Chemistry: A Volatile History Chemistry: A Volatile History Chemistry: A Volatile History is a 2010 BBC documentary on the history of chemistry presented by Jim Al-Khalili. It was nominated for the 2010 British Academy Television Awards in the category Specialist Factual. Only in the last 200 years have we known what an element is – a substance that cannot be broken down further by chemical reaction. The Ancient Greeks, with no way of breaking open substances, could only base their ideas of the elements on what they could see: Earth, Fire, Water and Air. In the 16th century alchemists were busy trying to turn
Tendency of the rate of profit to fall their own output prices, each capitalist controls only the price and the cost of the "labour" hired by their own business (and, possibly, some other variable operating costs). In the short term, the easiest way to reduce costs is usually to cut labour costs and reduce working hours. One dispute which has never been finally resolved is whether the TRPF should be interpreted as a cyclical tendency, or as a secular long run trend. Geert Reuten from the University of Amsterdam has argued that there is evidence that Marx originally believed in a long run secular tendency, but that, later