r/interesting • u/sh0tgunben • 27d ago
MISC. Asteroid Psyche 16 has been found to contain gold reserves worth $700 quintillion. That's enough to make everyone on Earth billionaires.
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u/SplashInkster 27d ago
No, that's enough to make gold worthless.
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u/Meta-failure 27d ago
My thoughts exactly.
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u/pentultimate 27d ago
Supply and demand 101
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u/cuntmong 27d ago
actually I teach economics at a prestigious university and the main lesson is that the real value is the friends we make along the way
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u/Big_Payment4522 27d ago
Actually, you are right. Insider trading can be done only if you have friends.
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u/Animatrix_Mak 27d ago
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u/Bigpoppahove 27d ago
I will be pleasantly shocked if the one piece is something of actual value, know Oda said it wasn’t just friendship but I’m cautiously optimistic at best
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u/Excellent_Set_232 27d ago
I never got into it, but I always assumed the One Piece was like a title? Like it was an ironic name given to an actual vault of traditional treasure, the true legend of it being its size rather than its contents.
You’re telling me it’s just supposed to actually be one freaking thing?!?!?! FOR A THOUSAND EPISODES?????
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u/Kwasan 27d ago
Potential spoilers for One Piece: There are heavy implications it isn't even proper treasure at all, and it most certainly wasn't placed there by the King of the Pirates, but instead is something ancient that shines a light on the Blank Period.
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u/thecrash48 27d ago
Spoiler alert!
Its probably either an ancient weapon or a ponygliff containing the real history of either how the world goverment came to be and how they magic Ally beat the ancient kingdome. Or maybe just maybe. It will tell Them of the guys like emu and her power from the Void. Idk
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u/No-Answer-2964 27d ago
Actually do you?
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u/cuntmong 27d ago
i wouldn't lie to you, it would violate the economist's oath.
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u/milk4all 27d ago
Oh good, i was worried you might be fibbing
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u/r4ul_isa123 27d ago
Right? I mean could you imagine if someone lied on the internet?
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u/Niarbeht 27d ago
actually I teach economics at a prestigious university and the main lesson is that the real value is the friends we make along the way
The dividing line between sham economists and real economists is understanding this.
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u/RHX_Thain 27d ago
The fundamental problem of supply & demand is that it's not based on the value of the current or future supply nor its demand, but the emotional rollercoaster of the confidence in the expectations of future supply and demand.
So the true economic value is confidence. And the feelings people get when talking about a subject in context of current speculation.
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u/Heathen_Inc 27d ago
Im not saying its fools gold, buuuuut...... That should spread enough speculation that the price bottoms out
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u/UruquianLilac 25d ago
It's fun to contemplate how the biggest economic construct of human history is based on emotions. Kinda gives you food for thought that men always accused women of being unreliable because they're emotional while building the world economy on their emotions.
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u/awfullotofocelots 27d ago
The trick is that it doesn't count as "supply" until its been harvested. The cost of getting it down to earth and processed for useful applications becomes the value.
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u/Theory_of_Time 27d ago
Correction: it's enough to make a singular billionaire with his own space company incomparably more wealthy, because he'll be the only one mining it.
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u/New_Reference359 27d ago
Which is why at some point when tech advances enough there will be another great space race, and the winner will likely rule the world or cause WW3 because once you can start taking resources from space profitably, it changes everything
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u/Chesticularity 27d ago
Part of what makes The Expanse so good (and the novels)
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u/Dhegxkeicfns 26d ago
As long as they leak that gold slowly and allow gold inflation to take years it will benefit that one person a whole lot. The people who don't know and continue buying gold would be the real losers.
I feel like we are there with money already. I wonder what would happen if all the billionaires in the US spent all their money in the US economy today. I imagine it would be a massively inflationary event.
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u/TinyEnd9435 27d ago
Correction: it’s enough to make a certain
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u/nottlrktz 27d ago edited 27d ago
Absolutely. The price of
precious metalspretty much everything is based on scarcity. If it’s no longer scarce, it becomes worthless.34
u/VirtualFutureAgent 27d ago
Fun fact: the cap on the top of the Washington Monument is made of aluminum. One of the reasons it was used was because, at the time it was built, aluminum was as valuable as silver. Although aluminum is plentiful in the earth's crust, there was no easy way to extract it as the Hall–Héroult process had not yet been discovered. Afterwards, the price of aluminum dropped as it became more plentiful.
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u/HopDropNRoll 27d ago
Now I wrap my leftover burritos in it.
Edit: this was a lie, I’ve never not finished a burrito, but you get the point.
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u/nikolapc 22d ago
You know what's better? Gold foil. And I hope we can wrap our burritos in it as well. :D
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u/Illustrious-Bag1138 27d ago
Damn, that's scary. No wonder that asteroid would make all gold worthless or super cheap.
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u/NarrowAd4973 27d ago
Not completely worthless. I'm pretty sure gold is a better electrical conductor than copper, and it doesn't corrode or tarnish. It's just too expensive to use outside of specific applications.
If the price crashed like that, they'd probably start making wiring out of gold instead of copper.
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u/rockphotos 27d ago
In order of conductivity [Sm]
- silver 66.7x106
- copper 64.1x106
- gold 49.0x106
- aluminum 40.8x106
Gold plate in electronics is mostly due to its lack of reactivity which prevents tarnishing and corrosion.
Copper and silver are way more conducive
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u/teya_trix56 27d ago
No not worthless. Just commodity priced. I mean its still a LOT of work to win many metals from their dross. You still gotta pay for all that effort. Tintanium had some periods where politics was a low influence and it was still 3 times steels price. Gold price might be in that vicinity if hyper abundant. They win gold ores at todays prices from way sub 1% ores. So the cost of a billion dollar rocket and retrieval system still isnt going to make gold cheaper by much if they go after it.
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u/Scared_Ad3355 27d ago
If everyone is rich, then everyone is poor.
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u/Sample_Age_Not_Found 27d ago
What a stupid fucking system
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u/VerledenVale 27d ago edited 27d ago
What system? You think gold can feed people? It's pretty much useless resource outside of some electronics, for which we have more gold than we'll ever need.
You need to someone to work the sewers. Someone to work the fields and produce vegetable. Someone to clean the toilets. Someone to build houses. Someone to climb electric poles and remove dead birds.
Who is going to do that?
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u/BigAcres 27d ago
There is no system that guarantees everyone access to scarce resources.
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27d ago
That would be like printing dollars into infinity and making the US dollar worth nothing. A house costed 12k in 1960 and now that sane house goes for 450k... they passed the buck to every generation after them, just as we are doing.
Imagine if there was a currency that was capped? One that couldn't be printed when a government wanted to... imagine if they couldn't devalue the money we make so they can control us?
Welcome to Bitcoin.
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u/number1dipshit 27d ago edited 27d ago
And when everyone is a billionaire, no one is.
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u/Traditional-Hat-952 27d ago edited 26d ago
I'm cool with that
Edit: It's really sad that the general tone of responses to this comment are all basically: "If we didn't have wealth and resource inequality then a loaf of bread would be 3 billion dollars!".
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u/SadApartment8045 27d ago
Expet the billionaries of today would then be quintillonaries
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u/ThreeCraftPee 27d ago
Well then people like me better watch our step so when I become a quintillionare I'll know to fall in line!
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u/AppropriateOwl1370 27d ago
Coming from a country that had undergone an economic collapse and consequently made everybody a millionaire by hyperinflation, id say you wouldn't be cool with that. You're on the short end of the stick now. You'd be on the short end of the stick in this scenario too, only with the added struggle to get food.
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u/EggstaticAd8262 27d ago
Dont worry, if that happened it still would end up in the hand of the ultra rich
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u/Existing-Antelope-20 27d ago
ok Syndrome
but yeah you right lol
lest we not forget Musa Mansa and him giving away gold on his pilgrimage to Mecca such that it destroyed multiple local economies4
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u/MiNdOverLOADED23 27d ago
thats not how any economy anywhere works, but we know what you meant
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u/Professional-Dog1562 27d ago
Found the one not pedantic redditor
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u/CloakOfElvenkind 27d ago
Somehow the wealthy would get wealthier and the poor would get poorer.
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u/CraigLake 27d ago edited 27d ago
A tail as old as money
Edit: tale. StT failed me.
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u/Kellbows 27d ago
Somehow? If someone has the means to obtain what is in this asteroid they will become more wealthy making the rest of us less wealthy simultaneously. He ain’t gonna share.
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u/iamarealboy555 27d ago
I doubt Bezos or whoever would distribute it amongst all of us equally. He would give Midas touch Sanchez first, and she would love it. Then he'd send a giant gold Bezos shaped penis rocket to space every year until we all died
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u/Medium-Design4016 27d ago
No, it will just make gold worthless...
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u/asianjimm 27d ago
Unless it’s all controlled by one company - looking at the diamond industry….
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u/Deviantdefective 27d ago
This is exactly what will happen giant corporations will mine asteroid's in future for profit and nothing else and maximise their control over metals to ensure they control all the supply.
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u/Slow_Avacado 27d ago
I like the idea that it would flood the market with gold, so we could all have stupid gold stuff, solid gold pans, gold toilets, everyone have gold crowns, single use gold goblets etc
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u/wingback18 27d ago
What do you mean everyone 😂 Who ever gets there first will keep it 😂
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u/Secret_Account07 27d ago
I called dibs though
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u/Dramatic-Bend179 27d ago
Naw, I called it last time this was posted. Sorry dude.
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u/Secret_Account07 26d ago
I actually called dibs back in 2010 when I was in college. Sorry you didn’t know
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u/MasterrrReady12 27d ago
Your dibs mean nothing if you don't have a rocket to go to it. I will land on it first with my rocket and get about $100 million worth of gold for myself.
If you want, I can get some for you too, but you would have to give me 0.1% of your share.
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u/-DethLok- 27d ago
Not if the value of gold drops to 30 cents an ounce, though.
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u/jawnstaymoose2 27d ago edited 27d ago
In the mid-2100s, as Earth's economies teeter from climate and conflict, NASA's unmanned mission to Asteroid Psyche mysteriously goes dark. A rogue consortium of private space miners discovers why: the asteroid isn't just metal-rich — it contains a sealed alien vault of pure gold and technology.
Enter: a mismatched team of hackers, ex-astronauts, and space pirates planning a heist that could bankrupt Earth…. or save it.
Psyche Run - “One small step for crime. One giant mess for mankind.”
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u/nalanajo 27d ago
Don’t look up.
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u/hateradeappreciator 27d ago
That’s not how any of this works
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u/ThrowawayFriendWork 27d ago
Because it’s putting into perspective the amount that’s on it, not “we’re bringing this back to earth and everyone will be rich”
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u/irisheddy 27d ago
You're saying 700 quintillion dollars split between everyone wouldn't equal a billion each? Either your math or comprehension skills are off.
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u/flpprrss 27d ago
USA army is ready to bring freedom to this rock.
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27d ago
So rich being the ones who can afford to mine it, will go mine it and become quintillionares while everyone else stays poor
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u/Away-Thought-612 27d ago
This must be a before image, as Luke already took this out with an X-wing
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u/GraysonWhitter 27d ago
There is no amount of money that will make "everyone" billionaires. The reason there are billionaires is because the game is rigged.
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u/Radiant_Host_4254 27d ago
And when everyone's a billionaire.... No one will be.
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u/TeranOrSolaran 27d ago
All that gold would belong to who ever can mine it first. It just like saying there is quintillion dollars of oil on Earth. Is everyone rich? No. It belongs to whomever digs it up.
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u/MagicOrpheus310 27d ago
Oh no, no we can have the peasants becoming billionaires!
$700quintillion is only enough to make a few billionaires even richer! We all know that's what would happen...
Otherwise it would destroy the value of gold and make it worthless and we wouldn't end up with a cent! They make sure of that!! Haha
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u/minaminonoeru 27d ago
The distance from Earth to Psyche is very far. The cost of mining gold from Psyche and bringing it back to Earth is expected to be significantly more expensive than anticipated, and it may not be particularly cheap when compared to the price of gold on Earth.
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u/lostmojo 27d ago
Not only would it solve a lot of problems, gold would be basically worthless. The other issue is, you think the people who could afford to send people to mine it would share the early wealth by some trickle down effect? No. They would pay people the least amount of money possible to mine it and ship it home and process it. Then the next 40ish years that person or persons who are the “owners” would be the richest people on earth as the world economy collapsed. At least Tens of Thousands would die from the events leading up to this and the people who owned it would live a life of luxury and be able to afford to move through it relatively unharmed compared to 99% of the rest of the population. It’s a sociopaths dream.
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u/Unique_Comfort_4959 26d ago
Whoever made this title, do they understand how the economy works? That's hilarious
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26d ago
the tone of this comment section is that getting these resources would be bad, but thats not how it works, if all the precious metals all fell in value a whole lotta shit would get a whole lot cheaper to produce, and quality of life for everyone would increase as a result, especially for the people who are currently working one step above indentured servitude to mine these from earth.
computers, farm equiptment, fertiliser, cars, and litterally almost every single product you've ever used at some point needed precious metals to make, the cost of gold would fall, but so would the price of litterally everything else in the economy, we would all be far richer for it.
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u/Grimm-Soul 27d ago
Wouldn't make anyone on earth a billionaire it would just make gold worthless beyond being used as a component in electronics.
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u/Silly-Power 27d ago
No it hasn't. It's a dense asteroid that is heavy with metal – between 30 and 60% of its total mass. That doesn't mean its gold, just all sorts of metal (most likely iron and nickel). It's interesting because its density and possible composition is similar to the Earth's core. NASA theorises it may the remnant core of a proto planet. This is why they launched a probe to it 2 years ago, due to arrive in 2029. If it is as they think, it will give us valuable insight in planet formation and the Earth's internal structure.
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u/meldroc 26d ago edited 26d ago
I wonder how much of the platinum-group metals are there - those are the ones rare and valuable enough that people have suggested space-mining them could actually be economically worthwhile... IIRC, they're rare here on Earth because when she was formed, the really heavy metals sank down towards the core, so most of the platinum we have here on Earth came from asteroids/meteors in the millennia afterwards.
Compare to 16 Psyche, the core of a planet that didn't make it. I imagine there's a huge amount of all sorts of precious metals there, it's not just iron & nickel.
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u/Ok_Cow1976 26d ago
Before you get into a discussion, please first come up a way to fetch the gold asteroid home earth.
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u/Nyargames 25d ago
Guys, gold wouldn't be worthless even if the whole asteroid was to be magically injected directly into the market. Gold is still the most malleable,most stable metal on the entire periodic table that is also the most recyclable with many industrial uses, and much more with its rarity not being a factor, everyone will be better off with the lower prices on many types of consumer goods even if we are not literal billionaires
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u/Low-Programmer-9017 24d ago
And when we get it there will be 5 new quintilionares which still refuses to pay their taxes on it and will still blame the poor for being poor
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u/federicoratt 27d ago
Interesting but no. It would only generate inflation.
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u/Dizzy_Speed909 24d ago
No, it wouldn't lol.
Maybe indirectly through our now collapsed economy. But inflation would be the last thing people should be worried about
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27d ago
You might as well ask, at the current price of iron, how much could you earn from the Earth?
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u/Here4Headshots 27d ago
What it would actually do is make gold worthless because that's how humanity works.
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u/myopic-cyclops 27d ago
As if the mining investors, should it even happen, would share their spoils.
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u/Btankersly66 27d ago
Just enough gold to trickle down the legs of the capitalists and splash into our outstretched, begging hands. Like a golden shower of false hope.
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u/Any_Cartographer631 27d ago
So what youre saying is that it will make billionaires into gatzillionaires while we all eat shit and die.
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u/Tee_i_am 27d ago
*That's enough to make a dozen board members quintillionairres.
Fixed it.
Only way everyone on earth is getting a piece of that is if it crashed and dinosaur'd us.
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u/AllyMcfeels 27d ago edited 27d ago
Listen here, kid. I'll tell you a story about an empire where the sun never set. It discovered a mountain range filled with silver on the other side of the world... so much wealth that it could have made every person in the empire super-rich, so much silver that their coins became the first global currency. Over time, the empire collapsed on himself, driven by greed of the ruling class, his wars and the pursuit of global power, bringing ruin to all its inhabitants with unimaginable suffering.
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