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== Elementary Particles ==
<nomobile>[[File:4 żywioły EN.png|thumb|The five elements: earth, water, air, fire and aether. The particles, in the form of regular polyhedra, according to drawings by Johannes Kepler.]]</nomobile>
The world is made of invisibly small particles of various shapes and characteristicsqualities. They come in a few kinds which correspond to the following '''elements''': ''earth, water, air'' and ''fire''. A single particle of each element has the shape of a regular convex polyhedron (also known as a Platonic solid). The particles of ''earth'' are cube-shaped, cubes being the only Platonic solids which can be arranged to fill space completely, which is why ''earth'' comes in solid phase. ''Water'' particles are little icosahedra (20-faced solids), which are most similar to a sphere, which is what makes water run smoothly through your fingers. ''Fire'' burns because its particles have the form of a (four-faced) tetrahedron with pointy vertices. A particle of ''air'', which is also gaseous, but not as light as ''fire'', is an octahedron, which has eight faces, or twice as many as a ''fire'' particle.
The problem is that there are exactly five regular convex polyhedra (which was mathematically proven already in antiquity). Which means there must exist a fifth element (also known as "quintessence", its Latin name), which would correspond to the fifth Platonic solid, the (12-faced) dodecahedron. In the far future, Luc Besson will imagine the fifth element to take the form of Ms. Milla Jovovich's supple body, but ancient natural philosophers thought it was actually ''aether'', a very subtle substance of which heavenly bodies are made. As ''aether'' does not occur on Earth, we won't be paying any more attention to it.
But that's not all yet. You can modify the natural humoral complexion of a given ingredient by giving it an appropriate thermal treatment. I suppose you won't be surprised to learn that roasting and baking makes things not only ''hotter'', but also ''drier''; frying ''dries'' them out, but to a lesser degree; and boiling adds ''moisture'' to your dish. This is why beef is good for boiling or stewing, but never for roasting, while pork – to the contrary – is good for the grill or the spit, but not for the pot. Veggies and fruits are for the most part so ''cold'' that you should almost never eat them raw; even lettuce should be at least scalded with boiling water before serving.
<nomobile>[[File:Barbieri, Paolo Antonio - The Spice Shop - 1637.jpg|thumb|left|Remember to grind your ingredients very finely and mix them thoroughly for their humoral characteristics properties to cancel each other out.]]</nomobile>If you wish to neutralize the humoral characteristics properties of one or more of your ingredients, then a rather obvious method is to mix them with ingredients having opposite complexions. For example, fat is rich in ''water'', so you can temper the ''dryness'' and ''hotness'' of red meat by larding. Sugar, ''moist'' and ''warm'' is commonly added to most ''cold'' dishes, even if these are not really desserts in the 21st-century sense. The natural ''moistness'' of fish is often counterbalanced by sprinkling it with vinegar or lime juice. This general neutralization method is more effective, if you can break down the ingredients into tiny bits and mix them all well. You can, for instance, mix ''cold'' vinegar with ''hot'' mustard seeds, but it's better to first grind the seeds down to a paste – which, incidentally, is how you make [[Ketchup_vs_Mustard#Mustard, “an Uncommon Condiment”|mustard]]. This is why mortar, pestles, graters and sieves are among the most important kitchen utensils.
The vast majority of spices and herbs (especially dried) is ''hot'' and ''dry'', whick makes them perfect for tempering the phlegmatic nature of some meats, like pork. Sprinkling, though, is not as effective as sticking, hence the great popularity of thick, spicy sauces. Even better is to mix spices with aspic (which, in itself, is ''cold'' and ''dry'') and pour this mixture onto meat, creating a galantine, one of the favourite dishes of medieval Europe. It's also important to give the various ingredients enough time for their elements to neutralize each other. In some extreme cases, you have to start the process of combining the ingredients while one of them is still alive. Hence recipes which instruct you to kill lampreys by drowning them in wine, bury live eels in salt or force-feed a well-fattened capon with vinegar.
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<mobileonly>[[File:Barbieri, Paolo Antonio - The Spice Shop - 1637.jpg|thumb|left|Remember to grind your ingredients very finely and mix them thoroughly for their humoral characteristics properties to cancel each other out.]]</mobileonly>
Any questions? No questions.<ref>As Sgt. Sukhov used to say in ''White Sun of the Desert'' by Vladimir Motyl (that's another quote from memory).</ref> Well, no, there is one:
<nomobile>[[File:Anagni 2.JPG|thumb|left|Yes another infographic illustrating the relations between elements and seasons (outer circles), and humours and stages of human life (inner circles enclosing a human figure). This one comes from the 13th century and can be found on the ceiling of a crypt in the cathedral of Anagni, Italy. On the wall below you can see Hippocrates (ca. 460 BCE – ca. 370 BCE) conferring with Galen (129 CE – ca. 216 CE).]]</nomobile>
<mobileonly>[[File:Capo Colonna2 retouched.png|thumb|The single remaining standing column from the temple of Hera built in Croton in the 5th century BCE]]</mobileonly>
In the meantime, another former Pythagorean, who was born here, in Croton, is doing natural philosophy with a medical bent. Dissecting human corpses is forbidden for religious reasons, but his studies on animal eyes and brains, have led him to the conclusion that it's the brain, rather than the heart, that is the seat of mind and emotions. Similarly to the Pythagoreans, Alcmeon views the world as a constant struggle of opposites. This includes the human body, where ''warmth'' competes against ''coldness'', ''moistness'' against ''dryness'', and so forth. A balance between them all is what keep you in good health, while the predominance of any one characteristics quality leads to illness.
'''Hippocrates of Kos''', born about half a century after Alcmeon, will eventually combine the latter's theory with Empedocles's by assigning one humour (including the imaginary black bile) to each of the four elements in order to explain the struggles of ''hot'' vs ''cold'' and ''moist'' vs ''dry''. He will be also known for introducing the general rule that the physician's duty is to make the patient feel better or at least not worse; and for contributing so much to medical theory that it becomes a standalone scholarly discipline. And all this without ever peeking inside a human body. This opportunity will only be available in the following century (4th BCE) to doctors working in Alexandria, such as '''Herophilus of Chalcedon''' and '''Erasistratus of Ceos'''. This they will owe to the first Greek rulers of Egypt, of the house of Ptolemy, who, for the benefit of science, will allow dissections of human corpses to take place on the premises of the Alexandrian temple of the muses (known as a "museum", but really more like a university).
