比特币和美国梦有什么共同点

比特币和美国对不同的人来说意味着不同的东西。两者可能都被企业利益所俘获。两者都与自由有关。

Bitcoin and America are two sides of the same coin. Both are full of promise and potential, but both have also been captured by corporate interests. Despite this, both Bitcoin and America are still all about freedom.

比特币和美国是同一枚硬币的两面。两者都充满希望和潜力，但也都被企业利益所俘获。尽管如此，比特币和美国仍然是自由的。

The United States of America says, after Walt Whitman: “I am large, I contain multitudes.” It's also full of platitudes: Land of the Free, Home of the Brave, A Shining City on a Hill. They've become platitudes as time has passed and the country (and the people who make it up) have changed. Changed just as its national motto has, from a fitting e pluribus unum ("from many, one") to a frankly puzzling “In God We Trust.”

美利坚合众国效仿沃尔特·惠特曼的说法：“我很大，我包容众多。”它还充满了陈词滥调：自由之地、勇敢者之家、山上的光辉之城。随着时间的流逝和国家（以及组成国家的人民）的变化，它们已经成为陈词滥调。就像它的国家座右铭一样，从合适的 e pluribus unum（“来自许多，一个”）变成了坦白令人费解的“我们相信上帝”。

What hasn’t changed, at least in name, is the U.S.’s animating myth: The American Dream. The idea that anyone can achieve success through sacrifice, talent, hard work, and grit, rather than just plain old luck.

至少在名义上没有改变的是美国的动画神话：美国梦。任何人都可以通过牺牲、天赋、勤奋和毅力取得成功，而不仅仅是靠运气。

The American Dream means different things to different people, though. I am a first-generation Greek-American, so to me, the American Dream means taking advantage of the opportunities I had because of a sacrifice my grandparents made by leaving their home country with their children. Does the American Dream mean the same thing to those whose families came from England ten generations ago? Or five generations ago from Ireland? Or Italy? What about those whose ancestors came here on slave ships?

不过，美国梦对不同的人来说意味着不同的事情。我是第一代希腊裔美国人，所以对我来说，美国梦意味着利用我所拥有的机会，因为我的祖父母带着孩子离开祖国做出了牺牲。对于那些十代以前来自英国的家庭来说，美国梦是否意味着同样的事情？还是五代以前的爱尔兰人？还是意大利？那些祖先乘坐奴隶船来到这里的人又怎样呢？

Probably not.

可能不会。

This ambiguity isn’t necessarily a problem. It’s true of many big, important ideas: democracy, for an easy example. Just because there isn’t broad, ubiquitous agreement on what an idea means doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to glean from it. There are guiding principles embedded in these ideas. At risk of sounding full of non-sequiturs, it’s in this way that Bitcoin and the American Dream fit together.

这种歧义不一定是问题。对于许多重大的、重要的想法来说都是如此：举个简单的例子，民主。仅仅因为对于一个想法的含义没有广泛、普遍的共识，并不意味着没有任何东西可以从中收集。这些想法中蕴含着指导原则。尽管听起来充满了不合逻辑的风险，但比特币和美国梦正是通过这种方式结合在一起的。

Bitcoin and its multitudes and platitudes

比特币及其众多的陈词滥调

Yeah, I know. Bitcoin!

是的，我知道。比特币！

Platitudes include: Bitcoin Fixes This, Bitcoin is [Synonym for Hope], You Wouldn’t Get It, Number Go Up, Have Fun Staying Poor.

陈词滥调包括：比特币解决了这个问题，比特币是[希望的同义词]，你不会得到它，数字上升，享受贫穷的乐趣。

It might seem trite to compare Bitcoin to the American Dream, but from my vantage point the commonalities are painfully obvious.

将比特币与美国梦进行比较似乎有些老生常谈，但从我的角度来看，它们的共同点是非常明显的。

At the surface level Bitcoin and the American Dream are a decent match. Success through “hard work”? That’s exactly how bitcoin mining works: the more work you put in, the more you’re rewarded. We can ask more questions.

从表面上看，比特币和美国梦是非常匹配的。成功是靠“努力”吗？这正是比特币挖矿的工作原理：您投入的工作越多，获得的奖励就越多。我们可以提出更多问题。

Is bitcoin peer-to-peer, electronic cash? Is bitcoin digital gold? Is bitcoin a store of value? Will Bitcoin enable a clean energy transition? Will Bitcoin use all our water? Can the Bitcoin protocol supercharge ransomware? Can Bitcoin empower the individual in oppressive regimes? Will Bitcoin cripple the Federal Reserve? Will Bitcoin bankrupt you? Will Bitcoin make you rich? Is Bitcoin Resistance Money? Is Bitcoin a Ponzi scheme?

比特币是点对点的电子现金吗？比特币是数字黄金吗？比特币是一种价值储存手段吗？比特币能否实现清洁能源转型？比特币会用掉我们所有的水吗？比特币协议可以增强勒索软件的威力吗？比特币能否在压迫政权下赋予个人权力？比特币会削弱美联储吗？比特币会让你破产吗？比特币会让你变得富有吗？比特币是抵抗货币吗？比特币是庞氏骗局吗？

The answers to these questions depend on whom you ask. For this reason, Bitcoin and the American Dream are even more alike that they appear.

这些问题的答案取决于你问的对象。因此，比特币和美国梦看起来更加相似。

Bitcoin means something different to me, a fully banked American citizen with access to basically any financial product I can dream up and to a relatively stable local currency, than it does to Roya Mahboob, an Afghani woman who uses Bitcoin (among other technologies) to help girls in Afghanistan overcome gender inequality and get an education. It means something different yet to Argentinians and Venezuelans facing hyperinflation.

比特币对我来说意味着不同的东西，我是一个银行账户齐全的美国公民，基本上可以使用我能想到的任何金融产品，也可以使用相对稳定的当地货币，而对 Roya Mahboob 来说，它的意义是不同的，Roya Mahboob 是一位阿富汗妇女，她使用比特币（以及其他技术）来帮助阿富汗女孩克服性别不平等并接受教育。对于面临恶性通货膨胀的阿根廷人和委内瑞拉人来说，这意味着一些不同的东西。

All these meanings of Bitcoin can be and are true. Bitcoin is large, it contains multitudes. Freeing those multitudes to transact without permission is the ethos of Bitcoin as a peer-to-peer, electronic cash system.

比特币的所有这些含义都可以而且确实是真实的。比特币很大，包含众多。比特币作为一种点对点电子现金系统的精神就是让这些人在未经许可的情况下进行交易。

Bitcoiners can agree that Bitcoin can be many things in the same way that Americans can agree that the American Dream (and America, for that matter) can be many things. One thing is for sure: as Americans are tied together by the American Dream, there is an ethos of Bitcoin, the freedom to transact, which ties bitcoiners together.

比特币支持者可以同意比特币可以有很多东西，就像美国人可以同意美国梦（就此而言，美国）可以有很多东西一样。有一点是肯定的：随着美国人被美国梦联系在一起，比特币的一种精神，即交易自由，将比特币爱好者联系在一起。

A supersized side of cynicism…

愤世嫉俗的巨大一面……

I intentionally sidestepped a question above because it is top-of-mind right now for both America and Bitcoin.

我故意回避了上面的一个问题，因为这是美国和比特币现在最关心的问题。

Is America captured by corporate interests? Is Bitcoin?

美国是否被企业利益所俘获？是比特币吗？

George Carlin famously said in a stand-up comedy routine that “it’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.” To his mind, the country had long been co-opted by profiteers. In a way, I share some of that cynicism. Consumerism and the obsession with acquiring things embarrass me as an American.

乔治·卡林在一场单口喜剧节目中说过一句名言：“这被称为美国梦，因为你必须在睡觉时才能相信它。”在他看来，这个国家早已被奸商所利用。在某种程度上，我也有一些愤世嫉俗的想法。消费主义和对获取事物的痴迷让我作为一个美国人感到尴尬。

This cynicism is echoed by the father of gonzo journalism, Hunter S. Thompson, in his acclaimed book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream. The title conveys the point: Las Vegas, as an epicenter of gambling and entertainment, is a caricature of American excess and consumerism, both of which (along with the drugs that feature prominently in

奇闻趣事新闻之父亨特·S·汤普森（Hunter S. Thompson）在他广受好评的著作《拉斯维加斯的恐惧与厌恶：通往美国梦之心的野蛮之旅》中呼应了这种愤世​​嫉俗的观点。标题传达了这样的观点：拉斯维加斯作为赌博和娱乐的中心，是美国放纵和消费主义的讽刺，这两者（以及在