Blockchain and Chitragupta: my musings

‘Life is transactional. Life is a ledger’.

Being a newbie to bitcoin/blockchain I am trying to understand the basics of blockchain technology. A few days ago I was watching an educational video by Mr.Andreas Antonopolos about bitcoin basics. He was describing how the blockchain originated and I was fascinated by the way he was presenting. So, the very first block of the bitcoin which came into existence was called the ‘genesis block’. This was in 2009. Since then, bitcoin blocks are being created approximately every ten minutes. Each block essentially contains information on underlying transactions. The transactions are made secure by mathematical processes called cryptographic hash functions. The entered transactions cannot be altered or forged in any manner. What caught my attention was that each block contains information about the previous block. There’s a digital fingerprint and a timestamp. In this way, the entire blockchain is linked with blocks, starting from the very first block the ‘genesis block’. This concept made me thinking. Where had I heard such process before?

I was brought up in an atmosphere made in learning/academics/culture/traditions. My parents and elders often told us stories of folklore, great epics like Ramayana, Mahabharata etc. One of those stories involved a loyal assistant of Lord Yama, the God of Death. His name was Chitragupta. The main job of Chitragupta was to keep a tally of all the good and bad deeds done by living beings. He faithfully kept a ledger of these deeds, starting from day one until the last breath. The net result of all the good and bad deeds is what constitutes as ‘karma’. On the day of reckoning, Lord Yama would review the ledger and decide whether the person would deserve heaven or hell. Bookkeeping or accounting probably originated then.

There are some similarities between Chitragupta’s ledger and bitcoin. In both, every transaction is entered and permanently stored. There is no way of altering the transactions. A person’s past good or bad deeds are irreversible. Chitragupta’s ledger is unchangeable. So is the bitcoin/blockchain.

However, there are certain differences between Chitragupta’s ledger and bitcoin. Bitcoin is decentralized and widely distributed in the computer network. Chitragupta’s ledger is probably centralized. Trust is taken as granted. Faith is a better term to describe the reverence placed by humans towards Gods. Ordinary humans have to start with the premise of Faith.

If a person constantly strives towards good deeds, in the form of meditation, devotional singing, selfless service to the needy without any expectations in return, he/she would end up with a positive balance and good ‘karma’. This is probably the best way to alter the ledger, for future deeds or transactions. I am not certain if the same can be applied to bitcoin ledger. Only time will tell.

References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chitragupta, accessed Feb 7, 2018
Andreas Antonopoulos. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJWCJCWOxBYSi5DhCieLOLQ, accessed Feb 7, 2018.