Stiff
eBook - ePub

Stiff

The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

  1. English
  2. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Stiff

The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

About this book

A New York Times forensic science bestseller, "this quirky, funny read offers perspective and insight about life, death and the medical profession."* 

For two thousand years, cadavers—some willingly, some unwittingly—have been involved in science's boldest strides and weirdest undertakings. They've tested France's first guillotines, ridden the NASA Space Shuttle, been crucified in a Parisian laboratory to test the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin, and helped solve the mystery of TWA Flight 800. For every new surgical procedure, from heart transplants to gender confirmation surgery, cadavers have helped make history in their quiet way. 

"Delightful—though never disrespectful" (Time Out New York), science writer Mary Roach's Stiff investigates the strange lives of our bodies postmortem and answers the question: What should we do after we die?

"You can close this book with an appreciation of the miracle that the human body really is." —*Wall Street Journal

"Acutely entertaining, morbidly fascinating." —Forbes 

"One of the funniest and most unusual books of the year. . . . Gross, educational, and unexpectedly sidesplitting." —Entertainment Weekly

With an Epilogue by the Author

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Yes, you can access Stiff by Mary Roach in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Biological Sciences & Anatomy. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Publisher
W. W. Norton & Company
Year
2004
eBook ISBN
9780393069198
Edition
0
Topic
Biological Sciences
Subtopic
Anatomy
Index
Biological Sciences

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. Also By Mary Roach
  4. Title Page
  5. Dedication
  6. Copyright
  7. Contents
  8. Introduction
  9. 1. A HEAD IS A TERRIBLE THING TO WASTE Practicing surgery on the dead
  10. 2. CRIMES OF ANATOMY Body snatching and other sordid tales from the dawn of human dissection
  11. 3. LIFE AFTER DEATH On human decay and what can be done about it
  12. 4. DEAD MAN DRIVING Human crash test dummies and the ghastly, necessary science of impact tolerance
  13. 5. BEYOND THE BLACK BOX When the bodies of the passengers must tell the story of a crash
  14. 6. THE CADAVER WHO JOINED THE ARMY The sticky ethics of bullets and bombs
  15. 7. HOLY CADAVER The crucifixion experiments
  16. 8. HOW TO KNOW IF YOU’RE DEAD Beating-heart cadavers, live burial, and the scientific search for the soul
  17. 9. JUST A HEAD Decapitation, reanimation, and the human head transplant
  18. 10. EAT ME Medicinal cannibalism and the case of the human dumplings
  19. 11. OUT OF THE FIRE, INTO THE COMPOST BIN And other new ways to end up
  20. 12. REMAINS OF THE AUTHOR Will she or won’t she?
  21. Acknowledgments
  22. Bibliography
  23. How to Donate Your Body to Science
  24. Notes