Henry: So after helium comes lithium with three electrons. That third electron must go into a new and different orbital called the 2s orbital.
Me: The 2s orbital is like the 1s orbital except it's bigger, right?
Henry: Not exactly. It's not like those Russian matrushka dolls where the next bigger shell simply encompasses the previous one. The 2s orbital interleaves the 1s orbital so that its electrons can stay closer to the core without getting in the way of the others. Likewise the 3s orbital interleaves the 2s and the 1s. Look at these cross-sections:
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Me: Why are you even showing me this stuff? Trooper York says he hates chemistry.
Henry: I'm just trying to explain why the toy metals like lithium, sodium, and potassium are so boring -- not the whole of chemistry.
Where do the wings of dove fit here?
ReplyDelete(Re: TY, If he has his glasses off, the illustrations might draw him back for a 2nd look, along with the talk of nodes. It's all chemistry after all.)
"Wings of dove" is an homage to Henry whose last name means "dove" in German.
ReplyDeleteGood ideas should have wings. "That idea has legs" is a bit too pedestrian for my taste.
"Wings of dove" is also a song lyric fragment.
Triple entendre!
Thank You. I didn't think to follow the tag for other clues, but doing so proved interesting.
ReplyDeleteThe orderly illustrations served as a contrast to another post I read today, on Melvin Way.
http://accidentalmysteries.blogspot.com/2008/11/melvin-way-cryptic-messenger.html
If you haven't seen this or the work he does, it's curious and worth a look, if only for the order/non-order represented. His writings/illustrations appear as the antithesis of yours with some small thread of similarity; they represent complex chemical linkages happening within.
Sometimes we see a bird, sometimes wings and sometimes loose feathers. All part of the greater Whole.
His writings/illustrations appear as the antithesis of yours with some small thread of similarity; they represent complex chemical linkages happening within.
ReplyDeleteMelvin Way seems to be more synthetic (putting things together) than analytic when it come to chemistry.
I should take a stab at deciphering him.