I am a part of a local mineral club which hosts several "field trips" a year to various mineralogically interesting locations (most of which aren't accessible as an individual, like private land and special digs at active mining/quarrying sites on their days off). I have never found anything even remotely as beautiful as the specimens shown, but the small collection of mildly interesting things that I've smashed out of the earth with my own 2 hands is amazingly satisfying to me. You don't even have to be a super dedicated "rock nerd" to take part, I highly recommend looking for local mineral clubs to join if this even remotely interests you. It's really a ton of fun!
There are a few species you can sometimes find in washes when they get buried during massive floods, but other than that most museum quality specimens are impossible to find for rockhounds.
I still bring my trusty Estwing rock hammer everywhere but it kind of takes the wind out of the treasure hunting aspect.
The asbestos formations are ones they keep behind glass.
https://crystalverse.com/best-way-to-grow-copper-sulfate-cry...
Crystal growth has been on here before. Let me see if I can find a link or two...
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31105320
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30487511
I suppose that the crystals from the picture are of pyrite, which frequently looks like this.
In the antiquity, when what are now called diamonds (the Romans and the Greeks called them "Indian adamants", because they were first encountered by Europeans during the expedition in India of Alexander the Great; "adamant" meant something else in Europe) were very difficult to cut and polish, they were normally used as gems in their natural shape of regular octahedra.
Cutting diamonds from their natural octahedral shape into polyhedra with more facets, e.g. brilliant, was invented much later.
At the end of the 18th century, Lavoisier together with a few other French chemists have created the modern systematic chemical nomenclature, so the old term "pyrite" was replaced by "sulfide" (like also "vitriol" was replaced with "sulfate").
For who does not know, "pyrite" comes from "fire", i.e. from the pronunciation in Ancient Greek of the corresponding word that was cognate with English "fire" (Ancient Greek or Latin "p" corresponds with English "f").
Striking pyrite produces sparks, which can be used to start a fire.
They’re not expensive
https://www.science.org/content/article/how-do-wombats-poop-...
Where the gems are in plain sight!
https://www.hmns.org/exhibits/cullen-hall-of-gems-and-minera...
(Post Malone’s response in a Joe Rogan interview when asked about McKenna’s Stoned Ape Theory)
"They are not rocks, they are minerals marie"
I don't see any god though, but I think I saw godzilla hiding in one of those shapes.
"The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you."
Gabriel: "Hey, God, what's doing?"
God: "Oh, well, I just got a big lump of boron so I'm trying to get it to crystallise out with all this silicon and alumina. If it works I think I'll have the tiny people call it 'tourmaline'. Yeah, look at that stuff, look at it go!"