Stablecoin Backed by Energy. Proposed by Researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Labs (DoE)

So the paper I quote below was released by the Cryptoeconmics systems journal, which was spun out of the MIT digital Currency Initiative and Published by the MIT Press

There are two authors Maxwell Murialdo who worked at the Livermore National Labs, PhD at Caltech, internship at Northrop Grumman. Obvious red flags.

Jon Belof is the other author and works at Livermore as well, specifically on material science for weapons.

“As Program Leader for Equation of State, Physics and Engineering Models (PEM) within the Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) program, I coordinate a multi-PI program that is focused on the research and development of advanced material models for use in weapon simulation. At LLNL, we are the world leaders in high performance computing applications for national security and the EOS program is no exception, with our simulation methods spanning from the quantum/atomistic/mesoscale/continuum regimes and with accelerated performance on the latest next-generation computer hardware.”

The paper is about creating a cryptostablecoin that is based by physical asset. Money backed by energy has been a recent focus of your @AMcD so I think you will find this significant. Energy as collateral for currency. @Jason_Bosch your research into the nature of money may bring up alot of thoughts here too.

From the Abstract:

In opposition to this conventional belief, we propose a new class of stablecoins that can be both fully decentralized and fully collateralized by a physical asset with intrinsic utility (electricity). We detail how statistical mechanics and information theory (via Maxwell’s demon) can be used to transfer free energy in the form of electricity between anonymous users of a decentralized network without interfacing with utility corporations, power plants, or even electrical grid networks. In turn we reveal how electricity can be used to collateralize a stablecoin such that each token can be exchanged for one kilowatt-hour (KWh) of electricity and vice versa, without any centralized authorities.

They claim that free energy can be transferred purely by the transmission of information.

The theory behind E-Stablecoin is built on the fact that free energy can be transferred by the transmission of information alone. It can seem daunting to try to bridge a connection between the pristine beauty, purity, and security of the ethereal digital world and the dirty, physical reality that humans must inhabit to physically survive.

Wow, dwell on that last part…

The specifics are difficult to understand for myself, but broadly the idea is that ‘work’ can be extracted from waste heat without violating the second law of thermodynamics. the extension of Maxwell demon to Szilards engine:

In Szilard’s construction there is only a single gas molecule in a box. The demon can close a shutter through the center of the box, thereby trapping the molecule in a random half of the box. (Note that the demon can be replaced by a reversible computer.) If the demon knows which half of the box the gas molecule is trapped in, then it can then push a piston into the empty half of the box (unopposed). Upon reopening the shutter, the gas molecule will push on the piston to perform up to kBTln2 units of useful work (Equation 1). In a thermally insulated system, the particle would cool down as it performs work on the piston. However, if the Szilard engine is in thermal contact with a larger single-temperature heat bath (e.g., the earth at room temperature), then it can extract heat from the bath so that the entire process is isothermal (and conducted at the temperature of the heat bath).

Okay so the earth is used to maintain temperature (seems parasitic) of the one molecule (bit) that exerts a certain amount of force in that design. They go one to explain how the ‘waste data’ generated by the knowledge of which side of the box the single molecule (bit) ended up on, maintains the laws of thermodynamics.

This redesign is conceptually similar to Maxwell’s demon. However, in the Szilard engine two addition facts become apparent. First, we see that exactly one bit of information (knowledge of which half of the box the particle is in) can be used to extract up to kBTln2 units of heat from the system and convert it into work. This one bit of information is the recorded “waste data.” Second, the measurement of the bit of information need not be concurrent with the conversion of the thermal energy into work. Once the shutter is closed and the information stored (knowledge of which half of the box the molecule is in), there is no rush to proceed. Szilard could choose to come back at any later time to convert his known bit of information into work. Furthermore, the bit of “which side of the box” information need not be stored locally (as elaborated by Hossenfelder [undefined]).

Recently has it been shown that a Maxwell’s demon that extracts thermal energy from a single temperature bath and converts that thermal energy into work can be physically realized [undefined]. Moreover, it is now understood that the “fuel” for such a Maxwell’s demon comprises the empty (preinitialized to a standard internal state) data storage space wherein the “waste data” is to be recorded.

Its a kinda of merger between the idea of information entropy (Shannon information, a basis of information theory) and physical entropy, in order to turn heat into ‘useable work’ which will be electricity in their stablecoin system.

Erasing this waste data required work and is the counterbalance that makes th system not violate thermodynamics.

While Clausius entropy is decreasing (as heat is converted into work), Shannon entropy is increasing (by adding entropy to the memory bank). The result is that the overall combined entropy (Clausius entropy and Shannon entropy) never decreases at any point in the process, thus preserving a generalized second law of thermodynamics.

Therefore, a Maxwell’s demon can continue to convert thermal energy into work until it runs out of digital memory space in which to record the “waste data” [undefined]. As soon as the demon runs out of memory space (i.e., fuel), it must either erase previously recorded information to free up new space or halt its process. Bennett clarified that the only thermodynamic entropy-generating step (necessarily irreversible step) in the operation of a Maxwell’s demon occurs when the stored “waste data” is erased from the memory bank [undefined].

The stablecoin system depends on outsourcing the erasure of data to another person who expends work to erase the data someone had to accumulate as they transmute heat into work. Below is step three in how Alice transfers her waste data to Bob who expends free energy to erase the data. In turn Alice gained work from thermal energy and Bob expended work. this creates the transfer of free energy between Bob and Alice through ONLY THE EXCHANGE OF INFORMATION…

Alice can continue to extract thermal energy and convert it into work (or electricity) until her local data storage hard drive is full of “waste data”. At this point, Alice must clear her data storage hard drive in order to be able to extract additional thermal energy. However, if Alice were to erase her “waste data” locally, she would have to expend all of the free energy that she previously extracted (by Landauer’s principle), assuming that all processes are conducted at a single temperature (room temperature). Instead, Alice can outsource her data erasure process to Bob (who is at a physically distant location from Alice). This is done by reversibly transferring the “waste data” on Alice’s hard drive to available storage space on Bob’s hard drive (see Section 5.4 for more details). The result is that Alice’s data storage space is reset to its initial (empty) condition while Bob’s previously empty data storage space is now filled with Alice’s “waste data.” This outsourcing process can in theory be done without expending any free energy. Here counterfactual communication channels can be established between Alice and Bob in order to transmit information between remote locations without transferring any matter/energy (or physical particles) through the intervening space.

Below is the steps in creating a stablecoin in their process.

1. Alice (now representative of any user of the E-Stablecoin network) connects a Szilard engine to a large thermal mass at a single temperature. Alice extracts thermal energy and converts it into one KWh of electricity (along with “waste data” which she stores locally via reversible computing). Alice uses the extracted electricity locally to perform daily tasks.
2. For the price of one E-Stablecoin token plus a fee, Alice outsources her “waste data” erasure process to a decentralized data storage cloud (D). In this exchange a smart contract destroys the E-Stablecoin token(s) that Alice paid for this service. The decentralized data storage cloud is housed across a network of privately owned (decentralized and anonymous) reversible computers (see Section 5.1 for more details). The private owners of these reversible computers are incentivized to share their storage space with the E-Stablecoin network in exchange for fees. The specific fee due to each contributor of data storage space is computed and dispersed automatically by a smart contract (see Section 5.1).
3. Bob (now representative of any user of the E-Stablecoin network contributing storage space to D) can expend his own electricity (locally) to erase the “waste data” outsourced to his privately owned hard drive. For this service Bob is awarded one E-Stablecoin token plus a fee. This transaction is automatically mediated by a smart contract. The smart contract creates new E-Stablecoin token(s) to pay to Bob for his services rendered.

Based on what we know on bionanotech, piezoelectric and related fields, It seems highly plausible that people will the ‘single thermal mass’ that the Szilard engine needs would be bodies.

Broadly this creates mechanism where people can be paid in a future global reserve currency (remember the US dollar is in ways backed by energy, due to its requirement for many international purchases of energy) just by maintaining their body.

Considering the authors affiliations and work at the Lawrence Livermore National Labs (DoE runs it, extension of Manhattan project, domination of life), the paper holds more weight.

The idea of a energy backed currency has been around for a long time and ties into what Allison has been looking into around chemistry based planned economies.

To be clear this is purely a theoretical paper. However the people at MIT are imaginative and this shows where their minds are at as they look at creating a ‘CBDC’.

I put this in the mixed bag category because it relates to the internet of bio nano things, e government, CBDC, blockchain, wellness (mediations, maintaining homeostasis, possibly using people ability to connect with the creator as fuel for harvesting energy and creating money ).

I hope some of that made sense… difficult subject, but I have an inkling that this is the longer term plan for a ‘CBDC’, and a link into how the nano tech could be utilized.

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@leo I did a cursory look into Maxwell’s Demon and can’t say that I really understand the theory. I will say this though. Money in whatever form or representation it takes on is not natural.

Both Aristotle and Plato noted the paramount monetary principle - that the nature of money is a fiat of the law, an invention or creation of mankind and society, rather than a commodity.
-Stephen Zarlenga, The Lost Science of Money

The law in this case being digital code.

“Money exists not by nature but by law” - Aristotle

Attempts to collateralize an artificial representation with natural commodities and/or processes is problematic on many levels (not even getting into the accuracy of statistical mechanics and information theory–which we know is mired with problems and corruption).

For one it creates the false illusion that the artificial is somehow natural, or in this case a “bridge” to the natural. It lends an authority to it that it doesn’t actually have. So many people now even think of Federal Reserve Notes as if they come from some natural process; I did labor and these notes are a mere representation of my labor. This is not only completely wrong but also a very dangerous belief.

I also learned from Zarlenga that whatever is used as a medium of exchange cannot be backed by anything with a commodity value. That commodity value will pervert its role as a medium of exchange. Electricity is a commodity that is speculated on. So the value of your token will fluctuate with the market. Not to mention, gamed. Not good.

Then there’s the issue of who or what has the power to create these tokens and for what purpose. I’m very skeptical of claims about “free energy”. Seems to me the theory that energy is never created nor destroyed but just transferred makes more sense to me but again, I don’t really understand that Maxwell’s Demon theory. Nevertheless, money or tokens, once widely adopted do have the power to direct energy towards or away from activity that may or may not be ethical or healthy. How difficult would it be to wage war for example, without the power of money or credit creation? The will for such activity is clearly not natural but the introduction of this artificial representation, which is required to acquire basic necessities makes it so in spite of people’s natural aversion. Of course this is an oversimplification and there’s a lot more going on but you get my point right?

The theory behind E-Stablecoin is built on the fact that free energy can be transferred by the transmission of information alone. It can seem daunting to try to bridge a connection between the pristine beauty, purity, and security of the ethereal digital world and the dirty, physical reality that humans must inhabit to physically survive.

Wow, this is very sick view. This needs to be explored more.

I’ll come back to this topic later.

Thanks for your response Jason.

Where I have trouble with this idea, is that I don’t understand how you can have a medium of exchange without supporting a commodifying perspective. Even if its not backed by a commodity, your still in a mindset that this ‘medium’ can be exchanged for units of stuff.

By “commodifying perspective” I mean seeing things as abstracted standardized units.

So I guess I mean as long as we view stuff as commodities (which is always nature, and the creator if that’s where you heads at), then our creativity at a social level will continue to be enslaved to the medium of exchange rather than inspiration.

As you’ve read Graeber (more than I have) the part on one of the key features of slavery systems is the removal of a person from their context, their web of relations. And that removal is always violent (even if there’s not physical resistance).

In my mind the perspective that commodities exist exerts a violence, removing stuff from its context (food, water, minerals, air ect), and is part of the mental colonialism we are steeped in.

Of course I agree with what your saying broadly though.

The Maxwell demon stuff is very difficult and I don’t think I totally understand either. I think the basic idea is that Maxwell had a thought experiment that a ‘nimble fingered demon’ could arrange molecules in a cloud of hot gas by their relative velocities. By doing so would create temperature gradient, which is somehow means a reduction of entropy and theoretically a violation of thermodynamics.

Part of the reason this sort of system does not violate thermodynamics is because the demon would have to record information about the molecules in order to do this. Recording this ‘waste information’ produces entropy according to communication theory, and in a computer requires energy/electricity to erase that waste .

In the stablecoin design above they don’t claim free energy I think, its about someone else erasing the waste information, constituting a system where energy is transferred purely through the exchange of information.

The last part is sick and somewhat shocking to me that it would pass through an editor from a government lab. Telling of the mentality and fundamental disconnection these researchers have at these high end labs that dictate the future of society.

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Hey Leo, in the end could this be one great big con job to sell this so called revolutionary crypto currency that is better than all its processors.

Create an unbelievable story backed by some make believe science research (Empire’s expertise) and sell it as the next best money making crypto currency available.

Hard to take anything at face value these days. The stock market nature of falsely promoting one crypto currency over another is no exception.

This comment


from here

What do you make of this gas stablecoin, is it really similar to the electricity stablecoin as the comment suggests? Apparently there other stablecoins to choose from.

https://meter.io/

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I’m going to sit with this. It seems to relate to theories of quantum thermodynamics that are being popularized, strategically I think, by Nicole Yunger Halpern’s book.

@jenlake this Harvard Gazette story references both Sherlock Holmes AND Poe’s “The Raven.”

"What do quantum computers have to do with smog-filled London streets, flying submarines, waistcoats, petticoats, Sherlock Holmesian mysteries, and brass goggles?

A whole lot, according to Nicole Yunger Halpern. Last week, the theoretical physicist joined Jacob Barandes, co-director of graduate studies for physics, to discuss her new book, “Quantum Steampunk: The Physics of Yesterday’s Tomorrow.”

And

"For the integral concept of entropy, Yunger Halpern relied on yet another bird — Edgar Allan Poe’s raven, to be exact. Entropy is, very simply, a measure of uncertainty. In the very small realm of quantum physics, scientists must disentangle more entropies, or uncertainties, to exert control over quantum particles. In larger systems with more particles, like steam engines, fewer and fewer entropies matter.

“It reminded me of a portion of ‘The Raven,’” Yunger Halpern said, before leaping into a recitation of several stanzas of Poe’s famous poem. “All his dreams, nightmares, fears, and horrors collapsed onto this one raven,” she said. “That is perhaps an out-there way of saying that all of these quantum entropies collapse onto just one in conventional thermodynamics.”

Before asking his next question, Barandes leapt in to pick up where Yunger Halpern left off, reciting another stanza of “The Raven” with almost quantum speed. (“My wife is rolling her eyes,” he said when, at the discussion’s conclusion, Yunger Halpern proposed they partner up on a longer recitation for Poetry Month.)"

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I think in the realm of energy speculation the role of John Arnold (Enron) is IoB social impact finance is relevant. @leo

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"This necessarily produces “waste data” which must be stored locally. Note that the thermal mass is assumed to be sufficiently large such that extracting a moderate amount of heat from it does not appreciably change its temperature. "

Just thinking about the volcano-backed bitcoin scheme in El Salvador.

@leo as I think about this am wondering if rather than extracting the initial energy from bodies that the energy for erasing the data would be created via piezo-electric wearables linked to a biometric-associated hard drive. TBH it’s possible that hard drive would eventually be DNA-based in vivo storage.

What we were talking about yesterday. Digital information storage - Leland Stanford’s horse.

" It’s significant that the first GIF preserved in bacterial DNA was a 5-frame clip of Eadweard Muybridge’s “Horse In Motion.Leland Stanford, California governor, railroad baron, and horse racing enthusiast, commissioned a set of images of his horse Sallie Gardner running at the Palo Alto race track to better understand gait analysis. Gait analysis is an alternative to facial recognition in determining identity through artificial vision / surveillance. Stanford University researchers and alumni are at the nexus of the military-finance complex advancing Metaverse life through impact investing and bio-nano-technology. We are literally racing towards a post-human future, the twin spurs of a global economy built on disruptive innovation and narratives of apocalyptic climate crisis driving us forward." Photonic Workhouses and Behavioral Scrip – Synthetic Pretenders Part 9 – Wrench in the Gears

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Yikes. I’m going to try and get a copy of this paper.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/4026001

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Ok @leo - here’s MIT with energy derived from human thermodynamics.

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Upsetting.

"IN VIVO EXAMPLES OF ENERGY HARVESTING FROM HUMANS - The advances in energy harvesters on animal models described in the previous section provide a foundation for these devices’ projected use on or in the human body. Recent studies reveal a wide range of energy harvesters capable of generating power, particularly in wearable configurations such as wristbands, bracelets, and clothing.

On the piezo front now I wonder about the encoded use of the word “impact” from an energetic standpoint - both figurative and literal. @Stephers

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I added a few links to the energy economics map @leo. Thanks for those leads.

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The Piezoelectric Effect – What Is It?

Literally speaking . . . The term “piezoelectric” is a compound word that is derived from the Greek words: “piezein,” meaning “to press or squeeze"…

That would seem to imply impact . . .

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@leo

Any useful medium of exchange must never have value in and of itself. It should only be a standard measure of value and that measurement must remain constant. When using a tradable commodity like gold, oil or more broadly, kilowatt-hours of electricity whose value fluctuates and is speculated on as backing, it also means that the value of the “medium” will also fluctuate. This creates lots of problems.

And there are many more problems with regards to the question of “money” that I have yet to resolve.

You’re right about this supporting a commidifying perspective. I don’t know of any monetary arrangements that don’t do that, which begs the question, should we be using money at all, regardless of how it’s designed? I actually think a great deal of human activity could exist and flourish in a much healthier way without the use of money or ledgers.

You mentioned David Graeber. In his book Debt: The First 5000 Years he talks about the “myth of barter”; how this story, told repeatedly by economists, has no anthropological or historical backing. That before “money”, people lived in smaller trusted communities and just helped one another out. That there is no evidence of any of these communities operating on a barter system. That the first “money” was created to do exchanges outside the community or as an offering like a dowry or acknowledgement of some wrong doing. I’m not sure if this is the first use of money or not but one thing Graeber didn’t address in his book is the outside imposition of “money” (in various forms) onto communities by central authorities backed by violence, the threat of violence or life threatening exclusion. I think this is far more significant and true to the origins of money than the natural, practical, and evolutionary processes usually claimed.

I don’t know what the solutions are. I do think we function better in smaller, local, autonomous communities. Trust and relationships with one another and with surrounding life certainly comes more naturally that way. And if “money” is used, I think the mutual credit model seems to make the most sense. Where the “money” is simply loose credits and debits, created and extinguished with actual labor exchanges. But in these communities would it even be necessary? Are these smaller communities still possible?

I intentionally excluded material exchanges here because that’s a huge can of worms for another time. I don’t support the ownership of land (in a property sense) or the materials extracted from it for example. I do support people having exclusive rights to live on land and use natural materials but within limits. Where the line is drawn between rights and responsibilities is debatable but I do think there is a line. Property rights are legal fictions obtained by conquest or with the exchange of “money” (created out if thin air by banks). “Property” “rights” really give the “owners” privileges to use and abuse with little and often no regard for others, the life living on the “property”, or future generations (I’m not really referring to individuals with a small amounts of land they are living or working on. I’m talking about the majority of “property”, which is “owned” by legal entities). This is a serious problem that I don’t have the complete answer to. Particularly how to be sure that any destruction involved with natural ‘resource’ extraction is reasonable and ethical (again debatable questions). And many questions about distribution and use of extracted materials and for what purpose, also need to be answered. I don’t trust a central (or even ‘decentralized’) authority or power to make these decisions any more than I trust “the market”. I’m spinning off topic here but I generally agree with you that the existence of “commodities” exerts violence part of mental colonialism so to speak.

Thanks for additional info on Maxwell’s Demon. The fact that this is just a theoretical thought experiment, rather than an observable phenomenon makes it even more problematic to be modelling behavioral economic systems on (unless I’m missing something?).

PS. I know that Stablecoin isn’t claiming to create free energy, I was referring to “Maxwell’s Demon” and extrapolating from that. I guess I don’t understand the term “free energy” in this context.

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If you get that paper please share it.

Got it last night.

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Hey @leo when you get a chance - look at this description. It kind of looks like a lot of academic mumbo-jumbo, but it also seems related to that MIT paper about quantum thermodynamics and entanglement.

I also find his focus on the concept of alchemy notable. @Stephers @jenlake

https://www.zanegriffintalleycooper.com/multimodal-scholarship

https://www.zanegriffintalleycooper.com/research-projects

More with Zane and Alchemy @Stephers - he is transmedia storytelling

His immersive media piece 2019 - funded by an energy policy center at Upenn.

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@AMcD

Eadweard Muybridge , original name Edward James Muggeridge , (born April 9, 1830, Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, England—died May 8, 1904, Kingston upon Thames), English photographer important for his pioneering work in photographic studies of motion and in motion-picture projection.

Muybridge made his most important photographic studies of motion from 1884 to 1887 under the auspices of the University of Pennsylvania. These consisted of photographs of various activities of human figures, clothed and naked, which were to form a visual compendium of human movements for the use of artists and scientists. Many of these photographs were published in 1887 in the portfolio Animal Locomotion: An Electro-Photographic Investigation of Consecutive Phases of Animal Movements . Muybridge continued to publicize and publish his work until 1900, when he retired to his birthplace.

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So I’m currently reading a book called “Protocol” by Alexander R. Galloway and he includes this table.

He also emphasizes the difference between decentralized and distributed networks. Often when people use the term decentralized they are really talking about distributed. I must confess I’ve made this mistake myself.

A decentralized network can have multiple central hosts with satellite nodes whereas in a distributed network each point is neither a central hub or a satellite. There is no need to appeal to a hierarchical intermediary. But they must all follow the protocol. This is Web3–control society.

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Good info. Thanks.

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I didn’t realize he was in Philly.