3 ms·

This is pretty muddled up. Let's look at it like this: a block on the blockchain has a maximum size. A transaction has a minimum size. So, each block contains

This is pretty muddled up. Let's look at it like this: a block on the blockchain has a maximum size. A transaction has a minimum size. So, each block contains a maximum number of transactions. Miners must waste a certain amount of energy hashing a block to ensure the security of the network (through the incentive mechanisms described above). So, we can compute a practical energy/block, which translates to an energy/typical transaction. Now, the block size is a kind of free parameter - the blockchain guarantees wouldn't be significantly different with 1GB blocks instead of 1MB. And that, in turn, would reduce the energy cost per transaction dramatically, and allow the network to process more transactions/second. Similarly, if there were fewer people putting fewer resources into mining bitcoin, the energy cost/block could go down. This would affect the security of the network though, as it also brings down the cost of a 51% attack. But miners are opposed to such changes, which have been proposed before. So, in practice, the bitcoin network as it is today has a huge energy cost/mined transaction. Again, if you don't believe this, you should ask yourself what stops the bitcoin blockchain from processing 1 billion transactions/second instead of the current pitiful ~2 hundred transactions.

ajkdhcb2 5y ago
Do you know what the lightning network is? It changes all of these relationships, and it is key to what we are talking about, but you didnt mention it in this comment. Separately to the lightning network, the security (hashrate, energy usage) is still not directly linked to the number of on-chain transactions that are processed. You can compute "a practical energy/block" specifically for bitcoin but it does not translate to a meaningful energy/transaction value because the quantity of energy used is not directly caused by transactions. You can have a less-secure blockchain that does many more transactions than bitcoin with low energy usage (altcoins exist) - if these are low value transactions then people won't even be incentivised to attack it. The relationship is NOT just energy/transaction. Your estimated energy/transaction value will keep changing because that's not the relationship; the new coins in the block reward will eventually drop to zero, the value processed by the network will change, the ASIC development situation will change, etc. It's like finding a runner that eats icecream and computing icecream/kilometre. >Again, if you don't believe this, you should ask yourself what stops the bitcoin blockchain from processing 1 billion transactions/second instead of the current pitiful ~2 hundred transactions. Nothing is stopping it. Run your own lightning node and you can do more transactions than what you are erroneously claiming
- simiones 5y ago
  What do off-chain transactions like Lightning have to do with the transaction costs of the blockchain itself? We can trade bitcoin over HN comments, that doesn't mean that the bitcoin blockchain is involved in our trade. The whole discussion is about the Bitcoin blockchain itself. Altcoins, lightning, payment apps etc are all entirely irrelevant to this point. The bitcoin blockchain as it exists today has a pretty well fixed energy cost per transaction. All sorts of things could change this - changes in the protocol to allow bigger blocks, changes in the hashrate that most miners are willing to invest, changes in mining hardware efficiency etc. But what you are claiming is like saying that it's meaningless to talk about the gas/mile of a diesel Ford Mustang, since you could always change the engine (block size), or change from gas to another fuel (better ASICs), or choose to ship the car by ferry somewhere(use Lightning instead)! > You can compute "a practical energy/block" specifically for bitcoin but it does not translate to a meaningful energy/transaction value because the quantity of energy used is not directly caused by transactions. Why does it matter that "it's not caused by " the number of transactions? As long as the block size is fixed, the number of transactions that can be processed by the existing bitcoin network is directly linked to the energy expenditure of the existing bitcoin network. Other hypothetical versions of the bitcoin network could achieve other energy/transaction thresholds. But the one we have today is extremely wasteful. > Nothing is stopping it. Run your own lightning node and you can do more transactions than what you are erroneously claiming "Why can't my car do 600km/h, it can only do 200km/h?" "Nothing is stopping it. Board a maglev train and you can do far more than 200 km/h."
  - topranks 5y ago
    I hear where you are coming from. But changing the blocksize is just a software change. It doesn't require outlay on a "bigger engine", or any new engineering. The "existing bitcoin network" could switch to it with a 1 line change in the code. So it's not quite the same as some of your examples.
    - simiones 5y ago
      > just a software change It's not "just" a software change. It's a huge political and organizational issue. It has been proposed and agreed and disagreed and fought over for many years, with no plausible change in site. Turns out, changing fundamental limits of a truly distributed system is actually very hard. True, not entirely for engineering reasons, but that makes it even worse - engineering can in principle be solved, people problems can be forever. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin_scalability_problem#Block_size_increases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin_scalability_problem#Bl...

ajkdhcb2 5y ago

Do you know what the lightning network is? It changes all of these relationships, and it is key to what we are talking about, but you didnt mention it in this comment. Separately to the lightning network, the security (hashrate, energy usage) is still not directly linked to the number of on-chain transactions that are processed. You can compute "a practical energy/block" specifically for bitcoin but it does not translate to a meaningful energy/transaction value because the quantity of energy used is not directly caused by transactions. You can have a less-secure blockchain that does many more transactions than bitcoin with low energy usage (altcoins exist) - if these are low value transactions then people won't even be incentivised to attack it. The relationship is NOT just energy/transaction. Your estimated energy/transaction value will keep changing because that's not the relationship; the new coins in the block reward will eventually drop to zero, the value processed by the network will change, the ASIC development situation will change, etc. It's like finding a runner that eats icecream and computing icecream/kilometre. >Again, if you don't believe this, you should ask yourself what stops the bitcoin blockchain from processing 1 billion transactions/second instead of the current pitiful ~2 hundred transactions. Nothing is stopping it. Run your own lightning node and you can do more transactions than what you are erroneously claiming

simiones 5y ago
What do off-chain transactions like Lightning have to do with the transaction costs of the blockchain itself? We can trade bitcoin over HN comments, that doesn't mean that the bitcoin blockchain is involved in our trade. The whole discussion is about the Bitcoin blockchain itself. Altcoins, lightning, payment apps etc are all entirely irrelevant to this point. The bitcoin blockchain as it exists today has a pretty well fixed energy cost per transaction. All sorts of things could change this - changes in the protocol to allow bigger blocks, changes in the hashrate that most miners are willing to invest, changes in mining hardware efficiency etc. But what you are claiming is like saying that it's meaningless to talk about the gas/mile of a diesel Ford Mustang, since you could always change the engine (block size), or change from gas to another fuel (better ASICs), or choose to ship the car by ferry somewhere(use Lightning instead)! > You can compute "a practical energy/block" specifically for bitcoin but it does not translate to a meaningful energy/transaction value because the quantity of energy used is not directly caused by transactions. Why does it matter that "it's not caused by " the number of transactions? As long as the block size is fixed, the number of transactions that can be processed by the existing bitcoin network is directly linked to the energy expenditure of the existing bitcoin network. Other hypothetical versions of the bitcoin network could achieve other energy/transaction thresholds. But the one we have today is extremely wasteful. > Nothing is stopping it. Run your own lightning node and you can do more transactions than what you are erroneously claiming "Why can't my car do 600km/h, it can only do 200km/h?" "Nothing is stopping it. Board a maglev train and you can do far more than 200 km/h."
- topranks 5y ago
  I hear where you are coming from. But changing the blocksize is just a software change. It doesn't require outlay on a "bigger engine", or any new engineering. The "existing bitcoin network" could switch to it with a 1 line change in the code. So it's not quite the same as some of your examples.
  - simiones 5y ago
    > just a software change It's not "just" a software change. It's a huge political and organizational issue. It has been proposed and agreed and disagreed and fought over for many years, with no plausible change in site. Turns out, changing fundamental limits of a truly distributed system is actually very hard. True, not entirely for engineering reasons, but that makes it even worse - engineering can in principle be solved, people problems can be forever. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin_scalability_problem#Block_size_increases https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin_scalability_problem#Bl...