The Paradox of Trust: Why Cryptocurrency Supply Cannot Have a Global Upper Bound. On the "Scarcity/Verifiability/Non-Coerciveness" (SVN) Trilemma and Reflections on the Cult of "IN MATH WE TRUST"

This article argues that the total supply of cryptocurrencies cannot possess a meaningful global upper bound, not because of flaws in cryptographic algorithms themselves, but because of a structural contradiction between non-coerciveness, verifiability, and scarcity. Starting from the trust problem that motivated Bitcoin, the article analyzes the necessary conditions for establishing universal trust in distributed systems. Following the insight of Ken Thompson’s Reflections on Trusting Trust, it argues that any system claiming absolute credibility must remain fully transparent and verifiable across the entire execution chain, including source code, toolchains, deployment processes, and runtime behaviors. From an engineering perspective, the article models the deployment of cryptocurrency systems as a process of parameter-bound instantiation. Once full verifiability is granted, the cost of creating communication-isolated variants approaches zero. Different communities, political groups, cultures, or economic interests may freely instantiate alternative but equally trustworthy systems, thereby continuously expanding the aggregate supply of equivalent resources. The article then generalizes this observation into a trilemma theorem concerning distributed resource-generation systems: Scarcity (S), Verifiability (V), and Non-Coerciveness (N) cannot be simultaneously satisfied. A system that permits open verification without coercive exclusion cannot maintain globally enforceable scarcity. Finally, the article argues that controlled inflation and externally imposed institutional constraints may represent not defects of civilization, but necessary mechanisms for resisting the natural concentration dynamics of purely mathematical systems. Version Notes (v1.1.2) This version incorporates terminology unification for the SVN Trilemma, revised citation metadata, updated licensing information (CC BY 4.0), and minor editorial corrections Version Notes (v1.1.3) This version incorporates terminology unification for global upbound, revised acknowledgments, normalized the Tower of Babel. 本文论证:加密货币的总供应量不可能具有可被实际维持的绝对上限。文章首先分析分布式货币体系获得信任所需的必要条件。沿着 Ken Thompson《Reflections on Trusting Trust》所揭示的逻辑,本文指出:任何宣称“绝对可信”的系统,都必须在源代码、构建工具链与部署机制等所有实现层面保持完全透明与可验证。 从工程实现角度出发,这种透明性将不可避免地使创建相互通讯隔离的变体的成本趋近于零。不同文化、政治、经济利益群体,都可以通过修改运行参数或采用不同共识算法,实例化出彼此独立但同样可信的系统。 本文进一步将这一观察一般化为关于分布式资源生成系统的“三元不可能性定理”:稀缺性(S)、可验性(V)与无强制(N)无法同时满足。一个拒绝外部强制力且保持完全可验证的系统,将无法维持全局意义上的稀缺性。 最后,本文讨论了算法货币体系背后的文明含义,并指出:受控通货膨胀与制度治理,或许正是人类社会对抗纯数学秩序自然极化倾向的重要机制。 版本说明(v1.1.2):统一了 SVN 术语、参考文献格式与版权声明,个别标点半角改全角。 版本说明(v1.1.3):统一使用 全局上限、致谢反馈列表更新。 Note: This Zenodo record contains both the English version (EN) and Chinese version (ZH) of the full paper in separate PDF files below.(注:本条目在下方分别包含了完整的英文版和中文版 PDF 文档,可根据语言偏好下载。)