> "To skip over that right to "but think about how much you're missing out" is... I don't know, I've seen people make this pitch better."

To clarify, I was pointing out that you're more invested in your beliefs than I am in mine. If I see that I'm wrong, I can simply sell my bitcoin at a profit and walk away - my bitcoin ownership is not a psychological barrier to a change of my belief (a hypothesis you made). But in order for you to change your opinion at this stage, you will also have to come to terms with that fact that through your own mistakes you failed to buy bitcoin at prices probably 10x-100x cheaper than they currently are. This is the barrier to change of belief that you incorrectly accused me of.

> "It does seem like your definition of "understands Bitcoin" is "agrees with you", so that's not particularly compelling as an argument."

It's true. The fact is that bitcoin presents itself on the surface as a combination of "Ponzi scheme" alarms bells, combined with massive, wasteful energy use. Most people see this and believe that they've seen through the hype that the dumb people have fallen for and walk away, albeit a bit disgruntled about the waste of energy that is affecting everyone.

They'll probably think things like, "I couldn't really care less about this crypto rubbish, but at least do it in an energy efficient way like [insert random shitcoin here].

Almost every bitcoiner has been there, even Michael Saylor!. It actually takes a deep insight into a number of widely differing areas of knowledge/expertise to see the whole picture (which also involves seeing though some of the nonsense of traditional finance/Keynesian economics) and only then does it make sense, and only when it makes sense does it become an excellent use of energy, rather than a waste of energy. If you miss just _one_ piece of the jigsaw, then bitcoin is an enormous waste of energy. So far every point you have made against bitcoin is one that I also made at one point along my learning curve but after 1000's of hours of deeper learning and contemplation, have realised they were wrong.

So, let's just start with the first of my misconceptions and at least agree on the facts, rather than any conjecture, before continuing on :"Miners don't validate the transactions ($100 nodes people can run at home do that)"

First off:

> "Bitcoin proves chain validity using a system called proof of work"

Almost, but proof of work doesn't prove anything other than work. The chain validity is proven by the global network of low-cost nodes that check the chain (including the claimed proof of work) against the rules of bitcoin, defined by the individual node itself.
If a miner mines a block of transactions in a way that doesn't conform to bitcoin as defined by my node, those transactions didn't happen (according to me). If someone makes a code change that I believe is detrimental enough to bitcoin that I'm willing to take a stand, then I won't apply the change to my node. Assuming I'm correct in my opinion, other bitcoiners will likely do the same and ultimately the network will split into two separate networks of nodes/miners, the best of which will ultimately win. This was seen in the "block-size wars" (were you on the side of the big-blockers?), which showed that the miners can mine according to which ever rules they like, but their work will be ignored by people who think those rules make bitcoin weaker/worse and the work will ultimately be wasted if those people were correct.

> "To be fair, it is true that individual nodes can validate whether or not a proposed chain is completely incorrect, but so heckin what"

So you agree to certain point, but not that the nodes have any power in defining what bitcoin is. Does my explanation above, including the outcome of the "block-size wars" change that belief in any way?

> "The important part is that the network specifically trusts whatever the longest blockchain is, and that entire security system is based on the entire network constantly racing itself to increase the chain's length."

I agree, but will qualify that the nodes on the network only trust the longest blockchain that confirms to the rules that the nodes' chosen code defines. If my node says the new longest chain is not bitcoin, then it's not bitcoin and I ignore it.

> "The inefficiency is the point, the point is that the network can spend more energy than you individually can. It outspends your access to compute power. "The network outspends your attack" is basically the definition of a proof of work blockchain. So at a purely technical level, your explanation here already has issues. But let's ignore that and talk about economics:"

So I agree on the fundamental point of "the network outspends your attack". But I don't agree that this makes it inefficient and I don't see how it highlights issues in my explanation (could you elaborate?)
To me the question of a system's efficiency is "does this system solve the problem while using the lowest amount of energy possible?". And so we first need to agree on what problem bitcoin is solving, before we can determine whether it's efficient or not. If you agree with what I've written in my other points above, then we can move on to that, but let's just get the facts about the blockchain straightened out and agreed on first.