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ELI5: Many billionaires like Bill Gates "give away" billions of dollars, but they give it to their own foundations, who dole it out at a trickle. Could they take this money back if they needed/wanted to? | I'm sure they'd have to pay taxes and penalties on it, but if they wanted to for some reason could they transfer funds from their foundation into their personal account, or just start spending it on themselves instead of on charitable causes? | 53 | No, this would be considered "self-dealing" by the IRS and is prohibited by law. An excise tax of 5% of the amount of money involved will be applied to everyone involved in the act of self-dealing and the act is supposed to be corrected. If it isn't corrected then a penalty of 200% of the amount involved is applied to the self-dealer and another 50% to any foundation manager who refused to correct the self-dealing.
So no, it wouldn't be accessible. | 38 |
CMV: The "first lady" job should end | Reason #1 - It is an outdated, archaic pratice that has no place in a modern republic.
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Back in the days of monarchy, when you were the king, your son was the prince. Should you die, he would rule and be the new king. If the president/prime minister dies, his/her son doesn't get to be the new president/prime minister. So why should, these days, someone be granted a title based on marriage alone?
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Reason #2 - It is nepotism pure and simple.
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If you argue that some form of charity done by the presidential office is important, shouldn't that job be given to a professional who has actual experience in doing it, instead of a random person that simply happens to be in the family of the president/prime minister?
Reason #3 - It inferiorizes women.
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Barack Obama's first lady was Michelle. Trump's is Melania. Now, do you know who Angela Merkel's "first husband/man" is? Do you know who was the "first man" of Brazil's Dilma Roussef? You probably don't and the reason is: when men are in power, it's okay for their women to be their "helpers", coming right behind them. Now, when a woman is in power it would be "weird" for their men to walk behind them taking a subordinate position. Maybe that's another sign that the job is not really necessary. I mean, if it becomes vacant for 4/5 years and nobody even notices...
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Reason #4 - It takes our attention away from the important stuff
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As the internet would say, government is serious business. A president/prime minister can take millions of people out of poverty, initiate a nuclear war, etc. When he have people discussing whether the current first lady is prettier than the previous one or not, wheter her clothes are adequate to a certain a event or not... That takes attention from the important stuff and transforms the "first family" into some sort of reality show couple. People stop debating tax rates and, instead, start asking if the first lady doesn't care about her husband's flings...
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Reason #5 - It reinforces the idea that the "traditional family" is the "proper" right one.
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The president/prime minister is elected, pictures start flooding the internet and magazines. Who's in these pictures? The president, the "first lady" and, hopefully, the two first kids and the first dog, as well. Now, put yourself in the shoes of a transgender person, a single lady, a sixty years old man who never had kids or a dog... Won't the fact that the "first family" is always different from yours start giving you feelings of inadequacy and make you question what you're doing "wrong" (even though you're not doing anything wrong at all, it just so happens that this tale tells you that you cannot be successful - or happy, for that matter- if your family does not look like every single family in power since the dawn of time)?
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What am I getting wrong here? | 18 | > Now, do you know who Angela Merkel's "first husband/man" is? Do you know who was the "first man" of Brazil's Dilma Roussef? You probably don't and the reason is: when men are in power, it's okay for their women to be their "helpers", coming right behind them.
I think the reason is that those countries never placed any importance on the "first spouse" in the first place. Do you know who Justin Trudeau's wife is? David Cameron's? Bolsonaro's? Shinzo Abe's? | 40 |
ELI5: How does the United States run on a deficit, and what does that ACTUALLY mean for the future? | We've only NOT run a deficit for four years of the past forty. As a member of the younger generation I'm trying to learn what it actually means for a country and it's posterity to run a deficit year after year. | 3,222 | Running a deficit basically means that you end the year owing more than you did at the start of the year.
Is that a bad thing? Well, maybe... but not necessarily.
You see, unlike in personal finance, when you're talking about national finances (or business finances, which are very similar), having some debt is usually a *good* thing, because it means you can spend money in order to make more money.
So if the country borrows money, spends it on things like infrastructure and job creation, and ends up with more of the population in work, earning more money, and paying more tax, then this extra tax ought to be enough to pay the extra interest on the bigger amount of debt. That's a good thing - it means the country's finances are growing. As the country's finances grow, so its ability to repay debt grows, and it would be wrong not to take advantage of that.
On the other hand, if the reason you're running at a deficit is because no one is in work so you're not collecting much tax, but you're having to borrow money to pay the salaries of civil servants, then that's bad. | 2,188 |
CMV: People who say "if you disagree with BLM, then you think Black Lives Don't Matter" are incredibly dumb. | Imagine if someone said "MAGA". If you found issue with their statement, would it make any sense for them to say "Oh. So you do not think America should be great?". Of course not!
If one was to disagree with the MAGA types, that can come out of a place of discontentment with the pioneer of the term (such as Trump), the policies that term has embodied, or the behaviour of a significant proportion of people who say that term etc. It does not necessarily come from a disagreement of the actual phrase itself.
Similarly, although I do support BLM and the movement it has spawn, it must be acknowledged that BLM, in addition to being a phrase, is a movement, And disagreeing with a movement is not the same as disagreeing with the name of the movement. It is disingenuous to immediately attribute skeptics of BLM as racists, or to accuse them of thinking that "Black Lives Don't Matter", of course unless they show otherwise. | 109 | I would actually argue that MAGA *is* an inflammatory statement. “Make America Great Again” implies something other than making America great - the keyword is “again”.
It implies that America was once great and lost part of its greatness - and that returning to the America of the past would be a good thing.
This is something you can disagree with, all while believing that we should make America great.
No such equivalent exists for BLM. It’s a wholly inclusive and easy-to-understand statement that’s only been made inflammatory by its detractors. | 21 |
[STAR WARS] What was life like for Stormtroopers and officers in Vader's personal 501st legion, post-clone era? | What was Vader's relationship like with his men? The clone troopers in the war loved him and he cared for them.
How were his relationships with his officers? | 146 | Officers hate him. Troopers are fanatically loyal to him.
It's interesting to note that so far in the new canon, there's been no mention of him commanding the 501st after the Clone Wars ended, not until Hoth, and that may be incorrect information at the moment. | 112 |
Where do files, pics, etc. go once they get deleted? | I remember someone telling me about cyberspace once but I don't really know much about it, or whether or not it has anything to do with deleted files. | 20 | your files don't go anywhere. you just forget where you put them.
whenever you want to draw a picture of a cat with your crayons. you just take a picture and draw. when you are done you throw it away, but you can take a new piece of paper and draw again. You'll always have paper to draw on (your parents will get it for you), and you just throw the old paper in the trash.
but a computer can't get its paper from its parents. it doesn't have any parents. instead it has a certain amount of memory to use and draw or write on, like drawing on the bedroom walls. It can draw all over those walls, and it always remembers where each picture is (the cat is below the light switch, the dog is behind the bed, the house is next to your trash can). But if it wants to get rid of something and start over new, it can't just tear out the wall. instead it just forgets where it put that particular picture. so it thinks the wall is empty.
so it forgets that the cat picture is under the light switch, and the cat picture is deleted. the computer thinks the spot is empty, and the cat is gone, But technically, the cat picture is still there, where we left it. some times you can do special stuff to get the computer to remember where that picture is, but it might be difficult depending on how it was deleted.
that deleted picture will stay on the wall until you ask the computer to write something new, like a picture of your goldfish. The computer thinks the spot under the light switch is empty, so it goes to draw the goldfish there. first it applies a layer of white paint, and then it draws the fish. now the cat picture is truly gone, and only goldie remains. | 14 |
ELI5: how do they decide what the temperature "feels like" compared to the actual temperature | 49 | "Feels like" is usually another term for the apparent temperature. At 50 degrees F or lower, that's the wind chill, above 80 degrees F, the heat index, and in between, it's the same as the actual temperature.
The wind chill is derived from the actual temperature and the wind speed - more wind, the lower the "feels like" temperature. The heat index is derived from the actual temperature and the humidity - more humid, the higher the "feels like" temperature. | 22 |
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ELI5: If there are no lions in Europe, why are they all over European heraldry? | Owls, bears, boars and all that make sense because Europeans would see them all the time. I've never heard of lions indigenous to Europe, and yet lions are everywhere when you look at European heraldry. How come? | 869 | modern europeans largely have a greek/roman lineage, to some degree (at least culturally). romans had lions. Lions are depicted in the bible. Lions territory used to be quite large as well, living in southern europe. | 483 |
[StarWars] If The Rebel Alliance failed to defeat the Empire how would the invasion the Yuuzhan Vong have been different? | 53 | It would be a lot shorter for one. The Empire did not mess around when it came to warfare, especially the kind of warfare the Yuuzhan Vong fought. The Empire is absurdly good at fighting fleet to fleet, the Rebellion only survived so long because they avoided these type of engagements at all costs, but the Vong would be running head long into it. Additionally, the Vong attacked a few decades after the Empire fell so who knows what kind of new superweapons the Empire could concoct in addition to having probably dozens of Death Stars and World Devastators, not to mention the even more devastating Galaxy Gun and Suncrusher. In short, the Vong would be absolutely fucked on every level despite what Han says | 69 |
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[Fallout: New Vegas] The Courier does not survive being shot by Benny and dies. How does this affect the Mojave Wasteland? | 16 | Kimball gets assassinated.
The Great Khans join the Legion.
The Brotherhood doesn't fix its stuff and either leave the bunker or lock themselves in.
Goodsprings gets wiped out by Powder Gangers.
The White Glove Society becomes cannibals.
The Omertas attack the Strip.
Mr. House doesn't get his securitron army.
The Boomers stay in their base.
Caesar doesn't cure his cancer.
The Legion probably wins the Battle of Hoover Dam. | 33 |
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[Star Wars] How many clones were created on Kamino ? | In the movies it’s suggested 1.2 million units. That simply makes no sense at all in the context of a galactic war. For context, China has an active army of 2 million troops - not including navy and airforce.
In the context of a galactic war, you would need many hundreds of billions of troops. This isn’t a regional war on a single planet. A galactic civil war would require almost incomprehensible numbers. Tens of thousands of star destroyers, billions if not trillions of active personnel and so on.
Is there any clarification on what was meant by “units”? | 167 | What you're asking is a question which has been debated by fans practically since Attack of the Clones came out. Some authors treated this gospel truth, with total numbers of the Grand Army reaching no more than a few million. Others portrayed it as far more flexible, with each and every planet in the Republic receiving a garrison force of between ~2,000 and 100,000 clones, even as the Republic's lines were allegedly stretched thin by the war.
Complicating things is that Lucasfilm Limited was quite clear that no more fixed number could ever be stated for the clones, ensuring that many writers would write battles where tens or hundreds of thousands of clones die even in quick raids - well exceeding the alleged ~1.2 to 3 million figure.
No clarification of the term "Unit" was ever given.
- If, however, it was referring to the 576-clone Batallion, then Lama Su would be offering Obi-Wan roughly 155 million clones with 576 million more soon - a far more suitable "starting force" for the opening days of the war.
- If it referred to a 2,304-clone Regiment - the largest "unit" in the Grand Army's structural makeup - then the Republic would begin the war with nearly 461 million clones, with another *two billion* arriving soon after - a much more reasonable force for beginning a truly galactic conflict. | 222 |
What keeps synapses together? | I've read that neurons do not touch at synapses, but are rather really close to each other. So what keeps them from coming undone, especially in a body in movement? | 56 | I think you mean what keeps two neurons together at the synaptic cleft?
Turns out their are glycoproteins (like you would have on the surface of just about every cell), that bridge between the presynaptic neuron and postsynaptic neuron. The presynaptic neuron has a glycoprotein called neurexin and the postsynaptic neuron has a glycoprotein called neuroligin.
By altering the genes responsible for the synaptogenesis of these glycoproteins, it's possible to induce certain neurocognitive conditions. | 47 |
ELI5: Why is walking slowly easier than standing? | 181 | It shifts the weight from one leg/ side of the hip to the other. This puts less stress on each leg than the shared weight, because each side gets a break. This is the reason you see a lot of people leanin on one leg when standing still for more than a few minutes. | 112 |
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[Kellogg's] Does Tony the Tiger have a digestive system or taste-buds actually capable of handling/appreciating a sweet, carbohydrate-rich food like Frosted Flakes? | Typical felines are not well-suited to appreciating or digesting a food like Frosted Flakes. Does Tony have some kind of aberrant physiology which makes him capable of appreciating them? Does his anthropomorphized aspect give him a broader palate than typical for a big cat, allowing him to taste things more like a human would?
Alternatively, is he just a completely bought-and-paid-for shill who talks about how grrrrrrreat Frosted Flakes are even though to him they have a taste indistinguishable from wood chips? | 33 | Tony's a chimera based on human stock; his basic body plan is human, and the feline elements (fur, claws, etc.) are largely external and aesthetic. Specifically, large canines aside, the anatomy of Tony's tongue, mouth, and throat is fundamentally human - he wouldn't be able to talk otherwise. (You ever see a cat try to roll its 'r's?) It's only logical that a human-derived tongue structure would retain a human sense of taste.
Whether he *likes* Frosted Flakes or not is another question. Of course he says he does, but the dude is a professional. | 26 |
As of 2014, there were 10 people left in the world living in iron lungs. Do we not have the technology to remove them safely? | I stumbled upon [this news story](http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/24/north-texan-one-of-10-still-living-in-iron-lung/), which talks about a man who has been living in an iron lung for the last 5 or 6 decades.
I know the iron lung is an outdated and generally obsolete piece of medical equipment, so why can't we feasibly remove someone from it and simply hook them up to a normal positive pressure ventillator?
Is it like the 'car-crash-victim-pinned-against-a-tree' kinda scenario wherein removing them would immediately kill them? Or is it just lack of money on their part?
I have no medical knowledge so apologies if this a simple question | 238 | Having worked with people in iron lungs, it can easily be done by switching that person to NIPPV. The issue would be one of comfort, because they would have to wear a mask to ventilate. There is still negative pressure equipment that can be used, and is less bulky than the iron lung. Maintenance of the iron lung is difficult because of the lack of parts available. | 70 |
ELI5: Why is peanut butter half the price of actual peanuts if it takes more effort to produce it? | 639 | You assume the peanuts that go into a jar of peanut butter are the same ones that go into a bag of peanuts. They're not.
The food that you buy whole (e.g. peanuts, tomatoes, potatoes, strawberries) are the best of the crop. The food that you buy processed into some other form (e.g. peanut butter, tomato sauce, tater tots, strawberry jam) are the small or bruised or misshapen or damaged parts of the crop. The appearance or condition doesn't matter because it's not going to retain that form when processed anyway.
People will pay more for nicely formed, pretty produce. So the stuff you buy whole in the supermarket (or _lightly_ processed, like a jar of roasted nuts) is more expensive than the produce that goes into highly processed foods (where highly processed = it doesn't retain any of it's original shape or form). | 416 |
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are billionares bad for capitalism? | Since billionares have so much money that is not being used to move the economy sunce its not being used at all, isn't this bad for the economy in a capitalist country? | 112 | Your question assumes that billionaires’ wealth is mostly made up of cash. But it’s the opposite actually, they typically owns assets that are worth billions in the open market today.
In essence what that means is they bought/invested in those assets with some cash at some point. And the recipients of that cash (typically some company), deployed that cash in a value creating manner for the public i.e. they provided goods and services that generate profits. The goods and services generate profits because the customers value them and are willing to spend money on it. In addition they generate profits because the company created the goods and services efficiently, in other words it costs them less to create than what customers are willing to pay.
So billionaires cash is actually being put to work in the market, and this is actually the essence of capitalism. Letting people choose where they want to spend their money, and in return giving them ownership of what they buy. In fact, this works the same whether you’re a billionaire or not. For most people with any retirement account, they don’t actually have much cash. They’ve given their cash to someone else (usually another investor) who uses that cash however they want. This is all overly simplified but it’s meant to address your assumption and explain how the money is being used. | 228 |
CMV: Parents who believe in faith healing and refuse to take their children to doctors when they’re sick should be charged with neglect and/or homicide if that child dies. | Little bit of backstory: I was raised by my grandparents and I love and appreciate them for everything they do for me, but they’re very religious and I’m not. Several times growing up, when I had colds or the flu, they would say, “just pray” and wouldn’t take me to a doctor unless I was passing out or in agony. It never got bad enough that I was in danger of dying, but I know what it’s like to feel like garbage and have your caregivers tell you that you’re just not praying hard enough.
Anyway, my stepmother and I are very close and really the only opinions we differ on concern religion (she’s loosely catholic, I’m agnostic). We were talking about a report that I’m doing for an ethics class concerning the death of a 2 year old girl whose parents refused to take her to a doctor because their faith “forbid it”, and the death of a newborn in Oregon for the same reason. In both of these cases the children were sick for a long period of time and all they did was pray and “anoint” then with oil. Long story short, the parents in both cases are being charged with neglect and manslaughter/murder, and I support that decision because it’s ridiculous to me that you could watch your child wither away to nothing and eventually die due to “God’s Will”. (This is a 3000 level college class and what follows is a civil debate, and I’m simply presenting the facts and then leading a discussion with everyone’s opinions. My own opinions aren’t in the presentation itself, and I have to review it with my TA to make sure it’s relatively unbiased).
My stepmother lost it and said I was being cruel and not thinking about the pain the parents were going through, what it was like to lose a child, etc. I tried to explain my opinion, that if these parents actually cared about keeping their kids alive they would actively try to keep them healthy, but she just repeated that I‘m being cruel because I don’t understand what it’s like to have faith.
Does anyone have an opinion here that I’m just overlooking in favor of my own? How can I have more compassion for these people?
Edit: spelling. | 90 | Why should we focus on charging them _if the child dies_? This seems like too little too late. Isn't the best time to charge them with neglect _before_ the child dies, when the child can still be saved? | 18 |
X-post from r/[Pokémon] Are all fossil Pokemon part Rock-type because they were fossils or because all Pokemon from their era were just Rock-type by default? | 96 | Perhaps only rock-type pokemon are likely to make good fossils? Fossilized creatures on earth are the one-in-a-million that happened to leave their bodies somewhere that would preserve them intact long enough for the mineral-replacement process to happen. The grass types from long ago probably just left very few fossils compared to the rock types. | 79 |
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LinkedIn finds my new stranger flatmates in its suggested connections algorithm. How? | Dear all,
Could someone explain this to me:
Last year I moved in to a rented apartment with totally random people who also found the flat on a housing ads website - we were total strangers. After a few weeks I managed to pop up on their suggested LinkedIn connections window. Neither of us searched for each other - it just happened (seemingly?) randomly.
Today this just happened to me again - about 3 weeks ago I moved in to a new flat occupied by a total stranger and today she cropped up on my suggested LinkedIn connections window - I recognized her from a profile picture. Once again, I told her this and she is 100% certain she did not search me on LinkedIn; she cannot even spell my foreign name. I did not search for her either.
Is this just a very rare coincidence, or am I missing something in my online behaviour that enabled LinkedIn to indicate flatmates as suggested connections?
Please explain! Thanks! | 22 | LinkedIn could be doing a check on which IP address you are coming from and assumr that you know each other if you are the only two people using that address on a regular basis.
*edit: changed "they" to "linkedin" | 20 |
[Marvel] How would Dr Doom take it if the One Above All came to him and personally apologized for making Reed Richards smarter than him in the field of science, and left? | 332 | It would piss him off even more.
Imagine if God himself came and told you that your most hated rival is deterministically smarter than you and there's nothing you can ever do to overcome that difference. | 340 |
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[Marvel] Could an individual carry both the inhuman and mutant genes? | 51 | Luna Amaquelin-Maximoff does. It was initially believed that they just cancelled each other out, but Quicksilver exposed her to terrigenesis and it worked, giving her the ability to see auras. She's still young though so her X-Gene hasn't activated yet if it even will. | 29 |
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Why is the most common psychological side effect "suicidal tendencies"? | I know there's an aspect of confirmation bias here, but it seems like more often than not a side effect of various drugs is "suicidal thoughts or tendencies."
Why is this such a common side effect? Is there some aspect of brain chemistry that makes us susceptible to it? Why aren't there side effects like "Sudden insatiable curiosity" or "unbearable clinginess" or "sudden hyperfocus on work and other tasks"? | 16 | This can be a side effect of anti-depression drugs. We are not sure of the exact mechanism, but here's the current thinking.
The most severely depressed patients often have suicidal thoughts already. When treatment begins, the patient may start to have more energy and motivation first, days or weeks before their depressed mood is alleviated. So where they previously only had a vague idea of self-harm, with treatment they have the energy and motivation to form a detailed plan, and act on it. | 10 |
Are libertarian ideas and arguments intellectually honest or philosophically viable? | I would like to start off by saying that I am new to both philosophy and political ideology, so sorry if this is a stupid question. Also, when I say libertarian, I'm speaking of the of the right-wing political theory that has been growing out of the United States rather than the political theories of left anarchism. Basically, my thinking goes a bit like this. I have found that most of the political theories that I have been studying will have some sort of ideological or (more often) some sort of philosophical justification for their arguments. If this is correct, I should be able to look into the philosophical justifications for many of these political ideologies to find if they hold any validity to modern understandings of known reality. My question is not so much "what do you BELIEVE ?" or "What party should I vote for?", but more of an academic inquiry of whether or not the beliefs, interpretations, and world view of this political ideology are philosophically justifiable. Can a person base their opinions off of logic, reason, skepticism, and academic honesty also be a libertarian, or is their some sort of gap inside their arguments? In other words, I'm asking if libertarians are nothing but a bunch of people who don't understand basic logic on some sort of deeper level, and are they promoting a pseudo philosophy. Is their debate about this? Is this too brad of a question? Is this the wrong place for this question? What would be some good reading material to learn more? | 17 | Nozick is considered the best libertarian philosopher. And his work is considered real high quality. So obviously its considered defensible. Whether that makes it correct or the most plausible option is another matter. There's a difference between a plausible defense of something existing and it being the most viable option. | 34 |
ELI5: How is it that some people are born with natural talents for things and others must learn them? | Some people are born with the ability to draw well or pick up musical instruments, while others must spend double the hours of practice to learn them. Why/how does this happen? | 86 | "Born with it" is usually a misconception. The general philosophy is that it takes 10,000hrs of practice with the aim to get better to master something.
The key to that is making the most of your time spent "practicing". For example, professional hockey players almost exclusively are born in January/February. It's not because the hockey gods decreed it so, but has to do with little league rules.
Most pro players got their hockey start in grade school where leagues are usually broken into age groups. Anyone who was 7 on Jan 1 plays in the 7yr old League. The difference between 7 and 7.8 years old is huge, so oldest kids on the team are usually the best just due to size.
Now they look objectively better than their peers when going out for select teams and coaches. This access gives them better training opportunities and tougher competition to grow their skills against.
It's not that they were born with it. They just were able to make better use of their time practicing.
If you aren't genuinely interested in what you are studying, don't have the best teachers, or simply don't challenge yourself, you aren't making the most of your time, and extend your learning curve.
Some *are* literally born with physical advantages, but like the hockey players this usually gives them an early advantage and early access to elite-tier training and competition. An example of this would be Michael Phelps and his freakishly long arms & legs attached to his extra-wide hands & feet. That man's body is just about perfectly evolved for lap swimming. | 75 |
ELI5: Why can anyone have a child but when it comes to adopting you need to be a fit parent? | 17 | Because we can reasonably restrict one but cannot restrict the other.
There is no way to keep people from having kids that doesn't interfere with the rights people have under the law and is also fool proof. Plus, even if there was, you run into the issue of how you are going to determine who is a fit parent anyway? Who sets the standards for that? Are they based on age? Physical health? Wealth? Intelligence? All of those are going to have some draw backs and are not necessarily good indicators of who is a good parent. Someone who is healthy, has enough money and is reasonably smart, might still have the sort of personality where they will neglect, possibly even abuse kids. How are you going to catch that? A simple test doesn't. And how would you deal with people who did not pass the test? Is there a retry option or is one test all you get to determine who gets to be a parent. How do you handle people who get pregnant anyway without a license? Birth control is not foolproof.
Of course everybody ideally only wants people who will be good to kids to have kids, but we can only implement measures that are realistic, and restricting who can and cannot have a child just isn't. | 25 |
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ELI5: why are the ears connected to the throat and nose ? | 16 | Hearing involves conduction of sound waves from the outer ear, through the ear canal, across the tympanic membrane (aka ear drum), along three middle ear bones, and then to the inner ear organs which convert the sound waves to nerve impulses to the brain. In order for the sound waves to conduct effectively across the tympanic membrane, there needs to be relatively equal pressures on both sides of the membrane.
There is where the eustachian tube comes in; it acts as a conduit between the middle ear and the nose/upper throat to allow for pressure equalization. It also allows for mucus and fluid drainage | 21 |
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Does Superman have Kryptonian gut flora? | If he does, then how does his poop not spread a wildfire epidemic of Kryptonian E Coli, immune to antibiotics and fire and anything else? How is the entire Midwest not covered in a ten-foot invulnerable biofilm? | 117 | he probably does not have kryptonian gut flora anymore...Studies have shown that when you start living with people(this can actually even include your dog) you end up "syncing" you gut Microbiome. However even if he did maintain his original gut flora, it would be unlikely to affect earth species since these pathogens would be developed for kryptonian biology and would likely be unable to bind cellular receptors or even illicit the immune/inflammation response that is responsible for most symptoms when we are sick. | 104 |
CMV: Veganism is morally correct compared to meat eating. | I am not a vegan or vegetarian myself. That said I probably should be.
The moral case for veganism is pretty simple and ironclad:
1) Producing meat and animal products causes thinking feeling animals to suffer.
2) We can feed ourselves perfectly well without animal products.
3) Therefore we should not eat animal products as it causes less suffering.
I don't really have a counterargument to this that isn't ultimately just "but they're tasty". Most of the counterarguments I've seen don't even try to make the case that meat is morally correct, just that it's *less* morally wrong.
Is there any case to be made for the morality of eating meat? | 19 | Why is it morally correct to limit animal suffering? Animal's being eaten by other animals is about as natural as it gets. Is a Lion immoral for eating a Zebra?
Would it be moral to kill a lion then if it saves countless zebras? Under the idea that we should minimize animal suffering, you can argue we should actually kill a ton of animals that are predators. | 50 |
ELI5: Why is Humpty Dumpty often times depicted as an egg when the nursery rhyme does not mention him being an egg? | 38 | One likely explanation is that Humpty Dumpty used to be a riddle when it was created. The answer to that riddle was "an egg".
However, over time it would gain popularity and become a well known nursery rhyme, taking the form of a story instead of a riddle. This allowed for Humpty Dumpty to become a character portrayed as an egg. | 42 |
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Eli5: How does a battery company produce say a double A battery that's better or worse than a competitor if it's the same thing? | Do generic products just like add less juice and more popular ones add more or something? | 27 | Firstly there are several different chemistries that are used in AA batteries. Some are more expensive and have higher capacity than others.
The consider that a battery is not just a pot of chemicals. There are various components including a carbon anode, separator, exterior can etc. The quality of these affects the capacity and internal resistance of the battery.
Edit to add: rechargeable batteries have even more variation because the robustness of different geometries to repeated cycling is not trivial to optimise. | 27 |
[Doctor Who] if the silence is playing a guitar but you aren’t looking at them do you hear them? | 37 | Sure- the mind-wipe only applies if you look at them.
Of course, they're unlikely to be playing guitars around you, but you know when you hear a noise but there's nothing there when you look? Same principle. | 48 |
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CMV: Gender as a social construct should be excluded from identification, and the law should not prohibit misgendering. | I know something like this has been posted before, but the user is often arguing against gender being defined as distinct from sex. I am not here to make that argument. While I think the distinction is largely overcomplicating things, words are defined by collective agreement of meaning, which makes the redefinition valid. I want to make that clear. That being said, I am *fundamentally* opposed to legislation that would legally require a person to acknowledge the distinction. There should be no law prohibiting misgendering. The only repercussions should be social.
Also, gender should not have any place in identification for obvious reasons. Gender is not an identifier, since if we agree it is subjective. This is especially true if we acknowledge gender-fluidity. There is no way to confirm someone's gender, therefore it has no place on identification. There are definitely ways to confirm someone's biological sex, however.
EDIT: I have decided that private entities should have legal requirements to not discriminate, in which case the law would prohibit misgendering. Well, more specifically it should be included in anti-discrimination laws. But fair enough.
I have changed my mind.
Edit 2: A lot of this has led me to question whether sex on ID is helpful anyway. I think ID is usually to confirm your identity at a glance, and the photo is clearly enough for that. The rest is secondary and largely unnecessary.
Which means I'm likely not responding to new comments. My mind has officially been changed. I'm really thankful for all you guys participating
Cheers! | 441 | The ways you check for bio-sex is to look at genitals or test Chromosomes. That is not acceptable for identification in public, or quick reference for ID. The Gender that someone displays is the factor that is useful for the vast majority of ID usages as it is some clerk making sure you are the person on the ID when you are buying something controlled (weapons, medication, alcohol, tobacco, etc) or when the police are checking you out (looking for you as a suspect, or running your ID for a violation such as speeding). | 159 |
[MCU] How did Iron Man defend against the Power stone with his shield in Infinity War? | In Infinity war Thanos shoots the power stone at Tony Stark and somehow his nano tech shield was able to stop it? The same power that obliterated Ronan the Conqueror and took 5 GOG with one of them being a kind of demigod to use? The same power used to hit Captain Marvel into the atmosphere? | 51 | Thanos didn't fire it at full power, he was holding back. You can choose how hard you hit with it, for example he uses it on Thor's head and doesn't immediately take it off and same with Nebula in the scene he tortures her to get Gamora to reveal where soul stone is. | 60 |
Eli5: why is it so easy to make heat but so hard to make cold? | 38 | Heat is easy because you just need to do basically anything which will then add energy. Light a fire. Rub things together. Whatever.
But you can't make cold. That's not possible. Instead, what you do is that you have to move the "heat" that is already there and move it somewhere else. A fridge isn't making cold and adding cold, it's taking heat away and moving it somewhere else. This is why the back of a fridge is so hot. That's the heat that's been removed. Compare that to turning on an oven. Something else isn't getting cold. You're not removing cold from the oven, you're adding energy. | 130 |
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All I heard the day of the eclipse was NOT to look at the sun directly or you'll get permanent, noticeable eye damage. I believe that's hyperbolic, like saying smoking one cigarette will give you lung cancer. What is the likelihood of permanent noticeable eye damage? | Edit: I don't dispute that it's not a good thing to do, just like smoking isn't a healthy thing to do.
The question is: What is the likelihood of **permanent** **noticeable** eye damage?
I'm not asking if it's dangerous. I'm asking **how** dangerous.
Edit: Also, anybody know of any studies that show frequency of **noticeable** eye damage? (meaning noticeable by the owner of the eyes' vision, not an optometrist looking at the eye and seeing damage).
Yet another edit: My analogy to smoking one cigarette is really bad. Maybe not putting on sunscreen if you're very fair skinned is a better analogy. It's dangerous to get a sunburn. Getting a sunburn will damage your skin. You shouldn't go outside without sunblock. It's a warning. But if you *do* get a sunburn once, your skin will most likely recover. If you look at a partial eclipse once, unprotected, your eyes will get damaged, that isn't disputed. Will I notice it by impaired vision? Will my eyes recover? (Skin is resilient, but aren't eyes also? - that's what my eye surgeon said when they performed LASIK on me). | 106 | You can get permanent eye damage from a single exposure to intense UV light, no doubt about it. (I got permanent damage to one retina by a short accidental look at a hollow-cathode lamp in a AAS spectrometer)
Your analogy to cigarettes is plain wrong. Cancer is usually caused by probabilities and _cumulative_ DNA damage, which is nothing at all like the _acute_ damage caused by short but intense UV radiation.
| 152 |
If you mixed a bunch of people's blood in a blender, and spilled it all over a crime scene, could they figure out whose DNA was whose? | I'm not implying that a blender could blend DNA or anything, but what problems would this create? Would eat swab give a different result? | 43 | I am a forensic DNA analyst. The result of each swab would give roughly the same result (unless the blending was incredibly short, as there is enough DNA in blood to ensure complete mixing of DNA profiles). Each swab would have all the different DNA.
While it's technically true that the instruments used would detect each unique DNA sample present in the mixture (the instrument would detect each different allele present in the mixture from whatever genetic markers you used for the DNA profiling). It is not able to separate specific profiles from each other. That would take further analysis of the results. For each extra person you mix with another, the less confident you can be to separate each DNA profile upon analysis.
Also, it would be very difficult (maybe impossible?) to actually physically separate each person's DNA from the mixture (at least with any technology a common forensic lab possesses).
EDIT: As astazangasta said, good luck trying to prove it in court. Defense attorneys have field days over mixtures. | 17 |
Logarithmic I don't understand | So I have this exercise. I've take out the exponent 15 and the 4th root of the x outside the logarithm and then I tried to put log2(x) = y. My results isn't corresponding with the one from the solutions and the one from Wolfram Alpha. I've even tried to change base but nothing. Any idea?
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https://preview.redd.it/4956r30e93z81.png?width=416&format=png&auto=webp&s=160ac1ca286d822529ffb0943b9963487dcea3ad | 15 | Note firstly that we must restrict x > 0 to ensure that the logarithms are defined.
Let y = log\_2(x). Your inequality becomes
y\^2 + (15/4)y - 1 >= 0.
Consider the corresponding quadratic *equation*:
y\^2 + (15/4)y - 1 = 0
or
4y\^2 + 15y - 4 = 0.
Using the quadratic formula, we find that its solutions are
y = (-15 +/- 17) / 8.
Thus, since the coefficient of y\^2 is positive, the solutions to our original inequality are
y <= (-15 - 17) / 8 = - 4 or y >= (-15 + 17) / 8 = 1/4.
That is,
log\_2(x) <= -4 or log\_2(x) >= 1/4.
Since exponential functions are strictly increasing, we can take 2\^{} across both inequalities, and the inequality signs will be preserved. Thus:
0 < x <= 2\^{-4} or x >= 2\^{1/4}.
That is
0 < x <= 1/16 or x >= 2\^(1/4) | 11 |
ELI5: Why India is the only place commonly called a subcontinent? | You hear the term “the Indian Subcontinent” all the time. Why don’t you hear the phrase used to describe other similarly sized and geographically distinct places that one might consider a subcontinent such as Arabia, Alaska, Central America, Scandinavia/Karelia/Murmansk, Eastern Canada, the Horn of Africa, Eastern Siberia, etc. | 11,476 | India is it's own land mass and sits on it's own tectonic plate. That plate smashed into another continental plate. So while it is part of the continent of Asia, it would also be it's own continent if it had not smashed into another one. So they call it a sub continent.
&#x200B;
Edit: Its.
Also, why do all other versions of possessives require an apostrophe? If you get your message across it doesn't matter anyway IMHO. | 8,138 |
ELI5: How do little insects that live in groups like ants and bees live when they get separated from their nest? | Imagine you're a bee and get trapped inside a car that drops you off two towns away from your hive. Do you just live trying to find your way back or just become part of another hive or just live like a lone wolf? Do foreign bees care if you are not their relative? Are you gonna survive? | 19 | Generally, it’s a death sentence for that individual.
Sometimes bees will get taken in by other hives, though there isn’t much documentation for this. The bee could probably make it back to his hive from just a mile or two away, as bees can cover quite a bit of area looking for flowers.
Ants are extremely territorial, though, and unless the lone ant in question runs across a different colony of *exactly* the same species, he’s definitely dead.
Even if the lone ant didn’t run into an enemy colony, he would likely not make it long. Ants are basically a bit of biological programming with legs, outside of the controlled chaos of his anthill the simple rule set that ants use to survive in a group would not get him what he needs to survive alone. | 17 |
[Toy Story] Do toys that require batteries i.e. Buzz need them to function when humans aren't around? | 45 | Not to move but for his laser sounds to work. His karate chopping action and wings would still work as they are mechanical, much like Woody's pull cord. He does need someone to activate the karate chop though. | 40 |
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[Star Trek] Why isn't the capital of the Federation on a neutral world? | It never made sense to me to make the Earth the capital. Maybe temporarily until construction could be completed. But it seems a to me that capital should placed on a previously uninhabited planet. To ensure no bias and concerns about humanity running the show. | 16 | At the time the Federation was founded, Earth *was* neutral. Humans were new comers to the galactic scene, and had okay relationship between the Vulcan, Andorans, and Tellerites, who all had issues with each other.
And there is absolutely no concerns with humans running the show. Most of the Federation members probably prefer it that way. | 32 |
ELI5: How can bamboo grow up to 3ft per day whereas other plants can get no where near as close to this speed? | 255 | Bamboo grow in a different manner to normal plants. Rather than growth through mitosis (splitting and division of cells) they already have present a number of cells and these cells stretch and elongate these cells. They become turgid (full of water) and stretch.
Tldr;
They don't grow faster. They fill with water and stretch into their adult shape fast. | 174 |
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[Marvel] So how does Spider-Man go about jumping around New York like a gymnasium without causing serious damage? | IIRC Spider-Man is pretty strong, able to lift up to 10-25 tons under extreme pressure. His webs and the force they generate also compliment this strength. By pulling and jumping as hard as he does how does he not cause any amount of property damage unless he chooses to? | 358 | He's not constantly using his maximum strength. He doesn't need to use multiton strength to swing around on his webbing or leaping around on or inside buildings. He rarely uses his strength to his highest levels, he's almost always holding back.
And when he has to use his webbing to stop something big, he's always anchoring it to as much surface area as possible to reduce the structural stress. | 292 |
Does Justice Exist? | My friend and I are engaged in an argument on whether justice actually exists or not, and I naturally gravitated to the more skeptical view that justice doesn't exist.
So far, I've discussed deconstructionism and variance (across history and time), but does anyone have any other interesting rationales?
Perhaps equally as important, does anyone have any arguments on why justice exists? | 47 | In the first book of The Republic, Thrasymachus in dialogue with Plato, claims justice is "the advantage of the stronger". Plato spends the rest of the book trying to pin down what exactly justice is by formulating a polis in which he believes it resides, allowing him to trace it back to the individual. That book is a decently long read by one of the most important philosophers to ever live and yet didn't produce a definite answer to this question. | 62 |
Why can I see very dim (distant) stars if I look away slightly, but when I look at them directly, I can't see them anymore? | 23 | The cells in your eye responsible for detecting faint light (rods) are not in the center of your retina. That pride of place goes to your cones, which are less sensitive in the dark, but which you use a lot more since they give you color information. As a result, your night vision is best when the light is focused off of the center of your retina where your rods are located. That's why when you see something faint, you can lose it when you look directly at it. They also aren't sensitive to red light, which is why people use red flashlights to avoid ruining their nightvision.
As a side note, dim stars are not necessarily distant, they may just be small and cool. All 3 things affect how bright a star appears. Proxima centauri is the closest star to the Sun but is too faint to be seen by the unaided human eye. | 23 |
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eli5: Why most people can turn both eyes inwards but not in the opposite direction? | 45 | Turning eyes inward is a very natural motion, for focusing both eyes on something that is very close to your face. You naturally do it all the time.
Pointing your eyes outward is not a "natural" motion, because there is no occasion where you would focus your eyes on two different objects. Your brain is inherently trained to use binocular (two eyes on one object) vision, not monocular (one eye on one object). | 108 |
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[Avatar] Why do people of the various nations continue to color code themselves? | In TLA I can understand the various elemental cultures wearing similar colors: it's a less connected world and harder to ship goods around, so I assume they use locally sourced dyes for their clothing (Easier to fine green/tan dyes in earth bender regions etc.) Why though, by the LoK time period do the four major tribes people still stick to Blue/Green/Red/Yellow for their clothing? There's huge national navies so one can assume civilian trade has spanned the globe much more thoroughly, and Republic City is intentionally a mixing pot of culture. | 66 | Three reasons:
- As you mentioned, in Aang's time they were probably using locally-sourced dyes. While things are more connected in Korra's time, local is still usually going to be cheaper (especially if you're not in somewhere like Republic City). They're not quite to the point where it's cheaper to manufacture everything in the Earth Kingdom and ship it around the world.
- It's the traditional style of their homelands. Not everyone is super patriotic, but most people would at least have some kind of fondness and connection to the culture of the place they (or their ancestors) came from. Sure, Varrick *could* get some fine red clothes from the Fire Nation (they make the best red stuff there), but he *likes* Water Tribe blue.
- People in Avatar-world tend to have eye colors that match their ancestry and/or bending type. Mako has reddish eyes, Bolin has green eyes, Korra has blue eyes, and Tenzin has gray eyes. This isn't absolute - Asami actually has greenish eyes despite having Fire Nation ancestory - but it's common enough to reinforce the trends. Fashion-conscious people would gravitate towards color palettes that complement their eye colors.
These things'll probably fade over time, but for now it's only been 70 years since the end of the Hundred Years War. The world hasn't been connected that long. | 87 |
ELI5:Why, despite violent crime being the lowest it has been in 20+ years, do most Americans feel the country is more violent than ever? | I got in a big debate last night about this and can't explain it. My theory is that the severity or the atrocity of violent crimes are more severe (ie. most crimes seem to be taken out on random people that don't know the violent criminal, such as Sandy Hook were innocent children are dying) and the news reports about violence more frequently than any other type of news.
| 36 | I feel like with the sensationalization of the news and how violent crime is generally the top story it has led to people being more afraid. Think about thirty years ago, while people knew there were violent crimes, we didn't have access to them five minutes after. Parents today say there are more "crazies" out there. Which may be true, but there were just as many people to avoid 30 years ago. It's really because we are so much more informed that we are more afraid. | 56 |
What does non-alienating labor look like | I've been reading Marx's 1844 Manuscripts and have been coming back to the section titled "Estranged Labor" over and over again for like a week now trying to conceptualize what non-alienating (specifically in the act of production) labor could possibly look like. I have not read Hegel, but I've consulted enough secondary sources to feel like I should be able to at least know what to google when a Hegelian concept trips me up.
I can't conceptualize this though. It seems like Marx is stating that, in the act of capitalist production, the worker cannot freely and spontaneously create according to their inherent/essentially human essence, but this seems to presuppose a specific set of materials-of-production which don't feel alienating when the worker uses them to produce things. It's not clear to me why a worker would accept some "natural" state of materials (with nature's bounds on the worker's creative possibilities) being available to them but not some "capitalist" materials, or, stated another way, why should a worker not accept a world of capitalistically-owned tools and materials when there must be ***some*** sort of set of relations between a producer and the materials which are used to produce (even if that set of relations comes only from natural laws/nature). Why does the finished object of production appear to the worker as something over-against/alien-to the worker specifically because of the capitalist mode of production, and is there a mode of production in which this does not in some way happen? Can nature also alienate man? Does the worker's species-essence possibly make them sensitive to man-made bounds on their creative abilities in a way that makes those bounds impose an alienating force onto the productive activity (and is this related to the master-servant dialectic of Hegel in a way that [this](https://www.marxists.org/subject/marxmyths/chris-arthur/article.htm) article wants to disabuse me of)? It seems as arbitrary as arguing that Java alienates the computer programmer in a way that C++ doesn't, but even more so because I can't find an example of non-alienating labor in Marx's/Marxist works even with my university journal access and google-foo. Is there anywhere that Marx specifically elaborates a mode of production in which the materials of production are not such that production becomes an active-alienation?
Sorry if I re-phrased the question too many times. I couldn't quite find the words to explain so I hope all of those together get across the main thrust of my confusion. | 19 | Alienated labor for Marx is not a matter of the *content* of labor, but of its *form,* namely the form of wage-labor. Marx's thought in 1844 is not identical to his thought in 1867, but even in the "Estranged Labor" essay we can see that the concept of alienation has to do with the *form* of labor in capitalist society:
> The worker becomes an ever cheaper commodity the more commodities he creates. The devaluation of the world of men is in direct proportion to the increasing value of the world of things. Labor produces not only commodities; it produces itself and the worker as a commodity – and this at the same rate at which it produces commodities in general. [Estranged Labor]
Here it is clear that alienated labor emerges for Marx only in a society principally characterized by commodity production, in which labor-power itself has become a commodity. What is alienation precisely, according to Marx in this essay?:
>This fact expresses merely that the object which labor produces – labor’s product – confronts it as something alien, as a power independent of the producer. [Estranged Labor]
Alienation is a condition in which laborers, *by virtue of the specific social form of wage-labor,* confront the products of their own labor as something alien, independent, even hostile.
We arguably don't really see an in-depth justification for this position until Marx's critique of political economy in *Capital,* where Marx engages in a systematic analysis of precisely how the activity of laboring subjects becomes an objective force which emerges as dominant over them. To greatly simplify the argument, the universal exchange relation in capitalist society, made actual in money, becomes independent of the very subjects whose collective action produces this relation itself. Even though the exchange relation is reproduced only by the activities of individuals in society, it asserts itself as the objective law of the market which all must obey.
Non-alienated labor, then, would simply be labor which has broken free of the wage-form. | 13 |
[Time Travel/Legal] If I take a work and publish it before the original artist creates it, can they later sue me for copyright infringement? | 23 | This very much depends on the universe you are set in, and can have some interesting outcomes:
1) There was no "original artist", and it was actually *you* all along, working under a pen name.
2a) *Your* version of the work is imperfect in some way, or just not as popular. When the original artist produces their work, they (and the world) are generally unaware and unaffected by your shenanigans.
2b) *Your* version of the work is imperfect in some way, or just not as popular. It eventually reaches the original artist, who draws/steals from it and creates the "true" original work.
3a) Your "work" makes as big an impact as the original, and eventually reaches the original creator. The artist is so taken in by the style that they go on to pursue and perfect it, creating even more bold works. Your piece has a part in history, but is largely overshadowed.
3b) Your "work" makes as big an impact as the original, and eventually reaches the original creator. The artist sees your piece, and ultimately decides that "the style has been done before" and goes in a different direction. How intense this new direction is depends on the artist and the medium, but are held in similar regard as the original timeline's pieces.
3c) Your "work" makes as big an impact as the original, and eventually reaches the original creator. The artist sees your piece, and ultimately decides that "the style has been done before" and goes in a different direction. This is an utter failure on their part, and they live the rest of their lives in squalor, unnoticed and unappreciated for their genius. As the artist is no longer notable in your time, paradox is imminent.
4a) You manage to secure your "work" with as much popularity and regard as the original. The original artist has the copyright, while you have none. The courts side with the original artist.
4b) You manage to secure your "work" with as much popularity and regard as the original, and you remember to copyright it this time. The original artist has rough drafts and other proof that the material was their creation, while you have none. The courts side with the original artist.
4c) You manage to secure your "work" with as much popularity and regard as the original, you remember to copyright the material, and mock up some rough drafts. The original artist has character witnesses and proof of own personal artistic ability which surpasses your own, while you have none. The courts side with the original artist.
4d) You manage to secure your "work" with as much popularity and regard as the original, you remember to copyright the material, and mock up some rough drafts after taking the time to master the craft and bribe/alter the memories of a few witnesses. The original artist has nothing to use against you, but the universe hates you. The courts side with the original artist.
5) Everything works out, and you manage to get away with it. Your work, while previously contested, has been proven to be your own, and the original artist (while annoyed and having lost face in the lawsuit) continues on their original timeline. You are world renowned as a remarkable artist with only one piece, and become known as a "one-hit wonder". You have a choice laid out in front of you: do you steal more art, and risk being exposed for what you are? Do you go into hiding, ultimately driving the value of your work down? Do you attempt to create new original works (which to be honest, if you were that good, you'd have just done that in your own timeline)? Was all this really worth it? | 16 |
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If abortion is legal, suicide must also be legal. CMV. | I believe if unconditional abortion of a viable fetus/embryo is legalized, suicide must also be legalized. I believe it is illogical and hypocritical to allow abortion but not suicide.
*if the life of a *viable* embryo/fetus can be terminated on a parent's decision, why can't a self-aware (already born) human make his own choice to terminate his life?
*It seems inconsistent that abortion is considered a body-rights issue when laws prevent people from destroying their own bodies through suicide. If abortion is legalized, I feel people have the right to destroy their own bodies just as abortion gives women rights over their own bodies.
To be honest, I am fairly ignorant regarding the laws that surround these issues. If you think it will be helpful, you can mention some laws. However, I don't feel you can CMV purely on legal technicalities.
EDIT: Consider this to be a hypothetical question, where unconditional abortion is legalized. Also, keep in mind assisted suicide (which to my knowledge is illegal).
Another point to consider: Suicide is prevented under the gamble that life has the potential to be better, and someone committing suicide is throwing away his potentially fulfilling life. However, with *unconditional* abortion, a *viable* fetus may be terminated despite the potential for a fulfilling life. This seems inconsistent. If the potential for a fulfilling life can be taken away with abortion, the legal system should have no qualms with allowing a person ending his own life. | 55 | >I believe if unconditional abortion of a viable fetus/embryo is legalized
This isn't the same thing as abortion being legalized. The vast, *vast* majority of abortions take place before the fetus is viable, and the vast majority of abortions that happen later are done to protect the life of the mother. | 50 |
[Superman] Are supermans muscles, bones and skin the same as ours but extremely dense (like, 1 billion times denser or something) or do they work entirely different? | I always wondered how they explain super strenght, and the most logic explanation I've heard would be extremely dense muscles, like almost zero space between atoms so that the muscle fibers are basically almost endless. Would this in theory work? | 44 | No, that doesn't really work. First of all, if his strength and resiliency were due to innate physical qualities like bone and muscle density, it wouldn't matter what color star he was under, and his strength couldn't be lost due to exposure to kryptonite. Plus if he were that dense he'd also weigh a few billion pounds and leave craters in the ground just by walking. | 31 |
ELI5: Why is it not advised to keep the phone plugged in after it has been completely charged? | 33 | Modern chargers stop charging the battery once it reaches 100%.
After this the phone will bypass the battery and use the electricity from the wall socket directly. The charger can become hot if you use a lot of power (similarly as the phone will get hot if you draw a lot of power from the battery).
Some (very much) older chargers, as well as chargers that are defective can heat up beyond a safe point and cause damage. This is likely the reason that this "unplug when fully charged" advise still floats around.
For modern cell phones (using lithium ion based batteries) it's in fact best to discharge the battery as little as possible, as using the battery will over time degrade the battery's life (even if very slowly). Hence it's in fact better to keep your phone plugged in. | 20 |
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Why did all the lithium end up in Chile? | 7,592 | It didn't. However, the combination of natural concentrations and the mechanics of salt flats has created the world's most cheaply-accessible lithium source. There are other deposits around the world, and there are other salt flat sources (Argentina and Bolivia both have some, as do Tibet and Nevada USA), but Chile's the biggest. | 5,830 |
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[Marvel] Why doesn't the Sandman just suffocate anyone he fights? | He could so easily just surround someone in sand, harden the sand, and suffocate them. Why doesn't he? | 28 | This is actually one of the very first things he tried against Spider-Man. It didn't work. Not that it isn't a valid tactic, but the people he's normally fighting are typically more than strong enough to break out of such a hold, and while Sandman *can* affect his density, he's not Concreteman or Steelman or anything like that; he's Sandman. The move would work great against your average bank guard, street cop, or mook, but Flint Marko's main opponent is a guy that bench-presses Hummers as a warm-up.
He can only get so hard. | 54 |
[X-Men] Do the X-Men ever fight standard threats the way, say, the Avengers do? | Like, do the X-Men actively battle foes like HYDRA, AIM, and so on? It could net them just a little good press. | 67 | Yes. Though oddly it was a lot more common in their early adventures.
Sauron isn’t a mutant (though he’s arguably a bigger threat to mutants), Mojo isn’t a mutant-rights issue, the Shi’ar aren’t, the Phoenix kind of sort of isn’t, Juggernaut isn’t although he works alongside them, the Living Pharaoh, Lucifer… a few Hellfire Club members… | 60 |
CMV: There is no benefit to having the electoral college. Either allow a percentage based sharing of electors, or have the presidential election decided by popular vote | For those who don't know/don't understand how it works, the U.S. uses a system of electors to elect the president. Each state has a certain number of electoral votes which aren't proportionate to their population (less populated states are overrepresented, more populous states are under represented) and its a winner take all system. If you were running for president and won 50.000001% of New York's popular vote, then you would receive 100% of their electoral votes. This is messed up for several reasons, mainly that the minority parties people's votes don't count in reliably blue/red states. I see two ways of fixing this.
1. Get rid of the winner take all system and replace it with a percentage system. If a democrat won California by 64%, then the republican candidate should get the other 36% of the vote. This would make reliably blue/red states competitive again, and stop nominees from spending 99% of their time and money in just a few battle ground states. It would also help to make the most popular candidate the winning candidate. OR
2. Have a simple popular vote system. In the first solution mentioned, one of the issues would be the over/under representation of states based on the population of the state. I am personally of the opinion that the person who the majority of Americans want to be president, should be president. | 60 | Benefit is a matter of perspective. The system was designed to benefit low pop states, and it does.
Your proposal would harm large pop states. It would harm the political calculus of Democrats especially. With 3 EC states like Wyoming their vote splitting is largely inconsequential, but if the 55 California EC votes were to split that harms the advantage Democrats have. The same to Texas and the GOP. | 20 |
[StarWars] What does Obi-Wan Kenobi mean specifically when he says "not as clumsy or random as a blaster.?" | I was wondering why he calls blasters clumsy and random when he introduces the lightsaber to Luke.
edit: I love all these answers. Thank you guys for clearing this up. I'll keep reading everyone's view. | 24 | Blasters get used for suppressing fire rather a lot. Standard doctrine for both Republic and Empire forces, and Obi-Wan has seen plenty of that. A Jedi knight walking into that will generally deflect everything, aided by only focusing on the few, random shots that matter (whereas a non-Force-sensitive still has to worry about stray shots, which is why suppressing fire works). | 49 |
Metabolically, what advantages are there to "Carbo-Loading" by loading up on rice/pastas the day before a big marathon or hike? | 26 | The most important thing about carb loading is the fact that it replenishes and maximizes your glycogen stores. When you carb load, your body digests those carbs into glucose, fructose, and galactose (mostly glucose). Fructose and galactose can be converted to glucose through a series of chemical reactions in the body. The thing is, you don't need all the energy at that moment. So, when you have such an excessive amount of glucose in the body, insulin is secreted which stimulates glyconeogenesis: glucose gets polymerized in a chain to form glycogen. Glycogen is almost entirely stored in muscles and the liver.
The importance of this is that when the body needs energy, it can then break down the glycogen through a process known as glycogenolysis. This process is stimulated most directly by the epinephrine that is pulsating through your body during physical exercise (it can also be stimulated by glucagon, but during exercise it is primarily epinephrine doing the stimulation).
By maximizing your glycogen stores, you maximize the energy your body has stored, therefore, maximizing your energy output and your success in any physical activity. That is why for practically any sport, you are supposed to carb load, not protein or fat load, the day before. This is also why everyone says you should eat the majority of your carbs a couple hours before you workout; you need your glycogen stores filled to push yourself.
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ELI5: WHY DO SOME books and news articles start the first few words in all caps? | I've always seen this in "classier" books and news publications, but I never understood why they did it, or what the origin was. Sometimes it's even in larger print. It seems random when it happens, or how many words they capitalize.
Thanks in advance! | 16 | When you have many articles clustered together, it makes it easier to find where they start.
In books, where chapters start in mid page, it can help find the where they start.
But mostly it is just a style. | 10 |
ELI5: How do we know that any one actually wins the contests advertised by companies. | Are there any people who over see this and make sure the company is genuine in determining of the winner and giving out the prizes? I'm sure if they weren't they could get in trouble for false advertising right? For example for radio contests sometimes they're just like "Nick" from Toronto won or "Bob" from Vancouver won, so everyone assumes there is a actually a winner. Idk I'm curious ELI5
| 53 | First, those companies *want* people to win. Having real, live people out there, from scores of $100 winners to the big jackpot winners they can put on TV, that too is part of the advertising strategy.
Second, yes, running a fake contest would be a crime, and worse than that, if word got out, it would be extremely damaging to that company. | 24 |
ELI5 Why do YouTube videos load faster while playing than they do when paused? | 31 | Google doesn't want to waste bandwith on someone who isn't watching a video. So they throttle the speed of data transfer of videos that have been paused for a long time, assuming that you have left the page and are never going to actually watch the video. | 18 |
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Eli5: why do car engines vibrate more when in park? | 22 | When your engine runs, it doesn't deliver nice constant power. It's a series of captured explosions delivering sudden bursts of power, followed by a lag until the next burst. This is more noticeable when the engine is running really slowly, since the explosions are further apart. Also, the weight and resistance of the drivetrain helps to smooth out the explosions and make power delivery feel more smooth, but when the transmission is in neutral this extra weight and drag isn't present to help smooth things out. Finally, engines are tuned to run best at a certain RPM, when they are running significantly faster or slower than this RPM, they can run more roughly.
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Does the sun make a sound? | When I imagine being close to the sun I imagine it making a very loud roaring noise, like that of a large fire. Also, if it does make a sound, would you be able to hear it in the near-perfect vacuum of space? | 45 | Depends on how you define "sound." In the strictest definition, sound is a pressure wave through some kind of medium, and there's nothing between the sun and anything else that can act as an effective medium.
But *within* the sun there are pressure waves that you could imagine are something like a sound. You could never hear them, obviously, because your ears wouldn't survive that environment for even the tiniest fraction of a second. But if you like, you can imagine the sun ringing like a bell that's continuously being struck.
That's mostly just poetry, though. In practical terms, no, the sun does not make a sound, and no you could not hear it under any circumstances. | 62 |
[The Expanse] If water on Ceres is so valuable why are steamed and boiled foods so common? | Detective Miller frequents a bar where they're constantly steaming something like your typical sci-fi ramen stand. If water is "more valuable than gold," heavily rationed, and constantly fought over why is this restaurant owner so cavalier with its use? Shouldn't they, at the very least, have something set up to capture and reclaim the water vapor?
I don't imagine the answer to this needs spoilers, but just in case please limit them to S1. | 117 | A chunk of ice the size of a skyscraper is more *useful* than a chunk of gold of the same size.
Humans need a lot of water, wherever they go, but it's not like the water is "used up" in the cooking. Everyone in space lives inside of a pressurized capsule surrounded by vacuum... so the water will eventually be reclaimed. They need all that water for, presumably, cooking noodles and boiling eggs. | 122 |
[Star Wars] Is there a canon explanation for why so many aliens are humanoid? | 15 | For most, such as Sullustans and Abednedo, convergent evolution. Species in the galaxy that evolve into intelligent toolmakers tend to have the same basic body shape.
The species that have human shaped heads with colorful skin or other small differentiators (like Twi'leks and Mirialans) are "near-humans" who have human ancestry but adapted to life on other planets or interbred with aliens. | 23 |
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CMV: philosophically speaking there is no reason not to live in a virtual reality once it is possible. | Heyah guys,
I hope I am allowed to submit this since my view is not actually a *I would rather kill you then Change my mind* Kind of view, but rather a simple thought I have been entertaining recently after an Argument with a friend about why I enjoy DnD.
My idea is simply that from a philosophical standpoint it it perfectly reasonable for everyone to live their life in a fake reality if possible. The reason being that a virtual reality would simply have infinite possiblities and could be tailored to our liking. It could simply be the fulfillment of your dreams.
I know that this is going into the *why should we not all do drugs* territory of philosophy but I don't think that These two Topics are the same. For one the satisfaction of a fake reality would be real, unlike a drug making you chemically happy in a virtual reality happiness would stem from actual accomplishments.
Footnote: ist just a Thing I have thought about in my free time, so please Refrain from telling me to see a therapist -,-
Footnote 2: Yes I have not read 100 books on the Topic so please Refrain from telling me I am an idiot. I am however always open for book suggestions.
Edit: I think I Need to clarify that this is a philosophical question. Technical Problems like my Need for Food and drink are out of the equation.
Edit 2: I am also not neccessarily talking about a virtual reality Headset, but about a full on virtual reality.
Like the Matrix minus Hugo Weavings creepy laughter
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> *Hello, users of CMV! This is a footnote from your moderators. We'd just like to remind you of a couple of things. Firstly, please remember to* ***[read through our rules](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules)***. *If you see a comment that has broken one, it is more effective to report it than downvote it. Speaking of which,* ***[downvotes don't change views](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/guidelines#wiki_upvoting.2Fdownvoting)****! If you are thinking about submitting a CMV yourself, please have a look through our* ***[popular topics wiki](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/populartopics)*** *first. Any questions or concerns? Feel free to* ***[message us](http://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/changemyview)***. *Happy CMVing!* | 19 | The reason to live in both realities is that they compliment each other. Philosophically speaking, to live only in our reality or only in the virtual reality is to miss the point of virtual reality and escapism altogether.
To truly appreciate virtual reality, it has to be in constant comparison to the real reality it serves as an escape from. Otherwise, it will simply become "reality" and lose its specialness. | 15 |
ELI5: In quantum mechanics, what do they mean when they say a particle takes "every possible path"? | I'm referring to Feynman's sum of all paths, which is often mentioned in layman physics books but rarely fully explained. What counts as a "possible path"? Often it is described as a particle travelling from point A to B could include a path in which it heads off to Alpha Centauri and back again. I know quantum physics is very counter intuitive, but in what way are we supposed to picture the particle heading off to Alpha Centauri? What sent it in that direction? What would have caused it to return? And are we assuming it travels below light speed (in which case that path would take years) or does this it not matter if it moves faster than light since this path is not the actual one measured, but only incorporated mathematically (whatever that means)? In that case can we take it to the extreme and say the particle also took a path to the other side of the observable universe and back again? | 49 | A basic difference between classical physics and quantum theory is the fact that within the quantum world, certain predictions can only be made in terms of probabilities.
As an example, take the question whether or not a particle that starts at the time A at the location A, will reach location B at the later time B.
In classical physics, an answer can be given depending on the particles velocity and the forces acting upon it, giving a simple yes or no answer. BUT, In quantum theory, it is only possible to give the probability that the particle in question can be detected at location B at time B. Quantum mechanics therefore considers all possibilities for the particle travelling from A to B. Not only the boring straight-line approach, but also the possibility of the particle turning loopings and making detours etc.
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Why does the Planck length exist, and why is it that specific size? | 19 | The Planck length is a length you get when you multiply certain constants together in physics, why it is exactly that number is not known, just as it is not known why the speed of light is the number it is or why the charge of the electron has that certain value.
You may have heard that the Planck length is the smallest length possible, but this is not so. It is simply at this scale that we would need to have a functioning theory of quantum gravity to understand phenomena. | 12 |
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[Heroes] Sylar’s power is intuitive aptitude which means he can comprehend anything they perceive. Does this mean he has a fundamental understanding of how the mind works? What consciousness is? Does he know the secrets of the universe and how it works? | 17 | The universe is probably too big for his mind to grasp, which means he can't use his power on it properly. He usually has to take brains out of people to learn their powers, for instance, which wouldn't be remotely necessary if it were just pure observation.
The same may be true of the mind - he may need to really *examine* a living brain before he can understand everything about a mind.
But he could learn what consciousness *is* pretty easily, since it is a purely chemical process. Fully understanding every part within it is much more difficult than knowing what it *is*. | 17 |
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ELI5: Why do browsers such as Chrome and Edge use such a seemingly large amount of memory? | 19 | Unused RAM is wasted RAM
If Chrome uses 500 MB of RAM and pages take a half second to load it's alright
But if you've got 8 GB of RAM and it gobbles up 2GB precaching pages so they now only take a quarter second to load then you're happier.
The increased RAM usage doesn't really matter. If a real program comes along and asks for memory to run in then it'll get dibs and chrome will back down, but a gig of RAM sitting there empty is doing nothing but consuming power, might as well use it! | 15 |
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Eli5: Why turboprops if you can just have a turbofan? | If the airframe and/or fuselage can support the weight of one of or more turbine based engines (including the necessary volume of fuel), why attach propellers? Wouldn't a typical jet engine provide far more thrust than a turboprop counterpart?
I understand turboprop retrofits in older aircraft, but when designing a new plane, what's the benefit of propellers? | 20 | Props can move a lot of air for their weight. An equivalent turbofan would weigh more.
Turboprops are more fuel-efficient and less maintenance-intensive. Fuel and maintenance costs are a big factor for single planes, and huge for those who have fleets.
Turboprops can usually take off on shorter runways. | 20 |
Any PhDs in social sciences that don't have horrific job prospects in academia? | I would love to become an academic and I'm really interested in anthropology and sociology but I've read the job market in academia for people with PhDs in those fields is horrifying. So yeah, my question is: any other social sciences (or humanities) PhDs that aren't as bad? Maybe Marketing as it is a more professional field? Thank you. | 48 | if you branch out into the data science part, sociology and communications aren't bad. if bad comes to worse you can always leave academia and land a decent job as data analyst /quantitative data analyst, especially if you learn how to use R or SPSS and other softwares | 34 |
Why does sweat have so much salt? | From a biological standpoint, why is salt excreted in sweat along with water?
From an evolutionary standpoint, why did sweat evolve to be an excretion of salt and water when potentially it could have evolved to be just an excretion of water? | 38 | From a chemical viewpoint, salt is excreted along with water because excreting water alone would increase the osmotic pressure inside the body (less water but the same concentration of salts, sugar etc. means the solutes become more concentrated), which would actually draw water back into the skin because of the concentration gradient. Evolving to excrete salt/water together means more water can be removed to allow for evaporation and thus cooling. | 16 |
Is it possible to have a dream that would permanently traumatize you? | There are certain things and events that can affect and damage our brain by giving us phobias, traumas and mental problems.
Is it possible that dreams can cause our brain harm? | 4,419 | So trauma is a tricky thing. It's subjective. What the field defines as trauma, currently, is anything that causes an individual to experience fear for their safety or life, or the safety/life of a loved one. In other words, as long as it causes the individual to feel like they are in danger, it's trauma. This is entirely based on the individual's perception of events, and it means that what one person considers extremely traumatic may be nothing special to another person. Even then, people react differently to trauma. Some people are able to cope with nearly any trauma they experience (they are "resilient"), and some people are less able to cope with trauma. The development of posttraumatic stress is not a given.
So the answer to your question is: yes, it is *possible* for a particularly extreme nightmare to cause lasting trauma (posttraumatic stress) to the individual, given the right circumstances.
E: expansion and clarity | 2,762 |
Eli5: What is the difference between various programming languages? Dont they all do the same thing? | 67 | It’s a bit like toys to build stuff. Think about Lego blocks, Lincoln Logs and an Erector set. You can build a house with any of them but the house you end up with is going to be different. The erector set house is probably the strongest but might take longer to build. The Lincoln log house might be the weakest but was really fast to build.
So yeah, the all do the same thing — tell a computer what to do. But some languages are easy to use but more limited. Some are more powerful but are challenging to master. | 113 |
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[Marvel, DC] What makes characters' eyes glow white when wearing their masks, and be expressive? (Woverine, Batman, etc)? | 21 | Batman has tech in his lenses that allows him to scan the environment, see in the dark, etc. The glowing is just a side effect. Also it makes him look more badass, and Batman is all about scaring the criminals. | 15 |
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ELI5: Why can't the space shuttle just go slow enough to not be heated up by friction with earths atmosphere on re-entry? | 24 |
Because friction is a completely free way to slow a spacecraft down. In space, the only way to slow down is to burn fuel in the opposite direction you're moving. Using the air to slow down instead means you don't need to bring as much fuel, which means you can bring a heavier payload.
Increasing the payload size by making the rocket more efficient is a goal for any rocket scientist. | 97 |
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[WH40K] If all of Ork-kind actually did unite under one banner, could the Tyranids be exterminated? | 27 | Maybe. The problem with the Tyranids is... We don't actually know how many there are. We know there are enough Orks to conquer the Galaxy quite handedly, but when it comes to the Hive Fleets, we dont really have a gauge of their total strength. Even the Silent King didn't really give us a good indication, as A: he likely did.t see the full swarm, and B: his basis for judgement was a Pre-Slumber Necrons, not what we have now.
If we go with the oldest (and thus far really the only) indication of how big the Swarm is... The answer is a resounding no. The 2nd Edition Tyranid rules discribed them as having consumed a thousand galaxies. There is no way in hell any faction in 40k can take on that amount of biomass alone. Even unified, it's unlikely.. | 22 |
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ELI5: How are black surfaces able to be glossy? | Black is said to absorb all colors of light, so why can a black surface be reflective, such as a black painted car. | 26 | Light can bounce off of surfaces like a ball. When it hits the surface in an angle from the left, it bounces with the same angle to the right. If all light bounces like this, you can see a reflection. This is how mirrors bounce light.
Light can also scatter all around to all directions. A very white surface may bounce almost all the light but you won't see a reflection because the light bounces to all directions and the "reflection" becomes blurry.
Now, a perfectly black material wouldn't bounce any light at all but it it impossible to make a perfectly black surface. Surfaces can be very dark but not black. If the black sufrace bounces the small amount of light like a mirror, it looks shiny. | 24 |
[The Matrix] Why did Smith stay? | Hi guys. I looked for answers around the web but couldn't really find any.
Why did Agent Smith stay in the Matrix if he hated it so much and couldn't wait to get out (like he told Morpheus)? When Neo destroyed him, he was "supposed to" return to the Source. Isn't that what he wanted?
He hates The Matrix, describing its disgusting smell and calling it a zoo. So why the hell would he stay after being rendered obsolete?
What do you guys think? | 15 | Smith wasn't really returned to the Source after being rendered obsolete. His fight with Neo corrupted his source code which turned his programming from a temporarily piggybacking hosts and programs into a complete takeover. By the time the new Agents were sent to fight the One, Smith had turned from Agent to full-blown virus that could also take down Zero-One through its connection to the Matrix. | 24 |
I believe police officers should have to wear cameras at all times on duty and that all of the footage should be a matter of public record. CMV | If you possess the right to deprive and individual of life, liberty, or property under the law I think you must then lose the right to privacy when you enforce these actions. There are too many bad people out there that abuse power for us not to need to be able to check them effectively. I think in the long run this would be great for police forces, because maybe then people who need police help most, the impoverished, the inner cities, and minorities, would actually be willing to trust them to help.
EDIT- So public matter was perhaps a bad choice of words. The idea is that the footage is held by a non-interested third party who can be trusted to provide the actual footage to victims/police and their legal representatives, the former of whom can make the footage public if they so choose. This way the privacy of the victim is protected and the function of police accountability is preserved.
MUCH LATER EDIT- So, I'll address a couple of common objections I haven't responded to yet.
1) Cost. Yeah, it wouldn't be cheap. All sorts of numbers are being thrown around and they all have that in common. Then again though, doing anything on this scale isn't cheap. And in this case, I think it is **very much** worth the cost. While my main concern is police accountability, /u/The_Naked_Gun, who at the very least sounds like a real cop, also feels that this would really help the police in defending themselves when they do need to use justifiable force. In both directions, I think that this could really help improve the relationship of the police with many of the more low income citizens who require their services the most. If that reduces crime, it starts a whole long chain of events that ends with an improved economic outlook. Aside from this even, I think its worth the cost on principle alone.
2) Privacy. There are ways to do this without violating the privacy rights of the victim/agressor here. As I wrote in my first edit, 'public record' is not a good word choice, what I mean by that is the footage should be available to the interested parties, and should be handled by a non-interested party to preserve the integrity of the evidence. No one is going to be made a spectacle by this.
3) Loss of police discretion. First of all, I am far from convinced on this one. For this to be the case, you'd have to have someone checking *every single video* trying to catch officers for being nice. And then what? Do you think the cops boss is going to fire him for maintaining a productive relationship with the public? Or that some court of peers would punish a police officer for being kind? Maybe I'm not as cynical as you guys, but I really doubt that police would feel constrained be inappropriately harsh or strict in that kind of context.
TL;DR, you guys have some decent points, none of them convincing enough though. | 910 | I disagree with the footage being public record, if only for the sake of victims of a crime.
For example, a domestic abuse victim who calls the cops wouldn't want footage of themselves covered in blood and bruises to be freely available on the internet for the public to look over. Similarly, footage of someone's house that has been robbed, footage of dead victims, brutally beaten persons, child victims, and numerous other crimes.
Especially in high profile cases, this footage being available for public consumption means it would be shown on the nighly news (or at least in the trashier gossip magazines)
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How can I combine programming and economic science? | Now I'm studying science economic in my university, And I study programming alone at home.
and wondering how can I combine these two areas, please Give me some ideas and advice. | 16 | What exactly do you want to know about?
There's plenty of programming in economics once you get into doing research or an economist job. Typically stuff like R and Python are the "scientific languages" although stuff like Java might be common as well in some jobs. | 15 |
[Star Wars] Why are stormstroopers extremely ineffective in Rogue One? | It feels like they arent even soldiers. I'd guess they take at least years of hard training, but can't even aim straight. They can't hit their targets from 20-30 meters, which is ridiculous. It feels like they are just random guys who took on the outfit, and got thrown out in the war on first day. Only I find this an extremely big plot hole? E.g. when the blind guys takes out 10 soldiers, what the actual fuck. If one just stays at the back, and shoots, the blind person dies, but... no. | 116 | Most standard troopers are just there to pad the strength in numbers for which the Empire prides itself. Quantity is a quality all its own, after all.
Training all these troops to be effective against guerilla tactics is resource intensive, and the Empire is stretched thin in some areas as is. Patrols of a dozen or so are easily taken out in ambushes, and the troops on Scariff were not expected to be the first line of defense.
It's not so much the troops are ineffective as the Empire does not effectively distribute them. Once they knew where the Rebels on Scariff were they began putting them down fairly quickly.
Edit: this somewhat proves the effectiveness of the Death Star (sans the reactor flaw of course). The only effective counters to guerilla tactics are either to use special forces (ie use your own highly trained soldiers in guerilla warfare), which is resource intensive, or to burn everything down (the Rebels are somewhere in this forest? Burn it all down). The Death Star would have been an effective use of the second method. We think the Rebels are on a planet? There is no planet now | 106 |
ELI5:Why are guillotine blades angular rather than rectangular shaped? |
Guillotines chop heads. If you look at the guillotine blade, it is angled, with one side of the blade much higher than the other end. I would think the guillotine blade would be shaped more rectangular. | 285 | A straight blade such as a rectangular shape is designed for chopping, while an angled blade is designed for slicing. The human neck is not hard to cut through, but there are pieces that are tougher than others (the spine for example). Imagining a tomato, the skin is tougher to slice than the flesh. Imagine taking your knife, flat against the skin and pushing down. It would squash the tomato, not cut it. Now imagine the same scenario, but you angle the knife in the direction of the resistance, suddenly the skin and flesh of the fruit becomes much easier to cut in one clean slice. A guillotine is the exact same concept. It's a slice, not a chop. | 734 |
ELI5 - How can the sun can be out, no clouds in the sky, and it's 83 degrees, the next day, same situation and it's 101? | Today was a pleasant day in Pasadena, but i noticed that the sun was beating down on me, but it felt pleasant. While the last few weeks, the sun has been beating down and it's been unbearable! Why do the same circumstances lead to different temperatures? | 18 | Weather is being imported from the areas around you all the time. Hot airs can blow in from elsewhere, a day in the sun can cause a previously cool body of water to heat up some and provide less of a mediating influence, etc. | 12 |
ELI5: Why do bugs all have more than four legs, while basically every other terrestrial animal has four or less? | 223 | Insects' evolutionary journey favored 6 legs. Ants can carry items with the front legs and still have 4 legs for balance and weight distribution. A beetle with a big ass has 6 legs to stabilize all that rear weight. Climbing walls with 6 feet means more contact with the wall at any given time.
Think of ants digging out s tunnel or bees finding pollen or s dung beetle rolling up poop. Think of a butterfly emerging from a cocoon or a moth landing on a vertical surface. Every action is easier because of the multiple points of contact. Even flipping over if they're upside down is easier with 6 long, multiple-jointed, centrally-anchored legs. | 115 |
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CMV:I Believe The Prosperity, Cohesiveness and Generous Spirit of Canadians is Because They Are Simply Americans Without the Enormous Costs Involved In Fighting the Cold War | I love Canada and Canadians. I believe they manage to address their diversity, their health care, their economy and their education smartly and efficiently. I think they are brave and conscientious and when needed they have served militarily with distinction and honor. We share many of the same heritage and lineage. I have often wondered why the Canadians seem to do so much better with the long term big picture. I believe now the difference was the enormous costs associated with the Cold War. Not just economic costs but the focus of our research and scientific endeavors. So my view is that the current state of Canada and Canadians is America less the costs of the Cold War. Change my view! | 28 | I think that you need to reach much further back in history to find the roots of Canada's identity. We didn't fight a war to cut ourselves off from Britain. We continued to aspire to be more like Britain and were always somewhat subordinate to Britian... look at the BNA, we didnt even really have control over our own country until after the second world war and well into the cold war. | 21 |
ELI5: What are the differences between dopamine, serotonin, and endorphins? | 21 | Serotonin promotes long-term positive feelings, psychosis, and digestion. A lack of it causes depression and anxiety. An overdose can cause seizures and death.
Dopamine helps with seeking behavior, medium-term pleasure, and movement. A lack of it can cause catatonia, dementia, and a few other disorders.
Endorphins stands for something like endogenous heroin, so they’re primarily painkillers, though they can also promote short term calmness. They’re what most often modulates addictive behaviors.
In short, they can all make you happier, but they do it through different pathways, with different side-effects, and for different periods of time. | 31 |
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Is learning assembly in 2019 a good idea? | 27 | Will you be programming in assembly on a regular basis? No, not at all. However, if you want a core understanding of how a compiler works or just a better low level understanding of how the computer works then yes go for it. You will learn a lot and have a appreciation of higher level languages and what they do. Learning is learning, go for it. | 43 |
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Is it possible to have a numeral system with a base that isn't an integer? | I read somewhere that the optimal base to have in a numeral system was e. I've tried for a long time to figure out how that would work, but I am unable to do so. Is it at all possible to have a base that's not an integer? | 142 | When we write a sequence of digits, i.e., 1234, it is a shorthand way of representing a particular quantity. That quantity doesn't HAVE to be an integer, or even a rational number. In base 10, when we write "1234", we mean:
1 * 10^3 + 2 * 10^2 + 3 * 10^1 + 4 * 10^0 . If we use a different base, the same applies:
"1234" in base 5 means: 1 * 5^3 + 2 * 5^2 + 3 * 5^4 + 4 * 5^0 .
Similarly for *e*, pi, etc. | 67 |
[Harry Potter] Why aren't they taught Latin and why do they all look so bored? | Latin seems to be the go to language for spells, so why not teach it to make learning, remembering and possibly inventing or adapting new spells easier? Also, whilst on the subject of teaching magic, why are they always acting like studying magic is like studying old poetry? If speaking a few lines of poetry could make you fly, transform into an animal or person of your choosing I'm sure I'd have been thrilled to memorize the entirety of Shakespeare's works. | 98 | Because the spells aren't Latin. Teaching it to them would be like teaching someone Spanish in order to read an Italian instruction manual.
And you may have that attitude as a twenty-something, but you're forgetting that these are all *kids*. Of course they're bored, stuck in a classroom for hours at a time. They see adults casting some of these spells without effort and want to instantly master it and move on. Unfortunately, it's not a matter of just swishing your wand just right and shouting some faux-Latin, as you can see by their struggles to lift a feather, turn a teacup into a mouse, etc. | 80 |
[Tron Legacy] Before things went south Flynn claimed the Grid and the ISO's would change the world as we know it. What exactly did he have in mind, and what would the world of 2010 have looked like if he hadn't become trapped due to the uprising by CLU? | 26 | "I was there man, at the new revolution - the personal computing revolution, when the machines were no longer these massive room-sized objects restricted to the military, big universities, corporations. Imagine having a computer you could hold in your hand in 1989, a worldwide web before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Imagine if we could just knock down all those barriers - digitization! A rat is digitized in Hong Kong, travels the grid, and appears back in the real world in New York City - or London, Paris, Cairo, Delhi. And anything we can do to a rat, we cand do to a human being - or a shipping container. That's the digital frontier man, the new colonial real estate of the mind, and the ISOs were going to help us bring it closer together...native programs, evolved, robust, efficient. Imagine what uses people would find for that technology, the sharing of information, culture. Free universities, no borders, what would be the new constraints? Who would try to control that new digital world - and how could they?"
- The Word of Flynn; voice recording | 24 |
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[Fantasy] eli5: The difference between sorcerers, wizards and warlocks. | 64 | A wizard studies hard to earn good grades, and thus has a wider breadth of knowledge.
A sorcerer slacks off on homework and studying and still gets good grades due to natural ability and creativity.
The warlock is fucking the principal. | 203 |
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ELI5: Why should you not defrost things, then refreeze them? | 17 | A couple reasons. One is bacterial build up. Another is texture. When you freeze something in a normal freezer, ice crystals build up and damage the cells. When you thaw it, those cells rupture. This leads to a bad texture and makes it more available for bacteria. Freezing again just causes more damage. | 10 |
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How do we know how long Jupiter's storm has been going? | 22 | We don't really, we just know for sure that it's been observed since 1830. There are observations of a spot from the 17th and 18th centuries but those may have been a separate storm, since there's a gap of about 100 years between those observations and what we know to be the modern great red spot. If it's the same storm it's been going for more than 300 years! If it's not, it's been about 190. | 15 |
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Why do severe injuries often not hurt the instant they happen? | When I touch something unbearably hot, I feel the pain almost instantly. I've heard many people who have been shot often don't realize it. I understand that adrenaline masks pain, but how quickly does it take to kick in?
Another example, I smashed my face into the ground (unintentionally) and broke my nose some months ago. The initial impact was painless; I obviously could tell I hit a hard surface, but the only sensation I experienced was the pressure of the ground. Was adrenaline released as I was panicking and falling? Did my body not have enough time to process the pain? I've heard it takes a couple of minutes for adrenaline to be in effect, but of course I'm not an expert.
I'm not sure of this is caused by something else, but I'd love to understand it better. | 28 | Self preservation, an evolutionary survival response.
A minor injury hurts to act as a warning to avoid further injury.
A catastrophic injury (say from a predator) and the body shuts off the pain response to give the animal a chance to escape first, worry about the injury later.
Both have the same goal, self preservation. | 23 |
CMV: The fights between Cap v Cap and Thanos v Iron man, Cap + Thor in Endgame are not consistent with previous depictions of their MCU power levels | \*\*ENDGAME SPOILRS\*\*
Thor in the end of infinity war wielding a bifrost capable Stormbreaker literally put Thanos out of traction with one hit. His weapon was shown to be strong enough to easily cleave through an energy blast (or whatever generic term you wanna use) from a fully powered infinity gauntlet with all of the stones. Prior to this his hand to hand was at least on par with the hulk (greater when he’s in ‘God mode’) and his enhanced lightning conduction/creation powers were also greatly enhanced.
Come endgame, sure he’s out of shape but the potency of his Axe, lightning, access to God mode not to mention Mjolnir - already a crazy powerful weapon, should have put him orders of magnitude above base-level Thanos who was not utilising a single infinity stone let alone all 6. But Thor got his ass handed to him as well as Nano Iron man - the blast Thor hit Iron man with that combined Mjolnir, Stormbreaker and god-mode-lightning (Thor's eyes were glowing) increasing the repulsor beams should have been more than enough to put big T down down but he blocked it pretty damn easily.
Meanwhile, Cap v Cap I have less of an issue with; however in the first Avengers we see Steve working that heavy bag and giving it the business, sure. But at this point, he’s a well trained soldier/maybe boxer with enhanced physical capabilities and his shield. We see him using more striking and grappling techniques a couple years later in Winter Soldier and by the time Civil War rolls around, he can put down (briefly) a flying War Machine with a spinning kick and batter the shit out of (admittedly not at his best) Iron man hand to hand. Steve has been training and getting better at various fighting forms as well as having experience fighting everything from super-soldiers to alien 6 limbed beasties and even a couple of the children of Thanos in the meantime. New Cap should have OWNED old Cap in a one-on-one but he had to pull the Bucky card to avoid getting choked out.
I reckon this is inconsistent (not the only instances in it but a couple of the more notable ones in recent days). | 54 | Infinity War Thanos had just had the shit kicked out of him by Sorcerer Supreme Et al, and literally every other non-thor Avenger.
Come Endgame he was completely fresh.
I don't have much of an argument about cap v cap | 28 |
Help! I'm a logical positivist! | I ask for help because I'm pretty confident I'm wrong, as logical positivism is an almost universally rejected thesis; and also because before this 'revelation' of mine, metaphysics was my favourite area of philosophy. Perhaps the position I've come across isn't quite identical to logical positivism, but it's pretty close in my understanding.
The issue comes of course from language. My first premise is (1) *Words cannot be meaningfully defined in terms of one another*. By this I simply mean that language cannot be a giant self-referential web. If we define some word W in terms of other words (W2, W3, etc.) then W2 and W3 cannot be meaningfully defined in terms of W. If our entire language just consists of words defined in terms of each other with no foundation then none of the words mean anything. I think (1) is probably a tautology? But I'm not sure how I would go about proving this. I hope you can see what I mean.
Words can't refer merely to other words, so words have to refer, in the end, to something we experience. This is concluded from my second assertion, which is that all we ever have access to is the contents of our own consciousness. I think this is a tautology too. It just seems incoherent to say we can transcend our consciousness.
So for words to be meaningful they have to be defined in terms of conscious experiences. They needn't be particularly precise definitions, as experiences are messy and unpredictable, but they still have to refer to conscious experience in some way or another to mean anything. We can build extremely elaborate systems of concepts that are all built on more elementary ones, but for them to actually mean anything they have to all at some point translate exactly to conscious experiences.
This is the conclusion I find worrying. If all meaningful language just translates identically to descriptions of conscious experiences, how can we do metaphysics, or most philosophy at all? How can it even make sense to speak of 'being'? 'causation'? 'abstracta'? This is my problem, and it arises from what seem to be two tautological assertions.
I suppose this thesis is slightly different from classical positivism in that it doesn't require that meaningful statements describe merely sense-experience, but all conscious experience.
Your help would be much appreciated as these recent thoughts have dismayed me quite a bit. Thank you.
Edit: It appears that my views align very well with those expressed in the *Tractatus* and that the best course of action for me would be to read Philosophical Investigations and other resources on Wittgenstein. I look forward to this and I thank you all for the excellent help and kind hearted responses. | 103 | You're in the thrall the early Wittegenstein. The cure is the later Wittgenstein.
Read the Philosophical Investigations; it's the standard critique of the theory of language and reference that you're trapped by. | 71 |
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