Thanks for the story. Yeah, the silk road was the first of thousands now. I still think that Albrecht got a raw deal.
I also had a harddrive crash with my passwords in an encrypted folder. I lost a few bitcoins or maybe only one, I don't remember. It didn't crush me because when I got them they were worth a little more than the electricity it took to mine them. I don't cry into my whiskey over it but I'd sure love to get that hard drive repaired. It's SSD which makes it nearly impossible.
I'm giving you a virtual no homo hug, fren.
Evil is unfortunately going to find a way to get paid. I'm invested in several cryptocurrencies. I've never used any of them to do evil. One time around 10 years ago I used around 20 bitcoins to buy a pizza. On the other hand, I did buy a debit card from 7-ELEVEn and bought drugs off the dark web. For science purposes.
You're right. When the black market has a price for anything and everything we'll be hearing about all kinds of crimes. Stolen or forged passports will be the next big thing. When people are refusing and soldiers come to th their doors all hell is going to break out. This is going to be the tea overboard moment that will either make or break our future as a country.
You didn't step on my toes. I just found your singling out bitcoin as odd and not well thought out. As I mentioned, there are numerous ways other than bitcoin to achieve the same transaction. People launder money through selling art or vehicles for exorbitant fees but often no vehicle or art changes hands. But drugs or humans do. Why would you single one bitcoin and not the others?
What I am not a fan of is bitcoin being used for the torturing and murder of innocent men, women and children, all at the click of a button
Were you aware of 7-ELEVEn selling 20 types of debit cards? A lot of nefarious dark web merchants insist on this instead of bitcoin. There's also Western Union and dozens of cash transfer apps.
If people want to do illegal things they are going to find a way to do it. Bitcoin is a scapegoat.
In case you haven't looked too much into the pyramids construction you might be surprised to hear that the blocks were poured like concrete. They built "forms" and then poured each block which gave fit so close you couldn't slide a piece of paper between two blocks.
EDIT : link is to video showing how the blocks were made https://youtu.be/KJfB_ZAIGYo
I'm also curious about Atlantis. One major reason is because for thousands of years people in India and Sri Lanka have had a story about a bridge between the two countries. Of course everyone said it was bull until around 10 years ago they found evidence of a large bridge between the two. Since then I became more open to the possibility of Atlantis being a real thing.
Thanks for taking the time to post that.