From Amulets, via Magical Elixirs and Indulgences, to Bitcoin

If we look at human history, we can see that technology is constantly changing, societies evolve, and civilizations rise and fall. But one thing remains surprisingly constant: the ease of getting other people’s money by playing on human fear, ignorance, trust, or the desire for a better life. Throughout history, this was done through amulets, magic elixirs, indulgences, false promises of wealth, fraudulent investments, and numerous other methods of exploiting human vulnerability. Today, the methods are more sophisticated, wrapped in modern language, professional marketing, and compelling stories.

About fifteen years ago, the ultimate version of this phenomenon emerged: the method of extracting money was itself presented as money.

It began with an anonymous programmer who created a system for decentralized data storage. The data here were fractions of an arbitrarily chosen number: 21 million. The project was called Bitcoin. Under normal circumstances, it would have passed unnoticed. Methods for storing data, both centralized and decentralized, had existed for decades, and numbers are ubiquitous in daily life. People had never before given up their labor, their property, or their life savings for numbers. Even the most famous historical deceptions handed something over to the buyer. A bottle, a paper, a stone, an amulet, a certificate, or a promise. Here, there was none of that. A buyer got only a fraction of the number the programmer had imagined.

How is it possible, then, that people started giving up anything for this? The answer lies in the way the project was presented.

It was presented as money.

The anonymous programmer and early promoters did not talk about a computer system that displays and stores arbitrary numbers. No one would have cared. Instead, they spoke of a decentralized payment system, secure transactions, spending, and protection against double-spending. The very name "Bitcoin", evoked "coin" and the name of the project contained the term "electronic cash". The project was even presented as a solution to the problems of money and the financial system. In other words, it was presented as a kind of financial elixir.

Such language is not an insignificant detail. People react powerfully to certain words. When they hear terms like money, spending, transactions, or payment they connect them with things for which people throughout history have been willing to give up their labor, time, and other resources.

And they did so because those things gave them something real in return.

When money was a commodity, it gave an immediate, practical benefit in the real world. A buyer who gave their labor for wheat, livestock, salt, or metal carried something concrete home. They carried food that satisfies hunger, a spice that preserves food, or a material from which a tool could be forged, or an ornament or jewelry made.

Today, when money is paper or electronic, it gives a benefit indirectly, through bank debtors. It gives their goods, services, labor, and property. This is because it is created in the process of bank lending, so debtors are obligated to return it to banks. The only way to fulfill that obligation is by offering their labor, services, and goods to money holders. If debtors default, banks seize their real estate and movable property and offer them to money holders at auctions. The biggest debtor is the government, and it offers money holders the possibility of settling tax liabilities.

So, since money throughout history has always given concrete benefits in return, the mere presentation of something as money triggers deep psychological associations in people that motivate them to give up their resources.

That is why presenting a simple computer system as a monetary system fooled people. They started giving money, goods, and services, investing life savings, taking out loans, and selling real estate. Some persuaded friends and family members to do the same.

All because of the story about money and the market mania it triggered.

This is precisely where the greatest uniqueness of this phenomenon lies. Historical elixir salesmen at least had to produce a bottle. Amulet sellers had to make an amulet. Forgers had to print paper. Here, even that was not necessary.

It was enough to write a few lines of code and find the right story to convince people to give up their money. And all this with complete anonymity. Nobody knows who the individual or group behind the Bitcoin project is, nor how much money they ended up with. This is because the identities behind Bitcoin addresses are unknown, and anyone can create as many addresses as they want.

Thus, the circle is closed, and human nature is confirmed once again. Technology has advanced from coined money and paper certificates to electronic records, but human vulnerability to beautiful stories has remained exactly the same. Once, alchemists promised gold from base metal, and priests promised salvation on a piece of paper. Today, the digital age has created the ultimate elixir: an illusion of wealth woven from code and human imagination. Because at the end of the day, amulets change shape, but human hope and gullibility remain the most profitable currency in history.