mississippichem

I think the only justification we truly need for going to other planets is the advancement of human knowledge. We are curious apes and we just have a desire to know more about the universe.

Why do we build particle accelerators? Why do we go on jungle safaris? Why do we react chemicals in flasks? It's called science man, you should try it!

In all fairness I think the prize is well deserved.

I've read arguments elsewhere on the net that instead of thinking that molecular biology is stealing the chemistry prize we should realize that chemistry is becoming advanced enough to begin to answer big questions about physiology.

Or maybe it is a sign that we are in one of those great exciting times were fields are merging and "the world is shrinking". I think the example of QM being used to predict the spectra of complex organic molecules (my personal obsession) is an analagous example of the unification of fields of study.

Every person in science fears reductionism to a certain degree. Only the mathematicians are truly immune to it .

The biologists are at it again, I see.

Maybe one of us can do some real chemistry and show the Nobel panel what a real (small molecule) chemist can do.

Then those big headlines like; "

Squeezing What Hasn't

Been Squeezed Before:

Another Victory Over

Uncertainty in Quantum Physics Measurements", "Scientists Cast Doubt On

Heisenberg's Uncertainty

Principle ", " Quantum Uncertainty: Are You Certain, Mr. Heisenberg?", "More Accurate Than Heisenberg

Allows? Uncertainty in the

Presence of a Quantum Memory", etcetra, are overt exagerations by the press to help them sell papers, eh? The least they could do is give, if not the man, the theory some respect. But I suppose these are the hand work of the editors, not scientists.

Bingo.

Bad science journalism are flashy article titles are rampant these days. The science blogosphere seems to agree as well.

In the quant vernacular of my particular area of the US... I heard that!

Small correction:

I-hurrrdat

Glad I could be of assistance.

Just a guess but Au(I) ions have a pretty strong affinity for sulphide ligands. Perhaps there could be some binding with protein cystine or methionine residues which would of course wreak havoc on said protein's tertiary or secondary structure, possibly altering or destroying the proteins intended functionality.

Again just a guess but at least there is some logical grounding to my speculation.

I have a feeling that to investigate the effects of the whole nanoparticle we will need to consider some quite complicated zeta potential effects and macromolecular crowding as the trends of interest are probably not quite as simple as the comparison of ionization energies.

OMG, MRI scans cause claustrophobia?!?

Sounds like a grant proposal to me . Hey, the autism/vaccine people got funding with worse logic.

That was a general "your" as "one's" sounds too formal for an internet forum to me.

Ah. My apologies. The ambiguity of text without voice or body language never ceases to amaze me.

Fixed. There's not a single person that I'm aware of that actually follows what Jesus actually taught. With good reason; it turns out he was wrong. But by all means continue with your "Christianity" so long as you don't infringe on anyone's rights.

Fair enough.

You just told one of the forums most staunch atheist to continue with his (my) Christianity!

I removed myself from my own lack of belief for the sake of argument in that post.

Watch out for friendly fire. I'd hate to end up KIA at the hands of a fellow soldier.

Funny. That seems to be the religion I practice. Or is this another one of the whole "nothing really exists because Descarte" philosophy ploys?

I think the intended meaning here (I speak for ydoaps here, hope I don't misrepresent him ) is that you may disagree with, let's say, an Eastern Orthodox or Gnostic Christian concerning theology almost as much as you would a Muslim or Shintoist.

I grew up Protestant, I had Catholic friends who didn't seem to worship the same God as I did.

Christianity is a HUGE umbrella term. It merely refers to people who, in some form or another, follow the teachings of a Jewish prophet/deity/demigod from the early A.D. or late B.C. years named Jesus of Nazareth.

I've always wondered why they put windows on planes. Kids are the only ones I see that are fascinated for more than a few minutes, and I would think there'd be more concerns about freaking out the acrophobes and the panic flyers. I'm sure they've done studies but I wonder if it isn't just an antique holdover from the early days of commercial flight.

The only exciting view I've ever seen from a plane window was a nice flyover of southern Greenland on a flight from Washington D.C. to Amsterdam.

I'd much rather focus my retinal receptors on the drink waitresses!

Sorry to be so late: happy birthday.

Cap'n you should complain, SFN is not on this site.

Where have you been michel123456!? Have you returned from your intergalactic travels? Did you bring us souvenirs?

You'll need all the help you can get in a science PhD program. May I ask what your area of study is?

Hell, I say he should make Air Force One a convertible. Romney is going to need more hair product though (that's really the engineering challenge).

Peroxy sulfuric acid is the name you are looking for I believe.

What is the oxidation number of an oxygen in hydrogen peroxide? What is the oxidation number for an oxygen in sulfuric acid?

If you can answer these then your question is in the bag.

I'm looking at major requirements for a BS in Chem at universities and they require me taking calculus 4. Do I really have to go that far with math? If you have a chem degree, did you?

As John said, we don't really know what "calculus 4" encompasses at you school. I have a bachelor's in chemistry and during my university time I took four semesters of calculus (two semesters single variable, one multivariable, one advanced topics), two semesters of linear algebra, and two semesters of differential equations. Of those, only three semesters of calculus and one semesters of differential equations was required.

I am of the opinion that more math education for anyone even remotely involved in sci/tech is always a good thing. I'm into the physical chemistry thing so my experience in chemistry has required a good bit of mathematical knowledge. If I had it to do over, I would've tagged on an abstract algebra class to make my knowledge of group theory (important to structure and spectroscopy) more rigorous.

You may want to be an organic- or biochemist and you may never have to evaluate a line integral or determine the character of an irreducible representation but you can still benefit from the mental heavy weight lifting you would do in an advanced calculus course.

If you have any interest in physical chemistry or even physics in general (more physics never hurt a chemist either) then it is quite advisable, and even necessary for you to acquire as much math knowledge as possible. The finer points of thermodynamics, kinetics and pretty much all of the quantum disciplines are unattainable for someone who doesn't have a strong grasp of differential equations and linear algebra.

One more question and I'll leave you alone, is your metal in period 5 or period 6 of the periodic table? I think I have it narrowed down to two metals. I still don't see why that would be a big secret unless it was obtained by somr questionable means.

I'm not accussing you of being a criminal, it's just that as an SFN staffer I need to help keep my subforum clean as liability law in the UK (where we are hosted) is a bit more strict than it is in the US. IIRC, we can get in trouble for giving advice to anyone who intends to conduct illicit activities.

Imfataal,

If you are reading, care to share some of your English legal knowledge? I can't afford the attorney rate, pro-bono please.

Chilled,

Did you really just mention that you had some exceptionally rare metal, then say you wouldn't tell us what it was?

I know how to make all sorts of illicit things (I don't make meth, but I damn sure could), so if you are not doing anything wrong, why not tell us what kind of chemistry you are up to.

Or else I'll assume you are cooking crank

Because "just agnostic" isn't a position. One can be an agnostic theist or an agnostic atheist, but not "just agnostic".

Also, lack of evidence for the existence of A puts me in the camp of "A does not exist until evidence of it existing comes to light" instead of "The odds of A existing is 50/50".

No one has any evidence for the existence of Zeus. Is anyone here agnostic about the existence of Zeus?

Newton's laws are rarely used in chemistry and you need chemistry to understand rusting.

However you are right that on a microscopic scale if a molecule moves it does so under the action of a force, subject to Newton's laws.

It is really only sub atomic particles that move fast enough to require relativistic considerations.

True, Newton's laws are rarely used explicitly by chemists. However it should be noted that from a theoretical standpoint, we need Newton's laws to build up all our statistical mechanics and ultimately kinetic molecular theory. So in an indirect way we use Newton's laws everytime we examine reaction kinetics.

Everything you said is true and I agree. Just wanted to take a rare opportunity to promote the deep and interesting link between chemistry and mechanics.

Many non-scientists don't realize the remarkable connection between fundanental principles like Newton's laws and complex emergent phenomena like chemistry.

Not a movie, but governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi speaks like he has marbles in his mouth. That may be a good example.

Even within Mississippi there are different accents. Barbour sounds like he is from north Mississippi or the delta (the real good ole boy, black folks hatin part of MS). I'm in south MS (still bass ackwards but at least we to keep it to a dull roar) and though I don't have a heavy accent myself, people here sound somewhat similat with a decent amount of New Orleansy twist.

I'm about an hour and a half from New Orleans though so we are well within the cajun sphere of influence.

I have a deep voice but probably only by coincidence.

It could just as easily be the carbanion.

Though as written (without charge) it is a methyl radical .

Well chilled_fluorine, the results are in. it seems that by a significant margin people would rather associate an organic chemist with a turnip than say that your are awesome.

Yeah some mods voted a few hundred times, but remember that this is an authoritarian forum so the results are totally legit (according to the official party standard of polling).

At scienceforums.net, poll take you!

It's not only a good idea … it's the LAW!

There is a punishment for violations the second law too.

Run a process that doesn't increase the entropy of the universe...nature still keeps the books and you'll have a loy of pent up entropy coming your way in the near future *(not something you want).

*statement not strictly true, consume for humor value and not scientific insight.

That's a very popular picture. I believe it's wrong: You inherently assume that the vacuum solution of the electromagnetic field is a proper Ansatz for the electromagnetic field in a medium, even for cases where the photon wavelength far exceeds the interatomic distance. In a medium, I wouldn't even speak of "photons" at all (as photons, by the physics I learned, are excitations around a vaccuum state of the electromagnetic field).

I agree.

I think that if sequential absorption/emmission was the case, the Stokes-shift that accumulated after several absorptions/emmisions would become large which is obviously not the case we observe for a light shown through clear glass.

Do you think Mie and Rayleigh scatteting have something to do with the slowing of light in a medium? I don't know.