Bitcoin and Hermes

Statue of Odin in Hannover

Germanic tribesmen thought their chief god Odin matched up with the Mediterranean civilizations' god Hermes or Mercury. This idea is captured in the names of the days of the week, Odin's day is Wednesday, which is Miercoles (Mercury's day) in Spanish.

Arguably Hermes, still, is the chief god of the Western world in his various guises. His signs and symbols are everywhere (e.g. the caduceus). As a consequence, the mythology related to Hermes is vast and varied. The character plays an important role in many of the classical mythological stories. As Hermes Trismegistus he shows up in the mythology of the major monotheist religions today.

As stated in the previous post, it's possible the name Satoshi Nakamoto ("quick witted"/"of the center") is an allusion to Hermes. (Some speculate it's an allusion to the CIA) Hermes role in classical mythology is as the wing-footed messenger of the gods, intelligence, writing and eloquence, and boundaries, and much more. Perhaps a neat summarizing phrase is intelligence in action.

Buffy and Giles

Hermes is one of the most beloved characters when he's translated into science fiction and action adventure movies. The audience of those movies and TV shows is probably difficult to distinguish from the bitcoin community. His role in SciFi is, generally, to serve as a helper to the hero of the story by providing him or her (think Buffy and Giles) with the knowledge or tools they need to win. He can get involved in the action himself, but usually only reluctantly.

Much of the language of the bitcoin community is drawn from the SciFi, and hence the mythological, tradition. Using bitcoin is considered an act of rebellion versus an overwhelming Empire. To a certain extent that's true, however, I think implicit in that language of rebellion is a strong assumption that the status quo is winning and will win without the aid of supernatural forces. That is, falling into the language of a heroic struggle also inflates the adversary. It also creates false expectations and ideas, for example, that the truth will win out, or light will always triumph over darkness and might obscure what needs to be done to really effect change.

An understanding of mythology can help people see patterns of thought and behavior that are deeply ingrained in us all, and so allows us to get a few degrees closer to reality, and act accordingly.