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They also don't provide very much heat output when it's cold outside
It needs to be really cold. Like -15°C and some go as low as -40°C. They degrade in efficiency but are still better than a space heater. In the worst case they are exactly as efficient as a space heater.
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This is basically what all life does. Thermodynamically, life can be described as an open system which makes use of gradients in its surroundings to create imperfect copies of itself. Crypto currencies still have a problem with creating copies of itself, but humans are happy to oblige.
Comparing life itself to crypto is ridiculous.
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This is basically what all life does. Thermodynamically, life can be described as an open system which makes use of gradients in its surroundings to create imperfect copies of itself. Crypto currencies still have a problem with creating copies of itself, but humans are happy to oblige.
Comparing life itself to crypto is ridiculous.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Comparing life itself to crypto is ridiculous.
Not entirely. Energy utilization is a common proxy for technological development. If a society is plowing tons of energy into crypto mining, then by definition somebody is getting utility out of it. (Which doesn't preclude it all being a Ponzi scheme, but that's another story.)
How does the network protocol of bitcoin work? Would governments be able to block it? Can it be DDoS-ed?
Without knowing for sure, I think you could just block port 8333. The individual miners could surely be DDoS, if you know their IP. I wonder if it's possible to just generate junk transactions and throw them at miners.
Junk transactions could stop a few nodes but all transactions are verified locally on nodes and won't be broadcast if they turn out to be junk.
Idea to solve the crypto energy problem - sell space heaters as dual purpose crypto miners. People need space heaters. They buy them, but they also mine crypto (as a free byproduct of the space heating). The number of crypto mining space heaters out there dilute the value of dedicated mining so much that people don't bother with it anymore. Even buying the space heater to make money from mining crypto doesn't make th…
Interesting to think about, but by firing up a miner on my graphics card at off hours I'd probably lower my overall fossil fuel consumption and make some money on the side.
Anything I'm missing here?
How does the network protocol of bitcoin work? Would governments be able to block it? Can it be DDoS-ed?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It needs to be really cold. Like -15°C and some go as low as -40°C. They degrade in efficiency but are still better than a space heater. In the worst case they are exactly as efficient as a space heater.
worst case being 0 K outdoor temperature?
Idea to solve the crypto energy problem - sell space heaters as dual purpose crypto miners. People need space heaters. They buy them, but they also mine crypto (as a free byproduct of the space heating). The number of crypto mining space heaters out there dilute the value of dedicated mining so much that people don't bother with it anymore. Even buying the space heater to make money from mining crypto doesn't make th…
Heat pumps are approximately three times as efficient as electric heating.
The CoP of a heat pump is dependent on the temperature potential across the heat pump. Caution to the reader who thinks one could pump heat from frigid external temperatures into their very warm, high temperature house: the very scenario your post suggests they should be used.
Heat pumps are great for increasing thermal potentials and moving heat across them (not for sourcing energy). They're also great for balancing an internal thermal state that is, on-net, in balance (think of a large office building in the morning, one side is being heated by the sun, the other side is frigid -- heat pumps can balance the internal energy demands instead of simultaneously cooling one part of the building and heating the other)