Gold is just a metal. It cannot be eaten or worn. Why is it so valuable?

What is gold? Gold is a symbol of wealth, a fine piece of jewelry and crafts, and a special currency that can be used for storage and investment. But in the final analysis, gold is just a metal.

Since gold is just a metal that cannot be eaten or worn, why is it so valuable? One of the main reasons why gold is valuable is that "scarcity makes things valuable". "Scarcity" means rare, and many people may have some misunderstandings about rarity. The so-called rarity can be divided into real rarity and fake rarity. Only real rare items can be expensive because of "rarity". I once saw a news report that a child secretly took his parents' money and spent tens to hundreds of yuan to buy some exquisite cards. Obviously, this is far more than the value of the cards, but when the child's parents found the merchant, the merchant refused to return the goods on the grounds that they were "collection value". This is a typical case of "fake rarity".

It is impossible for a card to have collectible value. Only "really rare" items have collectible value, and cards are not. What is really rare? It is a rare item that cannot be reproduced.

The card does not use any high-tech anti-counterfeiting technology. Even if there is only one card in the world, it has no collection value. It only requires an investment of tens of thousands of yuan to print it indefinitely. In fact, valuable antiques are not really rare items. Their irreproducibility is temporary, so their rarity is also temporary. With the advancement of science and technology, one day, when we can perfectly replicate objects at the atomic level, the value of any antique will be equal to the cost of replicating the antique. But gold is different from them. Gold is really rare.

All the matter known today did not exist in the universe from the beginning. At the beginning of the universe, only hydrogen and a small amount of helium were produced because these two elements are the lightest and simplest.

Later, under the mutual gravitational force, matter gradually gathered to form nebulae, and the nebula matter continued to condense to form stars. The huge mass of the star squeezed matter toward the center, and under the huge pressure, hydrogen nuclear fusion was ignited, so hydrogen elements were converted into helium elements through fusion reactions. When the hydrogen elements on the star were exhausted, the outward radiation expansion pressure weakened, and the pressure inside the star would be further strengthened under the action of its own gravity. Therefore, before the hydrogen nuclear fusion was completely ended, helium nuclear fusion was ignited. In this way, nuclear fusion continued to advance to heavier elements, and more and more types of matter were formed in this process.

However, the fusion reaction of stars can only produce elements below iron, because the fusion of iron elements no longer releases energy like the previous element fusion, but instead absorbs energy. Therefore, the outward radiation expansion pressure generated by the fusion will completely disappear, and the entire star will quickly collapse toward the center.

It can be seen that even powerful stars cannot produce gold, so where does gold come from? It comes from supernova explosions. When the nuclear fusion of a star reaches the iron element, the entire star will collapse towards the center, and the huge pressure will quickly hit the core of the star, causing a strong rebound in an instant, and then a huge amount of energy will be released. This is a supernova explosion. The energy released by a supernova explosion is so large and fierce that celestial bodies within 50 light years will be affected.

In the blink of an eye, a supernova explodes and forms a large number of elements heavier than iron, including gold.

Not all stars explode in supernovas. Only stars with a mass of more than 8 times that of the sun can become neutron stars through supernova explosions, so it is very difficult to produce gold. With the explosion of a supernova, gold and other substances will be thrown into the universe. Only these substances will condense into new celestial bodies due to gravity, such as the earth. Gold itself is a heavier element, so it will settle to the center of the planet. Therefore, 99% of the gold on the earth is in the core, which is an area we cannot touch, and the gold we can mine is less than 1% of the total amount of gold on the earth. Rarity is an important reason why gold is valuable, but it is not the only reason. Although gold cannot be eaten or worn, it is very useful.

You must have heard about the practice of extracting gold from old cell phones and computers, right? It’s true.

Because gold has good ductility, it can be made into very thin gold foil and can be pulled into very fine gold wire. In addition, the chemical properties of gold are extremely stable. Even if it is burned by fire, it will not be oxidized, which means that the chemical properties will not change at all. Therefore, it is an indispensable connection material on the circuit board. However, extracting gold from waste electronic products is a very professional matter, and it will be exposed to toxic chemical components. Ordinary people should not try it easily. Of course, the use of gold is not limited to mobile phones and computers. It is indispensable in airplanes, satellites, and aerospace electronic systems. Therefore, gold is not just beautiful, but a very rare and useful metal.

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