q_id
stringlengths 6
6
| title
stringlengths 3
299
| selftext
stringlengths 0
4.44k
| category
stringclasses 12
values | subreddit
stringclasses 1
value | answers
dict | title_urls
sequencelengths 1
1
| selftext_urls
sequencelengths 1
1
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
5quhy8 | Why does hearing certain pieces of music or chords give you "goose bumps"? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd28aji"
],
"text": [
"When your playlist strikes all the right chords, your body can go on a physiological joyride. Your heart rate increases. Your pupils dilate. Your body temperature rises. Blood redirects to your legs. Your cerebellum—mission control for body movement—becomes more active. Your brain flushes with dopamine and a tingly chill whisks down your back. About 50 percent of people get chills when listening to music. Research shows that’s because music stimulates an ancient reward pathway in the brain, encouraging dopamine to flood the striatum—a part of the forebrain activated by addiction, reward, and motivation. Music, it seems, may affect our brains the same way that sex, gambling, and potato chips do. Strangely, those dopamine levels can peak several seconds before the song’s special moment. That’s because your brain is a good listener—it’s constantly predicting what’s going to happen next. (Evolutionarily speaking, it’s a handy habit to have. Making good predictions is essential for survival.) But music is tricky. It can be unpredictable, teasing our brains and keeping those dopamine triggers guessing. And that’s where the chills may come in. Because when you finally hear that long awaited chord, the striatum sighs with dopamine-soaked satisfaction and—BAM—you get the chills. The greater the build-up, the greater the chill."
],
"score": [
5
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qujxx | How exactly is the Muslim ban unconstitutional when things like the Chinese Exclusion Act were never deemed unconstitutional (yet repealed for other reasons)? | Sorry, I'm not trying to be a concern troll. I am of the opinion that the ban is nothing but a dressed up excuse to legitimize xenophobia but I keep seeing and hearing people saying it's either unconstitutional or it isn't unconstitutional, but I never see any explanation. Could someone please clarify? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd26oz4",
"dd289gr"
],
"text": [
"There has not yet been a court ruling on any of the actions taken so far. Its not unconstitutional, because no one has said it isn't. Something becomes unconstitutional when a court deems it so. The court has not yet heard this case, as such, they have made no decision",
"Thank you everyone for the answers, I love how civil and factual this sub is!"
],
"score": [
6,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5qutol | Where did our modern standard of beauty (tall, fit/thin, strong facial structure, etc) come from? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd2913t"
],
"text": [
"The modern preference for thin people comes from the current economics of food. In poor times, being fat was a sign of wealth: one could afford plenty of food. Today, being fat in a rich country is a sign of being poor. Fattening food is cheap and and poor people eat junk food or don't care about their health or don't know any better. Whereas being thin and fit shows that you have enough money and spare time to go to the gym."
],
"score": [
7
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qvu28 | Why do people like red velvet cake? Is there a reason besides the visual appeal? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd2gxjc"
],
"text": [
"The redish color originally came from dutch process cocoa, which had a dark red color. It's a mildly chocolate cake. People love the red color so they add it to make it ever more red, but the cake itself is traditionally a mildly chocolate cake."
],
"score": [
4
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qwait | How would one go about obtaining a legitimate title (e.g. count, duke etc)? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd2kiks",
"dd2kg2d",
"dd2kz93",
"dd2lzr2"
],
"text": [
"You can buy your way into it.. [West Antarctica]( URL_0 ) [Sealand]( URL_1 )",
"Legitimate would simply mean legally recognized by the entity that issues those titles meaning you'd have to obtain it through those rules which differ from country to country. There is no world-wide rule on becoming a Duke, for example. There are two ways which are almost universally accepted: 1. Inherit it. 2. Obtain it through bigger army diplomacy.",
"If you don't stand to inherit such a title, the only way to obtain one is to be granted a title by a monarch (more particularly a European monarch). Anything you see about buying a title is a scam.",
"A football player, playing for Liverpool FC, purchased a property that granted him the title of Lord Djibril Cissé - URL_0"
],
"score": [
19,
13,
8,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[
"http://www.westarctica.info/join-us",
"http://www.sealandgov.org/shop/"
],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djibril_Ciss%C3%A9"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qyl1t | What exactly is VEVO and why is every popular artist on there? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd34a9r"
],
"text": [
"Vevo is the name given to a collaboration between the big three music publishing companies. Basically, internet streaming of music started to get popular in the late 2000s, and there really was little service like Spotify or what not. YouTube was becoming popular, and as a result, they made a deal with Google to put all the music on there, and the rest is history. The music industry mainly revolves around 3 publishing companies, and as a result, most pop music made in those 3 big ones makes it into Vevo."
],
"score": [
4
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qz2v3 | Why are people uninstalling Uber after the protests? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd38ygi",
"dd38xct"
],
"text": [
"First of all, the reason they're doing it right now is, as protests got underway at JFK airport the other day against Trump's executive order barring people from 7 predominantly Muslim countries from entry to the US, the New York taxi companies went on a one hour work stoppage, during which time they refused to go to JFK in order to contribute to the protests. That's huge, since taxis are a major way to get to JFK airport--most people don't own cars in New York (you can still get there by train and bus and subway). Seemingly in response to this, Uber turned off \"surge pricing\" for people going to JFK. In other words, Uber saw a big uptick in demand to go to JFK that evening because people couldn't go by taxi. When Uber experiences a surge in business, they raise their rates substantially. But they didn't raise them, they kept them the same for that evening, and therefore muted the effects of the taxi protests. In addition. Travis Kalanick, the CEO of Uber, is perceived as being somewhat close to Trump--Trump appointed him to a business council, the Strategic and Policy Forum. Most leaders in Silicon Valley have kept their distance from Trump. So taken together, Kalanick is seen as a supporter of Trump in some of Trump's hated policies. A memorable tweet against Uber was \"I don't need a ride to Vichy.\" Vichy was the seat of the French government that was a puppet of the Nazis during WWII, so invoking Vichy implies that Kalanick is a collaborator in racist Trump policies. In response, Kalanick has done some backpedaling and says he'll talk to Trump about the ban.",
"The New York Taxi Workers Alliance asked it's member to protest against Trump's immigration policy by not picking up passengers at JFK airport. Uber though was sending drivers there to capitalise on the lack of taxis. So some people in favour of the taxi protest are now refusing to use Uber as a form of protest against Uber."
],
"score": [
23,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qzj8r | What would it take for a president/head of state of a western, modern country to enact a dictatorship? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3bhhs"
],
"text": [
"A complete and utter break down of government, brought on by a massive internal insurgence, and probably civil war."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qzn07 | Back when the Indian caste system was stronger, why couldn't people of lower castes just move to a place where no one knew them and lie about which caste they were in? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3g8oa",
"dd3j6pt",
"dd3e8u5",
"dd3ciy6",
"dd3gox8",
"dd3dyt4",
"dd3dia3",
"dd3k93h",
"dd3fl4t",
"dd3camx",
"dd3h1az",
"dd3izpk",
"dd3doej",
"dd3ikmy",
"dd3ikf8",
"dd3lmwr",
"dd3fme5",
"dd3mwlp",
"dd3lb9h",
"dd3nj66",
"dd3eb14",
"dd3m71b",
"dd3kg2t",
"dd3jmlo",
"dd3idev",
"dd3ivcn",
"dd43uhu",
"dd3jkp0",
"dd3lh98",
"dd3vzer",
"dd3jlb7",
"dd3ui3i",
"dd3nqbc",
"dd3iw7p",
"dd3m941",
"dd3j8hp",
"dd3n43q",
"dd3grel",
"dd3kzpm",
"dd3wkp1",
"dd3sqr6",
"dd3vbsb",
"dd3vkfu",
"dd3ob8e"
],
"text": [
"The same reasons that blacks couldn't move to other whiter areas and hope to escape slavery. There were tell-tale signs that gave away a person's identify - skin tone (lower castes had darker skin tones), name, behaviour and occupation etc.,",
"**THANKS FOR THE GOLD!!!** my first time ever.... I would like to thank .... **THANKS** Imagine a playground with five groups of kids playing in a playground: The first group is a bookworm club, and has the luxury of knowing the only language in which the rules of the playground/games/swings/rides are written. They only teach this language to their own kind. If anyone wants to know how a particular game/swing/ride works, they come to them. They also run schools where they teach written language (not the special language) to other kids. These are your Brahmin Kids. The second group is the playground bullies club, but this group also the protects the playground from other kids who are not regulars, or want to take the playground for themselves. They know martial arts, and they write literature and arts in their local language. They bully everyone except the Brahmin kids, because they hold the power of knowledge. Others, they bully or pamper depending on how much they need them. One of them, is the de-facto ruler of the playground. These are your Kshatriya kids. The third group is a group of rich kids, they own several of the swings/rides in the playground, they frequently trade with other rich kids who own stuff on other playgrounds. They keep paying up to the bully to ensure their own protection, and the protection of their swings etc. Sometimes the bullies are nice to them, sometimes the bullies take away their stuff, to fund their campaigns to attack other playgrounds. These are your Vaishya Kids. The fourth group is a group of hardworking kids, whose sole purpose is to ensure everyone in the playground is fed, and everything in the playground works. They are paid measly wages by the traders and/or the bullies. They all share their knowledge of stuff through lore, and are restricted from learning any written language. *EDIT*: These are the Shudra kids. The fifth group is detested by everyone else, because their main job is to clean everyone else's shit. Basically, clean the flush-less toilets by hand, take care of dead animals, work in the sewers etc. Since they work in so much filth, no one wants to even come near them, let alone touch them. Since they are forbidden by the bookworms to even talk to them, they have no way of learning anything new. These are your Achhoot (Untouchables) kids. (Come to thinks of it Untouchables has such weirdly different connotations in the west vs. India) Now, as you see above, there are only two classes really trying to escape poverty. They can't because the knowledge required to enter the higher groups requires that they understand some kind of a written language, or years and years of martial training, or an incredible amount of sudden wealth. All three of these things were impossible to fake, and hence you were always stuck with caste you were born into.",
"It is important to know that the caste system was NOT stronger in the past. New subaltern studies indicate very strongly that the caste system solidified and became excessively rigid during the 150 years of British colonial rule. The caste system originally was defined as a guild system - similar to the one in say Europe from the fall of Rome onwards (or traced back to Diocletian's reforms on guilds). The varna system had 4 castes broadly, the Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra. These 4 groupings were originally not prevented or banned from changing their groupings by accquiring skills belonging to another caste (guild?). For instance, the writer (to whom the epic can be traced to) of one of India's most famous epics, the Ramayana was a hunter belonging to the Shudra caste. You have had many kings who were either Vaishya, Brahmin or Shudra castes, we do know that the Nanda dynasty, the Marathas, Cholas for a start were from what would today be considered a 'lower caste', yet sources from their era do not even mention their caste, which should have been a huge issue if one went by how rigid the system today is. If you take the Arthasasthra, it actually mentions the composition of the king's council and that it needed to have 2 from each major caste (why would a 'lower caste' person be included in the highest tiers of decision making in one of the most powerful empires this earth has seen?) Take recent times, The Beautiful Tree, a report by Dharmpal on the education system prior to the British take over (using British sources interestingly enough) says unequivocally that the 100's of thousands of village schools around the country educated kids of all castes and also girl children without discrimination. This is the background to the caste system per se. To answer your specific question though, discrimination was really not a big concern based on castes till about the mid 16th century when the caste system did slowly start to get solidified (it really accelerated after the British take over), but even here you had very quickly, reform movements like the Bhakti movement emerge to counter these ill effects of the caste system. That said, your caste was tied to a trade, and in real terms, learning an entirely new trade was (and still is, in this modern world) very different. Secondly, the village as a social unit played a big role in the survival and prosperity of individuals, to cut those ties was (and still is) extremely difficult. edit - left out the 5th caste, these were the untouchables, but this status was reserved only for those who worked the crematoria and those punished by exile from society who were made and called \"chandalas\". These were excluded from everything. Edit 2 - Just to clarify, the British did not invent this system, they took an existing socioeconomical and cultural structure, didn't understand it in the least, interpreted it the way their own system ran (priests, knights, traders and serfs with a bunch of slaves in the end) and applied their own rules to this system. The system then responded and became more rigid in response to this stimuli. Sources - * Nicholas Dirks' Castes of Mind. * Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age by Susan Bayly * Colonialism and Its Forms of Knowledge: The British in India by Bernard Cohn",
"India is huge with wildly different cultures, customs and traditions. In the past these differences were much more pronounced and you couldn't just move from one place to another, and people would probably be suspicious of outsiders. Back then (I'm talking about pre-colonial times) the identity of India as a unified nation did not even exist so if someone moved from say East India to the South they would be treated as foreigners. Also most other places had their own caste system (except probably the tribal areas). Also, castes were related to professions. So even if they did change their locality their job and skill set wouldn't. With no change in profession there would be no change in treatment.",
"Imagine yourself as a lower caste person born into large poor family. Your family is your whole support system. Traveling in earlier times was dangerous and uncommon. Ignorance, superstition and fear was widespread especially among the poor due to lack of education. So ask yourself this question. Would you take you (and perhaps your whole family if they agreed to your proposition) move away from a place where they have at least some semblance of security and income to unknown place with no guarantee of safety during the journey or knowledge of your destination? Some English serfs did do exactly that coming to America during Early Colonial Times with very unfortunate outcome. Edit: Should have used the term indentured servant instead of serf, from Europe instead of just English. URL_0 Additionally, You are psychological prisoner of your birth and circumstances. Very difficult to break out a prisoner mentality.",
"According to my Indian friends, the caste system is still very much in place despite being outlawed. A part of it is based on skin color and other physical features. One woman I know was harshly criticized by her family for being a light skinned woman throwing herself away on a dark skinned man (their way of putting it, not mine). Racism is the norm in all but the western European countries and the US, and it's only thinly concealed there. We're a lot less advanced as a species than most like to think.",
"You can't just magic up wealth, education, contacts/a social network, the right way of speaking, good diet, reasonable health care ... etc etc etc",
"This is like saying \"why don't poor people just move to New York City and pretend to be rich people?\" They could, but if you show up to NYC without a cent in your pocket, not knowing anyone (without any ability to be introduced to the right circles), not looking the part, people will either not believe you or simply not care. Think about how hard it would be to make it in the big city in this scenario. Most people would end up back being poor but in NYC, which is what would happen in India. People mentioned skin tone as well. This also played a role. Darker skinned Indians were largely in the lower castes, and would have been subject to more suspicion if he just showed up where no one had known him before.",
"My, admittedly fuzzy, understanding is that there was some flexibility in the caste system through the concept of *dvija* ([twice-born]( URL_2 )): > The first birth is physical, while the second birth is a 'spiritual' one. The second 'birth' occurs when one takes up fulfilling a role in society. Apparently there are different views on whether the lowest castes could use this process for social reinvention. Another form of social change is [Sanskritisation]( URL_0 ) which > denotes the process by which castes placed lower in the caste hierarchy seek upward mobility by emulating the rituals and practices of the upper or dominant castes. In terms of using immigration to claim a new caste, I am aware of the example of Mauritius, a small island country in the Indian Ocean populated in majority through Indian immigration: > We may assume that many indentured labourers took advantage of the system to start a new life with a higher status, either claiming to belong to a caste other than their own or laying claim to a status their caste members were not generally granted. Such individuals were sometimes mocked as ‘Brahmins from the boat’ (Singaravelou 1991: 16). We also know of reverse strategies (Carter 1995): some high-caste individuals preferred to hide their caste identity, fearing the planters would think them unfit for agricultural work or too prompt to federate the labourers because of their intellectual-elite status. > [The ‘Land of the Vaish’? Caste Structure and Ideology in Mauritius]( URL_1 )",
"Tis probably did happen. But based on my limited understanding: name - family names are linked to castes education - if you are an \"untouchable\", you can't suddenly pretend you are a priest. skill set - similar to above.",
"People did not move because being a member of a caste also meant you were part of a community - a 'samaj'. This offered a fixed, predictable way of life where you were given a profession, a partner, a supportive set of friends and extended family and a sense of belonging. Migrating alone would mean embracing the unknown, without a support system - a daunting prospect for most. That said, sometimes groups did successfully proclaim a higher status than before, after achieving the adequate social power to do so, and embellished the new status with suitably concocted legends and tales of ancestry.",
"Altough I'm not Indian I've studied a lot of the caste system in my degree in Anthropology and also had a teached who worked directly with Dalit (the untouched, outcasts) familys to a point where she had \"her\" family in India. For starters I dont think from what I read and hear that the caste system is getting weaker (see the documentary India Untouched available on Youtube and also articles like URL_0 ). Now the main reason to why people of lower castes dont \"lie\" it's as much connected to their signs as someone /u/AdityaRav has pointed out but also because the caste system is at the same time a belief that if you act right in the next life you'll get a better reincarnation. On the other hand, acting in a way that makes you go away from your original caste can take serious punishment. I've learned in school that a way for Dalits to fight the oppression is to convert to other religions. However, you can see on the documentary above that a woman who did that got beaten to near death and her hands were burned to a point where she lost them. Why didn't slaves rebel if they were in greater number then the master? Because the idea of punishment is greater then the possibility of reward. It makes us wonder about the book Surveiller et Punir: Naissance de la prison written by Foucault. ps: I'm sorry about my english, not a native speaker.",
"The Indian caste system was based loosely on genetics; there were four main caste, and people were assigned to a caste based on their strengths/skills. Over time, people default got their parent's caste because the logic was that the son of, say, a warrior, would be a much better warrior than the son of, say, a merchant. Also, a person's diet, routine, and therefore physical and mental condition would be closely linked to their caste. It would this be obvious which main caste a person was by setting how they behaved. There is a popular story of a (warrior caste) guy going to a (priest caste) sage for training in magic, pretending to also belong to the priest caste(magic was considered more of a science those days, and was supposed to only be learnt and known members of the priest caste). the suspicious priest asked him to sit on a rock for ten minutes without moving. That rock was an anthill, and he was bitten by them, yet didn't flinch. The date they said that members of the priest class were puny, and couldn't handle that pain, so this guy had to be a warrior caste dude. Similarly, i can think of several other ways to figure out a person's caste, even today.",
"Dark is the colour of labour. Lower caste folks usually had darker skin tones as they farmed and did more manual labour. The upper caste ranged from warriors and people who owned lands and properties (a Feudalistic society after all). Lower caste folks did not get education and you cannot fake being a scholar by just moving to another place. For a person to successfully evade the system by moving to another place, they would have needed lot of wealth to acquire land and power to evade being discriminated based on colour and caste. One couldn't move too far as language difference would cause trouble too. Only traders of upper classes who travelled a lot had such knowledge. Forget the Brits and the East India company, blah blah they ruled us for 200 years, let us blame them for this too. (Don't play defense and blame the Brits bruv, that is so RSS!) Sure they did what they could to exploit with existing differences, divide and rule policy still works considering the present world events. At first the caste system was pretty flexible, anyone from one caste can switch to another by changing their profession. During the Maurya dynasty, Buddhism was wide spread and everyone was treated equally (Thanks to Ashoka the Great). But then this dude called Pushyamitra Shunga who was a minister to the last Mauryan King wanted more powers and murdered the Mauryan king and he took the throne. Thus Shunga Dynasty was born, Buddhism was destroyed and the orthodox set of rules about caste were written and enforced among the people. Thus one belonged to the caste they were born into. If you want sauce: Revolution and Counter-Revolution in India, leader B. R. Ambedkar",
"A lot has already been said here. I would only like to point out a mythological example of someone claiming to be from a different caste, and the effect of what happened when the truth finally came out. The Mahabharat is literally an Epic -- one of the true four epics in the world, the others being the Ramayan, the Iliad and the Odyssey. At the heart of the Mahabharat is the power struggle between two sets of cousins -- the five Pandavs [the good guys] and the 100 Kauravs [mostly the bad guys]. The Pandavs were all sons of gods, carried in the wombs of two queens of Pandu. The eldest queen, Kunti, had learned the incantation from a Brahmin to call gods at will and give her a child. This was the incantation that led to the birth of the five Pandavs, despite the fact that Pandu was infertile. Now, Kunti had invoked this incantation once before, and that was before she married Pandu. On that occasion, the Sun god had come and given her a son whom she had put in the river in a basket, much like baby Moses. However, unlike baby Moses, who was picked up by Pharaohs and raised as a prince, this son, who came to be known as Karna, was picked up by a charioteer and raised as one of his own, according to his caste and not the royal caste Karna belonged to. When the time came, Karna received training under Parashuram, the Brahmin ascetic who had picked up a Parashu -- the axe -- and tried to purge the earth of Kshatriyas -- the warrior caste -- 18 times. After that he had settled with imparting knowledge, which was more in keeping with his caste. Also, he taught only Brahmins, and Karna identified himself to Parashuram as one. One day, as Parashuram rested his head on Karna's lap and slept, and insect bit Karna and started eating his flesh. Karna -- ~~born of a god and thus having Brahminical strength and endurance~~ showing the strength and endurance of a Kshatriya -- did not move an inch despite the insect burrowing into his leg and eating his flesh. When Parashuram finally woke, he was not happy at such sacrifice and discipline from his student, but was angry. After all, nobody but a true ~~Brahmin~~ Kshatriya could show such endurance, but Karna had identified himself to his guru as a ~~Kshatriya~~. Parashuram cursed Karna, saying he would forget all the knowledge Parashuram had imparted to him when he needed it the most. And that is exactly what happened in the great war of Kuruksheta, where Karna was killed by his half-brother Arjun. Edit: Got Kshatriya and Brahmin mixed up. Thanks for the correction, guys...",
"It's funny, I had this professor in my graduate program (you know you can tell someone has a graduate degree? Waiting a minute and they'll tell you) and he was from India and one day he got off on a tangent about the caste system, and telling me how he could tell you what caste a person was in by their last name. He says, \"I don't care about the caste system at all. Of course I was of the highest caste.\" Humble brag. It's like if I were to say, \"Yeah, I don't really work out, but I can bench 460.\"",
"You have to remember - this was part of a belief system. It wasn't just that other people had a world view in which you were lower class... likely, you were too. To try and subvert this system would be counter to your own religious beliefs.",
"Okay, I am from Nepal and what you just said did happened in my country. I know of such a person. Despite what others are saying, there is no difference in skin color between lower and higher cast person. The real case: A person called A migrated from a distant village into my city of pokhara and said that he was a high caste man. He used to live in our house on rent. He had a wife. There was no way of knowing his caste. But two things gave it: 1) He tried to do bratabandha of his elder son which a common ceremony in which one shaves his head and puts on a sacred thread called janai. It indicates a transition to adulthood. The local priest asked him to put on the thread and A put on the opposite side. (See janai on google). So, the priest knew then on but since it was 1990 and caste system was criminalized, he did nothing. He revealed the caste to everyone and everyone knew his caste 2) When my grandmother was in hospital, she met someone from As village. She asked B about A and his caste was revealed. Since A had already moved to different house and it was the 90s, she did nothing. Finally, rumor travels fast here. Its like a village. Everybody knew his caste. And his sons later married someone from their own caste. So, you can see how difficult and risky it is to do something like that. If it was a 100 years before, he could have been executed. Only a kings command could change a low caste person to high in those times",
"At the end of the room a loud speaker projected from the wall. The Director walked up to it and pressed a switch. \"… all wear green,\" said a soft but very distinct voice, beginning in the middle of a sentence, \"and Delta Children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly colour. I'm so glad I'm a Beta.\" There was a pause; then the voice began again. \"Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfully glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able …\" The Director pushed back the switch. The voice was silent. Only its thin ghost continued to mutter from beneath the eighty pillows. \"They'll have that repeated forty or fifty times more before they wake; then again on Thursday, and again on Saturday. A hundred and twenty times three times a week for thirty months. After which they go on to a more advanced lesson.\"",
"Some of them did move here to Europe. We know them as Gypsies or Romani or Roma. URL_0 I am not sure it worked.",
"Because as with any powerful social institution people of a low caste were for the most part complicit in its implementation. You are asking that from the perspective of someone who thinks caste is a bad idea.",
"People are forgetting some things in these comments. 1. There are poor brahmins \"According to a Wall Street Journal report, an estimated 65 percent of the Brahmin households in India, with about 40 million people, lived on less than $100 a month in 2004; this number dropped to about 50% in 2007.[44] Brahmins have also included wealthier and politically successful members.\" URL_0 2. Caste does not always correlate with skin color. There are dark skinned tamil brahmins. India, in general though, is very skin color conscious. 3. The caste system is complicated, its meanings are complicated and have a lot of history, they vary regionally, and their current form is *hugely shaped by the British Raj.",
"Because, for generations, people were brainwashed into believing that they were born into their cast due to their karma from previous life and only way for them to move upward in next life is to perform the duties of their caste wholeheartedly. Surprisingly, originally the caste was determined not by birth but by abilities but soon 1% priest class aka brahmins started brain washing people to maintain their status quo.",
"Well, it's more difficult than we can think. Back then, a village was a ground zero kinda place where everyone knew anyone and with no other communication devices than word of mouth, others from different villages also knew things about your village. Now consider you are a labour caste fellow. You are accustomed to working your ass of to a master(ish person) who will pay you in kind or a tiny amount of money that will barely feed you a snack and you have an extended family to take care of. So you work your back off for this person hoping one day he'll help you when in distress (which would actually happen). Then there were landlords who owned enough land to feed multiple villages (changed when a Indira Gandhi passed a law which said the person toiling the land will now own the land iirc) and were well connected with other such landlords and if you do some stupid shit, news traveled quick and you would be out of a job, anywhere. Hence, no one tried to fuck up. Say you fucked up somehow and now have no job. Thinking about moving to a neighbouring village? They know about you. Think you can move somewhere really far away and start afresh? Where do you have the resources? Villages/towns were good distances away and with walking (no, bullock carts needed resources too) the only option, you and your family with hungry kids won't last a day. Also consider the fact that landlords were also brutal assholes at times. They would beat you to pulp if you didn't work to their bidding and would threaten to bury you along with your family. Pawns just waiting to be sacrificed kinda. BUT. Landlords commanded a lot of respect from their workers. They would almost worship them for giving them full meals everyday. You can see that from landlords quickly forming their own militia when provoked. Then there's the mindset. Say you are again from the labourer caste or a trader caste (soudra and vaishya respectively). You grow up learning the same craft and think that it's the job you're destined to do and nothing will change it. If you are a clever lad, maybe you will want to be someone else, maybe pick up arms and fight for your king but you'd be quickly discouraged for reasons like, what would the family do if he was killed? What if the landlord was unhappy and disowned the family? And more importantly, \" No, you are a workboy and that's what you'll do in life. We work for our lord and we will do his bidding only. He provides for us so why go anywhere else?\" When you are one of the only breadwinners of the family, you can't argue against these strong points. Language and way of life also is a part of this. Considering India, every 50 kms, there's a change in dialect/language (even today). A person can easily make out where the other comes from solely based on how s/he speaks. Now, can you change the way you speak overnight? Maybe, but remember, most of them were literate only in the job they knew and nothing else. Fight for your king? Yes. Write a book? What's a book? Grow some rice? Yes. Brew some wine? What's wine? The way a person dresses up also gives away things (like today mostly). The lower casts wouldn't have the privilege of new clothes and mostly had hand-me-down items which never worked in their favour if they managed to move. They wouldn't have the money to buy anything new too. Example to everything I've said: My aunt's family own a shit ton of land and they let a community of potters to live on a part of their land 3 decades back and they are still there, doing pottery (beautiful pottery though). But they also work on the fields and inside their house. We are also a Brahmin family. Although we don't see them any lesser than us, they don't enter our prayer rooms, our kitchens or even sit with us when we are around. They are served 3 meals a day (around 30-40 workers) and given almost free medical help (my uncle is a doctor). I've spoken to them a lot of times (both my family and the community) and although they don't consider us landlords or we consider them as mere labourers, they maintain that statusquo. My aunt's family have tried to make them a part of everything that happens around and we still do. We can now see the changes happening with a lot of adults/kids being/getting educated and going out of town to work. This one time, I tried to enter one of their houses and wasn't allowed to, by them! It's more of a mindset than a forced thing, then and now. I haven't read through all the comments and I'm sure there are a lot of source included explanations that are better but here's my 2 rupees.",
"This happened a lot, a lot time ago a poor family had come to my great grand parents farm to work and asked them if they could use our surname to register themselves with the local authorities so their kids would have access to better education.",
"The caste system is still very strong today. Moving to another area today can mean moving to the US, UK, Canada or Australia. Even today inter caste marriage is very rare in India, perhaps at social acceptance level the west was at 75 years ago with inter racial marriage.",
"Another way to look at it... Why can't you just walk away from the life you have and walk into the life you want. Think about yourself in that context.",
"Indian anthropologist checking in. India never had a homogeneous culture so to speak; so your language, clothing, local gods and pretty much every social marker would be out of place if you moved. Moving around was simply not something most Indians did and the ones who moved are those we now call the 'tribals'. So yes, it wasn't possible to 'pass' as Brahmin because not only was/is it a matter of what last name you were born with, but also your dietary habits, language skills, knowledge of certain texts (used to be but definitely not anymore) cannot really be faked.",
"I see alot of the whole \"There were telltale signs\" and \"They don't know certain skills\" answers but I feel like no one has said the most obvious one to me. There is no way that you can pick and move to another place and lie aout your caste, because people check. They'll go up your lineage and cross check each person on their until they find a connection to their own caste or someone who knows of them. Like my dad taught me and my sisters our genealogy up to my great-great-great-grandfather in case we needed to \"introduce\" ourselves.",
"The same way you can't just walk up to an old money WASP millionaire and join their group. There are unconscious ways that different social groups \"signal\" that they belong. Including but not limited to: * the way you talk (cockney rhyming slang or stiff upper lip queen's English?) * the way you dress (more than just buying expensive brands, but having your garments properly dry cleaned, pressed, and lint rolled. Accessioning well and being able to match jackets, belts, and shoes to your outfit, and not just owning one or two of those things and having their function be mostly utilitarian. Having every garment you own fit perfectly because (a) the high end garments you buy are constructed with the assumption that you will be getting them altered, and (b) before you've even left the dressing room measurements have been taken by the stores in-house tailor, and the completed garments will be delivered to you a later in the week.) * the way you eat (do you hold your fork correctly? Do you know which wine to order with which dish? Have you had a decent amount of exposure to \"upscale foods\" and wont be grossed out or confused if oysters, caviar, or lox are served? Is the silent service code second nature to you, and your interactions with wait staff are seamless and invisible?) * the way you groom yourself (did you have braces and do you now get your teeth whitened semi annually, or have you never been to a dentist?) * how you talk about and handle money (do you talk about it? Do you fret over waste? are you concerned with \"value\"?) * your shared experiences (\"I didn't know what I wanted to study in university, so I took a year off to travel.\" vs. \"I took a year off before university to work and save money.\" vs. \"No one in my family has ever been to university.\" ) * Common interests (Golf and tennis vs. football and baseball vs. mudding and hunting) I think an easy to relate to example would be, why poor people seem so into name brands, showing off labels, and conspicuous consumption. To them they see the upper classes with money to buy expensive things, so to come across as rich, they need to buy expensive things, and then because those items represent such a large monetary investment, they need to show them off. Compared to the middle class, who see the difference between themselves and the upper class as manners, and go to great lengths to learn the proper etiquette for different situations, particularly dining (as a child I was told I needed to keep my elbows off the table and hold my fork a specific way because what if one day I was invited to have dinner with the queen?). The other difference is experiences, particularly travel. Middle class people will cash out their retirement and their kids college funds to go on trips, and see it as a worthwhile investment the same way lower class people see a branded LV bag or Gucci sneakers. Upper class people, I assume care about none of these things. Instead they care about service and exclusivity. If you want to impress your friends but money is no object to any of you, you try and track down things where money is not the only determinate of if you can have it: rare wines, haute couture (you have to be invited to be allowed to buy couture, it's not just about having enough money), limited production cars with 15 year waiting lists. Fairmont \"Gold\" floors, where you literally pay 3x the cost for the same room, just to be separated from the masses.",
"Also probably the people of the lower castes were terribly poor. If I am not mistaken people from lower castes were given the worst jobs and were poorly paid. They wouldn't have been able to just pack up and leave.",
"Remember in Showgirls, Elizabeth Berkeley's character says something to the effect of \"nice 'vuhr seis' bag\" when she meant \"Versace\"? Boom, she was cooked right there. Now imagine if it's not just language, but manners, behavior, skin tone. You can't just jump around to hide that. Also, most places in the world are wary of outsiders, so showing up with a manufactured backstory rarely works either.",
"Three things that prevented them from going anywhere: 1) economic standing - this applies more to the people that were being treated as untouchables - they were struggling to get their basic necessities met 2) your social circle - If your social circle are others like you who are not aware of basic human rights, then it's close to impossible to think outside of that box. 3) religion - added to all this was the element of religion that was stretched to make it morally okay to do this!",
"/u/RajendraCholzhan has a really great reply about this but I will try to dumb it down a little for ELI5 version.. Imagine you are in a school where children are divided into different houses (sections) and each house performs a specific duty. But if you want to change house you are allowed to do so by learning the task required by your desired house. For example, if you are in a house that cleans the dishes after meals and you want to move to a house that cooks, you will have to learn how to cook in order to move. This was caste system in its early stages. However, the principal of school changes (British rule) and the new principal doesn't understand the system. So he declares, you can no longer change houses. All students and even their next generations will have to stay in same house forever. And to answer your question about moving to a new place, its like changing schools. First of all, it is quite a trouble to change school leaving your friends behind (In old days, your community was your lifeline as barter system was dependent on having good relationships with your peers). And secondly, the new school will investigate to find out what you can do before they assign you a house.",
"There is a great book called White Tiger which talks about this. The answer is: Sometimes they did, but with great difficulty; and mostly they didn't because it's so difficult. Caste isn't just a label. It's somewhat morphological (you can see differences between castes) and very much intertwined with culture. It's like asking why doesn't a cockney Londoner pretend to be royalty. Their behaviour will give them away. Plus it's not just about caste, its social. The higher castes own land and run businesses. If their life was good why would they move? This would make toy highly suspect of a guy who rolled into town, nobody knowing them, with no money, a funny accent, who's claiming to be posh. And remember, social mobility in India is basically a way street. It goes down, but very rarely up. There are a vast number of ways to lose rank, even just by having cow's blood thrown on you, or by marrying out of your caste; and the only way to ascend is to die and be born again better off. This means that anyone from out of town claiming to be someone high caste isn't necessarily going to confer benefits. You'd be likely to think they were even more suspect (if he's Brahmin, what must he have done!?). Source: Lived in India for 5 years and wrote a research paper on Indian culture.",
"Because \"caste\" as we in the west think of it is not really an accurate description of reality. Jati - or birth group - is a much more useful construct. While there were four main castes (Brahmin, Ksatriya, Vaisha, and Sudra) birth group was a much more important indicator of someone's status (not just vertical). \"Moving\" to a different area would have been unheard of for many people because moving would mean transplanting into a different life-situation and inappropriate to your own \"Varashrama-Dharma\" - that is, the duty you are called to perform in this current incarnation, based on the 'color' (not skin tone) of your place in life. Westerners like to think of the caste system as exclusively or primarily an oppressive structure. This is nonsense. There is no doubt that it institutionalized structural inequalities, but it provided a stability and coherence to society that many other social systems (like free market capitalism) does not. So moving would often have not been a good or even desirable option anyway. Your 'caste' (really your jati) was WHO YOU WERE, it provided you a place in society, appropriate jobs, social networks, employment, and spiritual and religious significance. Moving to an a different area woudl have entailed learning a different language - an impossibility for most - and someone finding employment in a village (!!) in which you knew no one. While of course there were cities in India before the current century, you still had to choose SOMEWHERE to move and, traditionally, areas (even in cities = neighborhoods) are generally associated with a certain jati, which entails a certain lifestyle. This is why, contrary to what free marketers would think, like so many fabric stores in Delhi exist on the same street adn then, three blocks over, so many candy stores, and then, three blocks over, so many hardware stores, etc. I'm not saying that this phenomenon is exclusively a product of the caste system, but Jati groupings often determined the possible range of employment. So not only was moving not always possible, it was often not desirable. One's varnashrama-dharma (i.e. karma, if you prefer) indicated that it was RIGHT and GOOD to fulfill your duty in the position into which you were born. This is essentially the message of the Bhagavad-gita as well...'it's not up to you to chose your fate.... your fate is chosen and its up to you to fulfill it!\" which is what Krishna councils Arjuna when he is wondering if he should go to war with the other side of his family (he does). But showing up somewhere new, with a different accent (if not language altogether) with no social connections to anyone in that culture, no similar skills, different socio-religious rituals - moving often times made no sense. I'm not saying it never happened in cities but in villae life it would have been excessively difficult. And evne today the vast majority of indians live in villages or small towns.",
"You question is stated in a way that makes you appear to believe that thew Caste system no longer exists.",
"Because they don't have any money. How is an illiterate person with no money supposed to move somewhere? Who would have them? What skills would they bring to the new location?",
"Mostly by behavior. If you belong to a certain caste you picked up the behavior of that caste while very young by been around members of that caste (your family). Even if you were not Hindu you still belong to a caste.",
"First of all, India has dialects all over the place. So a person living in area A speaking language A was a foreigner in area b where language b was spoken, so it did not take too long to find out the identity. Second, even in America, Indian-Americans can find out the caste of someone just by the name or at most looks, and they assume that someone who looks from the Subcontinent and uses an Anglicized surname is probably someone who is trying to fake it.",
"I can expand about the caste system in Tamil Nadu, where it was extensively stratified. There are a few tell-tale signs. 1. Color - Brahmins are generally fairer (but plenty of exceptions exists) 2. Name. For example, any last name with -Selvan is non-Brahmin. Brahmins had Sanskritic personal names. Almost all of them would be the name of a Sanskritic deity. Non-Brahmins would use local deities, Tamil saints, local heroes and occasionally certain popular Sanskritic deities. 3. Language. Brahmins and non-Brahmins had different dialects which reflected their lineage. This is especially true in Tamil Nadu - Brahmin Tamil is Tamil mixed with several words which are Sanskrit derivatives. For more subtle differences: URL_0 4. Sacred thread - handed to Brahmin men after a 'thread ceremony' when young, a Brahmin is supposed to wear it till he dies (it gets changed in a ceremony every year). 5. Education level - generally Brahmins were highly educated. 6. Past occupation - again, stratified because of caste. Even if you moved to a different place, you would not magically acquire the skills needed to do the job of an upper caste person without formal training in the same.",
"A bit late to the party, but I studied in Tamil Nadu and did my independent study on Dalit conversions to Islam. Essentially, in 1980 two communities of Dalit (untouchable) caste converted to Islam in protest of the caste system. They felt (and still do, in a sense) that by leaving Hinduism, they would essentially be free from the caste system. Even in 2007, when I conducted my study, there were still hard feelings on both sides, with one Brahmin, who was an educated professor, suggesting that they converted because they were given oil money by the 'rich gulf states' and 'could be used as cannon fodder' for terrorist organizations. Those who had converted had found a sense of peace in the communities they built. I'm positive that the geographical location of these towns (not at all easy to access) has helped those converted separate themselves from the caste system, but, in turn, have made their communities somewhat of an island unto themselves. As stated above, were they to move back to an urban area, they would be pretty easily 'found out.' I also saw, at least in Madurai, Tamil Nadu, that caste structure bled into other religions, i.e. lower caste sitting on the ground in the back during a Catholic mass. TL;DR Individually, there would be problems, but entire communities removing themselves from the caste system has had some success.",
"Some people do that now, especially when immigrating to a new country. I'm Sikh, and we're forbidden from practicing the caste system. But most people are assholes, and want to do things they're told not to. So we have the Jatt (farmers, highest caste), Bhape (businessmen), Labane (also businessmen), etc. In Sikhism, all men are supposed to have the middle name Singh and all women Kaur. A lot of people immigrating to foreign lands (lots of people I know in the US) drop their last name while filling out paperwork or getting a visa, and adopt Singh as their last name. This gives them a fresh start in a new world, without them being judged by fellow Punjabis (people from Punjab, the state in India where Sikhism is the dominating religion) who also moved abroad. So if you see someone with the legal last name Singh, that's because they dropped their last name. No Punjabi has Singh as a last name. The sad part is when they move, and if asked about their caste, they say they're Jatt (rather than - its none of your bloody business). A lot of Hindus have started doing this too. Dropping their last name and adopting Kumar, or Singh (Hindu Rajputs carry this as a middle name too). Last name of a person can tell a lot about their caste and what part of India they're from.",
"It isn't like they just have a bad reputation... caste goes deep. (Goes. Present tense. But things are changing - that is the one eternal truth about India, things are *always* changing - and the rigid stratification superimposed over Indian society by the British is becoming a little more flexible.) It is the entire culture and religion and your family and friends and neighbors; if all of those believe something, there is a huge chance you believe it too. Even if that thing is that you are in some respect 'lower' than others. Caste is meant to fill a role; caste reflects on existing karma; caste can influence future karma. (In the US there is often indignation about people being treated \"like that\". But many of the offended people believe things like \"the meek shall inherit the earth\" and \"it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God\"... caste is those same ideas, in a place where society and country and religion and identity are often all more-or-less the same thing.) People of a 'lower' caste might not *want* to be in another caste. Their family and identity and society and *place* within that society all fit together... why would they want to go somewhere where none of those things 'fit'?(Again, not so different from Christianity, which devotes a lot of time telling people who are poor or downtrodden that they will be rewarded later.) If they *did* want to go somewhere else and pretend to be in a different caste, they might not have the resources to do so. Material resources, like money, and inner resources, like knowledge of customs inside other castes. But if they did have the resources, they wouldn't fool anybody anyway. They likely wouldn't even get the *chance* to try to fool anyone; showing up with no social and/or family infrastructure would tell others more about them than any story would. And there are social cues that someone who isn't really part of a group won't recognize and won't be able to respond to. Everything from body language to the way they speak to how much and what type of eye-contact they make can be read like a book by people of other castes. tl;dr: they might not *want* to change castes. If they did want to, they might not be able to do so. And if they were able to arrive somewhere else with a convincing story, it wouldn't work anyway... caste isn't like a bad rep; whatever caste you are in, you are likely in down to the subatomic level. That said, the caste system was a bit more flexible in the past, and likely will be again... the British love social stratification, so they found the caste system to be handy and tightened the bolts a bit. Since India regained its independence, adhering to such rigid social stratification has been less important."
],
"score": [
8157,
2640,
1939,
228,
167,
118,
92,
39,
32,
26,
26,
21,
17,
16,
16,
14,
12,
10,
9,
8,
8,
8,
7,
7,
6,
6,
5,
5,
5,
5,
4,
4,
4,
4,
4,
4,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indentured_servitude_in_the_Americas"
],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanskritisation",
"https://samaj.revues.org/3886",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvija"
],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.wunrn.com/2016/05/drought-gender-india-drought-hurts-low-caste-dalit-women-more-hunger-child-marriage-prostitution/"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romani_people"
],
[],
[
"http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB119889387595256961"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmin_Tamil"
],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5qzsyo | How People with Bipolor Disorders risk and impact those around them | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3djl6"
],
"text": [
"Statistically you are much less likely to be assaulted or injured by someone with a mental illness than anyone else, but lets move on to your question. For the most part, a depressive episode is an emotional risk for those involved, especially in the suicidal, but I've never heard of a depressed episode resulting in violence. In a manic episode (bipolar 1) there are generally two reactions, intense euphoria and/or irritability. In euphoria, the individual can make rash decisions that can be dangerous, such as speeding, drinking and driving, being extremely promiscuous (possibly spreading disease or infection) and in numerous other similar ways. In the irritable, just think of how an extremely angry and emotional individual with impaired reasoning can be dangerous."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r1dq3 | why is the population of so many Asian cities and countries so high? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3ow5m"
],
"text": [
"For the cities, it's mainly because Asian countries have seen a very rapid transition from people working on farms to people moving to \"The Big City\", whether that be Beijing/Shanghai/Mumbai/Tokyo/etc., to make a lot of money compared to what they earned in a rural village. China, for example, had under 10% of its population living in urban centers back in the 1960's. Just 50 years later, that figure is significantly over 50%. That's a ton of people moving into a pretty small area in a really short time frame."
],
"score": [
6
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r1l50 | What is the geneva convernion? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3q5g0",
"dd3otbz"
],
"text": [
"It was an agreement among nations in an effort to minimize the impact of war on the noncombatant population, for the most part. It also includes specific language for unnecessary suffering of combatants. Originally it was just an agreement for everyone to be fair and civil to the wounded soldiers, offer treatment, etc, but it has expanded a lot. It was the original GC that USSR did not want to sign because it called for POW camps to be subject to inspection, and they didn't like prisoners having rights to contact their home countries and such. These were both considered opportunities for security leaks and espionage tactics. Think of it like a Hollywood depiction of a gang fight. Two groups meet up ready to kick the shit out of each other, but before they start they set up some \"ground rules\". That's the Geneva Convention. An effort to make sure that the fight is about two military groups doing the minimum necessary to achieve an objective and nothing more... to the best of their ability. War is hell, but it can be made a little less hell for everyone else. Not everyone was on board with the exact letter of the GC, either. US for instance, only signed with reservations such as the ability to maintain a nuclear arsenal, as the US leaders of the time carried the belief that a strong nuclear arsenal serves as a deterrent against nuclear war.",
"It's a list of low blows not allowed in wars. No chemicals, no upside-down nipple-twisters in public, no killing of civilians. Basically, it's a piece of toilet paper because war is always going to bring out the worst in people, especially if their survival is on the line."
],
"score": [
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r27cf | How much power does the queen have today? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd3u0r2"
],
"text": [
"On paper, she has many powers, but the British \"constitution\" is not written down - it's the sum of existing laws, habits and conventions. Her rights are usually articulated in the terms defined by the 19th century British constitutionalist Walter Bagehot: - the right to be consulted - the right to encourage - the right to warn In the reality of the British constitution, all \"on paper\" powers the monarch has are actually devolved to the government. When the Queen acts, it is \"on the advice of Her Majesty's Government\". This system works because all players want to keep the system going. The system being hundreds of years old (the more \"recent\" major changes came with the Bill of Rights, 1689, the Act of Settlement, 1701, and the House of Lords reforms of 1911 and 1999), all legitimacy for anyone to hold power comes from the monarch. There is no sovereignty of the people, instead sovereignty rests jointly in the crown and parliament. Changing this would mean a complete and total overhaul of all institutions in the UK. If Charles, after becoming king, insisted on personally exercising some of those powers, it would cause a constitutational crisis likely to end with the monarchy losing those powers or being outright abolished - it would only take a 50.1% majority in parliament to pass such an act. The armed forces do swear personal loyalty to the monarch, but my guess (personal opinion here) is that the armed forces would not fight against parliament and the people to keep a meddling Charles on the throne."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r2vmw | Why does it appear that there is more emphasis on awareness foundations for woman than men? | URL_0 is an effort to raise awareness of heart disease in women, which is the number one cause of death for women. The thing I don't understand is it's also the number one cause of death in men. Why not just raise awareness for heart disease? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd403di",
"dd46gkv",
"dd4f3nv"
],
"text": [
"Because heart disease affects women differently than men. The heart problems that typically affect men are very obvious and tend to get treated. The heart problems that typically affect women are much less obvious or mimic the affects of other, less serious, health issues.",
"What about women's shelters? You never hear about men's shelters? I was a homeless father of 3 young kids for a while and I had to contact a women's shelter for help. I wasn't sure if they would help me since I wasn't a woman. They did. But I would have felt more welcome if it was called a family shelter.",
"There is something called an 'own group' bias that causes members of a particular group (usually race, religion or whatever) to feel greater empathy and bias in favor of people in their group. Women have this bias in favor of other women, but men do not favor other men. In fact, men are also biased in FAVOR of women. URL_0 This means that both males and females have a greater empathy for females. So with medical awareness campaigns, it is more effective to promote women's issues because people simply care more about women's issues and are more likely to donate. You see this trend in practically everything. For example, in war civilian deaths are often lamented as \"women and children,\" but in reality, men make up the vast majority of civilian deaths (75% in Syria, over 95% in Balkans). This includes young boys who, interestingly enough, are usually more likely to be killed than adult women."
],
"score": [
10,
10,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[
"http://www.apa.org/monitor/dec04/women.aspx"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r2z7i | Why is incest illegal? | No, I'm not incestual. But, today in Biology, we talked about the effects of inbreeding, and this question popped into my head. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd419zu",
"dd3zzm7",
"dd419ev"
],
"text": [
"The parent-child relationship is extremely easy to abuse. The child is totally dependent on the parent, and generally trusts anything the parent says. So a father could theoretically raise his daughter to believe that her only purpose in the world is to serve him. Even if he doesn't touch her until she's of legal age, he could still \"groom\" her to be his willing servant long before that. It's the worst kind of abusive relationship, because a child's mind is *plastic*, and how you develop as a child is nearly impossible to change as an adult. If an adult gets trapped in an abusive relationship, you can often save them and they can move on with their life. But someone who's been brainwashed as a child almost certainly can't. The same principle applies not just to parent-child but to any caregiver-child relationship, like aunts/uncles, grandparents, etc. Brother/sister is a little more iffy, but remember that these traditions started back in the days when families were huge, and an older sibling might be a grown adult while the younger sibling was still a toddler. The potential for abuse was still there.",
"The primary reason is the moral issue. For most people, it feels wrong to get sexual with a family member. And that is hard-coded into the biology. In rare circumstances (like an extremely low and isolated population), it can be accepted. But if some guy in Chicago is having sex with his 18 year old daughter, that's wrong. We codified the rules and said that basically anyone close enough that you might live with them is off-limits. Mother, father, sister, brother, son, daughter, aunt, uncle, 1st cousin, and grandparents. The benefit of these laws, and the reason they are never repealed or overruled, is the fact that genetic damage can occur in incest by increasing the prevalence of recessive genes.",
"I think its because it could lead to offspring with severe deformities and psychological trauma for all parties involved"
],
"score": [
19,
9,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r4dig | Why is the kitchen staff excluded from receiving tips? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4c9q0"
],
"text": [
"They're not paid wait staff salary. Plain and simple. Wait staff members, bar keep, and bus persons are kept at a lower wage and because of this, their earning is heavily reliant on tipping as a result of their excellent service. Remember, the next time someone comes by the table and tries to make sure you have everything you need, that person is probably making around $4/hr as a base salary and depends on you leaving at least double the tax."
],
"score": [
8
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r4qvo | How do you run for president? | Like, do you just come out and say that you're running for president, and hope that it picks up buzz? I'm very confused about this. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4fo9k",
"dd4hnv5"
],
"text": [
"- Convince a few wealthy people you'd make a good President and get them to help finance your campaign. Alternatively, be wealthy enough to fund yourself in the early stages. - Enter the primaries for one of the major parties, campaign hard in each state, press flesh, get people to believe in you, and solicit more donations. - Win the primary, and campaign across the country with the full backing of the party machine.",
"well first, we have to know what country you're asking about. But because I'm an ignorant, selfish Piece of Shit, I'll assume you're talkin' about the great ol' US of A. Requirements include that you be at least 35 years old, be born in the United States of America, and have lived in the US for a total of 14 years. If you meet those requirements, you announce that you're running for President and then kiss ass to rich people trying to get campaign funds. When you get campaign funds, use them efficiently in states where you are likely to get a lot of voters to advertise yourself Finally, enter the primaries and win them. Pretty simple, really."
],
"score": [
8,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r4zh0 | Why does is it impossible to find news that is accurate and can be trusted? | I am only 20 so I am new to this whole politics thing and really being involved. It doesn't help that this election has been insane and I am trying to learn about good news sources through this. I feel overwhelmed and I just want honest news. I feel like for every piece of news there is someone somewhere proving why they are wrong. SOMEONE HELP. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4hi1b",
"dd4iv48",
"dd4rzpy",
"dd4rrgy"
],
"text": [
"It is overwhelming -- there are so many potential sources of news these days, and many of them spend time telling you that most of the others are untrustworthy and inaccurate. That doesn't help. So start small, with things you know about or that people you know and trust know about. What sources are accurate about *that* stuff? That's good to know. They seem to represent truth as you understand it. Then note what sources *they* trust. That will expand your potential news universe a bit, let you extrapolate to things you don't know about personally. But that's not enough. Seek out people that are different from you -- maybe a different race, maybe from a different part of the world, maybe of a different social class. Make friends with them, figure out which of them are smart and trustworthy, find out what sources seem accurate to *them*. How do those sources match with the ones that you've already been consuming and trusting? Critical thinking will be key. If you find someone obviously telling a lie, you should question why they did so and whether you can trust other things they say. It is plausible (but sad) for a person or a source to be trustworthy on some topics but utterly deranged on others.",
"If you like podcasts, try listening to On The Media. They examine and explain news coverage of all kinds. The hosts don't report the news per se, but rather help listeners to understand the often confusing and contradictory relationship the press has with the truth. Their website even has a \"Breaking News Consumer's Handbook\" so \"you can glide through the murky waters of the media like a Navy seal.\" The show is produced once a week, with mini episodes in between sometimes. Comes out of WYNC, an NPR outlet. Very entertaining to me. In fact, it's where I get most of my news, so I don't have to weed through the rhetoric.",
"Almost all news sources will be 'wrong' on somethings, but you should still listen to all of them and sort through the bullshit yourself. Bias in news can manifest in different ways (whether intentional or not), so even sources you trust can skew your opinion on something. Exposing yourself to conflicting sources will give you a much more well rounded and 'honest' understanding of any subject.",
"My son came home from school today where his teacher spent a lot of time bashing the president's immigration order. She gave the class an assignment to use Google to determine what was in the executive order and why it was in there. Needless to say the top posts were all editorials and opinion. So I taught my son (7th grader) the importance of going to original sources and forming his own opinion. I have always told him that more important than believing in something is understanding why you believe it. Original sources is the answer. Read it for yourself or watch the live footage on C-SPAN. I have not found a news organization I really trust."
],
"score": [
7,
6,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r5jdq | What is a constitutional crisis? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4mdfc"
],
"text": [
"Generally speaking, no constitution is perfect. And, even a great constitution is not self-enforcing---no matter how beautifully written or clear, people still need to abide by it, more or less. When you have a situation that the constitution doesn't appear to cover or where part of the government refuses to abide by an accepted interpretation of the Constitution, you have what is usually termed a constitutional crisis. Sometimes, it doesn't have to be about the written constitution itself, but can involve violation of a widely accepted \"unwritten rule\" (sometimes called a \"norm\"). For example, say that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a law was unconstitutional, but the president continued to enforce that law. You'd have a crisis because technically, by the most widely accepted approach to the judiciary in the U.S., the Supreme Court has the final word. But if the President simply refused the order, it creates a crisis, which the Constitution doesn't provide a clear way to resolve."
],
"score": [
9
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r5ttg | What started the hatred of Homosexuality? | I don't mean religion here. As many Christians once held it was wrong for a man to lay with another man, where did this concept come from? What advantage was to be gained from spreading fear of a sexual preference? Specially one which could have yielded support. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4omwb",
"dd4os28"
],
"text": [
"Cultures that forbade any form of sexual release that didn't make babies outpopulated those that permitted them.",
"As far as I know, hatred of homosexuality does come from religion. There are plenty of cultures that have no problem with homosexuality. They just aren't in the majority that settled America."
],
"score": [
10,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r6xso | Where did the stereotypical mentality of the New Yorker who believes that "if you can survive New York, you can survive anything" come from? | I'm not American and have seen this mentality repeatedly appearing in movies, written stories, and even in real life interviews with New Yorkers on the news. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd4xwsb",
"dd4y06l",
"dd4yh6b"
],
"text": [
"New York is by far America's densest city. A very large number of people are crammed into a fairly small area, compared to the rest of the country. This has resulted in a somewhat ruder, harsher, more impatient culture there than in the rest of the country. You have to be a little bit pushy to get access to scarce resources and you have to assert yourself to maintain personal space. It's greatly exaggerated that living in New York is some kind of harsh challenge, like living in the wilderness or something, but it definitely is different than suburban or rural America. Everyone's in a hurry.",
"I've lived in 4 states (soon to be 5 next month!) and about a dozen cities across the US, and imho, there really is no place like NYC. I lived there for about 6 years during my early 20s, and I can honestly say I saw and did more than most ppl my age had, and I sincerely believe I will never see that much action in my life again. To this day, I refrain from talking about my NYC adventures because I don't want it to look like I'm showing off and/or come off as a delusional liar. There is just SO damn much that goes on there ALL the time.The huge variety of people (good and bad!), cultures, and lifestyles means you'll experience situations there that you wouldn't normally encounter anywhere else. Also, it's a huge city. You will very rarely, if ever, see someone more than once, even on commuting routes. I live in a fairly large city in the Midwest right now, and I see the same ppl on my commutes all the time. In NYC, there's a ton of competition, so you really have to try to stand out in order to make a living. I think this is what they mean when they say \"if you can survive NYC, you can survive anything\". I feel this way myself :)",
"Ive been all over the US, there's nothing like Nyc. Even compared to other countries, it's not quite the same. Firstly, it's expensive as hell and you get very little for your money. Paying rent in NYC is your first challenge. Everything else is expensive as well. You are also surrounded with tons of extremely wealthy people, famous people, well connected people, and business people. So everyone is always trying to do, become or achieve something. This is why it's hard to keep friendships and romantic relationships, it's a town where many people are just passing through, are too focused on themselves and their career, or are always looking for \"something better\". You are never lacking options. This is where New York gets its reputation as being lonely. Doing business in New York is extremely difficult, as prices are high and competition is high, and reputation is important. You are bombarded with advertising at every corner and scams run rampant in the city. This teaches you to be skeptical. Unlike other large cities in other countries, there pure capitalist mentality surrounding New York business with relatively little moral or ethical conscience, it makes the consumer more wary. Even panhandlers have elaborate money making schemes so that they can extract money from even the smartest NYC \"clients\". wall streeters, and millionaires take the subway too, after all. And if you're an artist, good luck to you! The subway has more musical talent playing for change than most major countries would have performing on tv shows, the competition is fierce and you may never get anywhere with it. But it's also one of the greatest cities in the world in part because of and in part in spite of all of the above mentioned."
],
"score": [
9,
8,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r8fei | how have so many first world nations slid away from democracy and multiculturalism? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd57rtd",
"dd59hxf"
],
"text": [
"Which first world nation is sliding away from democracy? 1) As for multiculturalism, I would say it's because it's hard. Done right it bring wonders for a country. Done wrong and it create gethos, poverty, crime and racial/cultural tensions. The problem is that it's easier to do it wrong and right. An other easy thing to do, is to go against multiculturalism. That way you are more sure to not have those problems. 2)Changing is hard for people. Accepting new ways to do things is not something that come naturally to most people. They prefer to not see those different cultural practice in their neighbourhoods. 3) Stranger are easy to blame for problems. You lost your jobs because you are a bad employee or you didn't finish school. It's way easier to blame all that on the foreigner instead of you. Human did that since the beginning of our race and will continue to do it for a long time. It's in our DNA, what make us care more about the people closest to us is also make us care less about the people further from us. It's hard to fight that.",
"My answer from [over here]( URL_0 ) touches on part of what you asked."
],
"score": [
11,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5r81hs/eli5_what_caused_the_rise_of_alt_right/dd54dog/"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r8l68 | why do spanish speakers from puerto rico, argentina, etc. have trouble pronouncing their 's's and 'r's? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd58f1h"
],
"text": [
"They have trouble pronouncing them the way they are pronounced in English because \"s\" and \"r\" are pronounced differently in the Spanish spoken in those places, so they both need to learn the new sound and change their lifelong pronounciation. In their native language, they pronounce those sounds just fine and you have trouble with them."
],
"score": [
5
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r8nqk | What impact does calling state representatives have? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd58q8l",
"dd5a2cu",
"dd59j33",
"dd5a25y",
"dd5c53w",
"dd5fw1r",
"dd5mpcg",
"dd5cifm"
],
"text": [
"Individually? Not a great deal. One voice isn't much when a representative is working with hundreds of thousands. But a bunch of them? You'll get a response at minimum. To paraphrase Wayne Wheeler (the guy who got Prohibition passed) \"the primary desire of any American politician is to get and keep a job.\" If you make it clear that they need to play ball with you to get/keep their job... they'll work with you.",
"Let's say I'm running for office in Anytown, USA. I won my last election 5,200 votes to 4,800 votes. If 500 registered voters of mine call me up and say \"We want you to vote no on Bill No.123 or we'll vote for John Doe in the next election\", if I don't vote no on Bill No.123, I lose 500 voters, and run a risk of losing an election. The number one priority of a politician is to get re-elected.",
"It has more of an impact than you think, particularly if you are registered to vote in their district. A phone call or personalized letter (not a form letter) will at the very least be documented in their office. If several people call or write in (again, not a form letter from some organization on your behalf) on the same issue, then it really gets the representative's attention. Also, you would be surprised how easily you can get a meeting with your state representative by just stopping by their office during the session. They are reluctant to turn away a constituent who is registered to vote. source: former staffer for a state representative",
"At the state level, it's pretty effective. I've had a.couple of instances where I reached out to my state rep and got a near immediate reply from a staffer with either direct help (direct line to EDD official) or empathy. Turns out, I wasn't alone on that latter one and she ended up speaking against a bill on the floor later that week. Get involved. Stay involved.",
"A lot, actually. My Aunt worked for a State Representative and one of her jobs was to compile stats of calls received for the Congressman. If there was a 'hot' issue then it was tracked closely. But even random 'one offs' were put into a general category like 'Veterans Affairs', 'Schools', 'Budget' etc. Now a days its almost all done online by signing up for a petition. I don't think a call is any more important than signing the petition online... unless you are donor or well known (for courtesy's sake). Sign up for email notices from your Congressman and sign the online petitions that are in interest to you. I just did one last week and the results (over 5000 online signatures) were used to sway a decision on closing some state offices. We wanted them kept open for jobs. The cities that didn't have as many votes... well, they also don't have this specific office any more.",
"They know that for every voter who calls, there are a *bunch* who feel the same but don't bother to call or write. Like seeing a mouse in the cupboard makes me immediately go get a dozen mousetraps.",
"If you are not a notable person, with money to donate or influence over a bloc of voters, your opinion will essentially just end up on a tally sheet. X calls on one side of a subject, Y calls on the other. Any reasons you give for your opinion are typically ignored. If you're hoping to sway a representative based on the logic of your argument, you're wasting your time. Your argument will not be conveyed to them. The tally itself is significant, however. Politicians take the total number of calls on an issue seriously as a barometer of how much their constituents care about an issue. And how many people call from each side is taken seriously as well. The call volume is also low enough (on most issues) that individual calls have some weight. At the Federal level, a few hundred calls on an issue to a congressman is extremely strong feedback. And while being 1 in 300 people might not seem like a lot of sway, that's a lot more influence than a vote holds. On less well publicized issues, as few as a dozen calls all on the same side can sway a representative to vote one way or another. If you want to know what a call sheet looks like, [Borgen Project]( URL_0 ) has a page encouraging people to call elected officials which includes examples of call sheets (This isn't necessarily an endorsement of the Borgen Project, I'm just linking to it for examples). I also saw a post on social media recently by someone named Mark Jahnke offering advice on how to make your calls as effective as possible. He claimed to have worked taking calls in a Senators office. I don't know him and can't independently confirm it, but his advice lines up with what I've found when calling representatives. > Friends! As some of you know, I used to work on Capitol Hill as the person in charge of all the incoming phone calls to my Senator's office. I have some insider tips to make calling your reps easier and quicker. > 1. Give your name, city, and zip code, and say \"I don't need a response.\" That way, they can quickly confirm you are a constituent, and that they can tally you down without taking the time to input you into a response database. > 2. PLEASE ONLY CALL YOUR OWN REPRESENTATIVES! Your tally will not be marked down unless you can rattle off a city and zip from the state, or are calling from an in-state area code. I know you really want to give other reps a piece of your mind, but your call will be ignored unless you can provide a zip from their district. And don't try to make this up; I could often tell who was lying very quickly thanks to the knowledge of the state's geography. Exceptions to this are things like Paul Ryan's ACA poll which are national. > 3. State the issue, state your position. \"I am opposed to ________.\" \"I am in favor of _______.\" \"I am opposed to banning the import of phalanges.\" I am in favor of a trade deal to lower the price of juice smoothies.\" That's it. That's all we write down so we can get a tally of who is in favor, who is against. It doesn't matter WHY you hold that opinion. The more people calling, the less detail they have time to write down. Help them out by being simple and direct. This keeps calls shorter, allowing more callers through. > 4. Please be nice! The people answering the phones on Capitol Hill already had the hardest job in DC and some of the lowest pay as well, and for a month now their jobs have become absolute murder, with nonstop calls for 9 hours every day. Thank them for their hard work answering the phones, because without them our Senators could not represent us! > What does this sound like? > \"Hi, my name is Mark, I'm a constituent from Seattle, zip code 98***, I don't need a response. I am opposed to banning the sale of blueberries and I encourage the Senator to please oppose implementation of any such ban. Thanks for your hard work answering the phones!\" > This is how I wish every caller had phrased their message. It makes it easier for the people answering the phones and takes less time and emotion than a long script. I know that you want to say why, but keeping it short and sweet helps the office answer more calls per hour, meaning more people get heard. The bigger the tally, the more powerful your voice. > Also, when you're reading off the same script as 100 other callers that day... well...they know what you're about to say, so you don't need to use the whole script for your opinion to be heard! > Pick one issue each day, use this format (I am in favor of _____ or I oppose ______), and call your 2 Senators and 1 Representative on their DC and State Office lines, and you'll be on your way to being heard. Hope this is useful.",
"My first job was legislative aide in a State Rep's office. Most offices keep an excel spreadsheet tally of calls, letters and emails. The more calls/emails/letters the more attention the topic gets. Most of the time you will talk to an aide when you call the state office. Ultimately these people want to get reelected and at the State Rep level the margin for victory is often in the low thousands. They really need you. LPT: If you want to optimize your influence corner your Rep in person. Face-to-face has a major impact and they will remember it. Handwritten letter or very personal typed letters also get more attention. Handwrite the envelope as well. Those cookie cutter letters you just sign your name to are better than nothing but the offices generally know that an organization is behind it and doesn't care as much."
],
"score": [
67,
30,
28,
8,
7,
4,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://borgenproject.org/call-congress/"
],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5r8yhw | Military officers swear to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not the President | Can the military overthrow the President if there is a direct order that may harm civilians? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5brc3",
"dd5cjfw",
"dd5cl2i",
"dd5jiqv",
"dd5galc",
"dd5b9m1",
"dd5c4xs",
"dd5eo7w",
"dd5b9bu",
"dd5df0j",
"dd5fr5n",
"dd69fft",
"dd5d55m",
"dd5c12n",
"dd5cf0m",
"dd5dgg5",
"dd5dm45",
"dd5okql",
"dd5m11n",
"dd5b9d8",
"dd5ospa",
"dd5f8u9",
"dd5je7d",
"dd6347b",
"dd5b9as",
"dd5jjbz",
"dd5j1ur",
"dd5ba1v",
"dd5cfqf",
"dd5quw3",
"dd5mfge",
"dd5c4qt",
"dd674y7",
"dd6k85p",
"dd5gapz",
"dd5dm02",
"dd5hrxb",
"dd63jlt",
"dd5hjag",
"dd5ne1s",
"dd6be6x",
"dd5hyro",
"dd5kukg",
"dd5bcxj",
"dd5ht6j",
"dd5elig",
"dd5px2o",
"dd66x1s",
"dd5x61p",
"dd601if",
"dd5jp86",
"dd60qf6",
"dd5judv",
"dd5ty36"
],
"text": [
"There are two areas of thought that apply. The first is for the enlisted and the second is for officers. While there is a common duty to disobey orders that are \"illegal, immoral, or unethical\", a further duty to steward and lead dissent is implied in the officer's oath versus the enlisted oath. The enlisted oath expressly states that the enlisted will \"follow the orders of the President of the United States and the officers appointed over me\". The officer oath has no such passage. Instead, officers are charged to \"protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, against all enemies, foreign and domestic\". The latter oath is more akin to that taken by a federal office holder (cabinet member, Congressman, President, etc.). This is further compounded by the fact that the officer oath contains the phrase, \"of the office about which I am about to enter\". That is, officers should hold Constitutional values above all else in their duties. While enlisted should do the same, the big picture may not always be evident to them. They are not charged to think second and third order effects of being told to, for example, mow the grass. If that act itself is legal, moral, and ethical, they must comply. Officers, by a reasonable measure, may decline to do so and decline for members under their command to do so if it can be reasonably defended that the act or operation as a whole is somehow of detriment to the Constitution. Tl;dr: The President is just another dude who is responsible for defending the Constitution and serving the nation. An important guy, but just a guy. He is fallible and susceptible to the flaws of man. Therefore, everyone swears fealty not to a man, but to the Constitution, the base document of our nation and ideals. That way you would not break an oath if the President went crazy. But you better be damn sure he went crazy before you disobeyed. Source: was a military officer and studied Constitutional law. EDIT: It's been a while since I reenlisted a service member but I should have remembered that there is a part about supporting and defending the Constitution in the enlisted oath. Rather the part about obeying orders is OMITTED from the officer's oath. Obviously everyone should support and defend the Constitution. The basic premise above, however, is the same. The omission defaults an officer's charge to think critically about the larger picture. Thanks to those in the comments that reminded me. EDIT the second: In my opinion, no, there is no provision to overthrow the government or President based on an order that may be unlawful, unethical, or immoral. You would be committing treason at that point. There is a proper way to dissent -- through inaction if it doesn't pass the legal, ethical, and moral test. EDIT the third: Thanks for the gold! EDIT the fourth: KesselZero's comment below is a more succinct answer to the actual question at hand. Basically, our Constitutional system of government has several redundant mechanisms to prevent a rouge (rogue) President. EDIT the fifth: I'm keeping my typo, dammit.",
"A lot of the Constitution is set up to protect the peaceful transfer of power. Basically, the only way the government should ever change hands is through different candidates winning elections. So while the armed forces swear to the Constitution, not the president, the Constitution itself includes a couple of methods (impeachment and the 25th amendment) by which a bad, crazy, sick etc. president can be removed and replaced. Ideally this would remove the need for the army to overthrow the president, because the other parts of our government (legislature and judiciary) could handle it. The problem with the armed forces doing it is that a.) it's not a peaceful transfer of power, and b.) the armed forces are now in charge of the government, which is bad. Having the military swear to the Constitution also serves another purpose, which is to separate them from the president, even though he's the commander in chief. One important move that Hitler made when he came to power was to have the military stop pledging to serve Germany and start pledging to him personally. His hope was that their loyalty to him would lead them to follow his orders even if they were harmful to the nation or its citizens. This fear goes back at least as far as ancient Rome, when (for example) Julius Caesar was able to become ~~emperor~~ dictator because he had a large army of soldiers who were loyal to him personally, rather than to the Roman Republic. *Edit:* Thank you for the gold! And thanks to those who are correcting and refining my history. This was all off the top of my head so there were bound to be mistakes.",
"In theory, military commanders are supposed to disobey an order that is unconstitutional: no need for a coup. In theory. Of course, if said commanders back the President anyway, that won't make any difference -- and it's not as if there's anyone else in a position to stop the military. This is the problem with a standing army, one which the US, in its early history, actively tried to avoid (hence the Second Amendment, which speaks of the need for a \"well-regulated militia\"). You should probably cross your fingers and hope we never have to find out. Suppose the President suddenly announces that all presidential elections are cancelled, and that he is President for life. A blatantly illegal and unconstitutional act. What could happen? Well, if things work correctly, either Congress or the Supreme Court, or both, will put a stop to that. For example, Congress could impeach the President -- effectively putting him on trial, and if found guilty, removing him from office. But what if things go really, horribly wrong. Perhaps Congress refuses to impeach. Maybe the President and those around him have been using personal and direct threats against Congressmen and their families (Hitler did something similar to ensure his rise to the top). For whatever reason, that mechanism has broken down, and those few brave souls who dare speak out are silenced, perhaps arrested or simply dismissed. Can the military stage a coup? To be honest, if things have got to that stage, then the rule of law has irretrievably broken down anyhow: doing nothing at all would simply allow the totalitarian dictatorship to establish itself. And I would imagine an awful lot of civil unrest, as civilians opposed to the President protest and are met with those sympathetic to him, and that might be serious enough for the military to impose martial law, simply to restore some kind of order. But here we're talking about a military coup, and military coups are not often good news. If you're lucky, a military coup might succeed in removing the dictatorship, and returning the country to civilian rule as quickly and painlessly as possible. If you're unlucky, a military coup simply replaces a civilian dictatorship with a military dictatorship. EDIT: Thanks for the gold.",
"Most people who have never served in the armed forces (the vast majority of the present population of adult Americans) have no idea how strongly our veterans feel about the oath of enlistment or oath of commission that they took when the joined our armed forces. I am 66 years old. When I was a boy, virtually all adult men were veterans of WWII or the Korean War. Those veterans all shared a common military experience. They were patriotic, and they expected certain behavior and attitudes out of other adults. With the upheavals associated with the Vietnam War, and the cessation of the Draft in 1972, this is no longer the case. Most adults today do not consider our armed forces to be \"part and parcel\" of the civilian population, and have never served as a soldier. They do not understand, because they never experienced military boot camp and training, that our servicemen and servicewomen are taught that they are to *defend the Constitution.* Most of us cannot imagine a situation where a tyrant might attempt to seize control of the United States. Conditioned by a recent history of presidents who attempt to do as they please through Executive Orders, many people believe the power of the president is not checked by Congress or the Supreme Court. This is not the case, and don't think for a second that the men and women of our armed forces are not acutely aware of this fact. As a young Marine sergeant, I saw teen-aged Marines outraged and offended when they believed General Haig (the Secretary of State at that time) was trying to take control of the government when President Ronald Reagan was shot. They were shouting, \"He's not next in the line of succession! It's the VICE-PRESIDENT!\" Haig later apologized, but as a general officer and the *Secretary of State,* for pete's sake, he should have known better. This little story is *exactly* why we need to continue to teach Civics and Government in high school. Americans should trust their armed forces more. Soldiers are CITIZENS, not robots. In my opinion, the Republic is in no danger from its armed forces. (Plus, the civilian population is armed to the teeth with 300 million firearms.)",
"If you look at it objectively, the military could easily overthrow the civilian government and install its own leader. We have the monopoly on weaponry. It happens in other countries. However, our democracy is safeguarded from this by several things: Some folks may not realize this but one of the reasons we have ROTC on college campuses is to ensure that future military leaders will always have a connection to the general public. This is to balance the effects of a dedicated military academy, by its makeup, tends to lean more tribal. Also, we also have another safeguard by maintaining separate branches of the Armed Forces instead of having a unified military command. In the third world, it is quite common to have one branch side with the government while another sides with the rebels. Checks and balances, if you will.",
"There is no constitutional allowance for the military overthrowing the President. Doing this would be an illegal coup. The military is bound to disobey illegal orders, however. Disobeying an illegal order is not illegal.",
"> The Oath of Enlistment (for enlistees): \"I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.\" > The Oath of Office (for officers): \"I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance tot he same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservations or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.\" Edit for ELI5: Dad tells you to fight the school bully who picks on little girls at recess, you do it because mommy and daddy have taught you right from wrong. then... Dad tells you to attack the neighbors friendly cat but you refuse because you know the cat didn't do anything to deserve that. Hes still your dad and you can't do anything about that but you can refuse to physically commit harm to another innocent being. As a former service member with a conscience, I would not follow an order if I thought it would be against my moral compass. We had discussions about how we would react if ordered to act against our own counties people and 10/10 people I spoke with would not entertain the thought of helping with a strike against civilians.",
"The people on this thread have explained the legal situation of this question pretty well, but, historically, governments that come from a military coup are ALWAYS worse than the one they replace, so I wouldn't suggest hoping for this situation to occur.",
"The president is the Commander in Chief of the military. When you swear in to the military, you also swear \"that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice.\" So, no, they can not legally overthrow the president. But, they are also legally obligated to not follow orders that would be considered \"unlawful\" *edit* OK, I get it - I quoted the wrong oath. I will drop and give myself 50.... But, even with officers, trying to overthrow the CIC would be punishable by law and UCMJ",
"As a prior enlisted Marine, the President is your boss, officer or not. He has direct authority over Marines and can send us anywhere for a limited time without approval from congress. That's the first part. Second part, think of overthrowing him as the same thing as mutiny on a ship or secession from the US. If you're gonna do it, you better be right and you better have the power to do so. It would be the equivalent of fighting England for Independence. Win and be right and it's gravy. Lose and you're spam.",
"I think we need to back up a bit on the question: what do you mean by \"harm civilians\"? The USA (and current allies) might be the only military in the history of warfare that is expected to fight all wars without any civilian casualties. Every time there is a drone or airplane strike, opponents scream about civilian casualties-- however, this is *normal in the history of war*. If there are 20 enemy fighters in a single location with 5 or 10 civilians, it's completely impractical to wait for some future time when there might not be any civilians nearby. That said, it is good policy and morally correct to do whatever we can do to *minimize* civilian casualties. We don't want to target civilians just for the point of targeting civilians (unless, for instance, those \"civilians\" are working in a military factory and therefore part of the machinery of war.) It's a very delicate balance, but my overall point is you cannot expect even the most moral of all military forces to execute warfare without impacting civilians. It's completely impractical.",
"US Army Officer here. It's as simple as it sounds, but at the same time quite brilliant. Our oath is different than the enlisted soldiers (the actual fighters) in that obeying orders is not part of our oath. We are only required to use the Constitution and our principles as a guide when deciding if we should follow an order. By virtue of how the oath is written, we swear to place the Constitution above the President. This is designed to prevent the President from being able to subvert the Constitution via the military. The reality that an order may not be followed by subordinate officers is a form of checks and balances that is designed to prevent tyrannical, unethical, or just plain dumb efforts from getting off the ground. What makes it brilliant is that the US military learned long ago that decentralized execution, meaning empowering subordinates to make decisions, works very well in combat situations as well as operational design and our central leaders are willing to accept the risk that comes along with that approach. Of note, enlisted soldiers have an obligation not to obey unlawful orders which makes them accountable for their actions. But officers have an obligation to disobey even those that could be classified as a lawful orders if it violates the aforementioned criteria.",
"I don't know about OCS, but other routes to a commission as an officer include plenty of ethics and morals classes in which they discuss this exact topic, among many other moral obligations. A large part of the answer lies within the exhilarating and suspenseful \"Naval Officer's Guide\", but I'll spare you those details as it's not quite as exhilarating as I may have talked it up to be. In short: an officer serves his/her crew and superiors, as well as the constitution. If they receive an unlawful, and/or immoral order by their standards, they're *morally obligated* to follow up on it/question it rather than blindly follow, for the sake of their crew's safety and the upholding of the constitution; albeit, you better be more sure of the immorality of that order than you've ever been before because the UCMJ does not take disobeying orders lightly.",
"They also promise to obey lawful orders of those above them, which includes the President, so if the military decides to disobey him, there would be a discussion on the legality of the orders. It sort of becomes a he-said-she-said, but for the most part, all military are taught to believe in the structure and hierarchy, so it would probably take a lot for the military to say \"no\". There's also the reality of losing your paycheck (not to mention becoming an enemy of the administration!), and many military people I have met fall into two main camps - the first ones wanting a wife and family who go into that American debt cage - so your badass soldier is actually tied into the same life as many civilians - dependent on a paycheck and maxed out on debt. And the risk of putting your family in danger. Then there's this other large group of younger single soldiers without a financial care in the world (expenses like rent, food, clothing are covered from the start so you end up losing the need to budget your money - you can be broke and still eat, and sleep.) I saw these guys also always go broke each month, because they bought brand new Camaros and Playstations, they drink like fish on the weekends and party hard at strip clubs. Just as dependent on that next paycheck as the family guy. So a lot of Soldiers are not the battle-hardened warriors that care only about saving the American people, rather they are quite motivated by that paycheck and what is perceived as a \"warrior\" lifestyle. I don't think they would disobey orders from the very top, unless their immediate supervisors were also encouraging insurrection.",
"No, and it would be a really scary government if it could. See Syria, Turkey, and Libya. If the president gives an unlawful order, the officers responsible for carrying it out could simply refuse, as they salute the constitution before the president. However, this is like killing someone in self defense. Even if you are in the right, you are probably going to spend some quality time in jail until the lawyers sort things out. With all of that said, technically the military is a bunch of guys with guns and a chain of command. They *could* just storm the white house and assume command. However, the instant they go traitor, they are no longer members of the US military and are rebel insurgents attempting a coup. While their actions would be bold and arguably just, they will have started an open rebellion. If they win, we are getting a rewrite the constitution overhaul. If they lose, almost all will surely be executed on treason.",
"Technically, yes. Reality would play out differently though. The only way I see the military removing the president from power would come after the president uses other means (other agencies or PMCs) to carry out an aggressive maneuver on dissenting citizens. This would most likely result in commissioned officers resigning and enlisted folk refusing orders. That is until only the most dedicated are still left in, at which point the military would probably start enforcing those orders, even on their former unit members. In a legal matter, military personnel could use Article 104 (aiding the enemy) as a justification for not following orders and overthrowing the prez if the actions and orders by the prez could be considered unlawful and actually be seen as an attack on the constitution (which supersedes the prez's orders) or its people. To get to that point though, I feel, a lot of things had to have happened that would have already been addressed. The National Guard is a different story. Those Nasty Girls (seems to have a different menacing these days) have pulled the trigger multiple times on citizens, even other veterans. Those are the fuckers to watch out for as they have oaths that put more authority into the prez and govs hands. While I'm not comfortable with the current prez, his Sec of Def is one bad mother who would slap the orange off the prez's face if such orders were to be given. Mattis is a force of nature with a lot of respect for life, as long as you aren't trying to kill him.",
"The military can stage a coup but honestly the President has far less involvement in the military than one might think. In fact Congress makes more decisions than the President does and they do a lot to road block our Generals. One of the many hats the Commandant of the Marine Corps wears, is professional Bullshitter and it's not a job he likes. Hardly any war dog enjoys having to fondle the balls of Congressmen and women. If given their way, they would depend on actual strategists and research without the approval of salty politicians. The military will of course harm civilians as a side effect of war, we all know that, but the president is not likely to order us to shoot a child in the head and rape their mother for kicks. Commander in Chief is mainly just a title.",
"My brother is an officer in the Army. Many of my friends are veterans. Donald Trump winning the election could not have been a bigger excitement to everyone I know who is in the military or has served. After 8 years of being neglected and having their hands tied by Obama, the military is super excited and proud to have Trump as their commander in chief. If you were asking this question to see if the military would start a coup of the Trump administration, you'll be very dissapointed.",
"This is the oath a soldier takes when they enlist. > \"I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.\" (Title 10, US Code; Act of 5 May 1960 replacing the wording first adopted in 1789, with amendment effective 5 October 1962). This is the oath an officer takes when he becomes an officer. > \"I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.\" (DA Form 71, 1 August 1959, for officers.) On careful reading, you will notice that true faith and allegiance are sworn to the Constitution and not any particular government office. The only mention of obeying orders (or the President for that matter) is in the enlistment oath, and that it is specifically subject to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So any order in conflict with the Constitution, regulations or the UCMJ is invalid and must not be followed. There is no provision for overthrowing the President in there. By my understanding the correct course of action when presented with an unconstitutional order is just not to follow it. Dealing with a rogue President is the job of Congress and the Supreme Court, not the army. This is probably a good move, because they are both a lot better at avoiding collateral damage than the army is.",
"No. The officers would decline to obey the order, but would not take direct action to overthrow the President in retaliation. There is an affirmative duty to disobey unlawful orders, but there is no authorization to attack or dethrone the person who gave the order. They are supposed to let the judiciary deal with that problem.",
"The last 44th President had the lowest approval rating of the current Armed Forces enlisted and officer ranks of any in modern History. Just keep that in mind when you attempt to use the military for bashing the 45th",
"While everyone answers are correct, in practice it is murkier. Laws are based on interpretation and what courts deem to be legal. If this interpretation hasn't happened you get a gray area. Many people find the orders of the President justified while some do not. Ultimately rank will decide action. When British troops shot civilians in the Boston Massacre, it wasn't an order to \"kill civilians\". They were staged there to prevent and insurrection. The British soldiers were heckled, harassed, before rocks started being thrown. Next thing you know a fight breaks out, a someone discharges his weapon, but nobody knows who, and now a British Officer gives the order to launch a volley into the crowd. That's how it plays out in real life.",
"If everyone remembers correctly, Obama stacked the deck in his favor by firing military leaders/generals etc who he didn't think aligned with him. General Mattis was one of those Generals. I'm sure Trump will do the same and let the generals Obama favored go. Given that situation, it would be very very unlikely that any military officers would try what would be considered an act of treason or sedition. Additionally, the US military overwhelmingly supports Trump, unlike Obama whom they only had tepid support for. Therefore the scenario in OP's question was more likely to play out under Obama than it would under Trump",
"throughout most of our nations history our military has been capable of staging a coup... but it never has... even when Truman relieved MacArthur during the Korean conflict... not even a whisper of rebellion. I think that in the age of scandal, too many of us fail to respect the fact that professional, moral, ethical SELFLESS service is the norm in our military. The vast majority of our military would not follow an illegal order no matter the personal cost or their political leanings. Do you remember in 2006 when the senior lawyers of each branch signed a joint statement rebutting John Yoo's torture memo and recommending to all military to refuse orders to engage in those techniques? Yoo freakedand labeled their statement disloyal and tried to get himself appointed as supervisor of the military lawyers (he was rejected). One more thing... it is the power of the American military that makes the President a world leader. They do not need to, nor would they, stage a coup. They simply (and properly) refuse to obey unconstitutional and illegal orders. If the US military refuses to get involved, the President is reduced to a guy with a soap box and less physical power at his command than the Governor of South Dakota (or any of his 49 peers)",
"Military personnel are trained to disobey orders that are illegal. Such as exterminating a village of non combatants in Afghanistan.",
"I never swore to the officers appointed over me or the president of the United States; I only swore to defend the constitution of the United States against both enemies foreign and domestic.",
"That would be called a military coup. Happens a lot in 3rd world counties. What would happen here? You've got a sizable percentage of the populace that believes in the president. And we're also one of the most heavily armed countries on earth. Only way peace is being kept after that is a prolonged period of martial law. So we'd basically end up extinguishing freedom altogether in order to \"protect\" it. Kind of perverse, no?",
"No, but they would be expected to refuse the order. Only Congress can remove the President from office, and only after an impeachment.",
"\"Following orders\" wasn't considered a defense for war crimes during the Nuremberg trials of the nazi regime. But I guess that rule only applies the losers.",
"There are much better ways to replace the President than the military doing it. Trust me, you don't want us doing it, it sets an awful precedent and the Constitution already provides methods for legally removing the President.",
"We have the second amendment, the right to possess and use firearms. Our country is designed to allow the PEOPLE to overthrow the government, not the military. That is the entire point of 2A (second amendment). If the military were the only option of overthrowing government, it would be hard to overthrow the military when they inevitably become tyrannical. There are no checks and balances for a military dictatorship, thus a military coup would be an unfavorable option for the people. That's the best ELI5 response you'll get in this thread.",
"The idea is that you're serving the country and not a particular person, although that person (i.e. the President) may have a lot of power over you. However, when there is a conflict of interest between the Constitution and the President, e.g. the President ordered you to carpet bomb LA for his or her own amusement, you would be able to refuse to obey that order as it would be illegal, because the law doesn't allow mass-murdering people for shits and giggles. Take the German Wehrmacht during the Nazi period: they had to swear an oath to Adolf Hitler himself, not the German constitution or some other book of law. From that vantage point they would have had to comply to any order given by Hitler, regardless if that order was lawful or not.",
"Yes. It is one of our sworn duties as the military to ALWAYS support and defend the Constitution of the United States, it's is our duty to obey all LAWFUL orders of our superiors...IN that word \"Lawful\" lies the warning to our leaders. ANY order that would come from any level of government that would defy, circumvent, or break any law or constitutional mandate, and we're IMMEDIATELY to disobey, and that goes up and down the ENTIRE chain of command INCLUDING the president. Moreover if an illegal order was to be given, and you FOLLOW such orders. You are IMMEDIATELY responsible for those actions. A little lesson that we picked up from the Germans and their \"I was just following orders\" excuse. So, if the president gives and order that is unlawful and military members carry that order out, they're heads will be on a pole as well.",
"Can overthrow the government: Yes, the ability to do so is present. Will based upon an \"unlawful\" order? Likely not. The president does not usually control the military via direct order, although they do have the authority to do so. Instead the president confers with military leaders (Join Chiefs of Staff and the secretary of defense) to find solutions that meet the goal of the president. These military leaders are in a way a check on the president's authority itself, because typically they would not suggest something illegal. These members could also refuse the order although at that point they could potentially be subject to arrest and prosecution so it would be paramount that the order was obviously unlawful. For example, the president might want to shut down a riot. Assuming local police can not or will not do it, the military could be used. The president wouldn't tell the JCS to \"kill everyone who disobeys the order to leave the area\", and they wouldn't suggest it. Instead the level of force used would be just enough (hopefully) to gain compliance. Although individual soldiers might exceed the necessary force required and use lethal force. Obviously President Trump inspires questions like these in some portion of the population, to put it plainly, a military coup is very very unlikely. The vast majority of enlisted soldiers (which make up the bulk of the armed forces) like and support Trump something to the tune of 7/10 enlisted. In order to convince the military at large that force was required to dispose the president he would have to do something so extreme that I can barely think of a few examples. Shy of dropping a nuke on the states, a military coup is unlikely. Similarly people wonder why the military didn't rebel when Adolf Hitler started ordering the extermination of Jews and various other minority groups. First, most soldiers were unaware. Given todays internet and streaming video it seems unlikely something like an extermination camp would go unnoticed. Second the soldiers were trained to see those people as \"the enemy\". Killing a person isn't easy and there are a lot of coping mechanisms, granted it is easier if they are shooting at you, and much harder if it is innocent civilians in particular your fellow countryman. Third the soldiers don't generally make a decision on whether or not to do something. If all of the superior officers sent an order, it becomes easy for the soldier to rationalize the order as \"a necessary evil\".",
"That's what the Second Amendment is for. To protect yourself if for some reason your leader decides to send extermination squads after civilians. I'm not talking about Assassination attempt on the leader, which is a big no-no. I'm talking about defending yourself. Your home. Your family.",
"Because a country isn't defined at all by its leader; rather by its rules and laws. That being said, you could always have a \"The Rock\" scenario where a bunch of elite soldiers goes rogue and tries to mess with the government. What a great damn movie.",
"I commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the USMC through a naval ROTC program. It was not only specified, but emphasized, that the oath military officers take does not mention swearing allegiance to the POTUS. Officers are intended to be conduits of commanders intent, only if it is legal.",
"Legit question, Redditor for 3 days. Gets responses on the matter from like-minded who are given gold for rankings. Wikipedia should answer this question, and by logic we all know the answer, but we know you Soros shills. You want to stir the pot and see what happens don't you?",
"> Can the military overthrow the President if there is a direct order that may harm civilians? No, they cannot. If the Courts of the US were to decide that a President cound no longer serve, they would use the legal system to enforce that order through the impeachment process. The President, if he tried to ignore the impeachment, would be arrested, not overthrown. But, they can refuse to carry out an illegal order.",
"Yes, but they would have to agree that \"would harm citizens\" is an objective truth, and not mass hysteria from the ill informed masses, as we are seeing with the protests of our current president. Now, however, if those protesters were to, say, start firebombing Washington and deemed enemies of democracy (which they would be), the military could rightfully stop them.",
"I scanned but admittedly didn't read every comment, so perhaps I'll get downvoted, but I haven't heard any mention of article 88 of the UCMJ. This applies to not only active duty, but retired as well. 10 U.S. Code § 888 - Art. 88. Contempt toward officials Any commissioned officer who uses contemptuous words against the President, the Vice President, Congress, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of a military department, the Secretary of Homeland Security, or the Governor or legislature of any State, Commonwealth, or possession in which he is on duty or present shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.",
"Its important to note, that they aren't protecting the literal constitution, if push came to shove and it was the president being held at gun point and the constitution they would prioritized the president first (or anyone really) before the piece of 200 year old paper They are protecting what the constitution stands for. This means that if invaders come into the country and try to take over and go against the appropriate rise to power that is clearly written in the constitution, 35 years old, born in the USA, through an election or presidential line of succession (if the president dies, vice president, if the vice president is dead or can not take office, Speaker of the house, and so on) Most importantly The constitution documents the powers and balance between them. Its the officers job to make sure people don't over throw it.",
"Atleast as a Naval Officer, we were taught the \"Constitutional paradigm,\" Which establishes the order of precedence like this: 1) Constitution 2) Mission 3)\"ship\" (meaning your unit, squadron, etc) 4)\"shipmate\" (another person in your unit) 5) self If there is a conflict at one level, the next highest level takes priority. Along with the constitutional paradigm, we're taught how and when to disobey an order. 1) If an order is unjust, you should first attempt to resolve this issue with the next highest level. If the issue goes all the way to the top and you still don't agree with the answer you should move on to: 2) Resign your commission/step down from whatever position you've been appointed to. If doing so would not solve the problem/make the problem worse, and you are without a shadow of a doubt convinced that you're morally right: 3) Make your decision to dissent/not carry out the order clear (I.e. in writing) and justify your reason for doing so. The people under your command should be notified of your decision, and it should be made clear to them that you are planning to disobey the order, giving them the opportunity to not follow you. 4) Accept the consequences. You may be relieved. You may be court martialed. You may be imprisoned. This is why you *need* to know, without any doubt, that you are justified in your actions. It will make it easier to accept the consequences. Hopefully this answers your question.",
"In all likelihood those officers and NCOs would probably simply refuse to follow such an order, if that order goes against the Constitution.",
"The constitution is what gives the President power and us the power to elect a President. Thus the Constitution is more important than the president.",
"The military can do whatever they want when it comes to disobeying orders. Should they? Probably not. If they did overthrow the president and declare martial law then the citizens would... revolt. They would have to depose the president then give control to someone else, like Senate and/or Congress. Would be a very bad time for everyone.",
"Where did you get harm civilians from? Are you saying that the military should have overthrown Truman after Hiroshima? We've nuked civilians, napalmed civilians, cluster bombed civilians, scorched civilians from the earth with chemical weapons, and tortured civilians to death. It doesn't say shit in the constitution about harming civilians, from our own country or any other. Use ctrl+f on the text of the constitution, see what you find!",
"Refuse orders, yes. Overthrow the president, no. However, there is a constitutional way to remove the president under the 25th Amendment if the president is unfit for office. So if the president have a batshit crazy order (like a first strike nuke attack for no reason), that could be invoked. The military doesn't have a direct role in that, it involves the VP and cabinet. But the military would probably have a lot of sway with th cabinet. Similar for impeachment, which is instigated by congress.",
"Also, the UCMJ requires that military personal follow LAWFUL orders only. The excuse, \"I was only following orders\" is no excuse for violating the law in the execution of an order. Along with removing an excuse for following an illegal order, this law also gives a soldier the freedom (and, indeed, the duty) to refuse to follow such an order in the first place. The UCMJ may come in handy when national guard troops are ordered to fire on protestors, something I fully expect to happen in the near future.",
"Not just officers, but every member of the military (including enlisted) Technically, we have a duty to disobey orders that go against certain things (Geneva convention etc) For instance, if a senior officer ordered us to murder people, and we knew it would be murder, then we should refuse. Of course, it's a very grey area between doing what's right/treason. We could overthrow the government, but it would be considered treason by the government in any case. So if you plan something like that, you'd better hope you succeed. We don't really have the authority to do so, just the firepower. Edit: Source: I'm an enlisted infantryman",
"Under the Constitution and U.S. law, no. The President has sole power over the Executive Branch, including the military. There is no legal exception for \"a direct order that may harm civilians.\" Virtually every military order or major emergency domestic order by a President \"*may* harm civilians.\" Every president in U.S. history has issued an order that \"*may* harm civilians.\" Of course, I'm assuming your ambiguous question means, \"Can the military overthrow the President *legally*?\" That's a separate question from what it would take to *morally* justify a military overthrow. For example, during the American Revolution, people argued whether it was morally justified under natural law, but no one claimed it complied with *British* law. To morally justify a military overthrow, presumably one of the first questions you would need to address is why the Constitution's existing mechanisms for removing a President through impeachment by a democratically elected Congress are inadequate and inferior to military action.",
"Little known facts. The president is a citizen and subject to being arrested. He has no special immunity. In a civilized country like we claim to be noone is above the rule of law. Ever wonder why Federal judges are appointed for life? So they can enforce rule of law in spite of anything. Federal court simply issues an arrest warrant for the president if he does not obey court rulings. Though they would most likely take care of things behind the scenes to avoid a media circus. By the way impeachment is all about whether or not he can keep the office. Technically he could go to jail and still be president when he walked out if Congress did not impeach him. Not really any need for military involvement. All they have to do is ignore the order. Problem is if anyone tried to arrest the president there would be legal challenges out the wahzoo. FBI, Congress, Capitol Police, dozens of groups. everyone and their mom would get involved to further their respective agendas.",
"Maybe a little bit on the side, but I think that an american soldier always has a responsibility to act in accordance with e.g. the Geneva conventions and \"the rules of war\" in armed conflict - so obedience goes only so far in certain situations. The US has signed all but Protocol II. (As Chancellor Merkel reminded Pres. Trump the other day regarding protection of victims of war). Ever since the Nuremberg trials a certain amount of responsibility has been placed on individuals even if under orders from higher up. I guess for US military that at least pertains to situations of international armed conflict, although it has been tried to blur the lines between outright warfare and \"unlawful combatants\" etc. Protocol II is to regulate internal armed conflict, and would cover situations with your own citizens and their treatment in that situation. The US, Iraq, Pakistan, Israel and Turkey have not signed this, so I guess your constitution and the US legal system rules more or less alone here. Not sure about international laws regarding possible threats to your own people as it seems that the US has withdrawn its signature to the International Crime Court/ICC in the Hague. URL_1 This court is meant to cover Crimes against humanity (like torture, deportations, apartheid, sexual violence etc etc on a large scale) and genocide, and areas outside conventional international wars, to protect people also from their governments. These are extremes of course, but the discussion made me think of this - national and international law, and the responsibilities and dilemmas military face. Anyhoo, the Nuremberg legacy, stolen off Wikipedia: The Tribunal is celebrated for establishing that \"[c]rimes against international law are committed by men, not by abstract entities, and only by punishing individuals who commit such crimes can the provisions of international law be enforced.\" URL_0",
"Although not a direct answer to the question, I am reposting something I did earlier about Roman Military and Roman Politics, and this is the very reason why interlocking the military and political offices are very bad, and indeed most evidently one of the reasons the Founding Fathers, who knew about the ancient Mediterraneans, had formed the government into the way they did. Part of this is the difference between Republican Era military and Imperial/Marian Reform Era military. The other part is the issue of social structure. In Roman society, there was the Cursus Honorum (course of political offices). In this Cursus, which every single patriarch (native Latin descendant) and wealthy plebeian needed to complete to be anybody of importance, every aspect was in relation to the army. The Cursus had military accountants/errandboys, soldiers, governors, generals, and President-like persons (Consuls). Therefore, the military and power of command was a crucial part of Roman society. In the Republic, the soldiers swore an oath to the state and the consuls, but their duty was for Rome. The Consuls each commanded an army, and many generals were given legal authority over generalship (Imperium), but again no general could wage war without the Consuls or the Senate's (composed of retired Consuls) approval. Each soldier paid for his own equipment, and so each troop was encouraged to fight hard so that they could acquire loot to sell for both profit and a means for better arms. The Republic lasted for a long time because anybody who gained too much power was kept in check by the Consuls and Senate. Most importantly, no army was to be stationed or marched within the Mediterranean interior. This all changed by the reforms of Gaius Marius, who in turn paved the way for Julius Caesar, the triumvirates, and the consequential empire. Gaius Marius, who was Consul multiple consecutive times, which itself was suspect and despised by other Roman officials, reformed the manner of the Roman military. Because of him, the leading general employed and furnished their soldiers; therefore, the allegiance of the soldier was no longer to Rome, but to the man who was leading them into battle, supplying them a salary, supplying them with land after their service, and giving them arms to defend them. These requirements were immensely expensive, and so only the extraordinarily wealthy could hold this amount of power; the power remained to specific families and persons, and those with power now had personal armies which they could utilize to their own desires. This permitted Sulla, Marius' own underling, to do what none other had done before; Sulla's soldiers respected him so much more than the state that they followed his command to march on Rome. Sulla had been denied a right to wage war for political reasons, and he held Rome hostage until he acquired it. This set the stage for Caesar, who did the same, and then the Emperors, who were titled Imperator (commander-in-chief). In the empire, the soldiers swore loyalty to the Imperator, and the Imperator not only furnished the army like before, but also granted Largitiones (donations to the army) when first taking the throne."
],
"score": [
10342,
4566,
1821,
723,
298,
263,
217,
206,
78,
69,
63,
43,
38,
34,
31,
24,
23,
21,
19,
18,
17,
17,
13,
12,
10,
9,
9,
8,
8,
8,
7,
7,
7,
7,
5,
5,
5,
5,
5,
4,
4,
4,
4,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_trials#Legacy",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Criminal_Court"
],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r93qu | why do the president and vice president take different oaths of office? the VP's is longer & more detailed, despite the lower rank. | Noticed this watching the inauguration. Here's the VP's (who goes first): > I, AB, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God. Then here's the President's: > I, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. edit: I realize that it's laid out in two different parts of the constitution, but it just feels weird to hold the president to a lower standard. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5gcwb"
],
"text": [
"Because the Constitution determines the oath of office for the President (Article II, Section One, Clause 8). To change that oath would require an Amendment to the Constitution. Since there is no specific oath required for the Vice President, it can be changed at any time."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5r9m00 | Why are people from Manchester called Mancunians? | Manchesterites? OK. Manchesterians? Maybe. Mancunians? No. No, no, no, no, this has gone too far and needs to be changed right now...unless someone can explain the reasoning behind it. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5hovt"
],
"text": [
"Manchester's original Latin place name was either *Mamucium* or *Mancunium*, depending on the source and time. Over many centuries, this ended up becoming the name *Manchester* that's used today. *Mancunian* is simply derived from the older place name. A side note, but it's not uncommon in the UK for demonyms to be derived from an older root: * Liverpool: Liverpudlian. * Manchester: Mancunian. * Newcastle: Novocastrian."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5ra0b9 | why do doctors work 24 hour shifts instead of the normal 8 hour shift? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5k9qh"
],
"text": [
"It's very simple, it ensures that in most cases one doctor would be able to work with a patient from entrance to the hospital to stabile/release. Tests, diagnosis, and treatment could be hampered if say the doctor had to hand you off to a changing shift and pass on the information gathered up to that point. It's possible that someone could be forgotten all together or that a vital bit of information could get lost in the transfer of your case. It also is easier to establish trust in care."
],
"score": [
18
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5ra2l5 | why are modern depictions of the future often dystopic, compared to the bright and positive predictions in the past? | In the past (particularly the late 19th and early 20th centuries) predictions of the future were filled with amazing inventions and a happy society. Modern predictions are filled with crumbling civilizations, plagues, and collapse of society. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5kp1k",
"dd5mxvs"
],
"text": [
"Science Fiction is less of a prediction mechanism and more of a window into what people are currently thinking. In early sci-fi, the goal was to exploit a possible future where people became better as individuals and as a species. Currently, sci-fi represents a general pessimism about the human condition. Not everything is that way of course, and there are a few upbeat stories about people in science fiction (see: the new Arrival movie).",
"There have always been both views. In the 1890s, H.G. Wells wrote of pretty dystopian futures in *The Time Machine* and *When the Sleeper Wakes*. Jack London wrote *The Iron Heel* in 1908. Early to mid 20th Century examples include Huxley's *Brave New World* (1931), Orwell's *Nineteen Eighty-Four* (1948) and Bradbury's *Fahrenheit 451* (1953)."
],
"score": [
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
5rakgi | why do americans pull out their wisdom teeth earlier than other countries despite it not being a problem at the current state when they're about to get pulled out? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5q1us",
"dd5oqen",
"dd5pa7p",
"dd5sw44"
],
"text": [
"In America we have good dentists. They are able to look at our teeth and tell us whether or not the teeth will be a problem in the future. If the teeth are going to be a problem anyway, why not remove them before they're an issue?",
"insurance makes it cheaper for minors. I had mine taken out as an adult and paid 50% of the cost.",
"Why wait for a problem to become serious if you can prevent it early on? A friend of mine didn't have them removed until two weeks ago. They were starting to push into the other teeth and causing immense pain. Preventative care is good for everything, including the human body.",
"A lot of us have orthodontic braces as young teens. So waiting until the wisdom teeth become a problem can ruin that."
],
"score": [
8,
6,
6,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5rauyo | Why would Mexico care if the US builds a wall or not? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5rb4c",
"dd5rjot",
"dd5rfvd"
],
"text": [
"It's less about the wall, and more that it's a symbol that the US is setting themselves as enemies of Mexico in how they want to handle immigration, rather than partners trying to solve a problem. It's a sign that the US doesn't want peaceful relations with their neighbor.",
"The Wall is inconsequential really, but it implies some things about US/Mexico relations for the future. It uses Mexico as a scapegoat for why the US is doing poorly, and that would mean that every Mexican is less than every American. As neighboring countries we've got a lot of shared history and ties both diplomatic and in trade, they benefit from us and we benefit from them, but this wall implies that the US thinks it can do better on its own without Mexico.",
"Because it's very insulting. Say you had a neighbor and he had an issue with your kid playing in his yard. And instead of telling you to keep better control over your kid, he builds a bigass ugly fence. How are you going to feel about this? Edit: And says he's going to buy the fence using your money."
],
"score": [
30,
13,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
5rawj0 | How did the culture of "work before life" start in America? | Whenever I read about work culture in many European countries, the culture is you go to work, you work, you come home, and don't do anything work-related until the next work day. That's *your* time to live *your* life. Plus they have SO much more vacation and paid-leave days because they realize people have lives outside of work, which matters a lot more to them. In the US, people will, or are sometimes forced, to work 10-12 hour days. Some are expected to be able to respond to email and take calls into the evening or night. On top of it, there is no minimum paid leave because of this work-before-life culture. How did work become such a priority? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dd5tqwf"
],
"text": [
"(1) Back in the day, your work was your life. If you didn't work (eg on a farm) you would die. (2) America was founded largely on a Calvinist doctrine some people call the \"Protestant Work Ethic.\" This idea holds that work, discipline and frugality are a result of a person's salvation in the Protestant faith. In this religion, hard work is more important than rituals like attending mass, receiving communion, and other \"Catholic\" ideas. (3) Partly due to these influences and partly due to the cut-throat nature of capitalism, America developed an idea of hyper-competitiveness. We routinely reject social safety nets like welfare programs, with the expectation that if people just \"work harder\" they will achieve success. (4) Over the last thirty years or so, workers have been getting screwed over by government and business owners. Business owners increasingly treat employees as disposable and try to pay the bare minimum in wages and benefits. In past generations, a 9-to-5 job for an unskilled worker was still enough to make a good living. This is no longer true, and a LOT of people in America still don't acknowledge that the labor situation is very different from the pre-Reagan era."
],
"score": [
30
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
73j4wx | In Asian countries, why are some things written in English and others written in their traditional logograms? | So I just watched a Korean movie. I have always wondered why some things will be written in English, while others will be written in their language. I've noticed this in all types of foreign movies, just seems more obvious when watching Asian movies. For example a girl was wearing a Letterman's jacket and it said "high school" in English. But everything on their phones and written on signs, and whatever else, seems to be prominently in their traditional language. Also, in the end credits, everyone's titles (director, visual effects supervisor, assistant, etc) were in English, but the names were in logograms. Is there a rhyme or reason to this? I understand the idea of business names being in letters, instead of symbols, since it would be easier to market world wide. But other small things seems odd. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnqotn5",
"dnqvxm1"
],
"text": [
"Almost literally for the same reason that people in the US get tattoos with Asian characters on them: it's \"cool\". American things are exotic in Asia, just like Asian things are exotic in the west. So they use a lot of American words to look cooler.",
"Before I begin, logogram is the wrong word. Kanji (Japanese) and Hanzi (Chinese) are ideograms. Hangul (Korean) is an alphabet, despite appearing as ideograms... the digital form COULD be stored as an alphabet but supposedly double-byte storage like ideograms makes rendering fonts easier. I have seen Korean typewriters, where there are character-position keys to move the type head to it's appropriate position... and it's a dead-easy alphabet to learn... much easier than English actually. Most Korean movies I've seen use 100% Korean text, opening credits, closing credits... some directors opt for English for stylistic or marketing reasons. See here: URL_0 The Korean title translates literally as \"Kind Miss Geumja\" - very different than the English title. It is part 3 of the \"Vengeance Trilogy\" (you may know that Old Boy was part 2)... and I just checked the opening credits... everything is in both languages there but there are oddities like 이미경 (Lee Mikyoung) = \"Mickey Lee\" in English. Heh. A lot of Koreans have \"English Names\" (sometimes their Catholic baptismal name) and use them even on their business cards. As for fashion, storefront signs, that's an odd one in Korea. Yeah, it's fashionable. The big banks in Korea got fined a few years ago for having English-language signs too prominent above their main branches in Jongno (the business district of Seoul). Another area of Seoul nearby, Insadong, being a traditional market, stipulates that all signage must be in Hangul... where you will find the only Starbucks in the world (supposedly) with signage that isn't English. It's kind of neat and still completely recognizable in Hangul. Street and highway signs are often in Hangul with Romanization displayed below. This just shows the dominance of English as a global language. At least attempting to be bilingual lets Korea believe they are on the same level as other top countries. Now, check out Japanese movies, where there is almost no attempt at all to appeal to English readers. In fact, English movies often take months to be released in Japan because Japanese viewers detest subtitles and dubbing is hard work. Unlike Korea, where Koreans have become very accustomed to reading subtitles... and it's great getting some premieres weeks earlier than the US release. Heck, the only movies that are dubbed here are animations... but big animations like Frozen and Tangled. were released in theaters with the choice of dubbing or subtitles. Everyone I know who saw those 2 movies agreed that the original language is better... though the dubbing was done by very famous actors and k-pop singers..."
],
"score": [
10,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"https://cinemakorea.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/2007051900_blog-uncovering-org_lady_vengeance_cinema_chan-wook_poster.jpg"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
73jiyb | Why do we know so little about ancient Egyptian technology? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnqsag5",
"dnqrw3n",
"dnqrvyw",
"dnqt8cy"
],
"text": [
"There's a perception problem when looking back on the Pyramids, you know they're old, but how old? They're ancient so like Julius Caesar era or Alexander the Great, right? Nope! The Pyramids are stupid old. You live closer in time to Julius Caesar than he did to the construction of the Pyramids. He looked on them with the same awe of their age that you do. It has been 4500 years since the construction of the Pyramids, Egypt has been through a lot in that time. Egypt went through 27 more dynasties after the construction of the Great Pyramid of Giza until they were conquered by Alexander the Great, then a small scuffle, then conquered and held by Rome. There was lots of war, lots of civil war, lots of looting, lots of burning of records, and a lot of just bad note taking. Some things just get lost to time over the millennia.",
"No written history. At least not any that explains the technology of the time. I would say it's safe to say that many lost technologies, such as the Roman way to make concrete, is lost due to illiteracy.",
"Bad record keeping caused by low literacy rates, lack of dissemination of information, poor printing technology and the stuff drawn is mostly cultural, not technological.",
"Trade secrets. Guilds protected their methods with strict secrecy for their members. Secret organisations like the Free Masons have their roots in such trade groups. Only by apprenticing to a master would you eventually learn all the methods of the trade. It wasn't good business sense to let outsiders know the way you earned your living. If you wanted a castle built you hired a master mason from the guild and if there was a few castles being built already you might have to wait for enough skilled trades people to be available."
],
"score": [
8,
7,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73jque | Where did the tradition of burying the dead come from? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnqtwrc"
],
"text": [
"Nobody knows. It's *really* ancient. Like, there's evidence that *cavemen* were deliberately burying their dead, and they're not even the same species as us. Neanderthals went extinct nearly 40,000 years ago, while civilization as we know it is only 11,000-ish years old. In fact, wikipedia claims that the practice dates back 100,000 years. One thing that's worth noting is that the WHO recommends burying dead bodies that contain infectious diseases; it is entirely likely that among primitive tribes, burial was an unintentional sanitation practice that helped those tribes survive, leading towards a sort of cultural evolution that favored burial."
],
"score": [
8
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73kj8r | Why is "hello world" always the first thing you write on computer programming applications? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnr128d",
"dnr0kjr",
"dnqzlbf",
"dnrcane",
"dnr0lo5"
],
"text": [
"In the past, the hardest thing about writing a new program wasn't the programming language. It was understanding how your programming tools worked. To use C as an example, in order to write your first program, you would need to: 1. Understand how your text editor worked, a non-trivial task on a text only, mouseless computer. 2. Understand how the file system worked, and how to save your program with the correct file extension to the correct location. 3. Understand how to run your compiler. This was before graphical interfaces, so you couldn't just click a button. You had to exit your text editor, type something like \"cc -Wall hello.c -o hello\", see if there were any syntax errors, and they pull up you text editor to fix them again. 4. Understand how to execute your program once you got it to compile. That is a lot of things to figure out, \"Hello, world!\" is an exercise in getting them right.",
"The first known incidence came from Brian Kernaghan's documentation for BCPL. // Hello world demo get \"streams.d\" external [ Ws ] let Main() be [ Ws(\"Hello World!*N\") ] BCPL was the precursor to C, and it just kind of steamrollered from there.",
"Tradition! It's an easy first thing to program, usually just needing 2 or 3 lines of code, and it's just what's been done since nerds started screwing around with computers. Old-school style (QBasic): For Cnt = 1 to 10 Print \"Hello Word\" Next Cnt",
"Because the first programmers were Canadians and it seems like the decent thing to do before going to work. More seriously, it's a simple way to test a language's most basic functionality: can you output something? How complicated is it before you can in fact do so? You'd be amazed at some of the difficulties in doing such a simple task! The words themselves \"hello, world\" were written by Saint Kernighan in his holy book, although some scholars will tell you he himself was inspired by his masters. In any case, ever since, the litany must be uttered whenever a new language is tested for the first time. It is known. And so my master taught me 30 years ago, and so I have taught any of my disciples...",
"Mostly tradition, but it is also useful to demonstrate a few things. It demonstrates that your programming environment is set up properly. Had you used a more complex program, you couldn’t be sure if problems are because of your programming environment or because the program itself is wrong. It demonstrates the minimal steps required to make a program work in that environment. Depending on your environment this may require things like compiling the code, give the script file proper permissions, etc. Again, the simplicity of \"Hello World\" allows you to focus on the steps required to make a program run, instead of having to deal with potential bugs in the code itself."
],
"score": [
37,
17,
17,
9,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73l25s | How does walking long distances help raise fund? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnr34s2"
],
"text": [
"It's an organized publicity event for the charity. Each person who will be walking gets sponsors to agree to donate $X to the charity for each mile that they walk. Walking is done - is a great social event, and the donations are made by those who agreed to sponsor a walker. For walks done around town, individual amounts raised might be small - a few friends and family giving $25 or $50 dollars each. The Make A Wish walks that I have seen are a bit different. There is a minimum each walker must raise in order to participate ($5000 or more - if I remember correctly), but these are big trail hikes, and participants meals and hotel rooms for the event are covered."
],
"score": [
4
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73l5at | Is it normal for a person to regularly fantasize about killing people? What causes it? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnr3xby"
],
"text": [
"I'm not sure \"fantasise\" is the right word here, but many people randomly daydream about doing bad things and about bad things happening so that your mind subconciously checks that it is bad and should be avoided. There was a recent ELI5 about it which I will link if I find. If you do mean \"fantasise\" as in killing people is something you seriously desire, then you might have a problem. I'm not an expert, but there's a line somewhere between \"it would be funny if threw that guy out the window in my head\" and \"I truly want to kill everyone around me with a serrated knife and bathe in their blood\". If your thoughts are genuinely aggressive, then it might not be normal."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73lvae | What's happening between Spain and Catalonia right now? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dns1pz9",
"dnri00o"
],
"text": [
"In the most basic terms, Catalonia is very culturally distinct from the rest of Spain and even have their own language. They see themselves as different enough from the Spanish that they wish to secede and self-government, something they have wanted to many years but continuously the Spanish government has ignored them and is not for it at all since they believe it would be very detrimental to both sides economically and politically. Recently Catalonia has decided to just go all in despite the federal government's wishes and vote on it since they are still very determined to break away. 90% of Catalonian voters have shown that they are pro-independence, but any vote is still deemed illegal according to the Spanish constitution and Spain is doing whatever it takes to try to put an end to this, including many violent encounters between both sides. *edited for clarity",
"Catalan people wants to vote for independence from spain and to decide whether or not the regional government should take actions for independence or not. Spanish government has declared the referendum as ilegal and unconstitutional. Catalan regional government has said that (after lots of dialog attempts over the last 10 years that were always rejected by the Spanish government**) even declared as ilegal in Spain the referendum was declared legal in Catalan terms. Spain has sent thousands of military police (Guardia Civil) to stop the referendum and they have made lots of force demostrations and actions agains the civilians who only had a vote as a weapon to defense themselves. ** This independence movement in Catalonia started to gain major support around 2007 during negotiations of Estatut (agreement of policies and administrative responsibilities between the Catalan regional government vs the Spanish central government)."
],
"score": [
32,
12
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73m42q | What exactly is happening in Spain right now? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnrbm08"
],
"text": [
"Catalonia is a region of Spain that is culturally and linguistically distinct from the rest of Spain, and is a region that has significant autonomy within Spain, but it is not considered a separate nation under the Spanish constitution. It's comparatively wealthy to the rest of Spain, and it was hit by the same austerity measures that the rest of Spain was hit by in the early '10s. Support for independence has been growing since then. Catalonian leaders had been preparing for a referendum vote to be held today on the issue of independence. The Spanish government has categorically refused to recognize the vote, stating that it goes against their constitution, which alludes to the national unity of all Spaniards. Over the weekend, national police have been closing polling stations, seizing ballot papers and boxes, that sorta thing. People showed up today to vote anyway (not all polling stations were shut down), which led to clashes between police forces and civilians."
],
"score": [
5
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73mjr1 | Why is fighting allowed in hockey but it almost all other team sports fighting will land you a suspension/fine? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnrekcn",
"dnrf43u"
],
"text": [
"Reposted answer from /u/nezroy URL_0 It helps to remember that fights in hockey are 99% consensual. If you don't want to fight you turn your back and that's it. There are players that fight and players that don't, and it's not really a machismo/honor thing that you MUST fight. No one thinks less of you for not being a fighter. If you jump someone who is NOT looking for a fight you are usually going to get tossed from the game and probably suspended for a few games to boot. It's not OK to blind-side someone who is not likewise spoiling for a fight and generally speaking that is frowned upon. So the minor penalties and general lack of punishment is only in the case of two people who have collaboratively decided to go at it, which is true for almost every fight you see. They are pre-arranged (often at the face-off) and mutually agreed. At that point, two consenting adults doing what they want, basically, and the refs leave it alone until someone is at risk of getting seriously hurt -- usually once someone goes down and it's no longer a standing fight, or if other people are getting involved, or if one person is effectively incapacitated, etc. To some degree hockey is a self-regulated game. Refs are there for line calls, not necessarily behavior control. 10 people flying around a small ice surface at 40km/h with wooden sticks can REALLY hurt each other while the ref is looking the other way if they want to. To avoid this, fighting is used as a pressure relief... all the pent up aggression you feel for the wrongs and slights done to your team goes into cheering for your guy in the fight. Afterward everyone chills out. This is generally true even if the two guys fighting aren't the actual guys you were mad at. But the thing is, everyone on your team is going to be mad at someone different for some random thing that happened, so it's not practical to expect everyone will \"pay\" individually. This mostly works because most players aren't assholes. If they do something to earn your ire it was probably by accident or a \"one time\" thing. It's unlikely you'll remember it for more than 5 minutes and unlikely that guy is going to specifically tick you off again. So the fight serves to release the cumulative pressure of all those little things, not necessarily any specific incident. Where this fails is if there is just that one total dick on a team that is constantly cheap-shotting people or otherwise behaving in a douchey way not consistent with the overall tone of the game. Especially if that person keeps doing it even after a fight or two. At some point the other team is going to remember his number and a \"generic fight\" won't fix the issue. That guy now has a target painted on his back and at some point -- maybe not even that game but in a future game -- someone is going to risk getting tossed from the game/suspended to teach that specific player a lesson. Though usually half of that guy's own team are just as happy to watch him get creamed because, honestly, he IS a dick. We'd never say it out loud of course, team solidarity, rah rah rah... but at some point people get what they deserve and everyone on both sides knows it. EDIT: Others replies here have also made the very good point that I feel worth highlighting... a hockey fight is not like MMA. It's really hard to get leverage on ice and there's only so much weight you can get behind a punch. And the minute it goes to the ice the refs do get involved to stop it. The dangerous parts of hockey are at speed near the boards. A hockey fight is practically tame by comparison to what can happen there.",
"The other posts in this thread are correct. However, it largely depends on the league. Fighting is tolerated in professional and semi-pro leagues like the NHL and AHL. Less so in the Major Junior and Junior A leagues under the control of the CHL, Hockey Canada, and USA Hockey. Some Junior A leagues now have an automatic ejection policy for fighting. Anything below Junior and fighting is outright forbidden."
],
"score": [
20,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/20azzv/eli5_why_are_ice_hockey_players_allowed_to_beat/"
],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73npov | Why is Catalonia trying to leave Spain? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnrrxcg",
"dnrpifi"
],
"text": [
"1- Catalonia has been a part of Spain for a while but it's regional identity (centuries old) was suppressed heavily by a dictatorship from the 30's-70's. After the dictatorship it regained autonomy again and thrived compared to the rest of Spain until the Spanish Supreme Court reversed it in 2010, in bird culture that was referred to as a \"dick move\". In 2014 Catalonia paid 9.89 billion euros more than it received back (5% of its GDP). Hyperbole time, think of how Texas would react if the federal govt made guns illegal, forced them to pay for/provide easy access to abortions, provided a federal mandated school curriculum that's very pro-science, and levied a large amount of federal taxes. 2- Catalonia is a prosperous region that has been propping up the rest of Spain. They held an independence referendum a few years back that passed and their govt has since been working towards independence (which is against the Spanish constitution). One main reason it's picked up is the federal government has cracked down violently and not really come to the discussion table, surprisingly when people feel they aren't being heard they take make drastic measures. 3- Remain: Pro Spain- They get a lot of tax money from Catalonia and can't handle losing that right now coming out of the recession. Pro Catalonia- They may be able to push the federal government to the bargaining table with this move and receive more of a say in national matters (like tax collection/distribution). Con Spain- They'll continue to deal with this and will likely lead to more violence which will hurt their economy even more. Con Catalonia- Same as with Spain. Leave: Pro Spain- They don't risk civil war. Pro Catalonia- They regain their autonomy and stop having to support a country they don't feel very attached to. Con Spain- They lose a major part of their economy. Con Catalonia- They would be a new country and have to deal with the EU which Spain would absolutely attempt to sabotage at every attempt causing a difficult transition. Even if they exit Spain on favorable terms it will take a while to join the EU which will negatively impact their economy. That's not ELI5 at all... Catalonia is a foster child that was taken in by Spain. Spain is an abusive foster parent and Catalonia is trying to run away but Spain won't let it. Yeah, that'll do.",
"It's been going on for hundred years or so. Basically they have a different culture, different language, and are wealthy and their taxes subsidize the rest of Spain... And they feel the federal government in Madrid isn't very grateful at all."
],
"score": [
39,
11
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73p3s9 | Why do the Catalans want to be independent of Spain? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dns0pth"
],
"text": [
"Because they have their own language and culture and they are tired of being conquered in the late 1700s during the Napoleonic Wars. They want to be their own country again. It is one of the richest regions of Spain, and they are also not happy to see their taxes spent on the other parts of Spain."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73p4zx | I have never heard of Catalonia before today on worldnews. What is happening? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dns1299",
"dns18jd"
],
"text": [
"Catalonia was a country with it's own language and culture, next door to Spain. In the 1790s it was conquered during the Napoleonic Wars. It was later incorporated into Spain. The Catalons are not cool with that. Like the Scots, they are trying to get a vote to leave Spain. However, Catalonia is much richer than the average Spanish province. They are unhappy to see their taxes spent in other parts of Spain, but Spain would be in deep trouble without those taxes. As to why you've never heard of it, perhaps you've not taken world history yet?",
"Catalonia is an autonomous region in Spain. It's similar-ish to a state in the U.S. but it's more independent. Historically, it's had a distinct cultural and political landscape from the rest of Spain and as always had an independent streak. It's also one of the most economically prosperous regions of Spain. Catalonia has been pushing for Independence from Spain to form their own country for a long time, but it came to a fever pitch in the last few years, so the Catalan government decided to hold a referendum on whether to ceded from Spain and form their own country. Spain refuses to allow the referendum to be held, but the Catalan government proceeded with it anyway, so Spanish police have been doing everything they can to stop it including stealing ballot boxes, making arrests, and beating people."
],
"score": [
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73pmti | Why does Spain have strong, independent cultures (i.e. Basque, Catalonia) while other European nations seem to be more culturally and linguistically uniform? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dns5462",
"dnsjmet",
"dns74hz"
],
"text": [
"While I don't disagree with your question, let me find you some examples which invalidate it: - Belgium is part French part Dutch, different languages, different traditions, different cultures. - Yugoslavia, but that was only a stable country under Tito. - Turkey and its Kurdistan part. - UK (or was it GB?) and Scotland and Northern-Ireland. - The former east and west parts of Germany, still cultural very different. - Czech and Slovakia were split up in the late 1990s IIRC. - Italy and Sicily.",
"Other nations in Europe aren't more culturally and linguistically uniform. It's just that the tensions in Spain right now are violent and more extreme. This is likely due to some 20th century historical events. Spain had an extremely ugly and deadly, some would say genocidal, civil war in the 1930s. It was won by the fascists, led by Francisco Franco. He was a brutal dictator and ruled Spain from 1939 until 1975 when he died. There was a lot of unhappiness and repression in Spain during those years. This exacerbated tensions between Catalonia and the Basque regions and their feelings for being part of Spain. There are 7 Basque regions in Europe--4 are in Spain, 3 are in France. There have been tensions between these Basque regions and the government of the nation they are in. But the tensions are far greater between the Basques in Spain and the Spanish government, than there are between the French and the Basques living in France. I mean, it's a popular fantasy/dream/wish among all the Basques to have their own nation. But the Spanish Basques are more violent and more active in their separatism than the French Basques. The reason can probably be attributed to the French Basques experiencing less repression and violence than the Spanish Basques, so they're less angry. And they have less to gain by being separatists since their lives aren't as bad overall and they didn't have, for example, the same language repression in France that the Basques in Spain had. The situation for the Spanish improved greatly following Franco's death but the independence movements were already established. Lately, there have been various economic problems in Spain so that has heated up the discontent that residents of Catalonia feel.",
"they dont. sicilian , neopolitan tuscan in italy . in fact much of europe have lesser known areas.. ask a parisian.. thier dialect different from someone from nice or provance"
],
"score": [
6,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73r659 | In the USA, it is illegal to falsely advertise a product or mislead individual with paid testimony without stating (e.g. Ads with Paid Actors prompt). How does false news operate when they are selling fake products? | It would see that no matter which side does or does not benefit, having false news narratives hurts everyone. We allow freedom of speech, but regulate some still, like advertisements, as to not mislead, misguide, or lie to customers. Could news, as product or service, be filed under this? If it cannot, why not? Shouldn't news, by definition, be truthful? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnsi508"
],
"text": [
"> Could news, as product or service, be filed under this? If it cannot, why not? It's not advertising a product, so it's protected. Wording is also important, and political speech in particular is extra protected. It's not illegal to lie, except in very certain circumstances-like products, but that's narrowly tailored. Generally speaking, in order to regulate speech you need to show that the government has a very compelling reason(in this case, direct harm to a consumer), and it's the least restrictive way possible(this is called [strict scrutiny]( URL_1 ). It's an extremely hard bar to hit. In addition, economic activity tends to be considered less protected compared to other activities. You can also add in the fact that many creators of the most egregious fake news tend to be foreign. So not only are they difficult to find in the first place, they're also hard to prosecute (especially if they keep jumping to new names/brands/websites) > Shouldn't news, by definition, be truthful? Morally/ethically perhaps, but not according to legal precedent/the supreme court. The big issue is the 1st amendment directly protects lying- it doesn't consider it any different than other speech. edit: I will mention, it isn't impossible for this to change, if the issue continues to become a bigger problem. These sorts of changes tend to be motivated when things are bad enough that it basically has to URL_0 's the last possible resort, and courts move slow. If they're forced to act, they may. But until then, they won't go anywhere near it short of a constitutional amendment. We didn't have a lot of these protections at first, besides libel/slander (which came from common law England). Most of them popped up in the 20's as a response to what unscrupulous companies were doing."
],
"score": [
4
],
"text_urls": [
[
"happen.it",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strict_scrutiny"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
73vb4i | Why do we still call Native Americans "Indians" even though we know otherwise? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dntejhf",
"dntfbu9"
],
"text": [
"When does a name stop being inaccurate and simply a correct name for the subject? European explorers realized pretty early on that they were not in India. Nevertheless, it was useful to have a collective term for the people that lived there, since there was not one before, and so it has been in use for centuries. It does not have any pejorative connotation in the United States and is used by Indians themselves as well as by the government. You should keep in mind that there is no neutral alternative. The very concept of the \"Indians\" as a single people that could be described in one term is a European invention. What should Indians that have adopted a collective identity use as a term? The word \"native\" is also value-laden: it refers to where one is born. When two people are born in the same place, and you call one \"native\" and the other not, you're choosing to sacrifice accuracy for other purposes. Of course you can invent new names altogether, but this has little to do with accuracy and is unlikely to displace a term commonly accepted and deeply embedded in a culture.",
"We've known they weren't from India since long ago. However, for most of time they preferred to be called their tribe names; Navajo, Sioux, Cherokee, ... . The term \"indian\" was just for things that applied to all of then, like the [US Government's Bureau of Indian Affairs]( URL_0 ). That's from a time when negro was a suitable term, as in [United Negro College Fund]( URL_1 ). While tastes in popular description, particularly self-description, change pretty often; organizational names tend not to change because it costs so much to change them and it destroys their branding value."
],
"score": [
12,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"https://www.bia.gov/",
"https://www.uncf.org/"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73vyrr | Is the theory that more education decreases crimes and such problems true, or is it a fallacy? And How exactly? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dntjykx",
"dntivzv",
"dntte01"
],
"text": [
"All crime or just violent? One could assume it increases fraud/white collar crime surely?",
"To some degree it is true. Education increases economic opportunity (makes it easier to get a good job), and people with plenty of economic opportunity are less likely to become criminals.",
"They are correlated, but it is unclear which direction that causality runs. It is pretty clear that poverty is largely responsible for criminal behavior. If you are wealthy enough to afford nice things, you are less like to steal or sell drugs to get nice things. And you are more afraid consequences of getting caught because you have more to lose. It is also true educated people are less likely to be poor, and poor people are less likely to become educated. Which is the bigger contributor, we are not sure."
],
"score": [
3,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73wntn | Why do Japenese put extra words after names in sentences sometime? | Examples being “kun” or “senpai” | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dntorar",
"dntpnyc",
"dnu8uzj"
],
"text": [
"Those are *honorifics*, which most often are used to show the status of the person being spoken to. In your examples, *-kun* would be used for a male friend close in age, and *senpai* would be used for a slightly older person whom you respect and admire, though the word literally refers to older siblings.",
"They are honorifics, which are used to reflect the 'status' of the person you are addressing. 'San' is a general respectful honorific for someone approximately equal to you. 'Kun' and 'Senpai' are used for someone slightly lower or higher (respectively) than you. E.g. a junior in high school would call a senior \"senpai\". 'Chan' is literally used for children, but can also be used in a \"cute\" way between couples or very close friends/relatives. Kind of like how English-speaking couples call each other \"baby\". 'Sensei' is used to show respect for someone clearly senior in status to you, e.g. a teacher, a boss, an educated professional, an authority figure, etc...",
"It is pretty much like placing Ms. or President or Dr. or anything like that in front of a name in English, just with quite a bit more complexity."
],
"score": [
70,
15,
6
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
73wxzu | why are mass shootings in America rarely referred to acts of terrorism? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dntr5bs",
"dntqv25",
"dntr468",
"dntrzd9"
],
"text": [
"Terrorism is the practice of instilling terror in a segment of the population to try to further some sort of political, social, or religious cause. You don't even have to kill anyone to commit terrorism. For example, the KKK burning crosses in the yards of black people is an act of terrorism, because it's an attempt to terrify the black population of a town to convince them to leave. It's using fear as a tool of social change. A person killing people just to kill them, and not to try to use fear to further some sort of cause, is not terrorism. It's just murder.",
"An act of terrorism is where you injure or kill people, generally civilians, for political reasons or gain. An insane person shooting up a school isn't an act of terrorism because there is no political motive to it. If the person was a terrorist then that means the police need to see if there are any terrorism cells in the area. If the person was insane then things like mental healthcare need to be improved.",
"Terrorism is defined as violence or threat of violence based on *ideological* reasons. If a person commits a mass shooting and there is no evidence they did so based on an ideology (religious, political, racial, etc) then it isn't terrorism. Historically, mass shootings in the US have been primarily the result of mental illness rather than ideology, although sometimes both factors are involved. So for example, Dylan Roof- the Charleston church killer- committed terrorism because his sole or primary motivation was to target black Americans. Conversely, the 2014 Washington Navy Yard shooter (who was coincidentally also black) did so because he had severe schizophrenia and thought the government was reading his thoughts.",
"Unfortunately, many people equate terrorism with \"a very bad thing that scares a lot of people\". Where prank calls suddenly become \"terroristic threats\", this devalues the victims of actual terrorism. Terrorism isn't a crime, it is a type of crime. Mass shootings and bombings can happen without it being terrorism. If you set off a bomb to cover a bank robbery, that's pretty terr-ible, but it is not terr-orism. Terrorism is illegal violence committed by a group to achieve a political goal. The 2004 Madrid train bombings are a good example. Three days before the elections, a group affiliated with al-Qaeda bombed several trains, killing nearly 200 and injuring 2000. And it worked, an anti-war party won an election they were previously behind in, and Spain withdrew from the war in Iraq. Since there is no secret organization of white Christian American men bombing civilian targets (at least outside of the military) bombing things then taking credit for it and demanding political change, it is pretty easy to call them isolated incidents. Since there are radical Islamic groups who have been orchestrating violence again civilians, it is less clear if a Muslim perpetrator was a lone crazy, or had organizational support. In short, the mass shootings in the US aren't typically classified as terrorism, not because they are less serious, it is simply not what that word means."
],
"score": [
44,
27,
8,
8
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73xvp0 | When does a dialect become it's own language? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnu0t2v",
"dnu5wwk",
"dnu5xw9",
"dnucml5",
"dnu49pf",
"dnu4djr",
"dnuqfda",
"dnuexj2",
"dnucfxs",
"dnucveq",
"dnu64uj",
"dnu6tss",
"dnu5c49",
"dnv5x4o"
],
"text": [
"When the people speaking the dialect have sufficient power and/or influence to get people to accept that it is. That's it. Two language can be very similar and mutually easily intelligible but if there are two governments that have the authority to say they are different languages, then they're considered two different languages. As I have been told is the case with Serbian and Croatian (I don't speak either so I'm just going by what I was told by someone who lived in the area). On the other hand, there's Arabic. I'm told that what is spoken in Lebanon is so different from what is spoken in Saudi Arabia that they're not mutually intelligible... but they're both considered to be Arabic because there's a purposefulness to keep calling them the same language. Yet at the same time these are all different countries so there's no cohesive movement to pick a standard version of the language so the different regions start speaking the same version.",
"The classic response to this is \"When it has its own army and navy.\" There's a thing called the Dialect Continuum, where dialects A and B can communicate, and B and C can communicate, but A and C cannot. So it seems to A and C as though they're speaking different languages. Are they? There are places in Europe where you can drive three hundred miles, cross a couple of borders, and everyone agrees you're now in a different country with a different language. But you could take someone from certain neighborhoods in Boston and drop them into certain neighborhoods in Louisiana and they would not be able to understand each other. Even though they are ostensibly speaking English. (In reality they WOULD be able to understand each other because they would each immediately shift dialects to the English everyone hears on the TV, but the point stands).",
"I'll agree with what everybody else is saying about political/social pressure being a key factor as languages seem to exist on a continuum. Also, I'd like to share that I've been exposed to an English language varient that I'd like to think of as being pretty darn close to being another language, that's Jamaican Patois. I grew up speaking it but because the social capital is in the mesolect (standard English) I was told as a child that we're English speakers and it was a sign of being poor/uneducated/rural to \"chat Patois\". Once I was older I realise how different that dialect is from standard English, trying to explain to a standard English speaker words in Jamaican music like \"unnu\" or \"dehso/yahso\" or a word like \"nyam\" which I can translate but has more implications than just eat or devour. I was like damn, this isn't just an accent like I was told by older folks.",
"So Quebec and France both speak \"French\", but a lot of people from France can't understand Quebecois even though Quebecois understand the French. A few years ago Quebec released a movie about an Olympic swimmer that drops blown up condoms on public events called \"a vos marques party!\" ( Play on words for \"a vos marques partez!\" Or translated it's \"on your marks, get set, party!\") When it was filmed in French in Quebec, but it was dubbed in Parisian french before being released in France so people could understand it. It pissed off a lot of hardcore Quebecois because they feel that quebc speaks French. Despite this, and despite having a lot of differences ( Quebec says \"char\" french say \"bagnole\" ), people still say it's the same language. I think Quebecois and french are on the tipping point before it becomes a separate language",
"We don't really have a good definition of this. There are languages that are very similar, but are considered different languages (Spanish speakers might be able to understand Galician and Catalan, and even communicate pretty well, but they're all different languages). On the other hand, we have languages with different dialects that two people speaking them won't be able to understand each other. This is true for Northern and Southern Italian, French from different regions, and Chinese especially. Just because you speak one of them, doesn't mean you'll understand all of them. And there are so many Chinese people that finding people in your region that speak your dialect, and having it evolve independently of the others is very easy. So in conclusion: governments get to pick and label them. But there isn't very clear definitions of either.",
"The difference between a language and a dialect is mostly political. Most modern European languages started out as dialects of a particular region. Large states need a standardized language for bureaucratic reasons, so the dialect of the ruling class or region usually becomes the standard language. This is true of Castilian Spanish (see the conflict now in Catalan-speaking regions) and Parisian French (Provencal is now an extinct language). Standard Italian is a little different, as it was established as a literary language based primarily, but not entirely, on Tuscan, long before unification, which was actually led by Piedmont, where they speak a dialect much closer to French.",
"Fun fact: Portuguese and Spanish are considered two different languages. Brazilian Portuguese and European Portuguese (also spoken in Africa) are considered just varities of the same language. We Brazilians and they Portuguese use the same grammar. Reading European Portuguese is very, very, close to reading Brazilian Portuguese. Lots of differences in vocabulary, but very close in everything else. Obviously, there are those nationalists who believe Brazilian Portuguese should be consider its won separat language, to which I disagree. But here's, finally, the fun fact. For a Brazilian, understanding spoken Spanish is usually easier than understanding spoken European Portuguese. Frankly, Spanish sounds like a strange dialect of Brazilian Portuguese, while European Portuguese sounds like gibbrish.",
"As others have already explained, the distinction between a language and a dialect is not cut-and-dried, and it tends to be directly related to political and/or military power. As a result, contemporary sociolinguistics have begun to use the blanket term \"variety\" to refer to all languages, dialects, etc. This term has come into fashion because it suggests that all ways of speaking are equally valid (e.g. African American Vernacular is just as legitimate as what we tend to call Standard American English.) The switch to the term \"variety\" suggests a larger movement in the field of sociolinguistics away from perscriptivism (telling people how to speak \"properly\") and toward descriptivism (simply studying the different ways in which people speak.) Source: Have taken several sociolinguistics courses.",
"In linguistics there's no actual difference between a language and a dialect. The difference is, as many others have already said, pretty much political, as in: we usually call \"language\" the idiom spoken by a powerful group of people, like the official/most prominent idiom in a country. This is not always true, but usually a dialect is only spoken, whereas a language has its own literature and a written tradition in general (this includes dictionaries and whatnot). Numbers have nothing to do with the distinction: for example, Sardinians (and as such Sardinian speakers) are something like 1.2 millions out of the 70 millions of Italians, and yet Sardinian is considered its own language (with its own dialects which are slightly comprehensible but not interchangeable with each other) whereas other local languages like the one spoken in Piedmont are considered dialects (fun fact: the Italian dialects are actually Latin dialects and they can be very different from each other. Actual Italian dialects are regional variants of Italian, like the Italian spoken in Sardian vs. the Italian spoken in Sicily vs. the Italian spoken in Tuscany etc).",
"It's a political decision. If the Founding Fathers had decided that the official language of the United States is American, then that would've been that and a new language would've been created.",
"As Max Weinreich said, it becomes a language when it gets an army and a navy...which is to say that the dividing line has more to do with politics than with linguistics. Things spoken in different countries may be called languages when the same things, spoken in different parts of the same country, would be considered merely dialects.",
"Disregarding all political and societal definitions and dealing solely with linguistics, speakers of different dialects of one language can still understand each other, whereas speakers of different languages cannot. American English and British English (or Scottish English or Australian English) are still understandable between each other. Obviously there are cultural touchstones, idioms, common phrases, and very severe accents that can get in the way, but if they were trapped on a desert island, they could still communicate without having to start from scratch. However, if you take Gaelic or Old English or ASL and there's no way any untrained English speaker could understand it. This is similar to the most common difference between two species: Races or breeds of one species can produce fertile offspring, whereas two different species either cannot produce offspring, or the offspring is infertile (such as a mule).",
"For people who talk the dialect it is it’s own language already, unless someone have enough power and resources to convince them it is not.",
"Chinese has a written language and a spoken language with many varying dialects. While the writing is the same for all of China, and Mandarin Chinese is the official language, the different dialects are so different that they're mutually unintelligible. For example, Cantonese and Shanghainese speakers won't understand each other if they speak, but can if they write. This doesn't explain the eli5 at all."
],
"score": [
898,
369,
73,
55,
33,
27,
10,
9,
6,
4,
4,
4,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73xzgd | How do we know that our translations of hieroglyphics are correct? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnu35hm",
"dnv37kk",
"dnugn2e",
"dnu0jxj",
"dnu2dza",
"dnuc7bt",
"dnupqbu",
"dnuecyq",
"dnu3f30",
"dnuxp9u",
"dnv1ent",
"dnu9gz5",
"dnuza8k",
"dnv55oh",
"dnvibi2"
],
"text": [
"As others have said the Rosetta Stone was vital in beginning understanding. Beyond that we know because it keeps making sense. So as an example. Why did the ¥ cross the road? The ¥ we ate last night was good. We had fried ¥. The ¥s ran out of the coop. The ¥ feathers were beige. We can start narrowing in on what ¥ is because there are only certain things that can be filled in and make sense. In this case birds are really the only thing that work, in particular I started with chicken. Sometimes we don't have an absolute answer but a close enough answer that can be used. As we see the symbols more we have more knowledge about what the symbol means. It is actually the same way you learn new words, the context eventually reveals the information, and as you hear the word more often you can fix any mistakes you've made in the meaning.",
"As others have said, the Rosetta Stone played a huge role in deciphering hieroglyphics since it included translations in languages we already knew. But how could it be deciphered if we didn't have that kind of cheat sheet? A fascinating example is [Linear B]( URL_2 ), a pre-Ancient Greek language discovered on stone tablets on the island of Crete. It was long assumed that it would be completely indecipherable without some sort of \"Rosetta stone\", but we cracked the code in 1952, thanks to decades of study by [Alice Kober and Michael Ventris]( URL_0 ). The first breakthrough came after Kober diligently recorded the frequency and position of each symbol on the tablets (While this type of analysis is not hard to do with computers today, this took *years* of work for Kober). In doing so, she discovered many instances of the same groups of symbols, but with consistently different endings. Through this, she realized that Linear B was an inflected language with different endings based on usage, like verb endings in Latin and Spanish. She also noted that there were about 200 unique symbols in total. Being an expert of many languages, she knew that this was too many characters to be alphabetic (each symbol representing a letter - English, for example), and too few to be logographic (each symbol representing a word, like Chinese). She surmised that each symbol in Linear B likely represented a syllable. Now we have a clear understanding of what *type* of language Linear B was, but how do we determine what any of it means? This is where Ventris stepped up. He theorized that these tablets likely had location names, and knew that location names often stayed similar over long periods of time. So he basically did ~~brute force~~ trial-and-error using the ancient Greek names for towns in Crete: What if a particular group of symbols are syllables that mean something like, \"ko-no-so\", meaning the Cretian city of Knossos? After exploring this idea in countless ways, he eventually discovered a pattern that confirmed this: When he interpreted one particular set of symbols as \"ko-no-so\", other symbols began to make sense. Slowly but surely, that first bit of translation led to him fully deciphering the entire language. EDIT: As /u/QuarkMawp pointed out, brute force was not the correct term. And since this has gotten some traction, if anybody is more interested in this and other sorts of amazing cryptography achievements throughout history, I highly recommend [The Code Book]( URL_1 ) by Simon Singh. It covers a broad history of immense achievements in cryptography including Linear B, along with things like development of new codes in Renaissance Europe, cracking the Enigma Machine code in World War II, Navajo Wind Talkers and modern Public-Key Encryption. It's very informative and engaging, and also very accessible for the layperson.",
"Others have talked about how we have decided what means what in hieroglyphs, but that doesn't actually mean we know for sure that our translations are correct. I'm going to give an example that I leaned about when I took a class on reading hieroglyphs in college; unfortunately, the details have faded a little. Back in the 50s or 60s, egyptologists thought they had the translations down. Then, one discovered a pattern in verbs that indicated a whole tense no one had noticed before. This tense looked very much like present tense, but was subtly different. They had to go back and re translate practically every thing. The fundamental meanings didn't change a whole lot, but the subtleties did. I think this new tense is called \"second tense\"",
"The Rosetta Stone is a big help. A decree etched on stone in both hieroglyphs, which we didn't understand, and Ancient Greek, which we do",
"The top and middle texts are in Ancient Egyptian using hieroglyphic script and Demotic script, respectively, while the bottom is in Ancient Greek. As the decree has only minor differences between the three versions, the Rosetta Stone proved to be the key to deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphs. URL_0",
"Related question: how are names translated from non-alphabetic languages? I can understand how a name that's a combination of common words (like \"smith\" or \"underhill\") would be translated, but how did the Egyptians write down a name that's a random collection of sounds?",
"Besides inferring from translations, there is also some help in errors that have been made by the people who wrote in hieroglyphs. Because when you make an error with language, it's not random but rather reflects the system of the language. So if you find a phrase that is repeated in many places, but in one place there's a mistake in it, you can look how it differs and thus get a better idea about the phrase. It's a bit hard to imagine, but one example is Latin pronunciation - a writer might confuse I with E because the sounds are pretty close, but he won't ever confuse I with X because they're very far apart.",
"Rosetta Stone as others stated. Remember it was a tax code. Meaning a lot of technical jargon. Not much room for interpretation. Had 2 languages we knew and 1 we didn't.",
"The importance of the Rosetta Stone is a bit overblown, but things like that help. Generally, we know through continued translations that match up using the same Hiero. Things would get very chaotic if the translations were wrong now. But we can still translate them fairly easily (the grammar is much simpler than Latin and Greek, thankfully.) Edit: If you're going to downvote me, at least challenge me in the comments. Or else you're only doing it because other people did. (I hate double editing, but for context I was at -7 when I made the first edit.)",
"BBC did an awesome documentary about this. It's on Netflix & it's called '[Egypt]( URL_0 )'. It's definitely dramatized but the facts check out. The first four episodes are about king Tut and the European race to find ancient Egyptian tombs & artifacts. The last 3 however are an account of the quest to decipher the Rosetta Stone's Egyptian Heiroglyphs.",
"There's a fascinating Nova special called \"Cracking the Maya Code.\" It covers this topic in regards to Mayan hieroglyphics instead of Egyptian, but it goes over the history of how we discovered certain things and how long-standing beliefs were changed after new discoveries. If you can find it, I highly recommend watching it. URL_0",
"For that matter, how do you know your tanslation of this english sentence to your native language (whatever that may be) is accurate? You assume it is, for you have \"learned\" the meaning of every word and think you know how to grammatically decipher a sentence, but how do you KNOW? On a less filosophical note, though, there's a video from VSauce that somewhere in the video goes on a tangent on how you could start to decipher any foreign language by noting how frequently some words and letters are used (also, the rest of the video is pure awesome). URL_0 Definitely worth a watch.",
"we use so many emoticons nowadays that I am wondering whether people in the future when they look back will think that we are in the age of hieroglyphics",
"The story is long and complex and full of feuds, frauds and other issues. Most people trying to decipher the hieroglyphs thought they were pictograms- for instance, that the duck was used for Son (which was a lucky guess.) This actually hampered the decoding for decades. One of the first clues, were the names of kings, like Ramses which were named in Coptic texts. Ultimately many sources of documents written in Greek, Coptic and other languages which had not died out - helped scholars build a larger and larger vocabulary. There is a Learning Company DVD series that helps you learn to read them, and gives the full history of how they were decodes. It's interesting to note that the breakthroughs still did not come until decades after the Rosetta stone was discovered. Part of the reason the language died was illiteracy and the rigidity of the scribes. The language changed over the centuries, but the scribes pretty much stuck to the same system. Imagine if all books today were printed in Gaelic - and you had to have a translator to read them to you, or write them for you.",
"All these comments about the Rosetta Stone and not a single person mentioned the name of the person who actually translated hieroglyphics: Jean-François Champollion."
],
"score": [
6281,
1193,
569,
418,
260,
94,
54,
39,
36,
18,
7,
7,
4,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-22782620",
"https://simonsingh.net/books/the-code-book/",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linear_B"
],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_Stone?wprov=sfla1"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0483603/"
],
[
"http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/cracking-maya-code.html"
],
[
"https://youtu.be/fCn8zs912OE"
],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73yg8d | Why do people like the room to be cold while they are warmly wrapped up in a blanket? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnu3vdv"
],
"text": [
"Yo ho ho! Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: Why do we sleep better in a cold room but still under warm covers? ]( URL_2 ) 1. [ELI5: Why is it more comfortable to sleep in a cool room with blankets around you rather than a warm/hot room? ]( URL_4 ) 1. [ELI5:Why does it feel better to sleep in a cold room with a thick blanket than a normal room without any blanket at all? ]( URL_3 ) 1. [ELI5: Why is it more comfortable to sleep in a cool room under warm blankets than just to sleep in a warm room? ]( URL_0 ) 1. [ELI5: Why are warm blankets cozy, but rooms of the same temperature are stifling? ]( URL_1 )"
],
"score": [
7
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37bic1/eli5_why_is_it_more_comfortable_to_sleep_in_a/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5gk2pe/eli5_why_are_warm_blankets_cozy_but_rooms_of_the/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5l9exy/eli5_why_do_we_sleep_better_in_a_cold_room_but/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/235tqf/eli5why_does_it_feel_better_to_sleep_in_a_cold/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/54zb2c/eli5_why_is_it_more_comfortable_to_sleep_in_a/"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
73yp1y | How much time have to pass before grave robbing is considered archeology? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnu5zbv",
"dnv0idg",
"dnukilt",
"dnu5rjb",
"dnugfjy"
],
"text": [
"There are no specific time that have to pass but it is more how it is done. Archaeology is very meticulously uncovering and recording all the finds and publishing them afterwards. It have become increasingly common to rebury any human remains after they have been studied. The intent of an archaeologist is to find the truth and not to find valuable artifacts. But archaeology have been used as an excuse for grave robbing, especially during colonial and imperial times. This is for example the time when the Indiana Jones stories take place. So you can be doing archaeology on a recent grave and you can do grave robbing in a several thousand year old grave.",
"I’m a commercial archaeologist in the uk, I’ve dug up bodies 150 years old and bodies 4000 years old. As others have said, time is not a factor, it’s all about professionalism. In the commercial sector we work ahead of construction work, we check and clear the area so construction can go ahead. We record and remove any remains, then rebury them else where, after a period of time to study them. Grave robbing is simply destruction, dig it up and mess the remains up, remove any historical finds, take no records.",
"Well, for starters, it's not just \"grave robbing\" we have to worry about here. If nothing else, it's been quite some time since most cultures buried their dead with anything of value. \"Grave robbing,\" as such, hasn't really been a profitable activity for several centuries now. But most governments nonetheless have rules about not disturbing formally recognized grave sites (e.g., cemeteries) for *any* reason, including things like construction. The concern is pretty much the same: protecting the dignity of spaces in which people bury their dead. This is one of *the* oldest traditions in human culture. As to how much time goes by before disturbing graves becomes okay? There's no specific rule. It's more a question of whether a particular burial site is *protected* as a \"grave\" site by whatever government has jurisdiction over the site. Just because a site is some person's final resting place does not mean that the site will be formally recognized as a \"grave\". So, for instance, any time a contractor is doing excavation work in a major urban area (say for a new high rise), it's not uncommon for them to turn up human remains, even in places with no previously recorded burial activity. When that happens, the usual result is to stop work on the project until the city sends out an archaeologist and/or forensics expert to examine the site. Maybe it's a crime scene. Maybe it's an indigenous people's burial ground. Maybe it's an important archaeological/palentological find. Who knows? But it probably *won't* be formally recognized as a \"grave\" no matter the outcome. The remains will usually be offered some dignified reburial elsewhere, but removed they will be. On the other hand, I used to live in a city with an interstate beltway. The interchange nearest my office has just about *the* most ass-backwards layout you could imagine. To the point that I'd use two separate exits in my morning and evening commutes, because the one closest to my house didn't actually lead to the office coming from that direction. Why? Because there's a mid-nineteenth-century cemetery located *right* in the middle of the north-side of the interchange, *exactly* where the south-bound off-ramp would normally cross the intersecting road. It was apparently deemed to be impossible to get permission from the relevant descendants (or just too expensive to track them all down). Hence the idiotic ramp layout. It's not that disturbing the graves would have been \"grave robbing\", but that the DOT wasn't willing/able to jump through the legal procedures necessary to disturb a formally-recognized grave site.",
"I'm gonna say intent makes the difference. Frankenstein dug up graves to steal the body parts and use them, that's grave robbimg and it's seem as bad. Archaeologists dig up graves/tombs to preserve and study them and that's seen as good.",
"As others have said, it isn't so much about time as it is permission. To do an archaeological dig, you need to get permission from the government who owns the land, potentially the descendants of the people interred therein, permits, licenses, etc, etc. It's a massive project. Grave robbing is the act of stealing from a grave. Archaeologists might well take things from a grave, and they may well be stealing those things if they haven't been given permission to take them."
],
"score": [
29,
11,
4,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
742pzn | Why do private citizens need gun silencers? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnv0dmx",
"dnv0czp",
"dnv1fdr",
"dnv1f11",
"dnv157z",
"dnv16t0",
"dnv31ez",
"dnv0go9",
"dnv1h96"
],
"text": [
"As a recreational shooter I would love to have a silencer at the range, so I could skip having to use earpro with subsonic rounds. I would also like to have a silencer when recreationally shooting in BLM land, because I don't particularly enjoy making a lot of noise and annoying people for no reason. That being said, actual silencers don't last that long and re-baffling them is a lot of effort.",
"...because their guns are loud. Honestly, if you've ever lived an a rural area where guns were popular, you'd wish everyone used them. The sound carries for miles.",
"For one instance: for a home defense situation, if you do not have a suppressor then you have to choose between permanent hearing damage and protecting your safety and your family's safety. Suppressors DO NOT MAKE GUNS SILENT. They still have a seriously loud report, especially with rifles since the majority of the rounds are super sonic. Super sonic rounds are in no way quieted by suppressors. Handguns can be subsonic and they will come down to 120 db minimums. That's not quiet. But it won't cause hearing damage. I do not want to have to cause myself hearing damage or my children's hearing damage to protect them from an intruder. Stop conflating suppressors with the ability to shoot without anyone noticing the shooting. Suppressors do not silence anything. That is a myth. 120 db is a thunder clap or an auto horn. Suppressors bring weapons down to the point of not causing hearing damage. This is a safe tool to have. And 120 db is the lowest a suppressor can get. More common average is more like 125-130 which is a jet taking off. In many countries is even considered rude to not shoot with a suppressor because it is simply loud and annoying. Noise pollution avoidance is also helpful and anyone near a shooting range can certainly appreciate the possibility of it being more common that weapons are quieter. This is just a few examples. There are many more. Bring on the downvotes. Furthermore since this is clearly an attempt to chase the political questions that have been pushed forth by recent events. Purchasing a suppressor currently requires a full background check, paying between 1000 and 2000 dollars, and waiting 9-13 months to posses along with vetting by the ATF and local police. The same goes for legal full auto except the weapons cost 20 thousand dollars or more. The recent attacks were carried out by a man who had both the time and money to procure these types of tools and didn't. Evidently legislation has been proven effective enough to keep evil people with the means from owning these things. Stop politicizing the acts of evil people to push an agenda.",
"\"Silencer\" is kind of a misnomer; it doesn't silence the gunshot, but instead takes it from 140 dB to maybe around 120 dB. That's still about as loud as a jet engine, but is comfortable with hearing protection. Realistically, suppressors are safety equipment, and were banned only so that Congress could look like they were actually doing something. Furthermore, the requirements to own a suppressor in the US are actually *more* stringent than in other countries (particularly Europe), where they are essentially unregulated.",
"Suppressors are legal in most of the world (including places WAY more strict on gun ownership), there's no good reason for a ban, the real world is not the movies. Rather than asking why they are needed, you should be asking why they are banned. As for why they are needed, gunshots are annoying, hearing is precious.",
"Presumably to not bust your hearing as bad. The real question is, what reason IS there to ban them? It's not like the movies where it makes a gun remotely close to quiet. It's still deafeningly loud and sounds like a gun. So, why SHOULD they be banned? A .22 caliber pistol will still be around 116 decibels with a silencer.",
"Why do people need car mufflers? A suppressor takes sound from levels that instantly damage hearing (140+ db) to merely very loud levels (120 db).",
"NEED? Mostly, we don't. But rights aren't (or at least shouldn't be) based on need. That being said, they are pretty great for hearing conservation, for the shooter and those around them. They can also help avoid alerting game.",
"Hearing protection and so the people who live near the range stop trying to get the range closed even though they knew it was there when they bought the place. In other countries it's considered rude not to use one. Also they don't make guns silent there is still a loud sound like dropping a thick text book on linoleum floor unless it's a 22 long rifle with subsonic rounds then it sounds like a pellet gun"
],
"score": [
16,
15,
15,
12,
6,
6,
3,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
7438c2 | Why do so many cultures have a thing about covering women's hair? | I'm not just talking about Muslims and hijab (although that's one example), but wimples in medieval England and tichels in some branches of Judaism. Is there a reason it's so common in so many diverse areas of the world? And why hair? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnv6jv3",
"dnv6i78",
"dnv9km5"
],
"text": [
"Well, you are talking about cultures that are all influenced by three religions that are very closely connected and originated from each other and in the same area. That is always going to cause a certain amount of overlap. Certain standards for female modesty originated in judaism which were then carried on into the development of christianity and islam. And which then in turn also influenced the cultures in areas where those religions had a major foothold.",
"The idea is that when God looks down on you, he does not see you: instead, he sees the head covering and moves along to punish other people. The notion of a purely spiritual God is a modern concept. If you look at ancient civilizations, they actually feared a physical God from above. For this reason, many of these civilizations built into cliffs or caves so as to hide from a very real and very vengeful God. This is the God(s) from the Old Testament and other ancient texts: a God that does not know his own creation, and seeks to punish humans for not providing salt water to drink with choice meats/cakes. What sky ship was God(s) traveling in? Sounds like Vimana as described. These previous fears resulted in modern church doctrines, just like not being able to provide these traveling God(s) with enough 'sacrifice' (i.e. food) resulted in the modern concept of sin. Religion is a response to a misunderstood civilization clash long since past; we are only now beginning to learn the implications.",
"Many cultures have a thing about covering women's bodies in general. The reason you are noticing hair is because it is a point of divergence. By contrast, virtually all cultures have a thing about covering women's breasts so it appears normal."
],
"score": [
9,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
743m95 | How did we become to trust banks with all our money? | I know if I were in the early years of banking I sure as hell wouldn't trust them with my life savings. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnv85ow",
"dnv8025",
"dnv83r0"
],
"text": [
"The original conception of a bank was simply a storehouse for wealth, initially represented by money. Rather than keep all your wealth on you (robbery) or at your home (theft, home invasion robbery), you pay for your wealth to be securely guarded by people who's jobs it is to protect that money. True banking came about when bankers started loaning that money out as loans with interest rates. This was seen as a good idea by depositors, as they would no longer have to pay a fee for their wealth to be guarded. Additionally, banks could now accept more deposits and accounts from more people since every deposit represents float they can use to issue loans (rather than a cost). Bank runs and closures were always an issue of course but far less prevalent than simple robbery.",
"Well you could watch some videos about that on YT. I reccomend extra-history: Money. So early in italy there was a lot of trade, and a lot of different currency. So the banks helped exchange money. You got some paper wich you could exchange at your lockal bank for gold. Eventually people never bothered to turn the papers instead just traded with the papermoney...",
"> I know if I were in the early years of banking I sure as hell wouldn't trust them with my life savings. You mean when most likely you would be a dirt poor peasant who didn't have *any* life savings? Early banking grew in a haphazard way but it was mostly used by wealthy merchants. The first real banks were in Italy and mostly acted as a neutral third party through which merchants could buy and sell goods without having to carry 100lb of gold across a country that was rife with bandits and armies. Instead the banks would issue promissory notes (the ancestor of our paper money) and would exchange these notes between each other so that trade could go on. From there is evolved into the modern system we have today."
],
"score": [
19,
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
744at2 | What does the phrase "no news is good news" mean? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnvdmyr",
"dnvdshf",
"dnvesv5",
"dnvhovl",
"dnvg4ba",
"dnved3a"
],
"text": [
"The second one. It's a shorthand for \"if something bad had happened, I would have heard about it by now, so things must be ok.\" It's a rule I live by at work. My boss and I work remotely and our jobs only really overlap when there are problems. If things are going smoothly, we'll often barely talk for a week or so. So no news is good news at work - if she's calling, something's usually gone wrong.",
"Example: I give blood. Once blood is donated, it gets sent off to testing. If the blood tests HIV+ or any other anomaly, the blood donation company will call you and tell you the bad news. If everything is fine, they won't call. In this case, no news is good news.",
"It's kind of like something you say to parents before you go out for the night. \"Don't be alarmed if I don't call. Be alarmed if I do call.\"",
"Every parent with kids in daycare can relate this sentence. If I were at work and got a call from daycare, it is usually like “your kid is sick, please come and pick him up”. It freaks me out when I see daycare calling or left a message.",
"If you haven't heard from grandma in the last month, you might get worried. Nobody has called to tell you she died yet, so it's safe to assume she's alive. Not having news indicates everything is probably ok.",
"There are three outcomes to any situation.. * Outcome #1: Things get worse. * Outcome #2: Things don't improve or degrade, they kind of stay the same. * Outcome #3: Things get better. People have a very significant tendency to complain more than they have a tendency to compliment. They yell when they didn't get what they want more than they share when they got what they wanted. \"Are my expectations met? Sure, I kinda guess. So I won't post a comment endorsing this good or service because that's too much work.\" versus \"Those utter BAStitches ripped me off and I'm gonna BURY them so deep they'll smell bedrock.\" And bitter people - the ones most likely to complain and create a ruckus - can be very loud when they want to. So, since most meaningful communication is negative, A LACK OF communication likely means neutral... or possibly even positive outcomes. So no communication - no news - has a tendency to indicate there's no reason to complain - which means good news to whoever would be targeted by the compliment or complaint."
],
"score": [
125,
36,
11,
9,
8,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
746zq3 | Why do we adapt old literature like Shakespeare to children? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnw0acl",
"dnvyyq3"
],
"text": [
"The themes aren't that complex, to be honest. Take *Romeo and Juliet*, for example. If by \"schoolkids\" you mean kids in their early to mid teens, which is when Shakespeare is usually introduced to them, the play is about two horny teenagers who hook up at a party and then make a series of stupid mistakes that ends in disaster. The play begins with Romeo madly in love with Rosaline, the only problem being that Rosaline isn't in love with him. He spends his nights wandering around outside, and then in the morning he comes home, locks himself in his room and refuses to see anyone. So his friends hatch a plan to smuggle him into a party where Rosaline will be. Unfortunately, the moment he claps eyes on Juliet he totally forgets Rosaline and starts flirting with her instead, a flirt that ends with a snog. Act 1 ends with Juliet discovering that the boy she's desperate to have sex with is the son of her father's worst enemy. People are often intimidated by the thought of Shakespeare, but once you get past the archaic language, the themes are very familiar. *Romeo and Juliet* is one of those photostories in a girls' magazine from the 1990s, with added murder.",
"Do we? I don't think kids usually see Shakespeare directly until 11-13ish which seems like a good time to start with adult themes given that they're about to become adults. The themes aren't out of date even if the language might be hard."
],
"score": [
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
747mn3 | Origin of "In Mother Russia..." jokes | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnw2iwz"
],
"text": [
"URL_1 . Yakov Smirnoff is a comedian born in Russia. He first told these jokes (\"In America, you can always find a party. In Communism Russia, the party can always find you\"). He drew a lot of humor from the differences between the two nations. EDIT: apparently this type predates Yakov. Even Bob Hope used this format, and one was used in a 1938 Cole Porter play. URL_0"
],
"score": [
121
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_reversal",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakov_Smirnoff"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
748284 | Why is archaeology considered a scientific discipline? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnw89zw"
],
"text": [
"A scientific discipline is generally anything that applies the scientific method, and archaeology does so: archaeologists make observations (including but not limited to excavations), they ask research questions, they formulate hypotheses and predictive models ('this is how we think people lived in the past'), and are able to test and refine those hypotheses through gathering more data. Following the scientific method makes it a scientific discipline. But as has been said in another post, archaeology is generally not considered part of the natural sciences although it does borrow many of their techniques (radiocarbon dating for example). It is generally considered part of the humanities."
],
"score": [
5
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74a22g | Why do books seem like a more legitimate form of learning than other media? | Is it inherent? Cultural and stigmatic? Is it as simple as: more words means more content? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnwnglg",
"dnxevhe",
"dnx7w3l"
],
"text": [
"For me, although I use mainly web based instructional videos, I feel like besides tradition it's a lot easier to just post on the internet instead of publishing a book. For someone looking to learn it's a whole lot easier to know you are getting real information through a textbook.",
"It's a bit of both. Tradition, but also a book is usually more efficient. You can read much much faster than you listen to someone talk. The index also makes books extremely easy to search (never mind ctrl+f search functions in electronic books). Video/audio search is really underdeveloped in comparison, although in principle there's nothing stopping them from making an index. Generally the closest i've seen is chapters/episodes.",
"Part is cultural. Part is barrier to entry. The great thing about the internet is that anyone can add to it. Part of what sucks about the internet is that anyone can add to it. Creating a podcast is easy, shooting a youtube video is relatively easy, making a webpage is fairly easy. Publishing a full length book is still probably the hardest. While self publishing has increased, the maajority of works you see out there still went through a professional publisher choosing a writer they thought reputable, going through an editing process, etc. More work is done upfront to make the work accurate because once published it is harder to change than a website for example. The existance of \"gate keepers\" in book industry is partbof what makes it more respected. That said, tradition and cultural significance come intonplay too."
],
"score": [
3,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74a6mn | How do people in India know which caste I am? | I'm an American of Indian ancestry and reading news about intercaste violence. If I visit India, how will I be viewed in the caste system? I don't even know which caste I am. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnwtphq",
"dnwz30r",
"dnwsr7k",
"dnx3ef6",
"dnws93v",
"dnwq2xg",
"dnwtkhu"
],
"text": [
"In modern times it can get blurred, people from different castes intra-marry, or even different states. Some clues exist, your last name can indicate what caste your family is from. Sometimes different castes use a different pronunciation or word, and that can give a hint. So can the style of traditional clothes worn can also give geographic or caste hints. Think of it this way, can you tell if someone is from rural Alabama? Probably, just as much as you can tell If someone is from the inner city or England. Different fashion, food preferences, and accent or words. Could someone pretend to be a different caste, sure but usually by adulthood, those difference are pretty engrained.",
"How you act has something to do with it.. in that a person living in India in a lower caste very much acts like they are from that caste. They don't walk around all high and mighty. I work (in Canada) with a guy who has been here 6 years, and came from a wealthy caste. He acts like he is above us all, especially the women (he's younger than me, and less skilled, but thinks he is superior). He walks around slow as molasses, and wants us to cater to him. Seriously he has been here 6 years and hasn't learned to drive because he was used to being chauffeured everywhere while living back home. He considers it beneath him to learn to drive. He works here and sends money back home. If he went back home even to a different part where nobody knows him - he would act superior so people would know he was from a higher caste.",
"As an Indian born in India and having lived 80% my life in Canada (later 80%). No one will care if you're travelling and living with your family. Avoid the conflict areas, and travel with someone and not alone, since you won't know the area either. If your gonna be travelling alone, no one will really give a shit about your cast if they know your an NRI, they will judge you as that and not by your cast. But avoid mentioning much about your person life. All that is just from my travel experience.",
"In my experience, being American is its own caste. But you will probably be viewed similarly to your family that are still in India if you are around them",
"By your name and region of family origin. And the fact that your family had the resources to move abroad.",
"Caste just means how much status your family traditionally has. The way people know what caste you are is simple: they recognize your family. It has no real meaning for foreigners, since they don't have Indian family lineages.",
"You will be fine. It's not like as if there are people running on streets killing people from different caste. Also it is very unlikely someone would ask you yours."
],
"score": [
30,
18,
13,
8,
6,
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74bdhb | Why would one want to sign a long term contract on an apartment rather than continually renew a short term contract? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnwy1rp",
"dnwy7yf"
],
"text": [
"Because then after the end of the 3 month contract your landlord can say \"nah\" for whatever reason they feel like and you'll be stuck finding a place to live on short notice. If you're on say, a year long contract then you don't need to worry about that possibility nearly as often. Also, generally year-long leases are cheaper than the places that do month to month or other short-term leases.",
"A few reasons I can think of 1) Ensuring you have a place to live for a year instead of just 3 months 2) Ensuring that you pay a consistent amount over a year. If renewing every 3 months, your landlord can increase the price each time 3) It is usually cheaper to rent for a year, and can still make the landlord more money as he wouldnt have downtime between 3 month rental agreements."
],
"score": [
6,
6
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74ccu7 | How did dolls that were modeled after bears - animals that are scary face to face - become so popular, turning into what are now known as 'teddy bears'? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnx6f9q"
],
"text": [
"The name teddy bear comes from former United States President Theodore Roosevelt, who was commonly known as \"Teddy\" (though he loathed being referred to as such). The name originated from an incident on a bear hunting trip in Mississippi in November 1902, to which Roosevelt was invited by Mississippi Governor Andrew H. Longino. There were several other hunters competing, and most of them had already killed an animal. A suite of Roosevelt's attendants, led by Holt Collier, cornered, clubbed, and tied an American black bear to a willow tree after a long exhausting chase with hounds. They called Roosevelt to the site and suggested that he should shoot it. He refused to shoot the bear himself, deeming this unsportsmanlike, but instructed that the bear be killed to put it out of its misery, and it became the topic of a political cartoon by Clifford Berryman in The Washington Post on November 16, 1902. While the initial cartoon of an adult black bear lassoed by a handler and a disgusted Roosevelt had symbolic overtones, later issues of that and other Berryman cartoons made the bear smaller and cuter. Morris Michtom saw the drawing of Roosevelt and was inspired to create a teddy bear. He created a tiny soft bear cub and put it in the shop window with a sign \"Teddy's bear,\" after sending a bear to Roosevelt and receiving permission to use his name. The toys were an immediate success and Michtom founded the Ideal Novelty and Toy Co. At the same time in Germany, the Steiff firm, unaware of Michtom's bear, produced a stuffed bear from Richard Steiff's designs. Steiff exhibited the toy at the Leipzig Toy Fair in March 1903, where it was seen by Hermann Berg, a buyer for George Borgfeldt & Company in New York (and the brother of composer Alban Berg). He ordered 3000 to be sent to the United States. Although Steiff's records show that the bears were produced, they are not recorded as arriving in the U.S., and no example of the type, \"55 PB\", has ever been seen, leading to the story that the bears were shipwrecked. However, the story is disputed - Gunther Pfieffer notes that it was only recorded in 1953 and says it is more likely that the 55 PB was not sufficiently durable to survive until the present day. Although Steiff and Michtom were both making teddy bears at around the same time, neither would have known of the other's creation due to poor transatlantic communication. Source: This was easily found on Wikipedia at URL_0"
],
"score": [
9
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teddy_bear"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74f900 | How is a countries border defined? Where is the official definition of a countires border? | What about borders that were defined by landmarks like rivers that change over time? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnxrzoy"
],
"text": [
"Borders typically arose naturally as A) significant geographical features (mountain ranges, rivers, etc.); and B) the furthest extent a central authority could defend. Border disputes were resolved, historically by A) fighting over it and winning; or B) verbally agreeing to it. In the modern day, borders are typically established by a treaty that explicitly says what defines the border usually a geographical feature or some degree of latitude or longitude."
],
"score": [
6
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74gcir | Did the holocaust have any lasting effects in the make-up of non Jewish people in Germany and elsewhere? | Specifically, in Germany have more blonde, blue eyed people than it would have otherwise? Obviously it had rippling effects in Jewish and Roma populations, but curious if it influenced human physical traits in the long run. Btw, I hate Nazis and highly condemn all that they have done. I think diversity is very important to a healthy and lasting society. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dny5gi3"
],
"text": [
"Before we say anything else here, it's important to note that there are many Jewish people who are blonde with blue eyes, and many Germans who do *not*! *That* said, here's the thing. *Tens of millions* of people died during WWII - 3% of the total population of the entire world, at the time. The holocaust is a part of that, but Germany was devastated by that war, and limiting the rippling effect to just the holocaust itself is probably not very feasible."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74hhxf | Why do so many Armenian surnames end with "-yan"? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnyakit"
],
"text": [
"It's their version of -son that we commonly see with European names. Anderson = son of Anders, Stevenson = son of Steven Petrosian = son of Petros"
],
"score": [
10
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74i6jq | How do scholars know what an artist was "feeling" or thinking while painting, how can they really confirm the artists intentions behind a piece of art? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnym6ci",
"dnygcz9",
"dnyn8lk"
],
"text": [
"They can't, which is why literary scholars around the 1940s, in the era called \"new criticism,\" thought authorial intent was irrelevant. Now, literary theory has changed a lot since then and many might say that the new critics went too far, but you still aren't going to find \"what was the author thinking?\" to be a primary question in academic circles very often. I mean, even if you have an interview with the author where he says \"This book is about true love.\" the author might become cynical when they are older and say \"Actually, I had no idea what true love was when I wrote that. It's about infatuation and lust, not true love.\" Who is right? The author when they wrote it or the author with perspective looking back on their life? Furthermore, we are all motivated by things that we are unaware of. The cultural moment we live in influences us in ways that we usually aren't going to be able to see while we are living in that cultural moment. Noir writer Raymond Chandler very well might have not thought his writing expressed sexist beliefs about women but you don't have to be a PhD in literature to see how negative women are often portrayed in his books. (confession: I like his writing despite his antiquated views on gender) So, the reader might be able to catch something that the author never consciously intended but is still very much there in their art.",
"Short answer is they don't/can't. Sometimes there is a narrative told by the artist directly, but this is rare. I don't have a link, but there is an Adam ruins everything episode related to this, i will edit later if i can find the you tube link.",
"Scholars often comb through the historical record looking for anything - *literally* anything - they can find that might give a tiny bit of insight into this, whether the insight is meaningful or not. A good example (not painting related) is the amount of scholarship on the music and performance style of JS Bach that is based entirely on his local church's records of payments made to musicians each week. This seems like a random piece of information but it enables us to know how many actual human beings Bach had to work with, the constraints he had to manage, and his *likely* thought processes in writing his music. This actually led to a revolution over the past ~20 years in how his music is performed."
],
"score": [
13,
7,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74lsfc | Why do some places consider people over 55 as seniors while in general 65 is thought of retirement age or seniorhood? | If 55 is a commonly accepted age to be senior, then most politicians I know and professors I had would all be senior citizens | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnzbusy"
],
"text": [
"Those \"places\" are typically businesses that are offering something to appeal to older consumers. They decided to expand the category to attract more consumers."
],
"score": [
14
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74lwzh | Why is it called “Octo”ber, a prefix usually reserved for words that stand for a unit of eight, when it is the tenth month of the year? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnzconj",
"dnzd0v0"
],
"text": [
"Because waaaaay back in Roman times, the calendar only had 10 months, starting in March. January and February didn't exist, and were only added later, \"pushing\" September, October, November and December back. Also, January wasn't always the first month of the year - in many places March was the first month. There's also a misconception that July and August were added by Julis Ceaser, but that's not true - they were simply renamed from Quintilis and Sextilis (which followed the same naming scheme as all the last months).",
"Originally, the Roman calendar was a lunar calendar that tracked the moon for all seasons but winter (calendars were primarily invented for farmers). So you had March through December (note that the months September through December are ALL named after Roman numbers), and then winter came until the first full moon after the equinox. The months January and February were allegedly added by King Numa Pompiius, second king of Rome. But at this time, they were still at the end of the calendar. This old calendar had accuracy issues as you can imagine due to its lunar basis, not to mention politicians that delayed months through decree to manipulate elections. Julius Caesar saw this and one of his earliest acts when he became dictator was to create the Julian calendar. He switched the start of the year to January to better match the solar-based Egyptian calendar (they were major trade partners, and Egypt started their new year on the solstice), and renamed a couple months (Quintilis became July named after Caesar himself, and Sextilis became August named after his adopted son Augustus)."
],
"score": [
20,
7
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74m0e3 | Why did avocados become so popular all of a sudden? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnzdjdm",
"dnzjkbl",
"dnzeggg",
"dnzdrfl",
"dnzs6d8",
"dnzdd9j",
"dnzlrjr",
"dnzv08s",
"do02fr0"
],
"text": [
"Maybe my perception is skewed by living in California where they've been commonly available for a long time, but it looks like production has \"only\" tripled in the past 15 years, which isn't a big increase year on year, more of a slow burn. No doubt the growers are more powerful now, so you're seeing more marketing and they're probably expanding into new markets with improved shipping. Avocados don't keep very well.",
"The push for “healthy fat” which usually only includes avocados. Some people dont trust or like salmon and olive oil isn’t a food so much as something you out on food.",
"The spread of TexMex that uses it has made it more popular, and some places can't deal with the demand. Out of season, NZ didn't have enough supplies and people began stealing them from farms and created an [avocado black market]( URL_0 ) to deal with the demand and make a quick buck, which only raised the prices higher in store.",
"What region of the world are you in? Avocados have been popular in Southern California and other southwestern US locations for DECADES! On the other hand, be patient and read this: however old you are now, this is the first time you've been that old, and the first time you heard of avocados was, for you, the first time that they had existed.... expand this a bit and you'll see that something that is new to you might not be new at all, just new to your life. The popularity of different foods varies, so while avocados may have stayed at a high level of popularity in Los Angeles, if you're in Fargo you might just have experienced the introduction of this old old food to a location that never had them before... so suddenly, to you, they are newly popular throughout Fargo... which, if you live there, is the entire world!",
"Mostly an increase in the acceptability of paleo- and keto-based diets, which are high in fat, coupled with the \"real food\" movement.",
"I don't have sources but I imagine its very similar to corn. Market surplus at some point led to a increase of artificial demand through subsidised production. The subsidised production was heavily marketed, creating a increase in demand.",
"They may have been popular in ca for awhile but not in the other coast, they just blew up here and my suspicion is following every fast food joint marketing new avacado stuff and all these health blogs pushing them. Even in fl where i see trees of them dropping them on the ground all the time the only actually became popular (i. E every eatery around advertising them hugely and store fronts carrying special abs avacado supplies and larger bins) and we have always sold them.",
"They taste good, they provide good/healthy fats, tremendous growth in popularity of cuisines they are used in -- especially Mexican, but also sushi. Mexican is consumed way more frequently than a decade or two ago, both because of Americans eating way more tacos and burritos and guacamole, but also the rising Latino population in the U.S. who have always consumed.",
"UK reporting in, despite all the \"I'm from California and avocado has always been popular\", It has absolutely taken off here in the last few years when it wasn't present before, similar to halloumi. Since it's mostly instagram girls and southerners that go all in on it, I'd say it's definitely a trend that'll reduce over time"
],
"score": [
65,
51,
18,
15,
11,
10,
8,
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[
"http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/335967/avocado-thieves-selling-stolen-fruit-on-black-market"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74nl91 | How do religious people reconcile "its a miracle, God saved me" with "God didn't bother saving all those other innocent people" ? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnznty6",
"dnznzdd",
"dnzoga7"
],
"text": [
"Virtually every single person who says something like that is convinced that God has a special plan especially for his special people, who are special. In all of space and time, (being an omnimax deity) God *chose* them to survive a horrible disaster that killed everyone else, thereby proving their point. Of course, all of this presumes the existence of God, and that there is a plan, and the whole thing is not a collection of survivorship bias and narcissistic tendencies.",
"Besides often not thinking about it, people are inherently selfish, there are a few reasons. At the core it's the idea that there is no such thing as innocence. All humans are sinful and worthy of punishment. For those that haven't accepted Jesus there is no explanation necessary. Also the idea of death being a punishment isn't entirely correct. If you die and go to heaven to meet God, isn't that a good thing? If God decides it is their time to die it can only be viewed as a good thing. And no, that doesn't justify murder or suicide because that's playing God, only He can decide when it's the right time. Those are the most logically sound reasons I can think of. There are plenty of others but these are the ones that are at least rational if you accept the teachings of Christianity.",
"I am a religious person and I still have a hard time figuring this one out. I think it comes down to what someone else hinted at...selfishness."
],
"score": [
10,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74nyeb | What is the purpose and rules of Mosh Pits and a Wall of Death? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"dnzw4nc",
"dnzr6e7",
"dnzuz9g",
"do01jng"
],
"text": [
"The mosh pit is based on the idea that if you are listening to high-energy, aggressive music it makes no sense to be sitting or just standing around. It's a time and place where you and your peers can let yourselves go and move to the music. Clapping, singing along, and head-banging are fine but if the band is feeding off the energy of the crowd then seeing full-body, chaotic reactions is what you want. It's the opposite of disinterest and the highest practical expression of excitement for the performance. The music makes you lose control. Wall of death is similar but instead of a semi-natural circle with people bouncing back and forth you get two sides to run into each other like you see in various medieval battle-scenes. In my experience it is never spontaneous but something the band sets up at the start of a song with everyone running to the other side when the music begins. Technically there are no rules but standard practice is you help people up if they get knocked down, everyone stops and helps search if something valuable gets dropped, and you try not to bounce too hard into people who aren't moshing. Elbows and punches and forearms and kicks are discouraged but you can still see swings and it's not a big deal as long as no one is being hit. And it's not considered a bad thing to not join the mosh pit as it's not for everyone. Is also not expected that people mosh from the start to the finish of a song let alone a show. There are certain points of songs (which can be anywhere, start, finish, middle, solo, chorus, etc) that call for the burst of energy.",
"Mosh pit: To have fun. Rules: You help people up who are on the floor or else you're a scumbag. Wall of death: Adrenaline rush, and to have \"experienced\" it. Rules: Better not be in the middle / front row if you're tiny and don't want to end up in hospital.",
"Been in many mosh pits: Do your own thing. Essentially you're dancing. Bumping people is fine and you basically ignore it. You may seek out contact, but don't just bullrush people. It's not a fight, it's not a riot. If you fall down, reach up and someone will pick you up. You'll then do the \"thanks dude\" half-hug with pats on the back. West Coast style pits turn in a circle, so there's more movement going on but the rules are the same. Always help people up when they fall down. I've fallen a bunch of times and in a good pit you don't even really feel the floor. In a bad pit, you take a couple kicks before someone helps you. The more mainstream a band got, the worse their pits became (just my experience at least).",
"Purpose: catharsis, expending energy, letting the music take control. You're at a metal show in GA with the other freaks, go nuts because there is no judgement here. I go to metal shows to scream my head off and act like an animal. It really feels great. Rules: have fun, help people up when they get knocked to the ground, if you see a fist pit and don't want your teeth knocked out, stay away from it. If you're on the edge of a pit but aren't participating, keep your hands up to protect yourself and never turn your back on a nearby pit (I got a nice kidney shot once for not paying attention). If you've never been in a mosh pit but want to see what it's all about, hang out at the edge and watch how people behave and treat each other. It's rough and sweaty, but people aren't trying to hurt each other. Go with the flow, push people, jump around, scream, and protect yourself. If you go down in a pit, people will usually stop and help you up, you should do the same."
],
"score": [
17,
9,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74pw59 | Why didn't the European settlers enslave Native Americans instead of importing African slaves? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do07cfs",
"do07w8r",
"do0b8jp",
"do07h9l"
],
"text": [
"Mostly because there weren't that many of them, something of the estimate of 250,000 natives in all of North America in 1650. But also they didn't want to start a war, if you bring in 1000 African slaves they have no allies on the continent, but if you enslave 1000 natives, they have allies. The Spanish and Portuguese had tons of native slaves, btw, because the native populations in central and south America supported it. But they had to have huge militaries to keep society in line.",
"From my understanding, at first they did. But they were able to escape easily as they knew the land well and knew the native language(s) to easily get away. Making it rather unprofitable. On the other hand black slaves were completely new to the area and couldn't communicate well with people that could help free them.",
"I believe that they originally attempted to enslave Native Americans to work on plantations, but they died en mass because of disease and other reasons. Because of this they began to import African slaves, apologies if I'm incorrect.",
"Holy Baader-Meinhof Batman. We've started discussing this in my American history class and haven't really dug into the details, so I may be missing some things but here it goes. The need for labour in the colonies was originally filled with indentured servants and headwright systems, which brought manual labour and population numbers to the fledgling colonies. By the time that labour demands were getting big enough to warrant slavery and the problems with indentured servants became apparent, the Natives had been more or less pushed out by increasing amounts of settlers and were too few in number to meet demands. The Spanish did practice native slavery but the English really didn't. We're mostly talking about English colonies so I don't have a lot of info on the Spanish/Portuguese part if things From what I understand it was traders and settlers from Barbados colonies that brought the first slaves to the US colonies when they started settling places like the Carolinas, and it was through them that the slave trade in the colonies began. Since they traded in African slaves, that's what became dominant in the colonies"
],
"score": [
18,
11,
7,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74qlbe | Why are burgers with out cheese called hamburgers when the have no ham in them? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do0cvs9",
"do0d3nn"
],
"text": [
"Hamburgers are named after the town of [Hamburg]( URL_0 ) in Germany. They have nothing to do with ham, the meat.",
"Gotta confirm the [source]( URL_0 ) but: \"The “burger” is an American short, a nickname, for the “hamburger”. Our hamburger started off as Hamburg steak in the late 19thC, courtesy of German immigrants bringing and incorporating their dietary preference from the city of Hamburg, where pounded beef had become a popular entree.\""
],
"score": [
18,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamburg"
],
[
"https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-burgers-and-hamburger"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74rro1 | Why is putting a worm in alcohol a thing? | This seems very unsanitary (alcohol may kill the bacteria ) and unsavory. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do0ms7v",
"do0mnf7"
],
"text": [
"Worms are only put into mezcal (a drink similar to tequila). Some makers claim it helps the flavor, but the effect is small if any. The worm (actually an insect larva that grows in the plant the booze in made from) is edible, and is seen by some as a macho symbol, by others as a sign of authenticity. Insect larvae are a legitimate food in some native Mexican cultures.",
"Marketing. The worm in tequila is a moth larvae that feeds on the plant they make tequila out of. It doesn't do anything to you."
],
"score": [
7,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74wni8 | Why do Brits fly the Union Jack, rather than their own flag? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do1nroa",
"do1n4rg",
"do1s2dt",
"do1skf2",
"do1pg41",
"do1vwsl"
],
"text": [
"I think it's pretty common to fly their own national flags in Scotland and Wales. But in England, many people don't really make much of a distinction between the British and English flags. It's fairly common to use the union jack to represent England. It was even used to represent the English football team before 1996. I guess there's also the fact that the English are the majority. Flying the English flag can be seen as needlessly excluding the rest of the UK. Of course the Scottish and Welsh flags are also exclusive, but the fact they are minorities within the UK it makes it a bit different. I haven't mentioned Northern Ireland because I know flags are a thorny issue there. They don't actually have an official flag of their own.",
"It depends what we’re celebrating. Around World Cup time you can see thousands of England flags (Red Cross on a white field) all over the place. I suspect the same would be the same if the other countries teams ever made it through the qualifiers!! (It’s just a joke!!) A lot of the time though, our celebrations are national (e.g. Queens birthday, VE Day, whatever) and so the UJ applies. The same for military displays etc. The military is made up of people and units from everywhere and so the union flag is used.",
"The Union Jack *is* the flag of the Brits. If you're asking why the *English* don't fly the *English* flag... some do. In fact, many, probably. Unfortunately, a lot of groups with rather controversial views such as the English Defence League have used the flag prominently, as well as football hooligans. This has led to many people associating the flag with violence and racism: one survey in 2012 found that a quarter of English people felt the English flag had racist connotations; only 10% felt the same about the Union Jack. For that reason many English people avoid flying the English flag, as they don't want to be associated with racism or violence. A couple of years ago Labour MP Emily Thornberry tweeted a photo of a house in Rochester that had English flags draped over the walls. Although she didn't comment explicitly in the tweet, a lot of people felt she was trying to imply that the occupant was a racist, and as a result she was forced to resign from her post (she was at the time Shadow Attorney General).",
"Unfortunately, both the union flag and St. George’s Cross has been co-opted by the far right. There are also connotations of an association with past imperialism with the union and George’s flags. I’m from wales and the red dragon is everywhere and to a lesser extent the union flag. I’ve lived in England and I rarely saw the St. George’s Cross, as others have pointed out many in England see the union flag as interchangeable with the cross. this I think is also the thinking in the Celtic nations with many people associating the union flag with England. I have family in Yorkshire and I’ve seen the white rose flag a lot there. Again I guess it doesn’t have the same extremist or imperialist connotations. The white rose is fairly romantic with its link to a tragic war and ultimately failed cause and most importantly from a series of events that was so long ago that it doesn’t cause any anger with people - I think that kind of notion of supporting the underdogs gets a lot of traction with British people. The same can be said of the Celtic flags in comparison to the English flag.",
"Because as a country we are a \"United Kingdom\" made up of smaller countries (Or Kingdoms). These smaller countries come under the umbrella of the United Kingdom because the united aspect of these seperate smaller countries is what makes the UK the UK. To put another spin on it, most US states have their own flag. Just as it would be unnatural for someone from Texas to fly the Texas state flag internationally rather than the US flag, the same sort of thing applies in the UK. That being said there are exceptions. Some sporting events allow Wales and Scotland to compete on a national level because they are still recognised countries. Like the World Cup.",
"Personally, I don't like the St. George's Cross as I see myself as a citizen of the U.K. first and a citizen of England second, and I think it needlessly excludes other parts of the U.K."
],
"score": [
56,
23,
21,
13,
8,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74xg41 | Why are manual cars the standard in Europe whereas automatic transmissions are the standard in the U.S.? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do1smks"
],
"text": [
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: How come most of the cars in the USA are automatics while most in Europe are manuals? ]( URL_4 ) 1. [Reddit - explainlikeimfive - ELI5]( URL_5 ) 1. [ELI5: Why is it uncommon for Americans to drive with manual gearbox and very common for Europeans? ]( URL_1 ) 1. [Why is it common for Americans to drive automatic cars rather than manual? ]( URL_7 ) 1. [ELI5: why are cars with manual transmissions so predominant in Europe but increasingly difficult to find in the US? ]( URL_0 ) 1. [Why are most car transmissions manual in Europe, and Automatic in the US? ]( URL_2 ) 1. [ELI5 - Why does most of America hate manual transmission? ]( URL_6 ) 1. [ELI5: Why do European countries have many more manual cars than the US? ]( URL_3 )"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3px6y6/eli5_why_are_cars_with_manual_transmissions_so/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2bmxnv/eli5_why_is_it_uncommon_for_americans_to_drive/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/NoStupidQuestions/comments/3mxk2k/why_are_most_car_transmissions_manual_in_europe/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6j7jb5/eli5_why_do_european_countries_have_many_more/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/38rvha/eli5_how_come_most_of_the_cars_in_the_usa_are/",
"https://amp.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4q5cr9/eli5_outside_the_us_why_is_driving_stick_still_so/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/cars/comments/43no17/eli5_why_does_most_of_america_hate_manual/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/1owtxi/why_is_it_common_for_americans_to_drive_automatic/"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74xmr4 | for nurses - why do male nurses ask female patients if they're OK with the caregiver assignment, while it doesn't happen the other way around? | I'm a woman. Once in a while I've been assigned a nurse who is not a woman. Fine by me, as long as your license is in good standing that's all I care about. But nearly every time the nurse who is not a woman will ask if I'm OK with him taking care of me. o.O I've never known a nurse who is a woman ask the same thing (in reverse, of course) of a male patient. Why does this happen? Are there really so many women who either claim sexual advances or are squicked by a man taking care of them *(even though he's got the same license as the woman they'd prefer to have)*? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do1w9hg",
"do1ve4s",
"do29vxq",
"do1umm3"
],
"text": [
"This is something that, in my experience, a lot of women don't really seem to understand about what it is like to be a man in western society. For better or for worse (I'm not in any way suggesting that men have it worse than women overall), men are kind of perceived as guilty until proven innocent in these kinds of situations. It's just seen as more justifiable for a woman to say that she's uncomfortable with a male nurse than for a man to be uncomfortable with a female nurse. This is similar to why a lot of men would be uncomfortable around children--like at a park or something --because a lone guy hanging around would be perceived as creepy in a way that a woman would not be. Whether this is a question of socially constructed gender roles thrust upon people by society, or if it's just a natural and unavoidable byproduct of more innate sexual dynamics between men and women, at the end of the day that's just how these things seem to work.",
"> Are there really so many women who either claim sexual advances or are squicked by a man taking care of them? Yes. It is a product of a society that casts men as the sexual pursuers and women as the sexual gatekeepers. For right or wrong, if a woman sees a man's private parts, she is the victim. If a man sees a woman's private parts, she is also the victim. And part of it is simply the fact we are more accustomed to female nurses and see it as ordinary for them to give a male patient a sponge bath. We have not reached the same level of comfort with male nurses.",
"I've been nursing for 6 years now and have never asked nor seen a male nurse ask if the patient is okay with having a male nurse. Now if I have to perform a sensitive task (such as inserting a foley catheter or even doing perineal care), I will ask the patient if she would prefer a female nurse. Most of the time, they don't care, but occasionally, due to modesty or culture, they do prefer to have females perform the task. And if I do have to place a foley, we have \"buddy system\" where another nurse accompanies the procedure to make sure it was performed in a sterile manner and to prevent any claims of inappropriate behavior. I have only been fired by a patient (where they refuse you as their nurse) once or twice for being a male nurse, and they are usually Middle Eastern women who are not allowed to have contact with a man who is not her husband. We accommodate those wishes as best we can and if a switch is possible, we assign her female nurses throughout her stay.",
"It's probably due to the fact that it's more common for a female patient to sue a male nurse for sexual harassment and what not, than for a male patient to sue a female nurse for sexual harassment and what not. Note that I said \"more common\" as in there are more cases reported publicly. It does not in any way imply that a male patient cannot get sexual harassed by a female nurse and what not. Also note that I said \"sexual harassment and what not\" because sometimes people are simply not comfortable with having someone of the opposite gender giving them intimate care, so they request for a change in caregiver assignment. Coupled with the statistic that it is more common for a male to sexualy harass a female, than the other way around, a male nurse probably feels more inclined to make sure that the patient is comfortable with him as a caregiver, or the hospital requires the male nurse to make sure that the patient is comfortable. Does this answer the question?"
],
"score": [
31,
12,
5,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
74yav2 | How are US military units numbered? If there's a 501st battalion, are there 500 others active at the same time? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do1zrdf",
"do20bqu"
],
"text": [
"The military gets bigger and smaller over time. A lot of units are disbanded based on requirements or the most decorated and acomplised ones are kept when others are cut but they keep their names. Same reason for MI5 and MI6, as far as I recall there were something like 14-17 (british) MI (military intelligence) units at the height of ww2 some were merged and others disbanded.",
"It means there were likely 500 other batallions *at some time* During WWI and WWII lots of divisions and battalions were created. During WWII the US had 90 divisions, but infantry division designations went up to 106 and armored divisions went up to 20 which is well over 90, so why? Because there were a few dozen \"phantom\" divisions, divisions that existed only on paper and were \"deployed\" to locations to free up real divisions that were about to go on the offensive without the enemy intelligence knowing that an area was now undermanned. Today the US still has some extremely high numbered divisions like the 101st Infantry Division, also known as the 101st Airborne Division. Today the US only has 17 infantry divisions yet the 101st Airborne division retains its high number in recognition of the unit's service during WWII. Letting a unit live on under the same number, or spawning a new one under an old number is sort of like retiring a jersey number, its about respect despite screwing up the count"
],
"score": [
10,
8
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74yp55 | La Croix flavored carbonated water, why did it specifically become the sudden trend? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do27gkj",
"do2an1q"
],
"text": [
"Great question.... been wondering this myself. I remember I used to drink this stuff when I was 8 years old. I think it's more than just la croix, its the overall boom in flavored seltzer water. There's definitely been a surge. More products. Soda stream. People are trying to be healthier, cut out soda. La croix has great packaging. It looks fancy. Colorful.",
"Seltzer water drinker here. I love carbonated drinks. However pop was bad for my health. I get my carbonation minus the dental cavities, sugar, etc."
],
"score": [
13,
9
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74ywmd | Why do sailors and pilots call their plane/boat/ vehicle a she all throughout human history? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do25057",
"do2i4jd",
"do2768k"
],
"text": [
"You get attached to something that you spend most of your time in and put so much effort into (and in this case literally depend on for your life and safety in bad weather). She (or he in some languages, such as Russian) is the language pronoun that usually indicates the attachment personification.",
"I think it's dependent on language, to start with. People who speak German, for example, have genders for every inanimate object, such as yes, boats, and other vehicles. Everything from das Auto (the car) to das Flugzeug (the airplane) which are not great examples because they're both neutral gendered (which is the third gender), but also Der Tisch (the table), or die Geschichte (the story) and you may notice that whether der die or das is used, they all mean \"the\" but are used for different genders. The interesting thing is that people who speak languages like this actually do think of these objects as this gender, so as I understand it, someone who speaks Italian will often consider the sea to be \"male\", and this also explains the difference between fatherland and motherland depending on the context of the speaker and their first language. Regardless, English used to have these, although I'm not 100% how far back it was, I'm guessing back in year 1000 when we spoke Anglo-Saxxon we probably had grammatical genders. Anyway, I suspect the concept of applying genders probably just stems from that, and since people saw other people do it, they just did it themselves, outliving the concept of grammatical genders. Alternatively, and I only include this conjecture due to the lack of answers, generally, men tend to do this more than women, at least anecdotally, so it's also plausible that lonely men who didn't have spouses, or who lacked something in their relationship applied that concept to an object to get or project something they were lacking in terms of emotional payout, but I don't have a background in psychology so that's less than an educated guess, as I'm not sure about the existence of this phenomenon in languages without a history of grammatical gender.",
"You often personify an object you work with a lot, and part of that is assigning it a gender. Different countries and languages have had different conventions. She is more common because most sailors were men, and referring to the ship as a she makes the mundane work you do to it take on an ironic romantic connotation."
],
"score": [
5,
4,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
74zaiz | Since inflation is necessary for a stable healthy economy, does that mean that all currencies will eventually devalue to the point where something like a Big Mac will cost millions of dollars? Are there safeguards or "resets" for the value of currencies to prevent that from happening? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do2dore",
"do28g3z",
"do28g7c",
"do285q0"
],
"text": [
"> Are there safeguards or \"resets\" for the value of currencies to prevent that from happening? The process is called redenomination. For example, in 2005, the Turkish lira was replaced with the new lira with an exchange rate of 1,000,000 to 1. It is less of a safeguard, and more of a \"we're sick of all of these zeros\".",
"Currency values can be reset at any time. All the government has to do is print new money and say \"100 old Dollars is equal to one new Dollar.\"",
"Inflation means that prices rise, but the amount of money circulating also rises. It doesn't matter that a Big Mac costs a million dollars, you'll be making thousands of millions a year Look at the Vietnamese Dong(get the giggles out now). $1 USD is equivalent to 22,750 Vietnamese Dongs today, that means something like a nice dinner would cost you close to a million dong! That's crazy right? Except the average monthly income in Vietnam is around 3.5 million dong(~$145/mo) so it balances out. You just don't do single dong transactions, the smallest bill is 100 dong",
"Why is inflation necessary for a stable healthy economy?"
],
"score": [
9,
8,
6,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
751ems | Why do we have this strong urge to have sex? And why is it frowned upon in so many cultures if its natural? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do2v2z8"
],
"text": [
"I think the frowning comes from at least two different reasons. First casual sex(M/F) has for most of humanity time on earth involved risks mainly for the woman involved; getting pregnant. Second religious ideas about sex being sinful is dominant in so many religions the most used saying being \"its not for enjoyment, but only to make little ones\" I bet the strong urge to have sex is instinct to make little ones"
],
"score": [
6
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
7523qb | ; How do ancient civilizations get covered by dirt, sand, etc? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do2zddj",
"do2v7jy"
],
"text": [
"If you have an ancient structure, there are three possibilities: * wind and water take dirt away from it * wind and water bring dirt to it * the amount of dirt that comes and goes is roughly equal In the first an third cases, the structure remains exposed, suffers from erosion, scavaging, or just get knocked down to build something else. In the second case, it is buried and preserved for archaeologists to find later. This can give a false impression all ancient structures get buried when in reality only a small portion do.",
"I guess you're asking how does it happen that a lot of ancient bindings if even entire cities are found underground as archeology discoveries. I'm not an expert, but here's my understanding There are actually a number of reasons for that: - erupting volcanoes can cover buildings with ash, lava and dirt; - tectonic activity can lead to the ground level changes and an abandoned city can become covered with dust and sand over time; - some settlements might even go underwater, get covered with mud and then when a sea level changes back they'll erupt completely covered with it. - structures that were built on a \"softer\" ground can just slowly sink underground under their own weight. Or a flood can turn a good-for-buildings area into a bog-like zone."
],
"score": [
9,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
754lj3 | In America, why are some counties in the midwest squares? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do3iwql",
"do3fu5j",
"do3e50y",
"do3dvsm",
"do3dulb"
],
"text": [
"If you see a straight line on a map, the person that drew the line didn't live there. The northeast was settled before states existed, so the town, county, and state lines all follow how the population lives because they were asked how they want their borders, often following geographical features that separate communities. The straight lines in the northeast are mostly because there was some dispute, and the politicians, who didn't live on the border, drew new lines. In the midwest, the lines were mostly drawn before people moved in, so the people doing the line drawing just drew grids.",
"It is an outgrowth of the surveying system used. [The Public Land Survey System (PLSS) is the surveying method developed and used in the United States to plat, or divide, real property for sale and settling. Also known as the Rectangular Survey System, it was created by the Land Ordinance of 1785 to survey land ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Paris in 1783, following the end of the American Revolution. Beginning with the Seven Ranges, in present-day Ohio, the PLSS has been used as the primary survey method in the United States. Following the passage of the Northwest Ordinance, in 1787, the Surveyor General of the Northwest Territory platted lands in the Northwest Territory. The Surveyor General was later merged with the General Land Office, which later became a part of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Today, the BLM controls the survey, sale, and settling of the new lands, and manages the State Plane Coordinate System.]( URL_0 ) Lands were surveyed with base lines, East West lines, and Meridians, North South lines. You can still find roads called base line roads, meridian, and terminator.",
"Usually, there has been an informal minimum population required before territory will be considered for statehood, so states in sparsely populated areas had to be bigger. It is hard to keep a 500-mile border simple if you are using rivers and mountain ranges as borders. Also, states in the east had over 100 years of colonial history to grow into their present borders organically and had a sense of colonial identity. In the western states, much of it was wilderness, and what was settled was recently wilderness., and much of the population was older than the territory. A homesteader doesn't really care if their land winds up in Montana or Wyoming, so no one is going to fuss much if you do the easy thing and just draw a straight line",
"Because they were arbitrarily drawn on a map for administration purposes. Squares are easy to deal with, straight borders, easily calculable area, etc. Thats about it.",
"lacking any natural bounderies like lakes, rivers, mountains, ect. and lacking notable demographic trends that might lead to funky gerrymandering, squares are about as logical a choice as any for dividing localities."
],
"score": [
10,
5,
4,
3,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Land_Survey_System"
],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
757b0v | Why is the name Job from the Bible pronounced differently than the word job that's defined as an occupation? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do43kqc",
"do41p6b",
"do41gkz",
"do42br5"
],
"text": [
"The English language has many homographs: words that are spelled the same but pronounced differently. Think of the bow of a ship and a bow made of ribbon; or an invalid in a wheelchair as opposed to an invalid input. Essentially, this is because English spelling rules are a mess. We haven't had a proper spelling reform since the introduction of printing, but the way we speak has continued to change through the centuries. As a result, our written language is seriously out of step with our spoken language. The word \"job\" appears to come from the 15th-century \"gobbe\", meaning \"lump\" or \"piece\": it was in the phrase \"gobbe of worke\". Over time, the \"of work\" was dropped because it became redundant, the \"g\" was softened to a \"j\" sound and the meaning was expanded from the original sense of \"a task\" to \"paid work\" and then to \"occupation\". The name \"Job\" comes from the Hebrew \"Iyov\", although the \"o\" was pronounced a bit more like our modern long \"o\" (not *quite* like it, but similar), and the \"i\" was pronounced like our \"ee\". The sounds represented by \"b\" and \"v\", as anyone who has learned Spanish will know, are very closely related and can sometimes be confused. But we didn't get the name directly from Hebrew. Instead, we got it from the Latin translation of the Old Testament. Latin originally didn't have a letter \"j\": it used the letter \"i\" to represent both a vowel sound (\"ee\") and a semi-vowel (like our \"y\" in \"yes\"). Latin also dropped the first vowel, giving us \"Iob\", pronounced roughly \"yobe\". Later, the new \"j\" was created as a variation of \"i\" and became used for the half-consonant sound, giving us the modern spelling \"Job\". Then the sound of the \"j\" changed, by a complicated process, to its modern version. Not all languages did this. In German Bibles, for example, the name is much closer to the original Hebrew: it is sometimes written \"Ijob\" (the German \"j\" still represents the \"y\" sound), but more usually it's aspirated, meaning an \"h\" sound is added, so in most German Bibles it's \"Hiob\" (without the \"j\", because it's actually superfluous), pronounced approximately \"hee-obe\").",
"They came to us through completely different routes. Biblical Job is a Hebrew name through Greek and Latin, with a soft j/i and a long o, more like \"eeobe\". Job as occupation is much more recent, might be from \"gob\" as in a lump (of work to do). Johnson's dictionary has job. (1) A low mean lucrative busy affair. (2) Petty, piddling work; a piece of chance work. which isn't very dignifying. Seems the hard \"g\" was softened along the way.",
"I think the more interesting question is \"why is the name written 'Job' \"? The historic name is more like \"e-ob\" (like **e-**mail). In some languages that changed a bit over time. [Wikidata has a list]( URL_0 ), many languages are still close to the historic name.",
"In the Hebrew Bible, his name is אִיּוֹב, although I've written that with the vowels in, and that style of vowel didn't even exist until many hundreds of years after the book was written. Regardless, in Hebrew, his name would be pronounced more like ee-YOV or ee-obe. Remember your Indiana Jones movies. There's no \"J\" sound in Hebrew. Lots of other common Hebrew names are said very differently in English than they would have been at the time, including other J names like Jesus, but also other names like Isaac (Yitz-Hhawk)."
],
"score": [
71,
39,
8,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q179962"
],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
757b7c | Why do the chinese language use characters that mean multiple letters but english languages letters are all separate? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do41ucq",
"do43nvj"
],
"text": [
"Very simplified answer: Mandarin (the dominant dialect of Chinese in mainland China) has a LOT of words that are homophones (think: to/too/two), and the number increases exponentially if you ignore inflection (which Chinese, unlike English, has formalized into the language itself and calls \"tones\"... think of the various meanings you can give to a phrase like \"Fuck\" or \"Merry Christmas\" just by saying it differently... in a very general sense, that's what tones are). Chinese can be written using the Roman alphabet (\"Pinyin\"), but it's \"lossy\" -- Pinyin can accurately represent tones, but can't by itself disambiguate homophones. In English, words that sound the same tend to have different spellings. In Chinese, words that sound the same have completely different characters. But you can argue that if Chinese used different combinations of letters to represent the same sound as a way of disambiguating homophones, would it really be any improvement over the status quo? Also, it's not accurate to say that every Chinese character represents a word, or that all characters are arbitrarily complicated. The reality is that every Chinese character is a grid of one or more \"radicals\", which can be kind of thought of like letters in the Roman alphabet... except there are 214 of them, not 26. Once you recognize those 214 radicals, you can look at a character and recognize the radicals used to write it. Also, most of what an English-speaker would think of as a single \"word\" would be written in Chinese as two or three characters. Single-character words exist, but not EVERY character can stand on its own as a unique word. In Chinese, the concept of a \"word\" is a bit fuzzier than it is in English. The best analogue I can think of is the way XSLT gets parsed. A written Chinese sentence tends to be more \"declarative\" than an English sentence. In English, you might write, \"An old woman drove her car to the grocery store yesterday\". In Chinese, it would be more like a single declarative word: \"YesterdayGroceryStoreBoundOldWomanDrivenCar\" -- there are no spaces between Yesterday, storeBound, old, woman, driven, and car, because they're all seen as being tied together. To someone who speaks Chinese, putting spaces between the characters would seem as awkward & unnatural as referring to a \"housewife\" as a \"house wife\", or a \"bedroom\" as a \"bed room\" would to someone who speaks English. There's no perceived need to split them apart with spaces, any more than someone who speaks English would feel a need to split apart \"sailboat\". As a practical matter, Chinese is probably harder to learn to WRITE than English, but isn't necessarily harder to learn to READ. It's been proven that native speakers of English and Chinese both read their native languages EXACTLY the same way -- by shape. At the end of the day, when you know the difference between \"to\", \"too\", and \"two\", you're applying exactly the same kind of knowledge that enables someone who knows Chinese to instantly recognize the difference between written words like \"horse\" and \"mother\" (both of which can be Romanized as \"ma\", but have very different characters, and obviously have very different meanings). Fifty years ago, Chinese was at a definite disadvantage when it came to primitive computers... written Chinese was just too complex for 8-bit computers to deal with, and just can't be rendered into a tiny 16x16 grid of pixels without mangling it almost beyond recognition. However, we now have Unicode, Wubizixing input (a way to touch-type Chinese with a PC keyboard that enables most Chinese characters to be typed with two or three keystrokes... someone who's good at it can achieve speeds comparable to touch-typing English at 140wpm), and phones & computers with 240dpi displays that can render even dense, complicated characters just fine.",
"Writing seems to have been invented at least twice (in Mesopotamia and Central America), possibly as many as four times (the previous plus Egypt and China). All of the earliest writing systems were literal pictures of the thing you were writing, so the symbol for \"house\" would be a little picture of a house, \"person\" would be a drawing of a person, etc. Over time, these symbols got simplified and rushed, just like your signature doesn't look much like your name after you write it ten thousand times. Since it's tough to come up with a picture for *everything* (how would you draw the words \"honor\" or \"interest\"?), and you need to write down names, which don't have literal meanings, some cultures invented an \"acrophonic\" system, in which the symbol for a word also means the sound of the beginning of the word. So the symbol for \"apple\" could also mean \"a\", a butterfly could mean \"b\", and so on. In some languages, this system wasn't really used much, but in others it totally took over, and people stopped using the \"symbol=word\" system entirely. There was one final important change: most of the early writing systems were written from top down, but some cultures found it easier to write left-to right because of the tools they were using, so they turned their clay tablets sideways to do the writing, then just started reading it that way too. English is written with the Latin alphabet, which descends from the Greek alphabet, which derives from sideways-rotated Phoenecian, which was an alphabet system derived from Egyptian hieroglyphs through acrophony. If anything, ours is the weirder writing system! URL_2 URL_0 URL_1"
],
"score": [
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform_script",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_alphabet",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_writing#Inventions_of_writing"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
757c9n | Why are Masters and Doctoral students called "candidates"? It makes it sound that there is a chance they won't earn the degree | In university, the speakers were introduced as Masters and PhD candidate. I associate candidate with elections, such as presidential candidate (who is not yet a president). Does this imply that grad students may not all earn their degrees? But to become a candidate they must first be accepted into the grad program. However, bachelor undergrad students were never introduced as candidate. Sometimes the term "Prospectus" is also used for diploma or other certification. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do41cau",
"do418f7",
"do41xrt",
"do41xs5",
"do42f22"
],
"text": [
"Well... yeah. The faculty of a university is basically a medieval guild, and a PhD candidate is a journeyman presenting his masterpiece- his dissertation- for their review, so that they can decide whether he's talented, skilled, and accomplished enough to be their peer. There is a very real chance that candidates won't be able to produce a dissertation that satisfies the review board.",
"There is a chance they don't earn the degree. There is an exam you need to pass. In practice, your supervisor won't let you \"finish\" your PhD until they are sure you'll pass. But in theory you might fail. I've seen a Masters thesis defense go wrong and the candidate was asked to do it again. I've never seen this with a PhD, there is too much at stake.",
"As a PhD candidate who is only a few months out from finishing...yeah. A fair number don't earn their degrees, often because they burn out or life happens and they have to leave school early, or because they just don't have what it takes to pull it off. The standards are also pretty high, and the professors take great care to ensure that you earn your degree (particularly PhD students), in part because the research that you do as part of a graduate degree directly aids your advisor.",
"An Associates or Bachelors degree is earned when you have enough credit hours in relevant subjects. After you have enough, you apply for the degree and you get it, end of story. Masters and PhD degrees are earned once you have enough credit hours **and** have a dissertation/thesis project that contributes to the field that you're attempting to get a degree in. Masters projects tend to be concerned with the application or practice of the subject matter, whereas PhD projects tend to be concerned with the philosophy or research aspect of the subject matter. If your dissertation/thesis project is not strong enough, or does not hold up to scrutiny, you will be denied the degree and be asked to revise. This process could theoretically continue ad infinitum, so a person could take years to get that degree, even though he's already finished the actual coursework.",
"Because there is a chance they won't earn their degree, particularly the doctoral students. Masters degrees sometimes and doctorates almost always require a thesis, which represents some new contribution to the field. You have to present your thesis to a committee and defend it. If they don't judge it worthy, they will reject it, often pointing out the ways it is deficient and giving pointers on how to correct them. However, sometimes the research is flawed beyond repair or the student proves unable to remedy the thesis. That candidate would have to basically start over on a new area of research if they were even allowed to continue at the school. Many masters degrees these days no longer have a thesis requirement, or it is optional and be substituted with additional class work. In that case, candidate is merely traditional. Bachelors degrees never had a thesis requirement, so bachelors students were never candidates."
],
"score": [
92,
20,
10,
5,
4
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
757hlw | Why does Japan have such a low birth rate compared to the rest of the world? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do42ihl",
"do422nw",
"do426nk"
],
"text": [
"Its birthrate isn't appreciably lower than that of most European countries. Greece, Spain, and Italy are 1.3 children per woman Slovakia, Poland, and Portugal are 1.4 children per woman Switzerland, Luxembourg, Austria, Hungary, Ukraine, Germany, Serbia, Croatia, and Bulgaria are 1.5 children per woman. Japan is also 1.5 children per woman. A few Asian nations have similar numbers--Singapore, Taiwan, and Korea are 1.2 children per woman, and Thailand is 1.5 children per woman. What we have here is a phenomenon of the first world. Many people live in small dwellings so having more children means more crowding. Also, a great deal of resources are expended upon each child, so they're very expensive and time consuming. Also, the more rights that women have, the fewer children they have. And birth control is easily available, so people only have as many children as they want. These all translate to people having fewer children. You may hear about it more in connection with Japan, though, because Japan has had a fertility rate below replacement rate (which is 2.1 children per woman in industrialized nations) for longer than many countries (since the late 1950s), and it also has an extremely low immigration rate. And it also has a government that pays a lot of attention to long term planning. All of that translates to a more serious problem and more serious attention being paid to the nation's low birth rate than happens in many other countries (the US has a birth rate of 1.8 children per woman, but we have a much larger immigration rate, which keeps the country's population expanding, and consequently really helps the economy because there are lots of more workers and lots more customers to buy things and go to school and keep the economic growth up). Japan's economy has been stagnant for quite some time, and there is some struggling economically. And part of this is attributed to low birth rate. And it's a really frequent story on the news. Also, the problem is disproportionately felt in villages. Tokyo has plenty of people being added to it, but villages are being depopulated, some even completely abandoned because everyone is heading to the cities. So it's really noticeable.",
"A lot of reasons, but primarily it's because of their shitty economy and the shitty way japanese companies treat their workers. In Japan, working overtime is not only normal, it's *necessary* because employees are so ridiculously underpaid. To the extent that some employees go to the extreme of camping out overnight at the office. Young people literally just have no time to raise a family, nor can they afford it with such meager pay.",
"Culture. Women are expected to stop working and be stay at home moms if they get married. They are expected to not work at all if they have kids. They'll actually be shamed into quitting by their coworkers and supervisors if they get pregnant or face termination if they don't abort. Well, many women want autonomy and the freedom of choice so they've been choosing more and more to not date, not get married, not start families so they themselves can live fulfilling and interesting lives. It's led to a higher death rate than birth rates. Edit: To add to that, u/therandomfox is also correct but it's an aspect of the above. Being a married housewife in Japan also means a very lonely life where you'll see very little of your spouse. Over there people are picked up by companies right out of school and stay on for life. There is not room for much advancement and competition is so high that people literally work themselves to death (karoshi), they spend so much time at work. So there's really strong incentive to NOT be a housewife."
],
"score": [
25,
21,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
757nts | Why do men and women find specific parts of the body attractive depending on what era it is, for example the 50s were not a time for large breasts or a big butt | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do4hah1",
"do45xfd",
"do4v380",
"do4w5xb"
],
"text": [
"> the 50s were not a time for large breasts or a big butt Pinup Bette Brosmer: URL_0 Sophia Loren and Jayne Mansfield: URL_1 Jane Russell: URL_2",
"What a wonderfully loaded question. The era is not in question; men will favor anything that indicates health, youth and therefore a successful pregnancy. These include a low hip to waist ratio(ease of conception), long hair(takes a while, not happening if you're sickly) and winkle signs, especially around the eyes. Large breasts have been considered a thing if they betray unevenness; they only need to be at a big enough size to display this. Smaller than you might think. Despite all this, makeup, plastic surgery, injections including the most poisonous substance known to paralyze nerves are all tools in regular use. We don't stand a chance.",
"Fashion. Fashions--in \"ideal\" body shape as well as in clothing styles--change over time. While individual tastes vary, and there are always those who really, really like a form that is out of fashion, there are definitely fashions in what a \"good\" look is. (I can't believe how I dressed and how long my hair was as a teen in the 70s.) At one time, a very pale, never-touched-by-the-sun look was the ideal. Of course, that was when most people labored in the sun, so being able to stay pale was evidence of wealth and status. Nowadays, when most working people work indoors, having the time and money to get and maintain a tan is a status symbol. Fashion.",
"A lot of it has to do with technology. For example, Lycra didn't exist in the 1950s. Fabrics could only stretch in one direction, which limited tight fitting clothing like bras and skirts to certain designs that didn't work as well with certain body shapes. Without yoga pants, having a big butt meant you had to wear bigger, looser fitting clothing, which could come off as being less attractive. Similarly, breast augmentation surgery became more commonplace in the 1970s, which meant having large breasts was more commonplace and less exceptional. Finally, fashion is based on exclusivity. If everyone can do it, it doesn't afford any additional social status. And once it has been around so that everyone is doing it, the fashion world moves on to things everyone isn't doing."
],
"score": [
12,
7,
6,
5
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://i.pinimg.com/564x/22/29/c2/2229c22b4271a15f063c7e1ff9a99e5d.jpg",
"http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1999039.1415133305!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/article_750/939453a.jpg",
"http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/03/02/article-1362040-0D6DBB9B000005DC-917_634x500.jpg"
],
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75bl1t | Why is "will not" contracted into "won't"? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do4w0dy",
"do5a2dd"
],
"text": [
"\"Woll\" is an archaic form of \"will\", from the German word \"wollen\". At some point \"will\" became more popular, but the contraction (which lines up with the rules we normally make contractions with) stuck.",
"The other response about \"woll\" doesn't seem to be supported anywhere that I can find. In reality, the old word was \"wonnot\" (and, prior to that, \"wynnot\"), a conjunct with \"cannot\". It was shortened in exactly the same way as \"cannot\", but the unabbreviated form died out and was replaced by the phrase \"will not\". [Source]( URL_0 )"
],
"score": [
64,
7
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[
"http://www.etymonline.com/word/won't"
]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75bv8m | Why do the majority of Americans drive automatic cars but in Britain most people drive manual cars? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do4xx28"
],
"text": [
"It's primarily because of the car manufacturers following the demands of the consumer. In the US it's more common to take cars on long, uneventful highway journeys, where an automatic is beneficial; in the UK it's more common to do shorter, slower journeys, where a manual is preferred."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75bxno | Why we change the names of people depending the language we speak? | For example, **Christopher Columbus** for me(growing up in a spanish speaking country) is known as **Cristobal Colon**. But he was Italian and his name was **Cristoforo Colombo**. The same with the pope, **Franciscus** is the real name he took, **Francis** is the name for the english speaking countries and **Francisco** for the spanish speaking. I understand if it is because they are names not common in other countries, but why this happen with some people and not with everybody, like **Galileo Galilei**, who is worldwide known by his name | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do4zn1y"
],
"text": [
"There's no cast-iron rule for this, but generally speaking we translate the names of important historical figures, but not those of other people. The Pope is an exception here: he's a contemporary figure, but traditionally his name is translated. In previous times it was normal to translate names, especially if the names were difficult to pronounce in different languages. In fact, Christopher Colombus was probably called Christoffa Corombo, because he was born in the 15th century in the Republic of Genoa, and so likely spoke a Genoese variety of Ligurian. There are many examples of people changing their names when they moved to a new country. The 17th century German composer Georg Friedrich Händel moved to England and became George Frederic Handel. The point is that names are just labels, and it was often easier to give yourself a name in the local language rather than attempt to teach the locals to pronounce your original name. People were doing this even very recently. In 1879, a man called Szmuel Gelbfisz was born in Poland. As a teenager, he went to live in England and translated his name from Yiddish to English as Samuel Goldfish. (In 1898 he moved again, this time to America, where he partnered with the Selwyn brothers to create Goldwyn Pictures, which became the Goldwyn in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. By this time, though, he had left Goldwyn Pictures and renamed himself Samuel Goldwyn.) These days, however, people prefer to make an effort to preserve the original name as much as possible, especially since the exact spelling of your name is pretty much part of your whole identity. For that reason, we don't translate names of even very prominent people (with a few notable exceptions)."
],
"score": [
3
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
75dljk | why do some restaurants have paper on their tablecloths; It can’t just be for coloring on..? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do5ckfl"
],
"text": [
"Paper is cheap to replace, and it makes clean-up easier when you can simply replace the entire tablecloth. It's the same reason the table in your doctor's office has paper -- it takes *way* less work to remove the paper than to thoroughly scrub the table after every patient."
],
"score": [
9
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75dnv8 | How do Arabic Names Work? | Do the majority of Muslims have a Kunya that says who their eldest child is? Is it often omitted? Is it given only for an eldest son or also for daughters? How does the Nisbah work? Are people still given Laqabs? What are common ones? Are abus, bins, bints, etc usually omitted now? Do non Arab Muslims use Arabic names? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do5qpko"
],
"text": [
"Arab here, Arabic names are normal, they usually come from a trait or description or a symbol. For example, Faisal is a normal Arabic name, it's a synonym for sword, it is named to symbolized chivalry and courage. A Kunya is literally a nickname, the way arabs use Kunya makes it confusing. For example, there was a man who was known to love cats and had a pet cat and was called Abu Hurrairah, which literally translates to \"Father of Kittens\" the Abu here is used as an associative word. Abu means father and most parents are called by their eldest son, who passes their name on to their grandchildren. Women don't take their husband's last name and children don't take her last name. For example Faisal's dad would be called \"Abu Faisal\" and his mother would be called \"Om Faisal\" (Om means mother). If they have no son then the eldest daughter is named but that is rare. Faisal would be Faisal bin \"his father's name\" \"his last name\". Bin and Bint are \"son of\" and \"daughter of\" respectively. Nisbah means heritage and just describes the heritage of someone and his ancestors. Hope that helps. Feel free to let me know if you need anything else!"
],
"score": [
6
],
"text_urls": [
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
75fsm0 | Why will companies never tell you why you weren't chosen for a job you've interviewed for? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do5ugch",
"do5xjq4"
],
"text": [
"Mostly because they don't have to, but also because you might not like the answer and they don't want the drama or lawsuits. Do you really want to know that they picked someone else solely because the interviewer didn't \"jive\" with you, or because another applicant was substantially more qualified and/or had connections to the company?",
"That's not true. You can ask them, and some companies will be nice enough to tell you. It just isn't common practice for companies to tell you why you haven't been chosen in the first place because there is simply no benefit from their angle. It just wastes time."
],
"score": [
22,
7
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75gsxn | Why are novel adaptations of movies so uncommon? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do63z07",
"do62lso",
"do64a73"
],
"text": [
"Honestly? They're not. A good number of the big-name blockbusters of the past few years have had novelisations: [*Suicide Squad*]( URL_4 ), [*The Force Awakens*]( URL_3 ), [*Pacific Rim*]( URL_2 ), [*Crimson Peak*]( URL_6 ), [*Warcraft*]( URL_5 ), [*The Cabin in the Woods*]( URL_0 ), [*Godzilla*]( URL_1 ) [and more...]( URL_7 ) So why do they *seem* so uncommon? I'd say it comes down to a couple of things: 1) Visibility. Novels generally don't have the marketing budget that movies have, and they tend to be aimed at fans of the franchise who'll buy them anyway. Any money that the studio has is going to go on advertising the movie, not the novelisation. 2) Adaptation. A good chunk of movies today are, as people have noted, adaptations of existing books. The 'movie tie-in' edition is the equivalent version, and is a big moneyspinner for authors, but you can't really novelise a movie that was previously a novel. (This also holds true for things like *Logan*, which aren't direct adaptations but pull heavily from the *Old Man Logan* arc.) 3) As other people have said, the home video market has made it so that rewatching is much easier. Unless you're a *really* dedicated fan, you'll probably just watch the movie rather than dedicate hours to reading the novel, especially because the movie novelisation has lost a lot of the prestige it once had.",
"In the old days before VCR's were common the only way to re-experience a movie that was no longer in the cinemas was to watch it on TV once a year, or, for a more regular experience, read the novelization (or sometimes the comic adaptation). For example, when I was a kid I read the Raiders of the Lost Ark novel over and over again because that's the only way I could \"rewatch\" it.",
"How Do I put this It's most of the time seen as a cheap cash in by 2nd-3rd rate author who are never gonna get a best seller and as such they often don't sell well these day and are less and less common except for Scifi films and franchises however some writers have taken this and run with it and made much better novels out of o.k. or bad films Normally by deepening them or expanding on them. For example The Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith novelization was written by Matthew Stover and is way better than the film or it as a tie in has any right to be. It add more to the depth of characterization and the dueling ideas behind the heroes. Buckaroo Banzai by Earl Mac Rauch for example adds a ton of parts that never were able to be filmed for time and cost giving a wider and stranger world."
],
"score": [
11,
5,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7980210-the-cabin-in-the-woods?from_search=true",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18594685-godzilla---the-official-movie-novelization?from_search=true",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17162161-pacific-rim?from_search=true",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25387202-star-wars---the-force-awakens",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29358261-suicide-squad",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27038914-warcraft-official-movie-novelization?from_search=true",
"https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25241995-crimson-peak?from_search=true",
"https://www.goodreads.com/search?q=movie+novelization"
],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
|
75kmvv | The purpose of modern day knighthood | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"do6xgzh",
"do6wgl4",
"do6y48c"
],
"text": [
"These days knighthoods are essentially awards for service to your country. Not necessarily for military service, you can also get a knighthood for being distinguished in your field whatever it is. For example Patrick Stewart is a knight for his contribution to the arts and entertainment.",
"To recognize and publicly show high social contributors. It's getting a first place medal. Or citizen of the year award.",
"It's just an honor/recognition... like being given a \"key to the city\" or a honorary doctorate from a university. Had no real value, but just a way of being recognized for some sort of achievement."
],
"score": [
10,
9,
3
],
"text_urls": [
[],
[],
[]
]
} | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.