Taoist Principles and Chemistry

[Daeluin]

Internal Alchemy takes many terms and principles from External Alchemy - Chemistry. What can we learn from combining western scientific principles of the interactions of atoms and molecules with taoist principles of wuji, yin, yang, taojitu, the four forces, five phases, bagua, etc?

 

Are there correlations between the number of protons and neutrons to a particular element's polarity of yin or yang? Can we have heavy yang and light yin? How do the orbital rings factor in? What role to neutrons play? Is there correlation between the mysterious pre-heaven and post-heaven arrangements of the bagua with the way elements alchemize with each other?

 

Finally, do answers to questions like these leak secrets of the heavenly mechanism? Would an accomplished taoist chemist be dangerous, and does this information need to be protected? Or do such fears originate from a government's desire to maintain stability by avoiding powerful unpredictable elements? (This is really deserving of its own topic, but maybe short comments on the subject would be fitting here until we open that door further.)

Edited January 7, 2015 by Daeluin

[Daeluin]

All right, I think I'd need to become a chemist to answer my own question.

 

Easy to speculate, but difficult to propose any theories without understanding the root of nuclear physics.

 

Part of me was wondering if there is a correlation between Carbon, atomic number 6, and Oxygen, atomic number 8, with the taoist notions of the 6 directions of energy and the 8 trigrams of the bagua. I imagine it is much deeper than this, but too, Carbon and Oxygen are some pretty important elements in how they nurture life as we know it.

[Brian]

Here's my thought -- the classical approaches to chemistry which hinge upon an atomic model in which a group of electrons are in orbit about a nucleus is fundamentally flawed. We've known it since before Einstein was born (Maxwell's laws show that a charge moving through a field necessarily causes a disruption) and quantum mechanics helped us to understand what's happening from a non-Newtonian perspective but those classical models are just so darned useful that we still use them and, unfortunately, generally teach them as if they were "how things really are."

 

In my mind, that means any philosophical developments built upon those classical models are built on sand. This, in and of itself, is not a concern. What is a concern, from my perspective, is the almost inevitable likelihood (based on historical observation) of subsequently forgetting the "let's pretend" foundation and assuming to have uncovered basic truths.

 

Make sense?

[ChiDragon]

All right, I think I'd need to become a chemist to answer my own question.

 

Easy to speculate, but difficult to propose any theories without understanding the root of nuclear physics.

 

Part of me was wondering if there is a correlation between Carbon, atomic number 6, and Oxygen, atomic number 8, with the taoist notions of the 6 directions of energy and the 8 trigrams of the bagua. I imagine it is much deeper than this, but too, Carbon and Oxygen are some pretty important elements in how they nurture life as we know it.

 

Where have you been when I was talking about the cell respiration or metabolism......??? What do you know about cell respiration...??? Can you talk about the mitochondria, in the body cells, and how do they generate the biochemical energy like ATP......??? ATP involves with the decompose of glucose by oxygen as we breathe.

Edited January 8, 2015 by ChiDragon