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BTC259: Bitcoin & Theoretical Physics w/ Jeff Booth, Jack & Nick (Bitcoin Podcast)
01:16:24
Jeff Booth, together with Jack and Nick, present a groundbreaking paper exploring how Bitcoin's discrete block structure may redefine our understanding of time, energy, and entropy, bridging the gap between computational and thermodynamic physics.
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- [00:01]
A
You're listening to tip.
- [00:03]
B
Hey, everyone. Welcome to this Wednesday's release of the Bitcoin Fundamentals podcast. On today's show, I have Jeff, Booth and Jack and Nick, and they come with a groundbreaking paper exploring the deep connection between bitcoin and physics. During the show, we discuss how bitcoin blocks may represent quantitized time that challenges the continuous time assumptions in all of physics, the bridge between bitcoin's satoshi unit and physical constants like the Planck temperature and the Boltzmann constant, and why bitcoin's discrete nature of time could mean quantum computers may never pose an existential threat that many assume. I know this is a crazy, bold claim, and some of the terms that I just used might go, you know, straight over somebody's head, but I'm telling you guys, this conversation was fascinating. Like, really, really fascinating. And if you enjoy anything with theoretical physics and you also enjoy bitcoin, you're going to really find this one to be a treat because Nick and Jack and Jeff are really well versed on all these different terms and how they may all fit together. So I hope you guys enjoy this one as much as I did.
- [01:14]
A
Since 2014 and through more than hundreds of millions of downloads, we explore the core of bitcoin, its economics, its technology, and its impact on global markets. Through in depth analyses, timely news breakdowns, and conversations with top voices in the industry, we uncover what bitcoin means for investors today. This show is not investment advice. It's intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. Now for your host, Preston Fish.
- [01:50]
B
Hey, everyone. Welcome to the show. I'm here with Nick, Jack and Jeff Booth. Talk about some very cosmic bitcoin. I think we hit every facet of reality, this topic. You guys, having gone through this, I am beyond excited to have this conversation because there has been thousands of hours of deep thinking that have gone into this. Oh, my God, I can't wait for the folks you know, listening to this to be able to dig deeper into the actual paper bit. For anybody that's hearing this for the first time, the paper that we're going to be discussing is called Bitcoin the Architecture of Time. The subtitle here is the thermodynamic and mathematical object of time, entropy and measurement. Guys, where do you want to kick this off? Like, what is your three sentence compression of this topic? For the listener who's tuning in and saying, what in the world are they about to talk about?
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C
If I was to start, I would simply put it, I think this is the answer that bitcoin is physics. And so this paper will bring us into the domains of exploring energy and time itself.
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B
Nick.
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D
As well as memory.
- [03:01]
B
Yeah.
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D
I think that we can at least say that bitcoin provides a new lens for us to look at what we've thought we've seen in physics for a long time and kind of give us a new language to reference to, kind of fact check ourselves and everything we've, you know, discovered since this project of knowledge started.
- [03:20]
B
Jeff. People were probably thinking, why is Jeff Booth on this call? What's his role here?
- [03:26]
E
So, you know, or people know how much reading I do, how much thinking I do, and when I'm stuck on something, I just continue to go down the rabbit hole. And the same reason took me down bitcoin, same reason many people went down the road of bitcoin. And physics is something I've been stuck on. For physics generally has been two different models of physics that don't work together for 90 years and a whole bunch of theories that can't make them work together. So when Jack and Nick first brought this paper to me, you can imagine that you too, Preston. I know this is true. We see a lot of information and we see a lot of stuff that might not jive with what we believe, and it forces us to, okay, could this be true? And look deeper. So when Jack and Nick first showed me this paper. And how long ago was this? Almost a year.
- [04:15]
C
Probably about a year ago. Yeah.
- [04:16]
E
There was something in it that grabbed my attention in one of the most profound ways ever. Right. It was still a nugget and everything else, and they were been working on it for a long time, but it wanted me to dig in.
- [04:27]
B
I mean, you guys talked to me about this, what, six months ago, and we had a conversation and the paper was probably, what, 150 pages at that point. And where are you guys at now?
- [04:38]
C
We're still in the process. 250.
- [04:40]
B
Yeah.
- [04:40]
C
Finalizing the editing here. But, you know, when we released the podcast, we're landing about 224 pages right now.
- [04:47]
B
I mean, this is a book and it's a lot of information. There's not fluff in this. Like, let me tell you, folks, when you go through this, you're just going to kind of be like, oh, my God.
- [04:56]
E
But I think that's the part precedent, which is going to set up a challenge.
- [05:01]
B
Yeah.
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E
Because if the ideas and Jack and Nick's paper here are correct, and it feels like they are, it rewrites everything. And so that's a big Big kind of ask. And you'd have to have evidence based on that. So it's not the depth, the number of words in the paper. Now, mind you, that's enough in itself. It carries such huge implications that it forces you to pay attention.
- [05:24]
B
Yeah. The reason I want the audience to kind of realize this isn't something that you guys just, like, banged out over the weekend. Like, this is something you guys have been thinking about and piecing together for, like, Jeff said, over a year.
- [05:36]
C
I want to make another on that, Preston. Yeah, we're going to get into some deep physics. And so when you talk about the quantum world, everyone likes to talk about entanglement. It's like we are entangled in ways that you cannot perceive. It's like your podcast has been instrumental in some of our thinking here and what has led us to this point. So it's like the thought has preceded 2020, you know, like, when you initially brought Michael Saylor onto your podcast, like, that was one of the. The moments where I was like, okay, somebody's beginning to speak, like, the language that I see in my head. I had this inclination that, like, bitcoin is energy and time, and there was no way to, like, properly express this. Listening to you has brought us to this point. Today we're seeing this representation of how the past is beginning to interact and build the future to where we are. And so we couldn't be here without you and without the bitcoin community. Everyone has played a role in this paper. Just because you don't meet the people who might hear your words, your actions directly influencing the future here. And I can say that that's how this paper kind of become what it was.
- [06:40]
D
Yeah. I would say that, yes, we've engaged within this past year, but the journey kind of doesn't have a clear timestamp of, like, oh, it started at this point. It's been the culmination of just, like, listening, hearing, and understanding different viewpoints where within what we call the bitcoin community and also outside of the bitcoin community, going back to formal academia frameworks and just, like, trying to take it all and make sense of it when you play it all out. But, yeah, you two have said things that are embedded in the thinking of trying to just explore these ideas, because we're trying to lay out an answer, but it is fundamentally an exploration. So this is an exploratory paper in the sense of. We're just trying to make sense of all of the logical pieces as it comes to us.
- [07:27]
B
So your paper opens with what feels like a Girdleian problem, which is physics treats time as a continuous parameter, but we can't step outside time to test whether that's true, because we're made of that. Can you explain this self referential problem? Why has it been invisible for so long and just kind of like where the paper kind of starts off with this.
- [07:51]
C
So I guess I would start. The problem that Gurnall introduced is incompleteness. And when you begin to dig and use Bitcoin as your reference to understand incompleteness, you realize that incompleteness is formally defined by the lack of a boundary. And so mathematically that is expressed through Bitcoin's 21 million cap. And so we really want to hit on the point here that the novelty of bitcoin is the 21 million cap. And so that that thinking needs to be extended outside of just money. It needs to be extended to physics and logic itself. And so like, when you're talking about mathematics here, any number that's divided by infinity is zero. That is your definition of, of meaninglessness. It's like the mathematical form of meaninglessness. And so when you begin to put together like what is incomplete here, it's. It's actually the lack of boundary in our mathematics. And so like, where the idea is that, like, we take Bitcoin as to be like the truest form of knowledge that we can hold onto, it literally persists indefinitely. Every block is literally persistent forever for as long as we know. And so we have always approached this as this object, this ledger is some formal structure that needs to be applied to further thinking here. And so when you think of it, it's like if we are a product of time, or if we are, everyone calls it like the Planck tick of time here, you know, the smallest, the smallest known unit of time where the theory of time breaks down. If we think of that object as simply like, equivalent to a bitcoin block, we exist within that block, and so we cannot exist outside of its formation. And so when you're trying to measure time itself, when you're trying to measure the block, if you are a fraction of time, you cannot actually reference, like its creation because the process precedes your cognition. And so it. It's like a computer bit trying to understand the computer that it resides in.
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B
This idea of Planck time literally makes my skin crawl when I'm reading this, because it's such a fascinating parallel to Bitcoin and Bitcoin blocks. In the paper, you say Planck time is invoked as a formal limit, but can't be probed. Why not? What's the barrier? Why can't we probe Planck time? I'm just not an expert in that domain. I'm sure the physics person is.
- [10:08]
D
I mean in general, the public understanding is this is just where our physics breaks down. This is the point in which quantum and classical physics like converge and then we don't know. So like right now it's been open ended where it's basically we don't know if reality and time is continuous or discrete past this point. It's just that we don't know. That's what Planck time as this limit represents in our current understanding within the frameworks of physics that we've inherited.
- [10:39]
E
I think we need to back up a little bit before kind of playing time and such for an audience that doesn't understand the difference between the standard model of physics and quantum physics. And I have a really simple analogy to use there to say kind of what I find the challenge. Anything under 10 to the minus 28 power. Small. Very, very small things like photons operate differently than big things. So if you took a photon in the double slit experiment, Many people have heard of the double slit experiment. They haven't kind of fully grasped what it would mean. If one photon hits two slits without an observer, that photon goes through both slits at the same time. But as soon as you introduce an observer to that experiment, that photon only goes through one of those slits. And this has been proved over and over and over again. And we have evidence of this reality. But that doesn't look like. And how could that reality match with a reality that we serve every day that is potentially made of that reality? Which would mean we are part of that reality being formed. But it doesn't feel like that in a macro sense. Those models don't line up. Did I explain that in a fair way to be able to say what is the problem with these two models that don't merge together?
- [11:57]
D
You've explained it in a fair way in terms of the reference that we do have like this. This interpretation is presented to us many times, but I think in all honesty it's an imperfect representation of what we're observing. Because remember, the photon itself is a model of something that we don't fully comprehend. Like the photon is our best placeholder of an object that's not just an object, it's also a behavior. It's also a wave. Right? So it's a wave particle duality. So how can this thing be two things simultaneously? What else exists in nature that behaves like that we're talking about the finest, like, resolution. It's the thing that allows us to measure everything else. And we're trying to probe and say, what is that thing? And why do we see its behavior in such the way that it seems probabilistic? And we see it in many places when you scale up and you zoom in on or zoom out on reality, we don't observe photons like that. We don't observe photons at all. Photons are what allow us to perceive anything at all. So the distinction of classical is like we're not perceiving objects in the same way. When you look at the microworld versus the macro world, I think what we're doing in the microworld is we're not actually perceiving objects. We're trying to apply an objective framework to it, but it's actually we're observing processes that lie outside of our ability to observe. And then we're trying to timestamp it, you know, put a package around and say, that's a thing versus that's a process playing out. And we're observing it.
- [13:34]
C
Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors.
- [13:37]
B
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F
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- [17:41]
B
The analogy that immediately comes to mind for me when I hear Jeff and Nick kind of talk there when you're looking at Bitcoin is prior to a block being found. You're saying that there's this infinite array of addresses that could transact with each other, but until you actually observe the block, you don't know what actually like transpired between addresses. Right. And then it's like you were saying earlier, Nick, it's memory, it's in the past, it's happened. And when you observe that block, you can say, oh yeah, this, you know, this address transacted with that address. If you're looking at what's going to happen in the future, there's literally an endless array of transactions that could happen. And so is this the bridge that you guys are seeing in very layman's terms? Because I'm telling you, the paper, folks, way more evidence from a physics standpoint of like how these two are correlated. Or it's a very simple model that we can look at that's maybe representative of our own reality. Right? Is that it? Or is there more that you would like to kind of, you know, from a very top level standpoint, point out to the listener so that they can kind of understand more nuance?
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C
So one of the main ideas that I, like Nick and I have been going back and forth on in terms of how we can think about this complex topic through the lens of Bitcoin, is we landed on like the UTXO model of reality, which is we're taking this UTXO model that we can all observe and understand, and we're trying to map that backward to our, you know, our physical reality. And so like you said, I wanted to correct one word you said. Like an infinite set of states, everything in Bitcoin is bounded. Even the future is bounded. Because in bitcoin, the future can only be determined by what exists in the past. So you only have a finite amount of UTXOs that could ever transact in any given block. And so like, it is a very large. But we have to say it is a finite set of futures. It's just unknowably large. Like it's probably incalculable large. And so we're looking at this as like the potential. Whatever exists in the mempool can be thought of as pre time. And so I think, you know, physics has. Well, I guess we're going to have to take a step back here because the problem in physics is the axiom of continuous time. And so with continuous time, physics doesn't have an answer to what a measurement is. The current best guess is that the observer is the measurer. And Bitcoin gives you a different Perspective. In Bitcoin, anything in the mempool does not exist, is only referential to its past state. The UTXO that was mined in the past exists, but this future transaction does not yet exist. And only when a valid nonce is found does the block collapse or does the measurement occur. And so the measurement occurs first. It is an objective answer to what has happened throughout the network. And only after the measurement has occurred can you observe the structure. So we want to separate the two. Like, there's measurement and there's observation. And so observation would be simply verification of structure, which is looking at what is like, objectively true post this block of time. And so we want to separate those two things because if we think about our existence as being existing inside the ledger, like we are inside of these blocks, somehow this consciousness of life has evolved to the point where we have cognition inside of these blocks of time. And so we're looking at what is. And so in physics, when they're observing something, they're really verifying it. The difference is they have no definition for measurement itself. And so they have conflated the two, as when I look at this thing, that is the measurement, and it's what they call the observation. But Bitcoin says when you look at it, you are verifying it. You are not creating that block, you are simply observing it and verifying it. So Bitcoin gives us like a, a way to distinct between the two, you know, these two forms. And so like, we can dig more into like, what that actually means in terms of like a discrete process of time. But objectively, like the problem in physics that we would say is it's continuous time. And that has forced physics to import like an external form of measurement that they can't define. And in, in Bitcoin, the measurement is internal, like the block of time, the tick of time is the measurement. And so in Bitcoin, time is defined in like numerous ways. It's defined by the rule set. So it's like the rules that exist before measurement. It's defined as the process, so the act of measuring. So this would be the act of mining and traversing the non space to find a valid nounce. And once you have a valid nonce, you have a measurement. And that measurement results in a block. And then the time is now an object. And so you've gone from energy to object or energy to memory. And that memory is like the lasting form of time itself. And so when you order blocks in a chronological order of how they've unfolded, that is what Physics understands as the coordinate of time. And so we're seeing multiple dimensions of time that do not exist in physics that we can observe in the universe. Now, because we exist within, inside that time that's producing. And so, like, Bitcoin provides us a different perspective, we stand outside of the time that Bitcoin produces. Like, we don't exist inside Bitcoin. We are the constructors or the architects of Bitcoin's time. We are the decisions that go into the transactions, the people that mine the blocks, and the blocks are the outcome of our work and our action. We exist on the other side of the boundary here. We are observing time from the outside. And so I guess to wrap up the point, we want to make it clear that both are objective understandings of time. One is the internal perspective and the other is the external perspective. And you need both sides of the coin to actually understand what time is.
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B
That was insane. In the initial part of what you were saying, you're talking about how it's relative to each other. And I immediately think of Einstein and his theory of relativity. And in that, you have space, time, right, is the big thing that was just groundbreaking, you know, about 100 years ago. So in your paper, you introduce time space as a replacement for space time. And in time space, time is the primary axis, the ordered sequence of thermodynamic commitments, and space becomes the derivative. This inverts how physics normally thinks. It's the opposite of that. So why is this? You know, I think for the listener, they hear all that, and it sounds like fancy jargon that you guys inverted what Einstein space time is. But, like, why is that important? Is it that you're saying that time is an emergent property of a blockchain or creating a fair system in which.
- [24:27]
D
You know, nobody can control the clock? Before I get into that, you know, like, oh, Einstein was wrong. It's more like if you observe it for what it is, is, you realize it's almost like a linguistic problem. And so time space is. Is a reference of simply inverting what you're prioritizing mentally to construct your mental model from. Because, again, space time is more of, like, a general term to describe the connection between time and space. And we think of time as a fourth dimension instead of something inherently different. And so the way that we look at it is you have the three dimension of space, and time is actually not a fourth dimension per se, but almost like the mirror of space itself. And so if you could see it from the other side, you can look at Time differently. And so we see time as the foundation, the constraint rule set, that allows space to construct itself, like spatial order, causal order. And so we look at time as basically what needs to be the preceding rule sets to allow the causal order that we observe as our spatial environment. So we see it as the flip side of space itself. And so again, instead of thinking space first and then time is this thing we append to it. It's just simply we're trying to say, okay, well, let's start with time itself. Could time be the place where, if it has a defined rule set and it's allowed to play out in this discrete steps, where something is evolving over time, then we can begin to see what we describe and observe as, you know, our spatial environment. It's just trying to invert the way that we inherited a. Almost like a bias.
- [26:15]
E
So Preston and I think that if you go back to Einstein too, why was he able to see that idea of space, time when nobody else could? And when you look back, he imagined himself on a beam of light, right? Moving at the speed, and everything was relative to the speed light. He imagined that, and that was outside. Why do I think these are important or very, very interesting things to challenge our minds is everybody else was in a box measuring what they thought reality was from within that box. What he did is he stepped outside of the box and he imagined, what if this existed, right, and this was the speed of light, and I was traveling at the speed of light. What would that change to this box? What I think this paper is, is that right? What if this probability space that we can observe in the mempool, you have this probability space that takes energy and converts that energy into. Into information, that direction, that one way direction creates time, and time is emergent from that same thing that, if that were true, would force us to challenge a whole bunch the concept, the ideas that we were stuck in this other box. Did I kind of. Jack or Nick, would you. Would you guys comment on that?
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C
I have some things to add. So Nick and I have talked about this. Like, we want to make it pretty clear that, like, this is not our theory. This is Bitcoin's theory. We're just trying to observe Bitcoin for what it is. And we believe that Bitcoin is something way more fundamental than probably the average person believes it to be. And so we're trying to map that thing that we're observing onto our reality and seeing if that allows us to unlock something new here. And so, like, we've jumped around a lot and, like, I really want to hit on, like, the point. It's like, beneath this subjective protocol, we're just trying to say that there is an objective physical process underneath it that maps directly onto physics. And like you said, it is the process at which, you know, we take a. I would refer to it as, like, we take the non space and difficulty. We'll quantify that as entropy, and we'll do work to resolve a single valid nonce from this. We'll call it a large space for the average listener. And in doing that, that creates work. The resolution of a valid nonce from a sea of invalid nonsense is work itself. And that work is applied to the block. So it's like you have work generated from the nonce, and that work is applied on the block. And so, like, that is kind of like the structure of the process beneath Bitcoin. And so we're trying to quantify the energy. Like, that was the original goal here, was to get outside of any fiat referential system here and just look at Bitcoin based as a physical transformation. And so, like, that's kind of the base level. But one thing that I wanted to add to that, in terms of you brought up time space, is that we kind of have to take a step back here and just say, objectively looking at Bitcoin, like, what is a block? And we see Bitcoin blocks as time itself. And so this Bitcoin is empirical evidence that time may be quantized. So when you look at the block itself, it is indivisible temporally. It's. It's all or none. There's no. There's no valid half work. There's not even a valid half hash. It's like the hash is quantized, the block is quantized, the value units are quantized, and time is quantized.
- [29:43]
D
Every aspect is quantized. That's just the observation we've made. Every aspect is quantized, and so the other system, not every aspect is quantized. And this is the initial thing we're observing and then trying to map and make sense of, which goes back to.
- [29:58]
B
Your original comment at the very beginning, which was boundary layers. And being able to write there's a.
- [30:04]
D
Boundary every step of the way.
- [30:05]
C
Everything has a boundary, including time. You know, that that's major for physics because all of physics right now relies on this assumption that time is continuous. Because there has been no proof prior to that. There could be an alternative. People have theorized that, like, people like Stephen Wolfram have begun to work on these ideas. And so, like, we Think he's really close to what we see. We think he's missing bitcoin, and bitcoin is the instantiation of what he's working on. It's like the proof needs a network. It needs to be filled with energy. It's a proof that needs to prove itself, to put it in, like, layman's terms. But when you look at the block, you can't break it up into smaller temporal components. Like, at layer one, the block is the smallest unit of time. Like, nothing happens between blocks. I mean, we know that lightning exists between there and. I don't want to go in there because, I mean, that's a whole different can of worms that this paper can unlock to, you know, in terms of thought. But staying on the. On layer one, there's no time between blocks. Like, the block is this quantized tick of time and to, you know, bring it back to time space. When you look at what time is in Bitcoin, I think, you know, Gigi wrote about time. I think it was, like, in 2020. And so everyone should go and read his piece about time as well. But, you know, he talks about the map being the territory. And if you're not in, that's kind of philosophical for some people. And if I was to put it in more layman's terms, it's like time is memory in Bitcoin and the memory is time. They're both the same dimension. It's like the memory that's produced in the block is the time itself, and that memory is lasting. And so when you look at, you know, the dimensionality, it's time and memory are a surface that exists in a coordinate of time, which is just the block height. So it's like the block height is the coordinate system. And at each block height, you have this time memory component where it's like a sheet of memory where time equals memory. Like, only in that discrete unit of time is that true. Every block is a different measurement. It's a different event. And so this is the process of understanding discrete time. And so I would kind of finish it here is like, if the block wasn't the measurement in bitcoin, and the ledger evolved continuously until somebody observed it and it became deterministic. It's like, how do you solve the double spend problem without a quantized measurement? And so if you really begin to think logically about Bitcoin, it's like, without that stamping, that quantized stamp of like, this is time, there is no solution to the double spend. And so, logically, bitcoin could not exist if the time that it produced was continuous. And so here we are sitting at this discovery of we're just seeing like the time produced by Bitcoin is objectively quantized. And if that is, and here's my point, it's like you realize that the quantization of time is the thing that produces the binary logic. And what does that mean? Physics says classical information. It means it's this or that, it can't be both, it can't be double spent. A UTXO in Bitcoin must be spent or unspent. The satoshis are here or there, it can't be both. And if it was a continuous process, Bitcoin wouldn't function. And so we couldn't build any logic on top of the system without that quantized tick of time. And we know, looking at physics, that information becomes classical. And so we are looking at something that is quantizing time, creating binary logic. And Bitcoin simply just says, if it's not the tick of time, if that's not the measurement, then what is? And so like that question just leaves a lot of, you know, open endedness. But we take, you know, the measurement as being the tick of time. And so all we've tried to do is apply that model backward to physics and try to rediscover, or not rediscover, but put together the same picture with a different process underneath it. Like yeah, physics emerges from time. It's a derivative of time. So time is beneath everything that we experience.
- [34:10]
D
And if we just like ground all that, it's just like, is this empirical evidence for one of the two options which is, is time a continuous only process or is time a discrete process? And we can at least look at Bitcoin as an isolated physical system that's running regardless of what our opinions of it are. It's running and every single block is an empirical piece of evidence for that truth. And we're observing it and it's a discrete form of time. And so if that's the case, and on the other side we don't know whether time is or isn't a continuous or discrete. We can at least look and point a Bitcoin, say, well, we at least have one physical system that operates on a discrete process.
- [34:57]
C
Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors.
- [35:00]
F
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- [38:20]
D
All right, back to the show, guys.
- [38:22]
B
I want to get a little bit more granular on the paper because there's other insights that you have in this that are just amazing with respect to entropy. Okay, so we've been talking a lot about time and energy and that you identify a fracture that's persisted in for over a century, and that's the Boltzmann entropy counts microstates in phase space. And then you have Shannon entropy, which, you know, we've covered Claude Shannon on the show a couple times. Shannon entropy counts uncertainty over symbols. There's no operational bridge between bits and jewels, which is what these two different theories are about. And so you're positing in the paper that there might be a bridge between these two. And this is the first time I've ever seen anything presented that suggests that there is a bridge. And you're using Bitcoin as, you know, again, the model to kind of demonstrate that bridge between these two very profound ideas. The ultimate entropy and Shannon entropy.
- [39:22]
C
Yeah, I mean, this was one of the hardest problems for us to solve. Like, originally, like, this whole process of. Or this whole discovery of time was kind of a derivative of our initial inquiry. Like, we originally started this paper just to measure Bitcoin and joules. Like, that's what we wanted to do. And it led to so much more, and it demanded so much more, because as we were kind of continually pulling on the string, just more and more of reality kind of began to reveal itself for us. And so looking at, like, entropy in bitcoin, we've never really had a process that kind of puts both together. And so, like, everyone says, bitcoin's backed by energy. And so when you're looking at the construction of bitcoin, like, we have a 32 bit nonce space, and we have some quantization of difficulty. Like, difficulty is integer number of units. And simply put, like, difficulty decreases the probability of a valid nonce in that 32 bit non space. So it's the frequency that a valid nonce will appear within that space. And so, conceptually, we can think of that space as entropy. We can quantify it as entropy. And so when you're looking at the probability, the decrease in probability is the same thing as an increase in multiplicity. So for the layman, it's like you have a 32 bit space. It multiplies the number of those spaces that you need to search to find a valid answer. So like, very simply put, like you have a block of 32 bit or a box of 32 bits that you can kind of search for. This nonsense and difficulty just says you have to search that many of those 32 bit boxes on average to find a nonce. And so like we're trying to quantify entropy here. And so like when you're looking at the process of bitcoin, it's. You have entropy on one side and then you have work applied to that entropy. And we'll call it happens under some temperature. Like we know hashing reduces, produces temperature. And the outcome is a block which is some quantifiable amount of information. And so like, we want to be clear here that when we're talking about the Shannon side, it's not the bits of physical information, like it's not the, the megabyte of the block itself. We're literally looking at the finite state space of satoshis. We're looking at the configuration of these satoshis because that is what is conserved through time. It's like as time progresses through blocks, the container around that is the 21 million cap. And so we have a system that started from 50 Bitcoin and is trending towards 21 million. And so each unit of time, the amount of satoshi is like existing in the system changes with each block. And so you have to account for that change. And so I might have drifted a little bit from what you asked, but, you know, bitcoin just gives us these two processes objectively. Mining produces heat in the form of Kelvin, and bitcoin produces information in the form of a unique configuration of satoshis in the network that you can measure. And so it's like you have both sides of this process known. Like, we know the difficulty and we know the non space before that and afterwards, we know the exact block and the difficulty that it was mined under. Like, we know all of this from beginning to end. And so the hardest part was how do we now relate these two things into one unified system? I mean, that that'll go kind of deep. I don't know if you want to go there in this conversation, because it's kind of going to Boltzmann's constant itself. And how do we rethink through the ledger and how to redefine past variables in physics? So that's where we want to go here.
- [42:53]
E
I think it's worth going a little deeper there. Yeah, we lose some of it, don't you think, Preston?
- [42:58]
B
I agree. Yeah. I would love to hear more on it.
- [43:00]
E
Yeah.
- [43:01]
C
So, very simply put, the original goal was joules per satoshi. And so the only equations that we had without making it up is the second law of thermodynamics, which gives us a relationship of temperature, internal energy, entropy, and it assumes constant volume and a constant number of molecules or of substance, we'll call it. When looking at, like, a satoshi, the satoshi is the atomic unit of bitcoin. Like, bitcoin is the one. Bitcoin of 21 million is like the quantum of value. And so this is what defines all value. And so it's imperative that that 21 million does not change. And so the satoshi is the resolution that you can perceive that value. So it's how do we break that unit of one into smaller and smaller components? And so the satoshi is the smallest unit of value that bitcoin represents. And so when you look at the word bitcoin, it's like that is what the satoshi is. We call it a value bit. You could call it a bitcoin, whatever you want. But objectively, it is a single bit of value inside that system.
- [44:05]
D
I mean, it's tough. It's like there's three worlds, and we've forever talked about two worlds. Again, you can think of the classical framework or the computational framework. You know, we understand there's a domain of computational systems, and then you have physical reality, and these are two separate processes. So talking about Shannon is talking about mathematics and computation, and then talking about Boltzmann is talking about physical. Physical process, you know, thermodynamics. And so we're trying to talk about is this again, bridge between them. That is, how does Boltzmann convert into Shannon? And then one makes this a real number objectively, within the system that records it.
- [44:47]
C
Okay, I remember what I was going to say.
- [44:49]
B
Yeah, go ahead, Jack.
- [44:50]
C
So you asked, like, how do we bridge the two? Right. And so it goes back to Boltzmann's constant. And so we wanted Jules per satoshi. And the only thing that relates entropy to energy is Boltzmann's constant. That's the only really known thing in physics here. And so we have to look at the dimensionality of Boltzmann's constant. It's joules per Kelvin. And so, remember, like, this whole process of applying bitcoin onto the universe, it's like, what does the universe look like if bitcoin or the ledger is its structure? And so we already kind of covered time earlier, but now we're going to cover, like, what is 21 million? Like, if the universe had a 21 million equivalent, what would it look like? And so, objectively, like, we're talking about a thermodynamic transition. Like, we're getting satoshis in the block. And so we're looking for something that exhibits a similar behavior to satoshis, but in the universe. And so it must be bounded like that. Remember, the boundary is the most important piece here.
- [45:48]
B
I'm laughing because I see where you're going. This is crazy.
- [45:51]
C
Yeah, it is crazy. Like, it objectively is crazy.
- [45:55]
D
I think it's like, literally a truth we've just always taken for granted.
- [45:59]
B
Absolute zero is that where you have.
- [46:02]
C
You have absolute. Bitcoin defines, like, the absolute zero and the absolute one. And what that really means is it just defines the boundary that you can define 1 and 0 within. It's very complex. But going back to Boltzmann's constant, it's like, what in the universe would be similar to that? Well, like, we have Kelvin, and we know that Planck energy has a limit. There is a limit at which physics says, at Planck temperature, the known understanding of temperature breaks down. And so what does that mean? It's like, when you apply the ledger to it, it just means nothing outside of this boundary can logically make sense. And so when you're looking at Bitcoin, it's the same thing as 21 million. Nothing outside of 21 million can have the ledger make sense. It's like, once you exceed this number, nothing makes sense. And so we're not saying that Planck temperature is the temperature of the beginning. We're just saying that this thing represents what appears to be the equivalent of the 21 million boundary. And so when we multiply Boltzmann's constant by Planck temperature to normalize for this full boundary system, you can remove the domain of Kelvin. And so when you do that, you're left with simply joules. You know, you have joules per Kelvin, and you multiply by Planck temperature, which is in Kelvin, you're left the joules. And when you do that, you realize you get Planck energy, which is what the physicists say is the energy of the universe. Well, through the lens of the ledger, it actually just says that this is actually a constant. If boltzmann's constant is the relationship of entropy in joules. And we remove the domain of Kelvin from this equation because it's bounded, then we have this purely Joules constant. And so I guess we have to take a step back here a little bit. And it's because we all think in absolute terms. Like, our understanding of temperature is in absolute terms. Like, we all know, sorry for, you know, the Europeans, but we all know water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit, you know, at normal conditions. And so we can think of that as a constant. And so when we apply this boundary of Planck temperature, it's actually a constant ratio. So I know I'm switching between Kelvin and Fahrenheit here. And the reason why we're using Kelvin is because it defines the absolute zero. It's. It makes more logical sense. And so what do I really mean by that? It's like every unit of Bitcoin that you have or you perceive, you can always perceive it with respect to the denominator. And the denominator changes with time. Everyone thinks 21 million, and Nick and I have gone back and forth as, like, this 21 million exist now, or does it exist in the future? And objectively, when you're looking at it through the lens of thermodynamics, it exists through the future, but we can also say that it exists now in some sense, but all measurement must be relative to the boundary. And so now you're. You're kind of getting into, you know, we said the defining of absolute zero and absolute one. It's like when you take all measurement and put it against the boundary, you are only bounded between 0 and 1. You cannot exceed. You cannot exceed 0 and 1. And so, like, what is the most generally relative thing, I would call it the space between 0 and 1 in the most purest mathematical sense. And so when you're looking at Bitcoin, it's like, that's what you get. You get one, you get zero, you get. And everything that exists must be between those two things, and it all must sum up to one. You can never exceed supply or the boundary.
- [49:27]
D
Yeah. And so in Bitcoin, you see the rules that allow that assumption to hold true, because Again, we're saying 0 and 1 and the space between. But until now, that's literally an assumption that we've had to use, not an external physical system from us that enforces that truth every step of the way to make sure that truth holds at the end of the process, the whole way through. And so to us, again, clearly, the universe must hold that same rule somewhere within it. And so if not, how could the universe not have a symmetry of that?
- [50:03]
E
Yeah, it'd be worth. It might be worth going into. Because if this is true, there's zero risk of quantum attack on Bitcoin. It's an entirely different model, similar to a fiat model being able to provide value forever. Would you dive into.
- [50:19]
B
Yeah, let's pull on that thread.
- [50:21]
E
Let's pull on that thread. And because it is literally an either or, it cannot both be true.
- [50:27]
B
Explain why it's an either or. Because I don't know that I necessarily understand that, Jeff.
- [50:31]
C
So the reason why it's either or, it's like it's Bitcoin or it's quantum in terms of quantum computers. And the reason why I say that is because it relies on the ontology of time itself. Bitcoin. Well, like we said, Bitcoin literally wouldn't work if the blocks were just these continuous morphing thing. Like, it needs to be discrete and quantize. So right there we have some contradiction to this axiom of continuous time that all physics relies on. Like, we want to make a note, it's like both general relativity and quantum mechanics both assume continuous time. And so if you pull that assumption away and say, no, it's discrete, like, we have to actually rebuild those theories from the bottom up again with this new understanding of time.
- [51:14]
E
Jack, can I just keep going? But I just wanted to kind of. When you say continuous time.
- [51:19]
C
Yes.
- [51:19]
E
If we were in continuous time, the question is, would we know it? Because the. Because we can't qu. Essentially, what you're saying is the idea of quantum. The very idea. This is the measurement of the discrete, tiniest humanity unit, and we would never be able to observe that through our lens within it.
- [51:38]
C
I think it's really ironic that if you do change the substance of time from continuous, and what we really mean by continuous is infinitely divisible, like, you can just keep breaking it into smaller and smaller pieces. And Bitcoin says no, like, at some limit, there's the block, and you can't go any further.
- [51:54]
D
You must commit to a standard measurement, a global measurement.
- [51:58]
C
And so, like we perceive in seconds, and so this is some magnitude. Like, it's a ginormous magnitude of frequency of, like, these fundamental blocks. But you could think of Bitcoin in larger units of time as like multiples of blocks. Like every 10 blocks, every A hundred blocks is a frequency of time. But you need to even build what a frequency means. And physics believes that you can just keep dividing forever. And so if that assumption changes, going back to like the quantum question, it's like, how does that affect quantum computing? Because everyone is talking about quantum as this inevitable thing that Bitcoin must bend the knee to. But Bitcoin actually is proving quite the opposite to our lens. And so the reason why it's binary is because the ontology of time matters. Like, you can't double spend what is true about time. It's either quantized, discrete and indivisible at some level, or it's continuous and infinitely divisible. It can't be both. So, Jack.
- [52:57]
B
But we have just to push back a little bit on this idea. So we do have quantum computers that already exist. They're, you know, microscopic in scale with respect to the number of qubits that they can perform at. Right. Like, I think the. From a logical Cupid standpoint, we're like less than 30 under 15, right? Under maybe even under 15. But it does exist. Would this be almost like a block reorder? I'm trying to think of the parallel in Bitcoin that would allow something like that to exist in a very small scale, but then never scale to a higher level. Would it be like a block reorg of time that the parallel blocks were being found and then they get reorged and get definitized. So you could never like have something that has. I'm just spitballing here. I have no idea. Like I.
- [53:43]
E
And I think we all might be crazy people in the same thing.
- [53:46]
C
Right.
- [53:46]
E
But exploring this is part of the. Yeah, the tigs. So my layman's version of that is you have all these probability states, and if you develop a logical qubit, then these probability states at the tiniest increment of time aren't actually coexisting. And as you expand the probability states, you get errors and errors on the other side. And so now you're building all of these error correction into the thing because you can't at the smallest. And they think. And you believe it can exist because you're not measuring time.
- [54:19]
D
Yeah, like we are not measuring time. We are approximating time. That is the distinction.
- [54:25]
C
Yeah. So I would say it's like, it's not saying that, like what they're observing is invalid. They're observing something. Right. And I think it's really what they perceive they're observing is different from what is actually occurring. They think something is happening, but fundamentally something else is happening. And it all depends on the. The ontology of time. And so I was saying it's Bitcoin or it's quantum, it can't be both. And what do I really mean by that? It's like when you ask the question, like, if time is quantized and discrete, how do these models change? Like, what changes? And so, like, I don't want to go deep into the formalism because that's kind of getting outside of my domain of expertise here. But simply put, for like the listener, you can't take the derivative of, say, Schrodinger's equation. If time is an integer, if it's this, if at some level it's indivisible, then you can't take the derivative. And so the entire formalism would need to be reorganized to this change in time. And so, like, that is a whole different domain of physics. Like, we are seeing a fracture in physics itself where there's the people who are appended to the continuous time and they're trying to make it work, and they keep hitting dead ends. And so, like, if this is true, if time is really quantized and discreet, it's like they're continuing to work on the sinking ship. It's a sunken cost that they can't fix. Like, the problem is the assumption, it's not what they're doing. And so you do have like, other domains of physics where, like, say we brought up Stephen Wolfram, like, he is approaching physics from the other side, which is the discrete nature. But we need to look at, like, what actually changes when time is discretized. And so, like, very simply put, like, what happens to or what is superposition or decoherence in a discrete time model. And so Bitcoin gives us that lens of what superposition actually is. It gives us an understanding of what physicists are actually observing when they call superposition. And that would be the mempool. It's a preconfigured state of possibility, but it doesn't actually exist until it's measured. And this is like, in the language of physics itself, they know, like, this is the pre measured state. And when it's observed, it becomes measured and deterministic. But they don't have the process of how this goes from superimposed to classical. And so essentially this isn't a substrate to actually compute on. It's a potential state. It's not a computable state. And so when time is discretized, the meaning of superposition changes because it is pre time. And then when you're looking at decoherence, decoherence is the natural process of the measurement itself. And so it's like these words are, are all inverted. Like, Bitcoin is actually saying no. Like what physicists call as decoherence is actually really coherence, its reality cohering to a single chain of events. They think this is a problem that you must engineer away. We need to maintain these superimposed states so that we can perform this computation. And oh, no. Like, it keeps decohering to these classical states. It's like without that decoherence mechanism, like, you don't have an objective reality. And so Bitcoin is simply just saying, like, no, this is the process of time occurring and they don't actually understand what they're looking at.
- [57:41]
B
I'm somewhat speechless. It seems that if we do start getting quantum computers with a thousand qubits or more or whatever, logical qubits, that it would be almost an invalidation of this entire thesis. Would you agree with that?
- [57:55]
D
Yes. And the goal is not to invalidate it. It's just trying to take the logic where it goes and just say, this is incompatible with the basically autopilot perception of like, this is inevitable. This is going to happen. This is what quantum computers are going to do. Quantum computers are going to break all encryption, which is one of their primary fundamental use cases. And so if Bitcoin is literally, in our opinion, the definition of encryption at a global, every state level, the conversation changes.
- [58:28]
B
Yeah.
- [58:28]
D
And right now, again, it's based on the ontology of time and understanding what is time. So that entire model has been built on, you know, and ironically, we're talking about quantizing reality. And yet quantizing means to find, like, the discrete points that are. It's like, that's what we're saying it is. And yet time gets a pass, and by default it's always continuous. How can that be the case? How can we say, yes, this type of science is meant to define everything in absolute terms, but time, that's continuous.
- [59:04]
C
Yeah. Like, simply put, it's. It's very ironic that to the listeners, it's like, go ask ChatGPT yourself. Like, don't trust me. But like, we want to make sure you ask the right questions. But if time is quantized and discrete, the entire formalism of quantum mechanics as we know it, like, breaks. It just simply doesn't work. It would have to be rebuilt. It's ironic that quantizing time breaks the system that was supposed to quantize everything.
- [59:28]
E
So. So Jack, just. This is so big. And that's kind of why I just kind of. It took me in the beginning and it took breaths and. Because they're incompatible.
- [59:41]
C
They are.
- [59:42]
E
But just like, and I think this for, for the listener, if you were listening to some of the stuff on Bitcoin about the environment and how could you solve the environment from a system that must destroy the environment? If you ask a question about money, right, how could you solve any of those problems by a persistent. Yeah, the amount of money and nonsense and everything else inside that system, right? Because it requires that the amount of money inside all of the research universities and everything else on Quantum is going to attack this thesis like crazy, right? Because the power of everything, which is.
- [60:19]
B
The real signal, which is the real signal by the way, the power of.
- [60:24]
E
Everything comes from that we've learned in Bitcoin is over and over and over, the more you move into the system, the more individuals move into the system, the more you're just immune from this entire essentially bull thing based on a foundation of lies that actually gets stronger and stronger by your participation in it. And so these two things are incompatible. But what I find interesting in this is our own agency inside this is being co opted in the Quantum because we don't trust ourselves in this. And there always has to be somebody else that's smarter.
- [61:00]
D
What does that mean? If again, like quantum physics, theoretical physics, let alone just quantum physics, but this domain, there are many interpretations and those interpretations are actually proliferating over time. So we are seeing a fracture in like what is actually happening at these scales that we can't perceive with our own individual eyes. And then we have to default to experts who study those models for, you know, the majority of their lives. And then we have to take on faith that what they're presenting back to us is what they say it is. And so is it possible that Bitcoin is this other model where you can get this more universal language understanding, where anybody, no matter what institution you're a part of, can actually be observing and talking about the same phenomena without any specialized group who, if you're not part of, you know, the in crowd, then you don't understand what's going on. And that's actually what I think is most exciting about this work is, you know, like, regardless of whatever profound insights at an individual level can happen, it's also just like it's something that I think that over time is shareable with a wider audience than just the people that dedicate themselves to basically a path that was laid out way before, you know, they came along.
- [62:20]
C
Right.
- [62:20]
D
Like we've been on this model for 80 to 100 years. In terms of, you know, our theoretical physics? And again, there's never been a true alternative to that path. So it's just everybody working on it, like Jeff said, like all the money being plowed into it. It's already tied to an incentive that is separate from the theoretical physics itself. There's already a money machine behind it. So you realize that all of the information that's been shared with us over time, like, you don't know what the error rate is, but you do know there is an error rate. You know, if you're not willing to perhaps question, like, how deep does the error go, then how can you truly know? Are we living in a truthful system of knowledge around us?
- [63:08]
B
Guys, what would be your closing comment to folks as they hear this whole conversation? What do you want to leave them with as they kind of, you know, put their phone down, take their AirPods out of their ears? What is the takeaway you want them to have?
- [63:24]
C
I guess I'll go first. My message is like, if bitcoin is quantized, if bitcoin is proof that time is quantized and discreet, we need to look at this quantum narrative for what it is. And that would be, it's simply an attack on Bitcoin that is masquerading as physics operating through the lens of language and psychology. And so I would say, like everyone, if you understand Bitcoin, you understand physics. I want the physics community to answer, like, why is Bitcoin not an open source laboratory? Why is this not an open source experiment? It literally uses energy and creates an outcome. This is a process, this is a measurement. Why does it not suffice for the physics community? And so we need to just, like, look at what this narrative really is. The narrative is bitcoin is broken or it will be broken. We need to upgrade it. And until quantum was the narrative, the old meme was like, hey, I'm new to here, I'm new here to Bitcoin and I'm here to fix it. It's like, hey, I just read about Quantum and I'm here to fix Bitcoin. It's the same thing. And so I would say, don't bet against Bitcoin and really don't assume the narratives that you hear to be true and just simply try to go into exploring this idea. Because bitcoin just says, like, don't trust, verify. And so it's like, who are you trusting with this information that. Who are the people telling you that bitcoin is broken? What is their incentive? What is their knowledge? If we don't actually understand this, like, base physical process beneath Bitcoin, like, we risk misunderstanding what Bitcoin is. And so one point that we didn't hit on, that I think is very important. It's like, objectively, our conscious decisions precede the block, our transactions and our decision to do work, and we call the protocol itself, all of that precedes the block itself. And so everyone wants to talk about upgrading Bitcoin through protocol, and we're forgetting the other half. Jeff, you always say it's like, we are Bitcoin, and it's like, that's literally true. The ledger is the map of our decisions. It is equally an imprint of our conscious decisions of how we value things, when we valued it, who we valued it with and what was actually done. And it's simply just a record of that. And so if we have a bug in our mind, we have a bug in the ledger itself. The error that we perceive Bitcoin, like, whatever we perceive it as, if that is, like, incomplete or wrong, then we are going to manifest that through our action. And so we need to be very careful here. It's like, we're not saying that Bitcoin needs to be upgraded. We're saying that bitcoiners need to be upgraded. Like, we need to change the way we think, and we need to change the way we act, and we need to finally understand what Bitcoin is. This problem has been going on for 17 years. It's like, all we're trying to do is objectively look at Bitcoin for what it is as a physical process. And we think that anyone who does this should arrive at the same results that we do. And if you don't, let's talk about it. Let's figure this out. Like, we're not saying that this answer is done. Like, this answer, this paper is literally just the beginning. It's just a tool to continue forward. I said it to Jeff a long time ago. Like, this is a paper about boundaries. And drawing the boundary on the paper was the hardest part, because you can literally take any domain of knowledge and run with it, run with this idea. And everything changes if you change the ontology of time. And so if you want to, like a little call to action, it's here. It's like, biology is waiting. Chemistry is waiting. It's like, go and do it, somebody.
- [66:56]
D
All epistemology, all ontology, there's an opportunity to reassess all of them through the lens of Bitcoin. And so this is just simply meant to Be a lens, but a verification tool for science, logic, and just our individual ability to objectively look at things without depending on, again, domains of knowledge that we inherited. Just. I think what I want to leave people with is if you don't think you have a fiat mindset, like, I don't think you're thinking hard enough, like, we were born into this system. There's no way our minds don't have a fiat perception of reality. You know, fiat being the euphemism for just simply, you're in an incomplete system. You have an incomplete understanding. When you finally see a complete system and you still default to answering with the incomplete systems, answers to explain the complete one. How can that make sense?
- [67:57]
B
Yeah. Break free of your past memories and create the new. Right. This is amazing, guys. Absolutely amazing. I want to highlight one thing.
- [68:07]
C
Conversation.
- [68:08]
B
Yeah, I'm sorry, Jeff, I interrupted. Yeah, no, you're right. Just for me.
- [68:13]
E
And what this exposes and what everything for a long time has exposed in Bitcoin is the stuff we talk about all the time. 8 billion people in service of 8 billion people. For your entire life, you've been told you belong here, and you believe that you belong here. You are part of a system. And Jack and Nick and Preston and all of the people that we love in this space are part of a system that is both contributing to a new system and that every single person can move their time. And that's what this is observing. And so when we see these seemingly crazy ideas that adds to our proof of work and the knowledge and everything else and extends our understanding, we change. And that's coming from us. We are both parts of it. So it just gives me shivers, same as you, to be a part of this crazy change inside of times. Right. That we're a part of it. It's just so wild.
- [69:10]
B
I love when you bring this point up, Jeff, because at the end of the day, you're talking about attention. And when you look at what has caused all these AIs to become so powerful with what it is that they're able to. It all came down to attention being the core thing that the humans unlocked in order to create this intelligence. Boom, right? And you're talking about that exact point. And it's like, it just makes so much sense that when you place your attention on where you want the world to go and what you want that to look like, that you can pull that into the block that's being mined or minted. Right? So excited, guys. And Jeff, I'm sorry for the handoff. We talk literally every day.
- [69:51]
C
And it.
- [69:52]
B
It just dawned on me that, yeah, you're a guest on the show and we're recording a podcast, and this isn't just another conversation I'm having with you. Other things. Where can people read the paper if they want to read the paper?
- [70:04]
D
Yeah, well, Jeff has kind of pushed an accelerator pedal on us, and there's still a lot more work we're doing and a lot of refinements. Because, you know, it would have been funny when we talked over summer, this would have almost been a lot easier to talk about, but there's just been so much more on, you know, like, again, uncovered. And so there's so much more that could be talked about in terms of getting us to a timestamp of like, okay, at least open up the conversation. We are now at the domain bitcoin lens.net. okay, that's where we're going to host it. And we'll make refinements, share updates, and show that process and hopefully invite people to not just read the work, but if they have ideas, you know, share it, point out, like, little errors, whatever you find, the place that they can find us will be the bitcoin lens.net.
- [70:56]
B
You guys put up the boundary, and now everybody's gonna come in and pick it apart. And you know what? This is wonderful because I think the influx of intellectual horsepower that you're gonna get coming to this site picking apart, for instance, if you enjoyed the entropy discussion and you wanna see all the equations and all the hard work that these guys have poured into that and the energy that these guys have poured into it, it's in section six of the paper, right? So go to section six, dig into it, find out why you disagree or why you think that there's additive information there. And this is a living. I'm speaking on your behalf, but I, knowing you guys, this is a living document. You guys are more interested in truth than credit or any of that kind of stuff. And that's another reason I think Jeff and I are so excited about you guys putting this out there and getting this conversation going.
- [71:48]
D
Yeah, we want to. With you guys, like, literally, we want to create the way we see it. I think is like the collective white paper for the white paper that is that final global mirror of what is bitcoin. And something I want to note is just we've had so many definitions of what is bitcoin that's pushed the narrative forward that we've all, you know, developed through, and we've thought, wow, wow, wow, over and over again, you know, bitcoin is a peer to peer electronic cash system. That's the pinnacle right there. But over time we've seen these, these lenses, windows, you know, bitcoin is time, you know, as Gigi gave us. And then bitcoin is digital energy as Sailor gave us. And many, many other people have created all these different lenses. And so this is just an attempt to realize, like, wow, we can actually kind of pull all of those different lenses together to see the same thing.
- [72:40]
C
I just want to make it very clear too to the audience, like we don't want to make this our theory or our paper. Like if what we're saying is true, like this is important for every single bitcoiner to know and have. This is not something to be centralized and controlled. Like it's knowledge that deserves to be out there. So we don't want to claim like the absolute authority over this paper. It's just somebody needed to start the process and to kind of create the framework at which people can iterate from. So I'm sure you'll find some things that you may disagree with or you know, you agree with. And it's like bring them forward to us or help do the work. Because it's like this is an ongoing process of us really discovering what we live in in terms of the universe and what bitcoin is and, and how the two are related to each other. And it's really just the most fascinating time because I think this paper really just demands all knowledge be re observed through bitcoin. And so it's like there's a lot of work to be done and so we need help. Just anybody can help doing whatever they see, however they can see it fitting.
- [73:44]
B
The part of the show that I enjoy the most nowadays is here at the very end. We have this fun little tradition that we've started of taking the conversation that we just talked about and we turn it into a song and then we play the song for the outro for the listeners. You guys aren't going to hear the song right now because we still got to generate it and it takes all the stuff that we talked about and it turns that into the, in the song. So I'm curious if either one of you, Jack or Nick, if you're really got a hardcore preference for an artist or a like music type genre. If either one of you guys has something, just say it. And that's what the listener is going to hear. As we play the outro here for.
- [74:23]
D
Music style or an artist, or an.
- [74:25]
B
Artist or Even a song that you just love.
- [74:27]
D
I'm a global lover of music. It's hard to pick a preference, but I try to find music that unifies the analog world and the digital world. I don't know, maybe what comes in, I think, is there's a group called Odessa and they. They're very good at synthesizing electronic and analog instruments into something that I think is a unique frequency that I think has absolutely impacted my ability to think about bitcoins. I love to Odessa for helping this bitcoin journey.
- [75:01]
C
For me, I wouldn't point to, like, a single artist, but I would just say, like, I'm a punk at heart and so, like, we're rocking the boat and so, you know, we might as well have fun with it.
- [75:10]
B
I love it. All right, well, guys, thank you so much for making time. We're going to have handles, you guys, both on X and Noster.
- [75:18]
C
Just Noster. Just Nostr.
- [75:20]
B
Nick, how about you?
- [75:21]
D
I have the handles. I've been off social media and again, this conversation is debate whether I engage with that, you know, outside conversation that maybe will take place from having a conversation with you guys. But the tag, I believe, is Plebnick on both Noster and X.
- [75:40]
B
Okay, I'll have the links to Jack, Nick, and Jeff, obviously over on Noster, and we'll have the link to the website where the paper is going to be hosted. And guys, check it out. Enjoy the song.
- [76:09]
G
At the threshold everything's pending Ghost in a ledger waiting for a wish Waves in a lattice all these may be.
- [76:33]
E
World.
- [76:35]
G
Folded like paper begging to be open. States on standby frozen in a shrug Tiny coin flips balancing I'm nothing your hand my choice hovers on a key collapse the shimmer name what used to break Time is not a river Time is a heartbeat Pulse by pulse the possible complete box of light Ticking into being all that we were locked in the seams Time is not a river Time is a heartbeat Pulse by pulse the possible complete Moments don't flow they shatter and link Step after step on a disappearing break. Spinning at the edge of memory Trembling on the smallest ledge where every truth of this. Entropy and energy trading masks in secret holes Spinning out of fragile friends where maybe never falls Time is not a river Time is a heartbeat Pulse by pulse the possible completes blocks of light Ticking into being all that we are etched in routines Time is not a river Time is a heartbeat Pulse by pulse the possible could conflicts Moments don't flow they shatter red link Step after step on a disappearing br0 point whispers under proof of work silent ch under every search quantum field some beneath the proof of work click like click we search.
- [80:12]
A
Thanks for listening to tip. Follow Bitcoin fundamentals on your favorite podcast app and visit theinvestorspodcast.com for show, show notes and educational resources. This podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not provide financial, investment, tax or legal advice. The content is impersonal and does not consider your objectives, financial situation or needs. Investing involves risk, including possible loss of principal and past performance is not a guarantee of future results. Listeners should do their own research and consult a qualified professional before making any financial decisions. Nothing on this show is a recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell any security or other financial product. Hosts, guests and the Investors Podcast Network may hold positions in securities discussed and may change those positions at any time without notice. References to any third party products, services or advertisers do not constitute endorsements and the Investors Podcast Network is not responsible for any claims made by them. Copyright by the Investors Podcast Network. All rights reserved.