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Personally, I agree with you. I'm not really of the opinion that immutability offers any advantages, and I'm not using Ethereum myself. That said, I think the

by DSMan195276 10y ago

Personally, I agree with you. I'm not really of the opinion that immutability offers any advantages, and I'm not using Ethereum myself. That said, I think the main idea is that no matter what a judge argues, nobody can modify the original contract in the Ethereum blockchain (That's the theory at least, as we've seen that's not the case). That's not to say something else couldn't be done, but as far as Ethereum is concerned the judge saying it is invalid means squat because that has no ramifications on the blockchain. You raise a good point though that in the end a judge could make any number of decisions outside of Ethereum, so Ethereum only provides so much "protection". Clearly, what a judge decides means much more then "squat" because it has actual ramifications on the people involved, even if it has no ramifications on the Ethereum blockchain itself.

twblalock 10y ago
The problem with this is that if a judge determines an Ethereum contract is unenforceable, but the blockchain does not change, then the blockchain no longer represents the state of affairs in the real world. If that happens, what is the blockchain good for? How can anyone be confident in it, or base decisions or future contracts on it, if it diverges from reality in such a way?
- stale2002 10y ago
  A judge can say whatever he wants. That doesn't mean that he can necessarily do anything about it. There are tons of bitcoin addresses that we KNOW have been used to buy/sell drugs, for example, any address that has sent or received money from a silk road address. I am sure that these judges would LOVE to confiscate all of this money that is being used for illegal things. But they can't do shit. Because bitcoin has proven to be pretty robustly immutable. That is one such value of immutability. Unfortunately for ethereum, it seems to now be much more vulnerable to the attack vector of a government court order, whether that court order is from the US trying to crack down on pot purchases or donations to wikileaks, or China trying to crack down on payments to journalists that are critical of it.
  - vectorpush 10y ago
    Immutability didn't stop the U.S government from auctioning off Ross Ulbricht's 44,000 bitcoins.
    - EdHominem 10y ago
      Actually, it did. They had to capture him and steal his passwords to do it. In the traditional system that isn't a requirement.
      - vectorpush 10y ago
        Right. My point is that immutability doesn't mean anything when the government can simply arrest you and coerce you to reveal your password, it's no different than a gangster stashing cash in a hidden safe.
  - roywiggins 10y ago
    If a contract pays out Ethereum to someone, and a court decides this should not have happened, the coin can still be returned manually by the recipient. If he refuses, he is in contempt of court and has to face the consequences of that. I guess you could play funny business by making it functionally impossible to return the coins (lock them up for years somehow? Hand the private key to a Russian friend?) but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can.
    - stale2002 10y ago
      " but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can." And how in the world would the courts do that? This is crytocurrencies we are talking about. The contracts I am talking about would be done anonymously between two people who have never met before, and have no chance in a million years of finding out who the other person is, or where they are. Thats the whole point! I'm sure courts would love to confiscate all of the bitcoin donated to wikileaks or that is used to buy drugs on the internet. They've made a few high profile arrests and confiscations, but nothing on the scale of mass arrests of silk road customers, even though they would if they could.
- DSMan195276 10y ago
  I don't think a judge or the legal system is concerned with such a thing. That is a problem that Ethereum would have to solve, if it can. That said, the blockchain is always going to be consistent. The catch is that a judge can still force things to be fixed in various ways - either by requiring you to return the ether, or perhaps requiring another type of currency to be given back. So in that way it doesn't really matter what the state of affairs on the Ethereum blockchain is, because you can just settle it apart from the blockchain if you really have to. And the reality is that you could make those coins impossible for you to access, but that doesn't do you much good, and while your ether is inaccessible the judge can seize your assets and require payment through other means.

twblalock 10y ago

The problem with this is that if a judge determines an Ethereum contract is unenforceable, but the blockchain does not change, then the blockchain no longer represents the state of affairs in the real world. If that happens, what is the blockchain good for? How can anyone be confident in it, or base decisions or future contracts on it, if it diverges from reality in such a way?

stale2002 10y ago
A judge can say whatever he wants. That doesn't mean that he can necessarily do anything about it. There are tons of bitcoin addresses that we KNOW have been used to buy/sell drugs, for example, any address that has sent or received money from a silk road address. I am sure that these judges would LOVE to confiscate all of this money that is being used for illegal things. But they can't do shit. Because bitcoin has proven to be pretty robustly immutable. That is one such value of immutability. Unfortunately for ethereum, it seems to now be much more vulnerable to the attack vector of a government court order, whether that court order is from the US trying to crack down on pot purchases or donations to wikileaks, or China trying to crack down on payments to journalists that are critical of it.
- vectorpush 10y ago
  Immutability didn't stop the U.S government from auctioning off Ross Ulbricht's 44,000 bitcoins.
  - EdHominem 10y ago
    Actually, it did. They had to capture him and steal his passwords to do it. In the traditional system that isn't a requirement.
    - vectorpush 10y ago
      Right. My point is that immutability doesn't mean anything when the government can simply arrest you and coerce you to reveal your password, it's no different than a gangster stashing cash in a hidden safe.
- roywiggins 10y ago
  If a contract pays out Ethereum to someone, and a court decides this should not have happened, the coin can still be returned manually by the recipient. If he refuses, he is in contempt of court and has to face the consequences of that. I guess you could play funny business by making it functionally impossible to return the coins (lock them up for years somehow? Hand the private key to a Russian friend?) but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can.
  - stale2002 10y ago
    " but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can." And how in the world would the courts do that? This is crytocurrencies we are talking about. The contracts I am talking about would be done anonymously between two people who have never met before, and have no chance in a million years of finding out who the other person is, or where they are. Thats the whole point! I'm sure courts would love to confiscate all of the bitcoin donated to wikileaks or that is used to buy drugs on the internet. They've made a few high profile arrests and confiscations, but nothing on the scale of mass arrests of silk road customers, even though they would if they could.
DSMan195276 10y ago
I don't think a judge or the legal system is concerned with such a thing. That is a problem that Ethereum would have to solve, if it can. That said, the blockchain is always going to be consistent. The catch is that a judge can still force things to be fixed in various ways - either by requiring you to return the ether, or perhaps requiring another type of currency to be given back. So in that way it doesn't really matter what the state of affairs on the Ethereum blockchain is, because you can just settle it apart from the blockchain if you really have to. And the reality is that you could make those coins impossible for you to access, but that doesn't do you much good, and while your ether is inaccessible the judge can seize your assets and require payment through other means.