Bitcoin Policy Institute Rejects Science Behind ‘Limited Adoption Problem

A research team from the Bitcoin Policy Institute (BPI) has rejected the conclusions reached in a 2022 research paper stating that the Bitcoin network has a scaling problem that will affect future adoptions.

The researchers argue that the 2022 papers misunderstand how the world’s largest cryptocurrency achieves consensus. 

Bitcoin Think Tank: The Assumptions Are Faulty

The researchers from the non-profit research organization denounced the conclusions drawn from a 2022 paper. 

The conclusions of the paper pointed out that the world’s leading cryptocurrency has an intrinsic scaling problem that will eventually limit its adoption in the future. 

However, the institute’s researchers, who come from six different high-end colleges in the US, believe that the purported “limited adoption problem” is only theoretical and illogical to the true nature of Bictoin’s operations. 

They noted that the paper titled “Bitcoin’s Limited Adoption Problem” is built on three biased assumptions. First, the writers of the research paper claim that transactions on the Bitcoin platform demand full network consensus for settlement. 

Then, the authors believe that adding more miners to the network increases the settlement time, as it “delays network consensus.”  Lastly, they asserted that the architecture of Bitcoin’s network creates an upper limit on Blockchain transactions. 

In their response to the first paper’s conclusions, the researchers argue that the authors basically misunderstand how Bitcoin (BTC) reaches a consensus. 

They argue that the authors don’t understand how miners’ entrances and exits affect the timing of blocks in the network. Furthermore, the researchers state that the first paper ignores the ongoing, wide-implemented scaling innovations. 

On the other end, the BPI’s research paper agrees that the work being criticized makes a solid point. They agree that the Bitcoin network doesn’t scale properly for on-chain transactions.  Also, the paper highlighted that scalability has been a recognized issue since the inception of the Bitcoin blockchain. 

In addition, the institute’s researchers noted that the original paper’s authors are “tilting at windmills.” As a solution to scalability issues, the researchers point out that Bitcoin scales using off-chain payments instead of increasing throughput at the network’s base layer. 

Off-chain protocols provide more-precise scalability, as they don’t depend on the consensus of the whole blockchain. 

Researchers From Bitcoin Policy Institute Reject Another Publication About Bitcoin, Crowds React

The Bitcoin Policy researchers also denounced each claim in a recent publication dubbed “Bitcoin Works in Practice, but does it work in Theory?”.  

The paper was written by expert economists Adam John, Christoph Hinzen, and Mohamed Salah.

The Bitcoin Policy Institute researchers’ paper was met with tons of mixed responses. Some pundits have applauded the paper for its meticulousness and refutation of the original paper’s conclusions. 

Others criticize the paper for not tackling all the issues pointed out in the original paper and for being too technical. All the same, the institute’s researchers’ paper has offered a notable contribution to the debate over Bitcoin’s (BTC) scalability.