The Nature of Money

U.S. Economy Grinds To Halt
As Nation Realizes Money Just A Symbolic, Mutually Shared Illusion

The Onion's right, it is an mutually shared illusion as fiat money is created from nothing and backed by nothing and...

Money is memory, said Narayana Kocherlakota in an important 1996 paper (he is now president of the Minneapolis Fed). It is the way we as a society record how much capacity to buy stuff each of us possess. In other words, The Onion was right. Money really is just a symbolic, mutually shared illusion.

and yet again...

So the U.S. dollar isn't just important because other people think it is. The U.S. dollar is important, because the world's strongest entity, with the full force of the U.S. army, the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and various local authorities with guns demands that you pay them in U.S. dollars. That's not faith. That's the law. Sorry.

When combined with Triffin's Paradox, you now know what money truly is.  :)