It’s a common elemental theme we see across stories, fantasies, etc. It seems like it is an element that should be part of that pantheon but maybe there is a scientific explanation of why it isn’t? Or is it simply, they did not have enough understanding of it at the time those 4 were suggested.
Mostly because the only real exposure to electricity the people who came up with the “classical” elements had was lightning. I’m sure they experienced static electricity from time to time, but they probably didn’t associate it with lightning.
From their perspective, lightning is a very brief moment of extreme light, then maybe a fire if they can actually see the impact site. So it seems a lot more closely related to fire than we would suppose.
maybe there is a scientific explanation of why it isn’t
Nothing about the “classical elements” is rooted in what we would understand as science today. It was just people making guesses about how the world around them worked without the rigor of the scientific process. It was little more than wild speculation.
Majorllama@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
Electricity is pretty much just very directed fire if you think about it in a sorta abstract way.
Thats why ATLA was objectively correct that fire benders could also handle lightning.
reksas@sopuli.xyz 4 weeks ago
maybe fire in classical alchemy is more like energy than just fire. I wonder what other elements are if you extend that logic to them
Majorllama@lemmy.world 4 weeks ago
The problem is heat energy/fire would kinda get all the cool shit. Like lava was given to the earth benders in LoK and I always felt that didn’t make as much sense as fire benders having access to it.
Air, water and earth all just have the one thing that really makes much sense. Water can do ice and stuff since that’s just a phase change for the element they control but what do earth and air get?