Subnostr

What do you mean by "exist" such that bitcoins and water exist in the same sense?

They don't exist in the same sense. One exists as material, a chemical composition, with mass and other such properties. The other exists as information. Might you say that YouTube, Google, and Nostr exist? That the New York stock exchange exists? Or that the largest identified prime number exists? (Rather, the record or proof of discovery.) Would you require them to exist in the same sense as water does?

This matters not as to whether Bitcoin is a commodity. What is required is that it is exchangeable, fungible, independent of a specific group of people, and is a basic good (not composed of other goods).

Some things exist as phenomena, like a vortices/tornados, society, or financial systems. These are composed of the motion of other things. Tornados don't exist in and of themselves but are the motion of bodies of air exchanging place, motivated by density differently caused mostly by temperature and gravity. Society is the organization, norms, and interactivity of individuals. Financial systems are mostly formal agreements about how to distribute goods, and the ones that exist are the ones that are enacted. The action of the participants make existent the composition.

Bitcoin is one such phenomenon. The network of free agents agree upon the rules of engagement, and their actions cause Bitcoin to exist.

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Discussion

a source familiar with the matter 2y ago

So a commodity is either: 1) a uniform physical material or 2) a system of behavior that simulates an exchange of information without being tied to any particular group of people engaging in that behavior

And the only purported examples of (2) are monetary substitutes

I believe that (1) is by itself a better definition of commodity and if we were discussing commodities apart from the desire to include Bitcoin in particular something like (2) would never occur to you

Every commodity but crypto "exists" in the ordinary sense - do you think the definition of commodity changed in the past 20 years?

James A Lewis 2y ago

I think we are narrowing in on something.

I've looked up other definitions of "commodity" and found this:

"A commodity is a basic good used in commerce that is interchangeable with other goods of the same type."

I like this definition, being both open and clear.

I didn't mean to imply that all phenomena which are systems of behavior not tied to particular groups would defacto be commodities, but I'll think about it more before I fully reject it.

What I meant is that Bitcoin does in fact exist, but not in the sense that water does, and more like in the manner that society and tornados do, as a collective phenomenon of action participants. It is a ledger, rules of engagement, a network of participants, and the unit of exchange within the network, each only existing for and because of the others. The composition of all those things exist for the sake of permissionless, stateless money.

Now, I do believe it to be a commodity. I don't know if it can be justified as the only of its kind, but certainly the first of its kind and only of its class, as all others are imitations or plain copies of it.

a source familiar with the matter 2y ago

Bitcoin is a ledger - but what does this ledger track?

James A Lewis 2y ago

It is the ledger, the asset tracked, the network, and the rules of engagement (the software standard).

a source familiar with the matter 2y ago

Father, son and holy ghost

One entity in three forms

But what is the asset?

It looks to me like a placeholder, a zero

James A Lewis 2y ago

What is the US system of governance? The constitution, the three branches, or the decision-making apparatus? One exists because of the others, and without one the others cease to exist in actuality. The constitution animates the governmental body, and the decision-making apparatus is the collective senses and actions.

What is a human being? The chemical reactions and the mass, or the rational soul? The being only exists as the combination of the two. Remove the soul, the animating force, from the body, and life ceases. The body grows cold and returns to the earth. Even in an empirical standpoint, a body that ceases to move is dead and will return to earth, and this is simply a semantic difference.

The Bitcoin asset is sats, bitcoin, an integer value, etc. It is not otherwise named. The Bitcoin network is a collection of nodes setup by people do have agreed to play by the rules. The Bitcoin ledger is the blockchain, the database of addresses and balances tracked. The asset costs energy to produce and move. Mining costs energy and is rewarded with a credit to the miners' addresses, and in so doing also validate the movement of other previously mined bitcoin.