[ngngngng]

I've never learned a bit of Chemistry. I assume there are formulas to determine how substrates and reagents will react with each other? And the process chemists understand these formulas better than most?

Apologies for the assumptions in these question, but are there many reactions in organic chemistry that are completely unknown?

This actually seems pretty fun. I'd love to have a reason to study it and a means to do something with my studies.

[Reelin]

> I assume there are formulas to determine how substrates and reagents will react with each other?

Well there are things we've experimentally tested, and things we haven't. Most reactions fall into the latter, and we can only make educated guesses about them.

If we could analytically solve the Schrödinger equation (we can't), we could accurately predict outcomes under perfect reaction conditions.

> are there many reactions in organic chemistry that are completely unknown?

Yes, the vast majority. But bear in mind that we can make educated guesses based on patterns, so we're not completely clueless.

[Symbiote]

Which country's education system doesn't have any chemistry at all?

Chemical formulae are required study for 11-14 year olds in England, for what it's worth. (Probably starting with words: methane + oxygen → carbon dioxide, and later writing a balanced equation: CH₄ + 2O₂ → CO₂ + 2H₂O.) The reaction presented is obviously much, much more complicated, but the same concept.

Edit: catalysts are covered too, although I don't know if the notation of putting them above the → is introduced at this age. https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zqd2mp3/revision/6

[ngngngng]

This was in California. I had to take a science class but there were many options and I just took other things besides chemistry.

[joyj2nd]

"I assume there are formulas to determine how substrates and reagents will react with each other?"

There are rules, yes, of cause. But always the question: how much will react? And not: will I get the (reaction) product? But: how many (different) reaction products will I get. This is actually the reason why you need the purification steps after each reaction. Otherwise you would get an "reaction tree", in the end, byproducts reacting with other byproducts and you would get a, basically infinite amount of different end products.