Surviving the Extremes: What Happens to the Body and Mind at the Limits of Human Endurance

by Kenneth Kamler

Book Overview

" Surviving the Extremes brings personal experience and scientific knowledge together beautifully, giving us narrative that are powerful, moving, and very real." -Oliver Sacks A true-life scientific... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0143034510
• Release Date: December 2004
• Publisher: Penguin Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.69 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.4" x 5.5" x 0.7"

Customer Reviews

Awesome

Surprisingly great book. I read it by chance and loved reading about everything that happens in your body in survival situations. I couldn't stop reading it.

Simply Fascinating

I couldn't set this book down and I couldn't stop telling people about. An extremely well written book of the Doctor's personal stories and accounts of others. As soon as you read the first page you know you've found an amazing book.

Really Hits the Mark...

What a great read. Dr. Kamler uses his medical background and personal high adventure experiences to write a highly entertaining and informative read that covers the entire gamut of human survival experiences...covering everything from high altitude, exposure, dehydration and submersion, and veering slightly into the macabre...even survival cannabalism. It's obvious Kamler did his homework, not only in the breadth of material covered, but also in producing a high quality read, remaining ever hopeful about the human experience. He even offers some medical explanations about the mysterious "X Factor"...when people survive despite overwhelming odds to the contrary. Don't read Deep Survival, which is a well intentioned yet misinformed rant, read this book.

Fascinating book, misleading marketing

This is one of the most interesting books I have read in ages. I'll agree with the other reviewer that the jacket information is misleading. This isn't really a "thriller" as conventionally defined. The author shares some first person as well as historical anecdotes but this really is an incredible biology book, interweaving physiology with some evolutionary biology. A very thoughtful and well-written book! It leaves the reader with jaw-dropping respect for the human body and its ability to adapt to extreme situations. It also touches on the adaptations other animals have to routinely live in environments which are totally inhospitable to humans. It is just too bad that people are disappointed in it because it isn't what the jacket says it is. I have taught basic survival classes for teens and I'm really glad to have this book to recommend because it is a different slant compared to what is out there in survival literature. My teenage daughters read Into Thin Air in high school English and I just wish I had this book before the younger one did her paper last month on dehydration!

This is what "survival" really means!

I make my home in a place that can challenge the human body. Alaska is a land of extremes-altitude, cold, sheer geological scale. Human survival in the Alaskan outdoors is dependent upon proper clothing and equipment, careful planning, and physical conditioning. But even then, people make mistakes and end up in trouble. Sometimes, they end up dead.How does the human body cope with the effects of exhaustion, the extremes of hunger or thirst, the crushing pressure of the ocean's depths, and the burning heat of the barren desert? Microsurgeon Kenneth Kamler, MD has forged a career out of understanding the body's reactions to these extremes, and the medical procedures that can help when things go wrong.Dr. Kamler was on Everest in 1996 during the tragic climb profiled in the books INTO THIN AIR and THE CLIMB, and in his own 1998 book A DOCTOR ON EVEREST. He treated climber Beck Weathers, the climber left for dead near the summit who survived terrible frostbite to his hands and face. He has performed intricate hand surgery in the mud of a rainforest jungle, and has treated a patient in an underwater habitat on the ocean floor. In his new book SURVIVING THE EXTREMES: A DOCTOR'S JOURNEY TO THE LIMITS OF HUMAN ENDURANCE, Dr. Kamler writes compellingly of the mental and physiological elements that combine to determine who lives and who dies when the human body is faced with extremes of altitude, temperature, heat, cold and pressure.This book is fascinating, compelling, and explains what the concept of "survival" really means within the context of the body's ability (and failure) to cope with extreme environments. Do not miss it!