The History of Chemistry

This episode discusses examples of chemical change known to prehistoric humanity, from fire to fermentation, from annealing and smelting copper to glazing pottery, from heating ochre to change its color to the first use of bronze.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/7/22 • 17:03

This episode discusses the general theme of the podcast, its scope (from prehistory to the present), who I am, and the format of the series.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/7/22 • 19:04

Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/7/22 • 01:36

We discuss the earliest historical practical chemistry, such as bronze, smelting iron, leather-working, mummification, salt as a preservative, dyes, soap, and even the ultimate origin of the word "chemistry". We have a special guest, Biblical Hebrew scholar Michael Carasik of the podcast "Torah Talk" to fill us in on a bit of chemistry in the Hebrew Bible.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/9/22 • 21:46

We discuss the first chemical theories, both Chinese and Greek, from ancient times, and some of the philosophers who argued about them.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/9/22 • 20:20

We talk about the rise of the mystical Egyptian art, "khemeia," in the Hellenistic Period through the Roman empire.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/9/22 • 17:42

This episode continues with the fall of the Roman Empire, sending the practitioners of Khemeia eastward. We learn of the rise of Arab Alchemy, the source of the word alchemy, and some of the major Arab alchemists: Geber  and Al-Razi, We hear about the two major types of alchemy: exoteric and esoteric. There was a parallel development of alchemy in China as well.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/13/22 • 17:43

As Europeans interacted more with Arab traders, many more books of ancient and Arab alchemy filtered into Europe. We learn about advances in glass, discovery of alcohol, gunpowder, mineral acids. We discuss a number of famous European alchemists and philosophers, and the practice of iatrochemistry.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/19/22 • 22:13

The Age of Discovery included new science, but alchemy still lingered. We meet the scholars Agricola, Biringuccio, Paracelsus, and more, along with their writings. We learn of the discovery of Glauber's salt, van Helmont's biochemistry experiment, and Sir Francis Bacon, with his method of scientific induction.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/24/22 • 18:17

In which we meet Angela Sala, who first described accurately a chemical synthesis, van Helmont and his research into gases, Torricelli and his barometer, and Robert Boyle, the "Sceptical Chymist", with a new definition of an "element." We meet one of the last alchemists, Hennig Brand, and learn what he discovered.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

5/29/22 • 20:32

Here we see the advent of the steam engine, using the knowledge of Boyle's Law, invented by Thomas Savery. We encounter Johann Joachim Becher, with his three elemental earths, including a fatty earth that burned. Then we learn of Georg Ernst Stahl, and his popular idea of phlogiston as the burning quality--but it explained corrosion and rust, too! There is the new calibrated tool, the thermometer, which led to Joseph Black's research on gas sylvester. We discover that at this time, alchemy and chemistry finally diverge, never to meet again. Finally, we hear about the effect of the current natural science even on poetry and music, as performed by Dov Rosenschein.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

6/3/22 • 23:15

We continue with research by Joseph Black, Henry Cavendish, and Joseph Priestley, concerning new "airs". Then there is the work by Karl Scheele, which was delayed being published, and Mikhail Lomonosov, which was generally ignored. Finally we reach Marie-Ann Paulze and Antoine Lavoisier, who created modern chemistry by realizing that phlogiston is bogus and water is not an element. We have a guest speaker, Dr. Martin Rosenberg, on the scientific art of Joseph Wright of Derby and a Jacques-Louis David's massive portraits of the Lavoisier couple. For links to images referred to by Dr. Rosenberg, become a Patreon supporter at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistrySupport the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

6/8/22 • 32:44

What happened to Joseph Priestley and Marie-Anne plus Antoine Lavoisier? What were the immediate effects of Lavoisier’s new chemistry? We discuss how quickly the new chemistry was accepted, with some evidence in Elizabeth Fulhame’s book, plus the controversy between Berthollet and Proust over chemical composition of substances.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

6/14/22 • 21:22

John Dalton, a Quaker from northern England, was a color-blind scientist. He presented his atomic theory that finally began to make sense to natural philosophers. He also invented a series of symbols for the elements, and created the first table of atomic weights. We learn about Joseph Prout's unusual atomic idea, and Gay-Lussac's work with gases that meshed with atomic theory. Then Alessandro Volta invented the electric battery, which allowed Humphry Davy to find new elements.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

6/20/22 • 25:53

In which we discuss Jöns Jakob Berzelius and his work. We also take a short detour to hear what US Presidents John Adams and Thomas Jefferson thought about chemistry. We mention the first female Swedish chemist, Anna Sundström. We continue with the conundrum of atomic weights, but the rule of Dulong and Petit helps this to a degree.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

6/26/22 • 16:29

We reach the beginning of the branch of chemistry called Organic Chemistry. How did organic chemistry differ from inorganic chemistry? Can chemists make organic compounds, or is that restricted only to living creatures? We learn about Friedrich Wöhler, and of Berzelius's theory of radicals, and the problem of isomers.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/1/22 • 28:30

We learn about radical theory and type theory in organic chemistry of the 2nd quarter of the 19th century, and the battle between old stalwart Berzelius and the upstart chemists Gerhardt and Laurent. There is a bit of political history from Japan, the Chōshū Five, and their intersection with English chemistry professor Alexander Williamson.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/8/22 • 23:18

We learn about Jane Marcet, one of the most popular science writers of the 1800s, and her connection to Michael Faraday, one of the most brilliant experimental scientists and demonstrators of the 1800s, as well as Faraday's investigations into electrochemistry. Faraday asked Reverend William Whewell for electrochemical terminology. We hear about the development of electric batteries, electroplating, and how a German soldier imprisoned for a duel founded an international electronics firm.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/13/22 • 20:09

Edward Frankland realizes that there are specific valences for atoms. Archibald Scott Couper and August Kekulé simultaneously realize that specific atoms bond to specific other atoms in molecules, particularly carbon with valence 4, and invent ways of drawing this on paper. Kekulé also solved the problem of bonding within the compound benzene, after (so he later told it) a dream. My supporters at Patreon get a reference sheet to view for images of molecules.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/19/22 • 19:46

This episode explains how I create each episode of the podcast, from researching, to script-writing, recording, and editing.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/19/22 • 11:05

...in which we learn how polarized light helped Louis Pasteur to determine that internal three-dimensional structure of molecules was real based on "optical isomers." We then move to the 1870s, and see how van 't Hoff and Le Bel independently came up with the idea of tetrahedral carbon to explain optical isomers. Once the idea of an actual 3D structure for molecules was accepted, a variety of chemists used this idea to explain all sorts of molecular structures. Supporters of this podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry can download a supplementary sheet with some diagrams.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/25/22 • 22:55

The problem of the large and growing variety of elements perplexed chemists, who attempted to bring order to the chaos. We learn about Döbereiner's triads, Pettenkofer and Dumas's correlations of multiples of atomic weights, Newlands's Law of Octaves, and Chancourtois's Telluric Screw. Kekulé's Karlsruhe conference brought order to some chemical chaos, and was the launching point for Dmitri Mendeleev and his periodic table, while Lothar Meyer almost beat Mendeleev for bragging rights. Mendeleev's close friend Alexander Borodin was a chemist AND composer, and we hear from guest Alan Rothenberg on Borodin's life and music.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

7/31/22 • 22:32

We learn about the development of spectroscopy by Bunsen and Kirchhoff, and its ramifications, like remote sensing of materials--including heavenly bodies. We also learn about new elements discovered by spectroscopy, which boosted Mendeleev's periodic table and earned him accolades. Mendeleev, however, also predicted elements that don't exist, and failed to anticipate an entire classification of elements found in the 1890s by William Ramsey. Writer H.G. Wells even included one of these elements in a world-famous sci-fi novel.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

8/5/22 • 25:32

We begin to examine 19th-century physical chemistry with thermodynamics. We hear of Rudolf Clausius and the two Laws of Thermodynamics, as well as entropy. There is Hess's Law, and Berthelot's calorimeter. We hear how Alexander Williamson started the field of chemical kinetics. Waage and Guldberg propose the Law of Mass Action, which tells us what concentrations of chemicals are at equilibrium.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

8/11/22 • 25:07

The Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution explains the behavior of gases nicely, and went well with the Ideal Gas Law of Clapeyton, until van der Waals modified the Ideal Gas Law a bit. We learn about absolute temperature and Lord Kelvin. Van 't Hoff connects the gas laws to osmotic pressure and ionic solutions. We hear of Raoult's Law and freezing-point depression. Finally we arrive at Svante Arrhenius's (barely passing) doctoral dissertation on ionic dissociation, and his activation energy for reactions.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

8/17/22 • 20:19

Josiah Gibbs revolutionized physical chemistry with his mathematics of thermodynamics and chemical equilibria, but published in an obscure journal few read. Wilhelm Ostward explained catalysis with his idea of an intermediate. Einstein figured out the cause of Brownian motion, and gave sufficient proof of atoms and molecules that all scientists accepted atomic theory. These developments led to the journal Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie, which still exists today. Arrhenius's ionic dissociation explained many of water's properties, and led eventually to Søren Sørensen's pH designation of acids and bases. Guest, Vincent Falcone, Head Brewer of City-State Brewing in Washington, DC, discusses pH and beer.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

8/23/22 • 27:45

In this episode we review 19th-century photochemistry, particularly photography, as well as chain reactions catalyzed by light. We finish up with boiling-point elevation, the last of the "colligative properties." With these aspects of physical chemistry, 19th-century physical chemistry gelled into a full chemical field, and the journal Zeitschrift für Physikalische Chemie was born.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

8/29/22 • 19:18

We look at the synthetic dye industry of the 1700s and 1800s, starting with Johann Diesbach, who invented Prussian blue in around 1706. Peter Woulfe found picric acid, a brilliant yellow compound, to be an effective dye for silk and wool in 1771. We hear the words of Dr. Jim Brazell, Professor Emeritus of English at The College of New Jersey, on early 19th-century literature by the German polymath Goethe dealing with chemistry. By the 1850s, William Perkin stumbles upon mauveine, and sent the Victorian Era crazy for mauve fashions. Baeyer discovers how to synthesize indigo dye, and Graebe and Libermann do the same for alizarin dye.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

9/4/22 • 26:16

We examine industrial inorganic chemistry of the 18th and 19th centuries, including sodium carbonate, focusing on the Leblanc Process and its replacement, the Solvay method. We look at production of the number one chemical in the world, sulfuric acid. We discuss the superphosphate process for fertilizer, and the invention of the match. Steel was a major factor in the Industrial Revolution, so we examine a variety of alloys. Aluminum's expansion with the Hall-Héroult process is mentioned. Finally we talk about the element fluorine and silicon carbide.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

9/9/22 • 24:36

In the 19th century, the centuries-old dependence on gunpowder for war began to change with Christian Schönbein's invention of guncotton. Then Sobrero invented the frightening nitroglycerin. We learn about Alfred Nobel's dealings with nitroglycerin and his efforts to improve its stability. We also hear about his will, founding the Nobel Prizes. There are more variations of nitro compounds, such as TNT.Support the show Support my podcast at https://www.patreon.com/thehistoryofchemistry Tell me how your life relates to chemistry! E-mail me at steve@historyofchem.com Get my book, O Mg! How Chemistry Came to Be, from World Scientific Publishing, https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/12670#t=aboutBook

9/16/22 • 20:57