You're not really transferring Bitcoin though, you're just adjusting a ledger of who owns what. There's nothing stopping you from doing the same thing with some gold, you could probably even create a setup where it is done at lower transaction costs.
> You're not really transferring Bitcoin though, you're just adjusting a ledger of who owns what.
If not this, what do you think a Bitcoin transfer looks like?
> There's nothing stopping you from doing the same thing with some gold
The custodian of the gold would be able to steal it from me at any time. I wouldn't actually be in possession of the gold, whereas I would be in possession of my Bitcoin keys.
The point is that physically sending the gold is not the equivalent sense of the word transfer in this case. There will of course be some differences, but the gold ledger is the best gold analog of a bitcoin transaction.
The question is a matter of trust in the correctness of any such ledger.
Bitcoin only exists as entries in a trustless ledger. The trustless ledger of gold is physical possession of that gold -- that's the only way that you can verify possession (or spend freely) without a mutually trusted third party.
If marking the blockchain (ledger) is not the same thing as transferring bitcoin, then there is no such thing as transferring bitcoin, because there are no actual 'coins' stored anywhere (digital or otherwise).
If I physically control gold, then I have some guarantees about that ownership. Someone can physically take it from me, but I can, at least, make that difficult.
If I own gold credits, then I must trust the holder of the physical gold, both to honor my credits and secure the gold.
If I own Bitcoin, it means I posses the private key that enables their spending. I have to trust the collective actions and incentives of the Bitcoin network, not a single party.
I think it's very clear that these are wildly different notions of ownership, and that they may be valued differently. Equating the transfer of gold credits to Bitcoins fails to account for these differences.
Yes but with a gold ledger you'd have counterparty risk, because the ledger would refer to something outside itself. With Bitcoin the ledger is the currency.
