Glass- Solid, Liquid or Gas?
What is glass and why in heavens name are there dozens of different shapes and styles to choose from when taking a drink?
Well, for starters, glass is a formless solid (huh?) that has been around in a variety of shapes for hundreds and hundreds of years. The idea of glass being liquid versus solid, has been fiercely debated. To make a long story short, glass is firm and motionless and does not vary molecularly when being melted and then solidified into a shape. Glass is a bizarre object since we can not call it a solid, nor a gas, and is not very much of a liquid either.
Glass is very high up on the list as one of the most multitalented objects on earth ranging from an unadorned clear drinking glass to a tempered and tinted form, with a great deal more in between. Glass is made up of a mixture of silica, soda, and lime. To cloud, frost or color glass, other ingredients are added to spice up the recipe. Glass is heated up to 1800° F (982° Celsius). The liquid is then either poured into forms or it can be blown into a choice of shapes. When it is cooled off, glass becomes strong, stubborn and unsociable and will not interact with anything that comes in contact with it other then heat which will return the glass to a liquid. Yup- that is how glass is recycled. ...continue reading