Spices have shaped history, influenced today’s global trade, and even sparked wars! Curious about how spices came to be? It is the hunt for spices that has led Europeans to explore oceans and lands. Today’s global trade routes were established by the search for spices. Continue reading about their history in "A Brief History of Spices"!
Spices come from plants or trees. They are usually in the dried form—they can be harvested from fruits (pepper), bark (cinnamon), roots (ginger), or seeds (coriander seeds). Spices may be whole or powdered. Spice powders may have one or more spices roasted and blended. They can be used as seasoning. You can also make spice blends and hot sauces (Curious about the chemistry of hot sauce? Continue on to "The Science of Hot Sauce: What Makes It Spicy?").
Spices make us think of the kitchen. In the kitchen, they add smell, taste, color, flavor, richness, complexity, and more to food (and drinks: read more about their use in tea and drinks in the Meg A. Mole Interview with Joseph Wiener). The properties of the spices are because of the essential oils they contain (read more in "Spice Up Your Senses: Scent-sational Essential Oils".). Herbs are also used for adding flavor. But they are the leafy portion—like cilantro (leaves) is the herb vs coriander seeds are the spice.
Spices are used in aromatherapy (use of smells for better health; lavender), in making perfumes (anise), medications (capsaicin), incense (cinnamon), cosmetics (turmeric), as insect or animal repellents (garlic/peppermint), home décor (scented wreaths), in religious rituals (cumin), and for their many health benefits (fennel for digestion). They are used in home remedies, too. Cloves are often used for toothaches. They contain a chemical, called eugenol, that naturally soothes pain. However, one small difference in their structure can drastically change their flavor, smell, and how they are used (perform the activity "Small Changes in Structure can Lead to Big Changes in Fragrance" to learn more).
Now you know how spices have many purposes in our everyday lives. They are treasures that also remedy some health issues. But, as always, consume them in moderation. You are now invited to explore the world of spices. You will learn where they come from, how they act, and have fun in the process of finding out all about their hidden lives!
Spices are as old as humankind itself! They have led to the creation and loss of empires. Even new continents were discovered because of spices. There are numerous spices mentioned in the Bible, such as mint, dill, and cumin. Mohammed in the Koran co-owned a shop that stocked spices. In the Hindu Vedas, chilies are spoken of as the child of the Fire God. Spices have a lot of history! But where do they come from?
Early humans accidentally discovered that food wrapped in certain leaves tasted better or even spoiled less quickly. Nuts, stems, seeds, fruits, leaves, roots, bark, etc. were used similarly. The best spices were often hard to find. The search and demand for spices often made huge changes to how people lived and did business.
Spices were highly sought after by the countries in Western Europe. Asian and Mediterranean countries were the places that grew spices at the time. Selling spices was a profitable business. The countries with the spices as well as the European merchants profited from them. Europeans took spices back with them on camels along a network of trade routes called the Silk Road. The Silk Road thus impacted many countries like China, India, Egypt, Persia (Iran today), Arabia, and Rome.
By this time, Europe was starting to use more and more spices. This created a demand, causing spices to become more costly. Spice sellers were in it for the money. The Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, and Dutch all competed for spices and resources in Asia and the Middle East. Wealthy merchants looked for ways to quickly reach the regions where spices were abundant. To meet that demand, the Western Europeans sailed long distances to bring back more spices as they could become rich. Several of the trips ended up finding people, lands, and spice treasures unknown to Western Europe. Christopher Columbus on one such travel accidentally landed on an island in the Americas.
Scientific advances in growing techniques have made growing spices in other parts of the world possible. With the many routes for spice transport, spices became more common. Their prices eventually began to fall. But the complicated history and the global impact remain. The lasting flavors, colors, and scents of spices continue to find new valuable uses today in cooking, religion, medicine, perfumery, and more.
Today, we use spices in everyday things and in more interesting ways. What is your favorite spiced item? Cinnamon rolls? Wasabi ice cream or chile chocolate? Or turmeric and pepper in milk, maybe?
A force is a push or pull upon an object resulting from the object's interaction with another object. Whenever there is an interaction between two objects, there is a force upon each of the objects. When the interaction ceases, the two objects no longer experience the force. Forces only exist as a result of an interaction.
Contact versus Action-at-a-Distance Forces
For simplicity sake, all forces (interactions) between objects can be placed into two broad categories:
contact forces, and
forces resulting from action-at-a-distance
Contact forces are those types of forces that result when the two interacting objects are perceived to be physically contacting each other. Examples of contact forces include frictional forces, tensional forces, normal forces, air resistance forces, and applied forces. These specific forces will be discussed in more detail later in Lesson 2 as well as in other lessons.
Action-at-a-distance forces are those types of forces that result even when the two interacting objects are not in physical contact with each other, yet are able to exert a push or pull despite their physical separation. Examples of action-at-a-distance forces include gravitational forces. For example, the sun and planets exert a gravitational pull on each other despite their large spatial separation. Even when your feet leave the earth and you are no longer in physical contact with the earth, there is a gravitational pull between you and the Earth. Electric forces are action-at-a-distance forces. For example, the protons in the nucleus of an atom and the electrons outside the nucleus experience an electrical pull towards each other despite their small spatial separation. And magnetic forces are action-at-a-distance forces. For example, two magnets can exert a magnetic pull on each other even when separated by a distance of a few centimeters. These specific forces will be discussed in more detail later in Lesson 2 as well as in other lessons.
Examples of contact and action-at-distance forces are listed in the table below.
Contact Forces
Action-at-a-Distance Forces
Frictional Force
Gravitational Force
Tension Force
Electrical Force
Normal Force
Magnetic Force
Air Resistance Force
Applied Force
Spring Force
The Newton
Force is a quantity that is measured using the standard metric unit known as the Newton. A Newton is abbreviated by an "N." To say "10.0 N" means 10.0 Newton of force. One Newton is the amount of force required to give a 1-kg mass an acceleration of 1 m/s/s. Thus, the following unit equivalency can be stated:
In a previous chapter of study, the variety of ways by which motion can be described (words, graphs, diagrams, numbers, etc.) was discussed. In this unit (Newton's Laws of Motion), the ways in which motion can be explained will be discussed. Isaac Newton (a 17th century scientist) put forth a variety of laws that explain why objects move (or don't move) as they do. These three laws have become known as Newton's three laws of motion. The focus of Lesson 1 is Newton's first law of motion - sometimes referred to as the law of inertia.
There are two clauses or parts to this statement - one that predicts the behavior of stationary objects and the other that predicts the behavior of moving objects. The two parts are summarized in the following diagram.
The behavior of all objects can be described by saying that objects tend to "keep on doing what they're doing" (unless acted upon by an unbalanced force). If at rest, they will continue in this same state of rest. If in motion with an eastward velocity of 5 m/s, they will continue in this same state of motion (5 m/s, East). If in motion with a leftward velocity of 2 m/s, they will continue in this same state of motion (2 m/s, left). The state of motion of an object is maintained as long as the object is not acted upon by an unbalanced force. All objects resist changes in their state of motion - they tend to "keep on doing what they're doing."
There is an important condition that must be met in order for the first law to be applicable to any given motion. The condition is described by the phrase "... unless acted upon by an unbalanced force." As the long as the forces are not unbalanced - that is, as long as the forces are balanced - the first law of motion applies. This concept of a balanced versus and unbalanced force will be discussed in more detail later in Lesson 1.
Suppose that you filled a baking dish to the rim with water and walked around an oval track making an attempt to complete a lap in the least amount of time. The water would have a tendency to spill from the container during specific locations on the track. In general the water spilled when:
the container was at rest and you attempted to move it
the container was in motion and you attempted to stop it
the container was moving in one direction and you attempted to change its direction.
The water spills whenever the state of motion of the container is changed. The water resisted this change in its own state of motion. The water tended to "keep on doing what it was doing." The container was moved from rest to a high speed at the starting line; the water remained at rest and spilled onto the table. The container was stopped near the finish line; the water kept moving and spilled over container's leading edge. The container was forced to move in a different direction to make it around a curve; the water kept moving in the same direction and spilled over its edge. The behavior of the water during the lap around the track can be explained by Newton's first law of motion.
Velocity is a vector quantity that refers to "the rate at which an object changes its position." Imagine a person moving rapidly - one step forward and one step back - always returning to the original starting position. While this might result in a frenzy of activity, it would result in a zero velocity. Because the person always returns to the original position, the motion would never result in a change in position. Since velocity is defined as the rate at which the position changes, this motion results in zero velocity. If a person in motion wishes to maximize their velocity, then that person must make every effort to maximize the amount that they are displaced from their original position. Every step must go into moving that person further from where he or she started. For certain, the person should never change directions and begin to return to the starting position.
Velocity is a vector quantity. As such, velocity is direction aware. When evaluating the velocity of an object, one must keep track of direction. It would not be enough to say that an object has a velocity of 55 mi/hr. One must include direction information in order to fully describe the velocity of the object. For instance, you must describe an object's velocity as being 55 mi/hr, east. This is one of the essential differences between speed and velocity. Speed is a scalar quantity and does not keep track of direction; velocity is a vector quantity and is direction aware.
Determining the Direction of the Velocity Vector
The task of describing the direction of the velocity vector is easy. The direction of the velocity vector is simply the same as the direction that an object is moving. It would not matter whether the object is speeding up or slowing down. If an object is moving rightwards, then its velocity is described as being rightwards. If an object is moving downwards, then its velocity is described as being downwards. So an airplane moving towards the west with a speed of 300 mi/hr has a velocity of 300 mi/hr, west. Note that speed has no direction (it is a scalar) and the velocity at any instant is simply the speed value with a direction.
Calculating Average Speed and Average Velocity
As an object moves, it often undergoes changes in speed. For example, during an average trip to school, there are many changes in speed. Rather than the speed-o-meter maintaining a steady reading, the needle constantly moves up and down to reflect the stopping and starting and the accelerating and decelerating. One instant, the car may be moving at 50 mi/hr and another instant, it might be stopped (i.e., 0 mi/hr). Yet during the trip to school the person might average 32 mi/hr. The average speed during an entire motion can be thought of as the average of all speedometer readings. If the speedometer readings could be collected at 1-second intervals (or 0.1-second intervals or ... ) and then averaged together, the average speed could be determined. Now that would be a lot of work. And fortunately, there is a shortcut. Read on.
The average speed during the course of a motion is often computed using the following formula:
In contrast, the average velocity is often computed using this formula
Let's begin implementing our understanding of these formulas with the following problem:
Q: While on vacation, Lisa Carr traveled a total distance of 440 miles. Her trip took 8 hours. What was her average speed?
To compute her average speed, we simply divide the distance of travel by the time of travel.
That was easy! Lisa Carr averaged a speed of 55 miles per hour. She may not have been traveling at a constant speed of 55 mi/hr. She undoubtedly, was stopped at some instant in time (perhaps for a bathroom break or for lunch) and she probably was going 65 mi/hr at other instants in time. Yet, she averaged a speed of 55 miles per hour. The above formula represents a shortcut method of determining the average speed of an object.
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Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727)
Cambridge University physicist and mathematician Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727) was a fellow of the Royal Society of England, who created a single system for describing the workings of the universe. Newton formulated three laws of motion which formulated the relationship between motion and objects and also the law of universal gravitation, the latter of which could be used to explain the behavior not only of falling bodies on the earth but also planets and other celestial bodies. To arrive at his results, Newton invented one form of an entirely new branch of mathematics: calculus (also invented independently by Gottfried Leibniz), which was to become an essential tool in much of the later development in most branches of physics. Newton's findings were set forth in his Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica ("Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy"), the publication of which in 1687 marked the beginning of the modern period of mechanics and astronomy.
Newton refuted the Cartesian mechanical tradition that all motions should be explained with respect to the immediate force exerted by corpuscles. Using his three laws of motion and law of universal gravitation, Newton removed the idea that objects followed paths determined by natural shapes and instead demonstrated that all the future motions of any body could be deduced mathematically based on knowledge of their existing motion, their mass, and the forces acting upon them. However, observed celestial motions did not precisely conform to a Newtonian treatment, and Newton, who was also deeply interested in theology, imagined that God intervened to ensure the continued stability of the solar system.
Newton's principles (but not his mathematical treatments) proved controversial with Continental philosophers, who found his lack of metaphysical explanation for movement and gravitation philosophically unacceptable. Beginning around 1700, a bitter rift opened between the Continental and British philosophical traditions, which were stoked by heated, ongoing, and viciously personal disputes between the followers of Newton and Leibniz concerning priority over the analytical techniques of calculus, which each had developed independently. Initially, the Cartesian and Leibnizian traditions prevailed on the Continent (leading to the dominance of the Leibnizian calculus notation everywhere except Britain). Newton himself remained privately disturbed at the lack of a philosophical understanding of gravitation while insisting in his writings that none was necessary to infer its reality. As the 18th century progressed, Continental natural philosophers increasingly accepted the Newtonians' willingness to forgo ontological metaphysical explanations for mathematically described motions.[57][58][59]
Newton built the first functioning reflecting telescope[60] and developed a theory of color, published in Opticks, based on the observation that a prism decomposes white light into the many colours forming the visible spectrum. While Newton explained light as being composed of tiny particles, a rival theory of light which explained its behavior in terms of waves was presented in 1690 by Christiaan Huygens. However, the belief in the mechanistic philosophy coupled with Newton's reputation meant that the wave theory saw relatively little support until the 19th century. Newton also formulated an empirical law of cooling, studied the speed of sound, investigated power series, demonstrated the generalised binomial theorem and developed a method for approximating the roots of a function. His work on infinite series was inspired by Simon Stevin's decimals.[61] Most importantly, Newton showed that the motions of objects on Earth and of celestial bodies are governed by the same set of natural laws, which were neither capricious nor malevolent. By demonstrating the consistency between Kepler's laws of planetary motion and his own theory of gravitation, Newton also removed the last doubts about heliocentrism. By bringing together all the ideas set forth during the Scientific Revolution, Newton effectively established the foundation for modern society in mathematics and science.
The French philosopher René Descartes (1596–1650) was well-connected to, and influential within, experimental philosophy networks. Descartes had an agenda, however, which was geared toward replacing the Scholastic philosophical tradition. Questioning the reality interpreted through the senses, Descartes sought to re-establish philosophical explanations by reducing all phenomena to the motion of an invisible sea of "corpuscles". (Notably, he reserved human thought and God from his scheme, holding these to be separate from the physical universe). In proposing this philosophical framework, Descartes supposed that different kinds of motion, such as that of planets versus that of terrestrial objects, were not fundamentally different, but were manifestations of an endless chain of corpuscular motions obeying universal principles. Particularly influential were his explanations for circular astronomical motions in terms of the vortex motion of corpuscles in space (Descartes argued, in accord with the beliefs, if not the methods, of the Scholastics, that a vacuum could not exist), and his explanation of gravity in terms of corpuscles pushing objects downward.[47][48][49]
Descartes, like Galileo, was convinced of the importance of mathematical explanation, and he and his followers were key figures in the development of mathematics and geometry in the 17th century. Cartesian mathematical descriptions of motion held that all mathematical formulations had to be justifiable in terms of direct physical action, a position held by Huygens and the German philosopher Gottfried Leibniz, who, while following in the Cartesian tradition, developed his own philosophical alternative to Scholasticism, which he outlined in his 1714 work, the Monadology. Descartes has been dubbed the "Father of Modern Philosophy", and much subsequent Western philosophy is a response to his writings, which are studied closely to this day. In particular, his Meditations on First Philosophy continues to be a standard text at most university philosophy departments. Descartes' influence in mathematics is equally apparent; the Cartesian coordinate system – allowing algebraic equations to be expressed as geometric shapes in a two-dimensional coordinate system – was named after him. He is credited as the father of analytical geometry, the bridge between algebra and geometry, important to the discovery of calculus and analysis.
