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Where are the resources for understanding why useless "proof-of-work" wankery burns electricity and CPU cycles that could be spent folding viral RNA in simulati

Where are the resources for understanding why useless "proof-of-work" wankery burns electricity and CPU cycles that could be spent folding viral RNA in simulation or doing pattern-recognition DSP on radio-telescope data or something useful? What an utterly disconnected-from-the-real-world approach to bringing literal VALUE in the world... (speaking of current implementations of cryptocurrencies and their fan bases aka vested interests. Not directed at this article even remotely. I didn't even read the article. If you flag me for anything, flag me for this. TLDR; lol)

sparkie 6y ago
> Where are the resources for understanding why useless "proof-of-work" wankery burns electricity and CPU cycles that could be spent folding viral RNA in simulation or doing pattern-recognition DSP on radio-telescope data or something useful? mises.org is a great place to begin to understand. Bitcoin is bringing real value into the world by allowing people to save money for a rainy day without making risky investments, and without subjecting the wealth they've earned to the possibility of theft or seizure by the state or anyone else. As for "crypto," the kind being mentioned in the article here, your guess is as good as mine. These are just scams intended to rake in money from naive investors and speculators, based upon a complete misunderstanding of why Bitcoin was designed the way it is. As for folding RNA and other useful stuff - that's all nice, but somebody has to pay the costs. That somebody, hopefully, is paying it voluntarily. I might even be happy to volunteer some of my money to causes like that. The "steal hard earned money from people to pay for pet projects" ideology is a non-starter for me though.
- z3rgl1ng 6y ago
  > Bitcoin > saving without making risky investments I’m sorry, what?
- sparkie 6y ago
  @z3rgl1ng - replying here as yours is marked [dead] > Bitcoin > saving without making risky investments > I’m sorry, what? Glad you asked, you heard correctly, but I'm not sure you understand the nature of money. Storing wealth with bitcoin is not really much different to storing wealth with dollars. In both cases, the future purchasing power of your wealth can change depending on the markets - it is in general, out of the control of any particular entities - but is in the control of every individual making transactions based on their own subjective value of the commodities they're exchanging (of which the money is one). In the case of Bitcoin, the value of other commodities relative to bitcoin is subject only to these markets of individuals making those choices. There is nobody who can reduce or increase the value of a bitcoin arbitrarily. This means "saving in bitcoin" is betting that the market will be favourable to bitcoin in the long term such that you can maximize the return from the hard-earned wealth you laboured for. In the case of dollars however, the dollar is still subject to the same market conditions as bitcoin - but it has an additional variable which can alter its value - the federal reserve, which can simply elect (by the non-elected) to devalue the dollar by arbitrarily increasing its supply. Since increasing the money supply has become the de facto behaviour of this entity, saving in dollars is an almost definite loss-making strategy. The money you obtained through hard labour will simply not be worth the work you performed when you come to spend it. Any investment contains risk. Storing dollars in your bank account can be seen as "investing in the dollar." A very poor strategy if you ask me. Although you're pretty much guaranteed lose purchasing power on it, it is fairly low risk that you're going to lose a significant portion of it quickly, but the history of dozens of other currencies which have hyperinflated tells a story that this could change at a moment's notice. An "investment in bitcoin" is an investment in a future of sound money, and not to be confused with "investing in the exchange rate of the dollar to bitcoin," which is a gamble and of course, high risk, if you have have a high time preference. The future of sound money merely needs people who lower their time preference to believe that their wealth can be stored in the long term in bitcoin without being devalued, and the predetermined nature of bitcoin's disinflationary currency release can give them some confidence in that. Hyperinflation of bitcoin cannot occur, and since the supply will diminish, the value per bitcoin is likely to appreciate unless demand also diminishes at the same rate. However, since bitcoin targets self-interest, demand is likely to increase - as more people decide to store their wealth, the value per bitcoin increases, creating a feedback cycle which further incentivizes people to save in bitcoin. This cycle is self-perpetuating and will gradually swallow up larger and larger amounts of savings globally - and as it grows, the volatility of the exchange rate to dollars will likely decrease too, although there's the possibility that it could trigger further inflation of the dollar, which would see even more volatility, but would only serve to increase confidence in bitcoin as the fix for the problem of inflation. At this point, I can't see how bitcoin could fail. The Federal Reserve has just committed to infinite devaluing of the dollar, and Bitcoin is about to enter its 3rd phase of "quantitative hardening." Will be fun to watch.

sparkie 6y ago

> Where are the resources for understanding why useless "proof-of-work" wankery burns electricity and CPU cycles that could be spent folding viral RNA in simulation or doing pattern-recognition DSP on radio-telescope data or something useful? mises.org is a great place to begin to understand. Bitcoin is bringing real value into the world by allowing people to save money for a rainy day without making risky investments, and without subjecting the wealth they've earned to the possibility of theft or seizure by the state or anyone else. As for "crypto," the kind being mentioned in the article here, your guess is as good as mine. These are just scams intended to rake in money from naive investors and speculators, based upon a complete misunderstanding of why Bitcoin was designed the way it is. As for folding RNA and other useful stuff - that's all nice, but somebody has to pay the costs. That somebody, hopefully, is paying it voluntarily. I might even be happy to volunteer some of my money to causes like that. The "steal hard earned money from people to pay for pet projects" ideology is a non-starter for me though.

z3rgl1ng 6y ago
> Bitcoin > saving without making risky investments I’m sorry, what?
sparkie 6y ago
@z3rgl1ng - replying here as yours is marked [dead] > Bitcoin > saving without making risky investments > I’m sorry, what? Glad you asked, you heard correctly, but I'm not sure you understand the nature of money. Storing wealth with bitcoin is not really much different to storing wealth with dollars. In both cases, the future purchasing power of your wealth can change depending on the markets - it is in general, out of the control of any particular entities - but is in the control of every individual making transactions based on their own subjective value of the commodities they're exchanging (of which the money is one). In the case of Bitcoin, the value of other commodities relative to bitcoin is subject only to these markets of individuals making those choices. There is nobody who can reduce or increase the value of a bitcoin arbitrarily. This means "saving in bitcoin" is betting that the market will be favourable to bitcoin in the long term such that you can maximize the return from the hard-earned wealth you laboured for. In the case of dollars however, the dollar is still subject to the same market conditions as bitcoin - but it has an additional variable which can alter its value - the federal reserve, which can simply elect (by the non-elected) to devalue the dollar by arbitrarily increasing its supply. Since increasing the money supply has become the de facto behaviour of this entity, saving in dollars is an almost definite loss-making strategy. The money you obtained through hard labour will simply not be worth the work you performed when you come to spend it. Any investment contains risk. Storing dollars in your bank account can be seen as "investing in the dollar." A very poor strategy if you ask me. Although you're pretty much guaranteed lose purchasing power on it, it is fairly low risk that you're going to lose a significant portion of it quickly, but the history of dozens of other currencies which have hyperinflated tells a story that this could change at a moment's notice. An "investment in bitcoin" is an investment in a future of sound money, and not to be confused with "investing in the exchange rate of the dollar to bitcoin," which is a gamble and of course, high risk, if you have have a high time preference. The future of sound money merely needs people who lower their time preference to believe that their wealth can be stored in the long term in bitcoin without being devalued, and the predetermined nature of bitcoin's disinflationary currency release can give them some confidence in that. Hyperinflation of bitcoin cannot occur, and since the supply will diminish, the value per bitcoin is likely to appreciate unless demand also diminishes at the same rate. However, since bitcoin targets self-interest, demand is likely to increase - as more people decide to store their wealth, the value per bitcoin increases, creating a feedback cycle which further incentivizes people to save in bitcoin. This cycle is self-perpetuating and will gradually swallow up larger and larger amounts of savings globally - and as it grows, the volatility of the exchange rate to dollars will likely decrease too, although there's the possibility that it could trigger further inflation of the dollar, which would see even more volatility, but would only serve to increase confidence in bitcoin as the fix for the problem of inflation. At this point, I can't see how bitcoin could fail. The Federal Reserve has just committed to infinite devaluing of the dollar, and Bitcoin is about to enter its 3rd phase of "quantitative hardening." Will be fun to watch.