All gold comes from the death of neutron stars. (Or supernova events.)
A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star. Neutron stars pack one-and-a-half times the mass of the sun into a ball only 10 miles across. A teaspoon of material from their surface would weigh 10 million tons. Many stars in the universe are in binary systems – two stars bound by gravity and orbiting around each other. A pair of massive stars might eventually end their lives as a pair of neutron stars. The neutron stars orbit each other for hundreds of millions of years. But Einstein says that their dance cannot last forever. Eventually, they must collide.
This stellar explosion creates gold.
I love it when people talk about how the value of gold will crater when we begin mining gold on the floor of the ocean or on asteroids. Right now the price of gold barely covers the all in cost of digging a hole in the ground, refining it, and minting into a bar or coin. What will deep sea or space mining cost? Heh!
This. When you hold Gold or Silver in your hand something about it just screams “this is worth something”.
I gave my friend 4 silver rounds and a $100 bill to hold and asked which one feels more valuable? He said the 4 silver rounds of course. This got him to start picking up 5-10oz of silver every pay check. He’s nearing 100oz. Proud of him.
Intrinsic value through widespread usefulness in many industries. Couple that with the fact that it can't be replicated in a lab and you have a recipe for an agreeable store of wealth. That and it's nice to look at.
Silver is highly useful. It is used in industry, film, medicine, electronics and more: it has powerful antibiotic properties. I dealt in PMs for a few years and at the time it was estimated that a third of all silver ever mined is used and can not be effectively recovered. It also kills werewolves. Gold has many special properties. It has a durability which makes it almost indestructible, only aqua regia disolves it. It is very maleable; an ounce can be hammered so that it can cover a tennis court. Precious metals, unlike paper, can not me fabricated out of thin air and destroy the accumulated wealth of a nation.
I’m a chemist. I’m well aware of the usefulness of gold and silver. But all of those uses were relevant AFTER someone dug it up and refined it.
I know this is a “chicken or egg first” question but it does bring up what event or person was like, “you need this useless heavy brick of shiny caveman”.
Honestly the person linking precious metals to occult practices seems most feasible. Are there any mythological stories about this? I’m science not history.
Explain to me like I’m 5 how we went from gathering nuts n berries to digging up precious metals as a form of value.
What is it that makes Gold valuable?
All gold comes from the death of neutron stars. (Or supernova events.)
A neutron star is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star. Neutron stars pack one-and-a-half times the mass of the sun into a ball only 10 miles across. A teaspoon of material from their surface would weigh 10 million tons. Many stars in the universe are in binary systems – two stars bound by gravity and orbiting around each other. A pair of massive stars might eventually end their lives as a pair of neutron stars. The neutron stars orbit each other for hundreds of millions of years. But Einstein says that their dance cannot last forever. Eventually, they must collide.
This stellar explosion creates gold.
I love it when people talk about how the value of gold will crater when we begin mining gold on the floor of the ocean or on asteroids. Right now the price of gold barely covers the all in cost of digging a hole in the ground, refining it, and minting into a bar or coin. What will deep sea or space mining cost? Heh!
This. When you hold Gold or Silver in your hand something about it just screams “this is worth something”.
I gave my friend 4 silver rounds and a $100 bill to hold and asked which one feels more valuable? He said the 4 silver rounds of course. This got him to start picking up 5-10oz of silver every pay check. He’s nearing 100oz. Proud of him.
Intrinsic value through widespread usefulness in many industries. Couple that with the fact that it can't be replicated in a lab and you have a recipe for an agreeable store of wealth. That and it's nice to look at.
Silver is highly useful. It is used in industry, film, medicine, electronics and more: it has powerful antibiotic properties. I dealt in PMs for a few years and at the time it was estimated that a third of all silver ever mined is used and can not be effectively recovered. It also kills werewolves. Gold has many special properties. It has a durability which makes it almost indestructible, only aqua regia disolves it. It is very maleable; an ounce can be hammered so that it can cover a tennis court. Precious metals, unlike paper, can not me fabricated out of thin air and destroy the accumulated wealth of a nation.
I’m a chemist. I’m well aware of the usefulness of gold and silver. But all of those uses were relevant AFTER someone dug it up and refined it.
I know this is a “chicken or egg first” question but it does bring up what event or person was like, “you need this useless heavy brick of shiny caveman”.
Honestly the person linking precious metals to occult practices seems most feasible. Are there any mythological stories about this? I’m science not history.