question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
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what's the deal with the one china policy? | The People's Republic of China is one of the US's biggest trading partners and have a massive modern military that we realllllyyy don't feel like testing in combat. We're pretty sure we could kick their asses, but it would be a bloody and costly conflict even if we won. When the communists took over China, the other si... | [
"\"One-China policy\" is a policy saying that there is only one sovereign state under the name China, despite the fact that there are two states, the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC), whose official names incorporate \"China\". Many states follow a one China policy, but the meanings ... |
Why is it that the probability of dying from Cancer is so high? what happened to dying of old age.... | You need to consider that only with the development of modern medicine did we start noting all the deaths caused by cancer. Some studies have even found cancer rates have decreased since the 90's.
_URL_1_
The increase in cancer rates is not as real as it seems.
> And not to mention at a fairly young age. Is the ... | [
"Deaths from cancer were 5.8 million in 1990. Deaths have been increasing primarily due to longer lifespans and lifestyle changes in the developing world. The most significant risk factor for developing cancer is age. Although it is possible for cancer to strike at any age, most patients with invasive cancer are ov... |
can two perfectly round spheres touch each other? | Two spheres contact at a single point.
Of course, physically 100% perfect spheres are not possible, since physical spheres are made up of molecules which means the surface of a sphere cannot be perfectly uniform. So in practice, they would rest against one another in multiple places (albeit all around a single point).... | [
"A 3-sphere can be constructed topologically by \"gluing\" together the boundaries of a pair of 3-balls. The boundary of a 3-ball is a 2-sphere, and these two 2-spheres are to be identified. That is, imagine a pair of 3-balls of the same size, then superpose them so that their 2-spherical boundaries match, and let ... |
why are australians so unhappy with their government? | Currently or in general?
Currently because Abbott pretty much set himself up as some sort of savior who was going to save Australians from our great economy which he proclaimed was in the toilet with its low interest rates, low unemployment, high GDP per capita..........
And in only a couple of months he's managed to... | [
"Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has said that the military were \"slowly trying to take control\" and pressure the PM to resign. Other notable Australians have also commented on the situation such as the then Australian Prime Minister John Howard.\n",
"In recent decades, Indian politics has become ... |
why do our emotions control our tear ducts? | Short version: Negative emotions cause the body to produce stress hormones, and the fastest way to get rid of them is dissolved in tears. Crying literally helps you return to normal.
Edit: [longer version](_URL_0_), [really long version](_URL_1_)
Edit 2: Since this seems to remain the top answer, I'll reiterate a poi... | [
"Tear composition varies among different tear types. Mainly, tears are composed of water, salts, antibodies and lysozymes (antibacterial enzymes). According to a discovery by Dr William H. Frey II, a biochemist from St. Paul Ramsey Medical Center in Minnesota, the composition of tears caused by emotion differs from... |
how were operating systems developed? wouldn't a preexisting one need to be in place to type the code? | There's a concept called bootstrapping which is about using something simple to make something complex and then using that complex thing to make something advanced and so forth and so forth. Well that's what happened with computers. The earliest computers were programmed using nothing but binary. If you wanted to add t... | [
"Early operating systems were very diverse, with each vendor or customer producing one or more operating systems specific to their particular mainframe computer. Every operating system, even from the same vendor, could have radically different models of commands, operating procedures, and such facilities as debuggi... |
how was the internet different before the nsfnet was shut down in 1995? | The WWW was in its infancy, and it wasn't clear it would come out on top as the way people accessed the Internet. Because commercial activity was banned, there were no ads, no spam, and no AOL moms complaining about porn. Virtually no women, and the few extant got marriage proposals every week. Most on the Internet w... | [
"In 1990, the ARPANET was formally terminated. In 1991 the NSF began to relax its restrictions on commercial use on NSFNET and commercial network providers began to interconnect. The final restrictions on carrying commercial traffic ended on 30 April 1995, when the NSF ended its sponsorship of the NSFNET Backbone S... |
what was the underground railroad and how did it work? | It was a wide array of people who worked together to provide safe houses and transportation along secret routes to allow slaves to escape northwards. Despite the name it was neither underground nor a railroad, overall, although it's not inconceivable that some of the routes had a little of either. At its simplest, smal... | [
"To some the Underground Railroad is thought to be just that, a series of underground railroads that were built to hide and transport former slaves that were seeking to escape from the southern areas of the United States. In actuality it was a web of hidden, interconnected, man-made paths that were shrouded by fore... |
How did Western music releases work in the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact? | While I don't know much about the "official" way of music coming across borders, there were many ways average citizens could distribute smuggled music amongst themselves. People would copy music from other copies, and even from Radio Free Europe transmissions. In a way, a low tech version of file transferring and count... | [
"To secure independence from the West, industry leaders mandated that the USSR develop its own sound technologies, rather than taking licenses on Western sound systems. Two Soviet scientists, Alexander Shorin in Leningrad (present-day St. Petersburg) and Pavel Tager in Moscow, conducted research through the late 19... |
Are animals as recognizably different as humans are? | You can easily differentiate between human faces because you are an "expert" at looking at them. You focus on particular parts of the body, the coloring, the shapes, the size, etc. You're deeply, deeply familar with uman faces after looking at them for so long.
The part of the brain this relates to is the fusiform gy... | [
"Weiss also compared the anatomical structures of humans and animals in order to establish proof that the reason why human and animals have different behaviors is because of their anatomy. He concluded that humans are capable of having biosocial responses and animals are not. Animals are unable to have biosocial re... |
what do accountants do? | They keep track of either company or personal finances for the purpose of reporting or distribution of profits. The most common association with accountants is that they gather documents from people and prepare their tax returns, so they know how much to pay the government.
The rest of the year, accountants are keepin... | [
"By helping the organization to make better decisions, the accountants can help the public sector to change in a very positive way that delivers increased value for the taxpayer’s investment. It can also help to incentive's progress and to ensure that reforms are sustainable and effective in the long term, by ensur... |
why do a lot of companies develop apps for ios first, when android holds 70% of the 'smart' market? (inspired by the new reddit ios app) | For many reasons, but the most obvious commercial reason is this:
iOS users consistently spend more money buying apps, and buying in-app purchases, than Android users. Even though there are more Android users than iOS users, they spend less money. | [
"Google Inc.’s Android has overtaken Apple Inc.’s iOS in the wildly growing arena of app downloads. In the second quarter of 2011, 44% of all apps downloaded from app marketplaces across the web were for Android devices while 31% were for Apple devices, according to new data from ABI Research. The remaining apps we... |
Why are English translations of ancient Egyptian texts usually rendered in an excessively formal and archaic style while Greek and Roman translations sound perfectly natural? Did the Egyptians really write or speak like that? | I recently answered [exactly this question](_URL_1_). It's a combination of Egyptian grammar and older generations of Egyptologists lending a dignified air to Egyptian texts.
As for the titulary, it largely has to do with the Egyptian king's five names and the ideology behind them, which I've written about [here](_UR... | [
"Words or concepts for which no adequate Egyptian translation existed were taken directly from Greek to avoid altering the meaning of the religious message. In addition, other Egyptian words that would have adequately translated the Greek equivalents were not employed as they were perceived as having overt pagan as... |
how does zero gravity chambers work? | Usually by being in free-fall. When you are accelerating towards the earth in an aircraft, relative to the aircraft you are not moving, so you don't feel as though you are under the effects of gravity. Because you're in a closed room, or aircraft, there's no wind whipping by you to indicate you are falling, and no vi... | [
"\"Dead Space 3\" puts Clarke against the Necromorphs, who serve as the primary antagonists of the franchise. The Resource Integration Gear (RIG) suit returns, using holographic displays projected from the players' suit and weapons to display health and ammo count, respectively. In vacuum areas, a timer will appear... |
What's the smallest change in temperature a human can detect? | I can detect milliKelvins using an EPR temperature probe. | [
"The RHIC physicists announced new temperature measurements for these experiments of up to 4 trillion kelvins, the highest temperature ever achieved in a laboratory. It is described as a recreation of the conditions that existed during the birth of the Universe.\n",
"These experiments demonstrated that changes in... |
why do some gymnasts wear an elastic belt over their leotard? | Most likely to assess and correct hip allignment during their activities. You may see these in dance, ballet, gymnastics ect | [
"A dance belt is a type of thong designed to be used in the same manner as an athletic supporter, but for male dancers (especially in ballet). Its purpose is to protect and support the dancer during dance activities without being seen through outer garments, such as tights, leotards, gym leggings or shorts. Thongs ... |
what takes place biologically when moles, freckles, or warts start to appear spontaneously in places as one's age progresses? | You know how when you make a photocopy of a photocopy of a photoco... wait, this is 2016.
You know how people post a JPEG to Facebook, and then people keep reposting it, and reposting it, and reposting it, and with every repost the quality degrades?
Well, your body kind of does that a lot. Cells die, cells split and ... | [
"Demodicosis occurs when female mites lay eggs in hair follicles. Each follicle may contain hundreds or thousands of mites, which leads to the formation of skin papules and nodules. These papules and nodules, or bumps beneath the skin, can be felt even before they can be seen. Typically, the papules and nodules las... |
why some types of animals (cats, dogs snakes, etc.) have such huge variation in size while others (humans for example) do not. | There is often less variation within a species than there is between like groups of animals.
Look at the variation between all the apes. Humans compared to chimpanzees or gorillas is an enormous difference. Dogs are usually considered a single species, but are a bad example because they have been selectively bred to ... | [
"Despite enormous differences in size, various cat species are quite similar in both structure and behaviour, with the exception of the cheetah, which significantly stands out from the other big and small cats. All cats are carnivores and efficient apex predators. Their native ranges include the Americas, Africa, a... |
whether buying american cars is better for the economy than buying foreign cars. | It doesn't matter these days, since most 'foreign' cars are now largely manufactured in the US | [
"Residents of other rapidly developing countries living under conditions not unlike US and Canada had a strong preference for well-engineered and robust American cars. The countries of the British Empire – Britain, India, South Africa, Australia and others – gave preference by charging much lower import taxes on go... |
why are some types of alcohol drinkable while some, like rubbing alcohol will kill you? | "Alcohol" is a general term for a group of organic substances. There are a lot of them and almost all alcohols are poison for the human body. However, at some point in time people found out that beer tastes well, and over the course of many generations a pretty good resistance to a single alcohol that is called ethanol... | [
"All rubbing alcohols are unsafe for human consumption: isopropyl rubbing alcohols do not contain the ethyl alcohol of alcoholic beverages; ethyl rubbing alcohols are based on denatured alcohol, which is a combination of ethyl alcohol and one or more bitter poisons that make the substance toxic.\n",
"Product labe... |
Why is it that my nighttime sleeps are always totally peaceful, but whenever I fall into an afternoon nap, I always wake up with feelings of near-terror? | I hope someone answers this. I get the same thing. Not every time, but often enough, if I'm napping I'll experience really freaky sleep paralysis. Terrible experience. | [
"Those with nightmares experience abnormal sleep architecture and that the results of having a nightmare during the night were very similar to those of people who have insomnia. This is thought to be caused by frequent nocturnal awakenings and fear of falling asleep.\n",
"Night terrors tend to happen during perio... |
why do we make solid and liquid waste? how does our body know which to make of what? | The solid waste is what didn't get absorbed in your intestines.
The "liquid" waste is all the stuff that was absorbed and needs to be flushed out again or the waste products of using the absorbed stuff. And it's only liquid because water is used as a transport medium.
So imagine you have a bag of apples. And you only... | [
"Solid waste means any garbage or refuse, sludge from a wastewater treatment plant, water supply treatment plant, or an air pollution control facility and other discarded material, including solid, liquid, semi-solid, or contained gaseous material resulting from industrial, commercial, mining, and agricultural oper... |
Native American names like "Wyoming", "Miami" and "Wabash" have been applied to areas of the United States hundreds and thousands of miles away from the tribes whose languages they came from. Why? | In early colonial times a lot of European explorers recorded Native American Indian (I'll just say "Indian" after this) names for places and these became a normal part of the named American landscape. In later colonial times and through the Revolutionary era Indian names generally fell out of fashion, as a lot of settl... | [
"Original inhabitants of the region include the Crow, Arapaho, Lakota, and Shoshone. Southwestern Wyoming was in the Spanish Empire and then Mexican territory until it was ceded to the United States in 1848 at the end of the Mexican–American War. The region acquired the name \"Wyoming\" when a bill was introduced t... |
Why are snowflakes 6 sided if the hydrogen bonds in in groups of 5? | It's 5 molecules in a tetrahedron [like this](_URL_0_), with one water molecule's oxygen atom in the center and the others at the corners of the tetrahedron. Stack those tetrahedrons on top of each other [like this](_URL_1_) and you get the hexagonally-symmetric crystal structure of ordinary ice (Ice Ih).
| [
"Hydrogen is noted for the different ways it forms bonds. It most commonly forms covalent bonds. It can lose its single valence electron in aqueous solution, leaving behind a bare proton with tremendous polarising power. This subsequently attaches itself to the lone electron pair of an oxygen atom in a water molecu... |
What was life like for a 14th Century Nun in France? | Most nuns had it pretty good. Their days were spent in religious activities (prayer, etc.), as well as more secular pursuits such as tending to the sick and poor. Many abbeys and monasteries were the medieval equivalent to our hospitals and motels - a haven for those who were sick or who needed a bed to sleep in while ... | [
"During the 17th century, over 80,000 women lived and were educated in convents. Nuns never received monetary compensation. They served without salary, surviving on charity. Although many young girls lived in the convents, they were not nuns. Every European city had at least one convent and some had dozens or more.... |
why are there specific rules about going faster in the left lane when everyone there is inevitably speeding? | It's not about how fast you're going, it's about not impeding traffic. The left lane is for passing, not for traveling in. | [
"In some US states (such as Louisiana, Massachusetts and New York), although there are laws requiring all traffic on a public way to use the right-most lane unless overtaking, this rule is often ignored and seldom enforced on multi-lane roadways. Some states, such as Colorado, use a combination of laws and signs re... |
in regards to how a candidate is selected to run for their respective party in the united states, what is a delegate, and why do those delegates get to vote for the candidate as opposed to the electoral vote process? | The federal electoral process is a constitutionally mandated process. Every step of the election is dictated by the constitution. The elections are designed to represent everyone's vote as equally as possible (yes, there are objections to electoral college, but that is a different topic for a different argument) beca... | [
"In the modern U.S. presidential election process, voters participating in the presidential primaries are actually helping to select many of the delegates to these conventions, who then in turn are pledged to help a specific presidential candidate get nominated. Other delegates to these conventions include politica... |
why is it, when one thinks about scary times in one's life- (a close call with death, for example)- that fear and adrenaline will flood your body, even if you are sitting on your couch, on dry land, far from the river that you almost drowned in? (as one example.) | It doesn't take much to trigger the body's sympathetic nervous response. It's designed to be on a hair trigger. A life or death experience, realizing you haven't studied for that test today, or even thinking viscerally about these experiences can trigger it.
When you're an animal intent on surviving having a hair trig... | [
"There are also popular notions that someone can be \"scared to death\" or die of loneliness or heartbreak. Experiencing fear, extreme stress, or both can cause changes in the body that can, in turn, lead to death. For example, it is possible that overstimulation of the Vagus nerve—which decreases heart rate in a m... |
when lawyers choose to represent someone, does the person tell the lawyer that they're guilty? | This is actually an unresolved ethics issue.
Believe it or not lawyers are not allowed to lie in court - though lying requires them to have actual knowledge that what they are saying is a lie.
Because of that the standard ethical advice to defense attorneys is not to ask, and to stop a client if it sounds like they... | [
"The law provides for due process. Defendants are presumed innocent. They have the right to a public trial and to be present during their trial. Juries are not used. All defendants, regardless of the court or their ability to pay, have the legal right to representation by counsel during proceedings. Although a cour... |
Do we stop feeling temperature changes after a certain point? | The reason for not feeling it heat up more is because your water heater is set to heat to a certain maximum temperature. If you go to your water heater and look on the bottom of it there is a dial or screw that let's you increase and decrease maximum heat output.
To answer your question, once your nerve endings are d... | [
"Changes to the normal human body temperature may result in discomfort. The most common such change is a fever, a temporary elevation of the body's thermoregulatory set-point, typically by about 1–2 °C (1.8–3.6 °F). Hyperthermia is an acute condition caused by the body absorbing more heat than it can dissipate, whe... |
Dragon banners in pre-Norman Britain? | There's some information on dragons and source material in [our FAQ](_URL_0_). You might want to begin there. | [
"The ultimate source for the symbolism of white dragons in England would appear to be Geoffrey of Monmouth’s fictional work, \"The History of the Kings of Britain\" (c. 1136), which recounts an incident in the life of Merlin where a red dragon is seen fighting a white dragon and prevailing. The red dragon was taken... |
If the solar sytem is revolving around the Milky way, is our galaxy revolving around something? | No, at those scales time to consider something revolving around anything else becomes too big for detection, but then again this might be of interest [_URL_0_](_URL_1_) . | [
"This motion is caused by the movement of the stars relative to the Sun and Solar System. The Sun travels in a nearly circular orbit (the \"solar circle\") about the center of the Milky Way at a speed of about 220 km/s at a radius of from the center, which can be taken as the rate of rotation of the Milky Way itsel... |
Does mass increase when temperature increase? | > I did the maths for 1000m3 of water, the supposed mass variation from 10°C to 90°C is 3.7 mg. I guess it is big enough to have been measured with something more stable than water.
Your calculation is correct, but 1000 m^3 of water has a mass of around 10^9 g. Measuring a fractional change in mass of about 3.7x10^(-... | [
"Once the mass is displaced from its equilibrium position, it experiences a net restoring force. As a result, it accelerates and starts going back to the equilibrium position. When the mass moves closer to the equilibrium position, the restoring force decreases. At the equilibrium position, the net restoring force ... |
since the iss is moving so fast, does nasa need to account for doppler shift in the radio signal? how do they account for this considering the iss uses fm? | NASA (and all communications with fast moving satellites) use Dynamic Doppler Compensation, where the frequency of the broadcasts are adjusted progressively through the broadcast to ensure that the receiver maintains a solid signal on the correct frequency. | [
"Along with the hydrogen maser, a microwave repeater was also included in the probe in order to measure the Doppler shift of the maser signal. A Doppler shift occurs when a source is moving relative to the observer of that source, and results in a shift in the frequency that corresponds to the direction and magnitu... |
Were the Greco-Persian Wars really that significant for the Achaemenid Empire? | Not to criticize your question--which I will answer--but right off the bat, you might want to tone down your assumptions. I know it's fashionable to bash school curricula, but in this case, it's possibly unwise. I can't speak for every elementary system, but I can speak for California's state curriculum as it relates ... | [
"The Greco-Persian Wars had their roots in the conquest of the Greek cities of Asia Minor, and particularly Ionia, by the Achaemenid Persian Empire of Cyrus the Great shortly after 550 BC. The Persians found the Ionians difficult to rule, eventually settling for sponsoring a tyrant in each Ionian city. While Greek ... |
Why are some people naturally resistant to many medications? | The effectiveness of drugs in different people is due to a persons genetics. There is many times a correlation in groups of people such as race or a family due to these groups having related genetics. For instance certain races will metabolize certain drugs faster or slower than others so dosage may need to be increase... | [
"Targeting medication to people who are genetically susceptible to a disease but do not yet show the symptoms of it can be a questionable measure. In large populations, there is concern that likely most of the people taking preventative medications would never have developed the disease anyway. Many medications car... |
Would it be possible to 3d print a set of fingerprints to "wear" over your own? | You don't need a 3D printer for that, this has been done with [plaster casts and liquid silicone](_URL_0_).
Of course, with a 3D printer you could copy the prints of some unwitting victim by scanning them off a flat surface and making a 3D mold off that. | [
"Numerous security printing techniques have been used to attempt to enhance the security of ID cards. For example, many modern documents include holograms, which are difficult to replicate without expensive equipment which is not generally available. Though accurate recreation of these holograms is extremely diffic... |
why can't we make energy using chlorophyll? | the day we're able to totally mimic what organelles do in an artificial environment will be a MASSIVE day for science. Sadly, thats pretty far outside our abilities at the moment. Besides, photosynthesis isnt actually the most efficient way to make energy, and our current ways are probably "better" anyway | [
"The light energy captured by chlorophyll \"a\" is initially in the form of electrons (and later a proton gradient) that's used to make molecules of ATP and NADPH which temporarily store and transport energy. Their energy is used in the light-independent reactions of the Calvin cycle by the enzyme rubisco to produc... |
what do foundries actually do? | Imagine it like a machine shop.
Company A orders a design from a Engineering company B. These designs are manufactured by Machine shop C. Machine shop C needs a special tools that it orders from Specialist company D. Machine shops C needs stock that it gets from supplier E.
Like. A processor is extremely complicated ... | [
"Emery is a producer of commodity and specialty chemicals made from natural oils and fats. It is one of the largest oleochemical manufacturers in the United States, along with Vantage Specialty Chemicals.\n",
"Floristry is the production, commerce and trade in flowers. It encompasses flower care and handling, flo... |
how were scientists able to "photograph the oldest light in the universe"? how were they even able to know the age of a light source? | Easy: light travels, so the light that's from the furthest away source is also older.
If you want to get a little more complicated, as the universe expands, it causes the waves of light to "stretch", which we see as frequency decreasing, the light gets redder, until it's infrared, then radio, then microwave.
So, th... | [
"The study of ancient perceptions of light developed from many disparate sources — archaeologists, artists, antiquarians, and astronomers — with precursors reaching back at least a millennium. In 1998, archaeologist Ronnie Scott speculated that Neolithic passage tombs in Scotland might have been used as camera obsc... |
the basic refrigeration cylce | There are 3 things at work here.
1: A gas will heat up when compressed, and cool down when expanded.
2: A liquid absorbs heat to evaporate into a gas, and a gas releases heat when condensing into a liquid. This heat is the heat of vaporization.
3: A gas can be made to condense under pressure, and evaporated back int... | [
"Vapor-compression refrigeration or vapor-compression refrigeration system (VCRS), in which the refrigerant undergoes phase changes, is one of the many refrigeration cycles and is the most widely used method for air-conditioning of buildings and automobiles. It is also used in domestic and commercial refrigerators,... |
When and why did the stocks/pillory stop being a punishment? | In London, it began to decline in popularity as a form of punishment because the spectacle often caused riots or other public disorder and sometimes resulted in the unintended injury or death of the convict due to thrown projectiles.
Historian Emma Griffin writes: "Historians have drawn attention to a cluster of bel... | [
"The stocks were employed by civil and military authorities from medieval to early modern times including Colonial America. Public punishment in the stocks was a common occurrence from around 1500 until at least 1748. The stocks were especially popular among the early American Puritans, who frequently employed the ... |
registers and stacks (computers) | In the future, please explain your question more thoroughly than this. Your question is broad to the point of being meaningless, but I will make an attempt at it anyway because I'm bored.
> Registers
Registers are physical parts of a processor which can be read from and written to extremely efficiently. Operation... | [
"In computer architecture, a processor register is a quickly accessible location available to a computer's central processing unit (CPU). Registers usually consist of a small amount of fast storage, although some registers have specific hardware functions, and may be read-only or write-only. Registers are typically... |
for someone to short a stock, does someone else need to be going long? | Whoever actually owns the stock is going long. If you're shorting stock, you're borrowing it from someone who owns it, and that person is going long. | [
"Short sellers must be aware of the potential for a short squeeze. When the price of a stock rises significantly, some people who are shorting the stock cover their positions to limit their losses (this may occur in an automated way if the short sellers had stop-loss orders in place with their brokers); others may ... |
Why do I unconsciously emulate the accent of those around me? | This phenomenon is known as "phonetic convergence" within linguistics. While there are ton of studies discussing the phenomenon, (it seems to me as though the exact reason "why" is still uncertain) I thought this study was the most useful in answering your question:
[Phonetic convergence in spontaneous conversations... | [
"The affective processing approach proposes that the positive-bias exhibited for others who speak with an own-accent is produced by a (potentially unconscious) emotional reaction. Put simply, people like others who have the same accent as themselves for that precise reason; they like it. This theory has developed, ... |
Did Native Americans (North and South) self-identify with tribe names? How did they refer to themselves? | That is true, most tribe names known by non-Indians are not titles originally used by Indians themselves.
Members of the Blackfeet Confederacy are believed to have been given the nickname "Blackfeet" by outsiders referring to the dark bottoms of their moccasins. The Blackfeet referred to themselves as Niitzitapi, whi... | [
"Herman also noted that some of the common names for Native American tribes are derogatory. Sometimes one tribe described another tribe with a derogatory term in their language and it stuck as the common name for that tribe. For example, the word \"Comanche\" is a word in the Ute language that means in English \"an... |
Is it pure coincidence that the borders of Catholicism in Western Europe correspond with the the borders of the Roman Empire? | The borders of the Roman Empire at what point? The roman Empire covered areas that are currently Muslim and Orthodox as well. This [article](_URL_0_) may interest you. | [
"Many Roman Catholic dioceses and other jurisdictions had borders deviating from the political boundaries often changing with the many wars in Central Europe. This led to the situation where parts of one diocese or jurisdiction lay in different countries. The territory of pre-1815 Brandenburg (thus without Lower Lu... |
How do GPS receivers work without an accurate clock? | Each GPS satellite sends out two things: where it is, and when it was there. Now, as long as each GPS satellite is in synch (which they are), then all your receiver needs to do is accurately measure the time between receiving signals, which is much easier than knowing exactly what time it is.
For a more complete desc... | [
"GPS satellite navigation receivers also internally generate accurate time information from the satellite signals. Dedicated GPS timing receivers are accurate to better than 1 microsecond; however, general-purpose or consumer grade GPS may have an offset of up to one second between the internally calculated time, w... |
why cell phone companies don’t implement some kind of public key authentication to track robocalls? | This would require basically rebuilding the world's PBX systems from scratch.
Cellphones would require an OS update and without it, you'd be unable to make calls. For Android, cell manufacturers are generally expected to provide OS updates. Are they going to provide an update for EVERY model? What about non-smartphone... | [
"Two-factor authentication is an option in iOS to ensure that even if an unauthorized person knows an Apple ID and password combination, they cannot gain access to the account. It works by requiring not only the Apple ID and password, but also a verification code that is sent to a device that is already known to be... |
During the times of slavery (Ancient Rome and America) how did free people get a job and make a living? | Despite the enormous numbers of slaves in the Roman world, they made up a minority of the total population of the Mediterranean. Slave labor could never provide for all the labor demands of the Mediterranean world in the first place.
More importantly, the assumption that free labor and slave labor are interchangeable... | [
"Slavery in ancient Rome played an important role in society and the economy. Besides manual labor, slaves performed many domestic services, and might be employed at highly skilled jobs and professions. Accountants and physicians were often slaves. Slaves of Greek origin in particular might be highly educated. Unsk... |
why does lower resolution video, like 480 on youtube, look the same on a phone as on tv? should he more concentrated pixels make it more clear? | You hold your phone a lot closer to your face than your TV is. That makes a huge difference. | [
"Because of its 480x480 resolution, SVCD picture quality is more than double that of VCD. On the downside, this increase in picture resolution sacrifices video length capacity by over 50%. Because of this, titles released on SVCD had to come on twice the number of discs.\n",
"A similar paradox applies to the vert... |
Why don't we breathe in the air we just exhaled? | A combination of things.
Firstly, you will inhale some of what you exhale, the reasons you don't re-inhale it all are (but probably are not limited to):
Exhaling gas with momentum drives it away from your mouth, this creates a slight vacuum which air from around your mouth will move in to fill. (interestingly this pr... | [
"Breathing (or ventilation) is the process of moving air into and out of the lungs to facilitate gas exchange with the internal environment, mostly by bringing in oxygen and flushing out carbon dioxide.\n",
"The main reason for exhalation is to rid the body of carbon dioxide, which is the waste product of gas exc... |
why has japan decided to send troops abroad? | The whole idea behind this new legislation is simply opening up newer avenues for Japanese industry - especially the military one. In recent years, as conentional industry has become stagnant, Japanese firms jave been trying really hard to diversify. Japan produces some top notch military hardware, but currently it cat... | [
"The Koizumi administration originally ordered the controversial formation and deployment of the JIRSG at the request of the United States. This marks a significant turning point in Japan's history, as it represents the first foreign deployment of Japanese troops since the end of World War II, excluding those deplo... |
how the hell can an almost 20 year old game cartridge (poke gold) know the exact time of day? | The cartridge has a built-in battery. This battery keeps the part of the catridge that has save file going when it is not being provided power (in the gameboy). So, just like a normal clock, it just keeps on going. Thus, if this battery runs out, your save file is gone and its time to re-buy the game. | [
"The battery life is about three hours for 6 AA batteries. This is also a problem for other color and backlit or sidelit handhelds of the time, such as the Game Gear at 5–6 hours, the Sega Nomad at 2–3 hours, and the Atari Lynx at more than 4 hours. Nintendo's Game Boy had a 40-hour lifespan on 4 AA batteries.\n",
... |
Is it possible to orbit the moon? | Absolutely. We've done so countless times. Even a lot of humans.
Point is almost all low lunar orbits are unstable over long term because of unevenness of the density of the Moon (mascons). The Apollo program people were acutely aware of this.
Relatively recently however it was discovered there exist a few inclinatio... | [
"Earth orbit rendezvous (EOR) is a potential methodology for conducting round trip human flights to the Moon, involving the use of space rendezvous to assemble, and possibly fuel, components of a translunar vehicle in low Earth orbit. It was considered and ultimately rejected in favor of lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR... |
how is the list of names for the credits in movies compiled? is it someone's dedicated job? | Short answer: It depends!
Long answer: Every production is an entity in and of itself. Not necessarily every person that works would be included in the credits (i.e. a PA that worked a single day), especially on TV where the credits are short, but there's a running list of every department and every regular person who... | [
"Credits for motion pictures often include the name of any locales (i.e., cities, states, and countries if outside of the US) used to film scenes, as well as any organizations not related to the production (e.g., schools, government entities, military bases, etc.) that played a role in the filming.\n",
"The credi... |
I’m a frail Jewish person who’s shuffling to the gates of my Concentration camp that’s just been liberated by whom ever, What so is I now that my camp is liberated? Where am I put for medical reasons and how would I get back to my home? | There is of course always more to say, but you will probably be interested in [this previous answer](_URL_0_) from /u/commiespaceinvader. | [
"Although most of the Jews from the camp were evacuated to Partisan-held territory, 204 (7.5%) of them, the elderly or sick, were left behind and were sent to Auschwitz by the Germans for extermination. Ivan Vranetić was honored as one of the Croatian Righteous among the Nations for helping save the Jews evacuated ... |
what is the difference between dopamines and endorphins in terms of how they affect your body? | I thought that dopamine was a neurotransmitter, whereas endorphins are a class of hormones. I could be in error | [
"Endorphins (contracted from \"endogenous morphine\") are endogenous opioid neuropeptides and peptide hormones in humans and other animals. They are produced by the central nervous system and the pituitary gland. The term \"endorphins\" implies a pharmacological activity (analogous to the activity of the corticoste... |
Was there ever any attempt by the Anglo-saxon kingdoms of the British isles to seek help from the Angles and Saxons of the continent during the viking age? | In short, no. The "Angles" and "Saxons" had no reason to help their insular cousins, lacked the capability to do so, and were no longer really operating in the same capacity across the North Sea as they had in centuries prior. For the sake of simplicity I will keep the usage of Angle and Saxon, but it is worth mentio... | [
"Ermentar records the first Viking raid on continental Europe against his monastery in 799. According to him, from 819 the monks were forced to spend summers on the mainland because of the Vikings. In 836, they finally relocated inland permanently and in 843 the Vikings took over Noirmoutier and made it their base ... |
Does this guy really believe this or is it just a major troll/scam to get people to buy his stuff? OR does it actually have any real scientific foundation? | A fun fact about vacuum energy: The estimate he is using is one of the earlier estimates made. This estimate became famous because it was probably the worst estimate in history that has actually been published. The value was off by a factor of 10^120.
Ps. No one actually believed this estimate, it was just published ... | [
"The article noted, to be sure, that some members of the scientific community “flatly refus[ed] to believe Bernard Fisher could commit bad science,” quoting New York cancer researcher Dr. James Holland as asking: “Do you think...the Pope takes money out of a collection box?”\n",
"Several scientists have expressed... |
the difference between starvation mode and caloric dificit | 'Starvation mode' is something that's only a concern for people that no longer have any significant amount of body fat. It's something that was observed during the '[Minnesota starvation experiment](_URL_1_)', which was conducted to study the nutritional needs of malnourished people following World War 2.
The particip... | [
"Some research has pointed toward hormesis as an explanation for the benefits of caloric restriction, representing beneficial actions linked to a low-intensity biological stressor such as reduced calorie intake. As a potential role for caloric restriction, the diet imposes a low-intensity biological stress on the o... |
how are there so many languages that use the same alphabet? | All you have to do is look at who used the Latin alphabet to learn how it began to spread. The Romans conquered vast territories, and their linguistic influence can still be felt all over Europe in the form of the Romance languages. As descendants of Latin, those languages naturally used the same alphabet. With the spr... | [
"Although at first glance, they may seem similar, there are many differences in the way the different languages use the alphabets. For example, similar words are written differently in Persian and Arabic, as they are used differently.\n",
"Most languages are written with a mixture of two distinct but phonetically... |
this new quantum thing | Some guys wrote a paper proposing a new concept of the nature of the universe, in which it does not have a beginning or an end, to go alongside the slew of other concepts of the nature of the universe. So far, they like their idea, and will presumably want other people to look at it for holes, flaws, etc. No more, no l... | [
"Quantum is a Mozilla project encompassing several software development efforts to \"build the next-generation web engine for Firefox users\". It includes numerous improvements to the Gecko, largely incorporated from the experimental Servo project. Quantum also includes refinements to the user interface and interac... |
Piracy was said to have ended in the Caribbean and the American eastern seaboard between 1720-30. Were there still some secret acts of Piracy, or any reports of Pirates and their ships after 1720-30? | Piracy did not end, but the increased activity of the British Navy caused it to decline in the early 18th century. Still, piracy continued long after the 1720s. Privateering was a factor in every naval war of the period, and that's just dressed-up piracy. The last famous pirate I can think of is Jean Lafitte, who allie... | [
"In the early 19th century, piracy along the East and Gulf Coasts of North America as well as in the Caribbean increased again. Jean Lafitte was just one of hundreds of pirates operating in American and Caribbean waters between the years of 1820 and 1835. The United States Navy repeatedly engaged pirates in the Car... |
Why didn't the Marines lead the D-Day assault? | During WW2 there were 89 U.S. Army divisions and six Marine divisions.
In June 1944, those six divisions were:
1. Recovering after heavy fighting in New Guinea.
2. About to be hurled into the Battle of Saipan.
3. Preparing to attack Guam.
4. About to join the 2nd Division in battle at Saipan.
5. In reserve during th... | [
"After fending off another coordinated assault, the Marines were low on ammunition, and all of them had been wounded by that point. While the frustrated pilots circled the area without being able to see clear targets, a C-47 deployed flares for illumination at around 01:00. Early into the morning, as Marines traded... |
why do the more vibrant colored animals/plants originate from tropical climates? | TL;DR Evolutionary pressures like competition for mates, visibility for pollinators and fruit eaters, and scaring away predators, all encourage organisms to produce bright colors, and these pressures are more extreme in the tropics, where organisms live in higher densities.
Tropical climates tend to have denser vegeta... | [
"Many groups of plants have developed iridescence as an adaptation to use more light in dark environments such as the lower levels of tropical forests. The leaves of Southeast Asia's \"Begonia pavonina\", or peacock begonia, appear iridescent azure to human observers due to each leaf's thinly layered photosynthetic... |
since the earth is round, wouldn't planes get into space by flying in a straight line? | Planes don't fly in straight lines. They fly along the curvature of the Earth. Just like when you drive a car, you're not driving in a straight line (because your car would fly up into space if you could). | [
"For example, consider an airplane that travels in a straight line, takes a 90-degree right turn, travels another , takes another 90-degree right turn, and travels a third time. On a flat Earth, the aircraft would have travelled along three sides of a square, and arrive at a spot about from where it started. But be... |
why is it that sometimes when water touches me unexpectedly, it feels painful? | It's simply that you aren't expecting it, and the temperature difference is usually very different to your skin. As soon as you feel this difference, your body jumps and reacts.
| [
"There may be a significant difference between touching a few tentacles with fingertips at a beach and accidentally swimming into one. The initial sensation is more strange than painful and feels like swimming into warmer and somewhat effervescent water. Some minor pains will soon follow. Normally there is no real ... |
Assuming that the waters of Europa aren't frozen, how would the mass of Jupiter affect Europa's tides and currents? | Amusingly, Wikipedia has an article about the [theoretical terraforming of Europa](_URL_0_).
The real challenge would be the gravity. It should be about 1/16th of Earth's, so the atmosphere will leak like a sieve (given the low gravity, and the stresses from being so close to Jupiter).
That's not insurmountable, but ... | [
"Ocean tides are converted to heat by frictional losses in the oceans and their interaction with the solid bottom and with the top ice crust. In late 2008, it was suggested Jupiter may keep Europa's oceans warm by generating large planetary tidal waves on Europa because of its small but non-zero obliquity. This gen... |
why does ™ and ® need to be after every instance of a company slogan or brand name? | It doesn't need to be there, but it's a reminder that a logo is trademarked or that a work is registered with a patient office. Copyrights are applied automatically when a work is created. Anything else done is not required but can make protecting it in the future easier. | [
"The two symbols associated with trademarks, ™ (the trademark symbol) and ® (the registered trademark symbol), represent the status of a mark and accordingly its level of protection. While ™ can be used with any common law usage of a mark, ® may only be used by the owner of a mark following registration with the re... |
How and when did dissent (or opposition) towards the First World War emerge in the different belligerent nations of Europe? | Some pointers for Germany, I don't know English language books, but Wikipedia should have some sources:
For the Spirit of 1914 have a look at the [original article published by Tucholsky](_URL_0_)
The relevant term in German is *Burgfrieden*, were the parties united behind the Kaiser, except for one member of parlia... | [
"During the onset of World War I, socialist political parties in Austria, Britain, France, Germany and Russia went along with the nationalist current and decided to support their nations' interventionist policies during the war. At this point, most of the socialist parties and members that held positions in the Sec... |
How much data do the different senses process? | If we can see down to the arcminute (60th of a degree), and can see 120 degrees left, right, up, down, and refresh 30 times a second, and we can differentiate 1000 colours, that's about 1.5 terabytes/second. | [
"The amount of sensory data collected pose a huge storage problem and require real-time signal processing to reduce the raw data to relevant derived information. In mid 2011 it was estimated the array could generate an exabyte a day of raw data, which could be compressed to around 10 petabytes.\n",
"There is a wi... |
why do people often look for a consensus in order to determine the validity of something, specifically in science, when historically, there have been many instances of the general consensus being wrong. | When your first example doesn't hold up, it sorta weakens your argument. _URL_0_ | [
"There are many philosophical and historical theories as to how scientific consensus changes over time. Because the history of scientific change is extremely complicated, and because there is a tendency to project \"winners\" and \"losers\" onto the past in relation to our \"current\" scientific consensus, it is ve... |
how can someone have manufacturing control of a drug that's out of patent? | Simply because they're the only company with a factory that produces it and government approval to say that the product they're manufacturing is safe. Legally there's nothing to stop anyone else producing a generic version, but until now no one has been interested in doing so because there was no profit to be made from... | [
"Depending on a number of considerations, a company may apply for and be granted a patent for the drug, or the process of producing the drug, granting exclusivity rights typically for about 20 years. However, only after rigorous study and testing, which takes 10 to 15 years on average, will governmental authorities... |
When it comes to massive projects like designing a rocket from the ground up (as SpaceX has done, for example), where does one even start? | Short answer: That's exactly what systems engineering is about.
Long answer: They start with very simplified concepts and models that are to be refined gradually. Typically a space agency like NASA or ESA will perform a feasibility study and a preliminary cost estimate before issuing an "invitation to tender". Industr... | [
"In July 2017, SpaceX made public plans to build a much smaller launch vehicle and spacecraft prior to building the ITS, and stated that the new system architecture had \"evolved quite a bit\" since the November 2016 articulation of the very large \"ITS launch vehicle.\" A key driver of the new architecture is to m... |
what is the relationship between a british royal title and the location mentioned in the title - for example, what does the duke of cambridge have to do with cambridge the place? | The land is owned in a portfolio. A percentage of the revenues from the land is given to the Royal family as a stipend; the rest goes into the government budget.
_URL_0_ | [
"Duke of Cambridge, one of the six current royal dukedoms in the United Kingdom, is a hereditary title of specific rank of nobility in the British royal family. The title (named after the city of Cambridge in England) is hereditary among male agnatic descendants of the titleholder by primogeniture, and has been con... |
What are the sources for claims such as "in middle ages the life expectancy was of 40 years"? | More of an archaeological or maybe math question than a historical one. It’s an average not an actual statistic. Child mortality rates were very high and that brings down the average life expectancy of the whole population. For example, if a child dies at two years old and an adult at 78 then the average is 40 years. P... | [
"In 1988, Dychtwald began popularizing the term “middlescence\" a theory which suggests that with the modern postponement of old age due to extended longevity, and the multiplying numbers of people who were reinventing themselves post-youth, a new middlescent lifestage was rising up between 45 and 65.\n",
"Estima... |
comic sans. | To be short... Because it's an unprofessional, childish, ugly font... | [
"The terminology used to describe photo comics is somewhat inconsistent and idiosyncratic. \"Fumetti\" is an Italian word (literally \"little puffs of smoke\", in reference to word balloons), which refers in that language to any kind of comics. Because of the popularity of photo comics in Italy, \"fumetti\" became ... |
Can wifi signals be transferred though magnetic resonance? | Usually magnetic resonance refers to the near field effects from an inductor/capacitor resonator. If your inductor is a coil, you can easily find pictures of the shape of the magnetic field that is set up around the coil, and by using resonance you can focus currents at very specific frequencies in the circuit. If you ... | [
"Near-field magnetic induction (NFMI) communication systems differ from other wireless communications in that most conventional wireless RF systems use an antenna to generate, transmit, and propagate an electromagnetic wave. In these types of systems all of the transmission energy is designed to radiate into free s... |
if somebody is in a submarine/car underwater and has to swim to the surface, can they use a plastic bag as a reserve breath? | Let's assume that the person isn't killed by pressure right after getting out of the sub, and that he won't freeze, and the bag won't tear itself apart due to the aforementioned pressure difference.
The plastic bag will work for maybe two breaths. After that it is just as effective to just hold your breath. Humans c... | [
"\"Spare Air\" bailout bottles, introduced in the 1980s, are very small cylinders with integral scuba regulators. Their disadvantage is that in many emergency situations they do not have sufficient capacity to get a diver back to the surface safely, and thus may cause divers carrying them to feel an unjustified sen... |
how can 2 people who are genetically identical, grew together up together and had mostly the same experiences can have such different personalitys | There are things called epigenetic factors that are turned on and off selectively in different individuals, even in identical twins. Twin studies were actually invaluable in proving their existence for exactly that reason; if genes really were determined in an 'if x then y' way, then identical twins would be essentiall... | [
"\"No Two Alike: Human Nature and Human Individuality\", was published in February 2006. Harris attempts to explain why people are so different in personality, even identical twins who grow up in the same home.\n",
"No two humans—not even monozygotic twins—are genetically identical. Genes and environment influenc... |
Can GMO crops be pollinated by bees? | Yep, they can be pollinated by bees. Well, except for the ones not pollinated by bees, like corn, which is wind pollinated, and soy bean, which is self pollinated.
Sorry, I can't think of many sources for you saying that GE crops are not sterile since it is such basic knowledge, but you can get it right from the hors... | [
"Carpenter bees have been observed pollinating agricultural plants such as passionflower and cotton, but \"X. pubescens\" do not naturally pollinate any agricultural plants. However, in a greenhouse setting, \"X. pubescens\" have been shown to be a more effective pollinator of honeydew melon than honeybees by incre... |
if pain occurs when something is going wrong in my body, why doesn't losing feeling in a limb (limb falling asleep) hurt? | The nerves have blocked, your body is trying, but the telephone lines have been cut. The tingling after is the nerves comming back online | [
"Diseases such as peripheral vascular disease can also result in local hypoxia. For this reason, symptoms are worse when a limb is used. Pain may also be felt as a result of increased hydrogen ions leading to a decrease in blood pH (acidity) created as a result of anaerobic metabolism.\n",
"Congenital insensitivi... |
what is the mueller investigation and why is it important? | Mueller investigation is into any potential ties between Donald trump or his campaign and Russia. Its important because the absolute worst case scenario trump enlisted the help of Russia to put him in the oval office. This would mean he is compromised and could not be acting in the best interest of the American people,... | [
"The Mueller Report, officially titled Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election, is the official report documenting the findings and conclusions of Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 United States presidential e... |
why was fdr unsuccessful in getting universal health care, but the new deal, which changed american society practically overnight, was able to pass? | We might have thought the Great Depression would create the perfect conditions for passing compulsory health insurance in the US, but with millions out of work, unemployment insurance took priority followed by old age benefits. FDR’s Committee on Economic Security, the CES, feared that inclusion of health insurance in ... | [
"Since the beginning of the 20th century, progressives and later activists from the liberal and leftist side of the political spectrum had sought the establishment of universal health care through a mandatory government-run health insurance system or other programs. While these initiatives had often failed because ... |
Why does some blood oranges have different tones of red? | At first i assumed it was purely genetics controlling pigmentation, but I looked it up to be certain, apparently, pigmentation is controlled by [exposure to cold](_URL_1_). For the science behind this: _URL_0_
The article talks about a retrotransposon that gets inserted into the genome under stress and promotes a gene... | [
"Blood oranges are a natural mutation of \"C. sinensis\", although today the majority of them are hybrids. High concentrations of anthocyanin give the rind, flesh, and juice of the fruit their characteristic dark red color. Blood oranges were first discovered and cultivated in Sicily in the fifteenth century. Since... |
Are black pixels on a screen a dark shade of colours, or simply turned of pixels? | It depends on the manufacturer and type of display. On most screens, the components that handle color and those that handle lighting are separate. The color is, as you said, red, green, and blue subpixels, and the brightness is just a backlight.
On some newer displays, however, these two components are being merged ... | [
"Finally, another quirk of Wozniak's design is that while any pixel could be black or white, only pixels with odd X-coordinates could be green or orange. Likewise, only even-numbered pixels could be violet or blue. This is where the so-called \"fringe benefit\" comes in. The Apple video hardware interprets a sequen... |
how do ambulance sirens cause traffic lights to change? (if they even do; this might be a folk legend) | If you look near the traffic signals you'll see a little sensor facing in the direction where cars are coming from. Fire trucks and ambulances use a device (can be a focused light or infrared) that preempts the signal and makes it turn green. (There are other technologies used as well, these are just the ones I see aro... | [
"A siren on a passing emergency vehicle will start out higher than its stationary pitch, slide down as it passes, and continue lower than its stationary pitch as it recedes from the observer. Astronomer John Dobson explained the effect thus:\n",
"In addition to visual warnings, ambulances can be fitted with audib... |
why do most people subconsciously swing their legs when their feet are not touching the ground? | This is a fitting question coming from someone named RidiculousHomunculus. There are a few reasons why it might be happening. 1.) People simply enjoy any type of stimulation to their bodies, and that is a relatively easy way to get it. 2.) It is a form of stretching. Stretching feels good, and without your weight on t... | [
"BULLET::::- \"\"I don't feel that I am that different from other people. Normally everyone is used to do everything with one's hands so your hands are more flexible. There is no rule saying that you can't do things with your feet.\"\"\n",
"\"Posture is important. We need to stand up and move. However, other post... |
Do other stars have a 11 year sunspot cycle like our sun? | Hello, I'm a graduate student in astronomy and this paper just appeared on the ArxiV today: _URL_0_
To answer you directly: Neither Kepler nor TESS have had 11 years to find activity cycles with just brightness changes from starspots (though they have used starspots to identify the rotation periods of stars).
But lo... | [
"At a distance of about eight light-minutes, the most frequently studied star is the Sun, a typical main-sequence dwarf star of stellar class G2 V, and about 4.6 billion years (Gyr) old. The Sun is not considered a variable star, but it does undergo periodic changes in activity known as the sunspot cycle. This is a... |
if it's illegal to use cellphones while driving for non hands free calling, why is it legal for truck drivers to use radios for communicating in the same way? | The fear with a cell phone is that you have to look at it while you use it, even for a short period of time. A truck driver is so use to picking up the radio it is literally muscle memory for them to do that task. While there is a learning curve for the truck driver it is something that becomes safer as they train the ... | [
"Current US laws are not strictly enforced. Punishments are so mild that people pay little attention. Drivers are not categorically prohibited from using phones while driving. For example, using earphones to talk and texting with a hands-free device remain legal.\n",
"Driving while using a hands-free device is no... |
In what ways was the Soviet Union beneficial to the territories it gained after WW2? | The clear distinction to make is that the governments "claimed" by the Soviet Union following the Second World War (Great Patriotic War) were their own separate governments that had political ties that waxed and waned during the Cold War till the end when majority broke free from communism and thus the pressure of Mosc... | [
"In the aftermath of World War II, the Soviet Union extended its political and military influence over Eastern Europe, in a move that was seen by some as a continuation of the older policies of the Russian Empire. Some territories that had been lost by Soviet Russia in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918) were annexe... |
At the molecular level, what changes in Sodium when it bonds with Chlorine to prevent it from exploding in water? | Well you've got a bit of a misunderstanding on what is in the water (I assume you are referring to dissolving table salt, NaCl in water).
If you were to, say, put solid sodium and gaseous chlorine into water you would have yourself quite the show. The sodium would react with the water and Chlorine, the chlorine would ... | [
"This driving force is what causes sodium and chlorine to undergo a chemical reaction, wherein the \"extra\" electron is transferred from sodium to chlorine, forming sodium cations and chloride anions. Being oppositely charged, these cations and anions form ionic bonds and combine to form sodium chloride, NaCl, mor... |
why do nuclear power stations need cooling towers instead of using the excess heat to create more electricity? | Cooling towers are actually more common in coal fired plants, though they can be used in nuke plants also. Both types of plants use the energy to heat water and turn it into steam and the steam then powers a turbine to create electricity.
Once the steam has done its job of powering the turbine, you then need to turn t... | [
"Industrial cooling towers can be used to remove heat from various sources such as machinery or heated process material. The primary use of large, industrial cooling towers is to remove the heat absorbed in the circulating cooling water systems used in power plants, petroleum refineries, petrochemical plants, natur... |
when i prepay cash for gas, why does the pump have to slow down to an absolute crawl for the last 40 cents of gas that i pump? | Precision. The machinery isn't good enough to stop from full flow on a dime (or a penny, in this case). It slows down to make sure it cuts you off at the right amount, and you don't get extra gas. | [
"The vast majority of gas pumps with pay-at-the-pump capabilities will place a temporary hold on a certain amount of money, generally $75-$150, in a customer's account following the use of a debit or credit card to make a purchase. The pump must do this pre-authorization before allowing a customer to pump fuel to g... |
How can yeast produce THC? | Disclosure: I know one of the members of the company profiled, though we've never talked about this work.
This is done by introducing biosynthetic enzymes into a yeast. If the pathway that a plant uses to make the compound is known, you can clone the genes, insert them into the yeast, and then make sure they have the ... | [
"Nutritional yeast is produced by culturing a yeast in a nutrient medium for several days. The primary ingredient in the growth medium is glucose, often from either sugarcane or beet molasses. When the yeast is ready, it is deactivated with heat and then harvested, washed, dried and packaged. The species of yeast u... |
Supermoon Eclipse Megathread | I'm just going to cut in here and thank the moderators for not using the term "blood moon" or "super blood moon". It's a "total lunar eclipse" - one that happens to occur near perigee - because that's what we've called it for centuries.
The term "blood moon" is a relatively recent term popularized by crazy Christian P... | [
"A supermoon is the coincidence of a full moon or a new moon with the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth on its elliptical orbit, resulting in the largest apparent size of the lunar disk as seen from Earth. This was the last supermoon lunar eclipse until 31 January 2018.\n",
"A supermoon is a full moon ... |
Would a coat of ultra-hydrophobic material on the bottom of boats help reduce wear from seawater? | The bigger issue is aggregation of all the random organisms in the seawater. Barnacles, and random other things. | [
"Underwater air retaining surfaces are of great interest for technical applications. If a transfer of the effect to a technical surface is successful, ship hulls could be coated with this surface to reduce friction between ship and water resulting in less fuel consumption, fuel costs and reduction of its negative e... |
Is there any correlation between cold temperatures and diseases? Specially influenza, pneumonia and bronchitis. | The popularly held belief is that change in temperature has no real effect on making a person susceptible to infectious disease. That is, being out in the cold or rain won't actually make you catch a cold. However, we still see spikes in things like influenza in the states during colder weather...and old wive's tales a... | [
"It can be difficult to distinguish between the common cold and influenza in the early stages of these infections. Influenza symptoms are a mixture of symptoms of common cold and pneumonia, body ache, headache, and fatigue. Diarrhea is not usually a symptom of influenza in adults, although it has been seen in some ... |
why are fancy dishes that no one uses called "china"? | China used to be the only place on earth where really high-quality porcelain was produced. Europeans tried for many decades (centuries?) to work out how to make it, and they called it "China ware." | [
" is the adjective for \"Japanese\" style \"Chinese\" dishes, or the restaurants in Japan which serve them. Chuka dishes originated in China, but have become modified over the years to suit Japanese taste, often with Japanese or even Western foods. They have changed enough that they are not identified as Chinese di... |
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