All right, this is Prom Constant and you're listening to Bitcoin
for Millennials. Together with my guests on this
podcast, I go on a journey to discover how our current
financial system works, why it's flawed, and why Bitcoin is the
most relevant technology that you should understand and adopt.
In this episode, I'm joined by Tim Niemeyer.
He's a Bitcoin advocate and author who began his Bitcoin
journey in 2018. As a former US Air Force
avionics technician, he brings a unique technological insight to
the Bitcoin space, and he's also enriched by his educational
background, holding a degree in psychology and having experience
as an elementary teacher. His recently published book
History Echoes Bitcoin, connects historical parallels to the core
properties of Bitcoin, and we are going to talk about that and
more in this episode. Welcome, Tim.
Thank you for having me, Brown. Thanks for coming on.
I absolutely loved your book. Thanks for presenting it to me.
We already talked of Mike, but I think just the the angle that
you chose already makes this like a great read for people
and. You cut out this like how, how,
how did your book came about? Like why?
Why did you write it? How did that?
What's the story behind it? I actually never intended to
write a book. I was just enjoying being a shit
poster on Twitter like everybody else.
And and going through Bitcoin, I, I got to a point where I
started to have those higher realizations.
You know, you get the 21 million, you get the different,
the basic concepts. But then when you start putting
all that together, you see things a different way.
And once I had the idea for this book, it was just like I kind of
got to write it. I have to, and So what?
What do you want people to take away from it?
From this book that there are. Have been arcs throughout
history basically on the properties that Bitcoin
represents. So permissionlessness, gaining
consensus, decentralization, trust, minimization, censorship,
resistance, open source, collaboration, immutability and
scarcity. Each one of those things
throughout history has shown to be beneficial to society in
their own way, and we see history yearning for all of
these. And they're all kind of
coalescing in Bitcoin. And that's the overreaching take
away I want people to start to see.
That's that's my realization that I had just a year or so
ago. I love that you say that like
it's it's yesterday I had a recording of of a previous
episode with with Mitchell Askew and it's it's so interesting
that what you just said is very big, right?
Like all these things from history, they are coming
together in Bitcoin and I think bitcoiners often talk like that.
But you know and and if you're if you're standing on the
sideline and you're looking at this and then you could think
like oh these guys are propping this up and they're talking like
this. But the the the realization, the
constant realization I almost want to say is that like a lot
of these things are actually true and happening.
And so I feel that a lot of things that are said in the
Bitcoin space are not really opinions, right.
They are just kind of like discoveries from research that
different people did in different dimensions and from
different point of views, right? It's like, yeah, this is just my
conclusion. It's not really an opinion,
almost. And and you almost have to hyper
focus on all these little things to you know the whole don't
trust verify kind of got got to do it on your own and zoom.
But then the realization comes when you're able to zoom out and
not have such that like hyper focus and when you start to
start to zoom out more than you see how the all these things
come together. For the trees concept, yeah,
yeah, yeah. And so how do you think you have
a really diverse background, which which I just mentioned,
right. Like in in the Air Force,
psychology. Music.
Also your elementary teacher, like, how?
How did this combination of all these experiences help you like
approach but eventually also understand Bitcoin well?
Let's add in farmer My dad. My father's a farmer retired
farmer now. Oh cool.
And I started out a few years farm on the farm hand and as a
farm hand and I was like, well, I could choose to do this, but I
could also go to see the world chose the Air Force got to live
in Japan for a couple years get a perspective there.
I could have stayed in for 20 years ago to retirement, or I
could have gone out and. I got my, got my college paid
for it. Thank you for paying your taxes,
you know, not you, but you know what I mean?
So I did that and then I got a psychology and I was like, you
know, want to help the world. So instead of talking smack,
doing something about it. So education made sense.
I like kids. I like teaching.
So I tried that and I've been a musician kind of throughout, a
guitarist, you know, very average at best.
And. And then just a few years ago,
4-5 years ago, I had the opportunity to become the
elementary music teacher. So all grade levels.
So it's it's just one of those things of like it's not so much
getting bored with something, but it's like oh, a new
opportunity, let's try this, hey, let's try that and just
try. It's the things that kept my
interest. So that in doing that, that gave
me a the ability to see a lot of different perspectives.
Like I said, my time in Japan, that was amazing.
It was very eye opening. We were talking before about
like different cultures and that was a culture I found so
interesting, so fascinating, very respectful and and it was
more of that shock of like hey, the what I've seen like for
example, like level of disrespect in culture.
You know it it's different from culture to culture or level of
respect I guess you could say. And then being so respectful
kind of shocked me to say, oh, there could be different ways of
doing things. You know what I'm saying?
Isn't it in Japan also that is, it's also about honor, right?
Like when I hope this example is right.
But this always stuck with me that, you know, if someone
starts a restaurant, for example, right, like the honor,
like, like they promised that they will do their best and
create the best restaurant that they can create, right.
And if then they have bad reviews and or people don't like
it, then they just quit because that's their honor.
Like they promised that they would do the best they could.
And if people didn't like it, then they just quit, even though
it might be a good business or something, you know, that honor
is very high. And so I don't know, like, I
hope this is true because I love it as an example.
But what's like the now that you're back for a lot of years
already? Like what what?
What do you think about America now?
That's a very big question. What do I think about as a
country? But like, how is it going now?
Also, let's combine it with, you know, the whole, the whole
Bitcoin point of view also, right?
Like I think Bitcoin, once you go into that, it opens your mind
as well and you find like other topics that you never looked at
before, you know. So I think it gives you like a
critical new viewpoint. Absolutely.
And and going back to like looking for new opportunities as
you go along, Bitcoin kind of just fell in my lap and it gave
me even more perspective. And in terms of like societally,
like the one thing I see now that I just can't Unsee is time
preference and its effects on society.
And I'm sure that's not just in in America, you know what I
mean? It's kind of everywhere the the
high time preference mindset which.
We believe is brought on through you know inflation or the
effects of inflation. To see society so immediate
needs like poverty mindset like I need this right now as opposed
to the I'm going to sell my chairs concept of living for
Bitcoin. You know it.
There's such a stark contrast. The people who listened to the
previous episode will hear again.
I talked to Mitchell. He's 23.
He showed me his His office is a desk, a chair and a computer,
and his bedroom is is a bed, One bed, and he has one chair in his
living room. He's literally doing what you
just said, what you just said. We both have plants in our
background. We're to live in the high life,
I guess. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I think so. Not true.
Bit corners you know sell your plants well.
But it's interesting this it's also people are kind of like
unknowingly forced into this short time preference lifestyle
almost right A and and I don't think it's only with in in like
from a consumerism angle or that people want things when they
want it but it's also in in discourse right.
Like it's like yes or no, good or bad.
You know, like people don't really think about, I don't
know, like 2 opposing arguments can be both be true, right?
Or both be bad or not true. That's critical thinking skills
right there. You know what I mean?
Yeah, exactly. And so I find it difficult to
see that people act really engaged or virtuous.
But they are doing that on the basis of information that's just
been shoved down their trucks basically and they doesn't seem
that they actually did that work.
Sometimes you're considerably younger than I Do you can you
remember yourself pre Bitcoin? Because I know I can, and I know
I I live. And I lived a lot of that high
time preference lifestyle. Yes.
Like, holy.
Well, I have 20 pairs of sneakers.
And now I don't buy sneakers anymore.
No. But it's like that.
It's I I said this in a previous episode.
And also one of the reasons why I, I focus on millennials.
Like I was 30 and working at a bank.
I had a mortgage and then a colleague was like and I was
already into Bitcoin. So that was like a weird thing.
And a colleague said, did did you know that money in the bank
is not yours? And I said, sorry, what?
Yeah. And then he explained to me And
then I just felt like an idiot. I was like, I'm participating in
something that I totally do not understand how it works, right?
And and it's I think less about fully understanding how it
works. But going from zero
understanding to a very important understanding that the
money in the bank is not yours was just a really big shocker.
And as you just asked me, like the time before Bitcoin really
clicked, you know, after a few times, Yeah.
I I honestly think, like, where was I?
Like, what was I thinking? Like, maybe I was lucky that I
was in a safe Western country, that I didn't die along the way,
right? Like, sometimes that's really
how I feel. Like, where was my mind?
Like, where was I at? Was I even paying attention?
Or was I just luck? Yeah.
Like, am I lucky that I'm still alive or something?
Like, maybe that's too big. But sometimes I really I get
about it like that. Well, your listenership might
not understand this concept, but I used to have like.
CDs Did you guys, did you have like, of course.
I'm pretty 6. Cool, cool.
I'm going on 46 this month, so OK, OK, well, but I had CDs too.
I had so many like like jazz and Blues and funk and just all
types of genres, just boxes and boxes of them and I can't find
them now. My mom might have thrown them
away, I don't know. Yeah, it's like all the money
and time now. It's music.
And that filled my soul, don't get me wrong, but just the idea
of just buying, buying, buying, buying.
Just consumerism. Consumerism is a big part of
this whole thing. Yeah.
Well, maybe this is a nice jump to to the things that you talk
about in the book, because I've talked a lot about kind of like
philosophical angle on Bitcoin in this podcast.
But I like that you in in your book like you touch upon ethical
considerations for Bitcoin. Like can you can you explain a
bit about that? Give me an example of what
you're checking. When you say ethical, you're
talking more like that, that how a society could improve with the
changes that Bitcoin can bring and how well, maybe it's also
kind of connects to what we just talked about, like just the
information asymmetry also, right?
For well, let's focus on like 1 Aspect 1 property of Bitcoin,
right? Yeah, I have a few I want to
talk about. We could take permissionless,
take permissionlessness, yeah, Yeah.
So you draw in the book, there's a comparison between between
like the less permissions South Korea and then North Korea.
Right. Where you kind of like
illustrate, yeah, a permissionless system versus you
have to have permission. I put that in there and that's
one of the few like it wasn't like a historical event.
It was just more of like a snapshot of comparison.
But what are the results of living a permission versus a
permissionless lifestyle? And for those of you guys know,
North Korea? It is going to be the more
permissioned side, the more authoritarian side.
Simple things like travel, like if you want to travel, you know
one terminal airport and you can only go to two places and go to
China or somewhere else maybe, I don't know.
One of those things, South Korea, it's going to be more
freedom laden, the. Education is better, the food is
better, the ability to own your own house is better.
The list goes on and on. You can have a passport to let
and travel anywhere in the world.
It just permissionlessness breeds freedom, yeah, like
freedom to participate in in the systems, right?
The economic systems and but that freedom and economic
system. Frees up the ability in social
systems and you know relationships and so many
different factors of life. So the opposite of permission is
permissionlessness, is permissioned and the opposite of
freedom is what? So just in that concept right
there, comparison of Korea, is it the ethical stance, you know
is that we should be aiming for permissionlessness?
And how can we do that? Our current system, our current
financial system controls our ability to conduct ourselves
freely because of all of the controls that we have currently
on money. Because the small few, the the
percentage of people with power that they're able to control
that system and gain more power and they do that through a
permission system. Yeah, well, it's even down down
to the level of if if you call your bank and say I want to get,
I don't know, maybe 10K cash, they will ask you questions,
right? So there's no there's no freedom
to get what you own. In the sense your money in the
bank and there is no money in the bank.
So like you said, yeah, no. But is that, that is you know if
we look at the application of Bitcoin, the the
permissionlessness versus the the permission system, right,
where yes, you have to call the bank to get money from a certain
amount and they will ask you what you're going to use it for.
And well, if they deem that not good enough or not the good
enough explanation, then perhaps you're not getting the money
right like that that really, ethically that goes against your
individual well. Freedom.
And yeah, the banks are basically the, you know,
financial watchdog, you know? Part of the political system.
Now they can just, why would they ask you that in the 1st
place? Because they want to know.
And if they want to know, they get to choose whether that's OK
or not. So yeah, there's these videos of
this guy, I think it's in Australia and he just walks into
the bank and he says I want to draw like, I don't know, 10 or
20,000, like Australian dollars from my account.
And then they say, OK, what? What do you want to use it for?
And he just gives them like crazy reasons, like the
stupidest reasons, whatever. And then and then you see these
people, they are just doing their job obviously.
But that's also part of the problem in a sense.
You know if we think back about how oblivious were we, you know,
like everyone needs a job, everyone needs a roof, everyone
needs food, right? So those those are like the
first things that you focus on. But then when you are like at
the outskirts of the system that is preventing other people from
having their personal freedom, right, Like accessing the wealth
or the the money energy that they that they gathered that's
in the bank. Like you, you don't, you know,
these people also don't know what they are contributing to,
of course. But it's just really interesting
that he asks them then like why do you want to know?
And then they say, yeah, that's just our protocol and like, they
don't. There's of course not really a
discussion, but it's just interesting to see how people
just operate without, I don't want to say, like all the
information or enough information or something like
it's, yeah. And that kind of goes back to
that perspective we were talking earlier and that's how how the
scope of what you're looking at because yeah, you got to zoom in
on certain parts to understand you know the inner workings, but
you don't gain that until you zoom out.
And and to me in a way, the zooming in is that high time
preference is the result of being a high time preference
mindset. Yeah, yeah, well, And if the
people at the counter would zoom out and maybe ask like
themselves, like why am I asking this person what they want to do
with their own money, maybe that's already a little threat
for them to explore further, to try and figure out like, what's
what am I actually. If there's some cognitive,
cognitive dissonance going on there.
Yeah. You always, you always wonder.
Yeah, yeah yeah. Another another aspect that you
touch is is decentralization. You mentioned the quote
centralization as a system is inconsistent with a non violent
structure of society. How does the principle of
decentralization in Bitcoin contribute to a non violent
societal structure? Like, what's?
What's the difference here? One thing I learned about a lot
of in researching these books is there's a lot of crossover.
So the permissionlessness is the permission system is able to
succeed because it is centralized, right?
Because there's that. Not only is there a single point
of failure, there's one entry point.
You know, what did George Carlin say?
It's like it's a big club and you ain't in it, you're not in
it, yeah. Yeah.
So it's a good bit, right? Oh, I see.
Great. But decentralization if you can
actually implement it. You know, without fail it stops
the whole permissionlessness. Now if if we have the
optionality to choose. So if you and I wanted to do
business and our bank said no, we could go say, you know, piss
off bank and we can work together.
That's the centralization in action on the small scale.
Yeah, they have force over us because they are the only ones
who control the access, right. And so when it's decentralized,
it's kind of like the other way around like you can only play if
you follow the rules as as the, how would you say that like the
enabler of what is happening with with the money in that
network, right. So it kind of turns it around.
Are you Are you a sports guy? Do you?
Is there a certain sport you like?
I want to say I golf, but I don't know if that'll help.
Sure. Example.
No, that analogy is just doesn't make sense at all.
Well, I mean. But like, so I'm a baseball guy.
My son's 10 and he's loving baseball and growing up, so I'm
coaching it and just loving it all over again.
Imagine if we're playing baseball and my team against
your team and I am not only the player, not only the coach, the
manager, but I'm also the umpire.
And the rule maker and the scorekeeper and I can change any
one of those aspects to benefit myself.
Now you would hope somebody with upstanding, you know, moral
structure would not. But that's just not the world we
live in. You know, people are make
decisions based on incentives. It's an incentive based world.
So if you have the ability in a game to make all those changes.
You got to think this someone will do.
The population is the population is going to do that, right?
Yeah. And decentralization keeps that
from happening. It keeps that ability to make
permissions, keeps that in check.
Yeah, well, and you can try to mess around with it, but then
you are just rejected by. And they find out, Yeah, yeah,
by the network, right? Yeah.
So it's it's also less, less obscurity in a sense, right
because you have to follow the rules that the, the, the
decentralized group agree to and once you don't then yeah you
cannot just participate anymore. All right.
And and to tie that back into what you mentioned about like
the the the violence and non violence is basically you know
is that about like a state having a monopoly on violence?
Or or what do you mean control? Like how?
How is it enforced? Obviously Bitcoin is enforced
through energy, right? Proof of work.
Where? How is the Fiat system enforced?
Eventually, and this is not to get too like fire and brimstone,
but eventually it comes down to force.
If you don't pay your taxes, what are they going to do?
You know they'll come and get you if you, you know, if you
don't follow their rules, they will apply force.
So to me, that's violence. Yeah and and a non violent
society is is basically a a voluntary society where you can
also depending more on the others in the society.
Well, because the others also and and you know we said humans
are make decisions based off incentives.
So in a in a voluntary society, the IT, the incentive is to act
well, be good to one another because it reciprocates in a
permission society. In in that centralized society,
that violence society, we're all just kind of like this is where
actually I think politics comes into play.
We're all just fighting for that control.
So I can change the rules to make you do what I say.
So I can exactly, yeah. So to not be dependent anymore
on whoever is in charge, right? In decentralized, in the
decentralized manner, you are all in charge.
So you are dependent. Everyone is dependent on the
other. It's not like one party is
dependent on the other, right? I think I want to say it right.
I think like the perfect like size for like a like a a a
barter society, like a localized society where where this is
optimized. I think it's 150 or 250.
People, I've heard that Dunbar number, the Dunbar number, I
think it's 250 two $0.50, right? So where everyone contributes
their own thing and they are all dependent on each other, there
is no said, well maybe there's an elder or something but they
are not the central ruler that controls what everyone needs to
do, right? And there is only like 1
sentence for not doing your part, it's that you're kicked
out of the group basically. So the the the social cohesion
and everyone doing their part right.
Like if you get the food in the in the jungle and you come back
home and there and and the dinner is made by someone else
and someone else fixed fixed the hole in your roof.
You know then you all contributed to you know that
that that that group in a sense that's there you are all the
people know that once they do they not they don't do their
little part they can be exiled from the group and that's just
that's that's just the only rule right.
So even if you try to mess around, a lot of people will
just, you know, hold you up against the that rule.
That reminds me of one of the things I wrote about the ground
Grand Council of Six Nations. So Northeast American Native
Americans, before the United States became a country, they
were six different tribes and they basically followed the
simple idea that we're going to protect each other.
From foreign invaders. But we're also going to let each
other make our own rules. We're all you know, I don't tell
you what to do. You don't tell me what to do.
But hey, if we're getting attacked, let's back each other,
yeah? That's about as simple as you
can get. In fact, the United States.
Ben Franklin brought them in to say this should be a model of
our Constitution. Yeah.
Oh, the Dunbar number, by the way, is 150.
It is 150, OK, yes. And it's the amount of also
social relations that yes, you can have, right?
Which supports the grand Council, which supports localism
and and in a way, Bitcoin allows for localism on a global scale
as opposed to the whole centralization, you know, model
of like one global political you know, order.
Yeah, whatever. Yeah, we're allowed to just
interact freely. Crazy thought.
Yeah. Well, the next one I wanted to
talk about is about trust minimization, right.
So the trustlessness of Bitcoin, which, you know, the
permissionlessness is about, no one has to give you access to
participate, right? Like anyone can participate.
And the trustlessness is about you don't have to trust anyone,
any person, which is a good thing, right?
And you use my thought it was a really cool example you use, you
use like the Navajo code talkers in in World War 2 and that was
like a method of trust minimization.
And in Bitcoin it's kind of used in a similar way.
Why is this? Why do you see this as as
crucial to to Bitcoin and and why did you chose this this
example? Trying to remember back to that
SO. Like I was saying earlier, the
arc of history trying to move towards all of these different
properties simultaneously speaking Trusk is easily broken
and it has been repeatedly throughout history, right.
So what I chose this example to kind of like illustrate, hey,
it's early cryptography, right? A lot of people outside of
Bitcoin here. You know, the cryptography, they
think crypto or cryptocurrency, and it's got a completely
different definition. But cryptography in and of
itself is just language, right? It's just math and code, right?
Yeah. So the Navajo Indians basically
were able to translate during the war into their own language,
which was completely different than any other language at the
time. So it was basically unbreakable.
Yeah. It was used as a way to send
messages, right? Especially I think in the
Pacific correct activity of the US.
World War 2, right? World War Two, yeah, Yeah.
So just having that component and see, the thing about Bitcoin
to me is each and of them in and of themselves are necessary.
But the magic sauce, the sweet sauce, is where everything
actually is put together and works together.
You can't have one without the other.
Yeah. And that's kind of what we
discovered over the last, you know, altcoin cycle.
Yeah, well, that's the discovery.
That is Bitcoin, right? The discovery like the
combination of all these aspects working together.
Basically, I I've been fighting back and forth like to really
understand the whole is it a discovery, is it an invention
thing? And yeah, because that's that's
not very intuitive, intuitive, and most people you know.
Kind of just, I don't know, but I'm leaning more and basically
and like on what you said, it is a discovery because like
inventions you can invent more things and put more bells and
whistles on. Yeah, it's about the combination
of it is, it's like the accidental discovery of
penicillin or LSD or you know, like like these things were also
accident. Yeah, accidental.
This is this was on purpose, but it's a discovery.
I think the engineering part in Bitcoin is about that.
Satoshi figured out how all these things fit together to
actually provide, you know what what he wanted to create.
Imagine, yeah, imagine Satoshi's low time preference and his
ability to zoom out to see how all those parts and pieces fit
together. Because I agree that that was
his like. There was he, he, he added a few
things, components that were very necessary, that had yet to
be implemented, But just that ability to zoom out and say I
need every single one of these in order for the whole thing to
work, that That's the brilliance right there, and also that these
inventions were spread out over over a pretty large time. 4050
years, something like that. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. Yeah.
And so the trustlessness in
Bitcoin, I find this a really interesting word, actually,
right? Because it ties into what you
just said and talked about this in the last episode as well,
right? Like any proposed system that is
potentially corruptible will be corrupted by someone who wants
to do that right? Even if you think I would never
do that if I were in that position like you, you, you know
it's going to happen. The incentives matter.
I, I like, I like to say, you know how everybody says Bitcoin
fixes this And I've said that many times myself, I I tend to
learn more. Now to Bitcoin incentivizes this
because it's a system in place and people act differently based
on different incentives and the and the incentives are aligned
in this system. So why wouldn't you want to
adopt it? Yeah, it gives you a very like a
great rationale I think to also compare to like current system
and and like a possible future system, right.
Like if you want to move towards Bitcoin because what you just
said about what we talked about like the the the teller at the
bank who asks you a question about like why are you using
this money? She's she's like on the
permission part, but you have to trust that that policy came from
somewhere that is, well, helpful to a citizen like you, right?
You have to trust that that was created for a good cause,
basically. And what is that?
You don't even have the choice, I wanted to add.
You don't have the choice to trust them.
You just have to follow along basically.
But that leads to like. If you think like brain science
and psychology, when you turn that skill off of like the
analytical skill of is this good or is this bad or or whatever,
you're also not flexing that muscle, so to speak, right.
So it kind of dumbs us down over time if we're not thinking
critically about all of these different decisions.
So the the trust model in in that regard where you don't even
have the choice to think. So I'm not going to think about
that. Yeah, you don't even see the.
Problem. Right.
You don't. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. It's like it's just, it's just
the way it is. But that's also why I think that
actually when you think about the trustlessness of Bitcoin,
what So the trustlessness in Bitcoin basically is you don't
have to trust any other person. The only things, two things I
think you need to trust are the protocol.
So if you understand what the protocol is, you know the code
that just you know just is and just will work until forever
basically that's the only thing you have to trust, trust the
code. And I think the second thing is
like you have to trust yourself that you're capable of you know
keeping your own wealth in your custody and all these things.
Like I I talked to a lot of people about this kind of this
is like one of the things that they find really hard is that
you the whole self custody thing right.
Like if I have X amount in Bitcoin.
Oh wow, I'm fully responsible. Yes, I'm you're fully
responsible. I don't.
There's no one else coming to save me.
No, there's no one else coming to save me, which implies
there's also no forced trust. But you have to be able to trust
in yourself that you will be diligent enough.
Right. Which forces you into a growth
mindset. And going back to that, you're
the reason you're feeling that fear is because that part of
your brain is not, hasn't been flexed in a while or in that
way. You know, I'm saying yeah, you
just didn't didn't. And you may not have the
confidence in yourself to be like I can do this and and yeah,
after you do it for a while, it's like that's not so bad.
You know, I think for most, most people it's probably more scary
to trust themselves than to give give away that that
responsibility to to be to being taken care of, basically.
Absolutely. So yeah, next thing I was
censorship resistance. And when you talk about
censorship resistance, you you talk about the trial and
execution of Socrates, which was a long time ago, but as you
discussed, right, Like his ideas didn't really.
You got chaos to say like yeah well in in in the real estate
way possible right and this was censorship by the state is
basically how you how you illustrate it.
How does the censorship resistance of of Bitcoin
counteract A centralized control that, you know, we just we just
talked about? So yeah, this book is full of
examples and non examples and to me this would be the non
example. You know what I mean?
Where that central authority is able to censor the, the
consensus was overridden by the few in the room.
And all he was trying to do was just share his thoughts, you
know, that we still think about today, by the way.
Yeah, yeah, those thoughts we all have and should or should
have, right. So that time was not censored
there. He was not resistant to
censorship. So that's just kind of speaking
to, hey, throughout history, you know, we kind of needed that.
This guy who was really smart and helped a lot of people have
a lot of new and. Better thoughts?
Yeah. He was able to get censored.
Why shouldn't we have a system that doesn't allow that?
And it and the censorship resistance comes from the
decentralization, right? Because if again like if once
it's published it's published, it's.
Published. Yeah, it doesn't matter.
My take on it, which it it just sets, it gives a basis for
reality as opposed to spin or propaganda.
If I can control the channels, I can tell you what to think and
how to think. And enough times of hearing that
you're more likely going to kind of be sympathetic to it at
least, right? Yeah.
But like you said, if we're able to broadcast that and everybody
has this shared understanding of just the very simple truth, then
it's hard to be like, well, this guy over here who's shouting,
he's saying something different. I feel.
I feel like it's not. Give me your I feel statement
please. Yeah yeah well I think.
I think this is this one I find like really illustrating and
also correlating to like current times right.
Like it's the the like freedom of expression and and action is
really countered with this like cancel culture where I think you
know this example of Socrates, we still people still talk about
Socrates. They still talk about you know
the the thoughts that he shared or the mental models and stuff
like that. And so he was actually right,
you know, like the fact, the fact or well, profoundly more
right than whoever executed him. Right.
And we have to talk, Yeah. And the irony of that is that
despite all their best intentions, his.
His thoughts still live on and he lives on.
So over time the truth won't out.
And we also still talk about the Greeks, right?
But it's it's I I find cancellation like one of the
weakest. It's the weakest form of any.
I want to say dialogue, but it's not even a dialogue.
But it's about like, where, where did we take this exit,
where we can just discuss ideas, right?
Like if you operate from kind of like first first principle or
like a mental model of I know that I don't know everything,
then whatever you think could also be interesting for me to
learn about, right? I don't have to agree and you
don't have to agree with me, but maybe both of our ideas are good
or bad, right? Like why?
Why? Why did we take that accident?
The Bitcoin or answer would probably be like Fiat maybe.
But yeah, I I do feel that the money is kind of like also one
of the base layers of interaction between people,
right? We are exchanging value and
exchanging ideas is also exchanging value.
So in some way, I don't want to say I know the exact cause, but
I feel like that is definitely part of it.
Just the ability to to exchange information and value with each
other is corrupted. And this is like one of the
examples of that. It's not facts, it's more
feelings, right? And the feelings are
legitimized. And then this someone is
canceled. Well, and Socrates time, he was
actually killed. Facts, facts are like a raft on
a raging ocean where you know you have the truth.
That's just sitting there like a battleship, but you know it's
it's not going to be deterred. I think it's also interesting
that when you dive into Bitcoin, it's like, like I said in the
beginning and the a lot of things people in Bitcoin say
they feel like opinions, but they're just kind of like
objective realizations or observations, right?
Like I don't there's opinions obviously in this space, but
sure, sometimes I hear myself say things about Bitcoin where I
think like, oh that sounds so ridiculous, sounds such like
like a hype type statement, right?
Or a shill for Bitcoin. But that is actually then not
the case. It's just my own realization of
something that I deeply studied. And and and you mentioned First
Principles and one of the guys that really bore that into my
head was Jeff Booth, your twenty previous guests, which that was
a great episode. I I just didn't love that
episode. But but speaking from first
principles, yeah, it's like, OK, you can say you don't like that,
but you can't. Disagree with doesn't change the
fact. And and and if you can't
disagree with it, then what is your one of your only other
tools is to cancel it. You know, to try and censor it.
It's like and like you said, that's weak.
That's beta, that's you know, we can do better than cancelling
each other's thoughts. It's like come at me with reason
logic. But why do we accept or why?
Why? Why is it accepted?
Why is cancellation accepted currently what?
What do you think about that? Again, an incentive of the Fiat
system, because the high time preference mindset is like, oh,
I'm I'm feeling discomfort from this current situation of
cognitive dissonance. So instead of like putting in
the proof of work to argue it or think it through or change my
mind, it's easier to just turn it off or swipe, you know?
Yeah, I don't want to do the work to understand why this
objective truth messes me up so much inside.
Right. Yeah.
Funny.
I I I feel that that people who really like dove into Bitcoin.
They understand this proof of work thing that you have to.
I also have the same feeling I sometimes people have opinions
and and then I think like, but how substantiated is this
opinion? Like did you do enough work to
form this opinion right. And I really try to operate from
a point where I, I want to know enough.
And that's my own quality, like bar, right, Like how much work I
do. But I want to know enough before
I have an opinion because it's just, oh gosh, it's also a
disingenuous conversation, right?
If I have an opinion about something that you, I don't
know, studied for 10 years, it's like I'm not even respecting
your time or intelligence or whatever if when I'm not able
to. Just I could.
I couldn't tell you who who the best golfer is, so I'm not even
going to try. I have no clue either.
Yeah, yeah, I have a goal for you.
I don't follow it, but I thought, yeah, that's great.
This is just, I could talk about this for a long time, but it's,
yeah, yeah, interesting. Last one I wanted to touch upon
from the book was the the scarcity aspect.
Like you reflect on how video games with unlimited lives
influenced your behavior due to like a lack of scarcity, right?
Like, I don't know, I played Grand Theft Auto also when I was
younger, like, oh, you can just do this crazy thing or I could
just die there and I spawn again, right?
So I I thought it was like a nice nice example, but you draw
a parallel to the real world concept of of scarcity.
Like can you explain this analogy that you used to?
So, yeah, to me that's also a an incentive kind of thing, right?
It's an incentive of the system, like I'm going to run balls to
the wall into, you know, Super Mario.
I'm going to just run and jump. I'm going to get that
eventually. But you know, I'm going to die
in the process and it doesn't matter because I'm going to keep
going. So as if it was a different.
Now video game probably wouldn't be played if it only had one
life, right? If you had one life and you're
done there, nobody would play the video game.
But scarcity changes how you act.
So Jeff Booth quote, You know cautious or you have to think,
right? Abundance lead abundance in
resources leads to scarcity elsewhere.
Scarcity in resource. You know that concept right
there. It is huge.
So, well, abundance takes away boundaries.
I'd say right? And boundaries are very
important for making a plan, being creative, analyzing you
know possible strategies etcetera.
So if if you can do anything you want, it's kind of like I think
this is one of kind of like the millennial tenets, right, like
we could always do anything. So we we get like what's the
paradox of choice Also in in a sense, right?
That analysis paralysis. Yeah, I can do anything.
What should I do? Oh, I don't know.
Or I try everything and I have no direction, right.
I think it's and it it's it, it has to do with that that
scarcity forces you to think within the frame of the scarcity
that is given to you, whether that's 21 million Bitcoin or
certain amount of time or whatever.
Well, and the the scarcity also it is about respect and
respecting time and effort, you know, so when we print millions
and millions, we create inflation and each unit.
In the system is worth less and less and if you're working for
those units and the current system is set up to devalue
that, it's basically develop devaluing your time and effort
and that's disrespectful. I take offense to that.
I mean, and that's one of the main reasons I love Bitcoin, is
because it's respecting my time and effort.
Yeah, I saw, just I saw a tweet the US Defense Department has
failed its financial audit for the 6th consecutive year.
This is a prime example, surprise like surprise face.
If you didn't have to do it after three years, then well,
probably also not after four and five and six.
So there are, I think there's a prime example of no boundaries.
It's That kind of reminds me of the phrase, like, if you're
talking to a banker, if I owe the bank $1000, that's my
problem. If I owe the bank $1,000,000,
it's their problem. You know, once it gets so big,
well, it doesn't matter. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Oh man, I think it's it is hard for people to find a threat, let
let alone more threats to start pulling from right to learn.
And also when I look back at my own journey, I find it hard to
really say like, oh that's when it clicked or that's when I
really saw something that I couldn't unseen before.
Like how's that for you? Like are there specific things
that triggered you or was it like a slow?
I was actually. I started.
To buy in and study in the middle of 2018 which was after
the last big peak of 2017. It came down and kind of
flattened out. And like I bought the week
before it went from like 6000 down to 3000.
So I I I went real quick. I'm like what the hell, man?
And I but I kept learning it because it was interesting and I
like to geek out on stuff and it was you know a new opportunity.
So, and then the and I've always been about, like, libertarian
leaning. Centralization anyway, so that
kind of clicked there. But the real eye opening was
2020 and and that crash and everything that ensued,
regardless of politics or anything else, it was just like,
holy shit, all of these properties that we've we've been
discussing or most of these properties just got flipped on
their head and they were already on that trajectory.
You know, the scarcity money printing.
Well, look at all the money we spent there.
The centralization, well, now we're taking control of all
aspects of your life, whether it's a good cause or not.
I don't even that's irrelevant to this, to this discussion.
The ability to gain consensus. We can't even agree with
sciences, you know, and it's all based on, it's all based on that
that truth feeling aspect we had before.
There was a lot of fear. We didn't have permissions, you
know, we couldn't see. Information being changed
through laws. So it wasn't open source.
You know, like all of these concepts in Bitcoin were being
challenged and Bitcoin was resilient through the whole
thing and not only resilient it it, it was anti fragile.
You know, it it got stronger and that that gave gave me hope,
that gave me you know Peace of Mind for everybody else is
flipping out. I I kind of had something to
hold on to to be like this all makes sense.
This is all, Yeah, this thing doesn't change.
It doesn't care, right? It's staying strong through the
storm. I think that's actually a very
strong realization that when name anything else that doesn't
care, well, nature. Nature.
Maybe Nature. Nature.
Yeah, yeah, honey Badgers too. But now, like, nature doesn't
care about what we do. Like nature will always survive
in a sense, even when we. But when we die out, nature will
always survive. And I I think when you have that
insight into Bitcoin, it's interesting also when like a
price really goes down and you think like oh, what happened?
Did it like crash? Or like did Bitcoin the
technology crash? Or did something change?
Or a hack, or like, No, nothing changed.
It's all purely the human psychology.
Asymmetry of information and all that?
Yeah, exactly. But it's the thing.
The basics, the fundamentals have not changed.
It's still the same. You can read about what is
actually changed, if there's something changed to the core,
right? But mostly it's just chugging
along. It's just there, you know?
I think that gives me personally a lot of rest.
Like I'm a pretty risky first person that's actually Wi-Fi,
Bitcoin. Like I don't have to worry about
all this external influence and all these people trying to mess
with whatever other system I could be involved in.
And for me, it's just like, I know this.
It'll just keep doing its thing and that actually gives me a lot
of peace. I love that.
So what, what of the way we talked about a few aspects, you
mentioned others before like which which of the aspects of
Bitcoin do you think has like the biggest potential impact or
is it more like what you mentioned before like that that
combination that you know they strengthen each other?
It's the confluence, it's the secrets, the mix, You know it's
it's all of them. Working in tandem in concert is
what makes it. The discovery that it is, yeah.
And so what's the biggest misconception you think people
have about Bitcoin, or what's like the biggest one that you
run? Into I don't even think it's
misconception. I think it's lack of conception.
You know what I mean? Yeah, I mean there's a lot of
fun out there for sure, but it's like, so I started just cuz I
like to geek out about Bitcoin. I started making like YouTube
shorts and stuff about Bitcoin education and I was sitting in
my son's jiu jitsu lesson. And I just finished one and I
leaned over to somebody who I've known, you know, since high
school. And I was, like, told her,
what's going on? I was like, hey, can you take a
look at this? And it was on scarcity.
And I was like, you know, what's your take away from it?
And she said, I didn't know there was a limited supply.
OK, So we get so bitcoins get so deep down the rabbit hole that
we can't even see out and see how people are walking around.
You know, not with without even, like, the slightest
understanding. Very interesting.
So I could, I could imagine I could have that conversation
with her on every other one of these properties, right?
And then have to do them separately just to even like
crack the surface, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And So what are you doing with the YouTube shorts?
Trying to to make it simpler then or like say there's only 21
million like what? What's your goal there?
So here's a fun 1A study from like, at least 10 years ago.
Analyzed the speech pattern or the difficulty of like text
complexity in presidential speeches throughout the decades,
and what they noticed was it went from a collegiate level
decades ago. You want to guess what the
reading level is now for. I don't know 7th.
Grade, 5th grade and that was in 20, that was in 2014.
So I I hate to see what it is now.
So well now it's like. It's yelling and screaming and
beating their chest, right. So my, my thing is like, I'm,
I'm an elementary teacher, you I've been doing that for almost
20 years. It's like you got to find the
frequency at which they can receive, right?
So I'm, I'm going to be making shorts, so they're going to be
more for the no coiner, I guess you could say.
And I'm going to make it not to. Disrespect anybody's
intelligence but I'm just going to make it bite sized chunks
easier to understand. So I I think that's like you
know you get into conversations you want.
I want to talk about the consensus algorithm and they're
like what? I don't know what either of
those words mean. So I'm kind of trying to take my
education background and my Bitcoin knowledge and put put it
toward there. That's the that's the orange
pill I'm going for. Yeah, great.
Great angle. Like I I think there's there's
still so much to do, right. So there's so many opportunities
when also for people who listen listen to this like what if
you're enthusiastic about Bitcoin, you can yeah, I I
started the podcast you are going to do YouTube shorts like
you can do anything to contribute and and help people,
right. And as you mentioned, like you,
you cannot expect that everyone that you potentially talk to
knows the basics like the fixed supply, right.
And there's just so much to win. So yeah, I love that.
Did you actually start with it yet?
Yeah. Or you're going?
To I'm going with zoom out so you can it's zoom Out 21 on
Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, not Instagram, but whatever.
I'll I'll link to all of them in the.
In the show notes so people can check it out.
Yeah. And also I'd say for your
listeners go to local meetups. I I Co host Lincoln Land Bitcoin
meet up in Springfield, IL which is in the middle of a corn field
so. It out, your list show up there.
But yeah if there are no local meet ups start your local meet
up. You know, yeah, there's an
opportunity right there. A 100% agree.
So what's what's like a personal story that highlights the the
impact of Bitcoin on on your life?
Is that, Yeah, well, is the meet up one of those things?
Or Oh yeah, no, absolutely. I'm I'm more of an introvert,
historically speaking or I guess pre Bitcoin.
So putting myself out there and making connections that way and
growing my personal local Bitcoin Dunbar number, you know
what I mean? Yeah, that that right there has
been huge. It's done a lot.
I know it sounds silly to people who might not understand the
have been down the rabbit hole, but Bitcoin has changed my
perspective on health. I've become so much more healthy
and I feel so much better. I'm I'm so much more productive.
Respecting my own time, having a lower time preference, there's
so many factors that lead into that.
Is that about being more aware or?
It's the proof of work. You know you you might see a
good tip, health tip, more sleep or better nutrition or exercise
or whatever. But like implementing those
things and making them like default, you know and and and
making them all work together is kind of where.
That's all kind of come together in the last year or two, Yeah,
yeah, yeah, it I talked about that in the last episode as
well. So really about what?
Walking the talk, basically. It really is.
Yeah, right. Yeah, that's that's, I think big
part of the of the Bitcoin ethos.
So I want to move on to my last question and ask everyone the
same same thing. What's a core belief that you
will never let go? Good ideas don't require force.
If we have to persuade, that's one thing.
If we, you know, educate, that's obviously another thing.
But if we have to force somebody to do something, even if we
think it's good, that doesn't mean that everybody else thinks
it's good from their first perspective.
And that force is just leads down a bad path.
It leads to more force and it leads to inverse force.
You know the the reaction to force.
So if we can build a voluntary society, it's unforced.
And that leads to prosperity, wealth, good times for all, you
know. Awesome man.
I love it. Thanks so much for this
conversation. I really enjoyed it.
Thank you. And where can where can people
follow you online? I will link to your YouTube.
Yeah, and. Thank you.
My personal is. Or Tim under score Niemeyer,
under score History. Echoes Bitcoin is on Amazon.
It's at HISTECHOHIBTC, Histon Echoes Bitcoin.
And then the other stuff on YouTube and Twitter at Zoom Out
21. Awesome, man.
I hope people will check that and.
Lincoln Land, Bitcoin, Yeah, So if you're around.
If you're in the middle of a corn field in the middle of
America, yeah, Lincoln Land, BTC Awesome.
Well, thanks again and keep in touch.
Thank you. Cheers.
I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you did, it would be amazing
if you could rate, review and subscribe on the podcast
platform of your choice. It will help us educate more
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You can follow and connect with me on Twitter.
I'm Bram K That's at BR. AM K, and if you are or know
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hope you'll be here for the next episode.
Thanks for listening. Bye.