What if gold is produced in lab?

[theomar]

By using Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR), Nickel transmutes into copper producing large amounts of heat. Although the physics behind this phenomena is not yet understood completely there is a lot of information on the web.

Here is some:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSVTg_yfwgg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxeKeuh_2Bw
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer
http://www.defkalion-energy.com/

What if LENR is used for creating precious metals like gold, silver or platinum with low cost?

http://www.drjoechampion.com/Procedure.htm

Then bitcoin would be the only medium of exchange that has a limited supply.



What do you think?

[paraipan]

By using Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR), Nickel transmutes into copper producing large amounts of heat. Although the physics behind this phenomena is not yet understood completely there is a lot of information on the web.

Here is some:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSVTg_yfwgg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxeKeuh_2Bw
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer
http://www.defkalion-energy.com/

What if LENR is used for creating precious metals like gold, silver or platinum with low cost?

http://www.drjoechampion.com/Procedure.htm

Then bitcoin would be the only medium of exchange that has a limited supply.



What do you think?

Thanks for sharing, and yes, bitcoin would probably be the only resource scarce enough for trading in the future.

[crazy_rabbit]

By using Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR), Nickel transmutes into copper producing large amounts of heat. Although the physics behind this phenomena is not yet understood completely there is a lot of information on the web.

Here is some:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSVTg_yfwgg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxeKeuh_2Bw
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Catalyzer
http://www.defkalion-energy.com/

What if LENR is used for creating precious metals like gold, silver or platinum with low cost?

http://www.drjoechampion.com/Procedure.htm

Then bitcoin would be the only medium of exchange that has a limited supply.



What do you think?

Thanks for sharing, and yes, bitcoin would probably be the only resource scarce enough for trading in the future.

You could indeed make gold in a lab, and I believe it has been done on the atomic scale. Doing it on a manufacturing level though would take an incredible amount of energy (far more then the cost of mining gold) as you would need to essentially be splitting atoms to get an atom with the right atomic structure. But it is possible.

[greyhawk]

Ah yes. Good old champion and his gold making machine that only works when he's around. Never get's old.

http://www.sharonlbegley.com/all-that-glitters-isn-t-chemistry

[HDSolar]

If this was done on a scale that could be manufactured I would bet you would have a second classification similar to man made diamonds.  A lot of men would be happy to buy man made gold for their ladies. 

[Binford 6100]

... man made gold for their ladies ...

I doubt anybody is interested in yeast colored silver ; ) that's what he's selling.

but making gold is indeed possible in machines like the large hadron collider. One atom at time. An ounce every 50 million years.

[Photon939]

I thought that nuclear transmutation resulted in gold that was at least significantly radioactive? Maybe they have found a better way to do it, I haven't read any recent articles on the subject.

[imanikin]

...
Then bitcoin would be the only medium of exchange that has a limited supply.

What do you think?

Yes, until maybe the miners consolidate into an oligarchy/cartel, and decide that the transaction fees are not enough for their "labor", and decide to increase block rewards again, or just continue them indefinitely... 

Hopefully, by that time, there will some better P2P currency.

Human nature is unlikely to change as fast as Bitcoin might change money.

[chmod755]

Then bitcoin would be the only medium of exchange that has a limited supply.

What do you think?

If someone finds (or already knows) a way to do this in a very cheap way, he/she/they won't inform you about it. If you're trying to produce something in lab you should start with platinum-190

If this was done on a scale that could be manufactured I would bet you would have a second classification similar to man made diamonds.  A lot of men would be happy to buy man made gold for their ladies.  

Maybe, but if it's done correctly it'll be hard to find out if it's natural gold or man made gold.

or just continue them indefinitely...  

If that'd happen many people would sell their Bitcoins. If you're not efficient at mining you have to leave the game.

[DeathAndTaxes]

I thought that nuclear transmutation resulted in gold that was at least significantly radioactive? Maybe they have found a better way to do it, I haven't read any recent articles on the subject.

It shouldn't.  Hg 197 (isotope of mercurcy) captures a neutron to become Hg 197 which decays rapidly to Au197.   Most of the unstable isotopes of gold have a half life in seconds so the quickly will decay to non-radioactive "non-gold".   If you produced "gold" in a lab and it was radioactive the portions which were radioactive are either non-gold or soon will become non-gold.  In refining the non-gold elements can be separated out. 

Of course all this is academic, IIRC the cost to produce 1 oz of gold is on the order of millions of dollars.  It is simply easier, cheaper, and faster to just dig it out of the ground.  Still if lab created gold was ever economically viable you may need to "age" the gold.  By letting the gold sit for say 5 years before refining you could cause 99.999999999% of the unstable gold isotopes to decay to non-gold.

[DeathAndTaxes]

If this was done on a scale that could be manufactured I would bet you would have a second classification similar to man made diamonds.  A lot of men would be happy to buy man made gold for their ladies. 

Doubtful.  Diamons aren't a unified structure.  It is the presence of inclusions and other abnormalities which are used to determine if a diamond is natural.  Also the lab made diamonds are getting better and better so a diamond marked natural may actually not be.  Diamonds also have the advantage of a monopolistic cartel.  Since 90%+ diamond pass through the cartel they can be marked with the origin. 

Gold on the other hand is just gold.  You can melt it and reform it.  Take 10 oz of gold coins, melt them  and make a 10 oz gold bar and you can change the form completely but it is still 10 oz of gold.  If synthetic gold could be made it likely would be nearly impossible to detect.  Also who cares?  It is gold.  It isn't like it is fake gold.  It has all the properties of gold right down the atomic structure.   The value of gold would quickly fall to slightly above the marginal cost of production.   The good news is that marginal cost of synthetic production is currently in the millions of dollars per oz. 

[DeathAndTaxes]

Yes, until maybe the miners consolidate into an oligarchy/cartel, and decide that the transaction fees are not enough for their "labor", and decide to increase block rewards again, or just continue them indefinitely... 

Of course that wouldn't be bitcoin and given there are no barriers of entry the remaining non-cartel miners could continue to real bitcoin fork.  In time more miners would join the real fork because that is where the value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity) is at.

It would be like saying.  Yeah someday gold miners could get tired of limited quantities of gold and start making coins made out of sand.  Then people would buy the sand coins and the supply of sand coins would explode.   Except they wouldn't.  They would continue to use the gold coins due to their value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity).

[cunicula]

Of course that wouldn't be bitcoin and given there are no barriers of entry the remaining non-cartel miners could continue to real bitcoin fork.  In time more miners would join the real fork because that is where the value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity) is at.

It would be like saying.  Yeah someday gold miners could get tired of limited quantities of gold and start making coins made out of sand.  Then people would buy the sand coins and the supply of sand coins would explode.   Except they wouldn't.  They would continue to use the gold coins due to their value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity).

How do the other miners mine without the cartel's blessing? You are dismissing the cartel by assuming that it does not exist.

[Lethn]

You know what this means don't you? Time to go out to space to find a new even rarer metal!

[DeathAndTaxes]

Of course that wouldn't be bitcoin and given there are no barriers of entry the remaining non-cartel miners could continue to real bitcoin fork.  In time more miners would join the real fork because that is where the value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity) is at.

It would be like saying.  Yeah someday gold miners could get tired of limited quantities of gold and start making coins made out of sand.  Then people would buy the sand coins and the supply of sand coins would explode.   Except they wouldn't.  They would continue to use the gold coins due to their value (from utility, adoption, and scarcity).

How do the other miners mine without the cartel's blessing? You are dismissing the cartel by assuming that it does not exist.

If the cartel is mining the fork then there is no restriction on mining the original.  Unless it is your claim that the cartel will be so powerful as to have a monopoly on the mining of both the fork and the original.   I know that is your argument because you have months ago denounced proof of work as unviable but it is just your unproven conclusion.

[ffcitatos]

By using Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR), Nickel transmutes into copper producing large amounts of heat. Although the physics behind this phenomena is not yet understood completely there is a lot of information on the web.
<...>
What do you think?

I think that Physics behind nuclear reactions is relatively well understood - producing gold in that way is not financially viable (and by that I mean millions of times more expensive than mining it from the ground).

I did not check the links, but presumably you are talking about cold fusion. In that case, it is complete crackpottery, meaning that it will never work, as that would break fundamental laws of Physics.

[imanikin]

...
It would be like saying.  Yeah someday gold miners could get tired of limited quantities of gold and start making coins made out of sand. 
...

Perhaps, to you "it would be like saying" that, but i am not going to waste our time on this pedantic debate, which has happened here before, including scenarios under which the miners would change the Bitcoin rules...

That's the point: Bitcoin has rules - of which the limited supply is one - which can be changed by the miners, because they are not based upon some unchangeable laws of the universe...

Many if not most of Life's games, including money, have undergone rule changes, which did not make them an entirely new game, and did not lead to their immediate abandonment or demise... 

Hopefully, by the time the miners get too full of themselves to do that, there will be a P2P currency that doesn't involve "mining", and is based on rules that really cannot be changed.

[Spaceman_Spiff]

I too believe the bitcoin rules could be changed, little by little, similar to the transition from the gold standard to pure fiat as we have it today.  But it takes decades to boil a frog that way without it jumping out of the cooking pot, so at least we'll have a few decades of "good money".

[Binford 6100]

I did not check the links, but presumably you are talking about cold fusion. In that case, it is complete crackpottery, meaning that it will never work, as that would break fundamental laws of Physics.

please give it a try (when you'll need a good laugh or run low on wtf moments). here, some pearls I reposted elsewhere that can give you an idea what to expect:

most people are so ingrained with traditional scientific theory that they have no room in their philosophies for such a totally revolutionary concept.

The resonant metal alloys of transdimensional plasma ships are developed using precision multi-stage temperature and frequency programs that convert base metals into alloys (above) containing all of the precious metals, rare earth elements and trace amounts of every other element on the periodic table - many in crystallized or metallic states not yet conceived of by Earthly scientists. Polarization of the final products is achieved by the micro-layering of perpendicular grain patterns formed within the crystals.

[justusranvier]

please give it a try (when you'll need a good laugh or run low on wtf moments). here, some pearls I reposted elsewhere that can give you an idea what to expect:

most people are so ingrained with traditional scientific theory that they have no room in their philosophies for such a totally revolutionary concept.

The resonant metal alloys of transdimensional plasma ships are developed using precision multi-stage temperature and frequency programs that convert base metals into alloys (above) containing all of the precious metals, rare earth elements and trace amounts of every other element on the periodic table - many in crystallized or metallic states not yet conceived of by Earthly scientists. Polarization of the final products is achieved by the micro-layering of perpendicular grain patterns formed within the crystals.

Cold fusion advocated are firm believers in, "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit."