The New Alchemy - Gold

[Robert Maxwell]

Instead of merely saying no back up your responses with YOUR OWN experimental data that you have concluded from doing your own experiments to come to the conclusion instead of relying on a hand me out that someone else has already concluded especially the play on words and the semantics that only prove you can twist words around.

Exactly what are you looking for here? Bacteria can extract gold from compounds containing gold. This is about as simple as logic gets. What, do you think this is magic? I don't know what point you are trying to make.

 

[Jedi_Master]

This was a neat article about the theoretical process of turning lead into gold. It is ridiculously impractical but still cool.

Link

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Ha! Before I even clicked, I thought "I bet with a particle acceleration and lots of time and dedication, you could do it." Sure enough, particle accelerator.

Hilariously impractical, as you said.

 

[Awesome Possum]

I have a process of extracting salt from salt water. It's a complicated process, but all I need is time itself.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Salt from water? That's really weak, you could extract potent and dangerous hydrogen fuel from any water. Turning water into fuel is probably a much more elusive historical holy grail than lead into gold, and yet it's... what Saturn V flew with.

"One day we'll turn water into fuel and use it to fly to the moon." Tell that to any alchemist and they'd tell you you'd been smoking your own alchemical preparations.

 

[Metryq]

"One day we'll turn water into fuel and use it to fly to the moon." Tell that to any alchemist and they'd tell you you'd been smoking your own alchemical preparations.

At least you said "water." If you'd said "hydrogen," the alchemist would have asked, "What's a hydrogen?" Although a similar line did appear in DESTINATION MOON (1950). Joe, the "average man in the street" for audiences, is one of the contractors building the rocket, and he comments to his bosses:

The thing won't woik—it can't. It's crazy! Figure all that weight. It won't budge an inch. And what do I see 'em puttin' in the fuel tanks? Water!

Anyone interested in the pre-chemistry history of alchemy might enjoy The 13th Element: The Sordid Tale of Murder, Fire, and Phosphorus.

 

[publiusr]

This was a neat article about the theoretical process of turning lead into gold. It is ridiculously impractical but still cool.

Link

Don't use lead--use mercury and put it into a reactor.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesis_of_precious_metals

Such transmutation is possible in particle accelerators or nuclear reactors, although the production cost is currently many times the market price of gold.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthesis_of_precious_metals#Gold_synthesis_in_a_nuclear_reactor
http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=207593
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_transmutation

Now, if security is low (Ha!) I suppose some goober who works in a reactor might try some home cooking...but Vic Mignogna's transmutation circles won't cut it.

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Mercury? It just doesn't have that ring to it.

 

[publiusr]

If we ever have an antimatter engine, carbon shielding will turn into valuable if radioactive elements on the way to one's destination, if memory serves.

 

[Australis]

Yeah, I'm not seeing it.

1, it's getting gold from gold.

2, it's not alchemy, which creates gold from base metals.

3, it's just straight science. It is, in this day and age, nothing special.

 

[Kemaiku]

3, it's just straight science. It is, in this day and age, nothing special.

Considering I did a smaller scale version of this experiment with Ferrocene (iron compound) at university, as part of the standard UK course, 10 years ago...yeah.