What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

What Would Happen If You Tried to Hit a Baseball Pitched at 90% the Speed of Light?

Randall Munroe, the creator of the beloved webcomic xkcd, has a gift for answering questions that no one should ever ask — with the full rigour of a trained physicist and the comic timing of a genius.

What If? collects the most mind-bending, hilarious, and surprisingly illuminating questions from his wildly popular "What If?" blog, and answers them with real science, hand-drawn diagrams, and an irresistible sense of fun. You'll never look at the universe the same way again.

Questions You Never Knew You Needed Answered

• What would happen if you tried to swim in a nuclear reactor pool?
• How long would it take to drain the world's oceans with a pump?
• What if everyone on Earth jumped at the same time?
• Could you build a jetpack using machine gun recoil?
• Rigorous science + absurd questions = the most entertaining physics book ever written

Book Details

• Author: Randall Munroe
• Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton (H&S)
• ISBN: 9781848549562
• Genre: Popular Science / Humour / Non-Fiction
• Language: English
• Weight: 300g

Perfect for curious minds of all ages — and anyone who has ever wondered "but what if, though?"