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vfaex3 | askphysics_test | 1 | What are common simple quantum mechanical models? By simple I mean well understood. I have weakness in quantum mechanics and I want to train on some excercises. Some of the excercises the come to mind are: Particle in a box Harmonic oscilator Hydrogen atom Uniform magnetic field What other good models are there? | icuoqwq | icv6qrm | 1,655,572,980 | 1,655,581,668 | 4 | 13 | A couple I found interesting when taking the course were the finite square well and top hat potential. I remember my professor made the step potential a homework problem and it was pretty fun. | The Dirac delta potential has a bound state and interesting scattering behavior, definitely something you should check out. V(x) = |x| is another potential that hasn't been mentioned yet. | 0 | 8,688 | 3.25 |
rl3mfw | askphysics_test | 0.98 | I don't want to be an engineer, I like physics. Hi there, im currently in high school and have some financial problems in the family, my parents are not satisfied with me doing physics (i mean get a degree and pursue higher studies in) as im also considering doing engineering as it has become a need. But i don't want to leave physics, i love atomic physics and cosmology so much. I want to ask here, can i continue my passion for physics while I'm doing engineering (IT) , will there be time for my passion. Or else is there any scope to follow my passion and take out my family of this? | hpdi7xb | hpdo802 | 1,640,053,657 | 1,640,056,433 | 20 | 35 | Physics is a hard way to make money. I have an undergrad degree in Physics, and in the long run I’m doing just fine financially, but it took a long time to get there. Physics undergrad degrees aren’t great financial investments. Even if you intend to get a PHD, that can still be a poor financial investment. So you’ll always have that to consider. Perhaps an undergrad Physics degree plus a masters in Education would be a good route for you? Ultimately you gotta follow your heart. If you go through with college Physics you will be a better critical thinker than 98% of everybody. It’s great training for your mind and teaches you to really know whether you know something. But you should keep a focus on how you are going to monetize it, if you don’t have great financial security | Another route to consider would be some kind of optical engineering/photonics track. This uses lots of physics really interesting but is really marketable. Many universities don't have designated optics/photonics departments but do have many professors doing the same work in physics or electrical engineering departments. A physics degree with decent optics experience is probably more marketable than most. | 0 | 2,776 | 1.75 |
yrzfys | askphysics_test | 0.9 | Does a full refrigerator use more energy than an empty one? Two identical refrigerators set to 40 degrees Fahrenheit. A is empty, B has a 24 pack of canned beer, already chilled to 40 degrees. Situation 1: The door is never opened. My intuition is that they use the same amount of energy. Is that correct? Situation 2: The door is opened once a day. My intuition is that fridge B will use less energy. When you open fridge A, warm air comes in that needs to be chilled. In fridge B, less warm air enters because of the beer. Beer has a high specific heat and so holds its chill while the fridge door is open. Is that correct? | ivwkors | ivxsy1k | 1,668,137,093 | 1,668,169,352 | 12 | 15 | Yes I think you’re right on both counts. | In a simplified textbook world you are right about both situations, above the effect of opening the door is small enough that it's not worth worrying about that. But in real life, in situation 1 there can be a quite significant difference. That's because the refrigerator's cooling system, the heat pump, cycles on and off controlled by a thermostat. When there's more thermal mass inside, it will cycle on and off more slowly. In an idealized model, that wouldn't matter. If it ran 25% of the time, it wouldn't matter whether that was 1 hour out of four hours or one minute out of 4 minutes. But the actual vapor compression refrigeration cycle relies on maintaining a pressure difference between the condenser and the evaporator. Each time it turns on, the compressor needs to first build up that pressure difference before much of work the compressor is doing goes into refrigeration. Then when it turns off, the pressures equalize between the condenser and evaporator, losing the work that was done to build up that pressure difference. So there's a certain amount of energy wasted for each cycle, and the slower cycling fridge with the higher thermal mass uses less energy over the course of a day. Note that better refrigerators will have smart* controls that will avoid having it cycle too fast even if there's very little inside. But in order to prevent the short cycling, they have to allow the temperature inside to swing up and down more than it would if they allowed the fast cycling, and more than it would if the fridge was full. Having the temperature cycle up and down a lot is worse for keeping food fresh, so even in that case, having more thermal mass inside is beneficial even if its effect on energy savings is reduced. *By smart I mean a really basic level of well-designed controls, not being connected to the internet or having a color touch panel on the front or anything like that. | 0 | 32,259 | 1.25 |
v10hro | askphysics_test | 0.97 | How much did you make as a fresh Physics PhD graduate? How much do you make now? Reposting here as I was told by the AutoMod on r/Physics not to post these types of questions | iajmuzf | iajunjg | 1,653,919,158 | 1,653,922,901 | 8 | 55 | I think it really depends on where you are, what kind of research you are aiming for, the domain ... As an example, in France, it will be between 1600 and 2000 in public labs, and can go way more than that in private labs | I know a few PhD physics phd graduates 130k University professor, hes a magnet guy. I don't get it. 90k space force/astrophysics 111k for... uh. Idk. Works at either Los Alamos or Sandia national labs... also an astrophysics guy 24k grocery store cashier 68k dude works at a dog food manufacturer trying to make sure kibble bits... "sheer" correctly ~75k at a community College. That guy was over qualified but they let him do what he wanted and he was sort of between projects, and working on emigrating and getting his wife. Also <3 These are all persons in the US. And I knew a masters student in physics who was making 80k because his research was VERY defense specific and someone showed up at his door, offering to make it classified, generously. Which is the same thing that happened to grocery store guy, but their research, answers and outcomes were all different. Also. All my answers are really... "defense" specific. Its the school I went to, and the location, and then once you meet 2, 3 then you just kinda collect them... Oh yeah! I want to tell you ABOUT them. They all have that... enthusiasm? Charm? They are all appealing outgoing people(except magnet guy and grocery guy) and I think that makes a BIG difference. Look at where alumni for your school end up. Ask program directors and career services. And remember networking is not at networking events. Its ehen and where you show up. | 0 | 3,743 | 6.875 |
7mgahb | askphysics_test | 0.98 | How can black holes grow if nothing passes the event horizon in our frame? Let's say a black hole sucks up a star. Its mass should increase and we see should see the event horizon grow. However if we would look closely not one single atom of the star should cross the event horizon according to time dilation. So how does that work itself out? | drtpzdd | drtqpyh | 1,514,396,735 | 1,514,397,545 | 3 | 41 | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mht-1c4wc0Q | In your perspective, as the infalling object approaches a point on the horizon slower and slower, it carries along with it its gravitational field lines shooting out to infinity. The number of field lines is equal (in some units) to the mass of the object. As it gets closer, these field lines do a very peculiar thing. They shoot sideways from the object, moving parallel to the horizon just above it up to some other point right above the horizon, then they suddenly shoot out radially from there to infinity. In addition the lines distribute themselves uniformly over the horizon: there is a constant number of field lines of the infalling object per unit horizon area. While still emanating from the body outside the BH, the field lines seem to really want to be field lines for the black hole. From afar, it looks just like the black has increased in mass by the mass of the object. If we define as it's natural mass through thennumber of gravitational field lines at infinity, then the BH has by all means grown. This is actually a piece of a very deep and interesting phenomenon with black holes in which if you purposefully choose "bad" coordinates so that infall takes infinite time (as we are doing above) then it's like the black hole "reenacts" in some weird codified way the infall using only outside-the-horizon physics. It's eerie. | 0 | 810 | 13.666667 |
tiuqri | askphysics_test | 0.93 | why do light atomic nuclei release energy when they fuse and why do heavier atomic nuclei release energy when they fission? ​ why do light atomic nuclei release energy when they fuse and why do heavier atomic nuclei release energy when they fission? This graph to explain: https://imgur.com/9SU7XPA I know that the amount of energy released during fusion and fission is based on the difference in mass. I also know that the cores at the top of the graph have the highest average binding energy per nuclei. I'm guessing the lighter nuclei need to fuse and heavier need to fission to move up the graph but I don't know why. My very best guess here is that the nuclear forces' range doesn't reach the outer parts of the nuclei so their average binding energy is a bit lower, and the reason light nuclei release less is because the radius of the nuclear force isn't completely filled yet. but I don't think this answers the question even if it is correct which I'm not even sure of. | i1go5ft | i1gtka9 | 1,647,817,189 | 1,647,819,624 | 3 | 37 | If two particles join and become bound, there is energy released (or absorbed) equal to the difference in binding energy. So, two deuterons, which are weakly bound, join to make a He4 which is much more tightly bound. This reaction releases an energetic gamma ray. The peak or most bound nucleus is iron. If one splits something heavier than iron into fragments, the fragments will tend to be more bound than what you start with. So energy is released. | The effect is because the strong nuclear force is very short range, compared to the electrostatic force. The electrostatic force follows an inverse-square law and makes all the protons in a nucleus repel each other quite strongly. The nuclear binding force between nucleons is a van-der-Waals type perturbation force and varies as a high inverse power of radius, times a decaying exponential in radius. For small nuclei (think helium or beryllium) the electrostatic force is totally overwhelmed by the strong force. As you add more protons to the nucleus, it becomes larger and the repulsive force on each new proton is proportionally more important than it was for the last one. That effect shifts the balance of neutrons and protons for optimal binding: the strong force works best with equal numbers of protons and neutrons (think helium) but the protons repel one another while neutrons don't. For small nuclei, the two effects (electrostatic and strong nuclear) are pretty close in effect, but the electrostatic repulsion grows faster. Eventually (at 26 protons, iron) the electrostatic repulsion begins to overwhelm the strong nuclear force, so subsequent protons and neutrons aren't bound as tightly. That means iron is just about the ideal condition for a nucleus, optimally balancing electrostatics and strong binding. Anything much lighter can fuse to be more like iron; and anything much heavier can break apart to be more like iron. | 0 | 2,435 | 12.333333 |
ig2ybu | askphysics_test | 0.98 | Does the observable universe have a non-zero net angular momentum? | g2ria0r | g2rb0i7 | 1,598,324,948 | 1,598,320,885 | 26 | 2 | How do define that rotation? Relative to what? | I read somewhere that the clusters and super-clusters of our observable universe are moving towards some "great attractor" that's outside of our bubble. | 1 | 4,063 | 13 |
trum66 | askphysics_test | 0.95 | Is there a specific name for the phenomenon where light's trajectory is altered by gravitational fields? Specifically when the gravitational pull of a planet or a star bends a ray of light. | i2nozhj | i2ofjwv | 1,648,602,359 | 1,648,615,836 | 14 | 17 | Gravitational Lensing | Gravitational lensing. It can be anything like a cluster of galaxies or the sun. | 0 | 13,477 | 1.214286 |
rn0tic | askphysics_test | 0.95 | What's physically happening inside the Earth's liquid iron core that generates our magnetic field? I'm learning about magnetic field and wanted to see if I can understand the Earth's magnetic field better. I'm specifically interested in the relationship between Earth's magnetic field, movement of electron, and electric field(?). I've learned that movement of creates magnetic field. Does this mean that the liquid iron core has a unidirectional movement of electrons, which creates the Earth's magnetic field? Does the direction of these electrons follow the right hand rule? Also, is there an electric field that's associated (created by?) this movement of electrons? Since electric field follows positive charge, would the direction of the electric field be anti-parallel to that of the electron? I've drawn a graphical presentation here: link. This is something I've been fascinated by. It'd be great if you could explain it in a simple terms for me to understand! | hppj0k9 | hppm20l | 1,640,282,649 | 1,640,283,914 | 2 | 14 | It is believed to be due to convective movement of liquid iron in the Earth's outer core, coupled with the Earth's rotation. It is known as the geodynamo. More information is in this Wikipedia article | This is one of the greatest not-quite-solved problems in geophysics. Turbulent convection currents in the liquid core bend and twist existing magnetic field lines in a way that amplifies them and creates a self-sustaining field similar to how a dynamo works. But it is nowhere near as simple as your diagram suggests. The field inside the core is believed to be incredibly complicated and asymmetrical -- in fact, there are proofs that the flow and field *must* be asymmetrical to create a self-sustaining dynamo. We are able to create numerical simulations of a self-sustaining planetary magnetic field, but we are not yet able to make them work with realistic Earth parameters, and (to my knowledge) nobody's given a simple explanation of exactly which parts of the complex interaction of field and flow are key to creating the field. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamo_theory | 0 | 1,265 | 7 |
a0luc6 | askphysics_test | 0.96 | What happens if water has no room to expand when freezing? Say you have a hollow container made from an extremely durable material such as titanium or something similar. This container is a perfect sphere with no imperfections or cracks or fault lines or anything of the sort. The container is 100% filled with water. There is zero room for air inside the container. This container is sitting in a room that is constantly 28 degrees Fahrenheit with no fluctuations. What happens? Does the water freeze anyway with no room to expand? Will it freeze and expand anyway and break the container? Or will the water simply refuse to freeze due to having no extra space for expansion? | eajd4vx | eairdir | 1,543,276,993 | 1,543,260,235 | 19 | 2 | There's 18 different types of water ice ("phases"), if you force extreme enough temperatures and pressures you'll generate phases that aren't the common freezer stuff: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice#Phases | Am I missing something or does water contract, not expand, when freezing? | 1 | 16,758 | 9.5 |
g7oit4 | askphysics_test | 0.98 | Why, 11 days after the Chernobyl accident, did the daily release rate of radioactive material sharply fall to almost 0EBq/d? Here's a link if it's easier, I do not understand this at all. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1SveczzSg0LZiQqFBEByvea2RMcrWQn_P/view?usp=drivesdk Why so sudden? | foism9j | foiraac | 1,587,795,685 | 1,587,794,484 | 27 | 9 | "A Study of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident Process" by Ishikawa, Michio offers an explanation: https://imgur.com/b2YT3bx | I like learning by being wrong and being corrected. So I'm going to throw out a guess that there was a reaction that burned itself out in the first ten days when it ran out of whatever fuel it was running on, possibly something unstable thrown up on the roof next to the graphite. | 1 | 1,201 | 3 |
b4d08n | askphysics_test | 0.99 | Not a question normally asked, but: what's the best way to get new physics news without it being distorted by the "pop science" articles? | ej677mx | ej67taw | 1,553,312,350 | 1,553,312,916 | 9 | 13 | In addition to Physics Today and Physics World, you can keep an eye on reputable blogs run by professors in your field of interest. Of course, they all have different target audiences, so they range from suitable for "professional physicists with a different specialty" all the way down to the general public. | Stay away from phys.org | 0 | 566 | 1.444444 |
xjsj8c | askphysics_test | 0.89 | Why was I born into a 3 dimensional universe and not a 4th dimensional or 500th dimensional one? | ipa7p71 | ipa7jle | 1,663,729,545 | 1,663,729,472 | 98 | 14 | Many of the structures that are stable in 3 spatial dimensions, like atoms and solar systems, are unstable if there are more (large) spatial dimensions. That is one possible explanation. | Just lucky, I guess. If you had been born in a 7 dimensional universe you wouldn't be you. You would be an entirely different creature who would be asking "Why was I born into a 7 dimensional universe and not a 3 dimensional or 500 dimensional one?" You might find this interesting. | 1 | 73 | 7 |
mbrnjh | askphysics_test | 0.97 | What is the craziest most extreme astronomical event we could experience? I was watching a video about super massive blackholes and they mentioned that its possible for 2 galaxies to collide and one of the black holes winds up just flying through space by itself. If it got close enough to us, the sun would just start morphing and peeling away into a black hole, which I thought would be an interesting experience to say the least. Its super unlikely, and we would notice this prolly before it got close at all, but it led me to a question, what is the craziest most extreme astronomical event that could actually happen here that we could experience? | grzum9p | grzoatx | 1,616,546,398 | 1,616,543,184 | 55 | 10 | Betelgeuse going supernova. | We'll find out in about 5 billion years when the Sun, in its death throes, expands into a red giant and swallows up the Earth. | 1 | 3,214 | 5.5 |
l1v1li | askphysics_test | 0.94 | Why can’t the wings of the aeroplane be used to generate electricity from the Earth’s magnetic field? We know that moving conductors in a magnetic field generate EMF. The plane flies in the Earth’s magnetic field. Is there any way to use this EMF to generate electricity (perhaps by completing the circuit) and using it to power the plane? In any sense, is this usable energy at all? (Even if it’s negligible) | gk1xmt3 | gk1sk9f | 1,611,230,955 | 1,611,226,283 | 3 | 2 | It's also worth noting that even if you could somehow create a useful changing magnetic flux to produce EMF on a plane, the earth's magnetic field just isn't all that strong. The magnetic field intensity is about 3 x 10^(-4) T. (About 1% of the magnetic strength of a typical refrigerator magnet.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(magnetic_field) | Moving conductors in a magnetic field do not generate EMF. Moving conductors in a changing magnetic field will do that. Supposing that you could do that, the induced EMF would generate its own magnetic field (assuming that there is current flowing) which would oppose the field you are flying through, thus requiring more energy. TANSTAAFL | 1 | 4,672 | 1.5 |
ixhgur | askphysics_test | 0.97 | Apples n peanut butter So I'm sittin here at like 12:30 at night eatin some apples and peanut butter because that's the healthy choice, right? Well I notice something and I've noticed it before but always just brushed it off as one of those great life mysteries. So of course I cut my apples into slices, and I notice that it's pretty easy to scoop up the peanut butter, like the corner of the apple gets in there and just scoops real nice. But then, I wanna rescoop. And the edge is flat now because I bit it. And the peanut butter doesn't scoop. It just pushes the peanut butter around. Why? It's not like any property of either changed, except the edge is flat. Why doesn't the peanut butter just stick to the flat edge? I'm wondering if when I bite it, more juice comes out and that's creating like a barrier. I'm not sure. My solution to this is just to turn the apple around to the other pointy edge, but the question is still there. What do flat edges have against peanut butter??? | g66yv82 | g66v31b | 1,600,758,273 | 1,600,754,602 | 67 | 28 | I love this post lol Some people in the thread seem to think that it's due to the moisture on the apple slice after you bite, but I don't think a bite would leave a significant amount of moisture, and apples are already pretty moist inside. I think it's more likely due to a change in the geometry of the apple slices after you've taken a bite. Like I'm imagining you cut the apples into the little normal shaped slices, and grabbing up the peanut butter with a sharp edge of the slice, so it gets in there real good and nabs some sweet sweet peanut butter. It gets in deep because of the sharp edge, it creates more pressure causing the apple to penetrate deep into the peanut butter, so you can scoop it. But after you take a bite, you don't have as much of an edge, so the apple slice doesn't penetrate much into the peanut butter, so it can't get as much of a hold, so it just pushes it around. If you want to test if it has anything to do with the moisture, and not the geometry like I think, you could try licking, but not biting, an apple slice and then trying to scoop. If it doesn't scoop, it's likely due to moisture. If it scoops just fine it's probably due to there being no edge. | Hmm this is quite a post I've stumbled on in the middle of the night. I would have to try this out for myself to better understand all the factors at play. I might guess that with the initial scoop, the apple slice simply goes deep enough to get more peanut butter stuck to it, as well as having more surface area for the peanut butter to stick to. With the second scoop you can't push the apple slice in as deeply for a nice big scoop as you did with this one. I would recommend trying to scoop as deeply the second time as you did with the first scoop and seeing what happens. Of course since the end is no longer pointed it gets harder to scoop it in as deeply. If you want to check whether the juice is affecting things, try drying the apple slice before scooping again and see if that changes things. | 1 | 3,671 | 2.392857 |
yj4ppw | askphysics_test | 0.95 | How do we know that gravity should be added to quantum physics? For example I often hear that we need a quantum version of gravity to explain singularities in black holes and like that gravity was the first force to be separated from the other three. But how do we know that if we ever have a quantum model for gravity, we can explain singularities in black holes? Basically my thought is, for example if we haven't reached the energy levels in our colliders where all four forces are merged, how do we know that all forces are indeed one before. Is it indicated in our current understanding of physics that research on these fields are the proper next steps or are we just hoping for the best that our hunch is right or that we stumble upon new physics? | ium9isn | iulwqqp | 1,667,306,484 | 1,667,298,240 | 70 | 9 | Having a quantum theory of gravity is not the same as unifying all forces. For example, in the Standard Model we have the electroweak and strong interactions, both quantum, but they are not unified. We expect that gravity should have a quantum description because matter produces gravity, and matter is quantum. | Disclaimer that I am under qualified to give a real good assessment but I think I can point you to some results that have a lot of people thinking that gravity can be described with a quantum field theory. In quantum field theory there are excitations in a field that gives rise to particles mediated by a force carrying particle called a boson. For example, in electromagnetism the force carrying particles are photons. A characteristic and defining quantity for these particles is their spin, which is a quantity concerned with what kinds of transformations on the particle preserves symmetry. All bosons have integer valued spin. A result that we came to about 20 years ago or so was that a massless spin 2 particle would give rise to a force that is indistinguishable from gravity and would essentially confirm that gravity is quantized in this way, thats what we call a graviton. Theres undoubtedly many subtle reasons why people believe that gravity can be described like a quantum field theory but thats a key result that I think is a good starting point for learning about the subject. | 1 | 8,244 | 7.777778 |
kvpw5l | askphysics_test | 0.96 | I'm studying physics and barely getting any interest in mechanics and on the other hand I am loving thermodynamics. The title says it all... I just want to know if this is only me or is this thing common that people who say they love physics never actually love to study every branch of it but just some particular ones.. I don't know why but i never seem to understand mechanics and always find it to be super boring. Does anyone has the same problem like that? | gizszh9 | gizt44z | 1,610,455,287 | 1,610,455,387 | 12 | 19 | Exactly the opposite. | there are typically at least two mechanics classes a physics student takes (not counting quantum), Introductory mechanics and analytical mechanics The first is intro mechanics where you learn about basic problems like incline planes, pulleys, work energy theorem, etc. and just begin using calculus to do physics. Have you taken both? because for me I didn't like mechanics after the intro course but when I got to the higher level one and learned about things like lagrangians and Hamiltonians it became very interesting to me | 0 | 100 | 1.583333 |
m9cjtn | askphysics_test | 0.96 | Which are the current important topics for research in physics? | grm49iw | grm5liy | 1,616,265,425 | 1,616,265,989 | 33 | 78 | There is research in every subfield and every subfield has probably a number of central / interesting questions at the moment. | You’ll need to be more specific to a sub field of physics you’re interested in (and even then it will be a difficult question to answer). It is comparable to asking “what are the best bands in music right now”, there are so many different genres and the answer will vary widely from person to person. If you are looking for some fun topics to learn about, try looking through this Wikipedia page to give you an idea: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_problems_in_physics | 0 | 564 | 2.363636 |
kuhia4 | askphysics_test | 0.97 | "Funny" patterns inside a block of ice Photos of the block of ice I took this block of ice from the freezer and got fascinated by these patterns. I am also very curious about their formation so I'd like to ask the community for some hints regarding what might have happened here. Thanks in advance for any help :) Some info that might be relevant: \- What I put in the freezer was just a transparent plastic bag filled with tap water \- It was a new plastic bag from those plastic bag rolls bought at the grocery \- The tap water is from the Norwegian water supply system, which is usually very clean. (I'm wondering about the brownish spot at the core of these patterns). | gisjap8 | giskdd2 | 1,610,308,388 | 1,610,308,919 | 4 | 35 | Gas bubbles would be my guess. No idea what the brown stuff is, but it might have also produced some gas when it froze. | Water, even clean tap water, always has dissolved gases and solids. As a volume of water starts to slowly freeze, the dissolved materials will generally be forced out of the "ice" portion and remain in the "water" portion, becoming more and more concentrated. If the concentration rises high enough, the dissolved materials eventually come out of solution. In this case you put a bag of water in the freezer, probably freshly filled so containing lots of dissolved air. It froze from the outside in, so there was no escape path for any dissolved materials. What you see is the concentration of any solids near the centre; and the small trails of bubbles left as the dissolved air came out of solution. If you want ice without bubbles, you need to freeze slowly from the bottom up, allowing the air to escape. https://engineering.purdue.edu/MSE/aboutus/gotmaterials/Other/yoder.html As to what exactly the solids are, generally there are some dissolved inorganic minerals in tap water (in fact it tastes rather strange if there aren't). The slight brown colour probably suggests iron compounds, which are very common. Typical dissolved solid levels in drinkable fresh water are a few hundred mg / L (compare to >35,000 mg / L in sea water). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_dissolved_solids | 0 | 531 | 8.75 |
yky0pj | askphysics_test | 0.99 | What does information mean in the context of physics? Like the black hole information paradox? When I think of information I assume it's like 1's and 0's in computer science. But is this the same as what Stephen Hawking talks about for the black hole paradox? What exactly does it mean for information to be conserved? | iuvxxyb | iuw21vm | 1,667,479,233 | 1,667,481,253 | 3 | 20 | Yes. All information that can be modelled by humans can be represented by binary. In physics tho information relates to the thermodynamic entropy. And it is closely related to information entropy, intact they have very similar formulas. In physics very basically more entropy means more "disorder" (not accurate) and to describe more "disorder" you need more information. Like if all the air is in one tiny spot in a box or if its a solid, you can easily represent all the air molecules, as there will not be a huge number of ways that those molecules might be arranged in space but if it is spread out then the number of arrangement of those molecules, of where they potentially could be needs much more information to be fully defined. Information entropy also relates to probability, in the sense that every bit of information, reduces your uncertainty by half. You can also model information in terms of energy. Basically, energy is needed to erase information. For eg, you drop a ball from height h, the ball will drop a couple times and will come to a stop. This is due to the ball losing its energy to friction and other losses. Once the ball have dropped can you tell from which height the ball was dropped? Nope, because that information have been destroyed, and it was destroyed by the ball using up its potential energy. Information is central to a lot of things not just in physics. | One of the rules of quantum mechanics is that processes are unitary. What this means is that if you take a state that has a certain amount of uncertainty - a certain "distance" from a particular state where every possibility is equally likely - then the movement of that process through time will never take it closer to or further away from that uncertain state, it will always be no more or less similar to the "I don't really know" state than it was before. So for example, if you measure the magnetic moment of an electron, so that you find which way its little bar magnet is pointing, and then let it move, it will slowly evolve through a set of states, each of which is associated with a particular direction, basically moving around like a top, even though you can't see it, the axis will be just as "certain". This kind of certainty is not the same as classical certainty, because even if the magnetic moment of the electron points sideways, you can still represent that as "50% up, 50% down", and by measuring it, force it to pick one, and drop it back into the original axis you started with again, so there will always be uncertainty. Another way to say it is that quantum systems will still give you answers to questions, even if they are bad answers; if someone is going west and you ask them if they are going north or south, the quantum way to answer is to give a 50:50 chance of giving either option. But if you keep track of how it *should* be moving, given what you know about it's law of motion, and keep checking whether it is at that point, step by step, you can end up getting a given axis almost 100% of the time, subject to some small amounts of environmental disturbance. This kind of property, that there is some measurement out there that, if it moves in a synchronised way with a state, will produce reliable classical answers, is called "purity", and you can think of a pure state as being fully defined by its starting point and some law of motion, like a classical trajectory. In contrast, a mixed state hides information, usually because there's some other set of degrees of freedom that are relevant that you don't keep track of. This state, with lower purity, can be considered a little subjective, in that you can always start by defining a state you have in terms of a mixed state, if you aren't totally sure how well you prepared it in its starting point. In other words, instead of an arrow pointing out of the electron showing where north is, you have a kind of sphere around it on which you've painted a fuzzy probability distribution, giving where you mostly think the north is. Then you can apply the same unitary transformation, which carries forwards that classical probability distribution, that "blob" of options, to other positions around the sphere. You might discover that your state actually has higher purity than you thought, if you prepare it a lot of times, and find that it consistently gives you the same fixed value step by step, whereas a really mixed state might give you something other than 100% probability of appearing where you expect it to be. But that basically is unitarity; once you have classical uncertainty, the laws of physics will carry that forwards, not making it better or worse, just moving it around, until you do more measurements to resolve it. The point about black holes is that they seem to still hide information, while also giving you all the energy back. You chuck something into a black hole, and you never know what happened to it after that point, but meanwhile, the black hole is getting warm, giving out a gentle buzz of particles from its event horizon. So you're getting something back, but it doesn't seem to be what you put in. Or to put it another way, when you set up a black hole in a certain state - if we could build a solar-system sized lab - we don't have a theoretical way to assume that we could just guess what it is going to say next and check step after step after step. It doesn't seem to just have the quantum "randomness" of failing to ask the right questions, but has the pure randomness of there being *no* set of measurements you can do that will give you consistent answers 100% of the time, even if you set it up perfectly. It has actual randomness. That's the thing people are trying to fix, understand how what goes into a black hole controls what it spits out, so that they can see how the history of the black hole is hidden in its event horizon, so that you can go "yep, photon leaving from that longitude and latitude, next we'll have a muon leaving there..." at least in principle, even if such an actual detector is impossible. | 0 | 2,020 | 6.666667 |
m0wyhw | askphysics_test | 0.98 | If I were floating in space moving away from the sun, how far would I have to get before I can't see my own hand? I was thinking about floating in space, and how you would technically be able to see the shadow of your hand as it blocked out stars behind it. But then that got me thinking how far away from the sun you would have to be in order for it to be basically pitch black. | gqaftqq | gqabpw5 | 1,615,260,584 | 1,615,258,299 | 105 | 21 | Ignoring all other stars, you could calculate this for the sun by looking at the total solar flux and considering that the iris is roughly 1 mm radius with sensitivity roughly \~50 photons/second. As a first approximation I'd just assume all the suns photons are visible and ignore wavelength dependence. A quick search didn't find total solar flux but this must be well known, I'll check later if I remember. Nevermind I found a number: this says 10\^45 photons per second emitted from sun. With 50 photons/second eye sensitivity and 1mm iris radius this gives a distance of 2 x 10^(18) meters, \~500,000 times further out than pluto if my math is correct. So really really freaking far out there. And since not all these photons are detectable by eye, the actual distance ~~would be even further.~~ Wait no the distance would be closer, this approximation gives an upper limit on the distance. | Thats a good question Damn im going to be thinking about this all night | 1 | 2,285 | 5 |
ys402o | askphysics_test | 0.81 | It is very well known that an ”observer” in quantum physics does not refer to only humans but does it refer to anything else besides organisms and machines? Are there ”observers” outside our solar system? | ivxqzxw | ivxax7s | 1,668,168,072 | 1,668,154,570 | 87 | 64 | May the day when "interaction" was replaced by "observation" be cursed. This is really confusing for people who don't do physics, giving it a kind of mystic aspect it shouldn't have. | An "observation" is an interaction that carries away some information about the system. It should be clear that any measurement apparatus you'd want to use in a lab is an observation of this sort, but I think it's also clear that this is a broader category. For example, random noise in the environment can interact with your quantum system and "measure" it, carrying away information. This process leads to decoherence, and is the main reason you don't see quantum mechanical effects on large scales. Most quantum experiments need to be very well isolated from their environments in order to avoid these accidental environmental measurements. So, given that, yes, there are "observers" outside out solar system. Any stray photon can be an observer, for example, and those guys are everywhere. | 1 | 13,502 | 1.359375 |
bpddqw | askphysics_test | 0.86 | Physicists, mind if you share which field of Physics you find the hardest yet enjoy the most? As stated by the title. ​ I really want to say Quantum Physics myself but... I'm just a humble grade 9 student so there isn't much for me to say. | enry4if | ens0zrn | 1,558,021,679 | 1,558,022,764 | 7 | 25 | I would say, Electrodynamics is a frikken hard subject. Of all the core courses in Physics (which includes Classical Mechanics, Electrodynamics, Statistical Mechanics, and Quantum Mechanics), I think Electrodynamics is the hardest. I always had a hard time understanding what Field means, dealing with the vector calculus, learning maths which I didn't know I'll need in Electrodynamics. However, I really think that once you master Electrodynamics, you'll be able to appreciate Modern Physics, as Electrodynamics compatible with Modern Physics and is the template for many subjects in Physics. | Statistical mechanics. It combines the difficulty of probability and statistics, of quantum mechanics and path integrals, with the beauty and simplicity of thermodynamics. | 0 | 1,085 | 3.571429 |
fe7hw5 | askphysics_test | 0.94 | Why does the shape/density of a body not affect it's gravitational pull The idea that an object's gravity just somehow propogates from it's center of mass has always bothered me. I coped with it by assuming that all mass-having components of such a body would pull an object directly toward it causing both the top and bottom of the body to be pulling at an angle to it's center of mass, partly canceling out. This seems to suggest that gravity is stronger the lesser the body's volume. It also seems to suggest that as you get closer to the body, the extremities would pull less strongly causing a small reduction as the angle increases (not enough to overcome the inverse relationship to distance of the equation perhaps). The equation for the force of gravity only seems to take mass, displacement, and the gravitational constant into account. Wouldn't the shape of the body have a notable impact on it's attractive force at moderately close distances though? | fjmdllj | fjmdkzw | 1,583,467,729 | 1,583,467,717 | 12 | 2 | Yes and no. It is true that the exact strength of gravity at a given location depends on the distribution of mass as well as the total amount of it. However large enough masses will always tend toward becoming spherical, because it decreases the total gravitational potential energy of the configuration. For a perfect sphere, the symmetry ensures that no matter where you are in relation to it the gravitational force will point directly toward the center. Nothing is exactly spherical of course, but for most large objects (including the earth) this is a decent approximation for everyday applications. However geologists can and do map the slight variations of gravity at variations as a method of understanding the composition of the particular area. Also if you’re far enough away from something, the slight variations due to the objects shape become completely negligible, and it’s perfect acceptable to just model the object as a point mass. | The shape of an object does effect it's gravity. https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24068-gravity-map-reveals-earths-extremes/ | 1 | 12 | 6 |
oeba3i | askphysics_test | 0.94 | Why do we use circularly polarized light in laser cooling? I am studying the principles of magneto-optical traps for an exam, and can't really understand why circularly polarized light is necessary for laser cooling to work. | h45njz1 | h45mb4d | 1,625,512,048 | 1,625,511,422 | 14 | 5 | Circularly polarized light is light in an eigenstate of angular momentum. For left polarization, angular momentum is +1, while for right circular polarization it's -1. Because of conservation of angular momentum, when the atom transitions from the ground state (m=0) to the state m=+1 (m=-1) it must do so by absorbing a left (right) handed photon. You can use that to make sure atoms on the +**x** (-**x**) side only absorb photons moving left (right), pushing them back to **x**=0. If you look at this diagram you can see that the laser is resonant in two places (left and right side). If you throw unpolarized light, then the atoms will absorb both beams at the two resonant points, which means many will gain momentum (increasing temperature and moving away from the trap). By using circularly polarized light you can guarantee this won't happen and the atoms will absorb the right photon on each side. | You need atoms with for example a 0,+1 and -1 state and an outer magnetic field that rises linearly through the x-direction of the trap, so that the Zeeman effect splits the energy levels depending on the position of the atoms. Now you want the atoms that move for example to the right to only interact with the laser that is coming from the right, so that the photon absorption gives them a little kick to left, towards the trap. The reason for the polarization of the laser is this detail, that the atoms have to only interact with one laser. So the atoms moving to the right will see resonant laser light for their (for example) 0 -> +1 transition, which is only resonant for lets say right cirularization. And the atoms moving to the left will be resonant for the 0 -> -1 transition, which is only resonant with the, lets say left circularization. So if you switch the polarizations of the two lasers, then the wrong transitions are resonant and the atoms get pushed outwards instead of towards the center. And if you use linearly polarized light, the atoms wont see any net force, because they are always resonant to both lasers from both directions. There are a lot of details at play here, I cant put everything in one comment, but thats the reason for the different polarizations. Did that help? (Also in which direction the atoms are resonant with which polarization obviously depends on the exact setup) Edit: This is a nice picture. Here atoms that go to right become resonant for their -1 transition and interact only with the sigma\_minus light from the right (but not with the sigma\_plus light from the left) and vice versa for the other side. https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-mechanism-of-a-magneto-optical-trap-for-an-atom-with-a-J-0-to-J-1-transition\_fig1\_268352730 | 1 | 626 | 2.8 |
jnui8j | askphysics_test | 0.91 | [Computational Physics] Should I upgrade my system? Hello to everyone, I'm a physics undergraduate in Italy and I've just started my first course of computational physics. Since it's a subject that I really like I plan to continue exploring it in the next years, mainly regarding particle physics and fluid dynamics. Currently my PC is a laptop with a i7-6700HQ (quad core), GTX 950M 2GB and 16G of ddr4 RAM and, for the few things I've done it held up pretty well. Do you think it is worth it to upgrade my system (I was thinking about a ~900€ desktop) or, for the level at which computational physics are done at university, this system will work? | gb4vqih | gb4hs9w | 1,604,510,735 | 1,604,504,138 | 5 | 4 | You absolutely need a monster graphics card, mechanical keyboard, widescreen curved monitor and a shit load of LEDs in your tower to do good computational physics. It's integral the the process. | What everyone else has said is true for research. For classes, your university might not give you access to serious workstations. But (i) the assignments are reasonable in terms of computing power if you're expected to run them at home (ii) 900€ isn't going to buy you a serious 2020 workstation anyway. Plus there's little point in buying new hardware if you're not using yours to its full capacity. Unless you're already writing parallelized code and you're pushing all your cores to their limit, or you're doing a *ton* of CUDA and machine learning on your own time, dropping 900€ to get a 0.3 GHz increase in CPU clock speed to get your stuff to run 10% faster is a total waste of money. You have enough already to run small simulations for classes at a decent speed. | 1 | 6,597 | 1.25 |
pb4w28 | askphysics_test | 0.94 | is there a universal limit on acceleration? or jerk? liek the speed of light, is there an upper limit of how fast something can accelerate? or how fast the acceleration can d/dx accelerate? | ha9j9tj | ha9jky6 | 1,629,874,860 | 1,629,875,107 | 13 | 77 | 4-acceleration in special relativity is the derivative of 4-velocity with respect to proper time along a world in some coordinate system. The γ factor of course varies with time in 4-acceleration, and the formula is somewhat more complicated than 4-velocity. But, as long as you can keep supplying energy, you can keep accelerating. Obviously those energy requirements will exceed your ability to supply them at some point short of the speed of light. | As discussed here: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/3334/is-there-a-maximum-possible-acceleration No kinematical restriction exists in general relativity for the magnitude of the acceleration. However taking into account Unruh radiation, an accelerated objects see's a thermal bath of particles whose temperature is proportional to the acceleration. So if the acceleration is such that the temperature reaches the Hagedorn temperature (temperature which matter is not stable) then the object will disolve. | 0 | 247 | 5.923077 |
j2kztz | askphysics_test | 0.93 | Do you find philosophy and art to be useful for physics? The early inventors of scientific and mathematic concepts usually did so without any apparent delineation from god and philosophy. This trend continues up until the 18th to 19th century or so, (early enlightenment) with big names such as Newton, Galileo, Kepler and the like still mixing religion and philosophy with science. Today there is a very obvious and stark differentiation that we can all readily point to. However, many great scientists (Einstein being the prime example) have still remarked as having found philosophy to be tremendously useful, perhaps even necessary to know. For you, has philosophy, the arts, god, or any such subject been at all helpful? | g763wzf | g763p38 | 1,601,472,581 | 1,601,472,446 | 50 | 18 | I find philosophy very helpful. There is an entire field of philosophy of physics, and philosophy of mathematics as well. Some concepts, such as falsifiability, may seem evident, because our whole education is built on that framework and we cannot imagine science in other way. But it was very helpful to structure my worldview by reading relevant textbooks. I also find philosophy helpful to shape my internal acceptance of quantum mechanics and general relativity. | I’d say so. It helps you think outside the box and view things from a different perspective | 1 | 135 | 2.777778 |
dlwgah | askphysics_test | 0.95 | I'm 23, self-learning Math/Physics - any advice? Hey everyone. I don't use Reddit a whole lot, but the more I get into self-learning, the more I'd love to have people to discuss topics with. Quick background info: I'm 23, went to a private university for 4 years to get a degree in music education, ended up double majoring in Japanese studies, took too many classes outside both majors and couldn't graduate in time, so I decided to drop out. I have a lot of interests, most of them in creative fields, so I'm grateful for what I got out of college, and I'm currently pursuing a career as a creative entrepreneur. Creating and Learning are two primary things in my life that I never want to stop doing. I've always been a self-learner and recently i started spending more time pushing myself to read regularly. This past month, I read Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" and it was super interesting. I've always had an interest in Physics, but only took one class in high school. I also took AP Calculus in high school, but it wasn't something I was particularly good at (I passed the class with a C+, but didn't pass the AP Exam). Either way, I'd love to have a deeper understanding in Physics and Math, so I'm starting a self-study project. Obviously, I need to have the foundations down first, before I try to get into anything complicated. I'm currently going through: \- A Stanford course on Coursera by Dr. Keith Delvin called "Introduction to Mathematical Thinking." I just finished up Week 1. \- "The Foundations of Mathematics" by Ian Stewart and David Tall. I'm finishing up Chapter 2 on Number Systems. \- "The Feynman Lectures on Physics." I read Chapter 1 earlier. \- I'll probably take the "Single Variable Calculus" course on MIT's website after I finish "Intro to Mathematical Thinking." I have a ton of interests, so I have no idea where this will take me or how deep I'll be able to go, but I'd love some kind of feedback/advice on self-studying Math/Physics - am I picking up good beginner material? Is there a way that I can use this subreddit to further my study? Anything like that would be great - Thanks! | f4uy0yo | f4upn0t | 1,571,832,915 | 1,571,822,938 | 76 | 3 | Just reading and watching vids won't do much. You need to actually do exercises and solve problems over and over and over again. I'd advice you to only try to learn the very basics for now until your business takes off, so classical mechanics, special relativity, linear algebra, complex and real numbers, and integral and differential calculus. That should keep you busy for a very long time if you're only doing this as a hobby. Most "recreational physicists" immediately want to jump to the juicy parts like astrophysics and cosmology, but I guarantee you that that's gonna be a massive waste of time if you actually want to understand something beyond the very surface. | Try PBS Space Time channel on YouTube. | 1 | 9,977 | 25.333333 |
ur1b50 | askscience_test | 0.76 | What caused the earth’s rotation and what dictated the rate at which it spins? Have we lost any speed over the billions of years? My son asked my a perplexing question regarding earth and why it actually spins. I didn’t have a 100% grasp on the subject so I gave him the “I dunno buddy,” answer. I’m familiar with the Big Bang, but were all planets, suns, stars created at this one event? Did the order of chaos (planets collided/were destroyed and what we see is the aftermath) create our solar system to revolve around the sun in the same direction? Did the same Big Bang that made these enormous rocks also cause them to spin while being yanked into ellipses around a large grav source? | i8wwth9 | i8vy9f6 | 1,652,765,525 | 1,652,746,288 | 12 | 6 | The Earth's spin rate is appreciably higher than what would be dictated by it simply forming from accretion. And its axial tilt is kind of cockeyed as well,. The most plausible explanation is the hypothesis that a Mars-sized planet (which they named Theia) smacked us at a particular velocity/angle/location around 4 1/2B years ago--most likely twice, a few hundred thousand years apart. The Wikipedia entry at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant-impact\_hypothesis includes the technical links needed to explore this more deeply. As far as I know this is the only hypothesis that can account for the current state of affairs of Earth and the Moon in our solar system. What's truly fascinating to speculate about is the possibility that we wouldn't be here if Theia hadn't paid that fateful visit back in the day. One study proposes that the volatiles needed to form life were produced by Theia's impact: https://www.universetoday.com/141342/without-the-impact-that-formed-the-moon-we-might-not-have-life-on-earth/ And our remarkably large Moon (relative to Earth) formed by this impact stabilizes Earth on its polar axis. Otherwise Earth's axial wobble would be much greater. And Theia's iron core merged with ours, giving us a stronger Van Allen belt, which prevents the surface of the Earth from being bombarded by anywhere near as much radiation as would be the case otherwise. We don't know if the amped-up Van Allen Belt and the "gift of the volatiles" and the faster rotation and the Moon-induced larger tides contributed to making Earth more favorable to life beginning here, but it seems plausible. And if all that is true--if life couldn't have started without our remarkably mild planetary climate and other conditions--then we could be alone in our galaxy. As I said, this is all speculation piled on speculation, but it all does wrap around proven facts that are otherwise hard to arrive at. | Way back when the solar system was just beginning matter was going every which way with almost no preferred direction. Then enough matter came together to form a small gravity well. All of the nearby surrounding matter was attracted to it. However some of the surrounding matter had just enough velocity to miss the gravity well and avoid becoming part of the proto star that eventually became our Sun. This matter started orbiting the sun because it had just enough kinetic energy to not fall in. Again there was almost no preferred direction or plane of orbit. However, in the pure chaos things started colliding. If the momenta of colliding objects was roughly equal, those objects would fall into the star. If one object in the collision had more momentum, than the resulting combined object would have momentum in that direction. Given another few million-billion years and this process does an effective job at making most objects orbit the star in a single plane in one direction. Now each proto planet is formed by objects crashing together. Relative to the center of mass of what will eventually become the planet these objects will be going all different ways. However eventually after several billion years whichever spin direction has slightly more momentum will become the direction of rotation of the resulting planet | 1 | 19,237 | 2 |
95xwpw | askscience_test | 0.92 | If you were a human floating towards the sun, at what distance from the sun would you feel an Earth-like temperature? | e3wp97z | e3wch6n | 1,533,845,569 | 1,533,835,172 | 5,191 | 4,752 | tl;dr: If you're near Earth's orbit, you're already way too close. You'd need to drift outward quite a bit. On Earth, if you leave something lying in the sun indefinitely, it will heat up until the heat it loses to the surrounding air (and the ground) is balanced with the heat it absorbs from the sun. In space, it works the same way, except that without air, the only way for an object to lose heat is by radiation (infrared, at normal body temperatures). If we want to keep our body temperature roughly constant, the heat we radiate needs to balance out the heat we absorb from the sun plus the heat generated by our own metabolism. I found a page estimating our own power output as 100W. Let's say we are a perfect blackbody radiator with a surface area of 2m^2 and our skin were to be 307K - we're in "spherical cow" territory here, but this should be the right order of magnitude. The power our skin radiates is then given by the Stefan-Boltzman law as 5.67e-8 Wm^(-2)K^(-4), or 5.67e-8 * 2 * 307^4 W = about 1000W. (So the good news is, we're losing more heat than we produce on our own, even without air-cooling. Without the sun, we'd freeze instead of overheating.) So how much sun do we need? This one is a bit more complicated, because it depends on how we're oriented. The bigger our cross-section facing the sun, the more we absorb. The total power output of the sun is 3.828e26 W. To get around 1000W of that, we need to capture 1 part in 3.828e23. So if we present a cross-section of about 1m^2, then our distance should be the radius of a sphere with a surface area of 3.828e23 m^2. Result: 1.75e11 meters, or about 9.7 light minutes. To give you a picture, Earth's and Mars's orbits are about 8.3 and 12.5 light minutes from the sun on average, so we'd have to go (very, very roughly) a third of the way from Earth to Mars orbit to feel comfortable. (Not double-checked; it's entirely possible there's a massive error in the above calculation, on top of all the ballpark guessing.) Edit: Mind you, the ballpark guessing already introduces some *wild* inaccuracy. If we drop the cross section to 0.5m^2, suddenly we're closer to 6.9 light minutes. And we're not perfect blackbody radiators, anyway. | The unsatisfying answer is "it depends." Here on Earth, the temperature you experience is largely determined by the ambient temperature of the matter (air) around you. But in space, you would be in near vacuum. The random particles around you might have some temperature, but there simply won't be enough of them to transfer a meaningful amount of energy to or from you. Instead, your temperature will be determined by radiation: how much sunlight are you absorbing, and how much infrared are you radiating away from yourself. When the magnitude of both of these are equal, that will be your equilibrium temperature. These will be determined by your albedo (e.g. what color are you wearing), your geometry (e.g. how fat are you), how well heat is conducted within your body, and how much heat are you generating yourself. In other words, it's complicated. But, to give you some idea, an astronaut in a normal space suit in Earth orbit can't spend much time in direct sunlight without getting cooked. | 1 | 10,397 | 1.092382 |
1jho3k | askscience_test | 0.93 | If an obese person and a thin person were stranded on a barren island with plenty of water, but no food, would the obese person live longer due to stored up body fat? What other factors would need to be considered? | cbeshrv | cbeth7w | 1,375,367,754 | 1,375,370,469 | 30 | 41 | Would the relative strain on the body of an obese person's circulatory system come into play here--problems with the heart, etc. in relation to a thinner person's? | I wrote an answer to that question some time ago: http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1a88ij/when_a_person_dies_of_starvation_is_there_a_point/c8vcku3 Basically: If it's potable water, they will both die more or less at the same time due to Thiamine deficiency. Unless the thin person has so little energy reserves (Back of the envelope calculation: 7kg of body fat) that they die earlier. | 0 | 2,715 | 1.366667 |
1jtbjs | askscience_test | 0.87 | Assuming the Oceans were drained, what would the air pressure be like at the Challenger Deep? Would there be a noticeable difference? | cbig8zg | cbi8f84 | 1,375,837,052 | 1,375,816,130 | 5 | 2 | If you were to remove the thin coating of water on the surface of the earth, you would expose roughly 70%, the seafloor. Most of the oceanic abyssal plain is fairly flat, with the exception of the mid-ocean ridges (spreading centers) and the trenches (subduction zones). The new "normal" surface would be the present ocean floor, which would therefore have roughly the same atmospheric pressure we currently experience (it would be a little greater given the existence of continents, which would seem like vast mountains). The trenches, of which the Mariana Trench is the deepest with the Challenger Deep being approximately 11,000m below sea level, would seem to be immensely deep valleys. They would extend down to 6000m below the average height of the surface. In the current situation, the pressure at the bottom of the Mariana Trench is about double that of the pressure at the bottom of the abyssal ocean (11,000m of water vs. 5000m). If the *fluid* were air instead of water, the pressure difference would still be about double at the bottom of the trench. A rigorous analysis comparing the volume of atmosphere relative to its current basin (with water filling the troughs) relative to the hypothetical basin (without water) would be an excellent student exercise in combining bathymetry with topography. The back of the envelope calculation will still be roughly double, since the fluid density of water overwhelms the atmospheric contribution to the current solution, but I am curious how many significant figures could be derived from our available topo/bathy information. | As a side question, does the speed of sound change for a large pressure change like this? If I double or triple the pressure of the air, the speed of sound should double or triple, right? Assuming temperature is constant.... | 1 | 20,922 | 2.5 |
sx5ixb | askscience_test | 0.94 | What part of the brain controls the tail in primates, and does it do anything today in humans? | hxri4im | hxr73s6 | 1,645,398,806 | 1,645,394,066 | 37 | 9 | Someone else has already answered that motor cortex representation is plastic, and so we don't have any region for tail. Another interesting consequence of this is phantom limb syndrome, which can happen when someone loses a limb that had motor and sensory cortex devoted to it. Essentially, other nearby regions start taking over the available real estate, because theres a fair amount of plasticity. So occasionally inputs can trigger the neurons that used to represent the arm to fire, causing the sensation of pain/itching/etc in an arm that is no longer there. This paper describes how monkey somatosensory cortexes remap. The brain functions on the 'use it or lose it' principle, synapses that fire often strengthen and are maintained, and those that don't are more likely to be pruned away. | On a related note, if something like Neuralink came to be, then by tapping into the motor cortex we might be able to create a digital controller that is like a virtual appendage. It seems that there is enough plasticity there to adapt to it, so eventually it would feel like you have a virtual "third arm" that you can use to operate digital devices without a controller. | 1 | 4,740 | 4.111111 |
tz564t | askscience_test | 0.92 | Is there an electronic component that can change its resistance based on the current that flowed trough it? A bit like air ionization just more permanently. Basically satisfying the following equation: R(q) = C \* sum(q) where R is the resistance, C is an arbitrary constant and q is the charge that traveled trough the device with a negative and a positive direction. | i3x36nt | i3x8j0m | 1,649,435,143 | 1,649,437,155 | 8 | 24 | If you have two MOSFET transistors orientated properly one of them acts like a variable resistor. This is an image of a test I got back today: MOSFET The top transistor acts like a resistor that changes based on the output of the bottom one. | That’s basically the asymptotic trend for a capacitor, isn’t it? Uncharged it acts like a short circuit (0 resistance), fully charged it acts like an open circuit (infinite resistance). As current flows in it moves from one regime to the other. | 0 | 2,012 | 3 |
p5flnf | askscience_test | 0.95 | What is the specific advantage of a moon base over an orbital space station? Now that several nations have developed plans for permanent installations on the moon, what is the specific advantage of building such an installation over having an identical facility floating in space? | h96cdzg | h95mrh2 | 1,629,132,035 | 1,629,121,592 | 2,245 | 1,463 | Mass. Every gram of everything that is needed has to be launched to an orbital space station. Structural members, radiation shielding, water, rocket fuel, ammonia, cooling system, oxygen, etc. On a planetary body, you can get some for free (bury the station for radiation shielding), or minimal processing. By sending up equipment to process the planetary resources, the total mass can be reduced, and you can build bigger / expandable stations. | Radiation. The only known worthwhile shield against solar proton events and galactic cosmic rays is matter. Every gram of orbital space station shield carted up from Earth's surface into orbit costs an obscene amount of money. So they tend to economize on the shield and the astronauts have a yearly limit on visits to the orbital station due to radiation exposure. On a moon base, radiation shielding is free. Just dig a hole in the ground deep enough and your base will be essentially perfectly shielded. | 1 | 10,443 | 1.534518 |
39g2op | askscience_test | 0.87 | Is there a nuclear decay process that yields an isotope of Au? If so, could we say we've solved the old alchemical quest of deriving precious from nonprecious metals? | cs3rbbz | cs3xukp | 1,434,072,696 | 1,434,085,672 | 2 | 9 | Also, I always found it interesting how with nuclear fusion we can create any elements we want, but I learned that any elements heavier than the Fe-55 isotope (I think?) actually takes more energy to create than it releases. So creating gold from fusion will never be feasible because it's just a huge waste of energy. (Assuming we master nuclear fusion) | I had a professor in university, Dr. Norm Halden - specialized in crystallography. He used synchrotron radiation to bombard crystals in order to reveal details about their structure. He was also easy to get into story telling mode during lectures. One day, while off on a story telling tangent, he tells us he can make gold. We all sit up a little in our chairs and someone asks how. He goes: 'Well, first you start with platinum, and add some high energy x-rays...' | 0 | 12,976 | 4.5 |
ztl28g | askscience_test | 0.94 | What is a Lobster's Theoretical Maximum Size? Since lobsters don't die of old age but of external factors, what if we put one in a big, controlled and well-maintained aquarium, and feed it well. Can it reach the size of a car, or will physics or any other factor eventually limit its growth? | j1e14x1 | j1evp8g | 1,671,814,012 | 1,671,826,485 | 1,309 | 3,165 | The limitation of it's growth is the energy requirement to moult and regrow it's shell. At a certain point the lobsters body cannot store enough calories and minerals to make it through. And they can't grow larger to hold more because the old shell is constraining them. So they don't die of old age exactly, but they are limited to a maximum shell size that is survivable. This size is right about the size of the biggest lobster you have seen. They just don't get freak 6 foot lobsters | The largest one on record was 20 kg (44 lbs) and about 1.2 m (4 ft) from claw tip to tail tip (about half that length is claw and arm). There are reports of larger lobsters from the colonial era, but it's unclear exactly how reliable they were. Lobsters continue growing for as long as they are healthy, but molting becomes more difficult as they age, and molting lobsters are more vulnerable to predators. I suspect maximum lobster is a bit bigger than the biggest known...if one was kept in idea environment with no predators, the best in lobster healthcare, and plenty of food, it ought to be able to successfully molt at larger sizes than wild lobsters. But how much bigger, it's hard to say for sure. It probably wouldn't be a huge difference, certainly not car sized. But I wouldn't be shocked if it was possible to get one up past, say, 1.5 m total length. If you have a hundred years and a really nice marine lab, you should do this research. | 0 | 12,473 | 2.417876 |
5vhrb5 | askscience_test | 0.86 | Are human the only animals that can use ketone bodies to fuel the brain? I recently heard that humans are the only animals that can use ketone bodies (B-hydroxybutyrate) to fuel their brains and I was wondering if this was true. Are other primates capable of doing this? If yes, which ones? In either case, is there any understanding of when this mutation appeared in humans/primates? It seems like the ability to maintain mental acuity in a fasted/starved state would certainly be a useful at whatever point in our history we became meat eating hunters. | de2pwmt | de302aa | 1,487,787,658 | 1,487,798,617 | 5 | 20 | I have my bachelors degree in neuroscience and I'm working on my PhD studying medical potential of snake venom proteins (I enjoy working with the animals so I've shied away from a neuro only degree). I have always been taught that the human brain can only use glucose as an energy source, hence the rapid brain death when deprived of oxygen. I thought this also meant gluconeogenesis did not occur in neurons. Also that ketones could not be used as an energy source in the brain as in other tissues. Do you happen to have the source for the research showing neural tissue using ketones as an energy source? I'm very curious as I've been taught otherwise for years. Thanks! | My thirteen year old daughter has been running on ketones all her life. She has a rare neurological condition called Glucose Transporter Deficiency Syndrome - which means Glucose cannot pass through her brain barrier. She's been in ketosis for 12 years now. Ketones are the business for some - a far better option then a multitude of epilepsy drugs. | 0 | 10,959 | 4 |
z7s45h | askscience_test | 0.94 | AskScience AMA Series: I'm Dr. Gretchen Benedix, a cosmic mineralogist and astrogeologist, and I study space rocks! Currently a Professor at Curtin University, I use the chemistry, mineralogy, and spectroscopy of meteorites to understand the formation and evolution of asteroids and planets. AMA! Hello all, I've been deeply interested in Planetary Sciences and the early evolution of the solar system. I'm also the lead on the initial Mineralogy/Petrology of the meteorites found by the Australian Desert Fireball Network (DFN), an interdisciplinary research group that is working to uncover the mysteries surrounding solar system formation. Digital observatories, part of the DFN, monitor a third of Australian skies, all night. The DFN images and studies the paths of fireballs in the sky, their trajectories, and orbits using intelligent imaging systems. As a geologist, I want to know where rocks come from, along with their composition and distribution. Trying to mesh those two is kind of the holy grail in figuring out what the solar system is really like. In 2006, an asteroid was named after me - Asteroid 6579 - for my contributions to planetary science. In August 2022, my work was featured in Interesting Engineering, and the publication helped organize this AMA session. Ask me anything about asteroids, meteorites, planetary science, and my work with the Desert Fireball Network. I'll be on 5 PM (November 29th US ET / 22 UT / November 30th 6 AM in Perth (GMT+8)) to answer your questions, AMA! Username: /u/IntEngineering | iy7wkvd | iy7vs4o | 1,669,724,510 | 1,669,723,969 | 113 | 14 | What is the most complex organic molecule found outside earth? I ask this because i want to know how valid panspermia theory is, did we have any new discoveries in recent times that hint at it being more or less realistic? And how exited are you to get your hands on real mars soil, what could potentialy be learned from it when we recover the first samples? | One of the hypotheses for panspermia is that volcanic eruptions and meteor/asteroid impacts are capable of blowing rocks with microorganisms into space. Now that we're at the point of actually recovering material from asteroids (preparatory most likely to mining them), do you think it's likely we'll find terrestrial organisms on them? And if so, will it mean that the entire solar system is likely already contaminated with Earth-based life? | 1 | 541 | 8.071429 |
81afjs | askscience_test | 0.88 | If bleach kills 99.9% of germs, what kind of spooky stuff is surviving in bleach? | dv2537e | dv2cpb9 | 1,519,970,952 | 1,519,987,581 | 10 | 428 | Bacteria that form endospores (dormant, REALLY tough microbes) are the most resistant type of pathogenic microbes. The genus Clostridium is one of these spore formers that cause really nasty diseases like tetanus and gas gangrene. In order to kill these, very strict standards are put into place. If you can kill endospores then the object in question is said to be sterilized meaning that ALL microbes have been killed/removed because these spores are so durable. | Nothing. Just to note it's not that bleach may only kill 99.9% of germs its more an advertising 'get out of jail free card' as they cant say it kills everything and thus leave themselves open for legal challenges if and when it doesn't. | 0 | 16,629 | 42.8 |
ihhbxp | askscience_test | 0.91 | What is the theoretical maximum depth of the ocean? We've only mapped like less than 1% of the ocean floor, so the chances of a deeper area than Challenger's Deep seems likely. What is that potential depth? | g31pkah | g31um19 | 1,598,551,770 | 1,598,553,910 | 16 | 40 | Another limit to this is due to istostacy, or the boyance of the crust ontop of the mantle. Right now, both the Marianas trench and mt Everest are in the ballpark of how deep/tall structures can be, as if you make the mountain larger, the plate it is on wants to sink, and if you make a trench deeper, the mantle around it will want to push up on and make it "float". Two edge cases to illustrate this are that you could never pile a mountain to outer space, or dig a hole to the core. So there must be a limit somewhere, and these two are in the ballpark of that. This is one of the reasons olympus mons on mars can be so tall. There is less gravity, so a larger mass can be boyantly suported, all things being equal. | I think the assumption in the question is wrong. We have mapped the ENTIRE ocean. But different parts of the ocean are mapped to different degrees of detail. But "How deep could the ocean be?" is a good question. We know it's current depth but maybe 200 million years ago or 200M years from now the depth could be different. Is there a maximum. My guess is the maximum depth is determined by the maximum speed that two tectonic plates can diverge | 0 | 2,140 | 2.5 |
f7ymun | askscience_test | 0.94 | If there was a tank that could hold 10000 tons of water and had a finger - width hole at the bottom and you put your finger on/in the hole, would the water not drain or push your finger out? | fiitb0v | fiiswkx | 1,582,426,373 | 1,582,426,114 | 961 | 112 | The amount of water makes no difference. Only the height of the column of water. The taller the column the higher the hydrostatic pressure at the bottom. Not sure how much you could contain with your finger. Maybe 50-100 psi. For a column of water weighing 8.3lb/gal pressure=0.052 x 8.3 lb/gal x depth Assuming you can hold 100 psi then using the above formula, anything over 231 ft deep you couldnt hold back the water pressure any more. These are calcs I use in the oilfield all the time. | Depends on the shape of the tank. What matters is the pressure at the bottom, & the air intake - if any - at the top. Gravity only exerts so much force, if there was no dedicated intake for air to take the place of the water, then water & air would fight each other over the same amount of space, disrupting the flow. | 1 | 259 | 8.580357 |
4jbni1 | askscience_test | 0.74 | If diamonds are the hardest material on Earth, why are they possible to break in a hydraulic press? Hydraulic press channel just posted this video on Youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69fr5bNiEfc, where he claims to break a diamond with his hydraulic press. I thought that diamonds were unbreakable, is this simply not true? | d35cgx5 | d35gd4r | 1,463,242,151 | 1,463,249,135 | 61 | 129 | Also, hardness isn't perfectly correlated with "breakability". Some things are incredibly hard, but can be chipped or shattered relatively easily in the right conditions. | Most materials with high hardness will have low ductility (making them highly brittle, e.g. diamonds, ceramics, martensitic steel). This implies that while a high hardness material will resist deformation and initial fracture, but once the fracture occurs it is more catastrophic. A highly ductile material (like copper, tin, pearlitic steel, or the clay model in the video) will deform easier (require less force to deform) but are much less likely to fracture and catastrophically break. There is another measure of a material's structural performance, termed fracture toughness (not to be confused with strength), which is the material's resistance to fracturing. High strength steels and titanium will generally have a higher fracture toughness than other materials. | 0 | 6,984 | 2.114754 |
v2eaob | askscience_test | 0.81 | AskScience AMA Series: I'm Futurist Amy Webb, and I just wrote a new book about a wild emerging technology called synthetic biology. AMA! We can now program cells as if they were tiny computers. What happens when anyone can manipulate organisms - or even create new ones? My new book, The Genesis Machine, gives you the background you need to think differently about research underway now, and what that could mean for humanity's futures. What questions do you have for me, Redditors? I'll be on from 2-4pmET (18-20 UT), AMA! Username: /u/Amy_Webb | ias2a4m | iarvve0 | 1,654,086,795 | 1,654,082,840 | 14 | 10 | 1) what is your high level process to identify and research future trends/technologies 2) what do you see as the most transformative development in the next 20-50 years | Any idea how to best go about protecting our personal biological data and how to keep it out of the hands of unscrupulous actors? Because if it’s handled in any way similar to our online personal data, things could get real ugly real quick with these powerful emerging technologies. | 1 | 3,955 | 1.4 |
q5m089 | askscience_test | 0.84 | What are the physiological differences between the SARS-CoV-2 Alpha and Delta variants? Have they been identified? Genomic sequencing is done to determine what variant an individual has been infected with, so the consequential mutation(s) within the genome has/have obviously been identified. I would anticipate, then, that the physiological expression of the mutation(s) is/are also known, but I have been unable to find that information. I must admit I'm not the most adept at scrounging through scientific databases, though, so I'm hopeful someone here can help me out! Thanks! | hga2vrr | hgcpgwq | 1,633,989,142 | 1,634,045,848 | 6 | 7 | The major different spike protein substitutions are E484Q and L452R with quite a few minor mutations. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1413867021000751 | There are multiple mutations, but these are the most important ones. L452R is a leucine (nonpolar) to arginine (polar, positive) mutation that slightly changes the physical shape of the spike protein so that it is harder to recognize by Alpha-derived antibodies. D614G is an aspartic acid (polar, negative) to glycine mutation that better binds to the ACE-2 receptor on a cell's outer membrane, making the virus better equipped to attach to the cell. P681R is a proline to arginine (polar, positive) mutation that assists the furin cleavage site and enhances fusion of the virus and cell membrane, making it easier for the virus to enter the cell once attached. Other variants have one or two of these mutations, but these three together are characteristic of the Delta variant (B.1.167.2). | 0 | 56,706 | 1.166667 |
64xl01 | askscience_test | 0.87 | What is a "zip file" or "compressed file?" How does formatting it that way compress it and what is compressing? I understand the basic concept. It compresses the data to use less drive space. But how does it do that? How does my folder's data become smaller? Where does the "extra" or non-compressed data go? | dg607re | dg61udm | 1,492,010,330 | 1,492,012,117 | 11 | 32 | As other commenters have pointed out compression takes advantage of redundancy. Here are some common compression algorithms: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding -- circa 1952, an old compression algorithm, modified forms of it was used in fax machines, has a drawback that the compression tree has to be included in the output so it can be decompressed on other end, this adds overhead to the resulting compressed file * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Run-length_encoding -- circa 1967, pretty simplistic, not used on its own but sometimes used as a step of other algorithms * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LZ77_and_LZ78 -- circa 1977/78, very important development in compression technology, used a dictionary table (or sliding window), dictionary _does not_ need to be included in output as the dictionary can be reconstructed on-the-fly on the other end. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lempel–Ziv–Welch -- circa 1984, An improvement on LZ77/78. Usually referred to as LZW. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burrows–Wheeler_transform -- circa 1994, used in the popular bzip2 unix utility, compresses better than dictionary algorithms at the cost of memory and CPU usage. The dictionary algorithms are the basis for most of the popular tools today like WinZip and gzip. People made slight alterations to dictionary algorithms to get around patents associated with LZ77/78 and LZW. | Let's compress OP's question by replacing certain 3 and 4 character sequences with a single character: * = "ing" ! = "hat" % = " is " Compressed: W!%a "zip file" or "compressed file?" How does formatt* it t! way compress it and w!%compress*? Original: What is a "zip file" or "compressed file?" How does formatting it that way compress it and what is compressing? In this compression, 23 characters were replaced by 7, a saving of 16 characters. Because we chose a single character that never appears in the original text, our compression can be reversed without error. There is some overhead, however, because we also need to send the translation key along with the message. In very long messages, there are often large and frequent repetitions that can be squeezed down enough to be worth the overhead. If the compression / decompression rules are built in to the software, there is no need to transmit the compression key. | 0 | 1,787 | 2.909091 |
h3j5u | askscience_test | 0.97 | Is there any truth to the idea that being dirty will "strengthen" your immune system? I've heard people claim they don't wash their hands often, or that they eat raw egg and handle raw chicken. When asked about it, they say that it's strengthening their immune systems. Is there any scientific credibility to this? | c1sb5sb | c1sc85e | 1,304,471,262 | 1,304,483,423 | 5 | 14 | If by "dirty" you mean not excessively trying to rid yourself or your environment of microbes or antigens, then yes. This is because first time exposure to an antigen initiates a primary immune response, and consequently leads to development of immunological memory, i.e. memory B/T cells. These cells are superior to naive B/T cells, i.e. those which have never encountered their antigen, because they need less stimulus for activation and have a greater binding affinity for the pathogen, ensuring faster clearing of it from the body. That said, I would advise against eating raw things excessively or not washing hands after handling them, simply because you cannot control the dose of pathogens that can enter the body by doing this; if the dose is significant, this can result in the person getting sick. Conversely, people who don't allow exposure to "dirtiness" can have a relatively undeveloped immune repertoire, and that's why it's usually said that a little dirt is good for you. This relates to the hygiene hypothesis, which states that a reduced exposure to antigens can lead to hypersensitivity. | Polio is a good example of this, albeit in a strange way. Page 621, Microbiology 10th edition by Tortora, Funke, and Case: >Why did this disease appear so suddenly? The answer is paradoxical- probably because of improved sanitation. Polioviruses can remain infectious for relatively long periods in water and food. The primary mode of transmission is ingestion of water contaminated with feces containing the virus. Improved sanitation delayed exposure to polioviruses in feces until after the protection provided by maternal antibodies had waned. At one time (and today in parts of the world with poor sanitation), exposure to the poliovirus was frequent. Infants were usually exposed to poliovirus while still protected by maternal antibodies. The result was usually an asymptomatic case of the disease and a lifelong immunity. When infection is delayed until adolescence or early adulthood, the paralytic form of the disease appears more frequently. | 0 | 12,161 | 2.8 |
ii0wdg | askscience_test | 1 | How do scientists determine whether an animal is a different species or just a different individual in the same species? Apologies for the possibly confusing title. I'm wondering how many differences do there have to be for two animals to be considered a separate species? | g37i1mh | g37iavv | 1,598,672,501 | 1,598,672,671 | 4 | 11 | Two animals are considered a seperate species when they can no longer procreate viable offspring (ie. offspring that can then reproduce themselves). For example, male donkeys can mate with female horses to produce a mule but that mule cannot then reproduce with other mules, meaning the horse and donkey are seperate species | One of the most basic principals for determining if two species are different is to simply have them mate and see if they produce viable offspring. In rare circumstances, two animals may be able to produce an offspring that can survive but is unable to reproduce (example; a mule is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse). This outcome occurs due to differing chromosome counts, which impairs sexual cell division resulting in **infertility**. **Of course, this implies that DNA composition (the base component of chromosomes) is responsible for determining species differences**. However, not all genetic alterations result in species differences (eye color, hair color, ect), *so what differences DO matter and why* do they matter in an evolutionary context? When it comes to identifying new species, scientists often look at the DNA in regions that are highly evolutionarily conserved, meaning that these regions are often highly regulated and deviations are not tolerated. They often lie in important genes which are vital for life itself, but may have slight flexibility which can change over a vast period of time. This dynamic allows for scientists to make comparisons to other closely related organisms to create phylogenetic trees and develop a timeline for evolutionary changes that *occur slowly*. Once this is done, biologists can then trace a species lineage and determine whether or not it is truely a unique species. All of this is also paired with other data such as; a physical description, geographic locations, diet ect. Tldr; It's a combination of molecular work, bioinformatics (computer science + DNA sequences), physical characteristics and a boatload of data. | 0 | 170 | 2.75 |
y8aqxo | askscience_test | 0.87 | Is a solid just a liquid with really high viscosity? Title. If a liquid achieves a high enough viscosity, does it start being considered a solid? | it0qgt8 | iszv6ri | 1,666,232,143 | 1,666,218,034 | 1,077 | 493 | In general, no. A fluid with high viscosity will deform continuously under even an infinitesimally small amount of force over sufficient time. A solid won't. There are composite materials, such as gels, which blur the lines, but only because they're more than one material linked together. Lots of solids can be *fluidized*, like sand, but these are composite, as there are gaps, and therefore air, making them act as composite materials again. The only way a solid can be a liquid with high viscosity is if you accept that at some point, that viscosity is permitted to effectively be infinite or permit the material to crack or deform. But that's just it: the very definition of solid precludes that it cannot be a liquid or a gas. Period. | No; no matter how long you leave a solid alone, it will *never* flow like a liquid and deform its shape. Rocks do NOT flatten into pancakes over hundreds of millions of years. Not by themselves, anyway, they have to be crushed or melted or something. Contrast with an actual highly viscous liquid, like pitch (a type of black tar). Pitch can look and act like super sticky Play-Doh, , but if you leave it for long enough it does actually flow and dribble. | 1 | 14,109 | 2.184584 |
imseoz | askscience_test | 1 | Why does temperature affect the solubility of compounds differently? For example, CO2 is more soluble in water a lower temperatures, and sucrose is more soluble in water at higher temperatures? | g4bth9c | g4brp3e | 1,599,485,190 | 1,599,483,975 | 8 | 3 | There's quite a few factors at play. As i'm sure you're aware, different solutes will have vastly different solubility in different solvents. Salts dissolve very well into polar solvents (such as water) but barely into apolar solvents. However, the most important difference with respect to temperature dependence is whether the solute is a gas or a solid. Generally speaking : solid solutes prefer higher temperatures and gaseous solutes prefer lower temperatures. For a substance (solute) to dissolve in a solvent, first the bonds between the solute are broken. Breaking these bonds requires energy. For solids, this means overcoming the lattice energy. For an ideal gas, there are no bonds between the solute. (In reality, there are some weak forces but these are generally negligible compared to solids.) Some bonds between solvent also need to be broken, for example hydrogen bonds in water. This also requires some energy. Upon dissolution, new bonds are also made. Solvent - solute bonds. The strength of these bonds heavily depends on the solute and the solvent. For example, certain very polar solutes in water may be able to form strong hydrogen bonds. Apolar solvents and solutes have van der waals interactions which are generally 100 times weaker. As a result of these solvent - solute bonds, dissolving an ideal gas is an exotherm process. The opposite is true for a solid : breaking the lattice generally requires more energy than forming solvent-solute bonds. Consequently dissolution of a solid is often an endotherm process. Apply Le Chetalier's principle to endotherm and exotherm reactions and you'll see that high temperatures benefit solid solutes, but not gaseous solutes. So far we've mostly talked about the energy released or required for dissolution; which is the enthalpy. Another consideration is the entropy. (I assume you know about gibbs free energy). Generally speaking, a gas has more degrees of freedom than a liquid, and a liquid has more degrees of freedom than a solid. The dissolution entropy for a solid is generally positive. The dissolution entropy for gas is generally negative. The dissolution of solids is thus driven by the entropy term, and generally opposed by the enthalpy term. These reactions thus favor high temperatures. The dissolution of gas species is driven by the enthalpy term, and opposed by the entropy term. These reactions favor low temperatures. | In case of gas-polar liquid pair (CO2 / H2O), the solvation energy is greater than the enthalpy in solvent-solvent interactions in water, therefore the reaction is exothermic%2FEquilibria%2FSolubilty%2FTemperature_Effects_on_the_Solubility_of_Gases%23%3A~%3Atext%3DThe%2520solubility%2520of%2520gases%2520in%2CEquation%25204%2520to%2520the%2520left.&usg=AOvVaw0Ot2N0u8r2bm7hNbo_bF56). Furthermore, addition of heat to the system will increase the kinetic energy (higher temp, higher KE) , which consequently breaks the intermolecular bonds and escape in the solution. Before we get to the 2nd pair, recall that there are 2 cases of solubility in solid/liquid systems. (I) Decrease in solubility w.r.t. temperature - if the heat given off in dissolving process > heat required to break the intermolecular bonds, the net energy would be exothermic. (Similar to the gas/liquid solubility principle) (II) Increase in solubility w.r.t. temperature - if the heat given off in dissolving process < heat required to break intermolecular bonds, the net energy would be endothermic. Adding heat would increase the kinetic energy that would break the bonds in the solute. Now, consider the nature of sucrose. It contains covalent (-C-H) bonds and hydrogen bonds (-O-H) in its structure. Sugar dissolves in water because energy is given off when the slightly polar sucrose molecules form intermolecular bonds with the polar water molecules. The weak bonds that form between the solute and the solvent compensate for the energy needed to disrupt the structure of both the pure solute and the solvent. Source of sucrose case here Hope this helps. | 1 | 1,215 | 2.666667 |
dqf3za | askscience_test | 0.86 | Humans use titanium dioxide for so many things, what will happen when we run out of it? From my research it doesn't seem like it's a renewable resource, at least not at the rate we use it? Aren't we going to run out of it at some point? | f65e1og | f6448lr | 1,572,701,431 | 1,572,687,939 | 171 | 39 | It is very unlikely we could ever deplete the supply of titanium. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titanium Titanium is the ninth-most abundant element in Earth's crust (0.63% by mass)[22] and the seventh-most abundant metal. It is present as oxides in most igneous rocks, in sediments derived from them, in living things, and natural bodies of water.[5][6] Of the 801 types of igneous rocks analyzed by the United States Geological Survey, 784 contained titanium. Its proportion in soils is approximately 0.5 to 1.5%.[22] | I can speak for the FnB industry in some measure where substitutes are being sought and used. My hunch is that if other industries find substitutes, running out of TiO2 wouldn't affect as much. Further, thanks to the current slowdown and the US China trade standoff, the overall TiO2 market seems to be headed for a slowdown, postponing the depletion. Essentially, substitution (and/or process modifications) would be key to offsetting any after-effects of TiO2 depletion. For what's being done by at least one player in FnB, check here: https://sensientfoodcolors.com/en-us/research-development/two-new-solutions-replace-titanium-dioxide/ Hope this helps. | 1 | 13,492 | 4.384615 |
389wdg | askscience_test | 0.92 | If the Internet could be wholly redesigned from the ground up, what standards, protocols etc. would be implemented differently? | crtvf86 | crtrest | 1,433,309,439 | 1,433,300,334 | 22 | 15 | If we were starting from scratch, we would almost certainly skip IPv4 entirely and go straight to IPv6 or some variant with an equally large address space. 4 billion IP addresses must have seemed like an endless supply back in the 80's, but in the last few years we've finally started running out, and the demand for addresses is only going to get worse from here. At the rate things are going now, it's going to be years before it's viable to run a public site solely on IPv6. | We'd build in connection level encryption for a start. SMTP would have authentication. DNS would be fixed to prevent spoofing. HTTP(S) is an amazing success that works astoundingly well, so I hope we'd keep that. | 1 | 9,105 | 1.466667 |
x3orq8 | askscience_test | 0.69 | Why is peak hurricane season in September? If energy from the sun is a critical ingredient for hurricanes, why don’t they peak in july? | imreqfb | imrgfhb | 1,662,096,074 | 1,662,097,229 | 9 | 31 | Peak hurricane/cyclone season is just when all the requirements are at their strongest. Warm water temp, low wind sheer in upper troposphere, maximum cyclonic circulation in lower troposphere, high humidity and availability of moisture in all levels of atmosphere. Edit, it’s not heat from the sun that’s required, if that were the case you’d have cyclones/hurricanes over the desert. | Ocean heating lags behind the seasons because the water takes time to absorb heat. It's the reason why ocean water is warmer in the fall and cooler in the spring. And it's the ocean temperature which drives storm formation over water. | 0 | 1,155 | 3.444444 |
u4qbk5 | askscience_test | 0.81 | Do genetic diseases that don't show up until later in life get passed on more frequently? It seems like they would. Because if a diseases that showed up earlier in life, say while you were still fertile, then there's more of a chance of you dying/becoming incapacitated and not being able to reproduce and therefore not able to pass on the disease. | i4xm6bz | i4xsakl | 1,650,094,672 | 1,650,099,955 | 5 | 18 | Assuming no genetic testing has been done in a patient to identify this before having children, it would make sense that it would. If you don't know you have at reproductive age you probably would go have kids like everyone else. There can be hints that have it when it is familial disease. Meaning your relatives suffer from a known genetic disease. Some of those people will get tested to see if they have the genetic defects (in some cases you may not have it depending on which genes you get from which parent). But there is a lot of denial too where people don't want to know and just go about their lives and maybe passing it on. This is a common situation. Huntington's disease is but one example. | Yes. Huntington's ~~~chorea~~~ disease usually starts after 30, which is a major factor in its continuing existence. You've already reproduced by the time it starts. When it starts before 20 (juvenile HD), there's much more strictly limited reproduction. | 0 | 5,283 | 3.6 |
nqvz98 | askscience_test | 0.93 | What exactly is missing for the covid-19 vaccines to be full approved, and not only emergency approved? I trust the results that show that the vaccinea are safe and effective. I was talking to someone who is not an anti Vax, but didn't want to take any covid vaccine because he said it was rushed. I explained him that it did follow a thorough blind test, and did not skip any important step. And I also explained that it was possible to make this fast because it was a priority to everyone and because we had many subjects who allowed the trials to run faster, which usually doesn't happen normally. But then he questioned me about why were the vaccines not fully approved, by the FDA for example. I don't know the reason and I could not find an answer online. Can someone explain me what exactly is missing or was skipped to get a full approval? | h0d946u | h0d82nz | 1,622,671,688 | 1,622,671,212 | 5,062 | 103 | TL;DR - FDA approval is designed on purpose to be a *slow ass process* to make sure a product is **safe, pure, and potent.** It's a process made hard on purpose. Meanwhile, an emergency use authorization slims down the red tape while still requiring a proven safety and efficacy record. **ETA:** If normal FDA approval is like a 300-guest wedding event, then emergency use authorization is a small courthouse wedding six months in advance of the main event so that they can file joint taxes and one spouse can technically be on the other's health insurance and dental. --- Right now the FDA has cleared just three of many vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna, J&J) for use via Emergency Use Authroization (EUA). To get there, they had to go through three phases, and at each stage demonstrate both a) effectiveness and b) safety. - Phase 1: given to a small number of healthy people to see if it's safe at various doses and prompts an immune response (if OK, move to 2) - Phase 2: given to hundreds of people, randomized and controlled, to see short term side effects and immune response at varying doses (if no major short term side effects, move to 3) - Phase 3: given to thousands of people to measure effectiveness and more safety information vs. a placebo >For an EUA to be issued for a vaccine, for which there is adequate manufacturing information to ensure quality and consistency, FDA must determine that the known and potential benefits outweigh the known and potential risks of the vaccine. > From a safety perspective, FDA expects an **EUA submission will include all safety data accumulated from phase 1 and 2 studies conducted with the vaccine, with an expectation that phase 3 data will include a median follow-up of at least 2-months** (meaning that at least half of vaccine recipients in phase 3 clinical trials have at least 2 months of follow-up) after completion of the full vaccination regimen. In addition, FDA expects that an EUA request will include a phase 3 safety database of well over 3,000 vaccine recipients, representing a high proportion of participants enrolled in the phase 3 study, who have been followed for serious adverse events and adverse events of special interest for at least one month after completion of the full vaccination regimen. So far only 3 have made it to EUA. **That means we know it works, we know *for sure* it's safe in the short term, and we know it's manufactured correctly and consistently.** You have a vaccine, you proved it works, and you proved it's safe - you can produce it while you go through the rest of the slow-on-purpose process. Now to have full approval, and under normal circumstances, the vaccine makers have to get full approval through a **Biologics License Application (BLA)** submitted to the Food and Drug Administration. This is a 3-stage process. The BLA application itself includes: - Applicant information - Product/Manufacturing information - Pre-clinical studies - Clinical studies - Labeling 1. They schedule a bioresearch monitoring inspection. FDA comes out to inspect the production process and facilities. 2. Then they file a Form FDA 356th which includes: - A summary of information submitted as part of the application. - Information on the applicant submitting the biologics license application. - A preclinical data section. - A clinical data section that includes safety and efficacy data on the product. - Draft labeling of the product to be licensed. - Information on the manufacturing, chemistry, and controls of the product. - A data summary of validation of important processes and assays involved in the manufacture of the product. - A description of the facility where the product is manufactured. - Case report form tabulations on the manufacturer’s clinical experience with the product. - Case report forms and serious event narratives. - An index. 3. Then we wait for the FDA review. This can take as much time as it needs to take. Sources: https://www.thefdagroup.com/blog/2014/07/test-the-biologics-license-application-bla-process/ https://www.fda.gov/vaccines-blood-biologics/vaccines/emergency-use-authorization-vaccines-explained https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-detail/pfizer-and-biontech-initiate-rolling-submission-biologics | Time; as more people are vaccinated and more people can be monitored for side effects, more data can be gathered, analyzed, and submitted to the FDA for full approval. Normally, the process of testing in all 3 phases and approval is done before full scale manufacturing begins. With Warp Speed, testing and manufacturing were done at the same time, with the government eating the cost of any vaccines manufactured that turned out not to make it through the three phases. With more data available to analyze, I believe all 3 US vaccines are being presented for approval in the near future. This link summarizes the process. | 1 | 476 | 49.145631 |
qwwp2o | askscience_test | 0.94 | Blood bank pioneer Charles Drew was killed in a car crash in 1950. His injuries were too severe for him to be saved. Per wiki a passenger says a blood transfusion might have killed him sooner. Are there any reasons/conditions why a blood transfusion could kill a trauma victim sooner ? If so, how ? By 1950, the major blood groups and RH would surely have been known for transfusion, (eg in North Carolina where the crash occurred) | hl5w04y | hl5tqpd | 1,637,266,267 | 1,637,265,388 | 2,419 | 177 | Blood transfusions increase blood pressure. Since his superior vena cava was blocked, blood flow from the head/neck/chest was blocked. But blood flow to the head/neck/chest continued. This causes a spike in blood pressure localized to these regions. A further increase of blood pressure from the transfusion could result in a cerebral edema, throat swelling, or hemorrhaging | According to a link in the Wikipedia article you mentioned: *Drew didn’t receive a transfusion because his injuries wouldn’t permit it. “He had a superior vena cava syndrome — blood was blocked getting back to his heart from his brain and upper extremities,” Ford said. “To give him a transfusion would have killed him sooner.* I can't vouch for the veracity of this statement. | 1 | 879 | 13.666667 |
45oq26 | askscience_test | 0.86 | Why does dopamine and other "feel good" chemicals actually feel good? Why is our brain happy when it experiences these chemicals? | czzenf3 | czzda4z | 1,455,440,521 | 1,455,435,642 | 97 | 17 | Dopamine is not really a "feel-good chemical". Opioids, endocannbinoids, and GABA fit that description better. Dopamine is used in the brain to help you exploit the resources in your environment. It does this by coding for reward expectations ("I expect a small reward for opening the fridge"). When an event deviates from baseline expectations (for better or for worse) dopamine responds strongly, in order to update your expectations. It thus acts as an indicator of progress. If you prevented dopamine signals from occurring in a rat, it wouldn't be motivated to seek out an available source of food. But if you put the food in its mouth, it would happily eat it. If you want to get all technical, then we could say that our brains are (probably) Bayesian and that they are trying to avoid unexpected states by building mental models and making predictions about the future so they won't be surprised. Surprise, in this case, is bad. It means something is beyond your control. Things being beyond your control is dangerous. Dopamine is used to predict outcomes so that you will have an edge. So the reason why some things "feel good" is that you are evolutionarily incentivized to exploit the resources of your environment. When something registers as such, it's going to feel good. You are roaming around the world improving your mental model of your surroundings with the biologically prepared goal of extracting rewards and avoiding terrors and to hopefully create a copy of yourself who can do the same. "Feel-good chemicals" are steering you toward desirable states. | Dopamine in particular is a neurotransmitter - it's a chemical message that neurons send to each other when they make computations. Happiness, as with all of your experiences, is a computation in your brain; your brain is integrating a bunch of inputs and saying that those inputs are good, and you experience this as happiness. Since happiness is just computation, and computation requires neurotransmission, happiness also requires neurotransmission. Not all neurotransmitters are interchangeable. Some neurotransmitters send one message, some send another, and some send different messages based on the context of their transmission. In addition, different neurons have different preferences for different neurotransmitters. Put all this together and you end up finding that some neurotransmitters are associated with particular kinds of computation, and in this way dopamine is associated with happiness. So it's not that dopamine makes you happy, it's that dopamine is an essential part of what happiness actually is, as a physical process in the brain. | 1 | 4,879 | 5.705882 |
ignajo | askscience_test | 0.95 | Could an identical twin who recovered from an infection donate some of their T-cells to the other twin as a form of vaccine? Could this work with any two people? I assume it would work best with identical twins since their lymphocytes would be genetically identical. | g2v267r | g2uykiw | 1,598,403,246 | 1,598,401,255 | 83 | 43 | In theory yes, in a genetically identical twin (so complete HLA match at all loci). This is based on what we now do in treatment of cell therapy for cancer patients (it also happens to be my own research :) where we take patient's own anti-tumor T cells expand and infuse back to them You can do it two ways. 1) Find and isolate T cells reactive against the virus or infection, expand them in large flasks and infuse them back into acceptor. Advantage here is that you can take a pool of reactive T cells so you get broader repertoire targeting the infection. But this has to be like you said HLA matched so your acceptor T cells don't kill donor T cells, so genetically identical twin might work 2) If you already know the specific protein and Epitopes from the infection you are targeting say SARS COV2 protein S1 some epitope restricted by patient's HLA A0201 (one type) for e.g. you can also isolate the specific T cell receptor (TCR) gene responsible for the targeting and engineer your acceptor twin's healthy T cells to express the TCR. *This is called TCR therapy*. The advantage here is that you control the specificity since you know exactly what you're targeting, so there is less chance of off target effects. Now the con is if you're targeting say SARS COV2 you likely need multiple proteins targeted on the virus and you lose the advantage of the broad repertoire that's available in #1 (each TCR from a T cell only recognizes one epitope from a given protein region). #2 however has the huuuuge advantage that you don't need to have perfect HLA match since you can still use the acceptor's own T cells. All you're engineering into it is the actual TCR gene that is targeting the infection. *So forget your identical twin example, if I currently have a disease and you have already recovered from it, if you and I share even 1-2 HLAs it's possible we can take your TCR against the virus and genetically engineer the TCR into my T-cells*. Cool huh. However, I have to warn if you're thinking in terms of COVID19 you likely have to intervene much much earlier in their disease course. The reason being, the disease causes severe respiratory failure like ARDs and symptoms are similar to when you have cytokine release syndrome in patients undergoing T cell therapy. So it unclear if you will be helping the patient if you give this amount of cells at a late stage of the disease, since the first stop all the billions of T-cells you infuse into patients are going to go straight to guess where : Lungs. They might severely damage the lungs which is already fighting an infection. Nevertheless it's unexplored and opportunities abound. Edit: minor details | You would somehow have to ensure you transfer a Stem cell memory T cell capable of producing the correct T cell receptor against a COVID antigen, and that may be able to expand sufficiently to confer immunity. Typically t effector cells are already committed to a particular target - so it wouldn’t matter how many of those guys you transfer if they aren’t committed to the correct antigen. So, I would guess no, unless you enrich for the covid t cells. But, if you meant enriching for covid attacking t cells, then sure! | 1 | 1,991 | 1.930233 |
5496sn | asksciencefiction_test | 0.83 | [Captain America: Civil War; The Avengers: Age of Ultron] Given what was done to Sokovia, shouldn't the total monetary loss be more than $474 billion? How is it calculated? I'm speaking exclusively and nearly from a monetary standpoint; as in, the amount of loss would not be offset by the benefit to the world, because if it were, then "Total loss" would literally be positive infinity, when you consider that the avengers literally prevented the extinction of the human race and likely the extinction of just about every animal but maybe cockroaches and frogs. $474 billion just seems so...small when you consider the literal disintegration of an entire nation state -- however small The country is in terms of surface area, political power, GDP, and population. I would put it on par with actual Eastern European countries that are small yet war-torn, perhaps something like Kazakhstan or even a smaller version of Turkey. All of those buildings, homes, businesses, and just general real estate with possible oil's and minerals and other commodities that could be mined have to be worth more than half a billion dollars. If you consider GDP and total job loss, along with displacement costs and worldwide relief aid, it has to be more than $474 billion, right? Even if they don't calculate the speculative and in tangible, like I said, the physical structures and properties and fissile material have to be worth a ton more when combined. **So, how do you suppose they calculate the damage or "total loss"?** Because the incident in **LAGOS was $14 million** -- and I have to believe that the building alone couldn't have been worth more than $14 million in Africa, since labor and materials would come cheaply -- do they use human lives to factor that in? Not just casualties, but injuries and psychological distress? If so, the Sokovia total loss would have to be at least somewhere close to $1 trillion. Even with, say, 3 million citizens, they're all displaced and have forever lost their homes -- not just their dwellings but their actual nation (**imagine if the US -- or your country of origin -- were completely vaporized, with zero time to prepare to capture the history. That would make my heart hurt. People's hearts ache over the loss of their childhood home not even due to demolition but just the view of a new family inside it -- imagine the feeling of seeing your entire hometown, your home *nation* being "demolished" and forever unable to revisit.**) I feel like the "cost" of the total "pain" (PTSD, emotional distress, nostalgia, etc) would be very high (3 million people multiplied $50,000, an arbitrary number for ***no*** precedence has been set, since you can't imagine how a Sokovian must feel not being able to even visit their hometown, not just home). That would be $150 billion already...and $50,000 is not even that high of an amount. Then, add in the costs of housing "refugees" (or whatever a displaced citizen is called) via World Aid/Relief, which could be calculated even at $25,000 per person, if would be $75 billion. **So $225 billion in just total cost of "pain" and "relief" -- not even counting tangible costs.** **1) How do you think they calculate Total Loss and 2) how do you think they *should* calculate Total Loss?** | d805i9d | d80g2od | 1,474,728,461 | 1,474,744,903 | 8 | 9 | Sokovia was already well on its way to disintegration, which meant that it was mainly damaging already destroyed stuff. It'd be like if you bombed Somalia or Syria or Detroit. Yeah people would be hurt, but you'd hit more rubble than standing buildings. | 3 million may be a large overestimation. The city proper that was destroyed was 2km wide, so total area of about four square kilometers. "Only" about half of the city was lifted by Ultron's device. Another European nation with similar architecture, Monaco, has half the area of Sokovia (two square km). That's approximately the same surface area as was destroyed. Their population is 33,000. If we allow for a higher population density in Sokovia and triple that figure we still only have a population of about 100,000. $225 billion works out to a whopping $2.25 million per Sokovian. | 0 | 16,442 | 1.125 |
1igojh | asksciencefiction_test | 0.9 | [Marvel] If you were to cut a mutant with a healing factor (i.e. Sabertooth or Deadpool) in half, perfectly down the middle, could you conceivably end up with two of that mutant? Like a starfish? Edit: to clarify my question, once fully healed, would there be two whole and complete versions of the mutant? | cb49laf | cb49qog | 1,374,033,140 | 1,374,033,587 | 9 | 27 | I wonder if they could create an army of duplicates this way. And what if you cut someone like Deadpool and Sabertooth in half then put half of Sabertooth next to the other half of Deadpool? Would they adapt and fuze together? Could we create hybrids? | I say the half with the part of the brain that controls healing ["sweet spot" in Heroes] regenerates and the other half dies. | 0 | 447 | 3 |
thxvf1 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.96 | [MCU] How bulletproof/bullet resistant is Peter Parker? Upon rewatching the MCU trilogy, there have been a few instances where he has been shot either from Mysterio's drones or from a SWAT member after the incident with the Green Goblin. Are these Stark suits actually saving him from the bullet or is his body just that resistant? If he can take a bullet train at full speed and a Pumpkin Bomb (which is effectively a grenade) to the face with no burns, how much damage would a bullet give him? Would it pierce his skin or wound him like a rubber bullet to a normal human? | i1azkef | i1b3wda | 1,647,711,971 | 1,647,713,782 | 27 | 48 | Starks Suit is bullit resistant not bullet proof. The Suit is designed to be lighter and more flexible so that it not hinders Peters reflexes and acrobatics. As to what I have observed in movies and comics alike is that comic spidey is supposed to be not more durable than a trained human but he seems to possess a mild healing factor allowing him to sleep injuries off. Movie Spidey is a bit more durable. Actually it has bothered me to some extend as not being true to the source material. Spidey is supposed to evade incoming attacks due to his spider sense instead of tanking them. | I've always imagined he's something like 20-40% more resistant to bullets than the average human, which is to say not bullet proof at all. While a rifle will certainly cut right through him, it won't blast a huge hole in the exit wound like it will with us. He'll be less likely to bleed out and die. But it won't save him from getting shot in vital places. | 0 | 1,811 | 1.777778 |
uo9ic8 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.91 | [MCU] Why Peter Parkers are different across the multiverse but Stephen Stranges aren't? The Doylist answer is obvious, but there is a Watsonian one you guys can think of? | i8d2i4b | i8de59b | 1,652,386,390 | 1,652,391,077 | 89 | 117 | We’ve seen three Peter Parker variants. By extension, now that the multiverse doors have been blown off, we’ve also seen multiple versions of Professor X, Daredevil, the Punisher, the Fantastic Four, Captain America, and Loki (specifically said to be the most common variant of…Variant…). While some have wide discrepancies in appearance (again, fuckin’ Loki…), some also do not. Professor X and Doctor Strange may just have a consistent look to them. | The stranges have all come from universes that have quite a lot of similarities with the main differences being the heroes. But otherwise a lot of the same events happened in one way or another e.g thanos, ultron. But in the Spider-Mens universes there’s basically no similarities at all except for the Spider-Men themselves. There was no invasion in 2012, there was no ultron attempt, there’s no thanos etc. So it does make sense that if the universes are similar then the people in it will look similar too | 0 | 4,687 | 1.314607 |
a7del5 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.8 | [Rick and Morty/MCU] Would Rick care about stopping Thanos or would he just move to a new universe to avoid the Snap? | ec3e6g7 | ec3fmlb | 1,545,194,992 | 1,545,196,468 | 2 | 7 | Doesn't he end a big scary galactic scale enemy of the hero team Morty likes and he is technically a member of but disrespects out of a fit of drunken boredom he didn't even remember? One rather like Thanos in some ways? | Rick has already easily killed a Thanos expy while blackout drunk. | 0 | 1,476 | 3.5 |
tvf38a | asksciencefiction_test | 0.73 | [Vigilantes] Does vigilantes like Batman or the Punisher ever get sick and tired of what they do or are they that dedicated to their cause? | i3914bz | i398vju | 1,649,009,256 | 1,649,012,498 | 20 | 29 | Batman has retired/trained successors before and only one continuity that I know of that he did so out of shame, so I imagine he has regrets and can feel exhausted at his crusade-perhaps in the face of extreme crime or the toll it takes on the ones he loves. Punisher on the other hand has pretty much nothing aside from this, so I don’t think he truly gets tired or such. Occasionally he may wonder of the past and what might have been, perhaps in the face of other heroes hesitate, but overall I’d say no. | It is impossible to overstate how insane and obsessive Frank Castle is. He has nothing but the job. He doesn't relax, he has no hobbies or vices, and he can barely taste the food he eats. If he's not killing, he's planning the next "hunt." Anything in him that is human, or tired, or distracted gets pushed down with other emotions that his mission doesn't have time for. And he'll do it until he's finally dead for good. Batman at least has a vision for a world after his work is done. He looks forward, sometimes, perhaps, to leaving his work in the hands of his successors. | 0 | 3,242 | 1.45 |
8evsbf | asksciencefiction_test | 0.95 | [General] I'm a monster and my boss asked me to stay in this barrel till the hero arrives. What are some things I can do to pass the time? It's kind of cramped in here, I'm getting bored and I want to keep my reflexes sharp. | dxym33e | dxygnrx | 1,524,685,955 | 1,524,681,321 | 379 | 140 | You really should be practicing your lines. You're expected to scream something vaguely threatening in the general direction of the hero. Also, get that death gurgle down, since you'll only get one shot at that one. | Flick a coin in the air and try not to have it land outside of the barrel | 1 | 4,634 | 2.707143 |
if93ac | asksciencefiction_test | 0.88 | [MCU] If you sneak to Thanos when he's alone and cast a spell throwing him to mirror dimension, like the Ancient One did on Dr. Strange, does it mean he's not a problem anymore? | g2m4uzj | g2m9sjo | 1,598,210,286 | 1,598,212,743 | 13 | 19 | Yes, unless he already has some of the stones. With the stones he could easily find a way out. | Even the Sorcerers of Kamar Taj can't get out of the Mirror Dimension without a Sling Ring, so yes, Thanos would be trapped. The Space Stone would, however, let him escape. | 0 | 2,457 | 1.461538 |
belyqw | asksciencefiction_test | 0.97 | [MCU] How powerful is Asgard compared to the wider galactic community? I'm talking pre-Hela Asgard compared to other civilizations like the Kree Empire or Xandar etc. | el86of7 | el87r6x | 1,555,630,354 | 1,555,631,189 | 12 | 17 | Not that powerful anymore, sadly. 😂😭 I would say pretty damn powerful while Odin was alive though, as none of the alien races outside the 9 Realms even considered an invasion, as far as we know. | Like a fallen empire in Stellaris | 0 | 835 | 1.416667 |
r8t5d3 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.97 | [Matrix] Was the red pill/blue pill choice just symbolic or did the pill have any actual effect? Pretty straightforward question. Thanks | hn7m2s8 | hn7ngnx | 1,638,636,316 | 1,638,636,892 | 23 | 114 | Had he taken the blue pill, they would have allowed him to remain ignorant and not exposed the matrix. He would have lived a safe, relatively normal life, and Orpheus and the others would have let him be. | The red pill is a tracer program that allows the resistance to find the pod the person is located in. The blue pill resets the person's memories to before they met the resistance, making them think it was all just a dream. | 0 | 576 | 4.956522 |
zls29t | asksciencefiction_test | 0.92 | [Die Hard/Ocean’s 11] Could’ve Danny Ocean’s crew pulled off the Nakatomi Plaza heist in a non-violent way? Something I’ve always wondered about these these two series is of the Ocean’s crew could pull off the heists in the Die Hard movies in a typical non violent manner. Ocean’s crew normally give back generously to the people they involve in their heists, whereas most Die Hard villains just kill innocent people all the time. Could the Ocean’s crew pull off the same heist, but not hurt anyone? Or is violence the only way to get that vault open? | j06vm0g | j06uos0 | 1,671,028,563 | 1,671,028,150 | 238 | 85 | Absolutely. They would socially engineer the entire thing and infiltrate Nakatomi at all levels. They could discover Takagi's password through subterfuge or simply placing a camera above his desk. The tech guys would brute force opens the other locks. For the magnetic seal, they'd make mock videos of a terrorist takeover. Cops would show up and set up a perimeter. Then Danny and maybe Rusty or Linus would pose as FBI agents. They'd take over the operation from the LAPD and order the power grid down. When the SWAT team finally bursts in, they'd find the Nakatomi Christmas party in full swing and Holly and Takagi would be confused, saying there were never any terrorists. Dwayne T. Robinson would be left scratching his head at what happened. The funny thing is that McClane would probably be an antagonist in this. He'd know Danny from his time working RICO in NY. He's jealous of him flirting with his wife and when he sees him at the party, he'd know something was up. He'd spend his time sleuthing, trying to figure out what Ocean is up to, and then get caught flat-footed when the other cops show up. | So Hans used violence in his heist for two reasons. For one, the terrorist cover made sure that law enforcement brought a specific response to the tower. Hans wanted the FBI to cut the power to the local area so the vault's final lock, sealed by electromagnets, were automatically shut off. But that response from the law would also be a heavy-handed anti terrorist squad, and not a serious investigator would would connect Hans' actions with the money that would invariably go missing from the vault. Hans wanted the police to think about shooting and death, because they would be too distracted to think about robbery. And by the time anyone realized what had actually happened, Hans and his crew would have disappeared. As long as Danny's crew can figure out a way to neutralize the electromagnetic lock in the vault without resorting to the FBI cutting power to the entire local area, they could easily do the heist without hurting anyone. The other locks on the vault were undone by a single hacker under Hans' employ, so the majority of the job would be easy for Danny's crew if they weren't going for a terrorist angle like Hans. Some charm and witty conversation with Nakatomi leadership could even get some passcodes that Hans failed to get because of his intentionally violent plan. Perhaps the majority of the heist planning and operation wouldn't be in Nakatomi Plaza itself, but the local power station. Danny's crew could sneak in disguised as city workers and temporarily cut power at the precise moment the other locks disengage. | 1 | 413 | 2.8 |
neiqzt | asksciencefiction_test | 0.97 | DC comics] So, what is the context of that crying Joker panel looking at a monkey? You know, this one: [https://i.redd.it/d3libfkvl8941.jpg It has been reposted a lot as a reaction picture, but I frankly never found the source or better, the context. What was happening that made the Joker tearful? Why was he looking at monkees? What did he meant with "It's time"? I need answers! | gygj10o | gyh1pcr | 1,621,267,329 | 1,621,275,017 | 213 | 613 | He abducts the baby gorilla and decides to raise it as his son and sidekick, Jackanapes. This isn't the first time he's demonstrated such an ape fixation; in Azzarello's Joker graphic novel, he meets with Two-Face at the zoo and has Harley disguise herself as a gorilla in case he needs backup. | I've read this comic! The baby monkey made Joker remember of a monkey doll he used to play with during his childhood. Short flashbacks show us that he had a terrible childhood with an extremely abusive mother, and his monkey toy was his only “friend". So seeing the baby monkey at the zoo made the Joker think of that doll he missed and he decided to kidnap the monkey and raise him himself. They forge a wholesome (for the Joker's standards) father-son relationship and the clown begins training the monkey to become his new partner in crime. At the end of the story the monkey, now grown-up, dies in their first mission together. The Joker seems devastated for a single panel, before falling back into a maniacal laughter. | 0 | 7,688 | 2.877934 |
q869pt | asksciencefiction_test | 0.94 | [MCU] Why does Hank Pym tell Scott that you can never trust a Stark? | hgp0zd0 | hgo9wgn | 1,634,267,572 | 1,634,255,096 | 11 | 5 | He's had some kind of falling out with nearly every person he's had any professional or personal relationship with; including his own daughter. He's narcissistic, unfriendly, judgemental and bitter. | At the time, Howard made a fortune by creating and selling advanced weapons ( Like Tony would later do) and was a figure who had a personality similar to Hank's so the two just couldn't really get along. | 1 | 12,476 | 2.2 |
1m285t | asksciencefiction_test | 0.87 | [Men in Black] Are there only 26 MiB field agents? I mean, with agents' names only having a single letter, there only seems to be so many possibilities. | cc53nfw | cc53s15 | 1,378,767,970 | 1,378,768,318 | 10 | 18 | Alternately, they might have multiple people with the same "name," just like an office might have multiple "Mikes" or "Jennifers." | In at least one instance, there was an agent referred to by something which is not, strictly speaking, a 'letter'. I seem to recall an Agent Double-A or similar. Unless this is the future where Double-A was killed before joining the organization. | 0 | 348 | 1.8 |
rx40kl | asksciencefiction_test | 0.89 | [Pokemon] why does Giovanni keep Jessie and James on team rocket? Not only does he keep them on the team, he sends them on special assignments and gives them a ton of resources. In the journey series they literally have a pelipper with a hoard of Pokémon following them at all times… why? Are they super successful outside pikachu catching or something? | hrgerwv | hrg4b0m | 1,641,447,277 | 1,641,441,957 | 31 | 13 | In gens 3 and 4 Jessie and james are so profoundly out of contact with the rest of team rocket most of the time they can’t even communicate long enough for them to get fired and Giovanni would forget they existed when they didn’t call. Its cost him literally nothing to have them on board since they don’t get paid. If they manage to establish footholds for team rocket in these regions they’re following the tweeps in, regions where rocket doesn’t operate, giovanni has gotten a huge reward for little risk. By the time gen 5 rolled around they’re now in contact with the rest of rocket but between gen 4 and gen 5 they became more competent so they weren’t fired then either | They were pay-for-play hires from influential families. | 1 | 5,320 | 2.384615 |
iqunhx | asksciencefiction_test | 0.86 | [General Fantasy] A human woman is born with all the eggs she will ever have, running out at ~age fifty. An elven woman lives for hundreds of years. Are their ovaries just *really* full? | g4uc4yu | g4ucaiu | 1,599,844,702 | 1,599,844,780 | 49 | 107 | Elves are a different species. Why would you assume their female biology works exactly the same? | You misunderstand biology, a human woman never runs out of eggs. Menopause is a shift in hormones, not running out of eggs. A woman has thousands more eggs than she will ever need. Elves are probably made similar, though with their slower reproductive cycles whether they have a monthly period is still a mystery to our doctors as is much of their anatomy. Imagine walking up to an elf of reproductive age and just asking... | 0 | 78 | 2.183673 |
tqh7pw | asksciencefiction_test | 0.91 | [Marvel] Why didn't Dr. Strange insure his hands? He obviously had the money. | i2h8hz1 | i2h7kdo | 1,648,497,580 | 1,648,497,198 | 446 | 83 | Maybe he did- it would explain how he had the money to try countless experimental surgeries and galivant around the far east looking for a possibly mythical magic temple. But the problem with losing his hands wasn't the money, it was that he put his entire self image into being the best surgeon in the world. He didn't want money. He wanted his hands back. | That would have required him to recognize that he is not invincible, which is inconsistent with his demonstrated arrogance. And if it paid off, it would have gotten him a bunch of money and zero new hands, because that's not a thing that money can buy in that part of the MCU at that time. So he'd still end up without the ability to do the thing he's built his life around, and the extra cash wouldn't help with that at all. | 1 | 382 | 5.373494 |
wj436o | asksciencefiction_test | 0.89 | [Marvel] Could Iron Man recreate super speed with one of his armors? how fast would he be compared to speedsters like Quicksilver and The Flash? | ijfacc0 | ijf5kwj | 1,659,954,420 | 1,659,950,609 | 81 | 6 | I'm sure he could make armor that has insane travel speed, and I think he's either had an armor or done something to himself that's boosted his reaction time/mental processing speeds but neither has been on the level of Quicksilver or Flash where time actually slows to a crawl and he can pluck/move bullets out of the air like in DOFP. If he had access to the speed force or studied it, he could potentially harness something? But on his own, I think there's a limitation to the more extreme powers, like he'd probably also have troubles trying to create a suit that could warp reality like Wanda | Id say no since superspeed requires also a super speed processing brain and no armor can really make tony's brain faster... He can make use of AI to help him but that can only take one so far... In a real combat an AI couldnt make the calls needed a speedster usually does... Not to mention the stress the friction of superspeed would put on tony's joints... No armor can protect him from that either... Besides, Flash is in a whole another level as far as speedsters go... He bends physics and warps with his speed... So tony who kinda uses those laws to build his armor cant really come close... | 1 | 3,811 | 13.5 |
rd5pm3 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.88 | [DC comics] Beastboy can turn into alien animals, Could he turn into sentient alien races like kryptonians? | hnz0kty | hnzbdbo | 1,639,132,545 | 1,639,140,263 | 16 | 37 | No. He gets his powers from The Red which is strictly an animal only thing. | No, but he could do a Kryptonian dog (*sigh*...or horse.), which gets similar upgrades under a yellow sun, including to intellect. Wont be able to use those powers til he's gathered enough solar energy, and I dont know how long that might take. Probably not as soon as he needs if he's turning into a canine sun dog for battle reasons. | 0 | 7,718 | 2.3125 |
rbxwxp | asksciencefiction_test | 0.97 | [Terminator] Does Skynet get some sort of transmission when a Terminator fails to kill Sarah/John or it it just wildly sending out Terminators across the past and hoping for the best? | hnr4ggv | hnrdukr | 1,638,990,602 | 1,638,994,178 | 92 | 139 | Step One: Send a Terminator back in time. Step Two: Look around. Step Three: Fuck, I'm still about to lose the war. Step Four: Send a Terminator back in time... | In theory, regardless of how long it takes the Terminator to get the job done, the effects on the future should be seen more or less instantaneously. Therefore the moment it leaves, if nothing changes, Skynet knows it failed and sends the next one. | 0 | 3,576 | 1.51087 |
wdi4jl | asksciencefiction_test | 0.79 | [General Fiction] What character matches the Joker's belief that it only takes one bad day to turn the average person into a monster ? | iiigv7p | iiid0te | 1,659,365,003 | 1,659,363,349 | 18 | 15 | Harvey Dent. | Rambo comes to mind since one bad day can make him revert to bring the legend of war that lurks beneath the surface, but once he's out of the shit he returns somewhat to normal. | 1 | 1,654 | 1.2 |
c5k6e5 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.79 | [Superhero General] If Peter Parker had been bitten by a radioactive octopus instead of a spider, what would be his power set? So let's say that Peter Parker (or Otto Octavius) is bitten by a radioactive octopus instead of a spider. What octopus based powers would he get? Could a distributed brain on his limbs be an advantage or a weakness if he became Octoman? | es2g0rt | es2h1x6 | 1,561,523,145 | 1,561,524,133 | 12 | 15 | Japanese porn star | His wall-crawling would be a little messier, for one thing. He might also pull this move off a bit more often when he's pissed. He could also ink a cloud as he wishes and catch thieves just like fishes. | 0 | 988 | 1.25 |
rda42l | asksciencefiction_test | 0.94 | [Comics] Why do so many animal only themed shapeshifters or " powers from the animal kingdom" characters like beastboy, Vixen, or Reptile make this weird distinction between non sentient and sentient animals? if beastboy can turn into a Kryptonianian dog then he should be able to turn into a humanoid Kryptonian as well as regardless of intelligence/ sentience they're both still animals. They should be able to shape-shifting into humans to as were still animals | hnzqwpo | hnzymp3 | 1,639,148,076 | 1,639,151,381 | 31 | 32 | Well in beast boys case he connects to a mystical power that only let's him turn into non sentient animals. It's the limitation to the magic. Vixen is in possession of the Tantu Totem which let's her tap into the spirit of animals, so once again limitation of magic. Likely a mcguffin of animals have spirits, people have souls. From what I can tell she specifically takes in an animal spirit which gives her its abilities, and its mannerisms/personality as well (aggression etc) which her human mind/soul overpowers, if she took in a human/kryptonian spirit/soul she would be fighting that spirit/soul for procession of her body. Reptil's powers are specifically to turn parts of his body in parts of a dinosaurs body. So he can only work with dinosaurs. | **Because they don't run on cladistics.** In cladistics humans are considered monkeys, fish, and animals - but in everyday speech, humans aren't any of those things. For instance, if someone went to the zoo and said they didn't see any monkeys you would know exactly what they meant, you wouldn't go "Huh, what about all the other humans?" In mystical terms, humans aren't animals. Animals are mobile living creatures *without immortal souls*. ---- Beast Boy gets his power from The Red, which covers non-ensouled animals. Vixen gets her powers from Anansi, who has chosen to give her the powers of every non-human animal on Earth. This also works through a connection to The Red. Reptil has a magical amulet that lets him turn into dinosaurs. It doesn't seem to include "birds" in the meaning of "dinosaur" - unsurprisingly, because the majority of humanity don't either. | 0 | 3,305 | 1.032258 |
rwg4pv | asksciencefiction_test | 0.73 | [Star Wars]Does the sarlacc no longer digest its victims for a thousand years in the new cannon? In the old cannon, if you got eaten by the sarlacc you were tortured/digested for a thousand years in its stomach and it was considered the ultimate fate worse than death. However, in the new Boba Fett show we see a dead stormtrooper inside the sarlacc next to Boba Fett. Fett also doesn't seem to have much problem escapting the sarlacc even though in the old cannon the sarlacc actually restrained you to prevent your escape. Does this mean the sarlacc is less horrible in the new cannon Vs Legends? | hrbm8py | hrbon63 | 1,641,363,920 | 1,641,365,460 | 14 | 55 | >In the old cannon, if you got eaten by the sarlacc you were tortured/digested for a thousand years in its stomach. People don't live for a 1000 of years. Most would starve to death before too long. I think that's just to scare people. | Our only source for the “thousand years” digestion thing was Threepio, acting in his role as Jabba’s MC, and he seemed to be translating or reading from a script] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8576PlXbUk). >You will therefore be taken to the Dune Sea and cast into the Pit of Carkoon, the nesting place of the all-powerful Sarlacc. In its belly, you will find a new definition of pain and suffering, as you are slowly digested over a thousand years." It’s worth noting that he says nothing about being *alive* for a thousand years. It’s entirely possible that it’s all exaggerated hyperbole for the sake of theatrics, but it’s also possible that you just die horribly and are then very slowly digested. It’s unclear how long that trooper was in the gullet… could have been days, weeks, or years. He was definitely being slowly melted and absorbed into the stomach, but we have no reference for when he was eaten other than, “before today”. Heck, we really can’t even say for certain that the trooper was *dead*… he might have been paralyzed but alive the whole time. Fett had little trouble escaping because his armor was still loaded with weapons, and a flamethrower from the inside does a lot of damage. Although I should think setting off a flamethrower in unknown, small spaces is super-dangerous to one's self, it’s entirely possible he was on the edge of panic and acted instinctively… It’s actually been my headcanon, given [the sad state of his performance, that Boba Fett was drunk off his knockers at the barge party. When the execution turned into a circus and Luke popped a lightsaber, his hatred for Jedi combined with his intoxication led him to rashly fling himself into the fight, where he was taken out by a blind man with a pole. | 0 | 1,540 | 3.928571 |
rdcbta | asksciencefiction_test | 0.97 | [Logan] How is the Adamantium skeleton poisoning Wolverine? After watching Logan, I’ve seen Wolverine talk about how the Adamantium skeleton is poisoning him which worsens his healing factor, but how? Shouldn’t his healing factor take care of the poisoning in the first place? And Wolverine lived for decades with it (He got the Adamantium skeleton back in 1970) and lived with no problem until 2023. After that year he started to age aggressively and become way weaker in the year 2029, all of that in just a span of 6 years? | ho05w7c | ho06fu2 | 1,639,154,305 | 1,639,154,521 | 47 | 296 | His healing factor has been taking care of it the whole time, just turns out it has limits. It can't continuously heal him forever, and this is what running up against that limit looks like. It can keep him in pretty good shape for about 50 years, but then it starts to peter out pretty quickly. | His healing factor is *mostly* taking care of the poisoning. That's why he's alive at all. A regular person with an adamantium coating on their skeleton would die in a matter of days at most (assuming the coating was added magically so as not to kill them while it was being added) ----- The aggressive aging at the end is because his healing factor starts to fall below the level at which it can handle both Adamantium poisoning and aging - and thus he starts aging - and then falls further until it can only partially handle the Adamantium poisoning. We don't know exactly what caused his healing factor to start faltering - it may be a product of his existing (slow) aging, it could be due to the strain of surviving Xavier's psychic bursts, or it might be something to do with the genetically altered corn syrup that has prevented new mutants being born. | 0 | 216 | 6.297872 |
oweood | asksciencefiction_test | 0.98 | [Mario Bros] When Mario is doing other stuff (go carting, tennis, everyday) is he big Mario or little Mario? | h7fppvm | h7fj9rb | 1,627,916,761 | 1,627,913,783 | 378 | 57 | In Kart, Mario and others use Super Mushrooms and don't grow a stage larger. This implies that they're already in their full size, like what happens when you grab a second Super Mushroom while already "Super" in other games: you either bank it or waste it, but you don't grow extra Super. I think as "Super Mario" he is often Super by default; a Super Mushroom will return Mario to his regular (Super) size, not make him larger than normal. Little Mario seems to be his injured or distressed state. Little Mario is half the height of Peach, while Super Mario is contemporary in size. In his sports and kart showings, he's not waist-high to Peach as Little Mario is shown during SMB1. He's not knee-high to Bowser. And while Bowser has some variance in size (I believe due to how much power he's possessing or utilizing), it's clear that this is normal sized "Super Mario" alongside Bowser. Also, while Little, his dimensions are far more minimized than we see in these games. The New Super Mario series shows a good modern example of how Mushrooms affect his size. If he was Little Mario, this would seem to be suggesting that Sports/Kart Mario are currently small and would become even larger when touching a Super Mushroom, but that would be from the effects of a Mega Mushroom instead, which we also see used (and follows the same Mushroom rules I've explained above) in the Kart games. | He's big Mario. | 1 | 2,978 | 6.631579 |
p7cy95 | asksciencefiction_test | 0.77 | [Skyrim] How strong is the Unrelenting Force shout? If it had consequences for the environment, would it be able to bend trees or blow up a brick wall? Would being hit by it directly explode your eardrums? | h9jfksq | h9jjrlx | 1,629,384,885 | 1,629,386,626 | 5 | 17 | Maxed out, it sends opponents flying a couple dozen feet and has a percentage chance of disintegration. If the game allowed gore, this would probably be more messy. I reckon it's as strong as a grenade. | I feel like shouts in general are stronger in the lore than in the game. Fire Breath, for example, should realistically be more like a ray of flame like dragon's breath rather than just a burst of flame. Also, I agree with the thought that, lore-wise, Thu'um probably doesn't have cool down. | 0 | 1,741 | 3.4 |
r09k4u | asksciencefiction_test | 0.87 | [Annihilation] what properties does the anomalous zone have (I watched the movie, but could not classify) and possible causes? | hlrssdx | hlsfzmv | 1,637,678,463 | 1,637,687,970 | 3 | 15 | The books go into it a bit. But it's sort of the point that something is going on that doesn't care about us and we don't understand. | In the movie, at least, the basic concept is similar to The Color Out Of Space- some kind of alien life falls out of the sky, transforms the area around it, it may not even be doing it purposely or even know that it's doing it. [warning, doylism zone]: The story of Annihilation is highly symbolic, which makes it hard to discuss without at least touching on what everything *represents*. That's not what this sub's for, so I'll keep it short: >!The key point is that the Shimmer is a place that forever changes anyone who enters, because it represents confronting trauma!<. Everything else about it is negotiable, so a lot is left up to the reader's interpretation/imagination. Sometimes it's the monster you can't see that's the scariest. | 0 | 9,507 | 5 |
daj8ui | asksciencefiction_test | 0.96 | [Alien/Aliens] I just discovered this sub, so forgive me since I'm sure this has been kicked around before, but I've always wondered - How do the xenomorphs generate body mass when they don't seem to have enough food to do so? Why doesn't their blood compromise the ship's hull? | f1q5flh | f1q7dyh | 1,569,693,915 | 1,569,694,969 | 5 | 211 | They get into the food stores. They're like mice. | They're basically hollow. As a chestburster they're soft, fleshy and elastic. Over the course of a few hours they use hydraulic pressure to stretch and expand their outer layer which then dries into the hard exoskeleton we're familiar with. As such, they're light enough to easily climb walls and run across ceilings whilst using hydraulics instead of muscles enables them to also be incredibly strong. Further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecdysis http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2180/do-spiders-have-hydraulic-legs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exoskeleton As they age and consume, their mass increases resulting in forms such as the Praetorian which is stronger, but lacks the agility and ability to run up walls. http://avp.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_castes_from_the_Alien_expanded_universe *Also, that acid that sprays out? Not blood, hydraulic fluid under pressure. It's acidic because it plays a role in the relatively rapid hardening of the exoskeleton, which may have a metallic component. "Acid Hardening" is a thing. **Also also, hydraulic systems only generate heat when in use which explains why they're basically undetectable if they're not moving. [this was my answer to a similar question a couple of years ago - it turns out it might be very wrong for a few reasons, but I still like it: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskScienceFiction/comments/6b96w7/alien_all_how_do_the_xenomorphs_neomorphs/dhl207s/ ] | 0 | 1,054 | 42.2 |
2vbs8i | asksciencefiction_test | 0.86 | [Harry Potter] In Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, why does Professor Quirrell try and choke Harry when Voldemort says kill him? I was rewatching some of the movies this morning, and I was wondering why he tries to choke him, rather than using magic, which he is more versed in than Harry. Thanks! | cog7v6b | cog90ye | 1,423,508,998 | 1,423,510,937 | 25 | 33 | A full-grown man could definitely overpower an 11 year old, and I'm pretty sure the stress of the situation was making him less than entirely rational, which is why he fell to base instincts. It's not every day that an evil fraction of soul from the plane between life and death inhabits your body and compels you to murder a child. | Harry Potters true abilities at that point in time weren't very well known. All people really "knew" was that he somehow survived an attack by Voldemort. Quirrell probably figured that using a spell could backfire very badly. So knowing that Harry is a first year, Quirrell most likely assumed that Harry couldn't directly use his wand/magical abilities to mortally harm Quirrell. Harry is also very young and as such, physically weak. So he may as well use that to kill him. | 0 | 1,939 | 1.32 |
95g362 | asksocialscience_test | 0.93 | What is the current scientific consensus about the pros and cons of homeschooling? | e3t44yd | e3tp4un | 1,533,704,160 | 1,533,736,848 | 13 | 19 | There is an extensive recent review publicly accessible here: https://othereducation.org/index.php/OE/article/view/10/55 | I think you are going to struggle to find a solid consensus because so many variable factors confound the model. Parents homeschool for dramatically different reasons, with dramatically different qualifications and under very different regulations. For example, a young, high school educated couple who is homeschooling for religious purposes. vs. a college educated couple who is homeschooling because they have the economic resources for one parent to stay home and provide an education that they hope is superior to public school. These two couples are going to use different homeschool programs, are going to have different standards of achievement for their children, are going to have different depths of understanding of the material even before you add in the normal educational variability of individual students. Some parents homeschool literally just to be able to control their children’s exposure to outside influences completely. There’s a push in some states to mandate a yearly doctor’s visit for homeschool children just to ensure there is regular contact between the kids and a mandatory reporter. It’s gained steam in recent months after the child abuse case in Fairfield, CA. There is also a fairly wide variability in state oversight in terms of standardized testing, parent qualifications and formalization of the homeschooling process. When I was homeschooled in Texas, in the mid to late 1990s, there was basically 0 oversight. I never took a standardized test or had to do anything to prove my mother was actually teaching me anything. There’s a reason most of the practicers of the “sovereign citizen” movement are in Texas. This article does a good job of summing it up, but it focuses within a single curriculum and doesn’t compare to outside educated kids. The lit review has some other great sources though! Parents who are motivated by being critical of the school and conservative political values (not religious) tended to have significantly better performing children. http://majorsmatter.net/schools/Readings/Collom%20EUS2005.pdf | 0 | 32,688 | 1.461538 |
kebp6u | asksocialscience_test | 0.92 | Is it possible for a legal system to be a mixture of common law and civil law? These are the two main legal systems of the world and they're often presented as mutually exclusive systems. But would it be possible for a legal system to be based on both statutes and codes from the government, as well as case law and precedent made by judges/lawyers? | gg389t1 | gg2c824 | 1,608,165,031 | 1,608,148,988 | 4 | 2 | Attorney here. That is the US legal system in a nutshell. Most legal systems are not "pure" civil or common law anyway. The federal and most state systems are a mix of statutes (civil law) and cases (common law). I would not feel comfortable giving a general statement that the US leans more towards one or the other. However, the Louisiana state system is modelled more strongly after the French civil law model. You can read more generally here (PDF warning). Some more in depth discussion of civil vs common law here. There are numerous articles on this topic in comparative law journals. However, your post is so broad that it wouldn't really help to list a bunch of them without trying to narrow it to a specific issue. | This is not my area of expertise but I hope this can be a starting point for further research. From the paper: "This is not too different from the modern definition of a mixed legal system given by Robin EVANS-JONES: "What I describe by the use of this term in relation to modern Scotland is a legal system which, to an extensive degree, exhibits characteristics of both the civilian and the English common law traditions." Both Walton and Evans-Jones are referring to common law / civil law mixed legal systems which stem from two or more legal traditions. Mixed jurisdictions are really political units (countries or their political subdivisions) which have mixed legal systems. Common law / civil law mixed jurisdictions include Louisiana, Québec, St. Lucia, Puerto Rico, South Africa, Zimbabwe (formerly Southern Rhodesia), Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon), and Scotland. It goes without saying that some mixed jurisdictions are also derived partly from non-occidental legal traditions: the North African countries, Iran, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and Indonesia, for instance." https://www.cisg.law.pace.edu/cisg/biblio/tetley.html | 1 | 16,043 | 2 |
4nas5s | asksocialscience_test | 0.93 | How do the Swiss maintain cohesion when they have so many referendums? I ask because I saw how divisive the Scottish secession campaign ended up and I'm starting to see the same with the EU referendum campaign here in the UK at the moment. Do the Swiss go through the same kind of social trauma or do they take a different approach? Does having so many referendums moderate how people debate and behave in public environments? | d42js30 | d42hg1t | 1,465,493,899 | 1,465,490,929 | 22 | 3 | I am a student of political science and swiss. First I tried to find some relevant sources, concerning cohesion and referendums, which failed. People usually don't really link the two. Are the two things comparable? Switzerland votes very often, alone last sunday there were two referendums and three initiatives (changes of the constitution initiated by collecting signatures ). And the some of the votes are really not very important topics, for example about the change of the value added tax for restaurants. Also important to note: Switzerland has this referendums since over 100 years, the people are used to it. *^("The referendum: direct democracy in Switzerland - KW Kobach - 1993")* On the other hand in Scotland there are usually no Referendum. The topic they voted about is probably one of the most important vote you can make as a region. So you would expect it to be very polarizing. If we look at a very important vote in Switzerland, which might be the closest to the importance of the Scottish referendum, are the ones concerning relations to the EU. These votes too are very polarizing and cause huge discussions long after they happened. A good example is the vote about joining the EEA (European Economic Area) in 1992. The vote was really close and showed huge divides in the population and also between the different language regions. There is still discussion today about this vote, due to change in EU relations. ^(^20 ^Jahre ^EWR-Volksabstimmung: ^Was ^haben ^wir ^damals ^entschieden? ^- ^Claude ^Longchamp ^, ^gfs ) Also the trauma you are talking about. One I am not sure if you might overrate it. And I don't think that just applies to referendums. Just look at the US elections now. To answer your question: It isn't really the referendum which polarizes society, but the gravity of the question asked. Additionally it might be that Switzerland is just used to having referendums and adapted its behavior. | What puzzles me is, how do the Swiss maintain cohesion when they have so many languages?! | 1 | 2,970 | 7.333333 |
2x4zkx | asksocialscience_test | 0.67 | If patriarchy is so wrong, how did it become the norm? Were we ever equal? Let me preface this by saying I support equality for all, but I'm curious as to how we wound up with the inequality we have. Why aren't women seen as superior? Why aren't we equal? Why are gender rolls wrong? Would they be OK if we attributed the same value to men's/women's rolls? | coxvqcr | coxibtl | 1,424,966,338 | 1,424,925,010 | 4 | 2 | We've had to nuke every top level comment in this thread. If you're leaving a top level comment IT MUST HAVE SOURCES. You must support your claims with citations to relevant academic material. | You are asking a lot of questions here, I will try to answer them individually. How did patriarchy become the norm? Highly debated, answers range from the patriarchy being an outgrowth from the division of labor in early human societies to the patriarchy being a manifestation of capitalist values. Regardless, there a long history (thousands of years) of male dominance and female oppression in western culture/religion/governance. Were we (men and women) ever equal. Equal in what sense? In terms of citizenship rights? The social value of our gender rolls? The opportunities afforded to men/women? The short answer is "probably not." Why aren't women seen as superior & why aren't we equal? In short, because of patriarchy. Why are gender rolls wrong? This one is trickier, they are not 'wrong' so much as their traditional expression is becoming (at best) outmoded and problematic. Would they be OK if we attributed the same value to men's/women's rolls? Attributing the same value to men's/women's rolls is a part of what feminists mean when they talk about destroying the patriarchy, and it would help a lot, but it would not negate the toxic expression of traditional gender rolls e.g. men cannot be emotional. To further your own understanding of patriarchy as an academic concept, I would highly recommend 'Patriarchy, The System' by Allan G. Johnson which informed how I answered this question. Johnson, Allan G. "Patriarchy, the System." G. Kirk, & M. Okazawa-Rey, Women's Lives: Multicultural Perspectives 3 (2004): 25-32. | 1 | 41,328 | 2 |
747dyd | asksocialscience_test | 0.89 | Are there examples of ethnic/cultural/religious/etc. groups merging in history. In often happens that different groups of people live together in a country or area, but it seems to me that more often than not that these groups try to protect their identity, which leads to ethnic minorities in different countries, groups having their own part of cities (chinatown), etc. More often than not this led to struggles between different groups of people, in different shapes and forms. Are there examples of the opposite happening, that groups of people merged their identities over time, and what are the reasons for this compared to where groups don't merge? | dnw72lp | dnw4isb | 1,507,124,694 | 1,507,121,283 | 13 | 10 | There are many examples of this! For one, the expansion of the Russian empire from the 15th to 20th centuries eastward from Europe has lead to many Turkic and Finno-urgic people's to identify as ethnically and culturally Russian. Another, is that in Argentina where only 1.6% of Argentines identify as Amerindian and most identify culturally as white European. However in actuality, some studies have shown that much of the population is actually genetically mestizo. The Goths, Vandals and other German ethnolinguistic groups, were eventually subsumed into the modern German ethnicity. The Gauls in pre-Roman Europe were a tribal ethnic group that were subsumed into the invading Roman Empire. Becoming "Romanized" (although I hate the use of that word) through imperial conquest and forced subjugation. So yes there are many examples of ethnic groups merging and becoming one, or one being subsumed into the other. It has happened all across the world, but for varying reasons. Yes, there are many ethnic groups that strive to protect their linguistic and cultural heritage but given enough time and proximity, and the right historical circumstances, it is not uncommon to see a merging of ethnic groups. I think the biggest thing to wrap your head around is that these are long term historical events. This isn't something that happens in a few generations. Some Sources: * Corach, D. et. al. (2010). Inferring continental ancestry of Argentineans from autosomal, Y‐chromosomal and mitochondrial DNA. * Dawisha, K. & Parr, B. (1996). The end of empire?: the transformation of the USSR in comparative perspective * Leibeschuetz, W. (2015). The Debate about the Ethnogenesis of the Germanic Tribes * Woolf, G. (2000). Becoming Roman: The Origins of the Provincial Civillization of Gaul. | This happens all the time! A great example is European countries, where historically, there have been hundreds or thousands of ethnic groups living in a particular country. However, over time, those particular ethnic distinctions have been forgotten, with everyone instead embracing the idea of "Dutch," "French," or "German." This is the product of nationalism, but nationalism can be a powerful force in bringing people together. An example without nationalism is the Ngoni of southern Africa. As the Ngoni conquered surrounding peoples, they absorbed them into their class structure, first as a lower caste, then integrating them more fully. However, in doing so, Ngoni gods, beliefs, and even names would change as Ngoni adopted things they liked from the groups they conquered. This definitely isn't unique in African history either - southern African groups tended to absorb rather than annihilate each other. You can still see this going on with Islam and Christianity in Africa. Rather than the Christianity or Islam you might recognise, the faiths are instead full of recontextualising, with Jesus or Allah taking on a traditional African role and being one among many. It's an extremely common phenomenon for converted peoples to incorporate indigenous beliefs with the converting religion, creating a blend of the two to better contextualise the faith and incorporate it into their identity. It's not quite an example of what you're looking for, but it really highlights why merges happen - people think other people have good ideas and good ways of looking at the world, and blend those ideas together to create a stronger whole. | 1 | 3,411 | 1.3 |
2nmazc | asksocialscience_test | 0.88 | In most US states, the capitol is not the largest city. Is there any benefit of this? Does this two-city system (especially in a state like Wyoming or Missouri, where there are no other cities) give any benefit to the state, the nation, or the people? | cmf1zou | cmf0qri | 1,417,149,995 | 1,417,146,817 | 30 | 16 | Isolated state capitols as a predictor of corruption: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=206884484 According to this article (and the study cited), a lot of these capitols were intentionally located away from the financial centers to prevent money influencing politics. This actually has the opposite effect, likely because of less newspaper/media coverage. They also tend to be managed poorly for the same reason, and voters less aware of what's going on. | Just to clarify, OP, what do you mean by Missouri having no other cities? It has both St. Louis and Kansas City which both have metropolitan areas well over two million each. (St. Louis has almost 3) Edit: To actually answer OP's question, in a narrow sense. In Missouri, central location during an era of slow travel was a large part of not being located in the central city of the time, St. Louis (Kansas City not yet having grown into prominence). Instead lawmakers established a commission to find a centrally located area along the Missouri River, which flows through the state and in the early 1820's was the fastest way of crossing the region, that also was available. The town that was picked was barely existent, but became the states second capital (after a temporary stent in the now-St.Louis suburb of St. Charles.) Geographical location was the big benefit, it would be easier to govern from the center during an era where the horse and river barge were the fastest form of inland transport. Source: http://www.sos.mo.gov/BlueBook/2001-2002/0011-0035.pdf#p12 | 1 | 3,178 | 1.875 |
1t1mq1 | asksocialscience_test | 0.85 | [Education] What studies demonstrate the most efficient or successful ways to study? | ce3fvr4 | ce3g6bv | 1,387,240,076 | 1,387,240,764 | 3 | 6 | I'm not a psychologist, but I read this recently in preparation for finals: http://psi.sagepub.com/content/14/1/4.full.pdf+html?ijkey=Z10jaVH/60XQM&keytype=ref&siteid=sppsi Not necessarily a study, but I have a hunch it's along the lines of what you're looking for, and it also links plenty of studies. | This provides an overview of spaced repetition. This site has other articles that are similarly well-researched that might also be of interest. I use a piece of software recommended by that article, Mnemosyne. | 0 | 688 | 2 |
od9qhq | asksocialscience_test | 0.8 | Can local police actually do much to prevent routine crime? Of course, local police can do their best to enforce conventional criminal laws in conventional ways, by responding to calls, patrolling, investigating and arresting suspects. Also, organizations like the FBI can investigate certain forms of organized crime and sometimes white collar crime. These do make a difference, in the long run. On the other hand, in some places in the U.S., crime rates remain high. Everybody has an opinion about crime prevention, and most of those opinions are pretty much fact-free. Is there actual empirical research about what local police can and can't do to prevent routine local crimes, such as assault, burglary, robbery, car theft, and so on? In other words, does anybody really know how to prevent such crimes? To avoid protracted pointless arguments, let's leave domestic violence, drug-related crimes and "victimless crimes" out of the discussion. | h40jat8 | h3zot4s | 1,625,399,303 | 1,625,372,229 | 9 | 8 | The answer to the question of "Can local police actually do much to prevent routine crime?" depends on what we consider to be "do much." But broadly speaking, yes. The heart of your question concerns a major topic in the academic fields of criminology and policing^(1). I will begin by sharing some facts about criminology, gradually honing into "what works?" in terms of policing. --- A major family of theories which has gained great influence in recent decades within criminology is what Wilcox and Cullen (2018) call **situational opportunity theories of crime** (also see environmental criminology). The basic principles are simple: crime is necessarily the outcome of the intersection in time and space of a motivated offender, an attractive target, and the absence of a capable guardian, and opportunity is a major causal factor (i.e. "opportunity makes the thief"). These principles have clear implications for prevention, hence **crime opportunity theories** are foundational to the approach called **situational crime prevention**, which is in turn associated with policing. Clarke (2012) argues that research on crime opportunity has achieved the following: >1. **It has supported the development of situational crime prevention**, a highly effective means of crime control. >1. **It has helped make credible the claim that the cumulative effect of situational prevention,** whether or not implemented under that label, **has brought about widespread drops in crime in Western countries.** >1. It has helped to clarify that most criminological theories are theories of criminality not theories of crime – in other words, criminological theorizing has been preoccupied with the question of why certain individuals or groups become involved in crime and not the question of why crime occurs. This latter question cannot be answered simply by explaining why some people are more likely to be delinquent or criminal; it must also be explained how situational factors facilitate or encourage the actual commission of criminal acts. >1. It has supported the development of an alternative set of crime (or opportunity) theories that will enable the growth of crime science. And according to Freilich and Newman (2017): >**SCP primarily seeks to solve and reduce crime problems in an action setting.** Newman and Clarke (2003, p. 7) explain that SCP’s approach is similar to that of “operations research” (Wilkins, 1997), in which the researcher works closely with the persons who are actually on the job. Indeed, **SCP’s focus on crime reduction has led to partnerships between academics, police, and practitioners, where SCP principles have been used to guide practice** (see, for example, Braga & Kennedy, 2012; Scott & Goldstein, 2012). **SCP is associated with problem-oriented policing, currently a leading policing strategy** (Eck & Madensen, 2012). **Problem-oriented policing calls for focusing on specific problems to devise proactive strategies to eliminate them** (Clarke & Goldstein, 2002, 2003; see also the extensive collection of Problem-Specific Guides for Police published by the Center for Problem-oriented Policing, many of which are heavily indebted to SCP). --- This leads us to the development of **new models of policing** and of **evidence-led policing**. What you describe at the beginning is associated with what is called the **traditional model of policing**, which is *reactive*. However, there exist other models which have been developed in the past decades, and which are meant to be (more) *preventive*. See for example: * Community policing * Problem-oriented policing * Intelligence-led policing]( https://www.aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi248) In the USA, these developments can be traced back to the late 60s and the publication of the [Katzenbach Commission's report, i.e. *The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society*. It is also around that time that we have some landmark experiments involving the police, such as The Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment and The Minneapolis Domestic Violence Experiment which strongly challenged "common sense" ideas about policing, and demonstrated the need for what is now known as evidence-based policing. Currently, we do have collaborations between researchers and police to evaluate police strategies, including experimental studies of what works. For illustration, see the British College of Policing's Crime Reduction Toolkit and George Mason University's Center for Evidence-based Crime Policy's What Works? Summarily, there *are* police strategies which are more effective than others at reducing street crimes, including what are called volume crimes (i.e. those crimes which constitute the majority of offenses, such as assaults, theft, etc.). For illustration, according to a recent Campbell Collaboration Systematic Review, the answer to "Does problem-oriented policing reduce crime and disorder?" is: >**Yes**. The results of this updated systematic review suggest that **POP is associated with a statistically significant overall reduction in crime and disorder of 34%.** >**There are positive impacts for POP across a wide variety of crime and disorder outcomes, among studies that targeted problem places and problem people, at a variety of different units of analysis and featuring a wide array of types of interventions.** The effect size is smaller in randomized experiments and after accounting for publication bias. >POP had limited impacts on police legitimacy, fear of crime, and collective efficacy. **Few studies incorporated cost-benefit analyses, but those that did suggest POP can be cost-effective and provide substantial savings through prevented calls-for-service and incidents.** --- In conclusion, the answer to the following question: >Is there actual empirical research about what local police can and can't do to prevent routine local crimes, such as assault, burglary, robbery, car theft, and so on? In other words, does anybody really know how to prevent such crimes? Is "Yes." --- Wilcox, P., & Cullen, F. T. (2018). Situational opportunity theories of crime. Annual Review of Criminology, 1, 123-148. | Here’s an interesting study that has lots of references that can start you out researching https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3566383 I think an interesting question to ask when measuring things is how do we measure things, and what does that measurement mean. What is prevention/effectiveness? | 1 | 27,074 | 1.125 |
ae0h8a | asksocialscience_test | 0.96 | What is the best social science paper that you have read in 2018 and why? | edlxydj | edm1jqa | 1,547,004,325 | 1,547,007,425 | 8 | 22 | Coping with Economic Hardship in Argentina: How Material Interests Affect Individuals’ Political Interests. | Can I cheat and give an essay collection? Jackie Wang's *Carceral Capitalism* is a great exploration of the novel ways our economy dispossesses people. If you're interested in mass incarceration or identity/class politics definitely give it a look. | 0 | 3,100 | 2.75 |
76f87g | asksocialscience_test | 0.82 | What is the current mainstream academic opinion on the best way to handle how mass automation is going to change the workforce?a I keep reading that in the long term, old jobs will be replaced with new ones for humans but that if we don't think about how to structure the system to accomodate mass automation we could suffer hugely in terms of inequality in the long term and unemployment in the short term. Is it simply to do nothing because eventually old jobs will be replaced with new ones? Or have academics already produced hypotheses on the best policy actions to mitigate the potential effects of long term inequality or short term unemployment that mass automation will have? If these papers exist, where would be the best place for me to start reading? | dodriwv | dodp19k | 1,508,033,245 | 1,508,029,806 | 13 | 8 | Whilst u/wyldcraft has made some good points, I think it's important to be mindful of skill-biased technological change. There's two main ways that technological advances interact with labour markets. On the one hand, technology can act as a substitute to labour. For example, self-serve kiosks at places such as McDonalds, or supermarkets. Workers who can be replaced by these things typically have a pretty rough time when it comes to their wages / standard of living. On the other hand, technology can act as a complement to labour. For example, Microsoft Excel and other software has made a lot of accountant's jobs much easier, making them more productive and raising their wages. In recent times, it seems as though a lot of technological advances that are complimentary tend to help out high-skilled workers, whereas ones that act as substitutes for labour mostly hurt low-skilled workers, which is not very ideal if inequality is a concern of yours. As far as solutions go, things such as EITC that u/wyldcraft has mentioned can be quite helpful, and I've also seen a lot of people suggest subsidised retraining programs to help workers adversely effected by technological advances transition into different types of employment, however I'm unaware of the efficacy of these programs as I havn't read much about them. In terms of relevant papers, I really liked this one, and I'm yet to read it but this one seems relevant. | None of the major economic indicators suggest a tailspin in the American workforce. Unemployment is under 5% and there are many industries with wage growth. It's true there's been a shift towards the service industry and many of those jobs are restaurant and other low-paying work. But it also includes high end financial and technology services. Reddit's econ network faq says the biggest problem is "short run structural unemployment," i.e. if driverless cars become legal tomorrow a large segment of truck drivers won't have the resources or opportunity to earn the same wages in another industry right away. America doesn't have the best re-skilling programs outside of tech. People's ability to adapt to future jobs hinges on better (adult) education. Another area the government can help that is popular with economists is expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit - think of it as a Universal Basic Income that actually works. | 1 | 3,439 | 1.625 |
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