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Rand Benedict Paul.
Not only did he sell us out, this douche bag did it to his own father! I'm more upset him selling his father out. I don't care who i think is going to win i would never sell my father out. If his willing to sell his father out what else is for sale?
The inherent value of gold is whatever you decide it is. To me, it's useless, therefore to me, it has no intrinsic value. To put it another way, its value is whatever I can trick you into giving me for it.
Last edited by eOs; 03-03-2014 at 12:37 AM.
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
This doesn't follow. By this reasoning, noone should pursue FRNs because they have no inherent value. People buy gold for a number of reasons. As erowe correctly pointed out earlier, gold, when used as a medium of exchange, is fiat. What makes gold money different from paper is that gold can't be printed. Thus it serves as a store of value, which FRNs don't.
If gold is fiat, then all money is fiat. Why then even bother criticizing the true fiat currencies, if we're just going to change the definition of all money to fall under that umbrella definition? Perhaps you should look up what fiat really means.
Of course any "accepted medium of exchange" is going to draw additional value from being one of the rare commodities that enough of society thinks is worthy of being a medium. That doesn't make it fiat, it is a feature of how money happens naturally. You have something with the desirable characteristics to be a convenient means of exchange, one that solves the inherent problems of bartering (and as we know, gold has many characteristics that make it an ideal source of money, such as scarcity, durability, portability when compared to other commodities, etc.).
And finally, I must ask, are there any more noteworthy countries that even use a gold standard anymore? Even if there are, the vast majority aren't buying gold just to sell to them... Yet gold is still considered valuable without being a currency. No matter if you think it should be valuable or not, it undoubtedly holds value on its own.
It's pretty simple how it holds value on it's own: Uses as commodity + costs of production + scarcity + long history of accepted value and desirable characteristics = market value (without even getting into supply/demand curves, though scarcity has an effect on those). Who gives a crap about "intrinsic", when the market has spoken. It's valuable, and not just because people say so. People see value in it without it being sanctioned anymore. That's anti-fiat.
All of those reasons (and that's just scratching the surface) makes calling gold fiat a pretty baseless claim. People who support bitcoin would be wise to shy away from trashing gold, because all it's doing is working to de-legitimatize any alternative currency.
Last edited by TheGrinch; 03-03-2014 at 12:57 AM.
I'd rather be a free man in my grave, than be living as a puppet or a slave - Peter Tosh
The kids they dance and shake their bones,
While the politicians are throwing stones,
And it's all too clear we're on our own,
Singing ashes, ashes, all fall down...
I don't mean all that to be overly critical, but I think sometimes people want to forget that theres a way that money is supposed to, and has to work for a free market to be possible.
Theres a reason gold arose naturally to be a accepted medium of exchange, and it was almost completely natural compered to fiat currency.
I'd rather be a free man in my grave, than be living as a puppet or a slave - Peter Tosh
The kids they dance and shake their bones,
While the politicians are throwing stones,
And it's all too clear we're on our own,
Singing ashes, ashes, all fall down...
multi-post
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
Precisely! The qualifier inherent is the fool's gold of the discussion. It's all entirely subjective, it's just that when these subjective opinions sometimes come to a common agreeability between more than one individual the individuals will then allow the material itself to take on a secondary property it never had to begin with, hence, intrinsic value is born.
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
The inherent value of gold is that it can be atomized and suspended in the atmosphere where it has the marvelous ability to reflect light from the sun.
So if you have enough of it, you can create a protective 'barrier' around a burnt, dead planet, shielding it from the sun's rays which allows the planet to heal and become healthy again.
Last edited by Jamesiv1; 03-03-2014 at 10:24 PM.
I mentioned this earlier in the thread. (though I find it more accurate to say "inherent utility", as value is everywhere and always subjective. The Austrians get it, as do a number of others.) I agree-it is weak and rather scary that the subject is so misunderstood around here.
Could any computer (or IC chip) even function without a few atoms of gold here and there? No real value there ether or so it would seem.
Maybe only our human brains and red blood cells have any true value (to us). http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/va...sic-extrinsic/
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