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why is nigeria so strongly associated with scams? | It's called an advance-fee-fraud and was made popular by nigerian groups in the 80s via fax and now via e-mail. They send you a letter in pretty bad english (they are africans and they want you to believe them, so they don't speak flawlessly) and say that a nigerian prince has a lot of money and wants to transfer it ou... | [
"One reason Nigeria may have been singled out is the apparently comical, almost ludicrous nature of the promise of West African riches from a Nigerian prince. According to Cormac Herley, a Microsoft researcher, \"By sending an email that repels all but the most gullible, the scammer gets the most promising marks to... |
How to cite a book Chicago style that gives about a hundred page overview then presents documents on the topic? | I'm deleting this question now, as it is not about history or historiography, but about the general academic process. I believe there are other subreddits about this topic, such as /r/askacademia. | [
"This is a bibliography of selected publications on the history of Chicago. For most topics, the easiest place to start is Janice L. Reiff, et al. eds. \"The Encyclopedia of Chicago\" (2004), which has thorough coverage by leading scholars in 1120pp of text and many illustrations. It does not include biographies. I... |
"mrs." or "ms."? | * Mrs. - married woman
* Miss - unmarried woman
* Ms. - none of your goddamned business
Traditionally, Miss vs. Mrs. was to advertise a woman's marital status, with Miss implying she was available.
Since men have no such distinction and are just Mr., Ms. was invented as a similar titled that was agnostic to marital... | [
"\"Ms.\" is the marital-status-neutral salutation for an adult woman and may be applied in cases in which the marital status is irrelevant or unknown to the author. For example, if one is writing a business letter to a woman, \"Ms.\" is acceptable. \"Mrs.\" denotes an adult female who is married. \"Miss\" can apply... |
how to land a plane | First of all, a disclaimer. I'm a flying instructor, I've been teaching people to fly (and land) planes for 9 years. It takes practice - lots of practice. What I'm writing here is background information for people who want to know more - it is **not an instruction manual**. If you want to learn to fly, have flying less... | [
"A plane may be compelled to land through the use, or threat of use, of force, if it strays off course into hostile foreign territory. The customary procedure is for the military plane to approach the airliner from below and to the left, where his plane is easily visible from the left seat where the captain sits. T... |
Can the Roman times and Medieval times be considered the same? | In just about all situations, they're exclusive. What's the context of this? It's possible your teacher or your sources are wrong. | [
"Medieval writers divided history into periods such as the \"Six Ages\" or the \"Four Empires\", and considered their time to be the last before the end of the world. When referring to their own times, they spoke of them as being \"modern\". In the 1330s, the humanist and poet Petrarch referred to pre-Christian tim... |
why do so many right wingers dislike green energy and are stuck that oil is what we should go for when there are so many political and geological benefits to drop it? | Many politicians are personally invested in industries that would be negatively impacted if we migrated away from oil. Further, they get funding from and are lobbied by such industries. Investing in newer, cleaner energy is a financial gamble they're not willing to take. | [
"Concerning energy policy, Green considers himself an “energy realist,” and does not believe there are currently technologies that can substantially or affordably substitute for conventional energy sources such as coal, nuclear power, oil, and natural gas. To the extent that such alternatives do exist, Green has sh... |
we can send signals to the rover on mars. how come i can't get a hdmi plug that wirelessly sends an hd signal from my cable box to my tv? | The equipment to send and receive signals to mars costs several billion dollars. A HDMI cable costs $15.
That multi-billion dollar equipment sends and received data at a rate of several kilobytes per second. Your TV could need a gigabyte per second to cover the audio and video signal.
They are experimenting with ver... | [
"The rover has an X band low-gain and an X band high-gain antenna for communications to and from the Earth, as well as an ultra high frequency monopole antenna for relay communications. The low-gain antenna is omnidirectional, and transmits data at a low rate to Deep Space Network (DSN) antennas on Earth. The high-... |
why does cartilage completely degrade from overuse? does something prevent it from regenerating like muscle tissue? | Cartilage isn't connected to any blood supply, such as arteries and veins. Thus, it simply wears down over time instead of regenerating. Additionally, this is why torn ligaments/tendons also take so long to heal, and require direct medical intervention in the form of surgery. | [
"Articular cartilage does not usually regenerate (the process of repair by formation of the same type of tissue) after injury or disease leading to loss of tissue and formation of a defect. This fact was first described by William Hunter in 1743. Several surgical techniques have been developed in the effort to repa... |
If the all of the sun's energy were in the form of heat, how far away would it have to be in order to heat the earth the same amount that it does now? | Heat is defined to be the thermal passage of energy between an object and its surroundings, so all of the energy that passes between the sun and its surroundings is called 'heat.' There are three main ways a hot object can transfer heat: conduction (through direct contact with a solid object), convection (through direc... | [
"In theory, the loss of energy through gravitational radiation could eventually drop the Earth into the Sun. However, the total energy of the Earth orbiting the Sun (kinetic energy + gravitational potential energy) is about 1.14 joules of which only 200 watts (joules per second) is lost through gravitational radiat... |
how do we know how to spell and pronounce names from ancient sumer and egypt just from reading symbols etched in clay? | You ever heard of the Rosetta Stone?
It's written in three languages. Two of them nobody knew how to decipher before it was found. The third is Greek.
By comparing the Greek passages to the same words written in Demotic and Hieroglyphs scholars really busted the languages wide open. That one simple piece of writing ... | [
"From the 18th dynasty of Egypt there are four texts containing names and sayings in the Keftiu language (). They are, as usual in non-Egyptian texts, written in Egyptian hieroglyphs, which allow a more precise pronunciation.\n",
"The Egyptians called their hieroglyphs \"words of god\" and reserved their use for ... |
What was the religion of the Mycenean's and Minoans like? | Since we haven't managed to decipher the Minoan's script, we don't know all that much about their religious customs. We do know some things based on physical remains, however. There are figurines of goddesses holding snakes, a lot of ceramic and painted bulls, and a lot of double-headed axes. So, it's pretty certain th... | [
"Much of the Mycenean religion survived into classical Greece, but it is not known to what extent Greek religious belief is Mycenean, nor how much is a product of the Greek Dark Ages or later. Moses I. Finley detected only few authentic Mycenean beliefs in the 8th-century Homeric world. The religion which later the... |
why does the charge of one atom determine how many atoms there are of another element in a molecule? | The general idea is that a atom what a full outer electron shell. That i 2 electrons for the first shell and 8 for all other .
So look at the [Periodic table](_URL_0_) where the nobel gases on the far right column have full outer shells. If you move a step to the right you add a electron and a step to the left remove... | [
"In chemistry, a formal charge (FC) is the charge assigned to an atom in a molecule, assuming that electrons in all chemical bonds are shared equally between atoms, regardless of relative electronegativity. When determining the best Lewis structure (or predominant resonance structure) for a molecule, the structure ... |
Did the German and Italian-Americans ever face discrimination during WWII similar to the Japanese did? | There were forms called Alien Registration Forms that any person who originated from an Axis Power nation had to fill out. They contained questions like "country of origin," "how long have you lived in the United States," and others like an immigration form. Citizens had to fill this out, even if they had lived in the ... | [
"There was also discrimination against German Americans and Italian Americans due to Germany and Italy being enemy countries during World War I (Germany) and World War II (Germany and Italy). This resulted in a sharp decrease in German-American ethnic identity and a sharp decrease in the use of German in the United... |
how do you order at starbucks? please give me a step by step answer as in how do you order and the different options. i want to become a person with a super complicated order. | At the risk of sounding rude: isn't all the information you're looking for on the menu and/or available by asking the staff? | [
"Users have the option of ordering from the website or from a Seamless mobile app for Android, BlackBerry, or iOS. Users enter their address, and Seamless returns a list of restaurants that will deliver to the submitted address. Users then select a restaurant, create an order from the online menu, and submit the or... |
How reliable/accurate is the account that Alexander the Great kept a copy of Homer's Illiad in a gold box once owned by Darius? | I mean, it's in our texts, if that's what you're asking. Plutarch says:
> κιβωτίου δέ τινος αὐτῷ προσενεχθέντος, οὗ πολυτελέστερον οὐδὲν ἐφάνη τοῖς τὰ Δαρείου χρήματα καὶ τὰς ἀποσκευὰς παραλαμβάνουσιν, ἠρώτα τοὺς φίλους ὅ τι δοκοίη μάλιστα τῶν ἀξίων σπουδῆς εἰς αὐτὸ καταθέσθαι: πολλὰ δὲ πολλῶν λεγόντων αὐτὸς ἔφη τὴν ... | [
"Homer is somewhat vague about the precise manner of Ajax's death but does ascribe it to his loss in the dispute over Achilles' armor; when Odysseus visits Hades, he begs the soul of Ajax to speak to him, but Ajax, still resentful over the old quarrel, refuses and descends silently back into Erebus.\n",
"The Life... |
if a woman uses birth control that also stops her her period, does it actually stop the body from releasing its monthly egg and if not, what happens to the egg without the period? | Most pills (I assume you mean the pill) contain an estrogen and a progestogen, which together suppress these things called 'gonadotropins'. There are two big gonadotropins that the pill is meant to deal with: Follicle-Stimulating Hormone (FSH) and human Lutenizing Hormone (LH). They both get downregulated by the pill, ... | [
"While all methods of birth control have some potential adverse effects, the risk is less than that of pregnancy. After stopping or removing many methods of birth control, including oral contraceptives, IUDs, implants and injections, the rate of pregnancy during the subsequent year is the same as for those who used... |
are unreliable cars unreliable because of cost cutting measures or because manufacturers can't do better? | Depends on what era you're talking about. In the 80s American cars were horribly built, because Ford, GM and Chrystler didn't care. They were confident in their market position, so they didn't focus on quality control, the defects per car rate was very high.
In the 90s defects per car declined because of automated man... | [
"A market failure is created when consumers do not have the information to choose autos based on better/worse repair costs. In the United States, this gap is helped by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which subjects vehicles to low speed barrier tests () and publicizes the repair costs. Car makers that d... |
Would the bombs dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki been visible from space? | It depends on what you mean by visible and what you mean by space. If you mean low earth orbit, then they would be easily visible. It would appear as a bright flash (even at 200 or so km, it would still be bright enough to be uncomfortable, maybe even dangerous). You would then see a cloud form around the site of the d... | [
"Hiroshima was the primary target of the first nuclear bombing mission on 6 August, with Kokura and Nagasaki as alternative targets. \"Enola Gay\", piloted by Tibbets, took off from North Field, in the Northern Mariana Islands, about six hours' flight time from Japan, accompanied by two other B-29s, \"The Great Art... |
Can other animals become more social if they are domesticated over time? | > I was wondering, what if we domesticated other mammals over hundreds of years like we have with dogs?
Some russians had the same idea 50 years ago. They were able to domesticate wild silver foxes fairly easily in a very short amount of time.
[Here is a 10 minute segment from BBC Horizons describing the experiment... | [
"The basic reason that social animals live in groups is that opportunities for survival and reproduction are much better in groups than living alone. The social behaviors of mammals are more familiar to humans. Highly social mammals such as primates and elephants have been known to exhibit traits that were once tho... |
how do the new quantum equations suggest to scientists that the big bang didn't happen the way we thought it did and that the universe is infinitely old? | Because obscure scientists wanted to get famous and click bait "news" sites will pick up on contrarian papers and completely misrepresent them or blow their claims out of proportion because science journalism is almost always awful even in reputable newspapers, let alone in the New Media.
The short answer is: They don... | [
"Various new models of what preceded and caused the Big Bang have been proposed as a result of the problems created by quantum mechanics. One model, using loop quantum gravity, aims to explain the beginnings of the Universe through a series of Big Bounces, in which quantum fluctuations cause the Universe to expand.... |
how does tsa precheck actually make sure people aren't smuggling bad things through security? | They still check you out, in most airports I see its a quicker check and only uses a metal detector instead of a back-scatter scanner.
These are also normally people that fly often and are considered low risk. | [
"TSA agents are also accused of having mistreated passengers, and having sexually harassed passengers, having used invasive screening procedures, including touching the genitals, including those of children, removing nipple rings with pliers, misusing body scanners to ogle female passengers, having searched passeng... |
how are people who create and build a company be fired? for example, how does someone like steve jobs get fired from apple if it's his company? | It wasn't his company. By the time he left, it had gone public: it was owned by investors, and the Board of Directors (elected by shareholders) were in charge (this is common when a company grows; it gives the company lots of cash in exchange for shareholders getting control over it). Jobs was chairman of the board, bu... | [
"Apple CEO John Sculley demands to know why the world believes he fired Jobs – Jobs was actually forced out by the Apple board, who were resolute on updating the Apple II following the Macintosh's lackluster sales. Jobs lambasted the decision and dared them to cast a final vote on his tenure, despite Sculley's warn... |
Since the gravitational force becomes ever smaller as a particle gets farther away from another body of mass, does this gravitational pull become zero at some point or does it become smaller and smaller, never reaching zero? | In pre-relativistic gravity, the gravitational field due to a single point mass is non-zero everywhere the field is defined. So the gravitational force on some test mess is never zero.
However, for an extended gravitating mass, there is *always* at least one point where the gravitational field is exactly **0**. Precis... | [
"In the case where one of the masses is much larger than the other (formula_7), one can assume that the smaller mass moves as a test particle in a gravitational field generated by the larger mass, which does not accelerate. We can define the gravitational field as\n",
"If the bodies in question have spatial exten... |
poetic meter and rhyme scheme. | ...blink. "Rome was not built in a day." Rhyme schemes differ and aren't actually required, although you might check out Shakespeare's sonnets. For meter, you could start with old Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, who had a way with meter that is extremely insistent. Robert Frost? Percy Bysshe Shelley? "Ozymandias" is a fine... | [
"A rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line of a poem or song. It is usually referred to by using letters to indicate which lines rhyme; lines designated with the same letter all rhyme with each other.\n",
"A limerick is a poem that consists of five lines and is often humorous. Rhythm is very... |
Why does wind whistle when it blows through objects like doors, trees etc? | Wind howls when it’s broken up from passing through or around objects, such as trees. The gust of air will split up to move around the tree and then comes back together on the other side. Due to factors such as the surface of the tree and the air speed, one side of the wind is going to be stronger than the other when t... | [
"Wind causes the generation of sound. The movement of air causes movements of parts of natural objects, such as leaves or grass. These objects will produce sound if they touch each other. Even a soft wind will cause a low level of environmental noise. If the wind is blowing harder, it may produce howling sounds of ... |
If water (or any liquid) is not compressible, why does water pressure exist? | All matter is compressible; liquids are just more resistant to compression because they have a high [bulk modulus](_URL_0_). Water's bulk modulus is 10000 times higher than air's, but still significantly less than most solids'. | [
"On the other hand, liquids have little compressibility. Water, for example, will compress by only 46.4 parts per million for every unit increase in atmospheric pressure (bar). At around 4000 bar (400 megapascals or 58,000 psi) of pressure at room temperature water experiences only an 11% decrease in volume. Incomp... |
How does the brain react to a limb being cut off? How would the nerves react if you tried moving whatever was left? | This is actually fairly well studied. You should check out the wiki page for [phantom limb](_URL_2_). If suddenly your left forearm was severed (at the elbow) from your body the sequelae of events would go something like this:
1. Pain; lots of it.
2. The nerve projections from the sensory neurons in your ([left forear... | [
"An important reflex initiated by cutaneous receptors and pain receptors is the flexor reflex. This reflex mechanism allows for quick withdrawal of the body parts, in this case a limb, from the harmful stimulus. The signal travels to the spinal cord and a response is initiated even before it travels up to the brain... |
What are these ancient artifacts and what were they used for? | Well, I've seen one of them on [here](_URL_0_), and is actually either a coin or a small weight used as a standard to weight other things against. Given that it appears to weigh around 250g, it's hard to believe that it was used as a kettlebell.
I have no idea about the others... | [
"In 2010, after long negotiations with the University of London, Egypt retrieved 25 000 ancient artifacts, some dating back to the Stone Age. The artifacts include a rare spearhead as well as pottery from the seventh millennium BC, which bears the fingerprints of its producers.\n",
"The Ancient Treasures Gallery ... |
how is the car heating up when the fans are running but the a/c isn't on? | The fans blow air into the car, that air is heated by heat coming off the engine while it runs. | [
"However, if engine temperature rises above the clutch's engagement temperature setting, the fan becomes fully engaged, thus drawing a higher volume of ambient air through the vehicle's radiator, which in turn serves to maintain or lower the engine coolant temperature to an acceptable level.\n",
"When the engine ... |
what is the white stream seen coming from the back of airplanes? | There are two or three kinds of contrails.
One kind is from wingtip vortices (I think /u/ThatsPower's father was talking about these). At the tip of any wing, the high pressure air underneath swirls around to the low pressure region above, and as the plain flies along this leaves a (sometimes pretty intense) tubular v... | [
"Where an aircraft passes through a cloud, it can disperse the cloud in its path. This is known as a distrail (short for \"dissipation trail\"). The plane's warm engine exhaust and enhanced vertical mixing in the aircraft's wake can cause existing cloud droplets to evaporate. If the cloud is sufficiently thin, such... |
Why did Robert E. Lee surrender the civil war and not Jefferson Davis? | Well... he didn't. It is a common misconception that Lee's surrender was the end of the war, but it really wasn't. He surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia, and not much else. As the flagship Confederate Army, it was a crippling blow to the Southern cause, but it wasn't exactly the end of the war. Rather it was the... | [
"Lee was only responsible for the Army of Northern Virginia, but its surrender became the death blow to the Confederacy. After the surrender, Grant paroled Lee and his army, and allowed them to \"go home\". Then, he declared a 30-day, unilateral truce, ostensibly to give the paroled Confederates time to return home... |
When driving at night, when I look in my rearview mirror I can see 2 reflections of my back window above and below my actual window, how are these forming? | Light is reflecting off of two surfaces on your rear view mirror. Rear view mirrors are wedge-shaped with a reflective surface behind a piece of glass. Most of the light passes through the glass and gets reflected back by the reflective surface. A small amount of light, however, gets reflected by the surface of the ... | [
"On manual tilt versions, a tab is used to adjust the mirror between \"day\" and \"night\" positions. In the day view position, the front surface is tilted and the reflective back side gives a strong reflection. When the mirror is moved to the night view position, its reflecting rear surface is tilted out of line w... |
How can some gasses have color? | In this case, it's better to think of color as a result of light absorption and emission, rather than reflection. When light hits a gas, it can be absorbed by various processes. Visible light just happens to be the right energy to excite the electrons bound to atomic nuclei in some molecules, such as those making up ch... | [
"Though gasoline is a naturally colorless liquid, many gasolines are dyed in various colors to indicate their composition and acceptable uses. In Australia, the lowest grade of gasoline (RON 91) was dyed a light shade of red/orange and is now the same colour as the medium grade (RON 95) and high octane (RON 98) whi... |
Why do some fabrics change shades when rubbed in certain directions? | Nap : _URL_1_ And : _URL_0_ | [
"American researcher Alan D. Adler, confirming the presence of bilirubin on the fabric, noted that it is not light-stable and may change the color under any light. According to Adler, since the image fibers are at or near saturation while the surrounding cloth is not, the latter will gradually get darker until the ... |
why does your chest feel 'heavy' for a few seconds after swigging a strong alcohol? | Alcohol irritates your stomach. Your stomach doesn't have many direct "pain receptor" nerve endings, and in any case you can't see or otherwise directly sense your stomach so it's hard for your brain to draw a direct link from discomfort in your stomach to a direct sense of pain in that area of your body (contrast tha... | [
"Heavy alcohol use is linked to Hypopharyngeal Cancer as well. Alcohol damages the lining of the hypopharynx, increasing the amount of chemicals that are allowed to seep into the underlying membranes. Heavy alcohol use is also associated with nutritional deficiencies.\n",
"Studies have shown that heavy drinkers p... |
[etymology] What is the process a researcher goes through to uncover the origin of a phrase? | This is maybe more of a philological question. I'm a classical philologist, so I will bite.
Looking into the usage of a word or phrase starts from the vaguest point and narrows down, usually. So you have your phrase "have it all" specifically with related to women, and with an ironic tone to it. First you will want t... | [
"Etymology is the study of the origins of words. Before the beginnings of large-scale modern lexicography in the 16th century and the development of the comparative method in the 18th, a scientific etymology as modern linguistics understand it was not possible. However, grammarians had always speculated about the o... |
Hypothetically speaking, if a planet contains 100% liquid water at a room temperature. What its core going to be like? | When you compres water, you get ice. However, there are several different types of ice all of which exist at some unique combination of temperature/pressure. The one we get forming naturally on Earth is Ice Ih. (h should be subscripted but don't know how). Some of the more exotic states can exist at significantly hotte... | [
"The state of water on a planet depends on ambient pressure, which is determined by the planet's gravity. If a planet is sufficiently massive, the water on it may be solid even at high temperatures, because of the high pressure caused by gravity, as it was observed on exoplanets Gliese 436 b and GJ 1214 b.\n",
"L... |
generally, how do car accidents kill people? | Depending on where the victim is...
A pedestrian struck by a car is either killed through internal bleeding or head trauma generally.
A driver or passenger usually either does from head trauma, internal bleeding, the severing of the spinal column resulting in brain suffocation, or if metal or glass is involved extern... | [
"Commercial vehicle accidents and injuries are often more complex than regular car accidents, often involving additional concerns, background checks on operator driving records, and corporate maintenance records.\n",
"Cars are the leading cause of fatal traffic accidents in many countries, cars are the leading ca... |
Can we control or predict the direction of an emitted photon? | Most light sources do not have much of a preferential direction by themselves. However, you can get preferential emission in certain directions by putting them in [optical cavities](_URL_0_). An optical cavity is a specific arrangement of mirrors and other optical elements in which only some light waves can actually ex... | [
"Since nothing else has changed from experimental configuration to experimental configuration, and since in the first case the photon is said to \"decide\" to travel as a particle and in the second case it is said to \"decide\" to travel as a wave, Wheeler wanted to know whether, experimentally, a time could be det... |
coffee on the sand | Looks like a wok full of sand. The sand is heated over a fire, and the coffee pot is placed in the sand to heat the coffee.
_URL_0_ | [
"Coffee rock has been exposed by coastal weathering process on the beaches of Broadwater and Bundjalung National Parks in New South Wales, Australia. In addition, exposures can be seen in North Queensland, Australia at Kurrimine Beach, and in South East Queensland on Fraser Island and at the entry to Coonowrin Lake... |
what happens inside a venus flytrap after a bug gets trapped in it? | The plant excretes chemicals that digest the bug and then the plant absorbs it. Very similar to what happens when you eat a bug. | [
"The Venus flytrap is a carnivorous plant that catches its prey with a trapping structure formed by the terminal portion of each of the plant's leaves, which is triggered by tiny hairs on their inner surfaces. When an insect or spider crawling along the leaves contacts a hair, the trap prepares to close, snapping s... |
why does it sound likes it’s easier to get pregnant when you are young. | Your hormones change/decrease
Your ovaries don't produce an egg every time you ovulate
Men's sperm loses motility- meaning they slow down
Your uterus lining doesn't support an egg attaching to it as well as it did when you were younger
Your vagina and cervix atrophy
Less sex overall when you age | [
"The sounds of babbling are produced before an infant begins to construct recognizable words. This can be partly attributed to the immaturity of the vocal tract and neuromusculature at this age in life. Infants first begin vocalizing by crying, followed by cooing and then vocal play. These first forms of sound prod... |
what happens when you buy a put option or sell a call option? | A put option gives you the right to sell a stock by a specific date at a specific price per share. It can be useful if the stock is volatile and may drop in price. The put option gives you a guaranteed buy at a set price, should you choose to exercise it. The call option is the opposite. It give you the right to bu... | [
"The seller may grant an option to a buyer as part of another transaction, such as a share issue or as part of an employee incentive scheme, otherwise a buyer would pay a premium to the seller for the option. A call option would normally be exercised only when the strike price is below the market value of the under... |
Why does the Dutch language not have any significant legacy in former Dutch possessions beyond Afrikaans in South Africa? | Yay! A relevant question for me! Je aanvraag (vraagje?) geeft me veel plezier!
Ibuffel got it largely right, and johnbarnshack made a vital point. In effect, the Cape Colony and its derivatives were the only major colonies of settlement that involved the transplantation of population and its expansion. The creoliz... | [
"The largest legacy of the Dutch language lies in South Africa, which attracted large numbers of Dutch, Flemish and other northwest European farmer (in Dutch, \"boer\") settlers, all of whom were quickly assimilated. The long isolation from the rest of the Dutch-speaking world made the Dutch as spoken in Southern A... |
Have there been US Presidents with no background in politics or law? If so, how did they gain the public's support, and what sort of leaders were they? | *No* political experience before being the President? You mean not having held civilian elected office?
Eisenhower's first civilian political office was U.S. President, I think. Though you don't get to be a general officer, much less four or five star general, without being a master politician.
There are plenty of ex... | [
"Many presidents of the state, due to the great amount of power they held, and the political importance of the region, went on to become Presidents of the Nation, and others went on to become important political figures in Congress or other areas.\n",
"The president of Congress was, by design, a position with lit... |
Was Stalin really a Tsarist informer? | Although rumors and accusations of police collaboration dogged Stalin for much of his early political career, these charges never really stuck onto Stalin. The tsarist secret police, the Okhrana, often employed a tactic of falsely accusing various revolutionaries of police collaboration to drive a wedge into groups tha... | [
"As General Secretary, Stalin had had a free hand in making appointments to his own staff, implanting his loyalists throughout the party and administration. Favouring new Communist Party members, many from worker and peasant backgrounds, to the \"Old Bolsheviks\" who tended to be university educated, he ensured he ... |
jury | They have the power just like a judge in your country has the power. As for the bribing question same thing. Possible but you could also just bribe a judge. | [
"In a jury trial, a jury is the trier of fact. The jury finds the facts and applies them to the relevant statute or law it is instructed by the judge to use in order to reach its verdict. Thus, in a jury trial, the findings of fact are made by the jury while the judge makes legal rulings as to what evidence will be... |
[Europe] Medieval social contract between Lord and serfs | The answer to this is going to vary with time and place, and have a lot to do with how desperately the lords needed someone to cultivate their land and how desperately the peasants wanted land to cultivate.
If you were formally someone's serf, that is, you swore an oath of fealty to them, they did have the obligation ... | [
"In contrast to other European forms of serfdom and feudalism there was a lack of vassalage and loyalty to the lord whose land the serfs worked. It took a much longer period of time for feudalism to develop but when it did it took on a much harsher form than elsewhere in Europe. Serfs had no rights whatsoever; they... |
what does the military actually protect us from? | Deterrence is an important factor. A lot of things don't happen because other countries (and various organizations) know that it would be a bad idea to mess with us. We haven't had a lot of big conflicts in quite a while, of course, and I won't say our military couldn't stand to be smaller and do less; but a big milita... | [
"The military has historically played a professional, apolitical role in defending the country from external threats. Since January 2011 and at the direction of the executive branch, the military has taken on increasing responsibility for domestic security and humanitarian crisis response.\n",
"Its military dutie... |
How "strong" of a vacuum can you make by pulling a piston out of a cylinder? | You can see see what happens by looking at the ideal gas law: PV=nRT, where P is pressure, V is volume, n is proportional to the number of gas molecules, R is a constant, and T is temperature. Assuming that the temperature and number of gas molecules stay the same, what you are doing is increasing the volume, which at ... | [
"In August 1827 John Hague was awarded a patent for a method of working cranes and tilt-hammers driven by a piston in an oscillating cylinder where air power supplied the motive force. A partial vacuum was made in one end of a long cylinder by an air pump worked by a steam engine or some other power source, and atm... |
Why do cats sleep so much? | Animals will rest as often as they can after spending the time necessary to obtain food, shelter, mates and resources for offspring. Animals that need to spend large amounts of time obtaining these things, like grazzing animals, will only sleep a few hours a day. Animals that can get what they need in a short time, lik... | [
"Cats conserve energy by sleeping more than most animals, especially as they grow older. The daily duration of sleep varies, usually between 12 and 16 hours, with 13 and 14 being the average. Some cats can sleep as much as 20 hours. The term \"cat nap\" for a short rest refers to the cat's tendency to fall asleep (... |
how do animals keep track of their babies? can they count? if so they know math? if not what kind of logic they use to know how many are there? | Counting isn't required to detect someone is missing, just the ability to distinguish individuals. Suppose you have no concept of numbers or math but you have children Billy, Bobby, Sally, and Sarah. You see Billy, Bobby, and Sarah. Where is Sally? You don't see her, she is missing.
See? No numbers, no math, but it ge... | [
"Developmental psychology studies have shown that human infants, like non-human animals, have an approximate sense of number. For example, in one study, infants were repeatedly presented with arrays of (in one block) 16 dots. Careful controls were in place to eliminate information from \"non-numerical\" parameters ... |
Is there any science behind why different types of beers should be drank out of different mugs/glasses/etc, or is it just a gimmick perpetuated by beer snobs? | _URL_0_
This article explains the reasoning behind many of the glasses. | [
"Beer is consumed out of a variety of vessels, such as a glass, a beer stein, a mug, a pewter tankard, a beer bottle or a can; or at music festivals and some bars and nightclubs, from a plastic cup. The shape of the glass from which beer is consumed can influence the perception of the beer and can define and accent... |
the alien & sedition acts of 1798 | * *Naturalization Act* (June 18th) - Immigrants had to have lived in the U.S. for 14 years before they could become citizens, and you had to wait 5 years after saying "I want to be a citizen" before you could become one.
* *Alien Act* (June 25th) - Gave the President the authority to deport aliens suspected of treason ... | [
"The Alien and Sedition Acts were four laws passed by the Federalist-dominated 5th United States Congress and signed into law by President John Adams in 1798. They made it harder for an immigrant to become a citizen (Naturalization Act), allowed the president to imprison and deport non-citizens who were deemed dang... |
why do ach (electronic bank transfers) take 3+ days | Really, 3 days? At least for me it's like 5 hours. Is that an American thing? | [
"ACH payments contrast with Real-time gross settlement (RTGS) payments which are processed immediately by the central RTGS system and not subject to any waiting period on a one-to-one basis. ACH systems are typically used for low-value, non-urgent transactions while RTGS systems are typically used for high-value, u... |
how do gas planets have any kind of objects orbiting them and/or gravity when they are just a big ball of gas, no rocks and stuff? | Gas is the same stuff as solid matter, just all spread out. Every particle of matter has its own gravity; the gravity of a planet is the combined gravity of each of its particles.
Also, gas giants are only mostly made of gas - they're believed to have solid cores and oceans of liquid. | [
"Given the planet's high mass, the planet is a gas giant with no solid surface. Since the planet has only been detected indirectly, parameters such as its radius, composition, and temperature are unknown.\n",
"Given the planet's high mass, it is most likely to be a gas giant with no solid surface. Since the plane... |
Was there ever a long lasting peace between the Muslim states of the South of Spain and their Christian neighbours to the North? | yes and no: convivencia was really defined by balance of power tensionsbut plenty of times without religiously motivated warfare. For instance the Taifa period between the Ummayad and Almoravid dynasties (Taifas were essentially small independent kingdoms, for instance of grenada, seville, etc.) was marked by Christi... | [
"Meanwhile, the Christian kingdoms of northern Iberia continued their centuries-long fight to reconquer the peninsula from its Muslim rulers. In 1492, the last Islamic stronghold, Granada, fell, and Iberia was divided between the Christian kingdoms of Spain and Portugal. Iberia's Jewish and Muslim minorities were f... |
[META] AskHistorians Showcase Submissions [North America] | Two of my favorite answers (I wrote) both involving the role of religion in some American secular affairs, music and foreign relations.
[How and why did Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists become such strong supporters of Israel and the Jewish people?](_URL_1_)
[What were the views of Church on Blues Music?](... | [
"The 2006 North American Forum took place from September 12 to September 14 at the Banff Springs Hotel in Alberta, Canada. It was hosted by the Canadian Council of Chief Executives with help from the Canada West Foundation. Under the title \"Continental Prosperity in the New Security Environment\", the Forum includ... |
What underlying social factors caused the 90s Norwegian black metal scene to be so violent? | It is often hypothesized that when Mayhem vocalist Per Yngve Ohlin committed suicide, the scene became a lot darker and real. Mayhem's semi official album "Dawn of the Black Hearts" was released with a cover featuring a picture of none other than Ohlin's dead body, with shotgun and all, taken by Mayhem guitarist Øystei... | [
"The early black metal Norwegian scene of the 1990s is credited with creating the modern black metal genre and produced some of the most acclaimed and influential artists in extreme metal. It attracted massive media attention when it was revealed that its members had been responsible for two murders, one suicide, a... |
According to multiverse theories, what separates our universe from other universes? | You're trying to think about a super dimensional model in three dimensional terms. It doesn't work to think about the problem that way because we can't conceive of dimensions beyond this that we live in.
There is a classic comparison that helps illustrate the futility of trying to think of super dimensions spatially.... | [
"The multiverse, also known as an omniverse or meta-universe, is a hypothetical group of multiple universes. Together, these universes comprise everything that exists: the entirety of space, time, matter, energy, and the physical laws and constants that describe them. The different universes within the multiverse a... |
Are all the stars we can see with naked eyes part of the Milky way galaxy? | Yes.
You can see things like the Andromeda galaxy and the Magellanic Clouds with the naked eye, but not individual stars in those objects.
Supernova SN 1987a in the Large Magellanic Cloud was naked-eye visible, but a supernova is, of course, a special case. There was a supernova in Andromeda in 1885 (SN 1885a) that ... | [
"The Milky Way galaxy is about 100,000 light-years in diameter, and the Sun is about 25,000 light-years from the galactic center. The small common star UDF 2457 may be one of the farthest known stars inside the main body of the Milky Way. Globular clusters (such as Messier 54 and NGC 2419) and stellar streams are l... |
what is the neurological explanation for the zapping sensation people experience in their heads when they are late taking anti-depressants? | There are some pretty bad answers in this thread 😂. Guys I’m pretty sure OP knows what they are & what causes them, he’s asking *why* they happen.
In short, we dont *really* know why they occur. We barely know why SSRIs work in the first place, and a lot of the withdrawal symptoms are an even bigger mystery. One th... | [
"People with antidepressant discontinuation syndrome have been on an antidepressant for at least four weeks and have recently stopped taking the medication, whether abruptly, after a fast taper, or each time the medication is reduced on a slow taper. Commonly reported symptoms include flu-like symptoms (nausea, vom... |
how do doctors get paid? | Doctor sends the bill to insurance company. Insurance checks their books and pays $x amount to the doctor. Doctor send the patient a bill for the remaining balance. | [
"BULLET::::1. Doctors are typically paid for services provided rather than with a salary. This payment system (which is often referred to as \"fee-for-service\") provides a financial incentive to increase the costs of treatment provided.\n",
"Most doctors working in hospitals also have a private practice. Excepti... |
during a divorce why isn't custody entirely up to the child? if they're old enough to properly understand and make decisions? | Until a child is 18, they aren't considered developed enough to be making legal decisions. They can testify and favor a parent, but it doesn't make a definitive choice. Once that child hits 18, they're allowed to live with whoever they want. | [
"In the event of divorce, a woman loses the right to custody of her sons when they reach the age of 13, and her daughters when they reach the age of 15, regardless of religion. Women can also lose custody before this age if they remarry, work outside the home, or move outside of the city or country. In such cases t... |
What is in the synaptic cleft exactly? | Fluid, basically extracellular fluid speaking generally.
_URL_1_
For a synapse the gap between the two cells is only about 20-40 nanometers across, so the total volume of fluid is not that much, and the specific amounts of neurotransmitters and different ions present will change from moment to moment and depending o... | [
"Four branchial clefts (also called \"grooves\") form during the development of a human embryo. The first cleft normally develops into the external auditory canal, but the remaining three arches are obliterated and have no persistent structures in normal development. Persistence or abnormal formation of these four ... |
Can anyone help me settle a chemistry debate with my wife? | When you mix bleach and ammonia they react to form chloramines which are highly toxic
Bleach is used in laundry primarily because it whitens stains. Bleaching damages the fabric and shortens its life.
Your daughter's urine is sterile, and contains almost no ammonia (assuming she doesn't have a serious kidney problem... | [
"Annual Review of Physical Chemistry is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Annual Reviews. It covers all topics pertaining to physical chemistry. The editors-in-chief are Mark A. Johnson (Yale University) and Todd J. Martinez (Stanford University).\n",
"He is author or co-author of around 50 internat... |
what is the geometric mean and why is it good as a type of average for comparing things that are indexes of lots of other things? | The geometric mean of n values is the nth root of the product of the n values.
By contrast the usual mean, the arithmetic mean, is the sum of the n values divided by n.
The geometric mean is interesting when you are interested in tracking proportional changes between different values.
Say, you have two values: 1 and... | [
"A geometric mean is often used when comparing different items—finding a single \"figure of merit\" for these items—when each item has multiple properties that have different numeric ranges. For example, the geometric mean can give a meaningful value to compare two companies which are each rated at 0 to 5 for their... |
when you’re playing chess with the computer and you select the lowest difficulty, how does the computer know what movie is not a clever move? | The computer typically rates moves by looking ahead -- if I make this move, will I lose a piece or a good position in the future, or will my opponent.
Setting lower difficulty tells the computer to look less far ahead, or to consider fewer possibilities before stopping. | [
"A feature of the two most difficult levels (6 and 7) is that the computer-player's prospective moves are displayed while it is \"thinking\" – in easier levels the screen is blanked to a solid, but changing, color. However, in these two levels, the computer-player sometimes fails to return a piece to its original p... |
Did America use 'Shock and Awe' (Rapid Dominance), to gain control of/ access to oil in Iraq? | This submission has been removed because it violates our ['20-Year Rule'](_URL_0_). To discourage off-topic discussions of current events, questions, answers and all other comments must be confined to events that happened 20 years ago or more. | [
"In 2004, declassified documents revealed that the U.S. was so distraught by the rise in oil prices and being challenged by under-developed countries that they briefly considered military action to forcibly seize Middle Eastern oilfields in late 1973. Although no explicit plan was mentioned, a conversation between ... |
how does the akinator site/app so accurately guess characters/people in so few questions? | It works because many people already answered the questions thinking of the same person as you. Akinator remembers all the answers of its users and uses them to learn what questions and answers lead to what person.
If you try describing a very obscure/unknown person akinator will not be able to guess them because not ... | [
"There was a preset number of persons to guess, and Frangén began each of the questions by giving clues about the person's identity, starting difficult and getting easier along the way. This continued until one of the contestants gave a signal, at which point he/she had to answer.\n",
"In indirect mode, the guess... |
What was the lifestyle of Germanic tribes during the Roman Era like? | Information on the "Germanic" tribes on the fringes of the Roman world is relatively scant for much of the Roman Empire's existence in the west. These various groups left little in the way of native writing, even less was written down contemporaneously to the events they ostensibly depict, and the works of Roman write... | [
"Ultimately, the Germanic groups in the Western Roman Empire were accommodated without \"dispossessing or overturning indigenous society\", and they maintained a structured and hierarchical (but attenuated) form of Roman administration.\n",
"Germanic peoples lived in what is now Poland for several centuries, duri... |
Were there any Native tribes in what would become the U.S. and Canada that were notably more advanced technologically than their contemporaries? | To start with, I do have an answer for you, but only reluctantly. I'd much rather say I reject the entire premise of the question. So I'll start with why I don't think the premise is sound, and then I'll give you part of the answer anyways.
So the trite complaint is to say that "advanced" is a highly relative and vag... | [
"The first innovators and inventors in Canada were, not surprisingly, the native peoples who arrived here 14,000 years ago. They innovated techniques to survive in a very new and mostly hostile environment. This involved new ways to obtain food, create clothing and travel across a huge territory. Notable inventions... |
Does alcoholism in parents affect the tolerance of their kids? If so, how does that work biologically/genetically? | Epigenetics. DNA is not immutable. The body will put "markers" on the DNA so different subsection are ignored or used. These can transferred to children. Basically, the environment affects which genes we express. A classic example is historical trauma which is that there are heightened anxiety in the children and gra... | [
"Alcoholism does not have uniform effects on all families. The levels of dysfunction and resiliency of the non-alcoholic adults are important factors in effects on children in the family. Children of untreated alcoholics score lower on measures of family cohesion, intellectual-cultural orientation, active-recreatio... |
Why is it that Newspaper Articles are accepted as credible sources when they are often opinionated or biased? | I wrote my final undergraduate thesis on the role of journalism in shaping our understanding of history — focusing specifically during the Spanish Civil War — using contemporary newspaper reports as my primary reference material, so I'm well aware of the pitfalls of using them as historiographical sources. But I also t... | [
"Studies have also been done that focus heavily on the role journalists and media in general play when it comes to public ignorance of science and common scientific misconceptions. The reason behind journalists spreading false or misleading information can be either because the journalists believe the information t... |
How does the absorption spectrum of compounds and molecules differ from that of their constituent elements? | Within an atom, the only "modes" for absorbing or emitting energy are electrons transitioning between different energy levels. Molecules offer additional modes. Each bond in the molecule can act like a spring, storing energy through the different ways the bond can vibrate. The greenhouse effect, for instance, is due to... | [
"A material's absorption spectrum is the fraction of incident radiation absorbed by the material over a range of frequencies. The absorption spectrum is primarily determined by the atomic and molecular composition of the material. Radiation is more likely to be absorbed at frequencies that match the energy differen... |
is it really possible for a person or entity to get precise information, such as your street location, from your ip address? | It's not really possible with just the IP. You can use it to get a rough approximation of your location - my IP address points to my town but to my ISP's location and not to my house.
You can get a little more detailed with the hostname depending on what your ISP sets it to. A hostname is basically a text label that ... | [
"This raises the question of reasonableness: assume it is theoretically possible to identify a person from information which does not include a name or address, but does contain clues which could be pursued to find out who it relates to. How much extra effort does it take to make it unreasonable that such informati... |
Could a fusion reactor use any element with an atomic number lower than Iron as a source of fuel? | In principle you can use any exothermic fusion reactions. But the Coulomb barrier increases with atomic number, so it’s harder to fulfill the Lawson criterion with heavier elements. Hydrogen has the lowest possible Z, and it’s very abundant. | [
"Fusion fuels include deuterium (H) and tritium (H) as well as helium-3 (He). Many other elements can be fused together, but the larger electrical charge of their nuclei means that much higher temperatures are required. Only the fusion of the lightest elements is seriously considered as a future energy source. Fusi... |
if our brain is the control system for everything, how come we aren't naturally experts at our own anatomy? | Because most of it is automated. There's no real benefit to our ancestors evolving some innate master level knowledge of every system. | [
"The function of the brain is to provide coherent control over the actions of an animal. A centralized brain allows groups of muscles to be co-activated in complex patterns; it also allows stimuli impinging on one part of the body to evoke responses in other parts, and it can prevent different parts of the body fro... |
Does a radio attract radio waves? | No, it doesn't attract them any more than a light sensor attracts light. It's just that the radio waves are traveling through the air, and the ones that hit the radio cause an oscillating current in the radio which it turns into sound. | [
"Radio waves are a type of electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum longer than infrared light. Like all other electromagnetic waves, they travel at the speed of light. Naturally occurring radio waves are made by lightning, or by certain astronomical objects. Artificially generated... |
why is english considered one of the hardest languages to learn? | THIS ISN'T MY WORK. Sorry for any confusion.
Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just com... | [
"This area has been criticized for undermining universities which do not use English as their primary language. Citations and publications in a language different from English are harder to come across. The English language is the most internationalized language and therefore is also the most popular when citing.\n... |
how can scientist really know what cats or dogs see? | You test them.
You train the animal that if it picks out the right colored object, it will get a treat. First you train it with black and white, then you try it with various color pairs.
If the animal can learn to pick the right color, then it can tell the difference between the two colors. If it never does better ... | [
"Dogs were previously listed as non-self-aware animals. Traditionally, self-consciousness was evaluated via the mirror test. But dogs and many other animals, are not (as) visually oriented. A 2015 study claims that the “sniff test of self-recognition” (STSR) provides significant evidence of self-awareness in dogs, ... |
how is it possible to own/ operate a graveyard considering that all payments are made up front (are low, relatively) and need to last indefinitely? | Aren't they paid for by governments and/or churches and other religious organizations? Neither of those operate like other businesses and get money from taxes or donations | [
"Another type of grave site considered for re-use are empty plots purchased years ago but never used. In principle it would seem easier to \"re-use\" such grave sites as there can be no claims of desecration, but often this is made complicated by the legal rights to be buried obtained by the pre-purchase, as any li... |
Why did Austria, Sweden, Norway, Finland and Ireland remain neutral during the cold war? | You're asking a whole lot of questions in one package. At least Norway should be removed since it was a founding member of NATO which pretty much puts it in the western camp I think.
Sweden was covered by Superplaner, longstanding policy of staying neutral.
Finland had to be neutral in order to keep the peace with th... | [
"Finally, Austria, Finland and Sweden were neutral in the Cold War so membership of an organisation developing a common foreign and security policy would be incompatible with that. As that obstacle was removed, the desire to pursue membership grew stronger.\n",
"Sweden was the only Nordic country that remained ne... |
How to publish an academic article? | I can't give you the best information, but usually this is something your academic adviser would help you with. Can you not solicit their help? They want your name and address because you will be asked to revise elements of the article. | [
"All articles accepted for publication are open to Open Peer Commentary in which multiple researchers may submit mini-articles criticizing, clarifying, or elaborating on the article from the viewpoint of any research field relevant to its content. \n",
"When an author submits a manuscript for publication in a sci... |
what's the relationship between power, wavelength and penetration? | Power is power, that doesn't change with wavelength. A 1 watt transmitter is a 1 watt transmitter whether its putting out microwaves or UV rays. Each photon has more energy which changes its behavior, but that's distinctly different from the power of the transmitter.
Wavelength, penetration, and target material are ... | [
"Penetration refers to the proportion of a primary energy (PE) source in an electric power system, expressed as a percentage. There are several methods of calculation yielding different penetrations. The penetration can be calculated either as:\n",
"The concept of penetration depth is one of many ways to describe... |
what (if any) does the color of a laser have to do with its power? | Power and color are separate. The color determines the energy in the individual photons, but the power is the total amount of energy being emitted (how many photons times the energy in each). | [
"The apparent brightness of a spot from a laser beam depends on the optical power of the laser, the reflectivity of the surface, and the chromatic response of the human eye. For the same optical power, green laser light will seem brighter than other colors because the human eye is most sensitive at low light levels... |
Did George Orwell ever reject communism/ socialism? | George Orwell rejected USSR Stalinist policies and their interpretation and implementation of Marxist-Leninist philosophy. But Orwell certainly didn’t reject socialism. In fact, Orwell himself was a devoted socialist, and volunteered and fought in war for socialism. He said himself in his essay *Why I Write*,
> “Eve... | [
"Yet Orwell \"had \"felt\" what socialism could be like\" and, according to Bowker, unlike the writer John Dos Passos for example, \"who also had a friend killed in custody by the SIM (Servicio de Investigación Militar/Spanish Secret Police) in Spain, and reacted by deserting the Communists and shifting decidedly t... |
What is the difference between slugs and snails? | OK...
"How is individual lineage determined in modern organisms with polyphyletic origins?"
- Basic answer... Don't try. They're polyphyletic. Which means they share a common ancestor but they're all bunched into an arbitrary group. A bit like Protists (which include archaea, fungi, bacteria and a few other things). Th... | [
"Slugs as a group are far from monophyletic; biologically speaking \"slug\" is a term of convenience with little taxonomic significance. The reduction or loss of the shell has evolved many times independently within several very different lineages of gastropods. The various taxa of land and sea gastropods with slug... |
do petitions actually change anything? | By and large, they don't make much of a difference. A petition is no real indicator of anything beyond a person's willingness to sign something. It doesn't confer any promise of action, nor any lasting consequence, and not even a guarantee of authenticity.
They can hold sway in situations where a decision may go one w... | [
"Topics for Change.org petitions have grown to include disagreement with the Academy Awards and removing milk from certain types of coffee. The authors of these petitions have been criticized for focusing on first world problems. Further debate over the content of petitions came in November 2014 when Martin Daubney... |
Why do both sides of a magnet stick to my refrigerator? | Your refrigerator is not (as a whole) magnetized. That means the the magnetic moments of the Fe atoms are aligned inside the microscopic iron grains of the material but the orientation of these grains are random so there is no macroscopic order in your fridge. It has no macroscopic north or south pole!
When you now br... | [
"Unlike most conventional magnets that have distinct north and south poles, flat refrigerator magnets are magnetized during manufacture with alternating north and south poles on the refrigerator side. This can be felt by taking two similar (or identical) refrigerator magnets and sliding them against each other with... |
. what is the difference between hdr and 4k? | HDR gives you better and brighter/darker colors (High Dynamic Range).
4K just gives you a massive amount of screen space | [
"4K resolution, also called 4K, refers to a horizontal display resolution of approximately 4,000 pixels. Digital television and digital cinematography commonly use several different 4K resolutions. In television and consumer media, 38402160 (4K UHD) is the dominant 4K standard, whereas the movie projection industry... |
if fat is stored energy, then why do fat people get tired faster than skinny people? | There are two reasons that I can think of, off the top of my head:
First, you don't get access to all the energy at the same time. Generally speaking (and way oversimplifying it), your body prefers to fuel itself using the food you eat instead of using your stored fat. Because of this, almost all of the fat rema... | [
"Enig co-wrote another book with Fallon called \"Eat Fat, Lose Fat\" which promotes what Enig considered \"good\" fats, and argued that many who follow low-fat diets feel low on energy because they are \"fat deficient\".\n",
"Taubes states in the book that it's not about fat people eating too much and exercising ... |
How has it come to be that Americans speak English and not French, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch etc.? | In 1775, [48.7% of colonists were English](_URL_0_), the next largest group were black slaves. none of the other ethnic groups were above 10% of the population. | [
"International speakers of English generally refer to people from the United States as Americans while equivalent translations of American are used in many other languages, namely French ('), although the term ' derived from ' (United States) in French is also accepted, Dutch ('), Afrikaans ('), Japanese (, rōmaji:... |
why is it always a hate crime when a white person kills blacks, but not a hate crime when it is a black person killing whites? | [Of the reported 3,407 single-bias hate crime offenses that were racially motivated, 66.4 were motivated by anti-black or African-American bias, and 21.4 percent stemmed from anti-white bias.](_URL_0_) | [
"There is also some research suggesting that blacks have also internalized the criminal stereotype. According to a study, 82% of blacks think they are perceived as violent by Whites. African Americans are also more likely than Whites to think that racial profiling is widespread and to think they are treated unfairl... |
Why does ice in my freezer occasionally grow these protuberances? | Water freezes from the outside in (the outside is in contact with the colder air). As it freezes it becomes less dense, taking up more space than when it was water. This pushes the unfrozen water out of the way, and the only direction it can go is up.
It then freezes as it emerges, forming these spikes. | [
"Certain bacteria, notably \"Pseudomonas syringae\", produce specialized proteins that serve as potent ice nucleators, which they use to force ice formation on the surface of various fruits and plants at about −2 °C. The freezing causes injuries in the epithelia and makes the nutrients in the underlying plant tissu... |
Why is the troubles characterized by conflict between Protestants and Catholics? | Someone may come along and discuss the religious breakdown of sides in the Troubles in more detail for you, but in the meantime, you might be interested in a previous answer I gave about the history of ethnic and religious tensions in Ireland: [_URL_1_](_URL_0_)
The key takeaway is that Catholics were the majority but... | [
"The emergence of the Two by Twos caused severe splits within local Protestant churches in Ireland at a time of increased pressure for independence by the Catholic majority. Because of animosity, they did not form a united front with other Protestant communities. Although the church was noted for extreme anti-Catho... |
why is it that the government has made it illegal to own both firearms and a medical mariguana license? | Under federal law there is no such thing as medical marijuana. So to the feds it's illegal to possess a firearm while being a user or possessor of restricted controlled substances, which marijuana still is. Federal law does not recognize state legalization of marijuana, so while your state does not criminalize it, if a... | [
"In 2015, Van Hollen introduced legislation for increased handgun licensing, specifically the requirement for permit-to-purchase licenses. This proposal was based on a similar law that exists in Maryland. On proposing the law, Van Hollen stated that \"States require licenses to drive a car or even to fish in local ... |
Do maps/GPS have an equivilant to UTC/GMT ? | There is. The GPS system, and plenty of maps nowadays (including Google Maps), use a [geodetic datum](_URL_1_) - basically, a frame of reference for Earth coordinates - called [WGS84](_URL_0_), whose main meridian (the IERS Reference Meridian) is about 5.31 arc-seconds east of the Greenwich meridian. Not only does it t... | [
"The GPS navigation message includes the difference between GPS time and UTC. GPS time is 18 seconds ahead of UTC because of the leap second added to UTC on December 31, 2016. Receivers subtract this offset from GPS time to calculate UTC and specific timezone values. New GPS units may not show the correct UTC time ... |
[Biology] Why is is that turtles can live so many years while for dogs we even say they have x amount of human years and y amount of dog years? | Taking a stab at the added question.. the dog years thing is just worked out by taking humans average life span vs dogs average life span.
Humans out live dogs by a factor of about 7 so we say a dog has 7 years in a regular year but its just a cute saying not really an actual thing.
Edit: wild speculation here but I ... | [
"Their average life expectancy is from 12 to 15 years. Exercise, especially daily walks, is preferred for this breed to live a long and healthy life. The oldest known Shiba, Pusuke, died at age 26 in early December 2011. Pusuke was the oldest dog alive at the time and lived three years less than the world record fo... |
why do doors get squeaky over time? | there's oil in the hinges that hold the door, over time that oil dries/evaporates/leaks and the metal parts of the hinges start rubbing
and scratching against each other, resonating when you open and close a door | [
"Wood floors, particularly older ones, will tend to 'squeak' in certain places. This is caused by the wood rubbing against other wood, usually at a joint of the subfloor. Firmly securing the pieces to each other with screws or nails may reduce this problem.\n",
"Also, squeaking sounds made by a house's materials ... |
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