[TML] Personal Armor Noise was Re: Current USAF fleet

[Tom B]

>  Note that it is _not_ possible to tell the difference with the naked eye
>  (assuming it was an unflawed diamond; you're probably not going to get a
>  flawed synthetic diamond). Thus, as a decoration, rather than a
>  statement of wealth, synthetics are as good as natural diamonds.

I'm not even sure it is just the latter.

There is something about the idea of having an item that took Mother
Nature huge amounts of temperature and pressure and time to create.
Sure, we can make the same thing, but that doesn't make Mother Nature
any less wonderous. If you're talking about the role diamonds fill in
our relationships, they're just a stand in for 'something valuable and
special'. Special in this case partly means 'the real thing, taking
Mother Nature a long time and special conditions to produce'. If there
was some magical 'Unobtanium' that looked half decent as jewellry, I'm
sure we'd end up buying settings made of it if it took some odd
circumstance to produce ("Can only come from the heart of a star!").
Part of this is a marketing thing, but part of it is the simple sense
of worth that we subconsciously assign to things which are hard to
produce or require very special conditions. If men had to fight
similodons to get access to the diamonds, then bring them back by
snowboarding down K2, they'd be even more symbolic and hence valuable.

It isn't all just money or even all just showing off to your friends.
It has something to do with our ineffable understanding of quality and
specialness and that a special good should be associated with a
special event and a special relationship and a special person. A big
screen TV and couch suite may cost as much, but they don't have the
same cachet. And they never will.