Split (3)

train · 273k rows

title stringlengths 0 299	text list
linear, quadratic and exponential time	[ "Talking about something like big O notation? \n\nIt sounds like you are describing time complexity - the amount of time needed to complete a task increasing as the size of the task increases. Some tasks \"scale\" better than others.\n\nLinear time: if the task becomes twice as big, it takes (about) twice as long...
The process that got the number "65 million", when it comes to dinosaur extinction, and why the process can be trusted.	[ "The underlying science is based on dating various layers of rock found around the earth. (see [this wiki](_URL_0_))\n\nBasically, scientists uses various methods to determine ranges for layers of rock that they find around the earth. These are then cross compared to come up with a basic timeline of large scale ge...
The Watergate scandal and why it brought down a president.	[ "There were offices in the Watergate complex in Washington DC. One of those offices was used by the Democratic party in the 1972 election. People working for people who worked for Nixon's Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP) broke into that office but were caught.\n\nSubsequently there was a coverup to att...
Historically, what happens to people of country X who live in country Y, when X and Y go to war?	[ "Usually most civilians try to vacate. War is not always an overnight start, and people with a strong survival instinct try to book it. Otherwise they could have thier lives leveraged as a negotiation tactic, put in internment camps, or just plain be casualties of hate crimes. Thats just scratching the surface of w...
I'm 26 and I have my University's insurance plan. If I have a heart attack or a sudden emergency, do I just call 911? Where will I be taken and who will pay for it?	[ "Because your post isn't asking a simplified conceptual explanation, but rather for an answer, its been removed. \n\nYou should try /r/answers, /r/askreddit or even one of the more specialized answers subreddits like /r/askhistorians, /r/askscience or others too numerous and varied to mention. \n\nRest assured th...
Why do we want to survive?	[ "This question is sort of breaking into the realm of philosophy, but from the standpoint of natural selection, organisms with a natural impetus to survive are more likely to survive, reproduce, and pass those traits onto their offspring.\n\nIt's just as true for humans as it is for any other living thing." ]
How do coroners identify a body during an autopsy?	[ "If police series are relatively accurate, there are a few ways this can happen.\n\n1) The body has some sort of identification on them (drivers license, passport,...)\n2) Using specific body traits, like dental records, fingerprints, DNA, traceable implants,... But these require them being in a database.\n3) Someo...
Why are pushups so much harder than they seem?	[ "I'm assuming it is because you are pushing most of your weight against gravity." ]
In games like Fallout and Skyrim ; why does fast travel always work outside but not once I go inside a building?	[ "To prevent you from going into a dungeon, completing the quest objective, and fast travelling out of there. It means you have to complete the dungeon before leaving. \n\nAdd to that the fact that all the game checks for is a flag on the cell/module that says it's indoors, and you also can't travel from Breezehome ...
Why is subtraction so much more difficult than addition?	[ "Psychologically, we are \"programmed\" to accumulate rather than divest. As such, we start with accumulating and then learn to take away. Algorithmically, i.e., arithmetically, there is no difference.", "I scrounged up a few theories online as to why this is. The general consensus is that partly due to our n...
How does your tongue heal automatically after it gets burnt from hot food?	[ "Heals automatically...it takes me 2-3 days for my tounge to stop hurting when it gets burned", "Your entire body (for the most part) heals after an injury. Your tongue is no different, the body has mechanisms in place to heal damage.", "It takes blood to heal things. Your tongue has a lot of blood in it, which...
How comes games for consoles lack mod support that their pc versions have?	[ "Modding a game generally goes against the policies that developers have to agree to to get their games on the console. Making a game moddable generally opens up possibilities for exploits that enable piracy and unwanted use of the system.\n\nOn top of that, games for consoles are very streamlined and made to be pe...
Why didn't coffee evolve the same way as tea, with everyone using little one-use bags of grinds just like tea?	[ "Yes, it is a taste issue, but coffee bags do exist. They're just not as good as other methods of coffee making, although they are better than instant.", "Coffee requires hotter water to brew properly in a reasonable amount of time. Water poured into a cup with a bag will quickly cool well below that temperature...
Can charge from lightning rods be converted to usable electricity, and if so why don't we do it (that I've heard of)?	[ "The main problem with lightning is that it happens so quickly. A bolt of lightning can strike and transfer all of its energy in mere fractions of a second... and then it's over.\n\nWe currently don't have any technology that can effectively capture that kind of power (without damage) in that short amount of time....
Flossing	[ "Teeth have bacteria on them. The bacteria produce a film on the teeth (sometimes called plaque). The film itself is acidic so can damage teeth. This is what brushing removes.\n\nOver time this film becomes hard (sometimes called tartar) and it can't be removed by brushing. It take 24-72 hours for this hardening to...
Why is it illegal to feed or provide necessities to the homeless in certain areas/states/cities?	[ "It's not like it's against the law to give your leftovers to a beggar when you leave a restaurant. What's illegal is setting up a large-scale food distribution scheme and going around feeding dozens/hundreds of people without getting food service permits. Once you start feeding large numbers of people, you'r...
Why do people learn differently, i.e, by hearing, by visual, and by touching?	[ "They don't. It's just an old myth. \n\n > There have been systematic studies of the effectiveness of learning styles that have consistently found either no evidence or very weak evidence to support the hypothesis that matching or “meshing” material in the appropriate format to an individual’s learning style is se...
When you get tan/sunburnt, why do you mainly peel on your shoulders and rarely your legs?	[ "Because your shoulders are more aimed towards the sun than your legs, which are kind of at an angle, and soak up a greater proportion of UV rays.\n\nIf you laid on your back all day facing the sun, your legs and chest would then burn a lot more than your shoulders would.\n\nImagine pointing a torch straight down a...
Christmas. How did it originate and how did it come to be what it is today?	[ "Many cultures have 'winter solstice' festivals in and around the 25th of December. This was because days were short and dark, as little as 5 hours between sun rise and sun set in some northern Scandinavian capitals (Oslo etc)\n\nSo the cheer themselves up around the time of the shortest say they would get together...
How does the processor know what to do with input and code?	[ "> How does the machine even know what to do with programming code?\n\nInside the Central Processing Unit are millions of transistors.\n\nThese transistors are grouped together to build logic gates - simple electric circuits that can do things with binary 1s and 0s, like determine if Bit 1 AND Bit 2 are both set t...
Why does my car have a spare tire, but not a spare battery?	[ "Your spare battery would go dead as well. You can't have a spare car battery sitting in a car for years without it dying while a spare tire will last a long time without compromise", "If your spare tire has a leak in it, the worst that happens is you need a tow.\n\nIf your spare battery has a leak in it, the bes...
;Why is it so easy to doze off during the day after(or at) work or class,but downright impossible at night?	[ "Probably because you have the variation your PER1 gene expression (part of the gene group that controls circadian rhythm) that makes you a night owl rather than early bird / day lark.\n\nIn prehistoric times, you would have been the one of the people watching over the village at night, keeping your family safe fro...
How does first past the post voting work, and what other voting methods are there?	[ "The basic idea of FPTP voting is that each person gets to cast a single vote and whomever gets the most votes wins. This is often referred to as the _plurality_ of votes, as the candidate does not have to get the _majority_ of votes cast, just the most.\n\nThe flaw in this system is that, if you support a less po...
Reddit, where do streams and torrents come from?	[ "Streams come from a respective central source like youtube or the website involved in the streaming, IE there is a central source hosting the material \n\nTorrents are a different story. Torrents are decentralized controlled by the peers who are sharing them. Websites like the pirate bay are middle men who give yo...
How does it work when someone wins a new home from a television show?	[ "They will probably end up having to sell the home. Since they didn't pay for the home, and instead received it as a gift, the home is considered income. If the home is worth 250k dollars(average price of a home in the US), then they owe taxes on all of that which is about 57k dollars for a married couple, before d...
Why aren't half dollar and dollar coins in greater circulation in the US, and why don't we have larger coin denominations in general (i.e. a $2 coin)?	[ "No one I know likes to carry around coins, especially 20 dollars worth of larger dollar-sized coins. Bills are lighter and take up less space.", "The $1 coins were going into circulation for awhile there, but a) people would keep/collect them and b) businesses wouldn't have an efficient system in place for coun...
Why do prisms split apart the different colors of light, but lenses don't?	[ "Lenses do too.\n\nThe phenomenon is called chromatic aberration. Good lenses, like camera lenses, have corrective doublet elements glued to them to compensate for the effect. If you have high index eyeglasses, you can see the effect by looking at a thick black line on white paper. It will be blue on one side an...
Why Should I Inhale and Exhale at Certain Points While Doing Abdominal Exercises?	[ "Some ab exercises tend to force are in or out of your lungs, so it is important to find the right point in the exercise to breath, so your diaphragm and your other muscles aren't fighting each other. Also, breathing at the same point in the exercise make it easier to maintain proper form...this is true for all ex...
Why is charging foreign customers up to twice as much for a product, like apple an wacom do, legal and not discrimination?	[ "In the case of market segmentation, which is what you are actually asking about, a company has chosen to charge more to foreign markets. They likely did this based on projected or actual import and shipping costs, local laws, taxes, tariffs, currency values, or simply that they felt like it. \n\nIt is not \"discri...
How does my car radio can display the song that it's currently being broadcasting.	[ "It uses the [Radio Data System (RDS)](_URL_0_). Basically the data is intermixed with the other data on the signal, but the radio knows how to read it and display it to you." ]
What does defragging your hard drive actually do?	[ "So when you delete something from your hard drive, really all you've done is removed a pointer in the computer that tells it \"hey there is something here.\"\n\nSubsequently, when new files are added, it sees that space as available, and writes into it.\n\nSometimes, the space being written into does not match the...
Why would a drug dealer mix a powerful opioid and deadly drug (fentanyl) with heroin, rather than a weaker substance, knowing that it could negatively impact future business?	[ "Because it's extremely addictive and powerful so will give the impression that their product is much better value.\n\nIf you find a heroin dealer selling the same amount at about the same price, and it seems much stronger, of course that's what people will keep going back to.\n\nAs if heroin wasn't already strong ...
Why does the word 'unisex' mean both sexes?	[ "From what I read from Oxford, it's not \"uni\" meaning \"one,\" it's uni as short for universal (or united)." ]
How does a car engine (or any engine) works, and what is the difference between a turbo charger and a super charger?	[ "Turbochargers and superchargers are basically the same thing: air compressors. In a turbocharger, the compressor impeller is spun using exhaust gasses that are being pushed out of the engine. In a supercharger, the compressor is spun using a belt and pulley mounted on the front of the engine. \n\nThe idea behind t...
How exactly does patient zero for the flu contract the disease? Is it an outside source or a mutation?	[ "I think what you are asking is how flues and other contagious diseases originate? Well, the origin of illnesses can be divided into two major categories: heirloom and zoonotic. The former are diseases \"handed down\" by our primate ancestors which we inherited as we evolved. The latter are diseases that we \"caugh...
Why didn't our taste buds evolve to make healthy foods taste good?	[ "fatty foods are high in calories. you need ALOT of calories to survive. you need relatively few vitamins to survive.", "Keep in mind that agriculture and all of recorded history are a drop in the bucket compared to the age of our species. We've only been farming about 12 thousand years, but have anatomically ...
Why is the shower curtain rod in hotels bowed out?	[ "Because shower curtains tend to get pulled inward when you're taking a shower thanks to the hot air inside the shower rising and creating a zone of reduced pressure. To keep the curtain from getting annoyingly close, the rod is bowed outward.", "To give you a little more room without having to buy a bigger show...
Why does citrus taste so bad after brushing my teeth?	[ "You tongue can detect different tastes. It detects salty, sweet, sour, bitter and umami.\n\nWhen you brush your teeth, the toothpaste becomes foamy. The foam is made by a chemical called sodium lauryl sulphate (SLS). SLS makes lots of foam and bubbles that make your teeth feel clean.\n\nSLS makes your sweet taste ...
why is a guitar never in tune?	[ "Different strings sound different even if they're perfectly in tune, which may be contributing to the \"out of tune-ness.\" The timbre (way it sounds) doesn't match between strings even if the pitch is the exact same.\n\nOther complications can arise when you're fretting, because even if the strings are set to the...
With a nuke, how is it possible that so much energy can come out of something that small?	[ "Nuclear weapons mostly work on the principle of fission. A heavy element (like Uranium 235, which contains 143 neutrons and 29 protons, and is unstable) is forced to lose some of it's subatomic particles and become different types of atoms.\n\nAtoms are made up of three types of subatomic particles, protons (posit...
Why does a beer explode when I slam a glass bottle on top of another bottle?	[ "Well, all the air inside forms bubbles, which move to the edge of the bottle then float upwards. When you hit the bottle with a another, it vibrates the glass, and the pressure pushes all the bubbles towards the middle. Because so many are pushed together they are forced both up and down, but obviously there's gla...
How come dogs shiver even though when you cuddle with them, they're super warm?	[ "My parents' poodle has had the shakes before -- the vet said it was because he was really anxious and stressed out. This happened while my parents were on vacation and I was dog-sitting.\n\nMy friend had a dog - I think a terrier - and when he got older, he started to shake/tremble whenever he was sitting (hind le...
The difference between Rap and Hip-Hop	[ "Hip-hop is a culture that encompasses a lot more things than just music. Break-dancers, graffiti artists, beat-boxers, and DJs are all a part of hip-hop culture. So are rappers.\n\nIn recent times, however, people have started to distinguish hip-hop music by saying that some of it is rap, and some of it is hip-hop...
Why don't we have cones at high concentrations throughout our whole retina, not just the fovea?	[ "Because evolution isn't out to make a perfect biological machine. Only make a biological machine that works for the pressures put against it right now.\n\nIt it figuratively the kid who doesn't want to be in school doing just barely enough work to get that D and pass the class." ]
Why doesn't the FBI (or any criminal investigative service) immediately shut down any illegal streaming service (or pirating) upon finding it?	[ "Most of the time these sites originate outside of the US, therefore outside their jurisdictional area.", "Servers can be hosted all over the world. And the FBI only has jurisdiction in the United States. Sometimes they keep it up to try to find members of the website, gathering evidence that way." ]
Why do zits seemingly only appear on your face or upper torso?	[ "Acne more often affects skin with a greater number of oil glands (also known as sebaceous glands); these areas include the face, the upper part of the chest, and the back. You have much more sebaceous glands on your face than on the rest of your body. Hope that helps!" ]
Why does the US have a rule that no President can do more than two terms?	[ "In most parts of the world, when there is a power transfer from one leader to another (or from one party to another), it's a risky time. There are often coups or power-grabs or even civil wars. In the U.S., the transition of power has always been peaceful (with the partial exception of Lincoln), and we really woul...
How did we figure out what each of our organs do?	[ "Medic/med student here. For a long time, we used autopsies. But those can only do so much when the subject is dead. We also used animals. By removing an organ or part of one and observing the changes, we could deduce its probable function. One such experiment was performed by removing the pancreas of a dog. The re...
Why do things physically hurt more when we are cold?	[ "Your body is filed with thermoreceptors to detect the temperature. You have 2 main thermoreceptors for cold: regular cold thermoreceptors and extreme cold thermoreceptors. The second one, extreme cold, sends pain signals to your brain. So when it's cold and something hurts you, your brain is getting 2 different pa...
How does this phone holder for your car not break your phone?	[ "There are two electronics components that are sensitive to magnets: cathode ray tube (CRT) screens and hard drives. Your phone does not have either of those- it has an LED or LCD screen instead of a CRT and uses flash memory instead of a hard drive. \n\nWith credit cards, the magnetic strip will get messed up with...
How do computers convert binary into instructions?	[ "This is the task of the CPUs control logic. All these transistors that make registers, busses, adders and the other fuctions of the CPU is controlled by single bit control signals. So you may have hundreds of these signals in a core. The control logic is a block that converts the instructions you feed the processo...
Why is it racist to make decisions based on race when it can be a good predictor of outcome/behavior?	[ "I knew some white people who had foster kids and their son got taken away for child molestation. So maybe you shouldn't go with the white babysitter guy." ]
What's the deal with "laces in"?	[ "It's from the movie 'Ace Ventura: Pet Detective' where a shamed former kicker who missed a game-winning field goal placed the blame on the star-QB/kick-holder because he didn't rotate the ball to be 'laces out' (facing away from the kicker).\n\nThe idea is that kicking the laced area may affect the trajectory/path...
Why does our atmosphere appear blue from earth in sunlight, but when earth is viewed from space also in sunlight, it's clear/invisible?	[ "The sky appears blue from inside our atmosphere because the light refracts (bounces around). The blue part of the light bounces around more, so that's what we see.\nFrom the outside however, we're seeing the light that is reflected, not refracted. It is a subtle difference, but basically it doesn't bounce around a...
What is integral spin/half-integral spin and what's the difference	[ "Integer, not integral. \n\nYou've probably heard of angular momentum; it's the rotational version of the momentum you encounter I'm everyday life. In classical physics, this is based on the fact that different parts of an object are moving in different ways. Imagine a carousel. At any time, two points on opposite ...
Why do women moan/scream during sex?	[ "It’s a release. A letting go. Just like crying or laughing or any other release of an emotion. It’s possible but not usual to silently laugh or cry, just like it’s possible but not usual to be silent during orgasm." ]
Why didn't the U.S. include the release of prisoners in the new nuclear deal with Iran	[ "Because that would have given leverage to Iran. By taking more prisoners and negotiating for their release too, they could have tried to extract more favorable terms in other parts of the agreement.\n\nBy not including prisoner release as part of the negotiations, the U.S. removed that potential negotiating card f...
Why does cold water feel way more FREEZING than it actually is when I'm chewing minty gum?	[ "The receptors that sense cold are partially activated by chemicals in the mint, and respond as though they're feeling a chill... when you hit them with something cold as well - they get a double whammy and it feels absolutely freezing." ]
The downsides of working out while drunk	[ "- If we count the \"hold-my-beer idiot risks\" as bad decisions leading to injury, being drunk also affects your muscle coordination which may result in injuring yourself even when you're doing your normal exercise routine.\n\n- Alcohol is a diuretic which means it makes you pee out more water and electrolytes, ca...
Who do most of our "traditional" Christmas songs, images and TV/movies come from the 1940s to the 1960s?	[ "Here's my opinion on this, I have no expertise in it though. By the way, this idea is directly plagiarized from [xkcd](_URL_1_).\n\n[Baby Boomers](_URL_0_) grew up with those things and there are currently a lot of Baby Boomers. Also , if you look at the current age and buying power of Baby Boomer's, they are r...
Ethanol in Fuel - What is it? Why is it added? Is it good/bad and why so?	[ "E10 is a blend of gas/alcohol made from biomass (corn, usually). Most modern cars are just fine running it. E85 is a different beast, however - the concentration of ethanol is much higher (as is the octane rating), making engine management / fuel system changes necessary (usually engines require higher flow inj...
How does Humble Bundle make money when they have discounts that cost them hundreds of dollars each sale, and only make a percentage of the discounted sale?	[ "It helps a lot that they aren't selling a physical product. Really cuts down on the cost per unit. No materials, no production cost. Just licensing and server costs (bandwidth). \n\nSo to say that it's 'costing hundreds' isn't accurate, they're almost certainly not dropping the price below cost, even though to us...
Why do the hurricanes "curve" when they get close to Florida instead of just continuing straight?	[ "Air currents 'push' the hurricane one way or another, in my comment below you will see a pretty interesting site." ]
What is the difference between top 1% owning 1% of the nation's income vs bottom 1% owning 1% of nation's income	[ "The reality is that the top 1% owns far more than 1% of the nation's wealth, hence what makes them the top 1%. If they owned the same as the bottom 1% then they would be in the same class as the bottom 1%. There would be no differentiating between the groups. How would you know anyone is relegated to whatever grou...
The origin & evolution of Black, Asian & European "races"	[ "That is a loaded question with a multitude of heavy answers, but I will just give you a small brief to tide you over. The common consensuses in the study of human origins is that the modern human came from Africa. The reason for the varied skin tones, bone structure, and genetic dispositions is due to adapting to ...
What the hell are flies so attracted to?	[ "Typically honey, but I've heard of a few people getting a few with vinegar." ]
"66% of black people are on welfare and are the majority of the welfare receivers"	[ "I don't know where the quote is from. Its source may provide some insights on whether you should trust whoever said it.\n\nAccording to the link you provided, assuming it's accurate, nearly 40% of welfare recipients are black. This is less than half, so it does not match up with the quote's assertion that they a...
How do cancerous cells affect and make the surrounding cells cancerous as well?	[ "A cancerous cell can produce exosomes, little packages of cancer proteins, DNA and RNA, these exosomes float around the body through lymph and blood vessels and they are be accidentally swallowed by healthy cells elsewhere in the body. And these cancerous proteins/functional RNA can possibly shut down the tumour i...
How do medications know to target specific parts of the body?	[ "It doesn't know at all. Medicines are designed to bind to specific cells. They are distributed throughout the body in the bloodstream but only affect the areas they are designed to." ]
why do camera lenses need so many elements? Why can't they just bend the light with one piece of glass?	[ "All the lenses allow it to be adjusted to zoom in and out, as well as focus at a specific distance" ]
Why isn't there significant talk about forming a third party in the US during this current political climate?	[ "One of the most robust conclusions of the literature on political science is that a winner take all voting system (like the US') will lead to the consolidation of political parties into two.\n\nPretend there are two parties, L and R which are left and right wing respectively. I then start a new party named LoC (wh...
Why doesn't the U.S. get rid of the penny?	[ "People are very reluctant to accept and generally dislike change.", "I think the real question here is- why is the nickel so much larger than a dime when the nickel is only worth half as much?", "Several reasons:\n\n* Historical inertia. The penny has literally existed since the founding of the America and bef...
What causes a drop of water on a phone screen to magnify the text underneath?	[ "Light is refracted when it travels from one medium to another. The light from the screen is refracted (spread out) by the water droplet and therefore appears bigger to your eyes. \nMore information on how light acts here: _URL_0_" ]
How do neurons "know" things? As in, "this memory is stored in this neuron."	[ "This is something that we don't know. We know that each memory has a particular network of neurons that is used when you remember it, but we aren't sure how that network stores things exactly. The brain recognizes the pattern of the network and you remember whatever is stored by it (or the other way around, you re...
If sand is eroded rock, why does melting rock give you lava, but melting sand give you glass.	[ "Geologist here! Let me see if I can help: Rock is made of of many different minerals like quartz, calcium carbonate, mica, biotite, feldspar, and many many others. Glass and sand are both composed of the same mineral - quartz (SiO2 or silica dioxide), though commercial glass has additives to color it or help ma...
Why galaxies are such perfect spirals, and brighter in the middle?	[ "To expand on what /u/xitssammi wrote:\n\n\"Perfect\" isn't the right word to use. Sure, some galaxies look like spirals (there are actually other forms they can take, too, like an ellipse), but they are far from perfect.\n\nThe maths is somewhat analogous to a traffic-jam, in a weird way. An individual car can...
How do companies like Turbo Tax and H & R Block that do tax returns for you make it's profit since people only use their services once a year?	[ "Actually a lot of people file their taxes 4 times a year. Anyone working a 1099 job and any business that surpasses a certain minimum revenue level" ]
Fisher v. University of Texas	[ "Hate to be a bitch, but...\n\n/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1gz0cd/eli5_the_scotus_ruling_in_fisher_v_university_of/\n\nIs that the one? I can ELI5 following a link if you want :) but it would just be \"click that link and eat your dinner!!!\"" ]
what's the difference between ram air parachutes and the round ones?	[ "You can maneuver a ram air parachute. Ram airs are for stunts and for people who want control after the chute opens. You can traverse a lot of lateral distance if you want. Basically \"fly\" the chute. Experienced jumpers could jump at high altitude from far away and land on a pinpiont that is miles away from ...
Why are international students a financial benefit to the school they're going to?	[ "For local students, a large part is paid for by the government, which generally comes with a large number of strings attached. The government will generally offer money, loans, land, tax breaks etc but in exchange might limit the fees charged, or require universities to accept certain students etc. This means tha...
Why can't LA desalinize ocean water to curb the effects of drought?	[ "Energy consumption. It takes a massive amount of energy for desalination.\n\nIt's getting cheaper all the time, and we're getting better at it and producing more energy, but it's still usually more expensive than alternatives.\n\nIt's also cheaper to conserve than desalinate. And the state can make money through f...
Why do ballpoint pens become unusable even though their see-through cartridges are shown with full ink?	[ "If the ink can't flow, it doesn't matter how much there is. Ball point pens can become damaged, or clogged with crap far before they run out of ink.", "Because that is probably just a thin lining of ink on the inside part of the cartridge, making it look full when really it's pretty much empty.", "A lot of tim...
How are Apple Pay, Samsung pay, Google wallet different?	[ "> Aren't they all NFC?\n\nSamsung bought a company called LoopPay so Samsung Pay is NFC or MST (magnetic secure transmission, basically faking a magnetic stripe). \n\n > If so, why aren't all of them accepted everywhere?\n\nBecause NFC is currently still accepted at only a minority of places in the United States...
Why is it that alcohol does not have to have the ingredients or nutritional facts printed on the bottle?	[ "It all depends on whether something is regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA, part of the Department of Health and Human Services) or the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB, part of the Treasury Department.) Only FDA-controlled items are required to have nutrition labels. For TTB beverages,...
Is it possible to "crush" water? What would happen?	[ "If you increase pressure on water, you will eventually get ice. There are 15 known types of ice, depending on the pressure and temperature.", "A kilogram of fresh water, at the surface of the Earth, fills a volume of one liter.\n\nAt four kilometers deep in the ocean, where the pressure is hundreds of times mor...
Why do mammals like humans and dogs tilt their heads when confused?	[ "They do not do it because they are confused, per se. Tilting their head gives them a different angle on the sound and helps them figure out more accurately where the sound is coming from, or to understand more accurately what the sound actually is. It's just a way for them to get additional information about the s...
SQL Injection	[ "In naive code, you'd generate an SQL statement by writing something like:\n\n sql = \"SELECT * FROM products WHERE code = '\" + product_code + \"';\"\n\nIf product_code is set to ABC123, that code would generate an SQL statement that looks like:\n\n SELECT * FROM products WHERE code = 'ABC123';\n\nIf the pro...
What makes Ouija boards move and why do so many people believe it's spirits when it seems almost impossible that it is?	[ "If people are touching the piece you move around, one of them is doing it. If spirits were communicating with them they wouldn’t need to touch it.", "In my experiences, one of the people in the group will push the planchette - and it is usually the person who first says \"Who's moving it? [Friend], is it you? St...
If military service in the US could be represented in hourly wages, how much would the different ranks be paid?	[ "There's absolutely no way to calculate this.\n\nEveryone in the military works a different amount of hours. Some will put in 24 hours in one day while others maybe do literally nothing and still get paid for it.\n\nSome start at 4 in the morning. Some start at 4 in the afternoon.\n\nGoing on deployment means worki...
Why can't deep web/dark web websites be closed?	[ "They are operated by individuals hosting servers in various countries. And first, you need to find the server/website then find the person hosting/paying for it. It will usually be in some remote country with little jurisdiction. Now, they have to produce a court order in that country. \n\nTL;DR; It is a huge pain...
Enamel protection products claim “once enamel is gone, it’s gone forever”. How true is this and if so, how do you explain enamel restoring toothpaste?	[ "My dentist explained to me that teeth will calcify and decalcify over time. A fluoride rinse or toothpaste can aid in this process, but if you have deep cavities and the enamel is beginning to form that sticky tar like consistency, that probably isn't going to recalcify sufficiently. In essence they determine th...
If I didn't know something was illegal, how could I get in trouble for it?	[ "Not knowing the law is not, in itself, a defense. This is a pretty important legal principle, important enough to [have its own Latin phrase](_URL_0_). I'm not quite sure what you're asking, since there's no particular reason you wouldn't get in trouble for it.", "Ignorance, in and of itself, is not a defense....
how do countries introduce new currencies	[ "First they print a whole bunch of new currency and distribute it to banks. Then they establish an exchange rate, and set a deadline after which the old currency can no longer be used or exchanged.", "This is how Europe did it when we introduced the euro. \n\nFirst you had a \"double period\" for a couple years w...
When it rains really heavily, how come ants don't "drown". How about when it floods?	[ "Ants burrow up to one foot deep in the ground, and no matter how hard the rain is, they will remain safe. However, in floods where the ground stays moist for days on end, they will die. However, like demonstrated after heavy rain and floods in Pakistan, bugs will take to the trees and higher ground" ]
How do they know which eggs don't have baby chicks in them, when they take eggs to sell??	[ "None of them do, because the hens are not allowed access to roosters, so they don't mate, and none of the eggs are fertilized.", "Also, eggs--even if they are fertilized--are retrieved from the nest very quickly. If the hen does not sit on the egg, keeping it warm consistently over a period of time, even a fert...
How do the Death Stars move?	[ "It depends on what level of canon you are looking for.\n\nIf you accept the Gaming books, the Death Star Technical Companion (at least one of them, I believe there were several) lists it as having both Ion drives and a series of 123 hyper-drive field generators (Chapter two, Technical Specifications).\n\nGiven tha...
Why do certain people faint or feel weak at the sight of blood.	[ "A fear of blood can trigger the vasovagal response, which dramatically lowers blood pressure. No one really knows exactly why that happens, but there's speculation that it might be a way of reducing bleeding when wounded.\n\nIt never used to happen to me, but last time I cut myself with a kitchen knife while cooki...
What is the link in hebrew between the alphabet and numericals values and what does it mean for us?	[ "The Hebrew language uses letters to represent numbers, as well as using letters to form words. The meaning is contextual, but as a consequence any word could be interpreted as a number as well.\n\nThis structure combined with the religious writings in Hebrew means that mentally ill people with an obsession with re...
How come when it is very windy outside, the water in the toilet bowl seems to be moving?	[ "When air moves over something it creates low pressure, the faster it moves, the lower the pressure will get.\n\nThose pipes that stick up out of the roof are attached to the drainage system of the house so when you flush or run the tub, sink, washing machine, etc... the water will be able to go down the pipes and ...
why couldn't the next Presidential candidate just promise to abolish some of the far reaching NSA programs?	[ "They could. The thing is, campaign promises are unenforceable. Obama promised to end the Afghanistan war, close Gitmo, protect whistleblowers and have a transparent administration.", "That's basically how Obama got elected. Promise to change everything. \n\nYou also seem to be stuck in the Reddit mindset if you ...

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