--- /dev/null
+---
+postid: 01f
+title: Bitcoin as infrastructure [i]
+excerpt: In which I argue that Bitcoin is more fundamental than mere currency.
+date: April 27, 2014
+author: Lucian Mogoșanu
+tags: cogitatio
+---
+
+This started out as an illustration of how (rather interesting) applications
+could in theory be built on top of Bitcoin or cryptocurrencies in general. At
+some point into my train of thought, however, I decided that painting a bigger
+picture of the subject is desirable, if not necessary. I personally deem it
+necessary, as it will hopefully clarify some points on a concept that is yet
+so poorly understood.
+
+Before beginning the incursion, I must warn the reader that the problem of
+money, or resources in general, is beyond the scope of this essay. I'm an
+engineer, not an economist, nor a finance expert. Nor am I a connoisseur of
+Bitcoin, for that matter, but only a lost soul wandering in the dark, finding
+questions to answers never posed.
+
+## Part I: Introduction and recurring patterns in human history
+
+In a [previous post][1] I (only) mentioned how we humans don't seem to fully
+grasp the underlying mechanisms behind social bonds. The abstract concept of
+"network" predates human existence, in fact it predates animal existence and
+life itself: physical and chemical bonds are probably the first examples of
+graphs on our Universe's timeline, at least as far as our current knowledge
+can tell.
+
+Graphs are themselves structures, describable using sets[^1] and pairs.
+However, even simple structures such as directed graphs are not enough to
+describe physical and chemical phenomena (for example, those involving
+energy), although some phenomena may be (possibly) unified under simple,
+abstract structures such as categories. But I digress.
+
+These network-like stuctures repeat themselves at the macroscopic level:
+biologists like to study the so-called "swarm intelligence" of ant colonies
+and bee swarms, observe organizational patterns and how they evolve. This is
+no less true for humans: throughout history, we competed and cooperated, we
+explored, exterminated or on the contrary, created new relationships and
+merged. In many of these events, structure, or infrastructure, has played
+a major role.
+
+For a long time, the biggest hurdle in the way of human social or inter-social
+bonds was physical, or more precisely geographical in nature. The Vikings were
+such a great people mostly due to their proficiency as seafarers. Babylonians
+and Greeks were great cartographers, this being a necessity to find the
+shortest, or the "right" path from one geographical point to another. Finally,
+the Romans were renowned for their roads and bridges, infrastructure proven to
+be essential for communications and trade and implicitly for the well-being of
+Rome. Indeed, this is probably one of the first examples of engineering-driven
+development in human history.
+
+We can easily see how structure, or infrastructure, has influenced major
+events in history. One such series of events, depicted on a monument known as
+Trajan's Column, were Trajan's wars[^2] on Decebalus' Dacia: to cross the
+Danube and invade Dacia, the Emperor hired an engineer known as Apollodorus to
+quickly build what became an important piece of engineering and architecture.
+Later on Trajan's successor dismantled the bridge to keep the Empire safe from
+the barbarian invasion.
+
+Another interesting series of events, which I will only briefly remind, are
+the explorations which led to the colonization of the two American continents.
+These explorations were mainly driven by the rise of the Ottoman Empire in
+Anatolia and Eastern Europe: the Ottoman Türks being muslim and all, they
+weren't particularly friendly to Christians. Unfortunately, they also came to
+occupy a segment of the trade route between Europe and Asia known as the Silk
+Road. Now, some seafaring Spanish and Portugese explorers were now sure that
+the Earth must be round, so they went West hoping that they'd reach Asia if
+they travelled long enough. Much to their surprise, the Indies they reached
+were not the silk-rich Indies they had expected, which is why some of them
+decided to slaughter the American natives. But again, I digress.
+
+Now we can fast-forward to the modern Industrial Revolution, when horses were
+complemented by engines and roads by railroads. Thus the communication latency
+turned from days to hours, and then to minutes after the invention of the
+electrical telegraph. Of course, the telegraph itself contributed to railway
+development, as most early telegraphs were built alongside railroads for
+signaling purposes.
+
+I have one last seemingly unrelated remark, which will lead us into the next
+part of this essay: one of the main challenges in telegraphy consisted of
+finding a reliable alphabet to encode electrical signals. Many of these
+encodings, including the standard Morse code, were binary. This had an impact
+not only in engineering, but also in the science of the 20th century.
+
+**Next**: The fractal nature of computing infrastructure
+
+[^1]: Admittedly, sets are one of the cornerstones of mathematics; this
+discussion, like any other, can only remain precise in the framework of
+mathematics. Alas, this is not entirely possible, but I can at least try to
+hold on to this path as much as possible.
+
+[^2]: One who's missed their history classes might feel inclined to believe
+that I am biased and suffering of [dumb nationalism][2] for calling the Dacian
+Wars a "major series of events". They were indeed quite an important turning
+point in Roman history, for at least two or three reasons. Firstly, both
+Burebista (one of Decebalus' predecessors) and Decebalus himself were meddlers
+into the internal affairs of the Roman Empire, and they both sided with the
+losing party, which made them enemies of the Empire. Secondly, the Getae and
+Dacian tribes, reunited under Decebalus, made frequent raids into Roman
+provinces, which caused a lot of trouble. Thirdly, Romans found an important
+source of gold in the new Roman province called Dacia Traiana. Finally, the
+monument itself stands as evidence to the battle's importance.
+
+[1]: /posts/y00/017-the-mechanics-of-socialism.html#fn1
+[2]: /posts/y00/00b-romania-s-dumb-nationalism.html
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