[alt-photo] Re: Stoichiometry for the nonscientist

[Katharine Thayer]

> Loris wrote:
>
> FWIW, an equally lucid explanation (for all: mole, molarity,
> stoichiometry) was already present in the page I have provided to  
> David:
> http://environmentalchemistry.com/yogi/reference/molar.html

I hadn't noticed that link before, but I've gone there now, and I  
can't agree that this is a lucid or helpful explanation at all; I  
think it's confusing   and would be especially confusing to someone  
who didn't understand the concept of gram-molecular weights to start  
with.  The author of the page defines a mole not as the molecular  
mass of something expressed in grams,   but as 6.022x10^23 of  
*anything.*  She says for example that a mole of bananas would be  
6.022 x 10^23 bananas, and the way you would find out how much a mole  
of bananas would weigh would be to get an average weight of a banana  
and then multiply that by 6.022 x 10^23.  This is *not* a helpful way  
to explain  molarity or stoichiometry, imo, it would just confuse the  
reader rather than enlightening them.