Response: Chapter 2: Electrostatic Glue

I can't remember when was the last time I actually read and studied the topics covered in this chapter. It talks about the atom and its components, among other things. Of course, as scientists point out "much is left to discover and confirm". It's pretty interesting to read about this up-to-date material nowadays, because I can compare it to what I learned in High School and the first years of my BFA, and see the progression of technology and science. I mean, not that I never heard the term "quark" before (not to be confused by the Star Trek character of the same name), but it felt like new material to me. Or maybe it simply comes down to how much attention I payed to my High School science teacher.



But on a more serious note, it's good to refresh my memory on these subjects by reading about the most fundamentalistic aspects of life. I found this chapter quite interesting, and it amazed me how I don't see the topics discussed as something purely theoretical that I will never use. In fact I could actually visualize the flow of electricity in our breadboards and other stuff used in class as a current flow (the free movement of electrons through a conductor).

The chapter also has a nice timeline on lots of scientists and their discoveries. Alessandro Volta (1745-1827),Andre Marie Ampere (1775-1836), Charles Coulomb (1736-1806), John Dalton (1766-1844), Ernest Rutherford (1871-1937), Neils Bohr (1885-1962), Louis de Broglie (1892-1987), etc.

As a final note, this chapter made me think on possible ways that maybe artists and designers will eventually find a way to make their works and new forms of expression by using tools to interact with the sub-atomic molecular level. This would be something nice to see, but we still have a long way to go, and lots of discoveries ahead of us.