It's like a book version of Philomena Cunk

Interesting, as you'd expect, but there is a frustrating tendency to show off instead of answering the questions asked.

Does Anything Eat Wasps?: And 101 Other Questions (New Scientist) by New Scientist (2005)

I originally bought this and another in the series for my eldest son who was quite scientifically focussed at the time and wasn't a great reader in the hope that the bite sized responses may have appealed, but it remained unopened on the shelf until the recent coronavirus crisis when frustration with scientifically illiterate people pronouncing on serious matters on social media drove me to read this, which is largely made up of scientifically trained people offering possible insights into largely trivial and often alcohol induced or focused questions. Not a book to read in a large chunk, but better in similar portions to the original magazine feature which I always enjoyed when I was a regular reader of New Scientist, although my own scientific endeavours are now ancient history and I haven't bought the magazine for decades. It was slightly strange given the context in which I picked up the book off the shelf, that in the closing section there was a question concerning how long coronaviruses survive on surfaces... But given that the previous answer suggested that human brains have a tendency to read meaning into random patterns I won't read more into that than I might do...

Nice book with quick answers to interesting questions. Good time-filler!

Reading too much at once of this sort of little trivia can get a bit boring, but in small doses this book can be very funny. I mean, learning new things and laughing while at it, who can resist! And it somehow comforts me that I'm not the only one asking silly questions, with the difference that I ask them in real life from professors and whatnot instead of with just my name and country (counts almost anonymous with a name like mine)...

Trivia buffs, this is your book. Others might not get that much out of it.

This books was a lot of fun. It answers some of those burning questions in a humorous way. It does get a little too technical in places but still very enjoyable.

Zobaczyłam kiedyś reklamę w gazecie i od tamtej pory czatowałam na tę książkę, aż dorwałam ją za 10 zł w Realu. Szybko się czyta, pytania są ciekawe. Zwykle jest po kilka odpowiedzi do jednego pytania, więc można sobie porównać jak sprawa wygląda z różnych punktów widzenia. Wadą jest dla mnie natomiast wydanie. Okładka jest całkiem estetyczna, jednak szybko się niszczy i odchodzi z niej folia na brzegach. Myślę, że za 10 zł warto mieć, ale pewnie nie kupiłabym jej za cenę okładkową (32 zł).

An enjoyable and informative read.

I am that kind of person who always asks annoying questions about the world so this book is just for me.
This is an informative and seems to be very well researched book. The questions people asked were pretty cool (except the ones about beer and other alcoholic drinks, which for some reason were quite a lot). There are many very interesting facts in this book along with some boring stuff. But I think different people like different things. Fortunately, you can just skip through the questions and answers you find boring. The question-and-answer format made me continuously want to pick this book up.

My main problem with the book is that I don’t really like the numbers and calculations so I skimmed over them as well as over some silly questions I wasn’t interested in.
4.5/5

Some fascinating insight

หนังสือรวมคำถามเกี่ยวกับสิ่งรอบตัวที่น่าสนใจและรวมคำตอบจากผู้รู้จากแหล่งต่าง ๆ บางคำถามอาจจะมีคำตอบมากกว่า 1 คน แต่ตอบด้วยมุมมองต่างกันไป ก็น่าสนใจดี
มีบางคำถามที่น่าสนใจดี บางช่วงก็อธิบายละเอียดมาก ๆ จนเกินความรู้ที่เรามีเลยรู้สึกน่าเบื่อไปบ้าง