The Tao as One's Life Purpose

The core flaw of Economics, which is also the source of the unsustainability of “economic” systems, is that it focuses on utility or pleasure from external objects as their ultimate goals.

According to Adam Smith, this is wrong because utility is merely the effect of existence and is part of the deception of Nature (which in Eastern Philosophy is called Maya).

Materialists and selfish people usually point to the statement above to justify that Smith approves of utility and the profit motive, conveniently avoiding his other statements that are against utility:

The dominance of the material sensations is proven in Abraham Maslow’s artificial hierarchy of needs. It says that physical physiological and safety needs have more scope and more primary importance than the metaphysical needs of belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. It views the lower needs as more urgent. This manifests as economic systems emphasizing immediate utility over their long-term consequences.

The problem with this method is that the metaphysical dimension is superior to the material dimension. Using material things to achieve the metaphysical goals is as ineffective as using drugs to make oneself happy, or using makeup to seem beautiful.

The result of which is a fake or artificial happiness which is temporary at best. This then leads to the need for repetition to sustain that fake happiness which then leads to addiction and withdrawal symptoms. These then result in pain and unhappiness as a natural karma for trying to achieve metaphysical goals in the wrong or artificial way.

Economic systems fall for this and that’s whymoney and prices become a sort of drug which creates addiction to those who follow the utility and marginal pricing theories of Economics. Their karma then is the volatility in their prices and valuation which also bring in pain, unhappiness,and even death . This volatility is unacceptable if we want to create a better system that is more stable, sustainable, and non-fatal.

An Alternative to “Selfish Interest”

We solve this instability by flipping the temporal order of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Instead of physiological needs being first, we start with self-actualization. Our basis is David Hume saying that mentality creates reality:

This metaphysical starting point is called the idea of the self. The path taken by the self is then ruled by its interest as ‘self-interest’ which is an ambiguous word. One may be ‘interested’ in pursuing material pleasures or in achieving spiritual goals. Western authors solve this by specifying an enlightened self-interest, as opposed to the ordinary one.

But the word ’enlightened’ is also unclear. Is stealing $1 more enlightened than stealing $1,000? Is destroying a forest to build houses for the poor less enlightened than preserving it to reduce CO2 and global warming?

To get rid of this ambiguity, we change the word ‘interest’ into ‘purpose’ in order to focus on the end goal. If the end is agreeable, then the means must be agreeable too (Hume, Book 3). Thus, a banker’s purpose in life is to do banking. But it wouldn’t be so easy to say that a bank robber’s life-purpose is to rob banks since everyone feels that robbing is wrong and therefore cannot be a life goal. Who would ever honestly say that his soul exists on Earth to rob banks? Stealing might be a life goal of other animal species, but it would result in a them having a totally different hierarchy of needs.

In this way, the entity is not made subservient to the lower material layer. This helps it keep its stability amidst the onslaught of material perceptions. If Bitcoin price is rising fast, then under Economics, you should buy it or be left out. But in Supereconomics, only the crypto-trader should buy it because his life purpose is to trade crypto. In this way, a Bitcoin crash will only affect the universe of crypto-traders and not everyone.

Supereconomics is based on Existential Purpose

The word ‘purpose’ has more in common with the word ‘dharma’ than ‘interest’. Our paradigm, called Superphysics, views existence as being a huge mind or Matrix which the Hindus call the Brahma. A thing would only exist in a mind if its Thinker had a purpose for it.

Thus, we can say that everything that you perceive has a purpose. Those that didn’t have a purpose never existed or never was perceived by you.

The specific purpose of every discrete thing or entity is then called The Tao or svadharma meaning ‘own dharma’ or own purpose in existence.

The study of this svadharma in economics can then be called Supereconomics, a subset of Superphysics.

In this way, a baker bakes because he feels that his life purpose is to bake and that he could happily spend his whole life baking. His passion in baking naturally allows him to make excellent bread which society wants and which they would pay more for. This manifests as the baker earning more money. This focus on svadharma then makes up the Effort Theory of Value of Supereconomics.

In contrast, in Economics, a baker bakes because he is supposed to be chasing the profits as the money from bread sales. To get more money, he logically must adulterate his goods, drive his costs down, automate instead of using manual labor, and raise his sales through marketing.

Eastern philosophy is full of warnings and safeguards against utility and worldly pleasures because the latter ultimately causes bondage within the dualistic universe.

If existence were a video game, then profits would be the high scores. Materialistic people would find themselves playing over and over again to reach the highest score which has no limits. In such a case, existence itself becomes a trap, tempting people to stay in the game without any time to get permanent rest.

Eastern philosophy tells us that dharma is the proper way out of this trap called existence*.

*The actual exit of existence is called samadhi, but that’s another story.

By following one’s path and purpose in life, then humans can better understand how their dualistic world works. So, by replacing utility with self-purpose, Supereconomics not only can help people generate and distribute value among each other, but also increase their chances of understanding the reason for their existence so that they can exist in harmony with everything else that exists.

A key characteristic of a supereconomic implementation or a supereconomy therefore is that it gives lower stress in exchange and acquisition of goods or services than that in economic, capitalist, or communist systems.