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Welcome back everyone. 
I'm Bennett Tomlin and I'm 

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joined as usual by my partner in
crime mr. 

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Caspian Sea cats. 
How are you doing? 

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I'm doing fine. 
We have a little background 

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noise but other than that, I'm 
good. 

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How about you Bennett? 
How are you? 

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I'm doing pretty well. 
Today, we're joined by a very 

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special guest dr. 
Michael Warren. 

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A professor of mathematics at 
the University of Oregon and the

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author of the recent textbook 
Bitcoin a game theory. 

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Dick analysis. 
How are you doing today? 

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Micah do it. 
All right, we brought you on 

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here today to talk a little bit 
about what makes Bitcoin secure 

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and what makes Bitcoin not 
secure. 

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So let's start with the first 
half of that. 

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What helps keep Bitcoin secure. 
Well I guess if you're going to 

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answer that question, you have 
to ask what is attacking 

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Bitcoin. 
It used to be that. 

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I think people thought the 
biggest Threat Vector was people

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doing double spins and this was 
like in the early days. 

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Is when, you know, you could 
mine a few blocks on your 

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laptop. 
It was very possible that you 

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could go you know sell somebody 
some some bike parts on 

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Craigslist and then go home and 
then line up all your laptops 

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and maybe try to do a double 
spend or something. 

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And you get the get the $50 back
somehow but those days are long 

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over and now it's very hard to 
do a double spin this. 

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So I think the major thing that 
Bitcoin has to worry about is 

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miners clewd. 
Being or, you know, somehow 

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acquired in lots of hash rate 
and is taking over the whole 

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network and then basically 
owning the network. 

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So less perhaps about like 
directly trying to profit from a

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double spend. 
And more about trying to either 

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like, take on a censorious 
position in the network or gain 

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some other type of advantageous 
position in the network in that 

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vein. 
What do you think is the least 

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appreciated weakness by most 
Bitcoin Advocates? 

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Like what do you think is most 
commonly missed when they're 

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thinking through like bit. 
Insecurity and how it works. 

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So I think they'd believe that 
it's impossible that there. 

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It's impossible to 51% attack 
the network because it just it's

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impossible because 51% is too 
much. 

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But the thing about 51% is it's 
less than a hundred percent. 

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So, you know, the the entire to 
the hash work of all the hash 

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rate is 100 percent. 15 percent 
is in e is a subset of that. 

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Like all you need is those 
miners to agree and most people 

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believe this will not happen but
But over time, I think the 

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security considerations are 
going to change and it will be 

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more advantageous for minors. 
Who are, you know, really just 

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fighting over over scraps to 
start to make collusive, 

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agreements to kind of like forms
sort of soft trusts and start to

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work towards more of a 
collusive, monopolistic type of 

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security. 
Well and when you say the 

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incentives are going to change 
what we're Mostly talking about 

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is like, the fat is the 
happenings, right? 

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Is that every four years, the 
amount of new Bitcoins available

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to the minors goes down and 
because of that, the incentive 

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start to change around that, 
right? 

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This is one of the most obvious 
ones but there's also going to 

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be other other factors. 
Like the fact that it's not a 

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new thing. 
And the miners aren't like kind 

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of like early adopters that are 
trying to boost the technology. 

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Like if you go out 20 years from
now Bitcoin if it's around will 

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just be another thing. 
Like email and you won't have 

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people like, you know, basing 
their lives like around with a 

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personality or you know that 
they are excited about email or 

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something. 
And if it's just another way to 

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make money and if your business 
comes or goes, it's I think less

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of a I still think we're kind of
in the in the early stages where

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people are trying to get us to 
get to the point where it's got 

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Mass adoption and it's and it's 
credible and it's viable. 

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And and if it if it never 
crosses that point where you no 

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longer, Trying to make his case 
to the public that it does work.

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Then the miners can kind of look
at each other and start going 

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after each other is profits and 
things like that. 

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Haven't the miners already done 
a meeting like in the past where

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they like had to discuss how I 
don't remember if it was a 

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mining pool or if it was miners 
themselves where they had to 

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like discuss that they were 
controlling too much of the hash

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rate and like to Tamp it down, I
thought that happened already 

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and my there was imagining that 
it was one event. 

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I don't know if The same weather
is a mining pool back in like 

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2014 g, hash where they, they 
had claimed over 55% of the 

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blocks or something like that 
and then everybody kind of 

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freaked out and left the pool. 
This is a pool, so it's not the 

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same thing. 
And of course that was 2014 I 

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think which is like, Bitcoin was
five years old and like it was 

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still very much a small hobbyist
thing and so people would would 

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look at that - lie back then it 
wasn't you didn't have Michael 

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sailor holding like Millions of 
dollars of its public Company's 

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stock in this thing. 
So I think they said of 

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incentives were a little bit 
different back then, so and I 

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don't. 
So I guess I'm saying I'm think 

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they would necessarily run away,
they would see this as this. 

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This horrible nightmare as they 
did when it was understood you 

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know ten years ago. 
The Bitcoin was kind of an 

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experiment. 
I think once people no longer 

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think of it as an experiment to 
think of it as a functioning 

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thing, they're less, they're 
more likely to kind of go after 

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the little you know, that's a 
profit here and there that they 

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can. 
And where they might not have 

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done 10 years ago. 
One thing that I think you've 

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actually changed my mind. 
Done more recently relates to 

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like the market fragility 
hypothesis and like conceptual 

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failures of Bitcoin. 
Can you talk a little bit about 

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what those mean in this context?
Yeah, so probably the main 

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security assumption that most 
people make is that miners will 

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never collude to attack the 
network because that would be 

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the end of Bitcoin like and this
is definitely like it was true 

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10 years. 
If all the miners would have 

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said, okay, we are just taking 
over the network monopolizing, 

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it it would have been a matter 
of months before it was just it 

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was history, right? 
Like nobody would have put up 

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with that, but over the last 10 
years, where we've had all these

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people stepping up and selling 
this is like a long-term store 

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of value, it's a hedge against 
inflation. 

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It's this useful way to, you 
know cut out the credit card 

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companies fees using lightning. 
It's a useful way to send money.

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He oversees, it's a, it's a 
weighted to, you know, that 

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dissidents, you know, fighting 
dictators in foreign countries 

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can like, you know, collect 
money can move it around and you

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know, all this, these great 
properties. 

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A lot of these properties don't 
100% require a non Monopoly. 

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Might it's like, if there were 
four companies that were coded, 

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there were sort of, like, kind 
of, like colluding to, to mine 

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and kind of, you know, had some 
sort of trust Arrangement where 

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they were keeping Hash rate slow
or something. 

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You know you can still you can 
still send money to to somebody 

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in some other country. 
You could still do all these 

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things, you can still store your
value and watch the number to go

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up and then sell everything. 
So I don't think it's the same 

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situation where if, if someone 
started, if some Corporation 

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decided to move in and took sort
of a heavier and heavier, 

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portion of the hash rate 
started, selfish mining started 

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forming some degree. 
Pants with other mining 

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corporations, I don't think 
everyone would run for the 

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exits. 
So that's that's what I call the

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Market fragility. 
Hypothesis, and it's what people

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used to believe, but I don't 
think it's true. 

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What's the incentive that these 
miners would have to collude at 

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that, at that point, like, what 
are they doing? 

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That is making this a profitable
Venture for them. 

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Well, so, in theory, my name is 
a very competitive industry, 

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right? 
It's supposedly like somewhat 

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like a perfectly competitive. 
And in all the hash, you know, 

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the hash is basically fungible 
and you're just Everybody's 

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fighting for these, the small 
margins. 

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So if you're spending, you know,
say globally. 

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If the this pinned to try to get
Bitcoin by minors is 10 billion 

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dollars, in a year, they might 
be getting like, eleven billion 

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dollars in return. 
And so, these are sort of, ain't

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it might be much less. 
They're getting some very small 

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profit margins, but if you can 
conclude if 51% of you decide to

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do this, you Spend five point 
three billion dollars, and you 

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can get that same 11 billion 
dollars in Revenue. 

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So your, your profit margin is 
just like jumped by an order of 

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magnitude or two. 
So and it goes beyond that. 

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Like once you have a monopoly, 
like once you are, you get to 

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say, you can actually do other 
things like differential 

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pricing. 
You can make. 

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You can insist that. 
If someone's going to send a 

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million dollar transaction, they
include a 200 dollar fee. 

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Like that and you can kind of 
make your own rules where you 

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couldn't do that in the way. 
It's a it's a much more 

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favorable to the, to the trans 
actors in the current landscape.

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So if they're able to do this 
and collude to compromise that 

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in these ways that make it much 
more profitable for them. 

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What's to keep people using it 
at that point? 

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Like why would people want to 
stick around on the Bitcoin 

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blockchain? 
So this is something which I 

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mean you think about why do 
people use Twitter? 

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Why do people use Facebook? 
Why do people use Google? 

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Why do people use a lot of 
things? 

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Why do people use GrubHub? 
I recently heard this term that 

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Cory doctorow came up with 
called and shit application and 

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it's this process happens to 
almost everything on the 

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internet where it starts out as 
kind of a useful thing. 

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You know, it's useful like 
Facebook like you know when you 

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know, 15 years ago is kind of 
nice. 

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You You just kept up with your 
friends, kept up, you know met 

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up case and with people in other
states that you realize we're 

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like one town over that kind of 
thing and like it was kind of 

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cool. 
I like Facebook 15 years ago 

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then a decade later. 
It's like I'm arguing with I do 

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some guy didn't go to high 
school with about gun control or

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something and watching my family
members go down like you and on 

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rabbit holes and it's become 
like a really shitty place and 

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you look at what happens to lots
of. 

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Network Internet phenomenon like
like uber was actually kind of 

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convenient and cheaper like 10 
years ago it was that. 

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I mean recently is actually not 
like I recently have used cabs 

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and found that like actually 
much more cheaper and convenient

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than Ubers. 
There's a lot of things where 

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the whole model of a lot of the 
the internet business over the 

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last 10-15 years is to like 
capture some sort of network 

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effect. 
Make sure that everybody's using

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the network they don't really 
have any viable. 

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Herbs, which fill that role and 
then just let it kind of 

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deteriorate to the point where 
they're capturing all the 

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00:11:14,200 --> 00:11:17,200
Surplus. 
So don't you think though and 

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and you know, maybe you'll tell 
me I'm absolutely wrong here. 

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But like don't you think that 
the stickiness of these networks

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is maybe not as sticky as Uber 
and Lyft like uber and Lyft were

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able to in a sense monopolize, 
the taxicab customer base and 

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taxicabs kind of disintegrated 
that industry industry. 

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Integrated and now people don't 
even think about using cabs as 

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an alternative anymore. 
I am like, I'm curious what 

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would keep people on the Bitcoin
Network? 

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00:11:48,800 --> 00:11:51,700
Like why would they be sticky? 
Why would they want to stay on 

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the Bitcoin network? 
If it felt like it was 

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compromised, if there was clear 
like collusion between miners or

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something along those lines? 
Well this is the, you know, 

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there can be only one like you 
know, that's what that's what 

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the Michael Sailors are trying 
to create, is this? 

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There is one store value. 
It is. 

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00:12:08,100 --> 00:12:10,700
Has been going, you're either 
off it or you're on it and if 

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you're you know, you're not long
at your short. 

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00:12:12,300 --> 00:12:15,800
It's like we all have to agree 
that this is a store of value 

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and if we all agree that to that
then you know where do we go? 

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If someone decides to defect 
that you just sell it and then 

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00:12:23,200 --> 00:12:27,100
go home or we can just agree 
that it's still working like the

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numbers still going up. 
The number, you know, all these 

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things are still happening. 
Like it's it's a slow process 

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where like like, you know, 
you're sort of rational in this 

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00:12:35,900 --> 00:12:38,700
overtime. 
You're like, okay, To slightly I

226
00:12:38,708 --> 00:12:41,200
mean, you know it's like you 
know, Facebook, whatever. 

227
00:12:41,200 --> 00:12:44,000
At some point you eventually 
dumping but like a lot of 

228
00:12:44,000 --> 00:12:47,300
people, it takes them five or 
ten years or Twitter you use it.

229
00:12:47,300 --> 00:12:50,800
You keep using Twitter even 
though like it's run by someone 

230
00:12:50,800 --> 00:12:54,000
who's like actively and shit 
Define it like speedrunning this

231
00:12:54,000 --> 00:12:58,300
whole thing but you know that 
like at some point it might not 

232
00:12:58,300 --> 00:13:00,800
be there but you're still using 
it because you get more 

233
00:13:00,800 --> 00:13:03,100
engagement. 
You know I tried using Mastodon 

234
00:13:03,100 --> 00:13:06,000
and kind of kind of crept back 
over to Twitter a little bit 

235
00:13:06,000 --> 00:13:09,400
because like, like I Just 
there's just not the same level 

236
00:13:09,400 --> 00:13:12,200
of Engagement and so it's a 
network people use it. 

237
00:13:13,600 --> 00:13:15,600
There's that's inertia, is going
to last for a while. 

238
00:13:15,600 --> 00:13:19,400
It might Last 5 Years and might 
last 10 years, so this could be 

239
00:13:19,400 --> 00:13:21,700
the same thing with Bitcoin, you
go in and if you got ten years 

240
00:13:21,700 --> 00:13:23,700
of like, decent profits before 
the whole thing. 

241
00:13:23,700 --> 00:13:25,500
Collapses, you don't care. 
That's pretty good. 

242
00:13:25,600 --> 00:13:27,300
That's better. 
That's better than eking out. 

243
00:13:27,300 --> 00:13:31,200
These tiny, these tiny profits. 
You're fighting very 

244
00:13:31,200 --> 00:13:34,100
competitively with all the other
Miners, and like, Cass. 

245
00:13:34,100 --> 00:13:36,300
I think it's possible that like,
when you and I think about 

246
00:13:36,300 --> 00:13:39,000
Bitcoin, the first thing we 
think about it, We most relate 

247
00:13:39,000 --> 00:13:42,800
to with Bitcoin is its value as 
this censorship resistant medium

248
00:13:42,800 --> 00:13:46,200
of value, transfer rate, you can
send transactions that no one 

249
00:13:46,200 --> 00:13:49,000
else can stop a lot of the 
Bitcoin ethos. 

250
00:13:49,000 --> 00:13:53,600
At this point is oriented around
like number go up store value, 

251
00:13:53,800 --> 00:13:57,500
all of these things. 
That may be tangentially related

252
00:13:57,500 --> 00:14:01,800
to censorship resistant, but are
somewhat distinct. 

253
00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:04,100
And so you wonder if some of 
those people might be willing to

254
00:14:04,100 --> 00:14:07,800
tolerate some loss of censorship
resistance and this really kind 

255
00:14:07,800 --> 00:14:11,300
of came into Focus for me. 
Mike and I recently did a panel 

256
00:14:11,300 --> 00:14:15,300
together with the publisher of 
his textbook to talk about some 

257
00:14:15,300 --> 00:14:18,100
of this types of things and one 
of the other panelists mentioned

258
00:14:18,100 --> 00:14:21,700
that they'd heard from a staff 
member of a politician who is 

259
00:14:21,700 --> 00:14:26,300
asking, what would it take to 
get minors to agreed to like the

260
00:14:26,300 --> 00:14:28,600
most simple of censorious 
requests? 

261
00:14:28,600 --> 00:14:33,200
Like, let's say you never, 
again, do a transaction to any 

262
00:14:33,200 --> 00:14:35,500
of the ofac addresses. 
Let's start with that. 

263
00:14:35,700 --> 00:14:39,700
And like the idea I think is 
This type of take over this type

264
00:14:39,700 --> 00:14:42,300
of conceptual failure. 
Would happen, kind of slowly, 

265
00:14:42,500 --> 00:14:45,000
and in the smallest reasonable 
step each time. 

266
00:14:45,400 --> 00:14:48,200
Oh no, we're just no longer 
going to let you transact with 

267
00:14:48,200 --> 00:14:52,000
ofek addresses, but anyone else 
in the world you can still send 

268
00:14:52,000 --> 00:14:53,400
your Bitcoin to. 
Okay. 

269
00:14:53,400 --> 00:14:56,400
Now it's ofac addresses. 
Plus this list of addresses that

270
00:14:56,400 --> 00:15:00,600
are known to be related to child
sexual abuse material, right? 

271
00:15:00,600 --> 00:15:03,400
And eventually you keep pushing 
that until well, if we only have

272
00:15:03,400 --> 00:15:06,500
this many miners, does it really
matter if we start like cranking

273
00:15:06,500 --> 00:15:10,000
up the block size and making it?
Unfeasible for like a home user 

274
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:13,500
to verify the blockchain and 
gradually eventually you get to 

275
00:15:13,500 --> 00:15:16,600
the point where portions of the 
community of stripped off along 

276
00:15:16,600 --> 00:15:19,500
the way, but there was never 
like a single Schism event. 

277
00:15:19,500 --> 00:15:22,800
And so there was never like a 
true viable alternative until 

278
00:15:22,800 --> 00:15:26,500
Bitcoin is captured. 
So I've heard ten years, five 

279
00:15:26,500 --> 00:15:28,900
years. 
So, some sort of metric where 

280
00:15:28,900 --> 00:15:31,400
there's like a sustainable 
amount of time that they're 

281
00:15:31,400 --> 00:15:33,500
still volume. 
They're still users, they're 

282
00:15:33,500 --> 00:15:37,200
still trading going on on 
bitcoin. 

283
00:15:38,200 --> 00:15:42,600
But I'm just curious like we 
already have a lot of competitor

284
00:15:42,600 --> 00:15:46,100
chains in in essence, right? 
Like, I think mon Arrow has 

285
00:15:46,100 --> 00:15:50,400
taken over when, when Ben and I 
think about like, oh, censorship

286
00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:54,300
resistant, like, privacy money 
that isn't nation-state built. 

287
00:15:54,300 --> 00:15:57,600
Like, I think most people think 
about mineiro more who were like

288
00:15:57,600 --> 00:16:01,800
super into that stuff, I think 
there's other chains that are 

289
00:16:01,800 --> 00:16:05,700
more used for transact ability. 
Probably when I would hate to 

290
00:16:05,700 --> 00:16:09,600
admit it is like think people 
use Tron Cuz it's cheap and fast

291
00:16:10,400 --> 00:16:15,500
like I think there's there's 
actual movements Alana and stuff

292
00:16:15,500 --> 00:16:18,600
like that so I think they're 
like they are already capturing 

293
00:16:18,600 --> 00:16:22,700
some of these these people who 
were previously using Bitcoin. 

294
00:16:22,800 --> 00:16:24,200
Are we already seeing this 
happen? 

295
00:16:24,200 --> 00:16:28,000
Then in real time like without 
without nation states or minors 

296
00:16:28,000 --> 00:16:30,900
needing to do anything at all? 
Well I guess a good question is 

297
00:16:30,900 --> 00:16:33,500
like what what percentage do you
have this huge market cap? 

298
00:16:33,500 --> 00:16:37,900
You know half a billion to a 
trillion dollars in supposedly a

299
00:16:38,100 --> 00:16:39,900
Right. 
How many of these how did this 

300
00:16:39,900 --> 00:16:43,100
comes from? 
These people that would leave it

301
00:16:43,100 --> 00:16:46,500
immediately, go to mineiro and 
how about how much of this is, 

302
00:16:46,700 --> 00:16:49,200
you know, these people that just
want number go up and they don't

303
00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:52,100
really care. 
If this is a significant portion

304
00:16:52,400 --> 00:16:55,000
that, you know, shedding a few 
of these people over to the 

305
00:16:55,008 --> 00:16:58,600
narrow overtime or or the people
that just need a quick means of 

306
00:16:58,608 --> 00:17:01,800
transaction overseas. 
That's not going to have a 

307
00:17:01,800 --> 00:17:04,800
significant impact and it's 
might not be something that like

308
00:17:04,800 --> 00:17:10,300
a possible minor collusion. 
Group would would be afraid of 

309
00:17:10,400 --> 00:17:11,700
well. 
And what's interesting to me is 

310
00:17:11,700 --> 00:17:15,700
there's even kind of an argument
that at a certain point if 

311
00:17:15,700 --> 00:17:17,700
number go up. 
If the value of your investment 

312
00:17:17,700 --> 00:17:21,000
is your primary driving thing, 
censorship resistance, could 

313
00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:23,099
actually work against that, 
right? 

314
00:17:23,099 --> 00:17:26,800
If your Cohen token investment 
starts, getting the reputation 

315
00:17:26,800 --> 00:17:29,200
as being the funding mechanism 
of choice. 

316
00:17:29,200 --> 00:17:31,900
For all these societally, 
undesirable things. 

317
00:17:32,200 --> 00:17:35,500
The value of your investment is 
likely to suffer and so there's 

318
00:17:35,500 --> 00:17:37,900
kind of these points of 
Divergence. 

319
00:17:38,100 --> 00:17:40,900
Would potentially these 
competing interests of these 

320
00:17:40,900 --> 00:17:44,100
different people who all 
considered themselves bitcoiners

321
00:17:44,600 --> 00:17:48,200
threatened kind of like we're 
sticking Strictly To One 

322
00:17:48,200 --> 00:17:50,200
threatens the interest of this 
other group. 

323
00:17:50,300 --> 00:17:53,300
Yeah, I mean if there's a strong
collusion that can actually 

324
00:17:53,300 --> 00:17:56,000
could kill two birds with one 
stone and that they could 

325
00:17:56,000 --> 00:17:59,900
actually drop the hash rate like
significantly and that could you

326
00:17:59,900 --> 00:18:02,400
have to worry about these? 
You know billions of dollars 

327
00:18:02,400 --> 00:18:05,800
spent on electricity if you have
three or four corporations who 

328
00:18:05,800 --> 00:18:08,800
are controlling the hash rate 
that's now No longer concerned. 

329
00:18:08,800 --> 00:18:11,700
These corporations are also 
protected us from the really bad

330
00:18:11,700 --> 00:18:15,400
people at the same time and then
the rest of the, you know, the 

331
00:18:15,400 --> 00:18:18,500
rest of everybody could just put
their money in there and watch 

332
00:18:18,500 --> 00:18:22,000
the number go up, which might be
appealing to enough people that 

333
00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:23,600
you don't have to worry about 
this whole thing clap. 

334
00:18:23,600 --> 00:18:26,000
See ya. 
And so I just haven't thought 

335
00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:28,400
more about those types of 
conceptual failures over the 

336
00:18:28,400 --> 00:18:30,700
last several weeks as we're 
working through some of that. 

337
00:18:30,700 --> 00:18:33,900
I have founded and increasingly 
kind of compelling and 

338
00:18:33,900 --> 00:18:37,000
interesting vision of Bitcoin 
failure as opposed to just the 

339
00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:40,300
more direct Look this minor 
could make more money by double 

340
00:18:40,300 --> 00:18:44,600
spending this one transaction. 
One other thing you recently 

341
00:18:44,600 --> 00:18:49,200
wrote Was A Treatise, an essay a
piece where you decided to 

342
00:18:49,500 --> 00:18:53,700
respond to some arguments about 
whether or not Bitcoin ends 

343
00:18:53,700 --> 00:18:56,900
Wars. 
So what do you think does 

344
00:18:56,900 --> 00:19:01,500
Bitcoin end War? 
Yeah, pretty skeptical about 

345
00:19:01,500 --> 00:19:05,800
that. 
I don't know, I don't exactly 

346
00:19:05,800 --> 00:19:09,900
know, the mechanism by which it 
would So it's hard. 

347
00:19:10,500 --> 00:19:16,400
It's hard to formulate a good 
response to that but that is a 

348
00:19:16,400 --> 00:19:19,900
thing that has been argued by 
certain bitcoiners is that as 

349
00:19:19,900 --> 00:19:23,500
hyper Bitcoin is a shin occurs. 
It eliminates her severely 

350
00:19:23,500 --> 00:19:27,400
reduces the amount of hot Wars 
that would occur in the world. 

351
00:19:27,600 --> 00:19:30,100
Right. 
And that's a popular argument. 

352
00:19:30,100 --> 00:19:33,500
This is okay, this there's a 
real argument there, like like 

353
00:19:33,500 --> 00:19:35,900
Alex glad signs made this 
argument and just the the 

354
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:37,800
ability to print money and spend
it. 

355
00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:40,900
It means that you're always 
going to be spending it on 

356
00:19:40,900 --> 00:19:44,300
things like the military and 
this could be, this could be bad

357
00:19:44,300 --> 00:19:45,700
it. 
So I guess that's that's there's

358
00:19:45,700 --> 00:19:49,800
a reasonable arguments there. 
I don't know that. 

359
00:19:50,700 --> 00:19:55,300
I mean that's an argument for 
why Fiat and war is go together,

360
00:19:55,300 --> 00:19:57,900
but it doesn't mean that like 
removing or adding bit code to 

361
00:19:57,908 --> 00:20:01,200
the, the situation will 
completely remove the ability of

362
00:20:01,200 --> 00:20:04,900
the government to somehow 
incentivize people to create 

363
00:20:04,900 --> 00:20:07,600
weapons that they could use to 
attack their adversaries with 

364
00:20:08,800 --> 00:20:11,700
There's other ways besides lend 
Aid, which governments can are 

365
00:20:11,700 --> 00:20:14,100
borrowing the brother. 
The government's can use to 

366
00:20:14,100 --> 00:20:17,700
create weapons and there's some 
versions of the argument where 

367
00:20:17,700 --> 00:20:21,000
Bitcoin almost becomes like the 
Battleground where these nation 

368
00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:23,300
states will fight. 
What do you think of those 

369
00:20:23,300 --> 00:20:31,700
arguments or what? 
So, this is you would never like

370
00:20:31,800 --> 00:20:37,000
you would never want to go into 
a battle where you know that you

371
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:39,200
are going to lose. 
It's like, I'm going to play, 

372
00:20:39,200 --> 00:20:41,400
you know, the game where you 
pull out what's it called? 

373
00:20:41,400 --> 00:20:44,100
Big wallet, or something, or big
thing, where you, you, you open 

374
00:20:44,100 --> 00:20:46,700
up your wallet whoever's got, 
has a big has a most money. 

375
00:20:46,700 --> 00:20:49,100
The wallet gets to keep 
everybody's wallet. 

376
00:20:50,600 --> 00:20:52,400
I don't have any was actually 
played this game but you know, 

377
00:20:53,400 --> 00:20:55,900
people have challenged me to it,
like no, like if you somebody, 

378
00:20:55,900 --> 00:20:57,600
if you are somebody who likes 
being a party and they're like, 

379
00:20:57,800 --> 00:20:59,800
hey let's open up our wallets 
and whoever has the most money 

380
00:20:59,800 --> 00:21:01,400
gets to keep everybody else's 
money. 

381
00:21:01,400 --> 00:21:03,800
Like, why would you do that? 
Why would you agree to that 

382
00:21:03,800 --> 00:21:05,300
game? 
You get to take take, you know, 

383
00:21:05,300 --> 00:21:07,300
the 58 dollars in your wallet, 
so you can get home. 

384
00:21:10,000 --> 00:21:12,300
So there's no reason anyone 
would ever put themselves in 

385
00:21:12,308 --> 00:21:15,100
position where they would be 
vulnerable to someone who's 

386
00:21:15,100 --> 00:21:17,900
going to outspend them as some 
sort of an auction situation. 

387
00:21:18,100 --> 00:21:19,700
Like this just doesn't. 
It's complete. 

388
00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:21,700
Complete nonsense. 
No one with no one would go for 

389
00:21:21,700 --> 00:21:25,100
this and so they would just opt 
out of this whole game entirely.

390
00:21:25,300 --> 00:21:27,400
I think that's the sure. 
Feel like one of the the one of 

391
00:21:27,408 --> 00:21:30,400
the tether Executives has 
suggested that the like the 

392
00:21:30,400 --> 00:21:33,900
first country that decides to 
just start buying up Bitcoin 

393
00:21:34,200 --> 00:21:38,000
like weather like with whatever 
their currency is like just your

394
00:21:38,000 --> 00:21:39,900
currency and keep buying 
Bitcoin. 

395
00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:45,100
Maybe it was Samson now and just
like that that that would be the

396
00:21:45,100 --> 00:21:48,500
win the country that wins in the
end and I was just like, this is

397
00:21:48,500 --> 00:21:52,000
so this is so absurd. 
And it also just flies in the 

398
00:21:52,000 --> 00:21:55,400
face of the suggestion that it 
can end all wars or anything 

399
00:21:55,400 --> 00:21:57,600
like that. 
It's like, oh well on one hand. 

400
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:00,500
They're suggesting you just 
print money and just keep buying

401
00:22:00,500 --> 00:22:02,400
Bitcoin. 
And then on the other, they're 

402
00:22:02,400 --> 00:22:05,400
suggesting that it's going to 
end all wars, and it's going to 

403
00:22:05,400 --> 00:22:08,900
stop spending, and it's going to
like It sounds like no, it's 

404
00:22:08,900 --> 00:22:12,600
going to keep spending going. 
Just in one Only One Direction. 

405
00:22:12,600 --> 00:22:15,600
Yeah, people are kind of having 
their own competition for the 

406
00:22:15,600 --> 00:22:20,700
most bullish hypothesis. 
And so scenarios in, which like 

407
00:22:20,900 --> 00:22:24,200
nation-states are foma. 
We need to bitcoin is kind of 

408
00:22:24,200 --> 00:22:29,100
like the top level of that. 
So I think that's the goal 

409
00:22:29,100 --> 00:22:31,200
there. 
I mean, we're seeing it on, on 

410
00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:33,300
some small level, at least, 
right? 

411
00:22:33,300 --> 00:22:36,700
We're seeing it with El Salvador
and I just looked it up. 

412
00:22:36,700 --> 00:22:39,800
I hadn't checked. 
On this in a while but Central 

413
00:22:39,800 --> 00:22:41,500
African Republic. 
They abandoned it. 

414
00:22:41,900 --> 00:22:45,700
Yeah, they gave they gave it up 
which I'm but I'm curious why 

415
00:22:45,700 --> 00:22:49,200
they decided to give up on that.
Well, they were very, I mean, 

416
00:22:49,200 --> 00:22:51,900
these are very low countries on 
the international totem pole. 

417
00:22:52,200 --> 00:22:55,300
So they have a little bit more I
guess less to lose. 

418
00:22:55,500 --> 00:22:59,000
So if they get, they put a 
little bit of their wealth and 

419
00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:00,300
everything goes up. 
It looks good for them. 

420
00:23:00,300 --> 00:23:03,300
It's not, it's asymmetric risk 
that if you just have a little 

421
00:23:03,300 --> 00:23:06,000
bit to put in, it's not, you 
know. 

422
00:23:06,000 --> 00:23:07,700
So I completely horrible, stupid
move. 

423
00:23:08,600 --> 00:23:12,600
Central African Republic. 
They had their part of this, you

424
00:23:12,600 --> 00:23:16,100
know, French system. 
I forget how it works but it's 

425
00:23:16,100 --> 00:23:19,400
kind of it's not great for them 
and it seems like they were 

426
00:23:19,400 --> 00:23:21,100
pressured. 
I don't know, I'm hearing this 

427
00:23:21,100 --> 00:23:23,700
for probably the Bitcoins, but 
it's like they were pressured 

428
00:23:23,800 --> 00:23:28,500
through economic means to like, 
rethink their movement towards 

429
00:23:28,500 --> 00:23:32,200
Bitcoin interesting, which, 
well, I mean, that's what we saw

430
00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:35,000
with El Salvador, as well. 
Like there is the attempt by 

431
00:23:35,000 --> 00:23:38,000
kind of the IMF and everyone 
else to you. 

432
00:23:38,100 --> 00:23:42,400
Use their access to loans and 
funding to convince them this 

433
00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:45,100
experiment with Bitcoin was not 
worth while there's something a 

434
00:23:45,108 --> 00:23:48,800
Bitcoin doesn't fix. 
This is only which I realized I 

435
00:23:48,800 --> 00:23:52,300
came into this, you know, like 
the first heard about it either 

436
00:23:52,300 --> 00:23:55,900
2011 and I was kind of hopeful 
about it. 

437
00:23:55,900 --> 00:23:59,600
I thought maybe, you know, there
is some way that people 

438
00:23:59,600 --> 00:24:02,300
organizing around the Shelly 
Point somehow we could, you 

439
00:24:02,300 --> 00:24:05,700
know, maybe come up with systems
that would kind of claw back. 

440
00:24:05,700 --> 00:24:08,000
Some of the power from from 
corporations. 

441
00:24:09,200 --> 00:24:11,900
And after you know, kind of 
wrestling with this for a while,

442
00:24:11,900 --> 00:24:17,900
I realized like it's really hard
to use surf, you know, power 

443
00:24:17,900 --> 00:24:21,500
like you can't like if you don't
have the power to do what you, 

444
00:24:21,500 --> 00:24:24,800
you can't do it. 
So they can always just use 

445
00:24:24,800 --> 00:24:27,400
other economic incentives to to 
beat you. 

446
00:24:27,400 --> 00:24:30,800
And so it's a really narrow 
roundabout long path by which 

447
00:24:30,800 --> 00:24:33,500
this could actually lead to 
something and something I guess 

448
00:24:33,500 --> 00:24:37,800
sustainable. 
And the actually accomplishes 

449
00:24:38,200 --> 00:24:41,700
what people wanted to do which 
was just kind of like take some 

450
00:24:41,700 --> 00:24:46,700
of the power back and I think if
it ever gets to their it's still

451
00:24:46,700 --> 00:24:49,400
right for someone to come and 
take over the whole thing. 

452
00:24:49,400 --> 00:24:55,600
We have Rob green on a long time
ago, who did some marketing for 

453
00:24:55,600 --> 00:25:01,000
cryptocurrency companies back in
the day and he said he also I 

454
00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:03,800
won't forget it just because he 
was the first person I heard say

455
00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:08,100
something like this, but it was 
like that he, he was kind of 

456
00:25:08,300 --> 00:25:11,800
Board with some of the messaging
of cryptocurrencies in general 

457
00:25:12,200 --> 00:25:16,200
and then the more he thought 
about it and the more he 

458
00:25:16,200 --> 00:25:20,800
considered the enemies that like
the people that Bitcoin was 

459
00:25:20,800 --> 00:25:23,900
supposed to be going up against 
which aren't just it's not just 

460
00:25:23,900 --> 00:25:26,700
nation-states, right? 
Like you said it's corporations,

461
00:25:26,700 --> 00:25:30,800
its banks. 
It's like it's the entire 

462
00:25:30,800 --> 00:25:33,200
Financial system. 
And when you think about the 

463
00:25:33,200 --> 00:25:36,400
trillions and trillions and 
trillions of dollars of 

464
00:25:36,500 --> 00:25:38,700
resources available to All of 
that. 

465
00:25:38,700 --> 00:25:44,100
And all of the people employed 
by that industry and like, yeah,

466
00:25:44,100 --> 00:25:47,600
just what you're up against, 
it's unless you have a really 

467
00:25:47,600 --> 00:25:50,000
good plan. 
It's pretty much insurmountable,

468
00:25:50,100 --> 00:25:51,300
right? 
Yes, I remember that. 

469
00:25:51,300 --> 00:25:53,000
Was a good one. 
The last 10 minutes I think he 

470
00:25:53,000 --> 00:25:56,200
went on very, very nice rent, 
which explains very clearly. 

471
00:25:56,700 --> 00:25:58,500
If I remember that correctly. 
It's a point. 

472
00:25:58,500 --> 00:26:02,500
You make I think in limp or as 
well when you compare the 

473
00:26:02,500 --> 00:26:06,200
security spend on bitcoin to 
various like to the amounts 

474
00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:08,900
currently spent on defense And 
things like that. 

475
00:26:08,900 --> 00:26:11,800
And I think you raised a similar
point in our panel when someone 

476
00:26:11,800 --> 00:26:14,600
talked about, like, Bitcoins 
role in the energy industry. 

477
00:26:14,600 --> 00:26:17,500
And again, you're looking at an 
industry where like the total 

478
00:26:17,500 --> 00:26:21,000
spend is so many orders of 
magnitude more than Bitcoin, you

479
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:24,700
can just kind of embroiling 
Bitcoin, in those types of 

480
00:26:24,700 --> 00:26:27,900
things, makes your protocols 
subservient to those interest. 

481
00:26:27,900 --> 00:26:29,800
It doesn't necessarily 
strengthen your protocol. 

482
00:26:30,100 --> 00:26:33,000
Yes, yeah, I mean, it's just 
like it can be picked up by some

483
00:26:33,000 --> 00:26:35,300
multi-trillion dollar 
Corporation. 

484
00:26:35,300 --> 00:26:38,500
It just sort of said wing of it 
and it's you know part of Of any

485
00:26:38,500 --> 00:26:41,500
of their interest like they can,
they can drop the whole mining 

486
00:26:41,500 --> 00:26:43,900
Wing if it's not profitable or 
they can sell it off, bundle it 

487
00:26:43,900 --> 00:26:46,000
to sell it to the Saudis or 
whatever like it. 

488
00:26:46,000 --> 00:26:50,100
You know, you can just it's 
nothing compared to hundreds of 

489
00:26:50,100 --> 00:26:52,600
trillions of dollars in other 
energy budget. 

490
00:26:53,200 --> 00:26:57,000
One thing that sometimes kind of
surprises me, I'm trying to talk

491
00:26:57,000 --> 00:26:59,900
about these things like some of 
these potential risks to 

492
00:26:59,900 --> 00:27:02,900
bitcoin, which I find 
interesting, mostly 

493
00:27:02,900 --> 00:27:05,000
academically. 
Theoretically, I don't own any 

494
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:08,100
Bitcoin, it doesn't in much of a
meaningful sense. 

495
00:27:08,300 --> 00:27:10,500
Matter if Bitcoin gets attacked 
or not. 

496
00:27:10,500 --> 00:27:12,200
But I just find these questions 
interesting. 

497
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:16,000
But when I talk to bitcoiners 
about some of these issues and 

498
00:27:16,000 --> 00:27:18,700
especially when I start to get 
close to search and touchpoints,

499
00:27:18,800 --> 00:27:22,700
they tend to recoil like if I 
were to whenever I bring up 

500
00:27:22,700 --> 00:27:26,900
that, I think it is likely at 
some point there will be a 

501
00:27:26,900 --> 00:27:30,000
version of Bitcoin with more 
than 21 million coins. 

502
00:27:30,100 --> 00:27:32,400
And I think that there's a good 
chance that that when retains 

503
00:27:32,400 --> 00:27:36,600
the ticker in a lot of the mass,
there's a tendency to kind of 

504
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:40,200
ignore it and not just, Just 
ignore it, but kind of deny the 

505
00:27:40,200 --> 00:27:43,900
things that would lead to that 
state, like deny the need for 

506
00:27:44,100 --> 00:27:47,400
growing transaction fees for 
that type of demand for blocks 

507
00:27:47,400 --> 00:27:49,700
base, for the types of things 
that are kind of inherent in 

508
00:27:49,700 --> 00:27:52,300
their protocol. 
What do you think kind of leads 

509
00:27:52,300 --> 00:27:54,400
to that tendency in the Bitcoin 
Community? 

510
00:27:54,500 --> 00:27:57,200
Well, I think there's a belief 
that we just need to get past 

511
00:27:57,200 --> 00:27:58,900
like the next stage. 
The next level. 

512
00:27:58,900 --> 00:28:02,400
We need to push through this. 
That were always just like one 

513
00:28:02,400 --> 00:28:06,400
cycle away from this like Mass 
adoption as one cycle away from 

514
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:10,100
whatever the price. 
It is that we need to like have 

515
00:28:10,100 --> 00:28:13,800
everybody believe that this is 
real and and make all the 

516
00:28:14,300 --> 00:28:18,500
Skeptics cry and we're just 
almost there. 

517
00:28:18,500 --> 00:28:21,000
And we just need to ignore this 
stuff because once we can push 

518
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:25,500
through, once we get to that 
level then we can solve all 

519
00:28:25,508 --> 00:28:29,000
these problems and sort of 
thinking about this problem. 

520
00:28:29,000 --> 00:28:33,800
Before we get, there is just 
going to stop us from getting 

521
00:28:33,800 --> 00:28:37,400
that we're never going to make 
it if we're running around when 

522
00:28:37,400 --> 00:28:39,600
Bitcoins 30. 
Thousand dollars worrying about 

523
00:28:39,600 --> 00:28:41,900
like the security budget in ten 
years. 

524
00:28:41,900 --> 00:28:43,400
You know that's that's not going
to help us. 

525
00:28:43,400 --> 00:28:45,100
It's not going to it's not going
to it's not going to serve the 

526
00:28:45,100 --> 00:28:47,800
mission. 
So I mean, that's what I think 

527
00:28:48,100 --> 00:28:49,500
makes people not with think 
about it is. 

528
00:28:49,500 --> 00:28:52,900
It's there's a, there's a 
positive positive probability 

529
00:28:52,900 --> 00:28:56,900
that this is actually bad for 
for the long-term security of 

530
00:28:56,900 --> 00:28:59,500
Bitcoin. 
So there aren't really good 

531
00:28:59,500 --> 00:29:01,300
answers. 
Yeah, yeah, no. 

532
00:29:01,300 --> 00:29:04,500
I think that's absolutely true 
but like, for me specifically 

533
00:29:04,500 --> 00:29:08,100
watching some of the mainstream 
bitcoiners. 

534
00:29:08,200 --> 00:29:13,400
Actions to ordinals recently was
really fascinating to me, 

535
00:29:13,700 --> 00:29:16,900
because you saw a bunch of 
individuals who had advocated 

536
00:29:16,900 --> 00:29:19,900
for turning on seg wit, who had 
advocated for turning on 

537
00:29:19,900 --> 00:29:24,400
Taproot, who suddenly saw these 
parts of their protocol used and

538
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:27,800
innocence driving demand, and 
raising transaction fees and 

539
00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:30,200
showing like more demand for 
Block space than there. 

540
00:29:30,200 --> 00:29:35,700
Had been since like 2017. 
I think and yet they they were 

541
00:29:35,900 --> 00:29:40,000
horrified that that was a thing 
that was Is occurring and in a 

542
00:29:40,008 --> 00:29:44,000
sense that supports the aims of 
their protocols, that's aligned 

543
00:29:44,000 --> 00:29:46,600
with all these things. 
They claim to be in supportive, 

544
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,700
but once it actually started 
happening, they were against it.

545
00:29:49,700 --> 00:29:51,600
Do you think there's like, what 
do you think? 

546
00:29:51,600 --> 00:29:54,700
There's a mistaken belief that a
lot of bitcoiners hold that 

547
00:29:54,700 --> 00:29:58,600
leads to that so I don't know 
exactly about, I mean, Taproot 

548
00:29:58,600 --> 00:30:01,400
was kind of funny. 
I didn't hear anybody opposing 

549
00:30:01,400 --> 00:30:04,300
Taproot like I don't know, like 
everyone is like. 

550
00:30:04,300 --> 00:30:08,000
Yeah, it's great. 
Um, I mean I didn't look into, 

551
00:30:08,100 --> 00:30:10,900
It too much but I mean it seems 
like the way people are 

552
00:30:10,900 --> 00:30:13,500
describing it as like. 
Oh you know you could do more 

553
00:30:13,800 --> 00:30:16,500
smart contracts things like okay
is that really what we want? 

554
00:30:16,500 --> 00:30:20,300
Okay, but everybody loves it. 
Um, But, you know, as far as 

555
00:30:20,300 --> 00:30:23,400
this, like, ordinals think, I 
think a lot of people think it's

556
00:30:23,400 --> 00:30:25,400
okay. 
It's Bitcoin, you know, it's 

557
00:30:25,400 --> 00:30:29,000
supposed to operate as this this
fee Market. 

558
00:30:29,000 --> 00:30:31,000
It's a fee Market, you know, 
they're supposed to be a 

559
00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:35,500
competitive market to get, you 
know, get your transactions on 

560
00:30:35,500 --> 00:30:39,300
the train, on the the chain. 
And over time, we need the fees.

561
00:30:39,300 --> 00:30:42,200
So, this is kind of good. 
But there's always this tension 

562
00:30:42,200 --> 00:30:44,900
between fees and the other 
Alternatives. 

563
00:30:44,900 --> 00:30:48,000
And this, this is an interesting
point, because if we want the 

564
00:30:48,000 --> 00:30:52,200
fees to go, Go up to replace, 
and they got to go up by orders 

565
00:30:52,200 --> 00:30:56,500
of magnitude, to replace the 
Lost fees from the Block 

566
00:30:56,500 --> 00:30:59,200
subsidy. 
Then you're going to have to get

567
00:30:59,200 --> 00:31:02,200
into the situation where people 
might start to leave if they're 

568
00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:06,200
using it for all these other 
reasons, like you know, 

569
00:31:06,208 --> 00:31:07,400
cross-border payments or 
something. 

570
00:31:07,400 --> 00:31:09,800
If you could just easily do this
with Tron, you might as well 

571
00:31:09,800 --> 00:31:12,600
just do this with Tron, right. 
If you're going to it's going to

572
00:31:12,608 --> 00:31:16,400
cost you $200 to send this or 
two thousand dollars like they 

573
00:31:16,400 --> 00:31:18,400
say, it's going to happen in 10 
to 20 years in the future. 

574
00:31:18,900 --> 00:31:21,100
Of course, you're going to use 
your going to use salon at the 

575
00:31:21,100 --> 00:31:27,800
Toronto cardano, or, or tether 
or whatever, or or us CBD. 

576
00:31:27,800 --> 00:31:32,200
See like, why not? 
If you're not, if you're if you 

577
00:31:32,200 --> 00:31:36,700
want them to think that you're 
buying, you know, a snowboard 

578
00:31:36,700 --> 00:31:37,900
off Amazon, and you don't care 
that. 

579
00:31:37,900 --> 00:31:40,300
Anybody knows that like, you 
might as well do that in the 

580
00:31:40,300 --> 00:31:42,800
u.s. 
CBC and like, what's really kind

581
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:45,900
of interesting to me about this?
Here's I think this connects 

582
00:31:45,900 --> 00:31:48,900
right back to kind of what we 
were discussing with optional 

583
00:31:48,900 --> 00:31:52,700
failures before and ways Bitcoin
can kind of be taken over in 

584
00:31:52,700 --> 00:31:55,600
that like the need to replace 
the new issuance with these 

585
00:31:55,600 --> 00:32:00,200
transaction fees is directly 
related to some of the hard 

586
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:04,300
money aspects that the store of 
value fans of Bitcoin propagate 

587
00:32:04,300 --> 00:32:07,000
and is like a central portion of
their thesis for wipe. 

588
00:32:07,000 --> 00:32:11,000
It clean with succeed but like 
as we're talking about here, the

589
00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:14,400
closer we get to that point, the
larger and larger portion of the

590
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:18,400
population, you price out of 
trustless Lee and sense. 

591
00:32:18,600 --> 00:32:21,400
Chip resistant transactions, 
using that protocol. 

592
00:32:21,600 --> 00:32:25,000
Like if you're going to insist 
on transaction fees need to rise

593
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:27,100
to this point to ensure 
security. 

594
00:32:27,400 --> 00:32:31,200
You are basically admitting in 
that that many people will never

595
00:32:31,200 --> 00:32:33,900
be able to use the protocol for 
censorship resistance. 

596
00:32:34,200 --> 00:32:37,300
And so I think when it gets down
to his kind of the tension there

597
00:32:37,500 --> 00:32:42,700
is Bitcoin has been promoted as 
a way to bank the unbanked and 

598
00:32:42,708 --> 00:32:46,600
provide everyone worldwide. 
With this new way to send value 

599
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:49,600
in this censorship resistant 
way, but the current design 

600
00:32:49,600 --> 00:32:52,700
decisions of the protocol 
including some that are seen as 

601
00:32:52,700 --> 00:32:57,200
sacred Sacrament, fundamentally 
make that more challenging to 

602
00:32:57,200 --> 00:33:00,100
achieve. 
And like, I think that at least 

603
00:33:00,100 --> 00:33:03,500
in part could contribute to an 
eventual, like kind of 

604
00:33:03,500 --> 00:33:07,000
conceptual Schism where Bitcoin 
would be vulnerable to the kind 

605
00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:09,100
of like takeover you were 
discussing, right? 

606
00:33:09,100 --> 00:33:12,300
I did, I mean, if you have to 
ask what happens if the fees go 

607
00:33:12,300 --> 00:33:15,100
up? 
Like let's just say that, you 

608
00:33:15,100 --> 00:33:21,000
know, ten years from now, people
are paying On average $250 a fee

609
00:33:21,300 --> 00:33:26,400
or you know say times 1000 or 
2000 block. 

610
00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:29,700
So you know you're getting this 
200,000 dollars in fees for a 

611
00:33:29,708 --> 00:33:33,400
block or something like that. 
This means that there has not 

612
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:37,500
been a viable alternative for 
most people like nothing like 

613
00:33:37,500 --> 00:33:41,000
there's no reason people would 
kind of continually over time. 

614
00:33:42,100 --> 00:33:44,200
Continue to pay these high fees 
for something. 

615
00:33:45,000 --> 00:33:48,800
It lists that really was like, 
really the top dog, it really 

616
00:33:48,800 --> 00:33:51,400
was the only one. 
Everything else was garbage. 

617
00:33:51,400 --> 00:33:55,800
Isn't isn't this the classic 
container ships argument from 

618
00:33:56,000 --> 00:33:57,900
Nick Carter? 
It's related to it. 

619
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:00,800
Yeah yeah. 
And so I mean but like yeah it 

620
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:03,600
could be that like this is the 
major thing that. 

621
00:34:03,600 --> 00:34:06,200
I mean you need to get your 
lightning Channel setup in this 

622
00:34:06,700 --> 00:34:09,300
end of the chain. 
So you're willing to pay 500 

623
00:34:09,300 --> 00:34:11,400
dollars to set up your lightning
channel, so you can service 

624
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:12,100
everybody. 
D. 

625
00:34:13,100 --> 00:34:15,400
That is this real. 
There's a real built-in Network 

626
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:19,100
effect there that the, you know,
could lead to this situation. 

627
00:34:19,100 --> 00:34:22,600
And at this point if this is the
main container ship, then all 

628
00:34:22,600 --> 00:34:24,900
you have to do is buy the 
container, ship shipping company

629
00:34:24,900 --> 00:34:28,699
or whatever and now you own 
everybody which is I guess 

630
00:34:28,699 --> 00:34:31,600
precisely the argument I'm 
trying to make is like if 

631
00:34:31,600 --> 00:34:36,900
everybody's shipping their stuff
to one ship and you buy the ship

632
00:34:36,900 --> 00:34:40,100
they like they don't have it 
either other options they've 

633
00:34:40,100 --> 00:34:43,199
already they've already 
Abandoned other other little 

634
00:34:43,199 --> 00:34:44,500
ships that they used to carry 
stuff with. 

635
00:34:44,500 --> 00:34:47,400
So you're just they're just 
stuck with whatever shipping 

636
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:51,100
company owns the ship well and 
just I think bitcoiners love to 

637
00:34:51,100 --> 00:34:56,000
portray Bitcoin is antifragile 
which means something that when 

638
00:34:56,000 --> 00:34:58,900
it's stressed it becomes 
stronger but I think in many 

639
00:34:58,900 --> 00:35:00,900
kind of respects like we're 
talking about here, some of the 

640
00:35:00,900 --> 00:35:05,200
feedback loops inherent year 
fight against that like if you 

641
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:08,900
assume the security budget needs
to stay roughly the same or 

642
00:35:08,900 --> 00:35:11,400
increase and you need fees to go
to this certain level. 

643
00:35:11,900 --> 00:35:14,900
Then you're going to like, as 
you're trying to get to that 

644
00:35:14,900 --> 00:35:18,200
point, continually be pushing 
regular trans actors on the 

645
00:35:18,200 --> 00:35:21,300
network to look for Alternatives
and to consider alternatives, 

646
00:35:21,300 --> 00:35:24,700
like it fights its own like path
to that point, right? 

647
00:35:24,900 --> 00:35:28,900
Yeah, I don't I mean, there are 
points where it is kind of anti 

648
00:35:28,900 --> 00:35:31,400
fragile, where you, you know, 
kind of on a local level like 

649
00:35:31,400 --> 00:35:34,700
you think about it? 
Hey, a ball which isn't a valley

650
00:35:34,700 --> 00:35:38,000
of the top of a mountain right? 
Like you know yeah exactly go 

651
00:35:38,000 --> 00:35:39,500
back and forth a little bit. 
It's going to roll down to that 

652
00:35:39,500 --> 00:35:41,400
little Valley, but if you push 
it too far, the whole thing is 

653
00:35:41,400 --> 00:35:43,400
going to end. 
The ball is going to roll to a 

654
00:35:43,408 --> 00:35:45,000
down to the seats. 
A metastable. 

655
00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:48,500
State isn't the argument against
this like the classic argument 

656
00:35:48,500 --> 00:35:52,500
against any of this? 
That it's been around for a long

657
00:35:52,500 --> 00:35:57,800
time now and this hasn't 
happened that nobody is trying 

658
00:35:57,800 --> 00:36:00,700
to do this seemingly. 
What could be like a pretty 

659
00:36:00,700 --> 00:36:03,800
profitable move like, nobody is 
doing it? 

660
00:36:03,900 --> 00:36:07,800
It clearly is able to protect 
itself against that and this is 

661
00:36:07,800 --> 00:36:10,600
sort of a paradox because once 
you say, like, once everybody 

662
00:36:10,600 --> 00:36:13,300
believes is that, we've got To 
this point, I still think people

663
00:36:13,500 --> 00:36:16,500
believe we're like a, not quite 
there like it's still the next 

664
00:36:16,500 --> 00:36:18,700
cycle before we get to that 
point where it's actually, you 

665
00:36:18,700 --> 00:36:21,400
know, set in stone and no one 
can mess with it. 

666
00:36:22,000 --> 00:36:25,100
So, it's a bit paradoxical and 
that, if once we believe this, 

667
00:36:25,400 --> 00:36:27,400
then someone that's what makes 
it vulnerable. 

668
00:36:29,500 --> 00:36:32,500
So, yeah, it's still a lot of 
people still think that we're, 

669
00:36:32,700 --> 00:36:36,000
we have another order of 
magnitude or two to grow before 

670
00:36:38,300 --> 00:36:42,300
the, the bowlers sentiments will
not be as strong, but of They 

671
00:36:42,300 --> 00:36:44,700
say once we get to a million 
dollars then that's what 

672
00:36:44,700 --> 00:36:48,300
everybody knows. 
It's secure which is of course 

673
00:36:49,500 --> 00:36:52,300
there is no point like that 
which we do it secure I think 

674
00:36:52,300 --> 00:36:55,400
it's best when it's just kind 
of, you're not using it to store

675
00:36:55,400 --> 00:36:58,000
value. 
Why do you think why do you 

676
00:36:58,000 --> 00:37:02,800
think it hasn't been attacked in
any meaningful way and up until 

677
00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:04,600
this point? 
Well I think a lot of the miners

678
00:37:04,600 --> 00:37:10,900
are there their Bush and so they
are part of the ecosystem and 

679
00:37:10,900 --> 00:37:12,400
actually what one thing About 
minors. 

680
00:37:12,400 --> 00:37:14,300
And this probably could persist 
for a while. 

681
00:37:14,300 --> 00:37:16,100
This is this kind of actually 
stabilizes. 

682
00:37:16,100 --> 00:37:21,100
It is that going into a 
competitive industry is actually

683
00:37:21,100 --> 00:37:24,100
like a horrible idea. 
Like if you're an entrepreneur a

684
00:37:24,100 --> 00:37:29,900
businessman like if you have a 
great family Pizza, rest recipe.

685
00:37:29,900 --> 00:37:31,900
You don't want to be like I'm 
going to go start a piece of by 

686
00:37:31,900 --> 00:37:35,100
the slice restaurant in 
Brooklyn. 

687
00:37:35,100 --> 00:37:38,700
Like this is like like it's just
not a bright idea. 

688
00:37:38,700 --> 00:37:41,600
Like you would you just started 
somewhere else build up. 

689
00:37:43,100 --> 00:37:47,100
There's actually a great I watch
this great talk recently by 

690
00:37:47,500 --> 00:37:50,600
Peter teal, who's maybe not your
favorite you know everybody in 

691
00:37:50,600 --> 00:37:53,400
the audience favorite person, 
but he says all the quiet Parts 

692
00:37:53,400 --> 00:37:57,500
loud, it's great, it's called 
competition is for losers, it's 

693
00:37:57,500 --> 00:37:59,300
a great talk. 
He gives it to, I think a 

694
00:37:59,308 --> 00:38:03,100
Stanford CS group and he just 
explains the way to make money 

695
00:38:03,100 --> 00:38:06,900
is to go find an industry where 
you can wipe out the competition

696
00:38:06,900 --> 00:38:09,300
and then suck up all the 
profits. 

697
00:38:09,500 --> 00:38:11,500
Like the last thing you want to 
do if you're smart. 

698
00:38:11,800 --> 00:38:14,200
Person is to go into an 
extremely competitive industry 

699
00:38:14,200 --> 00:38:16,700
because there's no way you're 
going to make a lot of profit. 

700
00:38:16,700 --> 00:38:18,200
And if you screw up just a 
little bit, you're going to end 

701
00:38:18,200 --> 00:38:21,900
up losing a ton of money. 
So this might be somewhere where

702
00:38:22,100 --> 00:38:26,500
where Bitcoin is actually being 
helped because the people that 

703
00:38:26,500 --> 00:38:29,300
are that are running into that 
the mining industry, they're 

704
00:38:29,300 --> 00:38:33,400
actually there because they're 
somewhat supportive of Bitcoin. 

705
00:38:33,400 --> 00:38:35,700
They're not just trying to make 
a quick Buck because you you 

706
00:38:35,700 --> 00:38:40,500
can't really make a quick buck 
and it and historically from 

707
00:38:40,500 --> 00:38:43,800
everything I've heard. 
Great miners, usually lose money

708
00:38:43,800 --> 00:38:46,100
in Bitcoin terms. 
They made a lot of profits over 

709
00:38:46,100 --> 00:38:50,700
the years because they've been 
on the good end of a bull market

710
00:38:50,700 --> 00:38:53,600
but they've actually lost money.
Like if they had to, instead of 

711
00:38:53,900 --> 00:38:56,900
invested in Bitcoin equipment, 
they would be buy Bitcoin. 

712
00:38:56,900 --> 00:38:59,600
They would have been a much more
successful in business. 

713
00:39:00,700 --> 00:39:04,500
So there is a lot of probate 
court ideology and I think they 

714
00:39:04,508 --> 00:39:08,200
are not really willing to go and
do these things. 

715
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:10,400
They're not to cannibalizing 
each other yet. 

716
00:39:10,400 --> 00:39:12,800
Like I think there's a point in 
the future would They could 

717
00:39:12,800 --> 00:39:17,800
start to look at each other and 
say okay if we don't collude and

718
00:39:17,800 --> 00:39:20,600
start selfish mind into 
something then these are the so 

719
00:39:20,600 --> 00:39:22,600
the group over here is going to 
do it and then we're going to, 

720
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:24,800
our profits are going to go to 
zero, really got to sell all our

721
00:39:24,800 --> 00:39:28,000
equipment and go bankrupt. 
And I don't think we're there 

722
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:33,500
yet, but this could happen if we
don't get another huge Bull Run.

723
00:39:33,500 --> 00:39:38,400
I mean, we like we still had, 
you know, cycle to cycle. 

724
00:39:38,500 --> 00:39:42,000
It's gone up by multiple. 
If we go a cycle where It 

725
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:46,500
doesn't go up by multiple. 
Like, if we don't reach 60,000 

726
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:52,800
in 2025 things could get kind of
testy with, because they don't, 

727
00:39:52,800 --> 00:39:55,000
they can't just rely on sitting 
around and waiting for the bull 

728
00:39:55,000 --> 00:39:58,900
market, to make sure that 
they're all, they're all rich. 

729
00:39:59,000 --> 00:40:01,100
Well, and I mean, we saw that 
already kind of a little bit. 

730
00:40:01,100 --> 00:40:02,900
I think, with course scientific 
right. 

731
00:40:02,900 --> 00:40:05,700
They over levered against their 
machines. 

732
00:40:05,700 --> 00:40:09,900
Going into the, like, during the
last Bull, Run didn't sell when 

733
00:40:09,900 --> 00:40:11,700
it was like peeking and we're 
still holding to. 

734
00:40:11,800 --> 00:40:14,800
Much when the market crashed and
like ended up in bankruptcy 

735
00:40:14,800 --> 00:40:17,200
because of it is I think the 
broad Strokes of their 

736
00:40:17,200 --> 00:40:18,700
bankruptcy. 
I haven't covered it much 

737
00:40:18,700 --> 00:40:22,000
specifically so go read coverage
before you take that is like a 

738
00:40:22,900 --> 00:40:25,700
detailed series of events. 
But broadly I think we've seen 

739
00:40:25,700 --> 00:40:27,900
miners like throughout the 
history of Bitcoin mining end up

740
00:40:27,900 --> 00:40:30,400
in that kind of position because
it's capital-intensive to get 

741
00:40:30,400 --> 00:40:32,500
started. 
You have ongoing costs, your 

742
00:40:32,500 --> 00:40:35,200
returns are delayed at least 
until you can get set up in the 

743
00:40:35,207 --> 00:40:38,800
machines running. 
And like you mentioned because 

744
00:40:38,800 --> 00:40:43,800
like the market for Bitcoin 
mining is global and Is global. 

745
00:40:43,900 --> 00:40:47,400
You're competing with whoever 
has the lowest possible energy 

746
00:40:47,400 --> 00:40:50,100
costs and so if you don't have 
the lowest possible energy 

747
00:40:50,100 --> 00:40:53,600
costs, you better hope that 
Bitcoin increases in dollar 

748
00:40:53,600 --> 00:40:55,900
terms. 
Yeah, this could happen. 

749
00:40:57,100 --> 00:41:00,300
I mean, this is something where 
an entirely this could happen to

750
00:41:00,300 --> 00:41:02,400
the entire mining industry at 
some point. 

751
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:07,900
If there's a kind of nasty in a 
trip down during a bear Market, 

752
00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:11,100
this could be really nasty, 
especially with the hash Market 

753
00:41:11,600 --> 00:41:12,800
with a hash rate is going. 
Going up. 

754
00:41:12,800 --> 00:41:16,800
Like I looked at it yesterday 
was like 370 million, Tara 

755
00:41:16,800 --> 00:41:20,800
hashes per second or something. 
This is like the this is really 

756
00:41:20,800 --> 00:41:24,300
big like you know, relative to 
the to the price, we're about a 

757
00:41:24,300 --> 00:41:29,500
year away from a having. 
So like the the price that I 

758
00:41:29,508 --> 00:41:32,800
mean, that the profit margins 
are going to be really tiny 

759
00:41:32,900 --> 00:41:34,700
coming up. 
Yeah, especially around the 

760
00:41:34,700 --> 00:41:37,500
having, but I think a lot of the
recent increase in hash rate is 

761
00:41:37,500 --> 00:41:40,400
probably due to bit main filling
some of the back orders they've 

762
00:41:40,400 --> 00:41:42,200
had for their most recent 
machine. 

763
00:41:42,600 --> 00:41:45,100
Because they had long back 
orders during the bull market in

764
00:41:45,100 --> 00:41:47,300
her finally filling some of 
those out. 

765
00:41:47,300 --> 00:41:50,700
So my get like so we're seeing 
the efficiency of miners go up. 

766
00:41:50,700 --> 00:41:53,300
So like in terms of hashes per 
dollar have gone up? 

767
00:41:53,400 --> 00:41:57,100
Yes Michael would you like to 
explain what selfish mining is 

768
00:41:57,100 --> 00:42:00,100
and how it changes the commonly 
accepted 51 percent? 

769
00:42:00,100 --> 00:42:01,700
Number that bitcoiners keeping 
their head? 

770
00:42:01,700 --> 00:42:06,700
Sure yes I'd love to. 
So it's selfish mining it's 

771
00:42:06,700 --> 00:42:10,100
something which it was there's a
paper that came up like 2013. 

772
00:42:10,100 --> 00:42:14,300
Someone describe this if A - it 
was a mean gun sewer? 

773
00:42:14,300 --> 00:42:17,000
Yes, yours. 
I mean, consider of a Avalanche 

774
00:42:17,000 --> 00:42:23,100
was yes, yes, he was in an 
avalanche then, but if a minor 

775
00:42:23,400 --> 00:42:26,900
is to keep certain block secret 
or write a blog, keep them 

776
00:42:26,900 --> 00:42:29,600
secret and then publish them at 
the right time, there's a 

777
00:42:29,600 --> 00:42:32,000
process or you know, they can 
buy pumps and these are the 

778
00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:35,400
right time. 
They can actually destroy more 

779
00:42:35,400 --> 00:42:38,600
blocks and their competitors 
proportionally than they are 

780
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:41,300
losing of Their Own by risking 
them by keeping them secret. 

781
00:42:41,300 --> 00:42:45,400
And so You know, it's the math 
is like a Markov chain and you 

782
00:42:45,400 --> 00:42:47,700
can you can figure this out. 
It's kind of a polynomial, 

783
00:42:47,700 --> 00:42:50,100
divided by polynomial. 
But you look at this function it

784
00:42:50,200 --> 00:42:53,400
and it shows you that once you 
get to one third of the hash 

785
00:42:53,400 --> 00:42:58,100
rate you see you by increasing 
your hash rate a little bit and 

786
00:42:58,100 --> 00:43:02,000
doing the selfish mining, you 
get more proportionally of the 

787
00:43:02,000 --> 00:43:04,700
blocks in return it. 
So this kind of abuse is a 

788
00:43:04,700 --> 00:43:06,400
difficult adjustment, a little 
bit. 

789
00:43:06,700 --> 00:43:10,400
So this means that once someone 
starts selfish mining at 33%, 

790
00:43:10,700 --> 00:43:15,100
they can start to bring in other
M and it's always going to be a 

791
00:43:15,100 --> 00:43:19,100
profitable investment to take 
hash away from the honest. 

792
00:43:19,100 --> 00:43:22,200
Mining pool over to the selfish 
gene pool because you're getting

793
00:43:22,200 --> 00:43:24,700
more, you know. 
Just it just Arbitrage 

794
00:43:24,700 --> 00:43:27,500
opportunity more bang for your 
buck by moving over the surface 

795
00:43:27,500 --> 00:43:29,800
mining pool. 
And so this creates a situation 

796
00:43:29,800 --> 00:43:32,700
where things could snowball 
where, you know, one day. 

797
00:43:32,700 --> 00:43:36,500
It's 33 percent next day. 34 35 
36 and pretty soon. 

798
00:43:36,500 --> 00:43:39,700
You have a 51% attack and then 
you're just Monopoly money. 

799
00:43:40,600 --> 00:43:42,400
So this is one of those things 
where R. 

800
00:43:42,408 --> 00:43:45,300
It's interesting. 
When you consider this Market 

801
00:43:45,300 --> 00:43:48,100
fragility hypothesis and say, 
okay? 

802
00:43:48,100 --> 00:43:53,400
What if a corporation just 
decided to start doing this like

803
00:43:53,400 --> 00:43:56,200
tomorrow? 
What everybody would everybody 

804
00:43:56,200 --> 00:43:59,300
just kind of is at the moment 
they would they would like run 

805
00:43:59,300 --> 00:44:05,500
away and go, you know, buy us. 
Treasuries or like what do you 

806
00:44:05,508 --> 00:44:08,300
have to get to like 40% of the 
mining before before they did 

807
00:44:08,300 --> 00:44:10,300
that? 
Or what if they had 45 percent 

808
00:44:10,300 --> 00:44:13,700
and we're controlling most of 
the And what if they just 

809
00:44:13,700 --> 00:44:15,900
actually had, like, full control
the money? 

810
00:44:15,900 --> 00:44:19,200
But they promised to, like, stay
true to Bitcoins core principles

811
00:44:19,200 --> 00:44:21,200
and they were going to censor 
anybody because that's, you 

812
00:44:21,200 --> 00:44:24,700
know, and this was all good 
because now they can, they can 

813
00:44:24,700 --> 00:44:28,100
kind of ease down the hash rate 
and we don't have to worry about

814
00:44:28,100 --> 00:44:29,800
the environmentalist fun 
anymore. 

815
00:44:31,300 --> 00:44:36,700
There's a lot of on-ramps for 
this for this centralization. 

816
00:44:37,000 --> 00:44:39,900
I think selfish mining is one of
the easiest ones, because you 

817
00:44:39,900 --> 00:44:42,800
just start at this at this level
and you, You can see it 

818
00:44:42,800 --> 00:44:44,700
happening at first but it can, 
it can slope. 

819
00:44:44,700 --> 00:44:47,600
They can snowball different. 
Nobody freaks out and leaves. 

820
00:44:47,600 --> 00:44:49,800
Like everybody says it's going 
to happen. 

821
00:44:49,900 --> 00:44:51,500
You can try it. 
I mean, you could just starts 

822
00:44:51,500 --> 00:44:54,800
off as Mining and then nobody 
the price doesn't go down. 

823
00:44:55,000 --> 00:44:59,400
Well you just keep doing it, 
this can work its way up to a 

824
00:44:59,400 --> 00:45:01,700
full centralization attack. 
Well and I think what you 

825
00:45:01,700 --> 00:45:05,500
pointed out there is like your 
only real other option in an 

826
00:45:05,500 --> 00:45:10,300
attack like that is to leave and
go somewhere else to change the 

827
00:45:10,300 --> 00:45:13,900
consensus algorithm. 
And And most of the Bitcoin 

828
00:45:13,900 --> 00:45:17,000
community that. 
Now this coin is the new Bitcoin

829
00:45:17,100 --> 00:45:21,200
and we all agree on that. 
So it's true but that's like and

830
00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:25,400
like that layer zero that social
consensus is fundamentally, what

831
00:45:25,400 --> 00:45:28,000
drives a lot of this. 
And like, I think what you 

832
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:32,200
pointed out, we're at what point
do you decide we need to leave 

833
00:45:32,200 --> 00:45:35,300
and, and like, change this. 
Because it's a pressing concern 

834
00:45:35,600 --> 00:45:38,700
is kind of what makes this 
challenging because perhaps some

835
00:45:38,700 --> 00:45:42,400
folks as soon as they see 
someone get to like 30% or Gonna

836
00:45:42,400 --> 00:45:45,700
be like this is a serious issue.
We need to take steps but if 

837
00:45:45,700 --> 00:45:49,200
they can't convince enough of 
that massive enough stays in 

838
00:45:49,200 --> 00:45:52,600
like the primary one, it can 
kinda trundle along to that 

839
00:45:52,600 --> 00:45:56,400
point and like, yeah, and so 
largely, I think that's what it 

840
00:45:56,408 --> 00:45:59,400
kind of comes down to with a lot
of these types of attacks and 

841
00:45:59,400 --> 00:46:02,500
why I like the Bitcoin cultures 
interaction with these ends up. 

842
00:46:02,500 --> 00:46:07,100
Fascinating to me because there 
is a portion of Bitcoin culture 

843
00:46:07,100 --> 00:46:12,100
that treats the protocol itself 
is some like sacred thing with 

844
00:46:12,400 --> 00:46:16,000
Many features that are never to 
be changed that to even talk 

845
00:46:16,000 --> 00:46:18,800
about changing them is, like 
committing some type of heresy, 

846
00:46:18,800 --> 00:46:20,900
against Bitcoin. 
And there are some of these 

847
00:46:20,900 --> 00:46:24,300
situations we're talking about 
where you end up in. 

848
00:46:24,300 --> 00:46:27,800
Like this selfish mining attack 
where you need to decide, which 

849
00:46:27,800 --> 00:46:31,000
part is most sacred. 
Is it like staying on this 

850
00:46:31,200 --> 00:46:34,800
historically, longest chain that
is followed this algorithm that 

851
00:46:34,800 --> 00:46:38,400
everyone knew described and hand
it out to everyone, or is it 

852
00:46:38,400 --> 00:46:42,200
changing that and preserving 
some other more vague aspect? 

853
00:46:42,300 --> 00:46:43,700
To bitcoin that's important to 
you. 

854
00:46:43,700 --> 00:46:46,900
It's censorship resistance, the 
distribution of its mining or 

855
00:46:46,908 --> 00:46:49,900
whatever and what's especially 
interesting to me, is there have

856
00:46:49,900 --> 00:46:54,600
been many attempts throughout 
Bitcoins history to, like there 

857
00:46:54,600 --> 00:46:57,500
was at one point, I think even 
Luke Dash, Junior suggested 

858
00:46:57,500 --> 00:47:00,600
adopting like manero's, Asic 
resistance, where they hop 

859
00:47:00,600 --> 00:47:04,500
between different algorithms at 
some randomly determined pace 

860
00:47:04,500 --> 00:47:07,500
and that that would help 
decentralized Bitcoin mining and

861
00:47:07,500 --> 00:47:09,500
prevent it from like 
centralizing into a six. 

862
00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:11,200
There. 
Been other people have suggested

863
00:47:11,200 --> 00:47:14,400
like switching bit. 
Into like wholly different 

864
00:47:15,200 --> 00:47:18,300
consensus algorithms that use 
like there was one that wanted 

865
00:47:18,300 --> 00:47:22,200
to use, like lasers reading 
discs or something that got some

866
00:47:22,200 --> 00:47:25,600
brief support but like none of 
these have ever been able to get

867
00:47:25,600 --> 00:47:28,800
like anything approaching what I
would call serious consideration

868
00:47:28,800 --> 00:47:31,000
in the Bitcoin community. 
And I think that kind of 

869
00:47:31,000 --> 00:47:34,300
highlights how Insidious this 
type of attack or how effective.

870
00:47:34,300 --> 00:47:37,900
This type of attack could be 
because it's really hard to 

871
00:47:37,900 --> 00:47:40,900
build that type of consensus in 
the Bitcoin community. 

872
00:47:40,900 --> 00:47:45,000
And I guess, obviously any Any, 
you know, effect to counter this

873
00:47:45,000 --> 00:47:47,300
by going to new algorithm. 
How long is it going to take for

874
00:47:47,300 --> 00:47:51,400
that new algorithm to be, you 
know, swamped by the same forces

875
00:47:51,400 --> 00:47:54,900
or completely new ones, right? 
I mean, and I guess if you're 

876
00:47:54,900 --> 00:47:58,100
thinking a little more 
cynically, how do we know that 

877
00:47:58,100 --> 00:48:03,400
the like Luke Dasher hasn't like
doesn't have like already talked

878
00:48:03,400 --> 00:48:05,900
to some people who have built 
this thing and it's ready to go?

879
00:48:06,800 --> 00:48:09,700
I mean we can trust him and 
maybe he's not out to do that. 

880
00:48:09,700 --> 00:48:11,800
But what if we do not supposed 
to trust him? 

881
00:48:12,400 --> 00:48:14,900
He's already had some of these 
machines ready to go. 

882
00:48:14,900 --> 00:48:18,100
And next thing you know, he's 
going to have he's going to be 

883
00:48:18,100 --> 00:48:21,200
selfish mining on these on these
laser discs or whatever. 

884
00:48:21,400 --> 00:48:23,600
You know. 
I don't think he was related to 

885
00:48:23,607 --> 00:48:27,300
that weird Optical like Spinning
Disk consensus algorithm, but 

886
00:48:27,300 --> 00:48:29,000
I'm pretty sure he did at one 
point. 

887
00:48:29,000 --> 00:48:32,000
When you adopt like the Monaro 
for a while, had one where they 

888
00:48:32,000 --> 00:48:35,500
switched between like a random 
set of algorithms at random 

889
00:48:35,500 --> 00:48:38,500
times in the hopes, that it 
would never be worthwhile for 

890
00:48:38,500 --> 00:48:41,800
someone to accumulate like 
enough of the different Asics to

891
00:48:41,800 --> 00:48:44,400
cover that. 
That but like Monet was also far

892
00:48:44,400 --> 00:48:47,300
smaller than Bitcoin and the 
rewards are far smaller and so 

893
00:48:47,300 --> 00:48:49,800
the incentives and up a little 
bit different like there's less 

894
00:48:49,800 --> 00:48:53,700
people willing to develop custom
chips for a smaller Market. 

895
00:48:54,000 --> 00:48:57,200
I haven't looked at that 
algorithm but in general when 

896
00:48:57,200 --> 00:49:00,200
you combine things you get a 
nonlinear relationship between 

897
00:49:01,800 --> 00:49:05,400
like input and output are like 
input and like how many blocks 

898
00:49:05,400 --> 00:49:07,500
you get? 
And the nonlinear is really bad 

899
00:49:07,500 --> 00:49:09,700
for centralization. 
The nice thing about like 

900
00:49:09,700 --> 00:49:13,400
Nakamoto consensus is if you're 
if you're contributing 15% of a 

901
00:49:13,400 --> 00:49:17,400
hash rate, you expect to get 15%
of the block rewards. 

902
00:49:17,400 --> 00:49:21,300
But if it's nonlinear, like, 
there's all sorts of incentives 

903
00:49:21,300 --> 00:49:24,800
for centralization. 
That was back in, like, 20, like

904
00:49:25,100 --> 00:49:28,300
middle of 2018 that I remember 
more narrow, having a bunch of 

905
00:49:28,300 --> 00:49:30,700
issues surrounding these 86 and 
trying a bunch of different 

906
00:49:30,700 --> 00:49:33,900
things for while they were just 
like, regularly, hard forking to

907
00:49:33,900 --> 00:49:36,400
new algorithms with like a 
month's notice or something like

908
00:49:36,400 --> 00:49:39,900
that, then I thought they change
it to something else where 

909
00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:42,100
switch between several but 
doesn't particularly matter. 

910
00:49:42,300 --> 00:49:45,100
The important Point here is like
it's hard to get consensus for 

911
00:49:45,100 --> 00:49:47,800
that kind of thing and like it's
hard to get consensus to change 

912
00:49:47,800 --> 00:49:51,100
the Bitcoin Supply cap. 
They tried to get consensus to 

913
00:49:51,100 --> 00:49:54,500
change the Bitcoin block size. 
They got many of the most 

914
00:49:54,500 --> 00:49:58,300
important like companies and 
people in the Bitcoin ecosystem 

915
00:49:58,400 --> 00:50:01,600
together at consensus and had 
them all, sign a piece of paper 

916
00:50:01,800 --> 00:50:04,600
and still that ended up not 
being enough consensus for 

917
00:50:04,600 --> 00:50:06,000
Bitcoin, duchy change, those 
things. 

918
00:50:06,400 --> 00:50:10,600
And so like I think that like 
escape to that layer, zero 

919
00:50:10,600 --> 00:50:14,200
social Escape ends up Really 
challenging in a culture like 

920
00:50:14,200 --> 00:50:17,300
Bitcoins. 
Yeah, that they are block size. 

921
00:50:17,300 --> 00:50:21,100
Words is interesting in that I 
think people have tried to clean

922
00:50:21,100 --> 00:50:25,700
a lot of like Universal wisdom 
is from this and then like, 

923
00:50:25,800 --> 00:50:27,700
maybe maybe it's true, you can't
change it. 

924
00:50:28,100 --> 00:50:33,000
Maybe smaller blocks are better.
Maybe the miners are always the 

925
00:50:33,100 --> 00:50:37,300
bad guys or will always lose and
the nodes always win but this 

926
00:50:37,300 --> 00:50:40,600
this is one of the like it's 
sort of built into the the whole

927
00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:44,700
mythology of Bitcoin. 
Now, That that the nodes are 

928
00:50:44,700 --> 00:50:46,400
always going to have the final 
say. 

929
00:50:46,400 --> 00:50:48,200
And I don't really notice. 
I said, I tried to like figure 

930
00:50:48,200 --> 00:50:50,500
out what exactly precisely that 
means and how that would make 

931
00:50:50,500 --> 00:50:54,000
sense, but it's this, it's kind 
of part of the, the 

932
00:50:55,000 --> 00:50:59,100
understanding now is that the 
nodes would be able to soft Fork

933
00:50:59,100 --> 00:51:03,000
away, anything that they did 
like, and I don't actually 

934
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:05,600
believe this is something, which
I think requires a lot more of 

935
00:51:05,607 --> 00:51:08,800
an argument, then what about 
2017? 

936
00:51:09,000 --> 00:51:11,900
So, if this happened to give you
the future happened, twenty 

937
00:51:11,900 --> 00:51:16,400
years, Future and the - that 
don't listen, we're going with 

938
00:51:16,400 --> 00:51:20,800
this hard Fork. 
These are, you know, 20, you 

939
00:51:20,800 --> 00:51:23,400
know, the the night having or 
whatever will be the last, 

940
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:24,900
there's no more having's after 
that. 

941
00:51:25,200 --> 00:51:30,300
That's a hard Fork, get aboard. 
It's not clear that that the 

942
00:51:30,300 --> 00:51:33,600
same, you know, it's weird. 
We litigated the block war. 

943
00:51:33,600 --> 00:51:37,100
Again, it's like the block size 
where it's, like, whatever is 

944
00:51:37,100 --> 00:51:39,800
going on in the world, and 2041,
or whatever. 

945
00:51:39,800 --> 00:51:41,800
It's completely different 
situation, completely different 

946
00:51:41,800 --> 00:51:44,400
dynamic. 
X and if it could is the thing 

947
00:51:44,400 --> 00:51:46,900
which people are using every 
day, they need to rely on it, 

948
00:51:47,200 --> 00:51:51,100
then they don't want to 
challenge miners who have, you 

949
00:51:51,100 --> 00:51:54,600
know, will at this point be 
working with all these major 

950
00:51:54,600 --> 00:51:58,600
Financial corporations to to, 
you know, set up lightning 

951
00:51:58,600 --> 00:52:00,700
channels for, you know, Wells 
Fargo and all that kind of 

952
00:52:00,700 --> 00:52:02,800
stuff. 
They're all good to go with the 

953
00:52:02,800 --> 00:52:04,000
mic. 
That's right there. 

954
00:52:04,000 --> 00:52:08,300
They're not going to like let 
their nodes fight and cause a 

955
00:52:08,300 --> 00:52:10,700
soft work, which is going to 
destroy the world's Financial 

956
00:52:10,700 --> 00:52:15,100
system when everything's on. 
And so I think these Dynamics 

957
00:52:15,100 --> 00:52:18,200
could become completely flipped 
once we get to this magical 

958
00:52:18,200 --> 00:52:21,800
place where Bitcoin is like in 
disposable and adopted by 

959
00:52:21,800 --> 00:52:24,600
everybody. 
I think there's lots of 

960
00:52:24,600 --> 00:52:28,000
assumptions that were made 
around 2017, which over the 

961
00:52:28,000 --> 00:52:30,700
coming decades, people will find
we're not true. 

962
00:52:31,500 --> 00:52:34,300
Thank you very much for joining 
us today. 

963
00:52:34,300 --> 00:52:38,900
Micah anyone who wants can check
out his recent textbook Bitcoin 

964
00:52:38,900 --> 00:52:44,200
a game theoretic analysis, which
has more Detailed information 

965
00:52:44,700 --> 00:52:48,000
about different attacks, Bitcoin
security, how to think about it,

966
00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:51,400
how to model it and like, really
how to understand these 

967
00:52:51,400 --> 00:52:54,000
different things. 
I should want to, thank you very

968
00:52:54,000 --> 00:52:58,400
much for joining us. 
Yeah, it's a math textbook. 

969
00:52:58,400 --> 00:53:00,100
It's a graduate level math 
textbook. 

970
00:53:00,300 --> 00:53:01,600
To be clear. 
So if you're interested in a 

971
00:53:01,600 --> 00:53:04,500
graduate level math, textbook 
about the game theory of 

972
00:53:04,500 --> 00:53:08,500
Bitcoin, it's the best. 
Yeah, it dominates that 

973
00:53:08,500 --> 00:53:11,400
category. 
Yes, yes, yes, I competition is 

974
00:53:11,400 --> 00:53:14,000
for losers. 
Well, thank you very much.