Using "falsifiable" thinking to discuss whether the Bitcoin block is blocked

Chapter 0 Introduction

Is the Bitcoin blockchain clogged?

Some people say: There is no congestion, as long as you pay enough handling fees, it will be confirmed in about 10 minutes. I have so many transactions every day, and I have never been congested.

Some people also said: Damn, it’s been several hours and my transaction still has zero confirmation.

Which Bitcoin block is blocked?

Chapter 1 Falsifiability

The key to determining whether a "proposition" can be called a scientific proposition is whether the proposition is "falsifiable".

For example, the idea that swans are white is falsifiable, because as long as you find a swan that is not white, you can prove that the idea is wrong.

What is "confirmation"? It means giving examples to prove your point. For example, if you want to prove that a swan is white, you can find a swan and say, "Look, it's white."

What is "unfalsifiable"? It means a proposition that is "never wrong".

For example, "God exists in our world." This cannot be falsified, because if I give an example, "I have never seen God, my parents and ancestors have never seen God, so God does not exist in our world." But you can say, "You are not qualified, your whole family is not qualified, you cannot see God, only those who sincerely believe in God can see him, and if you can't see him, it means you are not sincere." This is impossible.

If a proposition cannot be falsified, then it cannot be called a scientific proposition. If a proposition is falsified, we can say that the proposition is wrong, no matter how much evidence there is to prove that the proposition is correct, as long as there is evidence to prove that the proposition is wrong, then the scientific conclusion is that the proposition is wrong.

For example, this proposition: Swans are white.

You can find countless white swans to prove this proposition, even thousands or tens of thousands. But if you find just one swan that is not white, such as black, then you can prove that this proposition is wrong.

Therefore, if you want to prove that a proposition is wrong, it is more scientific to use the method of "falsification".

Chapter 2: Using the “falsification” method to prove that the Bitcoin block is indeed blocked

Now we are going to discuss this question: Is the block blocked or not?

There are only two conclusions: one is congestion, the other is no congestion. So how do we evaluate which conclusion is more scientific?

People who use the "confirmation" mentality will say: "Look, I sent two transactions today, and both were confirmed within 10 minutes. This shows that the block is not blocked."

People who use the “falsification” thinking can justify and justify the blockchain by finding a counterexample.

According to the scientific conclusions discussed in Chapter 1, people who use "falsification" thinking are more scientific.

As far as the current Bitcoin blockchain is concerned, a large number of transactions cannot be confirmed within 10 minutes. This disproves the conclusion that the block is not blocked. It is more scientific to say that the block is blocked.

Chapter 3: "What is a reasonable handling fee?" This is another question

The problem is that there are actually some conditions for blockchain transaction confirmation. For example, zero transaction fee is an "unreasonable" transaction, and it is normal that the confirmation speed cannot be obtained within 10 minutes. For example, when encountering a scalability attack, the transaction confirmation speed will be significantly delayed. Therefore, in order to more accurately judge whether the Bitcoin block is blocked, we need more qualifiers, and we need to define what is a reasonable transaction.

What is relatively clear is that reasonable fees should be stipulated, but a certain fee amount must be clearly given, such as 0.0001 BTC/KB. If this amount is not clear, it becomes unfalsifiable. Many people say that your transaction cannot be confirmed because the fee is not enough. This statement is unfalsifiable because there is no clear fee amount that can be falsified. How much is enough?

After clarifying the fee amount, the proposition we want to discuss becomes: When all transactions have paid the full fee of 0.0001btc/kb, is the Bitcoin block blocked?

Using the falsification method to verify is to initiate a transaction with a handling fee of 0.0001 BTC/kB to test the network. The current result is that a large number of such transactions cannot be confirmed in time.

Our conclusion is that transactions with a transaction fee of 0.0001 BTC/kB are now blocked in large quantities in the Bitcoin block, so we can reasonably say that the Bitcoin blockchain is congested.

As for those who say "the blockage is caused by not paying enough fees", this proposition itself is unfalsifiable and unscientific. Those who say it should give a clear fee amount. At this point, the question becomes how much the fee is reasonable, and then we can discuss whether the block is blocked or not. Note that these are two questions.

Please note that only by clarifying the reasonable handling fee can we scientifically discuss whether the blockchain is congested. We must not discuss the proposition of whether the blockchain is congested without giving a clear handling fee amount, because this constitutes an unfalsifiable proposition.

Chapter 4 Using “confirmation” thinking to prove that Bitcoin blocks are not blocked is wrong

Because a block is mined every 10 minutes on average on the Bitcoin network, as long as the mining pool does not mine empty blocks, there will be transactions confirmed within an average of 10 minutes. Therefore, using the "confirmation" thinking to say that the Bitcoin block is not blocked, there will always be enough transactions to prove that their view is correct. This is not a scientific attitude.

Chapter 5 Conclusion

Using the "falsification" thinking to verify whether the Bitcoin block is congested, the conclusion is: now transactions containing 0.0001btc/kb transaction fees are blocked in the Bitcoin block in large quantities, so we can reasonably say that the Bitcoin blockchain is congested.