What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

by Randall Munroe

In the Clarendon Laboratory at Oxford University sits a battery-powered bell that has been ringing since the year 1840. The bell “rings” so quietly it’s almost inaudible, using only a tiny amount of charge with every motion of the clapper. Nobody knows exactly what kind of batteries it uses because nobody wants to take it apart to figure it out.

Watch dials used to be coated in radium, which made them glow. However, this glow didn’t come from the radioactivity itself. It came from the phosphorescent paint on top of the radium, which glowed when it was irradiated. Over the years, the paint has broken down. Although the watch dials are still radioactive, they no longer glow.

There have been over 400 billion Lego4 pieces produced over the years.

A magnitude 9 earthquake already measurably alters the rotation of the Earth; the two magnitude 9+ earthquakes this century both altered the length of the day by a tiny fraction of a second.