Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus • Hacker News Board

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#531

Post by rufusroflpunch » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:22 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #456

inter_netuser wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and every other PoS chain that relies on USDC and major exchanges. So probably more than 1 guy. maybe 5-10.

And how is that better than a government?

It’s not. There is a huge gulf between Bitcoin and the rest of the crypto space. Bitcoin is certifiably decentralized hard money with an ossified monetary policy. I believe it is reasonable to conclude that something like Bitcoin can only happen once. The rest of crypto space isn’t really trying to be money, or is only pretending to be.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#532

Post by bastiantower » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

rocqua wrote: post #291

dawnbreez wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But...if you no longer have value on the network, doesn't that mean you no longer have enough stake to control the network?

You can fork far in the past, before you cashed out. Any new entrants into the network will not be able to distinguish your fork from the real chain. You cannot be slashed for this in the real chain because you already cashed out your stake there. This 'long range attack' is different from a 50% attack because it doesn't affect nodes that were running before the attack happened. But a situation where new entrants int…

Wouldn't anyone then be able to provide proof of that participant having exited? The participant would have generated a signature the moment they exit.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#533

Post by zivkovicp » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

dnautics wrote: post #449

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 can't accept that... For your own sanity I suggest you stop taking the process of getting rich so seriously. It doesn't make sense, nor is the fact that it doesn't make sense a singularity in the grand scheme of time, it has been known since ancient days (I'm not religious, this is just evidence of it's timelessness): "I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the str…

This is 100% correct. Chance is such a significant factor in the outcomes we observe in our lives, yet the majority of us have been fooled into believing otherwise. Sometimes you just have to do what you feel is right _for you_, and hope for the best.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#534

Post by crazypython » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:23 PM UTC

pshc wrote: post #78

ricardolopes wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The block 200 will be adding validation to the previous blocks, and will be validated by the future ones. Without other types of checks, nothing stops you from rewriting the previous 199 blocks and using block 200 to validate them. This is not FUD, it's the most obvious PoS flaw, called long range attack, and the reason PoS chains often need more checks to be more trustworthy (e.g. keeping hardcoded checkpoints, choo…

Here’s a recent ETH2 block: https://beaconcha.in/block/2604970#votes It was voted for by 8000+ validators. Many of them have been validating since beacon chain genesis a year ago. There are like 260k validators active right now. I find it highly unlikely some entity is going to come along and try to pretend their alternate history, with a whole new set of hundreds of thousands of validators (which wouldn’t be support…

How is that different from 8000-of-260k multisig?

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#535

Post by righttoolforjob » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:25 PM UTC

d0gbread wrote: post #509

righttoolforjob wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> mining needs the cheapest energy and renewable energy is generally the cheapest The cheapest energy is the cheapest. It has nothing directly to do with it being renewable.

I'm interpreting your comment as: x = x As if that's insightful. But in the spirit of HN, can you say more? My understanding is that renewables are the cheapest and will likely continue to trend in that direction, causation or not. So are you suggesting maybe there's a chance of a super inexpensive non-renewable overtaking this trend?

I was responding to someone's argument along the lines of mining needs energy, the cheapest energy is renewable, therefore mining would drive an increase in the supply of renewable energy, and a forthcoming decline of mining would free up a supply of renewable energy.

I broke this chain of logic by pointing out that renewable is an unnecessary consideration and that mining activities will choose the cheapest option regardless of its renewability.

Furthermore I claim that renewable is not the cheapest. Various subsidies aside, renewable is often many times more expensive to deliver where and when required. The total system cost is many times higher.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#536

Post by ajuc » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:26 PM UTC

mrkramer wrote: post #519

fuy wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're saying is tautological in a sense that for for it to be true, you need to postulate that every human activity is also based on economy and game theory (otherwise, why would people behave as you say they would behave) . So your argument essentially is that governments banning bitcoin is also based on economy and game theory. Which is fine by me.

I'm saying that market needs to decide whether Bitcoin is toxic commodity or not and what I mean by not is Bitcoin being useful like oil and gas are or any other commodity. And yes majority of people behave according to game theory because if they do not then they lose or in extreme cases die.

If people behaved like game theory says they should then lottery, addictions and casinos wouldn't exist.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#537

Post by bastiantower » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

seniorsassycat wrote: post #130

darcys22 wrote: post #103

He lost me at the part where he thinks you can sign messages after withdrawing your stake. The whole point of proof of stake is that you can only sign blocks or messages while you have something staked. When you withdraw you are no longer allowed to sign anything. He also didnt need to spend 1000 words going on about the history of bitcoin and proof of work. This is literally just a filler piece with a provocative cl…

I think the argument was that you could withdraw at 201 then sign new 200b messages.

But then everyone has a signature that you exited at 200

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#538

Post by Applejinx » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

DonHopkins wrote: post #385

dan-robertson wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A positive side effect of your (1.) scenario is that it results in a surplus of renewable energy (mining needs the cheapest energy and renewable energy is generally the cheapest). Having a surplus of cheap green energy is probably good for the economy, though a lot more than 1% would probably be needed to see significant benefits.

A positive side effect of hitting your hand with a hammer is a surplus of morphine your doctor prescribes to make you stop feeling it, and a surplus of lithium your psychiatrist prescribes to make you stop doing it. And no, renewable energy isn't generally the cheapest, coal is. (Until you factor in the health care and funeral service costs.) Bitcoin is just China's way of exporting coal through the atmosphere.

Illegal coal is. Because if your plant has been shut down for being too dirty, you have no other option but to continue to operate illegally or just straight up die, and bitcoin is by FAR the best option for consuming that illegal-dirty-plant energy.

The reason it's the cheapest is that you're negotiating with somebody who is desperate and has no options left. They have to sell the energy to you for bitcoin production because there's literally nowhere else they can turn.

The more green energy proliferates and climate change action expands, the more of these plants will be reduced to this desperation. The worst energy production is the cheapest, so long as it's been outlawed and the plant has no other options.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#539

Post by bhaak » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:27 PM UTC

comex wrote: post #27

josnyder wrote: post #8

PoW systems rely on the "phone a friend method" as well. When you download a Bitcoin client from a "friend", you are trusting them to honestly introduce you to the network. If you fall asleep for a period of years, you have to trust your friends to honestly inform you of all of the PoW forks and policy changes that have occurred over that interval. The only difference is that PoS blockchain clients must be bundled wi…

Indeed. And even if you posit a PoW currency which never has policy changes, unlike Bitcoin or any other major cryptocurrency… And you assume that attackers will never have enough computing resources to execute a 51% attack – which could happen because the currency’s value falls enough that people stop mining it, because an extraordinarily well-funded entity decides to attack it, or because someone manages to hack th…

What you describe is indeed a viable threat in certain conditions.

It's called "Eclipse Attack". But it's a threat for single nodes not for the network as a whole.

Re: Proof of stake is incapable of producing a consensus

#540

Post by madacol » Sun, Nov 28, 2021, 4:31 PM UTC

somebodythere wrote: post #330

rocqua wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A while ago bitcoin clients changed from facoring the 'longest' chain to favoring the chain with the most work done on it. (To prevent long chains with low difficulty)

So... the consensus rules of the network changed, you need to make sure you have the correct client, and bitcoin is weakly subjective after all?

Asking "what's the correct client?" will always be a subjective question

Bitcoin doesn't decide what is called bitcoin, we as a community do