ELEMENTS
Today we operate under a conglomerate logic: things in the world are not singular, are divisible. In the elemental paradigm, the world is gatherings, sediments, and fusions. Everything can be broken down: a tree is not a tree--it is wood, then leaves, then bark; cells, veins, vacuoles; finally atoms, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen. Atomism, or corpuscularianism (Principe), a pixelation of the world, a Seurat-esque, spotted understanding: this governs our interactions with and conceptualizations of ourselves and things around us, even the ever hovering air (nitrogen, oxygen, argon) (Ward). In antiquity, another set of elements reigned in a nonparticled fusion. Earth, air, wind, and fire (and aether) blended into things. Ratios and mixtures built the world, things were seen (fire) and were so pure that they were thought to exist in another. Its pureness made it solely responsible for such attributes (heat).
The classical elements, which cropped up in cultures across the globe during antiquity, are earth, air, wind, fire, and aether (Ferry 259). In Greece, these were originally conceived of by Empedocles, who imagined that everything was composed of those four material elements and moved by the “two opposing forces… Love and Strife” (Parry). These forces cause a “continual exchange” between the elements, a constant flux. Fairly straightforward to conceptualize in a material sense, the Classical elements had poetic resonances as well. They played significant roles in astrology, alchemy, as well as the arts. The least straightforward and sometimes omitted fifth element, aether, denotes the space of the atmosphere above the air surrounding life, an above-air. According to Aristotle, it composes the stars (Weisberg). Alternatively, it could be understood as a medium that fills all space. This was also part of
the group of elements Jabir ibn Hayyan created in the 8th century in his medieval alchemical system. In fact, alchemical systems from China to Europe to Egypt set up systems of elements that government material understandings of the world for centuries (“From Alchemy to Chemistry”). Although the goal was to form gold, thinkers from Indian Vedas to Islamic experimenters developed systems of composition based on these same four elements that underlay their alchemical and pre-scientific pursuits. Inevitably, these intellectual systems figured in conventional and paradigmatic thought of the these ancient times, which has trickled and morphed into contemporary ideas.
stolid stone, I will hold you belegs.
invisible, in(visibility) I blend and change, join me! evaporate
slippery flow, cyclical; rise with me, in tides seethrough.
a beginning, I am energy catching, spreading, char vital wonder
Contemporary elemental systems are rooted in the philosophy of atomism. According to atomism, everything is composed of atoms or miniscule particles (Weisberg). It assumes that the world would be a void or vacuum if not for particles filling it. This is similar to corpuscularianism, which conceptualizes the world as composed of small particles like atoms, but all coming from the same universal matter. The periodic table developed through a series of iterations beginning in the early 19th century (Brito). Based on atomic weights, Johann Wolfgang DĂśbereiner created the first system of elements resembling the periodic table today. A group of notable scientists crystalized many Western scientific theories surrounding ideas of the atom later during the Karlsruhe Congress of 1860. Examining and defining such concepts as the molecule, atom, and alkalinity led to such conclusions as “considering as an atom the smallest amount of a substance included in a moleculeâ€? from Dmitri Mendeleev, one of the thinkers. These early discoveries surrounding the periodicity or serial relationships between elemental qualities were hindered by limited technology at the time and issues calculating atomic mass or size.
Despite multiple scientists’ attempts and contributions to this system, Mendeleev is generally credited with creating the system we use today. He worked to organize the substances based on physiochemical properties--things he could observe without much of our contemporary equipment like “density, specific heat, atomic weight, atomic volume, melting point, valence, oxides, chlorides, and sulfides.” This reflected an ongoing trend of element concepts being rooted in sensation and observation. Much of these ideas draw from Lucretian philosophy. Lucretius wrote about atoms as if they were these balls with infinite types, forming things and then falling apart. He based his theory on concrete material observations he made in the world: the slow wear of paths and steps as people ongoingly walked on them was a testament to his theory that those tiny balls would fall away from their conglomerations. He also imagined a concept called “the swerve” (Lucretius 43) described as a “continuous random walk.” This sort of “dérive” of particles and the spontaneous encounters it would engender was responsible for generating things. His ideas of matter being
composed of these tiny, regular components, being in constant motion, and combining and decaying in ways that reflected our macroscopic observations of it were extremely influential. They also deeply inform my own elemental system. Although the gridded table of the periodic elemental system that is most often used today is laid out as such, the cyclical system could actually be arranged in a number of ways (Khan Academy). Many alternative versions exist, rounded, bent and amorphous, and even three-dimensional. This is just one of the many ways in which this system is not nearly as consistent or set as scientific professionals would make it seem.
this is particulate, you’re particular. I make words, and so wish to break down; I could be small Or perhaps to see this all as a cloud, made water, hovering bits. then I might Understand. I could be components, my veins and me. I used to be particular, and what changed? a few bits, sprinkled like salt (sodium chlorate), perhaps. my words don’t have these parts unless they smear on pages (carbon, mostly).
when I touch a penny there is zinc inside and inside me, metal disk and body, and why don’t these twin pebbles reach out to their kind, grab hold, why not conglomerate? gas, green (chlorine), poison deep into lungs, spreading downward through inverse branches, but in each bite I’ve taste deeply it entered me, my minute crevices
in this way I know, this poison friend, everything is only potentialities, shines that dull in companionship, yellows (sulfur) cleaving things, white (calcium) teeth and bones, orangey rust (iron) invasion and cover, making everything mossed, fungal, poisons and components.
1H a wish to expand, Explode I would. If not for lightness, singularity
6C shine and soot, I lattice and decay draw dusty lines
11 Na component salt, I crystallize not land, from Oceans or lake watery embrace, in currents
16 S gunpowder, chalky egg white, yellow powders. from petroleum, I emerge, Byproduct
2 He dual, lighter than air; I glow orange. Everywhere since the first instance, Unseen
7N nylon acid, explosion, I surround, as air and cleanse, ammonia
12 Mg milk of magnesia, salt of epsom I metallic, Heal.
17 Cl green gas poison, bleach and salt. I’ll swim with you in summer, blue antidote to heat.
3 Li stabilizing and reacting, Soft, kind Energizer. I shine a brightest gray
8O hovering breath, inhale me pure, and so life endures anywhere
13 Al deceptively light, enrobing compression and shine Take me, Smooth, and Crease.
18 Ar atmosphere home, I inert, remain. passive, incandescent
4 Be Atmospheric, I float metal, Mix. I’m toxic dust, Emerald cousin, mineral descendent
9F fumes, habitually malicious I etch, react; poison yellow fog
14 Si valley title, I’ve been invaded by connotation. Leave me, crystalline
19 K mineral, nutrient think of me, permeating
5B green flame, acid, borax; Cleanse. In earthen crust, I scarce, Exist.
10 Ne synonym for signs, see me glow, light! I’ll write your words, Electric
15 P I exist white or red, but never free. Mixed, riddled, find me with stars! cassiopeia
20 Ca you see me, teeth baring! and deposits. the structure of beings
21 Sc in stars, red and giant I am lost, come find me Above
26 Fe another word for decay my orange is age, rusty tallies of days
22 Ti I am too strong to be crushed, by heavy Reputation
27 Co this, my hue is my defense, afterbeyond blue. I am a vibrance
23 V in my life, I’ve ridden more sun Rays than you can name
28 Ni polar, I attract. with no labels, two opposites appear Same
24 Cr ultimate Shine, become reflections, light underneath my skin
29 Cu a turning, this change teal, a currency Mask shine, me
25 Mn cigarrete smoke, tendrils me, indissipation hazard in Bones
30 Zn essential, in body meander. in pennies, my Concealment
H2O a wish to Explode I would. expand, If not for hovering breath, singularity wish me pure, a lightness, life and inhale to expand, singularity Explode I would. If not for lightness, endures anywhere so
My elements draw from both classical and periodic elements, in addition to my own imaginings. They are Spindles. Spindles are always the same thickness, but they differ based on the following axes: rigid versus flexible, conductive versus inert, splintering versus resilient, and jagged versus slippery. These can twist together, entangle, stand straight in porous networks, flow alongside one another or become caught on each other. For example, a metal is composed of fluid, conductive, resilient, and jagged spindles that are very long and entangled. Its fluidity and long spindles produces its shine and potential smoothness. Chalk, by contrast, is composed of brittle, rigid spindles that cleave easily to form dust and written trails. Skin is resilient, flexible, and composed of long fibers; that way, it is strong, but flows and bends.
This project is situated in the world of pataphysics, a school of thought that is strange counterpart to contemporary “objective” empirical science (Hugill). In contrast, it revels in subjectivity and singularity of phenomena. Rather than asserting and executing repeatable experiments, pataphysics holds tenets such as the “clinamen,” an assumption of irregularity or “swerve,” of randomness. Others include “syzygy,” essentially a value for puns or a strange alignment of ideas and the “pataphor,” an extremely extended metaphor to the point of absurdity. My elemental system is an imagined alternate system of the composition of the world. This system is entirely based on creative thought about what potential explanations for the nature of things and the world could be. It is not grounded in an experimentation or research beyond my own experiences, sensations and perceptions of the world. Each set of elements, each past or current philosophy has been merely a paradigm. Each is ultimately questioned and new iterations emerge. I hope this project points to the imaginative construction of any knowledge system and a leveling or equalizing between fantasy or constructed reality and what is accepted as “official” or “objective” reality.
Foucault examined systems of knowledge in The Order of Things (Foucault; Gutting). He “argued that what was presented as an objective, incontrovertible scientific discovery… was in fact the product of eminently questionable social and ethical commitments.” This project is concerned with that idea that the asserted “objective” is also based on constructions, conventions, paradigms. This project also draws from the pataphysical work of Christian Bok. His book, Crystallography attempts to understand crystals, molecules, and other constructions through language manipulation, diagrams, and poetry. Bok describes himself as a pataphysician, and consequently his work is not concerned with some objective truth or empirical process. Rather, just as my project does, Bok’s book strives toward a subjective, alternate truth, but a truth nonetheless. This approach reflects Foucault’s idea that “language can function … as an autonomous reality,” that “language is a truth unto itself” (Gutting).
Works Cited Bök Christian. Crystallography. Coach House Books, 2009. Brito, Angmary, et al. “A Reconstruction of Development of the Periodic Table Based on History and Philosophy of Science and Its Implications for General Chemistry Textbooks.” Journal of Research in Science Teaching, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 30 Nov. 2004, onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/ tea.20044. Ferrey, Steven. “EARTH, AIR, WATER AND FIRE: THE CLASSICAL ELEMENTS CONFRONT LAND AND ENERGY.” Journal of Land Use & Environmental Law, vol. 27, no. 2, 2012, pp. 259–293. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/42842921. Foucault, Michel. The Order of Things. Routledge, 2002. “From Alchemy to Chemistry.” Khan Academy, Khan Academy, www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/ big-history-project/stars-and-elements/other-material3/a/from-alchemy-to-chemistry. Gutting, Gary, and Johanna Oksala. “Michel Foucault.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford
University, 22 May 2018, plato.stanford.edu/entries/ foucault/. Hugill, Andrew. Pataphysics: a Useless Guide. MIT Press, 2015. Khan Academy, Khan Academy, www.khanacademy. org/partner-content/big-history-project/stars-and-elements/knowing-stars-elements/v/bhp-periodic-table-crashcourse. Lucretius, and W. h. d. (translator) Rouse. Lucretius: De Rerum Natura, Translated by W.h.d. Rouse. Heinemann, 1937. Parry, Richard. “Empedocles.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 11 Sept. 2012, plato.stanford.edu/entries/empedocles/. Principe, Lawrence M. “Robert Boyle.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., 26 Feb. 2019, www.britannica.com/biography/Robert-Boyle#ref734596. Ward, Dennis. “Air Composition.” UCAR, www. eo.ucar.edu/basics/wx_1_b_1.html. Weisberg, Michael, et al. “Philosophy of Chemistry.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Stanford University, 16 Jan. 2019, plato.stanford.edu/entries/ chemistry/.