Your opinion is mostly worthless at this point, so I'm not sure why you create so much noise instead of solutions?

Why do you post comments on github commits, are you making code commits? Seems pretentious.

Hmm. It seems to be a variation of Mises' "Calculation problem" and individuals trying to know better than markets.

even though node quantity declines, (but the decline should eventually be arrested by a growing ecosystem, and increasing price).

In the face of the combination of price controls and shortages, the effect of a decrease in the supply of an item is not, as it would be in a free market, to raise its price and increase its profitability, thereby operating to stop the decrease in supply, or reverse it if it has gone too far. Price control prohibits the rise in price and thus the increase in profitability. At the same time, the shortages caused by price controls prevent increases in supply from reducing price and profitability. When there is a shortage, the effect of an increase in supply is merely a reduction in the severity of the shortage. Only when the shortage is totally eliminated does an increase in supply necessitate a decrease in price and bring about a decrease in profitability.

As a result, the combination of price controls and shortages makes possible random movements of supply without any effect on price and profitability. In this situation, the production of the most trivial and unimportant goods, even pet rocks, can be expanded at the expense of the production of the most urgently needed and important goods, such as life-saving medicines, with no effect on the price or profitability of either good. Price controls would prevent the production of the medicines from becoming more profitable as their supply decreased, while a shortage even of pet rocks prevented their production from becoming less profitable as their supply increased.

Maybe the entire point of Ripple was to show bitcoin's superiority to the idea of "modernizing" the traditional money system.

Everybody thought I was exaggerating. "It's no problem - we'll talk to the regulators and do what it takes to become compliant like a good citizens and everything will be fine," they said.

I can't have said it better, really.

I'm aware that bitcoin development is quite peculiar and there's little to no margin for errors.
And this is the reason why I think it's important to start spreading Justus's idea in advance,
because as you rightly said we need a lot of time to get there. So the sooner we start the better.

That said I wonder what are the link you see between the price discovering mechanism sketched by Justus
and the Bitcoin consensus code? I see them as quite unrelated pieces of the system, but maybe I am missing
something obvious.

Far from it. Though I expect each can approach it on their chosen level and interpret it through familiar lens filters, however limiting and distorted that may prove to be.

Multiply that by 100M and pretty soon you're making real money.

I don't think we need the same security model for buying loaves of bread that we use for buying homes,.

Bitcoin is a meta-layer for settlement systems, let's keep the politically-driven social sciences, like "economics", out of it

As for bolting JustusNodes onto BTC, it ain't gonna happen.  Such a massive change to the existing social contract is correctly perceived as an attack and will be defended against from the high ground of antifragility.

In addition, 87 percent of citizens confirmed that during the next presidential term, they merely hope to occasionally read something about their country in the news that doesn’t leave them feeling ashamed, angry, depressed, or completely mortified.

“It’s pretty simple, really: Just lay out a clear-cut, straightforward plan for a future in which we don’t totally go down in flames on a grand stage, and you’ve got my vote,” said Allison Joyce, a 47-year-old middle school teacher from Bethesda, MD. “Look, I don’t need to be inspired; I don’t need to be assured our future is bright; I don’t need to be told I’m strong and resilient in the face of hardship. Just convince me we can get through the next decade in the least demeaning way possible given all our problems with childhood poverty, gun violence, and people dying because they can’t afford medical treatment. That’s it.”

“That’s seriously all I want from my president going forward,” she added. “Just the faintest of silver linings that I can hold on to while everything else goes down the drain.”

Though they admitted to reporters that no one in the current field of presidential hopefuls seems likely to spare the country much humiliation while its infrastructure crumbles and its reputation is reduced to tatters, most voters expressed optimism that such a candidate will eventually emerge.

“We know what’s in store for America, so if we could elect someone who’s committed to keeping things somewhat tolerable while the whole place goes to hell, that’d be great,” said Seattle-based tax attorney Greg Hudson, 57. “It’s really our best hope at this point. The British Empire kind of just gradually fell by the wayside without too much embarrassment. Maybe we can, too. Who knows, we might still be able to go out with a little bit of class.”

“Then again,” Hudson added, “maybe at this point the best option is to put someone in the White House who will just bite the bullet and get this whole thing over with as quickly as possible.”

Imagine two competing digital currencies: Bitcoin vs Andolfatto's version of FedCoin, identical except for the monetary policy part (Bitcoin is bitcoin and 1 Fedcoin = 1 USD).  Which would the free market choose?

then it seems that there is no need to hash the UTXO set into the current block.  we aren't doing that now and it works.

don't UTXO sets differ slightly just like the mempools unconfirmed tx's?

The government does not have all the guns.

The government is made up of people. These people can be litigated against and convicted just like any other people... if it is done the right way.

The law, the courts, and the whole foundation of government - Constitution - is set up so that PEOPLE can litigate against other people who do them wrong.

If a government person (say, police officer) does you wrong, who does the wrong? Is it the government, the office of the police officer, or the man who wears the uniform 8 hours a day? It is always the man, no matter whose orders he might be following. Litigate the man for the wrong he does against you.

Litigate him correctly, and you win his bond money in court, and more if the city is behind ordering him to do the wrong.

Of course Ross Ulbricht was framed by the FBI and others, even the whole justice system. But the biggest method that they framed him was to keep him thinking that they had a case against him. So, essentially, he framed himself.

In American law and courts, if Ross had simply fired his attorneys and:
1. Stood as a man in court, present, not representing himself and not being represented;
2. Wished, required and demanded that his accuser come forward, swear or affirm to tell the truth and take the stand so that Ross could cross examine him/her about whatever harm or damage Ross had done to him/her...

... nothing else would have mattered. Why not? Because the plaintiff must appear and get on the stand (if a person demands it man to man), and the plaintiff in Ross's case couldn't appear and get on the stand, because THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA (the plaintiff in this case) can't do anything... not swear to tell the truth, not take the stand, not answer questions... nothing, because the plaintiff is paperwork.

If Ross had done this, and had stood his ground and did this clearly under all circumstances, he could have been set free, and demanded his property - computer and bitcoins - be returned to him, and government would have had to do it.

In fact, Ross's time for sentencing is coming up. If he does this even at sentencing, he can get off scott free.

Listen here http://recordings.talkshoe.com/TC-39904/TS-963949.mp3 to see how things work (almost 4 hours audio).