> at least at the end of the day gold has actual uses
TBF gold doesn't really have uses outside of industrial societies.
Sure it's shiny so you can make pretty out of it (jewelry and other decorations), but for the most part it has properties: it's ridiculously stable, it's easy to work with, and it's rare enough that the supply is rather limited but not so rare that it's essentially nonexistent (unlike the platinum-group metals).
In economies which are static or very slow to grow (aka preindustrial) this makes it a convenient store of value, because it's a slowly but ever-increasing (to the approximation of your supply sinking with a ship) supply.
TBF gold doesn't really have uses outside of industrial societies.
Sure it's shiny so you can make pretty out of it (jewelry and other decorations), but for the most part it has properties: it's ridiculously stable, it's easy to work with, and it's rare enough that the supply is rather limited but not so rare that it's essentially nonexistent (unlike the platinum-group metals).
In economies which are static or very slow to grow (aka preindustrial) this makes it a convenient store of value, because it's a slowly but ever-increasing (to the approximation of your supply sinking with a ship) supply.