Which of the following is an example of an irreversible physical change? a. boiling soup b. burning wood c. freezing water d. cracking an egg

 d. cracking an egg

Explanation:

A physical change is defined as a change in which there is alteration in shape, size etc. No new substance gets formed in these reactions.

A chemical change is defined as a change in which a change in chemical composition takes place. A new substance is formed in these reactions.

1. Boiling soup : Only the phase change takes place, thus  a physical change and can be reversed by condensation.

2. Burning wood: the chemical reaction occurs by combination of wood with oxygen , thus a chemical change.

3. Freezing water: Only the phase change takes place, thus a physical change and can be reversed by melting

4. Cracking an egg: Only the state changes and thus a physical change and cannot be reversed.

most historians agree that gabriel mouton, the vicar of st. paul’s church in lyons, france, is the “founding father” of the metric system. he proposed a decimal system of measurement in 1670. mouton based it on the length of one minute of arc of a great circle of the earth (now called a nautical mile, 1852 meters). he also proposed the swing-length of a pendulum with a frequency of one beat per second as the unit of length (about 25 cm). a pendulum beating with this length would have been fairly easy to produce, thus facilitating the widespread distribution of uniform standards. over the years, his work was revised, improved, and extended by a number of french scientists.

the political sponsor of weights and measures reform in the french revolutionary national assembly was the bishop of autun, better known as talleyrand. under his auspices, the french academy appointed several committees to carry out the work of developing a usable system of weights and measures for france. one of the committees recommended a decimalized measurement system based upon a length equal to one ten-millionth of the length of a quadrant of the earth’s meridian (i.e., one ten-millionth of the distance between the equator and the north pole).