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Old 04-13-2004, 11:35 AM   #1 (permalink)
Stompy
Banned from being Banned
 
Location: Donkey
Why "half-life"?

I knew this once upon a time, but forgot the answer... why is the decay of an element always given as the half-life? Why not just give the full time it takes to decay?

For example: Mt-268 has a half-life of just 0.07 seconds. Okay, so after .07 seconds, 50% of it exists. Why not just state when it no longer exists?

It's been a while since I've had chemistry/pre-calc (which touched on half-life/decay), and I've forgotten a lot of this stuff.. so bear with me

Last edited by Stompy; 04-13-2004 at 12:00 PM..
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