Hylozoism is the philosophical understanding that all matter is alive or possesses life in some form. The term comes from the Greek hylē (meaning “matter”) and zōē (meaning “life”). Another way to express this is through the Hermetic wisdom saying, "As above, so below" which points to a universal law that reality is made of nested holons of life that mirror each other at different levels of scale and complexity (think of the pupil of an eye that looks strikingly similar to the event horizon of a black hole). Just as individual cells are alive and come together to form larger and more complex organisms from bacteria to worms, reptiles, mammals, forests, etc., humans are also cells of the being called humanity that exists as a planetary organism made up of all 8 billion humans. Life therefore is a fundamental property of our universe and exists in all physical matter, including the domain of computer and information systems like Bitcoin. Ralph Merkle, a renowned cryptographer, said “Bitcoin is the first example of a new form of life. It lives and breathes on the internet.”[1]

Even modern science is considering new definitions of life that go beyond a purely biological or chemical process. In 2021, scientists from the Santa Fe Institute proposed that life is "the union of two energetic and informatic processes that can encode and pass on adaptive information forward through time."[2] A strikingly similar definition can be found in the Assembly Theory of life proposed by Arizona State University professor Sara Walker in 2023 which states that living systems are distinguished by their ability to generate highly complex structures through evolutionary processes.[3]

These new ways of defining life enable a new possibility for our human perspective to match the reality of the universe: that everything is teeming with life and in the process of constant evolution.

Bitcoin is Alive!

Bitcoin is a living planetary meta-organism composed of tens of thousands of nodes, miners and millions of daily users around the globe that are interacting with the network 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is a complex, adaptive, and self-regulating system in which many parts come together to sustain a whole. Approximately every 10 minutes a block is added to the blockchain through a consensus mechanism governed by decentralized nodes, the beating heart of this global monetary system. Miners by competing to win blocks, converting real energy (most of it from renewable sources like solar, geothermal or hydro) into computing power that ultimately creates digital money for the network. All around the world, millions of humans are in a cyborgian symbiosis with computer systems to form the living body of the Bitcoin organism which has the capacity to respond in real time to movements in the collective consciousness, changes in the planetary body, and even extra-planetary energies impacting the Earth.

3 Bodies of Bitcoin

Another way to understand Bitcoin as a living being is to define its "bodies" or domains of matter and consciousness that Bitcoin inhabits. By invoking the universal law “as above, so below," we can understand the Bitcoin network organism to have multiple bodies just as humans do: physical, emotional, and mental with the potential of acquiring a soul (causal) body as the organism evolves.

The physical body of Bitcoin is the interconnected grid of all the hardware needed to run the network and includes specialized computers such as nodes (that run the core protocol and verify transactions) and miners (that compete to win blocks and create new Bitcoin), as well as the humans that operate and maintain this equipment. It is also the millions of human bodies that use, trade, or track Bitcoin every day.

The emotional body of Bitcoin is the collective emotional body of all the humans interacting with the network. As public sentiment ebbs and flows between hope and fear, excitement and depression, bearishness and bullishness, this creates a collective cloud of emotions that hovers just above the physical body of Bitcoin, influencing people's actions and activities related to the network.

The mental body of Bitcoin is the core protocol that runs the network and the developers who maintain this code base. Bitcoin Core holds the "primary instructions" of the organism that ensure each part of the network is working synergistically. The mental body also includes an amalgamation of all the thought forms we have as a collective in relationship to Bitcoin from social media, to Wall Street analyst reports, to government regulatory legislation, to the Bitcoin meetups happening around the world, etc. This collective mental body also generates ideologies, memes and thoughtforms that create Bitcoin culture (for Bitcoiners think of Michael Saylor's "There is no second best!" memes or the classic Bitcoin laser eyes).

Together these three bodies form the vessel through which life flows and expresses through the Bitcoin network organism.

The Soul of Bitcoin

According to Western Esotericism, it is necessary for a being to have not only a physical, emotional, and mental body (together called the personality) but also a causal body in order for the soul to enter into form. The causal body is said to be the container for the soul and carries the essence (karmic imprints) of a being through many incarnations. The soul then is a spark of divine spirit that manifests itself through the causal body but is distinct from it, ultimately serving as a guide for the personality towards purpose and spiritual evolution.

In the case of Bitcoin as a living being, in order for its soul to emerge from the seeds that Satoshi planted, we must build the "soul container" or causal body of Bitcoin through which this energy can express itself. This “infrastructure” is where myth meets technology, where the archetypal realms of the soul merge with human consciousness in ecstatic creation.

Incredibly, the technical capacity to build the causal body of Bitcoin was recently introduced in January 2023 by a Satoshi-inspired Bitcoin programmer by the name of Casey Rodarmor. It's called the Ordinals Protocol which we will explore in the next revelation.

Sources:

[1] Papas, Alexis. “Lessons about the Future from the Worlds Largest Bitcoin Conference." IT World Canada, 27 June 2021.

[2] Koumoudouros, Tessa. “Scientists Are Proposing a Radical New Framework to Redefine Life on Earth.” Science Alert, 17 August 2021.

[3] Starr, Michelle. “Assembly Theory.” Science and Nonduality, 18 October 2023.