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5nwd3j | scientifically speaking, why does a simple butter and flour roux make cheese melt better? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5nwd3j/eli5_scientifically_speaking_why_does_a_simple/ | {
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"A roux is made by taking oil (or butter) and flour, which is made up of several types of starch, and *slowly* evaporating all available water molecules in the flour by heating the oil-flour mixture. This causes the color to change from a white/creamy color, to a darker color. If the roux is heated too long, the starches will start to break down (burn).\n\nCheese is a mix of several types of molecules, like lactose sugars, proteins, and fats. Protein molecules like to stick together, and these proteins provides a framework for fats and sugars to spread out, since those two usually don't mix well together. The result of *slowly* adding cheese to a roux is the protein in the cheese can spread together with the starch in the roux, and allow the sugar and fat to \"ooze\" out and create a creamy sauce. \n\nThis article [here](_URL_0_) explains it well."
]
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[
"https://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/food-dining/2016/01/25/better-macaroni-and-cheese-through-science/4ajKeGFOKChDzN1ZYXiWeK/story.html"
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5psjrs | when you press the unlock button on your keys, how does it only work on your car? | I'm guessing it unlocks it with a frequency value, but there must be something more? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5psjrs/eli5_when_you_press_the_unlock_button_on_your/ | {
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" > I'm guessing it unlocks it with a frequency value, but there must be something more?\n\nIt's not just something more. It's everything more. There is no \"secret frequency\" that's used. Instead, the keyfob and car both have electronic circuits that create psuedo-random numbers. Both the circuits are initialized with the same value, so they both produce the same sequence of numbers. Every time you press the unlock button on your remote, it sends the next number. The car keeps a list of the next hundred or so numbers in the sequence, and if it sees one of those numbers, it unlocks, and resets the sequence to the next hundred numbers from there (so that you have some leeway to accidentally press the button a few times on your remote without getting locked out of the car)."
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4al68e | why do colleges accept people in bulk rather than in smaller batches? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4al68e/eli5_why_do_colleges_accept_people_in_bulk_rather/ | {
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"most colleges do have rounds of acceptance... the notification is automated, easier to click the button for everyone in a group when your ready to. see how many accept first round and then send a 2nd round, and a third,"
]
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1k220v | how a plasma cutter can achieve temperatures of over 45,000 degrees fahrenheit? | I was watching Man At Arms on YouTube and he briefly mentioned that his plasma cutter achieved temperatures of 45,000 degrees Fahrenheit. How is that possible? Wouldn't temperatures like that be too hot for a human to be around? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1k220v/eli5_how_a_plasma_cutter_can_achieve_temperatures/ | {
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"A small plasma cutter requires ~2500 watts. A small space heater burns the same amount of electricity, so there isnt a lethal amount of energy. Also, with a plasma arc, the point that reaches extreme temps is very small, and the energy is quickly dissipated into the metal and the air. \n",
"You can imagine a match burning, it's flame is maybe a cubic inch. Well that is the stored energy in the match being turned into heat over the space of around a cubic inch and it burns for maybe 15 seconds and at maybe 1200F. Now if you were to take the amount of energy required to cause a flame for that time and temperature over that amount of space, and concentrate it to the size of a pencil tip and release it in 1/100th of a second instead of 15, well then the temperature goes way up because much fewer particles are being vibrated much much more rapidly. A plasma cutter gets so hot because it is a reasonable amount of energy being released really really rapidly in a very concentrated area. Hope that makes sense."
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b2a3v2 | what would the crew of a wwii tank be facing inside once they were hit? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/b2a3v2/eli5_what_would_the_crew_of_a_wwii_tank_be_facing/ | {
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"If the armor is not pierced they would be jostled severely, but not much more than if they hit bad potholes. \n\nIf the armor is pierced then they would be facing the percussive energy of whatever pierced them. Shrapnel from that projectile as well as their own armor. There is a major risk of fire, which in turn means that all of the ammo they are carrying is at risk of exploding in addition to the threat of being in a confined space with smoke and fire. In general they will blow up and be ripped to shreds by their own ammo. ",
"Smoke and fire from the fuel and ammunition.\n\nAmmo can cook off when struck, not necessarily exploding but cooking like fireworks.\n\nExplosive force from the round itself can knock the crew around if not outright kill them.\n\nDebris and shrapnel bouncing around inside of the tank.\n\nEven if the tank wasn't penetrated the force of impact could throw the guys around or causing spalling which is when material from the inside face of the armor plating sheers off and flies around the inside of the tank like shrapnel.\n\nOne story from a Sherman crew states they were shot at by a Tigers 88mm gun. They heard a horrendous noise and then saw an 88mm hole in the front armor and matching one in the rear. The shell had passed clean through the tank and it's engine before exploding behind them. That's how much more powerful the German guns were compared to the American tanks armor.",
"Depends what they're hit by and where it hits. In most cases, you'll have dead or injured crew members, but there are a lot of cases that kill the whole crew but leave you a mostly functional tank\n\nTanks have the majority of their armor on the front with some on the sides but very little on the rear. A hit to the big front armored plate(glacis plate) isn't going to do nearly as much to the inside of the tank as a hit on the side will, that's why they put the big armor plate on the front.\n\nThere are 5 main types of tank shell - Armor Piercing(AP), High Explosive(HE), High Explosive Anti-Tank(HEAT), High Explosive Squash Head(HESH), and less commonly AP Shells with no explosives which were sometimes APCR.\n\nArmor Piercing shells generally had an explosive charge inside of them that would go off after they made it through the armor. If it penetrated into the main body of the tank and detonated that's it for the crew, and the ammo in the tank will likely go up as well.\n\nAn HE round will explode on contact, it'll jar the occupants of the tank and can break things on the outside of the tank or start fires. Its not really meant for hard(armored) targets like tanks\n\nHEAT rounds are HE rounds designed for Anti-Tank purposes(its literally in the name). They're shaped charges which means the explosive would focus a stream of hot metal to cut through the armor, once its through it'll start fires inside the tank and spray hot metal on the crew, generally bad.\n\nHESH rounds are interesting in that they aren't trying to get through the armor, they're letting the armor do the work. When you hit a piece of metal you will cause fragments to break off on the other side which is called spalling, if you hit a large piece of metal with a good sized explosion you'll cause lots of fragments to break off inside. HESH rounds would hit, squish, spread out along the armor, and then detonate turning the inside layer of the armor into a shotgun inside the tank. Very bad for the crew, not too bad for the physical tank.\n\nAPCR rounds didn't have an explosive charge but they were really good at punching through anything in their way. This includes but is not limited to engines, transmissions, crew, guns, ammunition racks, and the other side of the tank. They would often break up on the otherside of whatever they just hit and spray around the inside of the tank but sometimes they'd just go right through. They're good if you're shooting a tank bigger than you but not if your AP round could get through anyway."
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34pc3k | what is so big about the recent boxing fight? | I don't follow the sport, so can someone explain why this match was so hyped/ talked about (at least seen on the media, and my facebook news feeds/friends statuses).
What makes it so special and why is there so much hype surrounding it? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34pc3k/eli5_what_is_so_big_about_the_recent_boxing_fight/ | {
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"If some one can answer please do? I am curious as well",
"For you and /u/spartan1124\n\n_URL_3_\n\n_URL_6_\n\n_URL_1_\n\n_URL_2_\n\n_URL_5_\n\n_URL_0_\n\n_URL_4_\n\nTl:dr They're both big boxers, the best of the best, who haven't happened to fight each other before. They will both get a lot of money no matter what, the fight is pay to view and they organisers will make a lot of money, the fighters over a million each. People don't like one of them because he beats up his wife.",
"This was a fight 5 years in the making between 2 of the best boxers of this era. Fans of the sport were extremely excited when this fight was finally announced and it was being dubbed the \"Fight of the Century\".\n\nUnfortunately, it didn't meet up to expectations because a lot of casual fans, including myself, didn't realize that Mayweather is a very technical boxer rather than an aggressive fighter like Pacquiao. For that reason, Mayweather won by unanimous decision even though most people were rooting for Pacqiao to win.\n\ntl;dr Big fight didn't live up to the hype surrounding it. "
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"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34p3d4/eli5_what_is_the_big_deal_with_the_mayweather_vs/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34ojhe/eli5_whats_the_big_deal_with_this_fight_tonight/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34o7ah/eli5_why_are_people_protesting_against_the_expo/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34ny8e/eli5_importance_of_the_fight_between_pacquiao_and/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34oxxj/eli5the_fight_of_the_century/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34o1q2/eli5_why_is_this_manny_pacquiao_and_floyd/",
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34nxls/eli56040_split_of_the_mayweather_vs_pacquiao_fight/"
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30epyp | why do not more regions of the world have different dialects of a language that persist today? considering a great many humans lived for centuries in smaller group conditions that lend themselves to variations in language (unlike today), why is, say, chinese more an exception than a norm? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/30epyp/eli5_why_do_not_more_regions_of_the_world_have/ | {
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"The different \"dialects\" of Chinese are really different languages -- we group them together because they share the same writing system and are all related, but honestly, they can be just as different as, say, French and Italian. \n\nSo China isn't really an exception at all: it's just a great big region with a bunch of different languages spoken in it, like many other places in the world. ",
"Most, if not all, languages have dialects which often differ greatly, almost to the point of being almost mutually unintelligible.\n\nEnglish comes in a huge variety of dialects. I happen to speak more or less the standard Oxford British English with some Westcountry influence, but if you have ever heard Scouse, Geordie, Cockney, Brum or Glaswegian, you'd probably barely recognise them as being the same language. And that's just England and Scotland: in America, you have the standard General American dialect, and then you have things like New York, Yooper, South Midland, Tidewater, and so on.\n\nI live in Germany, and the German language family encompasses a wide variety of dialects (some, like Dutch, considered separate languages) divided into two broad groups: Low in the north and High in the south. I can give you an idea of what that entails by explaining my wife's dialect.\n\nMy wife speaks a West Germanic language. West Germanic includes German, Dutch, Flemish, English, Swedish, Norwegian, Icelandic and some other more obscure languages like Faroese.\n\nNarrowing it down, my wife's dialect is a High German dialect, part of a group of dialects spoken in Austria, Switzerland and southern parts of Germany. Narrowed down further, and it's a Central German dialect, spoken in a broad band stretching from Luxemburg in the west to the Polish border in the east. Specifically, it's a West Central dialect spoken in the western half of that band. Drilling further down, it's part of the Rhine-Franconian group, spoken in most of the state of Hesse and parts of Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, Bavaria and over the French border in Lorraine. It can be further classified as Hessian, then South Hessian, then Lower Mainland; and if you go deeper than that, you're looking at individual villages, and those distinctions have now been blurred out -- but listening to older people, you can still tell (if you have a good ear) which end of the valley they were born in.\n\nThe point is, dialects and accents are alive and well, even if you don't realise it. Of course, when we talk about Chinese \"dialects\", we're really talking about a group of languages: in the same way that the Germanic family includes German, Dutch, Swedish and so on, so the Chinese family includes Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu and so on. It's roughly on that level.\n\nBy the way, there's no good way to define the difference between a dialect and a language. Dutch can be viewed as a dialect of German, or Portuguese as a dialect of Spanish; while Swiss German is so hard for Germans to understand, that they sometimes need subtitles."
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3tb90w | the differences of a business trust versus an llc. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3tb90w/eli5_the_differences_of_a_business_trust_versus/ | {
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"Both are entities under state law, so the answer will depend upon the state where they're organized as well as the state or states where they'd doing business. If this is something you need to know for decision making, you need to see a lawyer.\n\nBusiness trusts are a much older concept. They're both more complicated and more flexible. Because of this, they're usually just used in very specialized cases where the flexibility outweighs the complexity. Mutual funds are among the most common examples of business trusts. \n\nBecause of their simplicity, LLCs have become the most common organized entity for small businesses. It would be extremely rare for a small business to be advised to form a business trust instead of an LLC. LLCs are even recommended more often than S-Corps. \n\nThere are some legitimate practitioners who, for valid reasons, may recommend a business trust or a corporation instead of an LLC for a small business, but that's a minority opinion these days. There are also people who recommend business trusts as a vehicle for illegal tax evasion - which gives such trusts a bad name. "
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cbzamx | what happens when a child breaks his leg right before a big growth spurt? | Is the leg able to heal and grow at the same time? Is growth potential compromised in any way? Will the leg resume growing once the healing process ends? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cbzamx/eli5_what_happens_when_a_child_breaks_his_leg/ | {
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"Depends where the break is. Growth in long bones like the leg occurs at growth plates, so growth should continue if the plates weren't compromised.",
"A kid in my elementary school broke his leg before a growth spurt and they broke the other leg so that they would match. He missed the rest of the year and was in a wheelchair for a while.",
"Yeah, sometimes they break them both, though now they have a way to make the legs even in length—if one leg doesn’t grow longer, they can break the leg at some later point and then move the two pieces apart. You’re immobilized for months. Every day they move the bones apart a bit more, and every day your body tries to bridge the gap by growing to fill the space. Eventually the legs are the same length again and then you have to build up your muscles. \n\nThe problem happens when you break something they can’t do this with. I know someone who broke her hip as an adolescent. It stopped growing. Now she needs to not gain any weight because her hip won’t be able to support it. Sometimes she’s in a wheelchair. Its hard because she was like 100 pounds when it happened, so now she needs to be very skinny as an adult. She’s have to be in a wheelchair for pregnancy.",
"It completely depends on the location and size of the break. If it involves the growth plate, it could impact growth. If this is about your child, you’d get a more relevant answer by asking the doctor caring for him/her."
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88vef2 | how do all politicians become filthy rich while in office? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/88vef2/eli5_how_do_all_politicians_become_filthy_rich/ | {
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"Frequent, but that's not always the case.\n\nThe Clinton's claim to have been almost broke when they left the white house. They weren't made of money to begin with and even the 6 figure salary of the president wasn't enough to pay Bill's extensive legal bills, Chelsea's education etc.\n\nBut afterwards like many former heads of state and professional business people they began doing tours where they are paid significant amounts of money to do speeches. They sit on various boards etc like the Clinton foundation which pays them a salary. (I'm not going to discus it's dubious nature)\n\nLots of politicians end up getting jobs on various boards and committees or with corporations. Or getting an appointed position in a government owned organization. One of the upsides of accepting lobbying money is that they often take care of you financially after you leave office. Like getting a cushy executive job at a military contractor, pharmaceutical company, or big oil company etc that are profiting off legislation that you championed or helped push through.\n\nMany elite businessmen + lawyers who go into politics actually consider getting senate seat a retirement plan in and of itself because with the position comes a great benefits package and a government backed pension that only requires a few years of service to qualify for.",
"Very few do. Most were wealthy before they started politics. But they do get paid fairly high salaries so that helps to maintain their wealth. They also tend to make a lot of connections and when they get out of office they often make a lot of money on the private sector. "
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6nvj3t | what is a stock 'put' and how does it work? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6nvj3t/eli5_what_is_a_stock_put_and_how_does_it_work/ | {
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"A put or put option is a contract that gives the holder the right to sell stock at a certain price to the other party in the contract, but without an obligation to sell (it's the buyer's choice) usually either on or before before an expiration date. \n\nBecause they give one party a right without creating an obligation, they're a form of protection or insurance. The buyer pays a premium and gets to sell their stock at a certain price if the price drops. \n\nFor an example, if you bought a put option on Tesla from me, you might pay $1850 to sell me 100 shares before August 18, 2017, at a price per share of $320. You would only want do this if the price dropped below $320/share, but if the price dropped, you would get $320 per share from me no matter how low the price got. ",
"A stock put is a type of stock option, that grants you the option to sell at a specified date for a set price. It's effectively a means of protecting stock you own, or for betting against a stock.\n\nLet's say you buy an 1 contract for August 140 puts on Apple. That means that the date August options expire, you would be able to sell 100 shares at $140 if you so choose. So if Apple drops to $125 by that time, you'd protect $15/share of gains. This might only cost you $1-2 per share to buy the contract.\n\nOr if you simply think the stock will fall, the put will increase in value as the strike price approaches \"in the money.\" So that $1-2/sh. you spend to buy the put option might be worth $10/share if the stock starts dropping and there's greater likelihood that it'll be below the $140 price. \n\nBecause there is a set expiration date, the values have a relationship to both the underlying stock and the time until the expiration. So a month out, the put option that's $10 in the money ($140 put, stock trading at $130) might cost $20 while the day of the expiration it'd be just about the difference between option value and stock itself."
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6kg6n1 | if a baby is born in canada to an american mother and the father has dual-citizenship in america and australia, what does that mean for the child's citizenship? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6kg6n1/eli5_if_a_baby_is_born_in_canada_to_an_american/ | {
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"In most cases, citizenship is not determined by international law, but only by the domestic law of the sovereign state granting a person citizenship of that state.\n\nThe child would be a Canadian citizen because it was born in Canada. The child would be a United States citizen because it was born the child of a U.S. citizen mother. And the child would be an Australian citizen because it was born to a father who is an Australian citizen.\n\nSome governments don't allow dual citizenship--they often make children elect which citizenship to keep at adulthood, or void the previous citizenship when the person becomes a citizen of another country. For example, this used to be the case in Australia. But currently that is not the case in either Canada, the U.S. or Australia--so it's entirely possible, if a bit unlikely, to be a Canadian, American as well as Australian citizen at the same time."
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6bxoky | what actions constitute collusion? is collusion inherently illegal or does the action need to be illegal? | **I'm not asking if it happened or not, I'm asking what it could look like if it did happen.** I'm legitimately interested and hoping for an apolitical explanation without the speculation about what did/didn't happen. With that in mind, let's talk about Jill Stein colluding with Jamaica.
1. I've heard about Stein colluding with Jamaica but I don't understand what collusion actually is (what would have to be said/done). AFAIK candidates are allowed to talk to foreign leaders. Couldn't any of those conversations be considered collusion (e.g. foreign leader says "you should hold a rally in MI")? Did the candidate just collude with a foreign power by taking advice on where to campaign?
2. Is collusion inherently illegal or does it depend on the action being illegal?
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6bxoky/eli5_what_actions_constitute_collusion_is/ | {
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"Collusion just means working together in secret or behind the scenes. It's not inherently a crime. It can be used loosely to describe the crime of conspiracy, which is committed when two or more people agree to commit some unlawful act, and then take some action toward committing the unlawful act. \n\nConspiracies are usually secret and therefore usually fit the definition of collusion. However, there must be some *other* identified crime that the parties are working toward in order to constitute criminal conspiracy.",
"Collusion can be a legal term of art, but generally, it just means \"secretly working together,\" or something to that effect. It implies some degree of deception: outsiders are led to believe that the colluders are acting independently.\n\nIn some circumstances, it's important (or legally mandated) for two parties *not* to conspire against a third party: this comes up a lot in sports, where teams might collectively refuse to sign a certain player to push down his salary, not because they're trying to win, but to pay back a personal favor to each other.\n\nSometimes, it's just suspicious, and a sign that someone is not to be trusted."
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2iikyj | i clean about 2 pounds of dust from my room every month. what does this means for my lungs ? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2iikyj/eli5_i_clean_about_2_pounds_of_dust_from_my_room/ | {
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"Not much, unless the dust is something allergen inducing (dander, mite poop), or with carcinogenic/irritating physical properties like asbestos. Or unless you have a compromised respiratory system, like from asthma or smoking. Healthy lungs do a great job handling everyday amounts of dust by using mucous to trap foreign particles and cilia (hair like appendages on cells) to push the dusty mucous out. Also, most of those two pounds of dust are settled on the ground where they aren't going to be inhaled.",
"Where is your room exactly that it has two poinds of dust a month?",
"ELI5: How did you figure 2 pounds of dust? Seems like way too much. Just curious.",
"I heard once (maybe from a movie?) that household dust is roughly 80% skin. true?",
"Two POUNDS. Of dust. Every MONTH ...what? Where the hell are you living?",
"Not to worry, thanks to the mucociliary escalator. There are millions of fingerlike projections in your airway that all beat upwards. Goodbye dusty old mucus and hello new clean mucus. [Here's a super cheesy animation](_URL_0_). \n\nAlso check your air filter that's a lot of dust!",
"I really hope someone answers this. I can dust my whole house every day and three days later there is a layer of dust on every surface a centimeter thick. I am not exaggerating but I wish I was.",
"Beakman can ELI5 on this one. _URL_0_"
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9356wm | why do humans see little perfect circles when there is light bloom irl? | I've always noticed these perfect discrete circles of light, especially when it's a light in a dark location. Can anyone explain why it seems to form these perfect circles which almost seem to spread out discretely? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9356wm/eli5_why_do_humans_see_little_perfect_circles/ | {
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"What little perfect circles are you talking about? I don't see them. I do see auras of light around very bright lamps, such as the street lamps at night. Is that what you're referring to?",
"When you look at a single small light spot in the dark, does it have an [Airy Disk](_URL_0_) pattern? If so, it means your eyes are optically really good!\n\nThe airy disk pattern shows up when a lens such as the eye focuses a single light source down to a spot. Because a limited column of light enters your eye, it cannot focus to a sharp single point and instead has some ripples from the center that show up as rings. The closer you are to a symmetric airy disk, you closer you are to having the best possible optical lens.\n\nEveryone's eyes are different so people will have a wide variety of spots that they see. For example, without my glasses, a single spot in the dark becomes a grid of 12 points!"
]
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3wpp8g | what is the piezoelectric effect | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3wpp8g/eli5_what_is_the_piezoelectric_effect/ | {
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"Basically it's where a material will generate electricity if mechanical force is placed on it, and it will vibrate if electricity is placed on it. One of the more interesting aspects of physics, imo. If you get a piezoelectric material (generally quartz) of a specific thickness, it will vibrate at a specific frequency. Always. That's how we get quartz watches."
]
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eoe7l6 | why does chapstick/lip balm make your lips peel more than before you used it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/eoe7l6/eli5_why_does_chapsticklip_balm_make_your_lips/ | {
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"You’re getting a lot of pretty bad responses. The answer is simply that many lip balms contain ingredients that actually dry out, irritate, or sensitize the skin. Common culprits include lanolin, camphor, menthol, vitamin E, artificial fragrances, limonene/linalool, fragrant plant oils, and castor oil. Not everyone will react to all these ingredients, but it’s hard to find products that don’t use at least a few. Fragrances/flavors can also promote lip-licking, which can cause dryness.",
"Oily / waxy substances like chapstick make the dead and dry layers of your lips softer, but they can't make them any less dead. They just make the dead layers peel off easier.\n\nI find that raw apple does a better job of exfoliating my dry lips and getting down to the live healthy layer of skin.",
"I work in a cosmetics manufacturing facility that produces Chapstick brand products for Pfizer (among other companies). I’m one of the people that compounds all the “raw materials” together into a finished product in mixing kettles. I can tell you first hand there’s a lot of nasty stuff that goes into some of these products, some of which can indeed cause skin irritation, as well as respiratory inflammation when they’re heated and give off fumes. PPE like gloves, goggles, and respirator masks are a MUST around this stuff.",
"I actually believe it is because the excess skin that was dry and damaged is falling off, while the chapstick hydrates and moisturizes the healthy skin underneathe.",
"Chapstick/lip balm doesn’t completely keep your lips safe from drying out, and by the time you’ve applied it your lips are already chapped. Then it feels like you need to keep adding coats of chapstick, which is why it feels like it’s having a negative effect.",
"There are many products for your lips that give temporary relief, but contain ingredients that make you reliant on the product. You have to use them more frequently for the same effect. I apologise for commenting without knowing the science, but I was on Accutane (Roaccutane), and I learned this the hard way. I got so addicted to an ordinary drug store product that I had to almost detox on Vaseline - which burned like hell because my lips were so cracked and peeling. Maybe you could research the product you are using to see if you are becoming reliant on it?",
"Besides bad substance issues, lip balms are meant to peel off dead skin cells without further hurting healthy cells. Those cells that are already peeled off and hanging on one's lip cannot go back to moist fresh skin. With lip balms, you can safely peel it off without seeing blood.",
"My wife had a bad reaction to chapstick (full red ring around her lips) the dermatologist recommended Aquaphor but it still has active ingredients. She put it on religiously and it just made things worse. She now uses Vaseline only and uses prescription lipstick. Some of these products are brutal.",
"Chapstick/lipbalm is a class A drug that'll get you hooked in no time. Sure you lips feels moist but then you need a little more and a little more until suddenly you are 50k in debt to your local lip product dealer and still your lips are dry. Be smart kids don't do lip products.",
"It is the mineral oils (usually a petrol derivative. Think Petrolatum Jelly Aka Vaseline) in your Chapstick/lip balm that does that. \nYour skin is unable to absorb them, so they just sit on your skin. Usually, your skin produce something to moisturize itself. But, after you used Chapstick with that kind of ingredients, it sees that there's already something doing its job. So it thinks \"my job is done here, I deserve a day off\"... The more you use it, the more your skin gets lazy. The more your skin gets lazy, the less it produce your lips' natural moisturizer. That is why your lips peel more after you used Chapstick than before you did.\nSource: I'm an esthetician",
"I used to use chapstick all the time and my lips were constantly needing it. I decided to try going without it and I've never gone back. \n\nMy lips get bad once or twice a year now but I just get through it without any product and when I come out the other side I'm all good usually till the next turn of the season. \n\nAny science to all this or is it just in my head and I'm bound to become an anti-vaxxer?"
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1ja3nj | what does the atf do and why are those 3 entities lumped together? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ja3nj/eli5_what_does_the_atf_do_and_why_are_those_3/ | {
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"The ATF is basically defined by just a couple of federal laws, primarily the Volstead Act (Booze), the 1934 National Firearms Act (machine guns, explosives, etc), and a bunch of random excise taxes. They are sort of a weird hybrid between the IRS criminal investigation division (finding tax evaders) and the FBI (prosecuting violations of federal laws). The unifying theme, though, is the taxes- since even the NFA relies on Congress' taxing powers (and is structured as a tax).",
"The ATF grew out of the Treasury Department's Bureau of Prohibition, and was re-purposed in 1968 after the passage of the Gun Control Act.\n\nEDIT: Now to move out of ELI5 territory to make this more comprehensive. The Bureau of Prohibition began under the Treasury Department, and after repeal, dealt solely with alcohol taxation. Then the IRS began to move into its territory. That was dealt with by making the IRS a investigative unit under Treasury's auspices, and the ATU (as the ATF was called at the time) was the enforcement arm. Then the Gun Control Act of 1968 came along, and firearms became taxable, therefore falling under the IRS/ATF umbrella. Tobacco kind of 'fell' into the ATF's purview under the same logic of alcohol taxation/enforcement. A slightly incomplete explanation, since it leaves out several layers of politics and a pissing contest between J. Edgar Hoover and Harry Anslinger, but it covers the process fairly well, I think. ",
"Thanks, you guys! I could keep asking a million questions and will, if you are willing to keep answering, but y'all answered my question very quickly. I actually woke up in the middle of the night wondering this and thought--don't forget to ask reddit tomorrow.",
"I have an interesting experience with the ATF that I think may help explain some of the things they do. Last year in february, I was arrested at my home for a noise violation and subsequently possession of marijuana (they found the stuff because the police saw my guncase and asked where the firearm was. \n\nI only have mine for home defense and sport, not in anyway related to drugs\\pot. About 7 or 8 months later, I went with my gf to go gun shopping as we spend a few weekends a month shooting for fun\\sport. I filled out the federal background check paperwork and was given the response of \"Delayed\". I had gotten approved before the drug incident, but as one of the questions asked \"Are you now a user or have you ever been addicted to a controlled substance\" or something along those lines. Seeing as how I wasnt addicted or smoking, I answered no. \n\n5 days later I called and was told I could come buy my Mossberg 710 .22lr. I picked it up for around $250 and all was well...\n\n2 months later I get a phone call from Special Agent \"Warren\" (different name) with the ATFE. He asks me about the purchase, and a few other questions and it turns out that by answering the background check question \"No\"and purchasing the rifle I had violated federal law and was looking at 10 years in federal prison. All while coding at my desk at work. \n\nTo make a long story short, he said I could go sell the gun back to vendor, (I got $150) and get rid of my ammunition. I had over 5,000 rounds of .22(about 10 boxes--this is when you could find it). So I'm pissed and mad but at the same time I avoided legal trouble and just went with the whole \"lesson learned\" mantra. \n\nA week goes by and the agent calls me again. He references the original police report where they had found my gun, and subsequently arrested me for possession. He then tells me I have to get rid of my .40 Sig Sauer that I've had for over 5 years. \n\nI can either sell it or transfer to a family member. Seeing as my sister is the only family near me, I get him and her connected and he sets up the transfer. We all meet at her house and fill out paper work for the gun, my background and hers. Once it's all done and finished he tells me I can have the gun back a year from the date of the arrest. \n\nHe then threatens to throw my sister and husband in jail along with me if they provide me access to the weapon at any time before that date. \n\nTHEN, he gives me a 25 minute lecture about the dangers of smoking pot, (which to this day I've stopped smoking as my career has lent itself to being more enticing) and he would have gone on for another hour it seemed before my brother in made him leave. Both of them defended the choices I've made as well as how I've changed things in my daily life. \n\nTL;DR The point is the ATFE enforces federal laws on substances and weapons. ",
"They are also the group distilleries report excise tax to. TTB is a subset of the ATF. ",
"Because no Government agency goes away once its created. ",
"5-year-old answer: The ATF grew out of the department of the treasury division responsible for collecting taxes/prosecuting offenders of dangerous tax stamp industries. These people were called \"revenoors\" and usually dealt with bootleggers who were trying to undercut legitimate businesses in the alcohol and tobacco industries at the turn of the 20th century. Typically these were people smuggling in booze or cigars and trying to avoid paying taxes.\n\nThen prohibition came, and the job changed. The ATU was formed from the original group in 1920 as america essentially created gangland violence out of thin air by making fun illegal, and where fun is illegal only criminals have fun. And booze. And machine guns.\n\nThe ATU was eventually moved from Treasury to Justice, and was even a division of the FBI for a few years until 1933 where famous members like Elliot Ness and the Untouchables fought gangsters for the right to collect taxes on imported alcohol and other forms of fun. In 1933 Prohibition ended and the ATU was returned to Treasury.\n\nAs the units of the ATU had proven highly successful in dealing with armed and combative tax-dodgers through the 20s and 30s, it was decided that tax collection and enforcement for guns would be their job as well, though this was really just an extension of their responsibilities related to gangland violence as the only taxed weapons were machine guns (i.e. they weren't enforcing private citizen access to rifles or handguns as the gun control act was still decades away).\n\nIn the 1950s, the government consolidated the enforcement of the tobacco industry into the ATU, creating the ATTD.\n\nIn 1968 congress enacted the Gun Control Act and placed new restrictions (i.e. taxes) on guns. The ATTD was turned into the ATF.\n\nIn 2003, the ATF was returned to Justice, rebranded the BATFE, and will probably be there for another decade before they go back to being tax collectors.\n\nGrown-up Answer: The ATF under whatever name is a bunch of tax collectors. The only way this country can actually OUTLAW something that would be considered a personal liberty (say, pot) is to have a tax stamp requirement that can't be met. This was the way prohibition ACTUALLY worked. If you want to stop private citizens from doing \"a thing\" you make the tax on that thing SUPER EXPENSIVE and IMPOSSIBLE to get, and then give heavily armed people the power to enforce the taxes that you won't let people pay even if they wanted to.\n\nWorks for alcohol, works for tobacco, works for things that go bang.\n\nPossession of marijuana is a tax violation. Possession of a machine gun is a tax violation. Some tax violations have fines. Some will send you to jail. The people who used to enforce those \"taxes\" were scary dudes with heavy weapons.\n\nRuby Ridge, Waco, every other separatists' wet-dream...were actually tax stamp enforcement actions. ATF. Not Justice. Not FBI...the freaking TREASURY department.\n\nIs the BATFE neutered? No...but it's just an arm of an often confused and self-defeating Justice department. Be afraid when they go back to Treasury...the tax man doesn't mess around."
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51yz37 | why is the iphone 7 waterproof in 1 meter deep water, but not any deeper? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/51yz37/eli5_why_is_the_iphone_7_waterproof_in_1_meter/ | {
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"Because water pressure increases the deeper you go into water and something that can withhold the pressure of 1M of water can't necessarily withhold the pressure of 10M of water. ",
"Add-on question: Why upto 30 mins? What changes after 30 minutes?",
"The deeper something is in water, the more pressure it's subjected to--there's more water weighing on top of it. (This is also true for other liquids and gases; air pressure on Mt. Everest is much lower than at sea level.) At a high water pressure, the water might be able to bypass seals and other protective measures, which is why things aren't \"waterproof\" in an absolute sense but only up to a certain pressure.\n\nKeep in mind that water depth in this case is just a way to express static pressure. You could subject the iPhone to more pressure even in water that's less deep, such as by spraying it with pressurized water or forcefully moving through water, and it wouldn't be waterproof under that circumstance."
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7i1kx9 | why are printers so much harder to configure than other appliances? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7i1kx9/eli5_why_are_printers_so_much_harder_to_configure/ | {
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"1. Printers aren't really an appliance. They're a computer peripheral.\n\n2. In what ways are printers hard to configure? Sometimes drivers can be a pain, but again, that's a computer thing, not an appliance thing. Once installed they're fairly simple to utilize. Print. Change color settings if you feel like it or just use defaults. Done. "
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8fy00z | how does a coil generate a magnetic force? | Most answers I've read assume I know what happens at the atomic level. I know about the flow of electricity sure, but I don't know why coils specifically have the same properties as a typical bar magnet. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8fy00z/eli5_how_does_a_coil_generate_a_magnetic_force/ | {
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"When electrical current flows through a conductor, it creates a magnetic field around the wire. This field is oriented such that the lines of Force revolve around the axis of the wire. When this wire is coiled, aligns all of these magnetic fields into one large magnetic field. Essentially, it adds the magnetic forces together. Vsauce has a very good video on this on YouTube.\n\nElectricity and magnetism are very closely related. If you are interested in learning more about the physics behind these phenomena, I suggest picking up a copy of a book I studied while I was in middle school, entitled “Physics Simplified”. It contained many helpful explanations. It served for me as an ELI5, except it was an ELI11 because I was 11. I believe a pdf May be available online, but I was unable to find it as I am on mobile. "
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|
6hfmov | how come europeans measure everything with the metric system except screens/monitors and wheels? | I've lived in Europe for almost 4 years and these are the only exceptions I've noticed. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6hfmov/eli5_how_come_europeans_measure_everything_with/ | {
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"Industry Standards. Some regulations or standardization rules were developed first in areas where the metric system was not used, thus it became industry standard for an international company (even if they are in a country that uses the metric system) to report standardized figures in the original measuring system. This is really common for components for larger machines (wheels for cars have to fit around brake calipers, computer computer monitors have to fit in tight desks and require compatibility with a GPU, etc) because it would be nearly impossible for anyone to find the correct sized parts for a bigger machine like a car or computer if the measuring system were different for each part. ",
"I recall years ago Austin attemted to use a metric sized wheel here in the UK (I'm sure BMW have tried it too), But all this did was make the tyres harder to get and more expensive. Wheels have stayed in Inches because it's just too costly for everyone to change."
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43jtyt | how do the high explosive shells of naval artillery explode on impact? how do the armor piercing shells explode once they've penetrated armor and are inside a ship? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/43jtyt/eli5_how_do_the_high_explosive_shells_of_naval/ | {
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"text": [
"Shells that go off on impact use a simple [contact fuze](_URL_2_). Armor-piercing shells (like HEAT rounds), however, don't actually explode inside anything. Rather, they explode just outside the armor, sending forward a jet of molten metal which does the actual penetration. These types of warheads are called shaped charges and take advantage of the [Munroe effect](_URL_0_). Here is a [video](_URL_1_) demonstrating how they operate.\n\nNote, there are other types of armor-piercing shells (like APFSDS rounds) that utilize pure kinetic energy--these are essentially ultra-high-powered metal darts."
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjH0tpnisLo",
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||
nissp | why don't people check wikipedia before submitting an eli5 post? | Hmm... | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/nissp/eli5_why_dont_people_check_wikipedia_before/ | {
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"text": [
"Did you look up human psychology and laziness/natural enegy conserving before posting this?",
"Did you look up human psychology and laziness/natural enegy conserving before posting this?"
]
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|
69om27 | how is the value of a new floating currency determined? | In forex trading, what determines the 'value' of a currency? Especially when it's being initially floated? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/69om27/eli5_how_is_the_value_of_a_new_floating_currency/ | {
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"text": [
"every morning in the market square they will auction off one forex. however many goats the winning bid is gets translated to their weight in salt and the salt is then sold on the open market. the value of the salt then becomes the price of one forex for the day. this process is repeated at 4:37 every morning.\n\n"
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5pzk6v | how does our brain "edit out" our nose from our line of sight? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5pzk6v/eli5how_does_our_brain_edit_out_our_nose_from_our/ | {
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"The same way you stop noticing anything else. It is always there completely unmoving and unchanged. It's there in your view and your brain sees it but compared to everything else in the view it's so unimportant that you ignore it. ",
"Its similar to [this image](_URL_0_) looking through binoculars. As long as you are looking straight ahead. In reality you do see your nose. Close one eye and look straight ahead at the computer screen. Do you see your nose? Of course you do. Its even there when both eyes are open but when both eyes are open the perspective viewpoint differences cancel each other out to some degree. Your nose is still there but it seems smaller or truncated."
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"https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=view+trough+binoculars&view=detailv2&&id=25BD60081D498498C2C80558258DC9CA2B06B085&selectedIndex=37&ccid=kEijzOBx&simid=608012996432169687&thid=OIP.kEijzOBxRdcIrmibWWvp1AEsCh&ajaxhist=0"
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2ryadv | deep sea exploration. what's being done and what has been done? | I'm just curious regarding the exploration of the deep deep sea, what has been done to uncover the secrets and is anything planned in the near future?
And what has been found so far. Why can't they just send a submarine down and see what they find? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ryadv/eli5_deep_sea_exploration_whats_being_done_and/ | {
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"I have a friend who is a hadal (deep deep sea) ecologist so I'll answer with what I know from talking to her. \n\nWhat do we know? very little. Her PhD dissertation is trying to figure out what is down there and what they eat - in other words, the most basic ecological questions you could possibly ask. \n\nWhat's being done? Exploration. She has been on several cruises already in the past year to different trenches where they use a variety of equipment (including submarine type robot vehicles) to collect organisms and try to see what they can find. Once they have animals they do genetic analysis and look at stomach content, etc. \n\nThere's still a lot to be done - it is a branch of science that is wide open for discovery and will really start taking off soon. It's pretty amazing and exciting really, that with everything we know about the planet and beyond we are still at such a basic level of understanding about the deepest parts of the ocean."
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9xberc | why do drafts of air extinguish small fires (e.g. candles) , yet intensify larger fires (e.g. bonfires)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9xberc/eli5_why_do_drafts_of_air_extinguish_small_fires/ | {
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"Imagine a wave of food falling on a starving child. Imagine that same wave of food crashing into an obese person.",
"For most fires you have a _URL_0_ that illustrate what is needed for combustion. \n\n\nThat is heat, fuel, oxygen. if you remove one the fire can no longer burn. Blowing on a fire will reduce the temperature and it can no longer burn. \n\nLarge fire have a lot of mass that is warm so is is hard to cool them down. The speed they burn at is limited by the amount of oxygen that is available. So a wind will increase the amount of oxygen and it will burn more and produce more heat.\n\nA candle is not limited by oxygen but by fuel because the the was has to be wicked up the wick to the flame so extra oxygen do not increase the heat output to a high degree.\n\nSo if the extra heat that is produced is higher then the cooling from the air the fire will burn. \n\nIf you have a small fire and produce the ariflow your selfe by blowing or moving a tray to create a draft you can see that the ember that is hit first by the air will glow less or not at all because the get cooler but when the air get warmer the ember start to glow more as they have a increased amount of oxygen.\n\n\n\nWhen you put out a large fire with water the primary way you put is out is by cooling it down and not by removing the oxygen. It take a lot of energy to heat up water and to turn it into water vapor. That will cool down the fire so it will not longer burn.\n\n\n"
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||
2a0yn0 | if there have been no major flight terrorism incidents recently, why is the tsa still "beefing up" security measures constantly? | Maybe I'm not watching the right news, but there hasn't been much in last 5ish years of people trying to attack planes. Despite this, it seems like the Tsa is putting new requirements out every few weeks. The most recent of which, dead phones don't fly, made me think of this question. Why do they have all this power if what they are supposedly protecting us from isn't that big of a threat right now? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2a0yn0/eli5_if_there_have_been_no_major_flight_terrorism/ | {
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"Administration is pushing this story in the news and a media blitz about this \"new threat\" is part of it. The rise of ISIS as the #1 jihadi group has placed incredible pressure on the old-style Al-Qaeda groups, which face irrelevance in the near future if they don't get their shit together and do something high profile. \n\nTSA is designed to provide the feeling of security. Most of these measures are there just to make the public feel good about themselves. If the TSA is actually in a position to stop an attack, all our best preventative measures have already failed. The organization effectively only exists because no politician is willing to be the guy who voted to defund the TSA and then a terrorist attack hits."
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abnyrp | for the average person, what would be the basic steps between having a million dollar idea for a product, and manufacturing and selling that product? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/abnyrp/eli5_for_the_average_person_what_would_be_the/ | {
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"First you'd probably need to register as a business, through whatever method is existing in your jurisdiction (you don't have to, but I'd really, really recommend it).\n\nThen you'd need to figure out how you're producing it. Do you need to hire someone to produce it because you need facilities you don't have, or can you produce it in your garage?\n\nThen you need to set up a store page, either by making your own website or using something like etsy, ebay, or amazon.\n\nThat's about it really.",
"Just to give you a bit of perspective, the idea is probably the easiest part of bringing a product to market. Here is a quick (non-exhaustive list) of thing that are involved in going from idea to an actual product.\n\n* Creating a detailed engineering design for the product\n* Figuring out how to physically create the product\n* Finding a manufacturer or figuring out how to manufacture the product yourself\n* Raising money to finance the production\n* Figuring out the logistics of getting the finished product to your customer. (This is a big one that involves many sub-steps)\n* Testing the final product for functionality and safety\n* Advertising the product\n* Setting up customer service and returns"
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3p7xi9 | why are adobe products so expensive? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3p7xi9/eli5why_are_adobe_products_so_expensive/ | {
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"There are many reasons why:\n\nAdobe's softwares are the results of a long time of research and programing, they are to say the least, products of great quality and gives other businesses tools to create their activity and make profit for themselves. \n\n\nAdobe's consumers are mainly businesses and they can afford a larger cost than individual people, the price is chosen in order to make adobe's products professional more than personal, the bigger your business is the most expensive it gets. \n\n\nAdobe changed how they priced: before you bought photoshop for example but now you monthly subscribe and you get many of adobe's products with photoshop, like premiere, after effects, indesign, illustrator, etc... And adobe's cloud capabilities. \n\n\nAdobe also gained a reputation, because their products are well known and give a certain level of quality, Adobe can easily rise their prices without risking a huge fall of their clients. ",
"1. **Money**. Could I say more about this?\n2. **Its target audience**. Adobe products aren't aimed at the average Joe that just needs to get the work done - this isn't Microsoft Office! For example, I doubt that an accountant would ever have to use Photoshop! Since its target audience is the \"professional\" crowd, they can charge more for a product for professionals.\n3. **Its \"seal of trust\"**. Nowadays, Adobe is a trusted company, which means that people are more likely to invest in Adobe - that is, buy their products and hope they do the job well. However, as other contenders (e.g GIMP, _URL_0_) don't have that \"seal of trust\", the professional crowd is less likely to invest in **those** programs."
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2y9zs5 | i get that muscles generate force, but how do they do it? why do bigger muscles mean more force generated? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2y9zs5/eli5i_get_that_muscles_generate_force_but_how_do/ | {
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"Not necessarily more force, but more force in a given period of time. Muscles generate force by processing and releasing stored energy, which causes them to contract, (for example, contracting your biceps pulls your forearm up). Generally, the bigger the muscles, the more energy can be released at once. I say \"generally\" because it isn't all about size. It's also about density. Bruce Lee, for example, didn't have very big muscles, but they were very dense due to all his training."
]
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1d9nmf | how tv ratings work | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1d9nmf/eli5_how_tv_ratings_work/ | {
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"For clarification: content ratings ([listed here](_URL_0_))? Or popularity ratings ([mentioned here](_URL_1_))? Both have more info if you search in the sidebar, but if someone has a good explanation then go for it!",
"There are two different ways Nielsen measures ratings in the United States, either by a set top box or someone takes a daily journal of what they watch and when.\n\n\nThese numbers are separated into two numbers, rating and share. Rating goes by points. One ratings point is one percent of the total number of households with TVs. So if a show has a rating of 5, that means that 5 percent of people with TVs are watching that show.\n\n\nShare is similar but the difference is share takes into account the percentage of people actually watching TV. So a show might have a rating of 5, or 5% of households with TVs, but it might have a 15 share, which is the percentage of people actually watching TV are tuned to that show.\n\n\nNetworks then use these numbers to determine how much they can charge of advertising time during shows. Higher ratings = ability to charge more. That's why Super Bowl ads are so expensive.\n\n\nEDIT: Grammar",
"Former Nielsen field representative (equipment installer) here, should anyone wish to know how the equipment & systems work. \n\nI was around long enough to have worked with the old systems that we literally had to solder onto the mainboards of VCRs, TVs, and DTS / Cable boxes. DVRs and flat-panel TV's destroyed that metering method, so Nielsen switched to a more passive metering solution that works off audio, to explain it simply."
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3aa5lf | what would be the impact on the electrical grid if everyone had electric cars? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3aa5lf/eli5_what_would_be_the_impact_on_the_electrical/ | {
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"From what I understand, one of the challenges that the grids face is not just making sure there is enough power overall but making sure production can match the spikes in demand. Tesla recently came out with a battery for you home that acts as a reservoir of power that can also charge their electric cars. If everyone (or at least most folks with an electric car) had something like that then the tightrope between power surplus/deficit would be easier to manage.. Hopefully improving efficiently as well.",
"The vast majority of your electricity costs all year round are used to satisfy peak demand: the highest energy usage that happens in summer for a week or two where everything is on. Adding to this would be extremely costly and require additional power plants which have a massive cost. \n\nThe thing about electricity is that it is not like water. If people need 1001 GW of energy and you only have 1000 GW, everything black outs. This doesn't happen if you are missing other things like water/goods. Any electricity not used is lost, you can't use 'the grid' to store energy for later. This may be circumvented with things like batteries, but they are extremely expensive, enough that it isn't viable to use them over fossil fuels.\n\nUntil our energy production is switched from fossil fuels, there is no benefit for having electric cars. We will need massive adoption of alternative energies **and** the price of battery storage to go down significantly before electric cars are viable."
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3j45bm | how do they confirm/claim that so and so is killed in air/drone strike? | Do they have a ground force that verifies? How can they identify the victim from air? Does the target organization acknowledge the loss? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3j45bm/eli5_how_do_they_confirmclaim_that_so_and_so_is/ | {
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"For the purposes of this discussion, there are two types of targets in a drone strike, actively engaged militants. The various cameras, ground units, observe the people actively do something, such as fire weapons, set up an IED, etc. Once that's done, they know the people in the blast radius of the attack are militants. \n\nOthers are targets of command/control. For example, they observe a building where various messengers go, or they intercept cell phone or radio traffic. If you know a building is full of leaders, and you know who the leaders are, you can be reasonably sure that leader was in that building. \\\n\nIn some cases, a battle damage assessment patrol is set out, other cases, observation drones monitor the target afterwards, radio traffic is monitored. All of those give clues as to how effective an attack was, and who was killed in the attack."
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azaekd | why do people see a red or blue glow on edges of objects on wearing glasses (looking sideways towards the object)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/azaekd/eli5_why_do_people_see_a_red_or_blue_glow_on/ | {
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"Chromatic aberration, it is due to light of different frequency being bent different amounts by a lens. It is why a prism can be used to split light into a rainbow, and it is attempted to be minimized for optical lenses (but usually shows up at the edges regardless)."
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kl43u | what would happen if you were in outer space naked? | Is it true your blood would boil? What does blood boil mean? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/kl43u/eli5_what_would_happen_if_you_were_in_outer_space/ | {
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"\"When the human body is suddenly exposed to the vacuum of space, a number of injuries begin to occur immediately. Though they are relatively minor at first, they accumulate rapidly into a life-threatening combination. The first effect is the expansion of gases within the lungs and digestive tract due to the reduction of external pressure. A victim of explosive decompression greatly increases their chances of survival simply by exhaling within the first few seconds, otherwise death is likely to occur once the lungs rupture and spill bubbles of air into the circulatory system. Such a life-saving exhalation might be due to a shout of surprise, though it would naturally go unheard where there is no air to carry it.\"\n",
"Your blood does not boil - your body exerts enough pressure on your blood vessels to keep it in liquid phase. Liquids located on the surface - such as tears on your eyes and saliva on your tongue - _does_ boil. Boiling simply means that the vapour pressure of the liquid is at or exceeds the ambient pressure. Usually one achieves this by increasing the temperature of the liquid, but it can be done by decreasing the ambient pressure as well. In the case of being in outer space, since the outside pressure is so low, the liquid boils at body temperature.",
"Interesting read, I think it answers your question.\n\n\"If you don't try to hold your breath, exposure to space for half a minute or so is unlikely to produce permanent injury. Holding your breath is likely to damage your lungs, something scuba divers have to watch out for when ascending, and you'll have eardrum trouble if your Eustachian tubes are badly plugged up, but theory predicts -- and animal experiments confirm -- that otherwise, exposure to vacuum causes no immediate injury. You do not explode. Your blood does not boil. You do not freeze. You do not instantly lose consciousness.\n\nVarious minor problems (sunburn, possibly \"the bends\", certainly some [mild, reversible, painless] swelling of skin and underlying tissue) start after ten seconds or so. At some point you lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. Injuries accumulate. After perhaps one or two minutes, you're dying. The limits are not really known.\n\nYou do not explode and your blood does not boil because of the containing effect of your skin and circulatory system. You do not instantly freeze because, although the space environment is typically very cold, heat does not transfer away from a body quickly. Loss of consciousness occurs only after the body has depleted the supply of oxygen in the blood. If your skin is exposed to direct sunlight without any protection from its intense ultraviolet radiation, you can get a very bad sunburn.\n\nAt NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center (now renamed Johnson Space Center) we had a test subject accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) in an incident involving a leaking space suit in a vacuum chamber back in '65. He remained conscious for about 14 seconds, which is about the time it takes for O2 deprived blood to go from the lungs to the brain. The suit probably did not reach a hard vacuum, and we began repressurizing the chamber within 15 seconds. The subject regained consciousness at around 15,000 feet equivalent altitude. The subject later reported that he could feel and hear the air leaking out, and his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil.\"\n\nSource: _URL_0_",
"\"When the human body is suddenly exposed to the vacuum of space, a number of injuries begin to occur immediately. Though they are relatively minor at first, they accumulate rapidly into a life-threatening combination. The first effect is the expansion of gases within the lungs and digestive tract due to the reduction of external pressure. A victim of explosive decompression greatly increases their chances of survival simply by exhaling within the first few seconds, otherwise death is likely to occur once the lungs rupture and spill bubbles of air into the circulatory system. Such a life-saving exhalation might be due to a shout of surprise, though it would naturally go unheard where there is no air to carry it.\"\n",
"Your blood does not boil - your body exerts enough pressure on your blood vessels to keep it in liquid phase. Liquids located on the surface - such as tears on your eyes and saliva on your tongue - _does_ boil. Boiling simply means that the vapour pressure of the liquid is at or exceeds the ambient pressure. Usually one achieves this by increasing the temperature of the liquid, but it can be done by decreasing the ambient pressure as well. In the case of being in outer space, since the outside pressure is so low, the liquid boils at body temperature.",
"Interesting read, I think it answers your question.\n\n\"If you don't try to hold your breath, exposure to space for half a minute or so is unlikely to produce permanent injury. Holding your breath is likely to damage your lungs, something scuba divers have to watch out for when ascending, and you'll have eardrum trouble if your Eustachian tubes are badly plugged up, but theory predicts -- and animal experiments confirm -- that otherwise, exposure to vacuum causes no immediate injury. You do not explode. Your blood does not boil. You do not freeze. You do not instantly lose consciousness.\n\nVarious minor problems (sunburn, possibly \"the bends\", certainly some [mild, reversible, painless] swelling of skin and underlying tissue) start after ten seconds or so. At some point you lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. Injuries accumulate. After perhaps one or two minutes, you're dying. The limits are not really known.\n\nYou do not explode and your blood does not boil because of the containing effect of your skin and circulatory system. You do not instantly freeze because, although the space environment is typically very cold, heat does not transfer away from a body quickly. Loss of consciousness occurs only after the body has depleted the supply of oxygen in the blood. If your skin is exposed to direct sunlight without any protection from its intense ultraviolet radiation, you can get a very bad sunburn.\n\nAt NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center (now renamed Johnson Space Center) we had a test subject accidentally exposed to a near vacuum (less than 1 psi) in an incident involving a leaking space suit in a vacuum chamber back in '65. He remained conscious for about 14 seconds, which is about the time it takes for O2 deprived blood to go from the lungs to the brain. The suit probably did not reach a hard vacuum, and we began repressurizing the chamber within 15 seconds. The subject regained consciousness at around 15,000 feet equivalent altitude. The subject later reported that he could feel and hear the air leaking out, and his last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil.\"\n\nSource: _URL_0_"
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1tdnep | how do people develop an immunity to something? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1tdnep/eli5_how_do_people_develop_an_immunity_to/ | {
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"The simplest way is by exposure. If you go to a foreign country you might get sick from drinking the tap water but residents do not. They've developed the appropriate bacteria in their digestive system so it does not affect them.\n\nLet's use children as another example, after enough exposure they become less annoying! ",
"Part of your immune system is comprised of specialized blood cells called B cells (If you're interested, you can ask me why, but it's not that interesting). The B cells produce proteins called antibodies. The antibodies are basically protein receptors, but unlike most receptors in our bodies, they are highly variable (I can also explain why that is, but it's too long to put in here). Anyway, this means that each B cell, of which we have millions, effectively produces a different type of antibody, and each different antibody can bind to a different thing. Usually these things are foreign proteins or sugar molecules (but we don't know all the limits).\n\nWhen an infectious agent, like a virus or bacterium, invades your body, they might happen upon a B cell that produces an antibody that can bind to them. This B cell, then starts to rapidly proliferate into cells called plasma cells (which are basically just antibody factories) and memory B cells. The antibodies glom onto the invader and signal other immune cells to destroy it. After the infection is cleared, the plasma cells die off, but the memory cells remain. Thus, if the same invader comes again, they're ready for it, and begin to produce tons of antibodies again which help clear the invader even faster than the last time (called a secondary response).\n\nThe reason it's impossible to develop immunity against some things, like influenza is because those surface proteins that the antibodies recognize evolve very quickly and are highly variable in the flu virus population such that it's possible that even when you get it once, the next time you get it, it's unrecognizable to your immune system, and it doesn't get that super-efficient secondary response.\n\nThings like the chicken pox virus, though, don't change their surface proteins very much at all and are the same throughout the viral population, so getting one infection basically means your immune system can recognize *any* chicken pox virus infection. And thus vaccines and acquired immunity work for these types of viruses and bacteria.",
"So ill get a little technical here... But first a pathogen is introduced into the body. Lets say... A cut in your body. Well, there are these cells that are part of the innate immune system, or the immune system that you always have ready to go which are called macrophages and dendrocytes. They are pretty similar in function, but they are called professional antigen presenting cells. That will come up later. \n\nThese macrophages take in the bacteria/virus and process it. They then express MHC II or MHC I. Only professional APC (antigen presenting cells) can present MHC II, another important APC is the B cell. Every other cell in the body, except for red blood cells and neurons express MHC I. \n\nMHC II cells activate CD4, or helper T cells. And MHC I activates CD8, or cytotoxic B cells. \n\nAnyway, if a macrophages take up the external body, then they have to wait for naive T or B cells to show up. But Dendritic cells on the other hand, actually travel to your lymph nodes. This is where B and T cells are processed and activated with much higher efficiency. When the T cells see this MHC II on the cell surface of the dendritic cell, they can differentiate. After about 7 days of cell division in order to form an \"army\" against the foreign body, the T cells start to die off, but a small amount are kept as \"memory\" T cells, that are ready to spring into action if the body sees the pathogen again. \n\nNow B cells are another specialized, or adaptive immune system component. The B cell is kind of chilling in the blood waiting to see something awesome. They have this thing called the \"B cell receptor\" which recognized foreign shit and internalizes it and presents it as MHC II in order to help CD4 T cells, or helper T cells. In the bone marrow and lymph nodes, the B cells go through something called negative selection and then positive selection. (T cells go through positive selection first and then negative selection, but that's a different point). the negative selection makes sure it can actually bind to stuff and the positive selection makes sure it wont bind to anything in the body that might be important. Anyway this B cell has gone through a selection process, and once it is ready it goes into the blood and kind of circulates. Once it finds something, it starts to divide and present information to the CD4 T cell. Like the t cell, it will spend some time mounting a response but then eventually die, except some of them are kept alive for a quick response. The B cells have different antibodies meant for different sections of the body. IgE is for allergies, IgG is the main one, IgA is for mucus bodies, etc... but that's beyond the point.\n\nTL;DR. You have T cells and B cells. They activate each other in complex ways, but once you're body finds T and B cells that work, they divide. Eventually they die, but a small amount are kept alive in case the fucker decides to invade your body again. \n"
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7cqrfy | why do we eat maple syrup but not pine syrup or elm syrup or oak syrup? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7cqrfy/eli5_why_do_we_eat_maple_syrup_but_not_pine_syrup/ | {
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"Simply because the sap of the sugar maple tree is incredibly high in sugar. These others do not compare -- they don't taste good.",
"We can and do eat birch syrup, walnut syrup, and the syrups of a few other trees.\n\nThe key isn't as much the sugar content, the key is that the sap needs to be relatively neutral tasting, because of how much it has to be reduced to thicken it. The saps of deciduous hardwoods (maple, birch, etc) seem to work especially well here.\n\nAs far as why maple, I suspect it just tastes the most pleasant, although certainly it is to a large degree cultural as well - consider by analogy how almost any grain or fruit can be used to make alcohol, yet the large majority of world alcohol is made only using a few specific grains and fruits."
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3nql7s | with all the economic sanctions that are in place against russia and with the general state their economy is in, how can russia afford to invest so much into their syrian campaign? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3nql7s/eli5_with_all_the_economic_sanctions_that_are_in/ | {
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"When economists say scary words like *recession* and *collapsing* economy, they usually mean that the economy of a country stopped growing short term. Russia is 3.2%^^made ^^up poorer than it was in January, 2015? That means it’s collapsing!\n\nThey obviously can send 100% of the troops they could send then, or even more if they want.",
"Russian GDP is down 3%, inflation is 10%. The oil is two times cheaper, but the rouble is two times cheaper too, which means the budget gets exactly the same revenue as before. Russia has not downsized any programs so far, including its military budget. It has near zero external debt and $400B in cash reserves. It still gives loans measured in billions of dollars to other countries. \"The general state their economy is in\" and \"economic sanctions\" exist mostly in your tabloids."
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7ilg18 | why do video games all have such similar bugs? | Why do video games, made for years and years, by different companies all over the planet tend to have the same sort of bugs and technical difficulties?
For instance, falling through the map, items floating when they should be attached to someone or in their hands, ragdolls becoming kites that fly around. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7ilg18/eli5_why_do_video_games_all_have_such_similar_bugs/ | {
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"They're probably bugs that are inherent to animation and the physics coding behind them. You see a lot of similar issues when making cgi animation for movies. ",
"because developers don't start truly from scratch every time... even if their **code** is written from scratch, the **ideas** for \"how do i check what's bumping into what\" \"how do i make something ragdoll\" all tend to be implemented in similar ways. Someone at some company years ago figured out a good way to do it and they're just tweaking that same strategy rather than waste time inventing their own.\n\n",
"Modelling collision can be done in several ways. You can do it in a way which is basically perfect in terms of not having glitches of going through floors, etc., but it would require vastly more processing power and you would not be able to do it in real time for a complicated game.\n\nInstead, they cut corners, lots of corners, with the calculations. Almost all of the time it works fine, and the performance is orders of magnitude better. Because different developers use the same shortcuts to get to where they want to go, they tend to have similar issues."
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1sxy62 | how do official movie soundtracks work? sometimes i hear the song in the movie and other times i don't. | I was listening to a soundtrack to a movie the other day, and I realized I didn't hear any of the songs on the soundtrack in the actual movie. But there have been times when I've been listening to a soundtrack where I have heard all of the songs in the movie. Do they make songs that are themed like the movie? I'm just pretty confused on why there would be an official soundtrack for a movie but the songs don't appear in the actual movie. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1sxy62/eli5how_do_official_movie_soundtracks_work/ | {
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"Sometimes you'll see on a soundtrack where it says \"songs inspired by\". So sometimes not all the songs get used in the movie or were never meant to be used in the movie at all. Sometimes songs will get licensed to be used in a movie, but that song will be cut from the final cut of the movie because it didn't work thematically or tonally in the scenes of the film. A lot of times a soundtrack is just another way to advertise the movie. I think a recent example would be the latest Hunger Games movie. It had a soundtrack with current artists on it, but far as I can remember none of them were actually used in the movie. A soundtrack was really only compiled as another product to help sell the film.\n\nSo..there's many reasons.",
"Before I answer, we may as well clarify some terminology here since it's relevant.\n\nPractically speaking, a \"soundtrack\" contains \"songs\"—a song specifically refers to music with vocals/lyrics.\n\nConversely, an \"original score\" contains \"pieces/tracks/cues/etc.\"—instrumental music is *not* a \"song\".\n\nSo The Hunger Games soundtrack contains songs from or inspired by the film. In recent years it's been more the latter than the former. As sexandliquor pointed out, it's more about marketing than anything else. Chances are any soundtrack that you buy these days will just have songs. People don't tend to buy score albums as much, so the studios don't bother publishing them as readily.\n\nThe Lord of the Rings scores, on the other hand, contain original music written by Howard Shore for the film. The normal releases only have a small fraction of the massive amount of material, whereas the extended editions contain almost all of it. This is an exception, not the rule. The simple fact there were re-released special editions is rare, as they actually sold well unlike most score albums.\n\nGenerally, score albums contain only the best parts of a movie's underscore, as a lot of the material is too subtle to be worth including on a disk and would make for an unexciting listening experience.\n\nTo confuse things further, sometimes a \"soundtrack\" album is actually a score album with a few songs tacked onto the end of it. This is a sort of hybrid. Generally speaking, if you say \"soundtrack\" people will think of both the original score and songs associated with the films, but technically there's a distinction.\n\nBut \"songs\" are always pieces of music with lyrics, no matter how many times you hear people using \"song\" to refer to any piece of music. At least, this is true if you care to be proper in your terminology. :P"
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41ii94 | how come a soft cookie becomes hard when it is stale while a hard cookie gets soft? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41ii94/eli5_how_come_a_soft_cookie_becomes_hard_when_it/ | {
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"Because they adjust to the humidity of the surrounding air. The \"humidity\" of fresh soft cookies is above the humidity of air, so they get drier with time. However, the humidity of fresh dry cookies is lower than the humidity of the surrounding air, so they get moister with time. ",
"Reminds me of a famous court case, Cookies soften when going stale, cakes harden, \n_URL_0_",
"Sorry for not really providing an answer to your question, but I do think this may be helpful to you. If you bake cookies and want them to stay soft, put a slice of bread in whatever container you keep the cookies in (bag, box, etc.. just make sure you can close it reasonably tight). The bread will become hard as a rock eventually and the cookies will stay nice and soft. However, I have had a few batches get even softer, almost to the point of too soft, so keep an eye on that."
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7h9mp8 | how does graphite stay on paper? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7h9mp8/eli5_how_does_graphite_stay_on_paper/ | {
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"Graphite is relatively soft, and as you scrape it along a surface, tiny bits of it crumble away and stay behind. These bits are insaaanely individually tiny and make up an extremely fine powder. \nPaper is not as smooth as you might think. It's covered in ridges and pores and little valleys. \n\nSo as you are dragging the graphite along a piece of paper and leaving the trail of ultra fine powder behind it, you're also applying a bit of pressure between the pencil tip and the paper, effectively packing the graphite dust into all those grooves and pores and ridges in the paper. \n\nErasers work because they're soft and also extremely porous, wich allows them to sink into the textures along the surface of the paper and collect that graphite dust up in it's own surface, taking it from the paper. As you can imagine this process doesn't work perfectly every swipe, which is why erasers sometimes leave smudges behind. "
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1l68f5 | why put money into savings, with inflation being so high? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1l68f5/eli5_why_put_money_into_savings_with_inflation/ | {
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"It's a largely safe investment compared to other things. A steady interest rate makes people feel more secure than investing that money in stocks or real estate.",
"Inflation is very *low* right now.\n\nThat said, putting your money in a savings account is generally the least-good way to save it. It has the virtue of giving you nearly unfettered access to your money — your bank will have limits on how frequently you can make withdrawals — but as a store of value, there are better choices by far.",
"Convenience. The interest rates are generally crap, but it's really easy and you still have your money easily accessible. In the long run you're generally better off in putting your money for example in a sensible fund with a diversified portfolio. The market portfolio's value should rise faster than any savings account interest on average, but of course banks do offer steady nominal interest rates which does reduce the risk even if it's fairly low in the long run in a diversified enough portfolio."
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anb1gr | why is ‘utopia’ preceded by ‘a’ instead of ‘an’ ? | for instance, 'i tried to build a utopia' | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/anb1gr/eli5_why_is_utopia_preceded_by_a_instead_of_an/ | {
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"Because we put \"an\" before a vowel *sound*, not before a vowel. That's why you say \"an hour\", because you don't voice the h. ",
"Despite starting with a vowel, Utopia, Utensil, and Ukulele, all start with a consonant (y) sound unlike umpire or underwear. The rule has more to do with speech sounding consistent than making sense on paper. ",
"You don't sound it as \"oo-topia\", you sound it as \"you-topia\". You wouldn't put an before \"you\", but you would before \"oo\", or \"ee\", or any ooen vowel sound.",
"The a-an distinction functions to reduce the human mechanical effort required to pronounce those paired words.\n\n*An vowel* would be absurd for requiring additional human mechanical effort to pronounce; *a octopus* would render the listener unable to discern the *o* sound unless a terrifically mechanical [full-glottal-stop](_URL_0_) were inserted between by the speaker.\n\nWe say *a utopia* because *an utopia* is more human mechanical effort."
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enuztz | why is reading books viewed as such a good thing? i see new-resolutions all the time with books in mind. | I would understand if it were books that were educational, however I often see fiction refered. What makes reading so good? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/enuztz/eli5_why_is_reading_books_viewed_as_such_a_good/ | {
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"TLDR: your brain is a muscle that needs to be exercised. \n\nReading, no matter if it’s for leisure or for education, is always good for you. Fiction books are no less important to read than non-fiction books. With fiction books you allow your brain to work other areas like your imagination and lets you expand your horizons. Also, just because it’s a fiction book does not mean that there is not factual information in them. Take a look at the author Michael Crichton, a lot of his novels are fiction but are packed with scientific and medical information and concepts that are being developed today. At the end of the day, whether it’s a text book, comic book, or any other kind of book, find what you enjoy and read.",
"Because intellectual curiosity makes for a wellinformed mind and broad horizons. The notion is from before the internet, which may be why people don't resolve to read the wiki from one end to the other."
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5z5b2f | birds don't need goggles to protect their eyes from the wind. why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5z5b2f/eli5_birds_dont_need_goggles_to_protect_their/ | {
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"Birds have built in [goggles](_URL_0_). A special clear third eyelid.",
"The have a second eyelid that acts as goggles its clear. Turkeys are the only one I've seen up close they chill out in the rain like it's nothing",
"Also, Birds eyes are on the side of their head which gives them less exposure to front facing debris.",
"Others have already done a good job of answering your question, but I wanted to bring up an instance of birds wearing goggles. Scientists trying to study flight mechanics equipped a parrot with goggles to allow him to fly through a laser grid without damaging his eyes: _URL_0_"
]
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||
1tyzdk | nasa said today the sun has/is going to "flip upside down" and its magnetic poles have reversed. what does this mean and would it have any effects on earth? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1tyzdk/eli5nasa_said_today_the_sun_hasis_going_to_flip/ | {
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"The sun's magnetic field reverses every 11 years or so.\n\nIt happens during times of high solar activity, so flares are more likely and could potentially disrupt satellite communications temporarily. You will also get more brilliant aurorae and more sunspots.\n\nBut mostly, nothing will change, this is an ordinary phenomenon that happens all the time. "
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||
1rsmwl | why do dogs bite air? | When I blow on my dogs face she bites. She also bites when sticking her head out the window.. Why? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rsmwl/eli5_why_do_dogs_bite_air/ | {
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"Because she feels something there.\n\nDogs pick up things with their mouths, and while they may paw at items to get to them (like a bone in a corner or under a table), when it's in reach they go after it with their mouths.\n\nOther animals, who are more inclined to use their paws, will do so, [as in this video](_URL_0_).\n"
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1sdic5 | how do they shoot scenes of people being blown up or suffering severe trauma? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1sdic5/eli5_how_do_they_shoot_scenes_of_people_being/ | {
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"Either with CGI or practical effects/special effects makeup or a bit of both. You wouldn't believe how convincingly a skilled makeup artist can make someone look like they're have a *really* bad day. Do a quick image search on special effects makeup and watch some videos of it being put on, it's pretty interesting stuff."
]
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3atqoz | are all spicy foods spicy because of capsaicin? are there different types of 'spicy'? what about cinnamon or onions? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3atqoz/eli5_are_all_spicy_foods_spicy_because_of/ | {
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"Not all spicy foods contain capsaicin. Mustard gets its spice from mixing water with two compounds, myrosin and sinigri. Wasabi's kick comes from something called allyl isothiocyanate which is the same for horseradish. Cinnamon gets its spiciness from two chemicals called cinnamic aldehyde and cinnamaldehyde. \n \nSo there are a lot of different kinds of spiciness. "
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||
35ft31 | why does traveling at very high speeds, or going within the soi of celestial bodies with high gravity slow down time for the people in those situations, according to the theory of relativity? | i can't visualize in my head how high gravity or speeds could slow stuff down. for example, take miller's planet in interstellar. when brand, doyle, cooper, and case are futzing around down there, if romilly (orbiting in the endurance) were to somehow take a telescope and observe them on the planet's surface, would it look like they were moving in slow motion? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35ft31/eli5why_does_traveling_at_very_high_speeds_or/ | {
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"Gravity curves spacetime. \n \n > if romilly (orbiting in the endurance) were to somehow take a telescope and observe them on the planet's surface, would it look like they were moving in slow motion? \n \nYes, if you look up the Wiki page on time dilation: \n \n > An accurate clock at rest with respect to one observer may be measured to tick at a different rate when compared to a second observer's own equally accurate clocks. This effect arises neither from technical aspects of the clocks nor from the fact that signals need time to propagate, but from the nature of spacetime itself. \n \nWe deal with time dilation daily when we use GPS: \n \n > Clocks on the Space Shuttle ran slightly slower than reference clocks on Earth, while clocks on GPS and Galileo satellites run slightly faster."
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1pvmg8 | what is port forwarding? i want to maximize my online multiplayer on gaming consoles, should i use it? | People have asked this questions before but I still don't get it. I would love a simple explanation and to know if it is practical for my usage. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pvmg8/eli5_what_is_port_forwarding_i_want_to_maximize/ | {
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"So you have a router. And multiple devices that consume your internet connection (phones, pcs, tablets, toasters, etc).\nEvery connection made from any device in your internal network, consumes a port in your router (think of your router as the street door on your home, everything that has to go out side must go through it). \n\nDon't worry, you have roughly 65.000 ports available, you won't run out of them.\n\nIn esscense, port forwarding refers to signal your router to specify a port (or a range of ports, ie 7000-7100) to a specific device (the ip of a device, to be more specific). This is usually associated with certain applications that require the use of a specific port to work.\n\nBe careful when forwarding too, always remember there's a port on your local machine too, (an entrance port, and an exit port) and its very easy to get mixed up too. \n\nIf this is still unclear, port forwarding is only advisable if you know what ports is your console using.",
"Port forwarding works kind of like this:\n\nImagine your router like your front door. You have a bunch of people in your house, but any traffic in and out needs to use the front door.\n\nSo lets say that traffic from BF4 wants to get in. Well, OK, thats cool - where is it trying to go? Normally it will hit the router at a particular port, and if that port is opened, it goes through, if not, it gets blocked.\n\nMost ports are blocked by default.\n\nThe idea with port forwarding is you say, 'Open this specific port and let that traffic into the network.'\n\nYou can make it generic 'just fucking open this port,' or more specific, 'open this port specifically to *me*.' Most routers should let you do both.\n\nSome games / routers / computers support something called [UPnP](_URL_0_) where the 'game' in question tells the router 'yo open up these ports' and the router responds 'yeah they're open for you', so there is a possibility that your consoles are already dealing with that part.\n\nIf your router is any good, you can see the list of ports that are opened in the admin web console, and see whether they are manually assigned, or done via UPnP",
"Imagine you work in an office building, where all the offices have a number. If you need to send a package from your office to someone else's, you just write \"Office #15\" on it, and it will get to the right place.\n\nBut outside of your building, there are lots of Office #15's, so sending a package there doesn't work. So what you do is have them send it to the building, and set up rules in your mailroom...all packages go to Office #15, letters go to Office #22, etc., etc.\n\nThose rules are roughly equivalent to port forwarding. Inside your house, you might have several internet devices, your computer, your phone, your TV, your Xbox. They all know how to talk to each other, but if a request to talk to them comes from the outside world, which one should it go to? Port forwarding lets you route incoming game related requests to your console.\n\nSo should you use it?\n\nSome games let you play head to head with other players be connecting directly, rather than through a server, which sometimes can be a little faster. If you play games like this, you can use port forwarding, otherwise it isn't going to make a lot of difference. ",
"I'm going to start with an analogy, and then explain it at the very end, so please be patient: \n\nIn my analogy, there's an apartment building. As is the norm, the building has a single address, and each resident living there has an apartment number. So when you address mail to someone at the apartment, you have to include both the address and the apartment number.\n\nHowever, the property owner decided that he wanted to erect another building on the same lot, and he didn't want to go through the hassle of getting a new address for his building. Of course, you can't have two buildings with the same address and the same apartment numbers. How would anyone ever get their mail? So the property owner hired a guy named Robbie to handle the residents' mail. Robbie decided that the best way to do this was to keep a ledger. He gave each building a codename in his ledger so that he could tell them apart. Then, he'd look to see when someone from one of the apartments sent out some mail, and he'd modify the return address on the envelope to have a fake apartment number that was unique across both buildings. He'd then jot that fake number down in his ledger, along with the building codename and the actual apartment number.\n\nThis worked pretty well. Everyone who sent out emails to their friends and relatives and pen-palls were perfectly happy. In fact, this method also had the great side-effect of totally eliminating spam mails. See, every time a piece of mail came in with an apartment number that wasn't in Robbie's ledger, he just threw it away. Since spammer had no previous contact with the residents, of course they couldn't know what the made-up apartment numbers were, so their spam just got thrown out.\n\nBut one day, Sir Vernon, who lived in apartment 80 in building B, came to Robbie to complain. It seems that Vernon was running a business out of his apartment, and so he was expecting a lot of unsolicited mail. But since Robbie was tossing out all the mail to actual apartment numbers, well, you can see the problem.\n\nSo Robbie and Sir Vernon had a nice, long chat, and they eventually came to an agreement. Robbie would enter into his ledger that all of the mail that arrived at the shared addresses for both apartments would be sent to Building B, apartment 80. Sure, Vernon would get some junk mail, but at least he wouldn't lose any potential clients.\n\n****\n\nSo what was that an analogy for?\n\n* Apartment building = computer.\n\n* The apartments' address = the computer's IP address.\n\n* Apartment number = port number.\n\n* Residents = applications that need internet access.\n\n* Mail = TCP/IP data.\n\n* Robbie = router. He gave each computer a new codename (LAN IP address), while presenting the same old address to the outside world. He then made sure that every request from the LAN side of the router was able to communicate to the outside world.\n\n* Sir Vernon = server. Something that needs to accept unsolicited connections from outside the router. Port forwarding means that the router will always deliver traffic to a specific port on the router to a pre-designated LAN address and port.\n",
"Most home routers use something called Network Address Translation. With NAT, you can have one publicly routeable IP address, but many internal private addresses. Those addresses individually aren't routable from the internet, so when you initiate communication from your device, your router makes a 1 to 1 port translation for your outgoing communication. It remembers the source port you transmitted from and maps it in it's table. When it receives a packet back on the port it mapped to, it knows which private IP address that packet is supposed to be delivered to.\n\nBut this only works if your PC initiates all the communication. You can't get any unsolicited incoming packets -- your router will have nowhere to send them. So you create a static port forwarding in your router. It will always translate packets with that inbound port onto the IP and port of your choosing.\n\nGenerally most programmers for online games recognize that gamers will be behind a NAT router and will not know how to optimally configure it, so they write the program in such a way that you don't need to do anything.\n\nWhere port forwarding does come in very handy is when you need to talk between two devices that are both behind a NAT router. In most circumstances, you need an intermediary that will act as a man in the middle for all transmission. However, if you have port forwarding set on one device, you can initiate the communication from the other and have direct two way communication. The one thing I can think of that uses this the most is torrents, where two home computers want to communicate with each other."
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1sh5wq | rainbow universes or something | I have no idea what this artical is talking about. _URL_0_
It was posted in the physics reddit but no one seems to know what it means in a way I can understand.
I'm normaly pretty good at physics but I was blown away by all the jargon these people use. Please help. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1sh5wq/eli5rainbow_universes_or_something/ | {
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"Basically it is saying that different wavelenghts of light corresponding to different energies (by c=λv) would be affected differently by gravity. This is because in relativity, mass is just one expression of energy. If this theory is correct, then our techniques of tracing the origin of the universe (through telescopes which see light waves) could be fundamentally flawed. \n\nApparently the new (decade-old) theory has two outcomes. Either the function plateaus at a high density where these conditions are dominant, or it reaches a tangent and undergoes infinite regression. Either answer is contradictory with the big bang theory.\n\nEdit: Thanks for the downvote"
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2hz9tq | how does touching work? (sensation of feeling different surfaces) | Why I ask:
Im curious if, by very weak but accurate static/electrical stimulation, the brain can be tricked into feeling surfaces which aren't there. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2hz9tq/eli5_how_does_touching_work_sensation_of_feeling/ | {
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"Touching and other sensory inputs (except for the special senses) are mediated via corpuscles. There are 4 types of them and they have sense various stimuli like pain, temperatures, pressure etc.\n\nIn theory, what you described could be possible. But practically that would be difficult to achieve. Mainly because of the fact that fine/light touch is mediated via Meissner corpuscles, that are located deeper in the skin. Way deeper than Free Nerve Endings (FNEs)that give you the perception of pain and temperature.\n\nJust to give you a perspective, let's divide the skin to epidermis and the dermis for simplicity. The epidermis has 5 more layers. FNEs are located from the 3rd layer of the epidermis and beyond. Compared to Meissner corpuscles which are sometimes located at the 5th layer of the epidermis but are mainly concentrated in between the epidermis and dermis and beyond. FNEs are also present through the skin compared to Meissner corpuscles which are only present in hairless skin areas.\n\nWhat does all that mean? If you place an electrode over the skin, that is not invading any layers of the skin, and you stimulate the skin, the FNEs will pick up the electrical impulses before the Meissner corpuscles and you will perceive pain. Even if the stimulation reaches the Meissner corpuscles, they are adapt quickly so you will not really perceive the feeling of touch (FNEs on the other have both fast and slow adapting fibers, so the perception of pain does not change much over time).\n\nWhich is why when EMGs are performed for patients/students at a hospital or for academic purposes, it's the pain that bothers patients/subjects rather the than the rest of the sensations that could have been perceived.\n\n**tl;dr: Theoretically yes but practically no because your body's nervous system adapted for survival (probably through the evolutionary process)**\n\n---\nOn a different note though, let's assume FNEs never existed, and you performed an EMG or stimulated the skin via electrodes, then it is very much possible to perceive touch.\n\nThere was a theory in neuroscience about how neurons may carry impulses even if the stimuli isn't of its own kind. Which is why getting hit on the back of your head (as seen in cartoons) makes you perceive stars, which basically stimulate the neurons at the back of your head (where you visual center is) and you perceive flashes of lights which are not really present physically."
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620dzz | why do our cheeks hurt when we eat extremely sour sweats/food? what causes it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/620dzz/eli5_why_do_our_cheeks_hurt_when_we_eat_extremely/ | {
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"You are feeling the extreme activation of your *salivary glands.* The presence of very sour foods makes you produce much more saliva than normal, very suddenly, and this action feels uncomfortable."
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36dnnq | why does a white noise, such as a ceiling fan, help me fall asleep, but random noises annoy me while trying to sleep? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/36dnnq/eli5_why_does_a_white_noise_such_as_a_ceiling_fan/ | {
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"White noises are easily explained by your brain and can be run as a background process. Random noises demand an immediate explanation.",
"White noise, if you're using the technical definition, is a consistent noise that comes out evenly across all hearable frequencies. Say you're a musician. To play a middle C note, you play something that's about 261.6 hertz, the unit of frequency. White noise is just an equal amount at every frequency, from low to high, that a human being can hear. To keep the music analogy going, it's a gigantic band all playing a slightly different note. (Machines pushed to the limit, like fans, are especially good at hitting these notes.)\nWhen a noise wakes you up in the night, it's not the noise itself that wakes you up, per se, but the sudden change or inconsistencies in noise that jar you. White noise creates a masking effect, blocking out those sudden changes that frustrate light sleepers, or people trying to fall asleep.\n\nCredits to: Popular Science ",
"Like acheron and ftumpsh point out, white noise is predictable in a way.\n\nI would also like to point out that white noise is what you hear as a fetus. It is why humans like to be held and wrapped in blankets. Sometimes a nice, gentle shaking can help you fall asleep too (try sleeping on the back of the bus sometime)",
"White noise is a steady, constant noise. Once it starts, our brain becomes accustomed to hearing it and realizes quickly that there is no danger caused by the the white noise. Random noises are unexpected, and our brain automatically wakes up because unexplained noises mean danger. ",
"Simple answer: Because white noise prevents you from hearing those random noises that annoy you while you're trying to sleep.",
"Think of white noise like your clothing. Your brain has learned, over time, to ignore the constant stimuli that your clothing has on the surface of your skin.\n\nNow imagine that \"random noise\", as a water balloon. Once it hits your clothing, you instantly feel the weight, texture, etc. of whatever you're wearing.\n\nAll of your senses work this way, sort of. [Your eyes, for example](_URL_0_) (focus on the black dot for a few seconds). Most famously, your sense of smell does it pretty rapidly, able to ignore odors after only a couple minutes.\n\nTL;DR - The abruptness of the change (compared to the white noise) is what annoys you, not the noise itself.",
"True white noise comprises all frequencies of sound equally, though non-perfect white noise also works to varying degrees. True white noise actually doesn't exist for the same reason that there is no limit to numbers, though it's not necessary because our ears can only detect certain frequencies. Anyways.\n\nIt's a property of sound that when you have 2 sources of the same frequency of sound which are a [half wave-length out of phase of each other,](_URL_1_) the sounds cancel each other out. In practice, since white-noise is pretty much random, there are bound to be wavelenths in white noise which will cancel out (to some degree) other sudden or unique ambient sounds which might distract you and cause your brain to attempt to decipher them. \n\nA second reason that white noise aids in working to help you sleep is due to [persistent sensation adaptation](_URL_0_). All of our senses are largely based on detecting changes. Any constant stimuli will eventually be ignored by your brain and fade into the background so you don't really notice. This is why you don't really feel the cloths on your body unless you're actually thinking about it, or why you can't really smell if you're house stinks unless you leave for a couple hours then it hits you when you walk back through the front door.\n\nSo when you're hearing a constant backdrop of white noise, it's both canceling out sudden sounds as well as fading into the background of your active awareness, which amounts to a great reduction in audio distractions when trying to sleep (or read a book on the train, in my case).",
"Well, I'm sure all of these explanations are correct, but why is it that white noise, such as a fan keeps me up, while I can sleep right through garbage trucks, sirens, car horns and radios, people talking or walking or whatever in other apartments, etc?!?\n\nI grew up in NYC.",
"I was told by my wife's obgyn that white noise is very similar to the blood rushing through the mothers veins that you hear when you are in the womb. This is just one explanation I am sure there are more technical ones.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nHere is what it sounds like in the womb.",
"While some really nice answers are in here, they may be more appropriate if this question was posed in /r/askscience\n\nHere is a simple answer: a fan or other \"white noise\" machine is a low hum that makes good background Noise, mainly because it it's a constant sound that doesn't, for practical purposes, fluctuate. It Also helps to mute other internment sounds which would be more instrusive to relaxation or sleep.",
"Wouldn't this fall into the ASMR category as well?",
"I like how everyone approaches this from different perspectives, I'll give you the behaviourist psychology perspective.\n\n\nThe noise helps drown out other stimulation (those crippling fears lurking at the back of your mind), you can only focus on so many things in your episodic and short term memory, I haven't got the research on hand to back this up though so take it with a grain of salt.\n\n\nBut your question is why does the spacing of the noises make a difference? We have a system where a stimulus (noise) is extinguished (we ignore it) if we sense it too many times, this is known as conditioning, naturally it's used to conserve energy, as an example if i clap you might look over at me, but if i slap my desk every 30 seconds for an hour eventually you'd just get used to it, nothing changes, you don't need to spend energy making adrenaline or being alert. But what i slap objects closer or further away from you, or louder and quieter? well the stimulus has changed and could be a threat, so your brain has to pay attention to it.\n\n\nTL:DR; Until your brain is conditioned to remain calm it'll keep you alert.",
"White noise is consistent in its tone and rhythm where as random noise brakes the flow of the environment you're in. As an example you could turn on a sound meter with a graph display and a fan, while looking at the display you'll see a pretty consistent graph but if you snap your fingers a spike will occur which will upset the flow of sound. Another way to look at it is a stream of water coming out of a faucet, its consistent but if you stick your finger in the path of the water it splashes all over the place.\n",
"By the way, if you suffer from ringing of the ears which is generally called tinnitus or you have ADD/ ADHD or a nervous disposition the addition of a fan on low speed will help you fall asleep as it gives your mind a focus point. I've had a multitone tinnitus for years and have to sleep with a fan on due to how loud it is. Despite its pitch I have above average hearing even at the age of 45 and having worked in manufacturing and other industries with high volume sounds because I've always worn ear protection.",
"I believe that white noise is so hypnotic to humans because of the fact that it's a naturally occurring phenomena. The sound of the world turning (figuratively) is white noise. So when you synthesize white noise, it's so natural for our brain, it immediately luls us to sleep. \n\nThere are actually super acoustically perfect rooms that are able to deaden SOO much ambient noise, that even what we perceive as a \"silent\" room, is actually just a \"fairly quiet\" room. These rooms absorb so much sound, that people who sit in them have reported an extremely uneasy, almost nerve racking \"nothingness\". A common reaction to just a few moments inside the room is, \"the silence was deafening\". \n\nI've heard people attempting to challenge their tolerance inside these rooms have even had panic attacks and were sure that extended periods could induce psychosis. ",
"If you don't sleep with a box fan going, you're doing it wrong\n\nHowever, if you do, and the power goes out at night, everything fucking sucks.",
"Continuous, non-changing sounds become habituated (your brain gets used to it). Once habituated, having the sound there feels natural and almost soothing. It would also cover other, more intrusive sounds, that are too soft to 'break though' the haze of noise.\n\nSudden noises, or random, but changing, noises, demand your brain's attention each time they change/appear, so you can't \"drift away\". However, with training such as hypnotherapy, sounds such as these can also aquire the function of soothing you and pushing you deeper into sleep.",
"have you ever tried to sleep when your in complete silence on LSD? It's like someone is cranking the \"white noise\" to the max over and over again and the only way to make it stop is to focus. ",
"Consistency is easy to ignore. Rare events are note.\nAs long as something catches your attention, it will annoy you or stop you from sleeping.",
"Your brain doesn't try as hard to predict the patterns of repetitive noises. Your brain will have a harder time attempting to predict the patterns of random noises. ",
"If someone is doing DIY next door late at night, I find that it too helps me fall asleep. As does music and podcasts/audiobooks etc. ",
"Because we are animals, and a random noise should trigger something in your brain that you could get killed, and you'll have a better chance of survival if you're awake.",
"The same reason a yogi has no problem sitting on a bed of nails - the consistency is much easier to take than jagged highs & lows/loud sounds & silence.\n\nHere's a visual example: would you rather lay across a consistent profile\n\n |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||\n\nor a jagged one?\n\n ◣ ▲ ▲ ◣ | ◣◣ ",
"Our sensory neural pathways have inhibitor neurons that suppress the strength of a signal resulting from constant stimuli. It's the reason you don't constantly feel the clothes you are wearing right now. Our brains are set up to focus on what is new to our experience. So our brains will ignore the white noise in the room, this also means that any new noise would have to be noticeable above the white noise so it effectively screens out small noises that might otherwise interrupt your sleep. \n\nYou can see this inhibition visually with a variety of illusions:\n\n_URL_0_\n",
"The human nervous system is designed to detect differences, and especially important differences. \n\nA patch of grass, dirt, or sand recedes into a homogenous and not-very-important \"substance\", in our awareness. A similarly-sized patch of berries, snakes, or money might attract quite a bit of attention, on the other hand. \n\nSounds such as \"white noise\" serve as kind of sonic \"fog\". They mask and conceal other noises, and recede into irrelevance in your awareness. Your lower-level \"lizard brain\" acclimates to the constant sound, determines that it's not a threat, and ignores it. \n\nLight sleepers often find that harmless and even pleasant sounds can wake them up and keep them up. This is because the brain is attuned to detect differences. \n\nYou can think of it like your conscious mind getting up to check every sound as though it were a knock on the front door. Steady-state noise like a fan \"masks\" every little leaf rustling, and makes it so you only hear the real \"knocking\". ",
"The human brain is so hardwired to find patterns, that it often [invents patterns and meaning where none exist](_URL_0_). The human brain does this because our pre-human ancestors that couldn't detect an anomaly in the pattern (like a predatory animal hiding in the jungle) were eaten before they could reproduce. However, animals that could respond to any change in their environment, whether real or simply perceived, were more likely to reproduce.\n\nThis is why humans are much more likely to have experiences that return [false positives](_URL_2_) (they saw a tiger in the stars, but there really wasn't one there) than ones that return false negatives (while scanning the forest, Adam only saw forest. The tiger he didn't see ate him).\n\nYour brain is \"always working,\" even while asleep. In the absence of continuous stimulus, your brain responds to any and all variables (which are easier to detect because there's nothing to \"hide\" them) as a potential threat, because your brain is mostly comprised of portions that are millions of years old, and that dumb shit doesn't want to be eaten by a tiger, regardless of whether or not your living room regularly contains any [Panthera tigris] (_URL_1_).\n\nWhen you have a continuous, unbroken stimulus, not only will those sounds, images, scents, etcetera, help to mask any other \"sporadic stimuli,\" but your brain will also be continuously preoccupied with scanning the white noise for any alterations in its pattern that it'll ignore other stimulus.\n\nAnd lastly, your brain is best at noticing \"dramatic\" changes in a stimulus. The longer your brain is \"hypnotized\" by a continuous stimulus, the less likely it is to be able to recognize minor alternate stimuli.\n\nTL;DR: The majority of each one of our brains are easily distracted idiots that, no matter how often you try to comfort them, are obsessed with the notion that the second they let their guard down, they'll get eaten.",
"Your ears are searching for things to hear even asleep. So giving them constant white noise helps you stay asleep. And if/when you develop tinnitus, you'll really appreciate white noise as it's much more pleasant to listen to then the crickets in your head. \n",
"Basically white noise covers the entire audible spectrum, so if it's at a constant volume, your brain will get used to it and it won't bother you while it's partially covering up anything else that you might potentially hear. ",
"I think because the sound of a fan is a more consistent noise with less change in sound. When other things like closing doors and cupboards are way more inconsistent and infuriating. ",
" conversely, i sleep much better knowing I can hear what's going on around the house. The fact that my SO wants (needs) to drown it out drives me crazy. ",
"It's like this: Music, or recognizable noises stimulate your brain. They make it hard to think. White noises aren't recognizable enough to have anything stand out, but enough to keep your mind from being able to think of other things. It basically shuts off your brain.",
"Boo! I can't sleep with the fan on. I wait till my husband falls asleep and turn it off. It's too noisy.",
"That's your brain keeping you alive. It's survival instinct from when we had to worry about wolves and bears and tigers eating us, or someone coming to harm you. Your brain is listening for something to change and alerts you when it does. Now a days it's usually just the cat or the wind blowing, but the instinct to be alerted is still there."
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8bslim | how is the new european gdpr law even enforceable against us companies? | I keep hearing that US-based businesses that do business with people in the EU will have to comply with GDPR laws, even if said business has no physical presence in the EU.
Hypothetically, say someone from the US owns a small website that sells subscriptions to access content, and someone from England buys a subscription. From what I keep reading, that site would then have to follow all GDPR regulations.
My question is though, how would the EU actually enforce that? GDPR is not a law in the US, so what would give the EU regulators the authority to actually enforce said law and try to collect damages against someone not violating any laws in their own jurisdiction? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8bslim/eli5_how_is_the_new_european_gdpr_law_even/ | {
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"If a company is big enough to be operating in the EU, they will have servers dedicated for EU users wherein their data is stored. Such data is not allowed to leave the EU by law (lol), so it's easily enforceable to have them deleted.",
"They can tell banks and payment processors to confiscate any cash in EU accounts and to stop doing business with their American accounts. This effectively makes it impossible for the companies to make money from EU citizens. "
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3eh0z2 | why aren't more people on a structured starvation plan versus undergoing gastric bypass surgery which essentially is structured starvation? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3eh0z2/eli5_why_arent_more_people_on_a_structured/ | {
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"Because structured starvation plans don't work very well. They do try diet plans before resorting to gastric bypass surgery.",
"If they had enough impulse control to stick to any regimented diet, they wouldn't be so fat in the first place. \n\nAny reputable doctor is going to try diets and other methods long before resorting to gastric surgury.",
"Some people are at such an extreme weight that a gastric bypass might be the only thing that can help lower their weight. Also a structured starvation plan would require discipline to implement. If it is forced onto a person then they are more likely to relapse. ",
"For years my mother asked and pleaded with me to get gastric bypass or \"surgery\" as she called it. I didn't want it, not because I weighted 435 pounds, but because I didn't like the idea of having surgery to correct something that I myself had created. Call it pride if you will. I felt that if I didn't do it myself, having surgery would be no different, because I personally was not ready to embrace a healthy and active lifestyle.\n\nIn the long run, it took me about 15 years since I was about 12 years of age when I started to get overweight to finally take the initiative and start losing weight. Today I am 28 years old, and to date, I've lost about 100 pounds, and have about 100 more to go! I may only be halfway to my goal after 18 months, but I now possess the right mindset for the job, and it helps to make it much easier to accomplish, regardless if I had done the surgery or not.\n\nI do agree that for some gastric bypass and other forms of surgery are the only feasible options available to the person based on their current weight and mindset. You have to make the decision yourself to carry through, day after day, week and week, month after month, that you will continue the healthy and active lifestyle you've laid out. No one can do this for you. They can help show you the path and help you along the way, but you have to do the walking yourself.\n\nSorry to hijack your thread, I thought some 1st hand experience might help to explain why some people have surgery and others do not. All in all, we are all built differently and have different mindsets. Some people will make it, others will not. This is the harsh reality that we all live in."
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ngsbd | the u.s. state department and what they do. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ngsbd/eli5_the_us_state_department_and_what_they_do/ | {
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"Wikipedia says it very clearly:\n\n > > The United States Department of State (often referred to as the State Department or DoS), is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries.\n",
"Represent the interests of American and American citizens abroad. ",
"Wikipedia says it very clearly:\n\n > > The United States Department of State (often referred to as the State Department or DoS), is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries.\n",
"Represent the interests of American and American citizens abroad. "
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51h7rx | why does drinking after eating feel so satisfying? | Hello ELI5,
So, I don't know if it happens only to me or not, but I noticed that I feel really better while drinking something just after I ate something. Does some of you are feeling this too? And if so, do you know why?
Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/51h7rx/eli5_why_does_drinking_after_eating_feel_so/ | {
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"Liquids aid in digestion. That is the reason, and perhaps combined with other things like nutrient need and routine."
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a43gqp | how does teslas giant battery work? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a43gqp/eli5_how_does_teslas_giant_battery_work/ | {
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"It's just a bunch of smaller cells. You know how a remote control seems to always take two AAs? It's like that but on a larger scale and with much more than 3 volts involved.\n\nThere's 3 ways to set up cells: series, parallel, and series-parallel. Series is where they're end-to-end, like the way that remote control is wired up. Each AA in there gives 1.5 volts, put two of them end to end and you get the voltage of both! So now you have 3 volts, and for simplicity let's say you can draw 1 amp this way.\n\nParallel is if they were truly wired \"side by side\" instead of end to end. If we wired those AAs in parallel, you wouldn't get double the voltage like in series, but you would get double the potential current, so twice as many amps. Only 1.5 volts, but now we have 2 amps.\n\nIn series-parallel, you combine the two. So let's put our first two AAs in series to get 3 volts out of them, but they can only put out 1 amp. Now let's get two more AAs and put those end-to-end also. Then wire the top and bottom of our two stacks side by side. So now we can get 3 volts, but can now draw 2 amps since we have two stacks.\n\nA Tesla battery likely does series-parallel, just with cells *much* more powerful than AAs."
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63np43 | how do people get good at flying in wingsuits? where/how do they practice? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/63np43/eli5how_do_people_get_good_at_flying_in_wingsuits/ | {
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"Most people get lessons from instructions. \n\nPlaces you can get instructions for this is called a Drop Zone. But to learn wingsuiting, you must first learn the basics of skydiving, and most places require you to have some amount of skydiving jumps before they will teach you wingsuiting.\n\nSkydiving/wingsuiting is an expensive sport. ",
"Before learning to wingsuit all those people were already very experienced skydivers and BASE jumpers, so they already have a high level of skill in a sport that requires jumping off something and surviving with a parachute. They also have a trained awareness of how to fall. From what I understand, beginner skydivers have trouble not spinning, and if they start spinning, stopping or pulling your chute can become impossible. So again, before they try out the wingsuit, they are starting with a high level of proficiency at the needed skills. My presumption in regard to when they first try the wingsuit, is that they jump from a helicopter or slow plane from an very high altitude. Apparently, BASE jumpers are often viewed by skydivers similar to how rock climbers see free soloists; very similar looking sport, but totally different level of risk. When jumping from a plane, skydivers or a new wingsuit pilot have over a minute before they hit the ground. That is more than enough time to correct errors, or use a reserve parachute. My guess is that they learn to fly in that environment before testing themselves in those close flybys you see in videos."
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4u5j6o | why does everyone blame the united states for the current state of the world? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4u5j6o/eli5_why_does_everyone_blame_the_united_states/ | {
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"Because the US did a bunch of crazy shitty things in other countries. I.e. permitting drug to be brought into the US during the 80's \"war on drugs\", infecting thousands of people in south america with STDs to see how it affects a person. Research man. Its awful what they did in the past. ",
"I am sure you want absolution of the country and not an answer but the answer is that the US was one of the two global superpowers that became the one global superpower and it has had a LOT of effect over the last 60 years. \n\nGo back before that and england played a similar role. Sailing around the world and making decisions for other people. ",
"To use one example, Russia's attempt to annex Afghanistan failed in part due to US-backed Mujahadeen groups, which later became Al Qaeda. Much of the ISIS military leadership consists of former Iraqi military leaders, kicked out and banned from ever working for the Iraqi government by the US-backed Iraqi government, installed after the pointless US invasion of Iraq. "
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10dvg4 | why do americans consider nationalism/patriotism to be such a positive trait? | I'm from Belgium, which doesn't have much that resembles national pride, so I'd just like to know why Americans would consider this to be such a good thing. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/10dvg4/eli5_why_do_americans_consider/ | {
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"As a non-American I believe it's to do with the way the nation was founded: thousands of immigrants moving from Europe to somewhere new in the hope of finding prosperity. That achievement has been ingrained in the American culture ever since. The people are proud that, despite the country's young age, it has become the worlds most successful nation. ",
"Why do the French or British? Belgium is a bit of an odd country I think with regards to this question, because the country is ethnically divided. Are you more proud of or connected to your Flemish or Walloon ethnic heritage than your nation? America has no one ethnicity, so Americans identify themselves with their nation. This is pretty common around the world, I'm from Australia and there is plenty of national pride there as well. ",
"Constant repetition of the virtue of patriots throughout our public education. Every year we learned about our history, every year we learned about the same few people (at least 1st-8th grade) and every year they were celebrated as heroes.\n\nNationalism/Patriotism is instilled in all Americans from a very young age.\n\nHonestly, i'm surprised it's not this way in most countries, i thought it was common to teach children that yours was the best country out of all possibilities.\n\n",
"This is hardly just an American trait. Visit Korea (north or south), Japan, China, and many Western European countries. Honestly, it probably just seems more prominent because American media is blasted to the entire world.",
"I think also there is a tendency in Europe to downplay nationalism a little bit because of WWII.",
"In spite of how much we complain about our country and how we say its all going to shit many of us are very thankful for being born here. To be given the chance to get an education, to live without fear of persecution, to earn honest pay for honest work and live a simple life. Wave upon wave of immigrants came to our country seeking just that and even though we hardly spoke the same languages we worked together to build something great. Even today, people are risking their lives to try and enter our country and chase \"The American Dream.\" \n\nA famous American orator named Patrick Henry once said \"United we stand, divided we fall\" which captures this perfectly. We take pride that we are all Americans and we take pride in our country has given us the opportunities to live how we want. ",
"As an American its really hard for me to answer this. Its a lot about how we were founded, a true underdog story, then coming back from a civil war and two world wars strong as ever.Sadly, since then the government has been doing everything in its power to use this National pride as a way to get people in to wars, which is why it is frowned upon by other countries. But National pride really isnt a thing to be frowned upon as every country should be proud of there heritage and way of life. We just take it to an extreme level here because in the last century we have done some pretty awesome things, and were proud of it. Were not perfect by any means, but when it comes down to it, were proud to live here, and care maybe a little to much on making it better in each of our on ways. \nedit:words",
"ITT: People talking about every country except America.",
"Americans don't have a common heritage as we are all immigrants, we don't have a very long history, as we are a relatively new country. Patriotism was a tool for bringing all the people from different countries and all walks of life together under a common ideology and the search for a better life. ",
"Nationalism and Patriotism aren't necessarily the same thing. Nationalism is more akin to saying \"USA is the best and all others suck goat anus!\" Whereas Patriotism is having pride in your country and its workings, and making sure you do all you can to keep the country the way (you believe) it should be. Dissent is patriotic; nationalism relies on blind faith. "
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22tey0 | how can some terminally ill people just "hold off" death until they're ready? | Recently a family friend's mother died. She had some kind of terminal illness, but they all decided to go on a vacation to the Bahamas towards the end. She managed to keep going through the whole vacation, then "let go" and died a few days after they got back. There are many stories like this, where someone holds on for one reason or another, then simply lets go when the loose ends are tied. Medically, how is this possible? I know mind over matter can be pretty powerful sometimes, but how do some people literally hold off on dying until a certain time? I can't imagine you can just keep thinking "I can't die until X/Y happens" over and over in your head and keep living. What is the scientific explanation of this? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/22tey0/eli5_how_can_some_terminally_ill_people_just_hold/ | {
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"Luck? Coincidence? Fate? Whatever you're comfortable with believing, I guess.",
"possibly when they stop trying to fight off whatever could be a cause of death? Such as someone who has to force every breath without medical equipment, just stops trying and they accept that their time has come. ",
"Your mind and attitude is very power and effects your body greatly. It's well documented that people with no purpose ie retiring, depressed, giving up etc, die faster.",
"With a lot of diseases, your body become so weak that breathing is difficult, and can at teams require a conscious effort. You even have minor attacks, were you have to breath as hard as you can for a while just to stay alive. At some point, you might choose to not make that effort anymore.\n\nAlso, you can make choices about the type of treatment you receive. Curative treatment is about fighting disease and extending life. Palliative care is about relieving suffering without attempting to cure. A patient holding on for some event might endure more pain with curative treatment, then switch to palliative care after.\n\nFinally, there is some selection bias here. People are less likely to tell the story of the family member who died two days before the grand final vacation.",
"the dominating will to live",
"I don't know how it works, but I really think there's something to this.\n\nI worked full time as a janitor at a nursing home when I was a senior in high school. One day an old lady arrived to live there. She was friendly, full of energy, talked to everyone, and insisted on walking laps around the building every day for exercise. After the first week, I stopped seeing her because she began to just sit in her room all day. Two weeks after that, she died.\n\nHers was the most extreme case I saw, but I was always amazed at how quickly people started to deteriorate the moment they set foot in that place. It seemed like they realized they'd basically been sent there to die, and so they just gave up.\n\nI'm never going to let my parents end up in one of those places.",
"The lack of a will to live can certainly bring death faster and the will to live to can keep death at bay but I don't think we actually know enough about death and the mind to know how such occurrences work. The automated part of us does what it can to live (which it the cause of certain responses to pain, stress, and trauma) and \"you\" fight against some of these responses (trying to ignore pain, fighting sleep when your body wants rest, etc).\n\nWe're not sure how the mind can fight off natural processes from the rest of the body when they are seemingly controlled by the same thing (the brain).",
"The human will to live is powerful. "
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4byb05 | why do rovers always have six wheels? | Every time I see a picture of a rover designed for or on mars, it has six wheels. I know one might break, but since everyone goes for six, is there something I'm missing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4byb05/eli5_why_do_rovers_always_have_six_wheels/ | {
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"Six movable wheels with individual motors give a better balance to the vehicle and make it easier to cross all types of terrain.",
"It's a rocker-bogie differential configuration, designed to maximize the ruggedness of terrain that the vehicle can traverse without tipping upside-down. There's nobody to tip it right-side-up again if it does, so we really don't want it to happen. \n\nHere's a link explaining how this configuration works using lego models:\n\n_URL_0_\n\n"
]
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[],
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4wnvrx | why do sailors need to know knots? | It seems like they could easily use clamps or some other fastening device to secure sails or cargo. Even in modern sailing, knots are still used when a clamp could do the same job much more efficiently. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4wnvrx/eli5_why_do_sailors_need_to_know_knots/ | {
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"Why would a clamp be more efficient? It's like this whole other thing you have to bring along just so you don't have to learn to tie up the rope you already are using? ",
"I'm retired Navy. I spent 20 years on submarines. Despite this I still had to know knots. They are extremely useful for a multitude of things. A person that can't tie a knot is not a sailor. ",
"The tl,dr is that in many trades ropes are used to quickly tie, tow and hoist things.\n\nSometimes you need a rope to pull something without the knot slipping, sometimes you need to lift something like a tool than can be quickly untied and sometimes you need something that can be pulled and released on command. All that's where your knowledge of knots comes in handy.\n\nRope is simple, waterproof and non-mechanical. It's worked effectively for thousands of years. Clips, clamps and ratchets are all prone to snagging and wear.",
"Clamps or other devices would require both the Clamps and a wrench or screw driver to fasten and loosen. A knot requires your hands and some knowledge. It is way more efficient to use your hands and knowledge. Ropes are fastened to different things and then unfastened so frequently that the idea of finding a clamp and a tool is not practical or worthwhile when the simpler method is available. Not to mention, adding additional components adds to the risk of something breaking or coming undone. ",
"Sailor here! I've been a ship's officer for about 10 years and currently work on a fairly new 120k ton oil tanker. We use knots all the time. Sending out mooring lines to a far away point... tie a knot with a messenger line and pass it along. Rigging a lift... bunch 'o knots. Securing cargo or deck gear... knots, knots, and knots. Lowering/raising tools into a hold... grab a bag, line and tie up a few knots. Need to wash a tank with a portable hose and machine... Some line and a timber hitch are all you need. As a cadet we would even rig bosun's chairs and work planks to paint the hull... all knots.\n\nPut simply, knots are very versatile; there's pretty much a knot for every situation and they have various degrees of strength retention, and various types and lengths of line are ubiquitous on any modern vessel. This was especially true on sailing ships whose rigging was made up entirely of different knots. But even for modern-day mariners, it's much easier to just tie off a good knot and accomplish your task, than it would be to involve more equipment that you don't really need. \n\nThat said, there are many other types of specialized securing gear that is utilized on board. Ratchet straps, chains falls, shackles, turnbuckles and chain/wire, etc are routinely used when the situation calls for it. ",
"Man, I need to secure this item to the deck and all I have is a length of rope. I could secure it with nothing but the rope I'm already holding, or I could go find the right clamp for this size line and the object at hand...\n\nRope is extremely versatile, clamps are not. ",
"Dingy instructor here, a lot of the time a cleat simply won't do the job. If I need to loop a top through a eyelet and then back onto itself, that's one quick, easy knot that will not come undone. Or I could mess about with some sort of clamping arrangement that could come undone unexpectedly, is a bulky item that could end up damaging absurdly expensive sails and can get lost. If I have run a rope through a pulley and make to sure it does come out again I can tie a knot in the end without even thinking about it, or message about with some impractical lump of metal that will weigh it down, get in the way, can get lost and can fall off.\n\nTl;dr knots are quick easy and reliable. Clamps and cleats are lumpy items that will get lost if they aren't bolted down, can come lose and can get in the way."
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6sq54s | what are nanobots? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6sq54s/eli5_what_are_nanobots/ | {
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"Nanobots are tiny robots. Robots so small that they could do things microbes do. There are many things we could use tiny robots for: one famous idea is making tiny surgery robots that could swim like submarines inside your blood vessels so that doctors don't have to cut you open to fix your insides.\n\nSo far there aren't many robots actually that small (yet) because it's really hard to make things that small. But lots of smart people are working hard on it because they know that if their ideas work, it could be the next big thing since the internet."
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29a61p | if i heat a half pint of water for one minute in the microwave, does it heat up by exactly twice as many degrees as if i heat a whole pint for a minute? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/29a61p/eli5_if_i_heat_a_half_pint_of_water_for_one/ | {
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"Simply: Exactly twice as much, no. About twice as much, yes. \r\r\rMore in depth: Your microwave is around 1000 Watts, or 1000 Joules of energy per second. Assuming 80% of this hits the water, the water is getting 800 W. If your short time is 30 seconds and the long one is one minute, the water will get 24,000 and 48,000 J. It tales about 4.2 J to heat 1 gram of water 1 Celsius. If you have 1000 grams of water (about a litre or 1/4 gallon), 30 seconds will heat it about 5.7 C and 60 seconds will heat it about 11.4 C. \r\r\rSo that is the about twice as much. Now the reason it's not exactly twice as much is i used \"about\" a lot. Firstly, i said 80% of the microwaves power heats the water. It really doesn't matter if that is right or not, what matters is that it likely isn't constant. Colder water or hotter water may absorb microwaves slightly better or worse, steam may start to absorb it in the air. Secondly, i said water takes 4.2 Joules (also known as a calorie) to heat water 1 C. The thing is though, that number isn't constant. The amount of energy to heat water changes depending on its temperature. Lastly, i kept the 1000 grams of water constant. Realistically, some will come off as steam. Not only will this change the amount of water you have, the formation of steam also takes a fair bit of energy, energy that can no longer go towards raising the temperature. There is likely so other factors too, perhaps involving the container of something. \r\r\rEdit: crap, messed up changing volume with changing time. Top answer still applies, it kinda does. Most of the reasons still apply. An important addition now, more water water will absorb the percent of microwaves differently. "
]
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||
o1w1d | why people can't just follow the story line of the book when making a film adaptation. | Why do movie writers and directors have to change details, plot, and occurrences when making a movie that is supposed to be an adaptation about a book? Why is it so hard to stick to the freakin' book?
**EDIT** Okay. Maybe the better question is "How does accuracy translate into a less interesting movie, if the book itself was interesting?" | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/o1w1d/eli5_why_people_cant_just_follow_the_story_line/ | {
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"1. thats the directors/writers interpretation of the book.\n2. They have to cut a lot of stuff out so it can fit in a 120 minute movie\n3. time/budget restraints\n4. Make it more interesting/entertaining to those that haven't read the book.",
"What works in movie does not work in books and vice versa. \n\nFor example, the Lord of the Rings books are more about the adventure aspect and the world itself while the movies were all about combat. The sieges in the books were like, \"Oh a bunch of orcs came to Helms Deep. A lot of them were killed by the trio. It was pretty touch and go there for a moment but don't worry, I ate some oranges and it was k.\" While the movies are entirely about slaying bad guys. Action is simply more entertaining to watch in a movie.\n\nAn example of where this caused problems was in \"No Country For Old Men.\" At the end of the book and movie (spoliers up ahead) the main character gets killed by the drug trafficker (spoilers end). In the book the author doesn't write this scene and you find out about it in the following chapters. This made sense for the book because it was a unique way to tell the story and let's be honest, writing interesting action scenes can be pretty difficult. They did the same thing in the movie which caused disappointment and confusion amongst certain movie goers. The movie was pretty action packed and suspenseful up to that point and not seeing the final showdown was silly because, what works in books, does not work in movies.\n\n",
"I don't think the writers' and directors' goal is to simply present the book in a movie format. As artists they're going to want to make the piece their own by using their interpretations.",
"It's less about accuracy not being interesting, more about the fact that cinema and literature are very different mediums.\n\nAction scenes are hard to write in a book. 15 minutes of dialog can make for a dull film, badly handled.\n\nTo take the Harry Potter movies as an example, in the later movies, a few sub plots and side details from the books were left out. As a big fan of the books, I was disappointed not to see certain parts brought to life on the screen, but I have to admit that leaving them in would have made the movies overly long and badly paced. You get the essence and feel of the plot, without getting bogged down in enjoyable but superfluous details.",
"**In order to answer this question you have to look at the entire process of turning a book into a film.**\n\nSo a producer reads a book and says this would make a great movie. He decides to hire a writer to turn this book into a screenplay. \n\n Sometimes this book will be 1000 pages and have really long descriptive paragraphs and sometimes this book will have 100 pages and be almost entirely dialogue. \n\nThe writer is going to have to take either of these books and turn it into a screenplay this is roughly 110 pages. \n\nWhy 110 pages?\n\nBecause movies need to be a certain length (roughly 1.5 hours to 2.5 hours) in order to be profitable so screenwriters have to either shrink or expand the source material to fit into 110 page screenplay.\n\nAnother common aspect in almost every successful movie ever created is going to have certain \"beats\" happen at roughly the same time.\n\nSome common ones that [Blake Snyder](_URL_1_) refers to in his screenwriting book-\n\n* Theme Stated - by page 5 (roughly 5 minutes in) their should be some theme to the movie\n\n* Catalyst - by page 12 there needs to be some driving force that inspires the main character to do something\n\n* B Story - by page 30 there should be a secondary story introduced (normally the romance part of a movie)\n\n*To see a full example of a movie with an uncommon narrative and how closely it follows these beats see -\n_URL_0_\n\nIn a 1000 page book there might be a 150 page intro that sets some things up before the main character is ever introduced but in order to keep audiences following your movie you need to introduce them to your main character within the first 5 pages/minutes.\n\nThis leads to a lot of problems. If the novel being adapted doesn't have a love interest appear until the book is 70% complete the writer is now forced to either introduce that character by page 30 or to eliminate that story line altogether. If there is an intense court scene that spans 300 pages of dialogue the writer has to figure out figure out how to adapt that into a 10 page debate scene while conveying the same points.\n\n**TLDR: If a novel was word-for-word adapted into a screenplay it would either be too short or too long and suffer from a lack of structure that would most likely make the movie very slow in certain scenes.**"
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2oi2kc | why is public education acceptable but public healthcare a big no-no in the us? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oi2kc/eli5_why_is_public_education_acceptable_but/ | {
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"People who oppose socialized healthcare generally worry that their taxes will go up (almost certainly true) or that their quality and/or timeliness of their own healthcare will go down (possible). Some of them have very little faith in government programs, possibly believing that they tend to be incompetent and wasteful.\n\nThose aren't arguments I agree with, but that's their perspective in a nutshell.\n\nYou can try to point out to them that socialized healthcare is *less* expensive, but in my experience they won't believe that.",
"Neither are fundamental human rights in the sense that they must be provided to individuals by the community. This doesn't necessarily mean that they shouldn't be provided, but claiming such as a fundamental human right makes you sound like a spoiled self-entitled brat.\n\nAdditionally, education is run at the state level, not the federal. The US constitution was written that the states have much more authority over day-to-day things than the federal government. Those federal incentives that exist to coerce state policy on education is somewhat controversial as well.\n\nLikewise, state - level healthcare laws are not nearly as controversial as the ACA.",
"[A lot of people think we should be privatizing K-12 education as well.](_URL_0_)",
"There's some similarity between the treatment of public education in the USA, which is funded K-12 (sometimes starting pre-K) but not funded for adults (in college), and the treatment of health care, which has much more funding available for children (SCHIP, now called CHIP, above and beyond Medicaid) than it does for adults (just Medicaid).\n\nAlso, the health insurance lobby is strong, whereas the private education lobby is less strong. We do have some publicly funded private charter schools, but nothing like the dominance of private health insurance."
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5b9hns | how does a computer scale images to different aspect ratios? | Does it fill in pixels of the same colour when you extend the length of an image? If so, how does it know where to fill in the pixels, so that it doesn't make the image too abnormal. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5b9hns/eli5_how_does_a_computer_scale_images_to/ | {
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"There are two types of images, raster graphics and vector graphics. \n\nVector graphics rely on mathematically produced 'paths' to draw the image. When rescaling the image, the computer simply recalculates the path and there is no quality loss.\n\nRaster graphics rely on pixels. When these are scaled, the computer uses an algorithm to sample the pixels around the existing pixels and fill in the computer's best 'guess'. The problem with this is if you scale too far down, non-adjacent pixels start getting used in the sample and if you scale too far up, sampled pixels start getting used."
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1jq55j | what is the difference between ska, rocksteady, and reggae? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jq55j/eli5what_is_the_difference_between_ska_rocksteady/ | {
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"Reggae is the evolved form of ska and rocksteady. It's also used as a blanket term to describe all carribean (especially Jamaican) music. \n\nSka and rocksteady are big on live instruments, and there's an emphasis on horns in ska. Rocksteady is very similar but not as upbeat as most ska songs. Reggae is the stuff you hear on the radio now. Live instruments are always a good thing but not necessary. \n\nSka came first, then that became rocksteady, then modern reggae. I would say a good analogy is the difference between Motown, R & B, and Neo-Soul. First was Otis Redding, then came Luther Vandross, and now there's artists like John Legend. \n\nThe music is all very similar just originating from a different time. \n\nI hope that helped. I'm not from the islands at all but I used to listen to Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Hepcat, and dancehall a lot back in high school. I'm a fan of Damian Marley today too. ",
"They're basically just different eras in the same musical continuum. Compare the examples from the Wailers/Bob Marley/Rita Marley, which cover all eras:\n\n**Ska: (original era ~1958 - ~1966)**\n\nFast tempo, usually with a swing beat and a very strong jazz element. The original ska musicians from the '60s were all jazz musicians, so in addition to vocal songs, they often recorded instrumentals structured around a melody or theme (often \"borrowed\" from a popular movie or TV show theme song), followed by a bunch of improvised jazz solos with the theme repeated at the end. \n\nThe original ska bands followed a [big band](_URL_1_) jazz format: 8+ musicians with horns as the lead instruments and piano, guitar, upright bass, and drums doing the support.\n\n_URL_3_\n\n_URL_6_\n\n**Rocksteady: (original era ~1966 - ~1969)**\n\nA transitional form between ska and reggae. Medium tempo, smaller bands centred around bass, guitar, and piano and less around horns (notice in the first example below how the horns are barely audible and are now in the support role). \n\nMany newer rocksteady musicians didn't have a jazz background, so the music is simpler and more groove-based, though jazz-trained ska musicians often recorded on these songs as well.\n\n_URL_2_\n\n_URL_4_\n\n**Reggae: (original era ~1969 - ~early 80s)**\n\nSlow tempo and often minimalistic, emphasizing groove and space with fewer solos. Reggae groups usually follow a rock band format: guitar, bass, keys and drums, with the bass guitar carrying the signature line and very prominent in the mix. Many reggae songs don't have horns at all. Although most vocals are still sung, you start to see the emergence of [toasting](_URL_5_)--basically the Jamaican equivalent (and to some degree, a grandfather) of rapping. Also, as a precursor to sampling, some singers and toasters (aka \"deejays\") choose to record new vocals over old instrumental tracks (aka \"riddims\") instead of writing new music.\n\n_URL_7_\n\n_URL_9_\n\n**Dancehall: (original era ~early 80s - now)**\n\nA continuation of the reggae era, people will often just call dancehall music \"reggae\" and call old style reggae from the '70s \"roots reggae\" to distinguish it. Music is simpler still and more dance-oriented than earlier reggae. Paralleling hip-hop and r & b, a lot of live instrumentation is replaced with drum machines, synths, riddims (samples), and there's a lot more toasting (rapping) than before.\n\n_URL_0_\n\n_URL_8_\n\n\n**TL;DR: ska:reggae:dancehall::jazz:rock:hip-hop/r & b.** \n\nAnd rocksteady sounds like a cross between ska and reggae. Oversimplified, but that's the general idea.\n\n\n\n\n\n"
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"www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHRQ7-GWvIE",
"www.youtube.com/watch?v=eugQ3vfQOK8",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deejay_%28Jamaican%29",
"www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybmPHD7FPcQ",
"www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-5E6_qtXAw",
"www.youtube.com/watch?v=IzP_NF06vpg",
"www.youtube.com/watch?v=2j6uXOfgWz8"
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cvh2pg | biologically speaking, how exactly does an orgasm become bigger/harder? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cvh2pg/eli5_biologically_speaking_how_exactly_does_an/ | {
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"One factor is availability of oxygen; the less in your system, the more intense the sensation. Hence autoerotic asphyxiation."
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3karbx | why do we say every year before 2000 in the hundreds, and every year after in the thousands? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3karbx/eli5_why_do_we_say_every_year_before_2000_in_the/ | {
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"Because \"18 hundred\" is shorter than \"1 thousand 8 hundred\". On the other hand, \"20 hundred\" is longer than \"2 thousand\". After 100 years however, you will hear people say \"21 hundred\" instead of \"2 thousand 1 hundred\"",
"You could certainly say \"one-thousand eight-hundred\" if you wanted to. \"Eighteen-hundred\" is a bit more economical. Also the date doesnt end with hundreds yet so its a bit cumbersome to say \"The Twenty-Hundreds\" but id be willing to bet that \"The Twenty-one Hundreds\" will be more widely used than \"The Two-thousand One-Hundreds\" its mostly just a matter of what sounds right, its not a hard and fast rule.",
"Ask yourself how you would pronounce the year 1015. One-thousand-fifteen? Ten-fifteen?\n\nNow compare that to 2015. Two-thousand-fifteen. Twenty-fifteen.\n\nBoth work and both describe the year accurately, but it's just the first century of each millennium that experiences this problem."
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409c54 | how does the nlf tournament works? | How are the teams divided, why are they divided if they play teams from both conferences anyway, what are the wild cards. How many teams there are. How many go to play offs and finally how does a team qualify to play offs. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/409c54/eli5how_does_the_nlf_tournament_works/ | {
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"NFL? So the NFL is split into the NFC and the AFC. They both have 16 teams of their own. Each of these conferences are split into 4 groups of 4 called divisions. So there are 4 divisions per conference: North, South, East and West. Teams play other teams in their division twice a year, while they will only play other teams at most once a year. Wins against another conference team matter more than wins against teams from outside the conference in the case of a tiebreaker situation. There are 16 games a season and so there are 6 within the division, 4 against all the teams of a specific NFC conference, 4 against a specific AFC conference and then 2 more games against other teams in your conference. At the end of the season the teams that have the most wins in their division(or win in the case of a tiebreaker but I'll get to that) go to the playoffs. So that's 8 teams already. Now on top of that 2 teams from each Conference also get in as Wild Cards. This goes to the two teams with the most wins in each conference that weren't the best in their division (again if they have the same win/loss record as another team it goes to a tiebreaker to see who gets in). So now there are a total of 12 teams that made it to the playoffs. Now the teams in each conference play each other until one is the NFC champion and one is the AFC champion, and those two teams play in the Super Bowl. Before the conference championship, the teams are seeded. Of the 4 teams that were best in their division, they get ranked from 1 to 4 based on number of wins. Then the wild cards get ranked 5th or 6th based on number of wins. The 1 and 2 seed get a bye round, so they don't play anyone in the first round. The 3rd seed plays the 6th seed and the 4th seed plays the 5th seed. I should mention the higher seeded team always plays at home. After this the losers are eliminated and then the winners go onto the next round. The worst team left plays the 1st seed and the second worst seeded team plays the 2nd seed. After this game the two teams left in the conference play against each other for the conference championship. In terms of the rules for a tiebreaker, they're fairly complicated so here is a link to understand them: _URL_0_",
"There are 32 teams in the NFL. 16 each in two conferences, the AFC and NFC. That's broken down into 4-team divisions. Each season, each team plays the other 3 teams in its division twice, and the rest of the schedule is filled out with remaining teams, mostly from within the conference.\n\n6 teams from each conference make the playoffs--the 4 division winners, plus two wildcards. The wildcards are the teams with the best records that didn't win their division. The 6 teams are ranked--first the 4 division winners by record, then the wildcards by record. They play a standard elimination tournament, with the top two teams getting a first round bye. The winners of each conference play in the Super Bowl."
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3bi365 | the financial crisis in greece | All questions relating to Greece and its financial situation is to be posted here.
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3bi365/the_financial_crisis_in_greece/ | {
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"Greece spends a ton more than they take in and has racked up an insurmountable about of debt, mostly by providing welfare and government services they can't afford. Now at the very least they will be forced to start acting/living like the poor nation they have turned themselves into. But the people are reluctant to make the change within their government. They have continued to elect people who promise them they won't have to make the necessary painful cuts. But now the EU and IMF may make that decision for them...\n\nNations like the US can continue to spend money when we can't afford it because world lenders believe they will eventually be paid back with interest. The world has lost faith in Greece and they could be cut off. This is a problem because their economy and government expenditures are completely out of wack. Without the ability to borrow they will have to institute austerity measures and completely ruin their currency/international trade leverage and could enter a spiral to poverty.",
"Someone ELI5 please: How are they going to organise a referendum in just 5 days? Normally it takes months to compile the register, print polling cards, organise polling stations, recruit vote counters, etc. Not to mention raising the money to do all this.",
"I'm in Greece now on vacation, will this affect me in any way?\n\nEdit: affect not effect",
"\n\n > kh498\n \nI work at the moment in a Greek island and I can tell you that things look pretty stable but I'm not sure if they are. You won't have any problem with your holidays for sure.\n",
"Watching the news, Greece is nearing to default. What does this mean and (if any) what repercussions does it have on Greece and the Eurozone? ",
"ELI5:\nIf a) the IMF (and the world) knows that Greece can't make its debt repayment this month and b) the repercussions of Greece defaulting are expected to be bad, why is the IMF insisting Greece attempt to make the repayment? Wouldn't it be better to just let it ride a bit longer while the country tries to get itself into a place where it can afford to service its debt?",
"ELI5: What happens to all the other countries Greece owes money to if they go through with the Grexit?\n\nCountries like: Portugal/Italy/Germany etc. do they just simply not get their money and each country's economy also tanks?",
"ELI5: What exactly is the 'Grexit' and what referendum is being voted upon? I'm trying to find answers that are a) not in Greek and b) explain what is actually going on other than political propaganda, but not having much luck. The translation services make it look like the majority of articles I'm finding in Greek are actually propaganda.",
"What is the worst case scenario for Greece, and how long would it take them to recover from that? ",
"What programs has the government of Greece been paying for that the country can not afford? \n - I imagine its not gold bathtubs for everyone.",
"There is also the issue that the Greeks used Goldman Sachs to make things look rosier than they really were.\n\nThis article from 2010 explains some about how Goldman Sachs was used to mask Greece's true debts:\n\n_URL_1_\n\nIt is also said that Goldman Sachs massaged Greece's finances to help them get into the Euro in the first place:\n\n_URL_0_\n\nI think if the true financial state of Greece was known at the time, they wouldn't have been allowed in.\n\nI think if you want to really understand what is happening at the moment, you have to look right back to this stuff.",
"Eli5- why is all of this happening now? What set it off? Is Greece just going to turn into some sort of developing nation after all of this? ",
"For a \"true\" ELI5 (I know that's not what this sub is for):\n\nThe Greek economy has a broken leg. The doctor told them it has to be set, but they started to set it and it hurt too much so they yelled \"Stop!\" Now the doctor still says the leg has to be set, but the Greeks hope that if they just lay still, it won't hurt too much and maybe it will get better on its own.",
"Like most countries, Greece borrowed money to invest in order to boost their economy and their government services. \n\nAnd like most countries, Greece is borrowing money to pay the previous loans. \n\nDue to poor management and corruption, their debt got a bit higher than other countries. \n\nDuring the 2002 crisis, the income of all government worldwide went down since they collected less taxes. They had to borrow more money. As a result the interest rate went up.\n\nGreece had difficulties dealing with those higher interest, but had no choice but to keep borrowing in order to pay the previous loans. But since Greece had difficulties, nobody wanted to lend money to Greece and the interest for Greece got out of control. \n\nAt the same time, other countries feared that the debt crisis would spread. If a country like Greece can't pay its debt, people would hesitate to lend money to other countries with weak economy, increasing the interest rate for others. If the interest rate goes up, it cost tons of money to the other countries. \n\nThis is why other countries, especially european ones, don't want Greece to bankrupt. It order to avoid that they lent money to Greece that was no longer able to borrow on the public market. \n\nHowever, when lending to greece they forced Greece to cut down its spending. This was supposed to ensure Greece could pay back. \n\nSadly this was a huge mistake (as admitted by Strass-Kann who was director of IMF). By forcing Greece to cut down its spendings, it shrank Greece economy and increased unemployement. This mean, Greece income dropped just as much as its spendings, Greece was not any closer to be able to pay its debt and the situation got worse. \n\n***\n\nOne of the problem of Greece is that it doesn't have its own currency. \n\nIn general, strong economies should have a stronger currency in order to balance import/export. If a weak economy has a strong currency, it isn't competitive and it has trouble exporting. \n\nThis obviously can be a problem when countries with a strong economy like Germany share the same currency as a country with a weak economy like Greece. Germany gets a currency weaker than it should have, and Greece gets a currency stronger that it should have. Germany becomes very competitive, and Greece not competitive at all. Germany is effectively taking the jobs from Greece.\n\nTo become competitive again, Greece needs to devaluate its currency but it can't as long as it is using euro. \n\n",
"What happens if Greece ends up voting \"no\" on the July 5th referendum?",
"This is my understanding of it: The Greek government had been cooking its books for years before joining the Eurozone, the monetary union in the EU. The EU requires [certain attributes of an economy](_URL_1_) before a country is allowed to join this union. Greece probably did not meet these requirements but that was not apparent until [later audits](_URL_2_).\n\n\nIt was kind of too late to just kick Greece out of the union once everyone in the EU realized the Greece economy was a lemon. This situation would have been manageable if the entire world economy didn't crash in 2008. Because Greece was already in massive debt, and since they were in a monetary union in which they did not control the currency, Greece was put into a very bad spot without the tools to ease the crisis. Unlike Greece, in the US the Federal Reserve could manipulate the dollar in ways that would reduce the impact of the crisis. A lack of monetary tools was supposed to encourage fiscally responsible policy in the EU, but it ended up contributing to this perfect storm of economic crisis in Greece. \n\nThe EU had an interest in not allowing the Greece economy to crash, so a coalition led by Germany approved several [bailout](_URL_0_) [packages](_URL_3_) with the understanding that Greece would implement severe austerity policies (cutting social programs and spending) in order to be able to pay them back. The Greek people were not a fan of these measures, so they voted out the politicians that had made this deal. The new politicians were much more leftist and basically refused to pay the debts, getting rid of any austerity measures. \n\nNow to today, Greece needs another bailout to avoid default, but its creditors (i.e. Germany) are refusing to give them any money because they haven't paid off the last two bailouts. If Greece defaults on its debts, it will likely be removed from the Eurozone. Hence you see people running to ATMs withdrawing all their money before the Banks in Greece crash. Also contributing to this crappy situation are Greek politicians that are playing chicken with payment and negotiation deadlines. Through all of this, the Greek people are likely to emerge significantly worse for wear. \n\nEDIT: Read /u/green_velvet 's comment for clarification on austerity",
"This comment is very related and a great ELI5 answer: \n_URL_0_",
"This is more about the solution, or whatever comes next:\n\na, What happens if Greece accepts these terms? They get the money, pay back the IMF. But there is a huge ECB payment coming up next month. I have the feeling, just as most of the people that this can't go on.\n\nb, Most importantly, what happens if they refuse? The immediate thing would be that they default on the IMF loan. What happens after that in detail. What will the EU do, what happens to the peoples money.\n\nc, And connected to that, the default. They wouldn't default on everything, but what does a real government default means. I get that people are talking about that here as a huge deal but all I see is the IMF and the ECB loans and defaulting on them. Or these are enough to bring that devastating effect.\n\nd, And then there's the actual money. If they default, what happens to it. All those euros in Greece, owned by the people. Why would it destroy peoples lives. The government said it will pay the wages and the pensions. What happens to it if they leave the zone?\n\ne, And the last, grexit. Why is it so unavoidable and necessary? Some people talked about the devaluation of the money (which is obviously niot possible with the euro) and that would help the economy. Some said this would again, destroy the average citizens life? I understand some of the upsides but not all.\n\nI got some of it, but there is not a single full picture about these things. I hope someone will be able to answer at least a few of these questions.",
"As a german I heard, that we gave them a lot of money and I really dont get why they hate us so much. Could someone please explain it to me?",
"My daughter is going to Greece in 2 weeks. Can anyone tell me how the financial crisis there will affect her? I was going to send her with a credit card and some cash. Should I skip the credit card now?",
"Eli5: what happens when a country declares bankruptcy?\n",
"Will this affect tourism in Greece? Do you see the country going down a road where it is not safe to travel to?",
"Why if Greece is such a small country within Europe and not being specially powerful is a threat for the Euro as a currency and the whole Europe in general? \nWould not be as simple as just letting it go out of Europe and that's it?\n",
"Austerity is overrated, World GDP growth of 3.3% is 3 trillion (in US$) per year created out of thin air. Greek debt is barely 10% of that figure and harsh austerity measures have to be recognized as punitive rather than pragmatic solutions.",
"FWIW, the top comments here are currently not actual ELI5's of the situation. So far they're just biased interpretations of the situation, i.e. the Greece governments interpretation vs. the EU/troikas interpretation. Hopefully someone can present a truly balanced ELI5.",
"Why would Greece's exist from the EU affect american markets?\n\n_URL_0_ ",
"Rarely will you see an explanation of Greek debt that mentions how huge hedge funds basically ran the show. This is a [fun place to start](_URL_0_):\n \n > Just look at how banks like Chase behaved in Greece, for example.\n\n > Having seen how well interest-rate swaps worked for Jefferson County, Alabama, Chase “helped” countries like Greece and Italy mask their debt problems for years by selling a similar series of swaps to those governments. The bank then turned around and worked with banks like Goldman, Sachs (who were also major purveyors of those swap deals) to create a thing called the iTraxx SovX Western Europe index, which allowed investors to bet against Greek debt.\n \n > In other words, banks like Chase and Goldman knowingly larded up the nation of Greece with a crippling future debt burden, then turned around and helped the world bet against Greek debt.\n \n > Does a citizen of Greece do that deal? Forget that: does a human being do that deal?\n \n > Operations like the Greek swap/short index maneuver were easy money for banks like Goldman and Chase – hell, it’s a no-lose play, like cutting a car’s brake lines and then betting on the driver to crash – but they helped create the monstrous European debt problem that this very minute is threatening to send the entire world economy into collapse, which would result in who knows what horrors. At minimum, millions might lose their jobs and benefits and homes. Millions more will be ruined financially.\n \n > But why should Chase and Goldman care what happens to those people? Do they have any skin in that game?\n \n > Of course not. We’re talking about banks that not only didn’t warn the citizens of Greece about their future debt disaster, they actively traded on that information, to make money for themselves.\n \n > People like Dimon, and Schwarzman, and John Paulson, and all of the rest of them who think the “imbeciles” on the streets are simply full of reasonless class anger, they don’t get it. Nobody hates them for being successful. And not that this needs repeating, but nobody even minds that they are rich.\n \n > What makes people furious is that they have stopped being citizens.\n \n\n",
"The responses so far have all been woefully wrong. The cause of crisis in Greece was like the cause of the crisis in the United States, Ireland, and Iceland. It doesn't have to do with a budget crisis but with a failure of banks during the financial crisis of 2008. \n\nDuring the financial crisis of 2008, the Greek government, like the Irish government and unlike the Icelandic government, borrowed other European countries' money to bail out failing Greek banks. The government was forced to bail out these banks because foreign European banks were heavily invested in the Greek banks and they risked failures, ie contagion, in their homes countries if the Greek banks failed. So Greece borrowed this money to prop up their banking system and in turn the banking system of Europe. \n\nThe terms that Greece negotiated for this money have been too onerous for the weak Greek economy, which unlike Ireland, has failed to rebound making continued austerity for the sake of paying these debts unlivable and politically impossible.\n\nRead this article. It's explains it succinctly\n\n_URL_0_. ",
"Why can't the debt just be dropped? Why can't the Troika just say \"Do you know what? Forget the last £1.5bn, just forget it. We'll start again.\"?",
"France and Germany wanted to sell lots of military hardware to Greece and a previous administration was happy to take their loans to expand their military. When the German and French banks failed because they made bad investments (like lending money to Greece to build up a huge military), the govs paid off the banks and took on the debt. In the past, the bank would have to cover their bad investments. With banks controlling most politicians, that was no longer an option. Our tax dollars paid off their bad investments and allowed them to continue playing the same game. Privatize profits and have govs and tax payers pick up their losses. What a game, what a scam.",
"I'll try to provide an ELI5 from my point of view (Greek citizen). (Sorry for its length.)\n\nCurrent global economic system is based on borrowing money and paying the interests of that loan. You have a big problem when you owe a lot of money compared to the money you produce each yer(GDP =Gross domestic product). Due to wrong decisions, corruption in governments (they increased the size of the public sector so they can gain votes, huge projects were assigned to companies cause politicians were bribed (e.g. Siemens got many huge programs in Greece that way)), and tax evasion Greece failed to meet the growth of it's debt. (Many have already stated out that the true economic figures were falsified in order to join the Eurozone with the help of banks such as Goldman Sachs.That's true.)\n\nIn 2009 Greek Prime minister [G.A.Papandreou](_URL_10_) made an agreement with the [IMF](_URL_3_), so IMF would lend Greece money with low interest and Greece in return should reform some aspects of its economy to reduce the amount of money spent (austerity measures). Going under the IMF caused uncertainty in Greece and many retrieved their money from Greek banks leading to liquidity problems (not enough cash) which caused a need for a new loan to support Greek banks (Greek banks couldn't borrow directly any money because certain statistical rating organizations made sure they were demoted and lost their credibility even if it was OBVIOUS Greek banks wasn't the cause of the Greek debt problem (unlike Irish debt which was cause mainly by their banks)). Austerity measures led to reduced spending but also caused a huge problem in Greek economy, so a second set of measures were forced in 2011 in order to further reduce spending. Second set of measure reduced spending (cut down pensions, wages, etc) but also drove Greek economy to the ground (highest unemployment recorded in Greece, highest rate of people near poverty, reduced GDP ). It's easy to spot the black hole here, it's a vicious circle that proved their experiment with Greece failed. Now they proposed to Greece a third set of measures targeting pensions (which NEED to be reformed) and TOURISM in Greece (they want 23%VAT for restaurants and hotels) which would lead to huge reduction in tourists (Italy,Turkey,and Spain would benefit from that) and further shrink our economy.\n\nIt's clear that in order to get out of the vicious circle Greece must either boost it's economy (economic growth = higher GDP = more money \"produced\" per year) or have it's debt defaulted (you don't owe money any more because you are \"forgiven\")(partially or totally, like Germany had twice in 20th century).\n\n**END OF ELI5.**\n\n*(Bonus content/1st day free dlc)*\n\nNow some interesting facts:\n\n1. In the years 2005-2010 Greek economy problem was well known in Europe , but banks kept on lending Greece money so they can make profit.\n\n\n2. In 2010 G.A.Papandreou asked for a referendum with the question \"Do you want to join the IMF\", European leaders were paralyzed and counter offered loans without interest for some years and promised for future help (so he recalled it). If Greece refused to go under the IMF or demanded a haircut or even declared bankruptcy back then the only sure outcome was that European and American banks would collapse because they were holding a huge amount of the Greek debt (Later, European Central Bank bought that debt in lower value). Keep in mind that it was right after the collapse of [Lehman brothers](_URL_0_). [Deutsche Bank](_URL_7_) , [Credit Agricole](_URL_4_) would be the first banks that would collapse.\n\n\n3. It's [IRONY](_URL_8_) when German government accuse us of corruption when they REFUSE to extradite the number of suspect [Michael Christoforakos] (_URL_1_) (sorry i couldn't find an article in English) for the biggest scandal in recent Greek history (Siemens (German company bribing Greek government)).\n\n4. Tax evasion is a practice well known around the world ([yeap, even to Germany](_URL_9_)), is it a mere coincidence that most of the [tax havens](_URL_13_) belong to the [United Kingdom](_URL_2_)?\n\n5. Germany is the only country in EU that [violated the commonly agreed inflation target of 2% per yea](_URL_12_)r (wages would increase by 2% more than your GDP).That was possible by decreasing the power of its labor unions and putting political pressure on wages.\n\n6. When Greece took a loan to save its banks (low liquidity = low on cash to give if asked) European Union , IMF etc made sure that loan was calculated in the countries public debt. YET, when Spain took a loan for EXACTLY the same reason , that loan wasn't added to the public debt.\n\n7. 27% decrease in GDP since the first set of austerity measures, it's the HIGHEST ever recorded for a country during peace. And they can't figure out why we don't want a third set....\n\n8. **(Conspiracy time)** [Portugal , Italy , Spain and even France](_URL_5_) have the same problem as Greece. Certain [\"parties\"](_URL_6_) love the fact that Greece might fail if its citizens don't accept the third set of austerity measures. And those \"parties\" will make sure to make an example out of Greece for the next to come. The show is coming to end for us , one way or the other but it's time for Europe to face the real problem now and stop having Greek problem in the spotlight.\n\n\nEDIT: My only fear is the possibility Greek government has an agenda of forcing the country in becoming a \"left\" nation without asking us.. (and damn i am kinda leftist myself)\n\n@don_one I don't have a problem with Greece being in the spotlight if it was the major problem, but Greece is only 2% of the EU economy , even if its debt is totally defaulted(forgiven) there would be almost no negative outcome , yet Spain, Italy, France are in the G8, i can [bear](_URL_11_)ly imagine what a possible bankruptcy or a reduction of their GDP by 27% would cause in the world economy.\n\n@LxSwiss GOLD ? < 3 Thx kind stranger . And a black/white world would be SO boring..\n\n@moneyjewjew Let me know if you have any more questions\n",
"Essentially, the Greek economy has never been particularly strong, but coupled with high high levels of corruption in politicians and the richest refusing to essentially pay any taxes, the country wasn't in a particularly great state before the 2008 economic crash. \n\nPost Crash the economy tanked, and Greece was left with extremely high levels of unemployment (up to around 30%). Unfortunately this reduced tax revenues even further and Greece entered a spiral. In the past, governments would invest into economies to kick start the economy and create employment, but the EU, IMF & World Bank around this time decided Austerity (cutting of social spending and investment ) would produce a faster recovery. So in return for large loans, the stipulations were for vast levels of spending cuts. \n\n6 years later and the economy has yet to improve, and austerity has had the complete opposite effect of intended, increasing Greece's debt while having little effect on the economy. \n\nSince then the World Bank and IMF have produced reports saying that austerity has deemed to essentially failed, and have apologised to Greece stating that they never expected it to go so badly. \n\nThere has been a growing movement in Europe over the last 5 years for anti-austerity -the idea that you invest in your future rather than cut to get the debt down (see Post War Britain for one of the best examples of this). This culmulated in 2015 with the election of Syrzia, who stood on a left platform of anti-austerity in order to get the back on track. \n\n6 months later the EU has started getting pissed of with Greece for not cutting what politicians promised 7 years ago. Which has now culmulated in a situation where the Greeks have essentially been asked whether they want to stay in the EU (and commit to more austerity) or not. \n\nP.S. I haven't got a source for this, but I have also heard that Greece has one of the best structural economies in the developed world, and that under 100% employment ( and hence 100% of tax revenue), they would actually have one of the highest surpluses in the world. This would essentially make this an employment problem in Greece, rather than a selfish welfare benefit problem, which unfortunately much of the media seems to suggest. ",
"Would now be a good time to get a bargain on a villa overlooking the Mediterranean?",
"Here's another version to compare to the other top comments:\n\nGreece's economy got hit really hard by the recession, relatively speaking. A lot of their economy relied on tourism which pretty much came to a halt when all the tourists stopped traveling due to the recession. In response to these tough financial times, the ECB (which is just the European version of the US Federal Reserve) and other EU governing bodies decided to implement austerity measures. This just means that you reduce government debt, either by cutting spending, increasing your taxes, or both.\n\nIf you ever took Econ 101 (which is unlikely since you are 5), you know that during a recession, governments are supposed to implement expansionary policy (increase govt spending, cut taxes) in order for the economy to get firing on all cylinders again. If you're wondering why the EU implemented the exact opposite, well... Tough to say.\n\nAnywho. Greece impemented these austerity measures in a severe way. More so then any other EU nation because like others pointed out, they've been in financial turmoil for a while and in order to get more loans they needed to implement even more austerity as part of the terms.\n\nSo you end up with a downward spiral of more debt, more contractionary economic policy, and an eventual situation where debt is so high and the economy is so weak that a default occurs. If this default happens then the EU lenders will receive less money then if they had restructured current debt levels and allowed Greece to enact expansionary policy. This would be your win-win scenario but it means the EU would need to admit that austerity was the wrong path initially.\n\nInstead it seems pride goeth before the fall and the EU (led inexplicably by Germany and not the governing units of the EU) is poised to kick Greece out of the union. Greece's economy will suffer, lender nationa will receive less on their loans, and the future stability of the EU will be brought into question.\n\nLet me know if you have any questions or thoughts.\n\n",
"Some great answers here as I didn't fully understand this situation before reading this thread. So I guess ELI5: Is the United States going to go through something like this eventually since it owes over $18 trillion in debt?",
"ELI5: From reading the comments, what I understand is that the fault lies with Greece. If they were to refuse to repay the loans, would some country that has loaned Greece a significant amount of money start a war against them to seize Greece assets? What ways are there for the countries that loaned them money to get it back?",
"This story begins with the general economic crisis reaching Europe in 2008-10. A lot of European economic institutions and banks are in danger and so it is decided that Greece will take loans from them to keep confidence in the banking system high.\n\nNow, Greece is a unique country, economically speaking. It never went through an industrial revolution, so it has no industrial infrastructure. There is also a big tax collecting problem, as a lot of the big money-makers are shippers who have the ability to move their money overseas so as to avoid taxes. (There are more reasons Greece was unable to pay back the debt - of which genetic tendency to corruption is obviously not one of - but these are arguably the main ones).\n\nThis led to a problem of paying back the debt. This is where the EU, ECB (European Central Bank) and IMF (American/International economic organization) come in and force austerity measures on Greece - in other words: really harsh measures that kill its economy in order to raise money (the fact that austerity kills the economy is no longer debated, not even by the EU, ECB and IMF).\n\nThe Greek people have a problem with that, so they vote off the EU-friendly government that pretty much accepted all this and voted for the leftist SYRIZA party, which is against austerity.\n\nWhat is currently going on is SYRIZA fighting for lighter measures and the EU, ECB and IMF being unable to back down due to political reasons.\n\nWhat happens next is up to anyone's guess.\n\n(This is all based on [this non-ELI5 post](_URL_0_))",
"**So what exactly is the problem?**\nBasically, Greece was hit hard by the financial crisis, and since then it has borrowed a lot of money that it says it can't pay back – at least not yet.\n\nAccording to calculations by Reuters, it owes its official lenders 242.8 billion euros, with Germany its biggest creditor.\n\nThe lenders include the IMF (International Monetary Fund), the ECB (European Central Bank) and the Euro zone governments.\n\nMany of the loans don't mature for years, even decades.\n\nHowever some do. In particular, Greece was due to pay 1.6 billion euros to the IMF by the end of June in overdue interest. After that, 3.5 billion is due to the ECB on July 20, and another 3.2 billion in August.\n\nOn top of that, more than 8 billion euros in short-term bills are due over the next two months.\n\nGreece says it has scraped together all the money it can to pay its debts – it even called in cash reserves from councils, hospitals and other public bodies. It says that, to pay the money owed, it would have had to stop paying money into pensions and public wages – which it refuses to do.\n\n**What happens if Greece doesn't get the rescue money?**\nBarring further surprises, it will default on at least some of its debts.\n\nSovereign default does have precedents, but it always comes with major economic upheaval.\n\nThough the consequences of that are long-term (difficulty finding lenders willing to invest in the country), there will be immediate side-effects.\n\nAfter months of massive withdrawals, fearing this very crisis, Greece's banks are surviving on emergency credit from the European Central Bank. Without that, they have had to impose capital controls to stop any more money going out.\n\nGreek people will have less money they are able to spend. Business will be unable to invest. The economy will head into recession.\n\nSo far the Greek government has refused to countenance 'Grexit'. However if no new rescue deal is negotiated, Greece would have to supply the banks with money itself, or they will collapse.\n\nBut the government has no money. The only obvious solution is to start printing new money to get cash back into the economy.\n\nThis 'new drachma' would effectively mean Greece has left the euro – at least temporarily.\n\nThe 'new drachma', even if it began on parity with the euro, would quickly lose up to half its value. Essentially, the value of everything in the country would be halved.\n\nThere will be high inflation, and the new exchange rate would make imports much more expensive. Life will get even harder for ordinary Greeks and Greek businesses.\n\nOn the other hand, some economists say it would stimulate the local economy and, in the long run, leave the country stronger. There is fierce disagreement over this view.\n\n**Why would the Greek people possibly want this?**\nThey are sick of austerity. Unemployment has sky-rocketed, wages halved, pensions were slashed, public bodies like hospitals, schools and universities starved of funds.\n\nMany no longer believe that austerity is just a necessary, temporary measure to put the country back on its feet. They believe it is wrecking their economy and their lives. They are willing to take a risk and try something else.\n\n**How will all this affect other countries?**\nThe euro is already tumbling on international markets.\n\nIf Greece defaults it leaves many of its neighbours short. Germany is owed 57 billion euros, France 43 billion, Italy 38 billion and Spain 25 billion – on top of those countries' contributions to the IMF loans.\n\nThe loans don't mature for almost 30 years, there is almost no interest on them and some of the loans came with a 10-year moratorium on interest payments, so it's not like the countries need the money back immediately. However it's still a lot to have to take off the bottom line.\n\nConfidence in Europe, and the euro, has been profoundly shaken. Eyes will turn to the continent's other weak economies such as Portugal, Spain and Italy. They may start to lose capital and investment.\n\n**Is it just an economic problem?**\nNo.\n\nThis could also drastically change the political balance in Europe. If Syriza makes a success out of splitting Greece away from the rest of the continent, it will embolden other nationalistic parties such as the National Front in France or UKIP in the UK.\n\nFuture elections in Europe could see a surge in nationalism, a rejection of the European project, potentially enough to threaten Europe's stability as a political union.\n\nSpeaking of which, the UK is in the early stages of debate on a referendum on whether to stay in Europe, next year. If Europe is a basket case this time next year, public opinion (currently in favour of staying in) may drastically change.\n\nThen there is the question of Russia. Syriza has already made overtures to the Kremlin, with Tsipras a star speaker at Putin's recent big international summit in St Petersburg.\n\nIf Russia comes to Greece's aid, with money, other support (or both), it will be a new factor in the current Cold War-like tensions between east and west.\n\nGreece has already expressed its anger at Europe and NATO for not doing enough in its regular chest-bumping with Turkey. If Russian warships find a friendly berth in Greek ports, the strategic map of Europe is drastically redrawn.",
"What I find particularly disturbing about this whole mess is that in the early 2000s, when Greece joined the Eurozone, almost nobody in Brussels expressed concerns over how much of Greece's economic boom was built on borrowed money. The same troijka institutions demanding Greece to reform and slash spending helped in allowing this mess to happen. Goldman Sachs didn't mind lending the Greek government lots of money when they wanted to invest in prestigious projects like the 2004 Olympics. Complain about the Tsipras administration all you want, but you can hardly blame the Greek people for looking toward an alternative to the traditional New Democracy and PASOK governments.They led Greece to spend too much borrowed money in the first place. These same parties and institutions complaining that Syriza doesn't do enough are fucking hypocrites.",
"This comment board is a pretty good example for the two camps that people have been forced into through the media's bizarre simplistic and ultimately corrupt portrayal of how the global capitalist system works. \n\nThe main thing the Greek crisis is pointing out is that the world's entire economic system is resting on a house of cards made up of debts that can never be paid (and this includes the US economy/banks, and the supposedly responsible German banking system) The EU itself as a economic system that forces drastically different countries to use the same currency and fiscal systems was never a good idea. Basically the statement that the Greek government is irresponsible and is spending more than it makes is true, but it is only true because of the following:\n\n1) Goldman Sachs directly helped them hide their bad finances in order to join the EU and start taking out giant loans\n2) German banks knew exactly how risky loans to Greece were and plowed in because they were under the crazy assumption that the EU/IMF would never let basic math come home to roost. 3) There is no way for Greece to pay back the debts that German banks and the EU signed off for them to accumulate. The banking system always knew this and expected to start seizing Greek assets as soon as they stopped paying. This is essentially the same model as a loan shark...sure you can blame the idiot for taking a loan out, but you then also have to point out the loan shark nature of IMF/EU making loans they knew were mathematically impossible to pay off.\n4) The financial world is quaking at this situation because it exposes all the fake/bad math that exists built into our economies. If you acknowledge it in Greece then you also have to acknowledge the very same situations in Portugal, Italy, Mexico..the list goes on and on.\n5) They let Greece go this far with extending promises they knew they couldn't meet because the alternatives of admitting that all their math is off is terrifying. There are many banks that would be insolvent immediately if they have to admit all the bad loans they've made to countries just like Greece. \n\nGet ready for a rough ride world, Greece is the canary in the coal mine. \n\n",
"Could we PLEASE have the top comments sourced? The disinformation in here is astounding. ",
"[NPR article: Nov. 17, 2012](_URL_0_)\n > the Greek National Railroad generates a mere $100 million euro in revenues a year, and pays out $400 million euro in salaries to the employees of the Greek National Railroad. **He'd actually made a calculation that it would be cheaper to put the Greeks who took the trains into taxi cabs than to keep this railroad running.**\n\nThis type of public expenditure, coupled with an almost pathological refusal to pay taxes has had Greece living off of credit and deficit spending. It's like someone being on food stamps and buying a Ferrari. \n\nI don't blame the Germans and other euro zone members for refusing to bail out Greece *again* while they fail to address the fundamental flaws in their economy. Why should they subsidize and bear the burden of Greece's irresponsibility? There are going to be some very hard times ahead until a strong leader tells them that they're going to have to do some very unpleasant things and everyone is going to have to sacrifice. Blame only gets you so far, and while the rich certainly need to contribute, it won't solve the problem.\nEdit: mobile formatting",
"If the Economy of Greece does collapse, what would that mean for the rest of the world?",
"*I'm a bit late to this. Hope this doesn't get buried!*\n\nFor those who are interested in a little bit of a longer read (and obviously not ELI5 - but by no means technical), get the book Boomerang by Michael Lewis. It covers the financial crisis as a whole but also thoroughly explains what exactly went wrong in Greece with a few absolutely mind-blowing examples. \n\nAnyway, here goes a shot at explaining the whole situation, from joining the EU to what's going on right now. \n\nBefore Greece joined the Euro, the EMU (European Monetary Union) had set a number of requirements a country had to meet before they'd be allowed to join the Euro; this to make sure that only financially stable countries could join. Amongst them the maximum 3% budget deficit, but also things like unemployment rate. At that time (mid to late 90's) Greece didn't meet those requirements at all; they were struggling with a pretty serious unemployment rate and had a pretty sizeable budget deficit (meaning they spend more than they get in income), possibly even around the 10-15%. \n\nIn a few years seemingly they managed to have solved this, while in reality they did some 'creative bookkeeping'. In essence, they simply didn't record a lot of expenses and put people on the governments' payroll just to make it all seem well. In reality though, those people got a large sum of money monthly for pretty much doing nothing. The EU frankly failed to notice how Greece went from pretty much being a third-world country in a lot of regards to a financially healthy country like they pretended to be and let this all happen.\n\nTo quickly clarify the 'third-world' part, Greece never was a rich country (always had the lowest GDP per capita of the founding Euro countries) and when you look at things like tax morality or corruption, they score not just as worst in Europe, but also used to rank amongst the worst in the world. When I researched this in 2012, the country was ranked just as bad as China on the Corruption Perception Index ([you can find the data here](_URL_0_)). Not only that, a huge part of their economy depends on tourism and besides that not much else, which also made it a lot harder to compete with the rest of the Euro zone.\n\nNow as Greece managed to join the Euro, a couple of things changed. One of the things was that they could borrow at much lower rates; the rates of the most credit-worthy country in the Euro zone being Germany (I think the interest rates went from somewhere in the 10 to 5%. Now instead of taking responsibility and fixing the financial issues, the Greek leaders saw it as (if I may quote Michael Lewis) \"a stuffed piñata full of free money\". They started ambitious projects which would never logically have any meaningful return on investment which only caused the bubble to grow. At this point (we're talking 2001-2007 here), the Greek were living first world's standards on borrowed money. \n\nOnce the financial crisis started in 2007 and especially once the Euro-crisis (which is a separate part from the banking/housing crisis which started in the United States) started later towards 2010, the world found out what really had been going on in Greece and the bubble bust. It wasn't just a crisis like it was in other western countries, there were fundamental issues underlying the Greek system which means the solution isn't as simply as in other countries (as Europe is slowly but surely climbing out of the crisis as we speak). This meant serious reforms had to be done which takes a lot of political responsibility from the leaders at that time. I'll explain what happened further down this post. \n\nWhy? Well, imagine yourself as a small child getting a candy bar from your parents. Now imagine yourself as your parents take away that same candy bar. How does that make you feel? Pretty bad I reckon. Most people who get this question would actually feel worse than if they hadn't gotten that candy bar in the first place, which is a very important psychological phenomenon (explained by Daniel Kahneman, go read his book \"Thinking, Fast And Slow\" if this interests you). This exact same thing happened to Greece, they enjoyed the feeling of having all those privileges and right now have them stripped away from them, one by one. \n\nThe problem is, these reforms are mandatory. In Greece, you could be eligible for retirement in your mid 50's (compared to 65 in most other European countries) and now this just isn't financially possible any more. Another thing would be how there just wasn't an independent body that would control taxes and catch those not paying up. The list goes on with things that needed to be changed fundamentally but more importantly, will require a shift in mentality from most of the Greek people. This is simply something that does not come easily. \n\nNow another problem is, Greece was not rich to begin with, while they were still buying things at European prices. The effect of this is that a lot of 'common people' struggle to even make ends meet. People literally freeze to death during winters because they get cut from electricity/gas (you can look up the news for this). There's a humanitarian crisis going on but because the country is still in massive financial problems, there isn't much that can be done besides stopping the bleeding momentarily.\n\nAnyway, the politicians in the country didn't really want to admit that this was all their doing in front of the big public and lose their voters (and to be fair, it was mostly their predecessors' doing) so instead they blamed the European Union for things like putting them in an humiliating position or for any cuts in general. If you listen to current PM Tsipras' speeches you will see this exact thing; shoving pretty much all the blame for the position the country is currently in towards the other countries. Right now there's a massive anti-European movement in Greece which just flat out refuses to comply with any mandatory reforms, which is what's causing the problems right now. \n\nJumping slightly back in time, with the elections of last year Syriza is now the party in power and they are the embodiment of the anti-European voices in the country. Tsipras has played the game hard trying to get Greece out of these reforms, but their creditors won't budge. *If you ask me, with reason. If Greece were to ever become a stable country within the Euro zone, they will still need to keep making reforms to make sure the tax morality and corruption is on-par with the rest of Europe. They also still need to fix numerous things like retirement age (which is where part of the debate right now is on about). If they don't, it's just waiting for something like this to happen again.* Tsipras made serious promises during the election period saying he'd end all the cuts, but it puts him in a very difficult position because he has to come to an agreement with the creditors. Now both sides are on an impasse, and Tsipras appears that he doesn't want to take responsibility for either a grexit (Greece+Exit) which can cause serious instability for years or for another round of cuts which would lose him all the trust people had in him. Therefore he is giving the voice to the people, which may just as well be 'the death of him'.\n\nThe problem with the referendum is that it isn't on neutral terms. The question given will be \"Do you accept the reforms/cuts?\" which doesn't tell the whole story. If Greece were to vote no, it's pretty much over and out for them and the Euro - which is the part Tsipras doesn't tell. Instead, he publicly condemns the reforms and recommends all the voters to vote \"no\" in the referendum. That's also why the head of the Eurogroup, Dutch minister of finance Jeroen Dijsselbloem said that even if Greece would vote \"yes\", they strongly doubt the ability of the Syriza-led government to actually carry out those reforms. \n\nRight now, the situation is unclear. There is a payment due to the IMF tomorrow but if they cannot pay, there's still another month for them to try and pay those debts off before they default. It's pretty much waiting for what the referendum will bring and if Tsipras is willing to carry out the will of the people if they vote \"yes\" or if he might possibly resign as PM. Right now, it seems unlikely that the Eurogroup will want to negotiate with him again, especially on his terms. The Greek people will have the vote; which poison will they pick? Find out next week!\n\n**TLDR: The Greek fooled the EU, lived on high standards with borrowed money, once the bubble bust got privileges like pensions cut over the past years which seriously hurt the population and together with politicians not taking their responsibility caused an anti-European mood. Right now we're at an impasse waiting for what the referendum brings and the reactions from Syriza and the EU.**\n\n\n",
" > There are people who are willing to do anything to stop any competition.\n\n[More quotes](_URL_0_)",
"Is greece really loving opulent lifestyle with their high pensions and social programs? Can someone give me comparison of how much they are leeching compared to other European countries? ",
"Please ELI5 why killing jobs and cutting pensions is supposed to be the only responsible thing to do.",
"Sorry. I've yet to see a good answer. Most the answers I have seen even fail to mention Syriza, why the Greeks are voting for them (the huge rise in employment etc) and contain lots of bias against socialism. I can't give a good answer to this but await one.",
"So what happens if Greece goes under?",
"ELI5: What happens if Greece just tells the world to screw themselves and refuses to pay their debt? Would there have to be a war?",
"I'm /outoftheloop/ here. What is Tsipras trying to do that all the the other people are just NOPING all around?",
"Juncker and company are now only interested in a political change. That is, Tsipras out. They have finally understood, that their austerity measures produced no effect in Greece and that the current government won't bend over to the Troika. Read [Krugman's article](_URL_0_).",
"I am a very well traveled Greek (Lived in Greece for 18 years) with mixed opinions in regards to the matter that have studied and heard multiple sides of the story. I currently live in U.S. so I get to watch different news outlets and hear different perspectives. \n\nThe Greeks have a different culture and understanding of the world then most people. They are very social people and have a strong appreciation for family. Family and religion(at least for some part) for most Greeks means a lot. \n\nThere was a big instability caused by mainly the involvement of U.S. during cold war in the 1960s. There has been documents and proof that the U.S. government assisted in the establishment of a military dictatorship in Greece. (_URL_0_) \n\nI would pinpoint this dictatorship as the start of the crisis but also the start of the modernization of Greece. There have been extreme loans taken on the name of Greece that are still being paid off. These loans were partially used to build roads, schools and modernize Greece. However the big majority of the loans were used to hire public servants. \n\nThis period of time created the public servant culture. According to law it is illegal for the government to fire a public servant unless he has been involved into criminal activity. That means that working as a public servant is a very stable job. It is a dream job for most people. Hence the public sector exploded in size over the past few years. \n\nIt was often used by politicians to attract votes by promising positions in the public sector. But as you would expect hiring people that you can't fire to do nothing can be sometimes a problem. For the most part the public sector is very strong and stable but there is bad organization for it that in some cases there is surplus of workers in one place and lack of workers in another. \n\nGreece is a very socialist country regardless of who is being elected to lead. Regardless of social position the values of socialism are widely accepted. The idea of giving from one's surplus or wage to help the poor, seniors, handicapped have free education, free healthcare is viewed upon strongly. There is a strong sense of empathy between Greeks, and I haven't met a person from Greece that would disagree with the value of free education, healthcare etc. \n\nThe main income of Greece is from tourism. Farming used to be a big sector that has been slowly dying. \n\nA President of Greece (namely _URL_1_) with his party, have faked data to join the European Union because they saw a benefit from the common currency and boost in tourism. \n\nEuropean Union since then with different imposed rules have been slowly killing the economy of Greece by weakening other sectors of the economy. Farming has been slowly dying because according the European Union Greece is allowed to export a specific amount of tomatoes, peaches etc etc. As a result the surplus would often be bought by European Union for almost nothing and be left to rot and thrown away. This created a productivity slowdown. Moreover the European Union, would often pay farmers to plant Acacia in their farms as part of an ecological movement. Acacia is a very weird tree that has very long and deep roots and often destroys the area where it is planted because it is very expensive to remove. As a result big fields that used to yield lot of fruits etc are now useless. The farmers that were short-sighted got a big amount of money that ended up wasting around and left without a job. Farming was more or less destroyed by the rules of European Union and Greece had to import food from nearby countries (Like Turkey). \n\nCorruption in Greece is big. Not as big as in many other countries but there is a lot of \"white-collar\" crime. Big companies from Canada and US pay off politicians to provide with public available land and resources with tax free zones that end up ruining the environment driving tourism away from some areas. \n\nThe Greeks are people that like to enjoy the today and often ignore the consequences of tomorrow. They can be very obnoxious and many of them would appear to be spoiled. There are always exceptions to the rules of course. \n\nAs a result of all of the above, the people leaving the country side and coming to big cities with increased poverty for better \"opportunities\". The government loaning money to support a big part of the public sector and keep everyone happy. The slowly dying economy it was kinda expected for us to come to this point. \n\nHowever we also know to never give up and always keep fighting. Our values are very different than most of the countries. \n\nWhat makes me the most sad is that there is so much propaganda against Greece in all media. We are proud of our heritage despite our shortcomings and we are very friendly towards tourists. Our country was born with a big bloodshed against the Ottoman empire and every Greek sees in himself a little bit of revolutionary and as a Greek and from what I know is happening in Greece we are happy to fight back the people that forced a loan on us. \n\nAs additional information: the reason we dispute the loan is because during WW2, Germany \"took\" loans of huge amounts that destroyed the economy at the time but since recovered. They never paid off these \"loans\" even due to the principle of continuity of Government or country. \n\nGreece has a long way of reforms in regards to organizing the public sector. ",
"ELI5 how America can go trillions of dollars in debt and no one bats an eye but Greece goes a fraction of that in debt and everything is going to shit?\n\nAlso how much did Germany owe Greece in WWII reparations? Was all that paid off? ",
"They spent more money on government entitlement programs than they collected in taxes. This is the basis of socialism and why it doesn't work. Eventually, you will spend more than you make, more people collecting than people working and paying taxes. This new majority of people living off entitlements will vote for those who promise to continue these costly programs, driving them further into debt. It's not a \"rich vs poor\", \"decade old financial crisis\", or \"people evading taxes\" issue, it's implementing fundamentally flawed policies for years.",
"Here's a visual I posted a month ago to give you a better perspective of the amount of debt. \n\n_URL_0_",
"Now Putin can give them some Roebels.\n\nWhile he'll make sure **not** to fix the economy over there,\n\nSo the Greek politicians will have to listen to him !\n\nI bet he can't wait to build a military base in Greece, strategically it's an even better then the Krym",
"I've posted it before, my Greece debt analogy:\n\n\nYou meet your SO who has a horrible credit rating and has also maxed out all their credit cards before you met.\n\n \nYou ask your SO if they're just marrying you for your money. \"No, no, no.\" Your SO insists and you believe them because you think your in love with your SO and make a great match.\n \n\nThen you marry them, which Mom & Dad have their doubts about. Your SO applies for joint credit cards, backed by your credit rating, which you agree to provided they pay you back and they agree. Unknown to you is that your SO has also significant baggage from past relationships (hidden in the form of large debts).\n\n\nYou and your SO's rich friends convince your SO to go out to buy some useless stuff, that it won't cost all that much, and it will be lots of fun. This idea is encouraged by the media. With the rich friends and your SO not understanding how much $1 means this leads to problems further down the road.\n\n \nThe marriage continues without a problem for about a decade. Then your SO maxes out the new credit cards buying stuff they don't need and complain to you about having to pay you back with money they don't have because they forgot to tell you about all the debt they had and still have.\n\n\nYou, Mom and Dad pay off the credit card and other debt and cut up the credit cards then proceed to give your SO an allowance.\n\n \nYour SO has a garage sale selling items at a drastically discounted rate to try to make some money and the whole neighbourhood comes over and many other people to buy something that would cost much more at the store. The local gossip makes sure the entire town knows about this.\n\n \nYou won't let your SO apply for bankruptcy because that would also affect your credit rating.\n\n \nYour SO doesn't like being treated like a child after acting like a child by ruining two peoples credit rating and lying about their intentions and starts complaining about you, Mom & Dad to your kids and the media.\n\n \nYour kids ask your SO to buy them something. Your SO replies that we can't afford that right now. Your kids, being used to getting everything they want, have a full blown temper tantrum, they start stomping around throwing stuff at the walls and screaming \"That's not fair, we want it NOW! Why can't we have it NOW?\". Your SO blames you, Mom & Dad for not being able to buy your kids what they want.\n\n \nThe local gossips, who didn't care to listen to your SO complain, lavish attention on the kids because they're more exciting that your SO. The local gossips are such drama queens. The rest of the country watches with idle curiosity because its entertaining and its not their problem, yet.\n\n \nTo conclude: \n\n \nYour SO = Greece's government\nFeels like they're being patronized and is mad at you for not letting them declare bankruptcy.\n\n \nYou = EU\nAre disappointed that your SO doesn't understand the concept of money nor the responsibility of it.\n\n \nMarriage = Greece joins EU\n\n \nYou and your SO's rich friends = Germany and France\nComplain that you're no fun anymore now that you have no money.\n\n \nThe media: Western financial institution influence (Wall St., the S & P, Goldman Sachs,...) \nMakes fun of your SO and their situation.\n\n \nThe local gossips = the news media (ie. attention whores)\nPlaying up the drama between you, your SO, your kids and Mom & Dad just to get attention and they have nothing better to do.\n\n \nMom & Dad = IMF\n\nMom & Dad think that your SO is a mess and the marriage will not last. They're trying really hard not to say \"I told you so.\"\n \nAllowance = Austerity measures\n \nGarage sale = Greece's tourist economy\n\nGoing out of business, maybe, sale.\n \nNeighbours = EU country citizens\n\nOnly want stuff from you if it's cheap.\n \nOther people = non-EU country citizens\n\nOnly want stuff from you if it's cheap and exotic.\n \nYour kids = Greek citizens\n\nHave a temper tantrum because they don't like being poor and can't understand how their parents let it get to this point.\n \nTemper tantrum = Riots\n \nThe rest of the Country = Non EU member countries\n",
"[This paper](_URL_0_) is a fairly clear, simple, comprehensive and unbiased summary of what's happening in Greece. It's written by a professor of economics at Chicago, who should be more knowledgeable and able to avoid bias than the average redditor.",
"I love how no one in this thread puts any blame on the EU for lending so much money to an un-credit worthy country. \n\nRemember a few years ago when we had a little mortgage meltdown? Yeah, people shouldn't have borrowed have borrowed so much money. BUT, banks should not have lent money to those people either. AND, between the average American consumer and the average American loan officer, which one should be more knowledgeable about credit worthiness. Blame goes both ways. ",
"People say that Greece wants to devalue it's currency to make exports cheaper, but it can't do this because it's on the Euro, and it's not allowed to print more Euro. But, why can't it just sell it's exports for less? Wouldn't that have the same effect?",
"Greece, Spain and Italy are all 'pigs of the trough' meaning they take a lot of money out of the EU and put fuck all back in. Greece is corrupt as all hell and no one pays taxes over there. They don't like to work and there is a bit of a joke amongst Europeans that the retirement age in Greece is 15.\n",
"ELI5: How does this effect me, as a regular American?",
"\"We need money!\"\n\nHere you go!\n\n\"Thanks, now we need more!\"\n\nHere you go!\n\n\"Where do you keep getting all this money?\"\n\nFrom you!\n\n\"Oh no....\"",
"I tried to make my own topic but got auto shut down :(\n\nELI5: Why are all these greeks just now trying to take their money out of the banks?\n\nI mean the writing has been on the wall for some time now. You would think that the average person would have seriously considered withdrawing what they could a year ago, certainly a month ago, yet there are massive lines and protests outside closed banks going on... If my country has similar problems slowly creeping its way I would have remove my savings a long long time ago, but apparently no one did, not even after the election? Am I missing something?\n",
" Imagine that every country is stacking blocks to see who can have the most blocks on their tower. Greece didn't have alot of blocks to begin with so they borrowed some from other countries. The other countries said that was fine as long as greece gave back the other blocks as fast as they could. Greece stacked the blocks on their tower but found that their tower was still small in comparison to the other countries.The other countries were worried that if Greece's tower fell over, it might knock theirs down so they made sure Greece could keep building on their tower by giving them more and more blocks. Greece was still no closer to having the biggest tower AND they still had to give the other countries some blocks back once they could afford to.\n \n Things are looking bad for Greece, they need to give back the blocks and find a way to make the tower gap smaller. Greece decided to get blocks from a different country to return to the first country. This made the first country that greece borrowed from really big and increased the gap in tower size compared to Greece. Greece realized that as long as they were building their tower with the same kind of blocks as everyone else they would never catch up to the other countries.\n\n This lead to the re-introduction of the Drachma! A kind of block just for Greece! Greece knew they could slowly close the gap in tower size as long as they used the drachmas. Sure, the drachmas weren't as big as the other blocks but Greece knew they could eventually make their very own drachma blocks bigger than ever before. \n\n Alot of residents in Greece became scared because if they started using drachmas, all of their original blocks would be rendered useless. This meant that all the progress someone had made with the older blocks would be for nothing and they would have to start their tower over again entirely. Greece is voting whether or not they should use the drachma blocks or stay with the original blocks.\n\nTL;DR Greece is going to vote on whether or not they use their own currency. (to refinance their own economy)\n",
"This is the best ELI5 article on it that I've read.\n\n[The Greek Financial Crisis isn't sexy, but knowing about it is](_URL_0_)\n\n > \"When Greece joined the euro in 2001, confidence in the Greek economy grew and a big economic boom followed. But after the 2008 financial crisis, everything changed. Every country in Europe entered a recession, but because Greece was one of the poorest and most indebted countries, it suffered the most. The unemployment rate reached 28 percent in 2013, worse than the United States suffered during the Great Depression.\n\n > If Greece wasn't in the euro, it could have boosted its economy by printing more of its currency, the drachma. This would have lowered the value of the drachma in international markets, making Greek exports more competitive. It would also lower domestic interest rates, encouraging domestic investment and making it easier for Greek debtors to service their debts.\n\n > But Greece shares its monetary policy with the rest of Europe. And the German-dominated European Central Bank has given Europe a monetary policy that's about right for Germany, but so tight that it has thrust Greece into a depression.\n\n > So Greece is squeezed between a crushing debt burden — 177 percent of GDP, about twice the level in the United States — and a deep depression that makes it difficult to raise the money it needs to make its debt payments.\n\n > For the last five years, Greece has been negotiating with European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund (dubbed \"the Troika\") for financial assistance with its debt burden. Since 2010, the Troika has been providing Greece with loans in exchange for tax hikes and spending cuts.\n\n > Rich European nations such as Germany believe they're simply insisting that Greece live within its means. But the austere terms of the bailouts have caused resentment among Greeks and contributed to crisis-level unemployment and poverty. In January, they elected a new left-wing prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, who promised to reject the previous bailout deal and secure a more favorable agreement.\n\n > But he has very little leverage. In 2010, Greek debt was widely held by private banks, so a Greek default could trigger a financial panic. But since then, this debt has been consolidated in the hands of rich European governments, greatly reducing the risk of a financial crisis if Greece defaults.\n\n > So Greece faces a hard choice: it can accept the Troika's demands for further austerity. Or it can defy the Troika, which would likely lead to a default on Greek debt and possibly a Greek exit from the euro. The Greek government is holding a referendum on July 5 to let voters choose between these bad options.\n\n > In the meantime, the Greek economy is melting down. Knowing that Greek euro deposits could soon be transformed into devalued drachma deposits, Greek people have been rushing to ATMs to withdraw as much cash as they can. That has forced the Greek government to close the banks and limit withdrawals to €60 per day.\"",
"[Here's a simple primer](_URL_0_) by a Chicago Booth economist that explains the crisis in Greece in a very elegant way. \n\nIt essentially walks you through everything that has happened over the last few years, and explains the crisis from different actors' angles.",
"If there were no debt interest from the beginning, Would have Greece already been able to pay back their debt? (Bonus: Same question if the debt was simply inflation adjusted.)",
"So what happens to Greece and its citizens when the banks run out of money? ",
"I think one thing the media is totally glossing over is the destructive tax policies that deepened the crisis to the point of no return. During the Great Recession, the Greek government enacted tax policy that mirrors the Bush-era tax cuts. Deep cuts for the wealthy, and minor cuts for the middle class. However, as the crisis deepened, instead of raising taxes on the wealthy they put the tax burden on the middle class. So you had these stories of people paying nearly half of their monthly income in taxes. The problem isn't the taxes themselves, nor the social safety net they support. The problem is Reganomics.",
"Looking back on US financial markets seeing huge losses yesterday (Monday), why is it that United States markets reacted so negatively to Greece coming closer to default if there really isn't much involvement in the Greek economy? Why would investors panic so much if it really doesn't matter directly to US companies should Greece return to the drachma? To me, it seems overblown and a severe overreaction for US investors to see a default as a significant blow to the world economy. I understand the fears of the \"domino effect\" that could lead other debt-ridden countries to follow suit, it just seems to be a gross overreaction since Greece is not a dominant power in the global economy.",
"so what will happen to Greece and it's people?",
"What would be the downside to the EU just 'forgiving' the debt, creating Euros by fiat, and paying all creditors? \n\nPerhaps followed with a strongly worded memo saying \"We will never do this again so don't nobody get any ideas\" while glaring at Spain?",
"ELI5: What does this whole issue mean to the average citizen of Greece? e.g., If I was a citizen and I have $100k in savings, is that all worthless now?",
"What will the impact to the UK and rest of Europe be if A) Greece are declared Bankrupt and B) They are not declared bankrupt?",
"ELI5: What would happen if to Europe if they kicked Greece out. Would it actually affect people in Europe or not?",
"ELI5: What are they voting on in the referendum?\n\nI was under the impression that they were voting on whether or not to accept the next installment of payment of the bailout money, along with the new conditions it imposes.\n\nBut the deadline to accept has already passed. Are they essentially voting on whether or not they want to accept the proposal that is no longer on the table? Or is this meant to be more of a \"guidance vote\" or \"opinion poll\" so the government knows whether to default and give up negotiating or whether to continue to negotiate and accept the new conditions?",
"What exactly are the terms the IMF demand. I think I read somewhere it includes a 25% sales tax. Even if this is not true, no one seems to report what the exact terms are.",
"Could Greece be annexed to pay off its debt? What would happen then?",
"A serious / unbiased response to this question, please: What does the Golden Dawn party think of the crisis? What would their solution be?",
"Can someone please explain this issue from the start? How it started? how greece effects the Eurozone? what could this trigger?",
"ELI5: Why Greek economy, which is apparently in trouble, can pay it's citizens 700€ minimum wage (and appropriately adjusted average wage), while countries which have stable economies like Poland have < 500€ minimum wage? Shouldn't Greek minimum wages drop very much below the levels of stable economies?",
"What are the consequences to Greece if they refuse to pay the money back? is the money just written off as a loss/bad investment ?",
"ELI5: If Greece were to leave the European Union what happens to all the immigrants seeking asylum? \n\n",
"E: Are their rational arguments for the 'Greek side\" of the crisis? Meaning, how do the Greeks rationalize their situation as not the result of their choices and government but the result of something else? How can/do the Greeks view themselves as victims?\n\nI ask because I haven't heard the Greek side beyond not wanting cut pensions/programs and 'cultural differences'. ",
"What would happen if Greece voted yes or no?",
"In the worst case scinerio of economic crisis like this, I worry about the minority groups in Greece...I know Greece is by in large a homogeneous society but are there any ethnic tensions rising as a result of this crisis and if shit hits the fan who is the most vulnerable? ",
"Now that the IMF seems to be suggesting Tspiras was right:\n\n1 If this is what the IMF believe then why have they kept schtum until now, given how really quite useful it would have been for them to have said something along these lines a week ago?\n\n2 If this is what the IMF believe then why are they not willing to renegotiate their own credit agreement with Greece on that basis? Why could they have not at very least asked for their $1.6 bil repayment to be deferred for a week to allow the referrendum to take place before default?",
"I am going to Greece in one week, already payed through AirBnB the accomodation and I also have payed the transport months ago (before all this crap happened). \n\nWhat is the worst I can expect as a tourist going to one of their islands? I will be getting to Zakynthos by ferry. I am an EU citizen and don't have or require a passport at this moment. \n\nI know I should have cash prepared.. what else?",
"Hypothetically, if the US were so inclined, could the US 'buy' Greece (i think this is essentially buying Greece's debts?) And become Greece's owner? ",
"Well 5 years on, and they still won't pay their taxes... lack of serious reforms and enforcement.\n\nAsk anyone who has visited Greece, how hard it is to get a receipt.\n\nGreece has eaten their cake, eaten everyone elses cake, and is now asking for more cake as they are addicted.\n\nUnfortunately like all western culture, its the poor/lower class that has to pay. Everyone with money has taken their money out of Greece years ago.\n\nSure we can blame their high public wages and early pensioners but they're now taking 100% of the punishment for 10-20% of the wastage",
"Question(s): What happens to Greece if they'll be out of the Eurozone? What are the chances? Which countries will be affected? Also, is there a way out of this?",
" 1. Is it true that in Greece you get a guaranteed government pension of 110% x your final salary?\n 2. Is it true Greece productivity per worker is 40% less than Spain and Italy?\n 3. How were the banks allowed to get away with shoveling that much debt into Greece, collecting a decade of profits, and then handing their debts on to the Euro Central Banks and hitting the exits a few years ago?\n 4. Why are the same incompetents in charge of Europe? How has Christine Lagarde kept her job?\n 5. Is France next?\n 6. How long will German taxpayers put up with this? I don't understand why Merkel is so popular when she was so easily sucked in by the big banks to lump all this debt on the German voter. Can someone explain this?\n 7. Why were Greece allowed in the Euro in the first place after they got caught cooking their books during the application process?\n 8. How can Europe continue as a monetary union when countries cant deflate their own currencies? This will simply keep happening.\n\n",
"If there is a yes vote, what can/will Greece do differently so that they are not in the exact same position they are in now 1-2 years from now?",
"ELI5 : With today's referendum, what will happen to Greek citizen (living in the country and outside)?",
"How can the leaders of Greece be saying that the terms of the bailout are humiliating when they have defaulted on one loan and have gotten several loans in the past? From my perspective it seems like they've been loaned money tons of times, haven't paid it back, and are acting like they are entitled to terms that they want. I don't know much about how lending money on this scale works but it seems like they have very little ground to stand on.",
"ELI5: Why would Greece say no to the countries aid?\n",
"Where were the terms for the bailout by the creditors?",
"I don't get all this economic stuff. So - What will happen if Greece simply can't pay back it's dephts or is unwilling to do so? I guess the creditors can't confiscate stuff as it would be if a private person goes insolvent.",
"Here's a pretty straightforward analysis of the Greek (European) crisis from _URL_1_ - _URL_0_. Gave me a good idea of what is the issue and where we are right now.\n\nSorry if it was already posted. Couldn't find it in a search.",
"So the Greek parties (minus KKE and GD) just put together a deal to present tomorrow. Among the terms is that the defense spending be kept intact. Why's this one of the top priorities? What exactly is there to defend from?",
"Found this infographic that really simply explains the whole Greece Crisis, from the start right up to the referendum result and gives clear indications of what might happen if Greece leaves the euro/stays in. Really helped me to understand! _URL_0_ ",
"A good summary of Greece after the referendum and analysis of the possible outcomes and geo-pol ramifications\n[_URL_1_]\n[_URL_0_]\n",
"ELI5: isn't America in debt too? And had a deficit basically forever? How is this different? What am I missing? Why is Greece \"in trouble\" but America is okay?",
"Here's a good video breaking down what's going on and the potential repercussions for Greece, Europe and the rest of the world:\n\n_URL_0_",
"ELI5: So looking at the gross GDP of the world (2013 numbers) show to be roughly $75 trillion USD. The debt owed by Greece is roughly $353 billion USD.\n\nWhy does a country whose total debt accounts for .47% of the worlds GDP have such a large effect on the world's economy? That seems like a drop in the bucket."
]
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[],
[],
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"http://www.businessinsider.com/the-secret-goldman-sachs-greece-deal-thats-described-as-a-very-sexy-story-between-two-sinners-2012-3?IR=T",
"http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/greek-debt-crisis-how-goldman-sachs-helped-greece-to-mask-its-true-debt-a-676634.html"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Economic_Adjustment_Programme_for_Greece",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_convergence_criteria",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Financial_Audit,_2004",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Economic_Adjustment_Programme_for_Greece"
],
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3betvd/eli5_the_greek_governmentdebt_crisis/cslicr1"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/29/us-markets-stocks-idUSKCN0P91NO20150629"
],
[
"http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/a-christmas-message-from-americas-rich-20111222"
],
[
"https://www.vox.com/2015/6/27/8856297/greece-referendum-euro"
],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehman_Brothers",
"https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Christoforakos",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Monetary_Fund",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cr%C3%A9dit_Agricole",
"http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=ds22a34krhq5p_&hl=en&dl=en#!ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=gd_pc_gdp&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country_group&idim=country_group:eu:non-eu&idim=country:el:it:pt:fr:es&ifdim=country_group&hl=en_US&dl=en&ind=false",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Sch%C3%A4uble",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsche_Bank",
"https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7047/6861665259_55b341be24_z.jpg",
"https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/German_GDP_in_tax_havens.png",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Papandreou",
"https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/2586664217/o78k5fogx5g3hdy6peai.jpeg",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qw_2FxcE8mk",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_haven"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3bb82t/greek_bailout_extension_refused/cskz3x0"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.npr.org/2011/11/17/142437694/lack-of-trust-underlies-greeces-societal-problems"
],
[],
[
"https://www.transparency.org/cpi2014/results"
],
[
"http://trooclick.com/event/greek-banks-take-holiday-restrict-withdrawals-37635"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/29/opinion/paul-krugman-greece-over-the-brink.html?_r=0"
],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgios_Papadopoulos",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Costas_Simitis"
],
[],
[],
[
"http://demonocracy.info/infographics/eu/debt_greek/debt_greek.html"
],
[],
[],
[
"http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/anil.kashyap/research/papers/A-Primer-on-the-Greek-Crisis_june29.pdf"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.vox.com/2015/6/29/8862583/greek-financial-crisis-explained"
],
[
"http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/anil.kashyap/research/papers/A-Primer-on-the-Greek-Crisis_june29.pdf"
],
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[],
[],
[
"http://www.vox.com/cards/eurozone-crisis/eurozone-crisis-origin",
"vox.com"
],
[],
[
"https://www.scenesofreason.com/greece-crisis-explained/"
],
[
"http://www.democracynow.org/2015/7/7/economist_richard_wolff_on_roots_of",
"http://www.democracynow.org/2015/7/7/a_europe_of_equals_report_from"
],
[],
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dt6w4eE_tg0"
],
[]
] |
|
bivoah | why ripe fruits taste better even though they aren’t getting more stuff from the plant | When bananas ripen they turn brown and aren’t attached to the tree anymore so why do they taste sweeter? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bivoah/eli5_why_ripe_fruits_taste_better_even_though/ | {
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"There are actually two types of fruit, **climacteric** **fruit** and **nonclimacteric fruit**. **Nonclimacteric** **fruit** will not ripen off of the tree at all— they depend on their connection to their tree to build up sugar. Fruits such as citrus, berries, and melons are nonclimacteric and best when picked as ripe as possible, because while they can soften and develop a smell, they won't get any riper (sweeter) when detached from the plant. **Climacteric** **fruit**, on the other hand, responds dramatically to the plant hormone *ethylene*. Once triggered by ethylene, ripening enzymes break down stored starch into sugar. Fun fact: wrapping unripe fruits in a paper bag with an ethylene-producing ripe fruit traps and concentrates the ethylene in an enclosed space, and that's why fruits get riper when you do this!",
"This is more biology than chemistry (biochemistry, really), but basically fruits are made of plant cells, and plant cells have this hard, rigid structure called cellulose, along with several other structural proteins. They also store sugars as starch, because its way more efficient than storing it as sugars (sugars we detect as sweet when we eat them, starches we don't, even though its the same material overall just in a different arrangement). Fruits still live for quite a while off the stem and enzymes, special proteins designed to make reactions happen faster, are still breaking down starch into sugar to make it sweeter and breaking down structural molecules to make them softer."
]
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emoacm | how are certain plants "indoor plants"? don't all plants need sunlight to survive? | in some cases, certain planted pots are advertised as needing none to very little sunlight and just water to grow/survive. How is this possible? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/emoacm/eli5_how_are_certain_plants_indoor_plants_dont/ | {
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"Well, sunlight is just a more expansive mix of different wavelengths of light. Certain plants can tolerate a more limited spectrum of light. Furthermore, you can buy lights that have a larger spectrum than normal light bulbs.\n\nAll plants need light, sunlight is best, but not the only source of available light.",
"Many plants have evolved to be “understory” plants that live close to the ground, in the shade of layers of larger plants above them. This is a viable niche in the wild, and those plants are then also suited to many indoor situations."
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4x47lj | how safe am i on a plane? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4x47lj/eli5_how_safe_am_i_on_a_plane/ | {
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"I get creeped out sometimes when I think about it... and I work in aerospace. And I build the stupid things. I reassure myself like this:\n\nThe team that engineered your lawn mower spent thousands of hours making sure it would be safe and reliable. \n\nThe team that engineered your car's safety features spent tens or hundreds of thousands of hours making sure they would be reliably and consistently safe.\n\nThe team that engineered that aircraft and the tools that made it have spent (cumulatively) millions and tens of millions of hours in making it safe. And designed for failure well beyond any condition the aircraft would _ever_ meet in its lifetime. \n\nNo airliner has been lost in the past 40 years that cannot ultimately be attributed to human error, negligence in maintenance or maliciousness (terror attacks etc.). Just don't fly \"Fred's discount airlyne\" and you'll be fine. \n\nYou are more likely to die in the car ride to the airport than you are on your flight. "
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m8mqg | why did nazi germany treat british/american pows half-decently, but russian/slavic pows horrendously? | I understand that the Nazis consider the slavic people to be subhuman rats and therefore had no morale issue with treating them so badly but why did they go to the bother of treating British/American POWs half-decently? Why not just put them in terrible concentration camps like they did with Soviet POWs?
The only thing I can think of is, say if Nazi Germany were successful in conquering Britian, it would be difficult for them to explain to British citizens why they treat their POWs so badly, wereas for Russia and the east they planned to just "exterminate" them anyway. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/m8mqg/elif_why_did_nazi_germany_treat_britishamerican/ | {
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"You answered the question yourself. Russians were seen as subhuman, western Europeans and Americans not.",
"The Germans never really disliked the English. Even in WWI, the Germans always respected the English, and in both wars, never really wanted to fight them; it was the English that declared war on Germany. Their war was more professional than personal.\n\n",
"From an ethnic point of view, the English and German people share a common heritage - English is a Germanic language, and most English people are descended from Anglo-Saxon settlers who came an area that includes parts of what are now the Netherlands and Germany. The Nazis therefore did not regard the English as racial inferiors the way they did Jews and Slavs.\n\nThe Nazi classification of races regarded the \"Nordic\" European peoples as being of superior quality to the Mediterranean Europeans, while people of Slavic descent and Jews were regarded as subhumans. The Nordic European races included the English, Germans, Dutch, Danes, and Norwegians. As such, the Nazis had little interest in exterminating the English, and since many Americans would have been of English stock, the same would apply to them.",
"You answered the question yourself. Russians were seen as subhuman, western Europeans and Americans not.",
"The Germans never really disliked the English. Even in WWI, the Germans always respected the English, and in both wars, never really wanted to fight them; it was the English that declared war on Germany. Their war was more professional than personal.\n\n",
"From an ethnic point of view, the English and German people share a common heritage - English is a Germanic language, and most English people are descended from Anglo-Saxon settlers who came an area that includes parts of what are now the Netherlands and Germany. The Nazis therefore did not regard the English as racial inferiors the way they did Jews and Slavs.\n\nThe Nazi classification of races regarded the \"Nordic\" European peoples as being of superior quality to the Mediterranean Europeans, while people of Slavic descent and Jews were regarded as subhumans. The Nordic European races included the English, Germans, Dutch, Danes, and Norwegians. As such, the Nazis had little interest in exterminating the English, and since many Americans would have been of English stock, the same would apply to them."
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54ckp4 | why do you never see large news companies being charged for libel? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/54ckp4/eli5_why_do_you_never_see_large_news_companies/ | {
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"Because they tend to be very careful about precisely what they say and how they say it so they aren't actually committing libel. They also have a bunch of lawyers to address any charged that are filed against them, but they are specialized in reporting news and know how to phrase things well to avoid it in the first place.",
"Because they are very careful to not commit libel. Being wrong in a news report is not libel, maliciously spreading a known lie with the intent to ruin someone is libel. That was common at one point with news agencies, but has not been for nearly a century. ",
"I'm a journalism student currently taking (among other things) a course about this.\n\nThe short answer: in Canada (and probably other countries), libel/defamation laws have exception clauses. Those exceptions include things like if the information is true, a matter of public interest, etc, so as long as what journalists report is factual, they cannot be (successfully) sued for libel/defamation.",
"What country are we talking about here?\n\nIn the US, libel is very hard to prove due to the need to balance it with the (broadly interpreted) right to freedom of speech.\n\nIn other countries, such as the UK, it's [easier](_URL_0_).",
"First off, libel is a tort, and is not a criminal offense in most places. That means you won't be charged with libel, but sued for it.\n\nAnd to be sued for it, someone needs to show damages. They will need to show that your statements caused them financial harm. \n\nNote that most of the time when the media \"gets it wrong\", they are reporting information that someone else got wrong. So, if the news says that \"Joe Smith is wanted by police for questioning in the murder\", and Joe Smith had nothing to do with it, he won't have a cause of action against the media outlet because they simply reported what the police told them.\n\nNews organizations aren't really in the habit of just making shit up. Know why? Because a libel suit is a very bad thing. Not just in money, but in loss of reputation, and that's usually even worse. A news outlet that invents stories gets a lower readership/audience, and will have a lot more trouble getting qualified journalists to work for them.\n\nIn breaking news, especially, there's a lot of misinformation going around early on. But it's not libel to report that unless you do it recklessly or with malice, and that's almost never the case.",
"I actually work for a news station and something I hear all the time being shouted across the room is we can't say he did \"blank\" we have to say he was accused of \"blank\" or the police department suspects he did \"blank\" or the suspect was arrested for \"blank\" if you watch any newscast about crime and there is a suspect but they haven't been charged you will here some variation of that.\n"
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[],
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z49LjJj3VTI"
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4ahv0q | why do people hate planned parenthood? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ahv0q/eli5_why_do_people_hate_planned_parenthood/ | {
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"text": [
"This is older than any videos.\n\nPP is synonymous with abortions, even though only a small percentage of the facilities actually provide that service. Unfortunately, the conservative side of America (or whatever the fuck they are), think it's appropriate behavior to protest abortion clinics, or to make death threats to the people who go in. Why? Who the hell knows. To their twisted minds, it's somehow tolerable behavior act like a jackass in front of a business they don't agree with, despite the fact that PP offers many other services, like family planning, certain kinds of counseling, and other stuff related to making sure women (some men, but mostly women) can live healthy lives",
"Planned Parenthood provides many services related to reproductive health. One of these services is abortions. Many people think that abortion is immoral and some of them would even say that performing a procedure to intentionally destroy an embryo or fetus is murder. Since Planned Parenthood is the largest and most well-known abortion provider in the US, opponents of abortion do not like the organization. "
]
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[],
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1vyjrz | why do countries require visas and limit the people who can enter the country? (china, north korea?) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vyjrz/eli5_why_do_countries_require_visas_and_limit_the/ | {
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"text": [
"Unknown quantities of foreigners in a country can present a security threat and stress public services. For example, how do you know if they leave?"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
1l5rrw | what is germ theory? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1l5rrw/eli5_what_is_germ_theory/ | {
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"That germs exist and that is what makes you sick. ",
"Germ theory is a scientific theory that explains how germs - small microscopic organisms - are the cause of illness and disease.\n\nBefore germ theory, the common explanation for diseases were things like spirits or \"bad air\" (e.g. air that smelled bad).\n\nWhen large outbreaks of disease started occurred, scientists noticed some patterns in how they were spreading which made them start doubting the old superstitions about how diseases were caused.\n\nLater experiments/developments supported the idea that tiny organisms were at involved. For example, scientists noticed that if you heated food and then cooled it off and kept it well covered, it would prevent the food from spoiling. This supported their idea that the small organisms which were causing the food to go bad were being killed. \n\nLater on with the invention of ways of observing the tiny organisms (e.g. powerful microscopes,), we confirmed their existence and their role in disease. \n",
"At its simplest, germ theory explains that there are microorganisms (Bacteria, viruses, fungi, etc.) and they are the causative agents of disease. While this may seem very intuitive now, before the advent of microscopes people would have had no reason to accept the existence of something invisible to them. To explain the cause of sickness any number of hypotheses were generated including miasma theory, humorism, and witchcraft but failed to recognize the actual disease causing agent and often did little to mitigate the issue. Skeptics and critics of these ideologies had to overcome a great amount of resistance from scientist (and doctors) to finally recognize what we know today as germ theory. There were a very long series of experiments spanning centuries that finally established the \"germ hypothesis\" as \"germ theory,\" but the experiments conducted by Robert Koch are considered the standard for identifying a microorganisms (germ) as the causative agent of disease. He established four main tenants of diagnosis which are dubbed Koch's postulates:\n\n1. The microorganisms must exist in great number in an infected host, but be absent in a healthy host. \n2. The microorganism must be isolated from the sick host and grown in pure culture.\n3. The microorganism must cause disease when a healthy host is inoculated experimentally\n4. The microorganism must be reisolated from aforementioned experimentally inoculated host. \n\nAlthough there are certain exceptions to the above mentioned guidelines (which I can discuss if you want) these were the first parameters for determining the cause of disease and are the primary support for germ theory. \n"
]
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2jjub4 | why does every shower, no matter how hot i have it set for, always have that initial burst of ice cold water? | That half-second is the worst half-second of your life if you haven't pre-adjusted the shower head to point straight down. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2jjub4/eli5_why_does_every_shower_no_matter_how_hot_i/ | {
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"The initial burst of water is the water that is sitting in your pipes. It is the temperature that your house is kept at. ",
"Because the hot water comes from the water heater. There is water in the pipes between the water heater and the shower head. When the shower is not in use that water is sitting in the pipes. It is at room temperature, thus cold feeling. So it takes a second for the hot water to make it from the water heater to the shower head.",
"I'm about to change your life.\n\nTurn the shower on and let it heat up before actually getting into it."
]
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[],
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a3dvys | why are hispanics counted as white in demographics when there's a follow up question asking white people if they have hispanic heritage? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a3dvys/eli5_why_are_hispanics_counted_as_white_in/ | {
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"Because there are white Hispanics, black Hispanics, mestizo Hispanics, indigenous Hispanics, and even Asian Hispanics. The life experience and reality of a black Hispanic is likely dramatically different from that of a white Hispanic.\n\nCalling Hispanic a race or ethnicity is as accurate as calling American a race or ethnicity.",
"Hispanic is not considered a ethno-racial category, but rather ethno-linguistic or ethno-cultural\n\n > The U.S. Census Bureau defines the ethnonym Hispanic or Latino to refer to \"a person of Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South or Central American, or other Spanish culture or origin regardless of race\" and states that Hispanics or Latinos can be of any race, any ancestry, any ethnicity",
"Hispanic is not considered a \"race\" by the federal government (and lots of other people who keep those kinds of statistics). The distinction between a race and an ethnicity is pretty arbitrary when you get down to it, but here are the reasons why:\n\nSome Hispanics are descended completely (or mostly) from the Spanish colonists and look just as \"white\" as anybody descended from Englishmen, Germans, Poles, etc. They speak Spanish and have a different culture but there is no easily visible physical distinction.\n\nSome Hispanics are descended completely (or mostly) from African slaves brought over to work on plantations on Cuba or Brazil or wherever. These people speak Spanish (or Portuguese, which is also considered Hispanic) and have Hispanic culture but look just as \"black\" as any African American from a physical perspective.\n\nThen you have Hispanics with a mixture of ancestry from European, African, and/or Native American sources, who might be anywhere in between.\n\nUltimately the concept of race is going to have a lot of overlaps and fuzzy borders because it's something society made up, not something that has an objective scientific definition. But as long as society marks the distinction between races people will want to study and classify them in the same way. To paraphrase Morpheus, it's real because your mind makes it real."
]
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2vihnc | what is the rational basis of a no-knock raid in a country where guns are legal? how do you prevent police officers from being killed? | _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2vihnc/eli5_what_is_the_rational_basis_of_a_noknock_raid/ | {
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"No knock warrants are suppose to be reserved for cases that you already believe the occupants have weapons and are likely to use them on police if given a warning before entering. In such cases the safest thing for the police is to enter with overwhelming force hoping to neutralize the situation before it becomes violent. Overusing no knock warrants, though, makes things more dangerous for everyone involved.",
"Screaming, \"POLICE\" before crashing in like the Kool-Aid man isn't lawful identification to me. They can't verify you have heard and acknowledged their identity and they haven't provided any real credentials. \n\nA police officer was killed in Virginia because of a no knock raid went wrong. Guy was thought to be growing weed but was an avid gardener who was growing Asian plants to go around his Koi pond in his yard that were mistaken for marijuana. All he heard was his door caving in and he fired at the first person through it. They did find a misdemeanor amount of weed and that's it. Now he's in prison for manslaughter because of a false accusation and needless use of force. Did I mention the false information came from a police informant that BROKE INTO his home? Yeah..... \n\n_URL_0_",
" > How do you prevent police officers from being killed?\n\nIn most cases, by the cops being pro-active: shooting anything that moves, tossing flashbang grenades into the cribs of potentially-dangerous babies (I *wish* I was making that up...), that kinda thing.\n\nAnd then, when people who have been jolted out of bed at 2 in the morning by a bunch of screaming guys in black with machine guns actually *do* stand their ground and shoot one, you charge them with murdering a cop.\n\nSee? It's a win-win for everybody. Um, except society.\n"
]
} | [] | [
"http://thefreethoughtproject.com/prosecutor-seeking-death-penalty-officer-killed-knock-raid/"
] | [
[],
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"http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_Frederick"
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6lldbx | how does the tour de france work? | How is it team based but only individuals win the different stages? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6lldbx/eli5_how_does_the_tour_de_france_work/ | {
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"The primary objective of any sport is to get as much attention for the sponsor as possible. They are the ones who pay the salary. There are a few ways of doing this in a bicycle race. For example leading the race means there are a lot of cameras aimed at you while you wear the logos of your sponsors. There are also separate competitions for sprint point and climbing points as well as being judged the most aggressive rider of the day which will get you some attention. So some teams often have different racers going for the different objectives so they can get attention to their sponsors. However to perform well in a bicycle race you often need a team of helpers who make sure the main riders are well rested and comfortable. These helpers are paid almost as well as the main riders and even get their share of the price money whenever the team does well. They might also try to draw attention to their sponsors as often as possible.",
"Around the idea of teams competing but individuals winning the different stages, the individuals require their teams around them to help. Someone like a mountain climber would stay with their team to get longer-term speed advantages and help on the stretches, then 'break away' from the team on the hills to try and win that specific piece.\n\nTypically, the individual has the better sponsorship money and will 'donate' winnings from those stages to the team."
]
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5i69hy | why do caffeine tablets taste absolutely disgusting but caffeinated drinks taste nice? | Caffeine tablets on their own tastes extremely bitter - a lot like a powder. When drinking fizzy drinks or energy drink, I can barely taste the bitter taste. How do they mask the flavour? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5i69hy/eli5_why_do_caffeine_tablets_taste_absolutely/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Sugar and other chemicals in such drinks overpower the taste of caffeine, especially because there's so much less caffeine and so much more sugar eg 30 grams of sugar vs 200 mg of caffeine. That's not an accurate measurement, but a good example."
]
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[]
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|
2b60fp | why does it appear that certain ethnicities originated from certain locations around the world. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2b60fp/eli5why_does_it_appear_that_certain_ethnicities/ | {
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"cj245l5"
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"text": [
"Can you be clearer on your meaning? or is it simply why do Asian people look like they come from Asia why do etc etc ?"
]
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||
427ule | why is it autocorrect struggles with simple mistakes like 'convienent' but always finds a way to make inconvenient changes like 'one sec' into 'one sex'? | I have been ruined one too many times by auto correct! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/427ule/eli5_why_is_it_autocorrect_struggles_with_simple/ | {
"a_id": [
"cz8ax9w"
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"score": [
5
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"text": [
"Could this be due to confirmation/selection bias? The number of times that it worked correctly was not noticed, but when it works wrong, you notice and remember it. Over time, it makes you believe that autocorrect doesn't work as it should."
]
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|
66h7mh | how do companies design their products such that they are very likely to break/malfunction/deteriorate short after warranty ends? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/66h7mh/eli5how_do_companies_design_their_products_such/ | {
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"There are a handful of examples where a company builds an expiry date into a product. The companies that do this are assholes that everyone hates and are opening themselves up to massive, massive, government fines and penalties (which include class action lawsuits, etc.).\n\nIt is actually really hard for companies to \"get away\" with doing much that you would find despicable if you were truly informed of all the facts and issues at play. It happens, don't get me wrong, but its far less common than you think, its far harder for them to get away with it, and its seldom as overtly evil as one might think.\n\nHowever... Every physical object is going to have tradeoffs. Would you like your remote control to weigh twenty pounds but never wear out or need batteries - or would you like it to weigh five ounces and wear out after 10 years of average use?\n\nCustomers have spoken and they want cheaper, lighter, fancier shit - and they are wiling to pay for it.\n\nSo really what companies do is design the product so that in average use conditions it lasts a reasonable period of time, and then give consumers a warranty that covers a shorter, but still reasonable, period of time. And then if your toaster, or television, or jeans wear out sooner they replace them with an apology, and if they last longer... good everyone is happy.\n\nThe real issue though... Seven years ago you went to the store and bought a computer for \"word processing and browsing the internet\", and now \"browsing the internet\" means streaming netflix and you are trying to use a computer capable of opening Word, and reading CNN, to run a home media center. And its not up to the task.",
"This is done through MTBF prediction( Mean Time Between Failure). There are several methods based on field(real data) and some physics ones or simulation with which you can predict when something is going to break/fail.\n\nBest is if you have field(real) data based on previous product designs, but if none are existing then you can make accelerated lifetime tests (temperature, humidity, vibration .... anything you can think about) and then based on this how severe were the conditions during the test you can round up/predict in approximately how many hours/cycles you will get to failure.\n\nThe more data is available the more accurate is the prediction.\n\n\nP.S. This is not used only to design the product to break after the warranty. It is vital to the maintenance of life support systems, airplanes, power plants and etc.",
"Despite all the negative responses here, we don't design products to fail. We design products so that ~98+% will last until at least the end of the warranty period. But we also design them as cheaply as possible, and this often results in one of the parts failing shortly after the warranty period has expired. So if you want a product to last longer, buy the product with the longer warranty."
]
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24a1st | why does the american education system (primarily elementary and middle school) insist on the "everyone wins" policy. | It seems counter-productive that teachers are told not to necessarily tell their students they are wrong. A teacher of mine said this is to prevent "hurting the feelings" of students? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/24a1st/eli5why_does_the_american_education_system/ | {
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"Could you provide some background for why this isn't a loaded question? Why do you think the education system \"insists\" everyone wins?\n\nMy wife works in schools all the time and teachers routinely tell students they're wrong when they're wrong.",
"I'm not sure that teachers necessarily don't tell their students they are wrong, though I have had instances where teachers have let their kids down softly to escape helicopter parents from bursting through their class room door and yelling at them.\n\nLots of parents are very protective of their children and many think that little Susie can do no wrong.",
"I've seen it, I've lived it. What you talk about happens. Not all the time, mind you, but my grade school teachers would have all sorts of little class competitions and \"team building\" exercises, and everyone would get an award or _something_.\n\nI blame white, middle class suburban mothers who are sissifying our children because they believe their _precious snowflakes_ are _special_ and deserve a fucking medal for everything. The can't accept that a diversity of people can demonstrate a diversity of strengths and talents, that their children aren't going to be good at everything, and they feel the impulse to smother their children with emotional over-protection.\n\nSo these Smothers have rallied and pressed our school systems into conforming to their bizarre sense of reality, and all children have to bear the consequence of it.\n\nAnd it is counter productive. Children who grow up with this are emotionally fragile snowflakes as adults. They expect a handout with everything, don't do things \"because it's hard\", and these fucked up mothers think their children are fully prepared to be adults the second they turn 18.\n\nI've seen this in my school system, but I wasn't treated this way at home. Several acquaintances I know did get this treatment at home, and as a result, one, for example is finishing his Masters and won't look for work in his field because he's \"afraid\". He can't handle the feeling of rejection should he not get the job, so he doesn't look in the first place. He'd rather work a part time job at a bookstore. Others just don't know how to act as adults and turn to binge drinking because their behavior is utterly unchecked; they only kept in line when their mothers were there to wipe their asses. My fiancee tutors, and some of these college kids, they skip class all year long and then attempt to guilt her, \"I'm going to fail this semester if you don't help me.\" Really, kid? Like not going to class and not taking notes has nothing to do with it? Do you think she actually believes your line of bullshit? Or that it's even necessary?",
"I am a teacher and recent college graduate, and I have never been told not to tell a student they are wrong. We try to soften the blow a little, and the main reason is that constant negativity makes students feel worthless and helpless when we want to empower them to improve. \n\nWe are,trained to focus on positives and strengths rather than weaknesses. There are a few driving ideologies behind this. One is the concept of self efficacy. Once a student starts to think that they are too dumb or incompetent to be successful, the chances of them closing the achievement gap hits close to zero. Children are very perceptive of this even at an early age. My first graders have already started to idenfity and point out the better readers, early finishers, and discussion dominators in the class. While students can't officially drop out until the age of 16, they give up in elementary school. By focusing on what students have accomplished, and giving praise alongside corrective feedback we help keep students from frustrating out.\n\nSecondly, pointing out what students lack does not help much with promoting student growth. If I make a list of things a child cannot do or does not know it does not tell me where to start instruction. I need information on the skills they do have so I know where to go from there. I have also noticed several mistakes made in the classroom our when students try to apply information incorrectly. They have a strategy that works for one type of problem but they get the wrong answer when they try to use it somewhere else. If you do not explain that, they may discard that strategy as worthless.\n\nThat first part addressed the never telling students they are wrong or need to improve misconception. The fact is we do, quite frequently in fact, but we aim to keep a ratio that favors praise over redirection.\n\nAs for the idea that schools have an everyone wins policy, I do not feel that my school buys into that. Some schools probably do, but I do not think they are the majority. In my classroom I make sure all students are praised, even my lowest students. The lowest students are the ones that often need it the most to keep up their self esteem. The big focus is on growth. If a student comes in not knowing their letters but end the year near grade level that calls for celebration more than a student who barely grew at all but is still exceeding becuase they were more than a year ahead coming in (although typically the gap in achievement grows each year). However there are special celebrations only available to students who meet a prescribed standard. Some of these celebrations are academic, but others are behavior oriented. The biggest celebration of each quarter is based on district test scores, and only the parents of students scoring above 80% (where a passing score can be as low as 60% becuase the of the way questions are tiered) are invited.\n\nIn addittion to only presenting awards to students who demonstrate academic excellence, we don't withold the fact that students are failing. Almost all of my students who were at risk of being held back were at the conference when I informed their parents and compared their score to the benchmark and went through a pile of failing assignments. We like to focus on what students have accomplished and what can be done to improve towards a target, but they need to know where they are. "
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2vat1g | what is ameristralia (in reference to r/ameristralia) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2vat1g/eli5what_is_ameristralia_in_reference_to/ | {
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"text": [
"It was a 2013 reddit meme going around where the joke was basically while Americans sleep Australians take over providing content on reddit and vice versa."
]
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||
bbiu6h | how/why the length of a wire affects the output electricity. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bbiu6h/eli5_howwhy_the_length_of_a_wire_affects_the/ | {
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"text": [
"Bonus: How to reduce/minimize the loss.",
"The wire has electrical resistance to the flow of electricity. It's kind of like friction and the longer a wire is, the more resistance the electric current will see. This will make the wire hotter and the electrical force on the other end lower",
"Because wire produces resistance (measured in Ohms). More wire means more resistance. In essence it simply isn't a good conductor and absorbs/dissipates that electricity as heat (which you can feel if you run too much through a wire). The reason we still use copper wire despite it not being a very good conductor is because while there's better materials they're too expensive, and copper is \"good enough\".",
"Every electrical conductor has a certain resistance, that depends, amongst other factors, on its length (measured in Ohms/meter). In a longer wire, the electricity must travel through \"more resistance\", which will limit the electrical current, that can pass through. For example, if a wire with a given length has some electrical resistance, then a wire with twice that length will also have roughly twice the resistance, only allowing half the electrical current to pass. If you want to send a high current through a very long cable, then you will need a high voltage, to overcome the resistance of that wire. You can also use a wire with greater diameter to allow more current to get through, as resistance also depends on the \"thickness\" of the wire."
]
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5x3wm8 | how can we distinguish something that is real news and fake news? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5x3wm8/eli5_how_can_we_distinguish_something_that_is/ | {
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"Follow the sources. If an article do not include sources it is probably fake. If an article lists another article as a source that does not include sources it is probably fake. If the initial source contradicts what the article say then the article is fake. If an interview shows the subject contradict all his previous and future statements then it is probably fake.",
"First, look at the reputability of the source. The source may be a *biased* source (every source is biased in its own way), but if it's reputable, then you can typically trust the facts. If the source has a print edition or was around 30 years ago, its reputability increases. If the source's headlines are typically sensationalized or \"click-bait\", its reputability decreases. If the headlines are written in a way such as to make you feel angry, jubilant, or prideful, its reputability decreases. \n\nAlso, look for multiple reputable sources reporting the same facts. If nobody else is reporting it, wait a day and see. You don't always have to be up-to-the-second with whatever the news cycle is telling you.",
"By verifying the claimed facts across multiple sources, identifying the primary source of the claim, and evaluating the credibility of the source on the subject. ",
"Sources. If a news article lists and links out sources to other websites, or if searching for the elements of the article and you get other websites reporting on it, the less likely it's fake. Also, check the about pages and fine print of websites that something comes from, fake news often comes from 'satire' sites that specifically come up with false stories.",
"It is admittedly hard to tell, as no site is correct 100% of the time, but some do have a better track record than others. There are a few things you can look for though.\n\n* Is it a reputable source? Even the best news sources can be have wrong info sometimes, and a normally terrible site can sometimes have a nugget of truth, but in general something like the BBC is going to be more reliable than random blogs.\n* Are other news outlets saying the same thing? Every time there's a major event reporters swarm to it, so if something big does happen you can bet that many, many other places will be telling the story. If a particular website seems to be the only place saying something then that's suspicious.\n* What are their sources? In particular, look for primary sources backed up by photos and videos. While digital media *can* be edited and manipulated, it's better than nothing at all.\n* Does it report objectively and let you draw your own conclusions or does it tell you how to feel? There's a big difference between \"the president attended this meeting and had this to say\" and \"OUTRAGEOUS! Listen to what the phony president said! All true Americans should be outraged!\"",
"As an addition to the other good advice already given, take a look at...\n\nTone. Does this read as NEWS or an opinion piece? If it reads like an opinion piece, be wary.\n\nDoes it make seemingly outrageous/major claims with major ramifications without citing specific sources? Just because someone cited an unnamed source doesn't mean it's fake (this is common in real journalism), but it doesn't mean you should blindly accept it either.",
"Did you see the story on Facebook? Or some other service that's trying to hold your attention by appealing to your predispositions? Then it's fake, or at best biased.\n\nDid the event happen within the past 36 hours? If so, then the most reliable stories haven't been written yet, check back tomorrow.\n\nDoes the story offer \"secret knowledge\" that \"(somebody) doesn't want you to know\"? Then the likelihood it's fake is 90+%.\n\nDoes the story tell you that the world is simple and you/government/somebody should obviously do (something)? then it's probably pushing an agenda.",
"\"Real\" news is clearly distinguishable from \"fake\" new. \"Real\" news will usually cite multiple sources, and will fact-check their material. Their sources **must** be credible (Verified eyewitnesses, expert testimonials, hard scientific or statistic data, information from authorities, videos/photos). \"Real\" news also tends to be at least somewhat decent about correcting itself on inaccuracies they reported earlier. \"Real\" news tends to agree with other news in most cases, if not initially, eventually. Have you ever noticed that while FOX and NBC have quite different demographics for viewing, when they both report on something, the reports are often almost identical? \"Real\" news will be reported as it is, not as it is wanted to be. This is why critical stories that multiple networks report on are near-identical. They are all working with the same source material, they are all fact-checking the material. It's hard to come up with a different story from the guy ten feet away when you're both looking at the same thing.\n\n\"Fake\" news will fail to cite many, if any sources. These sources, if present, will not be credible. Sources may be heavily altered photo/video, false witnesses, experts nobody has ever heard of, statistics that don't match the norm, and a lack of information from the authorities. Fake news will usually not correct itself, and it will usually come from small, obscure \"news\" outlets. These outlets may be disguised to look like mainstream \"real\" news outlets, but can often be caught by check the url, or other details. Fake news reporting on a common story will often not match any other reports, with either no similarity, or changes to major details.\n\nPlease note, just because a news outlet makes a mistake, that doesn't make them fake news. Just because they don't agree with what you think, that doesn't make them fake.",
"It can be difficult which is part of the problem. Here are some tips:\n\n* check your sources - fake news often comes from fringe sources, butbwe aware mainstream news will often repeat those stories\n* check your bias - the most dangerous fake stories are the ones that tell us things we want to believe...make sure you separate your bias from what you are actually hearing\n* develop critical thinking skills - understand the difference between evidence and proof, anecdote and data, causation and correlation",
"I really like this blog post from [Popehat](_URL_0_)\n\nEssentially, read every news article like it's a search warrant and look for the presence or absence of three things: attribution, corroboration, and particularity.\n\nAttribution: For every fact asserted in the article, how does the author know it? If a statistic is reported, where does it come from?\n\nCorroboration: Other facts support what the author is saying. Anonymous sources are permissible if other facts support the assertions.\n\nParticularity: If a story attributes a stance, or a goal, or a motive to a public figure, does it give specific examples of conduct consistent with stance?\n\nEver since I read this post I've looked for all three things in news articles and it makes it pretty easy to distinguish fake news (fabricated) from news that isn't fake (just because something doesn't confirm your world view doesn't mean it's fabricated).\n\nOf course, there's still the issue of bias. Bias (implicit or explicit) can still encourage authors to make the facts fit the conclusion and that's why it's really important to read things critically. Be on the look out for logical fallacies that are used (many times very successfully) to manipulate readers. Appeals to emotion, attack the messenger, straw men, and ad hominem attacks (i.e. personal attacks), are good examples of logical fallacies that unscrupulous (or unwitting) reporters use to force a particular world view.\n\n",
"Well, here's how I do it...\n\nFirst thing is a \"gut check\". Does this news sound unlikely? Does it go against common sense? If it does, I head over to the front page. Is there a bunch of news on the front page that also sounds sensationalist, or is grossly skewed one way or the other? If so, I'm assuming this is BS and I'm outta there.\n\nSecond thing is are they the only one reporting it? News does not happen in a vacuum. If they're the only one reporting it and it's been a few hours, I call BS and move on.\n\nThird is the site itself. What kind of reputation does it have? Is it known as a serious news site, or a fringe site? I'm going to give a lot more credence to the NYT, NPR, BBC, AP and Routers than to the Huffington Post, Breitbart, Fox, or the Other98.\n\nLastly is, does the reporter cite sources? Obviously some sources are anonymous, and that's fine, but if they quote statistics or studies and don't reference those, I get suspicious. If the phrase \"some people say\" (or anything similar) appears anywhere in the article, I'm assuming BS."
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3vbuf4 | why do fish never bump into one another while swimming? | So when you walk down a busy street, you bump into people all the time, but when you see a large school of fish, or fish in an aquarium, they all seem to fluidly move past one other without any contact. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3vbuf4/eli5_why_do_fish_never_bump_into_one_another/ | {
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"Many fish have a line of sense organs along each side, which helps detect what is in the water nearby. \nGoogle \"fish lateral line\" to learn more.",
"When you're milling around in the park, you're the fish in the aquarium. No bumping. Lots of room, people talking, peaceful.\n\nWhen you are at the skating rink, you've got a lot of people in a generally open space. You're mostly all moving in the same direction, if in circles. You can see each other and talk, but mostly you just try not to bump into those around you. That's when you see a large school of fish in the ocean, or in a blue water tank, when they're moving in circles or moving fast.\n\nWhen you're walking down the street, you're the salmon moving upriver in a vast school. They bump into each other all the time, then. Moving fast, trying to follow the current, walls on both sides of you, it's pretty chaotic."
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Subsets and Splits