How do atoms get more electrons than the number of their protons?
Thats a good question! First of all chemists always say atoms or molecules ‘want’ to do something but obviously they don’t really want to do anything they just do it for various reasons (such as becoming more stable or charges atracting one another). A Flourine atom doesn’t actually know it’s a flourine atom. As for why fluorine ‘wants’ 10 electrons to become stable has something to do with bonding orbitals and lowering the energy of the molecule which is favourable. Most Non Metallic elements try and get a number of electrons that match that of those in group 18. This generally maximises their stability. So if there are 2 Fluorine atoms it would be better for them to donate an electron each to form a bond and create F2 which would place more electrons in bonding orbitals making the molecule more stable by lowering its energy. If your wondering know why atoms ‘want’ to be in a lower energy state then all I can say is they just do but I hope someone else can explain that better than me.
