• Question: who made up the name...'atom'

    Asked by sas6 to Daphne, Darren, Jon, Katherine on 21 Mar 2012.
    • Photo: Darren Logan

      Darren Logan answered on 21 Mar 2012:

      The name “atom” comes from the ancient Greeks. They had a word “atomos” which means “indivisible”.

      They used it to define the smallest thing that everything is made up of. A philosophy (the Greeks were good at philosophising!) called “atomism” grew up around this idea.

    • Photo: Katherine Haxton

      Katherine Haxton answered on 21 Mar 2012:

      The name atom was spot on for atoms until we figured out that atoms were made of protons, electrons and neutrons…then we figured out those were made of even smaller particles!

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