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Peter Todd is nothing like Satoshi Nakamoto

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Peter Todd epitomizes the brilliant engineer: deep technical mastery, elegant solutions to defined problems. Yet this very specialization blinds him to systemic effects.

Satoshi's genius wasn't technical—it was seeing the Byzantine Generals Problem as human, not computational. Where engineers seek optimal code, Satoshi created messy, resilient consensus.

Todd proposes "obvious" improvements that risk hidden centralization. He optimizes trees while the forest burns. This isn't personal failure—it's engineering training that rewards solving problems within systems rather than questioning systems themselves.

Bitcoin's strength lies in preventing any engineer, however gifted, from imposing changes through technical superiority alone. The block size wars showed this: engineers saw scaling problems with technical solutions; systems thinkers saw existential threats.

Revolutionary systems need minds that think in incentives not algorithms, emergence not specification, antifragility not optimization. They design not for control but controlled chaos.

That's why engineers like Todd MUST NEVER have central authority over Bitcoin. Their specialized neural pathways, perfected for bounded problems, cannot grasp the higher-order effects that make or break distributed systems.

Innovation requires diverse approaches battling without any single voice able to silence others—precisely what Satoshi built, and what no traditional engineer would ever design.

Let's keep Knots growing!

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Discussion

btcttombola 7mo ago

It is true, but i would not spit on Todd, if #bitcoin continue to work nowadays it is thanks to him too and other devs that are working on it.

But i agree that nakamoto was really different and very open mind.

Open to other ideas, other devs. A kind of decentralized way of thinking.

He could just keep his creation for himself and create a company or foundation to keep a huge voice and power on his creation.

But he was not looking for this. He wanted his project to live "by itself" on a complete decentralized and uncensored way.

It is very true that the recent "technical issue" just raise other problems that was not only about code, but about what bitcoin should be in future and how to preserve it from centralized pressure.

Nakamoto has an idea, then 1 project was born from it, and was shared with others devs. Multiple voice were speaking and Nakamoto just listen and argue about them, in a healthy talk, until a consensus (not perfect perhaps, but a solution emerge on different problems).

Nowadays they are multiple devs with different way of thinking that want to impose they way of thinking which is not a creation way but a fighting way. The aim is not to find a consensus but to make a point of view win against the other view, just like a fight (with a complete winner and a complete looser).

For me it is not a way to create things, because we only are humans and we can make mistakes, so thinking we have the entire truth is just a lie.

Listening others thoughts is a way to make less mistake, even if you don't follow all their view, it is nice to have multiple views and solutions instead of just yours.

You are really true when you said Nakamoto was not only a coder but also a thinker and finally also a great project manager in his way.

Sometimes i'm asking if he is not here, on #nostr , in an anonymous way, just to read and think about his #bitcoin project and people that are speaking and working on it. With a little smile and thought about human nature 😉

"Before you react, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you criticize, wait. Before you quit, try." - Ernest Hemingway

#thinkstr #btc4ever