Jennifer Ouellette - Me, Myself, and Why: Searching for the Science of Self

PENGUIN BOOKS

Me, Myself, and Why

JENNIFER OUELLETTE is a science journalist and the author of three previous books, The Calculus Diaries, The Physics of the Buffyverse, and Black Bodies and Quantum Cats. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, Discover, Slate, Salon, and Nature, among other publications. She writes a science and culture blog called Cocktail Party Physics on the Web site of Scientific American. Ouellette served from 2008 to 2010 as the director of the Science and Entertainment Exchange, a program of the National Academy of Sciences that aims to foster creative collaborations between scientists and entertainment-industry professionals. She has also been the Journalist in Residence at the Kavli Institute of Theoretical Physics in Santa Barbara and an instructor at the Santa Fe Science Writing Workshop. Ouellette holds a black belt in jujitsu and lives in Los Angeles with her husband, Caltech physicist Sean Carroll.

Praise for Jennifer Ouellette

The Calculus Diaries

Ouellette makes math palatable with a mix of humor, anecdote, and enticing facts.... Using everyday examples, such as petrol mileage and fairground rides, she makes even complex ideas such as calculus and probability appealing.

Nature

This dash through a daunting discipline bursts with wry wit. Ouellette uses differential equations to model the spread of zombies and derivatives to craft the perfect diet. Sassy throughout, she reserves special barbs for subprime mortgage holders: Chances are they werent doing the math.

Discover

A great primer for anyone who needs to get over their heebie-jeebies about an upcoming calculus class, or for anyone whos ever wondered how calculus fits into everyday life and wants to be entertained, too!

Danica McKellar, New York Times bestselling author of Math Doesnt Suck and Hot X: Algebra Exposed

I havent had this much fun learning math since I watched the Count on Sesame Street when I was three. And the Count never talked about log flumes or zombies. So The Calculus Diaries wins the day.

A. J. Jacobs, New York Times bestselling author of The Know-It-All and Drop Dead Healthy

Ouellette is every English majors dream math teacher: funny, smart, infected with communicable enthusiasmand she can rock a Buffy reference. In this book, she hastens the day when more people are familiar with an integral function than with Justin Bieber.

Peter Sagal, host, NPRs Wait, Wait Dont Tell Me, and author of The Book of Vice

Wonderful and compulsively readable... Ouellette finds the signature of mathematicsand especially calculus, of coursein the most unexpected places, from the gorgeously lunatic architecture of Spains Antonio Gaudi to the shimmering arc of waves on a beach.... Her ever clear and always stimulating voice is a perfect match to the subject. The Calculus Diaries is a tour de force.

Deborah Blum, author of The Poisoners Handbook

As amusing as it is enlightening... Ouellette steers us so gently we think were gliding along on our own.

Michael Sims, author of Adams Navel

If you ever thought that math was useless, read this book. Want to survive a zombie attack? Win at craps? Beat a zombie at craps? Well, listen to Jennifer Ouellette. The math she describes might just be your best hope if you dont want your brains to be gobbled by the undead.

Charles Seife, author of Zero: Biography of a Dangerous Idea

A charming and gentle introduction to important mathematical concepts and their relevance to everyday life.

Leonard Mlodinow, author of The Drunkards Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives

The Physics of the Buffyverse

Blending fizzy pop culture with serious science... Ouellette makes an earnest effort to introduce the laws of physics to couch potatoes in a relatively painless way.

The New York Times Book Review

If you dig science, vampires and the like, give The Physics of the Buffyverse a try.

USA Today

Ouellette presents a strong case for many of the seemingly impossible aspects of the world Buffy and her friends inhabit. All the while, she makes the science accessible, guaranteeing that fans of the show will be receptive.

Booklist

Black Bodies and Quantum Cats

Bursts with answers for curious adults... Employing contemporary cultural icons like the movie Addams Family Values and The Da Vinci Code, Ouellette explains the principles behind acceleration and ancient geometrical anomalies.... Ouellette shines when she pulls analogies from real life to explain, for example, why blackouts are more likely since the deregulation of the power industry, in prose that is engaging and economical.

The Washington Post

Readers of these pieces will feel Ouellettes companionship as a fellow layperson sharing her interest in physics history. Hooking the audience with some movie or science-fiction novel... her entertaining explications encourage generalists to give physics a try.

Booklist

Remarkably fresh and immensely readable.... All major theories and breakthroughs, along with the personalities that brought them to life (including a particularly ruthless Thomas Edison and a resourceful patent clerk named Chester Carlson, who built the first photocopier in his Astoria, New York, kitchen), are presented clearly by the readers pop-culture escort. It is a credit to Ouellette that, as the reader progresses into more complex theories, the TV and movie references arent nearly as interesting as the science.

Publishers Weekly

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First published in Penguin Books 2014

Copyright 2014 by Jennifer Ouellette

Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Ouellette, Jennifer.

Me, myself, and why : searching for the science of self / Jennifer Ouellette.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-14-312165-7

ISBN 978-1-101-61364-1 (eBook)

1. Self psychology. 2. Self-actualization (Psychology) 3. Identity (Philosophical concept) I. Title.

BF697.Q778 2014

155.2dc23 2013034514

Version_1

For my parents, Paul and Jeanne

One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.

G. K. CHESTERTON , THE LOGIC OF ELFLAND, Orthodoxy (1908)