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22keic | why are rooms with higher ceilings cooler than those with lower ones? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/22keic/eli5_why_are_rooms_with_higher_ceilings_cooler/ | {
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"Hot air rises. A tall room can hold more hot air before it gets to the level where you can feel it.",
"Warm air rises. Cool air falls. It's a density thing based on temperature. The taller the room, the more separation available between the warm air at the top and the cool air at the bottom (resulting in a larger variance in the thermal gradient of the room). Obviously, people are spending the majority of their time at the bottom of a room than at the top!"
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19las0 | how us govt. enforces that all children go to school (public, private, charter, etc) | How does the government ensure that children go to school, especially those that do not go to public schools. Also, how does homeschooling work legally. Are there certain criteria that make schools 'schools' by govt.? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/19las0/eli5_how_us_govt_enforces_that_all_children_go_to/ | {
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"The US government doesn't really get involved; it's a state level thing, and each state of the US does it differently."
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33bxkw | how do windows/glass reflect light if it's sole purpose is to let light through? | I'm on a bus for example and if I look at the windows I can see the seats reflecting in the window but also through the window. Or another example would be when you see your car or yourself in store windows. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/33bxkw/eli5_how_do_windowsglass_reflect_light_if_its/ | {
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"This happens because although windows are designed to let light through, they are not perfect. Glass lets through the vast majority of light, but always reflects some of it back.\n\nSo why don't we always see a reflection?\n\nWell, the percentage of light reflected back is very tiny, and the percentage of light let through is very very big. So if there's an equal amount of light on both sides of the glass, then the amount let through \"drowns out\" the light that's reflected back.\n\nThe time when you will see your reflection in a window is when you are on the lighter side of the window, and the other side of the window is much darker. This is because, although the percentage of light getting through the window is high, the total amount of light coming from the dark side to the light side is low because there's so little light on the dark side to start with. On the other hand, the amount of light reflected back from the light side, although only a small percentage of the light available, might be as bright or brighter than the light coming through from the dark side. Because of this, your reflection is as bright as the image from outside, and you are able to see it."
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e5vsa6 | how are sounds in video games and movies made from complete scratch? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/e5vsa6/eli5_how_are_sounds_in_video_games_and_movies/ | {
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"Many of them will be pre-recorded and just saved into a pack that can be dragged and dropped in. The rest will be Foley sound which is just recording something that sounds like the action in a sound proof room. Off the top of my head the only one I can think of was snapping a piece of celery for a bone breaking. They're normally layered with many other sounds to create the best sound for the film"
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4bmsxu | in 2014, drunk driving absolutely dwarfed the statistics for terrorism (accounting for american blood spilled.) if was able to find these statistics on the internet within seconds, then why do we still have people believing that terrorism is the highest priority on american soil? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4bmsxu/eli5_in_2014_drunk_driving_absolutely_dwarfed_the/ | {
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"The answer, interestingly, is in your original question:\n\n > If was able to find these statistics on the internet within seconds\n\nMost people don't go looking. They react to information which is actively presented to them, and we don't put every auto accident on the news. People have a tendency to view salient issues as more likely, regardless of the actual statistics. If you put every terrorist attack on the television but no car crashes, people will assume that terrorism is a greater threat.",
"Successful fear mongering by media and certain politicians. You can make people do what you want if you confront thm with their fears. Many people are ignorant others are just stupid or believe what they are told to believe without fact checking anything.",
"Think about it this way...you spend $3 on coffee every day, or almost $1100 a year on coffee. No big deal, doesn't get your attention. But you probably think twice about spending $1100 on a new smartphone. Our brains are aware of the context, not just the absolute magnitude. You are ignoring the context, just focusing on the absolute magnitude. If you simply focus on absolute magnitude things murders would be prioritized very low.",
"Though this debate has started, we'll have to ask you to move it to another sub. The Rules of ELI5 prohibit this sort of loaded question. You might find a more welcoming debate in /r/ChangeMyView ."
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656965 | what makes it so difficult to cure paralysis? | Is there many parts to the equation that we cannot solve? Is there some that we can? Will we ever be able to cure it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/656965/eli5_what_makes_it_so_difficult_to_cure_paralysis/ | {
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"Nerves do not regenerate the way other cells do. Nerves when cut quickly close themselves off to the matrix outside of the cell, and can grow back a little bit, but we don't see nerves re-fusing together frequently. If we are able to manipulate the severed nerves to join together and the functionality stays the same we can cure part of paralysis. \n\nOther ways paralysis can occur is muscle death. Muscle death is at this point irreversible as well. ",
"The spinal cord is very dense, making sure that all the nerves connect to all their counterparts without any errors is a very tall order, for either your body (nerves not regenerating much aside) or a surgeon. "
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cler8r | how far do the atoms in a rubber band stretch (separate) in relation to each other compared to the atoms in, say, a steel bar when you pull on it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cler8r/eli5_how_far_do_the_atoms_in_a_rubber_band/ | {
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"Rubber is actually something called a polymer which is a long chain of segments called monomers. These long chains are like a big pot of spaghetti. This is what gives rubber (and many other polymers) their ability to stretch and bend. The atomic radius of the atoms in rubber isnt really increasing its actually the polymer chains sliding over eachother much like when you take a scoop out of a pot of spaghetti. \n\nIn a steel bar all of the atoms are held together and are not allowed to slide past eachother like with polymers.\n\nTL:DR The atoms aren't separating the molecules are and steel doesn't have molecules so it can't stretch the same way.",
"Thwres a good vsauce on youtube that explains it. He holds a chain and shakes it to show the movement of energy when the chain is moving the chains shorter but if he pulls from the bottom the chains are stretched out and less clumped together so to speak. Look it up\n\nEdit: found it _URL_0_"
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8glj8f | what is the difference between a negative control and a positive control in experiments? | i've never understood the difference | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8glj8f/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_a_negative/ | {
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"A negative control is a control sample you're expecting not to react\n\nA positive control is a control sample that you are expecting to react\n\nIf you have to test a dozen samples for X and you have a test that turns blue in the presence of X then you would set it up with two control samples. One without X which should not turn blue(Negative control) and one with X which should turn blue(positive control).\n\nIf your negative control reacts that means that you have a lot of false positives and your test is no good. If your positive control doesn't react, that means you can't detect what you thought you could so you have lots of false negatives and your test is no good.\n\nSome tests can only have a positive *or* negative control due to what they're testing, some can have both",
"Suppose I am a hospital and I offer patients HIV testing. Everytime I test a batch of patient blood samples, I can add two more to the batch to test. The first will be from someone I know who is HIV positive and the second will be from someone who I know is HIV negative.\n\nThe person who I know has HIV will serve as a positive control and the test should produce a positive result. If not, then something went wrong with the testing and we need to investigate.\n\nThe person who I know does not have HIV will serve as a negative control and should produce a negative result. If not, then something went wrong with the testing and we need to investigate.\n\nThe companies that make testing kits usually include a positive and negative control in the kit so you don't have to go looking for your own."
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1a84wp | what is the business sense of walgreens, cvs and rite aid all being on the same street corner? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1a84wp/eli5_what_is_the_business_sense_of_walgreens_cvs/ | {
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"Wendy's made it by locating its restaurants near an existing McDonald's. Same principle. ",
"One company will spend time and money figuring out the best location for their store. The other companies then piggy back on the original store and set up shop across the street.",
"They want to prevent their competitors from attaining too much market share.",
"You and Timmy are both attracted to Wendy. Wendy is a cute-girl with blonde hair who ~~loves~~ really really likes a boy with money. In order to make money you and Timmy decide to sell Ice cream on the beach. When you first start selling, you start on one end of the beach and Timmy starts on the other end. You each receive 50% of the market because people go to whichever store is most convenient. (In this case its location. It can be a combination of things like previous history, etc). After a couple days you realize that you could gain more of a market share if you moved closed to Timmy. So you move your ice cream stand closer to the middle of the beach. Now you are gaining more market share than Timmy and making more money. Seeing that you moved closed to the middle, Timmy will move even closer to the middle of the beach in order to gain back the market share. Eventually, you will keep moving closer and closer until you are both right next to each other. Timmy will receive 50% of the guests on the left half of the beach. And you will receive the other 50% of the customers from the right half of the beach.\n\n**EDIT::** To clear some things up:\n\nThink of the beach as a field marked every ft 100 ft long. If you sell at 1/3 of the distance from the end, or the 33 ft line, then Timmy would move to the 34 ft line and gain customers on the beach from 34-100 ft and you would just gain customers from 1-33. Timmy would do this because this would gain him the most market share. Realizing this, you could move to the 35 ft line and steal the customers away from Timmy, but then Timmy would move to the 36 ft line and it would continue until you evened out at 50, or the middle.\n\nThis is how they teach you in economics. Thanks for all your comments :)",
"So tomorrow is your birthday, and your mom is going to make you a cake. She doesn't want to buy a cake from the bakery, but she's not GREAT at baking, so she buys you a cake from the cake mix aisle. \n\nYou look, and you see dozens of brands boasting what seems like hundreds of flavors of cakes and icings. You are amazed at all this, but you know one thing: **the cake is here**.\n\nYour mom buys cake mix, but no icing. You begin to wonder why she didn't get funfetti, or even chocolate! What in the hell is she up to?\n\nAfter cashing out, driving home, and unpacking things, she says it: \"CRUD! I forgot to buy icing!\"\n\nLittle did you know that she wanted to buy the Cool Whip Frosting they sell in the freezer section...AWAY from the cake aisle. She failed to make the association.\n\n***\n\nThe Cool Whip Frosting is a cake ingredient, and they sell it way far away from the cakes. Unfortunately, Cool Whip isn't selling much of this (side note: I'm in the industry). However, Betty Crocker, Pillsbury, and Duncan Hines all sell LOTS of frosting in the cake aisle. \n\nWhat am I getting at? You already associate cakes with the cake mix aisle, so you might as well put any cake mix, cake frosting, and cake decorating ingredients in that aisle. If a store puts those ingredients away from that aisle, they may not sell well because you might not be thinking \"cake\" when you're in the freezer section - you might be thinking yucky frozen vegetables. \n\n***\n\nBy putting a Rite Aid next to a Walgreens next to a CVS, you benefit from the association: **I always go here for my pharmacy needs**. A Rite Aid in a less competitive area might not do so well because people don't associate that area with pharmacies. You might be getting your prescriptions filled at the Walgreens on main, but there's a product you want at the Rite Aid on Elm (people will shop at 5-8 venues for their goods nowadays just to find a deal). If the Walgreens is spaced that far away from the Rite Aid, people are more likely to forget, or simply go \"Fuck it\".",
"They all go for roughly the same customers, so it makes sense to be very close so a client can easily go to other store. Each one of them want to take clients from the other stores.\n\n",
"Why do they always give away free flu shots? This is the ONLY free thing you can get from these places, who pays for this?",
"One reason is that they force the customer to choose based on preferences other than location or convenience.",
"- If one locates there, the others know that they'd done their homework and determined this to be a good location. They piggyback off of the studies, research etc. that the other has done before you.\n\n- Districts. Why did diamond distributors/retailers/wholesalers locate in the Diamond District? Or similarly with the Garment District? People recognized that this was the place to buy the product that the district was recognized for. Here, you know where to go to get whatever you might buy at a convenience store, just not which store you might stop at.\n\n- If there's enough traffic, there isn't *that* much competition. If you have convenience stores, gas stations etc. on opposing corners, you can turn right into either one or the other and not have to fight oncoming traffic to get into the parking lot. ",
"Because people know where to go to 'go to the pharmacy'.\n\nIn many countries where there is high population density you will find this type of thing with most products. There will be a tool/ hardware area, electronics areas, etc. where everyone knows to go there to buy that type of item. So once an area gets a name for having that kind of marketplace then traders in those goods tend to set up there. It's pretty amazing in some places in Asia, I love the tool market/ shop districts (I'm a carpenter). Way more interesting and varied than in the west where you just get the big-box stores who've eaten all the competition.",
"Good answers, but one thing to point out is that three drugstores in the same corner is far from being the most dramatic example. in many cities around the world there are whole *neighborhoods* with mostly just one type of shop. For example, in Seoul, there is one avenue that has a huge concentration of jewelry stores, a smaller street nearby that's mostly pottery shops, a huge electronics market with a ton of small vendors, etc.\n\nIf Mr. Kim is doing very good business in his jewelry store, Mr. Park will want to open his new jewelry store right next to Kim's in order to attract customers who went there thinking of going to Kim's. It multiplies, and then the neighborhood gets the reputation of being *the* place to go for jewelry, which attracts even more vendors.",
"\"Did you know that more frozen bananas are sold here on this boardwalk than anywhere in The O.C.?\"",
"Michael, I did the research. Did you know that more frozen bananas are sold right here on this dock, than in all of Orange County?",
"For the same reason McDonald's, Burger King and Wendy's line up on the same corner. Because there's enough demand for all of them.",
"CVS is a real estate company that happens to sell pharmaceuticals. Currently 7/11 is opening a store every hour (worldwide). CVS is a drug, convenience and grocery store inside 15,000sf. Plus if you owned a retail store and a decent unit was doing over $10 million a year in sales then you wouldn't give a fuck where your competitor was located. "
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79wxdr | how did hitler manage to give so many people a job, building the army, the luftwaffe, the autobahn and many more at a time when the whole world suffered an economical crisis? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/79wxdr/eli5_how_did_hitler_manage_to_give_so_many_people/ | {
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"Well first off, the economy was already recovering before Hitler came to power. So he was given a better hand than just the flat out mega depression.\n\nSecond is that they basically did what the US did during the era but on a massive scale. Government controlled and centralized work force doing industrial and infrastructure developments. \n\nJobs like the autobahn, creating the aviation and car industry, building dams, and ext were basically newly invented jobs. \n\nIt was expensive busywork done for cheap. This generally results in a very short term bubble of prosperity. \n\nWork long hours for low wage - > get a wage - > spend wage - > consumer market refreshed - > businesses can start hiring\n\nAnd since the workers were so desperate the government could avoid cost by paying basically next to nothing. ",
"He printed money. He printed a shit ton of money, used the temporary boost to create an enormous amount of production and jobs. By the time the currency had functionally collapsed they were at war, and the production was a survival requirement."
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2u9ykn | does shaving with a razor on your legs dull the razor faster than using it on your face? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2u9ykn/eli5does_shaving_with_a_razor_on_your_legs_dull/ | {
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"You have a lot more leg than face. Shaving your legs once is like shaving your face 10 times."
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3o7jks | what happens when a us state losses a representative in the house due to population decrease? | Is the newest member just out of a job? Do they not even run? What happens? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3o7jks/eli5what_happens_when_a_us_state_losses_a/ | {
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"Essentially it's like this, imagine a state with 3 equal districts, each have a candidate representing it.\n\n [ Bob | John | Anna]\n\nIn the next elections they lose a representative due to a population shift. Bob will likely still run for his seat, as will Anna. But John can't run for that seat anymore because it's gone. So in the next election if he wants to stay in congress he has to compete against Bob or Anna (depending on which half he lives on):\n\n [ Bob vs John | Anna vs OtherGuy ]"
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1vro5w | why is canada's leader, stephen harper, supporting israel so enthusiastically lately? | The Canadian press are all over it, with some really seeming to side with him (Toronto Star). Is it really that bad for Israelis that they need such foreign involvement, or are there other factors at play? I don't support either side in this issue, but things seem to be getting a little weird seeing as Harper doesn't usually seem this excited about anything. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vro5w/why_is_canadas_leader_stephen_harper_supporting/ | {
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"* Israel doesn't really need Canadian support.\n\n* It's good for Harper politically. To the best of my knowledge, the Conservatives & religious people in Canada are pretty pro-Israel, just like in America.\n\n* Reddit is pretty anti-Israel. A lot of people aren't. I think that always seems to escape the minds of Redditors, who think that support of Israel is because of AIPAC or something.\n\n* It's entirely possible that Harper is just very pro-Israel. That's well within his right. The entire West is pretty pro-Israel. Canada appears to be closer to the United States than Western Europe. Harper himself appears to be more enthusiastically pro-Israel than President Obama."
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5wilux | why does walking on wet sand leave dry footprints? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5wilux/eli5_why_does_walking_on_wet_sand_leave_dry/ | {
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"When you step you compress the space between the sand particles. This forces the water that was occupying the spaces out. When you lift your foot, the sand remains more compact than it was before. Also water is cohesive. It likes to stick to itself (Think of a drop of water on a table. It's not going to spread to cover the table unless you give it reason to.). So the water remains where it was pushed away to, leaving the sand drier than that around it."
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59ddt7 | why isn't digital signature forgery a bigger problem? | I know the insignificance of the scribbled mark on the "page" (or the digital Adobe document): _URL_0_
... and that the true significance of a signature is to demonstrate that you were physically present at the time to make the mark.
How, then, do digital signature programs work, and why isn't forgery a way bigger issue? I just did one with a wedding caterer and have done several with a realtor... I could have just typed "Joe Blow" in that fake-handwriting font Adobe presents instead of my real name... What gives? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/59ddt7/eli5_why_isnt_digital_signature_forgery_a_bigger/ | {
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"They're not really safe or easy to verify, but neither are actual signatures. The signature is just supposed to be an indication that you read the document and approve it; it's not some foolproof method of guaranteeing you're the one who signed it (that's what notarizing is for). Digital signatures are easier to forge, but electronic delivery systems usually help determine who sent the document. For example, it's easy to type someone else's name in a signature line, but it's hard to upload that document on their website or send it from their email.\n\nWith pen and ink signatures it's harder to forge a signature, but still possible. And it doesn't really matter if you can forge the signature or not if you're sending a forged document to a person who isn't familiar with the person's signature. It is also much easier to fake the origin of a document that isn't sent electronically - you can't really tell whether Frank actually mailed it from his house or whether Joe just forged Frank's name and dropped the letter off in the neighborhood postal box.\n\nLet's take your real-life example with the caterer. Say you did put “Joe Blow” down. Doesn’t the caterer know who you are? Wouldn’t that look weird to them? Even if it didn’t, what can you do now that you put down a fake signature? It doesn’t get you out of paying and the caterer still has your other information if they need to sue you. The real worry would having the caterer do something like forge your name on a contract for extra services that you didn’t request. That would still be difficult, though, because the caterer would have no proof of you sending the document (unless they also hacked your email, in which case that’s the bigger issue).\n\n > How, then, do digital signature programs work\n\nThey just put text down. There's nothing special about them. For most legal filings in court you simply add \"/s/ *Name*\" at the bottom of your document in Word to sign it. And you can sign for other people using that method if you have their explicit permission in writing.",
"So, there's two things we can be talking about. The first is just typing your name on a document. That's not verifiable at all, and as you noticed is easily faked. The second is a cryptographic signature. This is almost impossible to fake. \n\nAdobe offers both types of signatures for PDFs. You can either \"sign\" the document like with a pen (which isn't terribly secure) or you can use a certificate-based signature. This works similar to the way we verify that when you go to your bank's website, we actually talk to the bank- you have a secret number that you use in combination with the contents of the document to generate a \"signature\" and a public number you can give out that anyone can use to verify it. As long as no one hacks your computer and steals the secret number, they won't be able to forge the cryptographic signature on other documents, and even altering the document you did sign will make the signature invalid.\n"
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3ct1ne | how can events in dreams provide context for events and stimuli that occur in the real, physical world? | Basically, I've had dreams where I'm doing something, or something happens to me, and then something in the real world happens that seemingly perfectly lines up with what I was dreaming. For instance, say I'm dreaming that I'm about to walk into a concert hall, and then once I open the doors, I'm showered with the music coming from my alarm clock. It's like my dream somehow knew that I was about to hear music, so it "set the scene" for that event. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ct1ne/eli5_how_can_events_in_dreams_provide_context_for/ | {
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"It is usually a coincidence. You didn't notice all the times when it didn't match (you usually have multiple dreams every night, but you forget them). The one time that a super coincidence happened you think that it is really peculiar and you remember it.\n\nThat being said, (person experience from lucid dreaming) dreaming sound appears to be indistinguishable from real sound so it is possible to get a smooth transition from being asleep only hearing your dreams to being half asleep hearing real sounds.",
"Upvote because I have definitely experienced this.\n\nIn my dream something will be slowly falling over. Then it lands and I hear a sound. That sound was from a (real life) magazine falling off my dresser.\n\nI don't believe it to be coincidence. I don't believe it to be supernatural. I believe that somehow my brain re-arranges the chronology of things to make sense of it.\n\nOf course it doesn't matter what I \"believe\", what matters is what science can tell us. Unfortunately I have googled this many times and found nothing worthwhile. Please keep me posted if you do."
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bavhql | since we will eventually hit a wall of reducing the size of transistors on a computer processor, what else can we do to improve its performance? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bavhql/eli5_since_we_will_eventually_hit_a_wall_of/ | {
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"I'm thinking that a fundamental understanding of how an electron moves between two points without passing through all points in between is going to be the next big advancement. That could theoretically open the door to having no wires. ",
"There are a few things that can be done. First, architectural improvements. Processors have individual steps they can do called instructions. As time goes on, these instructions tended to be able to executed in fewer clock cycles on average. You can also add new specialized instructions that are useful for certain cases. Intel and AMD processors use the x86 architecture, which provides instructions to do operations such as addition on multiple numbers at once, which can greatly speed up things where many values are operated on the same way. Second, we can add more cores. This can be done by using multiple processor dies or by enlarging the dies to hold more cores. This is what makes a super computer better than a normal computer in basic terms: they use a whole lot of cores which can do many calculations in parallel.",
"In a way that is already reached. The clock speed increase a lot slower today the it did in the past so the result was that you started to add more and more cores\n\nLook at [40 years microprocessors trend data](_URL_0_) and notice how the frequency have remand relative stable since \\~2005 Single thread performance have still increased because the designs get better and better .\n\nSo when you can't create smaller transistors the rate of speed increase will slow down but you can still improve the speed by changing the design to more do it more efficient.",
"Very simple: streamline code. Make it efficient en cut out the sloppy parts. Don't program an Os that has everything like modern Windows, but go barebones and add what you need.\n\nBasically go back to the minimalist code of way back then.\n\nOh, and cut ads, telemetry.",
"There are a few avenues available once we can no longer brute Force our way with simply more calculations.\n\n1) more efficient coding. Figuring out the elegant solutions to problems rather than simply doing tons of small approximations.\n\nOr if you have to approximate (quite common in many situations) you do it with methods that require fewer overall steps.\n\n2) dedicated chips designed to do a specific type of calculations. We already do this. Graphics cards are optimized on a hardware level to do certain calculations very efficiently. Newer ones even have specific \"physics\" chips to take some tasks away from the main PC to figure out things like light paths, smoke, and fabric blowing in wind. This can apply to more tasks.\n\n3) parallel processing hardware and software design. Break a task up to different chips so they all do one small part. Then organize and deliver it as a whole when they're all done.\n\nWierd solutions: use radio signals to connect parts of the chips or motherboard rather than wires. It takes time for an answer to skip from one side of a chip to the other for further communication. So simply broadcast it wirelessly to use the fastest thing we can: light.\n\nOptical circuits that don't use electricity, but instead use light. This takes very different materials and processes to make, and it will be some time before it comes to complete with modern CPU on speed, cost and size. But theoretically much faster.\n\nMoving away from binary coding. Having only on or off in each piece of information is limiting if simple to engineer and code. Moving to a system that had more states (trinary with off, on and kind of on) can help with processing speed if done properly. But also not easily integrated into our current system.",
"An interesting possibility I have seen is making processors three-dimensional, or replacing electrons with photons (aka making the data travel by light instead of by wire)",
"There are a bunch of technologies that will continue to push performance forward for a while:\n\n * [Asynchronous logic](_URL_3_). You know how CPUs are clocked, e.g., 3 GHz (3 billion cycles/second)? Using a clock makes it much easier to synchronize and schedule the work the processor is doing. Unfortunately, the clock itself takes power and needs to get routed around the chip, and all of the work the CPU does has to get chopped up into chunks that can get done within one clock cycle. [In 1997, Intel developed an asynchronous, Pentium-compatible test chip that ran three times as fast, on half the power, as its synchronous equivalent,](_URL_5_) but didn't commercialize it because designing asynchronous logic is much harder.\n * [Photonic interconnects](_URL_4_) would eliminate the propagation delay of signals across the chip.\n * Exotic semiconductors like [Gallium arsenide](_URL_1_), [Carbon nanotubes](_URL_0_), and even [diamond](_URL_2_) can be clocked higher than silicon. Silicon has the advantage of being cheap, easy to manufacture, easy to purify, easy to manipulate with \"dopants\" to change its electrical properties, easy to insulate (SiO2), and being very well understood.\n * Widespread use of programmable hardware (FPGAs). The CPUs we use today are general-purpose. They are optimized to handle a wide variety of tasks, but truly excel at none of them. Nowadays a computer has lots of fixed, specialized hardware that you use only some of the time to decode video, render 3d graphics, decrypt data, and so on. If instead most of a computer's hardware was reconfigurable, it's as if entirely different chips, optimized to do different functions, can be swapped in and out on the fly.",
"We can make transistor a lot smaller, but there is no longer a guarantee that they will function as intended. They would operate probabilistically not deterministically. As in it probably gave me the correct result. We could simply adjust our way of thinking about computers to accommodate this, or deployed some compensation mechanisms. There are several error correction algorithms out there, especially in the digital radio communicates field. We could also simply parallelize the signal through multiple processors and take the consensus as the result.",
"Josephson junctions? They switch much faster then pure semiconductor or metal gated semiconductor junctions and use symbolic amounts of energy if the magnetic field that provides the junction switching is also superconducting like the rest of the junction.\n\nThe thing has to be very cold though. Not a problem for a supercomputer in a large supercomputing center."
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"https://spectrum.ieee.org/nanoclast/semiconductors/materials/carbon-nanotubes-outperform-siliconbased-transistors-at-the-same-scale",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gallium_arsenide#GaAs_advantages",
"https://electronics360.globalspec.com/article/11910/high-performance-diamond-semiconductor-devices-coming-soon-akhan-s-miraj-diamond-technology-granted-key-patents-and-trademarks",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asynchronous_circuit",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_photonics",
"https://www.technologyreview.com/s/401226/its-time-for-clockless-chips/"
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||
1zmakb | how do muscles regenerate between sets of an excercise? | Let's say I'm doing bench press. I've done 10 full reps, the 11th one I can barely push barbell an inch from my chest - I'm exhausted. Then I wait about 2 minutes and start second set, where I can lift at least another 7-8 times no problem. What happens with muscles during that 2 minute break? How do they regenerate so fast, from being totally exhausted to being able to lift weight again? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1zmakb/eli5_how_do_muscles_regenerate_between_sets_of_an/ | {
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"Energy for you muscles to contract comes from burning sugar (glucose). Afterwards there is burnt sugar (pyruvate) left over that prevents more sugar from coming in to get burned. If there is enough oxygen (aerobic) the burnt sugar can be whisked off, but if there isn't enough oxygen (anaerobic) the burnt sugar is temporarily moved out of the way and stored as acid (lactic acid).\n\nYour muscles can only hold so much acid until until they stop working properly (the burning feeling). Once you rest for a bit and have more oxygen the acid is turned back into burnt sugar and removed."
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43wmge | how can sugar/sugar based things like candies go so long without spoiling but eating sugar and not brushing your teeth causes bacteria to flourish? or fermenting alcohol for that matter, why do bacteria like sugar sometimes? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/43wmge/eli5_how_can_sugarsugar_based_things_like_candies/ | {
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"Highly concentrated sugar creates an environment toxic to bacteria. Once you dilute it with some water, it's food for them.",
"Bacteria thrive in a warm, humid, dark environments, like the inside of a washing machine full of damp clothing, or your mouth. Bacteria don't live on dry sugar -- in fact the only way plain sugar spoils is if you get it wet.",
"Sugar, like salt, attracts water. If there's enough water, the sugar dissolves and is a very popular food for just about everything around, bacteria, bears, bees, all love sugar. On the other hand, if there is very little water present sugar can dry you out. If you're very small, like a bacteria or fungus, then concentrated sugar is like a delicious, dry, deadly, desert. If you don't believe me go and eat a couple cups of sugar and let me know how your mouth feels."
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3m5q0y | why do astronauts not experience the effects of being in an anechoic chamber in space? | Supposing the astronaut isn't breathing heavily, speaking, or receiving a voice message.
EDIT: In the vacuum of space (i.e. spacewalk), not in a spacecraft/station.
Anechoic Chamber:
_URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3m5q0y/eli5_why_do_astronauts_not_experience_the_effects/ | {
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"Apparently, it's crazy loud in the ISS, to the point that it can cause issues with sleeping. Reason being, they're living inside a giant machine that has all types of systems going 24/7...AND there is no atmosphere or attached ground to dampen, absorb, and dissipate vibrational energy (sound) bouncing around the craft. It only is able to dissipate eventually after material flexing and internal air pressure damping converts it to heat and it is radiated away as infrared."
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3wy0jz | why does hollywood seem to use the same soundboard sounds for things like cats and babies? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3wy0jz/eli5_why_does_hollywood_seem_to_use_the_same/ | {
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"Because they often do.\n\nThey're called \"stock sound effects\". There are certain noises out there that are free for use (at least within a production company) and were recorded previously. Obviously, if you don't have to pay or get legal authorization for use, or pay to record/edit your own version, it's much easier/cheaper to use.\n\nThe \"Wilhelm Scream\", \"generic phone ring\", heck, even fart noises, were recorded long ago and re-used as needed just because it's cheaper/easier than trying to re-create."
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yiil1 | checksums | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yiil1/eli5_checksums/ | {
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"A checksum is a way to check that some number has been typed correctly, or at least is likely to have been done so. For example, the last digit in credit card numbers is a check digit. It is calculated from all the other digits. When you enter your credit card number somewhere, the receiving party will redo the calculation and make sure that the check digit is right. If you accidentally entered any single digit wrong, then the check digit will not match what it should be any more and the receiving party will know that the credit card must be wrong without doing anything else.\n\nThe last digit is calculated like this. Let's say that the first 15 digits of your credit card are \n\n1234 5678 9012 345\n\nThen starting from the right, double every other digit, this gets us\n\n2 2 6 4 10 6 14 8 18 0 2 2 6 4 10\n\nThen calculate the sum of all the digits, if the number is 10 or more now then calculate the sum of both its digits, for example 18 becomes 1+8. So we get\n\n2+2+6+4+1+0+6+1+4+8+1+8+0+2+2+6+4+1+0=58\n\nThen the last check digit must be such that when you add it to that sum, the whole sum ends in a 0. So in this case the check digit would have to be 2 and the whole credit card number would then be 1234 5678 9012 3452.\n\nThen let's say you enter it somewhere but type it wrong as 1234 56**87** 9012 3452. The receiver then calculates the check sum again\n\n2+2+6+4+1+0+6+1+6+7+1+8+0+2+2+6+4+1+0=59.\n\nThe check digit should be 1, but you entered 2, so the credit card number you entered must be wrong. A simple check digit like this can't catch all mistakes but it will catch many of them.\n\nThere are ways you can write your number wrong such that the check digit still matches. More advanced checksums have a much bigger check value which can then detect mistakes much more accurately. For example, the internet traffic on TCP protocol uses 16 bit checksums whereas a single (base 10) digit would be about 3.3 bits. Any error in sending or receiving will almost certainly cause the checksum to not match and the relevant data is sent again. Some checksums even contain enough information to be able to correct the mistakes, then we're talking about error correction codes.\n\n",
"Checksums are a very simple way to make sure that a message or a code doesn't have any mistakes in it. Checksums aren't perfect but they don't have to be perfect to be useful, especially when the medium used to store or transport the message might be unreliable. \n\nThis is how they work. I want to send the following message: \n\n explain like im five \n\nBut I can only send it with smoke signals and it's easy for the rings to get blown away on the wind. I could solve this by sending the message a bunch of times until I can be sure you got the whole thing but that makes my arms tired. Instead, I'm going to break it up into lines and put the number of letters at the end of each line like this: \n\n explain 7 \n like 4 \n im 2 \n five 4 \n\nI've only added four more characters to the message but now when it gets to you you'll be able to tell whether any of the words has the wrong number of letters and you'll know which word it's missing from too. This makes it a lot easier to find mistakes and that, in turn, makes it easier to fix the mistakes. \nOf course, the numbers could go missing too so it might be a good idea to send the grand total too. If we put the number 17 at the end then the other person knows how many characters they should have received. If we put it at the start then they'll know how many to expect. This way, if one of the numbers is missing, we can figure out what it should be by subtracting the ones we did get. \n\nSo, at the cost of six extra characters, our 17 character message has three layers of protection which work together to be about as good as sending the whole message several times but a lot less work! And, since it's based on simple counting, we can easily use this to measure really big messages and make sure they get through without any mistakes. Even if we do find a mistake, we can simply ask for the bit where the mistake is instead of asking for the whole message all over again. ",
"In a practical usage sense, checksums can be used to verify the authenticity of software.\n\nFor example, say you get tired of using Windows 7 and want to run Ubuntu. You need to download the Ubuntu software. You go to the official Ubuntu website, copy down this release of Ubuntu's checksum, and try to download it. However, the download is going far too slow, so you decide to **legally** get it off of BitTorrent. \n\nFive minutes later, you have it. However, since you got it from a source of questionable reliability, you're not sure if you really downloaded Ubuntu or if you got a big ol' virus. What do you do? You put your downloaded file through a program that will generate a checksum based on the contents of the file.\n\nIf the checksum you generate is the same as the one from Ubuntu's website, you know you have a legit copy.\n\nIf the checksum you generate is different from the one on Ubuntu's website, then you know that your file has been tampered with."
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entp0o | does eating food affect the absorption of painkillers? | If you were to take painkillers such as paracetamol or ibuprofen on an empty stomach would they work stronger/quicker as there isn’t any food to get in the way? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/entp0o/eli5_does_eating_food_affect_the_absorption_of/ | {
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"I don't think so. That kind of recommendation sounds more like to avoid of doing something bad to your stomach. Something like when people recommend to eat something with the coffee to counter the acidity.",
"Pharmacist here. It depends which drug specifically. In the case of acetaminophen/paracetamol, food may slightly slow down how the drug is absorbed in the small intestine but it's mostly negligible and the recommendation is to take it regardless of food. \n\nAs for ibuprofen, it's generally recommended to take it with food, mostly to avoid side effects (stomachaches or ulcers). It's thought that food actually increases the absorption of ibuprofen but again, the difference in absorption isn't very significant.\n\nIf you have more detailed drug-related questions I would suggest calling your local pharmacist :)"
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4vwnyq | why do people like to make people angry? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4vwnyq/eli5_why_do_people_like_to_make_people_angry/ | {
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"In my experience making someone angry is someone's way of feeling powerful by affecting someone. Probably because whoever enjoys causing people to be angry feels out of control in their own life. Also provoking someone to be angry is an easy way to get them to act aggressively and acting aggressively in modern society is frowned upon and whoever was acting that way is often seen as being in the wrong regardless of how they got to be distressed enough to act on their anger. \n\nTl;Dr: I understand it's a common bully/abuse/manipulation tactic."
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247jd5 | demyelinating neuropathy | Trying to prepare for my next appt with Neurologist, but I just can't make my brain work well enough to grok this: _URL_0_
Help much appreciated! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/247jd5/eli5demyelinating_neuropathy/ | {
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"The way the brain works is a series of electrical impulses caused by an action potential. This doesn't work like the matrix says it does. This potential is actually caused by positive charges, potassium and sodium. Myelin is a fatty protein that surrounds some neurons. Other neurons are surrounded by swann cells that share identical purpose. These fatty proteins help propagate the action potential. In a nut shell, they speed how fast the potential moves. The faster it moves, the faster your cells can communicate.\n\nIn demyelinating neuropathy, your myelin starts to unsheathe. It no longer functions the way it is supposed to, and the propagation slows down significantly. What you get is a criss cross of signals. Where as before you have perfect coordination, now some of your muscles receive identical signals milliseconds to seconds after they're supposed to. Think of it this way, you have many muscles, and you have to coordinate each one perfectly in order to do anything. When that coordination is no longer there, everything becomes jittery and quirky. Your body compensates for movements because your muscles don't react fast enough because your neurons can't signal fast enough because the myelin is gone. When your body compensates, it does so too slowly, and you must compensate for your overcompensation. This endless loop creates jitters and shakes.\n\nVery basically, your body has communication issues. If you think of your neurons as highways, demyelination is like having different speed limits. You'll get to where you're going, but it will take a lot longer to get there. As for what protein this disease affects I do not know. I only studied the physical effects, not the genetic or protein linked effects.",
"The link you provided is very thorough. As someone living with CIDP I've heard a lot of different explanations for demyelinating neuropathy. The simplest way of explaining it is: an (1) abnormal immune response is occurring in your body. Your immune system is attacking the fatty tissue surrounding your nerves (myelin sheath) because your immune cells think the myelin is bad. (2) In response to these attacks your body creates inflammation to counter act the damage. The inflammation damages the nerves and overtime severely affects specific muscles and processes. (3) If left untreated and undiagnosed your disease can create more damage and neuropathic symptoms like burning, muscle weakness, lack of coordination, and more. (4) Neuropathy symptoms vary depending on your disease, condition and many other factors.( 5) methylprednisone(steroids), Immune globulin (iVig) and immune suppressants such as CellCept are examples of treatments.\n\nMy advice is establish a good relationship with your neurologist (ie make sure they are helpful, considerate and respond quickly to sudden changes in your symptoms.) Get multiple opinions on your diagnosis to ensure you are treating the correct disease.\n\nI wish you best!",
"No problem little egypt! It's truly disappointing how some doctors can be...Just remember: you are your best doctor! You know your body best."
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2imuzv | why are ebola patients being treated in a wide range of places instead of all being contained in one treatment area, or ones with close proximity? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2imuzv/eli5_why_are_ebola_patients_being_treated_in_a/ | {
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"Transport can be dangerous and increase the spread of infection. If you can get the treatment to the patient, better to keep him isolated to reduce the chance of spreading the disease. Also, if you centralized all the patients, one crazy nut could fire bomb the location in some deranged attempt to \"save the world.\" There are other reasons I heard while taking biology classes in college. Bottom line, let the doctors figure it out, they are the professionals and certainly know more than the media or the politicians."
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8tum1b | why is seemingly every photo tagged with a “getty images” watermark? how big are they? and are they just an image host or do they also employ photographers? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8tum1b/eli5_why_is_seemingly_every_photo_tagged_with_a/ | {
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"text": [
"Getty is huge. They buy images from existing photographers and then aggressively protect copyright. I don't believe they employ their own photographers, but prefer to buy images from others."
]
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||
2v47hf | how did filmmakers achieved visual effects in the 70s and early 80s? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2v47hf/eli5_how_did_filmmakers_achieved_visual_effects/ | {
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"Well [here](_URL_0_) is an example how some of the effects in Empire strikes back came to be",
"Which visual effects in particular. There are many different kinds."
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3my7za | what tests are scientist's willing to invest in now that there's water on mars, whereas before they wouldn't? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3my7za/eli5_what_tests_are_scientists_willing_to_invest/ | {
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"Well I imagine now they would be more interested in searching for signs of life, as they now know that is a distinct possibility with liquid water. "
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9qluax | could armored dinosaurs like ankylosaurus and nodosaurus swim? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9qluax/eli5_could_armored_dinosaurs_like_ankylosaurus/ | {
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"Theoretically it is possible for large animals to swim. If these dinosaurs did is an entirely different question and one I doubt we have an answer for",
"Very unlikely, because the Ankylosaurus was a walking tank. It weighed between 5 to 8 tons and was 6–8 metres long when fully grown. \n\nThis weight was built up by the huge amount of osteoderms and bony plating on the animal. Frankly it's astounding that they could even stand.\n\nGiven the amount of weight and density, it's also of note that the Ankylosaurus couldn't move quickly at all except for its tail in times of distress, meaning that the Ankylosaurus would have had a lack of bouyancy as well as movement to keep it afloat"
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17wze1 | the phenomenon in our universe known as dark flow | Can anyone dumb [this](_URL_0_) down a little for me? It sounds really interesting but I don't totally understand what is going on. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/17wze1/eli5_the_phenomenon_in_our_universe_known_as_dark/ | {
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"The first and most important thing to know about it is that it's not actually known to be a thing at all.\n\nFor starters, ignore everything in the universe smaller than a galaxy. In fact, you can *pretty much* ignore everything smaller than a galactic *cluster.* We're talking about a very large scale here.\n\nIf you look at all the galactic clusters we can see in the sky, you'll find that they're all moving a little bit, kind of like dust motes in a sunbeam. This one's drifting that way, that one's driving that other way, and so on. This little random motion is called *peculiar* motion. Not because it's *weird,* but because it's *specific to* each galactic cluster we look at.\n\nIt's widely assumed — because the math tells us this should be the case — that the peculiar motions of the galactic clusters should be evenly distributed. That is, there should be no *net* peculiar motion. Everything should be drifting around randomly, not moving in some overall direction.\n\nHowever, *one particular* analysis of astronomical measurements suggested that maybe there is a very tiny net motion to the galactic clusters we can see. But this is just *one particular* analysis. And it's not a simple analysis, either; it comes only after a lot of very complicated math has been done to crunch the raw data collected.\n\nWhich means, in essence, nobody knows if this thing really exists or not. It's entirely possible that it's just a methodological error; in fact, several prominent cosmologists have gone on the record saying this is probably the case, and some researchers have crunched the data in a different way and haven't found the anomaly in question.\n\nSo until cosmologists collect a *lot* more data — over many more decades — it will probably remain an open question. If it were a simple methodological *error,* like a mistake in the math, it probably would've been identified by now. But if we collect more data and analyze that, cosmologists may find that what looked like a meaningful anomaly was actually just part of a bigger, entirely consistent picture.\n\nSo worst case, it's something unexplained that will never have any direct affect on any person who ever lives. Best case, it's just a math glitch that will go away when subjected to better examination."
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3ar8sj | why are there 'war crimes' which are different to 'crimes' isn't killing someone simply murder? | See title | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ar8sj/eli5_why_are_there_war_crimes_which_are_different/ | {
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"War crimes are war related crimes outlined in the Geneva convention, like killing prisoners of war, using chemical weapons like poison gas, killing medical personnel, etc.",
"A state of war between (or within) states is a time we've pretty much universally recognized that traditional law and order don't matter. However, in the wake of WWI and the many absolutely horrible weapons that were deployed, many countries sought agreements to the conduct of war along certain agreed upon rules. These have been formalized and breaking them is a \"war crime\" rather than a civil or criminal violation.",
"We have separate definitions for war crimes in the understanding that soldiers who fight are doing so out of loyalty to their country or cause, out of fear of the consequences of leaving, or because being a soldier is their career and expertise. Actions that are a normal part of war, like shooting members of the opposing military who are armed and dangerous, should not be punished, while any action that goes beyond the normal confines of war and causes unnecessary suffering should be punished, in the hopes that doing so will deter future war crimes.",
"We use war crimes to specify when a person or group conducts war outside of generally accepted norms. Since states will never renounce war as a tool of statecraft it is worthwhile to establish a few ground rules that most can agree on.\n\nSince war itself is not illegal per se thus you need a special set of agreements covering its conduct. Thus war crimes. ",
"When two countries are legitimately at war, it is not a crime to kill the enemy's soldiers. But over time, countries and international institutions decided it can't just be anything-goes chaos, so they outlawed certain tactics and weapons. The concept of war crimes is not a new thing, contrary to popular belief, there's been an effective ban on perfidy (pretending to surrender and then ambushing the enemy when they move in) for thousands of years, enforced by custom. But in recent years, with new technology, it became necessary and desirable to ban more and more of the particularly heinous and destructive tactics of war like the use of chemical weapons, intentional killing of civilians, torture and mistreatment of prisoners of war, genocide and ethnic cleansing, war rape, looting, etc. ",
"The concept of war crimes is mostly delineated these days by the Geneva Conventions (that's S, plural, there are seven of them), to which most nations are a signatory to, and which carry the weight of law in some countries like the US. There are other such treaties and agreements, but the GC are the biggie.\n\nIn addition to describing how you can and can't kill people, the GC list rules for dealing with prisoners of war. You must treat them humanely, you can't execute them, that kinda thing. Torture of any sort is WAY off the table.\n\nAnd that's why Dick Cheney and George Bush are bonafide war criminals. Cheney (who was really in charge in the early days of the Bush administration) decided he didn't like all these namby-pamby laws (and neocons are not real fans of the concept of \"international law\" in general), so he had his pet lawyer David Addington (and later John Woo) over at the Office of Legal Counsel draw up some *seriously* dodgy legal findings that said, essentially, the President didn't have to obey the GC.\n\nThe excuse they used was that terrorists were \"illegal combatants,\" and thus not eligible for protection under the GC. But that's bullshit. The GC *DO* define illegal combatants: they are people like spies, saboteurs, and mercenaries. It doesn't take so much as one mental pushup to realize that a terrorist is *easily* the equivalent of a saboteur. Addington and Woo had no real expertise in the GC, and Woo's work in particular has been called \"shockingly amateurish\" by people who WERE experts.\n\nAnd while the GC allows you to get a bit harsher on the ass of illegal combatants--for example, after a hearing to determine their status, you can execute them--torture is still *expressly* forbidden. But in the fantasy world Addington and Woo created, terrorists were this whole new thing nobody had even encountered before, so torturing them was just fine and dandy.\n\nSo we did. A lot. And in fact, it was par-TAY ON! for a whole list of activities specifically forbidden by the GC. The CIA did it, the military did it, probably several other government agencies did it. And all the time, the memo trail shows that these guys *knew* they were doing something that they could get prosecuted for.\n\nBut the punchline here is that the ticket to go barbarian came from the OLC. Most people have never heard of it, but it exists essentially to write get out of jail free cards for the executive branch. If an OLC lawyer writes a finding, it is not vetoed by the Attorney General (they rarely are), and the President signs off on it, then any member of the executive branch following the finding in good faith can essentially not be prosecuted under US law. Foreign and international courts might eventually file charges, but the US has a long history of ignoring those when it's OUR people being charged.\n\nAfter WWII, the Allies executed some German and Japanese commanders who did things that were as bad as what Bush and Cheney were responsible for.\n\nI'm just sayin'....\n"
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jx9ts | wound healing. what is it in our body that makes it heal cuts, burns, scrapes, etc. | And also why are there limitations (some wounds don't heal completely, no limb regeneration like lizards, etc)? And do all people heal at the same rate? And if not, what makes some people heal faster? And is Wolverine a real person? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jx9ts/eli5_wound_healing_what_is_it_in_our_body_that/ | {
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"In your blood are little things called platelets (or thrombocytes if you want to get specific). When you get cut, your brain tells them to fix the hole, as otherwise you could get infected etc. The platelets stick together again and again until a clot is formed, which stops continuous bleeding from the wound, otherwise whenever you got cut, you'd bleed to death (like you might if you had haemophilia). The bigger the cut, the longer it takes as it takes more platelets to fill the gap.\n\nThen, any bad cells/bacteria that get into your body through the cut are destroyed. Followed by the edges of the wound beginning to pull together and close up. As the wound is closed, unneeded cells essentially die, and the body makes collagen (a protein) and skin cells to repair the wound back to normal.\n\nAs humans are bigger and more complex than lizards and other creatures that can regenerate, regenerating entire limbs would be very difficult to control - the regenerated limbs may be smaller than before (this happens in lizards every now and then) or inefficient in some way, not to mention the entire process would be costly for the body - if a human loses a limb, there is HUGE blood loss, if a lizard loses its tail, it is able to stop the blood flow to that area so it won't bleed to death, humans cant do this.\n\nI'm not sure about the rate of healing, but it generally takes a similar amount of time for wounds of similar sizes, assuming they have a normal immune system and aren't lacking in anything the body needs for the process.\n\nAnd no, Wolverine is fictional and is a property of Marvel. Hugh Jackman is an actor and possesses none of Wolverine/s abilities other than looking like a badass",
"In your blood are little things called platelets (or thrombocytes if you want to get specific). When you get cut, your brain tells them to fix the hole, as otherwise you could get infected etc. The platelets stick together again and again until a clot is formed, which stops continuous bleeding from the wound, otherwise whenever you got cut, you'd bleed to death (like you might if you had haemophilia). The bigger the cut, the longer it takes as it takes more platelets to fill the gap.\n\nThen, any bad cells/bacteria that get into your body through the cut are destroyed. Followed by the edges of the wound beginning to pull together and close up. As the wound is closed, unneeded cells essentially die, and the body makes collagen (a protein) and skin cells to repair the wound back to normal.\n\nAs humans are bigger and more complex than lizards and other creatures that can regenerate, regenerating entire limbs would be very difficult to control - the regenerated limbs may be smaller than before (this happens in lizards every now and then) or inefficient in some way, not to mention the entire process would be costly for the body - if a human loses a limb, there is HUGE blood loss, if a lizard loses its tail, it is able to stop the blood flow to that area so it won't bleed to death, humans cant do this.\n\nI'm not sure about the rate of healing, but it generally takes a similar amount of time for wounds of similar sizes, assuming they have a normal immune system and aren't lacking in anything the body needs for the process.\n\nAnd no, Wolverine is fictional and is a property of Marvel. Hugh Jackman is an actor and possesses none of Wolverine/s abilities other than looking like a badass"
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3i45zn | why are so many candidates with little chance of winning seeking presidential nomination? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3i45zn/eli5_why_are_so_many_candidates_with_little/ | {
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"It gets them additional public exposure, and even if they don't win, the exposure can help them politically since a higher profile means more influence.",
"There might be several motivations: \n\n* The first one is the 'you never know factor'. You can't win the elections if you don't run and a sudden surge in popularity could theoretically carry you all the way to the office.\n\n* Just running, while not winning, increases your familiarity with the voters. Laying the groundwork now might help make you a more viable candidate in future elections.\n\n* Even if you don't win, running makes it possible to introduce ideas you hold dear. You might not get the victory, but maybe ideas you brought up become more visible.\n\n* Presidential candidacy offers you a massive bump in media visibility which may help you do things like sell books or land high-profile jobs."
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1k3jhm | can you actually go blind from looking at a solar eclipse with out proper eye protection? why? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1k3jhm/eli5_can_you_actually_go_blind_from_looking_at_a/ | {
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"Your pupils get large because the light levels are low, but it's still giving you a lot of UV light. Your pupils would normally get smaller to protect you from such a thing, but the eclipse fools this mechanism.\n\nYou absolutely can go blind, or at least have seriously damaged eyesight from retinal damage caused by ultraviolet light. Don't ever do that, seriously. Don't look directly at the sun, and never during an eclipse.",
"I used to stare at the sun as a child, so I could become blind and get my own guide dog. It didn't work, and now as an adult my vision is better than 20/20, after being corrected by very thick lenses."
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3gyezh | why does the united nations need permanent members? | Why is the UN not democratic? Why are there permanent members? What makes them more "special"? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3gyezh/eli5why_does_the_united_nations_need_permanent/ | {
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"The permanent members of the security council were the most power countries at the time of the formation of the UN. They would not join the UN without the powers of veto and permanent status being given them. Without them there is no point in having the UN as it would have absolutely no power or authority without their economies and militaries backing it. ",
"The U.S., Russia, China, U.K., and France (the Big 5) were the top dogs of the Allied forces at the end of World War II. It was after World War II that the Allied nations decided that the UN would be a good idea after the mess of the Treaty of Versailles that indirectly lead to the start of WWII. The Big 5 wrote the charter of the UN and they all decided to make their positions at the top permanent."
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2k0383 | how are bills able to be changed last minute with other members of congress seemingly being out of the loop? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2k0383/eli5_how_are_bills_able_to_be_changed_last_minute/ | {
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"It doesn't happen with most bills. \n\nWhen it does tend to happen is when there is a particularly complicated bill that has to be passed immediately (e.g. a bill that keeps the government funding from shutting down, or deal with some national emergency). In those situations, the bill can be dozens or hundreds of pages long, and contains very technical language. Because of the sensitivity of time, the members of Congress put their trust in a smaller number of people (usually the chairman and a few other members of the subject matter committee) to make sure that all the details are correct. Sometimes, this smaller number of specialists will add things to the bill that are unexpected or that other members don't have time to learn about and fully understand. Because the bill is very long and complicated and must be passed quickly, the members decide it's better just to vote \"yes\" to solve the big emergency, even though there is a risk of them inadvertently agreeing to something the didn't intend. On very rare occasions, the added provision is intentionally written in a confusing way so that it won't be easy to discover until later. Sometimes a last-minute provision is quietly added in order to get additional votes needed to pass the bill. ",
"\"You have to pass the bill to see what's in it\" -Nancy Pelosi"
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2j6qsy | what does it mean that there is a 2,500 square-mile cloud of methane over the southwest? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2j6qsy/eli5what_does_it_mean_that_there_is_a_2500/ | {
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"Methane is much more efficient at trapping radiation than CO2 - about 20 times more so. As far as greenhouse gases go, it's (one of) the killer(s).\n\nEdit: some reading - \n_URL_0_\n\n_URL_1_\n\nEdit 2: The stuff in parentheses.",
"To add... What is keeping us from sending someone up there with a lighter and a flame-retardant parachute? ",
"There was a lot of oil and gas development in that area years ago. This is likely the result of improperly plugged and abandoned wells. I'm just speculating at this point, but I'm down in that area doing oil and gas work several times each year, and I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that these old locations are on native reservations. If that is the case, it's going to be difficult to get it under control, as that's sovereign territory, and I'm not sure if any federal or state agency would have the authority to force proper reclamation of those locations. It could turn into a real cluster fuck. ",
"Facking is pumping water (plus other chemicals) into the ground to force up natural gas a.k.a. Methane. Poor techniques and even good techniques are forcing methane up through peoples' wells as well as seep out the ground.",
"Sorry, it was probably me i had beans that night"
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"http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/the_green_lantern/2007/11/the_other_greenhouse_gases.html",
"http://epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/gases/ch4.html"
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1zo0z0 | why is 100 degrees celsius the "boiling point", when water can boil below 100 degrees? | I mean, it evaporates before 100 degrees, so why is it the boiling point? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1zo0z0/eli5why_is_100_degrees_celsius_the_boiling_point/ | {
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"Water without impurities boils at 100degrees c at sea level",
"It's the boiling point at sea level.\n\nDepending on altitude, that boiling point changes, but you have to set the standard somewhere.",
" > I mean, it evaporates before 100 degrees, so why is it the boiling point?\n\nEvaporation isn't the same as boiling. If the average energy of the water is high enough that it can become water vapor, then it's boiling. Evaporation happens when water molecules are running into each other near the surface of the water, and the energy transferred in one of those is one-sided enough that a particular water molecule can make the transition to water vapor."
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7y9d6s | why do seniors/children pay less for movie tickets when they still take the same amount of space ? | I get buffets charge less because seniors/children generally eat less. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7y9d6s/eli5why_do_seniorschildren_pay_less_for_movie/ | {
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"Its a way to get them into the thester. If no seniors are willing to spend $10 to go to the thester, then profit is $0. If lowering the price will cause at least a few seniors to come, then profit is made.",
"Marketing. Take for example a restaurant. Say this restaurant offers a deal where kids eat free after 4. Since they are kids, they can't go by themselves, so their parents must go with them. These parents then pay normal price. Bam, extra business. \nTL;DR: Businesses offer discounts for people who usually don't/can't go out alone to draw more customers who assist/go with them. ",
"Say that you work in an office earning $50,000 a year. You probably go and see all the major new releases of movies you like. But suppose that your co-worker has a wife, three kids, and those kids are close to their grandparents. For you, going to see that movie costs about $20, but your coworker might have to pay $140 to see the same movie because of all of the people he has to pay to bring along.\n\nAs a theater, you can't fill up on singles. Singles will see the movies they want to at the price you charge, and changing the price doesn't bring in many more. But for that large family, they might never choose to spend $140 on seeing a movie at all, preferring to spend their money on, say, $100 family feasts. For the theater to compete for that market, it has to offer the family a better price.\n\nBecause the unit cost on going to a cinema as an individual are quite low, you'll rarely prioritize expensive alternatives. But for a family spending over $100 to go, there are a host of other alternatives that are almost as good and much cheaper. The cinema has to compete with that to fill seats, so it offers a discount.\n\nBut, good news! Most cinemas will let you book a party with a discounted bulk rate. As a single, if you routinely movie-go with 8-10 other singles, you too can have a discount rate.",
"Because they, and their caretakers are likely to not attend at all. By giving them a discount you make it more likely to get them and their caretakers, and the caretakers are paying full price. ",
"Seniors:\n\nWho else can go to a movie in the middle of the day on weekdays? Adults are at work and kids are at school. Retirees, on the other hand, might want to catch a movie. The low price helps get them in the door.\n\nChildren:\n\nFamily outings get expensive when everyone needs a ticket. By giving families a break, it’s more likely they’ll go to a movie instead of staying home."
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bj99ba | why is lumber sold based the size it was before it went into the planer? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bj99ba/eli5_why_is_lumber_sold_based_the_size_it_was/ | {
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"A couple of points to add, and this from a former NELMA Lumber Inspector. They use 'green lumber' sizes{i.e. that from the saw first into a plank or? to use a reference point. The sizes have changed over the years, I think they are getting smaller now- tho I have been retired for some years. The standard, planned, sizes were needed for mass production methods, and mass transit needs. And do not forget the extra money that comes from the shavings sold. If the mills sawed, dried, and sold a real '2x4' where would the extra profit come from? Thankfully for me, my little town has a Real sawmill; I can get any size I need to restore my circa 1812 house, without the horrors of plywood, chip board, and the Big Box 'lumber.\n\nAnd a further tidbit; this same house has wall studs that are rough cut on just two sides, and used for studs in the house. This saves time and work, in addition, leaving the bark on is better for the wood, and it helps to keep the bugs out of the wood. The original sub floor, is one standard thickness, but random width, the thickness determined by the saw, and not a planner. We are quite spoiled in this era of power everything tools",
"In the UK it is based on whether the timber is planed or not. Unplaned timber is called the nominal size, so 50mm x 100mm (which is near enough 2 x 4) actually is 50 x 100. Unplaned timber has a rough finish and is generally used a lot outside or where it can't be seen.\n\nPlaned timber, (finished) is now mostly sold as 50 x 100 but is actually 44 x 94 ish. (Sizes differ a bit between different timber merchants.) The 50 x 100 unplaned timber is run through a planer thereby losing 3 mm on each side. In some places you can buy accurate stated sizes. Planed timber feels smooth and doesn't need much finishing. You could paint straight onto it generally. Its the wood you would see inside your house - skirting boards, plank, floorboard, door liners, trims and architraves. (Your doors, windows and furniture are probably not made from planed timber since joiners who make these tend to size and plane their own better grade lumber.)\n\nSheet material sizes are accurate.\n\nIt's a pain basically, especially when you are using a lot of different sizes and trying to design and cost something. It's another 'economy' passed onto the customer to sort out.",
"Just a side note to your comment, but a quarter pound hamburger is the amount of hamburger that was put on the grill. The patty you end up eating won’t weigh 4 oz anymore. So your example actually is closer to the same than an opposite.",
"In the west all douglas fir framing lumber is sold and used wet. Dry DF is as hard as a rock and hard to work with.\n\nMy experience says all rough cut DF is near, but not exact, labeled dimension. One side is planed off 1/4, perfectly smooth. The next side is planed exactly to the reqquired dimension, (1.5 for instance). 1/4inch, more or less, is removed, leaving a perfectly smooth surface. All dimensioned lumber is \"cleaned up\" like this. A \"4x6\" is 3.5 x5.5. Framing is a system where a 4x6 must sit perfectly on a 2x4, the sides remain exactly flush. This rule follows all dimensions. larger or smaller, used in construction. If it varies more than 1/16 it's a problem.\n\nRough cut means the 4 sides do not have to be planed or be perfect dimension so it is less expensive.",
"Because \"two by four\" is easier to say than \"one and a half by three and a half\". Long ago, the wood was just raw cut from the sawmill and whanged together into a house. But raw wet wood has bugs and moisture. As it dries it warps. Consumers don't like warped houses or bugs, so to satisfy demand they started pressing, straightening and drying the wood before hand. But they never changed the size or jigs of the saws that cut the wood out of the log, which is always wet.\n\nCarpenters, happy to not have to deal with warped buggy wood simply adjusted to the fact that a 2x4 was really 1.5x3.5, and made the corresponding adjustments when they were drawing out their framing etc.** Any carpenter or framer who is any good knows the true dimensions of a board and can deal with it probably without even thinking about it. Us weekend warriors though have to be careful to do real world lumber math. \n\nHaving said that you can get true size treated lumber (a 2x4 that is actually 2x4) but it will cost you a fortune.\n\n**and this adjustment happened so long ago and just became \"standard\" accepted practise that noone ever bothered to go back and change it.",
"It's historical. Many years ago timber could only be bought in sawn sizes. Back in the day power planes hadn't been invented. Carpenters would buy it and plane it down to give a smooth finish. So they'd buy a four by two and by the time they, smoothed it off they ended up with a smaller piece of wood. \nI can remember back in the 70's when we had a local timber merchant. All the wood was sawn. After you bought it if you asked they would plane it down for a small extra charge."
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7oaf44 | why do products with double the amount/content don't nearly cost double the price? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7oaf44/eli5_why_do_products_with_double_the/ | {
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"Smaller products have more packaging costs, more transaction overhead & more customer service issues. When you make something, you just want to focus on making that thing so you sell it off in big lots so you don't need to worry about running stores & dealing with customers.",
"Actually making content once you have set up the production pipeline is not very expensive. Setting up a production pipeline is very expensive.",
"Because it's easier and quicker to make 1 big sandwich than 2 small sandwiches.\n\nAbout half the price of many things is paying the people who made it. Give a sandwich-maker big bread and big ham slices, and he/she can make big sandwiches at about the same speed as someone making small sandwiches. The big bread and ham costs more, but the work cost is the same, so the total cost of the big sandwich is less than for making 2 small sandwiches.",
"If you build a factory to just make one bag of chips then that is gonna be an expensive bag of chips. \n\nBut if you make thousands of bags of chips then the cost per bag goes down. \n\nEven then, if you actually just give people more chips and less bag that can help keep costs down even more. \n\nSo it probably doesn't cost twice as much to make twice as many chips. \n\nBeyond that, price isn't only determined by the cost to produce something but also what consumers are willing to pay. Sell big chip bags at twice the price and people might balk and only buy the small bags. But if you discount the bigger bags then you get more people to buy the big bags. "
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1soln3 | what causes the menstruation cycle to be regular? | How does the female body know every month to shed the lining of the uterus? What affects this cycle? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1soln3/eli5_what_causes_the_menstruation_cycle_to_be/ | {
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"Mother fucking biological clock, every 28 days that shit needs to be refreshed.",
"[Additional info](_URL_0_) \n\nThe menstrual cycle is caused by hormones that fluctuate in level throughout the cycle. A hormone called follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) is released by the pituitary gland, which causes an egg cell to develop. The little pod of cells it is inside is called the follicle. The follicle grows as the egg develops, and as it grows it secretes more and more estrogen until ovulation (caused by an increase in FSH and another hormone called lutenizing hormone). Then the follicle develops in to another structure called a corpus luteum, which secretes progesterone. Progesterone and estrogen cause the endometrium to thicken. \n\nEventually, if no baby appears, the corpus luteum will break down, causing estrogen and progesterone levels to drop. Low estrogen levels cause the endometrium to shed. Low estrogen levels also trigger the release of FSH, so here we are at the beginning again. "
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17b31y | i can always find a deal on most electronics if i look hard enough. why do the prices of certain products never seem to vary more than a few bucks? | Apple is the best example of this but I think the same might hold true for designer stuff too (and I'm sure there are others). | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/17b31y/eli5_i_can_always_find_a_deal_on_most_electronics/ | {
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"Apple will only supply to retailers if the retailer agrees to very strict conditions. Those conditions include that the retailer only sells Apple products at pre-agreed prices. Which is why you will never be able to find a deal on a new iPhone or iPad."
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1mfmqk | the concept of a t-test in statistics | When should/n't it be used?
How do I know if my output is reasonable?
How do I know if it's a one or two tail distribution?
I'm analyzing pre- and post- survey data, so I know it's a "paired" test. I've never taken an official stats class but I have plenty of math/science background. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1mfmqk/eli5_the_concept_of_a_ttest_in_statistics/ | {
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"A t-test is used to compare two sets of data gathered independently of each other to see how similar they are. In my job (biochemistry) it's sometimes used during method validation to test how well a particular test will give a 100% result when conducted multiple times.\nThe difference between one-tailed and two-tailed depends on your data set. Essentially it refers to the shape of a bell curve where you would expect your data points to lie, the tails are the ends of the bell curve at the extreme high and low values. If you're testing data which may vary in two directions, say between 95-105% of a theoretical mean then you should use s two-tailed test as the data may lie in either end of your bell curve, under either tail. If your data is zero-bounded, (cut off at zero) or otherwise can only vary in one direction, then you should use a one-tailed test, as you effectively only have half a bell curve and only one tail.\nWhether you should use it depends on the variability of your data. As with all statistical tests it is not perfect, perfectly good and precise data sets may fail a t-test where more variable data would pass. Because the test involves dividing a calculated value by the standard deviation, the more variable your results are the more likely they are to be considered similar.\n",
"To add to what /u/revdodge has said you should only use a t-test if your data is **normally** distributed i.e. the data is evenly distributed either side of the mean (50% greater and 50% lower). If you have a \"skewed\" data set (most of the data lies to either the left or right of the mean) [this site helps explain normality and skewness](_URL_1_) then a different statistical test should be used [such as a mann whitney u test](_URL_0_). \n\nHope this helps you."
]
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[],
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"http://www.mathsisfun.com/data/standard-normal-distribution.html"
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|
4takl9 | where there is a uterus or another female organ in a woman's body, what is in that exact spot in a man's body? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4takl9/eli5_where_there_is_a_uterus_or_another_female/ | {
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"No, the woman's bladder is just smaller when empty and is located more forward in the body, creating a space behind it, where the womb is located.\nAn important thing about the womb is that, when the woman is not pregnant, it's pretty small organ. It only gets huge and cumbersome when there's a huge, cumbersome baby in it.\n\nI hope that answers your question."
]
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||
60dm6o | how can a distance be infinitely smaller | In math last year we learned about asymptotes and how a curve can get infinitely close to a certain line but never touch it. How can the distance between two things be infinitely small when they can easily intersect? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/60dm6o/eli5_how_can_a_distance_be_infinitely_smaller/ | {
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"Between the numbers 1 and 2, there is 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etc. But between 1.1 and 1.2 there is 1.11, 1.12, 1.13, etc. And between 1.11 and 1.12 there is 1.121, 1.122, 1.123, etc. So there can always be more numbers in between two other numbers. It is infinite, you can keep going smaller and smaller.\n\nSo between any two points, there are infinite distances.",
"Saying that a curve gets infinitely close to an asymptote is an imprecise statement. It's better to say that the curve gets arbitrarily close to the asymptote. That means if you pick any positive number no matter how small, I can show a point where the distance from the curve to the line is less than that number",
"Because infinity goes in both directions, up, to the realm of the very large (easier to grasp concept) and down, into the very small, subatomic particles and beyond, no matter how close you are to an object, you can always cut that number in half and still don't touch said object."
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3k3sk6 | when people make supercuts, where do they get all the footage, and how do they find all the clips? | Something like this: [A supercut of all the times "Psych" made a reference to "Mentalist"] (_URL_0_) confuses me. Did someone really watch every episode, and buy all the DVDs, to put it together? Or is there some other way to do it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3k3sk6/eli5_when_people_make_supercuts_where_do_they_get/ | {
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"There are places on the internet where you can easily and quickly acquire just about every episode of these shows... For free. After that it's just up to you to piece it together. ",
"In addition to pirating/purchasing the episodes, the person could have combined multiple YouTube videos of less complete compilations. Also a quick Google search would probably show a list on a forum or wiki of all references to \"The Mentalist,\" for example, that people have noticed and it is just up to the author to find the scene from the list and copy/compile it themselves.",
"There are websites where you can acquire the scripts of the movie/tv show (this one for instance: _URL_0_) and just make a quick search looking for the words you want (which is the worst part) then if you own DVDs/BluRay or with a simple serch on Google, like others have pointed out, you can do the rest (to find the scenes and everything)"
]
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"http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/09/06/psych_makes_fun_of_the_mentalist_a_supercut_of_all_the_times_the_usa_show.html"
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[],
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2nwzuj | anarchy vs libertarian | What is the difference between libertarian philosophy and anarchist philosophy? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2nwzuj/eli5_anarchy_vs_libertarian/ | {
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"A libertarian philosophy is laissez-faire (minimal interference from the government) advocating only minimal state intervention in the lives of citizens.\n\nAn anarchist philosophy is based on the absence of government, and we are self-governed.\n\nSo one has a government that works minimally, and the other has no government. ",
"Libertarians would want a government to enforce contracts. ",
"'Libertarian' covers a wide range from laissez-faire to true anarchism. Anarchists are libertarians, but not all libertarians are anarchists. There's also a range of views covered by the libertarian spectrum. ",
"Right-anarchist (anarcho-capitalist) is a subset of libertarian.\n\nLeft-anarchists differ in how they view private property beyond personal usage."
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crk29t | what happens to an eyeball after it's removed from a body and loses its moisture? | Sorry if this is gross, I've just always wondered and can never figure out how to Google this. I never participated in dissections and I don't hunt so I've never interacted with an eyeball apart from putting contacts in.
If you took an eye out of a person or animal (not suggesting this at all) and just set the eyeball on a table, what would happen to it? Would you have an eyeball raisin after it's all dried out, or a pile of eye dust, or just nothing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/crk29t/eli5_what_happens_to_an_eyeball_after_its_removed/ | {
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"Well, it would definitely depend upon the environment around the eyeball, but since you're particularly curious about it being dried out; in an arid environment (say under a heat lamp or something) yeah, it would turn into basically an eyeball raisin. But under most conditions, it'd basically just eventually rot, turning into a dark goo as it decomposes, like the rest (mostly) of the organs.",
"You might enjoy [this](_URL_0_). It's basically an ophthalmologist (eye doctor) experimenting with a bag of pig eyes and acid, paintball guns, lasers, etc."
]
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[],
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3d7xh2 | "complexes" in terms of psychology | i've been seeing a lot of talk over "superiority complexes" and "victim complexes" over the web. what are these? i've tried googling the definition but they simply make no sense to my simple brain haha
thank you! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3d7xh2/eli5_complexes_in_terms_of_psychology/ | {
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"The psych meaning of complex is a bit different than the dictionary. In the field, complex refers to a group of attitudes, forms, or personality traits that define whatever word is placed in front of it. Example: \"superiority complex\" refers to the traits in a given person that makes them feel superior to others. "
]
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6gctlw | why are there not many artistic depictions of heaven within christian religious art traditionally? | I mean really depicting what heaven looks like. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6gctlw/eli5_why_are_there_not_many_artistic_depictions/ | {
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"perhaps depicting perfection was thought impossible and hence avoided. My theory, though, is that they thought it offensive to draw holy things back then",
"Aside from being depicted as 'beyond' the sky in renaissance art, it's never really described in the Bible. "
]
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ajyscc | why is dietary fibre important? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ajyscc/eli5_why_is_dietary_fibre_important/ | {
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"Fiber is made of complex sugars that makes up the cell walls of plants, such as cellulose, or other sugars such as chitin. Although some animals can digest it, humans can't. Since it is not digested, it makes it into the large intestine, where it absorbs water and makes pooping easier. There are other components and forms of fiber, but this is pretty much the main one.",
"There’s also new evidence that the “good” bacteria in our colon take nutrition from dietary fiber. So even if humans can’t digest it, our gut bacteria can. Having a healthy microbiome is essential to preventing diabetes, heart disease and all sorts of other inflammatory disorders. So, eat your fruits and veggies."
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9ho0y0 | why is it that modern body armor, like the kind used by the military and police, is very rarely of high enough strength to stop rounds from rifle caliber weapons? especially in a military context, aren't rifle caliber weapons exceedingly common? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9ho0y0/eli5_why_is_it_that_modern_body_armor_like_the/ | {
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"The speed of a rifle bullet is much more than a pistol. The amount of armor that would be required to stop a rifle bullet with the same effectiveness as a pistol round would be too heavy and bulky for the wearer to be able to do anything else effectively. ",
"When I was deployed we had armor with plates. They were rated to stop a round from an AK-47. But like with many things. The more times it gets hit the more it loses its structural integrity. Think of a brick wall and a sledgehammer. Sure, the brick wall maybe able to stop a few hits, but eventually the force is going to weaken it to the point of failure. You also have to consider mobility as well. The armor can’t be so thick and heavy that the person wearing can’t move either. It’s a balance that has to be reached. Too much weight and the soldiers may as well just make a Fox hole and fight from a secure position. ",
"Disclaimer: I was in the navy almost 20 years ago, so I'm sure things have changed since. \n\nWhen I was on active duty, there were several ports er stopped in where our watch standers were required to wear flak jackets. We were told they were rated for frag and small-to-medium caliber pistol rounds--but not rifle bullets.\n\nWhen I got off watch the first time, I hit the publications to find out why.\n\nAs it turns out, since WWII, upwards of 80% of casualties suffered by soldiers in combat were inflicted by fragments from explosive detonation, not bullets (frag grenades, land mines, artillery shells).\n\nAt the same time, nearly all modern militaries practice a type of warfare called \"fire and maneuver.\" Well over 95% of bullets fired are never even intended to hit their target; they're used primarily to force the enemy to stay behind cover (called \"suppressive fire\") while the rest of the squad maneuvers into position for the kill.\n\nI understand that nowadays, soldiers' armor is issued with trauma plates, so clearly things have changed a bit."
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302aaf | what made the beatles so revolutionary for the music industry? and why are they regarded as one of the most influential bands of all time? | I am a huge Beatle fan and have always heard of The Beatles truly changing the music industry and influencing countless artists. What exactly did they do the was so game changing? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/302aaf/eli5_what_made_the_beatles_so_revolutionary_for/ | {
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"Oh, my. A number of things.\n\n1 The Beatles wrote their own songs. Before, most Pop acts were given songs to sing by their producers. After The Beatles, it was more expected that a band would create its own music. I may be wrong, but I understand that the current model has drifted back to a \"You write, I perform\" model.\n\n2 The Beatles had two exceptionally talented and one very talented songwriter in the band. This meant that every album had unusually high quality songs in every slot. The norm before The Beatles was that a hit single was followed by an album that contained that hit single plus a whole lot of garbage quickly thrown together.\n\n3 Many of the hooks, tricks, teasers you hear in pop music today were invented by The Beatles in the studio - because they couldn't play live concerts anymore. They couldn't even hear themselves, much less have their audience hear them.\n\n4 The Beatles made it possible to incorporate other musical techniques into pop, ranging from string quartets to Indian sitars to pure noise like guitar solos played backwards.\n\n5 And, alas, drugs. You can hear the change in music when they started smoking weed, and again later when they started dropping acid. I'll leave everone here to imagine the impact on society from that.\n\nA better place to ask this question, with much more knowledgeable people than me, is /r/beatles.",
"Among other things, they wrote a lot of their own music, which was not at all common in pop music at the time. Most songs would be written by song-writers and shopped around to bands. The Beatles did a lot of covers early on, but then branched out more and more into writing their own stuff, which could be seen as the beginning of an era in pop music where more artists were the ones writing their own music. They also did a lot of experimental (at the time) things in the studio and with different song structures and concepts. \n\nWe have more or less transitioned back (in popular music) to the older traditional model where the artist is mainly a performer and the music is written by someone else.",
"Going hand-in-hand with having so many quality songs on each album, I believe they were also one of the first acts to think of an album as a cohesive collection of songs instead of singles & filler or greatest hits. ",
"There's a really great class on Coursera that's offered from time to time, it's the History of the Beatles and it's taught by John Covach and it's really a great class.\n\nThe Beatles were groundbreaking because in a time where pop music was made by big producers with paid writers and studio musicians or everyone covering everyone else, the Beatles were writing their own material, and after the first 2-3 albums (which they were churning out at a frantic pace) they were writing more material than covers, which was unheard of. They started the musicianship and songwriting as a craft movement in popular music, that eventually became the status quo for rock and roll. Because of the Beatles (and the Beach Boys and Everly Brothers and Buddy Holly) bands started writing their own songs and making their own music and it blossomed into a whole decade of fabulous music that comes from the souls of the men who perform the music.\n\nThey also experimented with different instruments, and different ethnic sounds (especially George) and John's lyrics pushed the envelope, leading the Beatles to be banned on the BBC a lot.\n\nEvery album is more musically inventive than the one preceding it. The Beatles were 1-2 years ahead of almost every other rock band in terms of music styles, instrumentation and innovation. Most of the bands we love of the classic rock era were influenced by the Beatles.\n\nEdit: They don't seem to be offering the class right now, which is unfortunate. His history of rock class is great too, which is also not being taught at this time. Anyway, I recommend reading two books: [The history of Rock and Roll](_URL_0_) by the professor, and [Beatlesongs](_URL_1_) if you want to do some reading, both books are great. You can however get the same info on wikipedia, the Beatles have a wiki page for every single song in their discography, and it's really great reading.",
"For people who are really, really interested in this topic, here is a 48 minute Youtube discussion by a music theorist/composer/historian about this question. It may be a bit over the top, but it hits the salient points brilliantly. (From the BBC, IIRC)\n\n_URL_0_\n\n",
"1968, I am a junior in college, just got home on Friday night after a final and in comes one of my room mates. He just picked up the new Beatles \"White Album\", put it on the stereo and hear comes a whining jet engine accompanied by Paul gleefully singing about how great it is to be back in the USSR and imploring his significant other to keep his comrade warm... wtf, we are in the middle of a cold war with USSR where is my happy teeny bopper love song? Herb Alpert, Fifth Dimension, Temptations, Rascals, Lemon Pipers, all popular groups at the time and their names say it all.\nThe Beatles had their share of sweet songs but albums like this one and Sgt Pepper\nwere just so far out of the normal pop song mileu that it is really hard to describe. They just blew the mold apart and didnt give a flying fuck. Their insane level of popularity provided a platform from which they could flaunt the norm and just really go in any creative direction they wanted. In those days there was not such fragmentation, diversity?, as there is now. An entire generation of young people was behind them, they took the ball and ran with it. Listen to the White Album, it is still a trip!",
"Easiest way to understand this is to just listen to each of their albums compared to the other shit people were making at that time.",
"Music as you know it today did not exist before them. ",
"Another important thing that should not be overlooked is that the early/mid sixties saw the birth of \"youth culture\". \n\nMany young adults for the first time had an expendable income which they could use to spend on music, fashion etc... they therefore become a new market in their own right. This largely coincided with the early success of The Beatles.\n\nThey were four handsome, well dressed young men who could write some great tunes, had a world class team of engineers and producers working for them....\n\nClever chaps but without any doubt as is so often the case with such levels of success there is a large element of \"right time, right place\"."
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"http://www.amazon.com/Whats-That-Sound-Introduction-History/dp/039393229X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1427156335&sr=8-3&keywords=john+covach",
"http://www.amazon.com/Beatlesongs-William-J-Dowlding/dp/0671682296/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1427156377&sr=8-1&keywords=beatlesongs"
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ta4or | charter schools, good/bad side to them | preferably unbiased, facts
thank you | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ta4or/eli5_charter_schools_goodbad_side_to_them/ | {
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"Good: Less oversight\n\nBad: Less oversight ",
"They're basically publicly funded private schools. They can be selective in who they admit as a student, often offer better facilities and better trained faculty, and in many cases are \"specialized\" schools that are geared towards students that may be interested in medicine, science, math, the arts etc... and educate them thusly. \n\nThese schools' greatest advantage arise when they are situated in an inner city where they are an alternative to the (usually) poor standard public schools which lack funding, are short on talented teachers, and are full of students disinterested in their studies. Charter schools seek to solve that problem by offering an alternative to the students.\n\nNow, that might all seem fine and good but if you read my first sentence in the post again, you'll see that these schools are *publicly funded*. This means that the people who live in the school district of the charter school will have their taxes partially go to that school, whether or not their children go there. It also diverts the district's money away from going to the standard public school system and therefore, away from the students who go to the public schools and possibly can not attend a charter school for various reasons. These charter schools also attract a lot of federal government funding that could be going to the public schools. Because of all this, lots of people view charter schools as stealing money away from the public school system, money that could be going to improve the schools, hire more and better teachers, and get the students more engaged in their studies. \n\nTL:DR: \nGOOD: In most situations, they offer a better alternative to the dilapidated inner city public schools that the student would be forced to attend without the charter school. They are also free for the student because they are publicly funded\n\nBAD: Because they are publicly funded, the argument can and has been made that they are stealing money away from the standard public schools, keeping the students that attend them at an extreme disadvantage.\n\nEdit: added a word"
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6mzoqo | how do some citrus food products contain 0% dv of vitamin c, when they contain 'orange puree' and 'lemon juice concentrate'? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6mzoqo/eli5_how_do_some_citrus_food_products_contain_0/ | {
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"text": [
"The same reason that it's possible for a banana peel to have 0% banana in it anymore. Those fruits are usually vehicles for vitamin c but it's processing removes it. Taste, texture and color don't equal the presence of nutrients"
]
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6mmapn | how can it be some people die after 1 shot but others, like emmett dalton gets shot 23 times in the late 19th century without great medical care and live? | Seriously, is it purely just dumb luck getting shot in all the "right" places? Also some people die of disease even with the best care they had in that time. Did he have a guardian angel?
"Emmett Dalton received 23 gunshot wounds and survived. (He was shot through the right arm, below the shoulder, through the left – right, in some accounts – hip and groin, and received 18-23 buckshot in his back)" | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6mmapn/eli5how_can_it_be_some_people_die_after_1_shot/ | {
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"There are youtube videos on the effects of handguns. Generally handguns are less powerful than rifles.\n\nYes there are specific deadly areas. Being shot in the heart, head or a major artery is generally fatal.\n\nThe existence of guardian angels is not proven and is suspect. Do not rely on one.\n\nBuckshot is smaller than most bullets. If you are counting each buckshot as being shot the number of wounds can go up. Shotguns have shorter ranges than most other firearms so anything which reduced the severity, such as firing through a wall, would reduce the lethality.\n\nIt is not lucky to be shot 23 times.\n\nDo not count on any one gunshot killing anyone. Always double tap.\n\nDo not expect to survive even one gunshot. Hollywood movies are not good examples of real life.",
"There are a ton of variables involved in how likely one is to die from a gunshot wound. If you take a hit in the torso from a rifle-caliber cartridge, you're probably toast unless you have immediate, expert medical care to save you.\n\nBut a handgun? Unless you take one right in the heart or vital part of the brain (plenty of people have survived head wounds because they missed certain parts of the brain), you have a decent chance of surviving.\n\nAnd of course, you're likely to survive a shot to a limb with any weapon if you can get a tornequit (no idea how to spell that) on in time. An exception to that rule would be a wound that nicks the femoral artery in your thigh. That's tough bleeding to stop.",
"Bullets don't always kill instantly unless you take down the central nervous system or remove blood pressure. \n\n Given the frontal or side area of the body, the central nervous system (aka spine) is very small part of the hitbox. \n\n The circulatory system has 1 major target, the heart, and a mass of smaller targets, blood vessels and organs. \n\nKeep shooting until the threat is down. Don't expect to use only 2 bullets. "
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2o64ur | how do big companies hire lawyers to avoid lawsuits? | Obviously nobody is above the law, and I'm sure that applies to corporations too. But somehow, it seems like the corporations can always pay their way out of a lawsuit. How, and why, does this happen? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2o64ur/eli5how_do_big_companies_hire_lawyers_to_avoid/ | {
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"Basically, the more money you have to defend yourself, the higher probability you'll get away with things (i.e. OJ Simpson). So, let's say you're a petroleum company and you have a spill. Now, you try to blame that on a third party who put the rig together but people still sue you directly of course. You know that if you lose, it might mean billions of dollars in damages so what you do is get a large law firm to defend you in court and then you spend hundreds of millions on that defense. You work as hard as possible to keep the suit going for as long as possible hoping that the plaintiffs will give up from lack of progress of simply run out of money. Or, you hope that after 10 years of litigation with no end in site, the plaintiff will decide to settle for a lot less than what you think the court would order. \n\nYeah it's a total douchebag move but that's what corporations do. "
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20fd9b | how does a star trek styled economy work "where all of humanity is equal and can spend their time creating art, exploring, researching, reading, gardening and raising their family" ? | How does one acquire products, food, healthcare?
Will this ever work in reality?
Can perhaps a Trekkie explain the general economy in detail. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/20fd9b/eli5how_does_a_star_trek_styled_economy_work/ | {
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"They have the advantage of having replicators, and in a world where they are commonplace, there is no need to work in order to merely survive. All of their basic needs are already cared for.\n",
"It's essentially Marxist Communism; people are all given what they need for free, and people work for the betterment of their neighbor and state. ",
"They've also contradicted the concept on many occasions. For instance, DS9 has \"gold-pressed latinum\". I think they're also addressed \"credits\".",
"This type of world is referred to as post-scarcity. We pay money for things because of scarcity. The crappy jobs are all automated, and the necessities for life are available with little to no effort. For example, you eat without needing a chef, a farmer, a truck driver (to transport), or any other third party to provide it to you."
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39nfbz | why looking at gruesome pictures of people/animals gross us so much? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/39nfbz/eli5why_looking_at_gruesome_pictures_of/ | {
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"Empathy. When you see an image of something you consider to have human emotions in pain, your brain actually simulates that pain in order to determine how you should feel about it. This simulation of pain is the root of all of our morality and feelings that other humans are worthwhile, because it allows us to understand what it might be like to be them.",
"There is a specific part of your brain, the insula, that reacts when you witness something disgusting. It triggers the nausea and the unpleasant subjective feeling. Now why would our body want to punish us for merely witnessing something? Gruesome bodies, especially dead ones, are dangerous. They might have diseases which could kill us. At the very least they might make us sick if we were to eat them, depending on what kind of gruesome they are. For our pre-medical ancestors a parasite or disease could be the end of us and maybe even our family or community. \n\nSo our bodies make us unlikely to spend too much time around things that might endanger us. The disgust reaction is pretty reflexive, but people have varying levels of this reaction. Interestingly the personal extent of the disgust reaction has been related to everything from political orientation to personality. "
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etplsy | why you can still whisper if you have lost your voice but if you try to talk nothing come out? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/etplsy/eli5_why_you_can_still_whisper_if_you_have_lost/ | {
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"Talking uses vibrations of your vocal cords.\n\nWhispering uses the same jaw, lip, and tongue movements to create speech, but only pushing air through open vocal cords. No vibrations = no voice."
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7he5h1 | how do the foam cutouts in a recording studio mute out sound? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7he5h1/eli5_how_do_the_foam_cutouts_in_a_recording/ | {
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"sound waves are just vibrations at different frequencies, a dense material like foam absorbs those vibrations more effectively that a harder surface like concrete, thus reducing reverb..",
"They don't mute the sound they absorb it. Picture this: throw a golf ball as hard as you can into a tiny room with concrete walls, floor, and ceiling. What did that golf ball do? Now cover the walls, floor, and ceiling with thick feather pillows and throw that golf ball. The golf ball represents the sound travel. ",
"They both absorb the energy of the sound wave as well as breaking up the reflecting echos in to multiple interference patterns. They use these for testing electronics as well \n\n_URL_0_"
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bvvq33 | how does the un work? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bvvq33/eli5_how_does_the_un_work/ | {
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"All the countries that are members of the United Nations send representatives to the council, and they have meetings, discussions, and hopefully agreements over all the subjects that are important to people all over the planet.\n\n\"The United Nations is an intergovernmental organization tasked with maintaining international peace and security, developing friendly relations among nations, achieving international co-operation, and being a centre for harmonizing the actions of nation.\"",
"So the UN was developed after WWII in response to the failure of the League of Nations. The idea is to build international consensus on topics of world importance. Treaties are discussed, sanctions are imposed, etc. \n\nIt depends on the specific process, but generally, there are two main bodies that decide on UN actions: the General Assembly and the Security Council. Let’s take sanctions as an example. Sakovia (fake nation) attacks some other country. So, the General Assembly takes up a measure condemning the attack and suggests sanctions, freezing Sakovian assets in other countries and imposes an embargo on trade. The General Assembly will debate the measure the same way that legislative bodies do the world over. Each country gets one vote but can have multiple representatives attend sessions. So the point would be to get 50% + 1 vote of countries to agree with your measure. As one example, the GA might agree to the embargo but an amendment prohibiting travel to Sakovia is rejected.\n\nOnce it passes the General Assembly, it would head to the Security Council. This is where things get weird. There are five permanent members of the Security Council: USA 🇺🇸, Russia 🇷🇺, China 🇨🇳, UK 🇬🇧, and France 🇫🇷 . Then there are ten rotating members who serve two year terms. The goal in the Security Council is the same as the General Assembly; gets a majority of votes for the measure. But there’s a trick. Each PERMANENT member has the ability to veto any resolution. Temporary members do NOT get this privilege. So any resolution you send better have the support of ALL five permanent SC members before you even go to the General Assembly with it. This also applies to changing the rules of the UN, which means that this will always be the case as at least one permanent member will almost certainly block their loss of power. \n\nThis was done in the wake of WWII as a method for creating a functional world organization for resolving international disputes. But the US and USSR also didn’t want to get outvoted by blocs of smaller countries, hence the absolute veto. The distribution was settled based on desires of US and USSR. The US figured a 3-2 advantage was good for them, which is really the only reason France got a permanent seat (East vs West!). USSR figures absolute veto would give them power (which it did) and probably also figured China would be with them and maybe they could convert France, so they’d have a chance to set the UN agenda. Alterations along the way have made the permanent members switch: USSR changed to just Russia, Nationalist China (Taiwan) lost the seat to Communist China in 1971. But the dipole of Russia vs US has pretty much been the same since it’s inception. \n\nOnce a resolution has been adopted it goes to member countries for approval. In some cases, some types of resolutions are immediately adopted, if there are existing treaties that allow for that. Sanctions against a country is one example. Others like the Paris Accords for climate change require adoption by all member states which is why the Rump administration was able to pull the US out after the Obama administration put the US in. \n\nUltimately, the idea was to create a representative ‘government’ in which all actors had some power but is ridiculously inefficient but still EFFECTIVE when it can overcome its own inefficiencies. The permanent member nations of the Security Council have the most power but individual member nations have power too. If they are feeling ignored, they can clog up the General Assembly and prevent any resolution the P5 nations might want passed from getting through. It formalized a POLITICAL axis of confrontation between the US and USSR that helped diffuse tensions that could have lead to nuclear conflict. And it has given a forum of grievances to countries that has prevented more than a few wars in the 20th century. So as an organization that is responsible for helping countries get along it’s been fairly successful. But there’s always room to grow too.",
"All the world's leaders are supposed to get together to argue. However, only some actually show up."
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c84nen | what’s the difference between a mountain’s height and its prominence? how are each measured? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c84nen/eli5_whats_the_difference_between_a_mountains/ | {
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"Height usually refers to the height of the mountain above sea level; basically, what is the difference in height between the peak of the mountain and the average sea level below.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nProminence refers to how much the peak of a mountain stands out from the surrounding landscape. Technically speaking, it's the difference in height between the peak of the mountain and the lowest contour line you can draw around it without including any other peaks."
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evmkdg | why do digital clocks slowly become inaccurate? (follow-up: but something like a car turn signal always blinks at the same frequency?) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/evmkdg/eli5_why_do_digital_clocks_slowly_become/ | {
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"Digital clocks use a crystal oscillator circuit to keep time, if there is a flaw in that circuit, where the pulse is not consistent or a small change in resistance over the circuit it will gain or loose time. In a perfect circuit this would not happen however there are just so many potential inroads for manufacturer error... An inconsistency in the wiring or saldering. A problem in the frequency resonance of the crystal. Lots of things, in short there is no such thing as the \"perfect\" circuit. It could also be an error in the crystal itself not being perfectly calibrated to the proper frequency. \n\n The simplest way to understand how the circuit works is, a pulse is sent through a calibrated crystal which is set to resonate at a certain frequency the duration of that frequency interlude before the crystal returns to its natural shape is a second.",
"Consumer digital clocks use crystal oscillators (like quartz) to keep time. When you pass an electric current through a crystal, it vibrates at a specific frequency. Crystal oscillators are accurate enough for consumer use but they're not *that* accurate. Things like mechanical stress or mechanical shock, temperature changes, and minor fluctuations in the applied voltage can cause the frequency of the oscillations to change, and this makes the clock lose accuracy.\n\nCar turn signals are not time keeping devices. They're not fixed to any specific interval of time and will not accurately keep any interval of time. They're just electromechanical devices. They're rhythmic enough that you don't notice fluctuations, but they're also only on intermittently and for short periods of time."
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5kv3er | why can't you use your phone when it's out of juice and you just plugged it in? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5kv3er/eli5_why_cant_you_use_your_phone_when_its_out_of/ | {
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"The battery charge system won't let the phone power up until there is a small reserve of charge on the battery. If you have a tiny charge on the battery, just enough to boot the phone, the phone will boot and the CPU/Display/Everything will start using more juice. This increase will cause the battery voltage to drop. Enough of a drop to crash everything and halt the processor. And then once the processor halts, the battery levels rise and the system can try to boot again, resulting in another low-power crash.\n\nSo the charging system won't let the phone boot until there's enough reserve for the system to come all the way up and stay running without getting stuck in a reboot loop.\n"
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498dcc | how do terrestrial ant colonies survive torrential downpours without flooding in and drowning them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/498dcc/eli5how_do_terrestrial_ant_colonies_survive/ | {
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"Water does flood in. However, ants usually dig colonies at least a foot deep. That creates a lot of surface area relative to the tiny entrance hole, so the dirt absorbs the rain quickly. Ants also build chambers at the top of upward sloping tunnels, so water can't flow in.\n\nAs a last-ditch effort, some species will form living rafts that can float on top of floodwaters.",
"I know that termites build tunnels that will collapse in on themselves to prevent the main part of the nest from being flooded.",
"During extreme torrential downpour ants have been observed making [rafts](_URL_0_) out of their larvae (which don't need oxygen and are buoyant), the other ants will connect their bodies and trap air within the structure using their hydrophobic body surfaces. The ants rotate oxygen deprived ants to oxygenated areas while keeping the queen in the center, well protected. ",
"There are also some ants that if their colony floods they will interlace legs to trap air and make a giant colony raft until finding dry land again.",
"This is probably a stupid question and unrelated but....\nWhy is it a terrestrial ant colony? Are there others, like an extra-terrestrial one?",
"Check out these guys here, they are casting abandoned colonies with aluminium:\n\n\n_URL_0_\n\n\nYou can see where the tunnels go upwards again, water wouldn't necessarily be there, so they could hang out in an airbubble there. I suggest watching 2 - 3 videos from that channel, different types of ant dig completely different nests.",
"How do ants in my kitchen sink survive and successfully get away me splashing them with my faucet?! ",
"They must get somewhat flooded because my house always gets invaded when the first rain of a storm hits. ",
"Ever try to drown an ant? It isn't possible.",
"you in california right now?",
"What are non-terrestrial ants?",
"by terrestrial, do you mean the ants that live on planet earth?",
"After a fairly good rain I came home to see nearly my whole garage door (a double) covered in what I thought was dirt that must have washed down from roof or splashed up or both. It turned out to be ants that where looking for dry ground.",
"do we have spaceants?",
"Some ants will also sacrifice themselves to plug the entrance if the rain is too extreme. If there is subsurface flooding with the dirt or soil (which is what causes earthworms to surface to avoid drowning in super-saturated dirt) that endangers the entire nest, there are cases where ants plug the hole with their own bodies. From my understanding this usually only happens with nests that are very large.",
"In most wheres I've seen, the ants simply deflect the incoming waterflow to a cistern for use later. The smarter groups will even rig a simple flow turbine to generate electricity as they do so. The stupid ones simply down, and so fall victim to your usual form of darwinism. The militant ones, however, form navies and strike at other colonies without and seize their resources, stores, and grubs.",
"What is this? A post for ants? ",
"When I was a kid I was obsessed with ants. I would take old coffee cans and make extreme environments to see how they would react. One example was filling the coffee can up with water and using these porous rocks I found in our drive way. Another was using a bunch of tree leaves and then pouring in ants. I eventually thought I could trust the ants and one night left the tops off these coffee jars. Woke up the next morning and the ants and ant eggs were gone. Never did find them dead or alive. ",
"The real question is how do exterrestrial ant colonies survive?"
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ciha6a | what is the difference between adrenaline and noradrenaline? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ciha6a/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_adrenaline/ | {
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"Two different neurotransmitters which signal in different way. Noradrenaline doesn’t have a direct action on the heart. Instead it increases vascular tone. Also, adrenaline has a methyl group on it!"
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1bbz9n | how does an excess of democracy in a society lead to civil war or dictatorship? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bbz9n/eli5_how_does_an_excess_of_democracy_in_a_society/ | {
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"It doesn't. Democracy just means people getting to vote on the rules they live by. What would an excess of that look like? Wars and dictators are caused by a *lack* of democracy. "
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6mbyw3 | what are the usa's immigration policies goals? | I was listening to Sam Harris's podcast and he and his guest were talking about how immigration should be designed so that the society has the means and the capacity to assimilate them. While I don't often agree with Sam, this idea made a lot of intuitive sense.
But in reality I don't know jack shit about immigration. Help! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6mbyw3/eli5_what_are_the_usas_immigration_policies_goals/ | {
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"To simplify it, the US is wanting to implement a system that can \"weed out\" the people that have connections to bad people or bad organizations that might not be so friendly to people in America.\n\nEssentially, the US wants to prevent a \"Trojan Horse\" immigration, where people come in under false pretenses, say \"Oh yeah we're friendly\" and then run amok.\n\nI have not specifically listened to the podcast you mentioned, OP, but I'm guessing that the subject of discussion for assimilation is Sharia Law, which Muslims claim to be the absolute supreme law of the land, which all people should live under. If you dig into what Sharia law is, it's very violent and oppressive towards women, and intolerant of gays, which are values that the US doesn't agree with.\n\nBy looking to only let in people that are willing to assimilate, the US is wanting to only let in those who are willing to live by our laws, rules, and regulations, as in the US, the Constitution is the absolute supreme law of the land, and has specific rules in place that say not to favor one religion over another.\n\nTL:DR, To make more of a melting pot, than a \"tossed salad\" with a few rotten vegetables."
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1t6mvq | why are humans attracted to bright and shiney things? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1t6mvq/eli5_why_are_humans_attracted_to_bright_and/ | {
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"Most mammals are. \n\nI once read it's because pure, clean water is naturally reflective, so that way we are more attracted to the shiny clean water than to the murky one. "
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z3t4v | if colors are defined by wavelengths of light, how do they combine to form new colors? | When I hear a 2 sounds at different frequencies generated at the same time, I hear a harmony, in which I can identify both distinct sounds. Yet, if I look at 2 superimposed colors, they combine to form a new color. If a green light is shined on a white surface, and a blue light shines on the same surface, it looks yellow. Yet, if I hear C and E, it does not create a new note.
Why is light additive, while sound is not? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/z3t4v/eli5_if_colors_are_defined_by_wavelengths_of/ | {
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"Colours are not _purely_ defined by wavelengths of light. In fact, colours are entirely the result of _perception_.\n\nThat means there are some monochromatic colours - light of one wavelength that makes you see a particular colour - and there's polychromatic colour - light with different wavelengths that make you see a colour.\n\nTo understand this, let's figure out how we perceive colour. We have 3 types of cells in our eyes that each detect different wavelengths of light in a different manner (i.e., have different absorption spectra). One particular wavelength may excite only one type of cell (S cells); another wavelength may excite two others (M and L cells). Most of the time a single wavelength end up exciting all three types at different amounts.\n\nBecause this is how our eyes perceive colours, we can get the same colour if we just _reproduce the excitations_. That means if I have a monochromatic colour that excites 2 types of cells, you can use two different wavelengths together to excite those 2 types separately to produce the same results.",
"The ear has many detectors with narrow response frequency for each detector.\n\nThe eye has 3 detectors that each have wide ranges of frequencies that evoke a response around the peak.\n\n",
"Sure if you mix a C note and an E note you get a different sound. You can do a spectral analysis on the sound wave and then see that it consists of the frequency of C and frequency of E. Our ears can do this to a degree on their own.\n\nBut it all works exactly the same with light. If you start with monochromatic green (that is a light which only consists the frequency corresponding to green colour) and monochromatic blue and mix them, you get a new light. You can do the same spectral analysis on this light and see that there are spikes at frequencies corresponding to green and blue light. What's different is that our eyes are less capable to do this analysis than our ears are for sound. While ears can pick up individual frequencies, our eyes can't. \n\nOur eyes only have three different types of receptor cells, which all pick up different frequencies of light in different ways. Roughly like [this](_URL_0_). If you mix monochromatic green and monochromatic blue, it will excite the cells in the exact same way as if you had a single monochromatic yellow light. So different spectrums of light can result in the same colour sensation. Also there are colour sensations which cannot be produced by a single monochromatic light, such as the colour magenta.",
"Because recognizing the sound of a lion roaring in the distance amidst the sounds of a jungle has saved our ancestors' lives many times\n\nBecause we use sound to communicate (speaking) and we must be able to hear someone speaking in a noisy situation.\n\nAlso: Because our spacial resolution is much lower for sound than for light. (ELI5: you can hardly tell the direction a sound is coming from, while for light we have eyes that can see very small details). This means that in our ears, sounds tend to get mixed up, while images of different objects are very well separated. So we must make up for this problem, and learn to separate better what has been mixed up.\n\nMany reasons why our brain has become VERY specialized in separating different sounds when they are mixed together.\n\nOur sight, on the other hand, is not as good in separating two mixed colors. We just give a new name to the new color (yellow + blue = green). \n\nTaste, and smell are in the middle: we separate the tastes, but we also mix them up. \n\nInteresting: see this ELI5: I love the flavor of butterscotch. I love the flavor of olives. ELI5 why I would perceive the two flavors combined as disgusting. (_URL_0_)\n\nThat's how amarkov replied: with an analogy with colors, and how they get mixed.\n\n"
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25oez2 | if someone used a flashlight in a closed container traveling close to the speed of light, would the waves of light leaving the flashlight, be traveling faster than the speed of light? | Basically this is what I am wondering:
If both sound and light are waves (I heard something about light also being a particle and a wave so maybe that's where I'm getting confused)
and they both travel at a set speed, sound: 340.29 m / s, and light 299 792 458 m / s.
But the ISS is traveling at some 7.71 km/s, faster than the speed of sound, and they can hear each other in it, and so that lead me to believe that the sound waves in the ISS is traveling faster than the "speed of sound" so I determined that the speed of sound is relative to the medium it's traveling through.
That got me wondering if that's the same for light, because if they are both waves, shouldn't they both travel proportionally to what they're travelling through? Like if someone was to shine a flashlight inside an enclosed space, that is traveling the just below the speed of light (like the shuttle itself, if it could) wouldn't the wave there be traveling "faster than the speed of light" or even if someone were to speak, would their sound waves be traveling "faster than the speed of light".
I'm sure I'm not the first person to think of this, but I couldn't find it on google, or from searching, and was hoping someone could explain to me why if this is/isn't right, I assume it has something to do with there being a limit to how fast the particles can go or something like that, so please explain it like I'm five. Thanks in advance!
Edit: Thanks, it makes a little new sense, when I have access to a computer I'll change the flair to answered (or if an op can do it that'd be fantastic) thanks for the answers guys! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/25oez2/eli5_if_someone_used_a_flashlight_in_a_closed/ | {
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"No.\n\nA common misconception is that you just add velocities to get a resultant velocity, which is why you think that your scenario would unfold this way.\n\n[The actual way to add velocities](_URL_1_) will give you, more or less, the same velocity you would get just by adding them in an every day scenario (e.g, rowing a boat at 5mph on a current of 3mph would get you moving at 8 mph), but the distinction is important at relativistic speeds and keeps things like what you proposed from happening. The formula for doing so is in the section of the wikipedia article I linked.\n\nPeople are telling you \"the speed of light is constant,\" and they're correct, but this is (partially) why the speed of light is constant.\n\n[Psuedoboss11 gives a simple explanation](_URL_0_) below me as to why this formula is correct.\n",
"[This](/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/10r8gn/how_can_the_speed_of_light_be_constant/c6fy7e3) is a pretty good answer.",
"No because of [Lorentz contraction](_URL_0_). As you approach the speed of light, any viewer sees the box as being \"smushed\" proportional to its speed. If you're travelling 50% of the speed of light, (0.5c) then the box is half as long, it will seem as though the light emitted is crossing the length of the box (now half it's length) in the same amount of time. The light is still travelling at c. The person in the box doesn't see himself as being contracted, but when he looks outside, he sees everyone else moving at 0.5c and therefore half as long as they really are. Sounds strange, it's confusing as all hell, but that's how shit happens. \n\n*These are floating sentences on the internet. I have only the vaguest background in physics near the speed of light, so there's a very high probability that I fucked up something/everything in the above.*",
"What you're talking about has to do with one of the key aspects of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity.\n\nAccording to Einstein, the speed of light in a vacuum is constant, for all reference frames. You can prove this using [Maxwell's Equations](_URL_1_). Basically if you combine the last two equations you get a mathematical model of an oscillating elector-magnetic wave, or light. You can then solve for the speed of the wave and you get a constant 299,792,458m/s. This means no matter how fast you're going you will always measure the same speed of light as someone who's not moving relative to you.\n\nLong story short, the light inside your enclosed space would move at the speed of light relative to someone inside the ship, and it would also move the speed of light to someone outside the ship not moving. However, the light would appear doppler shifted to the person not in the space ship.\n\nIf you want a good intro to Special Relativity, [Doc Physics](_URL_2_) has you covered. (**Edit** Skip to ~8:20 to see your example explained.)\n\nIf you have a lot of time on your hands and want a good book to read, check out [How to Teach Relativity to Your Dog- By Chad Orzel](_URL_0_). It's a really fun and easy introduction to Einstein's Relativity.",
"Look for Einstein special relativity and Doppler effect! "
]
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"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/25oez2/eli5_if_someone_used_a_flashlight_in_a_closed/chj5wi3",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velocity-addition_formula#Special_theory_of_relativity"
],
[],
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Length_contraction"
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"http://www.amazon.com/How-Teach-Relativity-Your-Dog/dp/0465023312",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell's_equations",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVVFlWD2LHk"
],
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|
61bffm | what is the differences between a bill getting pulled in congress versus it going to a vote and failing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/61bffm/eli5_what_is_the_differences_between_a_bill/ | {
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"In other words, what future consequences does pulling a bill have, rather than if it had failed to get a majority of votes. ",
"When you realize your constituents support something you've sworn to repeal, you no longer have to face the backlash that would arise if you had succeeded. Now, you can go back to your district and have an excuse as to why you haven't carried out your campaign promises. ",
"Legislatively, there is no difference. The house voted like 50 times to repeal ACA while Obama was in office. They could introduce and vote on the bill every day if they wanted to.\n\nPolitically, voting requires you to make a commitment, one way or the other. Whether it succeeds or fails, your vote is on record, along with any political consequences it might bring.\n\nPulling the vote allows fence straddlers to continue following the political winds.",
"Voting in Congress is the result of negotiations. When voting for something is easy, you don't need to use any political capital to get it pass. In many cases you need to make promises and compromises to get the number of votes you need to pass the bill. \n\nWith a bad bill like Trumpcare, anyone that was promised something to vote yes will still require the \"payment\". Pulling the bill will prevent the WH and the Speaker from owning anything to the \"yes\" crowd. "
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2kgkce | are you a criminal if you deliberately choose not to prevent someone from committing suicide? | title. Of course, you would want to prevent anyone from committing suicide.
But what if my grandpa would tell me he will jump out of a plane tomorrow without opening his parachute, because he's diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and wants to die while he's strong enough to make conscious decisions? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2kgkce/eli5are_you_a_criminal_if_you_deliberately_choose/ | {
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"I think for the most part you can't be charged with anything for letting someone commit suicide. I'm sure their are exceptions like if you are legally responsible for the person for whatever reason. ",
"I'd say it depends on whether the country you are in has a [good samaritan law.](_URL_0_)",
"In California: No there is no duty to report somebody who is suicidal *unless* you are a mandated reporter and you discover it in the line of duty. Practically this means you probably won't need to report your grandpa unless you were a health professional and he was in your official care."
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2gjffe | why do we "shush" people to try to quiet them? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2gjffe/eli5_why_do_we_shush_people_to_try_to_quiet_them/ | {
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"The \"S\" sound is very high frequency, so is easier to place in three dimensional space. The purpose of \"Shush\" is to draw attention to your face, so that you can convey to the noisy person your displeasure in their conduct (via the means of a stern gaze).\n\nThe need for a high frequency sound is so that you can do this without yourself creating much noise and becoming an offender, and subsequently shushed by someone else.\n",
"Infants have this calming reflex that is triggered when they think they are in a familiar environment i.e. mothers womb. While they were in there, they were constantly surrounded with this sloshing, shushing sound that came from the mothers blood flow. After birth, parents can exploit this to calm the baby, by making a \"shush\" sound. When combined with other sensations like swaddling, warmth etc. it is very effective and in time, parents would find themselves shushing immediately after they hear the baby cry.\n\nTheory: I think this habit would carry on to pre-teen years when children are learning behavior patterns from adults and it is easy to associate this shushing with a \"be quiet\" message, which would propagate the usage on to adult years.\n\nNote: Please keep in mind that the only reference I have is anecdotal evidence through being a parent. ",
"Oddly enough, the shushing noise can actually be very attention-grabbing. When putting on a stage show, often the people backstage are told not to shush someone to tell them to quiet down during the show, as the shushing sound is even more likely to be heard from the audience than someone talking in a low voice.",
"My AP Psychology teacher would continue speaking to us, but would start whispering. It was amazing how effective it was at drawing attention to him. He also taught from a rocking chair, hypnotized his classes(until a lawsuit), and shocked some of the students to teach classical conditioning.",
"because it's the beginning of the phrase \"sssshhut the fuck up.\""
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dqxnff | why does the age of consent tend to increase in more modern societies and vice versa? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dqxnff/eli5_why_does_the_age_of_consent_tend_to_increase/ | {
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"The key part is modern. Like it or not, it really requires around 12 years of basic education (generally speaking, there are many exceptions) to become a somewhat productive member of society. Many people aspire to 16 years of education for a basic college degree. Most modern societies have average lifespans into the 70s meaning at least 40 years of active economic participation. \n\nThere is a lot of value to society and to the individuals to foster a system that reduces early pregnancy/family. \n\nA hundred and fifty years ago, average lifespans was probably in the late 40s. And education beyond basic literacy was not useful for most of the needed occupations (farming mostly) Also, children were considered mostly free labor. So starting families early and larger families benefited society and the individuals more.",
"The age of consent is 15 in sweden and 18 in Somalia. \n\nIt is too simple to think of it as just being a factor of how modern a country is.\n\nViews on sex in general, the rights of young people, the role of marriage in society, the influence of religion can all play a part, but the topic is pretty complex."
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35v879 | how do you teach a deafblind person to a good level of education? (think helen keller level of education) | The main thing I struggle to understand is how do you teach meaning to someone through something like braille or the deafblind alphabet? If you can't see or hear, how can you understand letters/words and the meaning attached to those? It baffles and amazes me that this can be done, and makes me incredibly happy knowing that people who suffer with this can live a life not in isolation.
**EDIT: I should clarify, I mean someone born deafblind.** | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35v879/eli5_how_do_you_teach_a_deafblind_person_to_a/ | {
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"I'd recommend reading about Helen Keller. Basically it involves lots of patience and repetition. In a way, it's like listening to someone speak a language until you start to pick up on what they're saying. In the case of Helen Keller, she learned through letters being drawn on her palm. It took a long time, but eventually she realized that the letters drawn on her hand were a way of naming objects.\n\nA deaf blind person may not understand the letters in any way more than \"squiggly line, angled line\" etc, but it's enough to understand what each letter represents, and this forms a way to communicate."
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1if5x7 | what's the point of studying art? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1if5x7/eli5_whats_the_point_of_studying_art/ | {
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"There have been a lot of different art styles around the world throughout history. Studying art holistically can lead to a new understanding of art and can even result in insights into other areas of study like human cognition and psychology.",
"Why study music, film, theatre or literature? It may not matter to you, as you are merely a consumer of the product, but like film, theatre and literature it is it's own culture with it's own conventions, history and insight into the human condition; if this didn't matter, than why bother watching movies, going to the art museum or catching a play?\n\nHaving done a bit of art myself (not the practical side, I was rubbish at it), the theory of art is a very good introduction into critical thinking. Being able to infer messages, intentions, history, and psychology from images and third dimensional space is a skill that requires extensive tempering.\n\nCreativity doesn't just arise from being able to make art, but understanding it as well. I have yet to meet or hear of a single brilliant person, who has a disdain for the arts.",
"/r/arthistory\n\nAlso, art was the first form of mass communication, loong before the printing press, tv and radio. Many pieces told stories of ancestors, the battles they fought and the beliefs they held. They would bring a community together for cultural celebrations and discussions of politics and rhetoric. (see _URL_0_ for a politcal piece)\n\nArt varies greatly from one culture to another. Many tribes have traditions that aren't considered art and their props/masks/ clothes are meant to be thrown away because it's \"magic\" is a one time use thing. Until someone from the western world sees it, takes it from the trash (or it is sometimes gifted to them) and brings it home. Now, it is considered art even though the tribes had no intention of it being so. \n\n\nAlso in the western world art had a history of being commisioned either by the church or the wealthy. An artist could be put to death by painting a scene that was ofending to the ruling party. \n\n\nNow the act of art itself is different. Art it done to express feelings and to garner feeling from the viewers.\n\nMany argue what is and isn't art. You decide..\n\n _URL_1_\n\n\nIs a dead dog art? Or is it animal cruelty. Or is it both? Yes, the dog was tied up and left to die as viewers watched and were told to not help, but it is still art or an act of a dereanged psycho? \n\nArt has the ability invoke emotions. Many emotions, from love, happiness, anger and outrage. So from an artistic view, yes, this poor dead dog is art. To the averge viewer, it is simply animal cruelty, even though it has achieved the desired effect of bringing some viewers to tears.\n\nNow practicing art is almost, but not totally different. To me, art comes naturally but I was surprised to see how many people did not know that blue and yellow make green. \n\nDid you know that just about every color you see in your world comes from the mixing if only 3 colors? Millions of colors and it all starts with only 3.\n\nWhile studying, you also learn the different techniques and brush strokes to get your desired result. You learn about balance, contrast, and focal pionts.\n\nArt also goes far beyond holding a pencil or brush. Scultpure, photography, movies, fashion, advertisments...the list goes on and on. Anything and everything you own has some element of art when you look at it's design.\n\nArt has also been used as a a form of medical (loosely) treatments. Painting, weaving, woodworking. It helps people over come anxiety, physical limitations (did you know blind people paint??) During/after the war many soldiers were taught how to basket weave as a way to cope with PTSD, hence the term \"basket case\" to describe someone with mental problems. (I can't find the source, sorry)\n\nSo anyways, there are MANY reasons to study art. I learned more about history in one semster through art (I took 5 art history courses for my A.S.) than I ever did in in basic schooling for years. Unfortuanlty you have to self disciplined to make anythign of it if you study strictly art. They are many options to choose that have an artisictic influence but to think that you will become a millionaire through painting is pretty unlikely. \n\n(Kinda like everyone dreams of playing for the NBA becuase they can make a basket or become a famous rapper because you rap in the street corner. It's possible, but unlikely)"
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"http://news.softpedia.com/news/Artist-Leaves-Dog-To-Die-on-Exhibition-Display-82091.shtml"
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1kccz3 | why is email treated differently than snail mail when it comes to privacy? | I was listening to the news this morning and they reported that google has said that any one who uses their service has no right to privacy because they are using a 'third party.' Isn't the post office a third party as well? Or is it simply because it is a privately owned corporation? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1kccz3/eli5why_is_email_treated_differently_than_snail/ | {
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"Because there are specific laws written for how paper mail is to be handled, mainly because the post office is run by the government and it was already bound in part during it's creation by the constitution (4th Amendment, unless they have a good reason to look at your mail, the government can't).\n\nPrivate corporations handle emails and they're not bound by the constitution, so you don't receive many protections dealing with them.\n\n"
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dcspvi | it is so easy to reconnect a torn wire, any person with some duct tape can do it. how come it’s so difficult and often impossible to fix/reconnect a torn nerve? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dcspvi/eli5_it_is_so_easy_to_reconnect_a_torn_wire_any/ | {
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"A nerve isn't a solid or stranded piece of metal with some insulation where simply twisting two broken ends together will do."
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zivdp | how much turbulence can a plane take before there is a critical failure somewhere | Hi
So I am flying from Portland OR, to Toronto CAN, on a journey to the otherwise of the world, and mid flight the turbulence hits, the plane hits a pocket of I am guess low air pressure or something (please correct my understanding of this scenario) and drops out of the sky briefly, people gasp, followed by relatively violent turbulence.
This got me wondering as I look at the airplane wings bouncing up and down.. How much can the plane take before something goes wrong. To me it looks like the wings would snap if the turbulence had kept up. Can anyone explain to me as if I am 5 (for all practical purposes).. how much becomes to much? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zivdp/eli5_how_much_turbulence_can_a_plane_take_before/ | {
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"Airframe loading is generally measured in g's, 1.0g is the force exerted by gravity. The world's most popular commercial airline, the 737, has g limits of +2.5g and -1.0g. This figure is worst case, at full load with a belly full of passengers, cargo, and fuel. \n\nTo prove that figure, Boeing loads up the wings to 150% of that loading to show the plane can take it as part of airworthiness certification. Engineers call that extra capability the *margin of safety*. [Here is the 777 undergoing such a test](_URL_0_), **look** at how much the wings can flex without breaking.\n\nCombat aircraft like the F-16 and F-22 can withstand over 9.0gs of acceleration if they don't have things like external fuel tanks tugging on their wings."
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3d4l65 | why is heating for homes standard but cooling isn't? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3d4l65/eli5_why_is_heating_for_homes_standard_but/ | {
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"That depends on the climate you live in.\n\nWhere I live both are standard on homes. In places where it never gets very hot then there's no point in installing an AC unit on a house, and the same goes for heating systems on homes in year-round not climates."
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1xm0rq | why is female toplessness considered nudity, when male toplessness is pretty much acceptable? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1xm0rq/eli5_why_is_female_toplessness_considered_nudity/ | {
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"Breasts are primarily sexual characteristics, believe it or not. Prominent breasts have no bearing on lactation:chimps and other primates manage just fine without them. In fact, they are for sexual 'display'. Our female ape-like ancestors probably displayed sexual readiness by presenting their genitalia (and thus the rump as well) to their mate.\n\nWhen our ancestors began walking erect, this became less practical, and secondary sexual characteristics began to evolve, like breasts. Have you noticed how the shape and positioning of them is reminiscent of buttocks? Other characteristics evolved too, like having lips of noticeably different color and texture from the rest of the face - reminders of the labia.",
"Because they are considered sexual and, consequently, \"inappropriate\" in a lot of western societies. Because Christianity says sex is bad unless you're intent on having a child. Therefore, anything that would be sexually attractive to a man is bad, unless it's your wife and you're about to have sex with the intent to conceive a child. Also because Christians are supposed to be ashamed of their bodies because being human is evil and you are bad and you should feel bad.\n\nSource - 12 years of Catholic school. Seven years ago and I'm still recovering.",
"While many commenting focused on the instinctual and sexual response, we can point out the social aspect here. The difference between potential sexual arousal between men and women, is that in general it is assumed that men have a lower level of impulse control. If women are sexually aroused by a topless man, we dont feel the need to introduce legislation to prevent a woman from \"losing control\" and sexually assaulting the man. In a sense we are validating that men cant or wont exercise impulse control the way women do and government must step in. By this logic, we should also have the \"sleazy outfit\" legislation.",
"I was at a baseball game and when one of the visiting team's fans took of his shirt to reveal the beauty that can only be achieved by not exercising for over 50 years, the entire section began chanting 'put it on'\n\nTL;DR male toplessness isn't as acceptable as you think it is",
"Same reason women showing their legs in Afghanistan is nudity. Women are considered sexual objects, men sexual subjects. Women's bodies are therefore \"inherently\" sexual because the male perspective is the dominant one. Male toplessness is acceptable because men don't find it sexual.",
"A better question is why do we even have nudity laws?",
"Well...in many \"native cultures\" (Sorry. Don't know a better word right now) from around the world don't consider bare boobies sexually offensive in any way. I think it's a matter of culture: Boobies became a \"forbidden fruit\" and something naughty, because society made them that. \n\nI guess the whole thing started when humans started to wear clothes to protect themselves from the cold. So in time boobies became something that you are not used to see.\n\nThe more you get used to see boobies, the more they desexualise for you.",
"In Europe, no one gets all worked up over some boobs. It is an American thing. Mostly, it has to do with the expectation of a woman's modesty. You can see the most extreme examples in the Middle-East. Many men have much larger breast, so it can't just be a size thing, and it isn't.\n\nI saw a European TV show cracking up over the American reaction to Janet Jackson's nip-slip at the Super Bowl. They think we are silly for it. Come to Europe! Boobs everywhere!",
"Because female breasts are subjectively linked to sex, while male breasts are not. This is because, as children, both genders do not have large breasts. They only appear during puberty, along with all the other so-called secondary sexual traits (these include the appearance of body hair, including the beard in males, voice changes and general \"rounding off\" of the body shapes from generic child shape into adult man or woman shape). Therefore, the child/male chest is considered the \"default\" chest and the female breasts are sexualized.\n\nEDIT: okay I get it, beards are a counter-example to my wildly general claim. You guys caught me red-handed being wrong.",
"Because humans are generally ignorant and put labels on many things that do not matter. If everyone was naked all the time it would be the norm and no one would even know the difference.",
"How is this not obvious. Breasts are a secondary sexual organ, they develop during puberty. Men do not grow boobs during puberty.\n\nY'all are taking equality a little too literally.",
"there was a time when an exposed ankle or elbow was considered nudity.\n",
"Society has shaped our minds into thinking so.",
"[This]( _URL_0_) explains how breasts are characterized as human sex characteristics, while male chests and nipples are not. \n\nThough, given that information and society's logic, I guess men should have to cover their facial hair too.\n\nIt honestly varies from culture to culture. Many tribes in Africa see no reason to cover women's breasts... and several religions believe women should cover their hair. There are different extremes and different emphases placed on different body parts depending on where you're from.",
"It's not in Canada.",
"Explained like I'm five? Because male nipples don't give females erections.",
"Sexism, basically. Some places male toplessness is nudity, and some places female toplessness isn't. It's not universal, it's cultural. ",
"I consider it no more than double standards.",
"My explanation is less biological, more cultural. Boobs can be painful when unsupported for long periods. At some point in pre-history, many women figured out that wrapping them up and supporting them made life a little easier. Other women saw the advantages to this, and the trend spread around, gaining widespread acceptance. After a time, this became institutionalized, an accepted norm. However, once it was the norm to cover up, cultural forces like religion hijacked the meaning and purpose of doing it, changing it from being functionally easier to deal with anatomy to hiding a sexual display. Since men don't have to deal with boobs, they never had to deal with this problem or it would probably have ended up the same for them.",
"What really surprised me was learning that in parts of Italy circa the 16th century, women went topless.\n\nThere was an English chap called Thomas Coryat, who walked to Italy and beyond, and wrote up his adventures in a book called \"Coryat's Crudities: Hastily gobled up in Five Moneth's Travels\".\n\nThis little nugget of info was in it.",
"There is a documentary on reddit somewhere that shows a man undergoing a sex operation to become a woman. I think the video was hosted on youtube. The video shows the surgeon making the female breasts. At a apparently random point during the operation youtube censors the, now, female nipple. It's the same nipple! This makes no kind of sense. ",
"Sorry to sort of hijack the thread, but since you've got the answer I thought I could fork off this a bit with another question:\n\nHow come in the film and TV industry it is now acceptable to show a penis (I'm not talking porn, I'm talking actual films and shows) but it isn't acceptable to show a vagina? Granted you can show a woman walking around underwearless down there, but you can't actually see anything...",
"IMHO, because people have been trained by society to view the female breast as a sexual stimulant. Look at how today's society treats the female breast in comparison to 15, 30, 50 years ago. Now only the nipple is considered inappropriate for public display. Prime time TV shows, news reports, mainstream magazines all openly display the full breast sans nipple. If our society were to suddenly embrace the public display of the female nipple, it would only be a short time period before it was no longer considered inappropriate or a subject for sexual stimulation.",
"It's culturized sexualization.\n\nThere are still tribal peoples that have topless women because the breast is not sexualized.\n\nYou can also compare this to the past of western countries where showing female legs was sexualized and in some religions like Islam where women can cover up to, well, their entire body because doing otherwise would be considered sexual.",
"Because as a culture we live in a male driven society. Since all the males have decided female sexualization is something they can't handle seeing, it's become taboo. Back in the day it was considered risqué for a woman to \"let\" a man see her ankles. But progress is something old people see as ruining America. ",
"In just a few words: It is a cultural thing. \n\nThe concept of nudity and modesty are cultural constructs. I grew up in a place (south pacific islands, Polynesian) where men and women showed everything from the belly button up. Children don't wear any clothing (except for a celebration) until 6 or 7ish. It was considered inappropriate for a women to show anything between her knees and bellybutton after puberty. Breasts were not covered. \n\nNudity is not just about the evolutionary needs to procreate or the abstract dictates of a god. We as humans decide how we will interact with each other. These decisions put together form a culture. Different groups of people come to different conclusions. ",
"I think Ricky Gervais explained this one pretty well (at 1:20, but the whole clip is great): _URL_0_",
"(Serious) Explaining a shift in attitudes towards female toplessness + legality: In New York, female breast exposure is no longer considered public nudity or lewdness due to a definition change brought on by the 1992 case People v. Ramona Santorelli and Mary Lou Schloss. The New York Court of Appeals ruled that the previous law was discriminatory on the basis of gender and thus unconstitutional.",
"ITT: men justifying women not having the same rights to their bodies.",
"Dear moderators, suck a bag of dicks for deleting top upvoted ROOT comment. Half of whole comment thread are replies to it, and they are now left without context.\n\nThats pure bullshit, such moderating does not help /r/ELI5 at all, its just creating mess.",
"You've confused two different questions within your question.\n\n1. Why is female toplessness considered nudity when male toplessness is not considered nudity?\n\n2. Why is nudity pretty much not acceptable?\n\nThe answer to the first question is that nudity relates to the exposition of sexual organs/characteristics. Since female breasts are a secondary sexual characteristic that provide excellent clues to fertility and health, that makes them \"sexy\". This does not apply to the chests of men.\n\nThe answer to the second question is basically that people tend to become aroused by sexual stimuli when they experience them and it puts them in an awkward position if they are in public or if they weren't expecting it. People don't want to have to think about sex all the time, or even when they don't want to. They want to have control over that. Social norms then develop to make this easier for everyone.",
"because the men that made the rules weren't attracted to topless men.",
"Up until the 1920's or so, men weren't allowed to go topless either.\n\n[1920's men's bathing suit](_URL_0_)",
"In some parts of India, it was customary for lower caste women walk without covering breasts. It was a normal way of life for those women. British introduced blouses. Clashes happened involving this topic on whether to wear blouses or not and their rights.\n\nI read somewhere in critical writing that first fight for baring breast did not happen in France, but in these remote Indian villages.",
"If it's something people WANT to see, it is nudity. If it's something people DON'T WANT to see, it's fine. ",
"Religion. Most \"sexual\" issues with body image can be historically traced back to some form of religious moral edict. There are some religions in history that didn't place such importance on suppression of sexuality, but Christianity, for example, really ran with this concept.",
"There is no universal rule as to what constitutes a cultural taboo. In the case of the US, female toplessness is considered taboo. Go to some tribes in Africa or nude beaches in Europe, not so much the case.\n\nCultural taboo is a product of the culture. The U.S. definitely has a preoccupation with and many hang-ups about sex and sexuality, so it isn't surprising that this is a product of that. It has absolutely nothing to do with logic.",
"the biggest fight I had with my husband was about women at his work \"pinching\" his nipples. He didn't think it was a big deal so I told him that my nipples were in open season now..basically saying that if someone wanted to touch my chest, it was ok...he changed his tune then.\n",
"How would law enforcement act on a man with breast implants walking around the public topless?",
"In many places in Canada (and probably other places) it has become legal and accepted for women to walk around shirtless in as many places as it is for men.",
"Desmond Morris wrote The Naked Ape in 1967. He proposed that when humans began having sex face to face instead of rear entry, the breasts replaced the buttocks as a sexual attractant, both being soft and round. When a girl reaches puberty it's as if a sign was hung around her neck that says \"Sexually Mature Female.\"",
"It's because like it or not, [female breasts are inherently sexual] (_URL_1_). Stimulation of the breasts activates the same area of the brain as stimulation of the genitals, hence why some women can experience orgasm from nipple stimulation. Also, humans are somewhat rare in that we mate face-to-face; since female breasts are designed to release oxytocin (the \"cuddling hormone\") in reaction to stimulation in order to promote bonding during breastfeeding, and during sex, the breasts are in easy reach, it isn't much of a stretch to [include breast stimulation in sexual activity to promote pair bonding] (_URL_0_).\n\ntl;dr breasts are sexual because the female brain perceives breast and genital stimulation in the same way and also female breast stimulation promotes bonding in mates",
"because women's breasts are sexualized, and men's are not. ",
"Its actually legal in Canada and certain parts of the US for women to go topless. Meaning they can't get charged for public nudity, so legally there is no difference.\n\nFunctionally however the difference really boils down to \"bewbs\". There is no reason except that we men ( of the hetero variety) get aroused by bewbs. The prudes will yell at the women because they are uncomfortable with their own sexuality, the misogynists will stare and creep out the free hanging girls, while the rest of just try to think about chairs and go about our day.\n\nSo really no difference. But guys get horny if they see boobs.",
"It's simply the cultural acceptance of it. Some cultures here in Africa include topless women as a normality.",
"This thread has been locked. It's not generating useful replies, and has turned into an argument/spamfest."
]
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"http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-human-beast/201305/sexual-wiring-womens-breasts",
"http://www.scienceofrelationships.com/home/2011/12/16/breasts-are-best-can-women-orgasm-from-nipple-stimulation.html"
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dxeonc | if making images larger decreases quality, why doesn’t the same go for sound? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dxeonc/eli5_if_making_images_larger_decreases_quality/ | {
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"Increasing pixels is by definition increasing quality. Making an image larger by increasing the size of the pixels is what decreases the perceived quality.\n\nAnd sound is nothing at all like an image, at least in terms of loudness. More decibels just means more amplitude (strength) on the wave. The rest of it stays the same.",
"You don't increase the amount of pixels though, that's why. Larger amount of pixels means bigger images yes, but once you take the image on your digital camera that's when the amount of pixels are determined. You can't increase the amount of pixels, only stretch them larger and larger until you can clearly see them and the image quality is poor.\n\nGoogle pixel versus vectors and that should help.\nThis is my basic knowledge of photography and design. I know nothing about sound.",
"To enlarge an image, it has to be resampled. There is no \"extra\" information in the photo that will increase the resolution upon doing so, so an enlarged image will be larger, but not more detailed. That's why enlarged images are blocky and horrible. Audio does not need to be resampled to be played louder, as all of the waveform information is sampled at discrete time intervals. For example, audio CDs are sampled at 44,100 Hz and 16-bit depth, meaning 44,100 times per second a 16-bit number indicates what frequency the sound plays at. Playing a song louder just increases the volume that particular frequency is played at. \n\nThe analog to enlarging an image for audio might be making the song *longer*. There's no extra information to use when resampling the song, so each discrete time-sample would either be played longer (song would sound slowed down) or the frequency would change (sound would be distorted).",
"You can't compare resizeing a picture and changing the volume of a soundfile. The equivalent of resizing a picture would more be something like resizeing the sound file (making it longer/slower). In both cases you still have the same information (pixelvalues/\"air pressure\"values) but bigger (size of picture/length of soundfile) - > less information for the same size - > worse quality. The equivalent of changing the volume however would be something like changing the colorvalues of the picture or making it brighter for example. Here the \"information-size-ratio\" stays the same, only the values themself change - > quality is still the same. Hope it's at least a bit understandable. English isn't my first language."
]
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|
2ui7u5 | how does google buy and renew domains for their main site? | I can't imagine someone from Google typing their credit card info in to buy `google. < tld > ` for the newest country that's been added. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ui7u5/eli5_how_does_google_buy_and_renew_domains_for/ | {
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"text": [
"It looks like Google uses _URL_0_ as their domain registrar. MarkMonitor is a \"brand protection\" oriented domain registration service. And, I'm pretty sure, they write a check.\n"
]
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[
"MarkMonitor.com"
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1bqlhv | google chrome is dropping support for webkit and adding support for blink. what does this mean and how will it affect me? | _URL_0_
EDIT: It appears I've forgotten to add ELI5 to the title. I don't want to resubmit and get tagged for spam. So I'll just leave it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bqlhv/google_chrome_is_dropping_support_for_webkit_and/ | {
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"text": [
"WebKit and Blink are rendering engines. They are responsible for interpreting the HTML code of a website (which describes its layout and content), and transforming it into the page you see in front of you.\n\nGoogle have decided to \"fork\" WebKit (take the existing stuff, but branch off in a new direction) and have named their own version of it Blink.\n\nThis probably won't affect you in any way at all. You probably won't even notice the different. For web developers, there may be some minor changes in how the new engine interprets their code, but I doubt it'll be anything significant."
]
} | [] | [
"http://mobile.theverge.com/2013/4/5/4186302/google-chrome-blink-coming-to-chrome-28-in-10-weeks"
] | [
[]
] |
|
2ret8i | how do songwriter and musicians ensure that their new creations are unique and not a ripoff? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ret8i/eli5_how_do_songwriter_and_musicians_ensure_that/ | {
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"If you write the lyrics they will likely be original - it's hard to \"forget\" that you heard a full poem somewhere before. Melodies are a bit harder. You're unlikely to reproduce one that's exactly the same, but it might be very similar to something you've heard before but aren't actively thinking about.\n\nI don't know this for sure, but I assume nowadays a major label can just plug the song into a computer, analyze it, and compare it to other songs (similar to reverse image searching, but for audio). \n\nBack in the day you just had to play the song for others and see if anyone else recognized it. Paul McCartney said he woke up one morning with the tune for Yesterday in his head, but thought it might have been accidentally copied from somewhere, so he played it for people in the music industry to make sure he didn't before he finished it.",
" There is a difference between being INFLUENCED by what came before and RIPPING OFF what came before.\n\nLed Zeppelin is known for both for instance. From borrowing a guitar part and building a song around it to taking someone else's song and changing a few things to make it \"theirs\". \n\nMusic is not a random string of notes, its built on patterns, chords, melodies. \nIf you hear a blues song, you know it is a blues song because it shares elements with other blues songs. \nIt didn't RIP OFF other blues songs necessarily, it just emulates a style, and then creates something hopefully original within that style. \n\nMost musicians try to emulate their influences, without copying them.\nSome tend to sound DERIVATIVE in that they don't go far enough to distinguish what they do from similar acts. \n\nIn the end though, ripping off someone UNINTENTIONALLY is pretty hard. \n\n"
]
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1hl94t | why is everyone mad at the us government over the nsa scandal, but not the companies like google and facebook, verizon, etc. for allowing the government to use their information? especially when companies such as these, especially google, usually promote internet freedom and privacy? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1hl94t/eli5_why_is_everyone_mad_at_the_us_government/ | {
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"Because government is court-ordering these companies to comply. They don't have a choice.",
"I have a follow up question. \n\nGoogle especially, but other companies too, collect a lot of the same info that the NSA does. They even collect more in some cases. They certainly don't have warrents. Most people don't have a problem with that. Why not?\n\nI asked a friend the question and he says it's OK for google because they provide a service that I agreed to use. To me though the government is us. They are miss guided but they probably have our best interests at heart because I can't see why else they would do this. Google has only shareholders interests at stake. If they thought they could get away with something terrible that would make money I am sure they would do it. ",
"**It is absolutely also a problem** if Google or Facebook or any other corporation is intruding on our privacy. It just tends to be a lower-order problem compared to the government doing it because Google doesn't have nearly as many resources as the Federal government does, nor does Google's snooping have any implications with regards to the Judicial system.",
"I would say that these companies offer services in which we enter our information, where as the NSA collects information from all these sources that they don't own in the first place.",
"Because government is not a private corporation whose only interest is making money. A government, especially one that pretends to be democratic, like the US government, should act in the interest of it's people. You could say that by spying on people that the government is acting in the interest of it's people because it makes them safer. The thing is though, any institution or person that gets too powerful (and knowledge is a very empowering tool) will tend to abuse it. That's why democratic societies have governments with checks and balances and coded fundamental rights (such as the American Bill of Rights or the European Convention on Human Rights). By ignoring these, the US government is actually becoming a hazard for it's own citizens and citizens of other countries. Power requires counter-power. \n\nCorporations should be controlled in some sort of way by the government to stop them from being too powerful as well. That's why there are anti-trust laws for example. The fact that corporations have such powerful lobbies in DC is another worrying example. Any way, because the concentration of power in government and corporations, the ordinary people are fucked.",
"Because it's easier to get indignant than to stop using the services that allow for the easy monitoring of everything you do. Upvoting is simple. Quitting FB takes guts."
]
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1p8e51 | why do car windows get covered in ice and not the body panels? | Here in the midwest in the morning in the winters there is usually a layer of thick ice and or frost over the widows, but not so much over the body panels. ELI5? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1p8e51/eli5_why_do_car_windows_get_covered_in_ice_and/ | {
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"I think that more of the reason is because metal is more conductive for heat meaning that it heats up much faster than if the same amount of sun energy is aimed at the windows. Much of the energy focused at the windows will pass through it without ever converting into heat where as most energy that hits the panels will hit and reflect back causing it to heat up. It is like using glass/mirrors to reflect laser energy. The high powered lasers will not lose much power jumping from mirror to mirror but they will be capable of popping a balloon on contact because it absorbs the energy rather than reflecting it. This is the same principle",
"It's the glass itself. Water molecules have a strong affinity for being on glass. Water can form a \"monolayer\" which would be a one molecule or so thick layer of water on the surface of the glass. Water molecules also have a strong affinity for other water molecules. So water vapor in the air swirls around until it \"sticks\" to the glass, and which point other water vapors in the air can crystallize with the water that's on the glass.\n\nEven at very very cold temperatures there is usually some water vapor present in the atmosphere. You can see the vapor when you breathe in cold weather. Car exhaust also produces lots of water vapor.\n\nIn much the same way you can fog a window or a mirror with your breath. When it's cold enough, it's crystallized and sticks on the glass, but not wood, plastic, many metals the same way."
]
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3wnira | what are lasik and lasek surgeries? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3wnira/eli5_what_are_lasik_and_lasek_surgeries/ | {
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"They are subtly different surgeries to correct for irregular vision - the difference lies in the execution of the surgery and techniques used, but the overall goal to correct vision is the same. Some people that might not be good candidates for LASIK might inquire about LASEK though, because of the differences of the operations."
]
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[]
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||
6txoqh | why do so many people wiggle their feet to fall asleep? what exactly's happening there? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6txoqh/eli5_why_do_so_many_people_wiggle_their_feet_to/ | {
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"text": [
"I've never heard of this, but I assume it would give your mind something benign to focus on instead of thinking of things that may induce anxiety or other emotions that may keep you awake. Similar to the classic idea of counting sheep.",
"I do it while I'm falling asleep. I have no idea why. I have to actually concentrate to not do it. As soon I stop thinking about not wiggling my foot, I start wiggling it again. If something stops me from wiggling my foot, it's kind of nerve wrecking. "
]
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[],
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||
2wn7xn | why does software like itunes tell me "an unknown error occurred" and then give me an error number which obviously means the error is known? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2wn7xn/eli5_why_does_software_like_itunes_tell_me_an/ | {
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"text": [
"Did you look up the code? Because there is a code for \"Unknown error.\" It's what you get when none of the other known error codes match.",
"\"Unknown error\" means that nobody bothered writing up a detailed, user-friendly error message. Normally, only common errors that are easily fixed by or caused by users get friendly error messages."
]
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[],
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30avqo | what is instantaneous frequency? | So I get [frequency](_URL_0_) -- how many times a second a thing happens, basically. But what about [*instantaneous* frequency](_URL_1_)? Can anyone explain the concept to me without resorting to math (the way that the Wikipedia article rather annoyingly insists on)? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/30avqo/eli5_what_is_instantaneous_frequency/ | {
"a_id": [
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"Let's you were playing a trombone, moving the slide to constantly change the frequency of the notes.\n\nThe instantaneous frequency would be the note your were playing at any given moment in time. If I grabbed your slide and stopped it from moving, it is the note you would keep on playing."
]
} | [] | [
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instantaneous_phase#Instantaneous_frequency"
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[]
] |
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1tam3k | my iphone is 32 gb. it says i have 22.5 used gb and only 5.2 gb left, why is this. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1tam3k/eli5my_iphone_is_32_gb_it_says_i_have_225_used_gb/ | {
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"Apple pre-loads the device with things like the operating system and apps. It has about 32GB storage before they load it.",
"Some of it is used by system information. I think they don't count that",
"The internal software that runs the phone. Bloatware stuff that runs underneath programs also memory cache these don't show as registered installed things they are just \"there\" and basically it will auto sub it from the total available.. That is a vague answer and not very detailed but I am pretty certain that is the gist of it.",
"You are losing space as well because manufactures count 1mb as 1000kb instead of the1024kb. I believe it's like 6.78gb less per 100gb. So in you're case you lose 2.26gb.",
"Unfortunately, it has become a common advertising gimmick to state the *absolute total* storage capacity, rather than the *usable* storage capacity.\n\nWhen you get an iPhone (or almost any other device in the world), it comes with stuff already on it (like the pre-installed apps). All of these things take up space on the 32GB drive. So, once you take that into account, you may only have, say, 27GB of *usable* space left.\n\nBut they don't tell you that on the front of the box, because it doesn't sound quite as impressive.",
"Because, advertising! Many things can play a role here, one of the below, or combination of them, f.ex.:\n\n\n* The operating system is stored on the \"main\" memory which they advertise as 32GB. As iOS versions are going up, more features are added, which means more space they occupy, which explains why your iPhone memory capacity \"diminishes over time\".\n\n\n* The file system (that helps computers store and retrieve data from memory) occupies certain space too. For example, all the available memory is divided into blocks. Those blocks must be numbered so that the operating system can find and read / write from certain data block. Those numbers also occupy some space in a memory block. So you lose little amount of memory capacity here also.\n\n\n* And last thing which I believe is the most frequent, meet **gibibytes** or shortly GiB, which is the thing the computers \"see\". Now, the companies love to advertise everything in 'gigabytes' (GB), but in practice gibibytes are used. 32 gigabytes (GB) is equal to 32,000,000,000 bytes, while one gibibyte (GiB) is equal to 1,073,741,824 (a 'power of 2' number). When you convert those 32,000,000,000 bytes to gibibyte, you get roughly **29.8** gibibytes (GiB). Of course, Microsoft, Apple and friends will show you this as a \"gigabyte\" (GB) which is incorrect. Because of this marketing trick, you \"lose\" 2.2 GB.",
"Guy named Jason here! \n \nThis is a bit due to marketing, and a bit do to the definition of a gigabyte. In technical, computer terms, a gigabyte is 1024 megabytes, and a megabyte is 1024 kilobytes and so on. But in marketing terms, a gigabyte is 1000 megabytes, a megabyte is a 1000 kilobytes, and so on. \n \nSo if you do the math, first marketing style, \n32 Gb*1000^3 = 32 trillion bytes. \n \n3.2*10^10 /1024^3 =29.8 Gb \n \nSo your iPhone has only 29.8 Gb as the system can tell, but marketing says there is 32. Along with this, there is also some reserved space for the OS, and for system files, but with a mobile OS, is usually quite small. (a few hundrem mb) \n \n Also, [relevant xkcd](_URL_0_)"
]
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6c73jg | why do most helmets have a bunch of gaps? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6c73jg/eli5_why_do_most_helmets_have_a_bunch_of_gaps/ | {
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"text": [
"For ventilation and weight reduction.\n\nSports helmets don't need to be maximally strong.They're plenty strong enough to do their job, so it's safe to make some holes in them to reduce weight and improve ventilation and comfort."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
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||
2s5v00 | what is a stable star? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2s5v00/eli5what_is_a_stable_star/ | {
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"text": [
"There is an online game about horses called Star Stable. \nMister Ed was a TV show about a talking horse, so he was a stable star. \nThere was a groupie in the '70s named Sable Starr.\n\nYou're going to have to give some context to that question. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
3g39fw | what is donald trump's platform? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3g39fw/eli5_what_is_donald_trumps_platform/ | {
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"text": [
"He literally doesn't have one.\n\nI recently read somewhere (can't remember where, sorry) how political reporters covering him are getting frustrated, because they try to find policy statements for background that are standard issue for candidates, and it simply doesn't exist for Trump. He is just making it up as he goes along.",
"No abortion, no illegal immigrants, no donating to foreign powers, build jobs, make America strong again."
]
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[],
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||
282nr0 | have we not yet found a scientific proof of homosexuality in humans? | I'm not denying it exists, I'm just looking to shove some facts in the face of whosoever decides to bring some stupid "it's just a choice" argument in to conversation. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/282nr0/eli5_have_we_not_yet_found_a_scientific_proof_of/ | {
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],
"text": [
"No, we have not found a genetic cause for homosexuality.\n\nBut at the same time, it is not a choice to be gay.\n\nThe theory that I see most often is that it is environmental with certain genetic triggers (but those triggers alone do not cause it).\n\nBut it is a choice to a certain degree. Bear with me, it is not a choice whether or not you are gay. It is a choice whether or not you act upon your desires, which people should if it doesn't harm anyone. You can use this when arguing with people who claim it's just choice, you can point out that they cannot know if it's a choice because they can't read minds. They can't know if a person is just saying that they are straight and are secretly (or even unknowingly) gay, or if they are saying that they are gay and really are gay. All they can know is what the person decides to show, and the person has a choice in whether or not to show that they are gay. That is where the fundamental(ist) flaw is with that argument. They aren't choosing to be gay, they are choosing to express themselves in that way.",
"Scientific proof of homosexuality in any species requires only one bit of evidence. If same sex members of that species are engaging in mating activities or pair bonding, then you've got homosexuality.\n\nSo, yeah, there is scientific proof on homosexuality in humans. Gay porn is proof enough.",
"There's also homosexual animals, but people seem to always forget that...",
"My favorite come-back to \"it's a choice\" is \"let us assume it IS a choice. Why the fuck do YOU care?\"",
"There is evidence that sexual orientation is actually epigenetic, which is to say that environmental stimuli alter gene expression in an individual, without any changes to the underlying DNA. \n\nFor example, some epi-marks may act as a buffer between a developing fetus and androgens in the womb. Others seem to protect various sex traits from being masculinized or feminized. \n\nThese marks are supposed to be produced anew with each generation, but it is possible for epi-marks to be transmitted from fathers to daughters and from mothers to sons. Since the epi-marks in this case are meant to protect the parents from hormone level variations, they improve the fitness of the parent, but rarely they escape erasure and get transmitted to opposite-sex children.\n\n_URL_0_",
"\"Maybe you should try being gay for a week since you're choosing to be straight\""
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetic_theories_of_homosexuality"
],
[]
] |
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