Yanniru please allow me to quote:
"Tim was commenting that at first in chemistry they teach you that unlike charges attract. But then as you get to higher level courses it turns out that substances tend to coalesce much more than what could be expected from mass and gravity alone.

In the chem courses they try to explain it as a diple effect, but the explanation according to Tim is not all that believable. So he and I wonder if it is a manisfestation of this new charge."

actually i find the dipole effect a totally reasonable explaination. and i find your further analysis with respect to Miso soup et al and a
new charge C in the universe that can be plus or minus for which like charges attract to be most convincing also. together these features of the universe might well explain the mystery of Miso soup.

my original point though was what struck me as an anomally (of course it really wasn't an anomally)
that being on some fundamental physical level opposites attract, likes repel. (example + charge,
and - charge, then nature reveals that like substances tend to attract for example water and Miso soup. but actually dipole effects, hydrogen bonding in water explain the pooling of water. so actually the same fundamental principle opposites attract, likes repel on the microscopic level holds but the result on the macroscopic level is pooling of water, clumping of Miso soup and birds of a feather flocking together. and then to make things even more interesting there may be like charges that attract and unlike charges that repel that contribute to the whole scenerio.

something about this nags at me, it's like a ghost toddler scampering about a haunted house going nah, nah, na nah nah, you can't find me.
again my point is about the "flip flop" in physical results that occurs. on the micro level it's like attracts opposite and likes repel likes and visa versa, then on the macro level it's the same but in a mirror image with respect to the concept of opposites and likes on the micro level.
ie. water, miso soup and birds of a feather. then there are crystals of unlike atoms that can form, amalgms that are stronger than like pure metals they are composed of, mixtures tend to be the rule when you look at the big picture, like substances being imbedded here and there upon the earth with in unlike substances, looking at the animal world we see the likes depending on the unlikes in one way or another the whole an amalgm that derives it's strength from the unlikeness of the parts of the whole.

but it's the flip flop that interests me most.
the way that a concept such as like and opposite is manipulated by nature so that such complexity emerges in what appears to be a blosoming of symetry.

cheers tim