Split (2)

train · 226k rows

question stringlengths 3 301	answer stringlengths 9 26.1k	context list
Why do quasars emit so much light?	Essentially, because there is a lot of material falling into the black hole. When things fall down a gravity well, they lose gravitational potential energy. Drop something off a cliff, and gravitational energy gets transformed into kinetic energy, which upon hitting the ground will partly turn into thermal energy. Of c...	[ "Quasars (/ˈkweɪzɑr/) or quasi-stellar radio sources are the most energetic and distant members of active galactic nuclei. Quasars are extremely luminous and were first identified as being high redshift sources of electromagnetic energy, including radio waves and visible light, that appeared to be similar to stars,...
why is it that "time flies when you're having fun"?	I think because you focus much harder on the task at hand you stop thinking about the time so much.	[ "\"Funny How Time Flies (When You're Having Fun)\" is the seventh and final single from American R&B singer Janet Jackson's third studio album, \"Control\" (1986). While \"Funny How Time Flies (When You're Having Fun)\" was officially released in the United Kingdom and Australia, it was released solely for airplay ...
what are the grey areas that we can see in the moon from down here?	They're called mares. It means "sea," but these are actually more like patches of the surface that had melted and re-hardened in the distant past.	[ "The lunar landscape used in the film is Vasquez Rocks, a popular television and feature film shooting location near Los Angeles. A red camera filter was used to make the blue sky photograph very dark on the black-and-white film, but the result is still far from the ideal starry black. Bits of scrubby vegetation ca...
since blue whales have aortas large enough to swim in, do they have fewer issues with blood clots?	considering they have an extremely active lifestyle (swimming constantly all the time) and a relatively low cholesterol diet (mostly plankton and krill iirc) they are presumably at very low risk for blood clots in the first place.	[ "All squamates and turtles have a three-chambered heart consisting of two atria, one variably partitioned ventricle, and two aortas that lead to the systemic circulation. The degree of mixing of oxygenated and deoxygenated blood in the three-chambered heart varies depending on the species and physiological state. U...
When heating something to high temperatures it becomes “red hot” and then continues to change color to orange, yellow, and then white; why doesn’t the hot object start to glow green or blue after yellow?	The "red hot" appearance of an object is due to its thermal radiation. This is EM radiation emitted by every object and the spectrum of which is determined by the temperature. Objects at room temperature emit thermal radiation in the infrared part of the spectrum, but once objects get hotter, the spectrum of thermal ra...	[ "It is true that objects at specific temperatures do radiate visible light. Objects whose surface is at a temperature above approximately will glow, emitting light at a color that indicates the temperature of that surface. See the section on red heat for more about this effect. It is a misconception that one can ju...
why does fabric (temporally) change colour when it gets wet?	First of all, you have to look at how colour works. When light hits something, most of the light is absorbed by whatever is there, in your case, the backpack. What you see is only the light that isn't absorbed, it's reflected back at you. So, when you add water (rain) the reflection back is different because the water ...	[ "Linen fabrics have a high natural luster; their natural color ranges between shades of ivory, ecru, tan, or grey. Pure white linen is created by heavy bleaching. Linen fabric typically varies somewhat in thickness and is crisp and textured, but it can in some cases feel stiff and rough, and in other cases feel sof...
what will happen if a republican president is elected in 2016 and signs the obamacare repeal bill?	Yes, it could be repealed, and what would happen depends on what exactly is in the bill repealing it. While the Affordable Care Act is one discrete public law, it is codified by inserting provisions into various titles and sections of the U.S. Code (statutes) that deal with health care and insurance. So whatever act...	[ "In January 2017, at the beginning of the Congress, Collins voted in favor of a bill to begin the repeal of the Affordable Care Act (\"Obamacare\"). However, with four other Republican senators, Collins is leading an effort to slow down the ACA repeal in the Senate. Collins and fellow Republican Senator Bill Cassid...
why there is no radio function in iphones (not sure about androids) radio was avaliable in almost all old phones	Because you need to add yet another chip which can receive the right wavelength, which adds complexity, costs, and takes away space for things you'd rather put in.	[ "Some previous iPhone models contained a chip capable of receiving radio signals; however, Apple has the FM radio feature switched off because there was no antenna connected to the chip. Later iterations of the iPhone (starting with the iPhone 7), however, do not contain radio chips at all. A campaign called \"Free...
Did any Native American civilization possibly know that there was land and people beyond the Americas? Did they have any mythological tales about the rest of the world?	I think, from my understanding, you are asking about concepts of aboriginal knowledge- this is " including traditional teachings, empirical observation, and revelation" (1). I caution that I have only an amateur background in the histories, but hope to answer the concept of your question. Of the concepts mentioned the...	[ "In his very last years, Knorozov is also known to have pointed to a place in the United States as the likely location of Chicomoztoc, the ancestral land from which—according to ancient documents and accounts considered mythical by a sizable number of scholars—indigenous peoples now living in Mexico are said to hav...
why are australia's vast empty planes simply not covered in solar panels to help with their power productions crisis?	A couple of reasons: * it's expensive as fuck * you lose a lot of the power having to transfer it across lines to where it is useful. * despite it being fairly inhospitable to people, there's still a great deal of wildlife there that would be impacted by such a huge construction project. I mean yeah put a solar pla...	[ "Solar Ship Inc. is a company based out of Toronto, Ontario, Canada in order to develop hybrid aircraft to deliver critical cargo to cut-off places. The solarship gains lift from both buoyant gas and aerodynamics and uses power from solar panels. The aircraft is a new concept of transport that does not rely on foss...
why is it recommended to cook with cold water instead of hot water?	Yo ho ho! Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: Why is it better to start with cold water and boil it when making pasta or coffee, rather than starting with hot water? ](_URL_3_) ^(_30 comments_) 1. [ELI5: When I boil water, why am i supposed to use cold water? ](_URL_2_) ^(_29 comments...	[ "Since cooking foods at high temperatures in order to kill bacteria and pathogens is required, cautionary measures need to be taken into consideration. One of these precautions is the use of water and other solutions around deep fryers because water or ice that meets hot oils is likely to gurgle, splash, and bubble...
What properties make an object heat faster in a microwave?	You are observing the dielectric properties of the various materials. Some materials like dry ice are transparent to microwaves and will not heat up in a microwave because it has low dielectric loss. Some ceramic plates and bowls have higher dielectric loss than others meaning they couple with the microwaves and begin ...	[ "Different compounds convert microwave radiation to heat by different amounts. This selectivity allows some parts of the object being heated to heat more quickly or more slowly than others (particularly the reaction vessel).\n", "Microwave heating can cause localized thermal runaways in some materials with low th...
How much of Real Madrid's early success was because of Francisco Franco?	Sid Lowe's book 'fear and loathing in la liga' goes into great detail on this. Essentially people on both sides will claim lots and nothing. An important point to note is that real madrid were one of the best teams in the country directly before the civil war and were gutted by the civil war. Real madrid's president w...	[ "With a record of success that exceeds that of any other team in European basketball, Real Madrid has always lived willingly with high expectations. For at least half a century, Madrid has been a standard-bearer in European basketball, accumulating a record ten continental titles, based on its dominance in the 1960...
how is it possible that we encounter plateaus when losing weight even if we continue to operate at a caloric deficit?	There are a lot of possible explanations. One big thing to keep in mind is water weight. What are the physical things that make up your weight? Bones... Fat... Muscles... Organ tissues........ and Water! You're actually mostly water, by the way. And the amount of water sitting inside of you can vary DRAMATICALLY. You...	[ "A practical application of the plateau principle is that most people have experienced \"plateauing\" during regimens for weight management or training for sports. After a few weeks of progress, one seems unable to continue gaining in ability or losing weight. This outcome results from the same underlying quantitat...
How does our body keep track of time? And how might this effect space travel?	On your question about the role of the sun and the implications for space travel, there were a series of interesting studies a while back that provides part of the answer. The goal of these studies was to determine if our normal [circadian rhythm](_URL_3_) (as measured by physiological markers like the body temperature...	[ "Time is discretized into time steps. This discretization in both space and time results in a cellular automaton. One can think of a cell as being a few car lengths long and the maximum velocity as being the speed limit on the road. The time step is then the time taken for a car at the speed limit to travel around ...
How does graphite bind to paper, and how does an eraser remove it?	[So this is what paper looks like close up](_URL_0_) [This is what graphite might look like close up](_URL_1_) When you write, the graphite becomes all dusty and lands on the paper, and into the holes of the paper and all over it. But it isn't bonded to it. This is why, after long periods of time, lots of things like...	[ "The ability to leave marks on paper and other objects gave graphite its name, given in 1789 by German mineralogist Abraham Gottlob Werner. It stems from \"graphein\", meaning \"to write\" or \"draw\" in Ancient Greek.\n", "An ink eraser is an instrument used to remove ink from a writing surface, more difficult t...
Royal chefs in Middle Ages	The first German language cookbook was written by a woman named Sabina Welserin in 1553 (you can read it [here](_URL_0_)). Not much is known about her life but she mentioned in one recipe that the cook for Count of Leuchtenberg instructed her to cook fish a certain way hinting she is a professional cook of some kind. F...	[ "The most well known French chef of the Middle Ages was Guillaume Tirel, also known as Taillevent. Taillevent worked in numerous royal kitchens during the 14th century. His first position was as a kitchen boy in 1326. He was chef to Philip VI, then the Dauphin who was son of John II. The Dauphin became King Charles...
why would human poop be white?	White stool is not normal and should be evaluated promptly by a doctor. White stool is caused by a lack of bile, which may indicate a serious underlying problem. Bile is a digestive fluid produced by the liver and stored in the gallbladder. Stool gets its normal brownish color from bile, which is excreted from the liv...	[ "Sometimes food may make an appearance in the feces. Common undigested foods found in human feces are seeds, nuts, corn, and beans, mainly because of their high dietary fiber content. Beets may turn feces different hues of red. Artificial food coloring in some processed foods, such as highly colorful packaged break...
what is actually in contraband (cheap) cigarettes and why are they so cheap and illegal?	Because some states like New York tax cigarettes heavily. Contraband cigarettes are purchased out of state to avoid the taxes and sold at a discounted rate.	[ "The ICC (International Chamber of Commerce) warns counterfeit cigarettes were found to contain unsanitary ingredients (such as human feces, dead flies and mold), as well as a higher dosage of lethal substances in excess of legitimate cigarettes. Illicit cigarettes seized in Canada and the United Kingdom were found...
Winston Churchill often spoke about his "little black dog" (i.e. depression) that constantly followed him around. Did any Nazi leaders suffer from depression or other clinical mental disorders?	Suicidal tendencies were a sufficient problem in the SS that Himmler made a point of saying that funerals shouldn't be given for officers who committed it for "trivial" reasons. Between July and September of 1942, 30 members of the SS committed it. One particular case was a SS Brigadier named Fritsch who killed himsel...	[ "The book revealed that \"Black Dog\" was the name Churchill gave to \"the prolonged fits of depression from which he suffered\", leading many later authors to suggest that throughout his life Churchill was a victim of, or at risk from, clinical depression. Formulated in this way, Churchill's mental health history ...
If I unraveled the DNA in a human cell, how strong would it be?	What you're looking for is the tensile strength of DNA compared to the tensile strength of something like, say, nylon. It takes about 1 nN to break a strand of DNA, which at around 2nm wide and roughly circular, gives you a tensile strength of about 318 MPa. This is compared to somewhere in the neighborhood of ~100 M...	[ "Ordinarily, cellular transport mechanisms in humans and some other animals limit the amount of chromium(III) that enters a cell. Hypothetically, if an excessive amount was able to enter a cell, free radical damage to DNA might result.\n", "Each human cell contains around two metres of DNA, which must be tightly ...
why everyone seems to hate /r/politics.	Reddit as a website skews young, especially on the default subreddits. Reddit also skews liberal (which I am too). As a result, you get a bunch of 15-18 year olds yelling about politics they have only recently started to be interested in and learn about and which they barely understand. They lack an awareness of con...	[ "We were talking about all the bulls— on the Internet and how people just hate on stuff. We were saying, “What if we used that energy to spread positivity? Would it spread as fast as the hate does?” “All the hate and lies around us like an ember in the brush”: It just started writing itself from everything we were ...
during the cold war, how did the united states (and by extent, the soviet union) know that a nuclear missile was fired at thier respective country early enough so that they could deploy countermeasures?	A combination of huge long range radar stations and satellite early warning systems. You can't really hide a rocket launch from a satellite. Large rockets like ICBMs have a massive thermal signature that is easy to spot. That is why the US and USSR (and now Russia) notify each other of peaceful rocket launches in ad...	[ "Soviet concern about the issue grew with the U.S. development of highly accurate submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) systems in the 1980s. Until then, the United States would have delivered most nuclear weapons by long-range bomber or ICBM. Earlier U.S. sub-launched missiles, such as the 1960s-vintage UGM-...
Do rainbows also have sections in the infrared and/or ultraviolet spectrum?	Yes, definitely! You can easily see that in [this series of images](_URL_0_) taken in the ultraviolet (UV), visible, and infrared (IR) parts of the spectrum. As you can see there is a UV band below the violet edge and an IR band above the red edge, which you obviously can't see with the naked eye. This result is exact...	[ "Supernumerary rainbows cannot be explained using classical geometric optics. The alternating faint bands are caused by interference between rays of light following slightly different paths with slightly varying lengths within the raindrops. Some rays are in phase, reinforcing each other through constructive interf...
how can we identify different instruments playing at the same time if it is the same air that is vibrating?	Vi Hart explains it better than I ever could. Basically, it's what your ear was made to do. _URL_0_	[ "When each instrument of a symphony orchestra or the jazz band plays the same note, the quality of each sound is different — but the musician perceives each note as having the same pitch. The neurons of the auditory cortex of the brain are able to respond to pitch. Studies in the marmoset monkey have shown that pit...
what is the reasoning behind above-ground power lines? germany buries them, mostly, but the usa keeps them exposed to the elements.	Germany only buries the low-voltage power lines between transformers and the homes. The power lines between the transformers, switching stations and power plant are above-ground lines most of the time.	[ "In a building with electricity it is normal for safety reasons to connect all metal objects such as pipes together to the mains earth to form an equipotential zone. This is done in the UK because many buildings are supplied with a single phase supply cable where the neutral and earth conductors are combined. Close...
how do free mobile games make money when all the ads in the game are from other free mobile games?	Free mobile games make money primarily in three different ways: (1) offering in-app purchases usually used by their ‘whales’ (i.e - 20% of their customers who spend a significant amount of money on the game and keep it alive for the rest of the non paying users). Edit: Just wanted to clarify that the 20% isn’t suppo...	[ "Many mobile games are distributed free to the end user, but carry paid advertising: examples are \"Flappy Bird\" and \"Doodle Jump\". The latter follows the \"freemium\" model, in which the base game is free but additional items for the game can be purchased separately.\n", "Typically, commercial mobile games us...
how do man-made canals work? like the suez, erie, panama canal?	Their purpose is to move boats between places that don't directly connect. This saves a lot of money on shipping things, because then you don't have to steer your boat all the way around Africa or South America if you're shipping stuff from Greece to India or from New York to San Francisco. They are built, as you'd exp...	[ "A canal basin is (particularly in the United Kingdom) an expanse of waterway alongside or at the end of a canal, and wider than the canal, constructed to allow boats to moor or unload cargo without impeding the progress of other traffic, and to allow room for turning, thus serving as a winding hole. For inland wat...
why are electoral votes all or nothing(for the most part)? why are they not divvied out representative to popular vote?	Because each state chooses to use all of its electoral votes to elect the person the majority of the electorate in that state voted for. Each state chooses to not divvy up its electoral vote.	[ "The advantages of this system are claimed to be that: there would be only one election campaign to fund, it does not waste votes because votes for minority parties will count in the Upper House and so it should improve voter turnout, and as the upper house has no direct vote it has no separate mandate and so the C...
Why is the strong force repulsive at small distances?	My favourite [link](_URL_0_) for "why" questions, especially of this nature. Also the Strong force itself isn't repulsive over short distances, just an effective description of it for use between nucleons is.	[ "The effective range of the weak force is limited to subatomic distances, and is less than the diameter of a proton. It is one of the four known force-related fundamental interactions of nature, alongside the strong interaction, electromagnetism, and gravitation.\n", "This is because gravitation is an attractive ...
What are your favorite historical books about great empires and/or historical figures.	Caesar: Life of a Colossus Adrian Goldsworthy Fantastic well researched life of quite possibly the worlds most interesting man that is a great approachable read. American Ceasar William Manchester Sometimes a bit heavy but riveting all the same. Makes this complicated controversial man understandable and appreciable ...	[ "BULLET::::- Shadow of Wings (1972). A historical novel set around the rise of the Persian Empire. It starts with the career of Cyrus the Great, founder of the Persian Achaemenid Empire, but mainly deals with the rise to power of King of Kings Darius I (the Great).\n", "His best known work is a History of the sec...
What did pre-Columbian indigenous nations do with the dead bodies of people who they fought? Did they just leave them on the field?	I can't speak to the specifics of Aztec battles, but the huge diversity of pre-Columbian nations over thousands of years and across two continents gave rise to a variety of methods of treating fallen combatants. There will be as many answers to this question as there are distinct cultural traditions and skeletal remai...	[ "In 1847, during the Mexican–American War, the U.S. Army occupied northeastern Mexico. Captain John E. Dusenbury, a white bean survivor, returned to El Rancho Salado and exhumed the remains of his comrades. He traveled with the remains on a ship to Galveston, and by wagon to La Grange in Fayette County, Texas.\n", ...
why do we get random bouts of euphoria?	Hmm, I've never experienced that. I've known people who had sharp mood swings one way or another, but they usually had issues like hypoglycemia, bipolar disorder, etc. I've for sure personally moved from down to up, but never very quickly, and never for no apparent reason.	[ "Euphoria () is the experience (or affect) of pleasure or excitement and intense feelings of well-being and happiness. Certain natural rewards and social activities, such as aerobic exercise, laughter, listening to or making music, and dancing, can induce a state of euphoria. Euphoria is also a symptom of certain n...
why does ssds have a specific number of reads/writes.	The way my boss describes it is like this: When you write to a cell, you're basically shooting it with a shotgun (electrons). This makes it return a different signal when you apply power (to read it). When you erase that cell, you take a giant magnet to rip the bullets out. Unfortunately some of the target comes out...	[ "SSDs store data in flash memory cells that are grouped into pages typically of 4 to 16 kB, grouped together into blocks of typically 128 to 512 pages. Example: 512 kB blocks that group 128 pages of 4 kB each. NAND flash memory cells can be directly written to only when they are empty. If they may contain data, the...
Why do so many aerosol products use things like propane and butane as propellants? Why not air or nitrogen?	Propane and butane are liquids when compressed. This allows a lot of the gas to be stored in a small space. Normal compressed air is still a gas, and has to be compressed at much higher pressures to even approach the compact storage of the usual propellants.	[ "Propane and butane are gases at atmospheric pressure that can be liquefied at fairly low pressures and are commonly known as liquified petroleum gas (LPG). Propane is used in propane gas burners and as a fuel for road vehicles, butane in space heaters and disposable cigarette lighters. Both are used as propellants...
In WWII, did anyone become an ace as either a pilot or gunner of a bomber?	There are certainly gunners credited with five or more kills. Albert E. Conder's The Men Behind The Guns: The History of Enlisted Aerial Gunnery 1917 - 1991 has a section, "Some of the Aces"; Conder says "The thousands of enemy fighters downed by Gunners were counted as a "team" effort, rather than crediting individu...	[ "A flying ace or fighter ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down five or more enemy aircraft during aerial combat (The Germans traditionally set the threshold at 10 victories.). During World War II, hundreds of German Luftwaffe fighter pilots achieved this feat flying contemporary piston engine fighte...
why should i bother getting married?	From a secular point of view, a marriage is a contract between (usually two) people. They agree to pool their resources. The general idea is that both partners gain something from this, for instance financial security, a stable home situation and - not unimportant - a partner in procreation. The government (that is, t...	[ "A marriage of convenience is contracted for reasons other than that of relationship of love. Instead, such a marriage is entered into for personal gain or some other sort of strategic purpose, such as political marriage. Some cases in which those married do not intend to live together as a couple, typically marry ...
how do mesh networks maintain speed?	Any wireless mesh network will lose speed each hop because of the overhead. Even wired networks you will lose some speed each hop but it is not near as noticeable because there is much less overhead in wired communication. Basically each wireless node takes the data off the wire, encapsulates it in the wireless packet,...	[ "A mesh refers to rich interconnection among devices or nodes. Wireless mesh networks often consist of mesh clients, mesh routers and gateways. Mobility of nodes is less frequent. If nodes constantly or frequently move, the mesh spends more time updating routes than delivering data. In a wireless mesh network, topo...
why do i see product placement at big events in the form of only the name of a brand?	When you go to buy, say, a TV, you might see a Sony and a Magnavox. If you see Sony's name over and over again, you'll be more familiar with the brand name and think it more reputable.	[ "Due to the variety of ways in which product placement can be accomplished in any media, and because the category is nascent, this category is not standardized at all, but some examples include branded in-game goods or even in-game quests. For example, in a game where you run a restaurant, you might be asked to col...
What was the power relationship between USSR "spy agencies" and the Communist Party up until the fall of the Soviet Union?	First off, it's important to remember that the KGB didn't exist until the 1950s. The Cheka, OGPU and NKVD all came before. After NKVD director Lavrenty Beria fell in 1953, intelligence gathering was done by more than one agency, though KGB certainty had the most influence. The answer to your question varies greatly ...	[ "All sides in the Cold War engaged in espionage. The Soviet KGB (\"Committee for State Security\"), the bureau responsible for foreign espionage and internal surveillance, was famous for its effectiveness. A massive network of informants throughout the Soviet Union was used to monitor dissent from official Soviet p...
Could a large object come close enough to Earth to cause people to temporarily float without knocking the planet out of orbit?	For that to happen, the surface gravity of the object would have to be greater than the surface gravity of Earth. Such as object, presumably made of some sort of rocky material, would have to be of comparable mass to the Earth. The only way this object would careen past the Earth at super close range without hitting it...	[ "At a distance relatively close to Earth (less than 3000 km), gravity is only slightly reduced. As an object orbits a body such as the Earth, gravity is still attracting objects towards the Earth and the object is accelerated downward at almost 1g. Because the objects are typically moving laterally with respect to ...
What was happening along the rest of the eastern front during the Battle of Berlin?	On the Balkans, the Croatians and Heeresgruppe F were retreating under the combined pressure of Titos (by now regular) army, the Soviets and elements of the Bulgarian army. They were mostly attempting to make contact with the British in western Austria to surrender to them in a vain hope to not be turned over to Tito o...	[ "The Battle of Berlin was the final major offensive of the European theatre of World War II and was designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union. Starting on 16 April 1945, the Red Army breached the German front as a result of the Vistula–Oder Offensive and rapidly advanced westward throu...
can someone explain to me what a tax bracket is?	A tax bracket says the percentage of your income that is taken as income tax when you're earning a given amount. So, for example, it might be (taken from the Australian tax scheme): * 0 - $6,000: Nil * $6,001 - $37,000: 15c for each $1 over $6,000 * $37,001 - $80,000: $4,650 plus 30c for each $1 over $37,000 * $80,00...	[ "Tax brackets are the divisions at which tax rates change in a progressive tax system (or an explicitly regressive tax system, although this is much rarer). Essentially, they are the cutoff values for taxable income—income past a certain point will be taxed at a higher rate.\n", "Bracket creep is usually defined ...
Why is there so little known about seizures?	I think we know more about seizures than you'd think, and are learning more and more with the advancement of technology. It's just that this information isn't yet to the point where it is truly helpful to doctors. > Doctor's cannot even tell us why it happens Do you mean why seizures happen in general, or why they ...	[ "It has been reported that repeated seizure stimulation can result in spontaneous seizures, but studies have had conflicting findings on this question. In humans, some seizure disorders come to an end by themselves even after large numbers of seizures. However, in both human epilepsy and in some animal models, evid...
how does billing work for toll roads?	Will be helpful to list the specific system you are talking about In many cases in the US, tolls may be assessed on certain entry/exit points and certain points along the road.	[ "The toll can be paid by different means. Firstly, a particular route can be pre-booked over the Internet. Secondly, the toll can be paid at terminals (often found in fuel stations). Thirdly, the preferred method is the fully automated billing using On-Board-Units (OBUs) deployed in the trucks, receiving GPS signal...
You're in a medieval European city and you need to find yourself a place to call home. Who do you talk to? A medieval realtor?	Obligatory "medieval Europe can mean a lot of different times and a lot of different places." You should probably make your question a little more specific.	[ "In Medieval days a destination for such days out would be religious (to a nearby shrine) or commercial, for example to a seasonal fair. Later, in England, visits to stately homes by those who regarded themselves middle class became frequent and it was the tradition to reward the butler or housekeeper with a tip fo...
why does it hardly rain in southern california, despite being adjacent to the pacific ocean?	Proximity to an ocean is only one of the factors when determining rainfall. There's lost of deserts in the world that are ocean adjacent. The overall weather patterns play a much more significant role. So air currents, ocean temperature, as well as land features like mountains. There's more important factors than ...	[ "The large Westerly winds from the oceans also bring moisture, and the northern parts of the state generally receive higher annual rainfall amounts than the south. California's mountain ranges influence the climate as well: moisture-laden air from the west cools as it ascends the mountains, dropping moisture; some ...
Mom says you will catch a cold if you go out in the cold weather or rain without a coat. Do these actually contribute to getting you sick? And how?	The 'common cold' is usually caused by a rhinovirus. Cold temperature itself does not cause illness. [However, temperature effects may facilitate viral infection:](_URL_0_) > Although not all studies agree, most of the available evidence from laboratory and clinical studies suggests that inhaled cold air, cooling of...	[ "In addition to providing warmth for residents, cold weather rules help prevent damage to homes. Wintertime temperatures can freeze Water pipes, potentially causing bursts in the lines as the water inside expands as it turns into ice. Cleaning up after this can lay heavy burdens upon people who are already of limit...
Instead of a space elevator, how (un) feasible would a railgun /coilgun be to shoot things into orbit?	Because even without drag, nothing could survive the acceleration required. Let's assume no drag, and you're on the surface of the Earth. In fact, we'll put you right on the equator, to get maximum benefit from the Earth's rotation. Now, the ISS is in LEO (low earth orbit) so that takes the least energy to get into pla...	[ "BULLET::::- In the video game \"Portal\", yet another similar gun to \"Half-Life 2\"'s, which is titled the \"Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device\", can create a weaker zero-point energy field by simply lifting objects and carrying them, but cannot throw or pull in from a distance. These items can also be drop...
Hypothetically, if someone with a cold ate ice cream out of a tub of ice cream and then the rest of that ice cream tub was put back into the freezer, would all the cold germs "freeze to death" making it safe for someone else to eat that ice cream?	Bacteria are not going to "freeze to death", they are frozen at much lower temperatures on a normal basis (a normal lab freezer is set to -20C). Ice formation in the bacterial cells can lead to them "freezing to death", but this is unlikely in your freezer. I suppose if you waited long enough, the tunneling effect woul...	[ "BULLET::::- Freeze-dried ice cream is ice cream that has had most of the water removed from it by a freeze-drying process; sealed in a pouch, it requires no refrigeration. It achieved fame as a popular food in human spaceflight.\n", "Some Turks believe that cold foods, such as ice cream, will cause illnesses – s...
how does an iud work?	Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: How does a IUD work? ](_URL_3_) ^(_18 comments_) 1. [ELI5: How do hormonal IUDs release a reliable, steady stream of hormones for years? And do they taper off or just stop releasing hormones? ](_URL_0_) ^(_3 comments_) 1. [How does a copper IUD work...	[ "IUDs primarily work by preventing fertilization. The progestogen released from hormonal IUDs mainly works by thickening the cervical mucus, preventing sperm from reaching the fallopian tubes. IUDs may also function by preventing ovulation from occurring but this only occurs partially.\n", "An intrauterine device...
When I take medicine that supresses symptoms, do I prolong the sickness?	There are basically three classes of symptoms * caused by the disease "intentionally" to help it survive * caused by your body to manipulate your behavior * caused by your body to promote healing And each symptom is often a mix of the three. There isn't enough research in lots of cases to say surely if a specific s...	[ "Many pharmacological treatments which are effective for nausea and vomiting in some medical conditions may not be effective for motion sickness. For example, metoclopramide and prochlorperazine, although widely used for nausea, are ineffective for motion-sickness prevention and treatment. This is due to the physio...
if what we see and hear has happened in the past does that mean that time outside our sphere of awareness is moving faster?	It's all "going at the same speed", so to speak. The brain just takes a fraction of a second to 'boot up', and so it is starting out on the back foot. A bit like... if you have two identical marathon runners in a race, but one of them is given an 80ms handicap. You wouldn't say that time is now "running slower" for th...	[ "A proposed explanation for this effect is that the visual system is predictive, accounting for neural delays by extrapolating the trajectory of a moving stimulus into the future. In other words, when light from a moving object hits the retina, a certain amount of time is required before the object is perceived. In...
Is there any evidence to suggest that the Coliseum was flooded for sport?	Seutonius passes over it quickly in his Life of Nero: > But he compelled four hundred senators and six hundred Roman knights, some of whom were well to do and of unblemished reputation, to fight in the arena. Even those who fought with the wild beasts and performed the various services in the arena were of the same ...	[ "The Coliseum by this time was hailed as a financial success. Besides football games, the facility hosted bicycle races, the Military and Athletic Carnival of the AAU, Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, horse shows, agricultural exhibitions, and commercial trade shows. But all this would soon come to an end. On Decembe...
Were there ever any battles that involved artillery units targeting each other?	It's a frequent occurrence known as counter-battery fire. It's one of the more basic artillery strategies there is, employed as far back as there's been artillery. I suggest picking up John Norris' Artillery: A History. It's a good introductory primer to the history of big guns.	[ "The firefight included large-scale troop movements and the simulated destruction of major bridges – coal dust and dynamite were used to create explosions. Nine troop formations held three positions each during the tightly scripted invasion sequence; they were directed via telephone (one line per formation) and fla...
why does adobe publish so much software for free?	By publishing so much free software, they can get their name known to pretty much every computer user in the world. That way, when someone needs some software which is not free, Adobe's offering is a natural choice, because you've already heard of them.	[ "Adobe's decision to make the subscription service the only sales route for its creative software was met with strong criticism (see Creative Cloud controversy). Several online articles began offering replacements of Photoshop, Illustrator, and other programs, with free software such as GIMP and Inkscape or competi...
if the europe-central map projection used in most places is inaccurate, why isn't a more accurate created and used instead?	Are you talking about the distortion of certain maps, physically? Or are you talking about the fact that it's centered on Europe, and people think it should be centered elsewhere? In general, though, there is no "accurate" flat map of the earth. The earth is round, and a map is flat. That will cause every map to be in...	[ "Modern national mapping systems typically employ a transverse Mercator or close variant for large-scale maps in order to preserve conformality and low variation in scale over small areas. For smaller-scale maps, such as those spanning continents or the entire world, many projections are in common use according to ...
what is the tech bubble burst that everyone keeps talking about will happen soon?	Tech is part of our daily lives now and it's unlikely that will change any time soon so the demand for tech is comfortably high. But what is happening is the nature of that tech is always changing. Consumers are opting for tablets and smart phones over computers and laptops so the industry has to evolve to meet the ne...	[ "The dot-com bubble (also known as the dot-com boom, the tech bubble, and the Internet bubble) was a historic speculative bubble and period of excessive speculation mainly in the United States that occurred roughly from 1994 to 2000, a period of extreme growth in the use and adoption of the Internet.\n", "The dec...
What was the original motivation, intent, and context of the 14th amendment to the US Constitution, specifically in regards to the public debt?	The primary motivation for the section was unquestionably to confirm that the U.S. would neither assume nor even recognize the validity of Confederate debt. This part of the amendment was not heavily contested, so there is a relative lack of contemporary statements explaining its meaning, but here is Senator Howard g...	[ "At the time that the Constitution came into effect, the United States had a significant debt, primarily associated with the Revolutionary War. There were differences within and between the major political coalitions over the possible liquidation or increase of this debt. As early as 1798, Thomas Jefferson wrote:I ...
why do we pronounce the "w" in words like "swore," but not in "sword?"	Because English is a stupid language. _URL_0_	[ "Many imported words beginning with \"w\" in English have cognates in French that start with a \"g\" or \"gu\". This is because the English word was not borrowed directly from French or Old French, but from some of the northern langue d'oïl dialects such as Picard and Norman, where the original \"w\" sound was pres...
how can you get pregnant when not taking the pill every day at the same time/missing a day or when leaving the hormonal ring out for more than 3 hours? doesn't hormonal bc have a longer-term effect on women's bodies?	As I understand it (and I'm not an expert or anything close), hormonal birth control stops you from ovulating, and the part that it stops doesn't take very long. If it gets messed up, that little part will happen, then when whole process starts and you can be fertile.	[ "Progestogen-only contraceptive pills (sometimes called the 'mini pill') are taken continuously without a 7-day span of using placebo pills, and therefore menstrual periods are less likely to occur than with the combined pill with placebo pills. However, disturbance of the menstrual cycle is common with the mini-pi...
why is it we find walking outside in 90 degree heat unbearable, yet sitting in a 90 degree sauna is so relaxing?	Part of it probably has to do with the sun. The temperature isn't really the unbearable part, the burning from the sun is. In a sauna it is dark and moist. Even so I still hate them.	[ "BULLET::::- Being in cold and humid places such as bathtub, swimming pool, cold tub, and steam sauna is not good for them, while taking intense exercise such as jogging, running, cycling especially under low sun is recommended to them.\n", "Though known to cause a rise in the stress hormones due to hyperthermic ...
How did the US become solely a British Colony when originally there were so many different colonial powers in the area?	Remember that the French controlled Louisiana (a territory that does not match the boundaries of the State of Louisiana) until well after the American Revolution. We bought it during the presidency of Thomas Jefferson. Each area has its own history of turning from non-English controlled areas to either English or A...	[ "Three types of colonies were established in the English overseas possessions in America of the 17th century and continued into the British Empire at the height of its power in the 17th century. These were charter colonies, proprietary colonies, and royal colonies. A group of 13 British American colonies collective...
Why isn't Juneteenth a national holiday in the United States?	Juneteenth does not commemorate the actual emancipation of slaves; that happened in January 1863 for the states in rebellion, and with the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in Dec. 1865. Juneteenth celebrates when news of the Emancipation Proclamation finally reached Texas in June 1865. Initially a celebration...	[ "Commemoration of the American Revolution typifies the patriotic sentiment surrounding the American Revolution and the desire to preserve and honor the \"Spirit of '76\". As the founding story of the United States, it is covered in the schools, memorialized by a national holiday, and commemorated in innumerable mon...
the expulsions of the germans in european countries during and after ww2.	By the time of the World Wars, German speaking populations existed in many places throughout Europe, including Central Europe and along the Baltic Sea. These maps both show Prussia and other German states [before WWI](_URL_4_) and [before WWII](_URL_0_). Note how the territory is larger than modern Germany, and include...	[ "Germans fled, were evacuated, or were expelled as a result of actions of Nazi Germany, the Red Army, civilian militias, and/or the organized efforts of governments of the reconstituted states of Eastern Europe. Between 1944 and 1950, at least 12 million had fled or had been expelled and resettled to post-war Germa...
Why wasn't Augustus one of the "5 good Roman emperors"?	I think the best explanation in this case is the simplest one: the term “5 Good Emperors” refers specifically to the chronological succession of five emperors (Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antonius Pius, and Marcus Aurelius) who were lauded for their expansion of the empire and the relative stability of their reigns. It’s n...	[ "Many consider Augustus to be Rome's greatest emperor; his policies certainly extended the Empire's life span and initiated the celebrated \"Pax Romana\" or \"Pax Augusta\". The Roman Senate wished subsequent emperors to \"be more fortunate than Augustus and better than Trajan\". Augustus was intelligent, decisive,...
How does the fact that heat moves from warmer objects to cooler objects relate to IR emitted from greenhouse gases?	No, that is a entirely unreasonable argument. As an illustration, which do you think would heat up to higher temperatures? An oven with the door open or an oven with the door closed? If you consider the surface of the planet to be the IR source in the oven, and greenhouse gasses to be the oven door, you have a fairl...	[ "When greenhouse gas molecules absorb thermal infrared energy, their temperature rises. Those gases then radiate an increased amount of thermal infrared energy in all directions. Heat radiated upward continues to encounter greenhouse gas molecules; those molecules also absorb the heat, and their temperature rises a...
How did Plato's name become root word for non-sexual friendship? Platonic.	Mainly because of his dialogue the Symposium, which is effectively a prose drama showing several people making speeches about the nature of love/desire. All of the speakers are in agreement that physical desire is the "lowest" kind of love, and as the drama progresses there's a kind of escalation of what "higher" kin...	[ "\"Platonic\" refers to the writings of Plato, an ancient Greek philosopher who wrote on the interesting subject of love. Platonic love and platonic friendships are marked by the absence of physical or sexual desire. Plato did acknowledge physical desire, but thought that if two people truly inspired each other, th...
how do the "double irish" and "double irish w/ dutch sandwich" tax avoidance techniques work?	The EU operates a free trade regime such that a state can't attempt to tax an entity based in another country selling to its citizens. In the US context its very similar to the way US states behave, if I live in NY and buy something from a company in MA then NY doesn't tax the company in MA for profits they make but in...	[ "In 2013, Bloomberg reported that lobbying by PriceWaterhouseCoopers Irish Managing Partner Feargal O'Rourke, who Bloomberg labelled \"grand architect\" of the Double Irish, led to the Irish Government to relax the rules for making Irish royalty payments to non-EU companies (i.e. IRL2), without incurring Irish with...
how do they get water up large skyscrapers	with pumps! the pressure that is supplied by the water main available in most cities is usually only adequate to get water up around 6-8 stories. any building higher than that needs to supplement the water pressure in its system with pumps.	[ "In particular, the problem of bringing and keeping water on the upper floors is an important constraint in the design of skyscrapers. Water is necessary for tenant use, air conditioning, equipment cooling, and basic firefighting through sprinklers (especially important since ground-based firefighting equipment usu...
how did media control symbols become standard (play, pause, fast forward, etc.)? do other parts of the world use different symbols?	_URL_0_ There is actually an international standard for all forms of icons. I'm going off of personal knowledge here, so correct me if I'm wrong, but during the 80s when electronics started to become more widespread globally and production switched from the west to the east, many of the manufacturers understood they w...	[ "In digital electronics, analogue electronics and entertainment, the user interface of media may include media controls or player controls, to enact and change or adjust the process of watching film or listening to audio. These widely known symbols can be found in a multitude of software products, exemplifying what...
what does 'all property is theft' mean?	It is a saying that implies that anything you can own involves the exploitation and/or abuse of someone or something that is not being compensated, and that you can't separate the property itself from it's origins... That you can't, for examply, own a pair of shoes without separating them from the fact that it likely u...	[ "In common usage, theft is the taking of another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it. The word is also used as an informal shorthand term for some crimes against property, such as burglary, embezzlement, larceny, looting, robb...
why has the global temperature spiked so dramatically in the last 10-20 years even though that's the timespan we've become aware of global warming and started trying to combat it?	Guess what happened before 20 years ago? Rampant pollution while being oblivious. "Just exhaust it, planet Earth will pick up the slack and balance out" was the mentality back then.	[ "The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated in its first working group report that “most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations, contribute to climate change.\n", "\"...
How do trees grow in such a way as to not fall over?	I think it has more to do with the roots than with the branches. If trees had to balance their branches in order to stay upright, they would get blown over all the time.	[ "Trees that grow adjacent to lakes or other natural forest edges, or in exposed situations such as hill sides, develop greater rooting strength through growth feedback with wind movement, i.e. 'adaptive' or 'acclimative' growth. If a tree does not experience much wind movement during the stem exclusion phase of sta...
How did the idea of the atom advance beyond a theory? (other questions inside)	Atomic theory came from chemistry, from the realization that there must be little indivisible bits of each element. (Actually atomic theory is often said to go back to antiquity and the Greeks, but that's a bit misleading, because until the 19th century it all amounted to little more than "I bet stuff has bits in.") S...	[ "Atomism is a central part of today's relationship between thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Ancient thinkers such as Leucippus and Democritus, and later the Epicureans, by advancing atomism, laid the foundations for the later atomic theory. Until experimental proof of atoms was later provided in the 20th c...
AskScience AMA Series: We're a group of paleontologists here to answer your paleontology questions! Ask us anything!	In your field, what is the biggest unsolved mystery or unexplained fossil that you want answered?	[ "The Paleontological Research Institution, or PRI, is a paleontological organization in Ithaca, New York with a mission including both research and education. PRI is affiliated with Cornell University, houses one of the largest fossil collections in North America, and publishes, among other things, the oldest journ...
would hiv/aids cancel out leukemia?	Not really, HIV is a virus, AIDS is a deficiency of CD4 white blood cells, and leukemia is a cancer causing elevated abnormal nonfunctioning white blood cells (there are more types than just CD4) That about as ELI5 as I can get, there is alot more science behind it, between the progenitor cell lines and such.	[ "The AIDS crisis was shadowed by constant politicization which magnified the struggles of HIV/AIDS patients, as well as heavily hindered research and the search for treatment and/or a cure. The HIV virus wasn't discovered to be the cause of AIDS until 1984, and the first treatment, AZT, was not approved until 1987....
Why were the Channel Islands not liberated soon after D-day?	There was a plan to liberate them as early as 1943, called Operation Constellation. Drawn up by Lord Louis Mountbatten, based on aerial reconnaissance. The problem was that, as it stood, the Channel Islands weren't actually much of a strategic advantage. Obviously if the Luftwaffe were to establish a bombing base ther...	[ "Not knowing that on 15 June the British Army commanders had decided the Channel Islands were not defensible, the islanders were surprised to see the resident army units quickly depart on ships, with all of their equipment, the islands were being abandoned. The \"Channel Islands had been demilitarised and declared....
how did mining work back in the day? did people just picaxe long tunnels into the rock hoping they’ll find something useful?	Yes and no. Depending on what's being mined. Typically they'd find a vein and surface level evidence. (Think of gold washed down a creek, it comes from a vein somewhere)	[ "The task of excavating the tunnels began on 25 May 1782, carried out entirely by hand. The miners broke up the limestone rock using a variety of methods, including gunpowder blasting, fire-setting (building a fire against the face of the rock to heat it, then quenching it with cold water to cause it to shatter), q...
how does someone go from being christian to jewish and vice-versa?	Judaism discourages conversion (but encourages people once they've been accepted for conversion). So you'd first have to convince a Rabbi that you're serious about wanting to convert. Then you'd have to engage in study so that you know enough about what it means to be and live as a Jew (which will vary depending on d...	[ "List of former Jews, or more accurately, people of Jewish ethnicity and adherents of Judaism who have converted to another (or no) religion. According to certain concepts of Jewish being (cf. who is a Jew?), a Jew who converts to another (or no) religion is still \"a Jew,\" by family and heritage alone, if not als...
Can you recommend any sources (book or journal articles) that summarize issues related to Oral Tradition?	All sources - every bit of evidence about the past - requires source criticism to evaluate what flaws have insinuated themselves into the weave of information presented. The difference between a written primary source and recorded oral testimony that is not first hand can be summed up with the following: Historians co...	[ "Oral Tradition is a peer-reviewed academic journal established in 1986 by John Miles Foley covering studies in oral tradition and related fields. As well as essays treating certifiably oral traditions, the journal presents investigations of the relationships between oral and written traditions, as well as brief ac...
why is feet bone structure much more complex and composed of so many bones, while hands are much more simple?	There are 27 bones in each hand. There are 26 bones in each foot. Can you please explain what you are talking about?	[ "Because of the wide variety in body types, scaling and morphology of the distal limbs of terrestrial vertebrates, there exists a degree of controversy concerning the nature and organization of foot structures. One organizational approach to understanding foot structures makes distinctions regarding their regional ...
what exactly happens to my body when i get the flu.	For most viruses, all the symptoms are your body's attempt to slow the progression of the virus while it searches for an antibody. The virus is taking over cells and reprogramming them to produce more of itself. The only way to actually stop it is to produce the right antibody. I don't really know how that whole syste...	[ "Influenza, commonly known as the flu, is an infectious disease caused by an influenza virus. Symptoms can be mild to severe. The most common symptoms include: high fever, runny nose, sore throat, muscle pains, headache, coughing, sneezing, and feeling tired. These symptoms typically begin two days after exposure t...
The M60 was the only machine gun authorized by the Army to be used on gun trucks in Vietnam. How did officers react when they saw gun trucks armed with M2s and miniguns?	The officers were the ones leading the development of the Vietnam era gun trucks. Company, Battalion, and Group (Brigade equivalent) level transportation officers in Vietnam were heavily involved in these field modifications, and they also were the ones creating the doctrine to allow their units to use these gun trucks...	[ "The M60 later served in the Vietnam War as a squad automatic weapon with many United States units. Every soldier in the rifle squad would carry an additional 200 linked rounds of ammunition for the M60, a spare barrel, or both. The up-gunned M113 armored personnel carrier ACAV added two M60 gunners beside the main...
air conditioning	[This](_URL_0_) is the basic cycle of the refrigeration cycle. There is a lot of thermodynamics but basically it works on the fact that the liquid inside the air conditioner has a low boiling point and can transfer thermal energy well/ as it it pumped through the cycle the liquid experiences phase changes and these ch...	[ "Air conditioning is the cooling and de-humidification of indoor air for thermal comfort. Using a system of coils as a solution to cool and remove moisture from muggy air in a printing plant that was wrinkling magazine pages, Willis Carrier invented and manufactured the world's first mechanical air conditioning uni...
is there such a thing as a material that is completely impermeable? For example, can some molecules get though a plastic baggy?	Small molecules such as water may diffuse through most plastics, so even an airtight container is "porous" on a microscopic level. In any case, unless the bag is perfectly sealed by melting the plastic, chances are that the moisture can diffuse through small leaks at the sealing.	[ "Lightweight plastic bags are also blown into trees and other plants and can be mistaken for food. Plastic bags break down by polymer degradation but not by biodegradation. As a result, any toxic additives they contain—including flame retardants, antimicrobials, and plasticizers—will be released into the environmen...
why is it a mark of quality for a watch to be "swiss-made"? couldn't a swiss company make a crappy watch?	Of course - but like much advertising it trades on beliefs and mystique rather than facts. Switzerland does produce some truly amazing watches, but it doesn't have a monopoly on it. Not sure whether they'd bother to produce really poor quality stuff these days simply because anything they could do badly the Far East ...	[ "The legal standards for the use of \"Swiss made\" on a watch are a very minimum standard, and the Swissness of a watch is largely dependent on the brand and its reputation. The Swiss watch industry has not reached an agreement over the specific definition of Swiss made, as some companies favor stricter regulations...
Is it possible for an astronomical body to have a molten core, without orbiting a star?	Sure. If a planet forms and then gets ejected from its star system, there's no reason it couldn't have a molten core for a while. The Earth's core isn't molten because of the Sun, it's molten because of residual heat from planet formation plus radioactive heating from decay within the crust.	[ "Solid planets up to thousands of Earth masses may be able to form around massive stars (B-type and O-type stars; 5–120 solar masses), where the protoplanetary disk would contain enough heavy elements. Also, these stars have high UV radiation and winds that could photoevaporate the gas in the disk, leaving just the...
if working out is just damaging and repairing muscle tissue, couldnt we just mechanically damage the tissue and recouperate saving time and energy?	Finally something I might have insight on! First off, you can use electric pulses to build and repair damages tissue. I have had terrible knees for years, I started physical therapy at around 17. However, the cartilage damage was so bad in my knee, that I couldn't build the muscle in a healthy way to keep my knee in be...	[ "Skeletal muscle is able to regenerate far better than cardiac muscle due to satellite cells, which are dormant in all healthy skeletal muscle tissue. There are three phases to the regeneration process. These phases include the inflammatory response, the activation, differentiation, and fusion of satellite cells, a...
Chemistry - A few questions about pH buffers.	normally the range is roughly the pKa +/- 1. you can extend the range if you really need to, but i wouldn't recommend it. any more than that and it starts to lose effectiveness. to increase the capacity, use a higher concentration. the way it works is that since the two "versions" of the molecule exist in equilibrium...	[ "Aqueous buffer solutions will react with strong acids or strong bases by absorbing excess hydrogen ions, or hydroxide ions, replacing the strong acids and bases with weak acids and weak bases. This has the effect of damping the effect of pH changes, or reducing the pH change that would otherwise have occurred. But...
When fat is burned via exercise, which is burned first: the most recently stored fat or the oldest fat in the body?	Links, and abstracts to three papers pertinent to the question. Its a bit long, but (I think) very interesting. I have bolded a few key statements for those who would just like to skim _URL_1_ "Fatty acids are the most abundant source of endogenous energy substrate. They can be mobilized from peripheral adipos...	[ "Diet itself helps to increase calorie burning by boosting metabolism, a process further enhanced while gaining more lean muscle. An aerobic exercise program can burn fat and increase the metabolic rate.\n", "The distribution of adipose (fat) tissue changes slowly over months and years. HRT causes the body to acc...
how do composers write music?	It's all a grand formula called music theory. With Hans Zimmer and most other composers the steps go kind of like this: find a theme, build a central melody and build around the melody. Finding a theme is first step of the creative process and a theme can be deliberately sought after by a composer or it can just come t...	[ "Although a musical composition often uses musical notation and has a single author, this is not always the case. A work of music can have multiple composers, which often occurs in popular music when a band collaborates to write a song, or in musical theatre, when one person writes the melodies, a second person wri...
Did Sherman purposely let the Confederate garrison in Savannah escape?	"Sherman, along with Federal forces in Hilton Head, could have prevented Hardee's escape. Sherman was aware that the Confederates were building a pontoon bridge to South Carolina, yet upon his departure for Hilton Head Island on December 19, he left orders for his army not to attack the Savannah works until he had retu...	[ "Sherman's 1864 campaign against Atlanta, Georgia, was initially characterized by a series of flanking maneuvers against Johnston, each of which compelled the Confederate army to withdraw from heavily fortified positions with minimal casualties on either side. After two months and of such maneuvering, Sherman's pat...
Are there more planets or more stars?	Based on what the Kepler space telescope has found, there are almost certainly more planets out there than stars. Before Kepler it was hypothesized that few enough star systems had planets that there might be more stars than planets, but it turns out there are a lot more planets out there than expected. A few planets...	[ "The table below contains information about the coordinates, spectral and physical properties, and number of confirmed planets. The two most important stellar properties are mass and metallicity because they determine how these planetary systems form. Systems with higher mass and metallicity tend to have more plane...
if atoms have a positive nucleus with electrons that orbit it, why don’t they collapse into themselves?	There are many levels of understanding this. In the simplest terms, one can think of the electrons as spinning around the nucleus in circles. In the same way as you feel pressed outwards on a carousel, the electrons don’t want to stay on circles but move outwards. This outwards force is cancelled by the attraction betw...	[ "A classical electron orbiting a nucleus experiences acceleration and should radiate. Consequently, the electron loses energy and the electron should eventually spiral into the nucleus. Atoms, according to classical mechanics, are consequently unstable. This classical prediction is violated by the observation of st...
Does cold have diminishing returns, e.g. does -40 degrees generally really feel that much colder than zero degrees?	I can tell you first hand from living in North Dakota that base temp is not the end all be all of feeling cold. The air from these arctic high pressure systems that have had a strangle-hold on us this whole winter is typically very dry and crisp if that makes sense. It's a lot different than that damp, wet cold yo...	[ "Temperatures rarely rise above 30 °C (86 °F). The average winter low is −10 degrees Celsius (14 °F) and temperatures rarely drop below −20 degrees Celsius (−4 °F) although strong winter winds can make it seem much colder.\n", "Cold is the presence of low temperature, especially in the atmosphere. In common usage...
what makes rent so high in some areas for small apartments, and so low in others for relatively large apartments?	It can be largely based on surrounding areas income but it’s mostly just location. Are you in close proximity to a large employer (like a medical center?), close enough that people wouldn’t have to drive? Then it’s gonna be higher, marketed towards medical employees. It’s based on a lot of factors, but for most apart...	[ "Low-rise apartments sometimes offer more privacy and negotiability of rent and utilities than high-rise apartments, although they may have fewer amenities and less flexibility with leases. It is also easier to put out fires in low-rise buildings.\n", "Price ceilings can create shortages and reduce quality when t...
why do bulbs (that glow white) become green and stays illuminated for a while?	I assume you're talking about fluorescent bulbs. They work by having a gas inside which generates intense ultraviolet light when you pass an electric current through it. The inside of the glass tubes is coated with phosphor, this is a range of chemicals which glow in different colours when they absorb energy, in this...	[ "Incandescent light bulbs have been commonly used in holiday lights until recently. These lights produce a broad-spectrum white light, and are colored by coating the glass envelope with a translucent paint which acts as a color filter. Some early Japanese-made lamps used colored glass.\n", "Film and TV production...
can anyone explain if there is any actual valuable take-away from schrödinger's cat? or just an abstract thought experiment?	Firstly, the 'answer' to the Schrödinger's Cat thought experiment is not agreed upon. We simply don't have a universal answer to what actually happens. If you read the Wikipedia page, you get a short list of what the different interpretations on quantum mechanics say. It's not like actual physicists have one opinion an...	[ "A variant of the Schrödinger's cat experiment, known as the quantum suicide machine, has been proposed by cosmologist Max Tegmark. It examines the Schrödinger's cat experiment from the point of view of the cat, and argues that by using this approach, one may be able to distinguish between the Copenhagen interpreta...
Should the Chinese Emperors' mausoleums be excavated?	That's a very hard question to answer and honestly - I am Not quite sure if I am qualified for it. Especially not for the imperial tombs in china. What I can answer is what happens if things get done too fast, without a clear preservation plan and without a clear idea of what you want to achieve. I am from Vienna an...	[ "The eighteen mausoleums of the Tang Dynasty emperors (唐十八陵) in the valley of the Wei River north of the Qin Mountains(秦岭). Most are natural hills shaped by man, and they are among the biggest Chinese mausoleums, such as Qianling (乾陵), joint tomb of Emperor Gaozong of Tang and of the Empress Wu Zetian. Some mausole...

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.