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SUMMARY:How do you know that water is H2O? - Prof. Hasok Chang
DTSTART:20151110T181500Z
DTEND:20151110T191500Z
UID:TALK61468@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Andrew Carlotti
DESCRIPTION:Everyone knows that the water is H2O\, but how did 19th-centur
 y chemists with no access to atoms and molecules discover that fact? When 
 Dalton first published his atomic theory in 1808 he gave the formula of wa
 ter as HO\, and never changed his mind. Within a few years Avogadro gave t
 he H2O formula\, but it was promptly rejected and not taken up widely unti
 l 50 years later. Why did this take so long\, and what changed in the 1860
 s? It can be instructive to take the simplest things in science and questi
 on how we came to know such things.
LOCATION:Winstanley Lecture Theatre
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