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XKCD Author's New Unpublished Book Becomes Scientific Best-Seller
An anonymous reader writes: XKCD cartoonist Randall Munroe will be publishing a new book in November, but it's already become Amazon's #1 best-seller in two "Science & Math" subcategories, for mechanics and scientific instruments. Inspired by a cartoon describing NASA's Saturn V rocket as "the up-goer V", Randall's created a large-format collection of blueprints describing datacenters, tectonic plates, and even the controls in an airplane cockpit — using only the thousand most common English words. "Since this book explains things, I've called it Thing Explainer," Randall writes on the XKCD blog, trying to mimic the humorously simple style of his book. Randall's previous book of scientific hypotheticals — published one year ago — is still Amazon's #1 best-selling book in their "Physics" category, ranking higher than Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time."
"Technology for Pakleds" (they are smart)
"Most common 1000 words" is great for making a point.
Far more practical would be using a vocabulary that almost all 10-year-old native speakers can read and that a vast majority of non-native speakers who have spent the last few years living in a English-speaking environment (that is, an environment that pretty much forces you to learn to speak and read English at a basic level in order to survive).
I would expect this to be far more than 1000 words.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
in a book format.
http://xkcd.org/
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
I despise your implication that "popular" == "low quality". Popularity and quality are not mutually exclusive, for all advertising may bamboozle.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
And announced on https://www.xkcd.com/ long ago
Totof
There are way more science-fans than scientists, and the worst of these tend to enjoy xkcd.
What makes you the arbiter?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
This is Randall "Cunnilingus" Munroe we're talking about, yes?
A book written in only a thousand words, I thought, would be cool for people learning English. But it's not. The whole thing is shot through with Millennial cultural references, so much as to make it incomprehensible. Hell, I can barely understand parts of the sample page. People who had different life experiences from the author as well as non-native English speakers will be totally lost. Sad, I had such high hopes.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I thought that after the "nukular disasters are A-ok because: nukabananas" people would start to realize they are like bad building painters...
The less knowledge you have (paint) the more you need to spread it thin...
who's title I'm too lazy to look up. It is fricken awesome, well worth the $20.
// Don't even know him
/// Just enjoyed his book
/ Not Randall
When I read "the up-goer V", I received the message that technical language is a good thing since it helps to clarify concepts. (At least to a degree. I'm sure that we have all run across texts that use jargon to such a degree that it obscures concepts.) Just look at that cartoon. It is almost impossible to figure out what the Saturn V actually does because the language is so simple that it fails to convey the purpose of the various parts.
Making that point only takes a single cartoon. Anything more is tedious.
I always have to explain to new authors that it doesn't matter how good you think your book is, to get sales, you should try and achieve some fame first. I'm not saying Munroe didn't earn his fame, those xkcd comics are funny sometimes. I like them. It is just that being well known is important. For this reason, running a free site with no ads can benefit you in many ways in the long run.
God spoke to me
Will someone please show me Thing One and Thing Two?
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
... isn't it a little stupid to be giving awards to a book that isn't published yet? That's like giving an unfinished indie game the award of "game of the year"...
oh wait. That's actually happened before.
Buck Feta. You know what to do.
TFS points to the one he did of a rocket. http://xkcd.com/1133/
I'm a pretty good scientist, and I enjoy xkcd.
As a physicist, I don't expect the #1 book in "Physics" to be written by a professional physicist (although Randall has a physics degree and has worked a "physics" job). By definition, professional physicists don't specialize in mass market entertainment. Randall does specialize in entertainment, and I appreciate that he's using that expertise to write about science. If you don't like his approach, that's ok; there are other folks out there producing content about science differently.
I don't understand how the link supports what you say in your post. Whats absurd about saying that the new widespread availability of technology which can conclusively demonstrate tall tales, paired with the lack of such demonstrations, strongly implies that the tall tales were bullshit all along? That's the same reason we decided that Planet X doesn't exist, among countless other examples.
It's like YA for engineers.
"Old man yells at systemd"
What award? It's a best-seller for Amazon, which simply means that a lot of people bought it. Why get so many preorders before release? Because of the way the New York Times calculates their lists.
To sell many copies of a book, it really helps to be on the New York Times best-seller list for a particular week. But to get on the list, you have to sell many copies in a week. The trick is that the Times counts sales when the books are DELIVERED, not when they are ordered. So what you do is pre-sell books for a long time prior to publication. The week the book is released, and orders are fulfilled, the Times counts allb of those preorders as sales for that one week that the book is actually released. Hopefully, that's enough to get on the Times best-seller list and all of the publicity associated with that.
This is also why you'll see very attractive offers for preorders, things like "preorder my new book and you'll get the DVD, plus my last book, for free". They aren't trying to make money on preorders, they're trying to get enough preorders to get on the best- seller list for the week when they fulfill the preorders.
Wow. What an amazing collection of annoyed science snobs. "How dare anyone make science accessible or *gasp* humorous!"
What a bunch of highly educated whiners.
Donald Trump is going to win because money is everything in US politics: the only way to get ahead is toupee.
I have a suspicion that the BBC in the UK are running a similar experiment. Many documentaries seem to have lost their past tense which can result in a very awkward style when presenters try to explain historical events as if they are still continuously happening in the present. They obviously have a good deal of contempt for their audience.
This is exactly what I'm talking about. If you need help understanding why that comic is dangerous nonsense, take a quick look at the comments on his own site about it. Here's a hint: It has nothing to do with the subject, but the method.
Required reading for internet skeptics
Greetings jthill,
You can see Thing One and Thing Two here, eventually: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Cheers,
jeek
If you want to be seen, stand up. If you want to be heard, speak up. If you want to be respected, sit down and shut up.
Sorry guys, yes, I did not noticed the "TEN". I feel bad right now.
Totof
Ok, taking you seriously for a moment here: You've been double-bluffed.
Randall knows that the methodology is flawed. He's posting it as a self-referential deconstruction of the methodology that led to false beliefs, intentionally using junk science to discredit non-science secure in the knowledge that his science savvy readers will understand this and admire the inherent contradiction in what he's posting.
None of which detracts from the sheer common bloody sense insight that he's included for the benefit of those that missed the nuance above.
Somehow you fell through the cracks. Perhaps you should read a different web comic.
Your penance is to use Windows 10 for 90 days - no dual booting and yes, that includes a phone. One more time and it is Bob.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Not meaning to troll, but what makes you "a pretty good scientist"?
There is a scientific method. All scientists are supposed to follow it. So the quality of being a scientist is binary -- one is or one isn't.
If one isn't, why would one say anything? If one is, it is like saying "I am a policeman", "I am a teacher".
So here you could just say "I am a scientist".
Sorry, I just don't get the "pretty good" phrase, and it makes me question whether you are or not.
I come here for the love
Nonsense.
Required reading for internet skeptics
Of course it's nonsense. Shit, I used the term "self-referential deconstruction", you can't get much more nonsense than that.
Here's the thing. Doesn't stop it being right.
Did that "WOOSH" blow you over? Maybe you're not the correct audience for XKCD
Why not actually explain why that cartoon is nonsense. I'm clearly an idiot but anything would be a start.
Without doing so explicitly, I'm going to assume that this cartoon upsets you because you believe in ghosts.
If only the response to this was the ultimate burn - "well, the Nobel people think so..."
Please stop describing this book as "using only the thousand most common English words". The word 'thousand' is not one of the thousand most common English words, which is why Randall describes the book as "using only the ten hundred most common English words". Missing that detail is practically missing the entire point.
Says the physics crank.
Fleischman and Pons were bad scientists even if they followed the scientific method. Being a scientist is not limited to following the scientific method -- at least in the real world. It's possible to have your head up your ass (like you), to creatively interpret findings, to play politics either local or national. It's possible to have high minded ideals and it's possible to be a scientist for the Nazis. Your world may be a binary one where adherence to the scientific method is the only qualification, in which case you've just damned yourself with your own standards. You are a troll, and a fucking moron. Nothing you have ever written or done will ever be of use to anyone else. Live your life if you must, but if you never tried to write or explain anything ever again it would be too soon.
You can't fight reality. Randal has, in the past, said some pretty absurd stuff in his comics
Einstein said some pretty absurd stuff in real life - much of which is still widely quoted. Like that "God doesn't play dice" thing.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
Nice touch.
And there it is. The inevitable Stealth downmod (of parent).
Several days after the thread has died, so there is minimal chance of anyone coming along and reversing the moderation.
It is no wonder that Slashdot has gone down hill.
And that so many have gone elsewhere, or only post anonymously.
Hives don't like individuals.
And individuals don't like hives.