Gold and Silver: How and Why did these curious metals find themselves at the center of the financial universe
Nobody ever sat down and decided that gold would be the money of the ages. There was no meetings of kings or priests declaring that Gold would now be the universally accepted unit of exchange. Gold and silver emerged as the best money.
But Why Gold and Silver?
To answer this question all we need is a periodic table.
First let's remove the gases as they could never be used as money for obvious reasons.
Next let's remove anything that dissolves in water or reacts with air (whether it corrodes or bursts into flames)
Next let's remove anything radioactive, because you don't want your money to kill you
That leaves us with 5 precious metals Gold, Silver, Rhodium, Platinum and Palladium
Neither Palladium or rhodium were discovered till the 18th century which rules them out as early money
Lastly we rule out platinium is its melting point is around 3000 degrees celsius which was far out of reach of mans early furnaces
Beautiful in its rational simplicity. Well done!
Really glad you enjoyed it
This is excellent! Totally logical.
Thanks. It means alot coming from you. I have been following your great work for a while.
I like the way you did that. It's also still useful as money today as opposed to other alloys because it maintains it's value. Also, as mining technology improves gold production rises more or less in line with population growth, which makes it ideal to be used as a store of value.
Great point.Gold mining has been rising at roughly 1.5% which is almost exactly the population growth rate.
Actually this helps, love a bit of rationalizing
Yeah sometimes we overcomplicate the simple stuff.
Diamond is a form of carbon. I think that one falls out because you cannot melt it? Great post!
Yes diamonds are an interesting example. I am of the opinion that they can't be used as they are not uniform. 1 gram of a clear diamond isn't as valuable as one gram of a cloudy cracked diamond. There is also no easy way of dividing the diamond without affecting reducing it's value considerably (10x0.1 carrat diamonds are worth alot less than 1 carrat)
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