Reader's Guide — 11th Edition

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Chapter LVChemistry

Contents

  1. Triumphs of Chemistry

We have traveled far since Chemistry had as its simple basis four elements: fire, air, water, and earth, regarded as perfect and complete since they embody every essence of which a body was supposedly capable: for fire was hot and dry; air, hot and wet; water, cold and wet; earth, cold and dry. We have outlived the belief in the philosopher’s stone which animated the Middle Ages. Yet these fallacies are but manifestations of the effort—old as thought—to reduce the manifoldness of matter to primordial elements, from which, in one form or other, every substance should be capable of being built up. The ultimate problem of chemistry is, therefore, the constitution of matter, and the fight around this is waged on the marches of the physical and chemical sciences.

Triumphs of ChemistryThe great commercial triumphs of chemistry are, of course, those due to the conquest of waste, to the utilization of by-products which for thousands of years had been regarded as useless. We are all familiar with the uses to which the by-products of coal-tar are put; we swallow one derivative to relieve headache, we may sugar our tea and flavour our ice-cream with others; with one derivative we clean our clothes which have been dyed with others; and we disinfect them with yet another. Phenacetin, saccharin, synthetic vanilla, benzine, naphthaline, analine dyes, carbolic acid, are only a few of the many substances won to the consumer by the chemist in his laboratory; and this is only one field of research. The chemist is always busy (as now with rubber, camphor, etc.), working at the synthesis of natural products in the hope that he will be able to find a means of manufacturing them in quantities at a cost which will make them, commercially possible, and thus lessen the drain on the world’s natural supply. In almost every detail of our lives this science enters so familiarly that we forget that the many things made possible by the chemist do not simply “happen,” but are the result of laborious research in the laboratory.

It is not possible to attain proficiency in any experimental science without laboratory work; but to the student of chemistry the lucid and original articles in the Britannica will provide a most useful commentary on his work with test-tube and burner. The general reader will find in these articles an admirable survey of the subject, and of its bearings on problems of daily life. The main article Chemistry (Vol. 6, p. 33) generally covers the ground, and serves as an introduction to separate articles on important divisions of the subject. Following its arrangement the scheme outlined below suggests a useful course of reading.

(i.) Chemistry, History (Vol. 6, p. 33). Supplementary to this section are the articles Alchemy (Vol. 1, p. 519), Element (Vol. 9, p. 253), Molecule (Vol. 18, p. 654), Atom (Vol. 2, p. 870); and reference may also be made to Medicine, Iatro-chemical School (Vol. 18, p. 50).

(ii.) Chemistry, General Principles (Vol. 6, p. 39), with reference to Valency (Vol. 27, p. 847), Chemical Action (Vol. 6, p. 26), Catalysis (Vol. 5, p. 501), Isomerism (Vol. 14, p. 881), Stereo-isomerism (Vol. 25, p. 890), Radioactivity (Vol. 22, p. 793).

(iii.) Inorganic Chemistry (Vol. 6, p. 44). See also Acid (Vol. 1, p. 145), Alkali (Vol. 1, p. 674), and the list of 138 elements and compounds under this heading below.

(iv.) Organic Chemistry (Vol. 6, p. 47), with all the 240 articles enumerated under this heading below, especially that on Polymethylenes (Vol. 22, p. 29); see also Explosives (Vol. 10, p. 81).

(v.) Analytical Chemistry (Vol. 6, p. 60), with which may be consulted, Blow Pipe (Vol. 4, p. 89), Distillation (Vol. 8, p. 318), Electrolysis (Vol. 9, p. 217), Indicator (Vol. 14, p. 482), Solution (Vol. 25, p. 368), Stoichiometry (Vol. 25, p. 939).

(vi.) Physical Chemistry (Vol. 6, p. 65) supplemented by Energetics (Vol. 9, p. 390), Chemical Action (Vol. 6, p. 26), Thermochemistry (Vol. 26, p. 804), Solution (Vol. 25, p. 368), Distillation (Vol. 8, p. 318), Condensation of Gases (Vol. 6, p. 844), with the important articles Photochemistry (Vol. 21, p. 484), Electrochemistry (Vol. 9, p. 208), Metallurgy (Vol. 18, p. 203), Electrometallurgy (Vol. 9, p. 232), Assaying (Vol. 2, p. 776).

Among the contributors to the chemical department of the Britannica are: Professor Ernest Rutherford, of the University of Manchester; Walter Nernst, professor of physical chemistry in the University of Berlin; W. C. D. Whetham, author of Theory of Solution, etc.; Prof. James Walker of the University of Edinburgh; Johannes Diderik van der Waals, professor of physics, University of Amsterdam; W. R. E. Hodgkinson, professor of chemistry and physics, Ordnance College, Woolwich, perhaps the greatest living authority on explosives.

The following is a classified list of the articles on Chemistry which are contained in the Britannica. For discussions of the application of chemistry to photography, the reader should consult the article Photography (Vol. 21, p. 485), of which the chemical section is by Sir W. de W. Abney, adviser in Science to the English Board of Education.

CHEMISTRY—GENERAL

INORGANIC CHEMISTRY

ORGANIC CHEMISTRY

BIOGRAPHIES