Queen of Fractal Beauty’s Neighborhood

That's it, I'm blaming the peri-menopause. I mean, I have a doctor's note and everything. ::sigh:: I'm not saying I'm on my "periodical" as Pa Kettle calls them. It's just hit-and-run rage and hot flashes. So, excuse me if I totally lose my shite.

On a forum about iPhones, I simply went nuts.

The poster, supposedly a female adult, was decrying the lack of apps for girls.

Think about that because I'm a fairly girlie-girl kind of saccharine-sweet freak

with three nieces. We have dress-up parties and talk about hair. I'm a regular poster on a forum for fans a particular brand of makeup, not just any makeup. Here's a shot that shows my seat covers...and the rose on my mirror. I'm all for rocking your girlie self.

At the same time, I don't like being looked down upon for having a proper balance of X's -as in chromosomes

The whine about "no apps for girls" was enough to send up a red flag but I read on. She gave about 5 ideas, including something that could tell the girl-user how to color-coordinate her wardrobe. Excuse me? Okay, for one if we're being sexist, I'd argue that most women do better than most men when it comes to putting clothes together. Men don't care. -I'm old, these new-fangled metro-sexuals might care and that's fine but I'm saying in general

I tried to click away, my usual response to crap that ticks me off. I usually don't give it another thought but sometimes I'll post about it here or tell a friend if it stays in my brain long enough. What did I do, today?

I was mean. I'm not proud. I'm ashamed and I can't take it back. It's out there.

I asked "her" if the post was meant to be controversial. -because it sure as hell felt like it

I proceeded to call myself a girlie-girl type of person who found the mention of "apps for girls" insulting...I must be a smidgeon smarter than I had previously imagined and while I have always considered myself to have a poor self-esteem, at least I haven't yet resorted to having my iPhone tell me what to wear in the morning.

I ended with,

"Sorry, I'm acting like a girl."

See? I'm sticking with the peri-menopausal defense. I'm guilty but I actually couldn't help it at the time. It was like temporary insanity.

I've been so busy working that I almost forgot it was Tuesday.  And then when I got here, I saw that the last time I blogged was LAST Tuesday.  So much to write about... I'll get caught up soon.

Loathe:
- Hearing one of my girls sobbing on the phone because she misses me while on vacation
- Being asked to combine my office and my studio.  NO!  Bad husband!
- Having to wash Quincy.  Twice.  Then scrubbing down the tub and the whole of the bathroom.  Twice.  And the two loads of towels I had to wash after that.
- Bedroom's too hot when I'm trying to sleep.
- Ceiling fan lights that stop working for no reason.
- Feeling helpless.  Feeling like I'm missing out. 

Love:
- Parties with the neighbours!  Especially "welcome to the neighbourhood" celebrations when the FOR SALE sign has been pulled from the lawn... we aren't moving!  :)  We've been permanently adopted by our neighbours and we couldn't be happier.
- Private swimming lessons for the kids
- Clean doggies
- Still with the Body Shop green tea oil.   I wish LUSH made one, but they've only got the good-smelling stuff to rub on your body, not around the house.
- Pop art on the upstairs walls
- Brown hair with auburn highlights
- Hearing from old friends out of the blue... like Scott, my hugely awesome-cool nerd buddy, who seems to have made himself a little more Google-friendly
- Slow cruising down the lake drive at sunset
- Thinking about the future
- gmail.com
- Hanging out and eating Indian butter chicken, death-by-chocolate ice cream, and watching House with my husband

Until next time... and how are YOU doing?

This is a reboot of the previous post, which got tangled in hidden formating codes.

Yep - here we go again! A new version of Chapter 4, in which we discover Earth's minerals, rocks, and layers.
Please - be brutal! The more you help me improve this, the better it will be for the students who have to use it!

4.1 Earth’s Composition

Most of our information about earth’s interior and its composition comes from indirect observation; the deepest drill hole to date has penetrated less than 25 km into the earth, or about 0.004% of the distance from the surface to the center. Nevertheless, we have learned much about the chemical makeup of earth's interior from komatiites, which are believed to represent upwellings from the mantle, and meteorites, which are believed to represent earth's starting composition. Similarly, earth tides, gravity, magnetism, and inertial measurements tell us much about earth's mechanical properties. However most of what we know about earth's interior comes from seismic energy released by earthquakes, as we saw in chapter 3. The thickness of the layers and their velocities (fig.4.1, center) may be found using the arrival times at stations around the globe; in certain instances, the behavior of the energy at the layer boundaries is also informative (e.g., at the D’’ layer that is believed to be the core-mantle boundary).

The challenge before us is to interpret these curves in terms of the geology. Changes in the curve may represent places where the material suddenly changes from one chemical to another. Or they may be places where the composition is constant but the material suddenly becomes denser. Each boundary seen in the seismic data may represent either of these situations, and various lines of evidence need to be studied to determine their nature.

What we do know is that each layer has consistent properties (Fig. 4.1), from the high water content of the aesthenosphere to the absence of S-waves in the outer core. The properties of each layer come from its physical conditions (pressure and temperature) as well as from its chemical composition. But how the layers are defined depends on which property is most important. Geochemists study earth based on its chemical properties and so define a different set of layers than do geophysicists who divide earth’s interior based on mechanical properties. Mechanically, the layers are the lithosphere, the upper mantle, the lower mantle or D’’ layer, the outer core, and the inner core. These layers have been primarily defined by their seismic characteristics, including P-and S-wave velocities. We will examine this in more detail in later sections.

For now, let us consider earth’s chemical layers. Chemically, earth’s interior is subdivided into the crust, the aesthenosphere, the mantle, the core-mantle boundary, the outer core, and the inner core. Each chemical layer is made from a specific set of rocks or materials with a consistent chemical composition (Table 4.1-1). For example, the mantle consists primarily of peridotite and the oceanic crust is primarily basalt and gabbro.

The rocks in each layer are made up of naturally-occurring compounds which form molecules known as minerals. Though more than 100,000 different minerals have been identified, the bulk of earth’s interior is made from only thirteen compounds (Table 4.1-2) that combine in various ways to make fewer than fifty minerals. Similarly, each compound is made up of atoms with consistent properties known as elements. Earth’s main elements are oxygen (O), silicon (Si), iron (Fe), magnesium (Mg), aluminum (Al), calcium (Ca), sodium (Na), potassium (K), cobalt (Co), and nickel (Ni). The distribution of these elements is different for each planet and follows a distinct pattern (Chapter 10). For now, we will focus on the distribution of these elements in earth’s interior.

Each element is a specific type of atom with a defined number of positively-charged protons and electrically neutral neutrons in a central nucleus which is surrounded by concentric, non-spherical regions called orbitals that act as holding tanks for negatively-charged electrons. An electron must gain or lose specific amounts of energy in order to move from one orbital to another [1]. The number of neutrons in an element can vary. This changes the mass of the atom, creating isotopes which have the same chemical reactions but at different rates. More neutrons creates a heavier atom which reacts more slowly than one with fewer neutrons. As we will see, this effect creates a "thermometer" that can be used to determine the formation temperature for a mineral. The mass of an atom is shown as a superscript to the left of the chemical symbol. For example, carbon (C) is commonly found as with six protons and six neutrons, for an atomic mass of twelve (¹²C). However, it also has isotopes with seven neutrons (¹³C) and eight neutrons (¹⁴C).

It is the number of electrons that determines how each element reacts chemically, and the number of protons that determines how many electrons an atom can hold. Initially, these are equal. However, this can change in two ways. The number of protons and neutrons can change by nuclear decay (chapter 5) or fusion (chapter 10). If the number of protons has changed, the atom becomes a new element. The number of electrons can change when they gain so much energy that they leave the atom entirely and join another atom forming ions. The number of electrons lost or gained is shown by a superscript on the right of the chemical symbol. For example, when hydrogen (H) gains an electron it is written as H⁻ but when it loses one it is written H⁺ . Protons and neutrons are more than 1,000 times more massive than electrons. Thus, gaining or losing electrons only changes an atom’s mass by an insignificant amount.

There are four main ways of joining atoms together to form molecules (Table 4.1-3). The electrons can be shared between atoms in a covalent bond. Glass is a material with strong covalent bonds. Alternatively, an atom can become a positively-charged cation by losing an electron or it can gain an electron and become a negatively-charged anion. The electrical attraction between cations and anions creates an ionic bond. Salt is a common material with an ionic bond. Electrons can also move between atoms, forming a metallic bond. Not surprisingly, iron and gold have metallic bonds. Weak bonds known van der Waals bonds can also form between molecules. The exact nature of these weak bonds is complex and beyond the scope of this text. Ice is an example of a material with van der Waals bonds (and covalent bonds).

Covalent bonds are the hardest to break. Covalent bonds reduce solubility (as this depends on ionic bonds) and create materials with higher melting points (stronger bonds require more energy to break). Materials made with covalent bonds do not break easily or smoothly. Ionic bonds create materials that are poor conductors of electricity and that dissolve easily in water. They are not as strong as materials made with covalent bonds and will break along well-defined lines. Materials with metallic bonds conduct electricity easily and can be hammered into a new shape without breaking. The weakest bonds are those formed between molecules with the van der Waals force. These materials have little strength and will break evenly along a plane.

The number of each element in a molecule is given by a subscript to the right of the chemical symbol. For example, the main component of air is two nitrogen atoms (N₂) held by a covalent bond. The size of the orbitals and the atomic bonds create molecules with distinct shapes and sizes. A crystal is formed when these bonds create a solid from molecules, ions, or atoms in a repeating pattern. For example, salt (NaCl) is a crystal with alternating sodium (Na⁺) and chlorine (Cl⁻) ions held together by ionic bonds. Similarly, ice is a crystal formed from covalently bonded H₂O molecules linked together by van der Waals forces. Because atoms are three-dimensional and can form multiple bonds, the resulting molecules can have different sizes in each direction.

One common tool for finding the bond size is X-ray diffraction. X-rays are simply a type of light not visible to the naked eye. In 1670, Isaac Newton discovered that visible light could be split into colors using a simple prism. In 1800, Frederich Herschel discovered a color of light that could not be seen. Because it lay beyond red, he called the color infrared. Since then, we have discovered that visible light is just a tiny fraction of the whole electromagnetic spectrum, which ranges from long radio waves to short gamma rays (fig 4.1-2).

Though the spectrum contains both "waves" and "rays", light is actually neither. Instead, it is a photon that sometimes acts like a wave and sometimes acts like a particle [2]. Photons can create interference patterns, like waves, but individual photons can carry only discrete amounts of energy. The amount of energy (E) that a photon carries is:

where c is the speed of light, lambda is the wavelength of the photon, and h is Planck’s constant (6.626x10⁻³⁴ Js). A gamma ray photon (wavelength 10⁻¹⁶ m) has 10²¹ times the energy of a radio wave photon (wavelength 10⁵ m). The photon’s wavelength also determines its color.

[1] Einstein won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1921 for his description of this effect.

[2] This is similar to the "cameleopard" which has the hump of a camel and the spots of a leopard. Despite the name, it is neither a camel nor a leopard. The modern name for a cameleopard is "giraffe"

4.2 Earth’s Minerals
Earth is mainly made up of silicate minerals, which form around groups of four oxygen (O) atoms covalently bonded to one silicon (Si) atom. The chemical notation for this is SiO4 . The silicon atom’s radius is about 1/3 that of an oxygen atom, so the silicate forms a tetrahedron with the silicon in the center. Aluminum is about the same size as silicon and frequently substitutes for it. Silicate tetrahedrons can form covalent bonds, or may gain up to four electrons to form ionic bonds. Common silicate cations include Na⁺ , K⁺, Ca²⁺, Mg²⁺, Fe²⁺ (ferrous), Fe³⁺ (ferric). In general the cations are smaller than the anions. Thus, most of the crystal's volume is anions with cations put into the gaps.

Mumsfault

1 comment

What part of your childhood do you miss the most?
Submitted by Maretta

Before attaining the majority, I moved out and began living without the stuff that would've put my parents in prison for doing to me.

That was great. Then, I had to start busting my arse through university (paying my own way and keeping up academic scholarships). My time in high school was the most like what other people have when they go away to college. I just had a part-time job and high school. What pain is that? Well, other than high school was a ridiculous waste of time but compared to age 0-15, it was a dream-come-true.

I'm probably going to regret it, but I'm checking out for a bit. You won't see much of me this week, because 'sans child' means I will actually have a bit of a life for a while. And I'm going to take advantage of it. And if any of it bears repeating, I'll make sure to share. :)

No worries, I'll be back in no time, bitching and whining and moaning about single parenting, Rude Mom, my fatness & gray hair, etc.

Be good to each other. :)

This story kicked my arse. -entire story found at linked page