question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
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used car pricing. | 1. people highball their car because potential buyers will haggle down the price. that is a near guarantee, so they list the car higher.
2. people wildly overestimate the value of their car. it might have 200k+ miles and there might be a crack in the manifold... but it drives like a dream!
3. dealerships generally p... | [
"The growth of the Internet has fueled the availability of information on the prices of used cars. This information was once only available in trade publications that dealers had access to. There are now numerous sources for used car pricing. Multiple sources of used car pricing means that listed values from differ... |
The Colombian conflict from the 60s until 1994. Anyone know any good resources? | I can't recommend it because I haven't read it yet and I'm not a historian, but the [book list](_URL_0_) has one book on Colombia. It covers a wider area, but it's worth pointing out if you're interested in the subject.
To the mods: I'm technically referring to the book list and not making a rogue recommendation, so p... | [
"The 1992 Colombian energy crisis was a crisis of the Colombian energy sector during the presidency of César Gaviria, from May 2, 1992, to February 7, 1993, caused by El Niño. El Niño caused droughts across much of the country, which lowered reservoir levels at many of its principal hydroelectric dams and a further... |
Why was the Domus Aurea in Rome buried? | It was not abandoned wholesale, as many think. The Flavian emperors who came to power after Nero's death in 69 had listened to public opinion, and the Roman public was not very happy with Nero's capricious building program. We get scattered reference to the building as "hated." Tacitus (*Annales* 15.52) makes a charac... | [
"The tomb of the Roman emperor Hadrian, also called Hadrian's mole, was erected on the right bank of the Tiber, between AD 134 and 139. Originally the mausoleum was a decorated cylinder, with a garden top and golden quadriga. Hadrian's ashes were placed here a year after his death in Baiae in 138, together with tho... |
Why Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity didn't expand into the rest of Sub-Sahara Africa? | Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity had a distinct connection to the landed nobility and ruling houses of Ethiopia--through Biblical connections--and the theology in question was tied very strongly to SW Asia. People further inland did not gain anything from conversion to a religion that recognized a special sacred status... | [
"With the emergence of Islam in the 7th century, Ethiopia's Christians became isolated from the rest of the Christian world. The head of the Ethiopian church has been appointed by the patriarch of the Coptic church in Egypt, and Ethiopian monks had certain rights in the church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Et... |
How does prolonged use of pharmaceutical hypnotics (drugs used to treat insomnia) affect the human brain? | Just this morning, in Denmark, there were a big fuss in the news concerning an increased number of pharmaceutical hypnotics persciptions for children (age 0-11) and teens (age 12-19). In relation to what the OP is asking, if someone know, how does hopnotics affect children (babies and toddlers) in the long term, saying... | [
"A review of the literature regarding hypnotics including the nonbenzodiazepine Z drugs concluded that these drugs cause an unjustifiable risk to the individual and to public health and lack evidence of long-term effectiveness due to tolerance. The risks include dependence, accidents, and other adverse effects. Gra... |
how do doctors get prescription medication? can they prescribe them to themselves or do they need to go to another doctor? | They could prescribe for themselves, but they probably go to other doctors for a neutral point of view. Most doctors also are rich enough to go to another doctor when they're sick.
Source: My grandfather was/is (he's like part time at the age of 73) a doctor. | [
"Physicians control the distribution of prescription drugs. Some hospitals and clinics stipulate patients must buy prescription drugs from the hospitals or directly from the physicians who make the prescriptions. Such a restriction aims to prevent the loss of sales on prescription drugs to retailers, but retailing ... |
How did German citizens feel about American "invaders" towards the end of the war? How aware were they of the reasoning behind the war and how did they feel about their own government? | A gentle reminder that our rules don't allow for [personal anecdotes and speculation](_URL_0_). | [
"German Americans were sometimes accused of being too sympathetic to the German Empire. Former president Theodore Roosevelt denounced \"hyphenated Americanism\", insisting that dual loyalties were impossible in wartime. A small minority came out for Germany, or ridiculed the British. About 1% of the 480,000 enemy a... |
How do bacteria and viruses "know" where things are? | For viruses: They don't. Viruses enter a cell basically by "Velcro" -- they have a protein that will specifically stick to one of your normal cell proteins, and enter the cell that way. This is why viruses have "tropism" or in other words, they will only infect certain cell types which have that special protein they st... | [
"Bacteria exist in water, soil and food, on skin, and intestinal tract normal flora. The assortment of microbes that exist in the environment and on human bodies is enormous. The human body has billions of bacteria which creates the normal flora fighting against the invading pathogens. Bacteria frequently occur in ... |
If a human was thrown out into space, what would kill him first? Low pressure, low temperature, or lack of oxygen? | Lack of oxygen, although if you hold your breath there might be significant physical damage to your lungs. The low pressure environment of space would rapidly de-oxygenate your blood, whereas cooling would occur (relatively) slowly due to the lack of thermal transfer other than radiative cooling. Your skin's elasticity... | [
"Human physiology is adapted to living within the atmosphere of Earth, and a certain amount of oxygen is required in the air we breathe. If the body does not get enough oxygen, then the astronaut is at risk of becoming unconscious and dying from hypoxia. In the vacuum of space, gas exchange in the lungs continues a... |
What do you think about the parallel universes theory? | This comes up a *lot.* It appears to be a widespread misapprehension.
There *is no* "parallel universe" theory. Seriously. Not kidding. No such theory exists. No such *hypothesis* exists. It's all been made up by the peddlers of science-fiction stories.
There are questions about whether the fundamental constants — or... | [
"A parallel universe, also known as a parallel dimension, alternate universe or alternate reality, is a hypothetical self-contained plane of existence, co-existing with one's own. The sum of all potential parallel universes that constitute reality is often called a “multiverse\". While the three terms are generally... |
why do stadiums have such a short lifespan relative to other buildings? | Stadiums are basically concrete and aluminum seats. All the glitz goes in the boxes and high dollar seating. Then you have the dick measuring going on between owners over who has the best stadium. When they can find a government, local or state, to pay for it they want a bigger dick so they cut the maintenance and it g... | [
"Even though modular stadiums are built for permanent, long-term use, they still unite the many advantages offered by temporary construction, because they are quickly and cost-efficiently built with prefabricated modules. The modular construction also has another great benefit, which will become even more significa... |
Can a curved universe explain the accelerating expansion of the universe? | The accelerating expansion of the universe isn't due to a gravitational pull between galaxies. The space itself between galaxies is expanding. Which is why we view objects farther away from us as traveling faster away from us. The more distance in between, the more space that gets in between, so the faster it looks lik... | [
"The accelerating expansion of the universe is the observation that the expansion of the universe is such that the velocity at which a distant galaxy is receding from the observer is continuously increasing with time.\n",
"Another type of model, the backreaction conjecture, was proposed by cosmologist Syksy Räsän... |
Back in the days of Pangaea, was there nothing but ocean on the other side of the Earth? Or were there other continents, now lost? | It is a common misconception when looking at modern 2D maps that they only show half of the Earth's surface, when in fact it shows the entire surface. What you see is what you get with Pangaea. | [
"At the end of the Silurian period (c. 420 million years ago) the Iapetus Ocean had completely disappeared and the combined mass of the three continents formed the \"new\" continent of Laurasia, which would itself be the northern component of the singular supercontinent of Pangaea.\n",
"During the Permian, all th... |
Photons and relativity | The simple answer is that there is no photon's perspective, so the question isn't particularly meaningful.
If that doesn't satisfy you: photons, when propagating, don't behave like particles at all -- they're just oscillating electrical and magnetic fields spreading through space. It's only when they interact with som... | [
"Photonics is related to quantum optics, optomechanics, electro-optics, optoelectronics and quantum electronics. However, each area has slightly different connotations by scientific and government communities and in the marketplace. Quantum optics often connotes fundamental research, whereas photonics is used to co... |
why is fried food crispy? | Water is absorbed from the molecules surrounding the food items. When the h2o is freed the intermolecular bonds weaken and the item becomes crispy. | [
"There are a number of techniques to achieve crispiness when cooking. Frying food can make it crispy, such seen in French fries. A breading coating using flour, egg wash, and bread crumbs will provide a layer of crispiness. Baking and roasting impart crispiness, as well, as noted in the skin of Peking duck or perni... |
Why did no Medieval European country recreate a Roman style army? | There are several ways to look at your question.
It seems, though, that rather than speaking of professional standing armies in and of themselves, you're more curious about the tactics and such.
For that, first, you should look at the Battle of Adrianople in 378. In a battle between a Roman army led by the Emperor Va... | [
"After the defeat of Western Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium empire held on. The barbarian kingdoms had already set up their kingdoms in place, they started the process of recruiting and the advancement of soldiers. A warrior was highly respected according to the barbarian tradition, a brave war... |
1440p, 2k, 4k resolutions; what are they and why would i ever need these? | Yes, your eyes would tell a difference.
As good as 1080p is, there is still more information that could be displayed on screen with a higher resolution.
This information would likely be crisper edges, better definition of features, and most importantly, less aliasing.
Aliasing is when an object creates a stuttere... | [
"This resolution, sometimes referred to as 4K UHD or 4K2K, has a 16:9 aspect ratio and 8,294,400 pixels. It is double the size of Full HD (19201080) in both dimensions for a total of four times as many pixels, and triple the size of HD (1280720) in both dimensions for a total of nine times as many pixels. 38402160 ... |
Why does music make it easier to memorize things? | Storing memory and recalling memory are each improved with recruitments of more neurons coding for and recalling that memory. Additionally, when that memory is tied to another, easy-to-recall memory (such as a familiar tune), the signal fidelity is much better (compared to extraneous neural noise). Recalling a musical ... | [
"Despite the universality of music, enculturation has a pronounced effect on individuals' memory for music. Evidence suggests that people develop their cognitive understanding of music from their cultures. People are best at recognizing and remembering music in the style of their native culture, and their music rec... |
Why do some people have photographic memory, yet a normal person without one can still remember a huge quantity of information, such as the meaning of hundreds and thousands of words? What's the scientific difference between those two types of memory? | No one has a photographic memory. It has never been proven to exist in the real world. It's merely a creation of art/literature/film for the sake of plot.
Some people certainly have good memories, some of which are downright amazing, but no one has ever been recorded to have had a truly photographic (sometimes called ... | [
"BULLET::::- There is no scientific evidence for the existence of \"photographic\" memory in adults (the ability to remember images with so high a precision as to mimic a camera), but some young children have eidetic memory. Many people have claimed to have a photographic memory, but those people have been shown to... |
What would the inside of sun look like to the human eye? | It would appear brilliantly bright for a short time. The photons from fusion would still be very high energy, but the photons from temperature would not. It would emit lots of ultraviolet, blinding you, but also visible light.
It's a short time because the gamma rays would make short work of you. The radiation exposur... | [
"The visible outer surface of the Sun is called the photosphere. Above this layer is a thin region known as the chromosphere. This is surrounded by a transition region of rapidly increasing temperatures, and finally by the super-heated corona.\n",
"The visible surface of the Sun, the photosphere, is the layer bel... |
how is your brain able to recreate the sound of, for example, a song, perfectly in your head so it seems like you can hear it? | technically speaking, your brain is not recreating the sound of that song, it's only recalling its experience of it just like most other experiences it recalls, so your question is really a far more general one about how memories are stored.
However in the case of music there are probably a lot of areas of the... | [
"On 31 January 2012 Brian Pasley and colleagues of University of California Berkeley published their paper in PLoS Biology wherein subjects' internal neural processing of auditory information was decoded and reconstructed as sound on computer by gathering and analyzing electrical signals directly from subjects' bra... |
why are american doctors so willing to prescribe strong painkillers when doctors in every other country aren't? | **Tl;dr: It all boils down to different medical training and different laws.**
American doctors prescribe pain medication to prevent chronic pain, which is much more difficult to treat. Also, it is much more difficult for Americans to buy strong pain medications over the counter. In many Asian countries, prescription... | [
"Some prescription painkillers have been found to be addictive, and unintentional poisoning deaths in the United States have skyrocketed since the 1990s according to the National Safety Council. Prescriber education guidelines as well as patient education, prescription drug monitoring programs and regulation of pai... |
What is the lower limit of the number of cells that can make up a multi-celled organism? | The difference between a small colony and a true multicellular organism are probably arbitrary. Some protists like slime molds and volvox are capable of both unicellular and multicellular aggregations.
If you want a functional definition, I’d say that a multicellular organism would be any entity in which cells are he... | [
"Most living species have at least one upper limit on the number of times the cells of a member can divide. This is called the Hayflick limit, although number of cell divisions does not strictly control lifespan.\n",
"Cell size is highly variable among organisms, with some algae such as \"Caulerpa taxifolia\" bei... |
why do fish float upside down when dead or dying? | Fish have a pocket of air called a "swim bladder" that they use to help themselves swim up and down.
When a fish is healthy, they usually use chemical reactions to add or remove gas to the pocket, or just gulp in air and burp it out.
When a fish is dying, it starts to lose control of the pocket and may wind up over... | [
"It might be expected that fish would flee the potential suffocation, but they are often quickly rendered unconscious and doomed. Slow moving bottom-dwelling creatures like clams, lobsters and oysters are unable to escape. All colonial animals are extinguished. The normal re-mineralization and recycling that occurs... |
how do doctors determine if a sickness (specifically, topical) is caused by a bacteria, virus, or fungus? | They can either swab it and see what grows on media suited for microbial growth or through an immunoassay which uses antibodies and color indicators to identify specific probable species. | [
"In addition to the symptoms, an X-ray or computerised tomography (CT) scan of the infected area provides clues for making the diagnosis. Whenever possible, a doctor sends a sample of infected material to a laboratory to confirm identification of the fungus.\n",
"The biology of how an infection causes disease in ... |
they said "the water doesn't have an expiration date, the plastic bottle does" so how come honey that comes in a plastic bottle doesn't expire? | Whoever said that is wrong.
The FDA and IWBA can't find any evidence that age matters to plastic water bottles. The FDA has ruled that there is no limit to the shelf life of bottled water, and no company has even insinuated that the expiration is related to the plastic.
In 1987, New Jersey passed a law requiring all ... | [
"In the United States, according to the National Honey Board (an organization supervised by the United States Department of Agriculture), \"honey stipulates a pure product that does not allow for the addition of any other substance... this includes, but is not limited to, water or other sweeteners\".\n",
"While s... |
how are new domain extensions (such as .tech, .xyz, ect) created? | ICANN originally had domains for countries as well as the ones for organizations (com/org/net etc). Recently, though, ICANN opened it up and allowed anyone with too much money to register a top level domain. | [
"They can be downloaded from the online repository (TER) directly from the backend, and are installed and updated with a few clicks. Every extension is identified by a unique extension key (for example, \"tt_news\"). Also, developers can share new or modified extensions by uploading them to the repository.\n",
"I... |
what makes vlc able to play virtually any format and others players can’t? | Sheer force of will and engineering. The VLC devs have put a lot of time and effort into making sure they use the right codecs at the right time for the right reasons. The result is a good media player. | [
"Because VLC is a packet-based media player it plays almost all video content. It can play some, even if they're damaged, incomplete, or unfinished, such as files that are still downloading via a peer-to-peer (P2P) network. It also plays m2t MPEG transport streams (.TS) files while they are still being digitized fr... |
why are records still made of vinyl? i know they're more of a collector's item nowadays, but haven't we invented any materials that are more durable or would otherwise be better for the job? |
Audio for records is recorded to a surface that is scratched, then a mold is made, then a metal cast is made, called a master, then that metal mold is used to press vinyl into the shape of the recording.
Vinyl is used because it is easier to get a good copy of the mold without sticking to the metal.
It's just chea... | [
"In spite of their flaws, such as the lack of portability, records still have enthusiastic supporters. Vinyl records continue to be manufactured and sold today, especially by independent rock bands and labels, although record sales are considered to be a niche market composed of audiophiles, collectors, and DJs. Ol... |
what is a "confirmed kill"? is this a real military term or more a hollywood myth? | It's real. The military keeps records of sniper kills, the range, the weapon used...etc. Traditionally it wasn't publicly discussed and was sort of a "don't talk about fight club" rule among snipers, but Hollywood has popularized the term. | [
"Death of a President is a 2006 British docudrama political thriller film about the fictional assassination of George W. Bush, the 43rd and at the time, incumbent U.S. President, on 19 October 2007 in Chicago, Illinois. The film is presented as a future history docudrama and uses actors, archival video footage as w... |
would a gallon of water weigh the sams as a gallon of ice? | Your subject and the text in the post ask two difference questions,
> Would a gallon of water weigh the sams as a gallon of ice?
> I mean if you take a gallon of water and weigh it, then take that same gallon of water and freeze it.
The subject is a gallon of water and a gallon of ice, That is not the same as if ... | [
"In 2002, Nestlé insisted on a smaller container to increase profits and so the standard US half gallon (2 quarts) container (1.89 L) was downsized to 1.75 quarts (1.65 L) container. In May 2008, the 1.75 quart container was further downsized to 1.5 quarts (1.42 L). Most other ice cream manufacturers, with the nota... |
Since tidal force from the Moon moves such large quantities of water every day, do I weigh less at high tide? | You weigh a tiny amount less when the moon is directly overhead.
High tide occurs when the moon is overhead *and* when it's directly underneath. Tidal forces arise from the gradient of the moon's gravitational field across the Earth.
The moon pulls harder on the parts of the Earth closest to it than the parts furthes... | [
"Most places experience two high tides each day, occurring at intervals of about 12 hours and 25 minutes. This is half the 24 hours and 50 minute period that it takes for the Earth to make a complete revolution and return the Moon to its previous position relative to an observer. The Moon's mass is some 27 million ... |
Anyone know of any sources on the Republic of Pirates? | I actually [just picked up this book](_URL_0_) today! It was recommended to me by a flaired user on this subreddit and I think it's in the subreddit book list. | [
"The Republic of Pirates is the nomenclature for the base or stronghold of a loose confederacy run by privateers-turned-pirates in Nassau on New Providence island in the Bahamas for about eleven years from 1706 until 1718. Although not a state or republic in a formal sense, it was governed by its own informal 'Code... |
After reading about more and more exoplanets in the science media, I got to wondering what the most earth-like planet yet discovered is? Is there anything anywhere near the "habitable" zone yet discovered? | This isn't directed at you, but more general musing. I've noticed that every time there is a big exoplanet announcement, every body seems to forget the last exoplanet announcement. It's not that people weren't aware of them, each one generates dozens of questions here. Curious.
Anyway, here is the most recent: _URL_1_... | [
"In 2010, Kaltenegger explored whether we could observe geological activity, that is very important for habitability, on exoplanets, finding that about 10 times Pinatubo eruptions could be detected around the closest exoplanets, showing us if other planets are similar to our own Earth. In 2011, she led a team to mo... |
the newly discovered state of matter, "time crystals." what are it's properties, and what does it mean for scientific advancements? | I'm far from an expert on this, but this is what I understood when I read about them.
A regular crystal is a physical structure that does not change through time. A time crystal is a structure that does change through time, but does so predictably, on a cycle. If you have one that is on a 3 second loop, then at ever... | [
"The idea of a time crystal was first described by Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek in 2012. Later work developed a more precise definition for time crystals. It was proven that they cannot exist in equilibrium. Then, in 2014 Krzysztof Sacha predicted the behaviour of discrete time crystals in a periodically-driven man... |
why aren't there symptoms of high blood pressure? | High blood pressure can cause symptoms, which may include:
* Severe headache (tension in capillary walls in the head).
* Fatigue or confusion.
* Vision problems (pressure on the retina).
* Chest pain (tension in capillary walls of the heart).
* Difficulty breathing (edema in the chest).
* Irreg... | [
"Because there are no symptoms with high blood pressure, people can have the condition without knowing it. Diagnosing high blood pressure early can help prevent heart disease, stroke, eye problems, and chronic kidney disease.\n",
"Lower blood pressure is a side effect of certain herbal medicines, which can also i... |
Is the nucleus of an atom organized in any way, like the electron cloud is? | There are different theories for dealing with nucleons. The nucleus is a very complex object. That is because there are multi-body interactions between all the nucleons (protons and neutrons). The shell theory works very well and is very similar to how the electrons are organized into shells. The main difference is... | [
"Electrons, like other particles, have properties of both a particle and a wave. The electron cloud is a region inside the potential well where each electron forms a type of three-dimensional standing wave—a wave form that does not move relative to the nucleus. This behavior is defined by an atomic orbital, a mathe... |
What sort of role was planned for smaller members of NATO in the event of a Soviet attack? | I can't answer, but Albania, Slovakia (as part of Czechoslovakia) and Romania were all members of the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War. | [
"For much of the Cold War, to combat the overwhelming Soviet supremacy in armour and men, NATO planned to use much of West German territory as a flood plain in a defence in depth to absorb and disperse the momentum of a massed Soviet attack. Mobile anti-tank teams and counterattacking NATO armies would seek to cut ... |
How were black people treated in 20th century Britain as compared to America? | British Pathé's five minute 1955 short ["Our Jamaican Problem"](_URL_0_) offers a snapshot of some of the racial attitudes in mid-century Britain, when there was a strong wave of immigration from its (then) colonies in the Caribbean. Films like this would have been shown as part of the newsreel preceding the screening ... | [
"Post-Second World War Britain had a shortage of labour, which led to official policies to attract workers from the British Empire and Commonwealth countries. These people were placed in low-pay, low-skill employment, which forced them to live in poor housing. Economic circumstances and what were seen by many in th... |
why are most computer related numbers even? | Computers use binary numbers. We use decimal numbers.
Binary Decimal
1 1
10 2
100 4
1000 8
10000 16
100000 32
1000000 64
So in computer-ese, numbers like 64 and 16 are round numbers. | [
"Numbers has been well received in the press, notably for its text-based formulas, clean looks and ease-of-use. Macworld has given it high marks, especially newer versions, awarding Numbers '09 four mice out of five. They did point out a number of common issues, especially problems exporting to Excel and the inabil... |
Questions about herbivores and their digestive capacity | Q1) Most insects do not degrade cellulose, e.g. caterpillars excrete most of it. Leaf cutter ants use fungus gardens to break down cellulose whereas termites have gut bacteria to break down wood. Vertebrates also need bacteria in their guts to due it.
Q2) I don't think you need any special enzymes to degrade chloropla... | [
"A large percentage of herbivores have mutualistic gut flora that help them digest plant matter, which is more difficult to digest than animal prey. This flora is made up of cellulose-digesting protozoans or bacteria.\n",
"Herbivores digest cellulose by microbial fermentation. Monogastric herbivores which can dig... |
Deodorant dependance? | Probably a genuine observation but with a bogus explanation. Both acne and [strong "adult" body odor](_URL_0_) are common symptoms of the onset of puberty. Should we believe that the bad smell of teen school locker rooms is exclusively caused by the students who as little kids were forced to (needlessly?) start using... | [
"A deodorant is a substance applied to the body to prevent or mask (hide) body odor due to bacterial breakdown of perspiration in the armpits, groin, and feet, and in some cases vaginal secretions. A subclass of deodorants, called antiperspirants, prevents sweating itself, typically by blocking sweat glands. Antipe... |
In Aristotle's *Politics*, he refers to "the ancients". When people in classical Greece referred to Ancient times, how many years ago are they taking about. | We can't say with any definitive authority who "the ancients" in total were in the mind of Aristotle however we do know some specific individuals that he considered to be part of that group and can draw some inferences from that information. As a matter of obvious formality, let me start by stating that Aristotle lived... | [
"Aristotle (; \"Aristotélēs\", ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher during the Classical period in Ancient Greece, the founder of the Lyceum and the Peripatetic school of philosophy and Aristotelian tradition. Along with his teacher Plato, he has been called the \"Father of Western Philosophy\". His writings cover... |
Why does petting an animal relieve stress? | Petting an animal stimulates a release of oxytocin (sometimes seen as the "feel good" hormone). That said the mechanism for this release remains unclear. We are fairly certain that Oxycontin receptors are found in both an area of the brain called the nucleus accumbens and the amygdala. Both of these areas of the brain ... | [
"Because dogs often bark excessively due to stress, boredom, or frustration, changing aspects of an animal's environment to make them more content is a suitable way to quiet them down, rather than forcibly silencing a distressed animal. Spending more time with an animal, such as playing, walking, and other bonding ... |
why do i have to manually select "heat" or "cool" when choosing thermostat temperature? | Because it's really expensive to switch constantly between heating and cooling to maintain a specific temperature, so normally only one is set up to work at a time, so that during the summer you set cool down to 60, it cools slightly past it, then waits for the outside to heat it up, then it cools again.
The alternati... | [
"A thermostat, when set to \"cool\", will only turn on when the ambient temperature of the surrounding room is above the set temperature. Thus, if the controlled space has a temperature normally above the desired setting when the heating/cooling system is off, it would be wise to keep the thermostat set to \"cool\"... |
If helmets are designed to protect against shrapnel, why do modern helmets not follow the brodie-type shape, which seems optimal to protect against shrapnel coming from above? | The design of the Brodie helmet (or M1917 for the American-made version) is really a product of the conflict that it was introduced during: the First World War. The executive summary here is that of all the things that can kill you in trench warfare that a helmet will protect against (so excluding chemical attacks, act... | [
"These helmets are used for urban search and rescue, technical rescue, and medical rescue applications and are shaped differently from traditional fire helmets. Most designs are derived from them, but feature a lower profile and elimination of excess protective area to facilitate better freedom of movement for the ... |
are organs allergic? | Allergies are when the host is incorrectly identifying allergens as foreign invaders. If your receive an organ, you aren't allergic to it; rather, your body detects that it is foreign and attacks it. I guess it's similar to an allergy, but not really. | [
"An allergic response is a hypersensitive immune reaction to a substance that normally is harmless or would not cause an immune response in everyone. An allergic response may cause harmful symptoms such as itching or inflammation or tissue injury.\n",
"Symptoms of an allergic reaction include rash, itching, swell... |
How Were Medieval Noblewomen Trained In Administration? | Oh, hey, I'd been meaning to respond to this for a few days now.
The main thing to note is that medieval noblewomen weren't just administrators of estates when their husbands were away in royal service, crusading, etc. They generally tended to be the managers of the household, its personnel, its revenues and expendit... | [
"Court appointments are the traditional positions within a royal, ducal, or noble household. In the early Middle Ages, when such households were established, most court officials had either domestic or military duties; the monarch's closest advisers were those who served in the household. However, as time went by, ... |
is there a species of animals or plants that have no native habitat? | Well, there are some crop and livestock species whose wild ancestors are either extinct or not identified. Cows are descended from aurochs, which have been extinct since the 1600s; it's hard to say what, if anything, is the native range of the domesticated cow. Silkworms are in a similar situation. Maize (corn) seems t... | [
"In 1997, the United States Navy contracted a vegetation survey that identified about 280 species of terrestrial vascular plants on Diego Garcia. None of these was endemic, and another survey in 2005 identified just 36 species as \"native\", meaning arriving without the assistance of humans, and found elsewhere in ... |
What was the response (if any) when Romans encountered Buddhism? | The closest thing we have to a response are literary depictions of the *gymnosophists* ("naked wise man"), which basically translates to "naked wise men". From what descriptions we have it is difficult to know whether these are Jain, Buddhist, Ajivika or Vedic Hindu. In fact it is probably best to think of these as hig... | [
"Several instances of interaction between Buddhism and the Roman Empire are documented by Classical and early Christian writers. Roman historical accounts describe an embassy sent by the Indian king Pandion (Pandya?), also named Porus, to Augustus around 13 CE. The embassy was travelling with a diplomatic letter in... |
how does downloading data/files work? | Data travels across the internet in packets. Each packet can carry a maximum of 1,500 bytes. Around these packets is a wrapper with a header and a footer. The information contained in the wrapper tells computers what kind of data is in the packet, how it fits together with other data, where the data came from and the d... | [
"BULLET::::- Download – In computer networks, download means to receive data from a remote system, typically a server such as a web server, an FTP server, an email server, or other similar systems. This contrasts with uploading, where data is sent \"to\" a remote server. A \"download\" is a file offered for downloa... |
Why do historic paintings around the world of battle scenes and other dramatic events seem to always have emotionless faces on the people in it? | Hi, I just ran into this question while searching for something. You might like this thread:
* [Why do people in medieval art look bored or indifferent when being killed?](_URL_0_) by */u/silverionmox*
| [
"During the American Civil War (1861–65), Haley Sims and Alexander Gardner began recreating scenes of battle in order to overcome the limitations of early photography with regard to the recording of moving objects. Their reconfigured scenes were designed to intensify the visual and emotional effects of battle. Gard... |
what the heck is an 'open source platform' for website building? | Open Source is a phrase used to describe a methodology of software development. Instead of keeping the code closed and only allowing people use the software when it's assembled, they share the base code with everyone so they can work with it as well.
This inspires people to find bugs, security flaws, and bad features,... | [
"Open-source architecture relies upon amateurs as much as experienced professionals, the \"genius of the mass\" as much as that of the individual, eroding the binary distinction between author and audience. Like social software, it recognises the core role of multiple users at every stage of the project – whether a... |
This is probably a dumb question, but what form of matter is light? | Light is none of those.
Light is made of photons, which are fundamental particles (completely separate from protons, electrons, neutrons). Photons are particles but also have wave-like properties, and were classically described as traveling electromagnetic waves.
Photons are massless, never decay (as far as we know)... | [
"At the end of the 19th century, light was thought to consist of waves of electromagnetic fields which propagated according to Maxwell's equations, while matter was thought to consist of localized particles (See History of wave and particle duality). In 1900, this division was exposed to doubt, when, investigating ... |
why is sport such a significant part of our society? | My theory for the prevalence of sport in nearly every culture is that this acts as an outlet for our innate competitive instincts. In terms of an evolutionary advantage, communities that had this outlet perhaps had less internal violence which gave that community a better shot at survival.
In the modern world, the po... | [
"1) Sport is not simply sport but a means of government, a means of pressure on public opinion and a mode of ideological framing of the populations and of parts of the youth, and this in all countries of the world, in totalitarian countries as well as in so called democratic countries. This was noticeable during th... |
When passing the event horizon of a black hole there are no paths leading away from the center, but are there longer or shorter paths towards the center? | Yes there are, depending on your angular momentum. | [
"An observer crossing the event horizon of a non-rotating and uncharged (or Schwarzschild) black hole cannot avoid the central singularity, which lies in the future world line of everything within the horizon. Thus one cannot avoid spaghettification by the tidal forces of the central singularity.\n",
"The event h... |
Why is the Collatz Conjecture, a seemingly easy to understand problem, so difficult to prove? If it could be proven that any starting number eventually reaches a smaller number in the chain, would that be proof of the conjecture? | Second part is easy: Yes, that would be sufficient.
First part is much harder to find a satisfying answer to.
In general, one can say that many conjectures about natural number are easy to understand, but very difficult to prove, especially if they involve the combination of multiplication and addition. The most famo... | [
"If Legendre's conjecture is true, the gap between any prime \"p\" and the next largest prime would always be at most on the order of formula_1; in big O notation, the gaps are formula_2. Two stronger conjectures, Andrica's conjecture and Oppermann's conjecture, also both imply that the gaps have the same magnitude... |
How prominent was the KGB in the USA? | The [VENONA intercepts](_URL_5_) and the opening of the Soviet Archives (see Haynes and Klehr) showed a much greater involvement of the KGB in the US and in the workings of the US government than had been previously thought.
The KGB had both above board and under cover agents working in the US. Mainly, they recruited... | [
"The Russian KGB was a recurring antagonist in the history of Stony Man. As the most famous and important intelligence agency of the Soviet Union during the Cold War, the KGB attempted to spread Soviet influence, and communism in general, wherever and whenever the opportunity arose. This was often accomplished usin... |
what is the difference between pro-life and pro-choice abortion? | Pro-Life puts the life of the fetus as the most important factor in the choice to have an abortion or not, and is therefore the position where you are against letting women have the option of an abortion.
Pro-Choice puts the woman's right to choose what to do with her own body as the most important factor, and is ther... | [
"The description \"pro-life\" was adopted by the right-to-life (anti-abortion) movement in the United States following the Supreme Court 1973 decision \"Roe v. Wade\", which held that a woman may terminate her pregnancy prior to the viability of the fetus outside of the womb and may also terminate her pregnancy \"s... |
Russian troop movements WW1 | In 1915, the president of France requested 300,000 Russian troops be sent to France, in return for a large shipment of munitions. This was rejected out of hand by the commander of the Russian army, but in 1916 Czar Nicholas II agreed to send a small number of Russian tro... | [
"The Russian Expeditionary Force () was a World War I military force sent to France by the Russian Empire. In 1915 the French requested that Russian troops be sent to fight alongside their own army on the Western Front. Initially they asked for 300,000 men, an unrealistically high figure, probably based on assumpti... |
how is it possible that my girlfriend is able to fall asleep within a minute or less? | It's difficult to speak authoritatively without knowing your girlfriend, but it could be that she's just really good at unwinding before bed.
If you can take time to relax before turning in, it'll make it far easier to fall asleep. If someone's mulling over the state of the world, finances, job stress and so on before... | [
"Katrina Margolis states that there \"...is a space that lies between rape and consensual sex that remains unnamed and undiscussed.\" Margolis states that when a woman has \"...been drinking with a guy, and it gets past 2am, there is a certain expectation of sex if you end up together in a bedroom\"; or, \"after fl... |
why an object such as a piece of china won't stick back together on it's own after breaking | So explaining this in actual ELI5 terms might be a little hard, so to keep things simple we'll just talk about failure of brittle materials which is what you're talking about in your example with a ceramic like a piece of china. My materials professor used to say that if you don't know the answer for why a physical phe... | [
"A fracture where the bone cracks completely in two or more pieces, and the pieces move out of alignment (this type of fracture might require surgery to make sure the pieces are aligned before casting).\n",
"Also known as inherent vice, the intrinsic instability of the fabric and components of an objects can lead... |
When classifying a moon, is it based around the relative size to the planet? Or do all moons have to be a certain size or larger? | The word moon clearly describes an object that orbits something other than the main star in a system. Moons are not classified by their mass, size or composition. *Ganymede for example is the biggest one* with a diameter of 5,262 kilometers and we have just found that there are some with only a diameter of 1 kilomete... | [
"There is no established lower limit on what is considered a \"moon\". Every natural celestial body with an identified orbit around a planet of the Solar System, some as small as a kilometer across, has been considered a moon, though objects a tenth that size within Saturn's rings, which have not been directly obse... |
Origin of degeneracy pressure | Pauli's exclusion principle isn't *ad hoc*. It's fundamental to the nature of fermions that, unlike bosons, no two can ever be in exactly the same state. The reason is that if you swap the states of two fermions, the overall state of the system is multiplied by -1. If those two fermions were in the same state to begin ... | [
"The concept of disjoining pressure was introduced by Derjaguin (1936) as the difference between the pressure in a region of a phase adjacent to a surface confining it, and the pressure in the bulk of this phase.\n",
"Social degeneration was a widely influential concept at the interface of the social and biologic... |
why do leaves turn yellow (and other colors )? | short answer, time of year changes amount of sun. Leaves are full of colors, we usually see green cause theres a bunch of chlorophyll being activated by sun. When theres less sun the plant cuts off supply of sugars to the leaf. Chlorophyll leaves, the other colors show. Theres also other factors that make the colors re... | [
"why some leaves turn yellow. However, the yellow color can attract aphids, so some trees turn the leaves red instead by injecting a bright pigment. The loss of chlorophyll may also contribute to the abscission process.\n",
"A particularly noticeable manifestation of pigmentation in plants is seen with autumn lea... |
If the earth were drained of water and reduced to the size of a cue ball, would I feel a rough texture? | > OK, first, how smooth is a billiard ball? According to the World Pool-Billiard Association, a pool ball is 2.25 inches in diameter, and has a tolerance of +/- 0.005 inches. In other words, it must have no pits or bumps more than 0.005 inches in height. That’s pretty smooth. The ratio of the size of an allowable bump... | [
"Any land surface without any potholes and other serious damages (which may potentially harm a player) can be used as a field. Generally, it is played on evenings where there is little breeze and players can be free from the scorching sun prevalent in the tropical region where the game is mostly played. Although, r... |
Following dyslexda's question, how would Han Dynasty soldiers have fared against Romans of the equivalent time? | You might be looking for /r/historicalwhatif. | [
"Marcus Licinius Crassus invaded Parthia in 53 BC, but most of his entire army was destroyed. The historian Homer H. Dubs speculated in 1941 that Roman prisoners of war who were transferred to the eastern border of the Parthian empire might later have clashed with Han troops there. Similar claims, and even a Roman ... |
How do giant cities in the desert like Phoenix get enough water? Are they sustainable? | Partly from groundwater, partly from imported water. Phoenix gets a substantial amount of its water from the Colorado River. These desert cities are built on the Basin and Range region of the U.S., and are commonly between two mountain ranges. The floors of these "valleys" are actually incredibly "deep" - kilometers th... | [
"Martian cities are at the intersections of canals, where they serve as centres for trade. The canals are not entirely watertight – the small leaks create aquifers along the banks that support crops and small villages. The canal system is old, however, and not all of the ancient pumps still work or ancient bridges ... |
how do political parties besides the republicans and democrats enter the presidential race? | The same way that republicans and democrats do. The only difference is that republicans and democrats have more money and more supporters. So it's easier for an independent to just choose the side they more closely resemble. Or, people like Ron Paul, choose to run as a republican when they're actually libertarians. | [
"In United States presidential politics, voters within both the Democratic and Republican parties select their candidates for the presidential election through a series of primary elections. For this list, any candidate that has won at least one state or territory's primary or caucus for a major party or received a... |
Which charges would Eva Braun have faced (in the Nuremberg) trials if she had not commited suicide? | What exactly is a moral charge? I don't meant to sound rude, but the idea of a 'moral charge' in a legal trial is somewhat superfluous - either one is charged under a law or not.
Braun essentially had nothing to do with politics despite being part of the inner social circle around Hitler, and allowing her to have a ro... | [
"BULLET::::- British intelligence officers announced that exhaustive investigation indicated that Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun had married on April 29 and then committed suicide in a Berlin bunker the following day.\n",
"According to a fragment of her diary and the account of biographer Nerin Gun, Braun's second su... |
how do guitar frets work? | As noted buy others, each string has its own "open" note and every fret goes up one semitone. That's all the pattern there is. Obviously its possible to work out ways to play whatever notes and chords you want based on this information. The thing is, you can't possibly work it out as you play. You just have to lear... | [
"The Guitaret is a rationalised lamellophone, making use of metal reeds or tines which are arranged in three rows within a white painted metal rectangular case approximately 30 centimetres long. The ends of the tines protrude slightly above the level of the casing. The player takes the guitaret with the left hand o... |
How does a flu vaccine lessen symptoms when you catch a flu variant that isn’t one of the variants in that seasons vaccination? | First, we have to understand how vaccines work, in general. The basic premise is, we take a virus/bacteria and break it down into large chunks. These chunks are the outer shell/wall of the virus/bacteria, and as with most other cells, there are proteins that are embedded into them for communication, transport, etc.
Se... | [
"Influenza vaccines, also known as flu shots or flu jabs, are vaccines that protect against infection by influenza viruses. A new version of the vaccine is developed twice a year, as the influenza virus rapidly changes. While their effectiveness varies from year to year, most provide modest to high protection again... |
just because pr votes for statehood doesn't make them a state right? wouldn't congress have to vote to approve such a move? | Yes, statehood can only be granted if Congress votes for it. In fact, Congress doesn't even need the consent of the people in the territory to give them statehood (although that would be unlikely).
Bottom line, it's 100% the US Congress's decision. The vote is just an expression of interest. | [
"While the people voted in favor of statehood, numerous challenges still exist that might hamper creation of the state, including lack of Congressional support: DC currently does not have voting-level congressional representation, and the national Republican Party is against the idea of statehood, due to political ... |
why do goats totally freeze and lock up their bodies in times of stress or fear? | Not all goats do this, just myotonic goats. It's a neurological disorder. It can be fatal. This happens in other species as well. | [
"Freezing behavior or the freeze response is a reaction to specific stimuli, most commonly observed in prey animals. When a prey animal has been caught and completely overcome by the predator, it may respond by \"freezing up\" of in other words by staying complety still. Studies typically assess a conditioned freez... |
If you had a gas impermeable tube from the earth's surface to space (beyond the atmosphere) would it create a perpetual vacuum tube? | If you built a tube from the surface of the earth to space you should expect no flow. There will be a pressure and density gradient in the tube due to earth's gravity, and it will maintain the same equilibrium as the atmosphere outside the tube.
The atmospheric pressure of the ambient air at the base of the pipe doesn... | [
"Vacuum technology is a method used to evacuate air from a closed volume by creating a pressure differential from the closed volume to some vent, the ultimate vent being the open atmosphere. When using an industrial vacuum system, a vacuum pump or generator creates this pressure differential. A variety of technical... |
If there is no absolute position or speed, and both can be measured only in relation to something else, how can there be a maximum speed (light speed) and in relation to what is that measured? | Round two, fight! I apologize for how long this got, I wasn't really keeping track and I ended up writing an essay on special relativity. **If you just want the answer to your question, scroll down to the bold.**
**Short answer:** Light doesn't actually have a reference frame, which makes it special. Everyone sees the... | [
"In special relativity, there is an unreachable speed, the speed of light. We can add speeds without end, but they will always be less than the speed of light. The sums of all speeds are limited by the speed of light. Additionally, the composition of two velocities is inferior to the sum of those two speeds.\n",
... |
elis: why are we so fascinated with scandinavian countries? | Because economically, politically, and socially... many of them are the best humanity has provided. Mostly stable economies, education, and lack of crime.
Not everyone agrees with that of course, but one must admit they ams gots a real sweets gigs. | [
"In the book, Sanandaji argues that particularly the left has long praised Scandinavian countries for their high levels of welfare provision and admirable societal outcomes. Although true that Scandinavian countries are successful, the author makes the case that this success pre-dates the welfare state. According t... |
Why did William the Conqueror and King Harald of Norway both try to conquer England? | Harald III Hardrada of Norway did in fact have a claim, albeit a slightly tortuous one, going back to Svein Forkbeard and Knut the Great, who controlled a North Sea empire consisting of Denmark, Norway, and England with suzerainty over the bit of Sweden we call Sweden when discussing that time period. He was ultimately... | [
"Magnus's campaign may have been part of his father's plans for an invasion of England, as control over the Kingdom of the Isles would have provided him with more troops. Historian Kelly DeVries has moreover proposed that Harald may have wanted to test the situation in England before a possible invasion, only to fi... |
Why does it take so long to 'refill' (recharge) batteries compared to other energy sources like gasoline? | It doesn't!
When you refill your tank with gas, that's not equivalent to recharging a battery, it's equivalent to throwing out the old battery and buying a new one.
Recharging the battery is analogous to filling your gas tank with organic matter and waiting a **really, really** long time for it to turn into p... | [
"Batteries that are stored for a long period or that are discharged at a small fraction of the capacity lose capacity due to the presence of generally irreversible \"side reactions\" that consume charge carriers without producing current. This phenomenon is known as internal self-discharge. Further, when batteries ... |
How good are humans at choosing randomly? | I don't have the source at hand, but I read an article once about humans producing random numbers, and we don't seem to be very good at it. The biggest problem with human-generated strings of numbers, if I recall correctly the study used numbers 0-9, was that we tend to avoid using the same number twice in a row much m... | [
"Effective situation selection is not always an easy task. For instance, humans display difficulties predicting their emotional responses to future events. Therefore, they may have trouble making accurate and appropriate decisions about which emotionally relevant situations to approach or to avoid.\n",
"Evaluatio... |
what happens when i swallow my mucus. | It's not bad to swallow your mucous. Your body is designed to swallow your mucous. Your stomach is very acidic and is designed to kill microorganisms. Your stomach naturally produces mucous, so it's not like there's going to be a massive accumulation of mucous there. | [
"Esophageal dysphagia is almost always caused by disease in or adjacent to the esophagus but occasionally the lesion is in the pharynx or stomach. In many of the pathological conditions causing dysphagia, the lumen becomes progressively narrowed and indistensible. Initially only fibrous solids cause difficulty but ... |
Bombardment of German Forces in WWI | Most British monitors did not enter service until after the end of the Race to the Sea; the only monitors available were the three ex-Brazilian river monitors, *Severn*, *Humber* and *Mersey*. Other, larger monitors entered service in 1915, and did operate off the Belgian coast. The following will explain their service... | [
"The bombardment was paused at midday, as a ruse to prompt French survivors to reveal themselves and German artillery-observation aircraft were able to fly over the battlefield unmolested by French aircraft. The 3rd, 7th and 18th corps attacked at ; the Germans used flamethrowers and storm troops followed closely w... |
Do skin grafts include nerves, and if so do they retain the sensitivity of thier original location? | No. The nerve terminals within the grafted tissue are dead.
Nerve fibers project to the skin from their cell bodies next to the spine. The underlying nerve fibers underneath the graft will slowly grow into the grafted skin, and sensation/function will return. | [
"Tissue grafts utilize nerves or other materials to bridge the two ends of the severed nerve. There are three categories of tissue grafts: autologous tissue grafts, nonautologous tissue grafts, and acellular grafts.\n",
"Autologous tissue grafts transplant nerves from a different part of the body of the patient t... |
why do ants and insects get trapped in pen circles? | There are a few different explanations for this, depending on what the circle is made of. Ants will get trapped in chalk and baking soda circles, as well. A big contender is that ants travel largely by a scent trail left behind by other ants. If you watch ants coming for pieces of food left on the floor or the sidewalk... | [
"Since the sides of the pit consist of loose sand at its angle of repose, they afford an insecure foothold to any small insects that inadvertently venture over the edge, such as ants. Slipping to the bottom, the prey is immediately seized by the lurking antlion; if it attempts to scramble up the treacherous walls o... |
When did the English language emerge? | It depends on what you mean by the English language. The modern English language has a few main sources of vocabulary, which I'll go through chronologically. The inhabitants of Albion at first contact with recorded history probably spoke a group of Celtic languages. You then have a Roman invasion adding a little bit... | [
"The English language was first introduced to the Americas by British colonization, beginning in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. The language also spread to numerous other parts of the world as a result of British trade and colonisation and the spread of the former British Empire, which, by 1921, included a... |
Why is sexual dimorphism more prevalent in some species than in other to the degree that you may not be able to tell genders apart with just a look in one species but in others it's clear as day? | TL;DR: Often, monogamy
Sexual dimorphism happens when the optimal traits for males and females differ. Very frequently this is related to costly traits that help one sex (usually males) gain access to mates. Male peacocks have extremely showy plumage, which makes them an easy target for predators, but peahens are a du... | [
"Sexual dimorphism is the difference in body size between male and female members of a species as a result of intrasexual selection, which is sexual selection that acts within a sex. High sexual dimorphism and larger body size in males is a result of male-male competition for females. Primate species in which group... |
why are ligers typically much larger and heavier than both lions and tigers? | Built into your genes is code to *stop* growing. That's important because, for example, just making your heart *bigger* does not make it *better* at pumping blood. It takes additional muscle and different structure to be efficient. So if you get too big, your heart can't keep up with the need to pump blood farther and ... | [
"The liger is a cross between a male lion and a tigress. Ligers are typically between in length, and weigh between or more. Because the lion sire passes on a growth-promoting gene, but the corresponding growth-inhibiting gene from the female tiger is absent, ligers grow far larger than either parent species.\n",
... |
How does hemoglobin get into the urine? | So the heme is degraded into bilirubin. The bilirubin is then excreted as bile which is important for digestion of fats in the small intestine. Then the bilirubin's degraded even more from bacteria in the intestine to urobilinogen. Some of the urobilinogen is absorbed back into the bloodstream by the hepatic portal vei... | [
"Urine is formed in the kidneys through a filtration of blood. The urine is then passed through the ureters to the bladder, where it is stored. During urination, the urine is passed from the bladder through the urethra to the outside of the body.\n",
"Pre-urine is formed in the tubules, when nitrogenous waste and... |
Is the origin of western monasticism based in Stoic philosophy? (3rd ask) | You will find more helpful input from /r/AcademicBiblical almost definitely (and I think especially if /u/koine_lingua is active... I *think*).
You might also get some more joy by looking for connections between early Christians and Cynics - arguments have been put forward that Jesus was basically a Cynic teacher by s... | [
"Orthodox monasticism does not have religious orders as are found in the West, nor do they have Rules in the same sense as the Rule of St. Benedict. Rather, Eastern monastics study and draw inspiration from the writings of the Desert Fathers as well as other Church Fathers; probably the most influential of which ar... |
this was posted about 4 years, but i was wondering if there was updated information. are monster energy zero ultra drinks bad for me? if so, why? | If you're not experiencing side effects like high blood pressure or heart palpations, if you're not shaky and your decisions aren't impaired, and if you're not interfering with any medication, you're probably just fine. Are you having one, or several each day? Are you otherwise hydrating? Sleeping ok on average? Again,... | [
"The caffeine content of most Monster Energy drinks is approximately 10 mg/oz (33.81 mg/100ml), or 160 mg for a 16 oz can. The packaging usually contains a warning label advising consumers against drinking more than 48 oz per day (16 oz per day in Australia). The drinks are not recommended for pregnant women or peo... |
What is your preferred explanation for the Industrial Revolution taking place in the West rather than the East? | For a contrary view from economic historians, check out *Bourgeois Dignity: Why Economics Can't Explain the Modern World* by Deirdre McCloskey and *The Enlightened Economy: An Economic History of Britain, 1700-1850* by Joel Mokyr.
Lots of people argue that steam (and therefore coal, which is the fuel that powers steam... | [
"Technological advances, in areas such as railroads, steamboats, mining, and agriculture, were embraced to a higher degree in the West than the East during the Great Divergence. Technology led to increased industrialization and economic complexity in the areas of agriculture, trade, fuel and resources, further sepa... |
how long does your body take to stsrt using the carbohydrates you consume for energy? | What exactly do you mean? You are constantly using carbohydrates for energy, there is no start up time/period where you don't use carbohydrates.
Is your question about the time it takes from ingesting food to using the carbohydrates contained in it specifically? | [
"The effective overall energy unit for the available body energy is referred to as the daily glycogen generation capacity, and is used to compare the mitochondrial output of healthy individuals to that of afflicted or chronically glycogen-depleted individuals. This value is slow to change in a given individual, as ... |
how does a trade war work? what are the local and global repercussions? | A trade war is when countries begin placing tariffs on imports that specifically target certain countries.
So, imagine Country A exports loads of imaginarium at a low price. Country B also produces a lot of imaginarium too, but it's used domestically rather than being exported and it costs the domestic producers more ... | [
"A trade war is an economic conflict resulting from extreme protectionism in which states raise or create tariffs or other trade barriers against each other in response to trade barriers created by the other party. Increased protection causes both nations' output compositions to move towards their autarky position.... |
unicellular to multicellular evolution | Bacteria are single-celled, but even so they can behave together in groups in complex ways. If you have the time, look up "biofilms" in Wikipedia, as an example. Bacterial cells can communicate to each other in ways like: "dude, bra, this space here is totally awesome to lay down and chill" and other bacteria will get ... | [
"The Colonial Theory of Haeckel, 1874, proposes that the symbiosis of many organisms of the same species (unlike the symbiotic theory, which suggests the symbiosis of different species) led to a multicellular organism. At least some, it is presumed land-evolved, multicellularity occurs by cells separating and then ... |
Will there ever be a simultaneous eclipse of the sun and transit of venus? I imagine that it could be millions of years away, but have we worked out when? | April 5, 15,232, according to Wikipedia. | [
"In principle, the simultaneous occurrence of a Solar eclipse and a transit of a planet is possible. But these events are extremely rare because of their short durations. The next anticipated simultaneous occurrence of a Solar eclipse and a transit of Mercury will be on July 5, 6757, and a Solar eclipse and a trans... |
What impact did the video game crash of the early '80s have upon the British computer game market? | Pretty much none directly, presuming you’re talking about the North American Home Video Game Crash of 1983. These markets were very far apart from each other, though in the matter of shifting the power of computer game publishers to the fore there was to be a long term impact. In the UK there was a large financial barr... | [
"As the video game market became flooded with poor-quality cartridge games created by numerous companies attempting to enter the market, and overproduction of high-profile releases such as the Atari 2600 adaptations of \"Pac-Man\" and \"E.T.\" grossly underperformed, the popularity of personal computers for educati... |
what caused that "crackling" background sound when you played music on old gramophones? | Those records encoded the music in the shape of a spiral groove which covered one whole side of the disc. A stylus was dragged the length of the groove to get the sound that it encoded.
If the disc was dirty or the groove was damaged, there would be a crackling sound.
I called it 'campfire music' because it sounde... | [
"The instrument became increasingly popular among rock and pop bands during the psychedelic era, adding what author Thom Holmes terms \"an eerie, unearthly sound\" to their recordings. Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones played a Mellotron on several of his band's songs over 1967–68. These include \"We Love You\", wh... |
what was the point of nuclear torpedoes? | I believe they were made to counter nuclear armed ships and submarines. Standard torpedoes weren't reliable enough for preventing a potential nuclear attack, they needed to make sure they could wipe out the target with a single shot.
| [
"The idea behind the nuclear warheads in a torpedo was to create a much bigger and more explosive blast. Later analysis suggested that smaller, more accurate, and faster torpedoes were more efficient and effective.\n",
"U.S. interest in a nuclear torpedo can be traced to 1943, when Captain William S. Parsons, hea... |
how parent animals can carry their young and not inflict pain/wounds. | Animals that practice such behaviour have evolved to have abundant layers of skin around the top of their neck when they are young so that their parents can carry them to safety, food, etc. As they get older, the fat and the skin becomes less prominent in comparison to the size of their neck (or entire body for that ma... | [
"An infant or toddler is more likely than other family members to be injured by an animal because they cannot defend themselves and are lower to the ground. Familiar family pets with no prior history of aggression are more likely to attack the child than unfamiliar pets from other households.\n",
"They live in so... |
Is it normal/acceptable for historians to speculate about the thoughts, feelings, motivations, and emotions of historical actors? | People's motivations and the extent of their knowledge, here, are not "somewhat speculative claims." They're conclusions that the historian reached by analyzing evidence.
What do you mean by "in the real world," anyway? How are people's motivations not part of the real world? "Islam" didn't triumph in North Africa; No... | [
"In education, presenting information as if it were being told by a historical figure may give it greater impact. Since classical times, students have been asked to put themselves in the place of a historical figure as a way of bringing history to life. Historical figures are often represented in fiction, where fac... |
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