The Founding Fathers: How Occultism, Rockets, and Cypherpunks Paved the Way for Bitcoin
Pasadena, late 1930s. Jack Parsons, a self-taught chemist without a higher education, launches homemade rockets in the Arroyo Seco canyon. At night, he delves into esotericism and corresponds with occultist Aleister Crowley. Decades later, his developments would form the basis of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the entire American space program. A crater on the far side of the Moon bears his name.
Parsons is the archetype of the outsider whose ideas change the world. His journey from the "suicide squad" to co-founder of Aerojet is a story of how heresy becomes the norm. But pioneers rarely reap the rewards: Parsons was removed from secret work due to his ties to Marxists and occultism, and after his death in an explosion in 1952, the press turned him into a "priest of black magic." The industry preferred to forget its inconvenient founder.
Freedom as a Double-Edged Sword
In his essay "Freedom is a Double-Edged Sword," Parsons warned about the erosion of privacy and surveillance. His "creative minority" — a handful of independent thinkers — became a symbol of faith for the movement that gave the world Bitcoin. The cypherpunks of the 1990s, with their manifesto and belief in strong encryption, became the literal embodiment of this idea. It was from their midst that Satoshi Nakamoto emerged.
A Revolution That Became Mainstream
In January 2009, the genesis block was mined with a headline from The Times about bank bailouts. Back then, "money without the state" seemed like a toy for geeks. Today, Bitcoin is a favorite asset on Wall Street, and the SEC has approved 11 spot ETFs. The revolution ended when its ideas became part of the new order. AI is following the same path: from niche research to a race with trillion-dollar stakes.
Survivorship Bias
From Parsons' story, it's easy to draw a false conclusion: since the future is born on the periphery, any persecuted idea must be right. But for every successful innovation, there are hundreds of failures — from alchemists to EOS, which raised $4 billion and then vanished. Success is determined by technology, solving a real problem, and willingness to pay. Being on the fringe provides freedom, but guarantees nothing.
My expert opinion: Parsons' story is a powerful metaphor for the crypto industry. We see a recurring cycle: ideas born on the periphery go from ridicule to mainstream, while their creators often remain in the shadows. Today, DeSci, neural interfaces, and open AI are vying for the role of such "fringes." The question is not which of them will "take off," but whether we are ready to recognize the value of inconvenient pioneers while they are still alive.