Meni Rosenfeld's vanity thread

[Meni Rosenfeld]

What this thread is about
This is a thread where I (and possibly others) talk about myself. Given my level of activity in this forum I believe creating such a thread is justified. It can serve a variety of purposes:

1. Informing people I have a business dealing with about my track record, reputation and commitment to Bitcoin.
2. Informing people who may seek my advice about my skills and experience.
3. Satisfying the curiosity of anyone who is interested in knowing more about me.
4. Posting updates about myself that could be relevant to people with a stake in my various projects.
5. Giving customers/partners a place to report any misconduct on my part (and, through lack of such reports, demonstrate my trustworthiness to those who would come here to look).

A bit about me, personally
I was born in 1984 in Haifa, Israel, and have since moved to Hadera and then to Tel Aviv. I served in the IDF as an artillery battalion's telecommunications platoon sergeant, and then proceeded to complete an M.Sc. in mathematics from the Weizmann Institute of Science, doing a machine learning thesis under the supervision of Boaz Nadler. After that (in 2009) I started working as the head of research of the internet startup SimilarWeb, a position from which I started to phase out once I've heard about Bitcoin.

Some of my online profiles include:
http://www.facebook.com/meni.rosenfeld
http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=99439111
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Meni_Rosenfeld
I am fairly selective about connecting on social networks, so most of my connections would be people I know in person and which could give a reference.

I first heard about Bitcoin in March 2011 from this LessWrong post talking about SIAI (now MIRI) accepting Bitcoin donations. I have since become increasingly more involved with it, and starting August 2011 I have focused entirely on Bitcoin endeavors.

Bitcoin, Israel and myself
My largest area of activity is with the promotion of Bitcoin in Israel. I currently serve as the chairman of the Israeli Bitcoin Association.

In April 2011 I have started a test run of Bitcoil (thread), a service for exchanging bitcoins for ILS in Israel, and it was officially launched in August 2011. For two years it has been the best method for people in Israel to buy or sell small to medium amounts of bitcoins, with many satisfied customers and demand reaching millions of ILS per month in early 2013. Unfortunately, the service is currently unavailable due to opposition by Israeli banks.

I am the founder and organizer of the Israel Bitcoin Meetup Group, hosting regular events almost weekly. These have evolved from 3 people meeting at a cafe to lecture-filled events with 180 attendees, as well as two full-blown conferences (one local and one international, and counting).

I am a co-founder and the main content contributor of the content site http://www.bitcoin.org.il/, and an admin of the Facebook page and IRC channel.

I have written Hebrew translations of bitcoin-qt and of Satoshi's whitepaper.

I'm giving talks and interviews to any interested parties, including Oracle, Payoneer, the Haifa Linux Club and the channel 10 program "Layla Calcali".

Mining pool reward methods
In March 2011 I have developed the geometric method, the first non-PPS hopping-proof reward method. It is the basis for the double geometric method (DGM) which I developed in August 2011. DGM greatly expands the range of options offered by the geometric method on the reward method triangle (making it practical to have low variance for both the miners and the pool operator), and currently enjoys some popularity with the mining pools.

In July 2011 I started working on the comprehensive guide to the subject, Analysis of Bitcoin Pooled Mining Reward Systems (thread), and finished in November 2011. I have also written a summary of the results.

GLBSE
Despite its many deficiencies, GLBSE was a very powerful platform while it lasted, and it is unfortunate what happened to it. I have made several issues on GLBSE:

PureMining: My first (and most successful) issue, and the first perpetual deterministic mining bond. The idea was devised when I was looking for a way to harness economies of scale in purchasing BFL FPGA equipment, and followed the issues that could arise to their logical conclusion. While many are still confused about the concept, I believe and hope it marks the way for how most mining investments and hedging will work in the future.

A total of 15566 bonds worth 1 MH/s each we issued. After the GLBSE shutdown, payment has proceeded for a while with a static list, until I bought the bonds back according to their contract.

Anti-Pirate: At a time when pirateat40's Bitcoin Savings and Trust was gaining popularity, and a rising trend was pass-throughs for investment, I offered the opposite - a way to short his operation. It was a perpetual asset designed so that the profit from it is exactly (up to fee and time value of money) the negative of an equivalent investment with Pirate, so that if one believed investment in Pirate is lossy, investment in Anti-Pirate would be profitable. For whatever reason, not a single bond was bought.

ABSORB: After Bitcoinica shut down, I and others were looking for a way to control our BTC position. ABSORB was an attempt to use GLBSE's trading functionality to emulate BTC/USD margin trading. It worked as a prediction market for which of two exchange rates, high and low, would be achieved first. This allowed placing a leveraged bet on increase or decrease of the exchange rate, with a calculable equivalent effect on the position. The first (and only) series was concluded with a 400 BTC payout.

POLY: An improved attempt to emulate margin trading, POLY worked by having a face value calculated as a power function of the current BTC/USD exchange rate. It allowed easier control of the position with a persistent asset. The bonds were eventually bought back for a total of 560 BTC.

The ugly
Through life’s bad times we appreciate the good.

I unfortunately agreed to help one Alberto Armandi to raise funds for Bitdaytrade, a margin trading platform he was working on, through the BDT bonds on GLBSE. It didn't work out so well. The story is not over yet, but due to either malice or incompetence of Alberto, he now has a debt of about 10K BTC which he seems unable or unwilling to repay.

I have learnt important lessons from the experience about both human nature and my own limitations.

Miscellaneous
I devised one proposal for a Proof of Stake system, and led the effort to get DOSBox to accept Bitcoin donations. I am now collaborating in the development of colored coins, and I have helped Adi Shamir with his research on the Bitcoin transaction graph. I have written an analysis of hashrate-based double-spending.

In my blog http://fieryspinningsword.com/ I write about a variety of things, mostly related directly or indirectly to Bitcoin.

People from the forum I've met
If you've been to any of the conferences in New York (2011), Prague (2011), London (2012), San Jose (2013), Amsterdam (2013) or Amsterdam (May 2014), you probably saw me.

In particular I recall talking with bearbones, jared@bitmunchies, MemoryDealers, matsh, btcx, Bruce Wagner, BitPay Business Solutions, Steve, jed, Stefan Thomas, Littleshop, nanotube, Jered Kenna (TradeHill), Gavin Andresen, coblee; FreeTrade, worldly, Pieter Wuille, slush, molecular, genjix, lonelyminer (Peter Šurda), Goonie; Inaba, ribuck, garyrowe, Vladimir, Mihai Alisie, Vandroiy, Nefario, jgarzik, jim618, mintymark, shtylman, Mike Hearn, Andrew Miller, kangasbros; aantonop, evoorhees, Yago, retep, etotheipi, enmaku, Yankee (BitInstant), maaku, JoelKatz, eMansipater, edd, Luke-Jr, gmaxwell, Rassah, crazy_rabbit, fellowtraveler, casascius; gigavps, adam3us and Vitalik Buterin.

Additionally, I have met in Israel ripper234, iddo, eyal, Andrew Vorobyov, Eli, gilgil, yoniassia, WiW and yona.

Bitcoin online communities
I am very active in the Bitcoin forum; my post count is evidence of that, but by itself it shows no indication of the quality of the posts. My posts can be sampled by picking pages randomly and reading the first post in each. (Reading through the posts in one page is not a proper sampling method; I could be having a good or bad day.)

I also have accounts on bitcoin.stackexchange, the Bitcoin wiki and the bitcoin-otc WoT.

Some of the threads I've started on the forum are:

Pledge for DOSBox donations (96 BTC sent)
Geometric method: New cheat-proof mining pool scoring method
A short note about variance and pool payouts
Bitcoil - Exchange bitcoins for ILS
Do we want oblivious mining pool shares?
Mining pool reward math FAQ
NodeBank - Concept for a p2p banking network
Analysis of Bitcoin Pooled Mining Reward Systems
Double geometric method: Hopping-proof, low-variance reward system
PPLNS
Israel Bitcoin Meetup Group
Using mixing transactions to improve anonymity
The mining pool reward method triangle
Outsourcing vanity address generation
[GLBSE] PureMining: Infinite-term, deterministic mining bond
Introduction to Bitcoin - from bitcoin.org.il
Israel Bitcoin community homepage
Bitcoin-qt unwanted translations
[GLBSE] (discontinued) Anti-Pirate: Bonds for negative BTCST investments
Mine in multiple pools to reduce variance
[IDEA] Casascius physical Bitrings
I've finally figured out BFL's name and logo
Why you should care about miners
Dynamic block frequency
Rollover transaction fees
Output upkeep costs
[GLBSE] ABSORB - Emulating BTC/USD margin trading
[WTB] [FILLED] 1000 BTC Contract for difference (I'm taking the short position)
[GLBSE] POLY - Persistent BTC/USD margin trading emulation
Trustless, instant, off-the-chain Bitcoin payments
[GLBSE] BDT - 3% weekly interest bond, backed by Bitdaytrade
Bitcoin icon on TV (City of London)
Unofficial attendance list - Bitcoin London 2012
Unofficial Bitdaytrade deposit claims thread
How to determine common ownership of addresses? (Inspired by Shamir's paper)
How to determine dormant coins? (Inspired by Shamir's paper)
Short presentation about Bitcoin (technical focus)
Salient block countdown timer
How to detect the change output?
The Jewish holidays thread
Analysis of hashrate-based double-spending
Getting Wikipedia to accept Bitcoin donations - Community pledge
Some presentations about Bitcoin
Multi-PPS
Meni's Blog - Fiery Spinning Sword
Bitcoin Israel Think Tank
Bitcoin in Israeli prime time TV - "The Magazine", November 2013
Israel Bitcoin Conference October 19-20, 2014
Crypto for the Masses - Israeli Bitcoin documentary film
O Bitcoinis - That's the first line of a poem I've written

Political views
I am not a libertarian, and I find many of the views expressed by people in the Bitcoin community to range from silly to appalling.

A few words about trust
One goal of this thread is to carry across the idea that I stake my real identity on everything that I do; I only have one of those and thus my reputation is of the utmost importance to me. This doesn't mean that I will now start asking to be trusted with large sums of money, or that you should comply if I do. The trick which allowed me to honor every obligation I've made is that I never promised more than I am able to keep. When taking new liabilities one needs to understand the risks of what he is offering and limit his exposure to allow a wide margin of error, even at the cost of missed profit opportunities; and counterparties need to make sure the person is so diligent. Personally I don't intend to enter liabilities of more than a few thousand BTC any time soon, and even that only if it is for a very good reason.

Edit: Oh, the good times when the thought of thousands of BTC in liabilities was on the table

I do however now have faithfully completed obligations up to the $700K range on my track record, and the reputation I've built in ~3 years is worth at least that.

Assets and liabilities
A complete breakdown of assets is more personal than I am comfortable sharing at this point. I will simply state that I currently have no liabilities.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

Links to negative feedback:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=121314.msg1324789#msg1324789

[Meni Rosenfeld]

(reserved)

[Meni Rosenfeld]

On Nov 4-8 2012 I will be in miluim (military reserve duty) for the annual battalion exercise. I will likely not have internet access through that time; this means Bitcoil will be unavailable and that I will be making no further progress in resolving the GLBSE situation.

[ripper234]

Plus, I just want to say, I think this thread and Meni are very positives examples in the BTC community.

I've known Meni for about 18 months now, had several dealings with him, and he's always been honest, transparent, and a man of his word (in my Trust Building List he has WD, RL, ID, and FT 'badges').

[augustocroppo]

Political views
I am not a libertarian, and I find many of the views expressed by people in the Bitcoin community to range from silly to appalling.

What is your political view regarding the diplomatic relations of Israel with Iran and Palestine?

Are you religious or atheist?

What are your origins? Your parents or grandparents migrated to Israel after Second World War or they were already established on the region when the state of Israel was formed?

[Meni Rosenfeld]

What is your political view regarding the diplomatic relations of Israel with Iran and Palestine?

I don't have an opinion on this issue.

Are you religious or atheist?

I am mostly secular with some religious inclination.

What are your origins? Your parents or grandparents migrated to Israel after Second World War or they were already established on the region when the state of Israel was formed?

My parents both migrated from Romania around 1950 when they were young children.

[iCEBREAKER]

Impressive resume!  Glad to have you aboard.

What did/would you say when approached by recruiters from Moss@d?

[Meni Rosenfeld]

What did/would you say when approached by recruiters from Moss@d?

Never heard of it and am unable to find any information on it.

[MPOE-PR]

Plus, I just want to say, I think this thread and Meni are very positives examples in the BTC community.

I've known Meni for about 18 months now, had several dealings with him, and he's always been honest, transparent, and a man of his word (in my Trust Building List he has WD, RL, ID, and FT 'badges').

Alternatively, Meni Rosenfeld is a fuckwit who does fuckwitty things such as "unofficial claim threads" in an attempt to sorta distance himself from scams he pushed but doesn't want to pay for (studiously not mentioned here, obviously) and "vanity threads" which are about as devoid of content as the average livejournal.

Speaking of which, why don't you just start a tumblr or something, Rosenfuckwit?

Or at least add some dubious poetry.

[coga]

Alternatively, Meni Rosenfeld is a fuckwit who does fuckwitty things such as "unofficial claim threads" in an attempt to sorta distance himself from scams he pushed but doesn't want to pay for (studiously not mentioned here, obviously) and "vanity threads" which are about as devoid of content as the average livejournal.

Speaking of which, why don't you just start a tumblr or something, Rosenfuckwit?

Or at least add some dubious poetry.

I have to say, I also found idea of "lets talk about me" thread amusing 

[Meni Rosenfeld]

such as "unofficial claim threads" in an attempt to sorta distance himself from scams he pushed but doesn't want to pay for

Your criticism of that thread didn't make sense the first time around either.

(studiously not mentioned here, obviously)

The Bitdaytrade story was mentioned.

As for the claims thread, I asked theymos for a list of threads I had created on September 24. I stashed that list and then built the list of threads mentioned here based on it, removing threads which seemed irrelevant and adding later threads that I recalled. Since the BDT claims thread was started later than that, it was not in theymos' list and it seems highly likely I simply did not recall it at the time. Another possibility is that I recalled it but didn't consider it worth a mention. In either case, for your satisfaction and as a testament to my commitment to try to resolve the BDT issue, I added this thread to the list.

Speaking of which, why don't you just start a tumblr or something, Rosenfuckwit?

There are many platforms that can (and may) be used to provide information about myself. But the target audience of this particular writeup (and discussion) is members of the Bitcoin forum, and it's mostly about my activity with Bitcoin in general and in this forum in particular. Also since I spend so much time on this forum I feel more comfortable with its format than with some other platforms. As such it makes sense to have this as a thread on the forum.


Consider yourself fed. Now please go away.

I have to say, I also found idea of "lets talk about me" thread amusing  

Then I don't think you understood the idea. Think of it as an adaptation of the user page/talk page we have on Wikipedia with an emphasis on criticism on the services that I provide.

E.g., you've just started a thread with positive feedback about Mtgox. If anyone wanted to provide positive or negative feedback about my services, I believe a dedicated thread is better than a new thread for each instance (and since my services are backed with a personal guarantee rather than shielded with a corporate entity, a personal thread is appropriate).

This thread is also a statement that I think more people should have such threads.

That said this is a forum thread open to discussion like any other, and I guess discussion on whether such threads are useful is on-topic so we can further debate this.

[augustocroppo]

What is your political view regarding the diplomatic relations of Israel with Iran and Palestine?

I don't have an opinion on this issue.

You are part of military Israel forces but you do not have an opinion regarding Israel's enemy states? That does not sound reasonable. You have an opinion as everyone else, but I guess you do not want to disclose it.

Are you religious or atheist?

I am mostly secular with some religious inclination.

You are or you not are. There is no middle point between theism and atheism.

[casascius]

You are or you not are. There is no middle point between theism and atheism.

Yes there is, agnosticism is very popular and definitely sits between the two.

[Meni Rosenfeld]

You are part of military Israel forces but you do not have an opinion regarding Israel's enemy states? That does not sound reasonable.

I don't see the connection.

You have an opinion as everyone else, but I guess you do not want to disclose it.

For some things I have sufficient qualification and interest to form an opinion. For others, not. What you asked about is of some importance but also sufficiently complex that any attempt to opinionate for the sake of opinionating will be almost pure noise.

Are you religious or atheist?

I am mostly secular with some religious inclination.

You are or you not are. There is no middle point between theism and atheism.

This is not how it works.


I see no point continuing this line of inquiry as it has devolved into trying to tell me what I think.

[augustocroppo]

I don't see the connection.

For some things I have sufficient qualification and interest to form an opinion. For others, not. What you asked about is of some importance but also sufficiently complex that any attempt to opinionate for the sake of opinionating will be almost pure noise.

I asked for your opinion regarding your political views. Everyone able to express it thoughts are qualified to form and to present an opinion. Your refusal to present yours only shows that you are not willing to reveal certain aspects of your character in this forum.

This is not how it works.

I see no point continuing this line of inquiry as it has devolved into trying to tell me what I think.

It was your decision to step up in the stage of the public scrutiny when you started this thread. You assumed the position of being questioned and now you are afraid to answer the questions. I am not trying to dictate how you should think.

Anyway, I am satisfied with the answers and I will respect your right to remain in silence.

[Herodes]

I unfortunately agreed to help one Alberto Armandi to raise funds for Bitdaytrade, a margin trading platform he was working on, through the BDT bonds on GLBSE. It didn't work out so well. The story is not over yet, but due to either malice or incompetence of Alberto, he now has a debt of about 10K BTC which he seems unable or unwilling to repay.

I wonder why anyone would need 10K BTC to make a website ? That's more money than most visitors with full time jobs on this forum make in one year. Any site that requires some amount of work could take considerable time to make, but I think this was a little bit too much..

[Meni Rosenfeld]

I asked for your opinion regarding your political views. Everyone able to express it thoughts are qualified to form and to present an opinion.

No, not everyone are qualified to express opinions on everything. Politics is one area where this observation is often forgotten. See http://paulgraham.com/identity.html and the somewhat related http://lesswrong.com/lw/gw/politics_is_the_mindkiller/.

Your refusal to present yours only shows that you are not willing to reveal certain aspects of your character in this forum.

On the contrary, if you didn't choose to disregard my response you'd see it reveals quite a bit about my character. I am not interested in politics. I don't read/watch the news. When people start a heated argument about the latest politics thingy I don't have my own piece of mind I make sure everyone knows, I sit it out hoping the conversation will shift to something I can contribute to. As far as your specific question "regarding the diplomatic relations of Israel with Iran and Palestine", I have very little factual knowledge, not enough to verbally express an opinion, let alone one that is robust to new knowledge. I can't recall much of what I knew or thought because this is not meaningful enough for me to be encoded in memory. Contrary to what you seem to think, the response in my mind to your question wasn't "I believe that X Y Z! But I'm not telling." It's more like reaching into my mind to find something relevant to say and getting only a blank.

Sure, if I wanted I guess I could read up on some history and recent developments, analyze the facts and figure out what I think of them. But I have no interest in doing that.

Maybe if you asked some leading questions this would become an aided recall task which is easier.

It was your decision to step up in the stage of the public scrutiny when you started this thread. You assumed the position of being questioned and now you are afraid to answer the questions.

I have answered your questions to the best of my ability, you are the one who chose to assume I am hiding something. If you want a more detailed response ask a more focused question.

I am not trying to dictate how you should think.

Read again. You are not dictating how I should think, you are saying what I think, e.g. "You have an opinion as everyone else", "You are or you not are."

You are or you not are. There is no middle point between theism and atheism.

Religion is about more than a given set of beliefs, there is a strong cultural component. One may respect and be attracted to the culture and tradition regardless of the truth value of the associated beliefs.

If beliefs are all that you are interested in, it is rarely a good idea to be absolutely certain in something of any complexity. A Bayesian assigns a subjective probability p to the truth of any statement. If the statement is "the beliefs associated with religion X are generally true", then theism would be p~1, atheism would be p~0, and any 0<p<1 would be a middle point between theism and atheism.

As for me, I don't find the beliefs underlying Judaism to be likely true, but I don't rule out the possibility.

I unfortunately agreed to help one Alberto Armandi to raise funds for Bitdaytrade, a margin trading platform he was working on, through the BDT bonds on GLBSE. It didn't work out so well. The story is not over yet, but due to either malice or incompetence of Alberto, he now has a debt of about 10K BTC which he seems unable or unwilling to repay.

I wonder why anyone would need 10K BTC to make a website ? That's more money than most visitors with full time jobs on this forum make in one year. Any site that requires some amount of work could take considerable time to make, but I think this was a little bit too much..

It was not supposed to be "a site". It was supposed to be a trading platform which needs reserves to be able to hedge its position. The BDT bonds thread detailed some other planned expenses. I actually think $70K (what it was worth at the time) is too little to do such a service properly. It was still much more than should have been trusted with someone without more solid credentials, though.

[augustocroppo]

No, not everyone are qualified to express opinions on everything. Politics is one area where this observation is often forgotten. See http://paulgraham.com/identity.html and the somewhat related http://lesswrong.com/lw/gw/politics_is_the_mindkiller/.

I beg your pardon, but your argument does not dismiss the fact that every person able to rationally expose his/her thoughts is entitled to offer a political view independent of his/her qualifications:

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-politics/

Before attempting to distinguish and evaluate various constitutions Aristotle considers two questions. First, why does a city-state come into being? He recalls the thesis, defended in Politics I.2, that human beings are by nature political animals, who naturally want to live together. For a further discussion of this topic, see the following supplementary document:

On the contrary, if you didn't choose to disregard my response you'd see it reveals quite a bit about my character. I am not interested in politics. I don't read/watch the news. When people start a heated argument about the latest politics thingy I don't have my own piece of mind I make sure everyone knows, I sit it out hoping the conversation will shift to something I can contribute to. As far as your specific question "regarding the diplomatic relations of Israel with Iran and Palestine", I have very little factual knowledge, not enough to verbally express an opinion, let alone one that is robust to new knowledge. I can't recall much of what I knew or thought because this is not meaningful enough for me to be encoded in memory. Contrary to what you seem to think, the response in my mind to your question wasn't "I believe that X Y Z! But I'm not telling." It's more like reaching into my mind to find something relevant to say and getting only a blank.

Then you are expressing your political view. Lack of interest in politics does not make you unqualified to express your political views. Your willingness to shift the conversation to another subject indicates that you are trying to expose your political thoughts, but in a manner which you judge more consistent to contribute.

I did not disregard your answer. The poor response you provided did not demonstrated your political view. I only noted that you were not expressing what are your thoughts in regard with the question I made.

Sure, if I wanted I guess I could read up on some history and recent developments, analyze the facts and figure out what I think of them. But I have no interest in doing that.

Maybe if you asked some leading questions this would become an aided recall task which is easier.

I have answered your questions to the best of my ability, you are the one who chose to assume I am hiding something. If you want a more detailed response ask a more focused question.

I am sorry for the lack of precision. I was indeed harsh with the questions and I offer my apologies.

Read again. You are not dictating how I should think, you are saying what I think, e.g. "You have an opinion as everyone else", "You are or you not are."

I agree. I indeed said what you think and I am correct. You have an opinion and you expressed very well in the above quotes.

Religion is about more than a given set of beliefs, there is a strong cultural component. One may respect and be attracted to the culture and tradition regardless of the truth value of the associated beliefs.

If beliefs are all that you are interested in, it is rarely a good idea to be absolutely certain in something of any complexity. A Bayesian assigns a subjective probability p to the truth of any statement. If the statement is "the beliefs associated with religion X are generally true", then theism would be p~1, atheism would be p~0, and any 0<p<1 would be a middle point between theism and atheism.

As for me, I don't find the beliefs underlying Judaism to be likely true, but I don't rule out the possibility.

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/theism?q=theism

Definition of theism
noun
[mass noun]
belief in the existence of a god or gods, specifically of a creator who intervenes in the universe.

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/atheism?q=atheism

Definition of atheism
noun
[mass noun]
disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.

If you do not rule out the possibility (p), then you believe (b) that a divine entity exist (1), even if you do not know how to prove the existence of what you perceive:

1 ∈ p ∉ 0

Therefore you are a theist:

p ∈ b ∴ 1 ∃ b

[Meni Rosenfeld]

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/theism?q=theism
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/atheism?q=atheism

I know the dictionary definitions and explicitly addressed the case that you are sticking to them. But the words have connotations beyond the dictionary definitions.

If you do not rule out the possibility (p), then you believe (b) that a divine entity exist (1), even if you do not know how to prove the existence of what you perceive:

1 ∈ p ∉ 0

Therefore you are a theist:

p ∈ b ∴ 1 ∃ b

I don't understand your argument or its notation. "Believing that X could be true" is not the same as "Believing that X is true and not knowing how to prove it".

Which goes back to Graham's point - you seem to be wanting me to "pick a side" instead of treating it like any other statement that one can be uncertain about.