This fascinating book explains how humans can live in extreme environments from a physiologist's perspective, using modern concepts of stress, tolerance and adaptation. The book examines how individuals cope with life under extremes of immersion, heat, cold and altitude, emphasizing the body's recognition of stress and the brain's role in the responses needed to escape or to adapt. It also explores how humanity deals with problems of adaptation, first by trial and error, then byscientific experimentation, and finally through technological innovation. (Oxford)