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I am half-tatar and half-russian. I know a lot about the Russian history but very little about tatars. Can anyone recommend good books on history of Tatar people? More info in description | If you can read Russian, I recommend this book (second on the page, djvu format):
_URL_0_
It is a giant volume, 580 pages overall, and of a very high academic quality. They have chapters dedicated to everything: from language to cuisine, from history to holidays and traditions, and more. The language may be a bit dry... | [
"An ethnic Tatar from a peasant background, Geniatullin served in the cavalry forces of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the pro-Bolshevik Bukharan People's Soviet Republic during the Russian Civil War in Central Asia.\n",
"The largest group by far that the Russians have called \"Tatars\" are ... |
why do companies like duracell, energizer, etc. not make car batteries? | Energizer Holdings does make automotive batteries, through a subsidiary company: [Energizer Automotive Batteries] (_URL_0_). | [
"The remaining market experienced increased competition from private- or no-label versions. The market share of the two leading US manufacturers, Energizer and Duracell, declined to 37% in 2012. Along with Rayovac, these three are trying to move consumers from zinc-carbon to more expensive, long-lasting and safer a... |
the doomsday rule | There was a post about this in this sub literally this morning...
_URL_0_ | [
"Doom or \"the Doom\" was a specific term for the Last Judgement and first cited to c. 1200 by the OED (\"doom\", 6), a sense surviving in this artistic meaning and in phrases such as the \"crack of doom\" and the word \"doomsday\", the latter going back to Old English. The original OED in the late 19th century alr... |
how can tesla's grid battery solution can make sense when it can power 30k homes for only one hour? (south australia) | You’re definitely right, the battery system won’t stop a full blackout. Instead its purpose is to help buffer out periods of very high load until the power stations can respond. | [
"In July 2017, Tesla won a contract to install the world's biggest grid-scale battery in South Australia by promising installation within 100 days. The Hornsdale Power Reserve with total capacity of 100 megawatts was connected to the grid on December 1, 2017.\n",
"In November 2017 Tesla installed a 100 MW, 129 MW... |
why does one's heart rate increase more while running than while cycling at the same perceived effort level? | You use many more muscles while running. Your arms, neck, back, butt, and more leg muscles including calfs. While cycling uses more of the leg muscles than any other muscles | [
"Factors that increase heart rate also trigger an increase in stroke volume. As with skeletal muscles the heart can increase in size and efficiency with exercise. Thus endurance athletes such as marathon runners may have a heart that has hypertrophied by up to 40%. The difference between maximum and minimum cardiac... |
why do you get that weird feeling when you're going down the stairs, and you expect another step but hit the floor? | I'd like to know this too! Also, Lemony Snicket compares that feeling to the shock of someone close to you dying. “It is a curious thing, the death of a loved one. We all know that our time in this world is limited, and that eventually all of us will end up underneath some sheet, never to wake up. And yet it is always ... | [
"One waitress has said that she has heard footsteps, while working alone, in the attic. When she confronted someone, the answer was that no one was ever up there. No one wants to go downstairs for they feel a strange presence. As for Anthony, while upstairs and lying in his Queen Sized Bed, he felt someone on the o... |
In the United States many poorer States tend to be "Red States" while wealthier States tend to "Blue States". Is there any specific reason why this is the case? | The USA is fairly unique among nations in terms of the distribution of its cities across the country - this is more a matter of geopolitics than history, but you could say there are historical roots.
Most economic activity takes place in cities, so cities are wealthy. But, not all cities are made equal.
Many nation ... | [
"Since the 2000 United States presidential election, red states and blue states have referred to states of the United States whose voters predominantly choose either the Republican Party (red) or Democratic Party (blue) presidential Since then, the use of the term has been expanded to differentiate between states b... |
basic politics of hitler and the nazis | If Trump were to change the name of the Republican party to the Socialist Republican party, it would not be a left wing party. Names don't mean what they say. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is not a democracy where parties compete to govern. | [
"Hitler ruled the NSDAP autocratically by asserting the \"Führerprinzip\" (leader principle). The principle relied on absolute obedience of all subordinates to their superiors; thus he viewed the government structure as a pyramid, with himself—the infallible leader—at the apex. Rank in the party was not determined ... |
why do our hands go weak? | This is probably part of the fight-or-flight reflex and includes the feeling of weak knees, butterflies in your stomach and elevated heart rate among others. During this reflex your body dumps a bunch of adrenaline into your bloodstream which amps you up and prepares your body for immediate and drastic action. Since so... | [
"This commonly results from weakness of some of the ulnar nerve innervated intrinsic hand muscles -in particular the palmar interosseous muscle to the little finger- caused by damage to their nerve supply (denervation). There may be different causes for this denervation and muscle imbalance including: \n",
"Initi... |
Why do Higgs bosons mediate mass? Is there a possibility that everything that has mass is made of Higgs bosons at the deepest level? | Some particle interacting with a field that has nonzero vacuum expectation value is equivalent to a “mass term” for that particle. Lots of things interact with the Higgs field, and the Higgs field has nonzero VEV.
It’s not possible that everything is made of Higgs bosons, because the Higgs boson has a pretty high mass... | [
"In the Standard Model of particle physics, the Higgs mechanism is essential to explain the generation mechanism of the property \"mass\" for gauge bosons. Without the Higgs mechanism, all bosons (one of the two classes of particles, the other being fermions) would be considered massless, but measurements show that... |
why are surfboards so expensive? | Life insurance premiums for board makerscare huge. They breathe in tiny fibreglass particles and sniff chemicals all day. Life expectancy is 55 max. Plus, it takes a long time to make one. | [
"Most modern surfboards are made of fiberglass foam (PU), with one or more wooden strips or \"stringers\", fiberglass cloth, and polyester resin (PE). An emerging board material is epoxy resin and Expanded Polystyrene foam (EPS) which is stronger and lighter than traditional PU/PE construction. Even newer designs i... |
why can't two anti-virus protectors work together? | Let's say you hire two security guards to guard your bank - without telling each other. When one of them sees the other enter the bank at night, with a gun, would you be surprised if he just shoots him?
The security guards will be able to work as a team, only if they know each other and work out a way to share their d... | [
"A second category of tactics for fighting viruses involves encouraging the body's immune system to attack them, rather than attacking them directly. Some antivirals of this sort do not focus on a specific pathogen, instead stimulating the immune system to attack a range of pathogens.\n",
"Antivirus software runn... |
Solar power to hydrogen for storage | Any reason you want to do:
* Light - > Electricity - > hydrogen - > electricity - > work
As opposed to just:
* Light - > Electricity - > work
By using a battery? Every additional conversion results in energy loss, and storing large volumes of hydrogen is not exactly easy or safe. (If you compress it, then t... | [
"Solar–hydrogen energy cycle is an energy cycle where a solar powered electrolyzer is used to convert water to hydrogen and oxygen. Hydrogen and oxygen produced thus are stored to be used by a fuel cell to produce electricity when no sunlight is available.\n",
"The Solar–Hydrogen energy cycle can be incorporated ... |
Do top predator animals ever kill for sport or enjoyment? | Yes.
The most amusing (and sort of horrifying) popular example that comes to mind are household cats, which kill huge numbers of birds... and don't eat them. In a few isolated cases a few cats have quite literally wiped out entire species of birds on islands.
That being said, don't assume an animal does something for... | [
"In social predation, a group of predators cooperates to kill prey. This makes it possible to kill creatures larger than those they could overpower singly; for example, hyenas, and wolves collaborate to catch and kill herbivores as large as buffalo, and lions even hunt elephants. It can also make prey more readily ... |
What is being depicted on this ancient Greek wine cup (kylix)? | It's an "eye cup" with a satyr - a mythological creature that's part man and part horse - pursuing a maenad - a female follower of Dionysus. He's easily identifiable by the ears and tail, the female is less clear, but these kind of scenes are pretty popular (so she's identifiable by the similarities in iconography) and... | [
"In the pottery of ancient Greece, a kylix ( , ; ; also spelled cylix; pl.: kylikes , ) is the most common type of wine-drinking cup. It has a broad, relatively shallow, body raised on a stem from a foot and usually two horizontal handles disposed symmetrically. The main alternative wine-cup shape was the \"kanthar... |
Can we safely expect the ability to regrow cellular structures such as limbs in our lifetime? | In 2005 gene therapy on mice allowed them to regrow damaged tissue, heart muscle, and limbs.
- _URL_1_
And there are continually news articles about ideas at replicating this sort of function in humans.
- _URL_0_
So, yes, in the next 50 years it is _possible_. | [
"If the processes involved in forming new tissue can be reverse-engineered into humans, it may be possible to heal injuries of the spinal cord or brain, repair damaged organs and reduce scarring and fibrosis after surgery. Despite the large conservation of the Hox genes through evolution, mammals and humans specifi... |
Can anybody help me find information on my grandfather? He was a US Army Ranger (1st BN, C Company) during WWII. He was a POW at Stalag 2B and he may have given the last radio address of the 1st Ranger BN at the battle of Cisterna di Latina before being captured. | One of the things that the Federal Government does fairly well is collect and keep (mostly) accurate records. Have you considered filing a [FOIA Request](_URL_0_)? I highly recommend using this resource to ascertain more information.
On a personal note, I have enormous respect for your grandfather's service and the li... | [
"In May 1941, Davis reported first to Fort Snelling, Minnesota, before being sent to Camp Joseph T. Robinson, Arkansas, where he became commander of Company C, 1st Battalion, 134th Infantry, 35th Infantry Division. He saw extensive combat duty in the European Theater, and received the Silver Star Medal, the Bronze ... |
If you can use an antenna to produce electromagnetic waves and visible light is electromagnetic radiation, why you can't tune an antenna to produce waves in that length and make light this way? | Theoretically, you can. Practically, there are some limitations. I'm assuming by Light, you mean *Visible Light.*
& #x200B;
A user has excellently explained the limitation in one of the answers in [this link](_URL_2_). I suggest you follow it to know more.
Another article [here](_URL_1_) explains the scenario in mu... | [
"Another drawback is that when the circuit is adjusted to oscillate it can radiate a signal from its antenna, so it can cause interference to other nearby receivers. Adding an RF amplifier stage between the antenna and the regenerative detector can reduce unwanted radiation, but would add expense and complexity.\n"... |
[Physics] How are electrons in an atom distributed? | Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of the quantum.
[The following is adapted from a previous answer I gave about protons and neutrons]. There is no right way of visualising electrons and other quantum particles, as they are *impossible* for us to visualise accurately, because they do not actually have a perfectl... | [
"Working independently, Thomas and Fermi used this statistical model in 1927 to approximate the distribution of electrons in an atom. Although electrons are distributed nonuniformly in an atom, an approximation was made that the electrons are distributed uniformly in each small volume element \"ΔV\" (i.e. locally) ... |
Why was Saddam Hussein left in charge of Iraq after the Persian Gulf War? | The UN resolutions that created the coalition that went to war, specifically authorized liberating Kuwait and enforcing previous resolutions. It did *not* authorize a full invasion, regime change, and occupation of Iraq. If US forces had continued the invasion with the intention of freeing Iraq from the Hussein regime ... | [
"Saddam Hussein had also poured massive resources into regime protection agencies, like the Republican Guard (Iraq), that later took on a battlefield role. Losses during the Persian Gulf War from the United States-led coalition resulted in the reduction of Iraq's ground forces to 23 divisions and the air force to l... |
if i have a great marketing pitch for a company i have no contracts with, how can i secure the idea so they cant just steal it after i have pitched it? | Did you just watch Silicon Valley? If not, watch Silicon Valley. | [
"In Commercial Pitch the players in turn get a chance to bid 1–4 points for the privilege of pitching, or pass. Each bid must be higher than the previous one. Eldest hand immediately scores the amount of the bid. A highest bidder who does not win at least as many points as bid is \"set back\" the amount of the bid.... |
why don't we see movie theaters compete? | People don't go to the movies to go to the theaters. They go to see the movies so whenever a movie is out and has different showtimes or different locations people tend to just go to the specific theater they are used to or prefer and won't likely win over customers of other theaters. Plus the advertising is for such... | [
"Neighborhood theatres were mostly discount theaters and typically showed films after their first run at cheaper prices, often double features. However, because of their size, they would usually show reduction prints of films shot in such larger-sized formats such as Todd-AO, Super Panavision 70, or Ultra Panavisio... |
We're there any cases of vigilante justice against members of the klan in the south during their peak? | During the period of Radical Reconstruction, the Ku Klux Klan emerged as a terrorist organization that sought to revert time and restore racial and labor relations to their ante bellum status. Unleashing a campaign of terror that has no equal in American history, the Klan used violence to repress Black political partic... | [
"The toll of Klan murders and attacks led Congress to pass laws to end the violence. In 1870, the strongly Republican Congress passed the Enforcement Acts, imposing penalties for conspiracy to deny black suffrage. The Acts empowered the President to deploy the armed forces to suppress organizations that deprived pe... |
is there any difference for your body if you drink a glass of alcohol in 10 seconds or 10 minutes? | Not really, except it depends on what you do for the next 9 minutes and 50 seconds. If you have some more 10 second drinks, then I think you can see the problem. | [
"Moderate alcohol consumption 30–60 minutes before bedtime results in disruptions in sleep maintenance and sleep architecture that are mediated by blood alcohol levels. Disruptions in sleep maintenance are most marked once alcohol has been completely metabolized from the body. Under conditions of moderate alcohol c... |
When America was founded, did the word "republic" have a democratic connotation? | Well, this looks like a continuation of the thread from the other day about the meaning of "lives, liberties, and estates" in Locke.
That is an exceptionally difficult question, first because your wording of it is mixing two streams of thought in an awkward way, and second because it's brushing up against a massive hi... | [
"The early 16th-century works of Machiavelli (especially \"The Prince\") played a central role in popularizing the use of the word \"state\" in something similar to its modern sense. The contrasting of church and state still dates to the 16th century. The North American colonies were called \"states\" as early as t... |
if the congress' decision on the iranian nuclear deal doesn't matter on the long run, then why is it hyped up so much? | Because they can make a lot of noise and sway public opinion against the deal. Also, if Congress shoots the deal down and the President goes ahead anyway, the President's veto has to overcome a veto override. This is likely, but if it doesn't then the U.S. doesn't participate. Lastly, if the President's veto survives, ... | [
"In July 2015, after the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was unveiled, an international agreement on the nuclear program of Iran, Leahy issued a statement saying it was preferable to war and calling it \"unfortunate\" that some members of Congress opposed the deal as the lack of deal would allow Iran to further ... |
why does amazing art, in whatever form, have such ability to inspire, motivate and evoke such strong emotion? | Hi. Art grad here. Let's begin.
First off, art is subjective. Now there are things such as the Frozen movie that is loved by most, and that is because the general population of the targeted audience enjoys similar qualities in things. What I'm saying here is that not all art will have the same effects on everyone.
Ab... | [
"Great art is a multi-faceted phenomenon, which is not content to be merely propaganda or entertainment; but by appealing to people's higher intellectual and emotional faculties, it is designed to communicate truth. When entertainment and propaganda are transcended by, and subordinated to the communication of truth... |
When doing the double-slit experiment while measuring the actual photons, how do they measure which slit the light quanta went through? | In the descriptions I've seen, you produce pairs of entangled photons, such that when you measure the polarization of one photon, you know the polarization of the other. Specifically, if one has polarization along the x-axis, the other will have polarization along the y-axis, and vice-versa. Then, you send one photon t... | [
"In astronomy, long-slit spectroscopy involves observing a celestial object using a spectrograph in which the entrance aperture is an elongated, narrow slit. Light entering the slit is then refracted using a prism, diffraction grating, or grism. The dispersed light is typically recorded on a charge-coupled device d... |
smiling in pictures for different cultures | Probably i'm wrong, but i think it happen because in different cultures showing teeth is an offensive act. I remember a tribe where people cover the mouth with hand while smiling. | [
"Among humans, smiling is an expression denoting pleasure, sociability, happiness, joy or amusement. It is distinct from a similar but usually involuntary expression of anxiety known as a grimace. Although cross-cultural studies have shown that smiling is a means of communication throughout the world, there are lar... |
Would you be able to jump higher on the side of the moon that faces earth than on the dark side? | There was a good thread with a very similar question just a few days ago, and with a great answer.
_URL_0_
Basically, no. You'd be able to jump slightly higher on the side facing the earth than on the poles and the sides. However you'd get the same effect on the side opposite the earth.
Also, as others have noted th... | [
"Charlie can perform a rolling jump in order to make his way around the caverns and can jump quite high, doubtless thanks to the moon's low gravity. However, falling from great heights is still dangerous and will cause him to lose a life.\n",
"For stricken climbers above some experienced climbers have said that i... |
why can't our bodies prevent tooth decay without the help of toothpaste? |
We eat WAY more sugar than our teeth really evolved to handle. If you look at ancient skeletons (from before agriculture) you find a lot of people with really nice looking teeth. So, with modern living comes modern problems that need modern solutions to fight them.
| [
"Other public-health strategies to control tooth decay, such as education to change behavior and diet, have lacked impressive results. Although fluoride is the only well-documented agent which controls the rate at which cavities develop, it has been suggested that adding calcium to the water would reduce cavities f... |
why is it that people leave all stickers/labels from purchase on baseball hats/caps? | To show that your things are authentic and you have the money to spend on things like that. | [
"Baseball caps are made of many types of material and shaped in various styles for different purposes. Major and minor league baseball players wear classic-style caps made of wool (or, more recently, polyester) with their team's simple logo and colors; the logo is usually embroidered into the fabric. More recently ... |
i understand how median and mean are calculated, but how should i be interpreting them differently to get the most meaning out of them? | Average as you might know is the sum of all the values in a data set divided by the number of values. This is also called arithmetic mean or to keep it simple "mean". Let's consider the mark of 6 different students in Physics out of 50. Let them be 10,12,12,12,13,25. Now according to the definition above the mean of th... | [
"The median is a popular summary statistic used in descriptive statistics, since it is simple to understand and easy to calculate, while also giving a measure that is more robust in the presence of outlier values than is the mean. The widely cited empirical relationship between the relative locations of the mean an... |
Are there any chemical differences between buttered toast and grilled bread? | They involve the same ingredients, but it's the order that matters. If you toast bread, you are drying the bread as much as you are cooking it; as the moisture content drops the Maillard browning reaction slows, and you begin to see more carbonization than true browning.
When you butter the bread before applying heat,... | [
"Toasted bread slices may contain Benzo[\"a\"]pyrene and high levels of acrylamide, a carcinogen generated during the browning process. High acrylamide levels can also be found in other heated carbohydrate-rich foods. The darker the surface colour of the toast, the higher its concentration of acrylamide. That is wh... |
How do boiler explosions work? | > Thermal shock occurs when a thermal gradient causes different parts of an object to expand by different amounts. This differential expansion can be understood in terms of stress or of strain, equivalently. At some point, this stress can exceed the strength of the material, causing a crack to form. If nothing stops t... | [
"A boiler explosion is a catastrophic failure of a boiler. As seen today, boiler explosions are of two kinds. One kind is a failure of the pressure parts of the steam and water sides. There can be many different causes, such as failure of the safety valve, corrosion of critical parts of the boiler, or low water lev... |
why is australia so dominant at the commonwealth games against other countries with much higher populations? | Wealth/climate/space/culture is a potent mix. I've three teenage Aussie nephews and they and their friends all engage in sport at a level you very rarely see in the UK outside of fee-paying schools.
This time round Australia also has home advantage which plays a big part, particularly with the integration of para eve... | [
"Australians take the Commonwealth Games seriously because, on one level of national thinking, the event offers the country an opportunity to prove they are superior to the \"original country\", the United Kingdom. By the 1938 British Empire Games, Australia's combined medal total was already greater than that of t... |
Why is the shape of CMB images always a big oval? | The image we are all familiar with does indeed represent a sphere. It is a projection of the celestial sphere onto a 2d ellipse. This is done in the same way that the globe is put on to a map. Specifically, the [Mollweide projection](_URL_0_) is usually used to present the night sky. | [
"In the case of V838 Monocerotis, the light echo produced was unprecedented and is well documented in images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. While the photos appear to depict an expanding spherical shell of debris, they are actually formed by the illumination of an ever-expanding ellipsoid with the progenitor ... |
why do we sometimes have extremely dark, sinister subconscious thoughts about the ones we love the most? | those are called 'intrusive thoughts' and are usually linked with anxiety/stress/ocd. i can't provide anymore detail than that but if you're having an uncomfortable amount of them (im pretty sure everyone gets SOME form of intrusive thoughts at least some of the time) you can try to start meditating regularly. | [
"Ramon Bautista's inspiration was the people who become crazy because of love. He said that people who become crazy because of love will have a special someone because they will not worry about love after their break-ups.\n",
"I wanted the idea to feel like it was two different versions of being in this fantasy. ... |
The carriers of the Japanese task force which attacked Pearl Harbor were not equipped with radar. Why were these carriers not equipped with radar? | Japan was behind the UK, US and Germany in developing radio location; pre-war proposals met with little interest, only after a military mission to Germany in early 1941 did the Japanese take a keener interest in radar. The mission saw some British radar equipment left behind at Dunkirk, had some limited opportunities t... | [
"BULLET::::- Admiral Nagumo's Pearl Harbor Attack Force sailed under radio silence, with its radios physically locked down. It is unclear if this deceived the U.S.; Pacific Fleet intelligence was unable to locate the Japanese carriers in the days immediately preceding the attack on Pearl Harbor .\n",
"American ra... |
why does anime have such a dedicated and/or snowed in audience? | Stop motion can be anything really. Whereas anime is Japanese animation (though China and Korean animation is getting popular, also many Japanese animation and even American animation uses Korean-based animation studios due to cheap labor costs) and almost all modern shows have good looking animation.
But mainly, ... | [
"As anime has grown in its variety of viewers, genres, and themes, the industry has become more prevalent in society. Many producers will at some point create an anime that's inspired by Japanese lifestyle and reflect the culture. In modern Japan, anime has become so popular that memorable characters have frequentl... |
What are some popular/contentious cases of history in which the ownership of artefacts have been called into question? | There's the case involving St. Columba, who borrowed a manuscript and surreptitiously copied it. The lender of the original disputed ownership of the copy. At the time it wasn't an artifact, so it's more an early example of copyright law.
> Written in Latin. The Cathach is the oldest extant Irish manuscript of the P... | [
"The 1884 Law established national ownership over all artifacts in the Ottoman Empire and sought to regulate scientific access to antiquities and sites. Under this law, all artifacts discovered during excavation were the property of the National Museum in Constantinople and were sent there.While the law can be seen... |
what's happening in my brain when i listen to a song and can't make out the lyrics, then i listen to it while reading the lyrics and they're very easy to make out? | If you have Netflix, I recommend the show Brain Games. The first episode, "Watch This", has a segment that explains exactly what you're asking about.
If I had to put it in a nutshell in my own words, I think it has a lot to do with expectation bias. | [
"Many aspects of language and musical melodies are processed by the same brain areas. In 2006, Brown, Martinez and Parsons found that listening to a melody or a sentence resulted in activation of many of the same areas including the primary motor cortex, the supplementary motor area, the Brocas area, anterior insul... |
Why did no Japanese shoguns (or other de facto rulers) ever formally usurp the emperor? | You could dive into the complex relationship between Shogun and Emperor and analyse the critical differences between the two offices, such as the role of the Emperor being largely ceremonial and religious (not to be discounted however - this role held huge cultural significance) or the Shogun being essentially the supr... | [
"During this period, although the Emperor of Japan was officially the ruler of his nation and every lord swore loyalty to him, he was largely a marginalized, ceremonial, and religious figure who delegated power to the \"shōgun\", a noble who was roughly equivalent to a general. In the years preceding this era the S... |
why college football and basketball seem huge but college baseball seems to be small scale. | Baseball has the [professional minor league system](_URL_0_). Most minor league teams (Albuquerque Isotopes, Toledo Mud Hens, Tacoma Raniers) have loyal local fans. Plus, just about every minor league baseball team has a contract with a major league baseball team to act a development farm team to provide or develop fut... | [
"Traditionally, college baseball has been played in the early part of the year, with a relatively short schedule and during a time when cold (and/or rainy) weather hinders the ability for games to be played, particularly in the northern and midwestern parts of the U.S. These and other factors have historically led ... |
Every day for the past week has brought record setting high temperatures here in the Midwest. What disruptions to the environment could this potentially cause? | If we (I live in the upper midwest too), have another hard frost this season, it will mostly certainly affect the plants that are budding and blooming much earlier than normal. But there are various caveats and variations.
Let's say it snows. Corn shoots would be done. The snow would be enough to kill the shoots. ... | [
"For the Midwest became more related to the extreme high humidity, above normal rainfall from thunderstorms across much of Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska and Illinois in the previous month leading up to the heat wave caused dew points to soar; in Newton, Iowa, where temperatures had been in the mid-90s F, the dew point ... |
Answer of the Week #1 - Winners | Cool - thanks for the nomination. I hope you'll be sending messages to the winners to let them know of this thread. Communicating science is a really important part of educating the lay-public, and I'd hate for those people who get this recognition (even as simple as this is) to miss it. | [
"In this section, the guest host tried to win up to five prizes for a member of the audience, five different styles of questions were answered, with the first four often being things such as answering a question set by Stephen Hawking, guessing who Alan is imitating and naming a certain number of things in a time l... |
why is 'sgt. pepper's lonely hearts club band' considered one of the greatest and most influential albums of all time? | Paul McCartney and Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys were acquaintances and pen pals, and were in extreme rivalry with each other. As far as poppy boy bands went, they were both vying for the top spot, but then their musical interests became the point of the competition. Revolver was new and different, leading to Pet Soun... | [
"Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by the English rock band the Beatles. Released on 26 May 1967 in the United Kingdom and 2 June 1967 in the United States, it spent 27 weeks at number one on the UK Albums Chart and 15 weeks at number one in the US. It was lauded by critics for its in... |
Are halogen ions (Cl-, I-) toxic to microbes or is it just the elemental forms (Cl2, I2) ? | Chloride isn't. In fact, the most common growth medium, LB, contains 10g NaCl per litre. Iodide isn't tolerated as well and exhibits some toxicity. The antibacterial iodine preparations used have a way higher concentration of iodide and elementary iodine than iodized salt, though. | [
"These ions are usually only short-lived reaction intermediates; they are very reactive, owing to high ring strain in the three-membered ring and the positive charge on the halogen; this positive charge makes them great electrophiles. In almost all cases, the halonium ion is attacked by a nucleophile within a very ... |
why do most mmo's have reset on a tuesday? | Balance of staff availability and user traffic. Regular tech staff only work Mon-Fri. With network support center running nights and weekends.
You never change anything on Friday, thats just rule #1.
You need Monday to catch up on everything from the weekend.
So that just leaves Tuesday Wednesday and Thursday... | [
"The reference rate and the frequency at which the rate is reset are contractually set. The rate used is often some form of LIBOR, but it can take different forms, such as tying it to the consumer price index, a housing price index, or an unemployment rate. The rate can be allowed to reset on an immediate, daily, o... |
If the air was liquid, would we be able to breathe it? (ignoring temperature) | Our diaphragms aren't strong enough to move that much liquid. | [
"Liquid air is air that has been cooled to very low temperatures (cryogenic temperatures), so that it has condensed into a pale blue mobile liquid. To thermally insulate it from room temperature, it is stored in specialized containers (Vacuum insulated flasks are often used). Liquid air can absorb heat rapidly and ... |
action potential and axons | The axon is the sender of information from one soma (or cell body) to another.
Action potential is the electrical impulse that allows nerves to communicate with one another. They stimulate the neuron to release its neurotransmitters so that the neuron can pass on the information. This is triggered by a stimulus.
The ... | [
"Most axons carry signals in the form of action potentials, which are discrete electrochemical impulses that travel rapidly along an axon, starting at the cell body and terminating at points where the axon makes synaptic contact with target cells. The defining characteristic of an action potential is that it is \"a... |
What is the name of the company that produced the first condoms? | Hmm.... don't know if my answer is correct since they're not not technically the *first* rubber condom maker... but they are the first latex condom maker.
"In 1957, the very first lubricated condom was launched in the UK by Durex."
Source: _URL_1_
"The name, which the London Rubber Company trademarked in 1929, is an... | [
"In 1882, German immigrant Julius Schmidt founded one of the largest and longest-lasting condom businesses, Julius Schmid, Inc., based in New York City. The condom lines manufactured by Schmid included Sheiks and Ramses. In 1932, the London Rubber Company (which had previously been a wholesale business importing Ge... |
Why is spent nuclear fuel much more radioactive than unused one? [PHYSICS] | [Take a look at this "chart of the nuclides"](_URL_1_), which is what nuclear physicists hang on their walls instead of periodic tables. Each square is one known isotope of one element (a "nuclide"). The vertical axis is the number of protons, so each row corresponds to an element with all its isotopes. The horizont... | [
"High-level waste is full of highly radioactive fission products, most of which are relatively short-lived. This is a concern since if the waste is stored, perhaps in deep geological storage, over many years the fission products decay, decreasing the radioactivity of the waste and making the plutonium easier to acc... |
political ads: why do they all name the treasurer at the end of the ad? | It shows who paid for that ad. It's important to know that so that you can be aware of the connotations of the message. It also means that there's no deniability for negative ads and such. | [
"The Advertising Council, commonly known as the Ad Council, is an American nonprofit organization that produces, distributes, and promotes public service announcements on behalf of various sponsors, including nonprofit organizations, non-governmental organizations and agencies of the United States government.\n",
... |
How were the Dutch able to colonize so much considering the size of their country? | The same could be asked of Portugal, Britain, and other "small" powers. The importance was in controlling key areas of commercial activity with pinpoint overwhelming force, and building networks of clientage and authority that formed a sort of pyramid of control. Some of the things you mention, like Australia ("New H... | [
"From 1630 to 1654, the Dutch set up more permanently in the \"Nordeste\" and controlled a long stretch of the coast most accessible to Europe, without, however, penetrating the interior. But the colonists of the Dutch West India Company in Brazil were in a constant state of siege, in spite of the presence in Recif... |
In the news cycle in the U.S, every election we hear of some sort of news of votes changing or not being counted. How did Americans, since the the first election cycles, know that their vote was actually being counted? Were there any times where foul play was apparent when it came to the results? | 1/2
Every election is a little bit different, and they all change over time, but in the middle nineteenth century the process was basically that you had three guys at the polling place. Their job was to make sure only legal voters voted, which they did by either knowing the voters or getting them to declare they were ... | [
"This provides a summary of the results of elections to the United States House of Representatives from the first election held variably in 1788 or 1789 (different states held elections at different times) to 1822. This time period corresponds to the First Party System of the United States. For more detailed result... |
strikes and picket lines | Strikes like the current one for Verizon are a long time coming, so they striking unions and their workers prepare. Unions have rainy day funds for supporting workers on strike, that's sort of like their version of unemployment... members pay into the fund, and when they have to go on strike the money is there to offer... | [
"Picketing is a common tactic used by trade unions during strikes, who will try to prevent dissident members of the union, members of other unions and non-unionised workers from working. Those who cross the picket line and work despite the strike are known pejoratively as scabs.\n",
"Picketing is often used by wo... |
Is there a common explanation why people who took LSD describe similar visual experiences e.g. colorful, fractal, vibrating strings/stripes ? | LSD affects a specific neurotransmitter receptor in the brain called [5HT2a](_URL_2_). Activation of this receptor leads to many changes in activity across the brain. A recent [study](_URL_3_) looked at how taking LSD affects the part of the brain that processes [visual information](_URL_1_) using a technique called [f... | [
"The cited resemblance of the imagery to LSD- and psilocybin-induced hallucinations is suggestive of a functional resemblance between artificial neural networks and particular layers of the visual cortex.\n",
"Mescaline induces a psychedelic state similar to those produced by LSD and psilocybin, but with unique c... |
is there a common eyeglass prescription? | As people get older they require reading glasses, these normally have the prescription +0.5, +1, +1.5 or +2, So these would be the most common glasses, some places that require reading of legal documents often have a few in stock if customers forget them.
If you want to disregard the age related glasses, then the most... | [
"An eyeglass prescription is an order written by an eyewear prescriber, such as an optometrist or ophthalmologist, that specifies the value of all parameters the prescriber has deemed necessary to construct and/or dispense corrective lenses appropriate for a patient. If an examination indicates that corrective lens... |
why are the united states and european countries considered "the west" while russia and asia are considered "the east?" why is the map drawn the way it is? | It has to do with medieval Europe. Everything East of them was the East (also called Orient). The terms came into use before travel was possible across the large oceans by Europeans.
The reason that the Americas are the West is that we are descended from Europeans. Europe colonized the Americas and left their culture... | [
"In sociology, the East–West dichotomy is the perceived difference between the Eastern and Western worlds. Cultural rather than geographical in division, the boundaries of East and West are not fixed, but vary according to the criteria adopted by individuals using the term. Historically, Asia (excluding Siberia) wa... |
would you loose more gas going constantly fast versus constantly slow and why? | There's a sweet spot for each vehicle where it gets the most fuel economy. It depends on the engine, body shape and other factors unique to the car. | [
"Lowering speed reduces fuel consumption because the drag imparted by a fluid increases quadratically with increase in speed. Thus traveling twice as fast requires four times as much energy (and therefore fuel) for a given distance, which is why driving an automobile at requires less than 85% of the power required ... |
why do domesticated animals appear to be more loving towards humans than they are with other animals? | Because the definition of domestication means that another species is being manipulated by us for our own benefit. We are basically "making" them do what we like so that we can benefit from it. Which is domestication. Whether it's for food or for companionship etc. And it's not always the case that they are always ... | [
"Animals often portray many similar characteristics displayed by humans. There looms large belief that while both humans and animals evolve simultaneously, domesticated animals have benefitted the most from human-animal relationships because they have increased in population much further than they ever would have i... |
Would music sound different with a different air density? | A big factor that is not mentioned is temperature, at room temp the speed of sound travels at 343 m/s and when there is major temperature change that speed changes | [
"By far the most important factor influencing the speed of sound in air is temperature. The speed is proportional to the square root of the absolute temperature, giving an increase of about per degree Celsius. For this reason, the pitch of a musical wind instrument increases as its temperature increases.\n",
"Som... |
why do heat and cold kill things? | Imagine you had a small office, with some guy and a couple of assistants, all managing a bunch of paperwork. Usually, they're all very organized and manage to get all of the filing done more-or-less exactly right. One day, you pump them all full of tons of caffeine, and in the excitement and rush, they misfile everythi... | [
"Treating an object with heat is a method used to disinfect objects by either an oven or a commercial kiln. When the internal temperature reaches “130°F for three hours it will kill any insect”; however, this kind of heat can damage veneer, damage finish of specimens, warp lumber, or melt glues.\n",
"Cold has num... |
graph theory. what exactly is it and what are some of its applications? | Graph theory's essentially the mathematical study of connections between things. It's not necessarily about x-y graphs or curves that you'd normally imagine but more about points with lines connecting some of them like on a detective or conspiracy theorist's pin-board with bits of string connecting things. But obviousl... | [
"Graph theory is at its most powerful in network synthesis when the elements of the network can be represented by real numbers (one-element-kind networks such as resistive networks) or binary states (such as switching networks).\n",
"Graph theory, the study of graphs and networks, is often considered part of comb... |
how do we destroy nuclear weapons safely? | You disassemble them.
Nuclear weapons aren't like regular explosives; they aren't a set of compounds that are basically on a (comparably) constant hair-trigger. Instead, the actual process of starting a nuclear reaction is rather involved, and if one step in the process fails, the bomb doesn't really detonate.
This i... | [
"BULLET::::- \"\"We have to understand that nuclear weapons are not a play thing to be bandied publicly. They have to be treated with respect and responsibility. While they can destroy the enemy, they can also invite self destruction.\"\"\n",
"Other nuclear warfare doctrines explicitly exclude decapitation strike... |
Why don't two beams of light collide? | If you imagine it kind of like water waves you generally get the right answer. If you and a friend are at opposite end of a pool and you both make a splash at the same time the two waves will travel towards each other. Then in the middle when they hit there's some complicated pattern of ripples. But then each wave pass... | [
"When two waves collide, the process by which they affect each other is called interference. They can either strengthen each other by \"constructive interference\", or weaken each other by \"destructive interference\". This is true whether the wave is in water, or a single photon in a superposition. So even though ... |
Did people that lived in the North Eastern part of modern Russia not know that the N. American continent existed? | [This older answer](_URL_0_) may be of some interest to you. | [
"As early as 1641, Russian explorers came into contact with the Chukchi. The Russians showed little interest in the region until the late 17th century, when the potential wealth gained from reaching North America became known. However, expeditions to the Bering Strait were often attacked by the indigenous peoples i... |
Were there different types of storms or whether phenomena that were possible in the past that cant occur today because of the placements of the continents, planetary temperature and such? | Yes. There have been many periods in Earth's history where different weather happened. Different types of storms didn't really happen, but the amount and scale of weather events has been very extreme at some points in history.
Obviously the ice ages had much different weather for most of the planet with mile thick ice... | [
"Storms do not only occur on Earth; other planetary bodies with a sufficient atmosphere (gas giants in particular) also undergo stormy weather. The Great Red Spot on Jupiter provides a well-known example. Though technically an anticyclone, with greater than hurricane wind speeds, it is larger than the Earth and has... |
why does letting your phone die permanently affect the life of the battery? | Just to make a clarification, the act of letting your phone die in itself does not affect the battery. If the device's battery management hardware is engineered properly, which most are, you can use your phone until it dies without worry.
The problem arises when you let it die, and then never charge it for an extended... | [
"By the end of 2017, smartphone battery life has become generally adequate; however, earlier smartphone battery life was poor due to the weak batteries that could not handle the significant power requirements of the smartphones' computer systems and color screens.\n",
"Users have complained that the battery life ... |
how do bats know which click is theirs when using echo-location? | Bats change their echo so they know its theirs.
For example some will change the pitch of their echo.
Imagine you are in room of a lot of people and you are trying to talk to someone across the room. You don't get confused as to which voice is taking to you because you focus on the uniqueness of their voice. | [
"Bats navigate around objects and locate their prey using echolocation. A bat will produce a very loud, short sound and assess the echo when it bounces back. Bats hunt flying insects; these insects return a faint echo of the bat's call. The type of insect, how big it is and distance can be determined by the quality... |
What were the social issues in the 1920s? How was the culture and economics? | I do not view myself qualified to answer this, but I would suggest you specify the region you're talking about?
I am sure the social issues of 1920's USA were different from those in Germany or the UK | [
"The feeling that the early 20th century was an era of economic growth due to technological advances contrasted dramatically with the standard of living of lower social classes. The growth of the previous decades led to an unprecedented population explosion starting in 1929. The Great Depression caused the collapse... |
How did the Megalodons go extinct, and if evolution made them into sharks why are they so small? | Id imagine firstly, that their sizeand probable preferred diet involved eating unsustainable amounts of already large prey. Secondly, I would also imagine that the mass extinction of many other species reduced the amount of prey further and further.
When you look at something like a great white, theres no need for it ... | [
"A megalodon (prehistoric shark) is accidentally unleashed after an oil rig in the middle of a small island on a lake drills too far into the lake floor. The resulting malfunction also creates an explosion. The shark eats two girls before attacking a group of art thieves in a boat which consists of Barb, Rich, Doug... |
The Soviets were known to pioneer transplant surgeries through Demikhov's work with dog heads. What other bizarre medical experiments were conducted by the Soviets? | Yes, professor Ilya Ivanov in mid 1920s tried to create a human-ape hybrids using artificial insemination.
See: *A. Etkind, Beyond eugenics: the forgotten scandal of hybridizing humans and apes, Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological & Biomedical Sciences, 2008, v. 39. Special Issue: Eugenics, Sex, and the ... | [
"Vladimir Petrovich Demikhov (; July 18, 1916 – November 22, 1998) was a Soviet scientist and organ transplantation pioneer, who performed several transplants in the 1940s and 1950s, including the transplantation of a heart into an animal and a heart–lung replacement in an animal. He is also well known for his dog ... |
what does it mean when the house of representatives votes to "condemn" something? | It means just that. They agree, as a body to condemn something. They formally disagree with it. The main reason this happened is because the Democrats wanted a permanent record of who supported condemning the words of the President and who didn't. | [
"The court found that \"oppose\" is not defined by the statute, so a normal definition of it may be used, per \"Perrin v. United States\". \"Thus, a person can 'oppose' by responding to someone else’s questions just as surely as by provoking the discussion,\" further \"we would call it 'opposition' if an employee t... |
why is ceramic used for superconductors? | Superconductors are a specific combination or elements, elements that do not normally mix to create alloys. 'Ceramics' is just what we call that sort of combinations of elements. | [
"Many superconducting ceramic materials (the high temperature superconductors) have perovskite-like structures, often with 3 or more metals including copper, and some oxygen positions left vacant. One prime example is yttrium barium copper oxide which can be insulating or superconducting depending on the oxygen con... |
Did the wars and conflicts Israel was experiencing also lead to an increased number of jews leaving the country and emigrating to the US? | There were indeed a significant number of Jews who left Israel for elsewhere, but it's unclear if that was due to violent conflict!
First, the background: following the 1948 war and Israel's establishment, there was massive immigration into the state, primarily from the Arab and Muslim world but also from displaced pe... | [
"During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, around 10,000 Jews were forced to evacuate their homes in Palestine or Israel. The war indirectly created a second, major refugee problem, the Jewish exodus from Arab and Muslim lands. Partly because of the war between Jews and Arabs in Palestine, hundreds of thousands of Jews who... |
Why didn't the Soviet Union offer their own version of the Marshall plan? | The Soviet equivalent to the Marshall Plan was the Molotov Plan, a predecessor to the COMECON (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance). | [
"The Marshall Plan participants were not surprised when the Czechoslovakian and Polish delegations were prevented from attending the Paris meeting. The other Eastern Bloc states immediately rejected the offer. Finland also declined, to avoid antagonizing the Soviets (see also Finlandization). The Soviet Union's \"a... |
What on Earth did Europeans eat before the introduction of New World fruits & vegetables?? | Below I outline the fruits and vegetables which would have been grown domestically and eaten in *north western Europe* (France/Germany/England) by the late medieval period, or in some cases imported from southern Europe in preserved form.
The late medieval period would have been just the point before 'new world' foods... | [
"Other foods native to Latin America were brought to the island with the Spanish trade, such as cocoa, tomatoes, chayote, papaya, bell peppers and vanilla from Mexico and Central America. Potatoes and passion fruit were also brought over by the Spanish or Portuguese from Peru and Brazil.\n",
"In 1521, the first E... |
Could a "flash freeze microwave" be made to flash freeze food? | No. Its vastly easier to add energy to a system than to remove it. | [
"Flash freezing is used in the food industry to quickly freeze perishable food items (see frozen food). In this case, food items are subjected to temperatures well below water's melting/freezing point. Thus, smaller ice crystals are formed, causing less damage to cell membranes.\n",
"Frozen dinners, pies, and mic... |
When a baby is born is it born with all the gut flora it needs? If not how does it accumulate all those bacteria? | A fetus in the womb is generally sterile. It has developed entirely inside a sealed environment, the amniotic sac, so there's nothing in the gut except its own cells. Once that sac ruptures, colonization happens quite rapidly.
An infant born vaginally will pick up some of its mother's bacteria on its way through the ... | [
"During birth and rapidly thereafter, bacteria from the mother and the surrounding environment colonize the infant's gut. The exact sources of bacteria is not fully understood, but may include the birth canal, other people (parents, siblings, hospital workers), breastmilk, food, and the general environment with whi... |
[Computing] Does streaming a YouTube video use the same amount of cell data as downloading the entire thing? | Streaming *is* downloading. The term "streaming" refers to playing back a media file while it's downloading -- the same data has to to end up on your computer regardless of whether it's being written to a file or immediately played back and then discarded.
That said, each YouTube video is available in multiple separa... | [
"The amount of data used by video streaming services depends on the quality of the video. Thus, Android Central breaks down how much data is used (on a smartphone) with regards to different video resolutions. According to their findings, per hour video between 240p and 320p resolution uses roughly 0.3GB. Standard v... |
How accurate is Civilization V's "Civilopedia", the in game encyclopedia on history? | OP isn't referring to gameplay, rather the factoid sections about the various civilizations/leaders and unique units and buildings.
The civs and leaders can be pretty spot on in what they represent, but as /u/cow_legion said, it's pretty limited in scope. Also, the Civilization development team is clearly engaging in... | [
"The game comes with 27 different maps and 34 missions with user-created scenarios offering many game play possibilities. There are over 75 unique units, 115 different building types and 70 technologies to research in the game. The player can also find over 1000 historical facts in the Civilopedia. There are seven ... |
Prior to 1700, the vast majority of new towns in New England were incorporated with a name of a town or place in “old” England. Were there rules that encouraged this practice or did it emerge organically? | I have an earlier answer that might interest you:
* [Why did Europeans like naming colonial cities after existing ones?](_URL_0_) | [
"By 1785 enough settlers had arrived from Nantucket and Rhode Island that they were able to incorporate as a city, the first in New York since independence and the third in the state. They set aside the high ground today known as Promenade Hill overlooking the water at the district's west end as a \"Parade\", an op... |
Do we have a rough idea of the economic power of the Sassanid Empire to the Roman Empire during their respective contemporary existence? (200-600 CE) | Sorry, the China debate has drained away my willpower for tonight, but I can very warmly recommand Peter Christensen's *The Decline of Iranshahr* (a good part of which is available freely on Google Books); it includes a good (economic) survey of the heartland of the Sassanid Empire, Mesopotamia. In addition to this, Ho... | [
"In contrast to Parthian society, the Sassanids renewed emphasis on a charismatic and centralized government. In Sassanid theory, the ideal society could maintain stability and justice, and the necessary instrument for this was a strong monarch. Thus, the Sasanians aimed to be an urban empire, at which they were qu... |
A tennis announcer just said that the ball should
move faster because of the heat. How much does
the difference in air density caused by temperature
actually affect the speed at which things move
through it? | The hotter the ball, the higher the pressure inside the ball, which means the ball is more bouncy. | [
"Cold and humid weather are said to enhance swing. Colder air is denser and so may affect the differential forces the ball experiences in flight. When looking at humidity, changes between 0% and 40% humidity appear to have little to no effect on the ball's swing; yet, when approaching 100% humidity \"condensation s... |
Psychologists and/or psychiatrists, what is the difference between dissociative identity disorder and alter ego? | An alter ego has no psychological definition, and as a result refers to many things. Many of those things are engaged in willingly by the person, such as:
* A second family
* A pseudonym
* Superhero civilian personas
Dissociative identity disorder involves an individual possessing an alter ego, but it is one that t... | [
"Dissociative identity disorder (DID), previously known as multiple personality disorder, is a mental disorder characterized by at least two distinct and relatively enduring personality states. This is accompanied by memory gaps beyond what would be explained by ordinary forgetfulness. These states alternately show... |
Regarding solar power electrical grid storage issues. Why are gravity batteries (pumping water uphill during peak electrical accumulation and running it downhill at night i.e. a dam) not an option? | For that you need mountains, with two lakes above each other, and a river to replenish the evaporated water.
Most, if not all suitable sites are already used for that.
*Construction is expensive, and the energy content is relatively low.
As a theoretical exercise you can calculate the 'lake' sizes and he... | [
"When wind and solar are a small fraction of the grid power, other generation techniques can adjust their output appropriately, but as these forms of variable power grow, additional balance on the grid is needed. As prices are rapidly declining, PV systems increasingly use rechargeable batteries to store a surplus ... |
why is the v shaped peace sign an insult in the uk? | Well, Churchill's V for Victory sign is fine, that's like the stereotypical Asian teen girl sign. It's the backwards V that's frowned upon, another poster explains where that comes from, though. | [
"In Mainland China, Hong Kong, South Korea, and Taiwan, the V sign is a popular pose in photographs. It is used in both casual and formal settings. For the most part in these countries, the gesture is divorced from its previous meanings as a peace sign or as an insult; for most the meaning of the sign is \"victory\... |
Would it be correct to say that the USA manufactured contemporary racism during slave trade, or did it arise primarily from other factors? | I don't know if I'd use the word *manufactured*; it isn't quite that straight-forward. Rather, racial prejudice as it evolves in America *emerges* gradually and awkwardly from the 16th Century onwards in European discourse and has been well established by the time the United States came into being as a nation in the la... | [
"Historically, racism was a major driving force behind the Transatlantic slave trade. It was also a major force behind racial segregation, especially in the United States in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and South Africa under apartheid; 19th and 20th century racism in Western culture is particularly... |
Can a child get its genes only from its mother/father? | So you get 23 chromosomes from your mom and 23 from your dad if everything goes smoothly. So you'll always end up with a 50/50(ish) share of actual genes. However the gene expression may not be close to 50/50, meaning you actually express traits from one parent more than the other. | [
"Passing from parents to children, genes are the building blocks of inheritance. They contain instructions for making proteins. If genes do not produce the right proteins in a correct way, a child can have a genetic disorder.\n",
"About 74% of cases occur when part of the father's chromosome 15 is deleted. In ano... |
If Jupiter affects the Sun's orbit causing a "wobble;" does this increase the temperature on Earth when it "wobbles" towards Earth, and if so, how much? | Indirectly. Jupiter's influence on Earth affects when the perihelion/aphelion cycle syncs up with the summer/winter cycle (currently it's synced for the Southern hemisphere), which dictates how strong the seasons are and influences long-term climate patterns like ice age cycles. This is discussed a bit [here](_URL_0_). | [
"The absence of close orbiting super-Earths in the Solar System may also be the result of Jupiter's inward migration. As Jupiter migrates inward, planetesimals are captured in its mean-motion resonances, causing their orbits to shrink and their eccentricities to grow. A collisional cascade follows as their relative... |
do costco and sam's club receipt checkers actually check for anything in that 2 seconds they spend looking at my receipt? | They are only looking for high priced items in your cart or electronics. They see 1 item and find it on receipt then mark it. Its mostly just for show. A theft deterrent. | [
"Cashiers are often required to provide a receipt to the customer after a purchase has been made. Registers typically use thermal printers to print receipts, although older dot matrix printers are still in use at some retailers. Alternatively, retailers can forgo issuing paper receipts in some jurisdictions by inst... |
What would a medieval English/French farmer's year look like? When did they plough, sow, etc? | This wheel of yearly occupations in the linked graphics looks like it owes something to contemporary medieval motifs of the year's tasks in agriculture, as depicted in art -- the very idea of ordering works of the year by when in the year they were generally performed would not have been unfamiliar to medieval farmers,... | [
"In the medieval agricultural year, Lammas also marked the end of the hay harvest that had begun after Midsummer. At the end of hay-making a sheep would be loosed in the meadow among the mowers, for him to keep who could catch it.\n",
"Since the 800s, the invention of a more efficient type of plough—along with th... |
Why doesn’t chemotherapy have a 100% success rate? | Chemo targets actively replicating cells in your body. That's why you lose your hair and have GI issues (those cells replicate a lot). The primary tumor is usually active, but some early disseminated cells might be hiding dormant at metastatic sites. They get passed over and only start proliferating many years later. W... | [
"This selection bias makes the treatment look better, because candidates who would have fared better under any condition were selected. To belabour the point further Hortobagyi, using data from the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, reported in May 1995 that those eligible for high-dose ch... |
what is the affect of war on terror on economy of usa ? | Any kind of government spending, whether it be a foreign war, new road infrastructure, a big wall, tax cuts, or carving the President's face into a mountain creates economic stimulus.
When a government borrows money, it issues a bond, which is considered a safe investment. So they take cash that people were looking to... | [
"There are two competing views on the impact of terrorism on modern economies. Some scholars have argued that terrorist attacks have a small impact on the economy since they have a negligible impact on physical and human capital (i.e. buildings can be rebuilt, casualties are never that large). This theoretical outl... |
how can medical studies with very small sample sizes be deemed as credible? | One reason is that the available group to sample is very small. Take, for example, a new chemotherapy for retinoblastoma. There are less than 500 new cases each year. Even if I go to a really populous area, there aren't that many people who have it to test on.
The other reason is that the studies are extremely rigorou... | [
"Sample sizes may be evaluated by the quality of the resulting estimates. For example, if a proportion is being estimated, one may wish to have the 95% confidence interval be less than 0.06 units wide. Alternatively, sample size may be assessed based on the power of a hypothesis test. For example, if we are compari... |
what exactly happens when gas is pumped into a running car that causes a fire or explosion? | It's very unlikely that anything will happen, but leaving your car running increase the chance of a stray spark from a spark from some system in your car, which can ignite the vapors in the air from the gas you're pumping. | [
"The fire was reportedly caused by a spark when the driver of the dual-fuel bus switched from gas to petrol. Officer Ijaz Ahmad said a short-circuit next to a leaking petrol tank started the blaze. Police had earlier blamed an exploding natural gas cylinder.\n",
"The fire department was in the process of setting ... |
why is there blood outside the veins? | Imagine your body's circulatory system as a road network, with a big city (your heart) at the center. Now imagine the big highways that run out and connect to that city. These are your arteries and veins, all relatively large. Now, branching off of these you would expect a lot of small roads that connect each and ev... | [
"Blood vessels carry blood throughout the body, which moves because of the beating of the heart. Venules and veins collect blood low in oxygen from tissues throughout the body. These collect in progressively larger veins until they reach the body's two largest veins, the superior and inferior vena cava, which drain... |
Wool diaper covers - antibacterial properties? | Hey folks! There is real research on this out there, let's keep it focused on science. No anecdotes, etc. Thanks! | [
"The detergent effect draws on surfactin's ability to insert its fatty acid chain into the bilipidic layer causing disorganization leading to membrane permeability. Insertion of several surfactin molecules into the membrane can lead to the formation of mixed micelles by self-association and bilayer influenced by fa... |
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