Re: MIner Question

The debate started from "the miners are stopped from being rational".

No, it was about a situation where incentives external to the protocol might override block rewards. All game theory assumes that miners will be rational.

Hypothetical situation: The Chinese government pays miners to attack the network, and threatens those who don't comply with prison time. Wouldn't it be rational for Chinese miners to engage in the attack? I think so...

NO, that would show the Bitcoin [community] that the miners that accepted payment can be irrational, and can never be trusted.

That's not irrational behavior given the circumstances.

In any case, you're conceding my point -- if we can't depend on miners to be honest, how can we have confidence in the system's ability to secure our money? Even if the community rallied around a hard fork, what is the basis for user confidence in the new (and much less secure POW-wise) fork? What is to stop this from happening again?

IT IS irrational. Sacrificing the fundamental nature of their business, ending it, and all potential future profits by being corrupted is rational? Jihan Wu would be the first to call for a POW change if he saw it. Hahaha.