Economic Evolution: Darwin’s Idiot Speaks

Part 2 of 6

Prior to written documents being exchanged as representations of mutually agreed perceived value, the concept of money arose amongst multiple trading groups.  This may have taken place prior to the credit/debit system as a substitute for direct barter.  Money, whether composed of species of shells or artistically created beads, metals, etc., was a commodity created specifically for enabling exchanges of value.  As such the money object had to have intrinsic value in and of itself; it did not represent someone else’s liability to the current holder.  Various forms of money came to be exchanged, one for the other, again at an individual mutually agreed perceived value, and so the new economic technology of financial service had been invented. 

All these advances along with humanity’s other technological and energy-usage innovations coincided with broader communications and larger communities and ever greater market driven specialization in production of goods and services.  A new categor…