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[[Category:Popular Science|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|Popular Science]]==Popular science==__NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Alexandra Bruce|title=2012: Science or Superstition|rating=3.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=The fuss about 2012 has not started just recently. The first book to feature the story was from a Yale professor, in 1966. We've also had prog rock bands named after Popol Vuh, the Maya creation myth. But as the crunch date of December 21st, 2012 - the winter solstice that year <!- nears, it's becoming a very big story indeed. Even though it sounds absurd - the end of a 5,125Remove -year long cycle of the Maya calendar, which started on August 13th, 3114BCE - or was judged to start then, when they came across this concept a couple of thousand years into that period. Surely they couldn't predict the future from their 'primitive' state with such accuracy?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1934708283</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Baker1788360702|title=They've Got Your Number|rating=4.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=If you are in the slightest bit paranoidCharles, worry that ''Big Brother'' is always watching or like to believe that you are not a number, but a free man (or woman), then this may not be the book for you, as it will do nothing to dispel any of those worries. If, on the other hand, you think 'the mathematical modelling of humanity' sounds like one of the sexiest things ever, and are chomping at the bit to learn more about it, then you might well be interested in what Business Week journalist Baker has to say.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099507021</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewThe Alternative Prince: An Unauthorised Biography|author=Dr Aaron Carroll and Dr Rachel Vreeman|title=Don't Swallow Your Gum|rating=5|genre=Lifestyle|summary='''BANG'''. That's the sound of copious urban myths being shot down. '''BANG'''. That's the sound of the old wives slamming the door, as their tales get revealed as baseless. '''CLICK'''. That's the noise lots of ill-informed websites make as they get closed down. All noises come due to this brilliant book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043369</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Robert Rowland Smith |title=Breakfast with SocratesEdzard Ernst
|rating=4
|genre=Popular ScienceBiography|summary=In For over forty years, Prince Charles has been an ardent supporter of alternative medicine and complementary therapies. ''Charles, The Alternative Prince'Breakfast with Socrates'critically assesses the Prince's opinions, subtitled A Philosophy beliefs and aims against the background of Everyday Life, former Oxford Fellow Robert Roland Smith takes various elements the scientific evidence. There are few instances of a 'typical' day his beliefs being vindicated and provides insight into what an eclectic collection his relentless promotion of thinkers might treatments which have no scientific support has done considerable damage to offer the reputation of a man who is proud of his refusal to make these mundane routines more interesting. After allapply evidence-based, as Socrates declared 'the unexamined life is not worth living'logical reasoning to his ambitions.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682371</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James Hannam0192779230|title=God's PhilosophersVery Short Introductions for Curious Young Minds: How the Medieval The Invisible World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Everybody knows that the Medieval people thought the world was flat and that it wasn't until Columbus proved otherwise that they found out it was a sphere. Everybody knows that the inquisition burned people at the stake for their scientific ideas and that Copernicus lived in perpetual fear of persecution. Everyone knows that the Pope banned human dissection and the number zero, and everybody is wrong.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848310706</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewGerms|author=Sally Kindberg and Tracey Turner|title=The Comic Strip History of SpaceIsabel Thomas
|rating=5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
|summary=Sally Kindberg and Tracey Turner treated us 'Germs' seems to have become a [[The Comic Strip History of catch-all word to cover anything unpleasant which has the World by Sally Kindberg and Tracey Turner|Comic Strip History of potential to make you ill. In the World]]first book in what looks to be a very promising new series, OUP and Isabel Thomas have now turned their attention provided a clear and accessible introduction to space. They explain to children everything from the origins world of the universe, to germs. We get an informed look at how people originally thought about diseases and what ancient civilisations they thought caused them and how the thinking has developed over time. The vocabulary can be confusing but Thomas gives a regular box headed 'speak like a scientist' which explains some of the starstrickiest concepts and you'll soon be familiar with bacteria, through astronomers discovering the truth about planetsfungi, right up to current space missionsprotists and viruses – and how we should protect ourselves.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0747594325</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Stewartgareth_steel|title=Professor Stewart's Hoard of Mathematical Treasures|rating=4.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Ian Stewart has been collecting mathematical curiosities, puzzles and stories since he was 14. He published his ''Cabinet of Mathematical Curiosities'' in 2008, and hot on its success, he's sharing this second volume with us.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682924</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNever Work With Animals|author=Mick O'Hare|title=How To Make A TornadoGareth Steel
|rating=4
|genre=Popular ScienceAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Another year, another must-read book from I don't often begin my reviews with a warning but with ''Never Work With Animals'' it seems to be appropriate. Stories of a vet's life have proved popular since ''All Creatures Great and Small'' but ''Never Work With Animals'' is definitely not the New Scientist. Wecompanion volume you've been here before with [[Do Polar Bears Get Lonely? by Mick Olooking for. As a TV show the author would argue that 'Hare|polar bears]], [[Why Don't PenguinsAll Creatures' Feet Freeze? by Mick O'Hare|penguins]] lacked realism, as do other similar programmes. Gareth Steel says that the book is not suitable for younger readers and [[How To Fossilise Your Hamster by Mick O- after reading - I agree with him. He says that he'Hare|hamsters]]s written it to inform and provoke thought, particularly amongst aspiring vets. Now It deals with some uncomfortable and distressing issues but itdoesn's time to turn our attention to how to make a tornadot lack sensitivity, although there are occasions when you would be best choosing between reading and all the other crazy experiments that scientists have done over the yearseating.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682878</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Eva Hoffman0241480442|title=Time (Big Ideas)Healthy Vegan The Cookbook: Vegan Cooking Meets Nutrition Science|author=Niko Rittenau and Sebastian Copien
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular ScienceCookery|summary=''Time'' is one of ''Big Ideas'' series of books aiming Emotionally, I am a vegan. Mentally, I am a vegan. I read [[How to revisit Love Animals in a Human-Shaped World by Henry Mance]] and was appalled by the greatest notions and concepts and to provide them with way in which we treat animals in our search for (preferably cheap) food. Practically, I am not a modern summary and understandingvegan. The series strives It worked for a while apart from the odd blip with regard to cause people to think and debate, cheese but then a perfect storm of those events which you hope don't occur too often in your lifetime tempted me back to reanimal-evaluate and doubtbased protein. Another It wasn''Big Ideas'' books deal with topics such t the taste - I know that I can get plant-based food that tastes just as good as ''Democracy'', ''Identity'' and ''Bodies''anything plundered from the animal kingdom - it was the ease of being able to get sufficient protein when meals were often snatched in a few spare moments.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846680387</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Brian Cox and Jeff ForshawDaniel Gibbs with Teresa H Barker|title=Why Does E Equal mc Squared?A Tattoo on my Brain|rating=43.5|genre=Popular ScienceAutobiography|summary=Why does E=mc² Alzheimer's is a disease that slowly wears away your identity and why should we care? Two questions that every intelligent person should be able to answersense of self. I have been directly affected by this cruel disease, but I'll bet as have many. Your memories and personality worn away like a statue over time affected the elements. It seems as if nature wants that 95% couldnfinal victory over you and your dignity. This is what makes Daniel Gibbs'tmemoir so admirable. Brian Cox Daniel Gibbs is a neurologist who was diagnosed with Alzheimers and Jeff Forshaw explain this most famous of equations to the layperson has documented his journey in such a way that they won't need anything more complicated than Pythagoras' theorem to understand itA Tattoo on my Brain''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0306817586</amazonuk>1108838936
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tadg Farrington0099551063|title=The Average Life Wisdom of the Average Person|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Back Psychopaths: Lessons in schoollife from Saints, we would often bemoan the idea of 'average', saying that like being 'normal', if there were such a thing, who would even want to be it? There could be nothing worse, we thought, than being average. Except...there is by definition a whole lot worse than 'average' – the exact same amount that is better than average, in fact. And that was the problem.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224086235</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSpies and Serial Killers|author=Richard D Ryder|title=Nelson, Hitler and DianaDr Kevin Dutton
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Was Horatio Nelson, a navy officer of great renown, forever thrusting himself into the limelight, doing it because his mother passed away when he was nine? Was '' 'Donald Trump outscores Hitler overly affected by his father dying in a time of paternal disapproval, and a kind of Oedipal reaction to being the man in the house making him suffer when she herself died? And can Diana, Princess of Waleson psychopathic traits' claims Oxford University researcher.' parents' divorce lead to a claim she was a sufferer of borderline personality disorder?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845401662</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stuart Sutherland1849767343|title=IrrationalityCount on Me|author=Miguel Tanco
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular ScienceChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=The belief that humans are, essentially, rational dates to the Greek antiquity, title and although intellectual and philosophical fashions changed throughout the epochs, the capacity format of this book might lead you to reason and behave in think that it's either about responsibility - or it's a rational manner is often considered to be basic 1-2-3 book for those just starting out on the numbers journey. It isn't: it's a defining characteristics hymn of mature humanitypraise to maths. Irrational behaviours have been seen as an evidence of psychiatric or otherwise pathology It's about why maths is so wonderful and how you meet it in everyday life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905177070</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Brian DunningB08B39QNRH|title=Skeptoid 2The Curious History of Writer's Cramp: More Critical Analysis of Pop Phenomena Solving an age-old problem|author=Michael Pritchard
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Brian Dunning is the author responsible for a series of weekly podcasts debunking and analysing a variety of dubious, pseudo-scientific, un-scientific and downright loony ideas, claims and myths common or persistent in the pop (and not so pop) culture. ''Skeptoid 2'' Society is essentially a based on speech but civilisation requires the written version of those podcasts, a collection of fifty pieces of which many can be also read or listened to at his [http://skeptoid.com/ website].|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1440422850</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Dan Gardner|title=Risk: The Science and Politics of Fear|rating=4.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=Picture a world terrorised by just two words. A civilised, healthy, wealthy world no less, in thrall to and under threat from two words. Not what those two words represent even, just the actual small phrase. It sounds ridiculous, but when I say those two words – word''bird flu'' – and you've stopped laughing, you may well remember how the panic started, the non-existent worry was the biggest concern of the western media for some time, and then it went away again.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0753515539</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jerry A Coyne1776572858|title=Why Evolution is TrueHow Do You Make a Baby?|author=Anna Fiske and Don Bartlett (translator)
|rating=5
|genre=Popular ScienceHome and Family|summary=This book should not be neededIt's more than sixty years since I asked how babies were made.The theory of evolution has huge explanatory My mother was deeply embarrassed and predictive powers and it is also, philosophically, told me that she'd get me a wonderful one to behold: book about it shows a unity of all living things and our human connection to them all; through the billions of years and millions of generations, from the first bacteria to the human beings capable of understanding the story of life as it unfolded on this planet, the story told by the evolution theory is an exhilarating one; possibly the greatest story ever told by science. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199230846</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Philip Ball|title=Shapes|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=''Shapes'' is one volume A couple of days later I was handed a new trilogy born out of pamphlet (which delivered nothing more than the author's 1999 book 'The Self-Made Tapestry: Pattern Formation in Nature'basics, in clinical language which he surveyed a range of contemporary scientific investigation into the extent of nature's patterning with examples taken from areas such as plant growth, minerals, shells, desert sands, lightning, galaxies and atoms. This book has had never been restructured into the stand-alone volumes ''Shapes'', ''Flow'' and ''Branches'', with new material added.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199237964</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Gribbin and Michael White|title=Darwin: A Life used in Science|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=This straightforward our house before) and likeable biography of Charles Darwin charts the evolution of his theories of evolution, while providing solid insights into the man in the context of his upbringing, education and family life. Importantly, I was told that it makes you want to read wouldn't be discussed any further as it 'On the Origin of the Species'wasn', acting as a primer for the ideas introduced in that famous volume. t something which nice people talked about''Darwin: A Life in Science'' is pitched beautifully for the reader of popular science, yet gives plenty of signposts enabling future study. It also gives a very believable picture of Darwin, based on convincing evidence and without falling into florid psychological speculation.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847391494</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Patricia Fara|title=Science: A Four Thousand Year History|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=From Ancient Babylon to the present day, Patricia Fara presents a definitive history of science. It I 's wide-ranging enough to cover simply everything you could hope it would, whilst being in-depth enough so that you gain a sufficient understanding of the science and the people involved. It serves as a simple reference guide for the layperson - it's riddled with information, whilst also being perfectly readable as a knew'biography of science'. If you ever wanted to know anything about the history of sciencemore, this is the book for you. Patricia Fara but was also kind enough to be [[The Interview: Bookbag Talks to Patricia Fara|interviewed by Bookbag]].|amazonuk=<amazonuk>019922689X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Neil deGrasse Tyson|title=The Pluto Files: The Rise and Fall of America's Favourite Planet|rating=4.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=As director of the Hayden Planetarium, Neil deGrasse Tyson grouped the celestial bodies by type, rather than listing them under the arbitrary heading of 'planetslittle '. This put Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars together in one group, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune together in another, and left poor little Pluto out in the cold. His aim was for people to gain a greater understanding, rather than just knowing the names. The result was widespread outrage amongst newspapers, schoolchildren and the public at large. It was a scientifically-sound position, and ultimately fuelled the International Astronomical Union to define what was and wasn't a planet. The Pluto Files is a fascinating, educational and hilarious journey from Plutowiser's discovery, through its rise in public consciousness (by way of Disney), to the controversy about its planetary status, its ultimate downgrading, and the public's response to it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0393065200</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Michael D Lemonick|title=The Georgian Star: How William and Caroline Herschel Revolutionized Our Understanding of the Cosmos|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=No-one can ever look at the night skies above our heads as Galileo did. The light pollution covering so much of our planet makes it impossible to see nearly as much as he might. ConverselyThankfully, he would times have adored living in a time such as ours – with the technology to show him so much he couldn't see, so much he daren't dream of. Sitting happily between those two extremes was William Herschelchanged.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>039306574X</amazonuk>
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|rating=4
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Considering the amount We are living in a time of money spent on advertising rapid change, and the staggering sizes of corporate marketing budgets, itwe's astonishing to what extent re worried about it's unclear what exactly those huge amounts of money buy. Lord Lever famously said Dorling tells us that half of the money spent on advertising latter is wasted - but he had no way of knowing which halfnormal, natural and probably good for us.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847940110</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John D Barrow|title=Cosmic Imagery: Key Images in We are designed to worry and with the History current state of Science |rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=John D. Barrow is one of the most passionate popularisers of science, and hewhat we's also one of re doing in the most noticeably filled with wonder and joy of the discovery and capable of transmitting this joy and wonder world we have much to his readersbe worried about. ''Cosmic Imagery'' is veritably filled with such wonder However, over the next three-hundred-and following -some pages, if you can follow the old adages of one picture being worth a thousand words and each picture telling a storyarguments, itsets out in scientific detail why either we shouldn's subtitled t be as worried as we are, or in some cases that we''key images re worrying about the wrong things. Mostly. Because mostly, things are not changing as rapidly as we think they are. In fact, the rate of change in many things is slowing down and the history direction of science'': each of the eighty nine essays making up the book indeed has an image as a starting pointchange will in some cases go into reverse.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224075233</amazonuk>0300243405
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John D BarrowLangford_Emily|title=100 Essential Things You DidnEmily't Know You Didn't Know s Numbers|author=Joss Langford
|rating=4
|genre=Popular ScienceChildren's Non-Fiction|summary=I love those collections that appear at Christmas: Emily found words ''useful'77 places to visit before you die', but counting was what she loved best. Obviously, you can count anything and there'39 facts s no limit to how far you would never suspect about a Reliant Robin'can go, '101 tips for making your wife but then Emily moved a bedroom goddessstep further and began counting in twos. She knew all about odd and even numbers. Then she began counting in threes: half of the list were even numbers, but the other half was odd and it was this list of odd numbers which occurred when you counted in threes which she called ''threeven''. (Actually, this confused me a little bit at first as they' Some re a subset of these collections have not much utility beyond stocking-filling and providing the odd numbers but sound as though they ought to be a mild diversion from subset of the Boxing Day boredomeven numbers, the best are genuinely educational as but it all worked out well as fascinatingwhen I really thought about it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847920039</amazonuk>)
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=George Johnson1910593508|title=The Ten Most Beautiful ExperimentsApollo|author=Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins
|rating=5
|genre=Popular ScienceHistory|summary=''The Ten Most Beautiful Experiments'' looks at This incredible graphic novel is a love letter to the Moon landings and the passion for the most elegantsubject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, stylish, simple, ground-breaking, thrilling Chris Baker and inspiring experiments throughout historyMike Collins. There's This is a real feel that story we know well and because of this is how science should be done: one person, alone the authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that we can fill in the blanks. These shortcuts are the only downside to the book. If you've ever read a room, forming comic book adaptation of a hypothesis film you will be familiar with the slight feeling that there are scenes missing and creating that dialogue has been trimmed. This is a method to test it. It doubles graphic novel that could easily have been three times as a potted biography of some of the greatest scientists ever, but it's more about the experiments themselves than the peoplelong and still felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224071963</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=P D Smith1999308719|title=Doomsday MenLive Forever Manual: The Real Dr Strangelove Science, ethics and companies behind the Dream of the Superweapon new anti-aging treatments|author=Adrian Cull
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular ScienceLifestyle|summary=Having dallied with the odd CND march back in the For many years now I'70s-80sve (half) joked that I intended to live forever and that so far, it was working out OK. Time has passed though and while not normally although I'm a huge sci-fi fan (yet inordinately fond great deal fitter and healthier than most people of certain creaky films like The Day The Earth Stood Still - my age there were a few nagging health problems which were tipping my life out of balance. It was time to look for a new approach and as well as offering underwhelming special effectsso often happens, grapples with huge ideas about the death of humankind) reviewing gods brought me the book I found a great deal to enjoy in needed. ''Doomsday MenLive Forever Manual: Science, ethics and companies behind the new anti-ageing treatments'' and its history of weapons which may now be capable of entirely destroying seemed like the planetanswer to my problems - only you get so much more than just 101 tips.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141019158</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Charles Darwin and David Quammen (Author and Editor)1847941834|title=On the Origin of Species: The Illustrated Edition Atomic Habits|author=James Clear
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular ScienceLifestyle|summary=There I've said this before but there are some books I think that you have to readseek out, some books that you stumble across and there are some books that drop into your life because you have to really MUST read. them, like, right now! ''Atomic Habits'' This is one of the latter, and finally in a volume that goes a long way to making it one you have to own – with the approach to this classic making this edition the definitive one for a long time to comelast category.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1402756399</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mike Toms and Paul SterryHoneyborne BlueII|title=Garden Birds and Wildlife|rating=5|genre=Home and Family|summary=''Garden Birds & Wildlife'' has been created and published under the auspices of British Trust for Ornithology (though the actual publisher is, possibly in the spirit of penance for damage inflicted on wildlife by the motorcar, the AA). Accordingly, the main focus of the guide is, indeed, on birds. It contains a wealth of information: from birdwatching to bird biology and behaviour, including visual guides to eggs and nests; practical tips and guides to bird watching, feeding (what, how and where), creating a bird-and-wildlife- friendly garden and building nest boxes; it's all there, with copious illustrations, clear text and more interesting or practically relevant facts and tips in separate insert boxes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749559128</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewBlue Planet II|author=Manjit Kumar|title=Quantum: Einstein, Bohr James Honeyborne and the Great Debate About the Nature of RealityMark Brownlow
|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular ScienceAnimals and Wildlife|summary=Two theories You may well remember when the sticking of a number '2' after a film title was suggesting something of prestige - that the first film had been so good it was fully justified to have shaped modern physics something more. That has hardly been proven correct, but it has until recently almost been confined to the cinema - you barely got a TV series worthy of a numbered sequel, and thus our understanding of never in the world: quantum mechanics and general relativityof non-fiction. The relativity deals with huge scale systems If someone has made a nature series about, say, Alaska (and gravity - boy aren't there are a lot of those these days) and workswants to make another, while in why she just makes another - nothing would justify the process creating its own well know paradoxesnumeral. Quantum mechanics applies at But some nature programmes do have the prestige, the atomic (energy and lower) levelsthe heft to demand follow-ups. Of And after five years in the twomaking, itthe BBC's the quantum mechanics that is - and Blue Planet series has been - the most mind boggling for scientists and laymen alikedelivered a second helping.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848310293</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Maryanne Wolf1783099593|title=Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain|rating=3.5|genre=Popular Science|summary=It took me a while to get hold of this book. It arrived, I opened it, and my other half (who is not an avid reader) took it straight out of my hands. The next day, my parents arrived, and spent their weekend visiting me taking it in turns to read chapters. It dissects the magic of reading in a way that does not detract from the wonder of the achievement that is humans learning to read; it made me laugh, it made me sad, and, I have to admit, I threw it across the room more than once. It's a book that provokes, at least from me – and from those around me – strong reactions.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848310307</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSpeaking Up|author=Carol and Dinah Mack|title=A Field Guide to Demons, Fairies, Fallen Angels and Other Subversive SpiritsAllyson Jule
|rating=4
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=I should probably mention before I start this review that I have 'Speaking Up' has a bit fascinating subject matter - how language reflects and shapes our notions of an obsession with mythology and folkloregender. A casual glance It looks at my bookshelf shows a selection our use of thick reference bookslanguage in media, education, religion, the workplace and many of my favourite fiction books have their roots in some personal relationships. Author Allyson Jule calls on an encyclopedic body of research from the mid-twentieth century to the various mythologies from around present day. Reading it, we feel that she has studied everything that has ever been said on gendered linguistics; she references Foucault and the worldKardashians with equal rigour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681391</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mick O'HareCampbell_Astra|title=Do Polar Bears Get Lonely?Ad Astra: An illustrated guide to leaving the planet|author=Dallas Campbell
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Have So… you ever noticed that just before Christmas want to leave the bookshops are swamped with books of triviaplanet? TheyBefore you do you're usually full d better study the whole history of interesting (or otherwise) facts which can be bandied around in the pub or over the dinner party table, promptly human space flight to get up to be forgotten by speed. That could take a while… if only there was a handy guide that could condense it alldown for you. ''Do Polar Bears Get Lonely?'' is '''not''' in Enter Dallas Campbell with this classbook: it's popular science with a hundred and one intriguing science questions of An illustrated guide to leaving the type that you might have pondered yourself, or if you haven't, you wonder why notplanet.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681308</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Oliver SacksAdrian_Sock|title=Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the BrainSock (Object Lessons)|author=Kim Adrian
|rating=3.5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Oliver Sacks is a physician The subject of this book has been around for several millennia, and neurologist by profession, but yet my partner's daughter has an extremely keen ear been employed for musicseveral years designing it, or them. He is supremelyIt's something I use for about 200 days of every year, if not almost uniquelyat a guess (well, qualified I have my self-diagnosed over-active eccrine glands and other people to tell us in think about) – which clearly puts me at the opening pages opposite end of this book that the power scale to well-known mass-murderer of music occupies more areas women, Ted Bundy, who was into stealing credit cards to fund his desire of our brain than language doeshaving a fresh pair every single day. This is by way On which subject, the amount of a prelude them we create every year could stack to the freaking moon and more. Some idiots buy more than six pairs a book consisting largely year, apparently, which is plain stupid. I'm talking, as you can tell, of case histories of people struggling to adapt to different neurological conditionsthe humble sock.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330418386</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ben GoldacreGermano_Eye|title=Bad ScienceEye Chart (Object Lessons)|author=William Germano|rating=4.5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Bad science is everywhereIt's happened to me, and like as not it has or will happen to you, too. People buy more expensive brand name aspirin than an equal dose in I mean the receipt of certain little numerical results, with a different packet. Cosmetic adverts are peppered positive or negative before them to prove the correction needed to my vision to make me see with pseudoscientific breakthroughs the intended clarity and ostensibly positive statisticsnormality. Newspapers I've had that gizmo that photos the back of my eye to check for diabetes and TV news (other problems, I've had different tests to check the pressure inside my eye, and sadly not just I've come away with glasses I don't need to wear all the tabloids) are riddled with scare stories of cannabis being 25 times strongertime, but certainly benefit from on holiday, or miracle cures when watching TV or a cinema or theatre production. And above and beyond that will make everyone I've stared at – and everything fit and healthy immediatelygot wrong – the simple, seemingly ageless test, of various letters in various configurations that diminish in size, to prove to the relevant scientist at what stage things get blurry for me. Ben Goldacre (NHS doctor and Guardian columnist) cuts through Of course, it's not ageless, but the scientific progress that led to it, the bullshit changes other people made to it, and gives people the tools to spot such nonsense for themselvescultural impact it's had are all on these eye-opening small pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007240198</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Catherine DawsonBall_Wonders|title=Wonders Beyond Numbers: A Practical Guide to Research MethodsBrief History of All Things Mathematical|author=Johnny Ball|rating=45
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Before I review the actual bookLike many people of a ''certain age, '' I feel I need have fond memories of tuning in to deal with watch Johnny Ball enthusiastically extolling the what I think is the biggest problem with virtues of maths and science; succeeding where our schoolteachers had failed and actually making these subjects ''A Practical Guide to Research Methodsfun.''. It's external to the Although decades have passed since those classic TV shows, his latest book itself proves that he has lost none of his passion and to do with a lack of clear indication of who the book is enthusiasm for: because it certainly is not for ''anyone who needs to put together research projects quickly and effectively'' as the back cover blurb claimshis subject.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845282302</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Richard Dawkins Yong_Contain|title=The Oxford Book I Contain Multitudes: the microbes within us and a grander view of Modern Science Writing life|author=Ed Yong
|rating=5
|genre=Popular Science
|summary=Popular science The world you know is a huge field nowadays, populated by both writers who turn to science and scientists who took to writinglie. The collection I have the pleasure of reviewing contains samples of writing by scientists, most of it at least illuminating, some truly excellentThere is no such thing as good or bad microbes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199216800</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Simon Briscoe Sickness and Hugh Aldersey-Williams |title=Panicology|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summary=In ''Panicology'', two British writers ( with a background in social health are all far more complex than we thought. Things designed to save us may kill us and natural sciences) attempt to put some sense into the most popular scare stories that have appeared in the media in the recent yearsthings we think would kill us may save us. They analyse each of the subjects showing how the wide social factors (including the combined influence of media seeking sensation, political agendas of the government and opposition and changing social trends) contribute Welcome to the perception modern study of risks and creation of panics - moral and otherwisemicrobes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>067091701X</amazonuk>
}}