The Modern Triumph of the Periodic Table of Elements(bloomberg.com)
bloomberg.com
The Modern Triumph of the Periodic Table of Elements
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-08-28/the-modern-triumph-of-the-periodic-table-of-elements
2 comments
I'd expect the gaps, because the gaps are a natural consequence of the structure being interesting - that clear patterns appear as soon as you assemble a bit of data.
Most spoofs of the PT are bad because they don't have any periodicity, wholly missing the point.
I suspect this happens because the PT is the most famous organized list in science, and it's structure (not a simple array!) is fascinating even to people who don't bother to understand what the structure means (logically, not to mention chemically).
If you are really into the "Periodic" and "Table" aspects, check out Theo Gray's Periodic Periodic Table Table posts ;-)
Most spoofs of the PT are bad because they don't have any periodicity, wholly missing the point.
I suspect this happens because the PT is the most famous organized list in science, and it's structure (not a simple array!) is fascinating even to people who don't bother to understand what the structure means (logically, not to mention chemically).
If you are really into the "Periodic" and "Table" aspects, check out Theo Gray's Periodic Periodic Table Table posts ;-)
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It's a nice figure displaying the presence of elements in the Earth core, human body and cell phones, but why does it give no hydrogen in cell phones?
Also the picture of "native gold" is really pyrite, also known as fool's gold.
My confidence levels for this article are low.
>Also the picture of "native gold" is really pyrite
I gave up before I made it that far. So it is. I wonder if anyone put that in deliberately as a metaphor?
I gave up before I made it that far. So it is. I wonder if anyone put that in deliberately as a metaphor?
The article also presents the number of elements in things as if that can show some kind of quantifiable change in a positive or negative way (for example, they call out the number of elements in a cell phone as having increased since the first cell phone).
I was hoping for something a bit more insightful about the design of the periodic table itself, whether about
1. Increasing order by atomic mass (and the ramifications thereof)
2. Arrangement of periods and the predictions we've been able to make/use
3. The groups of the table and the predictions we've been able to make/use, though I guess this is most common among the noble gases
4. Rare earth metals
And I'm sure there's a lot more I don't know -- every time I learn something about the periodic table, the more impressed I am by how orderly and patterned it is today despite having been initially designed (with gaps!) a century and a half ago.
The article could even have gone into how there are spoofs of the periodic table just because it's such a lasting, easily-understandable design.