If I may interpret Michael Edmiston's position, I feel that it is
one taken because as a chemist he is really not interested in weight
*per se*; he is interested in mass. To a physicist weight is akin to
force, not mass. Chemists, however, like to call mass "weight", e.g.
"atomic weight". Michael's position makes perfect sense to me when I
interpret it in that way. Weight is the quantity of mass which must
be calculated starting with what he calls the apparent weight, a
reading on a scale which weighs samples in a bouying fluid, air. My
physicist's ideal scale does not take bouyancy due to air into
account unless it affects the accuracy of a particular application
in a significant manner. As I said, in that case bouyancy must be
accounted for, but weight is still what an ideal scale would read in
a vacuum.