The Alchemy of Us: How Humans and Matter Transformed One Another

"Noelle: This was one of my favorite books of the last year, about materials and how materials were shaped by inventors, but also how those materials shaped culture and society. One of the neat things about the book is that each of the eight chapters is titled by a verb—interact, connect, convey, etc. It’s focusing on materials, several of which are elements, but also combinations of elements. Ramirez pays attention to people who aren’t always that well known, surfacing the hidden stories of these discoveries. Henrik: The Alchemy of Us is another book that is largely written for a general audience. Since we are talking about elements, one way to look at this book is that it brings out the human element in all of this. As Noelle said, these materials were shaped by inventors, but those materials shaped culture and society. Many of these inventions have had very positive effects on human societies and human well-being—in terms of communication, in terms of light, in terms of being able to travel and so forth. But, towards the end of the book, she also talks about negative effects. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . For example, the last chapter is focused on the development of the silicon chip, with silicon being an element. The internet and Google and social media have changed the way we receive information and interact with other people. And this is, in fact, rewiring our brains. This is something that we should be aware of and think about. What kind of society do we want going forward? How do we want to interact with each other, and might there be some downside to this idea that we should continuously be connected or hooked up to something? Noelle: She stresses how technological development can both reinforce existing power dynamics and biases but also change them. She gives the example of color film exposure being optimized for taking pictures of white people versus Black people. This reinforced existing biases, and she talks about how that changed but also how that’s reflected, even today, in facial recognition software. The book opens up the idea that there are ways of developing technology and thinking about who is involved to potentially mitigate some of these biases. That’s one of the things that we think about a lot, in areas of sustainable development: how to empower different groups in society. And I think this is also a theme across the books. Who is making decisions? Who is harmed? Who is benefiting from these substances? That’s something we draw attention to in the mercury case in particular. You brought up the silver mining example. Silver production was benefiting colonial rulers, but at the same time killing the indigenous peoples who were the miners. Reckoning with that history is, I think, a theme in almost all of these books, as well as in Mercury Stories ."