After experiencing the legacy of an ancient demon, Lin Ke could not help feeling a little wistful.
The difference between ancient people and modern people lay in their horizons and access to information, not their intelligence.
Whether refining artifacts or concocting pills, viewed through scientific methods, it was merely a matter of combining certain substances.
Or selecting, refining, and fusing different substances through their melting points, boiling points, and so on.
Liquids and solutes, the melting points of solids, sublimation and deposition involving gases-all of these were methods of refinement.
For example, when it came to refinement with gases, there had been a very famous chemical reaction in his previous life called oxidation.
With a metal like aluminum, adjusting the conditions of the anodizing process could produce a thick, hard surface layer, making it effective under conditions involving friction while giving it both lubricating and wear-resistant properties.
Engine cylinders, pistons, and similar components in cars and tractors were made using anodized aluminum products.
This, too, was a kind of artifact refinement.
But the ancients' thinking had ranged more widely.
Or rather, this was the Great Wei World.
Among metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, wood alone was an element with which it was difficult to accomplish much.
This was also related to the philosophical ideas proposed by the Daoist School.
Chaos, yin and yang, the five elements, and so forth were an account of the world's origins proposed by the Daoist School under conditions where all means of observation were extremely limited.
They believed the world had evolved from chaos, producing two masses of qi, and that these two forms of qi, yin and yang, had then given rise to the five elements.
These five elements made up everything in the world.
Of course, this was a conclusion drawn under