Bitcoins - digital currency

Everyone is poor. They are obese because the only food they can afford is unhealthy crap. They can't afford activities. They gamble because they see no other way out.

Fix the money. Fix the world.

How does bitcoin cure the world of addiction ?

The world is better with Bitcoin compare to fiat, yes .
It’s all about debt .
Bitcoin is the opposite of debt .
That is why Bitcoin goes up so much , countering government borrowing too much .

Your response is completely unrelated to climate.

Do you understand English or just throw out random words in the hope that they mean something ?

If you can’t see over consumption (which is clearly boosted by debt) do not have massive implication on the climate then I can’t help you there .

It's very strange to me that you are so active in this thread about Bitcoin when you have no belief in the technology, and most of what you're posting is completely unrelated to Bitcoin.

Bitcoin's biggest strength is ultimately to provide a store of value that is theoretically deflationary and immune from inflation. Only 21 million Bitcoin will ever exist (19 million already in circulation), yet it can be subdivided into smaller fractions indefinitely. Thus it provides a store of value and a means of transferring that value which should be immune from the negative effects of inflation. In fact the value should theoretically increase due to increased demand and increased efficiency of producing goods and services.

Since 2019 prices for many items have doubled. Much of this can be attributed to the total amount of US currency in circulation increasing from 1, 759 billion in 2019 to more than 2, 322 billion (as of 2024, https://www.uscurrency.gov/life-cycle/da... Meanwhile the value of Bitcoin has increased from $16, 000 in 2019 to more than $80, 000 currently.

When the amount of paper money in circulation increases but the supply of goods and services does not increase, prices go up. The value of people's savings is effectively taxed and seized without legislation. Bitcoin combats this injustice.

Simple example: There are 100 "apple coupons" and 100 apples. Each coupon can be exchanged for 1 apple. Now pretend you print out 100 more "apple coupons." Now there are 200 "apple coupons" but still only 100 apples.

The value of an apple coupon has effectively gone from 1 apple to 1/2 apple. If you worked hard and saved up 10 apple coupons, thinking you had 10 apples, half of them have effectively been taken from you, and you now only have 5 apples.

Enter Bitcoin. A peer to peer method for storing and transferring value with a fixed supply. That sure makes a lot of sense to me.

Of course there are risks.

1. It's likely that speculative bubbles can and will occur during the adoption phase. This has already happened several times as Bitcoin's price rises tremendously, only to fall precipitously.

2. Quantum computing and AI could potentially crack bitcoin's encryption. This is an existential risk as people could completely abandon the technology and the value could plummet to 0 if people perceive that it does not safely and effectively perform it's function.

3. Government regulation/banning: Government's have a pretty good thing going printing money out of thin air and taking the value from people's money. They could ban Bitcoin and blame climate change, forcing you to use their CBDC. This one could be the biggest risk.

4. Yes Bitcoin uses energy. However everything uses energy. Energy usage is not the cause of climate change. There are clean energy sources available, such as nuclear, hydroelectric, solar, wind, etc.

1) There are already plenty of assets with a fixed supply. Metals. Land. Commodities like coffee. Fixed resources which people can convert into something useful.

We don't need more of them.

2) Governments do more than just print money. They provide armies. Police. Firefighters. Education. Roads. Courts and laws. Public utilities. Regulation of shared public infrastucture. Ports. Democratic elections. Border control.

3) There are obviously other forms of energy which don't have the same carbon footprint as fossil fuels. But the demand for energy is growing faster than the supply of renewables. Fossil fuel use is not declining, partly as a result of unnecessary tech like BTC.

I think there is a huge difference in the credibility of a person who can predict a market outcome in advance vs someone who comes in after the fact and says that he saw it coming.

This is a barometer of one's ability to discern market forces in advance ..... something which some people might consider valuable.

I'm going on record because survival of the fittest requires a competition of ideas. If BTC craters, I want the credit for having given the most useful advice. If it becomes what my opponents indicate they believe it will be ..... I'm willing to take the criticism. I'm pitting my view of the world against theirs.

Time will provide the answers.

There is another form of currency in the world. Credibility is a form of currency. The ability to anticipate future trends is a valuable form of credibility.

Well it could certainly crater. It's a high risk speculative asset at this point (in most peoples' opinions), but the use case is strong and it's serving a real purpose right now. It just seems like you're kind of beating a dead horse arguing with everyone.

Also what's up with some of your language here... Survival of the fittest? My opponents? It seems unnecessarily adversarial. You could just not buy it then laugh when all the suckers lose their money if that's what you think is going to happen.

The survival of the fittest language is intentional. I see this a competition between the people who choose the freedom to pollute shared public resources with impunity vs those who want to protect those shared resources. I think the survival of human civilization is genuinely on the line in this competition.

Second .... I'm not someone who takes any pleasure in the suffering of others so laughing at their future losses holds no appeal.

To the extent that I have any intelligence to offer the world, I want to make use of it for that purpose. It's not trying to engage in a dick measuring contest. There are young people and future generations whose future is imperiled by environmental destruction. Protecting them is a worthy cause. Debating that potential is something that should be valued in a society which claims to be open to ideas and values freedom of speech.

I don't expect people to agree with me just because I make a claim. But if make claims and over time they turn out to be accurate, then it bolsters my credibility.

fyi - those young people whose future I am interested in protecting ..... they will be inheriting the responsibility for running the government when old people naturally depart the scene and the consequences of my generation's environmental nonchalance is going to be falling in their laps as climate changes rather abruptly.

Exactly. Governments print money which causes inflation. Business input costs increase and they have to do one or more of three things to pass these onto the customer.

1) Pass the costs onto consumer directly with price rises caused by the inflation
2) Shrinkflation - keep the prices the same but lower the size of the product by 10% or whatever.
3) The third option is the most insidious imo - lower the quality of the product and put cheaper ingredients or materials into it to keep the costs down to what they were before.

It is because of option 3 in food that we are facing the obesity crisis. Which causes knock on effects in society as the populations health declines. These effects cause the state to print more money.

The businesses can also just to try cut costs which leads to more unemployment and more government spending leading to a bigger state that again requires more money printing.

The inflation also causes more families to be unable to afford children or housing leading to a decline in the birth rate, which leads to an aging population that cant be supported without more money printing. It also causes a mental health crisis in the population as everything becomes unaffordable and people live for today not tomorrow.

The fiat system also tricks people into thinking they are getting more wealthy when they are not. The wealthy can invest in assets which go up as the government prints more money. This drives inequality and makes the poor poorer and the people without assets the new poor. However even the people with assets are getting stolen from. They go up with the money printer but they face more and more taxes on their "gains" so in effect its death by a thousand cuts. The fiat system is institutional theft.

I'm checking out of this merry go round. See ya'll when we hit the next ATH. Good luck Nut Nut. Maybe go work on your commune instead of trying to change water into wine here?

There are other things which cause inflation besides the printing of money. Bitcoin doesn't eliminate inflation.

Increasing scarcity of resources causes inflation. Tariffs cause inflation. Anti-trust activity causes inflation.

If a currency like bitcoin remains fixed in supply and demand for a commodity like coffee grows faster than supply, then the price of coffee will go up regardless of which currency is being used to pay for it.

Scarcity in a resource may increase its price, and the price of things derived from it, but the money to pay that higher price has to come from somewhere. Same with tariffs, they alone won't cause inflation. The tariff gets paid and something else doesn't get paid for (until the governments spend that tariff money, then its a wash). These things won't cause the general rise in ALL prices that we see from currency debasement.

https://www.econlib.org/persistent-inflation-is-always-and-everywhere-a-monetary-phenomenon/

Econlib

Persistent inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon - Econlib

Y’all arguing with someone’s AI project.

AI is smarter than this.

Nut Nut just wants to talk doomer **** with the boys and I guess hes no longer getting his fix from the P&S guys

I'm actually working on a book in the background.

You all are doing a good job of surfacing the denial arguments.

The doomer **** is just realism coordi. The plastic levels in our brains. The overturning ocean circulation stopping. The fact that Earth hasn't seen greenhouse gase levels like this in over 3 million years .... it's all peer reviewed science. The AI and robotics to replace human labor is being implemented.

One way or another, an ideology which involves the freedom to pollute our only habitable is destined to fail in a spectacular way. Those homeowner's insurance premiums are a sort of canary in the coal mine.

When BTC goes extinct, some folks may look back and appreciate my doomer **** :-)

My formative experience was being a Jewish kid in a world which had recently exterminated 30-40% of my tribe. It's enlightening to learn what humans are capable of at a young age. Exterminating humans with the same kind of industrial efficiency that we use to turn pigs into ham.

There was a movement which arose in response to that ..... "Never Again" was the slogan.

But how do we manifest that mission ...... what would we do differently if we had to do it over again ?

My response is not to be silent.

I understand that most people can not wrap their heads around what it means to change the Earth's chemistry so radically. Just as people could not wrap their heads around Auschwitz a century ago until they had seen it for themselves. So .... people will need to see it for themselves. As for me .... I'm not going to be silent. Bitcoin is part of the problem .... not a solution to anything meaningful and it's destined for extinction.

If bullish sentiments are allowed, bearish sentiments should also be allowed.

How do we prevent plastic from going into our brains? I kind of want this to not happen. Are there precautions to take that limit our exposure?

As far as Bitcoin is concerned, I do feel like there are probably significantly worse things for the environment.

Unfortunately, it's really not possible to avoid plastics in the brain. It's in the water. It's in the sky and rains down into the soil so it's in the food supply.

There are indeed worse things than Bitcoin for the environment. Recreational jet travel. Beef. Things which are much more socially entrenched.

Non-recreational jet travel is better for the environment than bitcoin?

Nut Nut would love to decide for all of us which energy uses are essential and which are frivolous.

Essential is what is necessary to survive and that includes limiting pollution caused by non-essential activities.

If a society relinquishes the resolve to survive, it will perish. Someone(s) must have the authority to do what is necessary to survive.

Frankly, I would rather it be someone else making the decisions. I don't want to deal with all of the selfish and ignorant whiners. But if no one else is willing, then yeah, I'd do it. Someone must.