3 ms·
Fiat currency is worth nothing but cryptocurrencies carry a huge cost to the environment and energy independence. Crypto is arguably worth negative.
by jimbob45 4y ago
Fiat currency is worth nothing but cryptocurrencies carry a huge cost to the environment and energy independence. Crypto is arguably worth negative.
- latchkey 4y ago> cryptocurrencies carry a huge cost to the environment and energy independence "whatabout" traditional banking?
- notahacker 4y agoThey're not designed to maximise consumption of energy priced below expected yield from burning it, and are thus several orders of magnitude less harmful to the environment on a per transaction basis, and probably less harmful overall.
- latchkey 4y agoExpended energy per transaction basis is a popular misconception based on a misunderstanding of how PoW works in practice.
- notahacker 4y agoNope. It's a popular misconception that people think burning more energy than a mid-sized country to maintain a rounding error in the world's finances with pathetic transaction throughput is unacceptable only because we don't realise the energy use isn't strictly proportional to the transaction throughput. But it doesn't, it just requires acknowledging that crypto is burning more energy than most countries for a comparatively tiny number of people to gamble a comparatively tiny amount of wealth, and that the actual incentive structure of PoW (probability of block rewards based on consuming more energy than rivals) is the most wantonly environmentally destructive technology invented in a history which also includes leaded petrol and CFCs.
- latchkey 4y agoNice rant.
- forty 4y agoAs far a I know there is no reward in traditional banking to whoever can waste the more energy doing useless computation (creating a wasting race). It's probably not great, but at least it's not completely stupid.
- melony 4y agoYou have the entire government bureaucracy and military as an externality for fiat currencies if you absolutely insist on viewing it through that lens.