system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why isn't alchemy possible? Isn't it just protons, neutrons, and electrons that move from one atom to another?
gpt
I'll have to find the article to confirm it, but the Large Hadron Collider has the capability to produce 250 atoms of pure gold per second. 

So yes, "just" rearranging subatomic particles is possible at this point, but it's prohibitively expensive: 

To yield one mole of gold (about 197 grams) it would take around 7.61x10^13 years of continual operation and at a cost of over one billion dollars for each one of those years . 


You would get a much better return in your lifetime by investing in a slave army and mining for ore with shovels.