Questions for Mary Roach: Everything You’ve Wanted to Know About Guts But Were Too Squeamish to Ask

It is hard to imagine a topic in science that Mary Roach won’t touch. After all, as Carl Zimmer put it, the acclaimed science writer “put her head in a cow’s stomach for you, dear reader. If you don’t read [Roach’s new book] Gulp, then that was all for naught. Plus, you’ll miss out on the funniest book ever written about guts.”

Guts, and our taboos about discussing their bodily imperative, are humorously explored in Roach’s latest book, which raises questions such as these:

-Could thorough chewing lower the national debt?

-If saliva is full of bacteria, why do we animals lick our wounds?

-Why don’t suicide bombers smuggle bombs in their rectums?

-Why don’t stomachs digest themselves?

-Can constipation kill you? Did it kill Elvis?

These questions are no longer taboo, as Mary Roach will be discussing these topics and others in her interview with Big Think. So here is your chance to ask Roach what you’ve always wanted to know, but were perhaps to squeamish to ask, about the alimentary canal.

Please enter your questions in the comments.