321–330 of 630 posts
This is America, banning things rarely works as intended. A carbon tax solves this problem just fine.
> This is America Note that the author of the post is based in London, UK: https://www.stephendiehl.com/
But clearly positions himself as as USian.
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Looks like 0.8 tonnes / troy oz? https://www.spglobal.com/marketintelligence/en/news-insights... Given 3000 tons of gold mined per year, that should be roughly 70 megatons of CO2 / year. [I am pleased to report that this falls squarely in my previous estimate of 30-150 megatons / year that was based on the cost to mine gold, the cost of fuel, and the CO2 emitted by fuel.]
- Fossil CO2 Emissions (2016) 35,753 megatons globally - so gold mining is 0.2% of global CO2 emissions!? - Bitcoin mining energy use is at least 78TWh annually - 480-500g of carbon dioxide produced for every kWh consumed - So mining bitcoin produces 40 megatons of CO2 per year, which is the same order of magnitude of gold mining. - And mining bitcoin is 0.1% of global CO2 emissions (I would be grateful if someone wo…
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If the government is able to ban crypto currency because it's unnecessary and uses too much energy, couldn't they apply that logic to nearly any other modern luxury?
They do! Gas taxes, bans of gas vehicles, required emission standards, etc.
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None of this explains why fiat currency leads to starting a war.
Fiat currency allows the government to make its citizens pay for its usurious debts, by printing more money. This is not possible with gold or bitcoin.
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It has never been proven that deflation is bad - Keynesians claim this is the worst thing in the world, but I still have never had it explained to me coherently way deflation is inherently a bad thing.
Deflation by definition implies means that stuff will be worth less in future than it is now. This is bad for investors and producers spending money now in the hope of earning more money in future. On the other hand, simply holding onto cash is risk free, and that cash will have increased purchasing power in future (at the expense of the producers forced into offering lower prices to get money circulating again) An e…
Deflation doesn't discourage investment and consumption. You still need to eat, have shelter, and pursue happiness. It increases the bar at which you will part with your money, as merely holding it has a high level of return. This is a superior system to me.
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The main premise of the article is that cryptocurrencies are "speculation for speculation’s sake," i.e. gambling, and that's bad. Also, the article claims that they contribute to inequality. The green stuff is basically a side note. I don't think it's a terribly strong case but I suppose it depends on whether you agree that crypto is gambling and if you think gambling should banned. Anyway, I think lots of people stu…
The problem with governments creating welfare states is that other citizens (and the government) become responsible for the financial implosion of individuals which incentivizes stupid behavior. I don't believe gambling should be banned but should taxpayers be liable for the healthcare of someone who used their health insurance money to speculate on cryptocurrency? This is actually the main division between conservat…
At the same time, allowing extreme wealth inequality incentivizes stupid behavior on the part of capital (like wasting capital on unproductive speculation, or driving the working class foundation of the population to poverty). Welfare states put sensible checks on capital, and honestly capital should welcome policies that keep the population from doing rash things like nationalizing all their assets out of desperation.
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It has never been proven that deflation is bad - Keynesians claim this is the worst thing in the world, but I still have never had it explained to me coherently way deflation is inherently a bad thing.
Because deflation means less jobs and less jobs means less people being able to buy food, and starving people are dangerous. Deflation seems good if you're sitting on wealth. You'd be happy to wait things out just buying the basics and let the economy kind of reset from necessities upwards. But lots of other people are starving by that point.
Source?
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> clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally just 2 points: * using crypto will not make the military stop existing * switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems ...but bitcoin will not even consider keeping PoW and switching to argon2, since the investment of miners in dedicated hardw…
> switching to Proof Of Stake would solve almost all bitcoin problems This will also create a very severe problem: it makes it so the means of coin production exist solely in the hands of the coin owners today. Those coin owners won't ever sell you enough coins for you to be a competitive staker. At least with PoW, I can make more coins through extrinsic means -- i.e. better mining hardware.
Example would be if you had 1 US bank account sitting on a billion, never used it, so the govt is like, well you're not using that so we'll give it to someone else lol.
I personally am against billionaires existing. So, capping a coin at 1 billion or 999 million, makes sense to me - but only if there can ever be only 1 wallet per person. There could maybe be sub-wallets, but these are more like drawers in a dresser where the dresser is the wallet, and the drawers are compartments. Maybe a compartment in the wallet is a joint compartment that you share with a spouse, child, or a business/DAO or some other form of trust...
There's a lot of things possible, that could happen... but I think PoW still makes bad sense, because we do have a global warming issue that is starting to pick up in terms of severity.
This article seems to intentionally ignore the core reason for cryptocurrencies; escaping inflation and control. The article then proposes to use the law to bring those people back within the control of fiat and government oversight. I no longer think the environmental argument is really plausible here. Clearly crypto mining is emitting using a lot of power and some of that is CO2. But the competition is fiat; backed…
> But the competition is fiat; backed by fighter jets and nukes; literally. How is it that someone can't steal your money? The bank makes sure. How is it the bank can be sure? The cops protect them. How is it the cops aren't overwhelmed? The military protects them. At first glance, I find this an interesting take and it makes me rethink some things. But I don't think I find it very convincing, or at least it's too ex…
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That's really not a solid argument. Bitcoin doesn't depend on drugs to have value, anymore than the US dollar does.
Bitcoin does seem to depend to a large degree on money laundering and speculation on money laundering. You might not like it, but that is definitely the reality. Other kinds of currency and investment are a few times more useful as long as you are doing legitimate business.
For example the 10000 BTC pizza was one of the early purchases. If BTC stayed at 0.1c then you could still use it and it was used.
Caveat to this is now the mining infra means that returning to 1c coins would kill Bitcoin as a secure network since no one would mine for profit - the only reason to mine is the 51% attack