When will this forum begin rational debates?

PS-I suspect the British spelling and pronunciation is more in keeping with the nature of the subtance. In that the "minium" part of "aluminium" conveys a sense of minimum lightness, which the American version simply does not. Granted, "minium" is not the same as "minimum" but it's close enough I think to convey that sense. Aluminium/aluminum being one of the lightest metals to construct things with, and perhaps the most common of the light metals used in the modern world.

That said, the only light metal much in use is magnesium, and then to my knowledge usally alloyed with another metal. It gets more complex when you go into the lighter alkali metals like lithium, potassium, and sodium, which are too reactive in air to be used alone.

Well, it's hard to say which spelling and pronunciation is more correct. On the one hand, the first person to isolate aluminum was Danish chemist Oersted in 1925. I suspect if he said the name at all he pronounced it as the British did, aluminium. The next players included German chemist Friedrich Wohler, who first around 1827 isolated a pure sample of aluminium. Then the work swung over to the hands of American Charles Hall and Frenchman Jeroult, who independently discovered the economical process of aluminum production via electrolysis of alumina dissolved in cryolite. From there the process of discovery continued with Oberlin College professor Frank Jewitt and his student Charles Hall, whose collaberation starting around 1880 created an economical method of mass production of alumiinum, and eventually spawned the creation of The Aluminum Corporation of America, or ALCOA.

Given all the effort that went into making aluminum a useful and abundant material to mankind, the exact pronunciation and spelling of the name is rather incidental. Without it most of our air industry, as well as a wide variety of other essential appications, would be well-nigh impossible.

PS-Like most Americans I spell and pronounce it aluminum. But it is no great burden to understand the alternate spelliing and pronunciation. And I have absolutely no idea how the French, Germans, Russians, and other nations spell and pronounce it.

Yes, Sir, or Ma'am, or whatever you say.

So Mercy for All is a guy?

Here all along I assumed it was a female, because, well, Mercy could be a lady's name.

I just don't want to make an assumption that turns out to be incorrect.