[...]Honest Money » Blog Archive » In Defence of Freegold – on Wikipedia – “Defence” with a “c”[...]…

Gold emerged as money [Ivo: yes, but "is" it money?] not through a social contract
but through the spontaneous convergence of the choices of many individuals.
(Jörg Guido Hülsmann, “The Ethics of Money Production”, Auburn, Alabama, Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2008, p. 23 paraphrase)

There were authors who tried to explain the origin of money by decree or covenant. The authority, the state, or a compact between citizens has purposively and consciously established indirect exchange and money. [Carl Menger showed] the main deficiency of this method.
(Ludwig von Mises, “Human Action – A Treatise on Economics”, Chicago, Contemporary Books, 1966, (originally published 1949), 3rd. rev. ed., p. 405)

Carl Menger discovered that institutions appear through a social process, composed of a multiplicity of human actions, which is always led by a relatively small group of individuals who, in their particular historical and geographical circumstances, are the first ones to discover that certain patterns of behaviour help them achieve their goals more efficiently.
((Jesús Huerta de Soto, “Money, Bank Credit, and Economic Cycles”, Auburn, Alabama, Ludwig von Mises Institute, 2009, 2nd ed.,., p. 21)

“Monnaie courante” in French means “common practice”,
“courir” in French is “currere” in Latin of which the present participle is “currens”
I submit that that’s the etymological origin of the word “currency” –
the adjective becoming the noun in English – also for John Locke.

Etymonline.com says that the etymology of “currency” which I have traced back to “monnaie courante” goes back to the 1650s, where it referred to ” he condition of flowing,” from the Latin “currens”, present participle of. “currere” “to run” (see current); [expessed] the sense of a flow or course [and was] extended [in] 1699 (by John Locke (1632 – 17040)) to “circulation of money.”
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=currency

http://whataboutmarx.blogspot.com/2012/01/what-is-money-is-it-same-as-currency.html

through its E-mail bulletin
ISIL Update – December 29, 2011
[to subscribe, go to the bottom of http://www.isil.org/ ]

that it is not organising
but co-sponsoring

this free-market conference in Shanghai July 20-23, 2012

Bertrand Russell’s “History of Western Philosophy” (Routledge Classics, 1996, first published 1946), does however deal with More.

Russell writes:

p. 477
In Utopia, as in Plato’s Republic, all things are held in common, for the public good cannot flourish when there is private property and without communism, there can be no equality.

p. 479
There is foreign trade, chiefly for the purpose of getting iron, of which there is none in the island [island whose name is Utopia].
[…]
For war purposes […] they find a store of gold and silver useful, since they can use it to pay foreign mercenaries. For themselves, they have no money, and they teach contempt for gold by using it for chamber-pots and the chains of bondmen.
END OF QUOTES

I, Ivo, am afraid that Mises is correct and that Duisenberg was erring in his reference to St Thomas More,

Bad luck, isn’t it?

Utopia (in full: De optimo reip. statv, deque noua insula Vtopia, libellus uere aureus, nec minus salutaris quam festiuus) is a work of fiction by Thomas More published in 1516. English translations of the title include A Truly Golden Little Book, No Less Beneficial Than Entertaining, of the Best State of a Republic, and of the New Island Utopia (literal) and A Fruitful and Pleasant Work of the Best State of a Public Weal, and of the New Isle Called Utopia (traditional).[1] (See “title” below.) The book, written in Latin, is a frame narrative primarily depicting a fictional island society and its religious, social and political customs.

+

The meaning of the work

One of the most troublesome questions about Utopia is Thomas More’s reason for writing it.
Most scholars see it as some kind of comment or criticism of contemporary European society, for the evils of More’s day are laid out in Book I and in many ways apparently solved in Book II.[5] Indeed, Utopia has many of the characteristics of satire, and there are many jokes and satirical asides such as how honest people are in Europe, but these are usually contrasted with the simple, uncomplicated society of the Utopians.
Yet, the puzzle is that, some of the practices and institutions of the Utopians, such as the ease of divorce, euthanasia and both married priests and female priests, seem to be polar opposites of More’s beliefs and the teachings of the CatholicChurch of which he was a devout member. Another often cited apparent contradiction is that of the religious toleration of Utopia contrasted with his persecution of Protestants as Lord Chancellor. Similarly, the criticism of lawyers comes from a writer who, as Lord Chancellor, was arguably the most influential lawyer in England. However, it can be answered that as a pagan society Utopians had the best ethics that could be reached through reason alone, or that More changed from his early life to his later when he was Lord Chancellor.[6]

When it comes to betting on price of oil, aim high
Tim Webb Energy Editor
December 28 2011 12:00AM
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/business/industries/naturalresources/article3269879.ece
SNIP
Forecasting oil prices is always a dangerous game, but today’s highly unstable global economic and geopolitical backdrop makes it much harder than normal.
UNSNIP

Comments (2)

Doug Harrison
December 28, 2011 1:42 AM
I agree for the most part with Ivo. The purchasing power of the $US has fallen a long way and light sweet crude at $100 would be equivalent to around $80 ten years ago. Oil is still cheap and in my view the upper levels mooted above are only likely with manipulation of the market by some of those who would have us believe that they have no influence on it.

Ivo Cerckel
December 28, 2011 1:23 AM
In the real world, some people know that gold and oil are real wealth no matter what currency price is put on it.
It is the movement of gold in the hidden background that has kept oil at these low prices.

Oil must be billed at its correct “value” which must be reflected in FreeGold.

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported, that Japan and China will promote direct trading of yen and yuan without using dollars and will encourage the development of a market for the exchange.

Governments hate competition. Due to record breaking gold prices this year, more unauthorised gold exchanges have been created to capitalise on gold fever. However, China regulators are not happy about the competition, says marketoracle.co.uk.

The writing is on the wall for pricing oil in Honest Money, not green paper.

FreeGold means that the euro has a gold component and a paper component, and puts a “firewall” between both so that gold’s valuation as a wealth-preserving asset cannot be pulled lower by the inevitable inflation of the paper component of circulating currencies. It is the (quarterly) marking to market (MTM) of the gold reserves of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) , not to the Bretton Woods model of $42.2 like the USA central bank (originally $35), by the ESCB which provides that wall.

It’s the dollar, stupid!