Are all smart contracts created equal? How top Turing-complete blockchains compare

The crypto industry has several unique approaches to smart contract execution and decentralized applications (DApps). These innovations are driven by the need for scalability, security, and efficiency, allowing developers to build increasingly sophisticated applications. Yet, what is so different between the smart contracts on different blockchains? Which is the smartest smart contract platform?

Turing completeness is a key aspect of smart contracts. Turing completeness is a concept from computational theory that refers to a system’s ability to perform any computation given enough time and resources. It is named after the British mathematician and logician Alan Turing, who developed the concept in the context of the theoretical Turing machine.

Among the leading blockchain platforms, Ethereum, Internet Computer (ICP), Polkadot, Cardano, and Solana stand out for their distinct strategies in leveraging Turing completeness and smart contracts. This article explores how each platform addresses the challenges and opportunities in the blockchain space, highlighting their specific capabilities and contributions to the decentralized ecosystem.

Ethereum Smart Contracts

The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) stands as a cornerstone of the Ethereum network, a decentralized platform enabling the execution of smart contracts and decentralized applications (DApps). The EVM is a stack-based virtual machine designed specifically for Ethereum, facilitating the computation of state changes after each new block addition. Its Turing completeness allows for executing any computation given sufficient resources, making Ethereum capable of supporting complex smart contracts and DApps. This capability, however, necessitates a gas mechanism to measure and manage the computational effort required for each operation. Gas prevents infinite loops and ensures network stability by requiring users to specify a gas limit for their transactions, halting any that exceed this limit.

Smart contract…