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Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

bbc.com

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Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#101

Post by zaarn »

ulrikrasmussen wrote: post #69
zaarn wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, any blockchains that uses this amount of energy for it's consensus, though there are plenty of blockchains that don't really need that much energy (Git doesn't use much to run a commit either)

But git also doesn't solve a distributed consensus problem. The problem of reaching consensus on the official HEAD commit is externalized to traditional PKI methods, e.g. GitHub.

Well, no, the consensus of a git repo depends on who use it.

For example, on Linux the true HEAD is where Linus says it is. Everyone else is wrong. That's a consensus of everyone working on Linux.

In more distributed projects, HEAD is where everyone agrees HEAD should be.

Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#102

Post by ArthurBrussee »

tummybug wrote: post #100

I know the most people on here have a terrible opinion of bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general but I think a lot of the criticism based on energy usage and transactions per second is in bad faith. When you consider layers built on top of bitcoin (lightning network) this argument holds a lot less weight.

If every single transaction in the world was Bitcoin it would still be a _ridicilous_ amount of energy by several orders of magnitude. It is totally, fundamentally, broken

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#103

Post by phiresky »

Lerc wrote: post #89

Interestingly, article cites a source that contradicts the headline. The Joule paper puts the number at 45.8TWh. The main focus of the article has some guys putting the number at 58.93TWh. That's quite the discrepancy. In general I have come to treat anything that cites Alex de Vries with suspicion. Amongst other things, the repeated discussion of the number of transactions and the power expenditure. The power expend…

Exactly. People here always seem to assume that its power consumption will increase linearily the more people it use (from what the whole network consumes now).

But in the future, the amount of energy consumed for a single transaction will tend towards exactly the fee paid for that transaction multiplied by the cheapest electricity price in the world.

So either the transaction fees will be outlandish, or for a transaction that costs $0.10 you will consume roughly 2kWh.

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#104

Post by chii »

zaarn wrote: post #101
ulrikrasmussen wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But git also doesn't solve a distributed consensus problem. The problem of reaching consensus on the official HEAD commit is externalized to traditional PKI methods, e.g. GitHub.

Well, no, the consensus of a git repo depends on who use it. For example, on Linux the true HEAD is where Linus says it is. Everyone else is wrong. That's a consensus of everyone working on Linux. In more distributed projects, HEAD is where everyone agrees HEAD should be. Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

> Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

Not if you want a trustless system. Otherwise, why waste time/energy? A bank can currently perform the "human consensus" part already (ala credit cards and fiat money).

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#105

Post by kerng »

ArthurBrussee wrote: post #102
tummybug wrote: post #100

I know the most people on here have a terrible opinion of bitcoin and cryptocurrency in general but I think a lot of the criticism based on energy usage and transactions per second is in bad faith. When you consider layers built on top of bitcoin (lightning network) this argument holds a lot less weight.

If every single transaction in the world was Bitcoin it would still be a _ridicilous_ amount of energy by several orders of magnitude. It is totally, fundamentally, broken

Just to play devil's advocate, how much energy could be saved by closing all bank facilities and backend systems etc, in case they wouldn't be needed anymore?

Would BTC mining consume more or less energy then today's mainstream solutions?

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#108

Post by paulmd »

zaarn wrote: post #101
ulrikrasmussen wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But git also doesn't solve a distributed consensus problem. The problem of reaching consensus on the official HEAD commit is externalized to traditional PKI methods, e.g. GitHub.

Well, no, the consensus of a git repo depends on who use it. For example, on Linux the true HEAD is where Linus says it is. Everyone else is wrong. That's a consensus of everyone working on Linux. In more distributed projects, HEAD is where everyone agrees HEAD should be. Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

> Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

No, Linus is a form of an oracle here. Linus says the head is X therefore it is.

(oracles are fine! we could also just call them "authorities"! having an authority at the head of a project is fine! but it's not really blockchain.)

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#109

Post by zaarn »

chii wrote: post #104
zaarn wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, no, the consensus of a git repo depends on who use it. For example, on Linux the true HEAD is where Linus says it is. Everyone else is wrong. That's a consensus of everyone working on Linux. In more distributed projects, HEAD is where everyone agrees HEAD should be. Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

> Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus. Not if you want a trustless system. Otherwise, why waste time/energy? A bank can currently perform the "human consensus" part already (ala credit cards and fiat money).

You can clone democracy if you want trustless.

Re: Bitcoin's energy consumption 'equals that of Switzerland'

#110

Post by zaarn »

paulmd wrote: post #108
zaarn wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, no, the consensus of a git repo depends on who use it. For example, on Linux the true HEAD is where Linus says it is. Everyone else is wrong. That's a consensus of everyone working on Linux. In more distributed projects, HEAD is where everyone agrees HEAD should be. Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus.

> Human consensus is a valid form of blockchain consensus. No, Linus is a form of an oracle here. Linus says the head is X therefore it is. (oracles are fine! we could also just call them "authorities"! having an authority at the head of a project is fine! but it's not really blockchain.)

I would disagree that is not really blockchain, Linus is a form of consensus for the git blockchain of the Linux project, I see no issue in that.
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