Author: roconnor at theorem.ca 2011-12-30 17:19:24
Published on: 2011-12-30T17:19:24+00:00
The email conversation on December 31, 2011, between Chris Double and an unknown individual discusses the use of OP_DUP for looping and how it leads to Turing completeness. The email mentions the dangerous expressiveness of OP_EVAL and how it can be used to implement the SK-calculus given an arbitrary depth. The conversation then moves onto stack-based languages and how they reduce the number of required built-in operations. It is noted that the scripting engine in Bitcoin does not have the ability to manipulate scripts on the stack to be evaluated, but it has limited abilities through arithmetic and hashing operations. If OP_CAT, OP_SUBSTR, and friends are restored, it will have even more abilities. The email ends with a quote from the general counsel of the American Graphophone Company stating that there exists no property in ideas musical, literary, or artistic except as defined by statute.
Updated on: 2023-06-05T01:24:42.847595+00:00