The Science of Everyday Life

by Jay Ingram

Have you ever felt a sudden rush of recognition that you've been in a place before? What causes a déjà vu? Why do dogs look like their owners? What's up with insect swarms? What's the science behind showing your tongue? Do you keep drier by walking or running through a rainstorm? In this updated and expanded edition of The Science of Everyday Life , bestselling author Jay Ingram explains these and many more weird and fascinating mysteries.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Canada, Reference

200 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1989

About the author

Jay Ingram CM (born March 20, 1945) is a Canadian author and broadcaster. He was host of the television show Daily Planet (originally titled @discovery.ca), which airs on Discovery Channel Canada, since the channel's inception in 1995. Ingram's last episode of Daily Planet aired on June 5, 2011. Ingram announced his retirement but stated he will make guest appearances on Daily Planet. He was succeeded by Dan Riskin. His book The End of Memory: A Natural History of Aging and Alzheimer’s is forthcoming from St. Martin's Press in 2015.

Reviews

[Ralph McEwen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love science books that make me laugh. This book is easy to read. The hard scientific words used by scientists in their papers describing the experiments are only used after the the author has used simple everyday words to describe the experiments. The experiments are about everyday oddities like why we yawn and invaded personal space. I found it well written and it kept my attention.

[Sebah Al-Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

أيكفيه وصف "ممتع"/مدهش؟ لا أدري. دهشتي لم تنقطع من أول الكتاب حتى آخره. تفاصيل قد نجدها بديهية في حياتنا اليومية، لكنها مدهشة جدا.


-

من الأشياء المثيرة للفضول التي استعرضها الكتاب:
- ظاهرة سماها بـ: "what-did-you-say" phenomenon
و هي تشير لما يحدث حين نكون ملتهيين بشيء آخر و يخبرنا أحد شيء. الرد التلقائي على الفور أن نقول: "هه، ماذا قلت؟". لكن في ظرف ثواني، و قبل أن يتحدث الشخص، تجد نفسك تتذكر بالضبط ما الذي قاله الشخص، و كأنك استرجعت ما قاله و فهمته رغم أنك ظننت أنك لم تسمعه.

- و ظاهرة الـ cocktail party effect.

- "The harder you are concentrating, the less you blink."

-قبل أن نرمش بقليل، حساسية العين اتجاه الضوء تقل تدريجيا. ثم تعود لما كانت عليه بعد فتح العين. لذا، تسنتنج الدراسات، أن العين لا تشعر أن شيئا فاتها بإغلاق العين حين نرمش. و للدماغ أيضا دور في ذلك إذ يعمل على إغلاق أجزاء الدماغ المسؤولة عن الوعي البصري

-حين نمشي، نحن عمليا نتكئ على ساق واحدة دون أن نقع!، لأن الساق الأخرى تحاول اللحاق لتمنع الوقوع. نمضي 3 أرباع وقت المشي متزنين على ساق واحدة

-Anecephaly

-الغريب أني في فصل تحدث عن التثاؤب، بدأت أتثاءب بشكل كبير جدا، رغم أني لم أ كن أفعل ذلك في الفصول السابقة. التثاؤب "معدي" حتى بالقراءة أو السماع، كما أكد الكتاب!


***

تعلمت:

-جفن العين هو أرق الأجزاء من الجلد في الجسم

- الأطول يمشي أسرع لأسباب فيزيائية. و لهذا الأطفال يحتاجون للركض للحاق بمشي آبائهم.

-التثاؤب لا يتحكم بها الجزء "الواعي" من الدماغ، رغم ارتباطه به. و تقترح بعض الدراسات أن التثاؤب إشارة حيوية لتغيير في النشاط الذي نقوم به، يسبقه.
"Because sound travels fairly slowly, it's easy to judge the direction from which a sound is coming by comparing the time that sound takes to reach each ear. If it's coming from the right side, the right ear gets it first."

"We blink an average of fifteen thousand times a day, each one lasting roughly three-tenths of a second. That's about an hour and fifteen minutes each day we spend with our eyes partly or completely closed."
^هذا لا علاقة له بحاجة العين للبقاء رطبة. مرة واحدة في الدقيقة تكفي، بينما العين ترمش بمعدل 15 مرة بالدقيقة.

-"A blink is a visible signal that the brain is taking a breath."
-"Blinking isn't a result of the thinking process, it's a result."

[Danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

The only explanation for how this book came to be is that Jay Ingram is a very normal person who inexplicably enjoys reading scientific journals. When he comes across an interesting study (how close is too close for one man to stand next to another at a urinal, for example?) he digs up all the other relevant studies on the subject and then condenses them into little two-to-three page morsels for the likes of us to read and say, "Huh. That's interesting." And then in the next page turn, we're off to a totally new, unrelated, and fascinating subject.
This book was so fast, easy, and fun to read. It's what I wish my science classes had been like in college. One thing I really enjoyed is that many of the topics covered didn't have solid answers. There were frequent reminders throughout the book that there's still plenty we don't know (about blinking, for example). It almost makes me want to be a scientist. Ha, ha. Not really, but it does make me hope that real scientist will discover some more fascinating things about how science affects our everyday life and then Jay Ingram can write about them.

[Tue Le · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid and interesting.

[Joel Gutiérrez · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a great book. I liked the way the author introduce us into the everyday life science effects, but in some chapters, like "Words from the sky" and "Outstanding as she goes" were treated some subjects that maybe not everybody has experienced. At real, i just passed away form that chapters, because i don't even had been identified with the case, and i was started to geting really bored.

In the other han, chapters like "This is a yawning chapter" "The tongue-show" and the chapter that talks about rain, was so integrant because of the real everydayness of these subjects.

At finally, a good book just for read and get some new knowledge. I liked it!

[Byron Wright · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is the science version of short stories. Each chapter is 5-10 pages long and doesn't relate to the other stuff. So, it ends up being short snippets of "check out this neat thing."

While all of the items were interesting, nothing hit me as wow, that really cool. For many of the facts, I seemed to recall some of the details already. Since these books are not exactly new it's quite likely that I'd heard many of these already. Possible even from the author in his many media appearances.

Overall, worth picking up to check out.

[Gina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing! Easy to grasp and wholly entertaining!

[Gerald Ncube · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read

[Cynthia Schmidt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Humorous little science book.

[Melanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting little tidbits.

[Colleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this years ago while in uni or just after. I remember enjoying it immensely. A very interesting book!

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of scientific explanations for everyday phenomena. Although it is out of date, I liked how it is written from a Canadian perspective.

[Jay Cresva · Rating 3 out of 5]

Questions answered:
-Why you might want to show your tongue to keep people away, and why this method works.
-What was Archimedes' Eureka moment, and why does the water go down in varying directions based on its location on earth.
-Why does the moon appear bigger on the horizon when the moon in the horizon is the same size as the one over our heads.
-Why sparrows are considered pests even by the greatest bird lovers, and how this is somehow justifiable.
-Why does the sound of mixing coffee with a spoon changes based on the contents dumped into the cup.
-Add cream immediately after getting coffee, or wait until you're ready to sip it to keep it warm and enjoying longer?
-Why do we hear our name at a party, but filter out most of the conversations.
-Why is yawning contagious.
-Are there human equivalent of animal pheromones? How effective are they?

These questions are answered in an easy manner. It's highly readable and only 200 pages long (though it ends around 180 w rest being the bibliography section)

My rating: 3/5

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ingram tackles a different 'everyday life science' topic in every chapter, but while some of these were interesting and grounded, others were random and almost pointless. The chapters 'Dog Daze' and 'When the Lavatory Becomes a Laboratory', for example, jumped dizzily between two or three different science or social science topics which themselves had little or no concrete conclusions, leaving me with a feeling of frustration that I'd just wasted ten minutes listening to people argue about a subject no one's sure is even an issue. Several of these chapters contained what I'd declare TMI, and I skipped a number altogether because of their evolutionary-heavy topics on which I wouldn't waste my time.

In short, this book was not what I expected nor what I was looking for. I enjoyed only a third of the chapters, and could have very well done without another third either due to the aforementioned pointlessness or because Ingram took a jab at every sex joke that came along.

[Kayleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is interesting because it takes a look at everyday events from a scientific perspective. If you've ever wondered why insects swarm, why yawning is contagious, or whether you'd stay drier in the rain if you ran through it, this book is an excellent place to start because it breaks it all down in plain English. It'll even get you thinking about the science of everyday things that it may not even have occurred to you to wonder about, such as how a cup of coffee can be like a miniature weather system. After you read this, you'll find yourself looking at the world around you in a new way. Or you'll just be like me and find yourself staring at your cup of coffee a lot longer than a normal person should.

[Ogi Ogas · Rating 2 out of 5]

My ratings of books on Goodreads are solely a crude ranking of their utility to me, and not an evaluation of literary merit, entertainment value, social importance, humor, insightfulness, scientific accuracy, creative vigor, suspensefulness of plot, depth of characters, vitality of theme, excitement of climax, satisfaction of ending, or any other combination of dimensions of value which we are expected to boil down through some fabulous alchemy into a single digit.

[Dave Wiebe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easily ingested short little chapters of scientific hors d'oeuvres. I was expecting most of the topics covered to have all the answers covered but quite a few of them just discussed the leading current hypotheses which wasn't as satisfying all the time but I really appreciated it for being so true to the scientific method.

[Shareen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like the breezy, funny writing style of this author. As the title implies, he explains science concepts in the context of situations you encounter every day. Watching people concentrate, blink, or sit in an airplane are all going to be a little more interesting after reading this book.

[Wellington · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a smorgasbord of odd questions that you may have wondered about. Could be a book for parents, so they could have an answer to at least have an answer to some of the questions a child would ask.

[Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Een interessant en onderhoudend boek dat in een begrijpbare taal de wetenschappelijke reden achter dagdagelijkse 'mysteries' probeert te duiden. Na het lezen van dit boek zal je altijd anders kijken naar iets als 'n zwerm muggen.

[Lisa]

Cool Book!

[Doug Reith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightful, interesting short topics.

[Tina · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's always nice to learn a little something about the world around you. Plus, I've watched enough Daily Planet that I could 'hear' Jay reading it out loud to me :)

[Maggie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quirky things examined and answered, like "do you get wetter running or walking in the rain?" and "what's with the chewing wintergreen lifesavers in the dark."

[Reuben Janzen-martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good read - but nothing new or dramatic.

[Zsmb25]

Love the musing over everyday questions. Easy to read style. Enjoyed.

[Andrew Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thrift store find. Vintage pocket book with possibly outdated science but still a fun read.

[Jo Hogarth · Rating 3 out of 5]

what a fun read to break up a work of fiction. liked it, and easy to enjoy.