As I have pointed out here https://jsadove.medium.com/the-economic-ideology-of-crypto-and-ddlts-e8f5b476996d, the Austrians and their views of the world derived not from the rational/empirical tradition, but the teleological. Instead of observing and evaluating the world as it is, they operated much like their intellectual predecessors, Hegel and Marx, and extrapolated/projected the world from a single principle. Just like Marx, the process is to identify a reductive base –labor value in his view or money value in theirs-- then extrapolate to explain everything else. For this reason, the Austrian’s are more like ideologists compared to Keynes and Samuelson who are more like scientists. These latter share the intellectual traditions of Adam Smith, Hume, and DesCartes. Not Hegel, Schopenhauer, Marx.

And, of course, it makes sense culturally, historically and intellectually. Unlike Adam Smith and J.M. Keynes, none of the holy quad (Menger, Schumpeter, von Mises or Hayek) came from democratic capitalist societies. They all came up during the political and economic transition from late stage feudal societies being rocked by the various “isms”… Communism, Fascism, Socialism, etc.

So, it’s wholly understandable that Crypto “theorists” have adopted views that are teleological rather than empirical. And this also explains the kind of “belief” fervor that characterizes the space and its inhabitants and proponents.

And, unfortunately, it also characterizes their ability to evaluate honestly the core components of their beliefs, most of all “Decentralization”. This belief is held almost in a religious fashion in that examining its validity or existence is similar to questioning a fundamental tenet of faith. That all the software that runs crypto can be changed by a small group of people or that a single country dominates the functioning of the system seems NOT to undermine this holy belief.

So, as this evolves, look to it evolving like a religion. Schisms, new beliefs, revelations holy tenets and all.