by Gianluca Gilardoni

Why are we interested in strange phenomena?

We are interested in strange phenomena because we think the explanation of unknown, through the formulation of a verified model, is the real essence of all sciences. Strange phenomena are not necessarly facts without a possible scientific explanation, but also facts that have not yet a scientific explanation or not yet totally known. As an example of this kind of phenomena we can report the so called "fluctuant phenomena".

Fluctuant phenomena

In the middle of the 30s the italian physical-chemist Giorgio Piccardi, born in Florence in 1895, working on the limeston developped in the boilers during industrial processes descovered that it could be easily removed by water in wich a vial containing mercury under a neon atmospher was previously shaken. He noted also that the cleaning power of this water on limeston was not constant in time, but it was subjected to unexplicable variations also in the same experimental conditions. Owing to this facts Piccardi saw that many chemical reactions and industrial processes where subjected to the same variations and so he began a serie of experiments to study them. Since the precipitation rate of colloidal solutions is one of the processes involved in fluctuations, Piccardi began studing the precipitation rate of bismuthil cloride obteined by hydrolisis of bismuth cloride in water excess. This experiment was repeted from 1951 till 1971 many times a day; every day at the same hours so that it was possible to have a very hight number of data whith the maximum of reproducible conditions. The conclusion from the experimental data was that the precipitation rate is statistically the same for two colloidal systems, of wich one was shielded and the other not, if no perturbations af all kind where induced in the space. Instead, if electromagnetic perturbation was induced, the precipitation rate was different. Piccardi noted also that data fluctuated hour by hour, day by day, month by month; the fluctuations were attribued to influences of geo-phisical and astronomical order on the colloidal system. The importance of this fact can be understood if we consider that biological systems can be approximated to colloids so, if external perturbations influence the colloidal systems, perhaps they could influence also living organisms. After Piccardi, professor Maki Takata studied the fluctuations in blood coagulation rate.