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Full Idea
Whatever earns something membership of the extension of 'krypton' must be a property that can survive chemical change and, therefore, the gain and loss of electrons. Hence what makes it krypton must be a nuclear property.
Gist of Idea
The nature of an element must survive chemical change, so it is the nucleus, not the electrons
Source
Robin F. Hendry (Chemistry [2008], 'Micro')
Book Ref
'Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Science', ed/tr. Psillos,S/Curd,M [Routledge 2010], p.522
A Reaction
A very nice illuminating example of essentialism in chemistry. The 'nature' is what survives through change, just like what Aristotle said, innit?
Related Ideas
Idea 17476 Elements survive chemical change, and are tracked to explain direction and properties [Hendry]
Idea 485 Things must retain their essential nature during change, or mixing would be impossible [Diogenes of Apollonia]
| 17476 | Elements survive chemical change, and are tracked to explain direction and properties [Hendry] |
| 17477 | Defining elements by atomic number allowed atoms of an element to have different masses [Hendry] |
| 17480 | Generally it is nuclear charge (not nuclear mass) which determines behaviour [Hendry] |
| 17481 | Nuclear charge (plus laws) explains electron structure and spectrum, but not vice versa [Hendry] |
| 17478 | Maybe two kinds are the same if there is no change of entropy on isothermal mixing [Hendry] |
| 17484 | Maybe the nature of water is macroscopic, and not in the microstructure [Hendry] |
| 17479 | The nature of an element must survive chemical change, so it is the nucleus, not the electrons [Hendry] |
| 17485 | Maybe water is the smallest part of it that still counts as water (which is H2O molecules) [Hendry] |
| 17482 | Compounds can differ with the same collection of atoms, so structure matters too [Hendry] |
| 17483 | Water continuously changes, with new groupings of molecules [Hendry] |
| 17486 | Supervenience is simply modally robust property co-variance [Hendry] |