Timeline for An object that is gold in one specific area but becomes worthless if you leave that area?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
10 events
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| Jun 16, 2020 at 11:03 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
Commonmark migration
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| Dec 7, 2018 at 20:15 | comment | added | Mathaddict | @Neil The point is that a single city is too small to make the gold be worth anything, Japan isn't that small and it produces more than just Yen. This city doesn't. | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 21:10 | comment | added | Neil | @Mathaddict Yen may be used only in Japan, but it has value, if for no other reason than if you ever found yourself in Japan, people would take it in exchange for goods and services. The fact that legal tender is worth something in a single modern city like say Philadelphia doesn't make it worthless elsewhere. In fact, if the rest of the world weren't modern, being able to buy a flashlight may be incredibly valuable, boosting even more the "printed paper" being used in that city. It's not an illusion anymore than legal tender is an illusion of worth. | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 17:26 | comment | added | Mathaddict | @Neil, The difference between this and other legal tender is that in this situation, the "Society as a whole" is only the single city, and the rest of civilization not only won't but can't use their "Legal tender". It would be like a single modern city, say Philadelphia, saying: "We're going to print money!" so they print billions of "Philadollars" but no one outside of Philadelphia recognizes those as money, and they can't be spent outside of Philadelphia. Would you sell your car to someone there? For Philadollars? If so, I'd like to buy your car for some monopoly money. | |
| Dec 6, 2018 at 11:44 | comment | added | Neil | "The inhabitants think that they are wealthy, but they really are not, they're just suffering from a combined delusion." So.. like legal tender basically. If people in our society have lots of pieces of printed paper, they're wealthy for all intents and purposes. Value of an object is given by society as a whole. | |
| Dec 4, 2018 at 22:11 | comment | added | pipe | Came to post this answer after immediately thinking of the lotus-eaters described in the Odyssey. Everything was lovely and warm and shiny as long as you were on the island and ate the flowers like everyone else. | |
| Dec 4, 2018 at 9:26 | comment | added | Jemox | What happens when a someone pick a pretty rock outside the City and it becomes gold when brought inside ? The few that discovers the stratageme will exploit it and become very rich inside the city (until everyone discovers the truth). | |
| Dec 3, 2018 at 22:37 | comment | added | cmaster - reinstate monica | To me, "mind control" in this context sounds just like "a wizard did it". With the hypnosis approach, you have to explain a lot (who are the hypnotists, why are they doing it, how do they get away with it, how do they manage to get everybody hypnotized all the time, etc., pp., ... It's just too stark of an assumption to have an entire city population hypnotized in such a strange way for so little effect), and if you can't do so in a satisfactory way, there goes the fourth wall... | |
| Dec 3, 2018 at 21:34 | comment | added | JBH | I like this answer, there's a lot of ways it can be implemented. Hypnotists, a naturally-occuring gas or "something in the water." You could explain it as, "the individual sees what they most desire..." and since our erstwhile adverturers were seeking the gold of El Dorado.... | |
| Dec 3, 2018 at 17:15 | history | answered | Mathaddict | CC BY-SA 4.0 |