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June 17, 2025

From Turing’s Dissertation to Bitcoin Consensus——Sharing UTXO to Build Parallel Decentralized Arbitration Systems

I. Turing’s Breakthrough on Logical Completeness

In 1938, Alan Turing asked in his doctoral dissertation “Systems of Logic Based on Ordinals”:

“How can we go beyond Gödel’s incompleteness?”

To address this, he introduced two groundbreaking concepts:

  • Ordinal Logic: Using external “ordinal induction” to enhance a system’s expressive power;
  • Oracle Turing Machine: An abstract model capable of invoking “external sources of truth.”

This allows the system to handle problems of the form: (∀x)(∃y)R(x, y) —That is, “For all x, there exists a y such that the relation R holds.”

II. How Does Bitcoin Engineer “Oracle Logic”?

Bitcoin’s system validation structure is, in essence, a distributed implementation of “oracle behavior.”

Let’s define:

  • x = a transaction tx
  • y = a block block
  • R(tx, block): the transaction is included in that block and on the longest chain.

Bitcoin’s core decision problem becomes:(∀tx)(∃block)R(tx, block). In other words: any transaction must be included in a valid block to be considered “valid.”

This mirrors Turing’s notion of “relative completeness,” but implemented as an engineering arbitration mechanism in Bitcoin:Miners act as oracle invokers, using PoW to determine the longest chain; Consensus becomes logical judgment, where all transactions ultimately settle on the chain.

III. Shared vs. Unshared: Where Are the Boundaries of UTXO?

In other words: we can use Bitcoin’s UTXO data structure, but cannot use its consensus chain to arbitrate other applications.

IV. Parallel Arbitration Systems: The Next-gen Oracle Turing Machines

We can construct a decentralized ecosystem like this:

UTXO --> BTC Transfer  
    --> BTC-Vote  
    --> BTC-ID  
    --> BTC-Copyright

They share UTXO state, but each has its own independent arbitration mechanism:

Each is a Turing-style decentralized arbitration device for solving a specific (∀x)(∃y)R(x,y) problem.

V. From Bitcoin to Complex Adaptive Systems

We call this structure:Parallel Oracle Turing Machine Systems —Each system solves its own version of the (∀x)(∃y)R(x,y) problem.

In the future, we can:

  • Use BTC as the state source
  • Use varied systems for decentralized arbitration
  • Build a multi-semantic, multi-consensus decentralized social architecture
Conclusion
I. Theoretical Foundation: Oracle Logic in Turing’s Dissertation

In 1938, Turing in his doctoral thesis “Systems of Logic Based on Ordinals”:

  • Proposed Ordinal Logic, attempting to transcend the limitations of formal systems revealed by Gödel’s incompleteness theorem;
  • Introduced the Oracle Turing Machine, used to handle undecidable propositions of the following form:

(∀x)(∃y)R(x, y)

Here, R is a recursively decidable relation. This structure represents an attempt to extend formal systems at the Q₂ (double quantifier) level.

II. Bitcoin’s Engineering Realization: The Practical Landing of Oracle Logic

Bitcoin’s core issue is the double-spending problem, whose logical structure aligns with Turing’s Q₂ model:

(∀tx)(∃block) R(tx, block)

  • tx: a transaction;
  • block: a block containing the transaction and residing on the longest chain;
  • R(tx, block): whether the transaction is validly included and confirmed.

Bitcoin’s miner system can be viewed as a “distributed oracle behavior system,” dynamically constructing and evolving the range of R.

III. Core Breakdown: Modular Structure of Bitcoin’s Arbitration System

Conclusion: UTXO is a universal state expression structure; Bitcoin’s PoW consensus mechanism can only arbitrate BTC transfers, and cannot be reused for other semantic applications.

IV. Proposing a New Paradigm: Shared UTXO + Parallel Consensus Systems

Key Idea: Share Bitcoin’s UTXO structure, but establish independent, parallel decentralized arbitration systems for each application.

Structure:

V. Application Examples: Constructing Parallel Systems
VI. Summary: UTXO as “Universal State Structure”, Parallel Systems as “Engineering Expression of Oracle Logic”
  • Shareable: Bitcoin’s UTXO data structure, serving as the foundation of state and proof;
  • Not Shareable: Bitcoin’s main chain consensus mechanism, semantically specialized, only applicable to transfers.
VII. Concluding Statement
Bitcoin’s consensus system is an engineering realization of Turing’s Q₂ logical structure, used to arbitrate BTC transfers. We, however, can build a series of independent decentralized arbitration systems based on UTXO sharing, each mapping to a new R(x, y), together forming a “Parallel Oracle Turing Machine Ecosystem” — providing diverse support for decentralized societal infrastructure.