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>"Our philosophy is to ask for permission, not forgiveness", Cameron Winklevoss said. So, a complete opposite of what Bitcoin philosophy is. Gotcha.

by snitko 12y ago

obstinate 12y ago
One could easily argue in response that there's no such thing as bitcoin "philosophy." There's only what you can and can't do with the protocol. If they can implement their ideals under the strictures of what the protocol allows, that's their prerogative.
- jsprogrammer 12y ago
  Which is why this exchange is a bit strange. The problems are purely technical, not political. A completely open exchange (open code, open infrastructure) is all that is needed. A politically "regulated" exchange is just MBA masturbation.
- jedunnigan 12y ago
  So one might argue that that is a philosophy in and of itself. An agnostic one that is founded on technical specification, not moral imperative.
  - colordrops 12y ago
    No, not really. The entire purpose of bitcoin network's design is to reduce or completely remove the need for trust amongst participants. It was designed so that it operates in the same fashion regardless of the moral, political and regulatory climate surrounding it. That is not philosophy, but fact.
    - logn 12y ago
      And fiat-BTC exchanges aren't part of the spec, so regulation can be helpful. I seriously question the necessity or utility of centralized wallets, but regulated exchanges make perfect sense.
    - jedunnigan 12y ago
      Philosophical inquiry doesn't necessitate an adjudication on morality, politics or regulatory climate. It can simply be a formalization of concepts observed in a system. Bitcoin doesn't exist without human input, it requires active agents to engage it. So even if the rules are set in the code there is an element of humanity embedded in the protocol. Just look at the core developers. I can guarantee you they have a philosophy on what should and should not be done during maintenance and major upgrades to the protocol. But if you want to reduce the definition of philosophy to those things you mentioned, I'm happy to rephrase: the philosophy of Bitcoin is thus that there is no philosophy. Think of it this way: if you have a rule that says you have no rules, you still have one rule that there are no rules.
      - colordrops 12y ago
        You are begging the question. The design of Bitcoin has a philosophy. The instantiation of Bitcoin, the Bitcoin network itself, does not. Saying that bitcoin has a philosophy because the developers have a philosophy is like saying that air has a philosophy because the developers breath air. No matter what the developers do, the Bitcoin network will continue to exist on its own and act in an exacting way, despite your claims to the contrary. The miners are in control of the network, and not the developers. But no single miner is in control either. If the developers or miners could freely enact change on the network, then there would be a fuzzy line between the design and the implementation, and you could lay the philosophy on the implementation. But interestingly, of all technologies ever created by man, the bitcoin design and implementation may be the most decoupled in history, as bitcoin is built to be resilient to tampering. It is not a representative democracy. Until someone controls hashing power over a certain percentage, or the majority of miners agree to a serious protocol modification, no real change will occur to the bitcoin network's behavior. From another angle, would you say that a car engine has a philosophy? No. But the designers had a philosophy when they designed it. edit: Further analogizing with human designed artifacts, such as a towel or a laptop, I think this is a debate on semantics. An object can't have a philosophy, but it can embody or reflect one.
        jedunnigan 12y ago
- snitko 12y ago
  Of course it has a philosophy. Which is freedom from government regulation and coercion in finance (and, consequently, in everything). I challenge you to prove this isn't so when even Satoshi himself said that.
  - gnaritas 12y ago
    Bitcoin is a tool, it has no philosophy; its creator did certainly, but tools don't think nor have opinions and once released into the wild, the creators philosophy is simply no longer relevant. The code is open source, people will use the tool however they like regardless of the creators intentions.

>"Our philosophy is to ask for permission, not forgiveness", Cameron Winklevoss said. So, a complete opposite of what Bitcoin philosophy is. Gotcha.

by snitko 12y ago

>"Our philosophy is to ask for permission, not forgiveness", Cameron Winklevoss said. So, a complete opposite of what Bitcoin philosophy is. Gotcha.

obstinate 12y ago

One could easily argue in response that there's no such thing as bitcoin "philosophy." There's only what you can and can't do with the protocol. If they can implement their ideals under the strictures of what the protocol allows, that's their prerogative.

jsprogrammer 12y ago
Which is why this exchange is a bit strange. The problems are purely technical, not political. A completely open exchange (open code, open infrastructure) is all that is needed. A politically "regulated" exchange is just MBA masturbation.
jedunnigan 12y ago
So one might argue that that is a philosophy in and of itself. An agnostic one that is founded on technical specification, not moral imperative.
- colordrops 12y ago
  No, not really. The entire purpose of bitcoin network's design is to reduce or completely remove the need for trust amongst participants. It was designed so that it operates in the same fashion regardless of the moral, political and regulatory climate surrounding it. That is not philosophy, but fact.
  - logn 12y ago
    And fiat-BTC exchanges aren't part of the spec, so regulation can be helpful. I seriously question the necessity or utility of centralized wallets, but regulated exchanges make perfect sense.
  - jedunnigan 12y ago
    Philosophical inquiry doesn't necessitate an adjudication on morality, politics or regulatory climate. It can simply be a formalization of concepts observed in a system. Bitcoin doesn't exist without human input, it requires active agents to engage it. So even if the rules are set in the code there is an element of humanity embedded in the protocol. Just look at the core developers. I can guarantee you they have a philosophy on what should and should not be done during maintenance and major upgrades to the protocol. But if you want to reduce the definition of philosophy to those things you mentioned, I'm happy to rephrase: the philosophy of Bitcoin is thus that there is no philosophy. Think of it this way: if you have a rule that says you have no rules, you still have one rule that there are no rules.
    - colordrops 12y ago
      You are begging the question. The design of Bitcoin has a philosophy. The instantiation of Bitcoin, the Bitcoin network itself, does not. Saying that bitcoin has a philosophy because the developers have a philosophy is like saying that air has a philosophy because the developers breath air. No matter what the developers do, the Bitcoin network will continue to exist on its own and act in an exacting way, despite your claims to the contrary. The miners are in control of the network, and not the developers. But no single miner is in control either. If the developers or miners could freely enact change on the network, then there would be a fuzzy line between the design and the implementation, and you could lay the philosophy on the implementation. But interestingly, of all technologies ever created by man, the bitcoin design and implementation may be the most decoupled in history, as bitcoin is built to be resilient to tampering. It is not a representative democracy. Until someone controls hashing power over a certain percentage, or the majority of miners agree to a serious protocol modification, no real change will occur to the bitcoin network's behavior. From another angle, would you say that a car engine has a philosophy? No. But the designers had a philosophy when they designed it. edit: Further analogizing with human designed artifacts, such as a towel or a laptop, I think this is a debate on semantics. An object can't have a philosophy, but it can embody or reflect one.
      - jedunnigan 12y ago
snitko 12y ago
Of course it has a philosophy. Which is freedom from government regulation and coercion in finance (and, consequently, in everything). I challenge you to prove this isn't so when even Satoshi himself said that.
- gnaritas 12y ago
  Bitcoin is a tool, it has no philosophy; its creator did certainly, but tools don't think nor have opinions and once released into the wild, the creators philosophy is simply no longer relevant. The code is open source, people will use the tool however they like regardless of the creators intentions.