How to get or understand a sample in chemistry without knowing its chemical name or compound or formula How to get or understand a sample in chemistry without knowing its chemical name or compound or formula? I was thinking about whether there is a way to understand what the chemical compound sample that one might have. He/She doesn't know what its formula or its chemical properties or anything .He/She just got that one and was thinking what was that chemical and was interested to know about its structure. Would it be possible?
I am totally new at Stack Exchange so I doesn't know is this the proper way to ask.
And I am 15 year old so I doesn't know if these are taken in my upcoming classes but when I googled it or searched in many websites,I was not able find answers,So I am asking here.I have seen that we can guess the compound using many experiments but so also if the compound has been not found yet in human history would we be able to understand it?
Edit: This question had been closed stating it need to be more focused. I just wanted to clarify that what I wanted to know was whether there is a specific procedure to identify the chemical structure of the compound from just a sample alone.
Learning the unknown sample is called analysis and is a subject of analytical chemistry.
But your question is probably not about this.
You mean &quot;can i guess something without knowing chemistry at all?&quot;
And answer is yes!
Look at the food salt.
Do you know it without any knowledge of chemistry? Yes, you do!
But how much?
You know what it looks like,
you know its taste,
you know that it's soluble in water...
and probably that's all.
Now suppose you have a sample of something not found yet in human history.
You can easily know it similar to knowing food salt. Just check:
How it looks like?
What it's taste?
Drop it in water - is it soluble?
Now you &quot;know&quot; this substance just like you &quot;know&quot; food salt, without any chemistry!
But I guess you already suspect that there is something wrong with this knowledge.
It's very incomplete.
Chemist can learn more about food salt or your magic unknown sample.
Most of that serious knowledge require understanding of sample structure
at microscopic levels, and using theories that connect the structure to properties.
That was all about &quot;knowing the substance&quot;.
Another question is knowing what a substance is, which is rather philosophy than chemistry.
Does a substance exist? What is existance? Does a substance have hidden fundamental purpose? Was it &quot;created&quot; or &quot;appeared by itself&quot;?
These questions are probably more important than chemistry, and you may be the one who one day will guess some answers here.