Enlightening books on the everyday science that surrounds us
Sometimes, in our quest to find answers to the Big Questions, we run right past so many fascinating little ones.
Here are 9 books that shine a light on the little mysteries of everyday life. If you’ve ever wondered about things like, how do they predict whether it’ll rain on this spot tomorrow, or why is this cup of coffee so darn fine, or why does it feel better to say “damn” and not “darn”, here are the answers you seek!
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Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Robin Wall Kimmerer is a botanist with extensive training in asking questions and testing hypotheses through the scientific method. But she is also a member of the Potawatomi Nation, a people indigenous to the region around the Great Lakes whose ancestral teachings regard plants and animals as the oldest teachers. In this unique work of science writing, she takes us on a tour of nature along parallel tracks of science and traditional teaching, stopping to smell every flower and examine every weed to show how the scientific method is just a part of a complete understanding of the natural world.
View eBookChaos: Making a New Science
For centuries, science sought to put order to the natural world and any anomalies to that order were ignored as insignificant blips in the data. But what if those blips are a clue to a vastly more complex universe? Can something as tiny and seemingly insignificant as the beating of a butterfly’s wing set off a hurricane? Yes. In this seminal work and in wonderfully descriptive prose, Gleick describes the study of chaos theory, which seeks to explain the seemingly random patterns that characterise many natural phenomena.
How to Make Coffee: The Science Behind the Bean
Getting a decent cup of coffee is a fairly simple thing -- all you need is grounds, water, a pot, and heat. But an excellent cup of joe -- that’s a whole different story. The world of coffee for a true aficionado is a multilayered and magnificent thing, and this book is your complete guide to the science swirling in a great cup.
View eBookA Grain of Salt: The Science and Pseudoscience of What We Eat
Navigating the latest food fad or diet craze can be both confusing and a total waste of time. Dr. Schwarcz separates science from fiction in food chemistry to help you figure out once and for all what you really need to fuel your best life.
Swearing is Good for You: The Amazing Science of Bad Language
Bloody hell, can it be true? Seems so -- this totally fun exploration of the science of bad language shows swearing has been around since humans first began to communicate and is, among other things, an excellent painkiller and stress reliever. Curses, who knew?!
The Unpersuadables: Adventures with the Enemies of Science
Why do seemingly smart people believe dumb things? Such was the beginning of novelist and Esquire contributing editor Will Storr’s journey all over the world to meet with heretics and history deniers in an attempt to see the world through their eyes. In a mix of memoir, investigative journalism, and the latest research from neuroscience and experimental psychology, Storr reveals why and how we believe what we do, and how little we can count on our beliefs to be “true.”
Bad Singer: The Surprising Science of Tone Deafness and How We Hear Music
Some of us can sing like the angels or Adele, and some of us, not. Falconer decidedly falls in the “not” category, though he passionately loves music. How can both things be true? Here he delightfully describes his attempt to overcome tone-deafness -- which is an actual rare neurological condition -- in this fascinating work of scientific discovery, musicology, psychology, and personal odyssey.
Saved by Science: The Hope and Promise of Synthetic Biology
Infectious disease. Hunger. Climate change. Could these (and many other) mammoth problems facing humanity be addressed by technology that now allows scientists to build at the smallest scale nature allows? Dr. Mark J. Poznansky thinks so, and he explains here in terms any interested reader can understand how this new technology of synthetic biology can address these difficult problems through the design and construction of "biological apps."
View eBookAsk a Science Teacher: 250 Answers to Questions You've Always Had About How Everyday Stuff Really Works
If you’ve ever spent time with a kid you know there are very many questions and so few answers. It is a rare person who knows how planes stay in the air or whether fish sleep. Enter the unstumpable master-explainer Schneckel, who here reveals 250 of life’s enduring mysteries in clear language even a child will understand.
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