Chemistry in Life - Research Paper Example

full Chemistry in Life (Money, currency, and legal tender) 28 February Introduction The word money de s something that enables a person to buy things with that money. It is also probably a good or fun thing to have, the more money a person has, the more he is enabled to do or buy what he or she wants; in fact, the more money, then much better. Money as presently defined means the current medium of exchange as defined by government of a particular country, it is the officially-issued and officially-recognized legal tender of that country for people to buy and pay for the various goods and services they need in daily life. A key thing to remember is that all forms of money are collectively called as currency, which in turn refers to all the money coins and banknotes which are generally accepted and in wide use in the country to which it pertains. The currency of a country is its so-called legal tender that in turn implies the medium of payment recognized by the country’s legal system. Implication in a country having a legal tender means it is valid for meeting a financial obligation. In other words, a creditor (lender) is obligated to accept any payment made in legal tender towards the repayment of a debt owed by a debtor (borrower). A good but short example is when someone pays in American dollars then the lender cannot refuse to accept such payment since a dollar is the legal tender in America (although some states accept gold or silver coins as payment). If the borrower intends to pay in kind (like mineral ores or cocaine or cattle or something else), a creditor can refuse such payment since it is not considered as legal tender and can be refused to be accepted to extinguish a debt, financial obligation or some other consideration. However, before coinage was invented, barter was used which is just a simple kind of exchange for one type of goods for another type of goods or resources. An example will be a person wants to buy a loaf of bread but lacking any money, he pays for it with a live chicken depending on their agreed value of exchange (there must be some semblance of parity). Most historians are generally agreed that coins were invented at around 700 B.C.E. (before current era) independently in Lydia (now a part of modern-day Turkey), in India, and in China. Barter is a form of direct exchange by which goods and services were exchanged for another set of goods and services without the benefit of using a medium of exchange (currency). Barter has a set of inherent problems such as the difficulty in determining the exact or accurate value of an intended exchange between two kinds of goods and whether one or both parties get real value out of the exchange. Put differently, this inaccuracy in value determination results in most cases an efficient economy where the barter system was being used and so people had to invent something much more efficient and coinage came into existence as a result. (Note: These Lydian coins were not of standard weight or of any standard purity). Chemistry as the branch of physical science that deals with the composition, change, structure, and properties of matter has a lot to do with currency, both coins and paper money. Coins are usually combinations of two or more different kinds of metal through the process of minting and coins must be of standard weight and purity while paper currency also involves chemistry through the use of various chemicals in the printing process, use of counterfeit methods such as special ink and fibers, and distinguishing properties that can mark a paper money as the currency of a particular country. Chemistry is used to protect monetary values; otherwise, bad people can copy or counterfeit a currency and make it lose its value as a form of economic sabotage and people will lose faith and start to refuse accepting such currencies. Discussion The early Romans used salt as a form of currency to pay its army of soldiers known as legions. The legions were in turn commanded by a professional military officer called as the centurion. Using salt as payment for military services rendered was a practical and useful kind of monetary system although a bit crude because in old times, salt was often difficult to obtain and the human body needs salt for the right chemical balance in the blood. Roman legions in ancient Rome were partly paid in salt rations (called salarium argentum or literally it means “salt money”) and the modern English word “salary” comes from salarium. When a worker is good and he is worth the pay the employer is giving him, then he is said to be worth his own weight in salt, giving rise to the expression euphemistically as “worth his salt.” Long travels into the interior and hinterlands require a sojourner or traveler to carry salt with him as salt is essential for maintaining the body chemistry; may physiological processes can be quite impaired if salt is lacking (alternatively, a person gets sick also if too much salt is eaten). The Roman Empire was built on the trade of salt and Roman emperors built their infrastructure on this consideration by building the famous salt roads, all leading to Rome. In this picture shown below, a fortress guards the route of salt caravans going to Rome from the salt beds in Mt. Sdom in the western shores of the southern part of the Dead Sea (actually a salty lake). (Source: “Archaeology: All via salarium lead to . . . . Rome!” n. d. Web. 26 Feb. 2014. . Salt is a fairly simple chemical compound, consisting of just two elements which are sodium (chemical symbol is Na) and chloride (chemical symbol is Cl); it exists in its natural form as a crystalline mineral substance. It can be mined in the mountains and known as rock salt (halite) or it can produced artificially in salt beds by letting seawater evaporate, leaving a white substance which is the salt and then collected, packed, transported, and distributed. The human body needs salt for healthy living and is used mostly together in food preparations; there are about 14,000 known beneficial uses of salt. Salt is an electrolyte (chemical ions) that is used to retain the right amount of body water and also maintain the correct blood pressure. Salt is a main electrolyte together with calcium, chloride, magnesium, potassium, carbonates, and phosphates. A lack of salt can be dangerous leading to cardiac seizures and even coma. In many people, salt is a dietary requirement to replenish the salts lost through perspiration. This is why ancient human history is closely associated with salt trade routes all over the globe but especially in harsh and hot desert areas of the Sahara where perspiration causes a man to lose too much salt and became dizzy if this is not replenished after a while. History is replete with cases and stories of salt being used as actual money in the form of tablets or slabs that usually measure two inches thick by ten inches long and transported across great distances in the Sahara, from Egypt to Greece, across the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas. The value of salt was once equal to the value of its weight in gold as the human diet shifted from eating big-game mammals (cows, goats, sheep, etc.) to eating cereals (with development of agriculture and the increasing use of food crops like wheat, rice, sorghum, etc.) and there is a marked lack of salt in these cereals (Time Magazine 1) so people scrambled and mined for salt in all places, including several hundred feet underground just to obtain this mineral. Even slave traders conducted their commerce in slavery using salt as payment. Salt is extensively used as a food flavoring but more importantly, it is used also as a food preservative because of its antiseptic qualities (it deters the growth of bacteria that destroys meat products). Roman soldiers guarded the most famous salt road in history which was the Via Salaria as the wealth and power of ancient Rome depended on its accumulation and access to salt production. Table salt is the most common or ordinary form of salt in which iodine has been added to prevent thyroid diseases or goiter. There are many kinds of salt such as black salt (lava added) or red salt that has an iron taste to it (Scripps Networks 1) or kosher salt or even finishing salts. The bottom line is that humans cannot survive for long without salt such that ancient Roman soldiers line up for their wages as paid mercenaries in the form of salarium as shown below: Coinage – although money as understood today started at around 700 B.C.E. in the areas of Turkey, India, and China, its actual usage for purposes of being used as the medium of exchange (for intended parity in values of different goods and/or services) started earlier to around the third millennium B.C.E. in the old kingdom of Egypt as based on the recovered artifacts from archaeological sites. Use of metal coins indicate a certain level of civilization as a mark of social and economic development in which people attach value to a certain metal in exchange for goods sold or services rendered; in the case of ancient Egypt, the metal coins in use at that time were actually called electrum, or a combination of gold and silver in varying amounts (the mixture of the two metals was not exactly very accurate) as electrum was found in nature in its primitive state. Electrum is actually an alloy or a combination of one metal with another metal; in the case of electrum, the gold content can vary considerably from 45% to as high as 90% with the balance of the weight of the metal alloy in silver together also with trace amounts of another metal, usually copper, and other metals in already minute amounts. The invention of coinage significantly improved the economy of a place because for the first time, it allows for a speedier or faster exchange of goods and services instead of using the cumbersome and inaccurate barter system in which true values of exchange may not be a real indicator of the economic transaction taking place. Metal coins to a certain extent have an advantage over other forms of exchange as the coins (usually of pure gold or pure silver) have a higher intrinsic value in them so a large economic trade or transaction can take place. This is certainly a big improvement over the older barter trade system and people ascribe a higher value to either gold or silver because both metals do not rust easily. The chemical reaction in a rust is actually called oxidation in which iron combines with molecules of oxygen whenever there is water or any moisture that hastens the oxidation process. Gold and silver also rust but not that easily if compared to ordinary iron, hence people prefer it as the metal for coins. The chemical process of rusting on a metal is called as corrosion in which oxygen atoms combine with the metal atoms to produce a new compound which is an oxide of that specific metal. However, there is also a distinct disadvantage to using metal coins and that is the big amount of coins needed to be transported and paid to a seller if the amount of the transaction is quite large. This could take several oxcarts and the sheer amount of metal coins is certainly very heavy indeed and there is also the problem of storage as a large warehouse is needed for safekeeping of all the metal coins from thieves or robbers. Old kingdoms had huge treasuries for this purpose alone and it takes a lot of guards to watch over these caches of metal coins. It imposes a heavy burden on the owner of such a large amount of coins in terms of storing them and in watching over them as these coins are certainly attractive to people who want to steal. Certainly, there should be a better way to conduct economic exchanges using other forms of money other coins. The use of coins as the main form of currency had outlived its usefulness over time, as the metals used for making coins require a lot of work, from mining to smelting to minting. Incidentally, minting is the process of making coins made from metal. Early coins were crude in the sense these were not very uniform in shape or size as these were merely heated and then hammered into shape (usually round) and then put into circulation. As technology progressed, modern minting techniques involved the use of dies (spelled as dyes or actually some form of a mould) by which to form the coins more or less uniformly. Coins in the modern era also have uniform weight and mixture (in terms of alloy and metal purity). Modern production techniques with the use of the latest or state-of-the-art minting machinery and equipment enable the central bank of a country to mint coins in large numbers, usually by the billions, to enable its currency to have enough liquidity in terms of coin availability. The difference in the actual cost of producing or minting coins in relation to the actual or real value of the coins is termed as signiorage (also spelled as seigniorage). One advantage though of using coins instead of paper money is their durability; metal coins last much longer and so the country can save a lot of money because it does not have to keep minting new coins. Paper money – historians generally credit to the Chinese for idea for the printing of the worlds first paper money. Actually, when it is really considered, paper money is nothing but just a form of negotiable instrument which is given the force of legal tender, which in turn means anybody living within the boundaries of the country which issued that paper money is subject to the regulations pertaining to that form of paper money which signifies it can be used as payment to extinguish a debt or financial obligation. It was under the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.) that paper money was first issued but it was issued privately as bills of credit or a form of exchange notes to facilitate trade and commerce. It was used there in China for about 500 years before the idea spread and caught on in Europe, as paper money has many advantages over the use of metal coins. For one, large amounts of money can easily be carried by a traveler or businessmen, easily concealed somewhere in his person or clothes or somewhere else in his carriage to hide it from highway robbers, much lighter to carry than a ton of coins, and it has the force of being accepted almost anywhere if the issuer is known or generally recognized as a credible issuer who will honor the instrument upon presentation for payment (when it is redeemed in either gold or other precious metal coins). The invention of a system of paper money also give rise to a very important concept in trade and commerce: the use of credit which greatly expanded the capacity of the economy to absorb additional growth. Without trade credit, a local economy would be greatly constrained in its growth since cash is a limited resource. However, one distinct disadvantage of a paper currency is the threat of the currency losing its face or nominal value whenever too much of it is in circulation in relation to the supposed value it represents; this is what economists call as inflation. In fact, China was perhaps the first-ever country to have experienced hyper-inflation as the value of the currency plummeted such that China eliminated paper money in 1455 by an imperial edict (Time Magazine 1) and re-introduced paper money only after a lapse of several centuries. China had a fairly advanced civilization centuries ago and developed independently of foreign influences and one of its greatest achievements was the Great Wall of China in which barbarians or the foreigners were supposed to be kept out from the Middle Kingdom, as China calls itself. Their paper money was a brilliant idea and one of their many contributions to world civilization in which they had a well-developed financial system in which they ironically experienced the worlds first-ever financial crisis when their currency lost much of its value to over-printing. Printing – the printing of currency is closely monitored by the central bank of a country to prevent over-printing that can lead to inflation in which money loses its value. This is also a very intricate technical process as there are many aspects of paper money printing that needs to be examined and learned in order to assure the security of paper money from the counterfeiters who now use sophisticated and latest techniques available such as the use of the digital copying machines and processes which make it hard to distinguish between a genuine and a fake paper bill or note. This means each dollar note, for example, is backed up by the appropriate equivalent dollar reserve kept in the national treasury. This is what gives a dollar bill its value and the strength of the United States of America government further gives it the much-needed credibility since it is guaranteed by the worlds largest several trillion-dollars economy. Most currencies in the world today have security features to prevent counterfeiting. There are many currencies today that circulate throughout world markets depending on which currency has a greater value in terms of exchange rates (economists call it parity). A British-issued pound note is perhaps the worlds most common currency in the number of the countries in which it is being used (a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II is used in the currencies of about 33 countries, usually nations which belong to the British Commonwealth as the former colonies of the defunct British Empire). The United States of America also issues its currency using its famous heroes, revolutionaries, or Founding Fathers as they are more well-known: Security features – the first paper money issued in China was not actually “paper” but something much more durable, the leather or hide of an animal which was first issued in the Han Dynasty (118 B.C.E.) which was a good eight centuries earlier than the Tang Dynasty which developed the modern form of a paper currency in the sense it was a literally a bank note which guarantees to the bearer (whoever is named in the said financial instrument) to be given the equivalent amount or value in coins which can be redeemed at the issuers office. An idea for using paper money in turn originated from merchant receipts who accept paper notes as payment to be redeemed later in actual notes. The one who paid in paper notes had made a deposit to the issuer of that note, similar to making a deposit today in a local bank, which the seller can redeem in coins from the note issuer. This whole process eliminated the need to be carrying around a lot of the heavy metallic coins which were very cumbersome and presented a security risk to merchants conducting commercial transactions especially if in big amounts. Paper money has evolved over time, first starting out as a promissory note (actually, the promise to pay to the bearer the stated face value amount in the note) in precious coins to paper currency representing much more than just its equivalent value in precious metals to the concept of paper money as credit money (as a form of legal debt) to that of the modern-day idea of fiat money (like the United States government issuing dollars) or money that has been declared by the government of a country as its legal tender without necessarily having its own paper money backed up by actual reserves of precious metals such as gold or silver. A mere declaration is all that is required to make a paper money as the legal tender to pay off debts. In actual practice today, all the so-called reserve currencies of any country are just fiat currencies in the sense the world financial system has moved away from the gold standard. As long as a currency is declared legal tender, then it becomes acceptable as a form of payment as long as people have faith in that particular currency if it has a perceived value in it; otherwise, a paper currency is nothing but just actually a highly-stylized paper with a lot of fancy graphics in it. This is the very essence of paper money as cold cash; without it, the world will stop turning. A lot of financial transactions today are now done using a new form of money that is electronic. There are two main reasons why paper money needs to be secure from counterfeiting activities by criminal syndicates. The first is the use of special kind of paper that is not readily available to the general public. An example was the first Chinese paper money which used the bark of the mulberry tree instead of the usual paper made from bamboo for ordinary papers. It enable the ancient Chinese government to ensure its currency from fake notes and its imperial government imposed a monopoly on the trade of mulberry bark for this purpose. The paper in the money currencies of most countries today also include special security fibers to reinforce the paper to make it more durable or longer lasting as it goes into circulation. Most modern notes use cotton rag fibers while others use a combination of cotton, linen, and denim. This is an additional feature which gives paper money a certain texture to it, separate and distinct in a way from common paper made from timber pulp. Ordinary paper from timber pulp will glow if subjected to ultra-violet light while security paper from cotton and linen will remain stable. The use of special types of paper for printing money enabled monetary authorities to embed a lot of security fibers and threads within the paper itself to distinguish it from fake money. Printing using special inks also mark a real note from a fake note as these inks have a special quality which is being magnetic; the use of magnetic inks allow automatic sorting of a currency as the machine detects the special ink used in printing the serial numbers of the note. Additionally, modern paper currencies use a number of colors whereas earlier notes used only black ink, then it improved to two-color combinations, then to three colors, and now, many of these color combinations can be found anywhere on the genuine note, such as an official seal. An additional security feature is the use of a watermark which is the faint image produced by a raise part of the mould which in turn produced a different shade of print on the paper itself. Although difficult to copy, counterfeiters and forgers are now able to reproduce a watermark by using new technology such as high-definition photography or a digital copying machine, so central bank authorities continually update and transform their paper money to prevent it. Conclusion Money has been transformed into several versions over the centuries as people try to exchange goods and services for something they want by using various forms of payment such as salt, crude metal coins, to paper money, to issuing a check, letters of credit and promissory notes, and now the advent of a newest form of money, which is electronic money. It is money easily facilitated over the information and telecommunications networks globally using the wonders of electronic commerce (e-commerce) such as Internet banking. Today, any person can remit money to someone on the other side of the globe by transmitting the required amount electronically directly to the bank account of the recipient. In effect, monetary value has been transformed into bytes that exists only in the electronic networks but still useful and can even be stored for future use, or used to make a payment, this time, also electronically.. Salt is no longer used as money for making payments, but it is being used today in modern society as de-icing material to prevent road accidents by increasing road traction (The Salt Institute, para. 3) to prevent cars from slipping because of icy conditions and the resulting reduced friction. It is indeed a long way off from its beginnings as a food flavoring and also a food preservative. Money makes the world go round, it is often said, and people are supposed to be happy with lots of money in their personal possession although philosophers will argue differently that wealth cannot provide long-lasting happiness, that health is more precious. A lot of people will claim what is more important are having friendships and good relationships. Works Cited Scripps Network. Kitchen Dictionary: Salt. www.food.com 2014. Web. 27 Feb. 2014. . Time Magazine. A Brief History of Salt. Time Magazine, 15 Mar. 1982. Web. 27 Feb. 2014. . Time Magazine. Top 10 Things You Didnt Know about Money. n. d. Web. 28 Feb. 2014. . The Salt Institute. Road Salt Supplies Crucial to Winter Safety. 19 Feb. 2014. Web. 28 Feb. 2014. . Read More