He’s right, right?
A freshly minted golden coin feels differently between your fingers – teeth? – than a ‘note’, no matter how ‘crisp’.
Yes, but…
No buts. He’s right!
Yeah?!?
Then how about this guy?
Is he right too?
Well, from the rational point of view, yes!
But they cannot be both right! Not at the same time, anyway… Not in the same world!
OK. I gather you have heard about Solomon?
The wise king of Israel? Yes, I have.
And about the ‘split baby‘?
Yes, of course! What do you think I am? A savage?
What I think of you and what you are in reality are two different things.
But this is another kettle of fish.
A ‘different’ kettle of fish, you mean.
Have it your way. But you have to take into consideration that the kettle itself remains the same. Only the fish inside are different, one catch at a time. Even when the fish belong to the same species, are of the same size and you take the pain to add the same number of fish to the kettle.
Let’s go back to Solomon splitting babies.
The ‘official’ story, the one presently belonging to the “Hebrew lore” and “recorded at 1 Kings 3:16-18“, had been redacted. From what had actually happened:
As we all know, Solomon had many wives. An a few concubines. 700 and 300, respectively. In these circumstances, he rarely had a full night’s sleep. No wonder that whenever he had to make a judgment, specially early in the morning, he used to send for his trusted personal advisor.
When the two women, both pretending to be the mother of the disputed child, had come to seek justice before king Solomon, he was rather sleepy. But the faithful – and very discreet, ‘coach’ was there. As always.
The first woman was asked to tell her side of the story.
Solomon, at some point, waived his hand. ‘Enough, you seem convincing enough. Take your baby and scram’.
‘But sir, shouldn’t you also listen what the other woman has to say? Before deciding the fate of the poor baby?’ whispered the adviser in Solomon’s ear?
‘Wait. Come back, both of you! Now, the other one, what’s your story?’
‘….’
‘You’re also very convincing… you have the child…’
‘But sir, they cannot both be right! At the same time… There’s only one child…’
Solomon, suddenly awaken, turns back to face the counselor: ‘You are absolutely right too!’
And only then, after realizing that sometimes – when there’s only one child to be had, for example – two people cannot entertain two different opinions and be right at the same time, Solomon did put his mind to work. In earnest. And came up with his famous solution.
“Split the child!”
Same thing here. Both J.P. Morgan and Friedrich Nietzsche had been partially right.
There is a difference between ‘real’ – a.k.a. ‘golden’, and fiat money but the difference is made by us!
See, no need to split the child. Not this time, anyway.
But we have to keep in mind that, no matter what any of us thinks, for money to retain their value – no matter whether those money are ‘real’ or ‘fiat’, we need to be able to make good use of those money.
A heap of gold and a suitcase of dollars are equally useless if there’s nothing to be bought!
nicichiarasa 