Chrysopoeia: From Alchemy to Particle Physics

 

 

I. 

 

One of the problems I have with analytical psychology is that it posits symbols everywhere. 

 

Thus, for example, Jung insists that the alchemists were not literally attempting to turn lead into gold; that chrysopoeia is simply an ancient Greek term for individuation and has nothing to do with the transmutation of base metals. 

 

In other words, the alchemists were metaphorically describing a process of self-realisation and their obscure and seemingly nonsensical texts contained universal truths which, once you understood how to interpret them, anticipated and reinforced his own theories [1].

 

Thus lead, don'tcha know, symbolises the unconscious, that shadowy place of repressed emotions, unresolved conflicts, and unacknowledged forces; whilst gold, on the other hand, symbolises the fully integrated (and fully conscious) self.      

 

 

II.

There's nothing wrong with viewing alchemy as a magical art or esoteric philosophy if that makes happy. But, personally, I prefer to think of it as an early form of science, associated with chemistry and metallurgy.

 

And so I'm pleased to report that our friends at CERN have demonstrated (on several occasions) that you can, in fact, turn actual lead into actual gold - though the great work requires a particle accelerator rather than a simple melting-pot or crucible. 

 

In 2002 and 2004, scientists using the Super Proton Synchrotron reported producing a minuscule amount of gold nuclei from lead nuclei, by inducing photon emissions within deliberate near-miss collisions of the latter.

 

And, earlier this year, another experimental team at CERN announced that they had used the Large Hadron Collider to replicate the 2002 SPS experiments at higher energies and created a total of roughly 260 billion gold nuclei over three runs (that might sound a lot, but, again, it's a tiny, tiny amount of material; think trillionths of a gram). [2].

 

 

III.

 

So, how's it done? 

 

Well, since the crucial difference between an atom of lead and an atom of gold is that the former contains three more protons [3], all you have to do is subtract these with an artificially produced electric field and Bob's your uncle, you have accomplished something that medieval alchemists could only dream of and followers of Jung only conceive in relation (yawn) to the psyche.  

 

Of course, that's not so easy; as I indicate above, you're going to need access to some serious technology if you wish to fire lead atoms towards each other at extremely high speeds. But it is doable - and that's pretty amazing, I think (even if not something that the scientists at CERN particularly welcome) [4].

 

Notes

 

[1] Jung readily admits that he initially regarded alchemical texts to be nonsensical and impossible to understand. However, curious, he pressed on and eventually discovered passages that he thought significant and which seemed to correlate with findings in his own work: 'I realised that the alchemists were talking in symbols ... [and that] only after we have learned how to interpret them can we recognise what treasures they hide'.  

      See  C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, recorded and ed. by Aniela Jaffe (Vintage Books, 1965), p. 204.

 

[2] Despite its very high density, the gold nucleus is incredibly small, with a diameter of approximately 3 x 10⁻¹⁴ metres. This is about 10,000 times smaller than the diameter of a gold atom itself. So even 260 billion gold nuclei don't amount to much and cannot be directly observed. 

      Gold is defined as a distinct element on the basis of its nucleus consisting of 79 protons. The neutrons meanwhile - which vary in number depending on what isotopic variety of gold one is dealing with - determine the stability and mass of the nucleus.   

 

[3] For those, like me, who need a reminder ... A proton is a subatomic particle with a positive electrical charge. They are found in every atomic nucleus of every element.  

 

[4] Equally amazing is the fact that if you only subtract one proton from an atom of lead you'll produce thallium - a rare, naturally occurring silvery-white soft metal known for its toxicity - whilst if you subtract two protons, you'll end up with mercury.

      The reason why scientists don't particularly welcome this unintentional alchemy is explained by Ulrik Egede, a professor of physics at Monash University: 

      "Once a lead nucleus has transformed by losing protons, it is no longer on the perfect orbit that keeps it circulating inside the vacuum beam pipe of the Large Hadron Collider. In a matter of microseconds it will collide with the walls. This effect makes the beam less intense over time. So for scientists, the production of gold at the collider is in fact more of a nuisance than a blessing."

      See Ulrik Egede, 'Physicists at the Large Hadron Collider turned lead into gold - by accident', The Conversation (13 May 2025): click here.  

On Apples and Apricots, Poets and Philosophers

I've come to give you fruit from out of my garden ...

I.

It's interesting to compare the pleasure that Bertrand Russell took from eating a piece of fruit with that experienced by D. H. Lawrence ...

In an essay first published in 1935, the former writes: 

"I have enjoyed peaches and apricots more since I have known that they were first cultivated in China in the early days of Han Dynasty; that Chinese hostages held by the great King Kaniska introduced them to India, whence they spread to Persia, reaching the Roman Empire in the first century of our era; that the word 'apricot' is derived from the same Latin source as the word 'precocious', because the apricot ripens early; and that the A at the beginning was added by mistake, owing to a false etymology. All this makes the fruit taste much sweeter." [1]

It's pretty clear what Russell is attempting to demonstrate here; namely, how knowledge shapes and intensifies our sensory experience of the world, enhancing our pleasure and, as in this case, literally making life taste sweeter. 

But Lawrence, who, at one time, imagined that he and Russell might team up and put the world to rights, would doubtless reject this and accuse Russell of bartering away the physical delight of eating an actual piece of fruit in exchange for mental satisfaction.

Compare and contrast Russell's overripe intellectualism with Lawrence's more elemental joy in eating an apple expressed in one of his last poems:   

"They call all experience of the senses mystic, when the experience is considered.
So an apple becomes mystic when I taste in it
the summer and the snows, the wild welter of earth
and the insistence of the sun.
All of which things I can surely taste in a good apple.

Though some apples taste preponderantly of water, wet and sour
and some of too much sun, brackish sweet
like lagoon-water, that has been too much sunned.

If I say I taste these things in an apple, I am called mystic, which means a liar.
The only way to eat an apple is to hog it down like a pig
and taste nothing
that is real.

But if I eat an apple, I like to eat it with all my senses awake.
Hogging it down like a pig I call the feeding of corpses." [2]

II.

Now, to be fair, no one could accuse Russell of simply hogging down his fruit. But he too doesn't seem to eat his peaches and apricots with all his physical senses awake, even if his big brain is still mechanically whirring like clockwork. 

It's as if Russell has a secret horror for the soft flesh of the fruit and so seeks an escape route into historico-linguistic abstraction, transfusing the juicy body of the apricot with facts and false etymologies. It's what Lawrence terms cerebral conceit - the tyranny of the mind and the arrogance of the spirit triumphing over the instinctive-intuitive consciousness.

Having said that - and despite his obvious irritation at the charge - it could be that Lawrence is being just a wee bit mystical when he says he can taste in his apple the elements and seasons and wild chaos of creation, etc.

But of course, Lawrence is not the only poet to insist on this. One might recall, for example, Louise Bogan's verse 'The Crossed Apple', which was published in the same year as Lawence wrote his poem (1929) and which contains the following lines:

"Eat it, and you will taste more than the fruit: / The blossom, too, / The sun, the air, the darkness at the root, / The rain, the dew ..." [3]

I suppose we might conclude that whilst philosophers love to parade their learning, poets have to make a big deal about their sensitivity and insist that they can feel more than the rest of us.

(A friend, who happens to be a chemist, would say that what you can actually taste in an apple is a combination of sugars, acids, and tannins; that these things determine the flavour in terms of sweetness, sourness and bitterness. But then he might also insist that water is H2O and that's not quite the whole truth, is it?)

Notes

[1] Bertrand Russell, '"Useless" Knowledge', In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays, (George Allen and Unwin Ltd.,1935).

[2] D. H. Lawrence, 'Mystic', The Poems, Vol. I., ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013).

[3] Louise Bogan, 'The Crossed Apple', Dark Summer, (Scribner's, 1929).

Thanks to Simon Solomon for suggesting the poem by Louise Bogan.