#194 - More Questions than Answers

“When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed.” - Ayn Rand

A (re)introduction to Circle of Competence

For those who are new to my (somewhat) regular newsletter, my name is Benton Moss and I am a husband, a father, a business owner, and a Catholic. I am a North Carolina native and moved back to my hometown 5 years ago to run a real estate services business I bought during COVID. 

My background is in real estate and finance (hence the newsletter’s name), but I also love to read history, theology, politics, economics, finance, and about specific business leaders. I believe a multidisciplinary approach to learning a la Charlie Munger is the single most important thing one can do to get ahead in life. All good things flow out of a constant curiosity that is never satiated.

I started Circle of Competence in 2018 with the sole goal of sharing what I am learning - good reads, good charts, and my observations on them. Over the last 7 years, I have connected with hundreds of smart investors, entrepreneurs, and business leaders through the simple act of sharing. 

Drop me a line and let’s connect. Let’s get on with business shall we?

More questions than answers

2025 left me with more questions than answers. I have (a lot of) thoughts on each of these questions below, but I’ve selected a link or two that is of interest for each to be brief.  I am constantly updating my theory on how the future unfolds based on new information, so if you have strong opinions on any questions below, I’d love to hear from you!

1. What happens as the world inevitably moves away from a global dollar reserve currency?

   1. see this Link - I believe the only two possibilities are real assets and crypto as stores of the value in the future. What am I missing? 

2. What happens to society, to the labor force, and to the economy as a whole as AI becomes ubiquitous and begins to dissolve the foundations of knowledge work? 

   1. See this link - knowing what to do (what question to ask) will be more important than knowing how to do it.

   2. see this Link on preparing for the inevitable replacement of knowledge work and finding purpose apart from career identity.

3. What happens when the large model companies decide to remove the guardrails preventing their models from generating goals and allowing for automatic self-improvement? Will AI ‘escape the lab’ then?

   1. No idea.

4. What is the role of religion in the coming AI age?

   1. See this link for Pope Leo’s address to a conference of Catholic Research Universities on AI

   2. See this link for the Magisterium’s own AI trained on Scripture, Church teachings, and Church Fathers’ collective writings. Pretty amazing use of LLM technology!

5. ​What is the future of our republic? Are we a late stage Roman republic with barbarians at the gate, on our way to dissolving into fractious city states and becoming another ruin of history? Or are we bound for cyclical rebirth like the various Chinese dynasties’ history of birth, death, and rebirth? i.e will our constitution withstand even the most gnarly abuses of governance and a failing currency until a rebirth of American liberty prevails?

   1. See this link for Niall Ferguson’s lecture on the future of the West.

   2. see this link for Dan Wang’s take on how China is waiting for the US to simply collapse.

6. What is the future of Europe given the immigration and cultural situation there? Side question - has there ever been a society in world history with completely open borders that sustained greatness for a long period of time?

   1.  See this link for a long form discussion with Hungary PM Viktor Orban

7. What does the future of education look like when you have the world's greatest teacher at your fingertips with Gemini, Claude, etc. (asking for my kids)? Side note - what should we be coaching your kids to be when they grow up? 

   1. No idea what college or even K12 looks like in 10+ years. But I guarantee it will be very different than it looks today, and hopefully public education will be just one path among many, and hopefully it will be a much smaller % of tax outlays and public spending. 

   2. My thought on the side question - teach kids to be builders. We have to know how to build things. Don’t care what the thing is, just need to know how to critically think in systems to build things. Repetitive task oriented jobs - especially knowledge work - will be gone in 10 years.

8. Is there a catalyst to reverse the declining birth rate in the developed world? And what does a population bust look like societally, economically, and politically?

   1.  See this link for what the future looks like without a birth rate revival - the great robotic handoff

9. Are we on a glide path towards WW3 between the liberal west and more top down style governments? 

   1. See this link on how one professor sees the US and China on a glide path to WW3 

   2. See this link for policies Jeffrey Sachs and John Mearsheimer propose to avoid WW3

Investor’s Corner

Long thread on GE’s Aerospace business and its business fundamentals - Link

Scott Bessent: Fixing the fed, Tariffs for national security, solving affordability in 2026 - Link

Imagine a country where the monetary system fails. What is the real estate worth in that country? Link

Peak performance studied: multidisciplinary learning trumps specialization over the long run - Link

Stan Druckenmiller’s Q3 updated portfolio - Link

Copart is starting to look attractive at current valuations - Link

Chris Hohn’s 3 qualities he looks for in a business - Link

Is it a bubble? Howard Marks’ latest memo - Link

Energy Predictions 2025 - Casey Handmer’s predictions - Link

Technology Corner

How to navigate the end of work as we know it - Link

Steam, Steel, and Infinite Minds - Link

Patrick O’Shaughnessy interviews Gavin Baker on the AI boom - Link

Big Ideas 2026 - a16z - Link

Google’s stock investment portfolio revealed. - Link

Jensen Huang: ‘Smart’ just became worthless. Learn to live in poorly defined spaces or you will be replaced. - Link

Stanford Medical study shows that mRNA COVID-19 vaccines caused Myocarditis - Link

Politics, Philosophy, Theology Corner

The making of an elite: Japanese Christians in a 99% non-Christian society - Link

Trump Administration’s national security strategy document - Link

the Three Worlds of Evangelicalism - Link

There was no federal income tax the first 137 years in America was a country. Everything changed in 1913 with The Federal Reserve Act & 16th Amendment (Income Tax). - Link

We are repaganizing - Link

How globalism led to tribalism - link