Not to be a killjoy, but probably not.GZGoten said:
I imagine the surface is comprised of plain carbon ash and glass (as is most of the planet) with the more dense, compacted diamond material closer to the core.
Astronomers Discover Planet Made Out of Diamond
- Thread starter The Wooster
- Start date
I imagine the surface is comprised of plain carbon ash and glass (as is most of the planet) with the more dense, compacted diamond material closer to the core.
PrototypeC said:
I untwisted your panties for you.
The escapist is based in the United States, and the United States still uses Imperial measurements. Why should they pander to the rest of the world?
OT: I'm not suprised. Carbon is fairly low on the periodic table and pretty common in the universe, so this seems pretty normal to me. My question is are these going to be gemstone diamonds or industrial diamonds? Because there's a rather large difference there.
Yes, let's perpetuate the constant repetitive nature of international hatred in threads that don't even bring up countries. You know the guy who wrote this article is Canadian, right? Maybe tone down the US hatred a bit, at least over something as relatively small as the use of Fahrenheit instead of Celsius.PrototypeC said:
OT: Neat-o. Will scientists now finally realize that the universe doesn't need to simply work based around our current perception of "science"? Probably not, but hopefully this planet is a step in the right direction.
It's my favorite past-time!Fappy said:
I'm just thinking there's more productive ways of doing it rather than harping on the use of Fahrenheit.
I was hating on you plebs before it was cool ;DFappy said:
So...
Americans.
What's up with that?
*hold for applause*
...
OT: Bet there's a Marker in there, just wait, planet crackers will get to the planet then all manner of crazy necromorph shit is gonna go down.
Huh. Here's a question - how long is the day there, and what is the temperature on the side facing away from the star?Grey Carter said:
I mean, Mercury (the closest equivalent in this solar system) is insanely hot on the side facing the sun, but freezing on the opposite side. If you use robots to do your diamond mining, then freezing isn't necessarily a bad thing. If you could arrange to always be on the dark side... then robotic mining would be possible.
Assuming you could get to the star system in the first place, obviously.
Old Latin you say, how about A.M. and P.M. (ante meridiem and post meridiem)? Even people in countries that use the 24 hour clock still speak in terms of A.M. and P.M. Even Commonwealth countries can't resist using old Latin.PrototypeC said:
Besides when America eventually converts to the metric system, we'll go all the way past Celsius straight to Kelvin. Then we'll see who's stuck behind using archaic measurements. Or we'll just secretly convert to metric while still using the imperial units names just to annoy the rest of the world. Either way works.
According to this, the planet would be a bit more interesting if those diamonds were red.Dire Sloth said:
Certainly are prettier, in my mind.
i figure a lot of people are thinking this right now:
'we're rich! we're rich! let's blast ourselves off into space towards it without lightspeed drives, stasis pods and sturdy rockets! i don't care if my head explodes, i wanna diamond!'
BOOM!
a rain of brain
'we're rich! we're rich! let's blast ourselves off into space towards it without lightspeed drives, stasis pods and sturdy rockets! i don't care if my head explodes, i wanna diamond!'
BOOM!
a rain of brain
It's a little annoying that all of you from the U.S. came together to collectively belittle my concern just because of my choice of words. Is the U.S. backwards? Yes, if only in the way they measure temperature. Fahrenheit has been dropped by pretty much every nation in the world because it was no longer convenient and a better system had come along. You got offended and so you read my post as having all this rage in it; I actually typed it rather wearily.Fappy said:
Put your gung-ho patriotism aside for a minute and try thinking about this rationally. The Escapist is worldwide, and all English-speaking countries except the U.S. use Celsius. Hell, Carter could just put the Celsius in brackets next to the Fahrenheit if he insists on using the archaic one too.
Wait...so Equestria is on an alternate Earth? I was wondering what that planet was called...trophykiller said:
Now we've figured out how to win the alliance of the Equestrians. Since many ponies(like rarity) are obsessed with diamonds, we can use this resource to win their allegiance.
Also, according to data in the show(collected from when Twilight Sparkle is informing rarity about the number of stars in Orion's belt), it seems that Orion's belt is visible from their planet, meaning they must be between our star and the three stars making up the belt. So either the star has formed early enough that it's light hasn't reached us, or it *might* be Saif Al Jabbar, but that's unlikely being as how Alnitak(closest star in the belt) is around 700 LY away, whereas Saif is around 650 LY, thus meaning that the stars would likely not be lined up as well, meaning that twilight sparkle referring to them as Orion's "belt" would be incorrect.
Further evidence of the visibility of Orion's belt from Equestria comes from the episode "It's About Time", in which Twilight Sparkle mentions the horsehead nebula. The horsehead nebula makes up a large portion of the constellation Orion, including some of the belt.
P.S. I think that this post is intolerably nerdy even as far as The Escapist can handle. And don't worry, I realize the show is a work of fiction. Nothing here is to be taken seriously.
Anyways, my only question is this: Now that we've found a diamond planet, where are the pearl and platinum planets? *gets looks* Don't give me THAT! At least one of you was thinking the same thing!
CAPTCHA: it hurts
No...that's only when DVS BSTrD does a pun that it hurts, Captcha. All I did was a game reference.
EDITKINESIS ALPHA
Oh...crap...
I know what planet that is...
It came up during fanfiction research for possible realities to include.
*runs out...does a Google search...finds this Wikipedia entry [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_Brite_and_the_Star_Stealer]...runs back*
I was afraid of that. Guys...I think that's Spectra.
Diamonds are relatively common. Indeed, diamonds are common enough to be found in a wide variety of cost effective industrial applications. Those that are suitable for use as gemstones are far less so. Most of what is diamond has impurities that alter the color, or is too small, or any of a wide variety of defects that make the stone unattractive for decoration. This is, of course, true of most gemstones.dyre said:
Still, the accusation has long been leveled at DeBeers, though with strikingly little evidence along the way, that the supply of gems is tightly controlled leading to rumors and speculation of vast storehouses of the things. The relative drop in diamond worth relies upon the fundamental fact that there are relatively few of them in circulation. Were it true that debeers had a significant stockpile it may not make much difference unless that stockpile was many times larger than what is currently on the market. Dumping a few tons of rocks would have little impact on the price of the gem in the long term. Dumping a few thousand tons of the same, however, would certainly have tremendous long term impact.
Diamonds are relatively common. Indeed, diamonds are common enough to be found in a wide variety of cost effective industrial applications. Those that are suitable for use as gemstones are far less so. Most of what is diamond has impurities that alter the color, or is too small, or any of a wide variety of defects that make the stone unattractive for decoration. This is, of course, true of most gemstones.dyre said:
Still, the accusation has long been leveled at DeBeers, though with strikingly little evidence along the way, that the supply of gems is tightly controlled leading to rumors and speculation of vast storehouses of the things. The relative drop in diamond worth relies upon the fundamental fact that there are relatively few of them in circulation. Were it true that debeers had a significant stockpile it may not make much difference unless that stockpile was many times larger than what is currently on the market. Dumping a few tons of rocks would have little impact on the price of the gem in the long term. Dumping a few thousand tons of the same, however, would certainly have tremendous long term impact.
Sorry to add onto the pile of Americans belittling your choice of words, but choice of words is important. It was pretty much an unwarranted attack, regardless of its truth. Yeah, the US is hella backwards and extremely unpopular in a lot of ways, but just like I don't go around calling stupid people stupid for no reason, I only bring up US' backwardness when it's relevant.PrototypeC said:
It's not a matter of gung-ho patriotism; I certainly did a 180 degree turn regarding patriotism sometime in my first year of high school. But even if I was in Saudi Arabia, I wouldn't attack the country's backwardness unless I was trying to have a constructive discussion (or a good-natured joke) about it. It's just unnecessary rudeness, with a hint of bandwagon following added in.
Oh, and honestly, the relative merits between Farenheit and Celsius are negligible. We're not talking about the metric system vs imperial system here. You guys have the convenient 0 freeze, 100 boil numbers; we have the 0 is about as cold as weather gets, 100 is about as hot as it gets "benchmarks." Farenheit's a bit easier for weather reporting; Celsius is probably better for chemistry. It's not so much "backwards" as it is "different."
edit: sorry, I meant first year of college, not high school. It's pretty much part of the high school curriculum here to convince students that America's the best country ever.
Hmm, I did wonder if the fact that only certain diamonds can be made into pretty jewels had a large impact. I guess it does.Eclectic Dreck said:
So, you're saying DeBeers isn't manipulating prices through stockpiling?
I did a quick wikipedia search (not saying wikipedia's word is the law, but it's a good starting point), and it says DeBeers did stockpile and manipulate prices in the 20th century. Apparently it was a matter of creating a cartel system with all the other diamond producers, destroying small producers that wouldn't cooperate, and purchasing existing stockpiles. Since then, other major players have entered the market since then, and it can no longer do so. Also, it pled guilty to price-fixing industrial diamonds with GE in 2004.
So, I guess you're probably partly right. They don't use stockpiling as a means to manipulate prices anymore, since if you've got real competition then hiding your diamonds under your pillow isn't really going to help. But they used to!