“If you convert [your car] to run on copies of this book instead of gas, it will burn through 30,000 words per minute, several dozen times faster than the word consumption of a typical human.”
If you thought that “How to“, the follow-up to “What if…” would be more practical, then you’d be wrong.
Whether it’s chasing a tornado without getting up from your couch or moving your house with jet engines, Munroe takes another fun, inventive journey through science and maths. While it doesn’t quite hang together as well as “What if,” it still manages to amuse, educate1 and entertain.
There are so many good bits that it’s difficult to mention even a few highlights, but I think possibly my favourite part is where he fails to faze Colonel Chris Hadfield, even when asked how to land a space shuttle that’s attached to the carrier aircraft (response: “Easy peasy”).
If you’re at all interested in science or engineering, you should read this book (if you haven’t already). Just — please — don’t take the advice literally.
- I mean, not directly. You’re unlikely to have an exam where you need to know how to build a lava moat. But the thought-process in getting a serious answer to an absurd question absolutely has value. ↩︎