Open Letter to GMaxwell and Sincere Rational Core Devs

[traincarswreck]

Increasingly, Bitcoin's value is based on its authenticity. That will only increase as time goes on.

By hardforking the blocksize you're diminishing the authenticity for the sake of convenience. Do the math:

Value gained by greater convenience: 5%
Value lost to diminished authenticity: 40%-95%

(My estimations obviously).

It isn't really a technology question. The market is already deciding what the priorities are and whatever the issues about backlogs, confirmation times etc, it's something that has to be lived with.

I don't think we have a choice. Altcoins are the appropriate way forward for augmenting on-chain functionality, features and alternative monetary models IMO.

You see NO ONE is reading Nash's argument:

…my personal view is that a practical global money might most favorably evolve through the development first of a few regional currencies of truly good quality. And then the “integration” or “coordination” of those into a global currency would become just a technical problem. (Here I am thinking of a politically neutral form of a technological utility rather than of a money which might, for example, be used to exert pressures in a conflict situation comparable to “the cold war”.)

It's relevant.  You see, Nash ended the debate.  He already had this debate, and he had to have it bey himself because no one else would participate.  And no one could understand or conceptualize his premise: bitcoin.

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[BurtW]

@traincarswreck... if you are saying that bitcoin should not have any further hard forks or soft forks and should instead continue as-is in terms of consensus level code, then I agree.

I believe that both soft and hard forks of a particular cryptocurency (eg bitcoin) are a moral hazard as they change the rules of the game that people already invested time/money/energy into.

The cryptocurrency system as a whole can be continually upgraded by the introduction of new software with brand-new genesis blocks.  Anyone that believes in the properties of the new system can then invest into it.  Eventually one or more systems with the most desirable/useful properties should emerge.

I believe this to be the only moral path forward.

If I understand the thrust of your argument correctly I think you may be in agreement though from a different angle/perspective.

This exactly.  And you will understand better than others the significance of me saying that NASH  taught me what bitcoin was, not Satoshi. Core is being as irresponsible as VER.

I admit that as an electrical engineer I am not an expert in economics so I am ignorant - but not stupid.

I read this thread with great interest and this post seems to summarize things for me at least.  To recap my understanding of the thread so far:

  Bitcoin is good for some purposes and is not good for others purposes (all the "gold" versus "currency" posts).
  ALL sides in the great block size increase debate may kill Bitcoin by trying to "fix" it.
  Bitcoin is not really broken, it is what it is.
  Just leave all the fundamental arbitrary parameters (total number of Bitcoins, current block size, current block generation rate, etc.) as is.
  It is too late to change anything now.
  If you must make a change to any parameter, create an alt coin and see how the market responds to it.
  If we need something with attributes that Bitcoin does not have and can/will never have, create it, don't mess with Bitcoin to do it.

Is that basically what you are saying?

[jonald_fyookball]

If the block size changes we kill bitcoin's store of value properties.

Over time I've gradually come to this conclusion as well. It's almost academic and has nothing to do with "useability".
 

You'll have to explain how you came to this conclusion, please.

Cos it's a bit like saying..."hey, this gold's a bit heavy. It's a PITA to carry around and I'm always having to buy new trousers cos the pockets get holes from my coins. Lets just hardfork it and mix it with some aluminium so it's more convenient."

Over time, if the market values something as a monetary asset rather than a tech-stock then the above analogy increasingly applies. Maybe if Bitcoin had raised the blocksize back in 2010 they might have got away with it but I'd say it's too late now.

Not seeing how your analogy is apt whatsoever, sorry.
Blocksize and bitcoin scarcity are two completely different things.    

Even before BU, I had the same idea that blocksize should be removed from the consensus rules.

[iCEBREAKER]

[loopy schizo rantings and desperate pleas for attention]

I can see why people are making fun of you. You keep saying the same stuff over and over and have either a serious problem with reading comprehension or are not even trying.

I miss the Shelby parody accounts.  Where is Annoymint when we need him the most?  

[traincarswreck]

I admit that as an electrical engineer I am not an expert in economics so I am ignorant - but not stupid.

Exactly. Not stupid.

I read this thread with great interest and this post seems to summarize things for me at least.  To recap my understanding of the thread so far:

  Bitcoin is good for some purposes and is not good for others purposes (all the "gold" versus "currency" posts).
  ALL sides in the great block size increase debate may kill Bitcoin by trying to "fix" it.
  Bitcoin is not really broken, it is what it is.
  Just leave all the fundamental arbitrary parameters (total number of Bitcoins, current block size, current block generation rate, etc.) as is.
  It is too late to change anything now.
  If you must make a change to any parameter, create an alt coin and see how the market responds to it.
  If we need something with attributes that Bitcoin does not have and can/will never have, create it, don't mess with Bitcoin to do it.

Is that basically what you are saying?

Yes it is, but its only the beginning of the dialogue.  You see we haven't yet asked the question, together, as a group, what parameters guard bitcoin's gold like characteristics.  This the debate DEVELOPERS need to have. But the devs, are asking a different question, they are asking how can we safely scale bitcoin as a currency.  It's a bad question.  BAD.

[toknormal]

Not seeing how your analogy is apt whatsoever, sorry.
Blocksize and bitcoin scarcity are two completely different things.

I didn't say scarceity is what makes Bitcoin valuable, I said "authenticity" did.

Scarecity doesn't make anything valuable. Lots of things are scarce.

You can produce an altcoin tomorrow that's "scarce". It will go to zero if that's the only monetary property it has.

[hv_]

I m sure that greed will solve this in some months. The bounty in the mempools is just too attractive. So miners might launch some 10k nodes out of nowhere and might fork to BU or whatever... But who dares to predict the future?

That's why we need to talk about Ideal Money.  Because it is the rational founded argument for guarding bitcoin's properties as a gold (which miners are quite happy to do in general because the fees will stay high).

I am attempting to speak to rational sincere and influential members of the community.  And most of them are unreachable and think the introduction of Nash's argument is a joke (hint: who is the joke?).

Here we are again. You do not talk in Chinese, that would be near to ideal. Fully ideal in terms of what you try to achieve would be to talk in hashpower, means , try running 51% of the miners and you are heared.

I wish you all the best.

[hv_]

Not seeing how your analogy is apt whatsoever, sorry.
Blocksize and bitcoin scarcity are two completely different things.

I didn't say scarceity is what makes Bitcoin valuable, I said "authenticity" did.

Scarecity doesn't make anything valuable. Lots of things are scarce.

You can produce an altcoin tomorrow that's "scarce". It will go to zero if that's the only monetary property it has.

Don t forget the security from PoW, network effects and the velocity, last one is related to the 1MB limit.

[danda]

I can't speak for OP, but that is basically what I am saying, and have been saying for a while now.

I think there is a mostly silent 3rd side to this entire scaling debate that simply is happy with status quo, or at least does not wish to rock the boat and risk altering the fundamentals.

The beauty of the design of bitcoin is that anything controversial has little chance of getting adopted.  So we are likely to get our way, without any need to shout or make a fuss about it, like the other two camps.

I think the core-devs could best focus their efforts into creating a bitcoin upgrade that is truly fungible and scalable.  This could mean that it has lightning or something similar built in.  It could also mean adopting tech from monero.  Or any of the other great ideas in proposed in the space in the last 5 years, eg bitcoin-ng.  Hopefully a more distributed way to mine could be found also, eg built in p2pool.   A lot of things can be fixed and improved with the experience and hindsight we now have.  Then, when this new thing has been developed and well-tested, release it with a new genesis block.  I think a lot of people would move to it, but not a single person would be forced to.

edit: and yes, there should be room for devs to discuss and possibly implement some of OP's ideas also in this upgrade.  Though I am presently unclear on what concrete parameter or other changes OP would propose.

I admit that as an electrical engineer I am not an expert in economics so I am ignorant - but not stupid.

I read this thread with great interest and this post seems to summarize things for me at least.  To recap my understanding of the thread so far:

  Bitcoin is good for some purposes and is not good for others purposes (all the "gold" versus "currency" posts).
  ALL sides in the great block size increase debate may kill Bitcoin by trying to "fix" it.
  Bitcoin is not really broken, it is what it is.
  Just leave all the fundamental arbitrary parameters (total number of Bitcoins, current block size, current block generation rate, etc.) as is.
  It is too late to change anything now.
  If you must make a change to any parameter, create an alt coin and see how the market responds to it.
  If we need something with attributes that Bitcoin does not have and can/will never have, create it, don't mess with Bitcoin to do it.

Is that basically what you are saying?

[toknormal]

Don t forget the security from PoW, network effects and the velocity, last one is related to the 1MB limit.

Although important, none of those are related to archetypal fidelity. They are technology factors.

You can't compromise authenticity for those because authenticity is something that's not replaceable once lost. Technology factors are.

[traincarswreck]

Here we are again. You do not talk in Chinese, that would be near to ideal. Fully ideal in terms of what you try to achieve would be to talk in hashpower, means , try running 51% of the miners and you are heared.

I wish you all the best.

Yes I can speak to Chinese.  Bruce Lee was one of my instructors.  Listen its not a protocol proposal on that level.  It's a higher level proposal.  Bohm Einsteins protege: http://sprott.physics.wisc.edu/Chaos-Complexity/dialogue.pdf

Bohm and Lee had the same instructor: https://steemit.com/philosophy/@jokerpravis/jiddu-krishnamurti-the-philosophical-inspiration-behind-bruce-lee-s-martial-art-jeet-kune-do

Bohmian Dialogue will bring about this change.  It is the next evolution of technology.  It is our next major technological advance: https://steemit.com/psychology/@jokerpravis/bohmian-dialogue-and-group-therapy

As is Ideal Money, the levation of a stable unit value. What shall we call it?

[traincarswreck]

Don t forget the security from PoW, network effects and the velocity, last one is related to the 1MB limit.

Although important, none of those are related to the monetary archetype. They are technology factors.

You can't compromise authenticity for those because authenticity is something that's not replaceable once lost. Technology factors are.

Yes.  Core's mandate if moved to 'securing bitcoin's gold like qualities' attends to BOTH the problems of technical security and gold likeness.

They are ALL relevant vectors of attack that must be considered in ALL technical "improvements".  Ignorance on this subject is therefore a security leak.

[traincarswreck]

I can't speak for OP, but that is basically what I am saying, and have been saying for a while now.

I think there is a mostly silent 3rd side to this entire scaling debate that simply is happy with status quo, or at least does not wish to rock the boat and risk altering the fundamentals.

Yes exactly and this is a problem, and Bohm formalized the protocol to alleviate the problem:

In a dialogue, however, nobody is trying to win. Everybody wins if anybody wins. There is a different sort of spirit to it. In a dialogue, there is no attempt to gain points, or to make your particular view prevail. Rather, whenever any mistake is discovered on the part of anybody, everybody gains. It’s a situation called win-win, in which we are not playing a game against each other but with each other. In a dialogue, everybody wins.

An essential feature of the dialogue group is that it is able to reveal assumptions.

An essential feature of the dialogue group is that it is able to reveal assumptions. These assumptions are actually making us ill. And in that sense, it is therapy to reveal them. The content here, then, is more in that direction and eventually moving toward being free of those assumptions, and exploring something new beyond the assumptions.

So we’ve said that it is crucial to be able to share our judgement, to share our assumptions and listen to each other’s assumption.

Therefore, this is crucial both individually and collectively; and dialogue is the collective way of opening up judgements and assumptions.

And it’s very important that it happen together, because if one individual changes it will have very little general effect. But if it happens collectively, it means a lot more. If some of us come to the ‘truth’, so-called, while a lot of people are left out, it’s not going to solve the problem.

It is an important stage in the Dialogue, a moment of increased coherence, where the group is able to move beyond its perceived blocks or limitations and into new territory

Often the quieter participants will begin to speak up more as they become familiar with the Dialogue experience while the more dominant individuals will find themselves tending to speak less and listen more.

[traincarswreck]

This ABSOLUTELY belongs in the tech/developers' discussion.

[traincarswreck]

What is a stable unit of value to be called?  A watt, Celsius, Fahrenheit, Newton?

[hv_]

Don t forget the security from PoW, network effects and the velocity, last one is related to the 1MB limit.

Although important, none of those are related to archetypal fidelity. They are technology factors.

You can't compromise authenticity for those because authenticity is something that's not replaceable once lost. Technology factors are.

You cannot really divide live from body, things are complex.

[hv_]

What is a stable unit of value to be called?  A watt, Celsius, Fahrenheit, Newton?

Go an learn about extensive and intensive units first.

Economics: there is just no useful  metric because all known underlyings are not stable.

[traincarswreck]

You cannot really divide live from body, things are complex.

The person you are quoting is not saying anything that is wrong. You are starting from a conclusion that our point is irrelevant and insignificant and its not either of those things. It's based on founded science and an extensive argument by John Nash which he perfected for ~60 years.  You are simply ignorant to it, and ignoring.  But that doesn't make it wrong or go away.

[traincarswreck]

Go an learn about extensive and intensive units first.

Economics: there is just no useful  metric because all known underlyings are not stable.

I clearly know more about this subject than you. And so does nash:

   The metric system does not work because french chefs de cuisine are constantly cooking up new and delicious culinary creations which the rest of the world then follows imitatively. Rather, it works  because it is something invented on a scientific basis…
    Our view is that if it is viewed scientifically and rationally (which is psychologically difficult!) that money should have the function of a standard of measurement and thus that it should become comparable to the watt or the hour or a degree of temperature.
    …this standard, as a basis for the standardization of the value of the international money unit, would remove the political roles of the “grand pardoners,”…

I'd like the general community to take note of this posters' reaction in the face truth, and a well founded argument.  

They are not a scientist, and they don't see the validity in source documents.  I have read Szabo, Hayek, Nash, and Smith.  You have not read anything.

[hv_]

Go an learn about extensive and intensive units first.

Economics: there is just no useful  metric because all known underlyings are not stable.

I clearly know more about this subject than you. And so does nash:

   The metric system does not work because french chefs de cuisine are constantly cooking up new and delicious culinary creations which the rest of the world then follows imitatively. Rather, it works  because it is something invented on a scientific basis…
    Our view is that if it is viewed scientifically and rationally (which is psychologically difficult!) that money should have the function of a standard of measurement and thus that it should become comparable to the watt or the hour or a degree of temperature.
    …this standard, as a basis for the standardization of the value of the international money unit, would remove the political roles of the “grand pardoners,”…

I'd like the general community to take note of this posters' reaction in the face truth, and a well founded argument.  

They are not a scientist, and they don't see the validity in source documents.  I have read Szabo, Hayek, Nash, and Smith.  You have not read anything.

Haha too good. And you are not even close to achieve anything. So what does it teach to you know?

You read. I already know.