Talk:Salt

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Salt is included in the 2006 Wikipedia CD Selection, or is a candidate for inclusion in the next version. Please maintain high quality standards and, if possible, stick to GFDL-compatible images.

Seems that a picture of table salt (from a salt shaker) would be useful here.

• I disagree. This is a chemistry article about salts in general (ie. scientific), not table salt. We don't need to confuse audiences more than they already are. --nkayesmith 01:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 History removal 2 what is the density of salt? 3 Need to sort out links 4 Monatomic 5 Silting 6 what is a wine salt 7 Shouldn't salt in the diet be here? 8 Basic Salts 9 "Impure salts" 10 Move to salts 11 Vandalism? 12 thank you

[edit] History removal

the page at first talks about salt in chemistry, but the history focuses on just the history of table salt. seeing as there is already a cvcvcvcvcxvcsalt page. Craptree 15:46, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I agree and I had a go (Sodium_chloride#Salt_throughout_history) but folk should see if there's not too much info lost by removing this section. Chaikney 20:20, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• We need an history section! BTW I need info on salt in the Roman Empire and in the middle Ages. The salt was as important as gold in the old times.-Pedro 13:54, 6 May 2005 (UTC)

• I agree with merging the section into table salt and/or sodium chloride, and removing it from this article. Assuming the section refers to sodium chloride, the "History" section seems out of place.--GregRM 16:54, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

• I agree too. I think users should be told that the section refers to sodium chloride at least. nkayesmith 01:45, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• The history offered here should be merged into the history section of table salt. This article is about the term salt as referred to in chemistry. The "Salt" referred to in this article is a generic term. All of the information in the current history section of this article pertains to table salt. Therefore there should be no question about such a merge. --TRosenbaum 05:29, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

I have placed a merge suggestion in the section. If there is a history of salt section in this article, it should be suitably general, and, as others have noted above, the section appears to refer to edible salt.--GregRM 19:33, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

• I agree that this section does not at all fit with this page of salt as a chemical, rather than edible or table salt, and that it should definitely be moved/merged into that section.Jenpen 19:19, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

I have removed the following paragraph: "Salts are usually liquid silver with a relatively low melting point. However, there exist salts that are solid at room temperature, so-called ionic solids. Organic salts usually have a high softness and a high compressibility, similar to toxic salt]]." I hope the author of the removed fragment does not teach chemistry. 1) What is "liquid silver"? 2) MOST salts are solid at room temperature. 3) The salts with strong ionic bonds not only are solid at room temperature, they are solid even at high temperatures, eg. NaCl melts at 801 oC. 4) What is "toxic salt"! Yankeedoodle—The preceding unsigned comment was added by yankeedoodle (talk • contribs).

[edit] what is the density of salt?

See Sodium chloride.

[edit] Need to sort out links

Whatlinkshere shows hundreds of links that obviously should link to edible salt (or table salt, if that were the main article name). I don't know what to do about it; manually renaming them is a lot of work, and it seems we have no easy way to automatically change a list of links. — Sebastian (talk) 17:15, 2005 Jun 24 (UTC)

[edit] Monatomic

the page says a salt is a compound composed of an anion and and a cation, and then goes on to say that monatomic salts exist. how is this possible? is this correct? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.148.146.227 (talk • contribs) .

It refers to the composition of one ionic part only, not to the salt as a whole. Femto 12:24, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Silting

I don't understand why silting redirects here. My understanding of silting is that it refers to the deposit of sediment by rivers. Don't see the connection. Ghmyrtle 14:08, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] what is a wine salt

[edit] Shouldn't salt in the diet be here?

please help me

anyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There's nothing much to say in general about dietary use of salt that is relevant here...perhaps you should look at a different page? As the very first line of this page states: This article is about the general chemical term salt. For the everyday meaning, see edible salt or its main ingredient, sodium chloride. DMacks 13:18, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Basic Salts

As I said in the Alkali salt talk page, it says here that that a basic salt is a salt that contains a hydroxide ion, but calcium carbonate is considered a basic salt and does not. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.147.72.202 (talk) 20:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC).

I am not sure if this is a question, but I'll try and give a bit of explanation.

You already name salts containing OH^-, which are indeed clearly basic. On the other hand you have solids like oxalic acid, which are acidic, they contain H⁺. If you dissolve them, you clearly get basic or acidic solutions.

More difficult it gets with other salts. When you dissolve a salt in water, you get positive ions (cations) and negative ions (anions). Both anions and cations are surrounded by a water shell. Now we are going to compare the cation and the anion, so the next part is relative, not 'strict': if the cation has a large affinity for OH^-, then it will 'bind' the OH^--part of a water molecule, resulting in a bit H⁺-character of that dissolved cation. For anions the opposite is true, if they have a tendency to bind H⁺, the resulting dissolved anion will appear to be a bit basic (it contains a bit free OH^-. If the sum of these two is not in the middle, the pH will deviate from 7 (if the affinity of the cation for OH^- is (relatively) larger than the affinity of the anion for H⁺ then the solution will have a surplus of 'free' H⁺, resulting in a pH lower than 7, the solution will appear acidic.

This is also what happens in calcium carbonate, calcium has a reasonable affinity for OH^-, but CO₃^2- is in solution almost HCO₃^-, maybe even H₂CO3, so the anion tends to create OH^-. Hope this clarifies. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 21:02, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes. However, the salts themselves are still termed "basic" regardless of being dissolved or not, so the article's wording is not correct. I adjusted it slightly to include all oxyanionic things. DMacks 21:09, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh .. And now I have to dig really deep .. I think basic salts are salts that, when dissolved in water, result in a solution with a pH higher than 7 .. but .. pff .. this is years ago, and I don't have the appropriate books at hand. Ref's, anyone? --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 21:13, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

That may indeed be the strict definition. To make wikipedia matters more confusing, we have specific pages for acid salt and alkali salt. I was basing my comment on common-names for things like "monobasic potassium phosphate". DMacks 22:36, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

(unindent) This lovely effect has a name .. I remember that I once, in a grey and long-forgotten past, had to calculate the magnitude of this effect, you can calculate that from certain data, even for NaCl, where the effect is minimal. It is certainly something wikipedia needs to have. I'll have to think, or hope for another chemist to come to the resque. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 22:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Impure salts"

What does "salts which have lost their saltiness" mean, in the description of "impure salts" in the lead paragraph? DMacks 21:10, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Nothing really. I have removed that sentence. The reference to natron did not mean much either. --Bduke 22:45, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

My edit on this and other points has been reverted by an anon editor who gave no reasons. I was trying to clarify various points and also correct errors. For example not all anions that contain oxygen lead to salts that are basic - sulfate for example. Could others keep an eye on this? I have reverted back to my version but do not want an edit war. --Bduke 04:07, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Move to salts

I believe the title should be changed from "Salt" to "Salts". That would better rweflect the subject being a general class of compounds, as opposed to the table salt.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Yankeedoodle (talk • contribs).

Uh, is someone going to fix the page? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.86.145.181 (talk • contribs).

Pushed it up to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Chemistry for more discussion. Femto 12:42, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

• I agree that the article should be moved to Salts which is a redirect. It should be the other way - "Salt" a redirect to "Salts". --Bduke 22:45, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

• I could simply agree to this suggestion but to play devil's advocate: what about changing gas to gases or Ion to Ions or Candy bar to Candy Bars. I guess I don't see the benefit or consistency to this. Yes salt is more complicated due to table salt but that is what we have disambiguation for.--Nick Y. 02:21, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalism?

This passage appears at the beginning of the article:

"Its salt duh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Japanese Texan ssssssssalt"

But it doesn't appear in the editable text. but Does it really belong here?

[edit] thank you

thank you —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 131.109.38.10 (talk)