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How to : absurd scientific advice for common real-world problems / Randall Munroe.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New York : Riverhead Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2019Description: 307 pages : illustrations ; 24 cmContent type:
  • text
  • still image
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9780525537090
  • 0525537090
Subject(s):
Contents:
Introduction -- How to jump really high -- How to throw a pool party -- How to dig a hole -- How to play the piano -- How to listen to music -- How to make an emergency landing -- How to cross a river -- How to move -- How to keep your house from moving -- How to chase a tornado -- How to build a lava moat -- How to throw things -- How to play football -- How to predict the weather -- How to go places -- How to play tag -- How to ski -- How to mail a package -- How to power your house (on Earth) -- How to power your house (on Mars) -- How to make friends -- How to blow out birthday candles -- How to walk a dog -- How to send a file -- How to charge your phone -- How to take a selfie -- How to catch a drone -- How to tell if you're a Nineties Kid -- How to win an election -- How to decorate a tree -- How to build a highway -- How to get somewhere fast -- How to be on time -- How to dispose of this book -- How to change a lightbulb.
Summary: "For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. [This book] is a guide to the third kind of approach. It's full of highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole." -- From book jacket flap.Summary: For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. Munroe has created a guide to the third kind of approach. He provides highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole. In exploring the absurd, he opens up an understanding to the science and technology underlying the things we do every day. -- adapted from jacket
Holdings
Item type Home library Collection Call number Materials specified Status Date due Barcode Item holds
Adult Book Adult Book Main Library NonFiction 502 M968 Checked out 05/23/2024 33111009700275
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

AN INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

"How To will make you laugh as you learn...With How To , you can't help but appreciate the glorious complexity of our universe and the amazing breadth of humanity's effort to comprehend it. If you want some lightweight edification, you won't go wrong with How To ." -- CNET

"[ How To ] has science and jokes in it, so 10/10 can recommend." --Simone Giertz

The world's most entertaining and useless self-help guide from the brilliant mind behind the wildly popular webcomic xkcd, the bestsellers What If? and Thing Explainer , and What If? 2, coming September 13, 2022

For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. How To is a guide to the third kind of approach. It's full of highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole.

Bestselling author and cartoonist Randall Munroe explains how to predict the weather by analyzing the pixels of your Facebook photos. He teaches you how to tell if you're a baby boomer or a 90's kid by measuring the radioactivity of your teeth. He offers tips for taking a selfie with a telescope, crossing a river by boiling it, and powering your house by destroying the fabric of space-time. And if you want to get rid of the book once you're done with it, he walks you through your options for proper disposal, including dissolving it in the ocean, converting it to a vapor, using tectonic plates to subduct it into the Earth's mantle, or launching it into the Sun.

By exploring the most complicated ways to do simple tasks, Munroe doesn't just make things difficult for himself and his readers. As he did so brilliantly in What If? , Munroe invites us to explore the most absurd reaches of the possible. Full of clever infographics and fun illustrations, How To is a delightfully mind-bending way to better understand the science and technology underlying the things we do every day.

Includes bibliographical references (pages [292]-299) and index.

Introduction -- How to jump really high -- How to throw a pool party -- How to dig a hole -- How to play the piano -- How to listen to music -- How to make an emergency landing -- How to cross a river -- How to move -- How to keep your house from moving -- How to chase a tornado -- How to build a lava moat -- How to throw things -- How to play football -- How to predict the weather -- How to go places -- How to play tag -- How to ski -- How to mail a package -- How to power your house (on Earth) -- How to power your house (on Mars) -- How to make friends -- How to blow out birthday candles -- How to walk a dog -- How to send a file -- How to charge your phone -- How to take a selfie -- How to catch a drone -- How to tell if you're a Nineties Kid -- How to win an election -- How to decorate a tree -- How to build a highway -- How to get somewhere fast -- How to be on time -- How to dispose of this book -- How to change a lightbulb.

"For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. [This book] is a guide to the third kind of approach. It's full of highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole." -- From book jacket flap.

For any task you might want to do, there's a right way, a wrong way, and a way so monumentally complex, excessive, and inadvisable that no one would ever try it. Munroe has created a guide to the third kind of approach. He provides highly impractical advice for everything from landing a plane to digging a hole. In exploring the absurd, he opens up an understanding to the science and technology underlying the things we do every day. -- adapted from jacket

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