Precious metals and rare earths
From antinomy to lawrencium
Life would be so simple if we could get by with shipping out coal, iron ore and a few other basic commodities for cleverer people to make into more complex things, but there is now talk about our becoming suppliers of rare earths – those pesky 30 elements that don’t easily fit into the periodic table we learned at high school. And there is now a proposal for the lead smelter at Port Pirie to produce antimony.
To help us navigate this complex world Tom Lehrer put the periodic table to music, ending in what must surely be the worst rhyme ever attempted.
