Burning Kelp for War

daily.jstor.org

34 pointsonychomys4 comments

"... potash, an organic compound..." - immediate Gell-Mann amnesia effect. Potash is the soluble, inorganic leftovers of burnt plant matter.

What's interesting is how many different names derive from this production method. - potassium from "potash" (pot ash, collected burnt stuff) - K from "kalium", related to calcine (burn to ashes) - Alkali for basic compounds, which nearly all soluble metal oxides are - Calcium and Ca also derive from this root

(now let me check all of this so I don't Gell-Mann myself)

Wikipedia suggests that several different minerals have been called "potash", of which one (potassium carbonate) is organic and the rest aren't.

Metal carbonates are generally not considered organic.

JSTOR, $86M science paywall who killed Aaron Swartz, have a Patreon.

Get. Fucked.

This site should be banned from HN.

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