meaning, besides industrial use, what would they be used for? and what would their value be?
Does demand from men count?
The majority of diamonds are for industrial use, where its hardness and abrasiveness are unsurpassed. I have no idea whether diamond-the-substance might be useful in collimating light (lasers, masers, etc.) the way that corundum (rubies and sapphires) is. And I have no idea whether a diamond’s “fire” could be used to amplify a necessarily dim light source. Beyond that, it’s just because they’re considered beautiful by human beings of both sexes.
Even now, “industrial” diamonds are drastically cheaper than “jewelry-quality” diamonds. The real hilarity is that “artificial” (stupid word, the correct term is “synthetic”) lab-grown diamonds are worth less than “natural” diamonds to jewelers, because the lab ones are too perfect.
Women who want diamonds are generally not worth them.
you would hardly think so. but valuable they are.
It’s impossible to answer the OP factually as far as value. Industrial use has been addressed. And of course, there would still be a demand for diamond jewelry for men. I do not know the proportion of the diamond market aimed at men, but I can plainly see that 100% of the advertising I see for diamond jewelry is telling men to buy it for women.
IMHO the component of diamond demand driven by women is based on an evolutionary adaptation that females want to mate with males with more resources, indicating an ability to provide well for them and their offspring. The reason, again IMHO, that women like diamonds* is not that they like diamonds per se but that they like things that are very expensive. The intrinsic value of such things is entirely beside the point; it indicates that the male has abundant resources and is willing to devote those resources to the female.
And, of course again IMHO, most men who wear diamonds themselves are trying to impress women and create an image of power. (Men seem to tend to go for expensive cars, though. I know I’d rather drive a Lamborghini than have a 5-carat diamond pinky ring.)
If a bizarre turn of events caused cheap diamonds to become readily available, then the interest in them would drop because they would no longer provide the ostentatious display of wealth.
*Gross generalization, I know, but the point here is that most diamonds sold for jewelry end up decorating women who like diamonds. I don’t mean to say that all, or even most, women lust for diamonds, but most diamonds are lusted after by women.
If it’s such a primal instinct, why would they need to advertise so aggressively? Diamonds are a “need” created by marketing, nothing more nothing less. And both men and women buy into this dynamic. My husband has told me multiple times he’d like to upgrade the modest stone in my heirloom antique engagement ring, and honestly I’m perfectly happy with it the way it is. Men’s desire to show themselves as a provider or give “nice things” to their mates is as much a driver as anything on women’s end.
That’s like saying “if we have such a strong biological drive to eat food, why does McDonald’s spend so much on advertising?” The advertising is to convince consumers that diamonds/Big Macs fill that need better than anything else.
Obligatory link to Cecil’s column addressing this issue.
The value of diamonds has nothing to do with women. Exceptionally large, jewel quality diamonds are invariably precious as they are rare and often have considerable historical value. Further, they are frequently a part of the national heritage, thus rendering them priceless – e.g. the Hope diamond, the Koh-i-noor, the Cullinan I (star of Africa) and II diamonds in the British scepter and the Imperial state crown respectively. Generally, such treasures were the properties of the (male) rulers rather than their (female) consorts, and so you might say that, for much of human history, diamonds were a *man’s * best friend.
The association of the sparkly little bijoux (gems of ~few carats at most) with women, weddings and (their fiances’ ) wealth is a relatively recent (~1950s and later) phenomenon, promoted by the De Beer’s monopoly. That also ensures that the market value of jewel quality diamonds exceeds that set by the demand and supply laws of economics. With apologies to Anita Loos and Lorelei Lee, sometimes, the diamond and saffire (sic) bracelet may be worth a little less than that kiss on the hand ;). Anyway, jokes aside, the resale value of the typical engagement ring can drop to < 50 % of the purchase price, so buyer beware!
The fashion for pave diamonds (i.e. jewellery studded with tiny diamonds, each <~ 0.1 ct ) is barely 25 years old, having started off when western distributors for uncut diamond chips (mainly in Amsterdam) got access to the cheap labor markets (in Gujarat, India) of diamond cutters, who would grind tiny raw diamonds into glittering, polished stones which can then be styled into closely set diamond jewellery. Needless to say, the wholesale value of a pave diamond set is much, much lower than that of single crystal of the same total weight, but the retail prices follow no such rule.
Industrial diamonds are cheap – note that diamond tipped cutting tools are much cheaper than a ring! – but they are not commonly perceived as aesthetically pleasing, and are therefore not valuable. However, in the recent years, there has been an attempt to make yellow, brown and even black, diamonds fashionable and thus valuable. Innovations in diamond film depositing technology may make industrial uses even more economical (material scientist dopers, please elucidate). As another doper mentioned, synthetic, gem quality diamonds are available, up to 1.5 ct. Research diamonds up to 25 ct have supposedly been grown by De Beers labs, but it is not clear if that was of gem quality. Overall, IMO, in a few decades. mined diamonds may be reduced to mere curiosities, with most gem applications coming from synthetic stones. It is all a matter of persuading the consumer to accept them, and breaking the De Beers strong hold on the gemstone diamond market.
Really!? Even if she buys them with her own, hard-earned, money? :rolleyes:
That’s not entirely true. Diamonds have been mined and valued in India and later elsewhere for centuries. So I’d be curious whether diamonds would be as valued and expensive if not for the DeBeers marketing campaigns.
Diamonds have been long prized for their beauty, but De Beers is responsible for making the diamond engagement ring a cultural requirement for marriage (along with the “you must spend X months salary” on the diamond). CookingWithGas is correct that the need to display wealth and status is a sociobiological imperative when it comes to mating, but even sven is correct that, with respect to diamonds, this apparent status is entirely manufactured by advertising and careful control of the market supply rather than any inherent value in the carbon allotrope of diamonds. The recent campaign against artificially manufactured gem-quality diamonds, which are cheaper, contain fewer flaws, and can be made with controlled amounts of impurities which rival or exceed the objective beauty of the best natural “flawless” diamonds, is indicative of just how artificial the gemstone diamond market is.
To answer the question of the o.p., if there were not an existing market for natural gemstone-quality diamonds, the diamond mining industry would collapse completely. It is substantially cheaper to produce industrial-grade diamonds by artificial means than to mine and process them from natural sources.
Stranger
One way to look at it. The diamond mining industry produces 2 kinds of diamonds. The really small ones that are useful commercially. And the big ones that are pretty. The former may be a byproduct of digging for the later money wise.
If the demand for large and pretty went away, how much are the small “industrial” diamonds worth? How much does it cost to make diamond dust rather than dig for it? And it’s been my understanding that making BIG diamonds is still pretty damn expensive.
But, OTOH, digging for them ain’t cheap either. The effort that goes into digging for them is IMO almost mind boggling.
So, looking at it from a production end, I suppose one could say if you actually NEEDED a diamond of size X to make a 1920’s style death ray, it ain’t gonna be a whole lot cheaper than what size X goes for today for wedding rings and such because there is a non zero (and not minor) amount of effort and money that goes into getting the things in the first place.
My guess? Within 10 years Apple will be offering an iPhone with an artificial diamond screen, and the jewelry market will collapse.
There’s also these http://www.lifegem.com/
Small, portable, strongly associated with women, and expensive, like jewelry or clothing. Quite possibly because for most of human history women usually left their tribe/family and so only had the wealth they could carry, and because their husbands could take whatever they liked. Having wealth they could carry off and was regarded as “girly” was the best way of them having some wealth of their own. A husband who’d take cattle or coin for himself would be embarrassed to grab earrings, necklaces and fancy dresses.
As Alessan points out, probably not all that “bizarre” as synthesis techniques improve and its use as an industrial material increases in the public eye; it’s hard to maintain that kind of “it’s rare and valuable” mystique with something used like plastic or steel.
Linguists aside, this is spelled ‘sapphire’. And sapphires are not especially rare; there are some quite productive mines in Montana. Yogo sapphires are especially well-advertised around here.
Not sure about that last bit. I remember reading the four months’s salary rule in a P.G. Wodehouse novel, so even if it’s not “centuries of diamond mining in India” old, it’s old.
Once, at a physics colloquium, we had a speaker who used large, gem-quality diamonds in her research (and she even brought one along as a visual aid). I don’t know who made it, but it was about the size of a golf ball.
Well, there’s one woman who probably won’t be impressed much by a diamond ring.