5 ms·

Would love to hear Bitcoin proponents solution to this.

lightedman 9y ago
You won't, because they have no understanding of how anything truly works. Cash in hand is unhackable, almost entirely untraceable, and works when there is no power. 20:1 the Bitcoin people would propose some sort of buffered/delayed transaction solution. Of course that wouldn't work as there's no way of telling when you'd have restored power or connectivity. Puerto Rico is looking to have nothing for several weeks if not longer, much like the Ice Storm of 1994 in Western Tennessee.
- holydude 9y ago
  See my other comment reg. cash. Cash is not the solution it is just a band aid.
  - lightedman 9y ago
    Cash is the solution. Your other comment is literally demonstrating what merchants have done for millennia before we had computers - write down the transactions in a ledger so you can keep track of daily business. Now, if the lady behind the counter had a problem counting cash - that's on her.
    - holydude 9y ago
      Well yeah it is for inventory purposes.
- lojack 9y ago
  Cash in hand isn’t unhackable at all. Counterfeiting is still a real thing.
  - lightedman 9y ago
    Certain types of currency are absolutely unforgeable or easily detected if they are forged. Gold, for example. It's how we discovered specific gravity.
    - chrissnell 9y ago
      Nonsense. The average person, me included, could not detect impure gold if given a piece of it.
      - dnautics 9y ago
        It's not that hard. Take a Black Rock, and a few samples ok known purity, 75,80,95,100%. Then scratch the gold sample across a set of lines, of these purities, and see which is the closest.
        21 9y ago
        You failed. A lot of counterfeit gold has insertion of other metals in the center (tungsten for example which has a similar density) https://static6.businessinsider.com/image/505a1d2eeab8ea8610000007-480-640/fake-gold-bar.jpg https://static6.businessinsider.com/image/505a1d2eeab8ea8610...
        lightedman 9y ago
        Tungsten is noticeably lighter, by about 7%. Hand-in-hand comparison with another similar-sized bar of pure gold would give it away instantly.
        21 9y ago
        Note that I specifically talked about density, not weight. Wikipedia: Because the density is so similar to that of gold (tungsten is only 0.36% less dense), tungsten can also be used in counterfeiting of gold bars, such as by plating a tungsten bar with gold
- Finnucane 9y ago
  Not sure why you're getting downvoted; Bitcoin was clearly designed by someone with no understanding of how money actually works.
  - digi_owl 9y ago
    Indeed. Bitcoin is a crossover point between cypherpunks and goldbugs.
    - rothbardrand 9y ago
      Bitcoin is pretty much the essence of the entire point of the cypherpunks. That an privacy, but bitcoin is nothing but a censorship resistant ledger.
  - offtopicques 9y ago
    that bitcoin works would suggest your understanding does not survive contact with reality
    - Finnucane 9y ago
      Does it work as money? It hasn't yet.
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
      - rothbardrand 9y ago
        Yes, it has, though I'm sure you have some tortured narrow definition of "money" and an inaccurate assumption of some failing of bitcoin to claim that it hasn't. But that doesn't matter. All you're saying here is that it's going to be a few more years and a much higher bitcoin price until you convert over. That's your loss.
        omarchowdhury 9y ago
- sametmax 9y ago
  People didn't create bitcoin to replace cash. Years ago, the community tried to create an alternative to all existing money systems. That's all. No false promises. No silver bullet. Just a social experiment. The way you put it sounds like the early bitcoin believers were pretentious know-it-all getting over their head. What we tried to do was just something new related to money. And we did. We took risk. We were mocked. We invested time, energy and resources in a system we knew was experimental, unreliable and untested. And it did a dent. I would add, despite very negative people like you.
  - lightedman 9y ago
    "I would add, despite very negative people like you." Have fun when you run into the same lesson left unlearned from the 70s - distributed permission-less databases like blockchains cannot scale without becoming centralized. The more people that wish to participate, the growth rate starts jumping from exponential to exponential * log with the bandwidth and storage requirements to ensure every other node on the network is properly updated. "People didn't create bitcoin to replace cash. Years ago, the community tried to create an alternative to all existing money systems. That's all." Cash is a money system. You contradict yourself.
    - sametmax 9y ago
      > Have fun when you run into the same lesson left unlearned from the 70s - distributed permission-less databases like blockchains cannot scale without becoming centralized. The more people that wish to participate, the growth rate starts jumping from exponential to exponential * log with the bandwidth and storage requirements to ensure every other node on the network is properly updated. You mean it may fail ? Yes, we are aware. Since the beginning. That's what "experiment" comes from. > Cash is a money system. You contradict yourself. Being an alternative is not being a replacement. Just like the bike is an alternative to a car, and not a replacement for it. You seem to have a terrible grudge against bitcoin. I'm sorry about it, but it's irrelevant here. You may like it or not, but don't give the early community objectives we didn't have. We never sold a magical solution. We were not some 14 years old kid in a hoodie screaming "kill the banks". We hoped. A lot. We dreamed. We did noticed and disliked a lot of flaws in our current systems and institutions and explored other ways. But as intelligent people, we know very well the limit of the project and how much it can hurt. So keep your negativity to yourself. It's uncalled for, and definitely unwanted.
- phil21 9y ago
  Bitcoin is the digital equivalent to paper cash money. It's pretty hard for me to teleport a $100 bill to someone a continent away, so Bitcoin works as analogous to cash as so far been invented. I agree that Bitcoin does in no way replace paper cash, simply complements it by extending many of it's features to the digital space. It also can be improved on drastically.
tphyahoo 9y ago
Whenever you have a question about bitcoin ask the same question about gold, most of the time it is the same answer. Can you use paper cash in a monetary system that runs on gold? Yes, see the 17th to 19th century. Banks issue counterfeit resistant pieces of paper that represent pieces of gold in the banks safe. Sometimes you get counterfeiting or fraud, but it works well enough. When the power gets turned back on you go back to using real bitcoin payments (which are more convenient than gold).
rothbardrand 9y ago
Regarding TEOTWAWKI Bitcoin is just as vulnerable as the existing financial system. In fact, lower level disasters can take out the existing system before they take out bitcoin. Why aren't you asking "I would love to hear keynesians answer to this!" Power outages are power outages and will harm every electric system, including gasoline, electric cars, food production, etc. The entire society relies on electricity. As for physical bitcoin, which can be transacted offline. Just hand it over like a dollar bill: https://opendime.com https://opendime.com Still mostly useful for larger amounts, though, due to the relative high cost of hardware, but it's new.

You won't, because they have no understanding of how anything truly works. Cash in hand is unhackable, almost entirely untraceable, and works when there is no power. 20:1 the Bitcoin people would propose some sort of buffered/delayed transaction solution. Of course that wouldn't work as there's no way of telling when you'd have restored power or connectivity. Puerto Rico is looking to have nothing for several weeks if not longer, much like the Ice Storm of 1994 in Western Tennessee.

holydude 9y ago
See my other comment reg. cash. Cash is not the solution it is just a band aid.
- lightedman 9y ago
  Cash is the solution. Your other comment is literally demonstrating what merchants have done for millennia before we had computers - write down the transactions in a ledger so you can keep track of daily business. Now, if the lady behind the counter had a problem counting cash - that's on her.
  - holydude 9y ago
    Well yeah it is for inventory purposes.
lojack 9y ago
Cash in hand isn’t unhackable at all. Counterfeiting is still a real thing.
- lightedman 9y ago
  Certain types of currency are absolutely unforgeable or easily detected if they are forged. Gold, for example. It's how we discovered specific gravity.
  - chrissnell 9y ago
    Nonsense. The average person, me included, could not detect impure gold if given a piece of it.
    - dnautics 9y ago
      It's not that hard. Take a Black Rock, and a few samples ok known purity, 75,80,95,100%. Then scratch the gold sample across a set of lines, of these purities, and see which is the closest.
      - 21 9y ago
        You failed. A lot of counterfeit gold has insertion of other metals in the center (tungsten for example which has a similar density) https://static6.businessinsider.com/image/505a1d2eeab8ea8610000007-480-640/fake-gold-bar.jpg https://static6.businessinsider.com/image/505a1d2eeab8ea8610...
        lightedman 9y ago
        Tungsten is noticeably lighter, by about 7%. Hand-in-hand comparison with another similar-sized bar of pure gold would give it away instantly.
        21 9y ago
        Note that I specifically talked about density, not weight. Wikipedia: Because the density is so similar to that of gold (tungsten is only 0.36% less dense), tungsten can also be used in counterfeiting of gold bars, such as by plating a tungsten bar with gold
Finnucane 9y ago
Not sure why you're getting downvoted; Bitcoin was clearly designed by someone with no understanding of how money actually works.
- digi_owl 9y ago
  Indeed. Bitcoin is a crossover point between cypherpunks and goldbugs.
  - rothbardrand 9y ago
    Bitcoin is pretty much the essence of the entire point of the cypherpunks. That an privacy, but bitcoin is nothing but a censorship resistant ledger.
- offtopicques 9y ago
  that bitcoin works would suggest your understanding does not survive contact with reality
  - Finnucane 9y ago
    Does it work as money? It hasn't yet.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
    - rothbardrand 9y ago
      Yes, it has, though I'm sure you have some tortured narrow definition of "money" and an inaccurate assumption of some failing of bitcoin to claim that it hasn't. But that doesn't matter. All you're saying here is that it's going to be a few more years and a much higher bitcoin price until you convert over. That's your loss.
      - omarchowdhury 9y ago
sametmax 9y ago
People didn't create bitcoin to replace cash. Years ago, the community tried to create an alternative to all existing money systems. That's all. No false promises. No silver bullet. Just a social experiment. The way you put it sounds like the early bitcoin believers were pretentious know-it-all getting over their head. What we tried to do was just something new related to money. And we did. We took risk. We were mocked. We invested time, energy and resources in a system we knew was experimental, unreliable and untested. And it did a dent. I would add, despite very negative people like you.
- lightedman 9y ago
  "I would add, despite very negative people like you." Have fun when you run into the same lesson left unlearned from the 70s - distributed permission-less databases like blockchains cannot scale without becoming centralized. The more people that wish to participate, the growth rate starts jumping from exponential to exponential * log with the bandwidth and storage requirements to ensure every other node on the network is properly updated. "People didn't create bitcoin to replace cash. Years ago, the community tried to create an alternative to all existing money systems. That's all." Cash is a money system. You contradict yourself.
  - sametmax 9y ago
    > Have fun when you run into the same lesson left unlearned from the 70s - distributed permission-less databases like blockchains cannot scale without becoming centralized. The more people that wish to participate, the growth rate starts jumping from exponential to exponential * log with the bandwidth and storage requirements to ensure every other node on the network is properly updated. You mean it may fail ? Yes, we are aware. Since the beginning. That's what "experiment" comes from. > Cash is a money system. You contradict yourself. Being an alternative is not being a replacement. Just like the bike is an alternative to a car, and not a replacement for it. You seem to have a terrible grudge against bitcoin. I'm sorry about it, but it's irrelevant here. You may like it or not, but don't give the early community objectives we didn't have. We never sold a magical solution. We were not some 14 years old kid in a hoodie screaming "kill the banks". We hoped. A lot. We dreamed. We did noticed and disliked a lot of flaws in our current systems and institutions and explored other ways. But as intelligent people, we know very well the limit of the project and how much it can hurt. So keep your negativity to yourself. It's uncalled for, and definitely unwanted.
phil21 9y ago
Bitcoin is the digital equivalent to paper cash money. It's pretty hard for me to teleport a $100 bill to someone a continent away, so Bitcoin works as analogous to cash as so far been invented. I agree that Bitcoin does in no way replace paper cash, simply complements it by extending many of it's features to the digital space. It also can be improved on drastically.

tphyahoo 9y ago

Whenever you have a question about bitcoin ask the same question about gold, most of the time it is the same answer. Can you use paper cash in a monetary system that runs on gold? Yes, see the 17th to 19th century. Banks issue counterfeit resistant pieces of paper that represent pieces of gold in the banks safe. Sometimes you get counterfeiting or fraud, but it works well enough. When the power gets turned back on you go back to using real bitcoin payments (which are more convenient than gold).

rothbardrand 9y ago

Regarding TEOTWAWKI Bitcoin is just as vulnerable as the existing financial system. In fact, lower level disasters can take out the existing system before they take out bitcoin. Why aren't you asking "I would love to hear keynesians answer to this!" Power outages are power outages and will harm every electric system, including gasoline, electric cars, food production, etc. The entire society relies on electricity. As for physical bitcoin, which can be transacted offline. Just hand it over like a dollar bill: https://opendime.com https://opendime.com Still mostly useful for larger amounts, though, due to the relative high cost of hardware, but it's new.