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7gz5dm | i read that members of the u.s. congress need, on average, "$14,000 every single day just to stay in office". why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7gz5dm/eli5_i_read_that_members_of_the_us_congress_need/ | {
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"Power. \n\nWhy else spend $3 million to get a job that pays $80,000?"
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4902ls | why aren't sidewalks slightly higher in the middle so that water would drain to the side? | If it's good for keeping water from collecting in the middle of roads why not sidewalks too? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4902ls/eli5_why_arent_sidewalks_slightly_higher_in_the/ | {
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"Sidewalks should generally slope towards the gutter. Roads are crowned (higher in the middle) so that water drains to both sides, but on the sidewalk you have gutters on one side and peoples' property on the other.\n\nMost cities have a grading plan that tells people what grade is allowed for paved surfaces on their properties, to tie into the city's gutters and sewers. The main idea is that your driveway slopes towards the sidewalk, and the sidewalk slopes towards the gutter, and that way all of the runoff ends up in the gutters (and eventually the storm sewers). ",
"Sidewalks occasionally have a slight grade, but generally it's pretty level. ADA (in the US) requirements for sidewalks is about a 1% grade, which is almost nothing. Just enough to let the water drain off, but not much else.\n\nSince building a 1% grade is pretty difficult, building a flat form, and pouring concrete is the easiest and therefore the cheapest, so that's what's typically done. "
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yt2fr | baseball | Can anybody explain the rules of baseball? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yt2fr/eli5_baseball/ | {
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"Baseball is a game in which two teams try to score more points - runs - than the other team, given an equal number of chances. The offensive team attempts to score runs by batting a ball thrown at them into the playing field and avoiding certain situations which permanently end their attempt at scoring. The defense attempts to keep them from doing so.\n\nA baseball team consists of nine players. Each of the nine players plays in a different spot on the field when it's their turn to play defense, and on offense, each players bats in an order determined by their batting ability. \n\nWhen a player comes to bat, one of the defensive players, called the pitcher, is responsible for throwing the ball (pitching) in his direction. A referee, called an umpire, stands behind the person catching the ball and counts what happens while the batter is batting. If a ball is thrown and the batter does not swing, the umpire must determine whether or not it was reasonable for the batter to be expected to swing at it, based on where the ball was when it passed the batter. If it was, he calls a strike. If it was not, it is called a ball. If a batter gets four balls before he gets three strikes, he is entitled to a free base (more on this later). There are other ways for the batter to get a free base, but that is sort of an advanced topic. If a batter gets three strikes, he is called out (more on this later as well). A batter also gets a strike if he swings and misses at a ball, and if he hits a ball but it doesn't end up in the designated area (although his third strike cannot be of this variety). The batter's turn ends when he is called out, when he gets a free base, or when he hits the ball into the field.\n\nWhen a ball is hit into the field, the batter must then run to a small square location called a base - in this case, first base. If he hits the ball in the air, and it is caught before it lands, he is called OUT. If he hits the ball on the ground, but the ball is fielded and thrown to the person touching first base, he is also OUT. And if he is tagged with the ball before he reaches the base, he is also OUT. If the ball hits the ground and he reaches first base before any of these things happen, he is SAFE, and he becomes a baserunner. If the ball goes over the wall in the outfield, it is a home run, and he gets to touch all of the bases and score a point for his team.\n\nA baserunner's job is to get from first to second to third and then to home base before getting OUT. He can be called OUT for a number of reasons. If he is off the base and is tagged, he is OUT. If a batter hits a ball on the ground and there runner is occupying the base that the batter must run to, the runner must run to the next base before the ball gets there, otherwise he is OUT. If a fly ball is caught, the runner must go back and touch the base he started on before the ball gets there, otherwise he is OUT. There are other ways for a runner to be called OUT, but that is sort of an advanced topic. If a runner touches all of the bases including home base before they are OUT, they score a point for their team.\n\nThroughout all of this, the umpires are counting the number of outs. When the defensive team collects three outs, the teams switch sides and all of the counts are reset. When each team has finished their turn on offense, it is called an inning, and then the next one begins. Most professional games have nine innings. At the end of these nine innings, the team that scored the most is the winner. If the teams are tied, they play another inning, count the score after that inning, and continue until one team is ahead at the end of an inning.",
"FYI, baseball is a very very complex game. All of that complexity doesn't come out just by watching. I'm not a big fan of baseball, but after having roommates who loved and understood what was really going on, I have a healthy respect for its interesting details and understand how others can love it.",
"**From _URL_0_**\n\nTwo teams take turns trying to score the most runs. Runs are scored by hitting the baseball, which is thrown by the opposing team. After the ball is hit, the batter must run to all four bases (in order) to score a run. It must be hit within the white lines to be considered fair. While on these bases, the runner is safe. If the ball is caught in the air or reaches a base before the runner does, he is \"out\" and must leave. Runners may not pass one another. In the case the ball leaves the field, it is considered a home run, and the batter gets to run all the bases and score a run. Each team has three outs before the other team can bat themselves. This change is done nine times. At the end of the nine innings, the team with the most runs wins.\n—Jose Alvarez, San Juan, Puerto Rico\n\n[Define Baseball in 150 Words](_URL_1_)",
"Oh, oh, I got this shit. I just spent over an hour explaining baseball to my French boyfriend the other day. \n\n\nThere are two teams. The **Home** team, and the **Away** team. Whichever team is hosting the game in their personal baseball diamond is considered the Home team. \n\nA game of baseball is separated into **9 Innings**, and each inning is divided into two halves. In the top half, the Away team goes to bat and the Home team plays the field. In the bottom half, the Home team goes to bat and the Away team plays the field. Each team bats until their team has 3 \"outs\". \n\nThe objective of the batting team is to score as many \"runs\", or points as possible before they receive 3 outs (and of course to avoid getting outs). A batter will hit the ball and run through all 3 bases and to home plate (a total of 4 bases) before the field team tags him out. The batter is considered a \"baserunner\" or \"runner\" once he hits the ball and starts running to first plate. Baserunners are allowed to run every time a pitch is thrown (with a few exceptions). Sometimes they try to sneak to their next base while the pitcher is preparing to throw a new ball. This is called \"stealing a base\", and in most cases, it is allowed. If the pitcher becomes aware that a runner is trying to steal a base, he may quickly throw the ball to one of his own team members who can tag the sneaky runner out. The pitcher isn't allowed to deceive the runners in order to tag them out, however.\n\nBasically, whichever team has the most points at the end of 9 innings wins the game.\n\nThe baseball field looks like [this](_URL_3_). All you need to know is that it is separated into three parts: the \"infield\" which is anything that falls within the diamond of bases, the \"outfield\" which is anything that falls outside of the diamond of bases, and anything outside of the foul lines, the two lines that run at a 90-degree angle from home plate. \n\nThere are [9 field positions](_URL_1_). That means that a team only has 9 players on the field at one time, even though they have more than 9 players on the team. The coach decides who gets to play and when.\n\nThe pitcher throws the ball to the batter. This is called a \"pitch\". The batter has a few options, or a few different things can happen to him. \n\n* **Hit the ball**. If he hits it hard enough, it will fly out of the baseball field. Since none of the field players on the other team can get to it, this is considered a \"home run\" and the batter can run through all of the bases (counter-clockwise) and back to home plate, scoring a \"run\" for his team. If there are already other base-runners (previous batters) on some of the bases, they are also allowed to freely run through the bases and back to home, individually scoring a point or \"run\" for their team. \n\n* **Strike Out**. Each batter is allowed 3 strikes before he is considered \"out\" and returns to his dugout. This can happen a few different ways. If the pitcher throws a ball outside of the [strike zone](_URL_2_), but the batter still swings at it, the umpire will call this a \"strike\". If the pitcher pitches the ball into the strike zone but the batter does *not* swing at it, this is also considered a strike. He can also \"foul out\", which I will explain below. \n\n* **\"Ball\"**. A \"ball\" occurs when the pitcher throws a ball outside of the strike zone, the batter recognizes that it is outside of the strike zone, and he does not swing at it. The umpire will call this a \"ball\" and the next pitch is thrown. If 4 \"balls\" are thrown with one batter, he is allowed to automatically take first base. If there is already someone on first base, that baserunner will automatically take the next base, and so on, and so forth. If the bases are \"loaded\", meaning that there is a baserunner on each one, then a point will be scored since the baserunner on 3rd base will have to continue to home plate. This makes the field team sad, and the pitcher feels bad. \n\n* **\"Walk\"**. A \"walk\" occurs if the pitcher hits the batter with the ball. The umpire calls it a \"walk\" and the batter automatically takes first base, and the same rules apply as with a \"ball\". If the batter is too injured to continue playing, then another player from his team will take his place for him. \n\n* **Foul**. A foul ball occurs when a batter hits the ball and it falls outside of the foul lines. The foul lines are the two lines that run at a 90 degree angle from home plate. A foul is considered a strike, unless the batter already has two strikes. At that point, a foul is only considered a 3rd strike if the batter [bunts](_URL_0_) the ball and it rolls outside of the foul lines. Baserunners and the batter begin running to their next base as soon as a new ball is hit. If it is a foul ball, every runner must return to his previous position.\n\n\nThe field team can tag members of the batting team out a few different ways. \n\n* **By catching a fly ball**. If the batter hits the baseball into the air and a member of the field team catches it, that batter is considered \"out\" and the next batter takes the plate. If it is the third out, however, the teams switch places because each team is only allowed 3 outs per inning. \n\n*Note: if a fly ball is caught and a batter is out, all of the baserunners who ran while it was in the air have to return to their previous bases. This is referred to as \"tagging up\".* \n\n* **By tagging runners with the ball**. If a field player/baseman has the ball in his mitt and touches a runner with it (who is not safely on a base at the time), then the runner is considered out. Once a runner safely reaches a base, he can not be tagged out. Sometimes a baseman will have the ball and is waiting for a runner to reach him so that he can tag him out. The runner can slide into the base on the ground, avoiding the ball. An umpire will decide if the runner is \"safe\" or not. \n\n*Note: if a baserunner fails to physically touch a base as he's passing it on his way to the next one, for instance, he does not touch 2nd base while running from 1st to 3rd, this makes him susceptible to being tagged out by a field player.* \n\n\nThere are a lot of other details. For instance, the catcher dictates the game by sending secret hand signals to the pitcher, directing his next pitch and plays. While the pitcher is throwing a ball, one of his feet must be touching a bar that exists on the pitcher's mound, otherwise the pitch is not considered legal. There are many small details that do not matter until you understand the basics of the game.\n\n\nEdits: grammar.",
"Two teams of 9 players take turns trying to score points (runs) against each other. The home team begins the game on defense (pitching), with the visiting team on offense. The team on offense (batting) keeps playing until they've made three mistakes, called outs. After three outs, the teams switch places. A rotation where both teams have an opportunity to play offense and defense is called an inning. A game usually lasts 9 innings, unless the score is tied, then the game is extended indefinitely until an inning ends with one team in the lead.\n\nThe field is comprised of the \"diamond,\" which is really a square with 60ft sides. At each corner of the diamond is a base. Counter-clockwise, the bases are laid like so: home plate, 1st base, 2nd base, 3rd base. In the center of the diamond is the pitcher's mound. The field extends beyond the diamond (infield) into what is called the outfield. There are two lines that determine the field of play: the line that extends from home plate to first base and beyond, and the line that extends from home plate to third base and beyond. Anything hit between those two lines is fair. Outside those lines is foul. There is also a wall in the outfield, so it doesn't extend forever. This wall is located at different distances from home plate in different stadiums, creating a slight variation of play that is unseen in any other sport.\n\nA run is scored when an offensive player manages to run from home plate to first base, second base, third base, and then completes the circuit to home plate. There are a lot of rules concerning what allows a player to advance between the bases.\n\nPITCHING: The pitcher hurls the baseball from the pitcher's mound (a pile of packed dirt that is raised 10 inches above the level of the field) toward home plate, where the batter is waiting to swing his bat at the ball. The pitcher is aiming for what is called the \"strike zone\" - it is a small area that is roughly defined as the the area directly above the home plate, but it only begins at the height of the batter's knees and ends at the height of the batter's belt. If you think that is a very strange way to define a strike zone, you're not alone. There are arguments almost every game about whether balls were pitched to the strike zone or not.\n\nBATTING: The player at bat is trying to make contact with the ball with his bat and drive the ball somewhere onto the field, but he doesn't have all day to do this. A strike is counted against the batter if: 1) the pitch passes through the strike zone and the player doesn't swing (strike looking), 2) the batter swings at the pitch and misses (strike swinging), 3) the batter makes contact with the pitch, but the ball does not end up in the field of play (foul). If the batter gets 3 strikes, he is out. There is one exception, though: a player cannot strike out on a foul ball. He will remain at 2 strikes. (And then there is an exception: if the batter just tips the ball with his swing and doesn't knock it far enough off its course, the catcher, who is crouched behind the batter to catch the pitch, will catch the ball. If this occurs with 2 strikes, the batter is called out.)\n\nOf course, the pitcher can miss the strike zone with his pitch. This is called a ball. If the batter acquires 4 balls, he is allowed to walk to 1st base.\n\nTHE COUNT: The count is the tally of balls and strikes that a player has during his at-bat. This is done in a balls-strikes format. So, if a player has 2 strikes against him and no balls, the count is 0-2. A 3-2 count is called a full count, which means that the next pitch is likely to result in a play of some sort.\n\nRUNNING THE BASES: if the batter hits the ball and it ends up within the field of play, he starts running to first base. His goal is to 1) have the ball hit the ground before it is caught and 2) touch 1st base before a defensive player can retrieve the ball and throw it to the first-base fielder. If the ball gets to the base before the batter, or if the ball is caught before it hits the ground, the batter is out. The batter can also be called out if a fielder touches him with their glove while they are holding the ball. If the batter is in contact with the base, however, they are safe.\n\nWhen a player reaches a base safely, it is up to the next batter to advance them to the next base by hitting safely in the same fashion. There are some other options, too. The runner can attempt to steal the next base by taking advantage of an opportunity to run to the next base while waiting for the pitcher to throw a pitch. If they make it to the next base without being tagged by a fielder with the ball, they have stolen it.\n\nThe batter can also sacrifice themselves to advance the runner. They do this by weakly hitting the ball (bunt) to an area where it is easier for the fielders to get them out instead of the runner, who is already running to the next base.\n\nFORCE OUTS: An important part of fielding and running is knowing what a force out is. Only one runner may occupy a base at any time. When the ball is hit fair the batter MUST make it to first base. If there is a runner at first base, that runner MUST make it to second base. If there are runners at both first and second base, they both must advance to the next base, all to make room for the batter who just hit the ball. This creates what's called a force at the base that a player is trying to reach. If a fielder recieves the ball while he is touching the base, the runner who is trying to get to the base is out. If, however, a runner is, for example, at second base and nobody is at first base, they do not have to run because there is room for the batter to reach first base, therefore the only force out is at first base.\n\nThis distinction is important because of what is called the double play; when the fielders use the force outs at consecutive bases to get both the runner and the batter out (in that order) by forcing them out in turn. Sometimes teams will intentionally allow a batter to take first base in order to create this force out opportunity at second base.\n\nHITS: When a batter makes contact with the pitch, they will attempt to run to the furthest base they can get to safely. If they only make it to first base, it is a single. If they make it to second base, a double, third base, a triple. If the batter hits the ball far enough that it flies over the wall in the outfield, it is called a home run and the batter (and all runners on the bases) is allowed to run around the bases until they reach home, scoring a run for each player. If a batter hits a home run while there is a runner on each base (1st, 2nd, 3rd), it is called a grand slam and it counts for 4 runs."
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1jstln | why do i feel a disconnection between myself and my reflection? | When I look in the mirror, I have trouble associating the reflection with being what I look like, despite knowing that. It doesn't feel like a reflection of me, and I have a sort of dissociation from it. Looking in the mirror or catching myself doing something that isn't preening or teeth brushing or whatever provokes a sense of weirdness and wrongness. Anyone know why? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jstln/eli5_why_do_i_feel_a_disconnection_between_myself/ | {
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"I'm not an expert, but I would suggest you listen to this: _URL_0_ Its a rather long program, but I was unable to find a link to just the bit I am thinking of. \n\nReally fascinating hour of radio, but the part I think is relevant is a section where they talk about seeing pictures of people mirrored and the result is that they don't look quite right. I tried this on myself and took a photo of myself from straight on mirror angle and I look like a monster to myself. \n\nThe take away is that what you look like to yourself in the mirror is not what you look like. And, the result of just switching the sides wouldn't seem like it would be so important, but it does have a real impact that people may notice. "
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pwgxt | what's the significance of 255 is computing/programming? | It's a weird, odd, integer, yet I see it all the time when it comes to tech and computer stuff. Oblivion level/skill caps, XBLA message cap, and I'm sure you guys know more. So what is this number and why is it significant? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/pwgxt/eli5_whats_the_significance_of_255_is/ | {
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"It's the largest value you can fit into one byte.",
"We usually count in base-10. After 8 comes 9, then we run out and we add another number to be able to resume counting to 10, 11, etc.\n\nBut in software, numbers are usually stored in base-15 aka hex and always in pairs. You count like 00, 01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06, 07, 08, 09, 0A (10), 0B (11), 0C (12), 0D (13), 0E (14), 0F (15). Then it continues 10 (16), 11 (17) etc.\n\nThat means that our 100 is, in hex, 64.\n\nNow as you might imagine, since we have two spaces to write in (0A, 3C, A8, etc), you will run out eventually. You'll end up with the number \" FF. Translate FF to regular decimals and you get 255. Just like you add another number to make a 10, if you want to continue counting, you're going to grab another set of numbers. (256 would then be 0100, 257 would be 0101, 258 would be 0102 etc.)\n\nTry it yourself. If you're on Windows Vista/7, start your calculator. Click view-- > Programmer (or press alt-3). On the left side you'll notice a box with four options, the top two being Hex and Dec. Make sure Hex is chosen, type in \"FF\" and then click on Dec.\n\nTry any hex-number or any dec-number and convert it to the dec-system just by clicking the other radiobutton.",
"255 is the highest value you can measure with the smallest typically used unit of storage in a computer (a single unsigned byte/octet/char). A byte is comprised of 8 bits (binary digits) which can each only hold the value 1 or 0. The first 8 bits represent 1,2,4,8,16,32,64, and 128 which, when you add them all together, add up to 255.",
"Computers use bits to store information. A bit is either a 1 or a 0. \n\nNot a lot of things can be stored in one bit, so they lump 8 of them together in a byte. A byte can have 256 different combinations of 1's and 0's. \n\nComputers start counting from 0, so 255 is the highest number you can represent with one byte. ",
"Since you're five, you probably know how to count to ten. You probably even know how to count to one hundred. But why are those two numbers (10 and 100) \"significant\" or \"interesting\"? Why didn't I ask if you knew how to count to 12, or 78? You probably know this: ten is the first number that we have to use *two* digits to write down (a one and a zero). All the numbers before that, we only need one. Same idea for one hundred: it's the first number you need to use *three* digits to write down.\n\nThe numbers that come right before these are interesting too: 9 and 99. 9 is interesting because it's the largest number you can write down using only 1 digit. 99 is the largest number you can write down using only 2 digits. \n\nNow this is true because the system of counting you've learned in your first year of school has ten digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9). There are no more, so when you get to 9 and want the next one, we have to use two digits; when you get to 99 and want the next one, we have to use three. But what if we had a system of counting that used some different number of digits other than ten? Like 2, or 8, or 16? In these systems, you might have a smaller number of digits (for 2, you'd have only 0 and 1; for 8, you'd have 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7). And in others, you'd have some larger number of digits. For example, in a system with 16 digits, you'd have 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9, but that's only 10 - we'd need 6 more digits! We could invent new funny number symbols, but most people just use letters instead. So we'd have 0 through 9, but also A through F (for a total of 16). \n\nTo talk a little more about this system with 16 digits, if you were to start counting, you'd start with 1 (or zero, depending on how you like to count), then 2, up to 9. But then you'd say \"A\". And \"B\". Up to \"F\". And only then would you need another digit. That's really important. Remember how when we were using 10 digits, you could only count up to 9 before you needed another digit, and that's why 9 was special. Well, in the 16-system, \"F\" is the same way! And just like 99 was significant in the 10-system, \"FF\" is significant in the 16-system - it's the largest number you can represent using only 2 digits.\n\nWe're almost there.\n\nLet's think about FF a little bit more. If you counted up all the possible numbers from 1 way up to FF, you'd find that there are 255 of them.\n\nNow, for reasons that I won't get into in this post (because you're five, and it involves lots of multiplication and things), in computer programming, we often use systems of counting with 2, 8, or 16 digits, instead of the 10 that you're used to. Because of this, FF is a really important number: it's the largest number you can represent using only 2 digits in the 16-system. We also call the amount of space you need to store this number a \"byte\" - this is an important measure of space in computers (you've probably heard of kilobytes, megabytes, gigabytes and terabytes).\n\nYou said \"it's a weird, odd, integer\". Well, it's only weird if you look at it as 255. If you look at it as FF, it makes a lot more sense.",
"We store all our computer data in special boxes, These boxes are only made of sizes that are powers of 2 starting from 2^8. So the smallest box your computer has inside it can hold 256 (2^8) different things. Sometimes people use this small box to store numbers , but they can really be used for anything. So if you started with the numbers 0 , you can store all the numbers from 0 - 255. ",
"OP doesn't seem to like ragzilla's post, so I'll see if I can help out some.\n\nYour computer doesn't comprehend the decimal system quite like we do. Our counting system involves digits that start at 0 and go up to 9. When a digit exceeds 9, we add a second digit and reset the first. I hope this makes sense. 7...8...9...10...11, etc.\n\nYour computer knows the binary system, which functions in the same way as our decimal system, except it doesn't wait until 9 is exceeded to add another digit. It only knows 0 and 1. So counting works a little differently. Understand that the following numbers represent the same values in decimal and binary, but they are written differently because of the different systems.\n\n Decimal: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10\n Binary: 0, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101, 110, 111, 1000, 1001\n\nNow, what ragzilla was getting at is that since 0 and 1 are really only valuable by themselves in certain limited cases, we usually deal with data in terms of a slightly larger set of bits (0's and 1's). We often use a byte as a single unit of data, and a byte is 8 bits. That means the largest possible value we can store in a single 8-bit byte is:\n\n Binary: 11111111\n Decimal: 255\n\nA byte can express a total of 256 values ranging from 0-255, inclusive. Bytes are much more useful than bits in terms of single units of data. A bit, after all, can only mean 0 or 1, or an interpreted version of that which means False or True. But a byte can represent a text character (take a look at something like an [ASCII character chart](_URL_0_) to see how the letters in computer text match up to numbers in the 0-255 range) or simply a range of integer (whole number) values.",
"Imagine that the save file for your game is like a 'fill the boxes' form.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nIf you want to allow for numbers between 0 and 99, you need to have two boxes. Once you allow 100, you need to have 3 boxes to hold the number, and you'd need to redesign your form to allow for that.\n\nComputers use a special counting technique that lets them fit up to the number 255 in 8 boxes. The computer 'forms' have been designed to use blocks of 8 boxes together - this isn't a hard and fast rule, we could use bigger or smaller sets of boxes, but 8 is used most often and allows for easier layout of the 'forms'. \n"
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"http://english.zahlungsverkehrsfragen.com/images/ueberweisung_eng.jpg"
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5w7oh0 | why do those spots appear when you leave a surface like glass or mirror wet without drying it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5w7oh0/eli5_why_do_those_spots_appear_when_you_leave_a/ | {
"a_id": [
"de7xla5"
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"text": [
"When the water evaporates, it leaves behind all the impurities (like minerals), that is what you see. They say the \"harder\" the water (i.e. more impure) the more water spots you get. "
]
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||
ohbqn | how cough syrup works? | How does stuff like Robitussin and NyQuil work to keep you from coughing? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ohbqn/eli5_how_cough_syrup_works/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Well, there are two basic ways they work. With one type of medicine(Antitussives is the big person term), it makes you not want to cough, another (expectorants is the big person term) allows the stuff you cough up to slide down your throat like apple juice does. NyQuil also adds other stuff like tylenol that may make you feel even better.",
"Basically, it doesn't cure your cough, it just makes the nerves less \"itchy\" or responsive. So soon as the drug DXM wears off, you'll be coughing again."
]
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[],
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cekht5 | what are the applications of studying the fourth dimension? | There are two things I wish to understand that I don’t about the fourth dimension. First off I’d like to know: Do mathematicians mean that the fourth dimension is something that actually exists or is it a hypothetical idea? Secondly I wonder what the use of studying the fourth dimension is for us living in a 3D world, does it actually have relevant applications? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cekht5/eli5_what_are_the_applications_of_studying_the/ | {
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"It's not always directly related to the real world. If you take vectors as an example. You have (1,2) which is a 2D vector, you have (-3,1,4) which is a 3D vector but you could also have (3,6,1,4,1,6,7,9) without any issues. It doesn't always directly relate to physical properties. And even if it does relate to the physical world it doesn't have to relate to our 3 dimensions of space.\n\nActually I've dealt with 100-dimensional data in IT which basically only means that I safe 100 different attributes for a given item.\n\nHowever it can sometimes be necessary to have 4 dimensions to calculate some things relating to our 3 dimensional world. What they are I don't know because I frankly detest maths and avoid it at all costs but some professor at uni once mention it.",
"Mathematicians don't study real world in any capacity really.\n\nMath is about studying ideas and how they connect to each other. Ideas can be about anything. If you apply ideas to real world, you then get applied mathematics or other fields of science like physics. It's a bit hard to tell what field you're studying if your idea is deeply tied to the real world but you want to study that idea in particular. Applied mathematics is sometimes used to describe this. Anyway, ideas can relate to real world, but unless stated otherwise, mathematicians don't care about that connection.\n\nTheory of relativity views the world as 4-dimensional. Some computer graphics depend on 4d objects as they kinda use 4d to simplify 3d. Also there's a lot of stuff being done in even higher dimensions, like, many times with computer science you end up having to do things in a million-dimensional space or something.\n\nNow, I'm no expert, but my take on this is that while 4d is somewhat useful, the real reason mathematicians tend to like it is that it has some weird properties that other dimensions numbers don't have. Like, there are lots of things that hold for 1d, 2d, 3d and 4d worlds, but don't hold from 5d onwards. Some things only hold for 4d worlds. So it seems curious. Like, 5d and onwards, dimensions kinda blur together and don't seem to have their own individual quirks, like, 1000-dimensional space and 1001-dimensional space? It's hard to even notice the difference. But 4d is really clearly unique, it has bunch of things that make it clear it's its own thing. So mathematicians are like, well, this 4d seems like an interesting thing with lots of personality, I want to know it better!\n\nSo you end up having computer scientists and such use bazillion-dimensional spaces and be totally unfazed because bazillion-dimensional space is pretty much the same as bazillion+1 dimensional space, who even keeps count, but with 4d specifically, it has personality! You couldn't just replace it with 5d or 3d space and not notice, its clearly its own thing. So that sets it apart from most other dimension numbers. 4 is not just one number among many, you're really trying to get to know it.\n\nAnd this makes 4d really popular target for recreational mathematics."
]
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[],
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1ixdna | why are buffalo wings called buffalo and not just chicken? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ixdna/eli5why_are_buffalo_wings_called_buffalo_and_not/ | {
"a_id": [
"cb8yj27"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Because they come from buffalo ny. \n\nSource. I'm from buffalo NY. "
]
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| []
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[]
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||
fkq14r | difference between intelligence, knowledge, cleverness, wisdom? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fkq14r/eli5_difference_between_intelligence_knowledge/ | {
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"Intelligence is the ability to draw connections between things, see the links and commonalities, the ability to absorb information and use it to problem solve.\n\nKnowledge is the amount of information that someone has absorbed.\n\nSo someone can be intelligent without being very knowledgable. Knowledge is something an intelligent person gains through time and experience.\n\nI believe cleverness is synonymous with intelligent, but it also seems to portray a sort of quick resourcefulness as well.\n\nWisdom is the ability to bring cognitive and emotional intelligence together. A wise person may know the answer to something, but they also may know to keep that answer to themselves. Wise people often know more then they let on and sometimes choose not to speak even when they have something to say. Wisdom is knowing *when* to share your knowledge.",
"I prefer to use the following analogy using guns :\nKnowledge is the amount of ammunition you have. \nIntelligence is the firepower. \nWisdom is knowing in which direction to shoot."
]
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1bzgxo | why do some things taste good to others but not to me? also, why do some sounds irritate me but not others? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bzgxo/eli5_why_do_some_things_taste_good_to_others_but/ | {
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"Some of it is how you're born, and some of it is how you're raised.\n\nTASTE:\n\nSo, some people have a gene that allows them not to taste bitterness as much. Bitterness is often caused by phenylthiocarbamide in foods. Some people can't taste it at all (and therefore may like a food more for its other flavors, or at least not mind it) and some people taste it plenty, making them hate the food. Other genes may allow different people to taste, or not taste, sweet things in the same way that others do. My husband, for example, has a negative physical reaction to the sweetener aspartame.\n\nHowever, how you're raised matters too. Mayne you DO have the \"bitter\" gene, but because you were given bitter-tasting food since childhood, you like that stuff anyway.\n\nSmokers and coffee-drinkers tend to taste bitterness less because their tastebuds have been dulled.\n\nSOUND:\n\nSame deal. Your genes may have given you the ability to hear better/more than others, and so high-pitched or infrequent noises bother you more. But on the other hand, maybe you just grew up in a quieter household, so lots of noise feels uncomfotable.\n\nI had a roommate that COULD NOT sleep without music on, frequently turned the tv up louder than I thought necessary, and enjoyed lots of chatter. Drove me nuts-- but she wasn't wrong, just different."
]
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2410a7 | - how are people legally allowed to post obvious personal pictures of their own illegal drugs/substances on the internet without any legal repercussions, such as r/trees? | Notice: I have NEVER eaten marijuanas or any other drugs before, nor will I ever. Those god-awful substances will kill you! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2410a7/eli5_how_are_people_legally_allowed_to_post/ | {
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"Because you can't prove, with 100% certainty, that the substance in the photo is genuine and not a prop for a movie or something.\n\nImagine if every Walking Dead cosplayer and Halloween celebrant were forced through a murder investigation.",
"While the police may be too busy with other issues, others are not. Folks that grow and put up photos of said grow using a cell phone have been getting robbed, exif data is no joke. Now imagine photos of the inside of your home and all your goods, gps tagged...",
"Imgur strips exif data, which helps.\n\nAlso, unless the poster says what state/country they are in LEAs won't be sure who has jurisdiction. So they won't know who should try to get a court order for the records of Imgur and Reddit.\n\nHowever, if a person posts a picture of illegal sibstances and says where they are it is entirely possible some local DA might try to get a warrant, serve Imgur and then serve the ISP and then go bust down the door.\n\nIn short. don't post pictures of illegal drugs. If you feel like you *really* have to do it use Tails and don't say where in the world you are.",
"What about when celebrities post photos of themselves smoking blunts? How do they not get in trouble? ",
"1. could be fake\n2. could be someone else's drugs\n3. could be someone else's picture\n4. could be photoshopped\n5. could be in a different country\n6. the cop who saw the picture and tracked you down would have to be in the same state\n7. prisons are already full and it's expensive to prosecute someone\n8. the evidence might be gone by the time the cops get to your house\n9. probably a whole bunch of other reasons\n\nthey defintely monitor facebook and instagram though, usually to keep an eye on gang members (Who are often stupid enough to have facebook etc.)",
"Not necessarily. Police have gotten warrants in the past due to photos online of felons with firearms and drugs. \n\nThey just usually don't care for the most part. ",
"Because it's a hassle to attach a reddit username to someone and file charges all over a few grams of weed.\n\n\nWhat's crazy to me is the kids in my facebook feed doing bong rips with their face fully visible, admitting it's weed, and posting the video on their shit for everyone to see. Then all of their friends hit \"like\" and now a fuck ton of people they don't even know have seen it.\n\n\nThat's just being careless imo. I would never put anything illegal on something like facebook that has my real name and multiple pictures of me attached to it. Reddit is whatever.",
"This guy sounds like he may be an actual 5 year old.",
"A picture of something is not necessarily the real McCoy = reasonable doubt.\n\nYeah, it could be cocaine - or it could be a line of baking soda. We don't have the technology to jump into a digital photograph and grab a sample of whatever was photographed and run a chemical analysis on it.",
"Suppose you are a police officer in Chicago. You see a picture of someone smoking a joint. You get a subpoena to reddit and get the IP address of the poster. Turns out he doesn't live in Chicago, so you call in the FBI. Imagine they don't laugh you out of the office but take a picture of a guy smoking a joint seriously. They follow up on the IP address, and it turns out the guy lives in Germany....out if your jurisdiction. Assume, however that the guy lives in Florida. You call up the FBI in Florida. Assuming they don't laugh and hang up the phone and take it seriously, you investigate and pick up the computer owner, a woman. She says she doesn't know the guy in the picture, or she knows him a little and thinks his name is John or maybe Bob....let's say you subpoena her cell phone records and you find the guy in the picture. He says the picture was taken 12 years ago....beyond the statute of limitations....can't prosecute....or he says the picture is a goof and he was smoking tobacco, or he says the picture was taken on a trip to Amsterdam where pot is legal....can't prosecute.",
"One of the facts that the prosecutor and/or police must prove in a drug case, is that the substance in question is an illegal drug for which they are being charged for. I can arrest you based on probable cause that the substance I am smelling in your blunt wrapper is MJ, because I've encountered it numerous times. I then take the \"green, leafy plant like substance\" and submit it into evidence for our chemist to analyze. From there he will determine if it is MJ or a different substance.\n\nIt is pretty cut and dry when you are out in the field and physically encounter it. I smell weed, I see weed, you get charged. With a photo on the internet, I lose the level of certainty I need to make an arrest, which is \"probable cause\". Even a picture of a kilo of cocaine, with a dude saying \"this is cocaine\", does not give me PC to arrest. What it DOES allow me to do, is have a judge issue a search warrant. \n\nNow we theoretically could do this for people posting joints and stuff like that, especially if they say \"this is weed\", but we honestly do not care enough about drug users to go through that much work. One of the requirements for a search warrant is that the items to be seized should be presently located in the place to be searched. Well, a joint, or bowl full of weed will not last long at all. So, unless we see a photo online of high levels of distribution or trafficking, we aren't even going to bother with a search warrant.",
"Eye contact is used with lots of animals to assert dominance. With some species, the first one to break eye contact is considered the least dominant.",
"Eat the marijuanas, OP. Eat all the marijuanas. ",
"While we are in here, why can whiz khalifa, for instance, smoke weed in his music videos without getting problems with the police? It is kind of obvious he is an weed smoker, but still gets no legal trouble.",
"Prove the picture and \"substance\" is real. (Also don't admit it when the fuzz asks you a question). Don't talk to cops.",
"I'm from BC Canada, my ex used to develop photos (A while back, when developing photos was common)\n\n\nPeople would go to Jamaica or Amsterdam and take pictures with gigantic quantities of weed. The store's policy is to call the RCMP, they come, take a look, maybe take a copy of the pics with the customer's info\n\n\n...but that's it. Customer never knows, nothing really ever happens, but police do care, so I'm sure they're on some kind of list. And the pics were obviously genuine because the store develops them from raw film before the customer gets them. Makes you think that a photo developer can certainly fake photos and call police for whatever reason, right?\n\n\n\n**tldr** Probably gets you on a list",
"Obvious troll is obvious. ",
"Ever gotten pulled over by a cop and gotten off with a warning when you were clearly in violation of some rule or another? Law enforcement overlook petty crimes all the time. Since the police are the ones responsible for enforcing the law, and the police are not omniscient, they have to be realistic about what they go after. If they spent all their time trying to bust every Facebook user who was also a user, they'd never have time to go after the really important stuff like theft, assault and homicide.\n\nMy main reason for posting here is to address your follow-up notice. I apologize in advance for the wall of text that is about to ensue, but I would like to point out a few specifics on illegal drugs and substances that you mentioned. It sounds to me like you have some pretty strong feelings about the subject. It is not my intention to ruffle any feathers. However, something that is far more dangerous than drugs themselves is being ignorant on the subject. Drugs can just as easily save your life as do you harm, and simply keeping them out of sight and out of mind will not benefit you in any way, and will most certainly not make the problems they represent go away. Knowledge is power, and I implore to not be afraid to *learn* about drugs - not just the legal ramifications surrounding them, but about the nature of drugs themselves - just because you've heard that they can be dangerous. I was lucky enough to have a pretty decent high school health class where I could pick a lot of this up, but I'll try to summarize this for you in layman terms (if anyone cares to correct or refute me on any of this, feel free).\n\nQuite a few drugs are very dangerous and can easily be harmful if misused, but marijuana is not one of them. Tobacco and alcohol, both legal and available substances, have already both been proven to be far more dangerous than marijuana. Just look at the number of respiratory disorders caused by smoking, or cases of alcohol poisoning, not to mention accidents cased by drunk driving. While a lot of the popular recreational drugs such as [cocaine](_URL_4_), [heroine](_URL_1_), [LSD](_URL_22_), and [meth](_URL_25_) can be quite dangerous, marijuana is actually a much more benign drug (SciShow does a very informative video on the subject, available [here](_URL_23_)). It's been legalized in several states already, and aside from impairing judgement (something that alcohol is already quite famous for), there are very few negative side effects from marijuana use.\n\nEDIT: while the physiological effects of marijuana are not as harmful, it should be noted that any mood-altering substance can be addictive, and that if you are the type of person who becomes hooked on things, then it is entirely possible to become so dependent on marijuana that it can dominate and even ruin your life. Of course, the same is true for any other lifestyle choice, such as gambling and video-gaming. The key, as with many things, is in moderation (thanks to /u/evsie for pointing this out).\n\nBecause of it was lumped together with all the other recreational drugs in the 1970's, however, it has often been regarded as a \"gateway drug,\" but in my opinion, this has more to do with the drug's legal status than its actual effects. Yes, you can say that someone inclined to impair their judgement with marijuana may seek out other thrills in the form of more dangerous drugs. To me, however, the real culprit is the thrill you get from simply doing something illegal in the first place. And once you've already opened up that channel, the mystique is oftentimes strong enough to draw the user farther down the rabbit hole. How many teenagers try to sneak around to drink alcohol, simply because it's illegal? How many kids go on benders and nearly die of alcohol poisoning as soon as they turn 21 as a result? How much of that do you think could be avoided if alcohol didn't have this air of mystery about it all throughout their teenage years, just because it was illegal?\n\nThis is all just my opinion, however, so take this with a grain of salt. To get back to the subject, however, most psychoactive or \"behavior affecting\" drugs fall into three general categories: stimulants, depressants and hallucinogens.\n\n[**Stimulants**](_URL_15_) excite your nervous system and make you feel \"up\" or \"high.\" [Caffeine](_URL_0_) is a very common stimulant in soft drinks, as is [nicotine](_URL_24_) - the primary stimulant in cigarettes. Most prescription medicine to treat disorders like ADD and ADHD, such as [ritalin](_URL_20_) and [adderall](_URL_12_), are stimulants too. Common anti-depressants, like [prozac](_URL_21_), are also stimulants. While most of these are pretty benign, some examples of potentially dangerous stimulants are [amphetamines](_URL_9_), one of the most popular being lab grown [methamphetamine](_URL_25_) or \"crystal meth,\" as well as [cocaine](_URL_4_), which can be refined into crack cocaine. These last two are highly addictive, though as a general rule, *all* drugs can be dangerous when misused, but it takes a lot less usage for these last two to be dangerous.\n\n[**Depressants**](_URL_5_) pretty much do the exact opposite of stimulants and relax the nervous system, making you feel \"down\" or \"mellow.\" [Alcohol](_URL_26_) is probably the most common depressant, which impairs judgement and relaxes motor control. [THC](_URL_3_), the active drug in the aforementioned [marijuana](_URL_16_), derived from cannabis plant, is a depressant, used for recreation as well as medical usage. The drugs that doctors use for local and general [anesthesia](_URL_11_) are high controlled depressants. Other medical depressants include painkillers like [morphine](_URL_2_), [muscle relaxers](_URL_7_), [sedatives](_URL_13_), and [methadone](_URL_10_), which is used to treat addicts as a way of gently weaning them off of their substance. An example of a popular dangerous depressant would be [heroin](_URL_1_), which is highly addictive. Though less popular today, [opium](_URL_18_) is another depressant which was famous in the early part of the century in Southeast Asia. If you're interested in history at all, I suggest looking into the [opium wars](_URL_19_).\n\n[**Hallucinogens**](_URL_27_), as the name suggests, cause you to hallucinate, and just as with the other two categories, there are mild and extreme examples. The most benign are the natural hallucinogens, such as [psilocybin mushrooms](_URL_14_), or \"shrooms,\" and [peyote cactus](_URL_8_), which contains [mescaline](_URL_6_). A lot of these recreational hallucinogens were common in the 50's and 60's, and inspired a generation of musical history. Some more extreme examples of hallucinogens are [LSD](_URL_22_), commonly known as \"acid,\" and [PCP](_URL_17_), commonly known as \"angel dust.\" ~~Manufactured psychedelic drugs such as these are highly addictive and can be very dangerous if misused.~~ EDIT: /u/theMortyest points out that hallucinogens do not produce a chemical addiction that way opiates do, though as /u/Evsie reminds us, all mood-altering substance can be addictive if you have an addictive personality.\n\nAs I said before, knowledge is power, and you shouldn't let the social stigma of drugs prevent you from learning about them. If you are as opposed to the idea of drugs as you seem to be, the absolute best thing you can do to protect yourself is arm yourself with the knowledge to keep you safe. Even Batman, who commonly refused to use guns, knew enough about guns to disassemble one if he found one. The more you know about a subject, the more you can protect yourself from them. To remain ignorant is to not only expose yourself to dangers you may not even recognize, as well as to be helpless in the face of a the thing you despise should the worst happen, but it also promotes the irrational \"lumping\" of other, non-threatening things which are only guilty by association.\n\nIf this message comes off as patronizing, then I apologize, but if I can help educate even one person with this, I would rather be patronizing than allow ideas like \"eating marijuanas will kill you!\" to remain prevalent.\n\nEDIT: revision",
"Ha ha ha ha ha. Never say never Op!",
"Also just think of the pure amount of resources it would take to actually do anything about this. The time and money would be obscene. \n\nSure, posting timestamped images of keys of cocaine worth millions will probably get some attention but Bob from Ireland posting a ounce of weed isn't really worth the attention."
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroin",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THC",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depressants",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mescaline",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muscle_relaxant",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peyote",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphetamine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methadone",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anesthesia",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adderall",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedative",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psilocybin_mushroom",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stimulant",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phencyclidine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Opium_War",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritalin",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prozac",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LSD",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsJzCdFlpyQ",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methamphetamine",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcoholic_beverage",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallucinogen"
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3hba2x | why do celebrities generally engage in significant other relationships with other celebrities? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3hba2x/eli5_why_do_celebrities_generally_engage_in/ | {
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"People tend to get involved within the circles they work and socialize in. With celebrity types it could be that the long hours and types of functions they attend makes it natural that they pair off. A celebrity lifestyle probably has certain challenges and another celebrity used to the attention and scrutiny might be better prepared to understand those life and work challenges. That understanding might help build potential relationships. We want to be with people that understand us.",
"Because they already have fame and money so they're less likely to just be interested for that",
"I think there are several reasons for this. A big one, I think, is that when you are famous you would always question whether the person dating you is with you just for the game or just for money. If you date someone who is of a similar standing to you in terms of fame or wealth, some of that can be avoided.\n\nAdditionally, if you are always around celebrities you might be more likely to date them. The life of a famous person may seem easy but constantly being in the limelight and having every detail of your life scrutinised can be tough, so perhaps dating another person who understands and goes through the same thing is better.\n\nAnother thing could be the fact that (and this is a cynical one) you might get more media coverage and rise in fame... It is hard to resist ultra famous couples like Pitt and Jolie, Beyoncé and Jay-Z, Kim and Kayne... The 'powercouples'. Two famous people together can really get the media focused on you which is beneficial if you rely on popularity.",
"Same reason I married a fellow college student--- you look to your peer group and people on the same footing as having something in common with you to start a relationship. This balance is common across all levels of social status; the majority of people marry and have relationships with people in a similar social position. There are exceptions of course, but it is pretty common.\n\nSame for friends; I have met ally friends from school and work situations, where everyone is of a very similar background."
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frvk7a | why are disease mortality rates calculated the way they are when the outbreak is ongoing? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/frvk7a/eli5_why_are_disease_mortality_rates_calculated/ | {
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"In the early days it's hard to really say what \"recovered\" means. You don't have a 3 month or 6 month survival rate because there's no patients that have records that long. Nearly all cases are recent.\n\nYou also don't know what percentage of cases did not seek treatment or went unreported by suspect governments, so take any numbers you hear with a kilogram of salt for the next year.",
"Not very accurately.\n\nIn outbreak stages it is almost impossible to know who has the disease, so the denominator of the fraction isn't known very accurately.\n\nLike many questions, much better answers will be available in a nice infectious disease journal article in a year or two. That's why we try not to do current events here in ELI5."
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3zkwl7 | why does san francisco (and even oakland) have more cultural cachet than san jose despite being smaller? | San Jose has 25% more people than SF and way more than Oakland, but seems to be thought of less often. SF is more often the setting for movies, songs, and TV; SF and Oakland have more sports teams than SJ (which wins only in NHL and MLS teams), etc. The 49ers are basically in San Jose but still call themselves an SF team (though certainly the name relates too). Am I thinking too much or is this a thing? Is it just because the bay itself is the SF Bay? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3zkwl7/eli5_why_does_san_francisco_and_even_oakland_have/ | {
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" > San Jose has 25% more people than SF...\n\nNow. It has more people now.\n\nSan Jose was a suburb that started growing. It doubled in size from 1950 to 1960, and doubled again by 1970, and finally passed SF in 1980.\n\nEven that is misleading, an artifact of geography. San Francisco is blocked in be suburbs like San Bruno and San Mateo that are still within its cultural sphere. San Jose is not blocked in, and was able to annex a lot of land that otherwise might have been suburbs and not with its city limits. Depending how you could places like Palo Alto...or even Mountain View and Sunnyvale, it isn't clear which one has the larger metro area. \n\nThat all said, culture develops over time, and San Jose has not been a major city for as long. And even after it become a major city, SF's better established culture centers had a way of sucking all the air out of the Bay Area, making it harder for San Jose to develop culture of its own. "
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4px166 | how can i recall fractions of dreams i had as a kid but can't remember some recent memories? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4px166/eli5_how_can_i_recall_fractions_of_dreams_i_had/ | {
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"If the brain considers a memory emotionally significant, it stores it away for long term memory. You had thousands of dreams as a child and only remember a small percentage of that, and those would be the ones that affected you the most mentally. Has something to do with the Amygdala I think. \n\nLots of everyday memories are forgotten quickly because they don't create enough of an emotional impression on you and vividly remembering every single moment of your day without any filter would be a waste of your brains resources. \n\nFor example, can you tell me what you were doing on January 23rd, 2005? Not likely because that's probably just a random day where nothing emotionally stimulating happened. But you can probably tell me what happened on your first day of high school, your wedding day, moving away to university and leaving home for the first time, because those are important, significant and formative events. \n\nDisclaimer: I am not a student of neuroscience/psychology/anything like that, this is all stuff I've read over the years so feel free to correct any mistakes in my answer. \n\nEdit: I assume this was something that was mentioned in Inside Out since everyone keeps mentioning it. I have seen that movie but it was not at all on my mind while writing this comment, and frankly I can't even remember them talking about memory consolidation in that movie. ",
"You're not really remembering the dreams you had as a kid, you're remembering the last time you remembered that memory. Each time you recall it, you're cementing its place in your brain, so it stays with you as a strong memory.\n\nEdit: [further reading on the subject] (_URL_0_) ",
"This should be tagged psychology. Memory is rather reconstructive. If the childhood dream had a high emotional impact, your brain believes it's more important so each time you accesses the memory it's cementing that impact.\n\nFurthermore, you probably aren't remembering the dream very accurately, because you're reconstructing it, but you remember the emotional response, so your brain kind of fudges it and you feel like you're remembering it clearly.",
"I'm in my 50's now, but I still remember a dream I had when I was 3 or 4 years old. It was me hanging out with Hitler. The weird part is that I remember the dream being black and white and slightly sped up, like the documentaries of Hitler. In the dream I'm very separate from this B & W world. At some point we're in a car and Hitler acknowledges me.\n\nI assume the influence was TV shows. I don't think I understood what Hitler was and stood for at that time."
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2olpbj | why does the mlb have such an expansive farm system while other sports have little or no farm system? | The NFL has none I know of, the NBA has the D-League, the NHL has the AHL, and the MLB has countless leagues under it. Why? Also to tack this on why does the MLB have such a large draft while the other leagues have relatively small ones? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2olpbj/eli5_why_does_the_mlb_have_such_an_expansive_farm/ | {
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"NFL - College Football\n\nNBA - College Basketball\n\nMLB - College Baseball + Minor leagues.\n\nBasically this comes down to the nature of the sports. Your average Running Back's career in the NFL is shorter than 5 years, and possibly even shorter if they get hurt. Basketball players are slightly better off, but even they have a shorter lifespan than Baseball players do.\n\nSo the MLB has an extensive farm system because a good player could reasonably play for closer to 20 years where an NFL or NBA player is excited to make 10 years. ",
"One reason is that MLB players come from all over Latin America and Asia. Football and basketball have fit the square peg of 'minor leagues' into the round hole of the NCAA, but the same could never be done by MLB. ",
"There are a lot of professional baseball leagues that existed for a long time. The AAA leagues, the Pacific Coast League and the International League have been around since 1903 and 1884 respectively. The AA leagues have similarly long histories. The \"major\" leagues have used these leagues as talent pools for decades, and there was no reason to abandon a structure that worked. \n\nOther sports weren't *NEARLY* as popular and didn't have as many professional leagues. They did have a fairly large presence in amateur athletics, so as the NBA/NHL/NFL started up, that's where they got their talent from. \n\nThat being said, the NBA started a developmental league (referred to as the \"D-League\") in 2001, and hockey does have a pair of minor leagues (AHL and ECHL). The NFL is starting their own development league (the Fall Experimental Football League), as well. But those are dedicated to cultivating fringe players than developing stars. ",
"NHL hockey has an enormous world wide junior pool, AAA leagues."
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4bgxvg | why if light travels in straight lines does my phone produce a circular area of light on a wall | I didn't know whether to post this here or r/askscience but I feel like you people are more friendly | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4bgxvg/eli5why_if_light_travels_in_straight_lines_does/ | {
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"Straight lines doesn't mean it's emitted only at the right angle from the source. It's emitted in all directions hence the shape.",
"It spreads out in straight lines in the form of a cone if you view a cone from the side, you will see two divergent straight lines at the edge of the cone spreading out from your phone, when the cone hits the wall you are seeing the base of the cone which is a circle. The further away the wall the larger the circle of the cone is formed."
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67msip | why do human beings just get sad sometimes for no real reason? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/67msip/eli5_why_do_human_beings_just_get_sad_sometimes/ | {
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"Mood can be altered by any number of factors ranging from environmental to physiological. Chances are, when mood is altered, it's not actually for \"no real reason\". Even mild things that you're not consciously aware of will cause your mood to shift either positively or negatively. Hungry but still have to wait an hour for lunch? Now you're grumpy. Weird dream last night? Now the rest of your morning feels off. Something as simple as a television show or song with a certain atmosphere will cause someone's mood to shift. The possibilities are kind of endless. \n\nOne thing you have to remember is that mood and overall mental health are controlled by a very complex set of physiological factors. Your nervous system, hormones, and even the bacteria in your gut all work together to create a balance of both \"good\" and \"bad\" emotion. So, at any one time, fluctuations in these areas can cause you to experience fluctuations to your emotional state, even if there's no obvious external reason for you to feel differently. \n\nI'm not a neuroscientist or psychologist, so I'd love to see someone provide a more in depth answer in this area. However, I will say that emotions like anger or happiness or disgust (etc etc) all play a very large role in our decision making and motivational processes. This means that we NEED emotion to properly function and make decisions. This includes sadness as well. So, you might even be able to argue that episodes of sadness (even for no real reason), are inevitably needed to keep us functioning. \n\nEDIT: When I say that we need emotions in our motivational or decision making processes, I'm referring to something in psychology called \"the somatic marker hypothesis\". The hypothesis states that emotional \"markers\", such as the sweating and rapid heart beat associated with anxiety, help us to make decisions where cognition alone might fail us. The parts of the brain associated with the somatic marker hypothesis are the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and the amygdala. When damage to these areas occur (such as in traumatic brain injury) it has been found that individuals are more likely to make risky decisions on gambling tasks. Why? Because they aren't experiencing the same emotional reaction to betting or losing, meaning they are less likely to \"learn from their mistakes\" because they don't experience or process disappointment or regret in the same way. There are lots of studies done on this using something called the Iowa Gambling Task. That's just one example of how emotions impact decision making. Feelings of fear and regret play a huge role in mitigating risk behaviour alone. \n",
"Sometimes an old memory comes up and brings with it all the sadness. Those memories could be triggered by something or even random. An owner of a recently deceased cat for example, might think of their furry friend a few times a day and feel sad as a result. A husband who lost his wife decades ago will might still feel sad as he wishes she was here with him.\n\nSometimes, it could be induced by medications. Some medications alter the hormone balance in the body, causing people to have unexpected emotions. They could become sad, angry, anxious or at times even happy - but all of these are not natural and are usually unwanted side effects of medications.\n\nHope that answers your question. :)",
"Chemical imbalances in the brain. I'll leave the psychiatrists to explain the ins-and-outs, but that's the basics. ",
"BA in Developmental Psychology here, so I'm sure an expert may be able to explain it in more depth but here's what I remember from college.\n\n\"Happiness\" is a feeling derived from a combination of neurotransmitters in the brain: serotonin, dopamine, noradrenaline, and sometimes oxytocin.\n\nPeople may know that dopamine is the big one people talk about, where for example in game design designers know how to structure a level and the rewards you get so that you're getting a little \"dopamine hit\" that keeps you playing.\n\nSo, as you're going through a day, say a really good day where you wake up with your loved one, have an awesome breakfast, you rock your job that day, or maybe it's a day off, regardless it's an awesome day, or for some folks maybe even just an average day. Your brain is producing dopamine, and receiving it. Neurotransmitters travel from axons in your brain, to dendrites, where I like to think of axons as a driveway, and a dendrite is where you park at the end of it (there's actually a little gap between the two physically but I digress). So you create dopamine, receive it within a dendrite and after a while it gets spent. After a while of being pretty happy, you'll have exhausted the dendrites ability to receive dopamine (as it gets \"spent\" it creates gunk that gets in the way...this is where an expert could define his better).\n\nSo naturally, after receiving dopamine for so long you simply won't be able to for a little while, which is where sleep comes in but that's a whole other topic.\n\nA good example is drug use, where cocaine will spike up your dopamine levels for a while and exhaust your dendrites faster, so you get a big happy for a while, then crash. \n\nAs people have said already it's partially environmental and partially physiological because all sorts of factors can change your brain chemistry. Naturally your brain goes through ebbs and flows of various neurotransmitters and sometimes, you're happy, and sometimes you're just down.\n\nI hope that was a decent explanation!",
"Well, the lives we lead are completely mismatched to the way we evolved, so I can see that leading to some level of sadness or frustration. ",
"There's always a reason but sometimes we can't identify what the reason is due to so many possible reasons",
"Because our mind is connected to our bodies which require certain nutrition, sunshine, exercise, fresh air and good sleep and human touch to be healthy. Without basic hygiene and shelter/food needs taken care of, we get physically unhealthy. This effects our brain function which effects our mood. So depression can be a symptom of environmental, mental or biological causes. Stress can cause physical issues that lead to depression. Dehydration can make you feel depressed. Low Social status is the primary cause of stress which can lead to a myriad of health problems including sudden death from rapid clogging of arteries due to acute stress or it can lead to depression. (Sauce: documentary called [stress: portrait of a killer](_URL_0_))",
"Already asked a few days ago: _URL_0_",
"Sadness is an emotion that is triggered towards the perception of loss. It can vary in intensity from dissappointment or discouragement to grief and anguish, and is the feeling that something of irreplacable value has been lost. At any given moment there is a lot of subconscious thought happening in the mind, most of it brought on by sensory perceptions which you may not be fully aware of. Yet the emotions and moods brought on by those can linger. \n\nFor example you may notice a cinnamon flavour that reminds you of your grandma's cooking that then brings about a memory of loss. This may happen so quickly that you are not consciously aware of it, yet the blue feeling of sadness remain.",
"When somebody dies alone, and there is nobody to grieve for them, the sadness is randomly allocated to someone.",
"Hey, I made a quick [video](_URL_0_) to answer your video! If you don't want to watch the video here's what I run over:\n\n- Sometimes our thoughts wander, leading us to a thought that we may see as sad or depressing! This can be done subconsciously and without us knowing!\n\n- Stimuli can affect our mood, for example: if you're lonely one evening that may lead to sadness!\n\n- We associate smells with memory, if you smell something that reminds you of the time you and your significant other argued or broke up, that will lead to sadness. This is also done subconsciously so we don't even know it happens!\n\nHope that helps, also I hope you enjoyed the joke at the end of the video. \n\nHave a great day!",
"Probably because we aren't biologically meant to live for so long and in such dense, interconnected communities. \n\nWe were supposed to hunt, have sex, raise the kids and probably die much earlier. Was taking a medical physics class when professor remarked that the spine cartilages of a person starts degrading when one is 14. We were never meant to stay for the long haul. ",
"I've noticed since I began eating a better diet that eliminates gluten, dairy, and processed foods, my mood is better and much more stable",
"because the world is a mess and everyone knows it. the corruption, greed, poverty and despair are a reality that no amount of drugs, booze or happy pills will make go away. \n\nat the end of the day, we feel powerless to change things yet we all wish we could. \n\nif this sadness for the human condition seems to appear \"out of nowhere\" its because we occassionally wake from our trance inducing distractions to remember whats really going on. its too bad we arent smart enough to convert our fear and sadness into empowerment and action.",
"Death. It's always on its way toward us. This never changes. Sometimes, when we don't have enough other things on our minds or plates, that truth creeps into our unconscious minds and makes us feel meaningless.\n\nBe nice to people. It's all we've got.",
"\"Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.\" -Earnest Hemingway\n\nWe're capable of knowing that billions of years from now our sun will expand and envelope the earth. In the mean time, greed is destroying the planet. Nintendo Switch is sold out everywhere with no relief in sight.. and so on.",
"\"no real reason\" isn't the universe we live in. Usually it comes down to not maintaining our health (physical and mental) as best we should; not doing enough exercise, eating too much sugary shit, being reclusive for a little longer than usual, not getting enough sleep (thats a huge one), getting too much sleep (usually a symptom of depression), not enough water. Sometimes it's just the situations we find ourselves in, not satisfied by whatever job we're doing, having no outlet for creative expression, generally feeling unfulfilled, etc.\n\n\nNow to get weird and hippy-ish, I think a huge part of this is about our perspectives. We're kinda hardwired to assume the worst, jump to bad conclusions, focus on the shitty things that get us down. Truth is most of all that stuff you can never really avoid, but we can do things to improve our general outlook (like I've mentioned above).",
" > Why do human beings just get sad sometimes for no real reason?\n\nConsider the opposite question: Why do human beings go through life being so optimistic and happy for no real reason? Why do human beings not get sad a lot more often?\n\n- If you're like most people, you aren't all that happy with what you will do for the rest of your life\n\n- In any event, you will die\n\n- Everyone you love will die\n\n- All of us will die -- many of us in considerable discomfort and pain\n\n- We will all be nothing forever after\n\n- People who come after us will not know or care about us\n\nSo... ha!",
"This will get buried but there's also an evolutionary theory that regular, mild depression strengthens group cohesion. We help each other out, even just emotionally, and that creates emotional bonds that strengthen the group. I read this long ago in passing so I can't cite anything. Sorry.",
"because halfway through high school im realizing that im actually going to have to work a shitty fucking job my entire life until i retire, but i'll be too old to enjoy life then. Though, I guess that's a reason..",
"For me, I've noticed that when I become sad, most of what I dislike goes away. Like certain pains that have nothing to do with me.",
"Because life is sad, and sometimes people forget how they were convincing themselves that it's not",
"Being overtired fucks with our brains. When I was going through puberty, Sunday nights without exception I would get inconsolably sad after the excitement from the long weekend. If you think about it, a lot of aspects of modern society really mess with our innate biological processes. ",
"For all the talk about how much Reddit loves science, there is an amazing amount of scientific ignorance.",
"Mental Health counselor here:\nThe first comment was pretty right on. However, I'll add some things:\nFirst, we evolved to live in groups, so we had to have a mechanism to make that happen. Emotion is that mechanism. The word Emotion comes from the Latin \"Emovere\" which means 'to move.' It moves us to make changes in our lives to accommodate other people. Second, because evolution tends to co-opt existing structures for new means, our emotions ride on the same nervous system as pain and pleasure. So when your feelings are hurt, *they really do hurt.* Finally, any 'negative' emotions stand out in our memory more than 'positive' ones, because it is useful for our survival to avoid hazards. Negative emotions typically have a danger or loss attached to them some way, a warning for us to behave differently, instructions on how to stay safe within the tribe.\n\nSo when you are 'suddenly' feeling sad, what is probably happening is that some change has happened in your environment (internal or external). Your brain, that lovely organ that tries to make sense of it all, takes that stimulus and drops it into your habitual thinking patterns. For example, if low blood sugar is the issue, your brain will know it does not have the glucose it needs. It interprets the output as \"something is wrong.\" Your habitual thought patterns take over from there. \n\nPlease don't ask for references; I'm on the west coast and it is still early. ",
"Well, ya see we have these things in our bodies called Thetons. These are the remnants of the lost souls scattered around the universe by the evil Lord Zenu.\n\nThis is the reason for our pain and suffering.\n\nSo, give me, fuck idk, $300 a month and I'll tell you whatever the fuck you want to hear to make these Thetons go away ;-)\nOh, and I'll slander you if you decide I'm wrong.",
"There's never no real reason. From a Buddhist perspective, everything has a cause and effect. It could be physiological (your body functioning) or it could be some thought that's in your mind that's causing you to be sad. If it is a thought it is possible to become aware of it. For that I would recommend meditation. If it's physiological, well you should see that too by the absence of any mental causes. ",
"Is this normal? I don't remember the last time I was sad. Knock on wood. ",
"I think it's possibly to do with diet. If people ate more complex carbohydrates like pasta or porridge and the healthy types of fats found in nuts and oils instead of sugar rush meals that make you crash, they would have better mood and brain chemistry.",
"Existential doubt. I think it's impossible to ignore. You can do for a while but eventually it comes back around. If you don't grapple with it and make efforts to understand it you end up confused by your own inability to control your fate. ",
"The explanation I like to believe comes from the folks at Welcome To Night Vale:\n\n\"When a person dies and no one will miss them, the mourning is assigned to a random human. This is why you sometimes just feel sad.\"",
"Because the core of the human experience is a constant search for meaning that is impossible to find.\n\nAll fo the shit we do is an attempt to distract us from the fact that our existence is the equivalent of rolling a rock up a hill only for it to roll down the other side.\n\nSometimes that shit we do fails to distract us and we see human existence for what it really is; absurd.",
"Not a scientist, but I cured my own depression and anxiety. \n\nSadness is attributed to several factors: poor diet, bad environment, isolation, genetics, and above all else neurosis. I stress neurosis because virtually every person on this planet has some kind of imbalance. Sadness can be absolved if you find the root to your behavior and way of thinking. This often stems from childhood/adolescence or trauma after puberty.\n\nSeemingly random moments of sadness are not so random. There is often a trigger from something you see, hear, or smell. This can be ameliorated. Eat well and exercise daily. I find fish oil (omega 3s) to be extremely useful. As a man I can say that weight lifting is a must. If you're in an abusive or unstable environment, try your best to remove yourself from such a place or people who are inciting such responses. Also retain valuable friendships for human contact is imperative for wellbeing. I recommend trying to abstain from antidepressants and experiment with what I listed above and also medicinal marijuana (use modestly with care. Magic mushrooms and other natural psychedelics can work wonders but you need to be extremely careful -- do your homework and do not abuse it). Lastly, read books that help understand the world around you and also yourself. Hesse, Pirsig, Poe, Dostovesky, Camus, Kierkegaard, Nietzche, Lao tzu/zhuang tzu, Jung, etc. are all great authors/thinkers to study.\n\nSadness isn't random, and it's our quest in life to find the cause so that we can free ourselves from such chains of suffering. Life is very beautiful, but there is a lot of fog that needs to be waded through in order to see the sun.\n\nTl;dr: sadness isn't random. empty your cup. You do that by working on the task at hand, taking care of yourself, and absolving your past and understanding yourself.\n",
"Honestly, I'd bet my money on existential despair You see when given too much time (that which we have in our current society in spades) Humans will contemplate their own existence which inevitably bums them out. Humans have a great natural defense to this stuff, we're damn easy to distract. The problem is when you run out of distractions, you're lost and alone with your own thoughts. If you turn inward you'll see artificial purpose. Welcome to the absurd. ",
"Calories. Eat some. I get the hump for no reason get so down, crying at work. Eat my lunch. Oh better now! ",
"I read an interesting theory about this once. The reason is evolution. Throughout time, our ancestors have evolved by finding things that were wrong and finding solutions for them. It started with basic needs like finding more efficient ways to gather and hunt food. It has continued to evolve in the way we build homes and all of the other random inventions people have come up with to \"fix\" minor problems. The theory is that it is in our basic evolutionary nature to notice things that are wrong. Unfortunately, this carries over into our feelings. All of our basic needs are met in modern-day civilization but our brain is still trying to find something that is wrong. \nHope you are doing okay, OP. ",
"Why is it taboo to be sad? Why do humans see sadness as a bad thing? We say the bad make you appreciate the good, but we live like we don't actually believe it. We see sadness as a negative thing, and see being happy all the time as an ideal; it's an unrealistic ideal. Once everything that makes us sad stops making us sad, we find something else to be sad about, if there's nothing to find, we still feel sad. \n\nSadness is necessary, and there's proof of this fact when it hits you for no (apparent) reason. ",
"Humans get sad because deep down, we know that everything we ever love and we've ever know will cease to exist at some point in time. Otherwise known as the existential bummer . To become aware of your existence is s double edge sword!",
"I've been feeling down for a long time. I feel like there's something wrong in my head and I've been going to therapy for a minute now to try and get to the bottom of it. I can tell people all day that life is beautiful. People at work tell me that they wish they could be like me, always smiling and laughing. The thing is, inside, I feel like I'm dying. Sadness and I are lifelong roommates. I'm a 40 year old man and I'm hurting every day. Sorry, I didn't mean to gloss over your question or attempt to provide some kind of answer. Good luck and be safe. ",
"Hey, I can answer this!\n\nOur mood is affected by specific chemicals in the brain: serotonin, dopamine, glutamate, and norepinephrine (and many others, but these are the main ones).\n\nFor this explanation, it isn't important to understand what these chemicals do exactly. The only important thing to know is that these chemicals are responsible for *many* more of our brain's functions than simply our mood.\n\nIf you've ever lived in a house with old or poorly installed wiring, you may have noticed that when a large appliance starts up (like a washing machine or refrigerator), the lights in other parts of the house will dim. \n\nThis is a good analogy for what's happening in the brain.\n\nHow much of each of these chemicals we have (and how they interact), depends on many factors. I won't list them all, that would be impossible. But here are some major ones:\n\n* Current diet (could be excellent or terrible)\n* Time of day\n* Current physical fitness (could also be excellent or terrible)\n* External stressors (like loud noise or sitting in an uncomfortable chair)\n* Internal stressors (like exercise and/or illness)\n* Mental stressors (like worries and/or happiness)\n\nWhen the body is trying to use these chemicals to adapt to changing conditions, sometimes it has to allocate brain chemicals in a way that negatively affect our mood. It can \"dim\" us, just like those dimming lightbulbs, and we don't know why because we can't feel those other things the brain is using those chemicals for.\n\nNotice that I included both what we would consider \"positive\" and \"negative\" influences on our current state of being. \n\nThe real bitch of mood disorders caused by chemical imbalance is that the negative mood can *sometimes be brought on by being otherwise good to yourself*.\n\nIf you are experiencing such feelings here are some suggestions, because I've been through it, and I wish someone had told me what I'm about to tell you.\n\nFirst a disclaimer: *I'm not a doctor, this is not medical advice, and if possible you should try to find a therapist that works well with you if your mood is impacting your life in a bad way.* I also know that sometimes it's impossible to see a therapist/doctor because of financial (or many other) situations, so here are some techniques that work for me. *They may not work for you,* but they will at least give you a place to start, and hopefully begin to feel that your mood is something you can control or at least influence instead of the other way around.\n\nWhether you're able to start looking for a therapist right away or not, hopefully you can use these as stop-gap measures until you can find a professional that works well with you:\n\n* **Take a single deep breath, and remember it's just a ride.** I usually go to existential places when I get sad. It helps me to remember that while it may be a shitty ride, it's still just a ride, and however bad I feel, if I can make it through the next minute/hour/day, it's likely to change for the better.\n\n* **Drink a big glass of water.** Dehydration can wreck my mood even if everything else is going great for me. I take a drink, sit still for a bit, and see if I feel better.\n\n* **A bad mood does not equal a bad person.** I was raised to believe that I'm a bad person, and always will be. Even if you weren't raised to be religious, many cultures attribute a moral value to how useful or good we are able to be. A sad mood can wreck my ability to do anything for a while, but *that does not make me a bad or ineffective person,* it just means I'm a good person who has some hard shit to get through.\n\n* **Cry.** I don't usually have time to feel sad about things the way I'd like to or need to. Sometimes many small events in my life build up to the point where I just need to sob about them for a while. \n\n* **Eat something.** Something healthy if at all possible. A popular saying is \"food is the original anti-depressant,\" and it's true. I try to seek out something healthy to eat, but if there's nothing else around and I need to eat some junk food to make it through the day (a serious problem in Western cultures, but especially the States), that's okay. \n\n* **If I can't eat healthy, or if I simply over-eat, try eating \"one less.\"** A friend once told me that \"willpower is a muscle. I have to start small and go easy on myself while I practice.\" That little comment changed my life. Sadness and obesity go hand-in-hand, like Strong Sad from Homestar Runner prancing along with another Strong Sad (god I hope this isn't a terrible reference). So, when I began my journey of trying to manage my weight, I began by eating and/or drinking one less serving of whatever I was having in a meal: If I usually would drink three sodas, I'd only drink two. If I would usually eat five slices of pizza, I'd only eat four. In that way I very slowly trained myself to simply eat less. Now, this doesn't mean that the food I was eating was necessarily healthier. *But.* It meant that mentally I had developed a habit that made it *much easier* to make positive food choices for myself.\n\n* **Take probiotics.** Gut health [can improve mood.](_URL_3_) Probiotics help, and they're in [gummy form now.](_URL_2_) If I can't afford probiotics, eating yogurt is a great way to get helpful bacteria into my belly. As I continue to improve my eating my mood *does improve*. \n\n* **Gut problems might be caused by common allergens.** I'm not trying to be gross, but it's a very addressable problem that many people just don't talk about: I'll put myself out there and state that I had a *lot* of problems with gas/bloating/diarrhea for years. It turns out I had a food allergy, and eliminating that food from my diet improved my belly feels dramatically. 8 kinds of food account for 90% of food allergies. I tried removing them one at a time, and if I didn't feel an improvement, I was free to add that one back into my diet:\n\n > * Milk (mostly in children)\n > * Eggs.\n > * Peanuts.\n > * Tree nuts, like walnuts, almonds, pine nuts, brazil nuts, and pecans.\n > * Soy.\n > * Wheat and other grains with gluten, including barley, rye, and oats.\n > * Fish (mostly in adults)\n > * Shellfish (mostly in adults)\n\n* **Clean/pick up \"just one more than before.\"** In the same vein as \"eat one less,\" I gradually exercise my willpower muscle by doing *just one more thing* than I did before. If yesterday I did nothing, I put one sock in the hamper. If I put away one sock yesterday, I try two today. And so on. If I then collapse back into bed, I know that I made an improvement. It may seem stupid, but here's what [Stephen King said:](_URL_1_) \"It sounds too simple to be true, but consider the Great Wall of China, if you will: one stone at a time, man. That's all. One stone at a time... I've read you can see that motherfucker from space without a telescope.”\n\n* **Take a shower.** Feeling clean helps my mood a lot.\n\n* **Take a walk.** Gretel Ehrlich said \"walking is also ambulation of the mind.\" If I walk at all, I’ve taken a step (several, actually) to improve my condition, and to be healthier. Double bonus. If I walk for 30 minutes, I have successfully exercised for the day. Triple bonus.\n\n* **Manage stress in whatever way works.** I've tried yoga, volunteering, calcium antacids, rubbing my head, stretching, breathing deeply, screaming, punching a bag, lifting weights, helping a friend out, journaling, listening to soothing music, and a bajillion others. I try anything I can think of, and keep the ones that work.\n\n* **Take a dry erase marker, and write a positive thing about myself.** This one frankly sounded stupid when I first heard it, but I got so desperate I gave it a try. And it works. I wrote things like \"I love me,\" \"I am a good person who wants to do good things,\" \"I am great at __________,\" \"I'm a beautiful person,\" and many others on my mirror. I'd say them to myself 10 times every time I looked into the mirror. At some point, those sayings became my internal monologue, and I started to feel better about myself.\n\nI'm not trying to preach, and what I posted might not work for you. But I sincerely hope it does. If you are feeling sad and need someone to talk to, please PM me. I always want to help someone who's going through what I've been through. \n\nIf you are feeling like you don't want to exist (which one of my friends wryly referred to as being \"casually suicidal\") the suggestions above might help, but also might not be quite enough to get you to feeling balanced and level. If you need someone(s) to talk to, try /r/depression and/or /r/suicidewatch \n\nI really hope this helps. Love you all.\n\nEDIT: Formatting.\n\nEDIT 2: Added a section about \"one less.\" Again, hope this helps. < 3\n\nEDIT 3, THE GILDED BUGALOO: ...I really don't know what to say. Thank you all so very much for your words of gratitude and encouragement. All I've ever wanted to do was help people, and today it seems like I did. I'm intensely grateful for you all. Thanks for being here, thanks for being alive. You matter. Even if you don't hear it ever as much as you should, you matter, you're worthwhile.\n\nI can't say it any better than this: \"But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that, even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you, *I love you.* With all my heart, **I love you.**\"\n\n < 3\n\n[EDIT 4](_URL_0_)",
"Honestly, we have way more idle time and way more understanding of the world than we ever had before. When you're busy avoiding lions and hunting for food, ain't no time to be sad.",
"A humans natural state is happy. \n\nWe are either living in the past, depression, or future, anxiety. Living in the present helps to get back to our natural state. ",
"I think there's a spirit of sadness in the world from all the tragic things that happen and some people are just more in tune to it, like an antenna of sadness",
"I am very happy and content with my life but for some reason, my face can't express it and people always end up asking me, why are you looking so sad today. \n",
"The elephant in the room is, there often is a reason, we just have imaginative capacity for constructs that add up to self denial. We rationalize away most of the sources of our despair, or keep ourselves distracted until we are overwhelmed, or it leaks through \"randomly\". Oftentimes the base level of distraction inherent in our social reality and lifestyle, that is that we are led/forced by varying degrees to prioritise profitable enterprises (not usually our own), keeps us from our own development. I think if we're honest with ourselves, a confrontation of depression is going to have to include a confrontation with our modern ways of living, the costs of our abstracted relationship with nature (\" inside\" and \"outside\"), as well as the psychodynamics perpetuated by our socioeconomic system.",
"Feelings can happen for a reason, but sometimes the parts that make them happen won't even wait for a reason.\n\nYou know how sometimes when you play a whole lot and you're really sore and you didn't drink enough when you were thirsty your leg will get a cramp?\n\nOur bodies do stuff all the time that we don't want them to.\n\nSometimes you can get a cramp in your feels. \n\nBut what causes the cramp? Well, while normally you deciding to flex a muscle is what makes a muscle flex, when you have a muscle cramp it's because something inside the muscle that reacts to your decision to move it has gone wrong. \n\nThere are several things that can make it go wrong. \n\nThe parts of our bodies talk to each other with chemicals. There are many chemicals, some of them are proteins, some of them are enzymes, some of them are hormones. If the chemicals aren't right, the parts will think that the chemicals are that way for a reason. You'll experience something that is supposed to have a reason, even when there isn't one.\n\nScientists call this a false positive, when it shows up in their experiments. They predict what is supposed to happen when things react to each other. But if there is a mistake, with their tools or with the lab or with the thing they're testing, they have to account for that. \n\nIf you feel sad and don't know why, even if you don't feel okay over all, *it is still okay to not know why*. You are more than the things you see see and hear and feel. Sadness is not what you **are**; it's what you **can do**.",
"Vipassana (insight) mediation has been helping me answer this question and understand it in the context of my own life recently. \n\nI've found that part of the answer is because our mental constructs of our \"self\" and the world around us often set us up for unnecessary suffering. There are many common tendencies identified in Vipassana, from what I've learned it seems to boil down to our inherent desire for things to be different than how they are, that insistent feeling of \"not enough\". We humans often place our happiness and contentment in the future rather than in the present, \"When I accomplish A, then I will be happy\". \n\nMany of our societies are structured to reinforce this too, once we graduate awful high-school then we get to go to college and THAT will awesome. Then we're in college and when it sucks we think \"oh but when I'm out of school and have a job and get married then I'll REALLY be able to live my life\". Then adult life is feeling like it's not quite enough and we think \"Well when I retire and buy that boat THEN! I'll truly be free and happy\". Then you retire and maybe buy the boat but somethings inside you is still grasping for... What?...Then you die. Vipassana has helped me learn how to release this grasp, albeit one struggling finger at a time. \n\nAnother inherent trait of the mind that I find leaves me with unexplainable sads is when my mind has been constantly flooded with thoughts and carried away by them. We sometimes end up so carried away that we're drowning, trying to parce out and solve too many problems at once. Our minds go into overdrive and get burnt out and we feel helpless and sad. \n\nLearning to give the chaotic monkey mind a break through meditation (calm, nonjudgental, ardent observation of thoughts and sensations perceived by the mind and body) creates space and cultivates awareness of the thoughts and sensations that float by or carry us away. By doing this we gain insight into the habits of mind and learn what tends to lead us to suffering and discontent. It's often said meditation helps show you how to sit at the train station and decide whether or not you want to get on the train of thought that's passing by. This rest can also give the deeper subconscious processes a chance to take a crack at sorting out the \"problems\" that seem to be drowning us. It's like when you're doing the dishes and AH HA! the answer to the problem you were struggling with all day just appears in your mind, seemingly out of no where. \n\nThe trick (in vipassana) is to dissolve these constructs and our identification with them, cultivate ardent awareness of our minds and subjective perspectives, and ultimately see reality as if each second is the first and last second in the universe. \n\nIf any of this resonates with you, Mindfulness in Plain English by Bhante Gunaratana is a great starting point and reference especially if you don't have a teacher. \n",
"\"No real reason\" is not a thing. For every effect there is a cause. For every movement there is a force behind it. The reason for sadness may be indiscernable, both subjectively (from the viewpoint of the one experiencing it) and objectively (in the eyes of others), but our interpretations of our and others' experiences are not \"true\" in any sense. Just because you can't see through a wall doesn't mean the universe ends there. You can't even see the wall, that is, the structural element; all you see is the paint on its surface, which is purely decorative.\n\nSadness comes in many forms. Sometimes it is caused by a physiological abnormality in the brain (e.g., tumor, CJD, epileptic activity). Sometimes by genetic predisposition toward chemical imbalance (e.g., minor variations in GABA-ergic or serotonergic neurons). Sometimes by suppressed anxieties or forgotten traumas. Sometimes by really shitty environmental conditions. Always there is a reason.\n\nTo suggest there is \"no real reason\" is to shut the door to both inquiry and treatment. I hope that doesn't sound dismissive of your question. Strictly speaking, though, it is, but only because the question itself is dismissive. ",
"I think it depends on the individual. However, like most said it can be boiled down to sleep, nutrients, purpose, and stress. I know if I don't sleep I am frayed and hard to handle. If I don't eat properly I feel miserable, sluggish and onnery. If there was nothing gainfully accomplished (like a personal, professional, or spiritual goal) then I feel like a three day old turd. Also, if I don't deal with important things- like bills, certifications, or appointments - properly then I start to grow despondent. \n\nFind something that's your lifeline, for me it's writing. So when you get into a funk there is something that acts as you talisman, a little pick me up. \n\nMy mom has crafts, my dad has guitar, I have writing. Make sure you are able to complete personal projects. \n\nGood luck, I am rooting for you.\n",
"Because we're tribal creatures confined to 4 person walled off cubes. The first time we're introduced to a community it's a creativity killing indoctrination factory where children are forced to sit still for 6+ hours.\n\nWest is the best!",
"Hormones, lack of sleep, bad eating habits, lack of exercise, expectations, high standards, bad friends, no real love these days, no loyalty, lies."
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGYzzKYV4Bs&feature=youtu.be"
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/67msip/eli5_why_do_human_beings_just_get_sad_sometimes/dgtn9i7/",
"http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/120532-when-asked-how-do-you-write-i-invariably-answer-one",
"https://www.google.com/search?q=probiotic+gummies&oq=probiotic+gumm&aqs=chrome.0.0j69i57j0l4.3398j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8",
"https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/gut-week-gut-brain-axis-can-fixing-my-stomach-fix-me/"
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3859l6 | why are so many politicians lawyers? | Why do a disproportionate amount of politicians, at least in the U.S., come from a lawyer background? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3859l6/eli5_why_are_so_many_politicians_lawyers/ | {
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"Simplest answer I can think of,\n\nWho better to change and enforce the law then one specifically educated on it?",
"Law graduate here:\n\nAs /u/thePotatoeMasher mentioned, it does sort of come with the territory. Law school not only teaches you how to understand laws, but also how they interact with one another. You develop an appreciation for the complexities and ripple effects that can occur when a seemingly harmless law is enacted, or a case is decided, etc.\n\nNot only that, but lawyers aren't really in a position to change the laws they work with day to day. Whether you are a transactional attorney working in the world of Securities & Exchanges, or a high-profile prosecutor spending your days inside of a court room, you must work with the laws that apply... not wish for alternatives. I could see how, after a while, a lawyer could reach a point where they believe they can improve the process and decide to attempt to \"improve the tools\" other lawyers have.\n\nAdditionally, I'd say a decent amount of people go to law school with aspirations of politics. There aren't many other degrees that put you into the world of politics quite like law. As I mentioned above, the ability to see the cause/effect of trends in legislation and case precedents can help you identify the \"real needs\" of the people you wish to represent.\n\nFinally, and less romantically, I'd say that, these days, if you want to run for politics, a bachelor's degree doesn't quite cut it... so when you're looking for a graduate/doctorate-level degree that will improve your political competence, law school is a solid choice."
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3yr11e | why does a product 's manufacturing price decrease with an increase of that product's production? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3yr11e/eli5_why_does_a_product_s_manufacturing_price/ | {
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"because it's a discount given by the manufacturers. the more you buy the less they charge per unit. \n\nthe reason is b/c, if you want to over 1 item. 99% of the cost is the overhead in retooling the machine, making the designs, whatever. but if you buy 1000000000 of some item. only 1% of the cost is overhead. ",
"The ability of a company to speed up production is an effect of that product's having gone beyond a well thought of risk to a known moneymaker. Also, the research and development are paid for by now, enabling the manufacturer to put more money into production. These production costs continue to go down as assembly is streamlined, so as sales go up, costs often go down. ",
"Think of it this way: you order parts for a product that sells for $10/each, and you make a salary of $70K/yr (basically $35/hr for a 40 hour week). You call the part vendor and order 1000 parts. it takes 5 minutes to make the call. That's $8.57 of your time, split over 1000 parts makes $0.0086 per part. Now, if you had just ordered 5000 parts instead of 1000, your phone call would only be adding $0.0017 per part. Little savings like this add up, especially when you are dealing with large quantities. \n\nAnother example: loading a plate of metal onto a waterjet table might take 30 minutes. It'll take the same amount of time to load the plate whether the cut to be performed takes 10 minutes or 3 hours. Whoever is paying for that cut is paying for that 1/2 hour of labor, whether they're cutting one little thing, or 200 little things."
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9a6uud | laplace operator. its concept and its uses in real world. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9a6uud/eli5_laplace_operator_its_concept_and_its_uses_in/ | {
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"The Laplacian is the divergance of the gradient of a scalar field [div(grad(f(x,y,z)))]. \n\nBreaking this down, the divergance of a vector field tells you the net flux of the field from a given point. More physically, it tells you the rate at which \"density\" (of mass, of thermal energy, of electric or magnetic field lines, etc) exits or enters a given region of space.\n\nThe gradient of a scalar field tells you what direction from a point has the greatest increase in that Field's value and what that rate of increase is. For example, let's say there is a solution, and you know the concentration of it at any point inside that solution. Starting at some point, the gradient tells you in what direction concentration is increasing fastest. It also says the rate of increase in concentration if started to move in that direction. \n\nPutting this together in an example: In our solution, we know the dissolved chemical will flow away from regions of high concentration to regions of low concentration. The greater the difference between the concentration at one point and another, the faster the chemical will flow (it moves fastest going opposite the gradient, slower in other directions, and not at all in the same direction as the gradient). In this situation, the speed at which chemical leaves a point (summing over all directions of motion) is porportional to the laplacian of the concentration at that point. ∆f(x,y,z)*c, where c is a constant determined by the material. \n\nThe laplacian is used the interaction between something and a field depends not on the value of a field at the thing's location but on the relative values of the surrounding points. Here's another example. Suppose you have a topological map. You know the height of every point in an area. You hold an even-thickness skin of water over the entire landscape. When you let go, how fast will the water flow, not in meters/second but in liters/second at a specific place? It would be the laplacian applied to the height function times a constant defined by the strength of gravity.",
"Never answered an ELI5 before, but am trying this to help solidify my understanding. Please correct me if I have it wrong.\n\nSo, the Laplace operator represents the divergence of the gradient. What does this mean? \n\nThink of a landscape with hills and valleys and mounds and holes (not bottomless ones). You go over every point of the landscape with a spirit level and figure out at each point which direction you would have to head in if you wanted to have the steepest climb. You draw an arrow on the ground in this direction. The steeper the climb, the longer the arrow. You've just drawn the gradient of the landscape. A bunch of arrows pointing in the steepest direction for each point.\n\nNow at each point look at the arrows of the closest points. Do they tend to point away or towards the point you are on? The amount that the arrows tend to point away is the divergence of your arrows. If all the arrows are pointing towards your point, then you're at the top of a hill. This is because of you took a tiny step away from your point in any direction you'd land on an arrow that would point back the way you came to make the quickest ascent. If all the arrows point away, you're at the bottom of a hole because any direction you head in will make you go up hill.\n\nSo the divergence of the gradient, i.e. the Laplace operation sort of tells you how much you are on a hilltop or in a hole in our landscape scenario. \n\nNow, in our landscape, our measurements relate to the height of the ground at each point but we could imagine the height of the ground representing any other quantity. For example, temperature. The Laplace operation will give you a measure of hot spots (hills) and cold spots (holes). The Laplace equation can model the heat distribution through a solid where one end is heated. It states that the divergence of the gradient of the temperature will be zero. This means there will be no hot or cold spots throughout the solid. The heated end will be hot and that heat will be transferred smoothly through to the other end. You wouldn't get a hot spot in a uniform solid unless a source of heat was applied, because the heat transfer occurs from hot to cold and the bigger the difference in temperature, the faster the transfer until the temperature around each point is pretty close. You will see a change in temperature from hot to cold through the solid, just not localised hot or cold spots.\n\nDoes that make sense?"
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4uhlv8 | why do we sneeze sometimes as a response to pain? | When trying to pop a large painful spot, or plucking eyebrows, sometimes you sneeze what it hurts. Anyone know why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4uhlv8/eli5_why_do_we_sneeze_sometimes_as_a_response_to/ | {
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"The nerves in your face are very close together and sometimes a signal on one can cause an adjacent one to fire. \n\nSame reason some people sneeze in bright light. "
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2fvl8t | why the word "second" is used for the number two. | After four the ordinals match up to the number. First, second, and third are weird and second is the weirdest. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2fvl8t/eli5_why_the_word_second_is_used_for_the_number/ | {
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"'Second' is Latin, from *secundus* \"following, second in a list\", in turn from sequi \"follow\" (from which we also get 'sequel'). First and third come from German. How we managed to mix etymologies between ordinals is flatly beyond me."
]
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2qih8v | how do cats know to use the liter box from the get-go? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2qih8v/eli5_how_do_cats_know_to_use_the_liter_box_from/ | {
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"A large part of it is instinct. In the wild, one way to track an animal is my its droppings. Cats learned to bury theirs to hide their presence. "
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3o9ohy | catholics -- if jesus is god and has always existed as part of the trinity, why is it such a big deal that he died for our sins? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3o9ohy/eli5_catholics_if_jesus_is_god_and_has_always/ | {
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"Follow up ELI5: What the heck is \"died for our sins\" even supposed to mean?",
"Jesus is God in Human Form. Because Jesus had committed to no sin in his life. He was pure. His blood was clean. And because of that he was the perfect sacrifice. His blood was sufficient to clean all of man kinds sin. Unlike where before Jesus died you had to sacrifice a lamb to become free of sin. That is why Jesus came to earth and died, so everyone could be cleaned from sin. And that is also why we don't sacrifice animals anymore",
"Back in the day, sacrifices to appease god were still a thing.\n\nJesus dying is basically The Biggest sacrifice so people can switch to Christianity without God getting mad about \"well hey you weren't such a good person before!\" because people can say \"yeah bro it's cool, Jesus was a good guy and he did a sacrifice for me, so I'm clear\".",
"Catholics believe in original sin, which means humans are inclined towards sin (not people are bad, just subject to temptation.) So, God sent his Son Jesus as a human as a sacrifice to offer himself for the sins of humanity as a whole. Which means that Jesus kind of took the hit for everyone. To answer the question directly, it was such a big deal because God offered himself up as a sacrifice. See, the correlation between the Trinity is a tricky point. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three separate persons in one God. Confused? So are we! That's why it's called a mystery- the Church doesn't know the mystical way that God works as we are not Him and can't comprehend it. It's like trying to have a fifth dimensional object in the third dimension- it's just not on our plane of understanding or perception. So, its a big deal because God essentially sacrificed Himself for us, He made an offering of Himself for our sins. Which is a pretty big deal.\n\ntl;dr Since Jesus is God, God sacrificed himself for our sins."
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3il1g2 | how do camera operators in golf games track golf balls? they seem impossible to track in real life | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3il1g2/eli5_how_do_camera_operators_in_golf_games_track/ | {
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"I'm curious about this too. I live on a golf course and often see if I can track the ball. Even with my excellent eyesight, it's not easy",
"~~Eh, [top comment](_URL_3_) is simply reposting an answer word for word from [a previous thread.](_URL_0_)~~\n\nThe actual solution is actually simpler than that. The camera operator tracks it by eye - one of the methods of doing this is to feed his camera viewfinder with the output of the red channel only. This gives the ball contrast against the blue sky and greens.\n\nAlso, real time tracking with graphics is done with software: _URL_2_\n\n[Relevant bit from a 1999 interview with CBS camera operators covering golf tournaments:](_URL_1_)\n\n > Network television cameras, however, have the uncanny ability to track most shots throughout their flight and roll -- leading many viewers to assume that golf cameramen must use sophisticated tracking technology to lock onto a ball in flight.\n > \n > ''Three years ago I got a call from a guy at a big military contractor,'' Robert G. Mikkelson, who handles blimp cameras for CBS and other networks, ''And he goes, 'We've been hearing about this special tracking system you've got. We've been working on a tracking system of our own with a predictive function and we're working on the algorithms for auto-track, so what are you using?' ''\n > \n > When Mr. Mikkelson explained to the munitions mathematician that golf cameramen do it by practiced eye and steady hand, ''he could hardly believe it.''",
"You've been thinking about this after listening to the Rooster Teeth podcast right?",
"Aside from the technical answers being given, also factor in skill, experience and location.\n\nI suspect the cameras are positioned so as to have a good angle for showing the flight path of a ball, making the tracking easier. Also, the camera operators are well practiced at following these flight paths, and don't forget that the golfers are pros and their shots are typically pretty consistent and predictable.\n\nStanding in the tee box watching a friend tee off, I can track 90% of the shots hit, and I have mediocre eyesight and am a crappy golfer!",
"I was just at the PGA championship. We sat at hole 14 through most of Saturday afternoon, and when the leaders and big names started to come through, so did camera crews. Here's what we observed. \n\nCameraman lugs massive camera out to a pre-determined location, and an assistant brings a tripod that looks like it could support a car. Cameraman mounts camera to tripod, double checks wireless equipment on camera and focuses on the tee box 300 yards away. Based on what other commenters have said, their viewfinder has a filter on it, making the ball easier to track against clouds and sky. Ball is struck, and the cameraman manually manipulates the camera and tripod with a handle located well behind the center of mass of the camera, and in a buttery-smooth motion, follows the arc of the drive up and back down, all manually. \n\nWe are all experienced golfers, and one of us has 20/10 vision. None of us were able to track the drives off the tee, and only watched the flag-waver behind the tee box to know where to expect it to land. However, by watching the camera move, we knew immediately where the ball was.\n\nTL;DR: Cameraman with high end equipment is just incredibly talented. ",
"Remember when hockey pucks had the neon glow for a season? I wish they would do that for golf as well. Imagine a panned out video of the shot with a glow trajectory. Id actually watch golf for a few mins. ",
"It's actually a lot simpler than what everyone else says. You disable blue and green in the monitor so the white ball stands out as a bright red dot on a very dark red background, due to the grass and sky being mainly green and blue.\n\nAlso, professional camera operators for sports are very skilled. They know the game and have great intuition.\n\n_URL_0_",
"The camera is connected to a control unit called a CCU that is operated by another person, the CCU operator is supposed to close down the iris of the camera once the ball is hit to make it stand out against the sky.\n\nThe camera operator usually starts with a wider shot to spot the ball and slowly zooms in.\n\nSometimes the CCU op is slow to react and you can hear the cameraman scream \"C'mon ccu fuck ya\"",
"I work in sports production. \n\nWhen I was a camera operator, we jacked our contrast way up and turned up 'peaking' as well. Peaking helps us keep the ball in focus by generally creating vibrating lines/diamonds around everything that is in focus. Helps the ball 'pop out' from our view finder. ",
"This might not be relevant to golf at all, but my dads a pretty keen photographer and plane enthusiast so we end up going to a lot of air displays. When I was old enough to use his camera I couldn't take ANY photos of the planes because I had no idea where they were, and when I found them I couldn't track them.\n\nI got past this by keeping both eyes open: one through the viewfinder and the other looking as normal. Then I use the free eye to track the plane and use the viewfinder eye to sort out the zoom and focus (which is a lot easier than it might sound). I have no idea if this is how other people do it, because I've never bothered to ask, but I was pretty proud of myself when 10 yo me worked it out. \n\nI'm guessing it could be done with golf and other sports, but then again golf balls are a lot smaller and probably therefore harder to track with the naked eye.",
"best known secret in the industry: They are all using stock footage. While the ball is in the air the gauge the color of the sky and show pre prepared footage showing a white ball in front of a gray, blue... sky. That's it. Then cut back to the likely place where the ball with land and voila we are all in awe of the camera man. ",
"While on a television crew as a broadcast engineer, I watched a cameraman track a ball in a Dodger baseball game in LA. He was flown in from NY because of his talent. \n\nHe watched the ball fly through the air while periodically checking his viewfinder to make sure that it was centered and in focus. It is quite a talent as I had trouble just tracking the ball. There was a reason why they flew him in from NY.\n\nOn a camera there are two hand controls: zoom and focus. They can be either mechanical controls or electrically operated. It is usually the camera man preference. While tracking the ball, you have to zoom in to capture the ball in the screen and then keep the image a constant size while keeping it in focus during its flight.\n\nThere are different lens used depending on the position of the camera: announcer, first base, dugouts, field, etc.. The field camera has the longest lens. Surprisingly, the lens is usually the most expensive part of the camera and can cost $25,000 and up.",
"I don’t know why people are surprised when someone gets hit in the head with a golf ball. Do you ever watch these tournaments on TV? You got 600 people crowding around a hole that big (hands in the shape of a golf hole) and no one can believe it when a Titleist gets bounced off of someone’s coconut. You know you throw a rock into a crowd, that’s considered terrorism... but if you have a nice follow through (makes a pretend golf swing) you know - that’s golf (pointing finger in the air). I’m always impressed actually with the golf cameraman, who’s job it is, to, follow the golf ball when it’s in the sky. You know what I mean, it’s a little white ball, it’s doing a hundred miles an hour on a white background -- I got it, I lost it, I got it, I lost it, I got it, I lost it, (spinning back and forth) -- Why bother... **aim the camera at the sky, aim it at the ground, take a ball out of you pocket, throw it down -- who’s gonna know where the hell it came from?**\n",
"As a local news photographer who has covered more than one PGA/LPGA tournament... Practice, a good eye, a steady hand, and knowledge of the game.\n\nBasically I set up past the green, facing the tee. Zoom in and focus on the golfer setting up. I then time my pan up to when the golfer begins their swing... most of the time my camera starts moving up as soon as the ball leaves the tee, then its just a matter of keeping the ball in frame until it gets near the green/fairway and zooming out a little to get a better view where it lands.\n\nIt's a lot harder when its overcast as opposed to blue sky.",
"Also, why does the tee shot always look like it slices? Like, when a right-handed player tees off, and the camera is directly behind him, the ball shoots off to the right of the screen instead of the top of the screen, if it were straight.",
"I work for a TV crew so maybe I can help. Essentially, everyone on this thread has combined for a correct answer.\n\nGenerally, camera operators follow golfers, so the same person is filming Jordan Spieth all day/weekend. This means he/she has a good idea of how Spieth plays and what his shots look like. \n\nAt each hole, there is a designated \"camera bay\" marked off, the location of which is determined the day before a tournament when the broadcast's producer and a course manager walk through the course and determine the location on each hole that will give the best shots. The camera operator has his own caddy of sorts, who will carry his tripod for him (/u/westonenterprises hit the nail right on the head here, these are $20,000 tripods that are sturdier than you ever thought a tripod could be), so when they get to the hole the cameraperson and grip (his/her caddy) will get the tripod/camera set up. \n\nThis is where the magic happens. Each of these cameras comes with a $10,000 high-definition monitor that is connected to the camera with three RGB channels. For golf (and baseball as well, think baseball flying across clouds) the cameraperson will usually only plug in the red channel, giving him/her a black and white, high-contrast video, while the feed being sent back to the truck is still full-color HD. From this point, it's just years and years of practice. Getting a job at one of the major networks that produces the PGA tour broadcasts can take 10 years or more, so these guys have had plenty of practice shooting this kind of footage. They have a good feel for how fast the ball travels and its trajectory.\n\nThe other secret is that a camera operator will never find the ball in the air using the viewfinder. You always find the ball by looking for it with your eyes. From that point, it's fairly easy to point the camera where you're looking and follow the ball the rest of the way. Sometimes, however, this takes a bit. That's what's happening when the camera just stays on that shot of the golfer frozen in their follow-through. The camera operator hasn't found the ball yet, so they need to show something until that happens. Sometimes you'll notice the camera zooming in to the ball right as that shot is shown? That's because the broadcast's director saw that the camera operator has found the ball and needs to get off the shot of the golfer so they may go to the shot of the ball a split-second early. \n\n**TLDR:** These guys are really, really good at their jobs. \n\nedit: trying to be gender-netural. My female co-workers would be disappointed in me",
"Just impossible to track on TV. When you're actually watching it live, it's fairly easy to watch the ball flight. ",
"I used to work in the broadcasting industry and this is used in football, but I'm sure it can be applied to golf. What is often done is actually cover a large field of view with a very high resolution camera and then an operator will simply zoom in to whatever they want to show on TV from a nearby truck or studio. Easier than having to chase the ball with a camera. \n\nNotice this is done in football, so I may be wrong.",
"It may be completely different in other and more serious championships, but when I volunteered for the Cadillac championship back 2013, they had me set up behind a large telescope type machine. I would wait for the ball to land, search for it, locate it on the map they provided, then tell them the coordinates through an ear piece. That information was then delivered to the crew. I was a 17 year old girl with no experience doing this at all so half the time the caddies would be going around in circles cause I had accidentally sent them to the wrong place. ",
"Did you get this question from the RT podcast? ",
"Well, golf ball tracking is a skill, like any other skill. Play with your wife often enough and you get pretty good at tracking golf balls.\n\n",
"Cameraman here. I normally shoot news but did a bit of stuff that aired on the golf channel. I went in having never done it before and got decent in a couple days. I was just using a bw viewfinder..no color channel adjustments or full color vf. The key is to make it as contrasted as possible. Crush those black levels and make the ball pop. The other key to the VF is what is called peaking. It is a \"halo\" effect around what is in focus. You want that as turned up as possible, because it makes the ball pop visually. There are some directing tricks too...they normally show the shot of them from the back...then a few seconds...then the ball in the air, down to the green. Well, if the in the air cameraman missed, he can find the ball pretty quick if need be with lightning fast zooms on the box cameras. I was shooting the entire shot from the ground, so you have to basically tell you brain to make the muscles start moving as soon as he starts the down stroke, to allow the time for the signal to leave your brain, go through the nerves, and for the muscles to move...that allows you to start moving about when the ball leaves the tee...if not you would always be behind. You have to know where the ball *should* go...if he is going left right, what angle the club is going to make the ball go in the air, etc. With _URL_0_ and above, they are pretty good...you can get predictable results usually. The second hardest part of it all is kind of knowing when the ground is coming up and where the pin is when it shows up in frame in relation to the ball. You have to both think about it all and not think about it too much. If you are shooting the same hole all day or all tournament, it gets a bit easier. A lot of it is experience and muscle memory. After almost two decades of shooting, the brain just know what to do instinctually when it comes to tracking movement of things. Some things are tough in sports shooting...and some people just have better innate skills at seeing the ball. I'm decent, but some people are much better. Golf is not easy, some shots in sports are much harder. FWIW, I asked a guy I know who runs a production truck if they did the color channel changing, and he said no...but it may vary from crew to crew. I can definitely see it helping at times. The one thing you have to have to shoot pro sports is not just having the shot all the time, but SPEED. I watched the world series guys shooting and they had a couple assignments and were lightning quick going between them. "
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1p3olv | proper way to salute | I recognize that the majority of US salutes are with the palm facing down, and that some UK branches will salute with the palm facing out. Every now and then I'll see a US service member salute with the palm facing in. Is there a significant difference between that and the palm down salute, or does it not matter? If yes, who should use it and when?
Thanks | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1p3olv/eli5_proper_way_to_salute/ | {
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"All US service members always salute palm down, always, there is no other US salute. If you see a US person saluting different, they probably weren't in the military and didn't know what they were doing, or were messing around. The UK Army salute is palm up/out (The UK Navy salute is more similar to the US salute, palm in)",
"For commonwealth countries, there's a variation in how it gets there as well. Army is \"Long way up, short way down\"- so your arm goes out to reach your head, and then drops down immediately. Air force is the other way round, which looks ridiculous, IMO, but that's what you get for a service that thinks gravity isn't good enough for them, oh no.\n\nI gather all services for the US have the same type of salute from /u/CharlieKillsRats comment.\n\nedit - apparently there's some variation across the empire and I am incorrect.\n\n "
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1rrjsv | how do i get my fruits and veges when they're not in season? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rrjsv/eli5_how_do_i_get_my_fruits_and_veges_when_theyre/ | {
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"They're either imported from somewhere where they are in season or they are grown in \"hot house\" greenhouses (climate controlled to provide ideal growing conditions for whatever they are growing). "
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45xlly | when a zygote first begins to divide in the womb, how do the new cells "know" what to differentiate into? how does a "kidney cell" know that it's a "kidney cell" and not a "brain cell" or a "nose cell"? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/45xlly/eli5_when_a_zygote_first_begins_to_divide_in_the/ | {
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"It is very complex, and the full, exact method for how this happens is not completely known. The DNA is the programming to set everything up though.\n\nWhat it comes down to is at some point a lot of different hormones are created and released. \n\nThe stem cells are subjected to different strengths of the different hormones depending on where they are, and that tells them what to change into.\n\nEach cell has different rules for how it should grow, ie it stops reproducing when it hits a wall of its own cell type. Cells that do NOT obey those rules become tumors.\n\nUltimately it is all the DNA and how the initial cells interpret it.\n\n",
"Each cell in your body contains your entire DNA sequence, or genome, but not all genes are \"turned on,\" so to speak. Rather, some cells use only parts of your genome, and other cells use other parts of your genome. No cell in your body uses the whole thing.\n\nSo, your question really might be rephrased: how do the cells know which set of genes to use?\n\nFor that, you have to go all the way back to the moment of conception. The point at which the sperm enters creates some damage on the way in, which we call a pole. The egg cell starts depositing chemicals in the area in response to the damage. \n\nAs the cell starts to divide, some new cells grow near that pole and are being influenced by those chemicals that were dispatched in response. The influence is that it starts turning certain genes on and off: specifically, they start activating genes that start creating proteins. Some of those proteins will diffuse to farther reaches of the cell, but most of them stay local. The farther away, the weaker the effect.\n\nThese chemicals, in turn, will end up turning other genes on and off. This creates multiple layers in the developing embryo (3 layers, to be exact). Each layer only has the capability of forming certain types of cells. \n\nHow each cell comes to \"know\" its function (i.e., has certain genes turned on, or \"expressed,\" if we use better terminology here) starts to become a little different at this point, as a few different processes are in play, and not all organs form at the same time. It would be a different explanation for each one.\n\nWithin a few weeks, most (not all, but most) of the cells have differentiated before starting to divide. For example, cells that form the heart walls are already cardiac muscle cells: they're just splitting into more cardiac muscle cells to complete the process. Once something becomes one kind of cell, it isn't going to be able to switch to something else. It's fixed in that particular role. \n\nBy the time you're born, your \"nose cells\" can only split into more nose cells because they're fixed in the role. You can't grow a \"kidney cell\" there because the genes for the kidney aren't active in the nose cells, and if they split, you'll just have two cells that don't have the kidney genes active. As such, you can't grow a nose in your kidneys or another hand on your ear.",
"I once heard in a medical rounds that if people appreciated how critical the timing was and how little a difference in a hormone could change whether we were male or female, they would have more sympathy when someone who was one gender wanted to change to another. He said too that he had to tell a great athlete that they could not consider going to the Olympics because they would not test out as the gender they identified with."
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3u7nok | the perks of an eu membership | Being from the States, I've never really known why the EU is a huge thing for the citizens residing in it (I understand the diplomatic and economic benefits of countries). Does an EU passport/membership get you anything special as a citizen? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3u7nok/eli5_the_perks_of_an_eu_membership/ | {
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"based on various agreements you can travel freely around members of Shengen agreement (nearly all EU members + countres like Norway or Switzerland), you can invest/buy/sell things more easly between peope in member countries, lot of law or education things are aligned so it's easy to transfer various things (eg. degrees or license) etc.\n\nIt makes lot of international things seem like they were inside one country.\n\nMost noticable for a random person is imo free movement between countries (for eg tourism)",
"The free movement of people as tourists is a Schengen area thing, which is very similar in membership to the EU, but different. \nThe biggest thing for holders of EU passports is that they do not require a work or residence permit to live and work in another country of the EU. ",
"Being from the US you take for granted your \"US membership.\" Having trouble finding work in georgia, move to Colorado. Need a sunny vacation? Fly to California without needing a passport or visa. Have a farm in Indiana and want to sell to farmers markets in Chicago (without having to figure out exchange rates or tarrifs), no big deal. Born in Alaska but hate the cold? Move to Arizona.\n\nEU membership gives Citizens of (participating) Europe the same freedom to move about and work about in an area about the size of the US that the US takes for granted.",
"Freedom of movement are important ones.\r\rBeing able to set standards that everyone must meet is good too. For example the EU can agree a new trading standard, like no more battery farmed eggs for example, and all countries have to stick to it. It would be difficult for a country to lead the way on this as whoever did it first would be immediately undercut on price by neighboring countries who hadn't done it. We can agree what's in everyone's best interest and enforce it.",
"Hey, I heard European Business Law last semester at university and basically the 5 freedoms sum up most of the perks within the European Union. The freedoms are:\n1. The free movement of goods. = Good produced in member state A is allowed to sell and can move to member state B.\n2. The freedom of services. = Allows national or other businesses to provide services in all other member states.\n3. The free movement of persons (including workers). = All citizens of the EU have the right to move freely and can reside as long as they are looking for a job(!). (Important to know, because by law you are not allowed to just decide \"hey I'll live in France from now and chill\", but the law is of course hard to track)\n4. The freedom of establishment. = If your company (with it's company structure) is set up in member state A it needs to be accepted in member state B as well. Is important due to various minimum capital requirements for companies.\n5. The free movement of capital. = Prohibits all restrictions on capital movements and payments. e.g. taxes\n\nSome argue it would be only 4 freedoms because they sum up the freedom of establishment and services to one.",
"Another benefit (in addition to the ones already posted) is that I, as a British citizen, could study a degree in Sweden (or the Netherlands, or Germany, or any other EU country) for free or for minimal fees, instead of the extortionate fees our government make us pay."
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bjfrzn | how engineers can be sure that the hard shell of airbags won't hit someone during a crash? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bjfrzn/eli5_how_engineers_can_be_sure_that_the_hard/ | {
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"They're scored on the inside to allow them to tear predictably. Kinda like how some grenades have similar cuts to get even distribution ( looking at you takata).",
"People do still end up with black eyes or broken noses from air bag deployment- but it’s generally seen as preferable to actual loss of life.",
"The airbag shell isn't just hurled into the car cabin when the airbag goes off. They split open to release the bag but the pieces remain attached to the mounting brackets. So they don't hit people in a crash because they are behind an expanded air bag.",
"The whole point of airbags isn’t to provide a nice soft surface— it’s to provide a place that is vastly preferable to the steering wheel or other hard(er) surfaces within the car. \n\nThe whole purpose is mitigation of injury, not entire prevention of injury. Usually by the time the airbag goes off, injury is probable. Making that injury something that isn’t severe is the point. \n\nAs said already, the airbag covers are scored so they split open and the airbag operates through the hole.",
"My airbag deployed once, and the top is secured with a cable so that it open sideways, to the right. It actually hit my hand that was on the dashboard. At least on that model."
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6o3ji5 | how did game developers for old games like super mario put graphics, music, logic, etc using just tens of kilobytes? | A simple image nowadays can be a few megabytes. Oh and how did they use the few kilobytes of RAM they had so efficiently? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6o3ji5/eli5_how_did_game_developers_for_old_games_like/ | {
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"Things were coded so basically. If I were to use a modern game development tool to remake it exactly as it appears, the engine would do things so inefficiently. They didn't have an engine to work with, at least a graphical one. I remember reading that the objects coordinates had to be entered by hand because they didn't have graphical level design tools.",
"Graphics take up way more room than any code, even MIDIs and similar music formats are basically written in code rather than recorded.\n\nFor graphics, they had very limited palettes. A sprite that uses 4 colors out of a total of 16 also takes less room than the same sprite using 4 colors out of 256 or more possible colors. \n\nThink of it as a checklist you have to fill with Yes's or No's (1s or 0s), would you rather answer 16 questions or 256? No matter how many No's there are, they still have to be accounted for. Blue? Yes, Red? No, Yellow? ... Now imagine that list for every single pixel, thankfully the resolution of most retro sprites was a limited 32x64 or similar.\n\nThis is why Bitmaps could be saved in 16 colors or 16 bits (In a graphical sense \"Bits\" is half the number of colors that can be shown at a single time and the square of the total number of colors IIRC).\n\nAdditionally, that 16 color palette is shared among every sprite and tile (platforms, blocks, etc). If each sprite is only allowed to have 4 colors you can group them together with other sprites that use the same colors, monochrome them and paint-by-number.\n\nYou can see this effect malfunctioning in some romhacks, enemies might be the wrong color because they're in a level that has a different section of the palette assigned.\n\nAll these space saving measures with graphics and palettes made the difference between kilobytes and megabytes. ",
"Image-wise, They used a sprite sheet with extreme efficiency. Musically, the sounds were handled similarly with a handful of tones used at different speeds to create strings of tones that were then used at different speeds to create music and sound effects. The media content that comprised the entirety of the game could easily have been 13 tones x how ever many scales (if they weren't able to code the different scales using speed and pitch) and a single, large image with an incredibly small amount of colors, corners and edges likely reused as available.\n\nThe rest was text, also used efficiently and cleanly.\n\nCoukd have even been more efficient than that.",
"Adding on to the above they also used a lot of very clever hardware and programming hacks that allowed them to do more with less.\n\n\nIt's very interesting some of the techniques they used with color pallets swapping in games that lead to visual bugs we all saw growing up with the system but didn't know why.\n\n\n\nA great example of a seemingly intended trick is in space invaders where the bugs speed up as you kill more. This wasn't on purpose. The hardware was actually limited so there wasn't enough resources to move all of them at once at one speed. As you killed then more resources became available so they just moved faster.\n\n\nEdit\n\n\nYes I know space invaders wasn't nintendo. Just using it as an example of clever hacks. ",
"First on the issue of image sizes: Less pixels means less data right from the start. Say you've got a 256×240 image. Compare to how many pixels you'll have on a 1920x1080 screen! Additionally, there were less colors, less information required for the positioning and values of each pixel.\n\nBut the tricks; oh the tricks.\n\nThe NES split an image up into tiles and blocks. 4 8x8 tiles made one 16x16 block, which also means that your image could be done as hexadecimal values. Every memory page contained 256 tiles of 2-bit raw pixel art, but you could repeat it in various locations to save on memory. For example, by having 90% of the sky simply the same blue. Or by having NO background at all (this is also why 'black' was often a bit different from TV to TV). Or at least by repeating certain tiles quite a bit; like in the floor or walls...\n\nThe NES had 64 palettes. Every palette was a selection of 3 colors plus the shared background. A single palette could be used PER block. So each tile was now just a memory page location and an allowed palette. So the image only needed to call on the 2-bit memory location of each tile, and the 2-bit palette selection of each block. And guess what? The NES? It had 2 nametables, allowing the side-by-side or top-down screen systems in so many games; this is what allowed for the illusion of scrolling, when in fact only what was on screen at the moment 'existed'.\n\nThen things get even trickier. Some games would exploit the flickering or the 60hz refresh rate. Recca, for example, is famous for making everything exist only one out of two frames, allowing them to clutter the screen with even more explosions and enemies with two alternating 30fps images 'superimposed' as far as our eyes can tell. Sprites had their own additional memory page, and were used for anything that isn't in the background: Megaman's life-bar was a sprite, while your hearts and bombs remaining were in the background in LoZ. Sprites had their own locations on the screen independent of the background, which was great for the life-bar as you moved, though.\n\n An individual sprite had to be 8x8, but the result was that they made most characters into multiple sprites. This limited many games though, because there was a limit of 8 per horizontal line. Anything over that limit would not be rendered, which was going to be problematic when you already had 2 or 3 per line all making the main character. This was the source of much flickering; once player actions were taken into account there was little the developers could do sometimes.\n\nThere was also the other hardware to take advantage of: The TV! By doing loops or timeouts on certain parts of the graphics, you could take advantage of the tv's vertical blank (these become blatant sometimes once emulated on newer screens) to refresh the picture unit, to change the timing or loop certain cells, which could allow animation or certain effects on the cheap RAM-wise, although those instructions required quite a bit of knowhow and timing to look good. Combined with bank-switching (the art of just reassigning the image to a new position in memory) you could make stuff like waterfalls or 'moving-relatively-to-the-camera' backgrounds.\n\nPretty much every game had its tricks; those are just the very basics and the small handful I know from reading in depth on some of my favorite games.",
"Not graphics/sound related, but code size and portability were concerns going way back to the text-only adventure games of the 70's and 80's. \n\nThe authors of Zork wrote a good article on this (\"How to Fit a Large Program into a Small Machine\")\n_URL_0_\n\n",
"This video on old school graphics (Super Mario Brothers) answers your question perfectly. _URL_0_",
"The guys that made Crash Bandicoot for PS1 have written an amazing series of articles explaining many techniques they used to extract the maximum out of the Playstation system.\nFirst article here: _URL_0_\n",
"Here's my attempt at a much more 5 year old explanation than what's been given:\n\nFirst of all: When you look at a screen cap of an older video game, it's actually being upsized. Each pixel rendered by the system becomes many pixels when it's viewed on our displays of today. If you viewed the screencap image in actual pixels in terms of the resolution the game was rendered at, it would take up only a small tiny corner of your screen. So there is A lot of your data size difference right there. \n\nSecondly: the system didn't render a full still image for every frame. It rendered objects as they came into view and moved them around the screen and swapped them out accordingly. Getting deeper here leads you into the more in depth explanations already laid out in this thread. \n\n",
"Back in the very old days I used to make games for the Commodore 64. Although it had sprites, they were complicated, could have only 2 or 4 colors, and you could only have 4 or 8 of them. For backgrounds and graphics that didn't need to move that much, you would redefine the character set, basically turn whatever unused characters you had into bits of graphics and then arrange them on your screen as needed. At the end of the program were \"data\" lines, long lines of numbers which the computer translated into the characters. You did the same with music, loading a note, corresponding to a number, into one of three memory locations allocated for sounds. \n\nI'm not a programmer anymore, but I think nowadays, a lot of the stuff done like this is accomplished with libraries and things. The program loads in whatever .dll or whatever is needed at the time. Like I said, I haven't programmed since PASCAL. I've always meant to try and learn again but well it's been a long time.",
"Simple answer:\n\nCareful coding and reuse of game assets.\n\nThose old games were written in super optimized assembly code, and the old consoles had dedicated chips/hardware that made things easier and required less code.\n\nThink special chips to handle 2D sprites and music.\n\n\nBut, we still do this kind of coding today. Next month in fact.\n\nNext month [js13k](_URL_5_) is on again, a yearly gamejam where game developers get together and make a game using javascript that fits into a 13kb zip file.\n(There's also js1k. Yup, 1024 bytes is all you get)\n\nA theme is announced on the 13th of August and developers have a month to make a game using that theme.\n\nParticipation is open to all, entry is free, and you get a t-shirt for your effort.\n\nFor reference, here's some selected entries, these are all 13kb or less.\nYes, each game listed here is smaller than the thumbnails on the page.\n\nThese all play in your browser, no plugins or anything required. (Best to use Chrome)\n\n[Evil Glitch](_URL_1_)\n\n[Road Blocks](_URL_2_)\n\n[It's a lovely day for a drive](_URL_4_)\n\n[Super Pinto Rally Racer](_URL_0_)\n\n\nAnd my own\n[Super Dragon Rescue](_URL_3_)\n\nA Super Mario 2 clone with 5 levels and a firebreathing end-boss.\n\nThese entries are all open source, so you can actually check the code and see what kind of tricks people use to minimize their code and game assets.\n",
"There's one more thing that I don't see mentioned in this thread : Procedural generation. \nSometimes, it's easier to store code that generates an art asset instead of the art asset itself. \nImagine you have an application that needs to display colored circles of varying sizes and colors. Let's say 10 different sizes in 10 different colors. If you were to store them in files, that's a 100 files right there. What you could do instead is write a little bit of code that draws a circle of the requested size and color on the fly. You've swapped out a hundred files for ~20 lines of code. \nObviously this solution is only possible in a small number of scenarios.",
"Check out the 64K demo scene and you'll be amazed at how much 'content' can fit in a small place."
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"http://all-things-andy-gavin.com/2011/02/02/making-crash-bandicoot-part-1/"
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"http://js13kgames.com/entries/super-pinto-rally-racer",
"http://js13kgames.com/entries/evil-glitch",
"http://js13kgames.com/entries/road-blocks",
"http://js13kgames.com/entries/super-dragon-rescue",
"http://js13kgames.com/entries/its-a-lovely-day-for-a-drive",
"http://www.js13kgames.com"
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c9wv49 | why are printers in offices so huge when regular printers do a perfectly good job? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c9wv49/why_are_printers_in_offices_so_huge_when_regular/ | {
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"I don't know if it's the same for them all, but in my old job we had a massive printer in the office, and the reason is because the ink could be bought very cheap and last a lot longer. Instead of those small ink cartridges, we got extremely large ink banks, I guess they could be called, could last for around a month printing close to 5000 pages (A4)",
"Regular printers don't do a perfectly good job when you print thousands of pages a day. They don't print nearly as fast, their toner cartridges don't last as long and internal components aren't designed to be serviced. If the transfer roller goes out in your small printer you're probably going to just get a new one because the cost of a new one plus installation is probably close to the cost if a new printer. If one goes out on an office printer, it probably costs a lot, but replacing it takes 10 minutes. It's also much cheaper to have one printer for an entire office of 20 or 30 people rather than one for each computer."
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adrpwm | which way is the new horizons probe headed with regards to the path of the solar system through the galaxy? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/adrpwm/eli5_which_way_is_the_new_horizons_probe_headed/ | {
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"Basically the same direction. Our solar system is moving through the galaxy at about 230 km/s and the probe is doing like 14 km/s. It isn't enough to do much more than slightly alter its path from our solar system's."
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82g7lw | what makes a belly button an “inny” vs an “outie” | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/82g7lw/eli5_what_makes_a_belly_button_an_inny_vs_an_outie/ | {
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"Scar tissue development. \"Inny\" and \"Outie\" belly buttons aren't caused by where the umbilical cord is cut (contrary to a popular misconception). It's dependent on how scar tissue develops as the remaining tissue dries and falls off. This process is random, though \"inny\" tends to be a more common result. As an aside, the resulting belly button can be influenced by umbilical hernias (when a baby's abdominal muscles haven't fully developed/fused). This can cause the belly button to push outward when they flex or cry etc. and is usually resolved naturally over time. They can also change over time; pregnancy can result in an \"inny\" becoming an \"outie\", as can rapid stomach growth (read: weight gain).\n\nEDIT: A lot of questions here, I'm not a doctor (yet). I haven't really investigated the various reasons why a belly button might change orientation (or its racial specificity) but basically it's a fleshy leftover of the umbilicus, so it's quite flexible. Other than that I can't really give you guys a specific answer - I just happen to know the basics - sorry. The misconception referenced earlier is that doctors may somehow control whether or not a baby develops an \"inny\" or \"outie\" by adjusting where the umbilical cord is cut and clamped; this is not true. However, those with a significant disdain for their particular orientation of belly button can see a plastic surgeon to have it altered to their preference in a procedure known as an umblicoplasty. The umbilical hernia condition can be rectified without surgery over the course of the early development of the child but is typically handled with surgery if the condition hasn't gone away by the age of four. Those who develop these types of hernias later on in life simply have the misfortune of getting a hernia as any person may in the course of their life.",
"I'm sure genetics are a small factor. Like the genes that control how a scar heals. I've noticed black folks tend to have outies more often and their scaring tends to be more raised (which is why some tribes do scarification for aesthetic purposes). \n\nNo matter how well the cut is treated, some people just get thicker scaring. ",
"Oh I can contribute something new to the thread! \n\nSome babies can get what’s called an “umbilical granuloma”. Once the umb. cord falls off, it (rarely) tries to grow back. This happened to my youngest (6mo) and we have to get it surgically removed. Hers essentially grew back to the size of a pea then dried up, luckily. They can get huge and gross looking. It’s now this tiny little nubbin — about the size of a plastic pin head—inside her chubby little belly button. \n\nThe Dr said we can leave it forever or remove it. Up to us. But I don’t think she’ll appreciate having it when she grows up. \n\nI just tell people she’s extra ambitious. :-)",
"Anyone know what a fear of belly buttons is called?",
"So reading through here, it just hit me. Where does the inside of the belly button connect to? I mean the umbilical cord gets cut, yet it leads to the stomach while in the womb. After it's cut, what happens to the inside of the belly button? Does it just close off and create a sort of stomach button?",
"Definitely an umbilical hernia. My daughter was born with one. The doctor said if it didn't heal by the time she was four or five she would have to have surgery. It went in somewhat but no surgery was required.",
"I've got a question as well - is everyone's belly button either an inny or an outie, or can it be smooth (halfway between the two)?",
"The hepatic portal vein is a fairly large vein in unborn babies that is part of the pathway to keep blood away from the fetal lungs. It instead sends the baby's blood through the cord & into the mother to be cleaned and oxygenated. When the baby takes it's first breath and the cord gets clamped/cut, a tiny hole between the upper chambers of the heart closes and the hepatic vein is no longer necessary so it collapses and becomes a kind of ligament. As this vein dries up it pulls on the belly button. A vein that had a lot of collagen and was fairly stretchy doesn't pull super-tight and you get an outtie bellybutton. A vein that had a little less give, you get an innie. You can see the remnants of this vein on an adult liver as the band of fibrous tissue that divides off the loves of the liver btw. Just an added cool fact.",
"After birth they tie off the knot to the belly button. If they cut after the knot (leaving you with the permanent knot) you are an outie. If they cut BEFORE the knot (leaving you with a hole) you are an innie. Outies do not have a hole innys do. There are also people who do a lotus birth. Look it up on youtube. They leave the belly button attached to the placenta until it falls off naturally after a couple days. This process always leaves an outie."
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4uniq3 | led dimmers vs incandescent dimmers, what's the difference? | Tried reading about it, but with zero electrical knowledge I couldn't grasp why LED lights require expensive dimmers designed for them. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4uniq3/led_dimmers_vs_incandescent_dimmers_whats_the/ | {
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"Incandescent bulbs can be made to suit different voltages just by changing the size / geometry of the filament. So a torch bulb looks similar to a mains bulb, it's just smaller. And incandescent bulbs are relatively easy to dim: just reduce the voltage reaching them. \n\nLEDs are different: the physics of them means that they need a particular voltage to work properly, and you have to put some sort of current-limiting on them, as they get greedier and greedier the hotter they get (if you don't limit the current they keep taking more and more current until they burn up - *thermal runaway*).\n\nSo most LED bulbs have a special circuit inside that drops the mains voltage down to something more suitable for the LEDs, and it usually protects the LED from taking too much current so it doesn't burn up.\n\nAnd because LEDs need a particular voltage to work right, you can't just reduce the voltage to dim them; you have to take a different approach. PWM (Pulse width modulation) is what's used: it takes advantage of the fact that our eyes can't tell the difference between a light that's permanently on, and one that's pulsing on and off at high frequency (anything faster than 100 pulses a second just looks constant to us).\n\nAn LED can be \"dimmed\" by pulsing it on and off, and varying the duty cycle - how much time it's on versus how much time it's off. So if you want the LED to be 10% bright, you can switch it on for a microsecond, then off for 9 microseconds, then repeat - the LED is not actually dimming at all, it's flashing, but it looks to us like it's dimmed as our eyes average it all out.\n\nGood, reliable LED dimmers are expensive at the moment a) because they're not as common, and because b) they have to cope with the fact that they're not directly connected to the LED itself - they're usually connected to an LED *bulb*, which will have aforementioned current-protection and voltage-conversion circuitry inside it. So there are multiple circuits involved, and they may be from different manufacturers and work in subtly different ways.\n\nSo there's a lot more going on in LED lighting than there is in incandescent lights (where you can literally just reduce the voltage to any old bulb and expect it to dim in a natural way)",
"If you are talking about DC powered dimmers, I'll let others help you.\n\nIf you are talking about wall mounted AC power dimmers, the difference is not great. Dimmers use phase control of the AC waveform. They stay off for part of the cycle and turn on for the rest of it. This happens 120 (or 100) times a second because each cycle has a positive and negative peak. \n\nLeading edge dimmers are the older type. They will work with all incandescents, transformers for vow voltage halogens, and some LEDs. They start each half cycle **on** and switch **off** somewhere in the middle of a cycle. \n\nTrailing edge dimmers are the newer type. They will work with all incandescents and most dimmable LED bulbs. They start each half cycle **off** and switch **on** somewhere in the middle of a cycle. \n\nWithout getting out of ELI5 territory, it is the way the LEDs handle the sudden rise or decrease when the dimmer turns on or off in the middle of a cycle which matters. For LEDs, stability and dimmability to low levels usually mandate the trailing edge type. ",
"* Incandescent bulbs are just tiny wires that glow.\n\n* You can dim them just by lowering the voltage.\n\n* You can lower then voltage with a simple adjustable resistor. \n\n* LEDs use DC power of a very specific voltage.\n\n* The AC/DC adapters built into each LED light bulb only work at a specific voltage so lowering the voltage will cause them to not work properly.\n\n* You *can* dim LEDs by turning them on/off very rapidly and then adjust how long they are on compared with how long they are off. This however, requires a complicated electronic circuit instead of just a simple adjustable resistor. \n\n"
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5hc6c5 | why aren't unidentified dead bodies matched with missing persons? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5hc6c5/eli5_why_arent_unidentified_dead_bodies_matched/ | {
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"Well they are, if they can be. The police and medical examiner will use fingerprints, DNA and dental records to match to known missing people. ",
"They are but you have to realise that facial recognition etc isn't really as advanced as CSI would have you believe. You'd need to know that persons face."
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1l1bgw | the scam in the producers. | I watched this movie about 6 years ago and have felt dumb ever since. I got the jokes, I thought it was hilarious, but I don't get the scam.
They scam investors out of money for a flop, but the show is a success. Don't they make more money? Don't they have to return any unused money since it flops? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1l1bgw/eli5_the_scam_in_the_producers/ | {
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"I think the idea is that they are selling \"stock\" in the play to each investor, however they are selling more than 100% of the play to multiple people. So, lets say they have 5 investors. They tell each investor that they're going to own 50% of the play and thus get 50% of the profits. The investors do not know about each other. If the play flops, then the investor is not expecting their money back. However, if the play is successful, each investor is expecting 50% of the profits. This is impossible however, since there are 5 people all expecting 50% of the total gross of the play. The producers now owe way more money than the play has actually made. I THINK this is how it works, and why a flop can make them more money than a success (because a flop means they keep all the investor money)."
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5b8puy | why can't we put co2 scrubbers on airplanes or giant floating balloons to remove greenhouse gases? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5b8puy/eli5_why_cant_we_put_co2_scrubbers_on_airplanes/ | {
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"In order to hold the CO2 level steady, you would need a fleet of scrubbers that can handle that same air throughput as every gasoline and diesel engine on the planet. \n\nThey would need some source of power, which would contribute it's own emissions."
]
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1tgvc9 | how accurate are birth date predictions? how do doctors determine when a baby will be born? | People always say a specific day when you ask when their child is due. How accurate are these predictions? Wouldn't indicating a date range be more sensible? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1tgvc9/eli5_how_accurate_are_birth_date_predictions_how/ | {
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"The \"due date\" is actually not a prediction of the moment the baby is going to come out. Only about 5% of all babies are born on their due date. Instead, the due date is the best estimate of how long it will take for the baby to be fully developed. The week or so before and after that date mark the time period when the overwhelming majority of babies have done all of the developing that they need to do in the womb to thrive outside. ",
"The expected gestation time of a baby is 40 weeks...so they basically calculate 40 weeks after your last known period date",
"My midwife asked me when the last day of my period was then added 40 weeks. Kind of bs tho cause I knew the exact dates me and my SO had sex and it was no where near the last day of my period ( I was away at the time) but she wouldnt listen so my lil ones prob gonna be born about three weeks early ( im having a c-section and they do that a week before your due date). So I guess the \"due date\" isnt really very accurate at all.\n\n"
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ejczp2 | how could assassination of qasem soleimani lead to ww 3? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ejczp2/eli5_how_could_assassination_of_qasem_soleimani/ | {
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"WW3 may be a bit of a stretch, but I think it's plain to see that assassinating a foreign military leader, (even if it had somehow been an accident or collateral damage,) is a clear act of aggression that could lead to a military confrontation.",
"Who knows. It's funny calling qasems QUDs forces a terrorist organisation when they fought along the US against Isis 4 years ago.\n\nDon't believe the US propaganda.\n\nPower corrupts. This is true everywhere.",
"Unless Russia or china for some reason decide to back Iran it wouldnt be called WW3. In order to be WW3 it would require multiple major world powers to be in conflict and fighting would take place over multiple countries land. \n\nIt looks like this will just be US vs Iran currently just just a regular war."
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exzuoj | how do the cable guided cameras, in football games, work and move? | The cameras mounted over the field and move with the players. How does the reel system work? Is it from the camera setup, or large reels around the stadium? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/exzuoj/eli5_how_do_the_cable_guided_cameras_in_football/ | {
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"text": [
"The wires run to motorized winches. A computer moves the camera in response to an operator joystick. The winches, with their big spool of wire, are part of the stadium."
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4mz1bi | the dab. where did it come from and why do kids do it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4mz1bi/eli5_the_dab_where_did_it_come_from_and_why_do/ | {
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"Well back in the day it was simply called hash oil, the only real difference is in preparation and packaging.\n\nthe oil that gets us high is on the surface not in the plant in the form of small glands like little balls of oil, they found by taking these glands and collecting them it turns into a concentrated goo they can smoke.\n\n but this was a slow process so they found ways to remove these glands easier then before and do it in mass quantity, except for that it is simply just concentrated THC. (the chemical that causes high) and comes in many forms, hard cakes, dabs, wax, liquid etc. same thing in different forms.\n\n\nBefore the modern wave of legalization came about hash oil was not really simple to make, the actual steps arent difficult but time consuming and a lot of effort and product was needed to produce large quantities.\n\n\nwith modern extraction methods plus the recent legalization (making the weed needed more redily available)and the weed now being stronger has made it easier to produce in quantities, and being a concentrate makes it easier to carry and much stronger then just smoking loose leaf materials. so a little \"dab\" on the pipe is all you need.\n\nSimply put then - potency wise, dabs is to leaf, what moonshine is to beer.\n\nEDIT: Awesome fail, there was a news clip playing behind me not 10 minutes ago about wax and some other stuff so my mind automatically went that direction, sorry, never heard of the dance before, lol",
"I think it may have come from a [music video](_URL_0_) as most of these dance moves do.\n\nEither that or when people sneeze or cough into their elbows, people started calling it a dab or something. ",
"To answer the last half, because it's a dance move that A) anyone can do and look good, and B) doesn' take long. \n\nSay you do something badass around your friends, dancing around for 30 seconds is stupid, and weird. You just dab real quick then move on with whatever is happening. "
]
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[],
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWulmBUNnHk"
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47foe6 | why does it take so long for finger/toenail fungus to be cured and go away? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/47foe6/eli5_why_does_it_take_so_long_for_fingertoenail/ | {
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"d0ct30s"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Nail beds are moist, warm, and dark. Fungi must like this. It's a very good growing medium for fungi?"
]
} | []
| []
| [
[]
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|
||
1pdxbb | explain the symptoms of aspergers like i'm 5. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pdxbb/explain_the_symptoms_of_aspergers_like_im_5/ | {
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"Asbergers is now considered part of the autism spectrum and probably won't be diagnosed separately anymore.\n\n\n\nNot completely accurate but the character \"Sheldon\" on the TV show \"The Big Bang Theory\" exhibits behaviour similar to those with asbergers. \n\n\n\nI have met two people that where diagnosed, they tended to be very monotone during conversation and had difficult processing things like implied ideas in a conversation , humour or emotions.\n\n",
"I work at an apartment complex. One of our residents has this disorder. I understood he was more than socially awkward when the following event happened:\n\nThe power had just gone out and we are trying to care for everything. I'm in the lobby with both of my bosses having an obviously important conversation(we are huddled together and speaking with urgency). He comes out and starts asking us about the most recent football game. Then asks us if we want to see his new bobble head toy. He goes to his apartment and comes back with if. \n\nHe didn't recognize the social cues that other people would. The complex is in a state of emergency then the employees are probably busy. If not then the fact that two executives and an hourly employee are talking with serious faces should have also been a social cue. \n\nThat's the main part of the disorder: not recognizing social cues. It is a spectrum disorder so some people are obviously at different levels of social unawareness. ",
"I have it and I'll try to describe it best as I can. \n\nIt's really hard for me to understand when people are being serious when they say things. Most of the time, I don't register sarcasm, but sometimes I can. Personally, I hate being around people. I'd rather be by myself and just have it quiet than listen to people. \n\nEmpathy is another lost cause for me. Unless a person is crying in front of me, it's really hard for me to tell how they're feeling. It has gotten better over the years to understand other peoples emotions, but not to where I'd like it to be.\n\n"
]
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1p0qkq | why are movie dvd covers so badly photoshopped or just look bad in general? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1p0qkq/eli5_why_are_movie_dvd_covers_so_badly/ | {
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"[This](_URL_0_) was just in [/r/movies](/r/movies) the other day. ",
"DVDs covers (and especially Bru-Ray discs) are rather small and are meant to be sold on a shelf. So design choices made for a film's large theatrical poster sometimes won't work when shrunk down to just 7 inches. A new design must be created for home release. Sometimes, these are done by the original artist or another professional designer. Other times, it's anyone who can get the job done the cheapest and fastest.",
"Movie posters are highly stylized and a lot of time goes into their creation, with multiple ideas being fleshed out and tested before the best one is selected and released. In many cases, they are creative works of art and typography. There are also beautifully conceived and painted posters by artists like Drew Struzan, though those have become rare. It used to be that the worst-case scenario was that they'd stage a movie poster photo shoot with actors--although sometimes photo trickery was used, like the Pretty Woman poster (if memory serves, Julia Roberts head was added onto a stand-in).\n\nThese days, however, with digital image editing, theatrical release posters come in many additional styles and use all sorts of different techniques. But again, even when theatrical posters are digitally composited or outright created, a lot of thought, time, effort, and energy goes into the process.\n\nSomewhere along the way, someone decided that video cassette and DVD box art needed updating from the original movie posters to make it stand out on a shelf (movie posters are huge in comparison to a DVD case or VHS box). If it's an older movie, there's also a concern about making the artwork appeal to a \"modern\" audience. Other times, there's also a need to distinguish a barebones release from a deluxe edition with special features.\n\nGiven the budget for these home video releases being far less than the marketing of a major motion picture, a traditional poster or typography artist isn't really an option. And of course, it isn't feasible or affordable to get the cast back together for a new photo shoot (plus, they've all probably aged).\n\nSo what studios are left with is Photoshopping new box art based on existing assets from the original theatrical release. In most cases, the people in the home video marketing and art departments are completely separated from the theatrical marketing departments, and they are working on this are trying to do the best they can to create something new with whatever existing assets they inherited from the theatrical department. They also usually have tighter internal deadlines. The end result is that the \"original\" artwork on home video releases looks awful compared to the original theatrical poster.\n\n*Note: Of course, Criterion and Shout Factory are exceptions to this rule, because they focus exclusively on home video and put care and effort into any original artwork.\n\n\nHere's one example of an original poster vs. a reissue vs. an even worse-looking reissue:\n\n\nBetter Off Dead - Original Theatrical Poster:\n_URL_2_\n\n\nBetter Off Dead - DVD Release\n_URL_0_\n\n\nBetter Off Dead - Bluray Release\n_URL_1_\n\n"
]
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"http://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/1oydb7/before_photoshop_there_wasdrew_struzan/"
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[],
[
"http://i.imgur.com/mo7Vzzl.jpg",
"http://i.imgur.com/WTTkjkA.jpg",
"http://i.imgur.com/Bb2p0sF.jpg"
]
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|
||
dptyk9 | why are people in nordic countries the tallest people on average, while people from tropical equatorial countries are some of the shortest? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dptyk9/eli5_why_are_people_in_nordic_countries_the/ | {
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"Nordic countries have the lowest rate of extreme poverty and malnutrition.\n\nWhile genetic variations do play some role, the biggest predictor of average height in a large population is childhood nutrition. \n\nWhereas many countries where poverty is common, kids often have a diet poor in protein, calcium, iron, or other essential nutrients. This can lead to poor bone growth. Many impoverished countries lie near the equator. The socioeconomics of this are complex.",
"I don't think your assumption is correct. Dutch people are the tallest and they are not Nordic.",
"There are lots of possible *guesses*, but from a scientific perspective, we don't have a strongly confident answer. There is a correlation between human body size and latitude, but it's weak \\[[source](_URL_0_)\\]. There is some evidence indicating that there's a general trend for mammals to be larger away from the equator, and this observation is [named](_URL_1_) \\- but there are multiple possible explanations as to *why* that is true (notably around heat exchange and food availability), and it should be emphasized that it is just a general trend, not an immutable law.",
"Inuit are short and stocky and live furthest north. They are rounder because it reduces heat loss by reducing surface area.\n\nBy the equator are pygmies and the Dinka who are about 5' 10\" average for males.\n\nThe disparity in height between the nordic and equatorial Africans is due to diet. The nordic countries are wealthy and have lots of protein. Africa is generally poor and they have mostly carbohydrates.\n\nTheir latitude has nothing to do with it.",
"Diet, generally the only reason for height differences in large populations is diet in the early stages of life some countries which were historically thought to be populated with short people have grown taller when their children started to get proper nutrition, the height difference between North and South Korea is substantial despite the two populations being genetically identical - _URL_0_"
]
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[],
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"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19085512",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bergmann%27s_rule"
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[],
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"https://youtu.be/ZGXa3Oj-sGE"
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||
4ed7ji | why are school buses and city buses shaped differently? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ed7ji/eli5_why_are_school_buses_and_city_buses_shaped/ | {
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"text": [
"School buses have been standardized by law, as their are special laws [about what a motorists must do around school buses](_URL_0_). School buses are also bought an maintained on a much lower budget than city buses.\n\nCity buses have far fewer laws surrounding them, are less standarized, and are now mostly operated as revenue source for cities/counties.",
"School buses don't look any different to any other bus in Australia, so it must be a North American thing. Some laws or regulations that say school buses must look different.\n\nOutside North America they just use charter buses or city buses for school bus routes.",
"I'm pretty sure school buses have to have a rear emergency exit. City buses have their engines in the back, so they can't have a rear exit. Also all the windows on school buses open so you can pull kids out of there in an emergency ( .1%) and so the kids can throw shit outside and yell at pedestrians (99.9%.)",
"You might get better answers if you specified what country you are from, since the regulations concerning this issue vary from country to country."
]
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| []
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_bus_traffic_stop_laws"
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[],
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7tzm86 | why does cheese go hard when you melt it then let it go cold? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7tzm86/eli5_why_does_cheese_go_hard_when_you_melt_it/ | {
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"dtgg9s2"
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"text": [
"When you heat the cheese up past a certain point, moisture is released, which when it cools down, makes it harder as it is more dense. Water in cheese makes it softer."
]
} | []
| []
| [
[]
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|
||
30bm46 | why do we feel cold and have to use blankets when we sleep when we've been in the same room a few hours before sleeping and not feel the need to cover up? | I always spend a few hours in the same room using my computer and not feel cold but when I go to bed I get cold without a blanket. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/30bm46/eli5_why_do_we_feel_cold_and_have_to_use_blankets/ | {
"a_id": [
"cpqwnnj",
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"text": [
"It's to do with your body slowing down for sleep, your heart rate drops and less blood is moved around cooling you down. Also our bodies get used to a certain temperature for sleep, a range that comes from habit over the span of our lives. Also it may be because you sleep in your birthday suit but when on your computer you tend to wear clothing",
"Your heart rate slows down when you sleep and you become colder. You're stimulated on your computer so your heart will be beating at a good pace \n\nSource: talking out my ass"
]
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| [
[],
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2ssx40 | how does a dsl phone line work in unison with my router to bring me high speed internet? | 15 years ago when I started using the internet it was the same basic phone line, although it was dial up internet and no router was involved. So how is it that I'm able to get faster internet now with dsl?? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ssx40/eli5_how_does_a_dsl_phone_line_work_in_unison/ | {
"a_id": [
"cnsk5t8"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Modems communicated with sound that was transmitted down phone lines the same way that voices were. The advantage is that you could communicate with a modem on the other side of the world. The disadvantage is that bandwidth was very low - you had to fit all the information in the 10KHz or so of audio frequencies. \n\nDSL is digital data that is transmitted on different frequency signals on the same wire.\nYour DSL modem has to be very close to the modem at the other end ... at which point your packets hit the internet."
]
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| []
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292mgx | how can some buisnesses say they won't accept bills over a certain denomination? | I guess if it's your business you can do whatever the hell you want, but it's strange to think I can walk into a store and have that crisp $100 dollar bill in my wallet be completely worthless. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/292mgx/eli5_how_can_some_buisnesses_say_they_wont_accept/ | {
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"It's to avoid them being taken in by counterfeit bills. IIRC, the bank does not reimburse companies, so the lower the denomination, the less of a hit if they actually get one.\n\nEDIT: Sorry, I know this is very poorly worded, but I literally just got out of bed...",
"It is their business if they wish to accept your business. That means they can enact terms and conditions with regards to their transactions. ",
"If a company is willing to take large bills, they have to keep more cash on hand to make change, which means that they risk losing more money if there is a robbery.\n\nFurther, it's more common to see large bills being counterfeited than small bills. By not accepting large bills, they reduce their risk of losing money to counterfeit bills.",
"as a business, i choose how i conduct my business and who i conduct it with. that allows me to put up rules of service like \"shoes and shirt required\" \"no bills bigger than $20\" \n\ncurrency is legal tender for transaction, that doesn't require the business to take pennies. ",
"There is no law saying that businesses have to accept all denominations for sales. It is law that people have to accept all bills for payments of a *debt*, which is different. Many people confuse the later with the former. \n\nAs other people have stated, business sometimes want to not use the larger bills to minimize risk (of robbery, counterfeit bills, and so on).\n\nThat said, what really irks me is what is considered a \"large\" bill these days. This is usually $50 and $100 bills. Fifty dollars is about half a day's labor at the paltry minimum wage rate, and $100 is about a full day at minimum wage. In trade labor rates like plumbing or electrician rates, that's about an hour and two hours worth of worth respectively. In other words, \"large bills\" are NOT large anymore. This is especially true when you consider what were historically large bills. When I was a kid in the 60s (I'm an old fart), you would occasionally see $500 or even $1000 bills. This is back when a low paying job was paying only about $1.50. In other words, \"large bills\" back then were several HUNDRED hours worth of work. They really were large bills.\n\nWhy did the government discontinue them? And why hasn't the government issues bigger bills than the $100? Well, the answer has kind of evolved. The reason is that using small notes has big advantages in preventing crime. It's much harder to move around large sums in a many notes than just a few. Small denomination notes make the jobs of drug dealers, bank robbers, and so on much harder. However, keeping the maximum denomination note small is also a method of social control. It's to prevent you from being able to transport large sums easily, even if for legal reasons like moving abroad. The US wants you to use banks so it can track you while the bank lobbyists, who supported the reforms of the bank system after 9/11, are pleased that they now get their money transfer fees. Basically, the US used 9/11 as a way to tighten its watch on its citizens while claiming it is to prevent terrorism. While, catching criminals is a good thing, a minimum of $100 note is today a very small amount and no longer making sense. If you are a \"prefer cash\" person, it's annoying to have a full wallet of $20s which run out every few gas fill-ups. When social control starts to interfere with the ease of being a law-abiding citizen or forcing them to use banks, that method of control is too much.",
"If you're buying something for close to $100 in value then they'll almost certainly take it. \n\nIt's a huge hassle if it's a store that mostly does small transactions. Many of them have change drawers with $20 or less in change. The rest is usually in a safe, sometimes time-locked. Imagine if you're trying to buy a $1.50 of goods and hand the clerk a $100. They might not even have $100. Even if they do, they probably don't want to waste their entire amount of change on your one transaction.\n\nYour $100 bill isn't \"worthless,\" it's just that it's rude to expect change back for it unless you're spending $50 or up.",
"TIL: no one understands currency laws.\n\nA business can deny any form of currency they wish. End of story.\n\nEdit: that crisp $100 bill is not easily broken at small store, and creates a security risk if you can't drop it in a safe. \n\nSome people have tried breaking their hundreds at my desk for their $1.20 phone calls (hotel here.) I deny them. They would take 1/3 of my change, and the boss is not always here. Fuck that pay with debit."
]
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1p8rb3 | when i get in a car that's been in the sun all day, why does my face go numb? | I would explain the feeling like a hot-numb.... is this like a temperature shock or something? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1p8rb3/eli5_when_i_get_in_a_car_thats_been_in_the_sun/ | {
"a_id": [
"cczw75x"
],
"score": [
2
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"text": [
"I have no idea what this is. I've never experience it, although... I am certainly noting this."
]
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| []
| [
[]
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|
|
d9wwyo | how can babies differentiate between good tasting food from the bad? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d9wwyo/eli5_how_can_babies_differentiate_between_good/ | {
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"text": [
"Good food is sweet, bad food is bitter. It is slightly more complex but this is generally what instincts humans are born with. You can still learn new things regarding taste such as what bitter foods are actually good.",
"Question is, what is bad tasting food? Isn't that highly subjective?\n\nYeah, spicy and bitter is considered bad, because evolution gave us these instincts in order to keep us from eating poisonous stuff. Bug: many cultures introduce spicy food very early into their babies' diet. Whatever they get from their parents regularily, they will get used to.",
"They have taste buds just like we do. Taste developed as way to keep us from eating stuff that is potentially harmful to us. So in nature most vegetation that is bad to eat tastes bitter. We naturally have an aversion to bitter programmed into us, babies are born with the instinct or \"genetic knowledge\" Even then as taste buds develop they change over time and initially they taste bitter even stronger so they don't like it and sweet is one of the first ones to really be appealing hence children loving teeth achingly sweet stuff."
]
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[],
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||
3ogksf | why does the us borrow its own money from the federal reserve? why don't we just nationalize the banks? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ogksf/eli5_why_does_the_us_borrow_its_own_money_from/ | {
"a_id": [
"cvwzfy5"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"When investors look for places to park their money, US treasury bonds (t-bills) are considered the safest investment possible and thus the baseline against which all other investments are compared. If interest rates on t-bills are high, then they will suck up more of the available investment money and make less money available for other sorts of investments, like building factories.\n\nThe reason the Federal Reserve Bank is holding so many t-bills is because they are trying to get investors to spend their money on other things. They can't just drop their money on t-bills and get 2 or 3%, they have to go find businesses that need money and give it to them. The Federal Reserve Bank isn't bailing out the US treasury, it is manipulating interest rates and this requires buying giant piles of (mostly short-term) t-bills.\n\nThe US doesn't nationalize the banks because people are concerned that lending should be as removed as is reasonably possible from political concerns. We want businesses and individuals to get loans because they are likely to pay them back, not because they are politically connected. To this end, the government instead manipulates bank lending indirectly by manipulating various incentives such as interest rates and reserve requirements, but mostly leaves the final lending decisions up to the banks themselves."
]
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| []
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||
21al9w | why is the malaysian airplane incident so over-covered while crimea and syria don't get as much attention? | I was just watching the Daily Show with Jon Stewart who joked and criticized the media (especially CNN) for their over-coverage of the Malaysian Airplane. The incident was such a hot topic that the newscasters started making huge outrageous theories like "black holes" and "aliens" being the culprit. I understand that the Crimea incident wasn't a silent event, but it seems to me that the media really didn't care as much. Why? Is it really because of ratings? Won't something like riots and civil wars be more popular than a missing plane?
Simply put, if an Average Joe like me knows about the Malaysian Airplane incident inside and out, backwards and forwards, yet I still don't quite understand the entirety of Crimea, don't you think that's a tell tale sign that we haven't covered something enough?
I dunno, maybe I was just in the dark and only I've only now noticed the media's hogwash ways. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/21al9w/eli5_why_is_the_malaysian_airplane_incident_so/ | {
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"I'd say it's largely because a missing airplane is more interesting in sound bite form to the average person. I know that personally I was more likely to click on a link with a captivating description like \"Missing Flight Mystery\" over \"Crimea Conflict Escalates\". \n\nSource: woefully underinformed person",
"Fact: They'll cover whatever will gets the most viewers. \n\nOpinion: People love a simple story they can wrap their heads around easily vs a complex idea they don't understand. A missing plane is easy to understand and peoples' innate fascination with a mystery or potential conspiracy draws them in like moths to a flame. Explaining centuries of geopolitical history of a small part of the world practically no Americans have ever been to = BORING.",
"Part of it is certainly that \"plane got lost\" is easier to understand than the political chaos that is Crimea or Syria. It's easier to get emotionally invested in something you actually understand and are able to form an opinion about. Once a political situation starts to get too confusing most people aren't motivated enough to stay up to date."
]
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5mqweh | how many stocks compose a company? | My question is: how many stocks does a company have altogether, including the ones owned by "ordinary" people, and how is that amount determined? Does the value of a stock depend on how many others a company has in circulation? Do all companies have the same amount of stocks? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5mqweh/eli5_how_many_stocks_compose_a_company/ | {
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"text": [
"During the initial public offering (IPO) the company decides how to apportion shares amongst the people that own the company, and then decides much of the company to \"sell\" and releases as many shares as it wants to to meet this value. The number is somewhat arbitrary, but allows the people who own the company to maintain the majority of the shares so that they still control what the company will do",
"Different companies have different total amounts of stock outstanding. As long as they follow some relatively simple rules, the company can buy up its own stock (destroying those shares) or sell more stock (creating new shares). The company can also \"split\" its stock when the value of a share gets too high (companies usually try to keep their share value between $20 and $100) by issuing a new set of stocks, trading each of the old kind of shares for 2 or 3 of the new kind of shares, doubling or tripling the number of outstanding shares. \n\nThe value of one share of stock should be the total value of the company divided by the number of shares. A company in the US is required to publicly report the number of shares outstanding every three months.",
"You and I are in business together. It's worked out well as a partnership (I get 40% of the money we make, you get 60% of the money we make), but now we are ready to greatly expand our business and we don't want to sink any of our own money into it. So we become a corporation and issue stock.\n\nOur company is now worth $1,000 ($400 is my part, $600 is your part), and we think we need another $1,000 to grow our company. So, we decide to create a corporation and start out with 100 shares of stock. Each share is worth $10 because our company is worth $1,000 and each share of stock represents an equal ownership share of the company (I get 40 shares, you get 60 shares according to our ownership percentage). Great, but now we want to expand.\n\nWe create another 100 shares of stock and go tell some other people about our great ideas to expand the company. They really like those ideas and want to invest in our company, so we sell those 100 shares to them for $10 each (could be all to 1 person or 50 shares each to 2 people, or any combination to any number of people). Now our company has the $1,000 it needs to expand, but there are 200 shares (I own 40, you own 60, and other people own 100).\n\nNow instead of owning 40% of the company, I only own 20% (40 shares are mine out of 200 total shares), and you only own 30% (60 out of 200 total). Great, everyone is happy.\n\nNow our company creates a product that is hugely valuable and everyone on Earth wants them. Our company is suddenly worth $1 million. We still only have 200 shares of stock, so each share is worth $5,000 (5,000 x 200 shares = 1 million). We decide it's going to be hard to sell shares of our stock for $5,000 each because that's a lot of money for an investor to come up with, so we decide to do a stock split.\n\nWe give everyone who owns a share of stock 99 more shares, so now instead of 1 share, they own 100 shares. I used to own 40 shares, but now I own 4,000 shares, and you now own 6,000 shares. When we do the split, the company doesn't change value, so now instead of 200 shares worth $5,000 each, we have 20,000 shares worth $50 each. Same company, same value, just different number of shares at a different price.\n\nAll this is a very long way of saying, a company can have any number of shares. The management of the company just decides how many shares there should be. They can create new ones at any time, or the company can buy back shares and retire them.\n\nWhen new stock is issued, that normally lowers the price people are willing to pay for each share and thus the company's value stays constant.\n\nLet me just say that this is to try to give you a very basic understanding, there are a lot of rules and complexity to this as you might expect."
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41mox9 | if you have the heat on in just one room, will the room get warmer if you leave the door open or close it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41mox9/eli5_if_you_have_the_heat_on_in_just_one_room/ | {
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"That depends on a lot of things, including what type of heating it is, and how the heating system is designed.\n\nMany houses built in the US today use forced air. The hot air is delivered to the room through a vent, and then it returns through another vent. Unfortunately many designers cut corners and only put one return vent for the entire floor, so you need to leave the door slightly open for the air to return to the furnace so the room can be heated efficiently.\n\nFor most other types of heating (hot water or steam radiators, electric, or radiant underfloor) you'll do better if the door is closed, assuming that the rest of the house is colder. If the room you're in has a large window, then it's possible that the rest of the house would be warmer and leaving the door open would help to initially heat the room."
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2thk74 | who decided on the continents? who decided australia would be one instead of another part of asia? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2thk74/eli5_who_decided_on_the_continents_who_decided/ | {
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"No one decides. What a continent is just loosely defined and there is no official list of what is and isn't a continent.\n\n_URL_0_",
"Alfred Russell Wallace, a coauthor with Darwin, spent a good deal of time in the islands between Australia and Asia. He decided on [a line](_URL_0_) dividing that area, and based the line on observations of animals, especially birds but also insects and mammals, and the boundaries between species and groups of species. This line has been revised slightly, but it has been shown to be the division between the continental plates of Asia and Australia. His observations were correct and helped advance the idea of speciation in the context of geological timescales. Wallace was an amazing asset to the advancement of science, read more about him! (edit guy's name.)",
"It's not decided. Geographers use different models based on the loose definition of \"significant land mass divided from other land masses by geographical barriers.\"\n\nSometimes nearby islands are included and sometimes they are not (e.g. is Madagascar part of Africa?). Sometimes an isthmus is considered a geographical barrier and sometimes it's not (e.g. does Panama separate North and South America or are they all a single continent and similarly does Suez separate Africa and Asia or are they a single continent?). Sometimes mountain ranges and deserts can be part of a barrier and sometimes they are not (e.g. do the Urals separate Europe from Asia or is Eurasia one single continent?) \n\nOf course, this is also political, which is why we generally accept that Europe is its own continent and also why Canadians and Americans learn that South America is a separate continent but Latin Americans tend to learn that \"The Americas\" are one big continent. Of course, those who don't accept the Panamanian isthmus as a continental divide usually accept the Suez Isthmus as a continental divide, which can only make sense for political reasons, not geographical ones. ",
"Geographically Continents are defined by the tectonic plates on which they sit, Australia has its own plate and is therefore its own continent.\n\nIn world politics and social spheres though Australia is considered part of Asia. Our indigenous people also originally came from Asia.",
"Isn't Australia an island ? "
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3xwohr | what does "reasonable" mean in the context of "reasonable doubt" in the us justice system? | I've found a ton of explanations via Google, but many seem to contradict each other. I've never really understood this concept. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3xwohr/eli5_what_does_reasonable_mean_in_the_context_of/ | {
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"There's no hard test for it, but essentially it's a doubt that a reasonable person might have. A reasonable person is a normal person of sound mind. An example would be in a murder trial a juror having a doubt because they were unsure the accused could be placed at the murder scene because of an alibi. A juror having doubt that the accused could be placed at the murder scene because they believe the accused is a metaphysical projection in the evil fantasy of a space monster, that would be unreasonable.",
"There was a great movie call [12 Angry Men](_URL_0_) that goes into this. I definitely recommend it.\n\nReasonable doubt means that there is more than enough wiggly room if you will, to allow for the possibility that the accused did not commit the crime they are on trial for.\n\nThis is why alibis can be so important. If you can say that you were somewhere else at the time of the crime, you can inject reasonable doubt into the case."
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48etpi | why do people start to appreciate wine as they get older? is it because their palates change, or are there other societal and life experience factors at play? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/48etpi/eli5_why_do_people_start_to_appreciate_wine_as/ | {
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"I think mostly palate changes. Not everyone drinks wine, or likes it. I find that the older I get the more I'm able to appreciate the different tastes and all. \n\nSomeone below mentioned that people want to get drunk, and it's just socially acceptable to drink wine, which I'm sure is true for some people but it's hardly the rule. ",
"I always liked wine, as far back as the (perhaps surprisingly) good \"red\" my mom made when I was pre-teen. These days I can afford it, and I'm less likely to be hanging out in the sort of beer serving cafe/semi-fast-food restaurant that were the haunts of my college age friends.\n"
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3b1458 | why are stop signs traditionally octagonal? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3b1458/eli5_why_are_stop_signs_traditionally_octagonal/ | {
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"It was a decision made in 1922 when the stop sign was standardized. Its unique shape allows other drivers to identify the sign from the back, i.e. you approach an intersection and can tell if cross traffic also has a stop sign by it's shape from behind.",
"Historically: the more sides/angles a sign had, the more important it was. STOP is really important, so it's got eight sides. Railroad crossing signs are circles, they have infinite sides, because they're super dangerous. Yields are triangles, because it's still something to look out for. And the boring squares and rectangles are just information only. \n\n_URL_0_"
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aewa9w | why is it bad that orgs like the nra donate to politicians who favor them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aewa9w/eli5_why_is_it_bad_that_orgs_like_the_nra_donate/ | {
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"This seems like favoritism or corruption, they're paying politicians to get favors from them like more laxist laws for guns or other examples",
"Does the millions of dollars Big Pharma donates to the campaigns of elected politicians benefit the interest of consumers? Hell no! Politicans are more concerned today with making sure their political career is very profitable personally. There is a conflict of interest with accepting these large campaign contributions and staying true to one's constituents. ",
"Because there are specific rules for tax exempt non-profits w/ regards to explicitly funding/promoting political parties or candidates. They can promote their issue/cause, not candidates who support them.",
"Besides the money, there is an implication that the membership of a given organization will also fall in line with the political group due to an endorsement. So the official goes to the NRA seeking donations, they vet them out and determine if they along with the goals, if they endorse them it usually comes with money, this then tells the membership that Congressman Joe is the NRA guy, so you should vote for him.",
"Nothing in this world is free, especially money.\n\nPoliticians are just people, and most people are corrupted pretty easily by the power that money buys.",
"The truth is that people's opinions fall under the general frame of \"if I support the cause, donating is completely fine. In fact, *more* people should donate. However, if its a cause I dislike....well, that should be illegal as its basically bribery.\" \n\nYou see this all the time on reddit. You hear the Koch Brothers made out to be these comic book villains b/c they are billionaires who donate to more right-leaning causes. However, Soros and Tom Steyer (both billionaires who channel hundreds of millions into left-leaning causes) get a total free pass. Same is true for the lobbying activities of pro-choice groups, gun control groups, pro-net neutrality groups, pro-immigration groups, etc. This is because reddit is extremely young and extremely left-leaning. If you look for more right-leaning outlets, that relationship is flipped. \n\nOf course people will say pithy things like, \"I think all money should be out of politics!\" But they don't *really* mean that, and its obvious by who they think the 'bad guys' are. For example, if there is anyone here that's willing to say 'all money out of politics,' I'd find it far more convincing if they could *also* link back to a comment talking about how *any* cause that they support was fucking up politics by donating/lobbying (eg, \"I really support environmental causes, but the Sierra Club should *never* donate one cent to politicians\"). \n\nTLDR: people care less about 'money in politics' and care far more about \"people I don't like putting money into politics.\" Its all tribalism everywhere you look. "
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1zc5rs | how are some movies made for the academy awards judges? | Occasionally when reading movie review the critics write that they feel as though the movie was not made for people to enjoy or appreciate and that the movie was aimed more at getting votes from Academy Awards judges. Often they are historical or controversial movies. How can it be a viable business move to make a movie for such a select group of people?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1zc5rs/eli5_how_are_some_movies_made_for_the_academy/ | {
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"I think it's the different to make a movie for the masses than it is to make something thought and emotionally inspiring. you could make a comedy like Wedding Crashes or action flick like the Dark Knight and know it's going to net you a lot of cash, but they tend to be \"turn your mind off and just watch flicks.\" But then you make a serious movie, cast it with serious actors, and while it might not do good at the box office, it's a good \"thinking\" movie. Compare it to a Big Mac vs a nice steak. The masses per money wise show that the Big Mac is the way to go, while the judges with a higher level of critique would say the steak was the better choice ",
"Oscar bait, as it's called, aims at a certain type of movie goer. Often, they tackle \"intelligent\" themes etc that both simultaneously appeal to these high brow movie goers and the high brow Academy judges / members.\n\nOver time it has got to the point where you might be forgiven for thinking that some movie producers do indeed \"bait\" the Oscars a little bit as they have developed a taste for what does well at the Oscars (period stuff, deep acting, etc).\n\nOscar wins = more sales = money."
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6d4zyc | how are cities like manhattan formed? specifically their structure, did they have to tear down people's properties to may way for their grid like structures. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6d4zyc/eli5_how_are_cities_like_manhattan_formed/ | {
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"The oldest parts of Manhattan (i.e. Greenwich Village) do not fit the grid pattern. As the city grew and farmland was turned into homes and businesses the city leaders followed a plan to lay out streets on a standard grid. In the case of Manhattan the goal was to ease the movement of goods between the docks on on the east and west sides of the island and businesses. That is why east west streets are closer together than those going north and south. \n\n"
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35amj2 | how do actors and actresses not get off during sex scenes. | All I'm saying is...how can an actor not go the 'natural course' when getting down with an attractive actress? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35amj2/eli5_how_do_actors_and_actresses_not_get_off/ | {
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"Because it's not sexy, romantic, or sensual. To you, it's a quiet, intimate moment in a bedroom between two people emotionally connected, getting physical in a seemless interaction.\n\nTo them, it's [this](_URL_0_), with no emotional connection (they're acting), often physically separated (wearing flesh-toned garments that prevent them from being naked), and what seems like a single scene is probably many different scenes shot from different angles cobbled together in editing, not to mention are probably not the first take of the scene.\n\nSo you're starting, stopping, doing it again and again from different angles. I doubt it is sexy at all and probably becomes rather boring or irritating if done for too long.",
"Most sex scenes use a variety of tricks so that the actors aren't really rubbing up too much on each other. They wiggle around under covers without doing anything, shoot from angles that only capture the top half, use merkins, put pillows between them, etc.\n\nThere's also the fact that you're having to do this in front of a bunch of people who are filming you and making a movie. That means you're on a set with bright lights, cameras pointed at you, people running around everywhere, people yelling stuff at you. I imagine it's pretty stressful and not a big turn on. "
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2mtm6g | can someone explain why that last fish in the gif is so intent on dying with his friends? | _URL_0_
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2mtm6g/eli5can_someone_explain_why_that_last_fish_in_the/ | {
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"Hehehe. It's a mouth brooding fish :) \n\nSafest place for a little fish is in Mum's mouth.",
"Because they aren't being eaten, they are being carried by momma. \n",
"Those fish aren't being eaten. That's the big momma fish, and the little ones are its babies. The mother often times keeps the eggs in her mouth and protects them until they hatch. In a few species of [mouthbrooding](_URL_0_) fish, they keep the babies with them for a little while after hatching."
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41kc4y | why does fiber go away when you blend fruit and vegetables in a smoothie? | I was watching those popular health documentaries "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead" and "Forks Over Knives" and they all recommend juicing to get your vegetables fast. But when I try to look online for recipes everyone says don't do smoothies because blending will destroy the Fiber anyway. Is this true? Is juicing that much better than smoothies? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41kc4y/eli5_why_does_fiber_go_away_when_you_blend_fruit/ | {
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"I'm pretty sure that it's false information. Fiber is basically the stuff your body can't digest, and it doesn't make a difference if it's blended or not.",
"You may want to check your sources. Blending and smoothies do not destroy fiber; it's all there in your smoothie, it's just shredded. *Juicing* is what loses fiber. The liquid extract retains most of the vitamins and other nutrients of a whole fruit, but the process separates out the fiber.\n\nMayo clinic, a very good hospital, has more info: _URL_0_"
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7rwz7r | how is terry crews able to maintain so much muscle mass despite intermittent fasting? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7rwz7r/eli5_how_is_terry_crews_able_to_maintain_so_much/ | {
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"Intermittent fasting is actually related to improved muscle mass. Rats that ar fed 12-14 hours a day lose muscle and gain fat. Rats restricted to 12 hours a day eating gain muscle and lose fat. Restricting to 10 hours a day has an even greater effect.\n\nAnd this is what intermittent fasting is; not eating anything which starts your gut and stomach working for at least 12 hours every day.\n\nWhy do you think its called Break Fast for a morning meal? The ancients knew."
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3ky4f6 | how can gyroscopes seemingly defy gravity like in this gif | After watching this gif I found on the front page my mind was blown and I cannot understand how these simple devices work.
_URL_0_
Edit: Thanks for all the awesome replies, it appears there is nothing simple about gyroscopes. Also, this is my first time to the front page so thanks for that as well. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ky4f6/eli5_how_can_gyroscopes_seemingly_defy_gravity/ | {
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"It's not defying gravity. The entire weight of the gyroscope is still supported by the person's finger or the string or whatever. If you drop a gyroscope it will still fall to the ground just like any other object.\n\n\n------\n\n\nBut it's definitely doing something weird, right? It's a little complicated, but it has to do with the quirks of rotational momentum. If you hit a hockey puck from the right side, it will move to the left. No surprise.\n\n\nBut when you try to rotate an already-rotating object, weird stuff happens. Basically, movement happens in a direction *perpendicular* to the force. So when gravity is trying to tip the gyroscope downwards, instead it just ends up pushing it sideways. That's why the gyroscope spins in circles on the person's finger.",
"Well, i can't really explain it good, but i think [Walter Lewin](_URL_0_) does a pretty good job with that. The reason behind it is the [conservation of angular momentum](_URL_1_). ",
"This video shows something similar - the professor states that none of this stuff is intuitive and that's why 'formulas' and 'lots of maths' are usually involved\n\n_URL_0_\n\nThere's not really an ELI5 answer here - tho I'd be as happy to see one as anyone it's not stuff which most people can grasp easily (I know people with degrees who struggle with some aspects of it!)",
"There is a spinning weight inside. Instead of falling down when it's leant over at an angle it will precess around the point in the middle. It's called conservation of angular momentum. If the middle slows down too much it will still topple over. ",
"ITT people explaining how a force on a spinning object results in a perpendicular vector. \n\nThat's nice and all, but how exactly does something spinning and being pulled down result in it moving to the side? Why doesn't a spinning objects simply tilt down around his finger/fulcrum? ",
"Consider a horizontal spinning disk in front of you. Let's turn off gravity for simplicity, but say that it's free to rotate around other directions than the vertical if you hit it (i.e. it can freely pivot around its center).\n\nSo do that. You smack the part of the spinning disk that's near you downward. The point you hit had a lot of horizontal momentum, and gained some downward momentum from your motion. So the direction it moves in when it's near you is now tiltedslightly downward. What did that do to the rotation axis? It tipped it to the *side*; the axis that the circle is spinning around tilted in a direction perpendicular to you, not toward you.\n\nRotate this whole picture 90 degrees and you have the gyroscope here. The thing is already spinning in the vertical plane around a horizontal axis. Gravity is trying to apply a torque that's equivalent to smacking the bottom of the spinning disk appropriately to get it to tilt, as a rotate image of what we did above. This has the end effect of tilting the axis of the disk *sideways*, and gravity continuously exerting this torque causes the gyroscope to spin around.",
"Pilot here. Gyroscopes use precession and will tend to want to remain fixed in space. For example, on airplanes the vertical compass will tend to drift off heading after an hour or so...the number in n many books and from the FAA is 'up to 15 degrees an hour'. While the mechanics of the instrument have a lot to do with it, part of that number is because 360/24 = 15. As in the earth spins 360 degrees in a day, 24 hours in a day, so if the gyro is fixed in space it will be off by up to 15 degrees in an hour. As i mentioned before, theres a ton more to it then that (intentionally intruced correction errors, airplane location, etc) but that is one part of it.\n\nAnother thing cool that gyros do is give motorcycles stability. The front wheel of a motorcycle acts as a gyro which is why many times in accident videos involving motorcycles the bike will continue to stay upright even agyer the rider is knocked off. Its only after the motorcycle slows down or hits another object that it falls over. This is also why you 'counter steer' motorcycles on the highway (press on the left handlebar to make a right turn, press the right to go left). You are creating a small amount of drag on the bottom of the tire, but that drag dossnt take effect until 90 degrees later which turns the bike in the oppisite direction that it would go at low speeds.",
"There is no way to way to explain angular momentum to a five year old. In short, gyroscopes work because [insert multi-variable calculus and a full semester of kinematics], and they're fucking awesome!\n\nOP: watch this video, and if you have the equipment to do the experiment yourself, i highly recommend doing it.\n\n_URL_0_",
"If you only look at the xy plane (vertical cross-section of the system), and you balance moments a out the point of contact at the guys finger, what moment is counteracting gravity's \"downward\" moment? ",
"Reposting this from elsewhere in here:\n\nDoes it help if you think of the gyroscope as discrete points instead of one thing? Think of 1000 balls in a ring formation moving in a circle around a point. They're attached to that point with a string, which is attached to the end of a perpendicular bar, which they can move around the outside of for some magical reason without it getting in the way.\n\nTurn the angle of that bar and what happens? The balls will keep going in the direction they were already going. The circle they were traveling in doesn't change it's angle to stay perpendicular to the bar because of the momentum the balls already have.\n\nNow make that bar and the strings rigid (so that they have to stay at a 90 degree angle). The balls spinning around the bar are going to resist moving the bar, because they want to keep going the direction they're already going.\n\nNow change the balls into a solid ring, and you have a gyroscope.",
"The amount of stuff spinning around an axis multiplied by the speed at which it spins (angular velocity x distance) always has to stay the same. When you twist the spinning thing away from that axis, the whole spinning thing needs to start to spin in a different way to make sure that the amount it spins around the previous axis stays the same.",
"Okay, think of a bike, have you ever wondered how you can stay upright? Basically, the faster you spin a wheel the more it wants to keep spinning in that direction, it's difficult to change it without these weird effects occurring.\n\nIt's sort of like when you run, it's harder for you to stop running or change direction as compared to walking.\n\nIf you want to look into more of this, look up inertia.",
"The easiest way to understand this without all the technical stuff is to think of a single point on the wheel, say on the top of the wheel.\n\nGravity is pulling the wheel to the right which is what you would expect to happen and it would fall. But because it's spinning, and vectors what not, our point gets pulled to the left (and down and forward but I'm just focusing on 1D). \n\nIt hasn't escaped gravity it's just spinning in a circle left faster than it can fall to the right. The angular acceleration of the wheel also helps with stability.",
"Ok, so I've been meaning to ask this question for many years (and made this account just for this question).Why can we not use this phenomenon to move around/get our behinds off the planet?",
"I was listening to [this song](_URL_0_) and it fit perfectly with the gif. Thought I'd share.",
"Another question maybe someone can answer.. how do gyroscopes determine the movement of airplanes for their attitude display and horizontal situation? I never seem to understand that. I fly for a living and I know some of the planes navigational systems use gyros. I just don't really understand how. \n\nBut don't worry I'm not a pilot and I don't fix said objects. ",
"**I hope you read this OP, the other people are leading you astray** \n \nThe stuff about the third vector is basically a bunch of nonsense. That's not how it works even in the upper level calculus based physics world. That's not what's happening here. That's not why gyroscopes work. It's not even something that actually happens. \n \nGravity goes down. The finger is pushing up. The reason it doesn't fall is because of how fast it is spinning. The gyroscope, in each example, has to pivot around the point that is holding it up. This requires it to change from spinning vertically to spinning horizontally (or horizontally to vertically, it doesn't matter). The act of pivoting the gyroscope requires moving extra momentum because it's spinning so fast and has so much momentum. Imagine standing on a highway and trying to push a car opposite the direction that it's traveling. The car (just like the gyroscope) does in fact move in that direction. It's just that the motion is so little that you don't notice it. If you were to put a motor on the gyroscope so it spun forever and you hung it from a string like in the gif it would fall to the table. It would just go down really slowly. It could take minutes or even hours to fall. \n \nELI took calculus: \n \nThe angular momentum of the gyroscope is the triple integral of its density*velocity at each point. Gravity's effects only push on mass, not velocity. Gravity is thus imparting only a small force on an extremely energetic system. The system stays suspended because of how tiny the downwards force is compared to the total energy of the system. \n \nEDIT: It might be the double integral but I don't see why it matters one way or the other. A five year old wouldn't care",
"/u/mrpennywhistle you did a great series on gyroscopic precession. Any chance you could apply that in an explanation for how gyroscopes remain steady, if that's at all the case? :) ",
"It helps to focus on just a single point of the rotating ring. As the ring/gyroscope wants to fall to one side (because, you know, gravity), that single point starts moving downward.\n\nAs you probably know, things in motion tend to stay in motion. So that single point that started moving downward wants to *keep moving* downward. Now remember that the gyroscope is spinning, so in a fraction of a second, that point will be on the *other side* of the ring. Since it still wants to move downward, it balances the gyroscope (opposes the downward acceleration of a point on the other side) like someone pushing down on the other side of a teeter totter, keeping it from falling.\n\nAll of the atoms in the gyroscope are essentially doing this. They begin to fall as you'd expect, but the rotation quickly puts them in a position where that downward momentum begins to have an opposite effect on the gyroscope as a whole.",
"Here's the real, true, ELI**5**\n\nThings that are moving want to stay moving the same way. This is *important*, it's a physical \"law.\"\n\nFirstly, because of this, an object can only change speed or direction if a force acts on it. Gravity is a common force that causes things to \"speed up\" downward. Normally when you hold an object in place, gravity is cancelled out by tension in a string, or contact with your hand. Since the tension/contact force acts *upward*, the object can stay in place even though there is gravity *downward*.\n\nIn the examples you have here, the object is now ***spinning***, and it wants to keep doing this. The direction of spinning (i.e. its axis of rotation) now *doesn't* point in the same direction as gravity. Take a second to visualize this: gravity points downward: what direction does the axis of rotation point? In fact, it's completely perpendicular, so gravity can't cause the gyroscope to ever stop spinning. Therefore, the gyroscope maintains its height and just keeps spinning.\n\nDoes that make sense? That's as far as I can take it without actually introducing the math/equations.",
"[This is the best explanation of the effect that I've ever seen.](_URL_0_)",
"You're five, so you don't know what the word' momentum' means, but you probably understand the idea. If something big is moving it's really hard to stop it. \nMomentum is a measure of how much oomph a moving object has, it's equal to the objects speed times how massive it is. The big moving object had lots of momentum so it was hard to stop. \n\nThere's also something called 'angular momentum', it's the same thing but for a spinning object. Basically if something is spinning, it's hard to make it spin in another direction. So you have your spinning gyroscope on a point, for it to fall over on its side its angular momentum would have to change. \n\nThat's what is happening with a gyroscope. It's not defying gravity (the gyroscope is being held up by a finger against gravity), it's just not falling over. ",
"this always helped me its 90 degrees off thus the force of gravity is forcing it to go sideways\n\n_URL_0_",
"Would it be possible to buy one of these?",
"You might find [this video](_URL_0_) particular helpful (linking to the most visual demonstration).",
"ELI5: where can I buy that gyroscope?!",
"Energy spinning around a point wants to go out and away from that point. Imagine a pinwheel spinning around. If you detached the blades, they would fly out, away from the point they are spinning around.\n\nWell, if you try to *tip* that pinwheel forward, those blades still want to fly out in the direction they would if they were released. That energy *resists* the tipping motion. However, the energy you applied has to go somewhere, so the pinwheel moves *perpendicular* to it's rotation (down, sideways, etc...).\n\nIf you look at the gyroscope, you can see how gravity wants to pull it down, but the force gets transferred sideways to the base (or whatever it's attached to), which then holds it up.\n\nSorry if this isn't an 'ELI5' explanation, but I think it's about as simple as it can be.",
"Vector forces like gravity have two features: magnitude (their strength) and direction. To find out how an object is going to behave you figure out all the vector forces acting on it and add them together. So gravity on earth is a downward acceleration at 9.8 meters per second, even when you're standing flat on the ground that force is acting on you, but the force of the ground pushing up is the same, so nothing seems to happen. It's weird to think like this but the math checks out. Now, the gyroscope is also accelerating down due to gravity at 9.8 m/s, but it's spinning too, and that makes it weird. The end being held is more important than the \"floating\" part; the forces acting at that point of contact form an inverted lambda shape with gravity down and spin acceleration pointing down at an angle basically inside the axis of the gyroscope toward the base. When you add the force of whatever is holding it up into the equation (which will be exactly as strong as the downward sum if you don't want to drop it) you've got that last leg accounted for, and the angles and forces all add up to zero for as long as the spin keeps it's stubby little vector force arm in the air, countering the lesser relative mass of the far end of the gyroscope with the lateral component of its vector force trying to drag it upright. It, uh... spin is harder to explain for getting those forces into position. Imagine spinning in a circle with your arms held out, and how your hands feel heavier. As a unit the non-hand parts of you are now less heavy. It's sort of like that, because vector forces scale directly with the relative mass of what they're acting on. Big force, big mass, big energy. Big force, little mass... not so big energy.",
"Its hard to explain this simply, but my best shot would be gyroscopic precession. This states that any force applied to a rotating object will be felt 90 degrees in its plane of rotation. This video explains it very well. _URL_0_ \n\nSo when the gyroscope seems to be level on its side, it is because that force is not being felt directly down towards the earth.",
"you should get a gyroscope and play around with it, I think you'll understand it better then. I got one at Cracker Barrel for like $5",
"If a gyroscope is leaning left, at any particular instant it will be pulled to fall faster and faster to the left due to gravity - it's out of balance so it tends to fall over. However, before it has a chance to fall, the atoms that were on the left have spun round to the right and are being pulled the opposite direction. For any part of the gyroscope, the time gravity is pulling it one way is balanced by the time gravity is pulling it the opposite direction.\n\nIt's not a perfect balance, predicting the final effect takes some clever maths, and for more sophisticated understanding you need to think about conservation of angular momentum etc. But at the like-I'm-five level, as far as any one atom of the gyroscope is concerned, there's no one direction to fall - before it gets a chance it's around the other side of the gyroscope.\n",
"This is an example of angular momentum and torque at play. Here is a short clip of MIT Prof. Walter Lewin demonstrating and explaining it: \"None of this is intuitive\"\n\n_URL_0_",
"Takes a slapper at the rolling puck, WILD SHOT! ...Great Save Price! ... but Sedin scores on the rebound, Daniel Sedin, beauty play!",
"I don't get it; was torque something we defined from observing the result of applying a force on object that rotates on an axis?",
"Actual answer inc. Hopefully eli18 or so, but it's legit. It doesn't explain why it happens, but it definitely helps one understand more of what's going on.\n\nSpeaking in physics terms, the rotation actually causes something called a *moment* of inertia on the gyro. This *moment of inertia* is analogous to mass. So, in a way, spinning the gyro at a high speed makes it behave as if it were \"heavier\" than it is. It doesn't actually get heavier, because this mass is not gravitational mass, but that's a good way to think about it as I'll explain later. It's as if it were heavier for certain things. This isn't very intuitive to think about, but it's a real phenomenon you can measure scientifically. This mass is effective for forces that would say topple a spinning gyro.\n\nSo, if we understand that the effective mass is changed, lets see how that applies to physics by using Newton's famous relationship F=ma, force equals mass multiplied by acceleration. If we have a stationary gyro, and force on it that would rotate it, like if the gyro is spinning on a table and gravity would make it fall over, we have the same force as ever due to gravity (because the gravitational mass is the same as always), but we have an increased virtual mass. Rearranging F=ma to F/m=a using algebra, we see that a bigger virtual mass will result in a smaller acceleration, if of course the force stays the same. **Because gyros are spun up to such a high speed, this results in a highly magnified mass, and thus a highly reduce acceleration. So when you see the gyro \"not falling over\", it's actually as if it were in micro-gravity (for all intents and purposes) and it were actually just falling over very very slowly!!!**\n\nThis only applies to forces that would topple the gyro however, not forces that would speed up the gyro's rotation or slow it down. That's referred to in physics and geometry as a force perpendicular to the axis of rotation.\n\ntl;dr: crazy physics makes the gyro *seem* very massive if one pushes it in a certain way. the gyro isn't defying gravity, it's still affected by it, but while the force of gravity remains the same as for a stationary gyro, the increased mass means it moves much slower. kind of like if you push a large box on wheels and without; you might still use the same force, but without wheels, the box *seems* heavier and will move slower. In a way, mass represents how something resists changes in its movement, so that's why we call it mass and not something else.",
"The gyroscope is resisting rotational forces perpendicular to the axis of it's spin. In laymen terms it doesn't tip over and fall for the same reason your bicycle doesn't. When an object is spinning quickly it is said to be gyro stabilized and it will resist changing the axis of it's rotation. If it were not spinning and you were holding it by the very tip sideways, it would fall over. However if it's spinning quickly, it can't tip sideways fast enough to matter, so all of it's weight is supported by just the end, even if it's sideways. \n\nIf you took a bicycle wheel and spun it fast enough, it could support the weight of a rider, even if it were sideways like that. \n\nI have my idea of how it works but it's probably wrong. \n\nTo my thinking, in order for an object to rotate, it must have a vector and a speed for that rotation. IE vector is rotational, speed is 24degrees persecond/persecond. That is easy when an object is standing still, it begins to rotate, and it builds momentum in the direction of that rotation. \n\nBut if the object is spinning very quickly, then the instant it starts to rotate or tip, that momentum it gained is spun back around the other way almost as equally as the original direction. IE the object spins so the momentum of tipping is constantly re-directed in 360 degrees of it's spin so it's hard for it to build momentum in the direction it wants to tip. \n\nHowever nothing is free, as greater and greater force is placed on it to tip, more and more force must be spread out by the spinning object, which slows it down when it produces a complimentary and opposite force. IE if you take a spinning wheel by the top and bottom, and you try to tip it, it resists the force of your tipping with equal and opposite force, the opposite force isn't infinite so therefor the wheel must slow down. \n\nPhysics guru's tell me if I got close. ",
"A lot of people will say \"conservation of angular momentum\", but that probably doesn't help very much. It's a fancy way of saying, \"this thing is spinning in a particular direction. There's a physical law that says it wants to keep spinning in that particular direction\". The \"wants to keep spinning\" aspect of angular momentum conservation makes sense if you think of a car's tires. Even if the wheels are up off the ground, you still have to apply brakes to make them stop.\n\nIf you've spun a bicycle tire while holding it up off the ground or with the bike upside-down, you had to apply the brakes to stop it. That aspect of angular momentum conservation makes sense. The wheel is spinning, it wants to stay spinning.\n\nThe tricky part, the part that's leading to all the weirdness is when you turn it perpendicular to the axis of rotation. It doesn't matter if you're doing that with your hands, or if gravity is doing it by pushing down on one end. Conservation of angular momentum doesn't just mean you need to apply brakes to stop the spinning, it also means you need to apply a force to *change the direction of the spinning*.\n\nThat's the key to understanding it on some level--you're changing the direction of the spinning, and that takes energy.",
"As another person said already it's basically because of angular momentum. Imagine the gyroscope flipped 90 degrees. It wouldn't work, because the angular momentum wouldn't counterbalance gravity at all. The vector of the gyroscope's torque (Force of spin X distance to center of spinning object) HAS to be pointing perpendicular the force of gravity, which is what a gyroscope is designed to do at all times. It is also my understanding that gravity can be flipped if you have a big enough gyroscope. ",
"Even better ELI5 answer: the spinning motion of the internal gyro means that the entire item is trying to fall in every direction almost simultaneously, so it doesn't fall at all as a result. ",
"It looks like people are forgetting the \"five\" part of \"explainlikeimfive.\" Here goes:\n\nThe spinning action of the gyro transfers the force of gravity in a different direction. Normally, gravity would pull the gyro down. When the flywheel is spinning, the force of gravity is applied sideways, which is why the gyro \"orbits\" around the part that's holding it up. As soon as you prevent it from orbiting, it will fall just as if the flywheel wasn't spinning.",
"objects that have a fast rotation lose mass allowing them to be easily lifted, before wasting your time flaming my assertion watch this. _URL_0_",
"Imagine a kid that got going really high on a swing set. At one point he is completely horizontal and appears to be falling straight down just like we would expect the gyro to. But then all of his downward motion gets translated to sideways motion and he goes forward instead. The gyro is doing similar work by translating a falling motion into a sideways motion. \n\nIt might help to imagine the gyro as a turn based system rather than a continuous system. Imagine we have the spinning gyro supported sideways and when the support is released time moves forward .1 seconds at a time. In the first .1 second the gyro will want to fall something like an inch. In that same .1 second the part of the spinning mass that was also moving down (like the kid on the swing) rotates 90 degrees and is now moving sideways. That translation basically says \"anything that was a 'down' is now a 'sideways'.\" so the inch fall becomes a shift to the side instead. The same will happen in the next .1 second and the result is the gyro processing instead of falling. \n\nEdit: I'm sure nobody will read this, but since I thought of another analogy I thought I'd write it down. \n\nHave you ever seen the American football exercise where the players run forward and slam into a padded device (padded sled) and try to push it down field? Imagine if the \"padded sled\" was a merry go round instead. If the merry go round was still and the coach told the players to push it toward the end zone, when all the players hit it and pushed it would move toward the end zone. \n\nHowever if the merry go round were spinning, when the players hit it and began to push they would be spun along with the surface they were pushing on. When they looked up after pushing for a moment they might find that they had been rotated 90 degrees and pushed it toward the side line instead of the end zone. If they lined up and tried again the same thing would happen and the merry go round would continue to move toward the side line despite the force trying to move it to the end zone. If you replace the football players with gravity that is like what is happening to the gyro. ",
"So lots of people are talking about \"angular momentum\" but that's kind of an unhelpful shorthand we can unpack to show just how much energy is involved here.\n\nI'm going to assume you get the idea of linear momentum: the faster and heavier something is, the more energy it takes to change its path, either to stop it or to deflect it along a different direction.\n\nNow think about that little toy gyroscope. Every atom in the wheel is trying to move in a straight line, because things in nature do not move along curved paths without a force acting on them, in this case the atomic cohesive forces of the material itself. It's possible to spin things so fast the material just flies apart, but for a big heavy piece of brass like that it'd have to be spinning *really* fast. You're not going to get it going that fast by yanking a string, but you can probably get it up to several thousand RPM.\n\nSo now let's think about what that means. A four-inch gyroscope has about a twelve and a half inch diameter, and if you've got it spinning at 10,000 RPM, that means in linear terms the atoms at the rim of the gyroscope are traveling 125,000 inches per minute, which is about 175 feet per second, or nearly 120 miles per hour.\n\nNow imagine somebody firing that heavy brass gyroscope at you at the speed of a major league fastball (and then some) and perhaps it starts to make more sense. That's the kind of energy the gyroscope has, all directed along paths in the plane of rotation. And so when you try to change the plane of rotation, you're trying to drastically deflect the natural path of every atom, moving at that fastball-like speed. And it's not that you can't do it; it's just that it takes more force than you'd intuitively expect for something that size, because it isn't obvious to you how fast the mass of it is moving. To your intuition it's sitting more or less still because it isn't flying away from you, but it's actually moving very fast indeed in a particular direction (\"around its axis\") and like any heavy, fast-moving thing, it wants to stay there unless you expend enough energy to overcome that preference.\n\nYou can lift the whole gyroscope up and down easily because the vertical (Y) motion is a very small change in velocity relative to the motion in the plane. In the time it took you to lift it a couple of inches, the rotational velocity (which we are analogizing to a linear X) has covered most of a football field. Try to launch the gyroscope upwards at a similar speed and it will take a lot more force. When you try to rotate the gyroscope, you're not just imparting a small Y, but trying to dramatically redirect that massive X, and again it doesn't intuitively look like you're doing anything much different, but it's the difference between trying to deflect the fastball a little to the inside and trying to redirect the ball to hit the first baseman after it leaves the pitcher's hand. The former can be accomplished with just the air friction from a bit of spin on the ball, while the latter can be accomplished with little less than a bat.",
"Here is a video on what is happening: _URL_0_\n\nOkay guys, here is the ELI5 version. When a gyroscope like the one in the gif isn't spinning, it will fall just as a normal object will. But where the weighted part at the end spins, it's basically throwing weight upwards as fast as it is downwards. So the up and down forces are cancelling out. What's left is the leg to right forces, shown by the spinning of the gyroscope on the guys finger. This whole process is known as gyroscopic precession",
"Here you have a nice video that explains the gyroscopic precession: _URL_0_\nAnd here another just for fun, more gyroscopes! :D\n_URL_1_",
"the wheel spins around. gravity pushes down. but inertia keeps it in motion. if i throw a ball directly up, it appears to defy gravity, till it runs out of steam. spinning wheel has lots of steam.",
"Haven't found a good ELI5 yet, so here ya go:\n\nObjects rotating have inertia, where the amount of mass and speed of the object takes a proportional amount of energy to stop it. So, the faster it goes and the heavier it is, the harder it is to stop. Inertia also applies to the direction, so if you try to change directions, the rest of the mass and energy wants to keep going the same way. So, part A is once spinning it wants to keep spinning based on how fast and how heavy it is. Each time you act on it it will lose energy and slow down, so if you bump it, poke it, grab it, the friction from the pivots, gravity pulling on it, everything causes it to lose energy or slow down.\n\nPart B:\nAngular momentum follows the right hand rule. Some may remember this from physics. Take your right hand and hold your arm level with the ground. Now, point your thumb up, stick your pointer straight, and your middle finger to the left. That's the right hand rule. What it means is that when you apply a force to the gyroscope, the angular momentum will cause it to move in a direction 90 degrees from the direction you applied it. Test it out with a bicycle wheel sometime. Get it spinning fast, and then while holding the axle force it along each of the planes from your right hand rule. It will twist the wheel so it moves 90 degrees from the direction of force you applied.\n\nSo, back to the gyroscope. The gyroscope is moving at a speed with a mass (and some other parameters we won't worry about because we're 5 here) in a rotational direction. Because the amount of force translated when acted upon it is proportional to the amount of mass and spin, the faster it is moving relative to the force applied will have a bigger or smaller effect. So, when you put the two factors together, the right hand rule and rotational inertia, which is the resistance to changing direction based on how fast and how big the gyroscope is, we have our question. So, take gravity, where gravity is simply a force applied down. Based on the right hand rule, a downward force will be translated to a sideways movement based on the direction of spin. So, you will see this action as the gyroscope slows down and loses energy and the angular momentum starts to get closer to the force of gravity. What happens is it starts to spin in a circle around the bottom pivot if you were to place it in a fixed position. The gyroscope moves around and around as gravity, a force, causes the gyroscope to lose energy until it hits the ground. It's based on the weight, speed (and size) of the gyroscope, and gravity acts based on the right hand rule to move the gyroscope in a direction at right angles to the direction applied. It loses energy from friction and gravity and any other force trying to change direction until it stops.",
"OK, I think I have a good ELI5, but it may be too late. Hope someone sees this . . .\n\nI think it's easiest to understand if you imagine two balls of equal mass connected by a string. The balls are rotating around each other in zero gravity in a vacuum. Suppose you are watching from a position where the axis of rotation is horizontal (to you) such that the balls are moving toward you or away from you. (If it were a wheel it would be seen edge on and vertical.) You introduce two streams of air - one at the top moving to the right, and one at the bottom moving to the left. What happens?\n\nWhen the balls are above each other the top one gets a push to the right and the bottom one gets a push to the left. The centre of mass does not move. The balls continue to rotate out of the air flow, the top one moving off to the the right and the bottom one to the left. But they are held together by the string. The balls reach a maximum displacement half way down, and when the top ball reaches the bottom it is already moving a little bit to the left. The next pulse continues the process until the balls are rotating in line with the air flows.\n\nThe key for me in understanding why this happens is to think of what it would take for the rotating system to tip over sideways, i.e. the \"intuitive\" way. The force of the air will change the velocity of the ball (initially just its direction). To get the system to tip over the force of air would have to change the position of the ball - i.e., somehow teleport the top one to the right and the bottom one to the left, keeping the direction of movement directly away from you and towards you. That's not how forces work.\n\n\n\n\n",
"Where can I buy a good gyroscope like this? How expensive are they?"
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"https://youtu.be/GeyDf4ooPdo"
],
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ty9QSiVC2g0",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeyDf4ooPdo"
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3hpf58 | what makes the united states' economy the most powerful in the world? do they do anything different from other countries? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3hpf58/eli5_what_makes_the_united_states_economy_the/ | {
"a_id": [
"cu9cyis"
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"score": [
2
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"text": [
"The United States is the most populous and has the most arable land of Western Countries meaning it could make good use of the technology developed over the last couple hundred years.\n\nIt also wasn't bankrupted by the two world wars."
]
} | []
| []
| [
[]
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|
||
6rhw42 | why does it hurt to take a deep breath after a day at the beach? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6rhw42/eli5_why_does_it_hurt_to_take_a_deep_breath_after/ | {
"a_id": [
"dl57t4f",
"dl58m95"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Is it because you're outside running around or even swimming? I don't understand the question. I didn't think a deep breath was an issue to be concerned about.\n\nI too would like an answer to this, if this is a thing for some reason for some people.",
"I have never experienced or heard of this. Mind elaborating op? "
]
} | []
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[],
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7dscol | water is h20 , hydrogen peroxide is h202, how can one extra oxygen molecule turn into something that can kill you | title. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7dscol/eli5water_is_h20_hydrogen_peroxide_is_h202_how/ | {
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"Short answer: because changing even one element in a compound will drastically change how it interacts with other chemicals.\n\nLong answer: H2O is remarkable stable and wants to stay that way. H2O2 is still stable, but it will give the extra oxygen atom to any compound that it can, so it can be more stable. Unlucky for living things, cell membranes will end up taking this extra oxygen and they will no longer be able to hold their form. Once the cell membrane falls apart the cell will die. ",
"WOOOOOW literally every one of these answers are wrong.\n\nH2O2 does not kill cells with a free O atom going about grabbing up different things. In fact free O molecules happen all the time thanks to our Electron transport chain. It just bonds with H and creates water. The molecular structure of H2O2 is H-O-O-H, with those dashes being bonds. The middle bond is where the hydrogen peroxide breaks into two components producing 2 OH molecules. Now OH isn't bad. In fact our body is full of OH- molecules. Water is constantly losing and gaining hydrogen. This gives a mixture in pure water of H2O molecules, HO- molecules and H3O+ molecules. This is the whole bases for the pH system (p=-log: 14= -log[H] + -log[HO-]). So why does H2O2 kill? The answer is quite radical! (you'll see what I did there in a second)\n\nWhen H2O2 breaks they create two OH radicals. A radical is any molecule with an odd number of electrons. So their is one unpaired electron in it. Molecules/Atoms HATE this. In the body biologists call these Reactive Oxidative Species (ROS). Radicals will then go through radical reactions with any molecule in their way. So these reactions caused by ROS are incredibly detrimental because by stealing 1 electron from another molecule the ROS stops being an ROS, but the other molecule becomes one, so the reaction is maintained. All cells do have mechanisms to address this because cells do create radicals all time, but by dumping H2O2 on cells it overloads the system killing the organism.",
"Basically H2O2 has the ability to form an OH radical. Radicals are molecules with an unpaired electron hanging around. Unpaired electrons are not stable so they attack other things, like cell membranes. So if they attack the cell membrane, everything leaks out which is bad news.",
"The difference is not gradual: changing one atom in a molecule changes everything about it.\n\nThink of molecules like locks and keys, right? Some keys fit into some locks, and others don't. Some keys fit into many locks, some keys only fit in a few.\n\nJust like any key, these keys have teeth that allow it to turn the locks when they're just right, or make the key absolutely useless. After all, you can't just put any key into any lock and expect it to work, right?\n\nNow imagine we take a key called \"water\" that we know fits almost all of the locks the make up a human body: it hydrates practically every cubic inch of your body, but only because it perfectly fits in all those locks, right? Now take all of those \"water\" keys, and of each you file away one tooth. What do you think happens? They don't fit anymore! Your body isn't getting hydrated anymore!\n\nA small, gradual change (filing down or adding to a key's tooth) can have *drastic*, fundamental consequences (no longer fitting a lock).\n\nAdding or subtracting an element from a molecule changes he way it interacts with all other molecules.",
"Chem professor used to give this great example: Na, sodium, is a silvery white solid that if ingested would kill you as well as explode. Cl, chlorine, is a toxic green gas that would burn your lungs and cause a horrible death. Put them together to get NaCl, salt, and if your body doesn't get this, you die. Combinations and conformations make all the difference in chemistry.",
"In water, oxygen is attached to two hydrogen atoms, like this: **H--O--H**. These hydrogen atoms are really just protons, and they don't care too much about the electrons that they share with oxygen (the dotted lines in the picture above). This is why it's easy for one to leave the electrons behind and go off and do its own thing (free hydrogen ions are what make things acidic). On the other hand, oxygen is an electron hog, i.e. it's highly electronegative. It's extremely difficult if not impossible to take electrons away from oxygen, like you can from hydrogen. (in chemistry, when we take electrons away from something it's called \"oxidation\" because it's what oxygen always does)\n\nHydrogen peroxide is a completely different molecule. Its structure is like this: **H--O--O--H**. That single bond between the two oxygens is not very strong. Each side of the molecule is pulling on that bond in the middle with equal strength. Because of the symmetry, when the bond breaks, you're left with two molecules that have a *single unpaired electron*, because the bond itself was originally two electrons. Electrons don't like to be unpaired, it's a quantum mechanics thing. When peroxide decomposes, each oxygen takes one of the electrons from the original bond.\n\nThe two molecules it breaks up into are called hydroxyl radicals, and they look like this: **H--O***. That asterisk represents the unpaired electron. Now that unpaired electron is a huge problem. In fact, free radicals are pretty much the most reactive compounds known. It especially likes to find double-bonds or aromatic rings to attach to (ELI15). And guess what has lots of those? Pretty much all the most important biological macromolecules, like DNA and proteins.\n\nIt's a really big problem when free-radicals can sneak past all your body's defenses and damage DNA. Fortunately, your body has lots of ways of absorbing free-radicals. This is why it's not a big deal to spill low concentration peroxide on your skin.",
"How does hydrogen peroxide kill you? Recently one of my dogs ate a used tampon and we called our vet and they told us to have her drink hydrogen peroxide to induce vomiting. But do you just drink too much of it?"
]
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8mwqt6 | why does a container of icing/frosting say refrigerate after opening but you don’t have to refrigerate the cookies or cake after you put the frosting on? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8mwqt6/eli5_why_does_a_container_of_icingfrosting_say/ | {
"a_id": [
"dzr0yph"
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"text": [
"Magic? The honest answer is That you should be refrigerating the product you made as well. It’s just such a low risk item that we don’t need to. But it’s better to put the statement on the bottle so the unlucky sob that does from food positioning can’t sue"
]
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[]
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||
4c4ddz | if starfish don't have brains, how do they have consciousness? | Is consciousness not dependent on the brain? What is it then? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4c4ddz/eli5_if_starfish_dont_have_brains_how_do_they/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Who said they have a consciousness? Who says you have to have a brain to have a consciousness?\n\nThere's a lot we don't know about these things, so I doubt anyone can say definitively one way or the other.",
"Who says they are or are not conscious? Who says a brain is required?\n\nWhat is consciousness?\n\nWe know very little about how anything other than humans thinks. We don't even know that much about human consciousness.",
"starfish have a ring of nerves and some nerve cords, whilst they don't have brains they have what you would call a primitive brain.\nit's not exactly the same thing as a brain, but it does allow them to feel and see to a limited extent they have feeler tentacles and red eye spots.\n\n\\ > top comments are always really long this is a simple answer for a simple question"
]
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[],
[],
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9agcvq | how are the raw images sent back from space probes processed in such a way to give a vibrant and colourful image? | Let's use Saturn as an example. [This is a raw image from Cassini](_URL_1_), and [this is a processed image](_URL_0_).
Additionally, if I was to jump in a space ship and fly out to Saturn, would it look like the second image? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9agcvq/eli5_how_are_the_raw_images_sent_back_from_space/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Cameras aboard spacecraft like Cassini take photos using filters that isolate different wavelengths on the electromagnetic spectrum. Some, like red, green, and blue, capture light the human eye can see. Others, like ultraviolet and infrared, capture light it can't. All the images arrive to Earth as black-and-white frames, and then are assigned colors digitally and compiled into a composite. Sometimes the composite is a false-color image, where colors may be assigned to show infrared or ultraviolet that we normally can't see with our eyes. Others may be composites of visible light plus infrared and/or ultraviolet. The second image you linked happens to be a true-color composite, although it may be edited to make the colors pop a bit more. If you hitched a ride on Cassini, that image is more-or-less what you'd see with your own eyes. With a decent backyard telescope you can see Saturn with the same colors, albeit a lot smaller and in not nearly as much detail.",
"Yes and no? Look at the pictures of Pluto. This is the best example.\n\nThe data sent back is a mix of things that are then assigned colors. Also, in the case with Pluto the colors are there but very faint so they bump them to show the chemical, geologic, and physical attributes of the planet to show it's structure, composition, etc... If we jumped in a ship and drove to Pluto it'd look bland. Very faint greys and blues, maybe some copper but overall it's sepia toned.\n\nSo to make it look interesting they pump up colors.\nthere's Panorama pictures from Mars that show you what it would look like under Earth-like lighting conditions but also what it looks like under Mars's sky. This makes it a nice image and also clearly shows the attributes I mentioned. These are \"~~falls~~ false color\" images. True color images aren't as visually impressive. Not to say that's why images are colored falsely, all three image types are out there.\n\nTL;DR: Space agencies will use false color to show different data to illuminate features that naturally would not be seen. Visible spectrum pictures are also created via different data."
]
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| [
"https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQHxPXJjxzxA-dzVH56zmW7Vn0pE_oy4A_a5YvG4zIyG-AbtH0T",
"https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcR7fWONJDSdJ0Wjjt-YmSB0DMW2J-y220vEFlbm-iSTU4ko7htM"
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a65nd1 | why are fats bad in combination with carbohydrates | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a65nd1/eli5_why_are_fats_bad_in_combination_with/ | {
"a_id": [
"ebs7a7b"
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"text": [
"They're not. \n\nA consistent excess of calories is bad regardless of the source, but splitting your calory intake across the macronutrients is considered healthier by everyone except people that make a living off of making up fad diets. \n\nFor that matter there's a fair amount of evidence that getting some of your energy from alcohol has long term benefits. Just not too much. "
]
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| []
| [
[]
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||
6a3ja2 | why do most grocery stores still accept checks as payment in the us, while most restaurants generally don't? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6a3ja2/eli5_why_do_most_grocery_stores_still_accept/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Part of it is because our culture has come to expect grocery stores to always be able to cash and use checks. Few restaurants accept checks because the cost of accepting checks is greater than the potential lost revenue form not accepting checks, but for grocery stores, being able to cash checks is a great way to keep loyal customers. ",
"This is really interesting as a Canadian because the majority of grocery stores where I live no longer accept cheques as a form of payment. I can't say for sure for the eastern provinces, but in western Canada you generally can't anymore."
]
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[],
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b5nvvi | if a geostationary orbit is when a satellite is moving the same speed as earth’s surface, how does it also have enough speed to ‘miss’ earth when attracted by gravity and therefore orbit? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/b5nvvi/eli5_if_a_geostationary_orbit_is_when_a_satellite/ | {
"a_id": [
"ejenvcp"
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"score": [
4
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"text": [
"It's not moving the same speed as Earths surface, it is moving much, much faster. They are about 26,000 miles away from Earth, so they must travel a much greater distance for each rotation than does the Earths surface."
]
} | []
| []
| [
[]
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||
83r8ey | why are variable propelling nozzles seemingly only fitted to jets with afterburners? | I've never seen variable nozzles on any other kind of engine. Example below.
GIF: _URL_0_
EDIT: Spelling | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/83r8ey/eli5_why_are_variable_propelling_nozzles/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Most planes are designed to operate effectively at their cruising speed. They're going to take off, climb quickly to altitude, then spend a few hours cruising at a fixed speed and altitude before they descend. Their engines are optimized for this speed and altitude, and most of their thrust comes from the big fan at the front, not the exhaust from the jet.\n\nAircraft with afterburning turbojets generally operate under different conditions. They need to be able to operate effectively at a wide range of speeds(both subsonic and supersonic), work at a wide range of altitudes, have a huge range of fuel rates depending on if they're cruising or hitting the afterburner, and generally need maximum performance over anything else(weight, money, fuel)\n\nThe variable nozzle lets the engine operate more efficiently over the wide operating range of the aircraft and can result in increased thrust which is important to a fighter plane but not to jetliner. On an afterburning turbojet, all of the thrust comes from the combustion of fuel in the turbine so it is important to optimize the exhaust.",
"You may be confused about the difference between a turbo**jet** engine and a turbo**fan** engine (and also turbo**prop** and turbo**shaft**). All of those are \"jet\" engines, but they provide thrust in different ways. The engine in your gif is from an F15 fighter jet, and it is a turbojet engine.\n\nTurbojet engines provide thrust when the burning, expanding exhaust from the burning fuel exits the back of the engine at high speeds, and because of Newton's third law, the plane is propelled forward. The spinning fans in the turbojet engine don't provide any thrust. Instead, they are there to compress the air flowing into the engine. The more compressed the air is, the more efficiently the fuel will burn and the more power you get. On its way through the back of the engine, the exhaust passes through fans that siphon off some of the power to turn the fans at the front that compress the incoming air. The nozzle at the end focuses the exhaust to maximize the thrust coming out. The more focused the exhaust is, the more efficiently the engine runs, but if you try to focus it too much, it slows down the exhaust, which causes a \"traffic jam\" of exhaust, air, and fuel in the engine, which reduces your power and efficiency.\n\nAfterburners are a very inefficient way to add a significant amount of power when necessary by dumping additional fuel into the burning exhaust *after* the combustion chamber. It's not efficient because at that point, the air isn't as compressed because it's already expanding and burning, so the fuel doesn't burn as completely. The combustion chamber can only take so much pressure, so you can't just dump as much fuel as you want into it - not to mention that if you add more fuel than you have air to burn it, it won't work anyway. So you dump more fuel into the back just before the exhaust leaves through the nozzle.\n\nWhen you do that, you have to control the flow of air, fuel, and exhaust, *plus* you've just added a ton of extra pressure from burning, expanding exhaust, so you need to adjust the nozzle accordingly.\n\n**All** turbojet engines have the capability of using afterburners, provided they have an additional fuel line into that part of the engine, and also provided it can withstand the pressure. Some of them are just designed better than others.\n\nTurbo**fan** engines get power by using the exhaust to power a larger fan that pulls air into the *bypass* around the main core of the engine. As exhaust leaves the engine, it creates *inducted flow*, as air around the engine is pulled into the exhaust. The induction fan also helps. The result is that your exhaust ends up going a lot slower, since you're siphoning off some of the speed and power to accelerate additional air around the engine. Your engine goes slower, but it's also more efficient than a turbojet engine, at least at the speeds the turbofan is designed to operate at. I guess you could conceivably add an afterburner, but it wouldn't do you much good. It would just waste fuel.\n\nTurbofan engines don't use those same variable nozzles because you're not trying to control the exhaust in the same way. Your power does come from the exhaust, but you really care more about what the inducted air is doing. Many of them can control the airflow through the induction channel, though."
]
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"https://m.imgur.com/a/8VgbW"
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15dom8 | why do gun control advocates/opponents argue over the definition of the term "assault weapon"? | I have heard gun control opponents say that advocates are not using the term in the right context, or that the media isn't using the definition correctly. My initial thought is that they are splitting hairs. I've read the definition on several websites, but it's still seems muddled to me. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/15dom8/eli5_why_do_gun_control_advocatesopponents_argue/ | {
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"text": [
"Because the term \"assault weapon\" doesn't mean anything concrete, and its definition shifts based on whatever the anti-gun crowd wants it to mean. It's a bastardization of \"assault rifle,\" which has a generally accepted definition, and *very, very few* people actually own real assault rifles. ",
"It's mostly to figure out which types of weapons should be banned and which shouldn't be. Since some kinds of weapons are highly modifiable, saying \"you can't own this model of gun\" doesn't cut it. Hence an \"assault weapon\" has certain capabilities which are currently being argued about.\n\nAn \"assault weapon\" to a civilian is something that they'd think of when they think of something a soldier would use, whereas with this debate, an \"assault weapon\" also includes some types of what those same people would call a pistol.",
"It's a bullshit term, the real definition of which is: \"we hope you people who don't know anything about guns will think we are talking about machine guns when we really aren't.\"\n\nReal machine guns have been heavily regulated since 1934, and new ones banned for sale to civilians since 1986. Real, legal machine guns are difficult to get, incredibly expensive, and aren't being used in crimes. The sleazy gun prohibitionists hope to trick you into favoring a ban on something that is already all-but-banned.\n\nHere's an example: which one of these is an \"assault weapon?\"\n\n[This?](_URL_1_)\n\nOr [this?](_URL_0_)\n\nUnlike a gun prohibitionist, I'll tell you right now that was a trick question. It's the same model of gun and it works exactly the same way. Neither picture is of a machine gun.",
"Banning \"assault weapons\" is as vague as if the NFL banned \"dangerous tackles\" and just left it at that. An assault weapon isn't an actual type of firearm, like a handgun, shotgun or assault rifle is. When lawmakers attempt to define the term, the characteristics make little sense and usually only have a tangential relationship with the weapon's capability in a firefight.",
"Please refer to this [infographic](_URL_0_)"
]
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"http://www.impactguns.com/data/default/images/catalog/535/ruger_5801.jpg"
],
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"http://i.imgur.com/IIU33.jpg"
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3x1c0x | how does youtube determine when to play ads? | There are times when I don't see any ads for 5-10 videos in a row, then other times when I get 5-10 ads in a row. The length of the video doesn't seem to matter either, apart from those videos which are less than 15-30 seconds. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3x1c0x/eli5_how_does_youtube_determine_when_to_play_ads/ | {
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"text": [
"Mainly, whether the YouTuber has allowed monetization (ads). However, YouTube only plays the ad like 90% of the time on these videos as being constantly bombarded with ads will lower user satisfaction, making them view less videos. You can try this out yourself, play a video that has pre-roll ads, and if you load the video many times, sometime the ad won't load (less rare on Vevo channels).",
"I was under the impression that ads are only played when you're in a hurry to watch or show someone else something",
"They haunt the people without Adblock with ads until they decide to download it. It's all a big ploy",
"The moment they realize you are enjoying the video, concentrating on the video and not switching tabs...BAM!\n\nADS! GALAXY NOTE 5 RIGHT IN YOU FACE!"
]
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6sirgj | how does algae grow in fountains filled with clean water? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6sirgj/eli5_how_does_algae_grow_in_fountains_filled_with/ | {
"a_id": [
"dld2u5a"
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"score": [
4
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"text": [
"Algae is a plant. Plants love clean water. Why wouldn't algae grow in a fountain? The only way people prevent this is by putting chemicals in the water that reduce algae growth."
]
} | []
| []
| [
[]
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|
||
1yb623 | how do they remove the ice and put it back in hockey stadiums? | always wondered! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1yb623/eli5_how_do_they_remove_the_ice_and_put_it_back/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Also, if you're thinking they remove it after every game for other events, they actually just put another floor over top ;)",
"Here's a basketball to hockey transformation.. \n_URL_0_"
]
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| [
[],
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEAbTqAZ35s"
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5dugnl | why is cable internet (which travels over two copper wires) faster than dsl (which is also just two copper wires)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5dugnl/eli5_why_is_cable_internet_which_travels_over_two/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"It's more about the type of signaling used, and the type of wire. \n\nCoaxial cable the signal is on the inner wire, the outer braided shield helps protect against interference. IP over cable tends to be also a cleaner network, as far as how the signal gets from the cable company, to the head end to your house. \n\nDSL tends to be sent over unshielded twisted pair, which may be bundled with multiple other lines, and over multiple junction points and even over multiplexers before it finally reaches your home. DSL has to be designed to operate in cities where parts of the phone network may easily be 100 years old.\n\nThere are some other differences in the frequencies and signaling used in the various DSL types verses cable internet, but I haven't worked in that industry in a while, so I'm not confident in my ability to explain it accurately.",
"Think of each wire as a lane. Having two lanes should be faster, but it depends on a lot of things. How many other cars are sharing the lanes? How good is the road surface? Is everyone trying to get on or off the road at the same place? Are there a lot of signals?\n\nThe biggest of these reasons for DSL being slower is that the road surface is just not as good. Telephone wires were set up over 100 years ago, and only had to transport voice at reasonable quality. They're like a two lane dirt road that was only designed for horse carriages. Cable wires were set up much more recently, and were designed to transport video and high quality audio simultaneously. They're like a one lane Autobahn highway."
]
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atqax1 | why are golf balls shaped the way they are and not perfect spheres? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/atqax1/eli5_why_are_golf_balls_shaped_the_way_they_are/ | {
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"text": [
"The dimples actually improve the aerodynamics and flight characteristics. I know that seems counter intuitive, but their's hard science behind it. The dimples create very small air currents near the surface of the ball. The balanced cushion of air stabilizes the ball as it flies (hopefully) to the putting green. ",
"They started out as little baseball looking leather balls stuffed with feathers.\n\nThen the came the gutta-percha ball, which was a type of really stable rubber that could be molded and remolded. Everybody started using those, and they were perfectly smooth to start, but people found that they actually worked better after they got a few scuffs and nicks in them.",
"Perfect spheres have an unusual drag coefficient, _URL_0_ ,that causes them to follow a 'path of least resistance', a lot like water flowing downhill or an electric current. Not very useful if you are trying to aim at a target.",
"Relevant, look at the impact of a 150 mph golf ball in slow motion: _URL_0_",
"Air creates drag due to it sticking to the surface of an object. When the surface is perfectly smooth, air has a nice flat surface to stick to. The small holes on the surface of a golf ball cause all kinds of rotations in the air around the sphere, which make it harder for the air to stick to the surface, thereby reducing drag.",
"Counterintuitively, it's to improve aerodynamics.\n\nThe reason for this is that there are different effects contributing to the drag on the ball.\n\n[Here is a photo of a ball in a wind tunnel](_URL_0_), using smoke trails to show the airflow. You can see that the air flows smoothly around the ball's surface at first, but as it passes around the ball, it separates from the surface, creating a turbulent wake of low pressure air. The difference in pressure between the higher pressure in front of the ball and the lower pressure in the wake creates drag.\n\nYou would expect that a rougher surface would increase the drag due to friction with the air. However, it also makes the flow more turbulent, and this reduces the tendency for the airflow to separate from the surface of the ball, so the air will flow smoothly for longer and generate a smaller wake. As a result, the overall drag is actually lower than it would be if the ball had a smooth surface.\n\nSome vehicles have [vortex generators](_URL_1_) which serve a similar purpose - by altering the airflow around the car, they can reduce the overall drag without changing the shape of the vehicle. In the case of aircraft, doing this can improve low speed performance by increasing the maximum angle of attack (and therefore lift) that can be achieved before the airflow separates from the wing surface."
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex_generator"
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1xq5k5 | why is it that when i'm on a diet i seem to gain weight shortly before beginning to lose the weight? | It always seems like a day or two before I lose weight I seem to pack on a significant amount. What's the deal? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1xq5k5/eli5_why_is_it_that_when_im_on_a_diet_i_seem_to/ | {
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"Which diet are you using? Different diets have different effects on the body. ",
"Your weight will naturally fluctuate from one day to the next, due to a number of factors. I'd chalk this up to the fact that you're actually checking your weight more consistently when starting your diet, so you notice the upswings.\n\nWeight is going to be different depending on morning or night, your personal schedule, whether you just ate a 2-pound steak... don't sweat a few pounds increase right at the start."
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[],
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69hpru | why do pictures (taken on a phone) taken 5+ years ago become very blurry, super low quality and corrupted on social media and online photo albums (photo bucket)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/69hpru/eli5_why_do_pictures_taken_on_a_phone_taken_5/ | {
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"Pictures taken on older phones will be of way worse quality than phones today. So that's a major reason why they would look worse. Another reason is that those photo websites often compress the file even further to save space. Compression makes the image even worse looking though. If a picture is uploaded to a website, then downloaded and reuploaded to another one and then a few more times the quality will suffer a lot. "
]
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| []
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|
||
3h5k6i | why do big airlines have multiple subsidiary brands that operate their regional flights? | E.g. why is a flight on American Airlines operated as "American Eagle operated by Envoy Air' when all 3 are the same Airline group. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3h5k6i/eli5_why_do_big_airlines_have_multiple_subsidiary/ | {
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"text": [
"It's not a subsidiary. It's a completely different company that has an exclusive contract to operate codeshare flights on lower traffic routes, leaving the airline to focus on the main routes with larger aircraft. \n\nThis way the regional airline operates two or three kinds of small jets and can have all their pilots qualified on them, and the larger airline can have pilots qualifies for the larger planes. Same goes for mechanics. "
]
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| []
| [
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|
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4cgpq7 | how do they make boneless ribs? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4cgpq7/eli5how_do_they_make_boneless_ribs/ | {
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"\"Boneless ribs\" are typically not actually cut from the ribs, but instead are thickly cut strips of typically shoulder steak.\n\nThey are still called \"ribs\" due to the similar texture and flavor when prepared as if traditional ribs.",
"The McRib is rib meat that is ground up and formed into a rib-shaped patty, so basically a pork burger formed into a shape.",
"For pork it's the rib end of the loin (top loin) butterflied in half and then sliced into strips. "
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1iiit5 | what exactly does it mean for down syndrome's extra chromosome to be silenced? | For reference: _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1iiit5/eli5_what_exactly_does_it_mean_for_down_syndromes/ | {
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"So this is beyoned ELI5 imo, so I'll just keep it simple. Maybe... ELI10...\n\nFirst lets do a recap.\n\nThe normal human has 23 pairs of chromosomes for a total for 46. People with Down Syndrome have an extra copy of chromosome 21. This is why the other name for down syndrome is trisomy 21. \n\nNow lets also compare men to women. Men have 46 chromosomes, of which one pair is called the sex chromosomes. Men have one X and one Y (aka XY). The Y is substantially smaller and codes for much less than X. Women have 46 chromosomes as well, however their sex chromosomes are two Xs (aka XX).\n\nThe question must be posed that if three copies of chromosome 21 is bad by virtue of causing all sorts of defects that we see in people with Down Syndrome, couldn't it also be bad for women to be expressing double the amount of X than men? Well it turns out that -- generally speaking -- in each cell in women, one of those X chromosomes is shut off. Which one depends on what happens as a zygote, but let's not get into that for now. Just know that they only actively use one of their X chromosomes in a given cell.\n\nWell! this also begs the question: how does this happen? The process for this is not entirely mapped out, but as the article states, it certainly involves the usage of \"Xist\" which silences one of them. Effectively, one of the X chromosomes is read and eventually converted into protein (the normal function of a gene) while the other sits there unused (you can read up on it if you want, they are called Barr Bodies).\n\nSo the idea is that if we could use this same silencer that women normally use on their \"extra\" X chromosome, maybe we could use it on the \"extra\" 21 chromosome in people with Downs Syndrome.\n\nHope this helps. The article didn't go into more detail, I was simply translating what I read.\n\n"
]
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"http://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/1ihxu2/down_syndromes_extra_chromosome_silenced_in_lab/"
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189xk3 | how does my task manager know when a program has "stopped responding"? | I know what causes a program to stop responding (Stuck in an infinite loop, can't find a resource, etc.), but what allows Task Manager (and that thing that "Whites Out" non-responsive windows and shows "Program X has stopped working") to know when an application is no longer working? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/189xk3/eli5_how_does_my_task_manager_know_when_a_program/ | {
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"Basically, at the core of most windows applications there is something called an event loop. The event loop is simply a bit of code that runs over and over again until you close the application.\n\nWhat this code does is it constantly asks windows if anything has happened (known as 'events') since the last time it asked. If something the application is interested in has happened then it will react to it. \n\nSo you end up with a conversation between the application and windows that follows something like this;\n\nApplication: Has anything happened yet?\n\nWindows: No\n\nApplication: Has anything happened yet?\n\nWindows: No\n\nApplication: Has anything happened yet?\n\nWindows: The user clicked button 1.\n\nApplication: Ok, I'll show the user a message.\n\nApplication: Has anything happened yet?\n\nWindows: No\n\n\nThe primary way that windows determines if an application is not responding, is by checking how long it has been since the application last asked about what has been happening. If it has been a long time then the application is determined to be \"not responding\" (to events)."
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4fpi4g | why do loud noises like a hammer hitting wood make us flinch? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4fpi4g/eli5_why_do_loud_noises_like_a_hammer_hitting/ | {
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"Deep inside the oldest parts of your nervous system, there are circuits designed to protect you from injury faster than you can think. A flinch is the beginning of a motion away from whatever scary thing suddenly made a noise -- whether it was a predator, a falling rock, or something harmless, you can think about that half a second later."
]
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55dl9i | columbus took three ships on his famous journey. how were they able to stay together and communicate with each other? did anyone go from one ship to the other? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/55dl9i/eli5_columbus_took_three_ships_on_his_famous/ | {
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"When they sailed they actually had quite good weather, allowing them to traverse back and forth between the other ships. ",
"They maintained line of sight. If they got separated too far it was a problem. One famous example of this was in 1733 when James Cook's two ships the Resolution and Adventure got separated in a heavy fog off New Zealand. They had previously arranged a meeting point. Weather meant that one ship got delayed for several days by which point the other gave up waiting and returned to England alone.\n\nYes, in fact the Santa Maria ran aground and sunk off Haiti so the entire crew transferred to the other two ships for the rest of the return journey. Transferring people and supplies moved between ships was generally done using small boats in calm water, but it was also possible to use ropes to swing supplies or a person on a bosun's chair between ships.",
"To give some context to your question: it wasn't the first time people had sailed. Sailing has been around almost as long as humans have traveled. It's older than our writing systems. It's older than history we'll never know about. People of thousands and tens of thousands of years ago were *amazing* sailors. We tend to think of our ancestors as stupid, but they weren't. They had \"our\" brains. It's not like if you were dropped on an island and started to sail. The ability to read the sky, waves, weather, animals, the sun, wind, and other things I might be forgetting to such an accurate degree contributed. Yes, ships have been lost or separated, but ultimately it comes down to being able to communicate well with signals and trusting other ships to stick to plans like turning around or meeting at a location.",
"Flags. Assign the alphabet to a bunch of distinctive flags and start talking. Speed is usually not of essence, you have all day. For special manoeuvres, you add some extra flags (_URL_0_)"
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883ecv | who is jordan peterson and why is he widely talked about in politics? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/883ecv/eli5_who_is_jordan_peterson_and_why_is_he_widely/ | {
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"For \"what is this thing that Reddit's talking about\" questions, /r/outoftheloop is probably a better place to look than ELI5. They have [several past threads on this topic](_URL_0_).",
"He's a Canadian Psychology professor who became famous for publicly opposing Bill C16 in Canada that made it a crime to not refer to a transgendered person by their preferred pronoun. He has subsequently become popular with right wing advocates of free speech on college campuses.",
"Jordan Peterson is a clinical psychologist and professor from Canada. He has specialized in the study of the rise of authoritarianism throughout human history, the psychological and personality tendencies of men and women (in particular studying their differences), and the role that religion (any religion or mythos) plays in teaching the values of a society and various universal truths that go deeper than the surface of the story. \n\nHe is being talked about in politics a lot because he has been speaking against the rise of authoritarianism on the political left, in particular the Canadian laws regarding the use of non-binary personal pronouns and one of his debates was the catalyst for the fiasco that Lindsay Shepherd faces at Laurier university. "
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4j3cj0 | galaxies further away from us have a higher recessional velocity, why is this and how is it evidence for the big bang? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4j3cj0/eli5_galaxies_further_away_from_us_have_a_higher/ | {
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"It is evidence that the universe is expanding.\n\nHit the rewind button, and it is now contracting back into a single point.",
"Well, it's evidence for the \"big bang\" because the \"big bang\" answers the question of \"why is this.\"\n\nIf everything is moving away from everything else, then everything must have been much closer in the past. Far enough in the past and you have everything occupying the same point in space.\n\nOver the decades, there have been many proposals to explain this, and the Big Bang is the best model we have to explain what we see today."
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2tilo3 | how two programming languages are used in conjunction within a single application? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2tilo3/eli5_how_two_programming_languages_are_used_in/ | {
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"There's two major options:\n\n1. Different languages are used for different subsystems, and the subsystems communicate by passing messages in some well-defined exchange format - JSON, BSON, XML and so on are popular for this.\n* The different languages call each other directly using a [foreign function interface](_URL_0_). The computer has to switch between executing one or the other as necessary. Programming this way can get fairly complicated, especially if you aren't handing one language a complete problem to solve, give back a solution and forget about. "
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ddktai | generation z appears to be, on average, so much poorer than those of their parents. for most, ever owning a house seems unlikely, and even car ownership is much less common. what exactly happened to cause this? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ddktai/eli5_generation_z_appears_to_be_on_average_so/ | {
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"text": [
"Put incredibly simply: purchasing power went down. As resources are increasing much slower when compared with how fast the population is growing. Thus, demand goes up with the with the population. \n\nTo regulate the market, you can't just kill off the people (demand), so you regulate the price of the supply, so that the demand would drop (due to less people being able to pay the premium) to a point where supply would suffice the demand, thus allowing for a better situation than most other solutions would.\n\nTL:DR version; This universe is finite, its resources, finite. If life is left unchecked, life will cease to exist. It needs correcting. - Thanos.",
"Gen Z barely has the age to start looking for a new home (the oldest are still finishing college and whatnot). Is Gen Y (Millenials) who had and are having problems leaving their parent homes this decade.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nThat said, Gen Z is starting to have the same problem with very similar conditions. TBH Gen Y and Gen Z are practically the same gen with very similar social context and culture.",
"Honest question: Isn't Gen Z like 21 tops? Where is the data backing up the difference between Gen Z, Millennials and Gen X when the first of those groups reached that age?",
"If we could agree on that the elections would be a lot smoother.\n\nSo it depends on the politics of the person you're asking (if they even acknowledge the problem)\n\nEdit; there's this, _URL_0_",
"A combination of wage stagnation and inflation, a greater transfer of wealth from consumers to businesses. How much does your average house cost as a ratio of your gross annual income, say, 20-30 yrs ago as compared to present day? Middle class in developed countries have been shrinking, relative to developing countries. Is there a bubble that exist and should burst, creating opportunities and increasing quality of life for the masses? For those on the sidelines waiting to jump into the housing market it’s much welcomed. Was oil at $100/barrel in itself a bubble? Is a dollar better in consumers’ pockets better for the people than it is in business’ hands? Especially when the funds are offshore and not recycled back into the local economy?",
"A few things. Since this is ELI5 I'll keep them to short bullet points:\n\n1. Previous generations had an america centric economy where every other power was playing catch up, poor, or recovering from WWII. This is no longer the case. A lot of the jobs done in the west are now done elsewhere.\n2. Because there's higher competition for those jobs, employers can get away with paying less. Because if you won't take it someone else will because we're all fighting for a smaller number of jobs.\n3. Minimum wage hasn't kept up with inflation in a long, long time. A minimum wage worker in 1978 was making the equivalent of $14.71 at minimum wage, but their actual pay in 2019 is $7.25, or less than half as much. So the minimum is worth far less.\n4. Cost of living has also gone up so those fewer dollars won't go as far. Big ticket items like cars and homes are increasing in price faster than the cost of living. A car was about $4,645.00, which would be a bit over ten thousand dollars in 2019 money, in 1978. A modern car costs a little under forty thousand on average now.\n5. This is also true of basic day to day items. Milk and bread have increased in price far beyond inflation. Gas has increased even more dramatically. So the fewer dollars you're getting are getting eaten up just getting by.\n6. College tuition's have gone up to an even greater degree. More colleges are rebranding and remodeling to take in increasing tuitions that can only be paid for by student loans. College funds were common for a lot of households but even if they could hold on to that money it was basically irrelevant since an education costs as much as a new car. Which means you pay for a career you haven't started by taking on loans you hope you can afford later. Which, as we see for the first three points, is contingent on you getting a job that may not even exist when you graduate.\n7. Gen Z came of age during and after the housing crisis of 2007. Even by those standards the economy was bad. Calling what happened a recession essentially underplays that it was essentially a second great depression that made all of the above worse. \n8. As a result of all this heavy economic insecurity a lot of people just aren't marrying or having kids. You don't exactly need a house for one or two people and if someone is judging potential partners based on lifestyle(and implicitly or explicitly income) they're going to be screening out the people most affected by this. The amount of young people who aren't even sexually active, let alone in a relationship or planning for a family, has gone up dramatically in the last decade. If you don't have more people you also don't exactly need a newer safer car even if you're one of the ones who can afford it.",
"Governments realized that the middle class could be politically controlled if they had huge mortgages. They would always vote based on which party promised to keep house prices high and interest rates low. \n\nAnd the housing market was designed to be another capitalist, speculative, wealth generator instead of an essential commodity for a healthy society. \n\nAll of this combined with the effect of an aging population and workforce, globalisation, economic slowdown post WW 2 and economic liberalization ( trickle down economics ) has seen Generation Z in Western countries comparitively left behind.",
"Prices increased, as they always do. Productivity increased, wages did not, as more of the rich wanted to skim more and more off the top. Now no one gets paid enough to afford any of the inflated prices",
"I'm assuming you mean millennials?\n\nIt basically it just boils down to wages have nowhere near increased so much as living expenses. Houses, cars, especially school have increased way more than wages. \n\nSo while it's true the average wage is higher than say 1970, almost every basic living expenses was increased even more. \n\nAs a side note regarding car ownership, there has also been a large trend towards millennials just not wanting to buy cars. I, a millennial, would have no problem buying a car, but haven't had one in 6 years and see no reason to. There just a burden for me. Here is a little more info: _URL_0_",
"Globalization and the IT boom happened. And the US had a pretty unique way of dealing with it. \nAnd no, I actually support globalization and think its overall pretty great but let me explain the problem:\n\nAmerica tried everything (successfully) to protect itself from a true open world market yet everything to make their corporations world Market leaders. And this worked, America still has the most companies on the planet by far and they have extreme influence on politics in many countries. \nAt the same time the US workers didn’t get most of the egalitarian aspects of flexible workforces. In a free global market probably 90% of the highest income American workers would be now out of job. Sorry, no programmer outside the US makes regularly 100-400k in income. It’s insane and stupid to pay For Labour that exists for half of that elsewhere but America protected their valuable core industries and also importantly not just those overpaid workers(by global standards) but also the truly rich who aren’t employed but actually own (parts) of these mega corporations.\n\nNow fast forward to today - the US has still a lot of people making much more money than elsewhere in the world in exactly these large core industries and union jobs (which aren’t flexible at all) but also lots of people making what is more akin to global standards in less regulated jobs in industries where America doesn’t dominate. \nAt the same time a lot of the very wealthy and truly rich invested in stuff like housing while taxes are spent on military, debt and inefficient systems and not public education or efficient healthcare. Mix this together and you have a large income equality with rising prices many cannot afford and a crumbling public education system. \nBut again, Generation Z People working for or somehow connected to America’s world leading industries and boom regions or work union jobs are not poor or have it worse at all.\n\nOr think about this: yes, American steel workers make 3-5 Times what people in Asia and 2-3 Times what they make in Europe as steelworkers but how many workers in the steel industry jobs are still in the US compared to the past?",
"can someone please break down how we have put the different generations in groups? who are boomers? with ones are gen z? gen x I've heard since early 90s so xers are from 80s? does someone have a chart or something? \n\n\nEdit: \nshould have read comments, BrieLarsonsEvilTwin already had the answers! \n[_URL_0_](_URL_0_) \n\n\nbut it might be false informations since its the evil twin.",
"This is a trend all over the west.\n\nAnd really... simplest explanation is that they and millennias got the rough end of the globalist economy stick, and technological development. (I was born 93, so I often get allocated to both groups.)\n\nThere are no more good basic jobs in the manufacturing that have a steady and decent pay. (Not everyone is going to be an engineer, doctor, architect. Noe would there be demand for them.). Without good pay from which you can save money, it is really hard to own things. You can't get or afford loans.\n\nThese manufacturing jobs had a long supply chains that employed lots of people. Both white, and blue collar.\n\nThese jobs are now in China and India, their logistics are run by Asian crews, and owned by massive global corporations.\n\nThere is no longer an economic spine that everyone can participate regardless of skill, education, or experience level. \n\nNow... I'm not American. Im from Finland. We have the same discussion here. No one is going to invest to anew home or car when your jobs are 3-6 month rental work contracts that can end at any moment. (Because rental contracts can dnd whenever client cancels the order. 0 job security.)",
"Grossly simplified: Wages have stagnated for decades (aside from inflation), at the same time the cost of a house or car has increased. Why? Because the top 1% pocket all the profits of economic growth.",
"Reagan.\n\nMore accurately: Reagan and Thatcher.\n\nEven more accurately: Starting in the 80s a range of economic policies were enacted to deregulate financial industries, removing many of the safeguards that stopped stock traders and banks from making high risk gambles. Simultaneously taxes were cut on the wealthy and spending on social services slashed, with the idea that giving all the money to the wealthy would somehow cause the wealth to \"trickle down\" to the poor.\n\nIt didn't.",
"One of the main reasons for the housing issue in the uk is thanks to the torys. In the 80s they brought in what was called the”right to buy”. This allowed people in council housing the right to buy their home. so everyone bought their home, but no homes we’re replaced. So anyone looking for council housing now has really long waits. Enter predatory private land lords who charge more than double for rent what councils do. \n\n\nmy mother bought her council flat for something in the region of 15 grand. That same flat today would cost a first time buyer upwards of 70 grand. And what’s worse is that the area has gone down hill since my mother bought and sold it. My mother, being able to get onto the property ladder with relative ease, bought a house in 2006 for 145 grand. When she sold it less than 10 years later it was worth 250 grand.",
"At it's most basic level; income has not kept up with inflation.\n\nMy dad - a blue collar tradesman - bought his first house at the age of 25 in 1990. Speaking to him now, when he looks at the income of the young people in his industry now there is no way in hell they could afford to buy a house.\n\nGoing further back, my grandparents raised 4 kids on the salary of my grandfather who was a police officer at the time. My grandmother was a stay at home mom. This was in the 70s and 80s. All 4 kids were put through school, never lacked anything and there was even enough money for annual family vacations. Absolutely no way you are even raising two kids on a police officers salary today and living the lifestyle my grandparents did.\n\nI'm not American. I'm not even from Europe. This is a global thing. Gen Y got screwed. Hard.",
"Our societies rules are now made for corporations instead of individuals. The more money the corporations make the more they can change the rules. \n\nThe federal reserve's supply of money and inflation rates are among the rules that have been bent in favour of the elite and corporations, leaving individuals with less economic power over time.",
"Generation Y seems heavy in this category. At least the younger end of it. The only people i know under 30 who have settled down live in small town USA. Where the wealth has been inherited and passed down for generations, money doesnt matter, and their lives are just a continuation of what previous generations built. Small town USA is like a who's line is it anyway game",
"If people back in the day can work summers at a mcdonalds to buy a car, and I work year round just to fucking be able to go to mcdonalds, what can one do?\n\nI live in a very expensive city to boot.",
"Everyone touched on inflation etc but no one is mentioning that we’re spending a LOT more money than our parents, even us in our 30s. Back than you didn’t change phone every 2 years, pay 200$ a month for a contract, 100$ for internet and buy all the fancy stuff we buy. Restaurent was once or twice a month luxury ... now you have Uber eats etc.",
"For housing specifically, heavily suppressed supply. Sure they're building lots of suburbs, but suburbs don't work anymore and the NIMBYs in charge refuse to give ground on alternatives. Developers couldn't build houses fast enough to cover demand if they wanted to.",
"Of course owning a house seems unlikely because that generation is still quite young. I feel that this question isn't valid. You need to work for a at least 5-7 years with a good job before you can think about buying a house (with a loan). That has been the norm.",
"Gen z may be poorer than their parents but they are barely adults some technically toddlers still...\n\nGen y, millenals are the one being 30 ish now and soo much poorer than their parents... no wonder their 10yo are even poorer...\n\nSo there you go... gen z is poorer because they are still in school \n\nThe reason why boomers are richer than following generations is what you wish to know.\n\nAfter 2 world wars the reconstruction and overall peace boosted the economy, so many dead from the wars meant that the loads of money being generated by this rapidly expanding economy was shared by less people and the ideas where to help each other since we were rebuilding. \n\nWhen the generation born in these time grew to take power they were used to constant growth and felt entitled to everything but dismissed younder generation as not having earned it.\n\nThe next generation also saw fast increase in population meaning that money from working class continued to flow up to older generations with fewer people and refusing to share down or let go.\n\nEven when they did, growth slowed down but there were still more people meaning that in an average family the rich parents fortune would be divided in more than 2 children (on average) \n\nLess money created, more people to shared it between themselves and old generations holding a lot of it captive...\n\nThat's the crook of it.\n\nSomething may be said about spending more on electronic and new tech but I am not sure it holds considering older generations spent more on things that are now comparatively cheap (cars, travel, meat....)",
"It's three main things. Mostly.\n\nOne: Wages haven't gone up much. For every dollar increase in the minimum wage since 1970, the price of an average item has gone up $1.36. When you look at most average people, their paycheque still buys the same amount of basic things at the store as it did 40 years ago. \n\nTwo: the things you mentioned cost much much more than they used to, but there isn't more money to pay for them. The only way most people make money is with their time, so that's an easy way to see how much harder it's gotten. \n\nIn 1970, you could work 755 hours a year at a minimum wage job to pay for a year of post secondary – that's 14 hours per week. You can work 14 hours a week and still do university.\n\nIn 2010, you would have to work 1,823 hours – that's 35 hours per week, otherwise known as \"full time work\". It's very hard to work full time but also go to university. But 70% of jobs now want a university degree (40% in the 70's), so people go into debt to get a degree to get a job, but then they can't buy a house or a car because they have so much debt. \n\nIt's the same with houses: in 1970 an average house was $23,600. In 2011? $240,100.\n Wages haven't gone up and paycheques still buy the same amount of stuff but a house costs 10x what it used to. \n\nThree: The things you said have become investments that don't get shared as much. Our parents were much more likely to get a first car as a hand me down, or help getting a first house, or getting the family house when their parents retired and moved to Florida.\n\nNow, our parents are living longer and better lives but they have less money, so they're not retiring and moving away, they don't give up their cars, and they don't have lots of money to share to help us buy our own.\n\nOur grandparents got to ride a really great wave of lots of people making money and things generally getting better for everybody. So our parents got a really easy start to adult life with cheap cars and houses to buy early and lots of help to get settled.\n\nBut things slowed down by the time we were born, so our parents couldn't help us out as much. And when we became adults our cheques pretty much stopped growing, and everything has been pretty tough since then. There's no way to get ahead when you're spending all your money on basic stuff, there's no help from outside when your parents can't afford to give you big gifts, and any little disaster like an unexpected hospital bill can ruin everything when you don't have any savings or a house to sell. \n\nThat's long but hopefully basic enough.",
"All the money went up. I guess some companies are making billions in profit and their staff aren't getting pay increases.",
"Does this only apply to the USA / Western countries? I see this often discussed often but Eastern Europe was shitty in my grandparent's and parents time as well, nobody is as \"well off\" or \"had it easy\" as it says and people weren't really earning more under socialism where you either sucked up or got shit money. Yeah getting a house is harder, yes rent prices are shit but I feel like things in general got better, and if i remember correctly salaeies have gone up on average as well.",
"One explanation is, that since the mid 1970s, worker's pay has not kept pace with productivity gains:\n\n[Unz:](_URL_0_)\n\n > **One third of American worker's pay is being stolen. Here's how.**\n > \n > Basically everyone’s data suggests the same thing. After seeing solid wage growth prior to the early 1970s, non-management worker pay stagnated from the mid 70s until the mid 90s, and rose more slowly than productivity from the mid 90s until now with the exception of one significant jump up during the housing market crash. The economic stagnation experienced by a solid majority of Americans, particularly the middle class, is the driving force behind a variety of economic, social, and political problems. It’s among the reason why many Americans eat too much cheap overprocessed food, why young people are burdened with debt to pay for degrees to qualify for more complicated and demanding jobs that don’t pay enough to pay off their student loans, and why more women are working outside the home and choosing not to marry as they can’t find husbands capable of supporting them. It’s the driving cause of both the left’s growing agitation for more socialist programs to make up for their lack of fair pay and the new right’s longing for a bygone era when the American economy was great because workers actually got paid what their productivity was worth. Finding the cause of this problem and solving it would relieve much of the growing polarization and political dissatisfaction that’s growing among people who are too young to remember an era when workers got real raises every year.",
"Our parents and grandparents didn't spend 2-300 a month on phones or internet, they didn't always have to have the newest model of car, they didn't shop on Amazon for shit they didn't need, and they didn't have game consoles filled with thousands of dollars of content. Subprime loans weren't offered to them, and they wouldn't have taken them anyway because they were taught in school how loans and interest work.",
"Its called the fiat money system. When they print money it goes to the top and then it never trickles down.\n\nOne has to wonder why did we give governments the ability to steal our savings through \"inflation\". \n\nEdit:Btw of course their way to measure inflation shows that there is none. Otherwise you'd know who is responsible.",
"Shit got WAY more expensive, but wages for the entry-level jobs Gen Zers have to start out in haven't really grown at all.\n\nPoof - crushing debt.\n\nWages in the types of jobs their parents are qualified for are doing just fine, AND their parents weren't set back by said crushing debt in their 20s, so they are miles ahead financially.",
"Wages did not increase for decades, prices of everything skyrocketed. On top of that, being poor is literally more expensive than being rich, you get charged more fees for things for being poor while the rich get discounts and massive amounts of leeway for being rich.",
"We are in an inflated bubble which is due to pop some day. Like a pimple.\n\nBanks and interest have pushed the rich elite up while forcing the poor down. \n\nThe gap has grown unstable. \n\nNow labor is worthless and people won't have the desire, livelihood, sustainability, or motivation to do such low paying jobs. So they'll either disappear and business will suffer, or theyll have to adapt. \n\nThe alternative is protesting and rioting.",
"Wages and cost of housing are directly related to the size of the work pool.\n\nWomen are more likely to be in work which increases amount of competition for jobs and in turn, helps to somewhat suppress wages.\n\nAs women now work, a typical household consists of 2 employed adults meaning higher household income. Demand for housing has also increased with the rise in economic migration which, when combined has driven prices up.\n\nIf a single adult wants to buy a house, they should be looking at cheaper apartments etc. If/when they move in with someone, these 2 properties can combine to open the prospect of owning a house.",
"Generational debt. Your grandparents never met a tax-cut they didn't like or a military adventure they didn't want other people to go on. They just weren't that into being all that responsible. \n\nSo every generation since they has been hosed.",
"Because from the Boomers onwards, wealth inequality has been on the rise, and genZ are going to live in the world of millions of homeless, thousands of working poor and hundreds of middle classers for every billionaire.",
"Workers stopped unionizing. \n\nYou know what an auto worker makes now? a UPS driver? Those used to be entry level jobs who got paid less than everyone else. Now they make as much as first year software engineers while everyone else is getting the shit kicked out of them. That's because they stuck together and demanded their fair share.",
"The value of the labour that you do, instead of going to the worker goes up the chain to the boss. They're richer than ever before because they skim a bit from every person in the chain below them.",
"In the past 40 years, the [average American worker’s pay increased by only 12%.](_URL_0_)\n\nMeanwhile, CEO pay has [increased **940%**](_URL_0_) in the past 40 years.\n\nNot to mention that over the past 2 decades [housing prices have increased 290%](_URL_1_) and [college tuition has increased by 311%](_URL_1_).",
"“The rich get richer and the poor get poorer” it’s cliche but it’s happening I’m more gen x but still feeling the pinch.",
"In addition to wages remaining the same since 1970, productivity has increased dramatically during this same period. So essentially, there is a lot more wealth now, but almost none of it is going to the lower and middle classes.\n\nThe pressures of declining income forced women into the workforce, which further eroded worker leverage because of more available labor.\n\nThen unions were attacked and successfully beaten back, which took an even bigger portion of worker leverage.\n\nNow the robots and computers are coming for 40% of all jobs in the next 20 years.\n\nThe rich need to invest this new income from increased productivity, that way they pay a lower rate of taxes then if it is cash income. So, they invest in real estate, which drives prices up. Good for them, bad for you. \nThey buy up their competitors, so you have to pay their prices. Good for them, bad for you. \n\nIn every way, they stack the deck that was already stacked for them. \n\n\nBillionaires buy the politicians. It doesn't matter if they are democrats or republicans, they are owned. \n\nCorporations are multinational, but our laws aren't. So they take advantage of the rules. Facebook is an Irish company, so they don't pay taxes. Try telling the IRS you don't owe income tax because you have a post office box in Ireland as your official address, see how it goes for you. \n\nAnd the news is owned by the same billionaires and rile people up over abortion and guns so we don't pay attention to the robbery being perpetrated on all of us. \n\nIt is a great time to be a billionaire, a lousy time for the rest of us.",
"This is only one possible partial cause, however I think overall ramifications of it has a larger effect than it seem. I think a large impacting factor is that of the recent generations (Millennials and Z) the outlook of blue collar jobs (Electrical, plumbing, carpentry, HVAC, etc) has been drastically put down compared to the notion of going to college and getting a good job. I went to college, got my degree, worked at a Fortune 500 company for 5 years, and absolutely hated it. I only went to college because that's what my parent wanted me to do. I'm now an Electrical Foreman and couldn't be happier. I think of the recent generations the \"blue collar\" jobs have been viewed by many as less successful life compared to graduating college. The field for Tradesmen is hurting for young guys. A lot of the old timers are retiring and there aren't as many young guys to fill the spots as there was in the past. Working in a trade is an incredible opportunity to be successful with or without a degree. I highly encourage anyone who is hesitant about college to check out any trade they are interested in. Robots won't be replacing the trades any time soon. (I know ill get comments about that last sentence, go for it)",
"NIMBYS and land speculators treating real estate like a retirement account/get rich quick scheme. The federal government subsidizing home loans, local government restricting housing expansion. Also wage stagnation and all that shit.",
"Wages stagnated, social security taxes rose, the entirety of the older generation holding on to management level positions until they literally die and medical technology keeping them around forever..... also a little hint of using the entirety of our inheritance (that would be our nest egg to start our own business, buy that house, take a risk, etc) to hospitals and pharmaceutical companies so they can squeeze an extra 6 weeks of life out of their terminal illness stricken bodies. \n\nRange of things.",
"Well, my parents bought a house in Chicago for under $100k in the 80's and have no student loan debt, so that's a start. No cell phone bill or cable bill either",
"Capitalism accumulated wealth among a small group of people, rather than allowing workers to keep the fruits of their own labor. There was a great book written about it, *Das Kapital*.",
"Truly ELI5: cheap credit. \n\nBig ticket items like houses and cars and education have continued to rise dramatically because getting loans to buy them takes less than five minutes. If credit wasn’t so easy and abundant, car manufacturers would go out of business because nobody would pay $65,000 for their shitty pick ups... they would be forced to lower prices. Same goes for college. Nobody would pay $35,000 a year for college if they couldn’t get a loan for it so they would be forced to lower price.",
"There has been a massive wealth transfer to the very rich mainly due to lack of effective regulation, demonisation of a unionised workforce and the manufacturing of consent.",
"Adjusted for inflation, the average house in the 1950s was $50k.\n\nAdjusted for inflation, minimum wage in the 1960s was $19 per hour.\n\nQuestions?",
"I can name several thing that have happened over the last 50 years. \n\n1. Exporting of jobs overseas. Companies found it more profitable to build factories in China and pay employees 50 cents an hour than to continue to pay workers here 10 to 15 an hour. In the short term profits were very high. The long term cost is now being felt with markets being hard press to consume those products on the new lower wages. \n\n2. A lack of investment in infrastructure of the US. (I'm from the US so I'll speak on what I know. Other country's experience may vary) Our dear leaders would rather give tax breaks to the wealthy, start wars, or fund their favorite welfare program than rebuild roads and bridges or invest in high speed rail. Those jobs make a difference, but suffering and anger gets votes. \n\n3. A concerted effort by colleges and universities to create the perception (myth) that if you don't have a college education you are going to be a failure. All the while raising the tuition every year into ridiculous levels far beyond it's actual value. In 1988, tuition at my alma mater was 335 dollars for the whole semester. Now it's about 5,600 a semester. They also have luxury dorms, a mandatory food plan, and other fees. Fueling this gluttony of greed is the student loan industry which will give kids loans to pay for their degree regardless of whether or not that degree is actually needed or useful for a career. Those student loans ARE the house payment and car payment. \n\n4. Assault on labor. After WWII, the US was a worker's paradise. High wages, free training, good working conditions. The average factory worker could support a family and have a house and car and appliances on his single wage. But greed is the only moral in business and there have been several great assaults on labor. First was feminism which nearly doubled the size of the workforce. Then there was robotics, then the first great wave of illegal immigration caused by NAFTA, then there was the exporting of manufacturing due to Globalization, then outsourcing, and now in-sourcing, and next is going to be automation. At no point has the politicians had the backs of workers in the last 50 years. They have allowed laws that destroyed unions and privileged businesses at the expense of workers. This, BTW, is why Trump got elected and since no one has figured it out it will be why he gets elected in 2020. \n\n5. Fake media. The media lies. They sold out decades ago and have been destroying their brands for a profit and we are only just now figuring it out. About 10 years ago the nightly news had reports about how the pharmacy industry was going to need thousands of new pharmacists and there wasn't enough people to meet the demand. This was paid for by several new pharmacy schools that were opening at the same time and needed students. There were not going to be a glut of jobs. But those students would still have to pay off those loans with whatever jobs they got. This was when I stopped watching the nightly news. They fucking lie to us and there is no accountability. This kind of disinformation has hurt millions of young people with costly mistakes and makes it impossible to live the American Dream (whatever that is anymore).",
"Because my bootstraps aren't big enough to pull up on /s\n\nIn all seriousness, I work 45 hours a week, and a 1 bedroom apartment is still over half my income. I make ~1900 a month, and in my city, a 1 bed is usually going for around $1100-$1300. I can't afford that while also paying off student loans, having a car, buying food ect",
"In short... globalization. Houses and cars were only that cheap in certain countries like USA. Now that USA has to compete more... it meshes up more with the conditions of the rest of the world...",
"ITT: People talking about symptoms without talking about the cause. \n\nThe ruling class went to war against the working class. That’s the cause. That is why wages haven’t kept up with cost of living. That’s why benefits have been slashed, and why unions have been decimated. That’s why this generation will be worse off than the last.\n\n50 years ago, establishment elites across both parties and through all industries began aggressively enacting policies that crush working people in order to consolidate more wealth and power at the top. Automation is inevitable, but it only contributes to wealth inequality when guided by laws and policies that favor the elites. If you’re part of the working class, you’ve been under fire for a half a century. It’s time act. You can fight back, or you can roll over and die.",
"The global resources discovered peaked in about 1970, since then the population has doubled, the amount of stuff remaining unused divided by the number of people, has plummeted. We are in resource depletion, plus bad policy from corporate influenced governments has increased debt. Sadly, you cannot build cars and houses out of software, shares in companies with no material resources are worthless, and you cannot eat money.",
"Well you see the people with large amounts of money wanted more money so they are siphoning it any way they can from the american public. The trickle down stopped trickling down long ago and to quote [tupac these are the people you give humanitarian awards to.](_URL_0_) It basically boils down to greed plain and simple. There's better eli5's on this thread.. Back when there was an american dream you could afford a house and a car on the average workers salary but that's long gone.. Most people live paycheck to paycheck now without any savings and a lot of debt..",
"Capitalism caused this. Since the 1980s we have taken a system meant to take wealth from the majority and funnel it to the top and sent it into hyperdrive and now all the wealth is held by a few very, very rich men.",
"In general the greed of previous generations, and dumbing down of our education system. The top 1% sucking as much of the wealth and power as they can while simultaneously blaming the poor and defunding of programs meant to help people like social security, medicare,etc. Greed and stupidity.",
"Gen X and Millenials all said the same thing. You always feel poor after college. Then you start making money and you feel less poor.",
"Living got very expensive. Grocery shopping pretty much takes most of the money, bills sky rocketed and the salary is just the same.",
"The US is still the richest nation in the world but that wealth is concentrated in the fewest hands in the history of our nation. \n\nTangentially, at the time when wealth was most equitably distributed amongst the populace, the tax rate on the most wealthy in the nation was 90%.",
"I recently moved from Denver to South Carolina. In Denver I was making 40k/yr and living paycheck to paycheck for a one bedroom apartment off the highway. \n\nPeople keep talking about how much cheaper it is to live in the south and, while it might be true for housing, goods/gas/groceries/etc. all cost the same. And because \"the housing is so much cheaper\" jobs down here pay half what they do in Denver so it costs effectively the same percentage of what I take home to live in an objectively worse part of the country.",
"Inflation, wage stagnation, soaring house prices and rising costs of education.\n\nMy parents bought a large 4 bedroom house for £120,000 without issue about 20 years ago. I now need double that for somewhere half the size.",
"World population doubled since the 50s. Jobs didn't double. Jobs being automated. 8 dollar beers. TV and video games are really awesome. Super Gonoreah",
"House prices went astrological. The house I lived in until I was 19, sold for £27k. That same house is \"worth\" £90k+ today. Have my wages increased by the same margin? No.\n\nIf only I was a little older, and perhaps a little wiser, I could have had my own house by now.",
"It depends where you live. In a lot of frontier markets younger generations are doing better than their parents. In developed countries while I agree with other comments here, I also feel over consumption and poor savings practices in younger generations are big contributors",
"Wage stagnation....I'm making the same as my parents were in the 80's except houses aren't 100,000...gas isn't 50 cents a gallon...and a full grocery cart isn't $30.",
"It's why voting is Important. It was all designed to be this way, to be done slowly over the course of a generation. Not sure if a 5 year old can really grasp this issue, most adults can't.\n\n\\-[In the late 1970's they made Student Loans non-dis-chargeable in bankruptcy in order to usher in a new era of slavery.](_URL_0_)\n\n[\\- President Reagan then gave lots of money to people that missed slavery so they could buy Chinese slaves since the US ones would take a while to grow.](_URL_4_)\n\n[\\- They made Broadcasting Propaganda(Fake News) Legal by abolishing the Fairness doctrine, paving the way for people like Rush Limbaugh to brainwash the public over the radio and stories like Pizza Gate and the Birther Movement to run rampant](_URL_2_) \n\n[\\- in 2003 their new slaves were old enough, with no blue collar jobs to turn to, the government introduced them to \"Sallie Mae\" and Privatized the College industry so kids could go six figures into debt at Full Sail and Trump University](_URL_3_)\n\n[\\- They made people not want to vote and actively prevent those that do, leaving only those capable of seeing the issues, and those easily manipulated to vote along their Tribe Leaders Direction to push their agenda](_URL_1_) \n\n\\- With the US being the youngest first world country with exponentially more land mass, the wealthiest people from all over the world flock here and send their children (Now too armed with master degrees, but paid for by taxes instead of private 30 year mortgages ) to drive up land prices and cost of living in our most developed cities. Pushing locals further and further out into the country side",
"You can’t really start making assumptions about Gen Z already, as most of them are still in school.",
"Ronald Reagan’s administration restructured the tax-code to funnel trillions of tax-payer dollars away from the middle class, small businesses, and individual entrepreneurs... UPWARDS: creating de-facto welfare-subsidies for the ultra-wealthy at the expense of the rest of the nation, in a nut-shell. “Trickle down” economics was supposed to makeup for loss in federal revenue by gradually filtering down the economy; instead, all that wealth accumulated into the coffers of an elite few and has been hoarded (and stored in offshore tax-havens) ever since... all the while our national infrastructure has been crumbling. Reagan’s tax-cuts caused an exponential and unprecedented explosion in national debt, the cost of which was transferred onto the backs of the middle, working, and poor classes. As a result, the middle class was gutted, while the wealth disparity between the middle class and the top 1% sky-rocketed to historic levels. \n\nThis gave rise to the corporate-fascist oligarchy we now live under. Because of this, wealth buys influence and power in our political system. The disenfranchised middle-class and working classes, have been stripped of assets, equity, savings, and virtually all leverage within the socio-economic political system. Additionally, institutions of higher learning, minorities, and public investment have all been scapegoated and attacked by corporatist media, to satisfy a huge, illiterate, impoverished voting bloc (Republicans) into advocating against their own best interests by maintaining the status quo. Even the term “liberal” itself, the principles of which western democracies are built upon, has become a dirty word in the propagandistic lexicon of the corporate-fascist machine.\n\nRonald Reagan himself admitted that the debt explosion was the biggest failure of his presidency. To this day, those 1% special-interests continually advocate for this anti-free-market, communism-for-the-wealthy scheme... even though repeated tax cuts for the wealthy have only ever been shown to explode national debt, at the cost of our national integrity, infrastructure, equality, democracy, and very existence. \n\nBoth Adam Smith (Founder of Free-market economics) and Karl Marx recognized the cyclical, predictable, and entropic inevitably of a decadent capitalist system. Crucially, both thinkers advocated for an economic scenario that ties labor compensation (wages) to growth in production, in order to maintain a sustainable model, stem the spiral of debt, greed, and corporate monopolies, which eventually destroy every capitalist society. By either of their measures, we are living in a late-stage capitalist cycle, and we are witnessing the decline of American hegemony, and western liberal democracy as a whole.",
"This post made all the unemployed econ majors dust off their old degrees and drop their 2 cents - which adjusted for inflation from the date they received their degrees is now worthless.",
"I'm 58. My salary is slightly in the 6 figures but I started at $21k. I bought my car for $4k cash. I've never purchased any jewelry. I have no children. I'm trying to pay off my home which I bought for $140k in 2002. My goal is to retire and travel a bit. See Europe and hopefully the Tour de France. Maybe move to Mexico.\n\nI don't think my generation is that different. We all have to choose then prioritize those things which we want. Few can have it all. Live modestly. I think living modestly and not sapping the Earth's resources is a virtue. Deferred gratification is a great power. You'll get there. This is a message of encouragement.",
"Most of the population has been being paid 100% since around 1970. Meanwhile things may cost 5000% or more. When things used to cost 1% to 10% making 100% was fine. When renting a home costs 70% and utilities cost 35% and food costs 25% you can see where things start to go badly.",
"If I had invested what I was putting towards my student loans every month since 2014, I'd have nearly 20,000-30,000 in a 401k or invested account. Instead, I do not and I still owe 10,000 of what I borrowed. Instead of taking advantage of 7%+ growth, I'm losing 4%+ a year on that money. \n\nMy salaries have never been enough to both pay down debt AND save more than 50$ a month in a emergency fund that disappears twice a year with minor emergencies (new breaks, dental work, etc). \n\nSo.... how am I suppose to buy a house? It will take me until 30 to be debt free, and then I'll have to start from scratch having lost out on the most important decade for investing money.",
"Unions were vilified and destroyed, union membership and power plummeted, all profits that should have gone to working people went to the bosses and plutocracy. They bought all branches of the government including the media, and all processes that could have helped working people were co-opted into serving the plutocracy. \n\nAnd the people let this happen.",
"Because those with the money lobbied the government to make it so they could get even more money, and that money has to come from somewhere as they like to say. The middle class is being rung like a barely moist rag for every drop of water it has, if something doesn't change soon the middle class will be a thing of the past .",
"Boomers screwed up the economy, the government, and the planet in general. The boomer generation destroyed this country and refuse to take responsibility for it.",
"I am seeing a lot of good points here, but one is missing:\n\nMedical Technology has advanced drastically. This has two effects on the wealth of the younger-than-boomer generations.\n\nFirst, it means that boomers and their parents are staying alive for a lot longer. This delays the younger generations from receiving their inheritance. Eventually time will play its part and a lot of money from the boomers and older generations will get passed on, and Gen x/y/z will gain some wealth. \n\nSecondly, however, medical technology is extending peoples lives...at the expense of their savings. Retirement homes, medical treatments, and prescription costs can be high draws on older folks. This reduces that amount of wealth they will eventually pass on when they die, diverting it instead into the pockets of pharma and insurance execs. \n\nThis is perhaps a less major contributor to the issue than tuition costs skyrocketing or wage stagnation against inflation, but non-the-less, a lot of people in olden times were given their estate/farm/wealth when their parents died, and these days it's not uncommon for people to meet their Great Grandparents, implying that it will be a long time before they can count on inheritance to pass on to them. \n\nTL;DR: medical technology advances are delaying inheritances and reducing their sizes, so younger generations are having to build their own wealth from the ground up.",
"One point not to forget, this is not the case for most of the world, it’s only true for few countries like the US for example.",
"Serious question - are OPs stats taking into account the fact that Gen Zers are between the ages of 4 and 24? If so, thats only leaving, like, 5 viable ages to gather data from to draw this conclusion of supposed poor-ness.",
"Decades of NeoLiberalism and globalism have gutted what *used to be* called the \"middle class.\" Some third world poverty has been alleviated and development taken place which some (falsely) cite as a \"win\", but it is *temporary* and ultimately has come at the expense of the wrong people, representing only the race-to-the-bottom that ends with a global slave class ruled by global elites. *Not at all* a *net*-***win*** for humanity.",
"Late capitalism is being realized in an era of extreme neoliberalism. Basically what everyone else is saying about wages, but with the reason included rather than just the effects being stated."
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| [
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/"
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[],
[],
[],
[],
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"https://www.forbes.com/sites/lanceeliot/2019/08/04/the-reasons-why-millennials-arent-as-car-crazed-as-baby-boomers-and-how-self-driving-cars-fit-in/"
],
[],
[
"https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/17/where-millennials-end-and-generation-z-begins/"
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[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
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[
"http://www.unz.com/article/one-third-of-american-workers-pay-is-being-stolen-heres-how/"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ceo-pay-in-940-more-than-40-years-ago-workers-make-12-more/",
"https://www.wsj.com/articles/families-go-deep-in-debt-to-stay-in-the-middle-class-11564673734"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
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[],
[],
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[],
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[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GL-ZoNhUFmc"
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[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://www.reuters.com/article/us-student-loan-crisis/column-the-student-loan-crisis-that-cant-be-gotten-rid-of-idUSBRE87E13L20120815",
"https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/03/us/politics/voting-suppression-elections.html",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine",
"https://www.treasury.gov/press-center/press-releases/Pages/js2173.aspx",
"https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs181/projects/2003-04/offshoring/history.html"
],
[],
[],
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||
4d6da2 | other than genetics, what causes myopia | I remember learning that reading in the dark or reading for extended periods of time can cause nearsightedness. Looking at something across the room every now and then can help prevent it. But I can't recall the reasoning why. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4d6da2/eli5_other_than_genetics_what_causes_myopia/ | {
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"imagine the lens -or the muscles that control the lens- in your eye like a chewing gum, if you stretch it, and immediately release it, it can return to the unstretched state. but if you stretch it and keep it stretched for a long time, when you release it, although it contracts a little bit, it cannot fully return to the uncstreched state. \nthat's more or less the reasoning behind one hypothesis.",
"I remember reading something a while back about the huge rise of it in china. The new theory is a lack of sunlight during the development years.",
"The short answer is that eyes are complicated and small problems aren't fixed like they are in other places. That adds up to poor vision. The longer answer isn't much more informative, unfortunately.\n\nFirst thing to note is that eyes are [complicated](_URL_0_) and our body barely knows how to make them. There's an outside lens called the cornea, which is mostly rigid. Behind that is a pocket of fluid called aqueous humor that helps the cornea keep its shape because the eye itself is fairly squishy. On the other side of that fluid is the crystalline lens, which is somewhat flexible and helps focus small details. The iris is also located here, just in front of the lens. Behind the lens is the vitreous humor, a thicker fluid that fills up most of the eye and keeps the shape. Of those 4 things, the body doesn't bother to fix aqueous humor or the crystalline lens, and only partially bothers to fix the vitreous humor. Only the cornea is repaired when there's damage because it's kinda just like transparent skin. The iris too, but that's a different kind of component.\n\nLight comes in, the cornea/lens combo try to focus it so it reaches the retina at the right angles to be useful. If the eye is too long or too short then it focuses at the wrong spot, and looks blurry. There are no muscles to put the eye in the right shape. All that vitreous humor is supposed to keep it spherical, but that doesn't really work. The crystalline lens can change shape a little bit to help refocus, but it can't do very much.\n\nAnd speaking of the lens, every time it's moved, it breaks a little. Nothing serious, but in 40+ years, it'll stop being quite so flexible. This is why old people need reading glasses. Damage it more severely from too much UV exposure or something and you end up with cataracts, which we just have to replace the lens surgically because the body doesn't bother fixing it.\n\nGenerally speaking, myopia is when the eye is too long. As for why it's more common now, the general vibe of various hypotheses is that as the eye develops, we're exposing it to the wrong kinds of things, so it develops wrong. \n\nThe visual stimuli hypothesis is that the eye depends on a strong light/dark cycle that so much time in relatively dimly lit buildings isn't allowing the right chemical gradients in the eye to push growth in the right way. A lot of darkness tends to result in elongated eyes for unclear reasons. More time in bright sunlight seems to reduce myopia occurrence.\n\nThe use-abuse hypothesis has to do with a lot of time spent focusing on close things strains the crystalline lens during development and as such it takes an incorrect shape. The eye is supposed to focus light from very far away when the lens is completely relaxed. There's a stage of development where that property gets finalized, and if you instead spend a lot of time focusing on close things at that point of your life, then looking at close things becomes the completely relaxed state. And because of how the optical components in the eye work, it's much easier to make close things come into focus than far away things so we'd rather have far away be the default state.\n\nThese two hypotheses don't account for cases when the cornea or lens may be shaped wrong for other reasons, sometimes genetic. But together, they more or less cover why there's been such a rapid increase in recent history. Both could be at play, but the visual stimuli hypothesis seems to have somewhat more consistent data (though it's also newer, so fewer studies have looked at it).",
"Any action that requires you to focus on something close to you, like using a computer or reading, if done often enough, can cause myopia. That's why some people with perfect vision while they were young can become nearsighted after 20. It's called \"Evolutionary nearsightedness\" (literal translation from french \"myopie évolutive\").\n\nOther than that, when wearing corrective glasses designed to correct myopia, if the correction is too strong, it will, in time, cause more myopia. For instance, if you need -4 but wear -4.50, it will worsen your myopia. One thing to note here is that eye doctors tend to overcompensate myopia, thus creating more myopia..."
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