FYI (Popular Science) by Bjorn Carey
It might seem that this is another compilation of curious questions of science with their answers, succinct and childish. And partly, it is. But there are some notable differences in this.
First, the graphics of the book, which is good in every way, becoming, do you know…? It’s a book that should be stored, browsed and every so often worshiped as a grimoire of Harry Potter.
Second, a popular book comes to supply some cultural deficiencies that the majority of we don’t pay attention all our life. I do not exaggerate. In the U.S, to do not go very far, the third of its inhabitants still believe that people and dinosaurs were contemporaries, as revealed a study by Louis Harris.
We may not be in front of a profound essay book of science, but certainly this book serves as a grinder to sharpen the curiosity, a curiosity perhaps allow us to penetrate more lush jungles of scientific knowledge, and who knows, perhaps assimilate that the financing of such activities are not a whim of a mad doctor but the livelihood of our future, as very rightly expressed my favorite disclosing, Natalie Angier, in one of her most exciting, the canon:
However, the future of our scientific prestige doesn’t depend a lot of ingenuity in the areas of applied science but rather of the willingness to finance basic research, studies on the sex of the angels that take decades to provide results publishable, the assets of commercial interest, college students will put it on the market.
Scientists and the court suggested that if the good public was so versed for the intricacies of science, would welcome support a generous increase in the federal budget for this discipline, and the existence of long-term and undefined scholarships with the sufficient investment in infrastructure (particularly for better coffee machines in the labs).
The general public would admit the fact that basic researchers of today contribute to build tomorrow’s prosperity, not to mention the explanation of the mysteries of life and the universe; you can’t tag the price of a genius, except to say that is much higher than the allocation granted by the science congress in the current fiscal year.
Questions are answered by experts from various fields (some of which, I assure you, are particularly unusual or strange, as if you can kill someone just cut off with a paper), all coordinated by former magazine editor mythical:
