[ExI] Antiques as a store of value

[BillK]

On Feb 12, 2008 6:15 AM, spike wrote:
>
> I hear that a lot regarding engineers.  We are told we didn't get real
> education, but rather mere job training.  Granted we may have no clue why
> those paintings that were recently stolen were considered to be worth $163
> million.  Why?
>
> <http://www.blogrunner.com/snapshot/D/5/3/armed_robbers_steal_4_masterworks_in_zurich/>
>
> If they were worth that much, why couldn't we digitize photos of them and
> build a robot which would create arbitrarily many copies using actual oil
> paints on canvas, copies that are so good that only experts could tell them
> from the original?  Couldn't we replace all the original (absurdly
> overvalued) originals in the museums with really good copies, thus saving
> huge sums on the obviated security measures?
>
> So we don't understand the art world.  No amount of education will change
> that for me.
>


Surely nanotech must destroy the value of all items that depend on age
and provenance.

All artwork, paintings, sculpture, furniture, objets d'art, souvenirs,
etc that can be copied, molecule by molecule, to produce an identical
copy, must lose their million dollar valuations. Nanotech will be a
severe blow to the rich investors in such objects.

I have never understood how a pair of underpants once worn by Elvis
are now worth thousands of dollars. They are still just a pair of
underpants, for Dog's sake!

(Disclaimer: I don't own any valuable antiques or paintings, so I may
be biased. I do however own several pairs of incredibly old
underpants, if anyone is interested in investing).


BillK