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Single implementation is important for consensus systems. Look at e.g. the spurious dragon hardfork.

The problem with multiple implementations is that if there is a tiny difference in behavior between them, you can only find out after damage has been done to the network via a split/fork.

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You can have the exact same problem with just different versions or even configurations.

I think the idea is that the protocol is resilient to differences in implementation. A bad actor, could for all intents and purposes, manipulate the implementation to their advantage. An implementation, reference or not, is merely a convenience for users who do not want to write their own clients (which is essential for adoption).

In fact, last year an attacker launched a denial of service on the main Ethereum implementation, and the network barely hiccuped because people just switched over to one of the others.

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