The following item shows what English would look like if it
were purged of its non-Germanic words, and used German-style
compounds instead of borrowings to express new concepts.
This recently appeared in the Conlang mailing list.
Here's how the essay might look like in modern English:
For most of its being, mankind did not know what things are made
of, but could only guess. With the growth of physics, we began
to learn, and today we have a theory of matter and energy that
watching bears out, both in the labaratory and in daily life.
The underlying kinds of matter are the *elements*, which link
together in sundry ways to give rise to the rest. Formerly we
knew of ninety-two elements, from hydrogen, the lightest and
barest, to Uranium, the heaviest. Now we have made more, such
as Neptunium and Plutonium.
The elements have their being as particles called *atoms*.
These are mightly small; one gram of hydrogen holds a
number of them equal to two followed by twenty-two zeros. Most
atoms link together to make what are called *molecules*. Thus,
the hydrogen molecule contains two hydrogen atoms, the
oxygen molecule contains two oxygen atoms, and so on. (Some
kinds, such as helium, keep alone; others, such as iron, cling
together in lattices when in the solid state; and there are yet
more bondings.) When unlike atoms link in a molecule, they make
*compounds*. Thus, water is a compound of two hydrogen atoms
with one oxygen atom, while a molecule of one of the
cells making up flesh may have a thousand or more
atoms of these two elements together with Carbon and
Nitrogen.
At first it was thought that the atom was a hard thing that
could be split no further; hence the name. Now we know it is made
up of smaller particles. There is a heavy *nucleus* with a positive
electric charge, and around it one or more light particles with
negative charges. The least atom is that of ordinary
hydrogen. Its nucleus is a lone positively charged particle called a
*proton*. Outside it is a negatively charged particle called a
*electron*. The proton has a mass of about 1840-times that
of the electron. Early physicists thought electrons
revolve around the nucleus like the earth around the sun, but now we
understand they are more like waves or clouds.
In all other atoms are found other particles as well, about as
heavy as the proton but with no charge, known as *neutrons*.
We know an isotope of hydrogen with one neutron in the nucleus
along with the proton; another isotope has two neutrons. Both
isotopes are rare.
The next greatest element is helium, which has two protons
and two electrons. The abundant isotope has two neutrons
in the nucleus. If there are more or less, the atom will soon
break apart. More about this later.
The third element is Lithium, with three protons, three
electrons, and its own share of neutrons. And so it goes,
on through such everyday elements as Carbon (six protons) or
iron (26) to ones more lately found. Uranium (92) was the last
until men began to make some higher still.
It is the electrons that gets shared, and so their number decides how
a element behaves and what kinds of molecules it can help make.
The physics of this behaving, in all its manifold ways, is
called *Chemistry*. Chemists have found that as the
atomic number of the elements (that is, the number of
protons in their nucleus) increases, after a while they begin to
show properties not unlike those of others that went before them.
So, for an example, Lithium (3), Sodium (11),
Potassium (19), Rubidium (37), and Cesium (55) can each
bond with only one atom of hydrogen, while Carbon (6),
Silicon (14), Titanium (22), tin (50), and lead (82) can
each bond with four. This is readily seen when all are set forth
in what is called the *periodic table of the elements*.
When an atom or a molecule gains one or more electrons above
its own, it takes on a negative charge. When it loses one or
more, it takes on a positive charge. Such a particle is called an
*ion*, for that the attraction between unlike charges moves it. When
electrons flow by themselves, it may be as a bolt of
lightning, a spark off some solid matter, or the everyday
flow of electricity through wires.
Coming back to the atom itself, the heavier it is, the more
neutrons as well as protons in its nucleus. Indeed, soon the
number of neutrons becomes greater. Atoms with the same number
of protons but unlike number of neutrons are called
*isotopes*. Thus, most abundant isotope of oxygen has eight neutrons with
its eight protons, but there are also isotopes with five, six,
seven, nine, ten, and eleven neutrons. A isotope is known by
the number of nucleons, so that we have oxygen-13,
oxygen-14, and so on, with oxygen-16 being by far the most
found. Having the same number of electrons, the isotopes of
a element behave almost alike chemically. They do show some
differences, outstandingly among the heavier ones, and these can
be worked to differentiate isotopes from each other.
Most isotopes of every element are unstable. Their nuclei
decay, each at its own rate. This rate is called as the
*half-life*, which is how long it takes half of any quantity of the
isotope thus to decat. The process is known as
*radioactive decay*. It may happen fast or slowly, and in any of
the many ways, depending on the composition of the nucleus. A nucleus may
spit out two protons with two neutrons, that is, a helium
nucleus, thus leaping two places back in the periodic table and
four units back in mass. It may give off a electron
from a neutron, which thereby becomes a proton and thrusts
the atom one position up in the table while keeping the same
weight. It may give off a *positron*, which is a particle with the
same weight as a electron but a positive charge, and thereby
go one position down in the board while keeping the same weight.
Often, too, a particle is given off with neither charge nor
mass, called the *neutrino*. In most radioactive decay, a
particle of light with shortest wavelength comes out as well.
For although light usually behaves as a wave, it can be looked
on as a particle, the *photon*. We have already said by the way
that a particle of matter can behave not only as a particle, but as a
wave. Down among the atoms, things do not happen in a continious fashion,
but in leaps between positions that are forbidden.
The study of this is called *quantom theory*.
Nor are matter and energy different. Rather, they are essentially the
same, and one can be converted into the other. The relationship between
them is that energy is equal to weight multiplied by the square
of the speed of light.
By shooting particles into nucleuss, physicists have converted
isotopes of one element into isotopes of another. Thus did
they make Uranium into Neptunium and Plutonium, and they have
afterward gone beyond these. The heavier elements are all
highly readioactive and therefore are not found in nature.
Some of the higher isotopes are *unstable*. That is, when a
neutron strikes the nucleus of one, as for an example
Uranium-235, it bursts into lesser nuclei and free
neutrons; the latter can then split more Uranium-235. When
this happens, mass converts into energy. It is not much of the
whole, but nevertheless it is awesome.
With enough strength, lightweight atoms can be made to
fuse. In the sun, through a row of fusion and
radiocativity, four atoms of hydrogen in this wise become
one of helium. Again some weight is lost as energy, and
this is much larger than the energy gotten from a
chemical reaction such as fire.
Today we wield both kind of nuclear in weapons, and
nuclear fission gives us heat and electricity. We hope to
do the same with fusion, which would yield an unlimited
amount of energy for mankind's avantage.
Truly we live in mighty years!