Move the heretic of the God of Move: The mechanical structure of this building has problems; it just hasn't collapsed yet

Author: Beichen

Originally, Steven planned to write an article to formally respond to "Mingjing Web3"’s "Counterattack!", but we were suddenly pulled into a group with six authors, where various doubts from different perspectives came pouring in.

After several rounds of ineffective communication, no consensus was reached. This once again clearly illustrates an industry phenomenon—software engineers and communication engineers really do not operate on the same dimension!

There is a conflict of interest between the two sides—the authors of the Move ecosystem are stakeholders of Aptos and Sui, while the newly born "Earsplitting Whistle" needs to challenge industry giants to gain influence.

Thus, the patience that was initially extended out of politeness quickly ran out, and both sides felt that the other was just going in circles with repetitive arguments. So, we decided to stop there, and Steven went off to prepare for the next controversial topic (about distributed infrastructure).

This article is "Earsplitting Whistle"’s final response on why Aptos and Sui are not viable. If there are any disagreements, we will organize a Twitter Space where everyone can directly join the battle live.

Let me preview the bias that "Earsplitting Whistle" has been continuously reinforcing in this debate: a skilled mason uses rich plastering experience to judge the mechanical structure of a building.

About the Motivation for Creation

All the controversy began with "Reversing Technology! Aptos and Sui are actually consortium chains, and their survival depends on the patience of capital." The other side believes that "the article contains a lot of slander against Aptos and Sui," and thus began to question our motives in the group discussion.

I think the name "Earsplitting Whistle" has already clearly shown our tone—we are sounding a "whistle," which is "earsplitting," rather than a sweet, soothing sound.

As we expressed in our first article "About Whistle, Who Are We?", our goal is to occupy the leading influence in the crypto industry during the next bull market—like a fist, gathering strength to strike into the old patterns of the crypto industry!

Aptos and Sui are precisely the projects we believe to be severely overvalued within the old framework. As for the motives of the authors in the Move ecosystem, they are quite understandable.

Of course, evaluating based on motives is a rather lowly act, as standing on a moral high ground to deny the other side also dissolves the serious topics that were originally meant to be discussed. "Earsplitting Whistle" does not intentionally slander to take the black-red route; after all, posting baby photos in the crypto circle is the ultimate trump card for traffic (although mainly because we don’t have any…).

As for money-making strategies, given the current market conditions, it is still advisable to hold USDT and wait for a bottom.

About the Qualification for Criticism

Dismissing a person's viewpoint based on qualifications is even lower than speculating on motives, as it simply pushes the other party off the table and declares victory for oneself.

Steven has worked in 5G communications at Lucent for many years, involving RF and protocols, so does Steven have the qualification to analyze blockchain? At least from the perspective of distributed systems, blockchain still needs to follow the basic principles of communication system design—how the units within the system cooperate to ultimately allow the communication system to achieve both efficiency and security.

When we discuss whether the functions and technical implementations of a certain blockchain are problematic, Steven's experience can come in handy. Ordinary software engineers not only lack this experience but are even unaware of their lack.

This is why we invited Steven to provide a series of comments on the current mainstream public chains, akin to a senior architect evaluating the safety of these new buildings from the perspective of mechanical engineering, which I believe will be beneficial to the industry.

Much of the debate in the group revolves around Steven's qualifications. For example, someone suggested that Steven "should deeply read our industry’s classic works (i.e., 'Database System Concepts' and 'Distributed Database Systems') before arguing about database-related topics next time."

This statement logically equates to me telling the other party: "Before arguing next time, read the 'Xinhua Dictionary'," but the question is, then what… I believe effective expression should directly point out which word the other party wrote incorrectly and what the correct word is.

There followed a large number of similar logical disputes, just swapping undergraduate textbooks for project documents, white papers, codes, and even a reference in a document. The question is, then what…
The other side criticizes Steven for reading too little material, but the materials they provided did not genuinely address the issues, and I even doubt whether they actually looked at the links they threw over.

This guerrilla-style skirmish tactic is indeed very effective—making you overwhelmed by the constant barrage of information, and then the other side declares: have you finished reading everything, and easily jumps to conclusions!

However, among all the materials listed by the other side, there is no evidence to support their viewpoint (at least they did not specifically point out which statement it was).

The purpose of employing guerrilla tactics in a debate is not to clarify the logic itself, but to "disrupt" and then "exhaust the enemy." To some extent, the outcome is already determined; clearly, the other side has won!

About the Standards of Blockchain

The other side listed 12 questions in "Counterattack!" and new questions continued to emerge in the group.

Steven expressed groundbreaking views (which should actually be common sense) in a 4000-word interview, and then they, with Wittgenstein-like genius, patiently searched for linguistic ambiguities and gaps in the 4000-word interview to launch their attacks.

They uniquely avoided the most core point of contention—what is the evidence that Aptos and Sui are indeed blockchains and public chains?

Steven's controversial statement is that "Aptos and Sui have neither blocks nor chains," as he believes that a linked list structure is what constitutes a blockchain, and that Aptos and Sui are typical examples of consortium chain practices.

The rebuttal from Wubuku, the founder of the low-code Dapp development platform dddappp, is: Aptos has blocks, Sui does not have the concept of blocks, but he believes that "the narrow definition of 'blockchain' is not that important; what is needed to realize the Web3 vision is a 'decentralized ledger,' not a specific data structure."

So, may I ask, if there are no blocks, what is it still called a blockchain? Realizing the Web3 vision is indeed not limited to a linked list structure, so there is no need to wave the blockchain flag. The Engineering Corps, the Anti-Japanese Sabotage Team, and the Eighth Route Army are all anti-Japanese armed forces, and there is no need to treat the Engineering Corps and the Anti-Japanese Sabotage Team as the Eighth Route Army.

In the accounting process of blockchain (whether it is Bitcoin's UTXO model or Ethereum's Account model), every state change of the state machine is consistently written after reaching a consensus, while the public chains of the Libra system do not rigorously manage the global state. The ultimate result of this approach is that: blockchain accounting adds new fields, while the public chains of the Libra system update versions.

The other side's rebuttal clings to "updating versions": "Ethereum's account state model State Tree can also modify existing data, and UTXOs on the Bitcoin chain are deleted once used." But the problem is that Ethereum has four different tree structures at different levels for storage, execution, and state to achieve consensus, and the State Tree merely acts as a snapshot; Ethereum's core transaction functionality is not about updating versions.

This response is ineffective because its function lies not in directly refuting the argument but in sidestepping the main point, just like speculating on motives and questioning qualifications.

There are many points of contention regarding this core issue, most of which are trivial disputes. I believe that "how well the wall is plastered" does not affect "how sound the mechanical structure of the building is."

Steven believes that if it is not a linked list structure, it is not a blockchain, and Aptos and Sui are relational databases with version numbers (not implying that relational databases are bad, just that they are not blockchains). Moreover, the high performance they pride themselves on comes at the cost of decentralization and security, so a traditional centralized system with a bit of cryptography would suffice, and it may not even be less secure than Aptos and Sui.

About the Boundary Between Consortium Chains and Public Chains

Having established the standards for blockchain, the next point of contention is whether Aptos and Sui are public chains or consortium chains.

We believe that Aptos and Sui are not blockchains that have developed from Satoshi Nakamoto's Bitcoin, but rather relational databases that have borrowed some elements from blockchain (mainly tokens). Let's tentatively consider it a blockchain, but it is closer to a consortium chain. Steven believes that from the account model to the consensus algorithm, they are all practices of consortium chains.

The other side has many rebuttals on this point, including standard discussions and various deconstructed topics using guerrilla tactics (saying "you definitely haven't read the white paper/official documents/reference materials/blog carefully," then sending links for you to find answers yourself, yet they cannot point out any strong rebuttal…).

Let's not waste time on guerrilla tactics (because I have already wasted enough…), and focus on the most core dispute—what is the boundary between consortium chains and public chains?

The other side unanimously believes that since Aptos and Sui's nodes have no admission thresholds, they are public chains.

In contrast, Steven focuses on the degree of decentralization behind the surface, meaning that when the project team is gone, can this chain operate on its own? Due to design reasons, Aptos and Sui impose certain restrictions on nodes (too many nodes can affect consensus efficiency), and a concentration of nodes makes them easy targets for attacks.

I believe Steven's standard is more scientific because, according to the other side's logic, one would think that the Tiger Symbol Smart Chain (HSC) is also a public chain, but it is clearly a private chain disguised as a public chain. In fact, one cannot simply make a judgment based on node admission thresholds; for example, although Solana has no admission threshold, it has a strong influence over nodes, which essentially deviates from being a public chain.

About the Timing Diagram of the State Machine

The design ideas of Aptos and Sui are chaotic, with serious deficiencies in decentralization and security. The answers to all disputes actually lie in how the timing diagram of the state machine operates.

Although several technical experts on the other side urged us to read Sui's documents/white papers, the awkward truth is that none of these clearly explain how the timing diagram of the state machine operates.

When we asked for further clarification, one author stated: "I just laughed—because you read their white paper but can't construct its timing diagram in your mind, so they must be a consortium chain? The chain is there, the 'implementation' is already there. Don't 'doubt'…"

According to this friend's logic, without construction blueprints, just relying on the naked eye to see a load-bearing wall that has been tiled, without knowing the structure behind the load-bearing wall, but since the building hasn't collapsed yet, one can conclude that the load-bearing wall is useful. May I ask, how is this different from "God's miracles have manifested, and you should quickly convert?"

This kind of debate has already risen to the level of faith; how can I rebut? I can only admit that I am a heretic and blasphemer of the Move cult.

Additionally, another classmate believes, "The timing diagram of the state machine, according to my understanding, is for discussing security issues and is unrelated to the evaluation of public chains. Because logically, the timing diagram indeed has no relevance to whether it is a public chain; why do you mix these two pieces of information together?"

I suggest that this classmate, who advised Steven to read undergraduate database textbooks, should read the book they recommended carefully.

In summary, many of the rebuttals in this guerrilla warfare are equivalent to a mason judging how evenly the wall is plastered, and since the building hasn't collapsed yet, they accuse the architect, who points out that there are issues with the building's mechanical structure—after all, the masons still need to work in this building.

I believe the most direct way to counter is to present the actual construction blueprints (the timing diagram of the state machine) and conduct on-site acceptance (let the code speak), analyzing the safety of the building from the perspective of mechanical engineering. Feel free to come and slap Steven in the face!

Conclusion

The controversy sparked by "Reversing Technology!" (such as the 12 questions in "Counterattack!") mostly boils down to: "Why didn't you clarify XXX?"

As a 4000-word article, we clearly expressed our viewpoints and provided concise explanations, which is sufficient, but detailed elaboration on the project is certainly lacking. In fact, Sui's documents/white papers do not clarify how their timing diagram of the state machine operates and still require the imagination of that laughing friend.

The other side believes that what we published is "opinions" rather than "facts," but the problem is that our opinions are reasonable inferences based on known facts. If they disagree, please find new facts to refute; otherwise, they are merely using one "opinion" to counter another "opinion."

This technical debate ended in failure, sufficiently demonstrating how much the blockchain industry needs to interpret underlying infrastructure from the perspective of communication technology.

Many people in this industry are attracted by high-performance public chains, and the praise can be summarized as "Look, how high its performance is! Its security is relatively low, but that doesn't matter!" This is akin to a mason judging the sturdiness of an entire building based on the evenness of the plaster!

A deep understanding of the mechanical structure of blockchain (distributed systems) requires a relatively extensive knowledge system, and to make non-professionals understand, it would at least take a semester of coursework. If there is interest, we could consider offering paid knowledge, but there is no need…

However, we should at least have a sense of reverence for the concept of distributed systems; professional matters should be left to professionals. Masons should not do architects' work, and architects will not spend time discussing the details of plastering.

Many of the disputes this time are about our relatively objective expressions not being precise enough (such as "the technology leans towards consortium chains" and "the official theory will control the number of nodes"), so let's simply remove the degree adverbs, and from now on, we will only publish controversial statements, and we will not respond to viewpoints/beliefs.

Finally, let me reiterate the two key controversial statements we still firmly believe in.

1. Libra is an unfinished product, essentially a relational database with a version number. Aptos and Sui are projects that have developed from the corpse of Libra, directly taking the existing technology as a selling point to create a project that cannot solve any real-world application problems.

2. The narratives of Aptos and Sui resonate with those who have just transitioned from Web2 because they can only understand the concepts of "high performance" and "large-scale usability," rather than creating a new species with vitality from the logic of blockchain/crypto/Web3.

From these two controversial statements, a third controversial statement can also be derived, which will be the theme of "Earsplitting Whistle"’s upcoming series, namely that the myth of top VCs should be demystified! Their investment in Aptos and Sui can only be explained in two ways: either they endorse this direction, or they believe someone will take over. Haven't they invested in enough garbage projects?

By the way, the next article from "Earsplitting Whistle" will be about their investment in Helium.