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My only complaint about Bitcoin is the energy use. And I think it would be reasonable to whitelist things that are allowed to use so much electricity (or make

My only complaint about Bitcoin is the energy use. And I think it would be reasonable to whitelist things that are allowed to use so much electricity (or make their prices rise as a function of use)

HWR_14 6y ago
I know some localities turned to usage based rates, so a normal household (or maybe a normal house times two or three) was at a regular rate and then there was a sharp jump for usage after that (averaged over the month). Somehow they handled factories, etc. in a different system, but they wanted to only subsidize electricity for certain uses.
Mc_Big_G 6y ago
How much is trust worth?
- tsujp 6y ago
  Not definitive but at least the debt wiped out in the GFC including what is called "the lost decade". So at least quite a bit.
- zepto 6y ago
  It’s not actually trust if you have to pay for it by destroying the planet.
  - Mc_Big_G 6y ago
    How do you think the military industrial complex works to back the dollar?
    - zepto 6y ago
      Not by burning vast amounts of energy to do meaningless calculations whose results are discarded.
      - Mc_Big_G 6y ago
        Correct. It's burning even more vast amounts of energy to do meaningless things that aren't calculations and demonstrably harm the world, especially oil-rich, poor countries.
- sesuximo 6y ago
  Not related to my original point, but I feel like btc just substitutes trust in an existing banking system with trust in (your wallet provider, the exchange, your computer’s security, and the stability of btc’s price).
- rspeele 6y ago
  Why was trust worth 12.5 BTC every 10 minutes at the beginning of May 11 2020, but only worth 6.25 BTC every 10 minutes by the end of the day? How did trust get instantly cheaper without causing a disaster? Was Bitcoin paying too much for trust?
  - aeternum 6y ago
    The hashrate decreased 25% over the few days on/around May 11 2020. So yes, the price paid for trust decreased 50% and in response the overall security of bitcoin dropped ~25% as a result.
    - rspeele 6y ago
      But the security is still good enough, right? As long as the mining expenditure exceeds the potential illicit rewards of a double-spend, it's not profitable to out-mine the network just to be able to double-spend. So the security of bitcoin should be an all-or-nothing thing: either a 51% attack is profitable, or it's not. It seems to me if there was some way to determine the potential real world reward of a double-spend, Bitcoin could spend exactly the right amount on security: that number + 1. I don't know how to calculate that number. I doubt that Bitcoin mining is matching it precisely because how would it? So it is probably overpaying or underpaying by some amount. So far, Bitcoin appears to have overpaid for security, given that it hasn't been 51%ed. Who knows by how much. Maybe after the next halving, or the one after that, it'll be underpaying?
      - aeternum 6y ago
        It's really hard to price security investment because the primary signal that you've spent too little is often a very costly hack. Flashloans and other derivatives greatly increase the risk since they now enable extreme leverage on only a small amount of initial capital.
tshaddox 6y ago
It wouldn’t be an issue if there were no externalities from generating and using electricity, right?
- sesuximo 6y ago
  Yeah... but there are
  - tshaddox 6y ago
    Indeed, and those particular externalities are the same for each unit of electricity used (given some generation method), regardless of what the electricity is being used for. To me it makes a lot more sense for government policy to address these externalities directly, instead of trying to determine for each specific use case if it's okay to impose externalities or not.
    - sesuximo 6y ago
      I don’t think it’s necessary to think about all use cases... just those that use lots and lots of energy.
      - tshaddox 6y ago
        I’m not sure how that would work in practice. Does every use case get hit with a permanent ban the instant the combined electricity usage of that use case exceeds some limit? Was it okay for me to play around with the Bitcoin client on my laptop in 2011, but as soon as all Bitcoin clients combined to exceeded the limit, I can no longer run the client on my laptop? That strikes me as exceedingly odd and impractical.
        sesuximo 6y ago
        I was envisioning if you use x% of the grid’s power, you get a visit from the epa Edit: you’re right that this would not catch really decentralized mining. Which is definitely a hole. In those cases, it would be hard to regulate I agree
Tepix 6y ago
So you are ok with the low tps, the lack of programmability, the lack of anonymity, the high fees, the slow transactions, the centralized mining, the tainted community and the lack of development?
Sohcahtoa82 6y ago
The thing is, Bitcoin doesn't have to use a ridiculous amount of energy. You could theoretically run the entire network from a single miner running on a 10 year old Android. The problem is that the proof-of-work system creates an arms race and everyone starts building massive mining farms in order to get a bigger piece of the block reward pie. Some proponents will claim it's necessary for decentralization, and to a point, it's true, but we definitely don't need the amount of mining power in use today.
- Ekaros 6y ago
  Is there yet good pruning solution for bitcoin? That is all of the old transactions are discarded... As size of chain itself is and will be an issue. I wonder actually how many addresses with coins there are currently...

My only complaint about Bitcoin is the energy use. And I think it would be reasonable to whitelist things that are allowed to use so much electricity (or make their prices rise as a function of use)

HWR_14 6y ago

I know some localities turned to usage based rates, so a normal household (or maybe a normal house times two or three) was at a regular rate and then there was a sharp jump for usage after that (averaged over the month). Somehow they handled factories, etc. in a different system, but they wanted to only subsidize electricity for certain uses.

Mc_Big_G 6y ago

How much is trust worth?

tsujp 6y ago
Not definitive but at least the debt wiped out in the GFC including what is called "the lost decade". So at least quite a bit.
zepto 6y ago
It’s not actually trust if you have to pay for it by destroying the planet.
- Mc_Big_G 6y ago
  How do you think the military industrial complex works to back the dollar?
  - zepto 6y ago
    Not by burning vast amounts of energy to do meaningless calculations whose results are discarded.
    - Mc_Big_G 6y ago
      Correct. It's burning even more vast amounts of energy to do meaningless things that aren't calculations and demonstrably harm the world, especially oil-rich, poor countries.
sesuximo 6y ago
Not related to my original point, but I feel like btc just substitutes trust in an existing banking system with trust in (your wallet provider, the exchange, your computer’s security, and the stability of btc’s price).
rspeele 6y ago
Why was trust worth 12.5 BTC every 10 minutes at the beginning of May 11 2020, but only worth 6.25 BTC every 10 minutes by the end of the day? How did trust get instantly cheaper without causing a disaster? Was Bitcoin paying too much for trust?
- aeternum 6y ago
  The hashrate decreased 25% over the few days on/around May 11 2020. So yes, the price paid for trust decreased 50% and in response the overall security of bitcoin dropped ~25% as a result.
  - rspeele 6y ago
    But the security is still good enough, right? As long as the mining expenditure exceeds the potential illicit rewards of a double-spend, it's not profitable to out-mine the network just to be able to double-spend. So the security of bitcoin should be an all-or-nothing thing: either a 51% attack is profitable, or it's not. It seems to me if there was some way to determine the potential real world reward of a double-spend, Bitcoin could spend exactly the right amount on security: that number + 1. I don't know how to calculate that number. I doubt that Bitcoin mining is matching it precisely because how would it? So it is probably overpaying or underpaying by some amount. So far, Bitcoin appears to have overpaid for security, given that it hasn't been 51%ed. Who knows by how much. Maybe after the next halving, or the one after that, it'll be underpaying?
    - aeternum 6y ago
      It's really hard to price security investment because the primary signal that you've spent too little is often a very costly hack. Flashloans and other derivatives greatly increase the risk since they now enable extreme leverage on only a small amount of initial capital.

tshaddox 6y ago

It wouldn’t be an issue if there were no externalities from generating and using electricity, right?

sesuximo 6y ago
Yeah... but there are
- tshaddox 6y ago
  Indeed, and those particular externalities are the same for each unit of electricity used (given some generation method), regardless of what the electricity is being used for. To me it makes a lot more sense for government policy to address these externalities directly, instead of trying to determine for each specific use case if it's okay to impose externalities or not.
  - sesuximo 6y ago
    I don’t think it’s necessary to think about all use cases... just those that use lots and lots of energy.
    - tshaddox 6y ago
      I’m not sure how that would work in practice. Does every use case get hit with a permanent ban the instant the combined electricity usage of that use case exceeds some limit? Was it okay for me to play around with the Bitcoin client on my laptop in 2011, but as soon as all Bitcoin clients combined to exceeded the limit, I can no longer run the client on my laptop? That strikes me as exceedingly odd and impractical.
      - sesuximo 6y ago
        I was envisioning if you use x% of the grid’s power, you get a visit from the epa Edit: you’re right that this would not catch really decentralized mining. Which is definitely a hole. In those cases, it would be hard to regulate I agree

Tepix 6y ago

So you are ok with the low tps, the lack of programmability, the lack of anonymity, the high fees, the slow transactions, the centralized mining, the tainted community and the lack of development?

Sohcahtoa82 6y ago

The thing is, Bitcoin doesn't have to use a ridiculous amount of energy. You could theoretically run the entire network from a single miner running on a 10 year old Android. The problem is that the proof-of-work system creates an arms race and everyone starts building massive mining farms in order to get a bigger piece of the block reward pie. Some proponents will claim it's necessary for decentralization, and to a point, it's true, but we definitely don't need the amount of mining power in use today.

Ekaros 6y ago
Is there yet good pruning solution for bitcoin? That is all of the old transactions are discarded... As size of chain itself is and will be an issue. I wonder actually how many addresses with coins there are currently...