As well as being a fantastic piece of machinery (Do the maths) the body comes in a dazzling variety of shapes, sizes and colours (The shape we’re in), all crafted by millions of years of evolution in different settings. Today, the environment we live in still profoundly influences our body shape (Supersize me), starting before we are even born (Life sentence). It has transformed bodies in industrialised nations dramatically over the past half-century (In your dreams), making westernised ideals of physical perfection seem ever more outlandish (Vital statistics). The pressure to conform might explain some of the strange things we do to our bodies: from our love-hate relationship with body hair (Smooth operators) to our demands for increasingly drastic alterations (Extreme surgery). Even old or broken parts can be made as good as new, or better (Bionic bodies). Love it or hate it, your body says a lot about you. Your build dictates what kind of Olympian you might be (Built to win), while deceptively innocuous things such as the length of your fingers can reveal a startling amount about your sex appeal (Secret signals). Read all about it.
To continue reading, today with our introductory offers
Advertisement
More from New Scientist
Explore the latest news, articles and features
Popular articles
Trending New Scientist articles
1
A quantum state that lasts forever may finally be within our grasp
2
Remarkable fossils rewrite the story of how animals conquered the land
3
Autism may have two distinct subtypes that vary by brain activity
4
Almost the whole of Japan moved eastward after 2011 earthquake
5
The Selfish Gene at 50: Why Dawkins’s evolution classic still holds up
6
Fully autonomous drones have killed human soldiers for the first time
7
Gas from Uranus reveals it has an icy centre
8
The secrets to keeping your brain sharp in old age
9
Has the answer to life's origins been hiding in our cells all along?
10
Flood of AI 'garbage' is pushing open-source developers to the limit



