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From what I understand as a layman, it is overly generous to call the prime number sequences found by PrimeCoin "useful". I do think that a hybrid proof-of-sta

by lukifer 13y ago

From what I understand as a layman, it is overly generous to call the prime number sequences found by PrimeCoin "useful". I do think that a hybrid proof-of-stake system is probably superior and more efficient. But bear in mind that capitalism involves lots of waste, from high-frequency trading, to plastic doodads that wind up in the trash, to the vast majority of advertising and marketing. I'm absolutely in favor of a Star Trek / Buckminster Fuller neo-communism, if it can be achieved. In the meantime, we have to fail forward and innovate as best we can, and I think proof-of-work cryptocoins are far less wasteful in toto than the current global banking system. (What do you think it took in terms of energy and waste products to manufacture and distribute the dollars in your wallet?) Note also that intentional wastefulness shows up frequently in nature: costly signals are honest signals. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_theory#Costly_signalling_and_Fisherian_diploid_dynamics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_theory#Costly_signal...

gnaritas 13y ago
> I think proof-of-work cryptocoins are far less wasteful in toto than the current global banking system. Maybe, maybe not, I don't think anyone's crunched enough numbers to make a reasonable measure of that yet. > (What do you think it took in terms of energy and waste products to manufacture and distribute the dollars in your wallet?) I doubt either of us know. I'm a Bitcoin supporter, but one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. If that's true at all, then Bitcoin is wasteful.
- lukifer 13y ago
  > one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. I sincerely hope that a truly useful proof-of-work can be discovered. It would be a very big deal. The problem is, the work has to be reliably verifiable, and easier to verify than just doing the work over again, which is why hashes are a good fit.
  - 3rd3 13y ago
    What about Primecoin?
    - lukifer 13y ago
      See the discussion above. :) Prime number sequences are unlikely to be "useful" in the same sense as protein folding.
      - gnaritas 13y ago
        Another possibility.
        lukifer 13y ago
        Protein folding unfortunately isn't a good candidate, because verifying the work takes exactly as much effort as doing the work. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system
  - reginaldjcooper 13y ago
    Unless I am mistaken, you can verify arbitrary computations[0]. [0] http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.2003 http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.2003
    - lukifer 13y ago
      The abstract says that "a practical general-purpose protocol for verifiable computation may be significantly closer to reality than previously realized". This should be interesting though, thanks for sharing!
      - reginaldjcooper 13y ago
        You have a fair point, but I claim for a proof-of-work computation it might be good for it to be a bit unpractical. (Depending on the parameters, this paper is on my reading list but I haven't gone through it yet.) I think it's incredibly interesting also, in any case I hope you enjoy the paper :)
- KVFinn 13y ago
  >I'm a Bitcoin supporter, but one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. If that's true at all, then Bitcoin is wasteful. There are curecoin and gridcoin, which base a large portion of mining profits off Boinc credits. Kinda defeats the point of being decentralized though...

by lukifer 13y ago

gnaritas 13y ago

> I think proof-of-work cryptocoins are far less wasteful in toto than the current global banking system. Maybe, maybe not, I don't think anyone's crunched enough numbers to make a reasonable measure of that yet. > (What do you think it took in terms of energy and waste products to manufacture and distribute the dollars in your wallet?) I doubt either of us know. I'm a Bitcoin supporter, but one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. If that's true at all, then Bitcoin is wasteful.

lukifer 13y ago
> one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. I sincerely hope that a truly useful proof-of-work can be discovered. It would be a very big deal. The problem is, the work has to be reliably verifiable, and easier to verify than just doing the work over again, which is why hashes are a good fit.
- 3rd3 13y ago
  What about Primecoin?
  - lukifer 13y ago
    See the discussion above. :) Prime number sequences are unlikely to be "useful" in the same sense as protein folding.
    - gnaritas 13y ago
      Another possibility.
      - lukifer 13y ago
        Protein folding unfortunately isn't a good candidate, because verifying the work takes exactly as much effort as doing the work. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof-of-work_system
- reginaldjcooper 13y ago
  Unless I am mistaken, you can verify arbitrary computations[0]. [0] http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.2003 http://arxiv.org/abs/1105.2003
  - lukifer 13y ago
    The abstract says that "a practical general-purpose protocol for verifiable computation may be significantly closer to reality than previously realized". This should be interesting though, thanks for sharing!
    - reginaldjcooper 13y ago
      You have a fair point, but I claim for a proof-of-work computation it might be good for it to be a bit unpractical. (Depending on the parameters, this paper is on my reading list but I haven't gone through it yet.) I think it's incredibly interesting also, in any case I hope you enjoy the paper :)
KVFinn 13y ago
>I'm a Bitcoin supporter, but one has to think there are useful hard problems to solve rather than just banging out SHA-256 hashes over and over. If that's true at all, then Bitcoin is wasteful. There are curecoin and gridcoin, which base a large portion of mining profits off Boinc credits. Kinda defeats the point of being decentralized though...