It's nearly 25 years to the day since my first "brush" with the great power above that doesn't lend itself to a logical deconstruction.
Scene: Interview for admission to the B.Sc. Chemistry course at the St Stephen's College, Delhi in June 1990.
After I had walked in and the initial pleasantries had been done with, Prof S.V. Eswaran (the then Head of the Department of Chemistry at the college) looked me in the eye and said:
"According to atomic orbital theory, Oxygen should be diamagmetic. However, experiments prove that Oxygen is paramagnetic. Please explain."
