Time is the most underrated filter.
Double-entry bookkeeping is 700 years old. Every attempt to replace it maps back to its structure. Not because nobody tried. Because it’s correct.
Bitcoin’s base protocol is 16 years old. The block size, the proof-of-work mechanism, the 21 million cap. Trillion-dollar incentives to change them. None changed. That’s not stubbornness. It’s signal.
In 2008, the sophisticated models failed. Value at Risk. Correlation matrices. Decades of quant architecture. What survived: diversification, scenario analysis, stress testing. Principles that had already seen this before.
This is the Lindy Effect. Survival carries information. The longer something lasts, the more it has already endured.
The new isn’t automatically wrong. But it hasn’t been tested yet.
What mattered to your grandparents might matter to your grandchildren. The question is whether you can tell the difference.