James Cameron and Google to Mine Asteroids.

[hey]

No, I didn't get it backwards. You could have $20T if you don't flood the market and sell it slower over time. You could have $19T if you flood the market (lets be honest, it's much lower than that). That is a $1T difference (the opportunity cost of selling $20T worth of platinum for $19T is $1T), and it is not insignificant, for the reasons I stated in my edit.

I asked

what can be done with $19T that can't be done with $20T worth of platinum.

The total value is $1T lower, not higher. I see now you edited this, but what i responded to was definitely backwards. It's ok though, it's a minor mistake, not even worth discussing. I knew what you meant, hence i said i'd ignore it.

(lets be honest, it's much lower than that).

Or higher, since you'd be able to go mine 100 more asteroids and actually sell the resulting metals instead of mining a single asteroid, and selling it over 500 years (by which time a million other people have done the same, and it's all worthless anyway).

[archibaldcrane]

If either of you think that doubling the earth's available abundance of platinum with a single asteroid wouldn't significantly lower the price of platinum I don't know what to say.

[RKenshin]

When you have $19T, yes $1T is insignificant.

That's a ridiculous assertion.

Keep in mind that the opportunity cost is associated with the profit and not the revenue. $19T in revenue doesn't mean jack if it cost you $20T to make it.

You seem to think that the $19T/$20T figures are profits? But they're not. They're the potential revenue, yes, but the final profit (and opportunity cost) is after you take a chunk out for expenses. And if it costs you $18T to make that $19T in revenue, you're kidding yourself if you don't think that potentially doubling your profit margin is 'insignificant.' But, of course, we have no idea what the expenses would truly be like so that's all just a theoretical.

But that leads to the second point, in that business/investments seek to maximize profits. And the idea that any entity will just act like "Eh, an extra 5% revenue is insignificant." is completely wrong.

[Pirian]

I asked
The total value is $1T lower, not higher. I see now you edited this, but what i responded to was definitely backwards. It's ok though, it's a minor mistake, not even worth discussing. I knew what you meant, hence i said i'd ignore it.

Yes, $1T lower means that the opportunity cost is $1T, and you need this to be 0, therefore you would not sell it for $19T, you would sell it for $20T. With this $1T you can do things like you suggested and mine other asteroids or invest in other things. This is why it is an opportunity cost.

I don't think you want to add in factors other than the simplest model that we put forward here. That is a whole can of worms that isn't going to go in your favor.

It's OK to be wrong. I've admitted my mistakes plenty of times on these forums, lol. You don't learn the best from being right, but rather from being wrong, so embrace mistakes!

If either of you think that doubling the earth's available abundance of platinum with a single asteroid wouldn't significantly lower the price of platinum I don't know what to say.

Oh no, I definitely think it would. That's why I've stated that if he thought that the drop would only be $1T then he was out of his mind, but I was willing to work with it because the magnitude drop honestly doesn't matter.

[hey]

If either of you think that doubling the earth's available abundance of platinum with a single asteroid wouldn't significantly lower the price of platinum I don't know what to say.

It wouldn't if they sold it over a thousand years.

Which as i said, isn't possible, since a million others will have flooded the market long before then.

First, you need to keep in mind that the opportunity cost is associated with the profit and not the revenue. $19T in revenue doesn't mean jack if it cost you $20T to make it (aka, a profit loss).

You seem to think that the $19T/$20T figures are profits, but they're not. They're the potential revenue, yes, but the final profit (and opportunity cost) is after you take a chunk out for expenses. And if it costs you $18T to make that $19T in revenue, you're kidding yourself if you don't think that potentially doubling your profit margin is 'insignificant.' But, of course, we have no idea what the expenses would truly be like so that's all just a theoretical.

But that leads to the second point, in that business/investments seek to maximize profits. And the idea that any entity will just act like "Eh, an extra 5% revenue is insignificant." is completely wrong.

My understanding was that the cost was quite low.

From http://gizmodo.com/5904727 , which was posted on the first page:

2:11PM He believes that they are going to be able to make these space mining robots for single-digit million of dollars. He also claims that their missions will be in the two-digit million numbers. This is a pretty bold statement. These numbers are just a tiny fraction of current space programs.

Doing some quick googling, i'm getting the impression that the cost would be in the low billions.

Yes, $1T lower means that the opportunity cost is $1T, and you need this to be 0, therefore you would not sell it for $19T, you would sell it for $20T. With this $1T you can do things like you suggested and mine other asteroids or invest in other things. This is why it is an opportunity cost.

Except you can't sell it for $20T. Trying to do so would prevent you from accessing the value of that platinum for an absurdly long time, causing you to lose money by not investing it. You would also need to spend the money mining every single asteroid near earth to prevent anyone else from doing it (or buy them out i guess, but that'd cost even more).

[Milkster]

How has no one brought up Gundams yet?

[vagus]

Google finds a new mineral. That is the end goal.

Amazing news.

[Pirian]

Not only that, but you are also under the assumption that they are going to get all this ore at once and then dump it, but this is contrary to how you know mining works (a gradual process), so in all likelihood, what we're discussing is a non-issue because the rate of acquisition of these minerals is going to be such that they will need to mine that one asteroid for a very long time in order to actually get all $20T out of it.

[Rhyis.]

How has no one brought up Gundams yet?

And then we can finally begin the Earth and space colony wars, as predicted by the holy series known as Gundam.

^

[Pirian]

How has no one brought up Gundams yet?

Who knows, by the time this is a reality we may not even be bringing it down to earth. It may be 100% processed and used in a space station, and not even affect the Earth economy. It would make sense, given the cost of transportation out of Earth's atmosphere, that by the time we're to this point that there are two separate economies for Earth and space, all together xD It's all speculation

And then we can finally begin the Earth and space colony wars, as predicted by the holy series known as Gundam.

I think the real question is, how did you miss it


Oh boo beaten

[hey]

what we're discussing is a non-issue

No. If they can't mine it signficantly faster than would be needed to crash the price, it wouldn't be worth doing.

[Pirian]

No. If they can't mine it signficantly faster than would be needed to crash the price, it wouldn't be worth doing.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic here We've been having a "serious" discussion for too long xD

[Maguspk]

From the title to the comments this thread is full of misinformation.

[RKenshin]

My understanding was that the cost was quite low.

From http://gizmodo.com/5904727 , which was posted on the first page:


Doing some quick googling, i'm getting the impression that the cost would be in the low billions.

Not that any of us are experts on this, but I'm thinking that the low billions are far understated and/or only counting the upfront costs.

The cost of just mining that $20T worth of platinum would likely be very high in itself (that's a fuck-load of platinum), when you count the amount of specialized labor and time that would take. You can't exactly outsource that kind of mining to Chili (or Bruce Willis). Never mind the costs in transporting it back (or getting the people there).

But yeah, this is still all theoretical.... so I guess we'll see. But I can't imagine even a first-of-its kind mission like this having 200000% profit margins.

[aurik]

Platinum isn't the most valuable thing to come out of this anyway. Refined hydrogen, oxygen, and metals already in orbit is.

[Pirian]

I was taking platinum as just one thing to talk about :D It's always easier to talk about something complicated by starting out with a simple model

[Silenka]

I honestly have to wonder if platinum costs wouldn't go up.

There is a hypothetical marketing strategy here (not saying how this is actually how it will go but I could see it): people who are full of self-importance (aka rich people) are going to want to be the first people to get stuff made out of space platinum, thus they will pay retarded amounts of money for it. This is the same reason diamonds and gold are expensive - they have no actual worth aside from being useful in industry, but their imaginary worth has turned into real worth thanks to dumbasses who keep buying them for a lot of money (someone already made this point in the thread). From that precedent will come people who will do anything to get their hands on some space platinum jewelry or a car with parts made from space platinum. Everyone will want their little piece of history in the making - sci-fi come to life, items made from materials mined from asteroids.

If the people mining it wanted to market it this way, I'm pretty sure they could. Hype can be built around anything. If moon rocks cost so much, pretty sure SPACE PLATINUM could be the new marketing sensation.

Then again, it could just be that platinum is platinum and no one will give a fuck where it comes from.

[Mazmaz]

So serious question, what kinds of education/work experience will be required to work in this field? I'm pretty sure I want to make this my career. What are the different aspects/jobs we can expect in companies/ventures like this?

[hey]

Not that any of us are experts on this, but I'm thinking that the low billions are far understated and/or only counting the upfront costs.

The cost of just mining that $20T worth of platinum would likely be very high in itself (that's a fuck-load of platinum), when you count the amount of specialized labor and time that would take. You can't exactly outsource that kind of mining to Chili (or Bruce Willis). Never mind the costs in transporting it back (or getting the people there).

But yeah, this is still all theoretical.... so I guess we'll see. But I can't imagine even a first-of-its kind mission like this having 200000% profit margins.

When i said low billions, i was thinking more like $100B.

As you said though, none of us are experts.

[Silenka]

So serious question, what kinds of education/work experience will be required to work in this field? I'm pretty sure I want to make this my career. What are the different aspects/jobs we can expect in companies/ventures like this?

Guessing aerospace engineers. Designing and building robots. Knowledge of thermodynamics. People to analyze the data coming back from the telescopes. People who are knowledgeable in geology, physics and chemistry. There's going to be so many different kinds of people needed for a venture like this it really depends on which aspect of it you're going to want to deal in.