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Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

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Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#91

Post by _aavaa_ »

tossl568 wrote: post #80

Yeah yeah. Bitcoin is an open financial network that anybody can use and nobody controls and is secured by energy. What an amazing, historical feat of human ingenuity. It's neutral and just like the internet can be used by anybody. We're not going to apologise for its energy use.

I don't think that's quiet right. To paraphrase Kranzberg, Bitcoin is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral".

We can debate whether it's good or bad on net, but the fact that crypto provides monetary incentives for mining it (and thus spending electricity and computer equipment) is not up for debate.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#92

Post by tossl568 »

_aavaa_ wrote: post #91
tossl568 wrote: post #80

Yeah yeah. Bitcoin is an open financial network that anybody can use and nobody controls and is secured by energy. What an amazing, historical feat of human ingenuity. It's neutral and just like the internet can be used by anybody. We're not going to apologise for its energy use.

I don't think that's quiet right. To paraphrase Kranzberg, Bitcoin is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral". We can debate whether it's good or bad on net, but the fact that crypto provides monetary incentives for mining it (and thus spending electricity and computer equipment) is not up for debate.

But whether that is a bad thing definitely is up for debate. Bitcoin mining is a buyer of last resort for stranded renewable energy. It also incentivises renewable energy capture. Energy isn't fungible, it can't be magically teleported to where it can be used. Energy consumption in itself isn't something to be ashamed of or avoided. Personally I think mining Bitcoin with fossil fuels is wrong, but trying to tell people what they can compute is a dangerous road to go down.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#93

Post by jkepler »

scotty79 wrote: post #41
potatototoo99 wrote: post #12

I usually brush aside these doomsday articles about crypto, but the linked article is really depressing: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-25/sam-bankm... I remember nicer days when crypto had some value, and yes exchanges were already shady and did a lot of washing, but there was clearly a closer approximation to market sentiment and real world use cases. Nowadays everything seems to be revolve around…

The thing they describe as the box is literally a Ponzi scheme. You put in some money and you get high guaranteed return. You have money, and you even can cash out some unless too many people try to cash out at the same time. Then it turns out there's no money to cover the returns. Key innovation that further obfuscates this is that instead of cashing out directly you might use IOUs from the Ponzi scheme as a collate…

Many---nearly all---altcoins are dangerously close to ponzi schemes, except bitcoin. Bitcoin stands apart as the sole protocol that's really decentralized and doesn't promise ridiculous returns.

However, given that Bitcoin is jn the process of monetizing and may become the world's base layer of money, it stands to gain a lot of value the long term compared to the melting icebergs of central bank and commercial bank created fiat currencies.

If this doesn't make sense, please read "The Bitcoin Standard" and "Inventing Bitcoin" to understand this technological advance.

One can prefer sundials to watches, but reality was changed when the watch was invented.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#95

Post by jkepler »

tossl568 wrote: post #89
lolsal wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Yeah yeah. Bitcoin is an open financial network that anybody can use and nobody controls and is secured by energy. What an amazing, historical feat of human ingenuity. It's neutral and just like the internet can be used by anybody. We're not going to apologise for its energy use. If you think the ends justifies the means, I suppose you could do anything.

Bitcoin disappearing tomorrow wouldn't make a dent in our current fossil fuel emissions. Bitcoin mining ASICs don't emit CO2. Take it up with policymakers who subsidize fossil fuels.

Bitcoin mining currently consumes less that 0.2 % of global energy consumption. Smartphone use and the associated radio infrastructure use somewhere between 1% to 2% of global energy.

How much energy do central and commercial banks, auditors, accountants, corporate currency hedge trading desks, and the armies that back fiat currencies use? Way, way more than bitcoin... and they don't provide a way to pay electric grids to build out renewables the way bitcoin mining does.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#96

Post by jkepler »

throwawash wrote: post #50
immigrantheart wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are economists with deep understanding of finance and economy that disagree with you.

Where can I read their points of view? Can you provide some links by any chance?

Read Rothbart's Mystery of Banking, https://mises.org/library/mystery-banking. Or Mises' Human Action.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#97

Post by nh23423fefe »

jkepler wrote: post #95
tossl568 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin disappearing tomorrow wouldn't make a dent in our current fossil fuel emissions. Bitcoin mining ASICs don't emit CO2. Take it up with policymakers who subsidize fossil fuels.

Bitcoin mining currently consumes less that 0.2 % of global energy consumption. Smartphone use and the associated radio infrastructure use somewhere between 1% to 2% of global energy. How much energy do central and commercial banks, auditors, accountants, corporate currency hedge trading desks, and the armies that back fiat currencies use? Way, way more than bitcoin... and they don't provide a way to pay electric gri…

Is this what indoctrination looks like?

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#98

Post by tossl568 »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #97
jkepler wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin mining currently consumes less that 0.2 % of global energy consumption. Smartphone use and the associated radio infrastructure use somewhere between 1% to 2% of global energy. How much energy do central and commercial banks, auditors, accountants, corporate currency hedge trading desks, and the armies that back fiat currencies use? Way, way more than bitcoin... and they don't provide a way to pay electric gri…

Is this what indoctrination looks like?

What does dollar indoctrination look like? Like asking a fish what water is I suppose. It's all we've known.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#99

Post by jkepler »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #47
hardmoney99 wrote: post #13

Bitcoin is the solution to the fundamentally broken debt-driven economy. Critics don't get it because they lump it together with "cryptocurrency". While technically a cryptocurrency, Bitcoin does not exhibit any of the ponzi, scam-like shenanigans that are easily observable in shitcoins. Yes, there is a lot of crazy stuff happening with wash trading - but this is a byproduct of lack of regulation and has nothing to d…

> Bitcoin is a financial freedom tool Usually when describing something in the face of scrutiny, one describes a use case. If someone questions the validity of hammers, the solution isn't to say "we call this a hammer." It's to show how hammers are used. I doubt most crypto folks have any idea of credit markets or central banking. What they have expertise in is the manipulation of money. Bitcoin, and all of crypto, i…

Some of us have read Bastiat (in French!), Mises, Hayek, Rothbart, Solerno, and other "heterodox" Austrian economists, and have a better understanding of how money arises and how central bank interference in monetary and credit markets creates the boom and bust business cycles.

Bitcoin, with its Austrian hard money roots, stands head and shoulders above the crazy scammy mess of all the centralized altcoins (or "crypto" if you lile) that you right to criticize. Please don't lump real technological and computer science innovation in with a the crypto rug-pulls.

Re: Bitcoin Is a Hideous Monstrosity Made Out of Computers and Greed

#100

Post by _aavaa_ »

tossl568 wrote: post #92
_aavaa_ wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's quiet right. To paraphrase Kranzberg, Bitcoin is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral". We can debate whether it's good or bad on net, but the fact that crypto provides monetary incentives for mining it (and thus spending electricity and computer equipment) is not up for debate.

But whether that is a bad thing definitely is up for debate. Bitcoin mining is a buyer of last resort for stranded renewable energy. It also incentivises renewable energy capture. Energy isn't fungible, it can't be magically teleported to where it can be used. Energy consumption in itself isn't something to be ashamed of or avoided. Personally I think mining Bitcoin with fossil fuels is wrong, but trying to tell peop…

Yes, I keep hearing that it's a buyer of last resort. Is there any info on how true that it? What % of mining is done with last resort energy, and what % is just simply creating more demand. I would guess that most is increasing demand.
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