"Empedocles continues explaining how the universe as we know it evolved from the original appearance of the four elements and two forces. Imagine that the cosmos is like a large kitchen blender that contains equal portions of earth, air, fire and water, all swirling around. Suppose, then, that the two forces of Love and Strife are thrown into the blender, where Love has the power to draw the elements together, and Strife has the power to have the elements separate from each other. As the mixture swirls around in the blender, it will exhibit four separate states, depending on how much Love and Strife are sucked into the mix."