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1jek08 | how a wave breaks | I get that it has something to do with the wave hitting land, but I'm having a hard time with it, and would like explained. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jek08/eli5_how_a_wave_breaks/ | {
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"So if we're talking specifically about beach waves, it's not very complicated. The wave is pushed by the wind toward the beach. But as the water goes up the beach, it eventually reaches a high point, after which it wants to run down into the sea again. Now imagine those two things happening at the same time, except the \"running back into the sea\" is happening faster than the \"getting pushed toward the beach.\" This means that Mr. Wave is trying to get near the beach, but the water below him disappears, and so he tips over. Of course there are more things happening, but that's more advanced. \n\nThe best way to observe this is with animation, and this is the best I found: _URL_0_",
"In simplest terms, the energy carried from the molecules of water at the crest of a wave is the highest in the wave at all times, while the bottom of a wave has a lower energy. In deep water, the energy at the bottom, as well as the energy at the top of a wave are relatively similar to each other in scale, just as two inches closely resemble a single inch when the reference scale is a mile. However, as the wave travels into more shallow waters, the disparity in surface tension will seem to increase with reference to the scale. While the depth of an ocean miles offshore can be a mile, at several yards from the shore, the water may only be a single yard deep, where the difference in energy becomes more apparent. This, coupled with increased resistance from an undertow* and drag from surface sediment, will cause the differences in energy to become too vast.\n\n*Water from a wave will almost always have excess energy, which will cause it to climb the shore too high. As gravity pulls back down, the water will accumulate the exact same energy it once had, and clash with the next wave.\n\nOnce a certain difference in energy is met, the crest will begin to travel faster, causing the wave to lean forwards. Eventually, the slant becomes so significant, that the product of the mass of a water molecule and its acceleration (F=ma), overcomes the inter-molecular force from hydrogen bonds, and surface tension begins to break. Once surface tension is overcome, the wave loses its ability to maintain a single body, and progressively breaks into droplets and mists.\n\nThe white water often attributed with breaking waves results from sunlight being refracted countless times as it enters and leaves the droplets which are now interspersed with air. [Refraction is the bending of light as it enters and leaves a new medium, such as eyeglasses. It is also accepted that refraction will change the wavelength of a photon, proportionally to the density-difference between materials.] This light becomes white as photons are refracted arbitrary amounts of times and can change into any color of the visible spectrum.\n\nEdit: In terms of Ciremo's answer, he seems to tackle the nature of waves that you would find in a gulf, moreso than waves which you would find on a continental shore, which I was referring to. The main difference here, is that gulf waves are in fact powered by the wind, while continental waves are powered by the moon's gravitational pull.\n\nEdit 2: I accidentally an important word.\n\nEdit *: Refining."
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fy8koy | how do alarm systems know when a door or window has been opened? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fy8koy/eli5_how_do_alarm_systems_know_when_a_door_or/ | {
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"The installers put a pair of tiny magnets somewhere on the door (one on the door, one on the frame.) If you open the door, the system can tell that you’ve separated the magnets because it breaks a circuit."
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3mpo0j | why do you think europe as a whole is less obese compared to the states? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mpo0j/eli5_why_do_you_think_europe_as_a_whole_is_less/ | {
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"When I lived in the UK, I was struck by how often it just made sense to walk my errands, rather than drive . That's a lot more casual exercise. ",
"Walking everywhere. Portions are not ridiculous. A \"small\" here in the US can be a large in Europe. More people cook at home. Being comfortable with being fat is not the mentality. Food is different/better.",
"America has a culture of sitting. We drive almost everywhere, but in Europe its common to walk.\n\nHigh fructose corn syrup is lobbied and put in nearly everything you eat and its unhealthy. Seriously, go look at the ingredients at nearly everything in the middle aisles of a grocery store.\n\nPortion control. American portions are enormous. A tiny little Happy Meal from McDonalds is actually a pretty solid meal for a full grown adult. \n\nOur country subsidizes grains and makes food cheap. Cheapest in the world when factored into a percentage of income. But most of the cheap food is the unhealthy stuff. \n\nAll that and motorized scooters at Wal Mart. Seriously, how did that become such an acceptable thing?!",
"Cars. People in Europe walk, take transit (which involves walking), or cycle. Many cities are built on a pedestrian scale, or have an inner centre that is. I think the key thing is that kids start off following this lifestyle and, because they are more active day-to-day, they stay thinner and healthier and then have more energy to be more active when it matters, in their teen years.",
"There are a lot of complex processes going on but the most obvious one is that the food culture is completely different, in the US things highly processed and have huuuuuge portions. Even the same ingredients have different compositions here, our dairy, the varieties of wheat used in breads, the meat. \n\nHowever, [we](_URL_0_) are catching up, especially in places where traditional diets are being replaced with modern ones. "
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1kcmaj | the difference between rubbing alcohol (isopropyl) and hydrogen proxide | Aside from the different chemical compositions (are they really that different?), when is it a good time to use rubbing alcohol on a wound vs hydrogen proxide? Will one help your wound heal faster, or do they both work in a similar manner? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1kcmaj/eli5_the_difference_between_rubbing_alcohol/ | {
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" > Are they really that different?\n\nYes, yes they are. Hydrogen peroxide is H2O2 while isopropanol is C3H7OH. Alcohols generally behave very differently from peroxides.\n\n > Will one help your wound heal faster, or do they both work in a similar manner?\n\nFor wound treatment, both work as disinfectants. Hydrogen peroxide might actually slow the healing of wounds by killing new cells and causing scar tissues. In high quantities it can even cause an embolism. Isopropanol is safer, but will sting more as it is an alcohol. Soap and water should be sufficient in most cases anyway.",
"It's actually a medical myth to use Hydrogen Peroxide to clean wounds. People think that just because it bubbles it does something and clean up the wound. But actually it's better to just clean your wound with water. ",
"Anyways you should never use any alcohol to clean your wounds. It causes tissue damage, and improper healing. It however still works as a disinfectant. \n\nWell peroxide does the same as well, however that's only like 70% by weight. What we use to clean wounds is 3% by volume so all is good, won't be causing any skin damage anytime soon."
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72kufw | why haven't new alphabets been introduced in our languages? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/72kufw/eli5_why_havent_new_alphabets_been_introduced_in/ | {
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"Its more like alphabets slowly evolve and change over time, no one does it on purpose and it never happens quickly. But you can see the effects of it over time. Here's a good example: _URL_0_\n\nYou probably can't read that. But that's actually English. "
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24q35n | how do calculators do math? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/24q35n/eli5_how_do_calculators_do_math/ | {
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"They have both hardware and software methods to do various things.\n\nAt the hardware level, you are able to implement a lot of basic arithmetic functions in the same way that any computer can. With about 5 minutes of working some stuff out, you can easily design a very basic circuit that will add two numbers. I'm not going to go into any detail about how to do this, but this is trivial for anyone in the field of designing logic hardware. You can do the same thing to create circuits that will subtract, multiply, divide, and some other things, although some of them will be a bit more complex than a basic add circuit.\n\nOnce you have the framework for basic arithmetic at the hardware level, you can implement more complicated arithmetic using software. Keep in mind that a calculator is basically a mini computer. It runs an operating system, simple as it is, and executes code in the same way that your Windows desktop does. Thus, an engineer is able to write code to implement other arithmetic. \n\nYour question now may be how can the engineer write code to do things like find square roots or find the values of sin and cos or take derivatives. Well, most of those things have special methods that mathematicians have discovered to approximate them. There is a reason why engineers take calculus! \n\n~~Let me give you an example of this. Let's take approximating sine, for example. There are some nifty things called Taylor series in the world of calculus. A Taylor series, in short, is the representation of a complex function through a polynomial. A special type of Taylor series is called a Maclaurin series, which is what your calculator uses to do a lot of various things. We figured out that the Maclaurin series that represents sin(x) is simply:~~\n\n~~sin(x) = x - x^(3)/3! + x^(5)/5! - x^(7)/7! + ...~~\n\n~~forever and ever, following that pattern. Relatively speaking, we can figure out the value of this polynomial through basic arithmetic. As long as we are able to add, subtract, multiply, and divide, we can calculate this for any input x. And our calculator has hardware that can do that! So whenever we need to get a value of sin(x), our calculator executes some code that performs that math to get an extremely accurate approximation.~~\n\n~~If you are interested in seeing other functions that can be approximated through Maclaurin series (like logarithms and exponentials), check out this link:~~\n\nEDIT: Turns out I was a little wrong with my example of approximating sine. While it possible to use the Taylor series approximation, it is inefficient on a lot of calculators because they can't multiply at the hardware level (instead they only perform repeated addition to achieve the same ends). While this for does work, it isn't the fastest process. Instead, for approximating sine, a lot of calculators use the CORDIC algorithm, which is a relatively complex algorithm to calculate trig functions and some other things more efficiently. It does this by using a combination of logic and arithmetic (adding, bit shifting, etc), lookup tables, and some other stuff. \n\nWhile this is different than what I originally said, the effort is in the same vain. You come up with a software method that takes advantage of hardware methods (addition, bit shifting, storing predetermined values in memory) to approximate a more complex function. \n\nHowever, most newer calculators are able to multiply at the hardware level, and so the Maclaurin series approach would be used for those. That would include calculators like the TI-89.",
"By converting the numbers you put in into binary numbers. ",
"I'm going to refer you to:\n_URL_0_\n\n\nAnd then say, it uses circuitry to convert your the button you push into binary, store it in a memory register, and then push it through the appropriate arithmetic circuitry when you hit equals. Then it uses the binary output to convert the number back in to decimal on your screen.",
"For the purpose of this description, I'm going to limit this to simple PEMDAS calculations. The calculator builds a tree of the elements to determine the order in which computations should occur. For instance, (5+3)*2 becomes\n\n *\n / \\\n + 2\n / \\\n 5 3\n\nand then it works from the bottom to the top. The first calculation would be 5+3, then 8*2. This process could be continued indefinitely for larger computations. If you're interested in how the tree is built, how more complex things are calculated like sin, or how the actual additions are computed within the calculator let me know and I can expand my answer.",
"They have little abacuses inside, when you hit a number it slides over the correct number of beads. When you press an operation like + - * or / it saves that until the next number comes. When = is pressed it does that operations on the beads, putting the result on the screen. Only the beads are stored as electricity and don't actually exist.\n\nAlso, this is the basis of all computers.",
"Here, bill nye will explain it to you _URL_0_",
"To keep this as ELI5 as possible. Computers can only do operations in binary. The numbers that you enter [0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9] get converted to binary [0,1,10,11,100,101,110,111,1000,1001]. Order of operations are important too. 2 plus 3 times 5 is not the same as 3 times 5 plus 2. The calculator interprets the way you entered the number in a special way too.\n\nSo the calculator has to do several things. \n\n1)Convert to binary\n\n2)Respect order of operations\n\n3)Do the actual math\n\n4)Convert back to human readable\n\n5)Display on screen. \n\nDifferent ways to represent decimal numbers in binary:\n\n_URL_4_\n\n_URL_0_\n\n_URL_2_\n\nWays that computer can respect order of operations :\n\n_URL_1_\n\n_URL_3_",
"To fully explain this you would first need to understand binary arithmetic. Normally you would count from 0 to 9 then once you got to 9 you put a 1 in front and start over. So counting in decimal would go 8, 9, 10, 11.... With binary your largest digit is 1 so once you get to 1 you have to put a 1 in front and start over. So counting in binary you would go 0, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101... Now say you wanted to add 6 and 7, your result would be 13 which is 3 with a 1 carried over. If you wanted to add 1 and 1 in binary you would get 10 which is 0 with a 1 carried over, and 1+1+1 is 1 with1 carried over. Now we can add 6 and 7 in binary; 6 is 0110 and 7 is 0111 so our operation is 0110+0111. Our first digit is 1+0 which is 1 with no carry, our next one is 1+1+0 which is 0 carry 1, then since we had a carry from the last one our next digit is 1+1+1 which is 1 carry 1, and finally our last digit is 1+0+0 = 1. So now our result is 1101 = 13. These are the basic rules that your calculator uses when its preforming operations.\n\nWhen you input a number into your calculator it has to run through something called an encoder. The encoder would have inputs 0 through 9 and outputs A, B, C, D. When you press the number 6 on the keypad what you are doing is turning on the switch on input 6 of the encoder and the encoder will then turn on the outputs B and C. The calculator then takes that output, which is 0110, and writes it to a register which you can think of as a bank of switches. When you're all done entering your numbers and hit the \"=\" key the calculator takes the two numbers and runs it through a \"full adder module\".\n\nYour simplest 1 bit full adder module would have three inputs, first operand (A), second operand (B), and carry in (C), and two outputs, sum and carry out. The adder, as the name would imply, adds the two inputs and the carry in together so your outputs would be A+B+C and the carry out. So if you input 1, 1, and 0 your outputs would be sum (0) and carry out (1). If you were adding two 4 bit numbers (4 bit numbers are 0 through 16) you would have four 1 bit full adders chained together like [this](_URL_0_). After the operation the calculator sends the result to a decoder and displays it on the LCD. \n\nNow what about subtraction, multiplication and division? The easiest way to subtract two numbers in binary is to make the second number negative and then add the two together. To make a number negative in binary you can think of it like the odometer on an older car, if you were to roll it back from 0 you would get 9999 so you would count backwards from 1111. So -1 would be 1110, -2 = 1101 and so on. It is getting late and I have to get up early so I don't have time to explain binary multiplication and division. \n\nTL;DR: Calculators use Binary arithmetic and adder modules.",
"I would like to note that, since a calculator is a computer (albeit a fairly simple and specialized one as far as computers go), you're basically asking to ELI5 the foundations of computer science.",
"heres an explanation with dominoes \n\n_URL_0_ (background)\n\n_URL_1_ (application)\n",
"You can make a calculator out of wood by learning how to read marbles bouncing around inside a wooden machine in the right way. Here's a video: _URL_0_\n\nThe electronic version just replaces the marbles with other measurable physical effects like voltage.",
"Every possible answer to every possible entry is hard-coded into the longest if-then-else-if statement ever written. "
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1vic95 | the difference in taste or texture, if any, when one orders their drink shaken, not stirred. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vic95/eli5_the_difference_in_taste_or_texture_if_any/ | {
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"Whenever I order a drink and ask them for specifics, I make sure I know what it tastes like before hand.\n\nSomething smooth and strong like a shot of vodka with a chaser is usually better stirred in my opinion because it distributes the flavours more evenly except each flavour is strong.\n\nShaken isn't one of my favourites as it fuses the flavour of the alcohol and the chaser too much that I can't even distinguish what was put into my drink, but of course, different drinks have their different standards.\n\nThen there's straight, which is just drinking it as it is. ",
"Stirring a drink will blend flavours of similar consistency efficiently while cooling them, but you won't see as much dilution, it's more effective for a blended drink based on the core flavour of a spirit, such as a martini, an old fashioned, a manhattan etc. \n\nShaking mixes far more vigorously, chills a lot more and dilutes more. It's far better for a drink with ingredients of differing consistencies (purées, muddled fruit etc) and will blend these far better. This is much better for a base of a longer drink like a Tom Collins or a cooler, or for a drink based on a less alcoholic flavour like an espresso martini or a fruit daiquiri."
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2cf6r1 | what's the point of one-penny/one-dollar discounts? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2cf6r1/eli5_whats_the_point_of_onepennyonedollar/ | {
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"It's a ploy to make things appear subconsciously cheaper to the buyer",
"It has a psychological impact, as the mind tends to crop the numbers nor round then. ",
"This question concerns one of the most frequently asked topics on ELI5, so it has been removed. Try the searchbar next time please."
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3uz3ju | how come video compression is getting better all the time, but sound files are still the same size as ever? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3uz3ju/eli5_how_come_video_compression_is_getting_better/ | {
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"Audio compression is already really good, and has been for ages. People tend to be a bit more picky about audio quality (real or perceived) than they are about video quality, for some reason. \n\nThe bottom line is we don't really need better compression for audio files. "
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3ayxqo | why do planes crash into each other when they have so much open sky and space to fly in? when i look up at the sky, it seems almost entirely clear of planes. | Unlike a car, planes don't have to travel a narrow path. (Or do they?)
I assume that it has something to do with crowded airports, crowded flight paths, standard cruising altitudes, not being able to react quickly enough due to high speeds....But as a 5-year-old, I'm sure there is a real explanation. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ayxqo/eli5_why_do_planes_crash_into_each_other_when/ | {
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"Almost all air accidents happen near takeoff/landing where all those planes are in a tight area. There is a very narrow path to use a runway.\n\nThat said, air accidents are EXTREMELY UNCOMMON. You're safer on a plane than you are in your own car, by a huge margin.",
"It's pretty unusual, and when it happens it is often in the vicinity of an airport where the density of planes is greater and there are only so many routes to/from a runway. \n\nDuring take-off and landing the planes can be at different altitudes (thanks stpfan1), which makes seeing one another difficult, so if they don't get good guidance they may have a problem.",
"Planes almost never crash into each other -- and when they do, it's almost always at an airport where things get much, much more crowded.\n\nGo look up the things you've seen about two airplanes colliding. You'll find they were near the airport -- possibly on the runway.",
"Its quite rare that planes collide in the open sky . most collisions are on taxiways or landing strips when a plane is somewhere its not supposed to be. Even then, since commercial jets are travelling at 400 mph their time to react to an oncoming aircraft is very small. That's why air traffic is stacked with north / south on even altitudes, like 30000 feet and east/west on odd altitudes like 35000 feet ( could be reversed its been a while since I flew a plane) You have a far greater chance of being in a car wreck than a plane crash, and even less chance of being in a mid-air collision. ",
"Planes almost never crash into each other, for exactly the reason you note. Plane on plane crashes are very rare. There are about 1M commercial flights per year and since 2000 there have been 9 mid-air collisions. Only 2 of those were at cruise, all the rest were in airport patterns, usually with helicopters.",
"Planes do have to travel a narrow path actually. They are called flight paths. Specific parts of air space are reserved for specific flights by air control and planes are directed to said paths. This is all described in a plane's flight plan.\n\nMost collisions between planes happen near runways though where these there are a lot of planes in the air and air traffic control practically has to juggle them all. This especially gets tricky when there are other circumstances (such as bad weather or planes being diverted to another airport) that just add another layer of difficulty to the proceedings.\n\nGenerally when planes collide in mid-air, there is either one plane deviating from its flight plan (either due to pilot error or instrument error) or the crash involves at least one small air plane which do not always need to follow the same flight plan procedures as big commercial planes. Small air planes also don't always need to have the same anti-collision systems that big planes do, which can make it even harder to spot each other. Cause honestly, when you are flying, you are flying so fast that usually by the time you see each other (if you ever see each other) it can already be too late to avoid collision. ",
" > planes don't have to travel a narrow path. (Or do they?)\n\nWhen they in the process of taking off or landing, they do. And that is when just about every air to air collision is going to happen.\n\nSome smaller airports don't have a control tower at all, the airplanes just figure it out, much the same way drivers can navigate a 4-way stop on their own.\n\nLarger airports have air traffic controllers to sort it out, but if you misunderstand their instructions, and turn left when you should turn right, you are going to have a problem.\n\nYou also have things like navigational beacons and practice areas for student pilots, when air traffic tends to pile up."
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7a83fc | (us) why do car manufacturers promote horse power so much in their product marketing when you can’t even use it to its full extent? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7a83fc/eli5_us_why_do_car_manufacturers_promote_horse/ | {
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"You can very much use it to its fullest extent. \n\nDon't switch gears, and let that needle climb all the way to the redline. \n\nIf you're asking why cars can go more than 100 mph when there aren't any roads where you're allowed to go that fast, the answer is that it's more fun to drive a 300 hp car than a 100 hp car. ",
"Horsepower has **long** been a very important metric used for marketing by all car companies in evaluating the benefits of their cars and comparing to other cars.\n\nBasically, despite your claim of \"not being able to use it\" (which is wrong, and irrelevant anyways) Consumers still want to know what it has, and it helps them in their car buying decisions.\n\nAlso, car companies aren't dumb, they do hundreds of millions of dollars in marketing research into exactly which aspects of their cars they should promote. Horsepower has been around for a long time, its basically the go-to for many performance cars or big trucks. It sells."
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3hhlyc | how come hotel beds and pillows are so damn comfortable? | Lying in one right now! Sooo comfortable. What's the deal, why can't my bed and pillow at home feel like this? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3hhlyc/eli5_how_come_hotel_beds_and_pillows_are_so_damn/ | {
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"i'm guessing the one at home you bought was some cheap POS mattress and some polyester fill pillow. investing in a quality mattress and down feather pillow/comforter goes a long way. ",
"The hotel is probably figuring that if you have a comfortable bed and get a good night's sleep, you'll probably choose them if you can the next time you travel. It's about generating repeat customers.\n\nThat, and you're paying for a place to sleep. Decent hotels who give a shit want you to feel like your money was well spent, and they want you to come back and spend some more.\n"
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7nlrvh | why does ecstasy make your jaw swing like a nine iron? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7nlrvh/eli5_why_does_ecstasy_make_your_jaw_swing_like_a/ | {
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"It is a byproduct of the stimulant part of MDMA the MA stands for methamphetamine. Your central nervous system is being extremely stimulated and this causes your jaw to tighten and your body doesn't want tight/locked jaw, so you continually move it to keep that from happening."
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2y0nyz | why is it uncomfortable to exercise? it does not seem to make evolutionary sense. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2y0nyz/eli5why_is_it_uncomfortable_to_exercise_it_does/ | {
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"You should keep in mind that for essentially every animal but present-day humans (and even for some of us today), famine is much more likely than feast. So all creatures are evolved with an emphasis on gathering, storing, and preserving reserves of energy in case of famine.\n\nThere is a part of your brain that, towards that end, wants you to never exert more energy than you need to. Why run when you can walk? Save the calories. Why walk when you can sit? Save the calories. Why do crunches when you could... not? Save the calories. \n\nOf course, for most of us today, we have too much food, and all could stand to burn extra calories. But our bodies don't know that yet. They still assume we're one bad season away from starving to death.",
"before modern technology and conveniences, the activities of human daily life was all that was necessary\n\nexercise is NOT natural. the repetitiveness of it for example.\n\n\nliving actively is natural",
"It is uncomfortable if a person is very out of shape and/or they are over-exerting themselves. \n\n",
"That's because 'exercise' is a very modern concept that is different from 'physical activity'. The central premise of 'exercise' is that it is some separate thing you do for a short amount of time with the goal of tiring yourself out. By definition it is not easy, because if it was easy you would probably not consider it exercise (eg. walking to and from your car, picking up your laptop, etc etc)\n\nWe laypeople got this concept from athletes, who engage in training. Training is all about creating maximum improvement in minimal time, since athletes have limited recovery capacity to spare after you consider all their practice, competition, conditioning work, and skill-development stuff like watching film.\n\nMost modern people do not engage in that much physical activity at all, usually less than 3 hours a week. Our obsession with quantifying 'focused time spent on working out' sort of distorts the main idea which is - the human body isn't very good at sitting around. We are exceedingly good at sparing energy by walking, and storing energy for times of starvation, but have few built-in defenses for the side-effects of sitting for long periods of time.\n\nOutside of cities, and especially outside first world countries, people move around a lot. They are well adapted to all sorts of movements and have less issues like lowback pain than Americans who have inadvertently created a world in which you only need to be able to sit, stand, and walk to get my 90% of the time.\n\nToddlers have no trouble dropping into a full aka 'third-world' squat with their heels flat on the ground. No matter where they were born. It actually takes a fair amount of years to lose the ankle and hip flexibility necessary to do this, but by the time most people in the 1st world are teenagers it is already gone.\n\n\n**tl;dr** Exercise is all about making yourself work hard. The human 'animal' would have been moving around in lots of different ways all the time. Modern people try to fit all their activity for the day into an hour and it goes about as well as you would think..."
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3hort9 | why do some people's eyes dart back and forth while making eye contact? | I find this more common with peoples of the opposite sex, so I was thinking maybe it is attraction. I am a male. I would love to hear from both sexes opinions or scientific expertise. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3hort9/eli5_why_do_some_peoples_eyes_dart_back_and_forth/ | {
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"What do you mean dart back and forth? Like averting their gaze? Because eye contact can be awkward? They're looking at other things?",
"Ask someone to stare at you the entire time they're talking to you. It can be rather unnerving. Don't take it as them blowing you off or them not paying attention to what you have to say. They're just being polite and trying not to be intimidating or overbearing.",
"I couldn't really find anything concrete online about this phenomenon, but what it seems like it could be is that, visual sensation is one of our primary sources of navigating the world around us. When you are making eye contact with someone, especially that of the opposite sex, your eyes may dart because subconsciously, you're searching for visual clues (as well as acoustic ones) to see how a person is responding to you. You will be looking at their eyebrows and if they're relaxed or furrowed. You'll notice their mouth and if they are smiling, frowning, or remaining neutral. You'll notice their eyes and see if they're engaged or distracted or indifferent. All of these little clues are being processed by your brain the entire time you're speaking and your eyes are consistently taking in the entire situation as well as the environment around you (this is a more primal/evolutionary function to make sure that you're safe). The face and what it is doing [tells a lot about how a person is feeling and what they are thinking] (_URL_1_) and so it is natural for us to have become intuitive towards it. Furthermore, it is believed that:\n > eye contact is the strongest form of nonverbal communication. A study headed by Stephen Janik and Rodney Wellens at the University of Miami in Florida found that 43.4 percent of the attention we focus on someone is devoted to their eyes.\n\n[Source] (_URL_0_). ",
"You may be talking about this condition? It's common in albino people. _URL_0_"
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4ftdsz | why do people hate limp bizkit so much? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ftdsz/eli5_why_do_people_hate_limp_bizkit_so_much/ | {
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"Two reasons really. Firstly, Fred Durst has the reputation of being kind of a douche.\n\nSecondly, LB sort of became the face of the Nu Metal, which a lot of people don't like. The consensus is it's shitty rap and shitty rock, doing neither very well. ",
"I was a teenager in the late 90s at the peak of the rap-rock genre. When it first came out, people liked it because it was a unique sound. But after a while, the novelty wore off I guess and bands like Limp Bizkit devolved into caricatures of wannabe tough guys with not a lot of real musical skill. The artists ruined it for themselves by behaving like immature, attention-seeking douchebags."
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ko8mw | why is china seen as a threat to the united states? | I keep hearing about how Americans are scared of China becoming the new world power. Why is this? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ko8mw/eli5_why_is_china_seen_as_a_threat_to_the_united/ | {
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"Because Americans don't like that they actually have to follow rules and use diplomacy (not the gunboat kind) when they're not the only dominant power in the world. \n\nIt's like a kid who gets angry when someone decides to disable cheats in a videogame.\n\nOn the other hand, China represents third world countries that have been fucked over and stepped on by the West for 400 years, of course they'll be afraid of what they might do to get revenge. We have a saying in China \"The thief is most anxious\".",
"China is developing into a successful blend of communist style government with capitalist style economics. It is the world's largest nation, with approximately four times the number of citizens as the US. It has MILLIONS of low cost, low skill, but well educated and intelligent work force, that are prime for an industrial and technological explosion of manufacturing (similiar to the US following WW2). China's military is the largest in the world, and is only outclassed by the US because of technological advancement and professional training, although that gap is quickly being closed thanks to the glut of money from greater capitalistic endevours that now allows the Chinese government to shift away from inexperienced cannon fodder to a modern, well trained and well fed military force (While still maintaining large numbers) and the ability to buy the advanced technological advancements that the Soviet Union is still putting out. Soon, they won't NEED soviet assistance in terms of technology. While there military isn't going to be on par with a Soviet Spetnaz battalion, or an Army Rangers company, you could liken the level of competency and capability within the main bulk of their forces to a standard US national Guard unit. Now imagine there are 2 million of them, backed up by a capable air force flying Russian air superiority fighters on the same level as anything the US is fielding, a respectable naval force, and the manufacturing base of the largest nation in the world whose citizens are virtually unflappable when it comes to national support (not very many hippies in China)\n\nCompare to the US, whose people are increasingly LESS qualified for base level manufacturing jobs at low wages, more entitled, and nearly violently opposed to foreign military action. All within a falling economic situation, with less and less emphasis on the advancement of technology and education. \n\nHowever, no intelligent person would ever see China and the US as a close to war. China depends on the US to bolster it's growing economy, and realizes that a knockdown fight with the only other superpower on the planet will do nothing but set them back 50 years. Most of the confrontations you see are political bandstanding and military bluster. We aren't even remotely at threat of attack by China. \n\nAll that being said, IF the chinese and americans were to fight. I would imagine it would go something like this. \n\nChinese forces would roll over US and US ally military garrisons in their region pretty easily. South Korea, possible the Phillipines, Afghanistan. The US would begin enacting missile and air strikes onto high profile targets in the Chinese mainland, military bases, missile sites, depots, government and power sites, etc). China would respond in kind with missile strikes to military bases in Hawaii, Guam, possibly along the west coast. Civilian causalties on both sides would be relatively light, and the effect on the military capabilites of both sides would be negligible. Chinese and US Naval forces would clash HEAVILY in both China seas and the Pacific, with submarine groups on both sides wreaking a horrific toll on shipping. The chinese may...MAY possible make an attempt for a mainland invasion of US soil, definitely not the west coast, but possibly attempting to create a beachhead on Alaskan soil. The US navy and many, MANY air groups will put a swift end to any attempted invasion with a terrible loss of life for Chinese. US troops will make limited gains in Afghanistan, but at a moderate loss of men and materials. After a few months, the forces will be fairly well stalemated, with the Chinese preparing to smash though Afghanistan and Pakistan with massive numbers of mobilized army groups, and the US effectively maintaining (at high cost) a blockade of the Chinese fleet and troop ships. Cease fire will be declared shortly after, America agrees to withdraw special forces groups from occupied South Korea, the Chinese create a new territory extending about halfway through Afghanistan. American and Chinese soldiers eyeball eachother warily over a desert plain now seeded with anti-tank mines. \n\nNo nukes are launched, civilains causalties on both sides are less than 10,000 (substantially less for the US). Chinese forces have lost approximately 70,000 soldiers, airmen, and sailors (mostly from the failed invasion of Alaska and losses of men from the invasion of Korea), and the US has lost around 19,000 men and sailors (split evenly between ground forces in Korea, Afghanistan, and sailors lost to Chinese air attacks and submarines",
"China's population and military are already larger than the United States'. Their population is more than three times larger. China also ranks #2 behind only the US world's largest economies. The difference is that China's economic growth rate is about five times greater than that of the United States'. \n \nIf this trend continues, China will soon eclipse the United States as the most powerful country in the world in terms of size, wealth, and military power. \n \nSource: [CIA World Factbook](_URL_1_) \n \nEDIT: Did some [quick math](_URL_0_). Assuming the growth rates don't change, China's GDP will eclipse the United States' by **2016**. Feel free to correct me if you find my analysis is wrong/bullshit.",
"Because Americans don't like that they actually have to follow rules and use diplomacy (not the gunboat kind) when they're not the only dominant power in the world. \n\nIt's like a kid who gets angry when someone decides to disable cheats in a videogame.\n\nOn the other hand, China represents third world countries that have been fucked over and stepped on by the West for 400 years, of course they'll be afraid of what they might do to get revenge. We have a saying in China \"The thief is most anxious\".",
"China is developing into a successful blend of communist style government with capitalist style economics. It is the world's largest nation, with approximately four times the number of citizens as the US. It has MILLIONS of low cost, low skill, but well educated and intelligent work force, that are prime for an industrial and technological explosion of manufacturing (similiar to the US following WW2). China's military is the largest in the world, and is only outclassed by the US because of technological advancement and professional training, although that gap is quickly being closed thanks to the glut of money from greater capitalistic endevours that now allows the Chinese government to shift away from inexperienced cannon fodder to a modern, well trained and well fed military force (While still maintaining large numbers) and the ability to buy the advanced technological advancements that the Soviet Union is still putting out. Soon, they won't NEED soviet assistance in terms of technology. While there military isn't going to be on par with a Soviet Spetnaz battalion, or an Army Rangers company, you could liken the level of competency and capability within the main bulk of their forces to a standard US national Guard unit. Now imagine there are 2 million of them, backed up by a capable air force flying Russian air superiority fighters on the same level as anything the US is fielding, a respectable naval force, and the manufacturing base of the largest nation in the world whose citizens are virtually unflappable when it comes to national support (not very many hippies in China)\n\nCompare to the US, whose people are increasingly LESS qualified for base level manufacturing jobs at low wages, more entitled, and nearly violently opposed to foreign military action. All within a falling economic situation, with less and less emphasis on the advancement of technology and education. \n\nHowever, no intelligent person would ever see China and the US as a close to war. China depends on the US to bolster it's growing economy, and realizes that a knockdown fight with the only other superpower on the planet will do nothing but set them back 50 years. Most of the confrontations you see are political bandstanding and military bluster. We aren't even remotely at threat of attack by China. \n\nAll that being said, IF the chinese and americans were to fight. I would imagine it would go something like this. \n\nChinese forces would roll over US and US ally military garrisons in their region pretty easily. South Korea, possible the Phillipines, Afghanistan. The US would begin enacting missile and air strikes onto high profile targets in the Chinese mainland, military bases, missile sites, depots, government and power sites, etc). China would respond in kind with missile strikes to military bases in Hawaii, Guam, possibly along the west coast. Civilian causalties on both sides would be relatively light, and the effect on the military capabilites of both sides would be negligible. Chinese and US Naval forces would clash HEAVILY in both China seas and the Pacific, with submarine groups on both sides wreaking a horrific toll on shipping. The chinese may...MAY possible make an attempt for a mainland invasion of US soil, definitely not the west coast, but possibly attempting to create a beachhead on Alaskan soil. The US navy and many, MANY air groups will put a swift end to any attempted invasion with a terrible loss of life for Chinese. US troops will make limited gains in Afghanistan, but at a moderate loss of men and materials. After a few months, the forces will be fairly well stalemated, with the Chinese preparing to smash though Afghanistan and Pakistan with massive numbers of mobilized army groups, and the US effectively maintaining (at high cost) a blockade of the Chinese fleet and troop ships. Cease fire will be declared shortly after, America agrees to withdraw special forces groups from occupied South Korea, the Chinese create a new territory extending about halfway through Afghanistan. American and Chinese soldiers eyeball eachother warily over a desert plain now seeded with anti-tank mines. \n\nNo nukes are launched, civilains causalties on both sides are less than 10,000 (substantially less for the US). Chinese forces have lost approximately 70,000 soldiers, airmen, and sailors (mostly from the failed invasion of Alaska and losses of men from the invasion of Korea), and the US has lost around 19,000 men and sailors (split evenly between ground forces in Korea, Afghanistan, and sailors lost to Chinese air attacks and submarines",
"China's population and military are already larger than the United States'. Their population is more than three times larger. China also ranks #2 behind only the US world's largest economies. The difference is that China's economic growth rate is about five times greater than that of the United States'. \n \nIf this trend continues, China will soon eclipse the United States as the most powerful country in the world in terms of size, wealth, and military power. \n \nSource: [CIA World Factbook](_URL_1_) \n \nEDIT: Did some [quick math](_URL_0_). Assuming the growth rates don't change, China's GDP will eclipse the United States' by **2016**. Feel free to correct me if you find my analysis is wrong/bullshit."
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1finrw | why vitamin supplements can't be used as substitutes? | So you open up a box of multi-vitamin pills which advertise that they have 100% of an adult's RDA of vitamin X, Y and Z, but at the same time the instructions tell you that these are not to be used as substitutes. How come? Are the vitamins in the pills not guaranteed to be fully absorbed into the body? Is there some sort of mechanism that is missing? Is the disclaimer referring to the other nutrients that aren't offered in the pills? Are they just legally covering their asses?
If I take pills which promise 100% of my calcium RDA, am I not actually getting my calcium RDA?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1finrw/eli5_why_vitamin_supplements_cant_be_used_as/ | {
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"Legally covering. Keep in mind 100% of the recommended value doesn't mean it is 100% for your size, sex, health, & diet. So, they don't want you taking their very simplified chart as a guide for your entire health.",
"Dietary supplements are not FDA approved and therefore manufacturers cannot legally claim their products can replace any part of a healthy diet.\rMost of your other thoughts fairly accurate. The body cannot absorb certain vitamins/minerals in the large quantities found in supplements, and instead the vitamins pass through the system unabsorbed. Also, many vitamins are primarily found in vegetables, and taking a supplement doesn't replace the fiber and additional nutrients in the vegetables."
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cflqc8 | why can't surgeons just pull out huge chunks of body fat at a time with a glove or a modified vacuum hose? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cflqc8/eli5_why_cant_surgeons_just_pull_out_huge_chunks/ | {
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"For real if I ever need to go under the knife for something I'd love to talk to the surgeon beforehand and be like \"Hey could you do me a solid? While you're in there feel free to pull out some fat. Like anywhere it looks all yellow and gnarly just like, pull that out and throw it away for me would ya? Thanks in advance you're a real pal.\"",
"The fat isn't just floating inside you. Its attached to your organs and blood vessels. Tearing at it is gonna cause issues.",
"Because surgery is delicate enough as it is. Pulling out tissue they don't need to just complicates matters. Moreover, general surgeons generally don't have the equipment used for liposuction and similar procedures on hand. They're generally focused on saving lives, not throwing in some free plastic surgery while they're at it. It isn't their realm of expertise nor concern.",
"Using their hand requires a hole in your skin big enough to fit their hand. This large incision would lead to scarring when it is stitched up.\n\nLiposuction uses essentially a modified vacuum that has a cutter to suck up fat tissue and snip it. Its nozzle is small enough so that it goes under the skin without a large incision, reducing the chance of scars.\n\nThe downside is that fat cells don't regenerate. If the person continues to build up fat after surgery because their lifestyle does not change, the remaining fat cells will get larger. With fewer cells, that fat region will appear lumpy.\n\nSurgical methods to reduce people's appetite tend to work better than removing fat directly for weight loss.",
"There are two main reasons. \n\nFirst you have to cut the fat away. People saying it's mostly around organs are wrong, most of our fat is stored around our edges like fat sea animals. Some is stored near organs though, especially if you're really fat or have genetic predispositions to heart disease. Regular animals would die if they got anywhere near as fat as us.\n\n Second is you only have a certain amount of fat cells. you don't make more when you get fat, they just get bigger. Since they'll leak into your organs causing a bunch of fat people disorders if they get to big it's not smart to cut them out, especially on someone who has no self control when it comes to food. \n\nAlso no surgeon would take on the liability for free.",
"For the same reason why you should never put a vacuum hose inside of a desktop PC. The body is an intricate & complex system, not a messy ice cooler after a day at the lake.",
"In addition to all the great answers here, there’s also the issue of homeostasis. Your body is used to having the extra mass (and support systems for that mass) when you have a bunch of fat. If you ripped out a bunch at once, your body would go into shock and possibly shut down from the sudden loss of mass. Modern liposuction techniques often replace removed fat with some form of saline mass so your body can take time to adjust.",
"When you buy meat at the store, does the fat just fall off?"
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97a9xo | is the saying "red sky at night, a shepherd's delight" true and if so, why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/97a9xo/eli5_is_the_saying_red_sky_at_night_a_shepherds/ | {
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"Red sky at night, sailors delight.\nWhen we see a red sky at night, this means that the setting sun is sending its light through a high concentration of dust particles. This usually indicates high pressure and stable air coming in from the west. Basically good weather will follow. \n \nRed sky in morning, sailor’s warning.\nA red sunrise can mean that a high pressure system (good weather) has already passed, thus indicating that a storm system (low pressure) may be moving to the east. A morning sky that is a deep, fiery red can indicate that there is high water content in the atmosphere. So, rain could be on its way.\n",
"It is generally correct in temperate zones of the Earth (not too close to the Equator or poles) due to the prevailing winds there (which travel west to east).\n\nThe \"red sky\" is caused by the light from the sun reflecting off the underside of clouds. If you see this in the morning, then it is assumed that more clouds are on their way, bringing in bad weather. If you see this in the night, then it is assumed that the clouds are moving away from you, followed by clear skies."
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1iwvy6 | distillation as it pertains to alcoholic drinks | I very much enjoy adult beverages like whiskey, brandy, and vodka, but don't really understand the basics of what happens during the distillation phase of their creation. Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1iwvy6/eli5_distillation_as_it_pertains_to_alcoholic/ | {
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"Once the liquid that they are making the liquor out of has been fermented, and has alcohol in it, then the alcohol needs to be concentrated. Alcohol has a slightly lower boiling point than water, so they heat the liquid (which is called a mash by the way) to just below the boiling point of water. The alcohol boils off while the majority of the water remains liquid, separating the two. The alcohol vapor is then cooled and condensed back into a more concentrated and higher proof liquid. Then they generally age it in a barrel."
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x1vlf | why h2o is vital to life, but h2o2 is dangerous | The only difference between the two is an oxygen atom, which we breathe, so how are they so different? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/x1vlf/eli5_why_h2o_is_vital_to_life_but_h2o2_is/ | {
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"the extra oxygen makes all the difference!\n\nperoxide is an oxidizing agent, which means that when the molecule breaks apart it will steal electrons from other ions and molecules. This in turn can de-stabilize bonds in other molecules, leading to a chain reaction.\n\nWe need some reactive oxygen species in our bodies to help with cellular respiration, but too many can act like little bombs in your cells, running around breaking important bonds. When a cell sustains too much damage, it undergoes apoptosis, or programmed cell death. Therefore your body has a lot of ways to keep reactive species in check. exposure to large amounts of hydrogen peroxide can increase the amount of free radicals to dangerous levels and override the cell's control mechanisms, and can cause massive cell death.\n\nHope that helps",
"one single atom can change the whole chemistry. That's how it is",
"Take bread. Pretty good, right? Now add some butter. Also good, right? Now add a half pound of butter. Fucking awful now, right? \n\nLike that. Only it's chemistry, so not at all.",
"The extra O falls off, and immediately rapes the hydrogen off the first molecule it can find. \n\nIf that's one of your molecules, we have a problem. ",
"For The same reason a girl could be perfectly normal and no one would tease her but a girl with aN extra nose would be teased all her life . One tiny difference changes how other things react to something. Tldr; h2o2 is a two nosed freak And other molecules don't like it."
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56yhqp | why are we trying to colonize mars? | There's been a lot of news lately about SpaceX, Boeing, etc trying to send a colony to Mars.
What's the point? What is there on Mars that we haven't seen through the rovers? Why send humans there if they can never survive without a suit? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/56yhqp/eli5_why_are_we_trying_to_colonize_mars/ | {
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"To see if we can do it, we cant stay on earth forever, Elon and boeing know this. People like to do things that have never been done.",
"Just to do it. The race to the moon created tons of new technology and know how just by existing. Its exceedingly likely that trying to get humans to Mars, let alone colonize it, will create huge tech advancement here on Earth.\n\nWe're still decades, if not centuries away from a true colony on Mars. Right now the plan is just to get people there and back again.\n\nEventually, maybe 500 years from now, maybe less, we should actually be able to teraform Mars, creating a livable atmosphere. There are still significant hurdles to overcome, but that just means mankind gets more technological advances. Perhaps by trying figure out Mars, we succeed in helping Earth's own climate issues.\n\nLastly, consider Mars a backup plan. If all else goes wrong, we might one day live on Mars while we fix the Earth.",
"Because as Heinlein said:\n\n > The Earth is just too small and fragile a basket for the human race to keep all its eggs in.\n\nor as Randall Munroe observed:\n\n > The universe is probably littered with the one-planet graves of cultures which made the sensible economic decision that there's no good reason to go into space--each discovered, studied, and remembered by the ones who made the irrational decision.\n\nThere is nothing we particularly need on Mars. There is no good reason to live on Mars, but if you looked at it cold and calculating enough there is also no good reason to live on Earth.\n\nWe have to ways we can go from here. Humanity can stay on earth and die with its planet at some point in the future or we can go out there and spread ourselves among the stars. Mars is the first step on the second path, we don't know were it will lead and what benefits it will bring us, but the other one is literally a dead end.",
"Some facts about Mars: It has 24.5 hour days, 144 trillion square meters of land area (roughly equivalent to the land area of Earth), and an average temperature of -85F. That's cold, but better than any of our other options.\n\nFirst, a self sustaining martian colony is a Plan B for Earth, should a catastrophe occur that wipes out humanity.\n\nSecond, rare and valuable metals are abundant on Mars, and Deuterium is 5x more abundant, the fuel of choice should we ever achieve nuclear fusion as a power source. There is commercial and economic motivations to mine and manufacture on Mars. Because gravity is 2.4x less than on Earth, escape velocity is thusly lower and exporting of world to Earth is cheaper than going from Earth to Mars.\n\nThird, there is substantial opportunity for scientific research on Mars, looking for martian life and furthering our understanding of the creation of our solar system. There is also materials science and pharmaceutical chemistry that is achievable on Mars due to the lower gravity than here on Earth. For example, did you know you can make aluminum more transparent than your typical silicon glass? The problem is gravitational shear as the metal cools. There are methods to get around this but it's extremely expensive, reserved for high end optics and bulletproof US fighter jet cockpit domes because it's a government contract so fuck it. But in space or on Mars, if the gravity is low enough, they can mass produce aluminum glass; never again will you shatter your phone screen by dropping it. Or shooting it, apparently.\n\nAnd one that ties economics and science together is the amount of innovation that has to go into successfully establishing such a colony. As Neal deGrasse Tyson said, for every dollar invested in NASA, there is a $14 economic return just from the innovation that comes out of solving problems. Pyrex bakeware came out of trying to develop rocket noses, WD-40 was the 40th attempt at making a compound that would Displace Water, that's Water Displacement attempt #40, the internet as a whole came out of a scientists who wanted a better way of linking scientific papers to the documents they cite in their bibliographies. Just attempting to get to Mars would be a huge economic boom, and we're seeing this already, with the birth of the commercial space flight industry, with Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, and Boeing - specifically Boeing working beyond NASA and military contracts.\n\nFinally, there are political motivations. Just look how the US rallied behind the space race of the 50s. Imagine if you can motivate whole nations or an entire planet behind a similar cause.\n\nEdit: To quote Tyson again, who wants to build a jet engine that is 20% more fuel efficient? No one that isn't an aviation executive. Who wants to go to Mars? He had more to say in this thread I'm paraphrasing, but basically he was saying frontier science and engineering inspires the next generation, and they get involved and end up solving other problems while trying to achieve the goal in front of them.",
"It would be an offsite backup. Think about it like the most precious pictures you have stored on your computer. No matter how good and reliable you may think that computer is, it's just stupid to have data that valuable stored in only one place. Even if the computer would last forever on its own, your house could burn down around it.\n\nExtend that analogy to humans as a race. We're all here, all in one place. If something catastrophic happens, we could all be wiped out. It's a biological imperative to try and survive. This is just the next logical step.",
"The ultimate goal is to create settlements that would have artificial environments suitable for long-term (indefinite) human habitation. Further into the future, Mars could be terraformed, which means that its atmosphere and environment could be permanently altered by the use of technology (we already know how to do this in principle). It's worth pointing out that we know that the surface of Mars was once very different, likely identical to the prebiotic surface of Earth (a rocky but more temperate world, home to large bodies of water). Given that the latest SpaceX video briefly depicts the terraforming of Mars, it's reasonable to assume that they share this goal.\n\nThe point is a straightforward one (as elucidated by Elon Musk, and many others including Carl Sagan). Remaining isolated to one world is fundamentally risky for mankind. There is always the potential for cataclysms such as the use of nuclear or biological weapons, or natural disasters like impacts from comets.\n\nThis article, written by astronomer Phil Plait, gives probably the single most relevant quote from Elon Musk, \"Humans need to be a multiplanet species.\" _URL_1_\n\nWait But Why has a (very lengthy) article explaining why and how SpaceX will colonize Mars. I haven't read it, but I presume that it goes over the importance of colonizing other worlds to ensure the survival of humanity.\n_URL_0_\n\nThe fact that the Martian surface is naturally inhospitable (e.g. atmospheric composition, temperature range, etc) is fundamentally no more an obstacle than the inhospitable nature of any other unaltered environment here on Earth. Wherever you live now, imagine surviving a year without any technology (this includes protective clothing, tools, etc). Indeed, without *any* technology whatsoever, it's unlikely you'd survive a single day of winter if you live in even a temperate climate zone. One could argue that there is no unaltered environment on Earth that is suitable for long-term human habitation, and there is no settlement of human beings *anywhere* who survive without the aid of technology.\n\nAnother relevant Musk quote: \"Mars is a fixer-upper planet.\"\n\nOur ancestors were pioneers who colonized extremely harsh environments with far more primitive technology, successfully establishing human habitation that continues on to this day. I think it's a safe bet that the same will happen on Mars. Just as before, the first generation of pioneers will be bold, maybe even a little crazy to assume the risk. Just as before, things won't always go smoothly, and maybe people will die (hopefully nothing like the Donner Party incident happens)... But in the end, we'll turn Mars into a second home.",
"To push our limits as a species. See how far we can take this crazy existence. \n\nEither we colonize Mars (with the hope of eventually going even further), or we just sit around on this planet with our dicks in our hands until we get destroyed by nukes or meteors or by the sun when it starts burning helium (we probably won't make it that long).",
"'Cause it's next. 'Cause we came out of the cave and we looked over the hill and we saw fire. And we crossed the ocean and we pioneered the West and we took to the sky. The history of man is hung on a timeline of exploration, and this is what's next.",
"Mars has no magnetosphere to protect it from high-energy particles from the sun.\n\nUntil we figure out how to respin the core of a dead planet, I feel like all the other arguments are moot.\n\nAlso, the gravity is low enough to cause muscle degeneration, bone demineralization, and a host of other deleterious effects on the human body. We're not made for long-term low-grav environments. This may be more solveable, but so far I hadn't heard of any artificial gravity results worth a damn. Sure, in space you can simulate it (to good effect) with rotation, but once you're on the surface of Mars...whatcha gonna spin? A leek?\n\n[eta] Mars has a metal/metallic core, and it's likely still partially liquid. The problem is the silica mantle has solidified, and has no indication of getting back to a liquid state. The dynamo that provides a magnetosphere relies both on a hot rotating metal core, and a not-solid mantle.\n\n",
"ELI5: no matter how long it takes, one day Earth will not sustain life. Time to figure out how to survive elsewhere.",
"Every human being ever has been on earth.\n\nIf we don't leave this place we will have all died here as well.\n\nThat's a lot of eggs in just the one basket.\n\nNone of our neighbor bodies are really good choices, but they are what we have.\n\nRight now it would only take one big explosion to have the decendents of the common shrew wondering about humans the same way we wonder about dinosaurs.",
"ELI5: We are colonizing Mars so we have somewhere to go if/when the Earth becomes inhospitable ",
"Can't see this linked in this thread yet, but this is an amazing answer to the question by Dr. Robert Zubrin who's been advocating going to Mars for decades. \n\n_URL_0_",
"Money.\n\nThe space race made NASA and a whole industry - aerospace - a ton of money. \n\nTo quote Robbie from the Wedding Singer:\n\nRobbie: No, sir, I have no experience but I'm a big fan of money. I like it, I use it, I have a little. I keep it in a jar on top of my refrigerator. I'd like to put more in that jar. That's where Mars Colonization comes in.",
"\"Why are we trying to colonize the Americas?\"",
"We do have to inhabit other planets. The future of the human race is space exploration. The long-term view is that in billions of years, the sun is going to actually grow and encompass the earth.",
"'We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy , but because they are hard\"",
"Doesn't Mars not have a molten core, which means it has no magnetosphere to stop the atmosphere from being blown away by solar winds?",
"To quote John F Kennedy, \"We didn't go to the moon because it was easy. We did it because it was hard.\"",
"Because there's a good chance earth will be largely uninhabitable to humans within the next 200 years. ",
"Have you seen our presidential candidates? I volunteer as tribute!",
"Cause:\n\n1. Earth is overpopulated and we are damaging our own planet. Looking for a suitable new place to take the pressure off Earth would be great.\n2. We want more resources to increase economy and reduce prices. A new planet that we could exploit through mining colonies would help a great deal.\n3. We want to know how to do it so we could save our specie from extinction if any catastrophy would hit Earth. Keeping all the eggs in a single basket is not smart.",
"If you are not convinced after watching this, then nothing will convince you: _URL_0_",
"Since the invention of agriculture, every civilization has struggled with the answer to one question; **What are we going to do with our excess production?**\n\nBefore the invention of agriculture, it took basically everyone in your culture working all the time to survive. \n\nAfter agriculture, a few people could work and provide for everyone. Which meant \"everyone else\" needs something to do.\n\nTypical answers for this question are;\n\n* Build Pyramids\n* Conquer Other People and expand.\n* Explore and expand and conquer any people we find.\n\nHere in America, we've basically picked #2. It doesn't look like it from inside, but 1,000 years from now history books will talk about the Pax Americana and how much money we spent on military bases in other countries and there'll be a sidebar about Cultural Imperialism.\n\nRight now, if you're a young person lacking opportunities in America, you can always sign up for the Military. That's our Cultural Endeavor. It's the thing our nation does to solve the problem of excess production. You can always join the Army.\n\nEven when it looked like we picked #3, it was really #2. Once we were no longer in a race with our military rivals, we stopped. \n\nBut the public didn't really understand \"we're only going to the moon to stop the Russians from getting there and threatening us with Moon-launched nukes.\" This was a real fear. Of course, well before we got to the moon, more sensible people said \"Hey let's just invent ICBMs\" and the idea of a base on the moon having any military application became progressively more ridiculous.\n\nI mean, people cared about beating the Russians, but they fell in love with the idea of just exploring for the sake of exploring.\n\nThere was a lot of language surrounding the Moon Shot deliberately evoking the Wild West and the Discovery of the New World. The people living through the Space Race were in many cases very badly served by the public school system and had been taught and raised to believe the Wild West and the discovery of the New World was about exploring for the sake of exploring, which is completely ridiculous.\n\nBut that's how these folks saw it, and they made TV shows like Star Trek where you can see this insane confusion. Military vessels with military ranks and military weapons whose mission is to...explore. \n\nBecause of this confusion and romanticization of the past, there are generations of Americans who think we **should** be exploring for the sake of exploring. They think, wrongly, we *used* to do that, why did we stop? We should do it again! There's this whole tradition in America now that exploring space is not a means to an end, it's an end unto itself. They think they're descended from explorers.\n\nWhen someone confronts these people and says \"But WHY?\" They aren't comfortable with the truth. They search for answers that somehow make going to Mars seem *practical*. They say \"well look at all the technologies we got out of the Space Race!\"\n\nBut, as Carl Sagan pointed out, that's dumb. If you want the artificial heart, it's orders of magnitude cheaper to just research that, than it is to go to the moon and get artificial hearts as byproducts.\n\nBut people feel like the truth \"Well, we have excess production, gotta do something with it, and this is cooler than a lot of other options\" somehow lacks teeth. It won't get Congress to open its pocketbooks. \n\nThis sort of speaks to another problem which is; the people who are in favor of exploring for the sake of exploring don't pay attention to who their Representative is, or what they stand for, and vote in (or fail to vote out) Representatives who don't think this is a good use of our wealth.\n\nWell, the good news is, we can do it if we want! We're the richest nation in the history of the Earth. We don't have to only pick one on answer to The Question. If we wanted to, we could have the largest military on earth AND go explore Mars just to say we did it.\n\nIt's just a question of doing it.",
"To reinforce the idea this planet is dead and we are dying so lets not pay attention to the atrocities being inflicted on billions of people so a couple of million people can live like kings. So keep shopping folks",
"Read this incredibly detailed (and highly entertaining) piece by Tim Urban at: _URL_0_\n",
"Have to get that dynamo affect going in Mars first. It'd be nice to have a nice little magnetic shield to protect us from the suns radiation.",
"This may be a terrible answer, but the first thing to come to mind for me is George Mallory's answer to the question of why he wanted to climb Mt. Everest: Because it's there. \nI mean, it's a WHOLE PLANET that we can see, that could potentially be explored. Doesn't that make you want to go exploring? \nIn fact, I just googled the whole quote, and the spirit of it is exactly what I see as an essential part of the desire to establish a martian base: \n > Because it's there...Everest is the highest mountain in the world, and no man has reached its summit. Its existence is a challenge. The answer is instinctive, a part, I suppose, of man's desire to conquer the universe.\n",
"I'll try to add an answer I haven't seen. \n\nForget Mars. \n\nCan you imagine a planet somewhere in the universe you'd quite like to go? Perhaps it's all beautiful beach islands. Maybe clothes made of the fabric produced there never needs to be washed. Or the fruit just tastes really damn good. Doesn't matter, just imagine a planet with some advantage over Earth. \n\nHow do you get there? Well first, you must learn to travel through space and colonize planets. Mars is the low hanging fruit. The easiest stepping stone we have. In short, Mars is the gateway to the universe.",
"Other than the space suit bit, you can replace Mars with the new world and today with 1500 and get the same response: people inherently want to explore new places and discover new things; Mars is the natural continuation of that. ",
"Money. It's all money. \n\n1. Resources for rich people to use to make more money\n2. An escape strategy for rich people\n3. Pride to be the first one there, out of all the rich people\n\nI would like to add that if you're poor and plan to remain that way, don't worry about Mars at all. It won't involve you. Don't vote for Trump either. He doesn't give a shit about you. ",
"The only way for the human race to survive past a global extinction-level event is to become a multi-planetary species. \nA permanent presence on our Moon and the nearest semi-habitable planet (Mars) is a necessary first step. \n\nNext is (hopefully) Proxima Centauri B (And I hope that we have good pictures of that in the next 20 years).\nSlow colonization of the rest of the local star systems can then follow. \n\nBasically, humans will either survive until as close to heat death as is physically possible, or will die on this planet.",
"Simple answer: If humans live on 2 separate planets and both are self sustaining it's basically impossible for us to be completely wiped out. \n\nCurrently we're 1 rogue giant asteroid away from being wiped out. Or we could turn into another Venus if greenhouse gasses get out of control. Or world war 3. etc..",
"Studying other planets often gives us a better insight into what is happening on ours. Also developing technologies that are renewable on Mars could benefit us as well. ",
"Why go to the moon? Why go to the Marianas Trench? Why go to Antarctica? Why play Fallout 4 on survival mode?\n\n\nWe do these things not because they are easy. We do them because they are hard.",
"To put it simply: Our technology will keep getting better, and at some point the ease at which we can destroy our own planet will become so prevalent it becomes more and more likely to happen.\n\nHaving ONE planet, and super technology is a bad bet, eventually we are going to screw it up.\n\nWe need to become a multi planetary species BEFORE that happens.",
"I just posted this a little bot ago in another thread, but I'll add it here because it fits so well:\n\"There are a lot of hungry people in the world, Mal, and none of them are hungry 'cause we went to the moon. None of them are colder and certainly none of them are dumber 'cause we went to the moon...'Cause it's next. 'Cause we came out of the cave, and we looked over the hill and we saw fire; and we crossed the ocean and we pioneered the west, and we took to the sky. The history of man is hung on a timeline of exploration and this is what's next.\" -Sam Seaborn talking about going to Mars on The West Wing several years ago.",
"According to what I've read recently, unless some incredibly light-weight, super-effective shielding is invented, travelers to Mars would almost certainly suffer brain damage from cosmic radiation, and probably cancer as well. Who's going to sign up for that?",
"Whatever you think of it, just think of it as another goal for human kind. I think Casey Neistat said without a goal you can't score. That's it really. Humanity needs those impossible but somehow realistic goals that can be achived even tho it is unthinkable hard. This drives innovation. It drives progress. It makes technology and in a way humany takes the next step.\nWithout a goal you can't score. Mars is just the next goal. And goals are important. Very important actually. Think of your own life: not having any dreams or thinks you want to see or achive is pretty depressing. In someway it takes the point of life away. Getting to Mars is pretty much the same except instead of a human life it is on a humanity scale.\nWe need goals. Because the competitive desire to score is what drives us. Without goals life becomes pointless.",
"lots of reasons, on Earth there are a lot of religious stigmas you have to deal with; it'd be a great way to escape overpopulation, persecution and poverty; and people are always complaining about taxation without representation, in a New World, you could setup your own government without those sorts of issues",
"Short answer:\nNot because we need to conquer mars, it's the closest planet and we use it as proof that it can be done, and from it, learn what needs to be done, and learn things we don't even know we don't know.\n\nIt's an experiment, because at some point in the future, the human race WILL have to be a multi planetary species, mars is just testing the waters.",
"Given the harsh environment of Mars, the things we learn about establishing a self-sustaining colony there will allow us to live more efficiently on Earth.\n\nIf we decide to start terraforming Mars, the lessons learned from that will allow us to engineer Earth to suit our needs. Perhaps we will need to do that to survive climate change. Being carbon neutral may not be enough at this point, and we might need to develop ways to be carbon negative, where not only do we emit zero carbon but we also take carbon out of the atmosphere.",
"Economic benefits include aerospace innovations that could enable a new era of transcontinental travel, agricultural methods that could solve logistical practices, uncountable advancements in virtually every field as every aspect of everyday life will need to have some counterpart, etc. \n\nA humanistic approach would save that a safeguard is a vital step towards avoiding our own mortality and the fear of nuclear war and incredible climate change, or even simply a planet scale natural disaster. \n\nA futurist would say that establishing a Mars base is the true first step towards becoming a real extra terrestrial race, and that it opens up opportunities that do not exist on Earth. By reaching Mars we will likely have interstellar bases to avoid the cost of sending all materials out of our own gravity well, and asteroids contain far more accessible material than the Earth. For instance a single large heavy metal asteroid could contain more gold, platinum, etc. than has been mined in the entire history of the world. By orders of magnitudes. \n\nRobotic assembly and mining could lead to an almost post scarcity society in the long term. Human biological secrets may unlock keys to fighting cancer, or even aging. Hypersonic airplanes that can leave the atmosphere could enable a 10 minute flight from New York to London. ",
"The idea is to explore new places and for humans to be able to feel what it might be like to actually be on the planet next door. It's about knowledge. We as humans just want to know what else is out there. \n\nMars does seem a bit boring these days compared to some of the of the gas giant moons like Europa and Titan. Europa and Titan are still mysteries to us. Nevertheless Mars is a much closer and more practical destination for establishing a colony and it's more interesting and exotic than the moon. Consider the entertainment value alone of shaky, handheld video from an astronaut walking around on Mars and hiking to the top of a hill and panning around etc. It's more interesting to watch than rover video.\n\nEuropa basically *requires* a manned mission to do anything really interesting like getting an unmanned vehicle into the ocean there. In a way Europa's ocean is a more human friendly environment than is mars and there might be life there and if there is even single celled life it would tell us a lot of profound things about life in our galaxy.\n\n",
"Not a big Mars fan here. I really believe it will be just another moonshot. We show up 3 or 4 times, leave some trash behind, take our technical innovation and go home.\n\nA much more sustainable strategy is moon colonization. Ben Bova wrote an amazing book on this awhile back called \"Welcome to Moonbase\". It was written as a new employee orientation handbook for someone going to work on the moon and outline the operational details of living, working and playing on the moon (along with relevant economics) using THEN current technology.\n\nThe moon will create wealth and permanent progress. \n\nMars is a one-shot.\n",
"Alightly off topic question, what would be the rate of evolutionary change while maintaining life as a species on Mars?",
"To recreate a society like the one in Total Recall. You know space bars and girls with three boobies. It could be an adventure of a lifetime!",
"Plot twist!! Were in a huge game of civilization on a universal scale! Were just one of many intelligent societies all around the universe, none of which can be sure if they are alone or not. The best move is to be the first and fastest to expand!!",
"To quote James Tiberius Kirk (quoting ~~Sir Edmund Hillary~~George Mallory): \"Because it's there.\"\n\nThat is to say, humans are innately curious. It's what brought us down from the trees millennia ago. It's what pushed us to domesticate crops and animals so that we would have more time to think and create. When you were a baby, you learned about the world by experiencing it: you rolled over to see what was behind you, you crawled across the room to learn what that block felt like when you put it in your mouth, you ran across the yard to pet a dog. Exploration is woven into our very DNA.\n\nYou ask why we want to go to Mars? Because it's the most basic of human drives.",
"So I cant take credit for this, it was submitted by someone in response to a question of why the average person should care about the discovery of gravity waves. We can talk about the practical implications all day but to me there is something more primal about it, and this sums it up perfectly.\n\n\n > Imagine you woke up naked in a field, in the middle of nowhere. You have no idea where you are, or how you got there. What do you do? First, you'd probably go into survival mode; you'd look for the basic necessities to sustain life: water, food, and shelter from the elements.\n\n > Once you had everything you needed to stay alive, and you knew that, if nothing else, you could at least remain in your current location indefinitely, you might start to wonder what in the hell happened: one minute you're bouncing around Reddit, the next you're bare-ass in the middle of nowhere.\n\n > After you come to grips with the reality of the situation, you'd probably want to try and figure out where in the hell you are. You might try and look for clues from your environment or maybe a constellation you recognize, or perhaps you decide to do a little exploring around the immediate area, to see if there's anything around that could give you some clue as to where in the hell you are.\n\n > Let's say that your efforts reveal that you're in the middle of Africa. Once you've figured out where you are, you only have two choices left: stay there and simply exist as long as you can, or attempt to get back to civilization; either option has it's own risks.\nIf you chose to stay where you are, then that's essentially it for you, you now know how your future will play out: you'll remain at your current location until you either die of old age, or your area becomes unable to sustain life. Either way, the game is over for you; your entire existence becomes about survival, and you're just running out the clock until, at some point in the future, you cease to exist.\n\n > Maybe you decide to try and leave a message for someone to find in the future, maybe you're content to simply fade off into oblivion, either way, your fate is sealed.\n\n > Now let's say you decided to try and get back to civilization. Since you know where you are, your logical next step is going to be to try and figure out someplace to go, and then of course, how to get there. Now you have a goal, something you're striving towards. Life ceases to be about mere survival and becomes an epic journey to get you where you want to go.\n\n > This is the timeline of humanity. We woke up with nothing, on a little rock, in the middle of nowhere. We figured out how to survive, and we struggled to come to grips with our own reality. Then we started exploring, trying to find out just exactly where we were in the Universe. Now we're faced with the same choice: exist, or move on.\n\n > You ask if it's something that a \"regular guy REALLY needs to know\", to me it's the most important thing he/she needs to know: that humanity chooses more than an existence of mere survival. That humanity chooses to move forward and keep exploring and expanding. To know that, even though we might never make it, at least we're making the effort. That we have hope.\nThe alternative is to simply run out the clock and wait to fade off into oblivion.",
"Because science is not about \"why\", it's about \"why not?\"",
"In the history of earth, there have been five major species extinction events, the last one being the extinction of dinosaurs.\nThere is a possibility that the human race can go extinct due to any such event in the future. That is why Elon Musk wants humanity to become a multi-planetary species.",
"Remember that time, when you were a kid and you rode your bike too far? Like farther than before and you probably weren't supposed to bc Mom, and you thought - no way, we'll never make it back but you did. And along the way you saw some cool shit, learned some new things and found a 7-11? It's kind of like that.",
"We choose to go to mars. \n\nWe choose to go to the mars in the next decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.",
"Seriously? Humanity is like a word document on your PC. You are one hard drive crash away from never existing. We need redundancy more than pretty much any other thing we could accomplish.",
"Someday earth will be destroyed. Maybe in a few billion years the sun will eat it. Or maybe sooner one of a variety of terrestrial mega-disasters will end life as we know it. If we want to not die when that happens, we need to get good at leaving earth, and living on places that aren't earth. Mars is an opportunity to try to get good at leaving earth and living on a place that isn't earth.",
"Because someday, humanity will be forced to leave this planet. And this is our first practice run.\n\nIf we don't know how to survive on other planets, humanity will become extinct. It's a Integral part of long term survival.",
"A few reasons. \n\n#1 Not dying. \n\nThere are many interstellar and regular calamities that could wipe out all life on earth. It's happened several times in the past already.\n\n#2 A good space race is an investment. \n\nEvery dollar spent on space exploration results in $7-$14 of economic growth.\n\n#3 It's a good mining opportunity. Earth has very strong gravity, so launching stuff to space is very expensive but Mars' gravity is very low, so sending cargo from Mars to Earth is crazy cheap.\n\nFor comparison a Saturn V rocket can send about 1.3% of its weight to another planet due to our gravity. That same rocket launched from Mars can send 62% of it's cargo to another planet, a 50x efficiency increase. Which works out to about $20 per pound with current technology. If you take technology into development into account it would cost as much to ship something from Mars to Earth as it would to send it by airplane across the world now. If you wanted to have any kind of mineral or product shipped to Earth from Mars it might be as expensive to drop it from orbit from Mars as it would be to ship it from China. \n\n#4 The climate of Mars isn't as bad as it seems average temperatures don't paint a good picture. In the warmest regions it's warmer than the colder bases we already have in Alaska. A few centuries of terraforming could make it have a climate more livable than many locations already inhabited on Earth.",
"Because humans explore and push boundaries. Because as a species if we want to continue on past the next major extinction event we will need to be fully functional in space. \n\nJust for reference. Only ten thousand years ago north America was covered in a mile high sheet of ice. This is not a permanently habitable planet. \n\nTo escape the cylons when our AI becomes to intelligent. ",
"I believe it is absolutely crutial to human existence carrying on indefinitely. Once we take that first step and colonize another planet then we are slowly but surely on our way to intergalactic colonization. It may take one hundred generations but if we start at Mars we may one day be able to travel at near the speed of light. We could even launch lower speed colonies who mission is to travel space while repopulating so we could extend voyages for multiple generations and possible hundreds if not thousands of years. We have the capability so it is our duty to carry on not only human life but whatever life we can possibly bring with us. And the first step is leaving earth and colonizing somewhere else. Life on earth is far more precious than we realize in our grind it out day to day lives but it could be swept away at any moment. I suppose the entire Galaxy or universe could abruptly end also in which case we are totally f*cked but the odds of that happening vs only Earth or only our Sun abruptly coming to an end or becoming uninhabitable favor the later scenario. \n\nI am basing this opinion off of absolutely nothing scientific and solely off my stoned imagination.",
"1- Because it's there\n\n2- We've already been to the moon\n\n3- We already have a space station that has been continuously inhabited for over 10 years.\n\n4- Venus is too difficult\n\n\n\nETA- Space exploration is just a fun hobby for billionaires like Musk and Richard Branson. I like to climb mountains and can afford to spend $500 on gear. Musk likes to fly to space and can afford to dream a little bigger than me.",
"Because we can't do it yet. If humans didn't constantly push the boundaries of what we are capable of as a species we would still be living in caves. Why stagnate now?",
"Perhaps the most important reason for us to be a multi-planet species is the preservation of our species. Life on earth can end in many disastrous ways, we need to start taking steps in terraforming mars. We need to ensure the long-term continuation of our species and our earthly evolutionary branch. \n\nWe possess thousands of nuclear warheads capable of occasioning an existential catastrophe, and we are at the liberty of a fairly fragile global ecosystem with limited resources. Beyond that, our being confined to this single planet means that a single asteroid collision or some other unforeseen cataclysmic event could wipe out our entire species and potentially all intelligent life on Earth.\n\nWe have a serious existential risk. I think those that oppose Musk's view on being a multi-planetary species just don't understand how a sentient species should evolve in our cosmos. Think of that for a moment: Trillions, quadrillions of potential human and post-human beings will never taste this existence unless we ensure the continuation of our evolutionary branch. \n\nDon’t get me wrong: I think it is tremendously important for us to address global poverty, the refugee crisis, human trafficking/slavery, industrial farming, various environmental crises, etc. But those issues won’t matter at all if all intelligent life in the biosphere is obliterated.",
"Why do (most) people not live with their parents their entire life? Whats the point in moving out?\n\nEarth is the womb and we have to leave.\n\nAeons from now people will be amazed that we used to be confined to one planet, and some people wanted to keep it that way. Madness!\n\n",
"Because it was prophetized in the documentary series Babylon 5 and we have an obligation to fulfill it.\n\nTL;DR\nIt's a stepping stone to explore and colonize further. Achieving it would require new technological advances and innovations that would benefit the humans on Earth.",
"Because we can! Colonization is a giant step forward in making a space fairing society and some brilliant people are throwing their might against that step. Mars would also serve as a better spaceport than Earth because it take a little under half the energy to take off. Also, there exists the possibility of terraforming mars to be more suitable for humans so maybe we wouldn't have to wear full space suits and could get away with just oxygen masks or maybe even just breathing the air. ",
"No offense man, but try to see a bigger picture outside of your glimpse of a lifespan. Before Space, there was the Atlantic Ocean. No one believed land could be found in the vastness of open water. Yet here we are, one massive continent later. Mars is a stepping stone, just as the moon was. We proved we could put a man on the moon and return him home. Now we are trying to take it a step further. Our tiny existence is threatened by so many factors uncontrollable. To be able to terraform, colonize, and travel between planets, systems, galaxies... It will help to ensure our chances of survival for our posterity. Sure we could be content in our little wood boxes, but where's the fun or imagination in that?",
"What is the point of going to Mars? Survival.\n\nAs long as we stay bound to one planet, we run the small, but very real risk of experiencing an extinction event. Which type of catastrophe might do us in is fairly unimportant. What is important is that sooner or later, our luck will run out.\n\nMars (I would actually prefer Venus) is a first step towards spreading out among the stars, so that a single event cannot kill us all at once.\n\nThis is the ultimate reason. ",
"[This](_URL_0_) article explains the need to leave Earth pretty good, but if you don't want to read it all, the quote that made the point for me goes like this:\n\n > Picture the Earth as a kind of hard drive. And on this hard drive we have saved everything. Every song. Every book. Every thought that has been thought and every word that has been uttered. Every memory.\n\n > And that’s not all: It also houses every single species. All of it is stored in a word document saved on that hard drive.\n\n > Oh, and the hard drive has broken before, and when it happened, we lost nearly everything. It got a virus and…that’s it, two-thirds of the population gone. It smashed into something and, alas, there goes another batch of data.\n\n > Blank pages. File corrupted.\n\n > So it makes sense to make a backup. As Urban puts it, “Now—if you owned a hard drive with an extraordinarily important Excel doc on it, and you knew that the hard drive pretty reliably tended to crash every month or two, with the last crash happening five weeks ago—what’s the very obvious thing you’d do? You’d copy the document onto a second hard drive.” \n\nWhy Mars? Well, as others pointed out, it's the least deadly planet within our reach. Basically our training ground for interstellar travel.",
"I am going to answer your question with one my wife's hot but not so smart friend asked: If we bring back all these minerals from mars wont it make Earth heavier and if so wouldn't our orbit slow down? I had to walk away... but colonizing mars for mankind is like taking a step out of our safety zone. I bet you science and space travel will EXPLODE once we set up even a small base on Mars. Once we start sending people ou their for jobs everyone will be gunning for faster and more efficient engines making mars travel much more lucrative and cheaper and one day our childrens children will travel to and from Mars like e do going from Western to Eastern hemisphere. Wish I would be alive for the day when the entire SOL system is colonized. ",
"I'm going to take a somewhat different tack in answering this question.\n\nWhat I notice from a lot of the usual Mars efforts is that they seem to not necessarily be 100% conscientious of the ethical dilemmas surrounding colonizing Mars. Robert Walker makes the case very well in his many very well-developed posts on Science 2.0:\n\n_URL_0_\n\nBasically what is one of the big problems _and_ big boons of Mars is it may contain its own native life forms. This is simultaneously both a big carrot to wanting to explore it _and_ a big caution flag when it comes to colonizing it.\n\nThe trouble is that a human body contains a zillion microbes. In fact there are more microbes by cell count than there are human eukaryote cells. And these microbes may be much tougher than the latter type of cells.\n\nIf bodies are put on the surface, some of those microbes will inevitably leak, no matter how careful we are. And any such leak would likely be totally invisible. Even a tiny leakage of a tiny proportion of the total microbial complement of one human body could be in the millions of cells. And it takes just one of those cells finding a survivable niche to potentially put it in competition against any native Martian life forms.\n\nI believe that if we are as humans to embrace the \"better angels of our nature\" as Steven Pinker called them, we should take a conscientious tack to approaching Mars. Elon Musk seems convinced there's no life on Mars, but the current state of research to me looks like there's actually a shit load of unresolved questions and there are others with more expertise than I in the field who think the same way.\n\nHowever ultimately this is not a reason to _not_ go to Mars. On the contrary, I believe it is perhaps a truly great reason to go and go _the right way_. There are ways we could do it -- one option that I like would be using telepresence robotics, that is, putting humans in orbit, not on the Mars surface, to control super-sophisticated robots that could do far more science than ones controlled from Earth and limited by light propagation time and communication bandwidth constraints could do. With such options we could have an intense research program that would settle a lot of the unknowns and then provide a roadmap for any colonization plans, e.g. we could perhaps totally refute the existence of life, or if it exists then discover it and study its interaction with native Earth microbes to see if there'd really be a danger, and then we'd have far more information to figure out how to colonize.\n\nWhy is this a great reason? Because by doing a mission like this with _this_ kind of thinking animating it and not just baser thinking based on simple calculi of profitability or human survival, we would be exercising an opportunity to practice the kind of thinking that all the wise among humans cherish and that is truly in our long-term interest (that is, the thinking of responsibility and ethical conscientiousness), and furthermore given that to really pursue Mars seriously is a job that will almost certainly need cooperation from across our world, an awesome opportunity to actually unite humanity around a common cause embodying the absolute best of our being and full of so much potential for the future of not only our species, but many others as well.\n\nTHAT is why I think we should be going to Mars. We can elevate human consciousness to a new level by doing so.\n\n(Yes, I am aware that many of big Mars moguls don't think this way. I think that a pitiful shame.)\n",
"Because right now the universe is full of stones being thrown about, and only one bird we know of. ",
"Why do people want to climb mountains ?",
"Why did the first humans move away from whatever plain they found themselves on and cross those treacherous mountains to see what was on the other side?\n\nWhy did Europeans cross the oceans to find America, India, Australia?\n\nBecause it's there. Because we're explorers. Becasue we need to know, to learn, to discover, to grow.",
"My favorite show of all time is Babylon 5. In it, the commander of the titular space station, Jeffrey Sinclair, is told by a reporter that people back in Earth are questioning why we humans stay on the station and explore space, told that many think we should redirect those resources to problems back on Earth. The reporter asks him if they should do that. Here's his answer, which is exactly the answer I'd give to your question:\n\n\"No. We have to stay here. And there's a simple reason why. Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics, and you'll get ten different answers, but there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on. Whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand years or a million years, eventually our Sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us. It'll take Marilyn Monroe, and Lao-Tzu, and Einstein, and Morobuto, and Buddy Holly, and Aristophanes, and - all of this - all of this - was for nothing. Unless we go to the stars.\"\n\nMars is the first baby step to achieving what Sinclair is talking about and given that the danger isn't just the Sun going out... it's also asteroid impacts and nuclear war and disease and any of the hundred other things that can wipe us out at any moment... we can't delay, we've got to get going NOW. ",
"Because we believe in miracles, and have money to fund them. \n\nSo far we have not put enough thought into it\n\nThink about actually establishing a colony on Mars. How would we dispose of waste?\n\nWhat would be the first animal we bring with us from Earth\n in the pre-industrial era it was the horse. \n\nNow I think it's down to the chicken the pig or the dog.\n\nThe chicken because it provides food in two ways. meat or eggs.\n\nThe pig because it's skin, and internal organs are also useful the only useless part of the pig is the squeal! Everything else is good for something.\n\nThe dog, because it can provide companionship, threat detection and guarding and search and rescue for any members that get lost.\n\nSoooooo we have so much advance work to do before we can ever colonize Mars We can launch a couple of missions there within 25-30 years the way we sent missions to the moon. To come, land safely, accomplish a certain schedule of things and leave, but that's a long way from the pipe dream of colonizing Mars. We didn't seriously attempt to colonize the moon. , and it's unlikely that we will any time soon.",
"Because how can we hope to go further into space if we dont even know if we can reach whats in front of us"
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35ltcn | why does licking a seemingly dead pen make the pen able to write again? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35ltcn/eli5_why_does_licking_a_seemingly_dead_pen_make/ | {
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"Pens are a chamber with ink in it and a steel ball jammed in a tight-fitting tube at the lower end. When you write, the ball turns, \"rolling\" the ink onto the paper, then rotating up into the ink supply to bring more down.\n\nPens with ink still in them often get jammed up if unused for a while because a crust forms on the outer part of the roller ball that prevents it from turning. Try to write with it, and you just scrape the ball along without it rotating in its little tube.\n\nWhen you lick it, you're giving that roller ball a tiny bit of extra lubrication that overcome that jammed friction and can help it start rolling again. This unclogs the dried-ink jam, and allows the ball to turn and bring down fresh ink."
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15hpov | why isn't a zip code enough when entering an address, why must i give my state, city and zip code? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/15hpov/why_isnt_a_zip_code_enough_when_entering_an/ | {
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"ZIP codes are delivery points or zones for the United States Postal Service. There are commonly multiple cities (and sometimes more than one state) in each zone. The state and city further break down the location as the rest of the street address does.",
"Actually Zip code is enough. Some systems will ask for only your zip code and street address.",
"I'd assume it's a 2nd check for incorrect zip codes... IE: If you're sending a letter to Scruff McGruff in Chicago, IL 60652, and accidentally mix up your 5's and 6's and send it to Scruff McGruff Chicago, IL 50562, (Which is the zip code for Mallard, IA) they can say \"Chances are, it was meant to go to Chicago, rather than Mallard, Iowa.\" And would therefore reduce \"return to senders\". ",
"Another reason is Tax, some times different cities within same zip code charge different rate of tax. To make things complex some companies/organizations have special status (for tax purposes e.g. tax exempt) in some city that is not applicable to whole zip code.",
"A 9 digit ZIP code is indeed enough. A 5 digit ZIP code can span multiple cities.\n\nHowever, a 5 digit ZIP code is probably enough, because to my knowledge every case where a 5 digit ZIP code spans multiple cities, one of the cities is a USPS-valid alternative city to the actual city. For example, I live in city A, and my 5-digit ZIP code spans cities A, B, and C, but I can put either city A (my city) or city B (the main city in the area) as the city in my mailing address, and both are considered valid.\n\nAs a bit of extra trivia, the ZIP code now includes an extra two digits called the delivery point (which uniquely identifies your address), so the ZIP code is technically 11 digits. However, that's never written in the ZIP code and is instead only in the bar code printed on the bottom of the envelope.",
"Just for fun, I sent a letter to myself with no return address information.\n\nI only addressed the letter to [my last name] with no address but my zip+4. It was delivered without any delay.",
"I'm in Australia, my postcode covers three suburbs.",
"I can imagine there could be cases where two small towns next to each other share a zip code and each have a \"1 Main Street\". Does anyone know if this can't be true? ",
"Cause a lot of cities have more than one zip code and some zip codes cover multiple cities. ",
"Recently I was an idiot and sent myself a package with an incorrect zip code. Thanks to the redundant city and state, I was actually able to receive the package anyway, even though I couldn't reach the shipping company to correct the problem due to the holiday rush.\n\nBesides 30 pounds of steel cubes wandering around a nearby city for a day, I received my package without incident. I suspect this is why they require it!\n\nCheers,\n\n-Dirk",
"I work at a museum, and when we take mailing addresses to send people their membership cards, we take the ZIP code and the computer enters the city and state. Some of us verify the city, but it's not really necessary, because the mail will get there anyway, and both sides of the transaction know it.",
"Actually you don't have to put the city and state if you put the zip code. Write the street address then make sure you displace the zip code so that it can still make it through the mail sorter.",
"I always wondered why time has to be in AM and PM. Why not just A and P. Because this bugs me, I always write time out as 7:15P or 11:21A. I refuse to put the \"M\" because we already fucking know it's \"M\". Until I glance at the time and it says \"3:41 AW\" I refuse to acknowledge the \"M\". ",
"Hello,\n\nI design the interfaces to systems that ask you for your city, state and ZIP. The reason we ask for all 3 is that none of them are a unique identifier. Some ZIP codes span two states. Cities contain many ZIP codes, etc.\n\nThe three bits of data combined are a reliable unique identifier.",
"it would really suck if you had a typo in your zip-only address",
"Former corporate mail manager here.\n\nZIP (Zone Improvement Plan) Codes were introduced in the '70s to speed the sorting and delivery of mail. Prior to this, all mail was sorted entirely by hand, and alphabetically. The ZIP Code makes it easier and faster to sort. Here's how the Code actually works:\n\nThe first digit represents one of ten broad delivery regions around the country. Most of the Northeast is 0, for example.\n\nThe next two digits specify a central sorting facility within that area. Triple-digit stations sort mail for regions about the size that you could drive across in a couple hours or so. (All of Greater New Haven, for example, is handled by the 065 station. Most of central Connecticut by the 064 station, Hartford area by 061, and so on.) These stations are assigned by volume, not according to geography. As a federal entity, USPS needn't adhere to state and municipal boundaries, instead emphasising efficiency across state and local borders.\n\nThe last two digits represent the specific local office that handles your 'local' mail. 06511, for example, is the Elm Street Station in central New Haven. 0 = Northeast; 065 = Brewery Street sorting station; 06511 = Elm Street Station.\n\nSo, the ZIP Code is really only good enough to get the mail *near* you, not *to* you. ZIP+4 is used to specify carrier routes, but not specific drop points. (What USPS calls the 'point of surrender'.) Rather, that is specified in the line above, where you usually put a street address. (Any *subsidiary* routing, where a postman would physically surrender a mailpiece, should be appended to that line. Any *internal* routing done by someone else, such as internal boxes or mailstops, should be written above it, since they are not the postman's purview.)\n\nIt's not necessarily possible to create and use a code that's that precise, for a number of reasons. One is that local addresses can and do change. You might not notice it, but it goes on all the time. Local authorities assign street addresses, not USPS. So USPS can't get a lot more specific than, \"This station delivers the mail,\" and the rest the local station sorts out through ongoing communication with recipients and local authorities. Another is that such a code, even if it were feasible, would have to be a lot longer; that's not impossible, but it would place constraints on how mail is addressed, the use of labels, and so on -- details that have been sorted out over many years, and would then have to be changed all over again.\n\nThat's actually why we use two-letter state codes. Three-letter codes would have been preferable, but it was feared they might not fit on mailing labels. It was decided that two letters was good enough, even though it puts a higher learning curve on mailers.\n"
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28d5f6 | how does putting black charcoal marks below your eyes help you see better in sunlight? | Like the classic football player, hunter, or soldier look with the thick black lines drawn below their eyes. How does it help? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/28d5f6/eli5_how_does_putting_black_charcoal_marks_below/ | {
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"It reduces glare from light reflected under your eye and then into the eye.\nIt's like standing in the sand, the glare from the sand makes it harder to see.",
"Myth Busters did a segment on this. It does not work without a hat with cover over the eyes. But when you are wearing a ball cap the light that would bounce off of your upper cheek is absorbed by the dark colors.\n",
"Objects that are the color black absorb nearly 100% of the light that comes in contact with their surface. Putting black under your eyes reduces the light in your eyes because it eliminates all the light that reflects from that area into your eyes",
"mythbusters tested this - i think they found that a 'skin' colour foundation type substance works better for reducing glare than charcoal does. Sorry that it doesn't answer your question i just thought it was relevant to the question.",
"You'll notice many white or silver aircraft have a black or dark-coloured patch just forward of the pilot's seat for the same reason. \n\nFor example this P-51 Mustang:\n\n_URL_0_"
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2m3loj | how come some countries' currency cannot be exchanged like incidentally mine (tunisia) | So I know that it has something to do with the monetary value of a certain currency but other than that I just don't get it ,since this restricts lots of people from purchasing online | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2m3loj/eli5_how_come_some_countries_currency_cannot_be/ | {
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"Exchanging currency isn't really 'exchanging currency', it's selling your money like selling anything else. In order to 'convert' CAD to USD for example I must find someone willing to pay me in USD for my CAD. \n\nIf I can't find a buyer then I can't convert the money in exactly the same way if I can't find someone to buy my car then I can't convert my car into money.\n\nIf nobody is willing to buy your TND right now, nor are they willing to accept it as payment, then unfortunately you just can't do business."
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1nb79t | how can the ups trademark the color brown? | I got an email from UPS letting me know about the exciting innovations they're making in the realm of shipping. At the bottom, the following caught my eye:
©2013 United Parcel Service of America, Inc. UPS, the UPS brandmark, and the color brown are
trademarks of United Parcel Service of America, Inc. All rights reserved.
How is it possible for them to trademark a color? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1nb79t/eli5_how_can_the_ups_trademark_the_color_brown/ | {
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"Cadbury also trademark the colour purple. I'm guessing it's only that specific shade and is only trade marked to delivery companies or chocolate. ",
"They actually trademarked Pullman Brown, and the limitations of the trademark are likely to prevent other shipping companies from using the same color, this is to prevent market confusion. "
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7ppmj8 | how does buying us treasury bills help in keeping chinese yuan low? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7ppmj8/eli5_how_does_buying_us_treasury_bills_help_in/ | {
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"If China spends yuan to buy dollars (which you have to do because T-Bills are sold in dollars), this increases the supply of available yuan and decreases the supply of available dollars. Due to the free market, this drives down the price of yuan and drives up the price of dollars."
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2lkv2t | i wipe my bottom very well until the tp comes back clean - without fail 20 minutes later i have to "re-wipe" - what the hell is going on? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2lkv2t/eli5_i_wipe_my_bottom_very_well_until_the_tp/ | {
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"Your anus has two sphincters. When you're done and later have to wipe again, it's because the one that is deeper inside you relaxed slightly and some poo trickled down. Probably happens to everyone to some degree. Eat more fiber.",
"There is current research that suggest it is to do with your toilet posture. Look at this video as it gives a great break down. [Toilet posture.](_URL_0_)",
"Chase TP with baby wipes or use a bidet.",
"I don't actually know what's going on, but I had this problem for a while and casually mentioned it to my doctor at a routine checkup. He suggested it was actually issues with my gut and recommended taking black walnut capsules and morinda supplements (I think that was the name of it, I'm at work so I can't check right now). Problem went away after only a couple days. \n\nEdit: Just to clarify-this is something that worked for me, I am in no way implying that these supplements are the cure-all of ass disease everywhere or any other ailment.",
"It's because you are wiping away the poo on your butt, the TP is absorbing the moisture as you wiping, leaving behind dry poo that won't wipe away any more.\n\nSo when you walk around for 30 minutes or sit, with your butt cheeks together, they release moisture and re-moistening the dried poop you left behind, giving you mud butt.",
"Bro, it's called a bidet. Once you go bidet, you don't go back.",
"Definitely try most wipes before you go running to the doctor thinking you have gut issues. They're seriously a game-changer.",
"I have two tips for you:\n\n1: Switch to baby wipes. Trust me. Wipe with regular paper until you think you're clean, and then try a baby wipe. You would be shocked how much poo is left. Get the flushable ones.\n\n2: Get inside the hole a little. Put your finger into the paper/wipe like you're making a little ghost puppet (ooOOOOohh, spooky) and put your finger into your butthole a little bit, moving it in small, tight circles to get the edges. \n\n",
"Credentials: I'm a Medical Device Rep who teaches physicians hemorridal treatment and perianal care all around the country. \n\nIMHO, you probably have enlarged internal hemorrhoids. As the internal tissue prolapses in to the anal canal, that tissue sort of acts like a \"wick,\" allowing remaining stool from the rectal vault to slide along it and deposit on the outside. There are nonsurgical approaches to treating hemorrhoids and I would suggest looking into those.\n\nFYI I'm usually taking wet wipes away from patients, as that can lead to secondary yeast infections (the yeastie beasties love the dark warm moist environment). Excessive soaping is also harmful, as that area is normally an acidic environment and soap is a base which alkalinizes the area and further can lead to itching. If you must use wet wipes, I'd suggest taking toilet paper afterwards and patting the area dry. ",
"Many people here forget where it all starts: what you eat. If you increase your roughage intake, or take daily fiber supplements, you should see a drastic reduction or out right end to your issues. ",
"Get yourself one of [these](_URL_0_). Problem solved!\n",
"You need to dab up in your butthole a little further, there is still a bit of poo there. trust me I asked this same question to a friend not a month ago. I have been rewipe free for the past month. ",
"Eat some toilet paper after every meal. It will auto-wipe after you poop. Or take fiber supplements. Every dump will be a \"one wipe charlie.\"",
"Shit in the morning before the shower. Wipe and then finish off in the shower. ",
"It is because with dry toilet paper you are only cleaning the surface area of your buttock and the external part of your anus. Fecal matter (i.e. crap) still exist in the rectum and when you walk and move this fecal matter is squeezed out of the anus onto your bottom. This is very apparent after you do some exercise that involves full body movement like biking/spinning or running. You will notice an unwelcoming deposit on your undergarment (i.e. hash marks or the larger Hersey Kiss). A bidet helps with this since you are cleaning your private area with a water steam instead of dried paper. Another solution is training yourself to go to the bathroom first thing in the morning and cleaning yourself more thoroughly (slightly internally) during your bath time.",
"You gotta whipe the shit that's in your asshole, not just around it. Drape the toilet paper over one finger and insert to the intermediate phalanges. It will come back dirty at first, this is called the shitty ghost. Do it until it comes back clean. If you really want to get all the shit that is circumferentially lining the inside of your asshole, when your finger is in there, clench your asshole tight around your finger as you extract it, so the poop all gets scraped out."
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a89i5x | how do you doctors diagnose bacterial/viral illness? | I.E. Ebola etc. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a89i5x/eli5_how_do_you_doctors_diagnose_bacterialviral/ | {
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"Clinically, some bacterial/viral illnesses have very distinguishing features that give you a hunch towards what the disease may be caused from. Symptoms such as a certain rash, whether there is a fever, whether there is any pus, etc., point you in the direction of viral, bacterial, or even fungal infection.\n\nIf you think it's a bacteria, or fungus, you can sample it (from blood, urine, wound, etc) and allow it to grow or \"culture\". From there microbiologists can perform different tests on the bacteria that grow to determine which species it is and which antibiotics/antifungals are best for fighting them off (known as determining the bacteria's sensitivities). \n\nIf you believe it's viral you often don't need to pursue it any further (especially if we're talking about a respiratory or sinus infection) as you often just treat the patient's symptoms until the virus resolves. However, there are a few instances in which you need to determine the exact virus for treatment. In those cases, you would also similarly sample it (blood, CSF/fluid around your brain and spinal cord, cervix, etc.) and perform fancy biochemical tests to determine what type of viral strain it is. ",
"There are many signs and symptoms that would lead someone to think there was infection present e.g. fever, fatigue, vomiting etc.\n\nThere are some quick ways to hint towards either virus or bacteria, but we can never know truly without either taking a blood sample, sputum sample, urine sample or tissue sample. We then see what we can grow in a lab.\n\n A centor score, is a tool used to help identify whether a sore throat requires antibiotics (and is therefore bacterial) This includes checking whether there is: fever, sore glands, absence of a cough, and white pus in the throat. If all of these were present for example, I would suspect it would be very likely to be bacterial. \n\nThere are many such scoring systems and tools for help distinguishing between the different pathogens.",
"Some viruses or bacterias we have tests for, like strep throat or the flu. For these, they take a small sample, like by rubbing a cotton swab on your throat for strep, and then use a machine to see if the stuff on the swab includes the bacteria. Some things we know by the symptoms, like a virus called roseola that causes a very high fever followed by a specific rash. For most things you go to the doctor for, like a stuffy nose, they guess by how long it hangs around; if it’s still there after a couple of weeks, they assume it’s bacterial and prescribe antibiotics because your body would have beaten the virus by then and having all that mucus makes a nice home for bacteria to move in.",
"You specifically mentioned Ebola. Not a very common issue in the western world, so I had to look it up. Here's what the CDC says:\n\n > Diagnosing Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) shortly after infection can be difficult. Early symptoms of EVD such as fever, headache, and weakness are not specific to Ebola virus infection and often are seen in patients with other more common diseases, like malaria and typhoid fever.\n\n > To determine whether Ebola virus infection is a possible diagnosis, there must be a combination of symptoms suggestive of EVD AND a possible exposure to EVD within 21 days before the onset of symptoms. An exposure may include contact with:\n\n > blood or body fluids from a person sick with or who died from EVD objects contaminated with blood or body fluids of a person sick with or who died from EVD infected fruit bats and primates (apes or monkeys)semen from a man who has recovered from EVD\n\n > If a person shows early signs of EVD and has had a possible exposure, he or she should be isolated (separated from other people) and public health authorities notified. Blood samples from the patient should be collected and tested to confirm infection. Ebola virus can be detected in blood after onset of symptoms, most notably fever. It may take up to three days after symptoms start for the virus to reach detectable levels. A positive laboratory test means that Ebola infection is confirmed. Public health authorities will conduct a public health investigation, including tracing of all possibly exposed contacts.\n\nThis is common with a number of illnesses. The patient's history of events and symptoms prior to showing up for treatment are extremely important in directing the likely source. A physical exam may give further information. Blood tests and imaging are used to confirm or refute our concerns.\n\n",
"Bacteria mainly by cultivating them on a plate and then by identifying the exact strain with additional tests.\n\nViruses are often classified by biochemical test methods like ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay), antigen-antibody testing and genetic test methods.\n\n_URL_0_ "
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6ya0dj | why do we rely on donations from the public for disaster relief? isn't this the government's responsibility? | We pay taxes so the government can protect its people. Shouldn't the government be able to fully fund disaster relief without relying on contributions from the general public? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ya0dj/eli5_why_do_we_rely_on_donations_from_the_public/ | {
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"Yeah that's true, but private charities require donations to survive. Thus when a disaster hits charities go for donation drives and ask for money, part which will go towards disaster relief and part of which will go towards administrative costs that keep the charity afloat. \n\nPeople want to help others during hard times, so that's when they contribute to said charities. \n\nGovernment has no complaints since they save money in the end.",
"with a lot of donations. not all of them mind you, but a lot of donations, a lot of people make a lot of money, it is quite a lucrative business model.\n\nalso, that is incorrect, we do not pay taxes so the government can protect its people, the government protects the interests of the people(which is very different though it does end up with the same results sometimes), when the government fails to protect the people you have NO legal right to sue them for failure to do so, because they do not legally have to protect people. unfortunately though it has become popular to believe that it is the governments job. ",
"No, because if they did people would build in flood zones all the time for the pretty views.\n\nIf you know that Hurricanes and Earthquakes are possible, and if you don't we have science class for that, then you should be buying insurance. Admittedly, companies may be uncomfortable since they don't have the risk science, so having FEMA draw maps makes sense because commerce depends on everyone having the same facts. \n\nGovernment should pay for infrastructure, repairs to public property, and they're unlikely to find underwriting for that so funding it themselves with emergency legislation is probably the only solution.\n\nThe Government does not protect people from spending their money foolishly on a Gulf beach house, this is life in a free country. Such owners need insurance for that. The government protects you from not having a road in front of your house, because the government owns all the roads.",
"Well, why is that the government's responsibility? And which government--for instance, why should the federal government be involved in a disaster that's only in Texas? And how much should the government provide? You may think it more efficient that the government act as a kind of public insurer than for people to rely on private insurance, for instance, and you might think the federal government is better at that than state governments. These are still *political choices*.\n\nThe idea of \"fully funding\" disaster relief doesn't quite make sense, because there are many different forms of disaster relief. You have to decide specifically what money should be spent on and what should not. There is a federal flood insurance program, and there is emergency aid, and your taxes pay for that. But there are other things the government does not pay for, and which charitable organizations wish to provide, and they ask for your voluntary contribution. There are even be losses due to disaster that no one is interested in compensating; the individual has to bear the burden. Every community will decide for itself what that balance is between the government, charitable and individual burden.",
"Public = government. They're essentially one in the same except in order for disaster relief to get to the victims from the government we have to send money to Washington where it filters through a bunch of other pockets and then finally is used for actual relief.\n\nPublic donations have the potential to be much more effective because they can avoid all of the cost of bureaucracy and send a greater percentage of the money directly to the victims.",
" > Shouldn't the government be able to fully fund disaster relief without relying on contributions from the general public?\n\n\nIf you want to fully fund disaster relief, that means convincing voters to raise taxes, or cut spending elsewhere.\n\ngetting Disaster funding is notoriously tricky. No one wants to pay for it until it happens (especially if it happens to them), and no one wants to subsidize areas that are disaster prone. If federal funds are used, it means places that don't get hit (say, Wyoming) will pay for something only FL/Texas would use. Voters in Wyoming might not be super keen on that.\n\n\n > I believe the federal government should pay for these resources - even if they just cut a private company a check to feed/temporarily house/etc. victims. Our tax dollars should cover this.\n\nIf you think it should- great! convince other voters. Right now, you're in the minority. The government does do quite a bit for relief. It's just not fully funded.\n\nIt's not a question of whether the government can or can't. It can, but people don't necessarily agree with you.\n\n > I'm focused more on why the public is being urged (and many corporate leaders have donated millions) to donate to disaster relief - which goes to companies like the Red Cross. The Red Cross in turn pays for food, water, etc. to help people during disaster time. \n\nThe idea is that the federal government covers the bare minimum of what people want federally covered. However, private donations are encouraged for people who feel more should be done. This allows people who wish to help more, to do so. The people who don't, don't."
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c82c5q | why are insulated cups made from seemingly highly conductive materials like stainless steel or aluminum? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c82c5q/eli5_why_are_insulated_cups_made_from_seemingly/ | {
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"They are usually double-layered. Meaning, there is a metal cup inside another metal cup, insulated from each other by air, and only connected around the rim. Air makes an excellent insulator.\n\nMetal is used because it's way more durable, and with the air insulator the conductivity doesn't matter much.",
"Oh I think I actually know this one!\n\nOkay, so there's actually three layers in the cup: an outer layer of metal, a vacuum layer, and an inner layer of metal. You want to use a metal that doesn't \"off-gas\" (i.e. release gas into the vacuum) after you seal off the center layer. \n\nYou want that vacuum to be as empty as possible, because if it's empty, you can't transfer heat through conduction or convection, so the heat transfers very slowly into/out of your liquid. Having the surface be reflective also reflects most of the radiation back into the liquid (if it's hot) or the environment (if it's cold). This is also the idea behind Dewer flasks, except that they use reflective glass (which is even better about not off-gassing). However, if you drop a Dewer flask, they have a nasty habit of exploding. Loudly. Steel doesn't."
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bw9cuc | how does a store know i'm stealing something? | Edit: to clarify. I'm talking about these vertical things near the entrance, which set an alarm off if you bring something unpaid for close | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bw9cuc/eli5_how_does_a_store_know_im_stealing_something/ | {
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"I would rephrase this question to ask how the sensor monitors in stores detect the theft sensors on items.",
"I’m not sure if I can write enough words for ELI5:\n\nSensors by the door don’t work for everything, it’s only certain high value items, such an item will have a little strip on them that the cashier passes over something several times to deactivate when you buy it. I guess the strip is probably an RF chip, but I’m not sure. \n\nIf you try to pilfer something that doesn’t have this tag, the alarm will not go off, but the store may or may not have other loss prevention measures such as people monitoring cameras that would watch you try to steal the other thing.",
"There are sensors placed on products, which are removed or deactivated during the checkout process. If you try to walk out without paying, then they sensor will not have been deactivated and set off the alarm."
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5ayb93 | why do we sometimes think someone's first name fits that particular person? i.e; "you look like a dave" and when we try to associate a different name to them it feels weird and mismatched | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5ayb93/eli5_why_do_we_sometimes_think_someones_first/ | {
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"\nChong: Who?\nCheech: Dave, man. Open up.\nChong: Dave?\nCheech: Yeah, Dave.\nChong: Dave's not here.\nCheech: What the hell? No, man, I am Dave, man. Will you...\n(More knocks)\nCheech: c'mon! Open up the door, will you? I got the stuff with me, I think the cops saw me.\nChong: Who is it?\nCheech: Oh, what the hell is it...c'mon. Open up the door! It's Dave!\nChong: Who?\nCheech: Dave! D-A-V-E! Will you open up the goddam door!\nChong: Dave?\nCheech: Yeah, Dave!\nChong: Dave?\nCheech: Right, man. Dave. Now will you open up the door?\nChong: Dave's not here.\n.\nThis is what happens to me when I hear Dave. We all have our personal associations. Does anyone else do this? It sometimes annoys people. Some do scriptural associations. I've only observed this myself. Other cultures attatch significance. Maybe thats why this happens. I do this often with people. Dave do look like Daves to me. I have no explanation except to say I experience this myself too.",
"I base this answer off no hard science but.... I would assume that it comes from other people you've met named Dave. You associate those physical attributes with Dave. The more Daves you meet the larger your Dave library gets. You meet someone with the same eyes as Dave Smith, the same hair style as Dave Jr, and a similar body type of Dave Johnson.... BOOM you look like a Dave. ",
"It's because certain names have cultural associations, and people subconsciously compare the person to those stereotypes. It also gives a clue as to their parents and thus the environment they were likely raised in. "
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rdheq | how the large hadron collider could help scientists understand how something can come from nothing. | I know it's not really simple, but I don't understand the connection. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/rdheq/eli5_how_the_large_hadron_collider_could_help/ | {
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"In order to even begin learning about the origins of the universe we first have to understand how the tiniest bits of matter actually work. In the world we know things are governed by basic physics (Newton's Law's of motion), but at the moment of the big bang the universe was, as they say, infinitely small and infinitely dense. So we need to know what laws govern things on the smallest possible scale, so that we can see what the universe was like at the big bang, and what could and couldn't have happened. At the LHC they take the smallest pieces of matter we know of, and they smash them together at speeds just under the speed of light, in hopes of learning more about the laws governing these particles, among other things.",
"In addition to glitcher's comment, the particles they smash together are sped up until they have a MASSIVE amount of energy for their size. Then, when you smash them together, they break apart into pure energy, in the same tiny volume. This lets the scientists get close to the big bang, because at the big bang you had ALL the mass and energy in the universe in a tiny volume; the more energy they can pack into a small space, the closer they get to the big bang itself in terms of energy density.\n"
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3skf5v | is it possible to do insider trading accidentally and be convicted? | If I sell my shares in a company when the stock price is climbing, because, for example, I'd rather sell now, when the price is high, than take the risk of having to sell at a lower price at a later time (because I may anticipate a decline), and that the stock price crashes a few hours or days later in a way that was totally unexpected when I sold my shares, could I be accused of insider trading?
Assume that I'm not working and have never worked with this company before. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3skf5v/eli5_is_it_possible_to_do_insider_trading/ | {
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"In this scenario, it doesn't sound like you have any insider knowledge. In order to be convicted, the prosecutors need to prove that you were in possession of inside information.",
"Standard disclaimer, IANAL\n\nIt would be very difficult to \"accidently\" commit insider trading. Suspicious trades are routinely investigated. For example a sale or purchase of a medical or phamarcutical company a few hours before the announcement of a new drug or treatment. Or it's FDA approval/denial. \n\nTo be convicted, they'd need proof that you are an insider at the company (via job title or job function) or had the assistance of insiders. \n\nSee also\n_URL_0_\n\n_URL_1_"
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4ddopv | the differences between "franchised" mcdonalds and non-"franchised" mcdonalds | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ddopv/eli5_the_differences_between_franchised_mcdonalds/ | {
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"It's corporate and franchise stores.\n\nThe corporate ones are owned by McDonald's. The franchise store's owner pays a fee to corporate McDonald's to use the name, signage, menu and products.\n\nNot all the franchise stores are run exactly the same, which is why some MacDonald's never carry the ribwhich or don't have 20 piece nuggets value meals, and some do. The franchisee has a little leeway to run his store, but he also has standards he has to meet as well.",
"Pretty much the leadership. Franchising is the practice where you have a large corporation like McDonalds sign a contract with a willing third party, where the third party will build a McDonalds and hold it to McDonalds specifications and business model (for example, if the McDonalds corporation releases some new burger, the third party built McDonalds is contractually obligated to also make it, though these contracts vary drasitcally), and McDonalds will take some % of the profit, in exchange, the third party is allowed to use the McDonald's name, somewhat control the business such as hiring and firing practices/flexibility in some other things like renovation and price and what not, along with getting the rest of the profits.\n\nNon franchised means that the specific McDonalds is owned by the McDonalds corporation itself.\n\nSo, what are the pros for both sides?\n\nThird Party - Run a business which is already popular and is likely to bring profit.\n\nMcDonald's - Get money from not doing much and have basically no financial risk in case the business fails, as no money was invested into it.",
"Franchise stores are the ones owned by an individual. These stores have a little more freedom in how they're run. For example, if you go to one of these at 6AM wanting a McChicken, they might (keyword might--part of that freedom is that not all franchisees will allow employees to do this) tell you they'll make it if you wait for them to cook it. However, if you go to a corporate-owned store, it's an absolute no--they would get in trouble for that. \n\nIn the one I worked at, corporate decided everything, what new foods we got and what we didn't, when limited time items went away, etc. In a franchise store, the owner would decide this. So to the customer, there's not a big difference, it's more relevant to the employees. "
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74tugn | how do doctors keep up to date with new information/techniques? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/74tugn/eli5_how_do_doctors_keep_up_to_date_with_new/ | {
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"They are required to recertify every now and then, as well as being mandated to attend seminars and conferences about the latest of medical science in their fields.\n\nAlso, a doctor in a specific field is likely to want to learn about improvements in their field. They're clearly interested in whatever field they spent so much time studying. ",
"They take classes. Doctors, like most licensed professionals, are required to meet certain \"Continuing Education\" (CME) requirements to keep their certification. The requirements vary by the states/country in which they are licensed. In addition, certain jurisdictions or specialties may require that some or all of the CME falls under a particular theme or category. If a physician is licensed in multiple states, the same CME hours can count toward both licenses, but they would have to meet the requirements of each individual license in order to keep that license.\n\nPhysicians can get CME in a variety of ways--multi-day conferences, webinars, and self-study are some examples. In addition, some specialties may attend trade shows that demonstate technological advances in their area of expertise.\n\n\n\n"
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35cy7s | why did the hobbit movies use so much cgi (like in the famous ian mckellen crying picture) instead of real sets/ actors? | It may be obvious that its just less expensive, but some times they wouldn't even have the actors be in the same room. Is there another reason to this other than money? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35cy7s/eli5_why_did_the_hobbit_movies_use_so_much_cgi/ | {
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"I guess no one remembers how cgi intensive the lord of the rings were with the battle of Rohan. It would a lot more time and money to create those sets and hire the actors. The Lotr took a long time to film. While the hobbit wasn't that much compared respectively. So all in all many people wanted them quickly unlike Lotr so they had to cut corners. \n\nTLDR: Money & Time.",
"It's an odd but incorrect belief people have that CGI is less expensive than physical sets.\nIt's not.\nCGI is outrageously expensive, being tens of thousands of dollars (depending on the studio contracted) for a single minute.The more CG a movie has, the more expensive it will be. You can look at every major release and there's nearly a direct proportional relation between cost, and CGI usage.\nYou'd be surprised what isn't actually CG in many modern films.\nThe Hobbit, unfortunately, overused it to a gross degree.\nIt's hard to know the mind of every director, but what CG does is give you very fine control.\nWith physical sets, you have to plan them out, do takes until you get it right, with the actors laying around costing money. After you are finished, and you want to do something different, you need to set it all up again.\nWith CGI, it's simply throwing money at an animation studio to get a different shot. And you can get whatever you want with no physical limitations.\n\nBut it does tend to be noticeable, doesn't it. Directors like it, actors absolutely hate it, consumers are becoming more and more annoyed by the overuse, but I don't see it slowing down anytime soon."
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4y36ig | uptown vs downtown | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4y36ig/eli5_uptown_vs_downtown/ | {
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"Downtown usually refers to the heavy financial and commercial area of a city.\n\nUptown (less commonly used) can refer to either the primary entertainment area of the city or to the high-end residential areas where the wealthy reside.",
"Uptown refers to residential districts (especially high class), downtown refers to business/commercial districts.",
"The terms started with New York, where the southern tip of the island was the original core of the city and has since grown into the central business district. It also had access to port space, so it was originally rather commercial/industrial focused. As the city expanded north, that was mainly residential. Maps tend to show north as up, so the new residential areas were termed uptown.\n\nDuring the housing boom of the 50s, historical city cores hollowed out, with everyone who could afford it moving to the newly growing suburbs. The old city centers were destroyed through urban renewal projects and saw a lot of high-rise development which tends to be nice for commercial/office space so the downtowns of most cities came to be centers for whatever industries operated within the city.\n\nResidential areas also tend to be up-river from industrial areas for pollution reasons. And rich folks like to put their houses on hills, leaving the lower-lying geography for business. They also like to not be too close to rivers because they flood, so housing tries to stay away from the lower-elevation rivers, but business likes access to the rivers for transportation, so again, businesses tended to congregate in lower-elevation areas.",
"It's hard to know exactly what you're asking, but Uptown and Downtown usually refer to different parts of a city.\n\nIn New York City, the borough of Manhattan is famously divided into different sections based on geography. The northernmost (\"up\") parts of Manhattan are more residential, and are either incredibly wealthy (Upper East Side) or quite poor (Harlem). \n\n Whereas, the southernmost (\"down\") part of Manhattan is the financial and commercial district, the location of such well-known places as Wall Street and the World Trade Center.\n\nDowntown in NYC is so well-known that the similar financial districts in other cities are called Downtown even though they are not geographically downtown in the way Manhattan's is. This is the case, for example, with the LA neighbor of Downtown LA, which is the only part of Los Angeles that has skyscrapers but isn't actually \"down\" in any geographical sense. Also in NYC is Downtown Brooklyn which is the commercial district in the borough of Brooklyn that again is not actually \"down\" in any sense, but merely resembles the Manhattan Downtown in terms of its character.\n\nAs far as where you might have heard the two names, let's look at some references. The famous Petula Clarke song \"Downtown\" is about Manhattan. However, it is sort of inaccurate. Apparently, she wrote the song about Times Square not realizing that Times Square isn't Downtown, it's Midtown (between Uptown and Downtown). She didn't go downtown enough to experience the real Downtown, so her song gives the wrong impression of what Downtown Manhattan is like.\n\nIn Billy Joel's song \"Uptown Girl,\" he is singing about a rich girl who presumably lives in the wealthy Upper East Side neighborhood, though he could just as easily have made a song with that title about a poor girl from Harlem. The song \"Uptown Funk\" could be more about Harlem, a famously black uptown Manhattan neighborhood, or it could be about other Uptowns entirely. For example, Uptown, Minneapolis is famous for its nightlife and party scene and in that sense is the subject of the Prince song \"Uptown.\" Uptown, Minneapolis is not \"uptown\" geographically but is named for the similarly hip commercial district in Chicago of the same name. The idea of an \"Uptown\" and \"Downtown\" though likely originated with Manhattan.",
"If you're talking about Charlotte, NC by any chance they basically started calling their downtown \"uptown\" after they cleaned it up because the downtown area had a bad reputation for a long time. \"Uptown\" sounded more positive. It was a [marketing campaign to attract more people to the area](_URL_0_). ",
"\"[Uptown](_URL_0_)\" is a specific place in Dallas, just north of downtown. Hadn't realized it was a term in so many places.",
"Charlotte, NC has an Uptown but not a Downtown. It's basically the same thing here, except I imagine they didn't want the negative reputation other downtowns in this state have. \n\nUptown just sounds better I guessm",
"\"Downtown\" refers to the commerce and business area near the center of the city, usually around City Hall, the convention center, etc.\n\nGenerally, uptown refers to the residential area of a city, but not the suburbs. It's vague and unlike \"downtown\", doesn't refer to a specific location in most cities. ",
"In the Chicagoland area, *downtown* is a relative term. \n\nFrom the suburbs, \"heading downtown\" can mean to that you're heading to any of the heavily urbanized areas of the City of Chicago. If you're starting from one of the heavily urbanized areas that's outside of the central business and entertainment districts, \"heading downtown\" can mean that you're heading to those mentioned districts. \n\nThere is a specific heavily urbanized outlying neighborhood named \"Uptown\" but its not the same usage. People describing that they are heading there would say \"I'm heading *to* Uptown\" not \"I'm heading uptown\". Besides that, *uptown* isn't used in the Chicago area. \n\nI think that in contrast to the terms' usages in Manhattan, this is because the shape of Manhattan makes it useful to describe things as being uptown/downtown/north/south, whereas in Chicago the \"downtown area\" is actually at the center of the city so to say that you're \"going uptown\" is useless. That could mean that you're heading any direction besides due East."
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2la7ib | coal-fired power plants | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2la7ib/eli5_coalfired_power_plants/ | {
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"Burn coal. Gets hot. Boils water. Spins turbine. Generates electricity. Exhaust heat used to preheat the water. Soot captured with sulfur compounds for emissions. Makes gypsum for drywall and plaster.",
"Source: Went to a coal-powered plant for my work field trip. \n\nThe coal is brought to the power plant. It's usually kept in a huge pile outside the power plant, and trucks bring in the necessary amount needed.\n\nThe coal is thrown into burners that burn the coal to a very high heat. Above the heat are water tanks that boil and produce steam. \n\nThe steam has a lot of pressure, so it's pushing very hard to get out of the tanks. There are then turbines that run, powered by the pressure of the steam escaping. They spin around and around and generate electricity.\n\nMany power plants now have a way to conserve a lot of the water that is lost, and that water can go back into the water tanks instead of escaping into the air. \n\n[See this image](_URL_0_). \n\nThe tall towers are where the coal smoke escapes from. You can see the black smoke coming out. The lower white steam is coming from the part where the steam escapes out of the turbines after spinning them. "
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8kfzme | how male animals know which young is theirs so they can protect it. | We know that animals can't connect sex with reproduction. So how do males understand that a child is theirs? If they cant connect sex with childbirth, they must be doing it for pleasure. We know that male lions kill others offspring when they take over a pride to put the females back into heat, but if they can't connect sex to reproduction then why once the new children are born, and the females no longer want sex again does the male not just kill the newborns? Since they can't connect what they did three months before to the baby in front of them, all they should know is that the female won't mate again, which should have the same result as when he took over. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8kfzme/eli5_how_male_animals_know_which_young_is_theirs/ | {
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"They don't know. Many males of various species (like lions and gorillas) kill all the children once they rise to power, and they'll jealously and violently guard access to the females.",
"Why do you think animals can't connect sex with reproduction? What evidence do you have for this claim? \n\nIn fact we know that the males of many species fight off other males to prevent them from mating with the females that are \"theirs\" and will actively kill offspring that exist before they took over the females so that implies they do know the connection of sex and reproduction. ",
"Largely the same way humans did before DNA testing.\n\nFor animals where the male does protect their offspring, as opposed to the herd in general, it is often through pair bonding. They form a family unit with a female, and together they protect any offspring the female might have.\n\nIn your lion example, they don't \"know\", it is simply instinctive behavior programmed over millions of years of evolution. Lions who developed that behavioral trait were more likely to pass along their genes than those who did not.\n\nIt is the same reason you drink water when you are thirsty. Sure, at some level you understand the connection between drinking and dehydration, but mostly it is simply an urge you need to fulfill, not some higher level thought process.",
"The assumption that male animals can't connect sex with fathering offspring is the only reason the outlined scenario seems puzzling, and it's not true.\n\nThe same behavior of killing the offspring of other males exists in several species of animal, and in general, they don't kill the young of females that they have copulated with within the right time span. In some species this has lead to already pregnant females having the ability to go into false heat, couple with a new male, who then let's the offspring live despite them not being his.\n\nThe false heat thing can be found in, for instance, monkeys, that exist in larger social groups. When it comes to alpha predators like bears or big cats, they tend to have huge territories and killing the young happens when a new male moves in, or the alpha male of a pack/pride etc has been ousted. They encounter females they've never coupled with and any cubs with them can safely be assumed to belong to someone else."
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24ah30 | is there a reason why humans have an arch in their feet or is it just from evolution? | Is there a reason why humans have an arch in their feet or is it just from evolution? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/24ah30/eli5_is_there_a_reason_why_humans_have_an_arch_in/ | {
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"Everything is \"just from evolution\".\n\nSo... yes and yes?\n\nArched feet are easier to support a body that stands upright (like humans do). It also gives space for muscle which can soften the blow of walking and can be more springy, which wastes less effort when walking.\n\nI'm not sure it's right to say these are \"reasons why humans have an arch in their foot\", but these are benefits of the arch, and the benefits (as well as the drawbacks) are products of evolution like everything else."
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4wlwrp | why does putting food in a plastic bag prevent it from going stale? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4wlwrp/eli5_why_does_putting_food_in_a_plastic_bag/ | {
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"Putting food in any container that doesn't allow air in will prevent food from going stale. Well, not *prevent*, but slow the process down. A plastic bag, when wrapped tight enough, does an okay job, but there are other, better things that work."
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21l9nv | what's the limiting factor in how much memory companies like sandisk can make sd cards? | Alright, so I read back in February that SanDisk had released their first 128Gb micro SD card. I assume it goes a bit beyond just changing the packaging and price, but what's stopping a competitor from releasing a 256 GB card for half the price? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/21l9nv/eli5_whats_the_limiting_factor_in_how_much_memory/ | {
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"The circuits that make up the memory of the SD card take up a certain amount of space. Smaller components require more research time and more advanced manufacturing and so cost more money. Either 256 GB of memory cannot be made to fit or they would cost so much that nobody would consider spending 20x extra just to not swap out the card. (128 GB is already many hours of video, days of music etc)"
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16fan6 | what is the difference between a bitmap and a vector image? | I don't understand the difference. Also, why can you make vectors way bigger and not have them get pixelated. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/16fan6/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_a_bitmap_and/ | {
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"Think of a bitmap image as a painting. It's a specific size, it has been created and each brush stroke is where it should be. If we were to take an image of that painting and stretch it out, it would start to look bad because it wasn't meant to be that size.\n\nThink of a vector as the painter who knows exactly how to make the painting. He knows the shape of the objects in his painting, the technique used to paint it. If you ask him to paint a small version of the image, he can do it. If you ask him to paint a much larger version, he would be able to do that as well without any distortions.",
"You can visualize a bitmap image as being a \"set of instructions\" like this:\n\n* Put a red pixel at position (0,0)\n* Put a blue pixel at position (0,1)\n* Put a green pixel at position (1,0)\n* Put a yellow pixel at position (1,1)\n\nThere you have a 2x2 bitmap image\n\n RB\n GY\n\nThat's all the computer has as information on how to process that image, so if you want it bigger you'll end up \"zooming in\" on the pixels like this:\n\n RRRBBB\n RRRBBB\n RRRBBB\n GGGYYY\n GGGYYY\n GGGYYY\n\nwhich doesn't render great images if you wanted to zoom on a human face for example.\n\nNow, a vector image, just like bitmap, is a \"set of instructions\", but instead of asking the computer to draw pixels at individual points, it asks it to draw geometrical shapes by telling it their properties.\n\n* Draw a line from position (1,1) to position (5,5)\n* Make a rectangle from position (2,3) to position (6,6)\n* Make a circle centered at (3,3) with a radius of 5\n\nThe computer has no problem processing this kind of information, and the size of the image doesn't matter at all, as it's just a matter of scaling the shapes, keeping the right proportions, and the shapes are just drawn bigger, thus don't get pixelated.\n\nThat's all there is to it, really, it's a matter of how you tell the computer to draw your images. But bitmap and vectors both have their applications: Bitmap is useful for images taken by cameras, for example a human face is more easily described by locations of pixels than a set of geometrical shapes (you would need *a lot* of instructions, and it would make the file too big, making it impracticable.) \n\nVector images are mostly useful for mapping. Most maps you will see on wikipedia will be .svg files, vector files, as you can enlarge it as much as you want and still keep the details. \n\nIf you have any more questions just tell me!",
"Imagine you are looking at a giant painting on a wall. Then I come walking in to the room with a can of black paint and a roller. While you stand there in shock, I paint over the whole image and walk out. You really liked the painting and want to restore it, but you can't remember exactly how it looked. Thankfully, my roller had holes in it that left a regular grid of tiny dots still visible through the black paint. By blending together the colors of the dots, you could fill in the black gaps between them and get a somewhat blurry, but still pretty decent restoration of the original mural even though you aren't much of an artist.\n\nThat's how bitmaps work. Every pixel in the image is a tiny point sample of color. When you zoom in, the computer has to fill in the gaps by looking at the colors of the surrounding points to guess what should be there.\n\nNow imagine you are in the middle of a basketball court. Then I come in a kick over a barrel of black paint and cover the entire court floor with solid black and walk out. (I'm a huge jerk.) You like playing basketball and want to restore the court lines, but you better get them exactly right to keep the games fair. So, you go look up the official rules and they say stuff like \"There's a line down the middle of the court. In the center, there's a 2' radius circle and a 6' radius circle. All lines are 4\" thick. etc...\" By following these directions, you can repaint the court to exactly match the specification. If you were crazy you could even get out a microscope and make sure that all of the edges are as sharp as possible.\n\nThat's how vector graphics work. The image is described to the computer as a sequence of descriptions and operations on geometries. When you zoom in, the computer knows exactly how to draw the specific set of geometries that the image format allows at any scale.\n\nWhich one is better depends on what you need. A simple vector description can reproduce a very geometric image that would take a huge number of pixels to sufficiently approximate. However, each vector is fairly complicated compared to an individual pixel. To create a natural-looking, photo-like image would require an extremely complex vector description. It is usually simpler to just use a grid of pixels for that case."
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co8pei | if they use the same caliber and are similar in function, why is the ar 15 not used by soldiers? what is its catch? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/co8pei/eli5_if_they_use_the_same_caliber_and_are_similar/ | {
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"Because Armalite Arms did not get the contract to supply the US military",
"The core difference is in function.\n\nSpecifically, the M16 and M4 are capable of automatic and/or burst fire, which means multiple shots fired, ejected, and chambered with one pull of the trigger.\n\nThe AR-15 that is commonly available to the public is not capable of automatic or burst fire.",
"The difference between an AR-15 and an M-16 is due to legal requirements. Basically in order to be allowed to sell semi-automatic rifles on the American market it can not be trivial to convert it into an automatic rifle. Usually this means that you need to redesign the trigger group, receiver and bolt carrier in order to convert it which is usually harder then building a gun from scratch. The AR-15 is built with these requirements. However the army wanted a fully automatic rifle. So the M-16 were designed which were fully automatic. However in order to still make the AR-15 legal Armalite did some minor changes to the dimensions so that the major components of an M-16 would not fit into an AR-15. Thus the legal requirements for selling the AR-15 in America as a semi-automatic rifle were still met. At least as far as the federal authorities are concerned it is hard to convert the AR-15 into a fully automatic rifle even if components for M-16 are available."
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avenvv | how does science disprove religion? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avenvv/eli5_how_does_science_disprove_religion/ | {
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"It doesn't. Science and religion address and cover completely different things. Religious people, who say otherwise, are stupid and atheists, who say otherwise, are stupid.",
"Who says \"Science disproved religion\"? That seems like nonsense.\n\nScience is a technique, and it has a domain of information where it's very effective.\n\nReligion is a technique, and it has a domain of information where it's very effective. \n\nSome past religious leaders have claimed the domain of religion overlaps that of science, like when Pope Urban VIII excommunicated Galileo for the scientific result that the Earth goes around the Sun. That religious leader was wrong, and he used religious principles outside their effective domain. That was a human mistake by an uneducated leader, which science proved incorrect, but not science disproving all religion.\n\nAs long as religion stays in its lane and doesn't talk about facts in the scientific domain, there is no problem. Sure, there are still a few uneducated religious leaders, but leadership mistakes aren't really news."
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8aoqx3 | why does water make white t-shirts see-through? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8aoqx3/eli5_why_does_water_make_white_tshirts_seethrough/ | {
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"_URL_0_\n\nTo sum up the article (correct me if I'm wrong), it's basically about the complexity of the material and how many surfaces there are.\n\nCloth is made up of lots of fibers all woven together, so there are a lot of air-cloth surfaces in there. So when light hits the cloth, it gets bounced all about in lots of directions, and not a lot of it gets all the way through to the other side.\n\nWhen the cloth gets wet, all those little fibers swell up and stick to each other, so instead of the many surfaces you had before, you now have almost a big block of one material, with only a front surface and back surface. So the light can go straight through.\n\nIt also helps that water makes clothing stick to your skin. Usually clothing hangs kind of loose, so there's a good air cushion between it and your skin. So the color of your skin doesn't really get through. But when the clothes are wet, they cling right on to your skin, allowing it to show.",
"You know how when you bathe a cat, all it's hair sticks to it and it suddenly looks 1/3 of it's normal size?\n\nThe same thing happens to cotton fibers. They're fluffy, and the water pins down the fluff, which lets you see through the holes in the weave. ",
"The water fills in the tiny little gaps so instead of light scattering in random directions, it passes through more consistently. It’s like when you put tape over frosted glass. "
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3cy6qg | was black and white as a film medium necessary before the evolution of colour? | Could we not have jumped right to colour film? Was there a logical reason why black and white was necessary first? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3cy6qg/eli5_was_black_and_white_as_a_film_medium/ | {
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"There are a couple reasons we couldn't really have jumped straight to color film.\n\nOne is that early photographic film was sensitive only to blue-green, blue, violet, and ultraviolet - so we had no way of recording red light. We could never make full-color pictures without a dye sensitive to red light.\n\nAnother reason is that color photography is really complicated. Before there were one-part color films, you had to take three different photographs, with a different filter and light detector each time, and combine them later on. There were cameras that did this automatically, but fundamentally you still had three copies of each picture that you had to manually combine later on.\n\nKodachrome, which was the first modern color film, combining all these colors into a single piece of film, required a lot of chemical development. It took a long time for people to figure out how to stack the film. You had to make sure each layer was exposed to its proper type of light, and that it didn't react with the other layers - and then you also had to figure out how to *develop* the film properly! \n\nThe final version of Kodachrome film had six layers: from top to bottom, blue-sensitive (with yellow dye coupler); yellow filter; blue-green sensitive (with magenta dye coupler); blue-red sensitive (with cyan dye coupler); acetate base; antihalation (light-absorbing) backing. And I won't list the processing steps because there were *17* of them. And this is the *final*, refined version - the original process was even more complicated.\n\ne: The reason the light-sensitive/dye coupler thing is opposite colors is this: the way color film works is by first creating three black-and-white images and then converting each of those images into dye. The basic way black-and-white film works is that when the silver halide on the film is exposed to light, it is converted into metallic silver, and the amount converted depends on the amount of light it receives. The dye couplers, in the conversion process, use this metallic silver to convert into colored dye - so that particular image, instead of being black-and-white, becomes shades of (e.g.) red. The key thing to remember when we make the original exposure, we're creating a **negative**.\n\nThat should make it clear why the filters are the way they are. Let's look at the top layer: blue-sensitive, with yellow dye coupler. Because the top layer is blue-sensitive, it reacts only with blue light, turning black/creating metallic silver where there's a lot of blue. Because blue and yellow light are opposites, we want our *negative* to be **yellow** everywhere where the image is actually *blue*. So the yellow coupler combines with the metallic silver to make yellow dye where the film detected blue light. That's why we combine opposite light sensitivity in the film with dye colors in the coupler - because we're making a negative image, not a positive image.\n\nThen when we actually *print* our image, we make *another* exposure *through* the negative - and because, as I said before, the film *darkens* in response to more light, we're back to the real colors we wanted: the negative is very dark where there was a lot of light; so when we project through it onto the print, the print will receive very little light; so the print will stay light, just like the original scene.\n\n\nTl;dr: ***Film is really complicated, and color film is even more complicated***\n\n",
"So in order to record light you have to go through a lot of scientific hoops. The oldest forms of photography involved placing light sensitive chemicals on a plate, exposing the plate to an image through a lens for a certain amount of time, and then using a variety of other chemicals in low light to stabilize the image. However, these first chemicals were very sensitive, and so green light and ~~red light~~ and blue light and all the other colors had the same effect. So the part **in the resulting picture** that was black was unaffected, the part that was white was maximally affected, and shades of gray denoted how intense the light was.\n\nLight carries three different pieces of information: Intensity, Wavelength and Phase. In order to measure the color of light, the chemicals in film must be sensitive to the different wavelengths either in different ways or you must use different chemicals that react to the different colors of light. So the earliest photographers did not know how to record color with chemicals, and it was not known precisely how until well after the invention and common use of black and white photography and film.\n\nNowadays we have digital cameras which are able to absorb light electronically and through a variety of methods we are able to pick out the three different colors of light we need to see all the colors of the rainbow.\n\nedit: Inaccuracies corrected."
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7qxown | what is needed to get matter to being a bose-einstein condensate, the least known about state of matter? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7qxown/eli5_what_is_needed_to_get_matter_to_being_a/ | {
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"You want bosons in a system(usually weakly or noninteracting- typically using a dilute gas) at a low enough temperature. \n\nAt it's core, a BEC is a bunch of bosons sitting in the same ground state. You want bosons as opposed to fermions because Pauli exclusion won't allow fermions to all chill in the same ground state.\n\n > the least known about state of matter?\n\nI'm not sure I'd classify it as the least known about state of matter. There are many many new states of matter these days, that we know very little about. BECs aren't completely solved, but we do know quite a lot about them and how to make them. \n\nEspecially the simpler cases- you can derive the critical temperature for the simplest case of a noninteracting boson gas with pretty standard quantum stat mech\n\nedit:\nAs someone pointed out below, i assumed you had some background (or were willing to let some things be swept under the rug for the sake of simplicity) based on the way you worded your question. If you'd like BECs explained in much greater detail from scratch, I'd recommend these previous posts:\n\n\n_URL_0_\n\n\n_URL_1_\n\nThey do go into *much* more detail (that i swept under the rug), but it's a lot to take in if you have no background."
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atn07y | how does a space telescope judge distance? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/atn07y/eli5_how_does_a_space_telescope_judge_distance/ | {
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"Parallax is the most common type for near-ish objects. \n\nPut something in front of you. Look at it with only one eye open, then the other. You notice how you can use those two slightly different images to judge the distance? That's ***basically*** how we do it for nearby objects too. We can look at a star from one point of earth orbit, then look at it again when the earth has moved.\n\nThere are tons of different ways to measure cosmic distances however: _URL_0_\n\nRedshifting is easily one of the coolest though.\n"
]
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_distance_ladder"
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||
5thd0i | how does an iv drip work? how does the body accept and process that fluid? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5thd0i/eli5_how_does_an_iv_drip_work_how_does_the_body/ | {
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"It's a windy day outside. You're holding a glass of water and turn it over. The water spills out. Does it fall straight down? No - it falls at angle in the direction the wind is blowing. \n\nThis is similar to the fluid entering your blood. When the needle enters the vessel, the fast moving blood \"pulls\" the fluid out of the needle and into the bloodstream in the direction of blood flow. The IV bag being elevated relative to the needle helps this along. This can be further explained with some basic fluid mechanics (engineering principles). I can elaborate if you'd like.\n\n\nBlood is made largely of water and other chemicals (along with the blood cells). IV fluid, whatever it may be, is mostly water, so the body processes this normally - hydrating tissues until it reaches your kidneys where excess water is filtered out and turned into urine. This is why you'll have to urinate frequently while on an IV drip even if you're not drinking anything.\n\nThe chemicals in the IV drip are absorbed through various tissues and also eventually filtered out through the kidneys and sometimes liver, turning into urine or solid waste. "
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axlvel | why can my phone not connect to two different bluetooth devices? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/axlvel/eli5_why_can_my_phone_not_connect_to_two/ | {
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"It should, devices have been able to connect through multiple Bluetooth channels since like 2.1. My smart watch is always connected via bluetooth, and then I can pair my earbuds with no issue.\n\nIf you're specifically talking about like, bluetooth speakers, then the device has to support it (The speakers, not your phone). Most don't.",
"It depends on what type of phone you have and what type of device you're using. Most new phones can connect to multiple different types of devices like a smart watch and headphones. The problem is if you want to connect to say multiple speakers at the same time. It's very hard to transmit the data over a bluetooth connection without it sending it to one system then the other, creating lag between the two speakers. But if I remember correctly there are a couple phones coming out that have this ability.\n\nTLDR: Sometimes you can, but you have to have all the right devices."
]
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[],
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||
8c2wct | what would happen to the economy if the entire world decided diamonds, gold, silver, etc were worthless? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8c2wct/eli5_what_would_happen_to_the_economy_if_the/ | {
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"Well they all have uses in everyday products, so their value would be re-evaluated. As for any country with a gold standard, their economy would most likely crash.",
"There would be an initial shock as those commodities lost value on the stock market. Banks and hedge funds invested into those goods and/or their manufacturers and mines would post losses. The market would slump while those agencies that relied on credit for their investments, such as banks, recovered them.\n\nOverall, it would be similar to the loss of value in mortgages in 2008, but on a much smaller scale. Like mortgages, these commodities are generally held by funds that are very intolerant to losses, but they make up a much smaller portion of the market."
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3j319z | overthrow of hawaii monarchy | I've never learned about this in school and I can't find a good wikipedia article on it. The only thing I know is it was in interests of the Dole Banana company. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3j319z/eli5overthrow_of_hawaii_monarchy/ | {
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"Sugar cane farming was the major export from Hawaii. White American plantation owners moved over in mass in the mid-1800's.\n\nAlong with the plantation owners came American missionaries. The powerful influence of religion and profit doomed the Hawaiian Monarchy in the long term.\n\nThere were a lot of arguments and a few rebellions over taxes and democracy, that eventually culminated in a coup d'état. This was orchestrated by the U.S. government and the white land owners.\n\nThe U.S. government wanted Hawaii to extend its influence in the Pacific region and the land owners wanted more control over Hawaii’s trade and government.\n",
"A bit more detail: the Monarchy was trying to find its place in the world stage and was for the most part unprepared to do so. They also had the enormous task of converting a low tech society into one on par with the rest of the world.\n\nAlong the way they racked up huge debt, and steadily over the years the Kings/Queen were forced to give away more and more power in order to stay afloat.\n\nThe people of European descendency in the Kingdom did not believe in the ability of the Monarchy to maintain a viable country, especially economically. Then, the last Queen announced she was introducing a new Constitution to give more power to the Monarchy. This did not sit well with the white business leaders (most of whom were born and raised in Hawaii and spoke Hawaiian).\n\nSo to prevent the new Constitution from being implemented, the business leaders convinced an American battleship sitting in the harbor that American business interests were compromised. Troops came to the Palace and intimidated the Queen into abdicating.\n\nThe Hawaiian born and raised whites then immediately declared a new country (the Hawaiian Repuiblic) and tried to get USA to annex them. The sitting president was uninterested, so the Republic waited for the next President, who was interested due to Pearl Harbor's strategic importance. The country was then annexed into the Territory, and then statehood followed 50 years or so later."
]
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16pnfv | the manti te'o situation. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/16pnfv/eli5_the_manti_teo_situation/ | {
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"Manti Te'o is a very good American college football player for the University of Notre Dame. He plays linebacker, a defensive position, and plays it so well that he was voted second place for the very important Heisman Trophy, a prize that defensive players almost never win.\n\nIn September, Manti told a bunch of people in the news that his grandma and his girlfriend went to heaven on the same day. A few days later he played a very good game and told the news \"they were with me.\" This story got him lots of attention over the next couple of months as he continued to play very well and his team went to the college football championship game. People liked the story. It made them feel good.\n\nA web site called Deadspin did not believe this story and talked to some people who knew a secret: Although Manti's grandma did go to heaven in September, his girlfriend was an imaginary girlfriend. He said she went to a school where there was no record of her. The pictures of her were of a friend of one of his friends. She was made up by a boy who was friends with Manti, and he tricked people into believing she was real.\n\nSome people think that Manti knew. Other people think that he was tricked. Notre Dame, Manti's school, wants to know what happened. If Manti did know, there are several reasons he may have pretended. The nice story got him attention. It may have got him more votes for the Heisman Trophy. It may have got him picked sooner in the NFL Draft later this year, giving him more money. But if he did lie, now that people know about it they will not like him as much.",
"This link cleared everything up for me.\n\n_URL_0_\n",
"Ok like you're 5...also I'd like to point out this is an OPINION of the situation. All the other guys in your 1st grade class talk to girls and are friends with them. You (Manti Te'o) for whatever reason don't talk to many girls. Maybe you are uncomfortable around them, maybe your religious beliefs tell you that you have to wait until 5th grade to act like boyfriend/girlfriend. For whatever reason it is, you are getting pressured from your friends asking why you arent talking and hanging out with the other girls. So to stop them bothering you about it, you tell them you have another girl from an elementary school across the city that you talk to all the time. Eventually you decide to end the lie by saying something terrible happened to her so people stop asking you about her. You lie and say she has died from an illness, thinking that will be the end of it. 3rd grade come around and you are the most popular kid in school. So much even that the school newspaper wants to do a story on what a great guy you are, and talk about how you even stuck through the tough times of the girlfriend that died. You didn't think the story would ever get so big, but you've come this far already and can't go back now. You lie to everyone and tell the story until other kids from this other school tell everyone the girl doesn't exist. To cover yourself from embarrassment, you claim that someone from this other school lied to you and told you they were this girl and strung you along over the phone and internet, making you the victim. ",
"Manti Te'o is either a big liar or a big idiot.",
"can someone explain to me why we should CARE?"
]
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[],
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"http://deadspin.com/5976517/manti-teos-dead-girlfriend-the-most-heartbreaking-and-inspirational-story-of-the-college-football-season-is-a-hoax?utm_campaign=socialflow_deadspin_twitter&utm_source=deadspin_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow"
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66ro6w | when you buy land, what do you actually own in terms of height and depth? and who dictates this? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/66ro6w/eli5_when_you_buy_land_what_do_you_actually_own/ | {
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"Well, first off it's important to note that the land may not include mineral rights. So you can purchase the land, but you may not have the rights to any valuable things in it, like oil or gold or whatever.\n\nFrom a practical view, you own enough land beneath the ground level, and enough air above the ground level, for you to reasonably use and enjoy the land. So, for example, you can't prohibit a plane from flying 30,000 feet over your house -- but you may have a cause of action against someone flying a drone 100 feet over your back yard.",
"Although it's not totally clear, you own 500 feet above ground. As far as below ground, you would have to own the rights to the minerals underneath, which most people do not have.",
"That depends on jurisdiction, but often, you own the land to an indefinite depth. There may be restrictions, however. Certain underground resources may be reserved to the government, utilities may be able to run through your land, you may be required to inquire about the presence of those utilities before digging, and so on.\n\nHow far *above* your property you own is another question, and one that's come up a lot recently with the advent of consumer-class drones. Again, this depends on jurisdiction, but in the USA, landowners own at least 365 ft above their land, and at 500 ft, the airspace is open to the public regardless of ownership.",
"Here is a nice video:\n\n_URL_0_\n\ntl;dw: It is uncertain."
]
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ee6f4t | how is it determined that a very specific chemical or food (e.g. bacon) causes cancer? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ee6f4t/eli5_how_is_it_determined_that_a_very_specific/ | {
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"Salt cured pork belly doesn't cause cancer. Nitrite and nitrate preservatives used in bacon making causes cancer.\n\nThese interact with the red meat cells to make N-nitroso compounds, which cause cancer in bowels",
"There are multiple ways they determine carcinogenicity.\n\nThe most accurate way in humans is actually having humans exposed to the chemical in question, and noting that a significant increase in cancer(s) is observed. You have to be careful to filter out other potential causes and interferences though.\n\nSince it isn't ethical to run scientific experiments on humans in an effort to determine carcinogenicity, animal models (or cellular models to begin with) are used to approximate human carcinogenicity. This method has limitations because some animals may be more or less sensitive to the chemicals tested than humans. Not to mention exposures have to be adjusted for body weight.\n\nMy understanding is results of testing based on animal model(s) that find some carcinogenic effects is adjusted with a \"safety factor\" to account for the fact that the animal model(s) isn't an exact indicator. So if 1 mg/kg is enough to cause one additional cancer per million in the animal model, the recommended exposure limit for humans might be 0.1 mg/kg.\n\nIt's very similar to the testing done to determine safety of pharmaceuticals, minus the part where you're trying to determine clinical effectiveness and acute and chronic toxicity."
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5f2791 | the situation at standing rock | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5f2791/eli5_the_situation_at_standing_rock/ | {
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"As far as my understanding, it's being built on land that's been procured by the army corp of engineers, so technically private. The Sioux of that area say the land was taken from them in violation of a treaty, some years ago. Their main concern is that it will go under the Missouri River, a vital life source to the tribe, and region. It's being built by Energy Transfer Partners. I believe St worth being upset about, if for no other reason, than the last thing the world needs right now is more oil production. At a time when we should all be divesting, and supporting alternative, eco friendly power solutions. \nThe pipeline's advocates argue that it would be a safer and more efficient way to transport the crude than the current train-bound method. \n\n_URL_0_"
]
} | [] | [] | [
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"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_Access_Pipeline"
]
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||
2lp862 | re-financing my mortgage | I know this is ridiculous since I HAVE A FUCKING MORTGAGE.
I can't get anyone to give me a kindergarten level explanation. My loan is roughly $430k @ 4.75%. My broker tells me he can re fi down to 4.2% at no cost to me and save me $100 a month.
How does this not cost me anything? Will the amount of my loan go up? What are the reasons that you shouldn't re fi?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2lp862/eli5_refinancing_my_mortgage/ | {
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"Okay, he means no money out of pocket. All those closing costs would get rolled into your loan, slightly driving up the principal(what you owe).\n\nWhat you want to do is get the breakdown of what it will really cost,and calculate your break even point (the point where your savings on your payments offsets the extra closing costs. If you plan to be in the house long enough to break even, it may be worth doing. If you are only there a couple more years, it penalty would end up costing you in the long run. \n\nAlso, make sure you are comparing apples to apples. If one mortgage is a 30 year fixed, and the other is not fixed, has a direct term, or some other change, you have to think that over, too. \n\nFinally, if you got an FHA or similar loan, you may currently have mortgage insurance. If your home value has increased enough, you may also be able to get rid of mortgage insurance, by refinancing to a conventional loan. \n\nIf your mortgage broker can't explain this all in language you understand, you need a better broker, or at least a good book on finance. Go shopping before you act. Don't take long - rates are pretty low right now and can change in a dime. You might be able to lock in this rate of you ask, but is use a week or two making sure you understand the terms and that they are favorable to you. \n\nI highly recommend Personal Finance for Dummies. I gave it to my daughter for her 18th birthday, and is got a lot of clear information. "
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4ycrkp | if calories in = calories out, what difference would 3000 calories of bread compared to 3000 calories of protein have in terms of weight loss? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ycrkp/eli5_if_calories_in_calories_out_what_difference/ | {
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"text": [
"So long as you are getting all of the nutrients you need in the day there is no practical difference between sources of calories and it is the raw number in compared to the amount of energy you are burning that matters. "
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||
1pypa5 | why do i get sick from old raw chicken, even if i cook the hell out of it? | Alternatively, Why does any old food hurt you, even if you reheat it? Considering germs are supposed to die at a relatively low temperature (i.e., less than 200 degrees)
**Edit:** Spelling.
**Edit 2:** Thank you for all of the answers. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pypa5/eli5_why_do_i_get_sick_from_old_raw_chicken_even/ | {
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" > Considering germs are supposed to die at a relatively low temperature (i.e., less that 200 degrees)\n\nAt that point, it's not the germs you have to worry about. Rather, it's the toxic chemicals that they release as part of their metabolism. Cooking doesn't help with that.",
"The germs do die -- but they've been eating the chicken too, and their waste is what makes you sick when there is enough of it. "
]
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3etprw | why are some u.s. cities, like nyc, designed in a nice grid-system while others, like boston, look like something a drunken toddler with a magic marker drew on his parents' walls? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3etprw/eli5_why_are_some_us_cities_like_nyc_designed_in/ | {
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"It's all in the plan of the city. If people slowly moved in and decided to put a house wherever they felt like it, it's going to have drunken toddler streets. But if the people building the city knew how big it would be from the beginning, they may decide to block it off into a grid pattern. ",
"Some cities' roads were planned in advance - SLC and Chicago are good examples. They laid out the streets in a grid BEFORE people started building roads, houses, etc. \n\nIn the case of Boston (and many old cities in New England, Europe and elsewhere) the cities were not really planned in advance. The roads at the time were often originally based on native american paths through the woods (which themselves might have been based on trails that deer and other animals used), or just random trails/roads between farms, things like that. Stuff that didn't need to support a lot of traffic and just went from point-to-point. \n\nOnce you build up a whole area like that, it turns out completely random and stupid. But after it's built up, it's too late to change. ",
"US Cities laid out very early tend to follow the French design - roads were laid out either parallel or perpendicular to nearby bodies of water. See Boston, New Orleans, Louisville KY. Later cities in the strongly English sections tended to align streets North/South/East/West. NYC is a hybrid -- originally Dutch, streets were laid out parallel to the Hudson river, and cross streets perpendicular. But many parts of NYC illustrate the French influence.",
"Interestingly enough, center city philly, one of the most organized cities on the east coast WAS designed by a drunk (though he was not a toddler at the time)",
"Boston is a somewhat unique case. Most of what you think of as the city was [underwater for a long time](_URL_0_) the rest of it was on a hill. Hence the \"City on a Hill\" nickname.\n\nSo if you are building a city on hilly terrain with the technology of the 1500s... you don't end up with a grid. But once you landfill and dam the river, you can build lots of nice grids.",
"One word, \"Topography\", the lay of the land has a great impact one the the decumanus maximus and cardo maximus (grid) concept from the Romans is usually used because of ease it brings to orientation and traffic. But however when man meets nature (environmental context such as hills,..ect) nature usually wins causing man to cower, or suffer from blown budgets and impractical living conditions like some ridiculously hilly neighborhoods in S.F., that are almost impossible to drive up. So in these cases it is perhaps better to contour the layout to fit the landscape. Other factors are the experiential factor of cities winding cities may be more difficult to navigate but however offer a sense of magic of spontaneity like some Tuscan settlements....blah blah blah man vs nature =modernism vs post modernism/pre-modernism schools of thought. Let the landscape do the magic and humans just fill in the blanks is my motto! \nSource: I'm an architect and town planner."
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fu882y | do animals in the wild fail to produce milk in the same way as humans? | I just saw a video of a mommy and baby gorilla laying down in the grass, cuddling. While watching it I noticed how the gorilla’s breasts looked very similar to humans, and began pondering just how far those similarities go. Are there mammals who fail to produce milk? Do those babies just die? In the event of the animal belonging to a pack, will other mothers feed the baby who can’t receive milk from it’s own mother? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fu882y/eli5_do_animals_in_the_wild_fail_to_produce_milk/ | {
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"Yes, some mothers fail to produce milk, especially in hard times when food is less available. And, yes, those babies generally just die. Sometimes they're abandoned before they die because mom is desperate for food herself and can't afford to keep trying to produce inadequate milk. Baby's going to die anyway, it's better for her survival to not waste resources trying to keep it alive.\n\nWhether or not the baby will be supported by others in the group depends on the animal and how social they are. For many social animals, the answer is absolutely yes. The whole pack survives better when they share resources, and a mother taking care of someone else's baby now means that someone else will probably take care of her baby later. But that's not universal - some animals won't waste resources for offspring that isn't their own. Spending resources on milk for someone else's baby means fewer resources for your own baby, or just fewer resources for yourself and your own survival.\n\nThen again, some animals will straight up kidnap the offspring of others in the group if their own offspring dies, because the instincts to care for a baby are so strong. It really depends on the species and even sometimes the individual, and the circumstances."
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65rlaj | why do high schools and colleges press so hard on learning a second language? | Follow-up question: why can't we take a code language for 2+ years rather than Spanish? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/65rlaj/eli5_why_do_high_schools_and_colleges_press_so/ | {
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"bc it's useful for the students, in today's world you have to know others languages, especially if you aren't from an english speaking country",
"In some places, schools are allowing computer code as a replacement for Spanish, etc.\n\nMainly, it used to be important (way back, like 1700s back) for students to be able to speak French and Latin because those were important diplomacy and literature languages. Colleges like traditions, so they kept the importance of learning other languages.\n\nMany have argued that learning arbitrary languages in high school or college isn't actually important for the real world, and that most students in these courses don't actually learn the languages, which is a valid argument. Colleges will change when they want to, however, and that doesn't look to be anytime soon.",
"Partly because it is a unique opportunity.\n\nIt is very hard to learn a second language as a adult. The best time to do so is early childhood, failing at that, it takes the sort of dedicated, repeated classroom time you'll rarely find outside of an academic setting. If you ever want to learn a second language, that is the time to do it.",
"Huge stretches of the world don't speak your language as a first language. If you don't have language-learning skills, you will forever need someone to translate for you.\n\nLearning a second language introduces concepts other than just vocabulary, which is what most people pick up later in life. There are differences in tenses, verb-noun agreement, gender, and even sentence structure. If English is your first language, it can be helpful or interesting to learn the roots of much of the mutt of all languages.\n\nEven if you learn a language in high school or college and never or barely use it after that, an important learning skill may also have been acquired.",
"Coding is not language. That's like asking \"why can't we learn how to fix cars instead of Spanish?\"\n\nThat's a reasonable question but clearly you learn how to fix cars and Spanish for two completely different reasons. "
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6h4lck | what barriers are in place to stop an up-and-coming drug company from undercutting the epi-pen monopoly? | The way I see it, when selling medical things in the USA, you have to get approval from government health organizations to verify that your product is safe, and you need to have your own design or patent to make sure you are not infringing on intellectual property.
Epi-pens contain Epinephrine, a drug that has proven efficacy and safety, and it has been around long enough that nobody holds the patent on it.
So why is it that nobody has made some new kind of plastic autoinjector that works as easily as an Epi-pen and packs the same dosage of Ephinepherine? Then by charging much less than the Epi-pen costs, they could crush the monopoly and make a lot of money too.
It seems to me to be something that is easily realizable, but is prevented by some kind of mechanism that preserves the monopoly. What makes it so difficult to undercut the Epi-pen monopoly? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6h4lck/eli5what_barriers_are_in_place_to_stop_an/ | {
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" > So why is it that nobody has made some new kind of plastic autoinjector that works as easily as an Epi-pen and packs the same dosage of Ephinepherine? \n\nParts of the delivery system are still under patent. You would have to be careful not to violate those patents while making your new kind of autoinjector. Then, you would have to prove to the FDA that it worked as easily as an Epi-pen--which is very expensive to prove.\n\n > Then by charging much less than the Epi-pen costs, they could crush the monopoly and make a lot of money too.\n\nNot necessarily. Once you have survived the patent fights and gotten it through the FDA, they can still just lower their price to be lower than your costs, and destroy you.",
"CVS is working on something that is basically what you're talking about. Not 100% sure what the difference is, though I suspect that Mylan own's the patent on the injector even though the drug patent has lapsed.\n\n_URL_0_"
]
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[],
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|
5yzv0u | if everyone wore respirators for 1 year, would every cold and flu virus go extinct? | Credit to /u/LordBrandon for original comment. I felt it deserved it's own thread.
[Link](_URL_0_) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5yzv0u/eli5_if_everyone_wore_respirators_for_1_year/ | {
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"text": [
"No. Many new flu epidemics happen from inter-species transmission. New variants often appear first in chickens or other birds, then spread to pigs, and then spread to humans."
]
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5yzk9n/eli5_why_do_some_asian_people_wear_mouth/deu4dgt"
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[]
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|
g3q22l | if two offspring come from the same parents, how come their genes/characteristics are different from each other? | If it’s random selection, then how does the body (or whoever chooses it) choose which genes go into which offspring? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/g3q22l/eli5_if_two_offspring_come_from_the_same_parents/ | {
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"Imagine a woman drops in 100 red balls in a vase and a man dropps in 100 green balls. Now you go ahead and pull 100 balls out if that vase. Each ball symbolises a gene, one of them is dad's curly hair the other one is mom's eyes. Etc. Now do that 10 times. Each result will be easily different. And we have a whole lot more genes than 100.",
"Yes, it's a random selection. We have 23 pairs of chromosomes. Each of the sperm and egg cells contains half of each pair. The offspring therefore gets a random half of each parent's chromosomes.",
"There's two layers to how this all gets randomized.\n\n1. each parent is going to take a soup of ingredients to and put together 23 votes. The 'soup of ingredients' is itself producing randomness for what comes from each parent.\n\n2. then those 23 votes get throw in a pot and a random set of those emerges.\n\nSo...that's a lot of room for variation."
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1vdh1d | if the aca is giving insurance to everyone, why do i still pay $350 per month for insurance? | I understand that the ACA will be taking portions of everyone's paycheck to cover insurance for all, right? So why am I still paying $350 per month to my healthcare provider to be insured? Will this eventually go away? Googling this gives me too many unhelpful answers. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vdh1d/eli5_if_the_aca_is_giving_insurance_to_everyone/ | {
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"The ACA does not directly provide insurance. It expands existing programs for the poor, like medicaid, (though this is done through the states and the states can stop it) and it provides subsidies for the purchase of insurance on private markets or on state run \"exchanges\" of private insurers. \n\nWhen the bill was being debated, some wanted a \"government option,\" meaning an insurance plan run by the government that would compete with private health insurance. However, this was not included in the final bill, which continues to rely on private companies exclusively for those not qualified for medicaid or medicare. \n\nOr, to answer your question more directly, you are still paying for insurance because, as of now, that's still the only way to get insurance unless you qualify for assistance, something that is will not change absent a new law. ",
"\"I understand that the ACA will be taking portions of everyone's paycheck to cover insurance for all, right?\"\n\nWrong, that's not even kind of what the ACA does.\n\nACA requires you to buy insurance from somewhere, and sets up some extra places where people who don't have jobs or places to buy insurance can.\n\nThis will not eventually go away, unless new legislation is passed.",
"ACA does not provide insurance for everyone. It requires everyone to purchase their own insurance or pay a fine. It also attempts to make insurance more affordable for everyone. If you still can't afford it you can get government assistace. So your$350 a month insurance won't change. You might be able to shop around for something cheaper. I'm curious who told you a piece of your check would be taken?"
]
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zbhjo | why in american culture, is using the middle finger as in "flicking you off", considered offensive? | I had asked a family member this question years ago, and never got a good answer for it. I have heard different stories of how it relates to the male penis, to "it simply just is rude". So explain like I am 5, why is "flicking someone off","giving them the bird" or any other form of that phrase considered rude? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zbhjo/eli5_why_in_american_culture_is_using_the_middle/ | {
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"text": [
"Because it's basically saying \"Fuck you.\"",
"From [Wikipedia](_URL_0_)\n\n > The middle finger originated in Classical antiquity, where the gesture was used as a symbol of anal intercourse in a manner meant to degrade, intimidate and threaten the individual receiving the gesture. It also represented the phallus, with the fingers next to the middle finger representing testicles; from its close association, the gesture may have assumed apotropaic potency."
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finger_%28gesture%29"
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eh4hpi | why use median vs mean for household income data? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/eh4hpi/eli5_why_use_median_vs_mean_for_household_income/ | {
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"In places where the income spread is relatively narrow (400 - 1000%) such as Scandinavian countries, then high or low income outliers are well treated by the data.\n\nIn places where the income spread is wide (1,000,000%) such as Russia or the USA, a small number of outliers can seriously skew data.\n\nOutliers in high income inequality areas can mask such things as the fact that most workers live below the poverty line, simply because there is one neighborhood in the designated area where the bosses, who make 1,000 or 10,000 times the workers’ wages, reside.",
"They are only interchangable if the incomes are normally distributed.\n\nI don’t know if you’ve ever taken a look at income distributions in at least north american countries but the high earners (the 1%) out earn the rest by a couple orders of magnitude.\n\nIn the US the median income was 63k (jan 2019)\n\nThe mean income is strangely much harder to track down but in 2014 in was 72k. Thats over a 10% jump between the two (and in 5 years that gap will have gotten bigger).\n\nSo the most tangible reason why is that they are different numbers and median is more ‘useful’ for understand the average family.",
"A large dataset does not render outliers moot if those outliers are extremely outlying. Some people have incomes in the millions of dollars, which skews the data *massively*. This information is not useful at all in determining how well off the average citizen is. \n\nLet's look at an example. You have a town of 101 people. Of these people you have a perfectly even distribution of incomes ranging from 20,000 to 50,000 (this means that you can essentially average the values out to 50 people with 20,000 and 50 people with 50,000 for the sake of simple calculations). But you have one person who makes 10,000,000 a year. If you include all of this data together and take the mean, your data is telling you that the average household in this town has an annual income of 133,663. If you take the Median, it tells you that the average household makes an income slightly higher than 35,000. \n\nNow lets say that you're in charge of a tax plan, and you're a complete moron so you decide to just say that \"everyone in this town will pay exactly the same amount of tax\". You decide that 20% of annual income is a reasonable place to set the bar, but decide a flat figure is easier to understand, so you decide to convert it to a flat figure. You look at the mean of incomes to determine what 20% of the typical person's income is. It tells you that it's somewhere around 26,700. Great. You've got your number. Except that for the most well off of the average people in town, this is more than half of their income, not 20%, and for the worst off in town, this is more than they make in an entire year, meaning that they owe the government 6700 more than they actually make. Whereas, if you base it off the median, you get 7000, which is a much more reasonable chunk of the lowest incomes and is even less off the higher incomes. \n\nOf course, you would never actually do a tax policy like this, but it's just for the sake of example. There are plenty of other places where you would make fiscal policies based on this kind of information, and the median is just a much better estimate of what the average citizen actually has available to them.",
"Let’s say you have a neighborhood of 10 households. 9 of them make $50,000/year, one of them makes $2,550,000 a year. \n\nThe mean income is $300,000. Is that really an accurate description of the neighborhood as a whole? No. It’s not a bunch of fairly well off people living in large nice homes. It’s a bunch of people living modestly and one millionaire. \n\nMean is only an accurate description if the numbers are distributed fairly closely. If you have large outliers it skews the picture.",
"If the outliers are *really* extreme, they'll still distort the mean of the entire set. For example: 9 people with no apples and 1 person with 10 apples have a mean of 1 apple each. The mean here gives absolutely no indication of the reality. \n\nNow consider that over the past 40 years, typical worker salary in America has increased approx. 10%, and typical CEO salary has increased approx. 1000%. Now consider the compounding effects of that gap over two generations. That makes the mean almost completely meaningless (no pun intended)."
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8gp6hv | how do viruses with a high mortality rate actually manage to survive and spread out in the wild? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8gp6hv/eli5_how_do_viruses_with_a_high_mortality_rate/ | {
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"Some viruses have reservoirs - meaning that they can stay in hosts that aren't affected by the disease (the mosquito *Aedes aegypti* can carry a number of viruses that can give humans diseases, e.g. yellow, Zika and dengue fever).\n\nOther times, a virus doesn't need its host to survive for very long. If the human can stay alive long enough for the virus to replicate to a certain amount and to spread it to other humans, then the virus can still survive whilst being lethal to its host."
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1ycgsm | why is it so easy to stream a live event, and seemingly impossible to stream a live event in hd? | I can locate any streaming ball game or tv program within minutes, but have never seen a high definition one... I can't just be looking in all the wrong places. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ycgsm/eli5_why_is_it_so_easy_to_stream_a_live_event_and/ | {
"a_id": [
"cfjcjxe"
],
"score": [
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"text": [
"There is a user that streams hockey games for a specific team who I won't rat out. I once asked him why he does not stream in HD and he said there were a few reasons, first is that the equipment is more expensive. Secondly, he needs a higher upload speed than he currently has, which also costs more money. These are the two biggest reasons I can think of off the top of my head. I would assume most pirates don't have or want to spend a lot of money for your HD pleasure when they can spend a little money for your simple viewing pleasure."
]
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45ulbl | how can game bundles be profitable to the seller? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/45ulbl/eli5_how_can_game_bundles_be_profitable_to_the/ | {
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"Most games in bundles like that aren't new. The people who made them game have already made their investment, these are just the excess copies, they bundle them together because while you might not pay $10/game, you might pay $20 for three games.",
"Humble makes deals directly with the developers/publishers of those games. Because they're digital, making a new key is *free* - the only costs incurred by anybody are sales tax and Humble's web-hosting costs."
]
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||
3kkhfl | what benifit / purpose does day trading on the stock market serve? | I can understand buying stocks as a way for companies to raise capital and invest in their business. But I don't understand the economic value to society that buying stock and selling it 5min later has.
What would be the effect of only being able to sell a stock once every 24 hours? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3kkhfl/eli5_what_benifit_purpose_does_day_trading_on_the/ | {
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"One of the big purposes of the stock market is to provide liquidity - the ability to quickly sell any stock that you own. When investors price any particular asset, they take liquidity into account; lower liquidity (harder to sell) means that the price is also lower.\n\nThe markets don't have a big issues with day trading because it helps provide additional liquidity - more buyers and sellers is better for the market as a whole.",
"Think of short term traders (and speculators in general) as the grease on the wheels of the stock market. They keep everything running smoothly. In the current system, if you want to buy or sell a stock and there isn't anyone out there that's interested, the price will move accordingly to attract more people into the market (rising to attract more sellers or falling to attrack more buyers).\n\nThe increased trading volume means that you can sell off a stock you own relatively quickly, and you can find a seller of another stock just as easily. Without all those extra people participating in the market, you'd have to wait around for a buyer or seller who is interested in larger long-term investments, which would mean much more drastic fluctuations in market prices.",
"I buy AAPL at $100/share. I buy 1000 shares. Five minutes later, the price goes up to $105/share. I sell all 1000 shares. \n\nI have now *personally* profited $5000. That's a nice vacation for me.\n\nThat is one purpose of day trading.\n\nTrading, in a more macro sense, also gives liquidity to the markets. If a lot of people are buying and selling different things at the same time, then it's easier for an investor to quickly buy or sell what he has. If I buy 1000 shares of AAPL, I *could* be getting those shares from another long-term investor, but it's more likely it's coming from several different people trying to sell their shares for quick profits. Likewise, if I sell, it *could* go to a long-term investor, but again, it's more likely going to more active traders.\n\nThink of the market like an ocean. Investors are sharks, and traders and piranhas. Investors look for rare, big opportunities, and rarely feed (sharks). Traders are small, agile, quick things that quickly go for ANYTHING that could profit them even in the smallest bit (piranha). ",
"The problem is that you're trying to gauge the effect of one tiny part of civilization by looking at the whole thing (aka \"society\"). From that point of view, it's hard to see that there's any benefit. But it's also hard to see that there's any cost. You've simply zoomed out too much to see anything.\n\nIt's much easier to see the impact if you look at the specific individuals involved. For example: \n\nLet's say a stock has buyers willing to pay $10 for it, and sellers willing to part with it for $20.\n\nAlice is getting old and ready to retire, so she sells her stocks for $10 each. \n\nMeanwhile, Bob is younger, and is just starting to save for retirement. He shows up 5 minutes later, and buys the stocks for $20 each.\n\nObviously, they're not getting great deals. But a day-trader can help with this. Let's suppose Claire had been day-trading that stock.\n\nClaire offers to buy the stock for $14, or sell it for $16. Thanks to Claire, Alice gets $4 more for selling her stock, and Bob saves $4 on his stock purchase. Claire pockets the $2 difference.\n\nThere's the benefit you're looking for - all three of them are quantifiably better off then they would've been without day-trading. Alice has $4 more, Bob has $4 more, and Claire has $2 more, for each share that they exchanged."
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27aogq | explain some of plato's most important philosophical ideas | I am hoping to find some explanations of, what are considered, Plato's biggest and most influential ideas in philosophy.
I have long been a Psych nerd and am now delving into learning philosophy. After some summary reading, I decided that I liked some of Plato's thoughts (or they might have been Socrates thoughts as written by Plato) over the ideas of Aristotle.
There are over 30 "writings" to read through, and I'd love to know what philosophical ideas were most important, controversial, and interesting.
I do intend to wade through his writings, but it would be nice to know a bit of what to expect beforehand, and have a conversational grasp of Plato because it may take me a while (as life is busy) to read all his stuff. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27aogq/eli5_explain_some_of_platos_most_important/ | {
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"Really there's only two things you need from Plato: forms, and the philosopher king.\n\nForms are a little tough. Plato liked to use analogies to describe it, like the cave dwellers staring at shadows on a wall, but I'm going to make an original one. Imagine there is a god of the color blue. Everything he touches becomes an imperfect reproduction of his perfect blue-ness. You, not being a god, can only see the imperfect reproductions, never the perfect god of blue. That's forms: forms are the \"gods\" of things like color, shapes, just about anything that can be described. We only see the reflections that the gods have touched.\n\nThe philosopher king is easier. Plato thought the ideal form of government was a meritocracy; and at the top of the pig pile would be the smartest people around, and those people are philosophers. ",
"This is a question better suited for /r/askphilosophy \n\nThat said, I would say plato's most influential and most discussed ideas are his concept of Forms and Particulars, his allegory of The Cave, his political philosophy found in The Republic, and his concept of the Demiurge to explain the origin of the universe/existence.\n\nI am no expert in Plato, though.",
"Plato's idea of Forms: You've never truly seen a triangle. I mean, one that has angles that perfectly add up to 180, that has perfectly straight lines, that have lines that have no width, etc. But you still know what a triangle is. Or, for instance, how to little children know that a Saint Bernard and a Pomeranian are both dogs when they are more unalike than alike? How do we know what justice is when justice never really happens in our world? Because, Plato says, we were once in a heaven-like realm with perfect things that we now remember. These ideas of things are purer than the real things can ever be. He gives the analogy of people in a cave who know nothing but the shadows on the wall. Someone is dragged out of there and shown real things. At first, it's dazzling and terrifying. But eventually he realises that this is more real than what he knows. He goes back into the cave to tell them, but they think he's crazy and kill him. We think that we know reality, and real dogs, triangles, and justice, but really, we don't, we just have these memories of these ideas that we inaccurately apply to what we see here. When someone like Plato's teacher Socrates tells us that what we think is reality is not, we think he's crazy and kill him, just as Socrates was killed. The movie The Matrix is based on this idea. "
]
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1mx7w9 | why is the ring finger so connected to the middle and little finger? | Why is the ring finger "connected" to both the middle and little finger, when none of the other fingers are connected to each other? Why can't I move my ring finger without moving my little or middle finger, while I can move my index finger without moving my thumb or middle finger? Does this serve a purpose? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1mx7w9/eli5_why_is_the_ring_finger_so_connected_to_the/ | {
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" > Why can't I move my ring finger without moving my little or middle finger,\n\nI can. Is that abnormal? ",
"I can move all mine individually... you must be broken. Or not practicing. Or not explaining how you're trying to move them."
]
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5lhdts | why do we capitalize "happy new year"? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5lhdts/eli5_why_do_we_capitalize_happy_new_year/ | {
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"New Year's Day is the name of a holiday. Because of this it is capitalized like every other proper noun.",
"My guess is that happy is capitalized because it's the beginning of a sentence, and New Year is a proper noun (shorthand for New Year's Day).",
"I just had an \"aha\" moment reading some of these comments. \n\nAmericans (or at least some of them) consider \"Happy New Year\" to be short for \"Happy New Year's Day\". Presumably this is why some say \"Happy New Year's\" (heard as \"Happy New Years\" to these British ears, which is mildly irritating).\n\nIn the U.K. \"Happy New Year\" just means \"Happy New Year\". You are welcoming in the year, not the single day. At least, that's the way I've always thought of it. \n\nSo good question by OP. My guess is we capitalise it just because it looks better. I wonder what the style manuals of the economist, the FT, the New York Times etc say. I'm going to guess the economist does not capitalise it, but could be wrong.\n\nAnyway, happy new year."
]
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emgfy4 | why do ed medications, whether prescription or otc supplements, also delay orgasm? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/emgfy4/eli5_why_do_ed_medications_whether_prescription/ | {
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"We'll,using the ED Rx for many years( diabetes) I think it may be that the increased blood flow seems to reduce some sensation. It's great to be \" rock hard\" and fun for my partner to have a young man's erection to play with, but it does take a good while to come.\n\nI'm a bit older( 63) and while I enjoy the long sessions of lovemaking, it's also tough as far as physical wear & tear go, on both my spouse and I.\n( Muscles,knees and backs,etc.)\n\nThat being said,these Rxs are miracles if modern science.",
"They don't delay orgasm. They simply help you get hard(er), and remain hard during sex. But you still orgasm normally"
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2lqiaj | what it means when actors are "classically trained" | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2lqiaj/eli5_what_it_means_when_actors_are_classically/ | {
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"It means they trained in a program which focused on the work of Saint-Denis and Stanislavski. Most modern techniques of acting are derived from their works. A classically trained actor has learned the science and history of their craft in a way that a common actor who is merely talented has not. This training implies to directors a specific skillset that can be predictably drawn upon, rather than just having to draw out their intent more laboriously they should merely need to direct the actor who understands the specific techniques and terminologies involved in the craft. "
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1ri6wx | the us occasionally has drone strikes in yemen (i.e. we have airplanes dropping bombs on a foreign country), yet we are not at war with this country in any way. how is this possible? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ri6wx/the_us_occasionally_has_drone_strikes_in_yemen_ie/ | {
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"I may be wrong here, but I remember hearing that the Yemeni government supported some of the drone strikes, as the strikes were on essentially rebels against their government. I think it came out in one of the diplomatic cable releases that a Yemeni official had said \"We'll keep saying they're our bombs\"?"
]
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||
t3hcx | - why "artificial" elements that are man-made are significant and put onto the periodic table. | I understand that they are different from the other elements from being discovered in a laboratory setting, and I understand that they are created by injecting neutrons (?) into atoms to create new combinations. What I don't get is why we consider these "elements" when they aren't necessarily natural or found anywhere, but created. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/t3hcx/eli5_why_artificial_elements_that_are_manmade_are/ | {
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"text": [
"Well, each element on the periodic table represents a completely different kind of atom. This is important from the perspective of physics. It just so happens that some of those atoms do not exist in nature (or, possibly do exist, but then disappear so quickly we could never observe them). Any high quality periodic table will clearly indicate the elements that have only been created by man.\n\nAs a side note, you might be interested to know that some man-made elements actually have uses. Technetium (#43) is used in medical imaging, for example.",
"An element is an atom. They are differentiated by the number of protons in their nucleus.\n\nIt doesn't matter how they are created, or if they can be created in nature or are only 'man-made'.\n\nAtoms with the same number of protons -- even if they have different numbers of electrons or neutrons -- behave in similar ways. So, it made the most sense to group them in that way.\n\nIf an atom has a different number of protons in the nucleus, it is a different element. It's simply the way we defined it.\n\n\n"
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70ot7c | how does checking out a book from the library support the author or publishing company of a book? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/70ot7c/eli5_how_does_checking_out_a_book_from_the/ | {
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"text": [
"It doesn't, your library subscription does however allow your local library to buy new books, supporting those authors.",
"The library has to pay for each copy of the book that they own. If a particular book is checked out frequently enough, the library system will purchase more copies of the book so people don't have to wait as long for it to become available for them to read, which means more money goes to the author/publisher."
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5olp8r | what happens when you recycle something that isn't recyclable? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5olp8r/eli5_what_happens_when_you_recycle_something_that/ | {
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"text": [
"Dang it, I read an article about this just recently and now I can't find it. There are people whose job is to watch the stuff come down a conveyer belt, and they pick out what is not recyclable. They can miss things, though, which then go into the recycling, uh, machines (I should really find the article) and can mess the machines up pretty badly. After I read this I started being a lot more careful about only putting what is actually recyclable into my bin.",
"TL;DR: Recycling is hard but partially automated, usually useful to save energy, and people don't like doing it themselves. Otherwise it is just taken to the landfill. \n\nIn a recycling center there are a multitude of methods to sort materials of interest. Since material properties are varied among recycled products, these centers are able to take advantage and sort them in an automated process.\n\n- Ferrous items like steel and iron can be separated with a magnet.\n- Gravity and screens/filters/tumblers can separate paper materials. \n- Infrared cameras can detect plastics and communicate to compressed air nozzles to knock them off a conveyor line\n\nCertainly there is still a very large manual labor portion of this as not every material can be differentiated. There is of course further processing and refining for each material which usually involves chemical baths and/or melting. Normally a certain percentage of recycled material will be introduced into virgin stock (this is why you read \"made from up to 25% post consumer recycled material\"). In the case of steel in the US you are no longer allowed to make virgin steel. \n\nIt does take a lot of energy to do this refining. But in the case of aluminum cans specifically, a recycled can is made using only 5% of the energy required to make a new one. Too bad 50% of cans are still taken to the landfill. \n\nUnfortunately recycling rates are still very low overall, IMO. Around 30% in the US. It is often as high as 60% in some European countries and even higher in certain cities. "
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[],
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||
2aufkc | why do we get homesick? | I can't think of a good evolutionary reason because many of our ancestors survived by becoming nomads.
I wonder if homesickness is related to territorial instinct in animals. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2aufkc/eli5_why_do_we_get_homesick/ | {
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"Familiar surroundings, people, and routines provide a sense of security and comfort. In a new place, you may find yourself missing the comforts of home and loved ones. Those homesick feelings are completely normal.\n\nSome people may only feel a little loneliness, sadness, or anxiety. Others may feel physical symptoms, like stomachache or headache, or even become truly depressed. Most of the time, once the new surroundings and people become more familiar, feelings of homesickness go away. But if you are feeling overwhelmed, it's a good idea to seek help from the school or camp counselor.\n\nIf you have additional stress in your life — like a divorce or a death in the family — homesickness can be more intense. When you're coping with other loss or change, you'll feel especially attached to things that bring you comfort and miss them more when you're not around them.",
"Homesickness was a medical condition back in 1752 and was described as 'nostalgia' back then. People got so homesick in the world wars and conflicts that they became physically ill - doctors found that after telling the men they would be sent home they would suddenly spring back to life and their physical ailments would vanish. The actual word 'Nostalgia' means 'homecoming' in old Greek (I think) I did some study on this a few years back - and so the terms are closely related. Some people perished because of severe cases of nostalgia - which is pretty scary.\n\nNostalgia lost it's status as a medical condition when the idea of it being psychological came into being. It's no secret that psychological deterioration can have dramatic physiological effects.\n\nIt's all to do with stimuli being processed by the amygdala in the brain. We are pretty conscious beings and are capable of recollecting thought rather well compared to other animals. The ability to recollect thoughts of better places and times can stimulate the amygdala to make us feel fear, sadness or joy depending on the thoughts we are having.\n\nWe are not the only animals capable of this. Elephants get sad when captured (they actually cry too.) they can also recollect bad memories which can stimulate an emotional response.\n\nThe whole nostalgia/homesickness thing is REALLY interesting once you look into it. I did some studies on it back at university, more specifically looking at how music and sound can give you 'feelings' of the past."
]
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[],
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3cq2mu | what's with the british parliament and pedophilia? | Do they just suck at hiding it unlike other countries? Are the British MPs just more inclined to pedophilia? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3cq2mu/eli5_whats_with_the_british_parliament_and/ | {
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"There are currently 650 MPs in the House of Commons, and 700+ Lords in the House of Lords. These sex offences go back to at least the 70s, so there must be several thousand people who have been in Parliament during that time.\n\nChances are out of those thousands, several will have paedophilic tendencies, and being in a position of power gave them the means to indulge their desire to abuse.\n\nAs for why it seems like it's more prevalent in the British Parliament compared to other countries, your guess is as good as mine. It could be that it is happening in other countries, it's just not getting reported right now. Or it could be that there is something about the culture of the British establishment that lends itself towards this sort of crime."
]
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|
2pgja0 | what are the facial differences between men and women? | Just as an example here, if a head was found with no hair/eyebrows/eye lashes, how can the gender be found? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2pgja0/eli5what_are_the_facial_differences_between_men/ | {
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"Men in general have hard and rugged facial features, while women tend to have soft and smooth facial features. Testosterone has the effect of making men more aggressive than woman, leading to a more \"angry-looking\" facial expression.\n\nTo me, this has a lot to do with the curvature of features and the bone structure. Although, I have no scientific data to go off of. This is just from my experience.",
"That a suspicious, specific, and creepy example sir",
"Sexual Dimorphism - Some species of animals exhibit differences between sexes so that an individual of that species can fulfil they're reproductive and survival requirements relative to they're species. the differences can vary for different species and there is no set characteristic for males or females. i.e. in mammals (particularly social mammals) males tends to be larger and stronger and physically better adapted to aggression and conflict, females tend to be better suited to child rearing (before I get hate mail of Feminazis this is biology, not sociology). In Insects Females tend to be larger and better suited to child rearing, where males tend to be simply used sperm production.\n\n\nBut back to your original question, what are the facial differences between men and women?\n\nSexual selection seems to be one of the key factors in later human development. determine the fundamental characteristics of each sex based on the needs and requirement of the opposite sex. For example, men tend to be larger, stronger and broader shoulders; conversely women have wider hips, are shorter and have a higher fat to muscle ratios. These Characteristics are indicative that men historically have been considered the better fighters and women he better child carers, and in purely reproductive terms would have influenced the sexual selection of either sex, in laments terms men with more masculine features are more sexually desirable, and women with more feminine features are more sexually desirable. (generally speaking)\n\nHowever these selection characteristics have also influenced other arbitrary features that we have associated with better mates. I.e. men having wider, squarer jaw lines, and females having the converse. Women having \"softer\" facial features and men having \"harder\" facial features.\n\nThis isn't an exact science and I based on generalizations, which in turn are based on social perceptions. So a forensic investigator in the situation you provided would have to used assumptions to determine the difference. However I do think there are certain aspects that are absolute, like nose to eye width ratios and so on."
]
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[],
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1s0dlb | how can i help anyone with depression. | thank you for taking the time, I'm a fairly upbeat person and i see a lot of people on reddit struggling with Depression. I hear a lot about members who posts how they feel, but is there anything i can help to make your/their life that little bit better? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1s0dlb/eli5_how_can_i_help_anyone_with_depression/ | {
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"Read [this](_URL_0_), for one. It is vaguely humorous, but it addresses arguably the worst thing about depression. \n\nIf a person is depressed for legitimate situational reasons, the best thing to do is give them passive support and encouragement.\n\nIf a person is depressed because of problems involving brain chemistry, the best thing you can do is impell them to seek psychiatric help. \n\n(NOTE: Do **not** *compell* them. The difference is, you make them want to, not force them to when they don't want to.)",
"Just be open to listen to them and talk with them. Don't force yourself into their life, but let them know that you're there and available for them. You can invite them to join you for a meal or somesuch to talk about things.",
"Yes. \n\nDepression is a condition of the mind; and it has very complex origins. The things that you can do for depressed people in general are try to resolve the causes of depression. These can be manifold, but IMHO the most common cause of depression is social isolation. Human beings are inherently social creatures, and being outcast has a demonstrable (ie, visible on brain scans) negative effect on the brain and neurochemistry of the outcast individual. \n\nHuman beings need social contact to be healthy. \n\nThere are a lot of other factors as well, like:\n\n* Regular exercise\n* Healthy diet\n* Feeling of Accomplishment/Value (ie, does life have purpose)\n* Communicate regularly (ie, express oneself on a regular basis)\n\nNone of these are silver bullets or universal, but they do have a positive effect on mental health. ",
"No.\n\nSaying things like \"Keep your chin up.\" or \"It'll get better.\" or some other platitude sounds condescending and even insulting. They know this. It's all around us in society. \nIf it were that easy, they'd do it. This bumper sticker platitudes and bromides that we all hear doesn't do any good. \n\nThe whole \"fake it until you make it\" doesn't work either. \n\nIt's just wishful thinking from folks who have very good intentions, but no clue. \n\nSure, they may have gone through something SIMILAR, but it's not the individual's experience. And even if you did go through something really similar, like being beaten up by your mother as a child, it's still not the same thing - it discounts that person's experience. \n\nThe only thing to do with folks who have depression is to listen to them - and take what they with a grain of salt. Sometimes, they may say that they \"want to kill everyone\" - well, they are expressing their frustration with .... who knows what.\n\nDepression and mental illness in this society - well in the entire World - is a HUGE stigma. \n\nIt's really hard coping. People want to help and when you don't respond, they get angry and judgmental - like it's a character defect. \n\nLike , ... all ...everyone who does drugs is trying to cope. ALL of them.. Drug use isn't a character flaw, it's a coping mechanism. People don't understand that. \n",
"wow thank you guys that. I'm helping my friend cope, he's always tired, has a complete loss of motivation and almost gets irritated if people are too hyper. I understand listening is important but sometimes I feel like he could drown himself in his sorrow so i take him out, see different places, meet strangers not for very long but I want to try and make his body want to feel better. He's often paranoid if he's being the right kind of social cause actually he doesn't actually give a shit about anyone there. So I volunteer myself to be the clown, make my self the common idiot so he has something to point at and have a chance to engage with others. ",
"These all help me a lot with my situation. Have a good friend going through a lot right now, and I've made some mistakes in trying to help. I now know more and will be more helpful towards what they're feeling instead of trying to get them to do what I feel is right. Depression is a very confusing thing to me, and this is the first time I've loved someone with a condition like this.",
"sometimes its little, subtle things that can make the biggest difference. get to really know them and let them know how much youd miss them"
]
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[
"http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2013/05/depression-part-two.html?m=0"
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|
yduif | how could there be so little voter fraud in us without photo id before? | I live in a country where everyone has a passport. EVERYONE! I think even some homeless guys. You cannot be allowed into the booth unless your face matches that picture. So how does lack of photo ID not lead to people impersonating someone else? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yduif/eli5_how_could_there_be_so_little_voter_fraud_in/ | {
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"because if you're really trying to fix an election, having individuals show up at polls claiming to be a person who's registered there, but won't show up, is a really inefficient way to do it.",
"There's not a lot of money in it (for individuals). We have had a \"lot\" of voter fraud in certain places over certain time periods (I'm looking at *you*, Chicago). But since it needs to be an organized activity to be worthwhile, and either a candidate or a party would be the ones to benefit, it just doesn't happen very often. \n \nGenerally, people have to register to vote and have to go to the correct polling place to cast their vote. So you have to walk up to a person in the polling place and tell them the name of someone who is registered in that precinct. It would be a bit embarrassing, and potentially get you arrested, if that person had already voted. And even if you are successful, you wouldn't want to try it again at that polling place for fear of being recognized. So you'd have to drive all over town if you wanted to cast a bunch of ballots for your candidate. \n \nThe dangerous frauds are where it is organized, and where monitors at the polling place see it going on but ignore it. That's harder to do now, since most have monitors from both major parties, and one of them is likely to not be keen on the idea. Unless you bribe them well enough. But a lot of election monitors that I've seen are volunteer senior citizens, and would be tough to bribe. ",
"Voter impersonation:\n\nIf you succeed: you get to cast one extra vote.\n\nIf you fail: jail time.\n\nChance of one extra vote tipping the election: not a chance in hell.\n\nBasically, you'd have to be a complete moron to attempt impersonation. That's why nobody does it - even stupid people can realize that it is pointless, and way too risky.\n\n\n",
"The other answers are good, but I'd like to add that there are more ways to verify identity than photo ID. I live in NYC, and whenever I vote they compare my signature to the one they have on file (I assume from when I registered). No photo ID necessary and a decent verification.",
"In the US, when there is voter fraud, it tends to be ballots getting lost or uncounted in areas that are predominately voters of one party. \n\nPretending to be another voter is not common at all. For example, if someone wanted to pretend to be someone else, he/she would have to first find a person who is a registered voter and has a name of the same sex (a man wouldn't be able to say his name is Joslyn, for example). Then, they would have to pick someone who would likely vote for the other party, so they can change the vote. Then, they would have to go to the polls and lie and give them the other person's name and then cast the illegal vote. Then, what happens when the real person comes to the polls? They find out someone else voted in their name. \n\nHow many illegal votes would a fraudulent person be able to cast in the same day? Maybe a dozen? Maybe? That would be a whole lot of work and a whole lot of risk for a dozen votes when *a dozen votes doesn't typically make a difference.*\n\nAlso, only [a third of Americans have passports.](_URL_0_). Just a few decades ago, that number was much smaller (3%). They're expensive, and our country is so large that there's no need to have one to travel and see other cities and states within our borders. ",
"In my precinct, the same people have been working the polls for decades, and the workers know pretty much everyone. I don't know how many people are in the precinct, but it's not a huge number, and it's not even an entire neighborhood. \n\nIf someone new comes in, they're happy to meet them, and the new person gets looked at, and looked over. But you would have to be a complete idiot to try to cheat at my precinct. It's just not worth it.\n\nThe \"vote fraud\" thing is just to scare poor people and minorities from voting. They can dress it up any way they want, with talking points delivered by the big chested blondes on Fox News, but that's what it is. "
]
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[],
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"http://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewbender/2012/01/30/record-number-of-americans-now-hold-passports/"
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df5at4 | prenuptial agreements | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/df5at4/elif_prenuptial_agreements/ | {
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"So you basically sign an agreement with your soon to be wife/husband stating that in the event of a separation/divorce your spouse won’t be able to take you for everything you have.",
"Essentially, it's pre-planning a divorce. It's a legal document detailing how assets will be split in the event a marriage ends. It's most often used if there's some kind of disparity in assets going into the marriage.\n\nIf one person has 90 percent of the wealth and the other has 10 percent going in, a prenuptial agreement can prevent the person with 90 percent from losing a lot of wealth.",
"Most contracts come with terms to follow in the event that the agreement gets broken. Who's entitled to receive damages, who gets penalized if they're the one who breaks the contract, what sort of actions lead to the contract being void, stuff like that. A marriage contract, ordinarily, doesn't have much of that - which is why divorce can sometimes be a long and nasty affair as the couple fights over how to split up everything.\n\nSo a pre-nup is basically a contract to cover all of that stuff in the event that the marriage breaks up. The couple agree to that stuff beforehand so that it's all laid out and signed, and everyone's aware of it, before the marriage and especially before anything happens that might end the marriage. A pre-nup might include things like \"my car will be considered separate property, and won't be included in the assets that would be split in case of divorce\" or \"I will agree to pay X amount of alimony if I instigate a divorce.\" They're especially common among people who are very wealthy or who have a large wealth disparity with their partner - the idea being that the wealthy person wants to protect themselves from losing large amounts of their property and fortune if the marriage goes badly.\n\nThey also can include \"lifestyle clauses,\" which can include damages for things like cheating. \"If she cheats on me, she gets penalized by 20% on our asset split when we divorce,\" for example. These are tricky to prove and tricky to enforce depending on the state, but they've been famously included in some celebrity pre-nups and people like to copy celebrities."
]
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||
fxqbku | objects turn darker when wet, why do hands not turn darker when wet. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fxqbku/eli5_objects_turn_darker_when_wet_why_do_hands/ | {
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"Now I'm no water scientist or anything but the stuff that gets darker when wet is the stuff that absorbs the water, like paper towels or fabric or something. Spill some water on some plastic or metal and it doesn't get absorbed. Therefore, humans are made of plastic or metal"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
2ntosj | even if we were to figure out light speed travel how can it possibly be safe? | Like I'm sure it's impossible to get from point A to point B in space in a "straight" line without coming across an inevitable planet, asteroid, star, black hole or whatever else. You'd need some way to avoid these dangers and I'd imagine that computing that would be needed to avoid things while in light speed would be infinitely far in the future | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ntosj/eli5_even_if_we_were_to_figure_out_light_speed/ | {
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"Not an expert or anything, just a layman. Space is big. I mean BIG. it is incredibly huge. While you certainly have to calculate a given route, any collision would almost have to be a piece of space debris that was unpredictable, and again, space is big, so even that is unlikely. If anyone else has more to contribute, please do.",
"Being the mass of a black hole would never be safe. Don't ever go full light speed kids. ",
" > Like I'm sure it's impossible to get from point A to point B in space in a \"straight\" line without coming across an inevitable planet, asteroid, star, black hole or whatever else.\n\nNot at all. If you pick a random direction in the sky, you are *overwhelmingly* likely to go many billions of light-years without hitting a damn thing. Space is REALLY empty."
]
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[],
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|
1ueeao | why can't we put windmills on things like air conditioners and cars to generate energy as they use it? | I don't mean a perpetual energy device but at least generate enough energy to put a dent in what it normally uses. Does it have to do with the drag it would add on airflow? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ueeao/eli5_why_cant_we_put_windmills_on_things_like_air/ | {
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"text": [
"Because they pull more energy out of the system than they give back. The AC unit will have to work harder to maintain the same air flow rate if there are turbines blocking its outlet.\n\nIt's always a net-loss, in a perfect, frictionless, non-conductive universe the best you could hope to do is break even."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
4s9wcc | why do individuals vomit after a concussion? | What causes someone to vomit after major head trauma? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4s9wcc/eli5_why_do_individuals_vomit_after_a_concussion/ | {
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"Did you know that there is a part of the brain that controls vomitting? See: _URL_0_ \n\nWhen the brain encounters a physical shock, it is possible that this part of the brain becomes triggered. Once that happens, nausea may occur, which sometimes leads to vomitting. Because of the triggering, the brain might be trying to eject (a non-existant) toxin from the stomach.",
"To add context to PDX_Stan's (because I can't offer a *better* explanation than that), any time your brain thinks you've been poisoned it will make you throw up.\n\nOne of the most common cases of this is the \"my eyes say I'm moving, but my body *isn't* moving - oh crap, I've been poisoned!\" reaction that causes motion sickness. But a stripy bucket over someone's head and spin it, and they'll throw up *really* quickly - because the brain gets confused. Put enough pressure on the Vomiting Center and you get the same reaction."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vomiting_center"
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|
2row94 | how do us government agencies "recruit" new (young) agents? | An acquaintance of mine disappeared off the face of the planet fresh out of high school. Years later I learned from his sister that the CIA recruited him right after he graduated from a small private Christian school in Sacramento. He's now in the Intelligence business doing some Jason Bourne shi* or something.
The guy by all appearances was completely average. He played football, was in the school choir... I mean, seriously... How was this guy even on the CIA's radar. This was in '99 (pre social media).
Complete mystery that I'd love to have explained.
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2row94/eli5_how_do_us_government_agencies_recruit_new/ | {
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"That particular instance might have just been a family connection. His sister talked her boss into giving him a job.\n\nI do know that many government agencies (CIA, FBI, NSA) recruit people off of college campuses through career fairs and seminars. Its all fairly mundane stuff though.",
"apply for a job, just like any other job. \n\n_URL_0_",
"Job fairs. Not kidding. The CIA and FBI routinely show up at job fairs at my university, and I am sure agencies such as the NSA show up at the Math college's job fairs since we have a NSA sponsored research center on campus. They know where to look to find the type of people they want"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
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"https://www.cia.gov/careers/"
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|
630hs7 | when jumpstarting your car, why do you connect the black cable to the engine block instead of the black/negative terminal? | My mother needed a jump start earlier today and insisted on connecting red to red and black to black. Looking at the instructions on the cables and, later, on the internet you're supposed to connect the black cable to an unpainted section of the engine block of person's car with the dead battery.
My mother insisted on doing it her way because she's done it that way before and it worked. I wasn't going to win the argument so I went along with her. Fortunately, the were no electrocutions or explosions. this time.
So why do the instructions on the jumper cables say to do it their way and what could happen if you continue doing it incorrectly?
Thank you in advance. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/630hs7/eli5_when_jumpstarting_your_car_why_do_you/ | {
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"text": [
"Sparks near the battery can cause hydrogen fires. Sparks near the engine block are much safer. That said, modern batteries are sealed and pretty safe, but safer is always better."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
2ee74y | why do i sometimes see ads for the service i'm using to see the ad? | For example, half the ads I hear on Pandora are for... Pandora. I'm already here to hear the ad, no need to tell me to go there! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ee74y/eli5_why_do_i_sometimes_see_ads_for_the_service/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Because self-promotion is a way to retain customers. Also, they're usually ads for Pandora's premium service right?",
"Pandora could be used in a restaurant or office to play music for everyone; while the company might be using it, the people listening may not be.\n\nThus, ads."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
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] |
|
3j0fzd | why isn't the remote finder feature common on tvs? | When you turn on the TV manually, a sound comes from the remote until you press a button. Why isn't this feature on all smart tvs? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3j0fzd/eli5why_isnt_the_remote_finder_feature_common_on/ | {
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"text": [
"Most TVs use IR (infrared), which require line of sight to the TV - (the remote sends a series of invisible 'blinks', like morse code). \n\nThe TV doesn't have a way to send a blink out, and even if it could, the remote is probably lodged inside a couch saying \"screw you hippy i'm taking a nap, come and find me, suckah\".\n\nIf the TV used RF (radio frequency) then it could do that, but then the remote would have to listen for that RF signal, which would eat up the batteries.\n\n",
"Battery life.\n\nDo you want to keep your TV remote on a charging station?"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
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