Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's the market perspective, but there's a value perspective as well. Entire libraries have been written about and many, many careers have been based upon the notion of "the value of something." It's actually a very, very complex idea. The minuscule mass-energy of the electrons and photons oscillating in various wires and fiber optic cables to bring these words to you have virtually zero market value as individual…
>"Why are things worth what they're worth?" is the same order of complexity as "Why do things fall?" Your layman's dismissal of value is something like a medieval peasant dismissing the question of why an apple falls from a tree as an idiot's question. I don't think anything you just said is relevant to what I said here. All that I said is that there is a notion of value which is not simply "what the market will bear…
Context. There are contexts where even gold has greatly reduced value. If you're on a sinking ditched airplane in rough seas, are you really going to try and stash that 1kg bar of gold bullion on your person? In that context, it arguably has quite a bit of negative value. I'd account the "getting you dead" property as conferring negative value.
In the same context, liter of salt water is worthless. In a different context, it would be worth many times what the gold would be worth.
