分类：Web3 & Cypherpunks

The Ontological Basis of ‘Scarcity Makes Things Valuable’—With a Discussion of Why Bitcoin Is Valuable

Philosophy & Thought2018.01.22
The Ontological Basis of ‘Scarcity Makes Things Valuable’—With a Discussion of Why Bitcoin Is Valuable
This was originally meant to be a short piece about Bitcoin. On a whim I gave it a flashy title, but as I wrote it, it turned into a philosophical essay. In fact, the title is not all that outrageous. From the very beginning, what drew my attention to Bitcoin was that I saw it as an application of my own philosophical ideas. Over the following years, I have continued to use my philosophy of technology or media philosophy to interpret the significance of Bitcoin. By setting a fixed cap of 21 million, Bitcoin guarantees scarcity. As the saying goes, “what is rare is precious”; Bitcoin is so scarce, so…
philosophy Web3 value Bitcoin
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2018年1月22日
On ICOs: The Future of Stocks

Web3 & Bitcoin2017.09.14
On ICOs: The Future of Stocks
This year ICO has exploded. Many big names and veterans from the Bitcoin world have gradually become unable to sit still, and have taken up ICO, raising enormous amounts of money, only to finally dig their own graves. First, ICO was deemed illegal fundraising; now the entire domestic Bitcoin trading platform ecosystem is facing shutdown. How exactly will these big names end up? We shall wait and see. As for ICO, I have always kept a respectful distance from it. Although this may well have caused me to miss out on a chance to get rich dozens of times over, I have always adhered to an investment philosophy of safety…
Web3 Bitcoin blockchain decentralization
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2017年9月14日
Bitcoin: A Layperson’s Introduction

Web3 & Bitcoin2017.07.27
Bitcoin: A Layperson’s Introduction
After hyping Bitcoin for so many years, I’ve written quite a few articles, but on careful reflection, I still haven’t written a popular explanation of Bitcoin’s basic principles. Although you can find a ton of them with a casual search online, I haven’t found one that really suits my taste. During a spell of battling Shanghai’s heat, I had a sudden urge to write one myself and see how it goes. (This article is obviously not very timely; what’s hot lately is the Bitcoin fork crisis. I posted two Weibo updates about this issue recently, and they’re appended at the end.) I hope to explain Bitcoin’s basic principles in as…
technology Web3 value Bitcoin
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2017年7月27日
Is the threshold for “learning” Bitcoin higher? — Also on the Different Levels of Technical Knowledge

Web3 & Bitcoin2017.02.19
Is the threshold for “learning” Bitcoin higher? — Also on the Different Levels of Technical Knowledge
Recently on Weibo I again mentioned the issue of the learning threshold for Bitcoin: People always say Bitcoin has a high threshold and is hard to learn, and even some Bitcoin enthusiasts say so too. I think this is grossly misleading. In fact, it is not Bitcoin that has a high threshold, but old knowledge that has a high threshold, to the point that people who know a lot of old knowledge are unwilling to lower themselves and admit their own ignorance in order to learn new knowledge. If everyone were starting from zero, would understanding Bitcoin’s principles really be harder than learning all those M1, M2, interest-rate cuts, reserve-ratio…
philosophy technology Web3 Bitcoin
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2017年2月19日
Commemorating Bitcoin’s New High

Web3 & Cypherpunks2017.01.05
Commemorating Bitcoin’s New High
Bitcoin has just passed its eighth birthday, and its price has finally broken through its all-time high in one fell swoop (8,000 RMB). Let me post a Weibo message to mark the occasion. Today I went to Tsinghua to do a trial lecture, and tomorrow I’ll be at Beijing Normal University giving my postdoctoral exit report. My exit and hiring paperwork are finally nearing completion, and seeing the news of Bitcoin’s new high at this moment is, I suppose, quite fitting. Though I say that in a celebratory spirit, I’m actually rather wistful, because throughout 2016 my judgment on Bitcoin’s market was “buy, buy, buy,” and in just the past…
Web3 Bitcoin blockchain
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2017年1月5日
The Inevitable Path to Decentralization—A Few Thoughts on Bitcoin Hard Forks, and, by the Way, on Central Bank Digital Currency

Web3 & Bitcoin2016.01.21
The Inevitable Path to Decentralization—A Few Thoughts on Bitcoin Hard Forks, and, by the Way, on Central Bank Digital Currency
Bitcoin is facing the situation that the 1M block size limit is about to become insufficient; a major upgrade is needed. But how should it be upgraded? Different people propose different schemes. If a backward-incompatible scheme is rolled out without reaching consensus, then some people choose the new scheme while others do not update or choose yet another scheme, and the result is what is called a “hard fork.” There was XT a while ago, and more recently there was classic, but in the end a hard fork seems to have been avoided. Many people were probably relieved, but I, for one, feel a certain regret. In my view, a…
freedom Web3 Bitcoin blockchain
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2016年1月21日
Stock Market Musings: Freedom and Stability

Culture & Public Commentary2015.07.26
Stock Market Musings: Freedom and Stability
Recently China’s stock market has been wildly up and down. After an unprecedented “stock-market crash,” the central authorities have again stepped in with unprecedented force to maintain stability. The reason I thought of writing this article is not to play the prophet and predict market movements. On the one hand, I want to gather together some of my previous statements and thoughts; on the other hand, the stock market also has relations to political philosophy and natural philosophy. Besides, I believe this stock-market crash will have very far-reaching historical significance; in any case, it will become a landmark event. Although I have all along been promoting Bitcoin, and have always…
culture China freedom commentary
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2015年7月26日
Why We Don’t Need BitCNY

Web3 & Cypherpunks2015.01.29
Why We Don’t Need BitCNY
1、This Is a Revolution, Not an Upgrade BTS is one of the projects in the so-called “second-generation coins” (the full name is second-generation knockoff coins) that has raised the most money (so far) and has the loudest reputation (mainly in China). Whenever I casually take a swipe at it on Weibo, many enthusiastic netizens inevitably come over to “instruct” me, earnestly teaching me that I need to keep up with the times, need to be open and inclusive, need to keep learning… So I usually can’t be bothered to say much. This time, since I’ve been invited to write for 8BTC, I might as well concentrate my complaints here again,…
freedom faith Web3 Bitcoin
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2015年1月29日
Copernicus and Nakamoto — A Paradigm Shift in the Technological Revolution

Web3 & Bitcoin2015.01.28
Copernicus and Nakamoto — A Paradigm Shift in the Technological Revolution
This article was submitted last year to Babit, and may have been included in a new book published by Babit. But so far I still haven’t seen it published. Recently, while writing an article, I happened to come across some related content, and remembered that this piece still hadn’t been made public, so I might as well publish it first~ In the earlier Southern Metropolis Daily Bitcoin interview questionnaire, when I reposted it on Babit and Bitren, I added the title “Bitcoin as a Paradigm Revolution.” After all, having a title makes it seem as though it will spread better. But in fact, as a paradigm revolution, it was only…
philosophy of science media Aristotle Web3
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2015年1月28日
On CC Licenses

Site Matters2014.12.05
On CC Licenses
//This piece was commissioned by 8btc. The Bitcoin community is naturally inclined toward the spirit of free software, so it ought to be easier to accept the CC licenses. But copyright awareness in China is generally rather weak, and CC licenses are even less familiar, so plagiarism occurs frequently. Even places like 8btc that have brought up CC licenses still lack respect for them within the community. So some popular explanation is indeed necessary. For the moment it is hard to expect CC licenses to have legal force, but in the long run they are beneficial for fostering an atmosphere of mutual respect and collaboration in the industry, as well…
freedom Web3 internet website
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2014年12月5日