Chemical Elements and Substances

This chapter examines the work in chemistry that led to the discovery of boron and explores the implications of this episode for the scientific realism debate. This episode begins with Lavoisier’s oxygen theory of acidity and his prediction that boracic acid contains oxygen and a hypothetical, combustible substance that he called the boracic radical. And it culminates in the work of Davy, Gay-Lussac, and Thénard, who used potassium to extract oxygen from boracic acid and thereby discovered boron. This episode constitutes (...) a novel predictive success of Lavoisier’s theory of acidity, which was not even approximately true. Selective realists attempt to accommodate such false-but-successful theories by showing that their success is due to the fact that they have approximately true parts. This episode poses a strong challenge to selective realism because the parts of Lavoisier’s theory that are responsible for its success are not even approximately true. (shrink)

The thesis is: the “periodic table” of “dark matter” is equivalent to the standard periodic table of the visible matter being entangled. Thus, it is to consist of all possible entangled states of the atoms of chemical elements as quantum systems. In other words, an atom of any chemical element and as a quantum system, i.e. as a wave function, should be represented as a non-orthogonal in general (i.e. entangled) subspace of the separable complex Hilbert space relevant to the system (...) to which the atom at issue is related as a true part of it. The paper follows previous publications of mine stating that “dark matter” and “dark energy” are projections of arbitrarily entangled states on the cognitive “screen” of Einstein’s “Mach’s principle” in general relativity postulating that gravitational field can be generated only by mass or energy. (shrink)

This paper investigates the case of enzyme classification to evaluate different ideals for regulating values in science. I show that epistemic and non-epistemic considerations are inevitably and untraceably entangled in enzyme classification, and argue that this has significant implications for the two main kinds of views on values in science, namely, Epistemic Priority Views and Joint Satisfaction Views. More precisely, I argue that the case of enzyme classification poses a problem for the usability and descriptive accuracy of these two views. (...) The paper ends by suggesting that these two views provide different but complementary perspectives, and that both are useful for evaluating values in science. (shrink)

Arthur Clark and Michael Kube–McDowell (“The Triger”, 2000) suggested the sci-fi idea about the direct transformation from a chemical substance to another by the action of a newly physical, “Trigger” field. Karl Brohier, a Nobel Prize winner, who is a dramatic persona in the novel, elaborates a new theory, re-reading and re-writing Pauling’s “The Nature of the Chemical Bond”; according to Brohier: “Information organizes and differentiates energy. It regularizes and stabilizes matter. Information propagates through matter-energy and mediates the interactions of (...) matter-energy.” Dr Horton, his collaborator in the novel replies: “If the universe consists of energy and information, then the Trigger somehow alters the information envelope of certain substances –“. “Alters it, scrambles it, overwhelms it, destabilizes it” Brohier adds. There is a scientific debate whether or how far chemistry is fundamentally reducible to quantum mechanics. Nevertheless, the fact that many essential chemical properties and reactions are at least partly representable in terms of quantum mechanics is doubtless. For the quantum mechanics itself has been reformulated as a theory of a special kind of information, quantum information, chemistry might be in turn interpreted in the same terms. Wave function, the fundamental concept of quantum mechanics, can be equivalently defined as a series of qubits, eventually infinite. A qubit, being defined as the normed superposition of the two orthogonal subspaces of the complex Hilbert space, can be interpreted as a generalization of the standard bit of information as to infinite sets or series. All “forces” in the Standard model, which are furthermore essential for chemical transformations, are groups [U(1),SU(2),SU(3)] of the transformations of the complex Hilbert space and thus, of series of qubits. One can suggest that any chemical substances and changes are fundamentally representable as quantum information and its transformations. If entanglement is interpreted as a physical field, though any group above seems to be unattachable to it, it might be identified as the “Triger field”. It might cause a direct transformation of any chemical substance by from a remote distance. Is this possible in principle? (shrink)

To this day, a hundred and fifty years after Mendeleev's discovery, the overal structure of the periodic system remains unaccounted for in quantum-mechanical terms. Given this dire situation, a handful of scientists in the 1970s embarked on a quest for the symmetries that lie hidden in the periodic table. Their goal was to explain the table's structure in group-theoretical terms. We argue that this symmetry program required an important paradigm shift in the understanding of the nature of chemical elements. The (...) idea, in essence, consisted of treating the chemical elements, not as particles, but as states of a superparticle. We show that the inspiration for this came from elementary particle physics, and in particular from Heisenberg's suggestion to treat the proton and neutron as different states of the nucleon. We provide a careful study of Heisenberg's last paper on the nature of elementary particles, and explain why the Democritean picture of matter no longer applied in modern physics and a Platonic symmetry-based picture was called for instead. We show how Heisenberg's Platonic philosophy came to dominate the field of elementary particle physics, and how it found its culmination point in Gell-Mann's classification of the hadrons in the eightfold way. We argue that it was the success of Heisenberg's approach in elementary particle physics that sparked the group-theoretical approach to the periodic table. We explain how it was applied to the set of chemical elements via a critical examination of the work of the Russian mathematician Abram Ilyich Fet the Turkish-American physicist Asim Orhan Barut, before giving some final reflections. (shrink)

In his account of scientific revolutions, Thomas Kuhn suggests that after a revolutionary change of theory, it is as if scientists are working in a different world. In this paper, we aim to show that the notion of world change is insightful. We contrast the reporting of the discovery of neon in 1898 with the discovery of hafnium in 1923. The one discovery was made when elements were identified by their atomic weight; the other discovery was made after scientists came (...) to classify elements by their atomic number. By considering two instances of the reporting of the discovery of a new chemical element 25 years apart, we argue that it becomes clear how chemists can be said to have been responding to different worlds as a result of the change in the concept of a chemical element. They saw, did, and reported different things as they conducted their research on the new chemical elements. (shrink)

The success of a few theories in statistical thermodynamics can be correlated with their selectivity to reality. These are the theories of Boltzmann, Gibbs, end Einstein. The starting point is Carnot’s theory, which defines implicitly the general selection of reality relevant to thermodynamics. The three other theories share this selection, but specify it further in detail. Each of them separates a few main aspects within the scope of the implicit thermodynamic reality. Their success grounds on that selection. Those aspects can (...) be represented by corresponding oppositions. These are: macroscopic – microscopic; elements – states; relational – non-relational; and observable – theoretical. They can be interpreted as axes of independent qualities constituting a common qualitative reference frame shared by those theories. Each of them can be situated in this reference frame occupying a different place. This reference frame can be interpreted as an additional selection of reality within Carnot’s initial selection describable as macroscopic and both observable and theoretical. The deduced reference frame refers implicitly to many scientific theories independent of their subject therefore defining a general and common space or subspace for scientific theories (not for all). The immediate conclusion is: The examples of a few statistical thermodynamic theories demonstrate that the concept of “reality” is changed or generalized, or even exemplified (i.e. “de-generalized”) from a theory to another. Still a few more general suggestions referring the scientific realism debate can be added: One can admit that reality in scientific theories is some partially shared common qualitative space or subspace describable by relevant oppositions and rather independent of their subject quite different in general. Many or maybe all theories can be situated in that space of reality, which should develop adding new dimensions in it for still newer and newer theories. Its division of independent subspaces can represent the many-realities conception. The subject of a theory determines some relevant subspace of reality. This represents a selection within reality, relevant to the theory in question. The success of that theory correlates essentially with the selection within reality, relevant to its subject. (shrink)

Aiming at the conflict between access and storage due to the continuous accumulation of knowledge storage in the field of artificial intelligence in welding, the author uses RDF (Resource Description Framework) to represent the technological knowledge of CO2 gas shielded welding, designs and implements a knowledge base based on Web semantic and stores it in HDFS, which is used to solve the difficulties of mass data storage. By studying the mechanism and characteristics of spatter in CO2 gas shielded welding, aiming (...) at the common measures and means of reducing spatter, the author realizes the inference function based on welding process rules by using Jena framework and optimizes the craft realization, finally integrates the core functions into the Spring framework and adopts the HTML5-based interface design to enable a new welding process expert system across the Internet and mobile platform. (shrink)

Invited review of the anthology of new papers _Philosophy of Chemistry: Growth of a New Discipline_.

Attempting to compare scientific theories requires a philosophical model of meaning. Yet different scientific theories have at times—particularly in early chemistry—pre-supposed disparate theories of meaning. When two theories of meaning are incommensurable, we must say that the scientific theories that rely upon them are meta-incommensurable. Meta- incommensurability is a more profound sceptical threat to science since, unlike first-order incommensurability, it implies complete incomparability.

In a number of papers and in his recent book, Is Water H₂O? Evidence, Realism, Pluralism (2012), Hasok Chang has argued that the correct interpretation of the Chemical Revolution provides a strong case for the view that progress in science is served by maintaining several incommensurable “systems of practice” in the same discipline, and concerning the same region of nature. This paper is a critical discussion of Chang's reading of the Chemical Revolution. It seeks to establish, first, that Chang's assessment (...) of Lavoisier's and Priestley's work and character follows the phlogistonists' “actors' sociology”; second, that Chang simplifies late-eighteenth-century chemical debates by reducing them to an alleged conflict between two systems of practice; third, that Chang's evidence for a slow transition from phlogistonist theory to oxygen theory is not strong; and fourth, that he is wrong to assume that chemists at the time did not have overwhelming good reasons to favour Lavoisier's over the phlogistonists' views. (shrink)

Recent work on Natural Kind Essentialism has taken a deflationary turn. The assumptions about the grounds of essentialist truths concerning natural kinds familiar from the Kripke-Putnam framework are now considered questionable. The source of the problem, however, has not been sufficiently explicated. The paper focuses on the Twin Earth scenario, and it will be demonstrated that the essentialist principle at its core (which I call IDENT)—that necessarily, a sample of a chemical substance, A, is of the same kind as another (...) sample, B, if and only if A and B have the same microstructure—must be re-evaluated. The Twin Earth scenario also assumes the falsity of another essentialist principle (which I call INST): necessarily, there is a 1:1 correlation between (all of ) the chemical properties of a chemical substance and the microstructure of that substance. This assumption will be questioned, and it will be argued that, in fact, the best strategy for defending IDENT is to establish INST. The prospects for Natural Kind Essentialism and microstructural essentialism regarding chemical substances will be assessed with reference to recent work in the philosophy of chemistry. Finally, a weakened form of INST will be presented. (shrink)

Friedrich Paneth’s conception of “chemical element” has functioned as the official definition adopted by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry since 1923. Paneth maintains a distinction between empirical and “transcendental” concepts of element; furthermore, chemical science requires fluctuation between the two. The origin of the empirical-transcendental split is found in Immanuel Kant’s classic Critique of Pure Reason (1781/1787). The present paper examines Paneth’s foundational concept of element in light of Kant’s attempt, late in life, to revoke key distinctions (...) made in his Critique, including that of regulative and constitutive functions of reason. In a section of his Opus postumum devoted to the “Transition from the Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science to Physics,” Kant bends his philosophical system to address the newly emerging sciences of matter of his time. Specifically, he tried, without success, to develop the transcendental ground for microscale motions of bodies encountered in physical, electrical and chemical processes. Paneth’s discussion of chemical element does not take the Opus postumum into account, which is why it begins with a rejection of Kant’s rejection (in his earlier writings) of chemistry’s status as science. I make the case that Paneth’s definition of element effectively maintains something very like Kant’s critical separation of regulative and constitutive principles, while a advancing the concept of chemical science. (shrink)

Using the cases of three Russian chemistry textbooks from the 1860s—authored by Freidrich Beilstein, A. M. Butlerov, and D. I. Mendeleev—this essay analyzes their contemporary translation into German and the implications of their divergent histories for scholars' understanding of the processes of credit accrual and the choices of languages of science.

A lively philosophical debate has lately arisen over the nature of elementhood in chemistry. Two different senses in which the technical term ELEMENT is currently in use by chemists have been identified, leaving chemistry open to the logical fallacy of equivocation. This paper introduces a third, more elemental candidate: the high-enthalpy short-lived unbonded atom. An enthalpy index based on free-atoms-as-elements is established, whereby one can monitor the degree to which an atom’s spin-based attractive force is implemented exo-enthalpically when the atom (...) binds chemically to others. Enthalpy indexing shows that the strength of an atom’s attractive force is proportional to its spin angular momentum. Vibrational spectroscopy shows that the force varies inversely as the fourth power of the inter-atom distance. Both features differentiate the chemical force from the stronger electromagnetic force and from the weaker Van der Waals force. (shrink)

While most chemists agree on what is a metal and what is a non-metal there is a disagreement with respect to what is a metalloid and what is a transition metal. It is believed that this problem can be solved if two new terms are adopted: typical and less typical metals. These new terms will also help reconcile the European Periodic Table versus the North American regarding numbering of groups as well as the IUPAC numbering which could be as well (...) abandoned in favour of group names as will be shown in the manuscript. (shrink)

There have been occasions when the publication of a particular book has had a singular impact on the conceptual world of the chemist. Sometimes the publication occurs near the beginning of a major change in discourse, and sometimes more near the end. Jean Perrin published Les Atomes in 1913 as the culmination of a century-long controversy over the size and physical reality of atoms and molecules. After its publication almost all chemists and physicists agreed that atoms and molecules of the (...) size we currently understand to be appropriate are real physical objects. The story of the background, development, publication, content and response to Les Atomes forms the text of this paper. The content of Les Atomes is also the basis for extended reflection on the philosophical significance of the work of Jean Perrin. (shrink)

In 1931 eminent chemist Fritz Paneth maintained that the modern notion of “element” is closely related to (and as “metaphysical” as) the concept of element used by the ancients (e.g., Aristotle). On that basis, the element chlorine (properly so-called) is not the elementary substance dichlorine, but rather chlorine as it is in carbon tetrachloride. The fact that pure chemicals are called “substances” in English (and closely related words are so used in other European languages) derives from philosophical compromises made by (...) grammarians in the late Roman Empire (particularly Priscian [fl. ~520 CE]). When the main features of the constitution of isotopes became clear in the first half of the twentieth century, the formal (IUPAC) definition of a “chemical element” was changed. The features that are “essential” to being an element had previously been “transcendental” (“beyond the sphere of consciousness”) but, by the mid-twentieth century the defining characteristics of elements, as such, had come to be understood in detail. This amounts to a shift in a “horizon of invisibility” brought about by progress in chemistry and related sciences. Similarly, chemical insight is relevant to currently-open philosophical problems, such as the status of “the bundle theory” of the coherence of properties in concrete individuals. (shrink)

In 1931 eminent chemist Fritz Paneth maintained that the modern notion of “element” is closely related to (and as “metaphysical” as) the concept of element used by the ancients (e.g., Aristotle). On that basis, the element chlorine (properly so-called) is not the elementary substance dichlorine, but rather chlorine as it is in carbon tetrachloride. The fact that pure chemicals are called “substances” in English (and closely related words are so used in other European languages) derives from philosophical compromises made by (...) grammarians in the late Roman Empire (particularly Priscian [fl. ~520 CE]). When the main features of the constitution of isotopes became clear in the first half of the twentieth century, the formal (IUPAC) definition of a “chemical element” was changed. The features that are “essential” to being an element had previously been “transcendental” (“beyond the sphere of consciousness”) but, by the mid-twentieth century the defining characteristics of elements, as such, had come to be understood in detail. This amounts to a shift in a “horizon of invisibility” brought about by progress in chemistry and related sciences. Similarly, chemical insight is relevant to currently-open philosophical problems, such as the status of “the bundle theory” of the coherence of properties in concrete individuals. (shrink)

Apart from hydrogen, helium is the most abundant chemical element in the universe, and yet it was only discovered on the Earth in 1895. Its early history is unique because it encompasses astronomy as well as chemistry, two sciences which the spectroscope brought into contact during the second half of the nineteenth century. In the modest form of a yellow spectral line known as D3, ‘helium’ was sometimes supposed to exist in the Sun's atmosphere, an idea which is traditionally ascribed (...) to J. Norman Lockyer. Did Lockyer discover helium as a solar element? How was the suggestion received by chemists, physicists and astronomers in the period until the spring of 1895, when William Ramsay serendipitously found the gas in uranium minerals? The hypothetical element helium was fairly well known, yet Ramsay's discovery owed little or nothing to Lockyer's solar element. Indeed, for a brief while it was thought that the two elements might be different. The complex story of how helium became established as both a solar and terrestrial element involves precise observations as well as airy speculations. It is a story that is unique among the discovery histories of the chemical elements. (shrink)

Immanuel Kant has built up a dualistic epistemology that seems to fit to the peculiarities of chemistry quite well. Friedrich Paneth used Kant’s concept and characterised simple and basic substances which refer to the empirical and to the transcendental world, respectively. This paper takes account of the Kantian influences in Paneth’s philosophy of chemistry, and discusses pertinent topics, like observables, atomism and realism.

The history of the classification of chemical elements is reviewed from the point of view of a bibliophile. The influence that relevant books had on the development of the periodic table and, conversely, how it was incorporated into textbooks, treatises and literary works, with an emphasis on the Spanish bibliography are analyzed in this paper. The reader will also find unexpected connections of the periodic table with the Bible or the architect Buckminster Fuller.

This paper suggests that the cases made for atoms and the aether in nineteenth-century physical science were analogous, with the implication that the case for the atom was less than compelling, since there is no aether. It is argued that atoms did not play a productive role in nineteenth-century chemistry any more than the aether did in physics. Atoms and molecules did eventually find an indispensable home in chemistry but by the time that they did so they were different kinds (...) of entities to those figuring in the speculations of those natural philosophers who were atomists. Advances in nineteenth-century chemistry were a precondition for rather than the result of the productive introduction of atoms into chemistry. (shrink)

The project of chemistry to classify substances and develop techniques for their transformation into other substances rests on assumptions about the means by which compounds are constituted and reconstituted. Robert Boyle not only proposed empirical tests for a metaphysics of material corpuscules, but also a principle for designing experimental procedures in line with that metaphysics. Later chemists added activity concepts to the repertoire. The logic of activity explanations in modern times involves hierarchies of activity concepts, transitions between levels through non-dispositional (...) groundings. Such hierarchies terminate in powerful particulars, such as elementary charged particles. Do these have a fundamental place in the most recent accounts of molecular architecture, stabilities and transformations? However, a close study of the contemporary chemistry of substances transforming reactions discloses a hybrid metaphysics, making use of both the Boylean corpuscles and Faradayan fields. This is illustrated by an analysis of the metaphysics inherent in John Polanyi’s use of “chemoluminescence” to follow the formation of products in chemical reactions. A brief sketch of a resolution of the tension between the two metaphysical schemes is drawn from Niels Bohr’s radical metaphysics extended from the quantum realm proper to chemistry (and perhaps beyond). (shrink)

Over the last two hundred years, there have been many occasions where the name of a newly-discovered element has provoked controversy and dissent but in modern times, the naming of elements after scientists has proved to be particularly contentious. Here we recount the threads of this story, predominantly through discourses in the popular scientific journals, the first major discussion on naming an element after a scientist ; the first definitive naming after a scientist ; and the first naming after a (...) living scientist. (shrink)

This article will explore whether there are arguments for Aristotle's concept mixis which can aid our current discussions within the philosophy of chemistry. We remain troubled by the way and extent to which chemical substance in bulk can be identified with or reduced to the stability and structure of molecules, and whether these in turn can be identified with or reduced to elemental atoms and the quantum theoretical characterization of their electrons. Aristotle was as determined as we are to think (...) through the implications of substances comprised of constituents and to question their status in chemical compounds. (shrink)

In this article I assess the problems and prospects of a microstructural approach to chemical substances. Saul Kripke and Hilary Putnam famously claimed that to be gold is to have atomic number 79 and to be water is to be H2O. I relate the first claim to the concept of element in the history of chemistry, arguing that the reference of element names is determined by atomic number. Compounds are more difficult: water is so complex and heterogeneous at the molecular (...) level that `water is H2O' seems false under some interpretations. I sketch a response to this problem. (shrink)

The main scientific problems of chemical bonding were solved half a century ago, but adequate philosophical understanding of chemical combination is yet to be achieved. Chemists routinely use important terms ("element," "atom," "molecule," "substance") with more than one meaning. This can lead to misunderstandings. Eliminativists claim that what seems to be a baseball breaking a window is merely the action of "atoms, acting in concert." They argue that statues, baseballs, and similar macroscopic things "do not exist." When macroscopic objects like (...) baseballs move, exceedingly large numbers (1025) of microscopic components coordinate their activities. Understanding how this happens requires attention to the interactions that link parts into larger units. Eliminativists say that everything that truly exists has causal relationships in addition to those of its components—"nonredundant causality." This paper holds that if a number of entities interact in such a way that the effect of that collection on test objects is different than it would have been in the absence of the interaction, then identification of that collection as a single composite agent is warranted, for purposes to which that difference is relevant. Ordinary "chemical substances" (both elementary materials such as dihydrogen and compounds such as water) fulfill this version of the requirement of nonredundant causality. Other sorts of chemical coherences, including chemical dissipative structures (e.g., flames), also fulfill that criterion. All these types of coherences qualify as "substances" (as that term is used in philosophy) even though they are not all "chemical substances.". (shrink)

Robin Hendry has recently argued that although the term ‘element’ has traditionally been used in two different senses, there has nonetheless been a continuity of reference. The present article examines this author’s historical and philosophical claims and suggests that he has misdiagnosed the situation in several respects. In particular it is claimed that Hendry’s arguments for the nature of one particular element, oxygen, do not generalize to all elements as he implies. The second main objection is to Hendry’s view that (...) the qua problem can be illuminated by appeal to the intention of scientists.Keywords: Element; Simple substance; Basic substance; Antoine Lavoisier; Dmitri Mendeleev; Reference; Qua problem. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore a seldom-recognized connection between the ontology of abstract objects and a current issue in the philosophy of chemistry. Specifically, I argue that realism with regard to universals implies a view of chemical elements similar to F.A. Paneth’s thesis about the dual nature of the concept of element.

The formation of particles of elemental tin in association with the nucleation of the precipitate phase θ′ in an Al–1.7 at.% Cu–0.01 at.% Sn alloy has been investigated by high resolution transmission electron microscopy. Analysis of lattice images has demonstrated that these tin particles associated with θ′ platelets formed during short-term ageing (typically 3 min at 200 degrees Celcius) exhibit a crystallographic form that is distinctly different from that previously reported in such ternary alloys and also from that observed in (...) the binary alloy Al–0.01 at.% Sn. Those tin particles that could be clearly identified as β-Sn phase shared a crystallographic relationship of the form (001)Sn‖(001)Al‖(001)θ′, [110]Sn‖[100]Al‖[100]θ′ with the α-Al and θ′ phases with which they were simultaneously in contact. The observations imply that, while tin may assist nucleation of platelets of θ′, the formation of θ′ equally influences the crystallography of β--Sn that forms in association with θ′. Following prolonged ageing (typically 50 h at 200°C), the β-Sn particles in contact with θ′ plates had coarsened and diminished in number, and most now exhibited an orientation relationship with α-Al matrix similar to that observed in the binary alloy Al–0.01 at.% Sn (i.e. (100)Sn‖(111)Al, [010]Sn‖[112]Al) and to that previously observed in the later stages of ageing of the ternary alloy Al–1.7 at.% Cu–0.01 at.% Sn. (shrink)

There is now a considerable body of published work on the epistemology of modern chemistry, especially with regard to the nature of quantum chemistry. In addition, the question of the metaphysical underpinnings of chemistry has received a good deal of attention. The present article concentrates on metaphysical considerations including the question of whether elements and groups of elements are natural kinds. It is also argued that an appeal to the metaphysical nature of elements can help clarify the re-emerging controversies among (...) chemists regarding the placement of the elements hydrogen and helium in the periodic system and the question of whether there exists a best form of the periodic table. (shrink)

The following is an essay review of Paul Needham's translation of Pierre Duhem's Lemixte et la combinaison chimique and a numberof other essays. In this review we describe theintent and general features of Le mixte and try to place it in the larger context of Duhem'sprogram for energetics. The long essay (Essay3) opposing Marcellin Berthelot'sthermochemistry is singled out for detailedcommentary, since it gives Duhem's reasons forendorsing Josiah Willard Gibbs's chemicalstatics. We argue that a chemical mechanics ofa Gibbsian sort, defended in (...) Le mixte and otheressays in this volume, was the inspiration for,and basis of, Duhem's energetics. Needham'swelcome translations help an English-languageaudience to better understand the basiccontours of Duhem's important, if ultimatelymisguided, project. We conclude with somecomments on the difficulties in translatingDuhem and on the quality of the translationsNeedham has provided. (shrink)

What, precisely, is `salt'? It is a certainwhite, solid, crystalline, material, alsocalled sodium chloride. Does any of that solidwhite stuff exist in the sea? – Clearly not.One can make salt from sea water easily enough,but that fact does not establish thatsalt, as such, is present in brine. (Paper andink can be made into a novel – but no novelactually exists in a stack of blank paper witha vial of ink close by.) When salt dissolves inwater, what is present is no (...) longer `salt' butrather a collection of hydrated sodium cationsand chloride anions, neither of which isprecisely salt, nor is the collection. Theaqueous material in brine is also significantlydifferent from pure water. Salt may beconsidered to be present in seawater, but onlyin a more or less vague `potential' way.Actually, there is no salt in the sea. In bothancient and modern treatments of otherimportant chemical concepts, including thenotions of `element', related complication,especially polysemy (terms with multiplemeanings), also occurs.In a recent paper, Paul Needham discussed the(predicable) properties of chemical substances,phases, and solutions. He provided a valuablecharacterization of cases in which severalquantities occupy the same space. He alsoconcluded that solution properties are not`intensive', because solvent and solute do nothave parts in common. He tacitly assumed thatingredients are not altered by their inclusionin a solution. This may be the case in somespecial cases (deutero-benzene dissolved inbenzene, say) but is not true in general – andcertainly does not apply to the case of brine,which Needham used as an example – since theions that exist in the solution, and also theaqueous material there, are quite differentfrom the pure ingredients used in making thesolution. An adequate theory of wholes andparts (mereology) must take into account thatwhen individuals enter combinations ofinteresting sorts they no longer are the verysame individuals that existed prior to thecomposition. It appears that no such formaltheory now actually exists. (shrink)

In the 18th century, the concept of ‘affinity’, ‘principle’ and ‘element’ dominated chemical discourse, both inside and outside the laboratory. Although much work has been done on these terms and the methodological commitments which guided their usage, most studies over the past two centuries have concentrated on their application as relevant to Lavoisier's oxygen theory and the new nomenclature. Kim's affinity challenges this historiographical trajectory by looking at several French chemists in the light of their private thoughts, public disputations and (...) communal networks. In doing so, she tells a complex story which points to the methodological and practical importance of industrial and medical chemistry. The following review highlights the advantages and snares of such an approach and makes a few historiographical points along the way. (shrink)

The philosophical problem of the utility andmeaning of essences for chemistry cannot beresolved by Wittgenstein's principle thatessence cannot explain use, because use isdisplayed in a field of family resemblances.The transition of chemical taxonomy fromvernacular and mystical based terms to theorybased terms stabilized as a unified descriptivetaxonomy, removes chemical discourse from itsconnection with the vernacular. The transitioncan be tracked using the Lockean concepts ofreal and nominal essences, and the changingpriorities between them. Analyzing propertiesdispositionally, initiating a search forgroundings strengthens the case for (...) a logicalasymmetry between descriptive and explanatorydiscourses. Taxonomy is now driven byexplanatory concepts, but not including thosefrom quantum chemistry. (shrink)

Lavoisier defined an element as a chemicalsubstance that cannot be decomposed usingcurrent analytical methods. Mendeleev saw anelement as a substance composed of atoms of thesame atomic weight. These `definitions' doquite different things: Lavoisier'sdistinguishes the elements from the compounds,so that the elements may form the basis of acompositional nomenclature; Mendeleev's offersa criterion of sameness and difference forelemental substances, while Lavoisier's doesnot. In this paper I explore the historical andtheoretical background to each proposal.Lavoisier's and Mendeleev's explicitconceptions of elementhood differed from eachother, and (...) from the official IUPAC definitionof `element' of the 1920s. However, Lavoisierand Mendeleev both subscribed to – andemployed – a deeper notion of a chemicalelement as the component of compound substancesthat (i) can survive chemical change, and (ii)explains the chemical behaviour of itscompounds. (shrink)

Robert Deltete and Anastasios Brenner have provided a thorough examination of my translation of Duhem’s Le mixte et la combinaison chimique (1902) and associated essays. I am very grateful for their efforts and gratified that such competent reviewers should be generally positive. They provide an overview of relevant aspects of Duhem’s life and work, which may serve to introduce him to readers of this journal and promote interest in Duhem studies. They also raise and answer some questions about the interpretation (...) and evaluation of Duhem’s work, make some points of criticism of my choice of material and question certain points of translation. The editor has suggested that I make a response, and I shall take up some issues in these three areas. Since Duhem’s views play a central role in the development of the concept of chemical substance which I have worked on in recent years, I will make several references to my own publications. (shrink)

Some points are made about substance properties in their role of introducing mass terms. In particular, two conditions of distributivity and cumulativity of mass predicates expressing these properties are not the independent pair they first appear to be. A classification of macroscopic substance concepts is developed. This needs to be complemented in some way by the introduction of a modal qualification reminiscent of Aristotle's distinction between actual and potential presence of substances in a mixture. Consideration of the latter feature has (...) prompted Joe Earley to raise the question of whether there is any salt in the sea. I try to argue that there is. (shrink)

Is chemistry primarily about things or about processes, about chemical substances or about chemical reactions? Is a chemical reaction defined by the change of certain substances, or are substances defined by their characteristic chemical reactions? What appears to be a play on words to the modern scientist, is actually one of the most fundamental ontological question since antiquity, prompted by the most radical change – the chemical change or the ‘coming-to-be and passing-away’ as Aristotle’s treatise on theoretical chemistry came to (...) be known. The question has bothered philosophers ever since, who were not satisfied with the much too simplistic answer of atomism, according to which the basic elements of nature are atoms. (shrink)

In the early nineteenth century, chemistry emerged in Europe as a truly experimental discipline. What set this process in motion, and how did it evolve? Experimentalization in chemistry was driven by a seemingly innocuous tool: the sign system of chemical formulas invented by the Swedish chemist Jacob Berzelius. By tracing the history of this “paper tool,” the author reveals how chemistry quickly lost its orientation to natural history and became a major productive force in industrial society. These formulas were not (...) merely a convenient shorthand, but productive tools for creating order amid the chaos of early nineteenth-century organic chemistry. With these formulas, chemists could create a multifaceted world on paper, which they then correlated with experiments and the traces produced in test tubes and flasks. The author’s semiotic approach to the formulas allows her to show in detail how their particular semantic and representational qualities made them especially useful as paper tools for productive application. (shrink)