Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #131737 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781402737916
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Customer Reviews

Too many items, too little detail, and some pseudoscience
I think this author tried to have hundreds of items to make the book for marketable, but you end up with something discussed in a chapter that was already explained earlier. Also, because so many things are discussed and each has a big color picture, the explanations are short. For instance he said that glass is not a liquid (at least in our life time it won't flow). But better books I've read previously explain that the reason you see thicker portions windows in old churches is not because the glass flows (which I had heard when I was young), but that glass making was impercises and for stability they put the thicker portion near the bottom. And the biggest problem with this book - he says that it is FALSE that all crop circles are a hoax. What? The originators and many copy cats admitted to creating circles, even filming themselves. And crop circles only occur in Englis speaking countries so it is a hoax pop popular in US/England/Australia/Canada only. Do aliens only come to English speaking countries? The author says that some designes are too complex? Maybe they were done by an Intelligent Designer! So a mediocre book because bunk since the author of a 'science' book believes in miracles. It is a shame that the reputable James Randi is plastered all over the book and the Amazon listing because he certainly was not aware that Crop Circles were being touted as real science or he would not have provided the forward. With hundreds of items, he probably didn't get to the pseudoscientific one snuck in. Instead of this book, buy Flim Flam by James Randi, Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer, or something by Martin Gardner.

Amazing, but tepid
Having this book in your library is something that you will enjoying showing your friends and family, but don't take it to seriously. While most of the explanations given in the book are true, many of them are so only if you love to nit pick. For instance, the author states that leaves do not change colors in the fall. What? Everyone knows they do, they see them turn from green, to orange or read or yellow. If that is not a color change, then what is it? True, the leaves are green because of the presence of chlorophyll, which disappears when the leaves die, exposing the true color of the leaf cells, nevertheless, a change from green to red is a color change.

There are other points where the author is correct only because of a nit pick. He claims that the Earthquake of 1906 did not destroy San Francisco, the fire the quake started did. But would the fires have occurred if the earthquake not happened? Saying the fires destroyed the city, not the quake is like saying the knife stab did kill the man, the blood loss did.

Of course, there are times when the author contradicts himself. In one section he disproves there is no "Dark side of the moon", then a few sections later uses the "dark side of the moon" as a physical place in his conclusion.

He even delves into the area of religion when he defends why the myth of the Great Flood and Noah's Ark should be in the Bible. Simply because there was an actual ancient flood does not mean it is the source or should be considered the source of the Great Flood mentioned in the Bible. He fails to make that distinction. Nor does he mention any of the non flood theories for the Biblical myth

For the most part, most of his explanations are correct, but there are more than a few which are only correct to when applying the most anal interpretation of the supposed myth. Yet, it is a reference book most intelligent people will find interesting and somewhat enlightening.

interesting but not amazing
Interesting and worth reading but anyone with 21st century sense already knows most of these. Seems as though the author's could have just cited snopes for all of the information. The photos in the book are lousy. However, there is still enough info in the book to make it worth reading.