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Inspired by this question, I've wondered how it would world look, if those diamond berries were real.

Let's assume in my fantasy world of XVII/XVIII IRL technology have one species of plant that have diamond berries, for whatever reason. Also let's assume its quite common almost everywhere, not like regular weed, but it's not strange to see them in normal forests. Your typical berry would be something in size of raspberry.
The question is: What could people of my world do with those diamond berries?



Bonus question: Would be there any animals that use to some advantage those diamonds?

Slarty
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Guy with jewels' names
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    This cannot be answered in a measurable way, and as such doesn't belong here. – L.Dutch Jan 13 '20 at 16:57
  • Also, no "bonus questions". Ask one focused question at a time, please! (See the [tour] and [help] for more information.) – elemtilas Jan 14 '20 at 03:48

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Diamonds in this world would be dirt-cheap, that's one thing.

For practical uses, advance of cutting and grinding tools would happen much earlier than in rel world. People would be able to supply even the crudest saws and drills with diamond edges, which should boost productivity throughout the history and allow for faster technological development.

For the animals eating these berries - why not? If in this worlds organic metabolism produces diamonds, it's logical to assume that there would be organic process to digest those diamonds, and there would be animals (or bacteria) taking advantage of this process.

Alexander
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  • It's unclear that they'd be "dirt cheap". In our world, a famous cartel uses unethical (and possibly illegal) tactics to suppress the price of secondhand diamonds and to restrict supply of freshly mined diamonds to ensure their high cost. Otherwise, they're so abundant that they'd be considered junk. It's very possible to imagine something similar happening in this fictional world where the seeds for the plants are highly restricted and supply is limited. – John O Jan 13 '20 at 17:30
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    @John O if those berries are "quite common almost everywhere" the cartel should have enormous resources to stop them from growing. Can you imagine a renaissance-era cartel that wants to eradicate all wild strawberries? – Alexander Jan 13 '20 at 17:50
  • Diamond edges aren't all that useful for a lot of things. For instance, for wood cutting you want your edges to be sharp, but they don't need to be particularly hard, and diamonds aren't all that easy to sharpen. Indeed, diamond blades for cutting tile & stone (which aren't that expensive - under $20 at Home Depot) aren't sharp at all: they're just chips of diamond in a metal matrix: https://www.nortonabrasives.com/en-us/resources/expertise/understanding-diamond-blades – jamesqf Jan 13 '20 at 19:09
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    @jamesqf those blades cheap today - but that wasn't the case just a few decades ago. Even for softer applications like wood cutting - think about if a civilization has access to cheap diamonds before it can make steel? – Alexander Jan 13 '20 at 19:28
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    @Alexander: You'd have to have a very different design than today's diamond saw blades, at least, since they don't really cut soft or malleable things at all well. Maybe something like the Aztec macuahuitl: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macuahuitl But even then, it's very easy to put a sharp edge on obsidian, but (at least from the little I know of diamond cutting) not on diamonds. – jamesqf Jan 14 '20 at 00:52
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    There would be no such cartels. Remember that diamond berries was always around, so no one even think about them as a expensive commodity, it would make same sense for cartels to monopolize it like monopolize any other common fruit. – Guy with jewels' names Jan 14 '20 at 08:40