Chemistry, as a discipline that begins at an infantile stage, has its source known as alchemy. And this alchemy is exactly what Engels called the primitive form of chemistry. As for the origin of chemistry, there is an opinion that it originated in the alchemy of the European Middle Ages. Interestingly, the alchemy of the European Middle Ages was derived from the alchemy of Arabia. Before the early 20th century, especially Western scholars, they generally held this view. Not only did they look for traces of alchemy in ancient Greece and Egypt, but some even believed that Chinese alchemy was imported from Greece through Arabia. However, by the thirties of the 20th century, some scholars in China and the West had confirmed the fact that alchemy actually originated in China after in-depth research. The British historian of science Joseph Needham once pointed out that "one of the most important, if not the only most important roots, of chemistry in the whole is that it came from China." This point of view brings a new perspective and thinking to the question of the origin of chemistry.
Alchemy in China has a long history, dating back to the Warring States period, when there were records of monks and those seeking the "elixir of immortality". In the Jin Dynasty, alchemy was monopolized by Taoism, and alchemists were gradually replaced by Taoist priests. Although the original intention of alchemy is absurd, it is obviously impossible to achieve the purpose of violating the laws of nature by expecting people to live forever and become immortals with the help of the essence of gold and stone.
However, alchemists have accumulated a great deal of empirical knowledge about material changes in the practice of alchemy. Many alchemists are themselves medical scientists, and the drugs they use are closely related to the production of chemistry. According to an incomplete statistics based on alchemy literature, there are about 60 kinds of chemical substances, including inorganic and organic substances, and the elements involved include mercury, sulfur, carbon, tin, lead, copper, gold, silver, etc. All of these contributed to the early development of chemistry.
Alchemy contains a lot of chemistry. For example, in the Han Dynasty of China, there were records of mercury smelting with dansha, and later it was discovered that mercury could be combined with sulfur to turn into red mercury sulfide. Ge Hong, an alchemist of the Jin Dynasty, summarized this process in "Hug Puzi Jindan Chapter": "Dansha is burned into mercury, and it is returned to Dansha after accumulation. "Red mercury sulfide was one of the first products to be made chemically by human beings. In the practice of alchemy, the displacement reaction of iron to copper salts has also been discovered. The discovery of this reaction process laid the foundation for water copper smelting in the Song and Yuan dynasties. In addition, through alchemy, people have a certain understanding of some other metals and minerals. For example, Ge Hong learned that alkaline copper carbonate has a bactericidal effect, while Tao Hongjing used combustion to identify saltpeter (potassium nitrate), which created a precedent in chemistry to use the flame method to identify potassium salts.
China's alchemy spread to Arabia in the 8th and 9th centuries AD, and to Europe through Arabia in the 12th century, laying the foundation for the rise and development of chemistry. This shows that Chinese alchemy has an important place in the history of chemistry and has contributed to the progress of human civilization. Search Topic Full Time Challenge December