The Monero blockchain can NOT be verified with a pubkey. A Monero Transaction Can be verified, That is a BIG difference.
Yes thanks for correction.
Why would you want to verify other's transactions? That is the entire point, that you shouldn't.
If the protocol and the encoding procedure is bug-free, then it's just as valid transaction even if it's masked. And we know the whole point of hash functions and public key cryptography is that you cant recreate the same data from different source, collision protection.
If that mechanism is sound, then who cares what the transaction is, nobody can steal your money and nobody even knows who and how much money they have. Only those that you do business with will.
That is the whole point. You don't need a public ledge, a rich list, and such. It's very privacy invasive.
It’s all based on trust: trust in the “hopium” than that the client you happen to be using actually faithfully implements the protocol; trust in the
‘experts’ that the chain is ok when either some rogue group says it isn’t or when your own client software says it isn’t; trust in developers that the code isn’t doing some mad corrupt leakage out to an address that nobody can see or audit; trust in a centralised encryption algorithm that it won't be sprung open with a can opener a few years down the line to reveal every transaction in history. (A 'viewkey' doesn't in the least change this fact by the way. All a viewkey is is a private key with read-only privilages, it isn't a substitute for a fully transparent chain).
Just as with Dash's hopium that the Masternode system won't be broken or abused in some way.
By the way we are dealing with open source software here, so if you are really concerned about bugs then you can do something about it too. Hire a programmer or fix the code yourself, it's open, anybody can help.
Again you seem to confuse this with Zcash. Monero is nowhere are opaque as Zcash and it is transparently setup. There is no need to trust and I highly doubt and kind of "leakage" of secret coins is there, just as it can't happen in BTC or any other coins.
Monero doesn't reduce the security that Bitcoin has through it's protocol (to avoid minting or stealing unauthorized money). It just adds privacy to it, as an extra.
No you don't get it
A pubkey doesn't verify the Monero blockchain, only one single transaction. (thanks for pointing that out chilly2k) (and elaborated on in great detail by toknormal) Trust is required in abundance that opaque blockchains are legit. This is why I don't like zcash, and also one reason (among many others) why I don't like Monero. A bug was caught recently in cryptonote coins which would have allowed undetected coin minting. I'm almost sure fluffypony wouldn't do it on purpose but still, how are you ever sure this isn't happening or will never happen via some other bug?
Yes correct about the verification as pointed above.
Not correct about the comparison with Zcash. Zcash is entirely masked, and totally requires a trusted setup to initialize the encryption with some random number I think.
Monero is transparently built, thus the encryption is more solid. I mean the whole point why people don't use XOR is because the random numbers can be tampered with.
So Monero uses good encryption that addresses this exact issue. With Zcash there are just too many things that could go wrong or already did but we dont know yet.
Thats a big if. It has never happened, despite the big bounty on offer for someone who manages it. Not to mention rival developers of other coins also having vested interest in breaking Dash private send. Stating that it is easy doesn't make it so.
Ok so you think that somebody could mint secretly Monero, but you don't think that somebody else can already deanonimized Dash completely?
Pretty biased logic.