Alloyed pleasures: Multimetallic cocktails

The English language insists on unalloyed pleasures, thereby implying that the sensation of pleasure must be pure and not admixed with other emotions. Exactly the opposite rules in metallurgy, where pure metals have few uses and can always be improved upon by alloying. It is true that the civilizational journey of mankind began with the discovery of native metals such as gold and copper as pure metals. In fact this love at first sight of gold several millennia ago has persisted till this day and has its most exuberant expression in India. The Indian women buy pure gold in such quantities every year that it is the only metal that India consumes in relation to its population. In all other metals per capita consumption by India lags behind that of developed nations.