A full history of polishing would include many of the great names of classical physics, for instance Hooke and Newton. A second interesting feature: this is that differences of opinion which occurred a century or more ago still exist in essentially the same form today, Consider the following quotations;
'. . . the process of polishing is in fact nothing more than the grinding down of large asperities into small ones by gritty powders which . . . are yet vast masses in comparison with the ultimate molecules of matter. A surface polished artificially must bear somewhat the same kind of relation to the surface of a liquid, or a crystal, that a ploughed field does to the most deliberately polished mirror, the work of human hands.' (Herschel, 1830)
'. . . it seems probable that no pits are formed by the breaking out of fragments but that the material is worn away ... almost molecularly . . . one is inevitably led to the conclusion that no coherent fragments containing a large number of molecules are broken out. If this be so there would be much less difference than Herschel thought between the surfaces of a polished solid and a liquid.' (Lord Rayleigh, 1901)
'Firstly, polished surfaces always consist of fine grooves. Secondly material is removed at a significant rate during polishing. Thirdly, a plastically deformed layer is
produced . . . Polishing differs from abrasion only in degree on all these counts.' (Samuels, 1967)
'The concept of polishing by removal of material on a molecular scale is in accord with theory and experiment.' (Rabinowicz, 1970)
'Plus ça change, plus c'est la mime chose.' (A Karr, 1849).
Between the times represented by the above quotations, ideas about the mechanism of polishing have ebbed and flowed and have incorporated a number of different theories.
