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Welcome to the Bitcoin Infinity Academy. This is our course on my second book,

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Bitcoin Independence Reimagined, brought to you by the Plan B Network and Bitbox.

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I'm Knut Swanum and I'm here as always with Luke DeWolf. Today's chapter is the one-shot

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principle in the always up point, which we already covered in Lugano, but we're going to go through

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it once again here. How are you today, Luke? I'm great, Knut. Good morning. Yes, one-shot

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principle and the always up point we we did this one in lugano uh but the the whole deal with that

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was we were we were live from the plan b forum there and we streamed it on rumble it was a lot

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of fun really cool but it's not exactly the the format of the the this particular podcast so we're

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we're just doing it the the proper way so if you've already listened to us talk about this in

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the past that's okay uh but but yeah we're just going to cover it again here with the nice book

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visible and

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you know us sitting in our nice comfy

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chairs instead of in Lugano Switzerland

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on the

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tent stage where we later that

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no where we the previous night had

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played the Satoshi

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Rakamoto and it's a miracle

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that we were actually up to do the podcast

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at 8 in the morning the next day

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yeah that was

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exciting for sure

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this is probably the most

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known chapter

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of this book

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The one-shot principle is the most famous quote from the book by far.

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So yeah, let's dive into it and see what it is.

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Shall we?

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Let's do it.

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And before we get started, just a reminder that the best way that you can get involved

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with the Bitcoin Infinity Academy is to go to our Geyser Fund page, geyser.fund.project.infinity.

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You can get all the details there about how you can get involved.

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And that's one of the best ways that you can support the show.

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So go check that out, geyser.fund.project.infinity.

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And now, the one-shot principle and the always-up point.

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Who am I to conjure up theories about macroeconomics?

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I have no financial background, and even though I've probably studied mathematics more than your average Joe,

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that was a long time ago, and I'm hardly an expert at anything, really.

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Well, if there's one thing that Bitcoin has taught me, it's how scarce my time is,

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and that I won't be able to excel at anything if I don't have skin in the game.

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Everyone is new to Bitcoin, and everything in economics is speculative.

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John Cleese, one of my favorite human beings of all time, has said that it seemed like the main

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goal in life for everyone in his hometown of Weston-Super-Mare was to get safely into their

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coffins without ever having been seriously embarrassed. This phrase struck a chord with me.

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After having discovered Bitcoin, and in doing so also having discovered new ways to think about

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scarcity and time, I've decided to not hold my brain back any longer, but to put my thoughts

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out there, where they at least might ignite a spark in someone else's mind.

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Standing on the shoulders of true giants, here's my take on an economic theory and an

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explanation of the specific event that it implies.

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And just to be clear, this was Knut talking the whole time, not me, even though I agree

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with most of what you said, it doesn't all apply to me.

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Yeah, okay. So before we get into here's my take on an economic theory, the actual take on it, let's discuss this a bit. Yeah, it's funny because I had a guy come up to me in Lugano when we were signing books who asked exactly this, like, what gives you the authority to tell me about things? Like, why should I listen to you? Do you have a PhD in this and that?

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and the thing is uh bitcoin in my mind has sort of leveled that playing field this is one of the

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things i fell in love with with this community in the beginning all that mattered what what you had

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actually produced credentials didn't matter at all like people listened to ideas not to authority

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and and that's uh i mean all i have to my name um in terms of expertise on this are my books and how

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people like how much people like them like uh that's that's my proof of results that's that's

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the uh that's my phd uh and take that as you will uh if you want to listen to me or listen to

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a kinsian economist who has a paper from a school funded by the government that's up to you

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but all I did in this was think and write

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I was never paid by anyone to have a certain opinion rather than another

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very good point and I think also the John Cleese quote is interesting

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it's kind of yeah there's some inspiration to that right

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like you should lean in to the things and not worry about being seriously embarrassed

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No, it has, as I say here, struck a chord with me because so many people go through life without ever taking risks, and therefore nothing happens to them.

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So life is not a rehearsal.

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You have one go at it.

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And just as I explained in the Praxeology book that hope is a rational choice because you're going to die anyway, so you might as well live as there's hope, even if life seems hopeless.

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this is sort of in the same vein as that you might as well live life as if it was your last chance to

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do so because it is your last chance to do so uh so go out there and uh be courageous like

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not in the woke sense of the word but in the true sense of the word um what's the worst that can

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happen uh i guess you can die a martyr or you're gonna die anyway so why not just speak your mind

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Very good point. And so I think with that, let's get into that which you spoke your mind about.

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The one-shot principle.

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Absolute mathematical scarcity achieved by consensus in a sufficiently decentralized distributed network was a discovery rather than an invention.

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It cannot be achieved again by a network made up of participants aware of this discovery, since the very thing discovered was resistance to replicability itself.

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I forget if we pause there in the Lugano thing, but I think it's time to just let you explain that in your own words.

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Yeah, that is the quote that has made its rounds around Bitcoin, Twitter and so on.

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I recently talked to Max Keiser about this.

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It's one of the reasons that I went to San Salvador last week, because this is one of Max's favorite quotes in the Bitcoin.

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What's the word? The Bitcoin cannon, maybe.

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And it hints at maybe if I wrote it today, I would have used slightly different words.

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I would have replaced scarcity with finiteness, which is more accurate.

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But other than that, I still think this is the case. It's very simple. The very thing that intrigued me about Bitcoin in the first place was the promise of something on the internet that couldn't be copied. And I could never get my head around, like, how can information not be copyable? All information can be copied. That's in the very nature of information.

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but it's only like a decade later

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I realized the depth of that question

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and that the reason it can't be copied

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or that ownership of a Bitcoin can't be copied

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is because the Bitcoins are not on the internet at all

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they're in our heads

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and we are the thing

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so this is sort of a pathway

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a stepping stone on the path to that insight

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yeah and I

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I wouldn't mind

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if more people spread this thing

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what's your take on it Luke

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what do you think when you read this

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yeah well the quote itself

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is really just distilling

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a few ideas about

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Bitcoin into this one

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a couple of sentences

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basically and I

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really like how it does that

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that's the way all memes work

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right the simpler they are

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And the more information that gets packed into them, the better. And I mean, that's sort of everything divided by 21 million is this to a whole other level, basically, right? And I think the idea here is that this is also probably something that people are maybe a little unintuitive about here. It's the answer to all of the, well, why is Bitcoin actually scarce if there's all these other cryptos? That's basically the answer to that.

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Like it doesn't matter if you've got some other crypto that's got a fixed supply cap.

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They still have like a pre-mine and they have all of these other things that basically they knew the game they were playing.

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All of them.

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But Bitcoin is the only one that didn't.

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And so it's subtle, but it's important.

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It's more like, yeah, Bitcoin is the solution to the double spending problem.

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Like, either you can achieve digital resistance to replicability or you can't.

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So if the other cryptos were to count, then they would sort of debunk their own theory.

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They would be counterproductive to their own cause.

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So it's very simple.

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Finite amount of Bitcoin, infinite amount of crypto.

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And you have to bundle them into their own thing, like all of them, because they're all an attempt at doing the same thing, which is replicating resistance to replicability, which by its very nature cannot be replicated.

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So either it works once or it doesn't work at all.

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And I happen to be in the camp that thinks it worked once and that's all we need.

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Perfect.

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I think let's cover the remaining conversational paragraphs on this so that we can dig even further into your questions.

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Sure, one more thing before we do that.

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You mentioned boiling down complex thoughts into a few sentences.

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And that's why I fell in love with Twitter in the first place.

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because you were limited to 144 characters,

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which forces you to distill your thoughts

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into the shortest amount of characters possible.

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And that's absolutely helped my writing abilities.

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And I really enjoy Twitter for that reason.

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And I still do, by the way.

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you can put more characters in a tweet now, but you can only still only see the

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first 144 ones or whatever it is.

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I don't know if it's exactly 144 anymore, but, um, still that's what Twitter mainly

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did for me is is making me better at distilling ideas into fewer characters Yeah Very good point And yeah uncapping that for paid subscribers to Twitter maybe has had some effects

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I certainly don't make super short tweets all that often,

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but anyway.

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All right, on to the next paragraph.

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Absolute scarcity on the internet

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was long believed to be impossible

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because of the very nature of data.

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Ones and zeros that could be copied

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an infinite number of times

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weren't believed to be capable of representing something as uncompromisingly finite as Bitcoin's

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21 million coin issuance cap. That is, until Satoshi Nakamoto showed us that the double

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spending problem could be solved by giving every participant in the network a reward for following

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the rules and making sure that every other participant also did so. In doing this, and then

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disappearing at an early stage of the network's development, he gave enough participants hope that

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the decentralization experiment could actually work and created a living thing that feeds on

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human incentives. The rise of Bitcoin was a true black swan event and it cannot happen again.

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A competing token would need to be sufficiently different from Bitcoin in order to achieve

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true decentralization because it would be trivial for any big player to completely dominate this new

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coin and there would be no way to introduce it to the market without a skewed initial distribution.

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a competitor would need to differentiate itself so much from bitcoin that when push came to shove

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it wouldn't be a competitor at all i'll stop here i think that was mostly just covering a lot of the

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points we've already discussed yeah except one point and that is the monetary maximalism point

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here if uh this is so in order for anything else to it would need to be sufficiently different right

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in other words it couldn't be money it couldn't compete on the money front which is also why

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bitcoin needs to be money and nothing else if bitcoin is all all of a sudden all of these other

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things data storage bullcrap then it is competing with the other coins on those things and we don't

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want that kind of competition so so it's actually an uh uh inadvertent um argument for the monetary

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maximalism case it's uh being money is what makes bitcoin different from all the other shit yes and

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uh yeah i think digging too deeply into sort of the debates about you know arbitrary data on

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bitcoin that's not really the point of this particular uh series but yeah bitcoin is money

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and has to be money and has to be the thing that wins as money in order for us to do the things

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that Bitcoin is promising, right?

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Like Bitcoin is supposed to be the way out

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of the fiat system

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and the way out of the monetary spigot

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having cantillionaires placed right up against it

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and gaining power

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just because they're closer to the money printer.

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Bitcoin fixes this

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and Bitcoin can't fix this as effectively

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or as quickly if it is not money

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and if it is not the thing that wins at being money.

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I think that's all fair to say.

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Yeah, paraphrased.

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All it needs to do to win is be money.

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Very good.

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We should try to meme that.

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I'll continue here.

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More importantly, if a technically superior or more efficient token

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one day renders Bitcoin a thing of the past,

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the whole concept of absolute scarcity on the internet can be considered a failure

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because there would be no guarantees whatsoever

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that this new token wouldn't suffer a similar fate at some point in the future.

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Users would no longer stand to gain anything from saving their Bitcoin, but contrary to this,

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they would be incentivized to spend and acquire new alternative tokens. This would destroy the

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only true value proposition of Bitcoin, its scarcity, and deprive any future attempt at

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creating decentralized currencies of any legitimacy. This is the main reason that

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blockchains other than Bitcoin's blockchain are counterproductive and confusing to a lot of

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newcomers, especially since a lot of Bitcoin proponents don't seem to understand this fully

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themselves. Hal Finney, the man who received the first ever Bitcoin transaction from Satoshi

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Nakamoto, definitely understood though. He said the following in May 2011.

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Any successful replacement of the Bitcoin blockchain will forever undermine the credibility

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of any successor. How can an investor know that it won't happen again? Rebooting now may benefit

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a few thousand early adopters. What happens when hundreds of millions use Bitcoin 2.0?

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They'll be just as jealous and envious of you as you are of others.

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Given the precedent you want to set, how will you argue against yet another reboot?

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Very prescient words. I have my own thoughts as relates to ossification and this and that,

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But yeah, what are your thoughts on these points?

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Yeah, Hal was ahead of his time.

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Hal was so right about so many things, and this is one of them.

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I mean, my one-shot principle is just basically just paraphrasing whatever Hal said.

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So yeah, you can't reboot it without setting a precedent for it being rebooted again.

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So the ossification thing, though, if I'm going to make a comment on that, is that, first of all, Bitcoin cannot ever ossify. It's impossible since it's predicated on people doing things and people can just do things, as we know. So ossification is not a real thing. And it never was.

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all that can happen is that Bitcoin can develop

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more or less quickly.

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And it's preferable if changes are slow

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and thought through rigorously.

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There's a lot of developers that want to move fast

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and break things because they come from that kind of culture.

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And in Bitcoin, that's not necessarily preferable

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because people want, as soon as you do anything

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to the code base, as soon as you do anything to Bitcoin,

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you at least potentially change people's behavior,

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meaning that people value the thing differently.

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Meaning that the app, without

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doubt, has some effect on the purchasing power

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of the thing. Because it's all about how people evaluate it.

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And the more you fiddle around with it, the less

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convinced people will be of its robustness so that's that's the the best argument i think for

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for not tampering with it unless it's absolutely crucial that we do so like fixing a bug that will

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kill the whole thing of course we should address those things but uh fiddling around with it just

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for the sake of fiddling around is never a good idea yeah totally agree with you there there's a

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bit of a ship of theseus thing going on here right like uh uh the the the whole idea of that

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bitcoin needs to sort of adapt and change to its to its conditions and and what happens if like

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like a reboot would be totally getting rid of uh of bitcoin but we we don't need to do that that's

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that's sort of the the point here and as long as the blockchain itself like the bitcoin blockchain

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or the time chain, if you want to call it that, as long as that's still the thing. And Bitcoin is

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still the same network overall, just changing slowly, deliberately, then we've still got Bitcoin.

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But as soon as you grab a new thing, the funny thing is anyone can go say, hey, we've got the

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Bitcoin blockchain, right? And now we're spawning off a totally new network based on that, right?

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and we're going to run our own rules, right?

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Bitcoin 2.0, et cetera.

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And that's the thing that doesn't work

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because it's not the same network.

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So it has to be the same blockchain

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and the same network.

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And you can make little changes

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and people can come and go from that network,

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but it has to be the same one.

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So yeah, that's how we avoid

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the Bitcoin reboot basically.

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And that's just a couple of subtleties there.

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But on the ossification point, I think the thing that you mentioned that I specifically agree with why we can never truly ossify is just that there are things that could kill Bitcoin and there are people that want to attack it all the time.

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We live in the real world here.

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We live in a world where people who want to do bad things and steal people's money are going to be trying to do so.

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and their tools are changing, their methods are changing, and the way things happen always changes.

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So we do have to have the flexibility to be able to handle issues as they come up. We don't know

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the future. We don't know all of the things that could eventually be a threat to Bitcoin. And only

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so much can be done on the node level as well. Like many security features are developed by simply

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patching in vulnerabilities to the Bitcoin Core software or whatever implementation you choose to

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use. And those security features are good and useful. And it's not really the best thing to

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continue to use a really old version of Bitcoin Core, because there are security vulnerabilities

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that can literally, like you can lose your Bitcoin if you use that node as your Bitcoin wallet.

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if you use too old one with security vulnerabilities.

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So there's a balance to be struck here

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between like, let's be careful and deliberate.

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And also that we live,

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the Bitcoin is connected to the internet

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and therefore you get all the same people

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trying to hack it and this and that

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as anything else connected to the internet.

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And Bitcoin having all of this money attached to it

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or being money makes it an even better target, right?

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But the other point is that there are some things

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that have to be changed on a consensus level,

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such as the game-breaking bugs and things like this.

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And if we ever have quantum computing become a serious threat,

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I don't think it is now, but who knows, in a decade, two decades, whatever,

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we have to do something about it.

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It's not imminent, but we have to do something about it eventually.

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And so that means by definition that we can't truly ossify.

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And that will be how Bitcoin stands the test of time, or not.

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I'm hopeful that it can.

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Yeah, a couple of points there I'd like to address because I think I have a slightly different view.

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First of all, the reboot thing, Bitcoin cannot reboot.

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A reboot would kill it because then the double spending problem isn't solved.

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You could double spend.

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A reboot definitely, from a certain viewpoint, is a double spend.

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If this is not the thing, then the problem is not solved yet.

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The other thing is with the quantum threat, for instance,

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to make a point about that is that maybe we'll end up in a scenario,

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I think this is what you mean when you talk about that the scenario would be that we were faced with a fork where you would have to choose whether the hacked coins are somehow saved and taken off the network or whether the hacker gets to take the coins

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and I would quite firmly be in the camp that lets the hacker take the coins

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because the rules you signed up for when you bought Bitcoin for the first time you bought them

291
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they included this threat this threat was always there and it was up to you to evaluate

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how big of a threat that was and what would happen if those coins ever moved same with

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if just satoshi decides to come back one day and move all his coins that can also happen would we

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stop him from doing that would we fork off i certainly wouldn't also what who gets to decide

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what bitcoin is and the common thesis is that it's the longest proof of work chain right that

296
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that is bitcoin when that's what we define as bitcoin but ultimately that's not entirely true

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either because it's the market that decides if the market decides that the a fork that does not have

298
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the longest proof of work is the thing that we're going to call bitcoin then the other fork would die

299
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and die off slowly but surely and uh whatever the market decides bitcoin is is bitcoin and

300
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this is a crucial point because it's up to you the individual user to define what bitcoin is to you

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no one gets to tell you what bitcoin is except yourself and you you make this choice it's an

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individual choice at the end of the day it's not a collective choice roger veer may think he

303
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may think bitcoin cash is bitcoin as much as he likes i don't agree with him but it's not up to

304
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me to decide for him what he thinks is bitcoin and i can't decide for craig wright what craig

305
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right thinks is Bitcoin too, and they can have fun staying poor on their chain if they want to.

306
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And this is how I mean that the market decides because they had another definition of what

307
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mechanism decides what Bitcoin is and what it means than everyone else. And therefore,

308
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they are now insignificant because they chose the wrong chain. So the real moral dilemma,

309
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I think happens when there's a chain split where the biggest token after the chain split

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is not the ethical one.

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That's when we get into the real dilemma.

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If there's a government coin that sort of takes over the chain,

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if one part of the chain split is like OFAC compliant and all this crap,

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then if that chain becomes bigger

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that's the only case where I would

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cling to the other side

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not for personal monetary gain

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but to just keep my soul intact

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I still think this is a fight worth fighting

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and I still think Bitcoin is the only chance we have

321
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literally the only chance we have at taking this fight

322
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so we need to defend it with everything we got

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which is why I've been so adamant about spam being crap

324
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and that we don't hate the spammers enough and stuff like that.

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So regardless of if you're on the not so core side of that debate,

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that's not that interesting to me.

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The interesting thing is how willing are you to defend this thing in the long run?

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And will there be a fight where you will be forced to show you true colors?

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Who knows?

330
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Right now, I tolerate Bitcoin as it is.

331
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Core30 is released.

332
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I'm not happy with that release, but I am willing to tolerate that people are running those nodes and I'm not going to abandon ship because that happened.

333
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We would have to be in a lot more trouble than that for me to abandon ship for sure.

334
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However, I do think that these things are...

335
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The fact that we're debating them at all is very optimistic.

336
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It's very hopeful.

337
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More people are running nodes than ever.

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And in my opinion, as a result of that, the network is more resilient than ever.

339
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We'll just have to wait and see how this whole thing plays out.

340
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I wasn't expecting to go that deep into so many things.

341
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But yeah, I fully agree for the most part there.

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The only point I just wanted to be clear about with the quantum stuff,

343
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I wasn't referring to that if there would be like an eventual fork that has to deal with hacked coin.

344
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I think that would for sure be a discussion if it starts to happen.

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All of the lost coins are basically the ones that are vulnerable here.

346
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If someone has lost their key or something, Quantum could eventually go grab that.

347
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I don't want to go into the weeds of this, but what I was getting at was that basically Bitcoin would have to add new address types

348
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that would not be able to be, in any foreseeable future,

349
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hacked by a quantum computer.

350
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And that's possible to do, and there's lots of things that prevent that.

351
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Basically, if your public key isn't visible,

352
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that's already a very good start for that.

353
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But it's a future thing, but it's a thing that I do firmly believe

354
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will need to happen eventually in order to react to the changing world

355
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and the technological advancements.

356
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That's the overall point.

357
00:28:45,739 --> 00:28:49,379
Yeah, there's another bug, like the millionth block,

358
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the internal clock will reset somehow,

359
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and that's a bug we have to fix.

360
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There's theoretically 21 million more Bitcoins at that point.

361
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Anyway, where was I with this?

362
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The quantum thing.

363
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The event, I think, is comparable as the Ethereum split back in 2017

364
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when Ethereum Classic was invented.

365
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If I ever fell for the Ethereum scam,

366
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I would definitely be on the Ethereum Classic side of that thing.

367
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And I think that the fact that most of the network moved to the chain split

368
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that's changed history is a testament to how centralized Ethereum is.

369
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It's not resilient in the way Bitcoin is.

370
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And I think if Bitcoin had a similar split, everyone would lean towards the classic thing.

371
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Yeah.

372
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Anyway.

373
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I would hope so.

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I think that's enough about that.

375
00:29:50,679 --> 00:29:54,839
Let's end this section with a little bit of discussion about Hal Finney.

376
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For those of you who don't know, Hal was one of the people closest to Satoshi and a monumental part of Bitcoin's early history.

377
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He believed that the computer could be used as a tool to liberate and protect people rather than to control them.

378
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and some people even believe that he was the man behind the pseudonym.

379
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This would explain why Satoshi went silent in 2011

380
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since Howe fully lost control of his locomotive functions

381
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around the time of Satoshi's disappearance

382
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because of the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis disease he suffered from.

383
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The disease eventually bereft him of his life on August 28, 2014.

384
00:30:30,719 --> 00:30:33,379
Howe's body is cryopreserved and poised for resurrection

385
00:30:33,379 --> 00:30:34,979
as soon as this has been invented.

386
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Any day now.

387
00:30:37,759 --> 00:30:38,179
How funny.

388
00:30:38,419 --> 00:30:46,459
uh yes rest in peace how um there's a funny thought experiment that what if hal memorized

389
00:30:46,459 --> 00:30:52,299
a private key and when once he's resurrected 400 years from now he remembers that private key and

390
00:30:52,299 --> 00:31:01,059
moves the coins more of a funny thought experiment than anything else uh and it sort of also points

391
00:31:01,059 --> 00:31:06,719
to the difference between saving and hodling uh which in my mind are two different forms of human

392
00:31:06,719 --> 00:31:15,899
action uh anyway uh yeah i don't i i don't personally believe that hal is satoshi i i

393
00:31:15,899 --> 00:31:21,779
think there's sufficient evidence pointing to the contrary maybe if satoshi was a group of people

394
00:31:21,779 --> 00:31:29,139
hal was one of the group but uh one one of the members of the group but uh yeah speculating about

395
00:31:29,139 --> 00:31:36,279
satoshi and who satoshi was is not very productive in my in my no agreed but regardless hal is a

396
00:31:36,279 --> 00:31:40,979
great early figure in Bitcoin and incredibly important to its spread. So yeah, as you said,

397
00:31:41,079 --> 00:31:48,459
rest in peace, Hal. Okay, moving on to the always up point. The always up point is a highly

398
00:31:48,459 --> 00:31:53,559
theoretical, albeit logical conclusion of what one deflationary currency competing with nothing

399
00:31:53,559 --> 00:31:59,679
but inflationary currencies might ultimately lead to. The Bitcoin block subsidy, which is the newly

400
00:31:59,679 --> 00:32:05,699
minted coins part of the block reward, is halved every four years, resulting in an ever increasing

401
00:32:05,699 --> 00:32:11,339
stock-to-flow ratio of the asset. This concept is explained in the laws and effects chapter at the

402
00:32:11,339 --> 00:32:18,079
end of the book. At some yet unknown point in the future, Bitcoin's unmatched stock-to-flow ratio

403
00:32:18,079 --> 00:32:22,979
combined with enough people who aren't willing to ever sell their Bitcoin, also known as hodlers

404
00:32:22,979 --> 00:32:29,379
of last resort, will make Bitcoin so hard to come by that it can't lose value. In other words,

405
00:32:29,479 --> 00:32:35,079
a point in time from where the price of a Bitcoin can only go up. This might sound outlandish,

406
00:32:35,079 --> 00:32:38,399
but keep in mind how far off in the future such a point may be,

407
00:32:38,919 --> 00:32:42,779
and that all other currencies on Earth are inflationary, including gold.

408
00:32:43,559 --> 00:32:47,299
The comparison to other currencies is sort of misleading in this case,

409
00:32:47,539 --> 00:32:51,919
since Bitcoin's monetary properties are so vastly different from what we've seen in the past.

410
00:32:52,719 --> 00:32:54,019
All right, the always up point.

411
00:32:54,619 --> 00:32:58,999
Yeah, there's one sentence here which might be slightly unclear.

412
00:32:58,999 --> 00:33:06,319
is like will make Bitcoin so hard to come by that it can't lose value.

413
00:33:07,319 --> 00:33:13,399
Instead of the word value there, that is like that it can't lose value in fiat terms

414
00:33:13,399 --> 00:33:16,039
is what I would add to that.

415
00:33:16,139 --> 00:33:20,819
Because of course, valuations are subjective and dynamic.

416
00:33:21,299 --> 00:33:26,839
And how many sets you're willing to buy a hot dog for can still go up and down.

417
00:33:26,839 --> 00:33:33,659
the thing is though that all fiat currencies are not only inflationary but ever increasingly so

418
00:33:33,659 --> 00:33:42,759
there is never enough money around or fiat around to pay off the ever increase in debts so the only

419
00:33:42,759 --> 00:33:52,979
way to to pay them off is to issue more debt which leads to a compounding effect so that more debt

420
00:33:52,979 --> 00:33:55,379
is needed to pay off the previous debt,

421
00:33:55,599 --> 00:33:58,019
which means that all fiat currencies

422
00:33:58,019 --> 00:34:00,259
are on this hockey stick trajectory,

423
00:34:00,879 --> 00:34:04,599
especially as human beings get so much better

424
00:34:04,599 --> 00:34:05,759
at doing things.

425
00:34:09,119 --> 00:34:12,359
The price drops that should have happened

426
00:34:12,359 --> 00:34:15,779
in terms of all goods and services on earth,

427
00:34:15,859 --> 00:34:17,819
just since the mobile phone was invented,

428
00:34:18,559 --> 00:34:20,679
are just staggering when you think about it

429
00:34:20,679 --> 00:34:22,599
how much the prices should have fallen

430
00:34:22,599 --> 00:34:24,759
should have fallen.

431
00:34:24,759 --> 00:34:27,099
If you denominate in Bitcoin,

432
00:34:27,099 --> 00:34:43,599
you can sort of see this reality that all prices are dropping extremely fast and faster and faster each year With fiat it the opposite way It the other way around They have to print faster and faster to keep up with the technological advancements

433
00:34:43,599 --> 00:34:50,679
and add to that just simply the fact that there's never enough money around

434
00:34:50,679 --> 00:34:54,479
to pay off the debt, so the debt needs to grow exponentially.

435
00:34:54,479 --> 00:35:03,659
that is the conclusion of this always up point the the always up point is just uh being honest

436
00:35:03,659 --> 00:35:12,079
about how destructive fiat currencies are and how how vastly different bitcoin is um so there is such

437
00:35:12,079 --> 00:35:18,039
a point at somewhere in the future definitely and well let's see how far away we are from that

438
00:35:18,039 --> 00:35:23,999
it might be in our lifetimes it might not be but regardless it's it's good to look at what these

439
00:35:23,999 --> 00:35:30,079
natural conclusions are. I think we should finish off the chapter so that we can round off the

440
00:35:30,079 --> 00:35:40,499
discussion. Yep. Absolute scarcity means that one day there will only be 0.00000001 Bitcoin,

441
00:35:40,499 --> 00:35:46,759
or one Satoshi left in circulation. This Satoshi will probably be worth more than an original

442
00:35:46,759 --> 00:35:52,399
painting by Leonardo da Vinci, of which there are about 13 left a day at this point in time.

443
00:35:53,099 --> 00:35:56,339
It will simply be immeasurably valuable as a collectible.

444
00:35:56,819 --> 00:35:58,459
Not for sale at any price.

445
00:35:59,199 --> 00:36:02,679
The always up point would theoretically happen a long time before this.

446
00:36:03,579 --> 00:36:06,199
Sometime between now and when all of the Bitcoin is lost,

447
00:36:06,539 --> 00:36:11,439
there's a tipping point where it becomes pointless to talk about Bitcoin's price in dollars, euros, or yuan.

448
00:36:11,979 --> 00:36:14,819
But the always up point would precede that event too.

449
00:36:15,739 --> 00:36:19,099
These two points may be closer to each other than they are to the present,

450
00:36:19,619 --> 00:36:21,559
or the point where there is no Bitcoin left.

451
00:36:21,559 --> 00:36:26,039
but no one can know for sure how far off or close these two points really are.

452
00:36:26,859 --> 00:36:29,479
The always up point may sound like total science fiction,

453
00:36:29,799 --> 00:36:33,099
but try to think about these things without coming to these conclusions eventually.

454
00:36:33,519 --> 00:36:34,379
I bet you can't.

455
00:36:34,959 --> 00:36:39,419
There is, of course, always the possibility that Bitcoin may fail for one reason or another,

456
00:36:39,979 --> 00:36:44,239
but if it doesn't fail, these events are bound to happen and are not fictional at all.

457
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:47,019
Yeah, so again, some interesting thought experiments

458
00:36:47,019 --> 00:36:51,419
and definitely the point where there's only one Satoshi left

459
00:36:51,419 --> 00:36:52,639
is very science fiction-y.

460
00:36:54,579 --> 00:36:57,759
Well, at some point there will only be one Satoshi left to move.

461
00:36:59,379 --> 00:37:02,179
It will have to play out that way.

462
00:37:03,199 --> 00:37:08,279
Since once a private key is lost, you cannot get it back

463
00:37:08,279 --> 00:37:10,539
and all of them will be lost at some point.

464
00:37:11,659 --> 00:37:15,299
Then again, you could say that maybe that point doesn't precede

465
00:37:15,299 --> 00:37:19,279
you know, the earth melting because the sun expands

466
00:37:19,279 --> 00:37:21,459
and we need to colonize the stars

467
00:37:21,459 --> 00:37:22,939
and we couldn't take Bitcoin with us

468
00:37:22,939 --> 00:37:24,739
because of the hash horizon and stuff like that.

469
00:37:24,739 --> 00:37:29,559
But still, it's a funny thought experiment regardless.

470
00:37:30,139 --> 00:37:32,499
I think this also ties into, you know,

471
00:37:32,619 --> 00:37:37,219
the sailor thesis that the most altruistic thing

472
00:37:37,219 --> 00:37:39,359
you can do is die with your Bitcoins

473
00:37:39,359 --> 00:37:41,659
so that no one else gets access to them

474
00:37:41,659 --> 00:37:43,199
and thereby you increase the scarcity

475
00:37:43,199 --> 00:37:51,939
rising every other boat with that the scarcity tide so to speak and i've been thinking about that

476
00:37:51,939 --> 00:37:57,219
here in san salvador we had a great deep uh discussion about it after too many beers

477
00:37:57,219 --> 00:38:05,239
with a couple of other bitcoiners and that is what's because the the thing that's left out of

478
00:38:05,239 --> 00:38:11,879
that argument is that the entire economy would have one less player in it and having more players

479
00:38:11,879 --> 00:38:17,479
in it is valuable because the Metcalfe's law. If money is nothing but communication, that means

480
00:38:17,479 --> 00:38:21,939
money is a communications network, which means that the value of the communications network

481
00:38:21,939 --> 00:38:28,499
is equal to its number of users squared. So this user at the margin and his value

482
00:38:28,499 --> 00:38:35,339
will have to be greater than the value of the coins lost in relation to the total supply,

483
00:38:35,879 --> 00:38:41,299
which is also highly theoretical and of course unquantifiable because you don't know how much

484
00:38:41,299 --> 00:38:46,899
value another player brings because you don't know how useful that player is in terms of

485
00:38:46,899 --> 00:38:53,999
actually adding more economic value to the entire pie but you can know that if all bitcoiners died

486
00:38:53,999 --> 00:38:59,659
with their bitcoins in their heads there would be no people left to to give the last remaining

487
00:38:59,659 --> 00:39:05,059
if there's only one bitcoiner left uh the satoshis are worthless because there's no one to trade

488
00:39:05,059 --> 00:39:09,279
there's nothing to do with them you can't eat them you can't build a house with them

489
00:39:09,279 --> 00:39:21,919
All you can do is use them for trading. So you need other participants. So there's a curve there somewhere. I'm not entirely sure what it looks like. It's probably something like the Laffer curve or something.

490
00:39:21,919 --> 00:39:28,719
where if no one, well, I guess if no one ever died with their Bitcoins,

491
00:39:28,819 --> 00:39:30,579
that doesn't matter because they're still capped.

492
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,999
But there's something to you not dying with your Bitcoins.

493
00:39:34,659 --> 00:39:40,399
HODLers of last resort, the network growing as opposed to the network not growing.

494
00:39:40,979 --> 00:39:46,379
Utility at the margin squared since you're another user of a communications network.

495
00:39:46,759 --> 00:39:50,339
Yeah, there's a lot of brain farts to explore here if you want to.

496
00:39:50,339 --> 00:39:55,379
well if you die you're no longer a part of the communications network anyway no that's the point

497
00:39:55,379 --> 00:40:01,339
it's just a case of whether you've you've uh uh given your bitcoins if you have increased the

498
00:40:01,339 --> 00:40:07,739
adoption of bitcoin over your lifetime you dying that hasn't decreased the the efficiency of the

499
00:40:07,739 --> 00:40:14,739
network that would be my counter to that so uh what's the difference between dying and hodling

500
00:40:14,739 --> 00:40:19,839
forever. Well, there we go. I think that's, that's sort of, you've, you've answered that if you,

501
00:40:19,899 --> 00:40:25,279
if you are, yeah, interesting, yeah, hodling forever. So therefore this is, this is too

502
00:40:25,279 --> 00:40:30,779
complicated and extremely out there and maybe not so, so useful. The, the only other point that I

503
00:40:30,779 --> 00:40:35,659
would, I would want to make here is that I think the point of there only being one Satoshi left in

504
00:40:35,659 --> 00:40:40,519
circulation is probably when we're post money, as in when, when Bitcoin is no longer relevant,

505
00:40:40,519 --> 00:40:46,439
there's no such thing as scarcity. It's possible. Very, very science fiction. But I would suggest

506
00:40:46,439 --> 00:40:52,439
that that would be the scenario. If you happen to like thought fart experiments like this,

507
00:40:52,439 --> 00:40:57,239
I recommend all of my other books, especially the one I wrote together with Luke,

508
00:40:57,239 --> 00:41:01,319
Bitcoin the Inverse of Clown World, because there is where we really do deep dives on all of these

509
00:41:01,319 --> 00:41:11,879
thought 40 things uh i happen to like uh the the mental mental gymnastics for last of a

510
00:41:11,879 --> 00:41:18,779
lack of a better word like using mental gymnastics to to exercise the brain that's uh that's what it

511
00:41:18,779 --> 00:41:25,619
is more more than anything tangible uh still yeah the always up point is the sort of the

512
00:41:25,619 --> 00:41:28,599
other point of this chapter

513
00:41:28,599 --> 00:41:30,459
but the main point is the

514
00:41:30,459 --> 00:41:32,679
one shot principle. If there's

515
00:41:32,679 --> 00:41:34,839
anything that I wish you as the reader

516
00:41:34,839 --> 00:41:36,919
would remember from this chapter is definitely

517
00:41:36,919 --> 00:41:38,499
the one shot principle and

518
00:41:38,499 --> 00:41:40,739
don't worry too much about the always up point.

519
00:41:41,639 --> 00:41:42,779
Very good and I think with that

520
00:41:42,779 --> 00:41:44,699
that's a good summary of this

521
00:41:44,699 --> 00:41:46,299
chapter. The one shot principle is

522
00:41:46,299 --> 00:41:48,359
very good and a very good

523
00:41:48,359 --> 00:41:49,939
concept I think for

524
00:41:49,939 --> 00:41:51,959
Bitcoiners to grasp.

525
00:41:52,779 --> 00:41:53,879
I think with that

526
00:41:53,879 --> 00:41:57,239
we should remind our viewers and listeners,

527
00:41:57,499 --> 00:42:00,019
dear viewer and listener, you,

528
00:42:01,099 --> 00:42:03,259
check out the Plan B network.

529
00:42:03,419 --> 00:42:04,679
And actually this time now,

530
00:42:04,859 --> 00:42:07,599
we can mention something specific from Plan B

531
00:42:07,599 --> 00:42:09,839
that maybe you can do to get involved specifically.

532
00:42:10,039 --> 00:42:13,159
There's their business school coming up.

533
00:42:13,159 --> 00:42:16,799
So you can basically go check out up on planb.network

534
00:42:16,799 --> 00:42:19,499
all the information about their business school in Lugano.

535
00:42:20,899 --> 00:42:23,399
First of all, you can use Code Infinity for a discount.

536
00:42:23,399 --> 00:42:35,019
So that's awesome. But Knut, you've been involved with the business school the last couple of years. Maybe you want to say a little bit about what that's all about and why you should check it out.

537
00:42:35,019 --> 00:42:42,039
yes i i usually give one guest star lecture in the middle of the course which is uh mostly online

538
00:42:42,039 --> 00:42:47,399
but also in front of a live audience in lugano and then the 21 top students i i don't know if

539
00:42:47,399 --> 00:42:53,079
it's more this year actually but uh this last year was the 21 top students from around the world

540
00:42:53,079 --> 00:43:00,439
they get to go to lugano for a week during the summer and uh and uh uh listen to lectures all

541
00:43:00,439 --> 00:43:08,259
that week and get a diploma afterwards. It was a beautiful week this summer. I learned a lot from

542
00:43:08,259 --> 00:43:15,179
all of the other speakers and the students were just awesome. I met a whole bunch of them here

543
00:43:15,179 --> 00:43:21,299
in San Salvador. They were all helping out with both Bitcoin Historico and adopting Bitcoin

544
00:43:21,299 --> 00:43:28,279
conferences. So great to see them again. I think all of these people have a bright future ahead of

545
00:43:28,279 --> 00:43:33,979
them. If you want to get more involved, the business school is highly recommended. And this

546
00:43:33,979 --> 00:43:39,319
year too, the business school and the technical school are sort of merged together as far as I

547
00:43:39,319 --> 00:43:45,959
know. Giacomo has talked a lot about this. So you will not only be taught business skills,

548
00:43:45,959 --> 00:43:50,439
but also technical skills and vice versa. If you're one of the more technical students,

549
00:43:50,439 --> 00:43:58,759
you will learn some business tricks as well. So yeah, overall, becoming an overall more well-informed

550
00:43:58,759 --> 00:44:06,039
Bitcoiner, and that's always good. Looking forward to all of this. Yeah, the idea right now,

551
00:44:06,159 --> 00:44:12,619
this is not entirely fleshed out yet, but I will be doing an entire course on my Praxeology book in

552
00:44:12,619 --> 00:44:19,199
Logano, not only one lecture. So we'll see when and where that is. More information about that later.

553
00:44:19,199 --> 00:44:24,519
there are some details to be fleshed out before we go forward with that.

554
00:44:24,679 --> 00:44:27,339
But highly recommend anything Logano related.

555
00:44:28,219 --> 00:44:28,699
Very good.

556
00:44:29,219 --> 00:44:33,119
And I'll just mention here that the discount code applies,

557
00:44:33,559 --> 00:44:36,379
code infinity as always applies to both the Plan B Business School

558
00:44:36,379 --> 00:44:38,339
and the Plan B Developer School.

559
00:44:38,959 --> 00:44:42,439
And they actually have a separate link for this, planb.academy.

560
00:44:42,579 --> 00:44:46,299
So go to planb.academy for information about that.

561
00:44:46,299 --> 00:44:51,459
and of course we also want to tell you about our other sponsor Bitbox

562
00:44:51,459 --> 00:44:55,199
and if you don't know Bitbox is our favorite hardware wallet manufacturer

563
00:44:55,199 --> 00:44:59,399
and they're Swiss made everything is done in Switzerland which is fantastic

564
00:44:59,399 --> 00:45:04,119
they have the latest secure element with their Bitbox 02 Nova edition

565
00:45:04,119 --> 00:45:08,799
with a nice glass screen and full iOS compatibility and all this

566
00:45:08,799 --> 00:45:12,619
so go check that out bitbox.swiss slash infinity

567
00:45:12,619 --> 00:45:15,079
for everything you need to know about the Bitbox

568
00:45:15,079 --> 00:45:19,539
If you need a hardware wallet, if someone you know needs a hardware wallet, it's fantastic.

569
00:45:19,759 --> 00:45:21,039
The interface is easy to use.

570
00:45:21,419 --> 00:45:22,439
Can't recommend it enough.

571
00:45:22,579 --> 00:45:23,459
So go check that out.

572
00:45:23,619 --> 00:45:24,919
Make sure you get the Bitcoin-only firmware.

573
00:45:25,839 --> 00:45:35,979
Yes, I've heard through the grapevine that there's other types of firmware, but we don't endorse that at all.

574
00:45:36,319 --> 00:45:38,719
What we endorse is the Bitcoin-only edition.

575
00:45:38,899 --> 00:45:39,939
So make sure you get that.

576
00:45:41,059 --> 00:45:41,459
Perfect.

577
00:45:41,459 --> 00:45:44,079
and with that I think we can now say

578
00:45:44,079 --> 00:45:46,059
that this has been the Bitcoin Infinity Academy

579
00:45:46,059 --> 00:45:47,559
thank you for listening

580
00:45:47,559 --> 00:45:49,079
bye bye