Gracie
07-11-2007, 07:33 AM
The subtitle of this book is The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers (http://www.amazon.com/Stiff-Mary-Roach/dp/0141007451/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/105-5640283-0588451?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1184159090&sr=1-1)written by a woman who is an investigative journalist. I am reading this book at the recommendation of one of my friends and funny enough, at the recommendation of one of DD's friends.
I've been telling people about this book because it is so amazingly interesting without being too terribly gross. The author is a bit irreverent at times but not disrespectful and the dry-humor funny remarks keep you off balance. There's a chapter on so many different things that you never realized that donated-to-science cadavers are used for.
Obviously there's a chapter on medical school students' use of cadavers and another on organ transplantation, but then there's one on airplane crashes and how the investigators can tell what happened to the plane by what happened to the bodies of the people that died. Then there's the chapter on car safety features - they don't just use crash test dummies because their shoulders (for example) don't react like real shoulders. They also discuss testing of bulletproof vests and how cadavers are used to make a bullets/guns that have stopping power but won't maim or kill.
There are also interesting chapters about grave robbers from the 1500's, 1600's , etc and what experiments they did.
The only gross chapter dealt with the natural process of decomposition and the people that study that but even that was discussed in the terms of helping law enforcement determine how long someone has been dead and how it can help catch killers.
I will admit though that I was looking at my undercooked chicken a bit differently last night even after I microwaved it to finish cooking it. ;)
Has anyone read this or heard about it? It's not a new book, it's from 2004 and my copy says New York Times Bestseller on the top (or do all books say that? :) )
Loren
I've been telling people about this book because it is so amazingly interesting without being too terribly gross. The author is a bit irreverent at times but not disrespectful and the dry-humor funny remarks keep you off balance. There's a chapter on so many different things that you never realized that donated-to-science cadavers are used for.
Obviously there's a chapter on medical school students' use of cadavers and another on organ transplantation, but then there's one on airplane crashes and how the investigators can tell what happened to the plane by what happened to the bodies of the people that died. Then there's the chapter on car safety features - they don't just use crash test dummies because their shoulders (for example) don't react like real shoulders. They also discuss testing of bulletproof vests and how cadavers are used to make a bullets/guns that have stopping power but won't maim or kill.
There are also interesting chapters about grave robbers from the 1500's, 1600's , etc and what experiments they did.
The only gross chapter dealt with the natural process of decomposition and the people that study that but even that was discussed in the terms of helping law enforcement determine how long someone has been dead and how it can help catch killers.
I will admit though that I was looking at my undercooked chicken a bit differently last night even after I microwaved it to finish cooking it. ;)
Has anyone read this or heard about it? It's not a new book, it's from 2004 and my copy says New York Times Bestseller on the top (or do all books say that? :) )
Loren