Is a total of 21 million bitcoins a "religious" belief?

A topic that is often talked about in the currency circle has surfaced again recently: the expansion of Bitcoin.

According to a report by Trustnodes on Feb. 24, Peter Todd, a leading proponent of Bitcoin’s 1MB blocks, claimed that Bitcoin’s 21 million supply cap is “actually just a ‘religious’ belief.”

This news caused a lot of controversy in the circle. Jiang Zhuoer, a senior in the currency circle, quickly commented on this news, thinking that this is an inevitable solution proposed by the Bitcoin Core team.

Here, let me give you some basic background information. Bitcoin was invented by Satoshi Nakamoto, and a group of early developers contributed and served it selflessly. After Satoshi Nakamoto left Bitcoin, the development rights of Bitcoin were gradually taken over by the Bitcoin Core team. Peter Todd is one of the developers of the Bitcoin Core team.

So in the news released by Trustnodes, what does Peter Todd mean by the subtext of "religious belief"? In some people's opinion, it means that this kind of belief has no reasonable reason, not rational, but irrational or religious. So the extended meaning is that there is no need to stick to the upper limit of 21 million.

In Jiang Zhuoer’s view, this is a way for the members of the Bitcoin Core team to test everyone’s reactions through this kind of talk, and at the same time make psychological preparations for the real expansion of Bitcoin in the future. Further, Jiang Zhuoer believes that this is the inevitable path for the Bitcoin Core team. Because the Bitcoin Core team has always had a very persistent approach, which is to keep the size of the Bitcoin 1MB block unchanged.

If the size of Bitcoin's 1MB block remains unchanged, then it will encounter an embarrassing situation in the future:

With the development of the Bitcoin halving market, block rewards will become less and less, and miners will increasingly rely on transaction fees contained in blocks. The 1MB block greatly limits the number of transactions that can be accommodated in each block, which also limits the transaction fee.

In this case, if the price of Bitcoin does not continue to rise, the income of the miners participating in the mining will become smaller and smaller, and the smaller and smaller income of the miners will force the miners to gradually withdraw from Bitcoin mining. Fewer and fewer miners will make the Bitcoin network more and more vulnerable to attack.

So how to break this impasse? So far it seems there are only two things:

The first one is to expand the block size so that a block can contain more transactions, thus including more transaction fees, so that miners can be given sufficient returns even when block rewards are getting less and less;

The second is to change the block halving strategy and continue to give miners ample block rewards.

BCH and BSV chose the first strategy, Bitcoin Core rejected the first strategy.

In Jiang Zhuoer’s view, the only choice for Bitcoin Core now is the second strategy, which is why Jiang Zhuoer immediately commented on this news, and firmly believes that Bitcoin Core will take this path sooner or later .

Judging from the current situation, at least I think that after this halving, the block reward of Bitcoin will become 6.25. Such rewards can still maintain miners mining. But after several rounds of halving, when the block reward becomes less, whether Bitcoin can continue to attract miners is indeed a question that everyone should pay attention to.

Back to Bitcoin, in my opinion, the meaning of the upper limit of 21 million coins is no longer a specific number, but the brand that has been deeply imprinted on Bitcoin. Once this brand is removed, the soul and belief in Bitcoin will be destroyed. There will be wavering.

If one day Bitcoin is really changed to the 21 million issuance limit, I will not hesitate to abandon Bitcoin and invest all this part of the funds in Ethereum.