Question #4c8cb
2 Answers
Color, texture, boiling point, density, hardness, smell, size, weight, luster, how see through something is, there are many more, anything you can think of.
I think I’d choose a slightly different set of properties if I only had 5 to be able to identify a single material from the millions we have.
Explanation:
Density, I agree would be an excellent starting point, but I think stiffness (or the Young modulus if we’re being posh) may be more useful than visual aspects. Hardness is important, so that might make my list, but conductivity might be a better discriminator.
Melting point would allow you to be fairly confident in assigning which of the 3 material classes any particular material belonged to (metals, polymers or ceramics) so that might be helpful. And finally, perhaps % elongation at failure? That might be useful in refining which polymer (or at least which type) we were dealing with.
Overall, what has really struck me is what a brilliant question this is from an educator's perspective. It forces you to think carefully about a wide range of materials and their properties and to be discerning about their use. I’ll certainly be using it this week with my materials class, so thank you, whoever you may be! Please pass on my thanks to them.
