why I no-one will never understand economics
FTFY
The real problem you're facing boils down to this: economics is hard.
On the face of it, there are several layers of "applied economics" where you find a buch of equations to explain common effects of certain behaviors, e.g. "what happens if I print more banknotes?".
But there's also an underlying "philosophy" of economics, which is a lot harder to grasp.
What does it mean for something to "have" "value"?
What does it mean for someone to "own" something?
There's a common thought experiment of the first Neanderthal who ever pointed at the ground and told his fellow Neanderthals "this is mine".
Oh, they laughed so hard.
Ugrulug, what you mean "this is yours"?
There is no natural law to claim ownership of something you simply have.
OTOH, there is a natural law to claim ownership of something you made.
But in practically all real-world examples, something you made also contains something you simply had before.
So, you created a bow and arrow out of a few sticks and stones?
Great for you, the bow and arrow are yours, but the sticks and stones that are part of the bow and arrow, why are they yours?
Now, Ugrulug will claim that the sticks and stones are his, because they were found on "his" land.
But why was it Ugrulugs land in the first place?
And that's where basically everything breaks down.
There is no natural order of things that would define the concept of ownership.
But that concept is the basics for a
popular understanding of economics.
Now, there's another approach, and that is the concept of ownership as a
social contract.
I.e. society (whoever that is) agrees on a set of rules to define ownership.
Why would they do that?
Because it's
useful.
If someone can lay a claim on land, he can be certain that no-one will take away the grain he seeded on this land.
If someone can lay a claim on a hut he built, he can be certain that no-one will simply sleep in it without asking him first.
And that certainty incentivizes people to actually produce more.
A society where everyone produces more is more productive.
A more productive society will outcompete other societies.
In a kind of evolutionary arms race, societies with a higher level of organization and laws will become dominant over others.
Those societies with less rules and laws will become extinct.
But I digress.
Because now there's a new kid on the block.
It's called "intellectual property".
It does not (necessarily) contain something that existed before.
In a way, there actually is a natural law to claim ownership of intellectual property.
But there's a catch:
Intellectual property is not unique.
It may be copied.
Again, there's no natural law against copying.
And again, it may be useful for a society to protect intellectual property nonetheless.
But still, we're left with a social contract that has to protect it.
Now there's a corollary to that concept of a social contract:
Contracts may be breached.
Or, since they have to be accepted by society as a whole, they may be changed or replaced, if and when society decides so.
Fast forward to 2008.
Again, there's a new kid on the block.
Bitcoin.
It is something.
But what exactly is it?
Is it property?
Is it intellectual property?
Is it some kind of thing simply protected by a social contract?
Yes, it is, it's protected by a social contract set in code and enforced by the computers of numerous users.
So is it really special?
Well, that depends.
"A" Bitcoin is a kind of intellectual property, but it's also one that cannot simply be copied in any meaningful way.
It is protected automatically and there's no simple way to change the rules of this specific society.
And that's what makes Bitcoin kind of special.
It's still something like intellectual property (which is being used as "money") protected by a kind of social contract, but unlike others, this contract is practically a lot more secure.
Think of so-called "socialist" countries where the general social contract to protect property rights is being unilaterally breached.
Something like that is impossible, or at the very least highly unlikely for Bitcoin.
A more "social contract-secure" property is more useful than "regular" property.
And that, in a nutshell, is
why Bitcoin has value.
It's more useful than other kinds of property.
