question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
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what is the rationale for why we need to increase defense spending? | Because defense contractors get their profits from selling bullets, bombs, building cities, yada yada from the war effort. You really didn't know that? | [
"Military expenditure can impact the economy of a country and its growth through the demand effect. An increase of military spending, will increase the prosperity of the country and its employment rate, thanks to a rise of demand. It is link to the Keynesian multiplier effect, introduced by Richard Kahn in the 1930... |
if every living human body disappeared off the face of the earth all at once, would anything happen to the planet's orbit? | Yes! There would be change in the orbit of the Earth.
The Earth does not technically orbit the Sun, rather, the two objects orbit a common point in space, called the barycenter, about 450km from the center of the Sun. (still *well* within the Sun, but the Earth causes a 450km "wobble" of the Sun)
If all humans were to vanish, the barycenter would change by about 30 nanometers. | [
"After destroying a huge asteroid that was on a rapid collision course with Earth, a group of astronauts discover they have accidentally returned to their space station with an alien slime creature that feeds on radiation and can reproduce rapidly from its own blood.\n",
"Many of the same existential risks to hum... |
Did Otto von Bismarck really make the anti-war quote that's attributed to him? | That quote comes from his speech against Prussia going to war with the then weakened Austria. It had nothing to do with the "evil of war", he said it because Prussia's army wasn't anywhere near as strong as his colleagues thought it was at the time. The only people arguing for caution were the king and his court, he saw an opportunity.
He knew that arguing Prussia wasn't strong enough to defeat Austria would only enrage his peers' senses of national pride, probably committing them further to the idea of attacking.
He knew he was well known for his willingness to use military force and also known for his intelligence, so he gave this speech denouncing it and the power of that gesture convinced many politicians to change their votes. As a result, Prussia didn't go to war with Austria.
In the next few years the King came to rely on Bismark for many policy decisions and eventually made him prime minister. Under his leadership they bolstered the Prussian army... and invaded Austria, capturing it.
He was a genius, but also a calculating politician. | [
"From 1942, however, Bismarck had been opposed to the continuation of World War II, and had made contact with other members of the German aristocracy who were working against the Nazi regime – such as the Berlin police chief Wolf-Heinrich Graf von Helldorf, Colonel Claus Graf von Stauffenberg, and General Friedrich... |
what, exactly, happens to the body of the climbers in "the death zone" (i.e. on mount everest) that causes their death? | Some of the biggest factors are called HACE and HAPE; high-altitude cerebral edema and high-altitude pulmonary edema. Both of them involve fluid accumulating in a place where it shouldn't due to the body's stress at high altitudes - for HACE, fluid is accumulating in the brain, causing confusion and disorientation, while for HAPE, it's accumulating in the lungs causing shortness of breath. And when you're up on a mountain fighting exhaustion, weather, and the climb itself, either of those can prove quickly fatal. I believe that HAPE-related deaths are one of the most common, specifically, at high altitude.
And the scary thing about HACE and HAPE is that they can seemingly happen to anyone, anytime at high altitude. Being physically fit and acclimating to altitude slowly seem to reduce the chances, but even some of the most fit and prepared mountain climbers have died due to those conditions. If you've ever seen the movie *Everest* or read *Into Thin Air,* about the 1996 disaster on Everest, they note that Gary Ball, one of the founders of the Adventure Consultants company, died a few years before that disaster due to HAPE - and he was one of the most physically fit and well-prepared mountaineers in the world. Some of the guides and mountaineers who died on Everest that day were showing possible signs of HACE, possibly impacting their abilities to make decisions and move effectively. | [
"There are significant risks associated with climbing into the \"death zone\" of Everest, which has claimed many lives, as well as many limbs. One survivor of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster, Beck Weathers, was left on the mountain exposed at a high altitude on the south side of Everest because he was overcome by t... |
what do these things do individually in our bodies? | If you're familiar with the idea of a polymer, you already basically know what a protein is. Proteins are (usually) large, complicated molecules that are made of combinations of smaller molecules (amino acids). Different Proteins have different jobs, but most of the material that makes up the structures in your body is protein. There are so many different kinds it's hard to describe them all in detail, but it's kind of like saying, "There are 26 letters in the alphabet. You can combine them into many different words, some simple, some complex, all with a unique purpose." | [
"The human body is the structure of a human being. It is composed of many different types of cells that together create tissues and subsequently organ systems. They ensure homeostasis and the viability of the human body.\n",
"A whole body is typically composed of numerous surfaces that have different orientations... |
It's not uncommon to see people wearing facemasks to prevent getting sick in part of Asia such as Japan, Korea, China etc. What historically is/are the reason(s) behind this cultural difference, and why did it never catch on in "western" cultures? | The practice of face mask use in Japan originated from when the Spanish Flu epidemic hit Japan. A decent article on the topic is "Pandemic Influenza in Japan, 1918-19: Mortality Patterns and Official Responses" by Geoffrey W. Rice and Edwina Palmer. To what extent this was a uniquely Japanese affair is hard to say. I'm sure that other states dealing with the pandemic promoted similar behavior, but I can't say for certain. I do think it's fair to assert that public health efforts in Asia, particularly Japan and China, have tended to take on heavily collective and macro-social connotations as part of the state-building efforts. Another good example of this are the Maoist health campaigns in the 1950s to deal with common illnesses like "snail fever or schistosomiasis. A good source for learning about that particular topic is Miriam Gross's *Farewell to the God of Plague.* There's a broader discussion here about the emphasis on the agency of the individual in maintaining public health as a process of state-building. The practice of donning surgical masks (or cloth equivalents) when ill at work or school was likely adopted during this time. Although, to what extent this strategy was/is effective is hard to say. Other common health practices, like the overwhelming preference for drinking hot water, were promoted during the KMT period. However, the KMT often struggled with maintaining basic public order or curtailing banditry because of the ongoing political schisms within the party, the powerful influence of warlords, and the ongoing Chinese Civil War. So to what extent the public health efforts of the KMT actually influenced the behavior of everyday Chinese is hard to determine. The practice is also popular in Korea, but I can't comment on when the practice became popular or to what extent the Japanese promoted it when they controlled the peninsula.
However, fundamentally I don't think that your question is primarily historical. Much of it has to expectations of people in public, including protecting public health. Furthermore, in China at least people are often expected to go to school or work even if they are sick, in that instance it makes sense to reduce the likelihood that even a common cold will spread. However, u/EnclavedMicrostate is correct here, to a certain extent there is a very "orientalist" knee-jerk curiosity about "harmony" in East Asian societies. This isn't necessarily inaccurate, but it's also not exactly easy to answer "historically." Sociology, psychology, anthropology etc. are generally better means of answering this particularly contemporary question. | [
"Surgical masks are popularly worn by the general public in East Asian countries to reduce the chance of spreading airborne diseases; in Japan, it is common to wear a face mask whilst ill to avoid infecting others in public settings. In Japan and Taiwan, it is common to see these masks worn while ill, as a show of ... |
Why do hurricanes weaken over land, while incredibly strong and violent tornadoes can form and sustain themselves entirely over land? | Tornadoes are localized wind vortices that form around storms or weather fronts. Hurricanes are weather systems that increase in intensity when warm most air rising off of a body of water strengthens the convection within it. Land does not provide that warm most air. | [
"Hurricanes, which are the severest form of a tropical cyclone, have caused a considerable amount of damage to universities located in coastal regions. They are capable of producing high winds and heavy rainfall but they can also have the power to create deadly storm surge and tornadoes. Due to the fact that they f... |
Why can't we solve for the wave function of another element than hydrogen? | The Hamiltonian for a one-electron atom in the center-of-mass frame is
H*_1_* = **p**^(2)/(2m) - Ze^(2)k/r.
You can solve this system analytically for its eigenvalues and eigenstates (see the Wikipedia article on then hydrogen atom, for example).
Now, this is the Hamiltonian for a two-electron atom:
H = **p***_1_*^(2)/(2m) + **p***_2_*^(2)/(2m) - Ze^(2)k/r*_1_* - Ze^(2)k/r*_2_* + e^(2)k/|**r***_1_* - **r***_2_*|.
You can just look at this like
H = H*_1_* + H*_2_* +e^(2)k/|**r***_1_* - **r***_2_*|,
where H*_1_* and H*_2_* are each copies of the one-electron Hamiltonian for each of the two electrons. The leftover term is the interaction *between* electrons, and it depends on |**r***_1_* - **r***_2_*|, which means that you can't nicely separate it. And plugging this into the TISE, the resulting differential equation doesn't have a known analytical solution, so people use numerical methods to solve it. | [
"Hydrogen is an element inaccessible to Rutherford backscattering spectrometry since nothing can \"back\"scatter from H (since all atoms are heavier than hydrogen!). But it is often analysed by elastic recoil detection.\n",
"Therefore, water molecules can form an extended three-dimensional network. Introduction o... |
why does kissing make us... horny? | Your body reacts based on your knowledge and prior experiences: You expect that the person who kisses you finds you attractive and wants to do more than that. So you get horny. If high fives were a sign of affection in a different culture people would get horny after that too. | [
"Kissing stimulates the production of hormones responsible for a good mood: oxytocin, which releases the feeling of love and strengthens the bond with the partner, endorphins - hormones responsible for the feeling of happiness, and dopamine, which stimulates the pleasure center in the brain. Regular kissing protect... |
What impact (if any) will the new higher threshold for overtime pay have on postdocs, lab techs, and other grant funded research positions? | Postdoc and other grant funded positions are salaried, not hourly. There would be no effect. However, there has been an NIH budget increase next year for the first time in a while. That may have an effect. | [
"Overtime many economists have conducted empirical studies to try and determine the real life implications of a minimum wage on the labour market. This has led to disagreements between economists on whether a higher minimum wage does reduce employment as different studies have come to different conclusions. These i... |
how is the country (united states) with the largest deficit also the world's largest "super power"? | Superpower refers to military strength.
I think you mean debt instead of deficit (correct me if I’m wrong). Even though our debt is high, our GDP is massive. As producers and consumers, the US still dwarfs other nations. | [
"The United States is still considered by most analysts to be at the top of the world, both economically and in terms of military strength. With these abundant resources and power in the hands of the United States, they still remain as the leader \"in a single superpower world\". However, the emergence of new giant... |
why do helium-3 and deuterium in nuclear fusion produce 1 helium and an extra proton, instead of lithium which has 3 protons | It will form Lithium-5 initially, but Lithium-5 is exceptionally unstable with a half life on the order of 10^-24 seconds. All the lithium-5 that is formed quickly releases a proton and decays to stable Helium-4 | [
"The protons of hydrogen combine to helium only if they have enough velocity to overcome each other's mutual repulsion sufficiently to get within range of the strong nuclear attraction. This means that fusion only occurs within a very hot gas. Hydrogen hot enough for combining to helium requires an enormous pressur... |
why is russia divided into several oblasts, krai, and republics instead of just states or provinces, and what is the difference between a krai and oblast? | It's just the Russian equivalent of a State or Providence. They can be used interchangeably.
Many people do that realize this but many American states are legally called commonwealths. A commonwealth is no different than a state but the name was chosen to be used in place of state. For example Massachusetts is a Commonwealth, New York is a State, both are considered defined legal areas for local jurisdiction. | [
"Oblasts are a constituent political entity in a federal union under the Government of Russia with representation in the Federation Council, and serve as a first-level administrative division. Each oblast features a state government holding authority over a defined geographic territory, with a state legislature, th... |
What were some pre-modern weapons that were considered "too cruel" to use in combat? | Assassins weren't hugely popular between states. Likewise, spies were hung or shot without trial. Kidnap and ransom of one's family was frowned upon but people still did it. Scorched earth policies are horrendously cruel to their victims but that's never stopped Tilly (30 Years War), the English (Peninsular War) or the Russians (WW2) before. | [
"Firearms factor heavily in Filgaia's mythology. Called \"ARMs\", these weapons represent the world's ever-growing warfare technology, and, unlike the first \"Wild Arms\", are not considered inherently dangerous. Similar technology is used to create other mechanical weaponry not common in normal Western fiction, in... |
Nearsightedness and window screens. Something that has made me wonder for years. | That's just focussing. You don't have to be near-sighted for that to occur. Your eyes need to adjust their focus for short and long distance vision. If I remember correctly, your eyes have two "modes," one corresponding to close things (I think within about 20-40 feet away), and one corresponding to things farther than that. | [
"Everysight's first generation projection system was developed in 2004. This version was a small micro-HUD, which used a staged beam combiner integrated within a panel window device located in front of the user's eye. This allowed the user to view the surroundings while looking at real-time information, projected f... |
why is it easy to tear paper in half but not to pull it apart? | You've stumbled onto a key concept in engineering, which is the difference between [normal stress](_URL_1_) and [shear stress](_URL_0_).
In normal stress (tension or compression), you're pushing or pulling in line with the atomic bonds, like pushing/pulling on a spring. In shear stress, you're forcing lines of atomic bonds to slide *past* one another (like pushing a spring sideways), so you're not fighting them directly. Most everyday materials are less resistant to this sort of stress - paper is a great example. It's far too strong against tension for you to pull apart. But it can be easily torn or sliced by a shear load. | [
"Tearing is the act of breaking apart a material by force, without the aid of a cutting tool. A tear in a piece of paper, fabric, or some other similar object may be the result of the intentional effort with one's bare hands, or be accidental. Unlike a cut, which is generally on a straight or patterned line control... |
Where does the material for different geological strata come from? | Yes and yes. Water, wind, and gravity erode rock into sediment which is carried to the sea (or lakes) where it is deposited. Sediment is always "trying" to reach sea level.
James Hutton, the father of modern geology, noticed this back in the mid-1700s and realized that without some form of regular uplift to counteract erosion the Earth would eventually become a smooth, featureless spheroid. Only 200 years later did the rest of the world come around when plate tectonics was accepted.
Edit: last words.
Edit 2: Water is definitely responsible for more erosion than wind so, outside of deserts, the sediment you encounter can almost always has its "provenance" (i.e. point of origin where it was eroded off it's parent rock) somewhere in the watershed in which you are located. For example, here is a map of the [Mississippi River watershed](_URL_0_). All of the sediment carried by the Mississippi originated within that area*. That sediment is then deposited in the Gulf of Mexico where, eventually, it will turn into rock. At some point, probably when the next supercontinent forms, those rocks will be thrust up by tectonic action only to be eroded away again. Of course, by the time that happens the Gulf of Mexico will be a thing of the past and the Mississipi and it's watershed will be pretty unrecognizable
**Technically much of the sediment within the watershed was deposited by glaciers during a previous ice age and thus has its provenance in rocks in Canada outside the Mississippi's watershed.* | [
"Geologists study rock strata and categorize them by the material of beds. Each distinct layer is typically assigned a name, usually based on a town, river, mountain, or region where the formation is exposed and available for study. For example, the Burgess Shale is a thick exposure of dark, occasionally fossilifer... |
Someone please explain to me why this happens. | There are two factors at play here: At low temperatures, metals become brittle and hence less able to resist fracture. At high temperatures, they become softer (closer to melting) and hence also weaker. There will be some optimal temperature that maximises the strength of each metal or alloy (the peak on the graph), but the range of the graph you posted doesn't include these temperatures for bronze or copper - they will have a similar peak at lower temperatures, I venture. | [
"\"What Happened\" is not one book, but many. It is a candid and blackly funny account of her mood in the direct aftermath of losing to President Donald J. Trump. It is a post-mortem, in which she is both coroner and corpse. It is a feminist manifesto. It is a score-settling jubilee. It is a rant against James B. C... |
Is the beginning of bartering seen as the start of economics or is the starting of using coins? | I would recommend that you ask this on [/r/AskAnthropology](_URL_0_). They will better be able to help you. Historians only use available records to make a argument about how something occurred or why it occurred. Since agricultural societies predate written records, it is prehistoric (meaning that there are no written records). | [
"The use of barter-like methods may date back to at least 100,000 years ago, though there is no evidence of a society or economy that relied primarily on barter. Instead, non-monetary societies operated largely along the principles of gift economy and debt. When barter did in fact occur, it was usually between eith... |
why aren't all dreams lucid? | Because the part of the brain that controls logic is pretty much off. If it was on all the time we would realize how odd it is to be flying or whatever. It's when we become aware of the bizarre that we stop and think, "I must be dreaming". | [
"A lucid dream is a dream during which the dreamer is aware that they are dreaming. During a lucid dream, the dreamer may gain some amount of control over the dream characters, narrative, and environment; however, this is not actually necessary for a dream to be described as lucid.\n",
"Though lucid dreaming can ... |
why do we have a saying for when someone sneezes, but not for when someone hiccups? | Hiccups have never been an indication of impending death, a sneeze has, though. There was a time when plagues and diseases were ravaging whole countries and killing millions. A sneeze was not only an indication of possible sickness but even death. God bless you really does go back that far. | [
"In certain parts of Eastern Asia, particularly in Chinese culture, Korean culture, Japanese culture and Vietnamese culture, a sneeze without an obvious cause was generally perceived as a sign that someone was talking about the sneezer at that very moment. This can be seen in the \"Book of Songs\" (a collection of ... |
what exactly is the difference between chilblains and frostnip? | Frostnip is a precursor to frostbite and is caused by ice crystals forming under the skin.
Chillblains are caused by a circulation problem in small capillaries due to cold but not necessarily freezing temperatures. | [
"Frostbite is a vampire novel written by Richelle Mead. It is the second novel in the #1 \"New York Times\" bestselling series, \"Vampire Academy\". \"Frostbite\" continues the story of the main character, Rose Hathaway including her bond with Princess Vasilisa \"Lissa\" Dragomir, her budding romance with her instr... |
how do the deaf understand techno? | Loud music, particularly bassy loud music creates waves in the air that can be felt, rumbles in the floor, etc. Raves also have lots of interesting lighting and people. They think it's fun and interesting. What greater "understanding" of techno do you think there is? | [
"In Orson Scott Card’s series (including \"Ender’s Game\"), the artificial intelligence can be spoken to while the protagonist wears a movement sensor in his jaw, enabling him to converse with the AI without making noise. He also wears an ear implant.\n",
"BULLET::::- Artificial Intelligence and intelligent machi... |
how skyscrapers are built | You dig a deep pit until you hit bedrock, form the substructure of the skyscraper using beams and build the structure of the rest of the skeleton. Generally they will have a single core for the building made of reinforced concrete with thick steel beams and girders.
From the core you will brace the building with more beams and build the floor space. Depending on the location and size of the building you will need reinforcements in the form of dampers to prevent excessive movement at the top and against environmental effects. | [
"One common feature of skyscrapers is having a steel framework that supports curtain walls. These curtain walls either bear on the framework below or are suspended from the framework above, rather than resting on load-bearing walls of conventional construction. Some early skyscrapers have a steel frame that enables... |
why can't other large companies set up their own internet service that is wifi based? | * That's not what their business is
* It's a MASSIVE investment for a comparatively small return
* Even if you are able to solve all the current problems with long-distance WiFi connections (Look at LTE. It's the best we've got right now and I still wouldn't trust it for all the internet usage I go through), it's still going to have to be hard-wired into the rest of the internet at some point on the line, and running all that cable is extremely expensive. Not to mention all the permits and policies and everything you have to go through to get connected to one of the internet backbone sites. | [
"Due to competition laws, every DSL or cable Internet user has to pay separately to the infrastructure provider and to the Internet service provider (ISP). Infrastructure is provided by Bezeq (via dial-up and DSL) and Hot (cable Internet). All cellular companies (Pelephone, Partner, Cellcom and Mirs) provide wirele... |
what is the sputtering sound tractor trailers make when slowing down ? | Engine braking. No fuel comes into the cylinders and the engine acts as a compressor. What you hear is the sound of air in the exhaust. | [
"A teardrop trailer is an aerodynamically shaped semi-trailer with a curved-roof that differs in shape from the traditional rectangularly shaped trailer. The trailer is meant to be paired with a compatibly designed tractor unit leading to greater fuel efficiency of the tractor-trailer combination. As such, the \"te... |
When did it become popular to use acronyms in the English language? And why? | It might be worth cross-posting your question to r/linguistics. | [
"The widespread, frequent use of acronyms across the whole range of registers is a relatively new linguistic phenomenon in most languages, becoming increasingly evident since the mid-20th century. As literacy rates rose, and as advances in science and technology brought with them a constant stream of new (and somet... |
why were hops ultimately chosen as the go-to beer "seasoning," now used almost exclusively instead of spice sachets, etc.? | Hops act like a natural preservative of sorts. People started to notice that hopped beers lasted longer, so it became a vital ingredient. Just fyi, those seasoned beers you like most likely have hops, just like 99% of beers out there. If you dislike hops, but like flavorful beers, look for malty types or wheat beers. | [
"The use of hops in beer was written of as early as 822 by a Carolingian Abbot. Flavouring beer with hops was known at least since the 9th century, but was only gradually adopted because of difficulties in establishing the right proportions of ingredients. Before that, a mix of various herbs called gruit had been u... |
why does the nba have franchises in such odd locations, while mlb and nfl mostly cover the same cities? | It has to do with the history of the NBA vs the ABA. NBA formed first, putting teams in the cities you'd expect. ABA formed second and put teams in places without teams already (by definition, *not* the typical cities to have teams). When the two leagues merged in the 70's, some ABA teams remained, which is why there are still several teams in cities that other leagues don't have teams in. | [
"The only areas with at least two franchises in all four sports are New York and Los Angeles, which are the largest and second-largest cities and the two largest metropolitan areas in the United States. In New York, four of the metro area's nine major sports franchises play outside the city limits and three outside... |
why do game developers always seem to overdo it when it comes to balancing games? | with major changes, it pushes forward a new meta, new strategies, new ways to attack and defend. It the best weapon gets tweaked with just minor tweaks, people will most likely still use it in the same fashion, but if they nerf it to bits, suddenly people will actually have to go out and find new ways to do shit | [
"PC development is different. Game developers try to account for majority of configurations and hardware. However, the number of possible configurations of hardware and software inevitably leads to discovery of game-breaking circumstances that the programmers and testers didn't account for.\n",
"Balancing the gam... |
How much was known about radiation sickness before the United States dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. | US knowledge of bomb effects is somewhat out of my expertise, but tangentially related, so here goes. They knew radiation poisoning was a thing, and that it was deadly. Long term effects of non-lethal doses, like cancer and birth defects were largely unknown.
It's not like everyone who gets exposed to radiation automatically gets cancer, and there hadn't been enough people exposed with a long enough timeline to have any statistics on long term effects. At the time the US didn't even know enough to avoid exposing its own soldiers to radiation. I remember something about trinity test observers being too close to the blast as well as sailors on ships near underwater tests being irradiated. I don't have sources handy for those, so I may be remembering incorrectly - [this is an organization for US veterans exposed to atomic bomb radiation, though](_URL_1_), and [this is an article about testing related cancer in troops](_URL_0_).
All that suggests that the US didn't really know how bad radiation was at the time. At the very least, they sent occupation forces into Hiroshima right away, and the US set up the [ABCC](_URL_2_) in part to figure out what the long term effects even were. The Japanese definitely didn't understand atomic bomb radiation at first, and initially reported that the additional effects were due to poisonous gases released by the bomb. They even lodged an international complaint that the bomb should have been forbidden under the Geneva Convention prescription against the use of poisonous gasses in warfare.
[The French also deliberately exposed their soldiers to nuclear tests to figure out what would happen as late as the 1960s](_URL_3_).
| [
"The medical effects of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima upon humans can be put into the four categories below, with the effects of larger thermonuclear weapons producing blast and thermal effects so large that there would be a negligible number of survivors close enough to the center of the blast who would experience ... |
why is syria potentially america's problem, and not the un's? | The UN is pretty powerless most of the time. In this case, Russia, a close ally of Syria, doesn't want the UN to intervene, and they have veto power.
The list of humanitarian crises where the UN couldn't intervene, or didn't until it was too late, is quite long. It usually comes down to power struggles and political squabbling. | [
"\"Foreign Policy\" journalist Thomas E. Ricks wrote in his blog on ForeignPolicy.com, that one of the additional reasons he saw for declining to intervene in Syria is that doing so against the will of the American people, as American Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power had recently advocated, is \"prof... |
starcraft and its culture | Starcraft is a real-time strategy game for the PC, originally released in the late 90s. It was created by Blizzard Entertainment, also known for the Warcraft and Diablo series. Starcraft II was released a couple years ago after a 10+ year hiatus. The game revolves around collecting and using resources to create an army and a military base with which you destroy your opponent. If you've played Warcraft, Age of Empires, or any other RTS game it's relatively similar.
By culture I'm going to assume you mean the eSports scene and the obsession around it. As with any competition, the only real "start" to it was when people started gathering together to play. As the game got more popular and the skill level of the players increased, the events themselves increased. Over time, the events got large enough that tech companies started sponsoring players or teams of players to go to these events and compete, similar to how Nike or Addidas might sponsor a cyclist or a tennis player. In return for some sort of payment, the player might wear a patch from that company on their jersey, or give small shout-outs to them if they win. The game comes with a built-in spectator mode where a non-player can view the whole map, different stats about each player, and other cool things you can't do while you're playing. Since most people are not actually at the event, having an "observer" moving the camera around the map to important battles and things is important, otherwise the people at home won't know what's going on. Similarly, events will hire or sponsor "casters" to come and give sports like play-by-play and strategy commentary on the game. Generally casters are former or current players who simply like the game a lot, similar to how a football commentator might be a former quarterback. Most of these events are streamed online nowadays, with thousands of viewers watching players from all over the world compete for cash prizes, bragging rights, or invites to other tournaments. That's the basic run-down. I skipped over the whole Korea vs. Everyone else thing because it's not as important to a basic understanding, as long as you know that South Korea has a very long history and engrained culture around Starcraft, and has the best players in the world for the most part. Everyone is else is usually called a "foreigner" if they're not from Korea.
Also [check this thread out for more posts/info](_URL_0_) | [
"StarCraft is a military science fiction media franchise, created by Chris Metzen and James Phinney and owned by Blizzard Entertainment. The series, set in the beginning of the 26th century, centers on a galactic struggle for dominance among four species—the adaptable and mobile Terrans, the ever-evolving insectoid... |
Why doe the Universe have so much angular momentum? | I wouldn't say that the universe has angular momentum. But all the systems you mentioned started from very dispersed material gradually collecting in shallow gravity wells, which attract material around it (including material in other gravity wells). when two collections of material converge, the angular momentum of the sum is conserved. imagine two cars traveling at right angles, and one t-bones the other on the rear fender. visualize the forces involved, then try to imagine clouds of dust and gasses loosely held together by gravity. each of these impacts, unless dead on, will impart spin. | [
"Conservation of angular momentum states that J for a closed system, or J for the whole universe, is conserved. However, L and S are \"not\" generally conserved. For example, the spin–orbit interaction allows angular momentum to transfer back and forth between L and S, with the total J remaining constant.\n",
"Le... |
What would happen to a human body if it was exposed to say 2000°C for just a 1000th of a second? | It would have to do with what kind of medium the temperature was being carried through. That makes a difference because it'll determine how much energy is transferred to the body. Air wouldn't transfer very much because the thin layer of air next to the skin would transfer a little heat, then act as a thermal insulator that prevents the other hot air from touching the skin.
In any case, it's really unlikely anything more than some surface burns would occur. I say that because your body is mostly water (~75% we'll say) and most of that water is near the surface (in your skin). You bones and organs, are therefore, pretty well protected.
So let's say you weigh in at about 80 kgs. That means about 60 kg of you is water. Water can absorb a lot of energy before increasing in temp; in fact it takes 4.16 Joules to raise 1 gram of water 1^^o C. So, to raise your body temp 1 degree C we'd need about
(4.16 J/g) x (60,000 g) = 249,600 Joules of energy.
Okay, we can concede one point here: heat transfer isn't perfect and since your body is being heated from the outside the top layers of skin will heat faster. Skin accounts for about 3.7 kgs (8 pounds).
To raise the temperature of the skin 1 degree C would then (still assume 75% water):
(3.7 kgs of skin) x (1000 g/kg) x (.75 water) x (4.16 J/g) = 11,544 J
So to raise our skin temperatures 1 degree would require about 11.5 kJ.
If we assume skin temp is about 37^^o C and it gets damaged at around 75^^o C we'd need to raise skin 38^^o C so we'd need about 437kJ of energy.
The big question, then, is in 1/1000th of a second, how much energy could be transferred to the skin?
If the material we're using is at 2000^^o C we need it to be able to impart and transfer a lot of energy very quickly. The truth is that most things don't transfer energy that quickly. So how could we transfer 437 kilojoules of energy into your skin? Well, We could try it with light.
Using light we can assume we'll use normal, visible light (though UV light could be used too). Assume we heat the body all the way around - like you're standing in a big room filled with light bulbs.
A good way to measure this would be wattage since that's what we're used to measuring light in. 1 watt = 1 J/sec. In 1/1000th of a second a 100 watt lightbulb will release .1 watts. Hmm.. that's really low output if we need 437,000 joules in 1/1000th of a second.
So let's do the math to figure out how bright the room will need to be:
437,000 J x 1,000 = 437,000,000 watts
In other words, you'd need a light that shines at about 437 million watts to raise your skin temperature to a dangerous level.
In reality, it'd need to be higher than this because your body actually does a nice job of reflecting a lot of light off you. In addition, air would almost immediately carry the heat (in the form of thermal or infrared radiation) away from your skin.
I'd estimate about 60% of the heat would be reflected away and not absorbed. So really then, we're looking at a light that is 612 million watts.
That would be enough energy in 1/1000th of second to singe your skin and leave you feeling hurt. But it probably wouldn't kill you.
In the few seconds after being exposed to the heat the energy would be transferred deeper into your skin and muscle, but again, most of you is water and water has a high specific heat capacity. So your internal body temp would rise, but for the most part, not to any dangerous levels. Your body would immediately start cooling itself through sweating and dilating blood vessels. In addition, the air around you would heat from your skin radiating thermal energy away, which would create a convective cycle around your body and carry heat away faster. You'd actually probably cool down pretty fast.
Light is probably the best form of energy transfer. And you couldn't really expose a body to any other medium for only 1/1000th of a second. To expose your body to molten metal in just 1/1000th of a second you'd have to have the metal moving at around 1,000 ft/sec. That alone would kill a body. Water would be moving at around the same speed. Air would carry less momentum, but it would still need to hit a body at ~1,000 ft/s which is enough to tear your skin off (1,000 ft/s is about Mach 1 @ 681mph).
Okay, one note: your eyes would be cooked if exposed to this much light. Your eyes are EXTREMELY sensitive. Imagine, you can sit on a beach and your skin can handle being exposed to direct sunlight for a while. If your eyes are exposed to direct sunlight for even a short glance (by looking at the sun) it hurts. If you stared for a few seconds at the sun you can suffer permanent damage. So you'd need something to cover your eyes that blocked out all light during the exposure.
TL;DR: You should really ask about exposing the body to energy (not temperature). For such a short period of time the only energy source really capable to do that would be light. You'd need a room with about 612 million watts of light to raise the skin enough to cause a burn. Although painful, 1/1000th second exposure to that wouldn't kill you.
2000^^o C of any other material wouldn't be able to transfer enough energy to your body to seriously hurt you (other than burn your skin). However, the burns might be severe enough to cause infection, which maybe could kill you? Probably not that bad of burns though.
| [
"Profound hypothermia (< 14 deg°C) usually isn't used clinically. It is a subject of research in animals and human clinical trials. As of 2012, the lowest body temperature ever survived by a human being was 9 °C (48°F) as part of a hypothermic circulatory arrest experiment to treat cancer in 1957. This temperature ... |
So, if a visible star went supernova (in our reference of its light reaching Earth), how fast would be see it explode? | There's a confusing typo in your question, but all visible stars are within our own galaxy and moving at velocities far less than the speed of light relative to earth. So we would see the supernova play out in approximately real time. This has happened in the past, and is the source of the word 'nova' in the context of astronomy. A star too dim to be seen with the naked eye went supernova in the year 1572, making it bright enough to be seen. Astronomer Tycho Brahe wrote a paper about it, calling it the *stella nova*, or 'new star'. Astronomers now study the same star as a supernova remnant.
That star, [SN 1572](_URL_0_), is about 10000 light years away, so it actually went supernova about 10500 years ago, but we still see whatever's happening in real time, just with a 10000 year delay. | [
"The distance is estimated to be around 6,000 parsecs and has a high luminosity of between and . It has a high radial velocity of . According to the studies of Jura \"et al\" (2001), the star may explode as a supernova in the next 100,000 years.\n",
"The first confirmed superluminous supernova connected to a gamm... |
What was the long-term aim of the alliance between Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan? Was it simply an alliance of convenience against Great Britain or was there some longer-term vision behind it? | The intent of the Alliance between Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan was to squeeze *Russia*, not Great Britain. Or rather "to squeeze the USSR".
But let's back up. First we should *very quickly* talk about how unlikely the alliance is, on the face of it. Relations between the two powers historically had been strained. Germany had strongly supported Russia during the Russo-Japanese war of 1904/5 (the Russians got curb-stomped). Germany had moved to support Russia during this fight because Japan had been spreading into China during the preceding decade, and the European colonial powers (Germany chiefly among them) felt that Japanese influence needed to be checked.
Japan had then joined World War One on the side of the Allies, not the Central Powers - on the face of it strange, but not really, because Japan wanted to snap up Germany's colonial possessions in the Pacific and (surprise surprise) China. Although the Allies were victorious, "white" countries like Australia and the Dutch opposed giving the Japanese all the Pacific territorial gains the Japanese believed they deserved, because those countries feared the increase in influence that would give over; coupled with that fear was anxiety about the detrimental effect an Asian imperial nation might have on the native people living in colonized countries (ie, it might make them 'restless'). This staunch opposition to what the Japanese felt was their rightful reward created a climate of Japanese resentment against all European parties involved in this dispute.
Couple this with the Nazi's rampant and ultimately suicidal levels of racism, you can understand why an Alliance between these two parties needed a pretty compelling reason to get off the ground.
That reason was the Soviet Union.
Hitler always wanted to expand towards Ukraine and western Russia; he spells it out, black and white in "Mein Kampf." ("Mein Kampf" is definitely the most boring book in the entire world, by the way, which perhaps explains why so few historians actually manage to read it.) The Soviet Union was a kind of loathsome pot-purri of everything the Nazis decided to hate - Slavs with prime land and communism.
But the Soviet Union was also awesome - huge in scale, ambitious in production goals (even if those goals weren't often reached), and their military was doctrinally advanced (the purges of the '30s caused chaos, but that's a different tale.) With the trans-Siberian railroad, and a Navy and an Army Group based at both ends (at least in theory), the Soviet Union was both a Pacific and a European power.
On the Japanese side, an Alliance with Hitler is probably going to prevent your old enemy the Soviet Union from taking advantage of the chaos to invade China. You would prefer your fragile puppet-states to remain intact while you take the fight to the Chinese interior; you can leave them reasonably thinly garrisoned so long as the Soviets are worried about being struck from behind if they move to invade them. So that explains that neatly.
But now you are racist Hitler. You *know* you will invade the Soviet Union from the west at some point. You don't really want the Eastern parts of it - Siberia and such. But there is someone who *might* want that East - an expansionist power with a proven military and an old grudge against the Russian state.
Hitler's calculation was that the alliance would tempt Japan to move North after invading China, working in cooperation with Germany to seize Siberia while the Germans invaded from the west; this would force the Russians to fight on two widely separated fronts. The transfer of men and arms to the western front would be impossible. All this, if only the Japanese turn their eyes north to the untapped oil fields of Siberia and not the infrastructure and vulnerability of the Dutch East Indies, to the south. The Soviet Union would probably have collapsed had this actually been done.
Well, the Japanese decided not to play. But you can see why the Alliance might have been so attractive to both parties at the time, even if it was ultimately a destructive arrangement.
EDIT: /u/Driftwood44, thank you for correcting my spelling/stupidity. | [
"But there was another western nation which did value the Japanese - Nazi Germany. Indeed, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan wanted to form an alliance. A formal treaty of alliance was signed between Germany, Japan and Italy on 27 September 1940. Japan used the moment to move into northern Indo-China. This had been a... |
why can't hiv be treated with chemo therapy | I'm confused as to why you think it would be. The virus is still there. It would just attack the new T-cells. Chemotherapy specifically targets rapidly growing cells. Viruses are not cells and wouldn't be effected by a chemotherapy treatment. | [
"Many other drugs including common antibiotics may cause bone marrow suppression. Unlike chemotherapy the effects may not be due to direct destruction of stem cells but the results may be equally serious. The treatment may mirror that of chemotherapy-induced myelosuppression or may be to change to an alternate drug... |
what is the difference between a wet market and a farmer's market? | A wet market is just slang for a market that sells perishable goods. When people say wet market they usually mean markets that sell live animals for food and either slaughter it for you or sell it to you live. Most farmer's markets just sell produce and meat. | [
"A farmers' market is a physical retail marketplace intended to sell foods directly by farmers to consumers. Farmers' markets may be indoors or outdoors and typically consist of booths, tables or stands where farmers sell their homegrown produce, live animals and plants, and sometimes prepared foods and beverages. ... |
How does light from the sun shining from behind and over my CRT monitor, but not shining on to the screen, produce glare? | It's not producing glare, your eyes are adjusting to the bright light by reducing your sensitivity to light (like walking outside). Because your sensitivity is decreased, you can't see your relatively dim screen anymore. | [
"In conventional black and white (B&W) televisions, the CRT screen has a uniform coating of phosphor that emits white light when struck by electrons. The beam from an electron gun at the back of the tube is deflected (most commonly) by the varying fields from magnetic coils so it may be directed at any point on the... |
why do some stalkers want to kill their idols that they love so much? | There is probably a better explanation of it but it's sometimes something along the lines of "If I can't have you then no one can" | [
"Stalker and its hate are strengthened by the deaths of goblinoids, so it always seeks to inspire war, conflict, and death. Stalker has no worshippers, but many fear it. It has no priests or shamans. Goblinoids usually do not bother to attempt to propitiate Stalker, as it seldom does any good. The only exception th... |
what is the reason that some electrical devices with huge voltage ratings don't kill you, and what are the electrical properties that cause this? | For an honest to God five year old, I'd say voltage is like the mass of the electricity moving, amps are the speed. If a semi truck bumps into you, you'll be fine, whereas a bullet that has orders of magnitudes less mass but plenty of speed will cause you trouble. I'm no electromagician though. | [
"Exceeding the power rating of a device by more than the margin of safety set by the manufacturer usually does damage to the device by causing its operating temperature to exceed safe levels. In semiconductors, irreparable damage can occur very quickly. Exceeding the power rating of most devices for a very short pe... |
why is everyone making such a big deal about hillary clinton's emails? | Edit: it was pointed out to me that at the time of Clinton's tenure in office, using a government issued email wasn't legally required, only strongly suggested.
Government employees, especially high ranking ones, are required to use official government email addresses and servers for their work related issues.
There are two reasons for this, one is for security purposes, and two is for accountability and transparency. Basically they don't want another government or group trying to hack into unsecured emails containing sensitive information, and they want to make sure that somewhere down the road those official emails can be retrieved and reviewed.
So it came to light some time ago that Ms. Clinton was using her private email address to send official emails, which is a pretty big security breach, and is somewhat suspicious. It's a pretty tough line to sell that it was accidental, seeing as Ms. Clinton has held a government job for about as long as email has been in regular use.
That brings up the question of why. I'm no conspiracy theorist, nor am I fan of the Republicans, but I can't think of a good reason for this situation to have happened. | [
"Publish June 30, 2008: Hillary Clinton's campaign had it all: near-death moments, hard-won triumphs, dysfunctional relationships—and a staff consumed with infighting over how to sell their candidate. It was a battle that revealed why she came so close to victory, as well as why she didn’t make it.\n",
"During th... |
When sneaking or trying to do something quiet, why do I unconsciously tighten my jaw muscles? | Sneaking around is tense stuff. Do you tighten them in other tense situations? If so that may be a correlation. | [
"BULLET::::- Limited range of mandibular movement, which may cause difficulty eating or even talking. There may be locking of the jaw, or stiffness in the jaw muscles and the joints, especially present upon waking. There may also be incoordination, asymmetry or deviation of mandibular movement.\n",
"The tensor ty... |
how could mj have been so broke if he owned the rights to all the beatles songs? | Ridiculous purchases and not paying his debts. There's always going to be more and more ridiculous things to spend money on. | [
"Lennon began writing \"Strawberry Fields Forever\" in Almería, Spain, during the filming of Richard Lester's \"How I Won the War\" in September–October 1966. The Beatles had just retired from touring after one of the most difficult periods of the band's career, which included the \"more popular than Jesus\" contro... |
why doesn't the radio work when you start the engine? | The starter motor sucks up a great deal of current as it starts the engine. There isn't really any electricity to spare for the radio while the starter motor is drawing current. | [
"The \"spark\" radio transmitters during Collins time could not transmit sound (audio) as modern AM and FM radio transmitters do. This was because the discharge of a spark cannot produce continuous waves, but only damped waves. Instead they transmitted information by telegraphy, the operator turned the transmitter ... |
why do cars take longer to start when in cold weather vs warm weather? | Gasoline burns when it's a mixture of gasoline vapor and air. When it's cold it is harder to evaporate it | [
"A cold start is an attempt to start a vehicle's engine when it is cold, relative to its normal operating temperature, often due to normal cold weather. A cold start situation is commonplace, as weather conditions in most climates will naturally be at a lower temperature than the typical operating temperature of an... |
what is the "halting problem" in relation to something being turing complete? | Halting problem means that
It's impossible to make a program that sees if another program runs indefinitely
For example this pseudo code would run forever
10 X = 0
20 PRINT "Hello world"
30 X = X + 1
40 IF X > 0 GO TO LINE 20
X will never get 0 or under and so the code will run forever. This is easy for humans to see but not for computers.
| [
"In 1936, Alan Turing proved that the halting problem—the question of whether or not a Turing machine halts on a given program—is undecidable, in the second sense of the term. This result was later generalized by Rice's theorem.\n",
"The halting problem for Turing-complete computational models states that the dec... |
Do all stars have sunspots? What would a sunspot on VY Canis Majoris be like? | It's a very interesting question, actually. Very large stars have a very different [stellar structure](_URL_2_) than our Sun. Our Sun is [convective](_URL_3_) at the surface. A giant star would be [radiative](_URL_1_) at its surface.
The convection of the Sun is one of the major driving forces behind the appearance of sunspots, so a star with convection only deep in the interior would [certainly behave differently](_URL_0_). | [
"The commonly observed starspots are in general much larger than those on the Sun: up to about 30% of the stellar surface may be covered, corresponding to starspots 100 times larger than those on the Sun.\n",
"Both stars in the system are red dwarfs. The primary component of the system is only 23.7% as massive as... |
Is the Karrick process the best way to use coal? | Offhand, there is the [Fischer-Tropsch](_URL_0_) process which converts a feedstock such as coal or biomass to synthetic fuel/oil and other byproducts. Some researchers at my university (Colorado School of Mines) are working on reactors to run a F-T process on combined coal-biomass feedstocks. | [
"The Karrick process was invented by Lewis Cass Karrick in the 1920s. Although Karrick did not invent coal LTC as such, he perfected the existing technologies resulting the Karrick process. The retort used for the Karrick process based on the Nevada–Texas–Utah Retort, used for the shale oil extraction.\n",
"The K... |
stack (programming) | A stack is a data structure. Like a stack of plates, the last plate you put on the stack is the first one you take off. This is known as LIFO, last in first out. A stack is useful if you are working on a task A and get interrupted by task B. You put A on the stack and start to work on B. When you're done with B, you check the stack to see what the previous task was. If C interrupts B, you put B on the stack, and start work on C. | [
"A stack-oriented programming language is one that relies on a stack machine model for passing parameters. Several programming languages fit this description, notably Forth, RPL, PostScript, BibTeX style design language and many assembly languages (on a much lower level).\n",
"A stack is a standard C++ container ... |
how does anything live on islands where the max elevation is less than about 20 feet? | The same waves typically peter out as the sea floor elevation rises towards the island.
While it does happen, the waves produced out at sea dont carry the same force as a tidal wave, as only the surface water is raised (vs a tsunami in which the entire depth of the ocean is raised) | [
"There are a number of \"high islands\" which rise no more than a few feet above sea level, often classified as \"islets or rocks\", while some \"low islands\", such as Makatea, Nauru, Niue, Henderson and Banaba, as uplifted coral islands, rise several hundred feet above sea level.\n",
"On Earth, the elevations c... |
Has any country ever managed to wage a two or more front war and win? | I'll go so far as to say that Israel's 1948, 1967 and 1973 wars are the quintessential examples of how to win a multi-front war. In all three, they leveraged superior air power to great effect and emphasized concentration of force, defeating enemies in turn. I suggest Michael Oren's *Six Days of War* and Abraham Rabinovich's *The Yom Kippur War* for readable, fascinating histories of the latter two conflicts. | [
"The two countries have made contradictory claims of combat losses during the war and few neutral sources have verified the claims of either country. The PAF claimed it shot down 104 IAF planes and lost 19 of its own, while the IAF claimed it shot down 73 PAF planes and lost 59. According to the independent sources... |
why does turning the music down in the car help you better find a parking spot | Your brain finds it easier to process sounds so prioritises them.
When you turn the music down it's got less work to do | [
"When the car is parked, the car's steering wheel and instruments sit in an \"idle\" position on the centre console to allow the driver easy entry. The steering wheel and instruments assume their correct positions when the driver presses the start button and the headrest rises from the seat once the driver is seate... |
the (arbitrary) difference between species and subspecies? | > how is it decided that the variation within a species has become large enough to classify an animal as a different species altogether?
When someone feels it is, but one of the criteria they're supposed to use is that the two groups can't (or don't) regularly interbreed. This usually is a good signal that substantial differences have developed in the gene pools. | [
"A subspecies is a taxonomic rank below species – the only recognized rank in the zoological code, and one of three main ranks below species in the botanical code. When geographically separate populations of a species exhibit recognizable phenotypic differences, biologists may identify these as separate subspecies;... |
why does it look like time goes one second backwards when you look at an analog watch? | The short version is your eyes are moving faster than your brain can deal with it, and you're experiencing lag. While your eyes are trying to focus on the new target (the watch), your brain isn't able to interpret the images for a short time. Once it "catches up," the brain realizes it has a gap in its memory, so it takes the first new image that it *can* process, and copy/pastes it over the gap.
So if you look at your watch at 25.5 seconds, and your brain doesn't catch up until 26.0 seconds, it takes the image of 26.0 seconds and pastes it over the .5 seconds it took for the lag to go away. So you *think* that you're seeing 26.0 seconds for 1.5 seconds...you were actually looking at the watch while it said 25, but you don't remember it.
_URL_0_ | [
"A common occurrence of this illusion is known as the stopped-clock illusion, where the second hand of an analog clock appears to stay still for longer than normal when looking at it for the first time.\n",
"An analog watch has hands to show the time. One for the hours is short and thick. One for the minutes is l... |
why is the top of the wine cork smaller, thus easier to put its end first back into the bottle | Not an expert but I'd assume expansion of the cork through absorption of wine/liquid on the bottom end due to its contact and proximity to the liquid within the bottle. This environment also ensures the bottle stays sealed after bottling.
(Edited for spelling) | [
"Although cork was historically chosen to seal wine bottle for other reasons (including its inert nature, impermeability, flexibility, sealing ability, and resilience), cork's poisson's ratio of zero provides another advantage. As the cork is inserted into the bottle, the upper part which is not yet inserted does n... |
light years - light travel distance vs proper distance | That's not why the universe is 14 billion years old. That would make it seem like Earth is the center of the universe. The observable universe is 46 billion light years in any direction, 93 as the diameter. The reason we can see them is because everything used to be much closer together, but everything is moving away from each other.
_URL_1_
_URL_0_ | [
"The light travel distance of the light that we observe from UDFy-38135539 (HUF.YD3) is more than 4 billion parsecs (13.1 billion light years), and it has a luminosity distance of 86.9 billion parsecs (about 283 billion light years). There are a number of different distance measures in cosmology, and both \"light t... |
Considering the Higgs field permeates all of space how is it related to a vacuum? | In field theory, we work with it being given that there are space and time. The *vacuum* is the field configuration that minimizes the energy. It turns out that it takes less energy to have a non-zero value of the Higgs field throughout space than it would to have no Higgs field. Thus the vacuum in the Standard Model is space filled with a non-zero Higgs field.
| [
"Unlike other known fields such as the electromagnetic field, the Higgs field is scalar and has a non-zero constant value in vacuum. The existence of the Higgs field became the last unverified part of the Standard Model of particle physics, and for several decades was considered \"the central problem in particle ph... |
veterinarians: How similar are the treatments for different animals? | Former Vet-tech here.
Most of the veterinarians I worked with only felt comfortable with dogs and cats. We had one Vet at the office who would do some exotics (mostly stuff like hamsters, but he would see the occasional reptile), but for the most part there are veterinarians who specialize in those kind of animals. Aside from the division between dogs and cats and exotic pets, many veterinarians work exclusively with horses, while others work exclusively with livestock. The needs of the owner are different in all of these examples (dogs and cats are companion animals, livestock is more of a business, and horses are kind of a hybrid), which is one of the drivers of business specialization.
Even between dogs and cats though, there is a massive different in physiology. Cats especially get poisoned by many drugs that dogs can handle. There is def a lot of cross over in general medical best-practices however (triage and surgery hygiene).
I am not a Vet, but I hope that clarifies a bit. | [
"Most veterinary physicians work in clinical settings, treating animals directly. These veterinarians may be involved in a general practice, treating animals of all types; they may be specialized in a specific group of animals such as companion animals, livestock, zoo animals or equines; or may specialize in a narr... |
how does a company actually go about planting 20 million trees? | You plant whips; these are 12 - 36 month olds bare stems with root buds usually about a foot long. You can literally just stick them in the ground. This is regularly done on quite large scales and there are suppliers who grow and prep these. My father in law and his brother planted ~ 50 acres of their farm with mixed deciduous 20 years ago, which used about 50,000 tree whips planted at ~6ft spacing. | [
"WeWOOD promises to plant one tree for each watch sold. For this purpose, WeWOOD works with American Forests to plant trees in North America and Trees for the Future to plant trees in other countries. By the end of 2013, the company had planted 250,000 trees. Of these 50,000 trees were planted in Ghana, 7,500 in Te... |
How powerful are satellite signals? | GPS satellites are supposed to be about the power of a car headlamp - imagine a 50 watt bulb illuminating a hemisphere of the globe! The signal is incredibly weak, about 400 times weaker than background noise. In fact the signal is so weak that you can't pick up the GPS signal unless you know what the signal is.
The satellites used for TV are much much more powerful, around 10-20kW, and the signal is targeted at a much smaller area of the globe, for example Western Europe might have a dedicated satellite. Also at the receiving end you have a nice big dish to capture as much energy as possible. | [
"All satellites broadcast at the same two frequencies, 1.57542 GHz (L1 signal) and 1.2276 GHz (L2 signal). The satellite network uses a CDMA spread-spectrum technique where the low-bitrate message data is encoded with a high-rate pseudo-random (PRN) sequence that is different for each satellite. The receiver must b... |
Driving in rural VT yesterday I noticed spiral icicles hanging from a few power lines along the road. One section had about 5 of them almost touching the ground (~20 ft.). Any idea what would cause this? More details inside. | They're hanging from power lines, which will oscillate in the wind. That could cause it. I'll bet if you knew the freezing rate, wind speed and direction, and powerline length and thickness you could graph the size of the coils of ice as a periodic function, or at least get pretty close. | [
"By 2009, the ground and first floor windows and doors had been boarded up, and green netting attached across each end to prevent falling debris causing injury to passers-by. Demolition of the adjacent spiral car park began in April 2010, but due to complications with an electrical substation was halted soon after,... |
what "run as administrator" does to a software? | Software runs on top of the operating system. Normally the software should not be altering the operating system that it's running on. Back in the 90s and early 2000s there were LOTS of problems with windows and viruses, mainly because Windows allowed any software to alter itself to whatever needs the software had. Virus makers took advantage of that. But also many legitimate programs did it because it was easy and it allowed them to do things not originally intended by the OS programmers.
Come later versions of windows, Microsoft decided enough was enough and no longer allowed software to run as administrator by default. Not running as administrator forbids the software to make changes to the underlying structure of the operating system (I think this first happened in windows vista).
So now, software did not run with administrator privileges. This was all well and good. It took some time but most software makers updated their programs so that they did not require administrator privileges to run.
So what's happening to you is that the software you are trying to run has a legitimate reason to change the OS, or the programmers were lazy and never updated it from the older ways of doing business, or the software is infected with a virus.
My personal rule is that if software requires administrator privileges to run, it's likely a good idea to just not run that software. | [
"A system administrator, or sysadmin, is a person who is responsible for the upkeep, configuration, and reliable operation of computer systems; especially multi-user computers, such as servers. The system administrator seeks to ensure that the uptime, performance, resources, and security of the computers they manag... |
since we have invented the combined shampoo and conditioner in a bottle, why are we still persisting with one bottle for shampoo and one bottle for conditioner? | The good stuff isn’t in a combination bottle. Also the ratio of shampoo to conditioner a person needs depends on that person. | [
"The first commercially produced dry shampoo was sold in the 1940s, but the product existed before that. By the early 1940s, the Stephanie Brooke Company of Jersey City, New Jersey had developed Minipoo, the first brand of commercially produced dry shampoo powder. Minipoo was marketed to women and children for use ... |
It is common knowledge that Honeybees are disappearing in alarming numbers. But it is also known that all insects are disappearing in alarming numbers. Is there a connection? Are bees disappearing at the same rate as other insects? | Honeybees are not disappearing in alarming numbers. Its a common misconception that they are. [USDA numbers for the past 3 years](_URL_1_).
Number of Honey bee colonies in the U.S.
|Year|January|April|July|Oct|
:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|
|2018|2.63 million|2.69 milion|N/A|N/A|
|2017|2.64 million|2.69 million|2.99 million|2.85 million|
|2016|2.62 million|2.80 million|3.18 million|2.62 million|
So the total number of colonies in Oct 2016 was actually less that the number in Jan 2018. You can make other correlations both positive and negative but they are not vanishing in alarming numbers. There are seasonal fluctuations with numbers of hives peaking in summer and at a low point in January and there are yearly changes, but the numbers are staying pretty steady. The [Honey Bee loss Survey](_URL_0_) that the press loves to quote from "40% hive losses" is a loss survey not a TOTAL hives survey. It seeks to record how many hives were lost (not just died but combined by beekeepers as part of best management) not how many were gained that make up for those losses. And it records the losses from the peak to the nadir without a lot of regard for seasonal changes that happen naturally or because of best management practices by beekeepers. The more recent loss surveys are gathering more information about when the losses happen and gains happening but the press doesn't report that well because those numbers aren't sensational headlines.
So to answer the last question first. No they are not disappearing at the same rate.
Other insects are vanishing for several reasons. The first being habitat loss. As we turn natural areas into managed ones, even pretty grass covered parks, we are losing the natural habitat those insects need. Lawns are a desert. Wheat and corn (neither produce nectar honey bees collect) fields sprayed regularly to eliminate insects which feed on them are also deserts.
Honey bees however are managed, we keep them in hives and transport them around. They are not as dependent on the natural habitat as other insects. In fact we often create habitat (certain crops) for them that are not conducive to other insects like citrus groves. While the leaves of those crops might be a food source there isn't nesting available for other type of Hymenoptera (bees, wasps, ants) like ground nesting bees or leaf litter for them to hide under. The honey bees thrive on the bloom of crops like citrus and almonds living in their boxes on the side of the grove, but rows are mowed/sprayed to keep weeds down that eliminates places for other insects to nest and hide.
The second reason is we also spray large areas to control insects directly. We spray crops, lawns and homes specifically to eliminate non-honey bee insects. While tend to specifically avoid spraying those crops when they are in bloom and honey bees are present. Homeowners might not be so careful but the farmers are. Beekeepers who have contracts with a farmer will have clauses in the contract that if the farmer sprays the hives and kills the bees the farmer is at fault and will pay not only the pollination fees but for the economic loss of the hives. The target insects are those that eat the leaves of the crop, not ones pollinating them.
The last major reason is pests. While we know quite a lot about honey bees pests (varroa mites being the big one contributing to recent losses) we know very little about the pest of other insects. In the last several decades we have introduced tracheal mites, small hive beetles, a new strain of nosema, and varroa mites which carry some 30+ viruses to honey bees. We have no idea what we might have introduced to other insects that aren't managed in the same time period.
Now all this isn't to say honey bees aren't having issues. Every hive we lose is an economic cost to a beekeeper he does not want. Every time a beekeeper has to treat his hive for pests its a cost he does not want. But their losses overall are nothing compared to the problems other insects are having.
I am a beekeeper.
EDIT: converted to table | [
"Vanishing of the Bees is a 2009 documentary film by Hive Mentality Films & Hipfuel Films, directed by George Langworthy and Maryam Henein and released in the United Kingdom in October 2009. The story is centered on the sudden disappearance of honey bees from beehives around the world, caused by the poorly understo... |
I'm a shipowner in Britain during WW1 and my ships are be requisitioned by the Navy. How am I compensated for my loss? | Ships requistioned by the Royal Navy from British citizens during WWI fell into two main categories: liners requisitioned for use as Armed Merchant Cruisers (AMCs) and trawlers, yachts and drifters hired for patrol duties. The former category included several ships that had been built using money loaned or invested by the British government. This came with the stipulation that, in event of war, these ships would be turned over to the Royal Navy for conversion into AMCs. Such ships were typically constructed with reinforced decks and fittings for guns, to ease conversion. Ships that fit into this category include the Cunard liners *Mauritania* and *Lusitania*, though they were never really used as AMCs. As part of an agreement signed in 1903, Cunard were paid £150,000 per year, in return for putting these two ships at the disposition of the RN, with the International Mercantile Marine Co receiving similar payments for the potential use of White Star Line ships. Otherwise, if a shipping line wished to take a contract with the Royal Mail to carry mail, its ships would have to be made available to the RN in time of war, Subsidies were also granted to ships that might have been useful Either way, the owners were well compensated prior to the war beginning. Whether or not the ship was built with RN funds, the ships were hired from their owners. An example would be the P & O liner *Macedonia*, which cost the RN £1,698 per week. Rates for the hire of Cunard and IMM ships were set by the 1903 agreement, with the Cunard ships being available at a rate of 25 shillings per month per ton. The ships were also available for outright purchase, at a rate of 110% of their value at time of purchase. In addition, the owners would be compensated when a hired ship was lost. For example, the White Star Line's *Oceanic* was estimated, in 1905, to cost £705,617 if she were to be lost. Meanwhile, owners of smaller ships, whether hired or requisitioned, were also compensated. Hire rates were initially set at 12 per cent per registered ton, with four percent depreciation from the original cost per year. However, this was found to be insufficient, and it was swiftly raised to 18 per cent. Typical pay for trawler hire by the RN was £100 per month.
Several ships under construction in Britain were also requistioned or purchased from foreign governments. The most important were the Ottoman battleships, *Sultan Osman I* and *Reşadiye*, the Chilean battleships *Almirante Cochrane* and *Almirante Latorre*, and the Italian liner *Conte Rosso*. Several destroyers, cruisers and monitors were also requisitioned, from navies including the Greek, Portuguese and Brazilian. In the case of the Ottoman ships, no compensation was paid, as the Ottoman declaration of war came soon after their requisitioning. *Almirante Cochrane* and *Conte Rosso* were purchased while incomplete, and both were converted into carriers, with the former becoming HMS Eagle and the second becoming HMS Argus. *Almirante Latorre* was purchased by the RN in 1914, and served as HMS Canada. She was sold back to Chile in April 1920, at a cost just a third of her original value. | [
"The Admiralty paid £53,676 compensation to the B&CDR for the loss of the ship but the railway found that a new ship would cost £64,000. Given the changed economic circumstances after the First World War the company decided not to replace her.\n",
"In 1942, shipowners who had lost ships (either as a casualty of w... |
how can doctors a see a babies organs like their kidneys with ultrasound? | Sound waves go through soft substances and reflect of surfaces where the density changes. Baby kidneys are a different density than the rest of the baby-inards (not a medical term). That change in density causes a reflection that the ultrasound processor can use to produce a display image. | [
"Ultrasound is routinely used in urology to determine, for example, the amount of fluid retained in a patient's bladder. In a pelvic sonogram, organs of the pelvic region are imaged. This includes the uterus and ovaries or urinary bladder. Males are sometimes given a pelvic sonogram to check on the health of their ... |
Are extremophiles a relatively recent evolution, or does it appear that life on earth quickly spread to all available environments? | There's good evidence that extremophile organisms are among the most ancient on the planet. Many archaeal species are often found in extreme environments (high pressure, high salinity, high heat, no sunlight etc...) and the archaea are likely to have branched from the last common ancestor of life very early indeed.
However if you descend to the deeps parts of the ocean there are a great number of extremeophile animals which would be very much more recent. | [
"Extremophiles have adapted to live in some of the most extreme environments on Earth. This includes hypersaline lakes, arid regions, deep sea, acidic sites, cold and dry polar regions and permafrost. The existence of extremophiles has led to the speculation that microorganisms could survive the harsh conditions of... |
No offence or racism intended, but is it possible that some African Americans are better at physical activities because they were selectively bred during slavery? | Africa has more genetic variety than any other continent, and also a very high level of environmental variety.
And not all physical activities are alike. Kenyans and Eritreans perform better than anyone else in the world at distance running; both countries are in Northeast Africa, and have towns at very high altitude.
Jamaicans are currently leading the world in sprints - they are predominantly from Akan (Ghana, Ivory Coast) and Igbo (Nigeria) ethnicities, i.e. West African. Towns are much closer to sea level. So you take two parts of Africa, you get radically different genetic origins, environmental origins, and thus athletic capacities.
African Americans, meanwhile, [come from the Bakongo, Igbo, Mandé, Wolof, Akan, Fon and Makua tribes, among others](_URL_0_). So what I'm trying to tell you is that African-American is not really a useful way of identifying a group for sporting purposes. When you say African-American, you're identifying a wide range of groups, some of whom are naturally gifted at sprinting, others who are naturally gifted at distance running, and many of whom are just as poor at athletics as you or I. If you want to get real about athletic performance, you have to talk about actual genetic roots. The differences between west- and east-african tribes emerged over many, many generations, not the mere handful that were lived through by American slaves.
Finally, even if the slave-owners were trying to breed their slaves for physical strength or endurance, it would have made very little difference over the time period involved. It wouldn't be surprising if they tried it, since eugenics was extremely popular in America at the time. But if it had been effective, African Americans would perform significantly better than Africans in sport, and that doesn't really seem to be the case, at least if you correct for differences in wealth. | [
"In the United States, due to the influence and laws making slavery a racial caste, and later practices of hypodescent, white colonists and settlers tended to classify persons of mixed African and Native American ancestry as black, regardless of how they identified themselves, or sometimes as Black Indians. But man... |
how is it that being able to pass a top secret security clearance test isn't part of the process of running for president? | > I'm genuinely curious as to how this isn't part of the process. Is there any test at all?
This is a simple necessity of a democratic style of governance. If you create a process by which an entity must approve of a candidate before they can be elected, then that entity actually is in charge of who gets the position, not the people. This is especially true if those criteria are opaque to public scrutiny or subject to judgment calls; we might easily say that requiring presidential candidates to be 35 or older because everyone can tell if that is true or not, but identifying a security risk isn't something that the public may even be allowed to know the reasons behind. | [
"Under normal conditions, the President of the United States is required by Title to \"ensure that the congressional intelligence committees are kept fully and currently informed of the intelligence activities of the United States, including any significant anticipated intelligence activity as required by [the] tit... |
what's happening when i'm overthinking about something? |
So, your question is a little bit broad, but the easiest way to explain it is, overthinking something is usually brought on by a stressful or potentially stressful situation.
With that being said, you can overthink any topic if you tried, and here is why.
Though "overthinking" is a slang term, we don't use that word in the medical field, well we do when we say it to each other, but it is not a diagnosis or anything. When facing the stressful situation or whatever the case may be, there are probably multiple aspects to the situation. Albeit emotional or decision-based.
When the brain begins to focus on possible outcomes versus obvious or controllable outcomes this triggers the chemical response that causes stress, which leads to more thinking of all the variables in the situation. So you have this trifecta of things going on.
1. Situation
2. Variables / Emotional response vs. Behavioural
3. Introduction of stress, leading to an overwhelming feeling.
So when this happens, and everyone does it, so its not something that you need not worry about. To stop it, turn your attention to something else and take a refresher, tv show, youtube browsing, just something distracting. Then re-visit the situation and even make a pros and cons list if that helps. Now of course sometimes these things pop up last minute with little time to respond, but again take a breather, then approach it again.
Qualifier: I am a Medical Doctor.
Disclaimer: All information provided in posted comments are answers to posted questions. No comment is intended to diagnose, or treat any illness, disease, or disorder, however basic descriptions of posted questions may lead to the recommendation of consulting your primary care Physician.
question posed however basic descrriptions of comments may all medical issues should be addressed by your primary care Physician. | [
"\"I'm Thinking of Ending Things\" is narrated by Jake's unnamed girlfriend. They met in a pub during a college trivia night, and Jake gave her his phone number. Several weeks later he takes her to meet his parents on their remote farm. She has been considering \"ending things\", but has not told him yet. It is a l... |
why are we more sensitive to background noises when we have less sleep? wouldn't our senses be more dull without sleep causing us to hear less background noise? | With better sleep, our brains are able to function more efficiently, allowing us to focus on tasks better and not be distracted as easily, even if we can sense things more easily as well. | [
"Noise can make sleeping difficult on occasions, whether from snoring, talking and social activities in the lounge, people staying up to read with the light on, someone either returning late from bars, or leaving early, or the proximity of so many people. To mitigate this, some wear earplugs or eye-covering sleepin... |
Does it get significantly harder to heat water another degree as temps go up? | To add to what /u/DCarrier said, in practice it gets harder, because the hotter the pot of water gets, the more heat it [radiates](_URL_0_), and the stronger the convection currents around the pot (causing heat lost to the air). Furthermore, if you use an electric kettle, the resistivity of the resistive heating element goes up with temperature, so the wattage of the heating element will go down a bit as the temperature increases. | [
"A short period of hot weather can increase temperatures in the surface layer of water, as the warmer water tends to stay near the surface and be further heated by the air. In this case, the top warmer layer may have more oxygen than the lower, cooler layers because it has constant access to atmospheric oxygen. If ... |
Why was the USSR peace offer to Finland during the Winter War so generous, all things considered?? | As soon as the war began to turn sour for their German co-belligerents in 1943, Finland began to seek a graceful exit from the conflict. Secret negotiations were conducted by the Finnish government with the Allies in 1943 and 1944, but no conclusive agreements were ever reached. Meanwhile, the USSR began a bombing campaign against Helsinki in early 1944, hoping to force Finland to surrender. These raids were ultimately a failure both in tactical and strategic terms; very little damage was done and Finland felt no urge to surrender, especially as the Soviets offered more and more unfavorable terms. The Red Army broke the Siege of Leningrad in January 1944, and drove the German forces back towards Narva. This prompted Finnish Field Marshal Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim to tell German High Command that Finland would surrender if Axis forces were driven from Estonia, as the Soviets would be able to conduct further air attacks over the Gulf of Finland from recaptured bases there. In lieu of this, the Red Army launched an offensive against Finland in June 1944 that drove their forces back towards the city of Vyborg. While the Finns could not hold their ground, they did manage heavy losses on the attacking Soviet forces, who eventually ground to a halt. The offensive also drained the Finnish Army of any further resources to conduct the war.
However, President Risto Ryti had made an agreement with German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop that Finland would not seek a separate peace. This was taken only as a personal understanding. Seeing the writing on the wall, Ryti resigned on 1 August and Mannerheim took his place as President of Finland. Mannerheim cancelled Finland and Germany's agreements and sought peace with the USSR and Britain on 17 August, and received said peace terms from the Soviets on 29 August. These terms were (after further negotiations in September): Finland must demobilize its forces; remove any German forces from within its territory; return its borders to those of the 1940 Moscow Armistice that ended the Winter War, plus cede the Petsamo region to the USSR; pay $300 million (app. $4.3 billion today) in war reparations over six years; legalize the Communist Party of Finland and ban any parties the USSR deemed fascist; and try any individuals the Soviets considered responsible for the war.
As for why Stalin did not ask for more, this is fairly debated. First, the Soviet Union never held much of Finnish territory; it would have been seen as blatant antagonism by the western Allies for the Soviet Union to try to force a regime change in the Finnish government or take the entirety of Finland. Pressing for further concessions may have led Finland to leave the negotiating table and force the Soviets to take further losses. It is very likely Stalin did not want to continue needing to redirect his forces to hold the "Finnish sideshow." At the Tehran Conference in 1943, Stalin said his only objectives in Finland were territorial concessions, reparations, and military bases. Finnish military leadership, having learned Soviet military forces in the Leningrad region were to be transferred to the reserves, also knew the Soviet Union was no longer interested in occupying Finland by 1944. The Soviet Union wanted to focus on beating Germany, not conquering Finland.
For my sources, I will suggest:
Raunio, Ari; Kilin, Juri (2008). *Jatkosodan torjuntataisteluja 1942–44 [Defensive Battles of the Continuation War 1942–44]* (in Finnish). Keuruu: Otavan Kirjapaino Oy.
Vehviläinen, Olli (2002). *Finland in the Second World War: Between Germany and Russia.* New York: Palgrave.
Ylikangas, Heikki (2009). *Yhden miehen jatkosota [One Man's Continuation War]* (in Finnish). Otava. | [
"The Soviet Union argued that it was the only rightful government for all of Finland that was capable of ending the Winter War and restoring peace; however, before the end of the war, the Soviets gave up this interpretation to make peace with the preexisting government of Finland, which was still recognized by the ... |
why are some people's voices much louder or softer than others? | Vocal chords. Diaphragm. Breath control. Projecting.
And that sprinkle of "residual self-image." | [
"Bone conduction is one reason why a person's voice sounds different to them when it is recorded and played back. Because the skull conducts lower frequencies better than air, people perceive their own voices to be lower and fuller than others do, and a recording of one's own voice frequently sounds higher than one... |
How do fruits and vegetables stay "fresh" in their peels after they're picked? | Peel is like a nutrition storage for the fruit and it provides nutrients to the fruit itself but once it's depleted it rots.peel also prevent fruit do come in contact with different gases in atmosphere which are harmful for it. | [
"After the fruits are picked and washed, the juice is extracted by one of two automated methods. In the first method, two metal cups with sharp metal tubes on the bottom cup come together, removing the peel and forcing the flesh of the fruit through the metal tube. The juice of the fruit, then escapes through small... |
What kind of polarization does light have before it goes through a polarizing filter? | It depends on the source of the light. For the most part, something like sunlight is unpolarized, meaning that it is comprised of a random assortment of all different polarizations. A polarizing filter blocks all the components of the light source that are not propagating in the right direction.
However, there can be things in the environment that aren't "intentional" polarizing filters that still have an effect--light reflected off of the surface of water tends to be polarized; this is why there can be a painful glare on a lake on a sunny day. | [
"A Faraday filter, magneto-optical filter, FADOF or EFADOF (Excited Faraday Dispersive Optical Filter) works by rotating the polarization of the light passing through the vapor cell. This rotation occurs near its atomic absorption lines by the Faraday effect and anomalous dispersion. Only light at the resonant freq... |
why does wine age in the bottle, beer goes skunky in the bottle, and whiskey doesn't change in the bottle? | Beer goes skunky because there are certain flavor compounds from hops that break down when exposed to UV light, from sunlight or even in-store fluorescent lights.
Even some beers age in the bottle. Sierra Nevada beers are often bottled early, and finish aging as they make their way from the brewery to distributor and eventually retailer. I assume some other brands do that as well.
Whiskey's aging needs a barrel, because the flavor compounds come from the charred wood in the barrels. Once it's bottled, there are no flavor compounds in glass. | [
"Bottle variation that increases over time typically comes from the packaging. Exposure to heat or light can cause a wine to mature more quickly or even make it taste \"cooked\". Bottles aged in the chilly cellars of Sweden's alcohol monopoly are famous for tasting younger than the same wine stored at a more typica... |
if digestion takes 6-8 hours how do people experience diarhea symptoms in hours? | Diarrhea happens precisely because digestion *hasn't* happened yet. Yes, normally it takes hours for food to make its way through your stomach and intestines to slowly absorb water and nutrients, but diarrhea is bypassing all that. Your gut has a ton of nerves, and when it senses something is amiss for any reason, it triggers your brain to send signals to get whatever is causing the situation out as quickly as possible. That means there's little to no absorption of water or nutrients. In fact, the intestines can actually add water or mucus to get things flowing even faster. | [
"Gastrointestinal symptoms can appear 24 hours after ingestion of affected molluscs. They may include vomiting, nausea, diarrhea, abdominal cramps, and haemorrhagic gastritis. In more severe cases, neurological symptoms can take several hours or up to 3 days to develop. These include headache, dizziness, disorienta... |
why do some wwii-era propeller planes have a cable from near the cockpit to the tail/wings? | its the antenna
if im right older radio used lower frequencies which worked well with super long antennas | [
"Propeller aircraft use one or more propellers (airscrews) to create thrust in a forward direction. The propeller is usually mounted in front of the power source in \"tractor configuration\" but can be mounted behind in \"pusher configuration\". Variations of propeller layout include \"contra-rotating propellers\" ... |
what exactly are complex numbers, how can someone just invent new numbers and expect other people to accept them? | People didn't think negative numbers were a thing either until someone invented/discovered them and convinced people. Imaginary numbers really aren't that different. If you look at some very basic equation you can see the need for both the arise.
* x + 1 = 2
* x + 1 = 0
* x^2 = -1
The first one is easy. The second one is odd though. No counting number exists to solve it, nor does a fraction of a number. The only answer is some weird kind of opposite number. You define that as a -1 = 0 - 1 and you just came up with a whole bunch of new numbers, none of which are something you can count. In hindsight you may say we use them for banking, temperature, elevation, etc, and that is true, but nonetheless they were a weird concept at first.
The third equation runs into a similar same problem. The only way to solve it is to create a new set of numbers, and use 1j = sqrt(-1) as the answer. You can't count 1j objects, but neither can you count -1 objects. And in hind sight, imaginary numbers have lot of application that were not seen at the time. Electricity, quantum physics, differential equations.
Complex number are simply the result of combining imaginary and real numbers. Just as x + y can never be simplified beyond that, a complex number can never be simplified beyond a similar form like 1 + j. While we may never be able to count 1 + j things, we also can't count -1 things either. Complex numbers serve the same role as negative numbers, they can be applied to situation and speed up the calculation of certain things or even allow us to calculate thing we never could before. | [
"In simple terms, a method can be devised so that every formula or statement that can be formulated in the system gets a unique number, called its Gödel number, in such a way that it is possible to mechanically convert back and forth between formulas and Gödel numbers. The numbers involved might be very long indeed... |
why does intermittent fasting lead to "longer living" and healthier aging? | It is my understanding that it causes the body to go into more of a survival mode, rid itself of dead cells that were kind of hanging around not doing any good, and jump start creation of new stem cells. But the mechanism of action for this is still being studied and is not fully understood at this time. | [
"A 2018 review of intermittent fasting in obese people showed that reducing calorie intake one to six days per week over at least 12 weeks was effective for reducing body weight on an average of ; the results were not different from a simple calorie restricted diet, and the clinical trials reviewed were run mostly ... |
marijuana. | "Marijuana" is a special word for the common hemp plant, or cannabis — which is a plant that has been used for thousands of years for a lot of different things; such as rope, fabric, paper, oil, and drugs. The word "marijuana" or "marihuana" used to be a rare slang expression, but government people in the early 20th century started using it a lot in order to make hemp sound more foreign, and to make it sound scary to people who didn't like foreign things.
When people smoke or eat the buds or resin of the hemp plant, it does a bunch of different things to them. The most obvious is that it usually makes people feel good. Depending on the kind of hemp and the person doing it, it can make people feel happy, excited, relaxed, and a bit dizzy. It can make music sound prettier, make colors seem brighter, and make silly things funnier.
On the other hand, it can also sometimes make people scared or overwhelmed and unhappy. And other people think it makes them lazy or boring. People are different, and while some people like the effects of cannabis a lot, others don't. That's normal — just as some people really like the taste of olives or broccoli or red wine or blue cheese, and others really dislike them.
Hemp does other things, too. One is that it usually makes people a little bit hungry — you might have heard of this as "the munchies". This same effect helps keep people from throwing up if they are sick. This is why many people with AIDS or cancer use cannabis — because the medicines they take for AIDS or cancer are very powerful and make them throw up, but the hemp helps stop that.
Why does cannabis make people feel relaxed and happy? It affects certain parts of the brain, which are involved in feeling emotions, pain, and other sensations. It does this in a way which — for some people — can cancel out depression and certain kinds of chronic pain. This is another reason people take cannabis as medicine.
But people also often use cannabis just because it is pleasant and fun — just as people play games, or watch TV, or do other hobbies, or use other drugs like beer or coffee, just because they like to do so. A lot of people believe that there is nothing wrong with doing things just for fun, so long as nobody else is getting hurt. (It wouldn't be okay for a parent to just play games *all day* and neglect their kids — but that doesn't mean it's bad to play games *once in a while*.)
On the other hand, sometimes people use cannabis too much. It's not very common — it's actually a lot *less* common than people drinking alcohol too much. But because smoking hemp is pleasant and relaxing, people can get used to doing it a lot. This can make it harder for them to do other things with their life. The fact that cannabis is against the law makes it even harder, though — because they have to hide what they are doing, which makes it harder to change.
Today, cannabis is against the law almost everywhere. This means that when the police find out that someone is doing it, they come around and arrest people and take them away to jail. They often take away their car and house too. And if they have kids, those kids might have to grow up without their parent around to take care of them. This is really sad! Many people think that *even if* cannabis is bad for people, it's not as bad as what the government does to people who use it today. *Even if* you think that using cannabis is a bad idea, that it makes people goofy and silly and lazy, you might agree that this isn't as bad as dragging those people away to jail. | [
"Marijuana, also known as cannabis, is a euphoriant and hallucinogenic drug prepared from the dried leaves of the strong-smelling plant \"Cannabis sativa\". Marijuana is a commonly used drug, legal in many states.\n",
"Marijuana is a preparation of the Cannabis plant intended for use as a recreational drug and as... |
why does the word "smelly" carry a negative connotation? | "Smelly", quite obviously, comes from the verb "to smell".
"Smell" is an interesting word. The first recorded use of the word is from the late 12th century, when it appeared in Middle English (as smillen, smellen or smyllen). Some sources say there's no written record of it having been used in Old English before that, but others say it comes from Old English "smylllan" or "smiellen".
Interestingly, those Old English words could mean "to emit fumes", and there are related words in Middle Dutch and Middle Low German which mean "to smoulder". Some of those still exist in one form or another in modern languages.
So it seems the word "smelly" always meant a bad smell, associated with emitting fumes or smouldering. Being related to a good smell (smelling of roses) seems to be a much later change to the meaning of the word. But although we can use "smell" to mean a good smell (but we must qualify it when we use it this way) it's much more rare to see "smelly" used in this way. | [
"In the United Kingdom, \"odour\" refers to scents in general; but in the United States, and for many non-native English speakers around the world, \"odor\" generally has a negative connotation as a synonym for \"stink\". An unpleasant odor can also be described as \"reeking\" or called a \"malodor\", \"stench\", \... |
Were there any major changes in the relations between England and its allies during and soon after the process of Oliver Cromwell becoming Lord Protector? | I answered a similar question a few weeks ago which you might find relevant:
[_URL_0_](_URL_1_) | [
"As Lord Protector, Cromwell was aware of the Jewish community's involvement in the economics of the Netherlands, now England's leading commercial rival. It was this—allied to Cromwell's tolerance of the right to private worship of those who fell outside Puritanism—that led to his encouraging Jews to return to Engl... |
why are our heads propelled forwards rather than backwards when sneezing? | A sneeze is the autonomic equivalent of squeezing a near empty ketchup bottle. When you're trying to get ketchup out of the bottle, you rapidly thrust it at the food and bring it to a sharp stop while simultaneously squeezing the bottle. A sneeze is like that. The head is brought forward and then rapidly stopped while a blast of air helps to propel the now mobile snot out of the nasal cavity. | [
"There is much debate about the true cause and mechanism of the sneezing fits brought about by the photic sneeze reflex. Sneezing occurs in response to irritation in the nasal cavity, which results in an afferent nerve fiber signal propagating through the ophthalmic and maxillary branches of the trigeminal nerve to... |
mitochondrion. | Mitochondria are responsible for aerobic respiration, which is an extremely efficient process for getting useable chemical energy (in the form of ATP) from the breakdown of glucose.
ATP is a useable form of chemical energy that many processes in your body require to carry out your functions, including your muscles. No ATP = no body function = death. ATP can be thought of as as currency or fuel that runs everything.
The simplest form of glucose breakdown is called glycolysis, which doesn't rewuire mitochondria. One molecule of glucose can yield two molecules of ATP through this process. Aerobic respiration yields about 30 molecules of ATP per molecule of glucose.
This means that, without mitochondria, you would have to consume 15 times as much food to get the same amount of energy out of it.
Unlike most other parts of your cells, mitochondria are actually a separate species from the rest of your body. They are a bacteria that is most closely related to Rickettsia, which is actually a parasite in Arthropods (insects and spiders etc). | [
" Mitochondria are organelles found in all but one eukaryote. Mitochondria provide energy to the eukaryote cell by converting sugars into ATP. They have two surrounding membranes, each a phospholipid bi-layer; the inner of which is folded into invaginations called cristae where aerobic respiration takes place.\n",
... |
why is a sawed off shotgun more deadly than a regular one? | It's not any more deadly. The main issue is that they're much easier to conceal. | [
"A sawed-off shotgun (or \"sawn-off\") refers to a shotgun whose barrel has been shortened, leaving it more maneuverable, easier to use at short range and more readily concealed. Many countries establish a legal minimum barrel length that precludes easy concealment (this length is in the U.S. and 24 inches in the U... |
(or slightly older) - what is the relationship between the us dollar and middle eastern oil? | I can answer 1 and 3. I don't know anything about 2.
1) Other countries have to buy US dollars in order to buy oil. Depending on how favorable the exchange rate is for their home currency that day this could cost them more or less. The US doesn't have to go through the extra step of converting our currency before buying oil.
3) There would be slightly less demand for US dollars and so the value would go down. But, the money spent to buy oil is a fairly small percentage of people buying US currency. | [
" Perhaps one of the most significant moments in American economic involvement in the Middle East came in 1933 with Ibn Saud, founder and king of the new Saudi Arabian kingdom awarded concessions to the American company, Standard Oil of California. While the British had been the main western power involved in the M... |
Travel experience at light speed? | It works like this: Time for you will always move at the same rate. One second per second. Always.
The only time you will ever hear different is if you talk to a friend that is moving relative to you. That conversation would go like this:
friend: Hey. I'm glad we have these magic cellphones that let us talk to each other while we're moving. Because you just zoomed past me.
you: What? No. You zoomed past me.
friend: Well, I'm on a planet and you're on a ship, but whatever. The point is; I used my magic glasses to look at the particle decay experiment you've got going on and I thought you should know things are taking a lot more time than they should be.
you: What? You're wrong. Everything here is happening exactly when it's supposed to. My watch says so.
friend: Yeah. That's the thing...your watch only ticks off a second every couple of minutes or so.
you: That's dumb. Your clock's in fast forward.
friend: Nope. I'm looking at two other clocks. I'm right. You're slow.
you: I'm looking at clocks too. I'm right. You're fast. And dumb.
friend: Look. I'm just trying to do you a favor.
you: I hate you.
friend: I made out with your mom once.
END SCENE | [
"In 2018, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency made public a 2010 report that surveyed multiple different approaches to faster-than-light travel. One physicist who reviewed the report explained, that, while the theories were legitimate, they did not represent \"something that's going to connect with engineering any... |
if the illuminati is such a huge conspiracy and such a huge group, why do we have so little information about them? | They don't actually exist.
You can't find concrete information about a phantom. | [
"Many conspiracy theories propose that world events are being controlled and manipulated by a secret society calling itself the Illuminati. Conspiracy theorists have claimed that many notable people were or are members of the Illuminati. Presidents of the United States are a common target for such claims.\n",
"Th... |
how does walmart know what i've bought in store? | If she used a credit card or a debit card your name is on those accounts and they know who you are. So if she bought with cash this is creepy, but all other payment methods has a link to her account in some manner. | [
"BULLET::::- Scanning Products: Allows user to scan items at home or in store to find similar products in nearby stores or online and compare prices. This can also be done with a name search. The application has partnerships with over 40,000 retailers, including Barnes & Noble, Best Buy, Nordstrom, Sears, Target, a... |
How would an army attack a castle in medieval Japan? | This gets into generalization, but I don't think the overall concept of a seige would vary much because of how a castle was designed. Specific tactics might vary a lot based on specific layouts, but the overall concepts are pretty much the same.
Castles work (or "worked) because it is difficult to take them from a defending army. The concept of a seige is not about storming the castle, although that somtimes did happen. It was about surrounding the castle, and keeping the people inside from going out to get food/water etc. As seige equipment became more advanced it became possible to break down city and castle walls and sieges became about breaking the will of the defenders before breaking the walls.
For example, [The seige of Ishiyama Hongan-ji](_URL_0_) - It's wiki, but backed up by cites to Sansom, George (1961). *A History of Japan: 1334-1615.* Stanford: Stanford University Press, and Turnbull, Stephen (2003). *Japanese Warrior Monks AD 949-1603.* Oxford: Osprey Publishing.
This occured during Oda Nobunaga's attempt to unify japan. The Ishima Fortress lies on the coast of Japan, and a naval attack was impossible because Nobunaga did not have a dominant navy. 15,000 men were defending the fortress compared to Nobunaga's 30,000.
Several attempts at direct attacks on the fortress were repulsed. Nobunaga then settled in for the long haul, and from 1576 to 1580 he blockaded the fortress, defending himself against sally attempts by the Ikki. The Ikki then surrendered in April 1580 after a direct request by the emperor (at Nobunaga's request).
| [
"A typical military confrontation in medieval times was for one side to lay siege to an opponent's castle. When properly defended, they had the choice whether to assault the castle directly or to starve the people out by blocking food deliveries, or to employ war machines specifically designed to destroy or circumv... |
why does asphalt on the highway sound different on different sections of road? | Higher air voids in the asphalt mix make it quieter to ride on as the air is not forced through the tire thread. This is a function of the different aggregate sizes and % of those sizes in the mix
In contrast, concrete is pretty much solid and is very loud | [
"Most roads are cambered (crowned), that is, made so that they have rounded surfaces, to reduce standing water and ice, primarily to prevent frost damage but also increasing traction in poor weather. Some sections of road are now surfaced with porous bitumen to enhance drainage; this is particularly done on bends. ... |
why are we still using inflatable tires on our vehicles? | As compared to what alternative?
Air filled tires are a relatively simple invention that lacks a more complex but better alternative. | [
"Companies started to use tire manipulators mostly because of safety and effectiveness. In the past, many people were injured, or even killed by heavy tires exploding or falling. It was also time consuming to change tires. Mainly for these two reasons companies realised there is a need for special equipment that ca... |
Does the pull strength of a magnet lowers when it is pulling multiple objects versus one heavy object? | If I understand correctly- you're basically asking if the magnetic attraction is a fixed amount that needs to be spread out to everything near it, or if it pulls them all seperately and equally.
If that's a misinterpretation, sorry and lemme know how to fix it!!
If that's your question, then it's the latter. Regardless of how many things are near the magnet they'll all get pulled the same.
A reasonable approximation to this is planets going around the sun. The fact that earth is orbiting it doesn't mean it's "lost gravitational pull strength" to use on mars. It pulls them both according to their properties | [
"The attraction from a fixed strength magnet decreases with increased distance, and increases at closer distances. This is unstable. For a stable system, the opposite is needed, variations from a stable position should push it back to the target position.\n",
"As gravitational pull increases, the magnet's acceler... |
what is the purpose of those "safe/supervised injection sites" and how are they better than just trying to stop drug use? | I've used these services when I had an active addiction. It makes all the difference in the world in terms of helping you eventually quit.
Think of it as having periods of life-threatening lack of caring about yourself.
Using IV drugs, especially heroin, is like having the ability to feel bliss and oblivion at the press of a button. Everything goes away for a few hours, and the shittier your life is at the moment, the more desperate you become for that on-demand escape. So when the effects of your drug use comes knocking (i.e. getting thrown on the streets, testing positive for HIV, seeing a friend OD), your mind automatically thinks "the solution to this feeling is more heroin". There's no logic to it, other than 'the more bad feelings=greater desperation for heroin".
At safe-injection sites, you have health care professionals that do the minimum amount of caring for your life for you. They will provide sterile equipment, test the random bag of drugs you've just gotten from a stranger, they'll advise you on which vein might be less damaging to use, they'll administer you a reversal agent if you overdose.
They keep you alive and somewhat in a better physical state, so you have more to live for.
Most importantly for recovery, the time you've tried finding a vein for 45 minutes and throw your syringe across the room in utter defeat... they're there to ask "is it today that we can look at getting you to a rehab?". So because that you don't have an amputated arm and HIV, you're more likely to say yes because not *everything* is hopeless.
These are just the direct benefits to the user. The benefits to the society are also immense. No one wants people using in their apartment entrance, needles on the sidewalk, people OD'ing on the subway. | [
"The provision of supervised injection sites, also referred to as safe injection sites, operates under the premise of harm reduction by providing the injection drug user with a clean space and clean materials such as needles, sterile water, alcohol swabs, and other items used for safe injection.\n",
"Supervised i... |
if you gave everyone in your country one billion dollars what would happen to the economy? | In the spirit of ELI5, let's pretend that the country we're talking about has 100 people in it.
Let's say that, right now, the total amount of currency that this country has is one million dollars.
Divided by one hundred people, the average amount of wealth is $10,000 per person.
If you suddenly printed one hundred BILLION dollars, and gave each person a billion of it, there would now be one hundred thousand TIMES as much money as there was before the giveaway.
When there is more money available, everyone can afford to pay more for stuff.
Owners of stuff can then charge more for their stuff, since everyone has more to spend.
This is called inflation, and it doesn't help anyone actually get richer.
In our scenario, the candy bar at the store that cost $1, will soon cost $100,000. Since everyone has 100,000 times more money, spending $100,000 after the giveaway is about the same as spending $1 before the giveaway.
In the real world, inflation doesn't happen as fast (although hyperinflation has happened in some countries) , but that's the net effect when countries print more money.
In summary: printing more money does NOT equal more wealth, it just drives prices higher.
EDIT: I assume printing money is what you meant by "gave everyone in your country" If there happened to be one person who really had so much money, that he could GIVE his own wealth away, at the rate of one billion dollars per citizen, and no new printing of dollars was required, then those people would really be wealthy, while the giver would be poor(er).
| [
"In 2010 national governments spent an average of $2,376 per person, while the average for the world's 20 largest economies (in terms of GDP) was $16,110 per person. Norway and Sweden expended the most at $40,908 and $26,760 per capita respectively. The federal government of the United States spent $11,041 per pers... |
how is water from a well potable? | the way water flows down into ground reserves acts as a natural purification process. most often well water is naturally clean enough, but modern day wells is treated as a precaution, but prior to this, people regularly drank well water untreated. | [
"A water well is a mechanism for bringing groundwater to the surface by drilling or digging and bringing it up to the surface with a pump or by hand using buckets or similar devices. The first historical instance of water wells was in the 52nd century BC in modern-day Austria. Today, wells are used all over the wor... |
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