HardForks As Modern Day Heresies

in anthropology •  7 years ago 



In real life, that is, the world beyond 0 and 1, when someone has a different point view they create a heresy. In the digital world (and more specifically in the world of cryptocurrencies) this is called a hardfork.

Examining human interaction from the perspective of heresies unravels some interesting things about progress and human nature. The most evident thing is that the heresy that is most widely accepted, becomes the canon aka the genuine version while the lesser accepted views as seen as cults or deviations from the "truth". It doesn't matter which version is less or more true. What matters is what becomes accepted.

In an effort to boycott the other point of view, both religions and cryptocurrencies try to silence the opposition since they understand that this is a game of numbers. In the Ethereum hardfork, we saw the "code is law" group stick to Ethereum Classic while what became more established was Ethereum. In this case the more powerful and leading developers found themselves in the heretic part but they retained the original name and logo while the actual originals became a secondary version (Ethereum Classic).

In the case of the Bitcoin Hardfork, the original Bitcoin accepted some revisions to its code (supposedly) to improve while another heresy (Bitcoin Cash) added different features that make it faster and more efficient. The idea for the first one is for Bitcoin to stay as gold standard and for the other to have world wide adaptation in the form of cash. The politics here are again irrelevant since this is all about personal interest of specific powerful people and not what is best for everyone (hence the heresy). What is important is that there is a fight about which side will prevail. What we see in forums today with banning and silencing is no different that past religious persecution from zealots of different denominations.

Ironic. Blockchain technologies which were all about decentralisation and enabling new degrees of freedom fall into the same pitfalls of human nature. Hardforks and heresies teach us that what remains as true or established has nothing to do with truth. Rather, what prevails in the end, is how the public will be manipulated in order for something to gain acceptance. What we know as sacred and holy from religions is simply a hardfork of few individuals that decided to go their own way for their own personal interests.

Take for example modern day monotheism. The Judaism was a hardfork from the Egyptian priest Moses who didn't like the many Gods of Egypt and decided to create his own religion with a single God. Later on, Christianity hardforked Judaism, presenting Jesus as the son of the Judaic God that came to offer an update. Similarly, Islam hardforked Christianity accepting as Muhammand the true prophet and Jesus as the secondary prophet. Same Blockchain "Yahweh/God/Allah" but with different hardforks along the way.

Financially this teaches us that a coin or for that matter, a heresy, never really goes away or completely dies out. All heresies live in parallel because the original core remains the same and in reality they all support the same idea. On a larger perspective all religions are heresies of the same human blockchain — which is nothing more than the concept of belief to a higher power. This core exists in ourselves due to the way the human brain is structured. In the cryptocurrency world, all coins follow the same Satoshi Nakamoto blueprint of decentralisation and thus they are all related in some way.


Personally, I an avid believer in human nature. As long as we are made of flesh and bones and our endocrinological system produces specific hormones and neurotransmitters, we are bound to follow the exact same patterns and make the same exact moves. As an anthropologist, this helps me to contemplate and understand human behaviour across time and space. As an investor it helps me navigate the markets and make educated decisions. In the end the cryptocurrencies that matter will not be the ones with specific canons whether those are called Ethereum, Bitcoin, Neo or Monero. In the end the cryptocurrencies that will truly matter will be those that connect all others together such as Qtum, Cosmos, Aragon and Bancor. Humans will always hardfork one way or another. The wise move would be to stay above the hard forks and not be part of them.













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I agree with most of it, but it helps to understand the concept of "coins". A coin is both a unit if a particular currency and each currency within the overall Cryptosphere. Without lots of coin a cryptocurrency will die from lack of use and without lots of sub currencies evolving within the Cryptosphere the whole will suffer a lack of innovation and ultimately lose the battle to centralization and just like a dying star implode into a black hole (private esoteric network without a mainstream use).

And I have none of those. Thanks for the reminder lol.

This post received a 3% upvote from @randowhale thanks to @trumpman! For more information, click here!

This is a very good read about the principles of hardfork and or heresies. I was wondering if you can agree about the concept of demand and supply (see my latest blog post) and how it can negetively affect great coins. Wish you a blessed weekend, you always have my upvote.

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Yes! I have been thinking exactly the same thing! The debate between the different factions in Bitcoin is indeed much like the faiths splitting in two. We're seeing the digital equivalent of Catholics vs Protestants right now!

I guess they're all subdivisions of the Bitcoin Faith, which is in itself a subdivision of the Cryptocurrency Faith (although this may be debated by members of the Bitcoin Faith who believe their Bitcoin is the one True Crypto). We even have a mysterious Messiah in Satoshi Nakamoto to go along with it... and everybody is already debating on the 'true meaning' of Nakamoto's whitepaper..

How long before the first person gets killed over this debate??

Well, Satoshi himself of course! There's plenty of stories going around saying that secret government agencies got to him!

Yes, for a guy more dangerous than Al Queda or ISIL, if he still alive , the US government would have him in Gitmo

the same things happen in the ancient history is re produced but cover with new dress call modernism

yea u're right :(

In the end the cryptocurrencies that will truly matter will be those that connect all others together

I fully agree! The future will show how many core networks will stay alive, I actually think the market will make their choses for a limited selection of blockchains, maybe per vertical segment. When not, the umbrella blockchains and networks are the way to go to be able to connect to the whole crypto space and do not have to integrate to many different technologies and all.

this Is really good, thanks

This is an amazing point of view! Human nature is indeed about specific patterns and moves. No matter where you look at, from religion to the blockchain, it's all human nature everywhere.

The idea of ​​the mainstream is always true. Although in the future it will prove to be false. This has been happening since the beginning of human history. Not only in religion, science for example has followed the same path driven by economic interests. We have blocked knowledge with patents that could advance our civilization at exponential levels. An example not too distant was the hard fork that occurred between Edison and Tesla, we all know how it ended. The mainstream side of Edison with economic capacity and a large group of researchers making discoveries in their name. While Tesla died poor and alone.

Isn't it funny how things survive and remain as canon?

Yes is funny. And I believe in the human being too. But for me it is a sign that our civilization is far from the next phase.

I love your conclusion that those who connect will always survive. Hope I can make distinctions for the connected ones and support them with my time, money and energy.

Daaaaayum. This is brilliant! Hard Forks as a form of Religious Heresy - hahahahahaha! I love it!

Interestingly, the blockchain concept itself can be likened to the real reason humans have big weddings -- witnesses.

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Well said... I like that you can relate hardforks in crypto world to divisions in real world faith and ideologies... The analogy is very real, and makes anyone who takes the time to read this post, to really have a rethink...
Like you have well pointed out, the way that carries the most power, and the most following becomes the generally accepted way, wether its original or fake inherently...
I like your well elaborated post, thank you for giving me this insight from another perspective. Kudos for a well written article.

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Holy wow! This article is exactly the thought that was playing in mind for the past weeks, but I couldn't have worded it as explicit as yours. Brilliant! I definitely agree. Removing the facade of technology complexity and still boils down to raw human made conception.

Great work likee it and upvoted!!

Hard forks are a great thing. Instead of CEOs or political heads making a decision the general public gets to decide the future of technology and cryptos while the minority still gets a voice and

I love your example of modern day monotheism. Great way to relate the history of the world to modern day blockchain technology in a simple manner that makes it easy to understand even for newcomers to Steemit and other cryptos like myself. Thank you for sharing @kyriacos

This seems to provided a useful analogy - if not taken to extremes :-)

I hope we can continue to communicate and share information through the community, I hope I can follow you and you will also do the same.

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Of course, some cryptos have a lot of hash power concentrated on a few hands, but even considering that, it is far more democratic than a president or a group of politicians deciding for a whole country. Specially when you consider this politicians usually don't understand anything about finance.

Thank you for a comparison

But we cannot be separated from hard forks, simply because our own kids are hardforked from us

The question is how to stay above the hardfork.

Well written and great information. I'm guessing many like myself are off to get some Qtum, Aragon and Bancor but Cosmos (ATOM) has me stumped cannot locate it anywhere for sale.

I know the ICO was back in April but looks like tokens have not been released as yet. On https://coinmarketcap.com/all/views/all ATOM symbol seems to belong to a different company called Atomic Coin. A bit strange.

Thanks for the info.

As always, very interesting ideas! But now I have to go check out the coins you mentioned in the last paragraph ;)

Those haters of Bitcoin Cash can take up this proof challenge.
https://steemit.com/bitcoin/@tuventure/challenge-if-you-hate-bitcoin-cash-then-do-this-test-now

That is great post @kyriacos t

Very interesting analogy , and I find a lot of truth in what you say. Some people choose a believe and grasp it so hard that all other ideas are blasphemy. I try to stay open minded, or in case of bitcoin, I hold both so that I don't have to worry who will end up on the top :)

very good post

I think that as humans, we should learn to agree with eachother 😄🎉❤️

  ·  7 years ago (edited)

If things become honest and very famous and generate a lot of income, then there will be just who wants to fall.

Your analogy is inspiring, but your advice... I don't know.
The Bahai religion of religions have maybe 10 million believers...

Good job!