Split (2)

train · 226k rows

question stringlengths 3 301	answer stringlengths 9 26.1k	context list
Does fanning yourself with a piece of paper actually make you hotter?	If it feels cool, it's making you cooler. We lose heat primarily by conduction of energy from our bodies to the surrounding air, and by cooling that results when your sweat evaporates into that same surrounding air. If you sat perfectly still and there were no air currents around you, the air around you would warm to...	[ "BULLET::::- When the fan is used to speed up heat transfer, the air circulation will increase the amount of airborne dust in the heated room. This can be a problem for people with allergies. Therefore, central heating is a better source of heat for allergy sufferers. This can be avoided by not using the fan, but t...
what is a proxy, how do i get one and why do i want to?	a proxy is where you have a computer look at web pages remotely and it then will send that web page to you. It is useful to do this when you would like to conceal the computer you are working on or just want content that is not available where you are (if you are in China you might want one in Africa to avoid censorshi...	[ "Proxy is defined by supreme courts as \"an \"authority\" or power to \"do\" a certain thing.\" A person can confer on his proxy any power which he himself possesses. He may also give him secret instructions as to voting upon particular questions. But a proxy is ineffectual when it is contrary to law or public poli...
what is jihadism? what do jihadists believe?	"Jihad" means struggle. Whether that be the struggle of nofap, depression, etc. Anything that a person is struggling with, becomes their jihad. Some uneducated people in the middle east think this means they can struggle against tyranny of government dictatorship by blowing up innocents rawr! But that's contradictory b...	[ "Jihad () is an Islamic term referring to the religious duty of Muslims to maintain the religion. In Arabic, the word \"jihād\" is a noun meaning \"to strive, to apply oneself, to struggle, to persevere\". A person engaged in jihad is called a \"mujahid\", the plural of which is \"mujahideen\" (). The word \"jihad\...
I’m reading Founding Brothers, a book about the American Revolution and stories concerning the Founding Fathers, and I have a question that I can’t any stop thinking about...	You're on the right track. Ellis wrote a chapter about slavery which had a lot of moving parts and he wasn't quite as clear about them as he could have been. There are two important parts here, one of which is reasonably easy to tease out and the other being quite murky. So let's start with the easy part: The Constitu...	[ "BULLET::::- Alexander Hamilton—Founding Father, American Revolutionary War officer and aide-de-camp to George Washington, initiator and co-author of \"The Federalist Papers\", the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, economist, one of the first U.S. constitutional lawyers (picture appears on U.S. ten dollar bill)...
Does putting a drinking glass against a door amplify sound made on the other side?	Putting a glass against the wall or door creates a cavity for the pressure waves which make up sounds. The cavity has a quality factor: _URL_0_ This is the effective amount of amplification you will get. The reason it occurs is that waves at curtain wavelengths will constructively interfere with each other creating s...	[ "BULLET::::11. Down in a Mirror\" from \"Chair Beside a Window\" (discussing the way to listen to Jandek—“having a few glasses of wine and sitting down with Jandek and just listening”. Sample lyric: “we can’t deny there’s spirits in this house you shut the door the wind closes two more”)\n", "Because its sounding...
where do all the fonts get their names from?	It's a little unclear what you mean, especially as you normally don't name fonts, but rather typefaces and within each typeface normally there are many fonts. Whoever created (or ordered) the typeface gets to name it. Some are named after their predecessors, the "fonts" which were made long before computers, in the daw...	[ "Fonts originally consisted of a set of moveable type letterpunches purchased from a type foundry. As early as 1600, the sizes of these types—their \"bodies\"—acquired traditional names in English, French, German, and Dutch, usually from their principal early uses. These names were used relative to the others and t...
How do recessive genes even exist?	Just because dominant genes are present doesn't stop the recessive gene from existing. You will still have the recessive gene, and still potentially pass it on, just in most cases the gene will be inactive, and not cause any traits to appear.	[ "Normally, two recessive alleles need to be inherited (one from each parent) for the recessive trait to be expressed but recessive merely means that the trait is only expressed in the absence of the dominant alleles. The pattern of inheritance in which a single recessive allele is inherited but is still expressed i...
Do we know at what point in history the men's necktie was last used as a practical device rather than simply adornment?	Firstly, consider that what we think of as a necktie - a long, vaguely rectangular piece of fabric meant to be knotted (usually in a four-in-hand or a full- or half-Windsor) and allowed to hang down over the shirt front - is a product of the late 19th century, and only really displaced other forms (the bow tie, for ins...	[ "With the industrial revolution, more people wanted neckwear that was easy to put on, was comfortable, and would last an entire workday. Neckties were designed to be long, thin and easy to knot, without accidentally coming undone. This is the necktie design still worn by millions of men.\n", "The modern necktie t...
where is drinkable water stored before it hits my taps (big city)?	at the water treatment plant. it's like they make a batch of 1million gallons and put it in a pool somewhere. the plant is continuously running all the time to filter and make potable water.	[ "BULLET::::- Places for water collection: either water tanks where water is off-loaded from trucks (then filtered and potentially treated with disinfectant chemicals such as chlorine), or water tap stands that are connected to boreholes. UNHCR recommends 20 litres of water per person and one tap stand per 80 person...
Is there any net difference in the way my body handles 1000 calories in one sitting vs. 1000 calories over the course of a day?	_URL_0_ The above link is a meta review of several different papers. At the bottom of the page there are 34 papers that were considered when the review was written. Overall there is little difference. Remember that even a living thing obeys the laws of thermodynamics. Energy stored is equal to energy gained minus ...	[ "According to nutritionix.com, the regular serving size of champurrado (1 cup/177g) contains approximately 163 calories and 57 calories from fat. Considering that the average calories a person to consume per day is approximately between 2000- 2500, 163 calories isn't bad at all. The calories from fat also aren’t ba...
why is it that when rain falls, it doesn’t hurt us although it has an enormous potential energy as the water has a mass, and the height is unbelievable?	Water droplets don't have that much mass so they can't carry that much potential energy to begin with. Since they are a liquid the energy is also dissipated upon impact. Compared to something like hail that is frozen and hard and has enough force to cause a lot of damage. There is also terminal velocity, once an obje...	[ "If air near the surface becomes extremely warm and unstable, its upward motion can become quite explosive, resulting in towering cumulonimbiform clouds that can cause severe weather. As tiny water particles that make up the cloud group together to form droplets of rain, they are pulled down to earth by the force o...
Why are serious sicknesses like the flu so rare while colds are so common?	The flu is an actual, identified, virus. The "cold" is not a real thing. It's just a word we use for a general infection that could be caused by any of billions of bacteria/viruses. The body has the same reaction though, so we just tend to use one name, instead of pointlessly trying to identify and name each and every ...	[ "Common symptoms of the flu such as fever, headaches, and fatigue are the result of the huge amounts of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines (such as interferon or tumor necrosis factor) produced from influenza-infected cells. In contrast to the rhinovirus that causes the common cold, influenza does cause tissu...
how can sterility caused by a crispr gene drive spread when sterile mosquitoes can't breed?	One technique involves releasing large volumes of sterile male mosquitoes to reduce populations. Even though they can't breed successfully, they still try, and this means the sterile males are competing with their non-sterilized brethren, which means fewer female mosquitoes actually successfully mate and produce eggs...	[ "The inherited sterility in insects is induced by substerilizing doses of ionizing radiation. When partially sterile males mate with wild females, the radiation-induced deleterious effects are inherited by the F1 generation. As a result, egg hatch is reduced and the resulting offspring are both highly sterile and p...
What happens when a cell becomes cancerous?	Cancer is a disease of uncontrolled cellular growth. Your body has many mechanisms in place to prevent a cell from dividing uncontrollably. But when the DNA of a cell is mutated, the proteins that govern cell cycle activity can be changed, and a cell may be able to circumvent the body's mechanisms. For instance, let...	[ "Cancer cells are created when the genes responsible for regulating cell division are damaged. Carcinogenesis is caused by mutation and epimutation of the genetic material of normal cells, which upsets the normal balance between proliferation and cell death. This results in uncontrolled cell division and the evolut...
If we can re-enact a scene in Interstellar and give everyone a 100% synced digital watch, would the time shown on the watch still be dilated?	Yes, time is dilated so all time-dependent processes are affected.	[ "Another technique, temporal imaging using a time lens, can also be used to slow down (mostly optical) signals in time. The time-lens concept relies on the mathematical equivalence between spatial diffraction and temporal dispersion, the so-called space-time duality. A lens held at fixed distance from an object pro...
how does child lock work in cars?	From experience, on Toyotas, the child lock moves a guide pin out of position, causing the interior door handle to not be able to engage the lock latch. The outer door handle has a separate connection to the lock latch, allowing the two handles to have different functions. Other cars are probably about the same.	[ "The lock is typically engaged via a small switch on the edge of the door that is only accessible when the door is open. Some cars implement the child lock control as a rotary mechanism which can only be operated with a key. This design ensures the child lock remains in its intended state, and is invaluable for old...
obama's new climate action plan.	The Clean Power Plan (as it is called) is a series of EPA regulations and budget proposals that look to reduce CO2 emissions by 32% (from 2005 levels) by 2030, increase renewable energy generation by 30% by 2030, and provide a framework to measure these efforts. There will be a federal plan, but states are allowed to ...	[ "President Obama's last Climate Action Plan, issued in June 2013, included regulations to industry with the ultimate goal of cutting domestic carbon emission, preparing the U.S. for impending effects of climate change, and working internationally to address climate change. Among the regulations outlined in the plan...
Does windchill affect, say, the surface of a pond?	Wind chill is a measure of perception "how cold does it feel" which is in turn calculated from how much heat a person with a normal body temperature will lose for a given air temperature, humidity, and wind speed. Wind chill is expressed in term of what temperature would give the same heat loss in still air at some s...	[ "Physicists Bacon \"et al.\" studying the phenomenon in 1996, informed by studies in Owens Dry Lake Playa, discovered that winds blowing on playa surfaces can be compressed and intensified because of a playa's smooth, flat surfaces. They also found that boundary layers (the region just above ground where winds are ...
timeline of gaza/israel conflict pre-1967	Ok, super simple version of the timeline bits before 500 BCE assume the bible is somewhat accurate in regards to the migrations of people groups ~2000 BCE: Group of people migrate from Mesopotamia to what would become Israel (Abraham etc.) ~1700 BCE: These people move into Egypt due to a food shortage in Canaan (w...	[ "Gaza was occupied by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War following the defeat of the Egyptian Army. Frequent conflicts have erupted between Palestinians and the Israeli authorities in the city since the 1970s. The tensions led to the First Intifada in 1987. Gaza was a center of confrontation during this uprising, a...
Question about pressure	It depends on what pressure you want to calculate. When you calculate the pressure of water using that formula for 10 metres, for example, you get the pressure of the water above you. If you want the actual pressure, then you need to also add the air pressure above the water. That formula also only works when the dens...	[ "Pressure is a force that can be measured absolutely, because the natural minimum of pressure is total vacuum. Pressure is frequently measured with reference to atmospheric pressure rather than on any absolute scale, relative to complete and perfect vacuum; it is technologically simpler and cheaper. It may also be ...
if potassium is an alkali metal, why doesn't it violently react inside our bodies?	We do not have potassium metal in our bodies, we have potassium that is missing an electron, the potassium cation, K^+. It is very unreactive and stable in solution. Potassium metal has one electron in it's outer shell that it wants to get rid of like crazy and have a nice stable low energy complete lower shell. There...	[ "Potassium is an extremely active metal that reacts violently with oxygen in water and air. With oxygen it forms potassium peroxide, and with water potassium forms potassium hydroxide. The reaction of potassium with water is dangerous because of its violent exothermic character and the production of hydrogen gas. H...
How does diet affect the risk of heart disease?	I don't have a lot of time to go into an in-depth answer, but cholesterol and fats were vilified mainly because when you looked at the hearts and blood vessels of people with cardiovascular disease, you see a lot of plaques which grow and harden and constrict the blood vessels around the heart and the rest of the body....	[ "There is a correlation between adherence to a healthy diet, like the Mediterranean diet, and a lower risk of depression. Studies on which these correlations are made, are observational and do not prove cause and effect.\n", "The diet may increase the risk of heart disease. A medical report issued by the New York...
Since we see stars as they were some billions of years ago, if I picked out one that had already died, and travelled toward it at a reasonable speed, at some point would I see it explode?	The other answers you are getting are right (yes), but I want to contrast them by pointing out that the stars you can see with your eyes are only dozens of light years away, not billions. There are a handful that are hundreds, they are ALL within out galaxy. Even with a very impressive backyard telescope you are still ...	[ "BULLET::::- In the region of the constellation \"Perseus\", a star not visible to the naked eye, and 1,533 light years distant from Earth, explodes in a nova. The light from the star, now called GK Persei, will first be seen on Earth on February 21, 1901\n", "In 185 CE, Chinese astronomers recorded the appearanc...
why is it important that animal should not become extinct? i don't see how it would have a major impact on the earth overall.	Some animals are indirectly helping us by keeping the environment clean, or are at the start of our food cycle. Take Bees for example, and Coral.	[ "Scientists assert that human activity has pushed the earth into a sixth mass extinction event. The loss of biodiversity has been attributed in particular to human overpopulation, continued human population growth and overconsumption of natural resources by the world's wealthy. The \"Global Assessment Report on Bio...
how do routers know where to send outgoing packets if it has never before encountered the destination address?	It doesn't. Your computer kicks it up the chain. We'll take IPv4 since it's easier to visualize. Your address is 32.12.25.17. The destination address is 85.42.36.78. So your computer sends a packet to your local ISP, the ISP says "uh.. 85.42.36?, that's not me and sends the packet to the regional hub. It says "u...	[ "When a router receives a packet it normally decides where to forward it based on the destination address in the packet, which is then used to look up an entry in a routing table. However, in some cases, there may be a need to forward the packet based on other criteria. For example, a network administrator might wa...
what is a musical scale?	basically it's like an alphabet, for musicians. D,E,F,G,A,B,C,D... and it goes in a circle. a scale is when you start on one note, and you play through let's say a D, until you get to the next D. That's simplified.	[ "A musical scale is a discrete set of pitches used in making or describing music. The most important scale in the Western tradition is the diatonic scale but many others have been used and proposed in various historical eras and parts of the world. Each pitch corresponds to a particular frequency, expressed in hert...
how come my feet will hurt after a while in flat shoes, but not when barefoot?	Pressure from the shoes.	[ "Patients with painful disorders of sensation (dysesthesia) of the soles of the feet may have a similar gait but do not have foot drop. Because of the extreme pain evoked by even the slightest pressure on the feet, the patient walks as if walking barefoot on hot sand.\n", "Issues that can develop as a result of s...
how can mother ducks have 6 and more ducklings of the same age follow them if they have to lay an egg for each one of them?	When a duck breeds, there is more than one embryo available to be fertilized, so all the eggs being laid technically have the same (or nearly the same) gestational age despite not having been laid at the same time and will therefore hatch around the same time.	[ "Both sexes incubate, changing over once a day, with the male often taking the greater share of this duty. The eggs hatch in about 24–29 days, The downy ducklings are grey, with paler upperparts, and a white band on the neck, and weigh within a day of hatching. Like all ducklings, they are precocial and leave the n...
who doesn't 911 services not have a way to contact them through text?	Some areas do have that feature, as a matter of fact. However, text is very difficult to convey important information with, and doesn't allow dispatchers to ask questions to get that important information.	[ "In some countries, text messages can be used to contact emergency services. In the UK, text messages can be used to call emergency services only after registering with the emergency SMS service. This service is primarily aimed at people who, by reason of disability, are unable to make a voice call. It has recently...
what would happen to an economy if inflation was always at 0%?	Inflation encourages people to spend money now as they know prices will get higher. People not spending money is one of the biggest threats to a capitalist economy, as it starts a vicious circle that ends with lots of people being unemployed, so a low level of inflation is encouraged to promote expenditure. Another us...	[ "Inflation averaged 30.1% between 2005 and 2007. Inflation is a serious problem for the economy. In April 2007, the National League for Democracy organised a two-day workshop on the economy. The workshop concluded that skyrocketing inflation was impeding economic growth. \"Basic commodity prices have increased from...
how do usb splitter hubs work? how do multiple devices simultaneously transmit signals through a single port without stuttering?	They don't simultaneously transmit. Rather, they transmit one at a time. However, USB transmits so quickly that you'll rarely run across situations where it matters. Most USB peripherals - your mouse/keyboard, for example - use a tiny fraction of the available bandwidth. Even mass storage devices don't generally reach...	[ "Physically separate USB hubs come in a wide variety of form factors: from external boxes (looking similar to an Ethernet or network hub) connectable with a cable, to small designs that can be directly plugged into a USB port (see the \"compact design\" picture). In the middle case, there are \"short cable\" hubs w...
If gravity is a wave, is it possible to create standing gravity waves?	While in principle possible, the problem here is that gravity couples extremely weakly. Let's say you wanted to make a standing wave in a tank of water. Well, the waves reflect off of the sides of the tank (that is some pretty strong coupling), so all you have to do is drive the water at some point (not a node) at one...	[ "In general terms, gravitational waves are radiated by objects whose motion involves acceleration and its change, provided that the motion is not perfectly spherically symmetric (like an expanding or contracting sphere) or rotationally symmetric (like a spinning disk or sphere). A simple example of this principle i...
why would a solar storm's sustained magnetic field not destroy all data-even tape drives? if a degausser wipes data with powerful sustained magnetic fields, why would a weeklong solar storm not have the same effect on our data?	A really strong solar storm causes changes of > 250 nanoTesla in the magnetic field. The absolutely worst geomagnetic storm is estimated to have peaked at 1760 nanoTeslas. For reference, the Earth's magnetic field is around 50 microTesla or around 25x stronger than the strongest storm Those degaussers use electroma...	[ "The most severe effect of the radiation were current leakages somewhere in the spacecraft's power bus, most likely across brushes at a spin bearing connecting rotor and stator sections of the orbiter. These current leakages triggered a reset of the onboard computer and caused it to go into safe mode. The resets oc...
how are dictionaries compiled? how do words get picked to be in a dictionary? how do they not 'forget' to put in a word?	Nowadays they take help of computers. With the computer you can basically count all the words occurring in all newspapers and all of last year's released books within a very reasonable timeframe (hours?). Sort the counts and you have a long list of all the most common words, remove all the words you already had in last...	[ "Words are rarely listed in dictionaries on the basis of their inflectional morphemes (in which case they would be lexical items). However, they often are listed on the basis of their derivational morphemes. For instance, English dictionaries list \"readable\" and \"readability\", words with derivational suffixes, ...
Theoretically, if you had a chunk of dark matter and put it on Earth, what would it look like?	The basic idea behind dark matter is that it's basically like normal matter, but more boring. Matter interacts with other matter through the four fundamental forces: the weak and strong nuclear forces, gravity, and electromagnetism. The nuclear forces hold atoms together and control nuclear fission and fusion and r...	[ "If dark matter is composed of weakly-interacting particles, an obvious question is whether it can form objects equivalent to planets, stars, or black holes. Historically, the answer has been it cannot,ref name=\"siegel\"\n", "Dark matter can refer to any substance which interacts predominantly via gravity with v...
How did the wooden buildings of Japanese cities/towns withstand things like rot and different wood diseases.	This is an interesting question; the answer, however, is just as rooted in Eastern vs Western culture as it is in construction techniques. Please also take into account that, as a Westerner, I can only give a partial answer based on second-hand studies. First, take into account than on top of rot, Japanese constructio...	[ "Heavy materials like stone, mortar and clay were abandoned as building elements, with simple wooden walls, floors and partitions becoming prevalent. Native species like cedar (\"sugi\") were popular as an interior finish because of its prominent grain, while pine (\"matsu\") and larch (\"aka matsu\") were common f...
"Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing." Stephen Hawking	Right now, nobody knows the answer to your question.	[ "It argues that invoking God is not necessary to explain the origins of the universe, and that the Big Bang is a consequence of the laws of physics alone. In response to criticism, Hawking said: \"One can't prove that God doesn't exist, but science makes God unnecessary.\" When pressed on his own religious views by...
Were there calls to polish the Statue of Liberty, when it was turning green?	[This older answer might be of interest for you](_URL_0_).	[ "In covering these comments, multiple publications noted that the distinction Miller made between the Statue of Liberty and Lazarus's poem has been a popular talking point among the white supremacist segments of the alt-right. \"The Washington Post\"s Michelle Ye Hee Lee stated that \"Neither got it quite right abo...
Why are pressure cookers affected by altitude?	The limiting factor isn't the pressure inside the pressure cooker. It's the difference in pressure between the inside and the outside. If you open the pressure cooker completely, the inside will still be at the same pressure at the outside. Since the air is at higher pressure in lower altitudes, the pressure cooker doe...	[ "At higher altitudes, the boiling point of liquid in the pressure cooker will be slightly lower than it would be at sea level. When pressure cooking at high altitudes, cooking times need to be increased by approximately 5% for every above elevation. The absolute pressure in a pressure cooker will always be lower at...
stone age	The Stone Age is the period of time, believed to be around a few million years, between when humans figured out how to use tools made out of stone and when humans figured out how to make tools out of metal instead. Metal tools were a big turning point in history because they are stronger and last longer than stone ones...	[ "The Stone Age is a broad prehistoric period during which stone was widely used in the manufacture of implements with a sharp edge, a point, or a percussion surface. The period lasted roughly 2.5 million years, from the time of early hominids to \"Homo sapiens\" in the later Pleistocene era, and largely ended betwe...
how open source projects/developers make money	Companies like Canonical and Red Hat give away their software, and just charge for support. Red Hat actually does pretty well.	[ "BULLET::::- Open source is a development model using the internet to cooperate on projects. It is most notable in the development of software and widely used software, which has been developed and maintained by large numbers of people, including many home-based amateurs with high level expertise.\n", "Open sourc...
Why is dangerous radiation only dangerous within a certain distance of the radioactive source? (more in description)	I think you are confusing a few different ideas in regards to radiation. 1. Intensity from a point source decreases at rate of r^2 away from the source. For this purpose think of the radioactive source as a light bulb. The further you are away, the much less radiation you will be hit with. 2. Radiation itself does ...	[ "In summary, not all radiation is harmful. The radiation can be absorbed through multiple pathways, varying due to the circumstances of the situation. If the radioactive material is necessary, it can be ingested orally via stable isotopes of specific elements. This is only suggested to those that have a lack of the...
Is it theoretically possible to be able to access Internet on Mars?	The light delay between Mars and Earth is 3 minutes at best and 21 minutes in the worst case, which is most of the year. Space is very big. Any request you'd make to the Earth's internet (like, give me the Wiktionary entry for "lonely") would take at the very least 6 minutes to get an answer.	[ "SpaceX intends to provide broadband internet connectivity to underserved areas of the planet, as well as provide competitively-priced service to urban areas. The company has stated that the positive cashflow from selling satellite internet services would be necessary to fund their Mars plans.\n", "The Mars Telec...
how are vortexes in water created? image in description	The vortex in that gif is caused by the interaction of a body of cold water with one of warmer water. The cold water is denser (I think) so it gets pushed down, while the warm water goes up. These opposing currents create that vortex.	[ "In the dynamics of fluid, a vortex is fluid that revolves around the axis line. This fluid might be curved or straight. Vortices form from stirred liquids they might be observed in smoke rings, whirlpools, in the wake of a boat or the winds around a tornado or dust devil.\n", "In fluid dynamics, a vortex (plural...
why all of a sudden are insect populations on the decline globally? is it just a climate thing?	Insects have been on the decline for a while now but only recently has this information become more readily available to the public. The main factor that is causing insect populations to decline is the use of non-targeted pesticides that are lethal to a wide range of insect species. Farmers use these because they are...	[ "The decline has been attributed to habitat destruction caused by intensive farming and urbanisation, pesticide use, introduced species, climate change, and artificial lighting. The use of increased quantities of insecticides and herbicides on crops have affected not only non-target insect species, but also the pla...
why do wireless companies treat tethering data differently than mobile data?	There is no technical reason for this, and a few years back they did not. The bottom line is that they can make more money selling you an additional service.	[ "Depending on the wireless carrier, a user's cellular device may have restricted functionality. While tethering may be allowed at no extra cost, some carriers impose a one-time charge to enable tethering and others forbid tethering or impose added data charges. Contracts that advertise \"unlimited\" data usage ofte...
Did Hitler's top generals realize that Operation Barbarossa was going lead to the defeat of Germany?	Expanded from an [earlier answer](_URL_0_) Part I The short answer is that they really did not see this as the brass in both OKH and OKW were the ones responsible for planning the invasion itself. Although Hitler was decisive in reorientating German military power towards the USSR, many German military thinkers ...	[ "In Lukacs’s view, Operation Barbarossa was not inspired by anti-Communism or any long-term plan to conquer the Soviet Union as suggested by historians such as Andreas Hillgruber, who claims that Hitler had a \"stufenplan\" (stage-by-stage plan), but it was rather an \"ad hoc\" reaction forced on Hitler in 1940–194...
what causes a cowlick?	It more so depends on your hair follicle. This is what determines which way the hair grows out of the scalp. So essentially cowlicks are tufts of hair where their follicles cause them to grow in such a fashion. Also, considering this is an internal thing, we can't change our follicles, so you can't really "fix" a cow...	[ "A cowlick is a section of hair that stands straight up or lies at an angle at odds with the style in which the rest of an individual's hair is worn. Cowlicks appear when the growth direction of the hair forms in (against) the spiral pattern. The term \"cowlick\" originates from the domestic bovine's habit of licki...
why does the water used for tea and many instant meals have to be boiling?	Instant meals are designed for the water to be a specific optimal temperature. Boiling water has the convenient property that it's always at the same temperature, so you don't have to fiddle with a thermometer to figure out when to put the water in. The water used for tea doesn't have to be boiling, and in fact the ...	[ "Instant tea is a powder in which water is added, in order to reconstitute it into a cup of tea. The earliest form of instant tea was developed in the United Kingdom in 1885. A patent was granted for a paste made of concentrated tea extract, sugar, and evaporated milk, which became tea when hot water was added. How...
How do scientists collect so much data on planets that are hundreds+ light years away?	Much of what I've seen in papers is done via light spectrum analysis. By analyzing the light colors you can find chemical compositions of atmospheres for example because passing through an atmosphere will filter certain light bands out. [de Wit, J., Wakeford, H., Gillon, M. et al. A combined transmission spectrum of ...	[ "Based on data from the NASA exoplanet archive, Eyes on the Exoplanet enables uses to zoom in on more than 1000 planets orbiting distant stars. Exoplanets can be filtered by relevant criteria such as Earth-sized, large rocky planets, gas giants, etc. Distances to these planets are expressed in travel time by car, p...
Did history smell bad?	I'm having a hard time hunting down the exact quote, but an observer observing the women traveling with the British Army at the surrender of Saratoga mentions something to the effect of "had they not been smoking, I would have gotten sick from the miasma swirling off them." EDIT: Found it! "I never had the least Idea...	[ "Smelly Old History is a series of illustrated books published by Oxford University Press. The books contain aromatic scratch and sniff panels to provide the reader with an aroma of different smells to represent the ages. The series was written by Mary J. Dobson and has sold over a million copies around the world.\...
what is the survival instinct?	You’re really asking a nature vs nurture question. With humans, we live in relative safety and usually almost never experience anything that requires our survival instincts to kick in, and on top of that, even if they did, our brains are able to overwrite it in the moment. With animals, they’re constantly living in a ...	[ "Survival skills are techniques that a person may use in order to sustain life in any type of natural environment or built environment. These techniques are meant to provide basic necessities for human life which include water, food, and shelter. The skills also support proper knowledge and interactions with animal...
Question about second sons and noble titles/inheritance...	Whereas in the early medieval period, when inheritances would be shared amongst several sons and daughters, male primogeniture granted the entire estate to the eldest son. Male primogeniture became the norm in England in the late medieval period, and has stuck with the aristocracy ever since. Noble titles were part ...	[ "The noble titles were inherited through a system of loose primogeniture: The eldest son from the peer's first wife was usually the heir apparent, but inheritance by a younger son, a son of a concubine, or brother of the peer was not uncommon. Non-heir sons of imperial princes were entitled to petition for a lower ...
If relativity theory rejects absolute space, does that mean an empirically adequate geocentric model of the solar system is as "legitimate" as a heliocentric one?	To answer your explicit question, yes. That said, the first thing to realize is that the universe doesn't care how we model and label things. Earth is gravitationally bound to the sun and our trajectories are such that both objects orbit a common point somewhere deep inside the sun. What those orbits look like if, ...	[ "Despite giving more respectability to the geocentric view than Newtonian physics does, relativity is not geocentric. Rather, relativity states that the Sun, the Earth, the Moon, Jupiter, or any other point for that matter could be chosen as a center of the Solar System with equal validity. For this reason Robert S...
how do doctors know when a limb has to be amputated?	It's mostly based on the prognosis, or what is likely going to happen to the limb if they don't cut it off. If you have gas gangrene, nothing anyone can do will save it. It's better to cut if off to stop the infection from spreading. If there is a ton of shrapnel from an IED, it's the same situation. The danger won't s...	[ "People who have a limb amputated may still have a confused sense of that limb's existence on their body, known as phantom limb syndrome. Phantom sensations can occur as passive proprioceptive sensations of the limb's presence, or more active sensations such as perceived movement, pressure, pain, itching, or temper...
what causes us to pe attracted to a specific race?	I've wondered this. I think Freud would bring the parents into it, but even from my own experience this doesn't quite stack up. My 5c would be that it might have something to do with our early experiences though- a figure of care and love that stuck in our subconscious (or the opposite- a person treating us like shit...	[ "Race can be used as an example of in-group and out-group tendencies because society often categorizes individuals into groups based on race (Caucasian, African American, Latino, etc.). One study that examined race and empathy found that participants receiving nasally administered oxytocin had stronger reactions to...
why do women sometimes get urinary tract infections from intercourse?	Women have a very short urinary tracts. This gives UTIs an easier path to cover.	[ "A Urinary Tract Infection is an infection that involves any part of the urinary system, being the kidneys, urethra, bladder, or ureters. Although women are more susceptible to getting UTI’s, men may also develop them. The infection causes pain while urinating, the urge to urinate often, and pelvic pain. UTIs may b...
how exactly do skateboarders manage to keep their balance when going up the side of a halfpipe?	The black thing on top of our boards is called griptape which helps us keep our shoes on the board when we go up. It's also a little bit like a swing, when we go down or up the transitions we bend our knees and lean either forward or back to keep our center of gravity on the board.	[ "When a skateboarder drops in, they stand on the deck of a half-pipe, put their back foot on the tail of the skateboard, and push it so that the back wheels just roll over the coping into a position like in a tail stall. They then put their front foot on the deck, which now hangs over the half-pipe, lean forward, a...
It's possible to create artificial diamonds but, is it possible to convert real diamonds to graphite?	Sure. Just wait long enough. The stable state of carbon under ambient conditions is graphite, meaning that all other forms will spontaneously decompose to graphite, eeleasing energy. This process ia very, very slow, though. But given enough time all diamonds at any temperature and pressure you could live through will c...	[ "Synthetic diamonds can be grown from high-purity carbon under high pressures and temperatures or from hydrocarbon gas by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Imitation diamonds can also be made out of materials such as cubic zirconia and silicon carbide. Natural, synthetic and imitation diamonds are most commonly dist...
how do radio waves for cell phone signals penetrate into buildings if light can't travel around corners or visible light can't shine through opaque objects? wouldn't you need a direct line of sight to the tower?	Light and radio waves are all part of the electromagnetic spectrum. They don't all behave or interact with stuff the same. Xrays, infrared and microwaves are also part of that spectrum. They, like radio waves can be reflected like visible light but can penetrate certain materials.	[ "If unobstructed and in a perfect environment, radio waves will travel in a relatively straight line from the transmitter to the receiver. But if there are reflective surfaces that interact with a stray transmitted wave, such as bodies of water, smooth terrain, roof tops, sides of buildings, etc., the radio waves d...
how do different forms of mass communication work worldwide, when we're all so seperated by oceans? (we don't connect to internet servers across the globe through satellites, right?)	There's huge cables running across the oceans. [Here's](_URL_0_) all the connections.	[ "When all factors are at their optimum, worldwide communication is possible on HF. At many other times it is possible to make contact across and between continents or oceans. At worst, when a band is \"dead\", no communication beyond the limited groundwave paths is possible no matter what powers, antennas or other ...
What's the difference between an allergen and a poison or venom?	An allergen is typically a harmless substance like tree pollen or peanut butter. But some people get sensitized to it, so that the immune system over-reacts. This over-reaction causes the symptoms of allergy, not the harmless substance. A venom is a type of poison substance that is made by animals like insects (spider...	[ "The fields of medicine (particularly veterinary) and zoology often distinguish a poison from a toxin, and from a venom. Toxins are poisons produced by organisms in nature, and venoms are toxins injected by a bite or sting (this is exclusive to animals). The difference between venom and other poisons is the deliver...
why do companies need to put the ® or ™ symbols beside their product names every time it is written?	The "TM" symbol is generally used for unregistered trademarks (including those that are still in the process of being registered) and doesn't do anything significant legally when it comes to violations. The ® symbol on the other hand is used for trademarks registered with the federal government, and does have some...	[ "Because the ® symbol is not commonly available on typewriters (or ASCII), it is common to approximate it with the characters (R) (or (r)); for example the Python programming language Trademark Usage Policy advocates this usage. Example of legal equivalents are the phrase \"Registered, U.S. Patent and Trademark Off...
how does the nintendo 3ds display work?	The trick with 3D is to make each eye see a different picture. The Nintendo screen does this by having a series of pointy 'ridges' on the screen with a different picture on each side. Your right eye sees the right side of all the ridges, and your left eye sees the left side of all the ridges, so each eye sees a diffe...	[ "The Nintendo 3DS is a handheld video game console, revealed at Nintendo's E3 2010 press conference. Released in Japan in February 2011, it was released worldwide less than a month later. It uses autostereoscopic 3D to produce a 3D effect on-screen.\n", "Nintendo's Virtual Boy (also known as the VR-32 during deve...
Was either of the World Wars seen as the beginning of the biblical apocalypse by significant numbers of people at the time?	The biblical connotations were often applied in regards to international politics during the first and second world wars. Religious affiliations as always were espoused by nearly all sides and often played well into their political or diplomatic situations at the time. Nazi Germany during the second world war for man...	[ "\"The Apocalypse War\" is a storyline from the comic strip \"Judge Dredd\", first published in British comic \"2000 AD\" in 1982. It directly followed \"Block Mania\" which had set the stage without revealing the reasons until the last episode. It was written by John Wagner and Alan Grant and illustrated by Carlos...
What causes hair to turn grey?	Pigment cells called melanocytes naturally die as people age. These cells are part of the hair follicle which produces the individual hair strands. When the melanocytes die, the pigment that affected the color of the hair will be present in a less or non existent concentration, which makes hair translucent or, when cou...	[ "In some cases, gray hair may be caused by thyroid deficiencies, Waardenburg syndrome or a vitamin B deficiency. At some point in the human life cycle, cells that are located in the base of the hair's follicles slow, and eventually stop producing pigment. Piebaldism is a rare autosomal dominant disorder of melanocy...
We speak in different languages, so why do we all make "ha ha" or "ho ho" sounds when we laugh?	Isn't laughter a physiological response? Kind of like saying "why do all coughs and sneezes sound the same" 'Laughter is anatomically mediated by the epiglottis constricting the larynx'	[ "The difference in language often results in miscommunication, as seen in an onomatopoeic example, \"555\", which sounds like \"crying\" in Chinese, and \"laughing\" in Thai. A similar example is between the English \"haha\" and the Spanish \"jaja\", where both are onomatopoeic expressions of laughter, but the diff...
n95 masks and how they work	It's the same principle as a coffee filter, you have the layers in the mask itself that are very fine as to catch anything in the air that passes through it like dust, harmful bacteria, fine moisture droplets that may harbour virus particles, harmful chemicals from various sprays etc. This prevents said things from ent...	[ "Masking was one of the first techniques developed for the synthesis of Janus nanoparticles. This technique was developed by simply taking synthesis techniques of larger Janus particles and scaling down to the nanoscale. Masking, as the name suggests, involves the protection of one side of a nanoparticle followed b...
disk frag/defragmentation	Every time you access a program or file, think of it like an overflowing folder of paper work, while you are moving with it from point A, to point B, you drop a few pages in different places, and when you bring it back from B to A, you forget to pick up those pages that fell out. Defragging your hard drive is like pick...	[ "Diskeeper is a defragmentation program designed for Microsoft Windows. It was developed by Executive Software International, Inc., which later changed its name to Diskeeper Corporation, and is now called Condusiv Technologies.\n", "Windows Disk Defragmenter was updated to alleviate several restrictions. It no lo...
how is ceramic dinnerware so durable?	It has to do with hardness. Some materials like steel are very strong, but not terribly hard. You can scratch steel with most rocks, which we don't regard as being nearly as "tough" as steel. Wear tends to be an accumulation of small scratches. Ceramics can be very hard and thus scratch resistant. Ceramic glazes...	[ "Ceramic cookware (as in pans, not baking dishes) is not made of a solid ceramic, but rather is a metal pan, typically aluminum, with a nano-particle ceramic coating. This makes the surface rough on a small-scale and causes solutions to bead up more and not stick to the surface.\n", "In the 1970s, glass-ceramic c...
How much did the Mongols invasion of China affect Japan?	The effect was somewhere from somewhat important to absolutely vital. There is disagreement in the field, but it is generally accepted that the Mongols were an existential threat that hardened the Shogunate's control of the Honshu-Kyushu-Shikoku regions. This threat began in the 1220's when Korea fell under mongol cont...	[ "In 1274, the Mongol-founded Yuan dynasty in China sent a force of some 40,000 men and 900 ships to invade Japan in northern Kyūshū. Japan mustered a mere 10,000 samurai to meet this threat. The invading army was harassed by major thunderstorms throughout the invasion, which aided the defenders by inflicting heavy ...
what exactly causes this kind of rainbow coloration on stainless steel pots	Heating forms a thin layer of oxide over the steel, which causes the color effect by means of an optical process known as [thin-film interference](_URL_2_): basically the same effect that you can see in [soap](_URL_1_) [bubbles](_URL_0_) and [oil puddles](_URL_3_).	[ "Like many lake pigments, the exact colors produced depends on the pH of the mixture and the fixative used. Aluminum mordants used with brazilin produce the standard red colors, while the use of a tin mordant, in the form of SnCl or SnCl added to the extract is capable of yielding a pink color.\n", "Tarbuttite is...
Questions about Mad King Ludwig II of Bavaria	There was a documentary on BBC 4 that dealt with this, tracking his life and the castles he built. _URL_0_ It's been a few months since I've watched it but the castles are thought to be a part of his escapism from the realities of the loss of power Bavaria saw as Prussia moved towards unifying Germany. As well as thi...	[ "Ludwig II, King of Bavaria (German: Ludwig der Zweite, König von Bayern) is a 1929 German silent historical film directed by William Dieterle and starring Dieterle, Theodor Loos and Eugen Burg. It portrays the life and reign of the monarch Ludwig II who ruled Bavaria from 1864 to 1886. It was made at the Bavaria S...
Why are atoms depicted as spherical in our science textbooks? [Chemistry]	The actual structure is a bunch of probability distributions of electrons that are really hard to draw, and it doesn't give you a significant advantage over thinking of them as spheres. It explains why valance electrons matter, but it's a lot simpler just to think of atoms as a black box when dealing with chemical stru...	[ "In pure and applied mathematics, particularly quantum mechanics and computer graphics and their applications, a spherical basis is the basis used to express spherical tensors. The spherical basis closely relates to the description of angular momentum in quantum mechanics and spherical harmonic functions.\n", "Wh...
stealing home base.	It's also done so that the team can get a run in before the batter can possibly strike out, ending the inning with a third out. Other bases also have advantages when stolen, because then if the ball is hit to that base, the runner is already there and isn't forced to run into in easy out.	[ "Stealing Home is a 1988 American coming of age romantic drama film, written and directed by Steven Kampmann and William Porter (billed as Will Aldis). The film stars Mark Harmon, Jodie Foster, Blair Brown, Jonathan Silverman, Harold Ramis and William McNamara. In the film; Billy Wyatt, a washed-up baseball player,...
how does the earth’s magnetism work if metals lose their properties with intense heat?	Earth's magnetic field is generated by moving currents in the outer core. In that sense, it's more like a gargantuan electromagnet than a permanent magnet. Moving charge generates a magnetic field, and the liquid outer core moves in circular currents due to the intense temperature difference between the inner core an...	[ "Metallic properties increase down groups as decreasing attraction between the nuclei and the outermost electrons causes the outermost electrons to be loosely bound and thus able to conduct heat and electricity. Across the period, from left to right, increasing attraction between the nuclei and the outermost electr...
Are there any real instances of incredibly skilled soldiers in the ancient world?	Caesar likes to point out the occasional act of heroism and although one should expect him to embellish somewhat it seems likely that his stories are broadly factual (given the overall character of the work). He recounts the following event in De bello Gallico V 44: > In that legion there were two very brave men, ...	[ "Greek mercenary soldiers from northwestern India are mentioned in the accounts of the Pandyan Kingdom in Madurai, and described in admiring terms: \"The valiant-eyed Yavanas, whose bodies were strong and of terrible aspect\".\n", " were four skilled soldiers in Honest's employ. All four were highly trained and a...
Did North American wolves “learn” guns are bad?	Follow up question; would a biologist or similar be able to give different / more in depth information within Reddit?	[ "Proponents for wolf hunting often point out the apparently adverse effects large wolf populations have on game herds. An example occurred in 2008, in which the Alaska Board of Game approved plans calling for department staff to shoot wolves from helicopters on the southern Alaska Peninsula in order to assist the s...
why are there more two headed animals being born than two headed humans?	Two headed babies is a form of Siamese twins. This can only happen when there is twins. The probability of a twin birth depend on the mothers genes which is different between species. For humans this is quite rare but most animals give birth to twins, triplets or even more babies at once. This is also a feature that ca...	[ "Two-headed animals (called bicephalic or dicephalic) and three-headed (tricephalic) animals are the only type of multi-headed creatures seen in the real world, and form by the same process as conjoined twins from monozygotic twin embryos.\n", "In humans, as in other animals, partial twinning can result in format...
If you were to scream in the vacuum of space, would you be able to hear your own voice through the vibrations in your head? Or would you just hear silence?	Barring the other physical consequences of being exposed to space vacuum unprotected....if you had air in your lungs to exhale and 'scream' with, the vibrations from your vocal chords would propagate through your bodily tissue/matter and you'd 'hear' it--just like you already do in an atmosphere (except you probably 'h...	[ "BULLET::::- Hearing - In the space station and spacecraft there are only mechanical noises. There can be no environmental noise; there is no medium that can transmit the sound waves. Although there are other team members who can talk to each other, their voices stop stimulating the sense of hearing, since they get...
Seeing as how Constantinople was the capital of the Byzantine Empire, why didn't the Greeks retake the city upon regaining their independence from the Ottoman Empire?	Constantinople was a major goal of Greek nationalism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Greek ambition for territory in Anatolia, whether Istanbul/Constantinople or Izmir/Smyrna, pretty much ended after the Greco-Turkish War, one of several wars in the region in th wake of WWI. During this war, Greece occupied ...	[ "Constantinople was considered as a bastion of Christianity that defended Europe from the advancing forces of Islam, and the Fourth Crusade's sack of the city dealt an irreparable blow to this eastern bulwark. Although the Greeks retook Constantinople after 57 years of Latin rule, the Byzantine Empire had been crip...
Is ADHD something someone either has or doesn't have? Or is it a spectrum, and we only call it ADHD if a subject crosses some threshold?	There's a difference between theory and practice here. In theory, either you have ADHD or you don't -- kind of like syphilis. You have it or you don't. So there is a definition of ADHD you can find in the DSM V, and in theory, if you meet the definition you have ADHD, and if you don't, you don't. In reality, it's a ...	[ "ADHD is diagnosed by an assessment of a child's behavioral and mental development, including ruling out the effects of drugs, medications and other medical or psychiatric problems as explanations for the symptoms. It often takes into account feedback from parents and teachers with most diagnoses begun after a teac...
why does air cool when it's pressure decreases? (conversely, why does air heat up when it's pressure increases?)	Temperature is caused by atoms and molecules whizzing around and hitting off each other. The more collisions, the higher the temperature. If you hold a finite volume of air in a container (say 1 mole, a unit of measurement for atoms and molecules) and change the size of the container, that effects whether the molecules...	[ "However, when air is hot, it tends to expand, which lowers its density. Thus, hot air tends to rise and transfer heat upward. This is the process of convection. Convection comes to equilibrium when a parcel of air at a given altitude has the same density as its surroundings. Air is a poor conductor of heat, so a p...
ukip had over three million votes, why did they only get 1 mp ?	Let me explain with a really simplified version of the election: 2 Parties run in 100 local elections, each local election gets 201 votes. By sheer luck; Party 1 wins EVERY election 101 votes to 100. That means they win every seat. The end result is > 51% of total votes but 100% of the total seats. The number of v...	[ "UKIP received the greatest number of votes (27.49%) of any British party in the 2014 European Parliament election and gained 11 extra MEPs for a total of 24. The party won seats in every region of Great Britain, including its first in Scotland. It was the first time in over a century that a party other than Labour...
Why are Asia and Africa so big while Europe only occupies a small part of the world?	The naming of Europe goes back to the Greeks. They divided the world with a line through the Aegean Sea, The Dardanelles, the Bosporus and the black sea leaving the crimean peninsula in Europe. Originally the term only applied to Greece but eventually came to designate pretty much anything north of the Mediterranean a...	[ "Geographically, Asia is the major eastern constituent of the continent of Eurasia with Europe being a northwestern peninsula of the landmass. Asia, Europe and Africa make up a single continuous landmass—Afro-Eurasia (except for the Suez Canal)—and share a common continental shelf. Almost all of Europe and the bett...
why are airplanes and other aircrafts forward facing tips rounded instead of arrow shaped?	> Wouldn’t it cut through the air more efficiently if it was sharp? Only if the air only comes in perfectly straight. Otherwise it creates zones of low pressure which causes drag. A rounded nose allows the pressure wave which extends forward for subsonic aircraft to modify the flow of incoming air to work better wit...	[ "A rectangular planform wing produces stronger wingtip vortices than does a tapered or elliptical wing, therefore many modern wings are tapered. However, an elliptical planform is more efficient as the induced downwash (and therefore the effective angle of attack) is constant across the whole of the wingspan. Few a...
how do criminal bonds work?	Bail isn't used for anything ideally. It's held by the court, and then given back to you when you show up at the required time. The bondsman just loans you the amount necessary to pay bail, and you agree to have the court pay him back directly. This only breaks down if you decide to not show up to court. Then you don'...	[ "The \"bond\" is a term used for the softness or hardness of the powder metal being used to form the segments. The powdered metals hold the diamonds in place. The bond controls the rate at which the diamond segments wear down allowing new diamonds to become exposed at the surface to continue grinding with a \"sharp...
what exactly are co-op apartments and how are they legal?	Co-ops (at least New York style) are a type of apartment ownership that have a purpose similar to condominiums, but with some differences. With a condo, you own your unit outright but have a shared ownership of the common land, roof, and similar areas. With a co-op, all you own is a share of a corporation which has...	[ "A housing cooperative, or co-op, is a legal entity, usually a corporation, which owns real estate, consisting of one or more residential buildings; it is one type of housing tenure. Housing cooperatives are a distinctive form of home ownership that have many characteristics that differ from other residential arran...
Do any photographs exist of a Naval broadside hitting its target?	This should give you an idea of what these battles looked like: [the Bismarck in her final battle.](_URL_1_) There seem to be numerous photos of the battle of Jutland too, but this one is clearer. It doesn't quite capture what it was like for a ship to be hit by an armor-piercing shell though. I don't know if any sailo...	[ "The film contains several accurate depictions of torpedo attacks being arranged with periscope sightings, range and bearing calculations, and use of a Torpedo Data Computer to achieve a shooting solution. On the surface, the Captain uses a Target Bearing Transmitter mounted on the bridge to acquire a target visual...
why do solid-state drives work more efficiently?	Let me begin by explaining how regular hard drives work. Imagine a record player. Replace the physical grooves on the record with a magnetic charge. Now make it really really tiny and spin very very fast. This is in essence a hard drive. You have a spinning disk containing information stored as magnetic charges and you...	[ "Most of the advantages of solid-state drives over traditional hard drives are due to their ability to access data completely electronically instead of electromechanically, resulting in superior transfer speeds and mechanical ruggedness. On the other hand, hard disk drives offer significantly higher capacity for th...
What prompted the erection of all these confederate statues?	I've written in the past about Civil War memory, so [this previous post of mine](_URL_0_) might be of interest for you.	[ "In 1916, the University of Texas at Austin recognized several confederate veterans (including Johnston) with statues on its South Mall. On August 21, 2017, as part of the wave of confederate monument removals in America, Johnston's statue was taken down. Plans were announced to add it to the Briscoe Center for Ame...
Cave Diving vs. Open Sea Diving Pressure Difference?	Layman here. No, there's no difference. Distance below the water line is the only thing that matters; it doesn't matter if there's rock over your head or not. Related: fresh water is slightly less dense than seawater. (no salt) So you can dive slightly deeper in a fresh water than you could in the ocean. But the diff...	[ "Two regions have had particular influence on cave diving techniques and equipment due to their very different cave diving environments. These are the United Kingdom, and the United States, mainly Florida.\n", "Deep cave diving (as in the WKPP) has significant differences in hazards and environmental conditions f...
Are the planets in our solar system charged? Do electric fields exist between them?	The total charge of the planets is negligible. Any relevant net charge would be neutralized quickly.	[ "Of the eight planets in the Solar System, only Venus and Mars lack such a magnetic field. In addition, the moon of Jupiter Ganymede also has one. Of the magnetized planets the magnetic field of Mercury is the weakest, and is barely able to deflect the solar wind. Ganymede's magnetic field is several times larger, ...
why did people used to believe in witches, and why did things like 'wearing red lipstick' increase your chance of being one?	Witches were women (and, little known fact, in some cases men) who practiced pagan traditions and rituals (the name stemming from the german term 'wicca'). The church saw them as heretics and opposed them and their ways. After a while they began pinning things they didn't like on witchcraft and to subjugate the masses....	[ "Folklore, mythology and literature associate red with fertility, and women are thought to have worn the equivalent of a red lipstick as early as 10,000 B.C. and so sexual receptiveness and red may be a result of social conditioning. However, this social conditioning may have originated for biological and evolution...
why are tunnels round?	Following a simple Google search I found: Tunnels usually have a circular cross section because the stresses around a circular opening are more evenly distributed. ... So the short answer is: they're circular because it's convenient and there is usually no significant reason to make them any other shape. _URL_0_	[ "Tunnels are either square or round, depending on the method of their construction: Square tunnels were built with the cut and cover method of digging trenches down from the surface, constructing the tunnel structure, and then backfilling. Round tunnels are bored using a tunnel boring machine (TBM). The cut and cov...
what does the 'cosmic microwave background radiation' picture show and why is it oval-shaped?	This is the visual representation of the map of remnant radiation left over from the big bang (or shortly thereafter.) It is oval because it is a flat representation of what the sensors recorded from Earth looking outwards in all directions. The areas of higher temperature correspond to areas in the universe (again, ...	[ "The Cosmic Background Explorer satellite produces a detailed map of the background radiation remaining from the Big Bang. The map shows \"ripples\", caused by slight variations in the density of the early universe – the seeds of galaxies and galaxy clusters.\n", "The Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation s...
How do you go from anecdotal evidence to scientific study?	You need to do a scientific experiment where you have two equal groups and manipulate one independent variable to determine causation then publish your findings in a Peer-reviewed journal.	[ "Sometimes, a researcher may conduct exploratory research but report it as if it had been confirmatory ('Hypothesizing After the Results are Known', HARKing—see Hypotheses suggested by the data); this is a questionable research practice bordering on fraud.\n", "The results of exploratory research are not usually ...
what is the difference between atp and nad?	ATP is the energy molecule, which you're aware of. I don't know the full role of NAD, but it is part of the production of ATP. NAD becomes NADH when it accepts an electron, as glucose is broken down in multiple steps. Anyway, that accepted electron eventually gets placed in the Electron Transport Chain in the mitoch...	[ "From the perspective of biochemistry, ATP is classified as a nucleoside triphosphate, which indicates that it consists of three components: a nitrogenous base (adenine), the sugar ribose, and the triphosphate.\n", "In terms of its structure, ATP consists of an adenine attached by the 9-nitrogen atom to the 1′ ca...
Why didn't Germany take the rest of France in WW2 they seemed happy to stop after taking Paris?	The simple answer boils down to a couple of factors: * Military occupations can be very costly and expensive. For a country as densely populated as France, Germany would have had to commit a decent chunk of it's army to keep the annexed territory in line. This is expensive and costly, as Germany needed all of the sold...	[ "Paris fell to the Germans on 14 June 1940, and the government surrendered on 24 June 1940. Nazi Germany occupied three-fifths of France's territory, leaving the rest in the southeast to the new Vichy government, which was a bit more than a puppet state since it still had a navy. However nearly 2 million French sol...
When was the modern conception of romantic love developed? How long before it displaced ancient notions of marriage and love?	What do you mean, exactly, as a distinction between "romantic love" and "ancient notions of marriage and love"? Are we talking about rejecting marriages as a practical tool, and turning towards a 'I'll get married when I'm ready" modern attitude? It's difficult to draw the line... women have been more or less required ...	[ "Some believe that romantic love evolved independently in multiple cultures. For example, in an article presented by Henry Grunebaum, he argues \"therapists mistakenly believe that romantic love is a phenomenon unique to Western cultures and first expressed by the troubadours of the Middle Ages.\"\n", "American h...

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