Re: [10000Th] Eligius: 0% Fee BTC, 105% PPS NMC, No registration, CPPSRB
Mostly the same information I said here, but FWIW: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/36qje1/why_can_a_block_have_only_1_transaction/crgtdxk
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I don't know if I am capable of explaining this without explaining the Bitcoin protocol (and there are plenty of references you could read on it already). Blocks have two pointers, one to all past blocks/transactions, and one to new transactions. Both of these are just pointers, however. When people talk about block size, they are including all the new transactions, but that's just a matter of abstraction.
Which is the same as any new transactions in the block.
Not sure I follow here... I've added an empty block to the chain (well, there's at least 1 transaction because of the generated coins). That block has no other transaction. It does, however, know its parent. Are you stating that because I know my lineage until genesis, that's equivalent to having all transactions in every block? I'd argue that if this were the case, then every block would be larger than it's predecessor. Genesis would be size (n), block 1 would be (n + m), block 2 would be (n + m + x) and so on... obviously that's not true. I'll agree that every block has knowledge of its own transactions and a way to get to all previous transactions, but not that every block has every transaction .