In C&EN, "Proposed names for intermolecular forces"

Via C&EN, this letter:

What is a protopole?

After having spent my career at Henry Ford College (HFC), once Henry Ford Community College in lovely Dearborn, Michigan, as an adjunct in 1995 and then as a full-timer in ’98, on the eve of my retirement, I find it somehow fitting to submit my first letter to C&EN. First, a shout-out to the HFC faculty, staff, administration, and most of all, my students, who helped make this a career beyond what I could have imagined. Thank you all!.

Over the years, I have enjoyed giving a colorful rant about what a disservice we are doing to our students when we chemistry instructors force them to first learn the concept of hydrogen bonding and then the next week tell them that during a chemical change, bonds are broken or made. The students who remain on top of things put this together after 2 weeks: “So when you boil water, you are breaking hydrogen bonds; therefore, that must be a chemical change.” Then we say, “No, hydrogen bonds are intermolecular forces, not bonds, so that is not a chemical change but, rather, a physical one.”

Do you see how ridiculous we sound when forced to say a bond is not a bond? The students who are less on top of things just think, “Chemistry is too hard. How can I ever get this?” With this in mind, I have the following simplified names for the three major intermolecular forces:

• Old name: hydrogen bond
• New name: protopole

• Old name: dipole-dipole attraction
• New name: dipole-dipole attraction (keep that one; it is good!)

• Old name: London forces/van der Waals forces
• New name: vacillipole

I feel that keeping pole in each name will help students. The word vacillate serves us well in science and English, ergo the last suggestion. As for London and van der Waals, don’t get me started on scientists and their love of putting their names on things. This is an equal disservice to our students, who have to learn both the concepts of science and the names of people who think they discovered something that has existed for billions of years. This is not your discovery, “Dr.” Columbus! I don’t want to sound disrespectful to the wonderful work of our dedicated predecessors, but should we remove some of these barriers to learning, perhaps chemistry can be made more understandable and easier to learn (even though I would lose my opportunity to rant).

Todd Whitaker
Eastpointe, Michigan

I think "hydrogen bond" is going to stay, but "protopole" and "vacillipole" are definitely memorable.