Chemistry Creates its Own Subject

As early as 1860, an outstanding chemist of the 19th century, Berthelot, claimed Chemistry creates its own subject. This creative ability, similar to an art, is the main feature that distinguishes chemistry from the natural and humanitarian sciences ,Let us try to analyse the basis of this perception of chemistry s select posture in the spectrum of the sciences. 

For example, various mechanical, electronic, or other technical devices created by man can be highly complex and totally unrelated to any natural objects. Yet these items share a common feature they were designed with a definite goal. Qualitatively speaking, their basic properties were also known in advance. If we design and build an airplane, we know it will never serendipi-tously turn out to be a tape recorder or a meat chopper it will be only a good airplane or a bad one. 

In contrast, if we plan to synthesize a new compound, striving to obtain a medical drug, it might well turn out that this compound would exhibit instead the properties of a toxin, a defoliant, or a photosensitizer, to list just a few of the possible options. It is also likely that in carrying out the plan one could obtain something having a totally different structure with correspondingly unexpected activity. 

The discovery of the physiological activity of this substance did not bring only disaster to mankind. A detailed investigation into the mechanisms of its action led to the emergence of a new direction in the chemotherapy of malignant tumors. These studies were initially based upon the use of structural analogs of mustard gas. 

Such stories in the history of organic chemistry abound. Surely the study of man-made organic compounds is as rich a field for making unexpected 

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