Have you ever listened to two patent holders on YouTube that discuss the hassle—and the mysteries!—of patenting? Bitcoin inventor Dr. Craig Wright appeared on the Robert Edward Grant podcast that touched on various topics such as Bitcoin, Japanese culture, patents, and more.
Robert Edward Grant is not just running a podcast, though. Grant is an entrepreneur and inventor himself, much like Dr. Wright. That shows in the discussion because Grant seems to be kind of on the same level as Dr. Wright, which is refreshing to see. If you want to find out more about Grant, I recommend his website as a starter.
Wright and Grant discussed patents
The podcast delved into the subject of patents, given that both the host and guest have obtained patents and are continuing to do so.
“I could almost do a whole podcast series on the many facets of Craig Wright—for sure. For myself, I do not hold as many patents as yourself (…) I personally have about 60 patents now,” Grant said.
Grant is filing more patents and seems unstoppable, just like Dr. Wright. They discuss the costs of patenting, the legal implications of patent disputes, and the creative sparks that lead to patents in the first place.
Grant even tells the story of how he got into a matrix-glitch-like situation where someone from far away filed a very similar patent on the same day as he himself did. For your information: the patent Grant was talking about was in the field of photonics, so probably not your “everyday patent” at all.
Therefore, Grant is raising the question of how it could be even possible for two persons – who do not know each other—to have the same idea, the same patent filing, and the same filing date.
“The only conclusion I can come to is: Maybe what we think is local to our brains is not necessarily only local to our brains. It might be that it is some burst of inspiration that people who are tuned into that frequency might be able to tie into,” Grant said.
Japanese economics and culture
Grant also asked Dr. Wright about the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, which Dr. Wright derived from the 18th century Japanese philosopher Tominaga Nakamoto. Interestingly, Tominaga Nakamoto was active as a merchant in Osaka, with advanced education in economics.
Dr. Wright pointed out how filigree the Japanese economy centuries ago already was.
“If you can imagine modeling – without computers—the nature of how you move grain back and forth around the economy (…) they collected all the records (…) and then redistributed around the country,” he said.
Grant has lived in Japan for a while and added that even today, some of Japan’s company buildings are organized in a way that the CEO sits farthest away from the entrance – as in having a healthy distance to possible intruders, which Grant traces back to the Shogun era of Japan.
Democracy and republic in the West
Dr. Wright explained that republics are different from democracies and that Western society might be in danger.
“As we get more and more towards what we now call democracy, we are actually getting to the point where we are undermining the very Western culture that we have created. Now, in what I am saying there: we are allowing large business (…) the business people who are undermining society. We seem to think that the market must always be right, but Adam Smith pointed out that the ‘unseen hand’ is generally correct but needs to be guided,” Dr. Wright said.
Grant added that democracies that turn into demagogueries are not far from mob rule. He gave the example of France in the 18th century, an unpleasant time that we nowadays call the Reign of Terror.
Republic and democracy seem to be a topic that Dr. Wright looks increasingly into, as can be seen in one episode from the Messy Times podcast and in an article titled Constitutional Design Proposal that he published a good year ago.
Bitcoin SV moving to millions and then billions of transactions a second
As an inventor, Grant understood that inventing Bitcoin was probably not by accident. So, he was eager to hear about Dr. Wright’s invention and his plans for it.
“Bitcoin is really because I studied both computer science and economics, and statistics and a few others and law,” Dr. Wright explained.
That is a key point and the reason for a lot of misunderstandings coming from the so-called ‘crypto’ space. Bitcoin is not just code and not just cryptography. It is foremost an economic system, a commercial system, bound by a unilateral contractual offer that its creator made to all potential nodes.
The original Bitcoin Dr. Wright invented and is still working on is the BSV Blockchain (Bitcoin SV, also called BSV). And that original Bitcoin is stable in four ways:
- Stable code-wise (locked down protocol on a software level)
- Economically stable (solid foundation to build commerce upon)
- Contractually stable (Bitcoin is bound under contract)
- Stable as Bitcoin SV is a commodity, which is standardized by definition.
Concerning Bitcoin’s future, Dr. Wright said to Grant: “What we are trying to do is getting rid of all these barriers (…) into millions and then billions of transactions per second. It is not as easy as people think. Everyone goes: “Oh, you just make big blocks!”
“Well, just making big blocks is not an answer by itself. You have to disseminate those blocks, which means you have to send large amounts of data over networks very quickly,” he added.
Robert Edward Grant was not done with Dr. Craig Wright yet!
I am not going to lie here—it is an awesome podcast; thank you, Mr. Grant. It also shows that Dr. Wright connects to more successful, creative, and open-minded people, such as famous economist George Gilder, Founder and President of the IPv6 Forum Latif Ladid, and to inventor Robert Edward Grant.
Before we let you go, here is one slide that will make you want to watch the whole video for yourself. At the end of the podcast, Grant shows a special object to Dr. Wright, asking for his opinion—and I will not tell you what that special object is. Have fun!
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