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A comment on Why Is It Taking 20 Minutes to Mine This Bitcoin Block?. Parent comment

Re:Why Is It Taking 20 Minutes to Mine This Bitcoin Block? by lordnacho on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @02:30AM (#16471685)
This is the best explanation of the phenomenon. Simple and actually explains why it's 2x and not 3x or 4x.
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Re:Why Is It Taking 20 Minutes to Mine This Bitcoin Block? by thaumasiotes on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @03:36AM (#16471946)
Is it actually true though? Compare these two comments buried downthread:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16470358

> The hitchhiker's paradox is correct, taking a point and looking backward or forward will correctly give an average event 10 minutes away, but combining the events to give an average of 20 minutes is false.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16471544

> I thought this sounded funny, and I did a little simulation to see if it was correct. Given his assumptions (poisson with lambda 10), you do not get that answer. I got right around 10, which is what I would expect.

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Re:Why Is It Taking 20 Minutes to Mine This Bitcoin Block? by modeless on Tuesday February 27, 2018 @06:23AM (#16472539)
Yes, it is true. I'm not sure what the first commenter is trying to say exactly. The second commenter's code was wrong, and correcting it gives the expected 20 minute average period.
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