Thread by @Tr0llyTr0llFace

Nic Carter still tries to spin Bitcoin's mind-numbingly stupid energy and cash burn as a "debate". It's not a debate: Bitcoin's energy energy and cash burn is mind-numbingly stupid.
Let's dissect the desperation of a hypocrite who's backed into a corner.
coindesk.com/frustrating-ma…

The opening salvo sets the tone.
Nobody's debating if it's worth to spend "any" energy on Bitcoin. Sane people are simply saying that it's stupid to spend 100+ TWh/year because it's an insanely large amount and much more efficient systems could be set up to the same effect.

Then there's the assumption that Bitcoin is, or enables, "a non-state monetary system" and "sound money". It's not, and it doesn't. Bitcoin, in itself, is just a database - a distributed ledger, like tens of thousands of other databases, only much slower and more expensive.

The ecosystem that emerged around Bitcoin - the scammy exchanges, the fraudulent stablecoins, the spineless shills like Nic Carter - maintain the possibility of cashing in and out of Bitcoin, so that it can be used for payments the same way a piano can be used for payments.

Then, Nic is stating that Bitcoin's energy consumption is only temporary, because it's linked to the value of minted coins and thanks to halvings, that value is bound to fall, as Bitcoin isn't going to double every four years.
Don't worry, it will be fine in *checks notes* 2140!!

This is a lie, of course, as Bitcoin's electricity burn is required not only to mine coins, but also to secure the network. The new coins are just a way to finance the cash/electricity burn, but Nic prefers to ignore that because it's just an indefensible fact. More on it later.

Then comes the bullshit about "gold mining costs money, too". Bitcoin isn't gold. It isn't buried deep underground in infinitesimal concentrations, it's man-made computer code, and people are not bound by the laws of nature in deciding how it works.

"Satoshi created Bitcoin this way" - sure, so what? Times change, adapt or die. Bitcoin's waste in case of success was a problem that "needed solving" according to Satoshi himself.
Of course miners like it this way, but Nic explains that mining is a "free market".

Bitcoin mining requires billions of dollars in mining rigs and other infrastructure to be spend every year. For that kind of money, you could set up a hedge fund or an investment bank and become an "insider monetizing his proximity to the Fed", too.
How is that any different?

Then comes the "containers not parcels" line. Supposedly Bitcoin is just a settlement layer for outside systems, equal to FedWire.
This is nonsense. Banks use FedWire because they can 100% trust it. You can't 100% trust Bitcoin. No transaction is final. Errors can't be reversed.

You have no idea of how many errors happen in the front, middle, and back offices of financial institutions. How many times you say "sell" instead of "buy", how many times you input three zeros too many. "Censorship resistance" is a very stupid thing, it's a bug, not a feature.

If you imagine institutions are going to bet the success of hundred of billions of dollars worth of transactions on Bitcoin, please consult a psychiatrist.
The second US institutions begin to use it in this way, anyone can build up idle mining capacity to attack the network.

Bitcoin's cash burn is an insurance policy against attacks. The network burns more cash than an attacker could expect to win from attacking it, so nobody attacks it. If you want to use Bitcoin like FedWire, the cash burn must be astronomical. Not enough electricity in the world.

You just can't build a global settlement layer on PoW as there's not enough electricity in the world to be burned. The US would need to burn a billion dollars a day in mining just to be sure that China isn't building up spare mining capacity to take down its financial system.

And again, the cash/electricity burn we're talking about is just for the sake of a database. Whenever someone's comparing Bitcoin to the "global monetary system", they're ignoring all the bank branches and people in customer support and ATMs and lawyers and fraud detection teams.

Banks have databases, too. FedWire has databases. To quote Jimmy Wales, "they work well". No need to burn $20 billion of sucker money to keep the scheme going.