The irony of making this analogy is that it actually illustrates the danger of NOT making protocol changes.

What happened with the 737Max is that Boeing wanted to put larger, more powerful, more fuel efficient engines on their 737. The only problem was that the physical structure of the plane (the base layer protocol, in this case) couldn’t handle larger engines.

The 737 has a relatively low ground clearance compared to competitors like the Airbus A320. Mounting the larger engines in the same position as previous 737s would cause them to hit the ground during takeoff and landing.

Instead of changing the protocol - the base, physical structure of the 737 itself - to safely allow for the new engines, what they did was a hack to try to bolt these new engines (think L2s) to work with the old 737 structure (protocol). 

Boeing moved the engines forward and higher up on the wing. However, this gave the 737MAX a tendency to pitch up more during high angles of attack, increasing stall risk. 

To correct for this they created flight control software to automatically push the plane’s nose down in certain situations to prevent stalls. This software relied on data from a single angle-of-attack sensor. There was no redundancy built in. 

It was this faulty sensor that caused planes to go into a nosedive that the pilots (unfamiliar with how to override this overly complex software) couldn’t pull out of. 

In its current state, with no added covenants or expressivity at the base layer, virtually all Bitcoin users will be forced to use bitcoin through some custodial arrangement (even if it is a collaborative custody model like Liquid or Fedimint). 

You can think of these custodians as the sensor in the 737Max , where if they become faulty you lose everything. 

And you can think of conservative, well-vetted covenants upgrade as redesigning and lengthening the landing gear (and making minor alterations to the wing and fuselage) to safely accommodate new engines. 

Anyway, all of this to say that sometimes changing Bitcoin’s protocol is safer than not doing so. 

I believe this is one of those times.

nostr:note12vksy0t0sz3jh4xl538qslrzeflrvqtqdt0qvjpmy64z2ct3f75qkwywr6  

 Interesting analogy 

 In your analogy I believe that bitcoin is aerodynamics and lift… the 737 is the layer two and the engines are implementation details… the 737 worked amazingly for a LONG time but some idiots wanted to make some quick cheap and dirty changes to suit themselves and ended up killing people. 

 I think that aerodynamics and lift would be the internet itself, along with the various technologies that bitcoin is dependent on. That would be bitcoin’s environment, so to speak. 

And you could say that when altcoins do things like massively raise the block size, they crash and burn because their hubris leads them to ignore these “physical” constraints of the environment.

Mapping the analogy:

* Aerodynamics and lift = The underlying networking, computing and cryptographic primitives that Bitcoin relies on (internet, CPUs, bandwidth, storage, etc.)
* The 737 airframe = The core Bitcoin protocol itself
* The engines = Scaling solutions like Lightning, Liquid, etc. that need to be integrated carefully

However, this highlights the issue with arguing by analogy. You really have to make sure your analogy is apt, otherwise it creates more confusion than clarity. 

...And, for someone like Saylor, with the gift of gab, analogies can be effectively used for sophistry. 

 It’s the issue with analogy that makes it perfect for arguing… when never have to give up our positions because we can always reframe ;)

Saylor is like soma… easily accessible mind numb for the masses