What are the five elements?

The Five Elements is China's ancient material view. Mostly used in philosophy, Chinese medicine and divination. The five elements refer to: gold, wood, water, fire and earth. It is believed that nature is composed of five elements, and with the rise and fall of these five elements, nature changes, which not only affects people's fate, but also makes everything in the universe circulate endlessly. According to the theory of five elements, everything in the universe is composed of the movement and change of five basic substances: wood, fire, earth, gold and water. It emphasizes the whole concept and describes the structural relationship and movement form of things. If Yin and Yang are an ancient theory of unity of opposites, the five elements can be said to be a primitive general system theory.