Is Bitcoin a useless thing and an unnecessary carbon footprint? 🤔

I default laugh and assume someone is full of it when they complain about the resource use of Bitcoin.

For one because if you're driving a car and going home to your air conditioning and refrigerator and eating a cheeseburger, then you don't get to complain about the spec you think you see in someone else.

Their retort would be something like:

well..... those other things have an actual use tho

For example (from bookface):

It basically comes to this same argument any time someone pretends to be bothered by the footprint of Bitcoin.

And it's an odd argument...

[Pretend for a moment that indeed Bitcoin is pointless.]

If I did 'X' which had a tiny footprint and no point, compared 'Y' which has a huge footprint and some alleged point to it, it doesn't mean that 'Y' can't possibly be worse behavior.

If there are other ways to do whatever you were doing besides specifically 'Y', then 'Y' isn't necessary either, and if the net impact (between 'Y' and the cleaner alternative) is bigger than what was happening with 'X', then 'Y' is a more meaningful thing to be concerned about.

And it's not genuine to run around on a high-horse about 'X' when you're guilty of 'Y'.

By his line of thinking here, a kid playing around with a light switch would be the world's greatest ecological concern. (Since there's no point to it, whereas testing radioactive elements all day would be fine if allegedly there's a point.)

But more to the point, here's my reply:

Bitcoin has utility.

In general, it's really bad to think you could ever decide that something has no point to it. If other people are using it, my first thought is to wonder why rather than to declare they're all mistaken and there's no reason for this.

It's possible you're just missing the point.

But like the chihuahua barking at your heels, Keynesian types tend to be arrogant, and to assume how they value it must be objective reality.

If you can't see why a censor-less, permission-less way to transfer information has value, then it's just an imagination problem on your part. And your lack of foresight doesn't determine what is or isn't useful to other people.

For some people the value can be things like 'it's the best form of remittance to their home country'. And even if it's contained to that exact use case, that counts. That's at least something.

The grander value will be for whole economies when we begin using it, and we for the first time have a modern currency that works in a digital era without feeding a top-heaviness and further enriching the most aggressive people.

THAT MATTERS. lol.

And that's really the most vital thing about Bitcoin, is that it's essentially the backbone of how there can be commerce without hierarchy and authority. So if you believe in hierarchy and authority and can't imagine the world working without it, of course you'll have a blind spot for what Bitcoin offers.

But reality doesn't form around your blind spot, lol. We'll see what the market value is in 10 years and 50 years and 100 years.

fiat has a huge footprint

Bitcoin's footprint is smaller than fiat anyways.

The paper itself counts for something, but that's a total aside. (It would be possible to have a fully digital fiat currency.)

You need a perceived strong authority in order for it to work. And with the special privilege of being in charge of all the money, the people who are most motivated to win these positions won't tend to be the kindest among us. They'll want to use the position and the special privileges for their own advantage (even if they pretend to have different motivations), and they won't have the same moral thresholds that we normal people have.

They'll fight for resources and control.

So it's not hyperbole to say that fiat currency is essentially backed by war, and that war is an inevitable aspect of fiat.

All the bombs that fall, all the nuclear-active shit that gets tested and thrown around into the atmosphere (wars in Iraq, etc).. that's essentially your fiat mining process.

Plus the next tier of things, like subsidies to meat and dairy, and special advantages for coal and oil. Where you empower a centralized, monopolistic authority, it generally doesn't behave in ways that are good for the planet.

I'll take my chances with the Antminers.

Bitcoin mining can be really, really green. There's a natural incentive to use as little energy as possible, because you want the fee to be as small as possible. In a world where Bitcoin is commonly used, you probably have solar panels charging most of it. Either that or trusted clearing houses who settle on chain later.

It'll never be a large use of energy, because it doesn't work economically where you buy a cup of coffee and want to pay a 20 cent fee.

So it's an inherently contained thing, and their worry about it is essentially a projection for fiat and for what we're currently dealing with. Bitcoin is the solution.