The author of the webcomic xkcd gives desperately
impractical but scientifically rigorous advice on how to solve common
problems.
In many ways this feels quite like more of What If?, the
original site of which has only been updated once since 2017: starting
with a problem such as "How to Move", Munroe looks at various
subproblems (how to move your actual house to somewhere new) and
solves them by various means (jet engines can only support enough fuel
for an hour or so of vertical flight). But while these are enjoyable,
I think perhaps there's a bit too much structure, and not enough
absurdity (yes, all right, there's how to cross a river by boiling it
with many, many kettles, but there's no machine-gun-based jetpack).
Some of the chapters aren't absurd at all; How to Predict the
Weather and How to Take a Selfie (in particular how to get
interesting small things to look large in the background) are
practically standard pop-science, albeit with amusing cartoons.
It's… OK. But it's not first-rate material; it feels more like the
"greatest hits 2" album of a band that only had about five really good
songs in the first place.
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