alt Hacker News>"You can get huge, very high-quality diamonds now for a fraction of what they used to cost. Like 95% off. It's crazy."
The thing is though, what's the point? Unless you're trying to actually pass your diamond as real, there's literally no difference between that $1500 lab grown gem and a $5 piece of costume jewelry. No one but a jewler will ever tell the difference, so why pay anything at all? With real diamonds today you are paying for that certificate of providence, which is what actually gives it any value. Used diamonds of course are worth nowhere near their retail value, but used lab grown are worth zero, both monetarily and sentimentally. Grandma's heirloom Tiffany engagement ring will have meaning in the way that a lab grown no name ring ordered online will not, even if they are completely indistinguishable.
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> there's literally no difference between that $1500 lab grown gem and a $5 piece of costume jewelry.
Sorry but this is just not true. Diamond has a very high refractive index compared to most materials. Even a total amateur will quickly notice how much more shiny a diamond is compared to a cheap piece of glass or plastic.
> Grandma's heirloom Tiffany engagement ring will have meaning in the way that a lab grown no name ring ordered online will not, even if they are completely indistinguishable.
Not sure how to parse that. Perhaps it's a cultural thing? This seems to be conflating value, meaning and worth in a confusing-to-me way.
- "Grandma's heirloom" would have sentimental value, regardless of brand name, production process or monetary value. Grandma's candy box or her modest music box would have similar sentimental value. Depending on what this grandmother meant to you as a person, this could be positive or negative sentimental value.
-"Tiffany's" versus "no name, ordered online" might for equal quality jewelry make for a slight higher resale value. All other things being equal, that is.
- Lab grown versus mined could make a slight difference in resale value. This is very often very much overestimated because of how the diamond retail market works.
- Lab grown versus mined really depends when it comes to emotional value.
- For example, if someone were to offer my wife or me a mined diamond with no history, we'd assign it negative emotional value because of the suffering attached. Unless it were to have come from a historical source with no money having changed hands, not even in the second hand trade. In which case no extra harm would have been done even by trading in the secondary market.
- Others might attach positive emotional value to the rarity of the mined diamond.
- Some sociopaths, psychopaths or sadists no doubt attach positive emotional value to the knowledge people had to suffer for the ring on their finger.
As a fan of cool rocks and gems, and putting aside price and societal influences, diamonds are cool!
Especially compared to hard plastic “costume jewelry” (which I think you’re referring to), gems are hard, don’t scratch as easily as hard plastics, and have cool reflections.