Cryptocurrencies, Smart Contracts, and the Future of Economic Interaction
by Steve Omohundro, Ph.D.

Contracts are society's programming language. Corporations are defined by contracts with investors, employees, customers, etc. Countries are defined by social contracts with citizens, representatives, corporations, etc. But today's contracts are confusing and expensive to create and enforce. They are written in bad programming languages and enforced by slow, complex, expensive, and unpredictable mechanisms.
In 1993, Nick Szabo proposed machine executable "Smart Contracts" which can be self-enforcing. The introduction of the "Bitcoin" cryptocurrency in 2008 provided the decentralized "blockchain" infrastructure for implementing these smart contracts. Bitcoin spawned over 500 alternative "altcoin" cryptocurrencies and they have generated both enormous interest and huge volatility.
New "Bitcoin 2.0" technologies like Ethereum are just about to be released. These will support powerful smart contracting mechanisms and may transform many areas of human interaction. We describe these new technologies and their connection to the "Internet of Things" and emerging AI systems.

Bio:
Steve Omohundro has been a scientist, professor, author, software architect, and entrepreneur doing research that explores the interface between mind and matter. He has degrees in Physics and Mathematics from Stanford and a Ph.D. in Physics from U.C. Berkeley. He was a computer science professor at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana and cofounded the Center for Complex Systems Research. He published the book “Geometric Perturbation Theory in Physics”, designed the programming languages StarLisp and Sather, wrote the 3D graphics system for Mathematica, and built systems which learn to read lips, control robots, and induce grammars. He is president of both Possibility Research and Self-Aware Systems, a think tank working to ensure that intelligent technologies have a positive impact. His work on positive intelligent technologies was featured in James Barrat's book "Our Final Invention" and has generated international interest. He serves on the advisory boards of the Cryptocurrency Research Group, the Institute for Blockchain Studies, and Pebble Cryptocurrency.