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The earliest people to consider this were the Greek philosophers. They observed that a rock could be broken again and again, eventually becoming dust. But since everything is finite according to logic, they hypothesised that we would reach some point where the object at that size could not be broken further; their word for this point was atomos, meaning 'uncuttable', something that cannot be divided further. During the 17th and 18th centuries, various scientists proved that some materials could not be broken further by chemical means. However in the early 20th century the atom was split into itss component subatomic particles, showing that is not truly indivisble. Further tests and experiments demonstrated that everything has a definite molecular shape; these are confirmed by scanning electron microscopes able to show us the details at this scale.

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Q: How did the early scientists figure out that all matter consisted of atoms and molecules?
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