Thread by @dhruvbansal

\1 Ready to get weird?

I'm excited to announce a new speculative series "Bitcoin Astronomy" about hyperbitcoinized humanity colonizing space.

Part 1 "The Law of Hash Horizons" follows the Muskcoin Revolution of 2140 and its consequences for bitcoin.

unchained-capital.com/blog/law-of-ha…

\2 Assume hyperbitcoinization on Earth.

Lightning & mesh networks, PoW merging with energy production, the fracturing of nation states & global corporations, environmental degradation & mega-engineering marvels -- hyperbitcoinization delivers it all.

What happens on Mars?

\3 Martians will be able to use bitcoin and its higher layers just fine. They can HODL, transact, make lightning channels, &c.

They'll suffer some disadvantages because Mars is a long way from Earth, but they'll compensate.

Bitcoin on Mars works, but not as well as on Earth.

\4 What about mining? This is where it gets interesting. Mining will not be possible from Mars. @clarkmoody got it right: too little hashrate at too far a distance.

Every PoW blockchain has a "Center of Hash". Mars is too far from bitcoin's Center of Hash for mining to work.

\5 The idea of a center of hash and distance from it is intuitive but we wanted to be more quantitative.

So we decided to simulate mining bitcoin at various hashrates and distances from Earth.

We open-sourced the code, so you can simulate, too!

github.com/unchained-capi…

\6 Our simulations confirm that mining on Mars will not be possible. The plot below illustrates a phenomenon we call the "Hash Horizon" -- a distance from bitcoin's center of hash beyond which mining is not possible.

Mars is too far outside Earth's hash horizon for PoW.

\7 When Mars is strong enough and its people proud enough they will seek to launch their own blockchain -- Muskcoin, to honor their founder @elonmusk.

Their revolution against bitcoin will be unique as it is a revolution against consensus, not a state.

\8 It will not be a violent revolution but that doesn't mean there won't be fighting. Terran miners will fire hash bombs over high-powered comms lasers hoping to destroy fragile Martian blockchains light-minutes away.

But Muskcoin revolutionaries will have many means of defense.

\9 Eventually the revolution will succeed and Muskcoin will join bitcoin as a trading peer in the growing interplanetary market around Sol.

This pattern of settlement & revolution will be repeated over and over again as humans spread further from Earth.

\10 The desire to travel far away to start a new blockchain will turn out to be a powerful driver of human expansion throughout the future of our species.

We will expand through the universe like a fungus, seeking out artificial scarcity and energy (h/t @bquittem).

\11 If you enjoy these speculations, stay tuned for Part 2 & 3 where we discuss the universality of blockchains and their relationship to space and time.

Many thanks to: @clarkmoody @danheld @bquittem @TuurDemeester @BuckPerley @MartyBent @TaylorPearsonMe @RyanTheGentry