The Barmaid's Brain: And Other Strange Tales from Science - Hardcover

Ingram, Jay

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0716741202 ISBN 13: 9780716741206

Publisher: W. H. Freeman, 2000

Synopsis

Here are twenty-one unexpected and fascinating tales of science's stranger facts and episodes-from why we laugh, to why moths fly to the light, to how slinging drinks affects both memory and perception in a barmaid's brain (for the better!).

Best-selling author and media personality Jay Ingram offers investigations from the very edges of science that evoke the impressive breadth of the scientific mind and demonstrate how science works. Ingram explores how science adds to a re-examination of history with startling new theories about the Salem witches and a psychiatric profile of Joan of Arc. He describes remarkable battles-from the parasitic nastiness of cowbirds to the microscopic viciousness of bacteriophages. And he lets us in on some of the odder concerns of scientists: Will we be able to build a ladder attaching earth to an orbiting satellite? Is it possible that early humans spent their lives in water instead of on land?

Surprising, witty, and always edifying, The Barmaid's Brain serves up a splendid cocktail of fact, theory, and anecdote guaranteed to entertain and stimulate.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

"Ingram . . . acts as a kind of cross between a clear-eyed journalist and a tongue-in-cheek comedian."
--The Globe and Mail

"Jay Ingram has taken on the role of alchemist: he turns the lead of scientific jargon into literary gold."
--Calgary Herald

"Ingram is a wizard at transforming complex curiosities of the natural and physical sciences into entertaining anecdotes."
--The Edmonton Sun

"Lively . . . witty . . . In the tradition of Stephen Jay Gould and Oliver Sacks, [Ingram] manages a difficult trick--making the minutiae of science seem alluring to the uninitiated."
--Maclean's

About the Author:

Jay Ingram is the author of the best-selling books The Science of Everyday Life, Talk, Talk, Talk, and The Burning House, which won the 1995 Canadian Science Writers Book Award. He is also the author of three children's books:

About this edition

• Publisher: W. H. Freeman
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0716741202
• ISBN 13: 9780716741206
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 271