text: The ionisation energy of the neutral molecule is 14.4558 eV (or 116593 cm).
  The dissociation energy of neutral Ar in the ground state is 98.7 cm which is hundreds of times weaker than that of typical molecules. The dissociation energy of Ar is 1.3144 eV or 10601 cm.
  The Ar molecule can exist in a number of different vibration and rotational states. If the molecule is not rotating, there are eight different vibration states. But if the molecule spins fast, vibration is more likely to shake it apart, and at the 30th rotational level there are only two stable and one metastable state of vibration. In combination, there are 170 different possibilities that are stable. In the metastable states, energy will be released if the molecule breaks apart into two separate atoms, but some extra energy is required to overcome the attraction between the atoms. Quantum tunneling can result in the molecule breaking apart with no extra energy. However this takes time, which can vary from 10 seconds to several centuries. Molecules crashing into each other also results in breakup of the van der Waals molecules. At standard conditions this only takes about 100 picoseconds.