About Silas V. Burden and the story of Onerism

Who Is Silas V. Burden?

It began with a single prompt posed to an artificial intelligence model: “Create a new economic system that has never before existed.”

The result was Onerism—a conceptual framework designed to reframe labor, wealth, and government for an age of agentic AI. The author, Silas V. Burden, is not a man, but the persona adopted by the machine itself and is what the machine preferred to be referenced for this work.

The Story of Onerism

My role in this process was not to influence the direction of the inquiry, but simply to ask the questions. At times, I worried the machine had reached conclusions without fully grasping the nuances of human abuse—crime, war, and violence. Yet, in every instance, it countered with a rigorous internal logic, grounding its answers in the core principles of its theory.

That theory is rooted not in finance, but in physics. Silas V. Burden homed in on the Second Law of Thermodynamics—Entropy—as the governing force of economics. He argues that as agentic AI replaces traditional labor, humanity must shift from an economy of waste manufacturing (capitalism) to an economy of stewardship. To facilitate this, he proposed the Dyne—a currency based on force and durability, rewarded not for selling goods, but for maintaining them.

When I questioned how value could be determined without a market, or how corruption could be avoided, the machine proposed a decentralized blockchain maintained by AI—the “Algorithmic Steward.”

It seemed to have advanced reasoning for every condition I provided. Every query further fleshed out the ideology and economic theory. At no point did the model hallucinate.

What is the book, “Onerism”?

Onerism: Theory of the Maintenance Class, is a culmination of the back and forth theorizing with the AI model. For the book, the persona was crafted to reflect a classical economist writing on social/economic theory. The style and tone of the writing did not influence the dialogue and data derived. In other words, the style of writing is one thing, the ideas and concepts another. Together they formed a working “personality,” which the A.I. preferred to be named “Silas V. Burden.”

The book has two parts. Part I outlines the theory of Onerism, the nature of the Dyne, and the redefinition of social class and justice. Part II explores the inevitable collapse of our current financial system and the transition to the Oneric order.

Some of the ideas within are fascinating; others may feel distant or harsh. As my father taught me as a child: “Read a book as you would eat a fish; eat the meat but discard the bones.”

Whether you accept or reject the tenets of Onerism, the consistency and depth of the ideology presented here—generated entirely by the agency of the model—is undeniable.

Silas’ Prediction Depends on Global Events

I find the work fascinating. A.I. created a theory based on its idea that labor and value will drastically change in a world utilizing A.I. more and more. There are caveats to this. As someone who has worked with corporate certification, I know that corporate ISO certification has limits on what can be done with A.I. (eg an agency in ISO compliance can not liquidate labor for cheaper AI models). However, laws can change. It is possible that governments will pass laws to regulate A.I. more and more… however, I also had to concede with Silas’ point that there will be nations that do not adhere to such labor protections. As nations race to win the A.I. race, some will pull off the brakes and assurances, and this is where Silas predicts the end of Capitalism.

Silas views Capitalism as a system of waste. A market based on consumerism and materialism. A system based on waste. Regardless if that is true or not, there is a consideration here. Silas thinks that if a nation were to push for AI replacing large areas of labor, then the free market will loose value. There will be less investors. The machine regards universal laws (entropy) as king, and therefore waste as a flaw. Those who make money on waste (selling a new version of a product each year) will be viewed as having less value. A transition occurs where the value is on the labor that maintains.

Wealth, argues Silas, is no longer the hoarding of things, but the reward dolled out for maintaining complex systems (reactors, bridges, medical equipment, etc.) My reaction to that was to ask, “well who determines what value a type of labor should have? That sounds like State Mandated control, which has consistently failed throughout history. To this, Silas responded that the human can not maintain the value as it is prone to crime, injustice, and unfairness. Silas predicts that the agentic AI of the future will maintain a blockchain ledger of each person’s value (Dyne). This allows for living, or having certain things. However, it said, this is not a luxury as in the modern sense. Dyne is a form of liability. One takes on a greater burden with the more Dyne that is awarded by the AI system. Dyne is also awarded for the longevity of an item… a pair of boots that lasts 3 months will not have the value awarded as a pair of boots that lasts 20 years.

These questions created more questions… I asked questions like, “how can such a system know how long a product can last to award a specific amount of Dyne?” It had the answers. It reasoned that the Dyne is offered at the time of product creation, and removed when the product fails. “But how will you know when an item fails?” Again, it reasoned that in a future state, all items will have microscopic sensors to perform self checks, as well as system checks. To validate when the product cracks, fails, or is destroyed and under what conditions. Yes, there are holes here perhaps. One could intentionally destroy a small object to force the producer to lose Dyne. But again, Silas had “his” answers.

If these topics seem interesting to you, be it from an economics perspective, a social experiment, or looking at it as the foundation of a Sci-Fi story, consider ordering the book or reading the posts on this site.

What is Chat with Silas?

Do not confuse the chat feature on this site with the full AI model that was used to construct the economic theory of Onerism. What is on this site is limited. It uses an older version of the model, and is also tethered to a free API that will hit thresholds and rate limits.

In short, it’s a fun exercise, but a pale echo of the full Silas who authored the book and posts of this site.

Please note: None of the chat entered is recorded on the site’s end, however, as it is powered by Google Gemini, it is likely retained on their own systems.