Diamonds are somewhat rare on earth, but apparently space is littered with them, and the Spitzer Space Telescope is perfect for looking for them.
Before you get too giddy and have spectacular visions of finding out if isometric-hexoctahedral crystal lattice carbon allotropes are an extraterrestrial space babe’s best friend, keep in mind that the glittering stardust out there is mainly nanodiamonds, or gems 25,000 times smaller than a grain of sand. Spitzer’s powerful infrared vision is sweeping the sky looking for the stones, which can help tell us more about the origin of the universe if we can figure out the conditions under which they were created. We won’t be intercepting any 42 million carat asteroids any time soon.
The thing that raises my curiosity is the “Utopia” question of exploration. Thomas More described Amaurot, the capital of Utopia, as a city that didn’t care much for gold and silver because it serves no practical purpose in daily life, the way iron does. “The folly of men has enhanced the value of gold and silver, because of their scarcity,” he wrote.
There must be other worlds where diamonds and gold are more common, due to whatever specific geological activity existed there in the age in which it was created. But how strange to imagine a society where:
They find pearls on their coast, and diamonds and carbuncles on their rocks; they do not look after them, but, if they find them by chance, they polish them, and with them they adorn their children, who are delighted with them, and glory in them during their childhood; but when they grow to years, and see that none but children use such baubles, they of their own accord, without being bid by their parents, lay them aside; and would be as much ashamed to use them afterward as children among us, when they come to years, are of their puppets and other toys.
I think I could handle a little of that world . . .
on Feb 26th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
reminds me of El Dorado from Voltaire’s Candide. Synopsis from Wikipedia: “Candide and Cacambo wander on, and when it seems as though they are doomed to die in the jungle, Cacambo proposes the idea that they hop in a canoe, float downstream, and hope for the best. After a turbulent ride, they find themselves in the land of Eldorado, a geographically isolated utopia where the streets are covered with precious stones, there are no priests, and all of the king’s jokes are funny.”
on Feb 26th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
addendum: the children that Candide and Cacambo meet are all playing with the precious stones and the dust on the ground is gold. they totally take away buku treasures on the backs of 100 sheep. their inner scotsmen are pleased.
on Feb 27th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
One of the fellows here at work said he would never give a woman he cared for a diamond because its value was purely fabricated. We can already MAKE diamonds that are better in every measurement of quality than can readily be found, for far less than the inflated prices as set by the cartels.
I’m reading The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson, and in one chapter it talks about how all of the clear surfaces on a pleasure ship were made of diamond because it was cheaper than glass. Interesting statement as to what is rare and priceless.