Damn money!

We are used to perform payments of fiat currencies through digital transactions in which money it is digitally moved. In such scenario, multiple middlemen are involved and, depending on their relevance, they may censor transactions of a particular individual or organization. Bitcoin is the first censorship resistant digital money that, like cash, allows to perform transactions between two users without the permission of any third party. In this talk, we review how such censorship resistant property is obtained though a clever mix of cryptography, distributed network technology and game theory.

Break activity
Matthew earned his PhD in molecular neurobiology in the barren lands of the American Midwest at The Ohio State University. His research investigated molecular mechanisms of gene regulation in neural development and disease. Dr Murtha began stand up comedy in 2016 and was a finalist in the 2017 Barcelona Comedy Festival. He has performed across the world in cities such as NYC, London, Paris and Barcelona.

Why are some countries richer than others? To answer it, we’ll go back thousands of years, to the Neolithic revolution, the moment at which humanity transitioned from nomadic hunting-gathering communities to sedentary farming. Once agriculture was invented, some regions developed complex hierarchies leading eventually to the great civilisations of the antiquity, while some others didn’t. We’ll see that geography and different types of agriculture can help us understand this different development and we’ll show how early state development relates to current differences in economic development.