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> Discovering an asteroid full of gold, with as much gold as half the earth to put a modest number, would have huge impact All this would do is crash the gold
by myrmidon 2y ago
> Discovering an asteroid full of gold, with as much gold as half the earth to put a modest number, would have huge impact
All this would do is crash the gold price. Also note that all the gold at our disposal right now (worldwide) basically fits into a cube with 20m edges (its not as much as you might think).
Gold is not suitable to replace steel as building material (because it has much lower strength and hardness), nor copper/aluminium as conductor (it's a worse conductor than copper and much worse in conductivity/weigth than aluminium). The main technical application short term would be gold plated electrical contacts on every plug and little else...
- theGeatZhopa 2y ago> The main technical application short term would be gold plated electrical contacts on every plug and little else... .. And gold teeth and grillz.
- emporas 2y agoRegarding gold, i like this infographic [1], but my favorite from this channel is wolf population by country. Point being, that gold is shiny and beautiful, and it will be used even when it is not appropriate solution to the problem, just because it is shiny. I didn't know that copper is a better conductor than gold. Surprised by that. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Gd8CRG0cc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Gd8CRG0cc