What if the number of zeroes run out?

rivest

newbie

Activity: 2

Merit: 0

Thanks that's all I wanted to know. I always thought it was linear.

Quote from: kano on July 03, 2021, 07:32:43 AM

OK, so every 8 zeros represents 4294967296 (almost 4.3 billion) times faster bitcoin hash rate.
So we got more than 5 more sets of 8 zeros, or 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion
Which is an exponential increase, not a linear increase ... it wont happen.

Edit: reminder that 2^256 is close to the number of atoms in the universe (only about 1000 times smaller)

kano

legendary

Activity: 4592

Merit: 1851

Linux since 1997 RedHat 4

Quote from: rivest on July 03, 2021, 03:12:15 AM

Would it happen? Hashrate, miners and therefore difficulty keep increasing...

OK, so every 8 zeros represents 4294967296 (almost 4.3 billion) times faster bitcoin hash rate.
So we got more than 5 more sets of 8 zeros, or 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion x 4.29 billion
Which is an exponential increase, not a linear increase ... it wont happen.

Edit: reminder that 2^256 is close to the number of atoms in the universe (only about 1000 times smaller)

NotFuzzyWarm

legendary

Activity: 3822

Merit: 2703

Evil beware: We have waffles!

"Number of zeros" in what? What the hell are you asking? Huh

rivest

newbie

Activity: 2

Merit: 0

Would it happen? Hashrate, miners and therefore difficulty keep increasing...

Topic: What if the number of zeroes run out? (Read 122 times)