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What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

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Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#21
post #19

Cash is not going away anytime soon for at least a couple of reasons: Trust (Account Overloards say I have 100 USD in my account when I actually have 1,000), and cash is a very handy debt instrument for the issuer. (and) FDR did not take the US off the gold standard, he outlawed private ownership of gold. Nixon took the US off the gold standard in the early 70s.

> he outlawed private ownership of gold So if you buy gold in the US, you are actually renting it from the government or something?

This was in the past. Gold was made just another commodity from Nixon forwards.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#22
post #19

Cash is not going away anytime soon for at least a couple of reasons: Trust (Account Overloards say I have 100 USD in my account when I actually have 1,000), and cash is a very handy debt instrument for the issuer. (and) FDR did not take the US off the gold standard, he outlawed private ownership of gold. Nixon took the US off the gold standard in the early 70s.

> he outlawed private ownership of gold So if you buy gold in the US, you are actually renting it from the government or something?

[deleted]

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#23

This is a very fascinating story for me. I remember as a child my ( conservative, christian ) parents having long, serious discussions about credit cards and banking. They were wrestling with the same section of scripture that the writer quoted, Revelations 13:16-17: "It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads,so that they co…

Serious question: What is the difference between having a card and having a chip? I mean, theologically, and what is your particular hesitation? Growing up in a conservative, christian household myself, there were rumblings that the Mark of the Beast had already arrived in the form of a Social Security Number.

For me: what's involved in getting rid of/cutting the card vs. the implanted chip.

Knowing that rfid chips may be and are used not only for advertised transactions but also for tracking (Google around for unauthorized fasttrack readers), I'd like to be able to leave the chip at home.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#24

Cash is not going away anytime soon for at least a couple of reasons: Trust (Account Overloards say I have 100 USD in my account when I actually have 1,000), and cash is a very handy debt instrument for the issuer. (and) FDR did not take the US off the gold standard, he outlawed private ownership of gold. Nixon took the US off the gold standard in the early 70s.

There are innumerable small shops/cafes/restaurants that are cash only. Will banks or governments subsidize or provide free equipment in order to not harm the idolized small business owners and job creators?

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#25

Why implants? They are such a hassle to upgrade. I thought we'd skip them entirely and go from wallets to phones to fingerprints. And then to a central AI that can recognize you from a video feed.

Its about the same reason that I don't want Apple to do a TV. The difference in lifetime between the computing component and display are immense. Implants would seem to be as short a lifetime. Credsticks always made more sense.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#26

This is a very fascinating story for me. I remember as a child my ( conservative, christian ) parents having long, serious discussions about credit cards and banking. They were wrestling with the same section of scripture that the writer quoted, Revelations 13:16-17: "It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads,so that they co…

I don't understand why Christians get anxious about applying events in Revelations to the current day. Do they not believe that they aren't going to be here for it?

> Do they not believe that they aren't going to be here for it?

Well, it doesn't really say all Christians get called up before it all goes to heck. Revelations has quite a few stages.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#27

Why implants? They are such a hassle to upgrade. I thought we'd skip them entirely and go from wallets to phones to fingerprints. And then to a central AI that can recognize you from a video feed.

> fingerprints

I don't know how many times people need to repeat this: Fingerprints are usernames, not passwords. I am really not a fan of biometrics as identification at all.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#28

Does any one have a guess as to how future-proof these current chips are? Just like other new tech products, I can't imagine that they will be fully compatible with the majority of the payment ecosystem in 10 years.

They are just radio-frequency chips. Unless people start changing the bands NFC and RFID use, it really shouldn't need to be replaced. Maybe if the battery somehow ran out but then I don't have a CompE degree so I can't really speak about the in-depth detail about RFID chips and their power consumption (besides they really don't consume a lot).

Maybe to get a chip with more storage (These chips are really tiny storage-wise [last I checked] so not really something you could store a virtual wallet on)

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#29
Fun fact, the mark is on the hand, to the believer of the time of Revelation your whole arm is considered your hand. The letter "YOD" in ancient pictographic Hebrew was the picture of a hand (it's a full arm, but described usually as just a hand), the letter Yod is the tiniest in modern Hebrew.

Re: What the Mark of the Beast Taught Me About the Future of Money

#30

Why implants? They are such a hassle to upgrade. I thought we'd skip them entirely and go from wallets to phones to fingerprints. And then to a central AI that can recognize you from a video feed.

> fingerprints I don't know how many times people need to repeat this: Fingerprints are usernames, not passwords. I am really not a fan of biometrics as identification at all.

Fingerprints are neither usernames nor passwords; fingerprints can be destroyed independently of the user, usernames should not be destroyable as long as the user exists. Fingerprints are more something that is suitable as an optional proxy for a username.
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