how were the first atomic elements isolated and how did we know they could not be broken down further?
In: 164
Late 18th and 19th century chemist discovered that the mass of a chemical reaction is always the same. The products (things that are left after) are equal to the reactants that you put in.
They also discovered that some compounds that can’t be broken down into other compounds, when reacted with other compounds that can’t be broken down into other compounds, produce things with predictable proportions. Water is always 8 parts oxygen and 2 parts hydrogen, Hemaitie is always 7 parts iron, 3 parts oxygen, ect.
This allowed elements to be isolated and identified and useful predictions to be made.
As to how they knew things could not be divided more; they’d figured out lots of ways to reduce compounds, and couldn’t find a way to break some of them them down more. Once you ‘crack’ water, you can’t chemically reduce the hydrogen gas, though it took a while to understand that ‘normal’ oxygen gas could be broken down to a different kind of oxygen gas.
Latest Answers