作为一个思想实验，设想有一种普通金属，像黄金一样稀缺，却具备以下特性：
As a thought experiment, imagine there was a base metal as scarce as gold but with the following properties:
以及一项特殊而神奇的属性：
and one special, magical property:
如果它不知因为什么原因获得了哪怕一点价值，那么任何想远距离转移财富的人，都可以买入一些，把它传输出去，再让接收方卖掉。
If it somehow acquired any value at all for whatever reason, then anyone wanting to transfer wealth over a long distance could buy some, transmit it, and have the recipient sell it.
也许它会像你所说的那样，以一种循环的方式获得最初的价值：人们预见到它作为交换媒介的潜在用途。（我肯定会想要一些。）也许收藏者，或者任何偶然的原因，都可能点燃这个过程。
Maybe it could get an initial value circularly as you've suggested, by people foreseeing its potential usefulness for exchange. (I would definitely want some) Maybe collectors, any random reason could spark it.
我认为，传统上衡量某种东西能否充当货币的标准建立在一个假设上：世界上有很多稀缺物品互相竞争，其中能够靠内在价值自然获得初始价值的东西，肯定会胜过没有内在价值的东西。但如果世界上没有任何具备内在价值的东西可以充当货币，只有一些稀缺却没有内在价值的东西，我想人们仍会选择其中一种。
I think the traditional qualifications for money were written with the assumption that there are so many competing objects in the world that are scarce, an object with the automatic bootstrap of intrinsic value will surely win out over those without intrinsic value. But if there were nothing in the world with intrinsic value that could be used as money, only scarce but no intrinsic value, I think people would still take up something.
（我在这里用「稀缺」一词，仅指潜在供给有限）
(I'm using the word scarce here to only mean limited potential supply)
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