[XMR] Monero - A secure, private, untraceable cryptocurrency

[nakaone]

The risk of not holding monero is infinitely bigger than that of holding it.

With not holding, you can lose a sum equal to 1000x your net worth.

With holding, you can maximum lose the amount invested.

Sounds like Pascal's wager. That can never be the reason to do it.

I may be strange in that it seems perfectly valid to me. I pay taxes, because by paying, I lose only the sum invested, but by not paying, I risk unforeseen consequences. With Monero there is at least some upside, unlike in paying taxes which is a genuine lose-lose...

Yes, but the same is true for any other altcoin (even the most junky ones),

take the following assumption:
1.) you cannot invest
2.) you can buy a basket which is filled in an equal distribution with the top200 decentralized currencies

what would you do?

the same is true for the existence of any god. This is just not how logic works though.

even following the wikipedia article - pascals wager is not a proof of god - I always understood it that way: even if there is a tiny possibility for an infinite outcome, it is rational to take the bet . I see nothing wrong with that.

If I follow your idea correctly you say that if you observe 1000 ravens, and they are all black you can neither conclude that all ravens are black nor can you conclude that the next observed raven is black. This is obviously true; but don't you think you can at least partially conclude that the next raven is black?

To come back to xmr and I usually do not take much out of ristos predictions: but what he is essentially saying is that he has observed 1000 ravens which were all black, and xmr is the 1001 he is seeing; his estimation of the likelyhood that this raven is being black is quite high.

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[Joshuar]

The risk of not holding monero is infinitely bigger than that of holding it.

With not holding, you can lose a sum equal to 1000x your net worth.

With holding, you can maximum lose the amount invested.

Sounds like Pascal's wager. That can never be the reason to do it.

I may be strange in that it seems perfectly valid to me. I pay taxes, because by paying, I lose only the sum invested, but by not paying, I risk unforeseen consequences. With Monero there is at least some upside, unlike in paying taxes which is a genuine lose-lose...

Yes, but the same is true for any other altcoin (even the most junky ones),

take the following assumption:
1.) you cannot invest
2.) you can buy a basket which is filled in an equal distribution with the top200 decentralized currencies

what would you do?

the same is true for the existence of any god. This is just not how logic works though.

even following the wikipedia article - pascals wager is not a proof of god - I always understood it that way: even if there is a tiny possibility for an infinite outcome, it is rational to take the bet . I see nothing wrong with that.

If I follow your idea correctly you say that if you observe 1000 ravens, and they are all black you can neither conclude that all ravens are black nor can you conclude that the next observed raven is black. This is obviously true; but don't you think you can at least partially conclude that the next raven is black?

To come back to xmr and I usually do not take much out of ristos predictions: but what he is essentially saying is that he has observed 1000 ravens which were all black, and xmr is the 1001 he is seeing; his estimation of the likelyhood that this raven is being black is quite high.

"If I follow your idea correctly you say that if you observe 1000 ravens, and they are all black you can neither conclude that all ravens are black nor can you conclude that the next observed raven is black. This is obviously true; but don't you think you can at least partially conclude that the next raven is black?"

Let's say there were originally 10 black ravens, and you concluded that every new raven would Not be black, you would be wrong upto the point of there being 1,000 ravens(990 after the original 10 or 990 times you were wrong). To continue concluding that the next raven would Not be black would mean that you're insane in Einstein's definition of the word.

It's overwhelmingly logical and rational to estimate that the 1001th raven would be black, given that the previous 1000 were.

However, there is still a chance that the 1001 raven would Not be black, though the odds are 1000 to 1.

[Anon136]

[owlcatz]

LMFAO... brilliant even tho i'm too in me sauce now to keep up with these maths peoples!!  

[Toninho]

[eizh]

Since some of the Bytecoin/CryptoNote devs seem to have been scammers, how can we trust that the elliptic curve constants in Monero were not chosen maliciously? If they were chosen maliciously, could that be determined somehow? Should a new curve be chosen, just in case?

I'm not a cryptographer, so please excuse me if this is a stupid question.

It's not a new curve. The curve is Ed25519, invented by Dan Bernstein, who's also the inventor of the popular Curve25519 (which is the ECDSA version). The rationale for it is given in page 7-8 here: http://ed25519.cr.yp.to/ed25519-20110926.pdf

[nakaone]

Let's say there were originally 10 black ravens, and you concluded that every new raven would Not be black, you would be wrong upto the point of there being 1,000 ravens(990 after the original 10 or 990 times you were wrong). To continue concluding that the next raven would Not be black would mean that you're insane in Einstein's definition of the word.

It's overwhelmingly logical and rational to estimate that the 1001th raven would be black, given that the previous 1000 were.

However, there is still a chance that the 1001 raven would Not be black, though the odds are 1000 to 1.

the idea is that you cannot conclude (in terms of theoretical logic) from observations - let us not get it too far. but it is important to see the difference to a set of assumptions that says george is a raven; all ravens are black, george is black.

[owlcatz]

Since some of the Bytecoin/CryptoNote devs seem to have been scammers, how can we trust that the elliptic curve constants in Monero were not chosen maliciously? If they were chosen maliciously, could that be determined somehow? Should a new curve be chosen, just in case?

I'm not a cryptographer, so please excuse me if this is a stupid question.

It's not a new curve. The curve is Ed25519, invented by Dan Bernstein, who's also the inventor of the popular Curve25519 (which is the ECDSA version). The rationale for it is given in page 7-8 here: http://ed25519.cr.yp.to/ed25519-20110926.pdf

Shit for real? I ran Dan's Qmail Email software for like 10 years back in the day, plus a bunch of his other stuff like dns etc... that's awesome if true, he is very trustworthy and very much old school. Can anyone on the dev team confirm (Sorry eizh, not sure who all is the "Full" dev team so my apologies if you are on it!)

Thanks again, this coin amazes me more every day.

LOL i just realized. I should have just asked "Is it true?" ...

[Anon136]

I'll see your black raven and raise you 2.

[xulescu]

the idea is that you cannot conclude (in terms of theoretical logic) from observations - let us not get it too far. but it is important to see the difference to a set of assumptions that says george is a raven; all ravens are black, george is black.

Nonprobabilistic models are not particularly useful in the physical world.

However, there is still a chance that the 1001 raven would Not be black, though the odds are 1000 to 1.

1001:1 always use Laplace smoothing.

[eizh]

Since some of the Bytecoin/CryptoNote devs seem to have been scammers, how can we trust that the elliptic curve constants in Monero were not chosen maliciously? If they were chosen maliciously, could that be determined somehow? Should a new curve be chosen, just in case?

I'm not a cryptographer, so please excuse me if this is a stupid question.

It's not a new curve. The curve is Ed25519, invented by Dan Bernstein, who's also the inventor of the popular Curve25519 (which is the ECDSA version). The rationale for it is given in page 7-8 here: http://ed25519.cr.yp.to/ed25519-20110926.pdf

Shit for real? I ran Dan's Qmail Email software for like 10 years back in the day, plus a bunch of his other stuff like dns etc... that's awesome if true, he is very trustworthy and very much old school. Can anyone on the dev team confirm (Sorry eizh, not sure who all is the "Full" dev team so my apologies if you are on it!)

Thanks again, this coin amazes me more every day.

LOL i just realized. I should have just asked "Is it true?" ...

Yes, I'm part of the XMR team. The parameters are in the whitepaper (4.2.1) but you can check for yourself that crypto-ops.h and crypto-ops.c in Monero are actually consolidated from Bernstein's library NaCl: https://github.com/jedisct1/libsodium/tree/master/src/libsodium/crypto_sign/ed25519/ref10

[smooth]

Can anyone on the dev team confirm (Sorry eizh, not sure who all is the "Full" dev team so my apologies if you are on it!)

Official team (which of course includes eizh) is listed on the first post of this thread:

Who are you?
See Monero Missives #1: "(in no particular order) - tacotime, eizh, smooth, fluffypony, othe, davidlatapie, NoodleDoodle

[varun555]

The risk of not holding monero is infinitely bigger than that of holding it.

With not holding, you can lose a sum equal to 1000x your net worth.

With holding, you can maximum lose the amount invested.

Sounds like Pascal's wager. That can never be the reason to do it.

I may be strange in that it seems perfectly valid to me. I pay taxes, because by paying, I lose only the sum invested, but by not paying, I risk unforeseen consequences. With Monero there is at least some upside, unlike in paying taxes which is a genuine lose-lose...

Yes, but the same is true for any other altcoin (even the most junky ones),

take the following assumption:
1.) you cannot invest
2.) you can buy a basket which is filled in an equal distribution with the top200 decentralized currencies

what would you do?

the same is true for the existence of any god. This is just not how logic works though.

even following the wikipedia article - pascals wager is not a proof of god - I always understood it that way: even if there is a tiny possibility for an infinite outcome, it is rational to take the bet . I see nothing wrong with that.

If I follow your idea correctly you say that if you observe 1000 ravens, and they are all black you can neither conclude that all ravens are black nor can you conclude that the next observed raven is black. This is obviously true; but don't you think you can at least partially conclude that the next raven is black?

To come back to xmr and I usually do not take much out of ristos predictions: but what he is essentially saying is that he has observed 1000 ravens which were all black, and xmr is the 1001 he is seeing; his estimation of the likelyhood that this raven is being black is quite high.

To come back to xmr and I usually do not take much out of ristos predictions: but what he is essentially saying is that he has observed 1000 ravens which were all black, and xmr is the 1001 he is seeing; his estimation of the likelyhood that this raven is being black is quite high.
[/quote]In regards to Risto's predictions:
Could'nt it also mean that Risto has observed 1000 ravens which were all black and xmr is the 2nd raven (after btc) he is seeing that is not black (he's said that he has invested in these 2 only)?

[rpietila]

It's overwhelmingly logical and rational to estimate that the 1001th raven would be black, given that the previous 1000 were.

However, there is still a chance that the 1001 raven would Not be black, though the odds are 1000 to 1.

the idea is that you cannot conclude (in terms of theoretical logic) from observations - let us not get it too far. but it is important to see the difference to a set of assumptions that says george is a raven; all ravens are black, george is black.

All altcoins are black. Then I see an altcoin that is not black. Do I trust the accumulated wisdom, or my own eyes?

Trusting accumulated wisdom is the reason many people still work, even though they could have bought bitcoins in 2010.

Many bitcoiners don't even need to look to conclude that all altcoins are black.

[wachtwoord]

It's overwhelmingly logical and rational to estimate that the 1001th raven would be black, given that the previous 1000 were.

However, there is still a chance that the 1001 raven would Not be black, though the odds are 1000 to 1.

the idea is that you cannot conclude (in terms of theoretical logic) from observations - let us not get it too far. but it is important to see the difference to a set of assumptions that says george is a raven; all ravens are black, george is black.

All altcoins are black. Then I see an altcoin that is not black. Do I trust the accumulated wisdom, or my own eyes?

Trusting accumulated wisdom is the reason many people still work, even though they could have bought bitcoins in 2010.

Many bitcoiners don't even need to look to conclude that all altcoins are black.

Set that is a good reason to buy this altcoin (given that you abstracted away the actual reasons why XMR is not "black" here but alas)

[krawallmining]

Christmas again at Polo?
Blockchain size doesn't seem to deter.

[akula999]

I'm really excited XMR's progress!

[divan0w]

I'm really excited XMR's progress!

Me too, I was losing money for last few coins I invest in, but in this one for now things are cool. The big question as always is - for how long...

[Febo]

I'm really excited XMR's progress!

Me too, I was losing money for last few coins I invest in, but in this one for now things are cool. The big question as always is - for how long...

unless you will sell at price under your buy price or you lose wallet is impossible to lose any money.

[Jungian]

I'm really excited XMR's progress!

Me too, I was losing money for last few coins I invest in, but in this one for now things are cool. The big question as always is - for how long...

unless you will sell at price under your buy price or you lose wallet is impossible to lose any money.

That's the kind of delusion thinking traders love to take advantage of!