7 ms·

I think he’s saying that of all the things you could power in whatever electricity consumption regime you care to mention , bitcoin competes for supply with mor

I think he’s saying that of all the things you could power in whatever electricity consumption regime you care to mention , bitcoin competes for supply with more socially useful things.

inter_netuser 5y ago
..and it's absolutely not possible to build more nuclear powerplants..? We are going to settle Mars by relying on windmills. That's the plan?
- arrrg 5y ago
  We will not settle Mars. That doesn’t even begin to make sense. There are places orders of magnitude more friendly to human settlement on Earth than on Mars and we don’t even settle those. On Earth those windmill are much cheaper than nuclear power, even taking into account their capacity factor.
  - inter_netuser 5y ago
    "settling mars" is just a meme. humanity however, needs to branch out, and quick. and windmills aren't going to help us make that jump to an interplanetary civilization. Nuclear is cheap, very cheap. It was made expensive by political decisions, under the guise of proliferation suppression, but is actually a tool of economic suppression of potential challengers. Germany, one of the most high-tech countries in the world, cannot make renewables work. Germany also has very electricity rates. France, on the other hand, builds nuclear, supplies Germany, and has MUCH lower electricity rates. I guess no one told them nuclear is too expensive?
    - dopidopHN 5y ago
      Cost was not really a factor in France decision . Historically De Gaule launched the trend to reach energy indépendance and get the bomb. Now Macron is doing it to secure energy independence and win point in upcoming elections.
      - inter_netuser 5y ago
        so why is the expensive French nuclear so cheap, and supplies the enlightened fully-green Germany that's has insane high electricity rates then? Someone forgot to inform them nuclear bad?
        dopidopHN 5y ago
        My point is that cost is not the main driver. But mostly having independence from suppliers. We actually experienced high historical costs in 2021 for electricity as well. Nuclear does not shield us from variation in gas prices
roenxi 5y ago
We have a perfectly good system in place for punishing people who waste energy - it is called "the economy". It applies constant pressure to people who waste things. If crypto manages to run that gauntlet, there is a good chance that someone with a track record thinks it is socially useful. People confidently declaring that it is useless are in the same bucket as people confidently declaring that the internet was a fad in the first big tech bubble - lacking humility. The truth is we don't know if this (likely outrageously large) bubble is a complete waste or masking something transformative.
- AussieWog93 5y ago
  I think the problem here is that "the economy" is not punishing miners but rewarding them. Only a small minority of people who buy crypto genuinely have a considered belief that it's socially useful. The overwhelming majority are simply speculators who believe that they can sell it for more than they bought it for.
  - roenxi 5y ago
    > ...speculators who believe that they can sell it for more than they bought it for... Which, assuming that the individual speculators are intelligent and rational, has the emergent property of providing something that is socially useful. And if they are stupid and irrational, it'll bankrupt the lot of them so that they can't waste that much money again. The economy is a cruel beast, but it is much better than you or I at deciding what needs to happen to get people what they need. If something like bitcoin really is just a money burning exercise with no redeeming property, sooner or later it'll go bankrupt and disappear back into obscurity. It can't be a hot new thing forever. And "speculators" only have power when they are consistently right. If they routinely make big gambles and get it wrong then they don't get to speculate for long.
    - randalluk 5y ago
      As the article says >Libertarianism's attraction is based on ignoring externalities, and cryptocurrencies are no exception. The economy as currently regulated doesn't correctly price in externalities such as the ongoing cost of global heating generated by burning fossil fuels.
inter_netuser 5y ago
>"more socially useful things." What's socially useful is drastically different from Iceland to Tonga. People have their own mind to decide what is useful to them.

I think he’s saying that of all the things you could power in whatever electricity consumption regime you care to mention , bitcoin competes for supply with more socially useful things.

inter_netuser 5y ago

..and it's absolutely not possible to build more nuclear powerplants..? We are going to settle Mars by relying on windmills. That's the plan?

arrrg 5y ago
We will not settle Mars. That doesn’t even begin to make sense. There are places orders of magnitude more friendly to human settlement on Earth than on Mars and we don’t even settle those. On Earth those windmill are much cheaper than nuclear power, even taking into account their capacity factor.
- inter_netuser 5y ago
  "settling mars" is just a meme. humanity however, needs to branch out, and quick. and windmills aren't going to help us make that jump to an interplanetary civilization. Nuclear is cheap, very cheap. It was made expensive by political decisions, under the guise of proliferation suppression, but is actually a tool of economic suppression of potential challengers. Germany, one of the most high-tech countries in the world, cannot make renewables work. Germany also has very electricity rates. France, on the other hand, builds nuclear, supplies Germany, and has MUCH lower electricity rates. I guess no one told them nuclear is too expensive?
  - dopidopHN 5y ago
    Cost was not really a factor in France decision . Historically De Gaule launched the trend to reach energy indépendance and get the bomb. Now Macron is doing it to secure energy independence and win point in upcoming elections.
    - inter_netuser 5y ago
      so why is the expensive French nuclear so cheap, and supplies the enlightened fully-green Germany that's has insane high electricity rates then? Someone forgot to inform them nuclear bad?
      - dopidopHN 5y ago
        My point is that cost is not the main driver. But mostly having independence from suppliers. We actually experienced high historical costs in 2021 for electricity as well. Nuclear does not shield us from variation in gas prices

roenxi 5y ago

We have a perfectly good system in place for punishing people who waste energy - it is called "the economy". It applies constant pressure to people who waste things. If crypto manages to run that gauntlet, there is a good chance that someone with a track record thinks it is socially useful. People confidently declaring that it is useless are in the same bucket as people confidently declaring that the internet was a fad in the first big tech bubble - lacking humility. The truth is we don't know if this (likely outrageously large) bubble is a complete waste or masking something transformative.

AussieWog93 5y ago
I think the problem here is that "the economy" is not punishing miners but rewarding them. Only a small minority of people who buy crypto genuinely have a considered belief that it's socially useful. The overwhelming majority are simply speculators who believe that they can sell it for more than they bought it for.
- roenxi 5y ago
  > ...speculators who believe that they can sell it for more than they bought it for... Which, assuming that the individual speculators are intelligent and rational, has the emergent property of providing something that is socially useful. And if they are stupid and irrational, it'll bankrupt the lot of them so that they can't waste that much money again. The economy is a cruel beast, but it is much better than you or I at deciding what needs to happen to get people what they need. If something like bitcoin really is just a money burning exercise with no redeeming property, sooner or later it'll go bankrupt and disappear back into obscurity. It can't be a hot new thing forever. And "speculators" only have power when they are consistently right. If they routinely make big gambles and get it wrong then they don't get to speculate for long.
  - randalluk 5y ago
    As the article says >Libertarianism's attraction is based on ignoring externalities, and cryptocurrencies are no exception. The economy as currently regulated doesn't correctly price in externalities such as the ongoing cost of global heating generated by burning fossil fuels.

inter_netuser 5y ago

>"more socially useful things." What's socially useful is drastically different from Iceland to Tonga. People have their own mind to decide what is useful to them.