What State of Matter is Fire?

No, water isn't wet. 

The is water wet? question suggests a misunderstanding of a word in chemistry. A single thing cannot be wet. A liquid will cover a surface better or worse than a different liquid. The better a liquid covers a surface, the better that liquid is at 'wetting' the surface.

It's like asking what your tongue tastes like. It doesn't taste. It tastes.

So, what state of matter is fire?

I like the analogy that Hank uses at 1:05 - what state of matter is a waterfall - works nicely for me. "A waterfall is a process caused by a bunch of liquid and gas and solids in a specific situation. ... A waterfall isn't matter because it's a process."

Fire then is also a process of fuel and oxygen reacting to form other chemicals (mostly carbon dioxide and water).

Fire is not matter, and Hank says that pretty well.

Electric Vehicles' Battery Problem

"To replace the UK (not the UK) 31.5 million gasoline cars will require 236,000 tons of lithium carbonate." ~ quote from about 1:00 in the above video.

That would - again, according to the video - require all the world's output for 9 months.

And that metal comes from some countries with awful human rights records and workers' protections.

Then, if we mine the US's lithium, we have to use up water and leach arsenic into the water supply of Nevada...and dig into land holy to Native Americans...and destroy habitat for endangered animals.

It's the frickin' Kobayashi Maru, man.

Then we have to look at the cobalt mining.

To quote a magnet I got from the University of Utah, "what's your is mined," but clearly what's mined is bad for the planet and people.

Geiger Counter

Source - XKCD
rollover text: At first I didn't get why they were warning me about all those birds sitting on the wire, but then I understood.

See it's funny because Geiger counters click when they detect radiation...and to say 'something clicked' also means that the speaker finally understood what was being said or observed. (source)

So the speaker could mean either that the Geiger counter clicked - suggesting that there was radiation around to be detected and justifying the presence of the Geiger counter itself - or that Cueball finally had his Eureka moment and understood why 'they' wanted him to carry a Geiger counter.

Either way, it's funny because it subverts expectations.

Decay chain of uranium-235

I came across this meme while scrolling back through @difluorine's twitter feed.

It's not @difluorine's work, but it's worth celebrating. 

To learn a little more about uranium-235's decay chain, check out this wikipedia article.

Naughty elements

See, it's funny because oxygen has a high electronegativity, meaning it'll 'steal' electrons from other atoms easily.

Santa has promised those 'stealing' elements coal in their stocking, but oxygen wouldn't mind that because coal oxidizes just fine releasing a bunch of energy in the process.

Somehow the personification of oxygen as a seemingly mischievous little red-headed girl seems appropriate.

Thanks, again, to @difluorine for creating and sharing this cartoon. 

Solar Desalination Skylight by Henry Glogau

I am amazed by people who can develop this beautiful a solution to multiple problems.

The light described above seems to - and it's so perfect that I'm a little skeptical as to the science - purify salt water through simple evaporation while producing a concentrated salt brine that can then be used to power a 5V LED strip to provide light into homes that have no electricity.

I'm stunned.

An electrolytic cell cartoon from @difluorine

I really like this cartoon.

Big thanks to @difluorine for posting this and giving the world permission to use it in classes.

The cuteness of the big-headed figures and the scientific accuracy of everything just makes me shine with happiness.

And in case I ever need the black and white version...