Bluffer's Guide to Rocket Science

The Bluffer's Guide to Rocket Science
By Peter Berlin
Coming soon as an audio download, click here
Extracts from the book


Popular comment has it that: ‘It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to ...’, as in ‘It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to programme a mobile phone.’ This is true – it takes a teenager. A rocket scientist would intellectualize the whole process, press two buttons at once, and crash the software. The last person you would want to ask is a rocket scientist.

Blown opportunities
Many more millionaires have gone bankrupt trying to develop rockets than satellites. They have overlooked the fact that the operative word in “controlled explosion” is controlled.

Gravity depravity
Nobody knows what gravity really is, so don’t blow your bluffing cover by trying to explain it. The only thing known for certain is that any two physical bodies will attract each other in proportion to their sizes (which fact is best not taken literally by oddly sorted couples).

Lunartrick
One Sunday afternoon, the 12-year-old von Braun strapped rockets to a cart, lit the fuse, and sent the fire-spitting vehicle careening down a street .... His life-long aim was to send a rocket to the Moon. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that flying a lunar mission is tricky.




Reviews

A quick read and chock full of the basic information that's needed to pass yourself off as knowledgeable.
Toronto Globe & Mail

An amazing amount of solid fact disguised as frivolous observation.
The Sunday Telegraph

Table of Contents

Some Basic Definitions Introduction The basics Weightlessness and gravity Orbits, trajectories and other encounters Rocket science in the news From flaming hell to starlit heaven Talking through your ears The great pioneers Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun Sergei Pavlovich Korolev Edward Mukaka Nkoloso The moral dimension Wild rockets Otrag Rotary rocket The space shuttle The space scuttle The toilet question Clever satellites Global Positioning System (GPS) Hubble Space Telescope Iridium Exotic launch sites Be as close to the equator as possible Kourou Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg Baikonur Truth and consequences Movers and shakers in space The customer and the contractor Who is who in the space business The Coca-colonisation of space The human factor To be or not to be a rocket scientist A day in the life of a rocket scientist What rocket scientists are good at What rocket scientists are not so good at Making a career in rocket science The social dimension Why rocket science? Green space Rocket science serving world peace Rocket science serving world wars The ISS fly-by The moment of truth The crowning experience Glossary



Author: Peter Berlin
Format: 96 pages, pb
Published: 21/10/2008
Updated: NEW TITLE
Price: £4.99
ISBN-13: 978-1-906042-11-0

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