Science & Scientists Books - Page 3

Scien-Trickery: Riddles in Science

J. Patrick Lewis

Amazon Price: $6.00 List Price: $6.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Voyager Books Amazon Marketplace: 44 new & used starting at $1.59

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General AAS
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Literature -> Poetry -> General

Editorial Review:

These clever riddle-rhymes cover everything from dinosaurs to gravity. The illustrations incorporate clues about the riddles, and the answers themselves are subtly included for anyone who needs a little extra help.
Endnotes expand on Albert Einstein, the solar system, and other fascinating scientific topics.

"You Want Proof? I'll Give You Proof!": More Cartoons From Sidney Harris

Sidney Harris

List Price: $12.95 By: W H Freeman & Co (Sd) Amazon Marketplace: 17 new & used starting at $0.12

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Drawing -> General
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Drawing -> General AAS
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> History & Criticism -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

It's just not fair! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

There's the Poet Laureate of the United States, that profound artist who can capture the national experience in a few strokes of the pen. Labs up to national scale particle accelerators have their artists-in-residence, to bridge the gap between the deepest intellectual experience and the deepest emotional experience. Why isn't there a national Cartoonist Laureate, or funding for the Cartoonist-in-Residence at the most advanced centers of scientific research?

Maybe it's because we already have Sidney Harris. He unites our frontal lobes with our funny bones, with clear eyed but affectionate humor. That cover panel for example - yes, things do get a bit heated sometimes under the guise of anonymous review, or not so anonymous. (I had one of those go-rounds just yesterday, failing to praise what needed to be praised in front of the guy who needed to hear the praise. He's a Big Name and I'm not.)

Other humor fades into quaint anachronism just weeks after it's published. Not Harris. Look at the panel with two lab doors next to each other: "Conversion of petroleum products to food substitutes" and "Conversion of food products to petroleum substitutes." That's as pointed as today's headlines about food prices rising because of federally mandated ethanol for car fuel. Or the massive building labeled 'microprocessors'. Antlike people leaving the massive hive say "The smaller we make `em, the bigger we get." Heck, that's even more true today than it was 15+ years ago. I'm looking at the price of a new chip fabrication plant, compared to wealth of the world's nations - 30 to 40 nations each have a GDP lower than the $1-2B cost of a new fab, as of recent numbers. My favorite, though, might be a new Moses coming down from a new Mountain with new Laws: "1)Speed of light ... 2) Gravity ..." If I were a theist, I'd accept that Word before anything else.

Although these cartoons originally appeared 1991 and before, almost none of them have aged. Someone might niggle about the width of a necktie - pshaw. These cartoons are about the people in science, and face it: we haven't changed all that much since we were swinging in trees and flinging poo at each other. Harris captures all the flea-scratching and poo-flinging that really goes on inside our ivory towers and gigabuck labs. This doesn't degrade science, quite the opposite. It leaves me marvelling that creatures so flawed as ourselves have achieved what we have, even if there's an occasional flea to scratch.

-- wiredweird

The Infinite Book: A Short Guide to the Boundless, Timeless and Endless

John D. Barrow

Amazon Price: $20.80 List Price: $26.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Pantheon Amazon Marketplace: 30 new & used starting at $4.64

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists
Subjects -> Nonfiction -> Philosophy -> Metaphysics
Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Professional Science -> Physics -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

An examination of Infinity — in history and science — with excursions into literature, philosophy and religion, written by one of the most successful writers of popular science.

Infinity is surely the strangest idea that humans have ever thought. Where did it come from and what is it telling us about our Universe? Can there actually be infinities? Or is infinity just a label for something that is never reached, no matter how long you go on counting? Can you do an infinite number of things in a finite amount of time? Is the universe infinite?

But infinity is also the place where things happen that don’t. All manner of strange paradoxes and fantasies characterize an infinite universe. So what is it like to live in a Universe where nothing is original, where you can live forever, where anything that can be done, is done, over and over again?

These are some of the deep questions that the idea of the Infinite pushes us to ask. Throughout history, the Infinite has been a dangerous idea. Many have lost their lives, their careers, or their freedom for talking about it. The Infinite Book will take you on a tour of these dangerous questions and the strange answers that scientists, mathematicians, philosophers, and theologians have come up with to deal with its threats to our sanity.

365 Simple Science Experiments

E. Richard Churchill, Louis V. Loeschnig, Muriel Mandell

List Price: $12.95 By: Sterling Amazon Marketplace: 11 new & used starting at $3.48

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Ages 4-8 -> General AAS
Subjects -> Children's Books -> Science, Nature & How It Works -> Experiments & Projects -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Fabulously fun resource! 5 out of 5 stars.
47 of 47 people found this review helpful.

I purchased this book for the science division of our home schooling studies. It is laid out very well and it's easy to understand.

Using materials most people have around the house you can simply flip to the beginning and follow the headings for ideas.

What can you use straws for? Try out the section on "Clutching at Straws", make an Oboe, balance scale, spear a potato, etc.

Would you like to know other uses for lemon juice? Start on page 36. Keep going- check out soap suds, strings, paper cups, experiments with temperature, etc.

Basically you get it, you could spend many great minutes or hours teaching your kids through hands on learning.

Many of these can be done by an older child with very little help- a perfect solution to the "I'm bored" problem.

Please- turn of the TV, electronic games. etc. and let them use their brains- actively.

This is a wonderful book, one that every household would benefit from.

Editorial Review:

Make science magic every day of the year! "With an average of 3 or 4 accessible experiments per spread, the volume demonstrates how to utilize simple items such as straws, string, paper and eggs to make a galvanometer or a balance scale. Two-color drawings show step-by-step instructions, and a cast of animal characters inject some humor."--Publishers Weekly.

From Personal Ads to Cloning Labs: More Science Cartoons from Sidney Harris

Sidney Harris

List Price: $12.95 By: W.H. Freeman & Company Amazon Marketplace: 14 new & used starting at $7.80

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Drawing -> General
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Drawing -> General AAS
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> History & Criticism -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

The best science cartoons ever 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Sidney Harris is without question the best cartoonist with a scientific bent; his cartoons lampoon science and the people who practice it. He also throws an occasional barb at the people who follow pseudoscience as well. No area of science is beyond his reach, everything from the environment to nuclear physics appears in his cartoons. I reread this book every five years or so and smile every time I see the cartoons again. I also place copies of some of his cartoons in my office. My students enjoy them and they are a recurrent reminder not to take myself too seriously.

Geek humor at its best 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

'Science' magazine is one of the world's two premier outlets for the best in refereed general science reports, along with 'Nature.' It's also one of the places where Harris has published his brilliant cartoons.

The cover hooked me, but the first cartoon had me roaring out loud - a wry expression of the improbability (and wonder) of life on earth, and a clear but counterintuitive statement about chemical equilibrium in solutions with concentrations too low for statistical mechanics. Then a while later, a researcher emerges from a lab with a chimp, saying "It's just not working. HE's teaching ME primate speech" - the researcher herself being a primate, of course. Then the "String Theory Quartet." Then the Museum Dilemma: X-rays reveal a Leonardo under a Rembrandt. And so on.

Science is far too important a matter to be taken seriously. Face it, we're an irrational and emotional species, playing (often convincingly) at rationality. Harris does a wonderful service for humankind: he makes all that hard stuff as accessible and visceral as a belly laugh. Harris is the only cartoonist I know of who correctly translates the subtleties of science into the silliness of the human condition. This doesn't ridicule or trivialize the science. Quite the opposite, Harris makes it real.

If Harris didn't exist, we would have had to invent him. But damm, I wouldn't have been smart enough to think him up. I'm just glad he was there to do it himself.

//wiredweird

Editorial Review:

Harris's work has appeared in numerous publications, including The New Yorker, Playboy, and Discover. Now the author of Einstein Simplified and You Want Proof? I'll Give You Proof strikes again. "WHat's so funny about science? Sidney Harris, that's what!"--Isaac Asimov.

The Odd Body: Mysteries of Our Weird and Wonderful Bodies Explained

Stephen Juan

Amazon Price: $9.31 List Price: $10.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Andrews McMeel Publishing Amazon Marketplace: 46 new & used starting at $0.01

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> General
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> General AAS

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Good Book 5 out of 5 stars.
6 of 6 people found this review helpful.

"The Odd Body" is on of the most fascinating books I have read so far. It is
not one of those boring books on Body Science that you had to read back in
High School. This book answers all the weird, silly and bizarre questions
you have ever wanted to know about the human body.

It answers interesting questions like:
a) can you keep a severed head alive? (Something I have always wanted to
know)
b) Can we die laughing?
c) Can we live for ever?

Once I started to read this book I found myself unable to put it down. So if
you are the type of person who is into the mysteries of the human body I
would highly recommend this book.

Editorial Review:

Reading The Odd Body is like having your doctor patiently answer all your random questions, one by one. But Dr. Juan goes well beyond the usual and ordinary things people wonder about bodies, like why most individuals are right-handed or why you get chills when chalk screeches across a blackboard. He also tells readers how a dead body is made into a mummy, the success rate of those who bore holes in their own heads to relieve headaches, and much, much more.The Odd Body is a unique combination of fun and fascinating material that's delivered by an expert who happens to be a great storyteller. The book's question-and-answer format makes it easy to pick up, turn to any page, and immediately become drawn into the intricacies of anatomy and physiology while gaining a better understanding of humans' need to know more about themselves.

A Briefer History of Time

Eric Schulman

List Price: $14.95 By: St. Martin's Press Amazon Marketplace: 15 new & used starting at $2.30

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Essays
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Satire
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Monty Python meets Einstein 5 out of 5 stars.
12 of 13 people found this review helpful.

With a real gift for both science and humor, the author takes us from the Big Bang to The Internet. Many of the short sketches remind me of either Monty Python or the Farsign Theater (anyone who can describe the "birth of Netscape to the theme of the Beverly hillbillies is truely warped, or gifted.) Careful where you read this book or you will find yourself laughing out loud in airplanes, the subway, ect. After many presents that were ok-this was one of the best gifts that I ever got. An excellent purchase and a keeper. PS-Get Your Library to Order onw so you don't have to lend yours

Funny and informative -- the perfect package! 5 out of 5 stars.
10 of 11 people found this review helpful.

This book will appeal to scientists and non-scientists alike. The only requirement is a sense of humor -- the excessively serious-minded need not apply. The glossary is one of the best parts -- and I can't think of a single other book about which such a statement could be made.

Editorial Review:

From the Big Bang to the evolution of humans and the resignation of Richard Nixon, an astronomer offers a highly irreverent, historically entertaining, and scientifically correct overview of the most important cosmic milestones since the beginning of time.

The Solar Cat Book

Jim Augustyn

List Price: $4.95 By: Ten Speed Press Amazon Marketplace: 13 new & used starting at $3.25

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Cats, Dogs & Animals
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Very clever 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

The Solar Cat Book is a great introduction to solar energy using cats as a model system. Augustyn teaches us about solar energy and heat flow mechanics through a series of small stories and jokes. The illustrations and cartoons are not to be missed. Although one of the reviews suggests that children can read this book, I think that it is intended and is more appropriate for adults. It is really a shame that this book is out of print. I think that it should be revived!

This book is a perfect gift for solar cat lovers! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This is a great gift book for anyone who has anything to do with either cats or solar energy. I was very disappointed not to find it amongst Amazon's extensive inventory.

Editorial Review:

An illustrated, playful comparison of how cats and people use solar energy.

Anti Gravity: Allegedly Humorous Writing from Scientific American

Steve Mirsky

Amazon Price: $13.56 List Price: $16.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: The Lyons Press Amazon Marketplace: 63 new & used starting at $0.01

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Essays
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> General

Editorial Review:

Fast-reading, funny prose on science, pop culture, politics, and life.

Science with a Smile

Amazon Price: $44.00 List Price: $44.00 Usually ships in 1 to 4 weeks By: Taylor & Francis Amazon Marketplace: 15 new & used starting at $7.70

Buy at Amazon.com

Browse similar items by category:
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Satire
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Science & Scientists
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Humor -> Satire, General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 1 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Thought-provoking, insightful, and hilarious essays 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I checked out this book at the library, and found some of the essays so poignant or funny that I had to tell my classmates about them. In particular, "Adventures of a Cross-Disciplinarian", "Age of the Earth", "How to Write a Paper", and "How to Give a Seminar" (approximate title) stood out for me.

I would recommend having a used copy or borrowing this book from the library.

Editorial Review:

This anthology presents the reader with a fascinating view of the whimsical side of science. A unique and historical collection of humorous stories, anecdotes, verse and cartoons touching every science has been meticulously compiled by the author from worldwide sources. In addition to hours of amusement, this book will provide the reader with glimpses of the intensely human ambitions, frustrations, and elations of scientists as well as the changing attitudes within their sciences. The text is well illustrated and can be read from cover to cover with pleasure or sampled at leisure.