
Scientists discover nearby ‘diamond planet’ - mrsebastian
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/137719-scientists-discover-nearby-diamond-planet
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dsr_
It ends with a speculation that mining other planets doesn't sound so crazy
any more.

Idiots. Diamond is not intrinsically valuable; carbon is not rare, and
industrial diamond is fairly cheap. Humans (and in particular one cartel) set
a high value on gemstone diamonds.

It's going to be cheaper to turn waste carbon into diamond here on Earth than
it is to boost any sort of mining platform out to another planet or our own
asteroid belt, and this will continue to be true for many many years.

~~~
cryptoz
"Idiots"? Seriously?

The speculation is not merely about planets that are lightyears away. The
speculation includes asteroids. The Google cofounders, and James Cameron, and
others, are funding Planetary Resources, which will mine near Earth asteroids.
They will be launching their first satellites in 2-3 years and plan on
beginning mining operations in about 10 years.

I think you are being extremely shortsighted and rude to call people "idiots"
when they speculate about mining the asteroids.

Edit: It saddens me that the top post in this thread contains such hate and
name-calling towards someone with the imagination to think about the future.
Come on, HN, you're supposed to be better than this.

~~~
Dove
The criticism does not seem to be against asteroid mining in general, but
against the idea that diamonds in space would make it more viable. Diamonds,
especially for industrial use, are not something Earth has a shortage of.

~~~
cryptoz
Why would it ever matter if Earth has a shortage of them, or if Earth needs
them at all? Since we're _already_ talking about large-scale spaceship
operations, consider the diamonds may be useful in space. Perhaps
extraordinarily useful.

Earth has no shortage of water, either (if you include salt water). But in
space, water is one of the most valuable things imaginable. It's rocket fuel,
humans need to drink it, etc. Perhaps diamond would be similar.

~~~
Radim
And perhaps not.

OP says mining diamonds from outer space is nonsense, with good arguments, and
you say ... what exactly? That space-mined diamonds are somehow more valuable
than earth-produced ones?

~~~
cryptoz
> and you say ... what exactly?

I say, show respect for those with opinions. Maybe diamonds in space are 100%
useless, I would be totally willing to accept that fact. I'm only upset at the
rudeness and name calling.

> That space-mined diamonds are somehow more valuable than earth-produced
> ones?

If, in 20 years, we find a use for diamonds in space, then _yes_ , they would
be much more valuable than Earth ones since you don't have to transport them
to space. Additionally, it seems quite likely to me that a strong compound
like diamond would indeed have its use in space.

~~~
stephengillie
They're on a planet, so they'd still have to be transported into space.

Just because they're not on _this_ planet...

~~~
cryptoz
> They're on a planet

or a small asteroid, which has a negligible gravity well.

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awm
The interesting thing about a 'diamond' planet is that it would be a waste of
time. Diamond's value is superficial - it can't actually be used for anything
(except cutting), so mining this planet would essentially cause diamonds to
become worthless.

Whats more interesting is a planet made up of rare metals - that would still
cause the prices to drop (this assumes the mining can easily generate lots of
metal easily, transport costs aside), but can immediately be turned around
into something useful.

~~~
scarmig
Rare earth metals are, despite the name, not actually all that rare. They're
fairly abundant in the Earth's crust and mantle.

The reason they're more expensive than, say, iron, isn't that they're rare but
they're rather difficult to purify from each other. They share the same outer
shell electrons (s and d), and what separates them from each other is their
f-shell electrons. Those, however, are buried inside the other shells. So
their differences are largely driven by differences in atomic radius,
differences which are small in chemical effect.

Which is all to say that the cost of producing them wouldn't change too much
in that scneario, even if you had access to a trillion tons of ore for free.

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sukuriant
A planet made out of diamond and graphite. Why do I feel like this would be a
terrible place to visit as a human, even with a breathing suit. If the crystal
caves are any indication of what this planet would be like, it would be
incredibly inhospitable --- though possibly quite pretty.

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tocomment
How can they possibly know what the planet is made of? Does anyone know?

~~~
btipling
Via a Spectrometer

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrometer>

You can do it yourself. Do you know why the sky is blue? Because blue light
waves are scattered by molecules in our atmosphere. The light emanating from
distant stars also interact with the molecules in the star and nearby planets
etc.

~~~
tocomment
I thought we couldn't see the light directly, only the wobble in the star?

Also wouldn't the light only show us what's on the surface? Or perhaps only
the atmosphere? They seem to know there's diamond inside the planet.

~~~
ksmiley
Perhaps they performed spectroscopy on the star, found a lot of carbon, and
reasoned that the star's planet would also be carbon-heavy.

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hippich
Something like this (except, not diamonds maybe, but some rare metal-rich
planet) and girls/casino/blackjack will drive space exploration :)

~~~
ktizo
Girls could well drive space exploration, but not necessarily in the way you
might think. Sperm is easy to store.

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Tipzntrix
I think the true word that should be in quotes is 'nearby'.

~~~
mertd
I like how "traveling to the planet and back will take you a lifetime, if you
could travel as fast as light" translates to "nearby" when dealing with the
scales of the universe.

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russell
9x10^28 carats. That's a pretty big ring.

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whyhellothere
How does extremetech.com keep on getting to the front page of HN?

(this is an honest question, while I am trying to make a point, I would
actually like to hear other peoples opinions)

Something always seems off about the quality of their articles compared to the
other (above average) content that usually makes its way to the front page.

~~~
benologist
Their parent company Ziff Davis has 5 or 6 different accounts they use to spam
HN.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4555756>

