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You'll listen to Bitcoin FUD all day but you don't seem to care about the hydro carbons purged in the process of strip mining the earth for shiny rocks though.

You'll listen to Bitcoin FUD all day but you don't seem to care about the hydro carbons purged in the process of strip mining the earth for shiny rocks though. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/why-bitcoin-may-actually-speed-up-the-transition-to-renewable-energy-2021-05-18 https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/why-bitcoin-may-actually-spe...

cogman10 5y ago
This is pure garbage. The problem bitcoin solves, a distributed ledger, is one that's simply solved with a ledger over a trust network. In otherwords, this is a "solution" that is burning TWh of energy doing something global banks accomplish with kWh of power. All the power funneled into BTC would be far better spent doing anything useful. From electrolysis to protein folding. Also, it should be noted that shiny rocks have intrinsic value beyond their aesthetics. BTC is literally just a number with no value.
- drcross 5y ago
  >over a trust network There's your problem, you don't understand that bitcoin is trustless and the worlds first implementation of it's kind. If you can't understand why that's important I don't have the time to convince you.
  - cogman10 5y ago
    lol. Oh I understand what bitcoin is, I just think it has no value. You are arguing that bogosort, because it's the first sort of it's kind to use a random number generator, MUST have some value! After all, look at all the watts it burns! Just because someone does something first, doesn't mean that thing is useful or good.
    - drcross 5y ago
      >I just think it has no value. Don't use it then, but why would you also disparage the millions of people who are happily finding value in it? >Just because someone does something first, doesn't mean that thing is useful or good. Well done creating your amazing straw man.
      - cogman10 5y ago
        > Why would you also disparage the millions of people who are happily finding value in it? Because it's an environmental disaster causing a bunch of modern issues and the defenders are being annoyingly naive about. BTC uses a ton of power, requires a ton of equipment. They solve a problem with TWh of power that is simply solved globally with kwh of power. It is beyond wasteful. > Well done creating your amazing straw man. Nah, BTC is just beyond pointless. You are arguing that it's special, but have a hard time actually articulating WHY it's special "If you can't see this, then I don't have time to explain". That's the same line cult members use defending their faith. It's a mental shortcut to avoid critically analyzing something you've bought into.
        ipaddr 5y ago
        BTC encourages figuring out the price of power which is an environmental goal because if that power produces greenhouse gases a carbon tax should apply. The loophole is the same loophole that allows some nations to keep pumping gas house gases without paying for the environmental cost. BTC isn't bad for the environment carbon poluting energy is. Energy from non-carbon freeing sources makes bitcoin a greencoin. We need to fix where we get energy from and price it accordingly. BTC exposes this.
- disruptalot 5y ago
  Central banks don't do fixed supply money. Investment banks don't do payments and financial products that don't involve a middleman. Bitcoin is a censorship resistant, neutral money and payment network. Banks don't do that. Banks don't consume "kWh of power" by the way. From the endless wars to protect the US (dollar) hegemony to 50 floor buildings draped in marble. Thats all cost + energy.
  - cogman10 5y ago
    Bitcoin couldn't exist without the same endless wars and hegemony. Where do you think the computational power COMES from? That's why it's a bad faith argument. The only thing bitcoiners want to compare is the power cost of running the mining rigs. Why don't they include the cost to manufacture said rigs? To mine minerals to build the silicon needed to power their currency? Why don't they include the governments needed to make sure the equipment supply chains are properly maintained? Why don't they include the amount of power needed to run the servers and switches needed to power the internet needed to run btc? Why aren't you looking at the construction costs for the buildings housing the mining rigs? I'll tell you why, because they aren't making a good faith argument. They are trying to come up with ways to make BTC good and banking bad. That's it. Lots of things cost energy. The question has to be "what are we accomplishing with that spent energy". When two algorithms do the same thing and one burns TWh while the other burns kwh.. guess which one I'm going to favor?
    - disruptalot 5y ago
      Your arguments are just a whole load of strawmen. You don't address the central point. Bitcoin exists, and banks don't do it what it does. Hence the energy cost comparisons as rough and silly as you make them are not a conclusion to bitcoin's value.
- dang 5y ago
  Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That's the way threads turn into downward spirals. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
hn8788 5y ago
"Bitcoing drives renewable energy" is one of the most nonsensical arguments I've ever heard. It's not like the components for solar panels and windmills grow on trees, and bitcoin miners aren't going to just stop expanding wherever there is cheap power, so it won't get used for anything besides mining more bitcoins. It's like saying that we should deliberately cause more pandemics to drive interest in vaccine research.
- drcross 5y ago
  Wait until you hear all the energy it takes to run the current financial system, or the energy it takes to run the worlds gaming consoles, or any other stuff that you have personally found to be more useful than crypto currency. If bitcoin frees us from financial tyranny it's all worth it.
  - natmaka 5y ago
    Fiat money is trusted in good part because there are backed by institutions, mainly governments in turn are backed by armies (real soldiers and policemen). All this uses a fair amount of energy, and there is no other way. "Cryptos" are in their infancy and there are already ways for them to dissipate less energy.
  - paulgb 5y ago
    > Wait until you hear all the energy it takes to run the current financial system Every Bitcoin defender repeats this line, but I never see any numbers. Whatever the energy use is, it's provably less than Bitcoin by any metric like transaction volume or market cap, by the simple fact that if you were to scale up Bitcoin's energy use for comparison to the world financial system, it would use magnitudes more energy than humans produce.
    - drcross 5y ago
      The key to your misunderstand here is that the proof of work hashing is decoupled from transaction volume or market cap.
bruxis 5y ago
Nothing the previous poster says implies that they are okay with wasting energy in other ways and it in no way diminishes the fact that Bitcoin (and other PoW cryptocurrencies) use a _lot_ of energy.
- cyberstuff 5y ago
  Why is energy usage that important? Isn't the issue that society allows energy creation through fossil fuels? Like the sun 'uses' 384.6 septillion watts.
paulgb 5y ago
> you don't seem to care about the hydro carbons purged in the process of strip mining the earth for shiny rocks though This persistent idea that people who care about the carbon footprint of Bitcoin somehow single it out is silly. I dislike unnecessarily large SUVs, cruise ships, American suburb culture, and diamond mining too. Bitcoin just happens to be the topic of this thread.
- 8note 5y ago
  Of note: things like SUV's still have energy related regulations tied to them.
  - drcross 5y ago
    Is there energy regulations on new bank branches that open?

cogman10 5y ago

This is pure garbage. The problem bitcoin solves, a distributed ledger, is one that's simply solved with a ledger over a trust network. In otherwords, this is a "solution" that is burning TWh of energy doing something global banks accomplish with kWh of power. All the power funneled into BTC would be far better spent doing anything useful. From electrolysis to protein folding. Also, it should be noted that shiny rocks have intrinsic value beyond their aesthetics. BTC is literally just a number with no value.

drcross 5y ago
>over a trust network There's your problem, you don't understand that bitcoin is trustless and the worlds first implementation of it's kind. If you can't understand why that's important I don't have the time to convince you.
- cogman10 5y ago
  lol. Oh I understand what bitcoin is, I just think it has no value. You are arguing that bogosort, because it's the first sort of it's kind to use a random number generator, MUST have some value! After all, look at all the watts it burns! Just because someone does something first, doesn't mean that thing is useful or good.
  - drcross 5y ago
    >I just think it has no value. Don't use it then, but why would you also disparage the millions of people who are happily finding value in it? >Just because someone does something first, doesn't mean that thing is useful or good. Well done creating your amazing straw man.
    - cogman10 5y ago
      > Why would you also disparage the millions of people who are happily finding value in it? Because it's an environmental disaster causing a bunch of modern issues and the defenders are being annoyingly naive about. BTC uses a ton of power, requires a ton of equipment. They solve a problem with TWh of power that is simply solved globally with kwh of power. It is beyond wasteful. > Well done creating your amazing straw man. Nah, BTC is just beyond pointless. You are arguing that it's special, but have a hard time actually articulating WHY it's special "If you can't see this, then I don't have time to explain". That's the same line cult members use defending their faith. It's a mental shortcut to avoid critically analyzing something you've bought into.
      - ipaddr 5y ago
        BTC encourages figuring out the price of power which is an environmental goal because if that power produces greenhouse gases a carbon tax should apply. The loophole is the same loophole that allows some nations to keep pumping gas house gases without paying for the environmental cost. BTC isn't bad for the environment carbon poluting energy is. Energy from non-carbon freeing sources makes bitcoin a greencoin. We need to fix where we get energy from and price it accordingly. BTC exposes this.
disruptalot 5y ago
Central banks don't do fixed supply money. Investment banks don't do payments and financial products that don't involve a middleman. Bitcoin is a censorship resistant, neutral money and payment network. Banks don't do that. Banks don't consume "kWh of power" by the way. From the endless wars to protect the US (dollar) hegemony to 50 floor buildings draped in marble. Thats all cost + energy.
- cogman10 5y ago
  Bitcoin couldn't exist without the same endless wars and hegemony. Where do you think the computational power COMES from? That's why it's a bad faith argument. The only thing bitcoiners want to compare is the power cost of running the mining rigs. Why don't they include the cost to manufacture said rigs? To mine minerals to build the silicon needed to power their currency? Why don't they include the governments needed to make sure the equipment supply chains are properly maintained? Why don't they include the amount of power needed to run the servers and switches needed to power the internet needed to run btc? Why aren't you looking at the construction costs for the buildings housing the mining rigs? I'll tell you why, because they aren't making a good faith argument. They are trying to come up with ways to make BTC good and banking bad. That's it. Lots of things cost energy. The question has to be "what are we accomplishing with that spent energy". When two algorithms do the same thing and one burns TWh while the other burns kwh.. guess which one I'm going to favor?
  - disruptalot 5y ago
    Your arguments are just a whole load of strawmen. You don't address the central point. Bitcoin exists, and banks don't do it what it does. Hence the energy cost comparisons as rough and silly as you make them are not a conclusion to bitcoin's value.
dang 5y ago
Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That's the way threads turn into downward spirals. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

hn8788 5y ago

"Bitcoing drives renewable energy" is one of the most nonsensical arguments I've ever heard. It's not like the components for solar panels and windmills grow on trees, and bitcoin miners aren't going to just stop expanding wherever there is cheap power, so it won't get used for anything besides mining more bitcoins. It's like saying that we should deliberately cause more pandemics to drive interest in vaccine research.

drcross 5y ago
Wait until you hear all the energy it takes to run the current financial system, or the energy it takes to run the worlds gaming consoles, or any other stuff that you have personally found to be more useful than crypto currency. If bitcoin frees us from financial tyranny it's all worth it.
- natmaka 5y ago
  Fiat money is trusted in good part because there are backed by institutions, mainly governments in turn are backed by armies (real soldiers and policemen). All this uses a fair amount of energy, and there is no other way. "Cryptos" are in their infancy and there are already ways for them to dissipate less energy.
- paulgb 5y ago
  > Wait until you hear all the energy it takes to run the current financial system Every Bitcoin defender repeats this line, but I never see any numbers. Whatever the energy use is, it's provably less than Bitcoin by any metric like transaction volume or market cap, by the simple fact that if you were to scale up Bitcoin's energy use for comparison to the world financial system, it would use magnitudes more energy than humans produce.
  - drcross 5y ago
    The key to your misunderstand here is that the proof of work hashing is decoupled from transaction volume or market cap.

bruxis 5y ago

Nothing the previous poster says implies that they are okay with wasting energy in other ways and it in no way diminishes the fact that Bitcoin (and other PoW cryptocurrencies) use a _lot_ of energy.

cyberstuff 5y ago
Why is energy usage that important? Isn't the issue that society allows energy creation through fossil fuels? Like the sun 'uses' 384.6 septillion watts.

paulgb 5y ago

> you don't seem to care about the hydro carbons purged in the process of strip mining the earth for shiny rocks though This persistent idea that people who care about the carbon footprint of Bitcoin somehow single it out is silly. I dislike unnecessarily large SUVs, cruise ships, American suburb culture, and diamond mining too. Bitcoin just happens to be the topic of this thread.

8note 5y ago
Of note: things like SUV's still have energy related regulations tied to them.
- drcross 5y ago
  Is there energy regulations on new bank branches that open?