No. I'm not making that up. It's what the article says. Really:
sulfur is commonly known to have a standard atomic weight of 32.065. However, its actual atomic weight can be anywhere between 32.059 and 32.076, depending on where the element is found. (Emphasis added)Oh wait.... they're talking about "weight". Not mass. Silly me.
Oh wait. Silly them. Get outside of a gravitational field and there's no weight! Thus these ranges are a bit off.
Oh wait... that's still not what they're talking about? Well why didn't they say that?
What's really going on is that some people are wanting to include the ranges of stable isotopes (different atoms altogether) of certain, common elements. So.... they're not really changing anything. They're just pulling a bit of info off of the table of isotopes and including it on the periodic table.
No big deal really. Except now students are going to be a lot more confused about what number to plug into the formula they don't understand either. Yes. Let's compound the problems early.
3 comments:
A few years ago I was on my way to a BS Chem. Then I took 1961 off. When I returned the chemists and physicists had conspired together to change ALL atomic masses. Avogadro’s number changed as well. A mole of carbon changed weight. And CPS changed to Hz.
Will it never end? If we are not careful soon collective nouns like data be become plural.
Peter B
Egad, man! Git some FOLLOWERS!!
A few years ago I was on my way to a BS Chem. Then I took 1961 off. When I returned the chemists and physicists had conspired together to change ALL atomic masses. Avogadro’s number changed as well. A mole of carbon changed weight. And CPS changed to Hz.
Will it never end? If we are not careful soon collective nouns like data be become plural.
Peter B
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