[3] For example, many rocks exist as mineral complexes composed of multiple ions that do not occur in fixed proportions or spatial relationships to one another.
A variety of environmental variables contribute to a substance's properties, including temperature and pressure, proximity to other molecules and the presence of a magnetic field.
Philosophers debate facts regarding the origin of this phenomenon, namely whether it emerged contingently, amid a lifeless racemic environment or if other processes were at play.
[citation needed] One of the most topical issues is determining to what extent physics, specifically, quantum mechanics, explains chemical phenomena.
Some authors, for example, Roald Hoffmann,[6] have recently suggested that a number of difficulties exist in the reductionist program with concepts like aromaticity, pH, reactivity, nucleophilicity, for example.
Scerri is especially interested in the philosophical foundations of the periodic table, and how physics and chemistry intersect in relation to it, which he contends is not merely a matter for science, but for philosophy.