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1ws2tp | if opposition groups don't like the government, why do they boycott elections? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ws2tp/eli5_if_opposition_groups_dont_like_the/ | {
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"If you think that the government is corrupt, if you boycott the elections and they get elected you can just continue saying they are corrupt.\n\nIf they actually ARE corrupt, then if you participated they'd just ignore your votes and put themselves in power but be able to say that the entire country supported them.\n\nIf they AREN'T corrupt, then you can continue opposing them for whatever actual reason you oppose them, while calling the elections illegitimate because the people didn't trust them to begin with."
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3z0596 | why do people still have problems conceiving? wouldn't evolution mean that those with 'poor' genes wouldn't persist? or are all problems with conceiving environment related? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3z0596/eli5_why_do_people_still_have_problems_conceiving/ | {
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"There's a mass variety of reasons.\n-birth/growth defects\n\n-doing something wrong (Ie having sex 24/7, or not around ovulation)\n\n-trouble conceiving doesn't necessarily mean they will never have a kid\n\n-traits can skip generations\n\n-genetic mutation\n\nAlso, evolution in the human race has pretty much stagnated. With so many people, and with so much technology, it's pretty much impossible for such people to \"breed out.\"",
"usually because people wait so long to get pregnant. an 18 year old couple can get the woman impregnated really easily. 35, not so much.\n",
"Biologist here\n\n1) Every person is a mixture of the DNA of their two parents. The DNA of each parent might work fine, but doesn't always work when two peoples DNA gets scrambled together. Negative traits can emerge from the wrong combinations of traits that might be fine in different combinations. If you have the wrong combination of genes, all kinds of things can go wrong, and one of those things might be reproductive problems. \n\n2) sometimes two people don't have compatible genes. Person a may not be able to conceive with person b, but they work just fine with person c. \n\n3) Evolution is not always good at removing every single bad trait. There are a variety of reasons why bad genes can persist in a population, including gene linkage. \n\n4) Every trait has some genetic component to it, but not every trait has a large genetic component. For example, having an unpleasant personality is often pretty negative, but genes only account for a small to moderate amount of the variance in personality. \n\n4) New negative traits can always be created through mutation, and evolution just hasnt had the time to fix it yet. Every one of us carries new mutations, although estimates vary on how many new ones we each have -- the estimates range from a few to a few hundred. "
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1lzh16 | why is that in the same room, same temperature, my boyfriend can be sweating while i am shivering? | We are close to the same height. If we are wearing the same amount of clothing - or even if he is shirtless and I am wearing a sweater, he can be sweating while I am so cold I am shivering. Why do we feel THAT different? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1lzh16/eli5_why_is_that_in_the_same_room_same/ | {
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"Does he have a higher body fat than you? Fat is very insulating and would explain for it. \nAlso is he active and take part in a lot of sports? A faster metabolism will keep you warmer, you've probably noticed after intense exercise you feel warm for hours after. ",
"There's a region in the brain responsible for temperature regulation, and it seeks to set your body temperature to whatever it deems best. That may vary slightly among people. When it (the hypothalamus) sets your body temperature above what it currently is, you shiver - this rapidly burns metabolic fuel which releases energy as heat. If your set point is below your current temp, you sweat, as the evaporation off the skin will cool you down(related to the energy input required to vaporize water).\n\nAlong with normal variation between people, even in yourself you vary about half a degree centigrade throughout the day. This can cause a fair bit of difference in how our body reacts to a temperature relative to someone next to us.",
"It also it partially due to your different genders. Males are designed to get rid of excess heat, more of their blood vessels are closer to the surface of their skin. Females, are designed to hold heat in. It traces back to how your body is wired for reproduction. \nWith more blood vessels closer to the surface, he feels warmer. \nNow, there are always exceptions but this is a pretty good rule for how most people feel. I'd link to the article I read but I'm on my phone. I think I read it in r/askscience somewhere. "
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7w9y9e | when investing in a mutual fund for retirement, where does the wealth come from? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7w9y9e/eli5_when_investing_in_a_mutual_fund_for/ | {
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" > where does the wealth come from?\n\nThe companies the fund invests in become more profitable over time, producing greater profits that pay out greater dividends to shareholders, increasing the value of the equity you hold via the mutual fund.\n\n > am I just making others poorer\n\nNo. The return you get is a portion of the increased wealth the company generated. If I take seeds and grow vegetables I've made myself richer without making anyone else worse off. In this analogy you are providing me with money to buy seeds and getting a cut of the profit I make when selling the vegatables.\n\n > contributing to the wealth gap?\n\nYes. In general, if you are able to save and earn a return on those savings you are accruing wealth far faster than someone who cannot afford to. As such, you're growing richer far faster than someone who is poorer. \n\nThat said, it is pretty much completely incorrect to say that that is bad for society.",
"Everyone's work has value. Over time, that work adds up into money. Think of it like you're buying wood for carpenters. They need the wood to make furniture. Then in turn, you get a cut of the profits. Money supply increases as the value of goods increases. "
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1rnf5r | my friend brought over some glass bottled beer that was room temperature and said that if we wrapped them in wet paper towels and put them in the freezer, they would get cold faster. is this true? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rnf5r/my_friend_brought_over_some_glass_bottled_beer/ | {
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"Yes. The water in the paper towels will chill and freeze quickly, and since it's both denser than air and held directly against the bottle, it will help draw heat out of the bottle. \n\nIts not going to give you an icy beer in minutes, but it will speed the process along. ",
"John Green tested this in a Mentalfloss video. Apparently it works.",
"You can also put them in a bowl with water, ice and salt. This can give you chilled beers in a few minutes.",
"This works really well if your trying to get a bottle of something cold. Once the paper towel freezes shake the bottle to move the liquid around. You can chill a bottle of whiskey in 10 minutes. ",
"You could always... oh, I don't know... try it?",
"Within the freezer is a microclimate. There is a movement of moisture to the evaporator( old freezers would build huge blocks of ice by moving moisture from products to the evaporator coils , while newer \"frost free\" refrigerators have a defrost cycle, regardless of which kind the movement of moisture is still happening )\nThe evaporation of water carries with it a massive amount of heat.\nThe bottle of beer with a wet paper towel will experience evaporation of the water soaking the towel, this evaporation wicks heat out of the beer bottle faster than if you let the cold climate of the freezer cool the beer normally.\nSo yes the wet paper towel boosts the cooling process.\nFor a scientific understanding google \"latent heat of evaporation\"\nSource: 18 years of HVAC experience",
"The way to cool a drink the quickest is to put the bottle on top of a bowl of ice and slowly rotate it. The rotating of the liquid cools it all, instead of just the sides. One minute of spinning a can of soda in ice gives you a nice cold soda. ",
"If you want an even faster chill, put a small, deep container, big enough to hold a beer bottle, fill half full with rubbing alcohol, put it in your deep freeze, upright. If you leave it there, it will come down to your deep freeze temperature. Then, when you need to rapidly chill a beer, put it in the alcohol. 2-3 minutes, and you've got a deliciously cold beer...!",
"A wet paper towel will freeze very quickly, therefore applying freezing cold to the entire surface of the glass. like shoving them into the snow. It will quickly chill your beer.",
"Two things:\n\n1) Modern Frost-Free freezers circulate warmer dry air periodically to melt and evaporate frost. This has the affect of causing evaporation cooling to the wet paper towel that cools the beer.\n\n2) A wet paper towel increases the surface area the beer to the wall(s) of the freezer. It will likely freeze the paper to the walls, but it helps conduct heat from the bear directly to the surface of the freezer walls. It's basically the same effect as adding thermal past to a heatsink."
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4lei3h | why currency appreciation is bad? | In my very basic understanding of economics, it seems that having a strong nation currency is good.
Yes, appreciating currency hurts the exports and make imports cheaper, but is this downside that bad?
What are the benefits and drawbacks of appreciating currency? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4lei3h/eli5why_currency_appreciation_is_bad/ | {
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"If you are in a position where your economy depends on cheap exports you would want to keep your currency relatively weak compared to your trading partners. Because if your exports get too expensive, they'll go somewhere else and you won't have an economy.",
"It's a little bit complicated since the money supply is affected by a number of factors including economic inflation and recession as well as the money transmission mechanism. Fiat currency has no intrinsic value so it's not as if your dollar can buy more or less based on it's singular value. Also since we exist within a global market currencies value can change based on demand for said currency. \n\nHeres a situation: If there is a high demand for American goods, there will be a high demand for American dollars thereby causing the dollar to appreciate in value. As the dollar appreciates demand for American goods decreases until the dollar decreases in value and over time demand returns... But we like growth... So what the central bank can do is lower the interest rates. By lowering the interest rates they discourage saving thereby increasing the money supply and depreciating the dollar. This is what drives GDP growth. "
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5qt88d | how can malware get installed on your computer just by openning up a website and without the user getting notified about a download? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5qt88d/eli5_how_can_malware_get_installed_on_your/ | {
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"in general it just shouldn't be possible, everybody knows that this is a big security risk. Usually JavaScript and everything that allows your browser to run code on a homepage is the source of all evil. You just don't know exactly what this code will do on your computer. People try hard to make it save but programs have bugs and programmers don't always think about all possibles uses of the tools they develop.\n\n\nA basic approach of hacking is sending a string to your browser that gets executed and in some way nobody considered yet this code gets more rights to execute and write stuff on your computer than it should have. \n\n\nAnd i have to give credit to the hackers who develop those things. It is really hard and requires a lot of knowledge about a browser to do things like that. And as soon as other people notice how the code works they usually improve the browser to prevent something like it from happening again. \n\n\nBut nowadays most malware works by abusing the human mind \"click here for free iphones!\" or an email that says \"man, look at this picture i send you!\" or \"check out this cool game!\" are a lot easier to create and use.",
"Through exploits in insecure software, which downloads and executes something without the user noticing. An example of this insecure software is often Adobe Reader. Attackers basically make Adobe Reader have an error and then they use this to execute some code. \n\nAs soon as you can execute some code on a system you can basically control it. You can download more code to execute and do harm.",
"When you load a webpage there are things going on in the background to make that possible. For example images are downloaded and displayed, scripts are executed, plugins loaded etc.\n\nEvery time a program gets an input and does something with it there is a chance that such input is malicious (not the kind of data that the program normally deals with) and this fact should be accounted for by the programmer and dealt with in a graceful manner.\n\nHowever programmers do make mistakes and sometimes such malicious inputs aren't dealt with correctly and and the program can be derailed in its execution by such malicious code.\n\nFor example, the browser takes some picture in a website and decodes it so it can display it to you and the programmer didn't make sure to check that only precisely the size of the image can be loaded into memory, not a byte less not a byte more. An attacker can use that fact to create a particular image file that tricks the software into loading in memory more than it should which in turn causes it to write in an area of memory that enable the attacker to execute code.\n\nNow in a scenario like this it means that just by loading an image some code, aka a program, would be executed without any further action by you.\n\nFortunately most of these issues come from plugins like java or flash, which means that disabling them greatly reduces the risk of being victims of such attacks.",
"Because of bugs in your browser, or plugins installed in your browser. This is usually done with a buffer overflow attack to enable executing the data that was downloaded. The basics of this are as follows \n \n1. Flash wants to read part of the downloaded data, for instance to display a message. \n2. It thinks it only needs only 200 bytes to store this data, because that's usually the maximum size the data is, so it allocates 200 bytes in memory to store it.\n3. It starts to read the data, looking for the end of the data, usually denoted by a byte with the value \"0\". \n4. The specially crafted file actually contains invalid data, and will contain more than 200 bytes before a \"0\" is encountered. \n5. The program will continue copying the data into memory past the end of the 200 bytes it originally allocated. \n6. The extra data overwrites data in memory that was supposed to be executed later on by some other part of the program. \n7. The new stuff gets executed and you now have an infected computer. \n\n \n Usually the 2 biggest culprits are Adobe Flash and the Adobe PDF Reader. But there have been other exploits such as the standard Windows JPEG processing library, which could cause your computer to be infected simply by downloading an image to be displayed in the web page.",
"Malware is mostly spread through security vulnerabilities on your computer,\nfor example in your browser or some plugins your browser uses.\n\nThe most common ways for an infection are through JavaScript or the Flash\nplugin. Someone might find a bug in Adobe Flash to manipulate it into running\narbitrary code. Using this bug, he downloads the real malware to your computer\nand executes it. Since this still requires you to visit a website that serves\nthe exploit and quite sure you won't visit some site like\n_URL_0_ too often, there is often another step in the whole\nattack campaign like hacking a advertisement network and serving the exploit\ncode via advertisements. This way every website that includes ads from the\nhacked network, will serve the malware (that's why we love ad blockers ;)).\nAnother way to spread the exploit are so called Cross-Site-Scripting\nvulnerabilities in websites where a attacker can inject JavaScript code in a\nwebsite that will get executed when a user visits the website.\n\nBut using vulnerabilities in your browser or the plugins aren't the only ways\nto infect your computer. Another way that was described not to long ago but\nonly in theory (never seen in the wild) was to infect Fedora Linux using the\nfact that Google Chrome will download files without prompting the user and\nFedora will automatically index the downloaded files and create for example\npreview images for pictures or video files to show in your file manager. A\nattacker could cause Chrome to download a manipulated media file, that would\nbe stored on the disk and processed by the multimedia engine used by Fedora\n(called gstreamer). Due to a bug in gstreamer, when processing the manipulated\nmedia file, the attacker could execute code on the computer.\n\nAll in all, to infect a computer without user interaction the attacker needs a\nvulnerability in any program you use or multiple minor bugs combined in a\nclever way.",
"I answered this [yesterday](_URL_5_). Here's a copy of my answer.\n\n > A modern web browser is a complicated beast, with lots of different capabilities. It can do pretty much everything, from displaying complex graphics with custom fonts and playing audio and video in a variety of formats, to showing PDFs and doing all sorts of computationally intensive tasks. Browsers can also have addons and plugins, such as Flash, Java and Acrobat Reader. Websites can use your webcam and microphone, and access your local files, although only if you give it permission.\n > \n > Having the aforementioned capabilities means that browsers have a lot of complicated components, each with a lot of code. More code means more bugs, and some bugs can be abused by an attacker to take over your computer or steal your data.\n > \n > Getting infected by just visiting a website isn't that common these days, but it's still entirely possible, especially on shadier sites. Browser developers are pretty fast at fixing known exploits, but sometimes hackers use [zero-day vulnerabilities](_URL_2_). Keep your browser up to date and pay close attention to which websites you visit, and you should be safe.\n\n > [part 2]\n > \n > Yes, normally web pages can only save certain kinds of data, but certain bugs can lead into [arbitrary code execution](_URL_1_), meaning a carefully crafted web page can execute any code the attacker wants on your computer.\n > \n > Image, video, document and font formats can be quite complicated. For instance, two years ago [Google engineers discovered](_URL_0_) that a bug in Windows's font handling enabled carefully crafted font files to run arbitrary code on your machine. Since web sites can embed custom fonts, any website could've abused this.\n > \n > Plugins are also a common source of exploits. [Here's an example from this week.](_URL_3_) Cisco has a popular browser plugin called WebEx which is used for video calls. The plugin has to communicate with programs installed to your PC. Due to the incompetency of Cisco's programmers it's not limited to just communicating with their program, or only being usable from their website - any website can do anything to your computer. This applies to any browser the plugin is available for.\n > \n > Websites use Javascript as the programming language. Once again, things are complicated, so a serious bug in the language implementation can be exploited for who knows what. Almost every page already executes some code on your machine, and while it's limited to only certain things, breaking out of that [sandbox](_URL_4_) is not impossible.\n"
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5nsvbq | sometimes my phone's change with go from say 3% to 7% if i leave it alone for a long time. is it actually regaining charge? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5nsvbq/eli5_sometimes_my_phones_change_with_go_from_say/ | {
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"Your battery app calculates the remaining battery based on the battery power currently being used (mV) and your usage since it was fully charged.\n\n That's why you can generally do calibration to correctly measure the current battery status and range of it.\n\n Usually, if we ignore very little variations in the battery power, it goes down. So either your phone's forecast was wrong, or if the battery usage is lower than the expectation, in which case the battery level showed on your screen will increase a little. \n\nHope it was clear, English is not my native language, sorry about that. ",
"This mostly is because of how batteries work, it has two materials in it (usually plates of something), connected to electrodes. Charged ions move between the plates during discharge, and causing the current to flow. When the ion gets to the other plate it undergoes a chemical reaction and makes that spot on the battery discharged.\n\nHowever, the ions generally land on the surface of the plate, and make it so there are no more fully charged surface spots, even though there may be plenty inside the plate. The voltage of the battery is ultimately determined by how much charged plate space is exposed inside the battery. When a plate has an uneven distribution of charged spots, the ions tend to move around and even out (slowly), and drawing a large current quickly causes the surface of a plate to discharge. These two effects mean that if you quickly drain the battery it's voltage will drop quickly, in fact it will drop quicker than it normally would if you drew the same energy slower. This effect can be quite large, if you have a fully charged battery and short it, it will instantly drop into the millivolt range, but after removing the short it will restore it's voltage to something that closely resembles it's charge.\n\nSo it's the fact that the voltage is load dependent, with a time lag, that causes this error, your phone uses mostly voltage to determine charge. Doing something like quickly draining the battery then letting it idle can easily make it appear the charge went up. This is also why a dead battery can still read good if tested with a volt meter, it doesn't apply a load, so the voltage actually reads high, not something reflecting it's charge."
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1jcyq3 | what is the process of creating a maze in a cornfield? | Specifically ones when viewed from a distance create an image. From the planning, to actually cutting plants down, how is it done? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jcyq3/eli5_what_is_the_process_of_creating_a_maze_in_a/ | {
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"I actually saw the process at Roba's farm in NE Pennsylvania. They've done a ton, from Romney and Obama, to planes, to a beehive (last year's).\n\nThey start by planting a large farm of corn. Usually the corn grown isn't sweetcorn, which is edible for humans, but a different breed of corn, used as animal feed.\n\nThe pattern for the 'picture' is drawn out on grid paper, and is then blown up the same way those 'copy-the-grid' pages in coloring books work.\n\nRight before they grow more than a foot tall, they trample/rip up the areas that are walking paths and then mark them off.\n\nWhen the harvesting season comes, which is most popular for mazes, they put up wooden fences (usually, in the nicer ones) to prevent you from cutting through it.\n\nIn the case of Roba's, they'll put map areas deep in the maze, and you have to visit all of the 'map stations' to get the pieces of the map.\n\nI hope that answered your question."
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zlitv | why is new mexico so much more liberal than the other states surrounding it? | It seems to me that if you look at a [political map](_URL_0_) of the United States, states tend to lean either Democrat or Republican in clumps - the west coast and northeast are liberal, the Great Lakes area is somewhat moderate and diverse, and the rest is conservative. Yet for some reason New Mexico is the only state in the south that is strongly liberal (along with Colorado to a smaller extent), even though all the states surrounding them are conservative. Why is that? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zlitv/eli5_why_is_new_mexico_so_much_more_liberal_than/ | {
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"I was wondering the same thing yesterday. Hope you get a good answer.",
"I am not really sure, but I do know this: New Mexico is one of only a few states that are majority-minority (I know that Hawaii is too, I don't know of any others). So, whites do not form an absolute majority in New Mexicos population, rather, other minority groups (mainly Hispanics) are over 50% of the population. Whites are slightly more likely to vote Republican, whilst minorities are slightly more likely to vote Democrat. Hispanics actually swing more easily than other minorities, Bush did quite well with them, but the Republican party today is barely even pretending to care, so they will go for Obama by a huge margin.\n\nMost of the other states in that region still have white majorities, so they are a little more Republican. Actually, at the state level New Mexico votes Republican quite often, they have a Republican Governor right now I believe. But NM is safe for Obama this year due to the Republicans open hostility to Hispanics.",
"New Mexico is almost majority Latino and has a large Native American population, and those groups are mostly Democrats, and a lot of the white population in Santa Fe is liberal."
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5rfioh | what is fair tax and flat tax? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5rfioh/eli5_what_is_fair_tax_and_flat_tax/ | {
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"A flat tax is one of two things. \n\n1) You charge the same exact tax to every person. So if the tax is $2000 you charge everyone $2000. \n\n2) You charge everyone the same percentage. So everyone is taxed at say 30%. \n\nThe issue with a flat tax is that it hurts the poor more than it hurts the rich, as there are no exemptions or deductions. Everyone owe a flat percentage of their income, and due to the costs of the government that percentage has to be set high in order to get the money it needs to function. \n\nA fair tax does not means anything specific, but I think you are asking about a progressive tax. In a progressive tax you take into account how much harm a tax will do to someone. So the poorest will pay no taxes, and you gradually increase the amount paid in tiers going up 5% or so per tier. This is more \"fair\" because it does less harm. $2000 means a lot when it is 1 months pay or more, but it does not really mean much of anything if it is 1% of your salary. ",
"The term fair tax is subjective, depending on what is viewed as \"fair\", but I can tell you what a flat tax is.\n\nIt is generally regarded as a system of income tax where everybody, regardless of income level or possible deductions under current tax law, pays the same percentage of their income as tax. It doesn't matter if you make 20,000 or 2 million, you both would pay whatever it is, be it 10%, 20%, etc. Under most versions of the flat tax, there are no deductions, reinforcing the idea of it being flat and unchanging. Currently in the US, and Europe, and most of the world, taxes operate using brackets, where different levels of income are taxed at different rates. Keep in mind, income is only taxed at the bracket it lies in. If I make 100,000, at the first 10,000 is tax exempt, I pay no income on that. However, income between 80,000 and 100,000 might be taxed at 25%. \n\nThere are arguments for and against a flat tax, and whether it is fair. One argument for it is that since everybody pays the same percentage, and the same amount relative to income, its the most fair way of handling it. The argument against it is that affluent people have the ability to pay higher taxes without hurting themselves financially as much as the same tax would hurt a poorer person. \n\n "
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1gejo0 | why is paper money difficult to duplicate? | What makes it hard to forge paper money? What properties of paper money make it hard to forge and pass off as real money in everyday transactions? (not buying a car in cash or anything big)
If the answer is that it's not, what percentage of money in circulation is forged? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1gejo0/eli5_why_is_paper_money_difficult_to_duplicate/ | {
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"US money is made from linen which has a distinctive texture. It has a mixture of red and blue fibers scattered through it, special inks which change color depending on the angle, intricate patterns and smooth shades, micro print, embedded polymer strips with the denomination printed on it, and is infused with chemicals which will react with the ink of markers specifically designed to detect counterfeit bills. The ink of money even has a distinctive smell.\n\nAll of this combines to make forging money, if not possible, at least very difficult to do so profitably. It doesn't make sense to spend $25 to forge a $20 bill for example. Oh, and the Secret Service comes after you with black helicopters if you try it."
]
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[]
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|
1o0fly | how do they determine launch locations for rockets/space shuttles/etc? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1o0fly/eli5_how_do_they_determine_launch_locations_for/ | {
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"Short answer: That's where the launch pads are.\n\nLong answer: It really depends on what kind of orbit you're trying to accomplish. In general, it's useful to be closer to the equator, because that part of the Earth is spinning the fastest due to the Earth's rotation. Rockets launching from there and traveling east start off with that extra velocity from the Earth's spin. Orbiting is all about having enough velocity, so any extra speed that you can get \"for free\" is a big deal because it means you need less fuel. \n\nThe US chose Florida for most of their launch facilities because it's closer to the equator, and also when you launch a rocket east from there, it travels over the ocean, so if it explodes or crashes or whatever, it doesn't fall on populated areas."
]
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||
1j07ti | how does losing an eye lead to lack of depth perception? and to what extent does one face it? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1j07ti/eli5_how_does_losing_an_eye_lead_to_lack_of_depth/ | {
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"Hold up a finger in front of your face about 6 inches away. Next, alternate closing one eye (keep each eye open for about a second). You should see your finger sort of jump from side to side.\n\nIf your finger is centered on your case, the finger is a little to the right of your left eye and a little to the left of your right eye. This makes it seem like your finger is in two difference places. Your brain is pretty awesome. It gets the different signals from your two eyes and then assumes that the two separate fingers are the *same* finger and then makes a guess about how far away the finger is. \n\nIf the finger is very close to your face there will be a big jump in apparent positions. If the object is very far away (e.g. the moon) the object won't jump at all. \n\nSo when a person loses an eye, their brain only has 1 perspective per object. As a result, the brain can't make guesses about how far away something is.",
"The perception of depth is created using two sorts of visual cues, monocular and binocular. Monocular cues are well known to artists. Artists can give depth to two-dimensional drawings because they rely on the same sort of visual cues that we use when we look at a relatively-flat image as projected onto one eye.\n\nJust a few examples of monocular cues, with recent imgur pics:\n\nTexture gradient - when there is a texture or pattern to objects in the environment, the further away they are the more \"dense\" or small the texture seems to become. See, for example, the flowers in this picture: _URL_0_; or the cobbles in this road (ignoring the godforsaken Bieber fans): _URL_3_\n\nRelative size - objects that are further away tend to appear smaller. E.g., _URL_1_\n\nLinear perspective - As things get further away from us, parallel lines seem to converge into the distance. A great artist's trick is to draw a dot on your page and use a ruler to make sure all parallel lines are angled so that they are aimed at that dot. E.g., the trees lining the border in this US-Canada border image: _URL_2_\n\nThose are just a few of the ways that we can see depth without necessarily needing both eyes.\n\nBinocular cues, on the other hand, require both eyes and are what give us the greatest sense of three-dimensional depth. They work because your eyes are not in the same spot on your face. Because one eye is a few inches away from the other, they are taking in visual field that is angled a little differently from one another and so the image you see with your right eye is slightly different from your left eye.\n\nIf you've ever held up your hand in front of your face and tried closing your left eye, then switching to closing your right eye, then going back and forth to watch the image move, that's what I'm talking about. (And if you haven't done that, then dude, do it. Just don't smoke a joint first or you might not be able to stop doing it.)\n\nSo how does this translate into a three-dimensional image in our heads with depth? Well, our brain does some awesome and super-rapid math and uses the slight differences in images, combined with info about the angles at which our eyes are taking in the image, to make a single, unified image in 3d.\n\nLosing one eyes means we lose that binocular ability, and the rich, fully 3d perception of our reality. But it doesn't mean we lose our depth perception altogether, because our brain has a lot of ways to use monocular cues to figure out distances and such.\n\nTL;DR - Our brains are awesome; we use fancy math and angles to make 3d images with two eyes but also have tricks to see depth and distance with one eye. \n\n",
"I had a lensectomy when I was a month or so old. I have had sight in only one eye for essentially my whole life. In terms of depth perception it is difficult to explain what it looks like, or how I 'don't' have it as i have never had anything to compare it to. Also, as i have had it my whole life I can gauge how far away things are through experience, but not perceive a '3D' image as is able with two working eyes."
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"http://i.imgur.com/se4vr6d.jpg"
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2bjkdq | what is cloudflare's ddos protection is doing?(see picture) | _URL_0_
I'm always intrigued by what it's doing behind the scenes. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2bjkdq/eli5_what_is_cloudflares_ddos_protection_is/ | {
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"The DDoS protection ensures that there are not a lot of connection requests coming from the same place. If there were, it would ignore them so that they didn't hinder the operation of the site. Thats the idea behind it at least. Having used cloudflare on a site before, it didn't necessarily always work as advertised",
"Checks that your browser uses javascript, most DDOS attacks dont \"read javascript\" so they cant continue."
]
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"http://i.imgur.com/nKV5MnM.png"
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3jobgj | why do smoke detectors require batteries, when they are plugged into the wall? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jobgj/eli5_why_do_smoke_detectors_require_batteries/ | {
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"Smoke detectors don't get power from the wall. In cases of fire or other situations where you would really want your smoke detector to work, power outages are common. The fire could spread in between your fuse box and the smoke detector and cut off power to it, so it uses a battery.",
"You want them to keep working if the fire damages the wiring and the mains power fails, or just if there's a fire during a power cut.",
"In Australia it is now illegal to install smoke detectors that run purely on batteries. All smoke detectors must be wired to the main electricity supply AND have a backup battery in case of power outages. Having said that, it's amazing how many people don't have legal smoke detectors. Many people don't even have smoke detectors installed. You'd think in this country people would have more sense."
]
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139wiz | why linux is so special among unix flavors (unices?) | Unix was around long before Linus Torvalds came along, right? And there were all sorts of different competing varieties. Then Linux was introduced, and now it's taken over the roles that would have been filled, and the competition's between different kinds of Linux. So what makes Linux so special that it's considered separate from Unix, and why is it so popular? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/139wiz/eli5_why_linux_is_so_special_among_unix_flavors/ | {
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"Unix was first released in 1970; Linux started about 20 years later.\n\nWhy is it popular? It's free, reliable, and supports a lot of hardware. *Free* separates it from most of the early Unix implementations. *Reliable* and *supports a lot of hardware* helps make it popular.",
" > So what makes Linux so special that it's considered separate from Unix\n\nWell, first of all Linux is *not* Unix. Unix has a specific meaning, going back to the original product and progressing down through all the licensing to its modern day forms. Linux is instead Unix-*like*, it's designed to be compatible with Unix in many ways. A contrasting example would be Apple's OSX, which really is Unix-*based*. The similar system structures mean that a lot of stuff works in similar ways and many programs are very easily compatible with both types, but linux is entirely written from scratch and does not include any original Unix code. That's actually an important legal point that's been contested in the past.\n\nWhat this really means is that Linux is independent of Unix's licensing. Not only this, but it is a big flagship example of the free software and open source licensing community. Right from the beginning, it's been developed as a community effort with contributions from all over the place, leading to its modern position supporting an amazing number of different systems with an amazing amount of flexibility both in theory and in practice. Actually, this part turns out to work extremely well, the linux kernel and all its associated tools for the tasks it dominates are considered extremely high quality and are popular for this reason.\n\n > and why is it so popular?\n\nIt's become popular because a mixture of the above properties turn out to work really well for many different people. Its massive flexibility and free availability make it the obvious choice for many different tasks. For instance, if you want a simple OS to run your DVD player or TV recorder, you don't want to have to build your own from scratch or to buy one, it's simply not important enough...but thanks to linux you don't have to. Or a more modern example...if you want to build a phone OS to compete with iOS and don't want to build it from scratch, the linux kernel is already there with all those features you need baked right in.\n\nIt's also popular for more standard computer tasks such as servers or supercomputers. This is mostly because it's really well designed and supplied for the job, partly because it's so popular and its open nature feeds this popularity back into further development. This kind of relatively technical application also avoids the areas where it's traditionally fallen down, such as user friendliness (not to say that it still does so...progress recently has been very good).\n\n > and now it's taken over the roles that would have been filled, and the competition's between different kinds of Linux.\n\nI don't know how true this is exactly, but in general this is again for the reasons above. It's popular, flexible and open, so there's both the drive and the technical ability to make it run on practically any hardware. Not only this, but it means then all your hardware can have the same base and be developed in the same way.",
"Linux is:\n\n* free\n* runs on cheap PC hardware\n* lightweight\n* reliable\n* embraces free, open source software\n* has incredible community support\n* gives you full access to how it works, and allows, nay, encourages you to improve it\n* infinitely configurable"
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41xpat | what causes old dogs to sleep and lay around all day? | My dog seems to do nothing and still manage to be tired (she's a 10 year old border collie-black lab mix). I run her every few days whenever she wants to play. But, she'a always sleeping and seems tired | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41xpat/eli5_what_causes_old_dogs_to_sleep_and_lay_around/ | {
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"It's just old age. As living creatures get older they slow down, take longer to recover from exercise, or just get tired from day-to-day activities. Also most dogs sleep about 12 hours a day and some breeds even more. When dogs are bored or don't have anything better to do, they will sleep or just rest. An older dog, it just makes sense that they are probably going to sleep a bit more than a younger dog. They're also more likely to have joint problems, like arthritis, and other ailments related to old age. ",
"My uncles lab is 11 and she seems to save every last bit of energy for when people get home (or to tip the trashcan) she lights up and her billy club of a tail starts knocking everything over.. I just realized I'm not answering the question at all. \n\nI know she hurts and had quite a few vet visits this year but she still makes a huge effort for her humans. "
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266a3h | why is it so hard to permanently cure allergies such as nut and shellfish? | Unfortunately i have both, and i want to know if a cure is a realistic goal in the near future. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/266a3h/eli5_why_is_it_so_hard_to_permanently_cure/ | {
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"Not likely.\n\nAllergies aren't like most diseases.\n\nMost diseases are caused by something acting weird, or something extra growing somewhere, and are easily treated and cured.\n\nAllergies though, are the body attacking things that it shouldn't.\n\nInstead of knowing that it should attack bacteria, and leave that peanut oil alone, it attacks both, thinking both are trying to hurt the body.\n\nThink of the immune system as a protective husband, him and his wife (the body) are walking down a dark street. They see a gang of thugs (bacteria) coming down the street, so he pushes her into the bushes so that if he ends up fighting the bacteria, she is out of the way and safe.\n\nBut instead, they see a bunch of carollers out, he thinks that they are dangerous, tries to hide her in the bush, she slips on ice, get's hurt, while he gets into it with a bunch of people dressed as Santa and his elves.\n\nAllergies aren't a disease as much as they are a mistaken immune response, which is incredibly hard to cure, and is often only treated, which is why so many people have epi-pens."
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7b6jcv | why is it so much easier to set our biological clocks one hour back than it is to set them one hour forward? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7b6jcv/eli5_why_is_it_so_much_easier_to_set_our/ | {
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"text": [
"Most people are some level of sleep deprived, and can easily \"catch up\" on an hour of sleep.\n\nMissing an hour of sleep is rough, and it's still pretty rough trying to get to bed an hour earlier."
]
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[]
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||
6sxk73 | how does the first person receive a transmitted disease? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6sxk73/eli5_how_does_the_first_person_receive_a/ | {
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"Sometimes when a new disease arises, it's because of a mutation in an existing bacterium or virus that already is common in humans, but didn't cause disease before.\n\nSometimes it's because of a mutation in an existing bacterium or virus that is common in animals that humans interact with, but didn't cause (human) disease before. \n\nSometimes it's because of a mutation in a person that makes them susceptible to a particular bacterium or virus.\n\nThose are the usual ways a new disease pops up. Animal to human transmission usually happens in a farming or hunting context, where people come in close contact with animal blood, saliva, hair, etc.",
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained:\n\n1. [ELI5: How does patient zero get a sexually transmitted disease? ](_URL_0_)\n1. [ELI5:How did the first human being get a Sexual Transmission Disease. ](_URL_1_)\n1. [How did someone originally get an STI? ](_URL_2_)\n"
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1k0a6c/eli5_how_does_patient_zero_get_a_sexually/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3a1e3x/eli5how_did_the_first_human_being_get_a_sexual/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/6occt5/how_did_someone_originally_get_an_sti/"
]
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52m3rc | why are most if not all of the zippers on my clothing made by the brand ykk? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/52m3rc/eli5_why_are_most_if_not_all_of_the_zippers_on_my/ | {
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"Summed up, proven reliability.\n\nYKK has a good track record, their zippers are known to work reliably. Further, they own the entire production process, and are hence very secure from trouble caused by suppliers, and this also increases their consistency. ",
"About half the zippers manufactured are made by YKK, a Japanese company. Zippers are finicky and YKK makes reliable zippers. One reason it has managed to stay on top of the game is that it controls almost the entire manufacturing process, from smelting its own brass to making the final product, which guarantees it can keep making reliable zippers and has the added bonus of helping to hide its corporate secrets from competitors. There are some competitors which are cheaper, mainly in China, but the zippers break more easily and a lot of the developed world is wary of lax regulation in China and don't want lead in zippers. Additionally, starting a zipper manufacturing company would take a lot of capital and you would have to get a pretty big market share to make a sizeable revenue stream, so there are high barriers to entry. Here's an article that goes into more depth: _URL_0_\n\ntl;dr: YKK makes good zippers, controls the whole process, and it's hard to get into the zipper game."
]
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[],
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"http://www.slate.com/articles/business/branded/2012/04/ykk_zippers_why_so_many_designers_use_them_.html"
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||
584gso | how can you see things in your mind with your eyes shut? | You go to sleep and dream. In your dream there can be newspapers, books and magazines. If you read them in your dream who wrote those words and how can you read them with your eyes close? What is happening in your brain?? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/584gso/eli5_how_can_you_see_things_in_your_mind_with/ | {
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"Thanks for asking. I have wondered the same thing. I can be fully awake and concious with my eyes shut, and see a clear image of something I am thinking of. Very strange.",
"I'd probably say its along the same lines as how our eyes detect light and translate that into a signal our brain converts into an image to help keep itself alive as an evolutionary trick (since not all animals have eyes and begs an even deeper question of: What are their dreams like compared to ours?).\n\n\nI think its just the brain processing the events of the day coupled with a backlog of previous experiences in life, being combined into randomised signals similar to the ones the brain interprets for us on a daily basis. \n\n\n\nI've had dreams where I've heard something, or felt forces (like inertia from falling) and I think, since all our brain does is process electrical pulses from all our receptors like eyes, skin, tongue, then it all goes into a big boiling pot that forms your dream state.\n\n\n\nIts probably not too far from how you can hear a song in your head, its just a more immersive experience because sight is arguably the most useful sense for having a sense of 'being' in that situation. \n",
"They're not really there. You think they're there and your brain fills in the rest. The brain hates gaps. It hates not processing data so it will make it up. \n\nHence things like deja vu, pareidolia, false witness testimony, and (let's get flaming here) some spiritual beliefs. ",
"Your question appears to be asked from a logical position that information is taken in by the brain from the world around us through our 5 senses, processed, than stored and regurgitate as a memory when 1 or all our 5 senses are \"offline\". But that doesn't explain how blind from birth people can 'see' with their minds eye.\n\nHave you given some thought to reversing your logic? \n\nYour brain is a transmitter, like a radio and has the capacity to pick up on different channels (frequencies). The dial is your emotions and what's played on that channel depends on which channel (frequency) you tuned into. Feeling happy? Your emotion dials into the happy channel (frequency) your brain transmits it to your 5 senses which sends out a frequency and your seeing the world through rose coloured glasses. You get the picture. \n\nSometime though our emotions are jumbled because we tend to be lazy and allow our emotions to be defined by our surroundings so our brain is trying to tune into too many stations (frequencies) at once and voila! STATIC \n\nWithout your 5 senses activated by the world around you, you can still feel, smell, see, hear and taste but without the conditions dictating the outcome thus mastering visualization can result in unconditional emotional response to your liking and more importantly, laser focused so the channel is coming in crystal clear and your dancing in the rain happy as a lark for no good reason....like a 5 year old😊"
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62ispk | why some people are "nightowls" even though humans a supposed to be active in the day time | I've always been a late night person, I ussually default to going to bed at 4-5am and waking up around 2-3pm | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/62ispk/eli5_why_some_people_are_nightowls_even_though/ | {
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"There were night people long before there were computers and TVs and phones.\n\nI don't think there's any doubt there's a nocturnal predator gene lurking about, though I don't have any scientific knowledge about that.\n\nI have been a night person all my life and before I became a consultant where I could set my own schedule my working life was hell. Let's not even talk about school. My natural \"day\" ends at about 4 am and always has.\n\nI'm an avid backpacker. I adapt, in solo hikes, in about 2-3 days to a day that runs from about 10 am to 2 am and that's pretty much only because all-night hiking misses too much scenery, otherwise that's probably what I'd do. When I hike in a group I have to adapt to that silly day people schedule completely and it's tough.",
"In addition to what others say about how there are fun screens and toys and gadgets keeping us awake (I consider myself a night owl if only because I'm terrible at going to bed on time. Gotta play one more game of Overwatch), there's also a theory I've seen floating around that there's supposedly a predisposition to being more active at night somewhere in our DNA as a result of us being hunter-gatherer tribes that needed *somebody* to stay up and watch for predators/rival tribes/etc. ",
"Not true. People have different time cycles. Some are more night active. Mostly studies have shown that the average waking sleeping cycle of most humans is a little longer than 24 hours. So if left without sunlight a person will slowly stray from the cycle that work and daytime force on him.\n\nThere are extreme cases too. A woman in scandinavia started to live a 48 hour cycle after she was retired. Staying awake 24 h sleeping 24 h. It was what her biorythm naturally adjusted to."
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89iveo | why does the rotation of the earth not influence a mechanically driven gyroscope? or does it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/89iveo/eli5_why_does_the_rotation_of_the_earth_not/ | {
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"It does. Gyro compasses use this principle to operate and indicate true north rather than magnetic north. For a more accessible demonstration, some science museums swing a very large pendulum. These are many metres long with a heavy weight so that they can swing for hours without stopping. The direction of swing will rotate with the earth so that if you start it swinging east-west and then come back in six hours you'll find it swinging north-south."
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||
3mubyb | how we have all this scientific data and information about the universe but we didn't know about flowing water on mars until yesterday. | How do we have all this information on other planets, black holes, stars, other galaxies, etc and only found flowing water on Mars recently. This seems like it would have been found sooner being Mars is our closest planet.
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mubyb/eli5_how_we_have_all_this_scientific_data_and/ | {
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"Mars is a really big place, and we've only really explored a very small portion of it in any detail. There's only been a handful of landers/rovers exploring the surface directly, so most of our data has come from remote viewing. \n\nWhile we now are pretty sure that water does sometimes flow on Mars, it's a relatively tiny amount of water, and only under certain conditions. It's not like there are big lakes or rivers flowing all of the time that nobody noticed until now. \n\nThere have also been a number of hints of flowing water before, it's just taken until now for astronomers to find really compelling proof. I think it's safe to say that many people who've been studying Mars were not entirely surprised by yesterday's announcements, although they were still excited by it.\n\nIt's also worth noting that much of what we \"know\" about other planets, black holes, stars, galaxies, etc. are just theories based upon the available data and our current best understandings of physics. But a lot of it is just educated guesses. There is a ton about them that we don't know, since we haven't been able to study any of them up close. \n",
"The flows are in very specific areas only in a few specific months of the year. We don't have the resources to have cameras on 100% of Mars 100% of the time. "
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2d992g | what are the differences in the formations in soccer? | I mean I know that a 4-3-3 has four backs 3 mids and 3 strikers but why play it as opposed to a 3-5-2? What would be the best formation out of all of them? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2d992g/eli5_what_are_the_differences_in_the_formations/ | {
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"There is no one best formation, it's very tactical and based on the players you have. Basically think of it like a sliding scale between defensive minded and offensive minded. Midfielders can typically sort of feel both roles, but that requires them running up down the pitch, all game long, where as a defender or striker will typically only cover 1/2 the field, or so.",
"The formation you use is based on the type of players you have. I'm going to simplify this a lot but it's never this simple. Let's say you have 3 great Center Backs, 5 Great Mids and 2 Great Attackers. You're not going to use a 4-3-3 you're goign to run a 3-5-2 because that is what your personnel calls for. \n\nThe type of tactics you can use are also determined by the types of formations you use. For example a 5-3-2 formation (5 defenders) is far more likely to be used as a primarily defensive formation then a 4-3-3 which has 1 less defender. \n\nDifferent coaches favor different tactics. Van Gaal for example the Netherlands (now Manchester United) coach has perfected the 3-5-2 which turns into a 5-3-2 when the team is defending. What that means is the 2 players who defend the wings play as wingers in attack but as soon as the team loses possesion they run back and form a line of 5 players and defend with that amount. This is a very difficult strategy to break down.\n\nIs Van Gaals approach the best? Many people didn't expect anything from Netherlands. People didn't think they would even get out of a group that featured Chile and Spain. They made it all the way to the Semi-Finals. However there are probably a dozen other teams who tried the 3-5-2 and failed mizerably. It all depends on the personnel.\n\nShort Answer: There is no best formation. It all depends on what players you have available and what the coach likes to do. "
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fw5lkv | how do cinemas get original copies of a certain movie . do they buy it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fw5lkv/eli5_how_do_cinemas_get_original_copies_of_a/ | {
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"Via a film distribution company. The distributor is usually separate from the production company. Many films have a distribution commitment before they get made, but others -- especially indie films -- are produced, shown at festivals, and then, based on the festival performance, get a distribution deal. This is why festivals are so important for indie films. Some major media companies (e.g. Disney, Warner, Paramount, etc. have both production arms and distribution arms). \n\nThe distribution company is responsible for all the marketing of the film as well as getting copies to (and back from) cinemas. \n\nThe distribution company makes deals with the cinema chains. The cinema usually keeps a percentage of the gross of ticket sales (but all of concession sales) and returns the rest to the distributor. The distributor keeps their cut, and passes through the remainder to the production company. \n\nSo, no, the cinema doesn't buy the copy of the film. It's more like they \"borrow\" it from the distribution company for a period of time, as they are required to return it to the distribution company along with a percentage of ticket sales."
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e8v4z3 | why is the "cherry" at the end of a lit cigarette hard? | I want to know why the heat causes the soft tobacco to go into a more solid state, before turning to ash. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/e8v4z3/eli5_why_is_the_cherry_at_the_end_of_a_lit/ | {
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"As far as I understand, the heat causes the paper and tobacco to turn brittle and hard, before it finally burns the rest of the fuel and turns it to ash. It's a transition of the unused tobacco to its final stage of usefulness that makes it hard. Like how wood turns to charcoal and then ash, it's full of unused fuel but because the fire was on the outside it makes the outer side hard.",
"You know how if you burn wood in a fireplace, it turns to charcoal before turning to ash? The cherry is like a charcoal. \n\nIt’s the carbon residue that is left after the volatile organic compounds burn off as smoke.\n\nIt’s not a change of state from solid to liquid to gas, it’s the result of a chemical reaction (burning aka oxidization).",
"The heat makes water in the tobacco disappear before the tobacco gets used up, so it turns crunchy for a bit."
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2czqqk | why does rain hurt when it hits you during a sky diving free fall | I have talked to a sky diver and they said one of the reasons they hate jumping in the rain (something not really recommended anyway) is because the rain really hurts, but dont all things fall at the same rate? Why would the rain drops inpact you and hurt. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2czqqk/eli5why_does_rain_hurt_when_it_hits_you_during_a/ | {
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"Gravitational acceleration is constant for all objects in a given gravity field, so things would fall at the same rate in a vacuum. But in this case air resistance comes into play and a raindrop has much more surface area compared to mass than a human body does. This is because while 3D objects scale up their length and width they also scale up their depth; for every raindrop's worth of surface area exposed to the wind you have many more equivalent masses piled up behind it. So a skydiver falls faster due to their mass in relation to wind resistance, making them collide with rain at some apparently significant speed.",
"Everything falls at the same rate, yes, but there's air resistance. It's why a feather and a pencil don't fall at the same rate, unless they're in a vacuum. \n\nMy lay-theory is that the water droplets are encountering more air resistance than you are, being kicked around easily by high altitude winds and generally kept from themselves achieving terminal velocity (think about it: how much would terminal velocity rain *hurt* to those on the ground?). When you the skydiver fall through the rain, you're travelling at about 120 mph, and the rain is travelling significantly less than that. The slower the speed of the rain, the greater the difference between your two speeds, the faster it feels like it's hitting you in the face. \n\nAgain, not a physics guy, but it seems reasonable enough. ",
"All things on earth are subjected to a roughly constant acceleration due to gravity. Other factors such as drag forces(from air) affect the max speed an object can fall at. Rain simply does not fall anywhere near as fast as a human. So when people skydive through rain the rain hits them much faster than if they were standing still."
]
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2qxbpk | why are seas different from open ocean? why do we name some swaths of water but not others? | This has been on my mind for a while, and I've never gotten a real answer. Why do we name seemingly arbitrary places in the water a sea? Are there any differences between the sea and another part of the ocean? Why are these artificial boundaries created? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2qxbpk/eli5_why_are_seas_different_from_open_ocean_why/ | {
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"We name all swaths of water. Locals will often name stock ponds and tanks. \n\nA sea is smaller than an ocean and separated/partially separated from it in some way. \n\nThese boundaries are created like all boundaries are and are just as arbitrary. Boundaries show who owns what area, clarify the location you are talking about, and help general navigation. ",
"Can you name one sea that is unnamed? I didn't think so. ",
"I'm not sure this is officially true, but I think it works somewhat this way. Sea's are generally quite shallow. Either they are on the inside of the continent, or it borders the continent and is still part of the lithosphere of the continent (lies on/above this lithosphere). They are some several hunderd meters deep. \n\nOceans, on the other hand, are located above oceanic lithosphere. This lithosphere is thinner and heavier and lies a lot deeper than the continental (those lie for the biggest part above sealevel). Oceans are a few kilometers thick and, because they cover the entire oceanic lithosphere, oceans are (mostly) freakin' big. \n\nIf the earth would have less water, it might fit all in the oceans so you wouldn't have seas. If the waterlevel if higher (like it was in the Cretaceous) it floods bigger parts of the continent so you will have more of those shallow seas.",
"We name things to differentiate them from other things that are similar.\n\nWe have one moon, so it is just \"the Moon.\"\n\nMars has two moons, so we named them to tell them apart from each other, and from ours, which is the first and original.\n\nA random square mile of water in the open ocean won't have a name because there is nothing special about it, and no need to refer to it specifically, as opposed to something else. There needs to be a difference, because we name things to differentiate them.\n\nFor example, the San Francisco Bay. In the North, there is a part of it called San Pablo Bay. Bring it up on google maps. You can see why people named that part of the Bay a specific name... it's different! It's a bay within a bay!\n\nAny body of water with a name is named that way because someone, usually the people that live near there, wanted to name it to differentiate it from something else.\n\nThere's really not a hard definition of \"sea\" versus \"ocean.\" In fact, why do we have different \"oceans\" when they are really all one big ocean? Again, to differentiate in some way."
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1vicwz | do those "4g lte coverage maps" in advertisements actually represent anything realistic? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vicwz/do_those_4g_lte_coverage_maps_in_advertisements/ | {
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"I think you're referring to something like this.\n_URL_0_\n\nThat's simply a **high-level approximation to what the maximum coverage** by a network (Verizon, AT & T) is for a particular spectrum.\nNote that this doesn't guarantee you signal, nor does it say anything about signal strength. That depends on how your distance from the tower, weather, terrain, trees, etc.\n\nHowever, if you're outside the shaded area, you're not going to get any 4G coverage - because the companies would not have invested in infrastructure in these areas.\n\nVerizon and AT & T are the biggest players, they've invested a lot in infra, and it shows."
]
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[
"http://opensignal.com/network-coverage-maps/verizon-coverage-map.php"
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||
do0t4x | what is determinism? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/do0t4x/eli5_what_is_determinism/ | {
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"Determinism argues that basically all choices and actions were previously determined by things in your past/genetics and other things like that.\n\nBecause of this, Determinists argue Free Will doesn’t exists and any impulsive actions you think you’re doing have been doing were actually decided way beforehand.\n\nThis is a huge simplification, hope it helps!",
"Determinism is the idea that all of the outputs of a system are determined by its inputs. For instance, mathematical addition is purely deterministic. The output is always decided exclusively by the inputs. Taken very broadly, determinism cal be applied to our universe. There is an ongoing argument about whether or not our universe is deterministic. This raises interesting conundrums in many respects, but as far as I know the two biggest ones are randomness and free will. For instance, in a deterministic world, can randomness exist? If the outputs only depend on the inputs, then there should not be room for randomness, right? In the case of free will, the question is thus: Are people's choices completely dependent on their prior experiences/genetics/current situation? Or is there some other factor at play?"
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28wla0 | how do young earth creationists rationalize radiocarbon dating? | Not trying to stir the pot, just genuinely curious about how they do it. Since it is based on relatively simple math, and relatively simple science, on what basis do they reject it? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/28wla0/eli5how_do_young_earth_creationists_rationalize/ | {
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"They believe one of two things, depending on the denomination of their churches:\n\n1. God manipulated it to test our faith. Or...\n2. Satan manipulated it to fool us.",
"[Here is Ken Ham's explanation] (_URL_0_) for why radiocarbon dating is not a proof that young-earth creationism is wrong.\n\nNotice that the fact that it is nonsense is camouflaged in scientific-sounding language. Many young earth creationists will actively avoid reading science books that aren't written by young earth creationists, and so they will trust that this is real science (after all, it sounds very science-y), and not double-check its logic against other science.",
"I grew up in a moderately fundamentalist community, so I'll speak from personal experience. \n\nFrom the point of view of a fundamentalist, you are approaching the problem backwards. When you and I look at a problem such as \"how old is this item,\" we look for a method or data point to work from. When a fundamentalist looks at the same problem, they start with their interpretation of the bible. The earth is X,000 years old. Therefore, the item must be less than X,000 years old. Any information that supports this is correct. Any info that contradicts this must be either divine interference, a mistake, or a lie told by someone attempting to disprove God's existence.\n\nA perfect example of this. I went to a private school growing up. In our \"science\" textbook, was a section on radiocarbon dating. Our book included a graph showing us how reliable RC dating was. According to the text, after 5000 years, RC dating is unreliable.\n\nI will qualify all of this by saying that I know very few young earthers. Most practicing Christians that I know only believe that its been roughly 6-10 thousand years since Adam and Eve. They feel that any amount of time from Genesis 1:1 to the end of the garden of Eden could have been any amount of time. "
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90p1ln | how do big manufacturing companies like apple trace who leaked information about future products to third parties? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/90p1ln/eli5_how_do_big_manufacturing_companies_like/ | {
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"In many cases it’s the monitoring software that most companies have on employee devices and their networks. There are other tricks like tagging the media itself in various ways. ",
"There have been cases where companies have played Tyrion Lannister's trick: tell a bunch of people slightly different things and see which version of the story leaks. Fire the guy you told that version to."
]
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1mea24 | why does the death of a ceo decrease stock prices? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1mea24/eli5_why_does_the_death_of_a_ceo_decrease_stock/ | {
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"The market hates uncertainty. It's as simple as that really. ",
"My best guess is that for an easy example say when steve jobs died, all of a sudden all the choices he made that might have made apple the way it is now might not be made the same way by the new ceo, the new ceo might have a different idea of what is good and bad and the company could flop because of it"
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4g8vac | why is there so much incest on the front pages of porn sites? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4g8vac/eli5_why_is_there_so_much_incest_on_the_front/ | {
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"Because whether or not we like to admit it, forbidden is exciting and sexy. Incest is the ultimate of forbidden in our society and therefore it makes the porno seem all the more exciting in the back of our minds despite knowing the actors probably never met each other before in their lives",
"In addition to the \"forbidden fruit\" explanations already offered, it may also have to do with limited supply.\n\nImagine there are 10,000 views spread over 100 high-quality \"blonde with big tits\" videos, and 2,500 views on 10 high-quality \"incest\" videos. In this scenario the \"blonde\" videos receive 100 views each, while the videos in the much less popular \"incest\" category receive 250 each, thus ending up at the top."
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2b8ns1 | why can't we insist on nobody touching anything else from the malyasian ukraine flight shoot down without international press and civilian oversight? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2b8ns1/eli5_why_cant_we_insist_on_nobody_touching/ | {
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"We can insist whatever we want, but we have no bite behind our bark as long as Russia is involved, and the rebels (and Russia) know it. So, they can screw with the crash site as much as they want. They know we aren't going to parachute in and kick their butts for ignoring our warnings.\n\nAll we can do it shake our finger at them, and that's not really going to stop anyone.",
"We can insist. But since Reddit doesn't have direct physical control over the area in question, that insistence would not have much effect.",
"Because it is a war zone."
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2x0m9e | how did the hippy generation afford to travel cross country and enjoy the hippy lifestyle without having careers? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2x0m9e/eli5_how_did_the_hippy_generation_afford_to/ | {
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"The hippy lifestyle is fairly inexpensive, and the phrase \"Gas, grass, or ass\" sums up the trading that would go on. It doesn't take much money to get a cheap car driving around, and sleeping in the car cuts down on costs.",
"There are a lot of assumptions in this question which I'll ignore. My mom came from a poor farming family and paid her way through college. She has remarked that she was not able to participate in a lot of \"hippie culture\" because the people by and large were actually rich kids, that is, children of wealthy parents who would provide for them.\n\nNow as to who was actually migrant and what percentage of the subculture they were as well as income trends will require someone more versed in anthropology than myself. \n",
"Born before 1960 and hitched from NYC to LA and back once.\n\nForget all statistics you hear about 'with inflation.' If you want to know what a dollar was worth in any year get a newspaper from the time and check prices/wages in ads. \n\nA good read on the time/life style is 'Hell's Angels' by Hunter Thompson. Also try the novel 'The Wanderers' by James Michener.",
"There were two brands of hippies. The rich ones who were enjoying the lifestyle to piss off their parents and after a few years would return home and get a job through their network. My parents hung out around these types - they got a car for their college present and then skipped class to go follow around Grateful Dead, and my broke-hippie dad and his friends would pile in the car. \n\nBroke hippies did their thing by generally doing odd jobs here and there, and taking advantage of how cheap food and crappy lodgings were. Sleep in a car, go to the gas station deli and pay a dollar for a sandwich big enough for 2 meals, etc. Sharing culture also helped out a lot; not only were drugs cheap as hell, people would generally be happy to share what they had. \n\nYou also have to factor in that you didn't really need any type of financial means to have sex as a guy. Not that you \"need\" to spend money to get laid today, not by any means, but most guys today do feel the need to make enough money to buy nice clothes, have a decent car, have a decent job, and be able to take her somewhere other than Subway. Trying to have a good sex life if you're broke today (and not selling drugs) is not easy. Back then it was. \n\nAs Dave Chappelle said, if a guy can fuck a chick in a cardboard box, he's not going to buy a house. Hippies could meet all of their needs - food, drugs, somewhere to sleep, and people to fuck - without spending too much money. If you could get a decent gig for a few months doing some oddball job, you could save up and finance a hippie lifestyle for the remainder of the year. \n\nAnd if you got in with some rich hippies - who unlike the rich kids of today were not that cliquish at all - you'd be a part of a mixed group where some people had money, some people didn't, and few fucks were given because people shared decently well. "
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1ssqep | reddit's link karma system | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ssqep/eli5_reddits_link_karma_system/ | {
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"text": [
"What do you mean? When you post links (to other sites, not self posts like this one) you get the net difference between the upvotes and downvotes on your submission in karma."
]
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4ne379 | why do you have to send a zip/rar file through the internet instead of sending a folder? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ne379/eli5_why_do_you_have_to_send_a_ziprar_file/ | {
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"Because a folder isn't a thing. The only thing that exists on your hard drive is files. What is sent back and forth on the internet is files. \n\nAll a folder is, is a file structure marker. When you open lets say the pictures folder, the hard drive scans all the files the picture folder points to and displays those ignoring all the rest. ",
"Folder is a very special file that your operating system and hard drive file system use to collect things on your hard drive.\n\nFolder, as a file, is only a couple of bytes large. It tells you its name, when it was created, who created it, that kind of stuff, and that it's a folder, and it lists physical locations on your hard drive where your files begin.\n\nSending such a file would be pretty silly because those physical locations on your hard drive would not correspond to anything. So you'd have to send each individual file separately and create a new folder for them(because even after sending, those physical addresses won't match). But then people figured that hey, what if we make a special file that just contains all the files + the file structure(folders etc) of those files?\n\nThat special file is called Zip. There are multiple other, older and newer, formats intended to solve that same problem, but for Windows .zip has been the most popular solution for as long as I know.\n\nZip and rar deal also with a related problem: Now that you have this package of folders and files in a single file, could you compress it down for transfer? Usually there is redundancy in the file structure allowing for much smaller transfer sizes. For Linux the standard solution for this problem reflects evolution of this: Instead of .zip, you see lots of .tar.gz's, where .tar means it's folder structure condensed into a single file, and gz means gzip compression utility has been run on it. .zip and .rar combine these two into a single thing, so many people may think of them as simply compression tools, but that's only half of their utility. The other half, being able to send whole folders as a single file, is another important half of their utility."
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3qpo11 | what are the societal/cultural basics of the islamic (or muslim) religion? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3qpo11/eli5_what_are_the_societalcultural_basics_of_the/ | {
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"I can answer the first question... every other question is not really something I feel confident enough to explain, and leave to others.\n \nThe religion itsself is called Islam. People who practice this religion are called Muslims. ^(why this is? I can honestly say I have no idea. I believe it has to do with the meaning of the words)",
"the religion is Islam\n\nyou refer to things that are of Islam as Islamic (like you may refer to something that is of Christianity as Christian, Islamic values, Christian values)\n\nPeople who follow Islam are Muslims. \n\n",
"Well, this doesn't get into the Hijab (which I don't know much about), but the very very high level beliefs of Islam are characterized by what are called the five pillars:\n\n* You believe that \"there is no god but god\" and denounce false idols\n\n* You give some of your money to the poor\n\n* You pray 5 times/day\n\n* You fast during Ramadan\n\n* You attempt to make a pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in your life\n\nHowever, a great many Muslims don't even do all of this (many don't pray 5 times/day). It's a big religion and it's been influenced by a ton of different cultures over the last ~1500 years and it's really hard to pin down lots of things that *all* Muslims do. \n\nOne of the other things that people don't really think about in Islam that, IMO, is pretty important to recognize is that there has never really been a separate tradition of government and religion in Islam. From the very beginning, Muhammad was a political leader as well as a religious one and, unlike the early Christians, the Muslim community was a polity as well as a religious body.",
"One important thing to keep in mind is that Islam is a very diverse religion and has been for most of its existence. Despite the common association in the Western mind of Islam with the Middle East (which is where it historically began), the bulk of the Islamic world is actually in South Asia. Indonesia, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh are the countries with the 4 highest Muslim populations. As you might imagine, the Islam that you find in an urban center in Indonesia is very different than what you'd find in the hills of Afghanistan which in turn is very different than what you'd see in Morocco. Oftentimes pre-existing cultural norms get mixed in with Islam, and it can be hard to separate the two.\n\nAll of this is to say that the answers to most of your questions are going to vary widely depending on what type of Islam and where it is. I know Ismaili Muslim women of Indian ancestry who don't cover up, don't pray 5 times a day, will have a beer with you and will go out dancing dressed like any other 20 something lady. And I know Sunni women from Palestine who choose to wear hijab.\n\nThere are common threads that unite nearly all Muslims. They worship the God of Abraham and consider Muhammed to be his prophet or messenger. Muslims accept that God sent other prophets (Jesus is considered to be a fellow prophet, and very important one, but not the son of God), but that the revelation they delivered became distorted. The Quran is believed to be God's revelation as relayed, word for word, to Muhammed by the angel Gabriel. This perfect and pure revelation corrected the distortions of the previous prophets' revelations. \n\nIslam itself means 'submission,' as in submission to God's will, and Muslim means one who submits. Muslims typically worship by praying 5 times a day while facing Mecca, although that's not a hard and fast rule. Friday prayers are the main communal worship event at the Mosque, similar to Jewish Sabbath on Saturday or Christian Sunday services.\n\nModest dress is something that in the Quran applies to both men and women. The Quran and the teachings of Muhammed are often oriented towards producing a healthy society and community as much as an individual religious development, and that may be the best way to understand the origins of hijab: that it's better for society as a whole if we don't go around distracting each other with immodest dress.\n\nIn practice, this requirement to dress modestly has obviously skewed more towards women than men. Some, both Muslim and non-Muslim, consider this to be a sexist attempt to control women and to make them responsible for men's lust. To others, it's a way to ensure that women are treated decently and fairly rather than as sexual objects. It's almost like a suit of armor that protects you from being objectified. In the West and other societies where Muslims are not the majority, some women choose to do it as an expression of their identity and faith more than anything else, almost like a Christian or Jew wearing a cross or star of David on a necklace.",
"Former Muslim here. Hmm, what can I think of?\n\nThe religion is called Islam, it's practitioners are Muslims. \nMuslims worship Allah, who is the same One and Only (caps for emphasis) as the Abrahamic Yahweh/God of the Jews and Christians.\n\nMoses and Jesus are other prophets, but Muhammad was the last.\n\nMuslims also revere (worship would be the wrong word. Muslims only worship God/Allah) the Prophet Muhammad (commonly, his name is followed by the customary \"Peach Be Upon Him\", or PBUH) who they claim was contacted by the angel Gabriel to spread God's message in the godless and largely tribal Middle East in the early 600's. \n\nHe made a journey to Medina (\"nearby\" city) I think because he was shunned from Mecca. Then came back. That journey is honored and is supposed to be emulated by every Muslim who can afford to go to Saudi Arabia.\n\nMuslims vary in terms of conservatism. There are militant radicals, orthodox conservatives, moderates, and liberals like any other major religion. I grew up going from moderate to liberal (to non-religious).\n\nShaking hands is fine from what I know. Maybe not in conservative sects, but I never spent much time around extremely conservative Muslims. With that said. I'd say in Islam, \"moderate\" might be more similar to a Christian conservative, as I'd say the religion as a whole is somewhat more conservative. Part of this is that according to the faith, religion is the ONLY thing that really matters. You are expected to completely devote yourself to God.\n"
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37khlq | why is it that some victims of sexual assault, whether as children or as adults, are more capable of handling the trauma/experience, mentally, than others? | Made a throwaway, because obvious. I was molested twice as a child and have known a few close friends throughout my lifetime that have had similar experiences, yet we are all completely "normal". You wouldn't know it unless we told you outright. Why is it that some victims of sexual assault become so emotionally scarred over their past while others just glide on by? (Especially if it happens to someone as an adult, where they are more than capable of reasonably explaining how and why something happened, whereas children cannot.) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37khlq/eli5why_is_it_that_some_victims_of_sexual_assault/ | {
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"honestly it is how well the trauma aligns with the victims coping skills. so if it is the physivsl cotrol thwt\n\n\nok**. Abmian** making typouin imopssibl*\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n ",
"This is a hard question to answer without some basic psychology knowledge, but basically it goes like this. \n\nPeople differ in personality traits, the generally accepted model is modern psychology is the big five traits. These are:\nConscientiousness\nOpenness\nExtroversion\nAgreeableness\nNeuroticism\n\nEach of these is on a continuum, at one end, extremely low levels of said trait, at the other end extremely high levels. For example a person high in neuroticism will be highly anxious were as a person low in neuroticism will be low in anxiety. \n\nEach person falls in a different place on the continuum for all these 5 traits. The combination of these traits and the different points on the continuum on which a person lies will result in different behaviours, cognition and emotions for two different people experiencing the exact same thing. \n\nSo, with the above perspective in mind, two people who suffer the same or similar horrific abuse as a child will differ in how they interpret that event as a result of the individual difference in their underlying personality traits. ",
"As someone who was sexually abused as a child, I can tell you that while someone may look like they are handling it well from the outside, there is residual fallout that never goes away.\n\nI thought I was okay until I had a daughter. Then feelings that must have been buried deep came out and I had to go to counseling to make sure I did not visit all my baggage on my innocent daughter.a\n\nThen, when I reached my fifties, more stuff came out of no where. My therapist said it was quite common for abuse issues to surface at these times (having a child and reaching your 50s (or 60s).",
"Sometimes molestation is only the tip of the iceberg.\nIn some cases there may have been other traumatic experiences in the persons life which can be painful to deal with on top of the molestation. Also, much depends on the support which is given throughout a persons development years."
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91c5yo | if salt water is left alone does it separate into na+ and cl- ions? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/91c5yo/eli5_if_salt_water_is_left_alone_does_it_separate/ | {
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"Yes they do. Most salts, including NaCl, naturally dissociate into cations and anions in water. \n\nLooks like this: _URL_0_\n"
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2n2j23 | why do birth defects increase when people give birth when they're older? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2n2j23/eli5_why_do_birth_defects_increase_when_people/ | {
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"The quality of the woman's eggs declines as she ages. In simplistic terms, the good quality eggs are used first. ",
"A woman's ova (eggs) are all made in early puberty (say 10 or so), which means that as time goes on each egg is older as it gets released during ovulation. The older the egg, the more likely it has become worn over time. From a genetics point of view, the chromosomes within each egg are suspended in a particular position by tiny molecular strings so they can interact with the sperm's chromosomes during fertilisation. As time goes on, these tiny molecular strings can loosen or break which can lead to genetic abnormalities such as Down's Syndrome or unknown miscarriages."
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1nu68k | what is touching the inside of a body piercing? | So when people get ears, eyes or bellybuttons pierced, and they heal, what is the stuff that is touching the piercing (i.e inside the body)? Is it skin that grows over like grass would, scar tissue or something else? Does it change depending where you are pierced? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1nu68k/eli5_what_is_touching_the_inside_of_a_body/ | {
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"The hole (tunnel) is called a fistula and once healed it should be lined with skin. \n\nIf you ever get the sort of funky cheese discharge once the piercing is healed it is mainly shed skin from inside the fistula. \n\nThe type of skin will depend on where exactly you are pierced but will fairly similar to the skin around it. "
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9ywr6p | why are e. coli outbreaks such a common occurance these days? | Are there root causes for all food or is it different with different types of food such as meat, poultry, or vegetables? Are there measures that can be taken to help curb these outbreaks? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9ywr6p/eli5_why_are_e_coli_outbreaks_such_a_common/ | {
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"Much of the reason is the massive scale of our food production. Agricultural monocultures and industrial scale meat production a) increase the likelihood of bacterial contamination and b) result in ENORMOUS volumes of food being potentially contaminated by an outbreak.\n\nUnfortunately this is a tough thing to counteract without sweeping reform to modern food production which would be very costly and challenging.",
"A.) more food comes through a single production line\nB.) it's probably actually not all that increased we just know what it is, and can broadcast it now more vs before we had mass media. "
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wxj77 | what is a rss feed and what's the best way to use them? | I know it's some kind of automatic update when blogs + sites release new content, but I don't really know how that all comes together for the user. Is it worth using them instead of checking several websites daily? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/wxj77/eli5_what_is_a_rss_feed_and_whats_the_best_way_to/ | {
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"I use Google Reader to view my RSS feeds, but there are plenty of others out there. \n\nBut you have it exactly right, it aggregates all of the different sites you've subscribed to so that you don't have to manually go to every single one of your favorite sites to see if anything new or interesting has come out. It also lets you group them, so that you can view postings from multiple sites at once. And the best part I've found is just the ability to scroll through all of the posts without having to keep clicking 'next page' or going to a different site. \n\nMost sites have an RSS feed these days, just click the logo, and it will take you to a page that will allow you to subscribe, or a lot of times you can manually add a feed by adding .rss to the end of a URL. ",
"An RSS feed is a small document that contains a list of \"articles\" (which may be anything and not just news articles) on the site. When a new article is posted, the site's software automatically updates the RSS feed with a listing of the new article.\n\nAn RSS reader is a piece of software that keeps a list of RSS feeds and periodically reloads them. When it sees articles in an RSS feed that weren't there before, it tells the user, so that the user doesn't have to visit each site by hand.\n\nThere are other software that uses RSS feeds as well. For instance, Firefox has \"Live Bookmarks\" which are bookmarks linked to an RSS feed; the bookmark displays the most recent 10 or so entries from the RSS feed. It doesn't actually notify the user when a new article is there; it just lets the user easily refer to them.\n\nRSS feeds are a great way to save your time, and are also really handy for sites that update very infrequently since you don't have to waste time with what is usually a pointless check, but you still find out right away when they update.\n\nPersonally, I use Google Reader, an online RSS reader, but there are many other options.",
"Imagine that you had a friend who loved to tell you stories and you loved listening to because of the way they tell them, but they only tell you stories when you're both in the same place, and if you miss the story, you have to go find them again and get them to repeat it.\n\nSo you set up a mutual deal with your friend's sibling, to record the story in writing and put it into a folder for your later viewing. After a while, you go to the sibling and they pull out the folder of stories that your friend has told and let's you read them, taking out your favorites to save for later.\n\nIf you have multiple friends who tell stories you can do the same thing with them. Then instead of asking your friends to tell each story individually, you can go to your story-keeper."
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bboodd | without getting too political, why is the president able to remove and appoint people in completely separate organizations than his own cabinet? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bboodd/eli5_without_getting_too_political_why_is_the/ | {
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"The President is the head of the Executive branch of the government. A lot of the organizations in the government are part of that branch, it isn't just the cabinet.",
"The President is the leader of the entire Executive branch of the US Federal Government. Not just his cabinet. \n\nThe President is also in charge of nominating Judges for Federal seats as they become available, and the Senate is responsible for vetting and approving or rejecting the nominations. These authorities are part of the Checks-and-Balances system of the US where each Branch has some power over the other two.\n\nAlso, what organization do you think is completely separate that he is doing this to?"
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43wdct | how do scammers get away with contacting amazon and telling them their item (such as an xbox one/ps4/expensive video card) never arrived, and immediately get sent a replacement, or are refunded? how do they get away without an investigation? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/43wdct/eli5_how_do_scammers_get_away_with_contacting/ | {
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"Amazon knows that a certain number of items are stolen from front porches, and that it's hard to catch the criminals or prove what happened since most people don't have security cameras. If the problem gets too bad they'll increase the scrutiny or require signatures.",
"They often don't. But...when they do it is because the cost of investigation exceeds the value of the goodwill when it is a legit claim and/or the cost of the item being investigated. \n\nThe investigative process is a deterrent, but it's not cheaper in small volumes than replacement. They have algorithms and an entire department devoted to fraud, and systems that are used to detect fraud and that they escalate when red flags are triggered. "
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6y2ovh | why can’t modern productions of ww2 footage get the speed right? | I’m new here. Sorry if this is a re-question.
It just seems tragic that such a serious time in our history is portrayed with an almost comedic flair. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6y2ovh/eli5_why_cant_modern_productions_of_ww2_footage/ | {
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"The problem is that some of the film cameras were hand cranked, giving them an irregular rate of frames per second."
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76zq31 | ; why is nautical speed measured in knots and not kph or mph? | Wouldn't it be simpler if everyone used either kph or mph? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/76zq31/eli5_why_is_nautical_speed_measured_in_knots_and/ | {
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"Knots are based on the size of the earth, so that one nautical is equal to one minute of latitude (and 1 knot is 1 nautical mile per hour). When you're talking about things like planes and seafaring boats, it makes sense to measure speed/distance based on a fixed property of the globe/maps. ",
"They are called \"knots\" because back in the days of the High-Sea exploration they had a wooden board called a chip-board with a length of rope that was knotted at regular intervals. Then thrown into the water and the rope was allowed to run free. After a period of time, the rope was stopped and pulled in and the number of knots that had passed was recorded as the ship's speed."
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9m9cf9 | why do foods so often use artificial flavoring to replicate the taste of something, rather than just using the original thing to flavor it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9m9cf9/eli5_why_do_foods_so_often_use_artificial/ | {
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"there are two key reasons why this is done. First is simple cost because the flavour comes from something that is expensive so to cut down on the cost they make an artificial alternative. The second is spoilage if they were to use the actual ingredient then the product would have a much shorter shelf life. Using the artificial alternative makes the product last much longer.",
"The main reason is per-unit cost. While you may spend $50,000 to develop a new artificial flavor, you can then make 500 million units of that flavor cheaply.\n\nA second reason is preservation. Some artificial flavors last longer, under rough conditions.\n\nA third reason is exact control. Natural flavors in plants vary with time, and even depending on what farm and what soil they came from.",
"Cost efficiency and quality control. \n\n\nOn the cost efficiency, the production cost can be better managed and it is less likely to be affected by supply issues (Eg. Natural disasters affecting the plantation or the supply routes). Also it is easier to store large amounts of artificial flavoring compared to the natural ingredient, this can be due to storage condition (Eg. refrigeration) or the space required. \n\n\nOn the quality control, artificial flavoring allows for consistency across production batches and production location. This allows more control on the final product, and allows the manufacturer greater ability to tweak the formula towards the local palate."
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24bbm4 | why does my girlfriend seem so warm while sleeping at night? | She seems to get as hot as an oven, and I've heard of people in similar situations. Why does this happen? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/24bbm4/eli5_why_does_my_girlfriend_seem_so_warm_while/ | {
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"2 human bodies together generate more heat than 1 alone is the simple answer and your not used to it. If you used to sleeping alone than you are def used to it being cooler. Also a normal human should have a core body temp of 98.6F which is pretty warm if you think about it so that + that fact that people usually sleep under covers and between sheets means a lot of heat being trapped."
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22uuxk | how come reddit is so massive and influential yet all of the people i've spoken to don't know about it and i never see it used on tv like twitter or facebook is used? | Edit: So it seems that it's not as massive and influential as I thought it was. Thanks for the responses though guys :) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/22uuxk/eli5_how_come_reddit_is_so_massive_and/ | {
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"Because it's not. Reddit is not known for anything other than being a place that has both cat pictures and porn. Reddit isn't and will never be as massive or influential as Facebook or Twitter. \n",
"Here's a Time article with reddit references:\n_URL_0_\n\nA redditor posted a meme confessing to murder last year. That made national news. _URL_1_\n\nMy local news and comedy talk shows sometimes do a bit on a reddit post. \n\nI keep quiet about my redditing because I like being able to post things anonymously. I won't share my screen name with my friends/family and I would prefer they not look for me. ",
"Ya alot of people don't know about it but most if the time when reddit comes up the people around me know what it is but they don't use it because its complex to use\n\nTL;DR reddits commonly known but hard to use so they don't",
"The only advantage reddit has which the other two don't is that reddit has giant conversations. It is hard to communicate on the 1002nd comment on facebook when you are 19 thousandth and on twitter it is difficult to even see replies as conversations are mainly 2 person - with reddit, you can communication all the way down a thread with little branches coming off.\n\nThe problem with reddit is that: it isn't a clear \"share\" or \"retweet\" because of the algorithms, everything gets pushed off the front page regularly quickly and it is too customizable (you could stay in a small subreddit and not know of all the cool things. I unsubbed from AskReddit for my first year because I thought it was similar to blogs and that is probably the most popular subreddit interaction wise - shows how even the biggest stories aren't seen.).",
"Most people I have talked to say they do not like the format of reddit. It seems to confuse first time users as the interface is not \"clean\" and doesn't look organized is what they say...",
"Because it isn't. Reddit hits a certain demographic, I think its white males from 18 - 35 its most popular in, so its popular among demographics. Not to mention its a lot of the same opinions, liberal views mostly. The simple fact is among mostly white males its influential to a point, but the average bear on the street who doesn't use the internet too much it means nothing to them.\n\n",
"I've spoken to several people who like to browse reddit on their phones. That may only be because they're in the military and with work in the military, its either- busy all day or not busy at all.",
"Reddit has created a poor stigma for itself, since half of our pictures are of cats or nsfw. Everything else, has usually been taken from other sites like Wikipedia, YouTube, Twitter, etc. and news sources would rather use direct sources instead of Reddit. ",
"Actually, in the recent Jack Ryan movie, they checked \"Twitter and Reddit\" for the terrorist.\n\nSo there you have it.",
"Because reddit is not really a social media site people use to keep in contact with friends and family as Facebook or Twitter.\n\n\nPeople tend to use reddit to keep track and/or discuss topics related to their interests, so it is something one can perfectly keep to oneself and enjoy privately. On the other hand, using Facebook or Twitter and not telling your acquaintances... kind of goes against the point doesn't it?\n\n\nIn that sense, 4chan and reddit are alike, as much as 4chan would hate to hear that.",
"You only believe Reddit is so massive and influential because people and posts on Reddit tell you that it's massive and influential. ",
"I'm thinking it might be to do with the fact it can't be commercialized as easily in terms of content. On Facebook and Twitter popular companies will get liked/followed, and then those people receive all the shite those companies put up. On Reddit, that doesn't happen. It's about the content, not the poster, when it comes to how well seen something is.",
"Reddit seems massive and influential because you're a part of Reddit. When you're on a computer for most of your time, you kind of get absorbed into Reddit culture. \n\n\nThought experiment: Try to think of what you did on the internet before you went on Reddit.",
"I wanted to add my 2 cents so here it is...\n\nI've been on reddit for a few months now and it was hard for me to understand the site at first. It's overwhelming at first because there is so much information and I wasn't used to reading threads so it took some time to understand reddit. When I figured out how to find subreddits and customize my reddit experience I started getting more into it and now I rarely go on Facebook, I get all my news, gossip and laughs from reddit AND I can post my opinions without losing friends over it! \n\n\nAlso, it was very hard to maneuver reddit on my phone but I found alien blue and that helped a lot. Another thing I found hard was learning all of the acronyms that are used (TIL, CMV, AMA, etc). I'm still not even sure how to do formatting, that confuses me and I even know some basic HTML! \n\n\nI do constantly talk about reddit now and I find a lot of people have heard of reddit but aren't sure how to use the site. I tell them it took me about a month to really learn but it was worth it! I'm actually going to send my stepdad some info on reddit so it's easier for him to get into it.",
"It attracts a different type of audience. Facebook and twitter allows any idiot to show how cool they are with their 3edgy5me statuses and their pictures where they think their affliction shirt selfie looks cool. Also, it feeds their need for attention.\n\nHere, most of your posts will be labeled shit posts and if you can't provide anything (witty comment, facts, etc) you're a faggot, fedora tipping neckbeard, or just down voted. You think you look cool with your selfie holding a razor to your throat? Facebook just gave you 57 likes, Reddit made you front page of /r/cringepics",
"People come to Reddit for anonymous conversation.\n\nTwitter and FB are used as a public face for your social interactions.",
"Lol, cause people who browse reddit have no social influence or power whatsoever.",
"I'd question the \"massive and influential\"-part. ",
"Because it lacks credibility, it's 100% confirmation-bias.",
"I'm surprised the top answer here isn't just plainly: reddit is not that massive nor is it very influential",
"Clearly it is not \"so massive and influential\" as you think.",
"It's because you're addicted to the internet and they aren't. ",
" Is it wrong that I don't want Reddit to be commercialized? I think its perfect the way it is. If you were a forum user before Facebook and all the social networks, then its pretty clear. Best. Worldwide. Forum. Ever.",
"It's not influential. ",
"Because it's the only proof left for a loving God. Why would anyone want Reddit to become like Facebook or Twitter? ",
"Reddit isn't that massive or influential. ",
"please see the 1st rule of fight club",
"Jeopardy used it in a couple of clues and @midnight on comedycentral is twitter/reddit essentially.",
"Anonymity has a lot to do with it I think. "
]
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"http://rt.com/news/reddit-confession-fbi-investigation-536/"
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1rp63i | why do operating system messages give useless (to most) error codes instead of simple explanations of what went wrong? | Example: Windows Update was failing. A string of numbers was the error. Turned out to be a simple matter of the system time being off. Why can't they just SAY "Check system time"? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rp63i/eli5_why_do_operating_system_messages_give/ | {
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"There are thousands of error codes in the systems and the OS is translated in many languages..\n\n* It's cheaper to use codes because you can keep adding them all over and not have to send them for translation\n* although some error codes have a common cause, others can because caused for various reasons and thus the explanations would be really long.\n* numbers are also easier to pass up through the system if something low level failed.",
"In addition to the answers ElectroSpore gave, another issue is that often problems within computers require background knowledge of computing to understand. Computers are complex and people can spend years of their life studying computing to properly understand how OSs work, so in a lot of cases there's no way to produce a simple, succint explanation for what went wrong that laypeople are going to understand.",
"As a software developer, I would like to get reports from users in the form of specific error codes rather than long sentences of what went wrong. It would indeed be less helpful for the end-user to figure out the problem but on my end, ~~but~~ with specific error codes I can more easily pinpoint where in the code this error is being produced, without asking for a bunch of other details from the user. This should lead to easier tracking of bugs, so I can release updates that might benefit a good number of other users who are experiencing the bug / error as well.",
"I just had this same problem, sort of. In Ubuntu (Gnu/Linux distro) when an application requires administrative privileges, Ubuntu doesn't tell you which one exactly. So what if, for example, I opened multiple programs at once and just for the heck of it, one of them actually happened to be a virus that could harm Linux...\n\nNow I don't know how to make my choice if I can choose to block only one because I don't know which program is requesting this. ",
"**Actually, they do give great info. It’s just Windows that has a really really shitty culture in that area.**\n\nOn Linux, MacOS X, BSD, and basically any other Unix/POSIX/… operating system, you have a system log, and you can configure the log level for every process there is. You can set it up to `debug`, which is such a detailed level that you’ll practically get flooded. Or just filter out everything that goes above a certain severity threshold. (Like only show warnings or worse.)\nOn Linux you can even color-code messages according to their severity now.\n\nThat actually is one of *the* main reasons I use Linux. Because getting errors but having *no* way of finding out what happened and why… being forced to poke around in the dark… drives me *crazy*!\n\n(With a small tool called `logcheck` you can even have it take all new messages, filter out everything you deem normal (by using a text file listing regexp patterns), and mail you the rest. You won’t miss a thing! \nI couldn’t live without it anymore.",
" > Why can't they just SAY \"Check system time\"?\n\nBecause the line of code that failed doesn't know that the problem is that your system time is wrong. When you do a search for error codes or when you go look at the MS knowledge base you're looking at common causes for an error.\n\nBut when you write code you have something like this\n\nIf some condition is true (do whatever is supposed to happen).\n\nIf not, throw off an error code that indicated this condition failed. \n\nThe solution to the problem is to figure out what caused the condition to be wrong in the first place, but then, maybe it's *supposed* to be wrong some of the time. \n\n\nSoftware is a series of complex interlocking systems, particularly operating systems where you have thousands of programmers who have worked for years. The guy doing a software update is checking to see if time time is valid, the guy who wrote the clock software 5 years ago did so with whatever his assumptions were (that time servers would be accessible for example). \n\nEnter you trying to update. The programmer who wrote the update only knows how to check that the time is valid or not, he has no way to peak into the time keeping code to know that the problem was some time sync failed, and that caused his time to be wrong. He just knows the time is wrong, and there are a lot of potential reasons for that. \n",
"As a programmer, i do put \"useless\" error codes as error messages, deliberately, for people like You :) to discourage You to fix the problem, because in 99% of the cases, people without any background knowledge would make the problem worse. And authors of an application or a operating systems have their lists of error codes and their meanings, so they can fix the problem. Seriously, that is a t least half of the reason.\n\nAnd pure laziness, a lot of it. But then, usually, the operating system code is divided into shitload of pieces, and many different people are working on separate pieces, so when something goes wrong, it may be impossible to give You a straight explanation, because how can a poor programmer know what went wrong if all the computer knows it that we should receive a number but we have a potato ?\n\nTL;DR: We, programers, have no idea what went wrong.",
"TLDR: Root cause analysis of error code is very hard for the computer while it is orders of magnitude easier for a user.\n\nA lot of the times a programmer check for error, it is very localized in the code. Say you have 100k lines of code, then at one place, system time is at an unexpected value, like in the future for example. The simplest strategy is just to output that the time is wrong, then exit gracefully instead of just crashing.\n\nThe real problems starts when you try to determine why is the time wrong at that place. Is it because of a timing issue earlier on? Or the user changed the date settings during the update? To check if the user changed the date settings, you have to write tons of code, many hundreds of lines which can (will) in turn, produce more bugs.\n",
"Related, from a programmer's point of view. \"There was a null reference error. I know which reference was null... but you'll have to figure that out for yourself.\"\n\nMakes me want to punch language designers in the face."
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ab5c5b | how does white noise cause people to hear phantom sounds, such as voices or music? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ab5c5b/eli5_how_does_white_noise_cause_people_to_hear/ | {
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"All sounds are basically just vibrations through the air, think like throwing a rock into a pond but in 3d space.\n\nVoices and music in particular are made up of a bunch of these vibrations. White noise is basically just random waves interacting with each other, so like throwing handfuls of rocks into a pond you get a bunch of waves crashing into each other.\n\nWhen we talk we are making very specific vibrations that we've practiced our whole life, and so we are good at interpreting syllables and words that know and are expecting to hear.\n\nWhen you listen to white noise, you occassionally will get blurbs that are similar to the waves a word would make and our brain then interprets as someone talking or singing, because that's what it sounds like so it assumes that's what it is.\n\nThis is how the yanny laurel things work as well. You have sounds that aren't really saying anything, but they are close to other sounds that you are familiar with and so your brain tries to understand that information in context of what it knows."
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2b0j1s | why does the mh17 crash affects the us airline stocks? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2b0j1s/eli5why_does_the_mh17_crash_affects_the_us/ | {
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"Everyone hears about it. People become scared.",
"Businesses and Investors don't like instability. Instability means more risk and more importantly risk that is hard to mitigate.\n\nA passanger airline being shot down in Ukraine is a pretty serious international incident. This is a very unstable time in the region and for the world as a number of major players (the US, the EU, Russia) are involved.\n\nSo investors are pulling back and taking a conservative stance. They are trying to avoid loses due to the increased risk.\n\n\nEdit: As to why US airline stocks are being affected... somebody just shot a passenger jet out of the sky. People are being reminded that this is possible and that causes a small panic. People are expecting that fewer people will fly now out of fear (despite their being virtually 0 risk of this happening within the US)."
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bxfn1f | how do people make up languages for films/books? do they go through a dictionary word by word and make up a translation for each one? or is it more of a pig-latin type process? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bxfn1f/eli5_how_do_people_make_up_languages_for/ | {
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"That strongly depends on how competent or ambitious said writer is. Sometimes they actually hire a linguist to help construct their languages and make an actual consistent language from the ground up - with vocabulary, grammar, and idioms to fit a real language. Often this constructed language goes far beyond what actually appears in the work it features in, but it helps give it an air of authenticity. Often they use a real language family as basis, but in some cases it's made up. Tolkien, being the prolific world-builder he was, constructed [several languages to some degree](_URL_0_). Klingon for instance is a real language you can learn. You probably won't get much use out of it in your day to day life, but you could learn it to a good enough degree to hold a conversation. \n\nSometimes you just need to construct enough of the language so that your characters can speak it to the degree required for the book. That language might never have a word for \"Relax\", but it might have a couple of war-related phrases for that big battle sequence. \n\nSometimes it's just pig-latin esque, but that's a bit lazy and is easily found out: language is more than just english with a 1:1 word replacement.",
"Tolkien for example was an academic who specialized in languages. He actually invented his fictions languages and built the world around them first before starting to write a story to use all of that in.\n\nOf course not everyone can be a Tolkien. Sometimes they just make up some random gibberish words that aren't part of an actual language.\n\nWith Klingon the language of the Klingon aliens from Star Trek, they started out with a few random phrases that didn't mean anything, before they got a professional to build a consistent and complete language based on the original meaningless throwaway lines.\n\nThe Language in Avatar was created from the ground up by a professional who tried hard to make more alien than most created and constructed languages.\n\nSome movie makers go the other way and include actual real world languages. Star Wars fro example had multiple instances of actors being encourage to speak in their native tongue as the makers didn't expect many movie goers to recognize exotic languages like Kalenjin and it sounded alien enough.\n\nSometimes writers who haven't actually studied any of that want to try their hand at creating a language. this mostly ends in embarrassment for them. At worst they come up with a cypher that just replaces english words with their made up words but keeping all the other parts of the english. This is especially noticeable when the writer only speaks a single language themselves. \n\nAt best they make up a language based on what they know, but all they know are indo-european descended languages so their alien or fantastic tongue ends up being a lot more familiar than languages actually used here on earth.\n\nMost readers of course won't know the difference, but some writers like to go overboard in their world building and think having an actual language is neat."
]
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29jf39 | what are music critics listening for? | For example, the album "Yeezus" was well received by music critics but many said it would take multiple listenings for it to grow on the general public. And as far as I can tell, a lot of Kanye West fans did not really like it at first. Why is this? How do music critics appreciate music right away without having to hear it multiple times? Am i making any sense? And I know this happens in other genres, but Yeezus was a recent example that I was familiar with. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/29jf39/eli5what_are_music_critics_listening_for/ | {
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"I don't wanna sound cynical but often they pick up things like arrangement and production techniques that the average and majority of listeners doesn't really listen for or care about.",
"I write album reviews on metalcore/post hardcore and a mix of other genres. Generally, lyricism and execution are what I look for. I do get into the technical aspects but what I really want to hear is something that's not super generic and has great overall sound. For example, I gave Attila's new album a bad score because he literally just sings about partying and cock the whole time. It's interesting to listen to but there's no real substance. I gave Adestria's previous album (not the new one, I did not review it) a great score because there were a lot of awesome elements that made it a memorable album.",
"Variety, for the most part. The way music is produced, written, and recorded means far more than how much you \"like it\" when it comes to critique.\n\n[This](_URL_0_) video shows how tons of songs use the EXACT same chords, and how many of them are incredibly popular despite sounding the exact same.\n\nI don't know much about Kayne's music, actually, maybe someone more in tune with the genre could help you. ",
"Honestly, there really isn't anything special, it really only comes down to personal taste in music, and what the critic expects and can easily over look. Honestly the only thing that really makes a critics voice special is their music literacy, their hopefully diverse range of music to compare the album in question to, and the ability to voice their opinion accurately and coherently.\n\nAs far as the Yeezus thing that has less to do about Music critics seeing something that you're not and more with the accessibility of the album, and the general music literacy of the average listener, as far as their understanding of song writing, production, instrumentation and technical skills on display.\n\nThough, I have pretty wide music tastes, and I thought Yeezus was and still is the most overrated album of the year.",
"I find it depends on the musical training of the individual. not to sound sanctimonious, but i started out at a young age playing clarinet, then trumpet, moving onto percussion and i've been playing drum set for 16 years now, dabbling with other instruments. i've got a pretty good grasp on music theory now thanks to my traditional background but it separates me from musicians who are self taught. writing music has an entire language available to make it easier to translate...but most of it is in italian and sounds silly. believe it or not, if you apply this knowledge you will start hearing why music on the radio is good or bad, acceptable or substandard. many people argue that this is totally subjective but i beg to differ as in any genre music is a language and should be articulated with stride. "
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1pxt6a | lift (the phenomena, not the english term for elevators) | I know how lift is produced, I just don't know how the shape of the wings of an airplane or the shape of a frisbee produces it.
Edit: Please don't just say "It makes the air go underneath" or any other thing that explains lift. I want to know in an engineering sense HOW it produces lift. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pxt6a/eli5_lift_the_phenomena_not_the_english_term_for/ | {
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"If you force air over an object or force an object through air,the objects shape will have an effect on the shape and direction of the air. If one side is flat and one side is bulbous (like a wing), it will take air longer to travel over the bulbous side then the flat side. The added distance causes the air to spread out. This is where the pressure difference that creates lift comes from."
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6dhn4s | what did bill clinton do/what contributed to the prosperous economic state in the 90's? | Doing a presentation on the 90's as a decade, and one of the topics is economics. This seemed like a nice and stable period time for the U.S. but why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6dhn4s/eli5_what_did_bill_clinton_dowhat_contributed_to/ | {
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"Not much. He was serendipidously the President just as internet/tech began to take off. Refused to utilize military for counterterrorism.. so the combination of a robust economy and massive cuts to the military gives illusion he actually had something to do with it (budget surplusses and all) but in reality he was just fucking off most of the time. ",
"Most of anything that happens with the economy is completely incidental to the president.\n\nOne of the big drivers of the economy in the '90s was based on the rapid increase in availability of a new technology: the internet. This created entire new markets and industries that spurred overall growth.",
"Sometimes the best thing a President can do is not screw up a good thing when it's happening.\n\nThe Internet was just starting to boom then, and Clinton *didn't mess it up*. He didn't create it, but he didn't stop it either (and did a good job of making sure others didn't stop it). That may not sound like much, but Presidents/Congresses have purposely or ham-handedly stifled innovation in the past for various reasons. Clinton didn't do that.\n\nHe did do some things to help it too: increased education funding and funding to research universities (where many of the new technologies used by the Internet where invented), increased funding to the National Science Foundation by over 30% (again increasing the creation and adoption of new technologies), and so on.\n\nPaying for basic scientific research often pays huge dividends.",
"The Cold War ended, and the US had the first massive contraction of their Armed Forces since the late 1940's. Commercial internet began which led to a new massive multi trillion dollar industry.",
"Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993.\n\nDerided by Republicans as the largest tax hike in American history, it largely repealed the \"trickle-down\" tax cuts for the wealthy in the Tax Reform Act of 1987. This act passed through both houses and was signed by newly inaugurated President Clinton without a single Republican vote.\n\nThe increase in taxes on the wealthy in 1993 saw a dramatic increase in funding for Republican candidates in the 1994 mid-term election. Clinton would spend the remainder of his two terms in office working with a Republican Congress.\n\nThrough the remainder of his Presidency, market growth increased tax rolls to create a budget surplus. Clinton asserted that the surplus would be used to pay down the debt. To many this seemed like a fiscally-conservative move, but it was actually in opposition to Newt Gingrich's proposals to cut taxes to \"give the surplus back to the people.\"\n\nRegardless the economic boom in tech sector also had the effect of dramatically increasing consumer confidence, after all their leaders in DC were arguing about what to do with all that extra money! Sectors beyond technology saw growth as a result of high confidence in consumables and the service sector.\n\n\n",
"NAFTA. Cheaper goods meant a better quality of living by in effect deflating the dollar. This allowed people to buy more which sent the economy into overdrive.\n\n23 million net jobs were created in his 8 years. 3 million in the first two years, 20 million in the 6 years after NAFTA was signed.\n\n(Fun Fact: the Trump WH sent a memo to Congress detailing what they'd like to renegotiate in NAFTA. Nothing of consequence was noted.)\n\nThe second area Clinton and the Democrats in Congress spearheaded was building Internet infrastructure through subsidies.\n\n(But the .com crash at the end of his presidency lowered his net jobs total from 26-27 million to 23 million. To compare, Reagan created 16 million, Carter 10 million (in 4 years), and W Bush 3 million.)",
"Among the other reasons mentioned here, there was also a major scaling back of the military. This lead to a \"peace dividend\" where the money that would otherwise have gone into the military was instead used for things that actually helped the economy.\n\nThings were bad in places that depended on military spending for part of their economy (California was actually hit pretty hard), but that was a temporary situation."
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1w1hp7 | why, in most governments, does there seem to be no effort in fighting corruption in politics? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1w1hp7/eli5_why_in_most_governments_does_there_seem_to/ | {
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"Who puts forth the laws to stem corruption? Typically it's those who benefit from the corruption and thus have no incentive to change it.",
"Let's get the money out of politics, and then worry about this.",
"Sorry to break your circle jerk reddit, but actually, there is a great deal of effort to combat corruption. Most people just aren't aware of it because it is:\n\n1. Less than glorious work that looks more like auditing (see: _URL_0_) than the street protests or scandals you're looking for. Each agency and department in the government I have ever worked with (USAID, State, DHS) goes through fairly extensive checks to be held accountable for what they do and where their resources go. Also, more often than not, those investigations don't turn up anything \"newsworthy.\"\n\n2.Passive, the entire structure of the US government, for example, is designed to combat corruption.\n\n\nIn sum, just because you don't hear about it doesn't mean it isn't happening. Could we do more? Sure. Could politicians do a better job of holding themselves accountable? Of course. However, reddit's view that government is just a money sinkhole run by cronyism and nepotism is bullshit. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but its not like nobody cares about it or is trying to combat it.",
"Because *Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?*",
"I've got the power ... _URL_0_",
"Why don't pimps do something to stop getting all of those blow jobs?",
"On a more micro level than these comments seem to be addressing, in most parts of the world corruption runs rampant on a small scale daily because a lack of accountability has created different societal norms.\n\nExample: I'm currently living in Bucharest. Unless you're crashing, it's pretty much impossible to get an official DUI if you're willing to part with, say 75 Euros, more or less. Why here and not in America? Are cops better people in America? Fuck no. They might however lose their job and worse in America if something like this were brought to the attention of their superiors, especially publicly. This keeps them in line (to the extent that they're in line, anyway). Fear of repercussions. In Romania bribes are accepted and expected by all and anyone in a leadership position used to do the same thing and likely still does, only now on a higher level. Nobody involved, from the driver to the Mayor to the taxpayer sitting at home even has a different expectation. You can't create a controversy when what is seen as supposed to happen happens.\n\nSimilarly, in order to get your Driver's license here, you're apparently expected to bribe the test administer. Otherwise, they will simply fail you over and over. It's funny to me to imagine an American DMV worker trying this. They wouldn't last a day. The norm itself, however, is different here (as in most other historically poor countries).\n\nSimple Answer, micro or macro: $ \n\n\n\n ",
"The answer lies within your question..."
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f3zily | how is soy sauce made? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/f3zily/eli5_how_is_soy_sauce_made/ | {
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"Soy sauce is made by fermenting soy beans and wheat using a fungus called koji. You cook soy beans, then put mold spores on them, let the mold grow for a few days, then put all the moldy soy beans into a jar of salty water.\n\n > I have no clue how to make it and I need to for a gathering.\n\nI hope this gathering isn't any time soon, because after you put the soy beans in the salt brine, you let the mixture ferment for months, and sometimes more than a year.\n\nHere's someone's account of making soy sauce at home.\n\n_URL_0_"
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"https://thethingswellmake.com/how-to-make-soy-sauce-homemade-shoyu/"
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6aowmn | how can some people feel bad weather coming in previous injuries? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6aowmn/eli5_how_can_some_people_feel_bad_weather_coming/ | {
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"text": [
"Pressure changes. When the air pressure outside drops, the air trapped in joints and old wounds expands. The expansion can be painful. "
]
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9bukpc | why is volcanic soil so fertile? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9bukpc/eli5_why_is_volcanic_soil_so_fertile/ | {
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"The lava that comes out of a volcano is full of minerals containing phosphorus, potassium, etc. The things that plants need to grow.\n\nAs the lava rock gets broken down and mixed with organic material, it creates a nutritious soil for plants.\n\nOver time, nutrients get washed or blown away by rain and wind, returning nutrients to the sea or other areas. The soil becomes less fertile as the nutrients are lost.",
"High water retention and many essential minerals that are otherwise pretty lacking or limited in nature. Phosphorus is the big one.",
"Many nutrients for plants are used in form of ions. Soils typically can hold either positively charged ions or negativelly (depending on soil composition). Volcanic soil can retain both ion types (+ and - charged), making it a really fertile matrix. At least that is what I kept from edaphology classes."
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5gk1n6 | how do domesticated rodents know what a wheel is for? | I have a hedgehog and the day we got her we got her a wheel (like any hamster or gerbil owner would). From day one she "knew" what to do with the wheel. I understand they must have some instinctive need to run but how do they know that the wheel is for running?
Bonus: [Photo of Juliet the Hedgehog](_URL_0_) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5gk1n6/eli5_how_do_domesticated_rodents_know_what_a/ | {
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"text": [
"They will climb on it to investigate and quickly figure out the mechanism of it. Rodents/ many small mammals have excellent spatial skills and abilities.\n\n_URL_0_"
]
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3i7972 | why do governments produce and sell weapons to other entities than their own law enforcement? | **EXCLUDING WEAPONS FOR ANIMAL HUNTING!**
^(but they don't need a fully automatic, do they?)
Besides making profit, you can be 100% sure that, at a certain point the producer (government) will be the cause of armed violence against it's own law enforcement.
Does the profit financially outweigh the danger for armed revolution?
Because I think that is BS. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3i7972/eli5_why_do_governments_produce_and_sell_weapons/ | {
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"The US government does not manufacture a single bullet, gun, tank or missile. Private companies make it all and have the right to sell anything that isn't actual military secrets to anyone they want.\n\nWelcome to the Military Industrial Complex!"
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3a82x4 | why does it appear american conservatives have pushed so far to the right in the last 15 years? | I'm honestly not trying to offend anyone with this question. That's why I say "appear," because I want to include the possibility that the shift is merely my perception, not reality.
That being said, it appears the election of GW Bush in 2000 marked the beginning of a calculated and significant shift to the right among American conservatives.
What was considered moderate during the Clinton administration is often labeled as "progressive" by conservatives today.
Were there market forces driving this? Was there some change in US policy? What happened? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3a82x4/eli5_why_does_it_appear_american_conservatives/ | {
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"The Republican Party has pushed right, which also means many conservatives have gone right with them, either to keep with the pack or because they don't know any better. I know many fairly conservative people who are appalled at what the Republican Party now stands for.",
"I was alive then, and somewhat aware. What happened was that the economy had a hangover from the tech bubble and the LTC crisis, and other economic crises. So, the mentality shifted from spending, growth to conserving resources, etc. ( Don't spend on social programs, but cut taxes instead.) Then 9/11 happened which devasted any sense of security and isolated identity Americans had. This then leads to pro-military policies and tougher stances on other countries that could hurt the country and the identity of the country. ( military and pro national/anti-foreign sentiments are usually on the right)",
"According to [The Big Sort](_URL_0_), people are moving into neighborhoods with other like-minded people and listening mostly to those who agree with them. This creates an echo-chamber effect that serves to strengthen people in their previous convictions and push them to more extreme views. Thus, conservatives have been pushing to the right and liberals have been pushing to the left. "
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7k1l9m | what are gas giants and why can't we land in them? | **Edit** Thanks for all the answers, that clarified alot | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7k1l9m/eli5_what_are_gas_giants_and_why_cant_we_land_in/ | {
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"Exactly what it says on the tin: they are giant balls of gas. We can't land on them because: they are giant balls of gas.\n\nEven theoretical models that permit them to have a surface of some kind at the center, it would be under such conditions (temperatures, pressures) that no man-made craft could reach it and survive.",
"So it's a planet made almost entirely of gas with some ices (they usually do have a metal core) and thy are much bigger than earth. We can't land on them because they don't have a surface. As you go down through the atmosphere, due to the immense pressure, you would start feeling gas around you. As you went deeper in the gas would start to feel more and more fluid like until you reached the point where you could swim. This change from gas to liquid is gradual unlike on earth where you would get a splash. Also we couldn't land on them because the immense pressure and heat would destroy almost anything we send"
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qhwzc | how i can feel the presence of someone entering a room | Often when I'm in my room asleep/half asleep and someone comes in to grab something quietly I can 'feel' them enter and exit the room.
What exactly is this? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/qhwzc/eli5_how_i_can_feel_the_presence_of_someone/ | {
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"Sound and air pressure would be my answer. Even if they're quiet, in a quiet room they disturb the static air mass and you can pick up on that. One of the cool things about being an animal.",
"You have two levels of sensory perception.\n\nThere is the alarm response...it's fast, gets you ready to response, but doesn't tell you much.\n\nThen there is the normal sensory perception, where your brain takes the time to process what is going on.\n\nSince your alarm response is faster...*especially* when you are sleepy...it can give you the impression that you notice something *before* you figure out what you are seeing and hearing. ",
"Sound. There was a study done with blind people, who apparently have similar powers, as they always claimed that they \"felt\" the presence of object or people. They tried blocking sound to their ears and they stopped being able to detect things. They also hooked microphones to their ears that gave them the \"perspective\" of another person who would walk around, and they were able to \"feel\" when he was near an object, despite being in a different room/location.\n\nSorry, I cannot recall the name of the study, we discussed it in a psychology class a long time ago."
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5ll4g2 | why do roads have unnecessary bends? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5ll4g2/eli5why_do_roads_have_unnecessary_bends/ | {
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"Many very long roads add \"unnecessary\" bends in order to keep drivers awake and alert. Long stretches of straight road tend to put tired drivers to sleep, which is obviously a safety hazard.",
"I think the premise is false - just because it seems unnecessary, it's highly unlikely anybody is going to build needlessly curvy roads.\n\nObvious factors would be geography (Sometimes cheaper to simply avoid a big rock formation than to go through it), land ownership (maybe they couldn't acquire the land, or again, it was cheaper to go around), following a previous road/trail rather than trying to re engineer it, avoiding any other obstacles and, finally, some roads are built deliberately curvy to increase driver concentration.",
"Many times because you can't see and are completly unaware of why.\n\nThis includes geological formations, various barriers of material, utilities that need to be run, grading and drainage issues and a myriad of planning that goes into road engineering.\n\nA properly built road takes those factors in, it doesn't just appear.",
"Roads have required gradient changes (changes in slope). In order to achieve the specifications, the roads are longer and more curved to accommodate rise over run. In other words, roads can not be too steep so they are stretched out over long distances via curves and bends to accommodate the gradient change. This is one of the basics of civil engineering. ",
"There's a multitude of reasons why road designers do this.\n\nChasing the straight is the biggest reason. Roads that wind through uneven areas will often chase the straightest path that involves the engineers having to do the least amount of work levelling the ground. It's often cheaper and easier to extend the road a few hundred meters or even miles than it is to have to bring in the engineering resources to level the ground to build the road.\n\nThe next most common reason is a winding road is easier to travel up/down a gradient. Let's imagine you are at the foot of a steep hill. You can walk up that hill one of two ways. You can walk up it in a straight line and fight the gradient all the way up, or you can walk a \"Wavy\" indirect path that extends the distance you have to walk but decreases the gradient, making it easier, if a bit longer. Just like your legs, a vehicles engine and brakes will have an easier time of it ascending or descending the gradient if it does this.\n\nThe third most common reason is that sometimes its just easier to avoid something that the engineers knew was there but is not immediately obvious to you. Like marshy ground beneath the surface. In the UK there is a motorway called the M62 that is bisected by a [lone farm and looks extremely odd](_URL_0_). Many people believe that the farm is still there because the owners refused to sell their land. The real reason is the ground around the farm is so marshy its unsuitable for a road, the engineers simply went round it and did not need to demolish the farm, so they left them there.\n\nThere was some flawed research many years ago that led to the thinking that drivers are less likely to fall asleep if they are forced to drive to a curve. This was quickly debunked but it led to a common myth that motorways developed during the 60's and 70's where designed with this research prompting the constant curves in them. The real reason is that they where designed with shallow curves to eliminate the amount of sharper curving that might be required and thus maintain higher speeds and prevent slow-down or braking pinch points.\n\nA similar myth often leads to the belief that roads are sometimes designed with curves/bends to force drivers to obey a speed limit. No road designer would ever do this. All roads are designed to be navigated as fast as possible as an efficiency metric. Any road that is by design slowing the traffic down is inherently inefficient and will cause problems.\n\nBelieve it or not, property ownership is rarely a barrier to a roads construction and it rarely dictates the path a road has to take. If a road is considered necessary, many compulsory purchase laws exist in most countries that allow the land in question to be compulsory purchased from the land owner to allow the road to proceed. As I alluded to above, many people believe this is the reason the [farm that bisects the M62 in the UK](_URL_0_) remains where it is in its odd location. The real reason is the engineers didn't want it as it was a unsuitable path for the road to take. Had they wanted it, they would have gotten it (Just like they compulsory purchased all the houses and farms that surrounded it)."
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7gw83s | what ant decides when a colony is to be moved? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7gw83s/eli5_what_ant_decides_when_a_colony_is_to_be_moved/ | {
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"No one ant decides to move. Instead, when an ant thinks the colony needs to move, it goes out scouting for a new home. If it finds one it likes, it comes back to the nest, lays down a phermone trail, and brings another ant to check out the new nest. If _that_ ant likes it too, it will go back and also lay down a phermone trail and bring a new ant to check out the place. If it doesn't like it, the ant will just go back home.\n\nEventually, if the number of ants desiring to move to the new place gets big enough, the whole colony will migrate over. Ants may move if their old home has been damaged, or if they've just outgrown the space available, or various other reasons.\n\nHere's a write up about an experiment that this info comes from\n\n_URL_0_\n\n",
"I was really hoping there would just be one ant who was confident enough to convince their colony mates to move, and thus the move was on. "
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5otupv | why are bulletproof vests not reusable? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5otupv/eli5_why_are_bulletproof_vests_not_reusable/ | {
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"The easiest way I can explain this, is a kevlar vest is like a cube of jello? If you smack the jello and crush it, it will break apart, but absorb the shock, if you hit it again it's just a pile of mush so it will barely stop your hand, your hand being the bullet.",
"It can stop multiple rounds it just lowers the structural integrity of the material the more it's damaged lower than what is required to classify it as that class of body armor... they have an expiration date too.",
"Because the vest can stop a bullet only if certain parts of it are at full strength. \n\nWhen a bullet goes though it the layers will weaken as they stop a bullet. In fact some of the layers are designed to breakdown as they get struck by the bullet. As they those layers degrade they absorb a lot of the force of that bullet. \n\nBut if I have a new vest and a vest that has been shot a few times, the used vest will give much more unreliable protection. \n\n\nThey new vest will be far more reliable. ",
"They are not bulletproof, they are bullet resistant, that resistance goes down each time they are struck and eventually they will fail and bullets will pass through them.",
"Kevlar vests are made by layers after layers of material. Think of a net to catch a bullet. The bullet is going to rip through the net but it does slow it down a bit. There is a second net which the bullet also rips through but slows it down even more. Layer after layer gives way but slowing down the bullet more and more until the bullet is moving so slow that the next net does not break.\n\nSo even though the bullet did not get through the vest, half of the nets now have a hole in them. Those nets won't be as uniform in absorbing energy making them less effective and should a bullet strike the same spot twice, lets just hope the second half of the vest is just as good.",
"Ok depending on the type of vest you are talking about is going to get you a different answer, but a vest with plates is meant to break so as to absorb the impact. However, once the plate is broken there isn't enough surface area to dissapate the energy from the impact of the bullet so it will be inoperable.A Kevlar vest however is woven in layers which give it alot of strength. Technically speaking if you were only shot once a kevlar vest would be reusable if you didnt get shot in the same exact place albeit the structural integrity of the vest would be damaged and the risk of reusing kevlar vests is not one that law enforcement/Military is/should be willing to take. "
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oofa5 | eil5: why are sunsets more colorful in winter? | This may just be spitting in the wind, but it seems like sunsets during the winter months are more vibrant and colorful. They have deeper, richer, longer lasting colors. A lot of the time, they stretch all the way across the sky. Why is that? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/oofa5/eil5_why_are_sunsets_more_colorful_in_winter/ | {
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"OK, so it all depends on where you are on the earth. The sun's light is directed at an angle from -23 degree to +23 degrees throughout the year (in relation to the equator). This is because of our Earth's tilted axis. The winter solstice is when the sun is at its lowest point (in the northern hemisphere) and the summer solstice is when the sun is at its highest point (again, in the northern hemisphere). These solstices line up with the beginning of winter and the beginning of summer. The other two interesting points are when the sun's light is at an angle of zero degrees, these are called equinoxes.\n\nNow, the higher you are in the northern hemisphere (a higher \"latitude\"), the lower the sun light's angle will be in the winter. So, when the sun rises and sets, it almost seems like it barely gets above the horizon. I am in Seattle, so it is not that exaggerated, but noticeable.\n\nOK, now here's your answer: when the sun is setting during winter, the light has to pass through much more atmosphere before it reaches your eyes. More atmosphere means more \"stuff\" the light has to pass through. This is because of the angle of the sun's light as it shines on your location. The more \"stuff\" the light has to pass through, the more the light will be reflected and absorbed and create the colorful sunsets you see.\n\n"
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1qmgo7 | how can some people stand in the cold in shorts and a t-shirt and be perfectly fine, when another person of equal size and body type, might be freezing and need tons of layers to stay warm? | I'm a 20 year old male, 5'11", 145lbs, lived in Florida all my life. We recently had a cold front come through town, it was high 50s, low 60s, and in the morning I needed to get something out of my car and didn't realize how cold it was so I walked out there in shorts and tank and instantly I was freezing. Later in the day, now dressed in pants and a long sleeve shirt with a jacket, I drive out of my neighborhood past this bus stop and see a guy waiting there about the same size as me rocking shorts and a t-shirt and looking completely unfazed by the weather. How is this possible?? Why does this happen? I want to be able to stand out in barely cold weather and not be bothered, what's the deal with my body! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1qmgo7/eli5_how_can_some_people_stand_in_the_cold_in/ | {
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"Because different people adjust to these things differently. \nI met an exchange student from Poland here in Belgium and he was just rocking some shorts and a t-shirt when all of us were wearing our jackets and all of that. What's cold for us wasn't exactly cold for him. Same principle applies the other way as well, when I go to Dubia or something like that I'll feel like I'm melting when the people there seem to think it's a rather chilly day... It's just what you're used to.\n\nThat, and people adjust in different ways. I even like to sleep with my window open in the winter, because I handle cold really well. My mother, on the other hand, always heats her room until the point that I couldn't even be in there for more than three minutes. \n\nAlso; I'm not a scientist so I don't really know any super cool explanations, but that's just how I see it.\n\n\nTL;DR: It all depends on what you're used to.\n"
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1je60s | why are acid attacks so prevalent in the middle east/asia? | What is it that makes this form of assault so prevelent in the middle east as well as in Asia?
Is it because of the lack of control over acidic chemicals? Is it because many of these chemicals are produced in these places?
Please reddit, explain this like i'm five so I may be enlightened as to why this form of assault occurs in these regions at such a high rate. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1je60s/eli5_why_are_acid_attacks_so_prevalent_in_the/ | {
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"Follow up: If you can get these chemicals in the US and other Western countries, why are these attacks not as common here as they are in the east?",
"this is because they have no base."
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jdgm3 | the difference between polar and non-polar compounds | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jdgm3/eli5_the_difference_between_polar_and_nonpolar/ | {
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"Think of the shape in terms of sports objects. Something like a baseball, soccer ball, tennis ball would all be non-polar. An American football would be polar. A simplified non-polar example is \"balance,\" except not in a physical manner but with electrons.\n\nFor molecules, the polarity is the spreading out of electrons. A non-polar molecule (such as methane, CH4) has a single carbon atom in the middle surrounded by four hydrogen atoms. All the hydrogen atoms are the same distance apart from each other. If you were to have the methane molecule physically in your hand and turned it so you were looking at one of the hydrogen atoms directly in front, it wouldn't matter which hydrogen atom it was, since it would look the same every time.\n\nIf you didn't know anything about chemistry and were asked to draw out the water molecule (two hydrogen atoms, one oxygen atom) it would make sense to just draw it as H-O-H, in a straight line. In the real world this is not the case, mostly because of electron orbitals, but I feel like that might be too complicated to explain to a five year old (or maybe I just can't). But the main point is that the oxygen atom has numerous more electrons than it wants to share with the hydrogen atoms. It stores its extra electrons that it's not sharing in its orbitals, which is kind of like an electron cloud for the molecule. Without the cloud the water molecule would be completely straight, but since the cloud is there on one side it pushes the hydrogen molecules into a \" > \" shape because the cloud is quite large and takes up a lot of room. This causes the water molecule to be polar, having a partial negative charge where the electron cloud (orbital) is (because electrons have a negative charge) and a partial positive charge where the hydrogen atoms are located. The overall charge of a water molecule is zero, so if there is a partial negative area there needs to be a partial positive area to balance it out.\n\nI have no idea if a 5 year old could understand that but it was fun to type anyway.",
"A polar molecule has a positive charge on one end and a negative charge on the opposite end. Because of this, polar molecules align end to end like magnets. The charge difference is caused by one atom of the molecule being \"stronger\" and therefore better at pulling electrons towards it.\n\nA non-polar molecule has an even charge across its whole surface.",
"Think of the shape in terms of sports objects. Something like a baseball, soccer ball, tennis ball would all be non-polar. An American football would be polar. A simplified non-polar example is \"balance,\" except not in a physical manner but with electrons.\n\nFor molecules, the polarity is the spreading out of electrons. A non-polar molecule (such as methane, CH4) has a single carbon atom in the middle surrounded by four hydrogen atoms. All the hydrogen atoms are the same distance apart from each other. If you were to have the methane molecule physically in your hand and turned it so you were looking at one of the hydrogen atoms directly in front, it wouldn't matter which hydrogen atom it was, since it would look the same every time.\n\nIf you didn't know anything about chemistry and were asked to draw out the water molecule (two hydrogen atoms, one oxygen atom) it would make sense to just draw it as H-O-H, in a straight line. In the real world this is not the case, mostly because of electron orbitals, but I feel like that might be too complicated to explain to a five year old (or maybe I just can't). But the main point is that the oxygen atom has numerous more electrons than it wants to share with the hydrogen atoms. It stores its extra electrons that it's not sharing in its orbitals, which is kind of like an electron cloud for the molecule. Without the cloud the water molecule would be completely straight, but since the cloud is there on one side it pushes the hydrogen molecules into a \" > \" shape because the cloud is quite large and takes up a lot of room. This causes the water molecule to be polar, having a partial negative charge where the electron cloud (orbital) is (because electrons have a negative charge) and a partial positive charge where the hydrogen atoms are located. The overall charge of a water molecule is zero, so if there is a partial negative area there needs to be a partial positive area to balance it out.\n\nI have no idea if a 5 year old could understand that but it was fun to type anyway.",
"A polar molecule has a positive charge on one end and a negative charge on the opposite end. Because of this, polar molecules align end to end like magnets. The charge difference is caused by one atom of the molecule being \"stronger\" and therefore better at pulling electrons towards it.\n\nA non-polar molecule has an even charge across its whole surface."
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27odik | why can't i upload a gif as my profile picture or banner on facebook or twitter? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27odik/eli5_why_cant_i_upload_a_gif_as_my_profile/ | {
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"Because the format is not supported by the parameters set up by Facebook and Twitter. Also, HUGE GIF.",
"Because they decided that they don't want you to. ",
"Could you imagine loading an entire facebook page of GIFs? It's already bad enough to load one sometimes."
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65jy6i | when venus fly traps eat, how does the animal die? - also what would happen to a finger in a venus fly trap? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/65jy6i/eli5_when_venus_fly_traps_eat_how_does_the_animal/ | {
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"The fly's body slowly dissolves in liquids secreted by the plant. Same thing would happen to a finger. Seems like a pretty gruesome way to die. ",
"Basically the Venus Fly Trap (VFT) seals up when something is inside of it, creating a pocket. It then fills that pocket with acidic digestive juices (essentially creating a stomach).\n\nThe acidic juices aren't strong enough to destroy chitin (the harder exoskeleton), but it is strong enough to deteriorate the connective tissue between the chitin - like in leg sockets or in spots between body segments (thorax and abdomen). Then the acid gets inside the guts of the bug, liquefying it. \n\nOnce the bug's insides have been liquefied, the flytrap absorbs the nutrients/digestive juices within the pocket. When the trap re-opens (if it does... most traps can be activated 3-5 times before the trap self destructs), the chitinous husk of the last meal is leftover. This husk can attract spiders or other bugs looking for a meal, serving as bait in a way.\n\nWhen it comes to the finger issue, there's a few problems. VFT traps are activated by triggering a certain amount of hairs. Even then, after the trap closes, the prey item has to keep triggering the hairs, which indicates that prey is inside the pocket, signalling the trap to fully seal itself up and begin filling with acidic juices. In the instance you just put your finger in a normal size trap, it would probably close, realize its prey item is too big since it can't fully seal itself up, and then release you. \n\nNow, in the instance you fell into a man-size VFT, and it closed around you, sealing you up inside, and you continued to struggle and try to get out instead of sit very still as to not agitate the trigger hairs (which would release you, as the trap would think it did not actually catch you. Bugs are too stupid to not resist, we are not), the plant would seal itself up and become air-tight. Before any acidic juices are released, you asphyxiate within the trap from lack of oxygen (most likely), or you will drown in the juices when the pocket fills up with acid. You probably won't feel being burned alive - it takes the VFT a few days to fully digest a bug, so I imagine if it were the same for humans, you'd be dead due to asphyxiation long before you felt any burning sensations. \n\nProbably TMI for ELI5, but I've been raising VFT for close to 15 years now, and have studied them quite a bit. Also, as a note, don't feed your VFT meat. They don't like it."
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dtzzr0 | how was such a massive structure like the hoover dam constructed so perfectly without modern technology and how were they able to hold the water back during the build? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dtzzr0/eli5_how_was_such_a_massive_structure_like_the/ | {
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"The river was diverted by use of tunnels, there was no water to hold back. Once the dam was complete, the valley filled with water. You can read more on Wikipedia [Hoover Dam](_URL_0_)",
"What are you talking about? The Hoover Dam _WAS_ made with modern technology."
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cepqe3 | how does gold end up concentrated in a vein on earth, considering the contents originate from multiple separate supernovae? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cepqe3/eli5_how_does_gold_end_up_concentrated_in_a_vein/ | {
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"So there are a *lot* of factors at play here so I'm skipping a fair bit. The current theory of how gold seams form is as follows:\n\nDeep underground, a lot of minerals are fairly homogenously dissolved in groundwater and, because it's underground, this water is at extremely high pressure (3000 atmospheres). Earthquakes at these depths can cause fissures and cracks to open up between the rocks, and when this happens the pressure drops to close to 1 atmosphere. This causes the water to vaporise, depositing all the minerals dissolved in it onto the surrounding rock, gold included. \n\nWhen the earthquake is over and pressure normalises, the water condenses and re-dissolves most of the minerals. Gold is not very soluble though, so it is less able to be re-absorbed and stays as a thin deposit on the rock. This process repeats over and over until a significant amount of gold has been deposited in a seam/vein.\n\nAt this point some kind of geological activity is required to bring the seam to, or close to, the surface. Earthquakes, plate tectonics, volcanoes, etc can all do this. It's no coincidence that the (well, a) gold rush occurred in California, an extremely earthquake-prone part of the world!",
"My only experience is panning, so can't speak to deep veins. BUT those veins, over time, can make it to the surface. \nGold is denser than most material. Rain water and rivers will cause it to get trapped and concentrate as the area around it erodes away or material moves down stream.",
"ELI5: Can someone explain what OP is asking?\n\nEdit: thanks everybody",
"Planetary differentiation. \n\n\n [_URL_1_](_URL_0_) \n\n\nGold is heavy. Really heavy. When a planet is red-hot and molten, heavy elements sink to the core. Lighter stuff 'floats'. If that planet were to be destroyed by whatever mechanism, you'll have a bunch of asteroids with different compositions. Those asteroids then hit earth, seeding the upper crust with various metals. \n\n\nSee also, the Late Heavy Bombardment period: [_URL_3_](_URL_2_)",
"Gold and quartz precipitate out of solution in hydrothermal vents when the water cools in the upper crust",
"Geologist here, please ignore most of the previous replies apart from /u/interstellargator who explains crack-seal vein formation nicely.\n\nGold deposits are formed in many different ways, most of the time in gold mines you will never see the gold - it is contained microscopically within other minerals which need to be crushed up to recover it.\n\nWhen you talk about gold veins you are probably talking about the classic movie style 'motherlode' vein where you see nice [big chunks of visible gold](_URL_0_) hanging around in rocks. These types of veins are actually really common, they just don't tend to have gold in them. The veins form from hydrothermal processes, hydrothermal means hot 'water' (for want of a better word) which is loaded with salt, chlorine, sulphur, carbon dioxide and various acids. They are NOT magmatic (molten rock).\n\nHydrothermal fluids can come from a few different sources, the earth's mantle, crust, or surface and gold can be picked up by fluids originating from any of these sources! You just need to heat up the water, pressurise it, and get some nasty chemicals dissolved in it, this isn't hard when you start to circulate water around underground!\n\nFluids will travel through cracks and very small pores in the rocks and gradually the concentration of gold will increase as it dissolves it from the rocks it travels through (which may have 1 part per billion or less gold) or, if it is sourced from the mantle, the gold may already be dissolved in the fluid. Then, as the fluid circulates around something changes - it can be the pH of the fluid, the amount of oxygen, the temperature, and the gold will start to precipitate out.\n\nRemember - at this point, the fluid is extremely high pressure, it is busting apart the rock and pushing through it, it starts to fill in - think of lime that builds up on your kettle or your showerhead, exactly the same idea but this is quartz and gold instead of carbonate. additionally, because pressures in the earth are enormous, this type of veining occurs quite shallowly in the top ~5km of the crust because otherwise the open spaces would be forced shut, deeper 'vein gold' occurrences you get from more of a crack-seal type of vein.\n\nFinally, many people regard the most valuable type of gold vein to only exist on a website called 'Reddit' where a single inane comment will be 'gilded'. This is a rare occurrence just like the discovery of physical gold however the processes seem to be much the same albeit more of a social phenomenon than a chemical one. This inane comment will be followed by a 'chain-reaction' of replies generally along the lines of 'Nice' or 'F' and depending on the alcohol levels in the vein this can trigger what is known as a 'gold train' which is of course, as we all know, where the world famous 'Kind Stranger' nugget first originated.",
"Many have already given good answers, so I will just try to add something as I am currently working in gold exploration.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nOne good way to think about concentrating gold in significant amounts is the classical 1. Source 2. Conduit 3. Trap model for the formation of ore deposits. The model suggests that in order to form economic concentrations of gold there is firstly a need to have a source site (or an area) where gold is concentrated in fluid solution (hot, saline mixture of vapor, liquid and metals). As an example you could have **a rock unit deep underground** (several kilometers) that is subjected to circulation of hot fluids which are able to dissolve gold from the rock and increase the gold concentration in the circulating fluids to 100x - 1000x of that of the source rock. Here it is good to know that gold (as are most other elements too) is present almost in any kind of rock, but just in neglible amounts.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nSecondly, a **conduit** is needed to transport the now gold enriched hot fluids to depths where gold precipitation is possible. Someone already mentioned earthquakes ,and fissures and cracks related to them, that are very effective in creating pathways for the fluids to flow. Geologically there are also several other ways to create different kinds of weakness surfaces in the bedrock that are used by the gold bearing fluids to rise up.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nFinally, there must be a **change** **in the prevailing conditions** that act to destabilize the hot fluid (OR more precisely the chemical complexes within the fluid) that carries gold. Generally, three different mechanisms are responsible for gold precipitation: 1. Drop in pressure 2. Drop in temperature 3. Fluid chemistry change (mixing with other fluid, or contamination with reactive rock such as limestone/marble\\[ex. pH changes\\]). The process can be any single of the aforementioned or a combination of them, and if the change is strong enough gold 'simply' drops out of the solution a bit like a salt (NaCl) saturated water would precipitate salt on the bottom of a mug if the temperature is decreased.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nWorth mentioning is that there might be just a single event that precipitates gold, or the formation of the gold deposit can happen in multiple phases or pulses.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nEdit. Just corrected one typo, and added one missed paragraph change",
"Some top answers are focusing on the vein deposit part, so I'll try to focus on the Earth formation side and link to other answers.\n\nAfter a supernova, elements are scattered out, but you can vaguely argue that each point of distance is expected to have X% composition (size of star, supernova size/rate, element mass, velocity, volatility etc.). So just by earth being the distance that it is, is expected to have a certain % gold as an overall average. \n\nWhen a planet forms, it heats up, such that rock melts, this means that elements are mobile through the earth. Prime example is the so-called Iron Catastrophe, where a massive quantity of iron, iron-like and iron bonding elements sank to the core, mainly because of how heavy and dense they are, and this formed our core ( as its mainly iron and nickle). Each element has a spot where its comfortable, and for gold, it likes to go where iron goes. This is why gold is rare on/near the surface, it needs magma to bring it up from deeper in the earth.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nNow, while magma has a higher gold concentration than the surface, its not enough to form a deposit, it needs something to concentrate it further. This is where it diverges into different deposit types, mechanism, theories etc, but it usually chemical and/or physical changes.\n\nThis can be when the rising magma feels a pressure drop as it gets closer to the surface, its dissolved water comes out and the dissolved gold will be carried by that water. With enough water being released, it will crack the surrounding rocks (call it natural fracking), the magmatic water will rush into the openings, and now with a new massive pressure drop the gold is uncomfortable being dissolved and will prefer to bond to itself and deposit in the crack, forming a vein of gold to fill the crack. (there will be other minerals forming aswell, but this one way to form a gold vein deposit)",
"Geology is an odd mistress.\n\nGeology works on a very slow timescale but cosmic stuff is even slower. Stuff on the earths surface can be buried deep underground or be found in odd places. Some scientists have drilled under the ocean floor and found arboreal bacteria related to that sound on the earths surface and unrelated to ocean born bacteria. During some geological event the stuff got trapped under the ocean and layers of ground but was able to survive.\n\nOperating on that long timescale you can see plate tetonics fuse and make mountains from plains or dip and make new oceans or do a whole bunch of weird stuff. Even on a year over year timescale you can see it in real time, as rivers quickly change course or landslides and avalanches deposit earth in new places or icebergs and churrents deposit large amounts of stone and soil elsewhere as they drift. Through this process elements and materials are distributed regularly. The Americas are fed Iron and other metals from the Sahara and Africa for example.\n\nThe earth isn't static. It just moves very slowly.",
"Gold is pretty unreactive chemically, which leaves it out of most of the geochemistry that occurs during Magma/lava cooling, on larger bodies of magma a sloppy goo is left over at the end of the cooling/crystallising and some of that will be ‘native’ gold. There are other metallic elements that behave in similar ways eg silver. So you can find native gold in igneous rock veins. Once the elements get hold of the rocks they start to break them down, throwing off pebbles, rocks, boulders etc. If the rocks contain native gold there’s a really good chance that the gold will be washed down rivers and dropped at river bends or dead spits in river flow and gold being pretty dense you get unusually high concentrations because once deposited it’s harder to get moving again (this is the same effect you use to pan for gold ). These levee deposits can in turn be covered and turned into sedimentary rocks to later be mined, or the river deposits themselves are panned/sieved to extract the gold. \n\nSo it’s because it’s non-reactive chemically and it’s density causes it to be concentrated in the environment."
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4g6s7t | why do we sometimes get that "empty" feeling after a show, game, book, etc? | Is there a good reason for why we get "the void" after a series or show ended? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4g6s7t/eli5_why_do_we_sometimes_get_that_empty_feeling/ | {
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"Pretty much the same reason you get sad when a friend moves away, or when someone you care about dies. You grew attached to the story, the series, the show. You grew with the characters, watched them learn, watched them live, and, in some cases, watched them die. When the story ended, a sense of closure is also a sense of being ripped away from what you cared about.\n\nBasically part of the reason I haven't read a new book in a while, and why I'll just stop playing a game or watching a show at the last episode.",
"Entertainment releases dopamine, serotonin, and probably other neurotrasmitters. When said entertainment is finished, you are actually experiencing a mild withdrawal.\n\nMy friend and I did an experiment in college where we turned off all forms of entertainment for a week, with the exception of non-fiction books and chess. It was eye-opening. But really I didn't miss it too much by the end off the week.\n\nGranted, this was during the Writer's Strike and tv sucked ass anyway, so...",
"I felt depressed for about a week after finishing the mass effect series. I actually didnt leave my bed for the following 24 hours. Every now and again I'll remember the thrill I had playing it and feel that aching feeling. It's pretty bad and I actually thought about playing it again today but in a different way. \n\nMy boyfriend understood because he had played the series years before me and knew what it felt like but none of my other friends or family did. They thought it was really bizarre. It may have been a little too overdramatic but I did play all 3 games in less than a week with about 3 hours of sleep a day. Such a good game. Such a disappointing ending. "
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2zqzpm | how is it that all the hydrogen and helium (the lighter stuff) accumulated in the centre of our solar system, and all the heavier elements ended up circling around it? wouldn't the opposite make more sense? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2zqzpm/eli5_how_is_it_that_all_the_hydrogen_and_helium/ | {
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"Take away the air and everything falls at the same rate. So initially everything would be pulled to the centre of the solar system at the same rate. Since most of the mass of the solar system is hydrogen, it makes sense that most of the mass of the sun is hydrogen. Once fusion started the lighter elements would be blown away from the inner solar system by solar winds. We see this in the inner planets, they are low in free hydrogen and helium, yet rich in heavier elements. The gas giants further out still have plenty of lighter elements because the are larger and are less affected by solar winds. Even though the sun is almost all hydrogen there are probably heavier elements at it's core."
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jqxjw | shouldn't eli5 be more about explaining concepts than answering questions? | Maybe it's just me, but I think there's a lot of questions here that really isn't hard to grasp, nor to explain...
I'd rather have questions of the type: "[ELI5] How the Large Hadron Collider works" or "ELI5: Farm Subsidies" than "ELI5 What the heck happened to Digg?" or "ELI5: Why does everyone hate the sound of their own speaking voice on recording?" (examples from the frontpage). | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jqxjw/shouldnt_eli5_be_more_about_explaining_concepts/ | {
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"Agreed. ELI5 is often treated as \"AskReddit, except I don't want to have to think\"",
"shouldn't this question be in askreddit?",
"Like [this](_URL_0_) crap? Yeah it's kind of out of hand. ",
"Exactly. This isn't just a place to ask questions; it's a place to understand the concepts that you just can't grasp even after reading many different explanations.",
"Okay turbo, I see your point.\n\nThe thing is this is a place where maannny people from all sorts backgrounds get together and talk they all have different questions. Some might know a lot about Farm Subsides and they might laugh at somebody who asked about them, or explain it in terms that made no sense to the person who asked. But those Farm Subsidies experts might know nothing about sound waves and so it confuses them when they hear there voice on a recording and it sounds different. So here at ELI5 we treat every question like it deserves a though explanation.",
"Agreed. ELI5 is often treated as \"AskReddit, except I don't want to have to think\"",
"shouldn't this question be in askreddit?",
"Like [this](_URL_0_) crap? Yeah it's kind of out of hand. ",
"Exactly. This isn't just a place to ask questions; it's a place to understand the concepts that you just can't grasp even after reading many different explanations.",
"Okay turbo, I see your point.\n\nThe thing is this is a place where maannny people from all sorts backgrounds get together and talk they all have different questions. Some might know a lot about Farm Subsides and they might laugh at somebody who asked about them, or explain it in terms that made no sense to the person who asked. But those Farm Subsidies experts might know nothing about sound waves and so it confuses them when they hear there voice on a recording and it sounds different. So here at ELI5 we treat every question like it deserves a though explanation."
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28mjrw | i remember old games in higher graphics than they actually were. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/28mjrw/eli5_i_remember_old_games_in_higher_graphics_than/ | {
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"The power of imagination!",
"Well, a couple factors.\n\nThe first is the fact that you didn't have the new games of today to compare them with. Obviously if you took DOOM and put it up against Battlefield 4, then DOOM would look awful. But back in its prime, DOOM was the best of the best. Those *were* cutting edge graphics and that was a cutting edge game.\n\nThe other is imagination. When you play a game and really get lost in it, then it's like reading a book. You're not only playing the game and looking at pixels on a screen but you're building this image in your head as well. ",
"It's due to all of the nostalgia. Then you keep replaying the best parts over and over again, only the way you think it was. Ergo with better graphics.\n",
"Well they looked less shitty on a 1024x768 monitor than they do on a 1080p HD LCD for a start (not accounting for mods of choose)",
"I've often thought about this. The only conclusion I can come to is because you're comparing the graphics to what you've already played at the that point in time. Thus, any improvements/advancements blew our proverbial socks off and it's that impressed mindset that we remember. How many times I've heard or said, \"it almost looks real\" is kind of embarrassing in hindsight.\nHere's another thought; our minds are maybe geared up to remember other things rather than quality of detail. Like emotions, smell, touch etc. I don't know but when I try to remember situations from years ago, imagery is pretty vague.",
"I also remember the first time I played GTA3, but I remember the bridge being far longer than what it actually is.",
"A lot of it boils down to comparative thinking and gradual progression. Graphics are perpetually increasing in quality, with some combination of improved technique and [Moore's Law](_URL_0_) doing the driving. We've never, however, meter real time content (e.g. games) against reality; even the most graphically stunning titles today aren't close to photorealistic - you can tell you're playing a game, but it's at the forefront of what can currently be achieved, and that is the standard we care about. No doubt at some point you'll think that a game made in 2012-4, at the pinnacle of what can currently be achieved is visually stunning, because it exceeds our previous measure for games; you've never seen a game with better graphics. Similarly, it's easy to remember a game made in 1994 as visually stunning because it did the exact same thing. Now, you can't really picture the graphics from 20 years ago (unless you have an eidetic memory) so your imagination fills in the blank. Of course, now when you go back to said older game, it's certainly not visually stunning by modern standards; we're used to considerably better, thus the older game looks terrible, and the gap between your misremembered perception and reality closes sharply.\n\nYou can actually demonstrate this process to yourself over a much shorter time scale. On a decent TV, sit and watch a standard definition channel for a while - rate the picture quality out of 10. Most people say around 7 or 8. Swap then to a high definition channel. You'll probably think it looks a little better, but the difference between SD and HD is mostly minimal, maybe rating it 1 higher at 8-9. Now swap back to SD and rate it again; you'll find that by comparison to HD it looks awful; far worse than it did before, with most people revising their rating to around a 5. This is much the same process.\n\nIt's quite interesting to consider that even the most visually spectacular games today will be considered retro, or even ugly in a few years time, and people will probably still be talking about this, but using Crysis 3 as the outdated example.",
"In addition to the other reasons listed here, if you played the game on a CRT monitor it will look shittier on a LCD. Same reason that [old consoles look better on CRT.]( _URL_0_)",
"God I remember playing Perfect Dark on 64. I felt like those graphics were cutting edge and that there was no way graphics could get any better. The other day I pulled it out and I felt like I was playing minecraft.",
"I *always* remember Stunt Race FX looking like absolute shit.",
"Another factor is you were probably playing them on either a small monitor or a large TV that wasn't very sharp.\n\nIn both cases that helps to make low resolution graphics less apparent by smoothing the pixels out. [Here's an image to illustrate](_URL_0_) (edit: make sure you view the image at full size)",
"I remember getting a little chubby for the original tomb raider... square boobies",
"I remember playing Soccer on my commodore 64. I got right up next to the screen and remember thinking it looked just like real life. ",
"A) You had smaller tv screens and B) didn't have a comparison point with higher graphic games yet.",
"Your brain is really awesome at filling in details that aren't there. Your memories of games are very low quality, so your brain (being used to reality) fills in far more detail than is really there. \n\nIn the same way that it looks like you can see everything in front of you at high res. Whereas in fact you only see a [small area](_URL_0_) in high res, most things you see low res and your brain fills in the rest.",
"In addition to the stuff others have mentioned, the TV you were usually is actually a factor for games of a certain age.\n\nCathode-ray tube TVs -- you know, the big chunky ones, pre-LCD -- were a bit blurry. Back in the NES, SNES, and N64 days, developers were actually banking on this blurriness to cover up the harsh lines of early 3D models, and the blurring smoothed out the pixels in pixel-art SNES games. When you play those games on a modern LCD, the harsh lines and square pixels show up with sharp clarity and can look a lot clunkier. If you go into the menus of a retro game emulator, many of them have video filters designed to blur things a little, add scanlines, and otherwise mimic the look of older TVs, which can make a lot of things look, unintuitively, nicer. \n\nLikewise, the stuff you were comparing those games to was of a similarly low quality. If you were watching your movies on a long-play VHS on a 20\" TV, then you would've never really seen a ton of background details, and you would've been used to some blur. So putting on a good N64 game like Perfect Dark wouldn't have seem as far from the movies as it does today, when you've been watching 50\" Blu-rays. Some fuzziness and a lack of background detail would just be par for the course.\n\nIf anyone out there still has a CRT and an N64 or PS1, try taking a photo of a game running on that setup compared to a screencap of it running on an LCD TV, to show everyone the difference, it's larger than you would think.\n\n",
"There are a bunch of replies about the technical stuff here, but I think it's unrelated.\n\nThis is kind of the same as the slide that felt huge as a kid, but when you go back as an adult it's just not that impressive. Kids' imaginations make things really impressive.\n\n[Obligatory XKCD](_URL_0_)",
"The biggest factor here is that memory is based on meaning more than actual occurrence. It's similar to the reason why you often can remember what a movie or a song is about without remembering the name or the exact lyrics. You remember the story of the game, the characters, and the gameplay most of all because that is the meaning to you; that's what made you fall in love with the game. The graphics did not convey the game's meaning. \nNow, your mind has those things (characters, gameplay, storyarc) to create a mental image for your memory all of these years later. What does your mind do? It sets up those things as accurately as it can and then drapes imagery overtop of it. This imagery is in a higher detail than the actual graphics of the game, but that doesn't really matter too much because the memory has the correct meaning, similar to how you might not remember what your best friend was wearing at your 10th birthday party, but you remember how he got you a kickass videogame as a gift. Not the exact details are needed because you got the meaning right.",
"Yes same here, I guess we didnt know any better graphics to compare with, any other thoughts?",
"One word: Relativity\n\nThink about it",
"There's an image been floating around the last few days comparing Lara Croft over the years, the original must have been made with about 15 polygons. But back in 2001 looked quite good.",
"Maybe because back in the day, screens used to have lower resolution, we didn't have a 1920x1080 screen, but a 640x480 one, I remember playing The Legend Of Zelda Twilight Princess, and being amazed on how good it looked.",
"A major part of this was the way CRT televisions worked.\n\n_URL_1_\n\nDithering on a CRT display worked in such a way that the light from individual pixels would blend over to adjacent pixels. When you play an old game on a modern display you can see each individual pixel, when in the past they all blended together and colors would seamlessly transition from one to the next.\n\nEarthworm Jim on the Genesis took advantage of this:\n\n_URL_0_\n\nIn the bottom of the screen you'll see a series of orange bars spaced evenly apart. Today this looks horrible, but back then the color would blend with the \"blank\" space and create a semi-transparent fog effect.\n\nIt's the same reason why going back to watch episodes of Seinfeld in standard definition look so much worse; not only are you accustomed to higher standards, but also don't have one of the benefits that come from a CRT display.",
"You remember the experience more than the graphics. That's what you are really comparing in your mind relative to modern games. Not the graphics. Your memory generally retains feelings better than visual images. Most games that you play even today seem good to you because of how interesting they are to play; not how graphically stimulating they are. This will be the case until you can no longer differentiate the game visuals from reality. "
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9tfj39 | what is an ssh key and sftp and why are they important | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9tfj39/eli5_what_is_an_ssh_key_and_sftp_and_why_are_they/ | {
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"SSH - Secure Shell\n\nSSH is a method of remotely managing computers or electronic equipment such as routers and switches using a command line interface. All data sent using SSH is encrypted ensuring that data cannot be eavesdropped.\n\nPrior to the development of SSH management for similar devices was (and still is to a degree) performed with the telnet protocol which although similar in function transmits data in clear text that can be intercepted or compromised.\n\nSFTP - Secure File Transfer Protocol is a method of securely transferring files over networks leveraging SSH technology.",
"since the question was about ssh key and nobody explained it, ssh key is a pair of cryptographic keys, one public that you can distribute (install on a remote computer) and one private, that you keep to yourself. the key pairs are made from exponents which are easy to compute and hard to guess (using logarithms)\n\nshort video explaining it _URL_0_"
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dzxnky | what actually is a patent and why are companies allowed to sell products without them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dzxnky/eli5_what_actually_is_a_patent_and_why_are/ | {
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"A patent is a legal right for a company to control their invention.\n\nIf you didn't invent it, you'll need permission from the patent holder, or to make your own version of it that doesn't infringe the patent.",
"It's a legal protection saying no one but the inventor can make this thing without the inventor's permission.\n\nYou can sell products without them if the invention was never patented, or if the patent has expired (normally after 20 years).",
"But! If you got yourself a patent for your product (for example) in Germany, it will just be protected in your own country.",
"They exist so if you spend all the time and money doing research and development then you are guaranteed all of the profit for a certain number of years. They spur innovation and are brought up in the constitution",
"A patent is an exclusive right to an invention given to the inventor for a limited period (for example 20 years) in exchange for the detailed description of the invention being published for everyone to see. So an inventor will spend time and money trying different things to fix a problem. When the inventor have found a solution he writes it down and sends it in to the patent office for approval. When the patent is approved the patent office will publish it for everyone to see. It then becomes illegal for anyone to use the invention without the inventors permission. Typically the inventor will either sell the idea to a manufacturer or he will license it out to one or more manufacturers that may want to use his patent. Other inventors might look at his patent which helps them come up with improvements or alternate inventions. After 20 years the patent protection will expire and anyone can use the invention free of charge.",
"The other comments so far have done well explaining what a patent is. As to the second part of your question, a company may choose not to patent their product because patents are public records. While a patent gives legal protection against copycats, it will eventually expire. When it does expire, anyone can use your patent to create an identical replica and sell it as their own (as long as they don't use your brand or trademarks).",
"A patent says \"this is my unique invention, you need my permission if you want to make money off of it.\"\n\nA company might sell a product without a patent when:\n\n* their product isn't doing anything that has been patented or is patentable\n* patents only last a limited amount of limit, all relevant patents may have expired\n* the patent was explicitly put into the public domain\n* the company doesn't believe the patent is valid\n* the company is infringing on the patent"
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3rgow5 | what does a hospital do when there are too many emergency's at the same time? | You only have so many people, so what happens when there are 10 emergency's and only 8 medical people (so nurses and doctors)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3rgow5/eli5_what_does_a_hospital_do_when_there_are_too/ | {
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"triage. \n\npeople generally fall into 3 categories\n\n1. Those who are likely to live, regardless of what care they receive;\n2. Those who are likely to die, regardless of what care they receive;\n3. Those for whom immediate care might make a positive difference in outcome.\n\nyou ignore #1 until the end. #2 you spend minimal time on to make them comfortable or just ignore them as well. you treat #3 based on the shortest amount of time you need to spend to the longest amount of time you need to spend. in order to save the most people. then after all of #3 is done, you can go back and spend more time on #1/#3.",
"They will do what is known as \"triage\" - dividing people into three groups (or more), and helping them in that order. Generally the most primitive version, the one that was originally developed on the battlefield, groups them like this - people who will die if they don't receive medical attention, people who will be OK for a while but eventually need medical attention, and people who are going to die regardless of medical attention. They receive attention basically in that order.\n\nA big hospital will have more levels than that and some varying other factors, but that's basically what they'll be doing - categorizing people into broad groups by how immediately they need medical attention.\n\nThat's why if you go into a busy ER with a nail stuck in your hand or something, you might be waiting a while - a person who comes in with a gunshot wound is going to get treated before you. ",
"All UK hospitals have a \"major incident plan\". This typically involves sending every outpatient (clinic patient) home and not calling for inpatients (people on the wards) unless their condition is time critical. Clearing this frees up an awful lot of resources - you can go from just having an A & E CT scanner for emergencies to potentially having 3 or more CT scanners, as you can pull in the ones used for routine services and the same for x-ray rooms and other medical and diagnostic facilities.\n\nThis allows for the major incident plan to be performed, all doctors, nurses and healthcare professionals can be deployed as needed in the hospital to aim to treat patients in a order aimed to maximise benefit, which /u/jnxjnx described.\n\nThe emergency department will often be expanded during the major incident plan, taking up all free rooms that are nearby, with things like the A & E waiting room being changed into a room for minor incidents that, while the minors, majors and resuscitation departments will all be used for the more severe cases. Major cases will be coming in by HEMS (helicopter emergency medical services) and ambulances, so the hospital is alerted in advance of them.\n\nThe hospital will also start routing patients to other hospitals to try to spread the patients out, and the ambulance services will (of course) know and will work to try to avoid overwhelming any one particular hospital.\n\n[Here is an example of a major incident plan for a district general hospital - that is to say, not a major trauma centre. They will liaise and work with St George's Hospital, which is a major trauma centre, in a disaster or when they are overwhelmed. Tbh I just grabbed the first one a Google got me.](_URL_0_)",
"Almost all doctors that work at a hospital are on call to be brought into the hospital in the event of an emergency or to be sent to a the site of a major accident.\n\nIn the event that there are too many people to safely treat in the hospital, they send them out to other hospitals. They keep those unable to travel in hospital A, send those that can survive the trip but need urgent care to hospital B, anyone who can wait will either have the decision to wait at hospital A or travel elsewhere.\n\nIn the event that there is a major disaster, such as 9/11, they set up medical stations near the site of the disaster. These stations are for triage (judging injuries and directing people to hospitals that can help them) and treating basic injuries. There isn't much doctors can do for a concussion other than watch, and there isn't much sense taking up time and resources at a hospital if your injuries can be treated on-site.",
"What about VIP's? I don't mean Obama or anything, but like a board member or Doctor's wife? I've seen those people get \"bumped up\" over someone who really needed help otherwise. Often they're unappreciative, at least at my place."
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2i5fdl | if i smack into a hot object, will the burn be worse than if i lightly touched it? | For example, let's say that I accidentally smacked my arm into a very hot object, like the inside of a stove, hard enough to leave a bruise. Would the burn go any deeper into the skin or cover a larger area than it would if I had touched it lightly? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2i5fdl/eli5_if_i_smack_into_a_hot_object_will_the_burn/ | {
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"Burns are due to thermal energy transfer. Generally, this would be a function of the difference in temperature and time.\n\nThe burn would be a little deeper, as some compression would be expected due to the kinetics but I wouldn't expect to be substantially worse. If anything, you might expect the burn to be less severe as the contact time would likely be lower."
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4zg0t3 | if the earth rotates on its axis constantly, how are we able to see the same starts every night? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4zg0t3/eli5_if_the_earth_rotates_on_its_axis_constantly/ | {
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"We don't see the same stars every night. The Earth wobbles on it axis ([axial precession](_URL_0_))\n slow enough that it is perceived that you are seeing the exact same stars in relation to the time of year. As for Earth's orbit and rotation, both of those happen at relatively fixed rates, leading to consistent snapshots of distant stars in relation to our current place in our our orbit or rotation. All of these things lead to why different constellations become visible throughout the year.",
"The short answer is you don't, but that's not due to the rotation, it's due to our orbit around the sun. Without accounting for stars to the north, think of it this way.\n\nYou are in a gym sitting on a office chair that spins. There is a white sheet in the middle of the gym, this represents the sun. As you go around the \"Sun\" very slowly, your chair also spins. You will notice you can see the basketball hoop on one side for about half the trip around the gym. Then it goes behind our sheet that represents the sun. Same with stars at night. They track across the equator as the night progresses and the Earth spins. Each night they will \"start\" slightly closer to the western horizon, until they are no longer visible at night. \n\nFor stars to the north, it's a little more complicated. The earth is actually tilted. During the summer we tilt towards the sun, and in winter we tilt away. The impact of this is that stars due north and below a certain angle are always in the sky at night regardless of the time of year.\n"
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5tk3y4 | saltwater aquariums are so delicate - so how do these animals survive in the wild? | Saltwater aquariums are so beautiful - but most people can't be bothered with the maintenance on them. You have to balance your perimeters *just so,* check them daily as minor fluctuations can harm your fish... And then you could look at the damn thing too hard and everything goes to shit and your $500+ worth of fish are dead.
How in the hell do these delicate little snowflakes survive in the trash pit that is the ocean? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5tk3y4/eli5_saltwater_aquariums_are_so_delicate_so_how/ | {
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"There's a lot of ocean. It's hard to actually change the conditions because there's so much of it (pollution diffuses across the entirety of the ocean). \n\nOn the other hand... it also is a demonstration that ecosystems are actually quite fragile. And that's why we have exterminated so many species and pushed so many into a death spiral....",
"Most fish aren't too delicate. Rather, it's very hard to maintain even reasonably stable conditions in a tiny tank of salt water with many things living in it. The chemical conditions can run out of control. This doesn't happen so easily when you have a million billion times more water to work with.",
"In the wild, a hard rain can change the conditions of fresh water pretty quickly. Freshwater fish have evolved to have changes in Ph or an immediate 2-3 degree drop in temperature fir example. \n\nIn the ocean, there is so much water that ut is actually very difficult to change the temperature or Ph in a given region. Certain Sea life (like Reef animals) have not evolved to adapt to rapidly fluctuating conditions. \n\nThink of how much rain it would take to drop a river 1 degree. Now think of how much you would need to drop an ocean 1 degree. \n"
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azzxtj | what makes a beer belly how it is, round and hard? what makes it different from a normal stomach or a soft(fat) stomach? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/azzxtj/eli5_what_makes_a_beer_belly_how_it_is_round_and/ | {
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"It is *visceral fat,* the kind that grows *behind* your abdominal muscles and makes them stick out, as opposed to an external blob of fat.",
"If you stab your belly with a knife, first you will cut the skin, then subcutaneous fat, then your abdominal muscles, then visceral fat, then your organs. \n\nThat means if you press your belly and feel softness, you are pressing against your subcutaneous fat. Cutaneous means skin, and subcutaneous means below the skin. If you press against your belly and feel something hard, you are pushing against your muscles.\n\nIf you have a big belly, but it's hard that means that you have a lot of visceral fat. Visceral means deep. It feels hard because you are pressing the muscle, but there's a lot of fat behind the muscle which causes your gut to bulge.\n\nThis visceral fat is very dangerous. It's right next to your organs, so it can \"spill into them\". You can get non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, for example. Visceral fat is the thing most associated with heart attacks, stroke, diabetes, etc. In fact, measuring your waist size is probably even better than measuring your weight or BMI.\n\nDrinking alcohol causes beer bellies. Taking in a lot of calories causes beer bellies. And most importantly, genetics causes beer bellies. Asian people tend to store their weight in their belly, which means they can get heart attacks at far lower BMIs than other races.\n\nFortunately, even though visceral fat is the most dangerous kind of fat, it's the easiest to lose. Cardio like running, swimming, cycling can melt away visceral fat. It's the first kind of fat to go.\n\nAs a last thing, sometimes people say that if you have a lot of visceral fat, you are apple shaped. Your gut is big and your arms and legs are small. If you have a lot of subcutaneous fat (especially in your thighs) you are pear shaped. ",
"Heavy drinkers can damage their liver, which in turn can cause a condition called ascites where your [abdomen fills up with fluid](_URL_0_), and will eventually get round and hard like an overfilled water balloon. The treatment is literally to poke a needle into their belly and drain out the extra fluid, after which the round, hard look you are describing will be reduced.\n\nThis is different from a \"beer belly\" someone might get from drinking too many calories in beer.",
"Ascites is a condition where the space in your abdomen between your organs fills with liquid. This can be caused by a damaged or cirrhotic liver. Alcoholism causes this liver condition. When you see someone that has a distended abdomen (similar in shape to that of a pregnant woman) it may be this condition. A beer belly is usually a very dangerous thing. ",
"Many \"beer bellies\" are actually, in medical terms, ascites: fluid in between the visceral and parietal peritoneum, or the two layers of connective tissue that line your organs and your skin, respectively. These are men and women who look 9 months pregnant. The fluid builds up due to liver failure, and builds up so quickly that the skin doesn't slowly grow like it does with fat, but rather stretches to capacity and becomes firm. Doctors often do a procedure called a thoracentesis to drain the fluid, as ascites is painful and can cause organ issues from conpression. I've seen someone in severe liver failure remove 5 liters in one go (with more to go, but the doctor stopped after 5 to prevent hypovolemic shock), and another who would routinely lose 2-3 liters every 3-4 days wgile waiting for liver transplants.",
"You’ve gotten a lot of good info here, especially from u/McKoijion.\n\n\nHowever, to add to his answer, it’s not just that alcoholic beverages have calories. Also important to note is that alcohol is an endocrine disruptor.\n\n\nYour endocrine system is a system of chemical messengers (hormones) secreted by endocrine glands that circulate through the blood and have various effects on the body, especially metabolic ones.\n\n\nAlcohol has been demonstrated in studies to throw off the balance of certain hormones in the body:\n\n\n1. Alcohol stimulates the generation of fat. It does this by forcing glucose (sugar) into the blood, which triggers the release of insulin, which stimulates the body to make fat and store it.\n\n\n2. Alcohol stimulates your body to release cortisol, which over the long term can have metabolic effects, including weight gain.\n\n\n3. Alcohol interrupts the release of testosterone (very simply put; it actually inhibits the release of luteinizing hormone, which inhibits testosterone production). Testosterone aids males in burning fat, so inhibiting it promotes weight gain.\n\n\n4. In heavy drinkers, alcohol appears to interfere with the release of thyroid hormones, which slows down metabolism. However, this does not seem to affect moderate drinkers.",
"so if you are working out. firstly your belly will be hard then it will become soft as visceral fat goes away. and then as you continue working out it belly gets hard due to muscles ?\n\n & #x200B;",
"Older men tend to store fat around their organs (visceral fat). It feels hard because it's under a bunch of muscles.",
"I have a lot of fat near my belly. \nBut i am addicted to gaming and mobile phones. \nI cant leave them.The only thing i want to do is sit near my computer and play. \n\n\nWhat should i do.I am a student in live alone far away from my family. \n:("
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5nwswp | why does toast bread keep all the cheese in while normal bread lets the cheese ooze out? | I was just eating breakfest and pondering about it. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5nwswp/eli5_why_does_toast_bread_keep_all_the_cheese_in/ | {
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"What is toast bread? As far as I know there is only bread. Once it's toasted then you have toast. Or are there specific breads that are meant for toasting and I missed the memo. ",
"I understand your question. \n\nIn lots of places in Europe, they have their usual bread, which most of North America would see as fancy bakery bread. It's either a sourdough, a fluffy white loaf or a dark rye. What they call \"toast bread\" looks what a North American would think of as regular bread. A pre-sliced loaf that comes wrapped up in a plastic bag. \n\nToast bread has a denser structure than the white bread you are used to. Therefore the air pockets are smaller and the cheese can't sink through them. Plus with the denser structure, it can hold the melted cheese better. "
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42eh3i | why is a dish cooked at home considered "healthier" than the same dish cooked at a restaurant? | So why is a dish made at home considered healthier than the same thing I get at a restaurant? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/42eh3i/eli5_why_is_a_dish_cooked_at_home_considered/ | {
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"You choose the ingredients and the way it is prepared. Restaurant dishes tend to use things like more salt and butter than you normally use at home.",
"Assumptions. People make the assumption that home cooked food is healthier than anything that you will ever get at a restaurant, because restaurants are designed to get you in and out, for the most part. ",
"It's not inherently healthier, but restaurants tend to do things slightly differently. They use tons of salt and butter or other fatty oils and sauces. It helps seasonings stick to the food better and tastes amazing, but does a number on its calorie count.\n\nI used to work at a chain restaurant where, for a regular burger, they would butter the insides of the bun before lightly toasting them on the flat-top. Speaking of which, it did not get as hot on that surface as the regular grill and let the beef keep more of its grease and juices, compounding the \"unhealthy\" nature of it.",
"Because you know exactly what is (and is not) in it. Fast food is usually laden with large amounts of sodium, fat, and sugar. Fast food often has non food fillers, and preservatives that home cooked meals don't.",
"A lot of what they do in restaurants to amp up flavour is by adding a lot more salt, sugar, butter than you would at home. Fat and sugar are the two major players when it comes to taste. When it come to sugar, for instance, there is a 'sweet spot' which is the exact amount of sugar that is added to intensify flavour before it becomes unpalatable, thats why most processed or packaged foods have high sugar amounts. Wouldn't surprise me if the same is done in restaurants. ",
"They probably aren't referring to the quality of the ingredients, but the way that its prepared. Restaurants tend to use more butter, salt, sugar and the portion sizes are usually larger than what you should eat. They want the food to taste great and leave you satisfied. Cooking at home you have better control over the ingredients and portion size.",
"I remember an article in a tabloid about a woman who would cook all the time from celebrity chef cookbooks like Nigella and Gary Rhodes and couldn't work out why she wasn't losing weight. She threw her cookbooks out and the pounds started slipping off.\n\nThe idea is that if you are cooking, you are more in control about what goes into your food. This is pretty misguided though as taste is deceptive and a calorie-laden meal might appear \"lighter\" than it actually is! Also portion control is harder at home because second and third helpings may be readily available. Cooking healthily at home requires manual effort.",
"To your brain, restaurant food is a form of entertainment. Your brain expects to enjoy what it is eating because it had to deal with your frustrating job for 9 hours to pay for the food it selected from the menu. \n\nYour brain has expectations. It's a fickle little asshole that better get what it expects, or else it won't want to leave a tip or come back ever again. Restaurants know your brain pretty well.\n\n\nAt home, your brain will eat rediculous things because it's very proud of itself. YAY, I put peanut butter on celery sticks! When was the last time you saw that shit on an apetizer menu? \n\nAt home, your brain has different goals and lowered expectations. At home, your brain has other forms of entertainment, like TV and Halo and pornography. \n\nWhen your brain is responsible for meal prep, it doesn't demand an orgasm of flavor, it just wants some full tummies, so it can get back to fragging noobs and wanking on boobs.\n\nChain restaurants serve engineered products. Engineering is a requirements driven process. The requirements of entertainment food are taste and percieved value. Industrial grade fillers, thickeners, and flavorings are used to get tbe job done. Even the chicken isn't quite made of chicken. \n\nThe resulting product is surprisingly lacking in nutritional content, water, and fiber. Your brain may not know this, but you need water and fiber. And then marketing gets involved. Your brain loves marketing because marketing makes it easier for your brain to make decisions. \n\nDecisions are frustrating for your brain. If your brain walked into a dirty public toilet and saw a poster of the new McSnibble breakfast sandwich, it would want it's own McSnibble breakfast sandwich. Especailly if there were boobs next to the sandwich, even if hour brain is a proper lady. Boobs are awesome, therefore brain shall endeavour to partake in this obviously flawless meal item.\n\nYour brain's just like that...a delusional, passive-aggressive, lazy thrill junky. Your brain only knows the Max Powers way. \n\nTeach your brain how to enjoy cooking and you shall eat like a king...a real king...not a Burger King.",
"Serving size...at home you typically don't cook endless supplies of fries or portions bigger than your head. "
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5xpw33 | why do some people develop tics that go away, but others' progress into tourette's syndrome? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5xpw33/eli5_why_do_some_people_develop_tics_that_go_away/ | {
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"Tics do not \"progress into\" Tourette's Syndrome. Rather, tics are a symptom that can have various causes. One possible cause is Tourette's Syndrome."
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35aj9m | why is first (1st), second (2nd), third (3rd), but everything else is xth? |
* *first*
* *second*
* *third*
* four**th**
* fif**th**
* six**th**
* seven**th**
* eigh**th**
* nin**th**
* ten**th** | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35aj9m/eli5_why_is_first_1st_second_2nd_third_3rd_but/ | {
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"The numbers you are asking about are called ordinal numbers and we don’t know for sure why 1st, 2nd, and 3rd are different. Generally, the more often a word is used the more likely it is to be irregular, so that may explain some of it (think of the verbs that are irregular in a lot of languages – to be, to go, to have, etc. – they are all used very often).\n\nIn the Old English system they just added “tha” to the end of a number to make it an ordinal. This became the –th that we use today. First comes from the superlative form of the German word for “before”, so it means “the most before.” It’s easy to see how pointing out where one thing is ahead of all other things would be useful even when not counting. You probably use “first” a lot in your everyday life without referencing other numbers afterwards and people back around 1000 CE did too.\n\n“Second” comes from French by way of Latin and means “following.” You might recognize the sec-/seq- prefix in other words like sequential. There are also a lot of times you would use this word without necessarily thinking about numbers, so it’s also pretty understandable why it broke away from the regular ordinal pattern.\n\n“Third” comes from the Germanic “thridda,” which is a form of “three.” I don’t really have a good speculative explanation for this one other than “third” is easier to say than “threeth.” "
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vqpfy | the recent obamacare decision ruled by the supreme court, without bias. | Mandate upheld, mandate struck down. Either way I don't know what it means for the American people. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/vqpfy/eli5_the_recent_obamacare_decision_ruled_by_the/ | {
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"There were 4 questions before the court:\n\n1. Can the court hear these arguments before anyone is actually penalized for not having health insurance?\n\n2. Is the Individual Mandate to buy health insurance constitutional?\n\n3. If not, is the rest of the law constitutional without the mandate?\n\n4. Unrelated, can government require states expand medicare since the government is giving them money.\n\n\nThe decisions were as follows:\n\n1. Yes, they can talk about it. This was unsurprising\n\n2. The Individual Mandate is really a tax, not a fine. This is an important distinction because everyone agrees Congress can tax people but few people thought Congress could force people to buy stuff. This was the big question.\n\n3. Moot point due to 2.\n\n4. The court decided that if states take federal money they have to go with the federal rules, but states don't have to take the federal money and can then ignore the rules that come with the money. This was not terribly surprising.\n\n\nThe interesting thing is that the case was decided 5-4, with Republican appointed Chief Justice Roberts being the deciding vote. NOBODY expected that - they were expecting 5-4 against, 5-4 with KENNEDY the deciding vote, or 6-3 with Roberts joining so he could write the opinion. \n\nEDIT: The entire health care reform was upheld. You will have to have health insurance in 2014. There are a bunch of other provisions that were better explained elsewhere.",
"The frontpage topic will likely bury my question so I'll post it here.\n\n > ruling that a penalty for refusing to buy health insurance amounts to a tax. \n\nCan someone explain this to me? It sounds like it's forcing you to pay a penalty for not buying health insurance (and if I'm interrupting it wrong please correct me), and I honestly don't see how this is fair.\n\nI'm very in-the-dark about politics, this bill, and so on. I have no political stance, so please don't go downvoting me because it might sound like some republican going haywire.",
"Awesome. \nNow why are providers losing money with the decision to implement ACA?",
"I also have a related question if you don't mind me stealing your thread a bit.\n\nI constantly hear from doctors that Obamacare being upheld will noticeably reduce their salary. Why is this? ",
"In my admittedly limited knowledge, it seems like people are most up in arms over the \"mandate\" portion of the reform. My question is, how is this mandate any different from being required to own car insurance? No one complains about that, so why is health insurance such a big deal?",
"How are they going to find out if you don't have insurance? Won't that be hard to implement? \n\nAnd how will the evaluate a person to see if they need help with paying for insurance?",
"I have like a really nitpicking question about the ruling itself. This might be more than ELI5 can handle.\n\nRoberts wrote that the mandate should be treated as a tax for the purpose of the Constitutionality question. But he also ruled that it should NOT be treated as a tax for the purpose of something called the Anti-Injunction Act.\n\nCan anyone ELI5 what the Anti-Injunction Act is and what the difference between the two scenarios are? Why is seemingly exactly opposite logic used in each case?",
"So insurance companies are required to spend 80% of the money from premiums on healthcare and \"refund\" the amount over there, hopefully making premiums cheaper.\n\nWhat's to stop healthcare providers from raising rates? After all, more people will be insured - won't demand for services go up?",
"You are only 5 now, and so for the next 20 years you won't have to pay for doctor visits if your parents decide to keep you \"covered\". After that you will have to pay monthly(?) for doctor visits. If you don't pay, a greater amount of your piggy bank will be taken away each year. If you've learned fractions already, the doctors also have to use 85% of the money you pay on providing you and all the other people healthcare.\n\nAll this is what the bill says IIRC, however some of the actual effects may be slightly different. ",
"Here's an interesting question:\n\nI'm employed as a worker's compensation nurse case manager. We pay for work comp injuries but pre-existing conditions are not covered, obviously. \n\nHow is this going to impact how I do my job?",
"Hopefully someone can answer this for me,\n if they are now required to cover everyone what's to stop them from charging someone who has AIDS $5000 a month for insurance? unless I missed that part of the law that says insurance companies have to charge everyone the same.",
"Ok. One more question: does this honestly mean I could end up waiting 5 months for non-emergent tests/procedures?",
"Can someone explain to me how this being upheld could be considered a bad thing other than charging people who don't get insurance that can afford it?",
"I read a bunch of comments and I still don't understand :/",
"Work is hard to find these days, good work is even harder. My current employer can only hire me for 16 hours a week (sometimes only 8). I want insurance but the insurance they offer is only available to full time employees (35hrs or more) and it costs $85 a week. I want insurance and I wan't it bad. I need to get healthy. But as it stands I can't get insurance from employer or the government. \n\nHow can I get insurance? When can I get it? How much is it going to cost? Is the insurance the employer offers going to get cheaper? Will my non-fulltime ass be able to get it now or is it still for full-timers? Will I be able to get the new fancy obamacare insurance? Free or cost? When? \n\nTY ELI5!",
"This thread is more informative than anything I've seen on cable news. All I've ever seen argued are the moral implications, for and against. Zero talk of logistics. \n\nUnfortunately I think most Americans still need an ELI3 edition. ",
"Can anybody explain the difference to me between this and having to buy car insurance? People gladly shell out to the idea of car insurance, but seem to be unwilling to budge on health care. Or is the comparison invalid?",
"Canadian here, why do people not want this?",
"No one explains it better than Philip Defranco, take a look at his video to better understand the meaning of Obamacare. I know it helped me! _URL_0_",
"Calling it Obamacare sounds kinda bias.",
"Does it just mean you have to have health insurance in general? Or that you have to have the one the government says? Say you like the insurance you currently have. Will you be forced to drop it and get whatever crappy insurance the government is pushing?"
]
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[
"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RW5dvk_jE9w&feature=BFa&list=UUlFSU9_bUb4Rc6OYfTt5SPw"
],
[],
[]
] |
|
a62rki | why is it that sometimes a car move forward the moment you release your brakes while on "drive" but sometimes it doesn't even when it's stopped at the same place? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a62rki/eli5_why_is_it_that_sometimes_a_car_move_forward/ | {
"a_id": [
"ebr8743",
"ebsm0qa"
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"score": [
2,
2
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"text": [
"It be like that sometimes. Best 5yo answer possible.\n\nThe adult version has to do with idle rpms, incline of hill, temperature of transmission, type of transmission, weight of cargo/passengers, etc.",
"This may not be ELI5, but the force pushing the car forward (assuming the same gear) is proportional to the square of the difference between engine speed and transmission input speed. Since you're starting from a stop, that difference is simply the engine speed (shown on your tachometer). When starting, the idle engine speed (before you touch the throttle) is dependent on several factors, but mostly engine temperature. If it's really cold out, the engine speed will be higher, and there will be more force pushing the car forward. For example, if the engine is warm, the idle speed in gear may be as low as 600 rpm, but if it's very cold and the engine just started, it may be 1500 rpm. That would result in over 6 times the force pushing the car forward."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
|
8eqayr | why do some youtube videos show a small image of that point in the video when you hover over the progress bar and some don't? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8eqayr/eli5_why_do_some_youtube_videos_show_a_small/ | {
"a_id": [
"dxx9b96"
],
"score": [
4
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"text": [
"Typically it's newer videos that haven't had time to finish being cached (prepared for quick reference) on Google's servers. After the video has finished processing completely, one of the benefits is being able to see that image."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
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