How Stuff Works—The sort of title that gets small boys like me wet. Twenty years of playing with stuff can’t help but leave you wondering about it. How does glue stick? What are hangovers? What is the speed of smell? How do they put the stripe in toothpaste? None of these questions are answered in Brain’s book. There is a lovely section on sweat, though. For example, we have two types of sweat gland and two types of sweat. Apparently only “apocrine” glands (‘pits and genitals) produce smelly sweat. And only then after bacteria start going on the protein and fatty acids therein. There you go. BO explained.
Hey, and magna-doodles. So you have a lot of black magnetic stuff in a thick white liquid, trapped between two sheets. Apply a magnetic pen and the black stuff comes to the top and is trapped there by the viscous liquid. Apply a magnet to the back of the sheet, which is what the eraser does, and you pull the black stuff to the other side again. Cool.
Unfortunately, these are the exceptions. Otherwise, the “stuff” seems to be emphasized at the expense of the “how.” Numbers (especially big ones) are good; explanations are bad.
Take airplanes. Airplane wings create lift as a result of their angle of attack. The air pressure below the wing is thus greater than that above. So the plane rises. Erm. Where did the why bit go? It seems they swapped it for info on 747 cruise speeds.
Likewise, the only interesting thing about a toilet (apart from what you put in it) is the flush. Without electricity, gears, combustion engines or other stuff we can suck the contents of a toilet bowl out into the sewers. How? Apparently by using a siphon just below the bowl, which is filled if you put water into the bowl fast enough. How do siphons work? Nothing. How can they manage a four-sentence proof of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle (a masterpiece of brevity) but not explain the john?
Not only are proper explanations too hard for the reader to grasp, but we’re given idiot’s guides to toasters, to PC power supplies and to caffeine addiction: “if you feel like you cannot function without caffeine and must consume it every day, then you are addicted to caffeine.” No shit, Sherlock.
If you’re into cars and computers, then indulge yourself. Lots of engines, autos, processors and digital everything. Lots of things whose workings have never interested me. How do tire pressure gauges work? How fascinating.
Most ironic title: how dieting works.
Ho ho.
This would be fun to find on someone else’s coffee table. If it’s information you’re after, though, you’d be better off using their website (www. howstuffworks .com).
It also happens to be free, easier to search and more informative (it explains about airplanes). Or you could try looking in a real book.
