Bitcoin's energy use is what secures it. It's also a great use of otherwise wasted energy, from hydropower that goes unused in remote regions to the oil/gas industry using it rather than flaring off excess. If proof of stake proves to be superior, Bitcoin can switch to that.
Proof of work is only good insofar as you have energy to burn. As @HoustonHusky noted, China is doing a lot of mining now a days. Proof of stake certainly has its own issues, but saying that using gas that would otherwise be flared makes this a good system doesn't make sense to me. That isn't scalable and having a financial system based on having excess, unusable energy doesn't strike me as stable long term.
You mention switching to proof of state as an option - but that is what I mean by saying I'm not sure how they pivot. I am not sure how you cut over. Freeze the currency and tell everyone to get a new core? That sounds easier said than done to me.
Proof of stake has lots of issues. Ethereum is switching to it though so it can be the guinea pig both in terms of implementation (fork + airdrop?) and in terms of whether it actually works. My guess is it will be a little less secure and also trend towards centralization over time, which is why I'd be against it in the first place. But Ethereum is more about faking decentralization and security so it may work for them and not Bitcoin.
Talking about gas flares was only to point out one of the ways that Bitcoin unlocks otherwise stranded/wasted energy. It's not the main point, but it is certainly relevant when talking about energy usage. Of course the current banking system and gold also use a ton of energy, but the critics largely overlook that.
Not directly on-topic, but I was visiting my mom this weekend, and she told me that my uncle's son (whatever that makes him to me), who has not been exactly a home run kid - certainly not damned near perfect - made $150,000 on bitcoin. His investment was $10,000. Of course, this is a branch of the family we don't write about that much. He'll be playing with that "house money" until someone fucks it out of him in no time.
That is the fundamental difference between that branch and my branch. That branch is loaded with academically and artistically talented people, and also loaded with a lot of bad life choices. That branch will take the $140k and pretend like it never mattered and roll it until it's gone.
My branch, let's call us the slow strategy group, would first breathe a sigh of release we didn't lose the $10,000, and then take the $140,000 as a sign from God that he wanted us to have it, and we'd bank it.
Energy is the security of Bitcoin. The more miners fighting to mint blocks, and nodes verifying blocks, the more secure the blockchain is from cheaters. I’m no expert, just been reading up lately on it; I’ve heard it compared to the US dollar being secured by the military. Without that security, oil isn’t traded in US dollars. Without the world trading on US dollar, the value of the money would plummet.
There are Bitcoin mining companies like Great American Mining (https://gam.ai/)that setup near natural gas mining sites to buy the flare gas for energy to mine Bitcoin. These natural gas sites are far from populous areas where there isn’t a real use for that gas and they’re putting the otherwise wasted flare offs to a profitable use. Also pretty cool, the Bitcoin miners aren’t using large data centers to run their rigs; these are mobile platforms that can move to new sites with the energy source.
Edit: what buffbuffpass said
Jay Chinslee just pretty much banned natural gas in the State of Washington. But but global warming - riiiiight.
If people don't think politics and economics are essentially one and the same, they are daft.
TTTTT, I know.
Global warming is a fact. Take your conspiracy theories to the Tug.
The question is if human release of carbon is really moving the needle, or if the earth goes through cycles. Is the science settled on that point?
IDK, but I know the entire world is going after carbon-neutral with a hard-on. I had no idea Formula 1 was using hybrid power units and is aiming for carbon neutrality by 2030.
The science is settled. We understand milankovitch cycles. The human overprint is large and obvious.
We understand it so much that all of our models have been utterly wrong. Heck, we recently just found that all of the satellite measured CO2 radiation data has been well under even the most optimistic predictions...in normal times that would be good news but because it goes against the narrative it’s ignored.
Think of it this way...the atmosphere is on average somewhat around 2% water...a gas that absorbs more greatly across the infrared spectrum than CO2. Meanwhile CO2 is measured in parts per million. Even the models admit direct changes in CO2 aren’t enough to move the needle significantly, so the models have multiplier effects (increase in CO2 cause x to happen, x causes more warming...now we get severe temperature rise). Unfortunately for the fear mongers and fortunately for the world these models have failed miserably in predicting anything since they started this in the 1990s.
The statistic fraud of the “historical” temperature is an entirely different beast...as a good example Michael Mann is nothing more than a charlatan. And I’m still looking for a good explanation as to how the pre-1970 historical temperature record changed between the 1980s and 1990s...it’s almost as if it’s magic.
Or a religion.
I don't know what YouTube videos you've been watching but your generalizations here are simply wrong. If you want to discuss this in a different thread, feel free to pull up the literature reviews that do the metaanalysis on the accuracy of climate models and we can talk.
Bitcoin's energy use is what secures it. It's also a great use of otherwise wasted energy, from hydropower that goes unused in remote regions to the oil/gas industry using it rather than flaring off excess. If proof of stake proves to be superior, Bitcoin can switch to that.
Proof of work is only good insofar as you have energy to burn. As @HoustonHusky noted, China is doing a lot of mining now a days. Proof of stake certainly has its own issues, but saying that using gas that would otherwise be flared makes this a good system doesn't make sense to me. That isn't scalable and having a financial system based on having excess, unusable energy doesn't strike me as stable long term.
You mention switching to proof of state as an option - but that is what I mean by saying I'm not sure how they pivot. I am not sure how you cut over. Freeze the currency and tell everyone to get a new core? That sounds easier said than done to me.
Proof of stake has lots of issues. Ethereum is switching to it though so it can be the guinea pig both in terms of implementation (fork + airdrop?) and in terms of whether it actually works. My guess is it will be a little less secure and also trend towards centralization over time, which is why I'd be against it in the first place. But Ethereum is more about faking decentralization and security so it may work for them and not Bitcoin.
Talking about gas flares was only to point out one of the ways that Bitcoin unlocks otherwise stranded/wasted energy. It's not the main point, but it is certainly relevant when talking about energy usage. Of course the current banking system and gold also use a ton of energy, but the critics largely overlook that.
The current system certainly uses plenty of energy, but it does not have the same mechanisms of scaling. Bitcoin can scale back, but that goes back to my concern about stability when that occurs. I would hate for some folks to pull out because the energy costs got to steep, so now China exceeds 50% of the work.
That is a fair point on Ethereum - they will be able to pave the way here - significantly mitigates that risk for Bitcoin which I felt was their biggest hurdle. Even if Ethereum fails over this, Bitcoin could take the lessons learned if they had to try to go that route.
Energy is the security of Bitcoin. The more miners fighting to mint blocks, and nodes verifying blocks, the more secure the blockchain is from cheaters. I’m no expert, just been reading up lately on it; I’ve heard it compared to the US dollar being secured by the military. Without that security, oil isn’t traded in US dollars. Without the world trading on US dollar, the value of the money would plummet.
There are Bitcoin mining companies like Great American Mining (https://gam.ai/)that setup near natural gas mining sites to buy the flare gas for energy to mine Bitcoin. These natural gas sites are far from populous areas where there isn’t a real use for that gas and they’re putting the otherwise wasted flare offs to a profitable use. Also pretty cool, the Bitcoin miners aren’t using large data centers to run their rigs; these are mobile platforms that can move to new sites with the energy source.
Edit: what buffbuffpass said
Jay Chinslee just pretty much banned natural gas in the State of Washington. But but global warming - riiiiight.
If people don't think politics and economics are essentially one and the same, they are daft.
TTTTT, I know.
Global warming is a fact. Take your conspiracy theories to the Tug.
The question is if human release of carbon is really moving the needle, or if the earth goes through cycles. Is the science settled on that point?
IDK, but I know the entire world is going after carbon-neutral with a hard-on. I had no idea Formula 1 was using hybrid power units and is aiming for carbon neutrality by 2030.
The science is settled. We understand milankovitch cycles. The human overprint is large and obvious.
We understand it so much that all of our models have been utterly wrong. Heck, we recently just found that all of the satellite measured CO2 radiation data has been well under even the most optimistic predictions...in normal times that would be good news but because it goes against the narrative it’s ignored.
Think of it this way...the atmosphere is on average somewhat around 2% water...a gas that absorbs more greatly across the infrared spectrum than CO2. Meanwhile CO2 is measured in parts per million. Even the models admit direct changes in CO2 aren’t enough to move the needle significantly, so the models have multiplier effects (increase in CO2 cause x to happen, x causes more warming...now we get severe temperature rise). Unfortunately for the fear mongers and fortunately for the world these models have failed miserably in predicting anything since they started this in the 1990s.
The statistic fraud of the “historical” temperature is an entirely different beast...as a good example Michael Mann is nothing more than a charlatan. And I’m still looking for a good explanation as to how the pre-1970 historical temperature record changed between the 1980s and 1990s...it’s almost as if it’s magic.
Or a religion.
I don't know what YouTube videos you've been watching but your generalizations here are simply wrong. If you want to discuss this in a different thread, feel free to pull up the literature reviews that do the metaanalysis on the accuracy of climate models and we can talk.
I’m not sure what is worse...the arrogance of that response or the weakness of it. Youtube?
You going to claim the models that have failed miserably the last 30 years are now somehow accurate and questioning them is sacrilegious? Or that the historical temperature dataset isn’t a mess? Or that the hockey stick is somehow fake but real?
Believe what you want...don’t really care...but to say the science is “settled” is not only ignorant but flies in the face of the last 30 years.
I’ve got nothing against green technology...heck I think some of my patents in it are quite good...but I absolutely despise fear porn from “settled science” and the forcing of what end up being horrible decisions from it. Heck...look at the last year with the world’s COVID response. And the last thing we need is some megalomaniac like Bill Gates doing something stupid like pouring dust in the atmosphere to ‘save the world’ from global warming and causing a true catastrophe.
Comments
Talking about gas flares was only to point out one of the ways that Bitcoin unlocks otherwise stranded/wasted energy. It's not the main point, but it is certainly relevant when talking about energy usage. Of course the current banking system and gold also use a ton of energy, but the critics largely overlook that.
That is the fundamental difference between that branch and my branch. That branch is loaded with academically and artistically talented people, and also loaded with a lot of bad life choices. That branch will take the $140k and pretend like it never mattered and roll it until it's gone.
My branch, let's call us the slow strategy group, would first breathe a sigh of release we didn't lose the $10,000, and then take the $140,000 as a sign from God that he wanted us to have it, and we'd bank it.
That is a fair point on Ethereum - they will be able to pave the way here - significantly mitigates that risk for Bitcoin which I felt was their biggest hurdle. Even if Ethereum fails over this, Bitcoin could take the lessons learned if they had to try to go that route.
You going to claim the models that have failed miserably the last 30 years are now somehow accurate and questioning them is sacrilegious? Or that the historical temperature dataset isn’t a mess? Or that the hockey stick is somehow fake but real?
Believe what you want...don’t really care...but to say the science is “settled” is not only ignorant but flies in the face of the last 30 years.
I’ve got nothing against green technology...heck I think some of my patents in it are quite good...but I absolutely despise fear porn from “settled science” and the forcing of what end up being horrible decisions from it. Heck...look at the last year with the world’s COVID response. And the last thing we need is some megalomaniac like Bill Gates doing something stupid like pouring dust in the atmosphere to ‘save the world’ from global warming and causing a true catastrophe.