Liquidity Illusion: Currency Inflation Masks Structural Decline of Civilization

We are currently at the end of a highly financialized cycle. Certain cryptocurrencies may soar tenfold within a month, only to plummet by 20% the next day, and the market has become accustomed to this. This indicates that we are in a bubble, but the bubble is just a façade. The deeper issues lie in liquidity, distortion, and a civilization that is gradually collapsing under the weight of its own contradictions.

The S&P 500 index has reached a new high, triggering widespread cheers. However, if we take a step back and examine it, the so-called historical high is nothing but an illusion of Liquidity, measured in a currency that is entirely driven by inflation and lacks any support. Adjusted for inflation, the S&P index has actually shown no substantial growth since the early 21st century. This is not real "growth" but a direct reflection of the expansion of the money supply.

The possibility of the Federal Reserve cutting interest rates in the near future is low. Optimistically, it may happen in September, and if the economic situation worsens, there might be another cut in December. However, interest rate adjustments cannot solve the fundamental issues. We are facing structural problems, and only three aspects are truly important:

1. The Slow Collapse of the Debt System

The modern monetary order is on the brink of collapse. It is built on an ever-expanding base of debt and now faces irreconcilable internal contradictions. Past response strategies—stimulus measures, bailout plans, policy shifts—have all relied on one key illusion: the more debt there is, the greater the degree of prosperity.

But this illusion is collapsing. Productivity growth has stagnated, and the demographic structure is at odds with this system. The base of the working-age population is shrinking, the dependency ratio is continuously rising, and consumption is increasingly reliant on credit rather than income. This economic machine is aging and has lost its ability to self-repair.

The 2008 financial crisis was supposed to burst this myth, but it did not succeed. Instead, it was the COVID-19 pandemic that did, as it brought moral costs. It has been proven that governments are unable to protect their citizens in the most fundamental biological sense. The actions of many governments indicate that the right to survive is not equal for everyone.

This has led to a serious decline in legitimacy. Today's institutions are more like shells supported by surveillance, subsidies, and manipulation of public opinion. The Epstein case is not an anomaly but rather exposes a corner of the real structure: a complex system interwoven with crime, governance, and capital. The United States no longer disguises its corruption but rather monetizes it.

2. Smart Packaging

The discussion about Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) remains rooted in naive optimism. Most people still believe that AI will become as ubiquitous as Excel or cloud services, serving as a productivity tool and generating profits through a subscription model.

This is an unrealistic fantasy.

If machines gain the ability to self-improve, simulate complex systems, and design new types of weapons, whether biological, chemical, or informational, they will not be open source.

Nuclear technology has not been democratized. Gene editing technology cannot be used arbitrarily either. Every powerful technology ultimately becomes a tool for state governance, and superintelligence is no exception.

Some technology leaders suggest that it is not about enhancing consumer productivity, but about controlling the trajectory of post-human development. Multinational pharmaceutical companies are a case in point; future products will not be sold in regular pharmacies.

The public will not have direct access to AGI. They will only interact with encapsulated and restricted AI fragments that are embedded in the user interface. The truly powerful systems will be hidden, restricted, and trained to serve specific strategic purposes. Although most people may hold different views, beliefs ultimately cannot compete with infrastructure.

3. Time Becomes the New Currency

So far, money can buy comfort, safety, and social status, but it cannot buy time. This situation is changing. With the rapid development of AI decoding genomes and synthetic biology, we are entering an era where longevity becomes an engineered advantage.

But this is not a public health revolution. True longevity, cognitive enhancement, and embryo optimization technologies will be extremely expensive, heavily regulated, and highly controversial politically. Governments around the world are already overwhelmed by aging populations and will not encourage universal longevity.

Therefore, the rich will not only become richer, but will also biologically distance themselves from ordinary people. The ability to alter the human genetic blueprint will create a new economic class: those who can escape the normal death curve through biotechnology patents.

Such a future cannot be widely promoted; it is a privileged path. Longevity will become the ultimate luxury, serving only a few. This is why most "longevity funds" perform poorly. The return is survival itself, and survival cannot be scaled.

Fork in the Road: Three Future Forms of Civilization

The current society is diverging into different development tracks, each with its unique political and economic characteristics:

1. Numbed Masses (Digital Fentanyl): AI-generated dopamine loops, social media, virtual entertainment, and an endless flow of information. Overstimulation, malnutrition, politically irrelevant. This is the state of life for most people. A cheap and scalable anesthetic.

2. Cognitive Elite (Biological Sublimation): A minority group enhanced both biologically and intellectually. They do not seek economic returns, but rather the mastery of biology and death. They are few in number, extremely wealthy, and increasingly difficult to reach.

3. New Age Hermits (Conscious Withdrawal): A group of people who choose the third exit path. They disconnect from mainstream society, seeking meaning in life outside of machines, trying to retain humanity in a world that aims to erase the essence of human experience. Spiritually affluent, but strategically doomed to fail.

The first type of people provides funding and infrastructure for the second type. The third type of people resists the first two.

Most people go with the flow, barely surviving, unaware that they have become products of the system rather than participants. However, for those who can foresee the future, choosing to withdraw is no longer a neutral act, but a form of resistance.

Clear Strategies in a Fractured World

The market is filled with noise. Cryptocurrencies, stocks, various yield games, these are merely optional tools, not the path to salvation. The real challenge lies in who can escape the system collapse under what conditions.

• The design of the currency system is continuously degrading.
• Super intelligence will not become a productivity assistant for ordinary people.
• Biotechnology will make time itself a scarce resource.
• Some high-profile cases have revealed the unaccountability of power.

After understanding these trends, the key is not how to "beat the market", but how to prepare for an asymmetric situation in a system that no longer serves ordinary participants.

Insight does not come from interpreting price trends, but from systematic thinking.

Most people do not look up to the macro trends. Many will only awaken when it is too late. Even if they pay any price, it is of no use. Because spending a lifetime in ignorance is more tragic than dying without a penny.