It was an early source of amazement for me to learn that we could actually calculate the colours of certain substances from their electron transitions (albeit w

It was an early source of amazement for me to learn that we could actually calculate the colours of certain substances from their electron transitions (albeit with some empirically determined constants). A diagram, an equation, a few constants, and boom, you have the actual colour of a substance that matches your real-life observations. For reasons like this, I was quite into chemistry for a few years in high school. It's a demonstration of our ability to discover the principles of reality and make meaningful predictions, rather than merely observe and catalog nature as our ancestors did. It's one of the wondrous aspects of science for me.