Cosmological Milkshake

Ehrlich, Robert

ISBN 10: 0813520460 / ISBN 13: 9780813520469

Published by Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ, USA, 1995

About this Item

unused book / old store stock; clean, tight and square, no tears or creases, no spine creases, corner tips and edges are very gently bumped, text is clean and unmarked.

Seller Inventory # 313543

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Cosmological Milkshake
• Publisher: Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ, USA
• Publication Date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0813520460
• ISBN 13: 9780813520469
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Ehrlich, Gary
• Condition: New
• Seller catalogs:
  • Science

About this title

Synopsis

the book is arranged in five broad categories: distance, mass, temperature, speed, and time. The 135 essays cover such topics as how high you can jump, how big a water droplet can get, how heavy is light, and when you should add cream to your coffee. These clever pieces, accompanied by humorous illustrations, are clearly written and easy to understand, with a minimum of mathematics.

From Publishers Weekly

This is Ehrlich's second collection of "physics bites," short explications of abstruse-to-everyday concepts in the field. The author, who teaches at George Mason University, calls the ensemble "the equivalent of an unconventional introductory course in physics." Encapsulating the idea of subatomic particles--or just the elusive idea of mass--in 750 words or so is a neat trick, but sometimes it's just that. These 135 breezy Q&As, most illustrated with cartoons by his son, Gary, would make ideal relief sidebars in a high school or undergrad physics text, but they do not of themselves make a book. Ehrlich's first collection of what might be called stand-up lab physics demonstrations, Turning the World Inside Out , had the same playfulness but with a purpose for teachers. In this collection he turned up the cute and weakened the fragile structure. Yet there's nothing wrong with humor in the service of science; it can even draw in readers who might otherwise fear the subject: "Atoms, like people, can be stable or unstable."
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.