Bitcoin is Gamification – Reasoning from First Principles

Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dogecoin…. Whenever I heard/read someone talking/writing anything involving these words, I would simply stop listening or start reading something else.

I didn’t understand them and it seemed very complex to me. And complex subjects have always bothered me.

Before I get into Bitcoin and how it is related to Gamification, I need to tell you about first principles thinking.

What is First-principles thinking?

I have been a very slow learner throughout school and even today. My classmates would grasp complex concepts very easily. The same concept could take me days or sometimes months to understand.

For instance, in my sixth grade, our teacher started teaching us how to find areas of different geometrical shapes. She started with Square.

Quick Refresher for myself —

Area of a Square of side 1 centimeter = 1 centimeter x 1 centimeter

The outcome is read as 1-centimeter square (written as 1 cm²)

I understood this very easily and Mathematics as a subject made perfect sense — A square with each side of length 1 centimeter is called a 1-centimeter square.

That was plain and simple English actually.

When she asked the class what is the area of a square with each side of length 5 centimeters.

Simple mathematics again — 5 cm x 5 cm

The outcome — 25-centimeter square. That seriously knocked me off!

It was not plain and simple English.

The teacher moved ahead as everyone except me understood the concept and I didn’t even clarify with her. I was afraid that I might sound stupid.

I had just shifted from an English medium school where they taught every subject in Hindi to a school where they taught only in English.

Coming back to Geometry, the next shape was Rectangle —

Area of Rectangle with Length 5 cm & Breadth (3 cm) = Length x Breadth