Mercury is among the most fascinating of elements. It seems on the surface so absolutely magical in that it is a metal that flows as a liquid, not quite like water because its intermolecular forces are far stronger meaning that it holds together much more tightly than does water leading to a number of interesting properties.
It looks so very much like water in video, clear, brilliantly colorless water, but it is almost five and a half times as dense as water at room temperature meaning that a liter of water would weigh 2.2 pounds, but a liter of mercury would be nearly 12 pounds, shockingly dense in person, as dense as most solid metals tha people are used to. But the metal flows, parting and reforming beautifully.
This contradiction - a liquid metal - has lead scientists, alchemists, ancient believers to attribute to mercury magical properties - those of liquid moonlight, the tears of Diana, the transformative properties of the philosopher's stone.
Mercury can be found as a solid, but it isn't an easy thing to work with because of its - for a metal - remarkably low melting point.
For years mercury's tendency to react/amalgamate with metals has lead to some interesting security regulations.
Mercury is also one of the most insidious poisons and industrial pollutants because of the extreme difficulty in ever removing it from our environment, its tendency to lead to madness and birth defects, and the concentration increase as it travels up the food chain.
The environmental effects have lead to increasing regulations by the EPA and other agencies while businesses have fought back against these regulations.
But like the rest of the country, Maine has reached an impasse, for most of the mercury that fouls our skies, waters and land comes from outside our borders.
Tom Allen
One out of six women are toxic with mercury. Mercury comes out of coal plants and chlorine plants. I am toxic, I deal with symptoms, children are born with, you know, autism - there is an epidemic in this country. This is like, the air that we breath.
Daphne Zuniga
President Bush's mercury rule is a gift to the big energy companies that helped put him in office.
Tom Allen
I do care about the mercury contamination which this country will be experiencing because of the attempted sellout by this administration to special interests which will result in more mercury in the blood of young children in America.
Jay Inslee
And yet, mercury has been used in medicines for centuries...
How is it that mercury is not safe for food additives and Over the Counter drug products, but it is safe in our vaccines and dental amalgams?
Dan Burton
It looks so very much like water in video, clear, brilliantly colorless water, but it is almost five and a half times as dense as water at room temperature meaning that a liter of water would weigh 2.2 pounds, but a liter of mercury would be nearly 12 pounds, shockingly dense in person, as dense as most solid metals tha people are used to. But the metal flows, parting and reforming beautifully.
This contradiction - a liquid metal - has lead scientists, alchemists, ancient believers to attribute to mercury magical properties - those of liquid moonlight, the tears of Diana, the transformative properties of the philosopher's stone.
Mercury can be found as a solid, but it isn't an easy thing to work with because of its - for a metal - remarkably low melting point.
For years mercury's tendency to react/amalgamate with metals has lead to some interesting security regulations.
Mercury is also one of the most insidious poisons and industrial pollutants because of the extreme difficulty in ever removing it from our environment, its tendency to lead to madness and birth defects, and the concentration increase as it travels up the food chain.
The environmental effects have lead to increasing regulations by the EPA and other agencies while businesses have fought back against these regulations.
But like the rest of the country, Maine has reached an impasse, for most of the mercury that fouls our skies, waters and land comes from outside our borders.
Tom Allen
One out of six women are toxic with mercury. Mercury comes out of coal plants and chlorine plants. I am toxic, I deal with symptoms, children are born with, you know, autism - there is an epidemic in this country. This is like, the air that we breath.
Daphne Zuniga
President Bush's mercury rule is a gift to the big energy companies that helped put him in office.
Tom Allen
I do care about the mercury contamination which this country will be experiencing because of the attempted sellout by this administration to special interests which will result in more mercury in the blood of young children in America.
Jay Inslee
And yet, mercury has been used in medicines for centuries...
A night with Venus, a lifetime with Mercury.
[For centuries mercury was used as a treatment for syphilis.]
Saying. In Michael J. O'Dowd and Elliot Philipp, The History of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (2000), 227.[For centuries mercury was used as a treatment for syphilis.]
How is it that mercury is not safe for food additives and Over the Counter drug products, but it is safe in our vaccines and dental amalgams?
Dan Burton
Be careful, however, when looking up mercury medical information as there is a lot of barely scientific, entirely unscientific, or refuted scientific information out there about mercury fillings, mercury in vaccines, and mercury in homeopathic medicines.
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