I bought Endurance after watching the show
Atypical, in which the main character, Sam, is obsessed with the Antarctic
explorer Ernest Shackleton.
At the time, I had barely heard of Shackleton, but
I was quickly captivated by this tale of his doomed Antarctic expedition. I
don’t think I have ever read a more gripping story of perseverance and
survival. After the Endurance was destroyed by ice, the crew spent two years alone
in Antarctica and amazingly, not a single man died.
Despite setback after
setback and seemingly through sheer force of will, Shackleton saved his entire
crew. In describing Shackleton’s almost mythic quest to save his men Lansing
writes, “For scientific leadership give me Scott;
for swift and efficient travel, Amundsen; but when you are in a hopeless
situation, when there seems no way out, get down on your knees and pray for
Shackleton.”
After reading Endurance, I understand why Sam was so obsessed with
Shackleton. I think I may be a little obsessed as well.
In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance and set sail for Antarctica, where he planned to cross the last uncharted continent on foot. In January 1915, after battling its way through a thousand miles of pack ice and only a day's sail short of its destination, the Endurance became locked in an island of ice. Thus began the legendary ordeal of Shackleton and his crew of twenty-seven men. For ten months the ice-moored Endurance drifted northwest before it was finally crushed between two ice floes. With no options left, Shackleton and a skeleton crew attempted a near-impossible…
I discovered The Disappearing Spoon while googling “scientific
experiment for kids.”
The book’s title refers to gallium (Ga, 31), a
metal which has a melting point of 84 degrees Fahrenheit and thus, melts in hot
water. According to the book, a fun, practical joke among leading
"chemical cognoscenti" is to shape gallium into spoons, "serve
them with tea, and watch as your guests recoil when their Earl Grey eat their
utensils."
After viewing videos of these melting spoons on YouTube I bought
The Disappearing Spoon to learn what other surprising facts were hidden
in the periodic table. One of my favorite anecdotes pertains to the element
mercury. During the 19th century, “doctors” would prescribe mercury pills
for a variety of ailments.
Thousands of Americans took these pills, (which
didn’t work and were actually deadly), including the famous explorers Lewis and
Clark. As Lewis and Clark traveled across the Northwest territory, their bodies
worked diligently to expel the poison from their system.
As a result, today we
can accurately trace their expedition by locating their latrine sites which are
identifiable due to the high levels of mercury the men left behind.
The Periodic Table is one of man's crowning scientific achievements. But it's also a treasure trove of stories of passion, adventure, betrayal and obsession. The infectious tales and astounding details in THE DISAPPEARING SPOON follow carbon, neon, silicon and gold as they play out their parts in human history, finance, mythology, war, the arts, poison and the lives of the (frequently) mad scientists who discovered them. We learn that Marie Curie used to provoke jealousy in colleagues' wives when she'd invite them into closets to see her glow-in-the-dark experiments. And that Lewis and Clark swallowed mercury capsules across the country…
My father bought this book for me because I write on
marriage and relationships.
I was skeptical that a book about the mating habits
of birds had much relevance to my own work, yet I found Prum’s arguments about
the connections between birds and humans compelling. According to Prum, female
mate selection led to changes in the physical attributes and behaviors of birds
and these changes can provide insights into the evolution of human sexuality as
well.
As a scholar of marriage, I am very familiar with the argument that men
choose partners based on physical attributes while women choose partners for
economic and social reasons. Consequently, it was refreshing to hear that this
difference may be more environmental that innate.
Prum suggests that for much of human
evolutionary history, it was female preferences that mattered and that these
preferences were so strong, they actually changed male bodies. According to
Prum, women like a good-looking partner just as much as men—although maybe not quite as much as female
birds.
A major reimagining of how evolutionary forces work, revealing how mating preferences—what Darwin termed "the taste for the beautiful"—create the extraordinary range of ornament in the animal world.
"A delicious read, both seductive and mutinous.... Minutely detailed, exquisitely observant, deeply informed, and often tenderly sensual."—New York Times Book Review
In the great halls of science, dogma holds that Darwin's theory of natural selection explains every branch on the tree of life: which species thrive, which wither away to extinction, and what features each evolves. But can adaptation by natural selection really account for everything we see in nature? Yale University…
Americans hold marriage in such high esteem that we push people toward it, and fetishize its benefits to the point that we routinely ignore or excuse bad behavior and societal ills in the name of protecting and promoting it. In eras of slavery and segregation, Blacks sometimes gained white legal status through marriage.
Laws have been designed to encourage people to marry so that certain societal benefits could be achieved: the population would increase, women would have financial security, children would be cared for, and immigrants would have familial connections.
The widely overlooked problem with this tradition is that individuals and society have relied on marriage to address or dismiss a range of injustices and inequities, from gender- and race-based discrimination, sexual violence, and predation to unequal financial treatment.
![Book cover of Shapely Ankle Preferr'd: A History of the Lonely Hearts Ad [1695-2010]](https://res.cloudinary.com/hzpwrwfdi/image/upload/w_220/media/covers/61-5BRaHc3L_uyqt7s.webp "Book cover of Shapely Ankle Preferr'd: A History of the Lonely Hearts Ad [1695-2010]")
