this morning i had a coffee with almond-coffee flavored ice cream. over this delicious breakfast i was working though pieces of a beautiful argument with a normie and decided to expand on it for stacker news.
@cryotosensei @Lux you might really like this one.
https://www.etymonline.com/word/argue
[from Latin arguere "to make clear, make known, prove, declare, demonstrate"]
in other words: to shine light on the reality by way of reason.
bitcoin is physical; the bits have to be stored somewhere. they are stored on computer chips.
these bits are alive; every 10 minutes the bitcoin nodes get charged with life.
bitcoin is alive.
the energy comes out of the living-breathing planet, harvested by the living-breathing people, distributed to the electric panels that are maintained and operated by the people, and finally goes into the computers with chips. the bitcoin chips are absolutely dependent on the living-breathing collective working in unison.
all of the metals in the chips running the bitcoin software (and the other necessary supporting infrastructure) collectively constitute the wealth of key holders. if we took all of those bitcoin-containing chips and made a super-computer planet in space, that would be the collective wealth of bitcoiners. in essence, that's how we can picture it (see picture below).
however, this planet has been blown into a gazillion pieces and distributed all over the world. despite this vast distribution, every bitcoin user still has the claim on the tiny physical bits of bitcoin. that claim is the encrypted private key to the UTXO's (unspent output transaction). it's not a true ownership but a claim that the bitcoin collective respects and defends at all cost. the private key is the unspent claim.
one could argue that we own nothing but our body and our soul (do not give those away, by the way)
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=claim
[Latin clamare "to cry out, shout, proclaim"]
the way we spend the physical bits of bitcoin and transfer the claim of ownership is by using our private key.
let's say we are being super private with our bitcoin life, like @DarthCoin. in order to proclaim the ownership of bitcoin, we have to
- power up our private electric plant
- electrify our private transmission device (fiberoptic cable, satellite, radio antenna, whatever)
- connect the private bitcoin node, sync up to the chain and the lightning network
- charge the claim with a signature, the private key, using whatever means necessary (like key strokes, mouse clicks, or NFC chip scan).
- enjoy the beer.
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=charge
[Late Latin carricare "to load a wagon or cart," from Latin carrus "two-wheeled wagon"]
in other words: proof of work is proof of claim and the claim is charged with life.
may this argument help you in your orange-pilling endeavors.