Money is a key part of the formation of societies and history shows that many independent civilisations came up with money time and time again.
Gold is a great form of money thanks to its unique chemistry:
Its colour and lustre is unique - it's fairly easy to tell something is gold-ish by eye and weight. This is why gold was chosen by our low-tech forebears.
Its lower melting temp makes it easier to purify than say Platinum or even Aluminium.
Its inertness (thanks in part to the relativistic contraction of the 6s orbitals) mean that you can leave it in a safe for 1000 years and it'll basically be the same. You literally need conc HNO3 and H2SO4 aka aqua Regis to dissolve it.
People who think gold is a pet rock and is useless fail to appreciate that even if all stores of value are pointless and arbitrary, we still gravitate around particular stores for a reason.
I'd be fairly happy to hang onto some gold in a post Apocalyptic world if it looks like society may eventually recover.
Even stuff like coffee and oil would be useless in any size because they have a shelf life. And cash at scale can literally rot or get eaten by mice. Gold can be buried and it'll be there forever basically
Comments
Money is a key part of the formation of societies and history shows that many independent civilisations came up with money time and time again.
Gold is a great form of money thanks to its unique chemistry:
Its colour and lustre is unique - it's fairly easy to tell something is gold-ish by eye and weight. This is why gold was chosen by our low-tech forebears.
Its lower melting temp makes it easier to purify than say Platinum or even Aluminium.
Its inertness (thanks in part to the relativistic contraction of the 6s orbitals) mean that you can leave it in a safe for 1000 years and it'll basically be the same. You literally need conc HNO3 and H2SO4 aka aqua Regis to dissolve it.
People who think gold is a pet rock and is useless fail to appreciate that even if all stores of value are pointless and arbitrary, we still gravitate around particular stores for a reason.
I'd be fairly happy to hang onto some gold in a post Apocalyptic world if it looks like society may eventually recover.
Even stuff like coffee and oil would be useless in any size because they have a shelf life. And cash at scale can literally rot or get eaten by mice. Gold can be buried and it'll be there forever basically
Plus gold not only came from outer space, but from outside this solar system. In practice it doesn't make much difference but I find it super cool.