The Ethereum Paradox

[TPTB_need_war]

The system must have some means of converging on a consensus choice amongst competing double-spends.

Your thread is a discussion about that. We don't need to repeat that discussion here.

Eventual total ordering.

In the meantime, payers need to know where to place their transactions in the DAG so the transactions don't become eventually invalid. And payees need to know NOW which transactions to honor. Please quote my reply and post your reply in your thread, not in this thread.

I copied this post to your thread. Please continue to there. Please.

[TPTB_need_war]

Apparently programmable block chains will be useful for decentralized financial and business logic, such as for example decentralized crowdfunding and Augur-like decentralized prediction markets.

The key is to understand that such scripts when enforced by the block chain are able to enforce invariants which an external scripting (CounterParty?) of an asset and data storage block chain (e.g. Bitcoin) could not enforce. An example of such an invariant is not releasing the crowdfunds until X percent of the funders have agreed that the necessary milestone has been achieved. It seems in most cases the utility of scripting will involve some crowdsourced decision as opposed to the authoritative judges society uses now.

There are two main points I want to make about the future of scriptable block chains.

1. The currency they use will end up being which every crypto currency is the most popular. Arguing that Bitcoin doesn't qualify because it lacks certains features (e.g. fast transactions) is arguing the Bitcoin won't be the most popular crypto currency. Thus I think it is unlikely ETH will be that currency, because another crypto currency will become more popular sooner.

2. The consensus network (block chain) design will be the most crucial feature for a scriptable block chain. The VM and all that is mostly just noise and experimentation will eventually settle on what is the most efficient. Whereas the consensus design will determine which system wins this technology space.

Ukraine plans to trial an Ethereum Blockchain-based election platform. I hate to gloat, but maybe Ethereum isn't the useless shitcoin that people here have been calling it?

The issue is not the concept of scriptable block chains, but rather Ethereum's piss poor, overly hyped plans for implementing a consensus algorithm.

You speculators need to learn the distinction.

[Come-from-Beyond]

which I assert the control of must be centralized in order to not diverge.

BTW, do you know that the money is impossible in a completely decentralized world? Because a monetary system can exist only within boundaries of an economic cluster which implies a non-zero level of centralization around the core.

[TPTB_need_war]

That's the dichotomy at hand

There is no dichotomy in the case of strict partitions for asset transfers. I will not repeat myself again.

Then, lets agree to disagree.

Afaics, my point was unarguable. I already explained why. Strict partitions can coexist in a block with other transactions without causing the block to be invalid. The block becomes orthogonal to whether any of the partitions in it are valid or not. The key point is that the partition for which the block producer is guaranteeing is valid (i.e. has validated) has to be truth, else that block producer will lose his block reward if another subsequent block offers a proof-of-cheating on that partition. You can think of these proofs as equivalent to not mining on that chain in Bitcoin where Bitcoin has only one partition. Subsequent blocks can correct any deficiencies with proof-of-cheating, thus any cascade of lies is contained within the partition and can be corrected at any time by any proof-of-cheating. Same as for Bitcoin, the users of the currency have to trust full nodes but they should only trust a confirmation which was betting its block reward on that partition the user is relying on.

So in effect what this does is interleave a merge mining of separate "chains" into one block chain, one "chain" for each partition.

You made the assumption that the only way for block producers to veto a lie, is to not mine on the chain that contains the lie. But as you see, there are more flexible possibilities for a design.

I don't know if it is also very useful, yet it does stand as an exception to your desire to pigeon-hole the analysis. I try to have a flexible mind and consider all possible angles.

[TPTB_need_war]

which I assert the control of must be centralized in order to not diverge.

BTW, do you know that the money is impossible in a completely decentralized world? Because a monetary system can exist only within boundaries of an economic cluster which implies a non-zero level of centralization around the core.

What I am driving at is that the economics of consensus MUST be centralized due to economies-of-scale which drive the power-law distribution of wealth.

Yet I am asserting (and designing) that it may be possible to decentralize control over the centralized aspects of consensus, by making the decentralized control UNeconomic for profit (yet economic for purpose, e.g. the Nash equilibrium of getting your transactions on the longest chain).

I am thinking Satoshi's PoW, the PoS systems I have seen, and Iota conflate the two issues above such that the control becomes centralized along with the other aspects which are forced to be centralized by the economics of profit.

In other words, I am stratifying economics into profitable activities and purposeful activities. Pure profit will always be won by those with the highest economies-of-scale (and the most corrupt connections).

[monsterer]

The block becomes orthogonal to whether any of the partitions in it are valid or not. The key point is that the partition for which the block producer is guaranteeing is valid (i.e. has validated) has to be truth, else that block producer will lose his block reward if another subsequent block offers a proof-of-cheating on that partition.

Can you rephrase that statement? I'm having trouble parsing it; it sounds like you are saying opposite things one after the other.

[TPTB_need_war]

The block becomes orthogonal to whether any of the partitions in it are valid or not. The key point is that the partition for which the block producer is guaranteeing is valid (i.e. has validated) has to be truth, else that block producer will lose his block reward if another subsequent block offers a proof-of-cheating on that partition.

Can you rephrase that statement? I'm having trouble parsing it; it sounds like you are saying opposite things one after the other.

The block producer makes sure his partition (the one he is validating) is valid. Thus he will never lose his block rewards. He marks the block as only guaranteeing the partition(s) he has validated, so any other partitions included are informational but not Nash equilibrium confirmations. Re-read my prior post with that in mind. Again this is only valid for strict partitions (no cross-partition) transactions system.

The partitions can be thought of as separate block chains, that have been interleaved into one block chain with orthogonality between them. It is a more granular generalization of merge mining, because each block producer can choose which partition(s) he is validating and risking his block reward on in terms of the Nash equilibrium. Since all partitions eventually get confirmed by a block producer, then the overall Nash equilibrium is sustained on the coin's external market value.

[monsterer]

The block producer makes sure his partition (the one he is validating) is valid. Thus he will never lose his block rewards. He marks the block as only guaranteeing the partition(s) he has validated, so any other partitions included are informational but not Nash equilibrium confirmations. Re-read my prior post with that in mind. Again this is only valid for strict partitions (no cross-partition) transactions system.

I think my point still applies. What is his incentive to include more than the single partition he is validating in his blocks?

[TPTB_need_war]

The block producer makes sure his partition (the one he is validating) is valid. Thus he will never lose his block rewards. He marks the block as only guaranteeing the partition(s) he has validated, so any other partitions included are informational but not Nash equilibrium confirmations. Re-read my prior post with that in mind. Again this is only valid for strict partitions (no cross-partition) transactions system.

I think my point still applies. What is his incentive to include more than the single partition he is validating in his blocks?

He has to implicitly (whether or not he includes the latest update to that other unvalidated partition) when he builds his block at the end of the chain that includes that other unvalidated partition. Longest chain wins so he won't want to ignore that last block. His block reward doesn't hinge on whether that latest (before the current or new) block contained a valid partition (assuming it is not the partition the current or new block is declaring to be valid).

Convoluted to write, but not convoluted in my mind. Seems quite simple. Some of the convoluted stuff on the 140+ IQ level of a Raven's matrices IQ test is more convoluted.

Edit: think of it as multiplexing while maintaining a holistic Nash equilibrium.

[monsterer]

He has to implicitly (whether or not he includes the latest update to that other unvalidated partition) when he builds his block at the end of the chain that includes that other unvalidated partition. Longest chain wins so he won't want to ignore that last block.

By building on top of another partition's block, he increases the risk that his block will be orphaned because he cannot tell if it contains a double spend. For him it is better not to build on the best block at all, but to maintain his own partitioned chain of blocks.

[TPTB_need_war]

He has to implicitly (whether or not he includes the latest update to that other unvalidated partition) when he builds his block at the end of the chain that includes that other unvalidated partition. Longest chain wins so he won't want to ignore that last block.

By building on top of another partition's block, he increases the risk that his block will be orphaned because he has cannot tell if it contains a double spend. For him it is better not to build on the best block at all, but to maintain his own partitioned chain of blocks.

The partitions are strictly independent. Remember that.

Okay monsterer really. I must end this now. I am 100% certain my point is unarguable.

[monsterer]

He has to implicitly (whether or not he includes the latest update to that other unvalidated partition) when he builds his block at the end of the chain that includes that other unvalidated partition. Longest chain wins so he won't want to ignore that last block.

By building on top of another partition's block, he increases the risk that his block will be orphaned because he has cannot tell if it contains a double spend. For him it is better not to build on the best block at all, but to maintain his own partitioned chain of blocks.

The partitions are strictly independent. Remember that.

Okay monsterer really. I must end this now. I am 100% certain my point is unarguable.

They are not independent when you combine them like that with the LCR rule. You must see that? Every block that partition A builds on top of partition B's block is essentially a merger of partitions A and B.

[tromp]

The partitions are strictly independent. Remember that.

Okay monsterer really. I must end this now. I am 100% certain my point is unarguable.

They are not independent when you combine them like that with the LCR rule. You must see that? Every block that partition A builds on top of partition B's block is essentially a merger of partitions A and B.

Make sure you are agreeing on the exact definition of a partition...

[TPTB_need_war]

He has to implicitly (whether or not he includes the latest update to that other unvalidated partition) when he builds his block at the end of the chain that includes that other unvalidated partition. Longest chain wins so he won't want to ignore that last block.

By building on top of another partition's block, he increases the risk that his block will be orphaned because he has cannot tell if it contains a double spend. For him it is better not to build on the best block at all, but to maintain his own partitioned chain of blocks.

The partitions are strictly independent. Remember that.

Okay monsterer really. I must end this now. I am 100% certain my point is unarguable.

They are not independent when you combine them like that with the LCR rule. You must see that? Every block that partition A builds on top of partition B's block is essentially a merger of partitions A and B.

Sigh.  

Independent partitions are not merged. The holistic Nash equilibrium (of the LCR) was explained.  

monsterer can rescue his ego (and fill the thread with endless noise about his inability to connect the dots 3 pages ago) because many (most or all) readers are just as incapable as he is, so many will doubt what I wrote. Nevertheless my point was unarguable, but it isn't worth arguing to those are incapable.

monsterer can reply with some more nonsense. I am done arguing with him. Not because I lost, but because his ego desires a filibuster.

Make sure you are agreeing on the exact definition of a partition...

They aren't merged for the transactions nor for the Nash equilibrium of the blocks. There is no possible definition of strict(ly independent) partition for asset transfer that can support his position.

[TPTB_need_war]

Even if someone argued against my upthread point that strict partitions can't exist for scriptable block chains wherein I claimed this is due to uncontrolled external chaos due to external I/O, there is another unarguable reason that strict partitions can't exist for a scriptable block chain. That is because the gas (currency) transfers must be atomic with the script block confirmation (i.e. if they are orphaned and chain reorganized then they must be done together) so they must be in the same partition. But if the currency for a partition is a static set of UXTO or account balances (i.e. no cross-partition spending), then the system can not function properly.

Yet we also explained above (and even monsterer agrees on this point fwiw) that cross-partition spending breaks the Nash equilibrium.

Thus I continue to maintain my point that Ethereum can not scale with decentralized validation.

[monsterer]

That is because the gas (currency) transfers must be atomic with the script block confirmation

As I understand it, gas is paid within the script activating transaction.

Yet we also explained above (and even monsterer agrees on this point fwiw) that cross-partition spending breaks the Nash equilibrium.

You're putting words into my mouth there - I agree that there is a disincentive to merge partitions yet partition merger is essential for consensus; that is the basic problem facing all trustless p2p currencies and is particularly acute when there is no mining incentive.

[TPTB_need_war]

That is because the gas (currency) transfers must be atomic with the script block confirmation

As I understand it, gas is paid within the script activating transaction.

You didn't understand.

Yet we also explained above (and even monsterer agrees on this point fwiw) that cross-partition spending breaks the Nash equilibrium.

You're putting words into my mouth there - I agree that there is a disincentive to merge partitions yet partition merger is essential for consensus; that is the basic problem facing all trustless p2p currencies and is particularly acute when there is no mining incentive.

Obviously from the context of our discussion, I meant in the context of a block chain that allows multiple partitions to persist in the longest chain. In that case, you have agreed. Of course with Bitcoin's LCR, only one partition sustains within the LCR, so obviously I didn't mean that since the Nash equilibrium isn't broken for Bitcoin.

monsterer all I can say to you is sigh. You sure know how to fill up a thread with needless discourse.

[TPTB_need_war]

Btw, the way valiron handled the first few people who trolled him in this thread is probably indicative of the way I should handle monsterer, but what was more shocking is how gmaxwell and his gang railroaded valiron and even apparently deleted Come-from-Beyond's post wherein CfB had linked to this white paper just today:

http://rakeshk.crhc.illinois.edu/dac_16_cam.pdf

What is incredible is to see gmaxwel (and the other huge egos over there in Bitcoin Technical Discussion) have his arrogant, totalitarian ass (their arses) handed to him (them) by valiron (who is apparently a PhD level researcher) and so what does Gmaxwell do? Today when CfB posts, he locks the thread and does his usual Hitler tactics.

Fucking amazing.

I will do my damn best to make the Bitcoin killer and dethrone Blockstream. I hope you all have noticed that Blockstream's Segregated Witness proposal is a Trojan Horse takeover of Bitcoin.

[sandiman]

Ethereum is a system of redundantly executed code, a general purpose CPU mirroring the functionality of the worlds most inefficient botnet without parallelization.  Unless blockchain scaling is either huge or infinite, the validation and redundancy of simple transactional data, which Bitcoin attempted to solve in a distributed manner, is far more useful in a cost benefit analysis rather than open ended computational redundancy.  In other words, Bitcoin is an ASIC for a specific purpose, and struggles to fulfill that role even with a streamlined design.  Ethereum, on the other hand, has introduced an objectively less efficient design to try and conquer even more problems.

Such a design would obviously be dead on arrival out of the gate barring any other factors being introduced.  This is where partitioning comes in.  A partitioned network allows load to be split in order to scale further.  Here comes the paradox.  If the entire purpose of Ethereum is a system of redundantly executed code, how does partitioning even fit in the picture in the first place?  I guess you can say, ok, we're arbitrarily defining how much redundancy is enough, but how do you actually determine that?

As you can see, Ethereum is effectively useless without partitioning because it relies on scalability far more than Bitcoin does, while Bitcoin is struggling to achieve any scalability itself.  When you see Mike Hearn talking about using Ethereum as an OTC derivatives settlement, that functionality will be non-existent without partitioning.  The load carrying capacity would be far too small and fees far too large to do at scale.  It will be a case of centralized services vastly outperforming decentralized ones.  Who cares if it's trustless if it costs 10,000 times more?

Transactions can be bundled in Bitcoin without much of a side effect in order to scale, while bundling computational redundancy in Ethereum would defeat the purpose of it existing at all.  This is in addition to the fact that nobody has successfully deployed a partitioned cryptocurrency in the first place.  Fuserleer has been working on one for years and has been unable to release something.  IOTA is about to release.  I haven't dug through it enough myself, but Anonymint claims it's doomed because it will rely on centralization for convergence.

In summary, through bundling or even just plain on-chain transactions alone, Bitcoin can just barely reach functionality of an internationally used currency, at least justifying it's market cap.  Ethereum operating as a "world computer" is an obvious stretch of the imagination.  Since they issued an IPO money grab for their coin supply, I think most investors will already be considering the coin a failure if it has to dilute investors to infinity by leaking mined coins forever.  No actual secure PoS network has even been invented so far, so the coin needs not only one, but two cryptocurrency firsts in order to be considered viable - a valid PoS network and a partitioned network.  In order to even think about touching Ethereum, you're basically required to ask yourself, is Vitalik an order of magnitude smarter than Satoshi?

This redudancy + partionning paradox is extremely hard to understand for a newbie who's native language is not even english...

It would be really appreciated if someone could rephrase this paradox summing up with easy terms what is the issue and its consequencies

I am years ago of your computer science knowledge and I may stay years ago of your knowledge in this field for the rest of my life since it isn't my study field.

Thank you in advance. 

[YarkoL]

Even if you could force the external entity to declare the full lineage of the input data (i.e. 100% dependently typed), that would require that the scripting can't be programmable, i.e. the external I/O capability would be eliminated. If you don't understand why, please go learn about the typing systems Coq and Epigram.

I just came again across this initiative
http://www.idni.org/

like much of the discussion in this thread,
it occupies the higher stratosphere of crypto-related theory,
but as much as I'm able to make out of it, it endeavors to steer
clear of many pitfalls that have been explored here by employing
purely functional language "that contains a blockchain support built-in"