query_id
stringlengths 3
6
| question
stringlengths 1
299
| goldenAnswer
stringlengths 3
35k
| doc_id
stringlengths 36
36
|
|---|---|---|---|
bwradm
|
“Gut instinct” or Intuition
|
There is no 'right' decision. Sometimes your brain can come up with the closest answer faster than you can come to a logical conclusion.
Like if you're trained from childhood that 2+2 is 4. It might become an ingrained part of who you are.
Your brain might have the answer, but not be able to vocalize it, and you get the 'feeling' that 2+2=5 'LOOKS' or 'FEELS' wrong, before you can confirm the math with the slower logic part of your brain.
& #x200B;
But as you may have noticed, sometimes that knee jerk reaction is incorrect, like if you've grown up on a lie or simply misinformation. You might get a feeling or initial instinct that you know the right answer, but it could be wrong if you work it out on paper.
|
2c8e2f45-1b8c-4997-82f9-02879d0277ea
|
bwrb7a
|
Why do animals have different lifespans?
|
Many years of evolution, mutation, and diversification has lead each species to hit a lifespan that it is now.
Large slow creatures with slow metabolisms tend to live longer, but that's not always the case, as with some lobsters that can sometimes live indefinitely.
Small fast creatures tend to have fast metabolisms, so need to eat constantly, as they age they can't keep hunting for their food, or get caught by predators.
& #x200B;
For the most part cell division limits prove the limit to how long a creature can live, large creatures have more cells, and slower metabolism, so their cell division is slower. Small creatures have small numbers of cells, and fast division, so they hit those limits fast. Once those limits are hit, lots more mutations start to occur, the dna is damaged, they start to develop organ and tissue failures.
Either way it costs tons of energy to live, so even those fabled immortal lobsters waste a ton of energy molting and eventually get caught not having enough energy to molt, and die in their old shells, or get eaten.
|
8389a95c-fc6f-40bd-8b83-2298ee8200b9
|
bwrhvi
|
How do guns work?
|
When you pull the trigger on a double-action revolver, a couple of things happen.
1. The part holding the bullets rotates into place to align with the barrel.
2. The hammer pulls back.
3. Once a certain point is reached the mechanism pulling back on the hammer drops out and the hammer springs back and strikes the back of the bullet.
The hammer strikes a small part on the bullet called the primer, it's a tiny cap filled with basically the same stuff as pop snaps, rocks that if you rub them together they cause a spark, but they are in a tiny sealed chamber, so the spark is really strong.
This lights the gunpowner in the bullet casing. Gun powder, when lit usually burns really slowly, but when packed closely together it burns really quickly, having nowhere to go, the energy is released forward, it expands the casing just enough to release the lead bullet a bit and push it down the barrel.
Then Physics takes over! When the gas exists the barrel behind the bullet it also kicks the gun back in the opposite direction, this gives the bullet a ton of momentum, speed.
Tiny bullet, going at really high speed, translates to a lot of power.
|
58b68b86-d3c2-4362-a06c-196a475c0674
|
bwrzg7
|
How do creatures that live or dive down to deep sea depths avoid being crushed by the pressure ?
|
Pressure *differential* is what crushes things. You can't go down 20,000 feet because the inside of your lungs and intestines and skull is at 1atm of pressure and the water is pushing in at a devastating 600atm. That's enough force imbalance to crumple a submarine like a pop can.
Deep sea creatures dont have these hollow cavities and gas filled bags inside them and their entire body is itself pressurized to 600atm. If they rapidly ascend without letting the dissolved gas depressurize, they basically explode.
The infamous "blobfish" photo is actually a normal looking deepwater fish that decompressed too quickly.
|
cde9318d-a970-4ae9-a0cc-27fc04700711
|
bwspaa
|
If you were to dump the average brain, and all the information it retains, on a hard drive, approximately how much space would it take up?
|
Anywhere from 100TB to 2500TB of information.
More if the format jives with they way your body uniquely likes to store information.
But it can process about 100 million instructions per second, thought it's hard to quantify how.
& #x200B;
Also it's unlikely your brain would 'fill up' so it could be more.
Real answer, we don't know, but the above numbers are a rough estimate.
|
09e57137-ed87-4566-aba6-bf57a437c9f5
|
bwt1sn
|
How do thermometers work and how do they calculate what "it feels like."
|
Thermometers often exploit the fact that materials expand/contract depending on temperature, and different materials do it at different rate. The "feels like" temperature is a mix of the real temperature and the humidity. Humidity decreases the ability for sweat to remove heat from the body, so it makes the body heat up more than the same temp with low humidity.
|
3dc678d6-826e-4ef8-9d5c-eeb7feaee69f
|
bwtlcu
|
Why don’t adults get excited like children do?
|
Been there, done that. Laughing comes much more naturally to kids because there are so many new first times seeing or experiencing humorous things. Also, the media (and fail compilations) deadens us over time. And another great source of laughter is when things are funny, but you're not allowed to laugh because you're at church, school, a funeral, etc.
|
c2b19f5f-7dbd-4d93-aded-4f1b555acb56
|
bwtvqb
|
Why are we more tired after waking up from a long nap compared to a short nap?
|
Sleeping has a cycle your body and brain goes through. this varies between light and deep sleep. If you wake up in light sleep you are fine, if you wake up in deep sleep you are groggy. The cycle is roughly 90 minutes long with light sleep at the start and deep sleep towards the end.
|
23f84b19-d941-44a1-acb5-47d613c0b048
|
bwuke7
|
Why does the reflection of my car in a car that’s in front of me sometimes appear upside down and sometimes not?
|
It depends if the reflecting surface is convex (curved out towards you) or concave (curved out away from you).
Look at your face reflecting in both sides of a spoon for another example.
You can imagine that light traveling from the top of your car is reflected downwards, in the concave case, and will be perceived at the bottom of the image.
|
6c35b7f2-9ebb-474b-a8d2-58a61995e15d
|
bwuust
|
Why does water taste different at different temperatures?
|
Assuming that it's the same water and not from different sources which may contain different salts.. there are 2-3 major factors
1. The temperature itself. When water touches our taste buds, the temperature sets off slightly different responses to the brain.
2. The material. Chilled water may be stored in any container- plastic/glass/metal. Warm/Hot water is almost always used with metal and sometimes glass. So this is also a small factor.
3. Gases. The most important factor is gases. If a liquid surface is kept in contact with a gas, the gas WILL dissolve in the liquid slowly. The colder the temperature, the faster the gas will dissolve in liquid and vice versa. Boiled water is thus absolutely devoid of gases ( bud-bud-bud-bud bubbles, remember? ). That's why bottled water tastes sweet while boiled water tastes bitter. Oxygen.
|
beb1cf0f-1496-4398-a81b-6e861fa95bb0
|
bwvgp8
|
How do a Atomic Clock works?
|
As you know, atoms have electrons orbiting the nucleus. What you may not know is that you can adjust the energy level of an atom by hitting it with radiation of the proper frequency. It won't want to stay at that higher energy, though, and it'll drop back down, re-emitting that energy.
In the case of the cesium atom, there are two *ground states* (the lowest-energy configurations, and therefore the ones that're easiest to experiment with), separated by a very small amount of energy. As it turns out, if we hit the cesium atoms with exactly that amount of energy, we can make them "vibrate" between those two energy states.
We can detect those vibrations, and from there we can determine, *very* accurately, the passage of a second. (The most accurate atomic clock in the world only loses or gains approximately one second in *fifteen billion years*.)
|
d361f593-0e9c-4f91-a3f6-828c541ab9ae
|
bwvnka
|
Why does our voice sound deeper when we slow-mo but sound more high-pitched when we fast forward?
|
Sound is a vibration. When you slow the speed of a recording, you slow the speed of the vibrations in it, which lowers the pitch. When you speed it up, you speed up those vibrations so it sounds higher pitched.
Think about it this way: Al has a really deep voice, and when he says "Wow." his vocal cords vibrate 1000 times and it takes one second. Barb has a high-pitched voice, and when she says "Wow" her cords vibrate 2000 times over the course of a second. Now if you record them both, and speed the playback of Al's Wow to double speed, then his voice vibrates 1000 times in a half second, which is the same rate of vibration as Barbara's voice. So it should have about the same pitch.
|
87a98343-5640-4348-ab1c-92e69403a3aa
|
bwvy4q
|
why are wall clouds/hail clouds green?
|
Have you noticed how the color of sunlight seems to change throughout the day. The sun doesn’t change, it’s how much of the Earth’s atmosphere the light from the Sun has to travel before hitting your eye. The atmosphere is very very thin compared to the size of the Earth. At noon the Sun is brightest white/blue because it’s going through the least air. At sunrise/sunset it is orange red because it goes through more by coming from the side.
Clouds are made of water vapor which shift light towards a blue color.
Thunderstorm clouds, the types capable of producing hail or tornadoes are very tall clouds.
Because they are so high up they can get a lot of red light hitting the blue cloud.
Red light + Blue filter = Green color.
|
9a244c57-810f-494c-a6f1-8614c4eb9b7b
|
bwvzei
|
Why does our vision appear blue after having closed eyes in the sun for too long?
|
Your visual system tries to adapt to current conditions in a variety of ways. In this case, closed eyes in bright sun mean a lot of reddish glow from the light that manages to penetrate your eyelids. You brain starts adapting to this by turning down how strongly it responds to red. When you open your eyes, your retina is seeing an accurate colour version of the world, but your brain is damping down red, leaving everything blueish.
|
955eec3e-3751-4ef7-9485-daf5b0ce1a97
|
bww2ny
|
what is the Bruton rule?
|
The Bruton Complication
One of the rights an accused person has under the Sixth Amendment is the right to confront and cross-examine the government's witnesses against him. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bruton v. U.S. that this right is violated if a confessing defendant's statement is used against a non-confessing defendant at their joint trial (and assuming the confessor does not take the stand to be cross-examined by his codefendant).
[source](_URL_0_)
|
f0aab653-fd75-4e44-825e-84afc692d4de
|
bww3bb
|
Why do children seem to frequently get the stomach flu but you hardly ever hear about adults getting the stomach flu?
|
Ummmm adults get the flu all the time. The "stomach flu" isn't actually the flu, it's some sort of gastrointestinal issue that may trigger some flu-like symptoms. And adults have a more robust and better developed GI tract so it can generally tolerate more than a child's can
|
a2602376-04ae-4b05-b9a8-e645d4bd64ee
|
bwwcsn
|
why are some of the Waybackmachine snapshots links broken/missing?
|
There are many possible reasons. Maybe it was missed in the copy, or lost along the way to archiving. Some things have been removed through court orders or other legal actions. Maybe it was hosted on a different site, and that site had different robots instructions which led to it not being archived. There is no way to know which.
|
04e3b5bb-af6d-4c29-ba4b-56443b784a0b
|
bwwd2v
|
What are apertures, f-stops, How does depth of field work, and how does lens measurement factor into the equation?
|
An ideal lens focuses light from a single plane (called the focal plane) onto its sensor. However, that's not super useful, as we often want to take pictures of things that are thick. As it turns out, there is a region around the focal plane where the image is still well focused. This is called the "field" of the photo, and the "depth of field" (DOF) measures the thickness of this region from the point nearest the camera that is well focused to the farthest point that is well focused.
As it turns out, actual lenses are not ideal lenses. This matters when it comes to DOF. At small apertures, much less light enters the lens, and it all enters through the middle part of the lens. The result is a larger DOF. In fact, you can make pictures with no lens at all using a pinhole camera. The aperture is so small that the DOF is essentially infinite. Since the amount of light that comes through is similarly small, you need a very bright scene.
Since aperture effects both amount of light and DOF, it's not exactly a DOF control. As less light comes through, more integration time (or exposure time if you're still thinking of a film camera) is required to get an image.
f-number (or f-stop) is a ratio of aperture to focal length. This is a camera-specific idea, but the exposure time for similar f-stops is similar. This was a more interesting parameter when light meters were separate from cameras. Almost all modern cameras use through-the-lens metering and automatic (or at least semi-automatic programs) to select appropriate f-stops and exposure times.
|
52574cba-19f0-479c-bd46-e771ce0173cd
|
bwwfjh
|
Why does campfire smoke "follow people around?"
|
When you move you create minor low pressure areas in your wake, and the smoke follows that. However once you stop moving, or in a steady breeze, these quickly go away.
Generally, smoke doesn't actually follow you around a campfire. You're just sitting too close and random eddies in the air are giving you a faceful of smoke. If you stop sitting so close that your shoes are toasting on the rocks, you won't have this problem unless you're actually sitting downwind of a smoky fire.
|
3b14b8ea-e1df-428a-a049-6ac4578e6dbf
|
bwws8o
|
How does copyright work?
|
The laws are different in every country. In general, if you create a work, you own it and other people can't reproduce it in most situations for a long time.
|
f1200ec6-0d6e-46ca-adb3-99360d3ea4bb
|
bwwsf1
|
Can a phone call last forever (or at least until the phone itself deteriorates beyond function) if the phone stays plugged in to it's charger?
|
I'm not sure if this applies to mobile phone networks, but way back when in the dark ages of technology (mid-90s), we had a single local phone company competing with BT, the national supplier.
As a way to try to grow quickly, they offered innovative special offers, amongst them free local phone calls, something unknown in the UK until then. Sadly for them, no one in their marketing team had apparently heard of modems and BBSes.
After 4 monthly phone bills with individual call lengths in the hundreds of hours, they quietly slipped a rule in to limit calls to 24 continuous hours each :)
|
815359fc-0e7a-49b3-b789-1f613f6a1e57
|
bwwwwk
|
How does a Minecraft computer work?
|
Minecraft has something called redstone, which is able to simulate most logic circuits and electrical circuits. So you could theoretically build anything electronic that doesn't include audio or video circuitry. (Although there are sound blocks, so there is a limited midi type music capability.)
|
cd8e5616-5007-4377-8966-529d79ad212d
|
bwx06b
|
What's the point of blitz chess?
|
Solving chess problems faster takes many repetitions. To get more repetitions in a certain number of hours, you have to play faster.
Competitive chess also uses a total-time timer, rather than a per move timer, so knowing when to spend more time is also a valuable skill to learn.
|
d236a59e-9e64-41dd-b93d-358f0597fb55
|
bwx0jo
|
How do antidepressants cause weight gain?
|
A side effect is increased appetite. It won't make you gain weight, but you will find yourself eating more if you don't pay attention.
It's different for everyone. I think it's a possible side effect for many, many medications, but that doesn't mean it WILL happen for you. In fact if you eat to self-sooth, you may find that when you feel less awful, and are able to go out and do more, you end up eating less.
I know plenty of people who avoid anti-depressants or birth control, or whatever important drug, because they are scared of weight gain. It's different for everyone. And antidepressants work differently on everyone.
So if anyone is considering taking one, but worried about side effects. The only way to found out is to take one with the supervision of a good doctor, and let them know if any side effect is really too much. Fatigue in the beginning is common, but if it's been months and you can't get out of bed, then you need to switch to another drug. There are lots to try, and you have to find the one for you.
|
0ced3b38-0fb7-4e26-adfd-a5744487ed2a
|
bwx76g
|
Why is a negative times a negative a positive?
|
Let's say you're going backwards. Then you go BACKWARDS backwards.
See? Now you're going frontwards!
|
8642beb8-7fb1-4349-bbab-435eaf419afa
|
bwxal1
|
How does the human body know what kind of food you ate in order to secrete the right digestive enzymes like if you ate steak versus mashed potatoes?
|
There aren't a huge number of super specific enzymes required to process the food you eat, at least until it gets broken down to small enough molecules to cross from your small intestines into your blood stream. The types required are generic enough that you always have some ready to go, although you can ramp up production in response to a meal.
Things get a lot more complex in the bloodstream and major organs, with all kinds of receptors measuring levels of different chemicals, but from the perspective of your digestive system, starting from your lips and ending as your small intestines transition to large intestines, your steak and mashed potatoes just look like certain percentages of carbohydrates, fats and proteins. You will break them down to simple sugars, fatty acids and amino acids respectively, allowing your body to absorb them and get the chance to do more complicated stuff with them
|
fe248f71-dfa9-40ba-9287-3fb6a65e1c45
|
bwxh4i
|
If someone has been in a coma for months, what exactly is it that triggers in them to wake up out of it?
|
As far as I know there’s no exact cause. That’s why most people are “disconnected” after many years, because doctors can’t know for sure if they’re gonna wake up in 10 years, or in two weeks (if they’re even gonna wake up)
|
947e032e-8dbb-4c38-aad1-e5295c184bd2
|
bwxi2w
|
how does the NFL Draft work? Can players say no or have a say which team they go to?
|
The way I understand it, the team that drafts them has exclusive rights to their services for a set number of years. The player can sign a contract with the team or ask to be traded. The drafting team is not obliged to trade them and the player is not obliged to sign a contract. But if he does not sign a contract and he is not traded, then no other teams are allowed to offer him a contract.
He can, of course, go outside the NFL system and go play in Canada for instance, or any other league not affiliated with the NFL, but since the NFL has tons more money than anyone else, they usually just swallow their pride and sign a contract with whoever drafts them, and tries to make a name for themselves, so they will have some leverage when asking to be traded. Rookies don't have much leverage so they are pretty much a pawn for whoever drafts them. Refusing a contract gets them branded "difficult" and so players who start off earning a reputation like that will find it much harder to get trade interest in future seasons.
|
5f5edab6-da65-4121-835f-320178c8fe27
|
bwxifg
|
Why are human babies so much more helpless for so much longer than the young of other animals?
|
Because of the size of the human brain, their head is proportionally larger that other animals. Humans walking upright also means that there are changes in the pelvic bones that make pelvic outlet comparatively narrower when compared to other similar sized animals. These two things together means that humans have to be born before their head gets so big that they physically cant fit through the mother's pelvis. This means they have evolved so they are born less developed than some other animals.
|
e523075b-7ae3-462f-b572-608e930467cf
|
bwxumv
|
What does "order" and "disorder" mean in the context of chemistry?
|
is it talking about entropy? Entropy is how much disorder/randomness/chaos there is in a thermodynamic system such as an ideal gas or a liquid or solid. We can calculate entropy which changes with pressure and temperature and internal energy. Disorder (entropy) increases with temperature and decreases with pressure.
|
d37f1757-deb8-423a-b8ca-088c0554428d
|
bwxwg7
|
Out of all the money raised for cancer why does pediatric cancer get less then 5 percent.
|
I’m no expert on cancer funding, but keep in mind that less than 1% of new cancer diagnoses are in children. With this context, 5% of total funding (if that is the actual number) is already disproportionately high.
Source: _URL_0_
|
616f846b-16b6-470b-9701-876e68969b74
|
bwy785
|
Why does inbreeding result in a higher chance of genetic defects?
|
Think about it that way:
Your genetic code has 2 letters, A and B. Having B in your code means you can have the defect.
You are AB (which means you have a 50% chance of having the defect), and so is your sister.
If you have a child, he/she will have a 25% of definitely having the defect (BB), 50% chance of having it half of the time (AB), and 25% of definitely being healthy.
Now think there're the pairs AB and CD, that have the same mechanic (AB is ABCC and CD is AACD). If a ABCC has a child with a AACD, the chances of having the defect are lower (AB with AA results in a 50% chance of maybe; same for CC with CD) than if you crossed ABCC with ABCC.
This is very *very* oversimplified, but it gives the idea, I think.
|
8a8908ff-e18e-496c-abbf-fbb17573bad8
|
bwy7sk
|
Why is it hard for phone companies to supply unlimited high speed data?
|
It’s not. They just like money. It’s the same reason the cable and internet companies are fighting to prevent cities from installing their own fiber optic lines, they want more money.
|
3109f7f8-c2a7-48f8-af2f-e728f49fc361
|
bwyay9
|
What is a Consumer Carbon Tax? How does it work?
|
Basically, if a Consumer Carbon Tax is implemented, when someone uses or buys something that emits carbon dioxide, they must pay a tax. One of the largest markets taxed would be the petroleum (more specifically gasoline) market. The exact specifics are complicated as they are political in nature.
|
685bfb54-142c-4653-a915-2af42e816f64
|
bwyk62
|
How does ships weighing hundreds of tons not sink in shallow waters?
|
When it comes to floating above water, it is not about the weight, but the Density. Density is weight/volume, and water density is 997kg/m^3, So as long as it has a much larger hull to reduce the actual density of the entire ship, it floats above water.
|
8206c6b5-5a94-41ab-9e20-1264bee9a643
|
bwylvi
|
How are statistics calculated for events influenced by multiple variables/parameters?
|
By making a multi dimensional function, we can define some outcome by multiple inputs. For example, z = x + y, z is defined by two inputs, x and y. For probabilities involving multiple steps, or probabilities that involve previous conditions, we refer to Bayes theorem, which tells us the relationship between two statistical events.
|
56a55f90-a472-4548-a53a-3163a27cdf33
|
bwyql0
|
Why does the acid in coca-cola cause tooth cavities, but the acid in oranges is fine?
|
It's not fine. Orange juice is just as harmful, if not more, than soft drinks / sodas. If you eat an Orange however you are getting alot of fibre (the pulp) along with the juice. The chewing produces saliva which will help neutralize the harmful acids in your mouth.
|
0bc4a59a-6c8d-4300-ada3-39bf4e316b8e
|
bwyt3s
|
How does increasing or decreasing audio volume work?
|
Output from a speaker is just a current signal, when you turn the knob on the volume button you decrease a resistance in the speaker, which increases the current to the audio element, which makes the speaker output more sound.
You can think of it as a dam, where resistance is the opening in the dam. If you open the dam more, more water will pour out(more current) and it will generate more sound.
EDIT: Current makes it a better analogy
|
68849edc-3efc-4106-9017-0b5da98e7c99
|
bwz2ol
|
How come when permanent teeth grow in, they have bumpy edges, and how do they go away?
|
I had that on my two front teeth. When I got my braces off my orthodontist sanded off the bottom and smoothed them out. As far as I know it's just how they formed around my baby teeth but it used to bug me as a kid
|
e95ad6b5-373d-4b88-b48a-93746dbede45
|
bwz5e1
|
self-driving cars
|
Sensors do the easy stuff like stay in lanes and detect cars around you. GPS can track speed limits of where you are currently.
The tricky one is reading signs. Radar can’t tell if that sign says Stop, Yield, Deer Crossing, etc. That’s where cameras and machine learning come into play. Specifically Tesla is working towards this. To teach these cameras “hey that’s a red light/green light. Hey that’s a stop sign, not a yield sign.” Over the years, they will continually teach this computer to know what colors and signs mean based on the data every Tesla car sees.
|
4e2e2724-7378-44cb-99ac-fba6c9ff0b2b
|
bwz9km
|
How did Columbus communicated with the Aztecs if they didn’t speak their language and vise versa?
|
Columbus didn't communicate with the Aztecs. He never met them.
Hernan Cortes was the man responsible for destroying the Aztec empire.
When Cortes first landed in the Yucatan he met Geronimo de Aguilar, a Spanish Franciscan priest who had survived a shipwreck followed by a period in captivity with the Maya. This priest had learned the Mayan language.
Later, Cortes fought and beat the Tabasco natives. They gave him 20 women. One of which was called La Malinche and would become Cortes' mistress. She knew the Aztec language and the Mayan language, so Cortes was then able to communicate to Montezuma of the Aztecs through these translators.
|
8e018760-90d6-4bdb-94a4-3ee7ec12260a
|
bwze5u
|
Snails: where do they get their shells?
|
They form them from calcium. Snails cannot transfer shells, they are physically attached to their shells, and being removed from it means they die. A slug is not a "shelless snail" but an entirely different species.
& #x200B;
Edit: Now my top comment is about snails. Neat. Thanks for the silver.
|
5bd92c02-0524-400c-98bf-0afd9588b471
|
bwzhnv
|
What makes cancer so difficult to cure?
|
Cancer is caused by a genetic mutation in a cell that spreads to cells it divides to that tells it to replicate without any constraints, and disables the triggers that tell the cell to die. The difficulty is how do you kill those cells, but leave the healthy cells intact.
|
098702d8-a114-490a-8fe8-dd019b653782
|
bwzhyh
|
The Student Loan Bubble
|
The problem with student loans is that we're writing an awful lot of bad ones. The people who take on $30,000 worth of debt to get a bachelor's degree from a creditable university or $200,000 worth of debt to finish their medical degree aren't a big deal.
But there are a lot of students going to sketchy universities or who have an academic track record that virtually guarantees they'll drop out midway through (accumulating the debt and not getting the degree). You also have students who manage to graduate from decent universities, but with ridiculous amounts of debt given their qualifications.
All of those bad loans simply can't be paid back. Rather, students end up with an effectively permanent monthly payment because they're constantly paying down interest and never principle.
However, those loans are packaged together and sold as high quality investments because students can't get out from under them with bankruptcy. This is the same sort of problem that led to the mortgage meltdown - everyone *thought* the loans were high quality when they actually weren't. No one thought so many people would walk away from mortgages they couldn't pay - but that's precisely what happened.
With student loans, walking away is a bit harder. But it still happens. Moreover, there's a strong chance that the government will step in and change the rules at some point because the system is so predatory. These risk factors might not be properly accounted for with the current system.
|
783b59c4-8040-4f0e-b36a-6cba374e7ebe
|
bwzofa
|
How do ones and zeros make up complex computer programs????
|
Like you're 5? I'm not sure I can pull that off, but I'll cover what I know and maybe that will help you.
tl;dr: You build something basic to accomplish something basic. Then you put some basic things together to get something advanced, then you put some advanced things together, etc. After a dozen layers of this, you get something very complicated, built upon something very simple.
**Physical Circuits, or how to get to basic logic.**
At the bottom of the stack, we have the physical circuits of the computer. This is where the 1's and 0's are actually located. The 1's and 0's are actually just if a particular wire has more (1's) or less (0's) current on it. These wires connect to little switches, called transistors, that do something depending on if a wire has enough current in it. These transistors are grouped together into integrated circuits, which is where we can begin to do basic logic with the computer.
Next are gates, which are integrated circuits of transistors that accomplish a specific task. For example, an "OR gate" is an integrated circuit that will put out a 1 on the output wire if either of the wires that are connected to the input side of the circuit are carrying current signifying a 1. There are a lot of gates that get more complicated to accomplish different things. Several that come to mind are AND, NOT, NAND (NOT and AND), NOR (NOT and OR), EOR (Exclusive-OR), and ENOR (Exclusive-NOR).
After that, groups of these integrated circuits are put together into more complex circuits like an "adder", which just adds numbers together. This is accomplished by putting several to hundreds of gates together, and do something helpful really, really fast.
Multiple kinds of these complex circuits are usually put together into a single processor, and someone like Intel or AMD writes a software language to control all of these circuits.
**Machine Code, or the stuff no person writes in directly anymore**
AMD, Intel, or any other processor manufacturer has to write a way for software to talk to their processor. This is can be called an "instruction set", but no one will check if you remember that. Several currently popular examples are x86, x86_64, and ARM. This kind of code is extremely picky, so most programmers rely on another program to write this code for them.
**Low-level software languages**
Next up the ladder is the low-level languages, like Assembly. These are languages that were originally designed to be much easier for humans to read and edit than machine code, even though they really aren't thought of as easy anymore. Programs written in these languages are still tied to a specific processor, or at least a particular instruction set. These languages need to be re-written into machine code before they can actually be run, so programmers wrote other programs to read these programs and translate them into the commands that will actually be sent to the processor.
**High-level software languages**
High-level languages are languages that run on almost any processor. Examples include C, Java, and BASIC. The real power of these languages is that humans can easily read them and understand what is going on at any given step. These languages still need to be run through other programs (sometimes several!) before they can actually be used by the processor, but that is a small price to pay for the time saved for the programmer.
|
b2d5396f-eb24-48d6-a2f5-695a4467cf61
|
bx09vm
|
Why do clouds appear to be resting on a glass table (flat on the bottom)
|
So the bottom of the cloud forms at the point in the air that it is cold enough to form water droplets, this is the same height all along the surface of the cloud so the vapour forms at that same flat level as new vapour joins the cloud, pushing the old cloud bits up (assuming a flow of air exists)
|
a42ea770-d84c-4524-95c2-fcf32e508e27
|
bx0rok
|
How come practicing non-deliberately and not consciously makes you improve?
|
Thats why you should practice deliberately and try to identify weak spots/areas of improvement, recording yourself and listening back, etc. my old band teacher used to say “practice doesn’t make perfect it makes permanent, so pay attention and practice seriously”
|
0160e14e-450d-419c-9691-36ebc84d93e1
|
bx0t9p
|
What happens when you "unpop" your ears?
|
U open up a tube known as the Eustachian tube which connects the middle ear to your pharynx. This balances the air pressure in ur ear which is what u hear as a pop. Some examples would be popping ur ear during a flight, esp during take off/landing.
|
76801381-f69c-4722-a44b-452dac751b0c
|
bx10vk
|
Could someone get in trouble for accidentally stumbling upon child porn
|
Theoretically yes, practically no. Firstly law enforcement are not tracking those who on a single occasion saw something for a few seconds. Secondly if you accidentally clicked on something innocent then it is likely that hundreds of other people would have done the same and law enforcement can track back on your device to see how you came to the location.
|
672db981-1c4f-4346-ae83-0b7390ae9dfd
|
bx17vi
|
Why is our blowing power so strong but sucking power weak, also same with leaf blowers and vacuum cleaners?
|
Blowing basically means you have an area of high pressure that is attempting to equalize with the environment pressure.
Sucking basically means you have an area of low pressure that is attempting to equalize with the environment pressure.
Assume the environment pressure is 1 atmosphere. Assume negative pressures are impossible.
Sucking can only give you a differential of 1 atmosphere... I.e. Vacuum versus the environment.
Blowing has no limit since you can have pressures of 3, 5, 10 or even 110 atmospheres of pressure versus the environment.
|
29bfbd24-f2e8-4634-acbd-8131c1ea2d41
|
bx198z
|
When I’m falling asleep, if I hear a sound that startles me, why is it accompanied by a bright flash inside my eyelids before I properly rouse.
|
It's called Exploding Head Syndrome. [_URL_0_](_URL_1_) It's not a mental illness, it's more of a brain misfire, though the cause isn't really known. And yes, it is kind of scary. I've had it happen also.
|
dc889aae-afbe-4503-b186-39f0ff3bcd45
|
bx1asw
|
What happens to a swimmer, a boat or a fish when the lake is struck by lightning?
|
Very little, the charge dissipates in all directions which means that unless you were virtually under the strike very little of the electric charge will reach you.
|
d852357e-4fcf-494f-a05f-ae0cfa5e9d1b
|
bx1d78
|
Why can infants throw up without really reacting, but as we get older, throwing up becomes a horrible, scary thing?
|
It is mostly about how common or uncommon the situation is and how far down the digestive tract the problem is. I am a 40 year old adult with a Lap Band, and that makes it so I throw up every couple of days when I accidentally take too large a bite or my stomach just gets a little upset. And most of the time it is a fairly small amount coming up directly from the stomach, and not further down the digestive tract, and I deal with it as easily as a baby spitting up.
But for adults who do not have a lap band, usually when they vomit the problem isn't high up in the digestive system around the stomach, but further down. So the digestive system has to do a lot more work and reverse it's normal flow for longer, which is a lot more disruptive. But when babies spit up, it is usually simply because they took in more milk than their stomach can hold, and they just have to push out a little bit of excess.
|
ecc6d51e-6a5f-468a-b8bf-313d29796a46
|
bx1dm5
|
Why do humans get a random high pitched noise in the ear that dissipates quickly
|
I know what OP is talking about and absolutely no one in the comments is addressing what he's talking about. It's definitely not tinnitus and it is not electrical appliances. It is a loud, distinctive high pitched noise, sounds exactly like the sound effect they use for a flashbang in video games. It lasts for a few seconds at most. Last time I read about this, many people get this and it's nothing to worry about: it's something to do with hairs in our ears accidentally engaged in a positive feedback loop (like when a microphone picks up the speaker sound and it makes that annoying noise that sounds exactly like the noise you hear) that eventually resolves itself after a few seconds
|
c4af0fb1-9878-4f45-a747-10a861ec441f
|
bx1o1e
|
how does a chickens reproductive system work?
|
A chicken will produce eggs whether or not the rooster is involved, just as a human female will release eggs, whether or not a guy is involved. If there's no conception, there's a period, if there is, there's a pregnancy.
With chickens, the eggs are laid and are either laid fertilized or not, depending on if the rooster had his way.
|
87de1a5d-17ad-439b-b589-5e7730a956f4
|
bx1v2o
|
Why are snails able to move over razor blades without being cut or sliced?
|
Because snails don't really touch the surface that they are traveling along. They secrete thick mucus, and then Glide along that mucus. The mucus is thick enough that it covers the Razer Blade and protects the snail.
It is somewhat similar to a human throwing a blanket over razor wire before crawling over it. The blanket is enough to cover the razor wire and make it no longer an issue.
|
d0a2dbb6-a0a9-4aa4-9d60-083b9419a30f
|
bx1yco
|
Why do some chords sound better than others?
|
Musical notes are all certain frequencies. For example, the note A is at 440 hertz, which means a sound wave oscillates 440 times per second. This frequency is what almost all modern instruments are tuned in relation to. But how do they relate? The answer is simple: ratios. Notes sound better when their frequencies are “perfect” mathematical ratios. An example of this is an octave, which when using the note of A exists as a frequency at 440 hz and a frequency at 880 hz. The ratio is 1:2 and is generally accepted as the most consonant, or rather least dissonant ratio. Next is a perfect fifth, which has a ratio of 2:3, then a major third at 5:4, all the way through to the most dissonant interval in traditional western music, the tritone which exists at a ratio of 25:18. Very yucky ratio. How all of these ratios interact with each other creates the colour of the chord, and then combinations of chords create the overall harmonic flavour of a piece. I’m still a student of music but I hope I helped answer your question :)
|
ca05c281-ce3d-4a2f-9023-70229cf5859e
|
bx1ze9
|
What causes the 'uncanny valley'? How does it work?
|
There's this [video](_URL_0_) by Vsauce that kind of describes it really well.
We humans generally read emotions and stuff from people's faces. And we know some inanimate objects aren't human, and they're not a threat. But for a humanlike object, we by nature try to read whether it's a threat or not by reading the expressions, and when the expressions are unreadable, we, just in case, are scared of it as if it were a threat. It may sound stupid, but apparently it helped us survive so well that it is entirely ingrained in us.
|
ee08db01-b46a-4617-9dd6-bbc348a71c1c
|
bx2013
|
What reasons would an employer have in firing someone who has declared bankruptcy?
|
In many cases it doesn't matter. However, employing someone with a history of money problems represents a potential risk in, say, the Financial industry, or in a position where they handle large sums of cash or merchandise, since they would have incentive to steal.
Similarly, a bankruptcy or high level of debt represents a problem if your job requires you maintain a Secret or Top Secret clearance, since conventional wisdom is that you would be more susceptible to foreign agents offering cash for secrets. It's why the CIA and FBI have traditionally done a disproportionate amount of their recruiting at Ivy League universities -- the thought being that students whose families can afford to send them to Princeton or Yale are financially established enough that they don't need the money, per se, and will work more for love of country.
|
679ba00c-4a2f-420d-85db-92871eb3f5bd
|
bx295t
|
Why do colors pop out so much when it's raining?
|
Compare it to a tv/monitor. If you turn down the brightness and up the contrast the colors "pop" more or stand out.
& #x200B;
Light washed out colors as you know light is all colors in one. So less is more here - as your eyes can see the individual wave lengths of light easier.
|
2e6926f9-c5d4-460e-b749-9517ea6ec5a1
|
bx2onj
|
What exactly are stains? Why do they stay on something seemingly forever? Are they remnants of the liquid that was spilled still on the clothing?
|
Fabrics and other materials have fine, microscopic crevices to which coffee and wine and flow into and dry (which means that when they dry, they form into a contiguous clump that hugs into all the fine openings of the crevice. Imagine scoring clay to create a rough surface, then putting other clay on top of it. They kind of form into each other like velcrow).
Basically, they get stuck in these crevices due to forces like friction and van der waals and its difficult to clean them by just wiping them up. You'd have to dissolve them with cleaning agents or use tougher mechanical forces to "scrape" or "break" them out of there.
|
5e745469-b0b6-4741-abb1-5f33b19691ed
|
bx2rgn
|
If water is transparent why is snow white?
|
Snow is a whole bunch of individual ice crystals arranged together. When a light photon enters a layer of snow, it goes through an ice crystal on the top, which changes its direction slightly and sends it on to a new ice crystal, which does the same thing. Basically, all the crystals bounce the light all around so that it comes right back out of the snow pile. It does the same thing to all the different light frequencies, so all colors of light are bounced back out. The "color" of all the frequencies in the visible spectrum combined in equal measure is white, so this is the color we see in snow, while it's not the color we see in the individual ice crystals that form snow.
|
a7d79fda-405e-4900-b6c0-4ee844d80153
|
bx2xq9
|
The new Mac Pro will support up to 1.5TB of ram. In theory, could you have every file on the computer stored in the RAM?
|
Yes. This is called a RAMdisk.
It's a common practice in some servers, and you can replicate it at home with a small enough hard drive or big enough memory.
I believe the old skull canyon CPUs supported up to 128GB of RAM which made for a hardy Ramdisk.
& #x200B;
There's a downside, if you turn off your PC it takes forever because the data needs to be saved back to a non-energy-dependent source or it will be lost because of the nature of how ram works. Also the bigger it is, the longer it takes to set up for access, but once it's set up it's blazing fast (depending on the bandwidth and throughput of your bus).
|
62b093c4-2681-4089-9cbd-447228d89cef
|
bx301k
|
Why would it be better to not charge a phone/car battery to 100%
|
Because the battery chemistry weakens as max capacity is reached.
Consider a balloon. It has a maximum capacity. The capacity right before it pops. If you inflate the balloon is just this max capacity every time, it wears on the latex. However if you inflate to only 80% of this max capacity, there's less stretch wear on the latex.
Same principle on battery chemistry. As the state of charge approaches maximum capacity, there's a resistance to take more charge. If you're forcing more charge in, it's going to wear on the battery. 80% is the chosen balance point between having capacity and putting wear on the battery
|
8242124f-3f73-49f7-b955-9c436599a38b
|
bx344n
|
Why won't herd animals like Bulls or Wildebeest help their herd mates when caught or cornered by predators most of the time? They even out number the predators.
|
For the same reasons that humans do not always come to the aid of other humans that are under attack. Because doing so means risking being attacked oneself.
Herd animals absolutely do work together to protect each other, but that only goes so far. Once predators actually have their teeth in a herd mates, the rest will generally cut their losses and take advantage of the situation to get away unharmed.
|
bc4264ac-608e-428e-97ea-4bcedf5862e5
|
bx3c4t
|
how does the brain create brand new words?
|
Creativity. You could have merged together "rustles" with "cramp" or just added a c to the beginning because it was amusing to 8 year old you. Or you just randomly thought of it and it stuck.
For an example not involving language, imagine a purple creature the size of a chihuahua with a handlebar mustache and monocle. Chances are, you can picture this thing that does not actually exist in real life. Why did I choose these specific features? Because I was actively trying to be random and then when I added the handlebar mustache my brain associated the monocle with it so I added that too.
|
e15f25df-390a-42b2-9595-e6728257795c
|
bx3d4m
|
How does a nuclear reactor work?
|
When nuclear atoms gets hit with neutrons it gets hot. And tosses out more neutrons. Those new neutrons cause more atoms to get hot and toss out neutrons.
It’s a sort of self-sustained effect in a material that rapidly heats itself up.
Well. For a while. Eventually it’ll be crap at tossing electrons, and heat less. But let’s overlook that for a bit.
That heat is nifty to make use of. If you place the material in a tank full of water, it’ll make steam. High pressure steam.
The steam is used to move a turbine on a generator.
That’s pretty much what there is to it.
Very advanced and very dangerous kettle. Kind of like when you make tea in your kitchen. Except larger. Lots larger.
It’s literally advanced machinery that boils water in a fashion that makes it important to monitor it closely and add tons of safety features.
Edit; spelling.
|
d8ae2730-4eb4-4c8e-b488-3553bbf145c1
|
bx3i5m
|
Why do charging cables not spark when held close to the intended device?
|
They do, you just can't see it because the voltage isn't high enough to overcome the resistance of air at an appreciable distance, if you make the gap smaller, it will arc across air.
Tiny tiny voltages of like 5.2 or 4.2 volts, aren't enough potential to cause a visible spark.
& #x200B;
Noted that a circuit must be completed for this to happen, so just touching any part of the device will not do, rather only parts of the device that will complete the circuit.
|
8a93f150-e810-46e8-b5cf-1877bdbd590a
|
bx3llf
|
Why is it so hard to counterfeit currency?
|
Currency is specifically made to be hard to counterfeit. There are multiple security features present in larger denominations that are difficult to replicate without some serious investment.
US bills use a special and hard to source paper and ink, contain highly detailed watermarks, holographic panels, extremely fine die cuts, markings that stop printers and scanners, plastic security strips...
Convincigly replicating all of these is no small feat, and trying to source all the equipment and materials to do so will get you a visit from the Secret Service.
|
b7339cea-3abd-448e-bfa7-1ed8de2cc663
|
bx3prp
|
What do the folks on the floor of the NYSE do, when it seems like everything is electronic or done by computers now?
|
The vast majority of trading is electronic, so the people down on the floor aren't all traders. There are managers, IT staff, and SEC personnel onsite to monitor everything. The remaining people are traders, working in the few stocks that are left that can't be traded electronically.
|
001b2220-7546-4d08-9566-e7e400480e93
|
bx3vpa
|
Why do some radios get better signals when you stand closer to them?
|
Radio-waves are susceptible to interference. The shorter the wavelength (i.e. the higher the frequency), the more susceptible it is to interference like trees, walls, cars (anything solid) and even humans. Removing anything in-between you and the source will increase your signal strength.
There are drawbacks to lower frequency waves - they carry less information, but they can penetrate more obstacles - and vice versa.
|
1ea36057-e0bf-47c3-a34f-27cd1c2478b0
|
bx45lq
|
What happens during a heart attack?
|
A heart attack is a lay term for what is known in the medical world as a myocardial infarction, or MI for short.
Infarction means that blood stops going to an area and the area dies from a lack of oxygen, because it is the blood that carries the oxygen.
Myocardium is the medical word for the heart muscle itself.
Therefore a myocardial infarction, or a “heart attack”, is when there is a blockage in one of the blood vessels that supply the heart muscle and that part of the heart muscle is damaged as a result.
P.S. this is the correct answer
|
b88449c6-4f0c-4baf-8f6c-07d6201b953a
|
bx4m49
|
Why can animals drink from dirty rivers/lakes without any issue yet when a human does they get ill?
|
Oh, animals do not get by without any issue.
Wild animals are riddled with parasites and susceptible to horrid diseases at a rate that far exceeds human beings.
In fact, parasites from contaminated water are so common, there are vaccines available for domestic dogs.
|
c000f133-3b02-4a63-9341-46c0e2df096b
|
bx4pe7
|
How does electrolysis with water work?
|
Oxygen is very electronegative, which means that when it is paired with another atom bonded covalently and those atoms are sharing electrons, the electrons tend to spend more time around the oxygen than they do around those other atoms. This is especially true of hydrogen, which has very weak electronegativity.
Because of this, the end of the water molecule with the oxygen on it tends to be far more negative than the end with the two hydrogen's, which tends to be comparatively positive.
Running an electrical current through water pulls on that bond magnetically, and it is capable of breaking the bond, at which point the oxygen will hold on to the two electrons that the two hydrogen atoms brought to the equation. This turns that oxygen into a negative ion and gives it an overall negative charge, and gives the hydrogen ions positive charges.
At that point, the oxygen rushes towards the positive electrode because it is negative, and the hydrogen rushes towards the negative electrode because it is positive.
|
9ecebf29-44f1-41b5-a0f7-f7b90c7e198d
|
bx5120
|
Do animals like when they are petted? Why?
|
Social animals do. Many species of mammals and some birds use grooming and play to reinforce social bonds in the group. They will extend this to you once they're sufficiently confident you're friendly, and do enjoy it. A lot of them will even return the favor, although you might not like their licking.
Non social animals are more of a crap shoot. Some can learn that you're the food man and hang around you, others are indifferent or aggressive towards any contact at all.
Don't pet cobras.
|
58e98e7d-acc3-471a-adc1-c7a0d7069b31
|
bx5388
|
How do our bodies adjust to more hot temperatures?
|
One of the largest parts of it is your basal metabolism rate adjusting. If it is more hot, your metabolic rate will go down so you are not generating as much waste heat.
I am a fairly large male, reasonably muscular and moderately fat. And I used to live in Minnesota, where the winters get down to below -20 degrees Fahrenheit and The Summer's easily get into 90 degrees Fahrenheit. And during the winter, my basal metabolism would be so much higher that I would regularly eat 3500 calories and not gain weight. During the summer even 2000 calories would have me putting on pounds.
|
fbe6b768-6715-4060-b20b-cfcb3d56ee65
|
bx55y0
|
Why does the quality of GIFs, pics deteriorate with each repost?
|
If you simply copied the link to the original gif it would be fine. If you downloaded the original file and uploaded it to a service that doesn't apply any postprocessing it will be fine.
But what typically happens is, when you upload the image to a hosting service, that service decides to process the image to make it smaller or faster or a different file type.
Then someone downloads that processed image, reuploads it again to a new host that also applies processing to the image, reducing the quality of the file **again**.
Image hosts don't want huge lossless super high res gifs because it costs bandwidth and that costs money. So they mostly try to cut corners by resizing or shrinking the file.
|
59804513-953c-47a6-933c-dbb1aa1075d2
|
bx586h
|
; Why are wine bottles nearly always 750ml? Is there actually a reason for it?
|
In 1975 the European Legislation on packaging (75/106) declared that the wine can be sold only if packed in certain measure containers, making the 750 ml size the most convenient for customers and winemakers.
There are many theories to explain this peculiar size.
One of these goes back to a very practical issue dated back to the 18° century, when they discovered the importance to store the wine in glass bottles.
At the time, the glass bottles were made by glass blowers. Their pulmonary strenght was obviously limited and permitted to create only bottles up to 650-750 ml size. So they decided to use the biggest one between those, the 750 ml bottle.
According to another theory 750 ml is the exact quantity of wine per 6 serving glasses (125ml each) used in “osteria”.
Others say that the 750 ml standard was a metric adaptation of the fifth (fifth of a gallon) which was standard in the US & Britain. In fact each box of wine could only contain 2 gallons and the Britishes decided to put 12 bottles per box. The result is 750 ml per bottle!
Source: _URL_0_
|
cd9b35ba-6c99-4d75-bc5d-9d935cfefa81
|
bx599n
|
my dad has brown eyes and my mom has blue eyes. How does my brother have blue eyes?
|
You get a gene from each parent. If someone has blue eyes, then both their genes are blue eyed genes. If someone has brown eyes, they could either have two brown eye genes or one brown eye gene and one blue eye gene. If they have one of each then they could pass either on. Your brother would definitely get a blue eye gene from your mom, but if he also got a blue eye gene from your dad, then he would have blue eyes.
Look up "punnett square" for a diagram.
|
2a436d50-c6db-4637-aae1-649dd24de851
|
bx59ji
|
Do different altitudes in the ocean have different oxygen levels?
|
Different ocean depths have different oxygen levels. Near the surface the ocean has a similar oxygen level to the air.
Organic matter sinks down, and is eaten by bacteria and such as it goes. Oxygen levels can decrease with depth because it is used up by those bacteria in the deeper water. Below a certain point the organic matter decreases to basically nothing because it has been eaten and/or biodegraded, so there is less life the deeper you go because there’s nothing for it to eat. Very deep ocean can have a higher oxygen level than above because 1. It’s colder and colder water holds more oxygen 2. There are less organisms using up the oxygen.
Basically that octopus in the shallow water is getting plenty of oxygen since surface water has a lot.
|
ce27dd35-62bf-4fae-9fe2-4ab5101a1bbb
|
bx5ai7
|
Why is the number 100 so appealing to use in many areas (e.g. school grades, finance, automation, etc.)?
|
My guess is that its due to our base 10 system of math, and the fact that it typically represents 100% or “all” of something.
|
fb0b467f-c8c0-4c03-b133-8a20ffd4be6c
|
bx5syj
|
How do microplastics work? How can I minimize ingesting them?
|
That's the main issue regarding the topic; we can't. There was a post on the front page earlier today (not sure how credible it is, but I would assume so) that bottled water has much higher concentration of microplastic particulates. So if anything, I'd start there.
|
54bfed7f-fbf1-47c1-ac2d-06f371190042
|
bx5th9
|
why can’t you remember a whole phone number alone but when you ask someone else to remember a few numbers you automatically remember?
|
Memory is highly associational: remembering something associated with a memory makes it much easier to remember the memory itself. In this case, the first few numbers helps to recall the associated further numbers.
|
e3fc2516-061b-48b3-b346-16fca4fc40ff
|
bx5vym
|
How does "nuclear power" power a submarine?
|
nuclear power in its essence, is really just steam power.
Nuclear reactions create heat, that heat is then used to heat up some water, and that water is turned to steam which turns a turbine.
nuclear fuel just provides the heat, its the steam turbine that provides the electricity.
|
2261bd4d-8d9b-4b9d-8a4b-63267d97b640
|
bx60a0
|
the Inflaton Field
|
I only have a UG Physics degree, but I'll take a shot. Very early in the big bang, there was an exceptionally short period of extreme expansion of the universe called the inflationary epoc. The inflaton field is a proposed theory for why this happened, and there is also some proposals that the Higgs field itself was the inflaton field, but these are both unproven theories. The main theory is that the inflaton field in the early universe was in a "false vaccum" where the vaccum energy was high enough to create inflatons which drove the expansion.
A false vaccum is kind of like a bowl on a ramp: a marble in the bowl will stay in the bowl until it gets a strong enough perturbation, at which point it'll fall down the ramp onto the ground where it will stay -- the true vaccum. Once the energy fell to the true vaccum, the inflationary epic ended, and the inflatons decayed into "normal" particles.
The inflationary epoc is used to explain the fact the universe is mostly the same everywhere, and the cosmic microwave background is mostly uniform, among other cosmological phenomenon.
|
508da6f5-b082-44e0-9535-ac7baac65cfa
|
bx67f8
|
Why do penises get smaller in cold water?
|
Testicles will move in closer towards the body to help keep warm. The penis will shrink as there's less blood flow to it in cold conditions. Just like how an erection is achieved by drastically increasing blood flow to it.
|
3ac50c66-1d28-447c-ae2d-2ee01ef23f61
|
bx6abg
|
Aerodynamic manoeuvres and Wing rakes
|
I'm not sure what you mean by inverting the wings but forward-swept wings need to be stronger (and therefore heavier) than straight or rearward swept wings and, when it comes to building aircraft, weight is a pretty big factor to consider. Yes, it makes the plane more maneuverable but the benefit isn't really worth the weight penalty.
Also, for modern fighters, more emphasis is being placed increasing the plane's stealth characteristics so maneuverability has taken a bit of a backseat.
|
9892e675-3e4b-4285-a8e1-875966234acf
|
bx6ce5
|
What is antimatter?
|
It's matter, in that it has mass and takes up space like matter does. It's called antimatter because it's opposite in a number of important ways to matter, and when matter and antimatter meet, they annihilate each other.
A normal atom is made of protons, neutrons, and electrons. Protons have a positive charge, electrons have a negative charge, and neutrons and neutral. An antimatter atom is made of antiprotons, which have a negative charge, antineutrons, and positrons, which are like electrons but have a positive charge. It goes on and on from there. As far as we can tell, every kind of particle has an anti equivalent.
Edit: neutrons to antineutrons
|
944698dd-da05-440b-a2ca-da52ac49ec1c
|
bx6ihm
|
Why does a piece of butter spin when you put it in the middle of a pot of boiling water?
|
It should spin even if the pot isn't boiling, just might be imperceptible.
& #x200B;
See when we suspend something in water there will likely only be 3 forces acting on it.
1. is obvious, the force of gravity pulling it 'down'
2. is slightly less obvious, the force the water exerts 'upwards' on the butter
3. is nearly always forgotten, the force of the earth spinning
When moving an object that is spinning it encounters more resistance on one side than the other because one side is moving 'with' the earth's rotation, the other is moving 'against' the earth's rotation.
This is why toilets, under absolutely perfect conditions will flush clockwise or counter clockwise in the northern or southern hemisphere.
& #x200B;
In case of boiling water it might be simply because the butter is rarely even in size and the bubbles hit it imparting a bit of momentum, it builds up, and since water offers little resistance in terms of rotation, it just keeps on spinning.
But under absolutely still circumstances, everything tends to rotate one way or another depending on which hemisphere you're located in.
|
d9858f08-ed50-4ddf-a4bc-d4a017476f70
|
bx6som
|
If an electron is thought if more as a wave than a particle, how does it have a mass?
|
What is mass? Mentally, do you associate the property of mass as belonging to something? As you delve deeper into the physics of the small, "real world" intuition starts to break down. What we think of as mass might arise from an interaction of disturbances in one field with another field.
Bottom line: calling it a wave or a particle does not necessarily associate it with a property of mass. Meaning, waves = no mass, particles = mass is not a true intuition.
|
204bbfca-40aa-412f-808c-143ff70e3d6b
|
bx6t6w
|
How a laser can improve/correct someone's eyesight.
|
Your eye works kind of like a camera. It's got a lens system that focuses light onto the retina, the part of the eye that senses light. If the lens system is out of whack, the light doesn't focus right, and your eyesight is blurry.
One way to correct this is to put another lens in front of the whole thing. That's glasses or contacts.
Another way to fix it is to change the lens system of the eye itself. The shape of a lens is very important in determining how it will focus light. Change the shape, change how it focuses light.
With laser eye surgery, they don't change the lens itself. They change a layer of tissue in front of the lens, called the cornea. To the best of my knowledge, the laser very precisely burns away parts of the cornea to change its shape.
Here's a link with lots of information: _URL_0_
You may be most interested in the section called "During the procedure".
|
713346e1-1aa0-4c3d-bed3-b5b279bc0cd2
|
bx76el
|
What does it mean that race is “socially constructed”?
|
It means that humans have decided to classify people as different races, but that there are really just variations along a continuum and not artificial break points with biological differences. While the difference between the average Swede and average Kenyan might be obvious, if you go from country to country, you'll just see gradual changes over the distance.
|
97cd0d8d-d5be-4d89-b732-b510429fc3d2
|
bx79dd
|
What is it that stops liquid flowing out of a straw when then top is covered?
|
With a bit of air between the liquid and your finger (or whatever is covering the other end) it creates a little vacuum. Theres definitely a limit, but the weight of the liquid falling out is less than how much it would take to change the pressure of the little bubble of air. If your finger isn't there, there is no vacuum as new air can come in from one end of the straw and replace the air that travels down the straw following the liquid out of the other end.
|
b4cb8e57-1720-4fd1-b3ce-14c45f153bc3
|
bx7g4n
|
Why is it easier to see weak light, when not looking directly at it?
|
Your peripheral vision is designed to see changes in dark/light while your central vision is designed to see color and detail. You can see dim lights better with your peripheral because that is what it’s designed to do.
|
c3ff1c9b-16f5-43ba-ae66-badb5109feb5
|
bx7jn0
|
How did the voice in our mind work before we were able to speak or communicate through languages?
|
Probably a lot like it does in people with aphantasia, of which I am one.
I do not have an inner monologue. I can "speak" in my head by deliberately planning words to say and then not saying them aloud, but unless I do that, my internal mindspace is completely silent. In my case, my thoughts are governed by pure emotion and concept. I do not think the phrase "I want to go to the store," I feel a need for resources and an understanding that those resources can be found at the store. It's a mixture of remembering and feeling, and the parts just work; I could put into words exactly what I'm thinking if I had to, but until I deliberately do, I don't.
Without language, you'd be much the same way. You'd act on instinct, feelings, and learned logic, but would not narrate it. Some people would see a visual depiction of what they want to do, others might think of the sounds or tactile sensations involved. How one goes about it varies from person to person, but thoughts don't need to be voiced.
An aside... There are some evolutionary anthropologists who debate that the concept of gods and voices from heaven were actually early humans who had developed language but not yet developed the ability to identify that their internal monologue was their own thoughts turned into words. They'd hear a voice proclaiming what they should do, and they'd do it, not realizing that it was their *own* voice.
|
2d04467c-3181-4128-aa28-7acdce82db92
|
bx7n2k
|
How does increasing government spending affect aggregate demand in the economy?
|
The general idea is that aggregate demand is comprised of _all_ of the entities buying goods. That includes individual consumers, businesses, foreign firms and governments. If any of those groups starts buying more, then aggregate (i.e. total) demand goes up, so increasing in spending from any of them can increase aggregate demand.
The US Government is somewhat special in this regard, though, as it basically has access to unlimited funds over the short term. If the economy is flagging due to low demand, it can take on debt with incredible ease and spend that money in the economy buying goods and services. The firms that sell goods to the government then take that money and buy goods and services of their own, so every $1 spend by the government could have a 3-6x effect on demand. Then, once the economy is good again, spending can be reduced, taxes increased and the debt paid back.
Of course, that is a very Keynesian opinion. Ask a Chicago-school economist and they will tell you that government spending has zero effect on aggregate demand...
|
f1da0440-883e-4ba9-8a59-0a3f6dd360f9
|
bx7or0
|
How do restaurants determine menu prices?
|
It's called [cost accounting](_URL_0_). Practically speaking any item on the menu has two types of costs.
The first type of costs are variable costs, in a restaurant it's the prices of the main ingredients of a meal and the amount of labor used to cook the meal and to distribute it. Some of the variable costs are easy to allocate to a dish, e.g. if a steak costs $10 it's $10 in your books. Other variable costs are not so easy to allocate. For example, your cook works the whole night on many different meals. So you do estimate how much cook needs to prepare the meal and add this to the costs of the meal.
Then there are the fixed costs, which includes rents, electricity, water and all the other overhead. You may distributes these costs on a per item basis, e.g. a steak has the same fixed costs as a glass of coke. Or you use some other kind of distribution, e.g. on the basis of total monthly revenue of the items.
A newly opened restaurant has to make some guesswork about distribution of costs while an established restaurant may simply take the numbers of previous years.
You can probably do this in an sophisticated excel-sheet but there also exists specialized software (e.g. SAP if your company is big enough.)
|
933a1d01-f3b5-491b-a7a6-80914f33effc
|
bx7rrh
|
How do we know out about other galaxies and far planets when they're thousands of light years away? can telescopes really see that far?
|
Short answer: No, telescopes can't really see that far.
Long answer: What they can see are the effects of light as it passes through galaxies, star clusters, planets, and nebulas. For example; a couple of years back the Hubble Space Telescope was able to spot a galaxy 13.4 billion light years away, and snap a pretty decent picture of it (Messier 63).
Folks at NASA and some artists got together and came up with an "artists rendition" ([_URL_0_](_URL_0_)) based on the kinds of light we see from that galaxy. There's a whole lot of very complicated, but educated, guesswork going on here.
What the Hubble Space Telescope really saw was this; [_URL_2_](_URL_1_)
That light, having taken so long to reach us, must have come into existence around 400 million years after the beginning of the universe, which is actually far older than we even thought possible for a galaxy this size. We can tell that the light took that long to reach us by measuring its "red shift", which is a cheeky way of measuring how much the universe has expanded since that light began its journey. GN-Z11 has a red shift of 11.1, which beats out the previous contender for "furthest observed object" by quite a bit (EGSY8p7 had a red shift of 8.68).
|
540fe449-5136-4dc9-9d5e-f850d0f6b98a
|
bx88mf
|
How does stretching before/after a workout reduce the risk of injury?
|
In the medical field the opinions on stretching divided, some people say it helps some people say it doesn't make a difference.
But I would say that a proper warming up and cooling down are more important to injury prevention than stretching is.
|
725930db-2a05-4efc-8f38-e678bd11771d
|
bx8gh6
|
Do fish swim all the time? How do they sleep?
|
Some fish like sharks can’t use their mouths to pump water over the gills, so they have to constantly swim with their mouths open to move water across their gills so they can “breathe” (essentially just oxygen exchange over the gills—similar to what happens in our lungs). Most fish like the ones you’re thinking of CAN use their mouths to create suction and pump water over their gills (with the help of a flap of skin that covers the gills called an operculum), and so they don’t have to swim all of the time.
It’s kind of unknown whether or not all fish “sleep” traditionally, but most fish do go through periods of inactivity. Depending on what type of fish you’re looking at, these inactivity periods will be at different times during the day or night, and fish will have different behaviors associated with them. Essentially what’s happening is the fish’s heart rate slows, their “breathing” (or the rate at which they pump water over their gills) slows, and they may be less responsive to outside stimuli.
If you’ve ever had a beta fish, it’s pretty easy to tell when the periods of inactivity are. You can often see the fish sitting on something in the tank and not moving much, although the mouth and operculum will move occasionally to pump water over the gills (they still have to breathe!). If you tap on the glass while your fish is like this, they may freak out similar to how you would if someone jumped on top of you while you were asleep.
TL;DR: yes fish do “sleep,” but it’s more like periods of slowed metabolism and inactivity and less like the sleep that we experience.
|
fade665f-392b-414b-ae23-5d16503bd5c4
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.