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Would it make sense to ban electric heaters? Well, mining Bitcoin is not more wasteful than an electric heater. If we assume that cryptocurrencies provide no b

Would it make sense to ban electric heaters? Well, mining Bitcoin is not more wasteful than an electric heater. If we assume that cryptocurrencies provide no benefits, a computer mining crypto is equivalent to an electric heater. If we assume that cryptocurrencies provide some sort of benefit, then mining Bitcoin is more energy-efficient than electric heaters. So, if you want to ban Bitcoin mining, you should also ban electric heaters, if you want to be morally coherent.

rsynnott 5y ago
Well, first of all, direct electric resistive heaters (as opposed to, say, heat pumps) are likely on the chopping block in many countries in favour of more efficient solutions. But also, in general, the heat produced by mining magical internet money is, generally, not being used; it's waste.
go_elmo 5y ago
Would you get a building permit for electric heaters the size of factories heating the environment anywhere in the world (apart from outlaw places and places where religion > public interests)? I cant think of such a place somehow...
snarf21 5y ago
If all the waste heat was using for heating, then you might have a point. If you have to start burning extra electricity (fans, cooling systems) to keep your GPU or ASIC cool, your argument falls apart. I also don't think people are using mining farms with 1000s of units as a heat source for human habitation. This is the same old straw man, you can make the same argument for Twitter or Hatebook. For all their ills, there is some human benefit from us using them collectively. Crypto is unusable and always will be. Everyone in it is on the pump & dump train. It is all speculation and chasing dumb money.
MagnumOpus 5y ago
Nobody sane and financially literate runs electric resistance heaters if they need heating with any regularity. Heatpumps are 3-4x more efficient for heating. Nobody sane runs electric heaters which heat the great outdoors either.

rsynnott 5y ago

Well, first of all, direct electric resistive heaters (as opposed to, say, heat pumps) are likely on the chopping block in many countries in favour of more efficient solutions. But also, in general, the heat produced by mining magical internet money is, generally, not being used; it's waste.

go_elmo 5y ago

Would you get a building permit for electric heaters the size of factories heating the environment anywhere in the world (apart from outlaw places and places where religion > public interests)? I cant think of such a place somehow...

snarf21 5y ago

If all the waste heat was using for heating, then you might have a point. If you have to start burning extra electricity (fans, cooling systems) to keep your GPU or ASIC cool, your argument falls apart. I also don't think people are using mining farms with 1000s of units as a heat source for human habitation. This is the same old straw man, you can make the same argument for Twitter or Hatebook. For all their ills, there is some human benefit from us using them collectively. Crypto is unusable and always will be. Everyone in it is on the pump & dump train. It is all speculation and chasing dumb money.

MagnumOpus 5y ago

Nobody sane and financially literate runs electric resistance heaters if they need heating with any regularity. Heatpumps are 3-4x more efficient for heating. Nobody sane runs electric heaters which heat the great outdoors either.