Reddit user Bitcoin_Holder dropped a Reddit post titled “What happens to Bitcoin when energy is effectively free with nuclear fusion” and it went quasi viral.
In no time, the post had 393 upvotes and 388 shares. A testament to people understanding that energy and Bitcoin are closely correlated; Bitcoin has proof-of-work and energy is the ability to do work.
Speaking of unlimited energy is a very big deal because the food and fossil fuels we consume are mostly needed for the limited energy contained inside them – which all comes from the sun.
Yup, fossil fuels are the progeny of solar power. They were birthed in large quantities over millions of years, then were put in underground storage, till our fossil-consuming ancestors came along. And without these fossil fuels, many billions of humans today would not have been born.
You read that right: no fossil fuel, no billions of humans. The energy to produce, feed and raise them just isn’t there bro. Sis. Just isn’t.
Now if limited energy is the oomph behind our numbers and our great civilization, how about virtually unlimited energy! Takes serious work to wrap your head around that.
Speaking of work, let’s now speak block mining rewards and what do you know, the hottest comment was a pun by user Jezzes on how much more difficulty miners will face thereafter.
“Difficulty go up.”
For as energy gets cheaper, making and rigging up ASICs becomes cheaper and the competition for the block reward more intense. Automatically, the difficulty adjusts upwards and yeah, not cool if you are a miner.
How about if you are a Bitcoin user? Is unlimited fusion energy any good?
Absolutely. Cheaper energy means cheaper transaction fees. So cheap that Visa and SWIFT will probably adopt Bitcoin for their transactions’ sub-layer.
Incidentally, this will make Bitcoin more valuable and fiat money less valuable because everyone will want to use Bitcoin to move around monetary value while fiat is busy draining its value further with continued printing.
Coz if you stop printing fiat it stops being fiat.
Maybe in the future, fiat will be good, that is, if gift cards can be called fiat. But as things stand, it is a terrible way to store energized-value when compared to Bitcoin.
But as hinted upon, with great power comes great capabilities, and fusion powered rockets will be the first step towards conquering previous limits to the progress of human civilization.
Didn’t think I would say this, ever, but forget Bitcoin. At least for today. Unlimited fusion energy solves climate change, energy poverty, the need to kowtow to centralized energy systems.
If BTC is FGU (freedom go up) technology, unlimited energy is HGU (humanity go up) technology. Literally.
With unlimited energy (plus Bitcoin. Don’t forget it on Earth), we’ll touch the stars.
