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6rpyx1 | Why do many cultures greet or leave with a kiss on the cheek but not in the US? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"There are a lot of complex issues for this. A few of them are: 1) Personal space. Kissing on the cheek is far more invasive than even a hug. Americans have developed a larger personal space bubble than many places due to having more physical space and being less crowded in our cities and towns. Because we are less crowded invading someone's personal space without permission is a much bigger insult than other places. You will also notice that the few cities that are highly crowded like NYC and LA have a decent percentage of the population that do use the kiss on the cheek as a greeting. 2) Propriety. Anything to do with sexuality is a bit more taboo in the US due to our history with more conservative religious groups. As such a kiss on the cheek, although being very mild is still too sexual of an act for it to be common. And even when it is not considered sexual, it is considered something only granted to relatives (like grandmothers or aunts with young children) and so is considered improper to do as it is claiming a level of familiarity you have not earned with someone.",
"Cheek kissing also isn't common in the UK or Germany, both contributed substantially to the early population of the US. Those initial immigrants brought over their culture.",
"It can still happen. I have been part of an extended family of sorts that married a European and I was greeted with a kiss on the cheek. It can happen in a family, or friendship setting. One time I went back by an old job and an old coworker greeted me with a kiss on both cheeks. Startling. Another time it was an old friend of my mothers who ran into me at the market. It can happen but if you move to another city it would be unlikely to happen for decades. But say you move to Seattle in 2017. You might work with someone till 2024. You might both work well together, very professional. then in 2031 you run into them again....you just darn well might get kissed on the cheek!!!"
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6rr55c | Why did some cultures use a different language to create their own instead of just learning said language? | OK then, some examples are like Chinese and Japanese (hanzi and kanji) as well as Latin and English where one influenced the other | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"For the most part, people don't create languages (in relatively recent years conlangs like Esperanto are the exception). Languages have a tendency to adapt naturally through the interactions of different groups of people who speak them, and gradual changes that occur because of people who speak \"incorrectly\" (think of people who say \"imma\" instead of \"I'm going to\"). I'll give you an example with the Latin - > English question you asked about: English for the most part developed in the British Isles. In the 5th century a number of Germanic tribes took over the area, and between the 450ish and 1100, old English developed from the crossing paths of these tribes (look at Beowolf if you want to see the best example of this language). Old English has fairly similar grammar structures to modern English, but it lacks LOTS of our most commonly used roots. At the same time, French was developing in the central uplands of Europe. People speaking \"improper\" Latin (maybe colloquial is a better word) started back before even ~~the year 0~~ 1CE, and diverged so far from classical Latin that the languages were mutually unintelligible. Latin used many fewer words, but provided information by changing the endings of its nouns (declension). The francs ditched this concept and began using prepositions to convey the same information instead. Because Roman influence stretched so far, several different colloquial variants formed which today are called the romance languages. In the year 1066, William the Conqueror, a Norman from France, invaded England bringing French with him. For years, French was spoken by the upper classes and (old) English by the lower, but simply because of people's natural tendency to pick up the languages around them, French words began to spill over into English--this is where we get most of our Latin roots from. This resulted in middle English which is basically what Shakespeare wrote in (he's actually closer to modern English than what was spoken in the the middle ages as he wrote in about 1600, but he's the most prolific and well known example). Chaucer is a better example actually. ~~In the mid 1400s, the the English defeated the French in the War of the Roses after which the English took control of the crown again and French influence on English slowed.~~ In 1154, the crown passed out of the hands of the Normans, and French influence on English slowed. Of course another 400+ years have passes since Shakespeare, so increased globalization has lead to subtle changes in English due to exposure to all other languages, and people continue to speak \"lazily\" (contractions, eggcorns, etc.), so this accounts for all the changes between the language Shakespeare used and the language I am writing in. I don't even care if I don't get karma for this, I had a blast just thinking it through. TL;DR people don't usually create languages; languages develop because people get sloppy with the rules and adopt features from the other languages around them. Edit: Spectacular factual error and typos",
"I can give you some explanation to the Chinese and Japanese parallels in their written language. The people in Japan originate from China and Korea. At that point they spoke some variant of ancient Chinese, and the language slowly evolved into modern Japanese. The way it evolved can be seen today, the word selfie did not exist till very recently, eventually they words to describe different things will change and the language will be almost unrecognizable, kinda like reading Shakespeare. The reason that writing remained the same is because until quite recently, only a very small portion of the population could actually read and write. On the other hand, everyone could speak, so the sounds of the spoken language evolved with the written words retaining their meaning. Think of it like how regional accents develop, but taken to the extreme and over thousands of years. Another example is all the many dialects of Chinese, they sound completely different and it is not possible for different dialects to understandable to someone who spoke another. That said, they all retain the exact same way of writing as any piece of Chinese text can be read in any dialect.",
"Can you give an example of what you are talking about? I cannot think of any that have done what you say."
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6rsd4x | Why do bands release albums in Japan with additional tracks they don't include on their North American and European releases? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Apparently it's because albums are expensive in Japan, so it entices Japanese purchasers to buy the Japanese edition for the bonus track rather than ship a copy in",
"the Asian market is a little hard to please since they have their own thing going on there, so ocidental artists and bands have to do double effort to have good sells there",
"On top of cost (already mentioned) it behooves bands to do a little more for Japan, to keep their interest going. Bands want to sell in the US (biggest market), tour in Europe (biggest profit), and retire in Japan (the people will keep coming)."
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6rtfo4 | Why is President Putin so hated? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"He is a former KBG colonel (\"There is no such thing as a former KGB man\" - Putin), who seized power by [staging terrorist attacks]( URL_2 ), subdued the oligarchs and made himself czar. He killed or imprisonned a good number of [opponents]( URL_1 ) and [journalists]( URL_3 ). He cheats at elections, though he probably doesn't need to, most russians like him, maybe because he controls the media and serve them a nationalistic discourse. He led a [ruthless war in Chechnya]( URL_0 ), and is creeping in Eastern Europe (South Ossetia, Georgia, Crimea, Donbass). He has been financing political parties across Europe and recently meddled in the US elections. He also prones oppressive policies towards gays and women.",
"> ELI5: Why is President Putin so hated? It depends who you mean when you say he's hated. He's done a lot of things that a lot of different groups have disliked. He's encouraged anti-LGBTQ feelings in Russia (it's much more extreme than in the U.S., it can be legitimately dangerous), invaded parts of Ukraine and Georgia (both former parts of the USSR). We can also trace back some meddling in US politics (the recent presidential election perhaps being the most recent and blatant). He's also used a loophole in Russia's laws to stay president. They're only supposed to serve two terms. However, after his first two terms, he set up one of his supporters as a candidate, and became PM. After that was up, he ran for president again. This might not seem like a problem, but the institutions of democracy are very new and weak in Russia, which makes it hard to have a fair election. It's not like in the US/EU, where it's a \"well the people elected him\" He's also been known to suppress any negative media coverage, as well as political opponents/dissent. There a lot of enemies, both political and media, that is suspected that he's had killed (or threatened), although obviously it's very hard to prove. But they've died in very suspicious circumstances, and often. They also tend to be something of a political rival for the US. For example, traditionally been an ally with China and/or Iran as a way to try to balance out U.S. influence, in each region, respectively. This is less of an obvious \"bad\" thing, but it contributes. They also tend to oppose some US initiatives in the UN, if they feel it's against their interests. Part of that has been stoking anti-US sentiment at home, to help stay in power. He's spent a lot of effort in painting the U.S. as holding Russia back. He's also used his political power to enrich himself, as well as reward allies. People use the term \"oligarch\" here, but in Russia, it tends to be a lot worse/more blatant. There are probably a half dozen others, as well."
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"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Politkovskaya"
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6rtghb | How did humans come to adopt the naming model of a first name, middle name, and last name? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The anecdotes I have heard are mostly around identifying people when speaking of Joe to your friend if there are 5/7/10 Joes which one are you refering to? Earlier on it was easier to say Joe the Baker or Joe the Smith which is where a lot of the surnames come from that are associated to jobs, others used Joe Toms' Son which eventually become shortened to TomSon. As for full adoption of the naming scheme I'm unsure Source: Me and my family did a lot of ancestry tracing over the years",
"They didn't, naming structures vary across the world. For example in China and Korea, the family name is placed before the given name (Xi Jingping = Jingping of the Xi family)"
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6ruyxn | How does a crime organisation 'come to be'? | Huge groups like the mafia and triads are very prevelant in the modern world but how did they get there? What keeps them intertwined/efficient? On a basic level how does one run a criminal organisation? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Basically it goes like this: Bad guy wants to have a bigger slice of the pie. Money laundering, cons, dealing x/y/z isn't profitable enough for the risk associated with it. He turns to bad guy B, says, \"hey, imma start a new thing. I got a dealer I just need someone to run some dope. You'll get paid.\" Bad guy B is like, \"oh, cool. All good. It's sketchy but I need money for my kid anyways.\" Then they negotiate terms, do their shit, and get paid. Bad guy A and bad guy B are like, \"fuck man, we're killin' it. Can you take a bit more heat?\" \"Nah man, can't. I got my girl. Get lil C to do it. He's no snitch.\" And they merrily go about their way, evading law enforcement, keeping a low profile, and solidifying their hold on whatever enterprise they started. After a while, there are lots of lil Cs for the A and B to look after so they're in charge of supervising the Cs instead of being in the line of Fire. Also, rival As and Bs come into play which could make or break their organization. If they lose, they're done. If they win, they claim A' and B''s market share, thereby expanding. Eventually you get to a point where it becomes impossible to keep it from the public eye and this is where most organizations are caught by responsible law enforcement. However, A and B are smart. They buy out the cops and chiefs of police so they do their shit. If not that, they wait till the heat drops and keep going afterwards. Then they grew uninhibited since they don't have be too too scared of the cops now. They just do their thing but now they have different problems. Lil Cs are stealing shit. You either let them be, due to their previous services to you, or set an example to the other rival As and Bs to, once more, solidify your market share. It also keeps the other lil Cs in-line. At some point you get the point where shit is hitting the fan. People are leaving; people don't have enough, or just want more, whatever. Then you take advantage of what you have: power. Y'all got lots of little Cs and Ds and Fs looking to score brownie points or cash. So you say, \"beat the fuck outta lil C 2-342a, grab his kid, and make sure (s)he don't snitch. Ain't like we're gonna kill 'me - yet. Just collateral.\" At this point Cs are effectively top dog to most people in the organization. It's spread out like a spiders web. Ds and Fs look up to them but can't even see the A and B who started it. They're busy doing other shit like buying tigers, Hennessy, or leading an assassination order on some start-up. Whatever. The Chinese have more... brutal traditions. Since families/clans were so closely related, defined, and social structure set to such a degree, it wouldn't be uncommon for the 'grab the kid' action to be turned into 'kill his entire clan, including the generation above and below. Oh my face' if he decided to leave, act against the organization, or otherwise endanger people inside. The more powerful criminal organizations are tied together with money, drugs, and threats to keep them cohesive. And it usually works. The people in charge of, well, people know how to manipulate others to do their bidding - more importantly, *want* to do their bidding - and basically be a good ol' drone. The higher ups wash their hands clean, step back, and hide their involvement as they are undoubtably the first to fall if it goes public - with enough evidence to convict. However, most of these organizations were started before the advent of proper forensics so they could hide and bride their way out in the beginning. Now it's more difficult. Plus, there is now a prestige associated with the gang/affiliation multiple generations pass through. It isn't all that different than civic pride, national support for your country, or an unhealthy obsession with the Ravens. Source: fuck if I know. I pulled it outta my ass. Basic business expansion though, with an admittedly morally ambiguous touch."
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6ruz6f | Why is it depicted on film and TV that when someone is kissed, their foot comes off the ground? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It's body language, a physical manifestation of an emotional reaction, so the viewer knows what the character feels (likes the kiss). See \"curl my toes\".",
"> Why is it depicted on film and TV that when someone is kissed, their foot comes off the ground? The body language being used is that the woman (traditionally a few inches shorter than the man) is going up on the tips of her toes to be kissed. Of course she could do that with both feet but by raising one leg it highlights that she is being supported by the man and draws attention to the shape of her leg. Note that when raising the leg the toes are still extended as with the tip toed stance, accentuating the calf which is generally considered to make the legs more attractive. High heeled shoes are a method of producing this effect constantly, which is their main purpose. To make this pose more risque the man might grasp the woman's raised leg and draw her knee forward, pressing their pelvises together. A trope in sensual dance, the raised leg may reference such a move without actually performing it. Finally, it is a method to show off some leg when the woman might be wearing a longer skirt that would otherwise cover much of the calf when straight. In the past \"showing a little leg\" was seen as a tantalizing exposure."
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6rvic3 | why do conservative Americans still bring up the Benghazi attacks? Why was it so significant? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"In the grand scheme of American foreign policy, domestic safety, and geopolitical world affairs, it was not significant and it never was (of course it was highly significant for the families involved). But it did kind of cast Clinton's judgement into question, which was politically extremely valuable.",
"Because Clinton acted in what she thought would look best politically. Obama had declared that the war on terrorism was over in a speech shortly before this attack. And if she sent help to the embassy is would prove that the threat was still a thing. So people (including myself) Are upset that she valued her appearance over the lives of the American citizens there. I will admit that there were often threats to the embassy and Clinton clams she thought that it was just another false threat; however, the people in the embassy made it clear this was a different case and they needed help. I would have hated to have my father, brother, sister, or any loved one die there when their deaths were preventable. Also after Clinton lied about it and tried to cover it up. Obviously a lot of this is my opinion, I am certainly open to discussion and would love if people respectfully disagree and are open to a conversation",
"It was a failure specifically connected to Clinton. It was brought up because Clinton was running for president. It is not brought up in other contexts often."
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6rwed2 | Question about mid-20th century African American's trying to get a mortgage... | It was especially difficult for African American's to get loans for houses in the early to mid 20th century, as the majority of white-owned banks wouldn't lend to them. My question is, why didn't they try black-owned banks instead? I understand there may have not been any available for some families, but for the others who could've, why didn't they? Were black-banks not as reliable or protected? I read that these families would have to pay way more through a contract seller, so why didn't they try black-owned banks? Or am I misunderstanding this?? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You are misunderstanding the availability of black owned banks. Banks required capital, money, to open. They also require expertise to operate and reliable borrowers. Black borrowers were not as financially secure as a whole as white borrowers. The expertise and the capital were not there either."
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6rwtpq | Why do tech companies use diversity quotients when hiring employees but professional sports teams mostly do not? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"With the exception of a couple countries (like the UAE for example) they aren't legal diversity requirements. Companies make commitments for their own reasons. Those reasons are mostly based on the financial reasons that 1. Diverse teams tend to problem solve better (which is good for tech companies). And 2. It reflects better on the company in an image sense. So nothing other than their particular needs and what they find is stronger for it. Also height and Intelligence have a shit ton of environmental factors that play into it.",
"Most likely because of how companies vs sports teams are view by the public eye. Companies for example are often criticized for who they hire (race/gender/etc). For some companies, their success might be impacted by their reputation. So its in their best interest to keep the reputation high by avoiding controversial areas such as this. At the same time, jobs at such companies are accessible much more by the general population compared to sports teams. Sports on the other hand is viewed by society as a much more \"talent-driven\" occupation. People generally associate athletes with talent - and this is true to some degree, athletes are highly specialized. (Yes, employees for companies can be as well - but not to the degree of athletes). Also athletic talent is much more measurable than corporate talent, especially since an athletes game history is record so employers know exactly what they are \"paying\" for. If you team ends up being all white or all black - there may be measurable proof for why the organization chose those players. But in corporation - this is much more subjective.",
"Don't be so sure any of your beliefs about their hiring strategy is true. Companies are notoriously full of complete shit and lies regarding how they select the people they hire."
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6rxvgb | What is the definition of "Jewish"? Can a person convert to Judaism in their own private life and start identifying themselves as Jewish? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It's not possible to convert to Judaism on your own, because the conversion rituals require Jewish witnesses. But once you go through such a conversion process sincerely, you're 100% Jewish, at least according to whichever denomination converted you.",
"I'm in that ethnic group, but not part if the religious group. I used to be able to speak a little Yiddish and I appreciate some of the eastern European Jewish culture. I know other people who have Jewish roots from other parts of the world (eg sephardic) and have some connections to that culture. I've never figured out \"the rules\" of the Hebrew religion, and I know there are lots of varieties of \"jewishness\" that each have additional rules. (Orthodox or conservative or reform or etc...). I know I'd be easily accepted if I decided to convert, but I also know people from other very diverse backgrounds, who've converted, and are accepted and happy and devoted."
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6ryadv | How did the first Kings or Rulers come into power? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Initially humans lived in small tribal units or villages. Within these units you'd typically have one guy lead the group, because he's the strongest, the best hunter, the cleverest, whatever. These tribes would constantly fight amongst themselves, and occasionally one tribe would take over another tribe. This would give the victorious chieftain more land, more warriors, and thus more power. So it becomes easier to take over another tribe. And then another. And then another. By this point, word gets around that there's this powerful dangerous chieftain who's a serious threat to other tribes. So, some of the smaller tribes approach the top chieftain and offer to voluntarily join him. They get rewarded for their loyalty with special status, their chieftains become important nobles for the top chieftain, and the kingdom grows larger. When the top chieftain dies, typically one of his children takes over. If the child is smart and competent, he continues his father's work and expands their little empire further. Over time, a successful empire is viewed as having divine providence, and the founder is exalted."
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6rzqzd | Why is almost all car accident footage from Russia? | Do they all have dashcams, or are they all just drunk? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"There's a lot of issues with car insurance claims in Russia in terms of who's at fault in the claim, and a lot of people have claimed that even the police are complicit in wrongful claims in reports as well. Consequently a huge proportion of the driving population (compared to Western Europe / the US) use dashcams so their side of the argument will hold up in court or in the eyes of insurers, so they capture a large amount of the car stuff that goes viral.",
"Adding on to this, I believe I saw somewhere that a lot of insurance companies force drivers to use a dashcam in order to be covered.",
"Russia is super corrupt but has decent infrastructure and the rule of law. This leads to insurance fraud and rampant bribery. Cameras are a good way to ensure the laws are applied. People there use tons of dash cams."
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6s20l5 | Why aren't you required to wear seat belts in limousines? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Hi, There have already been quality answers and responses to your query in ELI:5 Before. Please take this time to reflect back on the responses of redditors current and past, who have taken the time to answer this question in detail and provide you with quality value in response. Remember next time, use the search bar! * [Link 1]( URL_1 ) * [Link 2]( URL_0 ) * [Link 3]( URL_2 )"
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/23y5vi/eli5_how_come_passengers_on_buses_or_limos_dont/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3c2yhy/eli5_why_people_are_not_required_to_wear_their/"
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6s2a4m | Where did the word "bullseye" originate from? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Bow hunting. the ocular socket of a bull is one of the few areas of the skull weak enough to allow an arrow to pass to brain.....So hitting a target the size of a bulls eye from various distances became the goal and meter of archers."
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6s2an8 | Where does the "West/Western civilization" begin geographically and why is it divided as so? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Depends. There's a Greco-Roman split in Western civilization that complicates things. We tend to associate \"the West\" with the Latin west and Germanic north, and any nations which descend from those. The Greek and Slavic East/Southeast; not so much. Different Christianity, different alphabets, different arcs after the fall of Rome and again after WWII, etc. Greece is commonly held as the cradle of Western civilization in the grand scheme of things. But it projected itself eastward far more than it did into core Europe. The Romans (who were obviously heavily influenced by the Greeks) did that. So Western Europe, everything west of a Sweden-Denmark-Germany-Austria-Italy axis, is considered \"Western.\" Though I guess a case could be made for all of Europe and the Mediterranean basin.",
"It refers to Europe and North America usually. When people say \"western culture\" they're talking about first world culture. It is called \"the west\" because in the beginning it was referring to only west Europe, which is everything in Europe West of Austria. It was divided like that because of the difference in popularity between Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity. It kind of doesn't make sense now, because it includes north america and west Europe, and west Europe is obviously not as west as NA. It more now refers American culture mostly, basically the most predominant culture. When someone calls something \"westernized\" it means a culture that had american/European influences that mad it more like the \"west\" i.e. Britian or America"
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6s2ken | Why do so many people dislike Americans? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"By no means a complete list, but start by reading about US involvement in Panama 1941, Korea 1945, Syria 1949, Iran 1953, Guatemala 1954, Vietnam 1950's, Cuba 1960's, Congo 1961, Brazil 1964, Indonesia 1965, Dominican Republic 1965, Chile 1973, Afghanistan 1980's, Nicaragua 1980's, Grenada 1983, Panama 1989, Haiti 1991, and then whole Iran, Iraq, Syria, Libya things. Numerous times, if the US didn't like another country's democratically elected leaders, we have backed \"rebels\" with money, weapons and training or even assisted with troops in the removal of that leader. It's always touted as \"fighting Communism\" or \"deposing the evil dictator\" but usually ends up being something more related to the price we pay for bananas or oil. We claim to be helping the people of that country and many times there may be benefits they receive but those are secondary at best to the political desires. Anyone can pick apart the specifics about the places I've noted, argue that we do more good than harm or whatever, but there is no arguing that the US has been in the business of regime change for a long, long time. Suddenly now, we are (some of us, at least) incensed at the notion of Russia daring to meddle in our sacred electoral process? Do we deserve it, no. No country does, but we've been dishing it out for a century or more."
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6s2mud | Why do some people consider real-life "not enough"? Constantly wishing it were more fantastical in some way rather than finding enjoyment in its current state? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"That is the central point of Buddhism actually. Life is essentially unsatisfactory. You don't get what you want, you get what you don't want. When you get what you want, it isn't all that you had hoped, doesn't last as long as you want, would be even better if you just had that other thing too. I think it all arises from the very nature of consciousness and the mistaken belief that we are supposed to be happy.",
"Because since I was old enough to wash dishes, I've probably washed dishes 12000 times (once a day for 35 years, just to make it easy). I've done about 5500 loads of laundry. I've taken the trash out about 4000 times. I've gone to work about 6000 days. For my future? Assuming that at 43, I'm at a half-way point in my life & don't die early, I get to wash dishes at least another 10000 times. Another 5000 loads of laundry. Another 4000 trash days. I'm not going to be able to take a full retirement (too broke, all my life) so I get to work at least another 6000 days. I've been broke most of my life, so I know how to entertain myself in old-fashioned ways. I embroider, I read, I like to color, I garden. There's a lot to do and see here in Las Vegas - it's not like I'm stuck in the middle of nowhere. I can leave my house & be surrounded by free entertainment in every direction. I'm married, have a dog & two snakes, so I spend time with the hubster and the pets. So I do have things that occupy some of my time. But it's the rest of the time... all that *time*. I tried practicing Buddhist mindfulness for a long time to get through my daily chores and work. I've tried to take pleasure in the simple acts of routine that make up each day. Each 24-hour cycle. Each 1440 minutes. Each 86400 seconds. But for some reason, I can't look forward to the next round of dishes. I don't look forward to gathering up the laundry or the trash. It never ever *ends*. I look forward to dying because it means I will never have to do another load of dishes again. I will never have to go to work again. I will never have to do another load of laundry or bag up another bag of garbage. I will never have to peel another carrot or make inane chit-chat with a hotel guest. I will die and it will be over. Finally. But people around me seem to get upset when I say \"Man, I cannot wait to die! I am looking forward to being dead!\" So I drink, smoke weed, and play pointless video games because it helps me escape, and when I fantasize I fantasize about having enough money to have a fucking maid.",
"10,000 years ago, fresh meat, a stash of berries, and not getting eaten by a tiger made for a pretty good day. Today we shower with instant hot water, buy or microwave some fresh, unspoiled food, and look at our smartphones that give us access to literally the sum of all human knowledge as well as instant connections to over a billion other humans. Yet we are bored and lonely and largely dissatisfied.",
"I've come to hate magical thinking because I think it shows a profound lack of appreciation for how awesome reality and life are, just on their own. For example, I tried so many times as a kid to move objects with my mind. I was convinced that if I just tried hard enough, I could do it. I desperately wanted to have some kind of power that could reach out and lift that apple out of the bowl and bring it to me. Eventually, I realized I do have that power. It's called an arm. *Just by thinking it* I can cause my arm to reach out and grab that apple. The human arm and hand are an engineering marvel, capable of everything from playing piano to painting a masterpiece to hammering in nails. The hand is incredible: strong, articulate, sensitive, and it operates in pure silence. And I've got one, attached to my brain, just waiting for me to give it the slightest impulse. Hell, I've got *two*. Duh! Why did I obsess over stupid telekinesis?? It's like people praying to an imaginary god up in the sky who created our world and gave us all life, when in fact the Sun is right fucking there in the sky, not imaginary, and literally sustains all of us by bringing warmth and sunlight, which feeds plants, creating all food in the world. Who makes the wind blow? Who made the clouds? Who can make it rain and sustain our crops? What unseen good should we do a dance for or kill a chicken for? None! The fucking *sun,* idiots, it's *right there!*",
"Dissatisfaction is hard wired into our brains. The instinct that makes people dream of more fantastic versions of reality is the same one responsible for the ambition to succeed and move up in one's job, or to excel at athletics or games or whatever. For prehistoric humans it might have been an advantage for security and contentment to be fleeting because that would encourage us to chase them. Being unhappy with their surroundings causes people to complain about them and imagine what might be better, which is crucial to the survival of a species whose success has been based on an ability to adapt it's surroundings to help it survive changing conditions. TLDR: complaining helped us survive in the prehistoric era",
"There is an oft quoted and really beautiful paragraph from Shirley Jackson's *The Haunting on Hill House,* which reads, *“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.”* That makes some sense to me; that no one can stay sane without some reprieve from reality. Jackson cites dreams here but anything -in my opinion- can work. Nicotine, alcohol, opiates, sex, food, a good film, hobbies, meditation, etc. Without those things, I don't honestly know if I would be more or less sane but I suspect that total abstinence might have done more harm than good; at least for me. I don't know if it's boredom that scares me or idleness or just the idea of a world without the 'magic' of dream and fantasy. But I alter my head space when I need because, for whatever reason, I just don't feel comfortable in my own skin. The universe and nature seem totally indifferent to my existence and the bleakness of my perception is less horrifying when I know that I can escape it. But that's only *my* experience. I can't speak for anyone else.",
"Because I wish pretty much everything in my life was different, I don't want to wait for change because I'm so unsatisfied with nearly every aspect of my life, and there are a lot of goals I have/things I want and I have maybe one or two of them partially met at best. I've also discovered a lot about myself recently and I realize that I need to change some things but, as I said before, change takes time and I don't want to be/do want to be some of these things *now* and not later because they're bad/good.",
"Dissatisfaction with life in general. The world sucks in many ways. Governments topple one another all the time. Bigotry runs rampant. Medicine and science have not advanced nearly enough to make peoples' lives truly easy. Being poor fucking exists *still*. A more fantastical world might mean, for me at least, being able to uncripple myself, or perhaps having never been crippled at all. I might have been born with the ability to give birth. Maybe I'd be as strong as I want to be. Etc, etc, etc... At the same time, a more fantastical world could also open up really neat shit. Imagine being able to hover whenever you want. That'd be cool, right? What about teleportation? \"Hey i'll teleport and travel the world!\" Etc, etc, etc... The world compared to human fantasy is plain right now, and can be(But isn't always) depressing.",
"Otherwise we would still all be stuck in Africa living like monkeys basically. The reason we have come this far and be able to have this discussion is because we as humans have evolved into wanting improvement. If we all were satisfied no improvements would ever be made.",
"It is a strongly reinforced evolutionary survival trait. Human behavior is balanced by \"conservative\" and \"progressive\". I am using perjoritive political terms, my pardon, but I don't know off hand the proper names. By \"conservative\" I mean behavior that is a human tribe/person staying in one area, where sources of water, food, and shelter are well established. It is safe. \"Progressive\" on the other hand, is the behavior you are describing. A person/tribe that believes it can find better water, food, or shelter somewhere else. It is a risk, or gamble. But it has paid off for humans (in aggregate, over time, your results may vary). Humans have spread across the planet to all continents save Antarctica (discounting research stations). Further, I'd reckon that wishing, even for something fantastical, is the spur of technological innovation as well as religions. Why pound grain by hand if we could invent something better? Where do we go when we die? Lastly, the human brain is remarkably optimistic. Studies find that people, constantly think the future is going to work out better than our experience predict. Not like flying cars, talking dogs, or a diet soda that actually taste good. But rather that the stock they invest in will go up, or they don't need health insurance because they are healthy now. All this behavior is hardwired into the brain. We get a little squirt of dopamine when *anticipating* a happy reward. **Sometimes, we get more of a squirt anticipating the reward than actually receiving the reward**! Gambling addicts get their \"fix\" by *almost* winning, not by losing (obvious), but not by winning either (wtf!).",
"I'm a man, but when I was a boy, I was surrounded with fanstastical stories. There was Indiana Jones, there was Odysseus, Hercules, St. George and the Dragon, and James Bond, and all sorts of adventures. I wanted to be a fighter pilot, I wanted to be a knight, and go on adventures, sail across the seas, fight bandits along the roads, and save \"the Girl\" and fight \"evil\" and be everything like the stories. Then I grew up. No one does any of those things, and if they tried, they'd lose and die horribly. There aren't any highwaymen out to protect travelers from, and if I tried, I'd likely either die or be arrested. I can't go on adventures out to new places; they've all been discovered, and I'd get arrested for trespassing or illegal immigration or something. \"Evil\" is a subtle thing, and a hell of a lot harder to detect than finding Dragons, which do not and have never existed. I can't afford the time nor the money to go on wild adventures, and even if I could, I'd be forced into a mess of red tape, disclaimers and waivers, and all sorts of nonsense that would make the eventual trip all that more a drudgery than anything else. It's a great deal depressing and frustrating to know that I'll never be a Robin Hood, or heck a Bonnie and Clyde. We've lost that element of the \"unknown\" from our world. Of chaos. And now that I'm employed, married, and a father, I would welcome a dragon to come to us if it simply meant for a small time before my inevitable death, I got to live a childhood dream.",
"As an alien sentient rock once said \"Humans just lead short, boring, insignificant lives, so they make up stories to feel like they're a part of something bigger. They want to blame all the world's problems on some single enemy they can fight, instead of a complex network of interrelated forces beyond anyone's control.\"",
"Because real life is mundane. It involves going to the bathroom and other bodily functions. It involves going to work, and paying bills, and cleaning dishes. People tend to leave these details out of their fantasies. For example, people love to fantasize about living in past time periods, but living without indoor plumbing, air condtioning, modern medicine.... or even modern hygiene is not what they would imagine.",
"I think a lot of it stems from people feeling a void deep within themselves. We spend a great deal of our lives trying to fill these voids by attaining materialistic items or fantasizing about lives of grandeur that we hope will bring us closer to a more exhilarating and fulfilled life. *Once I get this, I'll be good.* You get it and then it's like, well..that was cool but now I just need to get this or get there. We have a very strong disposition to dissatisfaction..an insatiable appetite for more if you will. We're not happy or content with ourselves because the way society is set up, is that we are all essentially competing with each other. Others around us **appear** to have more, so we try and keep up with the joneses. Social media I feel has exacerbated this ubiquitous desire to live large. Everybody flexin' now, shit even I am too. Monkey see, monkey do I guess. I may have went a little off topic but nonetheless I believe it to be intrinsically related to the question at hand."
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6s3m7y | Why is it so difficult for people to change their perspective on something when the evidence clearly shows that they are wrong? | Particularly what I am wondering about is why it seems most people react with anger or fear when faced with evidence they may be wrong about something. I do understand it on some level, we are naturally inclined to look for the things that back up our own beliefs and reject the information that doesn't fit but I don't quite understand why this is such a difficult task for people and why it often turns into anger or even hate towards said evidence. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"This is the best (and most enjoyable) explanation I've ever found. URL_0",
"It's been called the backfire effect - contrary evidence doesn't change the (presumed wrong) opinion, but rather entrenches it. It's a form of [confirmation bias]( URL_0 ).",
"We often think of a belief as something based on evidence and argument, since that's the ideal, but in reality it is much messier than this. We might believe something because someone who we like also believes it, or because it makes us feel good, or because we fear a world in which it is untrue. If that's the case, we're emotionally invested in the belief, and will naturally respond with fear or anger when it's threatened. One powerful example is beliefs that are essential to some way of life, like a religion (or a family or a social group or a workplace). If giving up your religion would mean you no longer belong to your community, then changing your belief would have enormous practical and emotional consequences, causing you to abandon the only life you know. Evidence is almost irrelevant when it comes to beliefs like that."
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6s3roh | Mormon history? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"So I'll try be as unbiased as possible here because otherwise it'll get ugly between Mormons and Exmos. Full disclosure: Was LDS/Mormon for 18 years before leaving the Church 5 years ago. The history of the LDS Church starts with a man named Joseph Smith, who grew up in Palmyra in Upstate New York. It is here that Smith claims to have seen God and Jesus Christ in a vision to start his own church. From here Smith claims that he was visited later by an angel named Moroni three times, and was commanded to dig up the Golden Plates holding the newest part of scripture for translation. It is then from these that the Gold Plates are supposed to have been translated from a Reformed Egyptian language into the current Book of Mormon. Now here's a wee rabbit hole, the Book of Mormon is to act as a 3rd part of scripture to the Old and New Testaments. It tells of a prophet Lehi during the reign of Zedekiah in Jerusalem to flee Israel and find the Promised Land. They build an ark of sorts and travel to America. Jesus visits the Americas after his Crucifixion. The two groups are the Nephites (white), and Lamanites (dark). The Lamanites win an almighty battle where Moroni buries the scriptures and now the Lamanites are believed by Mormons to be the ancestors to the Native Americans. Back onto Mormon history post 1830. The LDS Church is established and gathers members in upstate NY with some men supporting Smith with money and gold to start the religion. Eventually Smith claims revelation to relocate the Church to Kirtland, Ohio. The Saints leave NY to OH and settle in the town, beginning their Polygamy in the upper tiers of the leadership, and start building temples on a remarkably Freemason type of way. They create a near-Communist way of living wherein all money and goods are given to the Church and are divided among the Saints equally. Smith starts a Banking Society which collapses and begins the dissent towards Mormons in Ohio. Thus Smith leaves to settle in Missouri. The LDS continue to multiply and grow but continue to be distrusted and disliked, many being very wary of Smith and his cohort. The Governor of Missouri orders an Extermination Order for Mormons within Missouri and again they flee, this time Nauvoo, Illinois. Smith continues to get into legal troubles, and in his eventual fatal decision, he burns a printing press who were discrediting Smith. This leads to his imprisonment in Carthage Prison, Illinois, where a mob surrounds the prison and shoots Smith, killing both Joseph and his brother Hyrum. This is referred to as the Martyrdom of Joseph Smith. Here is where a succession crisis emerges and the Mormons split into multiple sects over who becomes the next leader. There was Brigham Young, Sidney Rigdon, Joseph Smith III (his son), and others who led various smaller groups. Brigham Young won out for the largest group and proceeded to take the LDS members into then Mexican territory, what is now known as Utah. Along the way this group became known as Pioneers, who took the long trek through deathly cold, many dying on the journey. Eventually Young proclaims Salt Lake City as the centre-point for the new location of the Saints, and starts work on a new temple. Eventually Utah becomes ceded to the US in the Mexican-American war, and Utah Territory is established. In one of the darker times in Mormon history, Young declares war on the US and the Utah War is fought. In 1890 Utah wishes to become a State and the rule is that Polygamy must be completely removed from Mormon culture. LDS President Lorenzo Snow issues a Manifesto that Polygamy is to cease and as of April 1890 it has been banned within the official Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but remains a practice among Fundamentalists and other sects. Through this time there is a ban on the Priesthood and Temple Ordinances (required for Salvation in LDS belief) on black people, as proclaimed by Brigham Young to be \"the curse of Cain\". In 1976 this rule is finally reversed and no longer is there anything in the official Church doctrine that stipulates between races. Mormonism grows through missionary work initially through England and the Pacific Islands, continuing to this day under the leadership of Thomas Monson, where they are an international organisation with an official membership of over 12 million. I am in no means a Mormon scholar, so some of my dates or locations may be inaccurate."
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6s42he | How did early societies first think of making bread? | I've just made a loaf of bread and it struck me that it's not a particularly intuitive process. I get that early bread would be a much simpler, unleavened affair but I don't know why you'd even bother to mill the grains into flour in the first place. It seems like a very labor intensive process compared to simply cooking and eating the whole grain. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"> It seems like a very labor intensive process compared to simply cooking and eating the whole grain. It is, but cooking the whole grain requires you to cook it for a very long time, so that's not optimal either. A less time and energy intensive way of preparing grains is to crush them into groats, which cuts the cooking time by a significant margin. If you go further and mill it into a coarse meal, you get products like semolina and polenta. From there, it's not a big inventive step to mill the grain fine enough to be able to make a dough from it. People might have started doing that not in spite of being very labor intensive, but because of it: The value of the food you eat shows your status. If you could afford to eat bread every day, you had some money to your name. Eating porridge every day meant that you were too poor for such luxury. You can see a similar thing in the rice eating parts of Asia, where brown rice was a sign of poverty. Producing white rice was also a laborious and wasteful process. Today, there's a similar thing with steaks. Some people spend lots of money on prime cuts of beef, while considering offal and blood to be gross - even though throwing those away would be very wasteful. Similarly, some people started eating traditional or exotic grains like spelt, durum wheat and quinoa, while shunning cheap staples like wheat and rye.",
"This isn't a particularly easy question to answer in ELI5. No one can say what early man was thinking because they didn't exactly write down their thought processes as we often do today. I mean, we have pictorial evidence from Ancient Egypt (c2500 BCE or so) that shows they ate bread, but not their thought process in creating it."
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6s460d | What is a nature(as in Jesus Christ had two natures) | I was searching for an answer on how Christ could die if he was a god, and most branches of Christianity(except for Coptic and some others) say that he had two natures, divine and earthly. I searched the internet already for explanations, but I can't understand any of them, so I hope I'll have better luck here. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The nature of an object is essentially what it is, what properties it has and what it does add up to its nature, Christ had two natures as he had the properties of both a mortal person, and a divine being."
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6s495x | What was "Pied" about the Pied Piper? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"\"Pied\" is an archaic term for something that's multicolored. The piper wore multicolored clothing.",
"His clothes. Pied means many-colored. It's an old word that was used in Middle-English when that folk tale was written. A Hawaiian shirt is pied. So is a tie-dye. Impress your friends next time the word is apropos! Joseph and his amazing techni-colored dreamcoat could have been named \"Joseph and his Pied Coat\" and it would mean the same thing. Admittedly it doesn't have the same ring to it however."
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6s4z0l | What is the difference between an atheist, an agnostic and a secular? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"An atheist is a person who does not believe in any higher power. An agnostic is a person who believes it's impossible to know whether or not a higher power exists. Agnostics may be divided into agnostic theists and agnostic atheists. An agnostic theist believes that it's impossible to know whether or not a higher power exists, but holds a personal belief in one. An agnostic atheist believe's it's impossible to know, and also does not personally believe in a higher power. Secular is just a descriptor for a thing that is non-religious in nature. It's not as much of a personal label as agnostic or atheist (although some may call themselves secular), but instead a way to describe a certain institution or activity.",
"Short answer is that 'agnostics' are people who don't feel like getting into an argument about religion when asked. Really, the question \"Do you believe in god(s)?\" has a easy yes or no answer, because you either do or don't. But people don't like being labelled and associated to others whom they may not like and don't always feel like arguing their belief or lack thereof. Definition: Atheist=not a theist agnostic=open to doubt gnostic=firm in belief Theist=believes in a deity Secular means that something is not religious, or doesn't take religion into account. A secular law for example won't discriminate between people of differing religious beliefs. Agnostic and gnostic are both adjectives that can be used to describe atheists and theists. Almost all atheists would fall into the category most people ascribe to agnostics.",
"None of these are exactly right but they're all close. Atheist: Not a theist (someone that believes in a god). So someone that does not *believe* in a god. Agnostic: Someone that does not claim to *know* that there is a god. You could be an agnostic Christian by saying \"I don't know if there's a god but I believe in one.\" Most Atheists are also agnostic because they do not claim to know that there is no god. Secular: No representations on religion. A secular position is one that makes no representation on religion. The government is secular (or is supposed to be) in that it makes no representations on which religion or lack of religion is correct. This allows all faiths (and non-faiths) to participate equally in theory."
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6s5hpc | Why do young children/toddlers love Sesame Street and other kids shows so much? | Is there some innate or inherent reason children are so drawn to shows like Sesame Street? Was watching my 1 year old nieces yesterday and they seemed to be absolutely captivated by it. Looked like they could watch it for hours! | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Not a doctor, psychologist or anything, but I do have 2 kids (3 years and younger). What I've come to figure out are quite a few things: * Children love colors. I would assume this kind of sets something off in their brain, especially when very, very young (infants can't really see colors, they gain that over time, so that would definitely keep their attention). * Look at the faces in animated shows, or on shows like Sesame Street that aren't animated but have puppets, costumes, etc. They make those faces inviting for anyone, but especially children. They have big eyes, usually very defined, but simple facial structures. * The plots are extremely simple. Kids have NO idea what's going on when you're watching NCIS, Game of Thrones, the news. There's nothing interesting for them. Kids care about games, singing, running, playing, counting, ABC's, all kinds of simple stuff. These shows focus on subjects like that. If you make something extremely complicated for a show, kids will walk away in a minute or two, if they can't follow along with what's going on (usually). * A lot of the shows are interactive (clap for this, say this with me!). It's a lot like when you're playing with children, you tell them to catch a ball, and they're like \"heck yeah let's go!!!!!!\" kids love that stuff, they love stimulation. TL;DR: kids love colors and mental/physical stimulation, that's how they learn and play. That's my take any way."
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6s9ftq | How is it possible to attain an A+ BBB rating, yet have a 99% negative customer satisfaction rating. | Navient. URL_0 | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The BBB considers the nature of complaints, the nature of the business, and the company's attempts to address complaints. Navient is a collections agency that services delinquent student loans, and the negative reviews here are mostly a case of people shooting the messenger. The BBB understands this, and considers Navient a reputable business despite the misplaced anger.",
"The BBB is not some kind of impartial ratings agency. They are a business that charges other businesses to be rated. You can simply pay them for a good rating."
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6s9wve | Is there a reason parents tend to speak in the third person to their young children? | 21-year-old father of none and probable future parent here. I seem to notice moms say, "What did Mommy say?" Perhaps fathers saying "Look at Daddy!" as he takes a picture of his two-year-old. It happens all the time: parents refer to themselves in the third person, instead of using personal pronouns (I, you, him, "Look at me!", etc.) Is there a reason behind this? Do children not have the ability to understand personal pronouns? Contrarily, are children able to understand personal pronouns, but parents tend to talk without them because it's more of a culture norm? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Children really do tend to have issues with things like pronouns. Because they're words that don't always mean the same thing. It takes time to learn that \"I\" and \"you\" and \"he\" and \"she\" are understand by context. Whereas \"mommy\" is just \"mommy\" like \"cookie\" is just \"cookie.\" Its a skill we overlook because of how basic it is to us, but to a little kid just trying to figure out how words work, it takes a big of time.",
"I'm a parent, not a psychologist: I do refer to myself in the third person to my child because I feel they understand who Daddy/Mommy is. They would be confused who \"me\" or \"I\" is. I've noticed that I did change to first person when they started to communicate back to me."
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6s9xo8 | Why do we feel like pop music is getting more and more terrible? Is it just an impression caused by the sorting bias (the fact that our brain mostly remembers the good things from the past) ? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"- A lot of modern pop music is mass produced and based off a small selection of chords. Large teams of people write the songs, but a small monopoly of people produce them. - Shows like Pop Idol/X Factor want to get someone on board to produce songs as soon as possible and aren't overly concerned about clichéd lyrics etc. - Music from a few years ago tended to involve dubstep, which is innovative and new - but also stretches the boundaries of musical-ness and risks sounding more like noise. - Some pop songs rely heavily on auto-tune and are more focused on image than on the music itself. - Modern music sometimes involves hip-hop, which involves remixing old songs rather than creating new ones from scratch (which is fine if you're good at it, but gets old if people remix the same songs or run out of songs to sample). - People are more reliant on individual instruments and computers than a full band or orchestra to perform their music.",
"It may actually be getting worse. Pop music is a place in time. It is fueled by a combination of the power of radio play and the hegemony of record companies. Both of these are waning. It is likely that as this happens talent stains away from the pool music industry toward other genres.",
"I think Pop Music has always been defined around a few key figures with some otherwise forgetful faces filling the rest of the catalog with one hit wonders and careers defined to a certain decade. For instance I think Bruno Mars might be vying for the position of this Generation's Prince or Michael Jackson. I think the worst genre in terms of lack of change is country music. I'd like to see them take influences from Punk and and bluegrass maybe. Like Steve'n Seagulls URL_0 On an unrelated note, I think pop music will never actually die, because it's like the fizz on top of everybody's drink. Sure there's people who really like specific genres, but Pop music is supposed to be just generic enough that there's a something for everyone. That's why I kinda think guys like Bruno Mars know what they're doing, because they don't get overly comfortable with one genre, but they stretch their legs out by creating hits around other genres, even the ones you don't expect for a pop song. For instance Avicii's Hey Brother is basically just EDM Bluegrass. Bruno Mars did a live version of the lazy song which was basically ska, which suits him for some reason. My thing with Pop music is I think it works best when it tries to incorporate a little bit of everything, whether that be rap, country, rock, bluegrass, punk, edm, polka, whatever. I just want pop music to be easy to understand but have some musical variety. If the songs all sound the same that just makes me not want to listen to them.",
"Not everyone thinks pop music is getting terrible. I'd actually argue that the 2010s is a golden age for pop music. The top 40 has mostly been the same bland stuff, but digging a bit deeper and you find the gems. OP, you'll have much better luck if you ask at /r/nostupidquestions"
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6sabe5 | How do trains/airlines/etc decide the age to stop letting children on for free? Wouldn't you be able to lie about their age? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"> How do trains/airlines/etc decide the age to stop letting children on for free? It is a marketing decision where the marketing department guesses what ages would be enough incentive to gather business they might otherwise lose to competitors. > Wouldn't you be able to lie about their age? Maybe. It isn't a big problem for such companies because they get at least one ticket sold, and if the costs of an additional passenger are burdensome then they wouldn't be offering free passage.",
"You can lie about age in certain instances but sometimes even children who are within the age limit look too old. I had this problem a lot when I was growing up. I'm not sure it was an issue this far back but I had a problem with it a lot for sporting event giveaways and things like that."
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6sb8si | Why was/is pizza the most popular delivery food in the west? | Is there a reason that pizza in particular became a popular delivery food as opposed to sandwiches or hamburgers? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Pretty much every ingredient in pizza is low cost and shelf stable. Pizza can be customized many different ways but still made quickly. The nature of pizza cooking is fast but holds for a significant period. This all makes delivery possible with low overhead and lots of options with a product that is still fresh when delivered. Burgers require perishables, take too long to cook and aren't peak after 10 minutes of sitting.",
"It's mostly subsidized ingredients which are kept dirt cheap in the west - flour and cheese.",
"To add onto other people's points it's also great for parties or feeding a lot of people at once.",
"carb heavy so dollar to calorie it goes a long way. especially deep dish. its typically available at a wider range of time. at least for dominoes/pizza hut, theyre fucking everywhere, so small towns have them too. its just really convenient",
"Cause they can customize it and cook it in 15-20 minutes... Then deliver it in 30-45 minutes.",
"$15 pizza can feed 3 people while a $10 meal anywhere else only feeds one. It's really that simple. Cost and taste."
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6sbmfy | How does China enforce its internet restrictions and how do they deal with people that try to circumvent those? | Even though some websites are technically blocked, there appears to be no real legal consequences for people who access sites like Facebook or Youtube. I heard people from mainland China openly mention how they use VPN or a proxy to access Youtube and they don't get fined by authorities or arrested. Some Chinese are even employed by Facebook or Google and face any legal issues afterwards. If the Chinese government is more serious about the ban of certain sites they would crackdown on people who are members of Facebook or other sites | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Lived in China for 4 years - at this point it's almost more of a symbolic thing. They don't *really* care if you use a VPN, the point is just that it's easier for you to use the Chinese alternatives (assuming you're Chinese). The rest of the reason for the block is mostly economic. By making Youtube/Google/FB/etc hard to use in China, they automatically promote their Chinese competitors. For most people, it's not worth it to use, say, Facebook if they have to download and run a VPN to do so. And if most people don't want to / know how to do that, then there's no point for the people who are fine with getting around the block to do so, since none of their friends use Facebook or whatever anyways. So you end up having either tiny niche groups of people bypassing blocks, or foreigners (who the government obviously doesn't bother too much). At this point there are many alternatives to all the popular western blocked sites, things like Baidu or Weibo or even WeChat probably would not have been so successful if China hadn't stifled growth of sites like Google and Facebook from early on. And as a small note answering your question, they basically just block things the same way that like a school would block sites for school computers except on a larger scale (starting higher up on the chain of internet service).",
"China doesn't really care people being able to access certain websites at all, they care about people being able to access those things *easily*. Its a matter of being able to control media on least common denominator level, sure people can get around it, generally decently educated at least middle class people. But kids and poorer people aren't as likely to circumvent it. China has a billion people, they don't care about a few here or there bypassing state media, they care about the overall picture."
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6sbmno | Why is it that older music on the radio is censored, while newer songs containing offending words are still played unedited? | An example would be in Sublime's Santaria where the word punk ass is still censored, as opposed to many newer songs that aren't censored for the same words. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The censoring is done by the record labels at the time of the albums release and would reflect the current sensitivities to offensive words and the labels' ideas of what the intended market would or wouldn't find offensive. A good example of this is a song released in 2000 by the band Dixie Chicks called Goodbye Earl. The record label decided to censor the lyrics \"cause Earl had to die\" presumably to not offended the arguably more conservative country music fans base that would be hearing the song on the radio.",
"They didnt re-record the radio versions of those older songs years later when peoples became desensitized to such language."
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6sbrvb | How did popular trends catch on before modern technology? | When I say modern technology I mean before photography and fast forms of transportation; if I had to put an era I'd say pre industrial revolution. Today trends pick up fast due to television and the internet but how did they pick up before? It seems like it would be hard for a fashion or music trend to start when spreading it would take a lot longer. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The high society frequently held gatherings; dances, feasts, games, balls, etcetera. This is where they would share the latest fashions and trends. High society fashion very slowly trickled down to the lower classes, once those fashions and trends became inexpensive enough for the lower class to afford."
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6sbu4s | Why aren't there black keys between all the white keys on a piano? | If the black keys are halfway points between the notes, shouldn't there be one between all the notes? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"All the keys on the keyboard are a halftone apart. On a piano if you play all the white keys from C to C that is a major scale. A major scale requires a half tone in a couple places to sound \"correct\". As a result of this certain notes do not have a sharp or flat note(a black key) associated with them.",
"There are 12 notes A - A# - B - C - C# - D - D# - E - F - F# - G - G# The white keys are A B C D E F G (C major scale).. The # means sharp, also they are the black keys on the piano.. Notice how B goes directly to C, no # note? And same with E and F.. Those are the places on the keyboard where you have two white keys in a row",
"The piano is arranged in octaves, which are alternating sets of 2 and 3 black keys, with 7 white keys. The black keys are sharps and flats (accidentals), not \"halfway points between notes\". However, some keys are used for multiple notes (enharmonics), F sharp is the same as G flat, for example. The spaces where there are no black keys show that the two white keys are enharmonic when used as sharps/flats.",
"The piano keyboard is arranged so that all the white keys form a C Major or A Minor scale. (There are other modes that fit, such as E Phrygian, but these are the most commonly-used.) The notes in these scales are not evenly-spaced frequencies e.g. C and D are a whole step apart, but E and F are a half-step apart. So your question can also be \"why are musical scales spaced the way they are, unevenly?\", and the answer is a combination of maths and history. We're squeezing historical scales that sound \"good\", based on fundamental harmonies, in to a 12-tone system that has a mathematical basis."
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6sc433 | How did the idea of three meals a day become normal? | Ive heard of people eating 6 meals a day and stuff like that and it made me wonder how three meals become the norm. Is it healthier to eat three meals? Was it always three meals? If not, how did it become three meals? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Actually, I remember watching a documentary on this yeeeears ago answering a similar question (why high tea became a thing). Apologies for not being precise, but the principle was this. Prior to the industrial revolution, it was typical of families to eat 2 meals a day (obviously this is a generalisation as class/locality/vocation etc. will deviate from this. I'm talking about working class Britons). This would be a large breakfast and a large evening meal at the end of the working day. The advent of the industrial revolution and increased mining and factory efforts led to workers facing different working hours (longer, continuous days rather than being able to take a break from work for the evening meal and then continue as required). This led to the women around the house starting to have a small snack or break in the early afternoon (the beginning of high tea), which transpired in the middle/upper class as being sandwiches and something sweet with hot tea. Note that in working classes, the women would often be working during the day so would follow a similar pattern as men. The advent of high tea caused a knock on effect of the evening meal becoming later and the men - after already longer working days than their counterparts 100 years prior - started taking small tins or tidbits of food in in the morning to extend the (custom) teabreak into a full lunch break. Lunch means just a small meal and at this time wasn't localised to a time. During the 19th/20th century it became customary to have lunch around midday and like many trends (table manners, use of salt and pepper, dunking biscuits in tea), all these practices spread naturally around the globe, mostly due to the influential reaches of the empire. Thus 3 meals/day is a norm in modern society. What is healthier? Well, dietary studies are wooly to say the least and although there is evidence indicating multiple small meals can have linked health benefits (meta-analysis shows tenuous links to reducing cardiovascular disease risk), that does not mean to say two meals a day is unhealthy, much like intermittent fasting etc. meal number decision can complement a lifestyle choice or convenience rather than being black/white healthy or not. Practicality and goal should dominate meal frequency rather than a generic 'be more healthy'.",
"Answered quite accessibly over in r/askhistorians. This question is asked enough to be in the FAQ. [Did early humans eat 3 meals a day? When/where did the tradition of eating 3 meals a day start?]( URL_1 ) Top answer ... > *Short Answer: At least as far back as the middle ages, possibly earlier depending on how you read the classical sources.* > This site has both interesting information about the history of food, as well as citations for the books where the author found her information. Here's a relevant quote: \"...what were the meal times and how often did people eat a day? The very poor doubtless ate when they could, but the slightly better-off peasants seem generally to have eaten three times a day. These meals consisted of breakfast at a very early hour to allow for dinner at about 9 a.m., or not later than 10.00 a.m., and supper probably before it got dark, perhaps at 3.00 p.m. in the winter. The times and number of meals were originally derived from the hours of devotions of the Church. Monks ate the main meal of their day after the celebration of nones, which was nine hours after daybreak. This was in practice at some time between midday and 3.00 p.m. The evening meal had to be a reasonable time after this, at or after Vespers (around sunset). Three meals a day were accepted as reasonable by most later sixteenth-century writers, such as Andrew Borde, although he thought that this was only good for the labouring man: anyone else should be content with two.\" Citation: Food and Feast in Medieval England, P.W. Hammond [Wrens Park Publishing:Pheonix Mill] 1993 (p. 104-5) Taken From: URL_0"
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6schtw | Why do Asian tourists wear medical face masks? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"In Japan (and most likely some other East Asian countries), it is considered polite to cover your mouth and nose when you have a cold or are ill in some way. This is to prevent the sick person from breathing/sneezing/coughing on and infecting other people. They may also use masks to prevent themselves from catching viruses from other people, when out in public. When tourists from the countries where this is normal practice go to the West, they often bring this custom with them as it is a cultural norm for them.",
"It's common in some Asian countries to wear a medical mask when you're sick in order not to infect others you may interact with.",
"They are used if: You are sick and don't want to spread it. You don't want to get sick. Their is a lot of pollution and you don't want your lungs to die.",
"For starters, it's common practice in Asia to cover your face when you're sick. Also, many of them are used to constantly wearing it back at their home because of high pollution levels, especially if they're from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and other highly polluted cities.",
"It's actually a pretty smart and considerate practice to prevent the spread of infection.",
"I'm sure the reason is different between each tourist, but from what I gather it's a combination of old Eastern Asian culture to protect against bad air/chi, newer Asian culture protecting from pollution and airborne illness (japan and china are very dense, population-wise, and outside countries could have who-knows-what), or simply a sign of unwillingness to communicate; just like people wearing headphones.",
"Couple of reasons.. to stop the spread of germs, also so they don't inhale toxic pollution. Not sure how they culturally developed to do this and we didnt but theoretically it's much healthier. I used to work with a Chinese guy and every time he got a cold he would wear a mask so he didn't pass it on.",
"On top of quasi-medical reasoning/culture, age group of 15 - 35 are wearing masks for partially cosmetic reason. Because some parents have been neglecting for kids dental bracing, many kids have suffered misaligned, organic growth of their teeth. This is probably more common reason for age of 25 - 35. For younger generation, there are some sort of mental issues. Girls are usually cover their faces when they go out but too lazy to do makeups. Dudes may wear when he's not clean shaved. Or simply, they feel more relieved by covering their lower half of the face. I've tried several times. It's weird and getting uncomfortable after a while, but I noticed some sort of isolation and protection from outside world. There is a wikipedia article about this trend, but it hasn't been translated to English. Will post it here anyways and hope someone translate for us ;) URL_0",
"Other people have already given the most common reasons, but vanity also plays a part in recent years. A lot of Japanese girls have confessed to wearing the masks because it draws attention to their eyes, and they actually manufacture masks that are made to make your face appear smaller (a small face is one of their beauty 'ideals'). Famous individuals also wear them in public to blend in regardless of whether or not they're warding off illness/are sick themselves.",
"The population of Japan is ~40% of the population of the US, on an island that is ~4% of the size of the US. (This is a land mass roughly the size of Montana, with a population 128 times the population of Montana.) Japanese sensibilities about cleanliness, politeness, and health, plus the realities of living in such a crowded environment, combine such that some people wear the masks to keep any airborne diseases out, and anyone who is feeling sick or has a cold wears a mask to keep any airborne diseases they might have from infecting everyone else. In such crowded places, personal space is necessarily more a state of mind, rather than actual space between one person and another... people cultivate their personal space, keeping the world out to whatever extent they desire. (This leads to interesting cultural situations... in the US, if you accidentally bump into someone you generally apologize. For some places in Asia, if you apologize you just intruded on their space a *second* time.) Young Japanesians also wear the masks as a fashion accessory, sort of a symbol of that personal separateness or isolation."
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6sd83q | Why do people in poorer neighborhoods walk in the street instead of on the perfectly good (more or less) sidewalk? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"When you are walking on the sidewalk you are more likely to be accosted by someone and drug out of view....and the flip side of that...when you are walking on the sidewalk, frequently out of view behind cars, you are more likely to have both nosey neighbors and police think you are up to something. Walking out in the street makes you clearly open and visible. If your dark skinned in America its one of the safest places to be....Im way less worried about a car than I am a cop rolling up or a crackhead hopping out."
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6sdwq2 | During Nazi occupations, why didn't Jewish citizens just denounce Judaism to blend in with the rest of the population? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You couldn't really denounce Judaism, as you are Jewish by Birth, meaning when your mother was a Jew so were you. The Nazis went to all extremes so you had to prove (with birth certificates and copies from other registries such as the Catholic church's) that you were in fact not Jewish by blood. Whether or not you were practicing the religion didn't matter.",
"It was not a religious persecution, it was an ethnic purging. You cannot just renounce Judaism because it is your ethnicity, and by Nazi definitions if you had a single Grandparent that was Jewish you were Jewish. To \"renounce\" that you would not only have to give up your religion but you would have to forge birth records, church baptismal and communion records, etc. A few were able to do this complicated thing, but it was not something available to the general Jewish populace as you seem to think.",
"Some actually tried this. However, under the Nuremberg laws, if you had a grandparent who was Jewish, regardless of whether you even looked the part, you were classified as Jewish. Interestingly enough though, and forgive me if this is going off on a tangent, there was a sure fire way to stay out of the camps. Namely, any jewish man who served with the kriegsmarine, was off limits to arrest. If a jewish man, serving for the kriegsmarine, could get a \"German Blood Certificate\" (which is basically saying you were born in Germany), then service with the kriegsmarine was not only possible, but common. Vice Admiral Bernhard Rogge was Jewish, just for example. Erich Raeder devotes an entire chapter to this in his memoirs, where he basically spells out why the Jewish sailors were off limits. It basically boiled down to the head of the kreigsmarine (before Doenitz) essentially telling Hitler, that if the gestapo started arresting his sailors, then not a single ship, nor submarine would ever leave port. Hitler backed down, and while Doenitz never pressed the issue himself, he did seem to support the prior decision. edit: Minor note here, but I believe the protection of the sailor extended to his immediate family, ie his wife and children. However I am not one hundred percent certain on this. However, it's worth noting that of the entire kriegsmarine, something like five percent of the sailors could claim jewish ancestry.",
"Wouldn't have worked, the Nazis were not against Judaism as a religion, they were against Jewishness as an ethnicity -- a people.",
"Because \"Jews don't get to decide if they are Jewish.\" The Nazis were doing the defining, and their definition had to do with family lineage, and not synagogue attendance. I don't have a link, but there's a story of a catholic nun being rounded up and executed as a \"Jew\" because one of her grandparents were Jewish.",
"You can't really denounce being an ethnic Jewish person. That's like asking why slaves didn't just denounce being African to obtain freedom in America 300 years ago.",
"It's not like timing would have mattered. Nazis started identifying registering and recording Jews decades before the war and the Holocaust. It's hard to say you're not Jewish when for the past 5 years you were a registered Jew and lived in same house as registered Jews in the Jewish ghetto.",
"Many tried. They were found out because the Nazis checked the birth records, or they were turned in by their neighbors who knew them from when they were openly practicing.",
"Quick story. When I was stationed in Germany, I made friends with a family from Israel. Jewish Dad was there working for a company that makes circuit boards. They sent their daughter to the American department of defense school (Paid tuition to do so). Part of German taxes, apparently, was that some of your salary must go to a church. JD didn't want to pay taxes to a church. The German tax department told him that because he is a Jew, he could send it to a synagogue. He said that he is an athiest. (Not sure if that is true or not). They said, well you're still a Jew so you must pay it to a synagogue. He said that he wasn't a Jew, he was an Israeli. Eventually he won and didn't have to pay the tax.",
"Judaism is not [edit: *just*] a religion, it is also a cultural and ethnic *identity*. You can't renounce/denounce your DNA and blood. The Nazis didn't care about *belief* in Judaism, they were trying to wipe out anyone with Jewish blood in their veins to achieve some sort of \"racial purity\". The Nazis loved the \"show me your papers\" thing, which was extremely difficult to dodge given the Nazis' record-keeping skills, and if you had more than some threshold of Jewish blood - 25%, I think? one grandparent? - you were Jewish. They took calipers and measured noses and skull shapes, and if they were outside of some Aryan ideal, you were Jewish. They recorded eye color and hair color, to show how far Jews, Roma, people with disabilities or handicaps, and anyone with a different color of skin were from the Nazi ideal of a pure blonde-haired and blue-eyed Aryan race. Even today, as it has been for a couple of thousand years, Judaism is more of an identity than a religion. They didn't have the option of tearing up a book or trampling a flag or swearing conversion to some other more acceptable religion. The Nazis gave zero fucks what you did or didn't believe... if you had \"impure\" blood in your veins you were a target.",
"What you are thinking of did happen more commonly in Europe during the Inquisition and other religious persecutions. That is why you have so many families in Europe with secretly jewish roots that they have been rediscovering in recent generations. But with the Nazis, as others have pointed out, it was more of an ethnic purge, where any Jewish ancestor would have gotten you a train ticket to the wrong destination.",
"Another thing missing here is being a heretic. To renounce ones faith is to renounce God. Judaism has no one official formulation of dogma against which heresy can be defined, it has no clear-cut definition of heresy. But, one can still be labeled a heretic or apostate, for various reasons, not officially listed in writing but rather agreed upon by the temple and rabbis/community. And then there is the age old \"Honor\" of dying for ones religious faith and not renouncing God or ones faith. Many of the catholic saints are granted sainthood because of this. Now, we do not have saints in the catholic sense, but rather k’doshim and speak of their Kiddush HaShem. Basically your life and devotion proves you are a good person who devoted your life to God and his teachings."
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6segiv | Why is dental care separate from medical care? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: Why does Health Care not cover Dental, Seems like teeth rotting out is bad for your Health? ]( URL_2 ) 1. [ELI5: Why is dental care considered to be \"separate\" from other kinds of medical care? Is it this way outside the US/Canada? ]( URL_1 ) 1. [ELI5: Medical vs. Dental: Why is there a difference? If your teeth are part of the human body why is dentistry kept completely separate -- even requiring separate insurance? ]( URL_0 ) 1. [ELI5:why are dentists their own separate \"thing\" and not like any other specialty doctor? ]( URL_4 ) 1. [Why is dentistry its own branch of medical care? ]( URL_3 )",
"Just want to pitch this in: In some places this is not the case. Where I grew up (A native american reservation) due to contract health (a treaty right thing) healthcare was bundled in with dental as the same thing. In my home town's hospital there's a dental department. It's awesome.",
"Simple. To make more money. No reason why they wouldn't be able to bundle it to one. Laziness and money."
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6setru | How are tattoo artists exempt from law? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"There are broad exceptions to copyright that are called Fair Use. Fair use isn't defined by copyright laws but it can be used a defense when the rights holder is suing you. One of the tests of Fair Use is whether the infringement will have a negative impact on the market for the original item. If you were selling bootleg copies of Cinderella on the street then it's pretty easy to see that you are having a negative impact on the market. But, there's no one on Earth who is going to see one of the seven dwarves on your arm and decide that they don't need to watch the movie because of that.",
"Copyright law is complex, but in practical terms, the lawyers will go after the big fish and ignore the small fish, it's not worth their time. Are you gonna pay a lawyer $200 per hour to go after a tattoo artist for making a $50 tattoo of Mickey, or is it smarter to go after that t-shirt printer that just made 40,000 t-shirts with Mickey on them and sold them for $10 each? $400,000 vs $50. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. Plus have you ever seen a rich tattoo guy? Most of them are just barely squeeking by.",
"They aren't exempt from the law. But Disney would need to track down these guys and sue them and they have bigger fish to fry.",
"Those artists are breaking the law, and you, as their customer are responsible. By the same logic, if the tattooist invented the art on your arm, they own the copyright to it. Could you be sued? = Yes. Warner Brothers sued some tattoo folks for using bugs bunny and foghorn leghorn. Could you lose money? = Maybe. WB lost their case because they couldn't prove that they lost any money as a result. That's no guarantee that the next case will go the same way, and being sued by Disney would be unfun. {Of course it goes without saying that you should not get legal advice from randoms on the Internet. When in doubt, see a lawyer.}"
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6sf4w1 | What causes teenagers to feel like "no one understands what I'm going through"? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"because they gradually are becoming self-aware and since they've never experienced it before think they are the only one. Only later after getting some experience do they realize they are pretty normal. Too young and you can't think for yourself Too old and you are used to doing it The transition between is the mind expanding experience.",
"Because the kid doesn't understand what they are going through, and they aren't mature enough to contemplate anyone knowing something they don't.",
"Probably because this is a major transitional time for them. They are coming into the realization that they will soon be responsible for their own lives and decisions and they are having a hard time accepting this fact. They feel like no one else understands how they feel, partially because each person goes through this individually, in their own way."
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6sf7rp | Why are puns generally frowned upon (albeit humorously)? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"because groaning and rolling your eyes is the response we hope for when we make a terrible pun. It's basically applause",
"Because they're low effort, short jokes. They're like a reddit shit post. It can be funny, but it can't be elaborate and abstract.",
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [Do people actually hate puns or do they just pretend not to like them whenever they hear one? ]( URL_1 ) 1. [Why are puns considered \"bad\" jokes? ]( URL_3 ) 1. [ELI5: Why do people hate puns so much? I feel like they can be some of the most clever forms of jokes. ]( URL_2 ) 1. [Why are puns considered \"bad\"? ]( URL_0 )"
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6sf8u6 | Why are lie detectors used during a police hiring process when they cannot be used in a court of law to determine someone's guilt? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Former LEO here. Bottom line: it's a discriminator for applicants. Like someone else said, they put you in a room, ask you questions, and get you to either confess (lie about what you previously filled out, which will drop you from the hiring process) or give them an excuse not to hire you, if you stick to your story. Example: you pass all the preliminary screening, the PT test, the interview, etc. now comes the poly. There's just something about you they don't like, but they can't find a tangible excuse to not hire you. So they give you the poly and then say your results came back \"inconclusive.\" \"Look, we're not saying you lied, just the results were, 'inconclusive'.\" This is typical at smaller depts with maybe only one opening and 15 applicants. They may think you look too young, or too old, or too white, or too female, but they can't *not* hire you for that. The poly gives the dept an out. Obligatory \"this blew up\" edit: I'll try to get to everyone. I believe if you took the time to respond to me, I can take the time to respond to you. I'll do my best. Just some quick answers: LEO = law enforcement officer Why do depts even do this and not just be \"straight shooters\" to applicants? .... I dunno, small town police depts are seeping in small town politics and probably don't want the drama. Or are saving money by avoiding a law suit... for another law suit. \"Too white\" ... congratulations to the 50% of you who got the joke. My experience is in Small Town, USA. A few commenters are letting me know they're outside the US.",
"Former criminal defense lawyer here. Polygraph tests are nothing more than an excuse to get you into a room with a trained interrogator. While the results of the test (whether the machine says you were lying or not) cannot be used as evidence against you in a criminal trial, everything you say to the interrogator can be, and this includes before and after the test is conducted. For example, if you submit to a polygraph, you'll typically have to fill out a questionnaire beforehand. You then go in and talk to the examiner about the questions. He/she might ask you to clarify or explain answers, help him \"understand\" what you mean by X, or Y, etc. Then, after the test, the examiner will go over the results with you. The examiner might say \"Oh, this answer here shows you were lying. Do you want to come clean about that? It will only help you.\" You get nervous, think you have to confess, so you do. Then you start confessing to everything else you ever did. And that's how the state gets evidence. Your confessions are admissible as evidence to prove your guilt. You just helped the state convict you of a crime. Congrats. Getting you to confess, and say anything against your interests that the prosecutor can use against you at trial is the entire point of the exercise. It has nothing to to with whether the machine is accurately judging your truthfulness. As to hiring police officers, I don't have any first hand experience with that.",
"It's an intimidation tactic. I made it through the LAPD hiring process, but didn't accept the offer. The lie detector was a big part of it. They use it to get you to admit things you wouldn't admit. \"You said you didn't do the thing.\" \"I didn't\" \"This says you did.\" \"I did\" \"You lied.\" If you stick to your answers, you'll be fine. When I was going through the process, I had never, ever touched drugs, not even pot (today is a different story). They insisted I was lying about my drug use, which I knew full well I wasn't.",
"I've taken 3 polygraphs. The defense attorney is absolutely correct in the assertion that it's to get you to speak to a trained interrogator. But with the hiring process of a department, there's a lot of subjectivity. This doesn't have to be admissible in court to prevent you from being hired. TL;DR, they ask non-response, control, and variable questions. For the full information: Non-response questions are things they know won't escalate your heart rate or breathing patterns (what is being measured by the chest and belly band and the heart rate monitor on your finger). \"Is your name really Forumordie? Are we currently in the state of Texas?\"These, they tell you, establish your \"baseline\" so they know what truthful responses look like. They'll likely also ask something like, \"Are you the queen of England\" and then state that the machine jumped and so now they have this pattern and they know when you lie. Basically total bullshit, but they're trying to convince you that the machine is a magi and it knows your soul Control questions are those things that they want you to lie about. \"Have you ever lied to avoid getting into trouble\". Of course you have. Everyone has. If you say \"Yes\", they'll likely dive deep into it, make it seem like a big deal, and ask you for every detail. The goal being to make you very nervous and spike all of those measurable bioindicators. They'll likely then come back and say, \"outside of the one instance you've told me about, have you ever lied to get out of trouble?\" Well the guy was just a dick, so now you're going to say \"No\". This is what they're actually measuring. Because of course you have. Your breathing pattern changes, your pulse raises, you're likely going to get clammy, and you're more than likely on camera. Now they know what it looks like when you lie. But, the important thing is, they don't give a shit about a control question's answers during this process, they're just looking for your bioindicator. Then there are the variable questions. These are the ones that matter. \"Have you ever done drugs that you didn't tell us about in the pre-polygraph questionnaire? Have you ever performed a sexual act with a minor? Have you ever stolen from an employer?\" At this point, they're looking for the control response in the variable question's answer. In the end, it's about recognizing the tactics and controlling your response. Know that as soon as the machine is attached to you, you've started. It's measuring everything immediately. I have a beat in my head for breathing. \"1-2-3 in, 1-2-3 out\". It keeps you calm, focused on something other than your nerves, and it keeps a consistent breathing pattern. When you notice a control question, fluctuate that pattern. \"1-2 in pause, 1-2-3-4 out/ 1-2 in 1-2 out\". It slightly affects your pulse and the breathing changes. Just don't overdo it. A long(er than this post ended up being) read is in the link. It's got a lot of history behind it as well as reasons why it's not Court admissible. Hope this helps. [The Lie Behind the Lie Detector]( URL_0 )",
"FBI agent I know has never had a sip of alcohol or cigarette or any drug in his life. When hired he spent two hours on the polygraph being questioned about how this could be true. They simply could not believe that any 24 year old could have never have even sampled a legal or illegal drug.",
"Penn and Teller's show Bullshit covers the lie detector and even shows you how to beat it in season 7, episode 5, if y'all are interested. Edit: As the name would suggest, the show is for adults and thus contains adult language and, depending on the show, nudity. FYI.",
"as someone who researched and built these devices for a job... simply because they are bullshit and most the only reason they \"work\" at all is that most people think they do, thereby getting anxious. They aren't lie detectors at all, they measure acute changes in your \"anxiety\" levels. These can easily be faked during true statements, and you can meditate or relax on false statements and it will throw the devices off. Bottom line, they are bullshit, but most people don't realize this and even if they do they aren't trained enough to evoke the same reactions (some of which are part of the autonomous nervous system, which isn't directly controllable consciously or at least with out practice) by will.",
"First, a polygraph is not a \"lie detector.\" It's exactly what it says it is: It records (-graph) a variety (poly-) of biological stimiuli (heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, skin conductivity, etc.). Those are recorded while you are asked questions, and someone interprets the polygraph data to see if there are changes when certain questions were asked or answers given. When you're in a court of law, and the standard of guilt is \"beyond reasonable doubt,\" and the polygraph doesn't really PROVE anything other than \"when asked this question, the subject's pulse quickened.\" It doesn't really say WHY. It can't. But interviewers don't need that \"beyond a reasonable doubt\" standard. Really they don't need any standard. An employer can deny an applicant for literally any reason short of discrimination based on race, religion, creed, disability and military service (and maybe some other thing, based on state law). So if an employer thinks that polygraphs and their interpreters are say, 80% reliable... then the employer can decide that the overall results are worth the 1 in 5 wrong results. There's also the chance of intimidating away people who feel they are unlikely to pass a polygraph... which is more likely than not to be people who feel that they would be disqualified. TL;DR: Polygraphs do not meet reasonable doubt, and employers don't need to either.",
"I was required to take one for my job. It really blew my mind that the place I took it had an entire department of people dedicated to polygraphs. The \"technician\" running my machine wasn't thrilled that I told him up front I think the entire thing is BS and I was shocked it's still used in any official capacity. But hey, he asked. It's nothing more than an interrogation tactic used to make you confess shit you wouldn't have admitted to. Just like a cop saying \"Do you know why I pulled you over?\" Always stick to your answers, especially if you have filled out any questionnaires they have access too (such as an SF86). Also, never tell the cop that you were speeding, texting and getting road head when all he pulled you over for was a broken tail-light.",
"Most of the time it is just an intimidation tactic, as stated previously. Many departments also use it as a way to check off a box in the \"we tried\" category, so they can claim to an outside observer that they did their best to eliminate bad apples in the hiring process. There are police departments that use the polygraph as a backdoor method to eliminate candidates who they don't want because of some other reason. For example, a department that doesn't want to hire women, gays/ lesbians, ethnic minorities, or some other protected category will have an inexplicably large failure rate on the polygraph test by people from those groups. Edit: I un-autocorrected \"Downey\" to \"department\"",
"[Here's a pretty good This American Life about just that]( URL_0 ) the guy used to administer polygraphs but then turned around and tried to help people beat them once he realized the harm he was doing. Pretty interesting stuff.",
"It's intimidation. Lie detectors aren't really useful for actually detecting lies and is mostly made up of pseudoscience. URL_0 The results are done for hiring because it's meant to pressure people into telling the truth. It can't be used in court because it doesn't really work.",
"Lots of Rage Against the Machine answers here, but the actual answer is a lot simpler: Polygraphs are used to find potential 'evidence of deception'. It's not determinative of anything, but it clues an investigator into potential areas to explore further. So to that end, it makes sense in an employment context. They are not used in court for a number of reasons: the shaky science and reliability of the machines, but also the general trend of not looking at \"quirks\", so to speak, to determine guilt/innocence. Is a witness stammering on the stand? Sweating? Fidgety? Jurors are now instructed to disregard those - one study found the only group who could reliably detect deception was Secret Service agents. Even judges were no better than chance at it. tl;dr the government's burden of proof is not satisfied by a defendant flunking a polygraph Source: lawyer with security clearance experience.",
"It works because you think it works. They ask questions that you're on the fence about telling the truth on, and when pressured, you buckle and fess up. They're used on cops for a series of reasons: (1) the same reason you do it in criminal investigations -- to get the truth out of people, (2) to see if you're smart enough to know when to shut up, since blabbermouths and the handling of private information or evidence that is non-disclosable don't mix, and (3) to see if you understand \"the game\" that is investigating crime. It's the best way to test intelligence, street smarts, and patience all at once. If you pass, you're either clean enough to make it, or know how to shut up enough to be trusted. If you spill the beans about railing coke off of a prostitute's taint in college with the slightest pressure, will you be able to keep serious and life-or-death information regarding an investigation secret when reporters harass you, let alone your spouse, kids, or family friends start asking for the inside scoop? The answer is usually \"no.\" Plus, you don't want naive goody-two-shoes on the street dealing with criminal elements. If you're easily manipulated in an interview, you can be easily manipulated on the beat.",
"Polygraph machines - like any 'biofeedback' device - can be wrong. Good liars can appear to be truthful, and very nervous but honest people can appear to be liars. It would be catastrophic if we allowed lie-detector results to be admissible in court. But employers are free to use them. I sold a retail business to a guy who polygraphed my staff, and fired most of them. I think he just wanted to bring in his own team, and was using it as an excuse. My staff were good people, and did not steal - I know because I checked frequently (using undercover \"shoppers,\" not polygraph).",
"I work Internal Affairs and part of that deals with hiring public safety applicants. My department won't disqualify anyone for failing the polygraph alone. Generally speaking I think being told you're getting a polygraph tends to make people get a little more honest with their answers during my interview. I don't do the polygraph myself, that's all handled via independent contractors that have no motivation to my knowledge to even attempt to fail a person without cause. My department is very understanding that people have a past, have chosen to experiment with drugs and occasionally have even been arrested and still get jobs. The key is being honest. If you're lying now, odds are you will be lying later. That lying thing continues to be a major thing during your employment. Speaking from my experience, nothing makes internal affairs investigators more motivated to nail an employee to the wall than lying or being corrupt in general. I take it very personal when someone brings discredit to themselves and to the department I've chosen to represent. Just my two cents on the matter.",
"The prosecutor did a great job of stating how they are used in criminal prosecution. Which is basically to confuse people into changing their stories to prosecute them on the basis of those muddled statements. Don't ever willing do a polygraph. Heres why: They do not actually measure lies from truths. They measure the autonimic responses from a subject during questioning. Its a construct validity error, that is confounded by the fact that those autonimic measurements never take into account that they react to a vast myriad of other stimuli. Their accuracy is extremely blown out of proportion by those why \"beleive\" in the practice, because they continue to confirm thier own results with convictions and false truths. The current meta analysis of lie detection data shows that their have been over the decades no actual reliability or validity in all of the proponant literature about lie detection. It is a pseudoscientific practice at this point. The reason these organizations continue to use them is they are highly alluring conceptual machines, though completely in effective, and they are much much cheaper than doing thorough background checks. Those who use them also seek out proponant literature to back up thier use of the devices. Dispite the overwhelming body of evidence against thier use. Heres the APA's oppinion on the matter: \"There is no evidence that any pattern of physiological reactions is unique to deception.\" They, simply put, do not work, but people want to believe they do so they keep using them because they are cheap and can be used to coerce people into false confessions and confabulation. (Psych Major/ currently working in field of behavioral analysis)",
"Criminal trials require a higher standard of proof than pretty much anything else. If the government is going to lock someone up, then we want them to be absolutely certain that the person is guilty. On the other hand you wouldn't want someone who is even *probably* a bad person to become a police officer.",
"I saw a public statement from the feds on why they use lie detector tests for things like security clearances, when the lie detector is basically just a load of bullshit. Paraphrasing it, they basically said 1) It tends to make people admit to things they've done in the past. If they admit to it, the part that counts is the admission, not the lie detector test. (So basically it's the same as sitting you with a hot lamp until you talk). 2) It tends to make people who did \"things\" in the past not apply, since they think they'll be found out. The fact that they probably wouldn't (based on the test alone) doesn't matter. 3) It tends to make people who have passed one and may have to do another NOT do \"things\" since they think they'll be found out on the next test. The fact that they probably wouldn't (based on the test alone) doesn't matter.",
"There is a recent This American Life about a guy who is in jail for teaching people how to reliably pass a polygraph: URL_0",
"My dad was a police officer part time for years, as well as a marriage and family therapist. He actually advised against ever agreeing to a polygraph because they can be caused to spike and read as a lie by anxiety over the question. So like, you may establish a baseline of anxiety, but most people get upset by being accused of committing a crime. The polygraph may spike enough to be a \"lie\" in a reading because you got super anxious or upset. So, yea, not a good reason to send someone to jail. Really unreliable. Also, if you have good control of emotional/biological response, it can show a false negative. And a lot of jurors think polygraphs are magic 100% foolproof even when they're told otherwise. However, it would be a good way to see how an officer responds to stress! And see how you respond to intimidating situations. It's a more subtle way to test than field training. So that could be why.",
"So, I just had to take a polygraph test last week for the military. I asked the NCIS agent your same question. In a huff he replied \"They're admissible in 33 states.\" I think it irked him a little.",
"It's a game of good cop / bad cop. The examiner is the good cop, the \"lie detector\" is the bad cop. Good cop befriends the subject and effectively says things like: \"look buddy I really want to believe you, but Officer Polygraph here says you're holding something back. You just need to give me something small to satisfy Officer Polygraph then you can get out of here\"",
"Former LEO. I have taken multiple polygraphs and voice stress analayzers (CVSA) over the years. I was employeed with three separate departments ranging from 30 cops up to 2,000. All the lie detector test are utter bullshit. As others have stated it's more of a \"gotcha\" tool to see if you will lie during the testing, and only really then by admitting you lied. Stick to your guns and you'll be alright. I could always see what the problem was internally with the department that I was applying by the nature of the questions. One focused on theft, another on sexual harassment, another on drug use. It's more of an applicant wash out tool than anything. I was never 100 percent truthful and passed every time. It really opened my eyes on how much of a joke these tests are.",
"Well, not too sure about from the police officer perspective, but in the eyes of the court, since the polygraph is not 100% accurate, it is deemed too \"prejudicial\" to the defendant in any particular case. There are many variables that come into play, with regard to the polygraph, that result in inconsistencies. There's a reason why DNA evidence took so long to be admissible in court... Let's face it- if I'm a juror in a criminal case, and if I heard from the prosecution that the results of the polygraph were that there was a 70% chance the defendant was lying, that would tremendously sway opinions one way or another. The goal of the court system (when things are going correctly) is to prevent injustice, and the chances of that occurring by allowing the results of a polygraph into evidence is too great to allow it in. As an aside, for anyone curious, this is the actual rule of evidence: *The court may exclude relevant evidence if its probative value is substantially outweighed by a danger of one or more of the following: unfair prejudice, confusing the issues, misleading the jury, undue delay, wasting time, or needlessly presenting cumulative evidence.*",
"Well keep in mind they don't work as lie detectors. They are glorified intimidating heart rate monitors.",
"A skilled examiner can get quite a bit from a polygraph. When I was at fort Jackson several of us got selected to go to the school where they train federal agents to administer polygraphs. It was pretty interesting. They basically gave is a thumb drive and had us install a virus on a computer. Then hooked us up to a polygraph and had the trainee try to figure out what we did wrong. Everyone who tried any of the bullshit methods of beating the tests would get called out by the main instructor. They may not be able to determine exactly what you did, but they can clearly tell if someone is doing something to be deceptive. If they know you're being deceptive, even if they don't know the reason for it, that's still an issue for concern.",
"I was disappointed that Last Week Tonight recently had a piece about Border Control, mentioned polygraphs and how they'll be used more, even included them in their skit at the end to drive home points.. But they've previously done a piece about how they're crap and only work to intimidate people into confessing. Which doesn't reflect how they show it being used in their own skit. Mr. Oliver, with respect, COME ON. You've already spoken, at length, about using fake information in a way that doesn't show it as fake and the resulting stupidity of the viewers that just trust it to be real. If you do it too, what hope do we have of people knowing the truth anymore? Not ELI5? I have a magic machine that tells me you're lying (I'm lying, it only tells me you got uncomfortable, I'll keep lying to get what I want from you), when you get nervous or scared I ask more questions about why until you tell me the truth. And Last Week Tonight does what they say not to.",
"Freshly hired with the Harris county sheriff's office here. I saw others mention it is used as a way to get you to talk or as way to not hire you if they don't like you. Which is possible, but there is also the fact that it is a buffer. People who are questionable might not even apply if they think skeletons from their closet might come out.",
"Cops use it to falsely incriminate people or if they have a gut feeling and want them to crack. They know they need them to admit if they have no evidence, and this is how you do it.",
"To cheat the detector... Think of the most horrific experience when they ask you about something true like your name. Think of a serene thing when you lie. You'll pass with flying colors. Maybe need a tad bit of practice.",
"I've taken 3 for Fire Department jobs. It's usually said that it's a way to hire \"honest\" people. But in reality it's used to weed through all the applicants. What they really want to find is confident people who aren't scared of something that worries most people, like say a polygraph.",
"Have you ever taken drugs? Have you ever taken illegal drugs? How many joints have you smoked? How many parties do you go to? Do other people smoke marijuana at those parties? If you were at a party and a friend offered you a joint, would you take it? What do you tell your friends when that happens? ... And so on for a dozen more questions.",
"Everyone here seems to just be taking it in their stride that, oh yeah sure, potential police officers are given polygraphs, that's totally standard procedure. Wtf? They actually do this? Is this an American thing? Do they do that here in the UK too? I've never heard of it being done, not even in pop culture or TV shows. Am I the only one who's never heard of police departments doing this?",
"[Here's a short writeup by a scientist for lawyers on why not to trust the polygraph.]( URL_0 ) From the article: > The polygraph cannot assess lying per se, but instead assesses emotion that can arise when specific questions are asked. As such, a verdict of \"guilty\" or \"lying\" is best interpreted as \"emotionally aroused\" or \"anxious.\" more: > More recently, an ad-hoc committee of the American Polygraph Association published a survey of field polygraph results, including more than 45 published samples and 11,000 examinations, and reported overall accuracy of 89.6%, but only after excluding 23.5% of cases with indeterminate verdicts. Unfortunately, more than half the samples came from articles of the lead investigator, and all suffered from the inherent selection bias: to wit, cases selected for inclusion in a field study are biased in favor of demonstrating accuracy because **the associated confessions are not independent but a consequence of the polygraph exam.**",
"A really interesting podcast on how inaccurate they are. Great story, quick listen. URL_0",
"It has been suggested that polygraphs are a social vetting system for a group think \"we like you\" having nothing really to do with the truth.",
"Fun fact: > William Marston, the inventor of the polygraph, was also the originator of the Wonder Woman cartoons. Wonder Woman used a “lasso of truth” to force people to stop lying. From my Intro to Psychology book.",
"All they test is if you are nervous or not. Police and LEO don't want nervous nellies so yeah, they kind of work. Except they don't do well at identifying sociopaths which they should sort out with other tests.",
"At my firm, we have criminal defendants take them from a well-like private polygraph analyst. If they pass, it often helps get charges dropped in cases where prosecutors aren't excited in the first place about moving ahead. It never dissuades the police. They don't let the truth get in the way of what their theory of the case is on any level.",
"I had two polygraphs over the course my career. The technicians couldn't even get accurate readings on the control questions (name, date of birth, etc.). It was \"SUCH AN IMPORTANT TEST\"! I couldn't possibly do government contracting without it. But then they couldn't confirm that I was being truthful when stating my own name. They also couldn't confirm I was lying. What a crappy test.",
"Love+Radio podcast did an excellent episode on Doug Williams, a former police polygraphist who quit his job when he realized polygraphs were bullshit and dedicated his life to fighting against them. He's testified in courtrooms and before Congress. He got a really interesting story and was actually thrown in federal prison for two years because of his (marginally questionable) activism. He was released last month. URL_0",
"A question, since I see people saying that it's a way to not hire someone (results of the poly are inconclusive or what have you): if you were not hired or fired and the stated reason was \"inconclusive\" polygraph results, could you sue? If we know the results are unreliable, at best, clearly not hiring someone based on polygraph results is questionable, at best. Seems like it would break some labour law to use that as a factor at all!",
"I know I'm a bit late, but my $0.02 is this: Polys for police hiring processes are simply a test to see how you will fare under intense questioning. It's a simulation of how you will do on a witness stand in court. If you EVER waver or change an answer, you're done. You're not a credible witness. They can't use you. So even if you told the 100% truth the whole time, they'll say you lied about X or Y and ask if you want to change anything or add anything and what have you. They're looking to see whether you will stick to your guns, more or less.",
"In the process for hiring now: Generally....it's because a massive number of people disclose that they were lying on their questionnaires. Major lies. The best example is my criminal justice professor, a former sheriff's deputy who did backgrounds has an anecdote of a guy (who was cleared in every way) admitting to child porn. Most \"lies\" aren't that big and are closer to fibs that we all generally say in other job applications. A lot is \"I said I had never done drugs, but in fact did experiment in high school once or twice.\" Automatic DQ. Or \"I actually did get fired from that high school job a decade ago even though I said I didn't.\" The majority of polygraph DQ's are for admitting to things that, had they been previously disclosed, would have been zero issue. The other reason is they can also mess with you. Grill you. Play mind games. Accuse you of lying. It can serve as a quasi-personality test: is this a guy who can be even tempered under pressure? A guy who gives a concise, straight to the point answer and stick with it. I'll fully admit, I understand the negative pressures and externalities involved. A true sociopathic person will pass. Or even a guy whose rationalized anything in his past he hasn't disclosed. There's a lot of debate about them. I've met a lot of cops that don't like that we still do them, they tend to weed out good, honest candidates that simply got a little bit stressed in whats essentially a job interview. But most departments have enough \"we were probably going to hire this star candidate until he admitted to lying about ever doing cocaine\" that they can keep justifying their use."
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6sf96k | How is non-alcoholic wine, wine? | If non-alcoholic wine is wine isn't it just grape juice then? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Basically non-alcoholic wine is when you make wine the normal way but then remove the alcohol afterwards. > In fact, most beverages labeled non-alcoholic contain 0.5% ABV URL_0",
"Wine is fermented juice. The fermentation does more than just convert sugars into alcohol, it changes the flavor and chemical structure of the juice."
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6sg24e | Why, when writing formal (letters), are (married) women sometimes referred to as Mr. (female's full name)? | I'm wondering if this is as simple as the somewhat old notion of men being the "important" ones in the family, or something else. Not trying to start a flame war. Edit: After reading several comments I realized I misspoke. What I meant was when a married woman is referred to as Mrs. (Husband's name) thanks everyone for pointing that out. (Not sarcasm) | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"If you know it's a woman, Mr. would be an error. Some women see this mistake, I have a friend called Gene Smith, her real name is Genevieve. She pronounces Gene like gene (the bit of DNA). She gets a lot of mail to Mr. Gene Smith, because if you google \"gene smith\" you get images of a bunch of guys. In workplace writing Ms. is the safe personal title for all females, marital status isn't a factor.",
"You're right this is something from yesteryear. Let's say the man was named James Smith. The wife would be referred to as Mrs. James Smith. We later dropped this and now would say Mrs. [her name] Smith. Some people today are now not changing their last name for the husband.",
"Traditionally, in English and American society, the family line goes through the man. When a woman is married, she leaves her former family and joins a new family. The husband is the head of that family; his legal authority over their household is balanced by a duty to protect his wife and children. Although most people would now consider husband and wife equal, and that's their legal position in most English-speaking countries, the custom of referring to a wife by her husband's surname comes from this system. When Miss Jane Doe marries Mr. Richard Roe, she may henceforth be referred to as \"Mrs. Richard Roe\" or simply \"Mrs. Roe.\" (She could still be called \"Miss Doe,\" though perhaps the husband might take offense, but \"Mrs. Doe\" would be simply incorrect.) Today, if a woman keeps her previous last name but still wishes to be referred to as \"Mrs.,\" she has forgotten the origin of the practice."
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6sgfeh | why do so many women die from childbirth in the US? | The number seems way too high for such an advanced country. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Something to keep in mind when you look at statistics like this is that when dealing with small discrepancies (such as the difference between 8 and 16 deaths per 100,000 people) the methodology and quality of the data you're looking at is very important. You should especially consider this in light of the fact that the US maternal mortality rate doubled over a 30 year period without explanation. To take it [directly from the CDC]( URL_2 ). > The reasons for the overall increase in pregnancy-related mortality are unclear. The use of computerized data linkages by the states, changes in the way causes of death are coded, and the addition of a pregnancy checkbox to the death certificate in many states have likely improved identification of pregnancy-related deaths over time. Whether the actual risk of a woman dying from pregnancy-related causes has increased is unclear. The US maternal mortality rate began increasing in the late 80's, and this corresponds well to the addition of a checkbox for maternal related deaths, as well as increased education of coroners that the box was to be checked if the woman died within 1 year of giving birth, *regardless of the cause*. To compare this to the data from other countries - [Australia only considers a death to be pregnancy related if the woman dies within 42 days of birth]( URL_1 ). This is a common standard in most of the world, and so its impossible to compare data between those countries and the US because the definition of a \"pregnancy related death\" is much broader in the US than it is elsewhere. Or we can compare it [to the UK]( URL_0 ). The UK doesn't even have an official definition for what causes a pregnancy related death. Official records only capture those deaths that occurred during or immediately after birth. The \"official\" UK report on the subject is compiled by a group of non-profits and academics that have been given access to all mortality data in the country. They consider any death within 6 weeks of birth to be a presumptive pregnancy related death, and will review any death up to 1 year after birth. But after 6 weeks they're very unlikely to rule the death as being pregnancy related and they're free to rule a death as being non-pregnancy related even if it occurred within those first 6 weeks. So the short of it is that we don't know if the maternal mortality rate is actually higher in the US than it is in other developed countries because the numbers are close enough that they could be (and very likely are) an artifact of differences in methodology or quality in reporting.",
"NPR did [a good story on it]( URL_0 ). The US is more than double the other developed countries. Part of it is a notion that \"woman's stuff\" isn't a prestigious/profitable medical specialty. The notion that \"women know what's best for their own bodies\" maintains pretty high ignorance levels. Finally, the emphasis on the baby, and hospitals with lots of specialized equipment for treating babies, leaves the life of the mother at more risk that it would see if doctors were driving the spending priorities. However, since money follow the woman's decision on where to have her baby, we're getting investments in things that look good on the hospital tour rather than things that science says would keep women alive."
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6sglyv | Why do hotels commonly carry the Christian Bible in their rooms? | One would assume that especially religious patrons would carry their own Bible if they plan on praying. Plus, this practice associates the business with a particular religion, which is a questionable choice. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It's a proselytizing tactic employed by a religious organization. I can't remember the name off the top of my head, but it isn't the hotels themselves that do it. They have an agreement (a financial one I assume) with this organization that facilitates the distribution of bibles to hotels/motels/resorts throughout the country. Edit: they're called Gideon International",
"The most common religion in America is christianity in some form or another. So the number of folks who get upset is likely very small. Plus, the folks leaving the bibles are Gideons, not the hotel itself. So if someone does get upset the hotel can honestly say they didn't place the bible, a previous guest left it. In terms of questionable choices, which is likely to hurt their brand more: Letting a portion of the Christian religion share their holy book for free like they have for decades, or openly saying they don't want/won't allow gideons to leave bibles behind? While the Gideons don't have any right to leave bibles behind, banning the practice would hurt a hotel's brand drastically. They'd be \"the anti-christian\" hotel and churchs and religious folks would likely boycott them for years over any ban. It's a lot safer for any hotel that doesn't want bibles left to simply quietly remove them when they're left, and to never print or say anything openly about the practice.",
"I've stayed in hotels that have a book on Dianetics, or a Book of Mormon. The practice is so ubiquitous in America that very few people are going to say 'x is a Christian business.' I've also noticed recently that there are fewer bibles than there used to be.",
"The tradition started with an organization of christian businessmen who formed [Gideons International]( URL_0 ). Basically, they all got together and decided that, since they spend so much time on the road, they and other traveling salesmen could spread their religion by carrying extra copies of the bible with them and leaving one in the room when they checked out. The organization ultimately grew to the point where it was receiving donations and support such that they could afford to buy bibles wholesale to donate directly to hotels (and hospitals, schools, prisons, the military- anyone who will take them) for placement, rather than relying on a member of the organization to happen to stay in each and every room in the hotel."
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6shcj9 | Why are cigarettes available in soft and hard packs? Is there some difference or purpose? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You need to understand that smoking cigarettes is a habit. Once people fall into a habit, they don't like to change things up. Hard packs are a more recent invention so soft packs are largely make for older smokers who are used to getting soft packs. There's not really a lot of other advantages to them.",
"Hard packs don't get crushed nearly as easily in a front pocket. From the small amount of time I have spent in jail, inmates like soft packs. They open a small part of the bottom instead of opening the pack at the top. That way, if they give someone a cigarette, whoever is grabbing the cigarette touches the part of the cigarettes that doesn't go in your mouth."
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6shywy | why do we bury people instead of just returning them back to nature naturally? | i believe burying people is a waste of thousands of dollars and its also bad for the environment based on a few articles. when we pump fluids inside the corpse to preserve it and to bury it with a casket, we are preventing the earth from extracting the nutrients a dead person has in it. so why actually put money into a dead person and not just let them rot in the bottom of the ocean, woods or something? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Why do humans do anything? Because it's tradition. Someone a long time ago probably decided that the \"proper\" way to dispose of a body was to bury it. Or put it on a ship and let it sail away and then sink it with fire arrows. Or cremate it. Or wrap it in linen after removing the internal organs. People make shit up because it makes them feel better. On top of that, leaving dead bodies out in the open is a good way to attract scavengers and disease, so some form of disposal was necessary, just how that was done varies from culture to culture. Also, hundreds of years ago, there were less people around. So burying people was a fairly legitimate way of disposing bodies. It's only recently that it's become this huge thing that people spend thousands on and that space has become limited. Like diamonds, the need is largely artificial and inflated in value. Also, there's *where* you can put the body that's important, you can't just dump a body in your backyard. I'm sure there are zoning laws for this sort of thing to prevent people from tossing bodies around or leaving them out in the open. People don't like tripping over corpses. Leaving them out in the open is probably the best way to do it -- look up sky burial -- but that's just considered disrespectful in most cultures for the above reasons. People are weird.",
"I actually would be fine with a natural burial. I think animals using my body for food would be fine. I would be dead. It would not hurt haha."
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6si1nr | how is the average Reddit user so literate compared to every other site that allows comments that I've been to? (And I've been to a lot.) | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"I don't think it is a question of literacy, it's just that Reddit allows for very long posts. I could answer your question in 500 characters if I wanted to, or 1,000. Other sites limit the amount of characters per post, which leads to people cutting corners to try to get their points across. When you cut corners, meaning gets lost in translation.",
"The \"illiterate\" get down voted to hell and the people who communicate well get up voted so on major subs you only (mostly) see good comments. There are **plenty** of subs on Reddit where you can find truly terrible comments."
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6sifhz | Why a firm handshake is so important in the business world? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Confidence. You have to show them that you know what you want. Don't do it too hard either. That would mean you're trying to take control of everything.",
"Shaking hands is a symbol of cooperation - you're extending a part of yourself to join with a part of your partner. If you have a weak handshake then you're showing that you're not too sure about this partnership. If you have a firm handshake then it means you're confident in the partnership you're embarking on with the other person. If you do it too hard then you're trying to dominate the other person which is often seen as a bad thing. If you're really curious about handshakes, watch political figures. You can write a whole book about political figures shaking hands. It's a massive show of subtle power that only the political elite notice or care about but it's still important. This is especially true of Presidents. After all, you have two world leaders meeting and you want to show the upper hand at all times. Not to get into anti-Trump/Obama bandwagon here but this is why Trump has his odd handshake where he starts with a normal handshake and then he pulls a random grab. He does this for two reasons: * he pulls into himself which, from a muscle standpoint, means he'll have more power and since he's the initiator, that's showing that... he shows initiatives while projecting more power. * it throws the other person off balance and makes them look stupid. Worse yet, it makes them be defensive and pull the hand back... but not too much or they'll look worse so they have to use the proper amount of force to pull the hand back while anticipating whether Trump will do this again. [Watch this video]( URL_0 ), the first 10 seconds and then skip to 25 seconds, 50 seconds, and 1:05. * Obama's handshake. It was a regular handshake but you can see the Chinese official (I don't think it was the President) put his other hand over Obama's hand as a show of power. * Shinzo Abe (Japan) meeting Xi Jinping (China). Not only did Xi's finger rest on top but Shinzo nodded, head bowed slightly while Xi seems barely interested. You're making subtle projections of power. Context? Territorial dispute between China and Japan where China is expanding everywhere. * 50 seconds with Putin. Again, Xi isn't meeting Putin, Putin is walking towards him. Brief handshake (thumb on top) and he's pointing at him - showing everyone that Putin adopted Chinese style of dress. * 1:05 - Obama again, same overhand gesture with that slight bow from Obama These are just some examples from a random search. There are other cues like manner of dress. Watch Putin wear a Chinese style shirt. This is a submissive gesture since you're throwing off your own culture and adopting someone elses. What happened there? Russia and China had a $25 billion trade deal which Russia needs. Then you have [this stupid thing]( URL_2 ) which is designed to make all three parties equal. It winds up being stupid but everyone looks equally stupid so nobody has the advantage. You can counter some of these things. For instance, look at Syrian President [Bashar al-Assad with Putin]( URL_4 ). Putin is at a loss here being short and his thumb is lower but he tries to make up for it by looking straight. This means al-Assad is facing Putin, wanting Putin's attention while Putin rejects him completely with the handshake being a \"oh right, you're standing here, wanting something from me\". Putin's hand is also overextended as if he's pulling away. Also look at their smiles (though this could be bad camera timing) with al-Assad grinning ear to ear (look at the sides of his eyes, upturned corners of mouth) while Putin faking a smile (flat mouth, almost nothing at the edges of his eyes). Again, could be bad camera timing. [But then look at this]( URL_1 ) - same pose and look at the thumb and height difference. Trump tries to even out by putting his hand behind her shoulder, forcing submissive posture. ... OK so I wrote way too many things about subtle projections of power and handshakes. Still, watch a bunch of interviews and this happens everywhere - important people, businessmen, politicians, etc. It goes back decades. This is also why we're unlikely to elect a short President. Look at Putin in that video after the handshake. Awful projection of power standing to someone who is literally head and shoulders above you. Ths is why [silly things like this]( URL_3 ) happen during picture time (note his heels, that's the French President)."
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6sjlvd | Why certain types of comedies were popular in the past but not in present times? | Not that they lose their punch but it seems like we cycle in types of humor. Like we start with slapstick, then went to wit, then went to shock value. Why do we crave different or new comedies rather then one specific type? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The basic formula for comedy involves someone in a situation doing or saying something that's unexpected. Not everything unexpected is funny, but everything genuinely funny is unexpected. A joke dies when it's context becomes too familiar. This can happen because we've heard the joke one too many times, or because we've learned a lot more about the premise. For example, jokes about how people use the internet for everything stopped being funny because that's just like now, and blond jokes fell out of fashion after people realized that stereotyping women was dry and predictable. New stereotypes about groups that we haven't historically stereotyped, however, like instagram users, are still funny (but will soon also get old). Once it is expected, a joke stops being funny. Humor is an ever-expanding art that needs to be improved and refined over time. This can take place over whole genres - the idea of physical violence being used in common scenarios without anyone really being hurt was very unexpected once upon a time, and you'd be all \"WHAT\" when Punch hit Judy, but today slapstick is tired and old.",
"As much as I love Monty python, the “man is dressed as a woman lol” humor seems to be dead now."
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6sjnv3 | Why are there universal fears in society? | Like something that a large portion of the population are scared of. Such as creatures with sunken eye, sharp teeth. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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6snfuo | Why do they add a laugh track to certain TV shows? | Does it psychologically make us want to laugh or think the joke is funnier than it actually is? Are live studio audiences for the actors? I do theatre a lot and I know an audience that laughs a lot gives a better performance. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"So that you know when to laugh, since their jokes aren't that funny cue: [Big Bang Theory]( URL_0 )"
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6snkmv | What happens to elders whose family refuses to take care of them? | Like say they have no money themselves, limited social security, and their kids/extended family want nothing to do with them and refuse to provide care or finances. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Stay tuned: Millions of Americans are about to find out. This is not a joke. And it doesn't happen only to those whose families turn away. See [here]( URL_1 ) and [here]( URL_0 ).",
"That depends on what country they're in. But, generally, they will live a life of poverty if they don't have their own resources and no one chooses to help them."
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6snkrf | How is it determined when documents from American presidents become declassified? | Here are letters from President Reagan to Soviet Union Leaders. Is it able to be declassified relatively soon because the USSR no longer exists or because the president chose to declassify them? URL_0 | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"A president can choose to declassify anything at any time they choose. There is a standing Executive Order that states that all classified material is to be declassified 25 years after creation unless it meets certain criteria. However, executive orders are simply directives from the President and can be changed in the future."
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6sojim | Why is Satan bad? Isn't he just an angel who rebelled against serving God for eternity, made Humanity gain massive intellect and the only representative of those who oppose the ethically questionable actions and ideas of God? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"That is a complicated question to answer, because the role of \"Satan\" changes depending on what part of the bible we are reading. In the Garden, he was the snake that tempered Adam and Eve to rebel against God, in Job he was more of an advocate to challenge God's ideas acceptably, in Revelations he is the King of the Lake of Fire, etc. That all said, the general idea is that God is perfect; he is all knowing, all powerful, all loving and never incorrect. By definition, disagreeing with and defying an entity that can not be wrong makes you incorrect."
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6sq1lh | Why does every civilization, ancient and newer, have legends of dragons? | They even look similar in most if not all cases.. why is that? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Because they didn't. *But* most every civilization encountered mammals and lizards and spiders and etc etc etc. and they made legends that reflected things from their world. And when Europeans found a legend that talked about a big lizard or slightly lizard like thing, they said \"oh that's a dragon!\" Even when the similarities were meager at best. The same as big hairy men legends and spider entities and bird monsters that are popular. Tldr not everyone had legends about dragons, but lots of people have legends about lizard things, because they all saw lizards. And we just call them all dragons because we're lazy."
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6srkjb | other than religious reasons, what are people's reasons for being against marriage equality? | Australia is currently in the midst of a marriage equality debate. Personally I support marriage equality but I'm honestly curious as to why people are against. As I said, aside from religious beliefs as that is just a giant can or worms. I'd also say that in Australia homosexual couples already have adoption rights so the children without mothers/fathers argument is not relevant in this situation either. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"To me all marriage is bullshit other than if religious. Wether that hetero or homo. However civil partnerships between man/women Or man/man woman/woman I do believe in because it is important to have a sign and declaration of your commitment with one another. I just think people just see getting married these days as a Facebook update and a way to make themself look glamourous. 80% Can't afford it and get in debt for that one day and the ones especially that end up going and getting a church but havnt even seen the opening page of a bible is mental."
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6sszj8 | How do linguists determine which languages are close or distant from each other? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"We can see the similarities. Take, for example, this sentence: > I have one brother. If we translate this into German, we get this: > Ich habe einen Bruder. We can see almost at a glance that they're very similar. The structure of the sentence is the same, and all of the words are very similar. Even where there are differences, they're not that big: the \"v\" in \"have\" is just like the \"b\" in \"habe\" except that instead of pressing the bottom lip against the top lip, we press the bottom lip against the top teeth. Obviously, when you get to more complicated stuff, the similarities aren't quite as obvious at first glance. But what's interesting is that a lot of the little words that do all the grammar -- words like \"the\", \"that\", \"when\", \"and\", and so on -- are very similar indeed. The grammar itself is quite close: German has fewer tenses than English, but the ones it does have are nearly identical. In particular, English and German don't have a proper future tense, instead using present tenses and modal verbs to express the idea of futurity. (Yes, I know we're all *taught* about \"the future tense\", but that's just a fudge to make it easier for people trying to learn the language.) The same sentence in French looks like this: > J'ai un frère. This looks quite different. In fact, if you didn't know French at all, you wouldn't be able to recognize it as the same sentence at all. And yet there are similarities. The French for \"one\" here is \"un\", which is very similar. The construction of the sentence is the same: just as in English, you have a subject, a verb and an object. And even though \"brother\" and \"frère\" look totally different from each other, if you know how sounds change as languages evolve, you can trace both words back to the word \"bhrater\" in the Proto-Indo-European language. (Note: although the French \"avoir\" looks very similar to English \"to have\", that's actually a coincidence. Those two words have different derivations.) The Russian looks like this: > U menya yest' odin brat. This has a different sentence construction: translated word for word, it means \"At me is one brother.\" That looks completely different, but look at the last word \"brat\" -- doesn't that look similar to \"bhrater\"? And there is also a similarity between \"me\" and \"menya\". The Hungarian is: > Van egy bátyám. This is totally different. It means something like: \"Exists one my brother.\" And here there is no longer any similarity: the sentence structure is quite different, and none of the words are similar in any way to their English translations. Obviously, I've just ELI'd the hell out of this, but that's the basic principle. German is very closely related to English, French quite closely related, Russian related (but not very closely), and Hungarian completely unrelated as far as anyone can tell.",
"Let's say we live in startland and speak startish. We have named a load of common things like bread, water, dog, fight and so on. Then some startlians move away. After moving they get mixed up with people from otherland but their language is still based on startish. They then invent guns. The person who invented the gun used the otherlandish words \"bangstick\". When guns get to startland they use the word \"flasharm\" as that is the startish translation of \"bangstick\". Now many years later a linguist could look at the languages of startish and otherlandish and work out who invented the gun and the migration patterns. Using such linguistic analysis we have worked out, for example, that Polynesian people originated from the south east coast of China near Taiwan"
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6stn42 | How Did Sikhs Come to Be, And What Do They Believe In? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Sikhism is based on the spiritual teachings of Guru Nanak, the first Guru, who started the religion around 1520. The first 10 Gurus wrote the Guru Granth Sahib, the religion sacred text. Three Pillars of Sikhism are: 1) Meditation on God and reciting and chanting of God’s Name—Waheguru. 2) Life as householders and honestly earn, with hard work, by one's physical and mental effort, while accepting God's gifts and blessing. 3) Sharing their wealth within the community."
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6swhhk | Does declaring a State of Emergency actually do anything? Or is it simply a symbolic gesture? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Say your apartment building is on fire. A whole team of firemen are going to show up under the command of a Chief, and begin search and rescue, going through every room of every apartment looking for people. Put another way, Government Agents are breaking into homes, invading your privacy, and forcibly removing innocent citizens on the orders of their Boss! What makes it OK when a Fireman does it, but not OK when a police raid does? A state of emergency. When the Governor/Mayor/President declare a state of emergency, that allows agencies to tap into extra funds that have been saved in special accounts exclusively for emergencies. These funds can pay for police and fire overtime, or to even bus in emergency responders from out of town. It may suspend certain environmental safety regulations so we can put the \"fire\" out NOW and clean up the mes later. Sometimes it allows the National Guard/Military to step in to help re-assert control over a rioting populace. For example, the National Guard was quietly activated when the Ferguson Riots were getting a little too close to Boeing's secret stuff. They are meant to only be used in a true emergency, and are immediately turned off when the \"fire\" is out, as defined by local laws.",
"Once a state of emergency is declared, it means people and agencies in the affected area are eligble to apply for government assistance, depending on the scope and who declared the emergency. A governor can declare areas of a state as emergency/disaster areas and those affected areas can apply for state aid (things like funding/loans and national guard units). The POTUS can declare areas as federal disaster areas, meaning FEMA and the US military can assist.",
"A State of Emergency usually means that certain regulations are suspended, or certain rights granted, for the duration of the emergency. For example, it might allow the government to deploy the army, or divert resources to affected areas. There may also be provisions to convene some sort of government, if the usual government can't operate for some reason. There may be extra security, such as restrictions on the freedom of movement. In short, declaring a state of emergency gives the government special powers to deal with the emergency. Obviously, this sort of thing can be a very powerful tool in the wrong hands. When, after WW2, the Allies insisted the new Germany must have provision for a state of emergency, this was fiercely resisted by the German public because similar laws had been horribly abused before and during the Nazi regime."
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6swusl | What was considered "junk food" in ancient times? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Garum was added to dishes in Roman food to make it a bit more tasty, it's essentially fish guts and salt mixed in a brine. It still had some good nutritional value, but mainly was added for the flavour, similarly to how we'd use condiments today. But there's not much we'd consider junk food today, but there were delicacies that had a similar effect of excitement, a rare treat on special occasions. Fresh fruit was expensive in many areas in antiquity, as it didn't store well so it was hard to transfer and Farmers preferred foods with long term and multiple usages (grains, olives, with grapes being the exception, but those were primarily used for wine and a necessity often due to the state of the drinking water.) Meat from larger animals was expensive and a really extensive process was required before you were allowed to eat it (giving it up the gods, enduring the animal was pure, etc.) Sea food really depended on where and what with no directly reasonable pattern for differences in what the poor ate and what the wealthy did. As empires were built, rare meats and such from other territories could be brought in for the wealthy.",
"For most of human history up until about 200 years ago food was hard to obtain and famine was common. Even in the \"developed\" world. As such there was no such thing as \"junk food\", all food was precious and needed.",
"Junk food is really the result of our modern ability to process food down to very calorie dense ingredients (like white flour, refined sugar, oils, etc) then very cheaply recombine them into highly calorie dense products without any fiber, little water, and few nutrients allowing anyone to inexpensively eat *lots* of calories before they feel full. That's hard to find in ancient times because they didn't have oil/natural gas to supply massive amounts of energy to everyone. So the few products that are similar to junk food today required lots of labor (and was delicacy enjoyed only by the very important) or occasional products where we use something else's labor (think honey, cream, or some alcoholic beverages--though many of these were watered down). These still tended to be quite expensive."
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6sxw03 | Why does the United Nations predict a world population of only 9.8billion by 2050 and 11.2billion by 2100 (~32% and ~49% growth) when we have historically experienced eight times those rates with less starting population, less technology, and multiple world wars and epidemics? | [Source]( URL_0 ) It seems blatantly obvious these numbers will not be correct, possibly 100% wrong by 2100. Please enlighten. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Demographic transition. It's the process where people start out poor and with poor medical care. Everyone has lots of kids. Most kids die before the age of 5. The limits on land keep overall population in check; if there are too many people there are famines or plagues. Science comes into the picture. And education. The death rate falls due to improvements in food supply, sanitation, and medicine. Population increase rapidly. People then stop having so many kids, and the birth rate falls and gets close to the death rate, due to contraception, increased urbanization, and a reduction in people living of subsistence agriculture that need kids to take care of them in old age (if you have social security or other pension checks, you don't need to rely on your kids to make sure to feed and care for you when you are old). Population stops growing (or even starts shrinking). So much of the West has already gone through this, and other countries are going through various stages.",
"Europe and Japan are already experiencing negative population growth. America would be too, if not for immigration. As other countries develop, their population growth will have the same characteristics."
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6sy6jo | The Body Positivity/Fat Acceptance movement. | I have seen a lot of articles lately that are applauding "fat" (their words) people for accepting who they are and not trying to improve their health. Why are they applauded for being unhealthy, over weight, and lacking ambition to improve? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"i always saw it as an anti-bullying thing; instead of letting people get bullied, start a campaign tell them to not be ashamed of how they look. i think it went a little too far though because in reality, overweight people should lose weight, they just shouldn't be given a hard time about it during the process or ever.",
"It's 2 arguments rolled into 1. You are arguing its unhealthy. They already know that. They are applauding good mental health. It's incredibly depressing being fat and everyone piling on \"just trying to be helpful\" makes it worse. Losing weight is very difficult and doing while depressed is virtually impossible. Body acceptance is just people letting themselves off the hook for all the built up self loathing.",
"The studies and my day to day endless reality in practice contradict you. I wish you were right and a part of me thinks you are but then the reality is so fucking dismal. I dread having to look another obese patient in the eye and try to explain reality to them. It's fucking hopeless. We are so fucked.",
"I like your question, but I don't think anyone is being aplauded for lack of health. I think there is some pushback on the health of the ideal healthy weight . Our ideal is miserably skinny. But I also think there is a desire to not use weight as the measure of health. If we looked at blood sugar, cholestoral, and blood pressure, could we find better personal ideal weights and behavior? Just thinking. I'm interested in other opinions.",
"One, I'm guessing you've never struggled with being fat or needing to lose weight. It's a special kind of hell you live in when you hate your body. If you've been there you don't question why people want to remove the connection between weight and worth. Two, the point of the movement is to show that the ideal, slender body, isn't always a healthy body (and vice versa). There are \"bigger\" body types out there who are healthy and strong, just as there are slender body types with shit health. The focus should be solely on health for everyone, not on body shape."
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6sya4s | What is the history behind the classic BA-DA-CHING a drummer plays after a joke? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It's called a rimshot. Not to be confused with a rimjob. Be careful while googling and do not mix the two.",
"Known as a \"rimshot\" or a \"sting.\" Best as I can find, it dates back at least to vaudeville acts, possibly acting as a \"jokes over, time to laugh now\" cue."
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6syin4 | Why is Chinese food so devoid of cheese centric dishes while most other food regions feature cheese prominently? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You might be interested in this older, gilded thread URL_0",
"About 65% of Chinese people are lactose intolerant. So they can't eat cheese without gastrointestinal discomfort. Lactose intolerance is very common through Asia.",
"To Chinese, beans (soy) are the equivalent of cheese. Source: am Chinese Soy milk, all different types of tofu, bean curd, natto (Japanese), fermented bean curd, soy sauce, soy paste. You have bleu cheese, we have stinky tofu and fermented bean curd. URL_0",
"I see a lot of posts saying Asians are lactose intolerant - I want to add that most animals and (numbers vary on reports) 65-75% of humans are. Lactose intolerant is the natural state, babies are designed to drink milk with an enzyme called lactase, and it's not normally produced after they grow a bit. Some people produce it their whole lives, and those people aren't lactose intolerant, but it's actually not the norm. It is genetic so you see it passed along generations and clumped in ethnicities.",
"In West China (Tibet, Sichuan, Yunnan) and in Inner Mongolia there are lots of ethnic groups that use yak milk dairy as a staple.",
"Which was first - lactose intolerant therefore no dairy, or no dairy animals therefore lactose intolerance wasn't 'evolved' away",
"A lot of top comments missed another important fact. It's not just about being lactose intolerant. Long ago, water was not always safe and abundant to drink. Humans solved this problem by using cattle and goats and other animals. These animals would eat tons of grass and be able to sufficiently extract enough water out from grass to produce milk. Thus, an important source of liquid was born! This practice was more common in Europe where the grass was great for cattle. However, it was not very good in all parts of Asia where the grass was more poisonous for cattle. (New research may suggest this is not true, but this was generally believed to be why cattle usage did not spread to east/southeast Asia.) Without milk, there can be no cheese. At least as a staple in diets. The Chinese didn't start to incorporate milk into their diet until it was brought over from India and they were like \"hey this tastes pretty good in your tea.\" Source: \"How to Cook Everything\" has a quick history lesson on milk to explain it's use in modern recipes.",
"Another gentleman by the name of Dave Brockie had the same question and he wrote a song about it. URL_0",
"This made me think about Cajun cooking. We dont have a lot of cheese in our dishes either.",
"They don't necessarily- its just that we Americans love cheese and throw it on ethnic food as much as possible. Mexican cuisine comes to mind- the adding cheese to everything was the Americanization of it.",
"Uhhhh....Korean food? Japanese food? Vietnamese food? A lot of East Asian and South East Asian cuisines make little use of dairy. And I suspect it's rather because of the lactose intolerant gene in the region. Something like 90% of people in the East Asian area are naturally lactose intolerant, but have trained their bodies to tolerate diary due to the prominence of diary products on the market nowadays."
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6sykj9 | Why is/was snitching discouraged in American schools when as adults we are expected to "snitch" to the police and not try and take matters in our own hands? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"In school, it wasn't about discouraging snitching on bullies or on vandals or thiefs. It was about discouraging tattletales who would earn themselves zero friends by telling teachers on every little wrongdoing of every party. That's part of your social development in school, creating a good balance between submission to authority and defiance, and teachers recognize the best is not all the way towards submission."
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6szjv1 | how does the Japanese writing system work? | I know people have asked this before but I'm still very confused. Specifically how do you know when to use Kanji and when to use one of the syllabaries? Or do you use both at the same time? Edit: clarification and spelling | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You know when to use kanji and when to use the syllabaries because as you study Japanese writing, you'll learn how to write each word and it will be clear to you. Certain parts of speech, like the Japanese equivalent of nouns (Japanese parts of speech don't 100% conform to English parts of speech so when I use the parts of speech names, it's just for convenience of this conversation), are typically written using kanji. Some are written using hiragana just because the kanji is difficult, like the word for \"rose\", I've noticed, is usually written in hiragana (薔薇 is the kanji, ばら is the hiragana). But with verbs, the first mora or two are in kanji and the ending of the verb is in hiragana. Same with adverbs/adjectives, since depending upon where you use the word in the sentence, the ending of the word can change. Once you do a little reading, you'll get used to this. As for katakana, it's sort of roughly the equivalent of using italics in English. Not 100% the same, but similar. Like, you'll use katakana to emphasize a word, just like italics are sometimes used. You'll use katakana for a foreign word, just as in print, when you use a foreign word, you italicize it."
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6szq53 | Why do government coffers pay for lawsuits when decisions made by a group of politicians were the reason the government was sued in the first place. | [Example]( URL_0 ) | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Particularly in the United States, modern people have this view of the government like it is a foreign power, a thing that is alien to them and often in opposition to them. The truth is that you, the voter, are the government. You are the shareholders and board of directors of America, and you hire the advisers and agents that make those decisions. They are you. It's possible that you made a mistake and hurt another American with your city council or congressional vote. If that's what happened, then you, as a taxpayer, are legally liable for the damage that your employee (the government) did. You can fire them afterwards. If you don't feel the government is a part of you, you should vote against them. Though, be understanding. Almost everything that people dislike about government is done because the government's voting shareholders (that's you) issued an order to, or at least, hired someone on the basis of that order. But, tl;dr: if you think that the person you hired for government did a bad job, fire them. If you think it was an unavoidable mistake, vote for them again. But they're your employee and because you can hire and fire them you are responsible for any damage they do."
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6t1x5g | Why are the Torah (Tewrat) and the book of Psalms (Zabur) considered holy in Islam whereas the rest of Hebrew Bible isn't? | In Islamic tradition the Quran, the Torah(Tewrat), the New Testament(Injil) and the Zabur(the book of Psalms) are considered holy but other parts of the Tanakh are not, is there a reason why this is the case? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"In Islamic belief, the Tewrat (Torah) was given to Musa (Moses) through divine inspiration, and the Zabur (Psalms) was similarly revealed to David. They believe that the true Injil (Gospel) was given to Jesus himself but has been lost, and they believe the same is true of the Scrolls of Abraham. Along with the Koran given to Mohammed, these 5 books are all considered scriptural - basically a direct line from God. The other books of the Jewish and Christian Bible are considered by Islam to be written by non-prophets, or at the least not divinely revealed. These are considered a mix of histories and philosophies, and they aren't considered to be totally \"truth\" in the sense that the scriptural texts are considered to be. So basically, if God said it, it's holy. If someone else said it, it might have some good stuff, but it's not quite so holy."
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6t2o6s | Why haven't we had a president with a nice beard or mustache since Taft over 100 years ago? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"WWI primarily. Prior to WWI having a beard was seen as a sign of adulthood, strength and nobility. But the war required the use of gas masks, which in turn requires you to be clean shaven to get a good seal. So you have an entire generation of people trained to shave for survival. From that point forward being clean shaven was considered the standard for society and only odd balls and rebels had beards. We have only gotten past that mentality in the last decade or so.",
"Fashion changes. None of our first 15 presidents wore facial hair - besides some [sweet mutton chops]( URL_0 ). Beards weren't the style of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Lincoln opted to wear a beard because, as the story goes, a kid told him in a letter that he'd look less weird with one. By the later half of the 19th century, a strong mustache or beard was a sign of a strong, decisive man - look at Teddy Roosevelt and his bear hunting, big stick ways. But by the early part 20th century the \"man's man\" idea had died out a little and the educated, smart diplomat was preferred. Nowadays, beards are associated more with young, rebellious men or older men than they are with intelligent, upper-class business ideals - so the presidents of the last 100 years have opted to style that way. In another 10 or 50 years (who knows?), the pendulum will likely swing again.",
"Beards and facial hair are considered untrustworthy by focus groups of old people who show up to vote. As they die off I would not be surprised if we get a president who dresses and looks like Lincoln... like many hipsters already do today."
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6t3azv | Why are we expected to dress formally in certain situations such as court, fancy restaurants, and weddings? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"These occasions are *rituals,* that is, things we do partly for their symbolic value. Doing them is like sending a message \"we all think this is important.\" Part of the ritual is wearing a special costume.",
"To show respect for the occasion and the people involved in it. I would add to the list live theater and church."
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6t3voc | how is a new language deciphered? | How do scientists break down a new language? Do they try to trace it to another more coherent language. With that in mind, why is it that there are some languages, such as indus river vally script and vinca that we have never been able to understand | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Usually they find a similar language. There's always a lot of guesswork involved, especially the early stages. You can work some things out. The number of different symbols indicates the type of language (ours has single symbols for consonants and others for vowels. Some have symbols representing syllables and some representing whole words). Certain combinations might be found only in certain places so probably represent the place name. These will probably be referenced in another known language or even be similar to the current name. Once you know the sounds of a few letters you can piece together some other words. Some might sound a bit like those in another language in the region. Once you have that information you can piece a lot more together.",
"Here's a (long and detailed) video you might be interested in, OP: URL_0 The linguist Stephen Bax talks about his attempts at a partial decoding of the Voynich Manuscript, a mysterious book written in an unknown script and unknown language supposedly around the 15th century. Basically he looks for proper names first - specifically the names of the plants that are featured in illustrations in the book. If a page has ten lines of text and a big picture of a juniper leaf or something, it's highly likely that one of the recurring words in the passage is that language's word for 'juniper'. And then he checks if it might possibly resemble the word for juniper in languages that he's familiar with, and that will give him a suggestion about what sounds the specific letters represent. And then he goes on to check if those same orthographic 'rules' come up again in other parts of the book, which he determines by once again looking out for proper names and plant illustrations",
"By \"new language\" I'm assuming you mean a recently discovered historical language. There are actually very few totally isolated languages. Almost all languages have something in common with a language that is understood, even if it's only a few similar words here and there. People smarter than me can take this as a starting place and build patterns from it. What has been more difficult for linguists is deciphering writing systems, not as much the languages themselves. Ancient Hieroglyphs and Cuneiform took many years and geniuses to decipher. Even WITH the Rosetta stone, Heiroglyphs were years of hard work. Specifically the ancient Indus River Valley civilization seems to have began in near isolation, not traded with outsiders or thier languages, and ended mysteriously leaving no descendants to propagate thier language. Modern day inhabitants of that region are descended from Indo-European ancestors that migrated in and replaced them. A completely different language. When you have no modern language analogue AND no modern script that compares to a discovered writing, it's virtually hopeless to decipher."
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6t3zgi | why do people use verbose/redundant languages? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Can you expand on this a little bit? What do you mean by verbose/redundant?"
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6t41v3 | When someone speaking to a journalist says "Off the record", is that legally binding or is it more of a gentleman's agreement? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"There is nothing legally binding about it at all and the statement can be used with anyone. All \"off the record\" means is \"please don't attribute this to me or quote me on it\". The journalist is more than allowed to refuse to honor that, but it would violate the \"gentleman's agreement\" that sources have with journalists - if the journalist doesn't respect \"off the record\" then the source will likely never speak to the journalist again, which can result in the journalist not having access to important sources for future stories. It is up to the journalist to determine if the information gained is worth violating that person's trust - if a Congressman said, \"Off the record, I killed a man last week\" I doubt the journalist would honor the Congressman's request.",
"Not legally binding. A journalist can publish it anyway, but if someone regularly lets you in on secrets you generally don't want to piss them off or ruin their career, because then you'll no longer be in on any more secrets.",
"Here in Germany (and some other European countries) there are even three different categories: \"Under 1\": you are allowed to name the source \"Under 2\": you can use the information and the (political) Milieu of the source, but not the name \"[Under 3]( URL_0 )\": you are not allowed to use the information for publishing But there is no legally binding."
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6t4348 | Nietzsche philosophy? | Can anyone explain the basics of Nietzschian philosophy to me? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Very generally: 1. There is no God. 2. Therefore, there is no supreme moral arbiter or objective morality. 3. Therefore, all morality comes from people. 4. Therefore, someone who has recognized these facts can build their own personal morality and feel no guilt or shame from following it. 5. This makes such people far more powerful, as they are unshackled from old, tired moralities imposed by religion and the state, able to have true self-determination and freedom. It is important to note that many of the cringey teenagers who latch on to nihilism have mostly only realized the first two points. Losing a belief in a supreme moral authority tends to make people feel adrift, and unfortunately the actual meaning of this philosophy is lost on them. Also important is the fact that there is nothing saying a Nietzchian nihilist must be a \"bad person.\" The personal moral code they develop could well be \"seek the freedom and agency of all mankind above all else.\" The idea is only that it frees you to make your own decisions rather than having someone or something else make them."
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6t51tl | Ayn Rand's objectivism | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"What we perceive with our senses around us is real and not just a figment of ours or some other beings consciousness. The best way to learn about our world is through reason and science. Your mind is the greatest tool that we as human beings possess. Your life is your highest value. All other values serve that. Human beings have free will and should only deal with other people through free exchange of materials and ideas. You should not initiate the use of force and only use it in retaliation.",
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5 objectivism ]( URL_4 ) 1. [ELI5: Objectivism ]( URL_5 ) 1. [ELI5: Ayn Rand's Objectivism and her Philosophy ]( URL_3 ) 1. [ELI5: Ayn Rand and objectivism ]( URL_0 ) 1. [ELI5: What is Ayn Rand's Objectivism? ]( URL_7 ) 1. [ELI5: Ayn Rand's objectivism ]( URL_2 ) 1. [ELI5:The political philosophy of Ayn Rand? What exactly is objectivism? ]( URL_6 ) 1. [ELI5: Objectivism and Existentialism ]( URL_1 )",
"[rationalwiki has the best article about objectivism]( URL_0 ) without putting the reader to sleep: > Objectivism is a peculiar philosophy formulated by novelist Ayn Rand. It sports a range of convoluted tenets, but is most infamous for redefining overt self-interest as the prime moral virtue — and, to take things even further, literally redefining altruism as evil. It's so terrible that even Conservapedia opposes it (though the page mostly focuses on Rand being an atheist).[2] The name \"Objectivism\" was chosen because, as Rand was the single smartest person in the history of the world, anything she said had to be objective.[Note 1] > As one might imagine, Objectivism is very popular amongst those who already hold a \"me-first\" view of the world. It lets them say, \"Hey, I'm not being a selfish jerk, I'm following a philosophy!\". Of course, this incredibly short-sighted and narrow outlook — only seeking short-term gains no matter the cost to everyone else — will not even maximize long-term individual gains (let alone short- or long-term societal gain). > Objectivism introduces several religious elements, the likes of which were previously only accessible to atheists via the messianic shrillness of Communism (or possibly a maximally insane adherence to the Austrian School of Economics),[Note 2] viz., an inability and unwillingness to define any non-self-serving epistemology, raging pseudointellectualism on the part of faithful, and a childish fixation with simplistic solutions to all complex problemsWikipedia's W.svg. > For obvious reasons, Objectivism has been met with a hilariously lacklustre acceptance from academia. Sorry about the formatting (using my phone). The subject also reminds me of a joke: An objectivist walks into a library and asks, \"'Atlas Shrugged' is a work of philosophy, why is it in the fiction section?\" The librarian answers, \"The garbage can was full.\" edit: fixed formatting of quote",
"[Ayn Rand is responsible for the ugliest selfish philosophy of the 20th century]( URL_0 ). Her last years relied on public assistance. She'd applied using a different name than AR.",
"Selfishness is good, ignoring that we'd all have died as children without the generosity of our parents and society ."
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6t594o | Why our voices go up in pitch when asking a question | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"its cultural, an English language quirk. it clarifies what response you are wanting from the other person. Chinese for example accomplishes the same meaning by adding the word 'ma' to the end of the sentence.",
"This is a tonal cue specific to English which indicates to the listener that the person is asking a question, or is unsure about what they are saying. Pitch going up with a questioning statement is *not* something which is universal among languages, and isn't even necessary in English for the idea to be conveyed through syntax."
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6t72kd | How do big or even sort of big celebrities/figures deal with the huge amount of social media notifications? Surely they aren't walking around with likes and dm's poping up every second on their phone, right? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"They can turn off notifications. They also do things such as paying others to do it for them as well as deleting an app off their phone or not having it in the first place. Or ignoring them",
"I've worked with quite a few celebrities. They all have their own ways of handling this. Some have their public social media presence (usually managed by someone else) and then secret hidden social media accounts for real friends. This is probably the most common method I've seen. Some that manage their own accounts (at least in part) learn to turn off notifications. I've seen Facebook on their phone and it will have thousands of notifications unread. Others that don't care enough to turn off notifications will have a constant stream of notifications popping up on their phone that, to me at least, renders the phone useless but they find a way to deal with it I guess. I've had moments of being semi famous myself and I've had to turn off notifications for certain apps or it's just mind boggling overwhelming. I've even had to completely turn off phone calls one time as I was getting dozens of calls a day from media and other people.",
"Most likely... sucks I know but it is part of what makes it so cool when they do reply. It's sort of like those big piles of fan mail you see on TV, they ignore most, read some but reply to very few"
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6t7nn4 | how do scat porn "performers" do what they do without throwing up on the spot or getting ill in the longer term? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Fake pooooooo. No seriously. I read on reddit before that it's usually chocolate or something, and not actual shit.",
"A lot of it is fake, but some do the real thing. In this case. Do something enough times, the body grows insensitive too it. This is how people work as garbage men, sewage cleaners, etc. As for getting ill, diet will play a part in how toxic fecal matter is andas long as you have no real open cuts and you fully clean yourself afterwards, there's a low risk of actually getting ill. Take a food safety class and they'll discuss 80% of all food illnesses relates to something in fecal matter being ingested. Poop particles are every where and causes majority of the illnesses. You can literally swim in shit and be fine if you properly clean yourself afterwards."
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6t8jhp | How do you get involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital as an adult, and what stops you from leaving? | I understand that the laws on this vary between countries, so if you could explain how involuntary commitment works in the United States, that would be great. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Hi, I've been admitted to acute psychiatric hospitals both voluntarily and involuntarily. Here's a very rough outline of what happens (in some cases, this isn't true for every case obviously but it reflects most of my experiences): The cops find you out in the world somewhere being a crazy person. You're threatening to hurt yourself or others, you're acting strange and/or not making sense, etc. Sometimes the police are called *on* you and if the department has a \"mental health officer\" (Austin, TX had one) they send that person. Anyway, you are detained-- not arrested, not unless you've been breaking laws and that's a whole different ball of wax, but iirc your mental health will be addressed first even then-- and taken to the nearest Emergency Room to be seen by a mental health professional. This is when your paper trail starts, which is very important and needed to keep you anywhere involuntarily. The officer(s) who brought you will fill out a report about where they found you, what they observed you doing or saying, etc, and the ER will get a copy of that report. In the ER, you will be seen by a psychiatrist somewhere within 24 hours. This guy just comes in to poke you a little and try to get a feel of why you're there. You get asked questions like \"are you feeling suicidal or homicidal? Are you seeing or hearing things that other people don't?\" The meeting usually only lasts a few minutes. The psychiatrist will make his own report about what he observed, and will ask the hospital to run some basic tests to make sure you aren't being negatively affected by illegal substances, prescribed meds, or some other kind of medical condition. This is generally just blood work and urine samples. Once those tests come back, the psychiatrist will use that information to make a decision about what he thinks would be best for you. In this scenario he's going to decide that you're currently a danger to yourself or others and need to be transferred to an inpatient mental health facility. He'll sign off on a 24 to 72 hour hold, meaning you are not allowed to leave during that time unless you take the matter to court. It can take several hours or several days to be transferred, depending on your insurance or lack thereof, and whether there's space for you at any local mental health facilities. (I was stuck in a blank room in the ER for three days once and it fucking sucked.) Usually a nurse or tech will come to check on you once in a while in the ER to ask you how you're doing, and will add his or her notes to the pile of paperwork you've been accumulating. When it is finally time to be transferred, you go by ambulance to the facility, where you're checked in and your belongings put away somewhere safe. At the facility, you see a different psychiatrist (again, within 24 hours) who has access to your file, but will ask you many of the same questions. This psychiatrist will make a decision about treatment, and will usually discuss it with you and have you sign off on it. Treatment at an inpatient facility usually lasts 3 - 5 days, depending on your needs. During this time, you can request to leave Against Medical Advice, though that sort of request also takes one or two days to go through-- you can't just walk out. If your psychiatrist believes you're a danger to yourself or others, they can request another 24 or 72 hour hold, or even up to fourteen days, or thirty days in some cases (that's only at \"long term\" facilities). That kind of thing takes paperwork and court stuff, so the psychiatrist will submit their request for a hold based on the paperwork you've been gathering and their own findings, plus your mental health history if they have access to it. Sometimes, if your hold is going to be more than a few days, court documents have to be generated and an attorney is assigned to your case, to tell you what your rights are and how you would go about fighting the decision in court, if you wanted to. You get a copy of the psychiatrist's requests for a hold, the reason why they asked for it, the court docs, everything. At the end of the day, though, it's really hard to keep an adult in the US confined in a mental health facility for longer than like, a couple of months. As soon as you no longer need someone up your butt every hour of the day, they want to let you go and make room for someone in greater need.",
"Most states have laws on the books that state that a mentally ill person can be involuntarily confined to a mental institution for a limited period (usually about 72 hours) if they pose a danger to themselves or others. In Florida it's called the \"Baker Act\" but I don't know what it's called in other states/areas. I don't know whether the police can just do it of their own volition or whether they need a judge to sign off on it like an arrest warrant. This allows mental health professionals time to evaluate the person and decide if they need to be permanently confined, which I believe can only happen under a court order."
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6t8rgv | Why did Italian develope as a separate language from Latin,even though Latin continued to be spoken?. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"In the book You Are What You Speak, the author explains that until the nation building trend of the 1800s, language was a continuum as you moved through Italy, France, then Spain, the common person spoke a language that was decreasingly similar to the Latin spoke in Rome. If you picked any point along the way, the communities on either side of you would have been intelligible, but as you moved away in any direction it would have been harder and harder to understand. During the nation building phase, when France, Italy, and Spain defined their borders, the language spoken in the capital became what was accepted as French, Italian, and Spanish. There are still traces of the traditional languages around, like Provençal and Breton in France, and Catalan in Spain."
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6t97kx | How it is possible that we haven't ran out of possible melodies in music? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The total number of possible melodies is finite, so we could theoretically run out of melodies, but it's a very big number. Define how long a sequence of intervals needs to be to be called a \"melody\". Let's say seven intervals, making the song eight notes long. There are twelve intervals, so 7^12 = 13.8 billion possible songs. However, this assumes every note has the same duration, which they haven't. Let's say you use four different note durations in your song, the number of possible songs is 40 digits long.",
"Most songs are actually quite similar, composed of varying speeds of 4 chords, with different layers on them. Multiply that with the number of new sounds/instrument's/genres and you have an exponential number of sounds you can create. Watch axis of awesomes 4 chords: URL_0"
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6t9jhx | How affirmative action works. | Can someone please tell me how and why affirmative is based on race and not economic level? I'm Asian, grew up in rural Virginia and I saw tons of poor white and black people and some blacks are just as racist as white and some whites are just as racist as blacks, in fact I'd say black people made my life a living hell more often than white people. So, if people/races across the board all have sucky ass folks why base it on race and not income? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Affirmative action isn't about individual racism. It's about systemic racism and trying to counter some of the larger societal troubles that disadvantage people of color. It's not a perfect system but it's at least a start",
"It based in the idea that equality of opportunity is not important, rather equality of outcome is what must be enforced. Here's a germane and real-life example. You (Asian), a black friend, and a white friend all graduate high school with exactly the same grades, SAT score, and general resume. You also all come from the same socioeconomic background. You all decide to apply to the same university. Now, this university has an affirmative action policy. So, when evaluating each application, say they have a scoring process. You get a prescribed amount of points weighted to your GPA, SAT scores, and general resume. Each individual is scored the same and ends up with a final point score. Everything up to this point is fair. Now, the affirmative action part comes in. The school may look at their population and say Asians are over represented, whites are ok, and blacks are under represented on our campus. So, we are going to adjust final scores. All Asians will be deducted 20 points, whites will remain the same, and blacks will get 20 points. Maybe after the adjustment, your two friends make the cut and are accepted, but you are not because you are Asian. Maybe none of you should have qualified based on your actual score, but your black friend was accepted solely because of the color of his skin. You can see that there is a strange departure here in thought. Individual merit and circumstances are secondary to your group identity. Donald Trumps son is treated the same as a poor white kid from rural West Virginia. Will Smith's son is treated the same as a poor black kid from Detroit. You see your individual circumstances are secondary to your race's perceived circumstances. When you really think about it, it's a racist and arbitrary system. It's not say that some individuals don't have extenuating circumstances that need to be taken into account. Maybe a kid from Nigeria who did not have access to public education gets a break because he had a lack of opportunity, but to then extend that same advantage to all black kids is asinine. Barack Obama's daughters do not need that same consideration, in the same way as the poor kid from rural West Virgina is not deserving of due consideration because he has the same skin hue as Warren Buffet's kids. To boil it down, Affirmative Action says your merit is tied to your race. The real problem I have with Affirmative Action is that it is the embodiment of the idea that you can fight past racism with present racism. That's just stupid. We should be addressing the real problems in our society. I posit that the real issue plaguing our society is single motherhood. Studies show that the overwhelming single predictor of crime, dropping out of high school, and long term poverty is single motherhood, regardless of race. This is an issue that plagues the white community as well has the black community. The rate of single motherhood in the 1960's was 5% for whites and 20% for blacks. Currently those statistics have risen to 29% for whites and around 72% for blacks. Interestingly, the long term poverty rate for two parent black households is 7%. The long term poverty rate for single white mothers about 37%. So, where is the white privilege for the single white mothers and their kids? In fact the Asian community has the lowest long term poverty rates and actually have a higher average household income than white families. Is there Asian privalige? Is there no history of institutional and systemic racism against Asians in this country? Is the system set up by Asians for Asians? No, that is stupid. So why are Asians doing better than everyone else, including whites? Because the rate of single motherhood in the Asian community is the lowest, at 17%. Again, I say it has nothing to do with race and everything to do with family circumstances. According to the Brookings Institute, there are 3 rules to follow to have 95% chance of avoiding long term poverty: 1) Don't have babies out of wedlock 2) Graduate high school 3) Get a job Notice that nowhere does it mention race as a contributing factor. Sources: Politifact & Brookings Institute",
"Affirmative action is a way of achieving something like [the second picture here]( URL_0 ) As much as we might WISH for a world where everyone starts on even ground, we're not in that world yet. So we compensate to be sure that even if we can't *start* from the same position, everyone gets a chance to be part of the game. And affirmative action *isn't* solely based on race. Race is the most visible subtype, but there are equivalent programs for people from impoverished backgrounds, programs for people with disabilities..."
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6tazxg | What actually happens during a state of emergency? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"Its more of an administrative/political \"declaration\" then a direct action, because the actions can be highly varied. While this can heavily vary by the location calling the state of emergency, it generally gives the government additional power to regulate things they would not otherwise do such as stuff like curfews, travel restrictions, additional police and public safety presences, national guard -- all in order to ensure public safety because there has been an extraordinary event that necessitates quick and decisive action. In addition, depending on specifics, sometimes \"emergency\" stuff will actually be funded differently than normal, which means you may have a special box of cash to fund in these cases, that you can never use for other things, or you can take money from other parts of the government, to instead use it for an emergency. When the government does *anything* there are generally two big questions to ask: 1) Can I legally do this?, and 2) Can I afford to do this? Declaring an emergency can be a short cut to solve one or both questions.",
"It varies hugely by country. In some countries, it just means that governments are given authority to move swiftly to provide emergency help, without a lot of bureaucracy. In some countries, it means that human rights and the constitution and legislature are all put aside, and a small number of executive or military or other leaders are given vast authority to order almost any action they feel necessary."
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6tb8tz | How did the asterisk end up being used for correcting an incorrectly spelled word? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"I think that relates to their use as footnotes. An asterisk* after a word refers to a passage at the bottom of the page which has clarification or extra information regarding the word. I think that with the advent of instant messaging, the method gained popularity as a corrective footnote. The first asterisk of the pair is obviously missing because you can't plan for typos in advance. --- ^(*which, FYI, comes from Latin \"aster\" which means star)"
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6tbv61 | How did nicknames for names like Richard and Charles become Dick and Chuck and other ones like that when they are so different from their original form? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"text": [
"All I wanna know is if Steve is short for Steven then why isn't Steph short for Stephen rather than Stephany? And what's short for Stevany????? Stev????? Help!!!!!!!!",
"Some of my friends told me that Dick comes from Richard due to the original nickname of Richard being \"Rick\". After that, Dick came to be due to its rhyming with Rick.",
"Interesting! How do you get Molly from Mary, then?"
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6tcmm5 | Why do flags that have the union jack in the corner have different field colors? | For example, the British Antarctic Territory has White, the old Canadian flag has red, along with British Columbia, and the Fiji, Australia and New Zealand flags have blue Follow-up: Why do the Aussie and New Zealand flags still have the union jack? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It comes from the different ensigns used by the Royal Navy in the past. Different squadrons of the navy used different ensigns, so dependent on where the squadrons patrolled new colonies and institutions would use the flag familiar to them. It's all explained in this link: URL_0",
"Speaking as a Kiwi, the only guess as to why we have the Jack still on our flag is because we're still part of the commonwealth, also we had a referendum to change our flag last year, it did fail obviously, you could find more information of the referendum [here]( URL_0 ) and [here] ( URL_2 ) I wanted [this]( URL_1 ) as our flag personally."
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6td25y | How do you whisper in tonal languages like Cantonese? Aren't all the tones lost? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You can hear the inflection in a question in English even if you whisper. It's the same idea.",
"The tones are there but they are really subtle. Sometimes you would have to find out from context like in tonal language songs or if you listen closely enough, you can hear the tones. Source: my Chinese teacher",
"I had a friend who researched this in college for Mandarin. He said that tones are differentiated while whispering by exaggerating the stress and duration differences for each tone that are present to a lesser extent in normal speech. However, the pitch elements that define the tone normally don't really come across when whispering."
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6tdql0 | how did the Kim dynasty begin? | Who were they before, how did they rise to power and secure that power, was there anyone else who tried to rule, how did it become a dictator ship in the first place, and why were they chosen? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"1.) In 1853 Japan is a closed society. They don't trade with the outside world, and they don't allow foreigners inside the country. The US Navy shows up, and starts blowing stuff up until the Japanese let them in and start trading with them. 2.) The Japanese are humiliated by this, but recognize how far behind they are, and start on a rapid modernization program. The movie The Last Samurai, while being a shitty movie, attempts to cover this time period. 3.) In 1913 a modernized Japan decides to colonize Korea. They hold Korea as a colony until 1945. 4.) Two days after the Hiroshima bombing the Soviet Union declares War on Japan in an attempt to make inroads at the winners table after Japan surrenders. 5.) Japan officially surrenders September 1945, mainland Japan is entirely under American control, but their Korea colony is split at the 38th parallel with the Red Army occupying the North, and the US Army the South. This was not meant to be permanent. 6.) The US and Soviet Union set up a commission to try to establish a Government of Korea. The talks go nowhere. 7.) In 1947 the US goes to the UN and gets approval to hold elections in Korea. 8.) The North refuses to participate, and they are only held in the South. In 1948 the newly elected Government declares themselves the Republic of Korea(South Korea) 9.) One month later Kim Il Sung declares the Democratic People's Republic(North Korea) to be a country. The Red Army leaves Korea around this time. 10.) In 1950 North Korea launched an invasion of South Korea with the intention of annexing the country. After initially being wildest successful, US reinforcements rapidly drove them back into North Korea. The US at this point did or didn't attempt to wipe out North Korea depending on who you ask. Whatever their intentions were they got too close to China, and China immediately entered the War. 11.) The Chinese pushed the Americans back to near the border although still in North Korean territory. The War then settled into a Stalemate until a ceasefire agreement was reached in 1953. 12.) They have stayed in this status until this day.",
"Kim Il-sung was a minor rebel leader in Japanese occupied Manchuria in the 1930s, commanding a mixed group of Chinese and Korean guerillas trying to expel the Japanese from Manchuria and Korea. The Japanese kicked the shit out of these groups and almost all the rebel leaders died. Kim was one of the few survivors but he was forced to flee to Russia where he fought for the Red Army during WW2. In the final months of WW2 the Russians declared war on Japan and invaded and conquered North Korea. Stalin asks his feared KGB chief Beria to select someone to head the newly formed North Korean communist party with the (successful) aim of installing them as the leader of a communist North Korea within a few months. Beria chose Kim because: - he was a loyal communist who had close ties to the Russians from his time in the red army - they could credibly describe him as the leader of the Korean resistance to Japanese occupation given how few other rebel leaders from that time period had survived - he hadn't been to Korea in 26 years and barely spoke the language and so would be very unlikely to develop his own rival power centre for some time, so the hope was that he would be dependent on Russia and highly biddable. But the Russians underestimated Kim and he managed to play the Russians and the Chinese off against each other, first taking all the weapons from Russia, then switching to China and declaring war on the south, both consolidating his domestic hold and his alliance with China, then eliminating all his domestic enemies, then semi-detaching himself from China.",
"North Korea was originally a USSR puppet state. They needed to set up a communist dictator there; it didn't really matter who. So they grabbed a random commander from the army and made him dictator of North Korea. That was Kim Il Sung."
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6tesyr | If we were still at war with Nazi Germany, Nazi supporters would be tried for treason. Why now are Nazi groups aloud to persist, unchallenged by law? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"There is a very fine balancing act between avoiding government censorship and persecution of political groups on the one hand, and allowing desctructive elements to fester until they become too big to deal with on the other. If you give the government powers to imprison people for holding certain political beliefs, how is that fundamentally different from what the Gestapo did? And who gets to say exactly which political opinions are allowed and which are not? Back in the Germany of the 1930s, the popular belief was that it was the Communists who were the dangerous, subversive elements, and the Nazis promised to deal with them. It was when the Reichstag building burned down -- apparently as part of a Communist plot, although nobody can ever be 100% sure of that -- that the Nazis were able to push through their Enabling Act, a kind of emergency legislation, ostensibly to eliminate this threat to society, but which in fact made it possible to effectively ban all other political parties and dismantle Germany's entire democratic system. For obvious reasons, modern Germany is very keen to ensure that extremist political groups can never do such a thing ever again, and so they had to come up with a way to ban such organisations without giving a future government the power to eliminate all opposition in exactly the way the Nazis did. Germany's approach takes on this form: first, the German constitution contains lots of written guarantees of certain basic human rights. Many clauses are subject to what's called an \"eternity clause\", meaning they can never be repealed or weakened for any reason whatever, and they must be included in any new constitution that succeeds the current one. Then, there is a ban on any political party that is, in the language of German law, \"antagonistic to the constitution\". That is, if your political movement can be shown to be actively working towards undermining the constitution, it can be banned. The bar is set quite high, though. The authorities have to gather a *lot* of evidence, and this often means infiltrating the movement. There was an embarrassing case a couple of years ago, when some agents had infiltrated such a movement so successfully, that they rose up through the ranks and some of them were partly responsible for the very policies that were supposed to be evidence of the party's anti-constitutional aims. (It's difficult to blame the agents -- after all, they really didn't want to break cover.) Then the constitutional court has to study the evidence, and decide whether or not to withdraw the organisation's status as a political party. But even if you ban the organisation, you can't change the minds of the individuals. They will simply regroup, and join or found a new party, taking care to ensure that in public at least, they stay on the right side of the law. The real key to this, though, is not the nuclear option of suspending basic rights for certain classes of people. It seems to be education, and here Germany has an advantage. All German schoolchildren are taught about the rise of the Nazis and WW2, and in particular they are all made to visit a concentration camp. The message \"Never again\" is drummed into them from a very early age.",
"Simply expressing support would not be sufficient to try someone for treason even back in war times. That would be deeply unpopular, but not treason unless you'd do something *material* in regards to the enemy war effort. For example, you can look at organizations like German American Bund or British Union of Fascists. In general, their organized activities were prohibited during the war and leaders were detained for various issues; but the detained people, as a rule, were not tried for treason and the vast majority of their members (tens of thousands of them!) weren't tried for anything ever.",
"That is not true. The Nazis in the US (yes we had a Nazis Party) were not tried for treason in the US during WWII simply for holding their beliefs. If that was not sufficient for it during time of war it most assuredly is not now.",
"You fight ideas *WITH* ideas. Providing they are not breaking laws or actually hurting people, public shunning, mockery, ridicule, and shaming, are pretty effective ways to change non violent behavior, attitudes, and beliefs. There were some pretty effective social movements based on those principles.",
"In the US, the legal standard for treason is very high. Expressing support is not treason, and US explicitly protected by the First Amendment. I recommend reading the Constitution. It isn't very long.",
"Nazi Germany does not exists. Nazis were a political party and the US has first amendment rights so you can't do anything to them. As long as they are peaceful that is. You may not like or agree with what they say or do but that's why we have the first amendment. You have to accept the good with the bad otherwise not allowing people to express their own views would be a form of fascism",
"I'm assuming some sort of combination of the 1st amendment and not committing any war crimes.",
"All these people are quoting free expression. Me, I think it's good they still exist. They're like a showcase example of a dumb idea, just so we can remember why it's a dumb idea and to never pursue it again.",
"If my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle. 1. We're not at war with Germany anymore 2. First Amendment protects peoples' rights to be shitheads 3. Treason is defined as \"*Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason*\" < -- walking around with a swastika flag and tiki torch doesn't count 4. Allowed.",
"If you don't act upon it (or at least within the boundaries of the law) you can believe what you wish. We do live in freedom."
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6tfgbi | What is the point of accumulating wealth beyond of what you can spend in a lifetime? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"First of all those numbers are not cash sums they have on their bank accounts. Those are largely positions in their own companies that are worth that much money. These companies help people: they provide jobs, produce a useful product or provide a useful service, sponsor sports teams that give opportunities to children, ... Besides that they usually spend quite some money on charities, invest in financial security for their families etc. And while it's not all well spent of course, a big part of the money goes back to the community in some way."
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6tgbnh | How did 'good weather' become synonymous with hot weather when just as many people prefer colder weather? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"You're viewing this from the very spoiled perspective of modern times. Being hot sucks, but not nearly as badly as freezing to death. Outside of modern times cold weather meant needing fuel to burn if you wanted to even attempt to stay warm. You can't grow crops, wild game becomes less easily found and the animals themselves become small/less nutritious as they lose weight from not having as much food supply. Simply put it's a lot easier to survive and feel comfortable in hot weather than cold.",
"We are descended from agricultural societies. Weather below freezing was a slow death to them, since you couldn't grow crops if the ground froze, if it was 100 degrees F it would be hot and a lot of crops would die if it was sustained, but it would still be a lot better than winter. And no one calls super-hot weather good. Good weather is somewhere between 60-90 degrees F.",
"More people chose to live and vacation in the hottest areas on earth than in the coldest. Most people would say the ideal temp is around 74 F, that's a lot closer to hot than cold. If you could ski on sand the difference in location preference would be even more dramatic. Nothing wrong with preferring cold weather, some of my best friends ...",
"As a person who has lived in both Alaska and south Texas, I have strong feelings about this. First, if you were to divide population centers into binary groupings of \"people who live in mostly warm/hot weather\" and \"people who live in mostly cold weather\" (i.e. People who live in places like Alaska versus places like the American south) you'd find a huge disparity in numbers toward warm weather. Are there some people who prefer colder weather? Sure. But, worldwide, it's a drop in the bucket compared to people who prefer and live near a warmer climate and simply endure winter months. Humans can survive quite handily in very hot climates. The body can acclimate to hot weather in a few weeks without ever being in danger of dying from heat alone as long as you have a source of water. Crops grow more efficiently, travel is easier and, from an anthropological perspective, there is generally a more robust sense of community since far more activities are held outdoors. Humans are quite fragile when it comes to cold weather. Once the temp dips below what a body can regulate on its own, hypothermia will set in and then death in a relatively short period. Your body needs lots of help to combat the cold. Animal skins, high-fat diets, substantial insulated shelter, etc. It's a lot of work (mitigated dramatically by modern technologies) to stay warm in the winter. You can survive in the heat with virtually nothing. That's the difference.",
"Since when good weather is hot? Good weather is warm, without crazy weather effects.",
"> just as many people prefer colder weather? I'm a colder weather person (grew up in the South), but where did you get the idea that \"just as many\" people in general like colder vs warmer? Almost everyone I have ever met in my life (and I'm a lot older than the average redditor. Like, parent-age older) has always preferred warmer weather. Forget all that nonsense about agriculture and freezing to death on the Russian steppes in our collective pasts - we don't have genetic memories dictating our moods & opinions now. From moment we go off to school, we are conditioned to associate *summer* (i.e. when all that hot weather usually happens. Or did before climate change) with good times because of **summer recess.** If you go to both kindergarten and college, that's **17 very influential years** reinforcing this. Plus, even once you're an adult, you continue to associate summer with far more outdoor activities and vacations. The circle is complete once you start having children and you need to time family vacations with their summer recesses.",
"Your premise is flawed. What evidence do yo have to prove that just as many people prefer cold weather?",
"There's a reason beaches are filled in the summer, even with hot weather, and you don't see tons of people just sitting around outside all day in the cold weather. Preferences aside, it does objectively seem like way more people enjoy being out in hot than cold weather. Hence, it becomes \"good weather.\"",
"Most people only care about the weather when they're doing stuff outdoors. And, in most cases, warm sunny weather is greatly preferred over cool cloudy weather. Which is why warm + sunny = good and cool + cloudy = bad",
"I think of good weather as clear skies with no precipitation. Doesn't matter what the temperature is.",
"Unless you can show me a valid scientific source, that says just as many people prefer cold.. Then I'm not gonna buy it.",
"As a middle eastern, trust me, there's nothing good or preferable about our hot 40-48 C summers. Without air conditioning, life here would be hugely undesirable and unsustainable for many. It's our winters, 20-35 C, that are bearable and \"good\".",
"As someone who lives in Singapore in the tropics, when we say good weather we mean temperatures of around 28 deg C. Usually cloudy, after it has rained. Bright sunny days easily range between 33-36 deg C, and no one likes those over here."
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6tggse | why is it that when adults learn a new language, they often repeat certain things the wrong way despite hearing otherwise in day to day life? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"When you learn a language growing up, your brain gradually customizes its understanding of how things are said -- only certain grammar, and only certain sounds, make sense. When much later you try to learn another language, its different rules seem so wrong that you keep \"correcting\" them to something more compatible with your lifetime of experience and learning.",
"My boyfriend refuses to pronouce Oregon as \"ora-gen\" and says \"ora-gone\", even though Oregonians themselves pronouce it as \"ora-gen\". We were there for two weeks, he was the only one mispronouncing it."
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6tgqpc | Why is alcohol sale often prohibited after a certain time of the day, and on certain days? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"They're blue laws. I'm not sure if any of them were backed up by research, but the simple reason for doing it was just keeping drunks off the street and away from bars overnight. Sure, you can stock up on booze and drink all night at home, but the focus was on rowdy bars never stopping. If you just milk your alcoholism at home with whiskey you bought earlier, that's not bugging the public. Restricting it on certain days (like Sunday) is just straight blue-law to try and get people sober for church.",
"Puritans. They ruined pleasure for a couple centuries here and we are still recovering as a culture",
"Most states have laws on alcohol sales after a certain time of night to help cut off crazy drunken/reckless behavior. Some states have also have limits due to laws that have been around forever and haven't been repealed, such as no sales on Sundays."
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6tgxtx | Who's in charge at the international space station and what would happen if there was a conflict? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"The current Commander is Fyodor Yurchikhin. I'm not sure what you mean by \"conflict\" but those under his command would be expected to behave themselves or would be coming down on the next shuttle. Such a thing would be basically unheard of.",
"While there likely are established protocols and procedures issued by their respective agencies, in all likelihood a war between the major parties participating in the ISS project would be cataclysmic and would limit any chance of rescue or resupply for a very long time if ever. So to answer your question, it is anyone's guess.",
"No one is 'in charge' exactly. It's a partnership. The main players are the Japanese (JAXA), the European Union (ESA), Russia (RSA) and the United States (NASA). From an operational stand point there are two sides of the ISS. The USOS side which consists of NASA, ESA and JAXA hardware and modules, which are like rooms on the ISS. The other side is the Russian side. Each side is in charge of certain things. For example the Russian side does the propulsion, while the USOS side does most of the communication and commanding. Crew members from all agencies are free to go where they like onboard, and work together constantly including training with each other before they get to space. They wake, eat, work and play together. For the most part the space agencies put politics of their respective nations aside, and focus on science and exploration. In my opinion that's part of what makes the ISS so special."
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6thes4 | Why has 'white cheddar' become the seemingly default flavor for any 'organic' or 'baked' version of snack food. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"It's a strong flavor with wide appeal in American markets. You need a strong flavor because generally speaking the \"baked\", \"organic\" or \"non-fat/low cal\" versions of snack foods lack flavor. Frying things in oil adds a lot of flavor, and that gets lost when they're baked instead."
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6tiq09 | This quote from Nicholas Machiavellis "The Prince" | "...For it is the nature of men to incur obligation as much by the benefits they render as by those they receive." For the context, he's talking about maintaining the loyalty of a towns people during a siege. | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"> For the context, he's talking about maintaining the loyalty of a towns people during a siege. Suppose you are a townsperson who has defended your prince at the cost of having your home and possessions destroyed. Now your prince comes to your aid and from your view there is compensation due for your efforts; the prince must aid in your recovery from such circumstances. How likely then are you to desert him for the invader who owes you nothing? Another example: Suppose an acquaintance gives you $50 and then you have the choice of maintaining contact with them. Probably would, right? But now what if you loan them $50, are you going to break contact? No, you want your money back! So you see the prince maintains their loyalty both by giving them aid and by their expectation of recouping their losses!"
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6tlssj | Why is there such a low standard of quality for comments sections on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter but Reddit's community often seems to be able to either 1) add to a story or 2) make a genuinely funny response to the original post? | Culture | explainlikeimfive | {
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"We have the capability to downvote content, and because we have that karma system, people aren't as willing to say terrible things because it makes it so they can't post as much or as often. We actually can self-police, and the consequences for failing that are in place. You can dislike things on facebook, and not many people reeeally care to discuss things on youtube. This is a bit more of a community of anonymous people.",
"The same reason you act differently at a formal dinner than when having some beers with the bros. I sometimes act shitty on yoyrube, way worse than I do here. It's just a different environment",
"I just remembered these from a video u/put on YouTube called what is Reddit? I'm sure there are more that I have forgotten and I will post the link shortly. Edit: URL_0 Watch from 3:00 onwards.",
"Moderators play a HUGE part. The karma system helps immensely but some threads are deleted before they can snowball into crazy ramblings and name calling..... Mostly."
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