Invitation to Chemidr~
I
WILLIAM J. WISWESSER Willson Products, Inc.
R.S.V.P.
T
H E news of a n "Atomic Era" in August, 1945, recalled these two-year old random notes on new horizons as seen in 1943 while teaching chemistry a t Cooper Union, New York, N. Y. I n view of the striking subsequent developments these comments and quotations have been brought up to date in the hope that they might serve as inspiration for all who are aware of the vital teaching tasks that lie ahead. In less than a hundred years chemical knowledge has grown so fast and so powerful that i t is now a major factor in the destiny of the human r a c t a n d i t cannot be ignored. This growth was no surpise to some pioneer visionaries. As early as 1830 a Scottish scientist ( I ) put this final statement to his "History of Chemistry" in the final chapter entitled, "Of the present state in chemistry" : Let the science advance for another century with the same rapidity that it has done during the last 50 years, and it will produce &ects upon society of which the present race can form no adequate idea.
Perhaps Professor Thomson's prediction was a few decades premature, and certainly was not believed outside the circle of his own fellows. Most modern historians have ignored this chemical phase of civilization as faithfully as their predecessors ignored the little currents among the common people. For example, in the 800-page "Rise of American Civilization," written in 1927, the capable Beards ( 2 ) considered the impact* of chemistry on civilization so unimportant that i t was dismissed in one single sentence: Having prefixed "industrial" t o their title, chemists, whose forerunners once sought the philosopher's stone, now vied with one another in discovering new commercial substances or in turning old elements.ta novel uses in the manufacture of commalities, the increase of agricultural produce, or the destruction of diseases.
Perhaps that was all that the chemistry of 1927 deserved; i t doesn't sound particularly flattering nor consistent with subsequent developments. Then in 1941 Britain's widely known J. G. Crowther (3) struck a new note in emphasizing "The Social Relations of
* "Impact"
is the key word in a new popular magazine, Sci-
cnce Illustrated, which has appeared since this paper was submit-
ted, long after these comments were written.
Reading, Pennsylvania
Science." Feeling the new war agony of his country, he proceeded to prove that we needed a new glance a t horizons : The present crisis of civilization shows that science is a determiningfactor in the destiny of mankind . . The chief characteristic of the present age is science . . . Science in the modern sense is only about 300 to 400 years old. I t arose about the same time as the Renaissance and the Reformation . . brought into existence by the same social forces. . . . The scientists who have been contending that science has no social relations, is a purely individual activity outside politics, and arises solely from intellectual freedom, are playing into Hitler's hands. The study of the history of science and technalogy seems to show that the prosperous periods in human history are due less t o efflorescencesof wisdom and more to new inventions which for a time reduced the difficulty of the material conditions of life. Partington bas recently remarked " . in the study of the development of man no part is more significant, even if more neglected, than that concerned with the use of materials."
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It is noteworthy to recall here that archaeologists, in describing the ascent of man, identify his cultural stages by the kinds of materials that mankind had masteredStone, Bronze, Iron, Coal. Since last Fall this classification seems to have been eclipsed by the one emphasizing Slave Power, Wind and Water Power, Fuel Power, and Atomic Power-with the new accent on energy as well as matter. What has happened in America since 1900 was poignantly described by William Haynes (4) in his 1936 essays on "Men, Money, and Molecules": Within an incredibly short time the sciences have ceased t o be a mysterious ritual of laws and formulas available only t o the initiated. Their latest discovery is cocktail hour gossip, and Wall Street finances its application t o industry. Their technical terms bristle not only in textbooks but in the newspaper; and they have come to replace the classics as the hallmark of an educated person. Indeed without a working knowledge of the natural sciences, one passes through this modem world deaf, dumb, and blind. Like the freshman when he learned that he had been talking English prose all his life, we are a little dismayed . Our dependence upon chemistry is appalling.
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It is so difficult to appreciate how recent and how fiersonal this great impact of science is that witnesses to the change have to go to great lengths of proof. Mark Sullivan (5) has keenly described many of these
pertinent changes in his record of "Our Times," the first volume covering "The Turn of the Century" : Due chiefly to medical progress between 1900 and 1925, man was enriched in the thing he prizes most-his security of tenure on life, his defense against disease and death. The average age of the people who died in 1900 was 49 years; of those who died in 1925,55 years. . . At the beginning of 1900 it had not yet been proved that yellow fever is transmitted by a mosquito, It was not typhus by a louse, bubonic plague by a flea known that typhoid and cholera come from germs in unclean water and milk; these diseases were still the scourges they always had been. Insulin for diabetes, vaccination against typhoid, emetiu for dysentery, a d r e n a l i n a l l were still unknown. Antitoxin for diphtheria and the X-ray were only just coming into use. Ehrlich had not yet made those 606 patient experiments that resulted in the remedy for syphilis. Radium had not yet been used in the treatment of cancer. . . . Man was enriched in the quantity of power brought t o his service and in the lowered cost of this power. . . . The gasolineengine is an instrumentality about which almost any superlative can be used . In 1900 the average farmer had, as the only supplement to his own muscles, the power of two or three horses I n 1900 there was but one generating t o carry on his work station exceeding 5000 horse-power . . . . Man was enriched-fabulously enriched-in his access t o material goods-omforts, conveniences, luxuries. I n 1900 the automobile was a dubious novelty. There were in all less than 8000 in the United States . . . . There were less than ten miles of concreteroad . . . . There was but one telephone for each 66 people. . In 1900 it was recorded that the number of silk stockings sold in the United States was 12,572 p a i r s a pair for one person to each 2000 of the population. Man was enriched in his knowledge of the surface of the earth. During this period both the North Pole and the South Pole were reached . . . In 1900 the great Texas oilaelds were still uadiscovered . . The Marconi wireless was unperfected . . . The tungsten electric light was not yet made. I n 1900 there were no oil-burning locomotives, no flotation process for recovering copper, no vacuum cleaners, no self-starter, no electric cookstoves or electric irons, no fireless cookers, no disc phonographs. Man was enriched in his knowledge of the universe. I n one field of pure science, understanding of the nature of matter, the advances made between 1900 and 1925 were greater than the sum of all the advances made in all time before. "It sounds incredible, but nevertheless i t is true, that science up t o the close of the 19th century had no suspicion even of the original sources of natural energy."-Professor J. J. T ~ o a n s o "Outline ~. of Science."
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bloody trouble for the future. . . Any decade, even the present one, may witness another general martial codagration over the whole European-American-Asian world, far more destructive than the last; for more terrible engines of war's destructiveness are invented constantly . . . This may sound unduly pessimistic; the man who is an unrelieved optimist, in the state of the world today, is blind. The only salvation for mankind is effective world peace. It is knowledge that men-the vast majority of men-have lacked for so long. This lack of knowledge has stained every land and every sea-way with the spreading scarlet of spilt blood. Lack of knowledge has caused that strange self-mutilating trait of mankind, the organization of hatred, in the form of dreadful group rivalries and wars. Man has never organized love of fellowman with any effectiveness. This is the task of man's future; and only knowledge can lead into this.. The object of society is t o socialize man's achievements .. ' Achievements consist primarily in knowledge, in ways and methods that man has invented for doing things . . The individual's object is to live, in the fullest amplest sense; and he can do this best by gathering what facts he can about the universe, by arranging them logically, and by learning how t o use them. Only knowledge can let a man or woman round into a developed human being.
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The fact that this was written 19 years ago, yet rings so true today, suggests that we still are repeating the same mistakes of ignorance, of heavily costly lingering learning. Today, because the world a t large has disregarded this cultural instruction, the thinking men find our nation facing a crisis that is almost indescribably horriblehomble because the average man does not know what an atom is, cannot comprehend radiant energy, stubbornly does not want to believe the terrible truths about atomic bombs, and is hell-bent for having another war quick before our "new enemies" catch up with us. "Modem Man Is Obsolete" declared Norman Cousins in October, 1945, expanding a Saturday Rmiew editorial (7) : The beginning of the Atomic Age has brought less hope than fear. It is a primitive fear, the fear of the unknown, the fear of forces man can neither channel nor comprehend. This fear is not new; in its classical form i t is the fear of irrational death. But overnight it has become intensified, magnified. It has burst out of the subconscious and into the conscious, filling the mind with primordial apprehensions. I t is thus that man stumbles fitfully into a new era of atomic energy for which he is as ill equipped t o accept its potential blessings as he is to control its present dangers.
Then in 1900 came Planck's quantum theory with its first explanation of the particle-wave nature of radiant energy. In 1905 came Einstein's relativity theory with Dozens of apprehensively written articles and pamits mass-energy interrelation, explaining the material source of intense radioactive or solar energies. In phlets and books have appeared since Hiroshima-many 1911-13cameRutherford's andBohr's theories of atomic of them "satellites" of the incomparably detailed Smyth structure. In 1923-27 came the bizarre wave mechanical Report (8)-but still the people do not learn about the theories that further welded the basic natures of matter dangers, much less the fundamentals that explain the and energy, thus pointing the way to recent theories dangers. [Is this any wonder, though, when not a single of nuclear structure and nuclear fission. Finally in one of these new "scientifically authoritative" writings 194245 came man's fearful success in the creation of (9, 10, 11, 12, 13) s h m s a clear and correct modern 9icinsidiously simmering atomic piles and sunbursts of ture of what atoms look like1 Even those few which atomic explosions. But there is hollow pride in the "take a look" a t the atom (14, 15, 16) show pictures that are about 20 years obsolete.] laying of the atomic bombs . . . . Dr. Harold C. Urey, who correctly pictured the atom Clement Wood, in his "Outline of Man's Knowledge," might have been speaking for 1946 instead of in'1930 and was one of the scientists who directed the work on the atomic bomb, confessed, "I'm a Frightened 1927 when he predicted and reflected as follows (6) : Man" (17), a t the beginning of this fearful year:
This cross-section of the world (after removing the cloaks of bias and prejudice) now looks hideous, weighted with immense
All the scientists I know are frightened-frightened
for their
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lives-and frightened for your life . . . We are afraid of what politicians and diplomats may do with the atomic bomb :. . . I hear people talking about the possible use of the atomic bomb in war. As a scientist. I tell you: there must never be another war . . . . I have never heard-and you have never heardany scientist say there is any scientific defense against the atomic bomb . . . The mere presence of the bomb cannot be detected by any "magical" means, and it is of such size that i t could fairly easily he smuggled in pieces from one country and assembled in another t o await explosion a t the touch of a distant radio control. . . . The atomic bomb is entirely different from other bombs . . . . Thousands die within a fraction of a second. In the immediate area there is nothing left standing. There are no walls. They are vanished into dust and smoke. There are no wounded. There are not even bodies. At the center a fire many times hotter than any fire we have known has pulverized buildings and human bodies into nothingness A single atomic bomb has the effect not onlv of 20.000 tons of TNT. but in addition starts a fire The wiil t o fight will not lengthen of hurricane intensity . the life of an attacked city five minutes. . . . Panic might empty the remaining cities . . . . . . Bombs of the future will be equal t o a million or two million tons of T N T . . . . t The safety of countries in the future, like our personal safety in cities, must rest on the law and conscience of man, backed by a vigilant world Let us do some more thinking about that net patrol war which m u d never be . There is no secret. There is no defense. The bomb is essentially cheap. If yau-the people--let things drift, wewilleatfear, sleep fear, live in fear, and die in fear. . . . Ending this menace . . is the most important thing in the world today There is only one answer: World Control. . . . Our "defense" is Control.. . Thinkl Because we would not face the obvious, mankind allowed fascism t o blast Europe. Now if we still refuse t o learn the lesson of cooperation, i t will he not Europe, but the world, which will lie in mins . . . . The bomb is fused. The time is short. You must think fast. You must think straight.
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who would like to die a natural death can read it with profit . . . "Destruction by air power," says General Arnold, "has become too cheap and easy. . . . The existence of civilization (is) subject t o the good will and good sense of the men who control air power." . . . Physicist Edward U. Condon says, "Sabotage. . . i s a fearful danger and an attractive possibility for an aggressor. . Twenty thousand tons of T N T can be kept under the counter of . . and Hans a candy store." Physicists Frederick Seitz Bethe . believe that almost any industrial nation can start producing bombs in about five years . . . . Irving Langmuir . . . thinks the Russians may do it in three years . I n a summing-up chapter Dr. Harold C. Urey describes . the atomic armament race, which is now in progress, and the end will be deadly fear everywhere." T o the scientists, the only solution is a world government strong enough t o make war impossible. "The problem has brought us t o one of the great crises of history. The arms race must be stopped. There is not much time."
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LITERATURE CITED
THOMSON. T., "History of Chemistry," Edinburgh, 1830. BEARD,C. A. AND M. R., "Rise of American Civilization," The Macmillan Company, New York, 1927. J. G., "The Social Relations of Science," ibid., CROWTHER, 1941. HAYNES,W., "Men, Money, and Molecules," Doubleday. Doran and Company, Inc., New York, 1936. SULLIVAN. M., "Our Times," Volume I, C. Scrihner's Sons, NewYork, 1926. WOOD,C., "Outline of Man's Knowledge," Lewis Copeland Company, New York, 1927. COUSINS,N., "Modern Man Is Obsolete," The Viking Press, New York. 1945. Soaum, H. D., "Atomic Energy for Military Purposes," Princeton University Press, P r i y t o n , 1945. YATES,R. F.. "Atom Smashers, Didier Publishers, New York, 1945. J. K., "Atomic Artillery and the Atomic ROBERTSON, Bomb," D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., New York. Tz O . -"*.
