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A review by cancermoononhigh
Periodic Tales: A Cultural History of the Elements, from Arsenic to Zinc by Hugh Aldersey-Williams, Ecco by Hugh Aldersey-Williams
adventurous
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
2.0
This book was interesting, not quite the page turner that I was expecting but overall, an interesting book.
*Iron has always indicted strength and toughness. Iron's masculinity is reinforced by the metal's suitability to make weapons of war
*Today Pewter is entirely made of tin with a little bismuth and copper. Pewter struggles to retain its foothold as an attractive material. Tin has become a pejorative term for cheap metal.
*Lead is the chemical element most closely associated with death. Lead sarcophagi are traditionally used to preserve bodies of popes, kings and queens to ensure the soul does not escape. Lead does not corrode so it preserves what it contains. The surface layer blocks further chemical attack. In parts of central Europe the custom has grown of predicating the future by pouring small quantities of molten metal into water. Germans perform this on New Year's Eve and In Hungary the ceremony takes place on Luca's day, December 13th.
*Silver has a deep cultural link with the feminine and with the moon. The white luster of the metal carries meanings to do with purity, virginity, virtue, innocence, hope, patience and passage of time. Silver is also the element most cited in song. Silver was one of the brightest, whitest of the elements known in antiquity. What is more remarkable is that silver is still one of the brightest and whitest elements in modern periodic table which has more than 80 metals.
*Copper is the only red metal. This gives Copper a special status in relation to gold, the only other colored metal. The contrast of color between the pure red metal and its watery blue and green salts was widely felt to be significant too. This embodiment of opposites was regarded as symbolic in cultures as diverse as the Aztecs and the Dogon of Mali.
*Platinum was recognized by European chemists in the 18th century. It was originally hailed as 'the eighth metal' joining the other seven: gold, silver, copper, tin, lead, mercury and iron.
*Zinc was the first useful metallic element to come to light since iron, lead and tin which was discovered a thousand years ago. Zinc figures of Cemetry angels and garden deities were being pressed out on the daily. Zinc is used for the hygienic transportation of bodies across national borders. The metal provides two way barrier, preventing the ingress of contamination and to seal infective matter.
*Aluminum was isolated in the 1820s. During a single century aluminum traveled from the singular to the general to the banal.
*Lime is oxide of calcium. It is made by simy heating chalk, limestone or sea shells to drive off carbon dioxide.
*Glenn Seaberg is one of the greatest elements discovers. He produced Plutonium in 1940. Curium and amerium in 1944, berkelium and califormium in 1949 plus he had a hand in several others.
*Plutonium is an element which hardly anybody has seen, has moved swiftly to occupy the demonic space traditionally reserved for Sulphur, at first because of its use in the bomb and then because of gradually dawning public awareness of the difficulty of getting rid of it. The radioactive half-life of the isotype mainly present in plutonium nuclear waste is 24,000 years which makes planning a safe disposal an issue that transcends normal engineering consideration.
*Titanium is an element in transit. Its ore was discovered in 1791, pure titanium metal was not obtained until 1910 and not made in commercial quantities until the 1950s. At this moment in history it is too soon to tell where titanium will find its place. There has been no gendered assigned to it yet.
*Mendelevium was the first element that had to be dragged into the world atom by atom, beginning in 1955. Even now it has never been made in quantities visible to the eye.
*Ornamental pools of mercury were a feature in Islamic high living, where guests would dabble their fingers in the metal, enjoying its cool touch, before the element's poisonous qualities were known. From the very beginning Mercury went on to find its many uses. In Medicine Mercury was once used for syphilis treatment to routine laxatives. All these and many others are falling into disfavor. Norway has banned all imports and manufacturing involving Mercury, including dental amalgams.
*The element Phosphorus is involved in some peculiar going ons. Herring are said to emit light as they rot away. The light comes from the combustion of short lived oxides that are created at its surface when its exposed to air. The discovery and application of phosphorus was well timed for the element to become the symbol of the taming of nature, of progress and literally, of enlightenment.
*Carl Auer was responsible for two elements named praseodymium and neodymium. Their pink and green compounds make them attractive in ceramic wares and in tinted glass for protective eye wear.
*William Ramsey discovered five new chemical elements during the 1890s. These new elements bear a strong resemblance, all are gases, colorless, odorless, and unreactive. They earned the name of noble gases, most chemists found them boring. Their laziness makes them useful to us primarily for lighting.
*Chlorine has the power for good when released in controlled doses. Our awareness of of the stinging smell of chlorine comes from the public swimming pools where its used as a disinfectant. It is said that chlorinated drinking water brought to the troops in WWI saved more lives than were lost to the gas as a weapon.
*Fluoridation began in America just as WWII was ending. Grand Rapids, Michigan became the first city to be supplied with fluoridated water. Fluoridation had long term effects on dental health and was determined a success. Well over half of the American cities drink fluoridated water today.
*One of the most meaningful measures of ageing is to look at the extent of damage to biological cells due to oxidation, the short lived species containing unpaired oxygen atoms known as free radicals.
*Marie Cure, a Polish (!!) woman who emigrated to Paris to complete her education. Marie decided to investigate the spontaneous emission of X-ray like energy, a newly reported effect that she termed 'radioactivity.' She found that uranium ores were more radioactive than others, and were even more radioactive than pure uranium metal which meant that the ore must contain an unknown, highly radioactive material. She would win a Nobel prize, the first made to a woman for the strange properties of radium. Marie was beatified as "our lady of radium" and was already beginning to suffer from radiation sickness.
*One of Marie Cure's greatest legacies was that she welcomed many women into her laboratory. Her daughter Irene would go on to win her own Nobel prize. Marguerite Perey was another follwoer, she would discover her own element Francium in 1939.
*Humphry Davis discovered potassium and sodium. They were extremely light, they exploded on contact with water, he discovered the two most reactive metals known to science.
*Sodium is by far the most abundant alkali metal in the salt of the earth. The existence of relatively uncommon but hardly rare elements - caesium, rubidium, and lithium had been obscured by the omnipresence of sodium.
*Niobium and tantalum often occur together in minerals. Niobium is twice the density of titanium and half that of tantalum. It is close to silver and feels more precious than titanium. Niobium is more forgiving than titanium, allowing it to be mainipulated.
*Painters today are free to use cadmium yellow, orange and red with the same abandon as Jackson Pollock and Vincent Van Gogh. The paint bares the label advising of their chemical contents.
*Blue has always been one of the hardest colors to extract from nature. Cobalt compounds can attain an intensity of color five times that of any other colorant of glass. The availability of these exceptional minerals sparked a remarkable fashion for blue in the twelfth century.'
*Swedish science could claim the discovery for at least 19 elements, more than a fifth of the naturally occurring total.
*The element Gadolinium would be the only element with its root in Hebrew.
*Mascara stems from the Italian word for witch
*Iron has always indicted strength and toughness. Iron's masculinity is reinforced by the metal's suitability to make weapons of war
*Today Pewter is entirely made of tin with a little bismuth and copper. Pewter struggles to retain its foothold as an attractive material. Tin has become a pejorative term for cheap metal.
*Lead is the chemical element most closely associated with death. Lead sarcophagi are traditionally used to preserve bodies of popes, kings and queens to ensure the soul does not escape. Lead does not corrode so it preserves what it contains. The surface layer blocks further chemical attack. In parts of central Europe the custom has grown of predicating the future by pouring small quantities of molten metal into water. Germans perform this on New Year's Eve and In Hungary the ceremony takes place on Luca's day, December 13th.
*Silver has a deep cultural link with the feminine and with the moon. The white luster of the metal carries meanings to do with purity, virginity, virtue, innocence, hope, patience and passage of time. Silver is also the element most cited in song. Silver was one of the brightest, whitest of the elements known in antiquity. What is more remarkable is that silver is still one of the brightest and whitest elements in modern periodic table which has more than 80 metals.
*Copper is the only red metal. This gives Copper a special status in relation to gold, the only other colored metal. The contrast of color between the pure red metal and its watery blue and green salts was widely felt to be significant too. This embodiment of opposites was regarded as symbolic in cultures as diverse as the Aztecs and the Dogon of Mali.
*Platinum was recognized by European chemists in the 18th century. It was originally hailed as 'the eighth metal' joining the other seven: gold, silver, copper, tin, lead, mercury and iron.
*Zinc was the first useful metallic element to come to light since iron, lead and tin which was discovered a thousand years ago. Zinc figures of Cemetry angels and garden deities were being pressed out on the daily. Zinc is used for the hygienic transportation of bodies across national borders. The metal provides two way barrier, preventing the ingress of contamination and to seal infective matter.
*Aluminum was isolated in the 1820s. During a single century aluminum traveled from the singular to the general to the banal.
*Lime is oxide of calcium. It is made by simy heating chalk, limestone or sea shells to drive off carbon dioxide.
*Glenn Seaberg is one of the greatest elements discovers. He produced Plutonium in 1940. Curium and amerium in 1944, berkelium and califormium in 1949 plus he had a hand in several others.
*Plutonium is an element which hardly anybody has seen, has moved swiftly to occupy the demonic space traditionally reserved for Sulphur, at first because of its use in the bomb and then because of gradually dawning public awareness of the difficulty of getting rid of it. The radioactive half-life of the isotype mainly present in plutonium nuclear waste is 24,000 years which makes planning a safe disposal an issue that transcends normal engineering consideration.
*Titanium is an element in transit. Its ore was discovered in 1791, pure titanium metal was not obtained until 1910 and not made in commercial quantities until the 1950s. At this moment in history it is too soon to tell where titanium will find its place. There has been no gendered assigned to it yet.
*Mendelevium was the first element that had to be dragged into the world atom by atom, beginning in 1955. Even now it has never been made in quantities visible to the eye.
*Ornamental pools of mercury were a feature in Islamic high living, where guests would dabble their fingers in the metal, enjoying its cool touch, before the element's poisonous qualities were known. From the very beginning Mercury went on to find its many uses. In Medicine Mercury was once used for syphilis treatment to routine laxatives. All these and many others are falling into disfavor. Norway has banned all imports and manufacturing involving Mercury, including dental amalgams.
*The element Phosphorus is involved in some peculiar going ons. Herring are said to emit light as they rot away. The light comes from the combustion of short lived oxides that are created at its surface when its exposed to air. The discovery and application of phosphorus was well timed for the element to become the symbol of the taming of nature, of progress and literally, of enlightenment.
*Carl Auer was responsible for two elements named praseodymium and neodymium. Their pink and green compounds make them attractive in ceramic wares and in tinted glass for protective eye wear.
*William Ramsey discovered five new chemical elements during the 1890s. These new elements bear a strong resemblance, all are gases, colorless, odorless, and unreactive. They earned the name of noble gases, most chemists found them boring. Their laziness makes them useful to us primarily for lighting.
*Chlorine has the power for good when released in controlled doses. Our awareness of of the stinging smell of chlorine comes from the public swimming pools where its used as a disinfectant. It is said that chlorinated drinking water brought to the troops in WWI saved more lives than were lost to the gas as a weapon.
*Fluoridation began in America just as WWII was ending. Grand Rapids, Michigan became the first city to be supplied with fluoridated water. Fluoridation had long term effects on dental health and was determined a success. Well over half of the American cities drink fluoridated water today.
*One of the most meaningful measures of ageing is to look at the extent of damage to biological cells due to oxidation, the short lived species containing unpaired oxygen atoms known as free radicals.
*Marie Cure, a Polish (!!) woman who emigrated to Paris to complete her education. Marie decided to investigate the spontaneous emission of X-ray like energy, a newly reported effect that she termed 'radioactivity.' She found that uranium ores were more radioactive than others, and were even more radioactive than pure uranium metal which meant that the ore must contain an unknown, highly radioactive material. She would win a Nobel prize, the first made to a woman for the strange properties of radium. Marie was beatified as "our lady of radium" and was already beginning to suffer from radiation sickness.
*One of Marie Cure's greatest legacies was that she welcomed many women into her laboratory. Her daughter Irene would go on to win her own Nobel prize. Marguerite Perey was another follwoer, she would discover her own element Francium in 1939.
*Humphry Davis discovered potassium and sodium. They were extremely light, they exploded on contact with water, he discovered the two most reactive metals known to science.
*Sodium is by far the most abundant alkali metal in the salt of the earth. The existence of relatively uncommon but hardly rare elements - caesium, rubidium, and lithium had been obscured by the omnipresence of sodium.
*Niobium and tantalum often occur together in minerals. Niobium is twice the density of titanium and half that of tantalum. It is close to silver and feels more precious than titanium. Niobium is more forgiving than titanium, allowing it to be mainipulated.
*Painters today are free to use cadmium yellow, orange and red with the same abandon as Jackson Pollock and Vincent Van Gogh. The paint bares the label advising of their chemical contents.
*Blue has always been one of the hardest colors to extract from nature. Cobalt compounds can attain an intensity of color five times that of any other colorant of glass. The availability of these exceptional minerals sparked a remarkable fashion for blue in the twelfth century.'
*Swedish science could claim the discovery for at least 19 elements, more than a fifth of the naturally occurring total.
*The element Gadolinium would be the only element with its root in Hebrew.
*Mascara stems from the Italian word for witch