JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
It is emphasized by the authors that no attempt has been made to make the treatment encyclopedic. Emphasis has been placed rather on critically selected methods and on limitations concerning precision and accuracy. The latter, and material dealing with interferences, are discussed in many small-type notes on the procedures which are important. This is a book which all chemists concerned with analytical chemistry should find very valuable. Very properly, emphasis is placed on the theoretical principles which have been discussed in d e t d in Volume I. The, treatment is not on an elementary level but is, in general, very c l e d y presented. The extent of moderniaation is perhaps best indicated by the fact thst of the 847 numbered references, many of them multiple, approximately one-half are to work which bas appeared since the last edition was published. The authors recognize that they have not been able to cover the foreign literature which has appeared since 1940 adequately. It is unfortunate that two y e m have passed since the manuscript was written and that as a consequence the latest literature references are to 1945. In connection with the determinat.ion of boron it should perb p s be indicated that horon-free glass is now available for a p paratus. The treatment of the relative stability of the halides and cyanides of mercuric ion on p. 205 is not consistent with that given on p. 331. According to Latimer and other standard aources, the cyanide complex is more stable than the iodide coinplex. The filtration of concentrated sodium hydroxide solutions through fritted glass filters as recommended on p. 70 is rather rough on the filters. The text is fairly free of typographical errors, and the ones noted by this reviewer should not lead to confusion. The indexes are excellent and the book is attractively printed and bound although the binding is not uniform with the first volume. M. GILBERT B U R F O R D
CHEMISTRY IN OUR TIME George Glockler, State University of Iowa, and Ruby C. Glockler. F. S. Crofts and Ca.,Inc., New York, 1947. xvi + 667 pp. 141 figs. 14 X 21 cm. $4.50. 0
ACCORDING to the preface, "This volume is written as a result of the belief on the osrt of the authors thst the standard textbooks in c o l l t ~ebcmistry ~ srr inakqunte fm the needs of t l a m studenis rvlm do nut immd t o use their knowlerl~wof this scienve in their iutuw vocations.. . I'rt!seut day cl,emstry is portrayed as the science now exists.. . . In essence the book is mainly descriptive, with no proofs given to validate its assertions.. . . The book is abmt chemistry, it is not designed t o leach chemistry to professional students." To meet this ohieotive the authors oresent anddescribefactsand theories of clrcrnistry with a mininlunl of mathcnmtics. Tlw student isasked tv do lrttlr rcnsoninginstmd of prcsmtcrl wrh 8 p n d ~ g o u samouut uf mawnal to mrrnorirr. The questious and answers a t the ends of chapters summarize the salient points; few require the use of numbers, The book is divided into six sections: the Concept of Matter, the Concept of Energy, Fundamental Particles, the Scientific Approach, the Divisions of Chemistry, and the Applied Fields of Chemistry. Numerous basic facts. laws. and delinitions are orasented in the first two serrions ~v\.rtl~out'theor6ticsl trtxatment, as groundwork foraubsequcnt develop~rrntin Section I 11 of theatonuc and kinetic theories, together with valency and atomic structure. Perhaps in a descriptive approach this'arrangement has merit, though the collateral consideration of fact and theory would seem to offer greater opportunity for correlating and remembering the many facts. The chapters in Section V contain extensive descriotive survevs of theoretical. inoreanic. oreanic. hioloeical. and t i e seiectkn and devkop&ent maiYticalchekstry. In of topics in these chspters is good; however, the balancing of
oxidation-reduction equations seems overemphasized in the chapter on theoretical chemistry, little use is made of the periodic table in the chapter on inorganic chemistry. and the chanter on organic chemistry deals with an enormous amount of material, including many topics normally found in advanced courses in the subject. The 6nal chapters entitled Chemical Engineering, the Metal Industries, the Petroleum Industry, Chemotherapy, Food, Rubber, Plastics, Textiles and Household Chemistry, as well as the section on the scientific approach, would make fine collateral reading for students of general chemistry. Other good points include the hibliographies at the ends of chapters and a t the end of the book, the many clear diagrams and tables, and the frequent digressions to consider the scientific attitude. The book contains few typographical errors, but is printed on paper of very poor quality. The binding is average. Unfortunately the book appears to have been hastily a s k bled. The writing is uneven, the meaning occasionally obscured by awkward sentence structure, and the pace varies from too leisurely to too rapid, especially in the use of illustrative examples. For reference use the bookis difficult: the topicsin each chapter are not numbered and are difficult to locate, since they are not in bold face type. Although liberal use is made of italics. definitions and statements of laws are commonly lost in the body of the text. There are several errors and questionable statements; for example, "the only formsof matter that are not and cannot be changed by altering the usual conditions are the chemicrtl elements" (p. 63). The collateral use of the term combining weight in the invariant sense of atomic weigbt and in the sense of a multiple or submultiple of the atomic weight is confusing and never clarified, even though the concept of combining weights is emphasized (pp. 79-85, 263). The inclusion of metallic carbonates and bicarbonates among organic compounds is unusual, as is the suggestion that hydrogen is oxidized in the reaction 4HCl+ 02-CL +HsO (p. 113). The recent growth of courses iil elementary chemistry far college students not majoring in science has posed the twin problems of selection of subject matter and method of presentation. This book merits considerationif only because it presents one extreme solution-the descriptive approach. R. M. SHERMAN
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THE STRANGE STORY OF THE QUANTUM
Banes6 Hoffman, Department of ~ k h e m a t i c sQueens , College New York. Harper 8 Brothers, New York;1947. xi 239 pp. 13.5 X 20.5 cm. $3.
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As TEIE author states in the preface, "The story of the quantum is the story of a confused and groping search for knowledge conducted by scientists of many lands on s front wider than the world of physics had ever seen before, illumined by flashes of insight, aided by accidents and guesses, and enlivened by coincidences such as one would expect to find only in fiction. "It is a story of turbulent revolution; of the undermining of a complacent physics that had long ruled a limited domain, of a subsequent?nterregnum predestined for its destruction by its awn inherent contradictions, and of the tempestuous emergence of a much chastened regime-Quantum Mechanics." To the reviewer. who remembers vividlv the difficulties he experienced in undekanding Plmck's earli&t h p e r on the qunoturn hypothesis, the stirnulatim rrsultixag from Bohr's publrcation, and all the subsequcrrt puzzling6ituarims vvlrieh confronted the so-called classical quantum theory, until they were resolved by the wave theory of matter-to one who has been so fortunate as to be an eye-witness of "the enchanted pageant" for almost five decades, the story told by the author is of extremely ahsorbinginterest. The stom is set forth in dramatic stvle. " ,"without mathematics, yet without important omission of concept." The scene opens, in the &st chapter (entitled "Prologue") with ~~
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