And the notion that you've chosen to spend your life with this person is NOT a sign of commitment and love?A Smooth Criminal said:
Poll: Diamonds! Are Worthless Little Chunks Of Worthless Rock...
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Sticking the hardest material on our planet into jewellery is a colossal waste of resources when we could be using them for far more important things like drill bits, saw blades, microchips and lasers.
I mean, has Anno 2070 taught us NOTHING?!
Just say "I love you" and mean it/be willing to accept the consequences.
I mean, has Anno 2070 taught us NOTHING?!
Just say "I love you" and mean it/be willing to accept the consequences.
Come to think of it, diamonds are pretty damn hard to break and actually pretty easy to get. Why aren't they being used for military purposes?
It's not the hardest [footnote]http://phys.org/news153658987.html[/footnote] material and lab diamonds are used for those things seeing as they can be sprayed and grown to needed size.Pebble said:
Diamonds are as worth as much people think they're worth, it's just carbon. Diamond is an infinite resource, we can synthesize it and have it look exactly the same as a normal diamond. Gold and silver are both finite resources, logically, gold and silver should be worth more.
Introduce a diamond to a hammer, see how hard it is to break.DaWaffledude said:
Tip: It's quite easy. Smashie smashie.
Someone above mentioned making bullets out of them. Hah. No. You'd fire, and the thing would shatter in the barrel.
Bah, first of all Diamonds are ridiculously cheap if you know where to get them, then you get a gold artisan to make it into a ring. My parents have won small pouches of Diamonds (full of them) for around 100,000 pesos (10k~Dollars) but seriously, I don't care about the whole "immortal" connotation it has, it's just a show of affection I feel. Society has come to expect it to a degree and there's nothing wrong with gloating, it's part of being human.
Why bother with anything pretty? Why don't you just sleep in an undecorated box of a room, I mean, Decoration is illogical right?
There's nothing wrong with getting someone something that's rare as a show of affection.
Not diamonds though. As you have heard they're really common and their prices are driven up artificially. To me diamonds represent the blind following of tradition. Eventually the people that hold down diamonds will have to stop, and when that time comes all those diamond rings will be worth so much less.
When that time comes people who think diamonds are pretty can buy some for cheap and line their houses with them.
Not diamonds though. As you have heard they're really common and their prices are driven up artificially. To me diamonds represent the blind following of tradition. Eventually the people that hold down diamonds will have to stop, and when that time comes all those diamond rings will be worth so much less.
When that time comes people who think diamonds are pretty can buy some for cheap and line their houses with them.
This.Zhukov said:
Personally. I'm not a Diamond Fan either, despite it being my 'birth stone' and most suited gem in all sorts of hilarious bullshit quizes. Get a Greenish Aquamarine and we'll talk value. Those things are getting very rare.
The plain blue ones which are technically still aquamarine are still quite common to see, but one reflecting the actual colour (greeny-blue) is getting scarce. The one I saw closest to it was going for something like 3k (not even in a ring)
But it's definitely my gem of choice.
Diamond market is kept artificially high, it's pretty common knowledge, but people place their faith on that value and it becomes what it is. Supply is kept from the market, so the demand stays at a level they can be sold for obnoxious prices.
So it is what it is.
I don't think buying a diamond for a loved one is so bad if it really means alot to you both. Be as cynical as you like. Hell I am. I just don't wanna rain on the parades of people who's faith in those kinds of things does mean something.
I despise relationships that need a symbol to hold them together. Diamonds are only useful if I attach them to the tips of my gloves, so that I can slice at people that I don't like. So yeah, I agree with op and No, as in No fucking way I am ever proposing to anyone.
Diamonds are for suckers, everyone knows that they are thermodynamically unstable and will eventually turn into carbon. Now lead or carbon those are the good ones. I intend to propose with a piece of coal just to knock her off her feet in amazement.
Seriously though, diamonds are decorative. You might say it's not a big deal, but this is how we work. We get fancy cars to show off, we get good looking spouses to show off, we get degrees. A great deal of what we get to give us an illusion of happiness has no practical purpose, art, uncomfortable furniture, fish tanks and jewelry. There's value to things we are willing to pay for,though there's no practical use for it.
Seriously though, diamonds are decorative. You might say it's not a big deal, but this is how we work. We get fancy cars to show off, we get good looking spouses to show off, we get degrees. A great deal of what we get to give us an illusion of happiness has no practical purpose, art, uncomfortable furniture, fish tanks and jewelry. There's value to things we are willing to pay for,though there's no practical use for it.
I've seen this like 3 times, and I have to correct it.Gordon Freemonty said:
Nice slippery slope guys. Saying that one piece of decoration is excessive, and worthless (The OP phrased things extremely poorly, but come on, reading between the lines isn't hard, and a bunch of people have already corrected that point).
A small ring on someone's finger isn't exactly the same as the entire appearance of a piece of space. My room already has function, so I'm going to have it either way, having it look nicer is a bonus. The ring on the other hand isn't. No function, bar decoration, and outdated social constructs.
But that's kind of tangential: If the purpose of the ring was strictly decorative, it is outdone by buying your partner a designer dress, or suit, or whatever, on a simple appearance/cost ratio. Heck, screw cost: The ring doesn't do as much as clothing, whatever the costs involved. The ring is an inefficient decoration, at a high cost which it does not justify. The cost is so high in comparison to it's benefits that it becomes ridiculous. Until your seriously up close, you can't tell if they wear a ring, and unless you're a jeweller with a loupe, you can't tell a real from a fake.
If decoration was all that mattered, a spray-painted piece of plastic with a piece of glass or cubic zirconia embedded in it would do.
Pretty much this. The concept of the jewel as a sign of commitment and whatnot is deliberately endorsed by those selling the jewel, for a large amount of money. It's a scam to take money from you. There is no good reason to defend it, and citing arguments about the decorative uses, or symbolic uses, of an item which is inordinately expensive, possible to synthesise, and easy to fake, is ridiculous.Loop Stricken said:
The absurdity of the tradition is not simply that it is decoration, or a symbol. It's that it's a mass-conspiracy to take your money. The cost/benefit ratio is completely out.
Your logic fails you, as you are not comparing like items. Gold is worth more than carbon, even in the form of a diamond. You can buy rough diamonds for dirt cheap on ebay. The problem with your assessment(and the biggest flaw with the OP's argument) is that you are only considering objective measurements when determining worth, yet you are comparing an element with a crafted good.Rule Britannia said:
A diamond's value is determined chiefly by four factors: clarity, carat(size), color, and cut. Clarity and carat are the only ones that can be directly compared to gold, and even then it isn't a perfect match. Gold may be the rarer mineral, but you can melt gold down, extract impurities, combine small quantities to make a larger mass, and after all that, the resulting material will be worth the same(or more) than what you started with. A diamond is what it is. You can't refine an included diamond to make it flawless, and flawless diamonds of any size are rarer than gold(manufactured diamonds can be determined to be such by a professional). Beyond that, color can also affect the rarity(and therefore value) of a diamond.
But the most important distinction that you are ignoring is that diamonds are graded on how well they are cut. A talented and experienced gemcutter can cut a diamond to best show off its natural characteristics, which would increase its value far beyond the ones churned out to most jewelry stores. You can't even really compare it to a well crafted gold ring, as you don't get second chances with gemcutting. If you screw up, you're either stuck with the result, or you lose material(and therefore value).
Someone said it before, but a diamond is a work of art. And like all art, there are people who will appreciate it and people who will not(obviously the OP falls into this category). The reason diamonds can be(but aren't necessarily) expensive is because they are an artform crafted on to a rare(for high quality) and unforgiving canvas.
As for me... well I designed my wife's and my wedding rings(no engagement ring), and my wife's does have diamonds set into platinum, though none were terribly expensive(the center stone was $50 because it apparently has a black speck in it, but neither my wife nor I can see it). My own ring is platinum with a gold sunburst surrounding a topaz. I'm happy with the aesthetic and enjoy knowing that our rings are truly unique.
The value in gold is that it's stable, it doesn't oxidize and such, so it's an investment in something that won't fall apart. The rest is just like our entire economy, artificial. Things are worth what people are willing to pay, the only intrinsic value in anything is it's usefulness (food, water, shelter), the rest is just worth what you think it's worth, and sentimental value. For example, the teddy bear I got when I was born is infinitely more valuable to me than any diamond. My two cents anyway.The Heavenator said:
OT: Well, fortunately, the whole diamond engagement ring stuff isn't that big in Norway, most people I know have fairly simple gold or silver bands. For me, I'd get my girlfriend something I could afford, no sense in bankrupting yourself, and personally I'd go for something more personal, like if she wanted a stone, I'd get her birth stone for example.
For me, all I'd want is a simple silver band. I simply prefer the look of silver to gold.
This here is the first argument that made any kind of sense to me. Smaller diamonds with flaws are a dime a dozen. Large flawless diamonds may actually be rare and working them properly into an appealing shape could be considered an artistic skill.Scars Unseen said:
I am not an appreciator of paintings or any similar form of art. I appreciate music, film, writing, many different forms of art but paintings, photos, drawings, they never clicked with me. I guess diamonds fall into that same category.
I am willing to accept that legitimately rare diamonds crafted by a master hand may have worth, though I still don't think it's nearly as much as some of you do.
Saying people are morons on a subject like artistic or visual merit just ends up with a clusterfuck of a debate on an epic scale.2HF said: