Lecture 1: Vision Statement, Administrative Details

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Welcome to 3.091. My name is Donald Sadoway, and I'll be your lecturer this fall. We've got plenty of room here if you need to sit. You can sit up the steps and in the aisles. We'll get things sorted out in the next day or two.

What I'd like to do today is to introduce myself, introduce the subject, introduce my plans. I have plans for you. I have plans for you called plans for learning because that's what it's all about.

People if you're coming in now, you can sit up here, or you even can sit on the floor up here. It's one big happy family. So, let me begin by telling you that 3.091 is the most important subject that you will take at MIT.

It is the most important subject that you'll take at MIT. I truly believe that. But, you know, any professor who stands before you should say the same thing about his or her subject. If they don't believe that, they shouldn't be teaching.

The difference is, when I say it, I'm right. It is the most important subject. I want to teach you things that you are going to retain, you're going to take with you. So, we need to get down to that.

What I want to do is get you to appreciate the unique perspective that you will get from studying solid-state chemistry. And so, what I want to do is begin by doing a little bit of introduction so you get to know what's going on.

So, I'm going to talk a little bit about myself, about the staff, and actually if I could ask the teaching staff to start handing out, there's three handouts that are going to come to you. Just stay seated, we'll get them to you.

If you don't get them, there's plenty of copies after. And, we are going to post everything on the website. So, let me begin by doing a little bit of background so you know what's going on here. I was born in Canada.

I went to the University of Toronto and I studied chemical metallurgy. You might say, well what's the person who studied chemical metallurgy doing teaching chemistry here? Well, after my Ph.D., I came here as a postdoctoral fellow in 1977.

The plan was to stay for a year or two, and then go back to Canada, and I lost track of time. So, I joined the faculty in 1978, and my first teaching assignment was 3.091 recitation. I had two sections.

One met at 8 am, and one met at 9 am. We don't have 8 am sections, at least we haven't in recent years. Maybe it's time to revisit that. So, my research is electrochemistry. That's why I'm teaching chemistry.

Electrochemistry is the most important branch of chemistry. Why not? Find your passion and pursue it. So, I'm interested in nonaqueous electrochemistry. I don't care about water. I'm interested in nonaqueous electrochemistry, so molten salts and polymers, the applied research.

First of all, interested in environmentally sound technologies for extraction, refining, recycling of metals. It's all chemical processes. Second, pardon me, second is batteries. I want to have an all-electric vehicle in my lifetime.

I want to see the end of the internal combustion engine applied to personal mobility. The only thing that stands between us and that is a suitable battery. So, find an important problem. Work on it, and to say nothing of the wireless device there.

She's driving, and she's talking on the cell phone, and looking at the photographer. And last one, we have to dream. We have to dream beyond the day-to-day living. Let's talk about the stars. So, if we're going to go to the moon, we're going to go to Mars, we want to be able to produce oxygen, structural metals and photovoltaic materials from in situ resources.

So, I have some research on that, as well. So, that's the kind of stuff: a little bit of background about myself. So now, let's talk about the perspective of 3.091. All of this will be posted. You can take notes.

You can just enjoy. You don't have to worry about getting tested on this material, at least not on my life story. That would be too self-serving. So, if you look at any engineering system, the performance of that engineering system is a function of its design and its construction.

And, that can be anything from a computer to a living system. We are solid-state devices. We are made of soft matter. This is macromolecular chemistry. These are photodetectors, band gap two electron volts, respond to visible light.

They're not made of gallium arsenide. They are made of organic matter: the same rules, the same laws of chemistry that apply to what makes this laser glow green apply to what makes these photodetectors work.

Well, what about construction? Construction is a combination of workmanship and choice of materials. Take this computer, if I pull the silicon out, I replace it with gallium arsenide, leave everything else the same.

Gallium arsenide switches ten times faster than silicon. All of a sudden, I've got a clock speed ten times faster with no change in design. So, that's the power of the choice of materials, and why? Properties.

Materials are bundles of properties. Conceptually, they are bundles of properties. What is this? You say it's an aluminum can. No, it's a bundle of properties. This is a beverage container. I could make this out of borosilicate glass.

I could make this out of polymer. I could make this out of metal. I could even make it out of steel versus aluminum. I could make it out of titanium if I wanted. I could make it out of gold. I'd prefer to make it out of platinum if I had my way.

Why? Bundle of properties: mechanical strength, chemical inertness, ease of fabrication: that's not a unique solution. Cost, ah, there is a factor that may be a determinant. So, properties, and where do we get properties from? Here: composition, clearly.

Everybody knows that. If you change the composition, you change the properties. But this is different. What I'm going to tell you now is different. What I'm going to tell you now is why you take 3.091.

The properties are not only a function of composition. They are a function of the instant atomic arrangement, how we arrange the atoms: same composition, simple example, one inch thick pine board, one inch thick plywood.

Both made of pine; both one inch thick. Which one has the superior mechanical properties? The plywood. Why? Because the plywood has been sliced into thin pieces that are laminated cross-grain. So, composition alone can't give you the answer to the question, why is the plywood superior to the solid pine board? It has to be the atomic arrangement.

The thesis of 3.091, and this is where the chemistry comes in, is that electronic structure of the elements holds the key to the understanding, not just the chemical bonding, but the long range atomic order.

So, that's how we get to the syllabus. So, here's the syllabus: two big blocks, first block general principles of chemistry, and that's the same whether you take 3.091 or 5.111 or 5.112. This is your insurance policy.

This is what ensures that if you take 3.091, you can go on later and take 5.12. You could be a chemical engineer. You can go to medical school. And then, this is the specialty topics that pertain to the devices, engineering systems.

So, let's turn to the handouts now. What I'm going to do for about the next 15-20 minutes is just tell you what the class operation is like so everybody knows. I want you to understand what you've signed up for.

The text is the one shown here. It's out in second edition. It's available at The Coop. It's available at Quantum Books. There's even some first editions out there which are very, very similar. There are some minor differences.

There's some numbering differences with some of the homework problems. I don't care if you buy the book. I don't work for Wiley. I don't own shares in Wiley. I don't own shares in The Coop. I don't care if you buy the book.

If you want the book, that's the book I use. Lectures, lectures are Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 11:00, or Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 1:00. The enrollment, last time I looked, is an even 600. So, the registrar's computer divided you between this 11:00 lecture and the 1:00 lecture.

If you want to change lectures, please go to Hillary or Lori, and arrange it because as you can see, some people don't have a seat. If everybody goes to the assigned place, there will be a seat for everybody.

So, out of courtesy, I think it's important that we follow the assignment. So, if you want to go at 1:00, you're welcome to do so, but please arrange it with my assistants. The 1:00 lecture is smaller group.

It's about 150. And, it's around the corner on the first floor building, 6-120. So, 11:00 will be in 10-250, and 1:00 will be in 6-120. So, that's Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and that's the standard lecture format: I talk, you listen.

I'm going to write things on the board, I'm going to post things up on the screen, and so on. Where you get a chance to interact on a greater level is in the recitations. The recitation is an old, archaic, New England term.

If you go back to the colonial times, education would be conducted in an unheated room by someone who basically hates children and would come into the room and look at someone, and glower and yell, "Sadoway! Stand and recite!" I would recite, whatever, the Articles of Confederation.

I would rise on my hind legs, quaking in my boots, and I would begin until I made a mistake, whereupon I would be castigated, berated, totally stripped of self-esteem by this monster who would that inflict the same pain on somebody else.

That was education in the old days. We are going to do it a little differently this year. So, in your recitations sections, I have asked the instructors not to do that. Instead, you come to class.

You control the agenda. I have instructed them not to give you a fourth and fifth lecture. You come there with your questions. You come to my lectures, take some notes, maybe you don't record everything I say.

Maybe record what you didn't understand. Then you go to recitation. The first thing they are supposed to say is good morning or good afternoon, and then they say, what are your questions? And, they draw up the agenda.

So, someone says I didn't understand what he was talking about at the end of the last lecture when he was doing the Bohr model. I didn't get it. Somebody else will say, can you do number three on the homework for me? So, they draw up the agenda, OK? So, those recitations occur Tuesdays and Thursday.

So, you'll have a time, and you'll go to the same time on the Tuesday and on the Thursday. The same thing applies here as with the lectures. If you wish to change sections, you may do so only with permission of the subject administrators because it's very important that those sections be kept at a small population.

I want to have the population at a number no greater than 20. That way you get good access to the TA. I don't want to have a section with 30 in it. So, there are many sections. They run from nine in the morning through four in the afternoon with multiple sections through the middle of the day, which are the most popular sections.

And, if you'd like to change, you can do so only with the permission of the administrator. And, you have to have reason to do so. You can't do it because, I don't do mornings or because my girlfriend is in this other section.

No, I don't get freedom; I'm told I have to be here at 11:00 Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I can't go down to the registrar and say, you know, I'd really like to do it at another time. No, no. But if you have a UROP, or you have a sports practice or something, we will allow that.

So, please stick to the sections. And, right now, because of burgeoning enrollment, we've opened up some sections. So, these three are underpopulated. So, if you'd like to switch into one of these three, they have very low numbers right now.

We've added an extra one at 11:00, an extra one at 2:00, and we've added one at 1:00. So, if that meets your schedule in a better manner, then again, do it but only with permission from Hillary or Lori.

Oh, by the way, talking about under enrolled subjects, the complementary subject offered by STS called History, Society, and Solid State Chemistry meets Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11:00 in room 2-136.

It is underpopulated right now, so if you are still shopping for a humanities subject, this one bears the precious CI-H designation. Think about that. If it's a question about the time of that, then perhaps raise it with the instructor and see, you know, we are talking about a small number of people.

I suspect that enrollment is going to be in the dozens, so it could easily be rearranged if the time is conflicting with one of your other classes. Homework: 3.091 is different. I give homework as a learning aid.

I give homework, and you'll see you have homework questions with model solutions at the outset. I want you to learn by studying the homework. I'm not going to have you work long hours on difficult problems to be submitted and then graded.

I don't do that. Part of this is designed to get you to start thinking about the transition from high school to college. What I mean by that is I want you to take ownership of your learning. So, I'm not going to come around and say, did you do your homework? And, I've got evidence that you didn't do it because you didn't turn it in.

So, it's easy. It's easy to blow it off. And those of you who have had a lot of chemistry, for the first little while it's going to be a lot of review, and you're going to get complacent. Don't do it.

Develop good study habits. The homework is a good test of that. Make the time to work the homework problems. But just to make sure, to stimulate interest, every Tuesday in recitation there'll be a ten minute quiz based upon the content of the homework.

So, if you've worked the homework problems, you will do the homework quiz handily. If you haven't looked at the homework problems, you might have difficulty with the homework quiz. So, there is no homework grade based on turning homework in.

The homework portion of your total grade is the aggregate of all of those weekly test scores. And, you must take the test. If you fail to take the test, you get zero, and I average the zero in. If you don't make it to class, contact your TA, your recitation instructor, and you can take a makeup within a week of the time of original test.

I want to give you every chance to get caught up, but it's your education. I want you to take ownership of it. So, all scores count. There's no dropping of lowest scores from the average. Some of the other classes perhaps do this.

People have actually confronted me telling me it's an MIT rule. I've been here 26 years. I know what the rules are. Speaking of homework, here's homework number one. So, it's assigned today. You've got the model solutions, and there will be a test in recitation on Tuesday the 14th based upon that homework.

And, it's based upon the homework subject. So, I don't want somebody coming in with an attorney saying, well, the question looked a little bit like 39, but it's not exactly. Well, I think you know what I'm saying.

Let's continue with the administration. In addition to the weekly homeworks, there will be monthly tests. And they've all been scheduled. So, you can plan. The monthly tests are the following dates: September 29, October 27, November 17.

The tests will be written in the normal class period. Now, I know you've had all this bonding in the orientation period, but I think that it's much better when you write a test for there to be some solid state defects known as vacancies in between the various people.

So, on the day of the test, we will have a shadow rooms. And we will divide you. So, some of you will write in here, and some of you will write in some of the other rooms. But you will write during the normal class period.

It will run the 50 minutes. And, likewise, there will be a test running from 1:05 to 1:55: two different tests of comparable difficulty. I did this last year, and the difference in the scores on all three tests was less than 1%.

So, I think we are capable of, with the kind of assistance of my staff capable of setting exams of comparable difficulty. But again, you are going to be required to go to the room that you've been assigned.

Otherwise, we don't have enough seats, or we don't have enough test papers and so on. By the way, on the tests, you will be getting tomorrow these handouts that you can use in working the homeworks, so when you are taking the test, you are allowed to bring in the copy of the periodic table of the elements.

We give you a very rich table of constants that's got all kinds of things from the mass of the electron to the speed of light, and all this stuff to the requisite number of significant figures. And, in addition, you are allowed to take in one sheet of paper, one sheet 8 1/2 x 11, you can write anything you want on it.

You can write on the front; you can write on the back. You can write on the edge for all I care. You can write; you can print. I've seen students photocopy exams down to the size of a postage stamp.

I don't care what you write on there. What it's designed to do is to give you the resources you think you need so that I can focus on measuring whether you've learned anything as opposed to whether you've remembered, memorized anything, OK, and of course, something to calculate with.

There is a final exam in this subject. It's a three-hour final. The final exam period is December 13 - 17th this year. Do not plan to leave town until your finals are over. Do not come to your instructor and say, I've got a really good ticket but I'm leaving on the 13th.

No, you are here for the finals. But I will say, once you know your final exams, schedule. And, you should know that about October 1. The registrar will publish the schedule. Once you know that, get on the phone, get on the Internet, book your tickets.

There are 30 degree-granting institutions in the Boston area. They start at different times. They all end just before Christmas. Everybody and his pet dog is trying to get a seat on a plane out of Logan airport.

So, once you know your schedule, then you make your arrangements. But you must be here for the final. Grading: for freshmen, it's pass, no record. And, to get a pass as a freshman, you have to be performing at C level or better.

For upperclassmen, you get the full range of the alphabet, A, B, C, D, F, it's all there, available for you. What is the final grade made of? I already mentioned homework. Now, this is supposed to be one sixth, but I know I don't want any transcendental numbers here.

So, I made it 16.75 exactly. So, it's roughly one sixth for the homework. That's the average of all of your weekly quizzes in the recitation. Each of those three monthly tests gives also a sixth.

So, one plus three is four, four sixths, which leaves two sixths, or one third. So, the final is worth 33%, all right? So, that's the breakdown. And, the grade is C level, and it's based upon a performance of 50% absolute.

I want you to learn; I do not have you compete against your classmates. There is no curving of the grades, OK, no curving of the grades. How do I know that that's an absolute pass, though? Well, when we set the exams, we set the tests, I sit with my TA's and we say, all right, let's work out the point scheme on this question.

Let's say it's worth ten points. I say, well, let's grade about five or six of them, maybe ten of them, get a sense of it. If a person has the basic concept down, regardless of numerical errors, if the person has the basic concept down, he or she must get at least five out of ten.

If the person has not mastered the basic concept, the person must fail, must get four or less. And, if that's not the case, then we redo the point scheme, all right? So, if you propagate that through the whole year, and you have the basic mastery of the concepts, 50 is a pass.

That's the way we do it, no grading on a curve. But, I also look at trends. To show you the kind of attention you get in this class, on the 17th, Friday the 17th, I know where I and my staff will be.

We are going to be in a conference room not far from here, and we are going to be reviewing every person's performance in this class. We're going to go down the whole list. And, what we looking for? We are looking for trends.

We're looking for trends. Obviously, if your aggregate score is 75, you're passed. But, I'm looking at what's going on in the vicinity of 50 because I don't think my point scheme is that accurate.

So, suppose I have somebody who comes in here with a shaky background in chemistry from high school and gets a failing score on the first test, and works hard and improves, but still fails the second test, passes the third test, writes a decent final, and has an aggregate score of 48.

I have the freedom to pass that person because I like the trend. Suppose I have somebody else who came here with two years of chemistry in high school, got a 95 on the first test, 70 on the second test, failed the third test, failed the final, has an aggregate score of 48.

I'll let that person sit there because that person clearly didn't make the investment. That person didn't take ownership of his or her education. That person isn't deciding to be a part of the 3.091 community.

In fact, if that person has a 48 and the first person who had the weaker score has a 46, I could still pass the person with the 46, and fail the person with the 48. If I want to, I can give the person with the 46 an A.

I can do anything I want because I'm the professor. [LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] What else I can do, there's no requirement for me to fail anybody. My management doesn't ask me what I'm doing in here, all right? They don't know.

They really don't. So, if everybody masters the material, I can say A's on the house. They don't say to me, six bodies, one of them must fail. No, so, my point is that I want you to succeed, and I know you can succeed.

Faculty here have three major professional activities. One is teaching. One is research. And the third is administration. We serve on committees. Well, for the last three years I've been chairing the committee on undergraduate admissions and financial aid.

I chaired the committee at the time you were applying. I read some of your folders. I sat at the selection period where we've got the stacks: 11,000 applications. You went through a grueling screening process.

I know the quality of individual in this room. I sat there. It was during the Patriot's Day, no, the President's Day weekend, sitting here Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, stacks of them going: yes, no, hell no.

[LAUGHTER] See, tenure means never having to say you're sorry. So, you're here. 11,000, and you made it. And I know that everybody in this room, first of all, belongs here. Everybody in this room has the intellectual apparatus not to just pass 3.091, but to flourish in 3.091.

And, I want you to succeed. The only people who fail 3.091 are those who choose to fail 3.091. They choose not to come to class. They choose not to work the homework. They choose not to interact with the recitation instructors.

I don't know why they make that choice. The website: the website has all sorts of goodies including the readings. You've got to read before you come to class. I'm not going to write them on the board like a little high school teacher.

I'm not doing that anymore. You are taking ownership. So, you go the website. The other thing you will find on the website are old homeworks, old exams, all sorts of resources, and they are videotaping this.

By the way, they are videotaping it in a sort of heightened technology this year. And so, some of this is going to end up on Open Courseware. So, if any of you doesn't want to be, by chance, seen on the Internet, then sit out of range of the camera.

I guess that's all I can tell you. So, that's why there's all these cameras here. So, you can click on this. It's On Demand. So, if you by chance, I know it's very rare, but if by chance you don't get the class you can always follow up later.

It's also on a vernier, a sliding scale. So, if there is one section of the lecture that I went a little too quickly for, you could say, gee, if I could just see that five minutes, you could click on it, zoom into that five minutes, play it a few times, and then say, I still don't know what he's talking about.

And then you go to a recitation instructor. So, this is what happens. You go to the website, there's all these bars down the side, so there's lecture videos. There is lecture topics. That's where the readings are.

And, there's a whole bunch of other information there, and then a list of recitation instructors. So, here's the reading. So, for example today, there is a vision statement, administrative details and I'm going to get a little bit of teaching towards the end.

And, if you wanted to, you could crack the book and look at chapter one. So, that's the drill. But, again, that's up to you. A couple of topics, a little bit unpleasant, but we have to cover them.

The management doesn't care what I say in terms of chemistry. But, they really care about this stuff. So, I'm going to obey. So, academic honesty: very simply, you can't cheat in 3.091. Is that shocking? No cheating! You know this.

The Roman poet philosopher Juvenal said men need not so much be informed as reminded. You know this. I'm telling you nothing new. So, when you take a test, you don't accept information from others.

You don't represent as your own work the work of anyone else, and you don't use aids to memory other than those permitted by the examiner. I'm giving you an aid sheet. You've got the table of constants.

What else do you need? It's enough. And, following a test, a lot of people write in pencil: don't try to erase something and bring it back and say that, oh, actually, this is what I had because we look at that and go, this is perfect.

How do we miss something like that? Don't do that. And, also, we're trying to teach you on many levels. We're trying to teach you some chemistry, but I'm also trying to teach you how to transform into a standalone professional.

In the code of conduct, professional conduct, that we embody by this code here is comparable to what you are expected to adhere to in your professional lives. You don't publish results that you've faked.

You don't publish results that you stole from others and represented as your own. So, don't start here. And, it happens infrequently, but I've got to tell you, a few years back on the final exam, a couple of people were involved in passing information back and forth.

They got caught. You know why they got caught? Because for the first time, you're being taught by people who are smart as you are. So, you're going to get caught. My TA's are really smart. So, don't think it's like back in, pick a place, I could offend somebody.

It's not like we're back in Ontario, how's that? That's where I came from. You're here now. So, don't try it. You're going to get caught. These guys got caught. I had to press the case to the committee on discipline.

One of them did not return for his sophomore year. That's a crazy thing to do. It's a huge price to pay in a pass-no-record first semester class. And, you know who is most severe on the committee on discipline? It's made of faculty, administrators, and students.

And, guess who the most severe members of that committee are? It's the students, your peers who are outraged at that kind of behavior. Speaking of behavior, I have to maintain a fertile learning environment in here.

We've got round numbers in excess of 400 people sitting here, so I expect certain things here, and that's how we're going to get along. First of all, no conversations, no talking. A little conversation here, a little conversation there, it adds up.

So, I insist, no talking. Please, no food or drink. No food or drink. We're seated cheek to jowl here. I don't want somebody opening up a clamshell with some hot food in it. It's not right. It's not right.

Plus, there's all kinds of trash left around. Nobody picks up the stuff. Now, this is an exception. This is for medicinal purposes. It's to make sure that my throat doesn't get dry. And, I swear, it really contains Fresca.

And, of course, no disruptive behavior, no disruptive behavior. Wireless communication devices must be silenced. So, from this moment forth, and I heard some stuff go off earlier. But, I let it slide because I haven't had my chance to explain what my expectations are.

But, from this moment forth, cell phone goes off, you're out. You leave the room, OK? And, Lord help you if a cell phone goes off during an exam because those things have text messaging capabilities.

If your cell phone goes off during an exam, I come up there. I grab your paper, I tear it in half, and I give you a zero. I am teaching you professional behavior. That's unprofessional. You can say that I'm over the top on this.

I've got 450 people. I want to maintain a fertile learning environment. When you walk through that door, it's an act of free will. It's an act of free will. Somebody's leaving. Bye. Let's go. Let's get it started right now.

Please. It makes noise when you turn it off? You owe these gals dinner, I tell you. All right, turn them off. If they have to make noise as you turn them off, turn them off, but that's it. So, when you walk through that door, it's an act of free will.

And, we enter into a contract. You walk in here, you have certain expectations of me. You expect me to conduct myself professionally. You expect me to respect you. You expect me not to use foul language.

You expect me not to say offensive things to you. You expect me to have a well-prepared lecture. Well, you know what? I have expectations of you. I expect you to come to class prepared. I expect you to sit there quietly, respect your neighbors.

I expect you to contribute to the learning environment. That's not unreasonable, is it? Good. You ever look in the course bulletin? You ever wonder what this is? This is the listing for 3.091, 5-0-7.

Five hours is contact time. That's three hours here, and two hours with the recitation instructor. Zero, there's no lab. Seven, I wonder what the seven is? That must be the time you spend in preparation in studying.

So, I make a pledge. You give me seven hours a week, you will pass this class, not just by the skin of your teeth. You will pass it. If you don't give me seven hours a week, I don't know what I can do for you.

So, I want you to be successful. So, I put this up. This is sort of venues for learning: recitation, reading, homework, so, that's my responsibility, the lecture. Recitation: that's got to be the staff.

You, you're responsible for the reading. You're responsible for the homework, the quizzes, the tests, the final exam. So, what we have here is a partnership, a partnership in learning. What we want is for you to grow.

Franklin said education is what remains when you've forgotten all your schooling. So, we want you to have some retention here. So, we've got a few minutes here. I don't want you to just have you go from room to room with people saying, welcome to MIT.

So, I want to talk a little bit about taxonomy, classification, nomenclature. I said at the core blitz that one of the things I'm going to try to do is introduce some things from beyond chemistry. So, let's see what the Bard had to say about nomenclature.

There may even be people here who distinguished themselves because they starred in Romeo and Juliet. Or, maybe they produced. Maybe they built the sets. Maybe they wrote the screenplay. I don't know.

So, let's look, Act II Scene II. You remember this, Romeo: "but soft, what light through yonder window breaks. It is the east, and Juliet is the sun." That has nothing to do with nomenclature, nothing.

Photon emission, perhaps. OK, let's get to nomenclature. Juliet: "oh Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse they name, or if thou wilt not, be but sworn, my love, and I'll no longer be a Capulet." She's a Capulet.

He's a Montague, you know, like the Hatfields and the McCoys, the warring families, two lovers, it's as old as literature that's here. OK, so now, Romeo: "shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?" Fellows, a bit of advice, don't interrupt.

The answer to that question is, no, don't speak. So, Juliet: "'tis but thy name that is my enemy. Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What's Montague? It is nor hand nor foot nor arm nor face nor any other part belonging to a man.

Oh, be some other name. What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other word would smell as sweet. So Romeo would, were he not Romeo called. Retain that dear perfection which he owes without that title.

Romeo, doff thy name, and for that name, which is no part of thee, take all myself." That's an offer. In science, it works differently. In science, we have to agree. It can't be like Alice in Wonderland.

I'll give the word the meaning I intend it to mean. Science has to have some rigor. So, if you look in chapter one, you will find these definitions for different atomic groupings starting down here with the elements and moving through up through complex matter.

This is solid state up here, aggregates of atoms. So, we're going to begin down in the lower left corner. We're going to begin in the lower left corner. So, let's look at some of the origins of chemistry.

We can go back to ancient Egypt where there is reference in the hieroglyphs to term khemeia, which, among other things, meant chemical processes for embalming the dead. You know, the Egyptians were very concerned about afterlife? They wanted to be well preserved to make that journey.

So, practitioners who understood what we would know to be chemistry were highly valued in that society. And then, you may expand it to other chemical processes, dyeing of cloth, glassmaking, and metals extraction.

It's magical. It's sorcery to take an ore and convert it to metal. It's magic. It still amazes me today. Gee, you know, I showed you this earlier. One of my areas is extraction of metals. You know, some things never change.

And then, they tried to make an overarching theme, an overarching theme, to go to the heavens. So, there were seven known metals at the time, and seven heavenly bodies. So, obviously, the sun would be gold.

Mercury is a liquid metal, and mercury, the planet, is the fastest moving naked eye heavenly body. Mars, iron, why is Mars red? Iron oxide. And, in fact, you can even couch things. So, if I wanted to make a bronze, which is an alloy of tin and copper, I could say the confluence of Venus with Jupiter, and that way keep it so that the common folk would know the secret of the alloy.

So, now, let's look at the transition from craft to science, craft to science. About 2,400 years ago, we have Democritus. And, Democritus moves from practice to theory. And, this is all that was known at that time, seven metals, carbon, and sulfur.

And so, here was his idea of the structure of matter. It's about 400 B.C. And, what did Democritus do? He described the physical world as the integral of void plus being. He used lofty terms. And, being he described as an infinity of indivisible particles, which he dubbed atoms from the Greek.

Tomi means to slice, and A as in apolitical, amoral, so a-tomi is something that is indivisible, cannot be sliced. And, he says these are eternal. And, in between, there is void, which is very similar to how we would describe vacuum.

This is 2,400 years ago. This depiction of matter takes you right up to E=MC squared. Brilliant. And, that's all he had to work with for data. That's all he had to work with. But, science doesn't always move forward.

After that came Aristotle. And, Aristotle gave us this system, which persisted almost through the Middle Ages. And, Aristotle gave us this, and I'll leave you with this. And, you can ponder. So, this is the Aristotelian view.

He's got four essences: Earth, fire, water, air. You could even make compounds: Earth plus water makes cold. I mean, this is nuts. This is nuts. But it was there for over a thousand years, and we now know things to be a little different.

And so what I'm going to do the next day is return to this discussion, and take a look at a more rational view of the chemical world. So, we'll see you on Friday.

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