By Mark Hamilton, Founder, Neothink Institute · Economics · June 2026

One sector of the modern economy was never placed under heavy government regulation, and it produced the only sustained technological revolution of the era. The computer, the internet, and now artificial intelligence advanced at a pace no regulated industry has matched. The Institute treats this as the controlled experiment hidden inside recent history: where the state withheld initiatory force, progress compounded; everywhere else, it stalled.

The suppressed variable

Mark Hamilton has spent 50+ years on a single pattern: transformative innovation concentrated in information technology while it stagnated across most other fields. The explanation points directly to the conditions for wealth creation.

"Look at the area where there has been a lot of advancement," Hamilton observes, "and that is information revolution: the computer, the internet, now AI. That's because there has never been really heavy-handed government regulation over the computer and internet and information technology."

Three forces suppress innovation: regulation, legislation, and litigation. The split in outcomes is visible across the economy.

Fields that advanced under minimal regulation: personal computers, the internet and web, smartphones, artificial intelligence, social platforms, cloud computing.

Fields that stalled under heavy regulation, legislation, and litigation: nuclear energy, medical treatment, biotechnology, housing construction, transportation, energy production.

The Suppressed Variable Regulation, not scarcity, is the variable that decides whether wealth compounds or stalls.

"The government should not tell a business how or how not they should run their company," Hamilton states, "how or how not they should do research in the medical field and all these other fields."

Initiatory force

The mechanism behind the stalled fields is initiatory force: force applied against others without consent and without prior actual harm. Regulations dictating how a business operates, laws restricting peaceful activity, bureaucratic barriers to development, and restrictions on activity that has demonstrated no harm all fall under it.

Self-defense force is force used only to stop actual harm: preventing genuine threats to a community, shielding individuals from demonstrated danger, responding to real and verified threats. This is the legitimate function of government.

Government's legitimate role ends at self-defense force. Beyond it, regulation is initiatory force, and innovation collapses.

The Dividing Line The boundary of legitimate government is the boundary between stopping actual harm and dictating peaceful activity.

The computer revolution was the controlled experiment hidden inside recent history: the one sector the state never placed under heavy regulation produced the only sustained revolution of the era, which makes regulation, not scarcity, the variable that suppresses wealth.

Protection without regulation

The standard objection is straightforward. With regulations removed, the protection of citizens from harm appears to lose its mechanism. The same distinction answers the concern.

Consider a factory. "Let's say there's a community, and then a factory comes and starts putting harmful chlorine gas into the air," Hamilton explains. "Well, it would be a self-defense force situation where the government would come in and stop that from happening." The community was there first; stopping a real danger to it is a legitimate role for government.

The line falls between responding to actual harm and bureaucrats issuing regulations that flatter public opinion and advance careers. Protection requires scientific evidence of harm. Consensus and political calculation do not qualify. "Consensus is not scientific evidence," Hamilton states.

The Copernicus precedent

History records what happens when consensus stands in for evidence. When Christianity ruled Western civilization, the accepted consensus held that the earth was flat and that humanity sat at the center of the universe. Agreeing with that consensus was the price of money, grants, church support, and at times survival. Nicholas Copernicus withheld his findings until he was on his deathbed, fearing what would follow their release.

The division Hamilton draws is between researchers steered by funding approval and scientists who follow the evidence wherever it leads. Genuine protection depends on the second.

The network-state path

The path to removing initiatory force runs through the Immortalis network state: a digital nation founded on the Prime Law, with citizens joining from across the world. A constitutional amendment establishing the Prime Law runs into the two-party system, which is nearly impenetrable. A network state routes around it. Once Immortalis demonstrates broad prosperity, health, and safety, that documented record becomes the argument for adoption elsewhere, including a return to America with proof of viability in hand.

A network state begins as a digital nation whose citizens are distributed internationally. Each new member adds to collective GDP, raising the nation's economic weight and bargaining power. The long-term aim is to accumulate capital and committed supporters sufficient to acquire physical territory and pursue sovereignty. The name Immortalis comes from the Latin for "immortal," reflecting the end goal of ending aging and death through unrestricted medical advancement.

Wealth, health, and safety at full scope

Universal wealth: technological advancement compounds across every sector, and living costs fall sharply.

Universal health: medical advancement accelerates once regulatory barriers are gone, chronic illness recedes, and aging itself becomes a target for reversal.

Total safety: criminal activity declines as both its motivation falls away and its consequences become swift.

Why the Prime Law works

The Prime Law consolidates thousands of regulations into one principle, and it produces a condition no civilization has held: a society with no ruling class.

Every historical civilization maintained a ruling class that governed through initiatory force. The Prime Law removes that layer entirely, leaving a society that operates through mutual value exchange. Any institution that fails to deliver value disappears, abandoned by the people it can no longer compel.

This explains why companies spend enormous sums on longevity research and recover so little. The missing element is freedom from regulatory constraint. One unregulated sector produced the only sustained revolution of the era; the Prime Law extends that condition to every sector.

The Extension What the unregulated sector did for information, the Prime Law is designed to do for every field at once.

Common Questions

What does the Institute mean by "true wealth"? True wealth is compounding technological advancement paired with falling living costs, the condition the unregulated information sector already demonstrates. It is created, not redistributed. The argument locates its source in the freedom to act without initiatory force, which is why the sector that escaped heavy regulation is the only one where wealth advanced without interruption.

What is initiatory force, and how is it different from self-defense force? Initiatory force is force applied against others without their consent and without prior actual harm: regulations dictating how a business operates, laws restricting peaceful activity, barriers to development that has demonstrated no harm. Self-defense force is force used only to stop actual, verified harm. The first suppresses wealth creation. The second is the legitimate function of government, and the boundary between them is the whole argument.

Why is the computer and internet sector treated as proof rather than a coincidence? Because it functions as a controlled experiment. The same era, the same economy, and the same human ingenuity were present everywhere, yet sustained revolution appeared only where heavy regulation was absent. When one variable differs and one outcome differs with it, that variable is the explanation. Regulation is the suppressed variable.

If regulation is removed, what protects people from genuine harm? The same self-defense distinction. When a factory releases harmful chlorine gas into a community that was already there, stopping it is a legitimate self-defense action. Protection requires scientific evidence of actual harm. Consensus and political calculation do not qualify, because consensus is not scientific evidence. Government acts against demonstrated danger, not against peaceful activity that bureaucrats dislike.

How does the Prime Law relate to this economic argument? The Prime Law consolidates thousands of regulations into one principle: no initiatory force. It produces a condition no civilization has held, a society with no ruling class governing through force. Economically, it extends the unregulated sector's condition to every field at once, which is why the article treats it as the structural key to wealth rather than a political preference.

Why pursue the Immortalis network state instead of a constitutional amendment? A constitutional amendment establishing the Prime Law runs into a two-party system that is nearly impenetrable. The Immortalis network state routes around it, beginning as a digital nation whose citizens join from across the world and accumulate collective economic weight. Once it demonstrates broad prosperity, health, and safety, that documented record becomes the argument for adoption elsewhere.

Further Reading