Why is there a random watermark on an xkcd? The original is here, for anyone who wants the alt text: https://xkcd.com/2943/
I scrape the bottom of the internet barrel through a special firefox container. It’s like growing memes on agar. Sometimes there’s a little contam.
Søren Sørensen, who came up with the concept of pH, wasn’t clear on what the letter “p” meant. It does involve powers of 10 and can be measured using electrical potentials, so the best guesses are “potential” or “power”, or several words that mean “power” in other languages and also happen to start with “p”. Bottom line, we don’t know, and unless somebody discovers more of Sørensen’s notes or a way to speak with the dead, we never will.
We can all speak to the dead. The problem is that they can’t answer.
That’s why I was careful to say, “speak with dead,” (after the D&D spell) implying a conversation.
Oh we’re going to pHight today, is that it?
Easy. Pico Henry. Not sure why chemists are so concerned with such a small amount of magnetism though…
Potencial de hidrógeno
I don’t get what the joke is
Nobody actually knows what the p means but we keep using it anyway. The guy who coined it is long dead.
Doesn’t it mean “potential” ?
I thought it was “power”. That’s probably wrong though.
Negative log of the concentration of…(Hydrogen ions, in pH).
