比特幣大辯論：創新與僵化

目前比特幣開發者之間最大的爭論是：比特幣協議應該改變多少？所有軟體，包括比特幣，都必須不斷發展

Visual representation of Bitcoin cryptocurrency. /Getty Images Plus

比特幣加密貨幣的視覺表示。 /蓋蒂圖片社加

LONDON, ENGLAND - MAY 30: In this photo illustration, a visual representation of Bitcoin ... [+] cryptocurrency is pictured on May 30, 2021 in London, England. Bitcoin is a decentralised digital currency, which has been in use since 2009. (Photo illustration by Edward Smith/Getty Images)

英國倫敦 - 5 月 30 日：在這張照片插圖中，比特幣的視覺表現... [+] 加密貨幣於 2021 年 5 月 30 日在英國倫敦拍攝。比特幣是一種去中心化的數位貨幣，自 2009 年以來一直在使用。

The big debate right now among Bitcoin developers is this: How much should the Bitcoin protocol change? All software, Bitcoin included, must evolve over time as users, networks, and use cases evolve. The question is not binary, but a matter of degree.

目前比特幣開發者之間最大的爭論是：比特幣協議應該改變多少？所有軟體，包括比特幣，都必須隨著用戶、網路和用例的發展而不斷發展。這個問題不是二元的，而是一個程度的問題。

Bitcoin has always been in a state of change, sometimes more than others. Perhaps the most radical changes occurred in the early years, when Satoshi changed the block size limit and the functionality of the Bitcoin scripting language in major ways. Now that Satoshi is gone, it is up to the core developers to reach a consensus on which changes to adopt moving forward, and this can be a contentious issue.

比特幣一直處於變化狀態，有時比其他變化更多。也許最根本的變化發生在早年，當時中本聰在很大程度上改變了區塊大小限制和比特幣腳本語言的功能。既然中本聰已經離開，核心開發人員就需要就下一步採取哪些改變達成共識，這可能是個有爭議的問題。

There are a cadre of changes that are without controversy, namely, the changes that improve the security of the network with almost no foreseeable resource or opportunity costs. The best example of this is p2pkh, the use of hashing of public keys. When Bitcoin started, a Bitcoin address was a public key, a point on Bitcoin's elliptic curve. To pay to that address, you would pay to that public key. After p2pkh, the Bitcoin address became the hash of a public key, which is more secure because the public key passes through the hashing algorithm SHA-256. If an attacker were to break Bitcoin’s elliptic curve digital signature algorithm (ECDSA), it would still need to break SHA-256 in order to recover the private key that secures those bitcoins. Adding an extra hash operation is computationally trivial, and so no one protested p2pkh.

有一系列變革是毫無爭議的，即提高網路安全性而幾乎沒有可預見的資源或機會成本的變革。最好的例子是 p2pkh，即公鑰雜湊的使用。當比特幣出現時，比特幣地址是一個公鑰，是比特幣橢圓曲線上的一個點。要向該地址付款，您需要向該公鑰付款。 p2pkh之後，比特幣地址變成了公鑰的哈希值，更加安全，因為公鑰經過哈希演算法SHA-256。如果攻擊者要破解比特幣的橢圓曲線數位簽章演算法 (ECDSA)，它仍然需要破解 SHA-256 才能恢復保護這些比特幣的私鑰。增加額外的哈希運算在計算上是微不足道的，因此沒有人反對 p2pkh。

But other improvements are not so innocuous. The last upgrade, Taproot, dramatically increased the transactional complexity and privacy of Bitcoin transactions. But it also opened the door to new use cases that I do not believe the core developers would have anticipated, like ordinals and inscriptions. Any major change that widens the functionality of Bitcoin has both upside potential and downside risk.

但其他改進並不是那麼無害。最後一次升級 Taproot 大大增加了比特幣交易的交易複雜性和隱私性。但它也打開了新用例的大門，我認為核心開發人員不會預料到這些用例，例如序數和銘文。任何擴大比特幣功能的重大變化都既有上行潛力，也有下行風險。

This is probably why Satoshi probably disabled some of the early opcodes in Bitcoin to constrain the Bitcoin scripting language deliberately. When the digital object is money, the incentives for attacks are high, and so it makes sense to limit Bitcoin's programmability to limit the attack surface. At the same time, new functionality can attract new users.

這可能是為什麼中本聰可能會禁用比特幣中的一些早期操作碼來故意限制比特幣腳本語言。當數位物件是金錢時，攻擊的動機很高，因此限制比特幣的可程式性以限制攻擊面是有意義的。同時，新功能可以吸引新用戶。

This question of whether and how to modify the protocol is, in my view, the most important question in Bitcoin development today, and possibly in the future. So, here's the skinny on the debate.

在我看來，是否以及如何修改協議的問題是當今乃至未來比特幣發展中最重要的問題。所以，這是辯論的要點。

The case for innovation

創新案例

The case for innovation comes from those who want to expand Bitcoin’s scripting language to include a wide array of programs and smart contracts. These contracts are possible on other blockchains like Ethereum, and the innovators want to bring that functionality to Bitcoin, the world's most secure network. However, there are other more conservative and traditional Bitcoiners who also believe that expanding the financial use cases of Bitcoin in the future will require more programmability and flexibility in scripting. This was part of the motivation for Taproot to allow for higher dimensional financial contracts on Bitcoin.

創新的理由來自那些想要擴展比特幣腳本語言以包含各種程式和智能合約的人。這些合約可以在以太坊等其他區塊鏈上實現，創新者希望將該功能引入世界上最安全的網路比特幣。然而，還有其他更保守和傳統的比特幣支持者也認為，未來擴大比特幣的金融用例將需要更多的可編程性和腳本靈活性。這是 Taproot 允許在比特幣上建立更高維度的金融合約的部分動機。

Some of the motivation for innovation comes from the desire to create and tinker, which is a part of software developer culture writ large (perhaps apparent more outside of Bitcoin than within). But there's another justification often given for protocol innovation: Bitcoin doesn't have enough usage today, so the protocol needs to attract new users. These new users will have new use cases, requiring new functionality in Bitcoin programming. It's impossible to predict these use cases in advance, but it is possible to expand Bitcoin’s scripting to allow for these in the future.

創新的一些動機來自於創造和修補的願望，這是軟體開發人員文化的一部分（可能在比特幣之外比在比特幣內部更明顯）。但協議創新通常還有另一個理由：比特幣目前的使用量還不夠，因此協議需要吸引新用戶。這些新用戶將有新的用例，需要比特幣編程的新功能。不可能提前預測這些用例，但可以擴展比特幣的腳本以在未來實現這些用例。

The case for ossification

骨化的情況

The ossifiers believe that the only innovation that Bitcoin needs is greater security. For example, relay messages between Bitcoin nodes today are unencrypted. And so, encrypting these messages would be computationally cheap and increase security. But anything beyond that would only increase the attack surface of Bitcoin, which could lead to downside risks that could upset the stability of the network and its use as a store of value.

僵化者認為，比特幣唯一需要的創新是更高的安全性。例如，如今比特幣節點之間的中繼訊息是未加密的。因此，加密這些訊息的計算成本很低，並且可以提高安全性。但除此之外的任何事情只會增加比特幣的攻擊面，這可能會導致下行風險，從而擾亂網路的穩定性及其作為價值儲存手段的用途。

If Bitcoin truly is to attract trillions of dollars of economic value in the next few decades, the chief objective should be stability and security, not innovation and experimentation. In fact, it is precisely the predictable and unchanging money supply of Bitcoin that distinguishes Bitcoin from central banks, which constantly change the fiat money supply at will. The flag of the ossifiers is “If it ain't broke, don't fix it,” and the vast majority of Bitcoin’s innovations happened in version 0.1 that Satoshi wrote.

如果比特幣真的要在未來幾十年內吸引數兆美元的經濟價值，那麼主要目標應該是穩定性和安全性，而不是創新和實驗。事實上，正是比特幣可預測且不變的貨幣供應量將比特幣與不斷隨意改變法定貨幣供應量的央行區分開來。僵化者的旗幟是“如果它沒有壞，就不要修復它”，比特幣的絕大多數創新都發生在中本聰編寫的 0.1 版本中。

The debate today

今天的辯論

This debate takes form today most notably in the proposal for covenants,

這場辯論今天最引人注目地體現在契約提案中，