Quote:
Originally Posted by Tom Bombadil
Astronomers discover planet made of diamond
Will it be valuable enough to start a new space race?
hmm, you can calculate the mass by the gravitational force, and you can tell it is made of carbon by some spectrum analysis most likely. How do you tell the size of the thing to calculate the density?
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You can get a guess at the diameter in several ways but one way I can recall without looking it up is: transiting a background star (duration of the "blink" compared to the estimated velocity vector portion adjusted for our movements in the galaxy).
There's literally no way it would be worth enough to justify the funding of an interstellar mission much less a competition of more than one. The value of a diamond is almost completely imaginary - set by price-fixing and tight cartel controls. It has some industrial value but its cheaper to make them ourselves in high pressure equipment than to leap across light years, dig and return.
I also imagine at some point we'll extract all the available gold and it will be more needed for industrial use than baubles. And then we'll either have to play alchemist and make it, or mine the local planets for it.... long way down the road even for that (assuming the "Global Tech Civilization" doesn't collapse before then).