Bitcoin emissions alone could push global warming above 2°C?

Dear Editor:   Nov 27, 2018

When I saw the Star-Advertiser link quoting the above titled paper, I had to read it for myself. It reminded me of a grocery store tabloid article from forty years ago, which I also had to read, titled “Alien Fleet Poised to Invade Earth”. The headline was complete with a poorly doctored photograph containing flying saucers. It was hysterical.

So was I again led to pay money for entertainment. It was well worth the price. The paper’s content is, to quote a sarcastic phrase, so bad that it’s not even wrong. One might excuse tabloids: such is their market. But for a purported academic journal, it’s a knee-slapper.

Consider the thesis: Bitcoin alone could push global warming above 2°C. Could has no place in any rational thesis statement. One might state something like “conditions a, b and c cause…,” but this paper’s statement intellectually empty.

With that in mind we can move on to the paper’s references which are largely circular (quoting only papers from the same UH department). Beyond those, its key reference leads to digiconomist.net containing nothing more than an anti-bitcoin rant.

But it gets worse. The digeconomist.net article contains a circular reference to the subject paper. And worse, the paper’s final reference for supplementary information contains a link to itself.  Digging deep enough one finally discovers that the so-called “models” assume that Bitcoin energy usage are not subject to real world constraints: No matter how much electricity costs, Bitcoin’s usage will increase. And the site dares to include the word economist in its address.

The tabloid from 40 years ago noted that the Alien Fleet author’s work “has been questioned.” At least the tabloid had some sense of honesty, unlike the crap stacking circle hosting the Star-Advertiser and its intellectually challenged authors.

Stuart Wilson

Haiku, Maui