Subset (10)

eli5 · 25k rows

Split (1)

train · 25k rows

query stringlengths 20 300	positive listlengths 1 1	negative listlengths 1 1
What's the avarege distance between two neighbor galaxies?	[ "According to this [paper](_URL_0_) the average distance between galaxies is 1 mega parsec. That is about 3.26 million light-years. Or as the paper puts it about 50 times the size of a galaxy. It's even emptier than I thought!" ]	[ "There is no one answer. It depends on a vast number of factors, including ambient light level, how long it's been since the ambient light level changed at all, what it is you're trying to resolve, and of course huge variances from person to person. But the rule of thumb for a person with perfect normal-range visio...
How do researchers choose which Studies to use for a Review of Studies?	[ "Start with major journals. In medicine, this would be something like the New England Journal of Medicine. Consider the number of participants in the study. More is always better. A study of 10,000 is better than a study of 10. Usually anyways. Look at the methods the researchers used. Did they use widely accepte...	[ "Most likely affiliate programs... they get a cut of sales they refer to the sites if you end up buying." ]
Why does melting polar ice raise the sea levels if ice has more volume than liquid water?	[ "> but in any basic science class one learns that solid ice has a greater volume than water; wouldn't melting the polar ice caps lower the sea level? In any basic science class you should also learn that ice displaces the same volume of water as it would as a liquid, the rest extends above the surface. So theoretic...	[ "To add to the other answer. We also have fossils and sediment layers which show us that some parts of the earth were once covered in water. We also know that mountains were flat land and have been pushed up. The Rocky Mountains are still growing (I believe) and people have found fossils to show that they were once...
how does marijuana get you high?	[ "THC, and other psychoactive ingredients in marijuana, are a kind of substance known as a \"cannabinoid.\" Cannabinoids are a wide class of substances that, despite the similarity in name to \"Cannabis,\" exist naturally in your body and other biological beings' as well. Hence, you have \"cannabinoid\" receptors al...	[ "Pictures on TV screens and computer screens are made from a whole bunch of teeny-tiny dots of lots of different colours. More dots, all jammed really, really close together, means the picture looks better. 'Cause the dots are less noticeable. And there's way more details. That's hi-def. More dots." ]
Since a year is not exactly 365.25 days, does that mean sometime in the distant future we'll have winter weather in July?	[ "You will notice that the extra time (0.25 days) adds up to a whole day after 4 years. You may also recall that we add an extra day to our calendar (February 29th) once every 4 years. These offset. There are also smaller aberrations (on the order of seconds). Every so often, we add extra seconds to the calendar as ...	[ "Not in a finite number of additions. In mathematics, there is an idea called 'limits' where the answer is '1'. The beauty of the 'limits' idea is that it is entirely defined in terms of finite operations. What it basically says is that the process of addition will get you arbitrarily close to 1 if you add enough...
How is "speed enforced from aircraft?"	[ "So, you know when you're driving down the highway, and you see those horizontal lines that go all the way across the road? The DOT has those metered out at a set distance, and they'll time how long it takes you to cross the distance between those lines. Since speed is distance divided by time, they can resolve you...	[ "Last I checked they didnt find Dzhokhar Tsarnaev using a satellite, someone walked over and saw the boat cover askew. As for your actual question, I'd imagine that most intelligence agencies try not to capture imagery of thousands of miles of empty ocean unless they have a reason to... Any geostationary satellite ...
how is it possible to become so zoned out when driving a route you frequent, that you don’t recall part of the drive there?	[ "You don't keep all your memories. Your brain does some editing to get rid of 'junk' information that isn't useful for the future. When you drive the same route a lot, your brain starts to recognise that there's nothing new here - the trip is the same as all the other trips, and so it starts not storing parts. The ...	[ "Sleep learning us a myth that has been debunked. If it were true, we would all sleep with ipods and speak 15 foreign languages and have multiple PhDs. What happened to OP is that he was in a trance state, similar to hypnosis. It is very easy to enter a self-trance state and with little practice we can all do it. W...
What colour is a mirror?	[ "If we define color by the region of visible light spectrum that is reflected by a surface, than the mirror is \"white.\" (or at least somewhere in the white-to-grey region) The difference is that most colored surfaces are also not smooth, so they don't reflect in the same way a mirror does, they scatter light off ...	[ "Do you have a fly screen over the window? If so what you are observing is a [Moiré pattern](_URL_0_) being projected onto the window. Essentially the light is passing through the screen and the light waves get split up and then interact with each other causing spots of superposition where some regions are darker a...
How can drunk people have full, coherent conversations and not remember anything they said or did the next morning?	[ "There is a part of the brain which fuctions as RAM i.e. storing recent memory, thoughts ideas and another part which has long term memory. Now, there are certain nerve cells and chemicals which take this information from short term and store it in long term. Alcohol intoxication inhibits this fuction, hence long t...	[ "This sounds like an extreme example of \"Tip of my Tongue\". _URL_0_ I can't really give an overly scientific answer as to what causes it (some interesting articles on that page, though), but I'd imagine that it's just a \"brain fart\", kinda like deja vu. It's a problem with long-term semantic memory recall. (Se...
How do people create new religions? What are examples of this?	[ "If you want to read the story of how someone actually did it: [No Man Knows My History](_URL_7_) by Fawn Brodie Also, since you brought up the guy who kidnapped Elizabeth Smart, if you want to see what makes these guys tick, check out: [Mormon Fundamentalism & Violence: A Historical Analysis](_URL_6_) Also check...	[ "Back then people still needed jobs, now they dont and can practice harder for longer. And science helps by showing then methods on improving motions. You cam find cool videos on youtube" ]
How can light be considered a photon particle when different colored wavelengths travel at different speeds?	[ "Reading through your comments I realize you have fundamentally misunderstood doppler- and/or cosmological redshifting. To simplify, imagine that the speed of light is 1 m/s. Now if a source is sending out light at a constant frequency of 1 Hz, that is one period per second, what will we observe? Well if the source...	[ "Every time a light ray hits a boundary between transparent materials, some of it passes through and some of it reflects back. (You can see through a window, but you can also see your reflection in it.) Both the reflected and transmitted light rays change direction based on the orientation of the surface. So if you...
How do they know how many calories are burned for an activity of exercise?	[ "People will get on treadmills with masks on their faces. Oxygen consumption and Carbon Dioxide levels are measured as they run. Similar things are done for swimming. A little math and science and the calculations are done." ]	[ "They have an investment bank do it for them! But there are a couple of methods they can use: 1) The value today of all future cash flows that the business is expected to generate 2) The value of all of the businesses assets, if you sold them. 3) The market capitalization of their stock" ]
How has South Africa avoided many of the problems the rest of Africa has had?	[ "Just as a heads up OP, this sub has a policy of not discussing topics under 20 years old, and is enforced everywhere outside of the main Mandela sub. While no doubt the history of South Africa leading up to December 1993 is pertinent to your questions and may be helpful, I suspect that most of the information you ...	[ "A smaller population may require the same type (police, fire, etc) services but at a much smaller scale. Mayberry only needed two cops, Atlanta needs thousands. The cost is greatly different. Other infrastructure are scaled accordingly." ]
What causes the bubbles to form on the interior of a newly setup aquarium?	[ "The bubbles were in the water the whole time, just dissolved into it. Once you give everything a chance to settle, warm up, circulate, and interact, the air reconstitutes as a gas on any nucleation sites it can find (usually microscopic cracks or flakes in the glass surface) Basically it's the same reason your b...	[ "The first animal with lungs (speaking of vertebrate lungs here, not invertebrate air-breathing organs), was found in fish. These fish lived in swampy, oxygen poor backwaters in freshwater environments. The lungs let them breathe even when there was little oxygen in the water. They developed as outpockets off the d...
Why do we say "Ow" when we're in pain?	[ "Because we've been conditioned (trained, basically) to say \"Ow\" or \"Ouch when we're hurt by everyone around us since birth doing it. Other cultures and languages have other words to express pain. Seriously, yell \"BUTTERED TOAST\" if you want, there's nothing physically requiring you to say anything." ]	[ "It's a survival instinct. By screaming, you warn others of the danger. A species that develops such instincts will have more individuals survive to make offspring. A species that doesn't gets all of its young eaten because nobody screamed to warn the others." ]
If I buy a brand new computer, what programs must I have to protect myself from cyber security threats?	[ "Microsoft Security Essentials is all you need. Get rid of Norton or anything else that is on there." ]	[ "The best thing you can do is to avoid misuse/ overuse of antibiotics. It is in foods/ meats as well. Most of the time antibacterial soaps are not necessary either. But for more details on the immune system, checkout these 2 Yale videos covering the immune system: 1: _URL_0_ 2: _URL_2_ Also a Yale video on antibiot...
Why is a broken leg a death sentence for a horse?	[ "Horses must be able to have even pressure on all 4 legs. They have very poor circulation in their legs and need their feet to be on the ground to keep the blood flowing properly. When you have poor circulation or none at all, tissue starts to die off. This is why horses must be able to stand on all 4 legs. If they...	[ "Follow-Up question: Were the Great Leap Forward and Four Pests Campaign disastrous?" ]
Why did latin die out?	[ "Please see the [Popular Questions FAQ](_URL_0_) and the /r/Linguistics FAQ [here](_URL_1_) The short answer is that it didn't die out, it evolved into several languages called the Romance languages, such as Spanish, French, Italian, and Romanian." ]	[ "Computers, and computer technology, are not static. As they develop and gain new functionality, the tools used to develop programs for these systems need to develop, too. Occasionally there'll be several options (in this case, programming languages) and one will just develop faster. And occasionally new tools dev...
Could cancer from one person survive in another?	[ "I did not know of any instances of cancers being transmitted between humans.... Until I looked up something for this post, However, I did know of [this](_URL_0_) and [this](_URL_2_), both transmissible cancers in animals called [Parasitic Cancers](_URL_1_), which has a list of instances of cancers that have jump...	[ "When cells divide they make pretty much exact copies of themselves. Introduce radiation to the equation and the copying process goes screwy and the new cell is different. Rinse and repeat over and over and you end up with body cells which are completely different in shape size and function to what they were origin...
How do professional sports teams turn a profit?	[ "You forget money from licensing, clothes, hats, figurines, etc. Plus advertising at the stadium. Sales of the private booths, Revenue from renting out the stadium to other venues, like concerts. And of course revenue from showing the games on TV. Plus I'm sure I'm missing a few other revenue sources for them." ]	[ "The only bad movie for a studio is one that doesn't make money. And all movies that don't come out are a 100% loss. It's actually pretty hard to know that a move will suck until it's finally edited." ]
when people say you are “sucking up the bandwidth”, what does this mean?	[ "think of the internet like a giant pipe from your house. How big the pipe is is the bandwidth. So the more bandwidth you are using the less other people can use." ]	[ "The pedestal of the fan contains a brushless electric motor that takes in air and feeds it into the circular tube. Air flows along the inside of the device until it reaches a slit inside the tube. This provides the basic airflow that creates the breeze you'd feel if you stood in front of the fan. Dyson claims that...
What will scientist and doctors use once we run out of helium?	[ "Hydrogen, Neon, Nitrogen.. They'll figure it out. Also, to the people saying Helium isn't used in medicine and science; Helium is used in GC/MS. Edit: Before anyone comments, I'm linking forensics to medicine. Yes, it's a stretch, but the link is there." ]	[ "We do know how to make it and actually can make better with modern processes. This is one of those yarns about ancient technology being mysterious and better. Total BS." ]
with the inevitability of octocore processors and os utilization of 10's of gigs of ram, why are gpus still nnecessary?	[ "Adam and Jamie (from Mythbusters) did an awesome job demonstrating the difference between CPU's (sequential\\linear) and GPU's (parallel) computation. [NVIDIA: Adam and Jamie explain parallel processing on GPU's](_URL_0_)" ]	[ "Former game dev here, The studio chooses a target hardware spec and builds the game to run on that as the reference minimum. If the game is too slow and they need to optimize, they optimize until it runs adequately on that machine. Everything that is determined to be \"not good enough\" is targeted to be improved ...
Are spiral galaxies shaped by gravity waves from black holes?	[ "No, gravitational waves are far too weak to do this. Galactic spirals are thought to be caused by a coupling of rotation and varying density. If you have a radial density wave, and start to rotate it, spiral arms will form." ]	[ "One way to answer your question is that stars don't collapse into spheres. Stars collapse from a cloud of gas and dust, and while most of that goes into the central spheroid (the star), there's a lot left over which collapses into a disk, and it is from this disk which planets are made. The difference between th...
Could there be any benevolent reason why the involved governments are being so secretive about the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership?	[ "[This thread](_URL_0_) in /r/unitedkingdom makes an attempt at it, with fewer conspiracy theories than in the bigger subs. TL;DR - it's a negotiation. No one involved in a negotiation would ever want the details of the things they're giving way on made public, but in order for any negotiation to work, both sides h...	[ "TTP stands for Twitch Plays Pokemon. There is a stream on _URL_0_ where users can type b, a, left, right, etc to control a game of Pokemon. As you might imagine, thousands of people trying to do this yeilds interesting results." ]
Why is there so much hate/animosity toward Dane Cook?	[ "Because he's terrible. Not just his \"comedy\" or \"performance\". Look at this recent [@GoogleTalk](_URL_0_)" ]	[ "\"Just about everyone here\" Where is \"here\" for you? It sounds like your question's premise is based on a small sample set based on personal observation. Before your question is addressed, you should be making sure the premise is valid..." ]
How is it that my guitar is sometimes sharp after I leave it sitting for a while?	[ "It is due to thermal contraction. When the temperature of the materials cool down, they will contract. Now, theoretically, if all materials in the guitar had the same coefficient of thermal expansion, then all materials would expand or contract at the same rate and would not go out of tune. However, in reality, me...	[ "_URL_0_ Reportedly cows tend to feed more around sundown when the nutritional content of plants is higher. > “A series of USDA studies looked at animals’ ability to choose different forages. The researchers cut hay in the morning and in the evening and used this in the choice tests. They’ve done it with cattle, g...
On a planet with more than 1 sun, what would a rainbow look like?	[ "[XKCD has a blog called \"What if\" that has answered this very question](_URL_0_). I think they did a really good job. To quickly paraphrase the post, if there is more than one sun, you will have more than one rainbow! Depending on how close the suns appear in the sky, the rainbows may overlap!" ]	[ "Human twins aren't always identical twins. There's basically two different kinds of twins: Identical which happens when the fertilized egg splits into two, which then turns into two babies instead instead. Then there's Fraternal twins, which just means there were two lucky sperms instead of one, so there's two fer...
Why or why aren't electrons and protons contained in the solar wind and CMEs sorted to the north and south poles depending on their electric charge?	[ "Keep in mind that the electric field is not the same as the magnetic field. Also, while you can have isolated electric charge, there is no such thing as a magnetic monopole. Even a single electron is a magnetic dipole, so the only bearing the Earth's magnetic field would be it's spin direction as it followed the f...	[ "We could make one crash into the Sun if we really wanted to do that. Basically, if you can send something out of the solar system, you can also crash it into the Sun. But of course it's a bit pointless to send anything into the Sun. Orbiting the Sun at a close distance is considerably harder to do. [Solar Probe Pl...
Can dogs be trained to detect anxiety in humans?	[ "Yes, some dogs can detect cues associated with anxiety and a range or similar issues (panic, fainting, heart issues, etc.). Typically, these are service dogs who are trained with a person for some time under the supervision of a professional dog trainer, and they have learnt over time and familiarity with you to p...	[ "Hey, I made a quick [video](_URL_4_) to answer your video! If you don't want to watch the video here's what I run over: - Sometimes our thoughts wander, leading us to a thought that we may see as sad or depressing! This can be done subconsciously and without us knowing! - Stimuli can affect our mood, for example: ...
When a solid is dissolved in a liquid, is it still a solid, what about individual atoms or molecules in a vacuum?	[ "States of matter only apply to collections of atoms. Single atoms are not solids, liquids or gases. An isolated atom does not have a temperature or pressure, these quantities are only meaningful in the context of multiple atoms. When you dissolve a solid into a liquid, assuming it completely dissolves and doesn't ...	[ "Imagine getting a balloon and filling it with air, and diving down to the very bottom of a deep swimming pool with it. The air in the balloon will be crushed by the water pressure, causing the balloon to shrink dramatically, right? The balloon can't withstand the pressure. Now imagine diving down to the bottom of ...
Why does placing two speakers next to each other result in four times the output?	[ "How are you measuring this? Do you have a decibel meter or are you looking at some other digital meter connected to the speakers? Additionally, do you understand there are several types of \"decibels\" having to do with power, electricity and air pressure?" ]	[ "You open a pizza shop and hire your nephew to take phone orders. For the first few weeks, you only get two or three calls per evening, so you get by with just one phone line and only your nephew assisting you. Then, someone posts a fantastic review of your place on reddit and the business explodes. Now you've got ...
How and why does genetics/DNA decide whether an unborn fetus should be either male or female?	[ "It's determined at fertilization - it depends on which sperm makes it to the egg. Your genetic code is made up of 26 chromosome pairs. The 26th pair is the sex pair. Females have two X chromosomes (XX), a symmetric pair. Males have an asymmetric pair: one X and one Y (XY). When you reproduce, you give one chromoso...	[ "> How does the computer decide what to delete first? Typically the delete command will assume that the sequence does not matter, so it just uses the most easily or quickly available one. Most likely, it will just call a routine to list the contents and delete them in that order, and that routine by default lists t...
Why can't there be coffee-bags (like teabags)?	[ "There are coffee bags, they do exist, just like tea bags. They are actually sold at my local supermarket." ]	[ "It is, you just need hills. China does, it, anywhere that has a lot of hills does it. It just is not usually worth building a hill to put a reservoir on top of. The weight based one doesn't scale properly, and is a lot less safe, also the masses required are enormous, you might as well just build a hill for the re...
Why is vegetable oil so bad for you if it's made of...well, vegetables?	[ "Just because something is made from vegetables doesn't automatically make it healthy. Heroin is made from vegetables." ]	[ "The burger has a lot of heavily subsidized ingredients. It depends heavily on things like corn and soy for the beef feed, which is federally subsidized, besides filler and ingredients for the bun and corn syrup for the ketchup. The salad has no subsidized ingredients." ]
Do animals get periods and what purpose does it have?	[ "Every mammal will in some way or another, not all bleed like humans but they have the same process." ]	[ "Please use the search function. _URL_11_ _URL_12_ _URL_13_ _URL_11_ _URL_12_ _URL_11_ _URL_12_ _URL_13_ _URL_12_ _URL_13_ _URL_13_ TL;DR: Why is a bad question with no good answer. We can't tell entirely with other animals, because we can't directly communicate though anecdotally, many seem to." ]
Would putting NOX through a 1500HP diesel engine change anything?	[ "Why would you put NOx in it? Most of the work today in diesels is to remove NOx from the exhaust, not to figure out how to add more. Are you referring to N2O by chance? Edit: I think below is what you are asking. Disregard the arguing below. NOx is waste and useless, its plumbed back into the EGR to supplement O...	[ "The fundamental problem is that the user has physical control over their own PC and the only information the game manufacturer gets is whatever their PC sends. > Doesn't their code have digital signatures? Sure, and those can always be defeated someone with enough time and perseverance. Let's say the code is runn...
What constitutes voter intimidation, and if voter intimidation is found to have occurred, does that make the election invalid and a new vote necessary?	[ "Voter intimidation is any attempt to interfere with somebody's right to vote. An extreme example of literal intimidation would be people standing around a polling place demanding to know who people will vote for, or trying to obstruct people they suspect won't vote for their candidate. It can also take more subtl...	[ "I think what you experienced was syncope. In medicine, when we say [\"shock\"](_URL_1_) we mean a life-threatening condition, \"circulatory collapse,\" when blood pressure dips too low to maintain an adequate supply of blood to the body's tissues. Symptoms include cold and sweaty skin, weak and rapid pulse, irregu...
why do some sites need both an address and a ZIP	[ "It can...if you entered your address correctly. Both pieces can be used to match each other for verification. You can't verify the address if it's not perfectly entered. And typoing on a zip code is just as common." ]	[ "Could be an issue with the packaging. Depending on the weight of the goods they might have calculated their shipping cost on a bundle to be more since they might have to use a larger box or a different shipping service." ]
Why does good cop/bad cop work, psychologically?	[ "Outside of movies, it doesn't work. The idea is that if I am yelling at you and beating the crap out of you, your will to resist will be stronger. Throw in someone who stops the beatings and abuse and tries to offer you comfort, and you will be so relieved you will tell him anything. Yeah, doesn't even sound like ...	[ "When you tell a child \"don't ever lick cold metal\", you'll often find the kid with his tongue stuck to a metal pole as soon as you turn your back, even though it would never even think to do that if you said nothing. It's called reverse pshychology, and it applies to most people. You could say we just don't like...
Do people who are in no way related, but look alike, have similar DNA?	[ "Actually, most people's DNA is around 99% the same. Most of what DNA does has to do with making sure everything works right on the inside - heart muscle is strong enough, blood cells aren't too big to fit through your veins, liver is where it belongs and not swapped with your kidneys, etc. That said, there are par...	[ "Paternity test is done by collecting cells from the inside of your cheek, not by drawing blood. So no, you couldn't alter the test's outcome." ]
Why is putting your feet up more comfortable than sitting with feet flat on the ground?	[ "< guessing > Blood flow and/or pressure to the legs and feet relieve any build up of lactic acid, eases tension, or muscle cramping" ]	[ "Food takes time to reach the stomach, and you'll notice if you eat and then wait you'll be less hungry. Chewing more simply takes more time to do, and so you get full with less food" ]
Did ancient / classical peoples name their ships?	[ "Yes, they did, with the Argo, traditionally thought in most versions of the story to have been the first sailing ship, being the most famous. More historical names can be found in the Tabulae Curatorum Navalium, a series of inscriptions, mostly from the 4th Century, at Athens which catalogs all the naval equipment...	[ "Sorry, we don't allow [\"trivia seeking\" questions](_URL_0_). These tend to produce threads which are collections of disjointed, partial responses, and not the in-depth discussions about a particular topic we're looking for. If you have a specific question about an historical event, period, or person, please feel...
Why does some body hair like head and facial hair grow until it is cut, where other like armpit, leg, pubic etc. grow to certain length? Also, how does the latter know to grow when it has been cut?	[ "[Here's an old thread on the same question](_URL_0_)" ]	[ "Banana fruits (flesh+shell) grow in clusters. If shells were round, they would have space in between, and pressure points where shells are in contact. To avoid that, shells follow a pentagonal-ish tesselation to better distribute pressure and minimize volume. Outside layers of skin are harder and inner layers are ...
If you stood in an empty room where the walls, the ceiling and the floor were all mirrors, what would it look like and what would you see?	[ "Do you have a light source? If not, nothing. it's going to be pitch black. If you do have a light source it might look something a [little like this.](_URL_0_). reflections of you and your light source for as far as the eye can see, reflections of reflections of reflections. Eventually the light gets absorbed b...	[ "This video created by Vsauce 3 (Jake Roper) does a very good job explaining this: _URL_1_ I hope this answers your question. He also did another video on a simmilar line of - could you survive: _URL_0_" ]
Why is it recommended that you start drinking beverages with the lower alcohol content and then steadily raise it (beer - wine - whiskey), and why is it bad to do the opposite?	[ "Hmm, this is the opposite of what I've always been told. Beer before liquor, never been sicker. Liquor before beer, you're in the clear. IMO you should start with higher alcohol beverages because alcohol takes a while for you to gauge how drunk you are, so if you're taking shots late in the night you might end up ...	[ "When playing Blackjack, there are a set of odds for how much a player can be expected to win based on how the House(the casino) plays and the likelihood of a player getting Blackjack. As the game progresses, more cards are shown, leaving less than a full deck inside. In Blackjack, having a deck full of high cards...
What was Hitlers policy towards Freemasons, and were any masons in his administration?	[ "Hjalmar Schacht was the only freemason in the 1933 Nazi government. The Nazi's associated freemasonry with international conspiracies and denounced it in their propaganda. Freemasonry in Germany was targeted immediately after the Nazi's came to power in 1933 and became illegal in 1935, after most of the lodges had...	[ "Alrighty guys, because apparently maturity and self-control are in short supply tonight, I'll go ahead and make this thread-level post. * Your jokes are not funny. Needless to say, they do not belong here. If your comment has no substance, do not post it. If any further jokes occur here, you will be warned, wi...
What happens when anti-matter and matter collide? Have we ever smashed the two together?	[ "The simplest reaction, taking electrons as an example, is electron+positron- > two photons. The photons have an energy equivalent to the rest mass of the electrons, certainly not enough to level a city or do anything noticeable on a human scale. This is used routinely in cancer diagnosis, by giving people glucose ...	[ "The common image you see of a 2D surface being pushed down because of objects sitting in it is just a visualization, but in general relativity massive objects really do distort space-time in a way analogous to that curved 2D surface. Except it's the 4D space-time geometry that's being curved. As an example, when y...
Why are articles downplaying Ebola when it sounds easier to catch than AIDS?	[ "Ebola has a reproductive number (R0) of about 1.8. That means on average each infected person passes it on to 1.8 other people. So that's actually very poor. Where it (rightfully) grabs headlines is its extremely high mortality rate. For comparison measles has an R0 of about 17 or 18." ]	[ "Your PC can run any program that's on it at any time. But your Android smartphone can only run programs downloaded from the app store unless you change an option deep in settings, and your iPhone can't run programs from unknown sources at all (unless you jailbreak it) And because viruses are computer programs that...
Gas planets and rock planets; do they start off the same?	[ "Most planetary scientists believe that Jupiter began as a rock much like the Earth, that started runaway gas accretion once it reached ~10X the Earth's mass. There are a few dissenters who think Jovian planets collapse out of the protostellar nebula directly, and were never rocky planets. This theory is mostly dis...	[ "\"Stochiometric\" is the ratio of air and fuel. Ideal stochiometric for a gasoline-powered car at sea level is 14.7:1, air:fuel. If you are running rich, there is more fuel in the ratio. The additional fuel can add carbon build-up, which can lead to predetonation issues and other things. If you are running lean,...
If I threw an object in space, how far could it go?	[ "In deep space, there are a few hydrogen atoms per cubic metre. Using this, we achieve the incredibly small density of 5.01x10^-27 kg/m^3 . I'm going to use a velocity of 50 km/h (not unreasonable for a pitch), and the size specifications of a baseball, and a mass of 1 kg. Using the standard drag formula, we get F=...	[ "only if it's structure is perfectly non-[amorphous](_URL_0_) so that it wouldn't start contorting with the inertial effect commonly known as the [centrifugal force](_URL_1_). This would rule out glass and many plastics Also it would have to also be in a perfect vacuum so that air resistance, or friction with the a...
All about Modern Deserts- How did they form? Why are they so prevalent? Should we fear their expansion?	[ "Deserts are a result of weather patterns. When there is no moisture in the air, it seldom rains. Where there are large chunks of land where the prevailing winds are not over oceans, deserts form." ]	[ "Are chapped lips a relatively recent phenomenon? I can't imagine it would bode well for your survival in a temperate or arctic climate to have lips that crack and bleed constantly." ]
What would happen if we light a fire on Uranus?	[ "> Me and a friend were wondering because the planet is almost made entirely out of flammable gasses and fluids, but it has next to no oxygen to keep the fire going. This is correct. There is no matter which the hydrogen, helium or methane can react with through redox, so there would be no fire, no explosion, or an...	[ "Would depend on what the weather is like and how big the methane lakes are. Not sure but interesting question." ]
What are those camera looking things at every construction site?	[ "That looks like a laser level… you might mean a Theodolite.._URL_0_" ]	[ "_URL_0_ The short version is they were recorded during a sting operation in which police were informed of the show's activities. You have no expectation of privacy during the commission of a crime in most jurisdictions. Local law varies, though." ]
How do trains/airlines/etc decide the age to stop letting children on for free? Wouldn't you be able to lie about their age?	[ "> How do trains/airlines/etc decide the age to stop letting children on for free? It is a marketing decision where the marketing department guesses what ages would be enough incentive to gather business they might otherwise lose to competitors. > Wouldn't you be able to lie about their age? Maybe. It isn't a big ...	[ "> \"Traditional\" estimates based on slow, reptilian growth rates, combined with the enormous size of dinosaurs, led scientists to conclude it could be up to several hundred years. [Source](_URL_1_) [Source 2](_URL_0_) So, traditionally, age estimation was based on modern-day analogues of dinosaurs. However, \"gro...
Can groups of animals that can't produce fertile offspring with each other still be the same species?	[ "The concept of species is artificial (how we humans classify organisms, nature doesn't care about classifications), and there are many definitions. The thing you're talking about is close to the [ring species](_URL_2_)." ]	[ "ecologists use a [species area curve](_URL_0_) to estimate numbers so species. It works somewhat like this, you sample an area for number of tree species. As you sample more plots you pick up more species, but with every sample the number of new species found becomes fewer. this would continue until you sampled th...
How can we simulate events in super computers (such as plasma behaviour) if we do not already know how they work in reality?	[ "We have to apply whatever mathematical models and theories that we do know or have sufficient evidence to believe to be true. We do have at least some knowledge about plasma's behavior (we can make if after all) and the rest has to do with extrapolating from our current understanding of physics. We just try our be...	[ "I initially was extremely sceptical, as the thread question is both wide-ranging and oddly specific. However, reading your explanatory post I got a much better idea of what it was you are looking for. You raise several valid points and I think the questions you are asking are interesting ones. But you mostly answe...
How smoke detectors work.	[ "The most common use a radioactive element called americium-241 which gives off alpha particles. These particles pass across a chamber constantly. When smoke is present, the alpha particles are neutralized by the smoke. When this happens, the detector knows there is smoke present because it is no longer receiving p...	[ "Your phone/laptop has a small internal battery that's used to regulate some circuits including the one used for the clock. Edit: You're not a phone. Oops." ]
How come there is formation of two molecular orbitals when there is single interference of atomic orbitals in Molecular Orbital Theory?	[ "If I'm understanding your question correctly, it's because when you bring two orbitals on separate atoms close together, they mix because the symmetry of the total system is no longer that of a single atom. Every orbital (in molecular orbital theory, at least) will have a symmetry that depends on the symmetry of t...	[ "Microbio is like...cell to cell interactions. It's on the level of cell organelles in humans, cells interacting with each other in small colonies, that kinda thing. It's usually interested in viruses, bacteria, etc. Molecular bio is like protein/molecular interaction level. It's closer to biochemistry in that you'...
Why would people sell high value collectables to a place like on Pawn Stars rather than on ebay or an auction?	[ "Pawn Stars is faked from top to bottom." ]	[ "With any hobby, you want to start small. Start with a basic unit and learn how to use it. You will learn a bunch of things. One of them might be that you are not really that into using a telescope. If so, then you didn't waste $400 on a clothes drying rack. If not, you will learn about what you really hate about u...
How large of a population (roughly) did the largest Native American (of any tribe) city at its peak?	[ "Teotihuacan is estimated to have 125,000 to 200,000+ people at its height. It is also the largest city in pre-Columbian America with a central core area of 26 square kilometers with a total area of 53 square kilometers. Millon, René 1960 The Beginnings of Teotihuacan. American Antiquity. 26(1): 1-10. 1964 Teotihua...	[ "A woman named Frances Wright did something like what you are asking in 1824. In Memphis, TN she bought two thousand acres of land from Andrew Jackson and would buy slaves. On this land she set up a co-operative labor system where they could basically work off their price of purchase and then they would be set free...
how does soap and other cleaning products actually make things clean?	[ "My Freshman Biology teacher explained it like this. The soap grabs onto whatever's on your hands. Dirt, bacteria, whatever. And it's with the soap right? Then you rinse the soap down the drain with water. And down goes the dirt." ]	[ "Pictures on TV screens and computer screens are made from a whole bunch of teeny-tiny dots of lots of different colours. More dots, all jammed really, really close together, means the picture looks better. 'Cause the dots are less noticeable. And there's way more details. That's hi-def. More dots." ]
Why is the dutch movie "The Vanishing" considered to be so scary?	[ "To each his own, but the movie is a story that could happen in real life., and that gets to people. There are no monsters or Jasons; just a sociopath. And the reveal of what the \"golden eggs\" meant was a nice touch." ]	[ "I think the responses you've got so far indicate that it isn't very reliable. The whole thing is based on a sample. A sample of people are given set top boxes that monitor what they are watching. This sample is then scaled up to the whole population with weighting bias added in so that they can account for the 'av...
How do metal detectors work? And do they detect ALL metals or just the ones that are used more frequently?	[ "Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: how do metal detectors work? ](_URL_2_) 1. [ELI5: How do metal detectors work? ](_URL_1_) 1. [ELI5 how do metal detectors work? ](_URL_3_) 1. [ELI5: How does a metal detector work? ](_URL_5_) 1. [ELI5: How do metal detectors work? ](_URL_7_) 1. ...	[ "Likely based on maps of coverage area, overlaid with maps of where people live. The accuracy of either type of map isn't perfect (if coverage is blocked by a very specific hill in an otherwise-covered area, for example). But it's feasible to cover basically all of a big city, and these small urban areas contain ...
How are games optimised?	[ "the same thing can often be achieved with different methods. if you know what you're doing, you can rewrite code so it completes faster and hogs less resources. you can split up tasks so several steps can be completed at the same time and dont have everything run on one core. you can also improve how it interacts ...	[ "Indexing. Google basically keeps a list of keywords and the websites they appear in. When you search something it just needs to access this list. You can also enable indexing in your computer, either through the windows settings (just google \"windows indexing\") or using a program like [everything search engine](...
What makes soap (bar or liquid) a disinfecting agent? Is there a difference in efficacy?	[ "The basic premise of your question is false. Soap in general is not a disinfecting agent. Soap causes oils to become able to be washed away with water and so is helpful for cleaning, but it does not disinfect." ]	[ "Normal weapons are localized. A machine gun can only fire in one direction, an artillery shell can only hit one spot, and even bombs have a smallish blast radius. You can avoid hitting things that you don't want to hit, and if you're not the USA people can call you out for hitting things you shouldn't. Chemical we...
Why are Anarchists usually considered lunatics or teenagers?	[ "Too radical for current and perhaps all times. Radical in the basic sense: anarchists question social structure in its most fundamental form. Anarchists did create shifts in political landscape, but their ideals of society without state and totally decentralized political power require a society able to take that ...	[ "The federal government still owns a good portion of the land in the Western United States. [Here's a map.](_URL_0_) It's still a big area of contention for many people. Some of this land is protected (like the wildlife preserve in Oregon where the standoff is taking place) and much of it isn't available for use. T...
What exactly IS radiation?	[ "When you ask about radiation, you're probably asking about what's known as \"ionizing radiation\". This is the kind of radiation that's very harmful to life. There are three basic types of ionizing radiation, alpha, beta, and gamma. In very simple terms, alpha and beta rays are just pieces of atoms spewing out. W...	[ "Your oven heats your food by fanning hot air from an element across it. Your microwave heats food by vibrating its water molecules. The food in your microwave will radiate a small amount of heat into the air in the microwave, but this has not been enough for you to feel. The microwave walls contain no water molecu...
Why do our sinuses get cleared when we're scared or startled?	[ "Adrenalin causes your sinus passages to open larger to prepare you for the \"fight or flighr\" response allowing you to breathe in more air." ]	[ "Carbon dioxide (CO2) and water (H2O) together undergo a chemical reaction to form a very weak acid called carbonic acid (H2CO3). So, after drinking some soda, the CO2 that is released reacts with the water inside your mouth, throat, and belly. The resulting carbonic acid, some of which is aerosolized, can than be ...
If a portion of the atmosphere of a gas giant (Jupiter, Uranus, etc.) combusted, how much of the atmosphere would follow?	[ "Combustion requires oxygen. And while Jupiter's upper atmosphere is 90% hydrogen and 10% helium with traces of other things there is almost zero oxygen so you can't have combustion. So you can't ignite it. And it's too small for fusion to start even if you hit if with hydrogen bombs. But you can make a bang thoug...	[ "The oxygen isn't infinite, through chemistry the astronauts are able to reuse the same oxygen over and over again. This is done through the following cycle: 1. Astronaut inhales oxygen and exhales both CO2 and water vapor 2. CO2 is captured and \"scrubbed\" by carbon dioxide scrubbers which use chemical reactions ...
Why is it that problems regarding Natives are talked about much more in Canada than in the U.S?	[ "The native population of Canada is about 5%, whereas the native population of the United States is around 2%. Additionally, since Canada has a total population of about 36 million in comparison to 330 million in the US, native people in Canada have a lot more visibility. This visibility also manifests in policy." ...	[ "\"Just about everyone here\" Where is \"here\" for you? It sounds like your question's premise is based on a small sample set based on personal observation. Before your question is addressed, you should be making sure the premise is valid..." ]
Why has socialism worked in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark but not in China or the Soviet Union or other socialist states?	[ "Social democracy != Socialism _URL_0_ \"Sometimes mistaken by Americans as socialist, while simultaneously being criticized by Scandinavians as overly capitalistic, the Nordic model could best be described as a type of middle ground. It is neither fully capitalistic or socialistic, and attempts to merge the most d...	[ "Governments give tax breaks and subsidies to corporations to lure them in to their area. The idea is that bringing that business to the area will, ultimately, bring more business and jobs to the area which, theoretically, will bring jobs to the locals and more tax revenue for the government. Again, theoretically, ...
Why when i'm watching t.v. does conversation sound so quiet but everything out sounds loud?	[ "If you are using standard television speakers and the movie is in stereo (like 5.1), some systems or players treat those speakers like midrange. The voices come out of the center channels/speakers on a 5 speaker system, so those being absent, it's much quieter. Imagine listening to a CD with only a subwoofer. My ...	[ "My guess would be that the incremental change of each device is programmed differently, so one increases volume by 0.1 while the other increases volume by 0.2. Also one device could have a higher max volume than the other so the rate at which the volume increases would naturally be higher." ]
How is the HTTPS handshake kept secret?	[ "With the algorithms we use, there are two different numbers involved: one number is used to encrypt, and a different number is used to decrypt. It's nearly impossible to find the decryption number given the encryption number. One computer generates both numbers and sends the encryption number to the other computer...	[ "Plenty of people have actually done this research: the implementation know as Tor is open-source, it's plain to see what code is used for each Tor node and each Tor client." ]
How does wind actually work	[ "Basically, air is moving so it displaces other air in a sequence. Like a ball hitting a ball, opposite and opposite reaction to movement" ]	[ "If you mean like the Dyson fanless fans, they have one big fan hidden in the base, that sucks in air from the holes, then pushes it all out of the 'fanless' section via a slot that runs along the edge" ]
If dinosaurs, and presumably many other plant and animal species, were made extinct by the Yucatán Peninsula meteor impact, shouldn't there be a thick layer of fossil records capturing that exact moment and the next few days and months - almost like a Pompei after Mt Vesuvius erupted?	[ "Mass extinctions are processes, not necessarily singular events. Not only did a lot of non-avian dinosaurs die after the impact, but new groups stopped appearing. Every species goes extinct eventually, but new species still evolve. When new groups stop emerging, then extinction overruns origination. This happens o...	[ "Like many things in history, this is the subject of interpretation. Many dynasties in history have had a similar destiny, being puppets and legitimizers of true rulers. However, the Abbasids didn't give up so easily. Caliph an-Nāṣir made a final attempt to restore the Caliphate to its original power: the Ayyubids ...
I just read that Russia Attacked a Ukrainian Air Base, How are they able to do that without starting a war?	[ "Someone has to shoot back in order to start a war. No one's shooting back -- either out of inability to do anything meaningful (Ukraine) or the desire to not start WW3 (UN and NATO)." ]	[ "Hi, I've approved the post, but just a note to you and potential respondents: this subreddit has a 20-year rule against discussing current events, so any answers will have to cut off at 1997. If you're looking for answers that can include 1998-2012, do consider x-posting elsewhere, eg. a foreign affairs sub like /...
- How can bugs such as ants, spiders, flies, etc... crawl on a wall/ceiling without falling to the ground? How does the gravity work for them there?	[ "Think of it like static electricity pulling hair to a balloon. There's an additional force involved other than a mechanical grip from hooks on their feet. Size helps too. The smaller the bug the easier it is for them to \"stick\" and grip." ]	[ "I've always been fascinated by the wide variety of \"Fall of Rome\" arguments and how they're affected by historical perspective. I was wondering: **Does your historical specialty advocate a certain theory for the fall of the Roman Empire? or what's a unique argument for the fall of the Roman Empire that you've co...
The theory of second best	[ "\"X is the best solution!\" \"I agree, but we can't do X.\" \"Damn, let's do Y then.\" \"But that's an entirely different thing from X!\" \"Yes, but if we do Y, this and this happens and the end result is going to be very close to X.\" \"That's counter-intuitive but the science backs it. Y it is!\"" ]	[ "If five male ducks all have sex with one female, her being able to reject the sperm of the weaker 4 and only allow the strongest one to give her offspring gives her children a better chance at reproducing themselves." ]
The frontier in the American Civil War.	[ "Alvin Josephy's The Civil War in the American West (1991) is a place to start. It's mostly an extension of the war itself and getting a little old, but you may find some useful analysis there." ]	[ "OP, you need to clarify: are you white, black, Native, or some class of immigrant? Rich or poor? Are you (presumably) free or are you a slave? How old are you? There are a lot of variables to \"a man,\" and most males wouldn't have fought at all." ]
- what is in belly button lint?	[ "Mostly fiber from your clothes. The color of the lint will resemble what's been worn. In addition to that, it's my theory that men's body hair makes the fibers make their way to the belly button because they are mostly facing that way. I'm a woman, and I've never had belly button lint, nor have I heard of another ...	[ "I remember a post on r/wtf where a guy used skin from his foreskin to put on a burn on his finger or something when he was a child. Lo and behold, when he reached puberty the finger grew pubes. That answer your question? Edit:clarification" ]
How did house staff wake up at the right time to do their jobs before clocks were common?	[ "Servants whose shift was ending awoke those just about to go on duty." ]	[ "It depends on how much money they had. In a one way migration from town to town, If they were poor or even middle class they had it on them in a physical way, either in cash, coinage, or mostly they bought supplies with it (wagon, oxen, rifles, etc) before they left. Later migrations they might have a check or a b...
How isn't state legalization of Marijuana unconstitutional?	[ "It probably is, but if the AG doesn't persue it, then the states can continue. However, at any point the feds could swoop in and arrest everyone involved, if they were so inclined." ]	[ "The word is that the Denver Colorado dispensary was funded by money received from Mexican drug cartels. The DEA got word through an informant and shut it down. Tldr: local$$= ok Cartel $$= fed jail" ]
Why are phone charging cables only 10ft at their longest? Why are they not longer like extension cords?	[ "Often, the resistance of the cable becomes a more notable issue. Due to the low voltage used by USB (5v as opposed to 110v), the portion of the energy supplied that is lost to cable resistence is greater)." ]	[ "The rules \"Any Playing Field constructed by a professional club after June 1, 1958, shall provide a minimum distance of 325 feet from home base to the nearest fence, stand or other obstruction on the right and left field foul lines, and a minimum distance of 400 feet to the center field fence.\" (Rule 2.01) Team...
How much truth is there in the claim that the average Tibetan lived miserably and in servitude before 1951?	[ "Follow-up/corollary: how does this compare with the life of the average person in the rest of China in the first half of the 20th century?" ]	[ "hi! in addition to /u/Jack_of_all_offs' link, here are a few more related discussions you may find of interest * [To what extent was the Tiananmen Square movement actually motivated by democracy?](_URL_1_) * [I've just read that there was no massacre of students in Tiananmen Square on June 4th 1989. What's the dea...
Why do people flock to buy bottled water before hurricanes? If the plumbing is still working, why not fill a bunch of containers with tap water?	[ "That's a good idea, and it definitely works, but a lot of people don't have the space to keep a ton of empty containers around waiting to be filled with tap water and find it more convenient just to buy bottled water when needed. You can always fill up the bathtub - not great for drinking out of, but if you need t...	[ "Let's say you have a 7 lane interstate. At each end there is a toll booth. In the past payments were processed manually and there was a receipt that had to print, but the printers were slow. Only do much traffic could get through. Fast forward to the future where you pay with the touch of a button and get an insta...
Why does a rat learn quickly from negative stimulus yet my two year old keeps getting her fingers stuck in our AC vents?	[ "Your rat's brain is more developed at this point. Humans have huge brains that need a lot of time to develop, and due to our narrow birth canals, we also have to be born fairly underdeveloped compared to other animals. Your two year old's brain is not yet in a stage where it can make the sort of long term connecti...	[ "The general consensus is [attention and approval seeking](_URL_4_) or [medical issues](_URL_1_). In [domesticated animals](_URL_2_), the approval seeking is generally from the owner. Because we see this in wild animals as well, it can't just be a human-approval mechanism. The attention seeking can be extended to t...
How does the effect of sunlight on human skin differ if the exposure is broken up? (Ex: 30 minutes of continuous exposure vs. sixty 30s intervals separated by five minutes?)	[ "> Also, it is necessary to know that sunburn is a long term effect and that it does not immediately surface on the skin. So the belief that if the skin feels cool immediately after a dip in the sea, it will not sunburn is again a false belief. This is a false belief considering the fact that sunburn is a continuin...	[ "The ISS goes by UTC/GMT. They orbit the earth about every 90 minutes, so in one 24 hour day they will experience around 16 sunrises and sunsets." ]
Why does a cottonbud feel so good inside an ear whereas any other object would give discomfort?	[ "The Vagus nerve may be stimulated through the ear and produce pleasurable sensations throughout the body as the nerve runs from the brain to the butt. I would imagine the soft nature of a cotton swab enhances said effects." ]	[ "It is surprisingly simple. The plug has two contacts. You can see the black plastic/rubber barrier between the front end of the plug and the back (sometimes there are 3 parts, then there is a mic, too). Those connect to two cords in your headphone wires, one positive one negative. There are little magnets in your ...
How machine guns on old panes were shooting through propeller without damaging it?	[ "There was a little notch on the drive-shaft of the propeller that lined up with the blades and was connected to a shut-off for the guns and disconnected the gun's trigger from the firing mechanism while it was engaged; [here is a diagram](_URL_0_) of one such mechanism; the overall mechanism is called a Synchroniz...	[ "If you're new to the thread, please don't post the Mythbusters episode again. Mythbusters is entertaining but it's not history (or more specifically, it's not historical proof of anything.) The short answer is no, not that we know of. /u/davidaop, our pirate expert, and I have both answered [questions about th...
What happens if a tree grows to maturity, then has every last one of its leaves removed?	[ "I can't speak for every type of tree, nor what would happen after repeated leaf removal. But you might find it interesting to know that in the Australian outback, some trees, (primarily of the Eucalyptus variety) have special buds, called [Epicormic Buds](_URL_1_), these are buried within the tree's bark, and even...	[ "Imagine your hard drive as a giant wall, like the Great Wall of China. Now imagine that your files are painted on this wall (Images, text, music notes). When you delete a file, your computer finds the spot on the wall where that file was painted, and marks that section of the wall as \"free\". It doesn't scrub o...
Why does Russia have a small plot of land by the Baltic Sea?	[ "The area you are referring to is the Kaliningrad Oblast. This territory was part of the area historically known as East Prussia, which was part of the German Empire and later Nazi Germany. Near the end of the Second World War, East Prussia was occupied by the Soviet Union. After the war East Prussia was stripped f...	[ "Hi, I've approved the post, but just a note to you and potential respondents: this subreddit has a 20-year rule against discussing current events, so any answers will have to cut off at 1997. If you're looking for answers that can include 1998-2012, do consider x-posting elsewhere, eg. a foreign affairs sub like /...
Can thunderstorms affect a wireless signal?	[ "Wifi and cellular systems use microwave radiation (like your microwave oven, except far far less power). Microwave radiation rips absorbed quite readily by polar molecules like water and fats. (this is how microwave ovens cook food, imparting the energy of microwave radiation into kinetic energy of water and fat m...	[ "If it's metal it would act as a Faraday cage. _URL_0_ _URL_1_" ]
How were the bodies of deceased soldiers in d day and world war 2 handled?	[ "There is actually a [section](_URL_0_) in our FAQ on this." ]	[ "I’ve read the term “waste” is used a lot in the 1086~ Domesday Book records for Yorkshire. Would this indicate wide-scale destruction to the extent that it would take a generation to recover? Contrary to that there are still villages like Normanton which are described down to the tenants-in-Chief and the number of...
Do animals such as a cat have a way to tell the opposite sex apart, or do they just look to see if it has a wiener or not?	[ "Female cats, when in heat, will spray. Which is urinating with hormones in it to say \"Line up boys, the pussy's ready\" And even then, you will see females going at each other and males going at each other if they can't find the opposite sex, or if they get confused (cat orgies)." ]	[ "How do you mean? Manufacturers give MAC addresses out to hardware they make, and unless told otherwise somehow the hardware identifies itself as such for the purposes of moving data over physical wires or through wireless signals between two devices. It's how you know a machine is one machine and not another. Do y...
How canPeople Live in Hiroshima and Nagasaki Now, But Not Chernobyl type places?	[ "The atomic bombs dropped on Japan were air bursts. This limits things such as fallout. The other reason was that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima had about 60kg of uranium while the bomb dropped on Nagasaki had about 6kg of plutonium. Chernobyl on the other hand had thousands of kg of radioactive material much of it ...	[ "It's due to the size of cities. They can go through download areas, but you have to realize that downtown areas are very very small in comparison to the size of tornado alley. [List of downtown tornadoes](_URL_0_)" ]
What is the biological basis of anhedonia / depression?	[ "I don't know very much about anhedonia, but since no one has answered yet maybe the little I know may be of interest. Some people in my lab look at anhedonia in the context of genetics, and I know there are studies that have identified potential candidate genes for traits such as anhedonia. It's of course hard to ...	[ "Can someone explain the difference between Dementia and Alzheimer's, please?" ]
If you one day woke up in the middle ages how would your knowledge of science help you survive?	[ "Wash your hands. Do whatever is necessary to have other people wash their hands. Move the midden heaps AWAY from the kitchens. Find someone with Cowpox and infect yourself IMMEDIATELY." ]	[ "The same way they do now: using satellite and microwave transmissions. Using the internet is kind of sketchy, because of a lack of control of the bandwidth that can cause the connection quality to drop, which is why other technologies are preferred when feasible." ]
I have a long physically demanding day today. Is there any advantage to sleeping 10-12 hours tonight instead of the recommended 7-8?	[ "Yes, because the recommended 7-8 hours is just a statistical average. You should sleep as much as your body demands." ]	[ "Two social psychological concepts come to mind here. State dependent memory encoding and Erickson Arousal theory of learning. State dependent learning states that what ever state of mind you are in during encoding is the state of mind where recall would be optimal. Erickson arousal theory states that learning is m...
why does music, more specifically an album, grow on you after a few listens?	[ "My first thought is that the brain likes to know what's coming. It literally makes us happier when there's a balance between what we expect and something unexpected. So when it starts getting familiar, we become more comfortable with it and we start to feel better about it." ]	[ "Have you ever walked into a room that had an odd smell, but three minutes later you couldn't really tell that the smell was there? Have you ever suddenly realized how hungry you are when someone passes by with a tasty looking snack? Have you ever had to pee, but you were busy doing something so it didn't really se...

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