Why You Can Never Get to the End of the Rainbow And Other Moments of Science

by Don Glass (Editor)

Overview

Have you ever wondered:
why cats' eyes glow in the dark?
why a rubber band snaps back?
what the world looks like to a bee?
how aspirin works?
what life would be like without zero?

This book contains the answers to these questions and dozens more. Written for readers of all ages with little or no background in science, it is the perfect armchair companion for curious people who want to know more about science in everyday life but have only a moment to spare. The short essays help remove some of the mystery of science, giving readers clear and concise information in language that is easy to understand. And they are fun to read.

Why can one rotten apple spoil the barrel? The answer is just a moment of science away.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253207807
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	05/22/1993
Pages:	166
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.25(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 - 8 Years

About the Author

DON GLASS is Special Projects Director at public radio station WFIU-FM and the radio producer of A Moment of Science. PAUL SINGH was Professor of Physics at Indiana University and the science producer of A Moment of Science until his retirement in 1992. STEPHEN FENTRESS is a writer who was most recently Producer/Music Director at the Strasenburgh Planetarium of the Rochester (N.Y.) Museum and Science Center, where he wrote and produced planetarium shows.

Table of Contents

Sample Contents

Benjamin Franklin and the Swatches on the Snow
Once You've Had It, You Can't Catch It Again
Why Is the Sky Blue?
Static Electricity
Why One Rotten Apple Can Spoil the Barrel
Superconductors
Does Smoking Cause Lung Cancer?
What Is a Gene?
Why Do Cats' Eyes Glow at Night?
Paul Ehrlich, Dyes, and Drugs
Why You Can Never Get to the End of the Rainbow
The Difference between a Square and a Diamond
Sounds over a Lake at Evening
Do the Best Dogs Come from the Pound?
Flip a Coin, Beat the Odds
Stroboscopic Stagecoach Wheels
Why Are Bells Made of Metal?
Why Rivers Don't Flow in a Straight Line
What's Your Average Speed?
The Basic Unit of Life
How Aspirin Got Its Name
Cold Water at the Bottom of a Lake
Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men?
A Thirty Percent Chance of Rain
Limeys
How Does Lung Cancer Start?
The Light of Spring
Vitamines and Vitamins
Colors and Their Opposites
How Does the World Look to a Bee?
Death of the Dinosaurs: A Quick Review
Why Do We Put Cut Flowers in Water?
Life without Zero
Prostaglandins
Sweetened Condensed Milk
What the Weather Report Doesn't Tell You
Why Mowing the Lawn Doesn't Kill the Grass
Galileo's Job Application
The Consequences of Smallness
Ozone and Ice
Benjamin Franklin's Madeira Wine Surprise
Viruses Attack Bacteria
The Birth of the Atomic Age
Honest Answers to Personal Questions
Risk Assessment
Broken Symmetry: Cosmetic or Cosmic?
Antimatter
Does Nature Abhor a Vacuum?
How Does Water Get to the Top of a Tree?
What Could Change Earth's Climate?
Death of the Dinosaurs Revisited
How Many Girls, How Many Boys?
Modern Biology in a Monastery Garden
Neutrinos and the End of the Universe
Cooking an Egg
The Most Important Fly in the History of Science
How Plants Fight
Sort Nuts by Shaking the Can
Everybody Talks about Genes—But What Do They Do?
How Cockraoches Get Away
A New Person from a Nose?
The Mysterious Number Pi
Newton's Rainbow
The Sweet Spot on a Baseball Bat
Make an Image without a Lens
Fluorescent Lamps
Carbon Dating
Soap Bubbles and Butterfly Wings
Tracing the Roots of Energy
Light Takes Time
Read Fine Print through a Pinhole
Infection: A Struggle between Two Organisms
Why Doesn't a Pregnant Women Reject Her Fetus?
The Floating Cork Trick
Microbursts and Airplane Crashes
What's inside an Atom?
When Pop Bottles Don't Blow Up... and When They Do
It's Not What You Hear—It's When You Hear It
Weightless Water
Getting Robbed in the Camera Obscura
Sperm Meets Egg: What Really Happens
The Curve of a Meandering River
Why Chickens Don't Have Webbed Feet
Our Most Distant Relatives