Can the argument that gold and silver have been currencies for thousands of years still stand today?

Just heard Mike Maloney referring to ancient Lydia when speaking about the first time PMs were used as money. I started thinking about why people used PMs for money and storage of value, and realized that in modern times the argument may have some issues. Can we really look back at the last 100 years of progress and equate it to any other 100 years any other time in history? It feels like every time I hear that "PMs has always been money" I want to say "burning wood and oil has always been the source of light", "riding horses has always been the means of transportation", and "bloodletting and shamanism have always been preferred methods of curing diseases".

I feel like once the electricity / computing / Internet genie is out of the bottle, there's no going back. In that case, we're either stacking for the currency collapse, for shortages, for the zombie apocalypse, or for our grandkids if nothing happens.