I think your questions are cool but have the same anxiety as I am suffering with my BA thesis right now. The theme or big subject seems clear in your exposition, though I don´t know if you have a "research problem question". For example you quote "[...]the people who practice it is always as a side note in some other context, such as the exodus from Spain as a result of the Inquisition". Well, that is exactly what a research question is. It needs to be just a frame analysis of the big subject cause the grade of spcecialization in sciences is huge to treat "knowledge" as a unique item. Of course I agree with interdisciplinary work and with the gathering of different "levels" of analysis of reality. I won´t go on with this epistemological matter cause is well explained in text books.

What aspect of the relationship between science and alchemy are you willing to research?. I suggest you concentrate on a concrete matter of this huge theme and develop your hypothesis. Of course you need first to be handy with the background history of alchemy in western world (maybe something from the east of Eliade´s "Alchemysts and Forgers" book) to make the "state of the matter", that is, what has been done before regarding the subject. About your implicit question of the relationship of alchemy and science, yes, Yates, is the best option to start a History of Science project, such us yours. Another book that quotes Yates and has lots of bibliography on it too, is " Coming to our senses: Body and spirit in the hidden history of the West" by Morris Berman.

On 11/12/07, Ty Falk <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Greetings!

I'm writing because I require some assistance on a little project I'm
working on. It is far larger in scope then anything I've attempted
before. One of the aspects of mysticism that I've begun to teach as a
normal part of my coursework is that of Alchemy, both as a system for
internal change, as well as an external pseudoscience and system of
allegory. The more I read about it, the more fascinating it becomes.
What I noticed, however, is that, at least from what I've seen, the
treatment of alchemy and the people who practice it is always as a
side note in some other context, such as the exodus from Spain as a
result of the Inquisition. I have yet to really come across anything
that gives alchemy real spotlight treatment (granted, I've only really
begun to traverse some of my newer sources). I want to do something
that gives a relatively scholarly history of the concept from the
scientific as well as mystical aspects, with a second section on
practical application for the modern practitioner.

Now I can handle the section on application well enough, it's the
historical portion I'm finding daunting. I think the sort of
symbolic/interpretive approach of, among others, Geertz, will be
rather useful for doing this because of how allegorical and symbolic
the tradition of Alchemy is. And I'm not above splashing some other
theory here and there where needed. So in that vein I had a few
questions.

Firstly, has this been done before? As I said I have found a few books, but they
seem to either treat the subject as secondary, or be rather limited in
scope. (I have The Alchemical Tradition in the Late Twentieth Century
by Grossinger on order, just waiting for it to come in.)

Other then Hutton's book "The Triumph of the Moon", Adler's "Drawing
Down the Moon", and Barrett's "A Brief History of Secret Societies",
are there any modern texts you would recommend on the subject or that
you think would give me a better context in which to do my analysis? I
was already shown from this very site:
http://www.alchemy-bibliography.co.uk/newthismonth.shtml

There is a fair bit of occult literature that is circulated in
electronic form. For example, one of the classic texts is "The
Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz". This can be a difficult
book to find a printed copy of, but is readily available on line from
sites such as:

http://www.sacred-texts.com/ and
http://www.alchemywebsite.com/index.html

How concerned should I be about being able to find physical copies to
cite with regards to some of these texts? How should I treat different
editions or translations?With regards to sources, how deep should I go
check validity? Should I go back to a sources' sources'? Or would just
the sources of the book I'm using suffice?

Anything else you can think off of the top of your head, people or
resource wise, that might be of use to me?

Preciate it!

Ty Falk
~~~~~~~
Erisian
Anthropologist
Grand Rapids, MI