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This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. The article then proposes to use the law to bri

This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. The article then proposes to use the law to bring those people back within the control of fiat and government oversight. I no longer think the environmental argument is really plausible here. Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. How is it that someone can't steal your money? The bank makes sure. How is it the bank can be sure? The cops protect them. How is it the cops aren't overwhelmed? The military protects them. Law and order stands on the backs of a lot of stuff and CO2. Bitcoin is an example of one little piece of this not needing all that stuff. Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine. It's a small step in the direction of getting away from all these endless wars and control. A little step away from needing to point guns at eachother to protect our pile of stuff. And this author is saying "point guns at them and make them give it up". That's crazy. Just leave them alone. (If you need to point guns to save the environment, do that specifically. Carbon tax CO2)

quickthrower2 6y ago
If we are Saying fiat is backed by fighter jets then Bitcoin is backed by selling dangerous fake MDMA. That’s if we are getting into that way of arguing which hopefully we are not.
- rybosworld 6y ago
  That's really not a solid argument. Bitcoin doesn't depend on drugs to have value, anymore than the US dollar does.
  - bayesian_horse 6y ago
    Bitcoin does seem to depend to a large degree on money laundering and speculation on money laundering. You might not like it, but that is definitely the reality. Other kinds of currency and investment are a few times more useful as long as you are doing legitimate business.
    - thirtythree 6y ago
      Source?
    - quickthrower2 6y ago
      The Bitcoin network could happy live without those things, as could trade, but price action depends on them. For example the 10000 BTC pizza was one of the early purchases. If BTC stayed at 0.1c then you could still use it and it was used. Caveat to this is now the mining infra means that returning to 1c coins would kill Bitcoin as a secure network since no one would mine for profit - the only reason to mine is the 51% attack
      - bayesian_horse 6y ago
        What does "happily live without it" even mean? Fact is that Bitcoin is used a whole lot for laundering and transferring money in illegal businesses or across borders without taxation. The "legal" part of Bitcoin transactions which aren't just for investment or speculation, like "Pizza sales" or something, are, for one thing not that practical, for another not that popular or significant. So it does stand to reason that most of the speculation is around the use of Bitcoin for laundering money. And even those with the best intentions are helping the money launderers by keeping the network alive and secure.
        quickthrower2 6y ago
        I mean you can have nodes, miners, block creation without the dark things you mentioned. Bitcoin price might be lower. But this is hypothetical anyway because with ASIC mining and dedicated power plants you can’t go back to a low price (other than zero i.e. network trust is lost!). I would imagine even $1000 Bitcoin now would introduce issues of too much hash power. With too much has power and not enough mining incentive in USD terms you’ll just get network attacks.
- Kranar 6y ago
  If you're being serious, the safest drugs were the ones sold online using Bitcoin. The Silk Road was actually an unbelievably reliable and safe way to acquire drugs. A system for rating vendors and reporting issues, incredibly competitive market that put pressure on vendors along with delivery right to your home or the closest post office by the USPS instead of having to either meet a dealer in a sketchy part of town or have them come deliver it to you themselves.
- SkyBelow 6y ago
  Exactly what bitcoin is backed by is something of a mystery for economist to debate. Much of it is people speculating, but I don't see anything unreasonable with saying much of the value, at least pre-speculation, is from its use to carry out illegal transactions. There is some use in other areas so I wouldn't say it was ever entirely the case, but I don't see what's wrong with arguing it was a major factor and is still somewhat of a factor. I do expect between speculation and alt coins better made for hiding activity it is a small and shrinking factor now, but I could be wrong.
tome 6y ago
> This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation I'm extremely confused by this argument that I see again and again. If you want to avoid your assets losing value to inflation that you can buy assets that are resistant to inflation, such as stocks, real estate, land, gold, inflation-adjusted bonds ... I just don't see that cryptocurrencies are particularly useful for that. What's the deal here?
- rybosworld 6y ago
  I think the major point is that Bitcoin seems to benefit disproportionately from inflation. It may be the case that it's the single best hedge against inflation. But yes, there are lot's of things that protect against inflation.
  - tome 6y ago
    > Bitcoin seems to benefit disproportionately from inflation Does it? On what basis would one know that? Why should it benefit from inflation more than gold, say?
    - rybosworld 6y ago
      My argument would be it's the only thing on that list of inflation hedges that has a fixed supply. Lot's of gold is mined each year. Houses are built. Stock is issued, etc. Bitcoin has a well-established upper limit.
      - tome 6y ago
        > [Bitcoin is] the only thing on that list of inflation hedges that has a fixed supply. Aha! That brings me to my next question. In what sense does bitcoin actually have a fixed supply? Sure, a loose coalition of people agree for it to have a fixed supply at the moment, but if enough of the miners, core developers, etc. agree they can change the rules arbitrarily, viz. hard forks. Why should we believe that bitcoin really has a fixed supply, just because everyone has roughly stuck to the rules so far?
smeej 6y ago
This is such an underappreciated point. U.S. dollars are backed by violence. Bitcoin is backed by math. I don't know what you want backing your money in the world you hope to leave for future generations, but I know what I want backing mine.
- dionidium 6y ago
  It's not underappreicated; it's facile. Everything you do in society is backed by the state's monopoly on violence. What are you going to do when I storm into your house with guns, kill your family, and demand access to your wallet? Appeal to math?
  - smeej 6y ago
    Given that you would first have to 1) Identify me as a target worth pursuing (not possible from my wallet addresses if I practice adequate sanitizing of inputs); 2) Figure out where I live (also not possible from wallet addresses, or even people who have sent to me); and 3) Verify I even had enough shards of a key accessible to me in my home to transfer funds to you anyway (not to mention 4) Outgun me), all the violence in the world isn't going to bypass the math. If you're violent enough, nothing is going to protect me or the people I love from you, but that's regardless of whether my money is in Bitcoin or USD. There's no disadvantage for Bitcoin here. The added difficulty of your obtaining the reward you seek actually reduces your incentive to try. The only incentive to kill me then is blind violence, and I guess you can admit to that motivation if you want, but it's protective for me against anyone less psychotically violent than that.
- tome 6y ago
  What math prevents a big enough group of miners and users rolling back the blockchain?
  - jude- 6y ago
    I'd rather that happen to my country's wealth than have it bombed out of existence.
hakesdev 6y ago
This. 100%. Bitcoin (like gold since the gold standard ended) is just a "check" on Fiat currencies and can act as insulation from central banks that issue too much money too quickly. Fiats will continue to exist alongside bitcoin/cryptos, they'll just eventually have to "compete" a bit more (i.e., not be printed so readily by gov'ts) or else they'll become significantly less relevant.
- bayesian_horse 6y ago
  Or governments will just ban the use of cryptocurrency and instantly marginalize its use. Lots of good reasons to do so, if only to prevent the democratic power over market regulation becoming "much less relevant".
  - hakesdev 6y ago
    It seems to me you've not thought through the game theory of banning cryptocurrency very much. There's an immediate competitive advantage (in the form of increased business activity & tax revenue) to the first country to adopt clear, consistent rules regards CCs and their use. If a few big countries try to ban it, that competitive advantage becomes even stronger for any country willing to buck the trend.
    - bayesian_horse 6y ago
      For one thing I said there are good reasons to completely ban cryptocurrencies. For another I didn't even say there aren't any good reasons against it. Your reasoning is faulty, because you underestimate the ability of countries to cooperate. The US could probably even enact a virtually global ban on its own. Yes, some countries could try and resist, or some companies (and criminal organizations, of course) but they would be instantly limited to a much smaller market. The only thing nations would have to do is make the interface between the Bitcoin economy and the rest of the economy illegal and too cumbersome. Bitcoin wouldn't die, but it would crash hard.
      - hakesdev 6y ago
zozbot234 6y ago
The "core reason" for cryptocurrency is to provide decentralized trust, albeit at very high cost. "Escaping inflation and control" is not the issue here; the real upside is to provide a baseline of control by market participants where there's currently none, e.g. in places without a functioning financial system. Cryptocurrency is very niche tech at best, that most people will have zero use for - but it should nonetheless be available. The OP article does not account for this at all, and is thus extremely misguided.
samvher 6y ago
> But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. How is it that someone can't steal your money? The bank makes sure. How is it the bank can be sure? The cops protect them. How is it the cops aren't overwhelmed? The military protects them. At first glance, I find this an interesting take and it makes me rethink some things. But I don't think I find it very convincing, or at least it's too exaggerated. Fighter jets and nukes primarily protect physical property and institutions, not cash. The primary purpose of banks is to lend, i.e. to allocate resources, not to protect people's cash. And police don't spend much of their time on currency theft - it's much more about order in public space. A side effect of all these things is a stable society in which cash can thrive (backed by the idea that you can pay your taxes in it). I'm willing to believe that bitcoin would survive certain modes of societal collapse that fiat currency wouldn't. I'm not sure that those modes are particularly likely to happen.
- jasode 6y ago
  >But I don't think I find it very convincing, or at least it's too exaggerated. Fighter jets and nukes primarily protect physical property and institutions, not cash. Typically, the concept of "military force" like fighter jets, aircraft carriers, etc in criticism about fiat currency (especially $USD) is about connecting the dots to explain the strength of that currency. E.g., USA gets Saudi Arabia to sell oil denominated in $USD and in exchange, Saudi Arabia monarchy gets "protection" from invasion by enemies like Iraq. This is one concept of the "petrodollar". This military protection requires fighter jets, etc. This makes $USD valuable to acquire by other foreign countries that want to buy oil. In contrast, Bitcoin doesn't need the expense of the military to decree that it's valuable; people just voluntarily agree to exchange it for value. (E.g. exchange 10000 bitcoins for 2 large pizzas.[1]) The (wasted?) energy for defending the $USD is more diffused among different institutions so it's harder to measure -- and thus harder to criticize. In any case, energy usage also includes the Treasury Dept's Secret Service anti-counterfeiting force running around the world to stop fake currency. The Bureau of Engraving that prints the sheets of paper currency. US Mint stamping coins. All the above require enormous energy expenditure as well. Then you have the energy costs of the Fed Reserve, member banks, etc all doing settlement with each other and the associated security systems to protect from hacking. Bitcoin doesn't need any of that. Does bitcoin use more or less energy than the collective sum of energy to maintain integrity of $USD? I have no idea. What's the best complete accounting of the carbon footprint for $USD? [1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0
abakker 6y ago
I never understand the counter-inflation argument...most economists understand inflation is something to be managed, but it is far from proven that target inflation is bad. There are many useful economic properties of inflation. Meanwhile, Bitcoin has undergone such massive speculative appreciation that everything around it has deflated in comparison. As a result, bitcoin is spectacularly less useful than it would have been. It is no longer useful as a method of transaction and really only a ledger and store of value. this inflation argument is specious. It just isn't the problem that demanded an unregulated anonymous deflationary currency.
- seibelj 6y ago
  It has never been proven that deflation is bad - Keynesians claim this is the worst thing in the world, but I still have never had it explained to me coherently way deflation is inherently a bad thing.
  - abakker 6y ago
    the Keynesian wisdom was that Inflation is good for borrowers and that deflation is good for lenders. Most governments are managing for borrowers since borrowers tend to be investing and it has been a long-held economic axiom that investment is good. Deflation decreases the value of work you have already done.
    - imtringued 6y ago
      >Deflation decreases the value of work you have already done. Are you sure? Deflation increases the value of work you have already done and decreases the value of work you will do in the future. Simple example: If I immediately convert my paycheck in BTC then I would have earned more BTC in 2013 than in 2021. My work in 2013 would be worth more than the work I did in 2021.
      - seibelj 6y ago
        You have a misunderstanding of "value", "worth", "cost", "price", etc. In our inflationary environment, you would (ideally) be paid more for the same service in the future. This does not mean you are automatically worth more every second that passes - rather, the value of the money you are paid in declines. A loaf of bread is a loaf of bread, but the dollar declines in value continuously. You do not automatically think your skills are "worth more" with every second that passes in an inflationary world, just as your skills aren't "worth less" in a deflationary world by virtue of time passing. In a deflationary environment, you would naturally be paid less over time, rather than paid more. Rather than a default of losing money, you are in default of gaining money. Prices adjust lower, and by saving money you are naturally gaining wealth vs. people with lower time preference who are spending money. But in reality, all of this is psychology. There is an amount of wealth in the world, and this is the sum total of all owned assets. We can use any unit of measurement we like to value this. If today there is $1 million total in existence, and tomorrow we double the money supply and there is $2 million, we aren't all suddenly 2x richer. Just as when the central banks print money, people aren't richer - we are redistributing wealth away from people's savings and towards the receivers of money. Wealth is only truly created when useful and productive enterprises grow.
wk_end 6y ago
I’m not sure if there’s a good way to measure how much CO2 is used to enforce fiat, but I very strongly suspect that it’s nowhere near as much as Bitcoin requires per economic unit or whatever. Bitcoin’s already using several country’s worth of CO2 and it’s still (compared to fiat) very fringe. Also bear in mind that much of that CO2 generated by the force you’re describing, aside from the people guarding the banks directly, is amortized across all the other things that force guards. Even if fiat were replaced by Bitcoin overnight almost all of it would still need to be around.
- beiller 6y ago
  Bitcoin doesn't use several countries worth of CO2. It has been "calculated" that "cryptocurrency" uses as much electricity as a small country. But that is not Bitcoin. Bitcoin does not use GPUs to mine. They use specialized chips which are far more efficient than GPUs. Etherium is the currency burning all the electricity. Also, you are conflating CO2 with electricity. Which is not correct in my opinion because electricy can generated via nuclear, wind and solar. In fact,any miners migrate to those power generation modes because it's cheaper for them. Electricity price is part of the ROI of mining.
  - wk_end 6y ago
    Please see https://cbeci.org/cbeci/comparisons https://cbeci.org/cbeci/comparisons If Bitcoin were a country, on its own, it'd be ranked 27th in the world on energy consumption. Looking at the chart there it very clearly uses as much energy as several countries (say: New Zealand, Hungary, and Peru) put together.
majormajor 6y ago
The "backed by guns" argument ignores the more powerful backing force of a society's belief and actions. Things don't daily come to the point of us being forced to believe our currency is valuable with guns and nukes, we just created this system because it's one we wanted to live in, and having such a fiat currency makes a lot of things easier. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is using its energy constantly.
- thoughtstheseus 6y ago
  Backed by taxes. You’ll always need to pay taxes.
Luker88 6y ago
> clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally just 2 points: * using crypto will not make the military stop existing * switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems ...but bitcoin will not even consider keeping PoW and switching to argon2, since the investment of miners in dedicated hardware is too great So I think honestly the bitcoin community is stuck. It will not change, not even when there are options that would only improve the technology underneath. Still stuck at less than 10 transactions/sec, I see. As a tech enthusiast, bitcoin has lost all its value to me. As an investor, the quick value fluctuations and overall value increase are a great thing. To me, the conclusion is that bitcoin is not anymore about tech (the project is completely static at this point), it's not about anonymity (it never was anonymous), it's not about distributed stuff (dedicated hardware and search for cheaper power are concentrating mining). It's just about quick investment that gets you money. Everything else feels like a lie.
- temp8964 6y ago
  One more factor though: path dependency. For historical reason, BTC is the most popular cryptocurrency. Maybe as you said, an altcoin with PoW is a better choice. (Or maybe there are other reasons PoW is not good. Let's just take your statement as true for the sake of discussion.) But you can't change everybody's mind like turn off a switch. Adoption takes time and change people's mind is difficult, but it doesn't make everyone else to be lying.
- jude- 6y ago
  > switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems This will also create a very severe problem: it makes it so the means of coin production exist solely in the hands of the coin owners today. Those coin owners won't ever sell you enough coins for you to be a competitive staker. At least with PoW, I can make more coins through extrinsic means -- i.e. better mining hardware.
  - gremlinsinc 6y ago
    I've contemplated the idea of a coin that has a single wallet per person (sybil-proof identities must be implemented), these wallets have a max-limit of 1 billion coins, and coins are minted/staked and applied randomly to the lowest 5%, maybe it'd have a use-it-or-lose-it thing built in as well, where if you just sit on your coins and never have any transactions occur it just assumes you might be a "dead" account and recycles a percentage of your coins for "unuse", and that percentage goes up the longer you are without any transactions until it just redistributes your entire wallet... Example would be if you had 1 US bank account sitting on a billion, never used it, so the govt is like, well you're not using that so we'll give it to someone else lol. I personally am against billionaires existing. So, capping a coin at 1 billion or 999 million, makes sense to me - but only if there can ever be only 1 wallet per person. There could maybe be sub-wallets, but these are more like drawers in a dresser where the dresser is the wallet, and the drawers are compartments. Maybe a compartment in the wallet is a joint compartment that you share with a spouse, child, or a business/DAO or some other form of trust... There's a lot of things possible, that could happen... but I think PoW still makes bad sense, because we do have a global warming issue that is starting to pick up in terms of severity.
khmmr 6y ago
You do understand that cops and fighter jets and nukes are the only reason why you are not slaving in labor camp for some foreign power? It's a necessity. Bitcoin is useless for anyone's physical safety. As of today is provides almost zero value at all. You could argue, that censorship resistance is helpful for people living in authoritarian regimes but that's about it, so the only value it has comes from it being "illegal" in some region. At the same time Bitcoin is already wasting as much resources as some mid-sized European country. The environmental argument is relevant in every way.
lmilcin 6y ago
> Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. All of it is CO2. Let me explain. When you burn energy for bitcoin mining, you don't just use capacity of your local energy producer, you are delaying removal of legacy power producers. Before a particular power producer (for example burning coal) can be turned off, the capacity must be created from other sources (for example renewable). If you decide to start burning huge amount of energy, before those CO2 guzzlers can be turned off we will now have to build even more capacity -- exactly the amount you are burning to mine bitcoin, but it also means that while this is happening the CO2 is still being emitted. This assumes that introduction of new renewable sources of energy is independent from bitcoin mining. As far as I know this is true. Or in other words: if introduction of renewable sources of energy is independent of bitcoin mining, the energy production from these sources is the same regardless of whether the bitcoin mining exists or not. Logically what this means that what is changing is energy production from non-renewable sources and it could be explained that they are working at either higher capacity or their removal is delayed.
- kortilla 6y ago
  > This assumes that introduction of new renewable sources of energy is independent from bitcoin mining. As far as I know this is true. It is not. There are marooned renewable energy sources (dams) that have had limited usage (the dams being mainly for flood control) until miners came along. Building high capacity transmission lines to them wasn’t economical.
  - lmilcin 6y ago
    So where and how much of the mining network utilizes this or similar? We are looking for at least significant portion of 130TWh the mining network currently uses. I just don't see all those old dams adding anywhere close to 1% of that value (although you have a chance to post your sources). You see, bitcoin mining currently uses 10x the amount of capacity used by Google and 50% of what ALL DATACENTERS IN THE WORLD are using. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56215787 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56215787 Your argument doesn't hold any water (pun intended).
- 6y ago
agentultra 6y ago
If you want to reduce the number of wars and conflicts there are better, more effective ways. Work towards ending racism; support young girls, women, and LGBTQ+ folks around the world; support environmental protections and projects that reduce food waste and increase water security; support fiscal policies that reduce wealth inequality; and topple authoritarian dictators and fascists. In this techno-libertarian utopia when someone defrauds you and steals your crypto-coins your only recourse is to buy the justice you can afford. Exchanges have already done this to folks who've been defrauded and sought recourse. Regulation and protections are in place to protect consumers just as much as they are there to limit damage from bad actors. I don't buy this notion that the world would be better off without a central banking system.
- nbardy 6y ago
  > and topple authoritarian dictators and fascists. This makes the violence worse every time the Americans stumble in and think they know how to fix a country by instilling new leadership.
  - p_l 6y ago
    Most cases are about installing a new dictator that supports US economic interests
jonnycomputer 6y ago
And frankly, bitcoin is intentionally deflationary, and that is almost certainly bad for economies. Why should I buy now when I'll save money by buying later? Why should I start my business now when my investment capital will be worth more later?
kortilla 6y ago
The Bitcoin network depends on a global functioning Internet. That depends on all of the defense, government cooperation, etc to stay stable.
thatguy0900 6y ago
What's stopping a group of people from abducting you and beating you for your bitcoin or breaking into your house when your not home to find and take your wallet? Those same police. That argument doesn't really hold up, it's not like someone can't force you to give them your bitcoins
lmilcin 6y ago
There is no "core" reason for cryptocurrencies. This is romantic bullshit perpetuated by people invested in it. The reality is, as I have predicted long ago, if bitcoin becomes large portion of worlds financial flow it will just be taken over by financial institutions and perverted for their use. These guys have much more experience at this (ie subverting financial systems) than you can imagine. Bitcoin is not going to stop wars and bring law and order. If bitcoin was supposed to be the safest method to move funds around then why people have higher chance of loosing their bitcoin for various reasons than almost any other kind of equity? You are just naive.
- biolurker1 6y ago
  Have you ever taken a step back and realizing how much hate is there in your speech and why is it so?
gher-shyu3i 6y ago
Good points. There's also the argument that some of us want nothing to do with interest and usury. And fiat currencies by definition are usurious currencies due to how the government runs its finances.
6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago
> But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. I don't like this meme. Fiat currency is backed by an entire democracy that includes a military, but the key piece here isn't the military, it's the democracy. Despite all the problems in the US and our economic system, the folks in charge of the currency generally have the right mandate (stable employment and stable prices).
- redisman 6y ago
  Bitcoin also runs on infrastructure that is backed by the exact same forces. Networks, electricity, the computers. You couldn't have Bitcoin if those resources weren't protected by your government. Otherwise I can for example find the top 100 largest Bitcoin miners and walk up to their door with guns and demand all their Bitcoins or I'll blow up the mines.
  - jonkho 6y ago
    Do you think you may be unsuccessful and get blown away by their own security apparatus?
gremlinsinc 6y ago
I'm not the biggest proponent of bitcoin, some of that is angst from not hodling any, but a lot is I feel it was more of a "concept" or "mvp". Ethereum/Cardano and other newer chains/tech are the actual "reason" for crypto. DeFi, and De-centralized autonomous organizations are the real world-changing things, eventually we could see a coin with automated taxation/basic income and identities (sybil-proof), it could essentially "beat" poverty and income inequality. Bitcoin is an energy hog, and not very exciting... but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater cause there's TON of exciting research on blockchain that's way better. I think long-term bitcoin may fall out of popularity, esp as all the new things hit w/ ethereum, cardano, and their competitors and all the sub-chains on them and level-2 making it so transactions aren't nearly as costly.
- atweiden 6y ago
  > Ethereum/Cardano and other newer chains/tech are the actual "reason" for crypto Not according to the Bitcoin genesis block, without which Ethereum never would’ve existed.
simonsarris 6y ago
Back in 2017 I wrote an article about the "backed by fighter jets and nukes" point because it seemed by far the most intuitive way to reason about it. https://medium.com/@simon.sarris/the-guns-of-bitcoin-1f779309a718 https://medium.com/@simon.sarris/the-guns-of-bitcoin-1f77930...
andreilys 6y ago
And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine No one except for the owners of major BTC mining operations. If a state actor, such as China, was motivated enough to identify, capture and coerce these miners it would be pretty easy to perform a 51% attack given that China accounts for around 65% of all bitcoin mining globally.
- dnautics 6y ago
  "pretty easy"? Exactly how do you Envision this attack going down, step by step?
  - blake1 6y ago
    Government agents show up at the data center and confiscate the servers in the mining pool. The coerce the owners into turning over the login credentials. Or they just deploy their own mining pool. Or the just tax all of their citizens’ cryptos. They have lots of options, since they have the power of the state behind them.
    - dnautics 6y ago
      Why wouldn't the network soft fork?
      - snarf21 6y ago
        China can rinse/repeat on any soft fork. There is also the ability to block crypto networks at the ISP level.
      - hudon 6y ago
        If stakeholders can manipulate the network to ignore a chain with more work, you’ve kind of undermined the whole proof-of-work thing and conceded that Bitcoin is ultimately subject to politics just like any other financial system.
neuralRiot 6y ago
>This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. Probably the article ignores it but not the governments or corporations who suddenly are worried about the environment.
TezNoble1988 6y ago
The idea that inflation is some sort of creeping evil that needs to be "solved for" is a made up fantasy of cryptocurrency zealots and libertarians. There's nothing inherently "wrong" or "bad" about inflation when it is controlled and stable, and in fact some low level of positive inflation is a good thing. Inflation is a bogeyman that was invented by the crypto-industrial complex to justify the environmental disaster and criminal danger that cryptocurrencies wreak on society.
- nbardy 6y ago
  Inflation is a problem when there is no way to beat it and it's hidden in stimulus bills that the majority of the country is too busy working to pay bills to spend time understanding. Most of my friends can't afford investment in the market. So when the stock market goes up that's them losing value on their dollar and wages. Inflation is fine for those who are part of the asset class.
  - TezNoble1988 6y ago
    There is very little consensus around whether these stimulus bills will create inflationary pressure or not. Inflation generally isn't a concern when unemployment is high; if anything, short-term inflation may be caused by a drop in supply and excess savings caused by COVID, a systemic event which would also cause BTC-denominated prices to increase if consumer goods were actually priced in BTC. I'm not sure what you mean by, "when the stock market goes up that's them losing value on their dollar and wages" -> that simply doesn't make sense
    - nbardy 6y ago
      > that simply doesn't make any sense. It does you just don't understand yet. Let me try and explain. Inflation measured by the government in CPI is a bad metric. It doesn't include ownership in assets which is the ability to retire. We already had inflation if you measure the cost of retirement in USD. With the spending package we drove a bull run. The SP500 going up in price is equivalent to the value of USD going down for anyone who doesn't own part of the market. They have to buy in at higher and higher cost. Younger generations have been priced out of an ability to own and in turn retire. While those who owned assets experienced a nice boost this year. When the cost of retirement goes up the value of USD goes down just like anything else.
jonnycomputer 6y ago
Of course crypto depends on the government. Miners can have their infrastructure investment stolen. Holders of currencies can be robbed, or extorted. The transfer of those currencies pass through infrastructure set up and maintained or regulated by governments. And frankly, it takes energy to mine, so if crypto became integral to national political and economic interests, there is not going to be any net change in energy politics. You are not unlinking the petroleum and currency in those petrodollars, you're replacing it with something that directly links to two inescapably.
deleted 6y ago
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mhluongo 6y ago
Thanks for this. The level of discourse around Bitcoin on HN gives me ulcers.. really appreciate the breath of fresh air.
abrahamepton 6y ago
This is pretty damn incoherent. > the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control Maybe in a whitepaper. In the real world, it's mostly about speculation and enabling crime. > Law and order stands on the backs of a lot of stuff and CO2. Bitcoin is an example of one little piece of this not needing all that stuff. Ok...? This is nonsensical. > Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine. Or someone can beat you up and make you give them your password. Rubber-hose decryption has a long track record and is trivial for the right actor to implement, this isn't some weird edge-case. > It's a small step in the direction of getting away from all these endless wars and control. Citation badly needed; how does cryptocurrency "get away from all these endless wars"? > Carbon tax CO2 Ok, this is correct and not incoherent.
- Tenoke 6y ago
  >enabling crime. Is this about DNMs? Because last I checked their volume is tiny.
  - fphhotchips 6y ago
    Ransomware is a key one, also.
- RinTohsaka 6y ago
  > Maybe in a whitepaper. In the real world, it's mostly about speculation and enabling crime. Speculation I could agree with... however, Crime? Really? Got anything to back this up? The vast majority of crime is performed using cash. https://hodlhard.io/blog/bitcoin-crime/ https://hodlhard.io/blog/bitcoin-crime/
  - boc 6y ago
    > Just last week, the United Nations alleged that North Korea was funding its nuclear weapons program using funds from hacked cryptocurrency exchanges, alongside other thefts. The U.N. believes that over $300 million in crypto assets have been stolen by various North Korean hackers.[1] > Iranian thinktanks have also emphasized the need for the nation’s government to use cryptocurrencies to circumvent US-led international sanctions. It now appears that the Office of President Hassan Rouhani has become more serious about using crypto. [2] A rapidly growing percent of nuclear weapons proliferation is being funded by crypto. That's way worse for the planet than crime performed using cash. [1] https://www.coindesk.com/doj-charges-3-north-korean-hackers-with-stealing-100m-from-crypto-exchanges https://www.coindesk.com/doj-charges-3-north-korean-hackers-... [2] https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2021/03/172786-iran-is-reportedly-planning-to-bypass-international-sanctions-by-engaging-in-bitcoin-mining-and-btc-transactions/ https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2021/03/172786-iran-is-repo...
bourgoin 6y ago
Why does it make a difference whether your wealth is denoted by USD, Bitcoin, milk caps, or Rai Stones? If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? And how does the medium of exchange have any bearing on nations going to war over control of oil, rare earth minerals, strategic islands? It seems to me you're implying that the colossal environmental damage inherent to a Bitcoin-driven world economy would be offset by the abolition of militaries, police, and banks, but I don't see how you make that jump. $trillions of military spending are used to secure resources and strategic assets and ensure national security, not to defend against bank robberies. A world without militaries or police is unimaginably different from our world in so many more ways than just the medium of exchange. And if you can't point guns at people to make them give up part of their pile, how will you implement the CO2 tax?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- nyolfen 6y ago
  the US dollar is backed by the petrodollar arrangement: oil exporters accept dollars for oil in exchange for defense guarantees and other benefits. everyone needs oil, so everyone needs dollars. the dollar is inextricably tied to oil consumption and the US is strategically invested in it. add to this that the US military is the single largest institutional consumer of oil on the planet. there is no coherent argument that bitcoin is worse for the environment than this. bitcoin only wants cheap energy; it is agnostic about what generates it, and incentivizes renewables since they tend to be the cheapest.
- kragen 6y ago
  > Why does it make a difference whether your wealth is denoted by USD, Bitcoin, milk caps, or Rai Stones? If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? The soldiers lining up your countrymen and shooting them in the head so they fall into a ditch become the new owners of your countrymen's USD and milk caps, but not their Bitcoin or rai stones. This kind of thing (the "pillaging" part of "raping and pillaging") is historically a major incentive for going to war. > If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? If your seed phrase is erased from your brain by a bullet, it probably doesn't do you much good. But it will completely change your life if you manage to escape: a refugee with pockets full of gold is observably different from a destitute pauper; a refugee who has memorized two seed phrases is not observably different from a refugee who has memorized only one. That's the difference between starting a new life as a homeless beggar and buying a country estate to retire on. > the colossal environmental damage inherent to a Bitcoin-driven world economy You seem to be begging the question here; why should we expect a Bitcoin-driven world economy to produce colossal environmental damage? Mining Bitcoin with fossil-fuel energy is unprofitable, so we should expect Bitcoin to produce a colossal shift to cheaper renewable energy, which may reverse the colossal environmental damage caused by fossil fuels. Or it may not.
VectorLock 6y ago
>And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine Or with all the mining concentrated in China, you can, as the Chinese government, take state ownership of all those miners and don't have to spend a jet or nuke to do it.
Fern_Blossom 6y ago
First, I'd like to really understand why people say crypto "escapes inflation". The only argument has been the artificial scarcity mechanisms built in the currency. Scarcity is a seasoning to the concept of value, not the main course. I don't know of anyone in economics in the last 100 years that has ever pushed forward the idea that scarcity is all you need to create value... except for Youtube economic cartoons. "Fiat currency" isn't backed by violence. It's backed by production in goods and/or services. You can see this easily play out in command-control economies. The resource rich, like Venezuela back in the day, was a prosperous country for a few years. Gov controlled oil meant that's how they made money. When the price of a barrel of oil is high, they just pump that oil, increasing the need of the international community to purchase their currency, bringing up the value. When their oil wasn't needed due to diversification of supply and the drop in price, no one "wants" said currency since the country had nothing anyone wanted. Thus, the value goes down and you have hyperinflation due to high economic specialization. All the military equipment they bought and posturing, which led to a hilarious wannabe propaganda-scare video, during the good years didn't amount to shit. You really think if Bitcoin magically became the almighty currency, war would disappear? I'm serious when I say this, quit watching Sesame Street and other children's shows. Be an adult. Read a history book. No good change will come from praying to unicorns. On average, less than 1% of a country's population is active law enforcement in the western world. It's just a hair over 1% in the US according to Bureau of Labor numbers and that includes all the admin/support/not-arresting LE as well. Y'all need to quit looking underneath your beds and checking your closest for the blue boogey man. They do a whole hell of a lot more than just "protect the banks". That's what G4S does with their tactical muffin tops. At that, here's a good example of the difference between what a police officer can do and what a sheriff deputy can do: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727/sweet-justice-a-florida-couple-forecloses-on-bank-of-america https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727... This happens more often than you think throughout the country. We don't hear about it because banks and other financial institutions swiftly put gag clauses in settlements. Banks do a fantastic job of teaching you how you can't use the justice system in your favor when in reality, you have more power than you imagine. Stop watching them youtube videos and go to the local library to learn more about local laws and procedures. Contest ownership... yea, still a problem with Bitcoin. Just look up "Bitcoin stolen" in your search engine of choice and there's article, after article, after article of theft and a cold day in hell's chance of retrieving it. There's nothing special there on that front. It's a preferred means of trade for the black market for a good reason. On one level, I don't care about the crypto ponzi scheme being played out. Let it happen. Madoff tricked a whole hell of a lot of people for around 20 years. Good. What ruffles my feathers, pushing a political agenda because you want to be rich in monopoly money, then use it to buy ice cream. Then throwing a fit because the cashier won't accept it. Yea, the amount of excess CO2 created by crypto mining is a valid and big problem. It's another industrial sized country on the world grid because of it. You act like this is some magic cure for "the poors", to help distribute wealth and other fantasies. Because there's a magic mechanism for a rich cat in USD to not do the same in BTC? The same way they garnered wealth in USD, GBP, JPY or EUR will do the same thing in any other new currency, making the point to the "revolution" null and void. Oh wait, Musk already started that. What's that, they found a good way for a loophole in being able to issue refunds in USD or BTC according to how they see fit depending which is cheaper? Yea, that sweet sweet "for the people" currency not going into the hands of the, what is he now, 3rd richest? 2nd richest? But I guess that makes him a fellow poor too since he's not 1st. Great step forward for that great reset. Let me tell ya'.
imtringued 6y ago
>This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. You aren't escaping inflation. You're escaping a savings glut which is the mortal enemy of inflation.
1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago
The "mining fleet", if it uses computers, requires electricity. Who controls the supply and sale of electricity. Nothing against desire to solve world problems but Bitcoin (edit: or any other example of a cryptocurrency) seems to be creating more problems than it purports to solve. The author calls cryptocurrencies a "predatory investment scheme". In practice, is this not correct. Is it not the lack of "law and order" with respect to cryptocurrencies that allows for this to occur. Please explain. Show me how cryptocurrency is solving world problems. Evidence, not speculation. When I was young people said that "money" itself was the root of all evil. Today, people online try to convince us that "fiat currency" is the problem. It does not feel like the same idealism. The original Satoshi paper made his idea sound like it would be possible to implement as peer-to-peer^1 without third parties. All the implementations I have seen to date involve third parties. Doubtful a coincidence that the third parties are all profiting from that involvement. 1. The term now has multiple meanings. Here it is used in the original, Napster sense. Peer-to-peer networking, not, e.g., peer-to-peer financial. Edit: To clarify further what I mean by peer-to-peer, can person A and B, assuming each knows how to reach the other through the internet (address:port), conduct a transaction without involvement of a third party. For example, a requirement for person A or B to "sign up for an account" with anyone else in order to start using a cryptocurrency would be "involvement of a third party". If persons A or B needed to have a third party "mine" the currency before transactions between A and B could occur, this would also be "involvement of a third party".
- Sargos 6y ago
  >The original Satoshi paper made his idea sound like it would be possible to implement as peer-to-peer^1 without third parties. All the implementations I have seen to date involve third parties. Bitcoin sort of stopped being developed years ago and pretty much everything shifted over to Ethereum where the ethos of Bitcoin were further developed and most of the things people talked about in 2010-2013 were actually developed. For example, Uniswap is completely peer-to-peer and decentralized. Most of DeFi is. If you are at all interested in what is happening in this space it's worth taking a look at what exists and what is being developed.
Lazare 6y ago
> I no longer think the environmental argument is really plausible here. Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. That seems like a non-sequitur. Proof of work crypto generates an astonishing large amount of CO2 to little effect. Some other alternatives are bad in other ways, yes, but that doesn't make the CO2 go away. I live in a small, peaceful, stable country with a very small military and very safe banks. If you're really trying to make some sort of argument that fiat currencies can't exist without a significant CO2 expenditure to try and enforce neoliberal orthodoxy at the barrel of a gun then that is very obviously untrue. > Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade So your argument is that nobody will steal my fiat currency from my electronic wallet (aka, bank account) because of the police, but nobody will steal my crypto currency from my electronic wallet because of their respect for pure math; no need for law and order? Respectfully, you might want to try and develop that argument a little further. > It's a small step in the direction of getting away from all these endless wars and control. Key driver of most wars is resources, especially energy, not money. I'm confident that we are not collectively dumb enough as a species to end up in a state where we're fighting wars to obtain energy resources to fuel blockchain mining, but that is a thing that can theoretically happen. I think you're falling prey to the is/ought distinction. It would be nice if crypto currencies could somehow create world peace, resolve the contradictions of late stage capitalism, cure cancer, <fill in your dream here>. But they obviously can't, and I would suggest pretending otherwise is pointless.
kaliali 6y ago
The environment argument isnt plausible when you add in proof of stake Cryptos the use thousands or millions of times less electricity than Cryptos like Bitcoin or Ethereum. People really do not know basic fundamental info on crypt I currencies and they make horrible arguments like these, spreading their ignorance.
hakfoo 6y ago
The thing is that we're already paying for most of the law/order/government infrastructure anyway. Once you hire the cops and soldiers to enforce "he can't take your sticks and rocks", "he can't reallocate your bank balance" adds trivial overhead.
nec4b 6y ago
>But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. How is it that someone can't steal your money? The bank makes sure. How is it the bank can be sure? The cops protect them. How is it the cops aren't overwhelmed? The military protects them. Law and order stands on the backs of a lot of stuff and CO2. Bitcoin is an example of one little piece of this not needing all that stuff. Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine. Who do you think is keeping the infrastructure (electricity, internet, companies that produce equipment,..) on which bitcoin runs safe?

quickthrower2 6y ago

If we are Saying fiat is backed by fighter jets then Bitcoin is backed by selling dangerous fake MDMA. That’s if we are getting into that way of arguing which hopefully we are not.

rybosworld 6y ago
That's really not a solid argument. Bitcoin doesn't depend on drugs to have value, anymore than the US dollar does.
- bayesian_horse 6y ago
  Bitcoin does seem to depend to a large degree on money laundering and speculation on money laundering. You might not like it, but that is definitely the reality. Other kinds of currency and investment are a few times more useful as long as you are doing legitimate business.
  - thirtythree 6y ago
    Source?
  - quickthrower2 6y ago
    The Bitcoin network could happy live without those things, as could trade, but price action depends on them. For example the 10000 BTC pizza was one of the early purchases. If BTC stayed at 0.1c then you could still use it and it was used. Caveat to this is now the mining infra means that returning to 1c coins would kill Bitcoin as a secure network since no one would mine for profit - the only reason to mine is the 51% attack
    - bayesian_horse 6y ago
      What does "happily live without it" even mean? Fact is that Bitcoin is used a whole lot for laundering and transferring money in illegal businesses or across borders without taxation. The "legal" part of Bitcoin transactions which aren't just for investment or speculation, like "Pizza sales" or something, are, for one thing not that practical, for another not that popular or significant. So it does stand to reason that most of the speculation is around the use of Bitcoin for laundering money. And even those with the best intentions are helping the money launderers by keeping the network alive and secure.
      - quickthrower2 6y ago
        I mean you can have nodes, miners, block creation without the dark things you mentioned. Bitcoin price might be lower. But this is hypothetical anyway because with ASIC mining and dedicated power plants you can’t go back to a low price (other than zero i.e. network trust is lost!). I would imagine even $1000 Bitcoin now would introduce issues of too much hash power. With too much has power and not enough mining incentive in USD terms you’ll just get network attacks.
Kranar 6y ago
If you're being serious, the safest drugs were the ones sold online using Bitcoin. The Silk Road was actually an unbelievably reliable and safe way to acquire drugs. A system for rating vendors and reporting issues, incredibly competitive market that put pressure on vendors along with delivery right to your home or the closest post office by the USPS instead of having to either meet a dealer in a sketchy part of town or have them come deliver it to you themselves.
SkyBelow 6y ago
Exactly what bitcoin is backed by is something of a mystery for economist to debate. Much of it is people speculating, but I don't see anything unreasonable with saying much of the value, at least pre-speculation, is from its use to carry out illegal transactions. There is some use in other areas so I wouldn't say it was ever entirely the case, but I don't see what's wrong with arguing it was a major factor and is still somewhat of a factor. I do expect between speculation and alt coins better made for hiding activity it is a small and shrinking factor now, but I could be wrong.

tome 6y ago

> This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation I'm extremely confused by this argument that I see again and again. If you want to avoid your assets losing value to inflation that you can buy assets that are resistant to inflation, such as stocks, real estate, land, gold, inflation-adjusted bonds ... I just don't see that cryptocurrencies are particularly useful for that. What's the deal here?

rybosworld 6y ago
I think the major point is that Bitcoin seems to benefit disproportionately from inflation. It may be the case that it's the single best hedge against inflation. But yes, there are lot's of things that protect against inflation.
- tome 6y ago
  > Bitcoin seems to benefit disproportionately from inflation Does it? On what basis would one know that? Why should it benefit from inflation more than gold, say?
  - rybosworld 6y ago
    My argument would be it's the only thing on that list of inflation hedges that has a fixed supply. Lot's of gold is mined each year. Houses are built. Stock is issued, etc. Bitcoin has a well-established upper limit.
    - tome 6y ago
      > [Bitcoin is] the only thing on that list of inflation hedges that has a fixed supply. Aha! That brings me to my next question. In what sense does bitcoin actually have a fixed supply? Sure, a loose coalition of people agree for it to have a fixed supply at the moment, but if enough of the miners, core developers, etc. agree they can change the rules arbitrarily, viz. hard forks. Why should we believe that bitcoin really has a fixed supply, just because everyone has roughly stuck to the rules so far?

smeej 6y ago

This is such an underappreciated point. U.S. dollars are backed by violence. Bitcoin is backed by math. I don't know what you want backing your money in the world you hope to leave for future generations, but I know what I want backing mine.

dionidium 6y ago
It's not underappreicated; it's facile. Everything you do in society is backed by the state's monopoly on violence. What are you going to do when I storm into your house with guns, kill your family, and demand access to your wallet? Appeal to math?
- smeej 6y ago
  Given that you would first have to 1) Identify me as a target worth pursuing (not possible from my wallet addresses if I practice adequate sanitizing of inputs); 2) Figure out where I live (also not possible from wallet addresses, or even people who have sent to me); and 3) Verify I even had enough shards of a key accessible to me in my home to transfer funds to you anyway (not to mention 4) Outgun me), all the violence in the world isn't going to bypass the math. If you're violent enough, nothing is going to protect me or the people I love from you, but that's regardless of whether my money is in Bitcoin or USD. There's no disadvantage for Bitcoin here. The added difficulty of your obtaining the reward you seek actually reduces your incentive to try. The only incentive to kill me then is blind violence, and I guess you can admit to that motivation if you want, but it's protective for me against anyone less psychotically violent than that.
tome 6y ago
What math prevents a big enough group of miners and users rolling back the blockchain?
- jude- 6y ago
  I'd rather that happen to my country's wealth than have it bombed out of existence.

hakesdev 6y ago

This. 100%. Bitcoin (like gold since the gold standard ended) is just a "check" on Fiat currencies and can act as insulation from central banks that issue too much money too quickly. Fiats will continue to exist alongside bitcoin/cryptos, they'll just eventually have to "compete" a bit more (i.e., not be printed so readily by gov'ts) or else they'll become significantly less relevant.

bayesian_horse 6y ago
Or governments will just ban the use of cryptocurrency and instantly marginalize its use. Lots of good reasons to do so, if only to prevent the democratic power over market regulation becoming "much less relevant".
- hakesdev 6y ago
  It seems to me you've not thought through the game theory of banning cryptocurrency very much. There's an immediate competitive advantage (in the form of increased business activity & tax revenue) to the first country to adopt clear, consistent rules regards CCs and their use. If a few big countries try to ban it, that competitive advantage becomes even stronger for any country willing to buck the trend.
  - bayesian_horse 6y ago
    For one thing I said there are good reasons to completely ban cryptocurrencies. For another I didn't even say there aren't any good reasons against it. Your reasoning is faulty, because you underestimate the ability of countries to cooperate. The US could probably even enact a virtually global ban on its own. Yes, some countries could try and resist, or some companies (and criminal organizations, of course) but they would be instantly limited to a much smaller market. The only thing nations would have to do is make the interface between the Bitcoin economy and the rest of the economy illegal and too cumbersome. Bitcoin wouldn't die, but it would crash hard.
    - hakesdev 6y ago

zozbot234 6y ago

The "core reason" for cryptocurrency is to provide decentralized trust, albeit at very high cost. "Escaping inflation and control" is not the issue here; the real upside is to provide a baseline of control by market participants where there's currently none, e.g. in places without a functioning financial system. Cryptocurrency is very niche tech at best, that most people will have zero use for - but it should nonetheless be available. The OP article does not account for this at all, and is thus extremely misguided.

samvher 6y ago

> But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. How is it that someone can't steal your money? The bank makes sure. How is it the bank can be sure? The cops protect them. How is it the cops aren't overwhelmed? The military protects them. At first glance, I find this an interesting take and it makes me rethink some things. But I don't think I find it very convincing, or at least it's too exaggerated. Fighter jets and nukes primarily protect physical property and institutions, not cash. The primary purpose of banks is to lend, i.e. to allocate resources, not to protect people's cash. And police don't spend much of their time on currency theft - it's much more about order in public space. A side effect of all these things is a stable society in which cash can thrive (backed by the idea that you can pay your taxes in it). I'm willing to believe that bitcoin would survive certain modes of societal collapse that fiat currency wouldn't. I'm not sure that those modes are particularly likely to happen.

jasode 6y ago
>But I don't think I find it very convincing, or at least it's too exaggerated. Fighter jets and nukes primarily protect physical property and institutions, not cash. Typically, the concept of "military force" like fighter jets, aircraft carriers, etc in criticism about fiat currency (especially $USD) is about connecting the dots to explain the strength of that currency. E.g., USA gets Saudi Arabia to sell oil denominated in $USD and in exchange, Saudi Arabia monarchy gets "protection" from invasion by enemies like Iraq. This is one concept of the "petrodollar". This military protection requires fighter jets, etc. This makes $USD valuable to acquire by other foreign countries that want to buy oil. In contrast, Bitcoin doesn't need the expense of the military to decree that it's valuable; people just voluntarily agree to exchange it for value. (E.g. exchange 10000 bitcoins for 2 large pizzas.[1]) The (wasted?) energy for defending the $USD is more diffused among different institutions so it's harder to measure -- and thus harder to criticize. In any case, energy usage also includes the Treasury Dept's Secret Service anti-counterfeiting force running around the world to stop fake currency. The Bureau of Engraving that prints the sheets of paper currency. US Mint stamping coins. All the above require enormous energy expenditure as well. Then you have the energy costs of the Fed Reserve, member banks, etc all doing settlement with each other and the associated security systems to protect from hacking. Bitcoin doesn't need any of that. Does bitcoin use more or less energy than the collective sum of energy to maintain integrity of $USD? I have no idea. What's the best complete accounting of the carbon footprint for $USD? [1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137.0

abakker 6y ago

I never understand the counter-inflation argument...most economists understand inflation is something to be managed, but it is far from proven that target inflation is bad. There are many useful economic properties of inflation. Meanwhile, Bitcoin has undergone such massive speculative appreciation that everything around it has deflated in comparison. As a result, bitcoin is spectacularly less useful than it would have been. It is no longer useful as a method of transaction and really only a ledger and store of value. this inflation argument is specious. It just isn't the problem that demanded an unregulated anonymous deflationary currency.

seibelj 6y ago
It has never been proven that deflation is bad - Keynesians claim this is the worst thing in the world, but I still have never had it explained to me coherently way deflation is inherently a bad thing.
- abakker 6y ago
  the Keynesian wisdom was that Inflation is good for borrowers and that deflation is good for lenders. Most governments are managing for borrowers since borrowers tend to be investing and it has been a long-held economic axiom that investment is good. Deflation decreases the value of work you have already done.
  - imtringued 6y ago
    >Deflation decreases the value of work you have already done. Are you sure? Deflation increases the value of work you have already done and decreases the value of work you will do in the future. Simple example: If I immediately convert my paycheck in BTC then I would have earned more BTC in 2013 than in 2021. My work in 2013 would be worth more than the work I did in 2021.
    - seibelj 6y ago
      You have a misunderstanding of "value", "worth", "cost", "price", etc. In our inflationary environment, you would (ideally) be paid more for the same service in the future. This does not mean you are automatically worth more every second that passes - rather, the value of the money you are paid in declines. A loaf of bread is a loaf of bread, but the dollar declines in value continuously. You do not automatically think your skills are "worth more" with every second that passes in an inflationary world, just as your skills aren't "worth less" in a deflationary world by virtue of time passing. In a deflationary environment, you would naturally be paid less over time, rather than paid more. Rather than a default of losing money, you are in default of gaining money. Prices adjust lower, and by saving money you are naturally gaining wealth vs. people with lower time preference who are spending money. But in reality, all of this is psychology. There is an amount of wealth in the world, and this is the sum total of all owned assets. We can use any unit of measurement we like to value this. If today there is $1 million total in existence, and tomorrow we double the money supply and there is $2 million, we aren't all suddenly 2x richer. Just as when the central banks print money, people aren't richer - we are redistributing wealth away from people's savings and towards the receivers of money. Wealth is only truly created when useful and productive enterprises grow.

wk_end 6y ago

I’m not sure if there’s a good way to measure how much CO2 is used to enforce fiat, but I very strongly suspect that it’s nowhere near as much as Bitcoin requires per economic unit or whatever. Bitcoin’s already using several country’s worth of CO2 and it’s still (compared to fiat) very fringe. Also bear in mind that much of that CO2 generated by the force you’re describing, aside from the people guarding the banks directly, is amortized across all the other things that force guards. Even if fiat were replaced by Bitcoin overnight almost all of it would still need to be around.

beiller 6y ago
Bitcoin doesn't use several countries worth of CO2. It has been "calculated" that "cryptocurrency" uses as much electricity as a small country. But that is not Bitcoin. Bitcoin does not use GPUs to mine. They use specialized chips which are far more efficient than GPUs. Etherium is the currency burning all the electricity. Also, you are conflating CO2 with electricity. Which is not correct in my opinion because electricy can generated via nuclear, wind and solar. In fact,any miners migrate to those power generation modes because it's cheaper for them. Electricity price is part of the ROI of mining.
- wk_end 6y ago
  Please see https://cbeci.org/cbeci/comparisons https://cbeci.org/cbeci/comparisons If Bitcoin were a country, on its own, it'd be ranked 27th in the world on energy consumption. Looking at the chart there it very clearly uses as much energy as several countries (say: New Zealand, Hungary, and Peru) put together.

majormajor 6y ago

The "backed by guns" argument ignores the more powerful backing force of a society's belief and actions. Things don't daily come to the point of us being forced to believe our currency is valuable with guns and nukes, we just created this system because it's one we wanted to live in, and having such a fiat currency makes a lot of things easier. Bitcoin, on the other hand, is using its energy constantly.

thoughtstheseus 6y ago
Backed by taxes. You’ll always need to pay taxes.

Luker88 6y ago

> clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally just 2 points: * using crypto will not make the military stop existing * switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems ...but bitcoin will not even consider keeping PoW and switching to argon2, since the investment of miners in dedicated hardware is too great So I think honestly the bitcoin community is stuck. It will not change, not even when there are options that would only improve the technology underneath. Still stuck at less than 10 transactions/sec, I see. As a tech enthusiast, bitcoin has lost all its value to me. As an investor, the quick value fluctuations and overall value increase are a great thing. To me, the conclusion is that bitcoin is not anymore about tech (the project is completely static at this point), it's not about anonymity (it never was anonymous), it's not about distributed stuff (dedicated hardware and search for cheaper power are concentrating mining). It's just about quick investment that gets you money. Everything else feels like a lie.

temp8964 6y ago
One more factor though: path dependency. For historical reason, BTC is the most popular cryptocurrency. Maybe as you said, an altcoin with PoW is a better choice. (Or maybe there are other reasons PoW is not good. Let's just take your statement as true for the sake of discussion.) But you can't change everybody's mind like turn off a switch. Adoption takes time and change people's mind is difficult, but it doesn't make everyone else to be lying.
jude- 6y ago
> switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems This will also create a very severe problem: it makes it so the means of coin production exist solely in the hands of the coin owners today. Those coin owners won't ever sell you enough coins for you to be a competitive staker. At least with PoW, I can make more coins through extrinsic means -- i.e. better mining hardware.
- gremlinsinc 6y ago
  I've contemplated the idea of a coin that has a single wallet per person (sybil-proof identities must be implemented), these wallets have a max-limit of 1 billion coins, and coins are minted/staked and applied randomly to the lowest 5%, maybe it'd have a use-it-or-lose-it thing built in as well, where if you just sit on your coins and never have any transactions occur it just assumes you might be a "dead" account and recycles a percentage of your coins for "unuse", and that percentage goes up the longer you are without any transactions until it just redistributes your entire wallet... Example would be if you had 1 US bank account sitting on a billion, never used it, so the govt is like, well you're not using that so we'll give it to someone else lol. I personally am against billionaires existing. So, capping a coin at 1 billion or 999 million, makes sense to me - but only if there can ever be only 1 wallet per person. There could maybe be sub-wallets, but these are more like drawers in a dresser where the dresser is the wallet, and the drawers are compartments. Maybe a compartment in the wallet is a joint compartment that you share with a spouse, child, or a business/DAO or some other form of trust... There's a lot of things possible, that could happen... but I think PoW still makes bad sense, because we do have a global warming issue that is starting to pick up in terms of severity.

khmmr 6y ago

You do understand that cops and fighter jets and nukes are the only reason why you are not slaving in labor camp for some foreign power? It's a necessity. Bitcoin is useless for anyone's physical safety. As of today is provides almost zero value at all. You could argue, that censorship resistance is helpful for people living in authoritarian regimes but that's about it, so the only value it has comes from it being "illegal" in some region. At the same time Bitcoin is already wasting as much resources as some mid-sized European country. The environmental argument is relevant in every way.

lmilcin 6y ago

> Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. All of it is CO2. Let me explain. When you burn energy for bitcoin mining, you don't just use capacity of your local energy producer, you are delaying removal of legacy power producers. Before a particular power producer (for example burning coal) can be turned off, the capacity must be created from other sources (for example renewable). If you decide to start burning huge amount of energy, before those CO2 guzzlers can be turned off we will now have to build even more capacity -- exactly the amount you are burning to mine bitcoin, but it also means that while this is happening the CO2 is still being emitted. This assumes that introduction of new renewable sources of energy is independent from bitcoin mining. As far as I know this is true. Or in other words: if introduction of renewable sources of energy is independent of bitcoin mining, the energy production from these sources is the same regardless of whether the bitcoin mining exists or not. Logically what this means that what is changing is energy production from non-renewable sources and it could be explained that they are working at either higher capacity or their removal is delayed.

kortilla 6y ago
> This assumes that introduction of new renewable sources of energy is independent from bitcoin mining. As far as I know this is true. It is not. There are marooned renewable energy sources (dams) that have had limited usage (the dams being mainly for flood control) until miners came along. Building high capacity transmission lines to them wasn’t economical.
- lmilcin 6y ago
  So where and how much of the mining network utilizes this or similar? We are looking for at least significant portion of 130TWh the mining network currently uses. I just don't see all those old dams adding anywhere close to 1% of that value (although you have a chance to post your sources). You see, bitcoin mining currently uses 10x the amount of capacity used by Google and 50% of what ALL DATACENTERS IN THE WORLD are using. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56215787 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-56215787 Your argument doesn't hold any water (pun intended).
6y ago

agentultra 6y ago

If you want to reduce the number of wars and conflicts there are better, more effective ways. Work towards ending racism; support young girls, women, and LGBTQ+ folks around the world; support environmental protections and projects that reduce food waste and increase water security; support fiscal policies that reduce wealth inequality; and topple authoritarian dictators and fascists. In this techno-libertarian utopia when someone defrauds you and steals your crypto-coins your only recourse is to buy the justice you can afford. Exchanges have already done this to folks who've been defrauded and sought recourse. Regulation and protections are in place to protect consumers just as much as they are there to limit damage from bad actors. I don't buy this notion that the world would be better off without a central banking system.

nbardy 6y ago
> and topple authoritarian dictators and fascists. This makes the violence worse every time the Americans stumble in and think they know how to fix a country by instilling new leadership.
- p_l 6y ago
  Most cases are about installing a new dictator that supports US economic interests

jonnycomputer 6y ago

And frankly, bitcoin is intentionally deflationary, and that is almost certainly bad for economies. Why should I buy now when I'll save money by buying later? Why should I start my business now when my investment capital will be worth more later?

kortilla 6y ago

The Bitcoin network depends on a global functioning Internet. That depends on all of the defense, government cooperation, etc to stay stable.

thatguy0900 6y ago

What's stopping a group of people from abducting you and beating you for your bitcoin or breaking into your house when your not home to find and take your wallet? Those same police. That argument doesn't really hold up, it's not like someone can't force you to give them your bitcoins

lmilcin 6y ago

There is no "core" reason for cryptocurrencies. This is romantic bullshit perpetuated by people invested in it. The reality is, as I have predicted long ago, if bitcoin becomes large portion of worlds financial flow it will just be taken over by financial institutions and perverted for their use. These guys have much more experience at this (ie subverting financial systems) than you can imagine. Bitcoin is not going to stop wars and bring law and order. If bitcoin was supposed to be the safest method to move funds around then why people have higher chance of loosing their bitcoin for various reasons than almost any other kind of equity? You are just naive.

biolurker1 6y ago
Have you ever taken a step back and realizing how much hate is there in your speech and why is it so?

gher-shyu3i 6y ago

Good points. There's also the argument that some of us want nothing to do with interest and usury. And fiat currencies by definition are usurious currencies due to how the government runs its finances.

6gvONxR4sf7o 6y ago

> But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. I don't like this meme. Fiat currency is backed by an entire democracy that includes a military, but the key piece here isn't the military, it's the democracy. Despite all the problems in the US and our economic system, the folks in charge of the currency generally have the right mandate (stable employment and stable prices).

redisman 6y ago
Bitcoin also runs on infrastructure that is backed by the exact same forces. Networks, electricity, the computers. You couldn't have Bitcoin if those resources weren't protected by your government. Otherwise I can for example find the top 100 largest Bitcoin miners and walk up to their door with guns and demand all their Bitcoins or I'll blow up the mines.
- jonkho 6y ago
  Do you think you may be unsuccessful and get blown away by their own security apparatus?

gremlinsinc 6y ago

I'm not the biggest proponent of bitcoin, some of that is angst from not hodling any, but a lot is I feel it was more of a "concept" or "mvp". Ethereum/Cardano and other newer chains/tech are the actual "reason" for crypto. DeFi, and De-centralized autonomous organizations are the real world-changing things, eventually we could see a coin with automated taxation/basic income and identities (sybil-proof), it could essentially "beat" poverty and income inequality. Bitcoin is an energy hog, and not very exciting... but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater cause there's TON of exciting research on blockchain that's way better. I think long-term bitcoin may fall out of popularity, esp as all the new things hit w/ ethereum, cardano, and their competitors and all the sub-chains on them and level-2 making it so transactions aren't nearly as costly.

atweiden 6y ago
> Ethereum/Cardano and other newer chains/tech are the actual "reason" for crypto Not according to the Bitcoin genesis block, without which Ethereum never would’ve existed.

simonsarris 6y ago

Back in 2017 I wrote an article about the "backed by fighter jets and nukes" point because it seemed by far the most intuitive way to reason about it. https://medium.com/@simon.sarris/the-guns-of-bitcoin-1f779309a718 https://medium.com/@simon.sarris/the-guns-of-bitcoin-1f77930...

andreilys 6y ago

And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine No one except for the owners of major BTC mining operations. If a state actor, such as China, was motivated enough to identify, capture and coerce these miners it would be pretty easy to perform a 51% attack given that China accounts for around 65% of all bitcoin mining globally.

dnautics 6y ago
"pretty easy"? Exactly how do you Envision this attack going down, step by step?
- blake1 6y ago
  Government agents show up at the data center and confiscate the servers in the mining pool. The coerce the owners into turning over the login credentials. Or they just deploy their own mining pool. Or the just tax all of their citizens’ cryptos. They have lots of options, since they have the power of the state behind them.
  - dnautics 6y ago
    Why wouldn't the network soft fork?
    - snarf21 6y ago
      China can rinse/repeat on any soft fork. There is also the ability to block crypto networks at the ISP level.
    - hudon 6y ago
      If stakeholders can manipulate the network to ignore a chain with more work, you’ve kind of undermined the whole proof-of-work thing and conceded that Bitcoin is ultimately subject to politics just like any other financial system.

neuralRiot 6y ago

>This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. Probably the article ignores it but not the governments or corporations who suddenly are worried about the environment.

TezNoble1988 6y ago

The idea that inflation is some sort of creeping evil that needs to be "solved for" is a made up fantasy of cryptocurrency zealots and libertarians. There's nothing inherently "wrong" or "bad" about inflation when it is controlled and stable, and in fact some low level of positive inflation is a good thing. Inflation is a bogeyman that was invented by the crypto-industrial complex to justify the environmental disaster and criminal danger that cryptocurrencies wreak on society.

nbardy 6y ago
Inflation is a problem when there is no way to beat it and it's hidden in stimulus bills that the majority of the country is too busy working to pay bills to spend time understanding. Most of my friends can't afford investment in the market. So when the stock market goes up that's them losing value on their dollar and wages. Inflation is fine for those who are part of the asset class.
- TezNoble1988 6y ago
  There is very little consensus around whether these stimulus bills will create inflationary pressure or not. Inflation generally isn't a concern when unemployment is high; if anything, short-term inflation may be caused by a drop in supply and excess savings caused by COVID, a systemic event which would also cause BTC-denominated prices to increase if consumer goods were actually priced in BTC. I'm not sure what you mean by, "when the stock market goes up that's them losing value on their dollar and wages" -> that simply doesn't make sense
  - nbardy 6y ago
    > that simply doesn't make any sense. It does you just don't understand yet. Let me try and explain. Inflation measured by the government in CPI is a bad metric. It doesn't include ownership in assets which is the ability to retire. We already had inflation if you measure the cost of retirement in USD. With the spending package we drove a bull run. The SP500 going up in price is equivalent to the value of USD going down for anyone who doesn't own part of the market. They have to buy in at higher and higher cost. Younger generations have been priced out of an ability to own and in turn retire. While those who owned assets experienced a nice boost this year. When the cost of retirement goes up the value of USD goes down just like anything else.

jonnycomputer 6y ago

Of course crypto depends on the government. Miners can have their infrastructure investment stolen. Holders of currencies can be robbed, or extorted. The transfer of those currencies pass through infrastructure set up and maintained or regulated by governments. And frankly, it takes energy to mine, so if crypto became integral to national political and economic interests, there is not going to be any net change in energy politics. You are not unlinking the petroleum and currency in those petrodollars, you're replacing it with something that directly links to two inescapably.

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mhluongo 6y ago

Thanks for this. The level of discourse around Bitcoin on HN gives me ulcers.. really appreciate the breath of fresh air.

abrahamepton 6y ago

This is pretty damn incoherent. > the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control Maybe in a whitepaper. In the real world, it's mostly about speculation and enabling crime. > Law and order stands on the backs of a lot of stuff and CO2. Bitcoin is an example of one little piece of this not needing all that stuff. Ok...? This is nonsensical. > Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine. Or someone can beat you up and make you give them your password. Rubber-hose decryption has a long track record and is trivial for the right actor to implement, this isn't some weird edge-case. > It's a small step in the direction of getting away from all these endless wars and control. Citation badly needed; how does cryptocurrency "get away from all these endless wars"? > Carbon tax CO2 Ok, this is correct and not incoherent.

Tenoke 6y ago
>enabling crime. Is this about DNMs? Because last I checked their volume is tiny.
- fphhotchips 6y ago
  Ransomware is a key one, also.
RinTohsaka 6y ago
> Maybe in a whitepaper. In the real world, it's mostly about speculation and enabling crime. Speculation I could agree with... however, Crime? Really? Got anything to back this up? The vast majority of crime is performed using cash. https://hodlhard.io/blog/bitcoin-crime/ https://hodlhard.io/blog/bitcoin-crime/
- boc 6y ago
  > Just last week, the United Nations alleged that North Korea was funding its nuclear weapons program using funds from hacked cryptocurrency exchanges, alongside other thefts. The U.N. believes that over $300 million in crypto assets have been stolen by various North Korean hackers.[1] > Iranian thinktanks have also emphasized the need for the nation’s government to use cryptocurrencies to circumvent US-led international sanctions. It now appears that the Office of President Hassan Rouhani has become more serious about using crypto. [2] A rapidly growing percent of nuclear weapons proliferation is being funded by crypto. That's way worse for the planet than crime performed using cash. [1] https://www.coindesk.com/doj-charges-3-north-korean-hackers-with-stealing-100m-from-crypto-exchanges https://www.coindesk.com/doj-charges-3-north-korean-hackers-... [2] https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2021/03/172786-iran-is-reportedly-planning-to-bypass-international-sanctions-by-engaging-in-bitcoin-mining-and-btc-transactions/ https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2021/03/172786-iran-is-repo...

bourgoin 6y ago

Why does it make a difference whether your wealth is denoted by USD, Bitcoin, milk caps, or Rai Stones? If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? And how does the medium of exchange have any bearing on nations going to war over control of oil, rare earth minerals, strategic islands? It seems to me you're implying that the colossal environmental damage inherent to a Bitcoin-driven world economy would be offset by the abolition of militaries, police, and banks, but I don't see how you make that jump. $trillions of military spending are used to secure resources and strategic assets and ensure national security, not to defend against bank robberies. A world without militaries or police is unimaginably different from our world in so many more ways than just the medium of exchange. And if you can't point guns at people to make them give up part of their pile, how will you implement the CO2 tax?

deleted 6y ago
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nyolfen 6y ago
the US dollar is backed by the petrodollar arrangement: oil exporters accept dollars for oil in exchange for defense guarantees and other benefits. everyone needs oil, so everyone needs dollars. the dollar is inextricably tied to oil consumption and the US is strategically invested in it. add to this that the US military is the single largest institutional consumer of oil on the planet. there is no coherent argument that bitcoin is worse for the environment than this. bitcoin only wants cheap energy; it is agnostic about what generates it, and incentivizes renewables since they tend to be the cheapest.
kragen 6y ago
> Why does it make a difference whether your wealth is denoted by USD, Bitcoin, milk caps, or Rai Stones? If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? The soldiers lining up your countrymen and shooting them in the head so they fall into a ditch become the new owners of your countrymen's USD and milk caps, but not their Bitcoin or rai stones. This kind of thing (the "pillaging" part of "raping and pillaging") is historically a major incentive for going to war. > If tanks roll over your capital city and your countrymen are made to kneel in a row, what good is it that you can refuse to give up the private keys? If your seed phrase is erased from your brain by a bullet, it probably doesn't do you much good. But it will completely change your life if you manage to escape: a refugee with pockets full of gold is observably different from a destitute pauper; a refugee who has memorized two seed phrases is not observably different from a refugee who has memorized only one. That's the difference between starting a new life as a homeless beggar and buying a country estate to retire on. > the colossal environmental damage inherent to a Bitcoin-driven world economy You seem to be begging the question here; why should we expect a Bitcoin-driven world economy to produce colossal environmental damage? Mining Bitcoin with fossil-fuel energy is unprofitable, so we should expect Bitcoin to produce a colossal shift to cheaper renewable energy, which may reverse the colossal environmental damage caused by fossil fuels. Or it may not.

VectorLock 6y ago

>And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade, no one to attack; the best you can do is make a fleet and try to mine Or with all the mining concentrated in China, you can, as the Chinese government, take state ownership of all those miners and don't have to spend a jet or nuke to do it.

Fern_Blossom 6y ago

First, I'd like to really understand why people say crypto "escapes inflation". The only argument has been the artificial scarcity mechanisms built in the currency. Scarcity is a seasoning to the concept of value, not the main course. I don't know of anyone in economics in the last 100 years that has ever pushed forward the idea that scarcity is all you need to create value... except for Youtube economic cartoons. "Fiat currency" isn't backed by violence. It's backed by production in goods and/or services. You can see this easily play out in command-control economies. The resource rich, like Venezuela back in the day, was a prosperous country for a few years. Gov controlled oil meant that's how they made money. When the price of a barrel of oil is high, they just pump that oil, increasing the need of the international community to purchase their currency, bringing up the value. When their oil wasn't needed due to diversification of supply and the drop in price, no one "wants" said currency since the country had nothing anyone wanted. Thus, the value goes down and you have hyperinflation due to high economic specialization. All the military equipment they bought and posturing, which led to a hilarious wannabe propaganda-scare video, during the good years didn't amount to shit. You really think if Bitcoin magically became the almighty currency, war would disappear? I'm serious when I say this, quit watching Sesame Street and other children's shows. Be an adult. Read a history book. No good change will come from praying to unicorns. On average, less than 1% of a country's population is active law enforcement in the western world. It's just a hair over 1% in the US according to Bureau of Labor numbers and that includes all the admin/support/not-arresting LE as well. Y'all need to quit looking underneath your beds and checking your closest for the blue boogey man. They do a whole hell of a lot more than just "protect the banks". That's what G4S does with their tactical muffin tops. At that, here's a good example of the difference between what a police officer can do and what a sheriff deputy can do: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727/sweet-justice-a-florida-couple-forecloses-on-bank-of-america https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2011/06/06/137002727... This happens more often than you think throughout the country. We don't hear about it because banks and other financial institutions swiftly put gag clauses in settlements. Banks do a fantastic job of teaching you how you can't use the justice system in your favor when in reality, you have more power than you imagine. Stop watching them youtube videos and go to the local library to learn more about local laws and procedures. Contest ownership... yea, still a problem with Bitcoin. Just look up "Bitcoin stolen" in your search engine of choice and there's article, after article, after article of theft and a cold day in hell's chance of retrieving it. There's nothing special there on that front. It's a preferred means of trade for the black market for a good reason. On one level, I don't care about the crypto ponzi scheme being played out. Let it happen. Madoff tricked a whole hell of a lot of people for around 20 years. Good. What ruffles my feathers, pushing a political agenda because you want to be rich in monopoly money, then use it to buy ice cream. Then throwing a fit because the cashier won't accept it. Yea, the amount of excess CO2 created by crypto mining is a valid and big problem. It's another industrial sized country on the world grid because of it. You act like this is some magic cure for "the poors", to help distribute wealth and other fantasies. Because there's a magic mechanism for a rich cat in USD to not do the same in BTC? The same way they garnered wealth in USD, GBP, JPY or EUR will do the same thing in any other new currency, making the point to the "revolution" null and void. Oh wait, Musk already started that. What's that, they found a good way for a loophole in being able to issue refunds in USD or BTC according to how they see fit depending which is cheaper? Yea, that sweet sweet "for the people" currency not going into the hands of the, what is he now, 3rd richest? 2nd richest? But I guess that makes him a fellow poor too since he's not 1st. Great step forward for that great reset. Let me tell ya'.

imtringued 6y ago

>This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. You aren't escaping inflation. You're escaping a savings glut which is the mortal enemy of inflation.

1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago

The "mining fleet", if it uses computers, requires electricity. Who controls the supply and sale of electricity. Nothing against desire to solve world problems but Bitcoin (edit: or any other example of a cryptocurrency) seems to be creating more problems than it purports to solve. The author calls cryptocurrencies a "predatory investment scheme". In practice, is this not correct. Is it not the lack of "law and order" with respect to cryptocurrencies that allows for this to occur. Please explain. Show me how cryptocurrency is solving world problems. Evidence, not speculation. When I was young people said that "money" itself was the root of all evil. Today, people online try to convince us that "fiat currency" is the problem. It does not feel like the same idealism. The original Satoshi paper made his idea sound like it would be possible to implement as peer-to-peer^1 without third parties. All the implementations I have seen to date involve third parties. Doubtful a coincidence that the third parties are all profiting from that involvement. 1. The term now has multiple meanings. Here it is used in the original, Napster sense. Peer-to-peer networking, not, e.g., peer-to-peer financial. Edit: To clarify further what I mean by peer-to-peer, can person A and B, assuming each knows how to reach the other through the internet (address:port), conduct a transaction without involvement of a third party. For example, a requirement for person A or B to "sign up for an account" with anyone else in order to start using a cryptocurrency would be "involvement of a third party". If persons A or B needed to have a third party "mine" the currency before transactions between A and B could occur, this would also be "involvement of a third party".

Sargos 6y ago
>The original Satoshi paper made his idea sound like it would be possible to implement as peer-to-peer^1 without third parties. All the implementations I have seen to date involve third parties. Bitcoin sort of stopped being developed years ago and pretty much everything shifted over to Ethereum where the ethos of Bitcoin were further developed and most of the things people talked about in 2010-2013 were actually developed. For example, Uniswap is completely peer-to-peer and decentralized. Most of DeFi is. If you are at all interested in what is happening in this space it's worth taking a look at what exists and what is being developed.

Lazare 6y ago

> I no longer think the environmental argument is really plausible here. Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. That seems like a non-sequitur. Proof of work crypto generates an astonishing large amount of CO2 to little effect. Some other alternatives are bad in other ways, yes, but that doesn't make the CO2 go away. I live in a small, peaceful, stable country with a very small military and very safe banks. If you're really trying to make some sort of argument that fiat currencies can't exist without a significant CO2 expenditure to try and enforce neoliberal orthodoxy at the barrel of a gun then that is very obviously untrue. > Instead it's protected by this mining fleet. And if you want to contest ownership there's no one to invade So your argument is that nobody will steal my fiat currency from my electronic wallet (aka, bank account) because of the police, but nobody will steal my crypto currency from my electronic wallet because of their respect for pure math; no need for law and order? Respectfully, you might want to try and develop that argument a little further. > It's a small step in the direction of getting away from all these endless wars and control. Key driver of most wars is resources, especially energy, not money. I'm confident that we are not collectively dumb enough as a species to end up in a state where we're fighting wars to obtain energy resources to fuel blockchain mining, but that is a thing that can theoretically happen. I think you're falling prey to the is/ought distinction. It would be nice if crypto currencies could somehow create world peace, resolve the contradictions of late stage capitalism, cure cancer, <fill in your dream here>. But they obviously can't, and I would suggest pretending otherwise is pointless.

kaliali 6y ago

The environment argument isnt plausible when you add in proof of stake Cryptos the use thousands or millions of times less electricity than Cryptos like Bitcoin or Ethereum. People really do not know basic fundamental info on crypt I currencies and they make horrible arguments like these, spreading their ignorance.

hakfoo 6y ago

The thing is that we're already paying for most of the law/order/government infrastructure anyway. Once you hire the cops and soldiers to enforce "he can't take your sticks and rocks", "he can't reallocate your bank balance" adds trivial overhead.

nec4b 6y ago