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> Bitcoin transaction use energy. The proof is that if no more transaction happened no energy would be spent in bitcoins. That is not proof that bitcoin uses e

> Bitcoin transaction use energy. The proof is that if no more transaction happened no energy would be spent in bitcoins. That is not proof that bitcoin uses energy, in fact bitcoin only does about 2k on chain settlements every 10 minutes, and it has been like that for a decade, but energy usage has grown multiple orders of magnitude over that time period. Obviously energy is used for something other than transactions.

afiori 5y ago
by the same logic you can prove that CPUs occupy no physical space at all given how much they have shrunk over the years. many people claim that eventually Bitcoin will be able to be extremely power efficient (with the lightning network and whatnot), I have no idea about how these planned future improvements work. but today transferring Bitcoin (the main action that users of the network are supposed to perform) consumes a lot of energy. you are clearly more knowledgeable about Bitcoin than me so if your position is that the internal operation called "transaction" nodes perform consumes a negligible amount of energy I have no qualms with it. but I believe I have overwhelming external evidence that the operation called transaction by the laypeople users of the network to transfer ownership and grow the blockchain in any meaningful way under the dynamic consensus model uses lots of energy by design. Edit: upon reflection I feel like what you are saying is that the nodes "consume" zero energy, but that I as the Bitcoin use am asking them to burn energy to produce a more secure block that will be better accepted on the blockchain. So the operations themselves consume nothing but rather use the value of energy as ingredient that ends up inside the block as stored value. I you are arguing this I can see how you could say that in good faith, I would still think that is a completely backward opinion
- keymone 5y ago
  > I have no idea about how these planned future improvements work. they already work. every on-chain bitcoin settlement can represent trillions of BTC exchanges. same as interbank settlements - done once a day, represent millions or billions of individual transactions. what does that do to your energy / tx metric? > but today transferring Bitcoin (the main action that users of the network are supposed to perform) consumes a lot of energy. transferring doesn't, securing it against an attack does. > operations themselves consume nothing but rather use the value of energy as ingredient that ends up inside the block as stored value that's exactly right, people that choose transacting on bitcoin chain do so knowing that they pay for certain level of security and you can see it from the correlation between bitcoin price and bitcoin hashrate. it's a system with many feedback loops that self-balances at a level of security that is demanded by the market. you may think it's backward opinion but i appreciate that you recognize i'm not arguing in bad faith.
  - afiori 5y ago
    Rereading my comment I realize that what i wrote is essentially an insult, I didn't mean for it to sound that way. I should have said that it is a backward implementation of security.
MereInterest 5y ago
> Obviously energy is used for something other than transactions. Not at all. The efficiency of the network is intentionally degraded such that the rate of Bitcoin transactions remains constant despite the increased energy use. You are assuming that the energy is being spent for some tangible benefit, and drawing conclusions from that assumption. I would say that the energy is being wasted, with the sole result being a receipt showing how much electricity has been thrown away.
- keymone 5y ago
  > You are assuming that the energy is being spent for some tangible benefit I don’t assume, I know what it’s being used for - security against chain overrides/rollbacks.

afiori 5y ago

by the same logic you can prove that CPUs occupy no physical space at all given how much they have shrunk over the years. many people claim that eventually Bitcoin will be able to be extremely power efficient (with the lightning network and whatnot), I have no idea about how these planned future improvements work. but today transferring Bitcoin (the main action that users of the network are supposed to perform) consumes a lot of energy. you are clearly more knowledgeable about Bitcoin than me so if your position is that the internal operation called "transaction" nodes perform consumes a negligible amount of energy I have no qualms with it. but I believe I have overwhelming external evidence that the operation called transaction by the laypeople users of the network to transfer ownership and grow the blockchain in any meaningful way under the dynamic consensus model uses lots of energy by design. Edit: upon reflection I feel like what you are saying is that the nodes "consume" zero energy, but that I as the Bitcoin use am asking them to burn energy to produce a more secure block that will be better accepted on the blockchain. So the operations themselves consume nothing but rather use the value of energy as ingredient that ends up inside the block as stored value. I you are arguing this I can see how you could say that in good faith, I would still think that is a completely backward opinion

keymone 5y ago
> I have no idea about how these planned future improvements work. they already work. every on-chain bitcoin settlement can represent trillions of BTC exchanges. same as interbank settlements - done once a day, represent millions or billions of individual transactions. what does that do to your energy / tx metric? > but today transferring Bitcoin (the main action that users of the network are supposed to perform) consumes a lot of energy. transferring doesn't, securing it against an attack does. > operations themselves consume nothing but rather use the value of energy as ingredient that ends up inside the block as stored value that's exactly right, people that choose transacting on bitcoin chain do so knowing that they pay for certain level of security and you can see it from the correlation between bitcoin price and bitcoin hashrate. it's a system with many feedback loops that self-balances at a level of security that is demanded by the market. you may think it's backward opinion but i appreciate that you recognize i'm not arguing in bad faith.
- afiori 5y ago
  Rereading my comment I realize that what i wrote is essentially an insult, I didn't mean for it to sound that way. I should have said that it is a backward implementation of security.

MereInterest 5y ago

> Obviously energy is used for something other than transactions. Not at all. The efficiency of the network is intentionally degraded such that the rate of Bitcoin transactions remains constant despite the increased energy use. You are assuming that the energy is being spent for some tangible benefit, and drawing conclusions from that assumption. I would say that the energy is being wasted, with the sole result being a receipt showing how much electricity has been thrown away.

keymone 5y ago
> You are assuming that the energy is being spent for some tangible benefit I don’t assume, I know what it’s being used for - security against chain overrides/rollbacks.