The technical debate on X (formerly Twitter) between Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin and Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson quickly exploded with wider criticism of blockchain design, governance, and practical, real-world survival rates of Zero-Recognition (ZK) proof systems.
It all began with a mathematical meditation from Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum. VitalikButerin investigated the theoretical efficiency of distributing ZK proof workloads across multiple probers.
It's fun math about the idea of splitting a large ZK that proves workload between multiple probers.
Suppose you have an N Prover and you have a proven workload split into N parts (and therefore one part per prober). You need a prover to register, but registration is…
– vitalik.eth (@vitalikbuterin) May 21, 2025
Buterin proposed that by using open access registration and fault tolerant retrieve, the system can achieve log STAR time verification. This is a very slow growth feature.
Buterin's Zk-Proof Math raises Hoskinson's real-world rebuttal
Mathematics was elegant, but Charles Hoskinson quickly sprinted over the unreality of the real world, naively calling the model in the face of hostile attacks, cloud failure risks and hardware bottlenecks.
Hoskinson didn't just pull away from mathematics. He used the opening to paint a larger picture of what he considers as a systematic flaw in Ethereum. He argued that the retry model proposed by Buterin for ZK Proof would collapse when faced with a cibil attack.
@vitalikbuterin I'll bite. Log*(n) Retry model stumbles on actual constraints. With open registration, attackers spin up thousands of provers at zero cost, turning a 20% failure rate into an adversary control lever that can knock out shards in demand.
– Charles Hoskinson (@iohk_charles) May 22, 2025
He explained that this is because the heavy hardware demands on the actual ZKEVM circuit cannot perform a very kicking 3-second retry loop. He also turned the risk of network self-destruction red. There, retrieval escalation can flood the system with unnecessary bandwidth and computational burden.
Cardano vs. Ethereum: Governance and layer philosophy clash again
This is not the first time Hoskinson has positioned Cardano as a more grounded alternative to Ethereum.
In September 2024, he criticized Ethereum's governance, comparing it to a “dictatorship,” highlighting how Cardano's Voltaire-era overhaul avoided the extremes of Bitcoin minimalism and Ethereum's founder-centered approach.
Butarin, on the other hand, does not remain idle. Faced with growing scrutiny on Ethereum's dependence on Layer-2 networks such as arbitrum and optimism, he recently proposed a bold layer-zero upgrade.
This next-generation architecture will replace Ethereum Virtual Machine with ZKVM based on the RISC-V standard, dramatically improving efficiency.
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According to preliminary estimates, the upgrade can slash from 346MB to just 1.5MB to just 1.5MB, reducing calculation cycles by more than 95%, and increase transaction throughput by up to 30x using GPU acceleration.
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However, Hoskinson remains skeptical of Ethereum's direction. He argues that excessive reliance on layer 2 siphons will leave the basic layer, bringing risks of fragmentation, leaving Ethereum vulnerable to being overtaken by more robust alternatives and Bitcoin.
He goes until he argues that if Ethereum continues along this path, it may not survive for the next 15 years.
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