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The Chinese periodic table goes hard - YouTube

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ElitPonkots explores how Chinese characters for chemical elements are constructed using semantic radicals for physical properties and phonetic components based on international names. This system, influenced by the ancient six writings categorization, provides unique, often rarely used characters for each element. Follow along using the transcript. ElitPonkots explores how Chinese characters for chemical elements are constructed using semantic radicals for physical properties and phonetic components based on international names. This system, influenced by the ancient six writings categorization, provides unique, often rarely used characters for each element. Follow along using the transcript.

Just so we’re clear, I don’t speak any Chinese and I know nothing about chemistry except for opioids so if I make some mistakes in this video, it might have something to do with that. And while I have never studied Chinese, I have studied Japanese, which has been influenced by Chinese quite a lot, so I expected to find some parallels in how chemical elements are named in both languages. The Japanese periodic table is not that interesting all things considered, and the naming conventions for the elements are all over the place. The vast majority are phonetic borrowings from German, Dutch or…

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