Ebook: Human Errors: Pointless Bones, Runaway Nerves, and Other Human Defects

Front Cover; Front Flap; Front Matter; Half Title; Title; Copyright; Epigraph; Contents; Introduction: Behold the Blunders of Nature; 1. Pointless Bones and Other Anatomical Errors; I Can't See Clearly Now; Nasal Sinuses That Drain Upward; A Runaway Nerve; Pains in the Neck; Knuckle-Walkers; No Bones About It; Coda: A Dolphin with Hind Fins; 2. Our Needy Diet; The Scurvy of Humanity; Acid Tests; Heavy-Metal Machines; Coda: Gorged to Death; 3. Junk in the Genome; Broken Genes; Alligators in the Gene Pool; Our Viral Graveyards; Jumpy DNA; Coda: Color Me Lucky; 4. Homo sterilis; Infertile Myrtle.;An illuminating, entertaining tour of the physical imperfections--from faulty knees to junk DNA--that make us human.