Waching daily Nov 28 2018

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1,2,3, go!

Don't rush me!

Philip, I promise I'll catch you.

I know, but how do I know?

I'm your wife.

Don't you trust me?

Of course!

Then go for it!

Okay, okay!

Here we go…

Ah, I can't!

Oh, forget it.

No, no. I can do this.

1...2...3…

Aaaah!

Trust is hard.

Counting on something you can't see or touch to be there for you when you need it can be

scary.

But whether we like it or not, you and everyone you know plays a global game of trust every

day.

It's called MONEY.

Money is imaginary.

This bill can't be used as food or clothing or shelter.

And yet it has value because we've all agreed to pretend that it does.

The employee who accepts a paycheck for their hours of work, the shopper who puts a new

pair of shoes on their credit card--even the bankrobber risking his life for a bagful of

benjamins--they're all putting their faith in a collective fantasy that only works because

everyone else believes in it too.

The earliest types of currency were things that had practical value, like food or livestock

or furs.

These commodity monies didn't require much trust.

A toolmaker is willing to accept a bag of barley as payment, because even if he has

more than he needs, he can be pretty sure that someone else will want it.

Because, you know, you can eat it!

But commodity money isn't very convenient.

Try schlepping forty bags of barley across town just to pay your rent.

And if your landlord doesn't spend it right away, it could mold or get eaten by rats.

And if he wants to buy a tool from you, he has to carry the sacks all the way back to

your house.

At some point, someone realized that life would be so much easier if instead of actually

carrying sacks of barley back and forth, we could just agree to pretend to carry sacks

of barley back and forth.

We'd just need some way to keep track of it all.

This 5,000 year old Sumerian clay tablet is one of the oldest examples of writing ever

found.

It says: "29,086 measures of barley, 37 months."

Writing wasn't invented for royal decrees or epic poems... it was invented to keep track

of imaginary sacks of barley--in other words, credits and debits.

So when St. Paul wrote that "love of money is the root of all evil," he may have had

a point, but he couldn't have written it down it if it weren't for money.

Once humans were willing to think about value symbolically, it wasn't long before we started

using other materials as currency.

But of all the elements on the periodic scale, which one should we use?

Well, first, it should be a solid.

And it can't be toxic, obviously.

It can't be reactive.

Or radioactive.

It should be easy to extract and smelt.

Rare enough to be valuable, but common enough to be practical.

It shouldn't corrode, rust or degrade.

But it should be soft enough to cut and shape.

And… it should be pretty.

That really only leaves a few good options, and the best fit is GOLD.

We're used to thinking of gold as inherently precious, but the main reason we use it as

a currency is… because it's great at being a currency.

Physically, it's not much more useful than a paper bill.

Maybe less.

At least you can burn paper for warmth.

So that paranoid survivalist burying bullion in his backyard is still playing the trust

game.

He's trusting that even after the apocalypse, everyone will agree to pretend that his gold

is valuable.

The next big financial innovation came around 640 BCE in what is now Turkey, when someone

had the bright idea to pre-weigh lumps of gold and stamp them with the royal seal, and

KA-CHING! the first coins were born.

That stamp is the king's personal guarantee of the coin's worth.

No need to weigh it or test its purity--if you trust the king, you can trust this coin.

Counterfeiting is essentially royal impersonation--a serious offense--and still known today as

a lese-majeste crime.

Hm.

Maybe that's why the organization that investigates counterfeiting in America is the same one

that protects the president from attacks: the Secret Service.

Coins were so convenient that they quickly spread all over the world, and almost every

incarnation had some sort of symbol of trusted authority on it.

If you were lucky enough to have a lot of these coins, you'd

need somewhere safe to store them, so BANKS were founded where you could exchange your

gold coins for a slip of paper called a "promissory note": a "promise" that the bearer could

come back for their coins whenever they wanted.

But a funny thing happened: these notes were so light and convenient that people actually

preferred them as currency, and VOILA: Paper money.

Governments eventually took over the role of printing banknotes, and covered them with

all types of assurances that this is more than just a flat rectangle of cotton and linen.

We especially love to put images of famous people on our bills--not just to honor the

people, but to use their stature and respect to reinforce trust in the currency.

I mean, look at ol' George there.

Doesn't he seem so TRUSTWORTHY?

"This money is REAL.

I cannot tell a lie."

So when you deposit your paycheck in the bank, you're taking it on faith that you'll

be able to withdraw it later as cash, which is a promise that can be redeemed for gold,

which you're hoping other people will exchange for food and shelter and all the other stuff

we need to live.

Wow, that's some Inception levels of trust going on there.

Kinda scary when you think about it.

Sure, but the fact that money is imaginary does give you a lot more power in your relationship

with it.

How you think about money affects its very nature.

In a future episode, we'll look at how this global trust experiment has moved beyond the

physical realm into the invisible world of cyberspace.

How can trust possibly survive when the majority of the world's wealth exists only in the

minds of computers?

We trust you'll keep watching.

Thank you to Curiosity Stream for supporting PBS Digital Studios.

Curiosity Stream is a subscription streaming service that offers documentaries

and non-fiction title from a variety of film-makers. Including Curiosity Stream Originals!

For example, you can watch "The Ascent of Money" to learn more about the history of finance.

You can learn more at curiositystream.com/twocents

For more infomation >> Money Is Imaginary. Should You Trust It? - Duration: 7:15.

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For more infomation >> BBB says everyone is vulnerable to charitable scams - Duration: 1:52.

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Lahren: Most interesting thing about the Clintons is Trump - Duration: 4:34.

For more infomation >> Lahren: Most interesting thing about the Clintons is Trump - Duration: 4:34.

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THE WHY: Why is Pelosi facing so much opposition from within her own party? - Duration: 0:58.

For more infomation >> THE WHY: Why is Pelosi facing so much opposition from within her own party? - Duration: 0:58.

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CBD is everywhere. But does it work? - Duration: 4:51.

These are two drinks from the same store.

They're the same in almost every way.

But this one costs $3 extra.

All it took was a few drops of this stuff — CBD.

It's a cannabis compound you can buy in oils, chocolates, bath bombs, face masks, gummies,

coffee, lotions, even dog treats.

It's everywhere.

And its proponents claim that it can help with a lot of things:

CBD exists right at the intersection of three huge consumer trends:

The 49 billion-dollar herbal supplement industry, the growing anxiety economy, and the almost

overnight rise of a legal cannabis marketplace.

There's still a lot we don't know about CBD.

But people are buying it.

This is how much consumer CBD sales have grown in the past four years.

And this is how much they're expected to grow.

For a product this popular, CBD is barely regulated and people tend to misunderstand

its effects.

So what do we know about it?

CBD — or cannabidiol — is one of over 110 chemical constituents in cannabis called

cannabinoids.

THC — or tetrahydrocannabinol — is a different cannabis chemical that causes the high associated

with consuming marijuana.

But by itself, CBD won't get you high.

You can inhale it as a vapor, or apply it to your skin,

but a popular intake method is edible oil — since CBD is naturally soluble in

fat.

That easy-to-consume format is behind the explosion of many new products we're seeing

today.

But it's also led to a lot of misconceptions.

For starters, people say CBD can treat everything from inflammation, to acne — even cancer.

But there's no proof that consumer CBD products can treat all those ailments.

We don't have that much data related to the therapeutic effects

of cannabidiol.

CBD has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties that have been shown to help treat

psychosis, anxiety, movement disorders, multiple sclerosis, and epilepsy and seizures.

And the FDA recently approved Epidiolex, a CBD-based epilepsy drug.

But there isn't enough research for CBD to be prescribed as medicine for all of those

other conditions.

Right now, we don't know a ton about how CBD affects the brain, or which doses or delivery

methods work most effectively.

And people who take CBD sometimes do it at risk to their own health, foregoing medically

approved treatments or failing to investigate its interactions with other drugs.

And the CBD that has trickled down to retail markets?

It's largely unregulated.

Because of that, consumers often have no idea what they're buying — and CBD products

often don't contain what they say they do.

A) They might not even have the cannabidiol that

is claimed on the label — but more importantly, B) is that some of them actually have THC

in it.

In 2016, the FDA issued warnings to 8 CBD oil companies after finding that some contained

either no or barely any CBD, and some contained illegal amounts of psychoactive THC.

And a 2017 study of 84 CBD products purchased online found that almost 70 percent were mislabeled.

But even when consumer CBD products are accurately labeled, the doses tend to be very low.

When you get a few drops of CBD oil in a drink, you're probably getting about 5-10 milligrams

of CBD.

You'd need 30 times that to reach the amount of CBD that current research has found to

have stress-relieving results.

So even though CBD has a ton of medical promise, the dose in the average CBD coffee is pretty

negligible.

But even at those levels, CBD products other than Epidiolex are still technically illegal.

When you go down the street and you buy your latte with cannabidiol, that is still considered "federally illegal.

At the state level it might not be, depending on which state you're in,

but federally speaking, it is still illegal.

The DEA maintains that CBD is federally illegal — but it won't bother going after anyone

possessing or using it.

And because the DEA won't prosecute, anybody from any state can walk into a store or go

online and buy CBD products.

Attitudes in health care are shifting: in December 2017, the World Health Organization

concluded that CBD is not harmful.

In January 2018, the World Anti-Doping Agency removed it from its prohibited substances

list.

And, if passed as it stands, the 2018 farm bill would legalize CBD and industrial hemp

nationwide.

CBD isn't bullsh*t.

It's a substance with a lot of potential.

But the quantity and quality in today's consumer products is often more of a scam

than a reliable wellness supplement.

What's next for CBD depends on research.

But right now, its popularity is proof that the absence of data doesn't prevent people

from selling products.

Instead, when you can claim everything — you can sell anything.