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Topic: Semantics of "fiat" - page 2. (Read 3977 times)

legendary
Activity: 2828
Merit: 1515
February 10, 2015, 12:59:41 AM
#44
You could argue Bitcoin is run by miners, or "regulated". Using regulated very loosely. But fiat currency has a value provided by the government. Bitcoin has no set value. It's value of course is determined by the users who trade and use it, but it's far from governmental regulation.
hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 09, 2015, 06:05:54 PM
#43
You win. I've been defeated.

I hereby declare that, according to amspir, “fiat” will no longer have the meaning “government” related to it.

Or at least, that's what you seem to expect me to say.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 05:46:14 PM
#42
Forget for a moment the meaning of “intrinsic value”. It's irrelevant to your initial concern that Bitcoin is a fiat currency.
My concern is the pluralistic ignorance regarding the term "fiat" among some bitcoiners, as in claiming bitcoin is not a fiat currency.
You could also ask me to explain the difference between water and heavy water without using the word "isotope".   

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And you still haven't refuted my sources I gave some posts back.

You couldn't even explain your cut and paste research yourself, don't ask me to do it for you.
hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 09, 2015, 01:35:57 PM
#41
Forget for a moment the meaning of “intrinsic value”. It's irrelevant to your initial concern that Bitcoin is a fiat currency.

And you still haven't refuted my sources I gave some posts back.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 12:40:45 PM
#40
I speechless "intrinsic value" means.

See:
The value of any money or commodity is affected by offer/demand. The use of a commodity is just a parameter in offer/demand among many others.
It means that  :
Intrinsic value doesn't make the market value.

I've got no problem with that statement.   That does not mean that bitcoin has an intrinsic value.

The US Government could go down and stay down, and if it does, the value of the US Dollar will go to zero since it has no intrinsic value.
The Internet could go down and stay down, and if it does, the value of bitcoin will go to zero since it has no intrinsic value.
This is the weakness of a fiat currency.  It doesn't mean that a fiat currency has no value, it will have value as money as long as people are willing to trade it for something else of value.

If I physically possess a gold coin, it will still have a non-trivial value even if the government that minted it no longer exists, because there is demand for it beyond its purpose as currency.

legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1131
February 09, 2015, 12:13:08 PM
#39
I speechless "intrinsic value" means.

See:
The value of any money or commodity is affected by offer/demand. The use of a commodity is just a parameter in offer/demand among many others.
It means that  :
Intrinsic value doesn't make the market value.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 12:03:06 PM
#38
Gold does not have “intrinsic value”.

You really just said that gold does not have intrinsic value.  Gold is the widely used example of a commodity currency that has intrinsic value.  I am speechless.

We value gold because we value gold. I don't understand your speechlessness.

I speechless because you simply do not understand what the phrase "intrinsic value" means.   When defining what intrinsic value is, gold is the most widely used example to support the definition, because people both use it as a form of currency, and for other non-monetary purposes: it can be made into pretty shiny jewelry, or used in electronics as non-corrosive conductor.  If you don't understand, then you just don't understand.

Declaring that gold holds no intrinsic value is a rather unique viewpoint.
hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 09, 2015, 11:43:06 AM
#37
Gold does not have “intrinsic value”.

You really just said that gold does not have intrinsic value.  Gold is the widely used example of a commodity currency that has intrinsic value.  I am speechless.

We value gold because we value gold. I don't understand your speechlessness.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 11:01:10 AM
#36
Gold does not have “intrinsic value”.

You really just said that gold does not have intrinsic value.  Gold is the widely used example of a commodity currency that has intrinsic value.  I am speechless.
hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 09, 2015, 10:31:37 AM
#35
PHYSICAL gold has intrinsic value because it can be used for other purposes in the real world other than as a currency.
You cannot make the same statement about a crypto-currency.

Gold does not have “intrinsic value”. Whatever gold can be useful as a periodic element has nothing to do with gold being used as money throughout human history. People have gold in vaults not because they are planning to build circuits with it, I can assure you.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 10:24:02 AM
#34
LOL, you seem to have a 19th century mindset, difficult to say where to start explaining the world but it would take a long time and need a paradigm shift to get the 21st century.
You remind me of the recent movie about Turing: The imitation game - they also laughed at his worthless machine.

I have read biographies on Turing in things called "books" because of his contributions to the field of computer science, long before a dramatized version of his story came out as a movie in 2014. 

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Apparently your math, engineering and programming background is nonexistent.
I suppose.  I make a living using and writing with my non-existent skills.  I sure fooled 'em.

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How did you end up on bitcointalk and WHY?

Apparently I like to argue with crazy people.  I also use bitcoin, and I think it's a revolutionary invention.

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Btw, mining physical gold is also virtual because machines are used in the process?

PHYSICAL gold has intrinsic value because it can be used for other purposes in the real world other than as a currency.
You cannot make the same statement about a crypto-currency.
 
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Bitcoin mining work creates a worldwide decentralized payment platform. This is the value you are missing.

  Bitcoin has value because other people perceive it as having value.   You can trade it for something for something else of value, but you can't do anything useful with it other than to spend it.  The same thing can be said for any fiat currency that people use in trade.

A commodity currency has the additional property it can be used for something other than money.

Read your last statement.  If you are trying to say that a fiat currency is a commodity because it has value as a fiat currency, then you fundamentally do not understand the difference between a fiat and a commodity currency.

I personally think the bitcoin eventually become a better form of money than other fiat currencies (once it has a history of price stability), but I'm not going to pretend that it is a physical commodity.

Book suggestion:  "The Emperor's New Clothes" by Hans Christian Anderson.
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1131
February 09, 2015, 08:26:58 AM
#33
It seems to me that many bitcoin proponents use the word "fiat" to describe central bank issued fiat currency, but don't use the word to describe Bitcoin.
In my opinion, Bitcoin is the ultimate fiat currency, since it has no inherent value (you can can't use it for anything other than paying someone else bitcoin).  It is a currency issued by "decree" through a protocol enforcing a consensus of users and miners.
If bitcoin is not fiat, can you really call it a commodity currency?   If the argument is that is a commodity in the sense that it valuable a currency, one could also say that USD has commodity value in that its only guaranteed value is that it can be used to pay taxes and keep an American taxpayer out of jail for failure to do so.

The value of any money or commodity is affected by offer/demand. The use of a commodity is just a parameter in offer/demand among many others.

Both USD and BTC are backed by the economy around it (=people using it to exchange things).

The supply of USD is strongly affected by a group of people (government) but not in Bitcoin. The number of miners doesn't affect the emission curve, no miner can change the max number of units.

Miners do not create Bitcoin, they work for the network and get a reward.
legendary
Activity: 2156
Merit: 1131
February 09, 2015, 08:21:08 AM
#32
Here is the problem.   If someone is unable to separate reality from a virtual reality, they can't make the distinction between a virtual commodity and a real commodity.   I believe this is an actual documented psychiatric disorder.  There is no point in debating further, It would be as pointless as continuing to argue with a delusional religious fanatic.

newbie
Activity: 29
Merit: 0
February 09, 2015, 08:16:57 AM
#31

I'm the long run USD is based on work.  Its backed by ...
  

Sorry but you have been fooled.  Virtual and physical USD are both issued by fiat.  You will never get your work, which is why nobody holds large quantities of either physical or virtual USD unless absolutely forced to.   

Paper never can be "backed" by anything other than promises which will eventually be broken.   
full member
Activity: 211
Merit: 100
February 09, 2015, 08:07:18 AM
#30
The process of bitcoin mining involves having a machine to do virtual work.

A Bitcoin miner does real work.  Real resources are consumed in the process.

So do World of Warcraft gold miners.  The point is that "work" hold little value to majority of people.  Who freaking cares if some computer can solve a math problem faster than another computer.


LOL, you seem to have a 19th century mindset, difficult to say where to start explaining the world but it would take a long time and need a paradigm shift to get the 21st century.
You remind me of the recent movie about Turing: The imitation game - they also laughed at his worthless machine.
Apparently your math, engineering and programming background is nonexistent.
How did you end up on bitcointalk and WHY?
Btw, mining physical gold is also virtual because machines are used in the process?
Mining WoW gold takes resources of a tiny computer cluster running the application - HW worth of thousands and electricity costs of peanuts.
Bitcoin mining work creates a worldwide decentralized payment platform. This is the value you are missing.
member
Activity: 112
Merit: 10
February 09, 2015, 12:59:27 AM
#29
The process of bitcoin mining involves having a machine to do virtual work.

A Bitcoin miner does real work.  Real resources are consumed in the process.

So do World of Warcraft gold miners.  The point is that "work" hold little value to majority of people.  Who freaking cares if some computer can solve a math problem faster than another computer.

It depends on which math problem it is solving.

Here is the problem.   If someone is unable to separate reality from a virtual reality, they can't make the distinction between a virtual commodity and a real commodity.   I believe this is an actual documented psychiatric disorder.  There is no point in debating further, It would be as pointless as continuing to argue with a delusional religious fanatic.

hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 08, 2015, 10:20:02 PM
#28
The process of bitcoin mining involves having a machine to do virtual work.

A Bitcoin miner does real work.  Real resources are consumed in the process.

So do World of Warcraft gold miners.  The point is that "work" hold little value to majority of people.  Who freaking cares if some computer can solve a math problem faster than another computer.

It depends on which math problem it is solving.
hero member
Activity: 784
Merit: 500
February 08, 2015, 09:27:08 PM
#27
The process of bitcoin mining involves having a machine to do virtual work.

A Bitcoin miner does real work.  Real resources are consumed in the process.

So do World of Warcraft gold miners.  The point is that "work" hold little value to majority of people.  Who freaking cares if some computer can solve a math problem faster than another computer.

legendary
Activity: 1246
Merit: 1011
February 08, 2015, 02:58:31 PM
#26
The process of bitcoin mining involves having a machine to do virtual work.

A Bitcoin miner does real work.  Real resources are consumed in the process.
hero member
Activity: 658
Merit: 500
February 08, 2015, 11:02:30 AM
#25
The meaning of the latin word "fiat" in no way implies government control.  Some bitcoiners seem to use the word "fiat" as shorthand to mean "government-issued fiat currency", which is my point.   Bitcoin is novel in that it creates a fiat currency without a conventional government.

You can't just say that while ignoring the evidence I've presented you. Where's your evidence that I'm wrong? You need to cite sources.
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