How Scientists Discovered Atoms Are Mostly Empty Space

Comments · 10

• HO

  @Hopeless_and_Forlorn · 2 days ago (edited)

  Most people have heard this account of Rutherford&apos;s discovery before, but here is a prediction he made even earlier that seems to be disregarded today. &nbsp;In his 1905 Silliman Memorial Lecture, later published as his book, Radioactive Transformations, Rutherford speculated on the possible discovery of yet-unknown effects on the atom caused by high-energy particle bombardment. &nbsp;Keep in mind that this was six years before Rutherford&apos;s own discovery of the atomic nucleus, and almost thirty-four years before the discovery and confirmation of atomic fission in 1938-1939.<br><br>Quoting from Rutherford&apos;s book, Chapter VII, Uranium and Actinium--<br><br>There is an additional possibility to be borne in mind. &nbsp;The violent disturbance in the atom resulting in the expulsion of an (alpha) particle may cause an actual breaking up of the main atom into two parts, and thus give rise to an equal number of atoms of different atomic weights in addition to the alpha particle. &nbsp;For example, such an effect might arise during the violent disintegration of radium C or thorium B.<br><br>So far, it has not been found necessary to choose between these theories to explain the transformation products of the different elements. &nbsp;The disintegration in each case results in the appearance of only one substance in addition to the expelled particles. &nbsp;It is not unlikely, however, that a still closer examination of the radioelements may show the existence of products which lie outside of the main line of descent. <br><br>End quote.<br><br>So here, Rutherford clearly proposes the possibility that atoms might fission--split into two parts--of elements far down the list of atomic numbered elements from the parent atom. &nbsp;But in late 1938, when the great Hahn found unexpected barium among the products of his high-energy particle bombardment of atoms, he was at a loss to explain what had happened. &nbsp;Early in 1939 Lise Meitner and her nephew, Otto Frisch, worked out the theory of nuclear splitting and named it as &quot;fission.&quot; &nbsp;The news caused great excitement and consternation among physicists around the world. &nbsp;The great Bohr himself was said to have slapped his forehead in amazement that the answer to the mysteries of far-distant products of atomic disintegration was so simple. &nbsp;And yet, Rutherford had told them what to look for, some thirty-four years earlier, and nobody had followed up on it. &nbsp;Today, history gives credit to Ida Noddack for being the first to predict nuclear fission in 1934, but that history is wrong. &nbsp;It was actually Rutherford, in 1905.

• LA

  @laponen69 · 4 weeks ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ul232hsiLbk&amp;t=61">1:01</a> Come on, Tesla discovered the electron in 1891, and the same J.J. Thompson then said it was bullshit. Then he did the experiment himself 6 years later and then something incredible happened. He discovered the electron. Then in 1906 he won the Nobel Prize for the discovery of the electron. I heard that it was one of the 10 Nobel Prizes they screwed Tesla for

  1

• MA

  @martinstubs6203 · 3 weeks ago (edited)

  This whole story doesn&apos;t really make sense. Atoms aren&apos;t empty at all. That would imply that electrons were just tiny points whizzing around, which they are not, and this is even stated near the end of this video. It&apos;s just that the probability of incoming particles being scattered by an electron is small.

• EL

  @electromagneticuniverse2361 · 1 month ago

  And then one reads this: Nearly all the mass of an atom was concentrated in a tiny, dense nucleus surrounded by almost unimaginable emptiness.<br><br>🤯

• BI

  @binnary863 · 1 month ago

  Great work, thank you!

  1

• EL

  @electromagneticuniverse2361 · 1 month ago

  Great channel!

• IS

  @isbaTech · 1 month ago

  there is no such thing as empty, vacuum itself is 4 dimensional and very active substance. the void between nucleus of an atom and probability cloud simply not dense enough to detect interactions.

• DA

  @David-r9e3w · 1 month ago

  A proton is a collection of 1836 expanding electrons and add a bouncing expanding electron makes a hydrogen atom. &quot;G&quot; calculated from first principles - the hydrogen atom - in 2002. Nothing to see here.