Curiousities Related to Chemistry
- Bad Science
Not really a curiousity, but I did not know where to put
this page, which is an attempt to sensitize teachers and students to examples of
the bad science often taught in schools, universities, and offered in popular
articles and even textbooks. There's a chemistry section in there too, but I
thought it was better to let you have this link instead.
- Book
of Quintessence
These pages present a
mid-fifteenth century magical text, The Book of Quinte Essence. Both a
translation into modern English and an HTML version of the original can be found
here.
- Characterization
of Organic Illumination Systems
Recent anecdotal
reports of novel principles of illumination have stressed qualitative aspects.
This note presents a quantitative study of an organic illumintation system,
characterizing the temperature and current-flow properties of the system as
functions of time and device parameters. Theoretical and practical implications
of these measurements are discussed. A similar attempting to create new
incandescent devices is communicated in the
The Light Emitting
Vegetable Diode page.
- Cooking HKN Hamburgers and
Lighting the Grill
See still photos or an MPEG
movie of lighting of a grill with 3 gallons of liquid oxygen. "Result is a
grill ready to cook in about 3 seconds, and all the old grease, etc burned off.
" Don't try this at home!
- Cure for the Common Cold
In April of 1995, the unthinkable happened. Fast DryTM
Lozenges were finally patented as the cure for the common cold. Learn how such
an astonishing patent came about!
- Fun with Grapes -
A Case Study
The authors have made an important
new discovery in the field of culinary entertainment. Properly prepared, the
common seedless grape can be made to combust spectacularly when subjected to a
short (5-10 second) duration of microwaves. Don't try this at home either!
- Cold Fusion
The ICCF5 Discussion Group - This is the archive of an independent
discussion group devoted to substantive scientific critism of the abstracts of
papers that have been submitted for the Fifth International Conference on Cold
Fusion (ICCF5 April 9-13, 1995, Monte Carlo).
- Cold Fusion Times
"The journal of the scientific aspects of loading
isotopic fuels into materials."
- Introduction
to Alchemy
"Alchemy is a multifaceted
subject. No longer can it be seen merely as a kind of proto-chemistry dominated
by the desire to make gold from base metals or prepare an elixir that would
prolong life. This reductionist view would confine alchemy to be of historical
interest only. The wide sweep of different ideas and perspectives found in
alchemical literature, both in printed books and manuscripts, shows us that
alchemy in many ways holds in its kernel, philosophies and ways of looking at
the world that are still entirely relevant to us today."
- Mad Science
First International Virtual Conference on Mad Science - IVCMS'96.
Among the submitted "papers", there are some entries that bear a
distinct resemblance of chemistry.
- Molecule
of the Month
A collection of interesting
molecules, put together as a collaborative project between the Chemistry
Departments from around the UK. A new molecule is added each month...
- Science
Jokes Archive
This archive contains science jokes
collected by Joachim Verhagen. There is a chemistry section linked in this URL,
but it would not be just to direct you past the pointers to the other topics.
Some quite fun ones in the chemistry section. Enjoy!
- Science Made Stupid
"The cornerstone of modern science is the scientific
method. Scientists first formulate hypotheses, or predictions, about nature.
Then they perform experiments to test their hypotheses." This is a quote
from this site, but that is also where the serious stuff ends. The rest is,
mildly speaking, hilarious!
- Skeptics
Society Web
The Skeptics Society and Skeptic
magazine investigate claims by scientists, pseudoscientists, and
pseudohistorians on a wide variety of theories and conjectures. The question the
Skeptics Society asks about all claims it investigates is this: How well do they
hold up under scientific scrutiny?
- Strawberry
Pop-Tart Blow-Torches
Not necessarily chemistry,
but I could not resist it: Yet another "don't try this at home"
experiment. The same experiment is also available from another site with MPEG or
QuickTime movies .
- The Alchemy
Virtual Library
This site, dedicated to Alchemy in
all its facets, has been set up by Adam McLean.
- T.W.I.N.K.I.E.S.
Project
Twinkies is a series of experiments
conducted to determine the properties of that incredible food, the Twinkie.
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