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3y6mi5 | if i'm in space, and i try to push an object away from me that is significantly heavier than i, what will happen? | As far as I'm concerned, if I would jump out of a spaceship, I'd be doomed to 'fly' through space in the direction I jumped for as long as something crossed my path.
Second, in Zero G, I'm able to toss heavy objects around with ease.
Assuming all of this is correct, If I tried to push a spaceshuttle or something else really heavy, would it move into the direction I'm pushing it or would I propel myself away from me it due to being lighter? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3y6mi5/eli5_if_im_in_space_and_i_try_to_push_an_object/ | {
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"You would propel yourself away from it because you are the less massive object. You would impart a minimal amount of force to the Space shuttle, but not enough to make any sort of real difference.",
"Conservation of momentum.\n\nMV + mv = 0\n\nwhere M and V are the mass and velocity of the heavy object and m and v are the mass and velocity of you (the light object). \n\nSo if you were to push on a heavy object, you'd go flying off while the object would barely budge. The shuttle weighs 4,470,000 lbs and let's say you weigh 200 lbs with suit. Let's say you were able to push off at 10 m/s (a completely unrealistic 22 mph) the shuttle would go off in the other direction at 200/4470000*10 m/s = 0.45 millimeters/second."
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1t1zr3 | why don't boats use headlights? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1t1zr3/eli5_why_dont_boats_use_headlights/ | {
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"Headlights are meant to see and be seen by...\n\n\nTo see, boats often don't need them since light from stars and the moon are often enough... when that isn't the case, they use spot-lights.\n\n\nTo be seen, they are required by law to have red/green combo of lights with proper orientation (I think red on left) so that oncoming craft can tell their direction of movement as well as position...",
"They do. Well...sort of. They have bigger lamps besides the standard red and green which are used while working on the ship at night / during storms to help other ships see them. For actually looking at objects (usually looking at wreckage, ice, etc), ships will have spotlights like [/u/bsoile6](_URL_3_) said, which can highlight the area of interest. \n\n* [Example 1 - Ship lights during storm](_URL_1_)\n\n* [Example 2 - Ship lights to help workers at night](_URL_2_)\n\n* [Example 3 - Ship spotlight](_URL_0_)",
"Having lights on to illuminate the sea is a bad idea for a few reasons. Firstly it obliterates your night vision and makes it very difficult to spot the lights of navigation aids and other vessels. It also make it more difficult for other vessels to see your navigation lights.\n\nAlthough you can easily see a brightly illuminated vessel, the arrangement of the navigation lights gives information about it's orientation which is important for collision avoidance.\n\nIn addition, there isn't really any need to light up the sea, as there isn't really anything to see. One bit of ocean looks very much like another and there isn't all that much to bump into."
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6koarp | how did they do music videos like "take on me" without computers | Cant imagine how. Blame me for not knowing if its common knowledge but im curious. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6koarp/eli5_how_did_they_do_music_videos_like_take_on_me/ | {
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"First they shot the entire video live-action, then used frames from the parts they wanted to be animated as the basis to trace out sketch drawings, then replaced some of the live-action frames with the animated frames.\n\nWhere the two were meant to interact, they would superimpose the animation over part of the live-action frame.\n\nThe technique is called [Rotoscoping](_URL_0_).",
"Essentially what /u/KubrickIsMyCopilot said. Graphic Design and animated video production used to be an extremely labor intensive process. That is why \"Photoshop\" was such a revolutionary tool when it came out. It changed the industry immeasurably. Eventually that led to things like \"After Effects\", which among some others, is what everyone uses today to do Rotoscoping.\n\nAll of the early tools in programs like these were based on manual processes people used to do. For instance [Dodging and Burning](_URL_1_), which is used to lighten or darken parts of your photos, used to be done with [cut pieces of paper](_URL_0_), your hand, or something else, while you exposed your ~~film~~ photo paper to light."
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3jx7b9 | fed interest rates. why the interest rates are more wacked then ever. | I've been looking at my student loans and the 6.8% I have to pay. Yet I look at spreadsheets for the federal reserve where they have interest rates at .07%... Why is it that I have to deal with a huge interest rate and large institutions are essntially getting an interest rate lower than .1 %? And have these interest rates ever been this low? Like the history going back makes it look like something is seriously wrong.
_URL_0_
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jx7b9/eli5_fed_interest_rates_why_the_interest_rates/ | {
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"Banks are expected to pay back their loans roughly 100% of the time. In the unlikely event that a bank declares bankruptcy, it is likely that the government will step in and provide assistance. \n\nIndividuals can miss payments, make late payments, renegotiate terms, leave the country, die, or declare bankruptcy. So the bank charges a premium when loaning money to individuals.",
"Their loans have collateral, and are due to be repaid in 16 hours. Yours are not, and are not.\n\n"
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"http://www.federalreserve.gov/datadownload/Output.aspx?rel=H15&series=40afb80a445c5903ca2c4888e40f3f1f&lastObs=&from=&to=&filetype=csv&label=include&layout=seriescolumn"
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2r1a17 | why did television insist on having married couples in separate beds, when our real-life parents obviously slept together? | I never really got the reasoning behind it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2r1a17/eli5_why_did_television_insist_on_having_married/ | {
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"I think it was purely because how uptight everyone used to be back in the day regarding sexuality of any sort, keeping to the mindset of, \"One only does it to procreate!\"\n\nAlso, found an article on snopes about the first TV-couple to be shown sharing a bed which might interest you.\n\nEDIT: Forgot to post [article link!] (_URL_0_)",
"It's important to remember that the early days of TV were a more innocent era, and as vocal as Media Watchdogs are today, there was a time when it was feared that it might be inappropriate to show a toilet on television. As a result, it took until the early 60s before married couples were depicted as sharing a bed. Before then, they were consigned to a pair of twin beds, usually with a nightstand in between just so we didn't imagine them ever pushing the beds together when we weren't watching. \n\nThe first live-action TV couple to share a bed on television, who were not already married in real life, were Darrin and Samantha Stephens on Bewitched, in the October 22, 1964 episode \"Little Pitchers Have Big Fears\". \n\n[Source](_URL_0_)",
"It's about what was considered acceptable at the time. Many at the time were concerned about corrupting the youths of the day. Even Elvis in his early days could not be shown waggling his hips because it was considered to raunchy. This is not a new concept, even the ancient Greeks were worried about how their youngsters the turning out. \nMany from that time saw it as perfectly reasonable to be racist and homophobic. Over time what is acceptable changes, no doubt in fifty years people will be amused by the censorship of today."
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1n30nx | microchips | A microchip might as well be a magic rune to me. How does bits of metal on a piece of plastic do anything? Let alone create insanely complex things like computers. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1n30nx/eli5_microchips/ | {
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"There's a little bit of a difference in complexity between a CPU and an Integrated Circuit, the integrated circuit (What many people call microchips) are literally just general purpose circuits (Things like timers, toggles, etc.) that have been fitted to a single chip for easy implementation, in theory you could build a CPU out of them but it would end up looking like [this](_URL_0_) and be just as slow. Honestly the line is a little blurry between ICs and CPUs but I like to draw the line where they start being able to do math or run code.\n\nA CPU is a very delicate thing but ultimately it only does three things: Fetch, Decode, Execute, repeat each one taking a certain number of clock cycles to complete (inversely related to the frequency of a CPU in Hz)\n\nThe basis of CPUs and other computational circuits is that given enough digitally controlled switches(i.e. Transistors), you can do *anything*, thankfully we've gotten really good at making these Transistors really, really, *really*, small in manufacturing so that new CPUs using new 14nm processing have individual transistors the size of about 60 silicon atoms.\n\nFetch merely grabs all of the instructions it can from memory and sticks them in the cache to be decoded later.\n\nDecode takes the instructions in the first step and toggles the right electronic pathways for the instructions to be executed. The details of this step are very complex and in modern processors is actually about three separate steps.\n\nExecute is where all of the juicy stuff happens, registers and accumulators are updated, data is moved out on the pins of the processor for the rest of the computer to enjoy, and more importantly the Program Counter (Which points to the next instruction) can be changed to a completely different place in the execution of the code in memory, which is how you do for() loops and the like in high level languages (in truth it is also incremented during fetch and decode to go to the literal next instruction but that's a detail).\n",
"This is one of those ELI5s of something that is so complex people spend *years* to really understand it. Also I'm not totally sure what you're asking. But for a general overview:\n\n* **Transistors** are basically electrically controlled switches, where the voltage on one terminal determines if current can flow through the other two terminals. You can actually buy individual transistors which are little plastic things with three wires coming out.\n\n* The voltages represent numbers that are either zero or one, i.e. binary. With a few transistors you can create basic circuits with a few inputs and an output. For example, \"output is high if any of the inputs are high\" (**OR**) \"output is high if input is low\" (**NOT**) etc.\n\n* By combining some of these, you can make more complicated circuits. For example, you can make a circuit that has two groups of eight inputs, each representing an eight bit number (0-255) and the circuit outputs the sum of the two numbers. (an **adder**)\n\n* A **CPU** has lots of those types of things -- it will have an adder, a multiplier, a divider, etc, all in hardware. What is really neat about a CPU is that it chooses which one to use based on the instructions it reads from memory.\n\n* Now, where does the frequency come in? CPUs use something called **clocked** **logic**. That means they operate in steps. There's a special type of circuit called an edge-triggered latch, used all over the place in a CPU. Whenever the clock ticks, the latch instantaneously reads its inputs and stores and outputs what it reads. These are all clocked at the same time, and are how the CPU's various bits synchronize their operation.\n\n* Now, **microchips**. These are more properly called **integrated** **circuits**, because they integrate many transistors into one package. These range from simple to complex -- you can get ICs that are AND/OR/NOT gates, ICs that are adders, or ICs which have the whole CPU. (Each of which, of course, would include many of the former.)\n\n* Making integrated circuits is tricky, because these days people want lots and lots of stuff in a tiny package. An IC has a bottom layer of silicon where all the transistors are, and several layers of metal traces connecting them together. First, the engineers designing it figure out what each layer is going to look like. They connect together in 3D, and that is pretty complicated. The IC is built in layers from the silicon up. First a thin layer of metal is applied; then it is coated with a special chemical called photoresist. Then an *image* of that layer is projected onto the photoresist. The light hardens the photoresist where the designers want metal; then the rest of it is washed away. Then it's dipped in acid, which dissolves the metal, except for where it's protected by the photoresist. In that manner, each layer of metal is shaped exactly how it has to be for the transistors to be wired together correctly.\n\n* They have been doing this for decades. Companies are always trying to push the limit on size, because they can make better chips. The make chips in something called a **fab**, which is a cleanroom with all the equipment they need. It has to be a cleanroom, because at modern scale, dropping a particle of dust into a partially assembled CPU would be like dropping a bolt into the cylinder of a partially assembled engine.",
"To ELI5:\n\n1) Making a microchip is pretty much printing a photograph onto very, very pure silicon\n\n2) When you run electricity through this \"photograph\", different things happen based on what was printed, and where electricity is running\n\n3) Those \"different things that happen\" are linked to concepts like \"electricity flows through here only if electricity is also flowing through there\"\n\n4) You can build everything in a computer, out of pretty simple constructs like that.\n"
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aj4cfj | why insurance premiums generally go up following an accident/tragic event? will they ever go down over time or are you stuck with the higher premium forever? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aj4cfj/eli5_why_insurance_premiums_generally_go_up/ | {
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"People who get into one accident tend to get into more accidents in the future. So insurance companies take this information and raise your rates accordingly. Eventually your premiums will go down if you maintain a clean driving record. ",
"Statistically speaking, if you've experienced one for one event you're more likely to have another than someone that has a clean record. \n\nIt's not personal, that's just how the math works out (apparently). Most insurance companies will be willing to drop your rates when there's been enough time between incidents. ",
"Insurance rates are typically based on a certain number of years of history, whether it's car insurance, personal/general liability, or most any other lines. Auto insurance varies by the specific type and state, but it's generally 3-5 years of history.\n\nBut the reason that insurance rates go up is because insurance premiums are based on probability, and when you get into an accident (or suffer any insurance loss), it's more probable that you're a riskier investment for the company. So their rates may go up to compensate for that, so that if you bring another loss to the company, it doesn't hurt them as badly. And of course, depending on the severity or details of the loss, rates might not go up at all. As an example I've had two auto accidents in my life: one where the other driver was at fault (no increase) and one very minor fender bender worth a couple hundred dollars in damages with no medical costs (no increase). It all depends on the carrier's standards, your own driving history, and the details of the loss incident - depending on a lot of factors. I've known people whose rates increased after an accident in which they weren't at fault.\n\nDoes all that mean that sometimes very safe people are penalized for an accident that was out of their control? Absolutely. But insurance isn't a personal thing, or it wouldn't work. It works based on the laws of averages and large numbers. A loss is considered proof that a person belongs in the \"less safe\" class, and it might take years of safe driving before the company is willing to take the bigger risk and put them back into the \"very safe\" class."
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77g9ib | what is this sideways slot in this outlet? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/77g9ib/eli5_what_is_this_sideways_slot_in_this_outlet/ | {
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"It means the outlet is rated for 20 amps instead of the normal 15 and can accept plugs of [this shape](_URL_0_) for appliances that need the higher amperage.",
"it is a 20amp recepticle. Its pretty rare to find a 20amp appliance since few outlets can safely support it (or need it).\n\nyou might see it on some power tools or portable AC units. Maybe a microwave... for the most part, they try to keep things under 15amps so they dont exclude many buyers (and confuse even more).\n\n20amp plug for reference\n\n_URL_0_"
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2refv0 | if you took a newborn baby from today and one from 4000 years ago and raised them together would there be any difference in intelligence or abilities? | Omitting natural variance between two unrelated people obviously. Are today's people smarter/healthier/better?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2refv0/eli5_if_you_took_a_newborn_baby_from_today_and/ | {
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"I don't know about intelligence, but the newer baby would most likely have a better immune system and have more antibodies given to them from its mother. \n\nIf I were to guess about intelligence, I would say for the most part they would be the same. Or rather the older baby would be comparable to modern kids in terms of learning ability and cognitive function. ",
"You could probably do the same with a baby from 50,000 years ago and cognitively they would be the same. Our brains have not evolved much if at all since modern humans appeared; we just have better toys (technology) now and the sum of previous knowledge to build upon.",
"The variance would be no greater than two different babies born today. On an evolutionary scale for the length of human life 4000 years is not long.\n\nThis assumes they made it through childbirth and gestation well - babies were much more likely to die during childbirth, but...I don't think that is part of your question really.",
"The only real difference would be disease susceptibility.\n\nA baby from 4000 years ago would be more vulnerable to modern diseases, just as a modern baby would be more susceptible to 4000 year old diseases.",
"Everybody is saying they'd be the same. There is a chance they are wrong.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nBasically, IQ has been increasing since we've began taking the tests in the 1930's. The cause/reason for this is open to speculation. It could be we are prizing intelligence more in regards to mating selection, thus producing smarter offspring (meaning our children today are smarter). It could be better health and general nutrition are producing people that are better able to fulfill their potential (meaning there's not a large difference in intelligence, but rather environment). It may be that we are better at taking IQ tests (indicating a difference in education and possibly cognition). There is evidence to suggest that the Flynn effect has leveled off, which would indicate that cognitive ability increases are more due to environment than evolution.\n\nIt is hard to say with authority. I would suspect there would, on average, be a small but testable difference. Keep in mind 4000 years encompasses 150-200 generations; it is a large enough time span that there should be noticeable evolutionary changes to the general population.",
"I remember seeing a documentary about a theory that posited that religious experiences (in particular \"the voice of God\") could be tied to left/right brain communication (or lack thereof) where one half of the brain could be creating a plan, and the other half wasn't quite 100% conscious of it, and it left the feeling of the voice of this plan coming from outside the self.\n\nThe theory suggested that the steady decline of religiousness over then last 5,000 years or so could be due to the evolution of the brain to have more and more hemispherical connections leading to a more connected left/right brain and a decline in the feeling of another presence outside the self giving you commands or suggestions.\n\nI have no idea if this theory has any value, but I found it interesting.",
"I've never understood the common answer to this being \"no differences at all\". Its almost like saying no changes occurred to our gene pool in 4000 years. I know evolution works slow, but even then there should be SOME changes between now and then, instead of none. I would assume that the average child today would be just a little bit more intelligent and a little bigger/taller.",
"Others have mentioned disease resistance but specifically the modern baby would be immune to the plague while the odds are that the ancient baby would not. "
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2qv9u1 | if adding heat to a gas increases the pressure, why is hot air thinner? | Such as in the summer it is harder for helicopters and airplanes to fly because the air is thinner. But why is this so if heat increases pressure? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2qv9u1/eli5_if_adding_heat_to_a_gas_increases_the/ | {
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"PV=nRT\n\nPressure increases with Temperature increases only if the Volume stays the same. If there is no container, the air will increase volume, lowering its density.",
"When the gas is held at a constant volume, like inside a beaker, adding heat adds pressure.\n\nWhen the gas is held at a constant pressure, like in the free atmosphere, adding heat increases the volume."
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6hpeuj | how cells can die if they go through mitosis. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6hpeuj/eli5_how_cells_can_die_if_they_go_through_mitosis/ | {
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"Mitosis is a pretty complicated process where things can go wrong. Within a cell undergoing mitosis, it can detect if something goes wrong in a step and basically signal itself to undergo apoptosis (programmed suicide). When apoptosis is signaled, the cell undergoes a series of changes to die out with minimal impact to its surroundings.\n\nIn certain types of cancers, these checks end up faulty which can result in uncontrolled mitosis to form tumors."
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53bwzz | why is discrete mathematics so important in computer science? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/53bwzz/eli5_why_is_discrete_mathematics_so_important_in/ | {
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"You can draw a continuous line on a piece of paper. If it weren't for atoms (of which there are still billions in your line) there would be an infinite number of points in it.\n\nWhen a computer draws a line on a screen it isn't \"continuous\" in the mathematical sense. The computer figures out pixel by pixel where the line goes and so the line is made up of thousands of pixels. We call this \"discrete\".\n\nThis is a fundamental property of how computers work and their difference to human minds. Inside the computer a finite number of switches 'think' about a finite number of individual pieces of data. We don't yet know how the human mind thinks.\n\nDiscrete mathematics is the study of collections of individual objects. So figuring out how to get a computer to efficiently 'think' about things comes under discrete mathematics. We want computers to order lists, find the shortest path between cities and figure out the most profitable number of widgets to produce.\n\nThere a problems like predicting the motion of planets which in reality is continuous but solving it continuously is either really hard or impossible so we use a numerical method to approximate the solution which can be a lot easier. ",
"In short, this is what I got from 1 year of discrete math.\n\nA better understanding of algorithms. Particularly understanding my own algorithms, before I implement them.\n\nHave you ever spent day implementing your idea, then spent a week debugging it, and then giving up? I spend a couple of minutes considering the algorithm with methods from discreet math. If it doesn't work on paper, it'll never work. If works on paper, I can then do a bit of performance analysis, and then I'll know with a very high degree of certainty, if it's worth programming it.\n\nIn think it also made me a bit better at debugging. Looking at a piece of code I don't understand at all, and quickly understand if there's some overlooked edge-case."
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30ihlc | why do computers last years without overheating or dying.. but consoles have a high potential to burn out after overuse or consistent use over time. | I've had computers on in my home for weeks with no issue, I'm not sure my consoles could survive the same treatment. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/30ihlc/eli5_why_do_computers_last_years_without/ | {
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"Consoles are just cheap computers without nearly enough cooling. Just cheaper parts and inferior design so the shelf life won't be as long if you constantly use it. \n\n ",
"Because a computer is built for more general use, and for a wider variety of uses...from the average user who will just take it for what it is and use it for years, to the person who cracks it open, switches stuff out, adds stuff, etc.\n\nA console is for someone who isn't going to do any modifying, just uses it. They want a small footprint and for it to simply work.\n\nAnd, like cell phones with batteries that stop charging after a year or so....the next one is already being planned. If the thing lasted forever, people might not go out and buy the newer one. So they build it to last....long enough till the next one comes out. It doesn't have to last longer than that.\n\nYou'll find this with a lot of appliances nowadays, not just consoles. Look at DVD players. They make them thin and without any ventilation. They are doomed to fail in a few years. But thats fine, you'll go spend another 60 bucks or more for another one. Same with stuff like toaster ovens and microwaves. Chuck it in the trash and get another.\n\nYou could modify the console, put it in a bigger case, add cooling, etc. But what good is that going to do you if you're going to go buy the next version in 2 years? You just spent all that money for something that you might hand down to a younger sibling....you're not going to still use it, especially since the games on it probably work in the newer one. Into a box it goes into the closet, or in the trash.\n\nWhy build them good when that is their fate?",
"Consoles are built to fit in a small form factor. A computer tower is much larger and has much better air flow. In addition computers have thermometers built into them and will slow or shut down the computer if it does get too hot."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
4r306i | why is there no algebraic formula to solve 5th degree polynomials? | Why isn't there one, and what consequences does it have? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4r306i/eli5_why_is_there_no_algebraic_formula_to_solve/ | {
"a_id": [
"d4xvzpz",
"d4xyi77"
],
"score": [
6,
2
],
"text": [
"The branch of math you're looking for is called [Galois Theory](_URL_1_). I've learned it from [this book](_URL_0_), but it does leave out a lot of the details.\n\nThe details are complicated (you'll need a good background in algebra to follow it), but the general idea is that you can find symmetries in the roots of a polynomial. For instance, if a+bi solves a polynomial equation (where a and b are real), then a-bi must also solve it. You can think of these symmetries as permuting the roots of a polynomial without affecting its values on rational numbers. Studying the permutations shows that there is no formula (using the standard operations and roots) to a general polynomial of degree 5 or more.\n\nIn practice, there really aren't that many consequences to not having a formula. No one solves polynomials by hand, and computers are very good at solving them without formulas. But the math behind it is very interesting, and I'd encourage you to look into it if you have the background.",
"We shouldn't even expect there to be such an algebraic formula. Essentially what we're trying to do is write solutions to ax^(5)+bx^(4)+cx^(3)+dx^(2)+ex+f=0 totally in terms of solutions of x^(5)-g=0. There is so much more going on in the former equation than in the latter, we shouldn't expect there to be a way to do this. What the real situation is is that we're *lucky* that we can do this for degree less than 5.\n\nIf we have numbers, start combining them, taking roots and continue to do this, then the kinds of numbers that we can create are of a very particular type. Note that we're allowing nested roots like sqrt(5+2sqrt(5)). This means that if we can solve and equation like ax^(5)+bx^(4)+cx^(3)+dx^(2)+ex+f=0, using only roots in this way then any number that is a solution to this equation must be of this particular type. Roots to degree 2,3 and 4 equations are always of this \"type\", but degree 5 and onward are not always of this type.\n\nIt boils down to the fact that permutations of 2,3 and 4 characters behave relatively simply, but permutations on anything larger become complex. This is to be expected, so the out-of-place permutations are the ones on 2,3 and 4 characters, whereas it's standard for them to be complicated. Polynomials of degree n have n roots, and so we can look at what happens to things when we permute around the roots. Sometimes, for degrees 2,3,4, this leads us to a formula but the rest of the time, this tells us that we can't find a formula."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://www.maths.gla.ac.uk/~ajb/dvi-ps/Galois.pdf",
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galois_theory"
],
[]
] |
|
6s1jet | the seth rich story and what went down | I've heard many different things but am not really picturing the timeline and implications. Can someone lay this out for me please. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6s1jet/eli5_the_seth_rich_story_and_what_went_down/ | {
"a_id": [
"dl9ez0v"
],
"score": [
5
],
"text": [
"Seth Rich was an employee of the Democratic National Committee, which is the top governing body of the USA's Democratic Party. In July of 2016, Rich was apparently assaulted and shot in an alleyway in Washington DC. He was found by police and transported to a nearby hospital, where he died. The murder is still under investigation by Washington DC police, who have since indicated that the incident appears to have been an attempted robbery that went poorly.\n\nSo far, that's a pretty objective explanation. Since then, people have turned this into a political side show.\n\nSome people think Rich was killed by a conspiracy within the Democratic Party. Conservative talk show hosts, and Sean Hannity in particular, have been promoting that idea. Since this is ELI5, I think it's simplest to just say that those claims are unsubstantiated at this time."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
jilv1 | traveling in basketball. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jilv1/eli5_traveling_in_basketball/ | {
"a_id": [
"c2cf3mw",
"c2cf3mw"
],
"score": [
2,
2
],
"text": [
"Moving with the ball without dribbling (bouncing the ball off the floor in a controlled manner)",
"Moving with the ball without dribbling (bouncing the ball off the floor in a controlled manner)"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
5xz6gi | why and how do dead pixels spread across a screen? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5xz6gi/eli5_why_and_how_do_dead_pixels_spread_across_a/ | {
"a_id": [
"delzvrd",
"delzzw0"
],
"score": [
3,
3
],
"text": [
"If anyone can explain also how a vertical line of dead pixels in my monitor came back to life, I would appreciate that as well.",
"physical damage and shock aside (where a physical trauma breaks connections, such as a drop or a hit), a 'dead pixel' can sometimes be a symptom of a systemic problem with the array of transistor nodes, bonding, or junctions.\n\nscreen technologies such as led, oled or plasma pixels are driven by a very large array of transistors.\n\ntransistors are made up of multiple 'junctions' internally and also bonded connections externally, these are temperamental to things such as shock force, temperature etc - it is common to have manufacturing faults or tolerances such that a lot of these are faulty and have a lesser capable 'range' than others.\n\nthat understood, a screen where a number of pixels have already failed (either partially or fully) is indicative of a process either during manufacturing or subsequently that left the junctions/bonds *more* fallible. so that screen would be more likely to suffer at narrow temperature and other ranges than one in which all pixels were fine.\n\nso it is not that 'all screens with dead pixels get more dead pixels', and it is not that 'every dead pixel creates more dead pixels' - it is a case of '**a screen with dead pixels is more likely, statistically, to get more dead pixels over time**' : there are no absolutes."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
3jab2o | the current hillary v. wikileaks situation and how this has suddenly changed public opinion | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jab2o/eli5_the_current_hillary_v_wikileaks_situation/ | {
"a_id": [
"cunlb1k",
"cunn4xu"
],
"score": [
2,
2
],
"text": [
"Nothing particularly interesting is happening involving Hillary's emails going public and their discuss of wiki leaks. Public opinion hasn't changed really, I'm not sure what your sources are. ",
"The issue with Hillary isn't the Wikileaks Discussion. The issue is, was, and will be the fact that she had a private Email Server as Secretary of State (that apparently the State Department Help Desk knew about since 2010), and a number of those emails that were found contain information that is considered Classified. That's why people are talking about her in connection to Wikileaks. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
yhwcy | how does a car engine and transmission not seize up when you've applied the brakes? | I've been driving for a long time now, and I've never been able to work it out in my head how a car's engine can keep turning over even if I've applied the brakes so I'm at a complete stop.
My thought process:
The engine turns the crankshaft, which turns the gears of the transmission which turns the wheels. Now, a manual transmission is easy to understand, since you have to disengage the clutch yourself with the pedal when you've come to a stop.
So if the wheels aren't moving and the car has an automatic transmission, then how is the engine disengaged from turning the wheels if you've applied the brakes, so that it keeps running without the pistons effectively being locked in place by the stopped wheels? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yhwcy/eli5_how_does_a_car_engine_and_transmission_not/ | {
"a_id": [
"c5vprvh"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Automatic transmissions have what's called a torque converter. This is a device that allows the engine to continue turning even when the wheels can't turn. It typically uses a fluid coupling, meaning, that instead of a shaft connecting the two sides of the torque converter, they instead float free and the converter is filled with hydraulic fluid."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
1oscqa | what is the difference between a libertarian, and a conservative libertarian, or a libertarian republican? | If a Libertarian is a person with beliefs that agree with that of the economic side of the Republicans and the social side of the Democrats (mostly), then what are Conservative Libertarians or Libertarian Republicans?
Rand Paul is a Libertarian Republican, and that would mean he is solidly economically conservative, but wouldn't that be redundant? Unless it is to clarify the differences between himself and a normal Libertarian, which would be social issues. ...doesn't that makes him a normal Republican...?
Glenn Beck is a Conservative Libertarian, same question. Libertarian + Republican social values = Republican?
This is a question that I decided to finally bring onto Reddit for an answer, the only explanation that I could think of is to distance themselves from any mistakes that the Republicans have done.
Thank you to any who answer, it is very much appreciated.
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1oscqa/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_a_libertarian/ | {
"a_id": [
"ccv9uok"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"As a Left-Libertarian, I can offer a perspective that most might not.\n\nThe left-right spectrum is too simplistic a way of looking at it. Think rather of a two-dimensional graph. The left and right designate the social issues, whereas the up and down designate the economic issues, with up as authoritarian and down as libertarian.\n\nA libertarian is anyone who strongly believes that the government should either be lessened or gotten rid of altogether (so it includes anarchists).\n\nA conservative, in the context of American politics, is someone who stands for such things as illegilization of abortion and weed, etc. You get the idea.\n\nA Republican libertarian is a Republican (who tend to be rather conservative) who places special emphasis on the economic parts of their politics.\n\nA left-libertarian (such as yours truly) is a libertarian who also agrees with most liberal political ideals.\n\nA conservative libertarian, however, as far as I can think, is someone who aligns themselves with both conservative thinking and libertarian thinking, but does not identify with the Republican party for various reasons."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
3qc1ve | why government provided free health would be invading our private life? (american) | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3qc1ve/eli5why_government_provided_free_health_would_be/ | {
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4,
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"text": [
"It wouldn't.\n\nBut conservatives like to argue that if the government provides healthcare, then the government will \"control\" healthcare, and therefore control us. But the government already provides lots of free services, like roads and fire departments, and those don't seem to increase the control the government has on our lives. ",
"There is a fear, founded or not, that the government will require specific actions or information in order to provided service.\n\nExample: \"Oh, you want kidney stone procedure done? Sure, but first we need to see all of your grocery store receipts to see if your diet is causing the problem\"\n\nor\n\n\"Yes, we will be happy to perform heart surgery. First, though, you're required to give us your entire family health history and any instances of heart disease\"\n\nPeople, understandably, don't like giving out personal information. There is a fear that they might be compelled to or else face not having access to services.",
"just one nitpick\n\n > ELI5:Why government provided ~~free~~ tax-paid health would be invading our private life? (American)\n\n",
"The main problem is that some treatments require you to live a certain kind of life style before you're allowed to get it.\n\nA perfect example is lap band surgery in Canada. If you want one you need to show that you have made an effort to lose weight and reveal in a diary to a doctor every single thing that you ate and upon reading it they might prescribe you to try something else first. The process can be very long and after going to Weight Watchers, a gym membership, and expensive foods you might finally get your lap band surgery.\n\nThe alternative is to pay for it out of pocket which means flying to one of the few private clinics in Canada that do this surgery. Alternatively you can go to Mexico or the United States to get the surgery done cheaper.\n\nThis is usually only limited to optional treatments.",
"The fear that you will lose some freedoms is one reason some people might be against it.\n\nFor example, if the government finds out that a certain substance is causing a lot of expensive medical complications that we all pay for using taxes, it might decree that the use of said substance is now illegal, saving everybody money and making us healthier.\n\nAnother reason might be that people don't like the idea of paying for other people's mistakes (until its them who would end up on the receiving end). For example, a lot of people neglect their health and make little to no effort to being healthy. So why should part of my hard earned pay be sent over to save this person from a completely preventable condition? I work hard so that I don't end up with that condition so why should I pay for their laziness? (Smoking, binge drinking, binge eating come to mind.)\n\nPeople could abuse the system much like welfare gets abused.\n",
"We've got free health care here in Australia and its fantastic. \nAny fears that the American public have over it I'm sure are somewhat unfounded, although admittedly I don't live in America and can't speak definitively on the topic.\n\nIts super easy being able to go to the doctor and not having to fork over a stack of cash and on top of that, any medication that I need is subsidized. Most surgery is also covered by medicare.\nIn that case that you have private health insurance the government gives you money back for doing that.\n\nIf there are concerns around private lives being invaded that would come down to the way everything has been setup. Surely your health records will be kept the same as they always have. Maybe a neat database has been setup for access by the medical professionals who you see. \nEither way, having a public heath care system has a lot of benefits. "
]
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|
4oecg9 | ect's effects on the brain | I understand exactly how the procedure is done, but what I would like to know is how/why it helps with depression. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4oecg9/eli5_ects_effects_on_the_brain/ | {
"a_id": [
"d4buj45",
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"score": [
2,
2
],
"text": [
"We're not 100% sure. \n\nThe prevailing theory is that the seizure induced by the electric current clears up/resets/changes neurotransmitter receptors, so it helps serotonin levels normalise. ",
"Benefits of ECT for depression were found back when scientists were experimenting with electrical pulses for a variety of other conditions, especially seizure disorders. It was serendipity, and as with many other current treatments for mental illnesses, experts really can't explain why these jolts are (often) effective. It stinks -- treatment of depression saves lives, but often entering into treatment means submitting to an elaborate and side-effect-filled experiment to find the most useful and best tolerated regimen for that individual."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
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] |
|
7f2047 | why do archers say you should not fire a bow without an arrow? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7f2047/eli5_why_do_archers_say_you_should_not_fire_a_bow/ | {
"a_id": [
"dq8x7uv",
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"score": [
35,
7
],
"text": [
"Dry firing in archery refers to the loosing of the string of a bow or other weapon without ammunition, which should never be done. Without the arrow to absorb the energy, the energy is instead dissipated through vibration of the string, limbs, etc. ... It can even cause the bow to shatter.",
"Pulling a bow back fills it with energy, energy that is supposed to be dissipated into the arrow. Without an arrow the energy is dissipated into the bow."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
2ycjld | how do fingerprint recognition systems work? if you're dead, how long after could your fingerprint still work? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ycjld/eli5_how_do_fingerprint_recognition_systems_work/ | {
"a_id": [
"cp88kcx"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"Assuming your body doesn't decompose, your fingerprint remains the same after death. \n\nEdit: as far as scanners work, I know that Apple TouchID scanners work by looking at your fingerprint and turning its shape / lines into an equation. It then stores that equation in an encrypted part of the phone, then compares every scan with that equation. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
8grn6k | why do presidents and ceos typically resign after a controversy instead of staying or being fired? like for a example a while back the president of a university resigned after hate symbols appeared around the campus why didn’t he stay? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8grn6k/eli5_why_do_presidents_and_ceos_typically_resign/ | {
"a_id": [
"dye0ya7",
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"dye2hhi",
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"score": [
30,
2,
5,
3,
3,
2
],
"text": [
"So the reason for the departure is that it allows the institution to blame them and move on. The university can say \"It was the president's fault, we will move forward and improve\", even though it's possible they do nothing afterwards it gives the appearance of action.\n\nThe reason why they usually aren't fired is because it's seen as a courtesy to allow someone to resign. Getting fired is really bad for their future prospects as a job and allowing them to publicly say they voluntarily resigned allows them to save face.",
"They likely can't be fired for the incident, at minimum it would be a protracted and public fiasco. Additionally, their contract possibly includes caveats that pay more if they get let go for any reason.",
"Generally at that level being fired makes everyone look bad. If the board that hired the executive fires them as well, then it implies they did a crummy job of finding the person.\n\nIt makes a clean break from the problem. This happened under the old boss, things are different with the new boss, with out actually blaming anyone. And finally it's symantics, everyone knows they got told to resign, but it's about allowing a graceful exit.",
"That's kind of the point of their role and why they are paid so much. They have responsibility for the organization and are thus the \"fall guy\" for anything that goes wrong.\n\nThey get paid a ton, and when something goes wrong they own up and quit.",
"The CEO owns the vision and culture of the organization they run. They are the top of the accountability chain for the employees and customers of the organization, although they are still not the highest decision maker in the organization \\(see also: board of directors, shareholders, etc\\). As such, when the vision or culture do not align with the mission, values, or needs of the organization, it is the CEO that is held accountable, even if they were not directly related to the issue. As said elsewhere, they can choose to fight and stay, but it is hard to be an effective leader when you do not have the trust and rapport to build camaraderie. For these reasons, most CEOs would prefer to craft the narrative of their exit and protect their organization from unneeded stress, and resigning is the easiest way to do that. The board will usually work with them on their departure, and may even prove instrumental in them finding their next executive position inside another organization.\n\nEDIT: Fixed spelling",
"It is typically part of a negotiated agreement.\n\nNeither the executive nor the organization wants a prolonged and public legal battle. So they reach an agreement where the executive quietly goes away, sometimes for a settlement, sometimes to keep their pension, sometimes just to not get sued or prosecuted. The executive gets to wait until everyone forgets then spin it their way the next time they look for a job, and the organization gets to pretend they knew nothing about it until the news broke, and then immediately took care of the matter. If most of the facts stay private, both sides can lie in the way that suits them best without fear of contradiction."
]
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||
lzyxm | why my crappy knee hurts when it rains | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/lzyxm/eli5_why_my_crappy_knee_hurts_when_it_rains/ | {
"a_id": [
"c2wyp0f",
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"score": [
6,
6
],
"text": [
"It has to do with air pressure. Low air pressure often brings rain as well as joint pain. [See this article](_URL_0_). ",
"It has to do with air pressure. Low air pressure often brings rain as well as joint pain. [See this article](_URL_0_). "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://www.arthritis-treatment-and-relief.com/air-pressure-and-joint-pain.html"
],
[
"http://www.arthritis-treatment-and-relief.com/air-pressure-and-joint-pain.html"
]
] |
||
5eucfc | why do vaginas have lips and flaps. why isn't there just a hole like with an anus? (nsfw?) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5eucfc/eli5_why_do_vaginas_have_lips_and_flaps_why_isnt/ | {
"a_id": [
"daf6yo4",
"daf7bb4",
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],
"score": [
11,
3,
4
],
"text": [
"The majora and minora labias are there to protect the vagina and they provide the lubrication during sex, here's a link [labia library](_URL_0_) ",
"When you're a fetus your genitals are determined by the amount of sex hormones that you produce. The testicles and ovaries start off as the same organ, and the head of the penis and clitorus are also the same tissue. If female fetuses produce too much male sex hormones they can produce ambiguous genitalia, this is actually good for diagnosing a salt wasting disease (CAH) so they can be identified easier than males, who have to be tested for it.\n\nIt's thought that the labia majora are a vestigial tissue, so a tissue that formed before we differentiated into male/female, like nipples are in men.",
"The anus is not just a hole. The Anus is a complex ring of muscles called a sphincter. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"www.labialibrary.org.au/anatomy/"
],
[],
[]
] |
||
18aydt | agonist vs antagonist | What is an agonist, and what does it do? What is an antagonist, and what does it do? What would happen if you took both drugs (that affect the same type of receptors) at once? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/18aydt/agonist_vs_antagonist/ | {
"a_id": [
"c8d6yeb"
],
"score": [
3
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"text": [
"Agonists attach to a site and activate it, antagonists lock to a site and do nothing.\n\nThe most common way to think of it is like a lock and key.\n\nIn your body you have *receptor sites*, these are the locks. There are certain chemicals that fit perfectly into the locks, these are the keys. The keys can either: do what they're supposed to (agonist) or do nothing (antagonist).\n\nLet's use opioids as an example:\n\nThroughout your body are opioid receptors, these are special locks that only certain keys can fit into.\n\nMorphine is a drug that can fit into an opioid receptor an turn it on, making pain go away. This means it's an agonist.\n\nNaltrexone is a drug that fits into the lock and does nothing, this would also block morphine from attaching and working. That's an antagonist."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
5ej39o | what is left and right? how would you explain left and right to me if i had no body? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5ej39o/eli5what_is_left_and_right_how_would_you_explain/ | {
"a_id": [
"dacsnnf",
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"score": [
2,
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],
"text": [
"Left and right are relative directions that require a frame of reference. You'd have to use an object to illustrate the difference between left and right.",
"If you had no body it'd be damn hard to explain a *lot* of stuff about physical space, lol.\n\n\"Left\" is a relative direction. You have to talk about it in context of an object or something. Usually when we say left and right without another object, we're **implying** it's to the left and right of your physical body. So if you had no body, I'd get two objects and be like \"the banana is to the left of the apple, the apple is to the right of the bannana.\""
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
7qjb19 | if water is able to smooth rocks into pebbles over centuries, how come sand at a beach is still rough in shape? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7qjb19/eli5_if_water_is_able_to_smooth_rocks_into/ | {
"a_id": [
"dsq1ujj",
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"score": [
12,
2
],
"text": [
"Sand is different all over the world, some is smoother than others. Some is fragments of coral and always building up so you get new bits of sand all the time and the buried bits never have a chance to get \"polished\".",
"I would wager that it has something to do with the chemical composition of sand, rather than whatever type of rock said pebble is. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
2ux8dd | is popcorn considered a vegetable? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ux8dd/eli5_is_popcorn_considered_a_vegetable/ | {
"a_id": [
"coci24a",
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"score": [
3,
4,
4
],
"text": [
"No but the USDA once declared pizza to be a vegetable.",
"Corn, and popcorn is nutritionaly and botanically a grain. Sweet corn is sometimes considered a vegetable for culinary purposes",
"At it's most basic level (without any additives or flavouring) popcorn is literally popped corn. Where I live you can buy unpopped kernals in a bag like you would get rice or pasta and heat them in a pan to make popcorn.\n\nCorn isn't a vegetable. It's a grain."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
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||
3o4lbl | what is a single advantage of banning breastfeeding in public? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3o4lbl/eli5_what_is_a_single_advantage_of_banning/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Uptight, hypersensitive, sexually repressed people won't have to deal with the \"horror\" of seeing a boobie. That's my opinion, the rest of this is just an attempt to fool the stupid bot from removing my comment.",
"Pretty similar to banning exposed breasts in general. If it was normal, it wouldn't matter, but people get offended because it's rare and vaguely sexual. They also don't want to have to explain it to their kids. Not that the kids care. Kids aren't even going to know it's sexual unless you tell them. But adults seem to assume they do.",
"This really isn't the best sub to get an argument. You might try your query over in /r/ChangeMyView and say \"There is no advantage to banning breastfeeding in public\". Those folks prefer to argue, this is more of an explanation sub."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
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||
4yfhx9 | why aren't neighbourhoods built grid-style anymore? what are the benefits of crescents and cul de sacs? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4yfhx9/eli5_why_arent_neighbourhoods_built_gridstyle/ | {
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"Subdivision layouts provide more privacy by offsetting houses, keep traffic slower and less common (not efficient shortcut) to protect playing kids, and is more aesthetically pleasing for many.",
"Many people prefer curvy streets in residential neighborhoods because it keeps people from driving too fast. Spacial efficiency isn't as big a concern outside of cities, so they can afford to waste some space.\n\nI would also guess that it's more aesthetically pleasing to many people.",
"Traffic management mostly. Long straight streets are just begging for cars to race, or at least drive faster. Curving streets slow down traffic and side courts and crescents minimize traffic on that street because there is little reason to be there unless you live in a house on that street. The winding roads are efficient so traffic keeps to the main arteries while kids play in the side streets. ",
"Suburban living is basically car dependent, so distances do not matter so much to residents. This allows developers to shape streets so that they are shared by less people, making them more private. Unfortunately this also means that a suburb built with crescents and cul-de-sacs cannot evolve into an urban place with places to walk to and decent public transportation. Proper cities that are surrounded by these types of suburbs cannot expand horizontally.",
"The goals in suburbia are different than the goals in a city. \n\nIn a residential subdivision the goal is to increase privacy of an individual lot, reduce the speed that people can travel in the neighborhood, and reduce the number of people that travel in the neighborhood. \n\nIn a city the goal is to have efficient use of space (sacrificing privacy), and efficient travel through the region (increasing the speed that people can travel, and increasing the number of people that travel. \n\nAs for why they have wide streets. In a residential area you need streets wide enough to park cars on the sides in front of the homes on both sides and have enough space for two cars to pass each other between them. ",
"As someone who studied urban planning, it was generally a move driven by concerns about the dangers cars posed. I guess it's easy to forget that when most gridded areas were built, cars were either non existent or a rarity. As they became more common, the dangers they posed led to the development of layouts which included bends and cul de sacs and the like. This of course isn't an issue in and of itself, but often it got taken too far, making for very long travelling distances between two properties which may only be metres apart as the crow flies. Theyre also generally looked upon less favourably these days in favour of things like new urbanism, which often utilises grid layouts but not necessarily a 'strict' grid (I.e. the grid is 'deformed' to try and slow vehicles and for aesthetics). ",
"Electric utility planner specializing in subdivisions here. No one's yet mentioned how topography shapes design decisions. Developers are in the business of making the most money with the cheapest land, so the less cut/fill they have to do in rough grading, the better. They'll work out the rough grading first and then design the streets, privacy/traffic flow/everything else is secondary. Developers want to make a good impression and sell the house, but then they move on to other projects. Hell, there are companies that *only* buy the land and do rough grading before selling to a housing developer. \n \nThat being said, I heard a tidbit a while back mentioning how the curves in streets affected who your neighbors become. Someone down the street but around the curve (out of sight) is not someone you'd invite to a block party, for instance, whereas block parties back in the day shut down the whole street cuz you could see the whole way down the street. ",
"I'm a planner and planning professor so here's my take.\n\nThe grid was prominent for a long time in the US for a variety of reasons. It maximized the commercial development potential of urban land. In addition, as the country expanded and we need cities built quickly to support colonization of the west and to support the railroads, a gridiron city was quick to layout and build. The gridiron also worked well for horse drawn trolleys and streetcars, the earliest mass transit.\n\nThe grid was not as conducive to auto travel. If you are in a car and approach a 90 degree gridiron intersection, you have to slow dramatically to make the turn. So the gridiron slowly began to break down and be warped to accommodate the auto. The gently curving intersections of modern subdivisions made for faster auto travel. This [image](_URL_0_) shows the evolution of street patterns.\n\nIn addition to the benefits to auto travel, cul-de-sacs are perceived to sell better by developers because they are quiet and don't have through traffic.\n\nThere is a strong movement to bring back the gridiron in new developments. For one reason, the gridiron works better for pedestrian and bicycle travel. Many cul-de-sac based neighborhoods mean long trips from one point to another because there is not a fully developed network of streets.\n\n",
"I can't find any references right now, but we talked about it in an architecture class in college. For many reasons, in residential areas, people prefer curved roads. Having roads curve around and go out of our line of sight makes us feel safer than if we see our street stretch out into the horizon. It also hides the fact that you are in a large master-planned neighborhood with hundreds or thousands of similar homes when you can only see the houses right around you. You don't feel like the \"king or your own castle\" so much when you look down a long street and see hundreds of houses just like yours.",
"Architecture school graduate who has worked as a Town Planner and now works as a Transportation Planner, reporting in.\n\nBoy have you tickled my gibblet, so I'm gonna annoy my girlfriend by ignoring the olympics, taking my time and writing a complete answer.\n\nCul-De-Sacs and winding roads are simultaneously annoying and enjoyable, confusing and logical and confusing again the more you think about them. There is a concept in traffic planning called Level of Service (LoS) that is responsible for a lot of the stupid road design in this country. Look it up. There's a push on state DOT's to stop using LoS as a metric, and you can help make it happen in your state by bugging officials and politicians and stuff. Be noisy. Zoning laws make it easier to build suburbia too. That's mostly the fault of traditional function based zoning, which was invented in the industrial age to keep smokestacks away from residences, but is now obsolete and outright impedes the healthy growth of cities. There's a movement in some cities to push for something called Form Based Zoning, which uses something called Transect Zones to define development based on the size shape and placement of a building, mostly relying on the free market to determine what function goes where. You should look up Form Based Zoning too. Check out Miami 21. \n\nUltimately, the suburban model is a combination of individual features that diverse homebuyers demand or are willing to pay more for. But developers build for everyone and combine all these ingredients without investing in real thoughtful design, and it comes out the same as you would expect if you combined your 10 favorite items from the fridge into one dish. But individually, they're great. Winding roads are supposed to feel pastoral and relaxing. Parents want yards. Everyone likes trees. Many people feel unsafe living on a through street, with strangers driving by at any time. People prefer windows and natural light on 3 or 4 sides of the house - rowhouses originally had much taller ceilings and thus windows, which allow light deeper into the house. And remember, Suburbs may populate the body of most major population centers today but they were *always* built on the edge of the city and feed through arterial roads to a highway. Interconnected streets only really make sense when there are destinations in multiple directions.\n\nThe thing is, consumers are starting to wake up and realize how ultimately miserable the suburban model is. It's isolating and impractical. Anyone whose ever lived in a true city knows the value of density - hell, all you need is to spend a week in New York to really get it. A cities size is limited in a way by the distance a person can reasonably commute in a day, and as we hit that limit in cities like Atlanta, Houston, etc, real estate developers and their customers alike are remembering the value of the urban lifestyle. Modern technologies are alleviating traditional problems with density as well. Thick floors, fast elevators, electronic security, insulated walls and windows, even silly things like food delivery, all make urban living more practical. \n\nAnd developers are waking up. Check out places like Glenwood Park, in Atlanta. There's a cool new project being built in Oklahoma called \"The Wheeler District\" that I think is going to be a big hit - and the more financially succesful these projects are, the more we're going to see of them in the future. It's that simple. \n\n#NewUrbanism"
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251fqp | why does it feel strange to leave your hands hanging by your sides when standing still | Every day when waiting for the bus or train, I see people are standing and no one is just hanging their hands by their sides. They're either playing with the phone, hands in the pockets, in their hoodies, arms folded, or cupped together. I always default to hands in the pockets without thinking about it. So why does it feel better to keep our hands anywhere but hanging in their natural static position? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/251fqp/eli5_why_does_it_feel_strange_to_leave_your_hands/ | {
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"It's a learned trait. In almost every social improvement course, they teach you to stand with your hands outside of your pockets. People are learned to close off their body language. This is one way we are accidentally taught that practice. It's simply social conditioning.\n\nAlso a habit that I had to break myself. ;) Give it a shot when you are talking to someone. Press your thumb to your middle finger tip and stand as tall as possible. You'll notice two things. \n\n1. People don't respond negatively. \n2. People will tend to treat you as more \"alpha\"(I hate that word...) and show more body language styles of respect toward you.\n\nIt sounds silly, but I speak from my own experiences."
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5j4kvw | ada requires that there be elevators in public buildings with multiple stories. people are not supposed to use elevators in the event of a fire. are disabled people just supposed to be left to die if there is a fire in a tall building? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5j4kvw/eli5_ada_requires_that_there_be_elevators_in/ | {
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"have you never been in a fire safety course in one of these buildings? \n\n1) the doors to the stairwells are fireproof/fire resistant for x number of minutes\n\n2) if you notice each floor has a landing that will seem larger than it should be. \n\n3) the stairways are separate from the rest of the building, Different ventilation system, etc. with fire proofing between the rest of the building and the stairwells.\n\nSo what does a person in a wheel chair go? same place as everybody else, Stairwell, and wait for the firefighters to get to them. Unless the fire was started in the stair well (which in that case everybody is fucked), or the doors are not closed properly (most are on heavy springs that close them automatically), the person waiting there will be pretty safe from the fire. the thing that will kill you the quickest is the smoke, hence the separate ventilation. \n\nSource: I've had a number of jobs in very tall buildings, and this has been part of the safety training more times than I can count. ",
"According to this [USATODAY](_URL_0_) article on the World Trade Center collapse, the previous bombing had taught the building management lessons in evacuation and \"gave every disabled person an evacuation chair that would let two husky men carry them down stairs. One evacuation chair was used to carry a man down from the 67th floor.\""
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2bqu3d | why are male animals more colorful and attractive in the animal world but it is the other way around for humans, where most attention for beauty is towards females? | Male peacocks, geese, and lions all make themselves more distinctive as ways to attract mates. Peacocks have lots of colors on their feathers, geese can have different colored heads, and male lions have manes. Female animals on the other hand, are more plain looking so they are attracted to beautiful males. Why is beauty reversed for the most part in the human world, where women put on makeup and usually more fashion conscious than men? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2bqu3d/eli5why_are_male_animals_more_colorful_and/ | {
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1ywltt | why was the korean war not considered a united nations victory? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ywltt/eli5why_was_the_korean_war_not_considered_a/ | {
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"For one, it never ended. They are in a cease fire - not peace, and not unification. It ended at loggerheads and the creation of an insane DMZ and two different countries - one socialist/communist and one not. \nFor two. North Korea. Hows that going?"
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7gv0dt | what is that weird smell that comes off old guitar strings? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7gv0dt/eli5_what_is_that_weird_smell_that_comes_off_old/ | {
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"Rotting skin and sweat stuck in the itty bitty cracks of the strings.\n\nMost strings are a material that doesn't rust or oxidize, like silver or stainless steel. That'll have a bit of a metallic smell, but everything else is leftovers from the player.",
"[Iron, copper, and brass are odorless, but they react with skin oil to produce a unique smell that we identify as \"metallic\"](_URL_0_) Guitar strings get skin oil smushed into them for hours at a time, they will produce a lot of these smells."
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1mt5uo | what is plasma? how is it considered a fourth phase of matter? | As a followup question, is fire plasma? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1mt5uo/eli5what_is_plasma_how_is_it_considered_a_fourth/ | {
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"Plasma is essentially matter that has been given so much energy that its electrons are moving so fast that they fly off and you are left with the ionized remnants. It is considered a separate phase of matter since it acts differently than gasses, liquids or solids. I'd go into more detail but I'm typing on my phone at a stoplight...",
"Plasma is hot enough to free electrons from the protons. this removes all bonds between elements. In gasses molecules are still the same molecules. Most bonds between 2 molecules are just nearly gone.",
"Flames != plasma. Some flames are a plasma. Depends on what is burning and how hot it is. ",
"Suppose you start with an ice cube.\n\nIn a solid, all the atoms are packed pretty rigidly together. They vibrate around but don't move much. In your ice cube, the atoms actually form a lattice, a repeating pattern. Not all solids do this (amorphous solids have no repeating pattern). Solids have a definite shape and volume. If you put your ice cube on a table, in a room cold enough that it doesn't melt, it'll just sit there. It keeps its shape and it doesn't change size.\n\nIf you add some energy to your ice cube, you can melt it. Then you have a liquid.\n\nIn a liquid, the atoms have much more freedom of motion. They still like to stick close to each other, but they slip and slide around. Liquids have a definite volume (like solids) but no definite shape (this is new) - they take the shape of their container. Melt your ice cube on that table and the water will spread out, attempting to cover the whole table in a flat puddle. Unless you have a very small table, or an impressively large ice cube, it won't be able to. Liquids do not change their volume. Put that same ice cube in a cup and melt it, and the water will conform to the shape of the cup (and be a cylinder, instead of the flat puddle on the table).\n\nTake that puddle of water and add even more energy. You'll vaporize it. Now you'll have a gas.\n\nIn a gas, atoms have even more freedom of motion. They also no longer feel the need to stick close to each other. Gases have neither definite shape (like liquids) nor definite volume (this is new) - they will expand to fill their container. So that puddle of water on your table, in gas form, now spreads out to boundaries of the whole room (it's important to note the definition of volume, though. Throughout all this melting, the number of atoms hasn't changed. So if you cooled the room back down, it wouldn't be filled with ice - you'd have the same size ice cube as you started with, if you somehow were able to shepherd all the gaseous atoms back together. What has happened is that the water vapor has spread out across the whole room, instead of staying concentrated in one part of the room like the ice cube).\n\nNow take that water vapor and add even more energy, enough to ionize it.\n\nNow you finally have plasma. A plasma is similar to a gas, but even more free. In a plasma, you have ionized the atoms of the gas. Now instead of being a cloud of atoms, you have a cloud of positively and negatively charged particles (you broke the atoms apart into electrons and chunks of the nucleus. The exact size and composition of these chunks depends on the substance and how much energy you added). Since plasmas are composed of charged particles (which are called ions, which is why the process of making them is called ionization), they'll react to an externally applied electric or magnetic field. Exactly how they react depends on the nature of the field you apply and some other things. Plasmas have no definite shape or volume (like gases), but can form structures when subjected to certain fields (this is new - if you google plasma globes you'll see examples of filamentation, one of the shapes a plasma can be induced to take).\n\nAt each stage of the game here we have added energy and drastically altered the nature of the substance we were working with. This is how we distinguish the phases of matter, and how plasma is the fourth. We went from atoms packed rigidly together, to atoms that slip and slide past each other but don't get too far away, to atoms that just fly around anywhere, to atoms that have been broken up into smaller bits. You can, in fact, keep adding energy and get to other, more exotic states of matter (if you add enough energy, you can break apart the neutrons and protons in the nuclei and get quark-gluon plasma. Today this only happens in huge particle accelerators for brief instants, because the amount of energy required is.....very big. But as the universe was cooling down after the Big Bang, there was a time where all matter was this). And conversely, you can take energy away from solids (cool them down) and get more phases (these are the Bose-Einstein condensates. In these, all the atoms kind of lump together into one super atom and you get a variety of quantum effects usually only seen with much smaller particles). Then there are theoretical phases that haven't been observed yet, like color superconductors and all kinds of neat stuff. \n\nThe bottom line is, a phase is a general state of matter where it behaves in a certain way. Solids, liquids, and gases are the three phases that a person is most likely to run into in everyday life. Plasma is another state of matter, often called the fourth state of matter because it is also not that hard to observe in basic settings. Plasma is characterized by the ionization of constituent particles, and otherwise behaves much like a gas.\n\nTo answer your followup, yes. Well, depending on whether or not you are a chemist either yes, or no, fire is a chemical reaction but flames are a plasma. When you burn something, you are releasing a lot of energy, and turning whatever you burned into a gas. If the fire is hot enough, the gas will ionize and you have yourself a plasma (where 'hot enough' is defined relative to what you are burning. Different things ionize at different temperatures)."
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blzxpr | during world war ii, how were american companies with investments in axis countries affected? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/blzxpr/eli5_during_world_war_ii_how_were_american/ | {
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"Generally speaking, they lost them.\n\nSome could be recovered to some degree after the war, but most of the Axis nations got bombed flat so there wasn't much left.\n\nFun fact: Fanta was invented by Coca-Cola Germany during the war as imports of Coke syrup from the US were impossible. Coca-Cola regained control of the plant, along with the recipe and trademarks, after the war.",
"You might try these subs. \n_URL_0_\n_URL_1_"
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6lbg39 | who actually sets up and fires off the large fireworks shows for local cities? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6lbg39/eli5_who_actually_sets_up_and_fires_off_the_large/ | {
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"Experts. Companies that do this, do nothing else but fireworks displays. The most famous fireworks company in the US is the one that does the Macy's display in NYC: [Grucci Fireworks.](_URL_0_)"
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6xyagq | if i pop an eye out, rotate it 45 degrees and pop it back in, what do i see? | Also, how do doctors know which rotation to pop the eye back in? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6xyagq/eli5_if_i_pop_an_eye_out_rotate_it_45_degrees_and/ | {
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"If you pop your eye out, there's a good chance you'll sever your optic nerve (the nerve that transmits info from your eye to your brain) and cause permanent blindness.",
"They're not disembodied balls, they have nerves and blood vessels and muscles attached to them, see [here](_URL_0_) for the main muscles. You're not going to put them back in the wrong way easily.\n\nIf you did somehow do that, everything would appear to be at the wrong angle for a while, but your brain would adjust.\n\nI remember watching a documentary years ago where people were fitted with \"glasses\" that flipped everything they saw laterally (from left to right). They were very disoriented at first but adjusted to it over the course of a week or so. Edit: maybe it was a vertical flip based on /u/chilehead 's comment.",
"The muscles that move your eyes would pull it back into the correct orientation immediately.\n\nIf that were not the case and your eye were somehow able to remain functional, what you saw would look like when you're trying to see one of those [stereograms](_URL_1_), but haven't quite got them lined up yet.\n\nOver the next 10 days or so, [your brain would adapt]\n(_URL_0_) and you'd see things like you did before the rotation.",
"You see an Ocularist for a glass eye, because if the muscle fibers are severed your optic nerve isn't going to do much.\n\nDoctors (and nurses actually, I found out my mom knows how to pop eyes back in for some reason and she is an RN.) just pop them back into place. The muscles hold the eye in place.\n\nBut for the sake of argument, lets say that you have 5 Feet of optic nerve in your skull and are able to remove it like a webcam.\n\n[Here's an eye cross section](_URL_0_)\n\n[Here's a digital DSLR camera cross section](_URL_1_)\n\nNot much difference honestly, you have a lens that focuses the light, a shutter that controls the amount of light coming in, and it hits a light sensitive material and transmits a signal from the chemical reaction.\n\nSo, if you were able to remove your eye from it's socket and you had 5 feet of optic nerve, you would see everything like you were holding a tiny round camera... until the fragile orb gets infected or damaged and your blind.\n\nThere are some differences between the human eye and a DSLR, the DSLR has more lenses than the eye. The DSLR has uniform density on it's cell grid, and optic nerve cells tend to be thicker toward the center of our vision and less to the edges.",
"They've done experiments, where they give people these glasses (big goggles full of mirrors and stuff) that turn your vision upside down; it is *extremely* disorienting for a few days (trying to grab something on your left, when you see it on your right for example, really messes with your head). But then, after a few days (of wearing them *constantly*), your brain adjusts, and your brain starts to process the upside down image as \"right way up\", and you get your normal motor functions back. But then when you *remove* the glasses, and return to normal vision, *that* seems \"upside down\", for a period, til you adjust. \n\n(also, the image our brain initially processes, on the back wall of your eyeball, is upside down, but the brain has to flip it in order to make it possible for us to interact with the world).\n\nNot sure if that's the kind of thing you're asking about, but if you *could* somehow have an eye constantly at a 45 degree angle, I suspect your brain would adjust and compensate over time (although having just *one* eye off kilter might screw with you more than *both* eyes, where your brain has to deal with *all* your vision uniformly)."
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1c962l | why dr. who is so popular. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1c962l/eli5_why_dr_who_is_so_popular/ | {
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"For pretty much the same reasons that Star Wars is popular. People enjoy escapist sci-fi space opera with good special effects.",
"High quality acting combined with a light, whimsical premise that allows for nearly endless open ended adventures and occasionally clever writing."
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7hql9d | why are people constantly posting 30 second videos of a picture instead of just posting the picture on facebook? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7hql9d/eli5_why_are_people_constantly_posting_30_second/ | {
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"The only valid reason I can think of is that they want their images and videos to be in the same repository.\n\nBut there is rarely valid logic in Facebook."
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2gaeed | the whole kim dotcom thing | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2gaeed/eli5_the_whole_kim_dotcom_thing/ | {
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"Kim set up what was basically a file-sharing version of Dropbox. \n\nThe US government asked the NZ government to intervene. \n\nThey did. \n\nNow, after a long series of court battles, Kim is basically winning because US laws are not New Zealand's laws. ",
"Did he get rich through megashare? If so how or was he already loaded?",
"In other news, he's started _URL_0_ ",
"I used to share the movie with my friends during the breaks at school. We would then talk and laugh about it and sometimes the movie was so great that my friend would ask their mom to buy the movie to keep it for themselves. One day, the teacher Ms. Jenkins, introduced us to a man, she said we had to listen carefully because some unacceptable behaviour had to stop. We didn't understand what she was talking about but they both seem very serious. The man was tall and he add funny black ears and I think he was named \"Mickey\". He told us that we must stop sharing the movies with each others and that it was bad and that we would have trouble if we were caught doing that again. My friend Marty said a joke about he would never get caught because he will invite everyone at home to watch the movies but he will not invite the man. We all laughed to marty's joke but the man turned all red and started shouting very loud to Marty, that he will go to his house and tell to his parents about him being a bad son and then he sent marty to the school director. After, we were all very sad because since then, the teachers would watch us in the playground and when someone brought a DVD, they would send him to the school director so we all stopped talking about movies.\n\nOn another day, a new children arrived at school, he was from Germany and he was very funny because he had a strange accent and his name was Kim. He told us that he knew how to watch movies but that it was a secret and that we shouldn't tell the teacher. We were all very excited because we really wanted to laugh like before so he invited us to go to his house after school. So after school, we would walk with him to his house but in front of his door, he would ask us 2$ to enter. He told us that we could watch all the movie we wanted and since he was our friend we gave him 2$. His house was very beautiful, more beautiful that mine and I was very happy to come here because like he said, there was a lot of movie and also video games, I wish I had a house like Kim. Because it was so great, we would come everyday and each time we would pay 2$. Soon I started asking money to my mom and she would ask me why I need money and then I would lie and I don't like lying to my mom but I also liked going to Kim's house so I did anyway. Later, Kim told us that if we brought our own DVD to the house, he would gave us 0.01 cent. I was very happy because I had a lot of DVD at my house so I would brought them all and now I could go to Kim's house for free, he told me I was his best friend and that made me happy because I liked Kim. One day he told us that we could make money if we talked about his house to other schools and that for ten new childrens, he would gave us 1$ ! He told us that by doing so, there would be even more movies and more game to his house, we were all very excited so we started talking about his house to every schools in the neighborhood.\n\nThe angry man with black ears soon heard about Kim's house and as he told us, he got to the house and wanted to talk to Kim's parent but Kim didn't have parent and the man was very upset. The man turned purple when he saw all the children in Kim's house and he started to shout that he was going to tell to the teacher about what was happenning, that it was even less acceptable to exchange money and that he would send Kim to a boarding school. Days later, the police came to Kim's house and they took everything and even the DVD I brought to Kim, I felt sad for Kim because they sent him to a boarding school. I heard that Kim started a fight with the keepers and that he escaped from the school but then I never heard of him.\n\nWhen mom heard about what happened she told me that I should never give money to Kim anymore, that he was a bad boy and that when he will be an adult he will probably be selling crack and that I should not feel sad for him. I didn't understand what crack means but I was still sad because now we were all bored and we missed the time were we could just give the DVD to a friend and then play about it in the backyard. \n\nThe last day of school, the angry man (that was how we would call him now) came back to school and he told us that if we wanted to watch movie we could all go to his friend's house on the netflix street but that it would cost us 2$ to enter. We were happy to watch movies again but we felt like we have been screwed here.\n\n\n\n\n\n",
"I'm sure you'll get lots of informative info here on *who* Kim Dotcom is... I just wanna play devil's advocate for a second.\n\nA lot of people talk about him as a Robin Hoodish folk hero, and a lot of folks in Redditland and surrounding areas seem to have a lot of love for him.\n\nI think he's just really good at marketing himself as the guy who's standing up to \"the man\" whilst stuffing his pockets with cash.\n\nFrom [wikipedia](_URL_0_):\n > In an interview on Belgian Television, he claimed that in Morocco a car was blocking him and he \"had to bump him off the road. Nothing happened to him\"\n\nOf course, it turned out to be the police chief in a civilian car.\n\nIf you are out driving a Mercedes with a tag that says \"MAFIA\" on it and you think that it's perfectly ok to just *bump somebody off the road* because they are in your way, than you're just a fucking jackass.\n\nI mean, if you saw anyone else behave like that, would you equate them with Robin Hood? Maybe it's just me.",
"Kim is some German guy who expatriated to NZ and lives there now. He and some folks set up a file sharing service. It performed like Dropbox or Google Drive. Technologically, there wasn't a whole lot different about Dropbox from Megaupload. It stores files in the cloud and lets multiple people share between themselves.\n\nThe *difference* came in when IP pirates started using Megaupload to trade content. They could have used another service, but they chose Megaupload for whatever reason. (there could be dozens...doesn't matter which it was). It's kinda like why does any particular bar become a \"gay\" bar? Shit just happens sometimes. It is my understanding that there is evidence that Kim & Co. knew that there was a bunch of piracy going on on Megaupload and that they can sorta be seen to have taken advantage of it...sorta.\n\nAnyway...because Hollywood purchased the DoJ from the Obama administration in 2008, the FBI is now an arm of the Motion Picture Association of America. The MPAA(et al) instructed the FBI(et al) to invade New Zealand and arrest Mr. Dotcom. The FBI went over there, got NZ SWAT (or whatever they call it there...the police that carry the machine guns and wear masks) to assault the Dotcom compound and arrest his fat ass and take a lot of his shit, freeze his assets, etc.\n\nSo that happened. Why? Because the MPAA put pressure on the politicians it owns to fuck with Kim Dotcom because they didn't like him and found him an easy target. He's not American, he's fat, he's not Google or other startup backed by billions of $USD.\n\nHe wasn't *really* breaking any laws...maybe a little...but no more than Google, Dropbox or Amazon could be attacked for because their similar services also facilitate movie piracy. All of these services are complicit to some degree of aiding piracy just because of what they are...at least by Hollywood's definition. But a company like Google could *buy* all of Hollywood with the cash it has lost in its couch cushions...so the MPAA doesn't go after Google. They go after some fat kid in a jurisdiction they don't have to be responsible in because nothing will happen to the MPAAFBI if the MPAAFBI breaks the law in NZ. They're just like, fuck 'em, it's New Zealand...whatddatheygonnado?\n\n\nTL;DR: The MPAA bought the FBI from Obama and used it to harass a fat kid halfway across the planet because they're dicks and they can. Google does the same thing as Megaupload that the MPAA doesn't like but Google has more money than god and could absolutely destroy the MPAA so they don't go after Google.",
"**TL;DR:** A megalomanic criminal decides that he now wants to make money with piracy instead of hacking and stock fraud. This makes him popular with people. MPAA and the US decide to fuck him over, and because they can't do it legally, they do so illegally. This gives him the opportunity to show off as David vs Goliath.\n\n^..............................................................................\n\nKim Schmitz, also known under his hacker pseudonym Kimble and today using the last name of Dotcom, likes making money with shady things, sometimes under the guise of legality, sometimes not.\n\nAccording to his own claims (!), he was cracking (i.e. hacking with criminal intent) into the phone systems of companies and selling access to them for profit. He got slaps on the wrist for that (and other hacking charges) when finally caught, which can likely be attributed for ratting out other hackers (the kind who did it for fun and/or to demonstrate security issues, not for their personal profit). This makes him *slightly* unpopular amongst hackers and activists in Germany.\n\nHe then committed stock fraud by buying a bankrupt company's shares, driving the value up with fake announcements, dumping them, and screwing the people who fell for it. Yes, that's illegal, and yes, he did get caught. He then continued comitting more stock fraud.\n\nAt some point, he figured out that there is good money to be made with piracy. So he built a site where anyone can upload files and share them. Just like Google Drive or Dropbox, except anonymously. So more like Rapidshare, which was already being used for piracy and had to start some token attempts at cracking down on it.\n\nKimble did not crack down on piracy. It is unclear whether he encouraged it actively by paying people explicitly to upload pirated content (that's one of the accusations), but it was clear that his platform was mainly used for piracy. So, technically, he was just providing a file hosting service, but in practice, it was a piracy platform. Just like noone buys a Usenet account to participate in discussions or download Linux images...\n\nOf course, providing \"free\" movies is a popular thing with everyone except the MPAA (even if you make shittons of money by selling premium accounts), so Kimble and his platform got pretty popular, and he started stylizing himself as a hero of the free Internet - he likes to be important.\n\nWell, at some point, the US content industry decided that they don't like that, so in one of their bed sessions with the US government, they told them to fix it. The US government then told the NZ government, and through some shady and likely illegal moves, they raided him, confiscated his everything, the Megaupload servers got shut down and wiped/repurposed by the providing company when they didn't get paid anymore. Now, the illegal moves are getting court attention, and it's becoming obvious that the NZ government is doing the US' dirty business illegaly.\n\nSo, to sum it up, Kimble makes money from piracy. US/NZ shut him down by a series of illegal actions, and the corruption of the NZ government is now unrolling in court. Meanwhile, Kimble simply sets up the next piracy platform (Mega) with even better deniability to avoid missing out on profit, sitting in a huge villa, playing Call of Duty on a projector and working on the fatness of his bank account and body.\n\nYes, Kimble's service was/is useful, and the MPAA/governments are corrupt and he did the world a service by making this so clear, but he's still not doing it out of philantropy. He's doing it because he is a criminal, ruthless scumbag and he decided that this is a good way to make money.\n\nSee [wiki](_URL_0_) for sources and details.\n\n",
"This article was helpful _URL_0_",
"ELI5 how on earth is MEGA making money when I can download from them at my line speed and never see ads? did the browser addon put me in a botnet? or do they just make it all off corporate customers?",
"Let's just keep in mind that this dude changed his last fucking name to Dotcom.",
"Kim had something that lets people share things\n\nEven things that some people wanted to sell, not give away for free\n\nThese things were digital\n\nSome people got mad about it and told the government.\n\nThe US Government then told the NZ government to do something about it\n\nSo the NZ government went to the house and took all they could, Kim included, and his money\n\nKim protested but the government didnt give it back.\n\nThen all the things that somebody else had stored on his computers got deleted because he didn't and couldn't pay rent anymore.\n\nMany people were sad because it got all deleted, even their own stuff (Pictures, Videos etc).\n\nThen he was found to be \"innocent\" and is getting his money/cars back\n\nMeanwhile he made a new place to share things.\n\nDid I explain it well? Or were there some mistakes?",
"There's one thing I personally don't like about this bloke, where and how did he make that \"fortune\" of his¿? always showing off in how much abundance he lives etc\nfrom wikipedia:\n\n\"In 2001, Schmitz bought €375,000 worth of shares of the nearly bankrupt company _URL_0_ (de) and subsequently announced his intention to invest €50 million in the company.[34] The announcement caused the share value of _URL_0_ to jump[35] and Schmitz cashed out, making a profit of €1.5 million. One commentator suggested that Schmitz may have been ignorant of the legal ramifications of what he had done, since insider trading was not made a crime in Germany until 1995,[32] and until 2002 prosecutors also had to prove the accused had criminal intent.[36]\n\nSchmitz moved to Thailand to avoid investigation[12] where he was subsequently arrested on behalf of German authorities.[33] In response, he allegedly pretended to kill himself online, posting a message on his website that from now on he wished to be known as \"His Royal Highness King Kimble the First, Ruler of the Kimpire\".[33][37] He was deported back to Germany where he pleaded guilty to embezzlement in November 2003 and, after five months in jail awaiting trial, again received a suspended sentence (of 20 months).[36] After avoiding a prison sentence for a second time, he left Germany and moved to Hong Kong in late 2003.[12]\"\n\nso basically he stole all of the money? hmmm",
"* Kim is a boys name in Germany where he's from\n* He was a champion video gamer\n* He created Megaupload which hosted many porns and pirated files\n* He moved to New Zealand where he thought he would be out of reach of the law\n* The FBI pulled some shenanigans and worked with the NZ police to arrest him and make a big show of force\n* He's beaten most of the charges, and started his own political party in New Zealand\n* He recently started a new Mega file sharing service\n\n",
"Steve Wozniak made a great analogy of this. Kim DotCom had a post office, called MegaUpload. People were sending drugs through it. The police shut down the post office ad arrested the owner instead of the senders.\n\nDrugs = Copyrighted files (aka: music/movies)\nPost Office = MegaUpload",
"Man sets up sharing site.\nPeople share illegal items.\nCompanies ask Man to take down items, he complies but they keep popping up.\nHollywood has enough and tells US forces to get serious. \nAll servers get taken down and the creator of the website gets arrested.\nArrested person fights back, showing that he, and his staff, never did anything wrong, the user might have but they always complied with take-down requests.\nMan is now beginning to win back the servers that hosted information for his customers, including NON illegal hosted file crap.\n\nAnother statement of the US government thinking they can go beyond their borders to stop things. The US doesnt own the internet, nobody does.",
"Kim DotCom is not the worst of Kims",
"ELI5 version kim set up a website to let people upload files and share a link bc email attachment suck (size to small, isn't as simple as copy-paste a link). He made $$ on ads and didn't block known pirate files from being uploaded again. He did not ban people who repeatedly upload pirated content (IIRC). They had reasonable suspicious he was encouraging people to pirate and made money from it so the US asked NZ to shut him down.\n\nNZ did but they couldn't charge him with anything. Now he has _URL_0_",
"**EDIT:** Alright, six paragraphs was a bit much.\n\nKim was arrested via a joint US/NZ task force, involving dozens of heavily armed agents and several helicopters, based upon questionable accusations of copyright infringement with no clear violation of either nation's laws being involved. Eventual accusations appear to have been made using evidence that was only available due to his being arrested and his assets being seized beforehand (**EDIT:** We seized assets unrelated to the case, which forced people unaffiliated with Kim's Website to shut down *their* Websites due to their intellectual property being in the hands of the US government). Publicity around the case revealed that it isn't unique, so he's now the poster boy for public resentment of the US government's policy on extreme persecution of potential copyright violations, which we appear to be conducting with a fervor comparable to that which we employ to track down international terrorists and drug kingpins.",
"Is his name really \"Dotcom\"? ",
"The New Zealand government also at the request of the FBI, spied on Kim Dotcom and handed over everything they found to them....which is really fucking illegal.\n\nThe Prime Minister had to appologise and everything...\n\nAlso, they seized a bunch of his stuff without a warrant [ they had some sort of warrant, but it was too broad and didnt cover anything] which is basically theft.\n\nAlso, the US are trying to extradite him and NZ courts are trying to make it happen...despite the fact he never broke any NZ law, and you shouldnt really be extraditing people over copyright infringement anyway. \n\nBasically the whole thing has been severely mismanaged and exposed corruption and American cronyism all the way to the top. As you can imagine, nobody likes it when their entire government, including the fucking Prime Minister is seen to be ignoring laws, the rights of citizens and sucking up to the yanks.",
"Kim Dotcom is basically a real-life Cartman. He'll fuck over anybody to get what he wants."
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2iadn1 | why are people so against eating candy and sweets early in the morning? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2iadn1/eli5why_are_people_so_against_eating_candy_and/ | {
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"This person is not at all opposed.\n\nPersonally, I've never let the time of day (or night) dictate what food was appropriate for me to consume.\n\nMy friends/wife/coworkers regularly give me shit about eating \"non-breakfast\" food in the morning. Spaghetti for breakfast? Why not? Have a hankering for Sushi and a bowl of Menudo in the a.m.? Go for it! Dessert for breakfast? Brilliant!\n \nIn my opinion, if it tastes good and you are in the mood for it, EAT IT!"
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[]
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||
cr1nff | what makes a first edition book special? are there different kinds of first editions, where one is more valuable? | For example, I have a book I bought last year that says first edition by the ISBN. Does that make it one as defined when books sell for a crazy amount? Or is it restricted to a few of those first printed?
(I understand the way the numbers, age, and infamy okay into value) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cr1nff/eli5_what_makes_a_first_edition_book_special_are/ | {
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"Think of it similar to \"rookie cards\" in card collecting. They are special because there is only 1 first edition, just as a player will only have one rookie season and during that season their cards often aren't sought after because they aren't popular yet. And, especially with older books, these first edition copies are usually limited in numbers so the scarcity can add value as well. People will be less likely to save and keep first editions in pristine condition when they don't know the book is going to become historically successful. I would argue that the first print of a book no one cares about probably isn't considered special or worth much at all.",
" > I have a book I bought last year that says first edition by the ISBN.\n\nBe careful. The most collectable first editions are usually only the first impressions of the first edition, i.e., the first run of the printing press. There will often be later impressions, if the first one sells out, but the content of the book, including the ISBN, remains unchanged. The only difference will be the [printer's key](_URL_0_) on the copyright page. A new edition involves typesetting the book afresh, typically with emendations or other changes, and that new edition will have a new ISBN, and a new printer's key."
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27gret | how can open sourced encryption algorithms be safe from hackers? (i.e. bitcoin) | Couldn't you just reverse engineer the source code ? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27gret/eli5_how_can_open_sourced_encryption_algorithms/ | {
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"The point is that an open source system can be examined and tested by the community to find flaws. A closed one can't be. There could be any number of glaring flaws in the system (possibly even deliberate ones), but since you have only a tiny number of people who can examine the logic, you're much less likely to find it. ",
"You don't have to reverse engineer anything - You have the blueprint in front of you. \n\nIn true encryption, truly secure software, the only thing that is secret is the randomly generated keys, and these are not in the source code - they are generated randomly when the software is used. These keys are what is used to secure the system, not hidden tricks in the source code.",
"Knowing how something is done doesn't necessarily mean you can reverse it. Modern encryption techniques revolve around mathematical operations which are easy to do in one direction but very hard to reverse; it isn't a secret *how* it is done.",
"Let's say that you know how to make a key to open a lock.\n\nCould you build a key that perfectly fits a specific lock out in the world that you know absolutely nothing about, that you're not allowed to inspect, or even see? How many keys would you have to make before you made the one that perfectly fit this random lock?\n"
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1w1f51 | reducing the resolution and dpi of an image increases the file size. wtf? | _URL_0_
Please help! I don't get it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1w1f51/eli5_reducing_the_resolution_and_dpi_of_an_image/ | {
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"What program did you use? Post a link to the original image.",
"It's likely that the compression algorithm used by the software that you used to reduce the image isn't as good as the compression algorithm that was used by whatever created the image in the first place.",
"The files are saved as [JPEGs](_URL_0_). \n\n > The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality.\n\nThe program that you used to edit the picture likely saved it with a higher quality setting, resulting in a larger file size, even though it is a smaller picture. When saving the JPEG, some programs let you select the level of quality.",
"JPEG image format contains a complicated compression algorithm. If you use Photoshop or _URL_0_ or a lot of complicated image programs, you get a \"quality\" slider that lets you choose from 1 to 100, 1 being highest compression but most lossy; 100 means least-lossy and best quality.\n\nSo, the original image was done and saved heavily compressed, with the slider more towards 1. That makes a lower-quality image, but a much smaller filesize.\n\nSo, you open the image in your editor. This essentially 'decompresses' the image -- you get all the pixels. At 2448 x 3264 x 256-bit color, that's probably about 2gig (compare if you were to have taken this picture in RAW format, that's what you get).\n\nSo, you resize the image in your program, and then save it with the compression slider over closer to 100 -- less compression, higher quality. So, rather than compressing 2gb down to 483K, you're compressing 1224 x 1632 x 256 -- 500MB -- down to 1MB. In both cases you're getting a heck of a lot of compression, but when you saved your resized version you're not compressing as much. All things considered, if you used the exact same compression in both cases, you would see as you'd expect, your shrunk version would be a comparable fraction of the original's size.\n\n\nBTW: changing DPI on its own does not affect file size; if it has the same number of pixels in the dimensions, changing the DPI from 72 to 96 to 300dpi is still essentially the same image; programs aren't required to obey DPI, and generally only programs that print care.\n\n(PS: sorry if my filesize math is incorrect; it's a simple example for explanation, not necessarily a perfect algorithm for calculating uncompressed file sizes)",
"483kb is really, really small for an image at 2448x3264@96dpi, so it was probably saved at like 60% quality originally, which is common for images you find online. (60% quality is the default setting in Photoshop when saving jpgs for web)\n\nso you took this 60% quality image and changed its size, etc, but when you saved it, you saved it at 100% quality, increasing the file size."
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2jsn1n | i have had anosmia (no sense of smell) for as long as i can remember. how does this occur and does it change other senses? | Is anosmia something you are born with? Or does it develop over time? Also I know that eating food uses taste and smell does this change the way I taste food? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2jsn1n/eli5_i_have_had_anosmia_no_sense_of_smell_for_as/ | {
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"It certainly will affect how you taste food. I'm sure there was a trick where you blindfold someone, get them to hold their nose and give them a slice of apple and a slice of onion, and they'll find it hard to tell the difference. \nNow to you, you probably wouldn't know what the fuss is all about, but there's a massive difference with the sense of smell."
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mpapn | paypal, how it works, if it's trustworthy/worthwhile and should i get it? | I'm considering selling my old computer over eBay, but I need a payment method for my potential buyer. Is PayPal a safe choice? I've heard many, many bad things about it, such as not being allowed to access money from transactions until as much as a week later. Has anyone used it and had a poor experience or a good experience?
I really appreciate any help you have! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/mpapn/eli5_paypal_how_it_works_if_its/ | {
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"PayPal *is* \"safe.\" But they're also assholes *if* something goes wrong.\n\nMaybe check out [Dwolla.](_URL_0_) Not sure if it will work in the way you need it, but check it out.",
"Paypal is fantastic as a buyer and 99% of the time they're perfectly fine as a seller. But as a seller, you can get into difficulties if the other party tries to defraud you.\n\nThe typical eBay fraud goes that the 'buyer' raises a dispute saying the item is faulty or not as described. Paypal immediately takes the money from you and asks the 'buyer' to send the item back to you and provide the shipping information. What they send back is an empty box (or a broken version of whatever you had before) - leaving you with no item, and no money. At that point Paypal will basically try to wash their hands of the issue and tell you to go through small claims (since you have their address and details to send it in the first place then you have the details needed to do this)\n\nBasically make sure that the buyer has good feedback and has a verified Paypal account (the details match up with a credit card, or their details are otherwise verified) - And make sure that you take note of any serial numbers/asset IDs for the item you're selling in the first place (with photographic evidence if possible) so you can prove someone has acted fraudulently if you are unfortunate.\n\nBut don't let that scare you too much. Most transactions are pretty painless, but it can't hurt to take precautions.",
"if you get access to your money only a week later, you're doing pretty well. \n\nat one time when i was selling on ebay, i had receieved a paypal payment for an item and dropped off the package at the post office. when i got home i received notification that the payment had been taken out of my account due to problems with the buyer (how is this possible, i wondered? and what then is the point of using paypal?) i ran back to the post office and got the package back from them, they weren't very impressed. \n\na day later, the funds in my account (not including the bounced payment that had screwed me the day before) were 'frozen' due to 'suspected fraudulent activity'. i was never able to receive a clarification on what the suspicions were, or how they were able to subtract a payment that i had already in my account from the buyer. there was no process to appeal the decision and no information about eventually unfreezing my account. at that time, paypal didn't have a phone number or an address (i unhappily discovered). \n\ni imagine there was some funny business with that one buyer, but i had lost the proceeds of sales to dozens of other buyers with no apparent recourse.\n\npaypal held on to my money for over 18 months, until i was involved in a class action lawsuit. apparently they had pulled the same stunt with many other accounts. when my account unfroze, i immediately withdrew my funds (a year and a half later, and with no interest paid) and closed the account.\n\ni would never use paypal again, based on the broken trust and general principle of dealing with such scummy people. even if the transaction goes through, fees are steep and i hate to think of these people profiting even more.\n\nmy advice is, unless you live somewhere hellengone, to just list your computer for free on craigslist. you can sell to someone local, exchange it for cash and save on shipping as well. ",
"PayPal is safe in the sense that nobody is going to steal your personal information. It will not protect you from fraud as a seller, among other things that other comments do a good job describing.\n\nIf you're selling your computer on eBay, you don't really have a choice. You do have a choice to not use eBay, though, and I recommend you seriously consider this.",
"PayPal *is* \"safe.\" But they're also assholes *if* something goes wrong.\n\nMaybe check out [Dwolla.](_URL_0_) Not sure if it will work in the way you need it, but check it out.",
"Paypal is fantastic as a buyer and 99% of the time they're perfectly fine as a seller. But as a seller, you can get into difficulties if the other party tries to defraud you.\n\nThe typical eBay fraud goes that the 'buyer' raises a dispute saying the item is faulty or not as described. Paypal immediately takes the money from you and asks the 'buyer' to send the item back to you and provide the shipping information. What they send back is an empty box (or a broken version of whatever you had before) - leaving you with no item, and no money. At that point Paypal will basically try to wash their hands of the issue and tell you to go through small claims (since you have their address and details to send it in the first place then you have the details needed to do this)\n\nBasically make sure that the buyer has good feedback and has a verified Paypal account (the details match up with a credit card, or their details are otherwise verified) - And make sure that you take note of any serial numbers/asset IDs for the item you're selling in the first place (with photographic evidence if possible) so you can prove someone has acted fraudulently if you are unfortunate.\n\nBut don't let that scare you too much. Most transactions are pretty painless, but it can't hurt to take precautions.",
"if you get access to your money only a week later, you're doing pretty well. \n\nat one time when i was selling on ebay, i had receieved a paypal payment for an item and dropped off the package at the post office. when i got home i received notification that the payment had been taken out of my account due to problems with the buyer (how is this possible, i wondered? and what then is the point of using paypal?) i ran back to the post office and got the package back from them, they weren't very impressed. \n\na day later, the funds in my account (not including the bounced payment that had screwed me the day before) were 'frozen' due to 'suspected fraudulent activity'. i was never able to receive a clarification on what the suspicions were, or how they were able to subtract a payment that i had already in my account from the buyer. there was no process to appeal the decision and no information about eventually unfreezing my account. at that time, paypal didn't have a phone number or an address (i unhappily discovered). \n\ni imagine there was some funny business with that one buyer, but i had lost the proceeds of sales to dozens of other buyers with no apparent recourse.\n\npaypal held on to my money for over 18 months, until i was involved in a class action lawsuit. apparently they had pulled the same stunt with many other accounts. when my account unfroze, i immediately withdrew my funds (a year and a half later, and with no interest paid) and closed the account.\n\ni would never use paypal again, based on the broken trust and general principle of dealing with such scummy people. even if the transaction goes through, fees are steep and i hate to think of these people profiting even more.\n\nmy advice is, unless you live somewhere hellengone, to just list your computer for free on craigslist. you can sell to someone local, exchange it for cash and save on shipping as well. ",
"PayPal is safe in the sense that nobody is going to steal your personal information. It will not protect you from fraud as a seller, among other things that other comments do a good job describing.\n\nIf you're selling your computer on eBay, you don't really have a choice. You do have a choice to not use eBay, though, and I recommend you seriously consider this."
]
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"https://www.dwolla.com/default.aspx"
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"https://www.dwolla.com/default.aspx"
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2ty6o1 | the tennis world ranking system | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ty6o1/eli5_the_tennis_world_ranking_system/ | {
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"there are 19 different kinds of tournaments that are part of the ranking system, each is awarded a value.\n\nFor example. winning a grand slam tournament is worth 2000 points, but merely qualifying is already 25 points. and winning a Futures 10,000 gets you 18 points. \n\nTally the points for everyone and you have a ranking.\n\nAlso, earned points are valid for 52 weeks."
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157y5k | what happens if you're driving in your car at the speed of light and you turn your headlights on? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/157y5k/what_happens_if_youre_driving_in_your_car_at_the/ | {
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"There's no real answer, because according to everything we know about physics right now, it is impossible for you to travel at the speed of light. Physics can't give you a meaningful answer to a question about what would happen if you did something that physics says you cannot do.",
"To move at the speed of light means that you and your car are shortened into an almost infinitely thin segment in the direction of your motion. Therefore, you are inside your headlights- and inside the headlight switch and they are both inside of you. You also have infinite mass, as do your headlights, and to activate the headlights you need infinite energy- which you have because you're travelling at the speed of light! Unfortunately, having infinite mass and infinite energy means that a barrier called an \"event horizon\" forms between you and the rest of the universe. Nothing from inside the event horizon can enter back into the universe, so the light from your headlights goes nowhere.\n\nIn other words, nothing makes sense when you try to answer this question knowing what we know of physics.",
"Since it is essentially impossible to travel at the speed of light (c) a more interesting question would be what would happen if you were traveling really close to c, say 99.9% of and turned your headlights on.\n\n",
"As far as we know now, it is impossible to accelerate something which moved slower than the speed of light, to be at the speed of light or higher. So the condition you describe basically can't happen.\n\nHowever if you're traveling nearly as fast as light, then light still travels at light speed relative to you (that's just how relativity works) so you wouldn't feel any difference at all (and all other relativity phenomenon are what other people see when they see you, for you everything will be normal)",
"Let's assume it were somehow possible to travel that fast, and all the weird and scary parts of relativistic physics were ignored:\n\nYour headlights would still produce light, but that light would be going the same speed as you were, so no light would actually come out of your headlights. It would just pile up inside the lenses. If you slowed down, though, all that light would start coming out, and to someone outside the car it would look like the light was following your path, even when you were going fast and the light was piling up. The light was still traveling unhindered, just like it normally would. It just wasn't outrunning your car.\n\nHowever, because you were moving so fast, your headlights wouldn't be white. In fact, they wouldn't even have a color. They'd be super-high energy gamma radiation. That's because with your car chasing its own light, the light waves get all squished together into a shorter wavelength of light. Shorter wavelengths have higher energy. In small amounts, this change just makes light more blue, so it's called blueshift, and it lets astronomers see how stars are moving.\n\nIn your case, it's a bit more impressive than that. In fact, since you were traveling the same speed as light, your headlights have a wavelength of essentially zero. That would make them the shortest, highest-energy light source in the universe. Probably the most energetic source *ever* and certainly the most energetic since the Big Bang. When your light finally reached an observer's telescope, they'd win their planet's equivalent of a Nobel Prize if they could explain what was going on."
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7k2gpd | why do we see things that happened so long ago when we look out into the universe? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7k2gpd/eli5_why_do_we_see_things_that_happened_so_long/ | {
"a_id": [
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"Because light takes time to travel. \n\nThink of a firework. You see the light, and a second or two later you hear the bang. The bang happened a few seconds ago, but you're hearing it now. \n\nIt's the same with distant stars and their light. The light that's hitting the earth now left the stars billions of years ago. \n\nWe also can sort of \"see\" the big bang, that's what the cosmic microwave background is. It's not possible to see past that though, because (to simplify hugely) there was nothing before the big bang, no light and, in some interpretations, there no *before* the big bang; time started at that instance and didn't exist beforehand. "
]
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f2p8a6 | why is distilled water considered not drinking water? maybe it isn't optimal, but how would pure water be actually harmful? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/f2p8a6/eli5_why_is_distilled_water_considered_not/ | {
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"No minerals. Need them electrolytes and whatnot. Technically helps to dehydrate you if you drink too much distilled water by leeching minerals from your system.",
"here you go\n\n_URL_0_",
"This is a great question. Cells will always perform diffusion, or a transfer of something from a high concentration enviroment, to a low concerntration enviroment. This \"something\" be glucose, salts or almost anything else. \nWhen you drink distilled water, the enviroment of some cells (mainly red blood cells) is very low on everything. The cells want balance (as all things should be), and let all of their sugars, fats and other things out the cell. Now the cell lacks all of these and dies. So dont drink a lot of distilled water."
]
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3cure4 | what exactly is the issue with money in politics? | Pardon me if this question isn't quite direct, as I'm having a difficult time phrasing it correctly. I've heard a lot about campaign financing, and while on the surface the concept of candidates having more money than others sounds unfair, I can't quite pinpoint why, once I apply what I know about how that money is utilized.
For example, I know that Hillary Clinton is expected to raise billions of dollars this election cycle, whereas Bernie Sanders (putting aside his recent success at the polls that have increased his expected contributions) is only expected to raise a fraction as much. Why exactly is it an issue that Hillary is raising more money? I know that in most explanations, most of this money comes from wealthy donors who some might argue don't have the interests of the public at heart; but even so, what does it matter? I guess I don't understand why her having more money is an issue, if it's being used to campaign. I know that legally, media outlets are by law required to give equal advertising opportunity to all candidates regardless of their political position. So, is this an issue of who is capable of making flashier campaign advertisements? When I hear people upset about this inequality in campaign financing, it doesn't make sense to me. Is there some way this money is utilized that doesn't sit well? Because from the outside looking in, it just seems like they have more money to throw at the election and, while money can certainly have a divisive influence on an elected official, I don't see what the issue is if the person has not yet reached a position of power, assuming that the electorate is still capable and able to make their votes autonomously.
Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3cure4/eli5_what_exactly_is_the_issue_with_money_in/ | {
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"The issue isn't really money in politics. The issue is a disproportionate amount of money coming from select special interests. Compared to how much money this country spends advertising toothpaste or cars or beer, the Presidential election cycle is cheap. \n\nFor example, there are a handful of extremely high net worth individuals who have the power to determine who will have a real shot at winning the primary and becoming the nominee of the party. That control is by no means absolute - they proved (again) in 2012 that they can bankroll fringe candidates until their checkbooks bleed and the primary voters won't endorse those candidates, but it is pretty clear that they can select from amongst a group of moderate candidates which will and which will not seriously contest the primary and the money they make available can be the factor that determines if a person runs, or not, and if they run, how seriously their candidacy is taken by the media and party infrastructure.\n\nThis may or may not bother you depending on how much you believe the winnowing process of the primary contest is actually being impacted by this money (the alternative is that it's just amplifying a contest that would likely play out roughly the same regardless of the injection of high net worth money but of course it's impossible to see the counter-factual world where that happens.)\n\nIn the general election a select group of special interest groups can substantially influence the outcome of a presidential election, and often statewide elections for Senators and Governors. They get less traction but still have an impact on Congressional races - enough traction that the people who run for Congress ignore them at their peril.\n\nThese interests are the AARP (retired people), the Teacher's unions (and organized labor in general, although the Teachers provide the bulk of the cash and the grassroots effort), evangelical religious leaders, the NRA, and an amorphous network of large business interests who aren't dumb enough to cluster into a visibly addressable target.\n\nGenerally speaking in the Presidential election, 45% of the voters split for each candidate based on party and the election is decided by the 10% who are willing to pick a candidate based on the campaign. Sometimes those ratios are distorted by historical events or by turnout but that's pretty close to the overall average for the past several decades of Presidential campaigns.\n\nThat 10% isn't evenly distributed. Because of a quirk in the Constitution, states, not the popular vote, frame the election. Most states award their electors winner-take-all (although a few do proportionate representation). Due to this system and due to the demographics of where people live who vote strongly by party, only a small number of states actually determine the victor. Those states are usually Florida, Ohio, Virginia and to a lesser degree New Mexico and Nevada.\n\nTHAT means that concentrating the money into a handful of states has the potential to significantly influence the outcome of an election, and it generates an arms-race mentality where both parties assume that if they fall materially behind in spending, they'll automatically lose. So they'll make whatever deals are required to get the funding they think they need since \"any price\" is the right price in a winner-take-all election."
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1q9v6e | is it possible to die from old age, and old age only? | You hear about deaths of old age, but are those really directly caused by old age, or is it that old age weakened the body which led to a heart attack, stroke, or some other cause? If you are perfectly healthy but very old, will your body ever shut down on its own with no other causes? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1q9v6e/eli5_is_it_possible_to_die_from_old_age_and_old/ | {
"a_id": [
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"You don't just die from time. \n\nHowever with time your cells are losing their capability to copy themselves flawlessly. Having flawed cells, or bad repairs, at vital places in your body, is what is then causing issues like reduced immune system effectiveness - and a cold turns into a pneumonia turns into death.\n\nAnother big reason is that our body is accumulating junk at all ends, and then e.g. a clogged blood vessel no longer supplying the heart muscle tissue with oxygen is what we call a heart attack.\n\nAnd there's the general wear-and-tear...while the first point leads to small damages not being repaired properly, also bigger, sudden failures can occur with time, and aged tissue is much more likely to tear than the still elastic young one...e.g. at some point maybe a blood vessel in the brain is no longer withstanding the constant pressure cycles caused by the heart beat. it bursts, and suddenly an area of the brain is without oxygen supply - a stroke.",
"Dying of old age is more of a legal classification than a medical one.\n\nIt basically says this person was old, their death does not appear suspicious, so there isn't really much point in trying to figure out the exact cause."
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14zq80 | why is a day 24 hours as opposed to any other number? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/14zq80/eli5_why_is_a_day_24_hours_as_opposed_to_any/ | {
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"It's by convention. 12 was thought to be significant because of the number of lunar cycles in the year. _URL_0_",
"Because, when they invented the first time systems, they still hadn't figured out fractions or decimals. So they picked a number that can be divided many different ways. 12 can be divided by 2,3,4,6, so they set 0 at dawn and 12 at dusk (they originally had a 12 hour day, and a 12 hour night, regardless of how long they actually were), and could say \"6 hours\" for half a day, or \"4 hours\" for a third of a day. Same reason there are 360 degrees in a circle.",
"Sumerians I thought, every thing is divisible by 6 unlike our decimal maths 10. time was their construct, that's why 60 minutes in an hour and not 100 which would make more sense to me. Their maths was based on 6, leftovers I suppose",
"[Numberphile](_URL_0_) has a great explanation for why base 12 is used for things like time and inches.",
"Hold out your hand. Take your thumb and count each segment of your fingers on that hand. Each finger (not counting the thumb) has 3 segments, so you can count to twelve on one hand that way. And, when you're done counting the twelve, you can put one of your fingers on your *other* hand up and start all over again. When all five fingers (*including* thumb this time) are up, that's 60.\n\nThe duodecimal system (which is what we call a number system based off 12) was very, very common in the past. Egyptians, Babylon, Sumerians, Indians and Chinese even. It may also be based off lunar cycles, but I'm sure ease of counting with the method I just talked about helped a lot.\n\nHours came from the egyptians, apparently, who divided the day into two parts, a day part of 12 hours, and a night part of 12 hours. \n\nThe Romans (and I *think* the Greeks) kept this same system. A Roman day started with sunrise, lasted 12 hours until night, and then it was another 12 hours until day. Because the day varied throughout the year (summer has more sunlight than winter), the length of an hour would vary from 45 minutes to 75 minutes, in our time.\n\nThe Romans spread this throughout their empire, and the Europeans spread this throughout the world."
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avsueg | why "righty-tighty, lefty-loosy" does not apply to twist-ties, like the ones on the bag covering a loaf of sliced bread, which are almost always wound backwards (turn clockwise to undo). | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avsueg/eli5_why_rightytighty_leftyloosy_does_not_apply/ | {
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"Nuts and Bolts need complimentary spirals to work properly, so the relevant industries and their manufacturers have all decided on a \"Righty Tighty\" standard. \n\nTwist Ties are glorified bits of string that tie to themselves. They don't need to match an industrial manufacturing standard to serve their core function. \n\nSo twisting them \"Left or Right\" is simply a function of how the twisty tie machine programmer was feeling that day. ",
"Turning something clockwise is often easier for someone who is right handed rather than turning it counterclockwise. This is helpful for things which tighten when turned clockwise as greater force can be exerted by most of the population.\n\nHowever in the case of a twist tie either direction would work in concept. By winding it in the factory counterclockwise it means taking the tie off by turning clockwise is easier for most people to do. After it is removed they can't govern how it is put back on, but at least they can make its removal slightly more convenient for the end user.",
"The machine probably puts them on both ways in an alternating fashion so it doesn’t get all twisted up. You notice the ones that are backwards more than the forward ones. "
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ews1o3 | how does the commentary in fifa games work? | How do the lines get generated in a particular sequence? Are the sentences recorded individually? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ews1o3/eli5_how_does_the_commentary_in_fifa_games_work/ | {
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"text": [
"I mean if you were to think about it, there are really only a finite amount of possible situations in a football match. So long as you have a player and an action, and prerecord all of the possible player names and actions, it becomes more realistic.\n\nThe truly impressive bit is how they managed to stitch it together so seamlessly, although I'm sure EA probably spent a lot of money figuring out how. \n\nThis also applies to all EA sports games with commentary as well\n\nEdit: _____ passed to ______ , ooh hes moving up to their defence, ______, _______, and he scoreeees\n\n\nWhere ______ are player names"
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397a7v | why has digital technology so quickly outpaced medical, transportation, and pretty much every other technology? | The world is vastly different from when I was a kid in only one way--digitally (smart phones, the internet, augmented reality, etc.). Why hasn't other technology kept pace? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/397a7v/eli5_why_has_digital_technology_so_quickly/ | {
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"cs0y08n"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"The other techs have kept up. We have cars with GPS and 4G network connectivity. We have robots that use lasers for surgery. Some things just aren't as obvious as smart phones and the internet. "
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6sanl0 | those "we buy houses" signs on street lamps do they actually buy your home or is it all a scam? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6sanl0/eli5those_we_buy_houses_signs_on_street_lamps_do/ | {
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"I know one company (open door) flips them after paying cash to the owners under their true market value. Their flips are thrown on the market in Phoenix, Vegas and Dallas usually way over priced and dirty inside.",
"Suppose your uncle just died, and you inherited his house. Great, right? (I mean, sad about your uncle, but great about the house.) But when you go over to look at your new house, it's in terrible condition. The roof leaked, and then water got in and the ceiling in one of the bedrooms collapsed, the kitchen countertops are missing, there's trash everywhere, and the raccoon who lives in the upstairs closet chased you outside and is still standing in the doorway hissing at you.\n\nYou're not a builder- you don't know how to fix the house yourself. And you can't get a loan to hire someone else to fix the house- banks won't usually write a mortgage unless there's a basically-inhabitable house to borrow against. And when you had a realtor out to talk about listing it for sale, he yelled at you for wasting his time, then peeled out leaving a cloud of rubber smoke.\n\nRight when you're thinking maybe we should just let the raccoon keep the house, you drive past a We BUY Houses: CASH sign. You call the number, and someone from their office says, \"308 10th St.... uh, hang on, let me look that up on the GIS... yeah, we'll give you $40,000 for that- we just need to run a title search to make sure you're the real owner and can legally sell it. What's that? Bad condition? Yeah, we can deal with that, it's all factored into the price.\"\n\nThat offer is kind of predatory- sure, the house needs sixty thousand dollars in repairs, but afterwards, it'll probably sell for $150k. But what else can you do? You can't afford you fix it yourself, and you don't have anyone else who wants to buy it. If you do nothing, the house will keep on decaying, and either you'll keep paying taxes on it or the city will seize it. You might as well get a payout now, even if it's not quite what the house is worth.",
"Yes, they usually will! Imo\n\nAt about half or less of what you could get for it.... ; (\n\n",
"They are basically flipping houses. They will but homes that are often fixer uppers or some variety like that and then repair and expand. Since most people don't have the technical ability to do so they just sell their home to these people for immediate, albeit likely lower, reward.",
"Where there's a need and a profit to be made, there's a market!\n\nThey hope to get customers who aren't in the housing market or want to sell the house \"for money\" but don't care how much, these could be drug addicts, alcholics etc. $25,000 sounds like a huge amount when you are coming down and just want your next fix.\n\nThey also market to people who might have acquired a house (such as through inheritance or as a gift) and the house either has a lot of bad memories attached and the person just wants to get rid of it, or if the house needs a lot of work but the person doesn't have the money or skills to fix it up. \n\nThey will usually offer to buy the house a lot cheaper than it's worth, for example a house that's worth $120,000 but needs $40,000 worth of repairs might get a $40,000 offer which to the seller is probably more than they make in a year and more money than they are used to seeing so they will of course jump right on that without thinking (I know I would!). \n\nAlso these companies will often give you the cash upfront and quickly with minimal fuss and paper work. whereas going through the official channels can be extremely stressful with mountains of paperwork to go through. Sometimes the stress isn't worth the extra profit. These companies often make a lot of money and they do have their place in the market (ie. they aren't scams) as there is a need for just such a company/service to exist."
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zxv5b | why does major league baseball play so many more games per season than the national football league? it seems both games take about the same time on average. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zxv5b/eli5_why_does_major_league_baseball_play_so_many/ | {
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"Recovery time. Football is much more physical and the players need more down time. ",
"Football is a lot harder on the body. Football players, even the most athletic ones, can really only handle one game per week, over a period of 4-5 months without destroying their bodies. "
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49l64a | how do facebook videos have so many views? | Almost any time I click on a link to a Facebook video, its view count seems so much higher than a comparable Youtube video would have (save for Music videos). | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/49l64a/eli5_how_do_facebook_videos_have_so_many_views/ | {
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"Auto-play is on by default. Most people don't turn it off. One of the many tactics used to increase add revenue. ",
"Because, as Hank Green so eloquently put it, [they cheat, they lie and they steal](_URL_0_).\n\nBasically, they cheat by massively favoring facebook-uploaded videos on facebook over youtube videos, they lie by auto-playing videos in everyone's feed on mute and counting it as a view, and they steal by freely allowing facebook users to steal other people's content and pass it on as their own."
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3l650z | how do undercover police "hitmen" meet their murder for hire suspect? | I was watching a few vids on youtube of undercover cops pretending to be hitmen. They record women trying to hire someone to kill their husband. I was just wondering how it is that they end up hiring an undercover officer? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3l650z/eli5_how_do_undercover_police_hitmen_meet_their/ | {
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"I don't understand what you mean.\n\nHow is that they find these \"hitmen\" to supposedly hire?\n\nOr are you asking how they find police to go undercover as the supposed hitmen?\n\nIf it's the first, then it's the same way that undercover operations occur for drug deals, prostitution and various other illegal services. Usually by staking out a forum or listing website (such as reddit, craigslist, kijiji) for a particular area looking for codes that they recognize and then act on. A good example is from the movie \"The Mechanic\" how people post \"job listings\" for mechanics that lead to coded website.\n\nIf it's the latter, then it's the same way that they get undercover cops to act like pimps and hoes, drug dealers and arms dealers. They find a cop and make sure he can talk the talk just long enough for them to get incriminating evidence to arrest the people.",
"Pretty sure it's they ask someone to find them a hitman then that person goes to the police. ",
"Guy I know's ex-wife wanted to hire a hit man. She asked her druggie motorcycle gang member boyfriend to find her a hit man.\n\nFunny story: it turns out druggie motorcycle gang members are not the most reliable people!\n\nSo he went to the cops and did a deal with them and they set up the sting. \n\nOf course, despite planning and paying for a contract hit on her ex-husband, she only got 4 years and served 2.",
"Are you asking for a friend?"
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3i6939 | why the stock markets are crashing today? how is china's devaluing of its currency contributing to this? i remember a new article a year ago that said the us wanted china to devalue it currency to reflect its economy more accurately. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3i6939/eli5why_the_stock_markets_are_crashing_today_how/ | {
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"I don't understand it either. Most of what I read says it's due to them not being able to import as much American goods in the future. However, I see it as Chinese labor just went on sale and our markets should be up.",
" > Why the stock markets are crashing today? \n\nProbably because people are worried about China's economy, and other people are worried about people being worried about China's economy, and other people just like to run around in circles and have their hands in the air.\n\n > How is China's devaluing of its currency contributing to this?\n\nIt is contributing indirectly. China allowed it currency to devalue because they hope it will improve their economy. Realizing how worried China's government is about their economy made other people worried about theirs.\n\n > I remember a new article a year ago that said the US wanted China to devalue it currency to reflect its economy more accurately.\n\nSome influential people in the US were complaining that China's currency was undervalued. That means they wanted them to do the opposite: revalue it upwards, not downwards.\n\n"
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2f2gtf | why do we still use infantry when we have drones and advanced missile technology? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2f2gtf/eli5_why_do_we_still_use_infantry_when_we_have/ | {
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"Why wouldn't we? It doesn't matter how much you blow something up if you don't actually walk in and occupy it.",
"Because a missile cannot recover intel or rescue a hostage. Why use forks when we have knives?",
"Because some things still need to be done on foot, or by thinking soldiers. ",
"Serious answer here. \n\nSoldiers are cheaper than drones and missiles. ",
"You can have all the drones you want but the only way to control the ground is to put boots on the ground",
"Drones and Missiles are *great* for destroying targets and breaking morale, but it takes feet on the ground to contain a situation. You can't just fly overhead with a helicopter and a loudspeaker saying \"Would you all kindly come out of your hiding places, lay face down on the floor, lace your fingers on your head, and someone will be by shortly to pick you up.\" and expect it to work. Grunts have a very important role in military operations because they are multi-faceted in general and there are also highly trained teams to do the work that requires finesse and maybe not just glassing a neighborhood. Yes there's always going to be collateral damage in a warzone, but the US does try to minimize it. No use conquering a people in the name of Freedom and Democracy if they have to build shacks and their infrastructure from scratch because we destroyed it all. "
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c99elo | how do electric circuits work? | I’ve always been very mechanically minded, although when it comes to electronics and circuits, I’m baffled.
How can pieces of silicon and metal make my computer turn on, to being able to run games and programmes? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c99elo/eli5_how_do_electric_circuits_work/ | {
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"Certain materials called conductors or semiconductors can make electrons \"flow\" at the molecular level. As a very basic example imagine water going through a hose. This doesn't apply to all electrical circuits but for a basic understanding it is enough. There are different types of electricity, Alternating current (called AC) and direct current ( DC). Basically AC is for stuff you plug into your home using those pronged cords and DC is for batteries. The electric circuits you describe is different from the electricity that powers your house or your oven. Fundamentally it is the same concepts. Electricity is defined as the flow of electrons. They don't flow differently but for larger things like powering homes resistance is usually bad and for smaller things like microchips or your computer motherboard resistance is necessary because the amount of electricity is so small you don't want to fry it. Of course electricity on all levels must be regulated to the correct amount. It isn't just an \"amount\" to be set to. For example you can't just pour a certain amount of water into a plumbing system and expect it to work. Pressure and resistance in an electrical circuit must also be regulated. For electronics, which is different than residential electricity or construction electricity, there are a plethora of devices that are used to achieve these things. I'm not gonna lie to you, electricity can be confusing. I myself had only taken an introductory course to electricity and electronics mixed in with more advanced classes. But if you take your time to figure things out, basic problems can boil down to simple arithmetics. I realize my answer might be all over the place so if there's anything you still want to know that I didn't say, feel free to message me back and I'll do my best to explain or hopefully someone else can provide a better answer than me. I love learning the trades so I'd be happy to help you excel in your learning.",
"Well a circuit mostly is a conducting line connecting the power supply to whatever is put in as the consumer. But that is boring. It is better to also put in a switch. That switch basically interrupts the conducting line, unless it is closed. \nIt gets really interesting when you have a switch that does not work by flipping a lever, but a switch that works by electricity (that is where the silicon comes into play, since it has some special properties). Those interupt the conducting line unless a current is fed into the side of the switch. And now you can build a circuit that switches the switch... or only switches the switch if two other switches are switched and so on. So that is basically playing very complex domino.... unless you notice that with two switches that switch each other, you can build a memory retaining thingy.\n\nWith two electronic switches you can build a flip flop. A thing that keeps a circuit open once it is opened and closed once it is closed. It is a way to conserve information.\n\nIf you put many a flip flops into a row, you got a register. Those flip flops flipping each other makes that register able to count... and do math. It is all really faszinating. You build a few circuits that add or subtract two registers when you flip a switch, and you basically have a calculator. From a calculator to a computer it is only a matter of upscaling. Your keyboard and mouse are the switches you flip and the cpu and graphics card do the calculating, shoveling data from one register (of which a computer has billions) to another.\n\nThat's basically it. Everything else is software (in many different abstraction layers).",
"The eli5:\n\nElectricity is a force like gravity. Electrons can feel this force, and flow like water.\n\nWires and circuits are essentially change for the electrons to flow. When they reach a component like a motor they cause it to turn, like a water wheel.\n\nOther components often have mechanical analogs. Transistors can be seen as levers or doorways. Electricity flows against one side, opening or closing it.\n\nA clever arrangenent of these can create situations where flipping one lever closes.or opens others. This allows you to design a setup where a few small changes can alter lots of different things.\n\nMechanical computers do exist, but are much much larger."
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66amo5 | what is the limit of space travels for humans right now? | I mean what distance can we pass with current technology and will be limit for space travels ever exceeded?
I'm gonna be grateful for every reply :) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/66amo5/eli5_what_is_the_limit_of_space_travels_for/ | {
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"very very limited. \n\nspace outside of Earth's atmosphere is dangerous. this is where the ISS is. primary danger is micrometeoroids that can puncture. \n basically putting your space ship in front of a machine gun and hoping all the bullets miss you. \n\nspace outside of Earth's magnetosphere is even more dangerous. \n in addition to the micrometeroids, you have to deal with Sun's radiation. there is no current high tech solution that'll shield us from solar radiation. the only low tech solution is to put \"stuff\" to shield us. current leading ideas of what 'stuff' to shield are water and lead. problem is..both are very heavy so you need 10x the fuel and 10x the cost to push up into orbit. ",
"Theoretically, Mars. But with current technology this would be a one way trip and the chances of even surviving the journey are low.\n\nThe biggest dangers are radiation, maintenance, and gravity (or rather the lack of).\n\nThere is a lot of radiation in space, and like krystar78 said below, the only solution we have is to shield the vessel with dense materials such as lead, which is very heavy and this makes getting into space very difficult.\n\nOn a spaceship, spare parts and tools will be in extremely limited supply, so if something serious break then it will stay broken. A major oxygen leak caused by a micrometeoroid puncture will kill the crew. Micrometeoroids can be as insignificant as flecks of paint, but when they are travelling at 40,000 km/h they will cause [damage](_URL_0_) (warning: Daily Fail link).\n\nThe crew will spend a very long time in zero gravity and will lose muscle tone, making operating on a planet (say Mars) very difficult. This can be prevented by exercise on board the vessel. What cannot be prevented is the deformation of the human eye. Without gravity, the eye material flexes and distorts, and loose proteins (eyeball floaters) will collect in the middle of the eye and they would stay there because they can't be broken down. I have permanent dark floaters from an injury, and if they balled up in the middle of my eye I would have a significant amount of my vision blocked. As the material of the eye changes, the crystalline lense in your eye that focuses light will flex, causing significant loss of focus and may be irreparable. The crew might get on the ship with 20/20 vision, but when they get off all those years later they could be functionally blind.",
"Right now, the current limit is the ISS, which orbits at an altitude of 400 km above the surface of the Earth.\n\nThe furthest humans have ever gotten was Apollo 13, which got over 400,000 km from the Earth, but we no longer have any spacecraft capable of carrying humans that far. There are new spacecraft that might be able to do that currently in development though. NASA's Orion, SpaceX's Dragon 2 and Boeing's CST-100 Starliner should be able to go that far, but they're still years away from completion.\n\nSpaceX is also working on a ship capable of taking humans to Mars and back, but that's even further away from completion.",
"Right now the only limitation is money.\n\nBelieve it or not we are now, as a race, absolutely capable of interstellar travel. All the technology we need for a trip to another star system now exists. Of course such a trip would, by definition, be a generational trip taking hundreds or even thousands of years. But there is no unknown that prevents us from constructing a generational ship and sending a few thousand people on a multi lifetime journey to another star system. \n\nOf course the people who began the journey would be long dead and their descendants would be the ones arriving at the destination. \n\nIn theory we could begin in orbit construction of such a ship tomorrow. \n\nBut if you are asking what can we realistically do right now. Well if were not for the Russian Soyuz craft we wouldn't even have manned spacecraft right now. However Both NASA and SpaceX are well along in building manned ships capable of traveling to both the moon and Mars. \n\nSo the answer actually depends on what you mean when you say *what distance can we pass with current technology*\n\nRight now at this moment, Low Earth Orbit. \n\nWhere we know we can go in the next 10-20 years? \n\nMars at least, maybe the asteroid belt. \n\nWhere could we go if we wanted to throw tens of trillions of dollars at it and were willing to send a large group of people on a one way journey?\n\nAnother star system is not out of the realm of possibility.\n\n"
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byxg4v | how does microsoft and sony compete with similar specs? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/byxg4v/eli5_how_does_microsoft_and_sony_compete_with/ | {
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"They both have a similar release date in mind since you don't want to come out too far after your competition and 3rd party developers want to know when to start making higher end games. As well they have similar price points in mind as you don't want to be way more expensive then the competition. So when you combine the two you end up with similar specs, the best most cost effective hardware that will be available for mass market consumption in year 20XX. There are only two major CPU and GPU manufacturers so both companies are drawing from the same pool unless they completely go out of left field. Sony tried that with teh PS3 and the Cell Processor and got burned.",
"I think it's also important to mention that if one of them decides to innovate too much and go in a different way, it risks being a failure and also pushing the market share to the other company that decided to be traditional.\n\n\nJust like this PS4/XOne generation. Microsoft tried to be different and try s different approach, but people didn't like it. So they went to Sony instead, because the PS4 was a safe bet, as it was a traditional console. \n\n\nNintendo takes more risks than the other two, which means sometimes they win the generation by a large margin, and other times they fall behind. \n\n\nHaving one of three companies taking risks is not a big deal, but if two of them take this strategy, the other one can just do more of the same and take all the market of the people who don't want new things.",
"Before the 2010's, most game consoles used different platforms. Both the 360 and PS3 used custom Power-PC CPU's, but they used them in very different ways. The PS3 used them in a cell processor configuration, while the 360 used them in a relatively normal way. This lead to very different specs, as they ran games quite differently.\n\nNow both the PS4 and XBOX One both use normal x86 CPU's. So they run software very similarly. Considering that there are tons of cross platform games, it would make sense that both would have similar specs to be able to run all games fairly well."
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4gl3at | the iraq war seems to be widely regarded as a mistake. why was the u.s. so motivated to get involved at that time? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4gl3at/eli5_the_iraq_war_seems_to_be_widely_regarded_as/ | {
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"The main reason prior to entering the war was the U.S. state department's theory that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destructions (WMDs) and would use these WMDs on his enemies such as Israel, or sell them to terrorists.\n\nOn the heels of 9/11, the at the time war in Afghanistan, the still unknown location of Osama Bin Laden, there was an implicit fear spread by the media and the U.S. government that the war in Iraq was somehow tied and connected the war on terror.\n\nAs U.S. forces moved in on Baghdad, and captured Saddam Hussein, the rhetoric or causus bell for invading shifted to providing freedom to the Iraqi people from an oppressive dictator. As it turned out, no WMDs could be located in Iraq and the US intelligence was inaccurate. \n\nAll of the above motivations played into why Americans as a whole generally supported the war in the beginning. Primarily fear of another terrorist attack which was constantly reinforced by the US media such as the \"terror alert\" scale (a color coded scale as to the likelihood of an attack). \n\nIf you did not live during this time period or were young, it seems weird today looking back. The internet was in its infancy, there were few dissenting opinions about the war and those that did dissent were shunned as unpatriotic, against the troops, hated america, etc. ",
"The public was still traumatized after 9/11 and latched onto the Bush administration's *shoot first ask questions later* foreign policy as a coping mechanism. \n\nWhere there are normally checks and balances, there was mutual reinforcement of reckless, short-sighted behavior. \n\n"
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5423ro | when watching movies, why at the time so special effects seem so real, but then after watching more realistic effects, then going back and watching the other movie again do they seem so fake? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5423ro/eli5_when_watching_movies_why_at_the_time_so/ | {
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"Because you have something to compare it to. Also, re-watching CGI makes flaws much more noticable than during the 1^st showing."
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8ez81n | what happens to your body when you get numb? specifically cold though water. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8ez81n/eli5_what_happens_to_your_body_when_you_get_numb/ | {
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"When the environment you are in is cold, the blood veins on the outside of your body contract to prevent too much heat loss. But by doing that, it will deprive the cells on the outside, including the receptors there, from the oxygen which is needed to operate. That is where the numb feeling is coming from.\n",
"It's called vasoconstriction. Your blood vessels get more narrow in order to keep heat in your body and concentrate it to vital organs. When they constrict for too long then you will experience numbness due to the lack of blood flow. \n\nThe opposite is vasodilation. When we get hot our blood vessels dilate/expand. This allows heat to radiate out of our body to cool us down. \n\n"
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2c572m | are you necessarily "healthy" if you are built and have large muscles? | What does the doctor mean when she says that I'm "healthy? I always thought cardio exercise was "healthy" because it works out your heart the most. I don't see how weight lifting can benefit you in any way other than give you muscles for cosmetic purposes. Also, does yoga do your body any good compared to running or weight lifting? I'm curious to all this because I'm scrawny as fuck. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2c572m/eli5_are_you_necessarily_healthy_if_you_are_built/ | {
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"It's rare that people will have only exercised for power or \"gains\" without doing at least some cardio throughout their cycle.\n\nCardio helps them with their gains, so it's unlikely that they would neglect it.",
"there's so many benefits to weightlifting. things I've read: \n* helps any athlete (whether it's endurance, sprinting, whatever) \n* better feel for your body(parts)/coordination increase \n* metabolism benefits \n* joint health/flexibility \n* bone density increases \n\nthings I know from personal experience (used to be 6' 140lbs now 6' 185lbs when I'm done dieting): \n* better posture (helped me w/ scoliosis) \n* toughens you up; I'm not talking about street fights here, I mean mentally as well as physically for whatever possible situation \n* confidence boost \n\nI'm not too familiar with Yoga but stretching couldn't be more important whether you are an athlete or recreational weightlifter. I hate cardio but there is obviously some benefits to it, same goes for HIIT.",
"In my experience, weight training has been far better for my health than cardio has been. I'm not saying that's true for everyone, but I experienced many more positive secondary effects when I swapped cardio for weight training. Now I do conditioning (cardio, kind of) maybe three times a week, but my main focus is on Weightlifting. \n\nI'm on mobile now so I can't post it, but there was a recent article that showed that bone and muscle density were better predictors of longevity than cardio-related indicators in seniors. So there's a longevity benefit to lifting as well. I will find the study and post later! \n\nEDIT: This is not the article I wanted, but it has links to the the study I remember and another that both support the resistance training-longevity link. _URL_0_",
"\"Health\" is a well balanced diet, clean air and water along with well rounded exercises that effectively works all muscles in the body. \n\nExercise and muscularity are only a small determinate of your actual health. You can have big muscles but if you got them with improper form then you're just a ticking time bomb waiting for your muscle to strain or tear. \n\nAnd with exercise, only doing cardio or or weight lifting is not good for you. If only work out one muscle group it's like putting a Ferrari engine in a Honda; the brakes, tires, transmission ect cannot keep up with the huge engine, the same way your body becomes stressed if you have huge (pick a muscle group) muscles but nothing else. \n\nThe food you eat, the water you drink and the air you breathe are far more critical. \n\nI have a buddy who is in peak physical muscularity but is currently being treated for kidney failure because all the protein supplements, creatine and pre workouts he's used for so many years. ",
"To ELY5 - no, having large muscles and being yoked up doesn't by default make you healthy. Some lifters do no cardio and neglect their diet but can bench 400+ lbs - they could still develop heart disease, etc. and all that extra bulk doesn't really do anything in and of itself.\n\nWeightlifting is still good for you however. I don't necessarily think bodybuilding is good for you though. Train like an athlete - some weights, some cardio, and lots of \"real world\" action. Eat real food, skip the supplement nonsense other than maybe a protein shake once in a while. Pushing a bar up and down all day and riding an elliptical once in a while isn't well rounded fitness IMO.",
"\"Healthy\" can be interpreted in many different ways, but I usually consider myself healthy if I go to the doctor's for a physical and they tell me that I'm healthy. In this case, people that have lots of lean muscle are probably better off than the general population as far as physical health goes. Here's an article outlining some of the benefits: < _URL_0_;. I'm sure muscle-y people have different health problems that come about from training. I tore some rotator cuff muscle and fucked up my back when I used to lift for weight gain. It was nothing serious but it put me down for a few weeks and illustrates some of the health problems that weight lifters might experience. Stretching, like you do in yoga, definitely helps avoid these injuries.\n\nHealth is important, but if you're a non-smoking, non-obese person, you'll get your physician's seal of approval on your next physical pretty easily (hopefully). *Fitness* is different. Fitness is what athletes have. Good fitness requires not only cardiovascular training and strength training, but also flexibility and agility. Yoga and other stretching practices can increase your flexibility, allowing you to reach farther and take longer strides. Footwork, like running ladders or doing chop-and-drops, will improve your agility, allowing you to change speed and direction on a dime.",
"A lot of strains and sprains happen when muscles are pushed beyond their limits. You lose your balance, the muscles isn't strong enough to regain it, and you wind up pulling it.\n\nWhen your muscles are strong enough to prevent this, you are less likely to be injured.\n\nAlso, \"healthy\" typically means nothing is wrong with you. \"Fit\" is more about the condition of your muscles. There are plenty of very unhealthy weightlifters.\n\n",
"To answer part 2, yoga is more than just fancy stretching. It's intensely physical and attacks the small connecting muscle groups that are woefully underused in most people. Physically it will make you stronger (especially in the core and lower body), more flexible, and better balanced. Mentally, most people get an intense feeling of relaxation/satisfaction from a good yoga session. And you don't need to buy into the spiritual part if that's not your thing.\n\nI highly, highly recommend going to a few beginner classes if you've never done yoga before. The chicks are hot too (I'm a dude).\n\nPS do the ohms, they're not stupid, they make you feel ridiculously good for some reason",
"The doctor means you don't show any or many classic risk factors for health problems later in life. Basically, you're not overweight, you don't smoke, drink or do drugs. I doubt the doctor really knows if you are entirely healthy. In nursing school they teach us that health/wellness is multifaceted - physical, emotional, spiritual, occupational wellness. Questions I'd ask myself if I wasn't sure if I was healthy... Do I eat a healthy diet (a good mix of carbs, protein and fat, as well as lots of vitamins and minerals, food closer to how it was grown and less processed)? Am I active most days of the week? (It is generally recommended to do a variety of activities. For me, it's yoga and bike riding and hiking. Some people prioritize lifting or running. Just don't put all your workout eggs in one basket.) Do I have enough energy to do what I need to do? Am I emotionally healthy (good, positive relationships, a support system, acknowledgement of my own emotions)? Am I happy with my lot in life? Is it about changing my perspective or changing my situation? Do I feel challenged? How do I handle stress?\n\nMy point is, healthy is holistic. Healthy is a balance of all the different things a human needs. If you think that putting on some muscle is a goal you want for yourself, great. But I wouldn't only weight train, I would do other activities as well. If you are obsessed about putting on muscle and it becomes the end-all and be-all of your life, you are probably pretty unbalanced and I would consider that unhealthy.\n\nEach of the different types of exercise have different health benefits. It really is best to get a mix. "
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2vlxa7 | why can i tell how full a container is by the pitch of the liquid that is falling in it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2vlxa7/eli5_why_can_i_tell_how_full_a_container_is_by/ | {
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"score": [
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"text": [
"As you add water to the container, the resonant cavity gets smaller and smaller, meaning the natural frequency gets higher and higher."
]
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[]
] |
||
1srca2 | why aren't mirrors a cure for nearsightedness? | When I look in a mirror, all the images I see are right in front of me, displayed on the mirror, sometimes four inches away from my face depending on how close I get to it. I can see things from this distance perfectly fine; my short-range vision is superb.
However, when I look through a mirror at images of things which are far away from me -- perhaps 5 or more feet behind me -- they still appear just as blurry to me as if I was just turned around looking at them. Why is this? Shouldn't the mirror correct this by having the image be incredibly close to me, thereby making it possible for me to see it clearly? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1srca2/eli5_why_arent_mirrors_a_cure_for_nearsightedness/ | {
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"text": [
"It is just reflecting light, a mirror is not a lense so what you see in it is what you would normally see.",
"the light still travels the same distance, it doesn' t just appear on the mirror , just look at your own face then take steps back until you can't accurately see it anymore",
"If you stand 10 feet away from a mirror, your reflection will appear 20ft away. \n\nImage this. You stand 10 feet away and hold a 10 ft Ruler so that it is straight and touches the mirror. What do you see? You see your ruler leading to the mirror, then your reflection's ruler leading to your reflection. That means your reflection appears 20ft away",
"The proper method for determining how far away an object in a mirror is from your eye is to add together the distance from the object to the mirror and the distance from the mirror to your eye. So the mirror actually *adds to the distance* the near-sighted eye is dealing with."
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2sb9nh | what awas the original cocktail? and why/how was it invented?? | If you have any details regarding the story behind it, it would be great. Plus I wanna drink this so… | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2sb9nh/eli5_what_awas_the_original_cocktail_and_whyhow/ | {
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"The answer to this is unknown. According to [Wikipedia](_URL_0_):\n\n > The Oxford English dictionary cites the word as originating in the U.S. The first recorded use of the word cocktail as a beverage (possibly non-alcoholic) in the United States appears in The Farmer's Cabinet on April 28, 1803:\n\n > > Drank a glass of cocktail—excellent for the head...Call'd at the Doct's. found Burnham—he looked very wise—drank another glass of cocktail.\n\n > The first definition of cocktail known to be an alcoholic beverage appeared in the May 13, 1806, edition of The Balance and Columbian Repository, a publication in Hudson, New York, in which an answer was provided to the question, \"What is a cocktail?\". The editor Harry Croswell replied:\n\n > > Cock-tail is a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water, and bitters—it is vulgarly called bittered sling, and is supposed to be an excellent electioneering potion, in as much as it renders the heart stout and bold, at the same time that it fuddles the head. It is said, also to be of great use to a democratic candidate: because a person, having swallowed a glass of it, is ready to swallow any thing else.\n\nSo \"cocktail\" was used to describe some unknown, possibly non-alcoholic beverage in 1803, and by 1806, it was used a generic term for an entire class of mixed drinks. So there's no known \"original cocktail\" recipe."
]
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[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocktail#Etymology"
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|
bi5bsj | what is my body doing with caffeine free diet cola? | With no sugar or caffeine is my body actually using anything besides the water? What happens to the rest of the ingredients and do they have any negative effects? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bi5bsj/eli5_what_is_my_body_doing_with_caffeine_free/ | {
"a_id": [
"ely66s0"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"There are usually some salts and small amounts of other minerals your body can make use of, but most of what's in there is just coming right out the other end."
]
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[]
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|
7udu6s | why are there still around 20 cases of polio per year? why not zero, or thousands? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7udu6s/eli5_why_are_there_still_around_20_cases_of_polio/ | {
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"There are not thousands because the vaccine is cheap, safe, effective, and widespread.\n\nThere are not zero because there are some parents who do not vaccinate their children. This is especially a problem in areas where the poliovirus is endemic.",
"So one reason polio cases are low now is because one type of the vaccine that is commonly used in areas that still have cases - the Sabin - is a live attenuated vaccine that can be transmitted to others. When that weakened form of the virus is passed it essentially vaccinates other people. This is a pretty cool example of a true herd immunity effect.\n\nNot to be confused with the idea that if enough people get vaccinated then non-vaccinated are “shielded” - in epidemiology this is called herd protection. \n\nWith true herd immunity we essentially vaccinate others around us in the same manner that the virus spreads. Thus polio rates are kept lower than they would be otherwise."
]
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2hq0hc | what determines your vocal range? as in, why can some people cover multiple octaves when a typical range is only 1.5? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2hq0hc/eli5_what_determines_your_vocal_range_as_in_why/ | {
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"Your voice box is a controllable resonant cavity. By changing the stiffness and shape of the cavity, you can change the resonant frequency and thus what sounds are emitted. Blowing air through your voice box introduces broad band sound energy, but energy at the resonant frequencies will be stored more than dissipated, so it will be heard.\n\nYou use muscles to change both the stiffness and shape of your voice box. In the same way that some people are able to write very neat cursive sentences, people must practice and train their singing muscles to perform the task.\n\nThe connection between resonant frequencies and stiffness in a mechanical system is square root, if you double the stiffness of a guitar string the frequency increases by root 2 or 41%. Assuming there is no change in geometry, increasing your range by one octave up is a doubling of frequency, which requires 4x increase in muscle stiffness. It is like being able to lift heavier weights with your throat.\n\nIn reality, the voice box is complex and includes tubes of different sizes, as well as interaction with the tongue and teeth to produce the full frequency range of speech. People with a 5-6 octave ranges are truly in tune with their whole respiratory system in terms of controlling the relative size of various cavities."
]
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||
71hok2 | what causes an engine (in a manual transmission car) to stall when trying to drive away? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/71hok2/eli5_what_causes_an_engine_in_a_manual/ | {
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" > But I still don't understand what causes the engine to actually stall, and how the various techniques prevent that.\n\nAn engine uses the force of burning gasoline to in turn compress more air and gasoline for combustion. The excess force of this process is bled off in order to propel the vehicle and power its systems.\n\nWhen you stall the engine you are pulling too much energy from the engine which doesn't leave enough to compress the air and gallons for the next cycle. You didn't just take the excess, you took energy that was needed to keep it going.\n\nTechniques to avoid this are generally either not engaging the clutch fully and so reducing the energy drawn away, or revving the engine so there is more excess energy available."
]
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||
6mytm9 | how do share prices actually change in real time? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6mytm9/eli5_how_do_share_prices_actually_change_in_real/ | {
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"There is no \"algorithm\". The share price listed is simply the last price that a trade was executed at. It doesn't have any deeper meaning on the face, its just a general indicator of the amount that last transaction occurred at.\n\nAny buyer or seller could (and do!) name *any* price they wish to buy or sell at. The share price listed just helps you judge what others have recently bought/sold at.\n\nThe exchange's purpose to to match a buyer and seller who want to execute at the same price. So if I want to sell at $10 and a buyer wants to buy at $10, it will match us.\n\n"
]
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|
ernysc | why are cpus sold as chips and gpus sold as graphics cards? | In desktop PCs, basically all CPUs are just the chips which you can then place on the motherboard. GPUs are sold as graphics cards like the 2080 Ti. Why is this and what is the purpose? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ernysc/eli5_why_are_cpus_sold_as_chips_and_gpus_sold_as/ | {
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"There aren't many cpu makers, and motherboard companies follow cpu regulations/data sheets when drafting their designs. They also incorporate some rarely changing standards, like ddrX ram slots, pcie connections and the like.\n\nBut pci express slots are the reason why gpu chips have to come with their own boards. Imagine if motherboard companies had to incorporate vram and other circuits specific to each gpu chip manufacturers designs. You'd have an exponential increase in board types, beyond the standard Intel vs AMD mobo. It'd be Intel processor X slot and Nvidia GPU Y slot, or Intel and AMD, then you'd have to make mobos for each number of gpu's a person might want, so an Intel X processor GPU Y x2 board etc. Marketing and manufacturing nightmare.\n\nSo considering that each pci slot is essentially an extension of certain pins on the cpu to aid in connecting complimentary cpu type stuff to it, like a gpu, mobo manufacturers decided to make a standard which puts the particulars of cpu extensions in the hands of any company willing to provide a chip, or set of chips, on some board, which fits a pci type slot for whatever purpose.\n\nIntel and AMD (and the few other cpu manufacturers that technically exist) are lucky that motherboard manufacturers didn't create a cpu slot standard that forces them both to provide their own boards/adapters to fit a \"cpu express\" slot or something like that. Instead, motherboard manufacturers decided that providing two types of each motherboard they make was doable. So you see either Intel based, or AMD based motherboards, all with the same kind of pci/pcie slots for expansion of each cpu. And in turn, gpu manufacturers provide their own boards, along with any other manufacturers of various expansions, like USB slot expansions, wifi chip expansions, audio processing, ethernet cards, Bluetooth cards, custom made security devices, etc.",
"Historically, Intel sold their CPU chips at such a high price that motherboard manufacturers couldn't afford to put them on the board. As they were in control of the market, they arranged to sell the support chips cheaply and sell CPU chips at inflated retail prices. This also allows motherboard purchasers to select from CPUs of various performance levels, and rarely, to upgrade systems with new CPUs. They was a short time that Intel sold CPU modules, but it wasn't the best choice for maximizing Intel profits and disappeared. At one time, AMD and others made CPU chips that were pin compatible with Intel's, but Intel kept rapidly changing chip interfaces to prevent that developing as a competitive path. Now, there are Intel motherboards and AMD motherboards with no effort to make pin compatible CPU chips happening.\n\nGraphics cards have never been standardized at the chip level, there being multiple manufacturers that split the market. They also need substantial amount of memory chips, and high end designs even need multiple PC cards or even multiple graphics cards with private interconnect buses.",
"I think there's some truth in the other answers, but I think it's mainly just tradition. Before GPUs, CPUs went into motherboards in the CPU slot and graphics cards went into a PCI slot along with network cards and whatnot. When GPUs appeared they were bound to the video system to do 3D graphics, so went on the video card rather than needing a new kind of motherboard with GPU slots. Many other computer architectures (not PCs) have a system where there's no CPU/RAM on the motherboard and you plug CPUs in on cards - PCs could go that way again (the Pentium 2 was a bit like that)."
]
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7fqeaa | why sampling in music is generally acceptable while plagiarism in written works is such a big deal. | Why is it that a musician can sample large portions of someone else's song while an author cannot take a portion of someone else's written work? If the resulting work is sufficiently different and has a recognizable source, what's the big deal? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7fqeaa/eli5_why_sampling_in_music_is_generally/ | {
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"In both cases, only a very tiny sample is acceptable, and even then, if it forms a key part of the resulting work, the original creator may sue for (and win) payment.",
"Sampling in music is typically done with permission and paid royalties, or obfuscated to the point where it is no longer recognizable. Either that or it's low-key enough/doesn't make enough money to go after.",
"Plagirism is taking someone elses work for your own.\n\nSampling is not supposed to be that way.",
"Sampling is done with some form of permission (or, at least, with a credit to the original).\n\nPlagiarism is where you're not crediting the original, and in so doing you're passing off someone else's work as your own.",
"Sampling is acceptable because the people doing the sampling have gotten clearance for the samples & pay some sort of royalties to the original artists. [Due to a series of court battles in the 80s](_URL_0_), it's pretty much impossible to do *any* degree of sampling without having the samples cleared anymore.\n\nPlagiarism is, by definition, taking somebody else's work *without crediting them or getting permission*.",
"As already stated, musical sampling typically starts off with getting permission and some revenue sharing.\n\nAlso the nature of a novel means that the author can't just take a passage and graft it onto his own story. People so rarely buy a 300 page novel because they really like one chapter. \n\nMeanwhile people might like the beat of a song. Or the hook. Blurred Lines sounds just like a Marvin Gaye song, so his estate won that lawsuit."
]
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_issues_surrounding_music_sampling"
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n1ot6 | how southwest airlines hedges their fuel expenses? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/n1ot6/eli5_how_southwest_airlines_hedges_their_fuel/ | {
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"Fuel Hedging is a contractual tool some large fuel consuming companies, such as airlines, use to reduce their exposure to volatile and potentially rising fuel costs. A fuel hedge contract allows a large fuel consuming company to establish a fixed or capped cost, via a commodity swap or option. Large fuel consuming companies enter into hedging contracts to mitigate their exposure to future fuel prices that may be higher than current prices and/or to establish a known fuel cost for budgeting purposes. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel swap and the price of fuel declines, the company will effectively be forced to pay an above-market rate for fuel. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel call option and the price of fuel increases, the company will receive a return on the option that offsets their actual cost of fuel. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel call option, which requires an upfront premium cost, much like insurance, and the price of fuel decreases, the company will not receive a return on the option but they will benefit from buying fuel at the then lower cost.\n\n**TL;DR they buy large amounts hoping that the price will go up (saving them money), and only loose money if it goes down**",
"Fuel Hedging is a contractual tool some large fuel consuming companies, such as airlines, use to reduce their exposure to volatile and potentially rising fuel costs. A fuel hedge contract allows a large fuel consuming company to establish a fixed or capped cost, via a commodity swap or option. Large fuel consuming companies enter into hedging contracts to mitigate their exposure to future fuel prices that may be higher than current prices and/or to establish a known fuel cost for budgeting purposes. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel swap and the price of fuel declines, the company will effectively be forced to pay an above-market rate for fuel. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel call option and the price of fuel increases, the company will receive a return on the option that offsets their actual cost of fuel. If a large fuel consuming company buys a fuel call option, which requires an upfront premium cost, much like insurance, and the price of fuel decreases, the company will not receive a return on the option but they will benefit from buying fuel at the then lower cost.\n\n**TL;DR they buy large amounts hoping that the price will go up (saving them money), and only loose money if it goes down**"
]
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||
2jp1yj | why are some guns "effective" at medium to long range, but considered not "effective" at short rage? | Say a rifle has a effective range of medium to long, but not short/close? The round would still have kinetic energy to penetrate the target. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2jp1yj/eli5_why_are_some_guns_effective_at_medium_to/ | {
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"Let's take an extreme example: a .50 cal sniper rifle. That thing is super heavy, is slow to reload, and has a huge long barrel. Now imagine you're inside a house. That barrel would keep bumping into things, the weight really isn't made to be carried around and shot from a standing position, and if you shoot, you're unleashing so much energy that you're going to pierce walls, blindly hurting and breaking whatever is behind it.\n\nWill it kill at close range? you betcha. But is it an effective weapon to use at close range? Really not. You can apply this same logic to more reasonable weapons, such as rifles"
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|
1i45rl | abenomics and japan | I'm really into international politics and keeping my finger on the pulse of things in that regard, but I lack the knowledge of Economics to understand the more complex aspects of it. Abenomics, as you know if you're answering, is one of the biggest issues in relation to Japan, but I can't begin to understand what decisions with their fiscal and monetary policy actually do. I've got a basic idea of microeconomic principles, but economics at the national level continue to elude me. If someone could explain this enigma to me, I would be really grateful. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1i45rl/eli5_abenomics_and_japan/ | {
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"Abenomics has one goal: to increase *private* investment. So all policies are aimed towards this goal. There is also the fact that China took over Japan's spot as the second largest economy. That lends more of a personal reason to invigorate the economy for most Japanese as well.\n\n(As a side note, 'economics at the national level' macroeconomics.)\n\nSo how does a country do this?\n\nJapan specifically does the following things:\n\n* **Yen Correction**. During the run up to the Lost Decade, the Yen's value experienced huge growth (for a variety of reasons). This gave consumers more purchasing power, but made it harder to export goods. By correcting this and creating a weak Yen, it makes it easier for Japanese companies to export, leading to growth.\n* **Public Investment**. This is a pretty standard depression measure. If the economy is doing bad, invest in public works to give people jobs and improve infrastructure, creating demand and causing growth.\n* **Inflation and Interest Rate Manipulation** Interest Rates and Inflation Rates tend to be inversely related. Japan has set a Target Inflation Rate of around 2% So, by manipulating the rate at which the central bank lends to private banks, they hope to set inflation at around 2%. Since economists know what the target inflation rate is, and they know what the government has to do to get it there, it allows them to plan further in the future by having a reasonable guess of what the interest rate at that time will be. Basically, it stabilises the economy by making it easier to guess.\n* **Quantitive Easing**. This is an interesting one that is also being used in the United States. Typical monetary policy states that to increase the money supply, a government buys or sells government issued treasury bonds. QE goes further, by having the *government buy or sell **company** issued bonds*. This is used when monetary policy is no longer effective due to short-term interest rates already being at unsustainable levels.\n\n(If you need more clarification on any, ask).\n\nAll in all, these measures make it easy for companies to invest in capital, thus leading to more goods being made, thus leading to more jobs, leading to more demand, leading to a growing economy.\n\nMake a bit more sense now?"
]
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28m1ox | are all humans related? | Do we all come from an original source even with the huge geological barriers such as oceans or did humans all just evolve in different locations? Am I a distant cousin with anyone else or even other species? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/28m1ox/eli5are_all_humans_related/ | {
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"Yes, all humans are descended from a common human population. Furthermore, all life on Earth is related by common descent. Go far enough back and your lineage merges with that of cows, or clams, or trees, or mushrooms."
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4g1ht0 | with all the cancer research, public education and millions of deaths, why do so many people still pick up smoking cigarettes as a ling term habit? | I will say, I did smoke for almost 6 years, from 16 to 22, and have not touched one since (I'm in my 30's now). My reasoning then was "why not, I can always quit", mostly because I had no role models or adult figures in my life really paying any attention, and I was a bit self destructive... even then, I knew it was bad and it took a good 5-6 years for my lungs to really feel like they were healing and for my lung capacity to feel normal again. Is it because education still does not reach certain demographics? do people just ignore it? I am not referring to someone older who has maybe been smoking and addicted for years already, but mostly I mean younger folks who are just now being presented with life's various vices. What would make something like this appealing in 2016 with all the negativity that surrounds it?
*EDIT: Typo in title, I meant "long term habit"
*EDIT: Thank you all, there some very genuine responses in here. I would like to say, I wasn't juding anyone for the act of smoking, as I said, I smoked for several years basically because I had nothing better to do and no one caring enough about me to pay attention. It just seems like in the past decade there has been a huge surge in public outreach and anti-smoking campaigns, more so than I ever remember when I was a kid... geez, just about everyone I know even in middle school was smoking outside the shoproom hallway door lol. It seems like you hear more about it in recent years and about the drastic effect its had on social circles now that its no longer looked at as "cool" as it was in previous decades, but from everyone's responses, it seems the same old reasons are well and alive, and the human spirit lives on. Thanks for the awesome answers! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4g1ht0/eli5_with_all_the_cancer_research_public/ | {
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"Because for a long time (and probably still is), smoking is cool. Think about it, cool people smoke, rebels, fun stuff, its its own little crew at a party or work, the smoking crew.\n\nAt what point does cool overcome other stuff. Being \"cool\" is just as practical as many other aspects of life.\n\nIf we did everything and anything that was only the safest approach, our lives would all be quite dull.\n\nEdit: \"The smoking is cool\" argument gets brought up a lot. slightly off topic, There was a book some guy wrote about why doing bad things is actually better for us, \"smoking is cool\" was one of the arguments. I think he was interviewed by Jon Stewart on The Daily Show, if anyone happens to know the author I'd love to know, I can't remember it, I'd like to revisit the book.",
"Because no one really picks it up with the intention of becoming a long term habit. cigarettes aren't just a habit, they're a delivery system for a drug. As with most highly addictive drugs, it starts with \"just this one\", then you have another the next weekend, then you have a stressful day at work and decide you could use a little something to unwind, then it's every weekend and sometimes on weekdays. After a while, your tolerance builds up and next thing you know you're smoking every day. \n\nIts the same cycle every time. You know it's bad from the get go, but your infrequency of use means you don't really worry about the negative effects of addiction. It eventually turns into an addiction, and then they health effects take a back seat to feeding your addiction.\n\nSource: former pack-a-day smoker, heroin addict, overly frequent coke user, and physician enabled amphetamine addict. ",
"When I was a teenager there was a myth that smoking a cigarettes after pot would somehow push the pot into your system faster and get you higher. So we would smoke cigarettes after pot and over time I'd have one without pot and next thing you know I smoked a 1-2packs a day for 8 years. Also I've noticed a correlation between smokers that have smoker parents.",
"You make it sound like its a conscience decisions. \"I'm thinking about a new addiction, I've heard good things about the tabbaca. Gonna give it a whirl.\"\n\nBesides, that's what vice's are for..being bad.",
"I did it because it was fun and I was a delinquent in high school. Also because my parents did it.\n\nSmoked off and on for 6 years, some times chain smoking all day and others not smoking for months. I don't feel that bad... recently quit though. My situation right now leaves me with no desire to smoke. ",
"I read somewhere that it's about prioritys. Some study asked teen girls why they smoked. Most knew, somewhat, of the dangers and bad effects. It's just that they valued fitting in with the other people who smoked higher than avoiding said effects. This then creates a new group of smoking girls, which other girls want to fit in with...\n\nProbably simular for guys.",
"I'll give you my experience. I dated a smoker. I decided to try it. I won't get addicted, right? Well that turned into me joining her for a smoke every once in a while. Then I bought a pack so I wouldn't have to bum then off her. Then one day when I was bored I smoked alone. I would smoke maybe a pack a week, I wouldn't even need to go buy some right away when I ran out. Well, a few weeks of that and BAM I was full on addicted. Smoking my last cigarette in the pack makes me nervous and I need to go get more. I've been smoking a pack a day for 4 years now. Don't try a cigarette, NOT EVEN ONCE because addiction is hard to understand until it happens to you, and it creeps up on you before you even notice :(",
"Everyone has vices, and everyone does something that will kill you. This is especially true when you start looking into [micromorts](_URL_0_) - a way of measuring how much average lifespan a particular behavior removes from your life; or another way, roughly how likely you are to die from any particular thing. Riding a bike for ten to twenty miles is the same micromort risk as smoking 1.4 cigarettes. Alcohol increases your risk of cancer, flying on a plane increases your risk of cancer, etc.\n\nOf course, that doesn't take into account the *quality of life* you'll have. Even if you don't actually die from smoking, it can mess up your lungs and make you miserable in your old age. But exactly how each person defines their quality of life is up to them. Eating red meat increases your odds of cancer, but I'll be damned if I stop eating burgers and steaks. I don't eat them *every day*, but I define my quality of life with steaks to be more valuable than a longer life free of steak-caused cancer.\n\nTo that end: I enjoy the feeling nicotine gives me. I don't smoke every day (just once a week or so). I rarely smoke cigarettes, I usually smoke pipe tobacco (which still isn't good for you, but it's less not good than cigarettes). So I control the risk I'm putting myself in.\n\nJust to give some actual objectivity in this post instead of anecdotes and philosophical ramblings: studies have shown that nicotine reduces some of the symptoms of depression and anxiety, and has some other benefits like possibly reducing the risk of Parkinson's ([source](_URL_1_)). So there's actually some benefits to smoking. Do they outweigh the harm? No, probably not. But they do exist, which I think helps explain why some people still take up the habit.",
"My friends do and they would offer it to me. For a lot of people, its about fitting in (at least from where I am from, where more than half the adults smoke). I was disgusted by smoke so I never said yes. To this day.\n\nMy mom started smoking because all her dorm people were. It is more about conformity. If you are at a party, and people head out for a smoke, you are gonna be the stick in the mud if you stay inside. Or at least, you are missing out on the oppurtunities for socializing"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort",
"http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/06/opinion/sunday/can-nicotine-be-good-for-you.html?_r=0"
],
[]
] |
|
98m5ie | why do leds light up instantly while incandescent bulbs turn on with a fade | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/98m5ie/eli5_why_do_leds_light_up_instantly_while/ | {
"a_id": [
"e4h1ay1",
"e4h4zng"
],
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11,
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"text": [
"Incandescent bulbs use Tungsten filament which emits light at high temperature. The electric current heats up the filament and it takes a second for that to happen. Once heated up, it emits light.",
"And why are LEDs instantaneous? Because the current through an LED knocks loosely bound electrons away from their atoms, and in order to fall back to their lower energy state they have to emit a photon to dump the energy. \n\nBecause this effect is only due to the presence of current, and not due to incandescent heat, it starts emitting as soon as current starts flowing. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
929jpf | how antivirus sandboxes works, if it does at all? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/929jpf/eli5_how_antivirus_sandboxes_works_if_it_does_at/ | {
"a_id": [
"e34cutx"
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"text": [
"It's like parents putting a child onto a room from which it can't get out, a child can destroy stuff in that room, and do damage, but house is safe. Then you take a child out and parents fix the damage in the room.\n\nEdit: There are chances that a kid will get out of the room if he can reach the door handle."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
zvdz1 | why does winrar say it has a 40 day trial yet, never runs out? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zvdz1/eli5_why_does_winrar_say_it_has_a_40_day_trial/ | {
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"text": [
"Damn I hope someone answers this one. ",
"Great question - I wonder if anybody actually pays for it?",
"Because fuck WinZip.\n\nThat's why!",
"winRAR lets you continue to use it even after the 40 day trial has ended because that's the best way for them to make money.\n\nIf winRAR really only had a 40-day trial, and you had to buy the program after that 40-day trial, less people would use winRAR and therefore it wouldn't be as well-known, therefore less people would use it and less people would buy it.\n\nIf winRAR said that it was completely free, they wouldn't get any money at all.\n\nThe way winRAR is right now, it is extremely widely used, and therefore they get many users who actually pay for the program and give the developers money because either 1. The users don't realize they can continue using it after the 40 days, or 2. The users feel obligated to pay because they aren't comfortable exploiting the fact that you can continue using the software.\n\nTLDR: They are trying to make you feel like you have to pay while still controlling most of the market share.",
"Use 7zip instead"
]
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[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
3ai5dc | how did banana peels get the bad reputation of being slippery? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ai5dc/eli5_how_did_banana_peels_get_the_bad_reputation/ | {
"a_id": [
"csctwgc"
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"text": [
"Their reputation came from widespread use in early Slapstick routines but Mythbusters showed that they are actually slippery (if you have a whole floor of them anyway). _URL_0_"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84rIcFwp3Z4"
]
] |
||
52kphj | how can a usb transfer power and transfer data? how does it know which one to do? | Also, I feel like if it's constantly pumping out power, if I plug in something that doesn't need power like a USB, it would fry it.
How does it know if it should charge something (like a Bluetooth headset), transfer data to it (USB) or both (cellphone)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/52kphj/eli5_how_can_a_usb_transfer_power_and_transfer/ | {
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"text": [
"There are power and data lines inside the cable. When a usb cord is plugged in, the two devices tell each other what they are using the data transfer part of the cable. If one says \"I'm a phone\" and the other says \"I'm a charger\" then it will just happily pull power through the power part of the cable. If you plug it into a computer, it will offer you the option of using the data lines to transfer information while also charging on the power lines. ",
"In you comment you include \"like a USB,\" which is confusing. I take it to mean. like a memory device.\n\nThe specifications for a USB includes providing voltage at a specified range and enough current to power small devices. Just because the voltage is there does not mean that current will flow. Think of having a light plugged into an electrical outlet. You can switch off the light. No current flows. The light is off. Any device which needs no power will not be drawing a current. Memory devices may need this voltage to operate. Almost no current is required. I have a hard drive which will plug into a USB outlet and it requires no external power source. It draws enough from the USB outlet. I have an older one which does require a power supply and the USB outlet. Its motor needs more power than USB supplies.\n\nThere are several contacts on the USB specification. Some are for data. Some for power.\n\nNo the USB does not constantly pump out power just because something is plugged into it. Does a desk lamp constantly draw current? No. Only when it is switched on. And one side is set up to supply some power. The other device draws what it needs. No real communication is needed.",
"USB has four pins, one of which transfers power and another which is ground. If something doesn't accept power then it can just not connect anything to that pin internally.\n\nThe data connection pins can also communicate that more power should be supplied to charge faster or supply more power-hungry devices, over the standard low power supply.",
"USB cables have multiple lines. Two are for power (+5V and a ground) and two are for data. \n\n5 volts isn't really enough to fry anything that has been designed or manufactured properly. \n\nFor micro-USB chargers/cables for cell phones and tablets, they'll have the +5V line and the ground. Better chargers will have the data lines and will actually talk to/communicate with the device - without this, you sometimes get a message like \"I can charge from this, but you should use the charger/cable that came in the box\".... i.e. the device tried talking to the charger, found it wasn't from the same vendor. When the device and the charger talk and realize they're compatible, sometimes this means the device will charge faster. USB by default is limited to only a few hundred milliamps of current. But if a tablet and charger (or a USB host like a laptop) communicate then they can negotiate a higher current, up to 2A, thus charging your device faster.\n\nUSB drivers on devices like tablets or phones understand \"device mode\" i.e. I'm the dumb device, Im connecting to a host like a computer and it will tell me what to do, \"host mode\" i.e. I'm the master/smart device, other things will connect to me but I'm in charge, or more recently USB OtG or On The Go - two USB devices are peers, they talk and work out amongst themselves who is host and who is \"device\", depending on what the user is trying to do. But all of these modes require the data lines for communications. If you have only a dumb charging cable, your device will only provide or receive +5V at some base 2-300mA. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
8idox2 | why updating my game doesn’t increase the amount of storage it uses | So I’ve had Fortnite on my Xbox for a really long time now. And when I first installed it, it was about 9 GB. Every week there is a 1-9 GB update and every couple months a really big one.
How come after all this time the amount of storage it takes is only about 15GB instead of something like 80GB. Please explain | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8idox2/eli5_why_updating_my_game_doesnt_increase_the/ | {
"a_id": [
"dyqwlg4"
],
"score": [
11
],
"text": [
"Because the updates *replace* some of the existing components, rather than simply being added to them.\n\nIt might be that there's a bug in some of the code, so that buggy code gets thrown out and new code gets put there instead without the bug.\n\nOr it might be that an image gets improved, so the old image gets thrown out and the new image gets used instead."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
|
1wma0g | why (near) perpetual motion car is not possible. | Since perpetual is assumed impossible, why could we still not use alternators, solar and wind power to power an electric car to make the battery stay charged longer, not indefinitely?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1wma0g/eli5_why_near_perpetual_motion_car_is_not_possible/ | {
"a_id": [
"cf3bneh",
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"text": [
"Solar and wind power generation aren't very efficient, so you're not talking about that much capacity on a car sized implementation -- not enough power generated to make it worth it.",
"Wind, in particular, would produce more drag on the car than it would give you in energy. You'd *lose* efficiency putting a windmill on a car.",
"Solar power is the only promising possibility, as you're taking \"free\" energy from the sun and converting it to useable power. But isn't very efficient yet, and the needed components add noticeable weight. Thus the charging rate of a car completely covered in solar panels still isn't enough to power the motors to move the car forward. It can be a net positive to add to other systems, but it ends up being a very small gain.\n\nAlternators need rotation to make power - where does that rotation come from? If it's tied to the engine or wheels, then you're still gonna make less energy than the engines are consuming, plus adding drag to the engine, meaning it needs more power to move the car forward than it would without the alternators, so you end up with a net loss.\n\nSame with wind power - the wind pushes on the blades to turn them, but that also pushes the entire car backwards, against the direction you want to go. The engine needs more energy to overcome this, giving a net loss.\n\nTL;DR: Theory is nice, but in the real world efficiency, friction losses and heat losses mean you get less energy out in useable power than you put in to make the system work.\n"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
1z373n | how can using a public wi-fi signal be dangerous for security on your devices? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1z373n/eli5_how_can_using_a_public_wifi_signal_be/ | {
"a_id": [
"cfq2s1w",
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"text": [
"They can hack your computer by spoofing webpages that will download malware or phish. They can access your personal computer a lot easier without having to deal with ports and such because you are connected to the same network.",
"Two main reasons:\n\n1. If your device can use the wi-fi to connect outside, then other devices on the same wi-fi network can possibly connect to your device. If the device you are using or its operating system has a security flaw, this can be used to hack into your device by anyone else who is currently connected to this network.\n\n2. The wireless router can see and control everything that your device sends and receives. Unless you're using a secure connection, it can either record everything you send, or worse - it can send you fake webpages in order to get you to send it your passwords.",
"One of the major problems with low security networks, is that someone may perform a \"Man-in-the-middle\" (\"MITM\") attack. This can happen on both wired and wireless networks.\n\nLast year, the European Parliament had to close off it's public WiFi due to this exact type of attack.\n\nSince Wikipedia had an easy explanation of MITM, I will just paste from it:\n\n\"The man-in-the-middle attack (often abbreviated MITM, MitM, MIM, MiM, MITMA) in cryptography and computer security is a form of active eavesdropping in which the attacker makes independent connections with the victims and relays messages between them, making them believe that they are talking directly to each other over a private connection, when in fact the entire conversation is controlled by the attacker. The attacker must be able to intercept all messages going between the two victims and inject new ones, which is straightforward in many circumstances (for example, an attacker within reception range of an unencrypted Wi-Fi wireless access point, can insert himself as a man-in-the-middle)\"\n\nPerforming this type of an attack is also really, really easy, hard to avoid and not (very) obvious for users. When I worked as an IT Tech when I was younger, we used to fuck with our boss, whom had no idea this was even possible. Logged everything he did, logged direct messaging, spoofed his DNS, shut off his internet connectivity, etc. Fun times!\n\nEDIT: Source link for the EU Parliament attack: _URL_0_\nWikipedia page about MITM attacks: _URL_1_"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[
"http://www.techweekeurope.co.uk/news/european-parliament-wi-fi-man-in-the-middle-attack-132795",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-in-the-middle_attack"
]
] |
||
42vsh7 | does anyone know why some penguins 'commit suicide'? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/42vsh7/eli5_does_anyone_know_why_some_penguins_commit/ | {
"a_id": [
"czdjunt",
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"text": [
"Its only be observed, nobody quite knows why this behavior happens. Penguins are socialble birds, it is believed they experience depression after a loss of a mate and a mix of that, and disorientation will send them to wonder off into the wilds and untimatly die. Its been noted that even if a Penguin is brought back to the pack of other penguins it will still remove itself from the group with the mindset of killing itself. Its a really weird mystery! ",
"Well, the content of the conversations get lost in translation. It's tough to say, but likely existential loneliness.",
"It's not entirely certain but it's probably similar to why humans do. \n\nTo start, penguins don't live in the most forgiving environments. Food isn't always easy to get and for long periods of times it's extremely cold. To add to this penguins live in large, social groups. Penguins can be ostracized for a number of things like having a different appearance. If this is the case, this makes it hard for them to find a mate. When they have no mate or offspring to take care of, there isn't really much for them to do.\n\nSo a combination of the harsh environment and not \"fitting in\" and not having a purpose is something that can lead them into not having the will to live anymore. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[]
] |
||
4cgmer | why are laptop prices still so high? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4cgmer/eli5_why_are_laptop_prices_still_so_high/ | {
"a_id": [
"d1hyp51"
],
"score": [
3
],
"text": [
"That's really not the case. Just from a quick search on NewEgg, There are 14\" Lenovo Thinkpads (i5 6200U, 4GB RAM, 1TB HD, 1080P screen) for $499.\n\nIt's also worth noting that comparing a 2.3ghz i5-6200U is not an apples-to-apples to the i5-2430 at 2.4ghz. Clock speed is not the only thing that matters when you are talking about processors."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
||
21f50j | why do partially charged devices believe themselves to be more charged than they really are? | My cell phone takes about 30 minutes to charge. If I unplug it after 10, it will show maximum charge bars. Then, a couple hours later, it will come to its senses and show the actual amount of charge that it received.
I feel like a similar phenomenon has been happening ever since first seeing rechargeable appliances in the 90s. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/21f50j/eli5_why_do_partially_charged_devices_believe/ | {
"a_id": [
"cgcg9oj"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"The charge \"percent\" is only an rough guess. Phones use lithium ion batteries that start at 4.2volts fully charged and will shut down around 3-3.4 volts depending on the type and usage(usually 3.3v). The reason the guestimation is rough is a combination of many things: First, the voltage drop isn't uniform. I'm not gonna google it but iirc, something like 80% of the capacity will be above 3.8 volts, which intuitively one would expect 3.7-3.8 to be 50%. Second, most cell phones do a rapid charge (0-80%) in 30-60 minutes and then the same amount of time to top it off. This is partly because it is very dangerous to over charge a lithium battery. Third, the batteries slowly degrade with each charge cycle, although with modern li-on batteries it can take 2-3 years of daily charges before it's noticeable. \n\n\nFinally, if you ever get a software update for your phone this can impact your battery life. You have all the natural physics of the battery working against increasing demands of software. It is easy to see how the phone can lose the ability to predict exactly how much longer the battery will last. "
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
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