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why is water able to evaporated below the boiling point? i was always taught 212f (100c) was when water could turn into a gas. | First let me say, if you have the time, ignore my answer and read the first chapter of the feynman lectures here: _URL_0_ Absolutely ELI5, great stuff.
Here's my explanation.
People found that liquid water is made of a huge number of tiny molecules. These attract and repel each other (too close and they repel, too fa... | [
"At a temperature below the boiling point, any matter in liquid form will evaporate until the condensation of gas above reach an equilibrium. At this point the gas will condense at the same rate as the liquid evaporates. Thus, a liquid cannot exist permanently if the evaporated liquid is continually removed. A liqu... |
What language has the least overlap of English speakers? | Given the sheer number of languages in the world (around 6000), it's quite difficult to get a handle of even reliable estimates of how many speakers each one has, let alone how l of its speakers also speak a language other than its national language. But there are hundreds of languages across the world in non-Anglophon... | [
"Five languages have more than 50 million native speakers in Europe: French, Italian, German, English and Russian. While Russian has the largest number of native speakers (more than 100 million in Europe), English has the largest number of speakers in total, including some 200 million speakers of English as a secon... |
law enforcement in usa | There are 15 times as many people who live in the US than in Australia. So it's reasonable that they would need more agencies to cover more issues.
State police can pursue you over state lines, they don't just stop chasing you when you cross the state line. | [
"Law enforcement in the United States is primarily the responsibility of local police departments and sheriff's offices, with state police providing broader services. The New York Police Department (NYPD) is the largest in the country. Federal agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. ... |
Why are large nuclei unstable? | The Pauli exclusion principle forbids two particles from sharing the same quantum state. Therefore, as you add nucleons to the nucleus they are forced to occupy higher and higher energy states to avoid violating this principle.
A nucleus in which the valence nucleons occupy a high energy state is unstable, since lowe... | [
"The nuclear force is highly attractive at the distance of typical nucleon separation, and this overwhelms the repulsion between protons due to the electromagnetic force, thus allowing nuclei to exist. However, the residual strong force has a limited range because it decays quickly with distance (see Yukawa potenti... |
Why did France preferred a facist state instead of a socialist/communist one? | France hasn't preferred a nationalist rebels (fascists, monarchists and reactionary Catholics) to the Spanish Republic. On the contrary, in the beginning, France and its Popular Front govt feared of being surrounded by fascists from the all sides. They initially moved to support the republic, but when they made to Brit... | [
"In France, the collapse of a leftist government coalition between social-democrats and left-liberal republicans, and the subsequent far-right riots that brought to power an autocratic right-wing government, changed the equation: in order to resist a slippery slope of authoritarian encroachment, socialists were now... |
What are the limitations on our ability to see smaller things at longer distances? (i.e. Seeing pluto from Earth) | The two key limitations are 1) achieving a high enough angular resolution and 2) collecting enough light. The [angular resolution](_URL_4_) is the smallest angular distance between two sources of light, for which the system will see two distinct sources rather than one blob. [This cartoon](_URL_2_) helps to visualize w... | [
"Largest does not always equate to being the best telescopes, and overall light gathering power of the optical system can be a poor measure of a telescope's performance. Space-based telescopes, such as the Hubble Space Telescope, take advantage of being above the Earth's atmosphere to reach higher resolution and gr... |
why aren't police departments footing the bill instead of the tax payers when it comes to court settlements? | Most police departments are taxpayer funded. Where do you think the money is going to come from? | [
"As to the issue of taxation, the court noted that, before the amount of an attorney-and-client bill can be recovered, it must first be taxed against that latter party. When the other party to the litigation is required to pay costs, the taxation will not be as generous as where an attorney's own client is to pay t... |
Why was Jean Bernadotte elected heir-presumptive to Charles XIII of Sweden? | Although the candidacy of Bernadotte, a non-Swedish speaking and commoner, to become the Crown-Prince of Sweden in October 1810 seems rather unlikely, there were a number of factors working in the French marshal's favor. The internal political situation in Sweden in 1810 was rather tense. Sweden had been undergoing a l... | [
"In 1810, Bernadotte was unexpectedly elected the heir-presumptive to the childless King Charles XIII of Sweden, thanks to the advocacy of Baron Carl Otto Mörner, a Swedish courtier and obscure member of the Riksdag of the Estates.. He assumed the name Charles John and became the \"de facto\" regent and head of sta... |
After Japan attacked pearl harbour, what did [the Japanese leaders] tell the Japanese people in regards to why, and what the goal of it all was? | The Japanese leaders attempted to frame the Japanese attack in a very sympathetic context: essentially, that the US sought to crush Japan in an economic vyse, thus asserting its power in the Pacific in an attempt to spread Western Imperialism. War, it was thought, was the only possible solution, to allow Japan to beco... | [
"The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise air strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy on the neutral United States in Oahu, Hawaii—with the focus being directed against the naval base at Pearl Harbor—on the morning of December 7, 1941. The attack sank four U.S. battleships, destroyed 188 U.S. aircraft, and killed nea... |
Are the protons and neutrons in a specific isotope always arranged in the same/similar way? | Yes, the arrangement matters. Just like atoms have discrete energy levels corresponding to arrangements of electrons, nuclei do as well.
> How many stable configurations are there for a given atom?
For a given nuclide, at most one (the ground state). However many nuclei are unstable even in the ground state.
> Are... | [
"Protons and neutrons are both nucleons, which may be bound together by the nuclear force to form atomic nuclei. The nucleus of the most common isotope of the hydrogen atom (with the chemical symbol \"H\") is a lone proton. The nuclei of the heavy hydrogen isotopes deuterium and tritium contain one proton bound to ... |
Why does a standard computer keyboard have 12 function keys (F1 - F12)? | Holy guacamole, I can actually answer this one. But first we have to go back to mainframes...
Back in the days of yore, desktop computers weren't a thing. Instead, you'd have a keyboard and monitor connected to a terminal of one sort or another. There were two main categories: *character-oriented* terminals and *block... | [
"Fn is a modifier key, and works like other modifiers keys, such as Ctrl, Shift, Alt and AltGr. For a standard modifier key, the microcontroller inside the keyboard sends a scancode for the modifier itself, which is then interpreted by the operating system and combined with other simultaneous key-presses. The Fn ke... |
What were the physiques of pre history human beings, including ancient physiques, and even medieval physiques of warriors and also citizens of different classes? We see many of them in movies and tv shows like in 300, Spartacus, and Roman Empire, etc, with amazing physiques. Is this true at all? | A whole cadre of writers answered a [similar question](_URL_0_) including u/FraudianSlip and u/GBFel. Someone else may have something new to add of course. | [
"Classical civilizations from Rome to China tended to invest the most importance in familial or tribal affiliation than an individual's physical appearance (Dikötter 1992; Goldenberg 2003). Societies still tended to equate physical characteristics, such as hair and eye colour, with psychological and moral qualities... |
why don't animals or humans decompose in a bog? | There's so little oxygen in that kind of environment that the bacteria and small animals required to make the bodies decompose simply can't live. | [
"There are also so-called \"accidental trogloxenes\" which are surface organisms that enter caves for no survival reason. Some may even be \"troglophobes\" (“cave haters”), which cannot survive in caves for any extended period. Examples include deer which fell through a sinkhole, frogs swept into a cave by a flash ... |
the success of works of art such as mark rothko's | Colour field paintings basically stemmed from the idea that colour can provoke emotion, and quite powerful feelings at that. I think a lot of people are attracted to these works subconsciously for that reason. | [
"Mark Rothko Art Centre ( – DMRAC) is a multi-functional institution of culture, arts and education, located inside the arsenal building of the Daugavpils fortress in Daugavpils, Latvia. It is a unique place in Eastern Europe, where the original paintings of Mark Rothko are located. He was one of the great artists ... |
How frail were women in the Victorian era, really? | For the health of women in Victorian women, perception was reality. With the belief that women were physically inferior to men every ailment was a confirmation.
Wendy Mitchinson writes in Chapter 2 of *The Nature of their Bodies: Women and their Doctors in Victorian Canada* on "The Frailty of Women." She states:
> ... | [
"Based on her study of cases from the Homewood Retreat, Cheryl Krasnick Warsh concludes that \"the realities of the household in late Victorian and Edwardian middle class society rendered certain elements — socially redundant women in particular — more susceptible to institutionalization than others.\"\n",
"In th... |
do we drill for oil to manufacture plastics, or are they made from the byproducts of oil refinement? | The refining process churns out a bunch of random shit. There's a neat picture [here](_URL_1_) that shows how different products are pulled out of crude oil at different temperatures. Plastics can be made from various refined products, but they're just not a significant use of oil overall: just 2.9% of crude use in the... | [
"Crude oil can be refined into a wide variety of component hydrocarbons. \"Petrochemicals\" are the refined components of crude oil and the chemical products made from them. They are used as detergents, fertilizers, medicines, paints, plastics, synthetic fibers, and synthetic rubber.\n",
"Synthetic crude may also... |
how does santa deliver toys to all the boys and girls in the world in one night? | You know how 1 year is like 7 to a dog? Well one night is like 1 year to Santa. | [
"The boy and the other children see thousands of Christmas elves gathered at the center of town waiting to send Santa Claus on his way. The boy is handpicked by Santa to receive the first gift of Christmas. Realizing that he could choose anything in the world, the boy asks for a bell from one of the reindeer's harn... |
Why do energy saturated systems have negative Kelvin temperatures? | You usually think of and treat temperature as a measure of how excited the system is. But an alternate definition, which is in some ways more fundamental, is that temperature indicates how much entropy increases when you add some heat.
Now, in most systems these definitions are equivalent. But in systems with a small ... | [
"A system with a truly negative temperature on the Kelvin scale is \"hotter\" than any system with a positive temperature. If a negative-temperature system and a positive-temperature system come in contact, heat will flow from the negative- to the positive-temperature system. A standard example of such a system is ... |
Is it true that there were only 500 German soldiers in Normandy? | I assume you mean on June 6th, 1944?
In that case, no, the Germans had many more men than 500. Based either on the beaches or shortly behind them were the 21st Panzer Division, 352nd Infantry Division, 709th Static Division, and 716th Static Division. This accounts for roughly 50,000 men.
In addition to these were a... | [
"The German armies had lost large numbers of troops in Normandy and the subsequent pursuit. To counteract this, about 20,000 \"Luftwaffe\" personnel were reallocated to the German Army, invalided troops were redrafted into the front line and \"Volkssturm\" units were formed using barely trained civilians.\n",
"It... |
how does one get data off of a computer/phone/technological device after it's been deleted? | Oftentimes when you think you're deleting the data, you're simply deleting the references to the data, not the data itself.
Think about a library. Imagine you want to get rid of a book. What most computers do it simply remove that book's card in the card catalog. But, the book itself is still on the shelves if you kno... | [
"When data is deleted from storage devices, the references to the data are removed from the directory structure. The space can then be used, or overwritten, with data from other files or computer functions. The deleted data itself is not immediately removed from the physical drive and often exists as a number of di... |
the shift away from 3d and vividly colored graphics to flatter more geometric designs. | When a technology is new, it's used extensively and taken to its limits. After it ages, the gimmick of it fades away and is then removed. | [
"Even simple shading and size of an image could be considered pseudo-3D, as shading makes it look more realistic. If the light in a 2D game were 2D, it would only be visible on the outline, and because outlines are often dark, they would not be very clearly visible. However, any visible shading would indicate the u... |
why do kids become attached to blankies? | It’s not just a blanket. Lots of people get emotionally attached to other inanimate objects. Usually it is a blanket or a toy of some kind. Stuffed animals are common as well. I don’t know the actual reasoning behind it though. It usually has something to do with security, like they feel more comfortable when holding i... | [
"Insecure attachment styles in toddlers involve unusual reunions after separation from a familiar person. The children may snub the returning caregiver, or may go to the person but then resist being picked up. They may reunite with the caregiver, but then persistently cling to him/her, and fail to return to their p... |
Did ancient civilisations actually build traps like we see in Indiana Jones. | Not to deter any new responses, but to get started [there have been similar](_URL_0_) questions a [few years ago—](_URL_2_) the basic gist of those threads is that Egyptian tombs could be mazelike and have deep pits and false walls, but the only account of having anything like Indiana Jones' pressure-sensitive plates t... | [
"Early reports claimed the story was about humans who tried to lure Predators with Alien eggs, although the idea was scrapped. Influenced by the work of Erich von Däniken, Anderson researched von Däniken's theories on how he believed early civilisations were able to construct massive pyramids with the help of alien... |
why does downloading new software such as ios10 on my phone cause a noticeable decrease in battery life? | Hi.
All of these responses are from people who sound like (and judging from post histories) have no idea how software design works, so I'm going to throw something in here.
When you write code for ONE device, ONE configuration, you and your team can likely do a pretty damn good job of making it work optimally on the ... | [
"Some users have experienced battery drain problems after updating to iOS 11. In a poll on its website, 70% of \"9to5Mac\" visitors reported decreased battery life after updating to the new operating system. However, in an article featuring Twitter complaints of battery life, \"Daily Express\" wrote that \"honestly... |
How/why do neon signs do this? | Did you take the video? And if so, did it look like this to the naked eye or did this only appear on camera?
It looks to me like it the kind of camera artifact that appears due to a fast-moving waveform being captured one frame at a time, so that in the final video it appears much slower, or even reversed. It's called... | [
"The neon sign is an evolution of the earlier Geissler tube, which is a broken glass tube containing a \"rarefied\" gas (the gas pressure in the tube is well below atmospheric pressure). When a voltage is applied to electrodes inserted through the glass, an electrical glow discharge results. Geissler tubes were pop... |
How would a video look back on Earth that was recorded on a spaceship that was going close to the speed of light? | The video recorder and all it's circuitry would be affected by the relativistic effects too. The video would be a record of how things appeared to those aboard the ship. | [
"Both for the purposes of visual observation to determine a result and simply as a unique visual for the program, high speed cameras are used during experiments and have become a trademark of the series. Very fast footage of moving objects in front of a measured scale is commonly utilized to determine the speed of ... |
why do some foods make you "bring it to a boil" only to immediately have you turn it down to a simmer? why not just simmer it? | Because that's how you can be sure that the water is the right temperature for simmering without having to measure. To simmer means to cook something at a temperature just below boiling, where bubbles are still forming but the water is not vaporizing. To get to that point, it's easiest to first go up to boiling and the... | [
"Boiling is the process of heating the ingredient until all the water escaped and a uniform sticky mixture forms. The most important thing during boiling is heat control. If too much heat is used, the sugar will be overcooked and won't have the crispy taste. On the other hand, if the heat is not enough, the sugar w... |
Are Titan's hydrocarbon seas combustible? | The atmosphere of Titan is 95% nitrogen and 5% methane. For combustion to take place there needs to be oxygen in the atmosphere. Since there is no oxygen they can't ignite. On the other hand if there were oxygen they would burn just fine: whether something will burn does not depend on the temperature. | [
"Large bodies of liquid hydrocarbons are thought to be present on the surface of Titan, although they are not large enough to be considered oceans and are sometimes referred to as \"lakes\" or seas. The Cassini–Huygens space mission initially discovered only what appeared to be dry lakebeds and empty river channels... |
Why do we define the mass of a proton/neutron as 1/12 of carbon-12, and not 1/56 of iron-56? | It's not really "inaccuracies", the mass defect is what it is and all you're doing then would be to ensure that the defect is always positive. I don't really see where the use of that would be. In chemistry you're using isotope-weighted atomic masses (e.g. the numbers you'll see on a periodic table) most of the time, a... | [
"The modern form of the whole number rule is that the atomic mass of a given elemental isotope is approximately the mass number (number of protons plus neutrons) times an atomic mass unit (approximate mass of a proton, neutron, or hydrogen-1 atom). This rule predicts the atomic mass of nuclides and isotopes with an... |
Fisticuffs / Boxing in the 1800's | Without gloves, bareknuckle fighters didn't hit the head very often; they couldn't risk breaking their hands. There were a lot of body hits, and broken ribs and noses, but it wasn't like modern boxing where the head is such a target.
In a recent *BBC History* magazine, there was reference to Tom Molineaux and Tom Crib... | [
"James Figg (1684 – 7 December 1734, surname sometimes spelt 'Fig') exhibited and taught methods of fighting with swords, cudgels and fists from a base in London in the eighteenth century. He is widely recognized as the first English bare-knuckle boxing champion, reigning from 1719 to 1730.\n",
"Boxing was profes... |
Why are some people so amazing at video games? | Some people have more efficient brain-wiring than others. DNA defines a fractal-like initial configuration of the brain, but at least as important are early-life experiences, the order that the individual learns things, etc. On average, I'd expect someone that had started playing fast-paced games from childhood to have... | [
"Video games have been found to be more engaging; instead of providing information over an extended class period, games provide small amounts of information at relevant stages. Playing video games helps with metacognition (which describes the ability to think about your own thinking); strong metacognitive skills ha... |
what are the psychological reasons behind seeing and/or formulating conspiracy theories? | Here's a couple posts from a recent askreddit thread I read a while back that provide some good insight:
posted by thinkofanamefast
* "Conspiracy theories also seem to be more compelling to those with low self-worth, especially with regard to their sense of agency in the world at large. Conspiracy theories appear to ... | [
"Doing research into conspiracy theories for his work on \"Brought to Light\", Moore came to develop his own opinions on the subject of a global conspiracy, stating that \"Yes, there is a conspiracy, indeed there are a great number of conspiracies, all tripping each other up ... the main thing that I learned about ... |
How did the rifle replace melee weapons despite how inaccurate they were in the early days? | Let's take it from the top but I want to predicate this post with a statement -- please do not fall into the common trap of believing those before us were somehow dumber than us or less enlightened. They were the same human beings we are today and they would not have done something that was clearly worse. They weren't ... | [
"During the 1850s, in a technological revolution of major proportions, the rifle musket began to replace the relatively inaccurate smoothbore musket in ever-increasing numbers, both in Europe and America. This process, accelerated by the Civil War, ensured that the rifled shoulder weapon would be the basic weapon u... |
How did ancient people keep stored water supplies such as cisterns safe to drink? | I’ve worked at a historical farm with a cistern. It is based on a farm in about the 1680’s. Edit- it is Pennsbury Manor outside of Philadelphia on the Delaware. Since the actual manse had been torn down it is a reconstruction based on historical records, though some of the window panes and artifacts are authentic. Incl... | [
"Throughout history, people have devised systems to make getting and using water more convenient. Living in semi-arid regions, ancient Persians in the 1st millennium BC used qanat system to gain access to water in the mountains. Early Rome had indoor plumbing, meaning a system of aqueducts and pipes that terminated... |
what happens if you go straight up in space, no stopping, will you run into anything? | Almost certainly not, however gravity from the Earth and other objects will pull you towards them. There is a lot more space then there are objects to hit. | [
"BULLET::::- \"Nothing else comes close to those first few seconds after leaving the plane, because once you take that last step there is no going back. A racing driver or a skier or climber can pull over and stop, have a rest, but with parachuting, once you cross that threshold, you have to see it through.\"\n",
... |
how do lung x-rays work, if you can only see bones with an x-ray? | X-rays show a lot more than bone! They show density of everything inside of you. Bones are the thick and easy to get a nice X-ray of but all your organs show up as different types of shadow. Lungs are made of a thin tissue and should be full of air so you can’t see them on X-ray very well when you’re healthy. But that ... | [
"Projectional radiography is the practice of producing two-dimensional images using x-ray radiation. Bones contain much calcium, which due to its relatively high atomic number absorbs x-rays efficiently. This reduces the amount of X-rays reaching the detector in the shadow of the bones, making them clearly visible ... |
why do soda 12-packs come in a 2x6 can box and beer 12-packs seem to always come in 3x4 can boxes | A long time ago, soda 12-pack boxes were sold in 3x4. But soda manufacturers realized that if they made the long box, that you could put the [box in your fridge and use it as a soda can dispenser](_URL_0_). This must have lead to an increase in sales of 12 packs, because easier access to cold beverages likely increas... | [
"Beverage cans and bottles are sold in multi-packs such as six packs, twelve packs, and cases of 24. These can be paperboard baskets, paperboard overwraps and cartons, corrugated fiberboard boxes, HDPE plastic handles, six pack rings, and shrink packs.\n",
"In the keg, fully made soda is stored under pressure jus... |
Has there ever been an estimate on how many planets there could possible be with the existence of Life? | A very simplistic but easy estimate can be made with the [Drake equation](_URL_0_).
The problem is that the values of things such as the fraction of planets that develop life and the fraction of life‐bearing planets that develop *intelligent* life are unknown and perhaps unknowable.
Here’s [Wolfram|Alpha’s interpreta... | [
"BULLET::::- No trace of life was discovered on any of the other planets in our solar system (or elsewhere in the universe), although it remained undetermined whether some forms of primitive life might exist, or might have existed, somewhere. Extrasolar planets were observed for the first time.\n",
"BULLET::::- N... |
why was Australia considered terra nullius when there were people living there already? | > why was Australia considered terra nullius when there were people living there already?
When the British came to Australia, they found a people who had no legal system, no leaders, no government. In other places, they had found native leaders with whom to make treaties to acquire the land; they couldn't find these... | [
"Unlike the rest of Australia, South Australia was not considered to be terra nullius. The enactment of the South Australia Act 1834 which enabled the province of South Australia to be established, acknowledged Aboriginal ownership and stated that no actions could be undertaken that would \"affect the rights of any... |
Why is electric charge quantized? | There is [a famous argument by Dirac](_URL_1_), which shows that the existence of magnetic monopoles and quantum mechanics goes hand in hand with the quantization of both electric and magnetic charge. [It came up in this topic some time back](_URL_0_).
The TL;DR version is:
(1) Introducing magnetic monopoles invali... | [
"The conservation of electric charge, by contrast, can be derived by considering \"Ψ\" linear in the fields \"φ\" rather than in the derivatives. In quantum mechanics, the probability amplitude \"ψ\"(x) of finding a particle at a point x is a complex field \"φ\", because it ascribes a complex number to every point ... |
If you were facing away from a black hole as you fell into it, could you tell when you passed the event horizon because you would suddenly be facing towards the singularity without changing direction? | The equivalence principle suggests you would not notice as you fell through, as a discontinuous transition implies physics operates differently inside the horizon. Why would you suddenly be facing the singularity? | [
"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",
"Observers c... |
How accurate is the movie "My Way"? | Hello,
Can you give some more specific examples on which part you are asking about? Not everyone has watched the movie, but should be able to give you answers on how accurate a scene is if you can describe it. | [
"A review in \"The Globe and Mail\" called \"The Right Way,\" \"an old-fashioned, grim Canadian movie\" that \"despite its paramount flows... marks the birth of a promising young director.\" The reviewer for the National Post wrote that despite the fact that the \"message is powerful and the production values fanta... |
why don't they make mid/rear engine front wheel drive cars? | When you accelerate, centre of gravity moves backwards. Rear mounted engine makes front wheels light - no weight equals low friction. Front mounted engine places weight above drive wheels, helps transfer power to road, whilst also using less drivetrain and cost.
| [
"Front-engine, rear-wheel drive vehicles tend to have the transmission up front just after the engine, but sometimes a front engine drives a rear-mounted transaxle. This is generally done for reasons of weight distribution, and is therefore common on sports cars. Another advantage is that as the driveshaft spins at... |
why is red eyes in pictures not as big of a problem as it used to be? | A selfie generally doesn't use a flash. Flash photography, especially from a flash that is positioned directly next to the lens, is still very much a problem for red-eye. | [
"The red-eye effect in photography is the common appearance of red pupils in color photographs of the eyes of humans and several other animals. It occurs when using a photographic flash very close to the camera lens (as with most compact cameras) in ambient low light.\n",
"However, the top-down factors of scenes ... |
What exactly makes us "think" or "know" in the brain? For example, I read a post saying caterpillars do not have the capacity to "think" or "know" [if they will turn into butterflies]? | Hi! I'm not a neuroscientist but I am a molecular biologist, so I have some vague insights and am also very interested in this topic. I just answered that caterpillar thread. My answer to it may help in your 2nd question (caterpillar consciousness). The short answer is, primitive organisms simply respond to stimuli... | [
"More recent research suggests that many of our preferences, attitudes, and ideas come from the adaptive unconscious. However, subjects themselves do not realize this, and they are \"unaware of their own unawareness\". People wrongly think they have direct insight into the origins of their mental states. A subject ... |
What was it like to fight in the Soviet admt during WW2? | I have a few responses on Soviet military culture you can find [here](_URL_0_). | [
"During World War II, most units of the NKVD Internal Troops were engaged alongside Red Army forces against Axis troops. They participated in the defense of Moscow, Leningrad, the Brest Fortress, Kiev, Odessa, Voronezh, Stalingrad, the North Caucasus and were heavily engaged during the Battle of Kursk.\n",
"Opera... |
Why was succession to the Ottoman throne "open" and not decided by the order of birth? Why did it often involve fratricide? | So, Ottoman succession is an extremely confusing nuanced evolution spanning six centuries. In 1261, the creation of the Ottoman polity, the Ottoman state used unigeniture to determine the new leader of the polity after the death of a sultan. As you can imagine, when a sultan has a dozen heirs capable of assuming contro... | [
"The Ottoman Dynasty had unusual succession practices compared to other monarchies. Those succession practices changed over time, and ultimately the sultanate was abolished in 1922. Later, the House of Osman (Turkish: Osmanoğlu Ailesi) continued the latest succession practice for the head of the family.\n",
"The ... |
Did General Douglas MacArthur have any significant redeeming aspects as a military commander in WWII and Korea? | Well, the last one (insubordination) is why he ended up getting fired, so they can be discounted, I think. And I really don't think you can hold the artillery and air restrictions in Manilla against him. Such concerns are rightfully the purview of Generals. Those of us at lower levels know our lives are at risk anyway,... | [
"Ostensibly for security, the Australian Government had given MacArthur control over the media in respect to operations in the theatre. MacArthur used this power for self-promotion and to convince the US public that the war in the Pacific was being won by his actions. Press releases implied that he was personally d... |
Why didn't Hitler just launch Operation Sealion while the Battle of Britain was happening? Wouldn't the RAF have been too busy to intervene with the landings? | Because an invasion is a *huge deal*. To be a bit crass, it's not like Civilization or Europa Univeralis or something where you drop some "army" unit onto the enemy territory and then you just rampage. I have little doubt in my mind that the Germans could have, if they so wished, snuck at least a token invasion force ... | [
"On 2 July 1940, in the aftermath of the French surrender, Adolf Hitler decided that an invasion of Britain could only begin after achieving air superiority. On 12 July he outlined his reasoning: aerial domination over the invasion area and its sea approaches was necessary to compensate for the weakness of the \"Kr... |
if the air scatters all the colours away so we can only see the blue light, why doesnt looking through *more* air at sunset look more blue? | Good thinking, but... it's the other way around. The colour that gets scattered the most is blue. That's why the air is predominantly blue. The blue comes from all directions (is scattered the most). Now, when light passes through more air, there is no blue left, and only the least scattered ones (red) reach you eye. | [
"The sky can turn a multitude of colors such as red, orange, purple and yellow (especially near sunset or sunrise) when the light must pass through a much longer path (or optical depth) through the atmosphere. Scattering effects also partially polarize light from the sky and are most pronounced at an angle 90° from... |
the potential scottish independence from the uk. both sides (pro/con) and the history of the issue. (curious american). | You are not going to get an ubiased answer because the facts about the potential consequences aren't really known, so right now a lot of people are just making up things that they would like to be true and cherry-picking sources to support that.
From an economic standpoint, pro-union people say that this would suck fo... | [
"Scottish independence (; ) is the political movement for Scotland to become a sovereign state independent from the United Kingdom. In 2014, a national referendum was held in Scotland. Voters were asked: \"Should Scotland be an independent country?\" 44.7 percent of voters answered \"Yes\" and 55.3 percent answered... |
why when i'm trying to fall asleep do i begin reliving cringe-worthy moments in my past? | There are lots of reasons - one of the primary ones being that in our history as humans, avoiding pain was a much higher priority than seeking pleasure as pain. So it makes sense that our subconsciousness tends to focus on negatives rather than positives, especially as back when evolutionary pressure was at its highes... | [
"According to Dunne, our wakeful attention prevents us from seeing beyond the present moment, whilst when dreaming that attention fades and we gain the ability to recall more of our timeline. This allows fragments of our future to appear in pre-cognitive dreams, mixed in with fragments or memories of our past. Othe... |
taking a second mortgage out on a home or property. | In brief: They are a secured loan, which means they use the borrower’s home as security. If you fail to pay back your loan they'll come after your house. | [
"If a consumer takes out an additional loan secured against the value of his mortgage (known colloquially as a “second mortgage”, for up to approximately the current value of the house minus outstanding repayments) the consumer is then hypothecating the mortgage itself the creditor can still seize the house but in ... |
how are athletes so much faster and better then compared to 10+ years ago? | It's a good question, but Usain Bolt is not a very good example. Bolt is peerlessly bioemechanically engineered for running, there is simply no other human is this world who can come close to him. His height, the length of his legs, the size of his feet, even the placement his achilles tendon is simply perfect. He is a... | [
"Over the years athletes have become bigger, stronger, and faster; in turn athletes scored more points leading to the world record where it stands now at 9126 points by the current world record holder Kevin Mayer.\n",
"The difference even between world class and national level distance runners has been associated... |
explain to me please, like i'm 5, what the hell is going on in the movie primer. | I can't explain it like you're five. If that means I should be downvoted, I'll take it with good grace, cause I really don't know the rules here yet.
But I *can* explain it to you like you're a grad student in modern theoretical physics.
The source of the drama in *Primer* is the main characters' misunderstanding of ... | [
"The film opens with an introduction by Wood's friend, psychic Criswell: \"Greetings my friends! We are all interested in the future, For that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives!\". (This line appears in the narration for the General Motors' \"Futurama\" ride and its accompanying film, \"To... |
why can humans live longer now than we could, say, 500 years ago? | Humans *don't* live longer than we did back then. *Life expectancy* is longer *on average* now, but that's not the same thing as saying people can live longer now.
Look at it this way. Imagine that most people who live to adulthood die at the age of seventy. It would be fair to say, then, that human beings can live ab... | [
"However, anthropologist John D. Hawks criticizes the popular conflation of life span (life expectancy) and maximum life span when popular science writers falsely imply that the average adult human does not live significantly longer than their ancestors. He writes, \"[a]ge-specific mortality rates have declined acr... |
why are wedding dresses so expensive? | People have "this is once in life time" mindset. Even though more and more people are have multiple weddings in their lives. Same logic diamond jewellers sell transparent piece of carbon for hell lot of money. | [
"About 75 percent of wedding dresses on the market are strapless dresses or sleeveless, in part because such dresses require less skill from the designers and are easier to alter to fit correctly. However, the sleeved wedding gown as well as wedding gowns with straps have both become more popular in recent years.\n... |
When I look in the mirror and move my eyes left to right, why do they look like they're not moving at all? | It's called [saccadic masking](_URL_0_).
When you move your eyes you actually don't see anything but your brain replaces the blackness with the last image you see
It is the reason that you think the first second when you look at your watch is much longer than the rest | [
"When humans turn the head from left to right, the image projected on the retinas moves in the direction opposite to the head movement. Without the head turning, such an image displacement would appear as something moving; but when it is correlated with the turning of the head, no movement of the environment is see... |
The Differing Economies in England, Spain, and the Netherlands in the 17th Century? | You'll want to talk about the differences in how England and Netherlands treated trade and their colonies. You may want to consider the role the Jewish banking families had on all three, as well as the more general motivation for expansion between the two.
Really though, at 1.5 pages you'll want to find a focused poin... | [
"During the Eighty Years' War the Dutch provinces became the most important trading centre of Northern Europe, replacing Flanders in this respect. During the Golden Age, there was a great flowering of trade, industry, the arts and the sciences in the Netherlands. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the Dutch were argua... |
Why is Russian word Kiev and not Ukrainian form Kyiv used in English? | The Canadian Broadcast Corporation online news opinion:
_URL_2_
> For more than five years, _URL_3_ referred to the capital of Ukraine as Kyiv instead of Kiev. We adopted this version at the same time the Canadian Press switched to Kyiv. The reason was simple.
> After the breakup of the Soviet Union, the newly ... | [
"Currently, \"Kiev\" is the traditional and most commonly used English name for the city. The Ukrainian government however uses \"Kyiv\" as the mandatory romanization where legislative and official acts are translated into English.\n",
"BULLET::::- The Ukrainian government maintains that the capital of Ukraine sh... |
the sickle cell and why it is in black people and why it makes them pass out, and what does it do? what is the sickle cell? | As said before, sickle cell is caused by a mutation for gene for hemoglobin in red blood cells. People with sickle cell anemia have 2 mutated alleles while those with "sickle cell trait" have only one mutated allele and one normal allele.
The abnormal hemoglobin is "sticky" in low oxygen environments and causes red b... | [
"Sickle cell disease is a blood disorder wherein there is a single amino acid substitution in the hemoglobin protein of the red blood cells, which causes these cells to assume a sickle shape, especially when under low oxygen tension. Sickling and sickle cell disease also confer some resistance to malaria parasitiza... |
If sea-level suddenly got raised by 8km, would you still need oxygen to breathe on the top of Mt. Everest? | You wouldn't need additional oxygen supplies if the atmosphere was displaced by the sea level rise. However, the atmosphere would be slightly thinner because the rise would increase the earth's radius by 8km from the 6371km and spread the atmosphere out a bit. The new pressure at the top of Everest (8,848m - 8,000m) wo... | [
"The top of Everest is nearly 9000 m above sea level. The peak was officially recognized in 2010 to be at an elevation of with the usual presence of snow and ice. Above about , which is approaching the cruising altitude of pressurized commercial jetliners, the air pressure is so low that the amount of available oxy... |
Did the concept of Italy endure even when Italy was politically fragmented? | Italy remained a concept from the fall of the Roman Empire up through the Risorgimento. To what extent different parts of what are modern day Italy (plus some parts that are in modern-day Slovenia) considered themselves Italian very likely varied at different times.
For example, Sicily became an Islamic state for a b... | [
"For many nationalist intellectuals and political leaders the process of unification of the Italian peninsula under a single national state was not complete however because several areas inhabited by Italian-speaking communities remained under what was seen as foreign rule. This situation gave rise to the idea that... |
why isn't there a national conversation about the mass genocide of the native americans? it seems to just be a glazed over part of our history. | Because genocide is mass intentional murder. What happened to the majority of the native americans occurred between the time of the first explorers and the pilgrims. The first explorers brought diseases with them that the native americans had no immunity to. This spread through the entire american continents killin... | [
"Native Americans in the United States were subject to military and land-taking campaigns by U.S. government policies. Disease reduced 95 percent the American Indian population between 1492 and 1900, the worst demographic collapse in human history. There were also frequent violent conflicts between Indians and sett... |
how does ballistic missile defense system work? | Yo dawg, we heard you like missiles, so we're shooting missiles at your missiles so you can... Yeah nevermind that.
But basically that's what's done, at least with an antiballistic missile system. Smaller faster missiles are shot at the incoming ( Ballistic ) missiles and blowing them up. This is how the Patriot missi... | [
"Missile defense is a system, weapon, or technology involved in the detection, tracking, interception, and destruction of attacking missiles. Originally conceived as a defense against nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), its application has broadened to include shorter-ranged non-nuclear tacti... |
when i eat a bunch of sour fruits, for example sour apples or a lemon, why are my cheeks and forehead sweating so much? | I never experienced this myself but was intrigued as to why, so I did some research and found this answer.
> In general, sweating is caused by too much heat, even if you're not aware of the heat. This can happen if the bowel moves and so raises the core temperature. Such movement is often accompanied with sweating, a... | [
"Gustatory hyperhidrosis is excessive sweating that certain individuals regularly experience on the forehead (scalp), upper lip, perioral region, or sternum a few moments after eating spicy foods, tomato sauce, chocolate, coffee, tea, or hot soups. This type of sweating is classified under focal hyperhidrosis, that... |
why does youtube say a video has 301+ views during the first few hours of a new video posted? | At 300 YouTube holds the count to make sure it's getting legit views. Sometimes two or more counts get in at the same time so often it's caught on 301 | [
"The video for the song was released on April 12, 2019. It simultaneously obtained the records of fastest-liked video and fastest viewed video on YouTube, reaching 3 million likes in 2 hours and 78 million views within 24 hours of release, making it the most viewed YouTube video in the first 24 hours after its rele... |
eil5: greek economic crisis and its ramifications for germany and the eurozone | Greece has a history of poor financial management, which meant they tended to inflate away their debt, which meant that they had to borrow at relatively high rates. When they joined the EU and Euro they agreed to manage their finances better, and being on the Euro meant they couldn't inflate, so their rates dropped. ... | [
"The crisis led to a loss of confidence in the Greek economy, indicated by a widening of bond yield spreads and rising cost of risk insurance on credit default swaps compared to the other Eurozone countries, particularly Germany. The government enacted 12 rounds of tax increases, spending cuts, and reforms from 201... |
During the middle ages, what was the common way to travel from England to Acre/Jerusalem, and how long did it take? | It depends on time and how wealthy you were - we'll stick to the crusading period from ca.1190-ca.1290.
If you were poor, you walked the whole way, across France, through the Alps, down through the Balkans into the Byzantine Empire, across Asia Minor, and down into the Levant from the north, regardless of time period.... | [
"In the Middle Ages there were three main Christian pilgrimage sites: Jerusalem, Rome and Santiago de Compostela in Spain. The large pilgrimage sites were often the graves of important apostles. The most famous pilgrims' way today is the one to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, also known as the Way of St. James. An... |
why do your legs turn red when taking a shower? | The hot water heats up the capillaries under your skin which makes them fill with more blood - Warmth causes blood vessels to dilate, which causes more blood to near the surface of the skin. When the body is warm, more blood is able to near the surface of the skin making the skin feel warm and look red. | [
"The red colour compound betanin is not broken down in the body, and in higher concentrations may temporarily cause urine or stools to assume a reddish colour, in the case of urine a condition called beeturia. Although harmless, this effect may cause initial concern due to the visual similarity to what appears to b... |
what happens to a recovered opiate addict if they require opiates for anesthesia or pain management? | This depends on the hospital, I think, and their procedures.
If someone has a known opiate addiction or dependency, pain management specialists would be consulted to carefully manage the case. The usual method would be to avoid using potentially addictive drugs, especially drugs that the patient has already used. They... | [
"This learning process has two parts. First, opiate users must connect their drug withdrawal to their use of the drug, which is something that individuals exposed to opiates in hospital settings are more likely to do. When withdrawal is interpreted as a form of addiction, the perceived (and felt) need for more drug... |
what exactly is human trafficking? | It's basically slavery. It's people being transported and sold like goods, and robbed of their most basic freedoms. | [
"Federally, human trafficking is defined as \"the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery\". The International Labor (ILO) ... |
i visited a country recently where the exchange rate was like 1:45... and the average salary over there is like $10k... does that make them poor? | Kind of, but not necessarily. It means that if they took their salary, exchanged it for US dollars, and tried to spend them in the US, they'd be poor.
But presumably everything is cheaper in that country as well, so that a $10k salary might actually be enough to pay your bills and live comfortably.
Prices vary a lot ... | [
"Exchange rates: Tuvaluan dollars or Australian dollars per US dollar - 1.0902 (2010), 1.2822 (2009), 1.2137 (2007), 1.3285 (2006); 0.9695 (2011 est.); 0.97 (2012 est.); 1.1094 (2013 est.); 1.67 (2014 est.); 1.33 (2015 est.)\n",
"According to the Bank for International Settlements, the preliminary global results ... |
Over the years, I've heard it said that the US dropped more bombs on N. Vietnam than all of WW2. Did the US seriously consider using nuclear weapons as well? If so, what stopped their use? | There were some within the US policy establishment that advocated for the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Vietnam. The reasons to oppose such a policy were many. From a political standpoint, it would have alienated the already-alienated American allies and domestic public, and could easily have led to an escalated r... | [
"During U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War the use of nuclear weapons was suggested in order to \"defoliate forests, destroy bridges, roads, and railroad lines.\" In addition, the use of nuclear weapons was suggested during the planning for the bombing of Vietnam's dikes in order to flood rice paddies, disrupt the... |
will the us financial economy ever recover to the same degree of the mid-2000 collapse? interest rates on bank cd's etc. is it possible to surpass previous levels of financial security somehow? | The economy is generally very cyclical, so...yes...we can expect the economy to boom and bust over and over again. As for your specific examples, using higher interest rates as a generalized barometer for "the economy" isn't a very good yard stick. It is reasonable to say that our very low interest rates currently ar... | [
"These mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and collateralized debt obligations (CDO) initially offered attractive rates of return due to the higher interest rates on the mortgages; however, the lower credit quality ultimately caused massive defaults. While elements of the crisis first became more visible during 2007, ... |
If the Earth moves far and long enough from the sun, would the core freeze? And if so, how long would it take? | The internal heat budget of the Earth is not influenced appreciably by solar radiation. Rocks are generally not great conductors, so the incoming solar radiation only effects the temperature down to a few 10s of meters below the surface. The two main sources of internal heat are [primordial heat](_URL_2_) (i.e. heat le... | [
"The Earth's inner core is thought to be slowly growing as the liquid outer core at the boundary with the inner core cools and solidifies due to the gradual cooling of the Earth's interior (about 100 degrees Celsius per billion years).\n",
"The growth of the inner core may be expected to consume most of the outer... |
what's the difference between a screw gun and an impact driver? | If you're talking about a regular drill and an impact wrench, the difference is that a traditional drill rotates at a constant speed. Whereas, impact wrenches literally use small, repeated impacts and higher torque to do the same job. Impact wrenches are generally used for applications where bolts need to be torqued do... | [
"A manual impact driver is a tool that delivers a strong, sudden rotational force and forward thrust when struck on the back with a hammer. It is often used by mechanics to loosen larger screws (bolts) and nuts that are corrosively \"frozen\" or over-torqued. The direction can also be reversed for situations where ... |
What does the amount of blades do for a airplane or helicopter? | assuming the blade profile does not change, the increased number of blades will provide more lift or thrust per revolution, but consume more power. We like t use more blades or a larger profile to keep the tip velocity down, going sonic uses excess power. but, on the other hand, you want each revolution to slice off ... | [
"The blades of a helicopter are long, narrow airfoils with a high aspect ratio, a shape that minimizes drag from tip vortices (see the wings of a glider for comparison). They generally contain a degree of washout that reduces the lift generated at the tips, where the airflow is fastest and vortex generation would b... |
how do flea collars work? | Flees travel from the body to the eyes and mouth to get water, so if you put band of something that kills fleas along the route they die. | [
"BULLET::::- Insect collar or flea collar. Impregnated with chemicals that repel or kill external parasites. They are usually a supplementary collar, worn in addition to the conventional buckle collar on a dog. They are also used on horses. The effectiveness of flea collars is arguable. Although they are convenient... |
how come mammals’ fur doesn’t come in a wider array of colors like green, blue, pink or purple? | The only reason reptiles like snakes are brightly colored is to alert predators that they are poisonous. Birds are brightly colored to attract mates. Fish are brightly colored to attract mates and alert predators they are poisonous. Amphibians like frogs are brightly colored to alert predators they are poisonous.
Mamm... | [
"The fur, which is soft, dense, and thick, is dark brown to gray on the upperparts, grading to black on the midback and yellowish brown on the sides. The underparts are sharply different in color. There, the hairs are dark gray at their bases and white at the tips, so that the fur appears grayish white. The fur is ... |
Why isn't metastatic cancer contagious if it's technically contagious within the body? | Cancer is able to survive in your body in part because the biomarkers are the same as your cells. You have defenses against cancer, but if that fails the cancer can spread through your lymphatic system.
Outside of the body, cancer cells are unlikely to survive. They require blood flow, thermal regulation, etc. Even if... | [
"Cancer, particularly when metastatic (spread to other places in the body), is a recognised risk factor for thrombosis. A number of mechanisms have been proposed, such as activation of the coagulation system by cancer cells or secretion of procoagulant substances. Furthermore, particular cancer treatments (such as ... |
if nuclear fallout is such a huge concern. how are nations able to test nuclear weapons within their borders. | Nuclear fallout is very minimal from standard nuclear weapons, hence how people live in Hiroshima and Nagasaki just fine today.
Nuclear tests will often be underground, underwater, or an airburst. The Japanese bombing was airbursts, which maximize destruction by create minimal fallout.
Regardless, nuclear fallout ... | [
"Nuclear targets can be attacked at any time, and doing so retards or even eliminates the development of that country's nuclear program (which then continues as before, but from its reduced development level). However, if the country has a mushroom cloud icon in place of a nuclear installation icon, this means that... |
How is an “increased risk of cancer” actually measured? | As part of the scientific process researchers use control groups. Control groups are as close to the demographic of the test group as possible, only absent the variable to be tested. They then measure instances of the risk in both groups, and conclude a increase as being due to the variable.
This is a very simplisti... | [
"For example, when studying risk factors of cancer, the cancer process may have been triggered long before actual diagnosis of cancer, and that therefore any exposure to risk factors in the \"lag\" time between may be unimportant.\n",
"In addition to these major risk factors there are also numerous other modifiab... |
How was the myth that people in the middle ages believed the earth was flat, started? | Not only did the Greeks know the earth was round and estimate the earth's cirumference, Arab astronomers managed to estimate the earth's diameter roughly accurately in the 9th century AD. Ahmad al-Farghani (c. 850 AD) observed that the earth's roundness could be seen every time a ship's mast disappeared in the distance... | [
"Historical writers have identified a number of historical circumstances that contributed to the origin and widespread acceptance of the flat-earth myth. American historian Jeffrey Burton Russell traced the nineteenth-century origins of what he called the Flat Error to a group of anticlerical French scholars, parti... |
TATA Box and transcription direction? | Your description is correct but you are not interpreting it correctly. The TATA box is "upstream", ie towards the 5' end. Transcription would start about 25 bp "downstream", ie 3' of the TATA box on the same strand. | [
"The TATA box is present in all genes that are transcribed by RNA polymerase II, which is most eukaryotic genes. The binding of the TATA box with TATA binding protein initiates the formation of a transcription factor complex. This is followed by binding of transcription factor TFIID, which then recruits TFIIB, TFII... |
What is the historicity of the writing of the Quran? | As the story goes, Muhammad first received communication from the Angel Gabriel in 610. He then did not receive another communication for quite some time, then he started receiving Qur'anic verses on a regular basis until his death.
Verses were recited to his Companions (or followers) and memorized verbatim and passed... | [
"Originality of Quranic manuscripts. According to traditional Islamic scholarship, all of the Quran was written down by Muhammad's companions while he was alive (during 610–632 CE), but it was primarily an orally related document. The written compilation of the whole Qur'an in its definite form as we have it now wa... |
why are our veins sometimes flush with the skin, while other times they are raised? | When your body is warm and trying to cool down, it can do so by expanding your vessels near the surface of the skin, promoting release of heat to the environment. If you are extremely cold, the vessels near your skin constrict to help conserve heat and prevent its release to the environment. These processes are control... | [
"Superficial veins are important physiologically for cooling of the body. When the body is too hot the body shunts blood from the deep veins to the superficial veins, to facilitate heat transfer to the surroundings. Superficial veins can be seen under the skin. Those below the level of the heart tend to bulge out. ... |
Has there ever been an example of a pre-modern army or nation going to war primarily for humanitarian reasons? | The humanitarian intervention literature usually only refers to some of the post-Cold War interventions as being motivated *primarily* by humanitarian intent.
The oldest humanitarian intervention (defined here as interventions influenced by humanitarianism) that the humanitarian intervention literature usually covers ... | [
"Polman's book \"War Games: The Story of Aid and War in Modern Times\" argued that humanitarian aid intervention often ended up fueling wars and making them worse. Her book cited the example of the Rwandan genocide, where humanitarian groups facilitated the flow of aid to Hutu militia who were involved with the kil... |
How many Spaniards actually moved to and settled in Spanish possessions in the New World? | According to Jose C. Moya in The Oxford Handbook of Latin American History, there were about one million Spanish immigrants and about half a million Portuguese immigrants to their respective possessions in the Americas (8). According to J.H. Elliott in Empires of the Atlantic World, “the total number of emigrants from... | [
"In the 16th century, following the military conquest of most of the new continent, perhaps 240,000 Spaniards entered American ports. They were joined by 450,000 in the next century. Since the conquest of Mexico, this region became the principal destination of Spanish colonial settlers in the 16th century. The firs... |
Did teenager pregnancy rates rise with the new availability of cars in the 1920s? | /u/chocolatepot covers some of this in her [How common were flappers in the Roaring Twenties](_URL_1_) and in previous answers linked in that one.
I can’t precisely say if it did or didn’t raise the pregnancy rates slightly, but the important context is that sexual mores were *so* much more conservative then it’s har... | [
"In the decades following World War II, the auto united in the United States with the single family dwelling to form suburbs. Suburban affluence led to a baby boomer generation far removed from the hardships of their parents. Community standards of the past, driven by scarcity and the need to share public resources... |
Paratroopers that didn't need parachutes | In the versions of that story I'm most familiar with the potential paratroops are Gurkhas. John Masters was a British officer whose first posting was to the 2nd Battalion of the 4th Prince of Wales's Own Gurkha Rifles, in his 1956 autobiography *Bugles and a Tiger* he outlines the background and attributes of the Gurkh... | [
"In World War II, paratroopers most often used parachutes of a circular design. These parachutes could be steered to a small degree by pulling on the risers (four straps connecting the paratrooper's harness to the connectors) and suspension lines which attach to the parachute canopy itself. German paratroopers, who... |
if humans are 80% water, why are we classified as carbon-based? | My house is mostly air but I still say that it's a brick house.
The water is just filler. It's there so that chemicals can float about and react more easily, water is vital to life but it's doesn't define us like carbon does. | [
"Water and carbon dioxide are metabolic end products of oxidation of fats, proteins, and carbohydrates. Oxidising a gram of carbohydrate produces 0.60 grams of water; a gram of protein produces 0.41 grams of water; and a gram of fat produces 1.07 grams of water, making it possible for xerocoles to live with little ... |
how can redbull and monstersponsor so much sport things, it feels like everybody is sponsored by them | They have a lot of money and want to have advertisements around their biggest demographic. | [
"The game also features sponsorship representing fictional companies. There are a number of sponsorship tasks that can be completed on single-player or online matches, and reward a customization item for first-time completion, in addition to cash or follower boost. These tasks range from taking down each opponent o... |
In the late Roman Republic and early Empire, we see many similar busts of nobles, all with the same short cut and clean shaven face, but by the time we get to the Reign of Marcus Aurelius, long loose curls and full beards start to become a trend. How did this happen? Where did the fashion come from? | It became much more common around the time of the Punic Wars and thereafter (as Rome was expanding, integrating and becoming more and more of a regional hegemon) to have Greek tutors teach upper-class Romans. This gave them a more refined and Hellenistic appreciation for the arts. Note that this didn't mean they didn... | [
"In the second century AD the Emperor Hadrian, according to Dio Cassius, was the first of all the Caesars to grow a full beard; Plutarch says that he did it to hide scars on his face. This was a period in Rome of widespread imitation of Greek culture, and many other men grew beards in imitation of Hadrian and the G... |
When a neuron dies, how does the replacement neuron re-establish the connections of the dead neuron? | Any "replacement neuron" generally doesn't re-establish the connections, but then there's generally no such thing as a replacement neuron.
Neurogenesis is very limited and occurs in the subgranule zone of the hippocampus integrating in the dentate gyrus, or in the subventricular zone integrating into olfactory bulb ... | [
"If the axons of a neuron are damaged, as long as the cell body of the neuron is not damaged, the axons would regenerate and remake the synaptic connections with neurons with the help of guidepost cells. This is also referred to as neuroregeneration.\n",
"It has also been discovered through research that if the a... |
Polyphasic Sleep Cycle | One of my friends has been doing this off and on for about a year now. I can't really tell you the health risks/benefits for it, but I can tell you a little about it.
First, what you read is true about the first month being absolute hell. You are very groggy often and can get very irritable.
It's often very difficul... | [
"The term \"polyphasic sleep\" was first used in the early 20th century by psychologist J. S. Szymanski, who observed daily fluctuations in activity patterns (see ). It does not imply any particular sleep schedule. The circadian rhythm disorder known as irregular sleep-wake syndrome is an example of polyphasic slee... |
If our universe were totally empty except for two atoms, would the two eventfully collide due to gravity? | Guys, I think that your responses may belie the spirit of this question... I think what /u/scrappyisachamp is trying to ask is whether or not gravitational attraction, even when small, can be felt over great distances. In other words, let's assume that **charge doesn't even enter into this thought experiment.** Further... | [
"Epicureanism states that atoms are unable to be broken down into any smaller parts, and Epicureans offered multiple arguments to support this position. Epicureans argue that because void is necessary for matter to move, anything which consists of both void and matter can be broken down, while if something contains... |
if colds are passed on by an infected creature, how did the first creature get it? | We're not really sure how viruses started. A virus is basically a chunk of DNA (or RNA) on it's own that can break into living cells and take over those cells to make it produce more viruses. Nobody's sure if viruses evolved as an offshoot of cellular life or if they're just a random corruption of broken-down cells. | [
"If the infestation can be limited to one or a few pieces, the insects may be killed through freezing of the object. The textile should be wrapped in plastic and vacuum-sealed, then brought to a freezing temperature as quickly as possible, to prevent the insects from adjusting to the cold. The object may be left fr... |
What type of "business school" training did people get in communist countries? | There was a recent thread on this: [What did economics classes look like in communist countries, particularly in the USSR?](_URL_0_)
Excerpting the top answer by /u/suchacleverguy:
> ... the focus of their curriculum was much more "business" oriented. Microeconomics courses in countries such as Russia focused on in... | [
"The school was the first establishment of its kind in a former Communist country. KSAP cooperats with public administration schools in other countries, providing partners in Ukraine, Afghanistan, or Myanmar) with trainings and workshops.\n",
"The Communists established numerous schools, formulating a new type of... |
why do suntans start to fade? | Because you’re constantly shedding the damaged tanned skin cells with new non tan skin cells | [
"Suntans, which naturally develop in some individuals as a protective mechanism against the sun, are viewed by most in the Western world as desirable. This has led to an overall increase in exposure to UV radiation from both the natural sun and tanning lamps. Suntans can provide a modest sun protection factor (SPF)... |
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