Abstract
In early days it was thought that there were four elements. Ancient philosophers chose four substances among everything around them as something special: these were the ‘elements’ that constituted the whole universe.
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Notes
- 1.
From ‘The fragments of Empedocles,’ Fr. 96, as quoted in Routledge History of Philosophy, Vol. 1. ‘From the beginning to Plato,’ ed. C. C. Whiston (Routledge, London; 1997), 188.
- 2.
As quoted in J. Longrigg, “The Roots of all things”, Isis, Vol. 67 (1976), 421.
- 3.
W. Pagel, Paracelsus: An Introduction to Philosophical Medicine in the Era of Renaissance (Karger: New York,1982, 2nd Ed.), 103.
- 4.
Allen G. Debus, The English Paracelsians (Oldbourne: London, 1965), 71–76.
- 5.
Allen G. Debus, The Chemical Philosophy (Dover, New York: 2002), 79.
- 6.
Ibid., 84.
- 7.
Ibid., 482.
- 8.
Gerald J. Holton, Introduction to Concepts and Theories in Physical Sciences (Princeton University Press: Princeton, 1985), 231.
- 9.
Mary E. Weeks, “The discovery of the elements. IX. Three alkali metals: Potassium, sodium, and lithium,” Journal of Chemical Education, Vol. 9 (6) (1932), 1035.
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Nath, B.B. (2013). From Alchemy to Chemistry. In: The Story of Helium and the Birth of Astrophysics. Astronomers' Universe. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5363-5_2
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