Cryptocurrency as the next significant stage for computing technology, not just an investment

[BobDobalina]

[usagi]

*flarhgunnstows*

[zlemflolia]

@chenGOD moving my reply to your post to this thread since it has nothing to do with the Trump thread.  You replied to my claim that Bitcoin is free of ideology

25 minutes ago, chenGOD said:

I’m sorry, but this is unmitigated horseshit. 

How? It's breaking down onto the substrate of the reality of what types of actions intelligent agents, biological or digital, are capable of (in general scenarios) exerting without censorship.  In other words, it's effectively more impossible to censor Bitcoin transactions than any other action an agent can push forth into the world.  And I do mean Bitcoin specifically, not other cryptocurrencies, since it is the most widely supported in terms of software infrastructure, and the most decentralized, cryptocurrency of them all.  This can change in the future in favor of other cryptocurrencies, they will take the new place of Bitcoin.  It's unlikely with the current momentum, market-wise and in terms of the feature progression of Bitcoin, though

Do people of certain ideologies like it more than those of others?  Yes, but it's an algorithm, it didn't itself invoke the love of those who follow those ideologies, and it's not even ideologically partitioned with regards to those who love it, rather only correlated to certain ideologies

I've done my best to make my point so if you genuinely disagree feel free to try to make your point that it's inherently ideological, because if it is I want to know

Edited August 7, 2019 by Zeffolia

[YangYing]

 

[diatoms]

@Zeffolia

Awesome Posts:)

If You Really Want to Gain Knowledge about Bitcoin

Read Zeffolia's Posts

You cover it all, Nice One!

Got in recently

Should of Read this Thread Sooner, Ha:)

[chenGOD]

6 hours ago, Zeffolia said:

@chenGOD moving my reply to your post to this thread since it has nothing to do with the Trump thread.  You replied to my claim that Bitcoin is free of ideology

How? It's breaking down onto the substrate of the reality of what types of actions intelligent agents, biological or digital, are capable of (in general scenarios) exerting without censorship.  In other words, it's effectively more impossible to censor Bitcoin transactions than any other action an agent can push forth into the world.  And I do mean Bitcoin specifically, not other cryptocurrencies, since it is the most widely supported in terms of software infrastructure, and the most decentralized, cryptocurrency of them all.  This can change in the future in favor of other cryptocurrencies, they will take the new place of Bitcoin.  It's unlikely with the current momentum, market-wise and in terms of the feature progression of Bitcoin, though

Do people of certain ideologies like it more than those of others?  Yes, but it's an algorithm, it didn't itself invoke the love of those who follow those ideologies, and it's not even ideologically partitioned with regards to those who love it, rather only correlated to certain ideologies

I've done my best to make my point so if you genuinely disagree feel free to try to make your point that it's inherently ideological, because if it is I want to know

Bitcoin, specifically, is one of the most manipulated assets around. The implementation of algorithms in the real world are always subject to ideological whims of people. The implementation part is key, as otherwise, it's just an algorithm - and there have been plenty of those kicking around before Bitcoin.

Bitcoin is not 100% censorship free:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2151.msg28228#msg28228

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/b0l56o/question_about_bitcoin_atm_double_spend_case_what/

Now you might say that the ATM implementation was flawed - but as it currently stands, there is no other realistic way for BTC ATMs to operate - unless you want to stand around for 10 minutes plus while you wait for the Tx to be confirmed. The scaling problem still exists.

Also, Bitcoin was not the first solution to the byzantine fault problem.

 

Finally, deflationary assets are no basis for a sound economy.

[zlemflolia]

3 hours ago, chenGOD said:

Bitcoin, specifically, is one of the most manipulated assets around. The implementation of algorithms in the real world are always subject to ideological whims of people. The implementation part is key, as otherwise, it's just an algorithm - and there have been plenty of those kicking around before Bitcoin.

Bitcoin is not 100% censorship free:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2151.msg28228#msg28228

https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/b0l56o/question_about_bitcoin_atm_double_spend_case_what/

Now you might say that the ATM implementation was flawed - but as it currently stands, there is no other realistic way for BTC ATMs to operate - unless you want to stand around for 10 minutes plus while you wait for the Tx to be confirmed. The scaling problem still exists.

Also, Bitcoin was not the first solution to the byzantine fault problem.

 

Finally, deflationary assets are no basis for a sound economy.

Neither of those quotes defend anything you said or are even related, and anyone using 0-conf like this BTC ATM was is willingly giving up all security, this is not an issue and it's well understood by anyone who knows what they're doing.  I never said anything about Bitcoin being the first solution to the byzantine fault problem, rather the first decentralized solution, and trustless.  And whether they are a basis for a sound economy is of no concern to me, because if an economy wants to pretend like Bitcoin cannot exist it is acting contrary to reality - all economies have to come to terms with this algorithm

Individual transactions can be lost in the mempool if they don't pay high enough fees, and due to temporary partitions across mining power or random lucky mining events, individual blocks can be invalidated after the fact, this does not mean censorship is feasible.  You can always retransmit your message, the double spend problem does not prevent any transmissions, at most it can delay them.  Note that censorship of receipt of transmissions is not the same as censorship of broadcast which nothing can prevent if you pay a high enough fee

Idk what this post is about but it has nothing to do with mine to which you are replying

Edited August 7, 2019 by Zeffolia

[Candiru]

That’s great n’ all but bitcoin is a big ol’ sin don’tcha know. Oh fer Pete’s sake if you’re gonna dance with the devil’s currency don’t be surprised when those chickens come home to roost there big fella !

[chenGOD]

3 minutes ago, Zeffolia said:

Neither of those quotes defend anything you said or are even related, and anyone using 0-conf like this BTC ATM was is willingly giving up all security, this is not an issue and it's well understood by anyone who knows what they're doing.  I never said anything about Bitcoin being the first solution to the byzantine fault problem, rather the first decentralized solution, and trustless.  And whether they are a basis for a sound economy is of no concern to me, because if an economy wants to pretend like Bitcoin cannot exist it is acting contrary to reality - all economies have to come to terms with this algorithm

Individual transactions can be lost in the mempool if they don't pay high enough fees, and due to temporary partitions across mining power or random lucky mining events, individual blocks can be invalidated after the fact, this does not mean censorship is feasible.  You can always retransmit your message, the double spend problem does not prevent any transmissions, at most it can delay them.  Note that censorship of receipt of transmissions is not the same as censorship of broadcast which nothing can prevent if you pay a high enough fee

Idk what this post is about but it has nothing to do with mine to which you are replying

From the first link, which is a post written by fucking Satoshi:

"1) How do you know if a past transaction becomes invalid and disappears?"

i.e., if a past transaction disappears, it has been censored.

The point from the BTC ATM is that this is where the real world implementation meets your non-ideological algorithm. Economies in general aren't pretending that BTC doesn't exist, they don't give a fuck because the value of BTC is less than a fraction of a percent of world GDP.

ALso, to your claim that you never said that bitcoin being the first solution to the byzantine fault problem...

13 hours ago, Zeffolia said:

Bitcoin, it's inherently non-ideological because it's fundamentally not software or technology, it's an algorithm that was discovered, specifically the first solution to the byzantine generals problem for decentralized write-only ledger creation,

If you are implying that it is the first decentralized solution, then yes, but that is a progression from other distributed ledger tech, which has been around since the roman empire.

[zlemflolia]

Obviously it's Satoshi, and transactions disappearing from the blockchain are a statistically rare event or the result of a 51% attack, which is once again statistically rare on majority hashpower chains and unlikely to be targeting an individual for censorship purposes but rather being exploited for double spend purposes.  Nobody is going to perform a 51% attack and spend millions of dollars to temporarily delay someone's transaction ("censor" them temporarily if you want to say it that way)

And nice job not bolding, you know, the second half of my sentence you're quoting lol, where I explicitly spelled out what you said I was implying.  Also you didn't mention this point, but write-only is not true, it can be read too - I meant append-only

[chenGOD]

1 hour ago, Zeffolia said:

unlikely to be targeting an individual for censorship purposes

Yet if someone wanted to censor an individual, it is possible, ergo, not 100% censorship free.

[zlemflolia]

6 hours ago, chenGOD said:

Yet if someone wanted to censor an individual, it is possible, ergo, not 100% censorship free.

What you're saying doesn't mean anything, first off there are no individuals on the blockchain, only addresses, so the individual could still get other Bitcoins and send them without being censored, unless the entire network is attacked by a persistent 51% attack over a long period of time, which would allow destruction of the trust in the network due to double spends, which would be censoring everyone at once, not an individual.  All claims about the properties of the network break down when the network itself is destroyed, this is kind of obvious and has nothing to do with censoring individuals.  What matters then is the feasibility of a persistent 51% attack on the network which is an entirely different topic of discussion.  The power is that individuals are erased, so to attack individuals you have to attack the entire network, this is what decentralization means

[chenGOD]

I'm well aware of how bitcoin works, thanks.

Addresses are simply pseudonymous. Once you identify an individual through their off-ramp address, they can be effectively censored, through removing Txs to any address identified further from there. Chainalysis is one tool that allows for tracing of BTC transactions very easily.

Question: how much hashing power is concentrated in China? Do you think more than 51%? * Do you think that the algorithm could be abused by ideological motives to censor individuals in Hong Kong the CCP disagrees with, who happen to use BTC?

Spoiler

*Correct answer is around 80%

Would it be difficult to do? Yes - would it be worth it? Depends on how badly anyone or any group, who controls 51% of the network, want to censor that individual. Bad actors will always find ways to abuse systems.

[zlemflolia]

36 minutes ago, chenGOD said:

I'm well aware of how bitcoin works, thanks.

Addresses are simply pseudonymous. Once you identify an individual through their off-ramp address, they can be effectively censored, through removing Txs to any address identified further from there. Chainalysis is one tool that allows for tracing of BTC transactions very easily.

Question: how much hashing power is concentrated in China? Do you think more than 51%? * Do you think that the algorithm could be abused by ideological motives to censor individuals in Hong Kong the CCP disagrees with, who happen to use BTC?

  Hide contents

*Correct answer is around 80%

Would it be difficult to do? Yes - would it be worth it? Depends on how badly anyone or any group, who controls 51% of the network, want to censor that individual. Bad actors will always find ways to abuse systems.

Guarantees only hold to the extent that any claim can hold, and only for timespans over which apocalyptic scenarios haven't happened yet.  China can nuke the city you live in too.  In the end the entire contents of the universe will be lost.  It's way cheaper for the Chinese government to hire an assassin to kill you than for them to perform a 51% attack to prevent you from getting transactions into blocks.  What you're saying is technically correct but not related to reality, and as Bitcoin becomes more widespread, its value will increase, rendering a larger negative economic impact to China if it pulls such a stunt

In practice nobody will bother performing a 51% attack for the purposes of preventing people from getting transactions into blocks, apart from preventing their own transactions (double spend), because they have to succeed forever for it to work, and even then, if there was a concerted effort on the part of China to perform a 51% attack, and they were succeeding, this chain would lose all of its economic value, the non-malicious network would hard fork with consensus rules no longer compatible with China's ASICs, this second-largest minority chain would gain the remainder of the world's hash power, and China's 51% attack would become nothing more than an isolated computational process in a closed off black box, which nobody cares about anymore

The biggest risk is China's ASIC fabrication plants giving them a head-start via hardware ramp-up to the new chain's consensus rules, but this effect will decrease over time as we approach the end of Moore's Law.  This aspect is political and relates to foreign trade policy in the country in which you live, and how it correlates to your country's lack of self defense against 51%+ attacks on your chain

You're also ignoring the fact that a subset of the malicious mining pools could conspire against the others to sneak your transaction in in exchange for a cut of it, this can be done trustlessly via a multi-output transaction, in other words the mining pools conducting the 51% attack could themselves face an internal 51% attack for this cut of your transaction, if it's sufficiently large.  And if it's not that large you can just wait out the attack, transmit your transaction in a minority hard fork chain, transfer the wealth to an anonymous cryptocurrency, and trade it for currency in the majority hashpower chain again, all with your wealth's identity concealed and therefore no longer censorable (unless the entire network is attacked) though probably with some loss of overall wealth due to majorityHashPowerChain-to-minorityHardForkDefensiveChain exchange rate differences

[diatoms]

Zeffolia

Are you only investing in Bitcoin?

not the other crypto

That's what we've decided

is the Best investment

hopefully around 7 years

then we're Free:)

[zlemflolia]

Bitcoin, Ethereum, Monero, everything else either runs on one of these, will be made obsolete by one of these in the near future, or the benefits don't matter enough to make a difference

[chenGOD]

8 hours ago, Zeffolia said:

It's way cheaper for the Chinese government to hire an assassin to kill you than for them to perform a 51% attack to prevent you from getting transactions into blocks.

Uh it doesn't cost the Chinese government anything to perform a 51% attack. They can tell the miners what to do - you're aware the CCP holds a lot more power over its citizens than in the US/Canada/Australia/UK etc. And again, we're talking about erasing past blocks, not necessarily preventing transactions. And in terms of foreign trade policy, Bitcoin makes up less than 1% of global GDP, so nobody considers it at all when talking about foreign trade. The reason you see regulations coming into place is because it (and other cryptos) can be used by bad actors (it does get used for money laundering, tax evasion, market frauds etc.), and of course, tax authorities are always seeking that cash. Governments aren't scared of crypto taking over.

 

8 hours ago, Zeffolia said:

as Bitcoin becomes more widespread, its value will increase,

Bitcoin can't become more widespread and have its intrinsic value increase. As the velocity of money (bitcoin) increases, so does its rate of inflation, lowering its purchasing power.

If you mean its value vs the US dollar, that also doesn't hold, as the reason it is so high right now is because it is seen as an investment, not a means of payment. Which, funnily enough, runs counter to everything bitcoin was created for.

But we digress - if you think BTC is free from ideology, then explain BCH and Roger Ver's involvement. Don't just say the algorithm is free from ideology, the algorithm is useless without implementation.

[zlemflolia]

2 hours ago, chenGOD said:

Uh it doesn't cost the Chinese government anything to perform a 51% attack. They can tell the miners what to do - you're aware the CCP holds a lot more power over its citizens than in the US/Canada/Australia/UK etc. And again, we're talking about erasing past blocks, not necessarily preventing transactions. And in terms of foreign trade policy, Bitcoin makes up less than 1% of global GDP, so nobody considers it at all when talking about foreign trade. The reason you see regulations coming into place is because it (and other cryptos) can be used by bad actors (it does get used for money laundering, tax evasion, market frauds etc.), and of course, tax authorities are always seeking that cash. Governments aren't scared of crypto taking over.

 

Bitcoin can't become more widespread and have its intrinsic value increase. As the velocity of money (bitcoin) increases, so does its rate of inflation, lowering its purchasing power.

If you mean its value vs the US dollar, that also doesn't hold, as the reason it is so high right now is because it is seen as an investment, not a means of payment. Which, funnily enough, runs counter to everything bitcoin was created for.

But we digress - if you think BTC is free from ideology, then explain BCH and Roger Ver's involvement. Don't just say the algorithm is free from ideology, the algorithm is useless without implementation.

Erasing past blocks is the only way to prevent transactions, that's what a 51% attack is.  And you can only do it a limited time into the past because 51% attacks become exponentially harder to perform the deeper in time you go.  And considering the Bitcoin miners pay China taxes, the Chinese government will in fact be losing money if they force them to stop mining real blocks and instead destroy the very network they used to be profiting off of

"As the velocity of money (bitcoin) increases, so does its rate of inflation, lowering its purchasing power" this statement is complete nonsense, BItcoin's rate of inflation is fixed at any given point of time by the block rewards.

As for BCH and Roger Ver, they are scam artists who have nothing to do with Bitcoin.  BCH is not Bitcoin.  It's expected that minority hashpower chains will try to take over the network through public sentiment, it's right in the whitepaper that the longest consensus-following PoW chain is Bitcoin, and nothing else is.

[chenGOD]

A 51% attack can be used for both erasing tx history and preventing new txs from confirming. https://bitcoin.org/en/glossary/51-percent-attack

There is an opportunity cost, but not a nominal cost. Again, given the minuscule percentage that bitcoin and crypto make up of GDP, the potential loss in tax could be negligible, compared to whatever end the CCP is playing for in this theoretical game. 

5 minutes ago, Zeffolia said:

"As the velocity of money (bitcoin) increases, so does its rate of inflation, lowering its purchasing power" this statement is complete nonsense, BItcoin's rate of inflation is fixed at any given point of time by the block rewards

Rate of inflation is not only determined by the supply of an asset, which is why I used the term velocity. Take an econ 101 course, it will help you immensely.

Roger Ver was called bitcoin jesus. He was one of the early investors in BTC. His ideology drove him to fork BTC and cause a rift in the community. So again, how is the real-world implementation of an algorithm not susceptible to ideology?

[zlemflolia]

Erasing tx history and preventing new txs from confirming are identical actions, they both require a 51% attack and that's the only way to do it.  It's only a matter of how deep in the past the attack attempts to reach.  It's a meaningless distinction between t=0 and t=-N

And if Bitcoin is small enough in value to incentivize China not to destroy it, it's small enough for them to have little incentivize to censor someone's transactions through 51% attacks

Where is your evidence that higher adoption of Bitcoin will increase velocity more than the adoption will decrease the maximum number of BTC available per person?  Maybe it's you who should be taking the econ 101 course

The real world implementation of the forks Roger Ver supports have nothing to do with the real world implementations of the majority PoW chain, the only real Bitcoin.  Like the whitepaper says there will always be minority PoW chains and they are always by definition not Bitcoin

Are we going to have a discussion of the political effects of the countless minority PoW chains that pop into existence every time two miners accidentally mine a block within a time period close enough to each other that the block propagation latency of the first mined block didn't alert the other miner to stop?  Because it's the same thing in terms of the protocol

[diatoms]

from: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/cnya4c/by_umoosemandaniels/

Ha:)

[chenGOD]

Dude, this is getting tiresome.

1. Not a meaningless distinction in their outcome.

2. BTC is small enough in economic value for China not to care about destroying it, but the political/social value of censoring someone on the blockchain could incentivize them, as they assert their authority.

3. Just...man - total supply of BTC is known. Amount per person has little if anything to do with purchasing power. Velocity is the variable.

4. You're clearly a BTC maximalist, so that's all good, but the point still stands - implementation of the algorithm is subject to ideology.

5. 105 forks! That has about as much relevance as what you posted.

 

Suffice it to say, I did ok on Crypto (and still hodl some), and think the blockchain has valuable applications. But bitcoin is not going to replace centralized fiat currencies anytime soon.

[zlemflolia]

BItcoin has hit $40k almost double from its previous all time high.  The reason is unfortunately because capitalism requires capital allocate itself the most effectively to avoid losing velocity and being absorbed by greater capitals through market competition.  Given that Bitcoin is the best international hedge against failing states which devalue their currency, all companies eventually must migrate to the system to maintain some level of capital within the only international currency not subject to manipulation by any individual economic ideological group right now, thus preserving their slice of the status quo of capitalist surplus value extraction.  For this reason Bitcoin actually already is the primary currency of the world, it's just that some people and groups of people in the world have not realized it yet due to bourgeois propaganda regarding the value of fiat currency as if it's removed entirely from geopolitical conflicts whose treaty structure can change dramatically as game theoretically sound behavioral patterns shift alongside the material conditions and advancement of industrial processes

[dcom]

No.

[BobDobalina]

loool

Bitcoin: Newport man's plea to find £210m hard drive in tip https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-55658942

looks like someone needs to kick up the 4d3d3d3