How To: Absurd Scientific Advice for Common Real-World Problems

by Randall Munroe

Physics doesn’t care if your question is weird. It just gives you the answer, without judging.

High-frequency sounds are absorbed by air as they travel through it, so they fade out quickly. That’s why nearby thunder makes a higher-pitched “cracking” sound, while faraway thunder makes a low rumble. They both sound the same at the source, but over a long distance, the high-frequency components of the thunder are muffled and only the low-frequency ones reach your ear.

a long jumper is just a sprinter who’s good at briefly going up instead of forward.

I really love that we can ask physics ridiculous questions like, “What kind of gas mileage would my house get on the highway?” and physics has to answer us.

This idea sounds ridiculous, so, unsurprisingly, the US military studied it during the Cold War.

The filtering effect of the atmosphere is part of why the time near sunrise and sunset is referred to as the “golden hour” in photography. The same warmer, redder light that creates brilliant sunsets makes for good portraits, as well as good sunset photos.

In a sense, skiers are really just mountain climbers who are unusually bad at climbing but make up for it with very good balance.

“Sin,” she said, “is when you treat people as things.”