[meteorite-list] Yet another gimmicky expensivemeteorite"collectable"

From: cdtucson at cox.net <*cdtucson_at_meteoritecentral.com*> Date: Tue, 7 Jul 2009 12:40:26 -0400 Message-ID: <20090707124026.84REG.213333.imail_at_fed1rmwml41> · cdtucson_at_meteoritecentral.com

--
Carl or Debbie Esparza
IMCA 5829
Meteoritemax
---- Martin Altmann <altmann at meteorite-martin.de> wrote: 
> Ah Mike and Steve,
> 
> it's not a big thing. Each child can do these tiny stats,
> and each professional meteoriticist, would need to come to these simple
> conclusions, because he knows where to find the Bulletin Database on web,
> not more than 5 to 10 minutes.
> 
> And that's why I'm often so impatient.
> Because the data are so clear and the opposite of a secret.
> And sometimes so shocked (e.g. when I had read that the former president of
> MetSoc.....ooops, - and so often not diplomatical, therefore shhhhhht). 
> 
> But in general, 
> cause I'm sometimes asked by people, who found on web an article about
> meteorites,
> or often also by friends, who have nothing to do at all with meteorites,
> some of them scientists in other fields, but also "ordinary" people like you
> and me,
> 
> and with them, if you only present the numbers and figures 
> (which everybody could find out more or less easily in web),
> 
> Then they are more than astonished about what's going on in the meteorite
> world.
> Because nobody can understand, what unfortunately is going on in meteorite
> science and politics regarding the very meteorites. Cause it's highly
> inefficient and illogical.
> 
> With figures and numbers I mean:
> 
> The find rates:
> 
> In Antarctica,
> In desert countries.
> In countries with protectionist laws before and after
> In countries without protectionist laws.
> Of "private" parties
> Of "official" expeditions.
> The find rates before the desert rush.
> The find rates during the desert rush.
> The weights of the finds from everywhere
> The weights of the "interesting" types among these.
> 
> The monetary aspects:
> 
> The costs of the Antarctic campaigns.
> The costs of the "official" expeditions.
> The costs of meteorites on "the market"
> The volume of traded meteorites in total.
> The costs of meteorites in history.
> The costs of meteorites today.
> The budget of universities and museum to acquire meteorites today
> The budget of universities and museum to acquire meteorites spent yesterday.
> The budgets of universities for acquisitions in other departments.
> The costs for branches of science dealing with similar questions like
> meteoritics.
> The costs for space-flight missions with mineralogical objections.
> 
> (O.k sometimes too the prices and values for meteorites, given in media or
> launched there by some of the protectionism advocacies. The incomes of a
> meteorite dealer...)
> 
> 
> And believe. NOBODY can understand why so few is done for meteorites from
> the official science side or why not more advantage is taken from the new
> finds
> and why not all are happy about that what has taken place during the last
> years.  
> 
> 
> And in fact I have no influence on that.
> I see scientists, who agree with my and the opinion of the majority about
> that nonsense.
> I see scientists, who are happy about the new finds and prices and take
> advantage of it.
> I see scientists, who want to take advantage of these paradisiac times,
> but can't due to a sometimes complete cut-back of their budgets.
> I see scientists, who think, that someone like we are criminals.
> 
> And I think the majority never got aware of this funny situation,
> because meteorites, meteoritics, meteorism is so extremely special,
> cause else the museum and labs would be full of the new finds,
> we wouldn't have these sick legal discussions
> and all in the meteorite world scientists, collectors, curators, dealers,
> hunters, planetologists, and even the tax-payers would be happy and would
> live happily ever after
> and unlike now and in the following years, the flow of incoming new finds
> revealing us more and more the secrets about our solar system
> would never run dry.
> 
> And it even wouldn't cost a thing.
> But obviously we're not intelligent enough,
> 
> and honestly, I'm getting tired to occupy myself with always the same mess,
> which nobody understands - I rather like to do our meteorites, the stones,
> until they will have closed down each and every country.
> 
> Everything further to that topic would be recurrent and anyway we have no
> credibility at those persons, who have to be convinced, cause we're dealers
> and collectors - so anybody else is better capable to show the trivial and
> evident facts than me.
> 
> And I'm tired to play the squaller.
> Our job is, like the other hunters and dealers too, to continue to deliver
> the rarest of the rare, the types, which the "official" side doesn't find or
> hardly finds and to deliver them at so low costs which they never can met or
> to make it possible for them at all due to the low costs to get them in
> their institutes, which they never could afford else and to deliver them to
> those, who appreciate our work.
> 
> So please maybe others instead of me could be the Cassandra or Pandora or
> whatever for legendary grouches existed.
> 
> I mean, it's in our all own interest.
> Or at least in the interest of all these who LOVE meteorites
> or who do that great research on meteorites.
> 
> Because if they don't care, nobody will care
> And we have to be aware, that the World will turn around also without
> meteorites.
> 
> 
> ...man, I even have not a minute time to learn a better English...
> 
> Gosh perhaps we should buy 1001 IMCA-Teddy-Bears and whenever we meet one of
> the old protectionists, we could bombard him with that stuff and scream: We
> love meteorites, we love you, we want to help you, we want to bring you so
> much meteorites more, which you never would get else and which you never
> would get funded....
> 
> Stamp collecting is also fine,
> but we learn so few from them about the universe.
> 
> So. And now I have to apply for a job as cook on the Suisse-Omani
> expeditions. - I have to look ahead for the post-desert time.
> So I will be able to see at least a few weathered OCs on my working place to
> have a certain continuity. 
> 
> Cheers,
> Martin
> 
> Disclaimer:  These and all postings are solely my opinion.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht-----
> Von: meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com
> [mailto:meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com] Im Auftrag von Galactic
> Stone & Ironworks
> Gesendet: Dienstag, 7. Juli 2009 16:41
> An: Martin Altmann
> Cc: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> Betreff: Re: [meteorite-list] Yet another gimmicky
> expensivemeteorite"collectable"
> 
> Hi Martin and List,
> 
> Well analyzed Martin.  Reading your posts on these matters is like
> receiving an education.   Now if we could just get the governments in
> question to read this list and consider what Martin has written
> extensively on, then we might see a return to reason.
> 
> It is in nobody's best interest to restrict the search for, discovery
> of, and trade of meteorites.
> 
> Best regards and clear skies,
> 
> MikeG
> 
> 
> 
> On 7/7/09, Martin Altmann <altmann at meteorite-martin.de> wrote:
> > No,
> >
> > it shows only how exotic these laws are.
> >
> > I'm sure the "Australian Government" doesn't intentionally want to keep
> the
> > Australian meteorites in Australia,
> > I'm rather convinced that quite nobody in the Australian government is
> aware
> > of that law at all,
> > because normal people don't know about meteorites or care about at all.
> >
> > And you have to keep in mind, how such laws happen.
> > The most probable scenario is,
> > that there are a handful of curators or meteorite scientists, who express
> > their wishes, that the national meteorites should be theirs or that they
> > should end in their hands or what ever their motivation might be.
> > No matter how thought-out their ideas are,
> > and they are sitting in a committee or elsewhere
> > they give the recommendation to the legislature, that meteorites do have
> to
> > be protected.
> >
> > Legislature means: politicians and civil servants.
> > Of course these people can't have any idea what a meteorite is, how they
> are
> > found, how many do exist, what for a scientific or economical value they
> > have or don't have and how they were exchanged between finders, museums,
> > dealers, collectors in past.
> > At best they have heard of artefacts, dinosaurs, resources - and know,
> that
> > these other - in their eyes similar - objects, have to be protected and
> are
> > of great importance -
> > and anyway the proposal to protect meteorites comes from scientists, hence
> > people, who are supposed to know about what they are talking,
> > therefore they will always wave that petition through
> > and will add the word "meteorites" into the relevant already existent
> laws.
> >
> > You see it in the Aussie-Natural-Heritage lists,
> > there they simply added "meteorites",
> > it would have been logic to add the Australian tektites too - they are
> much
> > more valuable than that Henbury, Mundrabilla, Boxhole, Camel Donga,
> > Millbillillie stuff and much more rare, but you don't find them there.
> > There you can see how arbitrary that all is.
> >
> > Or think to Poland - in the last 70 years they had 4 (four) meteorites
> there
> > - so I really doubt, that any politician would have seen an urgent need
> for
> > action to create a law for meteorites
> > - but they did, so bizarre or droll this may sound to you.
> > Most probably because a panjandrum put a bug in a clerk's or politician's
> > ear. Or because one from the latter felt for the usual rubbish in the
> > newspapers, that meteorites would have a value of millions of dollars per
> > stone and are trafficked and dealt by shady persons by thousands of tons
> on
> > ominous black markets. So that they get alerted, to protect the thousands
> of
> > tons and quadrillions of Zloty of their Polish meteorites
> > (and to get a faster promotion).
> >
> >
> >
> > But! If once a word is added into a law,
> > then it will be horribly difficult to remove it from there again.
> >
> > Look - nobody could have said anything about that experiment to protect
> > meteorites in Australia.
> > Now we can judge the results, because enough time has elapsed to see, what
> > the impact of this laws were.
> >
> > Well and there everybody can see, that the law had a converse effect than
> > initially intended:  Much, much less meteorites are recovered and almost
> no
> > Australian meteorites end up anymore in the Australian institutional
> > collections and universities.
> >
> > Wait - I will look in the Bulletin Database.
> >
> > During the last 10 years - 1999-2009
> >
> > 2007:    Bunburra Rockhole, EUC, 			tkw 324g -  a Fall
> >
> > 2006:    Eldee 001   L6, S3, W1-2 			tkw 4.51kg,
> >          Eldee 002   L6-melt breccia, W2 		tkw 101g
> >          Yaringie    H6,                       tkw 5.75 kg
> >
> > 2003:    Prospector Pool   Iron, ungrouped 	tkw 2.77kg
> >
> > 2002:    Myrtle Springs   H4 				tkw  53g   (Hello
> > Don!)
> >
> > 1999:    Dunbogan   L6                         tkw  30g    a Fall
> >          Reid 028   H6, W3				tkw  30g
> >
> > Makes up     8  (eight) meteorites.
> > Australia has a total of  649 meteorites.
> >
> >
> > And these, Ladies and Gentlemen, were the complete officially recorded new
> > meteorites of the decade of a whole continent, a continent full of
> deserts.
> >
> > For you in USA, where no such laws exist, to compare:
> > (I don't know, whether your deserts are of comparable size and so suitable
> > for meteorites like the Australian deserts)
> >
> > But USA had in the same time:
> > 1999-2009 officially recorded in the Bulletins:
> >
> > 282 new meteorites
> >
> > And USA has a total of 1576 meteorites.
> >
> > GIST OF THAT POSTING:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --->  during the last 10 years 18% of all known US-meteorites were found
> >
> > --->  during the last 10 years  1% of all known Aussie-meteorites were
> found
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > I use the percentage to exclude factors like population density,
> properties
> > of the surface and size of overall surface....
> >
> > So we see, there has to be done something.
> >
> > We here on the list are often only lousy laymen, even most of us not
> > citizens of Australia, we have no influence on Australian legislation.
> >
> > But scientists pled for the laws, which led to the leakage of new
> Australian
> > meteorites, so maybe scientists could pled for an amendment to these laws,
> > for them finally getting meteorites to work with again.
> >
> > Therefore we all could ask Alex Bevan, Bill Birch, the McColls, Ross
> > Pogson...all the Australian meteoricists - not to forget Caroline Smith,
> > cause just yesterday here an article about London was shown, with the link
> > to the blog where she went hunting in Australia, one of the few persons,
> who
> > were looking for meteorites down-under at all, so she knows the situation
> > too,
> > and of course the Meteoritical Society,
> > that they all perhaps will write at the end a memorandum to improve the
> sad
> > situation in Australia and to find better laws.
> > But also the other scientists should help their colleagues from
> down-under.
> >
> >
> > Huh, once I was told by a list member, a German who had emigrated to
> > Australia, that he would need even an export permit for his German
> > meteorites from his collection, if he wants to bring them out of
> Australia.
> > That's a perfect integration, I'd say, if the belongings of an immigrant
> get
> > immediately National Heritage of Australia. But also somewhat weird.
> >
> > Uh imagine, if someone sends a suspected stone to Bevan to Australia and
> it
> > will turn out and classified to be a meteorite. Then he has to apply for
> an
> > export permit to get the stone back?
> >
> > Australia has so fine meteorites and had once such a meteorite tradition,
> > the superb Wolf-Creek-Crater - well worth to have a meteorite or mineral
> > fair there. But nobody from other countries will come with meteorites,
> cause
> > the paper-warfare would be a mess.
> >
> > A not so theoretical question:
> >
> > The meteorite sellers in most cases have a return policy, which allows the
> > buyers to send the specimens back, if they aren't fully satisfied.
> > What one has to do, if that happens with an Australian collector?
> >
> > That all is so strange.
> >
> > But I think, it could be of importance, that Australia where the situation
> > became so evident, that the laws disrupted almost fully new finds and
> > meteorite research
> > and where the scientists are very disappointed about the situation,
> > would come to a more reasonable solution,
> > because it could be a signal for other desert countries and maybe also for
> > the few not yet so informed proponents and Luddites, who want to have
> > similar laws there, to avoid such a disaster like had happened in
> Australia.
> >
> > Well happy finding,
> > And greetings to Blinky Bill!
> > Martin
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht-----
> > Von: Galactic Stone & Ironworks [mailto:meteoritemike at gmail.com]
> > Gesendet: Dienstag, 7. Juli 2009 13:45
> > An: Martin Altmann
> > Cc: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> > Betreff: Re: [meteorite-list] Yet another gimmicky expensive
> > meteorite"collectable"
> >
> > Hi Martin and List,
> >
> > Does anyone else find it ironic that the Aussies will put an
> > Argentinian meteorite on their Australian coin?  The Aussie government
> > doesn't want it's own meteorites leaving it's borders in the hands of
> > non-Aussie citizens, so they will take another nation's meteorites and
> > use those instead.  Talk about hypocritical.  Talk about playing games
> > with permits and laws.  They should stick to Fosters beer.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > MikeG
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > On 7/6/09, Martin Altmann <altmann at meteorite-martin.de> wrote:
> >> A medallion with Blinky Bill for you to engrave!
> >>
> >> ...aah, you mean the Campo coin?
> >>
> >> To complicate to order for me and you,
> >> because we would have to apply for an export permit first.
> >>
> >> (I hope the Royal Australian Mint knows about that problem).
> >>
> >> A lawyer could make fun in ordering such a coin and if he doesn't find
> any
> >> export permit icluded,
> >> he could incriminate the Australian Government/Royal Mint for illicit
> > export
> >> of National Heritage...
> >>
> >> ....so stupid are these Aussie-laws.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> -----Urspr?ngliche Nachricht-----
> >> Von: meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com
> >> [mailto:meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com] Im Auftrag von
> Darren
> >> Garrison
> >> Gesendet: Dienstag, 7. Juli 2009 06:29
> >> An: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> >> Betreff: [meteorite-list] Yet another gimmicky expensive
> >> meteorite"collectable"
> >>
> >> Australian issued meteorite "coin":
> >>
> >> (mid list)
> >>
> >>
> >
> http://www.prospectstampsandcoins.com.au/web/royal_aust_mint/2009_coins/inde
> >> x.html
> >> ______________________________________________
> >> http://www.meteoritecentral.com
> >> Meteorite-list mailing list
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> >> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
> >>
> >> ______________________________________________
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> >> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > .........................................................
> > Michael Gilmer (Louisiana, USA)
> > Member of the Meteoritical Society.
> > Member of the Bayou Region Stargazers Network.
> > Websites - http://www.galactic-stone.com and http://www.glassthrower.com
> > ..........................................................
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > http://www.meteoritecentral.com
> > Meteorite-list mailing list
> > Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> > http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
> >
> 
> 
> -- 
> .........................................................
> Michael Gilmer (Louisiana, USA)
> Member of the Meteoritical Society.
> Member of the Bayou Region Stargazers Network.
> Websites - http://www.galactic-stone.com and http://www.glassthrower.com
> ..........................................................
> ______________________________________________
> http://www.meteoritecentral.com
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