标题: 《Right Ingredients 》作者： - A. Bertram Chandler【EPUB】 [打印本页] 作者: zaq 时间: 2013-9-5 19:01 标题: 《Right Ingredients 》作者： - A. Bertram Chandler【EPUB】 Blind chance seems to play a very important part in the shaping of destinies, and even in the realm of science it has certainly been responsible for many unexpected discoveries. Let George Whitley introduce you to a simple enough experiment into the Fourth Dimension. All you need is blind chance and . . . THE RIGHT INGREDIENTS By GEORGE WHITLEY It is when things get mixed up that they become dangerous. Take saltpetre, for instance, and charcoal, and sulphur. Of the three, it is only the first named that requires any special care in its handling, and that only because it is a strong supporter of combustion. Mix them in the right proportions, however—and the result is gunpowder. There must, I imagine, have been a strong element of chance involved in its first manufacture. There was some alchemist, perhaps, who was seeking the Philosopher's Stone or the Elixir of Life, and this combination of three common chemicals was one of the many that he tried. He didn't get what he was looking for but he got something just as powerful, or even more powerful; a force that changed the social structure of the world and, it may well be, gave rise to the explosive doctrine that all men are equal. Given the right ingredients and the right people to mix them, anything can happen—especially