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What? That is exactly what it does not do! Bitcoin takes the politics and money out of consensus -- once you are running a full node you are validating the rule

by maaku 11y ago

What? That is exactly what it does not do! Bitcoin takes the politics and money out of consensus -- once you are running a full node you are validating the rules and the ruleset is unchanging. Being above politics is entirely the point.

bhaak 11y ago
The ruleset is certainly not unchangeable. If enough miners and full nodes install a different bitcoin implementation, having combined more than 51% of the hash rate of the network, the ruleset of the new majority is valid. That's how bitcoin reaches consensus and that's how Classic would activate (going for 75% and a grace period of a month, because otherwise you'd probably get chaos and the possibility of 2 distinct bitcoin networks).
- maaku 11y ago
  > If enough miners and full nodes install a different bitcoin implementation, having combined more than 51% of the hash rate of the network, the ruleset of the new majority is valid. No, that is a misunderstanding of how bitcoin works. If the miners activate a new ruleset, and if that change is not so very carefully constructed as to make the old rules a special case of the new rules (a soft-fork), then those miners fork themselves off the network no one automatically follows. The amount of hashpower on the fork has zero relevance to the validity of the blocks they are mining, from the perspective of an un-upgraded node.
  - mcguire 11y ago
    No one except others using the new version of the software. If the majority decided to switch, the un-upgraded nodes would be cut off. Choosing the version to run is a political and economic decision.
  - bhaak 11y ago
    Bitcoin is simply decision making by CPU power. Quote Satoshi: "Proof-of-work is essentially one-CPU-one-vote. The majority decision is represented by the longest chain, which has the greatest proof-of-work effort invested in it." I didn't say that everyone follows automatically if there's a hard fork. But if there's a hard fork and an un-upgraded node finds itself on the losing side of the fork, it is lost. Whoever generates the longest chain that gets accepted by the majority of the networks, wins.
    - nullc 11y ago
      Don't mistake the ten second elevator pitch description for an engineering analysis. No version of any Bitcoin node software previously released has worked how you describe. The consensus selection rule is more complex: It's the longest _valid_ chain that nodes follow. Chains that violate the rules are ignored, and this is an integral part of the set of incentives that make the system work.
      - zaphar 11y ago
        You are correct. However the rules are determined by what the majority of miners say the rules are. If the miners decide to change those rules and they have enough others who agree with them then they can do so. And the economic incentive for everyone else is to agree with that or get left on a worthless network or a greatly decreased in value network. The economic incentive is that if you play nice with others and follow the majority ruleset then the coin that you mine will be worth something.
        maaku 11y ago
        > You are correct. However the rules are determined by what the majority of miners say the rules are. This is simply factually wrong.

by maaku 11y ago

bhaak 11y ago

The ruleset is certainly not unchangeable. If enough miners and full nodes install a different bitcoin implementation, having combined more than 51% of the hash rate of the network, the ruleset of the new majority is valid. That's how bitcoin reaches consensus and that's how Classic would activate (going for 75% and a grace period of a month, because otherwise you'd probably get chaos and the possibility of 2 distinct bitcoin networks).

maaku 11y ago
> If enough miners and full nodes install a different bitcoin implementation, having combined more than 51% of the hash rate of the network, the ruleset of the new majority is valid. No, that is a misunderstanding of how bitcoin works. If the miners activate a new ruleset, and if that change is not so very carefully constructed as to make the old rules a special case of the new rules (a soft-fork), then those miners fork themselves off the network no one automatically follows. The amount of hashpower on the fork has zero relevance to the validity of the blocks they are mining, from the perspective of an un-upgraded node.
- mcguire 11y ago
  No one except others using the new version of the software. If the majority decided to switch, the un-upgraded nodes would be cut off. Choosing the version to run is a political and economic decision.
- bhaak 11y ago
  Bitcoin is simply decision making by CPU power. Quote Satoshi: "Proof-of-work is essentially one-CPU-one-vote. The majority decision is represented by the longest chain, which has the greatest proof-of-work effort invested in it." I didn't say that everyone follows automatically if there's a hard fork. But if there's a hard fork and an un-upgraded node finds itself on the losing side of the fork, it is lost. Whoever generates the longest chain that gets accepted by the majority of the networks, wins.
  - nullc 11y ago
    Don't mistake the ten second elevator pitch description for an engineering analysis. No version of any Bitcoin node software previously released has worked how you describe. The consensus selection rule is more complex: It's the longest _valid_ chain that nodes follow. Chains that violate the rules are ignored, and this is an integral part of the set of incentives that make the system work.
    - zaphar 11y ago
      You are correct. However the rules are determined by what the majority of miners say the rules are. If the miners decide to change those rules and they have enough others who agree with them then they can do so. And the economic incentive for everyone else is to agree with that or get left on a worthless network or a greatly decreased in value network. The economic incentive is that if you play nice with others and follow the majority ruleset then the coin that you mine will be worth something.
      - maaku 11y ago
        > You are correct. However the rules are determined by what the majority of miners say the rules are. This is simply factually wrong.