Here’s Why Bitcoin Alone Would Survive a Nuclear War!

Bitcoin advocate, pioneer and entrepreneur, Charlie Shrem is no stranger to controversy, having being a convicted felon when he was imprisoned for his involvement in a money laundering operation linked to the Silk Road in 2014. However, with an impressive list of feats in the crypto domain, Shrem has a loyal fan base who love to hear his opinion on the future of the world of block chain and everything it contains.

In a recent article for Hacker Noon, Shrem drew up the hypothetical (but very real) possibility of a nuclear war engulfing the earth and leaving behind only cryptocurrencies as a viable source of trade and exchange.

“It would take just one nuclear bomb being detonated by a terrorist or rogue general to initiate a worldwide nuclear apocalypse that could wipe out most life on planet Earth.”

In the article, Shrem bases his opinion on the logical fact that traditional banks and forms of currencies are of course a material entity that are subject to the wear and tear of time or in this case, nuclear warheads.

He writes,

Since fiat money exists in the physical word and is not a digital entity like Bitcoin, it would be susceptible to being incinerated in the nuclear fireballs. Banks could instantly lose their cash reserves needed to operate.

He also listed out the ways in which centralized institutions would fall vulnerable to nuclear warheads and their radiation, with some being outright vaporized within seconds and others would become victims to a loss of operations due to exposure to radiation and a strong surge of electromagnetic pulse which would render their telecommunications and technological infrastructure obsolete.

Cryptocurrencies, on the other hand do not rely on these “single points of failures” and due to the fact that they are not “real” in a physical sense, they would remain untouched by any such nuclear catastrophe.

He further elaborated that because of the way in which block chains function, each and every user on the particular network would be able to keep it functional as opposed to conventional banks that need specialized employees for the job.

He explains this in the article when he says,

“As long as there is at least one node running Bitcoin, the Bitcoin network will continue to function. It is highly likely that many Bitcoin nodes would survive even the worst nuclear attack since nodes are scattered worldwide, and they could communicate with each other via satellite internet.”

Shrem also states that this potential clean sweep victory for cryptos is not without it’s own set of limitations. The plan suggests that all block chain users invest heavily in satellite communication and EMP protection technology to ensure that while all other servers are down, they are able to keep their own nodes up and running.

Although, some may argue that in the advent of a nuclear crisis, absolutely no sane individual would be worried about banks and money, Shrem has listed down some undeniably beneficial credits to cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, making them undoubtedly more useful.