Talk:Proton (physics)

From the article:

The proton was discovered in 1911 by Ernest Rutherford as part of his discovery of the atomic nucleus.

Not really. Prior to Rutherford, the dominant model of the atom was the plum pudding model, where there were a mixture of positive and negative charges scattered throughout the atom. All that Rutherford did was to show that the positive charges were clustered in the atom. It is therefore somewhat debatable to claim that he discovered the proton. That really aught to be the person who first positied the plum pudding model (as it required a distinct, positivly charged particle), or to whoever measured the proton, in some form or another. As I can't name either person, I'm going off to do some research, but I'm not comfortable with the above statement as it stands. Syntax 02:53, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Hmm. School teacher lie.  I forgot that.  Plum pudding model had a uniformly distributed positive charge.  Syntax

So who discovered America? Someone who proposed in might be over-there somewhere, or Columbus? (leaving aside all the pre-Columbian discoveries of coure; you take my point) Mintguy (T) 02:56, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Um, on the assumption that's not a pointless troll, Rutherford didn't (as far as I'm aware) suggest the existance of a particle with a positive charge equal to the electron, but rather that all the positive charge was collected in the centre. No discretely charged particles == No proton. Syntax 03:06, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Got it. It was Rutherford, in 1918. Good thing I'd draged my books home today. See, for example: http://www.dpgraph.com/janine/twins.html Syntax 03:10, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)