• Question: can you name all the elements in the periodic table

    Asked by moisty osisty to Claire, Franco, Koi, Linda, Mark on 11 Jun 2016.
    • Photo: Franco Falcone

      Franco Falcone answered on 11 Jun 2016:

      Hi, I would not be able to name them all, especially towards the end, but I think that I would have little problems with the first 100 or so. The first 6 lines I would be able to name. The periodic table of elements is very useful as it allows to understand the behaviour of certain elements.
      But when you say able to name, I assume that you mean looking at the symbols and saying their names. If your quesion is – can you draw a perioduc table of elements on a blank sheet of paper, then I would probably recall only 40-50 elements, certainly not 100.

      I studied chemistry at University for 3.5 years so we spent a lot of time with the periodic table of elements, but we were never encouraged to learn all the names – I think it is more important to understand why they are in a certain order and how this allows to predict some of their properties?

    • Photo: Mark Booth

      Mark Booth answered on 12 Jun 2016:

      Hi

      Not off by heart. I could probably pronounce most of them, which is hard enough in my opinion.

    • Photo: Arporn Wangwiwatsin

      Arporn Wangwiwatsin answered on 12 Jun 2016:

      I definitely cannot name all of them by heart, only those that I see often. But thanks to the wealth of information nowadays, I could quickly look them up if I need to know the name 🙂

    • Photo: Linda Anagu

      Linda Anagu answered on 12 Jun 2016:

      I can only name the elements I work with everyday. I did learn all of them in secondary school but with time those you get to encounter become more important to you and you know everthing about them from molecular weight to melting point to solubility. But, if I think long and hard I can surely remember more and certainly recognise most of them. Can you name all of them moisty osisty?

    • Photo: Claire Bourke

      Claire Bourke answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      Sadly not, I wish my memory was that good! I tend to remember the information that I use most often as there is just so much to know. Elements like sodium and potassium are easy to remember as I use them all the time to make up buffers for my experiments in the laboratory.

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