The New Creative Minority
When Usury Became Legal Under Paul Volcker, the Imperium Terminans Civilizationem Slouched Toward Bethlehem, Etc. True it is, interest‑bearing finance is a driver of the crisis, but it is not right that it is the root. Usury is one strand in a larger, interlocking failure of the modern economic order. The evidence we have — historical, religious, and economic — supports that high‑interest debt can destabilize societies, but it does not support the idea that interest alone explains our present breakdown. What monocausality does capture is the moral and thermodynamic dimension: debt claims that grow faster than the real economy eventually detach from productive reality. That’s where the “prophet‑engineer” voice is strongest. Across traditions and analyses, usury is consistently associated with several destabilizing effects: - Debt traps and immiseration — High‑interest lending creates cycles where borrowers cannot escape compounding obligations, reducing consumption and mobility. - ...