The Explainer

What happens to recalled meat? What’s the difference between a serial killer and a spree killer? How do you stop a lava flow? Does homeowner’s insurance cover murder? And what is Ovaltine anyway? Answers to these and other fascinating questions you never thought to ask, from the writers at Slate Magazine An entertaining and genuinely informative compilation of answers to some of life's most improbable questions, from the writers of the online magazine Slate. Often inspired by events in the news, the “Explainer” column asks the questions we never think to ask, or that we’re too embarrassed to admit we don’t know how to answer. Filling in these overlooked blanks of our daily lives, the book provides memorable tidbits for conversations, further rumination, or important context as we follow current events from day to day. Full of fascinating information about unlikely but important subjects, The Explainer will entertain and inform anyone who has ever stopped to wonder who runs Antarctica, how cell phones can reveal your location, or whether one can live off lizard meat.

Ever wondered how vaccines work, why whales strand themselves or if luck exists? The Explainer: From Déjà Vu to Why the Sky Is Blue, and Other Conundrums is a collection of around 100 of the best articles published in ‘The Explainer’ and ‘Monday’s Medical Myths’ sections of The Conversation. The book answers questions on everyone's mind about a diverse range of topics, abstract concepts, and popular and hard core science. Sections include: animals and agriculture, body, climate and energy, medical myths, mind and brain, research and technology, and more. Expert authors combine facts, analysis, new ideas and enthusiasm to make often challenging topics highly readable in just a few short pages. This book is for the curious, those with a thirst for answers, and those with a fascination of how phenomena, new technologies and current issues in our daily lives work.

In Zero-Variable Theories, Dr. Robert Wicklund invites the reader to consider the psychological perspective of the "explainer". In examining the over-simplifications that have become dominant in modern psychology, the author points to such factors as competition with other explainers and pressure to offer and promulgate a unique explanation. The explainer is characterized as equating theory with simple, fixed categories, and as defending those categories as one would defend a personal territory, fending off competing explainers through mis-use of statistical devices. The end result is the formulation of theories that neglect the perspectives of those whose behaviors are to be explained, and which simultaneously exclude psychological variables.

The creator of the popular webcomic "xkcd" uses line drawings and common words to provide simple explanations for how things work, including microwaves, bridges, tectonic plates, the solar system, the periodic table, helicopters, and other essential concepts.

This book deals with virtual environments for teaching and learning. The selection of chapters provides different and diverse views of e-learning approaches in various countries and educational contexts. [p.xxviii, ed].

Share the adventures and perils of Christian as he sets out on the journey of his life. On the road he meets terrifying monsters, horrible giants, a cruel judge, raging lions and scary dark places. But he also makes good friends and, at last, reaches his journey's end - the Celestial City. Game also available.

First Published in 1994. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 8th International Conference on the Theory and Application of Diagrams, Diagrams 2014, held in Melbourne, VIC, Australia in July/August 2014. The 15 revised full papers and 9 short papers presented together with 6 posters were carefully reviewed and selected from 40 submissions. The papers have been organized in the following topical sections: diagram layout, diagram notations, diagramming tools, diagrams in education, empirical studies and logic and diagrams.