
An 1858 definition of synthesis, by English chemist John Bidlake, with etymology, as the "putting together the elements" of which a chemical structure or compound is composed. [3]

An 1858 definition of synthesis, by English chemist John Bidlake, with etymology, as the "putting together the elements" of which a chemical structure or compound is composed. [3]

In chemistry, synthesis, from the Greek sūn, ‘together’, and thesis, ‘a placing’, refers to the formation of one or more chemical products from one or more simpler reactants, through one or more intermediate coupled mechanism steps or stages. [1]

The antonym of synthesis is "analysis".

Evolution
Synthesis is a replace of the more vague term “evolution”, acting as the more rigorous modern definition in describing the formation of human molecules over time from hydrogen precursors, i.e. humans were synthesized over time through a number of intermediate reaction mechanism steps.


A free energy of formation view of human synthesis (see: human free energy); drawing modified from from American physicist Daniel Schroeder’s 2000 Thermal Physics textbook. [7]

A free energy of formation view of human synthesis (see: human free energy); drawing modified from from American physicist Daniel Schroeder’s 2000 Thermal Physics textbook. [7]

Human synthesis
In hmolscience, in regards to a human molecule's (person's) reaction existence (life), the term "synthesis" is the modern term for what in ancient times was called "birth", which is now a defunct theory (see: defunct theory of life). In plain speak, a person, technically, cannot be "born" anymore so that can any other atom or molecule be born, but rather can only be synthesized (born) or analyzed (die). The outdated terms, e.g. "born", "die", "life", etc., are mythological-religious carryover terms, that do not hold up in the modern physical science view of the universe; hence the regress to pure chemical descriptions.

Etymology
The term “synthesis” or kunstliche was coined by German chemist Herman Kolbe for the de novo preparation of compounds, which generally stems from his famous 1845 production of acetic acid, CH3COOH, form its natural elements (CH, CO, H) in several steps. [2]

Berthelot | Organic chemistry from mineral chemistry
In the 1850s, in the midst of the vital force debate years (see: vitalism; urea synthesis debate), the general view existed that there existed a divide between mineral chemistry and organic chemistry, the latter (typified by animals) not permissibly derived from the former (typified by rocks). French chemist Marcellin Berthelot, set out to overthrow the vital force theory, which he explicitly stated as follows: [4]

“It is the object of these researchers to do away with life as an explanation, wherever organic chemistry is concerned.”

His aim here, although this seems to have have a feel of the defunct theory of life in it, was to show that all the transformations of the organic world are due to the play of simple chemical and mechanical forces acting in a mechanical way. [5] In his 1860 "Organic Chemistry Founded on Synthesis", his so-called masterpiece, Berthelot described his breakthrough insight, in his introduction, of how he obtained a first organic compound (formic acid): [4]

"Solely by a combination of time and ordinary affinities."

This was in opposition to earlier views which held that "special affinities" existed inside of plants and animals.

This statement also seems, in some way, to be a forerunner to the debate that will eventually surround the premise of the synthesis of a human molecule (person), a large animate 26-element organic compound (see: human free energy of formation). Berthelot then went on to explain, in what seems to be a forerunner to a disproof of the unbridgeable gap hypothesis, that any type of organic compound or structure can be synthesized over time, if the right steps, reactants, and amounts of heat are used: [6]

“In a word, in the order of organic synthesis, the essential point resides in the formation of the first from the elements, that is, in that of the carburets [hydrocarbons] of hydrogen and the alcohols; it is this which wipes out in principle all the lines of demarcation between mineral chemistry and organic chemistry. Thus synthesis extends its consequences form the elements up to the domain of the most complicated substances [human molecules] without our being able to assign any limit to the process. Among the organic compounds we know to how to make … up to those which exist in nature, such as the sugars and the nitrogenous principles of animal origin, we pass from one term to the other by insensible degrees, and we cannot see any absolute barrier or break which we may with any appearance of certitude fear to find unsurpassable. We can then affirm that organic chemistry is henceforth founded on the same base as mineral chemistry. In these two sciences, synthesis as well as analysis results from the same forces, applied to the same elements.”

(add)

Human chemistry from the elements
American physical organic chemist George Scott declares, in his Atoms of the Living Flame (1985), that, in the above statement by Berthelot, “chemical vitalism was dead”. This, however, is subtly far from the case. While organic chemistry may be now assumed readily synthesizable from mineral chemistry (or more generally from the 92 naturally-occurring elements of the periodic table), that human chemistry—that is to say human molecules (people)—are synthesizable from the elements of periodic table, by the same forces, is far from acceptable. In some countries, such as Latvia (see: life force), as many as 50% of the population, in modern times, believe in a vital force or life force at work in human origins and futures; and this belief becomes even more convoluted for the physical scientists (chemists and physicists) who—a large majority of—will readily and quickly label human molecular philosophy as “crackpot” or pseudoscience (see: Libb Thims (attack); detractors; human thermodynamics (objections to)); the general explanation of which is that many have not yet caught up the Goethean revolution, and are ignorant by some two plus centuries of human knowledge.

See also
● Thermosynthesis

References
1. (a) Daintith, John. (2005). Oxford Dictionary of Chemistry. Oxford University Press.
(b) Clark, John O.E. (2004). The Essential Dictionary of Science. Barnes & Noble.
2. Merluzzi, Vincent J. and Adams, Julian. (1995). The Search for Anti-inflammatory Drugs (pg. 5). Birkhauser.
3. Bidlake, John P. (1858). Bidlake’s Elementary Chemistry: a Text-book of Elementary Chemistry for the Use of Schools and Junior Students (§2: Chemical Affinity, pgs. 15-23, synthesis, pg. 6). London: Allman and Son.
4. Scott, George P. (1985). Atoms of the Living Flame: an Odyssey into Ethics and the Physical Chemistry of Free Will (pg. 95). University Press of America.
5. Moore, Forris J. (1918). A History of Chemistry (pg. 204). McGraw-Hill.
6. Leicester, Henry. and Clickstein, H. (1952). Sourcebook in Chemistry (pg. 429). McGraw-Hill.
7. Schroeder, Daniel V. (2000). An Introduction to Thermal Physics (pg. 150). Addison Wesley Longman.

Further reading
● Kalckar, Herman. (1941). “The Nature of Energetic Coupling in Biological Synthesis” Chem. Rev. 28:71.

External links
● Chemical synthesis – Wikipedia.