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> gold, nickel, and / or iron that's supposedly worth many times more than the entire global economy You hear these statements sometimes about asteroid mining,

> gold, nickel, and / or iron that's supposedly worth many times more than the entire global economy You hear these statements sometimes about asteroid mining, and they betray a misunderstanding of the way economies work. The reason gold/etc. is expensive is because it is scarce. If we suddenly have an abundance of these materials, then they will be cheap. The intrinsic value of these metals is not worth multiples of the global economy.

DennisP 2y ago
For precious metals that doesn't necessarily mean it's not worth going to get them in large quantities. Aluminum used to be more precious than gold. Now we make airplanes out of it.
- nsxwolf 2y ago
  Soda cans too!
- beerandt 2y ago
  It's a pretty good example with the difference being energy to retrieve vs energy to refine. Even with/if there's a 'flood the market' eventuality, you'd have approx multiple generations for the market to grow and mature, improving the associated technologies along the way, and wealth generated orders beyond the Carnegies Rockefellers and Vanderbilts combined.
dhosek 2y ago
I’ve had an idea for a sci fi story lurking in the back of my head of an earth-based cartel sabotaging space mining to preserve the value of their precious metals. The catch is being able to communicate the economics in a way that’s both accurate and entertaining.
- blooalien 2y ago
  As long as you double-check it's work, you could always ask an LLM for help with some of that, maybe? I'd install something local like Ollama or somesuch and download one of the larger more popular more recent models and give it an appropriate system prompt related to being a "writing assistant" or something like that. Then bounce ideas off it and maybe throw a few related articles at it for "context" to work with. It's one of the things a lotta recent LLMs are actually useful for and somewhat good at.
  - dhosek 2y ago
    Nah, I’m the kind of writer who views using a thesaurus as cheating. I have no interest in LLM nonsense for my writing.
    - blooalien 2y ago
      I can sorta understand that, but both a thesaurus and an LLM when used as tools to enhance and extend your own knowledge and skill can totally be a good thing. The problem is that many try to use such things as a substitute / replacement for their own knowledge and skill, to do the actual human creative work part for them. That's where the real fault lies; Not in the tools themselves, but in the user mis-using the tools. Also, not sure why the prior comment was gettin' down-voted. I'm just tryin' to be encouraging here. If this guy has an idea and wants to write, I'm just sayin' "go ahead and do it then". Why not? Even if nobody ever reads it, if you enjoy writing it, then something was gained.
- delsarto 2y ago
  Without giving too much away, you would probably enjoy “Artemis” by Andy Weir.

DennisP 2y ago

For precious metals that doesn't necessarily mean it's not worth going to get them in large quantities. Aluminum used to be more precious than gold. Now we make airplanes out of it.

nsxwolf 2y ago
Soda cans too!
beerandt 2y ago
It's a pretty good example with the difference being energy to retrieve vs energy to refine. Even with/if there's a 'flood the market' eventuality, you'd have approx multiple generations for the market to grow and mature, improving the associated technologies along the way, and wealth generated orders beyond the Carnegies Rockefellers and Vanderbilts combined.

dhosek 2y ago

I’ve had an idea for a sci fi story lurking in the back of my head of an earth-based cartel sabotaging space mining to preserve the value of their precious metals. The catch is being able to communicate the economics in a way that’s both accurate and entertaining.

blooalien 2y ago
As long as you double-check it's work, you could always ask an LLM for help with some of that, maybe? I'd install something local like Ollama or somesuch and download one of the larger more popular more recent models and give it an appropriate system prompt related to being a "writing assistant" or something like that. Then bounce ideas off it and maybe throw a few related articles at it for "context" to work with. It's one of the things a lotta recent LLMs are actually useful for and somewhat good at.
- dhosek 2y ago
  Nah, I’m the kind of writer who views using a thesaurus as cheating. I have no interest in LLM nonsense for my writing.
  - blooalien 2y ago
    I can sorta understand that, but both a thesaurus and an LLM when used as tools to enhance and extend your own knowledge and skill can totally be a good thing. The problem is that many try to use such things as a substitute / replacement for their own knowledge and skill, to do the actual human creative work part for them. That's where the real fault lies; Not in the tools themselves, but in the user mis-using the tools. Also, not sure why the prior comment was gettin' down-voted. I'm just tryin' to be encouraging here. If this guy has an idea and wants to write, I'm just sayin' "go ahead and do it then". Why not? Even if nobody ever reads it, if you enjoy writing it, then something was gained.
delsarto 2y ago
Without giving too much away, you would probably enjoy “Artemis” by Andy Weir.