4 ms·

>Imagine saying "who cares Cystic Fibrosis kills x people, heart disease is worse!" You're completely missing the point here: we have finite time and resources

by throwaway20875 6y ago

>Imagine saying "who cares Cystic Fibrosis kills x people, heart disease is worse!" You're completely missing the point here: we have finite time and resources to deal with problems. We must dedicate these finite time and resources in the most efficient way to possible to achieve the most desired outcome. If by "worse" you mean "heart disease causes more deaths and drives higher social costs" then yes there is a strong argument to be made on addressing the root causes driving heart disease with more resources and time then cystic fibrosis. But, again, your analogy is contrived-and-forced-apples-to-oranges with the topic at hand.

GavinMcG 6y ago
This paper is just saying there are reasonably estimable costs. That's all! It's not even trying to address the bigger argument you're talking about.
- throwaway20875 6y ago
  >This paper is just saying there are reasonably estimable costs. That's all! Wrong. You make numerous comments in this thread asserting that the sole focus on this paper is quantifying externalities of crypto mining when that's plainly false. The paper is prescribing policy options for dealing with crypto externalities and birthing new loaded clinical terms to ascribe solely to those externalities: "cryptodamage". Read it. "As an alternative to intervening in emergent cryptocurrency markets through prices (e.g., taxation) or outright restricting their development, there may be a role for government investment into R&D that focuses on designing mining puzzles that greatly reduce energy consumption (and thus production costs) while still allowing for secure validation of anonymous transactions. Fully vetting and encouraging such currency alternatives might retain the libertarian social benefits of the blockchain [35] while making “the last Bitcoin” irrelevant. Although there will still be private benefits captured from mining under possible low-energy design alternatives, as illustrated here there would be significant public good benefits (reduced cryptodamages) to justify such government investments into R&D. Importantly, such investments in R&D are not mutually exclusive with taxing to internalize cryptodamages, and may also come with the potential to generate spin-off benefits from blockchain technology more generally."
  - GavinMcG 6y ago
    I did read it, before I made "numerous comments." Papers discuss the implications and applications of their work. That discussion is not the work itself; it is meant to give a starting point for fitting the work with other research or doing new research that builds on the work. Thus, the authors "close by sharing our brief thoughts on policy implications of recognizing cryptodamages." That section mentions a wide range of policy implications—several paragraphs that you didn't bother quoting—without advocating for anything in particular beyond reducing harm. Frankly, that leaves it sounding like what you're really bothered by is that the paper points out that there is harm, and advocates for reducing it. And if that's the real problem—that you don't like it when someone speaks up and says hey, this has quantifiable downsides—just be honest about it.
    - effie 6y ago
      > That section mentions a wide range of policy implications—several paragraphs that you didn't bother quoting—without advocating for anything in particular beyond reducing harm. Yes but that is still propagating the unsubstantiated view that cryptocurrency mining is an important cause of societal harm worthy of mitigation/regulation. There is no comparison to other similar or bigger economic activities, no mention of the fact that the pollution happens at power plants and is under direct control of the power plant owners, not miners. It is inordinately focused on societal harms of cryptocurrency mining, it ignores the benefits beyond mining profit(which is uncertain but non-zero and hard to quantify in dollars). Limitation of the paper narrative to such a narrow topic shows bias.
      - GavinMcG 6y ago
        Not doing what you'd personally prefer isn't a bias. Tackling a problem at several levels is perfectly legitimate; it's just that a paper about clean power generation would be a totally different paper. It's a single paper. One piece of information that's small enough to be digested and connected with other work. And frankly, if the result had been that each $1 created 1¢ of costs, you'd be celebrating it. Your only real criticism here is that you don't like the result. If you're so concerned about the root cause of power generation, go focus on solving that problem.

GavinMcG 6y ago

This paper is just saying there are reasonably estimable costs. That's all! It's not even trying to address the bigger argument you're talking about.

throwaway20875 6y ago
>This paper is just saying there are reasonably estimable costs. That's all! Wrong. You make numerous comments in this thread asserting that the sole focus on this paper is quantifying externalities of crypto mining when that's plainly false. The paper is prescribing policy options for dealing with crypto externalities and birthing new loaded clinical terms to ascribe solely to those externalities: "cryptodamage". Read it. "As an alternative to intervening in emergent cryptocurrency markets through prices (e.g., taxation) or outright restricting their development, there may be a role for government investment into R&D that focuses on designing mining puzzles that greatly reduce energy consumption (and thus production costs) while still allowing for secure validation of anonymous transactions. Fully vetting and encouraging such currency alternatives might retain the libertarian social benefits of the blockchain [35] while making “the last Bitcoin” irrelevant. Although there will still be private benefits captured from mining under possible low-energy design alternatives, as illustrated here there would be significant public good benefits (reduced cryptodamages) to justify such government investments into R&D. Importantly, such investments in R&D are not mutually exclusive with taxing to internalize cryptodamages, and may also come with the potential to generate spin-off benefits from blockchain technology more generally."
- GavinMcG 6y ago
  I did read it, before I made "numerous comments." Papers discuss the implications and applications of their work. That discussion is not the work itself; it is meant to give a starting point for fitting the work with other research or doing new research that builds on the work. Thus, the authors "close by sharing our brief thoughts on policy implications of recognizing cryptodamages." That section mentions a wide range of policy implications—several paragraphs that you didn't bother quoting—without advocating for anything in particular beyond reducing harm. Frankly, that leaves it sounding like what you're really bothered by is that the paper points out that there is harm, and advocates for reducing it. And if that's the real problem—that you don't like it when someone speaks up and says hey, this has quantifiable downsides—just be honest about it.
  - effie 6y ago
    > That section mentions a wide range of policy implications—several paragraphs that you didn't bother quoting—without advocating for anything in particular beyond reducing harm. Yes but that is still propagating the unsubstantiated view that cryptocurrency mining is an important cause of societal harm worthy of mitigation/regulation. There is no comparison to other similar or bigger economic activities, no mention of the fact that the pollution happens at power plants and is under direct control of the power plant owners, not miners. It is inordinately focused on societal harms of cryptocurrency mining, it ignores the benefits beyond mining profit(which is uncertain but non-zero and hard to quantify in dollars). Limitation of the paper narrative to such a narrow topic shows bias.
    - GavinMcG 6y ago
      Not doing what you'd personally prefer isn't a bias. Tackling a problem at several levels is perfectly legitimate; it's just that a paper about clean power generation would be a totally different paper. It's a single paper. One piece of information that's small enough to be digested and connected with other work. And frankly, if the result had been that each $1 created 1¢ of costs, you'd be celebrating it. Your only real criticism here is that you don't like the result. If you're so concerned about the root cause of power generation, go focus on solving that problem.