You're right, the Democrats aren't really all that progressive. Most prominent Democrats (Obama definitely, but also many others) are moderately conservative. I think you could make a good case that in many ways the Democrats are closer to classical conservatism than the Republicans, who seem to have embraced dramatic change without consideration for consequences, though in a direction that's regressive rather than progressive.
And putting everyone at each other's throats is indeed not progressive. It's sadly working very well for regressives.
Whatabutt that guy in Chicago a hundred years ago, huh? Whatabutt that? Dems did it once!
It's surprising how often conservative arguments against Democrats point to actions by Democrats from 100 years ago, when the Democrats were the conservative party, and Republicans the progressive party.
The purpose is using proof of work as the core mechanism to bitcoin's decentralised trust model.
Yes, but it's the proof of pointless work. Nothing useful is being done with that work. It would be very different if all that massive work accomplished something useful.
Using large amounts of energy isn't the problem. Using large amounts of fossil-fuel energy is.
Sadly, at the moment, the vast majority of energy in the world still comes from fossil energy. Energy used to win bitcoins is not being used to heat the homes of the elderly or increase food production in poor countries. If bitcoin miners use clean energy, that's fantastic of course. But if they buy clean energy that could also have been used to replace fossil energy, they are still slowing down the reduction of fossil energy.
I've heard many miners are in China using energy from big hydro plants, which is clean, but thereby also not being used for the many other purposes for which China needs energy. And despite their investments in clean energy, China is still burning a lot of coal.
They are wasting energy because that's the explicit purpose. New bitcoins are awarded to the people doing the most pointless calculations, which wastes energy. You could award those bitcoins based on something more productive than that.
It's not just about doing things we don't like, it's about harming others for profit. Because that's ultimately what's happening here: the price of fossil energy does not take the cost of pollution into account. Wasting it creates needless pollution that nobody is paying for. The tax would not serve merely to drive the price up, but to undo the damage caused. Energy that doesn't pollute would not be taxed, driving an enormous demand for cleaner energy.
And once all energy is clean, wasting it wouldn't be so harmful anymore.
You're absolutely right, and I did not express that correctly. It's dirty energy that needs to be taxed. If all energy were green, wasting it would be much less of an issue. (Though wasting it could still lead to shortages for people who need it for more practical things, of course.)
But even if mining solves medical problems, there's no personal profit in a 51% attack. And if you really do want to do a 51% attack for some reason and you have the resources, you could still do one right now. So I don't really see the security issue here.
He's a Democrat. They believe that regulations and taxes magically solve everything.
I'm not and I don't. Well, I'm a small-d democrat.
But in this particular case, the damage comes from the fact that the price of energy doesn't reflect its true cost. It does damage that is not included in the cost. The only thing I want is to include the cost of undoing that damage in the cost of the energy that's doing the damage.
One big thing this will accomplish, is that fossil fuels immediately become way more expensive than clean forms of energy, which will speed up adoption of cleaner energy. In much of the world, solar energy is already cheaper than coal. But it's not so much cheaper that all coal plants are immediately replaced by solar plants. This energy tax may not even increase the price of energy much for people who switch to solar, wind, hydro or nuclear, but everybody will want to switch to those, because fossil fuel plants are immediately losing money, because they can't compete anymore. The whole world will rapidly switch to cheaper and cleaner energy, unlike now.
The efficiency of a heat pump depends on the temperature you're pumping from. As GP said, with access to geothermal, it can be extremely efficient, but even if you're just pumping outside heat, it should have an efficiency of over 100% at temperate winter temperatures. But you're right that when it gets deep below freezing, heat pumps become pointless.
Strangely enough, you don't want bitcoin mining to be useful for any other purpose, otherwise profit motives for the other purpose could make bitcoin network less secure.
How is bitcoin mining feeding those millions? Energy is being wasted on stupid things like this when it could be used to improve people's lives.
I'll gladly hear a better proposal from you, but at the moment, your argument sounds like we should leave things as they are so people will continue to starve while energy keeps getting wasted on bitcoin mining.
If you use the energy to heat your house, that's definitely useful. I doubt most cryptomining energy is used that way, though.
Whether using electricity to heat your house is the most efficient way to heat it, depends on how your electricity is generated and whether heat pumps are a viable alternative.
Exactly. Imagine if all that computational effort had been put into Folding@Home or similar computationally heavy problems. How many complex problems would have been solved by now?
All this wasted energy sounds like an argument for some stiff taxes on energy. I honestly see no other way to discourage people from wasting so much energy on these things. I'm all for cheap energy, but if people start wasting it like that, just because it's cheap, maybe the cost for energy should include its true cost, which includes the cost of repairing the damage it cases.
Of course that also means we should then invest those taxes into solutions for the problems created by this energy waste. Either cleaner energy technology, or carbon sequestration.
(Also, how is aluminium mining even economically viable?)
I think you miss my point. I strongly suspect that many people, probably not in this discussion, but very likely in that EU poll, prefer summertime because of the association they have with summertime. But that's not going to work in winter.
I'm not sure why you think an hour of daylight after work is more valuable than an hour of daylight before work. I strongly prefer it being light when I get out of bed, and certainly by the time I go out the door. It doesn't have to be light when I go to bed or have dinner or anything like that. It being dark when I get leave work is not great, but some darkness is unavoidable in winter, and I prefer it being light when I need to become active over it being light when it's time to stop.
And no, our biological clock has not evolved since the invention of the candle. We have become better at fooling our biological clock with the invention of the candle, but that's not the same thing. Daylight still matters. Otherwise, why would we even be having this discussion?
But our biological clock being slightly slower than a real day, also means that daylight in the morning is more important than in the evening; that's when our clock resets. We have no problem dealing with darkness at the end of our day. See how eagerly people go to bed far past dusk, or even in the middle of the night. But most people do not like getting up before the crack of dawn. Artificial light could have meant we use more of our early morning, but we don't. Instead, we use more of our evening. We don't care so much about living in darkness at the end of the day, but we don't like darkness at the start of the day when we need to get active. And that's also the thing that makes winter mornings so hard: getting out of bed while it's still dark.
Summer time sounds more pleasant than winter time because we associate summer with warm, pleasant weather, and summertime with these long summer evenings. Winter is cold and harsh and winter time means it gets dark early.
But changing winter time to summer time is not going to make our winter days any longer. It just means the son won't be up until 9:45 (where I live at least). That is going to mess with our biological clocks. However arbitrary people think timezones are, our bodies have evolved to respond to the cycle of sunlight. Winter mornings are hard enough as it is. Keeping it dark for an hour longer is really not going to make them easier.
If so, you just described the Caterpillar S61. Milspec for drop, water, and dust. Giant battery.
Interesting. I hadn't heard of it, but from reviews it sounds incredibly sturdy, and a builtin heat camera is really cool.
Although from what I understand, the battery isn't all that giant. It's certainly not small, but much of the energy saving comes from the underpowered processor.
Well, if we're gong to abandon the sun's role in this, I suggest getting rid of timezones altogether. Everybody just follow UTC. That's going to fix a lot of headaches.
(And yes, I said "most of western Europe. Not the UK, Ireland or Portugal, but France, Netherland, Belgium and Spain follow central European time despite being geographically mostly or entirely in the western European timezone.
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You're right, the Democrats aren't really all that progressive. Most prominent Democrats (Obama definitely, but also many others) are moderately conservative. I think you could make a good case that in many ways the Democrats are closer to classical conservatism than the Republicans, who seem to have embraced dramatic change without consideration for consequences, though in a direction that's regressive rather than progressive.
And putting everyone at each other's throats is indeed not progressive. It's sadly working very well for regressives.
Wasn't it the Republican party that used to be all for morals?
Where have you been these past 30 years?
Whatabutt that guy in Chicago a hundred years ago, huh? Whatabutt that? Dems did it once!
It's surprising how often conservative arguments against Democrats point to actions by Democrats from 100 years ago, when the Democrats were the conservative party, and Republicans the progressive party.
What are you talking about? I mean this as an honest question; it's not clear from your post what exactly you're claiming or what it relates to.
Pedophilia is obviously terrible, but I wasn't aware that it was a rampant problem among politicians.
The purpose is using proof of work as the core mechanism to bitcoin's decentralised trust model.
Yes, but it's the proof of pointless work. Nothing useful is being done with that work. It would be very different if all that massive work accomplished something useful.
Using large amounts of energy isn't the problem. Using large amounts of fossil-fuel energy is.
Sadly, at the moment, the vast majority of energy in the world still comes from fossil energy. Energy used to win bitcoins is not being used to heat the homes of the elderly or increase food production in poor countries. If bitcoin miners use clean energy, that's fantastic of course. But if they buy clean energy that could also have been used to replace fossil energy, they are still slowing down the reduction of fossil energy.
I've heard many miners are in China using energy from big hydro plants, which is clean, but thereby also not being used for the many other purposes for which China needs energy. And despite their investments in clean energy, China is still burning a lot of coal.
I think there are better ways to take care of pensioners than that.
They are wasting energy because that's the explicit purpose. New bitcoins are awarded to the people doing the most pointless calculations, which wastes energy. You could award those bitcoins based on something more productive than that.
It's not just about doing things we don't like, it's about harming others for profit. Because that's ultimately what's happening here: the price of fossil energy does not take the cost of pollution into account. Wasting it creates needless pollution that nobody is paying for. The tax would not serve merely to drive the price up, but to undo the damage caused. Energy that doesn't pollute would not be taxed, driving an enormous demand for cleaner energy.
And once all energy is clean, wasting it wouldn't be so harmful anymore.
You're absolutely right, and I did not express that correctly. It's dirty energy that needs to be taxed. If all energy were green, wasting it would be much less of an issue. (Though wasting it could still lead to shortages for people who need it for more practical things, of course.)
But even if mining solves medical problems, there's no personal profit in a 51% attack. And if you really do want to do a 51% attack for some reason and you have the resources, you could still do one right now. So I don't really see the security issue here.
He's a Democrat. They believe that regulations and taxes magically solve everything.
I'm not and I don't. Well, I'm a small-d democrat.
But in this particular case, the damage comes from the fact that the price of energy doesn't reflect its true cost. It does damage that is not included in the cost. The only thing I want is to include the cost of undoing that damage in the cost of the energy that's doing the damage.
One big thing this will accomplish, is that fossil fuels immediately become way more expensive than clean forms of energy, which will speed up adoption of cleaner energy. In much of the world, solar energy is already cheaper than coal. But it's not so much cheaper that all coal plants are immediately replaced by solar plants. This energy tax may not even increase the price of energy much for people who switch to solar, wind, hydro or nuclear, but everybody will want to switch to those, because fossil fuel plants are immediately losing money, because they can't compete anymore. The whole world will rapidly switch to cheaper and cleaner energy, unlike now.
The efficiency of a heat pump depends on the temperature you're pumping from. As GP said, with access to geothermal, it can be extremely efficient, but even if you're just pumping outside heat, it should have an efficiency of over 100% at temperate winter temperatures. But you're right that when it gets deep below freezing, heat pumps become pointless.
Strangely enough, you don't want bitcoin mining to be useful for any other purpose, otherwise profit motives for the other purpose could make bitcoin network less secure.
Why would that make it less secure?
What is wrong with you?
How is bitcoin mining feeding those millions? Energy is being wasted on stupid things like this when it could be used to improve people's lives.
I'll gladly hear a better proposal from you, but at the moment, your argument sounds like we should leave things as they are so people will continue to starve while energy keeps getting wasted on bitcoin mining.
If you use the energy to heat your house, that's definitely useful. I doubt most cryptomining energy is used that way, though.
Whether using electricity to heat your house is the most efficient way to heat it, depends on how your electricity is generated and whether heat pumps are a viable alternative.
Exactly. Imagine if all that computational effort had been put into Folding@Home or similar computationally heavy problems. How many complex problems would have been solved by now?
All this wasted energy sounds like an argument for some stiff taxes on energy. I honestly see no other way to discourage people from wasting so much energy on these things. I'm all for cheap energy, but if people start wasting it like that, just because it's cheap, maybe the cost for energy should include its true cost, which includes the cost of repairing the damage it cases.
Of course that also means we should then invest those taxes into solutions for the problems created by this energy waste. Either cleaner energy technology, or carbon sequestration.
(Also, how is aluminium mining even economically viable?)
I think you miss my point. I strongly suspect that many people, probably not in this discussion, but very likely in that EU poll, prefer summertime because of the association they have with summertime. But that's not going to work in winter.
I'm not sure why you think an hour of daylight after work is more valuable than an hour of daylight before work. I strongly prefer it being light when I get out of bed, and certainly by the time I go out the door. It doesn't have to be light when I go to bed or have dinner or anything like that. It being dark when I get leave work is not great, but some darkness is unavoidable in winter, and I prefer it being light when I need to become active over it being light when it's time to stop.
And no, our biological clock has not evolved since the invention of the candle. We have become better at fooling our biological clock with the invention of the candle, but that's not the same thing. Daylight still matters. Otherwise, why would we even be having this discussion?
But our biological clock being slightly slower than a real day, also means that daylight in the morning is more important than in the evening; that's when our clock resets. We have no problem dealing with darkness at the end of our day. See how eagerly people go to bed far past dusk, or even in the middle of the night. But most people do not like getting up before the crack of dawn. Artificial light could have meant we use more of our early morning, but we don't. Instead, we use more of our evening. We don't care so much about living in darkness at the end of the day, but we don't like darkness at the start of the day when we need to get active. And that's also the thing that makes winter mornings so hard: getting out of bed while it's still dark.
My son does. We live very close to school, though. Other kids come by bike.
Summer time sounds more pleasant than winter time because we associate summer with warm, pleasant weather, and summertime with these long summer evenings. Winter is cold and harsh and winter time means it gets dark early.
But changing winter time to summer time is not going to make our winter days any longer. It just means the son won't be up until 9:45 (where I live at least). That is going to mess with our biological clocks. However arbitrary people think timezones are, our bodies have evolved to respond to the cycle of sunlight. Winter mornings are hard enough as it is. Keeping it dark for an hour longer is really not going to make them easier.
Most people have never even heard of the Fairphone, and just buy from major brands.
The Fairphone is far from perfect, mind you, but the modular approach seems like a good idea.
If so, you just described the Caterpillar S61. Milspec for drop, water, and dust. Giant battery.
Interesting. I hadn't heard of it, but from reviews it sounds incredibly sturdy, and a builtin heat camera is really cool.
Although from what I understand, the battery isn't all that giant. It's certainly not small, but much of the energy saving comes from the underpowered processor.
One could imagine having a replaceable cover on a phone without a structural inner case.
You could imagine it but it wouldn't be a very good idea in day to day use for most people.
It works perfectly fine with my Fairphone. I think it's a good idea.
Or imagine them covering the outside in rubber to protect the paint, ruining the streamlining in the process.
Well, if we're gong to abandon the sun's role in this, I suggest getting rid of timezones altogether. Everybody just follow UTC. That's going to fix a lot of headaches.
(And yes, I said "most of western Europe. Not the UK, Ireland or Portugal, but France, Netherland, Belgium and Spain follow central European time despite being geographically mostly or entirely in the western European timezone.