# Musings on web3 By [Musings on web3](https://paragraph.com/@bargalon) · 2022-06-19 --- **Since the dawn of humanity - our ability to create and share stories and narratives was key to enabling humans to effectively collaborate in large numbers, create complex organisations and institutions & reach breath-taking accomplishments-** think air & space travel, the declaration of human rights, vaccine developments, the internet - all these and more were achieved thanks to countless humans from different countries and languages collaborating through an intricate system of relationships enabled by abstract (made-up) concepts like companies, money, ownership rights- all that and more from Yuval Harrri's Homosapiens. One of the most foundational aspects of these abstract concepts is that they all require the existence of a shared-belief or **consensus**. Consensus is an agreement amongst participants regarding the state or value of something and is a required condition for these institutions and concepts to emerge and sustain (think what would happen to your money if everyone around you would believe it’s worthless). And here lies the challenges, shared values & beliefs are so foundational to the ongoing operation of our world. According to OECD: “Trust is the foundation for the legitimacy of public institutions and a functioning democratic system”. But trust in these institutions has been slowly eroding over the past few years… As humanity enters a period of growing turmoil and as further erosion in ‘trust in institutions’ is expected, I find one area particularly interesting: Crypto & Blockchain technology.. \*\* Why? Well, for me- it’s all about how mathematics (Cryptography) is used to enable parties who don’t know (or trust) one another, reach **consensus** over a trustless medium (like the internet) without central ‘authority’ (or institution). This is massive. Blockchain technology, enables two people who don’t know or trust one another to reach consensus (or shared agreed state) and therefore to transact with one another without any central government, bank, organisation in the middle that facilitates it. This foundational shift could very likely become another 'building block’ that would shape the future of humanity (as long as we trust in math :). How? Since Blockchains allow us to reach **consensus** we now have the ability to ‘codify’ ownership (this could be money, land, property or even IP & digital-content) and align incentive systems in a way that doesn’t require centralised ‘consensus makers’ like governments, banks, central-agencies, companies and other such institutions. For the first time, individuals can be truly self-sovereign owners of assets and property and can unequivocally prove that they are. Codifying ownership may sound like not such a big deal to you- but perhaps that’s because you're living in a relatively lucky and well run country. But that could change. Ask your neighbours in Venezuela, Nigeria, Sudan, Iran, Lebanon or even Argentina and Turkey. (I have recently added Sri Lanka & Ukraine to the list which I believe going to get much longer as this decade progresses). A new decentralised way to govern and aligning incentives can create new ways to govern and form massive collaborations across countries and geographies that could reshape the future (think new forms of governance and structures like DAOs) Will the ‘turmoil-twenties decade’ ahead of us accelerate the move towards self-sovereignty powered by blockchains? I think it might… I see a world in which true self-sovereign property rights are added as a basic Human-right in the year 2050. \*\* \*\* What do you think? --- *Originally published on [Musings on web3](https://paragraph.com/@bargalon/musings-on-web3)*