Why should alchemists be interested in flashes of lightning? The Lynn Mills Law of Electron Transfer Via Matter State Changes may suit our Two Columns Symbolism.
Further, may the same hypothesis meet Die Sonne von Osten’s 1783 statement:” Hermetic Philosophers say that their Materia is being born like the thunder and leaves behind similar signs”?
“…when dilute water solutions are frozen, a large electric potential develops between the water and the ice… ” This is an excerpt from the pieces of evidence Mills used to support her theory. We will see further down the conclusion that can be drawn from it to contribute to flashes of lightning formation theories.
However, this statement can, in my opinion, be tremendously adapted to our two columns’ symbolism on the left, from Compass der Weisen, Birkholz Berlin 1782. Aesh and Majim (in the engraving appearing as J and B for Jachim and Boaz, the two Solomon’s Temple side pillars ) represent the two columns of expansion and contraction (as you can see in the picture from Compass der Weisen, Birkholz, Berlin 1782) which help to dissipate the raw matter or chemical salts. Air-Fire and Earth-Water. And why do we need this in Alchemy? Because our preparatory works or Labors of Hercules are all about that.
If we want to work open the salts’ electronic clouds, in which many alchemists do believe our Secret Fire/Mercurius is contained, we have to apply matter state continuously changes in Alchemy called Analysis or Magnetization. We call it Solve et Coagula in the first phase. The Sonne von Osten motto states that the Philosophical Materia birth shares similar signs with thunders. As a matter of fact, Alchemists, in their volatilizations of salts, do speed up what nature does in accordance with its rhythms.
While not yet accepted as a general theory, I thought the scientific postulate I’m posting here may sound very interesting to our alchemical purposes and research. The web page I’m examining seems to be expired, and I could not gather other news on the author. So all I can possibly do is thank Lynn Mills for her contribution and clever insights.
Lynn Mills’s beginning: Lightning is a product of condensation. It is part of the water cycle we all learned about in school.
INTRODUCTION
Water molecules in the liquid state share electrons covalently. This enables liquid water molecules to exist at a lower energy state and is the factor that makes water behave as a liquid. However, when energy in the form of heat is available, the water molecules use this heat energy to lock up a full complement of electrons in the valence band or a perfect dot diagram of eight electrons. The molecule is now free to move about independently and is now gas and refuses to share any of its electrons with its neighbors. It jumps into the atmosphere and leaves behind fewer electrons to be shared by the ocean’s liquid water molecules.
As the gas H2O molecules lose their heat energy, they also lose the ability to maintain a full complement of electrons, and the gas molecules are forced to condense with each other, become liquid, and once again share electrons. In the process, they give up the surplus heat and electrons they can no longer afford to maintain. A lightning storm ensues if condensation is fast enough and in sufficient amounts.
CONCLUSIONS
So the Mills Law predicts that in any cloud formations, the clouds’ condensing areas will have a negative charge or a surplus of electrons. In the parts of the clouds that are dissipating due to evaporation, there will be a loss of free electrons or a positive charge. Also, freezing portions of the cloud will become more negative, and thawing portions will become more positive. The volume and rapidity of condensation determine how much lightning is produced.
The Mills Law, if true, has far-reaching implications—one example. If the Earth is cooling and rock is changing states from liquid to solid, you would expect the Earth to carry a net negative charge. On the other hand, if the Earth is heating up, Mills’ law says you will find the Earth to carry a net positive charge because the rocks are going from solid-state to liquid.
So you see, lightning is merely a part of the water cycle. From Ocean to sky to earth again. Isn’t it just like nature to recycle?
The “Mills Law of Electron Transfer Via Matter State Changes” says That when matter changes states (solid to liquid, liquid to solid, liquid to gas, or gas to liquid), there will be a corresponding transfer of electrons.
“Electro-release condensation” is the release of an electron from the outer valance at the point of condensation, and conversely, “electro-nabbed evaporation” is the capture of an electron during evaporation.
EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT THE THEORY.
NASA recently established that there is a direct ratio between the volume of rain produced in a storm and the amount of lightning it produces; I have witnessed rapidly condensing freon producing sparks of static electricity;
Ninety percent of cloud-to-ground strikes are negative clouds to positive ground. Just as it should be if condensing water frees electrons;
When Dr. David Rust and his team sent a probe into the anvil of a thunderhead, they had a big surprise. Current theory says that the upper levels of a thundercell are positive. Instead of recording only high positive charges as they had supposed the probe recorded unexpectedly, a large area of high negative charge in the anvil. Just what you would expect in an area of a cloud that is both condensing and dissipating (by evaporation);
In an article by Dr. Hugh J. Christian & Melanie A. McCook (positive strikes), negative earth to the positive cloud, lightning strikes are discussed. They are mentioned as “an appreciable minority… of the total lightning strikes…. These positive flashes often occur during the dissipating phase of a thunderstorm life”. This is exactly what my postulate predicts. Dissipating storms are usually evaporating, and evaporation produces positive charges that result in a positive lightning strike;
Research by two separate teams, Studwell and Orville (1995) and Holle and Watson (1996), Discovered a predominance of positive flashes (delivering net positive charge to ground) in areas of freezing rain. Again this is exactly what my theory predicts. As water freezes, it becomes negatively charged. Since freezing rain becomes frozen in contact with the ground, it imparts a negative charge to the ground on freezing. Any discharge would be negative ground to a positive cloud, constituting a positive flash! The net result of the discharge is a positive charge left on the ground and a negative charge delivered to the cloud;
Laboratory experiments directed by E J Workman at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology Back up the freezing rain theory by showing that when dilute water solutions are frozen, an enormous electric potential develops between the water and the ice. The experiments show that the ice gains a negative charge while the water retains a positive charge;
Here is a copy of a letter I received. Thanks to Mr. Paul Brunson for giving me permission to publish it here: Lynn, We have a static shock problem at my plant on top of a structure. If you touch the handrail, any metal up there, or even the guy next to you, you get a pretty good shock. There is a small pinhole steam leak from a high-pressure steam line blowing onto the structure and you if you walk through it. As your lighting sources paper suggests, I question whether the steam condensing on the metal handrails and our bodies could release electrons. Then when we touch each other or the handrails we get a static shock to equalize the charge. Any input would be appreciated; Paul Brunson Olin Corporation Charleston, TN;
Maintenance crews and rescue workers with a lot of experience around helicopters are painfully aware of the large static shock they can receive when a chopper operates above moisture. The area of the prop wash is so extensive that large amounts of moisture are evaporated rapidly, creating a highly charged area around the helicopter;
TESTING THE PREMISE
A test of this theory might be to construct a large tank, insulate it from the ground, and then create a recirculating airflow, with combs to neutralize, through which dried air or moist air can be recirculated to the saturation point. With the tank recirculating dried air, a high-pressure stream of water would be directed at a ball or other object in the center of the tank that would atomize the water to evaporate almost instantly. The tank should rapidly build a static charge due to evaporation. Then repeat the process with the recirculating air in the tank being moist to saturation so no evaporation can occur. My theory is true if a charge builds in the dry air tank only. If a charge builds in both tanks, then my theory is not true, and the charges come from another source.
See also Cesare Ripa & the Hot Frozen Ouroboros World Machine , Dorneus & the Third Level, Archarion & the Analysis inside a Mortar, Basilius Valentinus & the Solve et Coagula Tree , Wenceslaw Lavinius and the Sky and Earth Properties , Stoll, the Lacinius Translator on Male and Female Elements.