What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!

An NPR Best Book of 2022

"The questions throughout What If? 2 are equal parts brilliant, gross, and wonderfully absurd and the answers are thorough, deeply researched, and great fun. . . . Science isn’t easy, but in Munroe’s capable hands, it surely can be fun." —TIME

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of What If? and How To answers more of 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, Munroe consults the latest research on everything from swing-set physics to airliner catapult–design to answer his readers’ questions, clearly and concisely, with illuminating and occasionally terrifying illustrations. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.
1140943988
What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!

An NPR Best Book of 2022

"The questions throughout What If? 2 are equal parts brilliant, gross, and wonderfully absurd and the answers are thorough, deeply researched, and great fun. . . . Science isn’t easy, but in Munroe’s capable hands, it surely can be fun." —TIME

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of What If? and How To answers more of 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, Munroe consults the latest research on everything from swing-set physics to airliner catapult–design to answer his readers’ questions, clearly and concisely, with illuminating and occasionally terrifying illustrations. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.
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What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

by Randall Munroe
What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

What If? 2: Additional Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

by Randall Munroe

Hardcover

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Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller

Who hasn't experienced the joy of an out-of-the-blue daydream, what if question, one that pushes the bounds of possibility? Such must be the everyday norm for Randall Munroe, but who unlike most of us, has the science "chops" to craft an answer. From comix to books, Munroe has dazzled and intrigued with flights of inquiry and is back with more. Guaranteed, your inner child will shout "Yippee!"

AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER!

An NPR Best Book of 2022

"The questions throughout What If? 2 are equal parts brilliant, gross, and wonderfully absurd and the answers are thorough, deeply researched, and great fun. . . . Science isn’t easy, but in Munroe’s capable hands, it surely can be fun." —TIME

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of What If? and How To answers more of 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, Munroe consults the latest research on everything from swing-set physics to airliner catapult–design to answer his readers’ questions, clearly and concisely, with illuminating and occasionally terrifying illustrations. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780525537113
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date: 09/13/2022
Pages: 368
Sales rank: 27,624
Product dimensions: 7.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

About The Author
Randall Munroe is the author of the New York Times bestsellers What If? 2, How To, What If?, and Thing Explainer; the science question-and-answer blog What If?; and the popular web comic xkcd. A former NASA roboticist, he left the agency in 2006 to draw comics on the internet full time. He lives in Massachusetts.

Table of Contents

Introduction ix

1 Soupiter 1

2 Helicopter Ride 6

3 Dangerously Cold 11

4 Ironic Vaporization 16

5 Cosmic Road Trip 22

6 Pigeon Chair 26

S Short Answers #1 30

7 T. Rex Calories 37

8 Geyser 40

9 Pew, Pew, Pew 43

10 Reading Every Book 47

W Weird & Worrying #1 51

11 Banana Church 52

12 Catch! 55

13 Lose Weight the Slow and Incredibly Difficult Way 59

14 Paint the Earth 66

15 Jupiter Comes to Town 70

16 Star Sand 74

17 Swing Set 78

18 Airliner Catapult 83

S Short Answers #2 88

19 Slow Dinosaur Apocalypse 98

20 Elemental Worlds 103

21 One-Second Day 108

22 Billion-Story Building 111

23 $2 Undecillion Lawsuit 120

24 Star Ownership 124

25 Tire Rubber 128

26 Plastic Dinosaurs 131

S Short Answers #3 135

27 Suction Aquarium 143

28 Earth Eye 149

29 Build Rome in a Day 154

30 Mariana Trench Tube 159

31 Expensive Shoebox 164

32 MRI Compass 168

33 Ancestor Fraction 172

34 Bird Car 176

35 No-Rules NASCAR 180

W Weird & Worrying #2 185

36 Vacuum Tube Smartphone 186

37 Laser Umbrella 192

38 Eat a Cloud 195

39 Tall Sunsets 199

40 Lava Lamp 202

41 Sisyphean Refrigerators 206

42 Blood Alcohol 210

43 Basketball Earth 214

44 Spiders vs. the Sun 217

45 Inhale a Person 220

46 Candy Crush Lightning 223

S Short Answers #4 226

47 Toasty Warm 234

48 Proton Earth, Electron Moon 236

49 Eyeball 241

50 Japan Runs an Errand 244

51 Fire from Moonlight 249

52 Read All the Laws 255

W Weird & Worrying #3 262

53 Saliva Pool 263

54 Snowball 268

55 Niagara Straw 272

56 Walking Backward in Time 277

57 Ammonia Tube 284

58 Earth-Moon Fire Pole 287

S Short Answers #5 298

59 Global Snow 305

60 Dog Overload 308

61 Into the Sun 314

62 Sunscreen 318

63 Walking on the Sun 323

64 Lemon Drops and Gumdrops 329

Acknowledgments 335

References 337

Index 349

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