question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
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since our "time" is determined by the orbit of the earth around the sun and it's day/night cycle, why don't we just make a slight adjustment to the duration of a single second to eliminate leap years and dst issues? | We chose not to do this. The reason is actually very simple: because this definition would be much harder to maintain than the current one.
First of all, let's eliminate daylight savings time. That pretty much makes no sense in general, I agree, but it is also not here due to the drift of the "second" definition. Leap... | [
"Because Earth takes one year to orbit the Sun, the apparent position of the Sun takes one year to make a complete circuit of the ecliptic. With slightly more than 365 days in one year, the Sun moves a little less than 1° eastward every day. This small difference in the Sun's position against the stars causes any p... |
why are ultrawide monitors 21:9 and not 7:3? | First, it's not actually 21:9; it's 64:27. 21:9 is just a close approximation that can be easily compared to 16:9.
As to why it's 64:27, it's because monitors were initially in 4:3 ratio. Wide screen squared the ratio (4:3 ⨯ 4:3) to 16:9 and ultrawide screen cubes it (4:3 ⨯ 4:3 ⨯ 4:3) to 64:27. | [
"On smaller CRT monitors (up to about ), few people notice any discomfort between 60–72 Hz. On larger CRT monitors ( or larger), most people experience mild discomfort unless the refresh is set to 72 Hz or higher. A rate of 100 Hz is comfortable at almost any size. However, this does not apply to LCD monitors. The ... |
can a sea creature that lives in deep sea swim to the surface? | If a human swims too deep he drowns. Unless he have specially designed breathing equipment in which case he will be fine. It is not the pressure that kills you but the problems of supplying you with oxygen. And at high pressures air changes properties so there is a long list of issues with getting oxygen to deep sea di... | [
"The term deep sea creature refers to organisms that live below the photic zone of the ocean. These creatures must survive in extremely harsh conditions, such as hundreds of bars of pressure, small amounts of oxygen, very little food, no sunlight, and constant, extreme cold. Most creatures have to depend on food fl... |
Why is mortality from measles in the Philippines so high? | Copied directly from one of the sources you provided in your post:
*"The measles case-fatality rate in underdeveloped nations,* **where vitamin A deficiency is prevalent**, *is about 3–6% of reported cases, 30 to 60 times higher than in developed countries."*
•World Health Organization. Measles: fact sheet [updated 2... | [
"In 2014 the Philippines experienced a large measles outbreak. According to the World Health Organization there were 57,564 suspected cases of measles, including 21,403 confirmed cases, and 110 measles deaths reported in the Philippines from January 1 through December 20, 2014. Most of the cases were among unvaccin... |
what do the +/- tracking controls do on a vcr? | From what I remember from a long, long time ago, the information magnetically encoded on the VHS tape are actually encoded in diagonal stripes running the length of the tape. If you were able to see it, it would look something like this:
-------------------
/ / / / / / / / / /
------------------
The tra... | [
"The control track is used to fine-tune the tape speed during playback, so that the high speed rotating heads remained exactly on their helical tracks rather than somewhere between two adjacent tracks (known as \"tracking\"). Since good tracking depends on precise distances between the rotating drum and the fixed c... |
why are some muslims so radical? what is written in the koran that makes them lash out to such extremes? | There is extremism in all forms of religion. Look at all of the deaths that have occurred in the name of Christ, whether it be the crusades or a crazy having a killing spree. The constant civil unrest in Africa is another good example of extreme radicalism.
Just because the news focuses on extremes does not mean it ... | [
"Hathout stressed throughout his life that being a faithful Muslim was entirely compatible with being a proud American, and that Islam is a religion of coexistence, reason and moderation. While he criticized Salman Rushdie’s book \"The Satanic Verses\", finding it \"insulting\", he also condemned Ayatollah Khomeini... |
since i learned so much in the detroit discussion, what happened to cleveland? | I think these videos do a comprehensive job explaining, with the first explaining how jobs are being funneled out of the city and the second touching on how the Cleveland economy was greatly impacted by the loss of its greatest export.
_URL_1_
_URL_0_ | [
"Although Cleveland needed financial assistance from the federal government to both rebuild and address its extensive problems, the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) cut off federal urban renewal funding to the city in the wake of the Hough Riots because the administrations of Mayor Lo... |
After the winter and summer solstices, why does it take so long for the Earth to warm up/cool off? | This delay in warming is mostly to do with lag times in heating and cooling of water, water requires a lot more energy to raise its temperature by a degree than the equivalent surface of land, this is knowing in climate mapping as continentality. When an area is near a large body of water, i.e an ocean, it takes signif... | [
"During early spring, the axis of the Earth is increasing its tilt relative to the Sun, and the length of daylight rapidly increases for the relevant hemisphere. The hemisphere begins to warm significantly, causing new plant growth to \"spring forth,\" giving the season its name. \n",
"In the winter time, there i... |
if sociopaths make up a sizable portion of the population, why aren't mass murders more common? | Do you have a citation that indicates that sociopaths are "a sizable portion of the population"? Martha Stout's notion that they are 4% of the population seems outrageously high, given that the DSM-IV prevalence of Antisocial Personality Disorder is 2% and sociopaths are a small subset of that. | [
"As with any large concentration of people, there is usually crime. High population densities, placing lots of people together, invariably result in higher crime rates, as visibly seen in growing megacities such as Karachi, Delhi, Cairo, Rio de Janeiro, and Lagos.\n",
"A 2016 opinion piece concluded that 22% of m... |
how is it possible for comets to continually “shed” themselves for hundreds, if not thousands, of years and never run out of comet dust? | It’s because it’s a very tiny amount of dust. It doesn’t take that much dust for a noticeable tail. Couple this with the fact that comets are huge (Haley’s comet is 3 miles in diameter) and you will see that it would last a long time | [
"A comet will experience a range of diverse conditions as it traverses its orbit. For long period comets, most of the time it will be so far from the Sun that it will be too cold for evaporation of ices to occur. When it passes through the terrestrial planet region, evaporation will be rapid enough to blow away sma... |
In beta positive decay, isn't mass created? | That is precisely why a solitary proton can't decay into a neutron. Beta plus decay only occurs in certain nuclei, where you have to calculate the total mass based not only on the sum of protons and neutrons, but also the mass due to intranuclear binding (the [liquid drop model](_URL_0_) is useful for calculating this)... | [
"Beta decay does not change the number () of nucleons in the nucleus, but changes only its charge . Thus the set of all nuclides with the same can be introduced; these \"isobaric\" nuclides may turn into each other via beta decay. For a given there is one that is most stable. It is said to be beta stable, because ... |
why aren't people buying the $1 houses in detroit? | Three reasons, all of which intermix.
The first reason is that the houses are *awful*. Old, full of asbestos, dilapidated, crumbling - it would cost a lot of money to make Detroit's abandoned buildings useful.
This ties in perfectly with the second reason: liability. These houses are so awful, that if a homeless ju... | [
"The average price of homes sold in Detroit in 2012 was $7,500. , 47 houses in Detroit were listed for $500 or less, with five properties listed for $1. Despite the extremely low price of Detroit properties, most of the properties have been on the market for more than a year as the boarded up, abandoned houses of t... |
why do d-day landing crafts open at the front? | In addition to the other remarks. One of the main issues with a beach landing is the water, the further the troops are away from the beach the deeper the water, the more the risk of drowning, the slower the troops move, the wetter and more tired they are when they eventually make it to the beach. A side exit means that... | [
"Tactical landing zones (abbreviated to TLZ) are landing zones selected on the battlefield for the insertion of troops or supplies. A TLZ can be used for the landing of an aircraft (in terms of the Royal Air Force, this could be a Hercules carrying supplies or troops or any of their other helicopters, such as the M... |
Why were double barreled guns not used more in 18th and 19th century European warfare? | The reason is rather simple. You're effectively halving your numbers of men if you have a musket that's double barreled. If you're making a double barreled musket, you're making two barrels of two muskets into one, so you're now limiting the amount of soldiers on the battlefield. While you could argue a quality over qu... | [
"In the 17th century, European armies expanded their use of firearms, which were at first matchlock weapons like arquebuses. These were later supplanted by unrifled muskets fired by a flintlock mechanism, which became the weapon of choice because it could be fired relatively rapidly (six shots per minute). Because ... |
When were dates invented? And if it was a long time ago, how did they calculate 365 days for the earth to rotate around the sun? | It is quite easy to note the day of the year with the longest or shortest hours of daylight. All one needs do is count between two successive midsummer days and you'll get the number of days in a year.
We use the [Gregorian calendar](_URL_0_) adopted on 24 February 1582, itself a variation on the precursor Julian cale... | [
"Ancient tables provided the Sun's mean longitude. The German mathematician Christopher Clavius, the architect of the Gregorian calendar, noted that the tables agreed neither on the time when the Sun passed through the vernal equinox nor on the length of the mean tropical year. Tycho Brahe also noticed discrepancie... |
What effects does castration after puberty have on a male's lifespan? | I do not believe this topic has been researched. I cannot find studies regarding this topic. There is a difference between removing the gonads and having the sperm duct cut (which is done when you want sterilization). If the sperm duct is cut, the gonads will still produce it's hormones without displacement.
There is ... | [
"A subject of castration who is altered before the onset of puberty will retain a high voice, non-muscular build, and small genitals. He may well be shorter than average, as the production of sex hormones in puberty—more specifically, estrogen via aromatization of testosterone—stops long bone growth. The person may... |
What was the reaction of the major world powers at the time to the creation of the Zionist movement in 1897? | First of all, I know you're referring to the first Zionist Congress, but the Zionist movement itself had begun before. The first people to write about Zionism that books usually mention as influential are the German-Jewish Moses Hess (1862, wrote *Rome and Jerusalem* arguing for a Jewish social commonwealth in Palestin... | [
"The World Zionist Organization was established in Constantinople; Theodor Herzl had tried to set up debt relief for Sultan Abdul Hamid II in exchange for Palestinian lands. Until the First World War its activities focused on cultural matters, although political aims were never absent. Before the First World War, H... |
sovereign citizens. why do people think they are not required to follow the law? what is this based on? | [This decision](_URL_0_) by a Canadian Court is the best write up I have ever seen of what the SC movement is/believes and where it comes from.
The ELI5 version is that SC's have been told---sometimes by people trying to sell books and seminars, sometimes by true believers---that the legal system is effectively a lie ... | [
"Every citizen is free to travel, both outside and inside the territory of the Republic, with restrictions granted by law only for possible health and security reasons. Citizens have the right to freely assemble, both in private and public places, peacefully and unarmed. Notifications to the authorities is required... |
Since the Indian Plate is subducting under the Eurasian plate, will there come a time when the whole subcontinent no longer exists? | No. Continental crust is very difficult to subduct because of the density contrast between it and the underlying mantle. Small portions of continental crust (small being relative to the size of an entire plate) can subduct in large continent-continent collisions, but this is restricted to the leading edge of continents... | [
"It is unknown when and where the India–Asia (Indian and Eurasian Plate) convergence occurred, at or before 52 Million years ago. The plates have converged up to ± . The upper crustal shortening is documented from geological record of Asia and the Himalaya as up to approximately less.\n",
"India is entirely conta... |
how does a computer read keystrokes from a keyboard? | A keyboard is just a list of switches. There is several ways to connect those switches but basically when a switch is pressed, it allows current to flow thru and a microcontroller ( a smart chip if you wish) will detect this current and basically record which one was pressed or released. In turn the microcontroller wil... | [
"A keyboard is the device most commonly used for writing via computer. Each key is associated with a standard code which the keyboard sends to the computer when it is pressed. By using a combination of alphabetic keys with modifier keys such as Ctrl, Alt, Shift and AltGr, various character codes are generated and s... |
Was America inevitably going to declare war on Germany after Pearl Harbor, had Hitler not pre-emptively declared war first? | A look into the [World War II](_URL_1_) section of the FAQ, [United States](_URL_2_) subsection, finds only ["Would the US have still gone to war with Germany in WW2 if Hitler hadn't declared war on the US post-Pearl Harbor?"](_URL_0_), a reply by /u/coinsinmyrocket, but it's only one comment and it's from 3 years ago.... | [
"BULLET::::- In Newt Gingrich and William Forstchen's book \"1945\", Hitler did not declare war on the United States after Pearl Harbor. As a result, President Franklin Roosevelt had no pretext to take the US into the European war -much as he would have liked to do it. In the following years, the US concentrated it... |
Why are sun spots black? | They are still very bright but they are significantly less bright than the surrounding material so appear dark in contrast.
They can be up to half as hot (~3000-4000K) as the normal photosphere (6000K) and due to the T^4 relationship of luminosity that can mean up to 16 times less bright.
edit: If you want to know **... | [
"The Sun's color is white, with a CIE color-space index near (0.3, 0.3), when viewed from space or when the Sun is high in the sky. When measuring all the photons emitted, the Sun is actually emitting more photons in the green portion of the spectrum than any other. When the Sun is low in the sky, atmospheric scatt... |
why it's bad when car batteries go completely dead/once they go dead they can't/rarely can be recharged to full strength? | Car batteries are designed to be able to push a few hundred amps on demand. That's actually kinda atypical for most batteries; your cellphone battery might do 4 amps top and that would be considered a high workload, and your car's battery is only 3 times the voltage (~12 car battery vs ~4 cellphone battery)
But in des... | [
"All batteries gradually self-discharge (whether installed in a device or not) and dead batteries will eventually leak. Extremely high temperatures can also cause batteries to rupture and leak (such as in a car during summer) as well as decrease the shelf life of the battery.\n",
"Batteries that are stored for a ... |
If we are made of tiny particles and empty space then how do we stay together/solid? | Particles aren't just tiny, they're points according to the standard model. You can't really zoom in on them... they aren't at all like really tiny baseballs. So, besides being empty space if you consider the area where the particles spend the vast majority of their time as their volume, what's empty space and what isn... | [
"In a solid, constituent particles (ions, atoms, or molecules) are closely packed together. The forces between particles are so strong that the particles cannot move freely but can only vibrate. As a result, a solid has a stable, definite shape, and a definite volume. Solids can only change their shape by force, as... |
what are the characteristics that define the market as either a bull or bear? | It's called a "bull market" when the line indicating the price of stocks is trending upwards, like the horns of a charging bull, and it's a "bear market" when the line is trending down like a claw of a bear. | [
"The terms \"bull market\" and \"bear market\" describe upward and downward market trends, respectively, and can be used to describe either the market as a whole or specific sectors and securities. The names perhaps correspond to the fact that a bull attacks by lifting its horns upward, while a bear strikes with it... |
What evidence is there that the rivers on Mars were actually composed of water from their leftover traces? | Several types of minerals have been identified on Mars that are only known to form in the presence of water. [Phyllosilicates](_URL_1_) (think clays) are the products of the weathering of earlier rocks in the presence of water and have been identified in many locations on Mars. Sulfate salts, which are often found in... | [
"In June 2000, evidence for water currently under the surface of Mars was discovered in the form of flood-like gullies. The question that was immediately asked was: is this an ongoing process or is this ancient and simply well preserved evidence of water/liquid flow? Most scientists agree that it is highly likely t... |
The Homeric myths and stories were a definitively oral tradition, passed in by word of mouth. But our text translations today go back at least as far as medieval Europe. Where do our current ‘definitive’ Iliad and Odyssey come from, and when was it penned? | Okay, well, this is like, a crazy complex question with huge amount of scholarly debate, although a lot of fun. Even the **TL;DR** is long:
----------------
The Iliad and Odyssey have been been circulating as complete editions in written form from at least from the 6th century BC, but an idea of a 'true' and 'authent... | [
"It has been shown from comparative study of orality that the \"Iliad\" and \"Odyssey\" (as well as the works of Hesiod) come from a tradition of oral epics. In oral narrative traditions there is no exact transmission of texts; rather, stories are transmitted from one generation to another by bards, who make use of... |
might sound dumb, but what's a rational number? | A rational number can be written as the *ratio* of two integers: q = a/b, like 3/5. In other words, fractions.
This includes whole numbers, since, e.g. 7 = 7/1. | [
"No rational number is normal in any base, since the digit sequences of rational numbers are eventually periodic. (However, a rational number can be \"simply normal\" in a particular base: formula_4 is simply normal in base 10.)\n",
"Every rational number is constructible. Every irrational number that is construc... |
why does urinating on a lemon tree help it grow? | Hold up.....WHA?????? lol
Ok I know nothing of this legend BUT i do know that urine will break down into Nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium with many trace minerals. so in that respect it is actually one hell of a good fertilizer for any plant. If the salts were an issue there would be many a dead tree in dog parks..... | [
"The viability of the lemonwood's seeds is affected by moisture levels of the soil. If the moisture levels are too high the seed is likely to become unviable. The lemonwood like other pittosporums is somewhat drought resistant therefore rainfall is not a major factor in the lemonwoods survival. P. eugenioides is re... |
why can all the areas in our mouths repair itself with new skin, but our gums can not? | Our cells can only figure our their function from their surroundings and interactions.
A wound in the skin of our mouth is surrounded by other skin cells. The new cells see those surrounding cells and realizes they should function as skin.
The gums attached to your tooth are different. They expect a firm attachment t... | [
"Once the bacteria and calculus are removed from the periodontal pocket, the tissue can begin to heal. The inflammation dissipates as the infection declines, allowing the swelling to decrease which results in the gums once again forming an effective seal between the root of the tooth and the outside environment. Ho... |
Why can't astronauts whistle in their space suits? | [Referring to this interview with astronauts](_URL_0_) in which they mention "the resonant frequency of the cavity of your mouth" (around 1.10).
I'm going to take an educated guess that the lower frequency doesn't resonate inside the mouth, so no sound can be heard. | [
"If nitrogen is used to increase pressure as on the ISS, it is inert to humans, but can cause decompression sickness. Space suits typically operate at low pressure to make their balloon-like structure easier to move, so astronauts must spend a long time getting the nitrogen out of their system. The Apollo missions ... |
if i open the car window is there an equal but opposite breeze outside? | Technically if you open a window air will flow in yes. But also air will flow outward because of the maximum capacity of airflow. The air will circulate and exit the car.
So yes there is an equal and opposite airflow | [
"An alternative explanation for the orientation of the window is that getting at least one corner of a window up as far as possible in the interior of the house allows hot air (which rises to the top of the room) to escape on summer afternoons. However, this reasoning seems suspect, as Vermont is not as hot as many... |
Has the United States been the primary cause of disruptions in the Middle East since the 1940s? | Clarification: the US was not a primary disruptive force in the establishment of the Jewish state either. Typically, the British, Soviets, and Arab states are considered to be more disruptive in terms of turning the tide towards Jewish self-determination. The US played a critical role in helping pass UN General Assembl... | [
"The U.S. responded to Soviet influence in the Middle East after the Camp David Accords by using economic sanctions to influence the Arab world. Geopolitics transitioned from post-Cold War polarization to 21st-century regional conflicts. The lack of two superpowers destabilized the Middle East as pressure-relieving... |
what happens after we die? (i.d, saving accounts, property, etc) | Presently dealing with this, pm me if you like.
Each State has different laws, but basics should be similar.
Assuming US here.
If you have a will or trust setup in advance, that can declare your legal assignment of things. Similar to if you knew you were dying, and gave your stuff away in your last hours.
If any... | [
"The concept of \"death of money\" also refers to the fundamental change in the nature of business transactions based on a complex, electronically managed system of valuations used for stocks, bonds, insurance policies, and other financial contracts that go beyond the simple, historic notion of money representing p... |
what happens if you take a stimulant and a depressant at the same time? | You end up potentially not realizing how out of it you are. It feels more normal, but in terms of objective measurement you're just as out of your mind as you'd predict given dosage and drug. This runs the risk of people thinking they can safely take more and ODing or just getting way higher than they meant to. | [
"In rare cases antidepressants can make users obsessively violent or have suicidal compulsions, which is in marked contrast to their intended effect. This can be regarded as a paradoxical reaction but, especially in the case of suicide, may in at least some cases be merely due to differing rates of effect with resp... |
how does nuclear materials make it possible to split the atoms to make a nuclear bomb possible. | It only works if you start with rare, special unstable atoms that are ready to split already. Typically these will be plutonium, or enriched uranium.
Average atoms are damned hard to split. | [
"Nuclear fission type atomic bombs utilize the energy present in very heavy atomic nuclei, such as U-235 or Pu-239. In order to release this energy rapidly, a certain amount of the fissile material must be very rapidly consolidated while being exposed to a neutron source. If consolidation occurs slowly, repulsive f... |
how did germany manage to take so much of europe during wwii despite its central geographic location? | There are too many reasons to list succinctly, but some factors that combined to get them their initial gains were initiative, an element of surprise, some newer military tricks and strategies, unpreparedness of their enemies, making effective use of modern weapons, etc.
And once they had taken everything through Fra... | [
"Germany's foreign policy during the war involved the creation of allied governments under direct or indirect control from Berlin. A main goal was obtaining soldiers from the senior allies, such as Italy and Hungary, and millions of workers and ample food supplies from subservient allies such as Vichy France. By th... |
how did jordan maintain relative stability during and after the arab spring, and how is jordan still maintaining the relative stability with the state the middle east is in right now? | Despite being a monarchy, Jordan is actually one of the better countries in the region when it comes to democracy and human rights. The king is popular and doesn't rule as a dictator.
The religious demographics also help. Jordan is 92% Sunni Muslim and allows a decent amount of religious freedoms for the rest (mostly ... | [
"The Arab Spring were large-scale protests that erupted in the Arab World in 2011, demanding economic and political reforms. Many of these protests tore down regimes in some Arab nations, leading to instability that ended with violent civil wars. In Jordan, in response to domestic unrest, Abdullah replaced his prim... |
Can you explain me quantum decoherence in simple language? | To understand this, it probably helps to start with quantum coherence. At a simplistic level, coherence can be thought of as the information that the quantum system holds. More precisely, it is a measure of the relationship between different possible states of the system. Quantum computers rely on this information to f... | [
"Quantum decoherence implies that irreversible macroscopic phenomena (hence, all classical measurements) render histories automatically consistent, which allows one to recover classical reasoning and \"common sense\" when applied to the outcomes of these measurements. More precise analysis of decoherence allows (in... |
how is profit margin a useful metric when a company can just reinvest all of their money back into the company? | This is why you actually *read* the earnings reports if you want to invest in a company. They specify how much they earned for what sectors and how much they spent on various activities(materials, wages, facilities, marketing, expansion, and reinvestment)
If you dig through it you'd see something along the lines of
... | [
"BULLET::::- while average profit \"rates\" on capital invested may decline as a result, profit \"margins\" (or profit volumes) will increase, because more output can be produced and sold in a given accounting period, using the new technologies (implying unit-costs for products made will decline).\n",
"If it is a... |
what are foreign currency reserves and why are they important? | Foreign currency reserves simply put are just monies from other countries a government (or central bank, if it is separate) have on hand at any given time. They use these reserves to buy and sell securities of other countries (which are denominated in foreign currency). This has important implications for government fi... | [
"These foreign-currency deposits are the financial assets of the central banks and monetary authorities that are held in different reserve currencies (e.g. the U.S. dollar, the Euro, the Japanese yen and the Pound sterling) and which are used to back its liabilities (e.g. the local currency issued and the various b... |
with all the wealth, resources, and technology in the world today, how does everyone not have a basic education, food, water, and shelter? | Because 85 individuals control the same amount of wealth as 3.5billion people. Yes, you read those numbers right.
Source: Oxfam | [
"In 2012 Kotler published \"Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think\" with Peter H. Diamandis. The book revolves around the idea that the world is getting better and in the future most people of the world will have access to clean water, food, energy, health care, education, and everything else that is neces... |
how do procedurally generated video games work? how are players not constantly stuck in a situation where they can no longer progress due to the level generation? | > Are procedurally generated levels given guidelines they must abide by
yes. that's why it's called "procedurally" and not "randomly". the game has to follow a procedure that makes sure the result is a playable map. a simple example would be to allow it to make gaps in a path, but the gaps have to be < 1m wide and h... | [
"There are two players in static games: the \"machine\" and the \"environment\". The machine can only follow algorithmic strategies, while there are no restrictions on the behavior of the environment. Each run (play) is won by one of these players and lost by the other.\n",
"Throughout the game, the player is pre... |
why isn't the orlando shooting on my front page? | The uncensored megathread on /r/news (censored comments appear in red): _URL_0_ | [
"Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Senator John McCain, accused President Obama of being \"directly responsible\" for the Orlando nightclub shooting \"because when he pulled everybody out of Iraq, al-Qaeda went to Syria, became ISIS, and ISIS is what it is today thanks to Barack Obama's failures.\"\n... |
how do power outages happen when too many people are using electricity? | Imagine a bathtub full of water, the water represents electricity. The bathtub has a faucet, which represents the generation of electricity. Imagine now that there are little holes in the bottom of the bathtub, all plugged up. When ever a home needs power, unplug the drain and let the water flow out.
Now imagine that... | [
"A power outage is an interruption of normal sources of electrical power. Short-term power outages (up to a few hours) are common and have minor adverse effect, since most businesses and health facilities are prepared to deal with them. Extended power outages, however, can disrupt personal and business activities a... |
So what's up with dogs and TV's? Can get watch it or is it something about the type of TV? | There is evidence that most dogs don't see a typical frame rate of 24 to 30 frames per second as continuous motion, but as separate still images. (_URL_0_) The changing images will still often attract an animal's attention, and many will react to what's on the screen even if it doesn't look smooth for them. | [
"DOGTV is a premium cable television network and the first television network that is made specifically for dogs. The network was founded in equal parts by Ron Levi and Guy Martinovsky, its first CEO, that sold his shares later to The Jasmine Group. DOGTV provides 24/7 digital TV programming that is designed to pro... |
if an spf50 sunscreen increases my skin's natural resistance to uv rays from 5 to 250 minutes, does its effectiveness wear off after 250 minutes even if i spend them in the dark, or does it only wear off during sun exposure? | The spf and how long it lasts aren’t really directly connected the way you described.
The spf is a measurement of how much sun it blocks, not how long it stays on your skin. | [
"The SPF is an imperfect measure of skin damage because invisible damage and skin aging are also caused by ultraviolet type A (UVA, wavelengths 315–400 or 320–400 nm), which does not primarily cause reddening or pain. Conventional sunscreen blocks very little UVA radiation relative to the nominal SPF; broad-spectru... |
breastfeeding and immune system | Only babies young enough that their digestive system hasn't started to its full capacity can get whole antibodies from breast milk. As soon as the child is capable of digesting solid food, its digestive system breaks down the antibodies before absorbing them. Antibodies are made of protein, so they are digested just li... | [
"Because various components present in human breast milk stimulate the growth of the immune system, there is a growing interest in whether breastfeeding provides a long term protective effect against auto-immune and inflammatory diseases.\n",
"Breastfeeding is thought to be an important driver of infant gut micro... |
How effective was gunpowder armies against traditional armies in battle? | A lot of ink has been spilt in /r/AskHistorians over the question of muskets v.s. bows, many of them ridiculously well-sourced. It's not a direct answer to your question, but I think it's pretty easy to infer: in general, gunpowder armies destroy traditional armies, which is why there are none of the latter left. Here ... | [
"Until the invention of gunpowder-based weapons (and the resulting higher-velocity projectiles), the balance of power and logistics definitely favored the defender. With the invention of gunpowder, the traditional methods of defence became less and less effective against a determined siege.\n",
"Until the inventi... |
Viking era (late 8th, early 9th century) history breakdown | If you want an overview of the Viking period as a whole, I'd check out Gwyn Jones's *History of the Vikings* from Oxford Press. It'll give you just about everything you need for a broad overview of the period. | [
"The Viking revival was a movement of interest and appreciation for Viking history and culture in the 18th and 19th centuries, often with romanticized heroic overtones. It began with historical discoveries and early modern publications dealing with Old Norse culture. These appeared in the 16th century, e.g. \"Histo... |
How do our lungs differentiate between oxygen and nitrogen when breathing? | Lungs themselves don't really separate gases like you seem to be imagining. The alveoli have a very large surface area with lots of capillaries, allowing gases to diffuse in and out of the blood. Any molecule that's more concentrated on one side than the other will diffuse across the barrier (although small molecules w... | [
"The sum of partial pressures of the gas that the diver breathes must necessarily balance with the sum of partial pressures in the lung gas. In the alveoli the gas has been humidified and has gained carbon dioxide from the venous blood. Oxygen has also diffused into the arterial blood, reducing the partial pressure... |
If I eat a 3500 calorie surplus today, how long until 1 pound of fat is produced on my body? | Hypothetically, the fat would mostly be stored within 4-48 hours of ingestion. The fat gets broken down in the stomach and small intestine, absorbed into the lymphatic system and broken down into free fatty acids, then most are transported around the blood in the form of triglycerides (because lipids aren't water solub... | [
"Calories expended, however, changed little. Accordingly, Cutler posits that the 20 min average reduced time of food preparation has resulted in an average increase of 100 Cal per day per individual. The extra 100 Cal can largely account for a weight gain of 10-12 lb in the American population over the past 20 year... |
how do non-human primates look after their teeth and why do humans need dentists? | They don't really, and they don't really need to. Evolution wants you to live long enough to reproduce then its just a waiting game, so you only *need* teeth in your early adulthood in a manner of speaking.
we also live longer and eat more sugars acids and general crap that is bad for us so there is a massive differen... | [
"Primates have four cutting upper parallel fore-teeth, except in some bat species which have two or none; solitary tusks in each jaw, one on each side; two pectoral teats; two feet and hands; flattened, oval nails; and they eat fruits.\n",
"The impala has a special dental arrangement on the front lower jaw simila... |
fair use of copyrighted material. | That wouldn't fall under *any* fair use laws, since that would not be a fair use of the material.
Fair use is what's called an *affirmative defense,* meaning that once you get sued for copyright infringement, you can claim that your use of the material — which *was* infringing, you admit — was a fair one. It's basical... | [
"Fair use is a doctrine in the law of the United States that permits limited use of copyrighted material without having to first acquire permission from the copyright holder. Fair use is one of the limitations to copyright intended to balance the interests of copyright holders with the public interest in the wider ... |
what would happen if 2 hurricanes ran into each other? | This is rare but it does happen. If two hurricanes are formed pretty close to each other they can interact. They basically spiral around each other and form one large storm.
This doesn't have the hugely devastating effect that you may think of and such large storm systems merging normally leads to the storm dispers... | [
"Hurricanes are another natural disaster found in the US, which can hit anywhere along the Gulf Coast or the Atlantic Coast as well as Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. Particularly at risk are the central and southern Texas coasts, the area from southeastern Louisiana east to the Florida Panhandle, peninsular Florida, ... |
magic the gathering rules/strategy | Deck building strategy largely depends on what format you are playing in (ie, Vintage, Legacy, Modern, Extended, Standard, Block, Commander) The different formats dictate which cards you can use, which in turn dictates play styles and meta-games.
Make sure you understand the rules first, as lasgnaman suggested, (the ... | [
"Magic: The Gathering - Tactics was an online turn-based strategy video game for the PC based on the card game that includes elements of positioning and map control. \"Tactics\" was developed and published by Sony Online Entertainment. The game was released for PC on January 18, 2011 and shut down on March 28, 2014... |
what's my computer doing for the last 1% of an upload? | Your file is uploaded in chunks. Once all the chunks have uploaded, the server has to put the chunks back together and perform an integrity check to ensure the received file is the exact same as the one that you've attempted to send. These additional steps aren't factored into the total upload time with consistent le... | [
"The first proposed interval between successive pageloads was 60 seconds. However, if pages were downloaded at this rate from a website with more than 100,000 pages over a perfect connection with zero latency and infinite bandwidth, it would take more than 2 months to download only that entire Web site; also, only ... |
Do the properties of a black hole change depending on the amount of material they suck in? | *Amount* of material? Yes. Most notably, their mass, and thus gravitational attraction and volume, depend on how much mass they sucked in. If a black hole sucks in 1kg of material, it gets 1kg heavier. Ditto with electric charge, and a couple other bulk properties.
What about *type* of material? Is there a difference ... | [
"In summary, the process results in a slight decrease in the angular momentum of the black hole, which corresponds to a transference of energy to the matter. The momentum lost is converted to energy extracted.\n",
"Because a black hole has only a few internal parameters, most of the information about the matter t... |
how do scientists determine the composition of atmospheres from earth? | There's a Cosmos episode that should cover this. They basically take a prism and split the light coming from a celestial body into a spectrum. There will be darker lines in that spectrum. Each group of lines corresponds to an element, depending on which frequencies of light are most easily absorbed by that element.
... | [
"Observations of atmospheric chemistry are essential to our understanding. Routine observations of chemical composition tell us about changes in atmospheric composition over time. One important example of this is the Keeling Curve - a series of measurements from 1958 to today which show a steady rise in of the conc... |
In WW2 who had the most effective small arms and why? | I don't think this question is specific enough. Do you mean the most produced and used small arm? Probably (Mosin Nagant). The most innovative and influential after the war? (STG 44). The easiest to produce? I would put that to the (grease gun).
The guns were produced based on the infantry doctrines of each of t... | [
"When World War II ended in 1945, the small arms that were used in the conflict still saw action in the hands of the armed forces of various nations and guerrilla movements during and after the Cold War era. Nations like the Soviet Union and the United States provided many surplus, World War II-era small arms to a ... |
how are professional rugby players able to tolerate such physical punishment seemingly with little injury where as soccer, basketball and protected american football players seem to have devastating injuries quite frequently? | As a rugby player I'll give my thoughts but they aren't science backed or anything. When you play rugby you learn how to take an impact without getting injured. You learn how to fall correctly and brace before you get hit. If you watch some "big hit compilations" on YouTube you will see that there is plenty of injuries... | [
"It is especially important to avoid any serious knee injuries, such as torn ligaments or fractured bones, because arthritis can complicate knee injury treatment. High-impact or repetitive stress sports, like football and distance running, should be avoided.\n",
"The occurrence of concussions in amateur leagues a... |
how does planting trees in drier areas increase rainfall? | Trees transpire (essentially 'breathe out') water vapour - they draw in water from the root system, circulate the water throughout the tree, and then expel water in vapour form through stomata in their leaves. If you get enough trees planted in a dry area the collective 'breathing out' of water vapour will create more ... | [
"BULLET::::- Watershed function: Because of the cloud-stripping strategy, the effective rainfall can be doubled in dry seasons and increase the wet season rainfall by about 10%. Experiments of Costin and Wimbush (1961) showed that the tree canopies of non-cloud forests intercept and evaporate 20 percent more of the... |
the heat of our body...what is producing the ''warm'' side of our body? and why are some animals cold blooded like frogs? | For starters, 'warm blooded' and 'cold blooded' are pretty generic terms. There's actually a lot of complex variation between and within either category. Not all cold blooded animals are cold blooded the same way, and vice versa.
There are advantages to either system. For instance, reptiles, or amphibians like your f... | [
"It has been hypothesized that warm-bloodedness evolved in mammals and birds because it provided defense against fungal infections. Very few fungi can survive the body temperatures of warm-blooded animals. By comparison, insects, reptiles, and amphibians are plagued by fungal infections.\n",
"Animals, including h... |
how do aquatic animals know how far they should go down in the water? ex. blue whales can only go so far down, what prevents them from going further? | Probably "similar" to the feeling you get when holding your breath past what's good for you. Your body just knows what it needs and will tell you when you are taking risks. | [
"In 2011, a tagged Cuvier's beaked whale dove to 2,992 m, (9,816 ft) which is the deepest recorded dive by any mammal. The whales' rib cages can fold down so as to reduce air pockets and decrease buoyancy.\n",
"Because krill move, blue whales typically feed at depths of more than during the day and only surface-f... |
how do we keep track of locations in space? | You have to agree on something to act as the base point from which everyone else is measuring from. When dealing with stuff in our galaxy, we usually use the Earth as the reference point, since pretty much everyone knows where the Earth is.
For an extrasolar planet, we'd use two reference points. We'd use the Earth a... | [
"BULLET::::- A NASA experiment, Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology (SEXTANT), shows how spacecraft may possibly determine their location by focusing on millisecond pulsars in space.\n",
"BULLET::::- Real-time location systems (RTLS) are used to track and identify the location of objects i... |
How large does a piece of land have to be before it is no longer considered an island? | I would guess it has to do with [plate tectonics](_URL_0_). For example, Hawaii is a volcanic *island* because it is in the middle of the Pacific Plate. Similarly, Greenland is an island because it is part of the North American Plate. On the other hand, we call Australia a *continent* rather than an island because it i... | [
"The largest island is Spitsbergen (37,673 km2 or 14,550 square miles), and the largest settlement is Longyearbyen (approximately 2,075 inhabitants, the administrative centre of Svalbard, located on Spitsbergen).\n",
"The largest island is \"Île Sud-Est\" (Eastern Egmont), where the settlement was located, with a... |
why is kim dotcom wanted by the us government? | For copyright infringement by the MPAA, the Motion Picture Association of America, amd the RIAA, the Recording Industry of America. They were mad that he was profiting off of piracy, or stealing (copying?) copyrighted, or works created by people for profit.
Example:
I make a movie, I expect people to pay for it.
Kim... | [
"In February 2014, Prime Minister John Key said in the media that Winston Peters had visited the Kim Dotcom mansion three times. This information turned out to be correct, and Peters publicly challenged Key to release the source of the information, suggesting that the Prime Minister had used spying agencies to trac... |
If we send garbage into the sun to be incinerated and the cargo contains some iron would the sun destabilize? | No. Iron does not directly cause stars to cease fusing elements, nor does it directly cause destabilisation or anything like that.
What actually happens with iron during fusion is that stars lose energy from fusing iron and heavier elements. Elements lighter than iron produce more energy than they consume through fusi... | [
"With the Earth's atmosphere full of dust and other material, radiation from the sun would be refracted and scattered back into space, and absorbed by this debris. The first effect on the Earth, after the blast wave and potential multiple fire storms, would be the death of most, if not all, of the photosynthetic li... |
What is the earliest known example of satirical, fake news in the same vein as the Onion? | I can't attest to what I've encountered being *the* earliest, but my period of study (English Civil War) was significantly affected by the boom in printing and the drop in restrictions on publishing so I feel it'd be a strong starting point for the discussion in a 'rise of mass media' sort of a way.
The text that I'v... | [
"\"The Onion\" is a satirical American publication that parodies traditional newspapers. Founded in 1988 in Madison, Wisconsin as a weekly satirical print newspaper, it began publishing online in 1996 and discontinued its print edition in 2013. Articles in \"The Onion\" often parody real-world public figures and cu... |
If quantum physics deals with phenomenon on a microscopic scale, what is the largest observable quantum phenomenon? | I think the question is too open-ended, and extremely dependent on variations on the interpretation of the question. (e.g., "largest"? "quantum phenomenon"?)
For example, I can say a diffraction grating demonstrates quantum phenomenon. I can equally say that repulsion between my hand and the table is due to quantum ph... | [
"Macroscopic quantum phenomena refer to processes showing quantum behavior at the macroscopic scale, rather than at the atomic scale where quantum effects are prevalent. The best-known examples of macroscopic quantum phenomena are superfluidity and superconductivity; other examples include the quantum Hall effect. ... |
why do your bones "crack" when you stretch in the morning? | Your bones aren't actually cracking. It's the sound of pockets of air in your body getting crushed by joint movement. It's sort of like how it makes a sound when you pop those packing bubble sheets. | [
"The main symptom is pain, causing loss of ability and often stiffness. The pain is typically made worse by prolonged activity and relieved by rest. Stiffness is most common in the morning, and typically lasts less than thirty minutes after beginning daily activities, but may return after periods of inactivity. Ost... |
why does my phone take longer to charge than the actual time of me using it? | Yeah that doesn't sound right... Unless your usage is high performance, like you're rendering 3D video constantly.
It sounds like there's a problem with your battery. Consider getting your phone replaced? | [
"It also comes with Battery Care, Sony's proprietary charging algorithm, that controls the charging process of the phone through machine learning. It recognizes the user's charging habits for a certain period and automatically adjusts itself to the pattern, for example an overnight charge, by stopping the initial c... |
what happens to my digital media if the distributor goes bankrupt? | Kinda yeah, but most likely they would give you a warning ahead of time to download all of your stuff before it goes down. | [
"An important aspect of the digital supply chain is the process of encrypting the content so that it cannot be played back without the proper license which is often acquired via purchase of content or subscription. This reduces the possibility of media being pirated.\n",
"Despite the aforementioned legal rulings,... |
why does everyone use q-tips to clean ear wax when the box specifically tells you not to? where did that start from? and what should be used instead? | Since 1923, people have been inserting q-tips in their ears. It starts out innocently enough: you're just kinda fooling around with a firm swab one day and then, whoops!, the tip just kinda slides in. You tell yourself that it's just the tip: if you don't go any further, it won't do any harm. But it feels *so freakin' ... | [
"Ear picks, also called ear scoops, or ear spoons, or earpicks, are a type of curette used to clean the ear canal of earwax (cerumen). They are preferred and are commonly used in East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia because Asians tend to develop dry ear wax.\n",
"Ear candling, also called ear coning or therm... |
how is redbox in business? | Because what costs me $1.28 at Redbox costs me $3.99 (at least) On Demand or Amazon. | [
"Redlasso is a broadcast media website which allows users to search, clip, and share licensed television and radio content. Initially envisioned as a video clip search engine, the company currently seeks to help publishers \"extend the life of their perishable content in a secure and controllable platform, while gi... |
Are European dragons and Asian dragons related? | There is a thread from about a year and half (?) ago [here](_URL_0_) that you might be interested in.
/u/AdamSC1 provides a very informative summary [here](_URL_0_cufab91/) and [here](_URL_0_cufabir/). | [
"The modern western image of a dragon developed in western Europe during the Middle Ages through the combination of the snakelike dragons of classical Graeco-Roman literature, references to Near Eastern European dragons preserved in the Bible, and western European folk traditions. The period between the 11th and 13... |
In the colonial times, the tricorne hat is often portrayed as being very popular which then evolved into the bicorne hat. Why were both these hat popular, especially when it doesn't look like they are effective at blocking the sun from you face? | [This](_URL_0_) thread with /u/mimicofmodes 's answer might help with some answers you have here. | [
"The tricorne appeared as a result of the evolution of the broad-brim round hat used by Spanish soldiers in Flanders during the 17th century. By pledging (binding) the brims, a triangular shape was obtained. This shape was favored by Spanish soldiers, as when standing at arms their muskets could be held at their sh... |
Why was the Prime Minister of Australia dismissed in 1975, and what was the reaction? | The short answer is that Prime Minister Gough Whitlam was unable to secure supply (he was unable to pass the budget, so no one working for the government would be able to be paid). Constitutionally a Prime Minister who is unable to secure supply he is required to call a double dissolution election. Whitlam refused to d... | [
"The Whitlam government ended in 1975 with a constitutional crisis in which Governor-General John Kerr dismissed the ministry and appointed Opposition Leader Malcolm Fraser as prime minister, an act in which the monarch herself was not consulted and, when approached after the event, pointedly refused to intervene, ... |
how does rock climbing work? how do people get the ropes set up at the top of the rock/cliff? can you climb any rock face you want or does it have to already be set up for all the equipment to work? | There are many types of rock climbing.
What you're talking about sounds like free climbing, where a person inserts clips and rope as they climb up the cliff. The clip (called an "anchor") holds very tightly into the cliff and then the climber can put the rope through it to prevent injury.
In some cases anchors might ... | [
"Rock climbing is a sport in which participants climb up, down or across natural rock formations or artificial rock walls. The goal is to reach the summit of a formation or the endpoint of a usually pre-defined route without falling. Professional rock climbing competitions have the objectives of either completing t... |
does a charge of attempted murder include all of the crimes that go into the attempt? | Nope...Separate offenses, even if they are steps in an overall plan are charged separately. This is done to improve chances of a conviction, assure that any individual aspect that is somehow justified does not pardon the entire case, and to maximize sentencing.
You would be charged for kidnapping, aggravated assault... | [
"In the United States, attempted murder is an inchoate crime. A conviction for attempted murder requires a demonstration of an intent to murder, meaning that the perpetrator either tried to murder and failed (e.g. attempted to shoot the victim and missed or shot the victim and the victim survived) or took a substan... |
how does breaking one part of a screen mess up the picture of the whole thing? | Each individual pixel in a screen needs to be controlled somehow. You can do this with a pair of wires to every single pixel, but that’s a lot of wires and very expensive with a high res screen. More usually it’s done by setting up a grid and scanning the screen with vertical and horizontal wires that “select” pixels a... | [
"If the subject matter is a landscape, you may consider putting the frontmost object at or slightly behind the surface of the screen. This will cause the subject to be framed by the window boundary and recede into the distance. Once the adjustment is made, trim the picture to contain only the portions containing bo... |
is it possible for unskilled workers to form unions? | depends on what you consider "unskilled", if you mean jobs that do not require a certification then yes, happens all the time. | [
"Labour laws relating to trade unions or the Industrial Relations Act 2012 do not enable workers to form unions. There is also very little room for those who are already organized in trade unions to bargain for the collective rights of workers.\n",
"Employers can also avoid unionization by entering into \"protect... |
Why is WWII history so fascinating? | One reason is certainly the vastness of the whole conflict. The 'Vietnam' or 'Korean' Wars can largely be said to confine within the geographical limits of those two countries. Obviously they involved the US, China, Soviet Union and extended geographically into other areas, but you get the point. WORLD WAR, however, ca... | [
"There is a wide range of ways in which people have represented World War II in popular culture. Many works were created during the years of conflict and many more have arisen from that period of world history.\n",
"\"The World at War\" attracted widespread acclaim and is now regarded as a landmark in British tel... |
why does licking a 9v battery zap you, but touching it to your skin not? | The skin on your arm has a higher level of resistance to electricity, mostly (I believe) due the natural oils from your skin. Your tongue does not have this shielding and will have little resistance against the electric current.
> The condition of the skin at the points of contact are critical. The actual resistanc... | [
"Niacin is known for its tendency to cause an uncomfortable flushing of the skin. This flushing is triggered by the activation of the GPR109A G-protein coupled receptor. NR does not activate this receptor, and has not been shown to cause flushing in humans—even at doses as high as 2,000 mg/day.\n",
"Electrical bu... |
Let's talk organized crime. | Well organized crime came in plenty of forms. For as long as people were making an honest buck, whatever that means, there were people willing to aggressively and perhaps violently deprive them of it.
The most straight forward forms were simply **robbery, banditry, and piracy**. In China there have always been bandit... | [
"BULLET::::- Organized crime: a business that supplies illegal goods or services, including sex, drugs, and gambling. This type of crime expanded among immigrants, who found that society was not always willing to share its opportunities with them. A famous example of organized crime is the Italian Mafia.\n",
"BUL... |
[Physics] How far can the human visual system semi-accurately detect range via only parallax? | According to [this study](_URL_0_), 97.3% of subjects could detect a difference in depth at 2.3 minutes of arc or smaller.
& #x200B;
Converting that to degrees, we get 0.0383333 degrees. If we now consider a right triangle with one leg of 65mm (typical distance between pupils in a human), one angle of 90 deg, and an... | [
"Parallax also affects optical instruments such as rifle scopes, binoculars, microscopes, and twin-lens reflex cameras that view objects from slightly different angles. Many animals, including humans, have two eyes with overlapping visual fields that use parallax to gain depth perception; this process is known as s... |
Has there ever been a case of a racially/ethnically segregated society where all of the races/ethnicities were truly "separate but equal" and everybody was more or less content with the system? | The closest I can think of is the Ottoman Empire. Different religious communities lived in different neighbourhoods and villages and applied their own law to social issues (marriage, divorce, inheritance, etc) although all were also subject to imperial law. Furthermore it was relatively common for non-Muslim merchants ... | [
"Wherever there have been multiracial communities, there has been racial segregation. Only areas with extensive miscegenation, or mixing, such as Hawaii and Brazil, despite some social stratification, seem to be exempt.\n",
"It can be argued that segregation between black and white ethnic groups is so strong in s... |
where do waves come from and why do they come in sets of seven when you’re at the beach? | Earth's magnetic field may affect our measurements of gravity, but they are separate. The moon's ( & sun's) gravitational "pull" on Earth cause the tide changes, but magnetism has nothing to do with it.
And waves do not specifically come in sets of 7. They can really come in any number of waves per set at many differ... | [
"The beach forms an attractive bay that ends in a rocky point where the waves it is famous for break. These break from left to right, are well shaped and go for about half a mile on a good day. The renowned quality of its waves is mentioned in the Beach Boys' song \"Surfin' Safari\". However, the quality of the wav... |
How much do we know about Rome prior to the Republic? | We don't know very much at all: all the literary sources for this period are from centuries later, and the archaeology of early Rome is made difficult by the fact that most of it is buried underneath later Rome. There are basically two schools of thought about early Rome: one is that the sources are too late to be of a... | [
"The history of the Roman Empire covers the history of ancient Rome from the fall of the Roman Republic in 27 BC until the abdication of the last Western emperor in AD 476. Rome had begun expanding shortly after the founding of the Republic in the 6th century BC, though it did not expand outside of the Italian Peni... |
Did pre-automobile societies have ”drunk driving” laws? How drunk were you allowed to be while riding through town before you get arrested? | How drunk you were was always up to the enforcing officer until tests were introduced in the 20th Century.
I can only attest for English law. Although other countries may have previously have had laws concerning drink driving in past centuries, the texts of those laws are not readily available on the internet. I'm fai... | [
"New Jersey enacted the first law that specifically criminalized driving an automobile while intoxicated, in 1906. The New Jersey statute provided that \"[n]o intoxicated person shall drive a motor vehicle.\" Violation of this provision was punishable by a fine of up to $500, or a term of up to 60 days in county ja... |
why is the daytona 500 so important in nascar? | Cause it just is. NASCAR has a lot of history in Daytona Beach the Daytona 500 has a huge purse, it's one of the fastest tracks of the season, it's the first race of the calender, but mostly it's the biggest race of the year cause it's the **Daytona 500**.
It's along the same vein as the **Indy 500** for Indycar and ... | [
"The Daytona 500 was conceived by NASCAR founder Bill France Sr., who built the Daytona International Speedway. The race was first held in 1959; it is the successor to shorter races held on beaches around Daytona Beach. It has been the opening round of the NASCAR season since 1982, and from 1988, it has been one of... |
Question on Iranian government | Forgive me, I’m not positive whether you mean Reza Shah, the first monarch of the Pahlavi dynasty, or Mohammed (Reza) Shah, his son and successor. Either way, the answer, for the most part, is yes: both men ruled more or less autocratically during their reigns. Both men pushed programs meant to Westernize and modernize... | [
"The Iranian Revolution of 1979 resulted in an electoral system (an Islamic Republic with a constitution), but the system has a limited democracy in practice. One of the main problems of Iran's system is the consolidation of too much power in the hands of the Supreme Leader who is elected by Assembly of Experts for... |
if a dj is truly mixing and not "pressing play", how does the lighting team sync lights to the music? | There are basically two ways: automatisation or manual control.
You can hook up a machine that starts/stops/moves specific lights at specific moments, volumes or frequency's, or you can listen to the music in advance and practice or program the lighting-computer / improvise and mash the buttons : )
^^editedforDMX | [
"DJs use equipment that can play at least two sources of recorded music simultaneously and mix them together. This allows the DJ to create seamless transitions between recordings and develop unique mixes of songs. Often, this involves aligning the beats of the music sources so their rhythms do not clash when they a... |
what are particle accelerators trying to achieve when the particles collide? | The mocking analogy that's been used is that they're trying to figure out how clocks work, by smashing them to tiny pieces and studying the explosion. To be honest, that isn't so far off the mark. Instead of clocks though protons, anti-protons, electrons and positrons are used, to study what *they* are made of, and... ... | [
"Particle accelerators and colliders produce collisions (interactions) of particles (like the electron or the proton). In the terminology of the quantum state, the colliding particles form the \"Initial State\". In the collision, particles can be annihilated or/and exchanged, producing possibly different sets of pa... |
do i have to be worried about isps selling my information? | You should only have a problem if you happen to get your internet from an American ISP... Which would be strange given that you live in Sweden. So no, I wouldn't be concerned about it at all in your personal situation. | [
"Dallas Harris, an attorney who specializes in broadband privacy and a policy fellow at consumer advocacy group Public Knowledge notes that ISPs might be able to figure out where you bank, your political views, and your sexual orientation based on what sites you visit and asserts that \"the level of information tha... |
What's the estimated amount of time for distant galaxies to start disappearing due to the expansion of the universe? | For about the next 2.7 billion years, more and more galaxies will become visible as the light from them reaches us. After that, it will all start to slowly go dark as everything else is too far away for the light to EVER reach us, and the visible universes red shift into obscurity.
edit: said universes when I mean gal... | [
"If the expansion of the universe continues and it stays in its present form, eventually all but the nearest galaxies will be carried away from us by the expansion of space at such a velocity that our observable universe will be limited to our own gravitationally bound local galactic cluster. In the very long term ... |
how do electric cars work so it supplies enough energy to the car? | Electric cars use an electric motor (or multiple motors in most cases) The electric motor is powered via electricity by energizing elector magnets that basically push and pull causing the motor to turn. Attach a wheel, and you've got something to strap into a car. Your battery in your gas car doesn't provide nearly eno... | [
"Road powered electric vehicles (RPEV) (sometimes called roadway powered electric vehicles) collect any form of potential energy from the road surface to supply electricity to locomotive motors and ancillary equipment within the vehicle.\n",
"While an electric car's power source is not explicitly an on-board batt... |
how is sarah palin such a high profile political figure? | she was governor of Alaska. she was a vice-presidential candidate. she strikes a chord with the republican base. She's very loud and "genuine." People who want a wackadoo republican viewpoint invite her on their shows. She is a high profile figure because we made her one. | [
"A great deal of attention was paid to Palin's physical appearance during the 2008 elections. According to \"Vogue\" magazine, \"Besides being telegenic, [Palin] had a tough-girl Alaskan résumé that most politicians could only dream of—the protein her family eats comes from fish she has pulled out of the ocean with... |
how can a company "take over" another one? and how is this different from a sale of a company? | If a company is publicly traded, you just buy up a majority of the shares to take control of the Board of Directors and thus the company. If it's privately held it's a little more complicated because you have to negotiate with shareholders independently, but if you can convince enough investors to sell to you to get ma... | [
"There are a variety of reasons why an acquiring company may wish to purchase another company. Some takeovers are \"opportunistic\" – the target company may simply be very reasonably priced for one reason or another and the acquiring company may decide that in the long run, it will end up making money by purchasing... |
how and why was america chosen as the name of the original uniting colonies? | The name, "The United States of America" was chosen because the colonies were conceived of as being separate countries (state is another word for country) coming together for a common purpose (hence united). All of the colonies were situated on the continent of North America, which is why it's "of America".
[The Ameri... | [
"The colonies were independent of one other long before 1774; indeed, all the colonies began as separate and unique settlements or plantations. Further, efforts had failed to form a colonial union through the Albany Congress of 1754 led by Benjamin Franklin. The thirteen all had well-established systems of self-gov... |
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