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Which and how much mathematical operations are required for the blockheader-to-blockhash operation and how fast would a human be able to calculate a single hash?

EDIT: For simplicity, I think it's a good idea to use the world record for mathematical calculations to make it a little more fair.

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The user C121 on r/bitcoin explored this topic in the thread Mining Bitcoin by hand.

He states that it takes 3385 integer operations to calculate one double SHA-256 hash.

His conclusion was that you would reach about 0.00003 H/s, or in other terms, it would take about 9.4 hours for one hash, assuming the human in question could do a 32-bit operation in 10 seconds.

He also estimates that you would fill about seventy pages of paper with the calculations per hash.

Update:
As Mathias711 pointed out in the comments, Ken Shirriff actually calculated some SHA-256 operations manually and wrote an article about mining bitcoin with pencil and paper. He arrives at an estimate of 0.67 hashes per day, at a vastly uncompetitive energy consumption. ;)

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  • Hmm, with a bit of pre-made tools (mechanical or not), we can actually steeply reduce this number right? – Pacerier May 22 '14 at 16:55
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    Do ASICs qualify as 'tools'? – Pieter Wuille Jul 5 '14 at 11:01
  • This guy actually did it, and he reached 0.67 hashes / day. – Mathias711 Sep 29 '14 at 10:48
  • I was actually just about to link this myself. I'm sure with practice you'd increase the number but humans make mistakes after hashing for long periods of time, I'm sure. – Wizard Of Ozzie Oct 1 '14 at 6:30

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