5 ms·

Except in this design, transaction verification always gets slower as well. Which makes the system less useful.

by wyager 5y ago

CRConrad 5y ago
Sigh... You didn't understand the comment you replied to at all, did you? That's what makes the resource ever scarcer. It only makes the system "less useful" exactly as much as the ever harder-to-mine magic numbers make Bitcoin "less useful". Beats achieving the same goal by having to burn an ever larger fraction of the planet's energy.
- wyager 5y ago
  No, it’s clearly you who’s misunderstanding something. Presumably the satellites also perform the same chain-commit function as miners (otherwise there’s no point), meaning as the satellites get farther away, committing a transaction takes longer. Bitcoin maintains scarcity without getting slower over time. You also seem to be under the false impression that Bitcoin requires monotonically increasing energy consumption. It does not. The amount of energy consumed by Bitcoin is a function of demand for security by its users, which presumably should equilibrate at some point. It sounds like your model of Bitcoin mining is not correct.
  - CRConrad 5y ago
    > Bitcoin maintains scarcity without getting slower over time. How? Isn't the whole point of Satoshi's algorithm that those magic numbers it takes to commit a transaction are ever fewer and farther between? So -- given the same model and number of computers -- it takes ever longer to "mine" the next one? That is, by definition, getting slower. If you're arguing that they're still finding the same, eh, number of magic numbers per day, that's only because they're "compressing time" by throwing ever more and ever faster computers at it. The point of Stross' idea was that this ever-increasing scarcity can be provided by astrophysics in stead of an algorithm, which AFAICS is pretty fucking genius. If your problem with that is "but then we can't beat the ever-increasing-scarcity algorithm by throwing ever more resources at the problem to keep up the speed!"... Well, then YTF use something based on ever-increasing scarcity in the first place? > You also seem to be under the false impression that Bitcoin requires monotonically increasing energy consumption. Well, no, not necessarily: If everyone just keeps their silly tokens where they are, I can see that it would take no energy at all. Not much of a "currency" then, though, if you can't actually do any trades with it, now is it? In practice, though: Yeah, that seems pretty much exactly what it has been requiring for all of its existence, and no end is in sight. > The amount of energy consumed by Bitcoin is a function of demand for security by its users, Huh? So Bit"coin" is millions of times as secure now as it was a decade or so ago? Wow, it must have had really crappy security back then. If you're saying it was so insecure then that it was pretty much fraud to sell it for real money, and sure, those guys should be in jail -- but fortunately it's a million times safer now... What do you then say to your equivalent (or yourself) ten years in the future, when they say the same about you now? > which presumably should equilibrate at some point. But it still hasn't, has it? And there is no such point in sight, or can you give us an approximate date? Within six months is precise enough... Unfortunately, the point where the actual resource usage exceeded what's reasonable to waste on silly games like this was passed long ago. So unless you can fix it so it goes back to where it was in, say, the third or fourth year by tomorrow, it's already so deep into unreasonable territory that shutting down the whole damn Ponzi scheme seems ever more like the only sensible thing to do, lest this fucking Paperclip Maximizer eat the world.
    - wyager 5y ago
      > Isn't the whole point of Satoshi's algorithm that those magic numbers it takes to commit a transaction are ever fewer and farther between? No. I suggest reading the whitepaper. Also c.f. Google search keyword "difficulty adjustment". There are some fundamental misapprehensions in your model. > The point of Stross' idea was that this ever-increasing scarcity can be provided by astrophysics With ever-decreasing performance. Bitcoin performance stays constant while its inflation schedule decreases to zero. > So Bit"coin" is millions of times as secure now as it was a decade or so ago? Yes > Wow, it must have had really crappy security back then. Correct, but no one cared enough to invest the resources required to derail it. Now its security threshold is sufficiently high that it's economically infeasible for anyone to derail it. This is well understood and part of the fundamental economic design of Bitcoin's security model. Once again, I suggest reading the whitepaper. It will clear up most of these questions you're asking. > If you're saying it was so insecure then that it was pretty much fraud to sell it for real money Is this a real argument or sort of a joke? > What do you then say to your equivalent (or yourself) ten years in the future, when they say the same about you now? This argument will be equally silly ten years from now > But it still hasn't, has it? And there is no such point in sight, or can you give us an approximate date? Whenever and if-ever Bitcoin displaces the dollar, yuan, ruble, gold, etc. as the global settlement and reserve asset. I expect its stability to asymptotically improve as it approaches that point, or to exponentially blow up before that happens. > Within six months is precise enough... You could make a lot of money if you could predict this, so I invite you to try. > the point where the actual resource usage exceeded what's reasonable to waste on silly games like this was passed long ago If you think millions of people are wasting resources on something and you can't really explain why, what's almost certainly happening is that they're buying something you personally don't understand (which I am certain is true in your case). Ideally once you understand how Bitcoin mining works you'll understand the economic security model and this will all make sense. > lest this fucking Paperclip Maximizer eat the world. Don't worry, there's not really any compelling reason for Bitcoin-related energy production to consume more than a fraction of a percent of global economic output. It's strictly bounded by the social surplus associated with using Bitcoin over fiat alternatives, which I would estimate at perhaps a few hundred billion dollars a year in current terms. Maybe even just a few tens of billions. So probably no more than 10-50x what it is now. There is no exponential growth problem like with a runaway paperclip maximizer. The Bitcoin network's "utility function" also isn't contrived, unlike paperclip maximization.

Except in this design, transaction verification always gets slower as well. Which makes the system less useful.

by wyager 5y ago

Except in this design, transaction verification always gets slower as well. Which makes the system less useful.

Sigh... You didn't understand the comment you replied to at all, did you? That's what makes the resource ever scarcer. It only makes the system "less useful" exactly as much as the ever harder-to-mine magic numbers make Bitcoin "less useful". Beats achieving the same goal by having to burn an ever larger fraction of the planet's energy.

wyager 5y ago
No, it’s clearly you who’s misunderstanding something. Presumably the satellites also perform the same chain-commit function as miners (otherwise there’s no point), meaning as the satellites get farther away, committing a transaction takes longer. Bitcoin maintains scarcity without getting slower over time. You also seem to be under the false impression that Bitcoin requires monotonically increasing energy consumption. It does not. The amount of energy consumed by Bitcoin is a function of demand for security by its users, which presumably should equilibrate at some point. It sounds like your model of Bitcoin mining is not correct.
- CRConrad 5y ago
  > Bitcoin maintains scarcity without getting slower over time. How? Isn't the whole point of Satoshi's algorithm that those magic numbers it takes to commit a transaction are ever fewer and farther between? So -- given the same model and number of computers -- it takes ever longer to "mine" the next one? That is, by definition, getting slower. If you're arguing that they're still finding the same, eh, number of magic numbers per day, that's only because they're "compressing time" by throwing ever more and ever faster computers at it. The point of Stross' idea was that this ever-increasing scarcity can be provided by astrophysics in stead of an algorithm, which AFAICS is pretty fucking genius. If your problem with that is "but then we can't beat the ever-increasing-scarcity algorithm by throwing ever more resources at the problem to keep up the speed!"... Well, then YTF use something based on ever-increasing scarcity in the first place? > You also seem to be under the false impression that Bitcoin requires monotonically increasing energy consumption. Well, no, not necessarily: If everyone just keeps their silly tokens where they are, I can see that it would take no energy at all. Not much of a "currency" then, though, if you can't actually do any trades with it, now is it? In practice, though: Yeah, that seems pretty much exactly what it has been requiring for all of its existence, and no end is in sight. > The amount of energy consumed by Bitcoin is a function of demand for security by its users, Huh? So Bit"coin" is millions of times as secure now as it was a decade or so ago? Wow, it must have had really crappy security back then. If you're saying it was so insecure then that it was pretty much fraud to sell it for real money, and sure, those guys should be in jail -- but fortunately it's a million times safer now... What do you then say to your equivalent (or yourself) ten years in the future, when they say the same about you now? > which presumably should equilibrate at some point. But it still hasn't, has it? And there is no such point in sight, or can you give us an approximate date? Within six months is precise enough... Unfortunately, the point where the actual resource usage exceeded what's reasonable to waste on silly games like this was passed long ago. So unless you can fix it so it goes back to where it was in, say, the third or fourth year by tomorrow, it's already so deep into unreasonable territory that shutting down the whole damn Ponzi scheme seems ever more like the only sensible thing to do, lest this fucking Paperclip Maximizer eat the world.
  - wyager 5y ago
    > Isn't the whole point of Satoshi's algorithm that those magic numbers it takes to commit a transaction are ever fewer and farther between? No. I suggest reading the whitepaper. Also c.f. Google search keyword "difficulty adjustment". There are some fundamental misapprehensions in your model. > The point of Stross' idea was that this ever-increasing scarcity can be provided by astrophysics With ever-decreasing performance. Bitcoin performance stays constant while its inflation schedule decreases to zero. > So Bit"coin" is millions of times as secure now as it was a decade or so ago? Yes > Wow, it must have had really crappy security back then. Correct, but no one cared enough to invest the resources required to derail it. Now its security threshold is sufficiently high that it's economically infeasible for anyone to derail it. This is well understood and part of the fundamental economic design of Bitcoin's security model. Once again, I suggest reading the whitepaper. It will clear up most of these questions you're asking. > If you're saying it was so insecure then that it was pretty much fraud to sell it for real money Is this a real argument or sort of a joke? > What do you then say to your equivalent (or yourself) ten years in the future, when they say the same about you now? This argument will be equally silly ten years from now > But it still hasn't, has it? And there is no such point in sight, or can you give us an approximate date? Whenever and if-ever Bitcoin displaces the dollar, yuan, ruble, gold, etc. as the global settlement and reserve asset. I expect its stability to asymptotically improve as it approaches that point, or to exponentially blow up before that happens. > Within six months is precise enough... You could make a lot of money if you could predict this, so I invite you to try. > the point where the actual resource usage exceeded what's reasonable to waste on silly games like this was passed long ago If you think millions of people are wasting resources on something and you can't really explain why, what's almost certainly happening is that they're buying something you personally don't understand (which I am certain is true in your case). Ideally once you understand how Bitcoin mining works you'll understand the economic security model and this will all make sense. > lest this fucking Paperclip Maximizer eat the world. Don't worry, there's not really any compelling reason for Bitcoin-related energy production to consume more than a fraction of a percent of global economic output. It's strictly bounded by the social surplus associated with using Bitcoin over fiat alternatives, which I would estimate at perhaps a few hundred billion dollars a year in current terms. Maybe even just a few tens of billions. So probably no more than 10-50x what it is now. There is no exponential growth problem like with a runaway paperclip maximizer. The Bitcoin network's "utility function" also isn't contrived, unlike paperclip maximization.