Bitcoin, Ethereum, and the Question of Identity

When people argue about Bitcoin, Ethereum, or even questions like “Who is a Jew?”, they often assume there must be a single correct answer hidden somewhere.

But in reality, many questions of identity work in a surprisingly similar way:

They are not solved by mathematics or history alone—they are settled by continuity and recognition.

In my three-part series Religions as Blockchains (Part I, Part II, and Part III), I explored the surprising structural similarities between religious traditions and blockchain systems. Beginning with genesis events, forks, and schisms, the series examined how both religions and blockchains preserve continuity while adapting to change. It then explored questions of authority, legitimacy, heresy, consensus, and interpretation. The final installment reversed the lens entirely, asking whether blockchain communities themselves can be understood as quasi-religious systems organized around competing visions, shared narratives, and collective belief.

This raises a deeper question. If both religions and blockchains experience splits, competing claims of legitimacy, and rival interpretations of continuity, how do we decide which branch is the “real” continuation of the original? The answer turns out to illuminate not only Bitcoin and Ethereum, but identity itself.

When One Thing Becomes Two

Cryptocurrencies make this visible in a very clean way.

Occasionally, a blockchain community reaches a profound disagreement about the future of a project. Sometimes the disagreement becomes so deep that the blockchain itself splits into two separate versions.

This happened with Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash, which emerged from a dispute over how Bitcoin should scale. It also happened with Ethereum and Ethereum Classic after a controversial decision to reverse the effects of a major hack. In both cases, each side believed it was preserving what mattered most about the original project.

After the split, both chains share the same past. They literally begin from the same history.

From that point on, however, they diverge.

And now the key question appears:

Which one is Bitcoin?

Which one is Ethereum?

There is no technical command in the system that answers this.

Instead, something else happens.

Identity follows recognition

After a split, the “real” version is not chosen by code. It is chosen by recognition.

In practice, recognition comes from the parts of the ecosystem that people rely on:

financial infrastructure

When these groups mostly agree, identity stabilizes.

ETH became “Ethereum”

Not because a central authority declared it, but because the ecosystem aligned.

The other chains—Bitcoin Cash or Ethereum Classic—did not disappear. They simply became alternative continuations of the same starting point that did not receive the dominant recognition.

Yet many supporters of those projects continue to view their own chains as the authentic continuation of the original vision. To this day, some Bitcoin Cash advocates argue........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)