What are ceramics? Glass, tiles, pottery, porcelain, bricks, cement, diamond, and graphite—you can probably see from this little list that "ceramics" is a very broad term, and one we're going to have difficulty defining. What do all these very different materials have in common? From a chemical viewpoint, we define ceramics in terms of what they're not. So you'll find most science textbooks and dictionaries telling you ceramics are nonmetallic and inorganic solids (ones that aren't metal or based on carbon compounds); in other words, ceramics are what we're left with when we take away metals and organic materials (including wood , plastics , rubber , and anything that was once alive).
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