Why don't oil and water mix? - John Pollard

Salt dissolves in water; oil does not. But why? You can think of that glass of water as a big, bumpin' dance party where the water molecules are always switching dance partners -- and they'd much rather dance with a salt ion. John Pollard explains how two chemistry principles, energetics and entropy, rule the dance floor.

Lesson by John Pollard, animation by Andrew Foerster.

[SpectreD]

This guy went so deep into the analogy that I have no idea how it actually works.

[pauljohnaguilar]

teacher:do you know why water and oil are not mixing?

student:because oils are terrible dancer

[RealationGames]

I've learned some pretty advanced stuff with simplified analogy, but this is way too metaphorical for me to extract any hard science information.

[zenaidaalejo]

What?
How could you dumb down something so much to the point where you don't understand anything

[lordbacon]

The writer was all "They're square dancing", the animator however decided, "Screw that, it's a disco."

[myherpesitch]

very stupid analogy.
it said nothing about ion attractions or polarity.

[namdang]

i dont mind analogies but this... this is too MUCH!

[artursanti]

Well, the analogy wasn't wrong at all but I just understood something because I was previously reading about it, but those who don't really know did get confused because well... Practically nothing was explained here.

[TheGreatFace]

I'll never see oil the same way again.

[viancavarma]

"Water and oil don't mix because they just don't make good dance partners." WHAT THE FUCK.

[hellothere]

this video was garbage, the analogy went so deep i didnt learn anything except that oil wears a dress and water doesnt want to dance because of it

[bmx]

I don't mind when analogies are used to help describe scientific concepts, but this is just too much.

[savagekid]

I think this would have been much more simpler if you went into actual detail as opposed to telling a children's story

[CoxTH]

Sorry, but in this video the analogies got way out of hands and basically no real science is left in this video

[nikarta]

Now, can you please explain this in chemistry? 😩😭

[TheUsbrasa]

I love how creative this is. It shows us a different way of thinking. It's like taking book knowledge and grasping it with your mind. It helps you to not memorize, but really learn how things work :)

[TheOddWorldOfJonas]

This is more of a metaphor than an analogy. The difference is that, in an analogy, you explain something, then compare it to something else to make it easier to understand. In a metaphor, you just say something figurative and the person listening has to already know what you're talking about in order to understand.
So, in my point of view, it isn't very efficient to make an "educational metaphor", which is what this video essentially is.

[KimC]

I cant even understand what are you talking about, I hope that you can just use the pro
I think the people who are interested in this video already got a certain level of chemistry knowledge.

[mixxxo]

if you hate metaphors here is a short answer


the oil molecules are too big to mix with the water molecules

[tromaggot]

there ist definitely too much party in my glass of water