I see this A little differently.
I do not think any one was comparing another board member to a child, beyond the point that the child could not run the equipment, and would have no understanding of how, and if they did they could get hurt or hurt someone else, the children should not be given the keys.
I do think it was a good analogy, when people come here to learn refining they are like kids to this art, they may think they know enough to run the equipment, seeing a video or reading some half baked instructions on the internet about dissolving everything in aqua regia and precipitating pure gold simple as that, no need to study, heck this is simple any kid could turn the key and pull on a few levers on that crane at the construction site and get the job done, heck he seen it done in a video.
Everyone here treats others like adults, we even treat our very young members like adults, (also sometimes the young members act more like adults than the adults do), but as adults sometimes we need to be shown we are over our head and jumping into the drivers seat before we are really ready, thinking this whole recovery refining thing is some simple thing, we may need an analogy like the one above to get us to realize it is not as simple as we first think it is, this is a complex chemistry we deal with, it seems very simple on the outside, but simple it is not, it can take years just to get a basic understanding of the reactions and what is happening when we put metals in acids, it can take years just to be able to understand the basics, even for a smart man who study's hard, even with the very easy books to understand like Hokes, and even with members trying to explain these basic principles on the forum, it takes a while to grasp these principles, then there are many different materials and processes that have their own aspects to learn, and I do not think any one man can learn all there is to this in one lifetime, this is a huge field of science to learn and understand, new members really have no understanding of how complicated it is, or the dangers involved, we do not treat them like kids, but we do try to get these grown men or women to understand the are like kids on a crane in the construction yard, when they jump in and dump acids and metals together with literally no understanding of what they are doing, like the kids in the construction yard they would only hurt themselves or others if they did not step back, get an understanding of what they are trying to do before they pull those levers.
Many of us men and women of the forum (most of us here) ( most of us OLD kids on the forum) started off this way, jumping in pulling levers without knowing what we were actually doing), until we found our selves running into problems, and then spent the time to study, it was only after we spend that time studying do we understand how little we really understood before, and began to understand how dangerous we were to ourselves and others, when we jumped before we really should have, and just how dangerous this field can be, where we could poison or selves or others around us, or have a flask blow up in our face from simply mixing a couple of chemicals and metals together.
siannopollo, when you suggested:
I would advise you look into the ways of either dissolving the gold plating from the base metal in the jewelry.
How do you advise we do this (other than cyanide), and if I took your advice How do I use this chemical without harming myself or others, I have never used it, should I just mix up a batch, and try it before I learn more about it, I am a kid at this process, (and at this point I would be like the kid in the construction yard on that crane), I have read a few things, but I also have learned enough from years of reading about it, that I really do not know enough to try it, but if I thought I have read enough to try it and jumped in before I was ready and ran into problems, could you give me advice? how about an antidote, I feel sick,and these acid fume are stinking up the house, after trying this can you help, or would it be too late.
I would rather you make an analogy, to try to get me to understand,before I jumped in over my head, That I was like a kid on the crane in the construction yard, pulling levers I knew nothing about, so that I may be able to understand that I really do not know enough about cyanide to be try it without a heck of a lot more study, before I came to you asking for the antidote.
To learn a complex science and its dangers it takes time and study, no man or women should jump in mixing acids and metals before they have done a lot of research, to get an understanding of the dangers, and the basic science and safety measure.
All of us gold refining kids had to start somewhere, and Hokes is a great place to begin, then the safety section and dealing with waste, and studying the forum, before we even think of mixing chemicals and metals.
