17 MAR 2013 by ideonexus

 The Origin of Interest

The international trading became the most profitable of all enterprises, and great land-"owners" with clear-cut king's "deeds" to their land went often to international gold moneylenders. The great land barons underwrote the building of enterprisers' ships with their cattle or other real wealth, the regenerative products of their lands, turned over to the lender as cccollateral. If the ship did come back, both the enterpriser and the bankers realized a great gain. The successful ship ventur...
Folksonomies: history economics banking
Folksonomies: history economics banking
  1  notes

From when bankers would hold cattle as collateral, and the cattle had calves. The calves were the interest.

01 JAN 2012 by ideonexus

 Space Exploration Costs the Same as Exploring the World

The Solar System is much vaster than the Earth, but the speeds of our spacecraft are, of course, much greater than the speeds of the sailing ships of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The spacecraft trip from the Earth to the Moon is faster than was the galleon trip from Spain to the Canary Islands. The voyage from Earth to Mars will take as long as did the sailing time from England to North America; the journey from Earth to the moons of Jupiter will require about the same time as did t...
 1  1  notes

Europe spent as much money proportionally to discover America as it would cost us to venture to Mars.