Bitcoin 20MB Fork

[bambou]

yes, i know. Gavincoin proposal is an attack on bitcoin. I just wanted to figure out which public channels to watch so i can be among the first ones to sell in case the community is forked and bitcoin hijacked.
I guess i'll just sell now and wait until the dust settles. Won't go anywhere before the halving anyways.
I think i might buy Mpcoin later if it comes to the MCA

Why do you think Gavincoin is an attack on bitcoin while MPcoin isn't?

MP coin is not intrusive, It is just the basic aftermath of hard forking bitcoin.
You are using mpcoin as of now btw ;-)

[Cryddit]

Oooohkay.  Let's consider the effect of a client that accepts and will cheerfully create >1Mb blocks.

Let's say I take a standard bitcoin client (client A) and create a new one (client B) that doesn't have a block size limit.  And then I start mining using client B.

Nice analysis, but you omitted the influence of the version field change in the client B. I believe the whole rigamarole with that field is to lock the client B onto the new chain, although I haven't analyzed the details and considered all the possible attacks.
 

I'm looking right at the code, and, no.  Client B will not be locked to chains containing at least one >1MB block; it will continue to accept any block that meets client-B protocol - which includes all client-A blocks, even if a client-B block gets orphaned.  

Likewise Client-A will continue to accept blocks that meet client-A protocol, even if they originate with client-B miners and arrive with an unfamiliar block version number.

Incrementing version numbers in the blocks is invisible at first; miners will start putting client-B version numbers into the blocks they mine while continuing to follow the client-A protocol rules.  The new blocks will be accepted both by Client-A's and Client-B's, and all the Client-B's will keep track of how often new-version blocks have been mined.  Client-B's will not actually create new blocks using protocol rules that client-A will reject until such time as mined blocks with client-B's new version number constitute a supermajority of the blocks recently mined (meaning protocol-B is now supported by the overwhelming majority of hashing power).

Spotting incremented block version numbers in the blockchain will cause client-A to pop up version incompatibility warnings, of increasing severity.  The appearance of an incremented version number that makes it into the blockchain will cause client-A to pop up a warning that a newer version of the software is in use and the user should upgrade.  When the new version constitutes 20% of recently-mined blocks, another version warning pops up.  When the new version number constitutes a majority of recently mined blocks, client-A will pop up a more dire version warning verging on panicky, stating that there is a new block protocol which will definitely cause a hard fork, and that failure to update the software immediately risks being on the losing side of an orphaned chain.   When the supermajority criteria for client-B blocks to actually start issuing is met, Client-A will issue a final version warning stating that a hard fork is imminent and it is definitely on the losing side.  When client-A actually finds itself on the losing side of a forked chain, probably within hours after that, Client-A will see a blockchain that contains blocks it cannot accept, with a different version number, which is getting a huge amount of hashing power.  It will put up a "we appear to be on the losing side of a hard fork, any transactions you make now will not be accepted as valid by the main blockchain, please update your software to get back on the main chain." dialog.  

[CoinCidental]

yes, i know. Gavincoin proposal is an attack on bitcoin. I just wanted to figure out which public channels to watch so i can be among the first ones to sell in case the community is forked and bitcoin hijacked.
I guess i'll just sell now and wait until the dust settles. Won't go anywhere before the halving anyways.
I think i might buy Mpcoin later if it comes to the MCA

Why do you think Gavincoin is an attack on bitcoin while MPcoin isn't?

MP coin is not intrusive, It is just the basic aftermath of hard forking bitcoin.
You are using mpcoin as of now btw ;-)

actually we are using satoshis coin now  ,which was always  intended to scale up as necessary
calling it gavincoin or mpcoin  is just spam
we need more than 7 tps ,if not today then when the next rally happens which could be anytime
so may as well just get it done

[Cryddit]

So....  First, I have no idea where this "bounty" comes from.  Who would pay it and why?  Second, it'll be an orphaned block unless the majority of hash power is already on the B version, so where could a 'taint' come from anyway?  Unless the majority of hashing power accepts that block as valid, the chain it's in will be orphaned long before its coinbase can be spent, and if it's orphaned none of the other clients are going to accept that block as evidence that a transaction has happened, so they'll just ignore it, repeat its transactions in <1Mb blocks, and the world goes on.

I think maybe you believe that someone has motivations they don't have.

Like I said earlier, I will wish to send myself transactions on your 'B' chain as soon as I can.  These I will be able to spend on the 'B' chain while they remain on the 'A' chain which is the chain I am betting on for long duration survival and usefulness.

Ah.  You then are one of the people I was referring to as a crook, and want to do double spends.

Making sure that transactions are tainted with coinbase from 'B' will insure that transactions can never be re-played on 'A'.  Thus, I'll want to get some coinbase from the first block which is over 1MB as soon as possible.

Except that coinbase from B can't exist until B has majority hashing power.  Any block that would produce a 'B-only' coinbase will have to violate protocol-A (be over 1M bytes long) AND be 100 blocks old before that coinbase can be spent.  Because client-A won't mine on any chain containing a block that violates protocol-A,  unless B has majority hashing power that B-only block will be orphaned long before then.   Further, because no miner will even attempt to produce a client-B block until incremented block version numbers in the recently-mined blocks indicate that B has an overwhelming supermajority of hashing power, there simply won't exist a >1Mb block, or any opportunity to "taint",  until that happens.

[kwukduck]

So we get to 140 tps...
What happens if we reach that in say 5 years... Another hard fork?
I just don't think changing it like this is a smart way of dealing with the issue, why not a dynamic size that scales with the network as some other coins do...?

[redsn0w]

So we get to 140 tps...
What happens if we reach that in say 5 years... Another hard fork?
I just don't think changing it like this is a smart way of dealing with the issue, why not a dynamic size that scales with the network as some other coins do...?

Now I think the hardfork isn't necessary (I've read a lot of article,topics). The 1 MB blocksize is necessary to keep the coin decentralized (more & more people save the blockchain on their PC) and bitcoin will stay a valid an great alternative to the current economy system in the next few years. For example if someone want to send money to his relatives in another country/nation, in this case bitcoin can help (because the fees are lower than moneygram,western union, bank transfer, etc...) and the 7 tps  aren't a real problem.

[balu2]

yes, i know. Gavincoin proposal is an attack on bitcoin. I just wanted to figure out which public channels to watch so i can be among the first ones to sell in case the community is forked and bitcoin hijacked.
I guess i'll just sell now and wait until the dust settles. Won't go anywhere before the halving anyways.
I think i might buy Mpcoin later if it comes to the MCA

Why do you think Gavincoin is an attack on bitcoin while MPcoin isn't?

How is bitcoin an attack on bitcoin? Afterall you want to fork off into an alt. Conservative folks will stay on the bitcoin chain. The neophyle fail-lords will fork to altcoin gavin-thing and pretend everything would be normal before then years later telling people 'whops, sorry, we need to raise the max coin limit for network security'.

I'll stick with the conservative stuff as i think a hard cap will be important for the value.
All your idiotic comments don't impress me and not a single fuck was given about the bloat-altfork.

[balu2]

yes, i know. Gavincoin proposal is an attack on bitcoin. I just wanted to figure out which public channels to watch so i can be among the first ones to sell in case the community is forked and bitcoin hijacked.
I guess i'll just sell now and wait until the dust settles. Won't go anywhere before the halving anyways.
I think i might buy Mpcoin later if it comes to the MCA

Why do you think Gavincoin is an attack on bitcoin while MPcoin isn't?

MP coin is not intrusive, It is just the basic aftermath of hard forking bitcoin.
You are using mpcoin as of now btw ;-)

correct. Mpcoin is what everyone is currently using - and it works just fine.

Really i don't give a single fuck about the gavin-bloat

[tvbcof]

So....  First, I have no idea where this "bounty" comes from.  Who would pay it and why?  Second, it'll be an orphaned block unless the majority of hash power is already on the B version, so where could a 'taint' come from anyway?  Unless the majority of hashing power accepts that block as valid, the chain it's in will be orphaned long before its coinbase can be spent, and if it's orphaned none of the other clients are going to accept that block as evidence that a transaction has happened, so they'll just ignore it, repeat its transactions in <1Mb blocks, and the world goes on.

I think maybe you believe that someone has motivations they don't have.

Like I said earlier, I will wish to send myself transactions on your 'B' chain as soon as I can.  These I will be able to spend on the 'B' chain while they remain on the 'A' chain which is the chain I am betting on for long duration survival and usefulness.

Ah.  You then are one of the people I was referring to as a crook, and want to do double spends.

It's not a double-spend.  It's two different solutions.  Nobody (including me) is going to throw away free money.

It very well could be the case that people will value 'two-system' money more than single-system money.  Adios fungibility (on the 'B' chain)...it was nice knowing ya.
 

Making sure that transactions are tainted with coinbase from 'B' will insure that transactions can never be re-played on 'A'.  Thus, I'll want to get some coinbase from the first block which is over 1MB as soon as possible.

Except that coinbase from B can't exist until B has majority hashing power.  Any block that would produce a 'B-only' coinbase will have to violate protocol-A (be over 1M bytes long) AND be 100 blocks old before that coinbase can be spent.  Because client-A won't mine on any chain containing a block that violates protocol-A,  unless B has majority hashing power that B-only block will be orphaned long before then.

I take it as almost a given that there will be more hashing on your 'B'.  Maybe not, but it doesn't make much difference.  Difficulties will adjust and valuations will fluctuate and various balances will be reached.  I would expect a fair amount of inconvenience from attackers on 'A'.  What doesn't kill us only makes us stronger, and I for one am happy to get techniques for working around superior resource attacks tried out.  As an 'A-hodler' I'm perfectly fine sitting on my stash for weeks, patching my system, and that sort of thing to deal with whatever eventualities come up.

[Buffer Overflow]

yes, i know. Gavincoin proposal is an attack on bitcoin. I just wanted to figure out which public channels to watch so i can be among the first ones to sell in case the community is forked and bitcoin hijacked.
I guess i'll just sell now and wait until the dust settles. Won't go anywhere before the halving anyways.
I think i might buy Mpcoin later if it comes to the MCA

Why do you think Gavincoin is an attack on bitcoin while MPcoin isn't?

MP coin is not intrusive, It is just the basic aftermath of hard forking bitcoin.
You are using mpcoin as of now btw ;-)

correct. Mpcoin is what everyone is currently using - and it works just fine.

Really i don't give a single fuck about the gavin-bloat

No. Mpcoin has a permanent block cap size, bitcoin has a temporary one. They are both totally different.

[cbeast]

So we get to 140 tps...
What happens if we reach that in say 5 years... Another hard fork?
I just don't think changing it like this is a smart way of dealing with the issue, why not a dynamic size that scales with the network as some other coins do...?

Now I think the hardfork isn't necessary (I've read a lot of article,topics). The 1 MB blocksize is necessary to keep the coin decentralized (more & more people save the blockchain on their PC) and bitcoin will stay a valid an great alternative to the current economy system in the next few years. For example if someone want to send money to his relatives in another country/nation, in this case bitcoin can help (because the fees are lower than moneygram,western union, bank transfer, etc...) and the 7 tps  aren't a real problem.

Your first wrongfully point assumes in five years people will still be using 500GB hard drives. Your second point wrongfully assumes miners won't keep fees low facing higher demand.

[solex]

So we get to 140 tps...
What happens if we reach that in say 5 years... Another hard fork?
I just don't think changing it like this is a smart way of dealing with the issue, why not a dynamic size that scales with the network as some other coins do...?

Now I think the hardfork isn't necessary (I've read a lot of article,topics). The 1 MB blocksize is necessary to keep the coin decentralized (more & more people save the blockchain on their PC) and bitcoin will stay a valid an great alternative to the current economy system in the next few years. For example if someone want to send money to his relatives in another country/nation, in this case bitcoin can help (because the fees are lower than moneygram,western union, bank transfer, etc...) and the 7 tps  aren't a real problem.

Satoshi Nakomoto's email to Mike Hearn in April 2009

"Hi Mike,

I'm glad to answer any questions you have.  If I get time, I ought to write a FAQ to supplement the paper.

There is only one global chain.

The existing Visa credit card network processes about 15 million Internet purchases per day worldwide.  Bitcoin can already scale much larger than that with existing hardware for a fraction of the cost.  It never really hits a scale ceiling.  If you're interested, I can go over the ways it would cope with extreme size.

By Moore's Law, we can expect hardware speed to be 10 times faster in 5 years and 100 times faster in 10.  Even if Bitcoin grows at crazy adoption rates, I think computer speeds will stay ahead of the number of transactions.

I don't anticipate that fees will be needed anytime soon, but if it becomes too burdensome to run a node, it is possible to run a node that only processes transactions that include a transaction fee.  The owner of the node would decide the minimum fee they'll accept.  Right now, such a node would get nothing, because nobody includes a fee, but if enough nodes did that, then users would get faster acceptance if they include a fee, or slower if they don't.  The fee the market would settle on should be minimal.  If a node requires a higher fee, that node would be passing up all transactions with lower fees.  It could do more volume and probably make more money by processing as many paying transactions as it can.  The transition is not controlled by some human in charge of the system though, just individuals reacting on their own to market forces."

Bitcoin was designed to scale up from day one. Deal with it.

[iCEBREAKER]

Yes, more hardware requirement==more centralisation. But if the devs don't forget to implement the optimizations part of the plans (i.e. "The Future Looks Bright" in https://blog.bitcoinfoundation.org/a-scalability-roadmap/) then everyone can run a full peer node in the future just as easy as now.

O look. The pruning bullshit.

If everyones prunes the spent outputs, how does a full node synchronize from scratch?
From 'trusted' archive nodes? Gimme a break.

The Gavincoiners use at least three canards to justify their attack on Bitcoin: pruning, disk space, and scale.

The pruning canard relies on experimental yet-to-be-invented vaporware and excludes synching from scratch, necessitating trust in archive nodes.  The entire point of BTC is to replace trust with proof.  When you want a prunable mini-blockchain, use Cryptonite instead of BTC.

The disk space canard overemphasizes the undisputed high density and availability of economical storage, in order to distract from the far more important bandwidth constraints under which much of the world (and hardened TOR-like networks) operate.

The scale canard is the same used by those opposing a gold standard.  Low TPS isn't an obstacle to scaling any more than a limited supply of gold.  The price of each simply increases and scaling is provided by quality (magnitude), not quantity, of transactions.  Substitution also plays a key role, as the more numerous but less important transactions migrate to secondary networks like silver/copper or Litecoin/Primecoin.

Bitcoin is no stronger than its ability to deal with an attack such as was undertaken against Kim Dotcom.

^This^ is why we must keep Bitcoin small, nimble, diffuse, and defensible.

[Cryddit]

I take it as almost a given that there will be more hashing on your 'B'.  Maybe not, but it doesn't make much difference.  Difficulties will adjust and valuations will fluctuate and various balances will be reached.  I would expect a fair amount of inconvenience from attackers on 'A'.  What doesn't kill us only makes us stronger, and I for one am happy to get techniques for working around superior resource attacks tried out.  As an 'A-hodler' I'm perfectly fine sitting on my stash for weeks, patching my system, and that sort of thing to deal with whatever eventualities come up.

You realize that no 'breaker' block (that is, no chain-B-only coinbase) will exist until after chain-B has 95% of the hashing power, and that because the vast majority of people still on A at that time will be there only by accident, that'll rapidly rise to 99%plus of the hashing power.  

That leaves a post-fork chain-A getting, at best, one block a day.  One <1MB block.  Giving chain-A a transaction rate, until the next difficulty adjustment, of maybe 1 transaction per minute, with 1-week confirmation times.   Difficulty adjusts every 2016 blocks, which, if you get it right on the cusp of a diff adjustment and actually manage to keep 1/2% of miners on it, which you won't, means chain-A will be like that for ten years.  

You're pointing a BB gun at an elephant here, and the BB gun isn't even loaded.  

[cbeast]

Yes, more hardware requirement==more centralisation. But if the devs don't forget to implement the optimizations part of the plans (i.e. "The Future Looks Bright" in https://blog.bitcoinfoundation.org/a-scalability-roadmap/) then everyone can run a full peer node in the future just as easy as now.

O look. The pruning bullshit.

If everyones prunes the spent outputs, how does a full node synchronize from scratch?
From 'trusted' archive nodes? Gimme a break.

The Gavincoiners use at least three canards to justify their attack on Bitcoin: pruning, disk space, and scale.

The pruning canard relies on experimental yet-to-be-invented vaporware and excludes synching from scratch, necessitating trust in archive nodes.  The entire point of BTC is to replace trust with proof.  When you want a prunable mini-blockchain, use Cryptonite instead of BTC.

The disk space canard overemphasizes the undisputed high density and availability of economical storage, in order to distract from the far more important bandwidth constraints under which much of the world (and hardened TOR-like networks) operate.

The scale canard is the same used by those opposing a gold standard.  Low TPS isn't an obstacle to scaling any more than a limited supply of gold.  The price of each simply increases and scaling is provided by quality (magnitude), not quantity, of transactions.  Substitution also plays a key role, as the more numerous but less important transactions migrate to secondary networks like silver/copper or Litecoin/Primecoin.

Bitcoin is no stronger than its ability to deal with an attack such as was undertaken against Kim Dotcom.

^This^ is why we must keep Bitcoin small, nimble, diffuse, and defensible.

You mean small blocks can stop US Marshals from breaking down your doors and taking your stuff?

[DeathAndTaxes]

I take it as almost a given that there will be more hashing on your 'B'.  Maybe not, but it doesn't make much difference.  Difficulties will adjust and valuations will fluctuate and various balances will be reached.  I would expect a fair amount of inconvenience from attackers on 'A'.  What doesn't kill us only makes us stronger, and I for one am happy to get techniques for working around superior resource attacks tried out.  As an 'A-hodler' I'm perfectly fine sitting on my stash for weeks, patching my system, and that sort of thing to deal with whatever eventualities come up.

You realize that no 'breaker' block (that is, no chain-B-only coinbase) will exist until after chain-B has 95% of the hashing power, and that because the vast majority of people still on A at that time will be there only by accident, that'll rapidly rise to 99%plus of the hashing power. 

That leaves a post-fork chain-A getting, at best, one block a day.  One <1MB block.  Giving chain-A a transaction rate, until the next difficulty adjustment, of maybe 1 transaction per minute, with 1-week confirmation times.   Difficulty adjusts every 2016 blocks, which, if you get it right on the cusp of a diff adjustment and actually manage to keep 1/2% of miners on it, means chain-A will be like that for six. years. 

You're pointing a BB gun at an elephant here, and the BB gun isn't even loaded. 

Yeah they imagine some kind of romantic war but there are only two scenarios
a) the fork doesn't get support and thus never happens (or is postponed)
b) the fork occurs only after a super majority of miners, full nodes, merchants, and users are already supporting it.

I guess nobody remembers the P2SH rollout.

[onemorebtc]

So we get to 140 tps...
What happens if we reach that in say 5 years... Another hard fork?
I just don't think changing it like this is a smart way of dealing with the issue, why not a dynamic size that scales with the network as some other coins do...?

Now I think the hardfork isn't necessary (I've read a lot of article,topics). The 1 MB blocksize is necessary to keep the coin decentralized (more & more people save the blockchain on their PC) and bitcoin will stay a valid an great alternative to the current economy system in the next few years. For example if someone want to send money to his relatives in another country/nation, in this case bitcoin can help (because the fees are lower than moneygram,western union, bank transfer, etc...) and the 7 tps  aren't a real problem.

maybe other people want to do other people with btc than transaction money to another country?
why dont you let them use it just as a currency - which it is designed for btw.

[iCEBREAKER]

...
But eventually after six months or so, let's say I get an 1100 kilobyte block (block B1, built on block A0).  It goes out on the network, and all the people
...

Ha!  Try six minutes or so.  I'll bet there will be a pretty nice bounty for exclusive use of the first 'gavintaint' (as disgusting as that sounds) and it is fairly cheap to spam a block to capacity...since all the Libertarians here are dead-set on subsidizing Bitcoin for the huddled masses to use.  An amazing quailty of Bitcoin is that it can turn Libertarians into Socialist.  Go figure.

'gavintaint' is kind of like the bathtub ring left by The Cat In The Hat so it won't be hard to come by, but it might be handy to be the first guy get access to some.  I predict that as soon as gavintaint is available there will be a big rush by many hodlers to double-up.  This should fill your 'B' blocks for some time.

Gavincoin is the Obamacare of crypto; we have to pass it in order to find out what it does!   

Not all of the Libertarians here believe Bitcoin needs to keep handing out free-samples, much less expand our free-sample giveaway program 20 times larger, followed by 40% annual increases.

Some of us see the value in doing one thing better than anyone else, instead of being all coins to all people at the cost of our original identity and niche.  Some of believe Bitcoin should start charging whatever prices the market will bear for its amazing utility, instead of eternally subsidizing (at the cost of network resilience and survivability) chain bloating latte purchases and Counterparty spam.

I can't wait to see what MP and his compatriots will and won't do in the Fork Wars.  Gavintaint is the most fearsome weapon in their arsenal, and we may also see pool users bribed to hash for the belligerents' fork of choice.

CKpool would be a great platform for Mircea Poolescu, which offers miners unbeatable rates for their support of Bitcoin Classic...

[iCEBREAKER]

Bitcoin is no stronger than its ability to deal with an attack such as was undertaken against Kim Dotcom.

^This^ is why we must keep Bitcoin small, nimble, diffuse, and defensible.

You mean small blocks can stop US Marshals from breaking down your doors and taking your stuff?

My doors?  My stuff?  You need to learn what the words "defensible" and "diffuse" mean!

Small blocks and their low propagation times/bandwidth requirements are important because of this:

Some people may remember 'megauploads'.  The case is instructive.

At its peak it accounted for a noticeable percentage of total global internet traffic.  Then, at the flip of a switch it was gone along with everyone's data who had been using the service no matter what the nature of the data.

Why was it so trivial to shut down megauploads?  All of the gear and networks that the service used were trivial to identify and valuable to the owners.  

people who live under the assumption that somehow 'freedom' and 'fairness' is going to protect the Bitcoin network if the mainstream financial players, and thus U.S. govt, wants it shut down are living in a fantasy la-la-land.  There are several things which could keep it going:

 - It more useful alive than dead to the existing powers that be, and/or

 - It is decentralized and supported by gear which is both cloakable and dispensable by the operators.  There would need be a lot of potential operators and they can be born anywhere and pop up anywhere overnight.

[traincarswreck]

The scale canard is the same used by those opposing a gold standard.  Low TPS isn't an obstacle to scaling any more than a limited supply of gold.  The price of each simply increases and scaling is provided by quality (magnitude), not quantity, of transactions.  Substitution also plays a key role, as the more numerous but less important transactions migrate to secondary networks like silver/copper or Litecoin/Primecoin.

To me, and I come from a completely different paradigm, which is the obvious arising of a universal poker coin which cannot be said to be unrelated. The ideal poker markets that are eventually created by having a near instant and near costless means of exchange creates a cradle for a solution basically that is "quixcoin" (I "think" Szabo mentioned it recently and is Sergio L's coin). I am far from technical, but to me this is the birth of the actual implementation of "mental poker".  But I instantly get confronted with the question or assertion about why one would not just use bitcoin. This is of course in relation to many skilled type games, and the markets that support them.  Thats a mutibillion dollar industry that could snap over the bitcoin nearly over night which is contingent on bitcoin having some form or amount of limitations (transition from fiat to bitcoin, but ultimately to separate value from the game with separate "coins" protocols, or networks, however we view it all) . This is an incredibly interesting conversation.  I am almost sad I will not be able to share the contents and meaning with many people I know irl. Someone accuses someone of being a thief, but I think rather we must all think like thieves in order to create the ultra secure platform.

I think I do see an inevitable "test" or experiment, and so then there is a democratic choice, you can vote for change or not for change, you can try to be malicious or try to be cooperative.  

Here is the outline:
https://thewealthofchips.wordpress.com/2015/02/11/outline/

Here are notes on "dialogue" which may be useful:
https://thewealthofchips.wordpress.com/2015/02/12/notes-on-on-dialogue-and-in-relation-to-the-block-size-discussion-dialoue/

Thus everybody is quite free. It’s not like a mob where the collective mind takes over-not at all. It is something between the individual and the collective. It can move between them. It’s a harmony of the individual and the collective,in which the whole constantly moves toward coherence. So there is both a collective mind and an individual mind, and like a stream, the flow moves between them. The opinions, therefore, don’t matter so much. Eventually we may be somewhere between all these opinions, and we start to move beyond them in another direction-a tangential direction-into something new and creative.

Now, that would be the ideal situation. I’ve painted the ideal picture.

And so that is the ideal and we perhaps have the possibility for the truth of this, although somewhat shocking about how far back certain "protocol" technology may have gone:

The tacit process is common. It is shared. The sharing is not merely the explicit communication and the body language and all that, which are part of it, but there is also a deeper tacit process which is common. I think the whole human race knew this for a million years; and then in five thousand years of civilisation we have lost it, because our societies got too big to carry it out.

With respect to TWON it might simply have been the outgrowing (or sinking ;p) of continents and especially in relation to the sea or "other lands" and the feasibility/economics of conquering/discovering them that caused us to "lose" this 'technology' bohm speaks of.

Very related vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRn23dQ_uJA

And then an auspicious comparison by bohm:



If the possibility of the choice of two coins arises, there might be some helpful strategy here: http://unenumerated.blogspot.ca/2008/03/logical-emergence-of-money-from-barter.html#links