Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

[blazespinnaker]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

With a little bit more imagination and another re-read, I think you'll get my drift.

I appreciate that you and some others are heavily invested in gold. My desire to argue against it isn't to piss you (or anyone else) off. Nothing I say here influences the prices of anything.

I am merely trying to caution people against basing their investment choices on the notion that the world will suddenly 'go gold'. It seems highly improbable.

More likely is that we'll see panic buying now and then when the world economy lurches around randomly, and people can't thinking of anything better to do except buy gold.

As things calm down, however, so will the price of gold. Sometimes these price swings will be highly dramatic. Make sure you have plenty of capital left aside in order to stomach those swings.

[jtabeb]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

With a little bit more imagination and another re-read, I think you'll get my drift.

Sorry, I'm long a bottle of wine and short adequate sleep.

V/R

JT

P.S.

Just did a re-read

is this the part "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." you mean?

I respectfully disagree with that too. Why did standards of living go up during the gold standard era? Why did we have the industrial revolution during that time? It doesn't seem to follow that a sound currency reduces sound risk taking and profit seeking. It seems like it is the other way around.

Thoughts?

[c1ue]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

I spoke with an expert in the CVD industry; he says that theoretically it is absolutely possible to create perfect diamonds with the technology.

However, there are issues with doing so commercially. Specifically there are parts of the process which do not lend themselves to mass production.

These bottlenecks are solveable with enough investment, but even then it would be 5 years minimum to get the technology into play.

So, deBeers has nothing to fear in the short term.

[we_are_toast]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

How about these diamonds!!



Ok, they're not diamonds, they're gypsum, but cool none the less!
Diamonds are far more plentiful than people think. It's the monopoly that maintains the high price. Any effort to capture a big chunk of the market and DeBeers will flood the market. Is there an Ultrashort ETF for diamonds?

[Spartacus]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

FRED & I had a discussion about this some time ago. Completely fiat currencies were not freely adopted before governments.

Gold eventually BECAME government fiat

BUT

a major reason governments[1] went that way is because it was the most widely [2] freely- accepted money before the governments tried to control money. What could be easier than to seize control of an existing infrastructure?

[1] actually this usually happened at the later stages of "big man" tribal societies (aka "ruling thug & his coterie) and early stages of monarchies

[2] Milton Friedman (who IIRC started as a historian) & his wife argued that Silver has been money in more times, more places, and for longer periods of time than gold. In many languages, French, Spanish, Sanskrit, several of the Indian languages, several arabic-related languages, the word for money IS the word for Silver.

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..

[metalman]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

FRED & I had a discussion about this some time ago. Completely fiat currencies were not freely adopted before governments.

Gold eventually BECAME government fiat

BUT

a major reason governments[1] went that way is because it was the most widely [2] freely- accepted money before the governments tried to control money. What could be easier than to seize control of an existing infrastructure?

[1] actually this usually happened at the later stages of "big man" tribal societies (aka "ruling thug & his coterie) and early stages of monarchies

[2] Milton Friedman (who IIRC started as a historian) & his wife argued that Silver has been money in more times, more places, and for longer periods of time than gold. In many languages, French, Spanish, Sanskrit, several of the Indian languages, several arabic-related languages, the word for money IS the word for Silver.

under a gold standard, the gov't creates a gov't monopoly on gold & silver, setting the price. why this is supposed to be more 'honest' that paper i'll never know.

[jtabeb]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

I spoke with an expert in the CVD industry; he says that theoretically it is absolutely possible to create perfect diamonds with the technology.

However, there are issues with doing so commercially. Specifically there are parts of the process which do not lend themselves to mass production.

These bottlenecks are solveable with enough investment, but even then it would be 5 years minimum to get the technology into play.

So, deBeers has nothing to fear in the short term.

But these artificial diamonds are chiral, aren't they? Natural diamonds are right hand matrix, these are left hand matrix correct, so they would fluoresce at different wavelengths than would naturally occurring stones.

Optically, I agree. But Chemically speaking, there should be a difference due to the "handedness" of the lattice matrix.

[jtabeb]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

under a gold standard, the gov't creates a gov't monopoly on gold & silver, setting the price. why this is supposed to be more 'honest' that paper i'll never know.

That's why it's stupid and doomed to fail. A market exchange mechanism between FIAT and gold and silver would work and eventually what they will be forced to do.

[blazespinnaker]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

That's why it's stupid and doomed to fail. A market exchange mechanism between FIAT and gold and silver would work and eventually what they will be forced to do.

Why not just have floating exchange rates?

Currencies quickly find their true values in the forex.

[c1ue]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

Chemical Vapor Deposition - CVD - is presently used in the Semiconductor industry to literally deposit single atom thick layers.

It is child's play to monkey around with 'right' or 'left' patterns when you're drawing with pixels.

The fluorescence you speak of is a characteristic of natural diamonds due to the particular circumstances of diamond formation; difference diamond bearing areas of the world have different typical characteristics.

But all of them could be replicated - the main issue is effort.

CVD machines and the clean rooms to use them in are also non-trivial costs, but with the incoming depression the utilization levels are already falling so fast that diamond creation might be a necessary byline...:rolleyes:

[tsetsefly]

Re: Artificial diamonds - now available in extra large

I remember reading 2 stories about this back in 03 and 04. In the story it said how the diamond industry was trying to pass regulation so artificial diamonds could not be classified as diamonds.
It was also mentioned how these diamonds (assuming they would be much cheaper than "real" ones) could be used instead of silicone chips because they can resist more heat than silicone...

here is one of the stories I could not find the other one: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.09/diamond.html