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Inquiring minds want to blow things up…

Author:  Randall Munroe

what if cover (196x257)Do you really like science?  A lot?

Do you wish that Sheldon Cooper would take some time to fully explain the calculations on his white board?

Do you know what a slide rule is for?

Do you become restless if you’ve gone more than a day without consulting Wikipedia?

If you answer yes to any (or all) of these questions, I’ve got a book that you’re sure to find entertaining, it may even produce gargalesthesia at your medial epicondyle.  Enigmatically entitled, What If?, the book is a collection of webcomic creator and former NASA roboticist Randall Munroe’s scientifically rigorous answers to some of the craziest hypothetical questions ever conceived.

Also known as gedankenexperiments for those of a more Teutonic bent, thought experiments have a storied history in the annals of scientific exploration.  From Einstein’s discovery of special relativity to the buttered cat paradox, great thinkers frequently perform mental gymnastics to answer complicated questions which present logistical or physical barriers that make an actual experiment impossible.

Assisted by clever questions, submitted by his loyal Internet following, Munroe takes the thought experiment to an entirely logical – and frequently ridiculous – extreme when he answers questions like:  “What if a glass of water was, all of a sudden, literally half empty?”, or “From what height would you need to drop a steak for it to be cooked when it hits the ground?”, or “What would happen if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90 percent of the speed of light?”.

Skillfully balancing detailed scientific reasoning with plenty of science geek humor, Munroe’s answers to these questions – and 54 more just like them – are consistently engaging, although I did have to take a break occasionally to let the swelling of my cerebral hemispheres subside.  Having originally appeared in the What If? section of the author’s xkcd.com website, Munroe’s answers  include many of the comically crude stick figure drawings he routinely uses to help clarify crucial details.  While this kind of hard core science writing won’t appeal to everyone, the author’s explanatory acumen is powerful enough that anyone with an interest in science will enjoy it, from grizzled quantum physicists to pre-teen neogeeks.

Boldly going where no web physicist has gone before, occasionally accompanied by a Lord of the Rings or Star Wars stick figure, Munroe has mapped out a great ride through the universe of hard core science, adroitly displaying his mastery of the mathematical arts.  Whether you want to know how to build a bridge from London to New York entirely out of LEGOs or how fast you can drive over a speed bump and survive, What If? is an imaginative and comical collection that is sure to please anyone with a fondness for science.

— D. Driftless

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