Split (3)

train · 273k rows

title stringlengths 0 299	text list
How Do The Mega Rich Like Bill Gates Have Free Access To Their Own Money If It's Mostly In Investments And Stocks?	[ "Having most of your money in investments and stocks is not the same as having all of your money in it. Gates is worth 91 billion dollars, so even if he had only 5% of his money as cash on hand he would still have 4.5 billion dollars available to him for purchases.", "They will have short term accounts that are i...
When we are tired, does eating makes us less tired because of the energy provided in food, or the other way round because of the energy needed to digest the food?	[ "Eating and digesting a large meal draws a lot of blood around the stomach and intestines. This can make you sleepy because less blood is perfusing the lungs (picking up oxygen) and taking that oxygen to the brain and other tissues. \n\nEating in general provides you with energy to perform required bodily functio...
How did they measure the height of Mt. Everest?	[ "With great difficulty over the between part of a century.\n\n[The Great Trigonometrical Survey of India](_URL_0_) started from the ocean in 1802, and 100 feet at a time, took measurements and did a bunch of math, and worked there way across the sub-continent to the Himalayas, completing in 1871.\n\nIt was a great ...
In MLB baseball they have technology to show if the ball was inside or outside the strike zone, so why do they still have home plate umpires making subjective calls?	[ "Tradition, and what people like. A ref's judgment is part of the game. Consulting a replay or computer to see if a ball was in or out of the strike zone every time there's a dispute changes the flow of the game.", "Two main reasons:\n\n1. Tradition. We like having a guy making calls; it's exciting and gives the...
How do gas pumps know when my gas tank is full?	[ "> This mechanism has been around for a long time, so it is safe to say there is not a miniature camera inside the nozzle hooked to a microprocessor. It's purely mechanical -- and ingenious.\nNear the tip of the nozzle is a small hole, and a small pipe leads back from the hole into the handle. Suction is applied t...
Why are most small cars front-wheel drive in favor of rear-wheel?	[ "Additionally, building a rear-wheel drive vehicle is actually far more complex that building a front-wheel drive vehicle. This is for a number of reasons that would take a while to explain, but essentially involve torque, driveshafts, and space to accommodate the driveshaft", "small cars have more rear legroom a...
Important Keynesian Economic principles	[ "He believed that there is a basic relationship between total aggregate consumer spending and the rate of employment; that is when the consumers spend more, there's more employment, and when the consumers save more, there's more unemployment. Many of his policy suggestions stem from this. Whether or not there is a ...
How is the Gitmo force feeding procedure done on Mos Def different from the feeding tube procedure done in hospitals?	[ "Presumably the people being force-fed in hospitals WANT to be force-fed.", "Source: I have had an NG Tube on a couple occasions.\n\nYes, NG tubes are VERY discomforting. They do not feel good at all. I can even admit some tearing from the pain. Not only this... but the tube can actually coil up inside your esoph...
Why are some morbidly obese people given mobility scooters to get around? Doesn't it make the problem worse?	[ "Because with obesity you can reach a point of no return very quickly. For instance, peripheral edema and diabetes can severely impair circulation, causing neuropathy and skin problems, damage that may never be healed no matter how much weight is lost. Joints wear down very quickly, impairing a person's ability. A ...
What is the difference between regular ice cream and soft serve ice cream?	[ "The amount of air in it. To make it \"soft serve\" there is more air injected by the machine. It's also mixed continuously, to keep the air from separating. Yummy." ]
what is the best way to go to sleep earlier?	[ "The keys to reduce stimuli that has the potential to keep you awake an hour or two before bedtime. This includes electronic devices or anything that emits any kind of blue light. Once you pick a bedtime and a wake-up time, make yourself stick to it. It will take a couple weeks to get your body adjusted but it's ve...
Are those almost perfectly curved land forms near Poland and Kaliningrad man made?	[ "They are natural. It's called \"spit\" according to wikipedia, this image from wiki explains clearly how it forms because of sand carried by water currents paralel to the land: _URL_0_\n\nMildly interesting fact - Poland is considering making a canal through that patch, because right now ships from Elbląg have to ...
Why do we get cold chills when we're sick?	[ "When we get sick, our body begins to produce various chemicals (e.g. cytokines) that travel in the blood to the part of the brain that controls our temperature regulation (in a part of the brain called the preoptic area of the anterior hypothalamus). These chemicals change the set temperature that we normally run ...
LinkedIn (LNKD) is trading at $191.41 right now, but Microsoft has agreed to buy them for $196 a share in an all-cash deal. Why are they not trading at around $196?	[ "The stock price is adjusted for risk. The sale will not go through for some time, so there is some risk attributed to this and time-value of money.\n\nThis means it should be worth a little less than $196. As we get closer to the sell date, assuming the sale goes through as planned, the stock price should rise to...
How have we not found a way to harness lightning	[ "The average American household (with its 2.59 inhabitants) consumes 41 billion (4.1410^10) joules each year. If your house ran on lightning alone, it would have to be struck more than 40 times per year! There are 114 million (1.1410^8) households in America. Multiply these two numbers, and you have 4.72*10^18 jo...
What is happening when we learn to like something like coffee?	[ "The answer to this actually applies to a lot of things in life.\n\nThe thing is by repeating something continuously it becomes part of our routine and we become accustomed to it. As so, it doesn't feel out of place anymore even if it isn't the most exciting thing.\n\nI also said that this applies to other things i...
If hypertension can cause erectile dysfunction, will lowering blood pressure to normal levels reverse erectile dysfunction?	[ "Well one of the main side effects for Viagra is a drop in blood pressure. In fact viagra was originally researched as a hypertension drug. It was only when the erectile dysfunction side effect was discovered that Pfizer realized they had struck a gold mine.", "Only if your erectile dysfunction is being caused by...
Why don't people questioned by ISIS pretend to be Sunni?	[ "Sometimes they can determine likely sect-membership by names and/or addresses/neighborhoods/towns and/or even jobs. But, with more certainty, they ask detailed and possibly obscure questions about religious practices that vary between the sects. Most people raised as Shiites won't know some details about Sunni r...
Why can't car tires be solid rubber?	[ "The \"springiness\" of an air filled tire helps delivery a smoother ride, and the ability to deal with minor imperfections in a road surface. A solid (using readily available rubber technology) wouldn't have the same ability to deform itself, so every little bump or object on the road would be transmitted to the ...
What my download, upload, and ping numbers mean for my internet connection (picture included)	[ "Simple, lets go off the \"Internet works like mail\" analogy. You love sending packages filled with jelly bean to your friends. However, depending on who you ask to deliver for them, they might take longer to get to your friend. Some messengers won't take big boxes, some love to bring your trucks of boxes but will...
What is the reason for the movie clapper, i understand it might help with editing but why the clap?	[ "It has already been answered, but I will add some more detail.\n\nA camera records the visuals, an microphone records the audio, obviously. The problem is, that unlike with consumer cameras, the audio isn't recorded to the same file as the video. So, you are left with a very high quality audio track, and a separat...
At what point is bad grammar considered a new language?	[ "The general rule of thumb is that if people can understand each other, it's a dialect, and if they can't it's a language. I think bad spelling and grammar vs actual rules is just a question of if people are consistent. If you accidentally wrote \"teh\" instead of \"the\", that's bad grammar. If you consistently wr...
how do sports announcers know how to pronounce all the players' names? Whose job is it to tell them?	[ "One of my friends is a sports caster out in Nebraska and I asked him the same thing years ago(he casts football games). He said that he spends an average of 20-30 hours studying for every game he calls, from memorizing the pronunciations of players names, the number they wear, stats they are known for as well as i...
Why does time slow down in near death experiences?	[ "This is a good starting point. \n\n_URL_0_\n\nShort version, the material near the core of your brain controls sensory perception, reflexes, immediate survival based decision making. \n\nMaterial further out controls emotions, higher level thinking, etc. \n\nIn a life or death situation, blood and vital fluid con...
Structurally, how is a GPU different from a CPU?	[ "Vast oversimplification, but you can think of a GPU like having thousands of weak cores while a CPU has a few powerful cores.\n\nWhen you're rasterizing graphics, each pixel is independent of each other--a GPU can calculate thousands of pixels at the same time. \n\nBut not all processes are this stateless. Oftenti...
How can the probabilities of all possible outcomes of an event not sum up to one? In other words, how can there exist a process for which unitarity doesn't apply?	[ "> However, the physicists who came up with the model postulated that locality and unitarity do not hold true at the quantum level.\n\nNo, that's not correct. They have a different mathematical formulation where unitarity and locality emerges from first principles. The end result is very much unitary" ]
Why (near) perpetual motion car is not possible.	[ "Solar power is the only promising possibility, as you're taking \"free\" energy from the sun and converting it to useable power. But isn't very efficient yet, and the needed components add noticeable weight. Thus the charging rate of a car completely covered in solar panels still isn't enough to power the motors t...
Why, as an 18 yo in California, my parents need to sign a waiver allowing me to sign myself out of school or sign anything for myself.	[ "because that's the contract between your school and your parents and you as a minor. \n\nas an 18yo, you can drop out of school, if you don't like that.", "Since you're 18, you can drop out of school. If you continue going to school, however, the school can set guidelines such as requiring you to stay on campus...
what’s the difference between emigrate, immigrate, and migrate?	[ "Migrate is general and just suggests moving from one region to another. Emigrate is to move your residence out of your country, and immigrate means to move your residence into a new country. So, if I move from Germany to France, I have emigrated from Germany, immigrated to France, and I have migrated from one co...
Time flow in singularity.	[ "It definitely isn't infinite mass. It's infinite density, which is a critical difference.\n\nThe rest I'll leave to others who are more educated to comment.", "Relativity doesn't prohibit the universe expanding faster than the speed of light; it just prohibits things in the universe physically moving faster t...
How do north koreans leave their country?	[ "The show Vice did a documentary following a North Korean refugee who wanted to escape North Korea. The first step was illegally crossing the border into China and meeting with someone who specializes in getting North Koreans out (kind of like a coyote who specializes in smuggling Mexicans into the U.S.). These...
Why do objects feel colder than the temperature of the air?	[ "Heat transfers faster through conduction (touching it) than through convection (transfer through a fluid, in this case the air). The faster heat leaves your body, the colder you register it as. That is why it is colder in a windy place than a calm place of the same temperature. When it is windy you are in contact ...
When people have 'high pain tolerance', do they feel actually feel less pain or do they just tolerate it better?	[ "Pain is in the brain. There is a part of your brain that translates stimuli from nerves into pain. If you would take this part out, you wouldn't feel any pain at all. In fact, there are people who are born without a functioning pain center in their brain. They usually don't live very long because the don't learn t...
Why is it such a big deal that Apple has so much cash?	[ "So, one part is because it's just a huge sum of cash....but let's go deeper\n\nA public company's responsibility is to maximize shareholder value. The best way to measure that is growth in the stock price. How does a stock price grow...stuff like ROI, ROE and profits and such.\n\nSo the issue here is that that cas...
How come if I wake up in the middle of the night, I often feel sweaty and gross, but if I wake up in the morning, I almost always feel normal?	[ "You're probably waking up in the middle of the night because you're sweaty and gross." ]
the difference between Yiddish and Hebrew	[ "Hebrew is the language of Jews in the Middle East and of Jewish religious texts, it's a semitic language close to Arabic and Aramaic. It had actually died out, before it was revived as the national language for the state of Israel. \n\nYiddish, by contrast, is an amalgam of German and Hebrew (using Hebrew script m...
how the switch on the bottom of the rearviee mirror works.	[ "There are two mirrors in a rearview mirror. That's why it's not super-thin. When you flip that switch you are moving one mirror out of the way and put the secondary mirror in place. The secondary mirror reflects less light and so doesn't blind you at night when someone has their brights on behind you.\n\nTo be a b...
What gives atoms their various properties?	[ "Yes, broadly speaking. \n\nAtoms gain their properties due to their valence. Learning about this is basically most of the first semester of a college chemistry course, but the short version is:\n\nAtoms are basically clouds of electrons surrounding a core of protons and neutrons. The clouds of electrons behave in ...
How can Paper Lanterns be safe? Why don't they start fires when they land?	[ "They do start fires. They're banned in 24 US states, according to the article below, because they're such a fire hazard. \n\n_URL_0_", "A paper lantern will typically reach a few hundred feet, and even after they burn out, they are still full of hot air, and can stay aloft for hours.\n\nThey also burn wax, which...
Someone commented on an askreddit thread that you can get drunk off of one shot by dipping your finger into it, and licking the alcohol off your finger over and over without actually picking it up and drinking it. How does this work, and is it legit?	[ "You could consume all of the alcohol out of the glass, yes. Would it get you drunk? Not a single shot, no. They're full of shit.", "I don't see any reason why that would work. Absorption rate of alcohol depends on [a variety of factors,](_URL_0_) one of which is the rate of consumption. Most people drink a shot ...
If I go without eating in the morning, waking up at 5 am and eating around 10:30 am I usually don't feel hungry. If I eat a banana or something after waking up, about 45 minutes later I feel like I haven't eaten in 3 days. Why is this?	[ "Because eating causes your body to begin the digestive process, beginning before the food even enters your mouth. It starts with saliva production, and you gastric juice fills your stomach before the food is even there. If you eat something small, your body kicks into a digestive process, usually anticipating a la...
What is Cryptocurrency(e.g Bitcoin) mining?	[ "What's happening? Basically, a computer is being used to perform a calculation, which gets more complex each time (each coin is harder to make than the last one). This is what keeps the value, it's a limited currency, there will only be so many bitcoins available.\n\nPeople are slowly accumulating them. You put pr...
How does reverse thrust on a jet engine work?	[ "Most jet aircraft have \"buckets\". When stowed, these don't interfere with the engines at all. But when deployed, they form a barrier behind the rear of the engine, which directs the jet exhaust forwards, creating reverse thrust.\n\nThere's a very good picture of the buckets in their deployed position [here](_URL...
Why are steel surfaces relatively inhospitable to bacteria and other germs whereas stuff like acrylic are not?	[ "I believe it has to do with the surface and how porous it is/isn't. Bacteria need tiny holes to hang out in (which also traps stuff they feed on), otherwise they get brushed away easily and there is less available 'food' for them. Also some metals give off ions that apparently kill bacteria. I know silver doe...
It is estimated that some sharks lose over 30,000 teeth in a lifetime - where does a shark obtain the levels of calcium necessary for such rapid tooth replacement?	[ "Well they don't have bones to worry about. We have a whole skeleton to upkeep, and we manage. But sharks eat a lot of things that have bones, and calcium in them, and what's more many calcium compounds can be dissolved in water, there are calcium ions just floating around the ocean, about 400mg/L of water. They ...
What's the matter with phi and fibonacci in nature?	[ "With regard to plants; Vi Hart has an excellent three part video on when it occurs, how it happens, and why phi in some plants is \"inevitable.\"\n[part 1](_URL_2_)\n[part 2](_URL_1_)\n[part 3](_URL_0_)\n\nIn all the other cases; the phenomenon doesn't exist. Or more clearly the only phenomenons are logical falla...
How do scientists calculate the amount of calories in food?	[ "They light it on fire! \n\nNo seriously, a calorie is a unit of measurement that measures the amount of energy it takes to raise the temperature of water 1 degree. In order to measure that, they burn things below a beaker of water and see how long it takes to raise a degree (I believe it is specifically one ml of ...
Why, as a non-smoker, do I occasionally get the "man, a cigarette would be great right now" craving?	[ "You've probably seen the relief on a smokers face after not having one for a while and your brain has subconciously associated tobacco smoke with relief.\n\nBut the truth is every time we light up we're only relieving our need for nicotine. The stress relief is entirely in our heads.", "I experience this too! \n...
Why can schools ban peanuts but not enforce manditory immunizations?	[ "\"Do this\" is harder to enforce than \"Don't do this\"", "Because the loudest parents are often the dumbest.", "I would like to see exemptions for those with strongly held beliefs that peanut butter is the best for lunch.", "On the whole, in schools, the squeakiest wheel gets the oil. And by wheel, I mean p...
What exactly are reverse mortgages?	[ "In a normal mortgage, you borrow a large sum of money from a lender to be delivered up-front and repaid by you over a number of years, and the money you borrow is delivered by the lender to the seller of the property as the property is being purchased, but the money is \"held\" and released only once the mortgage ...
Do most North Koreans truely believe that their leader is a deity?	[ "Obviously some do, likely out in the boonies but North Korea isn't nearly as tightly controlled as the North Koreans or the media would have you believe. It's certainly quite bad but Vice is know to \"hype\" their stories up a bit to make them a bit more entertaining. \n\nThe black market in North Korea is fairly ...
How were live television shows aired nationwide before the internet?	[ "They were broadcast over the airwaves, like radio still is now. \n\nOr they were broadcast by satellite to local stations, who broadcast it over the airwaves.\n\nWe were able to do a lot without an internet. Even invent the internet.", "They were broadcast across the country over the air from powerful antennas...
Why do I get the urge to jump when looking off a cliff or any high object?	[ "> Imagine a person with high anxiety sensitivity. She leans over a ledge of the Grand Canyon. In super fast reaction to her physical sensation of anxiety, her survival instinct forces her away from the edge. Yet when she looks at the ledge, she sees it’s sturdy. There was never any danger. Her brain tries to proc...
Why do couples so often experience a decrease in sex drive shortly after marriage?	[ "There isn't one good answer for that because for one, it isn't the same with each couple and two because it doesn't necessarily always happen. \n\nOne common reason though is simply time. A married couple will most likely spend their days working and by the time the day is done, sleep sounds like a much better ide...
Why cold water tastes better?	[ "I don't think it has to do with the taste -- I think it has to do with the refreshment.\n\nHumans (and all animals) don't drink water because it tastes good, but rather because we need it to survive and cool down when we begin to overheat.\n\nSince cold water is so refreshing, it's more enjoyable to drink. When a ...
What is a transistor, and why was it's invention so revolutionary?	[ "Transistors replaced vacuum tubes, which perform the same function: they both can take a small electrical current and use it to control a larger current. Both of them can be used as switches (in computers) to perform on- and off- operations (1's and 0's) or as amplifiers. Amplifiers are needed for radios, TV's and...
If the FBI supercomputer would take centuries to crack a certain password, can't they build several replicas of it and then solve it faster with cluster processing?	[ "First of all, all modern supercomputers are actually clusters of relatively slow processors. So they already do have a cluster. \n \nA properly set up 12 digit password using a standard English keyboard has 540,360,087,662,636,962,890,625 possible passwords (95^12). \nChina's Tianhe-2 computer holds the world...
If passwords are encrypted, why do I need to change my password on sites that use Cloudflare?	[ "The term that's used is hashed rather than encrypted. You could argue that a hash is a form of encryption, but I think it's important to mention this because there is a difference - encryption is usually a two-way thing, you can encrypt it but you can also decrypt it to get your original text back. Hashing is on...
What causes people’s voices to sound funny when they inhale helium?	[ "We are accustomed to hearing vocal cords vibrate in *air*.\n\nHelium is lighter than air (that's why helium balloons float). \nWhen vocal cords are vibrating in helium, they can vibrate faster, resulting in a higher pitch, because they vocal cords aren't pushing against the heavy air.\n\nSimilarly, if a perso...
Why places like fast-food chains support either Coke or Pepsi, but not both.	[ "With big chains Coke or Pepsi will try to get an exclusive contract, and they'll make an offer to sell really cheaply. IIRC Disneyworld gets theirs for free because it's such a big advertisement to have your product all over Disney.", "It's not that they \"support\" one or the other. Restaurants and chains gener...
Why can women have multiple orgasms while men can only have one?	[ "Wow, I think these comments are way off the mark. Do you guys think that cavemen were running trains on the cavewomen? And \"The strongest sperm\" != The strongest offspring, considering the first sperm to reach the egg don't fertilize it as they die breaking down the egg wall. Also, human females are better with...
Why do some people need to get up in the night and use the bathroom? Isn't that slowed down during sleep?	[ "\"Slowed down\" is not the same as \"turned off\".\n\nThere are many reasons, from drinking fluids too close to bedtime to actual medical conditions.\n\nJust like when you are awake, though, there is only so much your body can hold until it is time to relieve one's self. If it happens in the middle of the night, ...
What is happening when my computer, or phone, says I'm connected to the Internet, but it won't load any internet pages?	[ "Depends on what device and how they detect \"the internet\". Typically, it's done via a simple low bandwidth connection to some sort of \"home\" server. It can even be as simple as a ping.\n\nNow, remember how I said it's low bandwidth? That means that it uses a really small connection. Snapchat and it's ilk take ...
Soo, if we are flying around the sun flying around the solar system, flying around the galaxy...How are the stars we see at night in the same predictable places?	[ "Because the huge size of space means that even if things are moving quickly (hundreds of kilometers per second), they don't change position in the sky very much. Let's do some quick example calculations.\n\nFirst, you mention that we're flying around the Sun. That's true, we're moving at about 30 km/s around the S...
If antibacterial soaps are banned, what is ‘hand soap’ actually doing?	[ "You've got a field filled with rabbits, and they're eating your crops.\n\nAntibacterial agents and hand sanitizers are like poisoning the rabbits. The problem is that dead rabbit bodies are still strewn about, and some of the rabbits survive the poisoning, and their kids will also be good at surviving poisoning. ...
why is human excrement brown?	[ "There are a number of reason it's brown but the biggest contributor would be the presence of bilirubin. Bilirubin is a chemical that comes out of dead red blood cells. Basically, your poo includes expired blood, and that's brown." ]
Why does sunlight make it difficult to view our phone screens?	[ "Because the sun is brighter. The little light particles from the sun beat the phone’s light particles and so you see what the sun’s light reflects, not what the phone’s light projects", "The sunlight is brighter than the phone's backlight. If you look at the screen at a shadier area, the screen will look more br...
Why are some console versions of PC games not given the same treatment by the developers in terms of updates, patching, and DLC (i.e. Team Fortress 2 and Diablo 3)?	[ "Every update, patch and DLC has to go through certification and quality assurance on consoles. That process takes not only time, but money as well. Depending on much your particular audience is skewed towards PC, it is understandable that some developers will prioritize putting it up on that platform first, and th...
Why do I get so lovey-dovey when I'm tired?	[ "Depends on what you mean by tired and lovey-dovey but probably due to the happy chemicals your brain releases when you're about to fall asleep. Dopamine and such.", "Being tired has similar affects to being intoxicated, you're relaxed, and your inhibitions are lowered." ]
When you're reviewing your research, how the hell do you find the null hypothesis?	[ "The nullhypothesis is a statistical question. \n\nIt is the question you ask in order to disprove your hypothesis.\n\nIf you cannot disprove it with the data you collect, then the hypothesis must be correct.\n\n(Well, most likely correct.)" ]
Why road construction crews don't re-pave bridges?	[ "Because the bridges are likely made of concrete and the crews are re-laying asphalt. They are two different materials with different maintenance cycles.", "Bridges are designed at specific weights and loads to allow for them to remain standing while holding so much weight as traffic passes over them.\n\nAsphalt...
When games on Steam go on sale dirt cheap, who makes the money, and how do they make profit?	[ "Steam games have no physical product. This means that, once the cost of the development team is covered, there are no further expenses (simple situation, no multiplayer servers, etc). It also means that there is no difference in the cost of producing 500 copies vs producing 1,000 copies.\n\nGame is priced at $50...
Dependent and Independent variable.	[ "The dependent variable is what you are measuring (e.g. number of correct answers on a test).\n\nThe independent variable is what you are manipulating (or think of it like groups you are categorising people into e.g. gender (male/female), age (teenagers, older adults))\n\nThis usually leads to a hypothesis such as ...
Animal House - ELI5	[ "You sure you're not talking about Animal Farm?", "There is only one answer: Toga Toga Toga!", "I could give you the answer, but then I'd have to put you on Double-Secret Probation" ]
How are operating systems created?	[ "Well, OSes like most software has evolved over time. They started out very simply and over time more and more features got added. Eventually they get to a point where all the new features make the system run too slowly, so that is when they do a larger rewrite, and they may redesign most of the OS from the ground ...
how did vanilla become the "generic" flavor	[ "I'm just guessing, but I'd think that it's because Vanilla is such a strong flavour you only need a little bit of it, and because of that it doesn't impart much of a color to the food.\n\nLook at ice Neapolitan ice cream....it's got pink strawberry, brown chocolate and white vanilla. \nA lot of vanilla flavoured ...
Why are cans for canned goods not square?	[ "Cans are round because it maximizes the volume per amount of metal used and because being round makes them stronger than cubes." ]
Why cross platform gaming isnt a thing. Like pc to xbox or ps4 multiplayer. Can this even on the smallest chance be possible?	[ "For a lot of games, the controlls are just different between a gamepad and a mouse+keyboard setup. This is extremely noticable with strategy games shooters, but also comes into play with, for example, 3rd person action games. This means that it is very dificult to have a game that is exactly balanced between the d...
Why does the north star never move but all the other stars do?	[ "The others appear to move because the earth is spinning on its axis. Directly above either of the poles of that axis, a star will appear to barely move at all, but other stars will trace circles around it through the night. \n\nYou can take some cool long exposure photographs by pointing your camera at celestial n...
What makes something a vegetable?	[ "A vegetable is defined as the edible part of a plant, unless that part has a narrower and more specific definition, like say a fruit.\n\nYou can tell if your vegetable is a fruit by whether it contains seeds or not.\n\nSpinach and lettuce are vegetables, but your gourd or squash is a fruit.", "Vegetable is a cul...
How can we so distinctly remember things that never actually happened?	[ "It is possible to vividly imagine something and then simply re-categorize that mental image as a memory rather than something you imagined. The act of remembering it works just the same. You can see what it looks like, hear the sounds or voices, and so forth. You just have attached a wrong category to it." ]
Why do large explosions result in a mushroom cloud?	[ "[Wikipedia says](_URL_0_):\n\n > Mushroom clouds result from the sudden formation of a large volume of lower-density gases at any altitude, causing a Rayleigh–Taylor instability. The buoyant mass of gas rises rapidly, resulting in turbulent vortices curling downward around its edges, forming a temporary vortex ri...
why isn't there more footage on the Internet of US soldiers in close combat (e.g. clearing buildings) situations?	[ "When you are in close combat, you are at immediate risk of being killed. You have better things to do then screw around with a camera.\n\nNow that cameras are very very small and wearable, and have longer battery life, this kind of footage will become more common.\n\nA separate issue is that many military organiza...
how come some people have long, pointy canine teeth, which are longer than their regular teeth; and some people have flat canines the same length as the rest of their teeth?	[ "How long your teeth are based on a few things. Mainly its because of the genes (traits) you inherit from your parents and their parents before them. Shapes and size of teeth are different in people from different races which is also a trait thing. Pointy-ness of your teeth depends on how much you use them. The mor...
Why does everyone hate comcast?	[ "They stand against innovation by working in what is essentially a monopoly. They have outrageously high prices for outrageously low-quality products. Other countries have internet that is 5-6 times faster than Comcast for half the price. Why is Comcast able to do this? Because they have 0 competition. \n\nBasicall...
Why does amazing art, in whatever form, have such ability to inspire, motivate and evoke such strong emotion?	[ "Hi. Art grad here. Let's begin.\n\nFirst off, art is subjective. Now there are things such as the Frozen movie that is loved by most, and that is because the general population of the targeted audience enjoys similar qualities in things. What I'm saying here is that not all art will have the same effects on everyo...
Why won't printing more money solve economic problems?	[ "Back in the Nixon Administration, all currency was based on the gold standard. This meant that you could take a $1 American bill and exchange it for gold at a federal reserve bank. Because of this, a crisis arose in the seventies because foreign countries would collect American money and exchange it for gold. As t...
if putting dogs to sleep is such a widely accepted process, why is human euthanization so controversial?	[ "> I understand that there's a difference between dogs and humans.\n\nIf you understand this then why are you still asking this lol? In the most formal way possible, the answer to your question is that society doesn't consider dogs to be legal persons entitled to rights while it does consider humans that way." ]
Why do people on reality survivalist shows bring firestarters instead of a lighter? It seams that a disposable lighter would work much easier and last more than the 30 or so days that they are in the wild.	[ "Because if they wanted to do things the easy way they wouldn't be on a survivalist show in the first place.", "Firestarters will make much hotter sparks that can ignite tinder that even a small lighter wont burn. A fire striker is also non-reactive, lasts forever, is highly durable, and will strike many more tim...
Why do restaurants have so much trouble splitting checks?	[ "Splitting a check in half, like a 50/50 charge on each card is not too hard. \n\nWhen three couples split at the end, though, the server has to go back to the restaurant's order system and basically recreate 3 separate checks from scratch, voiding and reentering all the food they already input while sending a sepa...
How do speakers of Japanese, Chinese and other languages with pictographic writing systems organise their dictionaries?	[ "Japanese does have a common way of ordering their sounds. It is the order they use for their hirigana (Ka, ki, ku, ke, ko.) So some dictionaries get ordered in that way. (well, Japanese - english dictionaries do, at least).\n\nThen another way to order them would be by kanji radical. Kanji are made up of several r...
We have vitamin A , B, C, D, E and K but not F, G, H, I and J. Why?	[ "Vitamins A through E were named alphabetically. Vitamin K was discovered later and is essential in coagulation. But when they name it they spelled it koagulation.", "Followup question. Why did they decide to have 12 B Vitamins rather than use the rest of the alphabet?", "To keep it clear, vitamin naming is a...
Why does exercise such as running or cycling feel much more strenuous during the first couple of minutes?	[ "Blood is constantly pumped all around our body to supply oxygen to all our muscles. In the case of running and cycling, we predominantly use our legs, but seeing as though we still have a regular blood circulation, our muscles find it difficult to work comfortably due to the lack of oxygen for the task they are pe...
Why do I feel like I'm going to vomit when calling a stranger on the phone?	[ "While I am not a doctor, not your doctor, and this is not medical advice, it sounds very much like you are experiencing a panic attack, possibly brougt on by social anxiety.\n\nThe same thing happens to me, on the phone.\n\nYou might wish to seek treatment." ]
How is colour and temperature related when something is burning? Also, why does the Sun appear white?	[ "The purple may be an artifact. On some digital cameras, infrared shows up as purple. The blue filter lets some red through. I use the selfie cam on my iPhone 6 to test IR remote controls. The main cam does not do that." ]
Why were people shown as having pure white skin in ancient asian portraits?	[ "Pale skin was in China, as in Europe at one time, a symbol of the upper class--you cannot avoid being tanned if you perform outdoor labor. It's long been represented in art, dolls and make-up fashions as a beauty ideal.", "Fair skin was considered pure, noble, innocent, and desirable in most ancient cultures.\n\...
How does a ponzi scheme work? I'm 5 years old.	[ "#1. you borrow lots of money, and promise to pay it back at huge interest rates over a long period of time.\n\n#2. you live like a king spending money on whatever you like until the money runs out.\n\n#3. you borrow even more money to pay off the original loans.\n\n#4. repeat this until china stops lending you mon...
How did BBC get the seemingly impossible footage for David Attenboroughs Life series?	[ "Many many many hours of waiting. You can watch documentaries on how they film those documentaries. It involves cameramen being out in the field for months, being bored out of their minds while waiting for that opportunity to get that perfect shot." ]
What is physically different about a hard drive with a 500 GB capacity versus a hard drive with a 1 TB capacity? Do the hard drives cost the same amount to produce?	[ "Here's an analogy that a five year old might understand.\n\nImagine you have a piece of paper. You get your crayon and divide the paper up into squares. In each square you can write a limited amount of information (for this example, let's say one letter), [like this](_URL_0_). If you tried to write any more inform...
why do I have the urge to go to the bathroom when I get nervous before an exam/big event?	[ "I could be wrong but I believe it has to do with Stress levels and adrenaline releases. believe it or not Humans are actually getting that flight or fight response to things it wasn't necessarily intended for. We don't have to run from a pack of Wolves or Bear like our evolutionary ancestors but now we're getting ...

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