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The Cashless Society
endtimestruth.com
Microelectronics has made possible the
ultimate surveillance system that will allow the Empire of the Beast to track
and control the entire planet!
Could the ultimate fulfillment of the Image of
the Beast turn out to be an advanced computer system that will seem to have a
life all its own?
The foundation for the Mark of the Beast is
being laid even as you read these words.
The precursor to the seven-headed ten-horned
empire that will spawn the Antichrist and the Mark of the Beast is actually
busy developing the means to implement the final global economic system even
before the Antichrist is revealed.
And as it turns out, this early preparation is
absolutely necessary.
In order to successfully develop an economy
where some kind of mark validates an individual’s ability to buy or sell, an
extensive control network needs to be set up and operational worldwide.
If the system was not all encompassing and
completely foolproof, it would be too easy to get around the requirement for
the Mark simply if the buyer and seller agree not to use it.
To prevent this obvious loophole, it now
appears certain that the Antichrist’s system will completely eliminate the
physical transfer of money (paper money and coins) and will replace it with a
currency system associated with the Mark of the Beast (Revelation 13:16-18).
To authenticate the transfer of value between
a buyer and seller, there will have to be a behind-the-scenes operation that
will authorize each commercial activity and then transfer the new currency
between the parties.
If the validation is not successful, then the
transfer of money could not occur and the transaction would fail.
From our perspective today, the system of the
Beast is developing to involve digital currency and an authentication process
that is done using the extensive electronic capabilities and networks that have
been put in place over the last generation.
These developments are leading the world to a
cashless society where everything will be controlled.
Without the technological breakthroughs
underlying the development of high-speed microprocessors, computers, and
digital storage combined with the vast communications networks resulting from
building the Internet and wireless communications systems, the Antichrist’s
method of commerce would simply not function.
These developments in technology have come
upon us so quickly that before the 1970’s the scientific and engineering
knowledge did not exist to even start constructing this system.
Previous generations before our time couldn’t
have imagined this technology or how it would be used.
However, now we can see why the Bible
describes the prophecy about the Mark in Revelation 13 as taking “wisdom”
to understand it.
It turns out that no other time in
history could have spawned the Mark of the Beast and no other generation but
ours could have understood how the system would operate.
Incredibly, these developments in the
technology and financial worlds are occurring in the same time frame as the
fulfillment of all of the other predictions written in the Bible for the last
days.
Nearly everything associated with end times
prophecy had its initial beginning sometime around the point of Israel’s
rebirth or shortly thereafter.
In other words, the number one signpost of the
end of the age, Israel becoming a nation, is also the starting point for many
of the other prophecies of Christ’s return.
What an incredible God who could predict these
events thousands of years before they were destined to occur and bring them all
together in our time!
The march toward implementation of the Mark of
the Beast is a fascinating story.
Its origins can be traced back to innovators
and inventors within not only the academic research community, but also within
the electronics, computer, and communications industries, along with government
involvement, contributions from major retail companies, as well as the banking
and finance sectors.
In the following sections we will look at the
key developments in these diverse areas and see how they are all converging and
leading the world down the path to the final economic system of the Beast.
It will become clear that these varied but
interrelated developments have led to an insidious plot to totally change the
way the world operates and does business.
As soon as the man of sin arises, this system
will be fully capable and ready to begin the marking program.
It is only through an understanding of these
developments that we can discover how the Mark and the number 666 will come to
characterize the entire system of the Beast.
Microprocessor Technology
The key ingredients that have made possible
the development of the Mark and the Antichrist’s economic system involve the
inventions leading to the microprocessor.
The age of electronics reached a revolutionary
turning point in 1947 with an invention that made possible many devices that we
now take for granted.
In that year, John Bardeen, Walter Brattain,
and William Shockley working at Bell Labs invented the design for the first
transistor circuit.
In its most basic form, a transistor uses a
semiconductor material along with an input having a small voltage signal (the
base) to produce and control an amplified signal at another pair of terminals
(the collector and emitter).
This circuit design can be used to amplify
signals and also to turn on or off a second signal like a switch. It was
the switching aspect of the invention that created the ability to form logic
gates, which today are the fundamental components of every programmable
electronic circuit in existence.
Bardeen, Brattain, and Shockley went on to win
the Nobel Prize in 1956 for the achievement, and their amazing invention
literally changed the course of modern history.
Within a few short years, the familiar large
vacuum tubes that were once the standard electronic switching and amplifying
devices of the early 1900s, were being replaced by tiny transistors.
In the decades since that time, the
electronics industry has tried to manufacture circuitry of ever-smaller
dimensions and greater power efficiency.
They realized that if the circuits necessary
to make a computing device were small enough, then the benefits of such
technology could be made available for everyone.
It seems unbelievable, though, just how fast
this science has progressed.
After World War II, the state of the art in
electronics still consisted of vacuum tubes, which were in such devices as
television sets, radios, and record players in almost every home.
Those bulky tubes were actually the electronic
amplifiers and switches necessary for performing the functions required for
each device to work.
Throughout the 1940’s scientists used these
tubes to construct what amounted to the first modern electronic computing
systems.
The Smithsonian Museum has elaborate displays
showing the history of these early machines. One such computer,
constructed in 1946, contained nearly 18,000 vacuum tubes, weighed tons, and
took a huge room to contain it.
The name given to the device was ENIAC, which
stood for “Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator.” It was
actually the first all-electronic computer ever built.
Many other similar vacuum-tube computers were
constructed throughout the 1940’s and early 1950’s.
Though great progress was made in electronics
technology during those early years, by no means could it be said that these
machines, which weighed up to 60,000 pounds and cost millions of dollars to
build, could possibly do much to affect the way we live.
However, the invention of the transistor
changed everything. Using tiny transistors instead of vacuum tubes to
build electronic devices, the technology was suddenly poised to take a giant
leap forward.
Instead of containing massive vacuum tubes
with their large wired interconnections assembled by hand, circuits could be
made on silicon at a scale tinier than ever thought possible and their assembly
could be automated.
As transistor technology advanced, it made
possible dramatically smaller electronic devices, especially as the size of
each transistor shrunk from something that you could hold in your hand to
microscopically small circuits that could not even be seen with the naked eye.
It was only ten years after the development of
the transistor that true integrated circuitry finally became a
reality. This meant that multiple transistor switching gates could be
produced on the same silicon chip, paving the way for ever smaller
devices.
As a result, the multi-ton computing monsters
that were constructed in the 1940’s quickly gave way to more powerful and
compact systems.
Instead of having countless miles of large
interconnecting wires and thousands of vacuum tubes consuming kilowatts of
electricity, suddenly the processing brains of such systems could be made of
circuits that fit in a relatively small enclosure.
As an offshoot of the circuitry’s new
compactness, the decade of the 1960’s saw computer technology make still
another major innovation.
Integrated circuit boards made it possible to
move computers out of the theoretical research labs to the front door of
industries all over the world.
Large processors called mainframes were built
which became the accounting and financial workhorses of many
corporations.
Almost all electronic and scientific endeavors
began to rely on computer processing. Huge companies materialized almost
overnight which were dedicated to manufacturing and selling this hot new
technology.
In less than a twenty-year period from the
invention of the transistor, computers had suddenly become a common and needed
tool to do business in a fast-changing world.
The secret to this astounding leap of
technology was the ability to pack an ever-increasing amount of components onto
a tiny silicon chip less than a centimeter square.
In the mid-1960s, the state of the art in
circuit design consisted of a chip containing only about ten transistors (Microelectronics and Society, A Report to The
Club of Rome, p.43, 1983, Pergamon Press, Inc., Elmsford, NY).
Although this configuration significantly
helped to reduce the overall size of computers, it was a far cry from being
able to make them accessible to the general public.
As this was happening, another significant
development occurred in the year 1971 that would eventually create the foundation
for the Antichrist’s system to operate.
This single technological advance turned out
to be so monumental that no other generation in history could have conceived of
its creation or its wide-ranging effects.
In the book “Microelectronics and Society”,
the following statement is made:
“… in the United States,
Intel, now a major manufacturer of integrated circuits, developed the first
microprocessor, that is a central processing unit (CPU), where the logic and
arithmetic functions can be performed on a single silicon chip of less than 0.5
centimeter per side. In 1975 the same company managed to assemble a
complete computer on a single printed circuit board. One year later it
announced the production of an eight-bit computer consisting of 20,000
transistors on a single silicon chip” (Microelectronics
and Society, p.40).
By the decade of the 1970s a major functional
circuitry breakthrough was finally accomplished, namely placing an entire
computer processor on a single chip.
Intel Corporation had made commercially
available for the first time a central processor which could handle all the
logic and mathematical functions of a complete computer.
Coined “microprocessors”, these small devices
were poised to revolutionize the way we handle information.
With this kind of technology in hand, silicon
chips could be fashioned to contain not only transistors, but also the diodes,
resistors and capacitors necessary to make computing devices work.
It was solely due to the availability of these
microprocessors that a whole new industry sprang up almost overnight in the
mid-1970’s.
This industry was based upon something no one
had ever thought possible, the personal computer. The idea was a novel
one.
In only a few short years since chip
technology made possible the calculator, people were now making entire
computing systems small enough to sit on a desktop.
With the introduction of the first
mass-produced Apple and Radio Shack computers, each person could have at their
disposal the equivalent in processing power that formerly could only be
contained in a room full of equipment.
Most of those first personal computers were in
fact much more powerful than the massive ENIAC computer.
From that point the technology
snowballed. By 1980, chip manufacturers could put up to 100,000
transistors on a single processor chip.
Ten years later the number was in the
millions. Today, these chips are being built using circuit dimensions at
the low end of the nanometer (nm) scale, the latest of which are only
22-billionths of a meter in size.
The Haswell computer chips from Intel use 22
nm circuitry with 3-D transistor designs and contain billions of transistors in
an area no larger than one square centimeter.
Intel’s web site says that microprocessor
manufacturing technology is the most complex production process on Earth and it
takes hundreds of steps to make a final processor.
The complexity of each chip is so great that
relatively few people understand microprocessor design even though billions of
people now make use of them on a daily basis.
The major chip manufacturers now make over one
billion microprocessors each year.
Over the years, with every incremental
increase in chip density and transistor count within microprocessors came an
associated increase in processing speed.
The first personal computers could perform
nearly 100,000 instructions per second (equal to 0.1 million instructions per
second or 0.1 MIPS).
The first multipurpose processor put out by
Intel in 1974 (the 8080) had a processing speed of about 0.33 MIPS.
By 1982, the Intel 286 processor increased the
throughput to 2.66 MIPS and in 1987 Motorola introduced the 68030, which could
perform at 18 MIPS.
Not to be outdone, in 1992 Intel launched the
486 processor family that had an instruction throughput rate of 54 MIPS, and
this brought considerable graphics and calculation speed to the average desktop
computer.
The speed and processing capabilities that
personal computers had reached during the mid-1990s facilitated the coming of
the advanced graphical user interface and the World Wide Web.
Over the last 20 years, the speed of personal
computers has continued to increase almost exponentially.
Today’s most advanced multi-core processors are
capable of performing at speeds of 140,000—180,000 MIPS, which is up to 1.8
million times faster than the first microprocessor Intel created in 1971!
Memory chips too have grown dramatically in
density and storage capability.
During the mid-1980s the typical computer
contained at most hundreds-of-thousands of bytes of random access memory (RAM)
(one thousand bytes is equivalent to approximately one kilobyte or KB).
Today, the typical personal computer system
contains at least several gigabytes (GB) of RAM or over one million times more
memory than early personal computers.
Similarly, storage technology has advanced
side-by-side with processor speed and RAM. A single hard drive now can
routinely store over a terabyte (TB or one-trillion bytes) of
information.
The ability to store and process extreme
amounts of data is making possible a global electronic network that can keep
track of every activity done by people, businesses, and governments.
Soon this network will control every aspect of
society, including every financial transaction that occurs.
Skynet may be rising, but it will not be run
by intelligent machines of the Terminator movies, but by the Antichrist and the
Empire-Beast of Revelation!
Without the advances in transistor fabrication
and nanocircuitry, society would be much different than we now know it.
In fact, there would be no personal computers
or iPhones or digital TVs; no Internet or social media or instant messaging; no
online banking or electronic payment systems; no bar codes or smart cards or
even widespread use of credit cards; no cable or satellite TV services or
streaming video; no electronically controlled ignition or fuel injection systems
in vehicles; no modern airlines or global positioning systems; no communication
or weather satellites; very limited or no space travel and considerably less of
an understanding of physics and cosmology; no video surveillance cameras or
electronically controlled traffic signals; no audio cassettes or audio CDs or
mp3 files; no digital cameras or video recorders, no automated phone switching
systems or electronically controlled electrical distribution networks; no
guided missiles, smart bombs, or drones; no email or voice mail systems; and no
method to automatically track or perform surveillance on people through
biometrics, cell phone positioning, license plate reading, or video cameras.
As technology races forward, computers are now
a reality to billions of people, even to those in the poorest of nations.
Computerized devices, systems, and operations
that would have been unheard of only a few decades ago are now common-place in
every corner of the globe.
So quickly has this technology come upon us
that we now take it for granted. It’s hard to even think of a time that we
didn’t have computers.
In fact, many people are young enough to never
have known a time without computers.
However, back in the late 1960’s, the New York
Stock Exchange was still run completely by paper and manual operation.
It actually had to shut down for a short
period, because the information generated from normal trading was beginning to
inundate and clog the whole system.
In today’s world, the sheer volume traded
daily on the stock exchanges would make any thought of returning to
pre-computer days completely impossible.
Thus, a major key to forming the system of the
Beast lies in the advent of microelectronics and computer technology.
Over the course of the last forty years, we
have witnessed the development of the core technologies capable of making the
prophecy of the Mark come true — at least from an operational
perspective.
Consider what it would take to produce a total
switchover to an economy based upon something other than the exchange of paper
money or coins.
The financial accounting system necessary to
pull it off would be mind-boggling.
How would governments and financial
institutions ever control and administer global transactions consisting of
trillions of dollars in goods and services done without cash?
Especially, when the infrastructure now
consists of billions of people and millions of businesses doing billions of
transactions every day, it would be virtually impossible to manage manually.
Up to our point in history, commerce occurred
through the actual exchange of tangible currency, as it has for many
millennia.
However, in a cashless economy based solely on
an intangible transfer of value and validated by a mark, no such physical
transfer would occur.
Administering such a system never could be
done by hand.
In addition, implementing such an extensive
control system for buying and selling never could be completely set up during
the brief reign that is given to the Antichrist to lead the empire (1,260 days; see the sections on The
Antichrist and the New
World Order).
Without an extensive period of preparation and
development prior to the Antichrist’s rise, the Mark of the Beast would be a
dismal failure.
The reality is, the only way to successfully
implement a universal marking program and a fully cashless society enforced and
validated through the Mark would be if the essential parts of the system were already
in place before the Antichrist arises.
This is a radical statement. What very
few people have considered before our time is that the precursor to the Empire
of the Beast would be actively preparing for the revealing of the Antichrist
long before he would arise.
Whether the world realizes it or not, the
foundations for the coming economic system of the Antichrist have been built by
a series of technological developments and initiatives that have taken place
over the last generation.
This is all happening all around us on a
global basis, and it consists of an ever-growing network of electronic
communications all made possible by the recent advent of microelectronics,
computer technology, and networking.
Our society is now entirely dependent on computer
technology and the networks linking them. Huge industries would disappear
overnight if somehow computers could no longer be used.
The combined total of all the industries
involved in some form of information processing by computer now accounts the vast
majority of the gross domestic product (GDP) of the United States and other
nations.
Major governmental organizations and
corporations such as NASA, the Social Security Administration, the IRS, the
Pentagon, the stock exchanges of the world, the communication industry, the
banking industry, high tech industries, and countless other corporations could
not even hope to function in today’s world without computers.
These very electronic wizards that were
created to serve us are now becoming our indispensable masters.
David Burnham said that “as
computers become more and more efficient and operate at a higher and higher
psychological level…the catastrophe of the dominance by machines comes nearer
and nearer” (The
Rise of the Computer State, David Burnham, p.10).
So dependent has society become on computers
that there’s no choice left. Either we continue forward to whatever future
computer technology holds, or face certain economic collapse if we dare to slow
or reverse the process.
The path toward the eventual total
computerization of society has become a one-way street. We couldn’t turn
back now even if we wanted to.
The advent of the microprocessor has in effect
started a second industrial revolution. The society that has resulted from
its implementation is a dramatic change from anything that came before.
Even now, the manufacture of goods from raw
materials to finished products is being controlled and managed by specially
programmed computers.
In some industries, automated factories with
armies of robots have replaced the manual labor of the past.
In the retail industry, electronically managed
inventory and purchasing at stores has radically modified the way business is
done.
All of our homes, businesses, and government
agencies are being linked through the glue of electronic impulses traveling
over the wired and wireless Internet.
Society’s structure is becoming completely
rebuilt and almost unrecognizable as we march toward this bold new electronic
future.
Technology Worship
The coming of these computerized wonders also
has created a form of technology worship.
As the latest devices are introduced by the
high-tech companies we have grown to know and love, we are made to anticipate
and desire them.
Their flashy new features and capabilities are
so cool that we just have to have one.
Whether it is the latest computers, tablets,
or smart phones with touch screens and high-resolution graphics, they are so
enticing it is hard to resist.
The software and the Internet tracking schemes
are so good that they even make the devices seem to know what we want before we
ask.
Soon, we may be able to interact with these
computers like we do with other people — talking to them and getting answers to
anything we desire.
Could the ultimate fulfillment of the Image of
the Beast (Revelation 13:14-15) turn
out to be an advanced computer system that will seem to have a life all its
own?
Even before the day when Skynet is complete
and the ultimate computing networks are made to control our lives, the awe and
wonder of present-day technology is often put on a alter of desire.
The globalist organization called The Club of
Rome has said…
“… the promise of the
microprocessor… could lead to the virtual abolition of poverty and the tyranny
of work. In fact, the microprocessor could be the key to Utopia” (Microelectronics and Society, p. 26).
The hope expressed in microprocessors by the
Club of Rome is that with greater and greater electronic control, the drudgery
of life will finally disappear.
The utopian society envisioned by some could
be one in which man can relax and let advanced robots and programmed devices
take over.
Indeed, the microprocessor is already
spreading far beyond the computer.
Microprocessor chips will be merged with
nearly every electronic device and networked together to provide a linked
digital organism that will tie everyone and everything on Earth together
through the Internet.
Not only will you be able to receive
information from these smart devices, but you will also have the ability to
interact with the entire system through the vast interconnected network.
Soon, those that manage the network will not
only know who and where you are, but also will be able to track anything and
everything anywhere on Earth.
Microelectronics has made possible the
ultimate surveillance system that will allow the Empire of the Beast to track
and control the entire planet!
How do these facts fit with a prophecy made
centuries ago in the midst of a relatively primitive world?
In precisely the same time period that saw
Israel’s rebirth as a nation along with many other major signs of the end being
fulfilled, the foundations were being laid for the Mark of the Beast and the
Antichrist’s system based upon the development of microscopic transistors and
circuitry.
What began with a single transistor that could
be held in your hand became miniaturized to the point where billions of them
could be designed into electronic processors and memory chips.
Without this technology revolution, the system
of the Beast simply could not be realized.
The rise of microelectronics and the
tremendous processing ability of the latest microprocessors will provide the
means to design a totally new system of commerce.
The Biblical description of the Mark implies
that the typical use of paper money and coins will be eliminated.
In their place will be a medium of exchange
that will be based upon a Mark placed in a person’s right hand or
forehead.
The problems associated with administering
such a system would make it impossible if it had to be confined to the world of
manual operations.
This is because without a physical exchange of
money, every transaction would have to be recorded, manually validated with the
Mark, and then a transfer of currency credits be made — processes that would be
impractical to do without computers.
However, with the high-speed processing
capabilities of the networks now in existence, their natural extension is in a
cashless world of digital currency.
“The move to the cashless
society seems inevitable given the technological push provided by
microelectronics and significant cost advantages associated with the transfer
of funds electronically” (Microelectronics and Society, p.70).
In the following sections we will see how a
number of other technological developments are coming on the scene to
complement computer technology and move the world closer to the system of the
Beast.
End Times Truth is about warning people that the Coming of Christ is
near and that we are living in the last days just before His Return. During our
lifetime, Bible predictions concerning the Second Coming have been fulfilled
exactly as they were described thousands of years ago. Jesus said that we
could know that his coming was near if we watched world events and compared
them to what was predicted. As the prophecies come true before our eyes,
we know that we are getting closer to the end. While it is true that the
world is heading toward a judgment day, individuals can escape through
knowledge of the truth combined with repentance and faith in Christ (see Escape to Safety).
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