Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

[blazespinnaker]

A team in the US has brought the world one step closer to cheap, mass-produced, perfect diamonds. The improvement also means there is no theoretical limit on the size of diamonds that can be grown in the lab.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...tra-large.html


Can you imagine something like this for gold?

THis is why I can never see the world basing a reserve currency around gold. What happens if the economy becomes structured around gold prices and then suddenly someone finds a way to extract all the gold out of the ocean or something silly like that?

Or hell, they're making hot tub sized nuclear reactors now. What if they find a way to do cheap transmutation with them? (They've already proved that transmutation is possible, just can't do it cheaply)


Suddenly everyone who's money was based on gold is suddenly poor?

The world can not depend on something as arbitrary as gold as a standard of wealth.

Maybe a basket of commodities. However, this basket would probably have to change over time.

[metalman]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

A team in the US has brought the world one step closer to cheap, mass-produced, perfect diamonds. The improvement also means there is no theoretical limit on the size of diamonds that can be grown in the lab.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...tra-large.html


Can you imagine something like this for gold?

THis is why I can never see the world basing a reserve currency around gold. What happens if the economy becomes structured around gold prices and then suddenly someone finds a way to extract all the gold out of the ocean or something silly like that?

Or hell, they're making hot tub sized nuclear reactors now. What if they find a way to do cheap transmutation with them? (They've already proved that transmutation is possible, just can't do it cheaply)


Suddenly everyone who's money was based on gold is suddenly poor?

The world can not depend on something as arbitrary as gold as a standard of wealth.

Maybe a basket of commodities. However, this basket would probably have to change over time.

simple: governments name the process illegal.

[D-Mack]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Diamomds are made from carbon, the same stuff the gov wants to tax as CO2.


Gold, if you want to believe science, can't even be created in a star such as our sun.

On the Origin of Gold
Illustration Credit : Dana Berry, NASA

Explanation: Where did the gold in your jewelry originate? No one is completely sure. The relative average abundance in our Solar System appears higher than can be made in the early universe, in stars, and even in typical supernova explosions. Some astronomers have recently suggested that neutron-rich heavy elements such as gold might be most easily made in rare neutron-rich explosions such as the collision of neutron stars. Pictured above is an artist's illustration depicting two neutron stars spiraling in toward each other, just before they collide. Since neutron star collisions are also suggested as the origin of short duration gamma-ray bursts, it is possible that you already own a souvenir from one of the most powerful explosions in the universe.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap080518.html

[touchring]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

lol, new alchemist trick to create gold from lead?

[jtabeb]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

A team in the US has brought the world one step closer to cheap, mass-produced, perfect diamonds. The improvement also means there is no theoretical limit on the size of diamonds that can be grown in the lab.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...tra-large.html


Can you imagine something like this for gold?

THis is why I can never see the world basing a reserve currency around gold. What happens if the economy becomes structured around gold prices and then suddenly someone finds a way to extract all the gold out of the ocean or something silly like that?

Or hell, they're making hot tub sized nuclear reactors now. What if they find a way to do cheap transmutation with them? (They've already proved that transmutation is possible, just can't do it cheaply)


Suddenly everyone who's money was based on gold is suddenly poor?

The world can not depend on something as arbitrary as gold as a standard of wealth.

Maybe a basket of commodities. However, this basket would probably have to change over time.

You'd have to change the atomic structure of an ELEMENT to "create" gold.

This is nowhere near what they are doing here which is transforming graphite (which is carbon) into diamond (which is also carbon).

So while it is true that you can turn a pencil into a diamond, it is not true that you can turn lead into gold. (But what has been done in the lab is to turn GOLD into LEAD by nuclear bombardment, so I'm not worried at all)

[D-Mack]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

You'd have to change the atomic structure of an ELEMENT to "create" gold.

This is nowhere near what they are doing here which is transforming graphite (which is carbon) into diamond (which is also carbon).

So while it is true that you can turn a pencil into a diamond, it is not true that you can turn lead into gold. (But what has been done in the lab is to turn GOLD into LEAD by nuclear bombardment, so I'm not worried at all)

Looks like the Russians did it, but I haven't heard about it.

Transmutation of lead into gold isn't just theoretically possible - it has been achieved! There are reports that Glenn Seaborg, 1951 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, succeeded in transmuting a minute quantity of lead (possibly en route from bismuth, in 1980) into gold. There is an earlier report (1972) in which Soviet physicists at a nuclear research facility near Lake Baikal in Siberia accidentally discovered a reaction for turning lead into gold when they found the lead shielding of an experimental reactor had changed to gold.
http://chemistry.about.com/cs/genera.../aa050601a.htm

[rj1]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

A team in the US has brought the world one step closer to cheap, mass-produced, perfect diamonds. The improvement also means there is no theoretical limit on the size of diamonds that can be grown in the lab.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...tra-large.html


Can you imagine something like this for gold?

THis is why I can never see the world basing a reserve currency around gold. What happens if the economy becomes structured around gold prices and then suddenly someone finds a way to extract all the gold out of the ocean or something silly like that?

Or hell, they're making hot tub sized nuclear reactors now. What if they find a way to do cheap transmutation with them? (They've already proved that transmutation is possible, just can't do it cheaply)


Suddenly everyone who's money was based on gold is suddenly poor?

The world can not depend on something as arbitrary as gold as a standard of wealth.

Maybe a basket of commodities. However, this basket would probably have to change over time.

Just like how people can make a perfect copy and mass-produce counterfeit money? (the North Koreans for instance)

[D-Mack]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Just like how people can make a perfect copy and mass-produce counterfeit money? (the North Koreans for instance)

Looks like it could be from the usual suspects

Experts Suggest the CIA, Not Kim Jong-il, is Counterfeiting Dollars

by Klaus W. Bender


Global Research, January 9, 2007
Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Germany, translated by Armin Broeggelwirth, Watching America

“Sources allege that the CIA prints the falsified 'Supernotes' at a secret facility near Washington to fund covert operations without Congressional oversight.”

January 6, 2006[sic]

Germany - Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung - Original Article (German)


The American secret service, the CIA, could be responsible for manufacturing the nearly-perfect counterfeit 50 and 100-dollar-notes that Washington pins on the terror regime of North Korea. The charge comes after an extensive investigation in Europe and Asia by the Sunday edition of the Frankfurter Allgemeinen Sonntagszeitung of Frankfurt, and after interviews with counterfeit money experts and leading representatives of the high-security publishing industry.

...
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.p...articleId=4393

[Spartacus]

Re: you can make Gold in nuclear reactors & particle accelerators

Gold can be made from mercury - the entire nuclear medicine industry is based on this type of process.

Mercury 197 + a neutron ---> radioactive mercury --> decays to Gold 197

Google it
nuclear 197 gold from mercury

One of the hits:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesis_of_noble_metals

Diamomds are made from carbon, the same stuff the gov wants to tax as CO2.


Gold, if you want to believe science, can't even be created in a star such as our sun.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Mercury is extremely rare in the Earth's crust, and Hg 197 is a rare isotope of mercury at 0.15% of mercury. To transmute Hg 197 into gold, it takes time, talent, billions of electron volts of energy, gamma rays, capital investment in reactors, modulated neutrons, and the output of Au 197 is negligible.

Many things are possible to do in money-losing ventures. Extracting gold from sea water is one of these money-losing ventures. Transmuting Hg to Au is another money-losing venture. Going to the planets and stars to mine gold is another money-loser.

There is no shortage of ways to lose money, especially in mining.

[Spartacus]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

hear, hear. Say it again brother.

And you miss one point - Even if Hg -> Au were cheap, the Gold that comes out has been in a nuclear reactor and can exist as a mix of isotopes.

IOW, that gold will be radioactive.

I was speaking to the theoretical possibility.

Mercury is extremely rare in the Earth's crust, and Hg 197 is a rare isotope of mercury at 0.15% of mercury. To transmute Hg 197 into gold, it takes time, talent, billions of electron volts of energy, gamma rays, capital investment in reactors, modulated neutrons, and the output of Au 197 is negligible.

Many things are possible to do in money-losing ventures. Extracting gold from sea water is one of these money-losing ventures. Transmuting Hg to Au is another money-losing venture. Going to the planets and stars to mine gold is another money-loser.

There is no shortage of ways to lose money, especially in mining.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Happy to report that Au 197 is stable, so it is not radioactive. But the stable Au 197 may well be in a mix of radioactive isotopes, so you may need to filter or purify the mess that comes out of the reactor.

The stable Au 197 has no half-life, so what you get, you get to keep, forever.

You would have to ask a nuclear physicist about refining costs after Au 197 is generated because my expertise is in climatology, not nuclear physics. If you do have to refine or purify the mess, that is a cost of production. Disposal of waste isotopes would also be a cost although I couldn't bring myself to disposing of rare Earth metals, no matter how radioactive they may be.

When I was a kid, I used to keep the luminus dials from watches because the dials contained radium, an excessively rare element. I used to keep mercury in bottles because mercury is also quite rare on this planet---although not very valuable commercially.

There was no EPA back when I was a kid, and there were no eco-nazis around, either. So I could collect whatever I wanted to collect, and I collected everything.

[blazespinnaker]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Diamomds are made from carbon, the same stuff the gov wants to tax as CO2.


Gold, if you want to believe science, can't even be created in a star such as our sun.

Transmutation is already done. It happens in nuclear reactors when it heats up. This is a well understood process. It's just not done cheaply, currently.

However, companies are making nuclear reactors the size of hot tubs now and are going to be mass producing them. You have to wonder..

[blazespinnaker]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

I'm not arguing the probability that new techniques for generating gold are highly probable, I'm only arguing that the possibility is big enough that whole nations are not going to role the dice and base their entire economies around something so uncontrollable.

Gold is as fiat as any other currency, the only differences is that instead of being controlled by your central bank, it's controlled by scientific progress and the lack thereof.

There is also the fact that a currency based on gold would have very little inflation. No inflation means people have little incentive to take risks in order to protect their wealth.

No risk taking, means little advancements in standard of living.

That's a different argument, however..

[jtabeb]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Gold is as fiat as any other currency, the only differences is that instead of being controlled by your central bank, it's controlled by scientific progress and the lack thereof.



No risk taking, means little advancements in standard of living.

No, the first statement is categorically incorrect.


irredeemable paper currency, not resting on a specie basis, but deriving its purchasing power from the declaratory fiat of the government issuing it.

Let's see the us gov print up 1 trillion 1oz gold American Eagles? Nope, can't do it, impossible, not fiat.

Let's see the us government print up $2 Trillion to save the financial system? Yep, they did it, so it's FIAT.


No, second statement is categorically incorrect during a DEFLATION.



7 dictionary results for: FIAT
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This fi⋅at

   /ˈfiɑt, -æt; ˈfaɪət, -æt/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [fee-aht, -at; fahy-uht, -at] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun

1.	an authoritative decree, sanction, or order: a royal fiat.

2.	a formula containing the word fiat, by which a person in authority gives sanction.

3.	an arbitrary decree or pronouncement, esp. by a person or group of persons having absolute authority to enforce it: The king ruled by fiat.

---

Origin:
1625–35; < L: let it be done, 3rd sing. pres. subj. of fierī to become




Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

fi·at (fē'ət, -āt', -ät', fī'āt', -ət) Pronunciation Key n. An arbitrary order or decree. Authorization or sanction: government fiat. [Medieval Latin, from Latin, let it be done, third person sing. present subjunctive of fierī, to become, to be done; see bheuə- in Indo-European roots.]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
fiat
1384, from fiat lux "let there be light" in the Book of Genesis, from L. fiat "let it be done" (also used in the opening of M.L. proclamations and commands), third pers. sing. pres. subjunctive of fieri, used as passive of facere "to make, do" (see factitious).



Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

fiat

noun

a legally binding command or decision entered on the court record (as if issued by a court or judge); "a friend in New Mexico said that the order caused no trouble out there" [syn: decree]

WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
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Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law - Cite This Source - Share This
Main Entry: fi·at
Pronunciation: 'fE-"ät, -"at, -&t; 'fI-"at
Function: noun
1 : DECREE
2 : an authoritative but arbitrary order fiat —L. H. Tribe>



Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, © 1996 Merriam-Webster, Inc.
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Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This Fiat
Fi"at\, n. [L., let it be done, 3d pers. sing., subj. pres., fr. fieri, used as pass. of facere to make. Cf. Be.]1. An authoritative command or order to do something; an effectual decree. His fiat laid the corner stone. --Willis. 2. (Eng. Law) (a) A warrant of a judge for certain processes. (b) An authority for certain proceedings given by the Lord Chancellor's signature. Fiat money, irredeemable paper currency, not resting on a specie basis, but deriving its purchasing power from the declaratory fiat of the government issuing it.