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7dvd9n | why is it so difficult to type (i.e. move your fingers quickly and precisely, or even at all) when your hands are very cold? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7dvd9n/eli5_why_is_it_so_difficult_to_type_ie_move_your/ | {
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"When cold, your body reduces blood flow to extremities such as the fingers to conserve heat. This makes the nerves in the fingers less responsive, thus the numb feeling you get as well as the difficulty in making them move with the same agility as when warm.",
"There's a fluid in the joints known as synovial fluid that becomes more viscous (thicker) at lower temperatures. This thickness of the fluid contributes to the rigidity experienced when your hands are cold. ",
"In the sodium-ion channels that control our muscles, the conductance increases steeply with temperature. Electrically speaking, warmer is better with \"wet\" electrical signals.\n\nThe Canadian pianist Glenn Gould was famously concerned about his hands. He liked to soak his hands in hot water to warm them before he played",
"There are position or “angle” sensors in your joints. That’s how you know roughly where your hands are when your eyes are closed. Your brain depends on the feedback from those sensors to control your muscles. When cold, those sensors send delayed signals. The result is much smaller movements of your muscles. The effect is similar to what happens when you use a “speech jammer” app.",
"Body pulls fluids to your core when you get cold, this lessens perfusion to your extremities. This lack of blood flow increases metabolic waste build up and lessens the available energy and oxygen. Also the lower temperatures inhibit some enzyme function..these multiple processes among others can continue to worsen until difficult movement becomes a complete inability for the affected areas to function",
"As a musician (specifically a strings player) cold hands are literally the devil. You get less blood flow, and your muscles become a lot less efficient. Your nerves (which are numb, because cold) refuse to send signals fast enough to do things that require a lot of dexterity (AKA texting or playing the bass)",
"The same problem occurs while writing too. Many exams are conducted in freezing halls and it's really annoying.",
"Used to run warm/hot sink water over my hands before I'd play piano. Even when they didn't feel cold I always played better or 'learned' a song quicker after doing that. ",
"Related: why does the cold make my arthritis worse? ",
"When we’re cold, our body decides to reduce blood flow to the muscles as a defense mechanism. That way they get cold quicker, but in the event of freezing to death, you’d stay alive longer.\n\nThis phenomenon is why we see people vigorously warming up or moving before exercising in cold weather, to force blood flow to the muscles so as to combat this effect."
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2pv9lq | when certain drugs become legal will the drug dogs be able to be trained to not search for that scent? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2pv9lq/eli5_when_certain_drugs_become_legal_will_the/ | {
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"No. You can't train a dog to not search for a scent or train the to search for a scent. You need to understand they are trained to alert police of the scent, not to search for it. Dogs naturally search for scents. What will most likely happen is the dogs will be retrained to not alert officers of that scent and ignore it."
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5kho0z | why do some words, such as queue, have "useless" letters behind the pronounced "q'' | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5kho0z/eli5_why_do_some_words_such_as_queue_have_useless/ | {
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"They're usually loanwords. Queue is a loanword from French, and French is absolutely chock full of silent letters. For example, \"qu'est-ce que c'est?\" (Literally \"What is it?\") is pronounced like \"keska say.\"",
"Search past posts for \"silent letters\" to get some really detailed explanations. But basically as words and languages evolved, these artifacts remain."
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2730vv | how do old tv shows and commercials get onto youtube? | I'll take away the smartass answer first: yes I know they uploaded.
My question is more how this old content is available in the first place. TV shows from the '60s or whenever make sense to me; there are seemingly DVDs of everything these days and I know the process of ripping DVDs is relatively easy.
Commercials are a different story though. Are there redditors out there with tapes from the '80s that they're finding in storage and uploading somehow? If I find an old VHS with a 1985 Nintendo commercial on it, how would I go about digitizing it to be uploaded? How is this "original" content available to be converted in the first place?
I would assume that it's the same process that's followed when you take old 8mm reels in to get digitized. However, even though I've had that done, I realize I have zero clue how they did it. Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2730vv/eli5_how_do_old_tv_shows_and_commercials_get_onto/ | {
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"Taking a video tape and digitizing it is as simple as putting it in a VCR that instead of having an output to a television, goes into a computer which can write it to disk. The cards that would handle such a conversion are not standard equipment on modern computers, but are readily available on the open market.\n\nDigitizing film is a different process. In essence the film is fed through a flatbed scanner that lights it from behind and takes a digital photograph of each frame in the reel.",
" > Are there redditors out there with tapes from the '80s that they're finding in storage and uploading somehow?\n\nRedditors? Maybe, maybe not.\n\nPeople in general? Absolutely. My parents still have some old VHS tapes from that era.\n\nThere are services that will do VHS > digital, or you can literally buy a USB VHS device that can be used like a capture card to record them to a PC."
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2cn8tw | why do people generally dislike piers morgan? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2cn8tw/eli5_why_do_people_generally_dislike_piers_morgan/ | {
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"Because he's a self-righteous idiot. Even when he's right, you still want to punch him in the face for being such a douche about it.",
"I don't know what you're talking about. He's very, very nice and never interrupts people.",
"Because he's a cunt. \n\n",
"I don't watch his show, so I don't have any strong feelings about him. From what I have heard from other people, there are two major complaints:\n\n1) Back when he was in the UK, he had a reputation for publishing inaccurate, sensationalist content as news.\n\n2) On his show in the US, he is viewed as arrogant and condescending to guests. ",
"Zero self-deprecation. I can take someone being pushy and serious at times, but you have to mix that with a little humility. He ain't got any of that.",
"Something about wiretapping when he worked for the Daily mirror. ",
"Because hes a cunt?\n\nI had a good laugh when he was trying to lecture you yanks on gun control haha!",
"Because when he was editor of the Daily Mirror he allowed hoax photos of military personnel abusing an Iraqi to be published claiming them to be real despite the fact there were a number of glaring errors in the shots. \nThe Queen's Lancashire Regiment claimed that this had damaged their reputation and put British service men and women in danger. \n\nEDIT: He was fired for this after the paper conceded the photos were not real."
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3wag3q | do police provide medical assistance immediately after shooting someone? | In several videos I've seen in the media, when police shoot or otherwise disable suspects they don't appear to render medical assistance once the suspect is down on the ground. Is this standard procedure for police departments? (Please keep responses non-political in keeping with the rules of this subreddit. I'm really just asking about police procedures.) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3wag3q/eli5_do_police_provide_medical_assistance/ | {
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"Police officers first attempt to make sure the area is secure, including that the suspect is no longer a danger, before calling for assistance and then rendering any medical assistance if possible. The officer's safety is primary--if the officer gets injured, too, there's no one left to offer help.\n\nBut it's important to know that know that police officers have only limited first aid training, and there is only so much that you can do as an amateur for someone who took a few rounds to chest.",
"If the cops shoot somebody their first concern is how likely the person is to fight back. If the person is on the floor unmoving then they are obviously not going to fight back. If they're still moving around/fighting they're going to restrain the person first. The next concern isn't the perp's safety and well-being, though; it's securing the area and prepping for the Emergency Medical response team. Then they may begin to do what they can to help the person. As a cop, you generally don't have neoprene gloves on or any kind of tools to keep you from getting the person's blood etc all over your hands. This could lead to spread of diseases (especially STDs and STIs) and is risky for a cop to do that when in probably about 5 minutes in urban areas and maybe 15-20 minutes in more rural areas the EMS team will be there. It's one of those things better left to the professionals for both your well-being and the well-being of the perp (cops could easily screw up and cause more damage than intended since their knowledge is probably limited to basic first aid and CPR). Also, if they don't need the person alive it's not their prerogative to keep them alive per se.",
"Once it has been determined that someone presents enough of a threat for deadly force to be needed, a policeman's first obligation is to protect themselves and those around them. Just because someone has been shot doesn't mean they no longer present a threat.\n\nAlso note that police as a rule do not have the sort of medical training needed to care for a gunshot victim. Attempting to do so could make things worse, or expose them to legal action."
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17p7z9 | barometric pressure and old injuries | Why do some people feel (or claim to feel) changes in barometric pressure in their joints or in old injuries? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/17p7z9/barometric_pressure_and_old_injuries/ | {
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"I am one of those people, i can feel it in my shoulder sometimes. normally, it's in a joint that is damaged, usually a type of arthritis. changes in barometric pressure make nerves more sensitive, and because those joints are already damaged, they start hurting more than normal.",
"When it's about to storm or conditions are taking a turn for the worse, the baro pressure usually drops. The heart, on the other hand, usually pumps at the same pressure all the time. When the heart is pumping against less outside pressure, it can cause some areas to expand slightly leading to less drainage and very slight inflamation. This leads to slight stiffness and aches.\n\nIt's not quite the same thing, but astronauts report head congestion and stuffiness when blood isnt held down by gravity and pools to their head. A drop in baro pressure allows blood to pool slightly in joints/extremities or other areas with damaged vessels and reduced flow (like an injury). But in orbit or in a hurricane..the body adjusts after a day or two."
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3c4wgc | what stops people with insurance on their phones from just saying they lost it and getting a new one for a friend? | T-Mobiles coverage covers lost phones. I lost mine and so I am filing a claim, but I was thinking. What would stop me from just saying that I lost it and getting a whole new iPhone 6 for my brother so we both have one? (Aside from moral integrity of course) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3c4wgc/eli5_what_stops_people_with_insurance_on_their/ | {
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"Because the phone goes into a stolen phone database that's shared among the carriers. \n\nSo, a couple of years ago, my daughter broke her phone. A friend of hers gave her an older iPhone to use, and she put her SIM in it. As soon as she powered the phone on, the carrier completely disabled her number because she used a stolen iPhone. ",
"All cell phones and tablets (pretty much anything that uses a wireless network) has what's called an IMEI or MEID number and it acts as a unique identifier for that device. When you get a new phone through a provider, or register a phone you already have with a new provider, they record that number, along with your sim card information. They use that to track your device throughout their system and would pretty quickly catch you.\n",
"The number would be listed on the IMEI (phone's serial number) blacklist which would totally disable the functionality of the phone. That being said I do know several people that just before they upgraded they intentionally broke their phone to file a warranty claim. Got the new in box phone and sold it for more than they would've gotten for the used phone (taking into account the deductible)"
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2euv7g | in my country, low octane fuel (everything below 93-95) was discontinued 20 years ago for being 'low quality'. how come usa still sell it and use it for its cars? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2euv7g/eli5_in_my_country_low_octane_fuel_everything/ | {
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"There are different methods of measuring octane in gasoline. It's quite likely your country and the US use differing methods, and thus use different numbers to describe the same thing. \n\n_URL_0_\n > Because of the 8 to 12 octane number difference between RON and MON noted above, the AKI shown in Canada and the United States is 4 to 6 octane numbers lower than the AKI shown elsewhere in the world for the same fuel.",
"Octane has nothing to do with the quality of gas. It is based on the gasolines auto ignition temperature. In a car engine the gasoline is compressed and then ignited by the sparks plug. It then burns at a very high but measurable rate. It does not burn instantly. So as the cylinder is being pushed down the gas is still burning and expanding keeping an even amount of pressure.\n\nHow ever if your engines compression rate is too high the gasoline can auto ignite and burn instantly before the cylinder has traveled far and the pressure spikes way past what the engine was designed for. This is known as knock, and the two ways to fix it are to adjust your timing so the spark plug fires latter or to use higher octane gas with a higher auto ignition temp.\n\nIf your car doesn't knock their is no reason at all to put in higher octane.",
"Your country probably uses a different average for measuring octane.\n\nThe rule of thumb is use the lowest octane you can for your engine, and no lower. The reason for this is two fold:\n\n1) Lower octane is easier to produce and thus cheaper.\n\n2) Lower octane fuel is easier to yield energy.\n\nYou only need a more stable fuel for an engine that requires it. Low octane fuel is easier to extract energy, but you're going to get less of it. Higher octane is much harder to extract energy, but you'll get more out of it. You can't get more energy out of a fuel than your engine is designed to get, so a high octane fuel in a low compression engine is literally a waste of money for absolutely no benefit."
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2wncxr | just like blindness, deafness are loss of senses, what are the conditions where the loss of other senses such as taste, smell, touch called? why is that we don't know much about them? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2wncxr/eli5_just_like_blindness_deafness_are_loss_of/ | {
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"Smell and taste are very closely associated. \"Anosmia\" is the loss of smell, and in reality this will make it very difficult to taste, too - as anyone who has ever had a cold knows, we taste mostly through our sense of smell.\n\nIt's also possible to lose the sense of touch due to any one of a number of disorders.\n\nThe reason why we don't hear about those is because they don't require special adaptations to make everyday activities possible.\n\nThat doesn't mean they are not serious though - from psychological issues such as depression that can be a side-effect, through to health and safety issues like not being able to smell gas leaks, or to smell smoke in the event of a fire."
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bl1s5c | how does one become a politician? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bl1s5c/eli5_how_does_one_become_a_politician/ | {
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"This is dependent on laws and regulations in whichever jurisdiction. If you're in the US then [Ballotpedia](_URL_0_) probably knows more.",
"In Britain, a lot of people interested in going higher join a student society at University that is linked to the main political party. Others, mainly on the left wing, come into it through Trade Unions.\n\nThere is nothing to stop someone walking into a local office of a Party, signing up, paying the membership, attending local meetings and helping with the effort put into elections. \n\nWhichever route, make contacts, get known for being a good communicator, being committed and being \"on message\" and you can rise up the Party organisation."
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6rt4z0 | how would human body react to hot water slowly rising in temperature? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6rt4z0/eli5_how_would_human_body_react_to_hot_water/ | {
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"The story about frogs is an old wives' tale as far as I know.\n\nI don't think a human would survive significantly longer if the change was gradual. The heat would feel lower at first since we primarily detect changes in temperature rather than absolute temperature, but fact still is that our bodies need to be around body temperature to operate well.\n\nThere's a reason why even highest of fevers are fairly mild in the big picture, as anything higher than that just kills us.",
"A human would adjust to the temp and we probably wouldn't notice. You would die way way before boiling at 212f. Hot tubs max temp is 104f if you slowly moved it up to be 110-115 and you were mostly submerged your body temp would start to raise above 98f. It would essentially give you a fever and then you would pass out and die of heat stroke. It probably wouldnt feel like you were burning. You mental functions would start getting cloudy and then you would pass out.",
"Yes, the pot thing is fake. Eventually you would become uncomfortable due to being unable to effectively cool yourself, and likely leave the water. Eventually it would move from discomfort to pain."
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5o0y25 | in the us, does the first amendment guarantee social freedom of speech? | From what I understand, the First Amendment is pretty clear on the fact that congress can do nothing to hinder your expression of your opinion so long at it's not "hate speech."
I am wondering exactly how far these rights go into the social realm (see the Milo Yiannopoulos incident at UC Davis on 13 Jan). | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5o0y25/eli5_in_the_us_does_the_first_amendment_guarantee/ | {
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"The First Amendment guarantee absolutely nothing in the social realm. It only protect you from the governement. A company could limit your free speech as much as they want and so can an individual in their home.\n\nAnd like someone else said, there a little bit more than just hate speech that is not covert by the first amendment. But you can't lie to a cop depending on the situation. You can't be put in jail just because you lie, it depend on the situation. But lying to a cop can be brought against you in a court of law for a crime and lying in a court of law is illegal. There is bunch of specific exception.",
"The rights go absolutely nowhere in the social realm. *Legally* speaking you can say just about anything you want provided it isn't to cause a panic, but socially people are free to do whatever they want to keep you quiet/not listen to you provided it doesn't break any other laws."
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1rakcb | quaternions and octonions | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rakcb/eli5_quaternions_and_octonions/ | {
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"If you are familiar with ~~imaginary~~ complex numbers that would be a great start. Imaginary numbers are used to keep track of an angle. You have the real and imaginary part. \n\n_URL_1_\n\nSo as you can see to get the angle you take the inverse tangent of the imaginary part over the real part. This has many useful applications. For instance in electrical engineering they are used to keep track of phases and used in circuit analysis.\n\nThe quaternion extends this idea. It is an complex number with three parts. This allows you to keep track of three rotations. So now you can imagine how this is used in the real world. You can keep track of three rotations and we live in a 3 dimensional world.\n\nFamiliar with frames of reference? Quaternions can rotate you between these frames of reference and are not subject to [gimbal lock](_URL_2_) as can happen with using Euler angles to track rotations. You can turn a quaternion into a rotation matrix and a rotation matrix into a quaternion.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nOctonions extend this concept into 8 dimensions. At the end of the day complex numbers, quaternions, and octonions all use a real part and imaginary numbers to keep track of angles. 1 angle, 3 angles, and 8 angles respectively. From that simple idea a lot of really complicated math is derived.\n \nEDIT for clarity"
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7imues | why is there so little religion in china? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7imues/eli5_why_is_there_so_little_religion_in_china/ | {
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"The other 75% isn't atheist, it's mostly [folk religion](_URL_1_)/[Taoist](_URL_0_). The Chinese generally don't consider them to be religions, which is why they're often not included - but they're definitely religi*ous*.",
"During the reign of the CPP, Mao abolished religion including the destruction of precious religious artifacts and sites as to replace god worship with the worship of himself. Thus the cult of Mao was born. \n\nEven now, most people consider themselves atheist though they still hold onto many spiritual, superstitious quasi-religious beliefs. ie: many believe in Buddhism even though they themselves are not practicing Buddhists. ",
"During the Cultural Revolution, Mao suppressed just about any organized system of thought that was not overtly communists. Scientists, doctors, artists, writers, and of course, ministers, were often killed or retrained and forced to work as farmers. It had less to do with any love of atheism, and more about tearing down any power structures that opposed him.\n\nToday, China's constitution guarantees freedom of religion, but religious organizations not endorsed by the state are illegal. China is particularly intolerant of any church that owes allegiance to a foreign power, e. g., Catholics and the Vatican.",
"Chinese here. Historically religion in China had always been subject to and used by the ruling power, instead of the other way. Therefore Chinese people don't really have the same attachment to Abrahamic monotheism typical to the west. Our myths and legends typically feature people overcoming nature or even gods, instead of being subject to or helped by divine powers.\n\nNowadays people will identify as atheist because they don't really follow any organized religion, but at the same time people will follow various traditional practices likely religious in origin, perhaps not even seeing them as religion but only as part of the heritage and culture. It's common for homes and businesses have little shrines to buddhism or traditional folk deities or ancestors. It's complicated, variable, and difficult to identify as any single label, so if any survey attempts to categorize people according to major organized religions (or the government's branches of recognized religions), while assuming people who don't follow them are atheists, atheism will be over-represented.\n\nCCP membership does require atheism, but they also tolerate and regulate practices of religion, with limits that I personally view as taking the privilege away from religion like it should be in a modern secular society, but will be viewed by the religious used to the privileged status as persecution. Public preaching is banned (not perfectly enforced) and children are banned from religious venues (again not perfectly enforced or even enforceable). Cults are put down hard especially when they harm people and/or organize to threat the government.\n\nI think Christianity is clamped down alot because it arrived relatively late and is associated with a period of extensive foreign meddling in China. In contrast Islam in China dates back to the silk road times, Buddhism is largely sinicized, and Taoism is native.",
"When the CCP took power, they were militantly atheist. They destroyed a lot of religious establishments, severely restricted religious practice, and encouraged everyone to be atheist. While some people obviously maintained their religious beliefs and traditions, many did not. \n\nAlso, religiosity is expressed very differently in Taoism and Buddhism than it is in Abrahamic religions. You will obviously find many devout Buddhists (especially Tibetan Buddhist monks) and many people who are very dedicated Taoists, but religious beliefs tend to be fairly flexible, syncretic, mixed in with folk beliefs/traditions, and generally more about cultural practices than being a believer in any real doctrine. \n\nThen you have the fact that even though since the 1970s the CCP has loosened up a great deal on religion, proselytizing is still strictly prohibited (and any that exists is very, very under the radar), only a select few strains of religions are approved by the government, and religious activities are closely monitored. This is one reason why there's a lot of unrest in Xinjiang, where much of the population is Muslim (and not Han Chinese), and do not like that the Chinese government restricts religious education, tries to discourage women from wearing hijabs, tries to prevent people from observing Ramadan, makes it really, really hard to open and run mosques, and places a lot of religious leaders under surveillance.\n\nTLDR: Religious practices/beliefs were always different from how the West conceives of religious practices/beliefs, and since 1949, there's been a concerted effort by the government to eliminate/discourage religious belief and practice. \n\nSource: studied Chinese history, lived in China for a while after college. \n",
"Communism allows for only one god: the State.\n\nReligion was/is ruthlessly repressed by the ChiComs."
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6fuybn | how artificial intelligence works in terms of programming? | ###Fantastic answers from all you guys. THANKS! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6fuybn/eli5_how_artificial_intelligence_works_in_terms/ | {
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"There is no one answer to this question as it is overly broad. \"Artificial Intelligence\" is a goal of simulating an intelligence, not a single technique or calculation.\n\nIt is like asking \"How does building bridges work?\" The general goal is to bridge some gap but how precisely that is designed or implemented varies widely. Every design has benefits and weaknesses, and each kind fails at some point. Similarly every AI has different methods of design, different strengths and weaknesses, and none are perfect.",
"One thing to understand is that there are no *true* AI as the average person thinks of them. Computers are not capable of actual learning at this time, they are only capable of executing a program. \n\nWe have gotten better at programming and we can program to make them appear to be learning, but in the end it is just executing a program.\n\nA great example of this is some of the \"AI\" that can \"learn\" chess by playing people. All this is, is a program that plays chess, stores the information about what moves occurred during each game, and then the outcomes of those sequence of moves. It then learns that in situation X, it won 60% of games where it made Y move.\n\nIt is technically learning, but it can never do anything else other than calculate and apply the probability based on its original programming. ",
"Let's say that you have a set of marbles that are of different weights from 10 to 50 grams (totally made up values here, no idea what a marble actually weighs). Now let's suppose that you want to find only the marbles that weight between 18 grams and 20 grams. Of course, we don't want to do this by hand since we have a lot of marbles so instead what we'll do is make something that can make the decision for us.\nIn this case, we create a path by cutting a groove into a piece of wood that all of the marbles can fit down. Now, we put in a trap door that only marbles that weight 18 grams or more can fall through and into a new path.\n\nWe're half way there! Now the problem is that the marbles that are too heavy will fall through so we need another trapdoor to only catch the marbles that weigh 21 grams but allow the others to flow through into a bucket at the end of the path. This bucket will now contain only marbles weighing between 18 and 20 grams.\n\nWe would test it by having a test set of marbles where only red ones should end up in the bucket and any other color is incorrect. After the testing, we would make adjustments to the trapdoors so that only the correct marbles get through. This is called training.\n\nSo, in computers, machine learning is exactly this where the trapdoors are nodes that have certain weights applied to them. If the input passes a certain threshold (the marble is in the right weight range), then the node passes the value onto a certain pathway for further execution. If we find out that the output isn't what correct, then we go back in and work on the nodes / weighting (trapdoors) so that it works with values that we know to be correct.\n\nThis is a very broad topic and this is a super simplified answer which I hope clarifies it for you.",
"Artificial intelligence is a massive field. Asking how AI works is like asking how animals work. Don't let the down votes dissuade you, though. It's an interesting, expanding field.\n\nIf you have 25 mins to spare, this is a nice video on the topic: _URL_1_\n\nEdit: it's worth pointing out that neural networks as discussed in this video are just one field in AI, but I think this a nice introduction to the whole field. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong (with useful links to share!)\n\nEdit 2: might as well throw in a link to [carykh's channel](_URL_0_)",
"There are two broad categories for AI: Decision problems and search/optimization problems.\n\nExamples of decision problems:\n\n* Given this state of a chess game, which of the available moves should white make?\n* Given this huge body of medical data and this patient's symptoms, what diseases is he likely to have?\n* Given this huge body of historical weather data and the current weather, what's the weather going to be tomorrow?\n\nThere are a lot of different systems that are used to try to make these decisions. For games with turns, like chess, it's usually based around evaluating the state of the game at each move to give a score for each player, exploring all of the possible paths the game could take, and choosing the move that maximizes the score.\n\nFor things like the medical example, imagine picking two types of data and plotting them in a scatterplot. For example, age on one axis and BMI on the other. People with diabetes are generally older, fatter people, so we expect to see diabetics in the top right. Of course, there are a lot more variables with medical data, so in reality it would be some 50-dimensional scatterplot or something. There are then lots of different approaches to try to cluster data or draw lines between different groups. See: decision trees, support vector machines (SVMs), and clustering.\n\nExamples of search/optimization problems:\n\n* Solve this Sudoku puzzle\n* Given this road data of the entire world, find a good driving route between LA and NYC\n* Given the entire internet and this search text, find web pages that are relevant\n* There's going to be a convention with a lot of talks. Given this convention center and its rooms and their capacities, and all of the talks and their lengths and projected attendances, figure out how to put it all together.\n\nThe Sudoku puzzle is the only one with a definite \"right\" answer. You write a search algorithm that methodically tries all numbers in all open boxes, *forward propagating* to see if what you've done is still possible, and *backtracking* when there's a conflict.\n\nThe driving one is a little fuzzier, but you can still tell that an answer is at least correct. There are various graph search algorithms, but they're all based around the idea of exploring all possibilities outwards from the start, focusing attention on the ones that are doing \"well\", and throwing out ones that are clearly not working. See: A\\*, Dijkstra's algorithm.\n\nWeb search is really complicated. Early search engines just looked for pages containing your search text, which allowed people to put a bunch of invisible text on the page to increase result rank. Google made a key observation: pages relevant to the search don't just contain the text, but other pages link to them as a reference. So when you search \"dog\", you're not just looking for pages that contain \"dog\", you're looking for pages that sites about dogs link to. And that's why Wikipedia is usually a top hit. Google's full algorithm is much more complicated and a tightly-guarded secret, but that's the gist of it.",
"When I bought took post grad ai course I asked my professor: \"these algorithms are great but how do you get the computer to ask the question\"\n\nMost AI is merely analytics attempting to solve a question we have defined. Which, isn't really intelligent ",
"Imagine the following: \n \nDuring soccer practice, we learn to kick balls into a net. Success is getting the ball into that net. Failure is everything else. \n \nHow do we learn? \n \nMotivation. A coach celebrates our successes and berates your failures. Other pupils internalize this and behave similarly. Getting cheered on feels good. Getting booed feels bad. \n \nSo we keep trying. \n \nWe kick at the ball, and look where it lands. And we try again, and again, and again. If we lack progress, our coach will give us tips. If we improve, we get promoted. If not, we get rejected and asked to leave. \n \nThe coach's tips are like a computer program: we tell the computer how to score success. Us humans have senses to track the ball: a computer program has similar ways. \n \nWhy is this intelligence? \n \nBecause we update our behaviour based on evaluating rules we get taught, against a changing situation. \n \nA programmer gives a computer rules, too: if this, then that. Fairly simple, but not intelligent. The program chooses from predefined behaviour based on changing situations: it doesn't change its behaviour. \n \nAllowing a computer program to change its behaviour, is what makes it intelligent. There are 2 ways: \n- allow it to adjust known actions based on its senses; \n- allow it to create new senses and new actions. \n \nFor instance: you kick the ball. It lands to the right of the net. You adjust by aiming the next ball further to the left. \n \nA computer can be programmed to do the same. Left and right are input parameters, which the computer remembers and simply increases or decreases. \n \nWe must however also give it a way to evaluate the success of the adjustment. Did it aim far enough to the left, or not? Or too far? We have senses; a computer can be given a success function, that does the same. \n \nEvaluating that success function and adjusting input parameters to increase success allows us and a computer to get better at a task, without changing how we perform it. \n \nBut there's circumstances that existed before we learned to play soccer: \n- we are human; \n- we walk upright;\n- we have working legs and eyes; \n- we are capable of learning. \n \nIf any of those doesn't match reality, our soccer game will get played differently. \n \nA computer is not limited in the same way. It is, however, limited. So we program in features like memory, watching, evaluating, etc. But we don't give it legs (unless we're building a walking / running robot). \n \nThose features are set: even a learning program won't change those. It requires them to learn in the first place. \n \nBut unlike a human, we don't need to restrict computer programs to walking / running / kicking, using just 2 legs, eyes, and a sense of balance. A computer can be allowed to spice things up: \n- what about just 1 leg? or 3? \n- what about whiskers instead of eyes? \n- what about guide rails? \n- what about a funnel? \n \nMy examples are limited by my imagination. A computer doesn't have to be limited: we can literally let it try anything, as long as that ball gets into the net. And we can let it continue to try, and discard failures, and improve upon successes, without tiring, for months on end. \n \nWe can let programs rewrite parts of their own programming. Not all of it: they'd destroy themselves. But just its actions and its success functions. \n \nSee, in some programming languages, a function can be composed from sets of rules and behaviours. Those can be mixed, blindly, like allowing a million monkeys to write books for a million years, and aiming to wind up with Shakespeare's MacBeth. \n \nBut just like we can adjust our aim based on our senses, a computer program can be allowed to adjust its function composition based on the success and failures of its attempts.\n\nWe just have to give it the tools and let it run. \n \n",
"I think there is a lot of confusion about the term AI. AI is mainly a philosophical debate at this stage. What people refer to as AI in computers is usually just a set of rules a machine is following. Computers can't \"think\" or have a \"conscience\".\n\nThere are artificial neural networks which is like a computer representation of brain neutrons which can be used to program a computer using input data instead of explicit code."
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4d1qx2 | the north carolina gay rights laws. | What do they imply/mean? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4d1qx2/eli5_the_north_carolina_gay_rights_laws/ | {
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"The state passed a law that invalidated all of the city/county protections for LGBT people (and prohibited any future ones), so they effectively don't have any (other than federal laws).",
"[This is actually a great article on the subject] (_URL_0_), but in short, the law does two things:\n\n* It requires sex-segregated bathrooms to be used by the gender listed on their birth certificate.\n* It prohibits any anti-discrimination law from being enacted on a local level, reserving that right to the state.\n\nThis sleight of hand is a direct response to cities like Charlotte enacting laws preventing LGBT discrimination, laws that are now nullified by this. Though the law itself doesn't mention LGBT people to avoid being overturned by the courts (prior attempts like in Colorado in 1992 to discriminate against gay people failed constitutional muster because there was no rational basis for the law), its effect is clear -- once again allowing discrimination against minority sexualities.",
"On a practical level, I don't carry my birth certificate around with me to prove I'm using the bathroom for the gender listed on my birth certificate. So if I'm challenged, and can't produce the document, am I not allowed to use the facilities?\n\nWho is permitted to review the birth certificate and are they compliant with laws regarding handling of PII? Can they produce certification showing they are appropriately trained? How do I recognize such PII certification documents as authentic and know that I'm safe sharing my birth information with the bathroom monitor (there's a lot of other info on a birth certificate besides gender, after all)?\n\nIs the state providing funding for my business to certify the bathroom monitoring staff as PII compliant? Can we get funds for language training also to be able to read birth certificates that are not in English?"
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3jkjyr | why american people are afraid of a great state/government ? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jkjyr/eli5_why_american_people_are_afraid_of_a_great/ | {
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"It stems from how our country was formed and the political ideas behind it.\n\nFirst, we formed as a reaction to a tyrannical government, so from the very beginning we were opposed to a government telling us what to do. \n\nSecond, the political philosophy we embraced is founded on two main ideas: First, that ultimate sovereign power rests with the people; and second, that centralized power can easily corrupt. The result is that our government is limited in power and split up between separate branches and separate levels. \n\nSo the reason most Americans don't care for the federal government is because they're worried that a large government will be corrupt and tyrannical. "
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2u6i59 | what is going on when singers move the microphone closer and further away while they are singing? | I have seen several singers who do it a lot, but I have never really understood why. Are they trying to manipulate the sound in some way? What effect does it have? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2u6i59/eli5_what_is_going_on_when_singers_move_the/ | {
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"They are trying to avoid clipping. See, a microphone can only handle so much pressure. So imagine a singer normally singing at a volume of 5 (just putting it in numbers so it's easier to understand). The sound guy will then adjust the volume of the PA so that the singers voice at volume 5 comes across nice and crispy. \n\nA professional singer knows that it's hard for the sound tech to anticipate what he (the singer) will do. So instead of just singing louder or less loud and hoping the tech will adjust, he just moves the microphone further away when singing louder and closer when singing less loud than his usual volume.\n\nAlso, as you asked about sound effects, if you sing away from the mic, a little (really just a little) more reverb is created as more ambient noise from the room is captured. But this effect is really small."
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3ljejk | after years of huge online video game launches crashing servers & making the game unstable or unplayable for days & sometimes even takes down psn or xbl altogether, why can't sony & microsoft ever seem to anticipate server needs? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ljejk/eli5_after_years_of_huge_online_video_game/ | {
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"It's not necessarily the case that these companies can't anticipate the demand... it's often a decision based on logistics and cost-benefit analyses.\n\nHere's the deal. In order to support a game at launch you may need something crazy like 1000x the normal amount of server power you typically need for a regular day > 1 month after launch. \n\nThat's because everyone has just bought the game and everyone with the game is trying to play at the exact same time whereas normally lots of people who have the game would only play very occasionally (e.g. once a week) and others would play more regularly (but not all at the same time).\n\nServer hardware, maintenance, data center space, IT staff etc. is all very expensive though. It doesn't really make economical sense to spend millions and millions of dollars installing a 1,000 new servers when they may only be needed on launch day. If a company can get away with having a slightly rough launch with no significant/measurable loss in sales, then it may be worth it to consciously 'underestimate' the demand in order to save a huge amount of $$$.\n\nAlso, companies in the past have used the 'demand is greater than anticipated line' as a PR stunt to try and give off the impression that the game/product is doing so well that it's exploding in growth well beyond expectations even if it's performing within expected predictions. Just something to keep in mind.\n\nThere are, of course, cases where companies are genuinely unprepared for the amount of demand. This may happen particularly if the market research for the game was done poorly or if there is a lack of communication between the marketing department and whoever is in charge of running the servers; ultimately resulting in totally inadequate preparation.\n",
"Imagine your cousin Roman invites you out to a grand opening of a new bowling alley.\n\n The business opens, and it's just packed. You have to wait FOREVER just to get a lane. Instead, you decide to come back some other time when it's not so busy.\n\n Now, the owner of the bowling alley could have built more lanes to hold the amount of customers on the grand opening, but in long run, it wouldn't be cost effective as the maintenance on the extra lanes would only eat the profits of the first day. \n\nFind something else to do with Roman for a night. Or maybe don't answer his calls anymore. Both are choices."
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g32xse | so what is the difference between cloud and edge computing? actually, what is edge computing in concrete terms? | Been trying to wrap my head around it, read different articles but it sounds so vague to me. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/g32xse/eli5_so_what_is_the_difference_between_cloud_and/ | {
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"Edge computing is data-driven computing that is done near the source of the data. For instance, a Street Light will have a sensor that determines the light level, but will also take into consideration things like the time of day and day of year to determine whether or not it should turn on. It does this in a computer in the street light rather than send all the information back to a city server to make that decision.\n\nCloud computing is on-demand computing power. Cloud providers like Amazon, Microsoft, or Google have datacenters of servers waiting to be used in on-demand roles, whether that is spinning up new Virtual Machines, running non-persistent programs, data storage, or so much more. The key factor is that you can actually programatically buy server space, so your application can actually get the resources it needs to run.",
"Edge computing is computing done close to the controlled device. A street light that turns itself on and off using logic in a controller in the streetlight, for example. \n\nCloud computing is just applications or storage outsourced to some big company on the internet. To use an analogy - if you parked your car in your garage, that would be traditional parking. If you parked it at the airport, that would be cloud Parking. If a tiny robot that lived in your car parked it for you, that would be edge parking."
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168g8x | what are potential applications of molecular nanotechnology, and how is it even possible for man to create such small things? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/168g8x/eli5_what_are_potential_applications_of_molecular/ | {
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"Maybe this was more of a /r/science post. Nanotechnology in general blows my mind and confuses me all at once. "
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avjetw | why are pills 💊 multi colored? why not just have the entire pill be like one color? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avjetw/eli5_why_are_pills_multi_colored_why_not_just/ | {
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"Pills/capsules have to be different from other prescriptions so they can be identified if separated from packaging, even if it just means having a slightly different imprint on otherwise identical pills, the multi coloring is just one way different prescriptions can vary. Not a good explanation but I hope it helps",
"Not all pills *are* colored differently, typically the classic two tone pills are only the kind formed from two slightly differently sized halves which slide together to contain a powdered medication.\n\nThe two colors make that particular kind of pill more distinct from others which aids in taking the proper medication (imagine an old person trying to take 7 different medications properly when they all are identical white capsules)."
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137jkw | what is the difference between a llc and a sole proprietor? | I am looking to start a local recycling business where I will pick up recyclable materials from the customer's homes. I am filling out my business application and am unsure which type of business entity I am, LLC or sole proprietor? Thanks in advance! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/137jkw/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_a_llc_and_a/ | {
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"If you don't know, you're probably a sole proprietor. You have to actually submit paperwork with your state specifically for an LLC. \n\n**Advantages of LLC:** \n\nYou can be the sole member (called the manager) and therefore take 100% of the profits, but you are not personally responsible for the company's debts should you go tits-up. \n\nEasier to transfer ownership or add other people to the business (each other person is called a \"member\". \n\n\n\n**Advantages of a sole proprietorship:**\n\nCheaper to originate, since you basically are just saying \"heeey.. so.. here's my business.\" There's little to no paperwork involved in the process.\n\nLess distinction between your personal money and business money, so you don't have to keep as perfect of records. In an LLC you need to keep records of all business costs/expenses/profits and when you pay yourself, *called a member or partner draw*. With an SP you pretty much can just deposit that check into your own personal account and keep track of earnings/expenses loosely for tax purposes at the end of the year.\n\n\nI'd recommend the LLC method (this is the business type I have personally, it's for construction) as there's much more legal and financial protection involved if something goes wrong. \n"
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1gv9zr | why do electrons arrange themselves in shells of 2n^2 around the nucleus? | The maximum number of electrons in each shell around a nucleus is 2, 8, 8, 18, 18, 32..., where each pair is twice a square number. How do they know to do that? And why does each number occur twice? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1gv9zr/eli5why_do_electrons_arrange_themselves_in_shells/ | {
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"The Pauli Exclusion Principle dictates how many electrons can exist in each shell. No two electrons can have the same four quantum numbers (n, l, ml, and ms). The different numbers of electrons in each shell correspond to the number of different arrangements of those four quantum numbers. There's no simple way to explain this.\n\nBut if you have a fairly firm understanding of physics, I can go into more depth. I can give the typical reasoning that you get in an introductory chemistry class, or if you're really interested I can try to explain the actual quantum mechanics behind it. Beware though, it's a mathematical nightmare."
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3mmbvw | if movies and cameras were always in a wide aspect ratio why where tvs square (4:3) for so long? | You know... Cause | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mmbvw/eli5_if_movies_and_cameras_were_always_in_a_wide/ | {
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"This is an easy one. Movies only went to a wide aspect ratio in response to the initial waves of televisions becoming popular in the early 1950s. \n & nbsp; \nSilent films were in 4:3 ratio, and when they moved to movies with sound, they lost some of the real estate on the strip of film to the audio track, and had to settle on a new standard around 1930: [Academy Ratio](_URL_0_), which was only slightly wider than the 4:3 of the silent era (1.375:1 vs 1.333:1). Academy ratio was an industry standard for two decades. \n & nbsp; \nTelevision manufactures, knowing that there was a ready library of material in ratios that were either exactly 4:3 or very close to it, built their TVs to the same aspect ratio. Theater attendance dropped, and the movie industry decided to switch to wider ratios, to make going to the movies a unique experience that people couldn't get at home.",
"Movies weren't always in a wide aspect ratio; in the silent film era, films were also 4:3. I'm not a historian, but my understanding is that the 15:9 aspect ratio was a reaction to television, which was also 4:3. It gave them a way to be distinct from TV. \n\nSame with cameras. I'm old enough to remember film cameras; the pictures definitely were not that long. ",
"When engineers first started developing technical standards for television in the 1930s, they decided on a 4:3 aspect ratio. The 4:3 aspect ratio standard was already adopted by the Society of Motion Picture Engineers several years earlier, so it made sense.\n\nThe problem was, once a standard was chosen, it was very difficult to change it after that. All the TVs were analog and built specifically for a 4:3 aspect ratio. There was no easy way to produce a new TV signal format in a widescreen aspect ratio and still maintain backwards compatibility with old televisions."
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agkt0a | if alcohol burns off during the cooking process, why do recipes not use cheaper non-alcoholic alternatives? | For instance, is there any reason why non-alcoholic wine (or even grape juice) couldn't be used in place of white wine for a cooking sauce?
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/agkt0a/eli5_if_alcohol_burns_off_during_the_cooking/ | {
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"Alcohol *doesn't* completely cook off when you add it to a dish. The bit that remains is an important solvent for helping some flavor chemicals spread around the dish.\n\nGrape juice is too sweet. Non-alcoholic wine is expensive & generally shitty. A bottle of wine that's good for cooking can be had for $5."
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2k1bc7 | why does dr. oz still have his m.d.? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2k1bc7/eli5_why_does_dr_oz_still_have_his_md/ | {
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"Once you have a MD, you will have it forever. A medical degree does not, however, guarantee that you can practice medicine. For that you need to be licensed by an accreditation board for your specific specialty. That does need to be constantly renewed."
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6ebosc | why milk expires, but baked goods that have milk as an ingredient don't expire when the milk used to bake them would have. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ebosc/eli5_why_milk_expires_but_baked_goods_that_have/ | {
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"Milk goes bad from bacteria which will cause it to get sour and cause other by products. The bacteria start multiplying in the milk pretty much from the moment you open it up.\n\nBaking something will (generally) kill all the bacteria present and essentially restart the clock before they reach an unsafe amount in the food. In addition to that, many baked goods have a lot of sugar which can slow the growth of bacteria. ",
"Baked goods do expire. Food goes bad because of bacteria and mould. Milk has no natural preservatives. Baked goods tend to either have natural preservatives, or preservatives added, which slows the rate at which bacteria can grow. In addition, baked goods go through a heating process - obviously - which if done for long enough at a high enough temperature, kills most bacteria, meaning that that particular baked good has to come in contact with bacteria from another source in order for the spoiling effect to begin.",
"Microorganisms generally prefer wet environments since being so small makes them prone to drying out and being immobilized. Being a nutrient-rich liquid medium, milk is good for growing lactic acid-fermenting bacteria, which is the cause of milk spoilage. When milk is used as a baking ingredient, it is no longer in a form that is suitable for growing these bacteria, so it doesn't spoil as quickly."
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1podbx | when censoring nudity and such, how does the pixelation work? | How is it placed and kept in just the right area on moving objects, and what are the pixels doing exactly? Any other interesting info would be cool too. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1podbx/eli5_when_censoring_nudity_and_such_how_does_the/ | {
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"Image you have an 1000x1000 pixel image, it is going to show a picture pretty clearly.\n\nLet's say you take every 2x2 square, find the average color of those 4 pixels, and set them all the same color. Your 1000x1000 image will now effectively be a slightly blocky 500x500 image taking up the same space.\n\nIf instead you used 10x10 squares, is would be a really blocky, 100x100 image, and probably be hard to recognize.\n\nThat's how pixelation works, they take the naughty region of the image, and make it blocky.\n\n"
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6dbgpe | is zero considered a real number since it is technically the absence or placeholder when there is no number? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6dbgpe/eli5is_zero_considered_a_real_number_since_it_is/ | {
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"There's a distinction here which I'm not sure you know.\n\nIn mathematics, there are plenty of different kinds of numbers. There are counting numbers, there are integers, there are rational numbers, and then there are real numbers.\n\n0 is part of integers, rational numbers and real numbers. With counting numbers, it's a bit unclear if you include it or not, some people do, some don't.\n\nSo if you meant \"real number\" as mathematical concept, then zero absolutely is a real number.\n\nBut you could also mean something more philosophical, like, \"what really is a number\". In that case... Well, early mathematicians thought zero was not a number. Then our current number systems and notations were developed, and because of how they work, zero was included in these. So philosophically, \"what really is a number\", you could argue in both ways, as evidenced by stance early mathematicians took, but as far as all modern math is concerned, zero is a number just as any other.\n\n > it is technically the absence or placeholder when there is no number?\n\nThis is basically the position ancient Greeks took, and I've actually seen quotes from some Greek philosophers arguing about this very issue. Modern math disagrees with your statement here, zero is not an absence of number or a placeholder for anything, zero is a value in itself."
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1wzvmh | can semen clog pipes? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1wzvmh/eli5_can_semen_clog_pipes/ | {
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"I'm not a plumber, but I'm pretty sure it can. Whenever semen meets water, it gets that thick Elmer's glue consistency to it. If that were to get mixed with hair or similar drain trash, you can have a clog. \n\nNo need to call a plumber though. Just pour some drain cleaner down the pipes, and it'll be gone.",
"Guaranteed you have a lot more hair shedding off you in the shower than the tiny amount of fluid you have coming out of you jacking it. \n\nI'm no expert, but I call bullshit. You'd have to drop a bucket of semen down the drain to clog it.\n\nI mean, maybe if it was just like back to back dudes taking showers and jerking it for hours and hours, but if theres any kind of buffer of guys just not beating it in the shower in between two guys handling themselves, I would think that hot water would wash away whatever baby fluid was left in the drain from the previous occupants deposit.",
"This has actually been a pretty common \"official\" notice at lots of colleges and it's never actually official. I've seen variants for Penn, U.Mich, U.Mass, and even St. Andrews, which also had an \"official\" stamp but somebody who contacted the college found it was fake.\n\nThere is very little consensus on if semen **can** clog a shower but a general consensus that, unless you have a bukkake party in one, it's not going to, because there just isn't enough.",
"Is nobody wondering how they actually keep track of who is doing this? I mean, how would they catch the perpetrators if this is indeed a direct violation of their code? \n\n**student showering, rubbing one off**\n**RA suddenly opens the curtain** \n\n\"Aha! Caught you! Put a towel on, I'm taking you to the dean and telling him I watched you masturbate into the shower\""
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6ia8ig | why do our arms bend up when we run? is this a physical reaction or a learned one? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ia8ig/eli5_why_do_our_arms_bend_up_when_we_run_is_this/ | {
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"It's both. If you whip your hips, your arm will fly out straight and then crumple in on itself when the upper arm can't move.\n\nIt's also inherent to good running. If your arms are straight, they generate more torque and thus will increase fatigue and slow you down. If they are closed in they generate less torque. Not to mention you look like a fucking idiot if you run with straight arms. ",
"Similarly, I've always been told that it looks like I barely bend my knees when I run and I've also been told I need work done on my back from a chiropractor. Any skeletal issues jump out at you guys that would make me run this way? Always has bothered me since I've been made fun of for it to the point where I'm self conscious to run around people lol.\n\n*since this is about physics I guess I'm asking more about how running this way affects my speed and stamina"
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6cdwfc | why does each electron spinning around the nucleus of an atom do so in several different axes, but planets orbiting the sun all rotate together in a flat plane? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6cdwfc/eli5why_does_each_electron_spinning_around_the/ | {
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"Electrons in an atom acutally *don't* orbit like that. Electron orbitals are a complicated thing, and their shape has nothing at all to do with the physics that govern how larger objects work as a result of gravity.\n\nThe reason the solar system lies mostly on the same plane is because it formed out of a vaguely disk-shaped blob of matter that coalesced. The reason it was disk-shaped was because of angular momentum. Imagine a whole cloud that's got particles moving all over the place in various directions. Now, sometimes, those particles are going to bump into other particles, and thus negate their motion. If they collide head-on, they'll both just stop. If they hit each other as glancing blows, they'll slow down a little bit as they change the others' trajectory slightly. If you do this over time to all the particles, eventually you end up with a disk shape of particles mostly orbiting in the same direction. Any that move on strange trajectories different from this disk eventually bump into matter that's on the disk, slowing the matter on the disk slightly but stopping the helter-skelter momentum in exchange."
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ktg13 | how does teflon have the same static and kinetic coefficient of friction? | Just what the title says. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ktg13/eli5_how_does_teflon_have_the_same_static_and/ | {
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"Static friction is generally higher due to surface roughness as well as very weak bonding between the two surfaces. \n\nTeflon generally has a very smooth surface, and is so inert that there is no bonding at all between it and another surface touching it. ",
"Static friction is generally higher due to surface roughness as well as very weak bonding between the two surfaces. \n\nTeflon generally has a very smooth surface, and is so inert that there is no bonding at all between it and another surface touching it. "
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2vq7ja | why is the usa failing at rebuilding the middle east into allies? didn't they succeed with japan and germany after ww2? what are they doing different and why? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2vq7ja/eli5why_is_the_usa_failing_at_rebuilding_the/ | {
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"One of the big considerations with the rebuilding efforts is how many of the local people perceive the foreign presence. After WWII, the governments and peoples of both Germany and Japan, who were aggressors, had to accept that they'd lost the war, and rebuilding was inevitable. The US and other foreign soldiers aided in the rebuilding efforts and the governments fully cooperated. It was a \"gentleman's war\" in the end, and it was the gentlemanly thing to do.\n\nOn the other hand, not everyone in Iraq and Afghanistan see the US has having been fighting a war as a defender - rather they are perceived as an aggressor and invader, hence the large amount of insurgent battles and guerrilla warfare type tactics used in the prolonged conflicts. It's possible that the US overstayed its initial welcome and didn't help things turn around as quickly as it could, or that the acts of terrorism committed against its troupes left a distaste and distrust that alienated the soldiers from the people and government. In any case, the religion and perceptions of the people in the occupied country play a major role in building or hindering future relations, and the traditional US tactics in this case has alienated the locals and their government.",
"Japan and Germany were both exhausted and defeated by war. They were willing to rebuild, and we were willing to commit to rebuilding then (and had an extra incentive in that if we didn't, the Soviets would).\n\nThe Middle East is in no such position, and we are committed to spending as little money as possible in search of our primary goal and none in consideration of the consequences. We knocked down the political institutions of Iraq and Afghanistan, but the will of the people to fight was hardly unbroken. The Bush administration prevented contingency planning for all but the rosiest of victory scenarios - the idea that the people we were invading might not want us there or try and take advantage of the power vacuum we created was something that the people in charge of the details of contingency planning literally could not take into account.\n\nEven then, we let corruption overtake the efforts at rebuilding the infrastructure of these countries. The efforts at convincing the people we had just invaded got wasted when we would ship planes of cash over there and end up with next to nothing in return. But since those on people on our side of the fence who were involved with the rebuilding often were closely connected with the administration, bringing to light the ridiculous waste going on was not in the beat interests of those running the show. \n\nThis doesn't even take into account all of the other problems that sprung up along the way, but they were the biggest problems we faced. We implemented Shock & Awe to win the military phase of our campaigns, but wouldn't do the same for the rebuilding. We like the explosions, but rebuilding shit is just too hard.",
"Japan and Germany see themselves as a nation. When the government fell, they were still Germans & Japanese people. The people there have a shared history & are capable of building a government.\n\nThe countries of the Middle East are made up of people that were just arbitrarily clumped together when the European colonial powers pulled out. You've got tribes & religious sects that were trying to kill themselves before \"Iraq\" existed. When the Iraqi government collapsed, you had Sunni & Shiites running around that had no real desire to live with each other or, in many cases, even let the other side *even keep living*.\n\nYou know how Americans got all pissy about Bush/Obama getting elected? Multiply that by a hundred & you've got the sort of animosity that the separate groups making up these countries have towards each other.",
"Japan and Germany had strong state institutions, the rule of law, and an educated and trained population that was able and wiling to work productively. There was no meaningful armed resistance in either country after active hostilities ceased. The military and political leadership of both countries was either dead, or was swiftly arrested and scheduled for public and transparent trial.\n\nIn Iraq and Afghanistan you have countries that do not have strong state institutions, no history of rule of law, and a population that is comprised of large numbers of untrained and unskilled people - suitable only for subsistence agriculture. There are active insurgencies in both countries with bases and support outside the territory from which they can train, rearm, and to which they can flee.\n\nThe leadership of the two countries was not held to account. In Iraq the leadership was mostly killed in the war, disappeared in the immediate aftermath, or in the case of Saddam himself, convicted in a show trial and hastily executed. The continued existence of the prior regime's leadership in Afghanistan formed a nucleus for resistance against the occupation, and in Iraq created a myriad of conspiracy theories about potential coups.\n\nAfter WWII there was no organized resistance to allied occupation of either Germany or Japan. Iran and to a lesser extent Turkey and Saudi Arabia all have grievances about the occupation of Iraq and want to displace US forces with their own or their proxies. The US presence in Afghanistan is opposed by elements of the Pakistani military/political community who want to use Afghanistan as \"strategic depth\" against India, plus there are Pakistani religious and tribal figures outside the government itself that are extremely hostile to the presence of NATO forces in Afghanistan."
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5wo7vi | why can humans only hold their breath for a few minutes while, say, marine iguanas, with their tiny lungs, can hold it for about 30 minutes? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5wo7vi/eli5_why_can_humans_only_hold_their_breath_for_a/ | {
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"Sounds like iguanas have been covered already. In case anybody is wondering how mammals can hold their breath longer, they have a lot of a different form of hemoglobin called myoglobin which is usually found in our muscles. It's much better at holding oxygen than hemoglobin and allows them to more readily \"store\" the air. Simplified obviously but that's the basic picture. ",
"For the same reason iguanas can't build airplanes even though they have 5-fingered hands. \n\nSpecies adapt to their niche, and in our niche the huge brain with all its large oxygen demand is a competitive advantage over staying under water for 30 minutes.",
"\"Humans are what are called tidal breathers. When we breathe in, fresh air moves into our lungs along progressively smaller airways, eventually ending in little sacs called alveoli, where our bloodstream picks up oxygen and deposits carbon dioxide. Then the \"old\" air moves out of our lungs along the same path it came in.\n\nBut birds, alligators and monitor lizards are \"unidirectional\" breathers. After the air moves into their lungs, it begins to follow a system of tubes similar to arteries, capillaries and veins. In this system, the air moves through the air tubes in only one direction.\"\n\nEdit: [Source](_URL_0_) ",
"Pound for pound, mammals require about 20x more energy than reptiles. That means mammals will require about 20x the food and oxygen to survive.\n\n30 / 20 = 1.5 minutes, so the math checks out.",
"As for marine mammals many of them have massive spleens. One fun little thing the spleen does is store a little back up oxygenated blood for times of need, such as deep water submersion. ",
"There are many things that go into this phenomenon including things that [kouhoutek] mentioned where reptiles such as the iguana use much less oxygen (as they are cold blooded). However, just to create one complied answer I am listing some of the big factors below:\n\n\n**1. CO2 in Lungs**\n - When we hold our breath and have the feeling to exhale, that is caused by an accumulation of CO2 not a depleted amount of O2. If you go into a room with just 2% extra CO2 in the atmosphere, you will feel as if you are suffocating even though there is enough oxygen to survive. Animals like iguanas (and even mammals like whales) don't respond to a small change in CO2 in their lungs. They are able to hold a lot of CO2 in their lungs without having a need to breathe.\n\n**2. Slow Heart Rate**\n - All these animals who have the ability to hold their breath for this long have adapted over millions of years to do so just as [WRSaunders] mentioned. One of these adaptations is to be able to keep a slower heart rate when their breath is being held. This allows them to have a slower metabolism when their breath is being held in turn causing them to expend less oxygen when their breath is being held. However, this slower heart rate doesn't happen when we humans hold our breath, in fact the heart rate increases.\n\n**3. Positively Charged Myoglobin**\n - Myoglobin, similar to hemoglobin, is a protein found in the muscles that is able to have oxygen bind to it. Animals who can hold their breath for a long time have many positively charged myoglobin proteins which allow them to have a large reserve of oxygen in their muscles. Normally when proteins get too close to each other they clump up and cause diseases/disorders such as Alzheimer's but in these animals, the myoglobin proteins are all positively charged and repel each other. This allows them to be packed in tightly without clumping up together which enables them to hold a LOT of oxygen in their muscles (and blood in hemoglobin). In fact, 45% of muscle mass in some whales is due to a large amount of myoglobin.\n\n**4. Cold Blooded Uses Less Energy**\n - Warm blooded mammals spend a LOT of energy trying to keep their blood warm, however, cold blooded reptiles such as iguanas don't spend a lot of energy (and oxygen) to keep themselves warm. This allows them to use oxygen more slowly which means they can hold their breath for a long time despite not holding much in their lungs.\n\nI highlighted the main points above, however you are free to explore more on your own. [This](_URL_0_) site might be able to help.\n\n*If you have any more questions don't hesitate to reply below and I will answer your question(s) to the best of my ability. If you thought my answer was helpful, please just take a few seconds to leave an upvote. Thanks! :)*"
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4adfq4 | why do people get motion sick when wearing vr-headsets, but drone pilots never seem to be bothered by their fpv-googles? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4adfq4/eli5why_do_people_get_motion_sick_when_wearing/ | {
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"The reason you can get motion sick from VR headsets is because your brain thinks you are being poisoned, your eyes are experiencing movement when your ears and the rest of your body is not. \n \nThe reason \"drones\" pilots do not experience this is because they are different. For one, its 3D vs 2D, it's is much more difficult to get motion sick from a 2D video than a 3D one. Mainly, you move your head in a VR program, with \"drone\" goggles your perspective does not change when you move your head."
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1yq3r1 | what alternatives to binary do we have? | Machines understand information as 0's (no signal) and 1's (signal). Why don't we modulate the intensity of the signal to give us more options (0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, etc.) ? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1yq3r1/eli5_what_alternatives_to_binary_do_we_have/ | {
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"In theory any number system could be used. Transistors, however, work on an on-off system. Either they let current through, or they don't. While in theory a ternary computer (-1,0,1) could be more efficient in terms of calculations than a binary one, the practical aspects of creating a physical system to compute in ternay are overwhelming. Also, we not have binary established as a universally used system and there isnt a lot of motivation to wipe the slate clean and start again from square one",
"The point is that when there are fewer possibilities, it's easier to tell them apart. If you're trying to process a signal and you measure a level of 0.3, how do you know the sender really meant 0.3 and not 0.2 or 0.4? In general, you can't, so in the presence of noisy transmission channels, you can only ever receive an **approximation** of what the sender sent.\n\nThe big difference here is between **analog** signals, which make infinitely many distinctions, and **discrete** ones (a.k.a. \"digital\"), which make finitely many distinctions. With discrete, it is possible to use [error correcting codes](_URL_1_) to detect when a transmission error has happened and recover from most of them.\n\nBinary is just the simplest sort of discrete signal, which makes it the most robust and noise resistant: it's harder to mistake a 0 for a 1 than to mistake a 0.3 for a 0.4. And you don't really gain anything by using more than two signal levels, because:\n\n1. Any message you can encode with more distinctions, you can also encode by using sequences of bits. \n2. Some people in this thread have said that using more levels would allow you to send the same message more efficiently, by using shorter sequences of symbols. But this is only true in a *noiseless* communications channel. In a noisy system, a ternary signal is more vulnerable to noise than a binary one. This means the ternary signal would require stronger error correction, which eats up the supposed efficiency advantage. (That or quieter, more expensive equipment—which could also be used to increase the data rate of a binary signal...)\n\nAll of this falls under the field of [information theory](_URL_0_), which developed the mathematics that we use to reason about sending messages over noisy channels.",
"One example of a non-binary device is MLC solid-state drives. Early SSD's were SLC (single level cell) where each flash memory cell stored either a zero or one. Newer drives use multi-level cell technology where each cell typically stores one of four values, corresponding to two bits of data rather than a single bit. I think there are even drives where each cell stores three bits, but two is the most common. As some of the other commenters mentioned, four levels are harder to deal with than two so the MLC drives typically tend to be slower and not last as long as the SLC technology, but they are a lot cheaper because you only need half the flash cells for a given capacity.\n"
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2a9u4j | why can't surgeons "fix" paralysis? | We can have your heart beating outside your body, shave off pieces of your cornea with a laser, and pull an arm outside of an alligator and reattach it to your body.
So why exactly can't we fix someone who has broken their back or neck? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2a9u4j/eli5_why_cant_surgeons_fix_paralysis/ | {
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"I believe it's because surgeons can't hook up nerves together. Otherwise we would be able to have many other arms. Surgeons would be able to hook up nerves ti mechanical devices to act as arms.",
"Complexity. We don't know enough about nerves to fix them in all circumstances.. Reattaching bits of your body doesn't always leave you with feeling."
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b0be5h | helicopter maneuvers | Can helicopters do flips, sustained side angles or fly upside down?? If so, how. If not, why? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/b0be5h/eli5_helicopter_maneuvers/ | {
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"Ex Helicopter engineer here. I'll try to keep it as ELi5 as possible. \n\nYes, Helicopters can do loops and barrel rolls. \n\nThe rotors are not big fan blades as some people think, they are wings. While a plane (fixed-wing) has to get up enough speed for the air flowing over it's wings to create lift so out can fly, a helicopter (rotary-wing) just spins the wing through the air until it creates enough lift to fly. So a loop is really no different in a helicopter or a plane and a barrel roll is harder but still possible. \n\nAs for sustained inverted or sideways flying, no, not really. What makes that possible in a plane in the control surfaces on the wings and tail counter acting the forces of gravity pulling down on it. A helicopter has some control surfaces on the tail but not on the rotors. Instead a helicopter flys by adjusting the wings (rotors) to a position that makes it move the direction the pilot wants it to. Flying sideways means no lift and no control surfaces means it can't counter gravity, so it would fall out of the sky. It can't fly inverted mainly because the rotors are not design to produce lift upside down, so it would just fly into the ground. \n\nHope that helps. ",
"The blades of most helicopters are attached to the rotor by pivots. They are free to move back and fore, up and down. In flight, centrifugal force holds them outward and their lift holds them up. But because of the freedom of the blades, it is dangerous for a helicopter to fly upside down, do loops or rolls. The blades could hit each other or the tail.\n\nA few stunt helicopters have their blades attached with strong springs. Since the blades don't move around so much, they can do fancy aerobatics."
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85n6tw | why you're supposed to back into a space when you parallel park | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/85n6tw/eli5_why_youre_supposed_to_back_into_a_space_when/ | {
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"It tightens your turning radius. Making it easier to get into a space instead of constantly readjusting.",
"The way most cars steer, there's an effect called \"front-end swing\" where the front end of the car swings wider during a turn, and the back end of the car kinda just follows along.\n\nBecause of that, you can be usually get a tighter fit if you back into a parallel space. First you swing your front end out, then back up until your rear wheels are just about in position, then you swing your front end in and you're parked. That particular maneuver only works if you are in reverse gear. \n\nIn some cases it won't matter and there will be enough room to park with other maneuvers. ",
"You don't need to if there is enough space (for two cars), where you can just enter from the back and drive straight forward.\n\nWhen in a tight spot however, the rear wheels (fixed in position) create a pivot point while the front wheels (are able to turn left or right) turn in, allowing for a tighter turning radius. \n\nThe reverse is true for forklifts where the front wheels are fixed while the rear wheels able to turn. "
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4i3h59 | why do some medications cause different kinds of dreams? night terrors, hyper sexualized dreams, vivid deams etc. | I know some medications cause weird dreams. But what happens to cause night terrors vs. the sexualized dreams etc. Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4i3h59/eli5_why_do_some_medications_cause_different/ | {
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"Some medications, such as pain killers or anti-depressants, change your brains chemical makeup. It makes some parts of your brain, brain chemicals and/or hormone levels change, increase and decrease. These things are all responsible for the way you think and feel. If a medication rises certain levels in your brain then you may be caused to have these sort of dreams.\n\n** _URL_0_",
"I don't have an answer but rather an extension to the question. Why would some medicines cause someone not to dream at all? ",
"On the flip side, are there medications that remove dreams like night terrors? \n\nOr do those only count as anti-psychotics?",
"Also, why do I get such fucked up dreams from taking melatonin? ",
"Neuroscientists here. First off, the neurochemical mechanisms behind dreaming are not fully understood. To give you an idea of the complexity were talking here, Ambien and benzodiazepines (xanax, valium, etc.) both hit the same active site on the same GABA receptor subtype (meaning that they work, pharmacologically identically, as far as we know). Yet, while Ambien causes crazy hallucinations and bizarrely vivid dreams, the benzodiazepine class does not (normally). \n\nWhat I could hypothesises is this: if a drug has a significant effect on the norepinephrine, acetylcholine, or serotonin, it will have a strong effect on your sleep cycle, as [these particular neurotransmitters are integral to the various stages of sleep](_URL_1_). Of these, something that effects acetylcholine (like benadryl and scopolamine) would presumably have a greater effect on dream alteration, [as acetylcholine levels raise significantly during REM sleep](_URL_0_). Since acetylcholine is also integral to memory consolidation, it would make sense that a change in that system could cause distortion in the recall of your day's memories as the brain tries to rehash them during REM, which could you to experience some bizarre dreams. \n\nWhile that last sentence is *based* on factual information, it's nothing more than an educated guess. I hope this made some sense, and would gladly look into other classes of drug mechanisms to see if anything clicks. I'm very interested in this question as well, neuropsychopharmacology is what I *really* love (it's specific but exactly what your question involves). I'm typing this with one eye open, so apologize for any errors and rambling text, I'll check up tomorrow and see if I can work out anything more, particularly if you have any specific drugs you'd like me to look into.\n\nEdit: the mechanism of action of benzos vs. Ambien are actually very slightly different, they *are not* identical as I stated above, they are both agonists of the GABAa receptor subtype, but hit different subunits of the receptor. This still validates the point which I was trying to make: that neuropsychopharmacology can be very complex. It's difficult and sometimes impossible to extrapolate from molecular mechanism up to psychological experience. Thank you u/BlackTieButtPlug, for pointing this error out.\n\nEdit 2: thanks for all the interesting stories and fascinating questions, I hope my responses have been relatively satisfactory. I absolutely love extrapolating off of facts and into conjecture, it allows for more creativity than the day-to-day data collection of a lab! Feel free to continue asking and I'll respond the next chance I get. \n\nEdit 3/4: for those who want a simpler explanation, that's not really possible, as the neuropsychopharmacology of different drugs' effects on REM sleep is not simple. Here's the best I could do:\n\n***TL;DR/ELI5: We don't know. We don't know much at all about dreaming, so describing why certain drugs effect dreaming in certain ways is basically impossible. If I were to guess (based on factual information), those drugs that effect the neurotransmitters (the brain's alphabet) that are most active during REM sleep (dream time), would have the most effect on dreaming (which would be drugs like benadryl). In what specific way they effect dreaming is just too complicated to even guess at.***",
"It actually sounds to me like you're misunderstanding what night terrors actually are. \n\nThey're not bad dreams, or even nightmares. They're a very unpleasant experience that occurs outside of REM sleep, and are more comparable to sleep paralysis than to a nightmare. \n\nBasically, you would wake up in the middle of the night suffering from an strong fear, sometimes accompanied by hallucinations of figures, monsters, or black shapes around your room. Unlike with sleep paralysis, you're pretty much completely \"awake\" (your eyes are open and you can see your surroundings), you can move, but your brain is telling you something is incredibly wrong. \n\nUsually, night terrors end with you screaming yourself awake. However, there have been cases of people suffering from night terrors hurting themselves trying to escape from the imagined threat or monster. In one night terror I experienced, I broke my bed in half. In another, I almost jumped off the stairs. Most of the time, though, I would let out one or several bloodcurdling screams, because most of my night terrors evoked a primal, inescapable fear of death the likes of which I've never come close to experiencing when I am awake. \n\nI've never heard of medicines giving people night terrors, since this is a sleep disorder that doesn't involve dreaming. It's been associated with hormone or vitamin deficiencies in children, but otherwise its cause is unknown.",
"Drugs are usually discovered on accident. Rx drugs that affect neurotransmitters can be agonist (^production or absorption of NT) or antagonist (opposite), just like any drug. Your brain tries to maintain a homeostasis of NT so when you take a drug that changes the levels of any NT the process of dialing back the natural production begins, hence tolerance. Stimulants such as amphetamines increase dopeamine levels and when taken in excess can produce psychosis. LSD of even the purest quality can also produce psychosis. Psychosis is relevant to your question because brain areas are over stimulated and neurons fire that shouldn't be firing, so when a schizophrenic \"hears voices\" the part of their brain that processes sound is actually firing, they aren't \"hearing\" but they have truly perceived sound in their mind. Seeking out a drug that will stimulate you will come with side effects so unless you have a disorder such as ADHD please, avoid stimulants. Except xanthines enjoy your tea and coffee. \n\nIf you want vivid sex dreams read one of your grandmas harlequin romance novels before bed. Or buy a VR headset and watch prawn. ",
"Fun fact: \"night terrors\" does not mean what you think it means. Nightmares are dreams that happen to be scary. They occur during REM sleep. Sometimes they wake you up. You often remember them afterwards. Night terrors are completely different. They occur when you are transitioning from deep sleep to light sleep, or vice versa. During one, you are not having a vision. In fact, your are not really having any \"thoughts.\" Instead, parts of your brain are being triggered to react in the same way they would AS IF you were scared, angry, etc. but you (your conscious or unconscious mind) are not actually experiencing any thoughts or emotions. So your child, while having a night terror, might scream, say something, or even get out of bed. Once they wake up, however, they will not remember anything (because there are no \"thoughts\" to remember), they will not be afraid, angry, etc. any longer. This is quite different from waking up after a scary dream (i.e. Nightmare). Also, waking someone up from a dream/nightmare is not usually very difficult. Waking them up from a night terror, however, can be quite difficult. Keep in mind, though, that if it is actually a night terror, they are not actually experiencing any fear, anger, etc. ",
"I'm here to find out which medications cause hyper sexualized dreams. For science of course.",
"I went through a weird 6 months of hyper-sexual dream states where I'd wake up in the middle of the night crazy horny. This happened nearly every night, taking no medication not even NSAIDs. Well I ended up getting some blood work done for a separate thing, and my doctor offhandedly prescribed me Vitamin D supplements when the results came back because my levels were \"kind of low\". These were large dose, 1x week pills.\n\nThe next day after the first pill the sexual dreams and the waking in the middle of the night was gone. Haven't had an issue since. Weird stuff.",
"Which ones cause the hyper-sex dreams, again? 'cause that sounds utterly terrible and I just want to stay away from that. Yeah, like, forever.",
" > hyper sexualized dreams\n\nWhat drug does this?"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"http://mnphysicalmedicine.com/2014/01/21/how-do-pain-medications-impact-your-dreams/"
],
[],
[],
[],
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"http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3026477/",
"http://web.mst.edu/~rhall/neuroscience/03_sleep/sleepneuro.pdf"
],
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226zdm | it's spring time again! why the hell am i getting allergies? | My nose is always stuffy, eyes watery, and throught iches . I'm taking Allegra and Claritin multiple times a day. It sucks and barely works. Please explain this to me. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/226zdm/eli5_its_spring_time_again_why_the_hell_am_i/ | {
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"Your body is CONSTANTLY being bombarded with microbes, dust particles, varying gases. Most of them either get filtered out by your nose hair and mucus and become boogers, which you dispose of in whatever way you see fit. However, the smaller particles get into your lungs and then blood stream. \n\nNow, your autoimmune system is usually pretty good at identifying what is a bad guy (microbes that will attack your body) and good/neutral guys. Now, a pollen allergy happens when your body mistakes pollen (which is largely neutral) for a bad guy. This causes your autoimmune system to attack the pollen, causing the primary symptoms of the allergy (excess mucus, sneezing, coughing, et al). The other symptoms are secondary: headaches are generally a result of constricted blood vessels on the brain due to a lack of moisture (because it all went to mucus production) and a lack of oxygen (because your breathing is belabored due to all the mucus). \n\nWatery eyes is kinda unrelated to this. You'd get the same results if you walked into a cloud of dust or smoke. Pollen is a mostly airborne particle, so of course that's going to make your eyes itchy and watery. \n\nMedicines rarely actually cure something. They usually do one of three things, they either help your body spot the microbes that are causing the illness (the way an antibiotics do), they replace or provide something your body doesn't have or can no longer produce (like insulin or saline), or change how your body reacts to stimuli. \n\nAllergy meds are the third kind. Like cold meds, they simply repress your symptoms. Now, your body doesn't like this. Biologically, it thinks there is an infection that it is fighting off, but now something is coming that is shutting down the defenses. Your body develops a resistance to the chemical so it can get back to fighting this odd infection that comes every spring, thus your allergy meds eventually stop working. \n\nThere is a rumor that you can teach your body to ignore the pollen in your system by eating honey made by local bees. It has something to do with the bees metabolizing the pollens... I don't know. The science isn't in on that yet. At least I haven't seen any evidence either way. "
]
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[]
] |
|
9s91lz | what is the significance of a mersenne prime number? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9s91lz/eli5_what_is_the_significance_of_a_mersenne_prime/ | {
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"The big thing that makes them special is that they're fairly easy to find, all things considered, and consequently the biggest known prime numbers are Mersenne primes.\n\nIf you grab a random large number then it's difficult to check to see if it's prime. The simplest approach is to just try dividing it by various numbers. This can prove that a number is *not* prime fairly easily, most of the time. However, it takes entirely too long to use this method to prove beyond a doubt that a number is prime.\n\nThere are other tests of primality that are much faster but still run into the same problem: they can prove a number is composite, but can't prove that it is prime. A famous example of this is the Fermat Primality test. In this test you compute the remainder of 2^(N-1) / N. If N is prime then this will always equal 1; otherwise it's an essentially random number between 0 and N. You can then repeat the test using 3^(N-1) / N, 4^(N-1) / N, and so on. If you *ever* get a number other than 1 then the number is definitely not prime.\n\nHowever, this test still can't prove a number is prime. The number 561 is not prime (it's 3\\*11\\*17), but it passes the Fermat Primality Test. There are infinitely many such numbers, though they're far more rare than prime numbers.\n\nMersenne Numbers are special becauese they allow you to use the Lucas-Lehmer primality test. Mersenne Primes are in the form of 2^P - 1 where P is itself a prime number. For example, 2^7 - 1 = 127; 7 is prime and so is 127. In the Lucas-Lehmer test you have a set of steps that you have to run *P* times to prove if 2^P - 1 is prime. It is an absolute proof; there is no weakness like the Fermat Primality Test.\n\nOther than the ease with which Mersenne primes are found, the numbers also have a special relationship with prefect numbers. Perfect numbers are numbers that are equal to the sum of their factors. For example, 6 is divisible by 1, 2, and 3; 1 + 2 + 3 = 6. (6 is also divisible by 6, but we don't count the number itself). If you have a Mersenne Prime, M, then the number M\\*(M+1) / 2 is a perfect number. 6, for example, equals 3 \\* 4 / 2, where 3 is a Mersenne Prime (2^2 - 1). "
]
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[]
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||
bi2fra | does increased brain usage (i.e., studying/working) lead to increased caloric usage? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bi2fra/eli5_does_increased_brain_usage_ie/ | {
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"elxinh9"
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"text": [
"The brain uses a huge amount of energy, per unit volume, all the time. While studying or taking an exam might seem like it's making your brain work harder, the percentage change is usually pretty small. Really sensitive functional MRI machines can measure it, but it's not a diet scheme."
]
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[]
] |
||
cof7nk | did cavemen really live in caves? | We often depict prehistoric humans as living in caves with a fire and potentially some drawings on the walls but, realistically, how many of us live anywhere near caves like that. Did early man live in other basic shelter or is that a later period of history? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cof7nk/eli5_did_cavemen_really_live_in_caves/ | {
"a_id": [
"ewin5fw"
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"text": [
" > Well, not exactly. According to archeological evidence, prehistoric human ancestors such as Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and Homo ergaster were nomadic. The caves often lay on valley slopes and provided excellent views of animal migration routes.\n\n_URL_0_"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"https://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/sometime-cavemen/"
]
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|
2a7rwf | why do i have to download an installer to download a program's .exe file? | e.g. I want to install Google Chrome, but first I have to download this 65KB downloader to download my download. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2a7rwf/eli5why_do_i_have_to_download_an_installer_to/ | {
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"text": [
"The 65KB downloader will always fetch the latest version of Chrome, if there are any specifics (Windows version, CPU type, and so on) it will also account for that. This is so you can use the installer on any computer and it will work.\n\nWhy you can't just download Chrome.exe? Because it, and many other programs, require more than just the exe file to function. The installer will install all of the required files, as well as configure all of the system settings to what's required.",
"One reason could be that they want to make sure you have the latest version of chrome installed and that you got it from them."
]
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[],
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kxmhr | how is it that astronauts aren't blinded by the brightness of the sun? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/kxmhr/eli5_how_is_it_that_astronauts_arent_blinded_by/ | {
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"text": [
"Those visors: a real thin layer of gold on there.",
"Their helmets have a visor the block the majority of the harmful rays.",
"They're only a fraction of a percent closer to the sun than we are, and the visors mentioned above make up for the absence of the filtering effect of our atmosphere.",
"Those visors: a real thin layer of gold on there.",
"Their helmets have a visor the block the majority of the harmful rays.",
"They're only a fraction of a percent closer to the sun than we are, and the visors mentioned above make up for the absence of the filtering effect of our atmosphere."
]
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2cs7w1 | why are many se asian countries mainly muslim, when they were colonised by european countries? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2cs7w1/eli5why_are_many_se_asian_countries_mainly_muslim/ | {
"a_id": [
"cjigppj"
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"score": [
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"text": [
"Those countries had Muslims well before Europeans arrived. Before the Europeans spread all over the world and gobbled up all the land they could take, merchants and sailors from the Middle East had already spread out to distant regions in Eurasia."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
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||
1qe0j0 | social contract theory | If anyone could kindly explain this to me, that would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1qe0j0/eli5_social_contract_theory/ | {
"a_id": [
"cdby8tn"
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"text": [
"Social Contract Theories tries to explain why people get together and form societies. They try to explain why a group of seperate people will give up some of their individual/personal freedom to gain benefits that can only be given to them by a legitimate state. \n\nIn a cave man world, every person is on their own trying to survive. You have absolute freedom as for living your life as you want to. But who will protect your freedom against evil assholes out there? You? Are you really up for that task, and sustaining your health all by yourself? Probably not, so why don't you and Fred Flintstone get together with all these other dudes and agree upon not killing each other? Neither of you wants to fight those damn dinosaurs by yourself all the time and almost get killed. Heck, even some assholes dig holes in the ground with sharpened poles with shit pastered on them sticking up underneath a bunch of leaves and Jimmy over there fell into that pit, got spiked by the poles and died by an infection he caught by getting feces into his wounds. Those bastards didn't even put a sign warning for the dinosaur trap! \n\nYou and all the other dudes form Bedrock. A town with a leader, police force, military, judicial system and currency (and extra social welfare things if you can agree about them). When you get together and work together to secure your way of life TOGETHER, you give up some of your individual freedom to society, and everyone who does that will get the benefits that your society has promised to provide as long as you follow the rules. For example: you didn't have to pay taxes when you were trying to outrun a T-rex by yourself, but once you pay you will get the best T-rex defence your society can provide (maybe a hole in the ground with sharp shit-pastered poles). \n\nEdit: A lot."
]
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3ozl8u | why do human beings occasionally need "alone time" or solitude when other social animals like dogs never want to leave their packs? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ozl8u/eli5_why_do_human_beings_occasionally_need_alone/ | {
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"Because we are much more complicated than dogs. And because we have bred dogs who are particularly reliant on their owners in order to foster a strong relationship. If you're referring to wolves, and other wild dogs well, again that's because their social structure is different. Humans have a strong concept of self and personal identity that is not necessarily observable in pack animals. ",
"How sure are you that dogs never take alone time from their packs? I know that hyenas, especially male hyenas (who are low in the social structure) will sometimes wander off, as will some lions, but neither of those are canines.\n\nAlso, alone time doesn't necessarily mean distancing. I might put on my headphones and watch something on my iPad or read a book while still in the same house as my SO. Dogs don't have the technology, but if an adult wolf lays down twenty feet away from where the pups are nursing with their mother, is that alone time?",
"You're making a pretty gigantic stretch in implying we should act just like dogs simply because the adjective \"social\" can be used to describe both species. We are totally different creatures. "
]
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7tway5 | why do washing machines have glass windows whereas the dishwashers don’t? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7tway5/eli5_why_do_washing_machines_have_glass_windows/ | {
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"text": [
"Washer machines has a load level, also, requires some supervision of the activity [i.e. Trying to open the door when water level is hight]. Dishwashers can't be \"overloaded\" neither visual inspection is needed.",
"One important factor is that dishwasher detergents are usually quite alkaline to get rid of grease. Alkalies attack glass which has a slightly acidic surface chemistry. Wash cheap glasses frequently and they go cloudy as the surface is etched, and you shouldn't wash expensive glass in a dishwasher for the same reason. If you had a glass window it would soon fog up as it would be exposed on every single wash cycle and need frequent replacement.\n\nYou wouldn't see much anyway as the washing is done with a spray of water/detergent, so the window would just constantly be obscured with a droplet mist. "
]
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33iha3 | cyclotron particle accelerator | I have to do a project on something with an electromagnet, so my partner and I chose a cyclotron. We're highschoolers, so we need to explain this to other highschoolers. Help? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/33iha3/eli5_cyclotron_particle_accelerator/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"A cyclotron is a particle accelerator. It's circular in shape, and contains two \"D\" shaped electrodes, back to back ([see diagram](_URL_0_)). \n\nA strong magnetic field passes normal to the circle. This magnetic field forces the particles to travel in a circular path.\n\nA high frequency, alternating current is applied between the two electorodes. The frequency is the same as the number of full rotations made by the particles each second.\n\nCharged particles are injected at the centre, and are accelerated by the electric field created between the two electrodes. When they come around the circle, the field switches direction, so that the particles are always accelerating. The acceleration causes the particles to spiral outwards. When the particles reach the edge of the magnetic field, they no longer travel in a circular path and are ejected from the device.",
"In the very simplest form a cyclotron consists of two big circular magnets, one above the other ([Diagam](_URL_0_)). Charged particles sent between the two magnets will move in a circle because of the magnetic field between the two magnets. To provide acceleration there is a gap down the center of the cyclotron. As the particles move in their circular trajectory they will cross the gap twice every full orbit. The acceleration occurs because an the two sides of the gap are charged so an electric field sits across the gap. The trick now is that as the particles are accelerated they the radius of their orbit will grow larger and larger. However, they are speeding up so the time to complete a full orbit never changes. Because of this if you very the direction the electric field points in the gap you can time the change so that the particles always see an accelerating field on each pass.\n\nThat's the basic idea. Reality unforunately gets a little more complicated. Due to special relativity once the particles begin to reach higher velocities, relative to the speed of light the scaling between the radius of their path and the velocity becomes non-linear and things get much more complicated. The are two basic ways you can account for relativity. The synchrocyclotron which various the frequency of the electric field oscillations, or the isochronous cyclotron which modifies the magnets so that the field varies with radius.\n\nCyclotron originally saw a great deal of use in nuclear physics research though they are being phased out these days in favor of other types of accelerators. However, they still see a great deal of use in a variety of medical applications and there may even be growing demand for them once again if proton therapy takes off for cancer treatment."
]
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclotron#/media/File:Cyclotron_patent.png"
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"http://www.cyberphysics.co.uk/topics/atomic/Accelerators/Cyclotron/cycfig.gif"
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aopbl8 | why is the tiananmen square massacre such a sensitive topic in china, to the point of records of the events being suppressed? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aopbl8/eli5_why_is_the_tiananmen_square_massacre_such_a/ | {
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"[\"Students linked arms but were mown down including soldiers. APCs then ran over bodies time and time again to make 'pie' and remains collected by bulldozer. Remains incinerated and then hosed down drains.\"](_URL_0_)\n\n & #x200B;",
"Why is there so many posts on it right now? It's not an anniversary. It happened in June of `89.",
"If you're trying to push the narrative that your nation is so progressive and the leadership so benevolent to the masses, how do you think Tianenmen Square supports those narratives? And when the people are calling for the end of the corruption in government and for Democratic reform against a government that is full of the corrupt who aren't above sending the military after thousands of civilians and who don't want to lose their power, would allowing free talk of the event help keep the people happy with their government, even though it's obviously corrupt?\n\nIt's like an abusive relationship where a dude just keeps going \"no that didn't happen I didn't hit you I didn't say that\" until his spouse just gives in and accepts *his* truth as *the* truth."
]
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"https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-42465516"
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34ujws | why was the ps2 backwards compatible but no other system has been? | Couldnt we just do whatever we did in the ps2 in the ps4 or xbox 1? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/34ujws/eli5why_was_the_ps2_backwards_compatible_but_no/ | {
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"text": [
"Because Sony thought that was important for marketing the PS2. \n\nBecause it turns out that it wasn't important enough to be worth the additional cost.",
"Backwards compatibility is hard and expensive, in the PS2's case the hardware between it and the PS1 may have been very similar and the PS1 emulation they needed to do was small.",
"Wasn't the wii backwards compatible? Iirc, you could play Gamecube games on the Wii.",
"Early versions of the PS2 had an entire PS1 stuck inside. The first generation of the PS3 did the same thing with the PS2. Later PS2s, the second generation PS3 tried emulating the older console. The Xbox 360 had some sort of translation layer (similar to an emulator). The first approach is expensive and requires the consoles to be larger. The second approach is hard to make, slow, buggy, and not a lot of people use it anyway so Sony stopped working on it in the later PS3s and neither Sony or Microsoft tried to do it in the PS4.\n\nThen there's Nintendo's approach- if they don't change the processor architecture between console generations, the backwards compatibility problem becomes a whole lot easier.",
"The new Xbox One and PS4 are built using a different processor architecture for the hardware. The new architecture is closer to a desktop PC than a console. It would require a lot of time and effort to port games from the Xbox 360 to the Xbox One for this reason. ",
"The PS2 achieved backwards compatibility in quite a novel way. The CPU used in the PS1 was also used in the PS2 as an IO processor.\n\nSo they didn't have to add extra hardware to the PS2 to play PS1 games, it already had the hardware it needed. That hardware was useful for PS2 games as well as allowing the PS2 to play PS1 games.\n\nEarly PS3s had backwards compatibility with PS2 games, but to do that they needed extra hardware which was there purely to run PS2 games. So that got removed from later versions to cut costs.\n\nSome other consoles have backwards compatibility by emulating in software. All PS3s can play PS1 games because it is powerful enough to emulate a PS1, but not a PS2 (it was only PS2 backwards compatibility which was removed). I think the Xbox 360 could play some original Xbox games through emulation.\n\nAnother way to achieve backwards compatibility is by making the new console essentially just a faster version of the previous one. For example the Wii is pretty much a more powerful Gamecube, and the Wii U is pretty much a more powerful Wii.\n\nSo maybe Sony could have done one of these things for the PS4. But it comes at the cost of additional hardware or possibly having to compromise the design of the new console so it can be backwards compatible. I'm still hoping they'll add PS2 and PS1 backwards compatibility though, as it should be able to emulate them in software."
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9bytv4 | what’s the relation of black american culture and the barbershops as an important social space ? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9bytv4/eli5_whats_the_relation_of_black_american_culture/ | {
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"It is a space where black people can communicate freely. Problems can be articulated and solutions discussed. Narratives about events in society can be constucted.\nThe need for the barbershop is historical. For much of world history, disadvantaged groups - women, working class, racial minorities, sexual minorities - had no access to the means of communication. The problems that were discussed on the national news or in national newspapers were of a certain group of a certain class of a certain gender. the barbershop is also a place where a black person can see their dollars being recycled. It is the last stronghold in the black community. We will go to everyone else for every other product and service except a haircut. That is why it is very important for us to support black products in our shops, ie hair products, skin care products, clothing etc. There is no place else to do it."
]
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[]
] |
||
1zm5at | why is it taking so long to determine if e-cigarettes are better/worse/as bad for you as actual cigarettes? | I've Googled it but all I can find are pretty much opinions by some people saying they're worse and others saying they're better.. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1zm5at/eli5_why_is_it_taking_so_long_to_determine_if/ | {
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"Because health effects can only be determined after a while; after all, normal cigarettes will not kill you instantly either but make you sick after some decades.",
"It's known they are healthier than cigarettes. They can't be regulated just on that alone though. The detrimental effects of e-cigs (independent of how they compare to cigarettes - albeit that is still relevant) is what people are still trying to figure out."
]
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37u6zo | why can we only focus on one part of an image | When we see an image our focus draws instantly onto a part of the image like a face but then blurs out the surroundings or you look at two people but when you focus on one the other person blurs out. What is that? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37u6zo/eli5_why_can_we_only_focus_on_one_part_of_an_image/ | {
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"Your eyes have a spot right in the middle that has a lot more sensors than the rest of your eye. It's called the fovea. It's a little pit and that shape let's the eye pack even more light sensors right there than if it was flat. It takes a lot more nerves and blood to keep that many sensors working so it's not efficient to make the whole eye work that way--you can just point it in different directions to see stuff, and outside of it you pretty much just need a general idea of what's going on and if something is moving. So that's how you end up with a really sharp image in the center of your vision and less sharp around the outside. ",
"The human eye (and that of many other animals) has a very small area called the [fovea](_URL_0_) where the cells responsible for sharp vision (called the [cones](_URL_1_)) are tightly packed. This is the only part of the eye capable of seeing at that level of detail.\n\n"
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4i3c3f | what is the point of those spam calls where the line immediately hangs up? | Like telemarketers will often try to get information from you or sell you something, but what about those callers that always immediately hang up? Do they get some type of information from the 1 second connection? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4i3c3f/eli5what_is_the_point_of_those_spam_calls_where/ | {
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"They're using what's known as a predictive dialer. It dials numbers en masse and when it detects a live person on the line, it attempts to connect the line to an available operator. If no operator is available, the line hangs up. This is also why you sometimes hear an unnatural delay before someone comes on the line.\n\nSource: I sue companies that make these kinds of unsolicited calls.",
"They're just making sure that your number is a working number.\n\nThey can then sell this info to other companies.\n\nWhen you pick up or they get an answering machine, then it's mission accomplished for them."
]
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d36suu | i'm new to flying, can someone explain how passports and boarding a new country work? | Never flown as a adult before. Also, do not have a passport. Can someone explain how they work, in basic terms?
Do I buy a passport, fly, have the country stamp it which shown that I have permission to enter? What is a Visa? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d36suu/eli5_im_new_to_flying_can_someone_explain_how/ | {
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"A passport is a form of identity that's internationally accepted and essentially gives authority to leave your own country.\n\nA Visa is authority to temporarily enter a country as either a tourist or a temporary worker.",
"You will need to add more info.\n\nWhere are you from and where are you going?\n\nThat make it easier to answer for your case.\n\nBest thing to do is to go to your local government (city hall), ask for a passport, and inform about the place you're planning to visit. They'll have all correct info and hoops you'll need to jump through",
"You don't buy a passport, you apply for a passport that your country issues for you. I'm guessing you're from the USA, so here: _URL_0_\n\nWhen you enter or leave a country they denote it by stamping your passport at the border.\n\nA visa is a document produced by a country that allows a person to enter it. Many countries have visa waiver programs for certain others countries, meaning they don't require a visa to enter if you're from the country. For example if you're American you can freely enter any country in the European Union without a visa. If a country does require a visa, you need to get one at that country's consulate/embassy in your own country.",
"You obtain a passport from your government. You'll probably have to pay a fee and wait for some time (which may be weeks, so you should do this well in advance). They'll probably want some sort of ID.\n\nA visa is basically a permission to fly somewhere you usually couldn't go. So for instance an American can fly to the UK without one by just having a passport and buying a flight, because there's an agreement between the US and the UK. But if you want to go to Russia, then they won't let you in as it is. You need to go to the Russian embassy in your region, explain to them why you want to go there, provide documentation (typically some personal info, information about your background, travel plans) and prove your ties to your home country.\n\nThere are multiple kinds of visa. You probably want a nonmigrant one, meaning you want to come there for a short time and then leave. There are other visas for bringing your foreign spouse in to your country, or staying permanently to work. A nonmigrant visa doesn't authorize you to work.\n\nSome countries are worried that you might not leave. So they ask you to prove you have reasons to return, such as: not being too poor, having a job, having a house, being a student, etc. They'll also ask questions about what your plans are, whether you've been committed of any crimes, and so on. You may be interviewed in person. A visa lasts for a limited time (a year or so, you can get long term ones if you fly a lot) and grants entry for a limited time too, like say 3 months.\n\nThe visa goes in your passport. It's printed into one of its pages. It can take a long time, also weeks.\n\n[Here's an example of what the US asks for people wishing to travel to the US](_URL_0_). Yes, it's quite thorough, and they ask pretty interesting questions, like if you intent to commit terroristic acts.\n\nSo with that out of the way, you buy your plane ticket, probably enter the passport and visa number (if needed) on some form, and fly.\n\nOnce you land you'll go through passport control. You may have your fingerprints taken, your passport will be looked at, and you may be interviewed by border control. They'll put a stamp on one of your passport's pages. After that, you go in.\n\nIt's a very bad idea to lie or to overstay your visa. Any funny business can get you into a lot of trouble, and will likely ban you from entering the same country again."
]
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1rix34 | why can i still smell foul stuff from hours ago, yet i stop smelling pleasant things within minutes? | I smelled a container that had a rotten egg in it this morning to see what it smelled like. It smelled bad but the weird thing is that I still smell it some 8 hours later. This isn't the first time that I could still smell something hours or even days later. Why is this? It seems to be worse when I'm tired for some reason. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rix34/eli5_why_can_i_still_smell_foul_stuff_from_hours/ | {
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"I was taught that it has to do with what your body perceives as a threat to health. So stuff that smells good and poses no threat will be ignored. The stuff that can be harmful, the body makes a continuous aversion."
]
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[]
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|
3b1m83 | can we plant seeds into deserts which then can turn deserts into having lots of trees and jungle like feel? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3b1m83/eli5can_we_plant_seeds_into_deserts_which_then/ | {
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"If you replaced all the soil in a desert and watered it, it would cease to be a desert, yes.\n\nDeserts spread by desertification - the soil dries out, and the silt and clay turn to a fine dust and are blown away, leaving only the heaviest part of the soil, the sand. This in turn drains very quickly (because it doesn't have a lot of surface area to retain water), causing the nearby soil to dry out and have it's silt and clay blow away in the wind.",
"Well, not particularly. See, the thing about the desert is that it has extreme heat and extreme cold, which many plants can't survive despite the soil quality. You would also need to replace a lot of soil for this to happen because plants grow roots and just covering the top surfaces or even a foot or two down wouldn't sustain the plant life. Furthermore, the desert does not get enough rain to support life in the way that a jungle/rainforest would. A good thing to look at is California. Many of the plants that homeowners have are foreign plants which thrive only with substantial watering and care, and it has not been good for the environment."
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a388ae | how come our brain can remember the things that we were thinking about or doing during the day with ease, but when we are about to fall asleep it is so hard to remember what we were thinking about seconds before? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a388ae/eli5_how_come_our_brain_can_remember_the_things/ | {
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"Maybe when you get your answer I will get mine as to why mine thoughts are the exact opposite. I can't remember anything all day long and the second I want to lay down and go to sleep I remember everything I have ever done I don't want to think about. "
]
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||
aih6kp | 1st and 2nd order mechanical/electrical systems | Studying engineering at the moment and having trouble grasping this concept. I understand that mass and Spring store energy and the Damper dissapates (mass is inductance, Spring is capacitance and Damper is resistance - I think) but I'm a bit lost on how to tell the difference between a 1st and 2nd order system | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aih6kp/eli5_1st_and_2nd_order_mechanicalelectrical/ | {
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"So, you know how velocity is the derivative of position? That's a first-order equation. Most damping forces are found from velocity, making them first-order elements. A system with one of those is a first-order system.\n\nAcceleration is the derivative of velocity, making it the SECOND derivative of position. Anything that relies on acceleration for its calculation is a second-order element, and a system with one of those is a second-order system.\n\nThe number of a system is the number of derivatives you have to take to solve the equation. \n\nIt might help to write them this way: instead of V, write x'. Instead of acceleration, write x''. Then just see what the biggest number of ' is. That's the order of your system.",
"the order is a mathematical term denoting how many derivatives are required to explain the motion or phenomenon taking place. Hookes law is a great second order example which describes the motion of a simple oscillator, like a mass on a spring with small displacement from equilibrium.\n\nF = k * x\n\nSubstituting the left hand side according to newtons 2nd law, and expressing “a” as a derivative of position:\n\nF = m * a = m * x’’\n\nm * x’’ = k * x\n\n\nWe see the variable x present in a second derivative (second order term) and again on the right hand side without any derivative (zero order).\n\nSince the highest derivative present in the equation is a 2nd derivative (acceleration) it is a second order equation. any physical system governed by this equation is considered a second order system.\n\nedit: used prime notation for readability"
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4vqjnu | how does drinking water coming into nyc not get dirty from the pipes? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4vqjnu/eli5_how_does_drinking_water_coming_into_nyc_not/ | {
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"Why would the pipes be dirty?\n\nWater utility workers will occasionally open valves and hydrants to blow sediment out of the mains, but for the most part they stay pretty clean unless there's a major break.",
"They are very sealed and tested regularly. Furthermore, they put components in the water to help keep the pipes clean, which is one of the reasons why there is residual chlorine in the pipes.\n\nYou can go to the city's Aquaduct web site and find contact information, an Aquaduct worker may be all happy to answer your e-mails about your water supply!\n\nWhere i'm from (Ontario, Canada), we have the most stringent drinking water requirements in the world.\n\nDrinking water is extremley safe. Safer than bottled water in most cases, most of which are made from city water (because its a reliable safe source of water).",
"The pipes are constantly washed with running water, and are under pressure so things leak out, not in.",
"Why specifically NYC? Why would you think their water system is any different from any other city's water system?"
]
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d85hzd | how are streetlights on highways that stretch for miles powered and how does the government ensure that it doesn't suddenly cut in the middle of the night? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d85hzd/eli5_how_are_streetlights_on_highways_that/ | {
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"These days, street lights are usually powered from cables that run underground. trenches are dug and pipes laid while they are constructing the road, wires are pulled through them, and tapped in to by the street lights. If street lights are added to an existing road, then aerial cables are strung between the street light poles.\n\nThe power for these lights comes from the normal power grid. At regular intervals, wires are run to the lights from the normal, domestic supply. Often this power isn't metered - the government pays a fixed fee depending on how many lights it is estimated that they have.\n\nAnd these street lights are susceptible to power blackouts and faults, and often do go out in the middle of the night. Faults that only affect a run of street lights do happen, often they have monitors that report back by radio to tell them a light is out - but often they rely on employees or even the public to report that a section of street lighting is out."
]
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2rbd4p | why do we have differing "strengths" of orgasms and what is it that makes them better/worse | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2rbd4p/eli5_why_do_we_have_differing_strengths_of/ | {
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"As far as I have figured out it is lead up time, foreplay essentially. This is one of the major reasons it is so important.",
"Also, why does a varying strength male orgasm result in varying amounts of ejaculate and varying distance. There is a positive correlation between intensity, volume and distance. \n\nI tried to right that as cleanly as possible without saying why do I sometimes blast one over a girls head and sometimes its a sad drip",
"Orgasm strength is directly linked to overall arousal. The more stimuli there is (sight, smell, feel, etc...) the larger the build-up of arousal hormones. With that, the longer you are stimulated the bigger the build-up of arousal hormones. \n\n[Edit]: Syntax structure.",
"With male ejacualtion, the rhythm and pressure need to be applied throughout orgasm.\n\nAs the orgasm is about to happen, theres almost a 2/3 second period that you know \"its about to happen\".\nA point of no return one might say.\n\nIf at that point you stop what you are doing, ie stop masturbating, or pull out from sex, the orgasm will be very disappointing, it can be a less intense feeling, or in the worst case scenario, feel like nothing, or even slightly uncomfortable.\n\nSimilarly, if you change rhythm or intensity, this can also affect the intensity. \n\nIf you are going hard and fast, keep going hard and fast, if you are going slow, keep going slow.\n\nI can't answer for women, but from my experience, it's very similar to what I explained above. It's not about the speed or depth of the sex, its about being consistant. By changing position a lot of times, or changing technique, it can ruin the orgasm or make it less intense.\n\nMy advice is to always go at a moderate pace and keep to a rhythm. Find out what works best for you.\n\n",
"An orgasm is neurons in the pleasure center cranking things to 11.\n\nSo think of it as a crowd at a concert. Want their hands up in the air and screaming? Then they need to be primed, expectant, in the mood.",
"If you're male and wan't a stronger ejaculatory orgasm, try masturbating with a prostate massager in your butt. It sounds weird, but if you \"start and stop\" for about 2 hours before you ejaculate, you're orgasm will be like 10x stronger and last a few seconds longer.",
"I have no scientific validation for this, only self experience (so for males). Relax bro! The longer you can have a relaxed kegal muscle before you ejaculate the better it will feel. Any one know why? ",
"I've have been studying a unique phenomenon that has been directly related to extremely intense orgasms in woman, while having Intercourse the more words she hears that start with the letters \"V\" or \"Q\" (only one don't mix both letters pick one and stick with it for the session) it varies effectiveness but on average 20 words with either letter while being stimulated is effective. Trust me I'm a scientist. ",
"The answers seem to focus more on dudes, but as a lady I can say that strength of a female orgasm can depend on the level of arousal, level of stimulation, and the build-up (see edging). I personally find that mine are stronger if I haven't had one for a while. \n\nEdit: And I don't know if this happens for anyone else, but I find my orgasms are felt more...deeply, I guess, if I'm fantasizing during masturbation, as opposed to watching porn, which makes them strong, but not as long lasting. ",
"As a male, the traditional orgasm quit being great once I went through puberty and started ejaculating semen...it wasn't nearly as fulfilling or satisfying.... Then I started getting into prostate massage with a toy from a company known as aneros, and the magic is back for me, similar to when I orgasmed as a kid....I highly recommend prostate massage if you are comfortable with your sexuality",
"Along these lines, why do certain medications impede orgasm?",
"Orgasm requires cooperation between two branches of the Autonomic Nervous system (like the 'automatic' nervous system) to work together--sympathetic (fight or flight!!) and parasympathetic (rest, relax). Together they cause you to 'point' (para) and 'shoot' (sympa)...haha :). The parasympathetic branch encourages vasodilation, or the dilation of blood vessels, which leads to engorgement of the penis or clitoris. So, the more relaxed you can be with your partner, the more parasympathetic tone can lead to blood flow to erogenous zones. This occurs without physical stimulation; just the thought alone can increase parasympathetic tone.\n\nThat's not enough, though. You need the sympathetic nervous system to cause muscle contraction. In both males and females, this occurs during orgasm; it causes contractions in the vaginal wall or at the base of the penis to push ejaculate out. Orgasm is actually a sympathetic reflex in response to tactile stimulation (touch). This is why, while it's possible to orgasm without any physical stimulation, it's very rare. Without the sympathetic reflex/increase in sympathetic tone, all you have is parasympathetic activation increasing blood flow. It's the sympathetic activation that increases glandular secretions and leads to muscle contraction. So, how can you increase the strength of this reflex? Strong feelings for your partner (or strong excitement to have an orgasm on your own), stronger tactile stimulation, and/or a long buildup to allow for a great deal of blood to engorge the tissues. \n\nETA: This was written geared more toward male orgasm but the same concepts apply.",
"I'm going to throw in here:\n\nWe have different strength orgasms because the orgasm process is influenced by your muscles and hormones. So orgasm strength is dictated by the intensity of muscle contractions, and amount of sexual hormones around at the time. These things are also strongly influenced by mental arousal and simulation.\n\nIt might help to think of it more like a gradient, from weak to strong, with the 3 main input factors being: physical arousal, mental arousal, and hormones. However most of these 3 inputs are interconnected. If you have an orgasm when at a high level for all 3, your orgasm muscles get more nervous input, thus stronger contractions.",
"back when the learning channel actually showed educational stuff there was a series of sex-themed shows. two things that stuck in my head- when women are ovulating they'll show more skin, and when a guy thinks there is a chance that she is getting sperm from someone else, he'll over produce. ",
"Reddit: Where it's totally okay to explain orgasm strengths to 5 year olds."
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5kegly | what is the economic importance of dairy? | So, I stumbled across an article about how someone in Congress thinks labeling Almond Milk, Soy Milk, Cashew Milk, etc. is wrong and making the dairy industry suffer. Their conclusion was that we should not allow them to be called "Milk".
This made me wonder, "Why is it such an issue that milk sales fall?" Or "Why do we put such a huge economic importance on cattle farmers in the first place?" "Who cares if milk is being drank less?"
So can someone explain how milk affects our economy? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5kegly/eli5_what_is_the_economic_importance_of_dairy/ | {
"a_id": [
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"text": [
"Welcome to true politics. The milk industry has more money and has been around longer than the soy/almond milk industries and therefore can out lobby them in Washington."
]
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|
1i7fq4 | why did janet napolitano resign? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1i7fq4/eli5why_did_janet_napolitano_resign/ | {
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"text": [
"Because she got a job heading up the University of California system. Her salary probably quintupled. "
]
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||
8l53zg | do synthesizers have an infinite number of sounds? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8l53zg/eli5_do_synthesizers_have_an_infinite_number_of/ | {
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"text": [
"No. The tones created by a synthesizer are encoded with data. That data can have a stupidly big number of possible states, each of which correspond to a different synthesizer noise, but it is not infinite."
]
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||
2mucx3 | when i apply moisturizer to my skin, what is the 'moisture'? | If it's actually water, why doesn't water fix dry skin? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2mucx3/eli5_when_i_apply_moisturizer_to_my_skin_what_is/ | {
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" > what is the 'moisture'?\n\ntypically it's replacing oily substances in your skin that's lost from soaps\n\n > why doesn't water fix dry skin?\n\nDry skin is skin that has lost much of it's natural oils for whatever reason. It becomes \"chapped\", cracks, and hurts like a …\n\nThis is the same mechanism by which Chap Stick works too!"
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63kot5 | how does whatsapp's end-to-end-encryption work, and how do we know that it really is ecrypted all the way through? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/63kot5/eli5_how_does_whatsapps_endtoendencryption_work/ | {
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"The way end-to-end encryption works (not only whatsapp's encryption but pretty much any end-to-end encryption algorithm) is the following: Every \"thing\" you want to encrypt (chat messages in this case) has a public key. That key can be viewed by anyone. It's basically a long number. Now, every chat has a private key associated with it. That's another long number. Only the two clients in that chat have that private key and when client A sends a message, it gets encrypted with a combination of the public and the private key and can only be decrypted with a combination of those two as well. The only time the private key *could* be seen by someone else is when the chat is being initialized. Because then the private key gets generated and sent to the chat partner. From that point, it gets never sent out again. So not even the servers would be able to decrypt messages encrypted with that key.",
"Whatsapp is most likely completely end to end encrypted. If the underlying question you're asking is: \"Can anyone snoop on what I use my whatsapp for?\". The answer will be yes. It's more than likely that Whatsapp has a backdoor in it allowing for others to read \"secure\" conversations. As to what extend this is being abused I have no idea.",
"Whatsapp uses a modified form of the signal protocol - _URL_1_\n\nThe signal protocol is open source and has been scrutinized by crypto experts all over the world. It's probably pretty damn tight. You can check it out yourself if you like. _URL_0_\n\nCould whatsapp have built in a backdoor in the closed source - sure, but why? It would probably destroy the company if that info was leaked. Also worth noting - anytime you use software you trust the programmer/companies that wrote that software. And all companies and people involved in making the hardware that your software runs on!\n\nHowever, governments and malicious parties don't have to break the encryption. They just hack your or your conversations partners phone. Either by fooling you into running code for them or hacking android/iOS or the sim card/gsm etc. If you use whatsapp web it opens even more possibilities for intrusion.\n\nStill, at the moment whatsapp is your best choice for a secure communication platform."
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4lwmr9 | how classical music can be so complex and engaging, but also serve as perfect study music that isn't distracting | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4lwmr9/eli5_how_classical_music_can_be_so_complex_and/ | {
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"Im suprised nobody has mentioned baroque music. The idea is that it assists you in focusing. Something about this type of music assists you. Perhaps look into it OP",
"All of these descriptors are subjective. Some people may find classical music boring or ugly, and others may find it engaging and enjoyable. Likewise, some people can study to it well, and others cannot.\n\nThat being said, I think a major part classical music's reputation as non-distracting study music is the fact that people largely choose *instrumental* classical music to study to, while if they were to choose more contemporary popular music, they would likely choose music with vocals. Vocals distract listeners more, because they more directly engage the parts of our brain that register language.\n\nAnother part of classical music's popularity as study music is purely cultural. Since it nowadays has a reputation as being more \"serious\" and \"cerebral\" than contemporary popular music, people associate it with more intellectual activities.",
"I'll expand on something said elsewhere in the thread: It's not that classical music is less distracting, so much as it is that modern music tends to have lyrics--and listening to other people speak or sing makes it very difficult for you to read effectively, especially if the concept you're reading about is unfamiliar. \n\nTry listening to some non-lyrical modern music (movie scores are great for this, as is techno and electronica); you will likely find that it is good study music as well.",
"Noncognosco has given an elaborate explanation for 1 important factor. So I won't add to it. There is however 1 more factor that comes in to play here. For simplicity sake, imagine people on a spectrum of Highly ADHD to NOT ADHD. Music as background sound is good stimulation to occupy some of your attention reserve. So the more ADHD you are, the better it is to have some background music. That extra stimulation helps maintain a smaller percentage of your total attention dedicated to the important task at hand - studying. On the other hand, if you are totally Not ADHD, even a little bit of music can distract you - you don't need stimulation and your attentional reserve is just enough for focusing on that one task. This is has been experimentally verified but I certainly feel more experiments are needed. \n\nHowever, in today's age, we deal with so much information through so many mediums that most of the urban humans have a tendency to be a little ADHD. This makes it quite a well supported theme, culturally speaking - instrumental classical music can help concentrate. \n\nI'd also say that a little bit of the benefit comes from the aesthetic appeal too!"
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3845co | how is it that public servants who vow to protect and uphold the constitution are allowed to get away with doing the exact opposite? | I'm thinking specifically of the 4th Amendment, which has been systematically chipped away at by the Department of Justice and others. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3845co/eli5_how_is_it_that_public_servants_who_vow_to/ | {
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"Because, in the end, it doesn't matter what *you* think is a violation, it matters what the courts think.\n\nThere are more than a few areas that people believe is their own private business where both statutory and case law disagree."
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a2cvi8 | i was watching the steam from my boiler leave the pipe outside my apartment and wondered why they don’t attach some turbine to capture all that steam energy | Why can’t I use that steam to power my apartment, just a little bit? Or at the very least, use the power to make the boiler use less electricity. What else could the steam be used for?
Additional info, the boiler uses both gas and electric to make hot water for the kitchen sink and for the central heating in the apartment. The boiler is only for my apartment and nobody else gets the water from it.
I’m not actually in a position to make any modifications but I’m just very curious as to why all this steam is just being thrown out of everyone’s apartment and being wasted. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a2cvi8/eli5_i_was_watching_the_steam_from_my_boiler/ | {
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"It’s not very much energy to recover. Steam power works on backpressure, like when it comes out of a tea kettle spout. Holding back the steam makes it hotter and more humid inside, but we don’t want that in our homes. It would be uncomfortable and eventually moldy.",
"The \"steam\" is a mist of cooled, condensed water droplets, it doesn't have any stored energy that you can harvest. A steam turbine uses the energy in hot, pressurised gas (evaporated water) to blow on turbine fan blades and then them. Your domestic boiler is using the energy from the burning fuel to heat water, not to produce steam pressure, that would need a completely different set-up.",
"It's actually not steam that is being emitted, it's actually a fog of tiny water drops.\n\nIf it was steam, it would be transparent. Older boilers used to work like this. When gas burns it produces CO2 and water, but tiny amounts of contaminants in the gas when burned react with the water to produce acid.\n\nIf you allowed this steam to condense, it would form droplets of acid, which would eat the inside of the boiler away. So, boilers were designed to keep the exhaust so hot, that everything stayed as steam and there was no condensation. \n\nBecause the steam contained a ton of energy (about 1/3 of the energy from the gas), this was energy inefficient and expensive to run. So, energy efficiency laws came in requiring boilers to capture the energy in the steam.\n\nIn a modern boiler, the exhaust is cooled to condense the steam, capturing this energy. However, this creates water - some of this comes out in the exhaust as a fog of water drops, as well as liquid water which comes out of a drain tube. To deal with the acid, the boiler internals have to be made of special metals which don't corrode, such as high grade stainless steel. \n\nThe other issue is that your boiler isn't pressurised. In fact, because burning gas can produce deadly poisons like carbon monoxide, there are strict requirements on boiler design. One is that the combustion must be done at reduced pressure. There is a fan which actually sucks the exhaust out of the boiler - this way, if the boiler has an exhuast leak, air leaks *into* the exhaust, the exhaust gas doesn't leak out of the pipe into your apartment. There is a fail safe system installed. If the fan doesn't reach the correct speed, or the correct suction isn't generated (if the exhaust is blocked), the boiler will shut down, and lock out until reset by a technician.",
"Not exactly what you’re talking about, but we have started collecting that energy. I’m not sure what the equivalent piece of equipment is, but in an air system we use [Heat Recovery Ventilators](_URL_0_) (HRV) to pre heat incoming air. The pipes carrying the hot, used air will pass by the new cold air pipes. As they pass they transfer energy over so the new air doesn’t require as much energy to heat up.\n\nA similar thing happens with water heaters and Drain Water Heat Recovery Systems ([DWHR](_URL_1_)). I’m sure a similar concept could be/has been applied to boilers."
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4jc6o5 | how is macroevolution advantageous to a species? | I understand how microevolution is advantageous due to a species being able to adapt to the environment much more easily, but I don't understand how macro works. So the only advantage is that it stops a species from evolving? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4jc6o5/eli5_how_is_macroevolution_advantageous_to_a/ | {
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"Macro-evolution (if you wanna use the term) is just the accumulation of all those small changes and adaptations across a long timeline. ",
"Macroevolution is just the name for what happens when you let microevolution run for a very very long time\\*. Organisms can become arbitrarily different from their ancestors given enough generations.\n\nThe division of evolution into \"micro\" and \"macro\" isn't very useful. It doesn't carve reality at the joint, and it causes more confusion than it dissolves. This is probably a feature rather than a bug for creationists hellbent on spreading misinformation.\n\n\\* \"Macroevolution\" can also happen over a single generation in some rare cases, e.g. [canine venereal sarcoma](_URL_0_), a transmissible cancer that was once a dog.",
"It kind-of depends on what you understand by \"macroevolution\". Not all biologists are in agreement that there are separate \"micro-\" and \"macro-\" processes. You won't hear Richard Dawkins using the term seriously e.g. [here] (_URL_0_) he calls it \"simply what you get when microevolution goes on for very a long time\". \n\nThe Wikipedia article on Macroevolution has a whole section on [misuse] (_URL_1_) which talks about attempts by creationists to explain e.g. the well-documented evolution of bacteria to resist antibiotics while using rejecting the wider concept of evolution of organisms in to species. So I don't understand what you're asking when you say it \"stops a species from evolving\". The creationist argument is that species are fixed by \"God\" and don't evolve in to other species, but that is not a scientific theory. Evolution might go in directions we're not expecting, but could evolution ever really stop? "
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2huoyy | what percentage of the worlds trees would we have to lose before we started having breathing problems? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2huoyy/eli5_what_percentage_of_the_worlds_trees_would_we/ | {
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"I'm no scientist. But I'm pretty sure trees actually produce very little percentage of the air we breathe. I think most is from algae and similar things like that. "
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2cw820 | the pros and cons of an independent scotland using a) the pound b) the euro c) a new currency | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2cw820/eli5_the_pros_and_cons_of_an_independent_scotland/ | {
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"**Pound**\n\nPros: Scotland doesn't have to deal with making a new currency.\n\nCons: Scotland's monetary policy is *completely* beyond its own control, and those that do control the currency (England) are not going to be terribly sympathetic. Also the very act of Scotland leaving the UK may cause uncertainty in the Pound.\n\n**Euro**\n\nPros: Same as the Pound, but with the added benefit of synchronizing itself to the EU faster.\n\nCons: The Euro carries a fair bit of uncertainty with it right now, due to the monetary problems of Greece and Spain (among others). Also, Scotland's monetary policy is *again* out of their hands, and they are at the mercy of Germany (essentially) instead of the UK.\n\n**New (Scottish) Currency**\n\nPros: Scotland gets complete control of its own currency.\n\nCons: Probably an economic nightmare, as the Pound (and even the Euro) will be more stable. People will opt out in favor of using other currencies, and inflation may set in. Also may be unnecessary, given that Scotland appears to want to join the EU as soon as possible, and Scotland doesn't have the same weight as the UK in arguing that they should keep their own currency.\n\n**Other Options**\n\nUse the Dollar. You don't get to control policy, but you use a stable currency that *everyone* will accept (or that will have no issue being converted into something else, like the Euro or Pound).\n\nOr you could really go nuts and use the Norwegian Krone, but I have no idea why you'd want to unless increasing relations with Norway are in the cards. \n\nIf it were up to me, and if independence is inevitable, figure out whether or not the populace wants to join the EU. If so (and from everything I've heard, it is what they want), go with the Euro. If not, go with the Pound or the Dollar, whichever is more stable.\n\nEdit: I should mention that I am an American looking at this whole situation from the outside, and that I also don't think that Scotland should go independent, but it is ultimately their decision."
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30hwuz | if recording artists are not selling music because everybody steals it, how do they afford multi-million dollars mansions and private jets? | Just curious. We are constantly hit with this barrage of claims about how the recording industry is being wiped-out by theft. Yet, Gulfstream and Bentley seem to be selling tons of their products to these same broke-ass singers. Are they making 10's of millions per year just doing concerts and selling t-shirts? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/30hwuz/eli5_if_recording_artists_are_not_selling_music/ | {
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"Artists have rarely made money from record sales themselves. That money has almost always gone to the record companies. Recording contracts are structured to give minimal money to artists. We're talking pennies per album. For artists, the real money is in performances, publishing rights, merchandise and synchronization rights (allowing your music to be used in TV, movies and video games).\n\nThe recorded music industry absolutely is getting their shit wrecked, but it's hurting the corporations' profits, not so much the artists.",
" > Are they making 10's of millions per year just doing concerts and selling t-shirts?\n\nConcerts and merchandise have always made far far more money for bands than album/single sales, and have done since the record industry began. \n\nLet's break it down. A common figure for a band is 50 cents per album sold. The agent/manager takes his cut, then you split it 4 ways four a common 4-piece band and you're looking at 10 cents an album. To make $60,000 a year off that you'd need to be selling 600,000 albums every year. If you release an album every 3 years, each album needs to sell 1.8 million copies (almost double platinum) -- or more than 3x the latest Lady Gaga album.\n\nBarely anyone in the industry is living off record sales. Concerts are, and always have been, where the money is. Let's assume that Lady Gaga has negotiated a really good contract with the record company (20%), gives her manager a modest 10%, and is taking the rest home herself. She would make in the range of $0.8-1.2M cash from her latest LP, *Cheek to Cheek*. But as of May last year, she was booking stadium shows for $750K. Now you don't take home the entire $750K packet yourself either, but you get a much bigger share of show revenue than you do of album revenue, and you can see the point -- she is easily going to make more from a handful of concerts than from her record sales.\n\nAlbum sales are way down, and the recording industry is in bad shape because of it... but the *music industry* isn't. Musicians are making plenty of money because more people are going to concerts than ever before. Small/indie bands are getting far more exposure than ever before, and have started making good money from tours and shows thanks to exposure on Soundcloud, YouTube, Bandcamp, etc. The music industry, as a whole, is doing great. It's the *recording* part that's suffering. \n\nPretty much everyone is expecting that 10 years from now, rather than get hunted by talent agents from record companies and finally landing your big record deal, the environment will shift to bands getting exposure online, making money from shows, and paying to rent studio+producer time when they want to record albums. In the digital era studio time has gotten much cheaper so this is a good option for many indie bands.",
"[I'm gonna show you something, and I don't think you're gonna like it...](_URL_0_)",
"My dad told me about this. He told me that back in the 60's/70's/80's, bands made more money through record sales than they did touring, but in the 90's and 00's, it switched around. Now, they make more money through touring and merchandise sales.",
"Well in today's day and age people are now keeping more of the money the corporation used to get. There are also numerous advances in technology that generate $$$.\n\nTake the wack ass hoe rapper Mac Miller. He was smart about one thing...he put his 8 year old focused rap tracks up for download as ringtones and made 6 figures and that's how he got his first big check."
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56jmlf | why is it that when you close you're eyes you can imagine, but in a room void of light it's harder to? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/56jmlf/eli5_why_is_it_that_when_you_close_youre_eyes_you/ | {
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"Because your eyes are still trying to focus on something. If you try to imagine the image of a lion let's say, you can do so while staring off into space because you're brain isn't focusing on what you're seeing. If you close your eyes the same is true. But, if you look into the dark and try to make the lion appear it's not going to work because that would be you hallucinating something using your vision. "
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42qrsj | why are the motors used in kitchen blenders still so noisy in an age when you can barely hear an electric car? | EDIT: wow front page...thanks!
EDIT: so a few things I've learnt. 1) Everyone would like a quieter blender 2) there are some very expensive blenders 3) the noise appears to be caused by the much higher RPM of around 20,000 compared to comparable much quieter appliances 4) the need for torque also increases the noise 5) manufacturers feel it's safer for their products to be noisy 6) Ice makes a sound when blended EDIT: 7) Cost | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/42qrsj/eli5_why_are_the_motors_used_in_kitchen_blenders/ | {
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"A few reasons:\n\n1) they're cheaply made\n2) they don't have good cooling so they are exposed to exterior air for cooling (allows sound out)\n3) very expensive blenders can be quieter, but they aren't what you'd buy at the store normally.",
"You'd probably hear an electric car motor if it was on your kitchen work top\n\nThey are quiet compared to standard internal combustion motors",
"A small electric motor spinning by itself is usually not very loud. A motor is an example of Isaac Newton's thermodynamic laws in that they change energy's form from potential to kinetic, in a kitchen blenders' motor example, rotary motion. But as other answers say, cheap motors have inefficiencies from their cheap parts and materials. Newton's laws also say that we cannot create or destroy energy, just change its form, therefore, a motor's inefficiencies is expressed in both heat, thermal energy, and noise, acoustic energy.\n\nAlso, motors are connected to a drivetrain, usually gears, and spinning gears are inherently noisy. Gear teeth engage - disengage, cheap gears have a loose fit when the teeth mesh and transfer energy and sort of slip and hit each other, continuously creating noise.\n\nA kitchen blender has unlimited continuous energy, electrical power at 110 or 220 VAC, and its use sees common loads, i.e little difference between stirring ingredients in a bowl, therefore has little requirement to be efficient. Electric cars rely on limited battery power, have greatly variable loads, whether fat passengers or a steep hill, and so their motors must be efficient for electric cars to be truly useful, and an efficient motor converts most of its energy for its intended use than it loses to inefficiencies of heat and noise.",
"It's called a universal motor. It's a motor that works on both DC or AC. It's far from ideal since indeed it makes a lot of noise, the brushes it uses wear off and it isn't really as efficient as other types. \n\nHowever, it's extremely cheap to make (~$5 made in china), it can run at high speeds and has a decent starting torque. For short and light use (household blenders, drills, ... ) it's great! ",
"In addition to what other people have already mentioned, blending is noisy bussiness anyway so there's really no need to make the motor silent.",
"A few answers I've seen that haven't come up that are generic to cars in general, not just electrics:\n\n* The car engine sound is also partly masked by wind and road noise.\n\n* The engine isn't in the passenger area of the car, so the sound is having to pass through glass or other material. If you could put your blender in a glass box with something to dampen vibration beneath the blender, it'd be quieter too. Some restaurants have a setup like this.\n\n* Some of it may be the frequency of the sound. Generally-speaking, people tend to find higher-pitched engines more-annoying.\n\nAlso, you might try purchasing a quieter blender. *Consumer Reports* is a decent source of product ratings, and I suspect that they probably have a sound rating for blenders in [their blender reviews](_URL_0_).",
"Apart from every technical explanation: Because it's a blender that is designed around the idea of breaking things by crashing hard metal at incredible speeds against it! It's not designed to go as frictionless and thus as noiseless as possible because friction is its basic principle of operation.\n\nMaybe blenders could be less noisy while running without the ingredient to blend, but as soon as you put something it, most of the noise comes from crushing that stuff.",
"Its not just the motor. Its the bearings, housing, and the quick connect to the blender pitcher. A $30 blender is like $3 to the chinese manufacturer. They are not made any better than they have to be to pass UL standards. We are talking a level of cheapness here where they will reduce virtually any cost to make the product cheaper. Its not just the cost difference of the brushed vs. brushless motor, the latter being obviously more expensive and requires additional electronic controllers. \n\nThere are a few high end blender manufacturers, but by and large, consumers want the $30 for the amount that they use one. If you ramped up production of even a mid range blender, you could probably make it for not alot more, but as it stands, very few people demand a quiet blender. At the end of the day, people blend things that are noisy to blend so it doesn't really matter.\n\nLet's compare clothes irons to cars next. ",
"My real question is; why can't a company make a single motor base that I can throw a blender, food slicer/processor, or coffee grinder on top of? Nope, gotta buy 3 seperate gadgets, mumble grumble. (I have seen the combo units that exist, and most don't slice.) \n\nThen I want a single engine I can drop in my lawnmower or snowblower or generator. A girl can dream... ",
"One reason there's little demand for a quiet blender motor: people won't think it's as powerful as a noisier one.",
"Everyone is explaining it with \"cheap motors\". They can overcome this in blenders, vacuums, and other loud motors with insulation. \n\nThe problem is, people expect these things to be loud. \"The loud one works better\". The number one example of this is cars. Hundreds of kids (mostly boys) add an intake and exhaust to \"increase power and economy\". What really ends up happening is their car is actually slower after the \"upgrade\". Noise = power. \n\n\"But I feel my car is faster\" No. It feels faster cause now is slower to take off until it picks up and then gives you the power it was already making. \n\n\nTL,DR: loud=good",
"Cheap parts or brushless vs brushed are not the main reasons. Blenders need to spin fast and that inherently makes a lot of noise. ",
"The one very important thing I don't see other commenters realizing is that electric motors on cars spin very slowly compared to blenders.\n\nA direct drive motor on a car wheel spins at around 600 rpm if the car is going 60mph. A blender may spin 11,000! THAT is most of why they are so noisy.",
"If you want to quiet your blender, create a hush box for it. Open on one side, hinged lid on top, noise reduction foam all around.",
"The noise in the blender is twofold:\n\nOne) Even in \"High End\" blenders (Like Blendtec and Vitamix), they only have so much space to work with and still have a compact, easily movable kitchen counter appliance. No one wants a 25lb blender, so they have to skimp on sound insulation/cooling systems for the motor. Also, the RPM, oh sweet god the RPM. \n\nYou essentially have a reasonably high powered electric motor with minimal sound insulation for weight and portability reasons spinning at 20,000 RPM.\n\nTwo) What you are blending. A blender is essentially just a violence machine. It takes whole foods, frozen, solid, whatever, and turns them into less solid versions of themselves. This will be noisy. The items you are blending, combined with the ridiculous RPM you are blending them at, all the while contained by a 5mm thick plastic container is basically a perfect recipe for noise. \n\n\nThis is why the blenders at Booster Juice or other smoothie stands have a second cover that goes over the main blending jar as well as a bigger base. More room to insulate the sound all round. ",
"Because $. Same reason why things still break when we could make them virtually indestructible by now, but that wouldn't be good for the profit margins ",
"In addition to what /u/edwinshap and others said:\n\n - A blender is a small device, and a motor of equal loudness would result in more noise exiting the system than if there's a whole car around it.\n\n - Not only the motors, but also the rest of the blender is cheaply made. It's usually plastic, and in the places where different pieces meet it may not be a tight seal so when the motor vibrates, the whole plastic chassis starts resonating and the different pieces bang against each other.",
"its not as much the motor as much as it is the shit you are blending.\n\nalso, insanely high rpm's on tiny motors are going to be high pitched. Sometimes noise is about pitch, not just volume. ",
"What you're blending is what causing the noise. So even if you make the motor silent, it will still make loud noise.",
"Blendtech actaully do a blender with a noise guard, it costs about £1000 but runs very quiet ",
"Wouldn't be surprised if quieter blenders were poorly viewed in market research.\n\nI studied marketing and we read about soaps that cleaned very well but didn't froth, and people didn't like them. Same with clear window cleaner, people thought it was weird that it wasn't tinted. \n\nEngineering can do a lot, but consumer perception is a big thing too.",
"Lots of noise comes from the mechanical connection between the motor's drive shaft and the socket on the blender jug. When I first bought my blender it made very little noise, however after a few months the spline connection on the bottom of the jug started to rust and deform so the connection wasn't as secure. It now makes lots of noise.",
"_URL_0_\n\nKitchenAid has you covered. Also this post has taught me a lot about people answering questions from educated guesswork. Some people got close pointing at gearing causing noise. But the big noise maker besides food and rpm is actually the connection between the blender jar and the motor. There aren't many good ways to make a sloppy easily removable connection capable of being quiet when you're running very high rpm. \n\nVideo shows a magnetic induction drive blender. The thing is whisper quiet if you want to make 2 am margaritas. \n\nSource: spoke with an engineer working on the KitchenAid blender team #emp ",
"Source: I used to work for one of the big appliance makers in the US. One of my roles was designing kitchen counter-top appliances (blenders, food processors, stand mixers, etc.)\n\n1) Cost - The standard manufacture's markup is 3X. So if it costs $50 to make, it will retail for about $150. Some makers take more profit, some take less. But that $30 Oster will cost about $8-10 to make. (I did competitive cost studies on this stuff. I would consider an Oster disposable)\n\nEverything else comes from decisions on how much is it going to cost. So the jar, motor, controls, body, packaging, etc. all needs to be allocated.\n\n2) Motor choice. The basic motor for a blender is a brushed motor. They are used because they are cheep. Well really the controls are cheep so the systems cost is cheep. A brush-less motor actually costs less than a brushed motor to make (typically), but the controls for a brush-less motor will be 2-3x the cost of a brush motor control (MOS-FET vs. triac controls). Brushed motor are noisier than brush-less motors. Brush-less controls operate at frequencies above human capacity to hear. Triac (brush) motor controls operate at 60Hz - which can be heard as a high pitch whine given higher order harmonics and commutator noise. That is in addition to the noise from the brushes. (The brushes don't actually touch the commutator in operation. They ride on a plasma field. 5 cent factoid: Brush-less motors where developed by NASA as plasma can't exist in the vacuum of space.) Triac controls operate by clipping. They basically skip voltage cycles. So the power applied to the motor isn't smooth. MOS-FET controls operate by PWM (pulse width modulation). Long story short, MOS-FET controls are smoother in operation and hence quieter. (edit: MOS-FET controls can be used on brushed motors, typically DC motors. The noise generated by Triacs is higher order than 60Hz, but it's in the audible range. MOS-FET noise is much higher frequency noise.)\n\n3) Coupler. The biggest single contributor to unloaded noise. This is how the jar and the motor base can be disconnected. Some cheep blenders are all in one and don't have this. (the cheep Ninja is one - don't buy it - piece of crap. They spend a huge % of their SG & A on infomercials and shopping networks). Higher priced blender will use better geometry and better materials that may have sound absorbing properties. \n\n4) The Food load. Putting frozen stuff in the jar is just noisy. No real way of getting around this. Some blender marketed for bar or restaurant use have an outer cabinet the blender sits in to quiet noise. Try running a blender without food in it and it will be rather quiet. This is by far the biggest % of the produced noise.\n\nThe best blenders to buy? KitchenAid or the Vitamix. The Vitamix ones have a decent guerrilla marketing campaign so take that with a grain of salt. Their blade design is slightly different then the KitchenAid one though. It is dull which actually mashes food better than the sharp blade of the KitchenAid one. The KitchenAid ones are typically easier to clean. Flat membrane controls and smooth body. \n\nTL:DR: It is cost and the food load in the jar.\n\n(edits: spelling and clarification on controls)",
"You can barely hear an electric car IN RELATION to the ambient outdoor noise and the noise generated by the aerodynamic interactions of the vehicle. \n\nIf a blender was flying at 30mph down a busy high street, you probably wouldn't hear that before it hit you either. \n\nAlso, the noise a car makes generally influences people's opinion of it, so car manufacturers spend a lot of money researching noise reduction techniques (most supercars the see days have an entire team of acoustic engineers helping to design the vehicle to sound as satisfying as possible). Blender manufacturers make no such expense. ",
"I have 2 different ways to blend, 1 is what I use for my breakfast smoothie, a stick blender that is pretty quiet, and 2 is my daiquiri whacker, a two stroke gas powered blender that will grind a solid block of ice into margaritas in about 3 seconds...",
"I wonder how many times a TIL that made it to the front page resulted in OP getting homework done for free.",
"It's the gearbox!! It's on a 5:1 overdrive. So each rpm from the motor the blade turns five. Without oil the way the gears are cut makes so much noise. Add a cheap motor in and you got all that noise. ",
"The motors are generally quiet. I got an immersion blender. When it is not cutting anything you can pules it on and off and you hear very little noise mostly just air being moved around and some gears wearing.\nWhen it is placed into the liquid it is louder. This is mostly from vibrations cause from the mixing.\nAlso these devices are usually made from plastic which does little to dampen the vibrations.\n",
"I have a nutribullet RX. \n\nIt is so loud, that I've resorted to having a set of earmuffs in the kitchen for when I use it in the morning to make my smoothie.",
"The real answer is straight-cut gears. Straight-cut gears make a hell of a racket. But they are cheap. If you use helical gears, they \"wipe\" against each other smoothly and make less noise.\n\n[Here's a visual of the difference. ](_URL_0_)\n\nHere's a video of a BMW with straight-cut transmission gears. Notice how loud they are! (volume warning)\n\n_URL_1_",
"The motor itself is not what causes the sound. The sound is loud because of couple of reasons: \n- poor tolerances. Anything that is attached to something else can move around which creates noise. \n- blenders create lots of vibrations. The mechanicals are not well centered so when something moves it moves everything around itself. This noise is also increased by the lack of any vibration cancelling materials. Everything moves around and is banged against something else. \n- blenders are made of plastic. The same plastic that is the frame of the device is also the shell of the device. So the vibrations inside of the machine produce lots of vibrations and as such that vibration is very loud audibly too (sound is vibration). Being plastic it means they are relatively light which means it takes less energy to make them vibrate noisily. Things are made lighter because it is cheaper and costs less to transport. Also I'd imagine people prefer their blenders not weighing 5 times as much they weigh now. \n- electric motors that are used are small and rev high. The faster the speed of the motor the more sound it makes. High speeds are required from small motors because the device uses gears to convert high speed low torque motor to low speed high torque output. \n \nTo make blender make less noise \n- tighter tolerances. If you use gears use metal gears, if you use connections use metal connections that don't wear as fast \n- metals to make the frame of the device sturdier and heavier \n- bigger motor that doesn't need to spin as fast and doesn't need gearing. \n",
"They don't put mufflers on generators so that idiots don't put them in the living room. They make blenders loud so that idiots don't stick their hands in them.",
"It's the vibration that causes the noise. With your example of blenders, the shafts and blades are cast to be the same and are not the same most times. If they were machined and perfectly balanced then all you would hear is the food being sliced up. \n\nThe automotive motors have to be perfectly balanced because it is not only a safety and reliability hazard, but nobody would buy electric cars if they were louder than blenders going down the road.\n\nEdit: cast is cheaper for manufacturers in mass production. Means you can get a blender for cheaper vs more expensive. Meaning you pay for quality. ",
"Engineer here:\n\nHow much money would you spend on a blender that is quieter? How much larger and heavier can I make the blender before you won't buy it?\n\nThe answer to both those questions, for most people, is that they use it very rarely so they value noise reduction at almost $0.00/dB and they absolutely don't want it taking up more space in the cabinet than absolutely necessary.\n\nIn order to make the blender quieter, I'd have to use a motor that has tighter tolerances and/or is not a brushed motor, which is expensive. I'd have to use a gearbox with tighter tolerances, perhaps use helical gears instead of straight-cut gears, which is more expensive. I could add insulation around the motor and gearbox to deaden the noise, but that will shorten the life of the motor, cost money, and make the blender larger.\n\nNow, if you're someone who uses a blender a lot, then you might actually care about noise output. In that case, it's cheaper just to build a small enclosure around the blender to deaden the noise. An additional advantage is that, unlike moving parts in the blender, an enclosure won't just suddenly fail and create a lot of noise without being very obvious. This is good if you're, say, a business that has to adhere to OSHA noise regulations and your blenders gradually make more and more noise as they wear down. You might be in compliance when the blenders are installed, but drift out of compliance as time goes on. I'm not sure if this is a very relevant advantage (I haven't bothered to measure blender noise output), but I wouldn't be surprised if businesses that run dozens of blenders at once did have to worry about this.",
"Other people have pointed out the engineering reasons far better than I ever could, but I would like to mention the matter of perception.\n\nWhen you hear an electric car you are typically 5+ feet away from it in a wide open outdoor space, or perhaps inside of it and muffled from the noise. When you hear a blender you are typically in an enclosed room and within one foot of it. \n\nIf you take your blender outside and stand 10 feet away from it while it runs, I'm sure that it will still be louder than a Tesla, but it will probably seem less deafening."
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8QZezP02Imc"
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3d7j7z | why people still think that the physical act of printing money is the same as creating wealth? | How does the concept of it being a physical representation of credit within our banking system miss so many people? And why does it seem to miss people who are obsessed with monetary stability? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3d7j7z/eli5_why_people_still_think_that_the_physical_act/ | {
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"Well, society puts a huge focus on actual paper bills being worth something, so if you don't understand the economics behind it, it seems obvious that more bills = more value."
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[]
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|
85cupl | why are signed contracts admissible in court when signatures can easily be faked/manipulated? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/85cupl/eli5_why_are_signed_contracts_admissible_in_court/ | {
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"Because they CAN\"T easily be faked/manipulated. That's the whole point. If someone screws with the paper, it will leave signs. And forging a signature is not nearly as easy as you think. Any expert on the subject will be able to tell you all the little ways that the forger made mistakes.",
"In order to be admissible in court, the court has to recognize it as a legitimate contract. That generally happens either because all parties agree that the contract is legitimate (but are arguing over some aspect or application of it), or because the contract is notarized.\n\nA notary is just someone who is a third party paid to confirm that the signing of a contract is legitimate. They generally watch both parties sign it, sign it themselves, and file a copy of it away (so that neither party can change it and pretend that changed copy was the original).",
"I'm not exactly an expert, but as I understand it just as testimony can be faked or coerced, so can written contracts. So as a plaintiff/defendant seeking to invalidate the legitimacy of a contract you only need to provide evidence that the contract is false, which is punishable by forgery charges, which is a felony in all 50 states. Conversely, lying and saying a document is forged constitutes perjury. So it is possible to defraud people in court but the punishment is severe."
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ewczx0 | why are my fingers, when my hand is laying relaxed with its knuckles on a surface, not straight but curled up? | Is this also when you're asleep or dead? Why is it like this? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ewczx0/eli5_why_are_my_fingers_when_my_hand_is_laying/ | {
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"your finger is moved by two sets of muscles that act opposite to each other, one set extends your finger while the other folds it\n\nusually those muscles are in balance, so it is sort of a middle ground, half curled\n\nsame goes with pretty much any part of your body - your abs are curling you forward, your erector spinae muscle set curls you backwards\n\nthat's why complex exercises like deadlifts, squats, etc are much better than isolated ones, they work on both sets of musclesgroups",
"Because they have muscle tone, which is \"continuous and passive partial contraction of the muscles\". All of your muscles have muscle tone, unless your are suffering from a disease of muscle tone insufficiency. Notice how your arms don't hang straight down. That is also because of muscle tone.\n\nFingers are light, compared to arms, so they curl up under the same amount of muscle tone."
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2imv0u | why do we have to pay to convert money between currencies in online purchases? | Why can't the servers just take my 10 USD and convert that into whatever amount of any other currency it's equal to? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2imv0u/eli5_why_do_we_have_to_pay_to_convert_money/ | {
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"text": [
"Because you can't convert currencies, only sell it. If I want 10 USD and all I have is CAD I need to find someone to sell me 10 USD. It's not worth their time to give me what it's worth, they need something to make it worth their time and effort. They take a bit extra as profit."
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2zq1qs | how did "ass" become an adjective? i.e. "that's a big ass pimple" or "that's fly ass ride" | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2zq1qs/eli5how_did_ass_become_an_adjective_ie_thats_a/ | {
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"It possibly is a derivation (through shortening and rearranging) of the phrase \"noun is adjective as blank,\" as in \"that ride is fly as fuck\" or \"that Russian is strong as an ox.\"",
"They're not adjectives, they're adverbs modifying the adjectives.\n\nWith your \"big ass pimple\", you're not talking about an \"ass pimple\" that is \"big\", you have a \"big pimple\" that is *exceptionally* \"big\".\n\nSimilarly, you're not talking about an \"ass ride\".\n\nSee - _URL_1_ and _URL_0_. I'm pretty sure that the basic grammatical pattern has been around for a *long* time.",
"I think it originated with the popular early 80's phrase \"punk ass bitch\" \n",
"70s black American slang...\"Jive-ass turkey\" etc."
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8q62a8 | what exactly is cerebral palsy? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8q62a8/eli5_what_exactly_is_cerebral_palsy/ | {
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"Cerebral palsy is a group of disorders that are discovered at young age and lasts for life. It is caused by an underdevelopment or damage to the part of the brain that control movements, balance, and posture.\n\nPeople with Cerebral Palsy may have weak or stiff muscles, poor coordination, and trouble seeing, hearing, swallowing, and speaking.\n\nTldr; CP is a group of movement disorders, and people affected by it may have difficulty with any function or activity that involves muscle use."
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3tapp3 | in movie credits, why are some names coupled with the word "and" while others get ampersands? | [Topical visual example.](_URL_0_)
Why are the first two names joined by an ampersand but the word **AND** separates the other names? Why wouldn't it be one or the other the whole way through the credits?
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3tapp3/eli5_in_movie_credits_why_are_some_names_coupled/ | {
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"Usually, ampersands are intended to join two things that worked as one unit; the word \"and\" is to join units. In your example, the team of Justin Theroux and Ben Stiller worked with Nick Stoller and John Hamburg to write the movie.",
"It has to do with whether they worked together or seperately. So If you and I collaborated on a script, it would say \"written by /u/EstragonRosencrantz & /u/QuestionMarkyMark\". But if I wrote a script, a studio bought it but decided to hire you to make revisions, it would say \"written by /u/EstragonRosencrantz and /u/QuestionMarkyMark\"."
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asd24n | gold leaf. how do you get real gold so thin | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/asd24n/eli5_gold_leaf_how_do_you_get_real_gold_so_thin/ | {
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"Ever play with play doh and roll it out real thin? Basically the same principle!",
"The traditional technique involves pounding the foils out in a stack, interleaved with parchment (I think).",
"pure gold is extremely soft as far as metal goes. It's virtually on the border of being unusually firm clay.\n\nAs such you can hammer gold out into large sheets, and from there you can roll them extremely thin, to the point you can cut the sheets with normal scissors. ",
"Gold is extremely malleable a small piece of gold can be made into a very thin piece of foil."
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4x2n79 | at the risk of sounding really ignorant, is is homosexuality gender dysphoria? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4x2n79/eli5at_the_risk_of_sounding_really_ignorant_is_is/ | {
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"Not necessarily.\n\nHomosexuality is a preference for your partner's gender. Gender dysphoria is a perceived inconsistency with your current gender hardware. In general, changing some homosexual's gender would give them gender dysphoria; or make then unhappy in two ways.",
"No. Gay men don't want to be women. They are men who fall in love with other men. They can be very masculine by traditional social views, but rather than fall in love with women, they fall in love with other men. ",
"No. Gender dysphoria is when you feel severe anxiety over your body and how it doesn't match what you feel inside; specifically it doesn't match the gender that you feel, and that causes a lot of stress.\n\nHomosexuality is simply being sexually or romantically attracted to people the same gender as you. They can overlap, sure, but one certainly does not preclude the other and they are not the same thing. Many gay people feel perfectly comfortable in their bodies.",
"No.\n\nHomesexualty = wanting to have sex with someone who has the same genitals as you.\n\nGender dysphoria = believing in your mind that you were born with the wrong genitals and should be the opposite sex. Whose genitals you want to fondle play no role in gender dysphoria.",
"No. But they used to be commonly conflated, even by medical literature.\n\nSexual orientation is about who you desire as a partner. Gender dysphoria is the distress caused by gender inappropriate physical and/or social conditions, in particular the distress caused when someone's gender identity (their knowledge of themselves as a man/woman/etc) does not match their external appearance. Most gay people do not have any gender dysphoria.\n\nBut being gay could be called a type of gender *variance*. This is not the same thing as dysphoria. Gender variance is just any behavior or gender expression by an individual that does not match the gender norms of the gender they are perceived to be by society.\n\nSame gender desire can be considered a form of gender variance, because it goes against common gender norms. There's no general social taboo against sexual or romantic relationships with men - it's only an issue when *men* do so, because by having these relationships they have been considered to be inappropriately \"acting like women\". And there's no general taboo against relationships with women - unless a woman does so, in which case she is taking the \"role of a man\" and that has been considered a problem.\n\nFor most of the first half of the 20th century neither the law, medical science, nor social attitudes made any meaningful distinction between gay and trans people. People who would now be considered either gay or trans were all considered [**inverts**](_URL_0_) - people believed to have an inborn reversal of \"natural\" gender traits. A woman who desired other women was considered to be \"sexually male\", a man who desired other men was considered \"sexually female\", while bisexuals were called \"psychosexual hermaphrodites\".\n\nA person who was born male, happy as such, and conventionally \"masculine\" in all respects except for his desire for other men, and a person who was born male but identified and lived exclusively as a woman, were considered variations of the same \"inversion.\" The former was seen as \"inverted\" solely in his sexual desires, while the latter was seen as \"inverted\" in all aspects of her personality.\n\nOver the last few decades we've seen the social gender norms that treat desire for men as by definition a \"feminine/female\" trait, and desire for women as by definition a \"masculine/male\" trait, start to fade. But they aren't gone yet."
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erjobx | after spilling a liquid or mopping/steam cleaning, how does blowing a fan on the damp area speed up the drying process? | I know about basic evaporation of water into the air, is it the same concept if the liquid is not water? I was under the impression that heat was what sped up evaporation, not increased airflow. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/erjobx/eli5_after_spilling_a_liquid_or_moppingsteam/ | {
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"Air absorbs moisture from objects based on the moisture level of the object, and the moisture level of the air. The more moist the air is, the slower it pulls in moisture from other objects.\n\nWhen you run a fan over it, you're never allowing the moisture level of the air directly above the spill to rise.",
"The liquid in question is probably mostly water.\n\nThe blowing air is providing energy, a kick, to the water to evaporate. While heat is part of it, any temperature of water can become vapor. The way to think of it is that air is a sponge. You have a puddle you need to wipe up. If you heat the area, the sponge becomes a bigger sponge (hot air holds more water than cool air). If you blow air on it with a fan, it's like using more sponges."
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dyb2xd | how do stenographers catch every word in court? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dyb2xd/eli5_how_do_stenographers_catch_every_word_in/ | {
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"They have special keyboards and a shorthand way of typing it so they can type it all out as it is said and then \"translate\" it back into normal writing afterwards. Top stenographers can type at several hundred words per minute.\n\n_URL_0_",
"Stenographers use a special short hand that allows them to type out everything that is said really quick. If you look at a stenography keyboard, it looks nothing like a qwerty keyboard.",
"They use a special machine with a unique keyboard that allows them to type the rough phonetic spelling of the words they're hearing, which allows them to type much faster than your typical keyboard. They type up their record after the day in court, in regular English, so that anyone can read it.\n\nAlso, court reporters can and do speak up when they missed something. Unless it's something they can refer to later (like an uncommon or foreign name that they might not be sure about), they will ask the speakers to repeat themselves or speak up if needed.",
"In addition to what everyone else is talking about with the special keyboards, they also rely on audio recordings of the proceedings. They will run through and edit their final product and check the audio for verification.",
"My mom was a stenographer so I can help\n\n1. The minimum speed for a license is 300 words per minute with less that one error per minute The average decent types can type at 60 words per minute with multiple errors. A really good QWERTY typist can hit 100 words per minute. So they are typing faster than people can talk. \n\n2. They use a different keyboard. The way o understand it, you type by syllable’s. So the word STENOGRAPHER can be typed in 4 actions rather than 12 actions. They can also set macros for common words. If it was a law suit involving acetaminophen, they could make a shortcut to type it quickly. They can do this for names or other things. \n\n3. They can ask for clarification during a trial. They don’t often need to. Also, it’s not shown in tv shows cause it’s not fun to watch even if accurate.\n\nEdit: for those who want to learn stenography to type faster for work, it’s not that easy. The layout is not the same and the way you type syllable’s is not easy to understand. The words “understand”would look like thrqu*gthy ( completely made up but the output look like gibberish before it’s converted to English. \n\nAlso there are keyboards designed to help you type faster. DVORAK is what I’ve heard of. It tries to be easier but spacing out letters efficiently. Again to do this you’d have to learn a new keyboard so it’s worth it in the long rub but I never wanted to learn\n\n4. They can mark words they don’t know how to spell to go back and look it up later\n\nEdit2: why is this the technique used for court reporting? It’s more cost efficient to store transcripts and share them this way. Also, text is easy to look up. If a lawyer wants to clarify what was said earlier during trial, it’s provides an easy way to look up the answer that is faster than a voice recording because you can read faster than people talk or the amount of time it would take to play back. \n\nAlso there is a big push in the industry to switch to voice typing. It still involves a court reporter but they would repeat the testimony, or closed captioning for tv.\n\nAlso for those interested, court reporting is a good career. It makes good many, you can hear interesting stories, if you transcribe depositions you can make extra money. Also, if you’re single you can always try to meet a lawyer or judge!",
"In my divorce papers it was supposed to refer to a person, Keith Moore. But the stenographer wrote “keep more.” You might jump to that conclusion in a divorce hearing.",
"They don't. They record the phonetic sounds of speech, and later transcribe that into readable transcript of written words. In the English language, there are only 44 phonemes (discrete phonetic sounds) which combine together to make the language.",
"Serious question: why still have stenographers? Can’t recorders work just fine and then someone transcribes later?",
"Stenographers can “stroke” entire WORDS at the same time by pressing multiple keys at once. It’s not placing each finger on one key at a time, it’s placing 4,5,6, all 10 of your fingers on the keyboard and pressing down at once. \n For example, to write the word “standing,” I’d press the following keys at the same time: STAPBGD. S with my left pinky, T with my left ring, a with my left thumb, PB with my right middle, G with my right ring, and D with my right pinky. Pressing the P and B letters on the right side at the same time create the N sound. The G at the end of “standing” can get “tucked in” to the word to avoid using a second stroke to add G to the word. \n “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury” takes 1 press of these keys at the exact same time: HRAIPBLG. That’s called a brief, because making the sound layj isn’t a real word. H+R for the L, A+I for the long A, PBLG for the J. “LAIJ”. It’s incredibly intricate and time consuming to learn. It’s not something you can teach yourself. To learn shorthand reporting, students can enroll in an online program or go to a brick and mortar school. \nSource: a 150wpm stenography student\n\n EDIT:\nIn a courtroom or a deposition, stenographers can write in “realtime,” meaning the lawyers can have iPads in front of them and see the English words people are saying at the same time they’re spoken. CART stands for Communication Access Realtime Translation, essentially a speech-to-text service. It serves a huge audience including the deaf community, people who are hard of hearing, and people with leaning needs, such as a student with a learning disability that benefits from seeing a teacher’s words instead of just hearing them.",
"I worked in that industry for eight an a half years, from 1998 to 2006, and people still have weird ideas about it.\n\nKeyboard reporters used a special keyboard that took a lot of work to learn. It had to be able to keep up with some guy's 200 or 300 word a minute yapping and blabbering and I have yet to hear of a normal keyboard typist who can get even to 120 words a minute. The certification test was mandatory and the criteria were tough: pass was 99.6% and everything less was fail.\n\nWith more demand for transcripts, especially from administrative tribunals that offer a lot more work than court, as well as a wide variety of other people including one psychologist wanting transcripts of her discussions with a student, reporting switched to an audio recording model. At first the mask that the reporter whispered into to avoid disturbing the room, was what you typed, while the live mikes on the table were for backup. Those also had to be certified reporters and wanted too much money for the nineteenth-century-style robber-barons who ran court reporting companies here in Toronto. Instead the live mikes were quietly made a much better source and reporters were suddenly making less than minimum wage while the company made damned sure they could never get a job again if they left. Happened to me!\n\nAnyway, to answer your question, it's not the \"stenographer\" who could find her own butt with a flashlight, but the much more paid typists who worked our asses off in order to get the transcript right. We used a foot pedal that when released would slightly rewind the tape as adjustable, as well as a variety of macros to smooth typing. There were still problems with bad sound quality, similarity of voices (one eloquent pair, Counsel and client, talked almost exactly the same way and nearly took turns answering questions at the same length so like holy shit); every accent on earth (Jesus that Austrian guy nearly killed me dead with his accent); crossovers (two people talking over each other because in some proceedings Counsel could bicker like children and not let each other finish and we'd have to intersperse what they were saying). If listening to it again failed you took off your headset and listened to it on speaker while using your hand to control the play and rewind. If that failed you took the cassette to another typists's desk and that typist gave it a listen. There was even one case when there were like four of us trying to figure out that no, it wasn't \"ditchyboob\" but \"DJ booth\" and only when I went to the chief proofreader did he listen and tell me just put questions marks and he'd sort it out on proofreading. It was rare for any transcript not to have a couple of ??? here and there and the proofreaders could generally puzzle those out and if it were impossible the chief would authorize an ellipsis (…) instead. At other companies they used an inaudible marker but we were strictly told not to do that.\n\nHope that helps."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[
"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stenotype"
],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[]
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||
l6067 | how do you buy a house? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/l6067/eli5_how_do_you_buy_a_house/ | {
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"text": [
"Find house that has been foreclosed on. remove for sale sign. move in.",
"Find house that has been foreclosed on. remove for sale sign. move in."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
3zi0n3 | why do people sometimes make odd noises after they misspeak in order to re-attempt speaking and why does it so often work? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3zi0n3/eli5_why_do_people_sometimes_make_odd_noises/ | {
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"text": [
"Short answer, recalibration.\n\nYou kinda try to reset. Do various noises to check your voice, see if they came out ok then try again.",
"Its to draw attention to the fact that they're aware they just misspoke, most commonly mixed with a bit of humour. There's probably some element of it being a learned reaction as there are a few common stereotypical variations such as immitating a cassette tape rewinding.",
"If you're stuttering or slurring or drifting into moaning (ie tongue seizing up or something), breaking your sentence with a silly noise (like a 'bleurgh') is a way of escaping the downward spiral. When I stutter I know if I carry on trying to say the word it'll get worse, and when I do finally get it out my cadence will be wrong and I'll be out of breath and won't hold attention any more. Cutting the sentence off, beheading the stutter and starting again is much easier."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
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||
3g27qf | if all people openly know that most our top leaders are corrupt, why don't we just get rid of them and get new ones? | Every day you hear someone widely making a comment about the corrupt Government officials just making all the money and leaving the rest of us like crap, and we just accept it. With this information being so open, why don't we do something about it?
In every country this is true. It's even the butt of most jokes that all politicians are liars and thugs. Again, if everyone in the world knows this, why is it so hard to straighten them out?
(I know my post seems redundant but I really want to reiterate how it's a common topic of conversations. Before you answer, do you trust all the politicians?) | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3g27qf/eli5_if_all_people_openly_know_that_most_our_top/ | {
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"text": [
"It's a combination of people knowing that the new guy probably won't be much different and just plain not caring enough about corruption to do anything about it.",
"Mutiny will need to occur, and there is no certainty if the new leaders will be just as corrupt or more.",
"Part of their corruption is that they've rigged the system. In many cases, incumbents have shaped their districts to help them keep winning. They have the goodies to hand out, so they are in a better position to collect money from special interests. They throw roadblocks in the way of laws or investigations that would show or slow their corrupt ways. It's frustrating.",
"People do not care if their leaders are corrupt, just if they do what they want them to do (or say they do). Studies show if a politician you like does something wrong you justify it in your mind somehow, if a politician you don't like does the same thing you crucify them for it.",
"It's important to remember that in a democracy, we are almost always putting our politicians in no-win situations. \n\nSpend too much time in Washington? He's a \"Career politician and Washington insider.\" Spend too much time at home? \"He's missed X votes this year. Why isn't he doing his job?\"\n\nAlso remember that if an issue becomes a political issue, that means there are two sides to it. If there was only one obvious side to an issue, it would be resolved quickly and quietly. Which means that for every single issue that reaches the government, ***there is a built-in constituency that is going to be opposed to it no matter what you choose***. No matter what, every vote by every politicians on any sort of notable issue is automatically going to piss off 30-50% of the people. \n\nWe expect our politicians to think about the nation as a whole but also for the constituents. Can't reconcile the two? Out ya go!\n\nWe don't want career politicians and want to limit their terms...but when new, young politicians get elected we call them extremists. \n\nOnly scientists should be making science policy? Great, then, let's only elect politicians who hold multiple simultaneous degrees in science, medicine, accountancy, bioethics, social services, law, and psychiatry. Good luck finding 535 people who exist like that and also willing to do that for 150 large a year. \n\nWe expect our politicians to work 14 hour days and never take a vacation, while maintaining two residences and spending half their time away from their families. Oh, and for a salary that is a fraction of what they could be making anywhere else.\n\nBasically, due to the very nature of democracy, we automatically hate our politicians. And that's OK. If you aren't criticizing your leaders, there's a pretty good chance you're living under a dictatorship. ",
"To add on to everyone else's explanations: power corrupts. Can you name even one governement that never abused their power or hurt others for personal gain? Even if leaders were overthrown , the people doing the overthrowing would end up becoming corrupt, too. Especially since [successful leaders are more likely to exhibit psychopathic traits than the general population](_URL_0_) (this article is about business leaders, but political leaders need a similar set of skills.",
"To me, it's better that we slowly create more laws that eliminate some slight facet of corruption than it is to rely on everyone else to get it right."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[],
[],
[],
[
"http://www.forbes.com/sites/victorlipman/2013/04/25/the-disturbing-link-between-psychopathy-and-leadership/"
],
[]
] |
|
4fh50x | how do people make money off buying and selling currency? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4fh50x/eli5_how_do_people_make_money_off_buying_and/ | {
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"text": [
"It works fairly similar to stocks. Lots of currencies fluctuate in value with respect to the US dollar. And just like stocks, you'll buy it at a low value and hope it's value increases. Using the Euro as an example, back in 2012 it was worth 75 cents to the dollar now it's 90 cents to the dollar, and it peaked at 95 cents a few months ago. If you sold it at it's peak you'd have made 20 cents for every dollar you put into it.\n\nThat's the general idea, but it gets a little complicated since you have to consider that the US dollar's value is also fluctuating.",
"If you're talking about banks & exchange businesses, they simply charge a few percent on every transaction to pay overhead & make a small profit. Standard case of \"buy low, sell high\"."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
||
9piggq | how is deleting old emails good for the environment? | Edit: _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9piggq/eli5_how_is_deleting_old_emails_good_for_the/ | {
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"text": [
"I'm not sure that it is, particularly. In theory, deleting old emails frees up space on the server or the PC, so maybe the computers won't need to be upgraded so often if everyone keeps deleting old messages. But I'd imagine that the effect is minimal.",
"Who told you this? Where did you even get this thought from?",
"Email is a drop in the bucket compared to video (YouTube, etc). And what about all those photos backed up in the cloud? Don't worry if you use Gmail (or similar). They run super efficient data centers. \n\nYour equipment used to delete the email is using electricity, too, btw.\n\nIf you work at a company that runs their own Microsoft Exchange servers and needs to buy hard drives on a regular basis and expand their data center then it may add up. I used to work at a company that forced employees to clean up their email regularly to save expenses in IT. The software engineer time wasted clearing the inbox was worth significantly more than the savings in hard drives. The storage policy was then changed :-) \n\nDeleting email is generally a waste of time and money. (There are other reasons to delete them, e.g. retention policies, but that is a different story)."
]
} | [] | [
"https://en.reset.org/blog/save-planet-clean-your-inbox-12242015"
] | [
[],
[],
[]
] |
|
8d4hsx | when the air is humid and sticky, it feels heavy and makes you feel tired and sleepy. why is this the case? | In most cases, I even start to feel physically weak and unable to think properly. Sometimes even constipated too | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8d4hsx/eli5_when_the_air_is_humid_and_sticky_it_feels/ | {
"a_id": [
"dxkch2b",
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"When the air is warm and the humidity is high, your sweat will have a harder time evaporating. Evaporation is a cooling process (heat from your body is transferred to the water to make the phase change). With less evaporation, your body will feel warmer than usual.\n\nThat's all I know for sure. As the other poster said, it is possible that being warm and sweaty affects people differently.",
"im no scientist but possibly some evolutionary leftover, because... well... sleeping in freezing cold areas isn't a very good idea and is a lot worse than sleeping in hot ones, so maybe our body is thinking in survival terms as in heat=good whether it's from other bodies, fire or temperature and cold=bad for survival\n\nheat usually means comfort too, whether by fire, or body heat, the places we claimed we usually made a bit warmer, whether that's an igloo or a cave, so we've become accustomed to heat being linked to our living areas\n\n...or maybe im just an idiot who's making too many assumptions, you decide."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[]
] |
|
5wli7x | it is possible for music to have any drug like effects on the body? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5wli7x/eli5_it_is_possible_for_music_to_have_any_drug/ | {
"a_id": [
"deb0v9i"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"Henry Rollins says it does. He says something about how he tried drugs, he hated it, but music was so much better for him. \"Why should I do drugs when music can give me the same effect but without risks?\"\n\nI'm inclined to agree. There are some songs that hit just right and you just groove to it in a deeper level than normal."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
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