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Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

yanmaani.github.io

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Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#521

Post by Jweb_Guru »

keymone wrote: post #485
Jweb_Guru wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, and who chooses the block ? (Hint: it's the node that wins leader election). Maybe this article will help you understand just how nonessential the fact that the block is part of the SHA actually is: https://www.usenix.org/system/files/conference/nsdi16/nsdi16... . Please read the whole article, and then come back so we can have a discussion on equal footing.

> Okay, and who chooses the block? well certainly not the winner of the "election", because by the time that "election" starts, the block is already constructed. and i'm not going to read any of your links until you actually start understanding the basics of bitcoin protocol. though your lack of understanding explains perfectly why you fall for scammy bells and whistles of competing bitcoin-wannabes. "bitcoin new gen…

The peer-reviewed paper to which I linked, which I am not proposing as a replacement for Bitcoin, explains (to those who are willing to read it) why the block being chosen before or after the leader election does not matter when it comes to the security and consensus properties of Bitcoin. It is important for you to understand that this does not matter so you can understand why when the block is chosen does not change the fact that leader election is being performed.

Again, I'll ask you, since you keep dodging the question: if the node elected as leader is (according to you) not choosing the block, who is choosing the block? Why are you so obsessed with whether the value was chosen "before" or "after" the election, which is an irrelevant detail of the protocol? If you can't answer these things and won't read the paper, I don't really see any reason to keep talking to you, because all you've done is make the same irrelevant point over and over.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#522

Post by echopurity »

>If the same people own all the tokens, control all of the staking pools, the project governance, and run all the full nodes, an attack isn’t even possible. It’s so centralized, it produces the impression of decentralization from a distance.

Yeah, crypto has never been truly decentralized.

But that doesn't make people scammers, especially when this article is largely just quoting Vitalik.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#523

Post by rufusroflpunch »

notahacker wrote: post #472
javert wrote: post #457

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every time there is a fork, the market decides how much to value each of the forks. Personally, I think people will value bitcoin as good money if fiat money fails. And because they are seeking good money, will value the fork(s) that preserve bitcoin's prior monetary policy. A fork that changes the monetary policy drastically (particularly, changing the 21M cap) would obviously make for bad money in practical terms.

> Every time there is a fork, the market decides how much to value the forks So literally the same as every monetary policy change involving every currency that didn't use PoW in history...

No, not true. Nodes can literally just choose to use the version of software that provides the best money. You can’t choose to use the US monetary policy from 1960, for example.

This has happened multiple times with attempted hard forks of Bitcoin which have failed because once you change the monetary policy once, the promise of hard money effect disappears. So the original monetary policy remains in place and the original network continues as the reigning champion.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#524

Post by Applejinx »

throwaway6734 wrote: post #433
xwolfi wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He probably speculates, like the degenerate speculators, that it won't end up there. Why push around everyone to consume differently while distributing vast amount of tax money that immediately go into more wasteful crypto ? It will not stay at 1% and I agree with the OP that it's going to be difficulty to reduce electricity wastage on one end while ignore the elephant baby in the crib taking over the room. I'm a ran…

>I'm going to eventually be forced into using their tokens at whatever cost when it becomes legal tender, I'm assuming the large nation states would attack these tokens before allowing this to happen and I don't think any token ecosystem could withstand a strong nation state attack

We have a test of that unfolding, with China. If bitcoin is more powerful than China's state power I'm prepared to believe it is more powerful than any nation-state. Don't know if it's going to work out quite that way though.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#525

Post by newswasboring »

keymone wrote: post #305
Kbelicius wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The vast majority of mining today uses sustainable energy (70%+) Do you have an source for this? I remember the same number being flaunted before but it turned out not to be true. What was true was that 70%+ of miners use any amount of renewables in their energy mix.

You’re right. The correct number is somewhere around 50%, probably over the line already, which is significantly better than any other big industry.

> The correct number is somewhere around 50%

Do you have some source for this? I see random numbers being thrown around a lot, would be nice to have a citation for yours.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#526

Post by codyb »

keymone wrote: post #306
denton-scratch wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> standing armies that are "doing nothing" Armies have to practice. Smart generals don't let their armies do nothing; to be any good at warfighting, they have to fight wars. Effective standing armies have to constantly be finding new wars to fight.

Nice to see you rationalizing expenditure that goes towards murdering people. Are you the people talking down to bitcoiners about being wasteful and not caring about future of humanity? Give me a break.

How many people aren’t murdered because of armies though? Humans have been grouping and fighting each other for thousands of years now. You’re under the impression everyone should just… what… pretend it doesn’t happen?

When attacking a neighbor state costs more (because your neighbors have arms too), it’s less likely to happen.

The cold war had plenty of awful hot action with proxies and third parties but the entirely hot version obviously would have been far more calamitous.

I suggest reading Herodotus’ Histories, or you can read up on Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler, Alexander, the Crusades, or the myriad other conquerors and conflicts that have occurred.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#527

Post by JohnJamesRambo »

LittlePeter wrote: post #490
JohnJamesRambo wrote: post #476

When you see articles like this, buy more Ethereum not less. It means they are scared of it.

Who is "they"? Why would they be scared of it? Did you buy more Ethereum after seeing this article? And if you did not see this article you would be still be buying Ethereum, but "less" right?

“They” is Bitcoin holders, of which I will no longer be one by Dec. 1. Proof of work makes no sense anymore and proof of stake will take over with the launch of Ethereum 2.0 in 2022. I’m unbiased, this is just the market and math I see coming.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#528

Post by freeflight »

mym1990 wrote: post #479
Geee wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PoW generates heat, which is not waste, if it is utilized. The endgame of Bitcoin mining is that every bit of heat is utilized, because that's the only way mining will be profitable. Running these miners is profitable even without block rewards (heat alone is sold at a profit). You didn't take into account, that: - Bitcoin price growth won't continue forever; it'll find a stable price - Mining rewards halve every 4 y…

If the rewards halve every 4 years but the price keeps going up, wouldn't miners just increase infrastructure to mine the same amount of rewards?

Yes, that's what's been happening for the longest time. But it doesn't scale endlessly because of real world practical scarcities like affordable electricity and enough affordable silicon to mine on.

Which then results in situations like miners buying up the majority of new GPU releases, leading to shortages for any other users, and still not having enough to keep up with the difficulty increases.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#529

Post by SilasX »

brianolson wrote: post #133

(my day job is developer on Proof-of-Stake Algorand block chain, I'm a developer, this may not be polished official PR) Article's theory about malicious old blocks doesn't hold up. Let's say I start a new node and verify history since the beginning. Somewhere along the line I'm connected to a malicious node which hands me a fictionalized block. It would need to have been signed by not just one but about 30-45 account…

I just read most of the article. As I understand it, the failure mode isn't that one attacker could hand you a malicious node, it's that the network doesn't actually reach unambiguous consensus -- all/most "stakers" could simultaneously be signing a different transaction history the whole time, at virtually no cost, which is just as valid as "the" one you believe in; there's no (cryptographic) way to distinguish them. And so it's possible for, one day, the whole network to get pulled out from under you. "Nope, this other one is the real deal."

Is this a problem in practice? As the article says, no ... but only because there is a sort of vaguely specified "proof of authority" that backs the current chain, which actually just reintroduces centralization. The author cites the Bitcoin Cash and DAO/ETH Classic forks as cases where that proof of authority gets tested and shows the actual centralization.

It's my understanding that Algorand has something on top of pure PoS that ensures the consensus (which the article says is necessary) so I'm not sure the same criticism is applicable there, but can't comment further until I get more familiar.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#530

Post by Applejinx »

aljarry wrote: post #325
wcoenen wrote: post #268

Whether PoS will work, I don't know. But the author didn't realize that PoW is certainly doomed. PoW miners tend to spend more and more resources on finding blocks, until the cost approaches the rewards. But the rewards go up as the cryptocurrency becomes more popular, because the price and transaction fees go up. Therefore, a PoW cryptocurrency tends to "eat the world" as it becomes bigger. That's why Bitcoin is alr…

I generally like to think about this from opposite direction: miners and bitcoin investors are incentivised for bitcoin to be used and for the price to go up. Why miners? Because their main source of income is not the transaction fee, but basecoin, the guaranteed bitcoin payout for each mined block. Due to Bitcoin being such a huge amount of money, unethical players do anything to lure people in, including MLM-style…

It's interesting how this mechanism, purportedly for grown-ass adults, is a loot box mechanic.

Pump more energy in! Because you haven't hit a coin yet. And it is getting forever more unlikely that you will… but at the same time, the payoff is even greater than it was last week! Maybe you won't even hit a coin. Your operation is not big enough. But if you do…! So, MOAR…

Loot box mechanic. Turns out it is not just for manipulating children.

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