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If I froze some ice at -10 degrees and another piece at -50 degrees, would the -10 melt faster because its less frozen? | It would melt sooner assuming they are both heated at the same rate, yes. One piece of ice would need to absorb 10 degrees C of heat to start melting, and the other would need to absorb 50 degrees C of heat. |
How does Switzerland's politically neutral stance work? What protects them from external threats? | 1st: money. During WWII they stored nazi gold and allied money. 2nd: it's a mountainous country with a militia-style army (in theory every man is in the army and has a weapon at home) and they have plans and preparations in case of war that would completely close off the country, everyone would evacuate to the mountainous regions and fight guerrilla style. Basically invading Switzerland would be extremely hard and costly for anyone and not really worth the trouble. |
What is a spider doing when it sits on the wall for an extended period of time? | In a parallel universe, on spidereddit: "What is a human doing when it sits in front of a screen for an extended period of time?". |
Why are bus steering wheels (nearly) parallel to the ground whereas car steering wheels are (nearly) perpendicular to the ground? | Professional bus driver here. It has to do with the angle of the rod that connects the steering wheel to the tires. Since the bus driver is much more elevated and basically sits directly above the tires the steering wheel needs to point almost straight down in order to connect. The driver of a car sits behind his wheels and as a result, the steering wheel is at a different angle. Here are some diagrams to better explain it. The first one is a bus, the second is a car. _URL_1_ _URL_0_ Side note: In most newer buses you can adjust the steering wheel to make it more like a car's. |
Why do black socks leave lint in between my toes but white socks don't? | Because you're white and the black lint shows up better |
What were the purposes of the Nazi concentration camps? | Firstly the initial concentration camps were not extermination camps, that came later. In the first camps they were worked to death, given very little food and exploited for anything the Nazis could get out of them. When the concentration camps turned into extermination camps some people were killed virtually immediately others were used to dig grave pits, sort through clothes and belongings and other jobs that the guards didn't want to do. The transition from labour camp to death camp wasn't an overnight transformation the process gradually changed over time, with the numbers of people entering into the camps dramatically increasing and the life expectancy dramatically decreasing. |
Why is it that when I fart while wearing pants and sitting down it feels like there is a bubble moving between my jeans and skin? | My (educated) guess is that it is an actual bubble. Fabric can contain gasses (not very well, but some of it), so it might very well be that a bubble of gas lifts the fabric from your skin and moves until it comes to a place where it can freely escape into the air and poison you enemies. |
Why have Washington and Colorado not released people imprisoned for pot? | Because those people committed crimes. Just because something is legal today does not suddenly make them not-illegal when the crime was committed. The flip side of this is that you can do something that's legal today and not be charged when they change the law next week. |
(Conflicting info online) What genes determine eye color? Can a blue and a brown make a blue? Brown and a brown make a blue? | In both cases, yes. The brown-eyed gene is dominant while the blue-eyed gene is recessive. A person with brown eyes can have either one brown-eyed gene and one blue-eyed gene, or two brown-eyed genes. A person with blue eyes has to have two blue-eyed genes. So a blue-eyed person and a brown-eyed person who happens to be of the "blue-eyed gene and brown-eyed gene" variety can produce a blue-eyed baby. Two brown-eyed people who both happen to be of the "blue-eyed gene and brown-eyed gene" variety can also produce a blue-eyed baby. |
Why can small creatures such as Ants lift things much larger than themselves? | There's an mathematical law that pops up in nature called the [square-cube law]( _URL_0_) which simply states that as an object gets bigger, its volume increases faster than its surface area by a factor of a cube compared to a factor of a square. This is relevant to biomechanics because muscles get stronger according to their cross sectional area, which grows with the square of the radius of the muscle. The volume (therefore weight) of the muscle (and the rest of the animal) grows with the cube of the radius of the animal. This means smaller muscles are proportionally stronger per unit weight than larger muscles, because the volume shrinks faster than the cross sectional area. Other small animals use hydraulic pressure and not muscles to move, but the explanation is the same. |
When you look at someone welding, it hurts your eyes. Why is it that when you look at a video of someone welding, it doesn't hurt your eyes? | Welding torches emit ultraviolet and infrared light, which can hurt the eyes. Since cameras are only designed to pick up visible light, and monitors are only built to display visible light, UV and IR don't get projected by the video. |
Why are rocket scientists considered some of the smartest people? | The USA went through a period where we were racing with the Soviet Union to make milestones in space exploration. During that time there was a huge amount of government investment and public expectation toward the field, and this attracted the best of the best in many fields toward constructing the technological marvels that space rockets are. A rocket scientist would need both advanced education in engineering and physics, and was afforded generous salaries and social benefits for their contribution to the space race effort. This reality of such a person's value to society fueled the birth of the saying. |
Why are there no hreen, blue, true red or puple mammals? All other animals (insects, reptiles, fish, birds, etc.) come in a rainbow of colors; why are mammals so limited? | Generally other animals are bright colored to warn predators of their toxicity. Mammals aren't venomous or poisonous for the most part. They go with camouflage or subdued colors to blend in either to avoid being eaten or to stalk their prey more effectively. |
Does the earth 'leak' into space? | it does, solar winds strip little bits of our atmosphere away, we lose a few tons every day. some is replaced by micro comets/asteroids. net net its relatively small, and does not pose a threat to us on geological time scales (IE wont cause appreciable harm before the sun eats us in 10 billion years) |
why can't nations conquer other nations like in the past. | Starting after the First World War, and continuing up until the late seventies, there have been a series of charters, treaties, and so on, from various international bodies, including the UN that established the violation of a nation's territorial integrity, or the promotion of secessionist groups within a nation, by another nation as an international crime - specifically the ["Crime of Aggression"](_URL_2_) Hence the fig leaf of a referendum in Crimea. Of course enforcement can be a problem! |
Why does the cold cause your teeth to chatter? | It's your body shaking to attempt to make you warmer, the teeth chattering is just a side effect of the shaking |
What causes your body to feel different types of pain? From toothache to paper cut to sunburn, why does the physical sensation vary so widely? | Your brain is responsible for different types of pain (throbbing pain, sharp etc.) Your brain 'knows' where the pain is coming from and associates it accordingly. Its a useful feature to have because if you say, get scratched by an overzealous cat across the face, you need to be able to differentiate the pain to know what is hurt. If pain was just general, you wouldn't be able to differentiate what was broken, and possibly miss important stuff to treat. The other variable is the strength of the signal. A broken leg hurts worse than a paper cute because more pain nerves got activated in the accident, you brain interprets that to mean more sensation of pain. Those 'levels' of pain is your body's way of telling you how 'bad' your injury is (granted it is subjective but it works). |
How does Canada have access to US citizens criminal records? | Your criminal record is public information in the United States, barring circumstances like being a minor at the time or some kind of conditions on expunging it. It's not just Canada that can see it, anyone can see it if they ask. |
why rappers like soulja boy who are awful at rapping are still rich off of one hit wonders? | The same reason movies like Transformers are made Basically, record companies need to hedge their bets. Now, all record companies have people in them interested in producing quality music but they still need to return consistent profits. It's very hard to find high quality acts that consistently, because generally their music takes a longer time to produce and they are harder to find but most importantly, they only appeal to a particular niche market. Someone like Soulja Boy can make music that, although very few people actually think is good music, a lot of people can listen too. Like McDonalds, it appeals to everyone but not particularly to anyone. This makes it ideal music for large nightclubs and any other place with a large group of people with varied music tastes. This is why Baauer is signed to the same label as Zebra Katz and Duck Sauce to the same label as Action Bronson. Every label needs people on it who can make music that everyone finds tolerable at a party |
Why do i have to cough when i'm cleaning my ears? | Its because the two areas associated with the sensations are so so close together in the brain that ower-sensation can trigger the other. It will take a few seconds of cleaning before the cough is stimulated. Not everybody has this, but another common example is people sneezing when the pluck their eyebrows. The area associated with the pain sensation of hair plucking is right next to the sneezing mechanism, and so it sometimes triggers a sneeze! |
Colombia still produces hundreds of tons of cocaine each year, why aren't there cartels in the country like when the Cali and Medellin were big in the 80's and 90's? And if there aren't big cartels, who is moving all those drugs out of the country? | I know that the US gives Colombia a lot of money to shut down cartels before they become powerful...and they are pushed out of major cities and into the jungle. Its kind of like a win win. They get major cities back for tourism and the production of drugs is out of sight out of mind in the jungle somewhere. Also a lot of cartels moved to neighboring countries...ie Peru.. |
What are saccades, and why do eyes need them? | A saccade is a quick, jerky, near-instant movement of the eye. The speed can't be controlled; the muscles controlling the eye move as fast as they can. One popular suggestion for the necessity of the saccade is that the central part of the retina, called the fovea, that provides the clearest, sharpest vision, is very very small. By jerking the eye from point to point to point, the brain can build up a map of the areas the fovea's passed over and thereby get a very detailed picture of what it's seeing. |
How does a barcode work? | You know how Morse Code is a series of short signals, long signals, and periods of silence that represent letters? Barcodes work on the same principle, only on the visual spectrum and with numbers. The lines you see in the barcode represent a numerical code. When the scanner sees those lines, it can figure out the numerical code based on how wide the lines are and how often there is white space. It then sends that code to a database somewhere, which knows what items have that code. The database then return that items to the cashier's register. |
Why is 1080p advertised as "full hd" when there are much higher resolutions? | Because 1080p is what is considered high definition. 4k is considered Ultra HD. It's just a term used. |
How did Oasis become so popular in the'90s, and why aren't they as Iconic as Nirvana? | They had catchy, well written tunes.... for one album. Their follow up albums got worse and worse and the Gallagher brothers were notorious for not getting along with others or even each other. They even fought on stage. What they were not, however, is ground breaking. They sounded like an update of the Beatles. Nirvana, on the other hand, were original. They produced music unlike anything else, over multiple albums. Also, there is something about dying young that tends to make musicians iconic. |
Why do we laugh when being tickled when it's not enjoyable whatsoever? | As with most things biological, there is a tremendous amount of guess-work required to come up with a meaningful answer. There are many theories as to why we are ticklish and why we respond the way we do to it. The most compelling to me is the theory that tickling is related to play-fighting. The young of many social animals participate in play fighting where they will attack each other without the intent of causing serious harm. The human behavior of tickling seems to map very well to this, forcing the person being attacked to respond in a way which appears to be happy, and thus not distressing to the attacker. Children generally like some amount of tickling, but this fades over time at about the same time that 'play' of this sort gives way to other interactions. |
Does the car A.C. Use gas or electric to run, and how does it affect gas mileage specifically? | It doesn't directly use gas *or* electric. There's a pulley in the front of the engine. The air conditioning is turned by a belt that connects it to the pulley. When the air conditioning is switched on, it's pretty difficult to turn the air conditioning unit. And since this unit is connected to the engine by the belt, the engine has to do the work of turning the air conditioning. It gives the engine more load. This is similar to, for example, going uphill - another situation which puts the engine under more load. Either the engine (and car) will slow down, or you need to press the accelerator (gas pedal) more and use more gas to maintain your speed. |
Why we need to become unconscious in order to sleep? | An important detail which most commenters are apparently unaware of: You are still conscious while sleeping. Sleep is considered to be a state of altered consciousness, not unconsciousness. This is because you can still respond to stimuli while asleep, and wake up if necessary. In other words, everything is working normally while you're asleep. If you're unconscious, that means something is NOT working normally. Things that should wake you up aren't waking you up. Unconsciousness is a sign of something seriously wrong, e.g. brain injury, seizure, alcohol poisoning. |
How do loading bars know how far along a download is? | When you begin a download, it creates a "box" that says there is a specific amount space that the file will be contained in. As pieces in the box fill in, the box says "hey, I currently have been filled with X number of the Y required pieces." |
Why do bands bring have their own speakers and amplifiers if everything is just run through the arena's PA system? | Like their guitar amps and stuff? A guitar amp does a whole lot more to influence the actual sound and tone than the PA. A guitarist's amp is pretty integral to his whole sound, so he'll want it to be consistent, and he'll want control over it. Then the venue will put a mic on his amp to connect it to the PA. |
In space, it always seems that we are shown traveling on a 2D plane. What happens if you leave Earth and go straight "Up" or "Down"? | Our planets are all mostly on the same plane, which is nicely convenient for illustration purposes. If you go any other direction, it's pretty darn empty. And it will take a while to run into the [Oort cloud](_URL_0_). Beyond that is way more empty before another solar system. |
Why is the ocean water so clear in places like the Caribbean but not at US beaches? | Tropical waters like those in the Caribbean are warm, clear, and completely devoid of nutrients. This is why life clusters around reefs, a lot of creatures eat the plankton and algae that grows on the coral, they provide food for the area The waters up north are cold, dark, dirty, and full of nutrients! The darkness is partially from dirt/mud but a large part is all the algae, plankton, and krill. These nutrient rich waters support a wide variety of animals and many animals will go to these dark waters to feed and fatten up during the summer and then return to the warm clear waters to give birth and raise their young |
Why have newspaper comics gotten so abysmal these days? | Several factors are at play. First, you're older, so you've developed a taste. You might recall loving Garfield as a kid, but now you read recent strips and it's dull and bland. But if you went back and read strips that were published when you were a child, you would find them equally dull. Second, the authors change over time. They might come to view their comics as a metaphorical prison for their imagination. They might develop some sort of mental deterioration, as with Terry Pratchett. Finally, external conditions might change that reduce their ability to do their work, as with Tom Lehrer (who, when he produced music, wanted to satirize politicians, but he stopped because today he instead wants to punch them). |
How is it that I get so car sick when I try to read or write in the car when I'm otherwise fine? | Reading and writing requires intense visual focus. Your eyes home in on the paper, and the visual part of your brain kind of stops paying attention to anything in your peripheral vision. However, if you're in a car, your inner ears are telling your brain "hey, I'm moving all over the place". But your eyes are telling your brain "nothing's moving, you're just reading a book". Your brain, receiving these two conflicting pieces of information, decides that it has been poisoned and makes you headachey/nauseous so you can vomit the poison back up. True Story. |
Why is cheese sometimes crunchy/gritty? And what causes that texture? | The crunchiness is caused by crystals of various substances that form as the cheese dries. They start out dissolved in water in the cheese, but as the water evaporates, they start to crystallize. Usually, the crystals are made of calcium lactate. But sometimes, for some cheeses, there are crystals of amino acids like tyrosine, leucine, or isoleucine. Fun fact: tyrosine is named after cheese. *Tyros* is Greek for cheese. Tyrosine was first discovered in the protein casein, found in cheese, by Justus von Liebig. |
If a MLB pitcher were to hit a player in the head, and that player have life suffering injuries, would the pitcher be in trouble? | Unless it was intentional, no. All the players signed legal waivers when they sign their contracts. |
Why or how do fires make sound? More specifically 'roar' ? | Hot air rises, and the fire heats the surrounding air unevenly, causing increased turbulent air flow around the fire that we can hear as sound. |
Is there any Virus which infects Apple products?Why is there such a big problem with windows and hardly any problem with the mac when it comes to bugs? | Yes, there has been malware for Apple products including OSX. Windows gets targeted more because it has a far larger market share. I haven't had significantly more bugs on a Windows device than I have on OSX. I haven't seen a BSoD since XP was the latest Windows OS, but I did see a kernel panic on OSX (So basically the equivalent) just a few months ago. |
Do birds stop for rests after flying for long periods of time? | It depends on the bird. Most birds do stop to rest, but birds like swifts, terns, and albatrosses can stay in the air for weeks or months at a time, usually by gliding on air currents. One benefit is that lets them conserve energy. |
Stress is implicated in a great number of health problems today, things must of been pretty stressful for our early ancestors, why are our bodies still not able to deal with stress? | There's a big difference between acute stress and chronic stress. Life was not as stressful as you have been led to believe. Most anthropologists estimate that hunter-gatherers worked a lot less and had more leisure time than modern humans. The stress response is adaptive for dealing with short term threats in the moment, like a fight or a predator. It's not very helpful for "threats" that never go away, like debt. |
Why auto makers dropped the frameless doors? | Because they really didn't work too well. It was too hard to build a seal between the car frame and the glass, that worked well when closing the door, while allowing the window to slide up and down. Because you couldn't hold the glass in a channel, the window gets pulled away from the seal at high speed, unless you design it to push tightly against the seal, which makes the door hard to close and makes the window-winder mechanism stiff. The door-window seal has to do different things to the door-car seal. Trying to make one seal do both meant that both things were done poorly. |
is it true that if one sits too close to a television it will affect your vision after a certain amount time? | It MAY cause eye strain which could be a temporary annoyance, or cause a headache. But no long term damage can/will come of it. Simply put, your parents said that because if you were to close to the TV, it makes it harder for others to see. |
Why do low fuel prices have a negative long term effect? | It's not the effect of the low fuel prices, it's the effect of other things are shown by low fuel prices that are causing worries. Analysts who see concerns in the low fuel prices believe that the prices are indicative of demand for fuel dropping, which would strongly suggest poor economic activity (likely in Asia and Europe). |
Why can we be woken up by others snoring but not our own? | You can be woken up (easily) if your sleep is not deep. You only snores when your sleep is deep. |
How do they make old 70s and 80s movies in high definition when it didn't exist back then? | Film is a very high quality medium capable of storing images very high resolutions. The master prints of those films are still around and are used to create HD copies. Back then, scans of the films were taken at relatively low resolutions because VHS tapes were the standard medium for distribution. VHS tapes are low quality and the TVs people would view them on were low quality. Nowadays, much higher quality mediums are available for redistribution, so the films are being rescanned at more appropriate resolutions. |
Why do apps on Google Play need me to give them access to details which are seemingly private and unrelated to the app I'm downloading? | It depends on the app; either it: 1. Is spamming malware (there is no initial vetting done on apps put onto the Google Play store; Google only takes apps down if they're reported). 2. Is sneakily but legitimately selling your information to advertisers. 3. Has features you aren't aware that utilise those features for a real and positive feature. |
how do they determine traffic light timing at intersections? | I'm pretty sure they time how long it takes to get from one major intersection to the next major intersection driving the speed limit. Then they subtract 5 seconds and make sure you catch the red light |
What exactly is the Dial-up sound? | They're doing a few things: * Figuring out which protocols each modem is capable of, and selecting the best one that they both can handle. * Sending some commands to the telephone network that switch it to a mode more useful for modems than talking. * Measuring the qualities of the telephone connection. * Figuring out what the highest speed they can use is. _URL_0_ |
When a relative gets into an accident, how do emergency services notify you? | Depending on the circumstances, there are a number of ways next of kin are notified of an accident: - if the accident is fatal, all efforts are made by the police to locate the next of kin and notify them in person. This allows for support and victim services to be made immediately available. This also ensures that the person being notified is safe and doesn't do anything to hurt themselves out of grief. - if the next of kin lives in another city/state/country then the local police agency is contacted and asked to assist in making the notification. - if the accident is not fatal than typically social workers at the hospital will contact the next of kin by phone, advise them of the accident, and ask them to come to the hospital. Sometimes the police will assist with this type of notification if needed. Source: I've done it many times and it sucks. |
Why is affirmative action still around? | The easiest way i can explain it is affirmative action is a set of guidelines and goals to reduce and reverse historical trends of minority groups being deprived of social and economic opportunities not available to them solely because of their background. I saw guidelines and goals because actual quotas have been deemed unconstitutional for quite a while now, and don't actually exist. And government assistance is not ever based on affirmative action, at all. Its based on economic status, and you will find no law or statute that says otherwise, because that's illegal. The reason all this is still around is because its still necessary. The problems still exist. The reason so many people think there's not an issue is because they are fundamentally confused about what affirmative action actually is. Normally, this is because they never bothered to look into it and just kinda believed what other people told them, without ever verifying it. |
Why can English speakers efficiently communicate with most other English speakers (regardless of dialect) but a lot of Mandarin speakers can't communicate likewise between the various dialects of Mandarin nearly as efficiently? | There aren't many dialects of english. But get a creole and a cockney to have a conversation and I'll owe you a beer |
Why do people feel a dull ache in their forehead when an object (like a pen or finger) is brought very near to, but without touching, the point between their eyebrows? | I get the same sensation when something comes close to the area between my eyebrows. It has nothing to do with eye movement or mystisism. I cannot explain why but i can feel a slight pressure when an object is close. I have wondered about this myself. |
Why are weather forecasts still so inaccurate? | You remember the times they're wrong and rarely remember the times they're right. Also if an app is telling you it's sunny and clear when it's raining perhaps the location services on your phone aren't functioning properly. |
Since I'm not a Nielsen family, does pirating a show basically have the same effect as watching it on live TV? | With respect to TV ratings, if you're not participating in any special Nielsen Families (or related) program, then pirating would be effectively the same as watching the TV program live via antenna or via a passive cable/satellite tuner (e.g. using the QAM tuner built into your TV). There are, however, cable/satellite TV set-top boxes that can technically report back to the television service provider what channels you are watching. Whether your television service provider actually collects this information and/or shares it with other parties (e.g. Nielsen) for measuring ratings, that's a whole different story (one I don't actually have the answer to)... But certainly in terms of passive tuners (which basically just listen into one-way over-the-air / cable broadcasts), then there is no way they are collecting information about your viewership of the program and thus pirating would not affect the ratings. |
How can gas stations charge 9/10 of a penny, when no such denomination exists? | Since there is no such denomination, they "do it" by rounding to the nearest penny. When you multiply any amount of gas by any price, you always get something that has to be rounded off. It's their way of turning 9 cents into a dime, 99 cents into a dollar. That also gets them a tiny bit more money than if they didn't use that 9/10 of a penny in the price. I run into people all the time who think $2.599 is two dollars and fifty-nine cents. The ruse works. |
Why does society view the exposure of the female chest so differently from that of a man's? Why do women have to cover and men don't? | In New York State wherever a man can legally be topless, so can a woman. |
Why are actors/directors/crews not employees of major studios (or are they)? | Movie studios used to operate this way many decades ago. It was referred to as the star system. The decline of this method of operating came about largely because studios became notorious for exploiting actors and heavily restricting or controlling their careers. The system also tended to favour the development of a star's personal image, rather than focus on the quality of the acting. People in the entertainment industry still enter into contracts for all sorts of projects, however the goal of most artists is generally to retain creative control over their careers and being signed to lengthy contracts with studios obviously limits that. |
why is it easier to balance on a bicycle when moving than when standing still? | People are going to tell you it's because of the gyroscopic effect, but [these people showed it's possible to build a stable bicycle even when the gyroscopic effect of the front wheel is canceled.](_URL_0_) |
Why do deeply religious people badmouth other religions? | From their perspective, other religions *are* evil. If you believe your immortal soul goes to heaven you believe the right stuff, and goes to hell if you believe the wrong stuff, other religions are Satan's trick to try to lead you into damnation. To you, they are literally the worst thing in the world. |
Why did society's view of 'The Future' change from being classically futuristic to being post-apocalyptic? | Probably the Cold War if it had to be ONE AND ONLY ONE thing, may be more accurate to just say nuclear weapons in general. Also I think the upheaval and social restructuring that went on in the 60's, what with 'Nam and LSD and Watergate and all, kinda slapped the rose tinted glasses off of the face of society in a way and thus we have this pessimism. Edit: I can't believe I left out the assassination of JFK! That was another tremendous kick to the collective balls of the optimistic and really reminded the world that, yes, shit does indeed happen, even during an age of "prosperity" like post-WWII America. All that hope people had through him, gone in an instant. |
Why are the directions "left" and "right" associated with liberal and conservative political philosophies? | It comes from the French Revolution when people loyal to religion and the king would gather to the right of the president of the National Assembly while supporters of the revolution would gather on the left. The right thus became associated with traditionalism and conservatism while the left with equality and revolution. |
why is there a feeling of total disgust for men after they finish masturbating...and what causes it | Your mind pretty much goes from a high state of pleasure to a state of reason in a matter of seconds... |
How do nations determine their currency value? | Most currencies are not regulated in the way you say, countries do not set the values of their currency in international trade themselves. This was not always the case (see "gold standard"), but now, most currencies are floated on an exchange, the Foreign Exchange Market, where the value of each currency is determined by market demand. |
How are urls created, and also how are they made so they dont match another url? | each url (not including the sub directory) links to exactly one ip address (as determined by your dns server, different people using different dns, may be directed to different ips). this ip address determines the webserver which will serve the webpage. [server].[domain].[top level domain]/(optional)[sub directory] default server is usually www. although the domain host can choose to have others for specific pages within the same domain such as, _URL_2_, _URL_0_, _URL_1_, etc etc. domain is domain, such as reddit, google, microsoft, etc. top level domain. .com = commercial site, org means non profit, net means network, but don't have to follow these guidelines. some specalized ones such as .edu .gov .cn .ru etc are reserved for educational entities, us government, china, russia, etc. sub directories are just directories inside the webserver. most webpages front page are served on the root directory |
Why do some people feel more comfortable in the city, while others are more at home in the country? | preference.... I am not aware of any specific cause. The human brain rebels against monotony and sameness so that might have something to do with it. |
Why did it take so long for FTC to accuse Vemma of creating a pyramid scheme? | Many pyramid schemes masquerade as legitimate MLMs. The structure is identical, so just because it has that kind of structure isn't enough for the government to file charges. They need *evidence* that something illegal is happening. |
Why does it feel normal to sit back down in your chair, but if you sit in someone else's it feels warm? Why can't we feel our own butt warms? | When you sit in a chair it will change to the temperature of your body. So you wouldn't know the difference because the temperatures would get to the same degree as you currently are. Other people's body may be at a higher temperature at the time so you will notice the difference as the chair would be as warm as the person was. |
Why are people able to get your IP from your Skype name but not from other things? | If you've got a direct connection to someone (through a client like Skype), they can see the IP address you're using. Other things like Facebook aren't a direct connection between users; both people access the server to see what's been posted to it. It's a question of who has access to the information. If I ran a message board, I could allow administrators to see the IP addresses of everyone posting. Or I could publish those next to a post if I wanted to. The people with whom you're speaking are advising you avoid direct connections with people who might want to do your system harm. |
How and when did the world universally agree to use the same basis for time (24 hours, each of 60 minutes, etc) | As it turns out, "60" is just a really versatile number. If we had 100 minutes in an hour, for example, we could divide it in half, or in quarters, etc, but there are lots of numbers you *can't* divide by without creating complex fractions. With 60 minutes, though, we can divide it by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30 and 60, all without any fractions / remainders whatsoever. This makes it an incredibly practical number to use, because we very frequently need to divide portions of time into smaller fragments. It stems from Babylonian culture, I believe, where they were kind of obsessed with it. I'm guessing that "24 hours" is just a result of how many times we have these '60 minute cycles' within one rotation of the Earth (i.e.: a day). |
Why don't politicians get charged with libel when many of them knowingly lie or misrepresent facts? | For a start, lying isn't necessarily libellous. You can say all sorts of untruths without defaming anyone. Second...if you sued a politician for lying, just thing of the exposure you'd be giving their arguments? Money couldn't buy that sort of airtime (well, OK, in the US it probably can). Third - some countries like the UK specifically exclude party manifestos from breach-of-promise rules. IIRC in the UK this came as a result of someone doing what you suggested. So - apart from not working, being counterproductive and they'd just move the goalposts anyway, no reason at all! |
How come heat seeking missiles don't go straight to the sun? | Older versions of the AIM-9 Sidewinder did routinely lock on to the Sun or clouds, sending them ballistic. Newer versions have corrected this by adding optical filters to the sensor to only allow certain bands of infrared energy into the sensor for detection. This same system is used to help defeat flare countermeasures. |
Why don't countries apart from the US have manned moon landings? | I think the US sent a man to the moon more for national pride than for any practical purpose. JFK declared America's intent to complete this mission in order to send a message to the Soviets and the world that the US was a superior nation. Today, it's less about pride and more about science. It makes no sense to send manned flights, because unmanned flights are cheaper and more versatile, and can do things that humans can't, like stay there for long periods without food. |
How do people hack into an intranet and why do we need anti-virus systems in an intranet? | There are a lot of ways someone might "hack into an intranet" but a simple way to understand why something might get through the barriers surrounding an intranet is to consider USB thumb drives. A virus on a thumb drive might easily be introduced within the network even with the strongest of barriers between the internet and intranet. |
Why do both of these images exist? | Because anyone can caption any image anything they want. |
Why are final seasons/episodes of shows often done/received poorly? | Well for one reason, it's the same reason that we will never see Half Life 3. They're too hyped up and will never meet expectations. If valve were to release HL3 everybody would be expecting the best game in the world. If a series has gone on for long everybody will be awaiting the ending and thinking about what might happen. When it's not up to the standard that they created in their head, it's just stated that they should pretend it couldn't happen. Another reason could be that shows go on for so long, and use up pretty much all the ideas the design team or whatever can come up with, so there is not really a good way of putting a good end to something that is just floating along, ie the Simpsons. |
Explain how recording onto the old vinyl records works. | Why should the vocals be different from the instrumental music? Vocals are made up of sound waves just the same. You are drawing a distinction which is physically meaningless. |
I am trying to understand why the sun sets at different times all along the west coast of the US. Sunset was at 4:53 PM today in San Diego, 5:05 PM in San Francisco, and 4:43 PM in Seattle. I am baffled: why is SF the latest but it's in the middle of California? | San Francisco is at 122.4194° W San Diego is at 117.1611° W, so, way east of SF. Seattle is at 122.3321° W (about the same as SF) but also much farther north where winter days are shorter. |
Why is there a northern and southern accent in the United States? | Why is this under biology? Anyway, this is due to differing patterns of settlement. The North was settled mostly by religious pilgrims from the more rural regions of southern England, while the South was settled mostly by Scots-Irish settlers (Presbyterian Northern Irish) and aristocrats. This resulted in the creation of two different accent regions, which spread their influence as the rest of the US was settled (for example, Ohio was settled by Northerners, while Texas was settled by Southerners). |
Why do antidepressant often have depression as a side-effect? | Anti-depressants are a guessing game as far as prescribing them. You're messing with the brain my friend. There's no telling exactly how they'll affect one particular person and how they feel. Having used them, it's hard to tell exactly what feels different sometimes. You think a strange thought that you've never thought before and wonder if it's just you or the drug. Or feel a certain way and can't tell if you actually feel that way, or if the drug makes you feel that way. Crazy stuff. |
Why does it always come down to "drink lots of fluids" when you tell the doc you gave the flu? | There's no cure for influenza once you're sick. It's a self-limiting and mild infection that your immune system will fight off, all you have to do is keep your body working long enough for it to do so. That means sleep and fluids. |
What's a cellular automaton ? | For starters, it's not really an essential part of understanding computing. The idea came about as more of an entertaining thing to do with computers. At best, they're a footnote in the history of computing. Take a grid. Each cell of that grid can either have a thing in it or not. Now, given some rule based on the neighboring cells, you can decide if that cell has a thing in it for the next generation. The original example was [Conway's Game of Life](_URL_0_), the rule were fairly simple: 1. A live cell with 1 or 0 live neighbors dies of loneliness. 2. A live cell with 2 or 3 live neighbors is happy and survives. 3. A live cell with more than 3 live neighbors dies of overcrowding 4. A dead cell with exactly 3 live neighbors gets colonized with new life. With these 4 simple rules, it turns out that surprisingly complex patterns can arise. There's a virtually limitless number of different rule sets you can come up with, all of which have different patterns of behavior. |
How a "double bounce" or "super bounce" on a trampoline works | Fred is going to double bounce George. As George comes down from a jump, Fred jumps in and lands right next to George. Their combined weight and momentum stretch the trampoline tighter than it would with just one of them. At the bottom, Fred hops off to the side, however the trampoline is still stretched very tight. That extra tension propels George higher than he would be able to have gone on his own. |
What does 10th Cousin, once removed mean? | First cousins have the same grandparents. Second cousins have the same great-grandparents. Third cousins have the same great-great-grandparents. And so on. So 10th cousins have the same great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents. "Once removed" means that you're of different generations. For example, if Joe is my first cousin, once removed, that means Joe's grandfather is my great-grandfather. Another way to think about it is that if someone is my Nth cousin once removed, then they're Nth cousins with one of my parents. Likewise, an Nth cousin twice removed would be Nth cousins with my grandparents. [Wikipedia has some graphs to help visualize it](_URL_0_) |
Why do Jehovah Witnesses not celebrate Holidays? | exJW here. We avoided Easter because we celebrate the last supper in form of The Memorial, instead of Jesus' resurrection. As for the rest of the main holidays, we avoided Christmas due to its roots in paganism, Halloween due to its association with the occult, and birthdays because King Herod had John the Baptist beheaded for his birthday. Also, pagan roots. |
Is North Korea a credible threat to the the US? Aren't these the same guys we mock mercilessly? | North Korea is not a credible threat to the US. There are a bunch of US military stationed in South Korea who could be in danger if war broke out there. NK has a large but generally poorly equipped and trained army. They could potentially cause a decent sized mess in South Korea in the early days of a war, but they would be pretty quickly defeated. The NK military does not have any reasonable power projection ability. They've got some missiles, but likely nothing capable of reaching the US, and certainly nothing with that sort of range that has been well tested and could be considered reliable. Any overt military action against the US would pretty much be suicide for the NK government. I guess they could create more mischief via their "cyberwarfare division" or whatever they call their hacker teams. But it's pretty unlikely that they could cause serious problems that way. |
If computers have to follow direct commands, how can it choose things at random? | Computers usually *can't* choose things at random. Instead, they have algorithms that can generate [psuedo-random numbers](_URL_0_). This often involves seeding the number generator with various "random" factors, such as mouse movements, the current time, and/or the contents of the computer's memory, which are all unlikely to be the same the next time a "random" number is needed. Although, with [special hardware](_URL_1_), more-truly-random numbers can be generated. **Edit:** Also, I don't see what this has to do with living things making choices. Your choices are decidedly *not* random. If they were random, they wouldn't be choices. You don't do the mental equivalent of flipping a coin or rolling a die every time you decide something. Rather, you weigh the pros and cons, and reach an informed decision. |
Why do people say ouch even when something doesnt hurt. | It's a learned response. Different languages have different words for "ouch". You expect something to hurt so you go through the learned response. |
What did they do before eye-glasses? What if people had horrible vision? | They were said to be blind or have clouded vision. In some societies they were taken care of or depending on their vision could be mostly self sufficient. In others they were killed or left to die for being weak. |
What makes a CD an EP and not an LP or album? | EP and LP are terms that originated with the technology of vinyl records. An LP is a 12" vinyl record which when played at 33-1/3 rpm gave you ~22 minutes per side -- they were able to stretch that a little bit but not too much. A 'single' was a 7" vinyl record with a bigger hole in the middle (it was developed by a different company who originally wanted to sell a different player) which when played at 45 rpm gave you a single song on each side of 3-5 minutes (later stretched when singles got longer). An 'EP' was in the middle. The format varied but often it was a 7" record but played at 33-1/3 RPM instead of 45 RPM so you could fit perhaps 10 minutes on each side. In the industry, the format ceased to matter after a while, an EP became synonymous with a 3-6 song release. Whenever a group is inspired enough to write more than a single and its B-side but not inspired enough to write a full album they could release something in the middle and call it an EP. |
Why are Camillia Bowles and Kate Middleton Duchesses and not Princesses? | To be a Prince or Princess you must be the child of a Monarch. Being the Consort (wife) of a Prince is not enough. They are Duchesses because the are the wives of Dukes (who happen to also be Princes). Duke/Duchess is the highest rank of Nobility that is non-Royal in the British Peerage system, though members of the royal family are often given this rank in addition to being a Prince or Princess. |
Does cooling a sealed bottle/can of soda and then letting it come back to room temperature cause it to lose carbonation? | No. The sealed bottle or can is much closer to an enclosed system than an open container - it can stay very well carbonated for months. It would be a reasonable simplification to say that the carbonation hasn't changed at all. However, there is another property that is important, Solubility. When you open up the can, the drink itself will lose carbonation due to relatively low levels of CO2 compared to the container it was stored in as time goes on. When the drink is colder, CO2 (and other gases) are more soluble. So, as the temperature increases, there is less dissolved CO2, which likely causes the impression that the drink was less carbonated to begin with. |
How do dressmakers/tailors make garments bigger or take them out? | Clothes are made from several pieces seamed together. Seams are usually created by folding the edges of the pieces over in a complicated way and sewed over. The way the pieces are folded on the edges depeond on what kind of seam you want to create (hold firmly / have a little flexibility / comfort on the inside / plethora of other parameters ... ). When taylor makes the clothes bigger he cuts the thread and undoes the seam. then he refolds it a bit differently. There is almost always a bit more cloth in the seam than is necessery so the taylor can fold the seam in such way that the clothes would be bigger. If there is not enough material the taylor can put a wedge of material in between the pieces. So at first there was cloth - seam - cloth, now there would be cloth - seam - added material - seam - cloth. |
When, why and how did Monday through Friday become a classic work week, with weekends Saturday and Sunday? | Unions pushed for a standard 40 hour work week with 2 days off. |
- Why do motorcycles only have manual transmission motors? | Motorcycles with automatic transmissions exist. Perhaps you don't see as many as you live in a society where people who ride motorcycles are the sort who want power and control, or are cost-conscious, both of which manual transmissions have an advantage. Also, there isn't anything about a standard motor which makes it 'manual' or 'automatic', the transmission is a separate piece which transmits motor power into the system which drives the wheels. |
Why scientists can date the age of Earth, but not the Egyptian pyramids or the Sphinx? | Radiometric dating works by comparing the ratio of isotopes in an object now to a known reference ratio at the object's inception. Each element has a different useful range of applicability based on the half-life of the decaying isotope, with increasing error and eventually uselessness outside that range. C14, for example, is only useful out to about 60,000 years. In the case of dating the Earth, it was actually the Uranium -- > Lead decay which was used to determine the age, based on the content of these isotopes in the oldest known zircon minerals in rocks found in Australia and Canada. As far as the Egyptian artifacts go, carbon dating only really works on objects which contain(ed) organic material. Dating the stone used in the construction of the pyramids and the Sphinx would of course tell you how old the rock is, but not when these objects were constructed. |
Why do we sometimes remember dreams days or even weeks later? | That's probably a case of confabulation, where your brain makes plausible sounding lies to fill in a memory gap. The tricky part about confabulation is that you can only notice this when other people point out contradictory facts. |
why is the Scottish independence referendum positioned as neck and neck in the polls, whereas the bookmakers odds suggest the opposite? | I expect that the odds are down to a significant number of people betting the outcome will be 'No'. Odds aren't just calculated by looking at what will *probably* happen, but also by the amount of money already taken in by people betting. If the odds were, say, both even (which is what the polls suggest), and a disproportionate number of people bet on 'no', then if 'no' is the outcome, the bookmaker will lose out significantly. By stacking these odds, they can encourage people to bet the other way. |
Is there a difference legal or otherwise between "sponsoring" a politician or bill vs a bribe? | Sponsoring legislation is the term for when a member of Congress introduces a bill, it has nothing to do with money, bribery or corruption. |
What exactly IS Citizen's United, and why is it bad? | Citizens United itself is a nonprofit organization that helps conservative candidates win elections. That's not important. What is important is that when Citizens United tried to broadcast an anti Hillary video before the Democratic primary, they were told they weren't allowed. This started the Supreme Court case Citizens United v. The Federal Election Commission. It ruled that *prohibiting* organizations from "broadcasting electioneering [which is working actively for a candidate or party] communications within 60 days of a general election or 30 days of a primary " is unconstitutional. Many people think that this gives those organizations more power and control in DC than the average person does. |
Humble bundles.. and how it works from the game developers' perspective. Also.. how much does each dev get from a bundle? | Not sure about the first question, but the amount the developers get is determined by the buyers themselves. When you buy a bundle from the site you can choose how to split the money between all the developers, the charities and the humble bundle site. |
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