Bitcoin Forum

The two stand points explained simply:

Rational egoism: Do what maximizes happiness for you.
Utilitarianism: Do what maximizes happiness in the world.

i do know that there are other moral standpoints, but choose not to include them.
its critical to see that the rational egoist, does not have to be a complete asshole. eg. if he/she does not want to die sad and lonely, he/she should be friendly to people. while a Utilitarist would just be friendly to people because it makes them happy(and therefor maximizes global happiness)

pick your vote, and discuss.

Nice one.

But utilitarianism is not that simple. When you think about it, in most cases it's more like rational egoism but expanded to group of people you are in contact with. You cannot possibly be able to optimize for sum of happiness on the planet (too little information, too little computational power).

A rational Egoist might also be nice to others because it makes him happy. I don't know about you, but when I see a smile on my daughter's face, it brightens my day right up.

Rational egoism is based on human nature, whereas utilitarianism is just a nice idealistic concept. To be honest, not many people really care about sufferings of unknown people that are far away.
http://img.chan4chan.com/img/2012-02-24/8fb4355182141661b548666696ead9b5.jpg

Though upbringing in society usually injects utilitarian values into human mind (and it is difficult to overcome them), thus it is person's best interest to do something good for society if it is not too expensive for him/her personally.

in reality that is true. but this is philosophy it does not care about reality(we all know that it does not exist anyway: solipsism ;) ). it might be better to explain utilitarianism as: would you sacrifice your happiness if it maximizes a group's(or worlds) happiness.

True. I guess i might have described it a little bit too rough.

the pic says nothing about utilitarianism vs. rational egoism, only about value of human life...  a utilitarian does not necessarily against killing people(eg. he would have killed Hitler). In the push-a-button case, he might have rationalized it as: my extra happiness would outweigh the average happiness of a person(or indirect happiness caused by the now dead person), therefor it maximizes the global happiness.

Oh, how true.. he also considered happiness of his wife )

If all you are concerned with is global average happiness, then you can ignore a little local unhappiness. This is "missing the trees for the forest," and if everyone does this, your "little local unhappiness" will be repeated everywhere, until the whole world is unhappy.

Make your life better, and perhaps those of the ones you love, and if everyone does this, the world will be happy.

No. *insert generic poor black people in Africa argument here*.

also would you make your life better and a higher cost of someone else?

World's happiness = sum of happinesses of each individual (including me)
My happiness = <absolute happiness> - <my pain>
My pain = <my physical pain> + <my psychological pain>
My psychological pain = weighted sum of my problems

Society injects utilitarian values into my mind, thus for each person P: his/her pain becomes my problem with weight W[P]

I think every person maximizes his/her "My happiness". Though if values of W[P] are high enough, then this behavior is indistinguishable from maximizing "World's happiness".

Are the poor people in Africa incapable of bettering their situation? If so, why? What is stopping them? What is stopping those who love them? If you care so much about their happiness, what is stopping you?

I say again: If everyone maximized their, as arsenische puts it, "My Happiness," then the sum of those, "World Happiness" would also be maximized.

And how would I do that without violating the NAP? Violating the NAP would make me quite unhappy.

why should i care about their happiness? well im forced care if im a Utilitarian.

depends on how they maximize it, if they do it at the cost of others(with or without violating the NAP), the world might be less happy.

would you violate the NAP, if you knew that the world would be a better place if you did? (if you knew that a person would with absolutely certainty would become the next Hitler, and you are able to kill that person before he has aggressed, would you?)

Well, as a utilitarian, I would expect you to act to increase global happiness as much as possible. So why aren't there more people out there helping those poor African kids?

You still haven't explained how I can increase my happiness at the expense of another's happiness without violating the NAP. One example would suffice.

Allow me to quote your signature: "The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves and wiser people so full of doubts." -Bertrand Russell
Only a fool is "absolutely certain." I would wait until he aggressed. But if I were so sure he would, I'd keep a weather eye on him, and catch him in the act the very first time.

With 1 million dollars, i can save 3 poor guy in africa from starvation during 100 years and still enjoy a few improvement in my own life. I'm afraid i would push it a few time ...
Now i voted i don't care, because in this exemple i'm in between...

Mutually exclusive philosophies suck.

just because you are a utilitarian, does not mean that the whole world are. to be honest i don't know where i stand.

say you are at the market, and your little girl likes chocolate ice cream(say it gives her 1 units of happiness), there is only one bottle left in the freezer, you take it, just before someone else is going to. the person that was gonna take it also have a child, but his/hers child just loves chocolate icecream(say 2 happiness). would you give the icecream to them? maximizing happiness. or would you keep it, as you are perfectly able to do without violating the NAP, but with the knowledge of there gonna be 1 less happiness in the world?

absolutly true, but in the hypothetically situation you would still allow him to kill some one before reacting?

It wouldn't be up to me. Not my happiness, you see. Now, if I were to run into this situation, I would ask my daughter. "Dear, that little girl really likes chocolate. There's this chocolate chip (or whichever flavor she likes almost as much as chocolate) ice cream here, which I'll get you if you want to give her the chocolate, which will make her very happy. What do you say?" If she does decide that the other girl's happiness is important to her happiness, then I'll tell her how proud I am of her for being so nice to that other girl, further increasing her happiness.

It's not a zero-sum game, and being rationally self-interested doesn't mean being an asshole.

I didn't say kill, I said aggress. Even if that aggression is attempting to murder someone, I certainly wouldn't let him finish the job, if I'd been watching this whole time.

thats cheating! don't avoid the question, try again but this time your girl is home playing ludo. would you give them the icecream?
but awesome teaching your girl being nice to others, some people don't do that. :)

true, i did not say that. im only arguing against you because it would be a boring discussion if we did agree. :P

one way to solve the problem, but you are avoiding the dilemma. would you allow him to make the world less happy, by reacting after he have aggressed? if you are going to stop him anyway, why not before?

Well, way I see it, going through life pissing people off at you isn't a very happy lifestyle, and since my daughter's not there to see me give away "her" icecream (thus reducing her happiness, and thus mine), and since I know there are several other stores where I could get chocolate (if I don't just get her chocolate chip, instead) icecream, Yes, I'd let them buy the icecream. Again, this isn't because I want to increase total global happiness or some such, but because I don't want people pissed off at me, thus reducing my happiness.

Because before, he hasn't done anything. Ever watch Minority Report?

same conclusion, different reason?

have watched it, noticed the more peaceful world without murder?

No, same reason, really. "No need to be an asshole."

Except, it wasn't. There was murder. What happened to that young lady, do you remember?

They arrested her "murderer," and then someone else came along and killed her. Only fools are certain.

Helping yourself is greed, where does that get us?  I'll tell you, greed creates a society ruled by sociopathic humans that seek power and control of their neighbors rather than peace and prosperity amongst all.  Greed creates a society that irresponsibly consumes resources from the earth, unsustainable, when alternative options are known, for the sake of the industry that stands.  Greed creates a society where humans judge and hate each other, where bribery and a valueless concept of debt rule the minds of the population.  Ego creates mental disorders as we know, it makes people question their abilities and self esteem.  Ego makes people run from their problems by escaping realty, and no matter how far or fast you run, you can never escape your problems.  If people didn't eat junk food every time they're upset, or watch tv to ignore their feelings, or shoot up heroin or drink alcohol to find a sense of happiness, people could confront their problems.  People can become one, solve the problems of the world.

When you buy a sub at subway, you are going there to get a sub, correct?  Why do you need to have a certificate to eat?  If your neighbor asks for some sugar, do you give it to him or sell it to him?  Why do we sell goods to other humans, to accumulate our personal wealth, when we are all neighbors?  What if we helped each other so humanity could progress as a whole?  So we could all have a share of a much greater wealth?

"i like to make people happy" and "i don't like people to be angry at me", there is a difference.

you are not looking at the big picture. but i see your point.
individual vs. group conflict.

dank = atlas^-1 ?

You're focusing on the forest, and ignoring the trees. Care for each tree, and the forest will prosper.

One person cannot care for every tree in the forest.  We've been seeking some great leader to solve everyone's problems, a perfect king, when no such thing is achievable.  Everyone must help their self become a better person, nobody can make you hate or love but yourself.  We can help each other improve ourselves.

tired now. thinking about tree hugging. :D

Two sides of the same coin.

No, it's much simpler than that. You cannot punish someone for something in the future. Think of it as a version of the "grandfather paradox (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandfather_paradox)." By killing the future next Hitler before he even attempts an aggressive action, I've just made it impossible for him to do so, thus invalidating my reason for killing him in the first place.

Bingo.

Pick a tree, care for it. Everybody pick a tree, forest happy.

You are that tree. Everybody care for their tree, everybody happy.

See time travel paradox, raises with Many-worlds interpretation. which universe would be best? :P

Why not pick another tree, fall in love with that tree and feed each other more love?  Everyone has a soulmate after all.  When you fall in love, you lose your ego, you become one, as a couple.  If everyone found their soulmate, everyone would be in love, humanity would be one.

Sounds a little better than making yourself happy without others.  Making others happy is what gives you true happiness.

The universe in which he doesn't attempt an aggressive action. And we don't know that's not the universe we're in until he does.

I dispute your soulmate (http://what-if.xkcd.com/9/) claim, but certainly making those you love happy is a fine way to make yourself happy. Love, in fact, is best defined as that condition in which another's happiness is required for yours.

Utilitarianism can be used -- in fact, it was used -- to justify Hitler's Holocaust, Tsarist Russia pogroms, Lenin's "cut their heads and hang them high so everyone can see them", Mao's mass starvation (the biggest mass death in history), et cetera.  Utilitarianism is, indeed, the "moral system"  (ugh) that underpins all forms of statism ("we must give this tiny group of cronies the right to murder, cage or ruin anyone who disobeys them, in order to maximize the happiness of everyone else").

This is true because utilitarianism attempts to make moral theories based on of unknowables (as defined above, "maximizing global happiness"), combined with the fact that authoritarians are pretty gullible and they will happily believe any authority that says "I'm working for global happiness", even as the authorities literally mass murder millions of their own people.

Personally, in my view, if your moral system can justify these atrocities, your moral system is an epic fail, worse than cancer and AIDS and fucking children in their eye sockets.

How so?  Isn't there that one girl you love more than any other?  You may not know it, but everyone has, or had, a soulmate.  You're with them in this life and lives thereafter.

That's an awfully poor definition of love.  In fact, it's totally inaccurate.  My mate in life isn't with me right now, that doesn't mean I don't love them or love life.  Love is a raise in frequency.  That's what you feel, the change of your vibration frequency.  You have to love yourself for others to love you, that's dependent on only you.

Try taking a god-like time-less no-observer-effect perspective on it. say you have 2 universes:
One where you stopped him before aggressed, and another where you stopped him after he aggressed.
Which one is most happy? The only problem in the first would be your sadness over have broken the NAP, for a greater good.
of course, assuming that he will aggress. the most happy universe would be the one where he never aggress

(is my endings on aggress* wrong?)

That was not utilitarianism being utilized.  Lying and deceiving others is not love or moral, logically.  Lying is a function of ego, you lie to help yourself.  Hitler lied to help himself gain power.  And when you lie to others, you're only lying to yourself.

Utilitarianism could function in a anarchistic society(ie. true communism).

Nope, sorry.  If you're an utilitarian, you can't know or tell anyone whether "lying and deceiving others" is moral for sure.  Even the most cursory of examples will disprove that.

A utilitarian can very well apply utilitarianism and conclude that "lying and deceiving others" could very well be "moral", because lying and deceiving could conceivably be argued to increase global happiness.  Another utilitarian may apply utilitarianism and conclude that "lying and deceiving others" could very well be "immoral", because "lying and deceiving others" could conceivably be argued to decrease global happiness.

Since both conclusions are drawn from opinions as to what increases or decreases global happiness (which is an unknowable), and cannot be fact-checked in any way, what usually ends up happening is that the utilitarian that controls the guns, yells louder, or lies more better, ends up "winning" the debate.  Then all the other authoritarians say "Well, by Golly, if Hitlermaostalin says that killing teh Joos will make us happier, then I'mma get right on Kristallnachting 'em."

So yes, Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Lenin, they might not have been "utilitarians" in the textbook sense, but they were all relying on utilitarianism to seduce fools and gain power.

you could just as easily fit all the crazy dictators in under rational egoism(they did it because they liked power).

If a person honestly thinks lying is moral and justifiable, they're lying to theirself.  Let's use logic on a simular example.  What if people thought they had the right to be violent in the instance of revenge?  The cycle of revenge would never end, humanity would end.  Humans have to take the time to form a believe about the morality of lying and realize that it's not love.  Love is true, how can a lie be true?  You may kid yourself to believing it's true, form a false reality, but deep in you, you know lying isn't honest, it isn't love.

As kokjo said, they did it for power.  Power is division, lying divides people and gives people a sense of control over others.  Truth unites people.

OK, here's the dynamic.

Social dominants (like Obama, Roosevelt, Stalin or Hitler) truly believe that they deserve as much power as they can get, by any means.  They are not utilitarians insofar as they really do not believe any of that "common good" nonsense.

But of course that platform wouldn't make them electable even in Hell itself.

So what they do -- which they excel at -- is they lie.  They lie real good.  One of the lies they use is this commonly held utilitarian belief of "the common good" or "maximizing global happiness" or whatever (all utilitarian ideas).  They insist and insist that their promises of action will "bring the common good".  By force of repetition and propaganda, these stick.  They gain power.

Thus they have successfully used utilitarian theories to attain power, even if they are not utilitarian themselves.

This is why I conclude that they all are utilitarians, even if only outwardly so.

I agree with this too.

Sorry, can you respond to my argument first?  Thanks.  Do not introduce new and unsubstantiated hypotheses like "well, they must be lying to themselves".

How can you be for the greater good of people if you tell them you'll end wars and you start three more?  If they only use love for power, they are not loving and therefor not utilitarian, so how are they all utilitarians, rather than egotistical?

What? Don't introduce new concepts that might teach you something?

Then they are not. your logic is faulty. (go read the link in your sig!)

I think that these politicians I spoke of, are both rational egoists of the social dominant variety, and also utilitarians at the same time.  They are one thing inwardly, and the other outwardly.  My reasoning is pretty clear about this.

in capable of reasoning logically. hitting ignore button.

Address my argument, please.  Thanks.

Tehehe.  I love how some people allege that their interlocutors are "in capable (sic) of reasoning logically", but they don't even bother pointing out what the logical error is (which should be pretty trivial, if I have indeed made a logical error).

To be fair, a person like kokjo is better off not reading what I have to say.

Let me try to explain.  One person cannot be an honest man and a lire at the same time.  Yes, he can act like an honest man, but he what he acts like does not change his true nature.  If they use love to bring them power over others, they are acting on their ego, for self gain.  If they are using love to bring power to others, they are acting out of love.  It can't be both, even if people live in false realities, at the end of the day, they know the truth.

Tsk... Weren't you paying attention?




Liars are one thing inwardly, and another outwardly.

but from a utalitarian standpoint it would be perfectly good to lie IF it maximises happiness. eg.
scared person to you and you see which way he runs. murder comes asking "which way did he run?". do you lie and save the persons life, or tell the truth and let the person die? a utilitarian would lie, a Kantian(deontolog?) would panic and be incapable of performing any action(must not lie, must save lifes), and a rational egoist would not care.

Lying does not maximize happiness.  That is a fallacy.  That's like saying going to war generates peace.

yes but egoism and utilitarianism is mutually exclusive, they can perform the same actions, but the difference lies in there reasoning.

so let the murder kill him!

I agree.  I never said otherwise.

Now, how does that realization mean that I am "in capable of logicsssszzsssszzßßß"?


Not that kokjo can read anything of what I'm saying, but a person well-versed in UPB would have no problem ascertaining the least suboptimal thing to do in this attempt at a moral dilemma.

You can't conclude that if you are a utilitarian.

I previously made an argument that demonstrates you can't conclude "lying does not maximize happiness" by relying on utilitarian reasoning, and that asserting "lying does not maximize happiness" is an unsubstantiated a priori and baseless assertion.  In this very thread.

If you are a utilitarian, please don't ignore that argument.

I suspected this was kokjo's "logic" (but, the man having cowardly not stated it, I could not question it).

He can't read me, so it's unlikely that he'll prove me how egoism and utilitarianism are mutually exclusive -- I never said that -- or that they are incompatible (I relied on the fact that they are compatible)... that is to say, how a man who is allegedly a rational egoist is somehow "incapable" of exploiting utilitarianism to justify his true desires.

This thread is vitiated with the all-too-common mistake of "I identify as Xian, and I have concluded that Z is immoral according to Xianism, so obviously I'll substitute a defense of Xianism with my own conclusions about Z".

To wit, those who say "utilitarianism is correct" and then say "lying cannot maximize global happiness" introduced as an unsubstantiated premise, punctuated with the very obvious absence of a utilitarian proof that "lying cannot maximize global happiness".

These types of conversation are unpleasant.

unignoring Rudd-O, hide/show button to complicated.

Would not being a party to murder reduce one's happiness?

I knew it, behehehe.

i do not claim that i support any moral philosophy. its Dank that is doing that.

sounds meaningful, but unable to understand?? please reformulate.

Well, let's look at history, shall we?  Earth has seemingly always have a organized power structure over society.  Power and control have always been evident from people's egotistic, self-serving nature.  But that's what makes us human.  Where did that get us?  Should we continue the cycle of lies, violence, greed and power?  Or should we try something new, should we try being honest, loving?

Is it possible lying does not land you in heaven after all?  If you lie, to others, you're only lying to yourself.  You're only creating division.  Division is what we've had for the last few millenniums.  How is it working?  When you are honest, confess your guilt, to anyone, and come clean with your consciousness, you can find love and unity.  Truth is love, lying is hateful.

All I've said here is that rational egoists of the social dominant variety have no problem exploting utilitarian theories to gain power for themselves.  I referred to this observation as these men being both rational egoists and utilitarians.  I think that's a savory and useful conclusion which also happens to be true.

How that is "controversial" or makes me "illogicalzzzlollzzzozll", I truly do not know.

Yes, those that sell their soul for greed exploit the conscience of others, that doesn't make them a person for the greater good.  It's an illusion, do you understand?

From the very outset, this "Original Sin" theory of "humanity" is wrong.  Wrong twice.

1. All animals, not just humans, demonstrate an egotistic and self-serving side.  To call that "what makes us human" is ridiculously false and belied by any observation of animals in reality.
2. No animal but the human animal has a certain characteristic that distinguishes humans from other animals.  That characteristic is metacognition -- the ability to reflect on one's own thoughts and be aware, not just of oneself, but also aware that one is aware.  To ignore that this is what makes us human, and pretend that it's something else, is again ridiculously false.

This "Original Sin" political theory that dank is peddling here, is bunk, nonsense, false, wrong.

Obviously, starting from false premises will lead to false conclusions.  I won't address dank's conclusions because it should be self-evident that falsifying his premises is enough.

Political Creationism: not even once.

I don't know what you mean by this vagary.  Explain it in literal terms and without supernatural allegories.

I never said it was exclusive to humans.  Earth as a whole is still in the ego bound stage of society, for now.

You claim that a rational egoist would not care about the outcome of this particular scenario. Rational egoists care about their own happiness. Being party to a murder would reduce that happiness (see the formula on page one (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=125809.msg1341153#msg1341153) - it would increase psychological pain) for all but the most psycho/sociopathic of them. Ergo, the rational egoist would not desire to be party to a murder, and lie to the murderer. That the murderer's happiness is reduced by this doesn't matter to the egoist.

That is literally and exactly what you said, when you said:


Now you're contradicting yourself.

You're not being honest with yourself, Rudd.  Do you really believe people can't tell when you lie to them, 100% of the time?  Even if they don't know it at first, the truth reveals itself with time.

Do you feel happy when you're lied to?

Actually, you know what, you're right.  Just like the SA forums, people can lie to each other and create a sense of happiness.  But it's not love.  It's ego, people lie to each other to boost their egos and miss out on the beauty of truth.

proof that your argument about lying politician/dictators is invalid:
assume that a given person is behaving utilitarianistic. his reason could then either be:
a) egoistic, that is he is behaving utilitarianistic to gain something(exploiting it), he is therefor not a true utilitarian.
b) utilitarianistic, that is he is behaving that way he *thinks* it maximizes happiness(but he might be stupid, and kill a few million people). he is a true utilitarian.
c) he is completely crazy, and just doing random things that look utilitarianistic.

(i can feel i fail english!)

So, it is possible to use utilitarianism to argue in favor of lying, because it is conceivable that lying and deception can increase global happiness.

But now you're invoking your own (obviously) non-utilitarian preferable values of "love" and "beauty of truth".

Gents, does this count as a partial conversion?

logic is sound. rational egoist would not *have to* care, unless he feels like it. better? and again he does not do it for the victim, but for himself.

As I just said, it's not true happiness.  It's the same "happiness" we've dealt with in our society for thousands of years.  It's the same division and hate, but if that is what you seek.

i do not like to put people in boxes, BUT you sound like a Kantian, with some weird Freudian choice of words.

Not at all.  Logic shows us that lying brings us division and truth, unity.  Just think about it.  I find a girl and open up everything about me to her, honestly, we create a sense of oneness, we fall in love.  Then later down the road, when a lie is said between us, do you think that doesn't impede our love by creating division, separation?

It's logic.

You can lie to people, and even if they believe your lie, you still lied, that act still happened.  You can't lie to your self, ultimately, you still know.

And yet, the victim's happiness is improved, and the utilitarian goal of maximizing overall happiness is achieved. All from acting in self-interest.

wow these threads escalate quickly ;)


Yes, but then this utilitarianism differs quite a lot, you don't care about whole humanity, you select some individuals from human race (this group) and optimize for their happiness. This sounds more like.. I don't know... a government? ;)

I'm pointing it out because if you agree on that that's more like a choice between selfishness vs altruism, which seems to be quite separate problem from the original post to me. Original post reminds me something like a choice between my happiness and doing something positive for the world. Where the most intriguing part to me is what something positive for the world means.

Maybe if you will be nice to everyone it will slow down overall world progress?  Or is progress something positive? Maybe it will cause our self destruction? Or maybe it will let us save ourselves from something like e.g. big asteroid?

Rational egoism: Get ASIC mining device and mine BTC with 20X + speed
Utilitarianism:  Get ASIC mining device to as much people as possible, so that a 51% attack will not be possible

1st, It's not a human nature issue.  I believe we are more product of the environment (nurture) than the product of our gene (nature) !

2nd, I truly believe that we cannot live on our own self, we are social/tribal creature.  It's been proven that a human without contact with other human will die, even if all physical need fullfilled.  Human need social interaction and touch to survive.

3rd, Proven too, cooperation will succeed much more than competition, and make human involved much more happy.  We tend to believe that competition is better, like the free market encouraging competition, but it's all man made conception, several experimentation conclude that cooperation is a lot better.

This said, I can only stand by the point of view that helping other benefit more to ourselve than helping ourself alone.  If someone help his tribe/community/social circle, he knows that other will care for him too.  Helping others, taking care of family, friend, neighboor, community, while knowing that each other care for you, it's greater than being egoist of our time and ressources.

You want facts about my assomptions, google it, read books, listen to intelligent podcast, but first and most important of all : close your TV, stop playing games, and get a real social life, you could learn a lot !

Nothing personal, have read the thread and know that this kind of debate are a lot polarized.. I was on the Rational egoism side before, but I've learn a lot... I'm now Ultra-Utilitarianist !

Most important, Shut down the most effective propaganda machine ever, that have so much empowerment over the society, shut down those so called TV.. Close them all, sell those poisonous TV that pollute our minds..

was my two satoshi !

Doing bad for other or nature, is doing bad to yourself... remember, if you push the button, the next one to do so kills you !

the rational egoism would not want 51% attack either, not even if he is the attacker, as he would ruin the network and make bitcoin worthless(assuming that he wants bitcoin to succeed)

I concur with DoomDumas.

that does not mean that you are right.
utiltarism does not say anything about lying, cheating, killing, genocide, suicide. The only thing it states is:
"Do what necessary to maximizes the sum of happiness".

If that mean that you are gonna lie, or kill some people, SO BE IT! if the world is a happier place, you did the right thing. as long as the benefit outweighs the cost, every things is good. Utiltarism does say that you have to do these things, if they are what maximizes happiness(but in most situations they aren't).

Nah, the rational egoist is more creative than this. He is an entrepreneur not an idiot. There are many ways to profit by disrupting markets. You don't get rich by sitting on your ass and thinking like everyone else.

Suppose our egoist is pirate for example. Collect 400k BTC debt, convert to USD, 51% attack, payoff debt after BTC devaluation, go off on your way with a suitcase full of cash, and without breaking any laws.
Worst case scenario btc holds its value and you just pull a regular pirate. Everyone seems to be convinced that a 51% attack is the death of bitcoin though. So you should be safe from breaking the law.
Seems like a legit business plan.
 
[Can't wait to see someone pull this off! This is what is called 'creative destruction'.]