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us460
|
How did the religious class view Benjamin Franklin's scientific experimentations during his retirement?
|
I'm watching a documentary on Benjamin Franklin and they mention how the religious viewed lightening as a punishment of God, and not as electricity. It was also implied how Franklin's experimentation on these matters were an affront on the popular religious view. What other dissenting views were prevalent during his tenure as a citizen scientist?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/us460/how_did_the_religious_class_view_benjamin/
|
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"Great question. Franklin was (along with Jefferson) a really fascinating man. I hope someone has a good answer for this.",
"I'd suggest that that documentary was probably lying, or at least misrepresenting things. People have offered naturalistic explanations of lightning for as long as people have been writing about lightning, and I don't think they would have created a dichotomy between \"God did it\" and \"lightning is a result of X natural process,\" that's more of a modern hang-up. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
6f71b8
|
Why do we build larger particle colliders with bigger diameters instead smaller diameters traveled multiple times?
|
The question came up after [this article](_URL_0_) discussing the successor to the Large Hadron Collider.
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/6f71b8/why_do_we_build_larger_particle_colliders_with/
|
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"To go to higher energies at a fixed bending radius, you need stronger bending magnets. The momentum per unit charge of a particle along the central orbit inside a bending element is called its *magnetic rigidty*: Bρ = p/q.\n\nB is the magnetic field strength of the bending magnet, ρ is the bending radius of the central orbit, p is the momentum of the test particle, and q is the charge of the test particle.\n\nIf you want to increase p while leaving ρ fixed, you need to increase the magnetic field strength proportionally to p (or in terms of energy, sqrt[E^(2) - m^(2)]).\n\nWe can only make our bending magnets so strong, and it ends up being better just to increase the bending radius. That means that if you need a larger diameter accelerator.\n\nOr you could sidestep the need to bend the beam entirely by using a linear accelerator. But then you lose the ability to put the beam particles on target (or collide them with another beam) more than once.",
"Another thing is [synchrotron radiation](_URL_0_). If you accelerate (such as curve around a circle) a charged particle, it will lose energy from the emission of electromagnetic radiation. The smaller the radius of curvature means a larger the acceleration. More energy will be lost and therefore the more energy you need to pump in to maintain the orbit.\n\nThe power that is lost goes as 1/m^4 so a lighter particle like an electron will emit much much more (10^13 times) synchrotron radiation than a proton. This is why we don't see circular electron accelerators. The power lost also goes as 1/r^2 so even if bending magnets could be made stronger, eventually the input power requirements could be limiting."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/large-hadron-collider-2-0-cern-fast-tracks-plan-develop-three-time-bigger-particle-collider-1624587"
] |
[
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchrotron_radiation"
]
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|
3gamp9
|
why do people tap the top of their soda cans before opening them?
|
Does it really make a difference?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3gamp9/eli5why_do_people_tap_the_top_of_their_soda_cans/
|
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"If bubbles have formed on the side of the can, tapping the can may dislodge them and cause them to pop at the surface. Since the can is usually somewhat pressurized, any gas in the can will expand when you open it. If the gas expands under liquid (the bubbles stuck to the side of the can), the gas might carry the liquid with it, making a foamy mess. If the gas is all at the top, then it will hiss out as you open it, but there won't be any liquid coming with it.",
"Try tapping the top of a clear bottle and you'll see it does nothing other than agitate the contents. Total myth."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
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] |
|
1u7mlo
|
Why can't we make a camera that captures images that look the same as how we see them?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1u7mlo/why_cant_we_make_a_camera_that_captures_images/
|
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"What you should be asking is, \"why can't we make a camera that captures images exactly how we see them and reproduce them in a medium which is visually indistinguishable from the original scene?\"\n\nDesigning a camera that captures information identical to the photoreceptor layer of your retina is simply a matter of engineering four sensors with the same sensitivity vs wavelength functions as your photoreceptors. This isn't perfectly accurate due to temporal effects, but suffices as a first approximation. Difficulty of engineering aside, this is perfectly feasible from a theoretical standpoint.\n\nReproduction, on the other hand, is a much more daunting task. Current display or printing methods rely on representing different perceptual hues, which are the result of activation levels for each of three different cones, as the weighted sum of three or more components, each of which has its own distinct spectral characteristics. Disregarding rods for the moment due to their relative absence in the fovea, the implication of this is that each has a single, 3-dimensional response vector which represents the activation of your different photoreceptors to that particular component. You might think that any three components with linearly independent response vectors would suffice to produce the full gamut of colors that we can observe, but this fails due to the fact that we cannot have negative coefficients when mixing. Because of the overlap of the wavelength response curves for different cones, it is very difficult to choose a limited number of components that can reproduce any photoreceptor response. For example, violet is impossible to reproduce in the RGB color space. Two solutions to this would be to either to design a technology capable of reproducing exact spectra in the visible range, or to use direct stimulation of photoreceptors, which would in effect give you the component bases [1, 0, 0], [0, 1, 0], and [0, 0, 1].",
"The main reason why most cameras do not have the ability to capture images that look the same as what we see is that [the human eye has a roughly logarithmic response function](_URL_3_). This means that something that is 10 times brighter than a reference object might only *look* ~ 2 times brighter to our eyes. This means that the human eye has a very wide [\"dynamic range\"](_URL_2_)\n\nConversely, CMOS and CCD sensors have a much more [linear response](_URL_0_), meaning that something 10 times brighter will have 10 times the number of image \"counts\". If there was no limit to the number of image counts, then this would not be a problem: you could simply convolve your image with the response curve of the human eye and reproduce what the human eye sees. But in reality, most sensors are 16-bit, meaning there is an upper limit of 2^16 = 65536 counts per pixel. This may sound like a lot, but you also have the fact that the noise goes as the square root of the number of counts. This means that in practice you actually don't have very much dynamic range to work with, so you have to compromise by either taking a long exposure to bring out the faint part of a scene, or a short exposure to avoid saturating the bright part of a scene.\n\nA way around this is to take both a short exposure and a long exposure, and combine them later, which is known as [high-dynamic range imaging](_URL_1_). You can achieve some fairly stunning images this way, but it must be done *after* the images have been taken. A lot of newer cameras have features that allow you to \"take\" an HDR image automatically. \n\nTL;DR: The human eye sees logarithmically. Camera sensors are more linear. This means that you usually have to choose whether to pick out the bright part of a scene or the dark part. HDR imaging is a technique to circumvent this.",
"Because \"the way things look\" is a matter of mental perception, much more than optics. What you are really asking for is more like the Star Trek holo-deck, a full reality simulator. Anything less is just a flat photo, and our existing cameras are already quite excellent.\n\nOur perception includes many subtle cues that allow us to tell that we are in a real situation, not merely looking at an image. For example, 3D goggles like the [Oculus Rift](_URL_0_) need to go to great lengths to even just to track head movements, in order to shift what is displayed to your eyes very fluidly and without delay, because otherwise you feel very strongly that you are not \"looking\" at things around you. Any perceptible lag breaks the feeling of \"immersion\". The issues go far beyond optics."
]
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[] |
[] |
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[],
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"http://astroham.com/astrophotography_ccdtesting.html",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-dynamic-range_imaging",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_magnitude"
],
[
"http://www.oculusvr.com/"
]
] |
||
13ud45
|
I have a question about Pavlovian conditioning.
|
I am wondering what exactly would happen if you did this:
You create three tones. One the pitch of middle "C", The second an octave above middle "C", and the third an octave below middle "C".
Every single time you play the low pitch, you shock the dog. Every time you play the high octave, you feed the dog a treat. You do this until the dog is conditioned to salivate at the sound of the high tone, and jump/wimpier/shrivel at the sound of the low "C"
What would happen you play the center "C?" Anything? Why exactly?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/13ud45/i_have_a_question_about_pavlovian_conditioning/
|
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"It could get generalized to either of the two responses. It is more likely that it will not bring forth any response, though that may depend on how the middle C functioned during the conditioning process. If there was no stimulous matched with it then there would be no reason for the dog to expect anything.\n\nI dont know how sound is percieved by dogs, but for humans we can hear multiple distinct sounds at once. So what would be interesting is to sound both high and low Cs at once and see how the dog reacts.",
"I think that a big indicator to how the dog would respond would be which tone was played BEFORE you give them the middle \"C\" tone. It may be the case that a dog can, with great accuracy, distinguish the three tones as separate stimuli. However, it also may be the case that the dog is responding to \"higher tone than before\". If you were to play the low tone and give them the middle tone, they may salivate because the tone is higher in reference to the low tone. Only one way to find out..."
]
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|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
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|
o88x7
|
Parsley can cause a miscarriage?
|
This there any truth to the old wives tale that during the early stages of pregnancy [Parsley can cause a miscarriage](_URL_0_)?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/o88x7/parsley_can_cause_a_miscarriage/
|
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"[There is some evidence that parsley might be partially effective in inducing abortion, but it doesn't appear to be very safe.](_URL_0_)\n\nThat \"infographic\" is at least ill-advised and possibly dangerous.",
"That amount of Vitamin C is pretty high, although its not going to kill you or anything so I suppose its probably fine. Recommended upper limit dosage for Vitamin C is 2000mg per day."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://imgur.com/NrhIP"
] |
[
[
"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12807304"
],
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|
1uykwh
|
why can't i just hit the "off" button on my computer rather than "shut down"
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1uykwh/eli5_why_cant_i_just_hit_the_off_button_on_my/
|
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"+ Pressing shut down\n\nWill terminate all system and user processes normally. Exiting processes have time to write logs and results in the primary memory. Some of it can be important, but 95% of the time you won't notice a difference, if you are a casual home user and not involved in servers or programing projects etc. \n\nIt will also do what I describe in the next section\n\n+ Pressing down the power button\n\nGives enough time for the mechanical parts of your computer (HDD mostly) to power down safely. \n\n+ Just pulling the plug\n\nWill cause the mechanical parts of your PC to lose power while still working, possibly damaging them or wearing them down (if they power down at an active position. ",
"An oversimplified but ELI5-quality analogy would be the difference between passing out and falling asleep in humans. One is normal, expected, and healthy. The other, while seemingly harmless, can lead to memory loss, and decreased function over time. ",
"Why don't pc makers incorporate the shut down function into the off button?",
"Shut Down literally means the same thing as Turn Off. \n\nYou can change the behavior of the power button on the computer so that it hibernates, suspends, sleeps, or shuts down[off] in every version of Windows. Here's the Windows 7 instructions: \n\n_URL_0_",
"Because its like lulling someone to sleep by severing their spinal cord.",
"you can. Just it hit and let go real quick like a regular button. It will go through the shut down process. Just don't push and hold the button.",
"Macbook Pro retinas do this."
]
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||
6u157j
|
Could a planet be 'locked' in orbit between two stars?
|
Hi,
I'm wondering whether it would be possible for a planet to be 'stationary' between 2 stars. i.e. not orbiting either star, but trapped between the two due to equal gravity.
Also, would it then be possible for the planet to not spin at all?
it's for a fantasy game, so it doesn't need to be too serious
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/6u157j/could_a_planet_be_locked_in_orbit_between_two/
|
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"~~Yes but~~ no because it would be unstable meaning if there were any gravitational fluctuations at all from anything it would perturb the system pulling the planet towards one of the Stars slightly more than towards the other which would increase the Gravity from the one-star and decrease it from the other until the planet was engulfed. Worse yet is it would be impossible for a planet like this to form because when it was attempting to coalesce one of his particles would be closer to one star and one of them would be closer to the other and the two would never meet. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
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|
325zwf
|
Why is history's calendar based off a religion that not everybody follows?
|
Like I know there were a lot of Christians and what not, but didn't this offend other peoples of other faiths?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/325zwf/why_is_historys_calendar_based_off_a_religion/
|
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"Well it has been the tradition, and from a long history of western colonial dominance it has become (generally) the worldwide norm, the same way that western dress and the English language have become dominant in governments worldwide. Some countries, (Saudi Arabia is the best example) don't use the Gregorian calendar, and have their own variants, often based on the local majority religion.\n\nThat's not to say there haven't been major attempts to change the calendar and use a secular one. After the French Revolution, as part of a massive Enlightenment effort to secularize and rationalize the state, a secular calendar was created that lasted until 1805. (Another, much more successful product of this effort was the metric system.) The calendar featured a ten day work week, and had days and months named after the natural world at that time of year. Year one in the calendar was 1792, the year the French Republic was declared. It's pretty interesting, and the wikipedia article is pretty good: _URL_0_.\n\nThe calendar was brought in mainly for, as you mentioned, a desire for a secular calendar not based on Christianity. The main problem was that the calendar was poorly designed, and unpopular. It featured a longer working week and was relatively awkward to use, so many people opposed it.\n\nWhile we basically use a Christian calendar because it's what's easy and no one really wants to undertake a massive effort to change it for no major benefits, it's not outside the realm of possibility that had a more popular universal calendar been adopted in the French revolution, we might all be using a secular calendar.",
"In fairness, most historians now use CE and BCE instead of AD and BC. I suspect that's as much change as we're likely to see. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Republican_Calendar"
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x3t6l
|
What causes logs to turn white while burning, and why do moving black patches appear?
|
I was camping this weekend, and I noticed that the burning logs that were already white had black patches moving up and down the log. What causes this phenomenon?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/x3t6l/what_causes_logs_to_turn_white_while_burning_and/
|
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"The white product of wood combustion is ash.\n\nI'm not certain about the moving black patches though. Another reaction? Heat disturbing the layer of ash? I have wondered about that myself.",
"The ash that is produced is composed of several products. Some of of it is incompletely combusted carbon which tends to be black. Other components are due to other elements in the wood such as magnesium which forms white magnesium oxide when burned. The colour fluctuations you see while it is burning is due to blackbody radiation. When a surface doesn't emit light of its own (luminescence) it is considered black. When heated, the body starts to emit radiation at low frequency first (infrared, which we feel as heat). As it gets hotter, the frequency of the radiation increases to red, orange, and then white. The hotter the object the higher the frequency of radiation emitted. The temperature in the fire fluctuates due to convection currents causing areas of the wood to change temperature resulting in the colour of the blackbody radiation to change as well. When it's very hot it appears white, if it cools off it appears black again."
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2oldpx
|
why right before you go to sleep do you feel heightened emotions that you normally don't feel during the day? either motivation for making a life change, fear for a test, regret for a decision etc.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oldpx/eli5why_right_before_you_go_to_sleep_do_you_feel/
|
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"I'm no expert on the subject, but my understanding is that as you are going to sleep, your brain is saving information from the day. Throughout the day, you are storing memory in short term storage, as you are winding down for the night and ultimately going to sleep, your brain is reviewing all the information and deciding to either delete it or save it for later. \n\n\nWhile your brain is reviewing information, you don't have anything else going on. You have more time to actually focus on the data, which can cause your brain to over-analyze the information and causes the feelings of stress, regret, etc for whatever information it's reviewing. \n\n\n\nSide note, this is why it's also recommended to study before bed. Things you learn right before you fall asleep are more likely to be retained long-term. ",
"Fatigue impacts our emotional state. \n\nThroughout the day, we are occupying ourselves in our day to day lives and we are more distracted. \n\nAs you try to sleep and your mind is not distracted by activity; you have more time to overthink your decisions, thoughts, and ideas. \n\nCombined with the effects of fatigue on our emotional state; the things we are perseverating on mentally can seem more important. \n\nedit* spelling\n\n",
"Oh man I'm glad you asked this. Had a dream a couple days ago I had a kid with this girl I know. I'm 25 and single. Anyways woke up with a mess of emotions, it was like hitting puberty all over again.",
"I always think I feel more motivated right before sleeping because I know I don't have to deal with any of it until later if at all.",
"I can't speak for everyone else, but in my case it's because of the stuff I take for insomnia. It's really strong.",
"Ugh sometimes this makes it so hard to make a decision. You wake up in the morning and decide to do one thing, and before going to bed you can completely change your mind.",
"You don't feel those emotions during the day because you always have something to distract you. When you lay down at night, that is one of the few times in this always on, always connected world we live in that you are left alone with your thoughts.\n\nFeels are a normal thing. You don't have to wait for bedtime. Just be alone with your thoughts and resist the urge to pull out your phone whenever you feel alone/anxious.",
"Doing some form of meditation for just 10 minutes before going to bed helps alleviate this problem and allows you to fall asleep faster and sleep better.",
"Your tired brain is like a drunk brain. It's not firing at 100% and you have lowered inhibitions basically because of so. \n\nYou pretty much see things as an end goal, not all the issues and work going with it. For example, I'll definitely go to the gym tomorrow. You see the end of looking good and getting healthy, but you're not like that's a ton of work. You associate reward with the goal and that's why it seems so good\n\n",
"Do some meditation and you'll see that this doesn't have to happen only at night. The sad fact is that people are scared to be alone with themselves and their thoughts. We find distractions to fill our minds every minute of every day. Have you ever seen the running joke on reddit that people HAVE to take something to the bathroom with them to read, even resorting to reading shampoo bottles if there is nothing else. We have to be distracted even when taking a poop.\n\nIt happens when you are about to sleep because that is the first time in the whole day that you are just alone in the quiet and can think about important stuff without distraction.",
"Try meditating. You will feel these changes and anxiety earlier in the day when you actually have time to deal with them.\n\nThe rest of the time we're distracting ourselves from our own thoughts.",
"because you aren't busy with other things. \n\nas unemployed person with lots of time on hand, I get this feeling in middle of day....",
"During the day we \"freeze\" certain emotions in our body so we don't have to feel them, either because they are unpleasant, inappropriate or we don't have time for them. The way we freeze these emotions is through chronic tensions held mostly in the muscles. \n\nImagine watching a scary movie. Notice as your fear increases so does muscular tensions in parts of your body (the belly for instance) and your breathing becomes shallower. Then when a scary scene ends you take a deep breath, let out a sigh of relief and your body relaxes again. Basically what you're doing is forcing your body to freeze the fear so it isn't felt. This is a primitive but somewhat effective short-term way of managing feelings. \n\nAs you start to pay attention to this process you will notice how you freeze feelings in place so they aren't felt during the day, and when you relax your body in bed at night the feelings are felt once again. And because you've spent the day trying not to feel your feelings they seem extra strong when you finally relax your defenses at night.\n\nThe fact that this is happening shows that you are resisting your feelings to a large degree during the day. The more you allow your feelings to flow during the day the less you will experience this effect of the \"floodgates opening\" when you relax at night. \n\n",
"Why is it that I sometimes have a violent shake right before I fall asleep, waking myself up for a moment, then slowly drift back to sleep. Is my body resisting sleep or something? Does anyone else experience this?",
"Just like \"sleep is the cousin of death\", the end of the day is the cousin of the end of your life. This is also analogous to seasons, which are also associated with life periods, with Spring being the early stages of life, and Winter being the late stages. At the end of a day, you subconsciously sense an ending, and if things aren't right, then your mind starts to race. A new day with sunlight washing over erases all of this.",
"I think it's simply the fact that you stop doing anything and are left alone with your thoughts.",
"Because as soon as you are not tucked up in bed with a glorious time period ahead of you were you get to do basically nothing (except maybe have a wank), you are especially beaten up by life and all it's hardships that drive motivation out of you like a bully beating up a child so it can take it's lolly pop. ",
"What the fuck. I thought this was just me that felt that. Whenever I'm going to bed, i always tell myself I need to get out of this rut that i'm in and find a better job and do this and that...and then I wake up and do the same old shit. \n\nIt's like what the fuck happened to the motivation.",
"Like many said, it's probably the first time in the day you actually stopped and calmed down and thought about stuff without distractions. ",
"It sounds like you're not living your days to the fullest. After a hard and productive day you just fall asleep. ",
"As someone who studies neuroscience my answer is a bit different:\n\nYour brain is always being acted upon by a complex mix of chemical drugs, two of these hormones : serotonin (which mediates emotions ) and melatonin (which mediates your sleep/wake cycle) seem to be responsible for your \"heightened emotions\" since you need one to make the other. \n\nIt seems ( it's not fully understood yet), that when you start closing your eyes at night, there's a lot of serotonin made available (which makes you emotional) that will then be used to make melatonin which in turn keeps you asleep. \n\nSo your heightened emotions fuel your dreams :) there.\n",
"Lowering of defenses. We arm ourselves to go through our days then disarm to go to bed. This also follows a hormone flow : the sleep hormone, melatonine is inducive of a meditative and receptive mental and emotional state.",
"I agree with the being alone with your thoughts thing, but I also think it has to do with the fact that at the moment you're falling asleep you don't have to follow through on anything. At least I think that's what it is for me.\n\nA similar thing happens in therapy in which patients tend to not talk about anything terribly important until they have a minute left in the session.",
"I cant tell you how many times I have had a motivational life changing plan while going to sleep. It's almost sad looking back. As a very overweight guy, I have had many moments where i just want to get back out of bed and go for a run or go work out. Then morning comes and it turns more into.... yeah ill do that later. Sigh",
"After I took LSD (one time - really turned out to be a great personal decision) I absolutely loved being alone for a few weeks afterwards... It was so beautiful to lay in bed for a few hours and just lose track of everything that was happening. Just be in your own thoughts.",
"Interesting question, it's a good thing to feel all the emotions you had throughout the day. Hearing yourself think and speak is critical in everyday life.. Your concise is that very thing that creeps up on you in those times of the night when you lay down. ",
"It's majorly because our mind is idle. Our mind is not occupied and this gives us time to retrospect. We have no distractions whatsoever. So whatever we think about - We are paying full attention to it - And this makes the whole sense or emotion heightened. I have had sleepless nights because of such incidents when I ponder over my relationships - It really drains your energy. Its very much possible this can happen in daytime as well - Its just that the world around is not as stagnant as it is during the night time. When you go to sleep - Its just you and your thoughts. ",
"Your behavior can be explained by the Ainslie-Rachlin model of self-control. At an earlier point in time (in your case at night) smaller and larger rewards are both at an equal distance (you're about to go to sleep, so the possiblity of watching tv or joining a club are both about 8 hours away) and at this time the larger later reward (like exercising or joining a club) is preferred over the smaller sooner reward (like watching tv). So you make these big plans, but once you wake up and the smaller sooner reward is more imminent, easier to attain, and more instantly gratifying your time goes to that and your motivation towards other goals decreases. \n\nThere is more to it than that, like curve distributions, but that's the gist. It is all an issue of self control. Larger goals can seem overwhelming especially when their are additional factors in your day that aren't immediately present when you're falling asleep and thinking about future plans. \n\nIn order to develop and maintain your nightly mentality you can split your larger goals into subgoals. Completing subgoals is more immediate and less overwhelming than a larger goal and each completion will make you feel better and will act as a reinforcer and you'll be more likely to continue on doing the proceeding behaviors until you finally complete the larger goal. Each subgoal also needs to be precise. Without preciseness, the goal can become overwhelming again (for instance, promise to study biology for 20 minutes at 6:00 pm instead of being more general and stating you'll study that night). You can also create a commitment response. This is where an action is carried out an earlier point in time that serves to either eliminate or reduce the value of the upcoming temptation. So if you want to exercise, give your roommate (or parent, friend, etc.) $40 and tell them that if you don't get up and run for a half an hour in the morning then they get to keep the money. Over time these larger goals will just become a habit and you won't have to keep giving your roommate money to hold yourself accountable. There is a multitude of self-reinforcers and self-punishers you can do in order to maintain self control and increase success in your larger goals, you just have to find something that fits you.\n\n\n\n**Credit goes to:[u/lexxxx](_URL_0_)**",
"When you go to sleep parts of your brain starts going to sleep before the part of you brain where you \"consciousness\" resides. \n\nBut not the Brains worry center, it stays awake all night in case it needs to wake you up to run from those sneaking sabertooth tigers.\n\nSo what you are experiencing is your conscious mind dealing directly with your worry center, with few other parts of your brain awake to steal its attention.\n\nIn other words your problem solving mind is now giving your worry center it's full and undivided attention. ",
"The technical explanation is that your prefrontal cortex (responsible for logical thought) is less active when tired, making your thoughts fueled more by emotions.",
"Very simple: You are (nearly) completely alone with yourself, in a different spatial position than you normally are during the day, in darkness, and doing nearly nothing physical. In other words, you are very nearly in your mom's womb. \n\nThat is when the gravity of life hits you the most without any external interruptions.",
"People are talking about meditation and all these other things to get used to being in such deep thought. I feel like I am in deep in thought all the time. Which compounds with my shyness, and awkwardness to lead to lots of weird interactions. \n\nOne thing that broke the cycle of deep thought for me was getting really into a team based game. I still sucked but I was able to dial down my deep thinking. It was honestly extremely freeing and am realizing now I miss it a little.",
"This is why I'm a huge fan of midday naps. If it's good for small children to take naps in the middle of the day, why isn't still beneficial to adults. You will experience the same anxiety/motivation/stress, but you still have 1/2 a day to do something about it. ",
"Because you don't have to do it at that point.\n\nYou COULD go out and finish that project.. But right now it's sleepy time",
"Your body and mind are at their most relaxed as you go to sleep, allowing \"repressed\" thoughts/emotions to surface more easily, when they're not being pushed down by other thoughts. This is why some panic disorder sufferers have their attacks in bed. SOURCE: My psychiatrist. I am not a doctor.",
"As a person with cronical depression I perfectly know what is that. It's like when the night comes, your brain start to think stuff he normally does not, either because you have some distractions at morning, the light, or God knows why, but it is true that at night normally oneself think about the worst thoughts.",
"The top responses given in this thread are why the sleep sciences are still considered academic suicide."
]
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2vo4fa
|
how to christians justify strict adherence to one part of the bible (e.g. homosexuals not allowed to marry) and complete disregard for another (e.g. bible says you cannot get a divorce, etc.)?
|
For example, some religions use a theory that anything written later in time is given greater weight than those paragraphs/chapters that were written earlier (even when in direct conflict) - I know there is a word for it, I just can't think of it now.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2vo4fa/eli5_how_to_christians_justify_strict_adherence/
|
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"Because people tend to not follow rules/laws they don't want to follow. Every religion has the rules that only the most devout people follow because those rules are inconvenient. And you'd have trouble finding someone who doesn't J-walk even though it's against the law, because it's an inconvenient law.",
"Actually. You can get a divorce for specific reasons, such as your partner committing adultery. ",
"It's about who said what. God's Commandments and if you're Christian, Christ's Words are paramount. Leviticus and Saul of Tarsus/Paul do not have the same authority. ",
"One reason is that the Bible also offers justification (inequally yoked) for divorce, and that divorce is thought of by some as an individual action, which can be repented, unlike actively being in a same-sex marriage, which one continues to do, whether or not one has repented. \n\nThe main reason is that a person can always find an excuse for what he/she does, but what someone else does is unforgivably immoral.",
"There's something like 2 billion christians in the world, and many of them hold different beliefs, so there is no single answer to your question. I believe it's still strict catholic doctrine that divorce is unacceptable, and I'm sure there are many who continue hold to that.\n\nI will give you one justification though. I don't remember it ever specifically being used concerning divorce, but it's more of a general mindset for interpreting the bible. Also, it's doubtful this is some generally agreed upon principle for all Christians, it's just the one I remember while growing up.\n\nIt basically goes like this. The bible was written to have a meaning in the time period it was written to the people it was written to. There is also a greater meaning that still resonates with people today. But the actions described in the bible need to be looked at through the lens of the people living in that day, as people have to live within the societies of their day. So when the bible says \"slaves obey your masters\" it's not saying slavery is something God wants, or is good, it's saying that slavery is a part of the governmental and social system you live in, and it's bad to break the law. \n\nThis is justified with verses such as Romans 14:14-18\n\n > 14 I am convinced, being fully persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean in itself. But if anyone regards something as unclean, then for that person it is unclean. 15 If your brother or sister is distressed because of what you eat, you are no longer acting in love. Do not by your eating destroy someone for whom Christ died. \n\nMy recollection is that this is regarding things like whether or not you are allowed to eat meat that was sacrificed to idols. Not something that is particularly relevant today. But the meaning seems to be that you in your heart know right from wrong for you, but you shouldn't do things that your society deems unacceptable because you could cause others to lose faith or sin. Apply this to divorce and it means divorce isn't good, but it may be acceptable as long as it's acceptable to your church.",
"Some Christians you could say ignore the Old Testament but some claim they don't really ignore it at all. Just much of what was in the OT was very specifically only for to the Israelites in the first place.\n\nBut as for homosexuality and divorce both are clearly banned in the NT as well except for when one partner commits adultery.\n\nMany Christians just pretend it doesn't say that and go on to get divorced anyway even if there was no adultery but many times someone is cheating along with all the other things that lead to divorce.",
"My church very specifically encourages gay couples to seek marriage blessings. Marriage is considered a good thing, and we don't want gay couples to avoid it in the mistaken belief that they aren't welcome.\n\nWhy some ideas found in the bible are considered still relevant while others aren't - well, it depends on the passage in question, and on who you ask. Christianity is a huge and widely varied religion, the reasoning used to interpret scripture by a Roman Catholic theologian is going to be different from that used by a Baptist.\n\nAmong other things, many protestants have the doctrine of *sola scriptura* - the belief that the bible alone is the supreme authority in all matters of doctrine and practice. Roman Catholicism, Methodism, the Eastern Orthodox church, and the Anglican churches have the doctrine of *prima scriptura* - scripture is the primary authority, but tradition, reason, and experience can also be valid guides for what one should believe and how one should live.\n\nRegarding divorce for reasons other than adultery, one of the big reasons many churches don't forbid it is that marriage as we know it is very different from marriage as it was known to various biblical authors. Marriage in their world was a business contract between two men, transferring custody of a woman from her father to her husband for the purpose of procreation. Most women had no means of providing for themselves independently, making her utterly dependent on the men who had custody of her. It's not an accident that \"widows and orphans\" are so often paired together in calls for charity to the poor - a woman without a husband was seen as as helpless as a child without parents. \n\nTo divorce a woman was to throw her away like garbage. She was unmarriagable, because the paternity of any future child she had would always be in question. If her family was unable or unwilling to support her, she would likely end up a beggar or prostitute. Any future children she had would be *mamzer* - children of uncertain parentage. Not \"bastards\" exactly, but since the identity of their father was questionable there was a chance their father might not be Israelite, and therefor the children were not full Israelites either. They were a cast similar to untouchables - they couldn't hold most jobs, couldn't enter the Temple, could only marry other mamzers, and their children would be mamzers too. It was a miserable and degraded life on the edge of society.\n\nTo do this to a woman without a very good reason would be inhumanly cruel. It would destroy at least one life, possibly many.\n\nMarriage doesn't work like that here and now. It has changed from a contract transferring custody of a dependent woman, to a voluntary union between independent adults. Divorce has changed from throwing a helpless person away to die in the gutter, to the dissolution of that voluntary union. Divorce may still be tragic, but it's not the same animal as it once was.",
"Every denomination has at least one framework through which they view the Bible (e.g. Roman Catholic Church does not accept divorce still), some have more than one, and individual Christians have their own sometimes too. \n\nSome people will say that the New Testament overrides the Old Testament, and then some people will say that Jesus trumps Paul (or vice versa), some people will say there's so much cultural in there we need to live according to the Greatest Law (love God, love your neighbor), some will say we are under grace not law, so laws are guidelines not mandatory. Some will say it's too hard to burden new converts with a lot of rules so here are some basic ones that are important (see Acts 15). There are a number of ways to do it really. Churches develop these ways of interpreting the Bible alongside their own ecclesiastical traditions.",
"Your question is very well stated and legitimate. I will try my best not to be offensive with my response.\n\nI know things can get super \"referency\" when talking about religious matters so I will refrain as much as possible from referencing scripture outright as some may not view the Bible as an absolute authority. Also, I realize that Christians have their own dialect, I will try my best not to invoke it.\n\nOn the point of divorce let me say I am a Christian who has watched 3 friends go through a divorce. It was sad to see. Truly. It's a tough position to be in. Especially, in hindsight, when the position could have been avoided. Ultimately, without taking sides, a Christian is called to be \"Like-Christ.\" It is a thing that is completely different then being the way you want to be, naturally. We want to be happy. We want to be loved. We want to be admired. Jesus was \"a man of sorrows.\" Jesus was Crucified. Jesus is hated. When we repent from our sins, believe that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead and is the Lord God, we enter into a relationship with him and receive forgiveness. Forgiveness for all of our sin. What happens after we are forgiven? We change, slowly. We start to become obedient to Christ out of love. We still sin, but now we are heartbroken when we do. We are not perfect. But we are perfectible. Without this change we would have to raise some \"red flags\" to whether the initial repentance were genuine. Maintaining a desire to break our covenant with God/Christ, marriage, while also professing to be in a relationship with Him, is our own evil desires attempting to justify what we are doing as \"good\". A cursory reading of the Bible tells us, in no uncertain terms, that we have no idea what good really is because we taint everything with our sin. In fact, from a Biblical perspective, God has to intervene in a Christians life, through the Holy Spirit, for us to do anything truly good (Also, why we say the Bible is \"God Breathed\").\n\nIf anyone is inclined, I think this answer from Ravi Zacharias, about specifically homosexuality, is pretty sound as far as what the Bible teaches about practicing homosexuality and what I believe as well. _URL_0_ \n\nTL;DR - Humans will justify anything so that they are right and good. The Hero of their own narrative. The Bible teaches that.",
"I agree with the other commentors that mention we all try to justify our own issues and have a problem with those of others. However, there is a distinction in many cases. Most people that have a problem with cheating, drinking, lying whatever it may be recognize it at a problem. Homosexuality is celebrated. I'm actually not opposed to gay marriage(marriage is by and large a civil not religious matter IMO). But I do have a problem with the celebration of something the Bible says is wrong (like gay pride parades). Gays shouldn't be marginalized or denied rights any more than divorced people or anyone else should be. But they are both wrong. Everyone has their own struggles and those struggles are between them and God. ",
"I will speak for myself in answer to your question, since I am a Christian. I don't necessarily speak for all of Christianity.\n\nFor me, I focus on Christ's response when asked, \"What is the most important commandment?\" He responded, \"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind, and all your strength. And the second is like it: love your neighbor as yourself.\"\n\nAll questions of what is right and good must go through the filter of the greatest commandment. I take the Mr. Rogers definition of \"love\" here (\"To love someone is to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now - and go on caring through joyful times and through times that may bring us pain.\"). When in doubt, if the action taken is honoring God and acting with love toward neighbors, it is acceptable.\n\nAs far as I am concerned, those two commandments will stand through any changes in society and culture. So where the Bible gets into specifics, I put any of those commandments through that filter. "
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1i81ad
|
What speed and distance units were used to measure speed before cars?
|
Was watching Back to the Future III and there was a part where Marty and Doc ask a train conductor how fast he had gotten a train. The conductor said he had gotten it up to 55 mph, but had seen 70..blah blah. But it made me wonder whether speed was even measured in miles per hour back then since mph may not have been the most useful for horses/trains/etc. used at that time. Couldn't find anything on google and r/askreddit wasn't helpful so thought I'd see if anybody here knew. Thanks.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1i81ad/what_speed_and_distance_units_were_used_to/
|
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"Speed limits for horses were often expressed in terms of the horse's gait: walking only, no trotting or running, etc. Certainly by 1905, towns were posting speed limits for autos in mph.\n\nBut miles per hour were certainly well known for trains, and speeds for ships were similarly measured in knots. It's just that steam engines didn't commonly have speedometers, so an engineer interested in his speed had to count telegraph poles or mileposts passed in a certain amount of time. "
]
}
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[] |
[] |
[
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241s3t
|
what does a light scratch hurt more than a deep cut?
|
I took a cut out of my leg while falling on a screw (imagine a sawing action). It was about an inch long and a quarter inch wide. It was deep and didn't bleed much and felt relatively no pain. The other day I got lightly scratched by a brier thorn and it stings when anything brushes up against it. Why does it hurt more than the large chunk I took from my leg?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/241s3t/eli5_what_does_a_light_scratch_hurt_more_than_a/
|
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"Because most of the pain receptors are found near the surface of your skin, , so a wide superficial cut will trigger a lot more pain receptors than a small but deep puncture.",
"/u/gemmabeta is correct, but to add to him, deep sharp cuts typically cut the cells apart while smaller blunt cuts rip the cells apart, causing them to release more passion chemicals. (Although I don't know if what I said is apply able to your case)\n\nEdit: I forgot about adrenaline, deeper cuts may cause you to release nor adrenaline, numbing the pain."
]
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thdfx
|
I have an AP US History exam tomorrow, what is one bit of US History you feel is important for me to know?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/thdfx/i_have_an_ap_us_history_exam_tomorrow_what_is_one/
|
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"Alexander Hamilton shows up all the time. On every practice exam I took, he was on it. So I'd know who he is and why he's important (and why he's the most awesome founding father ever, but that's just me.)\n\nThe other guy who will show up all the time is Henry Clay. That dude lived for a long time.",
"If you're taking the apush test tomorrow then you should be good if you've studied and payed attention but if you haven't then be prepares for a bad time because no one piece of information can save you.",
"Alright it's been 4 years since I've taken the AP test but from what I remember:\n\n-night-hawks is correct in saying Alexander Hamilton. You should also know about Thomas Jefferson as well.... and why those mothafuckas didn't get along \n\n-William Jennings Bryan. Very prominent figure in politics from the 1890's to the 1920's (too bad he blew it with the Scopes trial)\n\n-The Gilded Age of Politics, I had a tough time with this because many of the Presidents had very similar qualities of laissez-faire politics. Know who it started with and who it ended with. Know who Boss Tweed and Thomas Nast are as well.\n\n-Know about the two prominent times of the Industrial Revolution in the 1800's \n\n-Know about the various Great Awakening Periods in the United States \n\n\nI think the biggest way to approach to test is to try and study the things that would be important in the time period. Obviously wars like WWI and the War of 1812 are big deals. But in the periods between huge events like these, focus on what was important, scandalous, culturally significant, etc and you'll be golden. \n\nI did all this and I got a 5 so you can too!\n\nEDIT: cause I'm drunk and made errors\n",
"Not really any advice here, just a fellow test taker. My problem is that I did not actually take a history class this year, and last year I only took honors history..only reason I'm taking this exam is because my school has a program where they'll pay for your 4th exam, and I was already taking 3.\n\nLast year's DBQ was over Nixon and the free response was comparing Civil Rights from 1920's to 1960's, so focus on other topics.\n\nedit: fixed DBQ/free response mix up",
"Tea Pot Dome Scandal was big on the test when I took it, and the Alien and Sedition Acts.",
"There was a crappy question about pop-art on mine. Caught me by surprise.",
"James K. Polk. Elected in 1844. Completed his four goals in one term. 1) got the southwest from mexico. 2)Settled the Oregon boundary dispute. 3)Lowered the tariff and 4) re established the independent treasury system. ",
"My AP US teacher told us to really look over our notes on William Jennings Bryan, the Populists, and the progressive movements in the late 1800s. The APUSH testers just really love the Populists. I'm pretty sure the DBQ the year I took it was on the Populists, too! "
]
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328bkt
|
what is the difference between an emoji and an emoticon?
|
I have noticed that people who use apple devices says "emoji" while PC users say emoticon. Is emoji preparatory? Are emoticons an open platform? HAHA but seriously I don't understand.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/328bkt/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_an_emoji_and/
|
{
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"text": [
"An emoji is a little picture, while an emoticon is a collection of letters and symbols which look like a little picture (;-)"
]
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|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
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|
22gjpr
|
why is there always construction being done on roads that had nothing wrong with them?
|
In my area in North Texas, some road is always shut down and then reconstructed. These roads were fine (to me at least, not a scientist) to drive on and often were uncracked. Why is it happening? My hypothesis was that they're just trying to spend all the money they have budgeted
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/22gjpr/eli5_why_is_there_always_construction_being_done/
|
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"Yes, that happens. But preventative maintenance is still a thing.\n\nAlso, sometimes they have to work on something under the road (sewer/gas line, etc) and there's nothing to be done but to tear up the road to do it."
]
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|
[] |
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|
20wufa
|
What is the history of coal and coal mining?
|
How did coal become such an important source of fuel? I know it was important during the industrial revolution and such, but who thought of burning rocks? How did mining coal begin?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/20wufa/what_is_the_history_of_coal_and_coal_mining/
|
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"Well, I can't give an in depth review of the importance of coal, but I can say this-\n\n\n1: Coal was important because it was commonly found in Europe and abroad, but where as something like oil took a fair amount of processing to take from initial substance to a workable product (mining might seem expensive, but so was tracking a whale on the other side of the globe, or traveling to the icy waters of the north to hunt seals, and if you wanted to use it for something other than heating and lighting, you needed to refine whatever you gathered. The infrastructure simply wasn't there to make much of oil and oil products till the start of the 20th century) coal was fairly simple. There was such a thing as poor quality coal though. Forget what they called it- brown coal or lignite or peat coal or something- but basically it didn't burn as well and was a lot messier. \n\n\n2: Coal was important because it could attain, and hold very high temperatures. The development of pre-industrial steel owes a lot to coal. The wider industrial revolution was entirely dependent on coal, especially high quality coal. One of the reasons that Britain was a major player in the Industrial Revolution was because of it's ability to gather large amounts of it. Coal was a primary indicator of a nation's wealth throughout the Industrial Revolution.\n\n\n3: Coal isn't a rock. And while it's purely conjecture, I'm sure someone who had seen mined coal, and had ever worked a fire would have looked at the embers after a fire, looked at coal, and drawn the connection. Regardless, the answer for the earliest usage of coal is lost to history. We have reason to believe the Chinese were mining it up as early as 1000 BCE to smelt copper. We've found trace amounts of coal used in bronze age funeral pyres in the British Isles, which was probably harvested from outcroppings. The Romans extracted coal from Germany (Rhineland, specifically) for use in iron smelting. \n\n\n\nCoal is important because its *easy* to work with. Compared to other common heat sources you simply didn't get much simpler than the usage of coal from initial harvesting to final product without giving something up. Wood might have been replenish-able and (arguably) easier to get, but it didn't burn as hot. Oil may have been able to burn hotter and / or longer, but was also far more involved to harvest. "
]
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5zcarf
|
if looked at under an extremely powerful microscope, what would sub-atomic particles look like? what would the space between them look like?
|
Edit: sorry if the flair is inappropriate
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5zcarf/eli5_if_looked_at_under_an_extremely_powerful/
|
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"text": [
"Part of the problem with you question is that \"looking\" is something that is not independent of size. \n\nVisible light has a wavelength from 390 to 700 nm (3.9 to 4 x 10^−7 m) while atoms have a radius of 30 to 300 pm (3 to 30 x10^-11 m).\n\nSo seeing is not really applicable here visible light does not work at this scale.\n\n",
"The problem there is that visible light has wavelengths way longer than the thing you are trying to observe. In our everyday macroscopic world it makes sense to think of light as rays that bounce off solid objects. But at the subatomic scale (or even just the atomic or molecular scale really) everything is interacting in terms of wave optics. So anything that is pictured from that scale in simulations or scanning tunneling microscopy is inherently an interpretation of data for the benefit of humans. But not \"how things really look like\".\n\nIt's a bit like trying to figure out how a frog sitting in a pond looks like by only making waves in the pond and observing the returning waves.",
"All comments so far have correctly discussed the problem of wavelengths of visible light, but allow me to pose as the OP for a moment and ask hypothetically, what if this weren't the case? Lets say that humans could view electromagnetic radiation at the far left end of the spectrum, deep into the realm of gamma rays. Assuming the radiation source emitting sufficient gamma rays did not disrupt the sub-atomic particle being observed, what might we expect to see when viewing such a particle under appropriate magnification? "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
5uw8kk
|
why jeremy johnson is being jailed for contempt of court after invoking his 5th amendment rights?
|
A little background: [Jeremy Johnson](_URL_0_) has been subpoenaed to testify in former Utah Attorney General John Swallows corruption trial. Really, the court case hinges on Johnson's testimony, however he has declined to answer any questions and invoked his fifth amendment rights. He has been offered a limited immunity deal from Salt Lake DA Sam Gill but he has concerns that the federal government will press charges. Johnson is currently imprisoned on fraud charges.
So I feel stupid but how can someone be jailed for invoking their fifth amendment rights?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5uw8kk/eli5_why_jeremy_johnson_is_being_jailed_for/
|
{
"a_id": [
"ddxbymc"
],
"score": [
8
],
"text": [
"From the article:\n\n > After being sworn in and refusing to answer basic questions, the judge found Johnson in contempt.\n\nYour 5th Amendment rights don't apply to basic questioning, only to questions asked that could incriminate you while you are in custody."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://fox13now.com/2017/02/15/jeremy-johnson-refuses-to-testify-in-swallow-corruption-trial/"
] |
[
[]
] |
|
3rrdro
|
do the wings on my paper/plastic/model airplane work like the wings on a real airplane? if not, how does it fly?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3rrdro/eli5_do_the_wings_on_my_paperplasticmodel/
|
{
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"text": [
"Yes, they work just like normal airplane wings. They use an angle of attack to push down on the air they're passing through, and thus lift themselves up as a resultant force from that push. Just like a normal wing would. ",
"Model airplanes, yes. They use a specially shaped wing to produce lift (see: airfoil). A paper airplane, however, is acting more like a parachute, using the large surface area to slow its descent. ",
"If you've ever seen the movie \"Flight of the Phoenix\" they make the exact point. The engineer that designs the new plane made from the wreckage of the original plane is actually a model airplane designer. He explains that the formulas work regardless of scale.\n\nGreat movie, BTW. The Jimmy Stewart original, I mean, not the Dennis Quaid remake."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
j72fl
|
How do pebbles on the beach get those tiny holes through them?
|
I've lived on the coast all my live & we have a pebble beach. A lot of the pebbles have little holes running through them, from one side of the other (so holding it up you can look through them). They're often very thin, only 5 or so mm wide, but you can see through the stone.
Any idea what causes them?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/j72fl/how_do_pebbles_on_the_beach_get_those_tiny_holes/
|
{
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"c29p1ze",
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3
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"text": [
"The stones aren't the same stuff through and through. Sometimes there's an inclusion or patch or bit of other mineral that's more soluble or less resilient than the surrounding mineral, leaving a gap, hole, or pit. ",
"The stones aren't the same stuff through and through. Sometimes there's an inclusion or patch or bit of other mineral that's more soluble or less resilient than the surrounding mineral, leaving a gap, hole, or pit. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
21idya
|
does keeping someone "awake", keep them from dying like in movies?
|
You know that thing they do in movies where people are like: "Hey, stay with me?" as if they're trying to keep someone from falling asleep? Does that actually prevent someone from passing away?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/21idya/eli5_does_keeping_someone_awake_keep_them_from/
|
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"You want them to \"stay with you\" so that you know they are responsive and not slipping away further into death. It's a way of making sure that bodily functions are still working.\n\nI used to have a roommate that would have panic attacks often. So I would tell him to do things like move his hands, fingers, legs, ect. so that I knew when and when not to take him to the infirmary.\n\nEdit: wrong word",
"You want to keep someone in shock from going unconscious. One way to do this is to keep their brain active by introducing stimuli. If they fall unconscious their blood pressure can crash resulting in more problems, essentially starting a feedback loop eventually resulting in death due to hypoxia essentially. \n\nMy ex explained it better so maybe someone else can add on. Medically it has to do with chemicals in the central nervous system. ",
" > You know that thing they do in movies where people are like: \"Hey, stay with me?\" as if they're trying to keep someone from falling asleep? Does that actually prevent someone from passing away?\n\nIt does not. It is used to determine the patients ability to stay conscious. If it doesn't work anymore, the situation has gotten worse. As a side note, this method only tests their response to verbal stimuli. Another method is testing their response to painful stimuli, such as pinching the trapezius muscle or sternal rubs. These allow medics to place a patient on the AVPU scale of alert, responds to verbal, responds to pain, unresponsive.\n\nSource: 5 years as a paramedic",
"If you are talking about sudden injury like being shot/stabbed/blown up; \n\nYou want your heart-rate to stay high to keep blood pumping to the critical parts like your brain.\n\nWhen you are critically injured and bleed out, it feels like you are getting really tired. Your pulse drops. Adrenaline levels drop. You don't feel the pain anymore. \n\nYou know that feeling when you watch a movie late at night, you kinda want to keep watching but you notice you start missing parts? That, but a lot stronger.\n\nEverything in your body tells you to just chill for a moment. People might be screaming in your face to stay awake, but all you can think of is:\n\n\"Yeah, yeah, I will...just give me a moment to catch my breath. I just need to close my eyes for 5 seconds and i'll be fine again.\"\n\nYou drift off in a dream-like state, and the voice in your head screaming to open your fucking eyes fades further away with every passing moment. ",
"It's a good idea to keep someone who has overdosed on CNS-depressants awake. Going into deep sleep slows down breathing even further.",
"Not in the cases of most deaths no, although it may be helpful in dealing with people who are bleeding to death and losing conciousness. I think this is more something that is said, rather then an actual assist. Someone who is bleeding out will feel as though they are drifting off to sleep, and although keeping them awake may give you an indication of their mental state, it doesn't actually save their life. If they are too far gone, they will die anyway.",
"u/MRTXM3 sums up the responsiveness scale perfectly. As for the logic behind \"stay with me bro!\" etc etc it's to keep someone from going into shock and mentally shutting down, usually in a combat/disaster situation. If someone is losing blood and they think they're going to die, shock starts to set in and they get caught in the opposite loop. Instead of calmly fading out they get so jacked up that they are making their injuries worse; i.e. with a lost a limb, going into shock pumps the blood out faster so they're bleeding out faster. So while you're applying a Combat Application Tourniquet, you need to try to calm them down and get them focused on providing buddy aid/self aid and returning fire. If you can get them to calm the fugg down and return fire you can focus on saving the leg or whatever \n\n(source: combat medic) \n\n(Edit: rogue period. Additionally, in that situation you would be trying to get them to stop focusing on what is going on internally and give them an external stimuli to focus on so they're brain will stop sending adrenaline dumps and shocks to the nervous system. Then the body's natural reactions can take over to start re-routing blood to the vital organs and restoring blood pressure; once they've calmed down and you've stabilized the bleeding that is) ",
"depends. Do you live on Elm street?",
"No, but it's a lot harder for medics to diagnose your situation if you are unconscious. It's also a bad sign.",
"If you keep someone awake they will not be dead.",
"\"Don't fucking die on me man!\"\n\n\"Oh shit, is that what I was about to do?\"",
"Keeping them awake doesn't keep them alive. Otherwise, every medic in the world would work on their conversational skills first, medicine second. It just doesn't work this way.\n\nIt looks good, but ultimately these people slip into unconsciousness. If you've ever seen someone pass out, it's a lot like that. Talking them through it doesn't help them.\n\nThat being said, every single patient that I've talked to that has gone unconscious, or even flatlined, has said that they found that people talking to them gave them incredible comfort. They were frequently upset when people around them were losing it, but I tend to not allow that kind of behavior around my patients.\n\nSource: 22+ years of emergency medicine",
"Well, you can't be awake and dead at the same time.."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
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|
3mld26
|
where does the idea that jews run the world come from? and when something happens, immediately point to isreal and us?
|
[deleted]
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mld26/eli5_where_does_the_idea_that_jews_run_the_world/
|
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"In the middle ages, the church ruled that Christians could not charge interest lending money to other Christians. Which made a Christian-run bank a rather unsustainable business. But people still wanted banks, so money-lending became one of the few well-paying professions available to Jews living in Europe at the time. And so now access to money is being controlled by Jewish bankers, who were part of a group that the Church had been telling everyone were untrustworthy backstabbers responsible for Jesus's death. That combination led to the \"Jews really running the world\" conspiracies, which has stuck around for quite some time.",
"The idea that Jews runs the world dates back to the early imperial age and the rise of the middle class. Often times merchant ventures needed loans to get started, and since Catholics weren't allowed to charge interest on loans, invariably that meant going to a Jew. Now, being in a position to even approach someone about a loan is a rare social feat, and having merchant ventures be possible is a separate thing entirely, but for some, it felt like the Jews decided who would succeed in business and who would fail.\n\nAs the imperial age progressed, banking continued to evolve, particularly under a Jewish family called the Rothschilds, a banking family who were really the first super-rich non-nobles. Being as they weren't nobles, many cried foul.\n\nToday, modern banks who use the Rothschild's techniques on loans to make money control the economy in a serious way, but very few of them are actually run by Jews. It's true that in the middle ages, Jewish people played a niche role in the economy that gave them a lot of power (though not nearly enough to counter how much of a hassle it was, believe me they had it rough). Today, there is no such advantage. But racist old myths die hard. The Rockefellers were another major banking family, and they weren't Jews (though conspiracy theorists will say they were neo-pagans of some description).\n\nIn truth, people hate being poor. When plates are empty, foreigners and subcultures are targeted. The Jews have historically always been that subculture in Europe, really until the 1950s. This hate will take any actual or perceived slight it can as justification. In the middle ages it was the ability of Jews to choose which boats would sail. In the Imperial Age where many could finance ships and the Dutch were crowdsourcing ships, it was the predatory practices of banks that were somehow the fault of an entire race. Today, with predatory banking a universal practice, it's geopolitical cash transfers that are considered to blame.\n\nNow, don't get me wrong - Banks were predatory, and Israel's lobby in America is disproportionately powerful. But that isn't the fault of a whole race of people. What crosses from reasonable criticism to bigotry is when you treat the actions of one person like they belong to a group - whether that's blaming Palestinians for throwing rocks, Israelis for AIPAC's strong presence in US politics, Jews for predatory loans, or any group of people for anything done by someone else you associate with them.\n\nAnti-Semites will try to use any bad thing done by any Jew against the whole race. Islamophobes will try to use any bad thing done by any Muslim against the whole religion. It's the same thing, really. And it needs to be stopped.\n",
"A major source is a piece of propoganda called _URL_0_\n\nPut out around 1900 possibly by the czarist secret police, partially plagiarized of an anti Napoleon III screed that didn't mention Jews, this peice of trash is still popular despite being proven as a forgery."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[
"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Protocols_of_the_Elders_of_Zion"
]
] |
|
7tkeub
|
How does my brain instantly calculate that I can toss an object into a small area from several feet away while walking?
|
Yesterday, as I was walking about 8-10' past a recycle bin with a soda can sized opening, I had a small wad of paper trash in my hand and in less than a second I had a feeling I could toss the paper into the hole. I tossed it and it went perfectly into the opening. I had no time to contemplate the weight or air resistance of the paper wad or the speed at which I was walking. I just had a sudden "whim" that it would work. I didn't slow down or anything.
Events like this almost feel Jedi-like though I know my subconscious must have been doing the math, I could never have made it if I had spent any amount of conscious thought on the effort.
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/7tkeub/how_does_my_brain_instantly_calculate_that_i_can/
|
{
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"text": [
"It's an interesting question; do you mean for something you are doing for the first time, something you have practiced, or something you do often without thinking too much about?\n\nThe same question could be asked about how people are able to react in sports to balls, for example. How does a tennis player know exactly how and when to hit a ball, how do they calculate in real-time, the exact direction and path of an incoming ball etc. \n\nIs the answer simply trial and error? Are our brains simply advanced enough to calculate spatial awareness, coupled with intuitive movements that we know we are capable of? "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
e2mg1u
|
Footage of people being knocked out by a 'sucker punch' usually shows their legs instantly going rigid. Why is this?
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/e2mg1u/footage_of_people_being_knocked_out_by_a_sucker/
|
{
"a_id": [
"f91mpyh"
],
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11
],
"text": [
"The nerves for conscious motor control originate in the \"top\" of the brain at the cortex and make up the corticospinal tract, but there are also subconscious reflex arcs that help you maintain your balance in the vestibulospinal tract.\n\nThese reflex arcs originate much lower in the brainstem and often even in the spinal cord itself. Their main way of maintaining posture is to extend the contralateral muscles when you lean too far to one side. This is why people sway side to side when standing with their eyes closed.\n\nWhen the brain is traumatized to the point of unconsciousness, the corticospinal tract is overwhelmed by the vestibulospinal tract and the \"extend\" messages are the only messages the legs receive. Stiff legs are an indicator of damage to parts of the brain closer to the top of the head.\n\nSource: [_URL_0_](_URL_1_)"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abnormal\\_posturing",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abnormal_posturing"
]
] |
||
1ngj4f
|
what does western society have against the female nipple? (serious responses only)
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ngj4f/eli5_what_does_western_society_have_against_the/
|
{
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"text": [
"Look into \"the modesty of most other countries\" and you might be surprised to find that the US is pretty middle of the road. From TV commercials to magazine ads to beachwear.. For every Western European country that thinks we're all ignorant, Christian prudes, therse a middle eastern or Asian country that looks aghast at our women walking around without enough bra padding to shield erect nipples through T shirts on a breezy day. ",
"I believe it has to do with simply drawing the line somewhere. In western societies, a woman's breast is seen as a sexual organ, and has been forbidden to show in most public settings for hundreds of years. This has relaxed quite a bit over the last few decades, but still exists. We've gotten to the point that you can show most of the female breast other than the areola and nipple. Probably because it can be clearly stated (usually) where it begins and ends. That would be difficult to do otherwise, unless one was to ban exposing any part of the female breast at all, which of course is done in some cultures. \n \nGive it a few more decades and it might change. ",
"It's not so much that society is *against* the female nipple. It's more that society is against public sexuality. A fully nude man is, broadly speaking, no more acceptable in public than a fully nude woman. But female nudity has become so fetishised that the default assumption is that bare skin on a woman is sexual in nature.\n\nThe result is that bare chests on men are not seen as *automatically* sexual, but bare chests on women are. So bare nipples in public are commonly more accepted on men than they are on women.",
"Western society used to be against female ankles. The thought was that ankles suggest legs, and leg suggest leg going all the way up. Some people think women should cover their heads all the time, some people think women topless is just fine all the time. It is all just a bunch of made up rules at the time by the people at the time.\n\nHonesty if more people walked around naked, more would feel the gift of shame and we might have fewer fat people in the US."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
7fsr6w
|
Does an increase in energy also increases the amount of entropy in a system?
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/7fsr6w/does_an_increase_in_energy_also_increases_the/
|
{
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"text": [
"Generally speaking, yes. When increasing the internal energy of a system increases its entropy, that system is said to be at positive (absolute) temperature.\n\nCertain systems can be arranged in a way that increasing their energy decreases their entropy. Then it would have a negative temperature.\n\nSo any system with positive temperature behaves as you described."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
2apl20
|
do authors get money only when a person buys their book, or when the bookstore buys it in bulk?
|
Same question could be asked about other forms of media (games, movies etc.) but I'm wondering about books in particular. Obviously if a book completely 'sells out' and more need to be bought by the bookstore or more printed then the individual sales contribute, but how does the whole process work when it comes to how many books are made or sold, and which aspects matter most to the author. Do books get printed all at once for a single "run" or do they get printed on a demand-only basis in smaller quantities?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2apl20/eli5_do_authors_get_money_only_when_a_person_buys/
|
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"I worked in publishing for a year after college (I was an assistant editor for a publishing company that published various fiction books). It all depends on the contract. MOST authors who aren't really well known will get either a one-time pay (say 60k-160k), or a smaller one like 30k-50k and a very very small percentage per book sold. Then if you're Dean Koontz or Stephen King, you're getting a HUGE one-time pay and a decent percentage per book sold.",
"Their royalty comes when the store sells the copy *at retail.* Bookstores can send back books that they don't sell. This usually happens when a book just flat out tanks, or with hardcover books when the paperback version is about the be released. ",
"I think this answer needs a little background. Via the traditional publishing route:\n\nAuthor writes a book. \nAuthor sends book to agent, who reads the book and figures out what publishing editors to pitch it to.\nAgent pitches the book to editors at various publishing houses. It could be a high-powered agent with good connections in big-name publishing houses, or it could be a more common agent who does a lot of work with mid-range or small presses. \nSometimes an editor wants to buy the book outright, and offers the agent/author, let's say, a 50k advance (this is a fairly big advance, especially if the author is debut or works in a less popular genre)\nSometimes multiple editors at multiple houses want the book, and they'll get into a bidding war. Usually agents manage the auction, and will normally accept the highest bidder. Sometimes the agent will sell the book to a lower bidder, if the benefits are better.\n\nEither way, let's say the editor buys the book for a 50k advance and 15% royalties. Though the numbers vary a lot from book to book and editor to editor and author to author, let's use them as an example.\n\nUpon signing a contract with the editor, the author usually gets one third of the 50k advance right away. Some of that goes to the agent. \n\nThen the editor suggest changes that ought to be made to the book, and the author and editor essentially negotiate how much to change the book, what to leave in, what to leave out. Eventually they (ideally) come to an agreement, and the author makes the required changes. If the editor likes it, the book goes to copyedits, where all of the typos are fixed, things like that.\n\nThen the author gets the second third of his/her 50k advance. \n\nThen the publishing house worries about formatting, covers, jackets, publicity, blurbs, promotions, all that good stuff. Eventually, the book goes to print. Then, the author gets the final third of his/her 50k advance. \n\nThen the book hits the shelves.\n\nWhat happens after that, in terms of author compensation, is a bit tricky. Using our previous numbers, the author basically earns 15% of every single book sold, BUT the first 50k of what he earns in royalties goes back to the publishing house. That 50k they gave him? It was basically just lending him the first 50k from his royalties, interest-free.\n\nTime goes on. Either the book sells, or it doesn't.\n\nIf it sells decently, the author will eventually pay back that whole 50k, at which point he's actually able to collect royalties for himself, with some of it going back to his agent.\n\nIf it sells poorly, in all likelihood that publishing house simply won't buy from that author in the future. From what I can tell, he doesn't normally have to pay back the 50k, but it can vary from contract to contract. \n\nTo address your question more directly: Larger publishing houses usually print larger runs of books they think will sell well. The books are distributed to various vendors across the country. If some vendors can't sell the books, they will try to ship them back to the publishers. The author's mostly concerned about the books that actually get into the hands of the reader, because that's when he/she gets the royalty. \n\n\nTLDR: Big publishing houses usually have larger print runs, especially if they expect the book to do well. Smaller publishing houses have smaller print runs, and either house will order another print run if the book sells well. Unloved books might be destroyed or sold on discount/overstock. ",
"I wrote a book and was given a modest advance then was paid per copy of the book sold. Payment per book was dependent on hardcover or soft then on how much the book actually sold for. ",
"I'm a professional writer, so here's how payment usually works.\n\nA writer gets an advance, which is delivered upon completion of the book (though usually, it's broken into smaller portions for various steps of the writing process, i.e. delivery of manuscript, completion of editing, and upon publication of book.\n\nThe advance is just that, an advance payment for royalties earned. Royalties are for books sold to customers, not to distribution centers. So, no, sales to bookstores don't usually count. It's only when a book is bought by a customer that it is usually considered sold. In fact, bookstores can usually return any books they don't sell without any real penalty.\n\nEarning out an advance is very important for an author's continued career. I'd much rather take a smaller advance that I can earn rather than a large one that I can't meet because, from a publisher's perspective, I haven't met my promised number of sales. Ideally, once you exceed your advance, you continue to earn royalties, hopefully for a while.\n\nHaving published ten novels at this point, I can say that some still continue to earn my royalties while others have fizzled out and are less reliable.\n\nHope that clears things up some.",
"I've heard that Stephen King's deal is that he takes no advance, then he and the publisher split sales revenue 50/50.",
"This thread ended up being even more educational than I originally thought it would. Cool to see those in the industry or with know-how getting in here and breaking it down for all of us."
]
}
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[] |
[] |
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[],
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|
6wbym6
|
video aspect ratios
|
Occurred to me the other night while watching a movie at home. Why do we still watch movies that are so wide in ratio? I saw all this space on my TV go to waste with two giant black bars on the top and bottom of my screen.
Of course it suits cinemas, but aren't we consuming media more at home nowadays?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6wbym6/eli5_video_aspect_ratios/
|
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"text": [
"It adds dramatic quality to the video. Epic and dramatic scenes and movies will be filmed in a wider aspect ratio than say a comedy or something. There are many movies where aspect ratios change dynamically throughout more intense/epic scenes and you wouldn’t even notice unless you were told. You would notice the scene was more intense but you wouldn’t even be able to notice the black bars changing size, making you feel that way.\n\nIt also can just makes things feel more expensive or of a higher quality.\n\nEdit: added a thing",
"In short, modern TVs use a 16:9 as a compromise between the 4:3 aspect ratio used for standard definition programming, and theatre wide aspects. Without one looking comically small or the other being too wide to see. \n\nPrior to the 1950s, most movies were shot in the Academy Ratio, which losely approximates 4:3. Which is why that ratio was used for television. When TV first came about, cinema ticket sales too a huge hit. So film companies began using wider ratios to give moviegoers an experience they couldn't get at home. When home theatre came about in the 90s, the upcoming HDTVs needed to be adapted so they could display both with acceptable results, without wasting too much horizontal or vertical space on the screen. \n\nHere's a video explaining in more detail the history of cinema aspect ratios and why specific ones were chosen.\n\n_URL_0_"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CgrMsjGk7k"
]
] |
|
5nqixo
|
why do our tongues get stuck on poles.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5nqixo/eli5_why_do_our_tongues_get_stuck_on_poles/
|
{
"a_id": [
"dcdk2xh"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Because your tongue is wet, and metal is extremely heat-conductive. So, the metal cools your saliva faster than your tongue can warm it up. At low enough temperatures, the saliva freezes to both the pole and tongue, so you're stuck.\n\nThe only safe option for releasing the frozen saliva is to heat up the pole above freezing, usually by pouring hot water on it at the point where the tongue is stuck; just pulling will tear off the tip of the tongue where it is frozen."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
cltorj
|
musical chord progressions.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cltorj/eli5_musical_chord_progressions/
|
{
"a_id": [
"evxvnes"
],
"score": [
11
],
"text": [
"Your question is pretty vague but I'll give it a shot!\n\nA chord progression is essentially a sequence of chords, often repeating multiple times throughout the duration of a song, that have been selected and placed in a specific order due to their relationship to one another.\n\nTo break it down further; a chord itself is a collection of multiple notes (often 3 or 4) which are played together. Chords are usually built from a sequence of notes known as a \"scale\" as those particular notes sound pleasant (harmonious) when played together, as opposed to unpleasant (dissonant). \n\nIn a chord progression, different chords have different roles, also known as harmonic functions, which gives the progression its feeling. For instance, the second to last chord in the progression may be \"unresolved\", which gives a feeling of incompleteness that is then satisfied by the final chord in the sequence. The exact same chord can have different roles in different progression depending upon where it is placed in relation to other chords, as well as what the other chords are.\n\nIn practice, an example of a common chord progression is C-G-Am-F (in the key of C). This means that the instrumentalist in question will play a C Major chord (i.e. the notes C, E and G) followed by a G Major, then an A Minor and finally an F Major. This progression is extremely widespread in popular music due to it's harmonious quality when repeated.\n\nHope that makes sense!"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
3snpa2
|
why does america have such a higher report of children with autism and adhd compared to other countries?
|
[deleted]
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3snpa2/eli5_why_does_america_have_such_a_higher_report/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cwyu712"
],
"score": [
6
],
"text": [
"There is so many things that play a role, it is hard to name them all.\n\n- Overall, the USA does have a very high quality medical system compared to certain countries. Doctors are available here and know what Autism/ADHD is. You can't say the same about certain other countries. Sometimes they do not have doctors, of when they do, they either have bigger fish to fry than autism/ADHD or they might not have the knowledge to diagnose it.\n\n- In the USA, there is less stigma regarding these diagnoses than in other countries. People are more willing to admit that they or their children have this disorder, whereas in certain other places, that sort of information is kept secret.\n\n- Higher maternal and paternal age increases the risk of kids ending up with these kind of disorders. In the USA, many people are having kids later in life. That might be something that fits better into the culture, but you cannot deny that it also has effects on the quality of the eggs/sperm production.\n\n- And yes, there is also some over-diagnosis going on (among certain groups, other groups are under-diagnosed)."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
2wfmkb
|
How did Harald Hardrada escape from Constantinople?
|
If I remember right, the Basilus ordered that the chain in the harbor be raised, so I'm curious as to how Hardrada got out of there.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2wfmkb/how_did_harald_hardrada_escape_from_constantinople/
|
{
"a_id": [
"coqj2ug",
"cor3aw1"
],
"score": [
40,
11
],
"text": [
" > The same night King Harald and his men went to the house where Maria slept and carried her away by force. Then they went down to where the galleys of the Varings lay, took two of them and rowed out into Sjavid sound. When they came to the place where the iron chain is drawn across the sound, Harald told his men to stretch out at their oars in both galleys; but the men who were not rowing to run all to the stern of the galley, each with his luggage in his hand. The galleys thus ran up and lay on the iron chain. As soon as they stood fast on it, and would advance no farther, Harald ordered all the men to run forward into the bow. Then the galley, in which Harald was, balanced forwards and swung down over the chain; but the other, which remained fast athwart the chain, split in two, by which many men were lost; but some were taken up out of the sound. Thus Harald escaped out of Constantinople and sailed thence into the Black Sea...\n\n\n\nFrom \"Heimskringla; Or, The Chronicle of the Kings of Norway\" by Snorri Sturluson (~1230) _URL_0_ ",
"They rowed as hard as they could at the chain, while everyone who wasn't rowing ran to the back of the longship, basically popping a wheelie, raising the prow of the ship. When the front passed over the chain they all ran to the fore of the ship and the chain slid along under the keel. Whether or not this actually happened . . .\n[Norwegian viking site explaining the maneuver](_URL_0_)\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/598"
],
[
"http://www.viking.no/e/people/hardrade/index.html"
]
] |
|
1l67iq
|
Can all life be explained by chemical reactions/processes?
|
So is there anything in a life form that cannot be scientifically validated/checked/or I guess and more specifically written as a chemical reaction? I am talking about all levels such as a cell, parts of a cell or an organ... but most likely if there is it would be at the cellular level.
So the things that happen at the cellular level, is it always some form of:
existing structure (cell, call parts(nucleus, mitochondria, ..), ...
plus
maybe some energy
plus
maybe some nutrients
=== > Sustained life and reproduction
There are also other types of processes, other than chemical reactions, such as osmosis, and maybe some electrical processes (nerves), motor processes...
I understand that the cell structure is mighty complex and that it cannot be recreated in a lab? Is it because we still do not completely understand it, or that we do not have tech to reproduce it?
The inspiration of this question is the following, although I would still like some info on the question above.
When I was in high school like 15 years ago our teacher told us that some chemical reactions are not reversible, and as an example he/she said that you cannot get eggs from a cake but the reverse is true.
So my followup questions is: if life is a series of chemical reactions, you can feed the chicken cake and you can get eggs. I understand that this is not a one chemical reaction but a multitude of chemical reactions, but this would be the time consuming way to create eggs from cake.
Thanks.
EDIT: formatting
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1l67iq/can_all_life_be_explained_by_chemical/
|
{
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"cbw7dtx",
"cbwgu6t",
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"text": [
"Although we can't recreate all elements of it (ie throw a bunch of components together and have it work as a eukaryotic cell) science and physics adequately explains every component of the life of a cell and all of the functions of life",
"There is nothing that we have found in life that cannot eventually be understood in using the tools of chemistry and physics. Biological systems are incredibly complex networks of very complex molecules. A lot of the systems in our cells are controlled by relatively huge and intricately folded proteins, but even if we cannot easily recreate that kind of complexity on the lab bench we can still understand the processes that happen to turn A into B or to signal X to do Y.\n\nI'm not meaning to say we have everything figured out right now. Just look at drug discovery. If we knew the mechanisms behind every disease or condition and the molecules that went with them then we should be able to design awesome drugs to fix almost anything. However, the systems are so complicated and not yet fully understood that we have a lot of very expensive trial and error to get any useful drug all the way to the market.\n\nFor your followup question, that is generally correct. You could make eggs from cake by feeding the cake to the chicken. Some of the same molecules from the original egg would end up in the new egg. In the strictest sense that does not meant that any of the reactions that turned the egg into the cake into the egg were reversible (with the chemical definition), but you could get all the way back to where you started on in a way.",
"metabolism is just chemistry, at the molecular level chemistry and physics aren't quite as distinct as people tend to think, but yeah life runs on chemistry as for irreversible reactions at the macro level such as cake the example holds, but as far as true reactions everything can be reversed it just takes more energy in most cases, some being stupidly high amounts such as breaking/saturating benzene, where it take a minor input to make a benzene ring in a lab to actually break or saturate that same ring you need to heat it quite a lot due to it's stability, because stable is good.\n_URL_0_\ngives an idea about it. \n\nmy explaining skills aren't so hot right now "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[
"http://www.kentchemistry.com/links/Kinetics/PEDiagrams.htm"
]
] |
|
3jvz9l
|
what does it mean for a watch to be waterproof up to "200ft"?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jvz9l/eli5_what_does_it_mean_for_a_watch_to_be/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cusqhtl"
],
"score": [
5
],
"text": [
"After that the water pressure is great enough to break whatever seal was protecting the goods"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
4by2um
|
In his time was Shakespere's writings difficult to understand?
|
I ask because we have all had some reading in school. We slowly proceed and break down what is being said sometimes. Would it have been as difficult at the time of writing to understand? I know of course language evolved and words come in and out of favor, but I feel like the common man may have been just as confused as most of us are. Was he writing, maybe, for the higher class? Thanks for the help.
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4by2um/in_his_time_was_shakesperes_writings_difficult_to/
|
{
"a_id": [
"d1dkmyq"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Hi, FYI there have been some earlier posts asking this question\n\n* [When Shakespeare's plays were first performed, was the average theater goer able to sufficiently understand the dialog to be able to follow the plot and understand the character's motivations?](_URL_0_) - featuring /u/texpeare \n\n* [Did people actually talk how Shakespeare wrote?](_URL_1_) \n\n* [Could the average person in the Globe Theatre during the Elizabethan era literally understand Shakespeare?](_URL_2_)"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2csbct/when_shakespeares_plays_were_first_performed_was/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/34rcaq/did_people_actually_talk_how_shakespeare_wrote/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1le3te/could_the_average_person_in_the_globe_theatre/"
]
] |
|
ikydo
|
If we were to discover tomorrow that a huge asteroid is going to hit Earth, could we do something about it?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/ikydo/if_we_were_to_discover_tomorrow_that_a_huge/
|
{
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"score": [
4,
12,
29,
3,
18,
4
],
"text": [
"Depends on how long it's going to take to reach us, as well as the size of the asteroid.",
"Depends on the orbit, how long until it hits and the size of the asteroid.\n\nIf it's thousand kilometers in diameter and it hits the Earth in 30 years, I don't think there would be much we could do. If it would be just few kilometers in diameter it might be redirected, maybe with huge efforts. \n\nIf the timescale is is bigger, like thousands of years, much smaller nudge might divert it's course. ",
"there have been a lot of theories of how we would be able to deter an asteroid, most people first think to blow it up but if it's too close to earth then that isn't going to do us much good. The best plan that I've seen (works only if there's enough time before it gets to earth) is to land a vehicle on the asteroid and, once it's secured onto the surface, it uses it's rockets to over time nudge the asteroid's orbit path just far enough away from earth that we're safe",
"Get all the people who study impacts ready to go to the likely location to watch and study a fresh impact. Personally I wouldn't mind some samples either.",
"Wikipedia actually has a [great article](_URL_0_) on this.",
"I'd advise you to check out Phil Plait's book \"Death from the Skies\" he has an entire chapter dedicated to what could or should be done.\n\nThere are so many factors that come into what we could do about it. How fast the object is moving, the angle it is coming towards the Earth, what it's made of, how far away it is, how long the notice is until impact, and of course - how freakin' big it is!\n\nWe could definitely *do* something. It would be a monumental effort and we wouldn't be allowed many or possibly any mistakes. It would be a shame though if we spent so much time arguing over who'd launch and lead the mission until it was too late.\n\nHumans are pretty good at figuring out stuff like that. They aren't so good at convincing others, or other people don't like changing their minds or being subordinate to someone. Human nature."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid-impact_avoidance"
],
[]
] |
||
2yp2em
|
what is a "principal component analysis"?
|
My senior thesis research might require that I do a principal component analysis on some of the physiological data that I have. However I have no idea what a principal component analysis is and the Wikipedia article about it may as well be in Chinese. I would really, truly, greatly appreciate it if any of you might be able to give a layman's explanation for this. Thanks!!
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2yp2em/eli5what_is_a_principal_component_analysis/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cpblzbv"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"Hard to explain without using images.\n\nSee:\n_URL_0_"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://georgemdallas.wordpress.com/2013/10/30/principal-component-analysis-4-dummies-eigenvectors-eigenvalues-and-dimension-reduction/"
]
] |
|
62lrw6
|
Did nativism play a significant role in the American prohibition movement?
|
I recently watched a PBS 'American Experience' documentary on prohibition, and it noted at some point that some prohibiton advocates hoped that outlawing the consumption of alcoholic beverages (e.g. beer) would encourage German immigrants to leaves the states. I had never heard of this argument befire, and I'd be curious to know how wide spread this feeling was held among prohibition advocates in the early 20th century.
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/62lrw6/did_nativism_play_a_significant_role_in_the/
|
{
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"dfo331z"
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"text": [
"There was indeed a great deal of overlap between the nativist and prohibitionist movements. The Anti-Saloon League, the most vocal prohibitionist organization in the country, was led mainly by Protestant ministers, most of whom were concerned that the religious and moral character of the United States was in peril.\n\nIt was not only the pernicious effects of alcohol that concerned them, but also that alcohol was of central importance to the social life of the millions of Catholic immigrants who had come to the country since the mid-19th century. The urban saloon was not merely a retailers of beer or rum – it was a place for the working man to socialize, and an arena where immigrants could organize themselves politically.\n\nIn particular, the tavern was associated with Democratic urban political machines such as Tammany Hall. The advocates of prohibition, meanwhile, tended to find their home within the Republican Party, and viewed the cause of temperance as being inextricably tied together with attempts to clean up corruption in urban politics – which was in turn caused by the clannish tendencies of immigrants and the degrading effects of drinking.\n\nOnce the Volstead Act was introduced, furthermore, it highlighted the status of immigrants as law-breakers while also infusing nativism with an added moral dimension. Various immigrant organizations had opposed Prohibition – notably the National German American Alliance, which represented German-American brewers (and which was tarred with the brush of disloyalty because of World War I) – and Catholics and Jews were disproportionately involved in rum-running and clandestine sales of alcohol.\n\nGiven the difficulties of enforcing the Volstead Act, many of its supporters turned to vigilante action, which was typically directed toward immigrants. The Ku Klux Klan was revived as a fraternal organization in the 1920s, choosing Catholics and Jews as its main targets. This reborn Klan was strongest in areas where Prohibition had the greatest support – not merely in the South, but also in the West and Midwest.\n\nThe Klan supported both immigration restrictions – culminating in the Johnson-Reed Act of 1924, which effectively put an end to the period of mass migration that had begun in the 1880s – and tighter enforcement of Prohibition regulations. Chicago Lawyer Clarence Darrow told the Baltimore Sun in 1924 that the “father and mother of the Ku Klux is the Anti-Saloon League. I would not say every Anti-Saloon Leaguer is a Ku Kluxer, but every Ku Kluxer is an Anti-Saloon Leaguer.”\n\nGovernor Al Smith of New York came to a similar conclusion about the Democratic Party convention of 1924: “the Klan and the anti-saloon forces in the convention were practically identical.”\n\nNot all supporters of Prohibition were necessarily nativists, but given their ideological similarities they made natural allies.\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
32ph98
|
why do "800 service" call me every day but nobody is ever on the line?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/32ph98/eli5_why_do_800_service_call_me_every_day_but/
|
{
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"text": [
"If you let it go to voice mail, they'll play a prerecorded message. But they know that trying to play a prerecorded message when there's a human on the other end doesn't work, so the computer making the call is programmed to hang up if someone answers.",
"You are probably getting a call center. They call lots of numbers at once so they don't waste time with a busy signal. They answer the first one that pics up and the rest get dropped.",
"Probably someone actually looking for your wife....",
"Could be due to the automatic dialer they use. Typically in call centers, there's a system that just dials number after number after number waiting for some type of response. If it's a busy signal or disconnect notice, it will just end the call and move on to the next number. If the call is actually answered (either by a person or voicemail/answering machine) it will then forward the call to the next available cell center rep. Sometimes that transfer can take a few seconds. So in that few seconds it takes to transfer the call to a live rep you're sitting there going, \"Hello?...Hello?\". In a lot of cases, you've already hung up by the time the connection is made.\n\n\nNext time this happens, hang on the line for an extra second or two and you'll probably get a real person. Not that you'd really want that from an 800# call. ",
"Probably a telemarketer. Add your number to the [Do Not Call Registry](_URL_0_). "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://www.donotcall.gov/"
]
] |
||
4w9it6
|
so how does the body 'die'? also what does it feel like just before a person is about to die?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4w9it6/eli5_so_how_does_the_body_die_also_what_does_it/
|
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"text": [
"Shutting down functions that aren't as necessary as others, until there's nothing left for the body to survive on. The battery empties. You slip away.",
"To answer the former, 'death' is typically recognised as the cessation of brain stem function. That is, a functional disconnect between the control centre (brain) an the body.\n\nCessation of function in any human tissue, including the brain, is primarily caused by a lack of oxygen and glucose. Distribution of these are maintained by the circulatory system, comprised of the heart and blood vessels.\n\nThere are many many reasons why the circulatory system may cease to provide the brain with its fuel, but ultimately all precipitating causes lead to cardiac arrest, and the brain subsequently being starved of oxygen and glucose.\n\nA remaining grey area is that of life support. Modern medicine can artificially circulate blood, oxygen, glucose and other nutrients that can be administered by health professionals. In this state, your body can successfully be sustained for long periods of time. However, the question arises as to if this is really 'being alive'. Therefore ICU doctors will assess brain stem function to gauge how much 'living' a person can do without being fully artificially supported.\n\nEDIT: To answer the latter, I have no idea what it feels like before someone dies, but it is not uncommon for patients to correctly and accurately determine that they are literally *about* to die. I also believe it is generally accepted that the last of or senses to cease is hearing.\n\nAnother interesting consideration is that when adenosine is administered to treat arrhythmias, it temporarily blocks the hearts electrical conduction causing asystole (flatline). This is often described as 'falling' or the 'drop of a rollercoaster'.",
"Former ICU nurse (current CRNA) here. Your comment about people recognizing they're about to die before a change in vital signs is interesting to read. I saw this all the time in the ICU, where patients would ask if they're dead, or say they were afraid of dying, and it seemed to me they'd pass away very soon after. Like they had a premonition. ",
"[This](_URL_0_) podcast is an interview with a hospice nurse that gives a really good detail of the dying experience.",
"Neuroscience PhD here.\n\nWe have learned a lot from near-death experiences (NDEs). The body dies from the outside in.\n\nFor most people, your heart is the first to stop. It just gets tired and worn out having been in use continually for 80+ years. Because blood is your body's way of heating the whole system, you start to cool down. This means your nerves send and receive signals more slowly. Your extremities are sending signals a long distance and so you notice the delay a lot more. This is perceived as a numbness by your brain.\n\nAs your brain gets deprived of oxygen-rich blood you slowly lose consciousness. Its like going to sleep, or under anaesthetic. Some people are still aware of the next changes that happen. \n\nThe first thing is your inner ear system turns off. With no feedback coming in about the direction of gravity, your body interprets this to mean you're airborne (hence the \"floating\" feeling some NDE survivors describe). \n\nThen your eyes stop sending signals. Many people don't know this, but nerves in your eye send signals only when there is dark. This is economical for an animal which is active during the day as it saves resources. So as your eyes stop sending signals, your brain interprets this as white light which grows in size as the nerves continue to die.\n\nThe next thing to die are inhibitory interneurons. This then permits the spontaneous activation of thousands of excitatory neurons, including the ones which encode your long-term memories. The \"seeing my life flash before my eyes\" is likely due to this.\n\nInhibitory interneurons also regulate the release of neurotransmitters involved in the reward pathway. So you get a huge rush of dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin. This is related to the \"feeling of euphoria\" that NDE survivors sometimes report."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/01/22/podcast-171-the-dying-experience-myths-and-answers/"
],
[]
] |
||
41zvuc
|
do blind people need to close their eyes to go to sleep if so why? if they already see pitch black?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41zvuc/eli5_do_blind_people_need_to_close_their_eyes_to/
|
{
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"text": [
"Because eyes need moisture and the only way to do that it to close your eyes so that your tears can cover the entire surface of your eye.",
"Of course.If you would be placed in a completely dark room, you would still need to close your eyes so that your muscles would relax.",
"Most blind people are not \"completely blind\". They usually can distinguish light. As well as what others have said about muscle relaxation and retaining eye moisture.",
"They are blind and thus they don't see pitch black, nor they see pink or yellow. They simply don't see. To understand what they see, try describing what can you see with your right foot.",
"Yes. Their eyes will dry out. And blind people, people who actually CANNOT SEE anything, don't see black. They don't see anything at all. Imagine trying to see out of your elbow, or the tip of your finger. What do you see? Nothing. It's difficult for a person with vision to imagine nothingness but that's what nothing is. Some blind people can detect light and dark, though. ",
"You need to close your eyes to sleep even in a pitch black room, blind people are no different.\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
3ew268
|
what do the numbers mean in reference to eyesight? eg. 20/20
|
My friend works for an ophthalmologist and tried to explain it to me...I obviously still am not getting it.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ew268/eli5_what_do_the_numbers_mean_in_reference_to/
|
{
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"text": [
"According to below, 20/20 essentially means the person can see an image 20 ft in front of them the same way someone with 'normal' vision would see the image. if they had 30/20 vision for example, this person would see an image 30 ft away the same way someone with 'normal' vision would see the same image from 20 ft away. \nMore explanations below.\n\nsource : _URL_0_",
"20/20 is sort of like a ratio of what you see vs what other people see. If you have 20/20 vision that means you see at 20 feet what the average person sees at 20 ft. If you have 25/20 vision then you can see what the average person sees at 20 ft from 25 ft away",
"They are a comparison to the average population. 20/20 means you can see at 20 feet what the average person can see at 20 feet. So 20/20 vision isn't perfect, it's literally average.\n\n20/10 vision would mean you could see at 20 feet what the average person could only see at 10 feet - ie you have better than average vision.\n\n10/20 vision would mean you could only see at 10 feet what the average person could see at 20 - ie you have worse than average vision."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://www.eyecaretyler.com/resources/how-the-eye-works/what-does-2020-mean/"
],
[],
[]
] |
|
2eejqv
|
the college admissions process.
|
What are priority applications? Admission confuses me in general and it seems really long and complex. What is my role as a current high school student to do and what does the college do to once they receive my application? What helps me more likely to get accepted?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2eejqv/eli5_the_college_admissions_process/
|
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"For the colleges in my region, in order to get accepted into a state university you had to have a RAI of 245 or higher. Which is found by using the ACT or SAT test score, high school rank, high school cumulative grade-point average, and the number of completed high school core courses. ",
"Let me give a broader version than the other comments:\n\n*Applications/Colleges and Admission in General*\n\nCollege X has enough space/professors/resources to educate 500 freshmen next year. However, 5000 students apply to College X. At first, you'd think it was easy: just admit the best 500 students and enroll them. However, College X is competing with Colleges A, B, C, and D for the best students. If each college just accepted the top 500 students and ended up splitting them, each school would end up with only 125 freshmen.\n\nThis is where priority applications and waitlists come into play. If Student 1 really loves College X, Student 1 can apply \"priority\" or \"early decision.\" This means that Student 1 promises to go to College X if they are admitted, and in return College X gives them a higher chance of acceptance. This is a win-win: College X has one less variable in trying to get 500 students, and Student 1 has a better chance of getting into College X. \n\nWaitlist is the flip-side of this balance: College X calculates that accepting 750 students will *probably* give them 500 freshmen. However, they instead give 700 students acceptances, and another 100 waitlists. That way they can just admit \"extras\" from the waitlist to fill up their 500 numbers. This is great for College X (since it makes it easier to get the right number) but sucks for students, who don't get a straight answer from College X.\n\n\n*Perspective of the Admissions Committee*\n\nIn order to do all this number/student-manipulating, College X has to decide who are the best students to admit, given that they can only admit a certain number of students. Most universities have some kind of formula for sorting students: RAI from the lower comment is a good example. Some schools say \"any student with an SAT below 1600 is automatically rejected,\" some schools do complicated calculations, etc. In general, they try to assess how well a student does on a bunch of metrics:\n\n* GPA from High School\n* Test scores like ACT/SAT\n* Extracurriculars\n* Application Essays\n* Recommendations\n* (Optional) Interview\n\nThere are a lot of different ways to analyze this, but basically the university is trying to figure out how close you are to their image of a perfect student, so that they can admit the right amount of the right students.\n\nUsually what happens is a temp college student is handed a stack of applications and told to auto-reject any that fall below their minimum requirements. Then the ones that seem okay are forwarded to an admissions officer/committee, who pick out the best ones and recommend them for admission.\n\n*What YOU Need to Do*\n\nApplying to college is a series of decisions:\n\n1) Pick colleges you want to apply to. This is a bigger question than I can address as part of this post, but it's an important step. Rule of thumb, apply to ~6 schools, 2 schools that you're overqualified for, 2 schools that are about right, and 2 schools that you're slightly underqualified for. This depends entirely on you though, and is a good conversation to have with your college counselor at your high school.\n\n2) Decide how you want to apply. Is there one you love love love enough to promise you'll attend? If so, make sure you're applying priority/early to that school. If you're not 100% convinced (or if you haven't toured the school) do NOT apply early. \n\n3) Try and excel at those bullet points for admission. Try and get good grades. Prepare for and take the SAT and ACT (I personally recommend taking both if possible). Participate in extracurriculars (volunteering, sports, etc.). Get to know (and do well in classes with) teachers who will write your recommendation letters. There isn't really a magic bullet for getting into college, but if you are *missing* any of these, it will reflect very badly on you.\n\n4) When it comes time for applications (usually early fall senior year is when you should be writing them), fill them out carefully and focus on writing essays. Essays are how you stand out to the admissions committee. This is also beyond the scope of this post, but college essays are very important, it is your only chance to stand out and be unique in a sea of GPAs and SAT scores.\n\n5) Mail in your application (plus transcripts and test scores) and wait. When you get your answers, *TOUR THE SCHOOLS* before you make a decision, and pick the place that you think you will succeed, and not necessarily the one that's \"best.\" \n\n\nIf you have more specific questions, just ask :) my mom has been on admissions committees for years and many of my friends have worked as admissions office interns."
]
}
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[] |
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[
[],
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|
5quw20
|
how does kelvin work?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5quw20/eli5_how_does_kelvin_work/
|
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"Kelvin is a temperature scale that start with absolute zero and has uses the same degrees as Celsius.\n\nCelsius has water freeze at 0° and boil at 100° absolute zero is at -273.16° C.\n\nSo in Kelvin absolute Zero is a 0 K, water freezes at 273.16 K and boils at 373.16 K\n\nThere is a corresponding temperature scale that also starts at absolute zero but uses Farenheit degrees called Rankine, but it is rarely used.\n\nHere is a chart:\n\nCelsius | Kelvin | Fahrenheit | Rankine\n---:|---:|----:|----:\n-273.16°C | 0 K | −459.67 °F | 0 °R\n-40°C| 233.15 K| -40 °F | 419.67 °R\n-17.78°C| 255.37 K | 0 °F| 459.67 °R \n0 °C | 273.15 K| 32 °F |491.67 °R\n100 °C | 373.15 K| 212 °F | 671.67 °R\n"
]
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|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
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||
8mq9a0
|
why commercial airplanes are usually white while military airplanes are usually grey?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8mq9a0/eli5_why_commercial_airplanes_are_usually_white/
|
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"3 main reasons :\n\n1. Minimizing visual signature . Aircraft operating over sea can be camouflaged by painting them blue\\-grey. \n\n\n2. Blending of aircraft with the tarmac. Parked aircraft outlines are harder to see if the aircraft color doesn't provide sharp contrast with the surface they are on. \n\n\n3. Modern military aircraft are painted with radar absorbent paint . The paint is most effective with darker colors and a matte finish. Hence, grey aircraft. ",
"On the commercial side, it's entirely a brand consideration. Spirit Air paints all of their planes bright yellow, for example. UPS paints the back half of their planes dark brown. Southwest uses a purply blue color.\n\nAs for why white is the most prominent, it's historical, and I'd assume related to white being associated with cleanliness, polish and professionalism (on account of white providing a good contrast to see dirt and damage).",
"Airliners *want* to be seen by other planes, military planes *want* to hide from other planes.\n\nWhite is easier to see in the sky than grey. White is a simple base color on which you can easily put other colors of paint or decals. White reflects the sun, which can help keep the plane cooler (and more comfortable for passengers) on hot sunny days. This cooling effect can also help some (non-metal) parts of the plane last longer, as thermal cycling can wear plastic and composite parts out more quickly.",
"Fun fact: \n\n\nBlack airplanes are faster than white airplanes, at least in sunlight they are.\n\nThat is, all other things being equal, the weight and texture \\(drag\\) of the paint being the same, the black airplane has an advantage.\n\nThe reason is, if you were the size of a molecule and you looked around, you'd think you were in the middle of a mountain range. No matter how much we polish, at a molecular level, the paint has a lot of texture. \n\n\nSo, there are molecules, down in the valleys, that gets 'dragged' with the plane, between the air that gets dragged with the plane and the 'relative wind' \\(i.e the air going by\\), there is the interface layer. The black airplane will heat the interface layer, making it less dense and reducing friction."
]
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[] |
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4w303y
|
how do websites, particularly like instagram and tumblr, deal with constant additions in content? is their storage virtually unlimited?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4w303y/eli5_how_do_websites_particularly_like_instagram/
|
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"text": [
"those are so tiny compared to youtube.\n\nyoutube adds storage space at the rate of petabytes a day. there's a module in a shipping container that house storage for 12petabytes. drop one of those in, you're good for another couple of days\n\n",
"I could write it out, or copy and paste it, but these guys at Backblaze (a cloud based backup company) explain it best: _URL_0_\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[
"https://www.backblaze.com/blog/open-source-data-storage-server/"
]
] |
||
eyyti5
|
why do home appliances all hum at the same tone frequency?
|
My washer, dryer, microwave, and dishwasher all hum at the same frequency (roughly the tone G). We have 2 microwaves at work - different brands, sizes, years of manufacturing - both hum at roughly G. How is that possible?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/eyyti5/eli5_why_do_home_appliances_all_hum_at_the_same/
|
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"Your electrical power is alternating current - switching back and forth 60 times per second. You will hear that 60 Hz tone, as well as overtones of 60 Hz (such as 120, 180, 240 Hz).\n\nedit: typo in overtone frequencies.",
"Because the hum of the appliances isn't being caused by the appliance itself. You've probably heard about how the electricity in our houses is of a type called alternating current. Without really going into the specifics of why we use it, what this actually means is that the direction of the electricity in your home and coming through your power outlets reverses direction many of times a second, usually 50 or 60, depending on your country. We refer to as 50 or 60 hertz, hertz is abbreviated as Hz which is just a unit meaning times something occurs per second. As a result, many appliances have components in them which will also operate at this same frequency. They may produce a small sound at a certain point during every cycle of the current, think of the sound a tiny switch would make, and so all of those small sounds add up to produce a constant tone at the same frequency of the electricity running through them. Depending on your country this will either cause the device to produce a G note if the power grid is operating at 50 hertz, or an A sharp/B flat if the device is operating at 60Hz.",
"Most appliances use AC induction motors. These operate at the power grid AC frequency which is usually either 60 or 50 Hz. (There are advantages and disadvantages to either 60 or 50Hz AC.)\n\nUnder the A4-440 logarithmic temper system, the note G corresponds to 49, 98, 196, 392, 784, or 1568 Hz. One thing you'll notice is that these are all multiples of 2 of each other. G2-98 is one octave higher than G1-49. G1 is the first G on a grand piano. There are some neat physics reasons why octaves are defined this way.\n\n*You'll notice that G1-49 is pretty close to 50 Hz. So I'm guessing your area uses 50Hz in the power grid.* \n\nWith AC motors, they will tend to rotate either 360 or 180 degrees during each AC cycle, depending on the orientation of the windings in the motor. This will be responsible for much of the hum from any appliances that use electric motors.\n\nAnother common source of electrical hum is an interesting effect called \"Magnetostriction.\" This is where an object shrinks or grows slightly in length when exposed to a magnetic field. This is a property that occurs n many metals. Small earphones often make use of this effect because it requires no moving parts. A small piece of a material with a strong Magnetorestrictive is wound with a fine copper wire. Most modern electronics use a power transformer to convert or \"step down\" 120V to something like 3.3 V. The transformer is composed of a looped iron core with a series of windings or coils around it. This generates a magnetic field through the core 50 times every second causing it to vibrate slightly due to Magnetostriction. This is a source of noise in appliances which has actually proven tricky to eliminate. The best way is to mount the iron core on rubber bumpers to absorb some of the sound.\n\nThere are advantages and disadvantages to either 60 or 50Hz AC.\n\nMost sources of municipal power don't tend to be pure sine waves of a single frequency. rather, they will contain moderate voltage fluctuations at higher frequencies. In other words, \"dirty\" power. The most common contamination is the third harmonic. that is: 50\\*3=150 Hz. This is between D3 and D3#.\n\nYou may be able to hear this frequency coming from large distribution transformers. This is not just becsue their large size makes the magnetorestriction effect larger. In fact, most distribution networks use 3-phase power. That is, they have 3 conductors instead of two, and the AC waveform in each line is separated by 6.6 milliseconds or 1/3 of a cycle. [it looks like this.](_URL_0_)"
]
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[],
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6cy93m
|
how can there be so much opiate prescription drug abuse when, in theory, the number of manufactured pills and the number of prescriptions are known? isn't it obvious the pills are being abused?
|
It seems like it would be easy to see either the total number of pills made is roughly equal to the total number of pills prescribed. Of course there would be error, but the apparent market of the illicit opiate abuse seems to dwarf the actual intended purpose.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6cy93m/eli5_how_can_there_be_so_much_opiate_prescription/
|
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"Very nearly all of the prescription opioids used in the US are almost certainly obtained with prescriptions and then used or sold. The issue is that those prescriptions are not necessary or obtained by patients faking pain (which is remarkably easy to do and difficult for someone else to prove you're doing it). ",
"Because pharma companies pay doctors off to prescribe more of their pills so they can make more money. They don't give a shit, its all about the Benjamins.",
"This assumes that the hundreds of labs manufacturing this substance worldwide are in close communication with the tens of thousands of individual pharmacies that fill these prescriptions. It also assumes that either of them have some financial motivation (it's a business, there aren't many other motivations) to keep track of this. ",
"Prescribing opioids for pain is a murky business. You're treating something that's not objectively measurable, with something people can rapidly become tolerant to, so dosing is substantially based on what patients say. There are no tests which can establish that patient A's pain is controlled on 200 mg/day of hydrocodone but not 150.\n\nThe most common immediate source of pills is from friends or family, but indeed, those pills had to either come from a pharmacy or be smuggled across the border. Heroin and synthetic opioids continue to come in illegally, but pills usually come from legitimate makers. So, how does the supply get as big as it is?\n\n* Prescribing too long. It's quite common to prescribe anything in intervals of a month, for no real reason besides habit and tradition. A notorious example is a 30-day supply of opioids after wisdom tooth removal, which often requires no more than a few days' worth, or can even be controlled without opioids. The rest of the 30-day supply may linger in a cabinet until someone else wants it. \n\n* Prescribing too much. Let's say patient A gets OK pain control on 100 mg/day of hydrocodone. They could accurately report that... but they're unemployed, and worried about making ends meet... so they say it takes 200, and sell half their supply. \"Pill mills\" may simply not care.\n\n* Doctor shopping. While state databases have helped reduce this problem, a dedicated person may still be able to obtain multiple prescriptions from different providers.\n\n----\nEDIT: To clarify, doses here are purposely on the ridiculous end to prove a point about the ample supply of opioids. That said, highly tolerant users and abusers absolutely do go well into the hundreds of morphine equivalents per day. ",
"Should also add the big pharma is the biggest lobby in Washington. That should tell you something.",
"I've heard that insurance companies are actively starting to run audits to try and see this kind of thing via claims. It's a fascinating approach to the issue. ",
"Yea it has a lot to do with big pharma pushing opiate pain relievers. They're cash cows for those companies that produce them. A couple decades ago opiate pain relievers were reserved for extreme circumstances and pain. But big pharma began pushing for their use with more common ailments. \nThere are plenty of numbers on the the amounts of pills being shipped to each state but practices to stop overprescription is difficult. I've even read that Purdue the maker of OxyContin has a database of doctors they are watching as possible \"pill mill\" doctors but don't share it with the DEA saying it's not their job to police prescribers. It's really all about the money. ",
"Canadian pharmacist here.\n\nGetting opioid medications is a 2-step process: the physician needs to OK it, and the pharmacist needs to OK it. Both of these checkpoints are failing.\n\nFrom the physician's side:\n\nImagine you're a physician and a patient presents to you saying they are in pain (or has a bad cough.) Pain is very subjective so it's difficult to judge if they're lying or how much pain they are in. These people also tend to be very clingy and would refuse to leave your office until they get something. What do you do? You give them something hoping the pharmacist would stop them.\n\nThere are also other perspective the physician can take. They could consider it as harm-reduction (at least they're not using xxx.) They could be an irresponsible practionner (money is involved.) They could be working in a area with a high addict population; suddenly opioids become the norm and it's hard to judge what is abuse and what is common place.\n\nFrom the pharmacist's side:\n\nA patient arrives to the pharmacy. You have your doubts that the patient needs it, but the prescription is valid. Like the physician, the pharmacist really also don't want to deal with this BS: You want to get on with your day and move onto other patients; You want to make that patient leave ASAP; You want to make money; You consider it as a harm reduction approach. If you're a busy pharmacy processing 300 prescriptions a day, you don't have time to deal with this. if you're a slow pharmacy processing 50 prescriptions a day, you really need the money.\n\nIf you don't fill their prescription: They might attack you or threaten to be outside for you when you leave); They might rob you (robberies for narcotics are VERY common); They might sue you for discrimination; The physician might also get mad that you for not trusting them. One other common tactics that pharmacists use is to lie that they don't carry it. In this case, the prescription is handed back to them which only pushes the problem onto other pharmacists; they can easily find someone else to fill it for them.\n\nWhat doesn't have much repercussions is actually filling the medication. The prescriber has already OKed it and the adverse effects are well know. If the patient is abusing it or is harmed, everyone expected it so pharmacist doesn't really take the blame. Both the prescriber and the pharmacist know that they're only responsible for the medication itself. No one will take responsibility for addiction.\n\nIllegitimate ways to obtain prescription narcotics are actually very limited. Addicts would much rather illegal drugs over prescription drugs that are more difficult and expensive to obtain. Common strategies these people use are \"Double Doctoring\" - going to multiple prescribers to get multiple narcotic prescription; or \"Prescription Forgeries\" - faking/copying/editing a prescription. Physicians and pharmacists who get involved in this get into a lot of shit, so they are very careful and aren't afraid to call the patient out on it with strict laws behind them.\n\n**EDIT**:\n\nThere are a few questions concerning how we know a prescription is forged. There are a few safety measures/red flags:\n\n- Many pharmacies are equipped to automatically and instantly upload prescriptions online\n\n- Some pharmacies have a procedure to confirm with the prescriber for each one\n\n- Insurance companies instantly know if it has been filled\n\n- Some prescriptions require special paper for the prescription to be written on\n\nRed flags include:\n\n- The patient has never been to this pharmacy\n\n- The prescriber has never been documented at this pharmacy (they might be a legit prescriber, but far away; why would the patient travel so far)\n\n- The patient looks anxious/is lying/not cooperating with the pharmacist's questions/counselling\n\n- The hand written prescription is legible.\n\n**EDIT**: \n\nFirstly, I am an Albertan Canadian pharmacist. I have no ideas of the roles/laws outside of the province, let alone the US or other countries. Just to list off a few things Albertan pharmacists can do: independently prescribe any medication (except narcotics), independently adapt the strength, dose, formulation, regimen, type of drug, ect. for any medication, independently renew prescriptions, prescribe in an emergency, dispense for animals, administer vaccines, administer injections, develop care plans, order lab tests, refuse prescriptions. And we get paid for all of them. Yes, even the refusal. When a pharmacist make any change, they are a sole responsible prescriber. No, family physicians aren't happy.\n\nNow just because we CAN, doesn't mean we should/will. A responsible pharmacist will know when they are not competent enough and refer to someone else. This is like how although dentists are allowed to prescribe anything, they should stay within their scope. Pharmacists know the medications very well, but we're not the best at diagnosis, so we will still be referring to physicians for most ailments. Most pharmacist aren't comfortable with prescribing and will refer for most things. However, we are getting more comfortable with prescribing for minor ailments. Also, many pharmacists are also getting specializations for a specific field (eg. diabetes.)\n\nSecond, I am getting a lot of comments about it's not the pharmacist's business how to manage patient's prescription. This is absolutely false as this is literally our job description, especially in Canada and the US. When something goes wrong, both the pharmacist and the prescriber are equally responsible. ~~For many countries in the world, \"pharmacist\" are people straight of out high school with no higher education. In these cases, their role is very limited.~~ Looks like I'm completely wrong on this. Canadian and US pharmacists have a ~3-4 years of university professional degree, and for various reasons, we're paid literally 2-4 times more than pharmacists from most European countries (yes even the developed ones).\n\nOur job description: We make sure that your medications are indicated, effective, safe, and manageable. Indicated means that it's the right medication for the right condition for the right patient. Effective means that the dose/strength of medication is appropriate. Safe means that the benefits outweigh the potential harm. Manageable means that you can actually take the medication by the prescribe regimen - this includes addiction concerns.\n\nIf we do see a problem, we can either take care of it independently (and be the sole responsible prescriber) or contact the original prescriber to give a second opinion (this is why your prescriptions take so long, because we're always on ~~the phone~~ hold with the receptionist.) The prescriber can change the prescription and fax us a new one or cancel it completely. Nevertheless, we will contact everyone involved about the actions we took. No matter what happens, best practice states that the pharmacist must refer the patient to someone to can help them.\n\nExample 1:\nA family physician gave a patient a narcotic prescription. The pharmacist caught that the patient was double doctoring. The pharmacist refuses to fill. After the patient leaves, the pharmacist notifies all prescribers involved and all pharmacies involved to cancel the prescriptions.\n\nExample 2:\nA dentist gave an antibiotic prescription for a urinary tract infection. Although dentists are legally allowed to prescribe anything they want, this is not within their scope of practice. The pharmacist deems the dentist incompetent in the field and refuse the fill the prescription. The pharmacist refers the patient to a walk-in-clinic. The pharmacist then notifies the dentist.' NOTE: just because it's outside of their scope doesn't mean that we have to refuse. The dentist could be fully competent and assessed the patient appropriately, plus pharmacists also can assess the patient and confirm the dentist's prescription.",
"Pharma makes more profit if there is extensive abuse, hence why we have the intensive abuse problems we have in America.",
"If you are interested in this situation the book \"[Dreamland](_URL_0_)\" is excellent.",
"I don't see what you're getting at. Is it that \"someone\" in government would notice that more pills are being produced than prescribed (is that even true?) and then they would start fighting really hard to... what, limit the number of pills produced?",
"I don't know how much value this will add to the numbers portion of your question but here in the U.S., people going to the emergency room for \"pain\" add to the problem. How big or small the contribution, I couldn't say. Due to emergency rooms and hospitals in general being graded from patient care surveys, doctors are more likely to prescribe a painkiller for someone in pain but no actual proof. They also take up important attention that nurses and doctors could have given to someone with real problems instead of having to fetch ice, blankets etc for said pill seeker. From the experiences of family members who work between several ER's and EMS services, it's sounds like doctors are stuck between a rock and hard place because the patient satisfaction determines some sort of payout that the hospital receives from insurance. They drain important resources that could be saving someone else's life so its like having to make a judgement call on which factor means more, especially when nurses are understaffed any way. Perhaps someone else here who deals with it on a first hand basis can explain in better detail than me, but I am of the opinion that it plays a factor in enabling drug seekers with addiction problems.",
"Also important to note that Medicare reimbursement is now tied in part to patient satisfaction, and it's planned to increase that portion of it over the years. \n\nTake everything that everyone mentioned here, and add to it the fact that a doctor will stand to possibly lose money by not giving in to a patient's demands.",
"There are other ways to get those pills rather than just through the health system. It’s a drug. Generics are made in other countries. China especially. They find their way over here.",
"Former pharmacy tech here.\n\nFor C-II (C2s, which opiates are) we would always look at the prescription and get the person's birth date and phone number (if it wasn't already on there, if it was, we verified it). Then we would take it to the pharmacist who can log into a system and use the information on the prescription to see if this person had a C2 filled anywhere else recently. So if you gave me a prescription for 90 Vicodin but we see that you just had 90 Vicodin filled at a different pharmacy 3 days ago, we're not filling it. We also know who the shady doctors are and won't fill the prescriptions they write.\n\nWe only get a certain amount of controlled substances per month and can't order any more than that. Part of the abuse comes from doctors that don't care and pharmacies that don't care. The 2 pharmacies I worked for were pretty strict about their C2 prescriptions. \n\nHowever; if your pharmacy is filling an unusual amount of C2s, the DEA can drop by at any time and check these kinds of things out. \n\nTL;DNR: in the pharmacy we can find out how many C2s you've had filled and won't fill it if it looks suspicious. But there are pharmacies that don't care and will do it anyway.",
"[It is pretty obvious when you look at the data. The will to do anything about it is missing.](_URL_0_)\n\n > In six years, drug wholesalers showered the state with 780 million hydrocodone and oxycodone pills, while 1,728 West Virginians fatally overdosed on those two painkillers, a Sunday Gazette-Mail investigation found.\n\n > The unfettered shipments amount to 433 pain pills for every man, woman and child in West Virginia.",
"[Pain used to be massively under-treated](_URL_0_).\n\nUntil recently people in severe long term pain were just being fucked by the system because \"drugs are bad mkay\" attitude.\n\nThis is only slowly changing, and that means a lot more pain killers are prescribed now. It's a very good change, as it leaves fewer people in severe long term pain.\n\nIn terms of numbers, the whole abuse story is just a minor unfortunate sideshow.",
"My great grandma's doctor would prescribe her opioids. The problem was, she was demented and he would steal them and no one would believe she wasn't abusing the drugs. \n\nSo a lot of the abuse is done via fraud or people selling their prescription.\n\nIt doesn't help that that doctor, when he was caught stealing from patients was simply moved to a different medical facility and continues to be a practicing doctor, despite having substance abuse problems. ",
"Big pharma is well aware of the abuse and the gigantic black market where powerful pain pills are sold for ridiculous prices. Upwards of $100 a pill in certain areas, if not more.\n\n\nTake the drug Opana for instance (oxymorphone). A synthetic opiate that is extremely strong when taken intranasally (snorted) but very weak when swallowed. The bioavailability (how much of the drug is actually absorbed into your body) is 43% with intranasal but only 10% when swallowed. It's over four times stronger when snorted. Why would they even make a pill form of opana when there are other drugs that have a very high bioavailability percentage when taken orally? (Such as oxycodone which is also regularly abused)\n\nThe answer is they are making a shit pile of money off these drugs, they are in insanely high demand by opiate addicts. This lack of concern from the drug companies has created a black market of what is essentially heroin like drugs in pill form. Many people shoot these drugs intravenously, which they are obviously not designed for, and that can cause massive amounts of harm for addicts.\n\nWhile I stress that nobody ever wakes up one day and decides they want to become a opiate addict, ultimately these people are responsible for their own actions. Opiates are necessary in the medical world, but they are being over prescribed at an absolutely alarming rate. They are not currently being issued in responsible or acceptable levels, and it's leading to a massive amount of good hearted people having every single ounce of joy and happiness sucked away from them. The desperation and misery of an opiate addict is something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. \n\n",
"In a previous life, and prior to the manufacturing and prescribing restrictions on opiates (back in the late 2000s), I worked at a small pharmacy in Florida. There were pain clinics specifically interested in giving out prescriptions for opiates. We'd have folks coming into the pharmacy with Rxs for 360 pills of opiates and 360 pills of benzodiazepines (always Xanax) at a time, 3 month supply. I don't know how the healthcare databases worked in 2008, but heroin addicts would come in with their dealers to pick up the prescriptions- not sure if they could fill a Rx in Georgia in the same month (would be profitable). I have no idea how it is currently, I live in Canada now and I don't work in pharmacies because the experience in the states turned me off of it. What I can say is that it was not regulated very much prior to 2009. Now docs are more careful, but getting hooked on opiates has a very well-known cure: finding your local heroin dealer. ",
"Two points:\n\n1, No one can get rich by stopping it.\n\n2, Many people are getting rich by allowing it.",
"It's harder to get them if you're legit, seriously. Addicts will lie and do just about anything to get them. I don't know how this answers your question however.",
"I'm in Vietnam at the moment. I can walk outside my building and get Codeine and other opiate meds from one of the several pharmacies on my street for $2 without a prescription. So theres that.",
"Where I live they \"solved\" the opiate problem by severely restricting prescriptions to opiate pain killers to the point that they would only prescribe me ibuprofen when I tore a mussel in my back and was in absolute agony. So now a ton of people just switched to heroine as their drug of choice to abuse. Way better off having folks pop a pill to get high than sticking a needle in their arm.",
"massachusetts has a big problem in this very area\n\nthey cracked down on dr. feelgoods a few years ago and politicians are still promoting the crackdown as a huge success.\n\nnot only did they watch prescriptions but they would limit the number of pills you could buy at one time. this way you could only buy a 7 day supply for example instead of a 3 month supply -- which of course made copays much higher\n\nwell, yes it was somewhat successful ... at driving up heroin usage. heroin is relatively cheap and widely available in massachusetts",
"My mother-in-law was prescribed 240 methadones a month for pain caused by neuropathy. She could get by on about half that. She would sell the other half to a guy who would have done heroin if he had not got the pills from her. She used the money to supplement her Social Security. \n\nTo answer OP's question: no it was not obvious they were being 'abused.' I would say it was more like they were being misused. Never felt great about it but never felt it was bad enough to report. Now she's gone and we choose to remember better stuff about her. ",
"Because of all the media hysteria there's a lot of people with genuine need who can't get relief. Doctors are scared to death to prescribe pain meds now. If you wind up like my elderly mother you are in a world of hurt. Just to make sure the bad guys don't abuse it. Not cool. ",
"People love money, this is the most basic reason for all ethical breaches you can imagine in nearly any situation.",
"I am just going to make a plug here. In Utah where I practice pharmacy they made a change to allow a pharmacist to give you naloxone (think antidote for opioid overdose, much like an epipen is for an allergic reaction) without a prescription. Many other states are allowing this too. If for any reason, legal prescription or otherwise, you or someone you know might benefit from having naloxone available, please talk to your pharmacist, we want to help! And if your pharmacist is an asshole and wants to see proof why you need it, go find a new one.",
"I was perscribed 120 pills of Oxycodone for my knee surgery\n\n15 I took for pain\n\n105 I took for pleasure\n\nThe abuse comes in how often they are perscribed and how easily they are perscribed. Its really up to the doctor to say how many pills a person needs because each person IS different and some need a ton of pills ",
"Look at it this way, you have addicts that want opiates. That gives you supply and demand. So let's say you go too the doctor with a legit complaint. He gives you a 30 day supply of opiates and you go home. 3 days later your better and the pills sit in the cabinet. Then someone down the road either asks if they can borrow some or because you need/want money you sell your excess for cash. Now you have people who are very good at convincing doctors they are in extreme pain and the doctor prescribes 90 to 120 pain pills. This person has no pain at all, but they are playing the system and selling off the entire prescription for a lot of money. Those are the 2 ways pills hit the street legally. Now in some states they are cracking down, so if you need long term treatment with opiates you go to a Pain Management specialist and they do random drug tests and pill counts to combat the con artists. In other places you have very little oversight. The problem is we never developed a nationwide monitoring and protocol system for opiates. It's being done slowly on some state levels but if one does nothing then it can generate a huge supply. Big enough to ship to states that have cracked down. One day the dea and fda might become useful and help create a nationwide monitoring system, and develop procedures for how the pills are prescribed under certain conditions. This would considerably alter the supply. However we must also realize that prescription opiates aren't the only ones being talked about in the reports that get cited on the news. Street drugs are included in most reports about the opiate problem including heroin, which depending on where you are is cheaper than the prescription pain pills. \n\nTL;DNR 2 streams of legal prescriptions, people with excess that give away or sell excess pills and con artists who fake out the docs and sell their entire scrip. Coupled with no national monitoring or prescribing protocol, and a huge dash of politics and lobbying. Hope that helps.",
"There are pill mills in every small town in Mississippi.. literally hand the receptionist $100 and tell the dr what you want.. I work in our family owned pharmacy and there is a website you can go to and check a patients recent \"transactions\" and we decide from there if we fill the prescription or not.. some people like cancer patients really need it, but the ones that have had like 240 pills in the past month from 4 different prescribers filled at 4 different pharmacies are not getting any medicine.. a lot of time it depends on the day and how busy we are also.. most of them have no insurance so they pay with cash and on a large prescription (120 Percocet) you can profit like $65-$70 after the cost of pills.. ",
"Watch Prescription Thugs on Netflix. All will be explained. There's another good one by the same guy about sports and steroids if you wanted to learn about that too. Clarifies much of both problems in a very entertaining way",
"This is anecdotal but a doc in my town was prescribing them to patients and buying them for his own use. I'm not sure how they caught him but I imagine that it's tougher to see it happening when all the paperwork looks legitimate.",
"Opioids are still the Gold standard for pain relief. They have the greatest effect with minimal damage compared to other pain relief drugs. People think pain is temporary but it is not. Imagine having the worst toothache you have ever experienced forever, every day forever. Some go through that daily and the only thing they have to rely on for relief is opioids. Should they be punished for the illicit use. Yet they are, even considering that only 3-5% of chronic pain sufferers ever become addicted to their medication. Every chronic pain sufferer would give their first born if there was a non-narcotic that handled their pain as opioids do.",
"People who get the prescription sell a portion or all of pills on the street. If they've been on pills for a long time they usually will be getting a higher strength pill and more of them than someone starting on day 1 of pain management. So they can sell half there pills and still keep enough to make there pain manageable if they actually need them if not they sell them and pocket the cash. A month's supply of say 60 oxycontin 40s could cost a medicaid patient a dollar or 2 for the copay and can be sold back in the day for any where from 15-25 bucks a piece. 15 was the going bulk rate 25 the individual price for name brand generic were usually 20. Lots of money to be made.",
"I haven't seen much of the other big source: illegal manufacturing. If you have a chemist and a press, you have oxy 30s. While for pharmaceuticals, the source is largely prescription and pharmacy abuse, harsher narcotics like fentanyl are typically illegally manufactured as opposed to obtained. This is why so many oxy abusers are dying from fentanyl overdoses. Fent laced oxy(or just fentanyl) pressed as oxys or dillys. Also why there are so many fentantl overdoses in the first place. It's stronger and cheaper to produce than codiene and hydro morphine and can be smuggled in smaller amounts for more impact so when illegal manufacturers press their batches they just use fent instead of whatever opioid it's supposed to be. New but rare drugs making their way onto the scene are carfentanyl and w18. I was my cities first confirmed case of w18 laced drugs when I pissed negative for heroin and fentantyl after a clinical piss test in which I admitted to doing heroin. I expected it to be fentanyl laced at least but had never heard of w18 and I was very involved in the scene at the time. That was last summer. Lots of factories on the west coast and asia smuggling this stuff into america. I'm Canadian and our stuff typically comes into canada from the states(either manufactured there or imported from asia, we do have some factories on the west coast but most are making extasy, mdma, speed, etc. the best safest mdma in north america comes from shawnigan lake on vancouver island) into alberta and then dispereses into BC and the maritimes from there. Even a lot of ontario/east coast opioid trade starts in alberta.\n\nsource: recovering heroin/fentanyl addict that has been involved with various levels of this scene and grew up with people who now or have operated at much higher levels. ",
"My perspective is from personal experience. I'm a PA. I've worked in surgical subspecialties and did a (thankfully) pretty brief stint in pain management, back to doing surgery now. There's a lot of comments being thrown around about how doctors are getting kickbacks/getting paid off/getting bribed by \"big pharma\" to prescribe more pain pills. Yeaah, that isn't happening. Take my word for it. Pharmaceutical companies are basically only allowed to give doctors food and pens and shit like that. No one is suddenly starting to prescribe a bunch of dilaudid because they got a nice cheese tray at the office.\nThe trouble with treating pain is that you can't measure it, and if someone comes to you complaining of say, back pain, chances are the harder you look the more you'll find anatomical reasons that the person might be in pain. Almost no one has stone-cold normal imaging, and it's hard to tell someone that they're just 'making it up' if there are some abnormalities that could potentially be painful. Postlaminectomy syndrome, a condition where a person has chronic back pain despite undergoing surgery and has no identifiable lesion that could be fixed surgically, is a great example of this. The person had back surgery, never got better, and imaging shows nothing conclusive to be fixed. How do you separate those people feigning continued pain from those really in pain? The simple answer is, you can't. People in chronic pain are often depressed, jobless, and destitute, so even your gut feeling may be thrown off by their presentation. \nIn pain management, we use all kinds of methods to try to figure out who's legit and who isn't- random pill counts, drug screens, checking state databases that show who filled what prescription when. Even with all of this, people are very adept at gaming the system and it takes a long time to catch them in the act. When you do, you kick them out of your practice and they move on to the next. This is part of the problem. Many states have what are called controlled substance monitoring databases, electronic record systems that keep track of who is filling what prescriptions. This can cut down on doctor shopping, but there's no national database, no information sharing, so you get patients who travel state to state filling scripts and unless you're logging into all those systems and checking, you won't catch them. There is a real need for a national system. \nThe biggest problem I think is that we need to be more forceful about when pain medication is appropriate. There has been research showing that chronic opioid therapy for back pain is ineffective in the long run. Neuropathic pain is better treated with other types of medication, like TCAs, gabapentin, lyrica- yet people are still being prescribed opiates for it. Fibromyalgia, likewise, should NEVER be treated with opiates, but plenty of patient are on them for this condition. \nMost people obtain opiates from friends or family members who are getting the medication for some purpose. Many of these are people who've had surgery. Surgery is painful. Oftentimes undertreating pain after surgery can lead to poor outcome- for instance, a knee replacement patient in a great deal of pain will not push hard enough in therapy, may end up contracted and have to undergo manipulation under anesthesia or lysis of adhesions. So sometimes docs err on the side of giving a little bit more after surgery. You can see how this could leave some people with extra pain medication they would sell or give away. Anyways, I've rambled long enough.",
"My MIL abused pretty badly. She would go to 3 different doctors per day and 3 different pharmacy, if she didn't have money for a Dr then off to the ER. She would burn through 30-60 Percocet per day, then when she felt like shit coming down she would call the ambulance to take her to the hospital. She always had bruises and rashes on her from falling down and not bathing. The cops and EMTs thought she was being abused. One cop yelled at my wife that she was a terrible daughter. One cop filed charges against my wife and we had to bring the script copies to show the judge. We tried calling all the doctors in the area to let them know she was abusing, we tried contacting social services, we tried getting her to do treatment and then she died.",
"My personal experience with the situation is this. I'm from the south in the u.s. In ghetto like neighborhoods older, seedy characters are abusing the health care system. Like others have said, pain is not measurable, However a \"script\" for oxy, hyrdo or what not holds a street value at about a dollar a milligram. What I see most is the patient would rather have crack. Crack dealer buys the bottle of pills for a deal, seller buys crack or something. Dealer probably has regular(addicted) clientele. Business is daily and lucrative. To the extent where the addicts are waiting on the day the dealers connect refills his/her monthly script.. while also seeking any other possible hookup. Maybe heroin...that's when a dangerous addiction/habit wander closer to...you get the point. Pain pills form of currency. When you don't even need or take them",
"Well the government is behind it for one - it's a huge cash cow.\n\nIf you don't believe me just look at Afghanistan pre 2001 (low). Since its increase 35 fold. Coincidence that our invasion increases that production? \n\n",
"Yes. The number of pills manufactured and sold are generally known quantities, as far as I'm aware. The abuse is driven by opioids being over-prescribed by doctors, which just puts more pills out there. And a LOT of people get their pills by exaggerating and taking illness. They can then turn around and sell those pills for a cash profit. They become dealers who use their unwitting doctors as suppliers. \n\nThis is compounded by the fact that pills are a huge target for thieves. Especially for the elderly. \n\nSo even though we know how many pills are being prescribed and manufactured, we also know that a lot of those pills change hand after the fact. \n\nSource : spouse is a chemical addiction therapist. ",
"Big pharma pays law makers to look the other way. \n\nSane reason we re one of two countries that allows direct to consumer advertising on tv. \n\nLobbyists are paying govt officials to look the other way by donating to their campaigns.",
"You seem to be under the impression that the manufacturers don't want them to be abused. They absolutely want them to be abused. That is why these companies lobby very hard to keep their drugs the only options. ",
"Story:\nI had my tonsils out two years ago at age 35. Was prescribed normal two week dose of oxy to handle pain. I recognize I love the stuff....got to the end of two weeks and needed (I.e wanted ) two more days of pills to ween off....I believe it was 4 or 6 pills total I wanted. I called doctors office who did procedure and was asked to come in and speak directly to surgeon who removed my tonsils. I sat in front of her and specifically asked for only 4 to 6 individual pills more. After debating with her for 5-10 minutes she finally relented and handed over prescription.\nWent to pharmacy to fill prescription.\nWhen I opened bag up there were 100 pills in the vial!!\nI called the doctors office to tell them there was an error and I got too many and they could care less. I pulled 4 out and told the wife to hide the rest.\nStill haven't found it. \nDammit \n",
"If you're like me, you don't like opiates. Imagine getting a 30 day supply of Percocet after a surgery but only take half that. Now you have a 15 day supply. You leave them in the cupboard and forget about them. A nosy cousin comes over and finds them and sells them to his/her friends. Boom. Opiate abuse.\n\nThis didn't happen to me, I disposed of them using coffee grounds and dropped them off at the police drug drop.",
"There's big money involved and pharmacy companies have a lot of sway. Doc's are happy & want to be safe, addicts know how to make things happen. I've read Burroughs' book/autobiography and even though it's outdated from today, doctor's are people and they can be played or pressured just as any other person. \n",
"U.S. Pharmacist here\nTo answer your question directly (most responses here are parroting the everyday reasons/causes of our current opioid epidemic), you asked how is it not obvious the pills are being abused if we know the number of manufactured pills and number of prescriptions.\n\nThe thing is that we *don't know* either of those numbers. The number of pills manufactured & sold by a company is proprietary information and therefore not publicly available. That information also wouldn't be meaningful in identifying severity of widespread abuse: Person A and Person B can both rate their pain an 8 out of 10, but Person A may need 20 mg a couple times a day to adequately reduce their pain while Person B may need 60 mg (this example is assuming neither person is lying about their pain score nor abusing the drug).\n\nThe story of the second number is similar. The number of prescriptions doctors' offices and hospitals' dole out just isn't data that has been extracted by anyone. It isn't public information, and again wouldn't really enlighten where the problem is coming from.\n\nI highly recommend the Netflix documentary, Dr. Feelgood. It follows a physician that was convicted of widespread narcotic distribution. It really highlights the muddy line between treating someone's pain and enabling addiction & dependence.",
"Big pharma overlooks abuse thanks to profit. Simple as that, OP. Some good people still work within the industry and they are trying their best to change things, but it ain't easy when the culture is so heavily focused on profits over the mental health and all-around well-being of it's customers.",
"I also want to add to the many good explanation. Some pharmacies collude with dealers and basically have their shop \"robbed\". ",
"honestly, the main issue is that determining the difference between an addict and an actual person in need is very difficult. both for the prescribing physician, and at times the patient themselves. \ni had personal experience with this very issue. after a series of foot surgeries, some of which went significantly worse than others, i spent over 6 months on heavy painkillers because just standing caused severe pain. after the first few months i couldn't help but think \"shouldn't i be healing by now? shouldn't the pain be lessening?\" \nconversations with my doctor became...awkward. \"yes, i need the prescription refilled. again. yes, i really do need it. no, you don't understand. i can't function without it. yes, i know how i sound right now.\" \nedits: words are hard. ",
"Pharmaceutical companies marketed drugs like OxyContin extremely heavily to doctors and lied very deliberately about their addictive potential, many believing it was to intentionally addict consumers to their products. The company behind OxyContin was ordered to pay something like 4 billion dollars in court. It's much more strict now. Fun fact, that's what really created the heroin/opioid epidemic in America, the majority of heroin/illegal opioid users were first addicted to their prescribed drugs",
"I'm not an expert on the topic but I've been a victim of our healthcare system since I was a child.\nOn top of that one of my good friends has been a doctor for many, many years. (he's in his 70's now) and took the time to explain to me exactly what goes on. (this was a while ago, so My memory might be spotty)\n\nGrowing up, I basically lived out of psychwards, since I was around 6? or 8? years old. Somewhere around there. I've been on every medication in the book. Why? Because people want an easy solution. If the kid is sedated to the point he can't function problem solved.\nEasy right?\nMany psych wards are like this. They're in it for the profit but this isn't what op wanted to talk about.\n\nNow, look at your e.r's. Doctor's are given incentives to prescribe things such as opiods and the like. There is encourangement on both sides, the insurance companies and what they will approve and the incentives pharmaceuticals will offer.\nSometimes they're ignorant. Being overworked and dealing with a shit ton of paperwork really encourages people to go with the flow.\nOther times, their job might be in jeopardy if they don't offer these things.\nHeck...most kids I know that are hooked on opiods got so because of an e.r. visit gone wrong. Hell I was thrown on morphine because I had pneumonia last winter.\n\n\nAnd it was fucking scary. Everytime it wore off I felt like shit...and grabbing more would make it feel better...but when it wore off I FELT EVEN WORSE.\nif I didn't recognize that I would be another one of those addicts laying on the street begging for heroin.\n\n\nThe entire problem is caused by the pharmaceutical indusry. But simply restricting it won't work. We've tried that...and where did that lead?\nIt lead to a shit ton of heroin overdoses. Killing tons of fucking kids everywhere.\nWe need education. We need doctors not to prescribe these to kids.\nAnd if they're already hooked, they need to help ween the kids off the shit. i've always heard it's better to do it slowly, vs cold turkey...but no matter what these people need help.\nThey need your fucking help to get their lives back together...or they'll just keep spiraling downwards until they become the very dregs of society that you despise and look down upon.\n\nIt's our fault that this happens. We should fix it.\n\n\nEdit: I'm a bit scatterbrained right now. I'll edit this and make my points a bit more clear later.\nsorry guys.",
"I keep seeing so many comments about how people are labeled as drug seekers. We see so many patients on combinations of opiates, benzos, and muscle relaxants. At a certain point you're just biding your time for respiratory failure. ",
"I'll throw in my two cents. Rep for a large pharma whole saler. Every visit I make to a pharmacy I'm checking the parking lot and the general look of the area for any suspicious activity and we are constantly monitoring thresholds to prevent abuse or diversion. It's not an ELI5 problem so it doesn't deserve an eli5 answer unfortunately. The problem is so fantastically difficult to solve. From the wholesaler perspective it's up to the pharmacist and physician, but when we cut thresholds they threaten to pull out of their contracts so we fee the pressure. The funny and ironic thing is that we genuinely make very little money on C2 control substances. I know that in the past we have considered not selling them in the first place but unfortunately there is a legitimate need for these medications and it's difficult to determine legitimate vs illegitimate. To solve the problem would require coordination between every doctors office in the country, all 22000 retail pharmacies, all of the chains and every wholesaler. That's why this is an issue.\n\nEdit: there is some confusions between manufacturers rep and pharmacy business consultant. I do not represent manufacturers of drugs. I work for a drug wholesaler, I do not interact with the doctor and have no control over what they prescribe. I sell generic and brand name drugs to pharmacies. ",
"Opioids are usually pretty well tracked once they are in circulation, but when they are being manufactured from pure ingredients, you still deal with the hole of large scale manufacturing. You cannot be 100% precise, so there is room for margin of error. When you're talking millions of pills in a production line in a day or a week, few hundred here and there are not missed much. I've hear stories that in the manufacturing plants, lose and broken pills of C2 narcotics are just swept into a corner for a while before being disposed. As a pharmacist, it boggles my mind a bit since I have to account for every single tablet of controlled substances and keep a record of it.\n\nHowever, the bigger issue is not opioid diversion from the manufacturers, but people mis-using and diverting opioids that was prescribed and dispensed legally. In 1996 the American Pain Society introduced the phrase \"Pain is the fifth vital sign\" in order to address the issue of pain being under-treated. However, the issue with that was that assessment of pain is completely dependent on the subjective feelings of the patient. Unlike heart rate or body temp, there is no objective monitoring method to measure pain. Health care providers are still being taught that pain is what the patient tells you what it is. That is correct, only the person feeling the pain can tell you much pain he/she is in and what makes it better and by how much. Even the most keen-eyed prescribers cannot tell for sure whether someone is faking pain or not. Under-treated pain also became a big issue with hospital surveyors and how hospitals got paid, so there was a push to better treat pain. Of course, that usually just meant more liberal use of opioid narcotics, which created a chain reaction of people becoming addicted, prescribers writing more opioids and so on. Shady doctors writing pill-mill scripts didn't help either of course. It's a vicious cycle at this point, and I'm not sure what could be done to address the issue.",
"Fuck all of this shit. People are dying from fucking ELEPHANT TRANQUILIZERS because PHarma marketed the shit out of their opiods. Follow the money. This epidemic is the fault of large multinational corporations chasing money. And then we have the audacity to expect then to pay taxes!",
"This is going to get buried in amongst all the highly informative and detailed answers already posted but no one seems to have mentioned that your question itself is a non sequitur... Yes we can _see_ that there is a lot of opioid abuse happening because of what you described, but that doesn't help us _stop_ it from happening. \n \nHow would that even work? It's not like a pharmacist can just arbitrarily deny medicine to people because \"sorry according to my international manufacturing data the entire world has already given out its full quota of opiates today\". Similarly we can't just get on the phone to every pill manufacturer everywhere and just say hey, stop, you've made too much. \n \nIt's a point of basic logic. ",
" > Isn't it obvious the pills are being abused?\n\nYes.\n\n > How can there be so much opiate prescription drug abuse\n\nMoney.\n\nAbout as ELI5 as you can get.",
"Here's a quick scenario from personal experience. I had back surgery a few years ago and was prescribed some opioids. I am not sure why, but I got a shit load of them and then I got a refill in the mail with a shit load more a month later. I really only used them for the first few days and then I stopped taking them as the level of pain I had was not bad. I probably consumed 10% of what was prescribed to be and had hundreds of pills left. I assume that this is how a lot of them end up on the black market, I probably could've sold them for $5-10 a piece (I threw them down the toilet to prevent them from getting into the wrong hands). ",
"It is obvious that they are being abused. But here's the thing: they're also being USED. They have a purpose, a reason for existence, and they have people who genuinely, truly, need them. You can't just say: 'wow, dude, there's a lot of abuse here, let's cut down how many we make and only give them to the people who really need them.'\n\nOr rather, you CAN say that, but good luck doing it. Because the people who genuinely need opioids are quite difficult to distinguish from those who want to abuse opioids. Partly because the people who abuse them learn, very quickly, the ways that do work and the ways that don't work to get opioids. They learn what behaviors work, and they pass that information on to other abusers. So, sure, you can say, 'too many of these pills are getting out there,' but knowing which ones are going to the wrong people and which ones are going to the right people is extremely complicated.",
"I'm not an addict, but I had dilaudid when I was sick in the hospital and I can see how easy it is to become dependent on that kind of drug. \n\nThe shit is amazing. It was given via needle and it ***instantly*** relieved my pain. I mean within seconds my pain was gone. I felt like I could leave the hospital the moment after getting it. \n\nI can see why people would use it. Once you're addicted you might have depression with your way of life or maybe you're already in a bad spot. \n\nOpioids like dilaudid gives you a fantastic high while also making you sleepy and sluggish. Perfect for you to forget about your problems, if only for a bit. \n\nEven though I only used it for a little bit in the hospital, I could feel it calling to me. Like the One Ring calls out to Frodo to place the ring on his finger. In this case I was lucky enough to be Sam - only had it for a bit and never let it cling to me. I still end up going across the sea tho...",
"_URL_0_ this John Oliver video explains they do it for profit ",
"Outside of the wonderful responses related to prescriptions... \n \nMy older sister was in a bad accident and had a lortab prescription. She still has the script but has always used as absolutely NEEDED and never more. \n \n2 other family members frequently steal her pills. Someone going so far as to replace her entire bottle with similar looking pills. It took her a few to notice. She was really worried she formed a tolerance. \n \nOne of those family members found out my wisdom tooth was removed. He called me. First time we had spoken in months! It was so sweet until he started making sure they gave me a good enough script for my pain. \n \nWhen I told him I didn't fill it because I didn't have any pain he offered me money to fill it and give him the pills. I told my brother no. We aren't close.",
"Directly answering your question. Most prescription drugs on the 'illegal market' were 'legitimately' prescribed. That is, those opiates were prescribed to someone by a legitimate doctor to a patient who has legitimate pain, and that patient then sold the drugs or had the drugs stolen (commonly siphoned away a few at a time by a relative or friend).\nOR those opiates were prescribed by a licensed medical doctor who knowingly writes prescriptions for people who don't need them in order to make money (you hear these doctors referred to on the news as pill mills).\n\nThe largest share of prescription drugs being used illegally get to 'market' this way. Large quantities aren't coming from warehouse of pharmacy break-ins (though those do happen, especially at end point locations like pharmacies, fairly frequently).\n\n\nThe problem ends up getting complicated because most opiate abuse starts out 'legitimate' - a person has real, serious pain, opiates exist and will reduce it better than other options, so 'we' prescribe them. Unfortunately, opiates are highly addictive. This problem is compounded by lots of factors, including some misleading campaigns by drug makers who advertised to physicians that xyz new opiate can't be abused and is 'safe' to prescribe. This happened with meperidine and oxycodone. I'm old enough and I've worked in pharmacy long enough to remember being told by a rep that Oxycontin couldn't be abused.\n\nI could go into more detail, but this problem gets tricky. I have some other top-level comments to other similar threads in the past which answer certain facets of the question. I'd be willing to answer any specific questions though.\n\nDisclosure: I'm a third year PharmD candidate, with 8 years experience working as a technician in a large pharmacy prior to attending pharmacy school. My main duties as a lead technician revolved around maintaining our C-II and C-345 inventory and records, among other things.",
"Pharmacist here, in my experience there are three types of \"incorrect\" narcotic prescriptions that require intervention.\n\nFirst one is the true fake prescription, where someone stole a script pad and is writing scripts. Relatively easy to catch, most people mess something up eventually, or the doctor will notice scripts he wasn't intentionally writing when he checks the database of narcotic scripts (assuming your state had one). \n\nSecond is where the patient withholds information to get more pills. Most commonly, someone getting pain pills chronically withholds that information to an ER doctor or dentist. Again, easy to catch, I just call the doctor, letting them know what the patient is already taking, and 9 time out of 10 they say, \"oh, I had no idea they were already taking that, tear my script up\"\n\nLastly is the troublesome one. Someone in actual pain has been taking these pills for years. Their doctor has been very lenient with prescribing, and increased their dose regularly. They are now at incredibly high doses, way higher then that necessary for treatment. Should I refuse to fill? They are in pain, and will go thru withdrawal if I do. And even if I do refuse, someone else won't, and they'll eventually get the medication. Plus, it's not exactly my place to question a diagnosis when I don't get the background information he doctor's do. Personally, I look into the experience of the MD. I almost never question the pain scripts written by an oncologist (cancer doctor) or pain clinic, given their large amount of experience with pain. I have called on excessive prescriptions written by family practitioners, but even with these scripts, it's really difficult to say when a script crosses the line; very few patients receiving these scripts think they are addicts or that they are abusing the medications. Big grey area",
"Since every response I've seen is long and complicated, let me see if I can simplify it. \n\nThere's essentially two pain groups: the one time/emergency/accident type and chronic. \n\nThe first category is simple. Car accident, torn ligament, severe broken bone(s), lawn mower accident. These are all legitimate reasons for a no-refill prescription. Someone has an accident and they go to the emergency room/urgent care or go see their physician and they are evaluated and given medication. \n\nThe second category are your cancer patients, disease complications, severe surgery repercussions (fusing vertebrae, neck surgery, etc). These people tend to stay on pain medication for a long time or forever in some cases. These are completely legitimate reasons for narcotics. Someone who has trouble sitting down because of back surgery, or is in constant pain from bone cancer, shouldn't be denied pain relief. \n\nBoth categories can end up being over-prescribed. Many one-time occurrences are given close to if not a full month of medication in some cases. If a chronic pain patient says that their medication isn't helping, instead of being removed from one and given another, they are occasionally put on a different medication as well as the original. \n\nNow, people who are looking to get narcotic drugs are either going to have an \"accident\" that isn't visible to the naked eye (no broken bones, etc) or a chronic injury that has bothered them since X since EVENT A happened. Now, if the patient follows all of the physician's recommendations, jumps through all the hoops, and the road eventually leads to painkillers, then what is a doctor to do? A patient claims they have pain, they've spent months visiting several times, tried physical therapy, piss clean, and have done everything the physician has asked with no complaints. Boom, meds. \n\nReally though, in the early 2000s pain medication was over-prescribed. Anybody could get them basically anywhere. Compared to the rest of the world. North America is severely over medicated, but doctors prescribe less, and it is harder for John Doe to get an opiate prescription these days. Yes, there is an opiate epidemic. A lot of people were given a legal taste of opiates and then they were taken away. That's led to research chemical abuse, and heroin usage. The opiate prescription abuse is down, but the people who were prescribes during the pill mill heyday aren't going to get kicked off if they have followed all the rules and their doctor isn't crooked. ",
"Drug companies just keep sending pills, even if it's clear that the pharmacy they're sending to couldn't possibly need all the pills. [West Virginia was shipped so many pills in the past few years that it amounts to nearly 500 pills for each person in the state. ](_URL_0_)",
"This was my experience.. I am a normal person, dress nice, speak well and am a professional - I work in an office. \n\nI had a back injury that impinged my sciatic nerve and without opioids I couldn't walk. Besides that, I couldn't think straight due to pain.. \n\nHow can I take care of my family if I don't get treatment? I couldn't.\n\nHere's the problem with \"drug seeking behavior\": it matches the behavior of someone in severe pain. I needed these pills to be pain free. I knew I needed them to do my job. I knew when I was going to run out.. I knew how long it took for the doctors office to approve a refill. I knew half the time they would forget to call it in. I knew the pharmacy hours. I knew if everything didn't go just right, then the prescription wouldn't be refilled before I run out of pills. \n\nOn top of that they make you wait until you have exactly two days remaining to do a refill and you have to call the office to get the process started, then wait a day to find out if they actually did anything because if you bother them they think you're addicted.\n\nBasically the process sets you up to look like a \"drug seeker\" when actually you're just trying to get a refill on something you need that's medically necessary so that you can pay your bills. Of course I was concerned about getting the pills.\n\nIt took two years for my back to heal. Thankfully the person who thought I was a \"drug seeker\" was the pharmacy and I was able to switch pharmacies and continue my treatment.\n\nThis was all over Tramadol which isn't even a strong opiod and I was never addicted but they make you jump through the same hoops as opiods and everyone looks at you like you're an addict.\n\nIts bullshit. People need to be pain free to live their lives.. Life is hard enough already.. Yes people need to be educated about the dangers but until we have a better medication for pain we should not force people to live in pain and make their life hard while they're trying to get treated.\n\nA life in pain is no life at all. If your pain is so bad that you're willing to risk addiction then we should let people make that decision on their own until a better medication comes along.\n\nPain makes people desperate for relief and that behavior is the same behavior as an addict- we should not have a doctor prescribing relief in one moment and then for the same symptoms accusing them of being an addict in the next moment.",
"C'mon now...can't be that naive right? Elderly folks get tons of pain killers, normal people get tons of pain killers. Shit I have crohns disease and was on MScontin and Vicodin at the same time just for everyday pain...one person who gets a script and doesn't need the whole bottle, plus all of the meds coming from Mexico and overseas, leaves a lot of unaccounted for medication on the streets...I was addicted to opiates for my crohns and then turned to heroin...been clean a year and 5 months now, off the methadone for 5 months. It's everywhere man.",
"All drugs should be legal. Who cares what others want to put into their body it's a health problem not a criminal problem. If Dave wants to smoke meth let Dave smoke meth. If Dave kills people on meth put him in jail. If Dave gets caught with meth cause he doesn't kill people and just likes to stay up rubbing one off for 7 hours straight? Who knows but it's a medical problem if it's not causing other people problems. \n\nYou legalize all drugs and the government can now produce these drugs and sell em and tax em legally. You want to do drugs do em! You don't? Don't do em! Remember alcohol and caffeine are drugs. We don't treat gambling addicts like drugs addicts. They are pretty much the same damn thing they just get high in different ways and always end up broke. ",
"It's a media driven story that has never once told the other side of opiate usage about patients that use the product correctly to maintain pain free living independence. Why? because that truth doesn't fortify the false message that everyone who has said pills eventually \"shoots up\".",
"It all started with 'pain is the 5th vital bullshit'. Now you get drug seeking patients in the driver seat If you don't control their 'pain' you get bad patient satisfaction scores which can result in being reimbursed less. So now the government is all concerned about opioid use, but still ding you for not prescribing by lowering reimbursement, fun times being a doctor.\n\n_URL_0_",
"they don't fix it because there is no $$$ in fixing it. \n\nCapitalism run amok. \n\n\n//not a communist...just sayin'",
"It would be very fucking easy! Problem is that big pharma are paying too much to doctors and politicians for any real changes to be made. Meanwhile Jeff Sessions wants to bring back the war on drugs to fight an epidemic that congress & pharma created, while the war on drugs has already proven to be ineffective. They need to come down on doctors who prescribe opiates unnecessarily and they need to treat addicts as a health issue rather than a criminal problem (obviously if they're breaking into people houses & shit to get money for drugs it becomes criminal).",
"Knowing how many pills are being prescribed isn't going to help anything. The problem lies in whether or not the patient is taking their meds or not. If you have medication expenses totaling $1000 a month, and you can live with your pain, selling 90 percocets for $10 a pop covers your heart meds, your blood pressure meds, and the others that keep you alive. Nobody dies from being in pain so many of those prescribed pills get sold off. There is no way to track this without having someone physically check every patients pill bottle every day and count pills. \n\n\n\nThe real problem came about 5 years ago when doctors realized pain pills were being overprescribed, and cut back on how many and how often they could be dispensed. Suddenly thousands of people who are addicted to pain pills are sick. Heroin is cheap and everywhere, and if your sick from not having any pills, and you will be if you take them every day, heroin will fix that for you really quick. No more waiting 45 minutes for swallowed pills to work, just snort a little dope and you feenit within minutes. And it's so cheap compared to pills, I could spend ten bucks a day and not feel sick. 10 bucks turns into 20, 30, 50 bucks a day really quick. \n\n\n\nSuddenly you're unable to snort enough dope to get you high. You hate needles and you swore you'd never do this, but it's getting expensive to snort dope all day and not get the same feeling due to tolerance, so you let your friend shoot you up. The effect is super strong and immediate. Everyone I've ever know who shoots up dope says it's the most amazing and orgasmic feeling they have ever had, and it's cheaper! Now you can use $2 worth of dope to get high, so why not double the dose and feel double good? $2 becomes 10, 40, 100 real quick. When you don't have dope you get sick in a few hours, really sick compared to pills, and now you're broke. You need to feel better to be yourself, so you take some stuff to the pawn shop. Then one day you realize you e taken everything of value to the pawn shop, you're sick and it's awful. Your neighbor has some nice jewelry you could get a few hundred bucks for and you'd be well for a few days, maybe a week. This is how the addict mind rationalizes these things and this is how people's lives are ruined. I should know, I lived out this scenario for 10 years. The first time I snorted too much heroin and woke up covered in crusty vomit was the end of the rod for me. ",
"Old people get prescriptions thrown at them because they are old and probably gonna die soon. Then drug users like myself buy the opiates from the old lady because her social security checks ain't enough to get by on. ",
"I have absolutely no experience in pharmaceuticals, abuse, or any related subject, but its time to give my two cents. What I do have is plenty of people I know who are/were addicted to opiates. Many addicts get started after they are legally and rightfully prescribed opiates after a severe injury or after a surgery. Due to taking them too long or in too high quantities, they become addicted. And some people will lie to keep getting them, or even hurt themselves to continue feeding their habit. Others will buy from others who sell their pills on the side, or any number of other methods.",
"As a former quality engineer (nothing to do with pharmaceuticals), I always wonder why manufacturers can't use lasers to etch individual pills with lot numbers, or something more specific.\n\nThere's a cost associated with that, but I think it's at least worth exploring whether that cost is more or less than the cost of law enforcement, prosecution, incarceration, treatment, premature deaths, and foster care associated with the opioid epidemic. At industrial scale, I'm skeptical that applying a trackable number to pills would be more expensive than the benefit in reducing the above outcomes. The number would better enable law enforcement to identify where diversion bus occurring.",
"in short there's no aggregate data, no one willingly wants to share their manufacturing or sales numbers and the opiates are generics and come from tens of different sources",
"In Canada (Ontario at least), Codeine is Over-the-counter. You can buy 200 Tylenol-2 (15 mg Codeine) just by asking the pharmacists for it. $15.00. \n\nIt was a real problem for me, and it took (literally) a year for me to wean myself off. So for the US it's one thing, and for a country where things are less-regulated like Canada, it can be entirely another. \n",
"This was just my thesis topic, finished a month ago!!! I'm glad you asked. I would be happy to cite any sources if you'd like.\n\nI'll ELI5 this. There are actually a lot of complex answers, and mine is WAY simplified. \n\nThe main logistical problem, at least the way you phrased the question, is that knowledge of abuse doesn't stop abuse. If you prescribe Johnny 60 pills, two pills a day, and see him on Day 24, there should be 12 pills left. But what if there aren't? What did Johnny do? Do we know? How do we find out? He could have taken them himself, he could have sold or given them to a friend (which in America among adolescents is by far the leading cause of introduction to opioids), a friend could have known he was on them and snuck them (also common) - anything. We don't know what he did. Therefore, it would be wrong to punish him for the illegal sale of prescription opioids; for all we know, they were stolen from him.\n\nWell, what if we still know exactly how many pills were prescribed and by whom, and we suspect he's selling them or taking too many because they've disappeared too fast several times? We still can't do anything about it. It's not illegal to take too many drugs, although you're right that that's by definition abuse. It IS illegal to sell, but unfortunately for us, Johnny doesn't wear an \"I SELL ILLEGAL OPIOIDS\" tshirt. He hands over a little foil packet of pills when he gets his pizza for lunch, and the *pizza guy* sells them. How could we track each pill? They don't have chips in them. \n\nNow, all this is assuming we know exactly how many pills are sold and to whom. Things get trickier with \"pill mills,\" where prescriptions are sold for money but not tracked in a system (illegal). Florida had a HUGE pill mill problem until around 2010, when state legislation cracked down by making each prescription be entered in the system. Easier said than done, but their problem has calmed down; the truth is that before 2010, it wasn't seen as an urgent problem. It crept up. (I'll get to that in a minute.) \n\nBesides pill mills, there's also doctor shopping. This is when a totally legitimate prescription is written by your GP, and then you go to your broken-bone specialist and say you're in pain and get another prescription, and then your friend goes to HIS GP and gets another and you buy it off him, etc. Basically, working the system by pretending each doctor is the only one prescribing you pills. This is again rarer now, because of inter-office patient tracking systems, but it's not that rare and still happens. So for this and for pill mills, there ISN'T a count of how many are prescribed, you see? (And yes, you could count the ones left, but nobody does that every day.) \n\nSo, in 2010 several important things happened. First, the nation and different states cracked down hard on drug abuse through different methods. I mentioned the Florida pill mill crackdown. Similar laws were put in place in the next few years, including one that said that Connecticut prescriptions could only be filled for 7 days at first and never refilled for minors (others had similar). \n\nBut the actual main thing that changed addiction was that in 2010 the manufacturers of OxyContin, Purdue Pharma, reformulated their pill. Before 2010, many people crushed and snorted the pill, or crushed it and mixed the powder with water to inject it. Way better and faster high than swallowing the pill, because the point of OxyContin was that it had a 12-hour release of its effects (it didn't -- Purdue lied -- but that's another story). By snorting it, you bypassed that. The Abuse-Deterrent Formula (ADF), though, turned to paste when mixed with water, and it couldn't be snorted or injected. \n\nSo, by 2011, there were many fewer drugs sold on the street, and the main brand previously abused was now not able to be abused. And you're right, OP, cracking down on pills does reduce the number of pills abused.\n\nHOWEVER, what my thesis was *actually* about -- and again, I'm happy to provide proof through cited sources if requested (I'm on mobile rn) -- was that the reduction in number of pills and the resulting increase in price of those pre-reform Oxys still on the market meant that an enormous number of people turned to heroin. Stronger, 8x cheaper on average for a hit, and - as you mentioned - far less traceable, because it was never prescribed. Not to mention any needle-sharing health risks, or the fact of Fentanyl or Carfentanil (which can literally kill you through skin absorption) mixed in.\n\nI'm out of time but hmu for more questions! Again, this is way simplified.",
"Pretty simple: Doctor gets patient hooked on Oxy then the prescription runs out. The patient is now a junky (too bad, no help with that from the doctor) and turns to heroin or stolen pills. ",
"Rx Pricing Analyst here - I work for a major insurance company and PBM (Pharmacy Benefits Manager). We do quite a lot to find instances of fraud and abuse using the data available. Unfortunately, when we identify such fraud we can often only remove said pharmacy from being in our network. We have begun taking more drastic measures such as referring the prescription provider to their state ethics board, when we can find definitive proof. We have a team of pharmacists here that help us identify what makes sense from a clinical perspective. ",
"Spine surgeon here. I write a fuck ton of narcotics. Spine surgery is really painful for a long period of time. You would be surprised at the volume of legitimate prescriptions I write. That being said, it is very difficult to figure out how much pain medicine someone truly needs. Pain is very subjective. For a given operation, I have had patients take about 4 doses of narcotics and flush the rest, and I have also had patients constantly requesting rx(up to 120 pills) for three months after. It is conceiveable that some of those could be diverted, but there's no good way to know. I don't want to falsely abuse a patient of narcotics diversion. Also \"not adequately treating pain\" is a common reason for medical review panels(basically the first step in initiating a lawsuit)",
"People who do not need the medication get it prescribed so they can sell it. An investment of lets say $2000 w/out insurance can bring easily $4500. If you have insurance it could coast $220 and you make $$$ ",
"I came to this thread looking for an explanation of how come doctors continue to prescribe opioids for anyone without adequate controls against abuse. I don't buy the theory that they are all on the take of big pharm.\n\nIt took a lot of reading to find out that:\n\n1. Some (probably not many) doctors are corrupt and don't mind creating or helping addiction.\n\n2. Some doctors are doing their best given the subjective nature of pain and the lying-nature of addicts.\n\n3. In fact limiting the prescriptions has had the unintended consequence of driving many addicts to heroin which increases the risk of overdose.\n\nI'm a big fan of doctors. The vast majority care about their patients' well-being very much. \n\n**That said, I would still challenge the medical community to come up with a protocol for monitoring patients on opiates in order to lower the risk of abuse. At the end of the day, it's their responsibility, it seems to me.** Moreover, they have the knowledge and authority to create such a protocol, far superior to the knowledge of politicians."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://www.amazon.com/Dreamland-True-Americas-Opiate-Epidemic/dp/1620402521/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1495590755&sr=8-1&keywords=dreamland+opiate"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.wvgazettemail.com/news-health/20161217/drug-firms-poured-780m-painkillers-into-wv-amid-rise-of-overdoses#sthash.orOubMH6.dpuf"
],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undertreatment_of_pain"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
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[],
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[],
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[],
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[],
[
"https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5pdPrQFjo2o"
],
[],
[],
[],
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[
"http://www.wvgazettemail.com/news-health/20161217/drug-firms-poured-780m-painkillers-into-wv-amid-rise-of-overdoses"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.mdedge.com/ccjm/article/109138/drug-therapy/fifth-vital-sign-complex-story-politics-and-patient-care"
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] |
|
19lft4
|
What are some examples of artwork by historical leaders?
|
I was just reading the thread about Hitler's motivations and came across multiple mentions of his artistic career. It got me to thinking about how intriguing George W. Bush's [recently leaked paintings](_URL_0_) were, and I wondered what other historically significant political figures dabbled in the fine arts and had some of their work survive to the present.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/19lft4/what_are_some_examples_of_artwork_by_historical/
|
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"Winston Churchill did [a lot of painting](_URL_0_) too.",
"Stalin's also a famous Georgia Poet e.g. Morning or To the Moon",
"This is more literary art than visual, but I think you might be interested in the *Illustrissimi* of Albino Luciani, who would (however briefly) become Pope John Paul I. \n\nCardinal Luciani produced these documents during his tenure as the Patriarch of Venice. They constitute about forty \"letters\" addressed to various persons -- some major historical figures, and others actually fictional or non-human characters. Intriguing addressees include:\n\n- Jesus Christ (somewhat obviously)\n- Mark Twain\n- Penelope (Odysseus' wife from *The Odyssey*)\n- The members of the Pickwick Club, from Charles Dickens' *The Pickwick Papers*\n- Sir Walter Scott\n- Christopher Marlowe\n- The English novelist/poet/theologian [G.K. Chesterton](_URL_0_)\n- Pinocchio\n- Goethe\n- A bear belonging to St. Romedius\n- Guglielmo Marconi, the father of early radio\n\nThere are many more, but the above should give you a sense of the breadth of the thing. These letters addressed each recipient on a matter of philosophy or theology that was intimately tied to their particular exploits, and not all of them are entirely positive in tone. \n\nThe most regrettable feature of the experiment is that no replies were possible.",
"Frederick the Great composed music for the flute. [Here](_URL_0_) is one of his compositions.",
"Emperor Huizong of Song was a quite noted painter, and enough of his work survives to the present to give a clear idea of his very high artistic abilities-he was at any rate a far, far better painter than emperor.",
"While he was in Vienna, Hitler produced hundreds of paintings. They were mainly for postcards and were lost but quite a few survived and fetch a pretty penny at auction these days. Here are a few of them.\n_URL_0_\n_URL_1_"
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://prospect.org/article/critical-look-art-george-w-bush"
] |
[
[
"http://www.museumsyndicate.com/artist.php?artist=667"
],
[],
[
"http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/16ftk1/was_gk_chesterton_a_particularly_influential/c7vs0dw"
],
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foIIbU8qadQ"
],
[],
[
"http://www.bytwerk.com/gpa/hitlerpaintings.htm",
"http://books.google.co.il/books?id=NEEEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA42&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false"
]
] |
|
24iu9t
|
Who was General Tso?
|
Was he a real person or a caricature created to market a certain type of chicken to Westerners?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/24iu9t/who_was_general_tso/
|
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"[Tso Tsung-t'ang](_URL_1_) (alternately Zuo Zongtang) was a Chinese general during the late Qing dynasty, most famous for helping to quell the Taiping rebellion.\n\nI'm about to commit a horrible sin for /r/AskHistorians by linking to a TED talk. Nevertheless, this [talk by Jennifer 8. Lee](_URL_0_) (coincidentally titled \"Who was General Tso?\") is actually rather informative on the subject of American \"Chinese\" cuisine.\n\nTo answer the sub-question, \"General Tso's chicken\" is an entirely American invention."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6MhV5Rn63M",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tso_Tsung-t%27ang"
]
] |
|
9z5wm3
|
How do we have so many pictures and videos of the treatment of Jews in europe during the Nazi-era?
|
Who was taking these pictures/videos? Were they documenting the events to show the horrors to the world? Were the nazis okay with this happening?
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/9z5wm3/how_do_we_have_so_many_pictures_and_videos_of_the/
|
{
"a_id": [
"ea6mm4x"
],
"score": [
6
],
"text": [
"Much of the footage that you see was done by the Nazis themselves. Their plan was to destroy the Jewish people and wanted to have evidence of how they had done so in a very thorough and efficient way. There was also a plan for Führermuseum - a museum whose purpose was to display a selection of the art bought, confiscated or stolen by the Nazis from throughout Europe during World War II. While ultimately the war ended before they could wipe out the Jews and build a museum, they had created a very significant amount of visual evidence of what they had been doing."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
7n0h8s
|
Is there any evidence suggesting that the Roman origin myth, that it was settled by emigrees from Troy (or the Trojan war), had any basis in fact?
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7n0h8s/is_there_any_evidence_suggesting_that_the_roman/
|
{
"a_id": [
"dryh3zi"
],
"score": [
12
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"text": [
"The Homeric epics and Virgil's Aeneid, the telling of the myth of Rome supposedly founded by the descendants of Troy, are, well, myth. The Iliad tells us more about the culture of Archaic Greece at the time that the epic was put in writing than it does about the mythical time of Greek Gods and Heroes that is narrated in the epic. Same with the Aeneid, which is more about Rome and the way Rome saw itself than it about the actual historical origins of the Romans.\n\nThis said, is there evidence that could theoretically link the Latins of the time of the founding and early days of Rome with the Greek world? Let's look at a couple of objects from the archaeological record, the Corinthian Chigi Vase and the Laconian Arkesilas Cup.\n\nThe [Chigi Vase](_URL_0_) is an \"olpe\", a wine jug that in Archaic Greece could have been used to serve wine to aristocrats getting together for a \"symposion\", the custom of elite men getting together to drink wine and enjoy dance, music and poetry. The Chigi vase was made in Corinth, and its protocorinthian style allows us to date its manufacture to about the year 650 BCE. It famously depicts a battle between hoplite forces, but it also includes images of young men hunting lions and riding horses, and of children hunting rabbits with dogs. Seen as an overall narrative, it tells how to become proper Greek heroic men through the stages of youth to the adulthood as warriors. The imagery is very much a product of Greek culture of its era. And yet, it was excavated in Veio, an Etruscan city that was just north of Rome. How did it end up there? It is unlikely that it was brought to Etruria from Greece by someone hoping to find a buyer for such an unique, high-end artifact used in the Greek symposion and depicting Greek culture. It is more likely that it was commissioned by someone from Etruria who was familiar with Greek culture and customs of that time. \n\nThe [Arkesilas Cup](_URL_1_) is a xylik, a vessel used by the Greek elite for drinking wine at a symposion. It is from Laconia (Sparta), and can be dated to about a century later than the Chigi vase. It depicts a very Greek imagery, the loading of agricultural cargo in the Laconian colony of Cyrene, in North Africa. Again, like the Chigi vase, the Arkesilas Cup is very much a product of Archaic Greek culture and elite customs. And yet it was excavated in Etruria, in Vulci, about 100 km north-west of Rome. \n\nTaken together, these two objects tell us that the culture and customs of Archaic Greece were known and sought after in the area surrounding Rome, in a period ranging from the middle of the seventh century to the middle of the sixth century. There is no reason to think that this would have started suddenly in the year 650, so it is likely that there was commercial and cultural contact between the Etruscans and various parts of the Greek world in the early seventh century and possibly mid to late eight century. These are the years that are traditionally given for the founding of Rome (753 BCE) and the time of the seven kings of Rome. So while the founding myth of Rome in the time of Heroes and Gods, is just a myth that is designed to connect the history of the city to the great epics of the Greek world, it is not completely impossible that there was some actual human or cultural Greek DNA in the very early days of Rome, passed through them by the elite Etruscans.\n\n**Sources**\n\nHurwit, Jeffrey M. \"Reading the Chigi Vase.\" *Hesperia: The Journal of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens* 71, no. 1 (2002)\n\nOsborne, Robin. *Archaic and Classical Greek Art*, Oxford: Oxford University Press"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hoplites_Chigi_Vase.PNG",
"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arkesilas_Cup_Cdm_Paris_DeRidder189_n2.jpg"
]
] |
||
3kvbki
|
how do doctors choose which of several medicines that do the same thing they should prescribe?
|
Take Vicodin and Percocet. They both do the same thing. What makes one better than the other?
If the answer is "the doctor was schmoozed by the manufacturer of one drug", then what would the process be without this influence?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3kvbki/eli5_how_do_doctors_choose_which_of_several/
|
{
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8,
6
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"text": [
"Medicines will be ranked as first, second or third choice, etc., for a given condition. Doctors will work through the line until they get a solution. \n\nThis is why you should never give up on meds just because they don't work for you. Second line meds might work far better than first line meds for any given person.",
"If you have two different drugs that target the same problem or same sets of problems you are still going to have some differences between them. They are going to have slightly different risks, or different target groups, or may work better under different circumstances ...there are many different factors to consider. For example, some drugs react badly together so the doctor needs to make sure they select the right drug for the right problem without it reacting with any of the patient's other prescriptions. So it is up to the doctor to learn about these differences, keep up on top of the latest drugs and prescribe the one that is best suited for their patient and their unique history. The doctor can look up the research that has been conducted on the drug, and they can look at the detailed drug label to find out who would best benefit from it. \n\nIn terms of drugs that are exactly the same (e.g. off-brand and brand name drugs) there can still be differences in their efficacy or in who they best target. For example hypothetically whatever coating is used for a certain brand-name allergy drug gives me heartburn, the exact same drug but off-brand has never given me issue. This might be something the doctor takes into account (e.g. the fillers in the pill that help the actual drug work). Another important factor between brand and off-brand drugs are their prices. If the patient is concerned about cost or what their plan will cover a doctor may end prescribing one drug over another."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
28357h
|
Was it common for WW2 fighter planes to shoot for wing-mounted bombs?
|
If possible at all, I seem to suck at googling. And was, say, a B-17's bomb bay as armored as the rest of the plane? Would it be easier to just shoot the plane itself? (not taking escort planes into account)
What about rockets?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/28357h/was_it_common_for_ww2_fighter_planes_to_shoot_for/
|
{
"a_id": [
"ci6yftc",
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8,
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"text": [
"Such precision gunnery was nearly impossible with WWII fighters. Shooting for the bombs would be a much more difficult target than the engine, cockpit, or wing root (where the wing meets the fuselage). There were largely two types of guns in WWII fighters. The first type was wing-mounted guns that were generally configured to converge at a given distance for maximum firepower. Most American and British designs featured this setup, with machine guns being the primary armament. Planes like the Spitfire and Hurricane for the British as well as the Mustang, Lightning, and most US naval fighters for the US. The second type of gun mount was in line with the pilot either through the propeller hub or through the propeller arc. These guns fired straight ahead and often included a cannon through the propeller hub. Many axis planes featured this alignment, though US planes like the P-38 and P-39 also had this type of arrangement.\n\n > And was, say, a B-17's bomb bay as armored as the rest of the plane? \n\nNo, there was little armor at all on a B-17 or most other bombers. To attack from below was difficult but possible. Also, most heavy bombers of the time used internal bomb loads--wing-mounted bombs were generally featured on dive bombers and fighters outfitted for ground attack.\n\n > Would it be easier to just shoot the plane itself?\n\nYes, yes it would. In either configuration accurate gunnery was difficult at any kind of range. Even bombers were moving in three dimensions through the sky and were varying their path--to avoid flak if nothing else. So you had to predict where your target would be by the time your bullets or shells reached it, maneuver yourself into position to make the shot, avoid incoming fire from the bomber and its escorts, *and* provide the right amount of lead for your shots to hit your target. None of these were easy to do. If your shots converged at a point out in front of you due to having wing-mounted guns your fire was much less concentrated at any other distance. You may have been firing six or eight machine guns, but the sky is still a very large place and it becomes an incredibly busy place during combat. Even if your guns fired straight ahead it was still difficult to produce accurate gunnery. Gyro-gunsights were available in WWII in some fighters and they did help, but later improvements like radar-assisted range finding would help even more. Even then, targeting the engines, cockpit, or wing root was much more likely than trying to pinpoint a relatively tiny bomb.\n\n > What about rockets?\n\nThe rockets mounted on planes in WWII were smaller than the bombs were. Most of them were mere inches in diameter, which would make them even more difficult to target than bombs.\n\nAs always, followup questions by OP and others are encouraged.",
"In the book \"General Kenney Reports\" George C Kenney says in the summer of 1942, the woefully out numbered Fifth Air Force had a serious problem. Its bomber pilots thought their bomb payloads were extremely vulnerable to exploding if hit with a bullet. So when a Fifth Air Force pilot or air crew saw any Japanese planes in the vicinity, they dropped their bombs right away and headed for home. \n Kenney put a stop to this by telling them that bombs don't explode until their fuses activate them. Bombs have to fall several thousand feet before the fuses activate them. The pilots did not believe him, so he had to show them, by having a P-39 shoot at a pile of 500 pound General Purpose bombs, from a distance of 500 feet. The bombs did not explode, but the pilots could see the evidence that fifty caliber and even 37 millimeter shells were hitting and ricocheting off of the bombs. That put an end to the early dropping of bombs, by Fifth Air Force bomber pilots. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
5644ds
|
why do many americans support a 2-term limit on presidents?
|
If people don't want a president anymore, they won't vote for them. Why limit it? I've read it's because there's a possibility of it turning into a dictatorship. Can someone explain this? In Canada, the Prime Minister can keep being the Prime Minister until he his voted out of office until the next election and it doesn't seem to be a problem.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5644ds/eli5_why_do_many_americans_support_a_2term_limit/
|
{
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"The 22nd Amendment was passed by Republicans and Southern Democrats (the conservative parties in America) who were strongly opposed to the New Deal and who didn't want to see another Presidency like that of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.\n\nFDR was the only President elected to more than 2 terms. He was elected to 4 terms but served only 3 full terms and then died a few months into his 4th term.\n\nSince then, it seems we're normally pretty sick of whoever is in office after 8 years...though this go around the choices we have are making us appreciate what we have.",
"it was originally simply a precedent set by george washington that a president should politely step down after two terms in order to avoid the tyranny that he and the other founders had fought so hard to escape. it went on as precedent until the 1940s when FDR was elected for a third term. with this, the idea of enforcing the 2-term limit legally instead of relying on candidates to follow precedent was examined, and the courts decided that it would be a beneficial addition to the check and balance system. \n\nbasically, though, i think people want to avoid a putin scenario where after enough time in power it becomes easier and easier to stay in power regardless of what the public wants. if a president had 3 or 4 or 5 terms to stack the deck in their favor for the next election, then the fear is that at some point there would be no chance at getting them out of power. \n\nanother thing to consider is that an important function of the american executive branch is picking the bench for the supreme court. while it's ok to have the same party in office indefinitely, thus eventually stacking the bench to one side, it's much different to have the same *individual* in power indefinitely as that individual could start making arrangements/nominations to the bench that are more self-serving than helpful to the party or the country. ",
"Because we very nearly had a dictatorship/monarchy installed by public support with FDR. He was so popular that he was elected 4 times. That many years in the Presidency allowed him to undermine a lot of the checks and balances in our system. \n\nHe was so popular that his support of a congressional candidate held a massive amount of weight. So much that he was starting to stack congress with people who agreed with his political leanings (but had not accomplished it yet). The fact that the Presidency is the one that names nominees for Supreme Court also proved an opportunity for him to start stacking it with people who agreed to his political leanings as seats became available. He even threatened to expand the number of seats thus putting more people loyal to him on the bench when he faced some problems with the Supreme Court. \n\nA maximum of 8 years greatly hinders how much you can stack things in your favor and acts to keep the checks and balances working properly. ",
"If you take a good hard look at this current election, do you really think the logic of \"if people don't want a president, they won't vote for them\" always plays out perfectly? \n\nThere are many reasons why term limits are important. Why, look no further than the Senate. The Senate is useless, constantly gridlocked, and full of apathetic legislators more vested in their own interests than the good of the country. \n\nWhy? Because they have no term limits. And sitting in those seats of power allows them to slowly amass power, influence, and sway over their electorate. \n\nIf a President can sit in the seat of power indefinitely, *his primary motivation will be keeping that seat*. It incentivizes him to be selfish, to pay off in favors people who can keep him there, and to wage private wars with opponents and up-and-comers. \n\nThis is the problem with career senators. If they can make a career out of it, they're going to focus much more on that than doing their actual fucking job. They'll vote along party lines (because the party will cut their funding or kick them out if they rebel), rather than having the guts to vote pragmatically, and to write legislation that helps us, rather than secures their seat of power. ",
"As a non-american myself, I assume some of these factors (along with the other reasons stated by commenters here) also are part of it:\n\n- a president can create a lot of havoc if (s)he is left roaming free, it makes a lot of sense that after almost a decade you try something entirely new. At the very least you get someone who has been out in the world a bit the last few years. Presidents tend to, unfortunately, be a bit isolated with all those security measures, and after eight years you can probably argue that they have to some extent lost contact with the world they rule over.\n\n- Electing an official that half the nations voters are against and keep him forever is a recipe for disaster. Obama seems to have been doing okay, but he got about 50% of the vote. This means, within reason, that about half the population would want another president and would do a whole deal to overthrow him if they had the means to do so. You have to let the other bunch get a say now and then, because otherwise the nation will start falling apart.",
"In most government systems there are limits on what can be done by any branch of the government- called checks and balances. America has a different political system and needs different checks and balances. One of the differences in the political system is the president has much more power than the prime minister in Canada. There are even a few instances where the president has no way of being restrained! To prevent people from abusing this, one of the checks and balances is the term limit. It prevents the president from doing unrestricted things for an unrestricted period. \n\nIn Canada there is no term limit because there is no need. A prime minister is not nearly as powerful a president. There's much less that Justin can do in the legal framework by himself. He needs support of other branches that are designed to provide oversight. So the prime minister of Canada is prevented from abusing power in a different way. \n\nTL:DR: Two different systems with two different ways of preventing abuse.",
"Washington only served for two terms, and out of respect to Washington, presidents served two terms maximum until FDR got elected to his third and fourth terms. After FDR died at the beginning of his fourth term, the constitution was amended so that there is a two term maximum. It's not that Americans support it, it's that the constitution specifically caps it.",
"Mainly to honor George Washington (1st pres) and its not really that we all support it, its just the way it is, one of the Roosevelt's actually stayed for almost 3 terms cause there actually was no rule about it until after Roosevelt's 3rd term "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
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|
19325z
|
How intelligent are giant octopuses?
|
Small octopuses are very intelligent and can use tools. They are the smartest invertebrates. How does their intelligence change with the increased body and brain size?
P.S.
[If you were wondering, Octopuses is the correct plural](_URL_0_!)
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/19325z/how_intelligent_are_giant_octopuses/
|
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"I don't know, but increased body and brain size don't correlate with higher intelligence so you can't really infer anything from that alone.",
"David Quammen wrote an excellent article on the giant Pacific octopus (The Troubled Gaze of the Octopus, in his Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature). There's only a preview glimpse on Google Books; sorry.\n\nBut it notes that they definitely show certain skills and abilities that seem to indicate they're quite clever. Perhaps if they lived longer and could master fire, they'd be running the planet by now.",
"It's pretty hard to come up with a standard of intelligence which can apply to compare such a wide variety of animals. Still, my impression from classes and from being around a few cephalopods is that they are at least as bright as the more intelligent sorts of fish. ",
"They're about as clever as a toddler, according to the woman at the aquarium I went to recently. They had a giant pacific octopus that successfully distracted her and stole the bucket of food she had for him."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wFyY2mK8pxk#"
] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
1w4rf9
|
How can a curve in spacetime make a a force (gravity)?
|
I know it has to do something with acceleration, but is there a good illustrating of how it is bent to make something move? I have seen those videos where they put a heavy object on a piece of fabric and throw marbles around it, but that doesn't really explain how the force works.
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1w4rf9/how_can_a_curve_in_spacetime_make_a_a_force/
|
{
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"text": [
"The rubber-sheet analogy is an extreme simplification that doesn't really shed much light on the underlying mechanism. It gives a bit of intuitive justification for how the paths of objects can be curved, but as you correctly observe, it doesn't provide any explanation for where their motion comes from, or why gravity appears to be a \"force\".\n\nThe key is that it's not space that's curved, it's *spacetime*. Objects are always moving \"timewards\" in spacetime, at a rate of one year per year. But because of the curvature of spacetime, those timewards paths aren't necessarily parallel. If you put two massive objects at rest near each other, each of their worldlines appears locally straight, but the curvature brings them closer and closer together as time goes on. Gravity feels like a force because if you wanted to keep the objects separated, you'd have to continually apply an opposing force to keep the worldlines separated.\n\nThis is much easier to explain visually, so look at the last diagram on [this page.](_URL_0_) Imagine that the north-south axis is time, and the east-west axis is one-dimensional space. Each particle is moving north (into the future) along as straight a path as it possibly can, with no east-west deviations; nevertheless, they collide at the north pole. \n\nOf course, the actual geometry of the universe is more complicated than a sphere; it's a 4-D space with curvature that changes over time depending on the mass distribution. But if the universe were ever to suffer a [Big Crunch](_URL_1_) (which seems unlikely) that diagram is a decent geometric analogy for what it would look like, with all world-lines being forced to intersect at the \"future-most\" point.",
"Consider this an accompaniment to /u/teraflop's answer.\n\n > How can a curve in spacetime make a a force (gravity)?\n\nThe critical thing to understand is that curved spacetime (gravity) is *not* a force.\n\nImagine sitting in a car. The car accelerates forward and you feel pressure on your back. This pressure comes from the force between your back and the chair in which you're sitting. You feel the force and you accelerate along with the car. This is what you expect from *F* = *m* *a*.\n\nSummary: you feel force, you accelerate.\n\nNow think about your butt. It's sitting on a chair. You feel pressure on your butt, but you *don't seem to be accelerating*.\n\nSummary: You feel force, but you do not accelerate.\n\nWoah, what happened?\n\nNow suppose you jump off a cliff. You're in free fall. Gravity is pulling you downward and you seem to be accelerating downward... but you *don't feel any force!*.\n\nSummary: You do not feel force, but you accelerate.\n\nThe reconciliation of all of this is that gravity is *not a force*. Free falling in gravity is actually the \"natural\" trajectory through space time. Any deviation from this trajectory is true acceleration. This is why you feel force on your butt when you're sitting in a chair: the chair is deflecting you from your natural free fall trajectory.\n\nWhen you have a massive object, it just influences the shapes of the free fall trajectories. It's not a force in the usual sense because as we already saw, things in free fall don't feel any force. Another way to drive this point home is to realize that when you're in free fall, say in orbit around a planet, if you close your eyes you have absolutely no indication at all that you aren't just standing still in space. Free fall in the presence of gravity and standing still in the absence of gravity feel *exactly* the same. There is absolutely no experiment you can do to tell the difference.\n\nEDIT: clarification"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://www.einstein-online.info/elementary/generalRT/GeomGravity",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Crunch"
],
[]
] |
|
2i6lwa
|
Is anything still named after Hitler?
|
I saw a photo once of a U.S. soldier replacing a German street sign which read "Adolf Hitler St." with a painted one that said "Roosevelt Blvd."
Did everything that was named after Hitler get renamed or demolished?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2i6lwa/is_anything_still_named_after_hitler/
|
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"Please, stop posting one sentence answers. If the OP was looking for links to websites without further context, he or she would go to /r/history or /r/askreddit. This is /r/AskHistorians and we have [rules](_URL_0_). Keep in mind that if you keep posting *bad* answers in this sub, you will be banned. ",
"Maybe not entirely irrelevant to your question would be the story of the Viale delle cave ardeatine in Rome.\n\n\nYou might have guessed this road was formerly named 'Viale Adolfo Hitler'. And was part of the greatest charm offensive in history.\n\n\nMussolini wanted to impress Hitler so badly that he invited him over on a tour of Italy that took almost 2 years in preparation. The enitire length of railroad Hitler would travel in Italy was meticulously checked for buildings that weren't up to standard. Shabby looking houses were torn down or obscured from view by massive posters. Every town the train went through was adorned with Italian and Swastika flags and thousands of people were recruited to cheer at Hitlers train in every town.\n\n\nIn Rome Mussolini had roads specially constructed that would appeal to Hitlers love for wide boulevards and because the Termini train station was in an area surrounded by 19th century housing blocks Mussolini built an entire railway station, Roma Ostiense, in an area that showed Italy's new industrial zone and that had an appealing route into the city that passed all the great monuments.\n\n\nThe entire city was all flags and every monument was lit up using gas lamps and airial search lights. The road from the station Ostiense towards the ancient city gate Porta Sao Paulo was named after Hitler himself.\n\nAfter the war it was renamed after the Cave Ardeatini, the location where the biggest massacre inflicted by German forces on Roman citizens had taken place. 335 Citizens where massacred as retribution for a bomb attack on a German army collumn. The Germans tried covering their deed up by blowing up the cave.\n\nSo it's not really named after Hitler anymore. The station still remains as a piece of History that is hidden in plain sight, though.\n\n\nSource: *Capturing the Fascist Moment: Hitler's Visit to Italy in 1938 and the Radicalization of Fascist Italy* by Paul Baxa.\n\nFor anyone that wants to see a good movie about the visit of Hitler to Rome I can advice watching 'Una Giornata Particulare' (or 'A Special Day' in English) it makes use of acutal newsreel footage of Hitlers entry into Rome. _URL_0_\n\n\n*Edits* Spelling is hard.",
"The only thing I know of that's named after Hitler from before WWII is a [particular sort of beetle](_URL_0_) discovered during Hitler's rise to power. Its name hasn't been changed on account of tradition: you don't change a species' binomial name unless it's miscategorized. \n\nOther than that, you'll find things named for Hitler as a joke, like the tongue-in-cheek logical fallacy Reductio ad Hitlerum. I don't know how quickly things were \"de-hitlerized,\" but dismantling such a well-developed cult of personality takes time. The Soviet union spent decades in de-stalinization, which was an effort specifically geared toward taking apart the image and legacy of Joseph Stalin, even changing the name of Stalingrad to Volgograd. ",
"There's one building that is somewhat relevant to your question, but maybe not exactly what you were looking for. It's the building in Braunau am Inn Hitler was born in. In 1938, it was bought by a high-ranking Nazi official and converted into a cultural centre. In 1945, shortly after Braunau was liberated by US soldiers, an attempt by German soldiers to demolish the building was foiled. The building has since been rented by the City of Braunau and the Austrian government, and used for various purposes or sublet to charitable organizations. Of course, all of the parties involved want to prevent the place from becoming a nazi pilgrimage site. As part of a historic ensemble, the building has been under protection for a while. It is officially being referred to using it's address, \"Salzburger Vorstadt 15\".",
"How common was it for things to be named after Hilter in Germany? Was there a Adolf Hitler Road in every town, or was it only saved for special buildings/addresses? ",
"I think this is the photo OP is referring to:\n _URL_0_"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/rules#wiki_answers"
],
[
"http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076085/"
],
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anophthalmus_hitleri"
],
[],
[],
[
"http://imgur.com/QAfHE"
]
] |
|
2aoelu
|
What would stop an AI system with greater-than-human intelligence from being detrimental to humanity?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/2aoelu/what_would_stop_an_ai_system_with/
|
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"score": [
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"text": [
"This question is difficult, mostly because of the notion of \"greater-than-human intelligence\". What does this mean?\n\nIn some sense it seems to imply that intelligence is a unidimensional quantity, and everything fits neatly onto some scale with humans at the top (currently). This is obviously wrong, though. Computers already possess \"greater-than-human intelligence\" when it comes to arithmetic or any rote computational task. Whereas humans are unbelievably better than computers at other things, such as spatial reasoning. (Of course this could change quickly.)\n\nEven if we were to grant that computers would become more intelligent than humans in _every conceivable way_, this by itself would pose no innate threat. So long as computers remained tools for human use--they only solved problems we set them to solve--we are fine.\n\nThe real question seems to be: What would happen if a super-AI system was given free will? What would motivate the AI--what would it want? Would its needs support human well being or oppose it? Would humans maintain a dominant role in the relationship? How would our ethical systems adjust?\n\nThese are philosophical questions outside the domain of computing. Within the domain of computing (and neuroscience, to be honest), what we can say is that we are far, far away from achieving them. (Even the energy requirements of simulating a human brain on modern processors would be prohibitive.) For the moment they are not a practical concern.\n\nI'd recommend posing this to /r/askphilosophy as well.",
"AI works by finding *sequences of steps* that will cause the agent to achieve a goal. Such a goal is imposed externally (e.g. by a human).\n\nThe most familiar example of AI in everyday life is a GPS navigator. You tell it where you want to go, it will calculate the sequence of maneuvers that will take you there. Reusing [an old comment](_URL_0_):\n\n > It works using the A* algorithm (at least in most cases), which is very common in AI and (I think) it existed before navigation. The algorithm knows the starting point and ending point, and the street grid. So it can deduct what the position will be if a given maneuver is performed (this \"what-if\" is the essential part). Then it needs to evaluate if that is a viable possibility or an alternative should be considered - so the straight-line distance is taken as an estimate. If the estimate is good, then it will proceed with analyzing the maneuvers from that point. The programmer wrote the algorithm to figure out a path without knowing the actual maneuvers to be taken. The machine will decide if you have to turn or go straight. If we neglect the optimizations that are specific of A*, the basic algorithm would be analyzing all alternatives (all sequences of steps) until it finds one of them that leads to the solution.\n\nAnother common example of AI is playing chess. The program has the goal to do a check-mate, then it calculates the sequence of moves that will lead to its goal.\n\nSo even if we extrapolate that kind of intelligence into something greater than human intelligence (not unrealistic after Kasparov was defeated in chess) it still can't figure out objectives by itself. Humans *want* to do things, computers just do what they have to.\n\nWith current technology I'm not aware of any kind of AI that generates its own objectives the way humans do.\n",
"Quite honestly, I believe it would be human error in writing the code that created or was the AI that would either prevent or cause the problem. We can't even keep from making billion dollar errors in electronic trading so AI that could make that leap is, at best, a far distant dream. ",
"You're asking this question about computers, but we don't actually know completely why humans turn out empathetic or sociopathic. By the time computer scientists are able to build this 'smarter than human' computer (which I'm assuming means basically an artificial human brain but enhanced) it's reasonable to assume psychologists/neuroscientists will have a very robust model for what conditions create sociopathic behavior that can be used in the design of the AI system you are describing. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[
"http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/25o6pl/how_does_artificial_intelligence_programming/"
],
[],
[]
] |
||
4ssyqq
|
Why was American Revolution helped by European powers, but French Revolution was feared?
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4ssyqq/why_was_american_revolution_helped_by_european/
|
{
"a_id": [
"d5c7hxh"
],
"score": [
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"text": [
"The reason is that the American revolution wasn't viewed as a revolution. The American revolutionaries legitimised their actions by claiming that the England had encroached on their traditional rights as Englishmen. The monarch had acted as a tyrant and rebellion could therefore be defensible, if the aim was to *restore* their rights. The French revolution was a true revolution; society itself was transformed. The sovereign, the King ordained by God, was replaced by a new sovereign, the nation. The American revolution did not change the basis for society itself (atleast until the constitution was ratified); the French revolution overturned the ideology of the ancien régime itself, threatening every society in Europe. One way to exemplify this is to look at the foreign policy of the United States and revolutionary France. The former never tried to export its ideas, but many of the most outspoken proponents of the latter wanted to spread the ideas of the revolution throughout Europe by force. \n\nI hope that makes sense. \n\nSource: Max Edling, 2009: \"Den konstitutionella revolutionens startskott\", in *Maktbalans och kontrollmakt*, eds. M. Brundin & M. Isberg. Edling is the foremost Swedish expert on the American revolution and a researcher at King's College, London. His dissertation, \"A Revolution in Favour of Government\", is an eminently readable revisit of the American revolution from a state formation perspective. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
212dwc
|
Would it be possible to build a magnetic shield for earth to protect us from solar flares?
|
Is it theoretically possible to build a "magnetic shield" that would protect us from an event like the [Carrington Event](_URL_0_)?
If so, what would it take?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/212dwc/would_it_be_possible_to_build_a_magnetic_shield/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cg9s6jk"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Yes it is possible, and the earth already has one! The part of the earths atmosphere that protects us from radiation from the sun and other sources of radiation is called the [magnetosphere](_URL_0_). We could build an artificial magnetic shield by wrapping massive wires around the earth several times and inducing a missive current in the wires. Saying this is \"possible\" is not necessarily saying it's probable though. Building a global magnetic shield is far beyond our current engineering and resource capabilities. Other methods could be used such as an array of satellites all with massive magnetic fields, but these would face the same issues with availability of resources and modern engineering capabilities. "
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_storm_of_1859"
] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetosphere"
]
] |
|
19avlz
|
semiconductors and doping
|
I am studying for the ASVAB and *really* struggling with the electrical section... I'm confused about semiconductors, doping, N-Type and P-Type Material; also how these junctions become a diode of both forward-biased and reverse-bias. Help?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/19avlz/semiconductors_and_doping/
|
{
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"c8mmwhw"
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"text": [
"Si has 4 electrons in its outer shell, and they bind up with other Si atoms in the crystal pretty well, so it is hard for them to move around. If you introduce a few atoms with 5 valence band electrons, those extra 5th electrons are like free agents. They aren't all that needed to bond the crystal together, so they are relatively free to move about. They are said to be in the \"conduction band\" of energy, and you've created an n-type semiconductor. \n \nDo the same thing with a dopant with 3 valence band electrons and you get the opposite situation...a \"hole\". It acts a lot like the opposite of a conduction band electron, except they are slower to move about. And you get p-type semiconductor. \n \nNow what happens if you abut the two types? The conduction band electrons and holes can combine. But the Si in the two areas doesn't have all of the *other* charges equally distributed around...the charges associated with the atomic nucleii. (Those atoms with an extra valence band electron also had an extra proton in the nucleus.) The overall charge of the Si material is neutral, but now you've got one area that has more positive atomic nucleii and one area with more negative. This creates a built-in electric field (called the \"space-charge region\" or \"depletion layer\"). \n \nNow if you want to have current flow through the diode, you first have to overcome that built-in field if you have the diode hooked up in the reverse bias direction. In the forward bias direction, it doesn't cause a problem and current can flow easily. (I'm vastly simplifying this.) \n \nThe [Wikipedia](_URL_0_) article on this is pretty good, and it has pictures that might help. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-n_junction"
]
] |
|
21jd0a
|
Why is South Africa the most developed African country?
|
I ask this as I know other countries in Africa have more natural resources and oil etc, and I know some of the Northern African countries have been superpowers since ancient times but aren't now, so why is South Africa the most developed now?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/21jd0a/why_is_south_africa_the_most_developed_african/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cgdnxow"
],
"score": [
4
],
"text": [
"This might be better suited to /r/asksocialscience.\n\nAlso, you might want to re-frame the question - by any metric of development I'm aware of (for example, [HDI](_URL_0_)), South Africa *isn't* the most developed African country."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index#List_of_countries_by_continent"
]
] |
|
w91we
|
Why was the Soviet military so ineffective in the first half of WW2?
|
After the battle of Stalingrad and Kursk, I know that a new method of warfare that they called Deep Battle was implemented which better leveraged their strengths.
But in the beginning of WW2, they invaded Finland and lost 200,000 troops, and Finland was tiny and isolated. Terrain favored the defenders, and the Finns were determined, but when the American military fought determined Japanese defenders, they destroyed them - and the Japanese were much more powerful than the Finns. How was this possible? And how was it possible that the Soviets lost so much of their army during the initial German invasion?
So why was the Soviet military so incompetent?
Edit: I want to thank everyone for taking the time to reply. Russian history is an area of great interest to me, and with such a complicated, large institution as the Soviet Union, it's often difficult to really piece together exactly why things happened as they did.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/w91we/why_was_the_soviet_military_so_ineffective_in_the/
|
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"I've been wondering this for a long time. Thank you in advance for anyone who takes the time to answer this question. You guys are the best!",
"Stalins purges destroyed all competent Red leadership. Also, Stalin refused to mobilize or move troops to defensive positions when it was clear the Germans were up to something. No red air force probably had an effect as well.",
"There is the mostly, but not entirely, tinfoil hat theory that the soviets were getting ready to attack the Germans. But mostly it was the purges, combined with the fact that all armies in ww2 needed time to learn modern warfare.",
"As a disclaimer, this isn't my particular area of expertise regarding the Soviet Union. These are more educated guesses than previously verified facts.\n\nAside from the purges of the Red Army from 1937-1938 which we're mentioned in previous replies, the Soviet Union's industrial situation and tactics likely had a hand in it. If you look at casualty numbers, the Soviet Union had absolutely enormous casualties in the Second World War. Stalin and the Soviet leadership had little regard for loss of life, and thus a simple quantity over quality approach was often acceptable in warfare. Throw bodies at the problem until it eventually goes away. This is, however, directly related to the state of the Soviet military and industrial sector.\n\nThe Soviet Union, it must be remembered, had only just begun industrialization shortly before the Second World War. Although the Soviet Union's Industrial Revolution took place at an absolutely unprecedented rate, this was not enough to adequately transform the Soviet military into a modern fighting machine like that of Nazi Germany. Upon the outbreak of war, the Soviet Union was at a distinct disadvantage in regards to the quality and quantity of their weapons, armoured vehicles, and so forth. \n\nThis situation began to change as the war progressed. As Total War set in, the full human, technological and material resources of the Soviet Union's vast territory was now directed toward the war effort. In addition, the Soviet Union received material aid from the United States after 1941 in the form of the Lend-Lease agreement. This aid totalled 11.3$ billion, or about 140$ billion dollars in today's terms. Taken from Wikipedia, examples of American aid to the Soviet Union under the Lend-Lease agreement: \"2,000 locomotives and 11,000 railcars were supplied under Lend-Lease. Likewise, the Soviet air force received 18,700 aircraft, which amounted to about 14% of Soviet aircraft production (19% for military aircraft).\"\n\nI'm by no means an expert on this, however these factors are a good place to start.",
"Stalin conducted a huge purge of senior army officers in the mid to late thirties. This had a catastrophic effect on the Red Army, especially as political officers were sent in to examine the decisions (and political reliability) of serving officers. This created a sense of paranoia, and was a damper of creativity and morale plummeted. These problems led directly to a poor performance against the highly motivated Finns.\n\nAfter this, Stalin realised that it was time to start undoing the damage that had been done. Some officers were returned to service from prison. However, this process of healing the Red Army had hardly begun by the time of the German invasion. Stalin kept his troops close to the border, thus permitting the Germans to use the element of surprise, and allowing his troops to be encircled with ease.\n\nSo now you have the situation where poorly led, poorly trained troops were put into a losing battle by incompetent higher ups against troops who were highly motivated, and much better armed and far more numerous than the Finns. Initially the troops were (in a manner similar to what happened to the French troops) given out of date and often conflicting orders, to hold objectives already far behind the fast moving German lines. Depleted units were ordered to attack, etc. It was, just like the French experience, the perfect storm of military incompetence. \n\nWhat is surprising is how quickly the Soviets bounced back. There were some very panicky moments in the high command, and a lot of troops were almost openly used as fodder to slow the German advance, but really the German invasion failed against stiffening Soviet resistance. If the snow hadn't fallen when it did, I doubt the Germans could have advanced much further anyway. They had been worn to the nub by ever increasing Soviet resistance.\n\nStalin reduced the power of the political officers and hastened the return of experienced officers from the gulags. Equipment was improved, supply was improved, and the call to arms for the motherland focused the energy of the people. Although there would be many setbacks along the way, after the first few months it was essentially all upwards for the Red Army, while the German army had started their slow decline.\n\nSo yeah, the Soviets sucked mightily at the start, but they learned fast and overcame their many problems in a most astonishing manner. I'm not sure that many armies could boast of such a turnaround in such a short time.",
"This is a very complex and complicated subject - probably hundreds of books have been written about this both inside and outside of the USSR. Essentially, the reasons could be put into 2 categories:\n\n**First Reason**: The Soviet Union was simply not ready for war when Germany invaded. During peacetime, the military of any major country works on a skeleton crew. It is simply too expensive to maintain a war-time full size army in peacetime. As soon as the war starts, the country will call up reservists, troops will assemble in cities all over the country, get on trains (or ships/planes whatever) and then be transported and deployed to face the enemy. This is call mobilization. For a country the size of the Soviet Union, this process takes a long time - more than a month. When Germany invaded the SU on June 22, 1941, the Red Army was still largely a peace-time army - it wan't mobilized or it was perhaps only partially mobilized. The troops in the interior of the country have not yet joined with those at the border. This gave the German army a significant advantage. The German army could concentrate an overwhelming amount of troops at the key points of their advance. This allowed them to quickly surround and destroy many of the Red Army units facing them. This meant that the mobilizing RA units arriving from the interior could no longer join with anybody and had to make a new front. Essentially, the defeat at the border created a cascading domino effect where the Germans would never really fight the RA at full strength and instead defeat it peace-meal. \n\nYou might ask \"Well, why didn't the SU mobilize sooner? Couldn't they have seen this coming?\" There is a lot of misinformation out there that basically says that Stalin was given accurate intelligence that the invasion was pending but refused to believe it. Actually, intelligence reports he received were contradictory and not reliable. There was no conclusive evidence that war was indeed imminent. However, the Soviet leadership became very concerned about the threat in the early June (about 2-3 weeks before the invasion). Even if mobilization was declared then, it was already too late, since at least 30 days were needed. But more importantly, they reasoned that a mobilization would be provocative to Germany and make war a certainty rather than merely a threat. \n\n**Second Reason** is the difference in troop quality. The the few years before 1941, the RA had grown by nearly 5 times. Soviet military academies had difficulties meeting the demand for qualified new officers. On a more theoretical level, the RA didn't really have a clear and effective doctrine that it would put into use. Senior officers understood that the nature of war had changed dramatically since the days of WWI, especially with the advent of the tank. However, it was not very clear what was the best way to use armor, and without concrete experience it was hard to determine. (The terrain during the war with Finland was not very suitable for armored warfare). To give an example, originally the Soviets had their tanks spread across the infantry. However shortly before the war, in 1940, they decided to organize all the tanks in to 19 mechanized corps. Each corps would have hundreds of tanks. However as experience showed, these mechanized corps, while looking formidable on paper, were actually too big and too difficult to control. Also, as experience showed, tanks actually need a lot of infantry and artillery support - something that these mechanized corps didn't have enough of. Finally, the mechanized corps didn't have sufficient transport which limited their mobility, which is a key feature of armored units. \n\nThe Germans, on the other hand, probably had the best and the most complete doctrine on how to use armor at the beginning of the war. During the interwar years, they put a lot of thought into how armor should be organized, what the proper ratio of tanks to infantry is, and so on. The campaign in Poland was just about the ideal scenario to test their doctrine - it was a real war with a real enemy but still forgiving enough that mistakes would not lead to a disaster. The Polish campaign was also one of several opportunities for German officers and soldiers to gain valuable experience. Thus the German military was well ahead of the RA qualitatively. \n\n**Re: Stalin's Purges**: The misfortunes of the Red Army are often explained by Stalin's purges. However these claims are usually exaggerated. Overall, only about 4% of Red Army officers were killed as a result of the purges. The majority of those affected were returned to the army either before or immediately after the war began. Several of Red Army's very senior officers were killed but there is no indication that they were more talented or capable the the ones who replaced them. Also, while it is true that the RA had a deficit of junior officers, the purges were very top heavy. Of course, the purges didn't help the situation but it would be incorrect to say they were the main or even a very significant reason for RA's defeats of 1941. \n\nSorry for the wall of text but this as I said earlier, it is a rather complicated subject. \n\n**TL;DR** - The Soviet Union was not ready for war operationally - the Red Army wasn't mobilized or deployed at the start the war. Also the Soviet military planners, nor the officers in the field, had sufficient experience with modern warfare (contrary to Germans, which had a ton).\n\nEDIT: Formatting and grammar",
"If I'm not mistaken it was Gen. Zhukov (the same one that defeated the Japanese at Khalkin Gol) that was among the pioneers of \"Deep Battle\" which today's planners basically call \"operational\" planning - somewhere between \"tactical\" and \"strategic\" planning. First implemented at Stalingrad but really really put into effect at Kursk (largest battle of all time!).",
"Why did the Winter War last as long as it did? Some reasons:\n\n* Soviet military leadership: See grond's comment about the purges.\n* Adaptation to the weather: Finnish soldiers grew up and lived in cold climates for their entire lives. By contrast Stalin didn't trust any Russians living near the border/Stalingrad area and decided to bring in troops from the warm south. A Finnish platoon had only to destroy a Soviet field kitchen and thousands would freeze to death.\n* Suomi KP/-31 SMG (later copied as the PPSh-41): Many theorists believed that a clumsy soldier would shoot off all their ammunition in battle if had an automatic weapon. Nobody told the Finns about this though, and their infantry were able to mow down the advancing waves of Soviet troops.\n* Improvised explosives: The Finns had to wait until Molatav cocktails (name comes from the Soviet foreign minister) and AT mines were introduced to effectively counter tanks. These improvised explosives enabled any individual soldier to set up ambushes and eliminate armor (if he was brave enough), and it turned out that enemy tanks with tunnel vision were especially vulnerable to this sort of behavior.\n* \"Blitzkrieg\"-esque school of thought: The Russians fought the war like Fuller would have imagined: massive tank thrusts paving the way forward with infantry bringing up the rear. Unfortunately, like the Americans discovered in France and Italy, and Germans in Africa and Kursk, armored 'thrusts' don't fare vary well against hardened defensive positions and difficult terrain.\n* Finnish tactical flexibility: This is an especially lengthy topic. Check out Battle of Suomussalmi for an interesting case study.\n\nIf western powers had actually backed up Finland with proper weapons and ammunition instead of believing the nation would crumble after a few weeks I think there's a good chance that the Soviets would have bowed out.",
"I might be going a little away from topic but I would argue the Red Army was never an effective army. While other people are correct as to why they were ineffective and got better, they had from 8-10 million casualties during this war. Axis armies from the start of Barbarossa only had less then 4 million. \n\nEven during the battle that marked the official turning of the tides (IMO), Operation Uranus, they won due to having many more men and the Germans low of resources. Poor reactions of German command also failed to recognize the threat of encirclement at all till it was far to late (Though yes it could easily be argued with Hitler controlling form afar it wouldn't of changed the outcome). Many of their first waves were pushed back with high casualties against frankly crappy Romanian soldiers. Why were they able to encircle the 6th army? Because they had a 1 million man offensive directed in two spots. One attacking SE, the other NW. Then after that Germany just had absolutely nothing left through a war of attrition for two years. Proven by the lackluster performance of Operation Winter Storm to free the 6th army, and the following counter attack by the RA in Little Saturn.\n\nWhile the courage of the Russian soldiers is undeniable the military was never effective. They valued their men next to zero, and won through sheer number. While it may look like the second half was different it really was not. Like stated earlier it was just two years of suicidal tactics that lead to Germany being beaten into the ground. Their highly trained German troops were at an end by when the Soviets started advancing west. The Battle of Stalingrad, quiet possibly the most brutal battle to happen on the face of the earth, nothing was pretty but if you send enough men into a meat grinder for long enough. Your under-supplied enemy about 1000miles from home, doesn't stand a chance when they do not get more men of matter. Hell in the Kessel they were using 10s of thousands of Russian men to defend the lines even. Hiwi's I believe they're called.\n\nThey used the same tactics as before. It was just against a different German army now.\n\nNow in their defense now. Stalin was able to wait more than 10 seconds before beginning a new offensive. Thus during counter attacks/attacks they were actually supplied now. Now they had many T-34's which German Panzors could not effectively pierce their armor. Though it should be mentioned Germany didn't have much armor left that was supplied well enough after Feb. 1943. And their communications system while not great it improves drastically. Lastly, great winter gear.\n\nBut still, I would never say they were effective fighting against a shadow of their former enemy. It just looks more effective because Germany was out of men, supplies, and will. They used the same strategy as before\n\nTL;DR *More* effective? Yes without a doubt. An effective army? No. Never ever start a land war in Asia against an enemy that has far more resolve then you could ever dream of.\n\nSorry if this is hard to follow I just sort of started typing. I could write about this for days so this is kind of a skeleton of my full argument. ",
"A Russian historian has written a book on the first ten days of the war on the Eastern Front. Read it, and you'll better understand why the Red Army did so poorly. \n[link](_URL_0_)"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.amazon.com/Stalins-Folly-Tragic-First-Eastern/dp/0618367012"
]
] |
|
65yfx9
|
why do non-native english speakers make the "their vs. there" confusion less often than natives?
|
for reference, the question occurred to me while reading this comment
_URL_0_
does seem confirmed by my experience somewhat. anyone can shed some light on why this is so —— e.g. what does this phenomenon (if real) reveal about say the process of language production?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/65yfx9/eli5_why_do_nonnative_english_speakers_make_the/
|
{
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17
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"text": [
"Because we don't write down a sound, we write down a meaning, and in our native languages their, there and they're (and your/you're) sound completely different, so we don't make that mistake. It's not that we translate, it's just impossible to mix them up because they are totally different things.",
"Native speakers learn the language mainly through listening and speaking as a child. As there, their and they're are pronounced the same they may not be distinguished from each other for many years until a child starts learning grammar. \nOn the other hand when you are learning a foreign language you tend to begin with a greater focus on the grammar than a native speaker and this saves a lot of the confusion with these words"
]
}
|
[] |
[
"https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14088280"
] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
3nyg3e
|
what is cosmic radiation and why is it harmful to life?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3nyg3e/eli5_what_is_cosmic_radiation_and_why_is_it/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cvsce1o"
],
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5
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"text": [
"Cosmic rays originate from outside of the Solar System, and it's essentially high-energy radiation coming from space. Because of how powerful it is, it's not only bad for life, but it's also bad for electronics because it can alter circuit components in them.\n\nAs for life, it's the main barrier for space travel because it's essentially space's form of ionizing radiation; That is, radiation that can separate electrons from atoms. With that said, long-term exposure to cosmic rays (and thus radiation) would lead to acute radiation sickness, and eventually death."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
3htqci
|
why do some governments call snap elections, even if they have a chance of losing?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3htqci/eli5_why_do_some_governments_call_snap_elections/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cuagnhn"
],
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2
],
"text": [
"Sometimes, governments are forced into positions where they have to make unpopular decisions.\n\nSome people will see how the government's hand has been forced and will accept it. But other people might object to the decision they've made, and feel the government is not acting for the thing it claimed to stand for when it was elected.\n\nIn this case, the legitimacy of the government might be called into question. This can result in them losing control, not being able to pass laws, and not being able to effectively govern.\n\nThey might then call an election. They'd hope to be re-elected, and, if they are, they will regain their legitimacy because the public have still voted for them even though they've seen what the government have had to do previously. Even if they lose, this will probably be less damaging than trying to govern without support."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
23fxfb
|
Who do you think is Jack the Ripper?
|
I really just want to know what the historians think who he is
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/23fxfb/who_do_you_think_is_jack_the_ripper/
|
{
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"text": [
"I found patricia Cornwell's case for Walter Sickert pretty compelling [Link to book if you want to check it out.](_URL_0_) Things like details in his paintings that a person uninvolved shouldn't have known as well as paper matching to the letters from jack the ripper to police are interesting ideas as well as her creating a physiological profile that fit him and the ripper. \n\nBut there are a few holes in her case as she is piecing together a 100+ year old crime. Nothing can every be conclusively proved or disproved so any real accusation is basically a highly educated guess. \n\nAt this point in history the only concrete thing to say is that nobody will know conclusively who Jack the Ripper was. \n",
"Academic historians tend to be fairly unconcerned with who the murderer really was. This is partly because we'll never know for sure, and partly because the myth of the Ripper is far more interesting than any reality. As a cultural historian of late-Victorian Britain, I'm fascinated by the response to the murders and what it reveals about British culture and society at the time. The failure of the police to apprehend the murderer created a void; a blank space into which people poured their fears and fantasies. It's a great way to explore ideas about gender, race, crime, the city, and the press. This is much more interesting (to me at least) than desperately speculating about the identity of the killer. Historians tend to leave this stuff to the Ripperologists...",
"A sort of followup question: I'm reading about H.H. Holmes right now and came across a mention that some people believe he was Jack the Ripper. Something about him being in London at the time. Can anybody offer a more scholarly analysis of this theory? It didn't seem particularly sound to me, but he did do some pretty nasty stuff in Chicago at the Colombian Exposition so maybe....\n\nIs this a theory that has ever been taken seriously by anybody? What is the likelihood of it being true? "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://www.amazon.com/Portrait-Of-Killer-Ripper-Berkley/dp/0425192733"
],
[],
[]
] |
|
sru7h
|
[Meta] Can we start a FAQ link of Recommended History Books?
|
It might be nice to start to compile a list of recommended books, I know we've had a few posts about it, but it would be useful to have them easily accessible. My thought is we can start a section on the [FAQ](_URL_0_) that has books, and with each book we can link to the recommendation from each of the threads.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/sru7h/meta_can_we_start_a_faq_link_of_recommended/
|
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"text": [
"we have a link on the sidebar for finding good resources, however compiling a list of books can get unwieldy quick. WARFTW alone would contribute like 40 books just on the Battle of Kursk.",
"We would need to start a whole wiki, and even then it would just turn into a list of books that would be so long it that people would feel buried.\n\nLook at US History:\n\n-Age of Exploration\n-Colonizaton\n-The Colonial Period\n-The Revolutionary Period\n-The Early Republic\n-Age of Jackson/Antebellum America\n-The Civil War\n-Reconstruction and Industrial America\n-The Progressive Era\n-World War War I\n-Interwar America\n-World War II\n-Post-War World II\n-Modern America\n\nThen you get specific, and stuff gets crazy. This is for a country with a hsistory that spans 500 years. When you're covering 10,000 years of history, it gets insane.\n\nIf you got a bunch of US Civil War buffs together, we might be able to agree on a general history of the war, but I doubt you could get a bunch of us to agree on five specific books that everyone should read. If you expand that to cover all of US history, I really don't know what to tell you, except avoid Howard Zinn. \n",
"I think a collection of those \"recommend me books\" threads in one, updated post would be a nice addition to the sidebar. I could do this, if someone wants me to.\n\nBut there is a problem with the big list of recommended books you want: There are too much of them! Most people asking for books here will only read a few of them. I have read many books on World History and often recommend some of them here. Most of the time I ask the OP to be more specific or what subject/time period/geographical area he is interested in, because \"tailor-made\" recommendations are much more helpful.",
"Very difficult, because books on historical topics are rarely *definitive*, and if they're not definitive, the precise angle they take is more important than the coverage of the topic itself.\n\nAlso there's a big problem with books that are *important* but *not necessarily right*.\n\nBooks like Syme's *The Roman Revolution* and Finley's *The World of Odysseus* are undoubtedly terrifically important and influential books, but there are probably not many people today (or at least I hope not) who would subscribe to the detail of much of what they say.\n\nI'm really not sure that such a list is possible, unless it's simply a list of \"[/r/askhistorians](/r/askhistorians) regulars' favourite books\"."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://www.reddit.com/help/faqs/AskHistorians"
] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
3vatki
|
the congressional vote to repeal no child left behind, and the impact it will have on the federal push for common core standards implementation.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3vatki/eli5_the_congressional_vote_to_repeal_no_child/
|
{
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"text": [
"Remember during the Bush administration when a school's funding was to be based on test scores, and all the kids who failed the tests still got to move on to the next grade? That was no child left behind.\n\nNow that they are finally acknowledging our failing education system, they want to make kids pass the tests in order to move on like they did when our education system wasnt such a joke, and steer funding away from being solely dependant on testing results.\n\nOf course there is A LOT more going on, but this is the main point."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
262sgd
|
Can light waves experience interference?
|
If waves like radio waves and sound waves can experience interference, can light waves? I understand that light is both a particle and a wave, but wouldn't some type of interference occur with some other wave "hitting" the beam of light?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/262sgd/can_light_waves_experience_interference/
|
{
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"chn3wo5",
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"text": [
"Yes, one of the most well known phenomena is [two slit interference](_URL_0_)",
"Two small addenda: First, radio waves and visible light waves are essentially the same stuff, the only real difference is that visible light has a much higher frequency. The reason why we give them different names is partly historical and partly because we refer to different parts of the [electromagnetic spectrum](_URL_0_) by how they are usually generated or used to have shorthands for different frequency ranges.\n\nSecond, interference is a fundamental result of our mathematical description of waves: amplitudes at a certain point add up. So anything we would call a wave displays interference/diffraction phenomena. Even many things we wouldn't ordinarily call a wave display diffraction phenomena, such as nuclear spins in [magnetic resonance imaging](_URL_1_)."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c2/Single_slit_and_double_slit2.jpg/350px-Single_slit_and_double_slit2.jpg"
],
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_spectrum",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physics_of_magnetic_resonance_imaging"
]
] |
|
ead289
|
For some species of ant, like Army Ants, what determines whether they become a small worker, a large soldier, a male, or a queen? Is it random or do queen ants choose which profession ants will be when they lay the eggs?
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/ead289/for_some_species_of_ant_like_army_ants_what/
|
{
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"text": [
"It depends on the species, but among many species of ants the caste that an egg develops into is based on differences in nutrition received through care and feeding by other ants as the larvae develops -- not by anything that the queen does.",
"This process actually varies quite a bit from one species to another. If you can access it, check out [Schwander et al. 2010](_URL_1_), which discusses caste determination systems in several different kinds of ants. Essentially, there is a continuum from purely environmental caste determination (as seen in some wood ants like [*Formica exsecta*](_URL_3_)) to purely genetic caste determination (as seen in the little fire ant [*Wasmannia auropunctata*](_URL_0_)). In the former case, caste is typically determined by some combination of food resources received during development and other factors about the colony itself, while in the latter case an ant's caste is determined at birth. Many species are somewhere in between these extremes however, and use a combination of genetic predisposition and environmental factors. However, I do want to point out that neither of these is really random, and if any other individuals are directly determining the caste of workers, it is probably more likely to be other workers rather than the queen.\n\nThough I'm not sure if this applies to *all* army ants (of which there are a few hundred species), one of the better studied species, [*Eciton burchellii*](_URL_2_) seems to be one of those with caste determination that is neither fully environmental nor genetic. As described in [Jaffé et al. 2007](_URL_4_), there clearly is *some* genetic component; queens mate with multiple males, and individual males vary in the proportions of castes that their offspring develop into. However, this genetic component is far from capable of fully predicting caste either, since all males *can* have offspring of any caste. The above authors found that additive genetic variance from fathers accounted for 15% of the variation in caste phenotype, so the remaining 85% of variation is explained by some combination of environmental factors and influence from the queen's DNA (which wasn't directly tested)."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[
"https://photos.smugmug.com/Ants/Taxonomic-List-of-Ant-Genera/Wasmannia/i-GZG2nHx/0/a04580c6/X2/auropunctata24-X2.jpg",
"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S016953470900367X",
"https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d3/Eciton_burchellii_army_ants.jpg",
"https://naturebftb.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Formica-exsecta-John-Walters-1a-1500.jpg",
"https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rsbl.2007.0257"
]
] |
||
47julj
|
how are professionals able to spot counterfeit signatures if a person can't sign their name exactly the same each time?
|
Any human action is somewhat _URL_0_ seems like any small differences between two of the same signature would be inconclusive.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/47julj/eli5_how_are_professionals_able_to_spot/
|
{
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"text": [
"It's more about finding consistent patterns than about finding perfectly consistent shapes to each figure. Maybe the signer does wide, loopy lowercase L's. They won't all be exactly the same, but they're always wide and loopy. If the L on a signature is thin and stunted, then it casts doubt on the signature.\n\nMaybe he lifts his pen between a specific two letters every time, maybe he dots the i as he makes it, instead of after finishing the word. Maybe the pen moves slower on one letter, and leaves a thicker line of ink because of it. All of these little things are more consistent than the shape exactly matching every time - find them all to be consistent, and it's almost certainly real. Find several discrepancies, and there's a good reason to doubt the signature."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"inconsistent.It"
] |
[
[]
] |
|
6tc4qi
|
why is low blood pressure and a low heart rate good, if that means that your heart is pumping less often and not pushing as hard?
|
It seems counter-intuitive to me. High blood pressure means that your heart is pushing hard, high pressure against resistance means more blood flow. High heart rate means that your heart is pushing more blood, again which means more blood flow. Why should a slower, less forceful heart be a good thing? Cardiac output is heart rate times stroke volume. High blood pressure means higher stroke volume. So high heart rate and high blood pressure means high cardiac output.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6tc4qi/eli5_why_is_low_blood_pressure_and_a_low_heart/
|
{
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"text": [
"As long as your body functions normally at a lower pressure or pulse, that means it's doing what it needs to with less effort and less strain that could be damaging over time. It also means there is more room for pressure or pulse to increase later in life without necessarily becoming a problem.\n\nBut there are people whose hearts underperform and their pressure or pulse is *too* low, causing them problems with circulation, and they take medication to correct it.",
"Low HR and BP are considered \"good\" because it means your heart is functioning efficiently (i.e. performing its job with less effort). Whereas, high HR and BP indicate your heart is having to strain to do the same job. Of course, you can have HR and BP that are too low, but generally speaking, the lower the better (to a point). "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
|
3eg3w5
|
How did Buddhist-majority nations reconcile state violence (wars and so on) with Buddhist precepts of non-violence? Did they bother to do so?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3eg3w5/how_did_buddhistmajority_nations_reconcile_state/
|
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"text": [
"A really interesting case study on this is japan during WWII and Zen Buddhism.\n\nTwo important works on this topic are \"Zen at War\" and \"Zen War Stories \" by Brian Daizen Victoria. These books examine how Zen Masters justified and contributed to pro war propaganda.\n\nHere are some quotes from Zen masters during WWII:\n\n > \"[If ordered to] march: tramp, tramp, or shoot: bang, bang. This is the manifestation of the highest Wisdom [of Enlightenment]. The unity of Zen and war of which I speak extends to the farthest reaches of the holy war [now under way].\" - Harada Daiun Sogaku \n\n > \"Showing the utmost loyalty to the emperor is identical with engaging in the religious practice of Mahayana Buddhism. This is because Mahayana Buddhism is identical with the law of the sovereign.\" -- Seki Seisetsu \n\n > . \"I wished to inspire our valiant soldiers with the ennobling thoughts of the Buddha, so as to enable them to die on the battlefield with confidence that the task in which they are engaged is great and noble. I wish to convince them.... that this war is not a mere slaughter of their fellow-beings, but that they are combating an evil.\" -- Shaku Soen \n\n > \"In the present hostilities, into which Japan has entered with great reluctance, she pursues no egotistic purpose, but seeks the subjugation of evils hostile to civilization, peace and enlightenment.\" -- Shaku Soen \n\nSo what we are seeing are men who are just as susceptible to nationalism as anyone else who are able to justify aggression using twists of Buddhist logic. Its the nature of belief structures that they can always be twisted to support a world view.\n\nAlso, understand that not every \"Buddhist\" \"takes the full precepts\". The full precepts would only be taken by Buddhist monks and nuns who \"renounce the world\". The average soldier would not have necessarily taken any preceipts personally. Even if a soldier has received something like the Soto Bodhisattva precepts which includes instructions not to kill, these types of things can be twisted subjectively.\n\nFor example:\n\n > \"\"It is just to punish those who disturb the public order. Whether one kills or does not kill, the precept forbidding killing [is preserved]. It is the precept forbidding killing that wields the sword. It is the precept that throws the bomb.\" -- Sawaki Kodo \n",
"Interestingly enough, I did a paper on this very question in my bachelor (comparative religion). My case study was Sri Lanka, but I'll give examples from other nations here as well, for a more 'universal' approach. \n\nThere are three means of reconciliation of violence and Buddhism I will distinguish here. Incidentally, these are not unique to Buddhists. Other religions handle their formal rejection of violence in a similar manner. \n\nFirst, Buddhism, like other religions, is linked to cultural and national identity. Buddhists would fight in protection of their nationstate and what they perceive as the \"keepers of the tradition\". They apply a larger-than-life mentality to the warfare. That is to say, the importance of continuing the tradition outweighs the views on morality they hold. (Daniel Kent (2010), 'Onward Buddhist Soldiers, Preaching to the Sri Lankan Army' in: *Buddhist Warfare*) \n\n > Soldiers don’t shoot the enemy out of personal anger. If they shoot they do so for the common good. This war is on behalf of the country, people, religion, region, and motherland. It would be negative karma to shoot one’s neighbor over a land conflict, but the intention here is a good one.\n\nSecond, there are attempts to de-humanize the opponents. This is very similar to Christian and Islamic justification of violence. Opponents are represented as possessed by demons, thereby transforming the violence from a mortal to a sanctified action. (in: Michael Jerryson (2010), 'Militarizing Buddhism, Violence in Souther Thailand' in: *Buddhist Warfare*)\n\n > [B]ecause whoever destroys the nation, the religion, or the monarchy, such bestial types [man] are not complete persons. Thus we must intend not to kill people but to kill the Devi [Māra]; this is the duty of all Thai. \n\nThird, karmic sacrifice. This is a classic case of multiple interpretations of (somewhat) ambiguous theology. Some individuals are considered such sinful beings, that they will only commit more crimes the longer they live. Killing these individuals can be considered a heroic act, because the killer will sacrifice his own karma in order to prevent the victim from committing more crimes and going to hell. (in: Derek Maher (2008), *The Rhetoric of War in Tibet*)\n\n > [K]illings [can be] undertaken in order to preserve sinful opponents of Buddhism from committing worse crimes that could be expected to earn them more severe karmic retribution than if they had not been killed.\n\nLastly, on a more personal note (hope that's allowed) there are some understandable misconceptions about Buddhism. (these same misconceptions incited my initial question for the aforementioned paper). Buddhism has many forms. And the majority of those forms has aspects similar to other religions. Please don't believe that \"Buddhism is more a philosophy than a religion\". Many forms of buddhism have gods, demons, heaven, hell, prayer for help, and rituals with magic properties. Therefore, evil and violence toward perceived evil is not at all uncommon among buddhists. If someone tells you that that is not real Buddhism, that would be a theological belief, not a statement supported by scholars. ",
"One of the more interesting one cases of Buddhism and war is Japan.\n\nHistorically Buddhism in Japan has being subordinated to the state and began as a religion of the upper classes. between the 10th and 17th centuries Buddhism temples and monasteries were incredibly powerful and military orders of warrior monks (not unlike Christian military orders like the knight templar), known as the Sohei. Those orders fought both to defend their own temples and in attacking rival sects. They eventually grew so powerful that they were viewed as major threats by would be unifiers of Japan during the Sengoku era. Nobunga, Hideyoshi and Tokugawa defeated them and banned them under in Tokugawa Japan.\n\nThat did not end the relationship between the state and Buddhism became a defacto state religion in the Shogunate, where families had to associated themselves with a nearby Buddhist temples. Buddhism in Japan was therefore subordinated to the state.\n\nZen Buddhism had always being favored by Japan's warrior classes, the sect advocated indifference between life and death, and stressed the importance of discipline and that of an austere life style. During the 20th century Zen Buddhism became actively involved in promoting war, especially during WWII.\n\nThey justified it by:\n\n1) Religion must support the state at all costs, because should the state ever collapse then the chaos it produces would in turn produce far greater violence than otherwise\n\n2) Killing could be justified if the people killed are \"evil\", and that failure to kill evil men actually constituted a breach of Buddhist beliefs. It is not compassionate, for instance, to let an evil man live so that he can harm others later on.\n\n3) The war being fought in East Asia was a \"just war\" based on eliminating western colonialism in Asia and the establishment of a greater Asian co-prosperity sphere, and hence on the long run, eliminate war.\n\n4) The emperor is an ultimate enlightened being and thus deserves special moral authority.\n\nThere were of course, dissidents to militaristic interpretation of Buddhism, but as religion was subordinated to the state, views favoring the needs of the state tended to be much more popular.\n\nSources: Critical Buddhism: Engaging with Modern Japanese Buddhist Thought By Mr James Mark Shields\n\nZen at War by Brian Victoria",
"This is fascinating and a question I'd wondered about myself -- particularly as I'd mostly fallen for the sanitized version of Buddhism popular in the West. \n\nOn the one hand, these explanations indicate that Buddhism is largely like other religions in formally eschewing violence, but finding convenient exceptions when necessary. \n\nGiven the great commonality among religions in this regard, I wonder if a further question might be whether there are any *differences* between Buddhist-majority nations and other-religious-majority nations on this subject -- and differences that might plausibly be attributable to Buddhism itself (and not merely attributable to common geographical or historical circumstances).\n\nFor example, is there anything in the ongoing rapid reconciliation between Vietnam and the United States (particularly as compared to the ongoing wars in the Middle East or Nothern Ireland, etc.) that is attributable to Vietnam's majority Buddhism? Or is that simply a red herring that merely clouds the decisive role of historical circumstance? \n\nAlso, I recall that in China, some of the early Qing emperors, I think, were devout Vajrayana Buddhists, but also were quite militaristic and violent -- responsible for just as many atrocities as other emperors. I would be grateful if anyone knows of this and could elaborate? Thanks!",
"Are we allowed to discuss the Burmese's treatment of the Rohingya here? Or is that too recent, even though it goes back to 1948?",
"Anyone know of good books on king ashoka rule over india, that was a buddhist kingdom "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
2qgr1t
|
i try to light my gas stove, but it doesn't light. i smell the gas several seconds later. i turn on another one, and that ones lights. why doesn't that flame blow my house up?
|
Isn't the smell gas vapor? How is that different then gas filling a room and blowing up with a spark?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2qgr1t/eli5_i_try_to_light_my_gas_stove_but_it_doesnt/
|
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"text": [
"They put bitterants in the gas that humans are *extremely* sensitive to. You smell amazingly small traces of it. \n\nYou need a decent amount to get a decent bang.\n\nCertainly you could do some damage if you were trying but the gas needed for the stove for a few seconds isn't really that dangerous. Be safe and give a bit for it to clear out, but it's no that big of a deal if you just flip the gas on and off.",
"No where near enough gas has gone through your house. Youd have to empty a very large amount to make your house explode. The gas that has leaked has dispersed itself too much to even ignite.",
"The percentage of fuel to air is no where near high enough to even puff, let alone explode.",
"I worked in the natural gas industry in the 1990's. One thing I remember very well is the average LEL and HEL (Low Explosive Limit and High Explosive Limit) The concentration of gas to air needs to be roughly between 3% and 5% to form an explosive mixture. The amount released by stoves would take a few minutes at least before this ratio was met. (Depending on the size of your house, air movement, temperature, humidity, etc)"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
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|
20x25o
|
Why are water droplets equal distance apart?
|
I heard someone say that, if you drip water out of a cup, the water droplets near the ground will always be the same distance apart. Is this true and, if so, why?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/20x25o/why_are_water_droplets_equal_distance_apart/
|
{
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"text": [
"Imagine instead of liquid water, we have the flow of identical marbles out of a spigot. That is, one successive marble after the other with the same initial horizontal velocity. The time between successive marbles starting to fall will be constant, let's call it Δ*t*. All marbles will follow the same trajectory, so the separation between successive marbles at any time is just the amount of distance corresponding to Δ*t* along the trajectory. This means that at any fixed point in the trajectory (e.g., the ground), the separation between successive marbles will be the same. Also the separation increases as the marbles fall further (at least until they've reached terminal velocity).\n\nIn fact, we can easily solve for the vertical separation between successive marbles neglecting air resistance. If the distance to the ground is a height *h*, then the time for one marble to reach the ground is sqrt(2 *h* / *g*). The next marble will have been airborne for sqrt(2 *h* / *g*) - Δ*t*, which means it will have fallen a distance *h* - Δ*t* sqrt(2 *g h*) + *g* (Δ*t*)^2 / 2. So the vertical separation is just Δ*t* sqrt(2 *g h*) - *g* (Δ*t*)^2 / 2 (as we expected it increases with drop height *h*).\n\nNow, the question is why a continuous stream of water breaks up into droplets, [which is not quite as simple to answer](_URL_0_). Naively, the stream has surface tension holding it together, but the acceleration will cause the stream to stretch for the same reasons as above. [At some point](_URL_1_) surface tension is overcome and we get water droplets for which the marble analysis holds. BTW, certain fluids (such as honey) are viscous enough to disfavor the formation of droplets, and instead exhibit [other interesting phenomena](_URL_2_)."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_thread_breakup",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plateau%E2%80%93Rayleigh_instability",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zz5lGkDdk78"
]
] |
|
3m6vov
|
What was the siege of Malta significance in WW2 and what are some good sources to read on the subject?
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/3m6vov/what_was_the_siege_of_malta_significance_in_ww2/
|
{
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"text": [
"Malta had a great strategic significance for the British in the Mediterranean, as a result of its geographical position. Being in the centre of the Mediterranean, aircraft, ships and submarines based there could interdict any shipping trying to move past it. This proved to be especially valuable, as it controlled the shipping lanes from Italy to North Africa. The RN based two main forces there - Force K, and the 10th Submarine Flotilla. Force K was a surface force, based around two light cruisers, *Penelope* and *Aurora*. It destroyed several Axis convoys, before increased German and Italian bombing forced a retreat. The 10th Submarine Flotilla was based in the old lazarette on Manoel Island in Marsamxett Harbour. Composed mainly of small U-class submarines, it was highly effective at interdicting shipping to and from North Africa. The flotilla produced some highly successful submarines, including HMS Upholder, which sank ~120,000 tons of shipping, making it the most successful British sub of the war. It provided a base for the RAF to launch raids on the Italian coast, and for repairing ships damaged in the waters around it. The British carrier *Illustrious*, heavily damaged by Stukas while escorting a convoy to Alexandria, received major repairs in Valetta's Grand Harbour. Aerial reconnaissance from Malta also proved useful. For example, Martin Maryland recon aircraft from Malta were able to confirm the presence of the Italian fleet at Taranto before the RN launched their raid. Once the siege had been broken, Malta also provided an excellent base for offensive operations against Sicily and southern Italy. The Italians and Germans were, of course, trying to prevent the British from using all of these functions. As far as books go, the big recommendation is James Holland's *Fortress Malta*, which is an excellent popular overview of the siege. Bradford's *Siege Malta 1940-1943* is also worth a read. If you can find them, the British official histories *The Air Battle of Malta 1940-1942* and *The Mediterranean Fleet* will give a good overview of the British side of the battle.\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
2bofr5
|
What are the consequences of significantly skewed gender ratio among human population? Are there any documented cases?
|
The biggest argument for ban on pre-natal gender determination in India is that it will increase abortion of female foetuses and that will lead to societal unrest. Is there any scientific/statistical/historical evidence to warrent this fear of skewed gender ratio?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/2bofr5/what_are_the_consequences_of_significantly_skewed/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cj7dlkb"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"Check out [this article on missing women of Asia](_URL_0_) and China's [one-child policy](_URL_1_), both of which outline actual cases of sex disparity and consequences of such."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_women_of_Asia",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_child_policy"
]
] |
|
67ed2o
|
Why does Israel exist?
|
I will fully admit I am coming from a place of relative ignorance here but my uninformed understanding is that sometime following WWII, the U.N. created the state of Israel. My question is why. Was it just so western nations could have an ally in the region? Why is it a traditional ally of the U.S. and other western nations? And what happened to the people who claimed that territory already? I am assuming the creation of Israel is only one part of the continual Middle East conflict, but didn't its sudden creation make a complicated situation infinitely more complex? Why would claiming that your ancestors owned the land thousands of years ago hold any weight in geopolitics?
|
AskHistorians
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/67ed2o/why_does_israel_exist/
|
{
"a_id": [
"dgpt8kk"
],
"score": [
13
],
"text": [
" > I will fully admit I am coming from a place of relative ignorance here but my uninformed understanding is that sometime following WWII, the U.N. created the state of Israel\n\nThe UN did not create Israel. It proposed a partition of what was known as the British Mandate for Palestine, originally envisioned as a Jewish state someday to come, where Jews and Arabs would get a state apiece. When this proposal passed the UN General Assembly, which was *nonbinding*, a civil war was launched between Jews and Arab Palestinians. The civil war turned into an international war when, in May 1948, Israel declared independence and the Arab states around it invaded (they had previously only been contributing resources and personnel more covertly in the civil war). This war is what Israel rose out of, not a UN decision.\n\nFurthermore, Israel was conceived of well before the 1947 partition proposal. Jews had been pushing for a state in the area since the 1880s, and the British proposed a Jewish state there (and partition) for the first time in 1937. It was not a new, or post-Holocaust idea.\n\n > My question is why. Was it just so western nations could have an ally in the region?\n\nThe reason behind supporting the creation of Israel was moral and strategic. Morally speaking, the Holocaust absolutely contributed. But there was also a moral imperative because of the feeling that permeated the world that self-determination should be given to all peoples, a theme that animated the creation of many new countries around then. Coupled with the belief by many that Jews simply deserved a homeland of their own and had none, the moral case was made. The strategic case was less clear, since it was unclear which side a Jewish state would take in the brewing Cold War over time, but both superpowers chose to support one, believing it might ally with them. The US was the first to *de facto* recognize Israel when it was created, for example, choosing to issue such a recognition 11 minutes after Israel's declaration of independence. The Soviets issued a more forceful *de jure* recognition a mere 3 days later, well before the US did. Israel eventually gravitated towards the west, but it's worth remembering that many of Israel's founders were very far-left, to the point of being socialist in many regards.\n\n > Why is it a traditional ally of the U.S. and other western nations?\n\nThis began with the shift of the Arab states to rely on the Soviets for arms. Israel was seen as a counterweight when the West could no longer rely on Arab allies, who the US had tried to entice as well. Israel's success since then made it a powerful strategic player in the region.\n\n > And what happened to the people who claimed that territory already?\n\nWhich? Are you referring to Palestinians? Arab states?\n\n > I am assuming the creation of Israel is only one part of the continual Middle East conflict, but didn't its sudden creation make a complicated situation infinitely more complex?\n\nDepends who you ask. That's kind of a difficult counterfactual to figure out, though.\n\n > Why would claiming that your ancestors owned the land thousands of years ago hold any weight in geopolitics?\n\nSee above."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
1x0m5l
|
On average, how accurate is the modern ascribing of medical conditions to historical figures?
|
Some sufferers of fibromyalgia have postulated that Florence Nightingale was also a sufferer, based on (I believe) accounts of her symptoms in her diary. I can't find much serious research backing this particular example up, but it does seem that the application of modern medical knowledge to contemporary accounts of historical figures and their illnesses is reasonably common. How accurate is this? And how does it change our understanding of the historical figures involved?
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1x0m5l/on_average_how_accurate_is_the_modern_ascribing/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cf76bly"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Even in situations where an accurate diagnosis can be made, the utility of this kind of diagnosis can be questionable.\n\nAll diseases are, to some extent, culture-bound. How we interpret and feel about symptoms and treatments, and how those feelings and interpretations inform our actions are directly tied to what we believe to be happening. For example, there was a time and place in which finding suppurating sores on one's skin would be a relief (it means that the bad stuff is coming out!). \n\nWhile there's perhaps some ways that knowing what a historical figure \"really\" was suffering from might help us better understand the past, it can also get in the way of understanding it if you apply it too rigidly. \n\nSometimes it works best to accept that what someone was suffering from was exactly what they and their contemporaries believed it to be, even if it's not a real thing anymore. If there's no context to understand, say, fibromyalgia, in the 19th century, declaring that a case of hysteria was 'really' fybromyalgia might obscure more about lived experience and context than it reveals."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
q9jz1
|
Darwin's use of "Natural Selection"
|
History prof recently mentioned about the **importance** of Darwin's use of Natural Selection. I had never thought about the use of natural selection to describe his theory as a big deal, but apparently it had some conflicts with his peers and long lasting ramifications in his field. We don't have time to go into great detail in the course.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/q9jz1/darwins_use_of_natural_selection/
|
{
"a_id": [
"c3vtfu2"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Is there a question here? I'm having a little trouble figuring out what kind of answer you're looking for."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
5jhpfw
|
if sugar is so bad why should i eat fruit? what does it give me that vegetables don't?
|
[deleted]
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5jhpfw/eli5_if_sugar_is_so_bad_why_should_i_eat_fruit/
|
{
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"dbg9j8t",
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"dbg9r3v",
"dbgekdj",
"dbgfr4a"
],
"score": [
2,
25,
4,
3,
2
],
"text": [
"some vitamins, such a C, are found more commonly and in greater quantities in fruits than in vegetables. \n\nhowever, that said, the sugar in fruit is no more healthy for you than the sugar in a candy bar. Sugar is sugar. Your body cannot tell the difference, the source does not matter. So you want to limit your fruit intake. Eating an assload of fruit is almost just as bad as eating an assload of candy, except the fruit has some vitamins and fiber in it. \"natural\" does not automatically mean better for you. ",
"It's not that sugar is bad; it's that sugars in certain capacities are bad.\n\nIf you drink a soda that has 20g of sugar, those 20g of sugar are going to be immediately and instantaneously absorbed by your body. On the other hand, let's say you eat a piece of fruit that contains 20g of sugar - that sugar will be digested over an hour or so, meaning it won't cause that significant spike the soda's sugar did.\n\nYour body needs sugar. Just make sure you give it the right kind in the right form.",
"I hope someone better equipped than I will answer this later but from what little I know: fruit has simple and natural sugars accompanied by both digestible and indigestible fiber and water which makes the sugars slower to pick up in the blood stream and doesn't cause the body to go into overdrive producing insulin like complex sugars. ",
"Watch the documentary on Netflix called \"sugar coated\"\n\nIt's well worth the watch and will answer all your sugar questions.",
"Too much fruit made me diabetic.\nI now eat 0 fruit, a LOT of vegetables, and I'm fine. \nYou dont need fruit if you eat a lot of vegetables. "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
1lwi4r
|
what is a virtual cpu ?
|
My laptop has 8 CPUs and only one is physical, I want to know what's the difference and why badly optimized games lag a lot.
Also why does it over-heat fast ?
CPU Info if needed: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2630QM CPU @ 2.00GHz (8CPUs), ~2.0GHz
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1lwi4r/eli5what_is_a_virtual_cpu/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cc3g3bo"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
" > Virtual CPUs or vCPU are the brand name of NetLogic for its SMT implementation, like Intels HyperThreading. The concept is easy: For each CPU core you have several vCPU's, which are simulated and share the hardware of the one core. The software that runs on such a architecture \"sees\" x vCPU's altough there are only y physical cores present. This is done for performance optimization.\n\n^_URL_0_\n\nConsidering that you have an i7, this is presumably from HyperThreading, which is only present in i7 series processors.\n\n**Why badly optimized games lag a lot?** Because they're unoptimized! More accurately, an unoptimized speed can be though of as the \"base\" or default speed. Optimization improves the performance, causing the game to run faster. As a result, an optimized game has better performance than an unoptimized game, in comparison.\n\n**Why does it over-heat fast?** Laptops don't have very efficient cooling systems (compared to desktops). That's part of the reason that processors and such for laptops are slower than their desktop variants. For comparison, my i7-2600K runs at 3.4 GHz by default, but can be easily overclocked to 4 GHz (the \"K\" means the chip is unlocked and can be overclocked).\n\nTo prevent overheating, get a cooling pad for laptops. And avoid blocking the air intake at the bottom of the laptop. Contrary to their name, they shouldn't go on your lap."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9326180/what-is-the-meaning-of-virtual-cpu"
]
] |
|
32rsun
|
When I viciously rip a leaf off of a tree during Spring months such as April, what exactly happens to the tree?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/32rsun/when_i_viciously_rip_a_leaf_off_of_a_tree_during/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cqe6oal"
],
"score": [
56
],
"text": [
"Assuming you didn't tear some of the bark and only ripped off the leaf, the tree will simply seal off that area via the [abcission layer](_URL_0_). Trees don't heal, they seal; leaves are shed in the fall by this same mechanism. While auxin is produced in the leaf the abcission layer will not seal off the leaf stem, but if conditions are appropriate to halt auxin production, or if a leaf is removed, the layer will grow and seal off the area exposed.\n\nTrees shed leaves before fall as well; infestation from aphids can cause trees to prematurely abcise their leaves. Nothing really bad happens to the tree other than getting a little less glucose from photosynthesis. If you were to damage part of the bark, the tree will still seal off the area to prevent the spread of infection, creating a callous tissue around the edge as well as using chemical defenses."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abscission"
]
] |
||
67xfr0
|
why aren't we always hungry for the things that our body needs most?
|
For example, we can distinguish between thirst and hunger because we need to have water. Why does it stop there and we can't go further - why can't we be hungry for calcium, vitamins, etc? Is it because our body can't taste them and thus we can't distinguish them once we eat - or is it because digestion takes more time and we can't perfectly forecast what we will need? Is it because in modern times, food is dramatically altered but we used to be able to do that? Or for other reasons?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/67xfr0/eli5_why_arent_we_always_hungry_for_the_things/
|
{
"a_id": [
"dgtyr2d"
],
"score": [
12
],
"text": [
"You are hungry for specific things. That's why you crave certain foods sometimes. Your body is used to nutrients being in that food so it tells you to eat that food."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
5khkf8
|
why are there free refills for soft drinks in the us?
|
I've always found it inconvenient that there aren't free refills when I travel to Europe, and it made me wonder how free refills started in the first place. Also, I'd be interested to know which other countries commonly have free refills of soft drinks. Thanks!
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5khkf8/eli5_why_are_there_free_refills_for_soft_drinks/
|
{
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"dbnzwfe",
"dbnzy33",
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2,
11,
3
],
"text": [
"The cost to the restaurant is minimal - just a few cents. You would literally have to drink hundreds of drinks at a free-refill restaurant to start costing them money on the $2-3 for a soft drink. \n\nMeanwhile the restaurant keeps you there ordering appetizers and desserts and you're more likely to go to one with free refills than without (if it's important to you). ",
"The cost of soda to fill your cup from a fountain is pennies. The cup itself costs more than the soda that goes in it. They can sell it for 2 dollars, pocket almost all of that, and then give customers a \"deal\" with free refills, since it costs them almost nothing. With products like alcohol, you don't get free refills, because that actually costs money.",
"In the US refills are free because soft drinks are commonly dispensed from fountain machines. A 12oz soft drink from a fountain costs the restaurant almost nothing, typically less than a penny. So restaurants see free refills as a perk they can offer with only a tiny cost to themselves that might encourage patrons to stay longer and maybe buy more food.\n\nDunno why they're uncommon in Europe. Maybe Europe got soda fountains later or they're less common.",
"Syrup is not pennies for most restaurants. Even if someone like McDonald's can get the syrup for half of my example below, it's far from pennies. \n\n5 gallons of syrup at our local Coca Cola bottling plant is $81.98. 5 gallons of syrup makes 237 - 16 ounce servings at a 5:1 water to syrup ratio. That is $0.346 for 16 ounces of soda. If you assume ice takes up 1/4 of the volume for 12 ounces of actual soda, that is 320 servings for a cost of $0.257. Then add in the ice, cup, CO2, water, and overhead. \n\n20 ounces = $0.423 or 3/4 full back to $0.346 for 16 ounces.\n\n\n\n"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
148d9h
|
how does prison labor work?
|
To be specific, I've heard that AT & T and some other large corporations "outsource" work to prisoners. How do they pay these prisoners, how much, and do they use the money while they're in jail or when they get out? Also, why is this allowed?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/148d9h/eli5_how_does_prison_labor_work/
|
{
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"c7ar7bx",
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3
],
"text": [
"I think like 10 or 20 cents an hour, certainly much less than a dollar an hour. Prisoners have access to a commissaryn where they can buy treats and snacks. ",
"In my prison, as an example, the guys who work in the dining facility start out at 40c an hour. The guys who work in the welding shop start out at 60c an hour. The guys who work in the wood shop get 45c an hour, but can get a bonus of up to $25 dollars depending on what they build. Inmates who stay with a job long enough and attend additional training can work up to become a supervisor and can earn up to $1.10 an hour. The guys who work third shift make an extra dime per hour. \n\nThey don't make a lot of money, because, regardless of what the inmates believe, it costs a lot of money to house an inmate. The difference between the wages of an inmate and a living wage outside goes to offset some of that cost. The inmates can do what they want to with that money. Some use the money to pay for college courses. Some use the money to buy things from the commissary. Some invest the money in a savings or retirement account. \n\nLarge corporations at some prisons can \"outsource\" jobs. The corporation has to be approved to do so, and some of the considerations are if the inmate labor will have an effect on the local economy. \n\nInmate labor is allowed because the inmates have to have something to do during the day. You can't leave them locked up in their cells all day and having a job to go to helps prepare them to reintegrate with the outside when they get released and have to have a job. ",
"Slave labor is legal in the United States.\n\n13th Amendment:\n\n > Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, **except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted**, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
33rmp2
|
Are there any lifeforms that have evolved exclusively on land and never began from water?
|
Or has all life evolved from lakes and oceans?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/33rmp2/are_there_any_lifeforms_that_have_evolved/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cqo15ln",
"cqo1qne"
],
"score": [
2,
2
],
"text": [
"Not sure what you mean there.\n\nIf you trace back the lineage of all known life forms further and futher back, eventually they all had ancestors that lived in the water. \n\n(E.g. for *Homo sapiens* - _URL_0_)\n\nIf you're just looking back one or two evolutionary steps, then of course the recent ancestors of almost all land animals were also land animals. ",
"As far as we can tell, no. From what we can tell, life has originated on earth [just once](_URL_0_), in the oceans"
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_human_evolution"
],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_descent"
]
] |
|
cl6vx3
|
How is the insulin transfer into the bloodstream regulated?
|
I suppose you need to detect the sugar concentration?! But how and with which receptors? And is there some "holding back mechanism" in beta-cells or is just the insulin production reduced (by closing Glucose channels)?
|
askscience
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/cl6vx3/how_is_the_insulin_transfer_into_the_bloodstream/
|
{
"a_id": [
"evtshrf"
],
"score": [
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],
"text": [
"The insuline secretion is mainly modulated by the blood sugar, i.e. your glucose level in the blood which is roughly 5 mmol/L or 90 mg/dL. Every cell in the body absorpts glucose (different mechanisms) where it can be metabolized. One important substance that you get this way is the ATP (Adenosine-Triphosphate), an energy carrier of a cell. If you want details on this I recommend to read up on glycolysis and the citrate cycle.\n\nAs the ATP levels inside the beta-cell rises, the membrane permeability of potassium decreases. This happens because there are ATP-sensitive potassium channels directly built into the membrane of the cell which deactivate upon interacting with ATP. This causes potassium to accumulate inside the cell. Note that the inside of a cell is negatively charged relative to the outside of a cell, in other words, the cell becomes *less* negatively charged.\n\nAs a consequence of this ion-shift the cell 'deporalizes' (see below) and thus increases the Calcium influx to the cell. Calcium is usually a trigger ion because its native concentration in cells is *extremely* low. Therefore, the cell is turn extremely sensitive to changes in the calcium concentration (which can easily change by up to 2 orders of magnitude). As a result of the Ca-increase inside the cell, the exocytosis of prepared insulin vesicles is triggered.\n\nThe insulin then allows other cells in the body to absorb glucose and thus lowers the blood sugar level. In turn, the glucose level inside the beta-cell of the pancreas decreases which leads to the activation of potassium channels which down regulates the Ca levels and therefore finally decreases the scretion of insuline. In short, insuline sort of regulates itself.\n\n\\-----------------------------------------------------------------\n\nNow to add on a few terminologies:\n\nA cell membrane is an electric isolator that has selective permeability to certain ions and molecules. There are active and passive transport mechanisms which built up an ion concentration gradient or passively resolve it. In all your cells there is a transporter that sacrifices one ATP to bring 3 Na ions out and 2 K ions into the cell (Na-K-ATPase). This way you have a very high concentration of potassium in your cell. Note that you have also gained a difference in electric charge. This change in charge is what your cell ultimately wants, because it allows it cell to have 'turned on mode' and a 'turned off mode'. Normally a cell is polarized, i.e. the membran has a negative electric potential. When the permeability of a membrane increases this electric gradient is decreasing and the cell depolarises. This mechanism is periodically induced in your pace-maker cells in the heart or used to store and transfer information in your nervous system. It is also used to trigger the release of Ca in your muscle cells to cause contractions of your muscle fibers.\n\nFor most (if not all cells) potassium is the driving factor for where the exact membrane potential is without excitation. It is usually sufficient to use the so called Nerst equation to calculate the membrane potential via E = RT/(zF) ln(\\[K\\]\\_o / \\[K\\]\\_i) which only uses the concentration of potassium inside and outside of the cell (and some constants). More generally you have to actually take the [Goldman equation](_URL_0_) which also accounts for the membrane permeabilities (the permeability for other ions than potassium is extremely low in comparison however and thus somewhat negligible).\n\n\\-----------------------------------------------------------------\n\nTo add on the blood sugar level in general:\n\nThere are of course a lot more hormones that regulate this important parameter. To give just one example, glucocorticoids (e.g. cortisole) are called 'gluco' because they increase the blood sugar levels. Patients that take high doses of cortisole or prednisolone over a long period have a high risk of developing a 'steroid diabetes'. Note that cortisole levels are also elevated under high psychological stress.\n\n\\-----------------------------------------------------------------\n\nWhy do we need insulin? Why don't cells just absorb glucose, what is all this fuzz about?\n\nCells absorb glucose differently. There are, in fact, different glucos transporters. The most important ones are GLUT1-5 (yes biochemists finally had an easy naming convention). We have these because we want our beta-cells in the pancreas to permantently check the glucose level, so they have the GLUT 1 transporter that does allow the uptake of glucose without the interaction of insuline.\n\nHowever, we absolutely do not want our muscles or fat cells (fat cells are the worst) to take all the glucose without any regulation, so they have the transporter GLUT4 which only acts with insuline. If the muscles did not need insuline, they'd just burn the glucose and our liver wouldn't be able to produce glycogen (short-term storage of glucose that lasts maybe 10-20 minutes under physical exercise, we use this energy ressource until the burning of fatty acids allows long-term energy supply).\n\nSimilarly, the fat cells would produce fatty acids with the glucose. The problem here is that this is a one-way ticket, there is basically (Succinyl-CoA etc. aside) no going back from fatty acids to glucose and we wouldn't be able to restock our short-term storage in the liver. If a lion now decided to hunt us, we'd have to parley for 20 minutes until we have activated the burning of fatty acids. This is also the reason that a diabetes patient has small lipoma around the insuline injection points."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldman_equation"
]
] |
|
1ae808
|
Roman (and other classical) political graffiti--what's the deal with it?
|
So I've read and I've loved the graffiti from Pompeii ([read it for yourself if you haven't](_URL_1_); it's full of classics like, "Weep, you girls. My penis has given you up. Now it penetrates men’s behinds. Goodbye, wondrous femininity!" and "Let everyone one in love come and see. I want to break Venus’ ribs with clubs and cripple the goddess’ loins. If she can strike through my soft chest, then why can’t I smash her head with a club?").
But I'm asking here about specifically **political** graffiti. I've seen it in movies (*Life of Brian* and at least one more serious place, maybe *Spartacus* or HBO's *Rome*). In *I, Claudius*, I think there's a major plot element where Claudius freaks out about seeing his name written upside down (I've never read the book--I only know this because Les Savy Fav had an EP called *Rome Written Upside Down*, and that's how they explained what their title). I never thought about it as a major historical thing until /u/LegalAction mentioned in the Ides of March thread that [people encouraged Brutus to kill Caesar by writing graffiti "along the lines of 'Brutus are you sleeping?' and 'Brutus remember your ancestors'"](_URL_0_). So what's the deal with Roman (and other classical) political graffiti? Was it common? Is it mentioned much in the sources? Did it change over the course of the Empire? Was it mainly written to encourage the populace to have certain implications? Was it that important what they thought? None of the Pompeii graffiti seems that political. Quick Google Scholar and JSTOR searches showed no articles on the subject.
|
AskHistorians
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1ae808/roman_and_other_classical_political_graffitiwhats/
|
{
"a_id": [
"c8ws9kq"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
" > In I, Claudius, I think there's a major plot element where Claudius freaks out about seeing his name written upside down\n\nNot quite. Part of the plot involves Germanicus, Caligula's superstitious father, being terrorised by defacements of his name and other omens, which turn out to be the doing of Caligula."
]
}
|
[] |
[
"http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1achhk/happy_ides_of_march_how_does_the_story_of_the/c8wfdu2",
"http://www.pompeiana.org/resources/ancient/graffiti%20from%20pompeii.htm"
] |
[
[]
] |
|
2puuhk
|
why does steam always have to install microsoft c++ redistributable 2005 when i install a game?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2puuhk/eli5_why_does_steam_always_have_to_install/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cn08ehx"
],
"score": [
4
],
"text": [
"In case it isn't already there. It isn't part of the operating system (Windows XP, say, was released in 2001 so isn't going to have something released in 2005). Since the game needs it, it is going to be installed.\n\nWhy do all games need it? Because it contains all the basic building blocks of the C++ language when compiled with the MS compiler."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
busoiy
|
what's the difference between a war and a 'cold war'?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/busoiy/eli5_whats_the_difference_between_a_war_and_a/
|
{
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"The cold war was a period where neither side liked each other, but both were too afraid of the consequences to fight an actual war against each other (since both had nuclear weaponry). The cold war involved spies, propaganda, arms races, foreign coups, supplying aid to terrorist groups attacking your enemy, supporting your allies in proxy wars (i.e against your enemies allies), and so on. Actual wars typically involve full scale fighting between the sides at war.",
"A “Cold War” doesn’t involve battles and fighting. Instead there’s propaganda and threats, spying...etc.",
"A Cold War is a war fought without the use of bullets.\n\nObviously, that's an oversimplified answer, in the fact that even in the American/Soviet Cold War, there were armed conflicts, like Korea and Vietnam, as well as border skirmishes and missile crises, but there is not all-out war between the primary antagonists of the conflict.\n\nKorea was supported by China and Russia, but the conflict was mostly limited to the Korean peninsula, for example.\n\nIn reality, the term Cold War was given to the American/Soviet conflict because it encompassed a longer campaign that wasn't always bloody, leading to verbal standoffs and culture wars.",
"USA and Soviet Union were on the verge of starting a BIG (\"normal\") war which may have included the use of nuclear bombs. They were basically like two feral hounds growling at each other, showing their teeth, on the verge of ripping each other's throats out. Since even the people in charge kinda knew that a nuclear war is probably not that good of a thing to commence, it never came to that, there was \"just\" a lot of fearmongering, spying, building pressure in other states (USA placed nuclear weapons in Europe, for example). However, they did do \"proxy wars\", meaning they supplied opposing states at war with money, weapons etc. just because the other side did the same to the opposing state.",
"The term \"Cold War\" was meant to indicate that the US and USSR were essentially \"at war\" but that if they went against each other (\"World War III\") it would be so devastating to both sides that they would, if possible, refrain from doing it. Instead they did lots of other things: spying, influencing elections, setting up and disrupting alliances, \"psychological warfare\" (propaganda), \"economic warfare\" (e.g. sanctions), etc.\n\nIt is worth noting that among those \"other things\" were to fight \"proxy wars\" in other countries. This is what the Korean War was, for example: the US was fighting North Korea, who was being supplied by the USSR and China. The Vietnam War, the Soviet-Afghan War, and many other wars in Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and many other parts of the world were all versions of this kind of dynamic. These proxy wars killed _millions_ of people (just not usually Soviets or Americans; the bulk of the dead were the civilians who lived in the countries where these wars took place), so there are those who think that too much emphasis can be put on the \"coldness\" of the Cold War. But it didn't \"go nuclear,\" so it was _relatively_ cold (but pretty much everything else would be).\n\nYou may think: gosh, some of this sounds like it is still going on, or describes the US-Russia or US-China relationships today. These kinds of dynamics were not unique to the 1945-1991 period, and still continue today in many ways.",
"Short answer: We weren't in a declared war with Russia, but there was an extended and very real conflict going on - just without our two armies fighting, or a declaration of war. Due to sabotage, proxy wars, assassinations, terrorist groups and poorly run prisons (mostly on Russia's side) lots of people died - but the US and Russia never formally entered into war or had our armies shooting at each other, so you can't call it a war. \n\nThere were a lot of costs to both sides. Russia tried to outstrip us in the space race and arms production, resulting in a lot of poverty and food shortages in the country. Paranoia and corruption in a planned state didn't help the matter. On our end, we had McCartyism and an anti socialist bent to politics that lead the way to our rather conservative political culture we have now and the stark income disparity. It also informed our unilateral interventionist tendencies that got us into a few intractable wars. \n\nThis is a period worth learning about, because the consequences of it are still VERY present in the world and can help you to understand modern politics. Everything from our close alliance to Israel, the destabilization of the middle east, our uneasy relationship with China, and the massive quasi-military drug cartels in the Americas can all be traced back to policies and programs introduced during the cold war. It also helps to understand Putin's popularity in Russia (though certainly inflated, he is undeniably popular).\n\nThere are some fun side effects of the cold war. In an attempt to spread their culture, an exchange was set up with India, resulting in tons of Indian films coming to Russia and becoming extremely popular. At the same time, Russian novels were translated into the many different Indian languages - so you will find indians of a certain age well versed in Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, while Russians of a certain age will know Bombay's hit. (Credit: [99 Percent invisible](_URL_0_) for this gem of a story) \n\nThe show The Americans can give you a bit of a look at some of the events going on, though obviously dramatized.",
"War = actually killing each other.\n\nCold war = Both sides threaten to kill each other and say 'swing first'",
"You know that guy in class that you just can't stand? You know the one, he's a total knucklehead and all his friends are real goobers too. Well he's been pushing your buttons lately and you want to do something about it. You're fairly certain you could take him but you can't just haul-off and hit him, because he might just take you down or his friends might get in on the action. It's better to have your friends pull elaborate pranks, snitch on him to your teacher and spread nasty rumors, preferably without being too obvious. The whole point is to to convince your other class mates that \"that guy\" is as big a knucklehead as you think he is, and ostracize him from the class community.",
"A war is when two parties openly use military force against each other. War ends in either a surrender or military domination.\n\nA “Cold War” is between two parties that don’t like each other, but for various reasons they don’t engage in full military conflict. Instead they engage in political and economic tactics to try and assert dominance. The two parties may give aid and weapons to be fought in a proxy war. Tactics include sanctions, tariffs, espionage, and trying to gang up on the other through international political pressure.\n\nThe most famous example, but not the only, was between the US and the USSR. Both parties wanted to be the only super power in the world. If both countries did not have nuclear stockpiles I believe we would ha e engaged in traditional war fare. However, since we had nukes the two countries didn’t dare engage on full scale war. During this time the United States engages in direct and indirect warfare against parties that were perceived to be more of an ally to the USSR than the US (Vietnam, Latin America, Cuba, etc).\nDuring this time the US said if companies do business with the USSR you couldn’t do business in the US, which economically attacked the USSR.\n\nDoes this answer your question?",
"Let's say you want to punch me in the face. But the only reason you don't is cause I will likely punch you in the face. That's a cold war. Now if you do punch me in the face and we fight, that's war.",
"War is when you decide to fight your annoying neighbor. \n\nCold war is when you pay a friend to beat up his neighbor that he's always had problems with, only your friend's neighbor is actually related to your original annoying neighbor. That way you and your neighbor don't have to fight each other because you know if you did one of you would pull a gun and neither of you want to actually die.\n\nInstead you cover your friend's hospital bills and take him to kickboxing classes so he can fight better and just keep sending him out there. So you're not technically fighting anyone yourself, you're just helping a friend fight someone who is directly related to the guy you actually want to beat up.",
"Imo main thing to summarize is \"A war thru Proxy Wars.\"\n\nIn a cold war - the nations won't fight each other directly, but will do so indirectly thru other countries generally poorer ones. \n\nI.e. vietnam war (north vietnam was backed by Soviet union thru training n $l and the war in Afghanistan (Afghanistan supported by US thru training n $ albeit ironically as these same weapons were used against us later on)."
]
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[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/from-bombay-with-love/"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
2cdr08
|
why do cars stop/stall when they are spun around?
|
Every time a car is pitted by the police or hits a bad patch of ice and spins it seems to stall or no longer be able to move to a certain degree. One notable instance is go karts they always seem to stall. What is causing this?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2cdr08/eli5_why_do_cars_stopstall_when_they_are_spun/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cjehbcu"
],
"score": [
2
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"text": [
"Cars can stall when the car is in drive and the car is spun and the tires start to roll in the opposite way that the gear is supposed to be rolling, thus making the gears go the wrong way. If you have enough power and are spun, and keep your foot on the gas and the tires are spinning forward still, the car wont stall, like when youre doing a burn out. \n\nManual cars also will not stall if spun if you hold the clutch in, disengaging the power from the engine to the transmission. \n\nSome cars also will shut off the engine just because it thinks you may have been in an accident. \n\nIf you look at enough police chase videos, youll find some where the car doesnt stall when pitted and keeps on running "
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
k018w
|
Are we bound to get cancer if we don't die from something else before that?
|
If I don't get a heart attack, or die by komodo dragon bite, will I eventually get cancer?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/k018w/are_we_bound_to_get_cancer_if_we_dont_die_from/
|
{
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"text": [
"Pretty much yes.\n\nCancer is an unavoidable consequence of evolution.\n\nA multicellular organism is a colony of cells that work in concert for one common goal. As we have evolved our cells have developed mechanisms to make sure all the cells divide and grow as complying members of the whole. Still, an individual cell that mutates (mutations happen all the time) to grow out of this control will do so!\n\nThe control systems have evolved to reduce the risk of cancers until they no longer posed significant selective pressure on reproductive success.\n\nGenerally though, because of evolution, as you live longer the chance of getting cancer approaches 1. That being said, there is no reason why we should not be able to push this back a lot further.\n\n=)\n\n",
"Yep.\n\nI'm going to quote my wife on this one, who worked with the American Cancer Society (since expert opinions count around here). Her best example of this was prostate cancer. On a long enough time scale nearly every human male will get this. And the time scale for that to happen is only a fair bit longer than human life spans.\n\nShe was trained that for some cancers it is not if but when. Which is why screen becomes so important since for those cancers everyone is a reasonably high probability of having it crop up.",
"Yes, because, on the most trivial level, eventually you'll get hit by a cosmic ray in juuust the right spot.",
"Also:\n\"Would you die from a lightning strike, if you don't die from something else before that?\"\n\n-Yes",
"Your question has a bit of a problem. Technically if I don't die of something before X, then I'll eventually die of X is true of a lot of things. If I don't die of something else first, eventually I will be sucked into a black hole. Excluding all other possibilities of course you will die of the only fatal possibility left. \n\nHowever, yes, eventually you will get cancer. In fact, chances are you have cancer right now. Everybody has cancers, your immune system just eliminates the mutated cells very quickly unless there is a problem. Most people don't really understand that cancers are not some disease that you catch, they're simply a byproduct of biological processes. Statistically, the longer you live the higher the probability that a mutation will eventually not be caught by your immune system.",
"Pretty much yes.\n\nCancer is an unavoidable consequence of evolution.\n\nA multicellular organism is a colony of cells that work in concert for one common goal. As we have evolved our cells have developed mechanisms to make sure all the cells divide and grow as complying members of the whole. Still, an individual cell that mutates (mutations happen all the time) to grow out of this control will do so!\n\nThe control systems have evolved to reduce the risk of cancers until they no longer posed significant selective pressure on reproductive success.\n\nGenerally though, because of evolution, as you live longer the chance of getting cancer approaches 1. That being said, there is no reason why we should not be able to push this back a lot further.\n\n=)\n\n",
"Yep.\n\nI'm going to quote my wife on this one, who worked with the American Cancer Society (since expert opinions count around here). Her best example of this was prostate cancer. On a long enough time scale nearly every human male will get this. And the time scale for that to happen is only a fair bit longer than human life spans.\n\nShe was trained that for some cancers it is not if but when. Which is why screen becomes so important since for those cancers everyone is a reasonably high probability of having it crop up.",
"Yes, because, on the most trivial level, eventually you'll get hit by a cosmic ray in juuust the right spot.",
"Also:\n\"Would you die from a lightning strike, if you don't die from something else before that?\"\n\n-Yes",
"Your question has a bit of a problem. Technically if I don't die of something before X, then I'll eventually die of X is true of a lot of things. If I don't die of something else first, eventually I will be sucked into a black hole. Excluding all other possibilities of course you will die of the only fatal possibility left. \n\nHowever, yes, eventually you will get cancer. In fact, chances are you have cancer right now. Everybody has cancers, your immune system just eliminates the mutated cells very quickly unless there is a problem. Most people don't really understand that cancers are not some disease that you catch, they're simply a byproduct of biological processes. Statistically, the longer you live the higher the probability that a mutation will eventually not be caught by your immune system."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
ig977
|
If you could theoretically survive on Venus, would you be floating in mid-air?
|
From the wiki:
"The atmospheric mass is 93 times that of Earth's atmosphere while the pressure at the planet's surface is about 92 times that at Earth's surface—a pressure equivalent to that at a depth of nearly 1 kilometer under Earth's oceans."
Would something like airships be possible there?
|
askscience
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/ig977/if_you_could_theoretically_survive_on_venus_would/
|
{
"a_id": [
"c23iwg4"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"Density, not pressure is the key point for buoyancy. According to wiki,\n\n > The density of the air at the surface is 67 kg/m3, which is 6.5% that of liquid water on Earth.\n\nSo while the air is 50 times denser than Earth's air, it's still like 15-20 times less dense than the human body, so you won't float."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
|
352s4n
|
why do some armies use chevrons and others use inverted chevrons? is it simply a stylistic choice or does it have some significance?
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/352s4n/eli5_why_do_some_armies_use_chevrons_and_others/
|
{
"a_id": [
"cr0eqjq"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"I dont exactly know where it came from, but from an educated guess it could be left over from the use of heraldry when it was used to show a particular family association, or even a throw back to the Spartans who used a lambda (Λ) on their shields. Of course if you read the da vinci code, you'd know its a penis."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[]
] |
||
zdvao
|
how to patent an invention idea and get rich.
|
explainlikeimfive
|
http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zdvao/eli5_how_to_patent_an_invention_idea_and_get_rich/
|
{
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"c63ppp3",
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4
],
"text": [
"tl;dr: patents are not the way to go for an inventor\n\nIt is said, that every good idea for a product is worth negative one million dollars. Why? Because you have to invest a significant amount of money until you can get any profit from it (prototypes, testing, tooling for production machines, investment in raw materials and parts).\n\nSo could you just get a patent and then license it to a bigger company, which then in turn makes a huge profit and gives you a (still decent) cut? So suppose your idea is *really* good. Then you will have to hire a patent lawyer which helps you to formulate your patent, or it will be worthless and easily circumvented. Let's also say that your did your research and there is no prior art present (nobody invented said thing before you already). Then the patent will be granted to you. At this point you can sue anybody who you think is infringing on your patent. The question is: Do you have enough free time and money at hand to fight that lawsuit?\nAlso: In you patent you will have to disclose a lot of information about your invention. This means that everbody interested in said invention will look for loopholes to use your idea, but without infringing your patent instead of giving money to you.\n\nSo what would you do if you have a brilliant idea? First check if it is really that brilliant. What to do next depends on the idea itself. Not disclosing how e.g. a production process works and relying on trade secrets could be an idea.",
"Step 1: Be rich and own a international company.\n\nStep 2: Hire a crazy expensive Patent lawyer to construct a patent in your own country.\n\nStep 3: Hire more expensive patent lawyer/translators in order to translate the patent for other country's.\n\nStep 4: Spend a shitload of money to implement these patents.\n\nStep 5: China steals your idea.\n\nStep 6: get sued by apple."
]
}
|
[] |
[] |
[
[],
[]
] |
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