Bullet Proof Tesla Battery!

Uncle Gizmo

Nifty Access Guy
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No, it's not, but the battery could be made from old Kevlar bullet proof jackets...

 
Ah, Minty... you KNOW your USA friends will disagree on sulfur. (I saw your fine print.) Ask your friendly online Ph.D. chemist about it. Oh, wait.... that's ME!

Since the name is thought to have come from Latin, it would have been spelled "sulfur" originally because "ph" as a diphthong was not common in Latin; it's more or a Greek thing.

My reference is from Encyclopedia Britannica rather than a USA source so you'll know I'm being international about this.

 
Well, I've got to say this: If the Royal Society of Chemistry AND IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) both say it is "sulfur" then I must offer scant hope of ever changing their minds. The Royal Society has a long and proud tradition of correctness to uphold, but IUPAC tends to think that their pronouncements are dicta dei. Which, in a sense, they are.
 
Melvin Bragg, a British
I wish they had spelt Sulphur correctly...

When William Caxton started printing books in English in the the 1400s there wasn't a correct way of spelling a word. Words were spelt phonetically and different spellings of the same word could appear throughout the text.

The object was to produce a book that resembled a manuscript with parallel margins. This was achieved by adding and removing letters from words to suit.

For more information see the following podcasts.

I have identified several time indexes, which are relevant and maybe of interest!

Melvyn Bragg, a British broadcaster, presenter of BBC Radio 4 "In Our Time" hosted a show on early printing.


At time index 28min physical characteristics of libraries Change to facilitate vertical books, as opposed to flat manuscript, from 200 books to thousands!

At time index 31.40min typesetters adding extra characters to make lines of words fit ..

Another podcast from:-

The history of English
Episode 139: The Business of Printing


Time index 47min the word business....

Time index 51min standardisation of the language

Time index 54min spelling was not standardized and spelling was normally as it sounded, hence, words spelt by whoever happened to set the word.

Also 100 different ways of spelling "thorough" and 20 different ways of spelling "might"

Time index 55min
Caxton wanted his books to appear like manuscripts, because they would sell better if they look good. To get the nice looking text he would use different spellings of words to suit the layout of the page.

Time index 59min used "th" instead of "thorn" (like a "P" but halfway down) replaced it with a "y"

Time index 1.03:50min winken the word a Dutch speaking German? Responsible for the funny spelling of ghost....
 
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Thank God the article didn't mention aluminium. ;)

Aluminium is how it is said in Spanish, I find it funny that would be a british/american difference, or discussed in the same context anyway.

So much so that it was one of those "this is how Mom says it" words that the kids thought was the English way too, I had to teach them when they were 15 I noticed for the first time they didn't realize....so they didn't go around saying "alum-in-i-um" to their friends who wouldn't know what they were talking about.
More funny things happened too but they were just me being stupid - like I liked to say "cellular mo-BILE" (with a long I) when they were little, but noticed when they were early teens they thought I'd been serious...I had to tell them it was just a joke to pronounce mobile like that
 
@Doc_Man, as the resident Ph.D. chemist, could you tell us how many elements in the periodic table end in "ium" as opposed to "um"?
 
There are a lot of "ium" suffixes. In fact, because the rare-earth metals provide most of the cases and there are a LOT of those metals, it is a huge number - over half the elements. I use the Americanized version. Others might use a European or British version. There ARE linguistic differences in some cases. Here are the "official" ending-in-ium names from the periodic table, grouped by rows.

https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/periodic-table/ and if you are not familiar with that domain, it is "National Institutes of Health" .GOV

Row 1: Helium

Row 2: Lithium, Beryllium

Row 3: Sodium, Magnesium, **** NOT Aluminum

Row 4: Potassium, Calcium, Scandium, Titanium, Vanadium, Chromium, Gallium, Germanium, Selenium

Row 5: Rubidium, Strontium, Yttrium, Zirconium, Niobium, Technetium, Ruthenium, Rhodium, Palladium, Cadmium, Indium, Tellurium

Row 6: Cesium, Barium, Cerium, Praseodymium, Neodymium, Promethium, Samarium, Europium, Gadolinium, Terbium, Dysprosium, Holmium, Erbium, Thulium, Ytterbium, Lutetium, Hafnium, Rhenium, Osmium, Indium, Thallium, Polonium

Row 7: Francium, Radium, Actinium, Thorium, Protactinium, Uranium, Neptunium, Plutonium, Americium, Curium, Berkelium, Californium, Einsteinium, Fermium, Mendelevium, Nobelium, Lawrencium, Rutherfordium, Dubnium, Seaborgium, Bohrium, Hassium, Meitnerium, Darmstadtium, Roentgenium, Copernicium, Nihonium, Fierovium, Moscovium, Livermorium

I counted 78 ending in "ium" as opposed to the "ending-in-um-but-not-ium" cases: Aluminum, Molybdenum, Tantalum, Platinum (4 in total).

If you have trouble remember the names, try this:

 
I make no judgments, Minty. The facts are there for all to see. Aluminum is not in the "ends-in-ium" group, probable because it has been known for such a long time. Many if not most of the "ium" cases were discovered in the last 100 years.

The "ium" ending is somewhat of a trend because, sad to say, most chemists are bereft of imagination when it comes to naming things. Lawrencium? (from the Lawrence, California Livermore labs) Berkelium? (from Berkely, California) Rutherfordium? (From Ernest Rutherford, early researcher). The list goes on and on... Naming elements after people and places? No imagination at all.
 
I think they should make things with more easily pronounceable names.

Minimuminum
Maximuminum
Mummyuminum

Heaven forbid they discover something in Wales?
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochium

You'd have to redesign the Periodic table to make it fit...
 
I think they should make things with more easily pronounceable names.

Minimuminum
Maximuminum
Mummyuminum

Heaven forbid they discover something in Wales?
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochium

You'd have to redesign the Periodic table to make it fit...
I was wondering if Paul was going to weigh in!
 
I think they should make things with more easily pronounceable names.

Minimuminum
Maximuminum
Mummyuminum

Heaven forbid they discover something in Wales?
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogochium

You'd have to redesign the Periodic table to make it fit...

Actually, there was going to be such a name, but (pardon the USA slang here)... someone welshed out on the deal.
 
Another take on the spelling.

English is the native language for 18 countries: Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Canada (excluding Quebec), Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Ireland, Jamaica, New Zealand, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, United Kingdom, United States of America

The population of the US and Canada (for which both use the name aluminum) would easily outweigh the rest (using aluminium).
 

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