Subset (10)

eli5 · 25k rows

Split (1)

train · 25k rows

query stringlengths 20 300	positive listlengths 1 1	negative listlengths 1 1
When and why did Nestorian Christianity stop being practised by the Mongolians?	[ "Follow-up question, if allowed: how widespread was Nestorianism in Asia at its peak?" ]	[ "Could you perhaps present us with your original source so we can see what the author writes about it? I think I know the answer, but I would like to know what exactly the author wrote. Also, could you remove the bonus question? We do not allow discussions of events after 1993." ]
What happened to Malasia flight MH370?	[ "Nobody knows but [this](_URL_0_) is an interesting theory. I figure the plane is either here (or somewhere else but similar story) or it's at the bottom of the ocean." ]	[ "[A similar question](_URL_0_) came up a few months ago, if you find the replies helpful. See the bit about Malays \"running amok.\"" ]
What ancient language is this and what does it translate to?	[ "If /u/Cenodoxus is right (and I'm willing to bet there are more people around who can read cuneiform than that!) you're in luck that Reddit is a den of geeks! As he points out, the script is cuneiform - specifically, it looks to be ~~Neo-Assyrian or Neo-Babylonian cuneiform (but more probably the former)~~ Old Bab...	[ "In general, [Wikipedia has a good list of different countries' copyright term lengths](_URL_0_). The longest term is 99 years after the author's death, offered in the Ivory Coast. (Mexico offers 100 years after the author's death, but only for works published after 2003.) However, Great Britain has made several ex...
What's the furthest I could travel in time and still communicate in English relatively easily?	[ "Hi, not discouraging other replies, but while you're waiting, you might want to check out a couple of earlier answers: * /u/bayoris walks us backwards through time in [How far back in time could you go, before modern English becomes unintelligible to inhabitants of the British Isles?](_URL_0_) * /u/cdesmoulins giv...	[ "I gona mention 2 potentially viable arguments but that are quite a few 1: It takes technology to make technology. Its like an exponential growth that has taken a long time to build up. A modern example would be for our modern computers to work we had to figure out analog transistors and before that we had have to...
Why is rain sometimes instantly heavy? What causes the tipping point?	[ "A lot of it has to do with water tension. If you've ever filled a cup to the brim, you could see it takes only one small drop of water to have the top overflow down the sides. This is the same with the clouds and heavy downpours. Sometimes, a cloud just holds too much water, and one drop causes it all to fall" ]	[ "This doesn't change between babies and adults. It's actually the exact same. What changes is they way we take our drinks as we get older. As babies we are drinking from a nipple (either an actual nipple of a simulated one on baby bottles). A baby has to suck to get liquid out of it. If you tilt a baby bottle, ver...
How do aquatic mammals eat food without flooding their stomach with salt water?	[ "They intake the food, and then blow outwards, spitting the water out of their mouth while keeping the food trapped inside (Humans can do this too. Put something in your mouth, for instance a small bit of carrot, then pour in some water. You can spit the water out through your teeth) The food is then swallowed whol...	[ "The same way that you and I do at home. Do not use too much toothpaste, and spit if you start to build up too much drool or foam." ]
Why can't you prevent injury in a falling elevator by jumping at the last second?	[ "Let's say that you and the elevator are moving downward at a velocity of about 100 meters/second just before impact. You jump upwards at about 10 m/s. This means that your final velocity at impact is 90 m/s downwards. If that won't hurt you, and the falling pieces of the elevator coming down on your head at 100...	[ "You normally think of a house as just a place to live. You buy it if you want a place to live, and then you have a place to live. Woohoo. The thing is, housing prices were increasing, and everyone expected them to continue increasing. So a house was also a good investment. If you bought one, it would be worth mo...
Why do some plugs have a wider and thinner prong, requiring you too insert the plug into the wall outlet in a specific way, and some plugs can be insert either way?	[ "It is a safety measure. The narrow blade connects to the hot side, while the wider blade connects to the neutral side. The neutral wire in the outlet is very close to being the same voltage as ground, so if you accidentally touch the neutral wire, chances are nothing will happen. Inside the appliance, the neut...	[ "This doesn't change between babies and adults. It's actually the exact same. What changes is they way we take our drinks as we get older. As babies we are drinking from a nipple (either an actual nipple of a simulated one on baby bottles). A baby has to suck to get liquid out of it. If you tilt a baby bottle, ver...
The difference between a hotel, motel, inn, lodge, etc.	[ "That is a tough one. There is a lot of overlap between the different lodging classes. The most distinct is the Hostel, which is shared rooms, almost like a barracks. Then you have your B & B, which is like renting a bedroom in someone's home, but usually still a professional setting. Lodges are usually going to be...	[ "hi! there's always room for more contributions, but FYI there's a related section in the FAQ* - check it out for previous discussions [Weeks, weekdays, and weekends](_URL_0_) *see the link on the sidebar or the wiki tab" ]
Would it be more efficient to send rockets into space from Earth's axis?	[ "No. The atmosphere is slightly thinner at the poles, but the bigger factor is that launching near the equator gives the vehicle additional velocity. Launch vehicles turn east shortly after takeoff. At the equator, this would give roughly 1,040 mph (465 m/s), which is about 4% of escape velocity. Atmospheric drag a...	[ "Get a protractor, tape or glue a straw to the straight edge, and tie a weighed down string to the middle. When you get on the plane, look down the straw at a star that you can easily pick out from the night sky (hope you're travelling at night!) and is viewable from both hemispheres, and mark where the string hang...
How come a lot of recycling bins say 'no plastic bags' on them, but are lined with plastic bags?	[ "Yes, the lining bags are sorted out and either reused, discarded, or recycled separately -- all of which are a pain for the company that is actually trying to collect metal, glass, or heavier plastics." ]	[ "In the UK, TV broadcasting first started with the BBC, which is funded by a television licence. As such the BBC required no advertising to pay its way. Commercial broadcasting came along later, and with it came worries about the power and persuasive influence of TV advertising. Because of this laws, regulations an...
What's the difference between the different schools of kung fu?	[ "Yes it is accurate to say there are different schools. In terms of the differences, it can be as small as different techniques for common actions to entirely different movement types and philosophies. Westerners like to think of kung fu as one type of martial art with multiple variations, but that isn't really acc...	[ "Depends on the country. Some countries have laws in place that ensure equal service for all providers using the same network, i.e. the network owner aren't allowed to diminish the service in any way for providers who \"rent\" their network. As for your particular example, they're both owned by the same corporation...
how was the British empire the largest empire in history at one point, how did such a small country gain so much control ?	[ "Ahoy, fellow redditor. Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: How did the British empire get so big and powerful ? ](_URL_1_) ^(_4 comments_) 1. [ELI5: The British Empire ](_URL_3_) ^(_4 comments_) 1. [ELI5: What allowed the British Empire to become what it became? ](_URL_2_) ^(_2 co...	[ "Congrats! You've asked what may be the single most-asked question on /r/AskHistorians. That's good news, because it means we have [a big FAQ file devoted to your question](_URL_1_). Check it out, and I hope it helps! Edit: And [here](_URL_0_) is a great answer from /u/talondearg, who answers it quite a bit." ]
Monte Carlo simulations.	[ "Suppose you are sharing a room with your brother. The left side is yours, the right side is his. You draw a line on the floor to mark them, but you think it should be moved more to the right and so you start quarreling. You do not have a measuring tape (and besides, since the room is not a rectangle it's hard to m...	[ "Downforce settings, camber settings, fuel levels, etc. The cars are supposed to be carbon copies of each-other prior to the engineers \"tweaking\" several settings, giving the driver a different feel on the track." ]
Are we digesting part of the gut flora together with the food?	[ "Good question. What proportion of the feces is living bacteria? The 60% figure given here suggests free feces is the way these bacteria 'seed' the environment? Like any ecosystem, there is a death/birth cycle and feeding/absorption dynamic? Thanks." ]	[ "Oddly enough this is something a professor at my university is actually working on. He is trying to develop bacteria which consume explosive compounds and has funding from the department of defense. The idea is completely sound and possible. However when he described his research to me, it was more to destroy expl...
How exactly do mirrors work?	[ "[Feynman Discussing Mirrors](_URL_0_) Not exactly about your questions, but along the same lines, and still quite interesting. His other videos from the same interview are also very entertaining." ]	[ "They don't. They have really really good camera's that can take a picture from really far away." ]
Why do some countries have different power plugs?	[ "Different regions used different voltages. They created their own infrastructure when electricity began to spread, there was no specific way of doing things as it was a new thing. Different plugs go into different voltages because it would be damaging or even dangerous if not. Why don't we all just use the same vo...	[ "This is a very common question. You can use search to find [all the other really good answers](_URL_0_ ). This is instant, and faster than ust typing in your question every time. It's a way of cheating elections. Read the others, and then ask a more specific question." ]
What are some of the things that need to happen in order for us to travel in space like Star Wars or Halo?	[ "In order to get people there, a few things need to happen. We must either A- Be able to freeze and melt people for long journeys or B- Be abe to get there really really fast. (The Alcubierre Drive mentioned by Teotwawki69 for example) In either case we must find a relatively light way to shield from cosmic radiat...	[ "Thrusters don't work by thrusting \"against\" anything. They work based on the conservation of momentum. When you throw something in one direction, what remains has to move in the opposite direction for the momentum of the entire system to remain the same. Imagine standing on a skating rink wearing ice skates and ...
What is it about being suddenly woken that often prevents you from clearly remembering the next few moments?	[ "Firstly: does this actually happen? I don't think it does in my subjective experience. If it does happen to many, I would speculate that it's related to the complexity that is human consciousness. We have 'awake' and 'asleep' but within and between those there can be many differences in what the brain is doing a...	[ "Sounds a bit like an [Amygdala Hijack](_URL_0_). In the case of an Amygdala Hijack, what happens is that the brain sends sensory input to both the Amygdala and the Neocortex. The Neocortex is the thinking part of our brain, and the Amygdala handles a bunch of emotional things. Now the Amygdala will check if it's i...
How can all planets in Solar system perfectly orbit around the Sun even though their distances from the Sun differ?	[ "> But, why doesn't Mercury just crash into the sun and why doesn't Pluto just \"escape\" the Solar systems with it being so far away? Because the planets are all moving sideways, which causes them to fall toward the sun, but always miss. That's really all an orbit is. It's actually quite difficult to get an object...	[ "Satellites are on a set orbit. The scientists put the satellite into that orbit to begin with, so they know when and where in space the satellite is going to be. When they launch a new satellite, they just calculate the appropriate trajectory and launch time to get the new satellite into space without hitting the ...
Why can't people exercise their Freedom of Speech in a court of law without the judge putting them into contempt of court?	[ "Because the government is entitled to put reasonable time, place and manner restrictions on speech. The function of courts is highly regulated, with certain people able to speak at certain times, and often only to certain issues or facts, to ensure that the rules are followed. Failure to follow the judge's instruc...	[ "Usually when we type, we are using our working memory to hold the info we want to type. Our working memory only has so much space in it that if something new pops up it pushes back the old info and takes front seat; attention also affects this. Think of it like a bus. What you're trying to type is in the drivers ...
What happens when DC current is applied to an AC induction motor?	[ "If you have a big DC source supplying the power that can supply enough power then your AC motor will suffer a \"thermal event\" Without the changing of the AC signal then the motor won't spin, if the motor isn't spinning then it doesn't push back on the current by creating \"Back EMF\", and without it spinning the...	[ "This is why the running a microwave empty is dangerous. That energy has to go somewhere, and it ends up in the magnetron and can damage it." ]
If we colonized a new planet, what is the minimum number of men and women we'd need to avoid eventual problems with inbreeding?	[ "Asked recently on /r/askscience here: [How many people would you need to self-sufficiently populate a planet without inbreeding being a problem?](_URL_0_) Pitciarn islands makes a nice case study in humans. Pitcairn Islands were [settled by 6 men and 11 women](_URL_2_); and the majority of inhabitants are their d...	[ "Everything /u/snarkinturtle said is correct, but it doesn't directly answer your question. > A systematic comparison to other population groups shows that in relation to the population size and in relation to the general bioscientific reference to this group, Jews are over-represented in human genetic literature,...
How long will it take for the moon to touch the earth atmosphere?	[ "The moon is actually getting farther from the Earth, due to tidal friction." ]	[ "It depends on altitude, space weather, and on board power requirements. This explains it better than I could: _URL_1_" ]
Why do events that have a negative effect on oil production cause immediate rises in prices of gas but when production is back to normal prices don't plummet back to where they started?	[ "You have a lemonade stand. You sell it for 50 cents a cup. One day you find out it's going to be very hot outside and people are going to want more lemonade. You figure you can get away with selling it for a little more since the demand is there. So you start charging 80 cents. You notice that the number of people...	[ "If you ask for 1 pen, it costs you two dollars. If you ask for 100 000 pens, they will only cost you one dollar each. I prefer selling you 100 000 pens at half price, than selling you 1 at full price and have 99 999 sitting around doing nothing. In a similar way, if you ask for a small amount of money, you pay a b...
The difference between mass and weight	[ "Your mass is a given quantity regardless of where you are. Its how much \"stuff\" you are made of. Weight is how gravity acts on your mass so you weigh less on the moon because there is less gravity but your mass is the same anywhere you go in the universe." ]	[ "I'm going to assume that you really meant to type CO, carbon monoxide, which is lighter than air." ]
Why do rabbis suck babies penises when performing circumcisions.	[ "The idea is to suck out the blood and cause it to coagulate around the wound, reducing the chances of infection. Traditionally this was done directly with the mouth, but nowadays it is mostly done using a sterile tube. As far as I know, most mohels (\"mohel\" is the proper name for the person who performs the circ...	[ "Are they [leaf cutter ants?](_URL_0_) then they are collecting it to harvest fungus which grows on the little leafs." ]
Why does it take forever to become 20 and only a short time to be 40?	[ "time perception. At five years old, 1 year is a huge chunk of time (1/5th).Compared to life at 40 one year is 1/40th. A 5th of your life to date is now 8years. As you age, time seems to move faster because you have a larger pool of time to compare it to...." ]	[ "I think we develop a \"been there, done that\" mentality in ways. I can not watch cartoons now. No matter what the topic. The irony is I just can't pay attention to cartoons." ]
Why do we gauge success of films by money made rather than the number of tickets sold? Wouldn't inflation hinder these 'popularity' results significantly?	[ "Because film making is a business. Who is more successful: someone making $40,000 today or someone making $30,000 in 1920? Clearly, the guy in the 20s was far wealthier. Studios measure the success of a film by how much money it makes for them. Just like any other business." ]	[ "I'm not a camera pro, but basically: A smartphone camera lense or even a Go pro doest have 1/10th of a cinema camera quality. There is much more than resolution and megapixels when it comes to cameras. Why does some 8mp phone camera does a better job than some 13mp ones? Same stuff. Lense, picture processing, etc....
When jumping over large gaps on a skateboard, does the skateboard absorb a significant amount of the vertical force?	[ "That vertical distance (let's call it around 15 feet) is reasonable to jump down from if you absorb the force in your legs (like you see the guy in the clip doing). The other thing to remember is that some of the downward force there is going to be transferred forward because he's hitting at an angle and the wheel...	[ "Another component worth mentioning is that YouTube clips can 'intelligently buffer', while GIFs lack this functionality. Imagine your friend likes pistachios, but hates opening them. You, in your infinite kindness, start to crack open the shells and placing the open pistachios next to him/her. If your friend were ...
Why does it burn when you urinate immediately after ejaculation?	[ "I also have this and it's not related to an infection or STD. If OP is like me he pees normally most of the time but if you go for a pee within about 5 minutes of ejaculating it stings a bit. I thought that it might be because the uretra is still sensitive from sex." ]	[ "I've had similar sensations in the past. A Doctor friend explained it to me as your brain just sort of cross-firing the pain response. From the standpoint of evolution, it could your body's way of saying, \"Hey, Klutz, you're hurting yourself, how about we just slow things down a bit?\" It's nothing and should pas...
Does Growing a Crystal Create "more" of it?	[ "No new salt is being created. Growing a crystal is a process known as [deposition](_URL_0_). Basically it occurs when something that is dissolved in a solution comes out of solution. Having a pre-existing salt crystal promotes this because it provides a [nucleation site](_URL_2_) for the dissolved salt to deposit....	[ "Short story. Air. The air is never 100% clean. Try freezing ice in a tray, then pulling it out too early. Bubbles are visible at the bottom right? That's because air and impurities will always fill in traditional ice makers. As for commercial ice, it's clear because the ice is frozen from the inside. A cold mold o...
Why is there such a fasciation with WWII and Hilter? Has anyone studied this from an academic perspective?	[ "People obsess over Hitler because he has ceased to be a historical figure, he's a symbol of evil. He was also driving force behind the single most massive war in human history. Said war was the first major war that occured in a society that resembles as our own." ]	[ "Is this a homework question? It says in our [rules](_URL_0_): Our users aren't here to do your homework for you, but they might be willing to help. Remember: AskHistorians helps those who help themselves. Don't just give us your essay/assignment topic and ask us for ideas. Do some research of your own, then come t...
Why do some african-americans say aks instead of ask?	[ "It's the same reason some white people do. It's a regional dialect. When you hear people who speak that way they are usually from the south, or have ancestry to the south. As an interesting side note, it's also not incorrect English. Chaucer used ax in the Canterbury Tales, and according to John Rickford it was co...	[ "> Middle English orthography was unstable, but when the sound /k/ appeared at the end of a syllable, two spellings tended to be used: > 1. If /k/ was preceded by a long vowel, it was spelled \"k\" (today's \"like\" used to be spelled \"lik\"). Adding \"ke\" at the end (like) is alater development. > 2. If /k/ wa...
What were the differences in stone projectile point technology globally?	[ "It would be extremely difficult. Styles vary so much that virtually any style may be found in a different location at a different time. For example the large finely flaked bifaces of the Solutrean period (20-15 kya) in what is now western Europe could very easily be lost among Cascade Period (6-9 kya) bifaces in t...	[ "New answers are always welcome here, but while waiting for them, you may be interested in reading these old threads: * [How did European late medieval/early renaissance pike squares compare to classical phalanxes? Going head to head, would a phalanx of Athenian hoplites stand a chance against a square of Swiss pik...
Why are tennis balls a bright neon-ish green while baseballs are white/ivory?	[ "Woohoo! One I know and actually something I've asked somebody during a job interview. They weren't always the yellow colour(known as optic yellow) they were more commonly white but in the 70's some research was carried out around how to make sure the balls could be seen on colour tv. This lead to the development o...	[ "It's actually in your document. > The next year, Loewy/Snaith suggested painting collection boxes one color instead of three, recommending a sky-blue color. Sky-blue paint was tested on a few trucks, but the color failed to impress postal officials. In 1968, the Department began testing dark blue collection boxes...
why can you not get the same cold/virus twice, how are antibodies so powerful?	[ "What we see as \"being sick\" is often the body's way of getting rid of diseases. This is part of our innate immune system, but it doesn't always work so well. Once your body makes antibodies, that's part of the adaptive immune system. The antibodies \"tag\" the virus so that killer T-cells can get rid of them. So...	[ "I think we develop a \"been there, done that\" mentality in ways. I can not watch cartoons now. No matter what the topic. The irony is I just can't pay attention to cartoons." ]
Is there a reason why various social networks (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Linked In, etc.) use blue as their theme color?	[ "You may want to take this answer with a pinch of salt because I'm not 100% sure, But I would imagine the reason why is because certain colours can physiologically change your view on things. The colour blue is known to give a more calming, trust worthy view. I recommend reading up on [this](_URL_0_) it goes deeper...	[ "Red meats have a much higher concentration of myoglobin, a protein that makes red meats look \"redder.\" Myoglobin is similar to hemoglobin, the protein that makes your blood red and both proteins also contain iron. Myoglobin and hemoglobin are used to store oxygen, one of the vital compounds needed for our body t...
Is there any support for fields that exist that have no observed particles that they interact with?	[ "You can easily add extra fields to your theory that just don’t interact with anything, and/or have enormous masses, so you’d never be able to produce that kind of particle. But by definition these things would be unobservable (at least currently), so you can’t experimentally falsify that they exist." ]	[ "Some things whose explanations most likely outside the scope of QM, GR or the Standard Model: 1. Dark matter 2. Dark energy 3. Neutrino Flavour Mixing 4. Charge-Parity violations by the strong force. One thing we don't yet understand, but will most likely be explained by QM, GR or the Standard Model (it's been tal...
Why are our sneezes so powerful?	[ "Sneezes use the diaphram... and yes you can produce this own power consciously. To answer the question of why, it's because it helps force out whatever's caught in your nose." ]	[ "Ok, just reading this post made me clear my throat. I'm genuinely curious and hope a psychologist or scientist will answer this :)" ]
How does the moon stay in orbit, as opposed to crashing into Earth?	[ "I was going to answer this with a description of Newton's laws of motion, but instead perhaps an analogy would be helpful. Imagine throwing a baseball, you know the baseball would accelerate down to earth on a trajectory of about 9.8 meters per second. The ball falls and comes to rest on the ground. Now imagine th...	[ "Very careful simulation based on testing data. Engineers have experimentally gathered data about all the different materials used to make the telescope. This data includes failure points given applied loads, vibrational frequencies, etc. They can use this along with a computational model of the sattelite to predic...
Why would apple have so much of their assets in cash?	[ "Well, understand it's not cash. That would be crazy. It's invested, and making money. This would be fine for you and me, but isn't good for a company. They need to be investing in themselves, building out facilities, putting money into R & D, acquiring new properties...Unfortunately, they have so much money, ...	[ "I suspect it's down to size. Adding clips and removable backs. Adding battery contacts etc are much harder than just a small snap on connection that never moves. It probably helps sell more phones as when your batteries dead your probably going to buy a new phone rather than try and get into an iPhone." ]
Can you predict the time it will take for water to change to a certain temperature, based on the temperature around it?	[ "Yes, you would use [Newton's law of cooling](_URL_0_), set it equal to the temperature you want, then solve for the value of t. The constant k is something you would either need to look up, or solve for yourself by taking two temperature readings at two different times." ]	[ "Could this question be answered by spraying Never Wet on the surface if a cup? If so, I will go perform this experiment in my garage with a plastic cup, coated with the Never Wet product, and fill it with ice water, placing that cup next to an untreated cup with the same amount of ice and water and see which cups ...
How does someone develop a "passion" for something?	[ "Firearms and cars. I was raised around both. I was always either helping my mom with her cars or she was taking me out and shooting targets with her old .22 rifle. It was just plain old fun. I enjoyed learning how an engine worked, I enjoyed learning how different types of guns worked/shot. Once I got older and st...	[ "Practice. They spent lots and lots of hours practicing throwing darts. It took them just as long to figure out how to get a dart shot as it did for you to figure out how to get a baseball throw. You just don't think about it, because you probably remember very little of how godawful you were at throwing baseballs ...
The future of computer storage: Storage capacity vs compression abilities	[ "So far, capacity has kept increasing rapidly. You used to buy the biggest drive you could afford, knowing that it was going to be filled up all too soon anyway, but that you'd be able to get a bigger one in a few years. These days, the capacity of a hard drive tends to be much larger than anyone needs, especially ...	[ "Computerphile explain it quite well - _URL_0_ Think of it like removing parts of a sentence but allowing it to still make sense. eg. 'The weather today will be sunny' compresses to 'weather today sunny' - it still somewhat makes sense, but there's less information. Hope this helps." ]
Why does alcohol intoxication produce such wildly different reactions in people, anywhere from complete euphoria to violent rage?	[ "I think the best description of alcohol's effect is lowering inhibitions. That makes it so that any strong emotion that happens to bubble up, be it happiness or sadness or rage, gets expressed without holding back. Essentially, it makes you emotional and gives those emotions exaggerated expression." ]	[ "Lots of chemical science and a base batch of fermented liquid to flavor. There isn't a lot of nuance in mass marketed booze, and practically every part of a flavor can be measured and replicated. The varietals are all put together the same way with tried and tested yeasts for exact Temps and times. They've removed...
Ponzi schemes vs pensions	[ "Pensions do not rely on new workers. Pensions are a specific savings account made in a worker's name that is put into various investments to grow the money. It then has a set payout rate at retirement." ]	[ "Playboy is a household name. 0G Juggs isn't. One looks good on any modeling resume (not to mention the contacts), the other is kinda limited." ]
What causes 'sympathy pain', or 'sympathy sensations' we feel when seeing/reading something happen to someone else?	[ "Empathy! In humans earlier stages it was important for us to care of our tribe and to care for each other. Thus creating a system for young and old to survive." ]	[ "The human body produces heat, at a rate of somewhere around 100 W averaged over a day, and it needs to get rid of it. If the temperature of our environment is too close to our body temperature, the efficiency with which we can shed our heat is greatly reduced. When the environment is as hot or hotter than our body...
Why is buying into a time share considered a huge scam?	[ "It isn't necessarily a huge scam. It does, however, cost a fair bit of money, and it has limited use. If you are able to actually utilize it the way it is advertised, they tend to be pretty awesome. Most people aren't, though, and this is why it is often considered a scam. My girlfriend's parents have a timeshare,...	[ "They don't. They just care about your money. Come Easter they will remind you that the best way to commemorate the sacrifice of the lord and saviour Jesus Christ is to lease a 2016 Ford Escalade < /sarcasm >" ]
Where do our eyes focus when we close them?	[ "The eye focuses on light, and thus when you close your eyes the muscle involved, the cillary muscle, relaxes." ]	[ "Imagine a spinning wheel getting faster and faster. At some point, it looks like it's suddenly reversed direction, spinning backwards, right? And then as it keeps on accelerating, it looks like the wheel is stopped. (Of course, the wheel is blurry, since it's going fast -- your brain interprets this as a spinning ...
How do radio stations know how many people are listening to certain radio programs?	[ "I was curious about this as well, so I did some google-fu and found some results. This is all secondhand so take it with a grain of salt. It seems that the stations contract survey companies to get a rough estimate based on a sample population in the area. Arbitron is one of those companies. How do they do it? The...	[ "Google Android has a feature that sends location data to the google servers, even if you have GPS turned off. If you use a Google Android phone, you can actually view your own data if login to Google and goto this site: _URL_0_ What Google is doing is fetching all this data that is sent from all the Google Android...
Why do we have speed limits rather than a speed range?	[ "Because that's the top speed you can safely do, assuming ideal conditions (at least that's the premise). When it's raining, snowing, cold or dark, this changes it from being ideal conditions. It's not safe to drive at that speed any more. Worse it is, the slower you need to go, especially if your visibility is imp...	[ "Sheriffs are elected law enforcement officers (LEOs), often under the jurisdiction of the courts. Police are LEOs under the jurisdiction of the local executives -- county board, governors, etc. Their jurisdiction is a function of where they're located and who they answer to. Highway patrol LEOs are usually state p...
How did DVD's continue to be a mainstream product along side Blu Rays? Why didn't they die out like VHS tapes did when new technology hit the market?	[ "Because of compatibility I would say. When we switched to DVD from vcr there was no backwards compatibility due to completely different form factors. Since dvd and bluray use the same form factor a bluray player can also play a DVD. So dvds didn't become immediately obsolete like vcr. Also, I don't believe the qua...	[ "Think of a rare baseball card. If there's only 10 of them in existence, then everyone would want them and they would be willing to trade hundreds of chocolate bars for it. Now think if they printed 990 more of that rare baseball card. Now everyone has one, and no one is willing to trade a chocolate bar for it." ]
How did we discover that space was a vacuum?	[ "Did we know Earth's atmosphere didn't go on indefinitely before we launched our first probes into space?" ]	[ "Many people posting here haven't actually taken a nerf gun apart and looked at it and are speculating that spring loaded guns could shoot fine in a vaccum. Well, here's a picture of a [maverick](_URL_4_) being taken apart for modding. You can see the spring is pushing on a piston-cylinder assembly. The nozzle on t...
How do shows like I Love Lucy record in black and white yet have flawless color nowadays?	[ "A computer can track the movements of objects in the frame and add color to them, particularly when overseen by a human operator." ]	[ "we used television cameras with vidicon tubes. These let it turn the optical data into electronic pictures, and let us turn those pictures into a digital bitstream, which was sent to earth. edit: fixed typos" ]
What makes Harvard any better than my local State university?	[ "Several things. 1 - Money. Harvard has an endowment of over $30,000,000,000. That means that they have the nicest of everything and if they want you... you get a full ride. 2 - Prestige. Harvard is a known university. Anywhere in the world a degree from Harvard is going to say \"I'm well educated and talented\". 3...	[ "Well, there's a difference between state and federal law in the US. If you break a state law and get sentenced to jail time - > state prison If you break a federal law and get sentenced to jail time - > federal prison" ]
Looking for name/brief explanation of a particular theory which explains the apparent lack of intelligent extra-terrestrial life.	[ "This might be of interest to you: _URL_0_" ]	[ "* What specifically differentiates genomic data vs typical data? More specifically, is genomic data not ergodic? * What similarities does reference based compression share with Slepian-Wolf (or Wyner-Ziv) coding? * Since there has been a large push towards machine learning, could you elaborate on the role you for...
The Ariel controversy and the backlash got me thinking. Why IS Jesus portrayed as a white hippie?	[ "In regards to the \"hippie look\", /u/thepibbs wrote in response to ['When did artists first start portraying Jesus with shoulder-length hair and a beard?'](_URL_2_) & #x200B; /u/sunagainstgold has written about [the role of iconography in Jesus' being seen as white.](_URL_1_) & #x200B; EDIT: You mentioned the '...	[ "Post-Roman England? Anglo-Saxon England? Viking England? Norman England? England of the Magna Carta? Late Medieval Elizabethan England? The middle ages stretched almost a thousand years with a lot of different societal, cultural and religious differences in that time. Regardless, we have no evidence that ethnicity...
In Full Metal Jacket (1987) the Marine cadets seem to alternate using "Sir, yes, sir." and "Sir, aye aye, sir." in their responses to the drill sergeant. What's the rules for using one vs. the other. Is/was there a convention during the Vietnam era or otherwise?	[ "The convention continues, at least among the Marines I've known, but I am Army myself. \"Yes sir\" is used when answering a direct question. \"Aye/aye aye\" is used to acknowledge you have heard a command. For example: Lieutenant Butter Bar: Private, did you submit your leave form? Private Snuffy: Yes, sir. Vs. ...	[ "Etymology online says knock it off is a request given to an auctioneer to end bidding (by knocking his gavel). While the entry puts the first usage as 1880, the same entry cites a US Senate record of 1834. _URL_0_" ]
Why do people have different tolerances to pain?	[ "I can't remember 100%, but in uni I remembering learning about how genetics is a huge factor, but of course environment plays a role too. So neurons in general have to reach a certain threshold to \"synapse,\" and in the case of pain/sensory neurons, the synapse=pain felt. If you have a higher threshold to reach i...	[ "Just depends on how your brain precieves (sorry for spelling) the responses from nerve endings. I personally hate being tickled and do not like the feeling." ]
Recommendations for books on the history of sexuality?	[ "Are you referring simply to the history of sex and sexuality, or are you interested in broader concepts like Gender or perhaps the LGBTQ community? Regardless, I'd suggest Magnus Hirschfeld and the Quest for Sexual Freedom: A History of the First International Sexual Freedom Movement by Elena Mancini. Hirschfiel...	[ "_URL_0_ The Geography of Time by Robert Levine. Blew my mind the first time I read it." ]
How do we know the chemistry of other celestial bodies in the universe?	[ "Spectra. Each element emits photons at very specific wavelengths when its electrons dop from excited to ground state. When we observe light from a celestial body we can break that light down into its separate component wavelengths and determine which elements are present in what relative concentrations." ]	[ "We don't and that is why the search for different forms of life persists. If very well could have happened more than once. But you should note that all DNA based life shares the common trait of having right-handed dual-helix DNA. Since DNA could have taken multiple configurations it suggests that all of it shares ...
Why are American tax payers footing the bill for professional sports complexes?	[ "The idea is that professional sports complexes will energize the local economy by regularly attracting thousands of people to attend events who will then frequent local restaurants, hotels, shops, etc. This will stimulate job growth and tax revenue. Do the investments work out? I don't know. Perhaps in some instan...	[ "We put bases in other countries with the full agreement of the host country (with the possible exception of Cuba). They generally feel they gain from having our presence there. We, on the other hand, don't generally feel that having a foreign military presence on US soil would benefit us much. Who are they goi...
Entropy in a biological context	[ "Entropy is a law of thermodynamics, not biology. It really doesn't have a 'biological context.' Although life could be said as a (relatively complex) entropy machine. We may create (temporarily) more complex objects (both biological and non-biological objects), but in the long run we use a lot of energy to create...	[ "Use everyday objects they can relate to along with analogies. I read this really good one a while ago explaining the prevalence of birth defects in siblings mating: pretend you and your sister's DNA are pants with holes on the left knee and right pocket. If you put them over each other there will still be holes. ...
What is engine braking, how does it work, and why is it not allowed in some places?	[ "A compression release engine brake, frequently called a Jake brake or Jacobs brake, is an engine braking mechanism installed on some diesel engines. When activated, it opens exhaust valves in the cylinders after the compression cycle, releasing the compressed air trapped in the cylinders, and slowing the vehicle. ...	[ "There are marks along the highway at measured intervals. A plane flies overhead, timing cars as they pass these marks. They radio to the cruiser on the ground a description of the car, who then stops them and writes the ticket." ]
How does The Daily Show find it's archived news footage?	[ "They use this - _URL_1_ It records all of the major news channels and indexes the closed captioning data so that it's searchable. _URL_0_" ]	[ "Google doesn't search the internet when you run a google search, they search their highly optimized indexes from their own database. The database is formed by google \"spiders\" that crawl \"the web\". If you wanted, you could build a highly optimize database of your hard drive's contents that you could run search...
Why didn't the Nazi Regime use their large navy to storm the beaches of Great Britain instead of the bombings? What was the push for air warfare?	[ "To add to the already excellent answers, I'd just like to put in one more point - Hitler was terrified of losing big ships. Hitler was an army man, first and foremost. He didn't really understand naval warfare, but he understood the prestige of big battleships well enough, and he was loath to lose any of them. The...	[ "I read a great book for my Ancient History major work on the Roman Military which helped me extensively as it includes detailed figures of military formations and the strategy behind the generals thoughts and step by step drawings of the different stages of major battles. I highly recommend this book as most of my...
I've always heard that the only type of hookworm transmittable to humans is only acquired by walking barefoot in unsanitary environments, so why did my dog's vet, upon diagnosing her with hookworm, tell me that anyone who's cleaned up after her could have it?	[ "A safety measure. The chance is low but its still the responsibility of the vet to make you aware and informed of it. Be happy you have a vet who is covering all the bases." ]	[ "One way is to word everything as a question. So if your headline reads \"Is Kim Kardashian a Hobbit?\" then nobody can sue you because, hey, you're just asking questions. Another strategy is to use so-called weasel words. Instead of saying \"Kim Kardashian is a Hobbit\", you say \"Some people have claimed Kim was...
What did Greek people look like 4000 years ago?	[ "Pretty much the same, one of the most interesting things modern genetics has shown is that populations have been more or less genetically continuous since the Neolithic, most population movements in recorded history have been small groups of men, who have had fairly little genetic impact on populations (if this we...	[ "Follow-up/related: Do we have any idea how prevalent the Classically stereotypical physical traits for each group (e.g. big strapping blond-haired Dorians) actually were in those populations?" ]
What makes a microbrewery different from a regular brewery? Is there an official limit as so how big you can be before you are just a regular brewery? Thanks	[ "Microbreweries used to be classified as a brewery producing less than 15,000 barrels of beer annually but over time the term has been associated more loosely." ]	[ "On normal cameras? No. The film or sensors in standard film or digital cameras simply records what light is on them. The recording medium needs to be at precisely the correct distance from the focal point of the camera lens, or else the picture will be out of focus. To focus the picture, we move the lenses towards...
Why is it a crime to attempt suicide? Doesn't punishing a depressed person make them even more depressed?	[ "Suicide is legal in almost all western countries. However, law enforcement is generally compelled to prevent a suicidal person from killing themselves by any means necessary." ]	[ "The law against defacing coins forbids doing so in order to commit fraud. [18 USC § 331](_URL_0_). This law dates back to when coins were made of gold and silver and and, by shaving a bit off of a coin, one could cheat others out of the full value of a coin while holding back some of the value for oneself. That i...
Why are many things in the US "general"? Things like the general store, General Motors, General Mills, etc.	[ "> Why are many things in the US \"general\"? Things like the general store, General Motors, General Mills, etc. Generally speaking this was intended to convey the idea that the products they produced were standardized. Back when those names originated it was common for products to be made in smaller shops for l...	[ "I'm given to understand that it was to differentiate between hanging by the neck until dead and being hung, drawn and quartered (where the hanging was only temporary, and death was caused by the drawing and quartering). Either that or as a way to more easily distinguish hanging as a punishment from hanging for o...
Does cell damage occur when an injection is given? What causes the pain or discomfort?	[ "Yes. Cellular damage occurs at different levels of your skin, muscle and blood vessels. However, what causes pain and discomfort is due to nerve endings and pain receptors in the same location. Something interesting I read a while back is that pain is thought to be a product of cellular damage around nerve endings...	[ "Every time you make a copy of a cell, there is a chance for errors. For example when you photocopy a first print, it is pretty crisp and close to the original, but there are a few minor discrepencies. Now if you photocopy the copy, it gets more distorted, and so on until some letters get hard to read, it gets diff...
How would my life be as a black man in ancient Rome ? How did Romans treat "coloured" people, even asian merchants ?	[ "u/cleopatra_philopater wrote a number of particularly excellent posts on this difficult subject. [This one](_URL_0_) is specifically focussed on Roman Egypt, and also discussed the Greek period preceding this, but should give you a lot of food for thought." ]	[ "More questions about The Golden Ass. 1. What's the deal with the Cupid and Psyche story? What's the sub-text there? 2. In one of the later books, Lucius--as an ass--has to have sex with human women, including one who has been found guilty of adultery or worse (I don't recall exactly). He shies away from sex wit...
Something I've always wondered- why is it that you are the most sore the second day after exercising?	[ "While we wait for an actual expert to arrive, the name for what you're talking about is [Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness](_URL_0_). Sometimes, just knowing what name something goes by is enough to open the Google Floodgates and get you more information about the topic. I hope this helps a bit, and is not grounds for...	[ "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 dust stay on moving cars? Shouldn't the air flow of the moving car be able to blow the dust off?	[ "Because the electrostatic force between the particle and the car is larger than the force pulling the particles off. The force which tries to remove the particles is dependent on the cross sectional area of the particle, where the air is pushing against. As dust are very small particles, the force applied by the a...	[ "Your eyes are constantly making adjustments for your movement, and your brain corrects for motion blur. A camera has to take a snapshot during a moment in time. If you move the camera during that moment, then the image is blurred. However, if your camera has a very fast shutter speed then the image will not be blu...
Accents. Why do they happen, and why are there different ones?	[ "There are at least two kinds of accents. The first is simply a way of speaking which propagates in a certain geographical region... this is the case in the US of people who speak with a southern accent, for example. Another form of accent occurs when a person speaks a foreign language. After the time of puberty, m...	[ "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...
Reading Suggestions for Slovak/Czech History?	[ "In regards to Slovakia, I know of one recent book that specifically covers the history if the country: A History of Slovakia: The Struggle for Survival by Stanislav J. Kirschbaum. It is more a political history, but does go back centuries and is specifically about Slovakia." ]	[ "Check out Yuri Slezkine,[ Arctic Mirrors: Russia and the Small Peoples of the North](_URL_0_)" ]
How do cemeteries make money after all plots are bought?	[ "The cemetery I run just bought 40 acres about 20 years ago. We have another 35 that was the original cemetery. We have about 600 plots left to buy in the old part. We do about 64 burials a year (ive been keeping track since 2011). We have double stacked bodies, meaning we dig one hole roughly 8' deep. Set two vaul...	[ "They don't. It's a marketing ~~lie~~ gimmick. I used to work for a company that did a similar thing by mail. New customers were supposed to sign up by a certain time for special rates but as a specific matter of policy we'd give those rates to anyone who mailed back the special offer." ]
What's the round structure on top of PBM Mariner flyingboats of the US Navy in WWII	[ "It's a radome to cover the AN/APS-15 search radar, first fitted to an experimental model designated XPBM-3E then rolled out to production models starting with the PBM-3C (from Squadron/Signal's PBM Mariner in Action). The most common installation of APS-15, also known as H2X (and \"Mickey\" due to some early ins...	[ "Edit: STSCI people have [posted an explanation](_URL_4_). There's also a [youtube video](_URL_3_) which explains it around 1:45. The long and short of it is that Hubble was tracking background stars throughout those images, and its orbit around the Earth meant that the comet had noticeable parallax which cause...
how a water softener works.	[ "The point of a water softener is to remove calcium and magnesium which form positively charged ions when dissolved in water.The tank is filled with negatively charged beads and so when the hard water enters the tank the positively charged calcium and magnesium stick to the beads. The water that comes out of the ta...	[ "Imagine you’re a wrinkled shirt. Masseuse straightens you out so you’re nice and unwrinkled. But some people are so use to be wrinkled, they don’t know how it feels to be unwrinkled. That’s my best ELI5. I tried." ]
Why do we refer to doing things "in the morning" and "at night" versus "at morning" and "in the night"?	[ "For the same reason we say \"in a car\" but \"on a train\"... Or \"in a chair\" but \"on a couch\"... Preposition use is English is exceedingly arbitrary." ]	[ "Are you from the US? Most of the world has shifted over to using 24 hour time (though analog clocks still have the 12 hour display). The most basic explanation is that it's too hard to glance at an analog clock and determine the hour if the circle is divided into 24ths. Dividing it in two was a good compromise: it...
What would be a "realistic" reason for aliens to invade? Are there any natural substances common on earth that are rare on a galactic scale?	[ "If they can live in Earth's ecosystem, then we have a whole planet sitting here ready to move in. (Even if they easily can build space habitats or terraform hostile planets or whatever, why not take this one?) Some people have postulated that biological materials (plants and animals) may be very valuable on thei...	[ "Clean water where you want it is a limited resource. It takes pipes to get the water to you, it takes treatment facilities to ensure it is safe, it takes land management and sometimes large, elaborate water transport projects to get treatable water to the treatment facilities. All of these facilities cost more the...
During WW2 how was post made possible between the UK and Germany?	[ "You go through a neutral 3rd country. For Europe popular choices were Switzerland (usually involving the International Red Cross for sending mail to POWs and civilian internees) and Portugal (for everything else). The British Mail service, in order to avoid appearing to colaborate with the enemy, enlisted the he...	[ "You may be interested in this similar earlier thread. _URL_0_ See responses by Blanglegorph, jonewer and myself. The short answer is that any positions of relative advance (e.g. Rocketry) tended to be out of desperation, whilst Allied advances (e.g. Computers) tended to be more a case of doing things they could af...
How are they filming violent movie scenes casting children without traumatizing the young actors?	[ "The process of filmmaking is nothing like the finished , edited work. Scenes are shot out of order, you probably just had lunch with the monster who’s going to kill you in the next scene, and nothing kills the mood like seeing the bored PAs standing around craft services. Most sets will also take special care to m...	[ "I'm a journalist. I can tell you straight up : it's for audience. These videos create shock, which is the best hook television news has over the viewer. The whole ethics speech they'll give you about people having the right to see it is BS. Television is a business, news or not, sadly. This is even more true in th...
Why does holding your breath, or refusing to exhale when you stub your toe, or kick the coffee table temporarily reduce the pain you feel?	[ "It increases your blood pressure and sensors in your lungs blood vessels dampen your central nervous system (which takes messages from your body to the brain) and so reduces pain sensitivity." ]	[ "The rate at which a human brain processes information is not constant. It changes based on a number of factors. When you feel a sudden threat, your body releases hormones that trigger a change in the rate at which your brain can process information. If your brain is processing information more quickly, your percep...
Do any fission or fusion nuclear explosions take place in the earth's mantle or core, and did any ever do so in the past? Or, are the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings, and sundry nuclear tests the only instance of nuclear explosions on earth since its formation billions of years ago?	[ "No explosions, but apparently there have been a number of natural nuclear reactors on earth over the millenia, where self-sustaining fission reactions occurred over an extended period of time. _URL_0_" ]	[ "As an initial matter, I believe statistically July is actually the warmest month in the northern hemisphere. What I'm gleaning from your question is \"why isn't it hottest when the sun is at it's highest northern position on the globe at the Tropic of Cancer on June 21st?\" (I.E., that's when the days are longest...
Why do some batteries "re-charge" themselves a little bit after they already died and you wait for a while?	[ "Batteries create electrical charge off of a chemical reaction occurring within the case. However as the reactants are not gaseous, it is very hard (teetering on impossible) to react all of the stuff together on the first go. Meaning, if you mix two liquid reactants together by pouring one into another, it is impos...	[ "When you shoot an arrow from a bow, the energy of the bow is transferred to the arrow. It gradually (doesn't seem like it, I know) pushes the arrow downrange, from a full stop at full draw, to full speed when the arrow leaves it. All that pent up energy of the bow at full draw is efficiently transferred to the arr...
What is actually happening when soap "lathers", and why is water so crucial for a good lather?	[ "As the other user posted. Lather is just a gimmick. Studies have been done with market groups to determine how individuals FEEL about lather and what is the right amount. Chemists are constantly manipulating contents of conditioners, soaps and shampoos depending on their target market's feelings about the physical...	[ "Nothing, boiling is not a chemical reaction. All you do is heat up the H2O and change the state of aggregation of a small portion of it from liquid to gaseous (resulting in bubbles and steam). Unless you trap the steam somehow a little bit of H2O is going away, but apart from that it remains exactly the same, chem...
With Darth Vader being a sith lord and second to the emperor, how/why was tarkin able to have him on a leash and have control over him?	[ "Think of it as the vice president on a battleship. The vice-president is technically of a higher rank than the general/captain, but the VP will listen to the general when he tells him the military situation. Tarkin doesn't outrank Vader, and won't directly order him around, but Vader knows enough to let him run th...	[ "Charlie Rose/60 minutes just aired an interview with Putin this week where they discussed this subject. Putin feels that Assad (Syrias President) is the best and only way to reclaim syria from isis. The US is backing non isis rebel groups in Syria to try and take down assad. They have opposing ideas how to deal wi...
How do states have time to pass silly bills when there are far more pressing issues at hand?	[ "Writing a bill can be done by anyone with the interest in doing it. Many bills are written by companies or organizations, they just find one state senator to sponsor it. Voting on a bill hardly takes any time at all. What takes a long time is finding compromise. With the really difficult and important issues, nobo...	[ "They write half as many checks a year, pay the person that does payroll for half the hours. Depending on the size of the company that could be a few hours a week saved." ]
How are birds and animals able to eat raw meat without getting the same infections and diseases that humans get?	[ "Many times they have adaptations, like [very acidic stomachs](_URL_1_) that help kill bacteria in the food. They can also have other weird adaptations--scientists are trying to figure out how vultures can manage to eat literal rotting meat without getting sick, and it looks like they might actually have [commensal...	[ "It's just in their DNA. Even now, science can't fully explain the phenomena we call \"instincts\", even though we can see them in action, and have them ourselves." ]
Can someone explain the difference between the Glycocalyx and the MHC classes on our cells?	[ "MHC stands for major histocompatibility complex, which you already know... when antigens are taken into a cell, the antigen is degraded into a specific peptide and then is loaded onto an MHC class I or II protein and the peptide:MHC complex is presented at the cell surface where it might bind to an antigen specifi...	[ "GMT is affected by daylight savings time. UTC isn't. When you are on DST time, you are technically an hour ahead of the UTC time on your timezone." ]
Were duels legal in Russia under Tsar Nicholas II?	[ "Yes, they was legal for army officers. In some cases even mandatory - if officer rejected duel, he was obliged to resign from army or well be fired after two weeks. In 1894-1910 there was 322 duels in Russian army, 315 with firearm, 30 people were killed." ]	[ "This question is getting a lot of traffic after being [tweeted by @reddit](_URL_5_), so I thought I'd welcome those of you that haven't visited /r/AskHistorians before to the subreddit. Please do bear in mind that in order to keep the quality of answers here high we have [strict rules on comments](/r/AskHistorians...
How do authorities determine a Banksy painting on a wall is actually Banksy and not a fake?	[ "There is an affiliated group of Banksy called \"Pest Control\" that authenticates Banksy's work. Small work and medium size work can be authenticated though them. Murals and street art pieces/setups are more difficult but those are usually for showcasing and not selling, thus do not need authenticating. Can refer...	[ "There are a few ways. Today we can do it by measuring distant stars parallax that changes slightly as we make a circle around the sun. We can look at other plants since we know their orbits and speeds. Finally, we can do what ancient people did, look at a pattern the sun makes in the sky. Each week exactly at the ...
What happens when a parachute doesn't open correctly?	[ "> Aren't all parachutes designed the same? No, there are many designs. > Is there no procedure in place to ensure every chute is safe to use? There is. The process is performed by humans who can make mistakes, and equipment can still fail regardless. > What are the factors in play that could change the way a chu...	[ "why would you eat your mentor? but the reaction will cause you to vomit uncontrollably sort of like putting baking soda in vinegar." ]
How are "two-way" mirrors made?	[ "Ever notice how on one side of a \"two-way\" mirror it's very brightly lit, but on the other side it's totally dark? That's not an accident. \"Two way\" mirrors are actually semi-transparent, with a highly reflective glass. The glare created by the bright lights on one side means that they can't look past their re...	[ "Non smart person here. My guess is it has something to do with light bouncing off particles in the air. Which is the reason why less light reaches the target. Because. of the dust and dander and other air born things absorb some and reflect the rest in different directions and those are the light rays we see." ]
How does salt raise the freezing and boiling temperatures of water?	[ "Title is incorrect - Salt lowers the freezing temperature of water. This is why when you add salt, the water no longer freezes until temperatures drop significantly further." ]	[ "It increses the osmolarity of your blood: _URL_0_" ]
Why did people like Gandhi want liberation in India from the English? and how did other Indians react to this movement?	[ "It's basically the same reason why the original thirteen colonies in America wanted to breakaway from the British Empire. The British Raj was widely despised in India for various reasons but mostly because they didn't respect local customs and taxed the population without giving them a say (no representation). The...	[ "Is this a homework question? It says in our [rules](_URL_0_): Our users aren't here to do your homework for you, but they might be willing to help. Remember: AskHistorians helps those who help themselves. Don't just give us your essay/assignment topic and ask us for ideas. Do some research of your own, then come t...
How does General Anxiety Disorder actually work, and why is it thought to occur? Is it "all mental" or chemical?	[ "there is no difference between mental and chemical. there is no difference between physical illness and mental illness, they all take place in this physical world made of chemicals. & #x200B; as to how it works: we don't exactly know. we don't understand the brain enough to explain most mental illnesses or their ...	[ "Lots. If you spend a lot of time in a building made of concrete, you're getting gammas from the small amount of potassium-40 in natural potassium. If you have an americium-241 smoke detector, you'll get gammas from that. ^(241)Am alpha-decays into ^(237)Np, but it doesn't always go directly to the ground state. So...

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