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5y9gfg | what have we learned from the new wikileaks cia dump ? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5y9gfg/eli5_what_have_we_learned_from_the_new_wikileaks/ | {
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"Well, it's about 8000 files. A lot to sift through.\n\nEven more difficult to effectively summarize, let alone an eli5.\n\nI guess the bottom line is the CIA has spent the last several decades becoming the best cyber spy the US debt can buy. \n\nThey've stockpiled cyber weaponry, created archives of known cyber warfare tactics (Russia, North Korea, etc.) and practiced all this on..\n\n*dramatic pause*\n\nUs. The American people. \n\nEvery single smartphone, apple or android, has the ability to spy on you.\n\nNow, to some, this might not sound new or special. A good part of the population, after the emergence of the NSA, has believed this to be true. \n\nHowever, if the leaks are true, they *confirm* the suspicion. "
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1bkki7 | the constitutional changes hungary is making and what the consequences will be | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bkki7/elif_the_constitutional_changes_hungary_is_making/ | {
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"Just in case you don't know it already, in 2010, the nationalist conservative party Fidesz (with its bloc party KDNP, which is a fairly conservative Christian party) won a majority in the Hungarian parliament. Viktor Orbán, of the Fidesz party, became the prime minister.\n\nThe Orbán government has been getting considerable criticism because it has literally rewritten the constitution to make it very hard to challenge their authority. Election maps were redrawn (edit: it may have been election rules - I can't remember the specifics offhand, but I'll look it up when I get the chance) to effectively ensure their continued majority in the parliament. Term limits on judicial authorities were changed, and can now only be *removed* with a 2/3rds majority - which Fidesz can easily get by working with the far-right Jobbik party.\n\nThey also made major changes to the laws regarding the press, again ~~changing term limits and limitations on power for the people in charge of press freedom~~ (that would be the judges - more specifically they removed wording that explicitly protected dissenting speech). They've already cracked down on journalists who have attacked them and have created a hostile environment for dissent. Without looking it up to be positive, I think a number of Hungarian intellectuals have already left the country.\n\nAs I recall, other changes along these same lines have been implemented in other authorities as well, but the changes to the judicial system and the new restrictions on press freedom are the two issues I've heard the most about."
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fkskad | how do photos of space matter produce all the colors? | Such as photos of nebulas or galaxies. I remember something about using filters of different gases but that’s it. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fkskad/eli5_how_do_photos_of_space_matter_produce_all/ | {
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"In a few different ways, depending on the purpose.\n\n1. they are digital colored to make them striking and beautiful. to varying degrees this _may_ be done consistent to number 2, below.\n\n2. different data is color coded. For example, many \"telescopes\" aren't looking at visual spectrum at all, so to make it useful to our eyes data is color coded. this is a sort of \"translation\".",
"Most photos of nebulas or galaxies are made using light our eyes can't see (like infrared or UV). \n\nTheir \"colors\" are remapped to colors we can see, so we can actually look at them. This is an artistic process as there is no \"correct\" way to map colors we can't perceive to color we can, which is why space photos are usually that colorful.^[1]\n\nSome pictures taken using visible light also have their colors remapped, just so that they look better. (There is nothing special about visible light -beside the fact that we can see it- so the process makes sense for it too).\n\n\n[1] In some cases you can still find raw version of these images, without the recoloring, but these are just arrays of values, so you'll have to remap them yourself, or just use them as is.",
"Usually photos are a combination of different filters and wavelengths. Rarely there is a very colourful photo of space with only a normal filter (naked eye so to speak).\n\nFilters are used to enhance detail and contrast, which can give you info which might be lost while otherwise.\n\nDifferent wavelengths are used to find info which cannot be found in visible light spectrum. Infrared can be used to research objects behind stellar dust while synchrotron radiation is known for certain processes and associated to certain objects"
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3zx2wi | why is marriage "hard work"? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3zx2wi/eli5_why_is_marriage_hard_work/ | {
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"Mine's not, but I do hear marriage get called work all the time. My marriage is the easiest part of my life. \n\nI can see that when you have kids, balancing everything -work, time with family, stress, money, intimacy, etc- is not easy, at all. ",
"Life is hard work. Marriage, or any situation where another person lives with you, complicates things because you can't just think about what is best for you in order to solve all the problems one encounters through life. Someone with a family has many more considerations to take into account when making a decision, and are not the only decision maker. There is much more compromise, and selfish actions usually cannot be taken.",
"Because you've committed to live the rest of your life with another human being, and nobody is perfect. You're sharing each other's joys as well as struggles, and everyone deals with stuff different ways. You'll need to work through anger, frustration, jealousy... and just never give up. There's going to be a lot of compromise, which might lead to some resentment, and through it all you have to ignore a loooot of temptation. ",
"Because it's difficult to spend years on end with the same person, even if you adore them. Because you have to consider the feelings, preferences, and ideas of another person before yourself, which is not necessarily a natural tendency. Because people change, and it takes effort to continue liking the person you liked 5, 10, 15 years ago. Because sharing space with another person can be difficult. Because people go through hard times and are sometimes difficult to be around, and you have to keep loving them and spending time with them. "
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1i7sv3 | how do sites like facebook, youtube, and apps like instagram hold a constant (unlimited) amount of data (photos, videos, etc.) ? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1i7sv3/eli5_how_do_sites_like_facebook_youtube_and_apps/ | {
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"Keep buying more hard drives.",
"The Serious accounts answer might have sounded like a joke, but it's actually the truth. While they do compress and work hard to keep the amount of data low, they do basically just keep buying new hard drives. They have big caves filled with servers, all holding a tiny piece of the data they have amassed. Since hard drive capacity keep going up, they can almost keep up with out moving to larger caves (they still do expand a little, so they aren't quite keeping up). "
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476kgn | how are there really people that believe that the world is only 2,000 years old? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/476kgn/eli5_how_are_there_really_people_that_believe/ | {
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"Very few people believe the earth is 2000 years old. Bute there are plenty who believe it's about 6000 gears old.\n\nThey get that approximation by looking at the Bible and counting generations back from Jesus to Adam, which apparently is about 4000 years, plus the 2016 years we've had on the plus side.\n\nThe people who believe this obviously think scientific answers and carbon dating and such are here to mislead and confuse us, likely the work of the devil.",
"Most likely for a similar reason that you believe the earth is ~4.5 billion years old. \n\nBefore people downvote to oblivion, hear me out. A person that they hold as an authority has told them that.\n\nMost people don't have the ability to determine the age of the earth on their own. I know that I certainly don't. I know that we have ways of determining the age of rocks, fossils and artifacts found. But I personally haven't validated those methods to be accurate, and truth be told, don't know where I would start to do it on that type of scale.\n\nBut, I, and most others have chosen to believe those people who are experts in the field and trust that the information they give us is as accurate and honest as it possibly can be. So we can be confident beyond any sort of reasonable doubt that the earth is in fact around 4.5 billion years old, or at the very least much, much closer to that than it is 6,000 years old. \n\nBut at the end of the day it comes down to who we trust. Most people aren't inspecting and evaluating the evidence on their own, they're trusting others who they believe are capable of making these determinations. Young earth creationists are trusting other people for other reasons.\n"
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1ttqrc | why isn't christianity just a part of judaism? | If I'm not mistaken, Jesus was Jewish and people made a religion in his name after he died. Why? Why isn't Christianity just a small part of Judaism? And isn't it technically heresy? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ttqrc/why_isnt_christianity_just_a_part_of_judaism/ | {
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"Christianity rejects or heavily modifies most of the teachings of Judaism. For example, Christians generally don't believe Kosher dietary law applies to them. It was certainly viewed as heresy by the Jews at the time, that's part of why Jesus was pissing so many people off (and was ultimately executed).",
"The idea that Jesus is the messiah, and the teachings of the New Testament, are pretty substantial differences from Judaism. Enough that Christians had to branch off and form a separate religion, since mainstream Judaism did not accept those ideas. However, there is a relatively new group called Messianic Jews, who don't recognize this split. They consider themselves Jewish, keep a lot of Jewish customs, but recognize Jesus as the messiah.",
"They are properly called Abrahamic Religions. There was originally a faith based on the person called Abraham. It was superseded by the Faith of Moses, generally called Judaism. There are many divisions of that faith. One of which considers the person of Jesus to be the fulfillment of prophecy. Islam is another offshoot. _URL_0_",
"Okay, I haven't edited the following, so the topics may change suddenly.\n\n[First of all, here's a visualization.](_URL_0_)\n\n**tl;dr**: Christianity is a part of Judaism the same way that Protestantism is a part of Catholicism.\n\nYou *could* argue that Christianity is a part of Judaism. In fact, Christianity, Islam and Judaism are all labeled as *Abrahamic religions*, because they all worship the god of Abraham.\n\nThe prophets in the old testament foresee the coming of a messiah that will liberate the jewish people (as far as I know. I haven't read the entire thing myself). Jesus claimed to be that messiah. However, not all jews accepted him as such and thus the religion split in two. On one side were the 'old' jews who didn't believe Jesus was the messiah; on the other side were the 'new' jews (Christians) who *did* believe that he was. From the perspective of the old jews this new denomination following Jesus *were* heretics (or at least Jesus himself was) as seen when they convinced Pilatus to execute Jesus. Anyway, the two seperate beliefs then developed seperately and became more distinct until they ended up as they are today.\n\nSo why aren't they both known as 'Judaism'? Well, partly because it makes sense to divide the two groups to be able to talk about hem seperately. Partly because they *aren't* the same religion. Sure, their roots are the same, but their teachings and beliefs are not. It is kind of like Mormonism being a branch of Christianity. In fact, IIRC, the word 'Christianity' wasn't really used that much a hundred years ago in America, simply because it was a useless term. It made no sense to call yourself a Christian when there were several denominations of Christianity in your local area. For instance, both Catholicism and Protestantism are part of Christianity and the latter stems from the former. But even so you wouldn't call the Protestant Church a 'part of' the Catholic Church. When someone says they are a Protestant that doesn't mean that they are also a Catholic. \n\nAdd to this diversity in Christian denominations the fact that Judaism has a lot of branches as well. 'Christianity' is an umbrella term that covers a bunch of different religious groups and so is the term 'Judaism'. There are many kinds of Jews and many kinds of Christians, which is why you simply can't say that all Christians are Jews.",
"Up until a few years after Jesus's death, Christians were a Jewish sect. And the early Christians kind of wanted it that way. Primarily, Jews were an ethnic group, and the group had their religion in common. People could, and did convert to the Jewish faith, but the Jews didn't actively recruit people. \n\nAlong came Jesus's PR man. Paul of Tarsus. Paul was going around arresting and persecuting the followers of Christ when he converted to the new found sect. Paul realized that not a lot of people wanted to convert to Judaism just to convert into the Christian sect, so he convinced the new found church that Christianity could be spread to the Gentiles and that becoming a Christian did not require a conversion to Judaism. \n\nThe fact that anyone could convert to Christianity also assisted in it's spread though out the world. ",
"Because jews rejected jesus as the mesiah (sp?). He did not meet the requirements set forth in the old testament. So this guy said im the guy you have been waiting for. The jews said you dont fit the description, no you're not. \n\nThat part of the bible is actually rather black and white (the part that describes who the mesiah will be). Jesus quite plainly doesnt fit the bill. Btw, im an atheist who is just fascinated by this stuff. I see it as history. "
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2l1el2 | glycemic index & glycemic load of foods. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2l1el2/eli5_glycemic_index_glycemic_load_of_foods/ | {
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"Hmm, I dunno the glycemic load, but the index is basically a measurement of how a food will affect your blood sugar. For instance, eating an orange, vs. drinking orange juice. Orange juice gets into your system very quickly, causing a spike in blood sugar and a resulting spike in insulin. Eating or drinking foods with a high glycemic index can contribute to your body becoming resistant to insulin. Insulin resistance is the main component of what we call Type 2 Diabetes (type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease where your immune system attacks insulin producing beta cells in your pancreas so that you cannot produce enough insulin). On the other hand, an orange has a lot of fiber mixed with the sugars. The fiber slows the absorption of the sugars so that your blood sugar does not spike high and therefore your insulin does not spike high.",
"Ok, so we start with carbohydrates, an essential macronutrient. No matter that form your carbs take, your body will digest it into sugar.\n\nGlycemic INDEX is a measure of how FAST your body will digest the carbs into sugar, and thus how it will spike your blood sugar. A high index makes your blood sugar rise and then drop relatively quickly. The are often foods that leave you feeling hungry again soon, like white rice and noodles. \n\nSomething with a low index takes longer to digest. Blood sugar takes a longer time, rising and dropping smoothly, and you feel full longer. Beans and oatmeal for instance. \n\nGlycemic LOAD is basically the \"load\" (amount) of carbs in a serving of food - how \"hard\" it will hit you. The line labeled Carbohydrates on the label mostly covers it. You take that, and cross reference with glycemic index to get load. \n\nSome foods like watermelon have a high Index, but a small number of carbs per serving, so the Load is considered low. "
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3myjce | why do internet people use so many acronyms they'd never use in spoken conversation? | Don't tell me it's laziness/efficiency when they've spent several hours typing out things. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3myjce/eli5_why_do_internet_people_use_so_many_acronyms/ | {
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"On older phones it took more effort to type out a full word so it was more efficient to type the acronym, people use it now because it maybe habit or for irony or sarcasm.",
"When we speak we unthinklingly litter our talk with little phrases and ticks, which when you see written down take up a lot of room on a page (\"...I guess\", \"to be frank\" \"...to be honest with you....\" \"...you know what I mean?\" etc ).\n\nWe talk a lote more naturally than we type (though in the future this may change) and speech is for most of us naturally more fluid. To type out all these little turns of phrase (FWIW, LMFTFY, TBH, and so on) takes a relatively large amount of effort unless you reduce them to acronyms.\n\nSoe other arconyms are just things to convey a way in which you are saying something, or to allow proxy non verbal speech (laughter, or facial expressions - which you can read as lol, rofl, hehe etc. and see in things like ' & #3232;_ & #3232;' when online. ",
"It used to be that you needed to save space in SMS because it cost you a lot of money if you took more words. It's also quite hard to spell correctly on those phones.\n\nNowadays those limits aren't really there anymore (except maybe in Twitter). It stuck, maybe because it gives people a sense of being part of an \"in-group\". It gives them the idea that they're \"in the know\"."
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1pkmlc | in countries that use a 24 hour clock to describe what time it is, how are the times pronounced? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pkmlc/eli5_in_countries_that_use_a_24_hour_clock_to/ | {
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"it's still \"see u at 9\" even though clock says 21:00 colloquially you still go off 12 hour clock. you just record official times in 24hour. "
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7phwq4 | gerrymandering, and why nc is being ordered to redraw its congressional map. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7phwq4/eli5_gerrymandering_and_why_nc_is_being_ordered/ | {
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"Gerrymandering is where politicians redraw voting districts to favor a particular side. You can stretch and squash and mold a district’s boundaries to include specific pockets of voters that you otherwise wouldn’t get. \n\nNorth Carolina is facing cristicism because the way it was gerrymandered was illegal; partisanship that gave the GOP a huge advantage.",
"Very simple video explanation:\n\n_URL_0_\n\n[Visual explanation](_URL_2_)\n\nFor a simple text explanation: congressional districts are supposed to be equal in population. But the way the population is divided between districts can be done in such a manner to protect certain people and promote certain people.\n\nIt should also be noted that both parties do it. It's not just done to keep parties in power, it's also done to keep races in power. The most famous example of this being a district in Chicago (a heavily Democratic state), used to keep Hispanic areas of the city voting together: _URL_1_",
"The US Constitution says that every 10 years, the government must do a census, essentially counting how many people live in the US, and plotting where those people live. \n\nBased on the results of the consensus, the government divvies out a certain number of congressional seats (it's been 435 seats for a long time) proportionally based on population. \n\nWhile the smallest states get just one member in the House of Representatives, most states have multiple representatives (peaking with California, which has 53 seats). \n\nLikewise, states use census data to determine where most people live. \n\nBased on that data, states are tasked with drawing lines for the districts in a process called \"redistricting\".\n\nThat abuse of redistricting is called \"gerrymandering\". The name gerrymandering comes from when the governor of Massachusetts (Elbridge Gerry) and his party drew some odd looking districts in order to make sure that his party had a majority in most of them. One of those districts looked like a bit like a skalamander, so it was mocked as a \"gerrymander\" district. \n\nThe gerrymander districts work like this: \n\nLet's say that there are 10 seats available to district in a state with 100 people. If 60 of those people are part of the Cake Party and 40 are part of the Ice Cream Party, it would seem most fair if 6 out of 10 of the districts had Cake advantages, and 4 out of those districts had Ice Cream advantages (at least in theory). \n\nThe Cake party has control of the state house and the governor's office, so they are in charge of drawing the lines. Instead of making the districts represent the people, they draw all sorts of crazy lines to group people together so that every district has 6 Cakers and 4 Ice Creamers. Instead of the districts representing the true will of the people, the crazy lines make it so that all 10 districts have Cake favor abilities... even if Ice Creamers and Cakers tend not to live in the same area. To get to that point, Cakers had to cut neighborhoods apart to split Ice Cream voters. \n\nObviously, that kind of system isn't exactly fair. While there are some conflicting and incomplete SCOTUS rulings about gerrymandering, it's generally accepted that courts have the right and authority to reject gerrymandering based on certain criteria. \n\nIn the case of North Carolina, a panel of federal judges determined that North Carolina had drawn its lines based on \"invidious partisan intent\". In other words, the court found that NC's lines weren't drawn to respect voters and existing political boundaries (like city/county lines), but instead to pack voters for partisan reasons. \n\nLawyers may be able to weigh in better, but the federal court's legal authority in that regard isn't necessarily written in bedrock. While the SCOTUS has previously upheld lower court rulings throwing out districts, they haven't created a test or standard for exactly what must be considered to determine if districts are fair. It's still theoretically possible this ruling can be appealed, but I personally feel that's unlikely. \n\nTo answer your \"why\" question, NC is forced to redraw their maps because the maps were made with political motivations instead of in good faith, and the courts called them out on it. ",
"It is drawing political districts to give your party an advantage.\n\nLet's say the Blue and Red party are split 50-50 in a state with four districts. If the Blue party is in charge, they can create a sacrifice district that is 100% Red, then three safe Blue districts with a 67/33 majority. The state will send 3 Blue and 1 Red representative to congress for the foreseeable future.\n\nWhy is it allowed? There are a lot of competing interests when drawing districts, and political advantage is just one of them. It is desirable for districts to have similar populations, follow existing county and city boundaries, to be representative of different demographics within the state, and to maintain historical districts. Even an honest attempt to draw these boundaries can wind up with weird borders that look like gerrymandering.\n\nAlso, there are sometimes civil rights era federal court orders in play that require states create districts with a certain kind of majority. This often winds up with both weird boundaries and gerrymander like effect for the opposite party.\n\nFinally, politicians often put their interests above the party. If that sacrifice district gives you a job for life, you might not care about the rest of the state, and support boundaries to the detriment of your party."
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4dbol2 | why can light travel through some solids (e.g. water bottle) but not all? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4dbol2/eli5_why_can_light_travel_through_some_solids_eg/ | {
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"Some molecules have a tendency to crystal structures: if you look at a piece of material very closely (with an electron microscope), you can see that the molecules form repetitive, organised structures. A famous example of this is [diamond](_URL_0_) .\n\nIn the picture, you can see the pattern that is repeated millions of times in all 3 directions, which eventually creates a touchable diamond.\n\nSome molecules tend to form a strucure that is essentially one gigantic crystal strucure (e.g. sapphire). Because all the atoms are very nicele ordened in a pattern, photons can often fly through whithout boucing off an atom.y\n\nA polycristalline structure is also possible. This can occur when the same type of atoms 'decide' to form clusters of different crystal structures, or because there are different atoms with different structures etc. In this case it is sometimes possible that the materials are still semi-transparent, but in e.g. metals (which form crystal structures) light cannot pass through.\n\nMaterials can also be amorphous, which means the material is just a mish-mash of unordened atoms. In this case, light cannot pass through the material (the material is opaque). Light bouncing through will always hit an atom after a small distance. An example of this is silicon.\n\nYou can compare the photons to a straight flying football going through a stll-standing batallion of soldiers in formation vs. going through the mass at times square during New Year's Eve.\n\n**TL;DR**: Sometimes atoms are nicely ordened which makes it easy for photons to pass trough the material.\n\n**SOURCE**: I have a material science course.\n\n**EDIT**: spelling"
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6q7vti | why do companies seem that they have no ethics and will do anything for money? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6q7vti/eli5_why_do_companies_seem_that_they_have_no/ | {
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"If something a company is capable of doing would make money and is not explicitly and definitively illegal (*all* the company's lawyers do not agree that it is illegal), it might be determined that the company's officers would not be meeting their fiduciary responsibility if they *didn't* do anything for money.\n\nNow obviously in the real world there are actions *well-inside* the bounds of legality so responsible companies find profitable ways of operating that don't push the boundaries. But if it comes down to it, why not make money? It's what they're supposed to do.",
"Because it is true. And that is not necessarily a bad thing.\n\nCompanies are not immoral, they are amoral. They are a structure people invented to maximize profit, and that is exactly what they do. \n\nProblems can arise because a corporation can dilute moral responsibility. Each individual in the company can make moral decisions and you still wind up with what many would consider to be immoral results. That is why it is so important governments create rules for companies to followed and punish companies that do not.",
"Because of human nature and we all contribute to it.\n\nImagine you've invested 1000$ of your hard earned money in a companies stock i.e. Apple, in hopes of making a decent return on your investment.\n\nWould you primarily worry about how Apple treats its employees? How environmentally friendly they operate? That their products are overpriced? Or would you rather just hope that those fucks at apple manage to grow and earn more money, so you don't loose yours? Most likely, it's the second.\n\nThis is no different if you're just on the consumer site and have no interest at all in investing in stocks... because you buy stuff every day. \n\nAnd you want that stuff to be as affordable as possible. We all vote with our money and don't consider if it was made in the most ethical way possible (at least the vast majority).\n\nSo basically, companies are not the \"problem\". People are (including us).\n",
"Because those within a system often do not have the power to change it. This goes for people as well as companies - cops in a corrupt district can't 'rat out' fellow cops any more effectively than the CEO of Wal-Mart can raise cashier wages to 15$. If they tried to do so they would quickly no longer be a cop or a CEO and would be replaced by someone who would behave.\n\nIf face we just saw this in action - Whole Foods was a responsible company with a CEO who was paid reasonably and treated his workers fairly. I didn't do so well for a few quarters so it's stock went down. It was bought out by a company (Amazon) that treats it's employees worse than Wal-Mart. Literally worse than Wal-Mart. Now it's going to be run like an Amazon warehouse and all the nice things get lost in the race to the bottom.\n\nA very interesting Slate Star Codex page on this race to the bottom prisoner's dlima phenomenon and the lack of ability to do anything but try to win the race - _URL_0_\n\n > In fact, it’s not just art. Any sect at all that is leaner, meaner, and more survivalist than the mainstream will eventually take over. If one sect of rats altruistically decides to limit its offspring to two per couple in order to decrease overpopulation, that sect will die out, swarmed out of existence by its more numerous enemies. If one sect of rats starts practicing cannibalism, and finds it gives them an advantage over their fellows, it will eventually take over and reach fixation.\n\n > If some rat scientists predict that depletion of the island’s nut stores is accelerating at a dangerous rate and they will soon be exhausted completely, a few sects of rats might try to limit their nut consumption to a sustainable level. Those rats will be outcompeted by their more selfish cousins. Eventually the nuts will be exhausted, most of the rats will die off, and the cycle will begin again. Any sect of rats advocating some action to stop the cycle will be outcompeted by their cousins for whom advocating anything is a waste of time that could be used to compete and consume."
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1ajcks | there has been a lot of talk about the iraq war lately, can someone explain to me what the war was really all about? | For example, everyone now knows that the president knew there were no WMD in Iraq, so what was the real reason for this war?
*edited for clarification
**re-edit Damn you guys, explain LIKE I AM FIVE | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ajcks/eli5_there_has_been_a_lot_of_talk_about_the_iraq/ | {
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"It wasn't even vaguely senseless.\n\nIn 1990, Iraq, under the leadership of autocrat Saddam Hussein, without provocation invaded the neighboring state of Kuwait. This made pretty much everybody in the world very angry.\n\nAfter several months of demands, with which Iraq did not comply, a coalition of nations effectively led by the United States launched a series of military operations designed to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait, and to deprive Iraq of the ability to retaliate.\n\nAfter just a few weeks of fighting, Iraqi military leaders met with US military leaders in the village of Safwan in southern Iraq. There the terms of a temporary cease-fire were hammered out, along with the roadmap toward a permanent peace.\n\nThat roadmap included several specific and non-negotiable terms. See, Iraq had been a very belligerent state for many years. It had used chemical weapons in war against Iran, and also against Iraqi civilians. This was completely unacceptable, and as part of the terms of the armistice, Iraq was required to completely and fully disarm.\n\nIraq refused. Boldly and consistently. The Iraqi regime thwarted attempts to verify the destruction of its weapons stockpiles and programs for *a decade.* But the US and the other coalition states lacked the political will to enforce the terms of the armistice as strongly as they could have, so the situation lingered. Over time, Iraq became more and more belligerent, carried out horrific atrocities against Iraqi civilians, and ramped up its sponsorship of international terrorism, both against Israeli and US targets.\n\nTo put it bluntly, Iraq was a *huge* and lingering problem, particularly for the United States (which continued to have to dedicate military resources to enforcing the 1991 cease-fire) but also for other states as well.\n\nThen 9/11 happened, and suddenly the United States found the Iraq situation intolerable. Having a rogue state with both the ability and the willingness to use chemical weapons, and an active program seeking to build atomic weapons, *and* clear and unapologetic ties to international terrorism? That simply was not okay.\n\nSo in 2002, the United States basically said, \"This ends here,\" and delivered a series of final ultimatums to the Iraqi regime. When those final ultimatums were ignored, the United States launched its military invasion with the goal of removing Saddam personally and his government in general from power. Since the Iraqi regime had demonstrated *conclusively* that they meant to do harm and had refused to be dissuaded, a full military invasion and a lengthy and difficult reconstruction was, unfortunately, the last viable option to restore the region to stability."
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d15smh | why is water also referred to as dihydrogen monoxide, hydrogen oxide, hydrogen hydroxide, hydric acid, hydroxylic acid, oxidane, etc.? do those terms have different meanings/contexts/applications? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d15smh/eli5_why_is_water_also_referred_to_as_dihydrogen/ | {
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"I've only seen those used to point out that scary sounding chemistry names don't mean that stuff is inherently bad. A lot of people freak out if you tell them that they frequently consume stuff containing the industrial solvent dihydrogen monoxide. But that's just water. Water is a chemical containing two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen and is frequently used in heavy industry as a solvent. It's just to point out that just because something has some sciency chemistry name and is used in other industries, it isn't bad.",
"Hydrogen Oxide mean a molecule made of hydrogen and oxygen. In theory this could include water and hydrogen peroxide which is H2O2, but since water is so widespread people pretty much never use hydrogen oxide to mean something else than water.\n\nDihydrogen Monoxide is a more precise term that mean 2 Hydrogen and 1 oxygen. \n\nStuff can become solube in water, so the PH of water can be variable making water either a base or an acid. So when you say Hydrogen Hydroxide or Hydric Acid you indicate that the water is a base or an acid.\n\nHydroxylic acid is another name for acid water.\n\nOxidane mean an oxygen with a standard bonding number and water is exactly that.\n\nSo the word depend on what you want to communicate as information. Also some of those naming convention is about a group of moleculte, but when it come to water there is often only water in that category, but other molecule are just so less widespread than water, that the word is almost exclusive use for water."
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8kndg3 | when i’m waiting, why do things i want feel like they take longer to arrive than things i don’t want, even if it’s the exact same time frame? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8kndg3/eli5_when_im_waiting_why_do_things_i_want_feel/ | {
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"Because you are specifically paying attention to the time, counting down almost every second. When youre distracted doing something you will concentrate on that thing and time will seem to pass much faster. ",
"Essentially the whole adage, *a watched pot never boils*, pertains to this. \nWhen focused on an uninteresting subject, the brain becomes bored in anticipation lol. So you focus on every second until the task is over. \nI've also found these moments, tend to be among the most memorable for me, a little like traumatic events. "
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6kymzm | why is it that defecation occasionally results in a "no wipe" scenario, but other times results in an "infinity wipe" scenario? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6kymzm/eli5_why_is_it_that_defecation_occasionally/ | {
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"Fiber. \n\nThe density and, er, stability of feces is a measure of water and fiber, at its most basic. \n\nConsume a proper water and fiber for the 'best' feces. Other things like indigestible sugars also contribute (sugar alcohols like xylitol) by passing through largely intact. \n\nLong version:\n\nFecal make-up is based on health and diet. A diet rich in fiber will produce denser, drier (but not too dry, it should still be 'soft' but firm), and sturdier feces. The best wiping feces are the ones you don't have to push out, but come out as a semi solidish 'log' mostly on their own. \n\nWhen you push, you're forcing fecal matter that may not be 'ready' through a small hole. Imagine pushing a banana through a rubber tube. If the tube and the banana are properly aligned, the banana will slide through easily. If the banana is too soft, you have to press it though, and that causes smearing. \n\nFiber firms up and gives structure to your feces. Proper water supply allows your colon to coat the feces in a mucus for passing. You need enough fiber to have sturdy feces and enough water for it to be slick. If it's off, then the feces can be too soft for the mucus to help, requiring you to push it out, which smears it like the banana. ",
"Even if you have a no wipe scenario you still wipe just to make sure you don't have to wipe.",
"Fats in your diet - undigested fats make for a messy infinity wipe. Disease sometimes plays a role in this - if your digestive system is on the fritz, it can cause constipation, diarrhea, and really spectacularly disgusting poop due to undigested foods being present. Pale yellow/whitish poops that smear like peanut butter, float, are sometimes frothy, and smell like the devil have undigested fats in them. Time to get to a doctor if you are seeing this. Edit: I have celiac disease - an autoimmune disease of the guts. Poop issues were first clues! Seriously, poop needs to be mentioned more at the Dr's office. I would have been diagnosed years earlier if I had thought to mention greasy poop to the Dr. I thought it was normal, though.",
"hardcore protip:\n\n- don't wipe, pinch in towards center\n- if you are next to a sink, on the second wipe, put a small amount of water and pinch in, then \"cone\" the paper a bit and well, push slightly while rotating\n- super cleanliness",
"Fiber is good, but don't forget hair. \n \nThe optimal ass-hair length is short but not bare, like facial hair after a week or two of not shaving. I shave once every couple of months and bear the itching for a day in order to get months without a dingle-berry as my reward. Wipes with a bald ass are the worst because your toilet paper tends to get stuck to your skin. \n \nif you want proof I'm right, take a gob of peanut butter and put it in your hair when it's ~1\" long, then try to wipe it out with toilet paper. It gets all in the hair and you can't get it out without a million wipes. If you have a buzz cut it will wipe out much easier. \n \nTL;DR - Give your ass a buzz cut",
"Sit up straight and relax your exit hole. Let it come out by itself. Minimize wipe needed.\n\nWe should all hunker down Asian style and poop. When I was on China, I hunkered down and even very upset stomach left little to no residue.",
"More protein means less wiping. Less protein and more fiber means LOTS more wiping. High cheese diet? You will be lucky to shit at all and then it will be LOTS of wiping. Like trying to pull peanut butter out of a cotton ball. ",
"It depends mostly on your diet, if you want to only wipe once get a bidet or bidet attachment for your toilet."
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131k0m | curvature of space | I have heard that space may or may not have "curvature" to it. What does that mean? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/131k0m/eli5_curvature_of_space/ | {
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"The angles of a triangle in space (if space is curved) do not add up to exactly 180 degrees.",
"Just like you live now on the surface of the earth and it appears to be flat but is actually curved it is possible that the universe itself is actually curved as well. It is much harder to visualize because it is a 3-d surface that is curved not a 2-d surface like the earth. "
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1rs2jw | how can illegal websites (i.e. piracy and illegal streaming) have advertisements on their sites of well-known companies and brands? | How can companies be allowed legally to do this and why doesn't this immediately expose these websites to the federal government? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rs2jw/eli5_how_can_illegal_websites_ie_piracy_and/ | {
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"If a site isn't based in the US they have no obligation to comply with US law. \n\nMost sites just sign up to an advertising service and then that service places ads on the site. Well-known companies & brands often have no ability to choose where there ads appear. ",
"I feel like the only ads i ever see on torrent sites is \"how i can make my dick bigger with just one simple trick\", or \"make 237$/a day\" or \"click here your wife will never know\"",
"The short answer for 99% of these sites:\n\nThe US government just doesn't care enough. Most onion sites, streaming sites, piracy sites (save maybe TPB), etc. fall under this category. The US government really just doesn't care enough to bust them, but if they wanted to they would (see: TSR, Kim Dotcom).\n\nSure, a lot of these sites are run by, and hosted by, citizens in countries where piracy is not a priority (e.g. Russia). \n\nAgain though, the real reason is just because they don't really care that much (despite possible rhetoric to the contrary).",
"Most of them get around it by either externally hosting or being a P2P network. Sites like Megaupload can get away with piracy claims against them because its not their fault (doesn't mean shit doesn't get real for them, but thats another story). Where as sites like TPB and most recently isoHunt get (got) around it using the P2P clause, where by because its not directly hosted on their server it becomes a lot harder to file a copyright on it.\n\nIf a site came out and started uploading say, TV shows in full without licensing and they weren't being implemented by 'user created' means, such a site would be a sitting duck for lawsuits, but most of the websites like this get around it by hosting on external sites (eg Megaupload) and merely provide a search/listing system.\n\n**TL;DR:** Legal loopholes that allow blame to be passed around."
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6kbhwy | why does water form a chain link shaped stream when poured? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6kbhwy/eli5_why_does_water_form_a_chain_link_shaped/ | {
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"The simplest answer is that it is a standing wave in the water, imparted to it by the forces that caused the water to leave the container.\n\nThere is a much more complex answer though.\n\nI'm sure others may want to expound on what I say but here goes. \n\nThere are a few factors that determine the type of flow water (or any liquid) will have when it is moving or poured in this case. The most important though are turbulence, shape, and viscosity.\n\nOne is the internal turbulence of the water. If the water is moving rapidly with respect to the container it can become very turbulent and when the water leaves the opening it will try to follow a tangential path to its last contact. This can (and often does) create a helical flow as the tangential path is acted upon by the cohesive force of the water molecules (which is a fancy way of saying surface tension, but in truth it is more than just surface tension as all the water molecules interact and cause the force, not just the ones on the surface).\n\nLaminar flow (that really cool effect when water flows and looks perfectly clear) is the result of no (or nearly no) internal turbulence in the flow.\n\nAnother factor is the shape of the opening.\n\nOpenings with sharp corners (squares, slits, stars, etc) induce not only turbulence into the liquid but also they cause an effect much like the Bernoulli Principle whereby the liquid that is at the sharp intersection experiences a greater force than the liquid in the center. \n\nNearly incompressible liquids like water react by speeding up at these sites. The greater speed of these pinched areas causes a pulling effect on the other water molecules, or you could say the slower molecules cause a drag effect on the faster moving particles.\n\nWhen these forces are in balance a spiral shape is a natural outcome. Given water's affinity for cohesion the forces we are talking about have a range of values that will all produce a spiral shape, with the value of each force having an effect on the shape of the spiral produced.\n\nThere is an additional adhesive action that can also play a part in the flow of the water since water will also try to adhere to the surface of the container and opening. However, depending on the rate of flow this force may or may not have a noticeable effect. The slower the flow the more noticeable the adhesive force will be.\n\nLastly is viscosity. Viscosity changes everything. The higher the viscosity the more the liquid will resist the forces involved to create the helical flow (that's mure fun to say than spiral). Viscosity has a dampening effect on the necessary forces. Lower viscosity == better spirals.\n\nThere is a lot more here, and you could probably make a full college course out of the physics if you really wanted to understand it fully.\n\nFluid dynamics is one of my favourite fields of science."
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au2xvr | white nationalism? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/au2xvr/eli5_white_nationalism/ | {
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"I'm white, and nationalist. I am British, I love my country, and am proud of it. I don't hate foreigners and support legal immigration. I support equal rights regardless of chosen gender, faith or colour (and all the rest of the long list of differences we have).\n\nWhite nationalists aren't evil people. White nationalists who are white supremacist, racist, violent scumbags are.\n\nI hope this helps. "
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5etx8r | how did penguins develop to the stage they are at now? | Are their flippers residual wings or fins? And how on earth did Emperor Penguins start nesting in Antarctica. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5etx8r/eli5_how_did_penguins_develop_to_the_stage_they/ | {
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"Their flippers are wings that have been adapted to propel and maneuver through water instead of air. Their ancestors first migrated to Antarctica by flying there when it was a warmer environment.\n\nAs the antarctic cooled and vegetation disappeared penguins became more reliant on fishing for their food. Penguins who could swim better survived and had more kids. Over many generations there was a progressive reduction in wing size, which makes diving more efficient and flying less so. Penguin bones also thickened over the ages, as lighter bones that make it easier for birds to fly gave way to more dense bones, which may have helped make them less buoyant for diving. Finally, penguins grew larger as bigger lungs meant they could dive deeper and longer while looking for fish. They also got fatter, because cold.\n\nThere's a tradeoff between efficient flying and swimming. Penguins didn't benefit much from flying when there were no big threats left on land, but they really benefited from being good swimmers. Over time they evolved to make the best of their environment. "
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674t0m | why is alcohol supposed to be "worse" for you than marijuana. | I've seen this claimed a lot in threads about marijuana. I have tried looking up their negatives weighed against one another; however, I have yet to see a list of the short term and long term negatives of both marijuana and alcohol. How is one drug's consequences worse than the other? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/674t0m/eli5_why_is_alcohol_supposed_to_be_worse_for_you/ | {
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"The main reason that alcohol is considered “worse” for you than weed is the fact that alcohol can kill a person if too much is used at once. Alcohol is poisonous to human cells, whereas weed has never killed anyone, and an overdose of weed only results in some anxiety and possibly a fast heartbeat. Also important to keep in mind is that alcohol is physically addictive, and a severe addict can die from the withdrawal symptoms alone, weed is not physically addictive, although people can develop a mental addiction to weed, it will not kill you if you stop.",
"Alcohol can lead to several fatal conditions, either in a single round of consumption, or over a prolonged period of excessive consumption.\n\nMarijuana can be bad for your lungs, just as is inhaling any particulate matter, so a lifetime of excessive smoking may lead to lung related ailments, but you can't consume enough to easily kill yourself. \n\nYou can kill yourself with alcohol pretty easy. ",
"Not a doctor or a scientist here- people who get drunk can get violent, rarely does someone who is high on grass. Alcohol causes all sorts of physical problems, liver damage and so on, while cannibis seems to have very little ill effect on most people. People who are legally drunk are also usually very impaired, to the point of crashing their vehicle and possibly killing someone else, again, not safe to drive stoned, but not usually as dangerous. ",
"Alcohol can cause death from an overdose but marijuana can not. Alcohol can cause loss of consciousness, falls, and vomiting with asphyxiation, marijuana does not. Long term use of alcohol can cause liver dislike, the science between marijuana and organ issues is inconclusive, although you could argue it's not beneficial to the lungs. Alcohol can cause severe and fatal withdraw symptoms. \nAnd in all my years as an ER nurse I have never had anyone come to the hospital for detox from marijuana. Every day I have people sleeping it off in the ER from too much alcohol. Alcohol has ruined millions of lives and cause untold deaths. Marijuana has not. Marijuana is not a health food but alcohol is a poison. ",
"So many reasons... \n\n1. Alcohol causes far more impairment. Alcohol can quickly put a person in a stupor where they can barely see, have no balance, very slow coordination, etc. Marijuana? The effects are almost entirely mental and far less overpowering. \n\n2. Alcohol can outright kill you. You can overdose and die from alcohol poisoning. Roughly 6 people die each day in the US from alcohol poisoning. Marijuana overdose deaths? Zero in history. \n\n3. Alcohol is highly addictive. It's withdrawal symptoms are right up there with heroin - your body can become so dependent upon alcohol that you can literally die from the withdrawal. Marijuana? Most people don't believe it has any addictive properties, and those that do will admit it is very mild. Sugar is much more addictive.\n\n4. Alcohol causes a wide range of long-term health issues. I can't even bother to begin listing them because the list is insanely long. Marijuana? It's actually used to *treat* a wide variety of illnesses. It does increase risk of lung cancer if you smoke it, but that's just from inhaling any kind of smoke, period, not from marijuana itself. Many people vaporize it so they don't inhale any smoke. \n\n\nThose are the big ones. ",
"Alcohol poisons (nearly) every tissue in your body (not a complete list):\n\n(1) Your nervous system: Cerebellar degradation, Wernicke's encephalopathy, peripheral polyneuropathy, alcohol induced seizures, not to mention withdrawal\n(2) Your GI tract: Barrett's esophagus, gastropathy, GI bleeds, pancreatitis, liver failure (both acute and chronic)\n(3) Your Heart: Alcohol-induced myocarditis\n(4) Your lungs: Aspiration pneumonia\n(5) Your muscles: Alcohol-induced myopathy\n(6) Your psyche: Suicide and suicidal ideation, depression, insomnia, judgement, domestic violence, homicide, \n\nMarijuana has a couple of psychiatric associations, including an increased risk of psychosis when used in teenagers, increased risk of depression, and poor GPA when used by kids. There is some evidence that MJ might make people sicker if they already have HCV, but those studies aren't great. It can lead to cannabis hyperemesis syndrome if you use it too much. Plus there is some data that if you use bud, you are at higher risk of a fungal pneumonia called Aspergillosis. These pale in comparison to the incredible risks of alcohol use, especially chronic alcohol use. Add to it that alcohol is \"socially acceptable\", even heavy drinking, and you have an epidemic.",
"A lot of people on here seem to confuse Alcoholism with recreational drinking of alcohol (i.e not binge drinking). Some studies have shown one or two wines a day as having health benefits. marijuana isn't completely safe like a lot of people claim it to be. Just as someone could get violent drinking alcohol, another person could suffer from mental problems exacerbated by pot. Comparing them side by side would be difficult as dosage and chronic usage of alcohol plays a big factor in the health affects whereas I think it's only chronic usage of pot that plays a factor in it's health concerns.",
"Might be worth looking into accident and emergency wards in hospitals. Not sure if your area is like mine but in Britain the A & E depts are crammed with people with alcohol-related injuries. Police stations too. Handling the weekend deluge of drunken revellers is a huge burden on our services (and tax money). ",
"[Here is a clip](_URL_0_) from a norwegian fact show, they base the stats on several studies (google Professor Nutt drug and some of them should pop up) The data shows each individual drugs damage potential regardless of amount of users. Red shows damage to user and orange shows damage to enviroment. ",
"I'm a nurse that frequently works in ER. This is why I will continue to stand by the idea that alcohol is way worse on our society than pot: I have seen countless people come in from the effects of alcohol. More people come in for alcohol related causes than anything else. Whether it be seizing from Withdrawals, drinking too much, getting into fights or car wrecks because of it, or people who have been at the hands of someone intoxicated (spouses , children, bar fights etc). My personal favorite is the people delirious and withdrawing and telling me they're going to kill me, spitting on me, and physically and verbally abusing me. Pot on the other hand? Once. He was a high school kid that smoked up for the first time with his friends and greened out and threw up. Gave him some fluids and his dad took him home. Would have been just fine without our help but the school had to call an ambulance. "
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dsbo29 | how do scammers claiming to be the irs get money off of requested itunes cards? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dsbo29/eli5_how_do_scammers_claiming_to_be_the_irs_get/ | {
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"They sell the codes for say 50% of face value. You give them $500 in cards, they sell them for $250.\n\nConsidering it costs them literally nothing it's a good margin.",
"They sell them. If they used amazon cards and bought stuff it could be traced back to them."
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2neu0s | how come when i wake up and i drink water right away i don't feel sleepy/tired anymore? | Title^ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2neu0s/eli5_how_come_when_i_wake_up_and_i_drink_water/ | {
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"Because you wake up dehydrated. You just spent the pass 6-10 hours sleeping, sweating, and not drinking."
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2b8lot | rpms and gas usage? | I've heard your best MPGs come at about 55 miles per hour. Does higher RPM's mean more gas usage? If I'm on a flat plain and going 10 MPH at 4000 RPMs in first gear, am I using the same amount of gas as going 50 MPH with 4000 RPMs in 5th gear?And if shifting up in gears does mean better MPGs, why do most cars only have 5-6 gears? Why not add more gears and have gas efficiency topped out at 75 MPH instead of around 55? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2b8lot/eli5_rpms_and_gas_usage/ | {
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"50 mph at 4000 rpm uses more gas than 10 mph because of air resistance (gallons burned per minute), although the higher speed would give much better MPG due to the extra time spent driving those miles at 10 mph. Generally higher rpm's use more gas because engine friction rises with increasing rpm. They have added more gears over time. The 1st automatics were 2 speed and early manuals had 3 gears. Now you see 6 7 or even 8 speed transmissions in cars. More gears means the engine is always at the 'correct' rpm vs vehicle speed. 75 mph has way more air resistance than 55. 55 or 60 mph seems to offer the best economy."
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369hh2 | how did reality tv become a thing? | How and why did reality tv come about/stay popular? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/369hh2/eli5_how_did_reality_tv_become_a_thing/ | {
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"Reality TV gets big ratings while costing relatively little. Example: I used to work for Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. We would do an hour of prime time Sunday night TV that would get 18 million viewers at its peak. Our cost was $850K per episode. \n\nWe were followed by Desperate Housewives which got comparable ratings. Their cost per episode? about 3 million.\n\nTL;dr cheaper per-viewer cost."
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2c8lvh | why do we get sunburn/skin cancer if thousands of years ago we could tolerant it? | Like the Cave man era with no clothes out in the sun. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2c8lvh/eli5_why_do_we_get_sunburnskin_cancer_if/ | {
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"They simply didn't live long enough to even have to worry about skin cancer. It's also the case with many of the geriatric diseases that currently plague the world. \n\nWith that said, I don't think it's correct to assume that we could tolerate it thousands of years, since it's likely very few people lived long enough to even get skin cancer. ",
"Melanin- aka the coloring of our skin, is the human bodies natural defence against harmful UV rays. When we evolved on the African Savannah we were all dark skinned. By moving north, our skin lightened so that we would be able to absorb more sun and get more of the much needed vitamin D, which is not available in winter months at certain latitudes. \n\nHumans also used to spend most of their time in direct or indirect sunlight, before modern shelters were created. Even after houses became popular, people still worked on farms and spent most time in the sunlight, gradually getting a tan. Unfortunately for a society that now spends most of its time indoors, and then goes on a vacation to the Bahamas, our skin does not have time to naturally develop the melanin necessary to protect from sun damage. \n\nOur skin is also given defense by what we eat. Animal fats help protect our skin, such as cod liver oil and butter, as well as eating certain antioxidants such as Astaxanthin. A diet high in processed foods and sugars/grains puts the skin more at risk for burns because it is not properly made. ",
"What makes you think we *didn't* get skin cancer back then? The problem is for most of our history we didn't know about things like cancer. Some diseases have very obvious outward signs (like smallpox) and are thus easily identified in history. Others, though, aren't so obvious. That's why if you read a lot of history you'll see things like \"he died of natural causes\" or \"she died of old age.\" What that really means is \"we have no fucking idea what killed them, but they were old, so meh, what do you do?\"\n\nIf skin cancer really wasn't that prevalent throughout history (I don't know either way), there is also the fact that we've thinned our ozone layer (which blocks out harmful UV radiation) for most of the 20th century. Back in the 80's this was a major concern and there was real talk of having to bundle up when you went outside even on hot days to escape the deadly radiation that would pulverize our planet without an ozone layer. Thankfully since we've stopped using aerosols the damage has somewhat reversed and we're a little safer now."
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5a5hdc | how do computers handle infinitely repeating numbers? | For example, if I open up calculator on my computer and do 100 divided by 3. The answer would be 33.33333, the 3's repeated for infinity. How does a computer handle the infinitely repeating number without crashing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5a5hdc/eli5_how_do_computers_handle_infinitely_repeating/ | {
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"Simple, it only stores a finite number of those repeating digits, rounding it off at the end. You can see this with cheap calculators by creating a repeating decimal and them multiplying it back and you won't get your original answer. For example 1 divided by 3 and then multiplying it back by 3 might give you 0.999999",
"They don't. They round them instead, for example 0.3333333333... can be stored as simply 0.3333333333 (in reality it's stored using binary and not decimal, but it's the same idea). These rounding errors are in fact a major problem when performing precise calculations, and there's a [whole mathematical field](_URL_0_) dedicated to handling this problem.\n\nSometimes computers programs can be smart enough to figure out that a number like 0.9999999999 is actually 1, but it's often not the case. Some programs represent fractions using simple fractions, as a pair of numbers, since they allow more flexibility than decimal fractions. "
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2qts4d | why do victims of frivolous lawsuits need to hire lawyers to respond to them? | Recently, United Airlines sued a 22-year old for creating a website that, ostensibly legally, lets you buy cheaper plane tickets.
> In the lawsuit, United and Orbitz call Skiplagged “unfair competition” and allege that it is promoting “strictly prohibited” travel. They want to recoup $75,000 in lost revenue from Zaman.
Redditors commented that the lawsuit is likely to be unsuccessfully except that it might force Zaman into bankruptcy due to the legal costs.
My question is: why can't a victim of a frivolous lawsuit just write a letter to the judge that articulates why the website isn't illegal, and why can't the judge just be like "yea duh this lawsuit is frivolous as hell" and just throw it out? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2qts4d/eli5_why_do_victims_of_frivolous_lawsuits_need_to/ | {
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" > why can't a victim of a frivolous lawsuit just write a letter to the judge that articulates why the website isn't illegal, and why can't the judge just be like \"yea duh this lawsuit is frivolous as hell\" and just throw it out?\n\nBecause the whole point of the court is to make that decision; to not allow both sides a say is unfair.\n\nNow that said I also think it should be possible for the judge to order all legal fees and lost incomes paid out to the defendant if they deem it frivolous while in-court and after both sides have said their piece. ",
"A judge can do that. If a lawsuit fails to state a claim upon which legal relief can be granted, then you can ask the court to dismiss it at the very beginning. For example, if I file a petition with the court saying \"/u/xavier86 hurt my feelings on Reddit\", you can ask the court to dismiss the suit because even if it's true, there's no legal relief a court can give me. The same thing could happen here. If United and Orbitz have no legal claim, the defendant could just say \"even if that's all true, there's nothing the court can do.” I’m guessing they tried that already and the court said “there may be a claim here” and let the lawsuit proceed.\n\nGenerally, the rule in America is that each party pays its own attorney’s fees. However, several laws change that so that the losing party has to pay for the winning party’s attorney’s fees. I don’t know where the suit was filed or what the claims were, but he may be able to get reimbursed for attorney’s fees.\n\nIf a lawsuit is truly frivolous then a court can sanction the plaintiff and/or the plaintiff’s attorney and force them to pay a fine to the defendant and/or court.\n\n > Redditors commented that the lawsuit is likely to be unsuccessful\n\nAlso, this isn't a reliable legal source. I would imagine the legality of selling plane tickets online and the enforceability of contracts for air travel are pretty novel legal issues that are still being determined, which means this suit could go either way.",
" > Redditors commented that the lawsuit is likely to be unsuccessfully except that it might force Zaman into bankruptcy due to the legal costs.\n\nThey're incorrect. United and Orbitz are claiming that Skiplagged is doing what's known as \"tortious interference\". Roughly, this means they're deliberately encouraging consumers to break the terms of the agreement they sign when the buy tickets. Since Skiplagged is indeed doing this, it's far from obvious that they'll win; they need to somehow show that the contracts they're encouraging people to break aren't enforceable or don't matter.\n\nHe also made the problem worse by a series of stupid moves, where he promised United and Orbitz that he'd stop linking to them and then refused to do so. (Ironically, we know this is true because he admitted to it in an AMA...)"
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74nad0 | how are video game environments with vast proportions created? does it take a painstakingly long time to code or are there any design hacks to create environments? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/74nad0/eli5_how_are_video_game_environments_with_vast/ | {
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"Short answer is both.\n\nTake for example The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, this was a procedurally generated world(something like how minecraft worlds are created), and probably had some added polish after it.\n\nThe Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim was a different story, and there were more level designers and less of the world was procedurally generated.\n\nSo yes, it is painstakingly long but there are also design hacks to shorten the time needed to create an environment, though most of the time the game world is 'better' if its more level designers working, and less hacks to shorten the time"
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7u1gz6 | what happens to your vocal cords when you sing falsetto? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7u1gz6/eli5_what_happens_to_your_vocal_cords_when_you/ | {
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"The concept of \"vocal cords\" is pretty misleading. What you have instead are \"vocal folds,\" which are two flaps that let air travel through your larynx, which we manipulate into certain sounds using our tongue, teeth, and lips. Part of the low voice sound is the vibration your vocal folds make when they're more closed than open. When these two folds come together, the small area that air escapes through causes them to vibrate and slap together, and your voice sounds \"lower.\" Try it now; when does your voice sound lower, when you're making an \"s\" sound or \"z\" sound?\n\nThe deepness of one's voice is mostly determined by how low their larynx is. That's why tall people often have lower voices because their larynx is lower, which gives their vocal folds more space. Children have high voices because their larynxes have no depth, thus small vocal folds. You can raise and lower your larynx at will to make your voice higher or lower, which is what someone is doing when they're making their best attempt at a \"Darth Vader\" voice (lower larynx longer folds). \n\nTherefore, during a falsetto, your larynx is raised, and your vocal folds are open.\n\nEDIT: Clarity\nEDIT: I changed some wording around about larynx size because some people were losing their shit about the word “neck.”",
"Like u/beto1460 said, your vocal \"cords\" are actually vocal *folds,* flaps of skin inside your larynx. When you make a sound, they flap open and closed a bunch of times per second and to regulate air flow out of your throat. Typically, though, the deepness of your voice isn't so much dependent on how low your larynx is, but on how long and thick your vocal folds are: Longer, thicker vocal folds will produce a deeper voice, because they vibrate more slowly. When you make your voice higher and lower, what you're doing is manipulating the shape and tension of your vocal folds to change the speed at which they vibrate.\n\nWhen you speak in falsetto, your vocal folds don't close all the way. However, the vocal passage is *not* entirely open: Your vocal folds have mucus membranes on the edges, sometimes called \"false vocal folds,\" and when you speak in falsetto, those are what's vibrating together to produce the noise.",
"It's simplest to just show an animation:\n\n[Here's your vocal cords singing normally](_URL_1_)\n\n[Here's your vocal cords singing falsetto](_URL_0_)"
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3cwm2e | how was 50 shades of gray a bad protrayal of bdsm? | I remember hearing somewhere that 50 shades a gray was a pretty shittyk movie and it protrayed BDSM terribly. I've never seen the movie except for some parts of it but I get the point. So how did it fuck up protraying BDSM? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3cwm2e/eli5_how_was_50_shades_of_gray_a_bad_protrayal_of/ | {
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"It really has nothing to do with BDSM, it's straight up rape. The guy stalks her, threatens her, controls her, forbids safe words, etc.",
"BDSM should be safe, sane and consensual. Both partners should be agreeing to what boundaries they want to push, which ones they want to leave in place, and everybody involved should always be able to stop at any point during either through using no and/or a safeword (depending on what sort of scene you are doing).\n\n50 shades is not safe, nor sane, and definitely not consensual. The guy stalks his partner, threatens her, controls her through expensive gifts, pretty much throws a mental tantrum when she uses her safeword and on at least one occasion disregards her use of no/her safe word entirely. We call that rape.\n\nPlus, there are a lot of people who aren't really happy with how the guy's backstory and his interest in BDSM were linked. It really feeds into the whole 'all people into BDSM have to be mentally damaged' stereotype, which is hardly true. ",
"Let's say you enjoy wrestling with your friends.\n\nOnce one of you says \"uncle\" or \"stop,\" you stop.\n\nThat's kind of like BDSM. It's two people who like to test each other, but once it gets too rough, they stop. \n\nThe movie wasn't about two people agreeing to test each other and trust that they wouldn't hurt each other.\n\nThe movie was about someone taking control of another person.\n\nNow, if you were really five, I'd have said \"go ask your mother.\"",
"50 shades is as much a portrayal of BDSM as Catcher in the Rye is a portrayal of baseball. That is to say not at all. What takes place in 50 is nothing short of a disturbed sociopath stalking and mentally dominating a weak person. It reads like a training guide for how to become a cult leader. He uses mental, emotional, physical, and psychological manipulation on her for nothing more than his own self gratification. This is not BDSM. This is abuse.",
"Both the books and movie are based on the author's BDSM experiences, which are none. She had a fantasy about BDSM, read some fanfictions, but lacked the know-hows to make a story properly based on that.\n\nWorse, the relationship depicted into both the movie and books is an abusive one, with [cult recruitment techniques mixed in](_URL_0_).\n\n If you want a better story about BDSM, I recommend the [Sunstone](_URL_1_) graphic novel series.",
"Hey there! Right, let me preface this with my, uh, credentials as it were. I'm a member of the fetish community, and myself and my partner/dom are into the super brutal shit. As in, he proper gets off beating and abusing me, (consual) violations of consent, verbal/emotional abuse, hell, even knifes get involved sometime (-dreamy sigh-). If I were to write down a night with him, it would read like a fucking police statement. It's less of the SSC acronym (Safe sane consensual\") and more RACK (Risk assessed consensual kink) so it's more intense than 50 Shades which claims to -ahem- \"follow- SSC (I'm not buying it)\n\nSo, why is this ok and the (relatively tane) 50 shades stuff isn't? It's not just an issue of consent, but one of *informed* consent, open, frank discussion and ***mother fucking aftercare***.\n\nSo lets go through these one at a time;\n\n**Informed consent**: So aside from the issues with straight out consent in the novel (and film, but it's the novel I've read, so we'll go by that), Ana is a virgin, never even had an orgasm, never hear of any of these weird fetish shit before. What does Christian do, shove a big contract on her and tell her to wiki it (WIKI IT! Literally the worst way to learn about sex ever). He's aware of her naiveté; and doesn't seem to care that he's pushing her to something she doesn't understand, so long as he gets what he wants out of it, which is creepy, manipulative and predatory. \n\n\nContrast with me and my partner; The first time we had sex there were some kinda kinky elements, really mild (hair pulling, back scratching, I think he put his had on my neck, it was a while back I cant remember exactly), and then we spoke about what we had and hadn't done, what we're comfortable with, what we know how to do safely and went from there. Which brings me to my next point...\n\n**Discussion**: Right so in 50 Shades theres some discussion about the contract. It's weird, clinical, and mainly consists of Ana saying \"I don't want to do this\" and Christian saying \"I'll take that as a maybe\". After whatever act has been done, there is little to no discussion after the fact about what either party felt about it, if they wanted to do it again, what they liked, didn't like, nothing.\n\nMe and my partner; so right, not only do we talk about what we want to do to each other, but most of our discussion comes after a scene. Recently we had a night that was really intense, there was crying, bruising, blood, kicking, I got my head stepped on at one point (not hard, but it fucking hurt. Probably dangerous but eh RACK). In the couple days after we probably spent more time talking about it than it actually took, we dissected and examined it to see which levels we were happy with, which to dial back and which to push further. We didn't rush it, we spoke until we were happy the other had understood how we felt and vice versa. \n\nLastly \n\n**AFTERCARE**: Oh my fucking god, there was no aftercare in that book. If you're unfamiliar with the term, it's pretty self explanitory; aftercare is caring for your partner (normally the dom for the sub, but doms need it too) after a scene, it's allows for a sub to get out of the sub headspace, to normalise and process whats happened. It can take a lot of forms; from a cuddle, to soothing lotion for spankings, to hot chocolate, to some alone time, everyones needs are different. In 50 Shades aftercare is never talked about, let alone given. It's mainly this and the consent issues that for me take this novel from \"A kind shitty novel with some shitty BDSM\" to \"A shitty novel passing off abuse as BDSM\". Ana is not given the opportunity to communicate what she wants or needs, and isn't listened to when she does. \n\nMe, the aftercare I need is lots og cuddles, being told he loves me, and that I did well and other nice things and being touched gently while I fall asleep. Then I wake up bright eyed and bushy tailed ready for the next brilliant beating. I told my partner it's what I needed and he listened, and so I'm able to get out of my headspace of being scared and obedient and even desperate, which allows for more open communication. It lets me know for sure that the scene is over and I can leave the mentality of our scenes behind until we do it again. \n\n\nAnd before anyone says that these aren't sexy; that in porn you don't see the actors discussing things before hand or anything like that: **I call bullshit**.\n\n50 Shades isn't a 20 minute video of two bodies mashing together. It's (meant to be) a novel, with characters who's thoughts and feelings you care about and ALL OF THE THINGS I'VE TALKED ABOUT ARE DAMN SEXY. Me and my partner talking about what we're going to do, or have done is sexy as fuck, when we talk post scene half the time it's all I can do not to jump him there and then. It mixes remembering the arousal from the scene coupled with the anticipation of the next one and it's great! More fucking sexy than a clinical contract copy pasted what three times? As for aftercare, in a romance novel isn't that just what you want to see? Your two heros, after a night of intense, kinky sex, cuddling, caring for eachother, playing in the non-kinky sense? \n\n50 Shades may not be billed as a BDSM book, and definitely not a how to; but for a lot of people it's their first glimpse into that world, and it's not a safe one. I have personally interacted with more than one guy who claim to be like Christian, who use the book to pick up women and that scares me; because I know what I'm doing (more or less), I know the difference between BDSM and abuse red flags, but there are girls out there who don't who will get sucked into it. Because this book and books like it are being billed as BDSM and it makes the community as a whole look like a bunch of manipulative, abusive, rapists, which we are not. We're a rich and diverse community of mostly lovely people. And the fact that EL won't even respond to polite and relevant criticisms of her book is childish and irresponsible. \n\nSo yeah\n***TL;DR: It's shitty because of a lack of informed consent, discussions, and aftercare. It paints a bad picture of BDSM as a whole through poor research and I wouldn't trust Christian as far as I could throw him. Plus it's a shitily written book, but that's just my opinion***",
"50 Shades of Gray is criticized for its terrible portrayal of consent, and it's considered sort of borderline rape.\n\n[Here's a fun youtube video](_URL_0_) that sort of explains a 'fan'theory about the subject.\n\nThe idea is that Mr. Gray is practicing a thing called \"indoctrination\" which is a technique used by cults to recruit members and convince them to do things that they wouldn't normally do.\n\nThe idea that what'sherface is being manipulated into doing sexual acts with the guy just isn't right, and isn't really considered to be consensual. "
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3liefu | what are the repercussions of getting a large loan and not paying it back before you die? | If I get a loan for 500,000$, spend it all and live life avoiding to pay, what happens? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3liefu/eli5_what_are_the_repercussions_of_getting_a/ | {
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"For the average person to get a loan that big you will probably have to use your house as collateral (assuming its even worth that much). If you don't pay it they will foreclose on you and repo your house. In fact they will probably do that with whatever you use. \n\nOverall it will also hurt your credit score which will prevent you from getting loans and all that",
"The value of the estate will be used to pay any outstanding debts before heirs get any money. \n\nSo, if you owe $500,000 and your estate is worth $600,000, then your heirs inherit $100,000. \n\nBut if you owe $500,000 and your estate is worth $400,000, then your heirs get nothing and your creditors have to eat $100,000. "
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31s1qn | what is happening in the brain when you move on or let go of someone, whether because of death, a breakup, their moving away…? | I'm sure we've all experienced this in many different ways. You lose a loved one to death. A long term relationship breaks up. You permanently fall out with a once best friend. Someone you care deeply about emigrates to the other side of the world.
In these scenarios, even if it's not death, we still experience the typical grieving process. And eventually, somehow, even if it will always hurt on some level, we manage to get on with life - presumably from an evolutionary standpoint, if early man didn't bother hunting because he was too busy grieving, he'd end up dead himself.
But what is actually happening in the brain when someone's memory no longer causes intense pain, or the fact that they're gone no longer causes that pain? I've often assumed this is literally a physical scenario involving neurons - that when you remember something, you activate specific signalling pathways between neurons (memories) and that essentially grieving involved your brain "reprogramming" itself so that certain circuits are no longer associated with pain or shock. An oversimplification of the thought process sure, but I've always assumed that this was essentially how it works.
Am I correct, or is there an entirely different mechanism going on here that is entirely unlike what I'm envisioning? How is it that our brains learn not to associate the loss of someone with emotional overwhelmedness and instant weepiness? What has happened brain-wise on that first morning you manage to get up and not dwell on whatever caused your grief? What has happened brain-wise the first time you can think of the person you miss with a smile on your face instead of a tear in your eye?
Are these processes even known, or am I asking questions which are beyond our current understanding of what's going on inside our own heads? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/31s1qn/eli5_what_is_happening_in_the_brain_when_you_move/ | {
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"I am very interested in other answers to this. \n\nThe most I can offer is that you get used to your \"new normal\" because you have to. You adjust to being without that person, you create new habits and stop using the old ones, and you deal with it or you die (like your example caveman). \n\nLong-term survival instinct. I hope someone has a more detailed answer than mine, though. ",
"With a breakup Ive been led to believe its a sort of chemical addiction. You have part of it down with neurons triggering memories. After that though those memories trigger hormones. I think the pain involved is a withdraw/unbalance of those hormones. I cant even remember where I heard this so please take it with a grain of salt. ",
"Hey man, psychologist in training here (not a specialist in this area by any means, but I'll give a basic answer). \n\nSome background first. So the limbic system is highly involved what you are talking about. This is a series of structures responsible for many things I won't go into, but two of the most important are the hippocampus and the amygdala. These two structures work together closely to encode long term memories (the hippocampus) that are marked by emotional contexts (the amygdala). Okay, so those structures exist in both the right and left hemispheres. In the right the hippocampus specialize in faces, in then left in language (super eli5). \n\nThat being said, more on your question. So you have someone in your life, you encode memories of them in your hippocampus constantly. You stop interacting. But you still think about them (with emotional markers from the amygdala). This continued thinking about them represents your minds way of processing what happened in the relationship. When you recall your memory of them, however, you alter the memory somewhat and the emotion as well. Do this enough times, in different contexts and the chemical and physical properties of your memories of that person will change. The right hemisphere Jammie's implicated in emotional processing so it is probable that many of the emotional episodic memories associated with the person happen here. "
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avjmum | bonsai trees | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avjmum/eli5_bonsai_trees/ | {
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"Bonsai trees are a Japanese art form. \n\nThey are otherwise normal trees that through certain techniques have been forced to remain small while being shaped to resemble larger trees. \n\nTechniques used are things like pruning, constraining growth through planting in small pots and limiting nutrients, steering growth through wires that force the branches into particular forms or directions, etc. \n\nTraining a bonsai takes years, sometimes decades. It's a tree; it grows slowly! "
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27frzo | where do mosquitoes sleep? | Where are do mosquitoes hangout all day till they come to fuck with me? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27frzo/eli5_where_do_mosquitoes_sleep/ | {
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"they were with me. About 20 of them keep visiting me when they're done with you.\n",
"I hope someone knows the answer to this. There's been one mosquito in my room for a week now, hiding in the day, fucking with me at night.",
"Evil never sleeps.",
"Outside, they hangout under leaves on low level vegetation like bushes and weeds, etc. That's why keeping your yard cleaned up will help with mosquitoes because it limits the area for them to hide.",
"They never sleep, if they are not fucking with you they are fucking with other people.",
"With your mom. Seriously though, they avoid sunlight and stay on bushes, plants and brush. \n\nIf you hire one of those mosquito spraying companies, they target all those areas and any low hanging tree branches. "
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2r1abj | what was/is the point of a middle name? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2r1abj/eli5_what_wasis_the_point_of_a_middle_name/ | {
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"The phrase “middle name” first appeared in an 1835 Harvard University periodical called Harvardiana, but the practice dates back much further.\n\nIn ancient Rome, having multiple names was an honor usually bestowed upon the most important people—like Gaius Julius Caesar. The fad died out only to pick back up again in Western cultures in the 1700s, when aristocrats started giving their children lavishly long names to indicate their place in society. Similarly, lengthy Spanish and Arabic names adopt paternal or maternal names from previous generations to trace the individual’s family tree. (In other cultures, like Chinese, there are traditionally no middle names.)\n\nThe three-name structure used today began in the Middle Ages when Europeans were torn between giving their child a saint’s name or a common family name. The practice of giving three names eventually resolved the problem with a formula: given name first, baptismal name second, surname third. It branched to America as immigrants arrived: Adopting a trio of labels became a way of aspiring to a higher social class. Nonreligious middle names—often maternal maiden names—gradually became the norm, and by the Civil War, it was customary to name your child whatever you liked. Middle names had started to become more or less official by World War I, when the U.S. enlistment form became the first official government document to include space for them.\n\n[Source](_URL_0_)",
"People, especially men back in the day were often given their mother's maiden name as a middle name. They did this for two reasons: 1, it kept the maiden name in use and let everyone know the connection between the son and his mother's family, and 2, it distinguished them from other relatives with the same name. Back in the day you might have an absolute ton of Williams or Johns, so that was inportant.\n\nOverall I'd guess that was a big reason for middle names: to distinguish someone with a common name from others with the same name.",
"Depends on your culture or heritage. I have a friend from the Czech Republic that doesn't have one and an Iraqi friend that has like 20.",
"Plus it separates the Lee \"Harvey\" Oswalds from the Lee \"Norman\" Oswalds.",
"Nowadays, many people use it as a way of honouring both sides of the family: if the first name comes from the mother's family, the middle name can come from the father's ( & v.v. for a second child).",
"For English names, if could imagine things going along the lines of: \n\n\"John, son of Robert. The Tailor.\"\n\n\"John, Robert's son. Tailor\"\n\n\"John Roberts Tailor\"",
"It's also useful if you want to honor a relative whose name has, for whatever reason, fallen out of fashion. \n\nA lot of names move in hundred-year cycles of being popular for a generation, then sounding stale and aging with their bearers into a stereotypical \"old-person\" name until they die off, people stop hearing the name in that context and a new generation of novelty-seeking parents revives it.\n\n Middle name is where you'd put a \"middle age\" sounding name, if you're eternally grateful to Aunt Sharon or Uncle Kevin but their name just sounds...not something you'd imagine on a baby of your child's generation. ",
"It's common in Vietnamese names (that follow traditional rules) the middle name denotes a generation of siblings in a family. All brothers would have the same middle name, and all the sisters would have the same middle name.",
"It's so you know when you have done something wrong. When Mom or Dad calls you using your middle name, you know that shit has hit the fan."
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a5f524 | why, as a normal civilian, should i be worried about data leaks? | Asking more out of interest to learn, it seems like such a bad thing for companies to have your data, but what's the actual harm in this? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a5f524/eli5_why_as_a_normal_civilian_should_i_be_worried/ | {
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"If they have your email and password, and you use the same password for your email (which many people do), they can effectively take control of your online presence (sending password resets for things).\n\nA little digging in your personal emails and they could probably get the answer to a few of your security questions (or ask people close to you while posing as you).\n\nAt that point they have access to your online banking.\n\nSo keep a diverse set of passwords and you are fine, but most people don’t.",
"As a normal person your primary concerns would be fraud and identity theft committed against you and the damage to society done as a whole.\n\nThe first part is easy. If someone has your details they cans teal from you. It might be something simple as finding out what email and password you use on one website and then using it on another website where they then take over your account and do things with it that damage you.\n\nOr it might be that they gain enough of your data to open up accounts in your name and incur debts that you have to prove aren't your later.\n\nOr they might simply steal your credit card number and do shit with that.\n\nLess obvious are things when the data that gets in the wrong hands is not really used to directly hurt you financially. The bad guys might simply amass a list of thousands or millions of people who according to their data fit their profile and target them with political advertising in ways that drive them to ever more radical opinions since only the people who are inclined to believe it get targeted. Before you know it you have a large number of victims who live in a parallel world where everyone agrees that the moon is made of cheese and they vote accordingly.\n\nThat can really hurt society as a whole.",
"Everything about you is somewhere on the Internet. Your online-shopping patterns, your old phone numbers, your previous address(es), credit history, hair color, eye color, height, weight, date of birth, your favorite soft drink, the type of movies you like to watch on Netflix, absolutely everything. The only thing that keeps it all (relatively) secure is firewall software and encryption, both of which can be broken by anyone with enough time, skill, and determination.\n\nThe actual harm in a data leak is that once it's been leaked, there's no way to 'unleak' it, and you have *no idea* who has access to it or what they plan to do with it. Most of the time, you're just a single drop in an entire ocean of data, and your personal data will go unnoticed and unused, but if your data ends up in the wrong hands, that leak can destroy your entire life, and in certain situations, it may get people killed.\n\nUltimately, the only way to be absolutely, totally secure and anonymous on the Internet is to never connect to it in the first place.",
"Ask again when you can search your name in google and view all of your browsing history, personally identifying information, entire email inbox and outbox all nicely linking to any and every social media account you use including your anonymous reddit account. Oh, and there'll also be a street view of your home there with address and links to all of your family members social media as well as your employers.",
"Companies like Facebook and Google run ads - the more personal data they hold about you the more they can target the ads you see with things they think will interest you. Sound benign? Not really once you realise that your entire online experience has been influenced and curated. You’re being swayed and influenced in ways you don’t notice or possibly understand - why do you think fake news is such a big deal? Targeted click bait, fake news and ads can skew your perception of what’s happening in the world and how you should act accordingly."
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5px9js | why are the oscars considered the most important/special awards in the film industry? | What makes the Academy Awards so much "better" than any other type of film award? Why is our society more obsessed with the Oscars than any other set of film awards? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5px9js/eli5_why_are_the_oscars_considered_the_most/ | {
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"Three reasons:\n\n1) Promotion.\n\n2) Promotion.\n\n3) Promotion.\n\nThe Oscars are there to make money, just like any other television show. In turn, they give the movies they nominate a boost at the box office and streaming rentals.",
"Hi, I have personally worked on the Oscars voting system, which these days is computerized and highly encrypted for security. It's done by [this company.](_URL_1_)\n\nUnlike other film awards, the Oscars are voted on by members of the [Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences](_URL_0_) (hence the term \"Academy Awards\"). The voters for each category are experts in exactly that craft -- directors vote for best director, editors vote for best editing, and so on. So the Oscars represent the opinions of the professional experts.",
"Society is obsessed with whatever the media chooses to cover. Awards shows are cheap to broadcast and there is a psychologically compelling \"contest\" aspect to them. \n\nMy guess is that the Academy Awards make it a whole lot more profitable for the TV network. So we get exhaustive coverage, other TV personalities always talking about the Oscars, movie studios advertising either their candidates or their successes. \n\nSo it's partially a media racket, very profitable for certain parties. Whatever makes money, we get a whole lot more of.\n"
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44z2q2 | is it possible to land a spacecraft on a gas planet? | Would you just go through it? Or be sucked in to the centre because of gravity? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/44z2q2/eli5_is_it_possible_to_land_a_spacecraft_on_a_gas/ | {
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"You'd fall through the atmosphere until you were crushed by the increasing pressure or melted by the increasing heat. The gas giants are believed to have small possibly-solid cores, but no ship would reach them with any known material.",
"No. There is no surface to land on.\n\nHowever, most gas giants, such as Jupiter, are thought to have very dense solid cores at their center, very deep inside. But by the time you got that deep into the planet's atmosphere, your ship would be crushed like a wet tissue by the atmospheric pressure.\n\nA probe fired from the Galileo mission into Jupiter and went down on a parachute. It only lasted a little over an hour before it was crushed out of existence.\n",
"So here are some xkcd \"What If\" articles that go into the details a bit. Neither of them answer you're question but I think you'll find them interesting. \n\n_URL_1_ (How would a submarine react on Jupiter)\n\n_URL_0_ (How a plane would fly on various planets. \n\nBasically, the end result is that the atmosphere is to thin for any solid footing. This is partially because the atmosphere is so thin but also because gravity is so strong. Deeper down near the core the pressure gets stronger and floating might be possible but the pressure is so strong it will crush the ship."
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oro5u | silent letters/double letters in english | I've never understood what the point of them is. Are they just artifacts from earlier languages? Words with double letters almost always throw me off when I try to spell them.
Double letter examples: connection, association, parallel, etc.
Silent letter examples: herb, autumn, half, etc. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/oro5u/eli5_silent_lettersdouble_letters_in_english/ | {
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"Back in Shakespeare's day, people spelled things pretty much however it seemed right to them to spell them. (Shakespeare himself had over a dozen ways of spelling his name — including such oddities as *Shaxberd*.) If you look at things that were written in the 16th-17th centuries in English, you'll see a lot of different spellings.\n\nA little while later, as more English-speakers learned to read and write, people started to decide that spelling words the same way was a sign of being better educated. Standard spellings also made it easier for books to be understood by people with different accents or dialects — even if a word would be pronounced differently in London, Edinburgh, and Boston, it would be spelled the same.\n\nIn the 18th and 19th centuries, people like Samuel Johnson (in Great Britain) and Noah Webster (in the U.S.) wrote dictionaries. Often they used older spellings which were more \"traditional\" but didn't reflect current pronunciation. For instance, all the English with *-gh* (like *rough* and *though*) used to be pronounced with the same sound (the last sound in *Bach* or Scottish *loch*) but over time they became different sounds. We still spell them the same because Johnson and other lexicographers (dictionary-makers) wrote down *cough* and *though* instead of *coff* and *tho*.\n\nSo, that's where a lot of the unusual features in English spelling come from: dictionary makers who thought the \"traditional\" spellings were nicer, prettier, or more formal and appropriate than more phonetic spellings would be. And once the idea that correct spelling was important became common, anyone who decided to spell it *coff* would look silly.\n\n(And it's true that standard spellings make it easier to read. If everyone spelled things differently, you'd have to sound out every word all the time, and know what their pronunciations were!)",
"They're mostly artifacts adopted from other languages and earlier versions of English. For example, all of your double letter examples are from Latin, where double letters in a word determine which syllable is emphasized. \"Half\" comes from Old English, and dropping the \"L\" is just a quirk of pronunciation that has developed over time.\n\n",
" > Silent letter examples: herb\n\nThe *h* in \"herb\" is silent in American English, but not in British English.\n\n\"Herb\" comes from the Old French *erbe* (no *h*, although modern French does have one), which comes from the Latin *herba*. Eventually in English it came to have the spelling it did, but kept the *h* silent. When the Founding Fathers went off to the US, they took this pronunciation with them. A couple of centuries later, the British pronunciation fell into line with the spelling, but by then America was well established as a separate country and stuck to the pronunciation it had always used."
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9jemme | clarence thomas and anita hill | What is the history surrounding Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill? How does this relate to the appointing of Brett Kavanaugh as supreme court justice? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9jemme/eli5_clarence_thomas_and_anita_hill/ | {
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"Clarence Thomas is a current supreme court justice. Anita Hill is someone who worked for him prior to his nomination. \n\nHill alleged that Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor, primarily asking her out repeatedly and lots of graphic sexual talk in the office. Ultimately, Hill testified about this in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee (like Dr. Ford is doing today about Kavanaugh). \n\nAfterward, Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court by a narrow margin. \n\nIt relates to the appointment of Brett Kavanaugh because they are (to my knowledge) the only two people who have had a woman testify about their alleged sexual misconduct during their nomination process for the Supreme Court."
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5ikb3s | why are their expiration dates on medical oxygen tanks. does the oxygen actually "expire"? | My impression is that the oxygen does *not* actually expire. But are there other factors, such as the integrity of the tank and nozzle, or contamination of the oxygen from the metal casing? Some coworkers were talking about how dumb it is that oxygen tanks expire and it got me wondering about whether there is a good reason.
I suppose this question may apply to industrial tanks, too. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5ikb3s/eli5_why_are_their_expiration_dates_on_medical/ | {
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"You answered your own question.\n\nThe tanks are certified to hold the amount of oxygen they say they are holding without malfunctions for a certain amount of time. In theory, it's possible for an oxygen tank that has been stored and maintained perfectly to last much longer - maybe even forever - but in practice the manufacturer can't guarantee it past a certain amount of time.\n\nIf they didn't have expiration dates, you could dig a rusty 60 year old oxygen tank out of some closet and use it, and if it doesn't work properly you can sue the company that made it. ",
"The FDA has expiration dates for two reasons - they don't want gasses breaking down over time (and they don't exempt gasses that don't break down), and they want the tanks cycling in and out of use so that they're tested regularly for safety reasons. The oxygen in a tank isn't going to go bad, but the tank or valve assembly might get damaged and the FDA wants to make sure that bad tanks are discovered and pulled from service in a relatively timely manner.",
"It's more for the tanks than their contents.\n\nHigh pressure equipment needs to be inspected and things like O-rings replaced on a regular basis. In particular, oxygen is highly reactive, and becomes even more so under pressure."
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3ho3py | what is the metric system and what is the imperial system? what are the differences? compare/contrast. thanks | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ho3py/eli5_what_is_the_metric_system_and_what_is_the/ | {
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"You can find a lot of details of both on wikipedia.\n It depends a little on what you're measuring. \n\nSuper basics:\nImperial measurements are in Base 12 at smaller distances, and get somewhat arbitrary (seeming) as they are larger.\n\nTemps are based on the human body. 100 being a tiny bit above normal body temp, and 0 being super dangerously cold.\n\nMetric is base 10, and has easy math when working from small to larger units across all measurements, and most of the world uses it.\n\nArguments are heated, and long, and passionate, but you need not worry yourself with those arguments, as long as you side with the Metric standard.\n",
"The metric system is based on natural phenomenon. Distance is defined by the time it takes for light to travel a milisecond. Temperature is based on the freezing and boiling point of water. Mass is defined by 1 cubic centimeter of water at room temperature. And various other units are based on metric system. ",
"Here is some information on the modern metric system (SI) also called The International System of Units.\n\nWhy is the metric system easier than Imperial, and USC? Or any other measurement structure. The most frequently given answers include:\n\n1…Because metric is simple and consistent. There is only one meter and one kilometer and one liter..Unlike the mile (3 miles, international mile, US Survey mile, nautical mile.) and two gallons (Imperial gallon and US gallon) metric is simple and less confusing, fewer errors, less cost. \n\n2…Because it dramatically reduces conversion factors in calculations. Less time doing calculations, fewer errors, less wastage in material and time, less cost. \n\n3…Because metric prefix’s enable whole numbers only. Avoiding decimal fractions and missinteruptation and errors. \n\n4…Because metric offers units from very large to very small. \n\n5…Because metric dimensions are easier to divide by three. \n\n6…Because it has links between related measurements. \n\n7…Because it uses logical symbols. \n\n8..Because it is the only properly maintained system. \n\n9..Because it is a complete system of measurements. Everything in the known universe can be measured with it.\n\n10.Because practically everyone uses it. For more than 95% of the world population, the metric system is the customary system of units, and for more than half of the industrialized world, it has been for at least a century.\n\nAlso I beleive that the metric system is better than Imperial measures because..\n\nThe metric system is a system. The metric system is the only measurement method ever developed as a complete system. All previous attempts used random developments at different places, at different times, and for different purposes.\n\nThe metric system is universal. The metric system has been gradually adopted by all of the world’s people. Despite often-vigorous opposition, the metric system has always been successful.\n\nThe metric system is coherent. Because the metric system was developed as a complete system, it was possible to design it so that it has an internal consistency. Its internal coherence means that if you learn one part of the metric system you can easily extend your knowledge to all other parts.\n\nThe metric system is capable. All crafts, trades, and professions can successfully use the metric system. Although the structure of the metric system is quite simple, it can be used in every human activity.\n\nThe metric system is equitable. The metric system is fair and just to all who use it.\n\nThe metric system is simple. The metric system uses only 7 base units and 22 units with special names — 29 units in all. There are now only 20 old measures left that are non-SI units currently accepted for use with the International System.\n\nThe metric system is supported. International treaties and research keep the metric system modern and forward looking.\n\nThe metric system is fundamental. The metric system is the only system used internationally. It is now fundamental to all measurements, both old and new.\n\nThe metric system is unique. The metric system is unique because: it was planned; it is decimal; it has prefixes; and it is human in scale. It is unique because there has never been a measuring system like it.\n\nThe metric system is legal. Legislation in every country in the world supports the metric system. It is often the sole method of measurement recognised by governments. International agreements also support the metric system so that contracts written in metric units have validity across international borders.",
"Metric or Sisteme Internationale is a universal set of measurements based on natural phenomena defined by observation, including seven base units; the Metre(unit for distance), Gram(unit for mass) (well, officially the *kilogram*, but the gram doesn't have a prefix), Second (unit for time), Celsius (unit for temperature) (well, *kelvin*, but it's the same scale with differing starting points), Ampere(current), Mole(amount of substance), and Candela(brightness), there are also many derived units such as the Newton(force), Pascal (pressure), Watt(power), Coulomb(charge), Ohm(resistance), Hertz(frequency), and Volt(electrical potential difference). the Metric System works on powers of 10, ten metres is one decametre, one thousand grams is one kilogram, one hundredth of a metre is a centimetre. Metric temperature has 0 degrees as the freezing point of water and 100 degrees as the boiling _URL_0_'s logical and is easy to use.\n\nImperial and customary measurements are in fact two systems, but they are similar enough to talk about in the same paragraph, Imperial distance is 12 inches to a foot, three feet to a yard,22 yards to a chain, 10 chains to a furlong, 8 furlongs to a mile, and 3 miles to a league. there's also the fathom, which is around 2 yards, the cable, which is 100 fathoms, and the nautical mile, which is different to a regular mile and is 10 cables, additionally there's the link, which is nearly 8 inches, 25 links also make a rod, and four rods is equal to a chain. metric volume is 20 fluid ounces to a pint, two pints to a quart, and four quarts to a gallon.Imperial mass is 16 ounces to a pound, 14 pounds to one stone, and 2240 pounds to a ton. Imperial temperature uses the Fahrenheit scale which is based on brine rather than water, water boils at 212 degrees and freezes at 32. Imperial is only really used majorly in the USA, and to a very much lesser extent in commonwealth countries."
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1kq68l | the state of dubai today | So we all know that it was once in a MASSIVE boom, but what is it like now? Are as many things being built? Is it still tax free? (Was it ever?) Is there still 70% of the world's cranes there, as the rumour once purported? Or is it headed for bust?? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1kq68l/eli5_the_state_of_dubai_today/ | {
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" > So we all know that it was once in a MASSIVE boom, but what is it like now? \n\n[Dubai is generally in good health](_URL_1_). It does have some structural problems to solve but the economy bounced back quickly after the 2009 global financial crisis, helped in no small part by [a multi-billion dollar bail out from neighbouring Abu Dhabi](_URL_2_).\n\nPhilippe Dauba-Pantanacce, senior economist at Standard Chartered, says, [“Dubai’s core assets of trade, tourism and infrastructure have proved to be very resilient to the global economy’s weaknesses, and the role of Dubai as a regional hub has been greatly reinforced recently”](_URL_3_)\n\n > Are as many things being built? \n\nMany things are indeed being built. There are currently [$614 billion worth of construction projects in progress in Dubai, with a further $703 billion worth either delayed or cancelled.](_URL_4_)\n\n > Is it still tax free? (Was it ever?)\n\nThere is no personal income tax in Dubai. You do pay sales tax on luxury goods (including a whopping 30% on alcohol).\n\n > Is there still 70% of the world's cranes there, as the rumour once purported? Or is it headed for bust??\n\nThere were never 70% of the worlds cranes here although it was reported that 30% of the worlds cranes were here at the peak of the construction boom. I don't know what the figure is now.\n\n > Or is it headed for bust??\n\n[Dubai's economy grew 4% in 2012](_URL_0_) so we can conclude that it is not, currently, headed for bust. The growth is not huge, but it is good in the context of the current global recession. USA's economy grew by 2.2% in the same period, for comparison.\n\n[This Economist article has some interesting updates about Dubai's current state.](_URL_1_)"
]
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"http://www.arabianbusiness.com/uae-economy-grew-some-4-in-2012-econ-min-486253.html",
"http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21569036-gulf-emirate-flashy-ever-it-still-has-structural-problems",
"http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8411215.stm",
"http://www.arabianbusiness.com/dubai-economic-outlook-2013-back-basics-491694.html",
"http://www.emirates247.com/news/emirates/dubai-s-new-real-estate-projects-valued-at-dh404-billion-2013-01-10-1.490528"
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coru0x | zero point fields | I just finished reading Bernard Haisch’s “God Theory” however in his chapter on zero point fields (which is integral to his theory) I got a little lost. And YouTube videos were of no help so now I turn to you, the geniuses of Reddit! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/coru0x/eli5_zero_point_fields/ | {
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"not sure about your book in particular, but in physics it is probably called \"ground state\" or \"vacuum state\".\n\nThat is the lowest-energy configuration, a feature of quantum mechanics.",
"It's nonsense. It's not anything. He made it up. Bernard Haisch has done some legitimate science but he's also veered deeply into pseudoscience and straight up fiction with claims involving things like mysticism, god, aliens, reincarnation, and whatnot. Zero point fields are just his mishmash of talking about a vacuum state (as u/RRumpleTeazzer said) with some gibberish about god and higher planes of consciousness and other new-age nonsense. It's total bogus, totally unscientific, and exists nowhere outside of his mind."
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2iyrgz | there's not water on mars okay, but what would happen if say we took a bottle of water and poured it on mars? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2iyrgz/eli5_theres_not_water_on_mars_okay_but_what_would/ | {
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"It would probably freeze long before the ground could absorb it. Mars is always below freezing and the temperature can get as low as -133C/-207F with an average around -55C/-67F. \n\nThen it would sublimate (go directly from a solid to a gas) away into the atmosphere.\n\nNothing exciting."
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72dkwc | why do reusable batteries need time to charge? why can't we recharge them in one powerful electric shock? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/72dkwc/eli5_why_do_reusable_batteries_need_time_to/ | {
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"Aside from the speed at which the chemical reactions within the battery cells can occur, another issue which would make this difficult is that the charging process is not 100% efficient. Some of the energy is \"lost\" when it is converted to heat during charging. Consumer-grade Lithium ion cells get very warm already, especially during rapid charging cycles which still take half an hour to an hour, or longer.\n\nAs long as the total heat output is generated over a long enough period of time, it doesn't build up as much so you can cool the battery cell down relatively easily, and you don't even need active cooling (like a fan), or bulky heat sinks.\n\nIf you attempted to charge a battery instantly (not that you could charge a consumer-style battery cell this way, because the chemical reaction doesn't work that quickly, but let's just pretend you could), you would still be generating all the heat that you normally would over, say, half an hour, but within the span of moments. That's a *lot* of heat, and your battery cell would likely melt unless you had massive heatsinks and active cooling in place."
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tar4z | why are the planets in the middle bigger than the planets on the ends? | But like, really explain it to me like I'm five... or four if you can.
A four year old little girl asked me this question. She was staring at a chart of our solar system when she piped up and said: "why are the ones in the middle bigger than the ones on the ends?" Meaning, I think, why are Saturn and Jupiter bigger than Mercury and Neptune? I know a bit about the subject, but not enough to really enough to break it down like she needs. For example, when I told her that the biggest two in the middle were made mostly of gas she said: "like we feed cars?"
After a bit I told her that I didn't really know, but I would find out for her. She smiled, said okay, and went to look for bugs. (She named a grasshopper Richard.) I really want her to have a good experience with asking questions. Especially when the questions are as insightful as this.
Thank you so much! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/tar4z/eli5_why_are_the_planets_in_the_middle_bigger/ | {
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"The solar system formed as a large cloud of gas, holding itself together under gravity. As things started colliding, more and more of the gas is pushed into a relatively flat disk by hitting other gas particles. This disk would have been densest in the middle, and slowly leveling off towards the edge of the solar system. As the sun formed, most of the material still around towards the center of the solar system is sucked in. This leaves a ring orbiting the sun, heavier towards the middle of the ring. And as planets form here, they are larger. Also, there is a slight process of elimination involved, where planets too heavy and too slow to orbit at a certain distance are sucked in towards the sun, and planets too small and light are flung away from the sun.\n\nAs for the gasses that make up the gas giants, they are 60-90% Hydrogen and 10-35% Helium in different parts of the atmosphere, with a very small amount of other elements. It's basically like a giant gas tornado with a little bit of rocks and sand in it. \n\nAlso, for some fun measurements, the sun is nearly 99.9% of all the mass in the solar system, and 90% of the remaining 0.1% is Jupiter and Saturn. Jupiter on it's own is more than twice as large as the rest of the planets combined. As for Pluto, there is a reason it's no longer considered a planet. Not only are there seven moons in the solar system larger than Pluto, including earth's moon, but there are several other comets larger than it. Pluto is itself considered a comet, as if it were closer to the sun, the ice surrounding it would melt, and it would form a tail. \n\nIt's really nice to see that you, as a teacher, take interest in your students' questions, no matter the age.",
"I'll try - seeing that I have a 4 y.o. of my own.\n\nYou see, the middle planets are not bigger. They're actually small, but they look fat, like mommy. Why do they look bigger? Because they wear these loose gowns that get filled with air and gases and other things. So when we see them from far away, they look bigger.\n\nThe other planets, at the ends, they're smaller but they're harder and more solid. And they wear nicer clothes too. Like Daddy. No loose gowns and very little air. So they seem smaller."
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auqba4 | what causes internet fluctuations and what limits how fast it can be? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/auqba4/eli5_what_causes_internet_fluctuations_and_what/ | {
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"Assuming you’re going through network hardware that is running normally, the general limitations are the number of hops you have to make to get to your destination and the physical distance to the servers (the speed of light goes only so fast). \n\nImagine every internet destination requires you to go through toll booths which can slow you down - this is when you switch to another company’s network. This can happen a couple of times or many times depending on where you are and your destination is. \n\nExample in your command prompt type \n\ntracert _URL_0_ \n\nAnd see how many lines you get and how long it takes for each line in milliseconds. Those are the hops. \n\nThen there are issues on your Internet Service Provider (an outage, for instance) or at your destination. they have to pay money for you to connect to them, so they may throttle the speed or they have too many requests and the pipe on their side is only so big. "
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3ll3n1 | why does every country aside from the us have really crazy skyscrapers/skylines while new york mostly looks like a bunch of boxes | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ll3n1/eli5why_does_every_country_aside_from_the_us_have/ | {
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"I am not an expert on architecture but I think it has something to do with the time at which most of these buildings were made. Also keep in mind that even in cities with artistic buildings many will still be very basic looking because it is spatially and economically efficient.",
"They have newer building technology, more advanced materials, better construction techniques, etc... It also helps to have demand to fulfill these skyscrapers. That's why Boston has like one nice skyscraper, it's a relatively small city compared to the Londons or Shanghais or Tokyos of the world.",
"New York has a bunch of boxes due to International Style being predominant for so long while New York was having a boom of growth (mid-50s to mid-70s). New York also has the most Art Deco skyscrapers of anywhere in the world. Dubai, China, etc also probably have more lax laws regarding permitting, design, etc which allows them to build some truly unique and amazing buildings. \n\nA lot of the reason why other countries skylines are developing while ours stay stagnant is that the current trend in the United States is to develop a suburban office \"campus\" with multiple low rise buildings instead of a single high rise. Add that to the fact that people in many cities like to complain about the height of buildings then immediately condemn sprawl, and you have a double whammy to us not having new skyscrapers.\n\nPerfect example is where I live. Jabil Circuit needs 600,000 sq feet of office space and is looking to relocate to downtown. Now, a 600,000 sq foot building doesn't need to be very tall, and can be easily accomplished with a 1 acre site and about a 35-40 story tower, but NOOOOO. We don't want that, we want to take up 5 square blocks to build a campus with no building higher than about 6 floors, a terrible use of limited downtown land which has the zoning density to allow high rises, but one that is easy to get past the public, because the building isn't tall.",
"Part of it is that New York sky scrapers were built earlier and bizarre shapes were just not feasible in the 30s.\n\nA further factor is that most European and Asian cities weren't planned on a grid system, so the plots of land aren't rectangular in the first place.\n\nBut the final thing is that generally in most Asian and European cities the land values aren't high enough for skyscrapers to be an efficient use of land once you get past 40 stories or so. So when you're building really high you're largely doing it for the prestige value of being in a tall and iconic building, in which case there is as much value in building something striking looking as there is in building something tall.",
"Skyscrapers in other major cities were built more recently. And if you look at the recently built Skyscrapers in NYC, they do fit that description. The one world Trade Center, for example, would fit in well in the London, Tokyo, dubai skylines. NYC is older and more bland. But personally, I still think it looks the best. Has a more, idk, authentic look to it. Compared to the all glass skylines you see of the other major cities across the world. ",
"Many of NYC's skyscrapers were built early on compared to many foreign cities. At the time the technology available and the style in fashion favored boxier designs compared to more modern structures (although at the time many were considered rather daring). Now add in that many buildings try to fit in with the area to an extent (to avoid looking clashing or gaudy) and the overall 'vibe' of a city and you get old themes being followed. Especially in NYC where over time the look of the city buildings has become part of how we see Gotham's character. ",
"It's interesting looking at the population densities of some of the cities mentioned in this thread. New York City has the highest density by a wide margin. That boxy style presumably ends up being more efficient in terms of how cities tend to grow and organize themselves.\n\n\nCities ordered by population density.\n\n_URL_4_ (Density: 10,756/km2)\n\n_URL_0_ (Density: 6,000/km2)\n\n_URL_1_ (Density: 5,490/km2)\n\n_URL_3_ (Density: 3,800/km2)\n\n_URL_2_ (Density: 524.7/km2)",
"A big part of this has to do with design software developed in the last 15 years that shows stress allocation allowing more creative buildings to be designed without fear of structural failure. ",
"It's not totally straightforward, but a few things jump to mind in the US:\n\n- Office projects almost always use debt (particularly for spec projects), which tends to add a layer of financial discipline but also a great deal of risk aversion. Western banks aren't known for their outsized appetites for risk. They're not going to take big chances on a new concept, particularly if it's a large project. Even with institutional development deals, they're thinking about building something that's optimized for usability and resale value rather than splashy, risky architecture (painting with broad strokes here). \n\n- Large US office markets tend to be expensive and their cities are typically very anti-development. This drives up the development cost and can lead to risk aversion. \n\n- Construction costs and standards are radically different between developing markets and developed (read European or North American) markets. I've been appalled at the construction standards and practices I've seen in some of these markets. Terrified would be another word I'd use. \n\nThere are other considerations at play as well, but by and large, when you see exuberant skylines in developing markets, you're really looking at very young real estate markets with something else to prove (China, GCC, Southeast Asia, etc.). Market considerations and leasability were not driving factors in design, like they typically are here in the US. Some markets in Europe have managed to impose enough design oversight to require fun architecture (London, Paris) but that's more a result of hot office market pricing outstripping extremely high barriers to entry and entitlement costs (largely due to constrained supply). Source: real estate professional who's worked in the US and the Gulf. \n\n",
"LA is actually famous for having just boxes and an ugly skyline because theres was a regulation (that ended just a year ago i think) that requires it to have a helipad on the top. This is for evacuating purposes in the case of an emergency"
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eu5qtl | how do supermarkets work? how do companies get money from their products in a supermarket? what happens if their product is left on shelves | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/eu5qtl/eli5_how_do_supermarkets_work_how_do_companies/ | {
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"The supermarket pays for the product, if the product is left on shelves then it's the supermarket that's made a loss",
"In general the supermarket buys the products from other companies, then they sell them on to customers at a higher cost. It's up to the supermarket to judge how much they'll be able to sell so they don't end up wasting it. That's how most shops work, the supplier earns their money immediately, the shop then has to sell it on to recover the costs and make a profit.",
"Many supermarkets do NOT pay for the product on the shelves. They are paid by the distributors to place it there and the distributor actually maintains the product level themselves. Typical examples are the potato chip and soda isles."
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4ig1ob | how are elections bought? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ig1ob/eli5_how_are_elections_bought/ | {
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"Of course the votes matter, but there is a strong correlation between the candidate who spends the most money and the candidate who wins. The reason for this is because people are susceptible to advertising and do tend to internalize what they see and hear a bit.\n\nSo, if you're an undecided voter who's only mildly informed and you've seen a ton of advertisement about how Candidate A is good and B is bad with very little messaging about how Candidate B is good and A is bad, you're likely to have a better gut feeling about Candidate A and will be more likely to vote for them. ",
"The votes do matter more, but the money is how you get the votes. You need to advertise going to vote, your candidate, why your candidate is better than the other, bad things the other candidate has done, advertise the party, advertise down ticket races, pay for campaign offices, pay for salaries for them, pay for phone bankers, pay for canvassers, pay for travel expenses, pay for food and drinks, hotels for the press traveling with you... \n\nAll this to get recognition and make everyone think your ideas are better than the other persons. ",
"This is akin to asking why marketing budgets are important to films when all that matter are movie-goers.",
"The effect of money on a particular race depends on a number of factors, including what race we're talking about exactly. Just this year, this rich guy [Trey Hollingsworth](_URL_0_) spent a ton of money and won a House primary, despite being a guy who had just moved to the state and had little connection with his district. But this other rich guy, [David Trone](_URL_1_), spent $12 million trying to win a House primary, and lost. It was the most expensive House campaign in history and it got him nothing. Also, this year Jeb Bush's PAC outspent all the other candidates, to no effect. \n\nSo in response to other people in the thread, yes, money is important. It's needed to buy ads and hire staffers. But it's not the only factor, and it's only sometimes the most important factor. Perhaps it's more accurate to frame it this way: money doesn't guarantee you'll win, but a lack of money can guarantee a loss, when you don't have enough money to carry out basic campaign functions. Whether or not that's enough to characterize our elections as \"bought\" is purely a matter of opinion, but OP is right that it comes down the voters in the end. ",
" > don't the votes matter more?\n\nOne thing people are missing is [Gerrymandering.](_URL_0_) You have the same total number of votes but they are counted differently. ",
"That's easy. People are stupid. This is not a rant or put down. We are chock-a-block full of neurological fallacies and emotional hot buttons. We are easy to confuse and dupe even though we _think_ we aren't. It is _difficult_, literal _hard_ _work_, to filter out nonsense.\n\nSo how can my money let me defeat you?\n\nI can run a lot of different negative ads about you. Most voters can be \"turned off\" on a candidate if you can find one resonant issue. So if you can run three attack adds against me, and I can run twenty against you, I am six times more likely to have any given viewer have seen an add that \"rings true against you\" for their individual hate point. So I win because I made you lose.\n\nI can use my extra money to hire detectives and \"journalists\" to dig deeper into your past looking for things I can use to turn the electorate against you.\n\nI can keep your name alive in the negative press. Think about Hillary and the issue of the month campaign by the GOP. Bengazi turned smoothly into email server gate. Absolutely zero wrongdoing has been found in both cases but that money has kept that message so lively that you imagine there _must_ have been _some_ reason those words keep popping up, so you'll be resistant to her because of the \"where there's smoke\" rule, and blind to the fact that all that smoke was bought and shipped in by her enemies.\n\nI can keep my name alive period. Trump really won the nomination because of all the \"Trump will never win the nomination, look at the wacky thing he's doing now\" coverage. He was normalized by consistent repetition. He never stopped being a dolt, but we got used to it. Meanwhile you don't even know who John Kasich was. Google doesn't even autocomplete his name when you type in \"presidential candidate john k\" and it _does_ give you Kerry. (That's how not having money makes you invisible.)\n\nI can make myself look well supported by paying actors to attend my rallies. This is how the whole first half of Trump's rallies worked. But nobody cared because it still looked like a lot of people. So for the same reason that everybody stands facing the same way in elevators, people follow the presumed insights of others.\n\nYou can buy spin.\n\nWe believe the first version of every story we hear, so you can get your message out first.\n\nIf you already have the money, you don't have to waste time _earning_ the money, so you can spend more time \"on message\" and less time \"looking elite at those expensive dinners\".\n\nYou can rent a convention space while your opponent is stuck in a tent, and then you can send the photographers over to take a picture of the schmuck in the dirt lot tent sweating in the absence of air conditioning and compose the \"why is bob always sweating? Is it because he knows xxxxxxx?\" attack adds.\n\nBack when everything was done blind, through newspapers and personal interaction, money was far less important. But in the age of \"image and appearance\" you have to pay to look like you play. \n\nFinally add the Dunning-Kruger effect. The less a person knows about something the more they are likely to think they are an expert. So if I can send out a strong but hugely oversimplified message, but repeat it in many ways, I can convince you that you know all you need to know. Familiarity breeds contempt, and I'll make you as familiar as hell with the concepts I want you to repeat. Soon she's a liar and hes a flip-flopper.\n\nThe combinations of disinformation get to be fascinating, with the wholesale repetitions of fractions of ideas that let you call Obama a socialist while drawing on a Hitler mustache because you are sure you know that Nazi national socialism is the same as democratic socialism because they both have one word in common. Meanwhile hes also a communist and an \"elite\". You know he's elite because the other guy just gave a press conference at his exclusive resort and told you so.\n\nSo yes, on the whole, people are really stupid and their opinions are easily swayed, and all you have to do is buy the air time.",
"I first read this as \"How are electrons bought?\" Thought I was in r/shittyaskscience lol",
"Money buys influence, and influence buys results. \n\nI'll explain how that works using a recent example: The same-sex marriage issue. I'm in favor of same-sex marriage for a plethora of reasons, ranging from civil rights to civil liberties to not wanting to be a hypocrite as a recreational lesbian pornography enthusiast to general homophilic political leanings. I'm a bleeding-heart lefty, love the ACLU, no surprise I hold the opinion that I do. \n\nBack in 2004, the anti-gay lobby had way more money to spend, so they were able to buy more influence and drown out the voices of reason on this issue; certain people used same-sex marriage as a wedge issue to rally their base. The anti-gay lobby was able to buy the results they wanted because they had more money. As the years went by approaching the present, the gay lobby built themselves up and were eventually able to outspend the anti-gay lobby, and you can see that change in who has the bigger stick correspond to how the issue is perceived. \n\nNow, buying influence is not the only vector in determining public opinion, certainly. It does make the whole process feel kinda dirty, even if your side wins on the issue. "
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abmt9g | why do people with autism have a disorted voice. | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/abmt9g/eli5_why_do_people_with_autism_have_a_disorted/ | {
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"Not all people with autism do. It depends on where they are on the spectrum and if they have other disorders. ",
"I've never met anyone with autism who had a distorted voice. Are you sure you're not thinking of people with Down Syndrome? They often have unusual speech patterns",
"Maybe that’s just your voice? If your weren’t on the spectrum maybe you would sound the same. "
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dtwy4i | how come lots of online services still subscribe you to their newsletters though you didn’t tick the option to do so when signing up? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dtwy4i/eli5_how_come_lots_of_online_services_still/ | {
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"Most of the times the \"receive our special offers and newsletters\" box is already checked automatically and you have to uncheck it before accepting. Just pay close attention when agreeing to services theres always tricks in place to get subscribers."
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1q1khi | why don't modern fighter aircraft have weapons systems that lock and shoot backwards to destroy a tailing enemy? | I realize that dogfights are somewhat things of the pass, but as a laymen it still raises the question... Why not reverse pointing missiles on an fighter aircraft?
I assume many of todays current weapons systems are still using heat tracing technology, and while facing into your exhaust trail, it could cause some confusion for the weapon.
Additionally, while exceeding mach 2, the physics of firing a missile in reverse may cause for some strange dynamics. But considering how sophisticated todays avionics and armaments are, id assume this is something that could be overcome.
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1q1khi/eli5why_dont_modern_fighter_aircraft_have_weapons/ | {
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"The Soviet Union experimented with this, with at least one fighter design having a backward facing IR missile system. I'm not sure why it isn't at all widely used though. ",
"If you were travling at mach 2, it would be hard for a rocket engine to fight the dynamic pressure being shoved into its nozzle. It has to start off traveling at the speed of the aircraft, but it's pointing backwards with the nozzle to the wind. It's likely doable, but much harder to accomplish.",
"they do - AIM-9x the new helmet system allows them to lock on whatever they look at and the missile itself can negotiate 180 degree turns mid-air due to adding controlled wings and fins... the original AIM-9 missile had front canards that would allows it to steer, the 9x rear fins can now move\n\nsource: I'm a weapons loader in the USAF",
"As you said, dogfights are very uncommon. Weapon systems are expensive to design, develop, and maintain, so outfitting a fighter with a system that would almost never be used is a huge waste. In addition, there's the opportunity cost that another, forward-facing weapon system could be installed instead which would be much more applicable to modern warfare.",
"\"Not in the military, but I have slept in a holiday inn express\"\n\nRandon Thoughts about the question:\n\nFighter aircraft are smart weapon platforms. Dumb weapons have to be pointed at what you want to kill, Smart weapons can turn around.\n\n Fighter planes are comparable to infantry and calvary. Speed, weight and brains are top priority. Adding a rear facing dumb/smart weapon would add to the weight, impacting speed, and would require a second seat of brains just for the weapon systems. \n\nFighter planes are like sniper rifles. its always better to shoot the enemy from outside the range of their weapons. If you have to drop the rifle and draw a pistol and fight hand to hand, something's gone horribly wrong. \n\nFights to the death are fine and dandy if you're trapped and alone, fighter planes never go alone. they have wingmen who defend the other directions. \n\nIf your back is to the enemy, the best solution is zig zag and haul your ass, get out of range or behind the enemy and then shoot at them also known as dogfighting. ",
"There is also the issue of relative motion of the craft and the missile itself. Lets say your going 500 knts and want to fire backwards. The missile has to accelerate in the opposite direction of the craft to fly out to it's target. So it automatically starts out 500 knts slower than a forward firing missile. \n\n If we want the rearward firing missile to have the same flight time to target, or have the same range as a forward firing missile, the rocket motor in the rear firing missile then needs to be inherently more powerful than a forward firing missile. Or the missile, itself, smaller. So that it accelerates more quickly. \n\nFurthermore, the missile is largely uncontrolled during it's transition from forward movement to rearward. During the initial burn of the motor we are decelerating, thus less air mass over the missile canards, thus less control. It will also drop like a brick during this phase, which will also reduce the range. \n\nLargely the performance and logistical trade offs necessary for this type don't make sense. Especially in light of basic fight tactics which say if you let somebody get to your six you've already lost. ",
"It is easier again - you just remove humans from the craft and scale them right down, make \"forwards\" and \"backwards\" less important by the design of the vehicle at the same time as making it a projectile in its own right.\n\n\nDrones are fun.",
"When was the last time jet fighters actually engaged in a dog fight with enemy air forces? ",
"1. They do. The Su-35 has that capability and the Chinese have shown interest in it. However, thanks to the fall of the Soviet system, the plane never really came to full production/deployment. And because:\n2. Short range missiles tend to be IR guided AKA heat seekers. The heat signature is strongest at the rear of the aircraft at the jet exhaust. Firing at a aircraft's nose from in front would likely be fairly ineffective. \n "
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93kpiu | why are the us marines considered the fifth branch of the military even though they’re naval infantry and under us navy jurisdiction? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/93kpiu/eli5_why_are_the_us_marines_considered_the_fifth/ | {
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"Because they operate independently of the Navy and have almost from the beginning. While they often do joint missions, and do serve as security on many Naval vessels out of tradition they are still separate enough to merit being their own branch. ",
"The Marines are subordinate to the *Department of the Navy* (a government department led by the civilian Secretary of the Navy), but not to the *United States Navy* (a military branch led by the uniformed Chief of Naval Operations). The Marines have their own rank structure, their own basic training, their own officer training for people getting a commission after college (in college, they and the Navy share Naval ROTC and the Naval Academy), their own uniforms, their own rules and regulations, their own promotion system, etc. While they do work very closely with the Navy on some things (e.g. Marine units use Navy personnel as medics and chaplains, they share a pilot training pipeline, their research and acquisition arms are somewhat linked), they’re more sister services that are both within the Department of the Navy than a parent and a subordinate."
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636yq3 | why are traffic lights good at showing color even in full sunlight? | I noticed this n my morning drive, the sun was behind me and the green was still super bights versus all 3 lights in direct light.
Edit: This pertains to America | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/636yq3/eli5_why_are_traffic_lights_good_at_showing_color/ | {
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"What country? In the netherlands they aint. ",
"LEDs help tremendously at newer install places. LEDs have a very direct beam in comparison to other light types, also pointed to focus at a specific distance for incoming traffic, same for newer railroad crossings. Also the hoods and insetting of the lights into the assembly help for a glare free lumination. \n\nOlder setups rely on the focus / insetting only.\n\nThink of why its easier to see everything on tv in the basement instead of in the living room with the windows shades open. Same concept.",
"\nGreen light has a wavelength that stimulates different cells in our eyes, than red or yellow or orange. Because Red and Amber (yellow) are similar to the color of the sun but not as bright, it's harder for our eyes to notice them.\n\nThe plastic covers in traffic signals as well as the lightbulbs or LEDs inside must have a certain amount of brightness, clarity, and a very specific color.\n\nThe civil engineers who design and specify how traffic signals are made are called traffic engineers. One of things they design is exactly how bright the lights in traffic signals and automobile signal lights should be: they write those standards, and then those standards become something like laws which manufacturers must obey. If they deviate, their products will be considered unsafe and the government won't let them sell it. (These same standards also say exactly how big and how far apart headlights and taillights should be. This is why even though all cars have differently sized light covers, they all look kinda similar at a distance at night, when all you can see is their lights.)",
"A few things..\n\nSheer size. Most people don't realize just how huge they really are. A friend of mine got his hands one on. Things is huge. You can fit a big, bright bulb in there.\n\nThe cover over the top. In every place I've lived, there is a small rounded cover that hangs over each light. This helps keep too much direct sunlight off the light so you can see it easier.\n\nMany new lights are using superbright LEDs now, which are way more efficient and can be even brighter than old bulbs"
]
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ebmwg3 | when swiping (or inserting) a card, how does the card transfer its information to the machine? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ebmwg3/eli5_when_swiping_or_inserting_a_card_how_does/ | {
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"Your information is stored either in a magnetic strip (similar to a hard disk drive) or in a chip that the card reader has an interface too (like the metal bits In a charger)\nWhen connected the reader reads the information and confirms with a site whether the pin is correct and whether you have enough money to purchase the goods.\n\nIf so it sends a code authorising the payment to the reader allowing you to go about the day and deducts it from your account",
"These days there are four ways to enter card data onto a credit terminal:\n\n1. Type it in—highly discouraged these days, since it is pretty insecure. Anyone with the account number (and a low-tech terminal) can place charges on the card (until the bank takes notice).\n\n2. Swipe the [magnetic stripe](_URL_0_)—like a cassette player, there is a magnetic head that reads the data encoded in the stripe. Discouraged because it is insecure, equipment to spoof and skim magstripes is now easy to get, and magstripes can be thrashed by magnets and other magstripes.\n\n3. [EMV](_URL_1_) chip—transfers much more secure information to a chip reader inside the terminal. The terminals maintain encryption and can defend against some kinds of intrusion, such as preventing use of the previous methods on the same terminal.\n\n4. [Contactless](_URL_2_) (tap to pay)—an RFID or 'near field' communication system wirelessly powers the card's chip, and reads the data that it transfers back wirelessly. Although vulnerable to attack from wireless skimmers (e.g. someone \"bumps\" into you at the airport), the weak signal practically requires the physical card to be present."
]
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMV",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contactless_payment"
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||
502ua8 | would a wet towel dry in space? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/502ua8/eli5_would_a_wet_towel_dry_in_space/ | {
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"Yes, the water would vaporize due to the low (almost zero) pressure. You can see a similar effect when water in a sealed jar is placed under a vacuum--it begins to boil, even at room temperature.\n\n_URL_0_",
"It depends on the conditions. \nIn total vacuum the water would boil off the towel but in doing so would suck heat from the wet towel until the remaining moisture in the towel would freeze solid. Depending on how wet the towel was and its starting temperature the towel could reach dryness before it became cold enough to freeze the remaining water. If it were encapsulated, say in a space station, it would dry normally via diffusion of moisture into the surrounding atmosphere."
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1b1mlr | why do social issues such as gay marriage rights always remain at the forefront of politics, when there are problems such as the current economic situation we are facing? | The fact that there are so many other issues facing the United States, i.e. the economic crisis we are currently facing, why do certain ideological issues that lack urgency always surface when there are clearly more important tasks at hand? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1b1mlr/eli5_why_do_social_issues_such_as_gay_marriage/ | {
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"Ideological issues are much easier to captivate people and, by extension, their money.\n\nThis cuts both ways btw. \n\n\"Give to me and I will protect your right to choose (i.e. abortion)\"\n\n\"Give to me and I will fight for your right to marry whoever you want\"\n\nYou can easily reverse those two with similar results in fundraising and voting support.",
"I'd submit first that gay marriage lacks urgency to you because it likely does not affect your life. However, to a gay couple, it's probably an urgent issue. \n\nThat said, I think it's about power and pain. Fixing the economic issues we face would mean economic pain for many. No politician wants to give up their power base to be the catalyst for change, which may not take place anyway. By sticking to \"safe\" issues like gay marriage rights, they are able to energize their respective pro/con bases while not really jeopardizing their electoral chances. ",
"Because the democrats and the republicans are virtually the same when it comes to economics. Sure, there are some minor differences. By when it comes to the rest of the world, parties on the left lean socialist (economic control by the working class) and parties on the the right lean capitalist (economic control by the elite class). But in America both parties are capitalistic. They do not want you to realize the huge similarity, or that socialism is even a valid option in election day so when they talk about economic issues, the focus on the little league problems like social security, instead of the lack of class mobility or the fact that the upper class americans are richer now than they have ever been, despite (actually because of) the Great Recession. And they tend to hijack those conversations to get back to the social spectrum and the american people are non the wiser. And the two are even more similar on the foreign policy issues. But they only want to talk social issues because, lets be honest, they do not have a long term effect. Yes, gay marriage is important. But does it really need to be a major issue when dealing with huge levels of economic equality? ",
"To provide another perspective, gay marriage rights - like civil rights and women's rights before it -- are about human rights. The things that any human being, by virtue of being a human, should be afforded and not earned.\n\nThere are a lot of different issues to address with gay marriage rights, but I won't get into them for this thread. Instead, consider this thought exercise. Men and women are two different genders, but we're both human. Further, both men and women have the human right to marry and there aren't separate rules that govern what men or women can do; there is one rule that governs both genders. So, why does it matter who the person wants to marry if everyone has a right to marry?\n\n",
"When, in the history of the United States, has there ever been a time when there *weren't* \"more important tasks at hand?\" Some woman has to sit in the back of the bus because of the color of her skin? There are more important things going on! Women can't vote? Who cares, there are REAL issues to deal with! Children have always been starving somewhere. War has always been imminent somewhere. Economies have always been in trouble somewhere. There will NEVER be a time when there aren't many issues facing the United States. We don't deal with social issues *instead* of such things; we deal with them *as well*."
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7owfok | how is sticky tape only sticky on 1 side despite the whole thing being rolled up? | Just one of those late-night insomnia deep thoughts. You'd expect some of the glue to get stuck on the non-sticky side and make both sides sticky, but somehow that doesnt happen? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7owfok/eli5_how_is_sticky_tape_only_sticky_on_1_side/ | {
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"text": [
"After the tape is coated with adhesive, the adhesive is overlaid with a thin coat of anti-stick material (such as polyvinyl carbamate) to keep it from sticking quite as hard to the next layer of tape in the roll."
]
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[]
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|
36vy28 | what exactly is the endgame to all of the nsa's spying programs? | I know there's no definitive answer here but I know some of you have thought about this and probably have a good answer. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/36vy28/eli5_what_exactly_is_the_endgame_to_all_of_the/ | {
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"I suppose the ideal outcome would be the ability to predict when bad things are going to happen... before they happen... so they can be stopped.\n\nThat's the whole point of this. Making use of modern technology and the absurd growth of data to try and prevent things like 9/11 or the Boston Marathon Bombing *before* they can happen.",
"Information obtained on private citizens, without a strong regulatory committee or a paper trail, can be used to discredit or harm practitioners of free speech. The NSA somehow can't figure out how to stop the Boston Bombing (as another poster uses as an example pro-spying, after almost *twelve years* of constant and over-reaching surveillance), but they can conveniently leak the internet pornography habits of 'radicalizers' who speak out against the government, as one of Snowden's documents showed. The NSA is so comfortable with misuse of information for purposes unrelated to national security that they have a unique phrase for information collected on the love interests and exes of government employees - 'LOVEINT'.\n\nThis has always been the goal of surveillance. Back in the 60's, the FBI attempted to threaten Dr. King into submission by revealing his supposed sexual promiscuity. We know it now as opposed to back then, because these documents were sealed to be released many decades later, long after any kind of consequences could be handed out to the perpetrators of unconstitutional surveillance."
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4nui9v | why is it that animals do not complain (or make a drama) as much as humans when they are in pain? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4nui9v/eli5_why_is_it_that_animals_do_not_complain_or/ | {
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"Animals do not have language, so they have no way to make a moderate complaint. They can only make noises, which are pretty useless unless expressing a fairly serious problem. \n\nAnd they can only indicate what's happening *right now* -- lacking language, they cannot talk about how something's been going on for a long time, or keeps coming back, or is expected to keep happening, or is part of a long pattern of problems.",
"If you're in pain, you cry out and other humans come to help. If most animals are in pain and cry out, that signals to a predator within earshot that there is some injured prey nearby, and nothing will come to help it.\n\nWe are social animals that can help each other, so crying out for help is beneficial. In most animals, a scream in pain is only a defense to startle an attacker.\n\nThis means that you can have animals in lots of pain or distress but not making any noise so people assume they are fine. ",
"Evolutionary strategy. Humans are social, communal animals. It is to our benefit to attract attention when we are in pain because attention will usually come with help. \nWhen other types of animals are in pain, they actually try to attract less attention. They do not want to display their injuries because they do not want to display their weakness and vulnerabilities. It might make them vulnerable to predators or even opportunistic thieves of their own species. \n \nSource: Sister is a zookeeper.",
"What you are describing isn't actually a phenomenon. Many animals DO make a hue and cry when in pain, and the reasoning has to do with evolution.\n\nSome species have evolved not to cry out because it attracts predators to the location to finish the job. Others do cry out because if you are unlikely to survive, predators after you are less likely to be eating your kin.\n\nBoth are observed animal behaviors, and it varies from species to species.",
"Because if an animal makes a fuss over pain in the wild, it will make it easier for predator to find an eat it. Humans don't need to worry about predators.",
"Humans pass way more judgements on the present moment and all of its sensations than animals. Our egos are way bigger than any animals. Because of this, when we are in pain, we pass judgements about that pain such as, \"this isn't okay\" \"this isn't how I'm supposed to feel\" etc. These thoughts are cycles because once you become stressed about something the stress multiplies itself by making you stressed about your stress. Animals don't have such strong egos, which allows their consciousness to take the stance of \"this is how it is\" \"this is how I feel\" \"this is truth\" (although obviously not verbally). They don't get caught up in the duality of what they want vs what they don't want, although they still honor those things by searching for food and avoiding predators and accidents. Next time you're in physical or emotional pain, instead of judging the situation you're in, honor that feeling as a form of and expression of life itself. You will still feel the pain, but it will cease to be problematic. "
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2pc4my | why is it so hard to go back to the moon? | The technology to go to the moon is ancient by today's standards Why is it so difficult to send someone back to the moon with today's technology? Shouldn't it be as easy as creating an F22 or such? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2pc4my/eli5_why_is_it_so_hard_to_go_back_to_the_moon/ | {
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"It's not hard at all, it's just expensive. There is no point in spending that much money to do something that has already been done. It is more lucrative to put a satellite into orbit than to put a person on the moon. Everything really boils down to money and the moon is just not profitable. ",
"As far as I can tell, it'd be relatively easy to go back. It's just not of huge interest. What we could have gained by going to the moon, we did. The government would most likely rather spend money exploring other planets and parts of space, rather than a satelite of earth we already have sufficient understanding and data on. ",
"We are no longer willing to tolerate death. Safety makes space travel **super** expensive.",
"Well basically it comes down to this. Why? We've been there, nothing more to do unless we want to build a multi billion dollar colony, instead why not go to Mars? Which we are doing 2030s"
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f3gnur | why do you get such bright red marks when you scratch your legs after getting out of the shower compared to any other time? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/f3gnur/eli5_why_do_you_get_such_bright_red_marks_when/ | {
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"In the shower your skin will turn red due to the hot water. When your body temperature rises your body will dilate the blood vessels in the skin to help cool you down. Which is why people’s faces/skin will turn red when they are hot. \n\nWhen you scratch you are causing trauma to the skin.\n\nIf you scratch after the shower you’re causing trauma to skin that already has dilated blood vessels near the surface, which is why it appears more red."
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||
b1y3ib | what’s the goal of email spammers who send random text with link in them? | We see them all the time but I’ve never really stopped to think about it.
It’s often just sections of random texts with links to websites in there.
I’m a digital marketer and understand the value of backlinks but not spam email links. Unless they’re just trying to boost traffic numbers when people accidentally click them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/b1y3ib/eli5_whats_the_goal_of_email_spammers_who_send/ | {
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"Security Analyst here. There are mainly 2 seperate reasons:\n\n1.) I write a program that sends out 1 million spam emails an hour, lets use the old Nigerian prince example - if I'm asking for $5,000 to \"release\" millions to you, it sounds too good to be true, and most won't fall for it. But some people will. If only 1% of those emails get a hit, well, I just made $50,000,000. From just 1%. But I don't *need* 1%. *I just need ONE*. Which nets me $5,000 for barely an hour of work. Pretty damn good, huh? So every hour I write and send out a new, clever email, while previous emails still get sent out every hour, too. \n \nHow much money do you think I'd still make, *even if 99.99% of all those emails were ignored?* \n \nThis is why you still see so much spam. It's incredibly profitable. \n \nIt's also highly illegal, in case you were thinking of doing it. \n \nAnd 2.) When you click that link, I've embedded malware into the email that has now, unbeknownst to you, infected your computer and now I have administrative access to your computer. And millions of other computers. So I turn them into a \"botnet\" - I take all the computers I have control of, and have them run calculations and work for me, basically granting me supercomputer level processing power for any nefarious purposes I wish. \n \nI also scour your computers for personal info, either to collect into databases and sell to market research companies, which is good money; or, \n \nI find that credit card info you entered into Amazon that your browser conveniently saved for me. Or your account passwords the same way. I'd gladly go on a shopping spree at your expense."
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6otgs7 | how does manhattan handle all of the human waste? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6otgs7/eli5_how_does_manhattan_handle_all_of_the_human/ | {
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"The same way everywhere else does: there's a comprehensive sewer system that leads to wastewater treatment plants, which treat the water and then release it into one of the area's rivers. Manhattan is covered by three of New York City's twelve wastewater treatment plants. You can see a map of NYC's wastewater treatment plants [here](_URL_0_)."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://www.nyc.gov/html/dep/html/wastewater/wwsystem-plantlocations_wide.shtml"
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||
20vadt | why do you have to be 21 to go and play in a casino? | When you can be 18 to buy lottery tickets and bet on horse races? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/20vadt/eli5why_do_you_have_to_be_21_to_go_and_play_in_a/ | {
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"It's more about the alcohol than the gambling. Many casinos will let you in if you're 18, as long as their bar staff has a handle on carding.",
"The hard part is that you have people wandering around, unsupervised, with drinks. If you let minors in, you need to restrict alcohol possession/consumption to a small area where you can be relatively sure that under-21s aren't drinking.\n\nDrunk people make bad decisions, helping the casino money. Kids 18-21yo don't really have much money so they've decided that they stand to make more money by making drinking easier than they would by letting the 18-21 crowd in.\n\nWhen I was in college, there were a few small card houses that had poker & blackjack that served the 18-21 crowd by just being small enough to be 'restaurants' as far as liquor laws were concerned. What options are available to you depends on where you live."
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a9xf6r | why do spanners make a tink sound when dropped on the ground and other tools dont ? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a9xf6r/eli5_why_do_spanners_make_a_tink_sound_when/ | {
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"A wrench is a solid piece of metal, which can vibrate through itself freely without being dampened by any wood or fiberglass, or secondary piece of metal (as pliers).\n\nIs it really the *only* such solid metal tool that will tink? Probably not. But many other tools have fiberglass or multiple parts."
]
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[]
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||
2xytgj | non-dairy whipped topping contains milk and cream? | Whipped Topping is marked as "Non-Dairy," but the ingredients state "skim milk, cream." Seems counter intuitive... | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2xytgj/eli5nondairy_whipped_topping_contains_milk_and/ | {
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"They name it that because otherwise it's too easy for people to mistake it for whipped cream, when it is usually mostly soy oil and a little dairy to flavor it. Dairy allergic people can't eat it, obviously. Many margarines have dairy ingredients too.",
"Pics of the top and list. \n\n_URL_0_\n_URL_1_"
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37kf0b | why does hard alcohol taste so bad? | With todays technology, why do companies make, for example, Ciroc Vodka taste so bad. It burns your stomach and hurts to drink. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37kf0b/eli5why_does_hard_alcohol_taste_so_bad/ | {
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"text": [
"It tastes great, you just aren't drunk enough.\n\nIn all seriousness there is a taste which ethanol (drinking alcohol) has and it is unavoidable. 80 proof liquor (40% ABV) tastes like ethanol because it's 40% ethanol. If you don't like it, that's fine, but it's how all hard liquor tastes. You can drink it on rocks (with ice) or mixed (mixed) if you want an alternative.",
"Because you are not adapted to it.\n\nYou could ask \"Why sprinting make my thighs so much\" or \"Why does weightlifting make me so more all over?\"\n\nIt is because alcohol is inherently poisonous. A delightful poison that makes the stress goes away, once you have adapted to it.\n\nBut it is still poison.",
"there are plenty of spirits out there that are buttery smooth. I have a few different rums that are so smooth you forget just how much you have had until it is far too late! Wonderful stuff!",
"A few things:\n\n1) alcohol lowers the threshold to temperature for cells to transmit pain signals to the brain, hence the burning sensation. \n\n2) alcohol evaporates easily and thus gets vapors into the sinuses. Burning sensation in the sinuses is no fun.\n\n3) Pure watered down ethanol actually doesn't taste so bad (provided you're used to the burning sensation). It has a slightly sweet taste, but that's about it. However, in the distallation process you often end up with other compounds that are a byproduct of distillation called congeners. These can increase the burning sensation and also often give the drink a more \"solventlike\" flavor - like a whiff of paint thinner or nailpolish remover. For drinks like vodka, distillers generally try to remove these (good vodka should arguably taste like water and pure ethanol only). In whiskies, distillers like to get a very small amount of these compounds in the mix, (as well as esters and other organic side effects of fermentation) to give the drink a characteristic flavor - otherwise they might as well just be putting vodka in oak barrels.\n\nWhen you hear someone talk about a drink being smooth, it usually correlates to there being fewer of these congener compounds in the product.\n\n"
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4tn50r | why aren’t we able to make roads out of a more durable material than asphalt and concrete? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4tn50r/eli5why_arent_we_able_to_make_roads_out_of_a_more/ | {
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"Any suggestions on what we should use instead? Concrete and asphalt are relatively cheap, strong, easily repaired, and can be poured. What more could you want in a material?",
"Concrete is *very* durable. Finding a more durable material that can be put down miles at a time in outdoor conditions and be driven over by trucks would be extremely challenging and expensive.",
"We certainly have the technology to make better, longer-lasting roads, but what we don't have is the technology to do so *anywhere near as cost-effectively* \n\n\nConcrete and asphault are the best choices available when weighing both cost and durability. ",
"In addition to what has already been said Asphalt is 100% recyclable which is why the roads can be repaired every 5 years. Also climate plays an enormous factor into building roads as well as cost.",
"Well, we can, but sometimes it's not a good idea.\n\nLet's say you had to build a road. One method will last 5 years before it needs repair. The other will last 50 years before it needs a repair.\n\nSeems obvious, right? Let's throw this in the mix: the second method costs 20 times as much as the first.\n\nSo, now, you find yourself going for the first method, because the more durable method will cost twice as much money over the next 50 years.",
"We did sort of, they were called cobbles \n\n_URL_0_\n\nSadly the issue with these are they are not a consistent and flat surface, they are expensive to lay in terms of manpower, more costly to repair among other things. \n\nAsphalt and concrete on the other hand have several benefits\n\n- Can resist climate changes very well - some places can go from -10oC to +40oC, be wet, dry, windy, frozen, baking hot and while both materials will suffer with this in terms of cracking and buckling it goes to the next point about popularity.\n- Cost effective both in terms of the materials used and the labour involved per unit of road surface laid on day 1 as well as the costs of upkeep for repairs. \n- Easy to install services under them and access these services by digging up, disk cutting out the part of the road surface in the way of access\n- Can be recycled into the same surface (without going into too much detail both can be mixed in and find itself reused in the same road where it came from).\n- Easy to create a smooth surface in both cases and each can be done in large batches over the space of minutes per meter of coverage\n",
"Well it turns out, asphalt and concrete have some **pretty sexy properties** when it comes to making roads. \n\n - Firstly asphalt is **cheap**. It's essentially a bi product of the oil refining industry. Which would normally just go to landfill, but can now be put to good use by society. Which also makes using it **environmentally conscious**.\n\n - Secondly, it's **traction properties** are excellent. The surface is rough and inconsistent. Meaning that even when wet, it can provide a nice reliable grip. This has the added bonus of letting water trickle away between the gaps, leaving the top-most part exposed. Meaning that the surface doesn't become slick after rainfall.\n\n - Thirdly, it's **load resistant** when poured thick enough. Meaning it can take the weight of vehicles and not yield. The weight is distributed evenly over the surface. If we were using a material in tile form, the tiles would start to wobble out of place gradually. Or crack. Which would let water seep in and start eroding. Or worse, have the tiles ping out of place and cause a driving hazard.\n\n - Lastly, it's **resistant to weathering**. Be it freezing temperatures, summer heat or pouring rain, the roads will expand and contract as needed. Sure...this does mean they'll wear down eventually and need to be replaced. But it's normally a process that takes years or decades.\n\nNow it's not impossible to use competing materials with some of these properties. But all of them simultaneously? \n\nThere's a [pretty good video by Thunderfoot](_URL_0_) that talks about that proposal to replace the roads with high tech-solar tiles. It's interesting and worth watching."
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7ucdtb | how come diamond-companies are allowed to control the number of diamonds in circulation, without being a monopoly? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7ucdtb/eli5_how_come_diamondcompanies_are_allowed_to/ | {
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"The **are** a monopoly. DeBeers is very much in violation of the various anti-trust statutes in the US.\n\nThe problem is that they aren't _based_ in the US and their executives don't come to the US, so the US can't do anything to stop them. They operate out of countries that allow their business practices and, since they control supply, people who want diamonds don't have a choice but to deal with them.",
"They are a monopoly. But they are not based in countries that care that they are a monopoly (or care that anyone is a monopoly). There is not a global government that governs everything. They control a large enough percentage of supplies that countries generally have to do business with them to some degree if they want to have diamonds for jewelry or industrial use. "
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23eao8 | how come some internet connections completely slow down download speed when the upload speed reaches the cap? | It is noticeable when using a torrent client with no upload limit set, that when you start seeding at the maximum capacity of your upload speed, absolutely everything else slows down. I thought upload and download were different bandwidths? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/23eao8/eli5_how_come_some_internet_connections/ | {
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" > I thought upload and download were different bandwidths?\n\nThey are, but when you download, you have to routinely send back acknowledgement messages to let the sender know that the data arrived correctly. When your upload bandwidth is saturated, these messages are slow to go through, which slows down your downloads, as well."
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2s44qx | how do iphones get unlocked? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2s44qx/eli5how_do_iphones_get_unlocked/ | {
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"As in it was passcode locked and you entered the wrong one too many times? You'll need to hook it up to iTunes and wipe/restore it. Assuming it hasn't been reported lost/stolen. If it has and you're not the owner... have fun."
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4zeo4o | the difference between tactic and strategy | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4zeo4o/eli5_the_difference_between_tactic_and_strategy/ | {
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"Tactics win battles.\n\nStrategy wins wars.\n\nTactics are decisions and things done by soldiers fighting in a single battle. But a war is typically many battles, and the overarching set of decisions and things done to win the war are called the strategy.",
"Strategy is what goals you want to achieve, it's the high-level stuff. Things like \"take this city\" or \"hold this line\", and also what you do it with, i.e. which units are assigned to those tasks.\n\nTactics is how you achieve those goals, so, the specific deployments of units, movements, entrenchments, timing of attacks and so forth.",
"\"*Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.*\" ~ Sun Tzu",
"Example strategy: Acquire maximum customers in lowest amount of time.\n\nExample tactic to achieve strategy: coupons for free sample size in the sunday newspaper.\n\nThe strategy is an overarching approach to achieving a high level objective. The tactic is what you do. For the strategy example, I literally can't tell what action to take, but the tactic provides that.",
"Think of tactics like a series of steps that are designed to solve a problem on the field - soldiers on the ground would know how to \"out flank\" or \"charge\" or \"lay down cover fire\", and sports people would have a series of pre-designed plays that they've rehearsed that they can choose quickly as the game is in play.\n\n\"Tactics\" is related to the word \"Tactile\"; in other words, tactics are touchable, real world activities.\n\nStrategy, as others have said, is higher level solution planning. It's abstract and \"not touchable\". Unlike tactics, strategies don't need to define exactly how to do something - rather, strategies identify problems (or potential problems), and outline organisational responses to them. \n\nStrategies are often also sequenced - first, achieve this outcome, then we will be in a position to commence the next strategy. And they can be conditional - if this happens, here's what we should do.\n\nSo in the sports analogy, strategies are often organisational and off-field - how to train, how to recruit. If on-field it'll be abstract: how to manage energy through a match, etc. \n",
"I tend to think of this in business terms just as u/bguy74 gave an example of (I do corporate strategy for a living after all). However, depending on your background war provides a more natural and intuitive explanation which is what I use with colleagues and clients\n\nStrategy: To win the war we will invade Europe and drive all the allied forces toward Berlin, overtaking the Axis forces along the way\n\nTactics: spread misinformation, conduct airborn assault, conduct D-day landings, storm the beaches in five sectors etc. ",
"It's been covered pretty well, but if you wanted another analogy... \n\nStrategy is the long term plan to win the chess game. \n\nTactics are the short term plans to win the piece or the current board state. ",
"A strategy is a plan for HOW to achieve an objective by leveraging your strengths against your opponent's weaknesses. General Ulysses Grant's strategy to win the Civil War was to attack quickly while his opponent was preparing. In sports, a young player's strategy for defeating an older player might be to tire him out, while an older player's winning strategy might be to outsmart a younger, less experienced player. In contrast, tactics are short-term things used to gain a momentary advantage, like fooling an opponent by faking left and going right in football, or dropping bombs to frighten and confuse the enemy. It is said that generals focus on strategy while privates focus on tactics.",
"Tactics is charging the weak and cowardly Tau Xenos with bolter and chainsword in the name of the Emperor because they are the equivalent of human 10 year olds in melee combat but their ranged weapons are extremely accurate and deadly.\n\nStrategy is after pushing the Tau from the valuable hive cities and manufactorums you glass half a continent to wipe them out even if it makes most of the planet uninhabitable. You don't have time to waste on these Xenos because a tyranid hive fleet was spotted heading towards your recruiting worlds."
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1g2qus | how do i know that a headphone is good? | Never any infomation just standart stuff in any product! and why is that so? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1g2qus/how_do_i_know_that_a_headphone_is_good/ | {
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"There are plenty of ways to benchmark the quality of headphones but really it comes down to what you like and how you'll use them. I'm going to say it comes down to three factors:\n\n1) Sound quality: If you're a sound engineer you need a completely flat response but the fact is that most of us are neither sound engineers nor willing to pay for that quality of headphone. For most of us just listen to the music you like through a pair of headphones and decide whether you like how it sounds. Are all the instruments coming through nicely or are they muffled? Do you care?\nIf you really want to make sure you're testing them properly leave this playing on them for a few hours when you get them so as to \"break them in\" _URL_0_\n\n2) Comfort: Put them on leave them on. How do they feel after a few hours? Can you move about in the way you want to move about?\n\n3) Other people. The best audio quality headphones are open backed. It gives the most natural sound in your ears but it also means that everybody around you can hear them too. If you're using headphones to listen to things in private make sure you check if everybody around you can hear them too.\n\nThe fact is that everybody has different musical tastes, shape of head and ears, and reasons for using headphones. So your only way to know if a pair of headphones is any good is to find somewhere with a very liberal returns policy and try them out.",
"If you are looking to buy a set first thing is to check reviews on build quality, last thing you want to do it buy something that sounds good that will break.\n\nAs for the actual quality of the headphones when it comes to sound reproduction you want to look for a frequency response chart. What this will show you is how the headphones reproduces sound at all frequencies. These usually run from 20Hz (the bass range) to 20,000Hz (the highs). Some will look like [this](_URL_0_) and other will look more like [this](_URL_1_).\n\nGenerally speaking, the flatter the line the better the speaker/headphone is at accurately reproducing sounds. In practice a completely flat frequency response is nearly impossible and extremely expensive. Your best bet is to go to either a music shop that has a bunch of headphones and find someone knowledgeable and can walk you through the different headsets to find one with a frequency response curve you like. Everyone likes a little bit different sound out of their headphones so it just experimentation."
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2sh8fe | why would supermarkets and resturants rather throw out their food than give it to the employees | I work at a supermarket and there is a hot table more specifically i work in the hot table. At the end of each day we throw at almost 15 whole chickens and around 5-10 pounds of wings and potato wedges onion rings etc | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2sh8fe/eli5_why_would_supermarkets_and_resturants_rather/ | {
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"They don't want to be liable for what happens if you ingest the food and get sick.",
"Employees may not sell something (hiding a particular item, telling customers something is sold out when it's not) so that they can take it home.\n",
"1. If you allowed people to take home leftovers, you would encourage them to over produce in order to take more home this driving up food costs.\n\n2. Risk. Just because that food item was safe to eat at your location, doesn't guarantee it will be safe to eat back home. You run the risk of lawsuits if someone gets sick from your Product. ",
"If you could take that home then some douchebag you work with would probably cook fresh shit right before the time to throw it out specifically so it could be taken home.\n\nSad but true. ",
"You should try and connect your manager and the local food bank. The Bill Emerson Good Samaritan act protects against liability for food donations. Either that or cook fewer chickens.\n\nEdit: clarified liability statement",
"throw them out into the back seat of your friend's car"
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d6cxxf | why does a link in a word document takes too long time to open when clicked in? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d6cxxf/eli5_why_does_a_link_in_a_word_document_takes_too/ | {
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"Because Microsoft Word is not a web browser. So when you click the link it has to take time to open the web browser before it actually searches the url and opens the page.\n\n\nJust a guess."
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14q1k7 | why can't julian assange claim diplomatic immunity | If Assange was to apply for citizenship and then was given a post as a diplomat for Ecuador, could he not claim diplomatic immunity which prevents prosecution from UK authorities allowing him to leave the country? My understanding that immunity is more a custom than a law but surely it would hurt British prestige if they were to detain a diplomat and deport them to anywhere other than their representative country | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/14q1k7/eli5_why_cant_julian_assange_claim_diplomatic/ | {
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"It might work, from Assange's point of view -- but from Ecuador's perspective, going from \"giving this guy asylum\" to \"giving this guy Ecuadorian nationality and diplomatic status\" is a pretty serious escalation.",
"Diplomatic Immunity is established by the Vienna Convention and has laws and procedures that must be followed, it can't just be granted to people to get them out of a situation unless you want serious blow back. ",
"Diplomatic immunity is more than a custom. It's an international law set out in the 1961 Vienna convention to which we are a signatory. It was brought into UK law through the 1964 Diplomatic Privledges Act. The UK can ask other states to waiver a diplomats immunity and can expel diplomats but cannot arrest them. However this has been violated previously.\n\nThe best bet maybe smuggling him out in a diplomatic bag.\n\n[An intresting article on this](_URL_0_)\n\n[CPS guidelins](_URL_1_)\n\n",
"Firstly, as all the other contributors have said it would have major diplomatic implications. It's cheating the system and abusing it and diplomacy is based on everyone playing by the rules. Britain would withdraw their embassy staff for sure and so would a lot of their allies. \n\nMore importantly, it wouldn't work because of [section 1(3) the Diplomatic and Consular Premises Act 1987](_URL_0_) which states \n > if\n\n > (a)a State ceases to use land for the purposes of its mission or exclusively for the purposes of a consular post; or\n\n > (b)the Secretary of State withdraws his acceptance or consent in relation to land,\n\n > [the embassy] thereupon ceases to be diplomatic or consular premises for the purposes of all enactments and rules of law.\n\ni.e. if Ecuador gave Julian Assange diplomatic immunity for the purposes of smuggling him out of the country that would be not what the embassy is for, so the foreign secretary would revoke their diplomatic immunity and arrest Mr. Assange. ",
"First, the UK would have to accept Assange as a diplomatic representative of Ecuador, and that sure isn't going to happen.",
"I think what you're actually talking about is \"asylum\". Diplomatic immunity is something granted to diplomats - which he isn't. \n\nAsylum is where a country lets someone in who is persecuted. The laws depend on the country, but usually you don't grant asylum to people who are wanted for crimes in another country. The U.S. isn't granting asylum to every criminal on the run from Mexico. While this all depends on the trumped up criminal charge against Assange, it is what it is.\n\nAdditionally (at least in the US), asylum is only granted when someone is persecuted based on a list of things in our Immigration and Nationality Act. Those include persecution based on race, religion, political beliefs, etc. Assange is none of those things. He's being \"persecuted\" because of a \"crime\" he committed.",
"Countries tacitly acknowledge diplomatic immunity when they grant entry, and are free to deny entry if they don't wish to extend immunity.\n\nSo even if Ecuador granted citizenship and diplomatic status, the UK doesn't have to acknowledge it under these circumstances.",
"IT JUST GOT REVOKED"
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cbg2i5 | why is it that when we’re exhausted suddenly everything becomes so much more funny? does this have to do with a possible correlation between lack of sleep and brain function? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cbg2i5/eli5_why_is_it_that_when_were_exhausted_suddenly/ | {
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"Remember reading on a similar post that our dopamine receptors are more sensitive when we're tired. This is also why r/3amjokes is a thing",
"Is this a thing? Never experienced it myself.",
"One of the common themes of comedy is things not meeting our expectations. When we're very fatigued, our mind doesn't have the ability to predict things quite as well - so we're more likely to find something doesn't match our expectations, and thus amusement.",
"It's actually the other way around for me, the more exhausted i become , the more i find everything annoying and not funny.\n\nYou're lucky lol",
"Watch Our Planet or whatever it’s called on Netflix when you’re tired. You’ll be laughing with tears in your eyes. \n\nYou’ll also be crying with tears in your eyes because some of that shit is devastating when you’re tired.",
"Because when you are tired, your brain has to work harder to keep you awake. To help, it gives you a boost of dopamine (which increases happiness) thus making you more likely to find things more funny",
"never felt this way and i have really bad insomnia to the point where i stay up 2 days every other week and only sleep 4 hours most days. I just feel insanely exhausted and get annoying migraines i find myself to be more annoyed at things i cant properly do than nothing.",
"I wish I could remember the exact science behind it, but I distinctly remember learning in a neurophysiology class (I also made a FB post about it at the time) that 5 minutes of hearty laughter produces positive effects for the brain that are similar to getting ~ 2 hours of sleep. Obviously, it does not replace the total restorative effects of actual sleep, but some of the positive neuronal functioning. Truly wish I could remember more specifics, but I think this is a clue.",
"Ah, the dopamine receptor sensitivity and dopamine boost to keep you awake seem very probable and interesting. Never thought of that.\n\nMy guess would be a little more macro than that - when you're tired you don't have enough energy to execute top-down control on your behaviour. Things like focus, concentration and composure are thrown out of balance, including our inhibition of behaviour due to societal conditioning. So, exhaustion of these higher function areas of the brain leads to less suppression to the creative parts of the brain and more random connections are activated (through 'random' neuronal activity). It is all a guess though, don't take my word for it, as I am sure that dopamine sensitivity plays a huge role in this too, and also as someone pointed out that comedy is based on prediction errors. Again that may play into the exhaustion as dopamine and prediction errors are tightly linked, so less energy = more frequent incorrect behaviours + decrease in inhibition of higher order behaviours = things are funnier or more irritable (depending on the person/day/etc)",
"I have never found things funnier when I’m tired. Am I an anomaly?",
"I wonder if this is like how there are \"happy drunks\" and \"angry drunks.\" Because when I'm exhausted, nothing's funny, I'm irritable and extremely pessimistic.",
"A major role for your brain is to stop things from happening (inhibition). So when you are tired (or drunk) you become more disinhibited.",
"That's what I was wondering. When i don't sleep for 24+ hours I don't feel tired anymore. I giggle a lot and want to do funny shit, make joke all the times, etc. It's kinda weird",
"Apparently this is a thing? I feel like nothing's funny when you're tired.",
"When you work night shift in the Emergency Room , even the most morbid things become hilarious .",
"When you think of it. Nothing seems funny enough to make you laugh out loud when you've just woken up.",
"Wtf is this real? Is there an article to back it up?",
"Oh god, and here I've been thinking I was the only one. I thought I was the person who coined the term: \"night-high\"",
"Am i past this point when everything pisses me off when I'm tired?",
"When your brain is sleep deprived your emotional responses will be amplified. This goes both ways so you might find jokes to be more hilarious than usual, but a small inconvenience can also cause a lot of anger and frustration.",
"Sleep deprivation has similar effects on cognitive function as alcohol intoxication. Things get funnier when you’re drunk as well, and being sleep deprived is basically the same (to your brain) as being drunk.",
"All these responses are off. When you're over-tired/exhausted this causes you to have an overactive sympathetic nervous system.\n\n\nYour sympathetic nervous system is what predominantly governs your emotions. This effect causes you to experience emotions with much greater sensitivity. I.e. Laughing way more at something that is funny. Or being irritable at little things.\n\n\nFun fact: this is also why people with severe depression that experience strong ~~dysphoria~~ apathy (loss of feelings either good or bad) feel relief when they go a night or two without sleep: their overactive sympathetic nervous system overpowers the feeling of dysphoria and they can experience emotions again! (however this is a very temporary fix and lack of sleep has a whole host of problems so should not be used as a \"cure\")",
"I did an existentialism unit a few years back in high school and one of the quotes that have still stuck with me is this one:\n\n\nSo what possible reaction is there left, when everything has ceased to matter, but laugh at it all. – Eugene Ionesco\n\nThe full version of the quote is this;\n\n\nThe fact of being astonishes us, in a world that now seems all illusion and pretense, in which all human behavior tells of absurdity and all history of absolute futility; all reality and all language appear to lose their articulation, to disintegrate and collapse, so what possible reaction is there left, when everything has ceased to matter, but laugh at it all. – Eugene Ionesco\n\nIdk, it kinda makes sense to me",
"I think I know the answer, for once. \n\n\nBackground: I have narcolepsy. \n\n\nNarcolepsy is the result of the death of a neuropeptide called orexin or hypocretin due to an autoimmune response. Two words for the same thing. Orexin allows you to fall into that deep, restorative sleep. It regulates wakefulness and is thought to [regulate certain emotional responses.](\n_URL_0_). \n\nMy guess is if you’re exhausted and trying to stay awake, a healthy brain will utilize more of this compound situationally. With that would come exaggerated emotions. Sounds like fun!",
"So nobody else finds things a lot less funny when tired?\n\nI can't be on my own!",
"Several years ago I suffered from sort of brain illness where I had enlarged white matter in the brain. I slowly stopped cognitive function to the point where I have three weeks of the six weeks in hospital that I don’t recall. I have seen my notes from the time and as I was recovering apparently I found everything absolutely hilarious (even when I’d soiled myself and they had to give me a shower). Obviously this is anecdotal but reduced brain function was directly correlated with how funny I found everything.",
"Speak for yourself. When im exhausted I'm more likely to be grumpy and swearing than laughing.",
"Seems like part of the dissociation response probably kicks in if we have to keep going but we're exhausting. Best painkiller ever. Well in such a situation it produces a kind of escapism and detachment that might produce humourous results, kind of like we can't be bothered to filter all the silly connections and don't care if it makes sense. When people are really sleep-deprived, of course this slips into mania and paranoia, or more psychotic extremes if its days without sleep, you'll likely hallucinate and have an episode because the mind is so far behind on energy levels it doesn't filter or reality check AT ALL, whilst giving high doses of psychedelic sleep hormones.....i'd say we get a bit manic perhaps; like we aren't really 'joyous' but we're laughing in a more absurd way.",
"Is something wrong with me? Cause I don't find shit funny when I'm tired. When I'm up and during the day? Hell yea. But when I'm sleepy? Nope.",
"I personally have the exact opposite effect. When I'm exhausted, I have 0 patience for humor",
"I would replace \"funny\" with \"not funny at all\".\n\nWho when they're exhausted thinks that shit is funny? I'll feel like killing everybody I come across when exhausted.",
"I am not finding anything funny when I am tired. I'm more likely to be chill if I am not tired (or stressed). Your brain sounds fun, OP.",
"Doesn't happen to me\n\nI just get irritated and want it all to end so I can just go to Sleep or relax",
" > when we're exhausted suddenly everything becomes so much more funny \n\nHuh?? I've never experienced, or even heard of this. 🤷♂️",
"You are not at your highest interaction level ( mind and body) so you just let everything in. \nPeople who excercise a lot ( thus exhausting their bodies ) tend to sleep better. if you actually have time without sleeping, it make it worst to process information because it is all stored in frontal cortex where temporary memory resides. Temporary memory is released on sleep and consolidated ( through sleep) in another area of the brain. Frontal cortex is (almost) empty in this process and you again have plenty of resources to obtain and process information. I guess you can compare it to thet way RAM works in modern computers. So lack of sleep doesn't equal more capability of enojying something. Could be, if any, the \"non resistance\" state you acquiere when tired.",
"Canabanoids are produced by the human body and bind to receptors in the hippocampus when we lack sleep. So much so that a sleep deprived individual can fail a drug test for canabanoids without any experience with Marijuana... ever.\n\nEver hear stories of HighSchool athletes failing drug tests without ever doing an illicit drug? This is usually the cause.\n\nSo yes, when you are sleep deprived you do get high on your own supply.",
"One night my sister and I were coming home from the State Fair and on the way home I saw a Hospital named Doctors Hospital. I asked my sister if that's where the Doctors go when they get sick. We had been walking all day and I was so tired I was slap happy. When I saw the sign for the hospital, it struck me funny and I started laughing so hard. I bet I laughed for about an hour because everytime I about stopped then I would think about it again and just start laughing all over again. My ribs hurt when we finally got home."
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2ttxif | how can it be ok for parcel carriers to leave packages in front of someones house? who is responsible if it gets stolen? and how is this system not abused (pretending it was stolen)? | Where I'm from (Germany) you ALWAYS have to sign to get your package. If you are not there then you have to pick it up at a central location or at a neighbors. Leaving it in front of someones house would be totally unacceptable. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ttxif/eli5_how_can_it_be_ok_for_parcel_carriers_to/ | {
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"From what I understand, the system is abused. If you report a package stolen that was from Amazon, and Amazon did not require a signature for said package, then they will send you a new one. Happened to my brother with a laptop. The flipside to this is, he could have just stashed the computer in his house and claimed it was stolen. How the system could not be abused I do not understand. They (Amazon) put you on a list if it happens multiple times, however.",
"If you live in an area that you don't trust you can request a signature to go with the package. And if you report it stolen too many times they'll start requiring it anyway. They'll also sometimes automatically request it with expensive packages, but that depends on the individual company. ",
"I'm from the Netherlands and it's almost the same as Germany. \n\nA signature isn't always required, but packages are never left on your doorstep. If they can't be delivered, they will be delivered to a neighbor or they will try to deliver again the next day. If delivering failed multiple times, you have to personally get it at the post office (with the card they put in your mailbox) \n\nEdit: I'm sure packages would be falsely reported as stolen if they dared to put it on the doorstep here. Plenty of greedy people are up for getting a free second of *insert expensive item they ordered here* for a friend or ebay. ",
"From my experience, I've only had packages left outside when they were sent by Amazon. They don't care if a few people abuse the system because they know the amount of people is low enough that it doesn't really matter.",
"Signatures are usually only required for expensive items where I live. The delivery person will leave it on a step or under the mat or behind the bush next to our door. Mostly they don't bother to see if we are at home.\n\nHere's the thing: I don't think we've ever actually had a package stolen, but since I work from home, someone is usually at home when packages arrive. Most people are honest, and in our neighborhood there are usually people around to look askance at someone going up to someone else's house and picking up a package. But my feeling is that if the item wasn't expensive enough to require a signature, the merchant would make good if something was stolen. Incidentally, this is why I hated our mail order prescription program we were forced into by insurance, they would just leave our prescription meds on our doorstep in all kinds of weather.",
"Used to be a courier for a company that would occasionally pick up extra deliveries from major companies (we had Staples account for 6 months, idk how they weren't losing money over using UPS). We weren't allowed to leave packages without a signature unless they were out of sight from the street, like on a porch.",
"In the USA we mostly care about profit ratios. The costs of ensuring zero abuse are higher than simply eating the costs of abuse. So we go with a convenient yet abusable system. This is basically why you're generally not responsible for credit card fraud. You used to be, but the industry realized it was vastly more profitable if people used their cards everywhere without reservation. Other countries are more concerned with reducing fraud than maximizing profits. They take it personally when there is a theft, whereas in the USA it's just a cost of doing business. When it gets too high we do something about it but not before.\n",
"I currently work for a company that sells over one million dollars in products via Amazon each month. We are currently in the process of making all items over X require a signature because people are abusing USPS and Amazon.\n\nHere is how it goes. We give you a tracking number and ship the item via USPS or FedEx. Once it has arrived, the carrier and I (the company I work for) can see that it is that but we did not require you to sign for it. So you can say \"oh, I would like this or another item for free because they can't prove I received this item.\" Some cases that is true. If you live in a big metro area then most likely you can get a way with this and get a refund through Amazon. Keep in mind that this is still stealing and karma is a bitch. \n\nSo my company has decided to hike the price up for shipping (which is free but we are really just adding that to the cost of the item) so that the new price will cover signatures. We only did this for items over $300 in the past but are now requiring it for most items. \n\nNow with our new system it does not matter at all who signed for it. The fact is it arrived at the provided address and your snobby nosed neighbor signed for it \"because you weren't home.\" Now you can say you didn't get it and we can say you very much did. You have instantly lost your claim with Amazon, FedEx, and USPS.\n\nTLDR; Changing the game because people are thieves.\n\nEdit: Words",
"With Economies of scale these massive logistic companies can absorb the costs of the odd thief by reducing the time for drivers to wait around for a signature. And let's also remember that these companies have sinking funds set aside for stolen items that would be incorporated into the cost of every single package sent with the carrier. If big boy gets ripped off, he changes the rules to the game. Simple. "
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383ml8 | what citizenship status does a child who is born in a non-territorial region (international waters, antarctica, disputed territory, etc) have? | Say a boat is sailing across the Atlantic and smack dab in the middle of the ocean one of the passengers gives birth or a couple of researchers at an Antarctic weather station get a little turnt one night and forget a condom.
Is the resulting child from these situations considered stateless or does it automatically gain the citizenship of one or both of its parents? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/383ml8/eli5_what_citizenship_status_does_a_child_who_is/ | {
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"That would depend on the citizenship of its parents I suppose. Not all nations have the same requirements for citizenship. In the United States, for instance, a child of US citizens in many cases receives US Citizenship regardless of the location of birth. ",
"In addition to what the others have said, usually* when you are on a ship you are considered to be in whatever country the ship is registered under. So if your \"born smack in the middle of the Atlantic\" scenario isn't too big of an issue - your baby is considered to be born in whatever country the ship is flagged to. \n\n*Note: There are exceptions to this rule - maritime law is weird. ",
"It's generally parent's citizenship in most other countries other than the Americas.\nMainly because North and South America is predominately countries formed from all immigrates. \n\nFor example, President Fujimori of Peru, (his parents were Japanese) so he was able to register and get Japanese citizenship. He was born in Peru so he got Peru Citizenship. \n\nThis meant that when he did horrible shit and ran away to Japan when he got caught, Japan was forced to say fuck no we don't extridate our citizens when Peru wanted his neck. \n\nIf you were abandoned in the middle of the ocean and discovered on a piece of driftwood, I presume the ship that found you is likely to designate what country you belong to unless otherwise decided. ",
"All countries that I know of primarily decide citizenship by ancestry.\n\nSo unless your parents are stateless, it doesn't matter where you're born. If your parents are X nationality, so are you.\n\nFor example, my friend was born in Poland, both his parents are American. He's an American, no doubt about it.",
"Well, to work or have an extended stay in Antarctica, you need to undergo physical exams to make sure you are healthy and won't need any immediate advanced medical attention caused by a pre-existing condition. \n\nI don't think they would ever let a pregnant person stay in Antarctica long term at one of the U.S. Stations. Heck, they won't let me stay there with a cavity!",
"This actually happened with by Great Grandmother. Not to long ago we did some looking into the ancestry of my family. \n\nIt turns out she was born on the boat coming over from England. Upon arriving in in Ellis Island she was considered English Immigrant. I am not sure if she ever \"officially\" had English Citizenship, but to the USA she was was English. \n\nHowever this varies significantly from country to county. There are basically 2 principles of nationality.\n\n1. *jus sanguinis* - citizenship is not determined by place of birth but by having one or both parents who are citizens of the state.\n\n2. *jus soli* - is the right of anyone born in the territory of a state to nationality or citizenship.\n\nFinland for example has decided that for a child born to a Finnish mother, the actual place of birth is completely irrelevant. A Finnish child's birth place is defined by the city where its mother was resident when it was born. So no matter where you where born if you mother was a resident of Helsinki at the time, that is always your official birth place. This is *jus sanguinis*, citizenship determined by your parents citizenship. Many countries citizen ship is based around this.\n\nFor *jus soli* there are roughly 40 countries that recognize birth on a ship/plane as birth on national soil meaning you can claim citizenship for that specific country. This was further complicated by the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness. From this several countries expanded what they consider *jus soli* to include planes simply flying within the country. \n\nThese various rule can combine for some interesting citizenship. For instance a child born to American parents, while on a Canadian Plane that is flying over Brazil could claim American citizenship (jus sanguinis), Canadian citizenship (jus soli from the UN convention), and Brazilian citizenship (normal jus soli). Conversely, a child born to Canadian parents on a British plane flying in Russia is simply Canadian.\n\nTLDR; Citizenship rules vary from country to country but the main rules are citizen ship by parental citizenship or citizenship by the location of your birth. All countries have their own rules for these. \n"
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3stsa4 | how do they make bamboo, which is circular, into flat flooring which looks like one piece? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3stsa4/eli5_how_do_they_make_bamboo_which_is_circular/ | {
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"It's large bamboo, cut into strips, planed or steamed into rectangles, then edge-glued into sheets.\n\nIf you look you can see the dark patches which are the nodes in the original bamboo - think of the \"knuckles\" in a piece of grass, which is essentially all bamboo is. Those dark patches stretch across just one strip of the original material, so you can measure how wide each strip is - about 10-15mm usually."
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1bakmf | what exactly is a "mhz" when talking about cpu's? | And why does it make my computer work faster when it is overclocked? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bakmf/eli5_what_exactly_is_a_mhz_when_talking_about_cpus/ | {
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"Basically the MHz is the amount of instructions that can be executed per second. M stands for million, so a one megahertz processor can do a million instructions per second. G is billion, so a gigahertz processor can do a billion istructions per second. \n\nThe main purpose of overclocking is to increase the hertz count of the CPU, so for example if you overclock your 3.3 GHz CPU to 4.5 GHz, you will get quite a few more instructions done per second, thus speeding up the processing. Of course, the performance boost is not equal to the increase of the instructions per second, because other parts of your computer will become bottlenecks.",
"Imagine the CPU is a producton line of people, making a car; one guy lifts the body and puts it onto the conveyor belt, the second guy fits the undercarriage, the third guy puts on the wheels, the the fourth guy puts in the seats etc.\n\nNow, in a CPU, there is a conductor who basically goes \"NEXT!\" and every time he goes \"NEXT!\", all the people in the production line move their own task forward, but the conductor can't go \"NEXT\" before everyone is done, because then one part of the production line wouldn't do anything and that particular car just wouldn't be made. \n\nThat conductor is the called a \"clock generator\" and the \"NEXT!\" is known as as the clock signal. Each time the clock generator goes \"NEXT!\" is essentially known as a \"Hz\", pronounced \"Hertz\". A Mhz is 1 million Hz.\n\nOverclocking is essentially telling all the workers on the production line to just work a lot faster, so the conductor can go \"NEXT\" faster and so more work can get done in the same workday. Of course, working harder makes your workers really hot, so you have to cool them a lot better than usual or they'll dehydrate and die, or in the CPU's case, it'll overheat and cook."
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8ndcy1 | european parlament's article 13 on copyright directive | I've read about it. I can't really grasp what's it for, why so many are against it, as every website explaining it is complicated as hell so looking for a semi-ELI/full-ELI explanation.
Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8ndcy1/eli5_european_parlaments_article_13_on_copyright/ | {
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"I’m actually really surprised this post didn’t get more activity. I hope there’s a more popular ELI5 floating at the top somewhere. \n\n[here is a good video that really explains article 13 and why everyone should be worried](_URL_0_)",
"First off, linking what on earth you're talking about might help, searching on Google ment I had to wade through a 1000 think pieces before finding anything offical.\n\nSecond, from what I can tell, it removes the limited protection Hosting sites had for hosting copyrighted material.\n\nSo before if I was a hosting service, like squarespace, I would be somewhat protected if someone used my equipment to share copyrighted material. As long as I can prove that I had nothing to do with the site that did share it and I did not know such content was on my hardware I'm in the clear.\n\nUnder article 13, my hosting service no longer has that protection. Meaning a rightholder (the person who owns the copyright in question) can sue me even if I didn't know the content is on my hardware and was being shared. It effectively means a rightholder can police what is and isn't a copyright violation and allow them to get hosting platforms to remove content, rather than dealing with a potentially anonymous person. Think of YouTube DMCA takedowns but with more teeth and on every European server.\n\nWhich is kinda iffy depending on the rightholder and how willing they are to yell \"copyright violation!\" For instance, movie reviews are typically not a case of copyright violation, even if they use footage or screenshots, as the reviewer would likely need some copyrighted material to make the review, but won't likely be a replacement for the copyrighted material. As in a review of The Avengers: Infinity War is in no way a replacement for watching the movie itself.\n\nSo the fear is, if a movie studio (or any other company) wanted to censor negative press they could just claim a copyright infringement on 2 seconds of footage or a screenshot and have that negative press go away. In theory it seems like it's possible in the text of the law, but it has yet to be proven in court. And a law that isn't enforced is not a law. Well that and attempting to remove critism from the public eye tends to create an even bigger problem."
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188ku7 | nuclear reactions | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/188ku7/eli5_nuclear_reactions/ | {
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"Just about everything you see around you is made up of atoms. An atom can be more or less split into two parts, a small center part (a nucleus), and a cloud of stuff moving around that center (electrons). The nucleus controls what something is at a basic level -- the reason gold is gold, carbon is carbon, iron is iron, etc. The way a material behaves has to do with the way all that stuff is held together by electrons.\n\nNow just about every chemical reaction you are familiar with involves just electrons moving around. For instance burning a candle, baking a cake, watching a lightbulb glow, iron rusting, even doing stuff like making plastic...This is all electrons changing how stuff is being held together, but at the end of the day it's still the same stuff (iron is not becoming gold). \n\nSome special reactions actually *do* change the nucleus however, and making this change happen can often either require or release a lot of energy. Once these reactions occur, the actual stuff you have is changed (for instance there are people out there who turn can lead into gold! It is just incredibly expensive an can only be done in very very small amounts). Reactions that change the nucleus are called nuclear reactions.",
"Think about a ping pong ball sitting on the floor. It's just kind of chillin'. Maybe rolls around a bit, maybe just sits there. But the point is that it doesn't have a lot of energy. \n\nNow, imagine we could balance that ping-pong ball on the top of a steel rod, maybe about the diameter of the ping-pong ball. The steel rod is maybe a meter long, so it's pretty high up there. As long as there is nothing to push it (wind, a poorly behaved child) it's going to sit there, though. \n\nSo this is a pretty boring setup. The ping pong ball clearly has more energy, we call this potential energy, because it can now, if it ever gets to the edge of the rod and rolls off, fall to the ground with some speed. But that's not going to happen without outside interference. \n\nBut what if, rather than one ping-pong ball, we have 235 ping-pong balls - all balanced on that same steel rod, stacked on top of each other (if that were even possible). Now, you can see how even the slightest, undetectable disturbance, could make that stack of ping pong balls come down - and because there are so many of them it would actually be a lot of energy! \n\nThe ping pong balls are analogous to protons and neutrons in the nucleus of an atom. The instability of the ping-pong balls atop the rod, or the relative instability, is what drives nuclear reactions. It's called the **Weak Force** because it isn't as strong as the force that keeps the ping-pong balls on top of the rod (but for reasons that have to do with quantum mechanics, it manages to knock them off the rod anyways). \n\nNow, there are two forces competing in the nucleus. The Residual **Strong Force**, which wants to keep the Protons and Neutrons stuck together (even though, because they have the same charge, the protons want to fly apart) - and the Weak Force which represents that instability we were talking about earlier. The Strong Force is named that way because it is - it is *waaaaay* stronger than the Weak Force. So even though the 235 ping-pong balls are precariously placed, there is a kind of glue holding them together that almost nothing in the universe is strong enough to undo. On normal human timescales, there is a tiny, tiny chance (like 1 in trillions or more) that the ping pong balls will fall on their own, but for the most part the Strong Force is going to keep them on the rod, no matter what. \n\nEnter the push. \n\nRemember that wayward kid we were talking about before? He's a'comin', and he's got a special, blue ping pong ball with him and a mind to start ruckus. He takes a look at your perfect, basically stable ping pong ball stack balanced on a rod and lets that neutron-cum-ping-pong-ball fly with all his might. You gasp in terror, and then watch in surprise as the neutron-ball harmlessly tunnels through the ping-pong-ball nucleus. Nothing is disturbed. Maybe everything is going to be ok? You wonder for a moment, before junior whips out a fist full of balls and begins to unleash them at your stack like there is no tomorrow. nuetron-Ball after ball sails through the nucleus, and you begin to become amused as his frustration grows and he begins to tire. \n\nFinally, he draws back his arm one last time and screws up his face in determination. You can tell something is going to be different this time, and you decide to intervene. Just as Dennis the Menace is about to release, you catch his arm in mid throw, but not before he is able to throw the ball with maybe a 1,000th the velocity of the others. You shake your head in disappointment but after seeing the fast-hurled neutron balls flung at the nucleus-stack, you're not really worried. \n\nYou watch the neutron ball sail towards the nucleus - the throw wasn't even good and it slowly fades away, it's clearly not even going to hit it. And that's when it happens. Defying all logic and common sense, the neutron actually changes course and heads straight for the nucleus! *swhump!* It gets sucked in like a fat guy eating a starburst. \n\nYou stare in shock for a moment, and then the nucleus because to move. The protons and neutrons are shifting, you can tell the addition of the extra neutron has made them restless. Slowly the shifting becomes ore and more persistent, as if the addition of just the one neutron has made the entire thing unstable. \n\nYou think back to the time gongpo explained nuclear forces, and have only a moment to briefly consider how the Weak Force is doing this when the entire stack suddenly and without warning *cleaves itself in two* with a loud **CRACK!** and big flash of light, and two uneven pieces fall towards the ground. As they fall, though, two rods, each of unequal height catch them and they slowly balance themselves again. \n\nAt the same time, a single neutron-ball that detached itself from the big original nucleus sails away with a huge speed, way faster than the one bratty mcbrat brat threw. \n\nAnd that's how a nuclear fission reaction works. \n\nFusion is similar, but almost everything is opposite (start with two small nucleus, end with one bigger one...still get a neutron out, though). \n "
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37hd7t | why don't bugs try to fly towards the sun or moon? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37hd7t/eli5_why_dont_bugs_try_to_fly_towards_the_sun_or/ | {
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"They use bright light like the sun or moon to know when they are flying straight. If they want to fly straight, they just keep the sun or moon in the same part of their view.\n\nNow imagine you’re a moth using that technique with a candle flame to your left. You try to fly straight, but the bright light moves backwards in your vision. Oh no! That must mean you’re curving to the right. So you fly more to the left to keep the light in the same place. And you unintentionally circle the flame.",
"[There's a SmarterEveryDay video explaining some of this stuff.](_URL_0_)",
"Actually they do...which is why they fly into flames. They navigate this way. Before we ruined the night with artificial light sources it was less risky for moths and that's how they have evolved...based on few light sources at night. ",
"They do, don't they? I was under the impression that insects like moths actually use natural light sources for navigation at night, and the reason they fly toward our lights is that their internal navigation system doesn't account for artificial light and fails rather amusingly when there are lights in their path.",
"Quote from Richard Dawkins:\n\n > Moths fly into the candle flame, and it doesn’t look like an accident. They go out of their way to make a burnt offering of themselves. We could label it ‘self- immolation behaviour’ and, under that provocative name, wonder how on earth natural selection could favour it. My point is that we must rewrite the question before we can even attempt an intelligent answer. It isn’t suicide. Apparent suicide emerges as an inadvertent side- effect or by- product of something else. A by- product of . . . what? Well, here’s one possibility, which will serve to make the point.\n > \n > Artificial light is a recent arrival on the night scene. Until recently, the only night lights on view were the moon and the stars. They are at optical infinity, so rays coming from them are parallel. This fits them for use as compasses. Insects are known to use celestial objects such as the sun and the moon to steer accurately in a straight line, and they can use the same compass, with reversed sign, for returning home after a foray. The insect nervous system is adept at setting up a temporary rule of thumb of this kind: ‘Steer a course such that the light rays hit your eye at an angle of 30 degrees.’ Since insects have compound eyes (with straight tubes or light guides radiating out from the centre of the eye like the spines of a hedgehog), this might amount in practice to something as simple as keeping the light in one particular tube or ommatidium.\n > \n > But the light compass relies critically on the celestial object being at optical infinity. If it isn’t, the rays are not parallel but diverge like the spokes of a wheel. A nervous system applying a 30- degree (or any acute angle) rule of thumb to a nearby candle, as though it were the moon at optical infinity, will steer the moth, via a spiral trajectory, into the flame. Draw it out for yourself, using some particular acute angle such as 30 degrees, and you’ll produce an elegant logarithmic spiral into the candle.\n > \n > Though fatal in this particular circumstance, the moth’s rule of thumb is still, on average, a good one because, for a moth, sightings of candles are rare compared with sightings of the moon. We don’t notice the hundreds of moths that are silently and effectively steering by the moon or a bright star, or even the glow from a distant city. We see only moths wheeling into our candle, and we ask the wrong question: Why are all these moths committing suicide? Instead, we should ask why they have nervous systems that steer by maintaining a fixed angle to light rays, a tactic that we notice only where it goes wrong. When the question is rephrased, the mystery evaporates. It never was right to call it suicide. It is a misfiring by- product of a normally useful compass."
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axdu33 | how the spacecraft docking to the iss is slow while orbiting at high speed? | I was watching the SpaceX crew dragon spacecraft docking to the ISS. The spacecraft was slow while docking to the ISS. But at the same time, both the ISS and the Crew Dragon were orbiting at high speed. How does this docking process work? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/axdu33/eli5_how_the_spacecraft_docking_to_the_iss_is/ | {
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"text": [
"The craft is slow relative to the speed of the ISS. As an example, drive on the highway at 65. Someone going 70 will appear to be going 5mph in relation to you. ",
"It's all about matching relative velocities.\n\nImagine you're in a car on the highway going, say 70 mph. You're moving fast relative to the road, but if there's another car next to you going 69 mph, then you're only moving at 1 mph relative to it.\n\nThe orbital mechanics is more complicated, because they're moving in circles rather than straight lines, but it's the same basic idea.",
"They are both in orbit near the same speed. I don't know what the velocities are, but they are relative to each other.\n\nIf you were in a ship going 100 miles per hour, and there was a ship next to you was going 101 miles per hour, it would only appear that they were going 1 mile per hour from your reference, while passing a stationary object would make it appear to be moving in the opposite direction.\n\nSame applies here. They are travelling thousands of miles per hour relative to a stationary object, but since both the ISS and the docking craft are moving at a similar velocity, they appear to be moving slowly relative to each other, and only small adjustments are made to their speed in the process.",
"The spacecraft and the station are both moving fast in orbit, but slow *relative to each other.* Think about cars on a highway. They might be driving at 65 mph (105km/h) but since they're all going the same speed in the same direction, they barely move relative to each other. You can drive at 65phm behind another car going 65mph, and the distance between the two cars won't change. Spacecraft docking to the ISS do the same thing. They match orbits and relative velocities so the spacecraft adjust its speed a little bit and slowly approach the station to dock, just like in my example, the second car can speed up to 66mph and thus would be slowly approaching the front car at 1mph.",
"Imagine you are in a car on the highway doing 70 MPH, slowly catching up to a car ahead doing 69 MPH. As you get closer you reduce your speed slightly to reduce your closing rate down to inches per second until you touch at almost zero speed difference. On a spacecraft, latches engage at that moment and lock the two together."
]
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|
31jdo9 | why do i perceive that there is a metallic taste on a metallic fork after it touches aluminium? | Or any metallic cutlery. For example, if I accidentally scrape the bottom of a tuna fish can with a fork I have to use a different fork to eat because the fork now has the most unpleasant metallic taste that overpowers everything. It also hurts my teeth for some reason... ?
My friends dont get the same effect. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/31jdo9/eli5_why_do_i_perceive_that_there_is_a_metallic/ | {
"a_id": [
"cq23afv"
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"text": [
"Aluminum is more reactive than the stainless steel that you are used to eating with. The sensation of it reacting with your saliva is is what you taste. \n\n(gold is even less reactive, even noticeably different than steel) "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
dxvmyl | how do scanners at the front of stores detect unpurchased items? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dxvmyl/eli5_how_do_scanners_at_the_front_of_stores/ | {
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"text": [
"Most items have stickers containing metal that will trigger the alarms as you walk through. By scanners, do you mean those metal things by the exit?"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
36v1ek | art forgery | I'd just started re-reading The Goldfinch, and there's some discussion in the book about art forgery and the market around it.
What I don't understand is this: when you reproduce a famous piece of art, isn't there already a clear provenance for a well known painting?
Wouldn't it be nearly impossible for someone to pass off a reproduction as legitimate?
How do people successfully market a fake painting that's well known? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/36v1ek/eli5_art_forgery/ | {
"a_id": [
"crhbshu"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"By mimicking brush strokes. There once was a con man who would purchase moderately priced paintings ($20k-$200k), hire student artists to reproduce specific artworks, then sell them to museums for a bit more while stashing the real one. Doesn't seem like he would make much money off doing this, but he would have the students make 3 or 4 copies, and sell one in the US, another somewhere in Europe, and the others in other parts of the world. The trick was to also forge the certificate of authenticity. Since he had bought the artwork legitimately, he could just copy the validation, to show the museum/auction house."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
4cgo74 | how this thing called love works. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4cgo74/eli5_how_this_thing_called_love_works/ | {
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"text": [
"Interesting question. Love is very subjective so it's difficult to give an objective answer but I'll give it a shot. \n \nIMHO love is really a willful choice to be with someone rather than be alone. In doing so, you give up certain things like time to be with the other person. You also help to support them emotionally. The trade-off here is that you get a companion and someone who supports you (in some form) and takes care of your wants and needs. It also fulfills some of your social needs since humans are naturally social creatures. \n \nAs you reciprocate the action of emotionally supporting each other you naturally develop \"feelings\" in the sense that you have a desire to be with them, and they make you feel happier. You experience more positive emotions around them as they support and make you feel better. The trade off is that you're more exposed and they can also make you feel significantly worse than you ordinarily would if they fail to satisfy a need or want. \n \nIn fairness it's not for everyone - but our species appears to have evolved to adopt this process for a vast majority of us across all cultures, countries, etc. There are also examples of those who have chosen to remain single and are happy about it. Shoutout to Mother Theresa! \n \nHopefully that helps. I have no idea how to tl/dr this. ",
"A lot of it is anima/animus projection. When you fall in love you aren't falling in love with a person, but an idealized image of the repressed feminine/masculine part of yourself. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
3lupy1 | if england is a constitutional monarchy with the queen and the rest of the royal family being more or less celebrites with little political clout, how do they stay so relevant and so wealthy? are they funded by the people of england? | It's a slow day at work. Last night I binged on the Daniel Craig led 007 movies and for some reason it got me thinking about England's political structure, which led me to this question. I am just genuinely curious. I would love to get the facts and also some opinions/thoughts from people about living under Constitutional Monarchies.
Edit: Thanks for the great responses! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3lupy1/eli5_if_england_is_a_constitutional_monarchy_with/ | {
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"text": [
"The Queen is also a property owner, with a lot of real estate. She isn't just a politician, but also very wealthy.\n\nAll of these lands are leased to the British Government at a discount rate. But she is still the owner, and if the monarchy was dissolved that would devolve back to her.",
"So the monarchy does own lots of land. George III made a deal with parliament (that all future monarchs have gone with as well) that parliament administers the royal lands in exchange for letting the royal family live in their fancy house and a stipend from the government. I believe the royal family receives something like £50 million a year. \n\nThe rents from their lands (and the tourist dollars from foreigners coming to see royal-related things) more than make up for the stipend though.",
"According to the first sentence of the Wikipedia article on the subject, \"The British Royal Family is financed mainly by public money\". A big part of this financing is that they (generally) don't have to pay taxes. _URL_0_"
]
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[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finances_of_the_British_Royal_Family"
]
] |
|
6iwjt7 | big public companies like jpmorgan, gm, ge, boa and apple have millions of different shareholders, both private and institutional, what is the process to fire and appoint the ceo? | Let's say Dimon or Cook fuck things up and need to be removed, who takes the decision? Do companies like Vanguard , Blackrock or Fidelty get the right to vote even though they are investing other people's money? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6iwjt7/eli5big_public_companies_like_jpmorgan_gm_ge_boa/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"The Board of Directors hires and fires all Executive Officers. The Board of Directors is elected by the Shareholders.",
"The board of directors are tasked with hiring/firing the CEO. Institutional investors may have a representative on a board (more typically VC/hedge fund types that funded pre-IPO than, say a mutual fund), or an activist investor might have some influence/leverage due shares controlled, but it's the board's call. The large institutional investors might state their views/preferences but still just have the sway that their number of votes carry on proxy votes or board elections. They're always free to sell their shares if they disagree with positions."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
|
5czcbl | why are cans for canned goods not square? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5czcbl/eli5why_are_cans_for_canned_goods_not_square/ | {
"a_id": [
"da0kgdq"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Cans are round because it maximizes the volume per amount of metal used and because being round makes them stronger than cubes. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
1jq1na | the gametophyte and sporophyte, and the alternation of genrations | So far biology has been a breeze for me, but for some reason I can't understand what gametophytes and sporophytes are and how they interact with each other. My bio book and everything I read online just confuses me more. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jq1na/eli5_the_gametophyte_and_sporophyte_and_the/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"This confused me so hard when I was in AP bio. It's actually pretty simple but it is really confusing to understand in higher plants like trees.\n\nEssentially your sporophyte is your 2n plant. For Angiospersm (anything with flowers or fruit and grasses) as well as for gymnosperms (mostly pine trees) this is the whole plant.\n\nIf we go back a little on the evolution time scale we get to ferns.\nNow a typical fern is sporophyte, but when it propogates it doesn't make sperm and egg (gametes), instead it makes a spore (hence sporophyte). The spore disperse and a new plant grows (so note, at this point there is yet to be any sexual interaction). But this plant isn't the same as its parent. This plant is a gametophyte. In ferns this gametophyte is small but it is free living (i.e. it is seperate from the sporophyte and is self sufficent for the short time it lives). It is also not so small as to be microscopic, if you knew what you were looking for you could see it with your bare eye.\n\nNow this gametophyte will eventually form sperm and egg cells (gametes). Often it will form egg cells first, then sperm later so it can avoid fertilizing itself.\n\nWhen the egg and sperm fuse, you will get a new embryo and that will grow back into a sporophyte. Thus you have the completion of your two generation life cycle. Two different, free living organisms, one 2n, one 1n, and thus you have a clear alteration of generation that is the easiest to understand.\n\nStill interested? Cause I can go on for days:\n\nLets go back further to moss. Now moss are a little different, in that the green fuzz you see growing on a rock is actually the 1n gameophyte. Moss lives most of its life as a gametophyte and only grows a sporophyte structure for dispersal. Moss will produce sperm and eggs when it is ready, and these will fuse and make a sporophyte. The sporophyte evolved to grow a stock upwards a couple inches, so that when it disperses its spores they have a better chance of going further.\n\nHave you ever seen something like this coming out of moss\n\n(_URL_0_)\n\nthat is the sporophyte.\n\n\nSo back to trees and flowers, where is the gametophyte? Well, it has gone all the way from being the main part of moss, to be half the life cycle of ferns, to being just a tiny part of flower and trees. It develops inside the plant, and the female version only gets to be 8 cells usually, including the egg cell. The male version, if you haven't already guessed, becomes pollen,. Pollen, which is only a few cells, produces two sperm cells once it lands on another plant(pollen itself is not sperm).\n\nSo, you see the great trend in the evolution of plants. To go from a gametophyte dominant life form (moss) to a roughly equal mode where both gametophyte and sporophyte can live apart (ferns) to a sporophyte dominant life form where the gametophyte is inside the sporophyte and only a few cells big (trees, grasses, flowering plants).\n\nTo anwser a further question you didn't ask:), why did this happen?\n\nWell think back to the moss. The gametophyte is just sitting at ground level fighting for rocksurface to absorb sunlight. It develops a vascular system that lets it grow upward and uses it to spread its spores. But now, that vascular system in the sporophte could be used to climb up and collect sunlight with less competition. Thus the sporophyte begins to dominate until you have ferns, and eventually flowering plants.\n\nHope that maks sense. You only really need the first few paragraphs to anwser the question but I know way too much about this to stop there. Let me know if you don't get something or want to know more."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://www.cas.vanderbilt.edu/bioimages/image/p/poju70wpsporophytes13698.htm"
]
] |
|
u6tuu | how and when did society come to be almost entirely financially dependent on the stock markets? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/u6tuu/eli5_how_and_when_did_society_come_to_be_almost/ | {
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"c4sss0q",
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"text": [
"what makes you think society is fiscally dependent on the stock market?",
"You can make < 1% on CD's, interest, etc, or you can make, even in a not so great market, 3-6% on good quality investments. For growing money, there's no better place than the markets."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
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