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Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#321

Post by bluedevil2k »

Jiejeing wrote: post #40
cyberpunk wrote: post #3

Married members of HN, what did you do if you think diamonds are utterly ridiclious however due to societal constraints some kind of ring is required for your SO?

I am curious, is the diamond thing a US-centric trope? I do not know anyone here who genuinely cares about that sort of thing, generally people want some discreet metal ring. It may be a precious ore to symbolize the commitment but otherwise I have not seen anything outlandish among my friends or family members who got married.

Not US-centric - they're popular in the US and Canada, Japan, China and SE Asia.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#322

Post by bluedevil2k »

wilsonrocks wrote: post #124
cyberpunk wrote: post #3

Married members of HN, what did you do if you think diamonds are utterly ridiclious however due to societal constraints some kind of ring is required for your SO?

Luckily my wife wanted Peridots but I would not have bought diamonds on ethical grounds.

What ethical grounds? Based off an article you read a few years ago about 1 mine in 1 African country that accounts for < 1% of all global diamond supply?

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#323

Post by 988747 »

gruez wrote: post #194
grw_ wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The economics behind diamonds are better explained by an sociologist, not a geologist- the high cost and useless-ness of the gift are a feature not a bug! The burning of significant amount of wealth is a costly signal of commitment to the receiver. I heard from a friend who worked at a diamond company (and as such could purchase stones with significant discount to market price) that his fiancée had specifically rejec…

>the high cost and useless-ness of the gift are a feature not a bug! The burning of significant amount of wealth is a costly signal of commitment to the receiver. So basically... proof of work?

More like "sunk cost fallacy".

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#324

Post by Nursie »

jonnydubowsky wrote: post #192
Nursie wrote: post #35

Good for them. It's literally the same material, and we can now use scientific and engineering advances to remove the need for people to toil and die underground to get them. Hopefully the process is more environmentally friendly too. They are real diamonds. I find it hi-goddamned-larious that the moment these became viable, the industry switched from "Diamond purity is the be-all and end-all and you must have the cl…

Would the lab grown process tolerate adding in some super-fine particulate matter, added using a random number generator to control the amount? "Natural" imperfections on-demand?

Most likely yes, this has already happened with other synthetic gems - look up star sapphires, once exotic and sometimes mounted on engagement rings alongside diamonds, the process to create carborundum was figured out, and then another to insert the right inclusion, and hey-presto, you can buy them in bulk for around $1 per carat. They can create bi-colour sapphires now too.

A quick search of the internet turns up various articles about inclusions in diamonds deliberately introduced to control the properties of the resulting material. So if we're not there yet with synthetic jewellery diamonds, we will be.

The sapphire market is interesting in some ways, 'natural' sapphires still fetch a few hundred dollars per carat. It genuinely fascinates me that someone would pay (as an example I just found) over £7000 for a ring with a 4.98 carat "natural" bi-colour sapphire set with six small 0.1 carat diamonds, when you can get a synthetic stone chemically and physically the same for around £12.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#325

Post by sopooneo »

GordonS wrote: post #281
vagrantJin wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Okay class, child labour, a few thousand poor people dead, terrorist groups starving hundreds of thousands, destroying schools and libraries. That is where diamonds come from. How many would still want a natural diamond because diamonds are forever?" The elephant in that lecture hall was probably the hypocrisy. I think if you still raise a hand after hearing all that, the issue isn't branding at all. It's narcissim,…

I personally fully agree, but unfortunately not everyone thinks as logically as you or I. I talked about this with my wife recently, and even though she had a vague idea of the horrors that mined diamonds bring, she'd still continue to buy/want mined diamonds. She sees mined diamonds as more "real", and finds it difficult to believe that her diamonds in particular would be part of the problem - as if it somehow would…

My guess is that we need a sweeping, emotion-fill, romantic story toward something else, not just away from the current diamond-status quo. There certainly is a quiet satisfaction, and clear conscience, in avoidance of evil. But no joy in the act of NOT.

A normal person who repeatedly throws aside a full heart in favor of facts will not wake up singing for many years. There needs to be a new song to replace the old, something as emotionally filling as DeBeers shadow demons dancing to a swelling string section.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#326

Post by Clewza313 »

JoshuaEddy wrote: post #288
neilwilson wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Always remember the whole diamond ring thing was a marketing putsh by DeBeers in the first place. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/02/ho... So arguably buying a diamond ring has always been a symbol of wage oppression and terrible mining conditions in Africa, and any right thinking person should boycott it. Fortunately my SO isn't that struck by sparkly rocks. She prefers antique jewellery with…

Diamond engagement rings date back to 1477, and diamond jewelry dates back much further. It was viewed as very exclusive/rare. Diamond engagement rings for the masses was from DeBeers advertising starting in 1938. The growth in diamond mine production in the late 1800s tremendously increased diamond supply. DeBeers took advantage of historical perception of rarity and actual lower cost of materials to create a new ma…

No, diamonds were actually kind of second-rate for a long time, medieval jewelry tended to favor flashier colored stones like rubies, emeralds, etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_jewelry

Although to be fair, this was in part because diamonds are hard to cut and they don't look good without faceted cuts. Diamonds only started becoming popular in the late 1800s when South African mines started producing them in bulk and modern cuts were developed, and they went mainstream once the De Beers marketing engine kicked in after WW2.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#328

Post by bluedevil2k »

vagrantJin wrote: post #197
qw wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's mostly about the emotional attachment. If you find two identical pens, and one of them was used by a famous writer, you would expect a price difference. There is no difference in the quality of those pens. They both work the same, and using the writer's pen will not make you a better writer by itself. I personally would not buy a natural diamond because of the ethical issues, but I do understand the students who…

"Okay class, child labour, a few thousand poor people dead, terrorist groups starving hundreds of thousands, destroying schools and libraries. That is where diamonds come from. How many would still want a natural diamond because diamonds are forever?" The elephant in that lecture hall was probably the hypocrisy. I think if you still raise a hand after hearing all that, the issue isn't branding at all. It's narcissim,…

Your comment shows your understanding of the diamond industry comes from a few articles you read on the internet, like an anti-vaxx person crying foul about vaccines. The facts, about 50% of the diamonds in the world come from Western countries like Australia, Canada and Russia. Another very large percentage come from stable African countries like Botswana and South Africa. There's no child labor in any of these countries, no terrorists, not thousands of dead people, not the terrible working conditions you read 1 article about a few years ago by a writer in the Congo or the Blood Diamond movie with Leo.

Botswana has used the opportunity of being so diamond-rich to require that diamonds be cut/polished in the country, enabling hundreds of their citizens to learn a new high-paying trade. Many countries require the sale of their stones happen inside the country rather than having all the stones immediately shipped off to European trading floors.

The real hypocrisy is people complaining about an industry they really know nothing about.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#329

Post by aliyfarah »

chrisseaton wrote: post #222
myfavoritedog wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because people are rational and can be convinced to abandon notions of value deeply ingrained since childhood because of a nice analogy during a single lecture?

If an analogy doesn't help you look at a situation any differently... is it a good analogy?

To each their own...it helped me look at lab diamonds differently. I've always assumed they were somehow chemically inferior to the real ones, maybe compromised tensile strength or something.

Re: Pandora says laboratory-made diamonds are forever

#330

Post by Clewza313 »

While this is a great step forward, let's not ascribe too much to it just yet. Pandora's niche is cheap, impulse-buy jewelry, a lot of it under $100, so diamonds rarely feature anyway and few people would buy their engagement rings there. It'll take Tiffany switching to synthetics to make De Beers really start crapping their trousers.
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