The Mystery of the Periodic Table Quotes

“Sometimes a clearly defined error is the only way to discover the truth”
― Benjamin Wiker, The Mystery of the Periodic Table

“Lavoisier did not begin as a chemist, however. He first studied to be a lawyer, just like his father. But someone persuaded him to sit in on a very popular chemistry course, and young Lavoisier never thought of being a lawyer again.”
― Benjamin Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“Now one day—and we know the day, August 1, 1774—Priestley put calx of mercury underneath a glass. He focused the sun’s hot rays on the calx with his new 12” diameter magnifying glass. It began to give off a gas. The calx of mercury changed back into mercury, and Priestley trapped the gas with his pneumatic trough. And then he sat and looked, and thought, and looked some more. He happened to have a lighted candle nearby. Without really thinking about it Priestley exposed the candle to the gas. The flame suddenly flared into brilliance! What was this wondrous gas? If”
― Benjamin Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“You can try the same thing, and use the juice of purple cabbage instead (which you get by boiling several cabbage leaves in 3–4 cups of water for about 15 minutes). We recall that in the experiment at the end of Chapter 4, vinegar was an acid, reacting with baking soda. Baking soda was a base (or alkali, as it is sometimes called). If you put a few drops of purple cabbage juice into some vinegar, and a few drops into a solution of baking soda and water, you will find that the vinegar turns red, and the baking soda solution turns green. Scientists use this test today, and it is called a litmus test. Litmus paper is soaked in a vegetable dye derived from lichens, and then dried. When the paper is dipped in acid, it turns from pink to red, and when dipped in a base, turns blue. (Thus, we normally think of blue as the test color for bases, but as we see from the cabbage juice, different chemicals can cause different test colors.) He”
― Benjamin Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“Aristotle had thought that atomism was wrong, and he rejected the views of the ancient Greek atomist Democritus. (The other atomists, Epicurus and Lucretius, lived after Aristotle.) But Boyle thought that Aristotle was wrong, and so he rejected the alchemists’ belief (based on Aristotle) that fire, earth, air, and water were the fundamental elements, and Aristotle’s belief that each thing had a definite form. Instead, Boyle believed that everything was made of atoms—including fire, earth, air, and water—and that a thing’s “form” was merely the result of how the atoms were put together. What”
― Benjamin Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“And so we might find on his shelf some vitriol of Cyprus (copper sulfate), white vitriol (zinc sulfate), aqua regia (nitro-hydrochloric acid), arsenic, saltpeter (potassium nitrate), alum of Yemen (aluminium sulphate), burning water (alcohol), brimstone (sulfur) or sal ammoniac (ammonium chloride). We”
― Benjamin D. Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“Alchemy, however, began in the first century BC, most probably in Egypt. Indeed, scholars believe that the “chem” in alchemy (and hence in chemistry) is from a Coptic word “khem” which means the Black Land, that is, Egypt, for after the Nile River rises and floods the land each year, it looks black. That alchemy probably began in Egypt makes sense. The Egyptians were some of the best metal workers of the ancient world. From”
― Benjamin D. Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table

“The relationship between the planets and the days Sun-day and Moon-day is obvious. As for the rest, the Saxon god Tiw is the same as the Roman war god Mars, hence we call it Tiw’s-day, instead of Mars-day. The Saxon god Woden is the same as Mercury, and so we call it Woden’s-day instead of Mercury-day. Thursday was named for the god Thor, rather than for Jupiter. And finally Friff (the wife of Woden) took the place of Venus for the Saxons, and so we have Friff-day, or Friday.”
― Benjamin Wiker, Mystery of the Periodic Table