Alchemy

So of course after watching Fullmetal Alchemist, I've been inspired to do more research into what Alchemy actually is. While I still have little knowledge of it, I find it incredibly interesting, especially the philosophical aspects of it. What are your opinions and thoughts on Alchemy?

https://soundcloud.com/ambulas/bad-alchemy

its bad don't do it

You can absolutely nail resurrecting your mother with it, that's for sure

All I know about alchemy is that there are four elements.  Golden Sun is about alchemy but probably not the kind you're thinking about.  They just share elements, if I remember

Alchemy is largely about symbolism, and is not to be taken literally.  "Lead into gold" was actually a metaphor for spiritual transformation.

As to the four elements, they are Earth, Air, Fire, and Water.  They combine to form the fifth element, Spirit.

It's meh. People come up with some strange stuff. It had some motive behind it, be it literal greed or trying to better yourself. I've seen a lot stupider ideas come out of people who have access to a modern education, when it comes to pseudoscience. Haha.

Personally I also prefer the seven "elemental" model versus the four. Four is outdated. Not irrelevant, they're still there, but you can't just drop life/light/nature now either, though technically the whole "spirit" thing could have counted as life.

Honestly it probably looks like I have no kdea what I'm talking about.

Q wrote:It's meh. People come up with some strange stuff. It had some motive behind it, be it literal greed or trying to better yourself. I've seen a lot stupider ideas come out of people who have access to a modern education, when it comes to pseudoscience. Haha.

Personally I also prefer the seven "elemental" model versus the four. Four is outdated. Not irrelevant, they're still there, but you can't just drop life/light/nature now either, though  technically the whole "spirit" thing could have counted as life.

Honestly it probably looks like  I have no kdea what I'm talking about.

I am shamefully unaware of the seven elemental model.  I must educate myself.

I am unaware of this model as well.

It's just madder-jick madder-jick.

It's not that common and most people see it as aether/wind/fire/water/wood/earth/metal I think but metal has always come off as redundant for me so I move it to light in my stupid brain. I think it's ancient Chinese possibly? It also varies with the representation of a center element too, Life and light aren't actual "things" in a sense either in my mind but again I don't think I am exactly an authority on the subject of new models haha.

If you really get looking you find an abundance of variations of these sorts of things. It's pretty interesting, apparently though most everyone agreed on the whole "fire/air/water/earth" thing, and the fifth was pretty common although left out in some instances.

Sorta like how constant the concept of bread is.

I actually do like the idea of aether/wind/fire/water/wood/earth/metal a lot more. Specifically that it involves aether, that improves it.