1) the bitcoin mining equipment = do the mining companies and their suppliers and their employees burn the money they earn?
2) and electrical energy used by miners = do the energy companies burn the money they earn?
3) all the time spent by bitcoiners looking at charts, trading bitcoins = do websites and exchanges and traders burn the money they earn?
4)and watching Antonopulos videos = does you tube burn the money they earn from ad revenues (a tiny bit of which come from admittedly a very few btc videos in the grand scheme) or the people that make the videos? or the video cameras?
I insist: money is not wealth, just tokens that people are willing to accept in exchange of wealth. All the things above destroy wealth, and move money from some people to other people. Once again: some forms of money, like dollars, are so stable and widely accepted that people usually count them as wealth, when evaluating the wealth owned by a person or company. That is a valid assumption for those purposes. But when one is discussing the wealth of the world (as in the above) or of a country, it is wrong to count the money owned by its inhabitants. (Except, in the case of a country, the money that the country could use to acquire wealth that is outside the country, without giving other wealth in return.) Money is not wealth, it is a symbol we use to represent wealth. If what you are stating is that BTC uses resources that could be used for something else.. then.... yeah... but have you had a good look around the world recently? (personal note: In the future I may start to keep some of my wealth in cow form, I like cheese, and milk.......and steak.... oh and food for the veggie garden......plus I think I would rather enjoy owning a cow or three, they are pleasant) (bullish?) |
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Does not translate. The replacement of barter by money transactions hugely improved the flow of goods and services, by breaking down complicated multi-party trasactions into independent two-party steps, that could be widely separated in time and space.
Bitcoin, on the other hand, has not yet brought any significant contributions to commerce. The benefits of bitcoin are, at best, the saving of a few percent in the price of international payments. That is counted as a benefit, because otherwise the payment of those extra fees would have meant waste of work by bank staffers, for services that (allegedly) were not really necessary. All those saved fees together may barely add up to 10 million dollars.
The losses caused by bitcoin include, first, all the wealth consumed by the "bitcoin phenomenon": the bitcoin mining equipment and electrical energy used by miners, all the time spent by bitcoiners looking at charts, trading bitcoins, and watching Antonopulos videos, all the time and equipment and electricity consumed by bitcoin companies, all the time spent by non-bitcoiners listening to bitcoiners and trying to understand the thing. We should also add all the losses and hardships suffered by victims of bitcoin thefts, scams, and collapse of bitcoin companies. Even if we discount from the latter the losses of wealthy people (which, a communist might argue, were just cases of thief stealing from thief), we can easily get to a billion dollars of damages.
1) the bitcoin mining equipment = do the mining companies and their suppliers and their employees burn the money they earn? 2) and electrical energy used by miners = do the energy companies burn the money they earn? 3) all the time spent by bitcoiners looking at charts, trading bitcoins = do websites and exchanges and traders burn the money they earn? 4)and watching Antonopulos videos = does you tube burn the money they earn from ad revenues (a tiny bit of which come from admittedly a very few btc videos in the grand scheme) or the people that make the videos? or the video cameras? |
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COCKSUCKER
A nuanced and cogent reply  (of which I approve) |
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Speaking of "marshall auction next week" is this the last of the coins the feds have to auction at this point? I hope so. I think that it has caused some parties to keep prices deflated for hopes of purchasing in at a lower price, or just the fears that price will plummet because of such a huge amount being sold off.
no there is another batch |
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There are quite a few people in this thread who would be happy on Mars. No government, no taxes, no infrastructure. If some of them could channel their energies into a Mars settlement, it could happen in no time at all.
There are a few people on this thread that I wish they would grind up and grit bloody roads with....preferably on Mars. Hmmm....ok.  ha ha yeah I was kinda kidding... Ignore button is your friend no doubt. No no, I'm game! That's the button for the grinder. Or was it me you were thinking of? ah.... I am with you now. |
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There are quite a few people in this thread who would be happy on Mars. No government, no taxes, no infrastructure. If some of them could channel their energies into a Mars settlement, it could happen in no time at all.
There are a few people on this thread that I wish they would grind up and grit bloody roads with....preferably on Mars. Hmmm....ok. ha ha yeah I was kinda kidding... Ignore button is your friend no doubt. |
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There are quite a few people in this thread who would be happy on Mars. No government, no taxes, no infrastructure. If some of them could channel their energies into a Mars settlement, it could happen in no time at all.
There are a few people on this thread that I wish they would grind up and grit bloody roads with....preferably on Mars. |
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It has been suggested by some that it will take another 100 years before we reach Mars... but then people said the same thing about sequencing the human genome halfway through the project when it was only 1% complete.
On the other hand, I still can see in my mind a special issue of Life magazine from the 1960s, about the US space program, with a timeline of future milestones running across the bottom of several pages. It had men landing on Mars in 1980, if I recall correctly. Of course, but this phenomenon is recognised, and people, the media, got, and continue to get excited and get it wrong, and often are more interested in telling a story than the actual facts. Fact is though that in most measurable ways "technology" is growing at an exponential rate every 12-18 months or so , both in performance and cost-effectiveness, and that coupled with the synergy of before unconnected technologies, is leading us in a very clear direction. The timing may be out for some predictions, sometimes, for sure, for various reasons (not least of all who is doing the predicting and based on what, and for what purpose) but the direction and trend is very clear. How long ago was the first manned flight? and now look at the aerospace industry. I am not even talking about Mars here per se, I am just saying that , we are at (or nearing) in my opinion a knee in the bend of an exponential growth curve in technology, where the doubling effect is really going to become apparent, and where we are going to continue to see technology, developments and new inventions, not only become a reality, but become a reality quicker, more often, and reach more of the population in a quicker time frame than before for ever decreasing costs. By before I mean the last 100 years. The time frame I predict these changes to become more and more profound, is from right now, and over the next 25-35 years. I believe we will see more change in the next 25-35 years than we have seen in the past 100 years of human history. Some of those changes, had seeds that were sowed long long ago, even before the 60's and 80's as you point out. Thing is those seeds, that were sowed, have grown into a forest, and that forest is growing at an exponential rate. Blink and it doubles. The only thing that is assured is change... we all know that. I am just arguing that it is accelerating and will continue to do so. We cannot even keep up with laws for tech and its impact on society, already as it is. (Just imagine as measurable performance of tech continues to grow at these rates exponentially each year ish, then in ten years it will roughly be 1000 times more powerful/efficient/cost effective....... and in 20 years 1 million times more powerful, and in 40 years time...) |
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Yeah that is another interesting project.. I have been eyeballing developments in that one for quite some time.. Will be interesting to see if economically it is a valid way to launch people off into space. I know they have come leaps and bounds since the inception of the idea, especially with the material they are developing to act as the "wire tether" to the geo-orbit platform. Even if this does become a reality, I still think we will have other projects happening ahead of and around this time. (thanks for the link btw, not seen that article before) |
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Talking of which I am more than curious to see how these guys get on, if they make it off the ground at all, and if so when, if they make it there, and actually manage to make a go of it, if they win the race, and what will follow. http://www.mars-one.com/mission/roadmapI am not sure about these guys at all, if they know what they are up to. Time will tell. It has been suggested by some that it will take another 100 years before we reach Mars... but then people said the same thing about sequencing the human genome halfway through the project when it was only 1% complete. It could well be that Orion reaches Mars first... or another project we do not even know the name of yet. Or not at all. Going to be interesting finding out though. I heard they were taking people to Mars in 2024. Apparently, there was also a contest from whcih 100 people have already been selected, and 2 will be shortlisted finally. Same company. (I thought?) |
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Talking of which I am more than curious to see how these guys get on, if they make it off the ground at all, and if so when, if they make it there, and actually manage to make a go of it, if they win the race, and what will follow. http://www.mars-one.com/mission/roadmapI am not sure about these guys at all, if they know what they are up to. Time will tell. It has been suggested by some that it will take another 100 years before we reach Mars... but then people said the same thing about sequencing the human genome halfway through the project when it was only 1% complete. It could well be that Orion reaches Mars first... or another project we do not even know the name of yet. Or not at all. Going to be interesting finding out though. To keep their schedule they need to order some doohickey(can't remember what it was) from Lockheed Martin within 6 months, and it looks like they won't. Which means the end of the project. oh , I had not seen/heard that, last I heard that they had another year delay. Eitherway these are all interesting ideas.. Interesting to think lockheed could take themselves there if they wanted, as no doubt could a few other corps out there... and they will.. soon as the profit model is locked in. |
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Yes OT. But not if we can get them to accept bitcoins for the tickets  Ha ha yeah. One thing is for sure I do not think people will be walking around with folded pieces of finely mashed chopped down dead trees, which they keep in folded pieces of cow hide as a form of value exchange for toooo much longer in the grand scheme of things. Law of accelerating returns = the world is going to (continue) to change rapidly over the next 25 years, we are at a very interesting time in history. Normally bias will not stop it from happening. |
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Talking of which I am more than curious to see how these guys get on, if they make it off the ground at all, and if so when, if they make it there, and actually manage to make a go of it, if they win the race, and what will follow. http://www.mars-one.com/mission/roadmapI am not sure about these guys at all, if they know what they are up to. Time will tell. It has been suggested by some that it will take another 100 years before we reach Mars... but then people said the same thing about sequencing the human genome halfway through the project when it was only 1% complete. It could well be that Orion reaches Mars first... or another project we do not even know the name of yet. Or not at all. Going to be interesting finding out though. |
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Wow, I really didn't think they would be going ahead with it so quickly - can't wait!! And thanks for posting empowering, you're one of a few people here that I actually like to read, unlike BrainDeadMcChopFace: Thank you, tis a pleasure, and I thought worthy of an OT mention. Times are a changing. We all bang on about trains and moons... give it 25 years and the trains will be hyperloops and the moon and mars a possible work destination. |
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^ off topic but cool as hell. Better OT post than whatever the hell the NLC multiple personality disordered crew are currently seeking attention with.
Yeah... they should start rolling these things out... that would be some worthwhile infrastructure investment. Link all of Europe with one, across Russia and from Russia to Alaska down through Canada and across the US, and down into the South Americas, and then maybe another that ties in Asia and the Middle East/Africa. I have read that if they were to be rolled out en masse they could be cheaper than motorways to build, lets face it, we are most likely going to end up going down this route... so may as well get building.  |
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...arguing with a cat is a bad idea.
I have done both with great success in the past. ... Let me guess, particle physics? The cat owned you, amirite? Nahh... that would be crazy.  |
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so ideas/thoughts dont exist?
and yet, many people here concluded that you are stupid as fuck. care to explain that in numbers?
Of course thoughts and ideas exist. That's why we use phrases such as "good thought" or "bad idea". We measure them against other thoughts or ideas. For example: arguing with a woman is usually a bad idea for the same reason arguing with a cat is a bad idea. I have done both with great success in the past. But I am a fucking wizard so... no biggie. |
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Watching trolls and their sockpuppets post droll insignificant twaddle, is like watching a constipated rat trying to squeeze one out
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