OK. I think you guys are not understanding (or choosing to ignore) what I'm saying. I am NOT trying to argue exactly HOW a miner would make the attack profitable (I have no doubt that there are profitable methods for doing so, but that's not what this is about). I'm also not arguing that it wouldn't be obvious as to what happened after the fact.

It would be completely stupid to bring a gun into a bank and try to rob it. Any rational person would realize that the potential gain is not really very significant as most banks don't have a lot of cash on hand anyway. Any rational person would not risk the very real possibility of losing years of life, freedom, and "honest" income for such a low payout. A rational person would know that if you were to get away with it (such a low possibility), everyone would know the bank had been robbed. A rational person wouldn't attempt this, BUT IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME.

The motivation doesn't have to make perfect sense for something to be a very serious threat. The >50% attack is known, there's little we can do currently to stop it (short of significant changes to the protocol and/or algorithms), and it's very much within reach for some of the pools.

Why in the world is there so much pushback (or willful blindness) about this?? Every day that Bitcoin becomes more mainstream, the stakes are higher, and the possible "exit strategies" for this attack become more plentiful. I sincerely don't want it to happen, but I guarantee it will happen eventually unless we are proactive about stopping it. And when it happens, we all (as supporters of Bitcoin) stand to lose.


Or, just go ahead and keep ignoring it because "it wouldn't be as profitable as you'd think." Because the chances are low (never mind the fact that a small probability multiplied over days, months and years becomes a very high probability).