Customer Reviews

Science of Everyday Life

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This is one of the funniest books I have ever read in my life. It covers everything from yawning to the subtle dynamics of a cocktail party. It is put in very simple terms, so everyone can understand it. It covers things you would never even think about, and makes it fun. Reading one chapter makes you want to read another, and then another. After reading this book, you go out into the world with a different point of view about everything covered in the book. Never again will I fly on a plane without thinking about the science of the armrest.

About: The science of common things around us in our lives. Who gets the armrests on planes, how smart bees are, why we yawn and blink, why humans walk on two legs, why do teddy bears look like they do, the dynamics of bathroom behavior, why geese fly in V's are just some of the topics covered

Some things I learned:

Bugs always swarm over an object like a stalk of corn or beer can

We aren't sure why we yawn

Quills in the feathers of flying birds are always off to one side

You'll usually get less if you run in the rain

Bees are really smart

People usually wait longer to interrupt someone if the tip of their tongue is sticking out (as in concentration)


Pros: Very interesting, bite-sized chapters, well written and engaging, further reading section at end. If you like Mythbusters, you'll probably like this book.

Cons: Some topics aren't really "everyday" life

The science of everyday life (1994) by Jay Ingram. Toronto, Canada: Penguin Books.

Reviewer: W. P. Palmer

I liked this little book. Admittedly the book was originally published in 1989. This is a comparatively new paperback edition of the original, but I don't think that its contents have dated to any major extent. The book is made up of 25 sections totaling 209 pages. Thus each section is a little less than ten pages in quite large print, so it is very easy to read. The style is conversational: in general, the science being discussed is everyday science and the explanations of this everyday science where they are known are given clearly and well. I will cover some of the examples that Ingram mentions, but many of the pieces are about matters that there are not clear unambiguous and uncontroversial explanations. That adds to their interest

The first piece is about the phenomenon of tongue-showing when people concentrate. Ingram also points out that research shows that when people exhibit tongue-showing either consciously or unconsciously, then people avoid disturbing them. I had never noticed this before, but I now keep my eyes peeled to observe the phenomenon.

The second piece is about Roadrunner and Wile E Coyote (the cartoon characters) and the impossibility in terms of Newtonian physics of some of the actions they perform. I have never given students an assignment on this, but I have often felt it would be a good idea to ask students to see a one minute cartoon segment and to answer in writing all the actions that the cartoon characters took that contravene the laws of physics. In general this piece looks at only one of Newton's laws of motion (the first), such as the cartoon view that Coyote where he runs off a cliff and only starts to fall when he looks down and then falls vertically downwards as opposed to the arc his body would follow in a real situation. Here Ingram is entertaining, but not original.

We have all observed that when the full moon is low in the sky (close to the horizon) that it appears to be much larger than when it is high in the sky. I must admit that I thought there was a physical explanation for this, but evidently I am quite wrong, it is an optical illusion and the disc of the moon is the same size, wherever it is in the sky. This can be verified by holding an aspirin at arm's length between the eye and the moon. It covers the disc of the moon equally however high in the sky the moon is, showing that the apparently enlarged moon near the horizon is a psychological not a physical phenomenon.

I was reading the book on a plane journey and came across the piece called "Sex and the single armrest" just after arrival. The observation concerns the occasions when a male passenger occupies a seat adjacent to a female passenger. It is then observed that male passengers control the armrest of the seat more frequently than the female passengers.

Observations continue about a whole variety of events including why mosquitoes swarm, the evolution of the faces of Teddy bears and the effect of asparagus on the smell of the gourmet's urine due to the production of a chemical called 3-methyl-thio-proprionate.

There's a surprise in almost every story and a wide enough variety of stories to suit every taste.

BILL PALMER
The science of everyday life (1994) by Jay Ingram originally reviewed for Journal of the Science Teacher Association of the Northern Territory (1997), Volume 16, pp.158-159