We are like diamonds

Go impress your other half with some facts on diamonds!

Diamonds are seen as a symbol of forever, hence it is used in a large majority of wedding rings around the world. Diamonds are considered to be one of the hardest substances on the planet, with a hardness of 10/10 on the mohs scale of mineral hardness. Diamonds are also made of mostly carbon, and the purer the diamond, the higher the gem quality. Diamond have some industrial application, but for the most part, this gemstone is used in jewelry.

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Diamonds are not found everywhere. They are generally found in old continental crust called cratons. Certain cratons have the perfect recipe for diamonds to form. Cratons are thick, they are old (over 1 giga annums), they are cold. In the image below, the craton distribution throughout the world is highlighted.

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Something you may not have known about diamonds is that they are metastable at atmospheric conditions. What does this mean? A diamond is not stable at room temperature and pressure. It slowly, but surely, converts into amorphous carbon, graphite and CO2 (Fais, 2016). It happens so slowly and discretely, that we cannot see it happening with our eyes. For more on this, read here.

Diamonds form in what is called a diamond stability field. If plotted on a normal cartesian graph, there is a field in which a diamond forms. Too much pressure, no diamond, too little pressure, no diamond. Too little temperature, no diamond, too much pressure, no diamond. So it is not true that the more pressure and temperature, the more diamonds, or higher the quality of the diamonds. This is illustrated in the image below:

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Why is the price of diamonds so high? Well, de Beer's mining company is the master of advertising. Amidst China putting a halt on their raw material consumption in recent years, almost all mineral resources saw a decline in price. Not diamonds. They have continued to increased in price.

How are we like diamonds?

I love to compare ourselves with science, or natural phenomena. I thought about this one, and when I realised how much we are like diamonds, I was astounded.

1 Just like diamonds, we cannot be at our best if we are just loaded with the pressures and temperatures of the world. There is the right niche of trials and difficulty that we can go through in order for us to become diamonds. We also cannot go through less than we need to, otherwise we will also not become our best selves. Think of the runner who needs put himself through difficulty to succeed. Too much, he gets injured, too little, and he will not achieve his potential.

2 Why do we value some humans over others? Just like de Beer's used some crazy skills in their advertising to make diamonds have such a high monetary value, we sometimes put value on people regardless of what they actually are or can do. We often just look on the outward appearance and make assumptions based on that. Look at steemit for example, the reputation determines the amount of people that read your article (for the most part). If you have a 25 rep, hardly anyone looks at your content.

3 Even though diamonds look beautiful, they are busy eroding in front of our eyes. We are the same. We are all ageing. Another analogy that can hold true for this is that sometimes we look happy and perfect on the outside, but unknown to those around us, we are struggling on the inside.

4 Diamonds are symbols of love. Well, now we know that neither love nor diamonods are perfect. Love is something that needs a certain amount of pressure, it can be hard to find, it pretends, often people are engulfed by the beauty of the person, so much so, that they don't realise who they are falling in love with.

And so the list of comparisons can go on. I just thought that this would be a cool little exercise. Personally, I love colourful gems in diamonds. Geologists often do not have diamonds in their wedding rings. Some choose tourmaline, sapphire, tanzanite etc for various reasons.

Have a good day all!