Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions What If?, #2
Hardcover, 368 pages
English language
Published Sept. 13, 2022 by Riverhead Books.
The #1 New York Times–bestselling author of What If? and How To provides his best answers yet to the weirdest questions you never thought to ask.
The millions of people around the world who read and loved What If? still have questions, and those questions are getting stranger. Thank goodness xkcd creator Randall Munroe is here to help. Planning to ride a fire pole from the moon back to Earth? The hardest part is sticking the landing. Hoping to cool the atmosphere by opening everyone’s freezer door at the same time? Maybe it’s time for a brief introduction to thermodynamics. Want to know what would happen if you rode a helicopter blade, built a billion-story building, made a lava lamp out of lava, or jumped on a geyser as it erupted? Okay, if you insist.
Before you go on a cosmic road trip, feed the residents of New York City …
The #1 New York Times–bestselling author of What If? and How To provides his best answers yet to the weirdest questions you never thought to ask.
The millions of people around the world who read and loved What If? still have questions, and those questions are getting stranger. Thank goodness xkcd creator Randall Munroe is here to help. Planning to ride a fire pole from the moon back to Earth? The hardest part is sticking the landing. Hoping to cool the atmosphere by opening everyone’s freezer door at the same time? Maybe it’s time for a brief introduction to thermodynamics. Want to know what would happen if you rode a helicopter blade, built a billion-story building, made a lava lamp out of lava, or jumped on a geyser as it erupted? Okay, if you insist.
Before you go on a cosmic road trip, feed the residents of New York City to a T. rex, or fill every church with bananas, be sure to consult this practical guide for impractical ideas. Unfazed by absurdity, Randall consults the latest research on everything from swing-set physics to airplane-catapult design to clearly and concisely answer his readers’ questions. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.
Filled with bonkers science, boundless curiosity, and Randall’s signature stick-figure comics, What If? 2 is sure to be another instant classic adored by inquisitive readers of all ages.
The first book was more novel, but first books have a tendency for that to happen. Still an enjoy able read.
A hilariously entertaining book that sets out to do what it says. People send in absurd, hypothetical questions, and the author seriously tries to answer them using what science knows about how the world works.
The result is a popular science book that entertains, yet educates, and makes you think about how the world could work if situations in the questions could really come about.
The author is, of course, careful to put disclaimers at various points of the book, telling the readers to absolutely, definitely, not to try out some of the answers for real. Doing so would probably get the reader in trouble with the law, lose his life, destroy the earth or the universe, or all of the above.
El humor geek siempre corre el peligro de transformarse en una celebración de un complejo de superioridad donde lo importante no es tanto el chiste sino el demostrar lo listo que es el autor y, por asociación, sus lectores. Es muy difícil encontrar un equilibro donde el humor científico sea gracioso y además entendible por gente con una base mucho más limitada que la del autor (valga yo mismo que no soy más que un ingeniero, un umpalumpa de la ciencia). Pero xkcd lleva años siendo un maestro de este equilibrio. Su humor muchas veces puede exigir una mínima base, pero no es excluyente. Pero también es cierto que cuando habla sobre un tema sobre el que algo sabes se disfruta infinitamente más. El chiste del pequeño Bobby Tables es ya un clásico en el mundo de la seguridad, por ejemplo. La serie de libros de What if son una …
El humor geek siempre corre el peligro de transformarse en una celebración de un complejo de superioridad donde lo importante no es tanto el chiste sino el demostrar lo listo que es el autor y, por asociación, sus lectores. Es muy difícil encontrar un equilibro donde el humor científico sea gracioso y además entendible por gente con una base mucho más limitada que la del autor (valga yo mismo que no soy más que un ingeniero, un umpalumpa de la ciencia). Pero xkcd lleva años siendo un maestro de este equilibrio. Su humor muchas veces puede exigir una mínima base, pero no es excluyente. Pero también es cierto que cuando habla sobre un tema sobre el que algo sabes se disfruta infinitamente más. El chiste del pequeño Bobby Tables es ya un clásico en el mundo de la seguridad, por ejemplo. La serie de libros de What if son una auténtica gozada. Randall Munroe pone todo el poder de la ciencia al servicio de preguntas a cada cual más absurda. Pero las respuestas a esas preguntas por la magia de la relatividad o la cuántica muchas veces consiguen dibujar un escenario todavía más absurdo. Y generalmente catastrófico.
A highly entertaining, educational read, with (at times disconcerting) questions brought to Munroe. Would have been nice if he added a few of his own ponderings, but at least I know the answers to a lot of things I'd be too sensible to deem possible. Granted, there was one question in there that younger, less jaded me had on her mind.
Enjoyable edutainment at some of its finest.
Easily as good as the first. Oh, how I needed this right now! This is the kind of book that reminds me there is hope for the world.
Excellent humor but also surprisingly educational. For everyone interested in science.
This is a wonderful book for the "weird nerdy speculation"-hungry nerd (like me)
Purchasable
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/576761/what-if-2-by-randall-munroe/.