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Blockchains are slowly becoming a pseudoscience. People spout a bunch of jargon and crypto math but have no idea how anything is connected to the real world. M

Blockchains are slowly becoming a pseudoscience. People spout a bunch of jargon and crypto math but have no idea how anything is connected to the real world. Most of the fraud that exists out there is due to social hacking. There is no real problem a blockchain solves. The surprising thing is how many people are falling for it.

arberx 5y ago
They solve the problem of centralized trust.
- oblio 5y ago
  Yeah, but property is also enforcement. That's trust. Centralized trust.
- wittyusername 5y ago
  He said "real problem" so..yeah
  - arberx 5y ago
    Byzantine fault tolerance is definitely a real problem.
    - vkou 5y ago
      For whom? Folks at Google, Facebook, and Amazon that are building distributed databases aren't re-writing their backends to use blockchains, for obvious reasons. As for people who aren't building general-purpose distributed databases, a solution to the Byzantine generals problem is more of a solution to a problem that they don't have - as other posts in this thread demonstrate.
  - noofen 5y ago
    Both can be true: 1) The original BTC paper was a huge breakthrough in decentralized systems. 2) Most "blockchain" projects today are merely elaborate Ponzis.
- jeremyjh 5y ago
  That’s like solving the problem of snortleblast.
  - arberx 5y ago
    You can not like crypto and still acknowledge the very real technology powering crypto. Whether it's Byzantine fault tolerance, or cryptoeconomics, there are some good solutions there. People's issues tend to be whether the solutions are applicable to the world, and/or useful.
    - sanderjd 5y ago
      It is great, super interesting, very clever technology. Which is exactly why it is nerd-sniping: the CS of it is so interesting, it must be innovative and useful! Alas, nope not really. I was so excited about Bitcoin back when the whitepaper first came out - a totally new idea! based on ideas from cryptography! amazing! this will replace all digital payments and reshape the world! Alas, nope. Then Ethereum came along - smart contracts! so cool! just imagine the new legal infrastructure this will unlock! Alas, nope again. I still hold out a hope (perhaps a fantasy) that all the talent and money funneling into all this, combined with the fundamentally interest and novel technology behind it, will come up with something truly innovative. It just seems like it must, right? But every new thing (most recently this NFT stuff) that comes out just further and further confirms my long-held tentative conclusion that there really isn't much there, there.
      - arberx 5y ago
        Have you seen: - https://uniswap.org/ https://uniswap.org/ - https://aave.com/ https://aave.com/ - https://makerdao.com/ https://makerdao.com/ - https://yearn.finance/ https://yearn.finance/ Pretty innovative and useful stuff...
        sanderjd 5y ago
        It looks to me like uniswap epitomizes the real world ownership problem discussed in the article we're discussing. "An experiment in tokenized socks" is (unironically?) highlighted on their home page. Aave seems like something that is useful within the bubble of cryptocurrency traders, but not outside it. It strikes me as a meta thing, not a thing. It doesn't work if cryptocurrencies are never useful for anything outside that bubble. Does Dai have a strategy for being actually useful as a currency to purchase things? Bitcoin has been trying to be useful as that for a decade with very little success. Yearn seems to be in the same boat as Aave, it only exists in this bubble of cryptocurrency speculation. None of this stuff or anything adjacent to it exists for anyone I interact with in my life outside of this website. What will blockchain technology be known for amongst people who are neither computer science nerds nor financial speculators? If it's just a new kind of speculative asset, like a new kind of derivative, then fine, that's innovative in a way, but it is extremely niche.
- dmitriid 5y ago
  They don't. Neyond some very small applications anything with "crypto" in it ends u reinventing all the institutions of trust that people have had for thousands of years.
3pt14159 5y ago
I'm broadly anti-blockchain and anti-cryptocurrency since I grew disillusioned by the scene early on, but even I think blockchain has solved some problems, I just don't think those problems are worth the cost or that those problems are of people that should have them, like criminals. For example, blockchain is allowing many Russians to move capital out of the country while the state locks down foreign currency transactions. That's a real problem that's getting solved, and I'm sure in some cases it's good people trying their best to survive. On the other hand, it also allows individuals or organizations to avoid sanctions or paying taxes. The cost isn't worth it. I'd rather not have the crime, schemes, and pollution that so often come with crypto. Plus all the countless stories of good people losing all their money because they forgot their password to their cryptowallet.
- knorker 5y ago
  > blockchain is allowing many Russians to move capital out of the country while the state locks down foreign currency transactions. Like it or not, this means it's breaking the law. So this is just another way of saying that it allows you to break the laws you don't agree with. (also the ones you do agree with, of course) > That's a real problem that's getting solved On the flip side it's a real law that's being broken. So your "on the one hand, on the other hand" is "it allows people to commit good crimes, but also commit bad crimes". The law isn't perfect. Absolutely not. But the solution to bad law isn't "no law". That's not the path to a good future. There are people out there who think all taxation is theft, and that tax evasion is as moral as smuggling money out of Russia. Of course others say exactly the same, but mean that they are both immoral.
  - mypastself 5y ago
    What about a piece of software designed to circumvent laws against accessing websites critical of some authoritarian regime? Should citizens of that country suck it up, because the solution to a bad law isn’t “no law”? Is using such software immoral?
    - vkou 5y ago
vkou 5y ago
> The surprising thing is how many people are falling for it. I don't think they are falling for it, I think they are mostly trying to talk up their speculative investments. (Be they direct I-own-coins financial investments, or indirect I-make-money-by-consulting or I-am-building-a-startup carreer 'investments'.)

arberx 5y ago

They solve the problem of centralized trust.

oblio 5y ago
Yeah, but property is also enforcement. That's trust. Centralized trust.
wittyusername 5y ago
He said "real problem" so..yeah
- arberx 5y ago
  Byzantine fault tolerance is definitely a real problem.
  - vkou 5y ago
    For whom? Folks at Google, Facebook, and Amazon that are building distributed databases aren't re-writing their backends to use blockchains, for obvious reasons. As for people who aren't building general-purpose distributed databases, a solution to the Byzantine generals problem is more of a solution to a problem that they don't have - as other posts in this thread demonstrate.
- noofen 5y ago
  Both can be true: 1) The original BTC paper was a huge breakthrough in decentralized systems. 2) Most "blockchain" projects today are merely elaborate Ponzis.
jeremyjh 5y ago
That’s like solving the problem of snortleblast.
- arberx 5y ago
  You can not like crypto and still acknowledge the very real technology powering crypto. Whether it's Byzantine fault tolerance, or cryptoeconomics, there are some good solutions there. People's issues tend to be whether the solutions are applicable to the world, and/or useful.
  - sanderjd 5y ago
    It is great, super interesting, very clever technology. Which is exactly why it is nerd-sniping: the CS of it is so interesting, it must be innovative and useful! Alas, nope not really. I was so excited about Bitcoin back when the whitepaper first came out - a totally new idea! based on ideas from cryptography! amazing! this will replace all digital payments and reshape the world! Alas, nope. Then Ethereum came along - smart contracts! so cool! just imagine the new legal infrastructure this will unlock! Alas, nope again. I still hold out a hope (perhaps a fantasy) that all the talent and money funneling into all this, combined with the fundamentally interest and novel technology behind it, will come up with something truly innovative. It just seems like it must, right? But every new thing (most recently this NFT stuff) that comes out just further and further confirms my long-held tentative conclusion that there really isn't much there, there.
    - arberx 5y ago
      Have you seen: - https://uniswap.org/ https://uniswap.org/ - https://aave.com/ https://aave.com/ - https://makerdao.com/ https://makerdao.com/ - https://yearn.finance/ https://yearn.finance/ Pretty innovative and useful stuff...
      - sanderjd 5y ago
        It looks to me like uniswap epitomizes the real world ownership problem discussed in the article we're discussing. "An experiment in tokenized socks" is (unironically?) highlighted on their home page. Aave seems like something that is useful within the bubble of cryptocurrency traders, but not outside it. It strikes me as a meta thing, not a thing. It doesn't work if cryptocurrencies are never useful for anything outside that bubble. Does Dai have a strategy for being actually useful as a currency to purchase things? Bitcoin has been trying to be useful as that for a decade with very little success. Yearn seems to be in the same boat as Aave, it only exists in this bubble of cryptocurrency speculation. None of this stuff or anything adjacent to it exists for anyone I interact with in my life outside of this website. What will blockchain technology be known for amongst people who are neither computer science nerds nor financial speculators? If it's just a new kind of speculative asset, like a new kind of derivative, then fine, that's innovative in a way, but it is extremely niche.
dmitriid 5y ago
They don't. Neyond some very small applications anything with "crypto" in it ends u reinventing all the institutions of trust that people have had for thousands of years.

3pt14159 5y ago

I'm broadly anti-blockchain and anti-cryptocurrency since I grew disillusioned by the scene early on, but even I think blockchain has solved some problems, I just don't think those problems are worth the cost or that those problems are of people that should have them, like criminals. For example, blockchain is allowing many Russians to move capital out of the country while the state locks down foreign currency transactions. That's a real problem that's getting solved, and I'm sure in some cases it's good people trying their best to survive. On the other hand, it also allows individuals or organizations to avoid sanctions or paying taxes. The cost isn't worth it. I'd rather not have the crime, schemes, and pollution that so often come with crypto. Plus all the countless stories of good people losing all their money because they forgot their password to their cryptowallet.

knorker 5y ago
> blockchain is allowing many Russians to move capital out of the country while the state locks down foreign currency transactions. Like it or not, this means it's breaking the law. So this is just another way of saying that it allows you to break the laws you don't agree with. (also the ones you do agree with, of course) > That's a real problem that's getting solved On the flip side it's a real law that's being broken. So your "on the one hand, on the other hand" is "it allows people to commit good crimes, but also commit bad crimes". The law isn't perfect. Absolutely not. But the solution to bad law isn't "no law". That's not the path to a good future. There are people out there who think all taxation is theft, and that tax evasion is as moral as smuggling money out of Russia. Of course others say exactly the same, but mean that they are both immoral.
- mypastself 5y ago
  What about a piece of software designed to circumvent laws against accessing websites critical of some authoritarian regime? Should citizens of that country suck it up, because the solution to a bad law isn’t “no law”? Is using such software immoral?
  - vkou 5y ago

vkou 5y ago

> The surprising thing is how many people are falling for it. I don't think they are falling for it, I think they are mostly trying to talk up their speculative investments. (Be they direct I-own-coins financial investments, or indirect I-make-money-by-consulting or I-am-building-a-startup carreer 'investments'.)