Hmmmm... I see what you are saying, sorry for my prior misunderstanding amaclin

Of course! There are only 160 bits of public addresses space.

To understand with an extreme example: If there were only 2 bits of address space then only 4 possible public addresses, and of course no matter what hash func you apply to 256 bits, it would have to reduce down to 1 of those 4 public addresses. So in this example you could hash any random 256 bit privkey and ~ 1 in 4 times hit a winner.

=========================

So I stand corrected:

On average ~2^96 private keys will unlock any single address.  

The effective privkey space one needs to search is "only"  ~2^160 before you get a hit on average. Perhaps a few bits less due to collisions.

But it's not like we can just chop off 96 bits from privkey space before we search, valid privkeys will be scattered "randomly" throughout the 256 bit space.

=========================

And lets think of some ways to increase the chances of unlocking some coin:

One could check against the list of the richest 2^16 (64k) addresses, further reducing the number of hashes required to 144 bits.

With average luck you would hit jackpot when ~50% through search, so 1 bit less = 143 bits.

To try 2^143 hashes at 10TH/s ~=
35,357,599,566,417,147,294,418 Years.

Universe age ~=
13,798,000,000 years

So still very safe against logical brute force attack.

Fear is an analogue scale.

It's not like I fear the thought of death constantly. My fear level plotted against time has it's ups and downs, so does yours and every other living creature.

If you narrowly escaped a head on crash with a lorry you would ramp up to a high fear level, saying otherwise is nonsense.

Anyone that says they have no fear are just bullshitting to appear like they're "enlightened" or that they have big balls to get the girl.

Granted people have different tolerable fear thresholds.

I would say the opposite to you: if you have never experienced fear of death then you have never lived.


That's debatable, I myself have never come across any information that would settle me on a yes/no answer.

I am not afraid of what my or may not happen after death, just as I am not apprehensive about going to sleep, but not all deaths are short and sweet, some are bloody awful!

I remain agnostic.

yes, I corrected my above post.

but just to make clear:


no, the number of private keys that will unlock any given public address is MUCH less than 2^96

I don't know the average number, somebody probably does though?

The example in wikepedia concerns sampling raw qbits (like D-Wave does).

The factoring result was stated with X% certainty, where X was <50%, I can't remember the number.

The output was a gaussian spread over discreet bins after multiple runs, the highest bin being the result.

The trouble being that the act of sampling the qbit almost destroys all info, the quantum state being so fragile, many samples are needed to get a result over the noise floor.

However steps are being made toward a "logical qbit" and if it does as advertised then a 2^N number could be factored with one pass on a N qbit system, with 100% certainty.

I think John Martinis is the world leader in this field.

He gives a very nice presentation, covering QC 101 and also the very latest work (logical qbit) that he is doing, well worth a watch for anyone interested:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQmFEt6l6Tw

No, only a modest number >= 1 out of the 2^256 priv keys will map to any given public key address.

The fact that multiple will map is due to "collisions" in the hash func.

Death should scare you, that's fear is a gift given to you by evolution, helps you avoid getting killed.

I think the experience of a "good" death will be just going to sleep and that's it, lights out.

Of course peoples ego cant stand that (the end) and some prefer to think of a great after party, exclusive tickets only with a bouncer on the door.

Truth of the matter is that part of you does have an afterlife, your DNA, and it too will be judged in its next life (provided you breed). Really we should consider ourselves as a subset (that manifests physically) of our DNA information.

But a conscious "afterlife" might be possible by cloning the entire information state of a brain, real body then killed like star trek transporter. State could be stored or executed in sim environment or synthetic body. Will take alot of BTC and a good escrow.

haha 'tis true! Aliens would probably be able to pwn the blockchain using a smartphone equivalent.

hmmm... spaghetti, with nice sauce... heavenly!

Mitochondrial DNA evolution seems more complex than the OP article assumes:

http://www.trueorigin.org/mitochondrialeve01.asp

The beauty of nature and the universe is enough for me to not crave a "god", I mean think how wonderful it is that we are brim full of symbiants (mitochondria) that are tiny life forms in their own right. Really we ought to pray to them, without them we would have no cellular energy created. Those little critters manufacture our axiomatic "fuel" ATP, EVERYTHING in us runs on it.

Or if you want something bigger to pray to then we have SOL, our life enabling star.

Maybe you want bigger, then our galaxy centre might have something special in it for you.

Yes, I'm also very eager to hear about shipping for Batch1 GB people.

I realise @Marto must be VERY busy right now but it would be nice to know approx shipping date.

Enumeration is not needed in a quantum computer, as @doubleredrolex says, in an X qbit register, all 2^X bit states can occur at once in "superposition".

D-Wave has an array of raw qbits, but reading the state gives a very fuzzy statistical answer and the fuzziness scales with it, so the more complex the architecture, the more useless it becomes. The best you can do with such a system is reduce the problem space, but not nail down an answer, it is useless for hard spiky (logical) problem spaces.

However a "logical qbit" has a fully deterministic read/write.

A logical qbit is formed from a collection of raw qbits in an error correcting surface code topology:

http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1208/1208.0928.pdf

Large scale general purpose architectures and also application specific systems (quantum ASIC) could be made using logical qbits.

Interestingly (and somewhat off topic) similar error correcting code topologies have been found in string theory in the very fabric of our own reality:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1LCVknKUJ4

I have 12 surplus of these if any one wants to make a BTC or PayPal bid:

http://sumvision.com/?p=product&id=246

They also come with SATA to PCIE converter cables.

They are new in boxes but without mains power cords.

I am located in in europe.

apathy?

Without doubt it will trigger some users to move exchange.

How many, that's the question.

High frequency traders will be hit hardest.

Lower frequency traders will not mind as much.

Many traders prefer to hold account with the exchange rather than incurring constant deposit/withdrawal fees and hassle. And so they value exchange integrity highly.

If I had to chose an exchange to store coin/fiat in for an extended period I would still chose Kraken. Ver and Powell spare no expense with regard to security and public transparency. I believe it is the exchange which has the least chance of being "goxxed".

So from the perspective of a low to medium frequency trader who doesn't want to worry about their deposit security it still remains a strong choice in my opinion.

But twitch traders with a relatively modest account, will prefer other exchanges, offsetting the reduced security and transparency against the lower fees.

Not yet for me...

So we are led to believe.

But strategically it would make a lot of sense to convince everyone that a cold war has started, Russia against the West. Russia and West both developing nukes and other systems, the whole world saying (hoho they're gonna kill eachother if they fight).

But of course as a joined force (Russia & West) they would be formidable.

Interestingly the Ukraine is atop the Black Sea, beneath which lies the middle east. What a perfect ruse to amass a large force just north of the Black Sea.

Of course this is all crazy conjecture, but crazy will probably "win" the global game.

The end stages of the global game will probably involve much double crossing and such, a very chaotic and risky game if you ask me, unless of course your safely controlling the game from a deep underground bunker, then it's great fun! like a multiplayer computer game!(sarcasm).

Well that escalated quickly! (Backs away cautiosly)

Woohoo... I'm gonna make a faucet!

Some name ideas:

The dirty door knob.

The big sneeze.

Corpse licker.

Holy Water.

Religions are a very interesting subject for sure! They are memetic viruses, competing for survival, their growth medium being human consciousness.

Be careful your academic interest doesn't seed a mind virus, I've seen it happen to people I have considered objective and intelligent in the past.

The answers you need are simple:


A fictional character.


Chances are never, he/she being a fictional character.

When you realise that all religions are memetic viruses then you realise the form they take is due to evolution in the competition space.

The spread I think is very analogous to code war competition. Most times the endgame will be a winner takes all scenario, the winner being the sneakiest, most aggressive strain.

A loving caring religion would be crushed if it entered the global game, hence all religions that survive and grow in global game space will inevitably exhibit an "us against them" mentality leading to a "kill them" mentality, it is inevitable.

I'm always suprised that some people still believe this fiction.

It's as kooky as the kookiest babble you might hear in some mental asylum.

But the man in the sky lol, oh what trouble that causes. The trouble comes because an elected few always claim to have direct contact with "god" and they write instructions and books to coral the opinion and action of the "believers".

It's time we as a species started to take self responsibility, instead most kids grow into adults and still crave a "daddy" and or a "mummy", this takes the form of a leader of state (lame) or more likely a "god" (lamer).

Bitcoin and computer science has no room for "religion" and all the perverted thoughts it ecourages.

I realise most posters in this thread are only academically interested in the subject, not "believers", thank god