FOR TO-OAY'S DISCUSSlON,
Chemistry J
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ROPHECY, in general, is a form of gambling wherein the prophet stakes his P r e p u t a t i o n on the turn of events instead of his money on the turn of a card. It is unbecoming that science waste its time in such haphazard speculations. Like other forms of gambling, however, prophecy may be analytically approached through the medium of probabilities. The available data for this analysis consikts of all the speculations concerning the future of chemistry t h a t the imagination can produce. Since the imagination is n o t limited by any recognizable finite boundaries, the amount of available material becomes indefinitely large. Despite this semi-infinite volume of data, it must be recognized as being still incomplete, for certainly events will occur in chemistry during the next century that are beyond the conception range of the 1935 imagination. This justifies the stretching and straining THOMAS MIDGLEY. JR. of t h e 1935 i m a g i n a t i o n to i n c l u d e a m a x i m u m of future event conceptions even to the point of disregarding the limitations imposed by the 1935 notions of what is impossible. It is apparent that the nature of this hypothetical data is so different from that which is ordinarily available in problems of probability that the orthodox mathematical methods of treatment cannot be used. Under such circumstances it would be logical to Iist the available data and to discuss and classify it in detail, with a view to selecting those combinations which show a maximum of probability. Such a procedure also presents insurmountable difficulties. There remains the use of the principle of false position whereby the assumption is made that such a list exists, the individual items of which are simply referred to as future events. The next step becomes the development of a system of classification. Several different systematic classifications are possible and the analyst is free to choose whichever one best suits his need. I have chosen to divide these data into three classes, based on degrees of probability: CLASSI. Those future events that are so probable as to be practical certainties. CLASS11. Those future events that are probable but not certain. C w s s 111. Those future events that are improbable.
T o aid in the proper classification, it is desirable to establish certain criteria by which each future event may be critically examined. 494
Next Century THOMAS RIIDGLEY, JR. Ethyl Gasoline Corporation, Detroit, Mich.
Class I should include all those events that are suggested by extrapolating some recognizable trend of progress. For example, the next century will see many stronger and lighter materials developed. Class I1 should include all future events that do not fall in class I and that do not violate our present conception of the natural laws. Class I11 should include all future events that do violate our present conception of the natural laws. The following example will serve as an illustration of the difference between class I1 and class 111: KO present-day interpretation of any law of nature would be violated by synthesizing an element of atomic number 100. This future event, consequently, belongs in class 11, but the discovery or synthesis of an element of atomic weight zero would be distinctly in contradiction to our conception that matter must always have mass, and hence falls in class 111. An examination of this system of classification leads to some elementary observations : 1. All future events are imaginary until they have become past events. 2. Many, if not most, of the future events included in the above classification will still be imaginary in 2035. By definition the percentage of residual imaginary events remaining in each class in 2035 should increase from class I to class 111. 3. Could we determine which individual future events will remain imaginary and which will become actual, we could predict the future with the same accuracy as we can write the history of the past. This we must admit is beyond our ability to do. 4. Approximately equal chances of becoming actual must be conceded t o the individual events in each class. The magnitude of this chance is large in class I, somewhat less in class 11, and small in class 111. 5. The selection and study of representative future events from a given class should give as good an impression of the future as would the study of all the events in the class, and the chances of this impression being correct is large for class I, fair for class 11, and very small for class 111. 6. Theoretically, the number of easily conceivable future events in each class should greatly increase from class I, which is
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limited to extrapolations of present trends, to class 111 which is not even confined by the laws of nature; practically, this is not the case. The obviousness of class I events renders their conception, in seemingly limitless numbers, mere child’s play, while the inhibition to indulge one’s imagination in speculative channels that run counter to the accepted interpretations of the natural laws must be overcome before any class I11 event can take the form of a conception. But when this is done, class I11 events have little difficulty in making their appearance-for example, the synthesis of an element of negative atomic weight or a gas which cools upon being compressed or a substmce which :tbsorbs heat from a cooler body, etc. I do not know what use such conceptions may have and I don’t believe they have any. I wish merely t o point out t’hat an unlimited number of class I I1 conceptions can be brought into existence. Class I1 events present a greater problem. They lack the obviousness of class I and at the same time must not overstep the boundaries of the accepted natural laws. I recommend their conception as an excellent and constructive exercise for t,he imagination. The foregoing outline logically leads to the following deductions: Despite the fact that it is beyond our ability, it would be interesting to select any class I11 event that would prove to be other than imaginary, since, as each such event occurred, it would be necessary to alter the then-existing interpretation of the natural laws. This consideration yields the following prediction: Within the next century many discoveries will be made which will be in contradiction to our present-day conception of the natural laws to such an extent that several radical revisions will be necessary. This is a most important deduction, for it guarantees pure acience a continuing life. As long as new natural laws can be discovered or new interpretations given to the old, just that long will pure science live. Let us hope that this prediction can be made as certainly in 2035 as it can be made today. The indefiniteness of any other deduction that can be drawn from class I11 renders its further consideration useless for the purpose of developing a picture of chemistry in the next century. Definiteness can be found in class I--stronger materials, lighter metals, brighter dyes, hetter fabrics, more durable rubbers, highly efficient fuels, less corrosion, and new insecticides, medicines, road surCr ,? faces, vaccines, varnishes, etc. And what is the picture this gives? Simply a bigger, brighter, safer, and speedier world than that of 1935. If this is all there is to be in the next cenhry, I will gladly join t h a t gloomy school of thought which suggests that science take a holiday until economics catches up. But it is not all, as will be seen by contemplating the events of class 11. As has previously been pointed out, class I1 events are much more obscure than those of class I ; otherwise I should terminate this discussion now with the suggestion that each of you visualize a dozen class I1 events before going to sleep tonight and thereby develop your own impression of the future of chemistry. But realizing the difficulties of the task (with no more guidance than the above abstractions), I am appending a series of specific examples as they apply to various fields of human activity.
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and easy for the student to coyer much more ground in a given time than is now possible. In addition, our knowledge of the biological and physiological effects of addition compounds to the human system will be such that the deleterious effects of adolescence may be treated as would be any other physical defect which interfered with the proper habits of study. The net result of such developments will be to produce a graduate who could enter any of our research laboratories of the present day and solve our most intricate problems overnight.
=War= Unpleasant as the subject may be, no discussion of this sort would be complete without forecasting the future relationship of chemistry to war. Be it thoroughly understood that neither chemists nor chemistry make war. Hatred, greed, and fear are the causative emotions responsible. They have no place in chemistry. Until they can be controlled, war is inevitable a t recurring intervals. Thinking people must face the facts. Ever since the first primitive savage hardened the end of a sharpened stick in a fire for the purpose of facilitating the slaughter of his neighbors, chemistry has played a roll in warfare of ever-increasing importance. This has not been (as so many laymen believe) exclusively devoted to offensive weapons. The metallurgist of Damascus who produced a superior sword was matched on the field of battle by his colleague of Toledo who sent forth a perfected armor. The effectiveness of high explosives has been greatly reduced by the chemically made smoke screen, and toxic gases are rendered harmless by a canister of active charcoal. And thus may we expect the trend to continue. Should the next century see the extension of the principal of humane offensive weapons (which already has been introduced b y t h e u s e of lachrymators) to include c o n t a c t anesthetics or t e m p o r a r y paralysisproducing compounds, just as certainly will a defensive a n t i d o t e b e developed. Or should some archfiend succeed in producing an offens i v e device of s u c h potency t h a t entire populations may be eradicated, thereby fulfilling the dream of many pacifists that war will become too horrible for any nation to wage it, just as certainly will some genius arise and discover a means to render this device innocuous. Such considerations lead to the conclusions that, irrespective of what chemistry may contribute to warfare during the next century, the determination of victory will remain where it has always been-in the hands of the men with the knives.
=Agriculture= =Education= Sometime within the next century, the revolution which is now going on in physics will come to an end. This will be characterized by a majority of physicists agreeing upon the nature of the physical universe and remaining in agreement for a reasonable period of time. Following this very desirable event, a man or group of men will appear in chemistry who will recodify its laws in much the same manner as was done by Mendeleef and Willard Gibbs. This will make it simple
The distortion of economics which exists a t present in agriculture makes it difficult to interpret properly the future of chemistry in this field. I have heard this economic distortion described as a condition wherein we grow more corn to raise more pigs t o make more fertilizer to produce more cotton to plow under. Such a condition is so contrary t o the established rules of progress that it cannot continue very long. If I am wrong in this belief and crop curtailment continues as a permanent necessity, I feel justified in making the follow-
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ing class I1 prediction: The chemist will eliminate the bureaucracy that is otherwise necessary to maintain the crop curtailment by increasing the amount of ozone in the earth’s atmosphere, thereby limiting the ultraviolet radiation available for agriculture to the amount required. The economic machine may be likened to an automobile that has blown out a tire and gone in the ditch. One group of people is trying to rescue it by pushing it forward, another group by pushing it backward, and still another by rolling it over sidewise. Is it any wonder that fenders are being crumpled and glass broken, and that we seem to be making little progress? Yet I hold that we will get it out of the ditch, back on the road, and repaired well within the next century. It is upon this assumption that the following predictions are based: Plant growth will be stimulated by new fungicides and insecticides. New agricultural products will be derived by the introduction of new enzymes into the seed or plant. The waste cellulose of the farm will become a valuable byproduct, and new crops, such as rubber, will be added t o the products of the United States for use in the chemical industries. All of these are merely class I predictions. The direct synthesis of the carbon-hydrogen bond from carbon dioxide. water, and sunlight will become an accomplished fact. Such a development will take place on swamp and submarginal lands where the basic raw materials are as readily available as elsewhere and will result largely in the production of organic raw materials for further synthesis in the chemical factory. In the field of animal husbandry great changes will result from the application of synthetic hormones to promote growth. This will make possible a much greater and more rapid meat production from a given amount of foodstuff. In other words, a century hence, chickens will be the size of pigs and lay footballs, pigs will be hogs, hogs the size of cattle, and bulls will be mastodons; yet the food consumed will be no greater than that used a t present.
=Transportation= The greater strength and lightness of the materials of construction of the future will develoD i n c r e a s e d speeds and safety of transportation, yet t h e s e a r e m e r e l y extrapolations of a wellrecognized trend. Like the return of prosperity, the thousand-mile-an-hour airplane is “just around the corner.” The fireproofing of hydrogen or the commercial synthesis of helium would serve only to extend a type of transportation which is already in existence. These things are not enough by which to gage correctly the developments within the next century. Engineering is already waiting for chemistry to give it a fuel capable of releasing more energy per pound than is required t o lift that pound out of the earth’s gravitational field. Given such a fuel, interplanetary travel will become a possibility. Gasoline, explosives, or other materials which depend on combustion for their release of energy fall short of this requirement-so much so that a really new magnitude of energy storage must be sought. This perhaps may be found in radioactivity. So far, the inability to control or direct such energy liberation prevents its utilization for the purpose a t hand, but within the next century this difficulty should be overcome. It would seem that some form of synthesis of elements (or their equivalent) of the proper active type would
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be the logical line of attack. Be this as it may, the major premise is that within a century the chemist will offer to the engineer a “fuel” capable of releasing in useful form more energy than will be required to lift itself through the earth’s gravitational field. This, in a short while, will result in malting interplanetary transportation possible. I should not care to give the impression that interplanetary transportation will become a commonplace immediately. Considerable preparation of environment will be necessary. Mars will need mater, Venus a new atmosphere; all of this will mean work for the future chemists and engineers and, after all, why should we not leave something to be accomplished in the century after next?
=Health= Expected future events under this heading are multitudinous. A few of the more obvious are as follows: The understanding of the chemistry of cancer and its resulting control. The eliminationof cold and influenza epidemics by a knowledge of the basic chemistry involved. The exDosure of the chemistrv of the teeth, leading t o a relatively simple and effective hygiene for their proper preservation. The end of tuberculosis, diabetes, septicemia, and a host of similar afflictions by a fuller k n o w l e d g e of t h e chemical factors involved. And so on, ad injnitum. I
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What greater hope may be held out to suffering humanity than such predictions as these, and yet they are nothing more than extrapolations of well-recognizable trends. In the previous predictions I find that I have often encroached on the field of health by imagining the results of the use of addition compounds. I suspect the majority of readers would do very much the same. The faith we all have in the future of such scientific research is thus illustrated. This field is not as new as it seems. The witch doctors started it, the alchemists continued it, we profit by it, and many of the most startling changes in human relationships in the future will result from its scientific pursuit and further application. This idea is suggestive that predictions concerning future addition compounds for the human system are merely class I events. Generally speaking, this is true within the field of health, with the following exceptions:
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1. The correlation of physiological behavior w t h chemical structure and constitution will be carried to such a point that brand new forms of behaviorism will be predictable as the result of introducing certain organic compounds still to be synthesized, into the human system. The possible results of such a process are beyond the range of the 1935 imagination. 2. The control of the age cycle will become an accomplished fact, making it possible for an individual to order an indefinitely
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INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
long life (except for accident) at any given age level he or she may choose, such as 30 to 35 or 18 to 22. If thls prediction is extended t o the year 3035, I shall include the statement that by that time, llethuqelah’s record will have fallen.
=Comfort= I have encountered more difficulty in developing any class I1 predictions under this title than for any of its predecessors. This naturally has led to a c e r t a i n a m o u n t of analysis with respect to the title itself. C o m f o r t s a r e intirriately associated with habits, and to change a habit is distinctly uncomfortable; h e n c e i n order to improve comfort, it is necessary to produce a transitional period of d i s c o m f o r t . ?his makes it difficult to 11i c t u r e properly even class I predictions in this field (because of the aasoci,ited feeling of discomfort) while class I1 predictions seem well-nigh ridiculous. T o obviate this difficulty, I present the predictions of future comfort by a description of a day in the life of one of our own worthy members in the year 2035. He wakes up in the morning about ten-thirty. Perhaps he feels drowsy and so rests a bit while his mind fumbles with a difficulty that has developed in connection with the application of his latest synthetic elastic. This material may be made into very thin porous sheets and has the peculiar properties of being nearly a perfect thermal insulator when dry and a perfect heat conductor wheri damp. Made into skin-tight underwear, it will eliminate the need for any change in weight c i garments for winter or summer. In fact, the material is c o perfect that it is just like ail extra layer of skin on the body except for one thing. It has no nerves, so that if one itches beneath it, one cannot get the comfort of a good old-fashioned swatch. Realizing that his work for the day is great (two full liours a t least), he breaks his train of thought and reaches for a capsule of “wake producer.” A small capsule has the de-ired effect and in a few seconds he is fully aroused. It has heen a cold night. He pushes a button to lower the windows, another button to fill the rooin with warm humid air. The furniture, carpets, draperies, and wall coverings of the room are all made of new materials which combine high thermal insulating value with lo^ specific heat so that he does not have til experience the discomfort of waiting for the room to warm. By snapping his fingers he throws off the bed clothes which w i g h only a few grams, being woven from fibers of aerogel He arises and throws his pajamas into the wastebasket (the cost of waste cellulose textiles being less than paper and not worth the coqt of laundering) and so to his morning toilet. . . In hie shower bath he turns a valve and iq soon covered by a fine spray of detergent, containing both fungicides and germicides for removing all parasitical matter. 4 short rinse with water is followed LBJ’ a draft of warm air of zero humidity, he dries like a beaker treated with alcohol and ether-much more quickly and cleanly than with toweling. Sext he turns to the washstand v-here he rinses his mouth with a solution which a t the same time dissolves all tartar and foreign matter from the teeth, stimulates the gums, and acts as a perfect antiseptic. He newr used a toothbrush. The only one he ever TTas on display two years before a t the second Century of Progress Exhibit held in Chicago. Alongside of it was a trepanned skull and a sign Tvhich read “lncient
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barbarian health ideas.” He take5 up a flexible “kiottle” of depilator and squeezes a fern drops on the palm of his hand which he rubs over his face to remove what beard there may be. And then to dress and so to breakfast. . . At breakfast he drinks pharmacopeia orange juice and “novofein” coffee, eats cellulose derivative cereal, and reads a paper that is printed in the latest wired natural color. And so to work. . . A graduate student tells him that the latest attempt to synthesize the third isotope of element 100 has resulted in an explosion (though the pressure was well below the limit of one-half million pounds per square inch for which the autoclave was built). No damage was done, however, for these new alloy autoclaves are not very brittle. Another student reports his work in the electron mathematics of the relativities of space lattices in the noncolloidal glasses. “Wonderful young generation,” he thinks, (‘how they can use this new simplified math. Wish they’d had that when I was young. Too old to change though. I’ll just look wise.” A twenty-minute lecture on “the application of fifth dimensional reasoning to the problem of the physical properties of the aliphatic hydrocarbons,” and his day’s work is done. And so to lunch and on to play. Golf has disappeared by more than half a century. It had to go when the synthetic rubbers and guttas became so good that the average dub could knock a ball two thQusand yards. There was no room left for the courses. A new game has recently sprung up, based on the rules developed by the Australian aborigine who played it with boomerangs. In the modern version, however, a ball, rich in indeterminacy, is struck by a crooked stick. Unless the stroke is executed with perfect skill, the ball is likely to go through several weird convolutions, eventually striking one of the players in the back or pit of the stomach. The winner is the one who is struck the least number of times. Medical men who like the game say that it is good for the heart, lungs, and kidney;
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medical men who do not like the game say that it is bnd for the heart, lungs, and kidneys. At least there is one good thing about it. One need not tire one’s self to death by walking. Our worthy member spends three hours convincing himself that he is having a great time and then home to dinner and so t o bed. . . A tremendous change has taken place in people’s habits during the preceding thirty years. With the discovery of certain hormones in the stomach of the boa constrictor and their subqequent syntheqis, it is no longer necessary to qtay
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up after eating in order to digest one’s dinner-just a pill and right to bed. -4 few young people still like to go out to dance, a few hardy souls go out in the spirit of adventure, and the poor who cannot afford the modern luxuries gather a t each other’s houses as the ancients used to do, but most people after reaching middle life go to bed. The mentally lazy (and these are always a majority) select the particulsr dream isomer they desire for the night from their supply of totally harmless sleeping tablets, and go to sleep. These tablets are made in various isomers, each isomer producing some certain type of dream. Others, and this group includes our worthy member, tunein the ceiling television and “visit”where\-er they choose. On this particular night the two hundred and eighty ninth meeting of the AhfERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY is in progress. There is no longer any central meeting placewiththenuisance of getting there. The radio commission merely assigns a wave length, and the committee arranges a program. One doesn’t need to sit in a stuffy auditorium but simply goes to bed and tunes in. Our friend tunes in on the symposium under way, “Four Hundred Years of Chemistry in America.” The paper on the program is “The Chemistry of the Last
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Century.” Our worthy member listens to the summationthe story of the great correlations, the elimination of adolescence, the control of radio activity, the development of the contact anesthetics for war and the new fields of research they have opened, and many others of a similar sort. He knows them all well, it is somewhat tiresome to listen to, even though the speaker does a good job. However, as the paper ends, one thought lingers on in his mind-the tremendous possibilities that confronted the chemists of a century ago. Why had he not been born then? “Think of it: they gave Urey the Nobel Prize for discovering heavy hydrogen just one hundred years ago. That was really the beginning of Chemistry as a science. I have been born too late. Why, I would even be willing to sit in their stuffy auditoriums and listen to tiresome papers predicting the future of chemistry if I could only enjoy the opportunities for advancing science which were theirs.” And so to sleep. . . RECEIVED Marcb 22, 1935. Presented before the general meeting at the 89th Meeting of the American Chemical Society, New York, N. Y., April 22 t o 26. 1935.
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Scientific Foundations of American Chemical Industry
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H E X o u r pioneer foreALFRED H. WHITE and there followed the centuries of the Dark fathers built their first log Ages. The revival of knowledge came with University of Michigan, the outburst of the Renaissance which accabins in this new world, Ann Arbor, Mich. thev did not trouble with foundations but laid companied a period of free inquiry in many fields, Columbus discovered America; Rathe“1ogsdirectly on the ground. Similarly, the first chemical industries in this country three hundred years ago phael and Michelangelo reached heights still unsurpassed as had no scientific foundations. It is true that the most promicreative artists; Leonard0 da Vinci was both a wonderful nent of these pioneers, John Winthrop, Jr., was himself an artist and an extraordinary scientist; Shakespeare gave us his educated man, the possessor of a notable library of books on immortal plays. alchemy, and one who sought counsel with the most learned The scientific thinkers of the worId had been dominated by men of England. But the books and the counsels of the the philosophy of Aristotle and believed that the processes of learned can have helped him but little, The chemists three nature could be discovered by the oaerations of thought alone. Modern science commenced hundred years ago believed there were only three chemical when students discarded this principles, salt, sulfur, and mercury. When wood burned, philosophy of the Greeks and they thought it was killed. The world still had t o wait for began t o collect accurate data more than a century before the discovery of oxygen should f r o m w h i c h , later, general give some insight into the real nature of combustion. With laws were derived. If we exsuch meager knowledge and even misconceptions of the simamine this century commencplest chemical reactions, little help can have come to the chemiing with the year 1600, we cal industry from science. The early chemical manufacturer find Sir Francis Bacon w i t followed the empiric methods which had been handed down i n g h i s “Advancement of to him and, aided only by his own common sense, commenced L e a r n i n g ” i n 1605 a n d his operations. William Harvey discovering Our country is fortunate in that it was settled during that the circulation of the blood in wonderful century which has been called the “Century of 1616. Galileo died in 1642 Genius.” Before the beginning of the Christian era a small and Sir Isaac Newton was group of people had erected the Golden Age of Grecian civiliborn the same year. The age zation and through Aristotle and Plato had given expression of quantitative measurements to as noble and complete systems of thought as have ever and the correlation of cause A. H. WHITE come from the mind of man. Greece fell, Rome rose and fell,
