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

Bestseller

Author: Randall Munroe

Narrator: Wil Wheaton

Unabridged: 6 hr 35 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Penguin Audio

Published: 09/13/2022

Synopsis

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. As he consistently demonstrates, you can learn a lot from examining how the world might work in very specific extreme circumstances.

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.

Reviews

Goodreads review by H (no longer expecting notifications) Balikov on April 04, 2023

No, this isn’t a sequel. If you haven’t read What If? (The Original) you can read this one first with no regrets. If you have read The Original, you may conclude that Randall Monroe will never see the bottom of his bucket of absurd questions. Will you, like me, be thrilled and delighted by his appro......more

Goodreads review by library ghost on November 13, 2022

it honestly ended right when it was getting reallyy good 😭. books that come with random science facts (or facts in general) have to be my fav non-fic genre. and this book delivers exactly that! though i was hoping this would be an easy 5 star like What If 1 but no such luck :((......more

Goodreads review by Bandit on October 12, 2022

I’m a fan. I’m SUCH a fan. Munroe’s books are the science books you wished you were taught from, and Munroe is the science teacher you wish you had. The man’s qualified too, he’s a former NASA physicist who decided to cartoon his way to pop science instead. And good for us, readers, because his book......more

Goodreads review by Rod on April 20, 2023

I only wanted to read this book because it was on NPR's Books We Love 2022: Favorite Comics and Graphic Novels list, and I have a goal of reading all the books on that list. When I checked the book out of the library I was disappointed to find that it does not fit my definition of a graphic novel, b......more

Goodreads review by Douglas on June 12, 2022

Randall Monroe is the author of the webcomic xkcd. In this book he takes ridiculous, extreme questions (like "What if Japan suddenly left the Earth?") and reasons about the results using (primarily order-of-magnitude) scientific estimates. If this sounds familiar, that's because the book is just lik......more

Quotes

Praise for What If? 2

“Delightful. . . Randall Munroe has made a career out of sharing his joy in science and engineering. . . . This book and its predecessor inspire us to believe that, even in a vast and mysterious universe, there’s a lot we can figure out with nothing but a sharp pencil, come basic scientific knowledge and a vivid imagination.” —The Wall Street Journal

"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

"Picking this book up now and then enlivens life by letting you briefly consider the effects of, say, putting an indestructible 20-meter-wide glass tube all the way down to the deepest part of the ocean. Plus, Munroe’s illustrations turn stick figures and flowcharts into the stuff of existential hilarity." —NPR 

"Entertaining. . . . combines Munroe’s true research and truly funny prose with his signature stick-figure illustrations." —The Washington Post

"Perfect if you enjoy it when stuffy figures of authority crack a smile. Or if you like it when black holes form. That happens a lot." —Newsweek

"One of my favorite books of the year." —Tim Harford, Financial Times

"It's an absolute delight! It's the coolest way to learn how the world actually works." —Hank Green (on the Dear Hank & John podcast) 

“A delight for science geeks with a penchant for oddball thought experiments.” —Kirkus

Praise for Randall Munroe and What If?

“Randall Munroe is a national treasure.” —Phil Plait
 
“Extreme astrophysics and indecipherable chemistry have rarely been this clearly explained or this consistently hilarious.” —Entertainment Weekly “10 Best Nonfiction Books of the Year”

“Consistently fascinating and entertaining...Munroe leavens the hard science with whimsical touches... An illuminating handbook of methods of reasoning.” —Wall Street Journal

“It’s fun to watch as Munroe tackles each question and examines every possible complication with nerdy and methodical aplomb.... The delightfully demented What If? is the most fun you can have with math and science, short of becoming your own evil genius.” —Boston Globe

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