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A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

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Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#641

Post by sbenitoj »

_gx90 wrote: post #570
Scarblac wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The market has settled on gold? For money? What? The market moved on to other forms of money centuries ago.

This is categorically false. The gold standard (albeit a reduced version of it established under the Bretton-Woods monetary regime) was abolished in the United States as recently as 1971. In Switzerland this link was abolished in the early 2000's AFAIK.

It was only loosely linked to gold even at that point, fractional reserve banking has been going on for a long, long time!

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#642

Post by johnisgood »

foxrob92 wrote: post #632
johnisgood wrote: post #591

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My favorite summary of crypto is something along the lines of: leaving your car running while it solves sudoku puzzles in exchange for drugs. The drugs part isn't as relevant anymore, but the rest is. Seriously? By the way, the negative environmental impacts will be significantly reduced after ITER is ready.

You're saying that we just need to make fusion a reality in order for bitcoin to be environmentally friendly?

I am saying it will not be an issue in terms of environmental impact after fusion becomes a reality, as far as electricity goes.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#643

Post by int_19h »

908087 wrote: post #376
sbenitoj wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t know why you’re getting downvoted, your comment is spot on. Governments can’t be trusted with money, the incentive to cheat is too great.

What would you call the near-daily exit scams, pump and dumps and ponzi schemes in the "crypto" world if not "cheating"?

They're the same, but when your government does it, it's not really opt-in, unlike with all the crypto frauds.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#644

Post by cjbprime »

rspeer wrote: post #349
cjbprime wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure whether this is true, but I expect that electricity-from-coal for Bitcoins isn't a massive problem because doing so is simply unprofitable: the electricity costs more than the value of the Bitcoins, so it would be irrational to do. I would expect that mining has become an arbitrage market that narrows in on the cheapest possible electricity anywhere in the world, and as such is dominated by excess "free"…

Well, it's not true. Bitcoin has increased the demand for coal power in China. Bitcoin miners flocked to New York State for cheap natural gas power. Green energy is not necessarily the cheapest form of energy. If it were, it wouldn't even be _hard_ to stop burning fossil fuels and prevent climate change.

Green energy isn't the cheapest source everywhere in the world, but Bitcoin mining has no geographic restriction. Instead of picking a location and then choosing an energy source once there, as most of us do, they can first pick a green energy source and then choose a location anywhere in the world that provides it.

Thus, there's no analogy to the challenge the rest of the world faces in moving away from fossil fuels.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#646

Post by int_19h »

malloreon wrote: post #16

I have long wondered how cryptocurrency fans would answer the question: ‘Would you be happy if the crypto-utopia you bring up happens in the next 10 years, and all value is stored/transacted through a cryptocurrency, but it was a coin that you do not possess now, nor could you transfer any of you current currencies into it?’ Say tomorrow someone releases the one true coin, but no one notices. All other cryptocurrenci…

Yes, although ironically I might not end up using it much if at all. But it'd be good to have it even so.

The reason is that I think that while governments can be better at monetary policy, they need competition to keep them in check. Other currencies technically provide that competition, but they can be suppressed via legislation in a given jurisdiction, and this is, in fact, commonly done precisely where such competition would have practical sense (e.g. countries with hyperinflation often try to regulate and even outright ban currency exchange; or the various historical bans on private ownership of bullion gold in many countries).

Bitcoin is always there, available to anyone who has Internet access and can get past "great firewalls" (and when people's money are at stake, they are surprisingly good at learning such things). Consequently, the government can only do so much to its own money before it starts losing that competition - Venezuela is one ongoing example.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#647

Post by mightybyte »

good-idea wrote: post #242

I'm shocked and disheartened by how infrequently environmental concerns are brought up when discussing crypto. Proof of Work vs Proof of Stake, security, storage size - these are problems for the network and those that want to see it become a real part of our economy. (I am one of those) But the amount of energy being used to mine bitcoin is a real problem - it's not just a technical challenge (like the problems abov…

The "blockchain is bad for the environment" argument has been shown to be grossly uninformed and overstated. It is pretty much all based on one source that has been thoroughly discredited. See this article for more information:

https://hackernoon.com/the-reports-of-bitcoin-environmental-...

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#648

Post by blurbleblurble »

nostrademons wrote: post #622
geofft wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When you say Bitcoin "hurts the environment", what, concretely do you mean? Presumably, you mean it in a stronger sense than "using energy to produce food hurts the environment" or "using energy to run an ER hurts the environment". That is, you think that relative to the benefit provided, the use of (harmful) energy to run bitcoin miners doesn't justify its environmental cost. For myself, that is not what I mean wh…

"(... except perhaps capitalism itself, and funny enough, people are claiming that capitalism too must be stopped to avert irrecoverable climate change)". Also life. Evolution, birth, and metabolism also result in all available energy going into increasing the complexity of the system. The real reason we have an environmental crisis is because there are 7.5B of us, but few people recommend destroying all life on eart…

The "real reason?"

It's not about how many. It's not about how many.

It's about how systematically detached we are from sustainable ways of life.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#649

Post by jchw »

SilasX wrote: post #381
good-idea wrote: post #242

I'm shocked and disheartened by how infrequently environmental concerns are brought up when discussing crypto. Proof of Work vs Proof of Stake, security, storage size - these are problems for the network and those that want to see it become a real part of our economy. (I am one of those) But the amount of energy being used to mine bitcoin is a real problem - it's not just a technical challenge (like the problems abov…

No, we don't. Bitcoin is one way to use energy. There are hundreds of thousands of other ways. When you say Bitcoin "hurts the environment", what, concretely do you mean? Presumably, you mean it in a stronger sense than "using energy to produce food hurts the environment" or "using energy to run an ER hurts the environment". That is, you think that relative to the benefit provided , the use of (harmful) energy to run…

No offense but this is some pretty strong whataboutism. The amount of energy that would be used by a crypto currency that gains mainstream adoption would be pretty substantial, certainly much, much more substantial than traditional currency/credit cards/etc.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#650

Post by mightybyte »

Scarblac wrote: post #361
celticninja wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont think we have any real evidence that cryptocurrencies are predominantly using polluting methods of power generation. The entire argument falls over if it is all renewable energy.

Then it's still using up renewable energy that could have been used on something else. Electricity is mostly fungible.

This is decidedly not true. Electricity transmission has substantial losses over long distances. Check out this article for more information about how the crypto mining industry uses electricity.

https://hackernoon.com/the-reports-of-bitcoin-environmental-...

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