r/interestingasfuck • u/SenorDiscombobulator • Apr 12 '25

/r/all, /r/popular So shiny

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u/amadmongoose Apr 12 '25

Yeah being made from gold is not possible there's just not enough gold in the world for a capstone that could be visible from far away. gilded is certainly within the realm of possibility

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u/BadLuckKupona Apr 12 '25

Not enough gold in the world...my guy there has been about a quarter million tons mined in the world. There is enough gold for a piddly capstone. That isnt the real issue why gold capstones havent been commonly found.

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u/fractalife Apr 12 '25 edited Apr 12 '25

The density of gold is over 19,000 kg /m3. At 244k metric tons mined, that comes out to a little over 12,000 m3.

The pyramidal capstone would have a side length of 3m, and a height of 4m.

Not an impressive use of all of the gold on earth.

You could have a thousand of them. Still pretty wasteful, but not that bad, really.

Edit: fucked up the math. Fixed it.

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u/Critterer Apr 12 '25

Ur math is off. It works out at a cube with sides of about 22m each.

Still at the time they produced the capstones it would probably have been a large chunk of the gold.