This book explores the work of scientists working at the edge of science on projects too ridiculous for science fiction: the Deathbusters at Alcor Extension who will freeze your head for a price; building time machines; hatching plans for dismantling the sun; Evel Knievel and the private astronaut programme and, of course, the mambo chickens who spend their whole lives in intensified gravity and are built like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Here are Dave Criswell, who plans to recycle the stars to increase their energy efficiency; and Bob Forward, designer of time machines, the grey goo problem and a fifth-dimensional hypervelocity space drive.