Atom - Etymology

Etymology

The name atom comes from the Greek ἄτομος (atomos, "indivisible") from ἀ- (a-, "not") and τέμνω (temnō, "I cut"), which means uncuttable, or indivisible, something that cannot be divided further. The concept of an atom as an indivisible component of matter was first proposed by early Indian and Greek philosophers. In the 18th and 19th centuries, chemists provided a physical basis for this idea by showing that certain substances could not be further broken down by chemical methods, and they applied the ancient philosophical name of atom to the chemical entity. During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, physicists discovered subatomic components and structure inside the atom, thereby demonstrating that the chemical "atom" was divisible and that the name might not be appropriate.. However, it was retained. This has led to some debate about whether the ancient philosophers, who intended to refer to fundamental individual objects with their concept of "atoms," were referring to modern chemical atoms, or something more like indivisible subatomic particles such as leptons or quarks, or even some more fundamental particle that has yet to be discovered.

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