Page 9 - MODERN ELECTROCHEMISTRY

viii PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

dynamics and the horseless carriage; they often consist of Nernst’s theory of galvanic
cells (1891) together with the theory of Debye and Hückel (1923).
Electrochemistry at present needs several kinds of books. For example, it needs
a textbook in which the whole field is discussed at a strong theoretical level. The most
pressing need, however, is for a book which outlines the field at a level which can be
understood by people entering it from different disciplines who have no previous
background in the field but who wish to use modern electrochemical concepts and
ideas as a basis for their own work. It is this need which the authors have tried to meet.
The book’s aims determine its priorities. In order, these are:

1. Lucidity. The authors have found students who understand advanced courses
in quantum mechanics but find difficulty in comprehending a field at whose center
lies the quantum mechanics of electron transitions across interfaces. The difficulty is
associated, perhaps, with the interdisciplinary character of the material: a background
knowledge of physical chemistry is not enough. Material has therefore sometimes been
presented in several ways and occasionally the same explanations are repeated in
different parts of the book. The language has been made informal and highly expla-
natory. It retains, sometimes, the lecture style. In this respect, the authors have been
influenced by The Feynman Lectures on Physics.
2. Honesty. The authors have suffered much themselves from books in which
proofs and presentations are not complete. An attempt has been made to include most
of the necessary material. Appendices have been often used for the presentation of
mathematical derivations which would obtrude too much in the text.
3. Modernity. There developed during the 1950s a great change in emphasis in
electrochemistry away from a subject which dealt largely with solutions to one in
which the treatment at a molecular level of charge transfer across interfaces dominates.
This is the “new electrochemistry,” the essentials of which, at an elementary level, the
authors have tried to present.
4. Sharp variation is standard. The objective of the authors has been to begin each
chapter at a very simple level and to increase the level to one which allows a connecting
up to the standard of the specialized monograph. The standard at which subjects are
presented has been intentionally variable, depending particularly on the degree to
which knowledge of the material appears to be widespread.
5. One theory per phenomenon. The authors intend a teaching book, which acts
as an introduction to graduate studies. They have tried to present, with due admission
of the existing imperfections, a simple version of that model which seemed to them at
the time of writing to reproduce the facts most consistently. They have for the most
part refrained from presenting the detailed pros and cons of competing models in areas
in which the theory is still quite mobile.

In respect to references and further reading: no detailed references to the literature
have been presented, in view of the elementary character of the book’s contents, and
the corresponding fact that it is an introductory book, largely for beginners. In the