"Another sort of abuse is comedy periodic tables: periodic tables of the vegetables, period table of the desserts, periodic table of the presidents, and on and on. There are zillions of them. I believe the vegetables one was the first widely distributed example.
What's wrong with them? Again, they miss the point about the one true periodic table, Mendeleev's periodic table of the elements. In fact, to put things with no structure into a periodic table not only misses the point of the periodic table, it misses the profound idea that some things have periods."
This is entirely true, but I would like to point out the existence of a Periodic Table of Desserts that does not omit the periodic nature of the table:
What's your deal? requinot59's argument was informative, actually. I appreciate his contribution to this discussion. Your remarks are rude and don't add any value to this discussion. If anyone here is trolling it's you.
It is a travesty that I have just now realized and understood the meaning behind the use of the term "periodic" in the title of Mendeleev's table. I feel dumb. Thank you for this article and for pulling out that excerpt :)
That would also be missing the point. Simply ordering the cells by code weight doesn't give you "periods", which is the main point of a periodic table.
I don't really agree with the main point of that post (c'mon, why care so much?) but it was good read nonetheless just for the fact that it reminded me how awesome science is. Almost makes me want to go back to school.
"Another sort of abuse is comedy periodic tables: periodic tables of the vegetables, period table of the desserts, periodic table of the presidents, and on and on. There are zillions of them. I believe the vegetables one was the first widely distributed example.
What's wrong with them? Again, they miss the point about the one true periodic table, Mendeleev's periodic table of the elements. In fact, to put things with no structure into a periodic table not only misses the point of the periodic table, it misses the profound idea that some things have periods."