The Electronic Theory of Chemistry: an Introductory Account

Abstract

IN contrast to a recent paper by Hunter and Samuel¹, which has been criticised even more adversely by physicists than by chemists², Prof. Hunter's book on “The Electronic Theory of Chemistry” is a trustworthy guide to modern views on the theory of valency, since it is very largely descriptive in character, and is more concerned with chemical facts than with physical theories. The chief fault that can be attributed to the book is a lack of historical perspective, which gives to it a flavour of immaturity. For this fault, geographical limitations may perhaps be held responsible. Thus it is unlikely that the Zeitschrift fur anorganische Chemie for 1893 is readily available in Aligarh, and it is difficult to discover evidence that the author had this volume before him when he wrote his account of Werner's theory of co-ordination, which is there expressed much more clearly than in his subsequent book. The author also omits to point out that the ideas of stable shells of electrons, and of chemical combination between atoms resulting either from electron transfer or from electron sharing, were introduced by J. J. Thomson³ in 1907, and that their development in 1916 by Kossel and by G. N. Lewis respectively did not depend directly on the introduction of the nucleus atom in place of Thomson's model, but was an immediate sequel to Moseley's experimental determination of atomic numbers, which provided a firm arithmetical basis for the two conceptions which Thomson had already introduced.

The Electronic Theory of Chemistry: an Introductory Account.

By Prof. Robert Fergus Hunter. Pp. vii + 125. (London: Edward Arnold and Co., 1934.) 8s. 6d. net.