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Show ica Laws By . BUEHLER JOHN-ADOLP- Consulting Chemist A.B., University at versity of Indian. Pennsylvania, A AA, Pit D., 7m Uni- Professor of Chemistry. Anderson and Consulting Chemist, city of Anderson Colleaei Industrie! corporations. Frequent Lecturer n private Mohly technical sublects for Indiana Academy of Specialist In synthesis of amino acids, applies. tion of organic molecules to the quantitative determination of specific metals, detection of Cobalt It by Succinlmide and Isopropvlamlne. To understand hot? chemical laves are related to God, to appreciate the extremely finite nature of the human mind, and to make us realize that humility befits even fiie brightest among modern scholars, I must invite my readers to follow me in a very brief historical survey of chemical science my special field. I shall try not to be technical and to nse plain English. Ever since the dawn of civilization man has endeavored to understand the changes In the material world around him. At first his understanding of matter was vague and incomplete. Democritus, about 400 - B.C., was the first to make the shrewd guess that everything was made of small particles that were entities in their own right Such an idea was a bold departure from the concept of the continuous nature of matter. It confradicated the sense of sight, and the idea was quickly buried under the prevailing mysticism of the age. For two thousand years alchemy with Its accompanying mysticism and magic attempted to explain the meaning of matter. About file middle of the seventeenth century, however, Robert Boyle adopted the viewpoint of Democritus and applied the term element to simple substances that could not be broken down Into simpler substances by laboratory means. This was a departure from Aristotles elements of earth, fire, air and water. In 1774, John Priestly discovered oxygen, and in 1776 Lord Henry Cavendish discovered hydrogen. A short time later Antoine Lavoisier found that air was a mixture of oxygen and nitrogen. He also reasoned that water could not be an element, because it could be made by burning hydrogen in air. Chemical science was indeed making progress. In 1799 Joseph Proust, a French chemist, argued that pure chemical substances, like common table salt, would always be the same regardless from where they were obtained. Berthollet argued that salt from different places on the earth would be different. After eight years of experimentation Proust won the argument Thns the invariable composition of compounds was proved. A Quaker schoolteacher, John Dalton, in 1808 attempted to sum up all the accumulated knowledge of chemistry up to 1 that time and to explain the constancy of 'elements and compounds. He postulated tiie Atomic Theory of Matter. He viewed the elements as minute particles called atoms. The atoms of any one element were the same. Different elements had different atoms. He also considered atoms indestructible. The physical and chemical behavior of the elements, he taught, was due to a difference in weight and properties in the atoms. He explained the invariable of compounds on the basis that elements united in exact numerical ratios for any one compound. Thus It became evident that chemical phenomena obeyed laws, such as the Law of the Conservation of Mass, the Law of Constant Composition, and the Law of the Conservation of Energy. With these tools to guide scientists in their adventures the qualitative stage of chemistry gave place to the stage where exact measurements were Important com-positi- Kf '1 jfi-- For the present, the Heisenberg principle fa useful to help us in our study o( iujjatomie particles, just as Daltons Atomic 'Theory was of untold value to the nineteenth century chemists. We must recognize that we do not know all there fa to be known about matter and energy. In fact, we have only scratched the surface. It may well be that what we refer to as disorder and chaos at the subatomic level fa not that at all. H i Our idea may- - beMaulty and may be due to Imperfect knowledge of this phenomenon and a wrong level of observation. All through Nature one finds order and design! Thj? universe seems to be heading toward a definite goal. This is evident in the order among the atoms. There is a definite pattern that is followed from hydrogen to uranium and beyond. wmsfflaiMai! smaaKeoaisRgi . Once the road had been opened and the direction pointed out, real progress began. When it became an accepted fact that law and order prevailed, the study of matter became a science. For the. next half century or so Chemistry advanced along the line of Newtonian concepts. From twenty elements in Daltons day to more than ninety by 1900 that became the record of chemistrys growth. Dalton gave us the concept of an atom as a hard core of matter which obeyed the Newtonian laws. In the second half of the nineteenth century numerous experiments were to reveal the existence of a much more complex atom than conceived of by Dalton. Beginning with Masson, in 1853, who passed an electric current through a tube that had been evacuated, followed by Geissler who used a stronger current and tried more types of gases, we come to the experiments of Crookes, in 1878. Crookes produced a more perfect vacuum in his tube and noticed a strange glow when an electric current was passed through it J. J. Thomson showed these mysterious rays to be negative in charge, to travel with incredible speeds, and to be almost weightless. These rays were called cathode rays and the tubes that produced them were called cathode tubes. Later these rays became known as streams of electrons. There followed the discovery of radioactivity by Becquerel and the Curies. This discovery opened up a completely new world of subatomic particles. No longer was the atoms a hard core of matter. It became a miniature solar system, with its major mass at the core or center, where all the positive protons were accumulated; and around this concentrated mass file negative electrons, units.of energy, were distributed in definite patterns. The chemical and physical properties of the atoms became associated with the differences in the changes on the nucleus and the arrangement of the electrons around the nucleus. At first, attempts were made to apply the Newtonian concepts to the subatomic particles, but it soon became evident that the laws that governed the behavior of moving particles on the macro scale did not hold when applied to the subatomic scale. j Thus it became necessary to develop a new mathematics. Quantum Mechanics, or the Calculus of Probabilities, to express mathematically the behavior of protons, electrons and other subatomic particles. In 1927, Heisenberg enunciated his "principle of uncertainty to explain why the Newtonian laws did not apply to subatomic phenomena. This principle of uncer- - talnty states that "it fa impossible to specify the position and velocity of a particle at any one instance." Every time we observe an electron we change its state; we change either its position or velocity or both. Thus we can speak of the probability of an event occurring but cannot pinpoint any single event. Consequently we say that Nature follows the statistical laws of chance. The reason we have such certain and predictable laws in chemistry fa because these laws are really statistical laws. We customarily work with large numbers of milions or molecules in the laboratory lions of them. In mixing our solutions each Individual ion acta in an unpredic- table, chaotic manner. Yet we can predict the outcome of the reaction with a high degree of certainty. Several hundred thousand ions may still be unreacted, but since our analytical balance fa not capable of weighing such a small number of ions we regard the reaction as 100 per cent complete. Du Nouy points out that everything depends on our scale of observation. What would seem to us to be 100 per cent reaction might appear far from complete on another level of observation. Thus a gram of carbon black when mixed with a gram of flour would appear to us gray, but to a microbe crawling through the pile it would appear as a pile of black and white boulders. His level of observation is different from ours. The reason chemistry seems to obey the laws we have discovered fa because we are really dealing with a statistical Science. At the base of our physicochemical laws is apparent disorder and chaos, but because of the vast numbers with which we work the statistical laws are applicable and exact laws result. Thus out of chaos comes harmony. What Ls the directing force that underlies the laws of statistics? When one applies the laws of chance to the probability of an event occurring in Nature, such as the formation of a angle prfltein molecule from the elements, even if we allow three billion years for the age of the earth of more, there isnt enough time for the event to occur. Only by postulating a directional force with a purposeful end can we account for the harmony and order which have come from chaos. It may well be that the Heinsenberg principle ot tndeterminancy (uncertainty) may only exist because we havent found a way on our present level of to observe an electron without affecting either its position or velocity. Some day, when we know far more about energy than we do today, we may be able to view the electron with the same degree of stability as we view Mars. under-standin- WEEK g The more we learn about the laws that govern the distribution of the protons and electrons to produce the various elements, the more we become aware of the harmony and order that exists in matter. Some day we shall learn how energy fa put together to produce these building blocks of matter. It was Einstein who first showed the interrelationship that exists between matter and energy. Man has only begun to unlock the secrets of atomic energy. At present we are getting energy out of matter. Some day we shall make matter out of energy. It seems that the universe is one, chemically. We have ways and means to examine many of the elements on the other planets that we find on earth, and they are the same. Even in the distant stars we recognize elements common to laws of Nature that govern this planet also rule in the far reaches of outer space. Wherever we look, we find- - design, order and harmony. There is no doubt in my mind that a Supreme Intelligence has planned and constructed the universe, and is guiding its destiny. If time and space would permit, to emphasize still more the marvelous facts of design and order, I would call the readers attention to the water cycle, the carbon dioxide cycle, the ammonia cycle, and the oxygen cycle. All of them indicate a Planning Mind and a Constructing Power. Although there are many things in Nature that are at present unexplainable and shrouded in mystery, we will of course not make the same mistake the ancients made when they Conceived of "gods to explain the unexplainable, assigning to each "god his power and function. At a later stage, as science developed and many bf the mysterious phenomena in Nature became understandable, and as the laws which govern their behavior were were no longer discovered, gods deemed necessary. For many even God became superflouous. As for God, instead of considering Him, Him, superfluous, or instead of classifying Him among the soalled unknowables, we should see Him and adore Him In the law and order of the uni- or the idea of verse. v Man may be able to explain the "unknowable by discovering Natures laws, but man will never be able to create Natures laws. God fa the Lawgiver; man discovers the laws and gradually learns to interpret Nature. Every law that man discovers brings him closer to understanding God. God uses that method to reveal Himself to us. It is not His only method there fa His special revelation in the Bible bit it fa an important one. ENDING OCTOBER 14, 1967 CHURCH-- 13 i, -- a |