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In Roman history the word 'barbarian' is applied to many people. What was the quality of life for these 'barbarians' and how savage were they? | Like you say, it was applied to many people. In the context you're using it in, the term more or less meant "non-Romanized/Hellenized person." Which means everybody living outside the Empire's boarders, and often a hefty chunk of the people living _within_ those boarders.
As such, it's nearly impossible to provide an... | [
"A barbarian is a human who is perceived to be either uncivilized or primitive. The designation is usually applied as generalization based on a popular stereotype; barbarians can be any member of a nation judged by some to be less civilized or orderly (such as a tribal society), but may also be part of a certain \"... |
Does smoking marijuana stems and seeds lead to impotence? | Some of my research has involved studies of cannabis use. While that by no means makes me an expert in all things cannabis, I have never heard this claim, and am quite certain that this has never been directly studied.
Lastly,
> I am pretty sure most of us heard this growing up
Might want to rethink that, given th... | [
"The cause is unknown, but it is thought to be caused by intracellular edema of the superficial epithelial cells coupled with retention of superficial parakeratin. Although leukoedema is thought to be a developmental condition, it may be more common and more pronounced in smokers, and becomes less noticeable when s... |
How much of Fermi's paradox can be explained by thinking: from each other's perspective, our home planets haven't formed yet? | Nah, that doesn't help. The Milky Way is only around 100,000 light years from side to side, so the time it takes for light to cross the galaxy is totally negligible compared to the cosmic timescale. | [
"The second aspect of the Fermi paradox is the argument of probability: given intelligent life's ability to overcome scarcity, and its tendency to colonize new habitats, it seems possible that at least some civilizations would be technologically advanced, seek out new resources in space, and colonize their own star... |
What was the traditional formation in a Spartan army? | The were basically the definition of a textbook hoplite phalanx. They would have been stacked 8 to 12 men deep in a line. The best men would have been on the right end of the phalanx as hoplites had a tendency to drift right in battle as each man naturally attempted to get behind the shield of the man to the right of t... | [
"Like the armies of the other Greek states, the Spartan army was an infantry-based army that fought using the phalanx formation. The Spartans themselves did not introduce any significant changes or tactical innovations in hoplite warfare, but their constant drill and superb discipline made their phalanx much more c... |
if the earth's moon was formed by a collision, how are other moons like europa formed? | The same way the moon did actually. The moon wasn't formed by the collision, it didn't 'knock the moon out of the earth'. What happened was there was now a collection of particles orbiting a body that were being held in by gravity. These objects also have gravity and slowly attract each other. Eventually these objects... | [
"According to the giant impact hypothesis, the Moon formed after a collision between two co-orbital objects—Theia, thought to have had about 10% of the mass of Earth (about as massive as Mars), and the proto-Earth—whose orbits were perturbed by other planets, bringing Theia out of its trojan position and causing th... |
if two different phones/tablets/computers are running the exact same os, how is it possible that one device can experience a bug/glitch but not the other device when performing the exact same task? | 1: A mechanical defect in the device. This could be something as large as a bad piece of solder on a board to as small as an actual defect in a chip, or anything in between.
2: Random cosmic ray strike. High energy particles from space can hit sensitive electronics and "flip" a bit from a 1 to a 0 or vice versa, c... | [
"Some of the software mentioned can also be run on different devices than what they are intended for. A particular case-in-point is the Android software which can often be run on laptops or PCs (running Linux, Windows or Mac OS X) as well. This can be done using emulators.\n",
"There is no set limit on how many c... |
cricket. | You have two sides, one out in the field and one in. Each man that's in the side that's in goes out, and when he's out he comes in and the next man goes in until he's out. When they are all out, the side that's out comes in and the side thats been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out. Sometimes you get men... | [
"Many theories exist about the origins of cricket. One suggests that the game began among shepherds hitting a stone or a ball of wool with their crooks and, at the same time, defending the wicket gate into the sheep-fold (from Anglo Saxon 'cricce', a crooked staff). A second theory suggests the name came from a low... |
Are there seasons in the deep ocean? | Kind of, depending on where you're looking and what you're looking for.
The [Antarctic Bottom Water (ABW)](_URL_0_) is a good example. ABW is the leftover water after sea ice forms on the surface. As sea ice forms from nearly pure water, the leftover is has high salt concentration compared to surrounding sea water, an... | [
"The deep ocean is both cold and dark with generally weak velocities (although limited areas of the deep ocean are known to have significant recirculations). The deep ocean is supplied with water from the upper ocean in only a few limited geographical regions: the subpolar North Atlantic and several sinking regions... |
How do microbes in the human body survive our immune systems? | It's not clear what "microbes in the human body" you're asking about. In general, there are very few microbes in the human body, and most of those that do get there are rapidly eliminated by the immune system.
But what about the enormous numbers of bacteria, etc, in the digestive system? Strictly speaking, those are... | [
"There are many species of bacteria and other microorganisms that live on or inside the healthy human body. In fact, 90% of the cells in (or on) a human body are microbes, by number (much less by mass or volume). Some of these symbionts are necessary for our health. Those that neither help nor harm humans are calle... |
If we kept up the research and development on steam engines would they be more efficient than our combustion engines today? | Modern, efficient steam engines are everywhere. Steam turbines are a huge improvement in terms of mechanical simplicity and efficiency over the piston design that springs to mind when you think of a "steam engine". Every power plant uses them to convert heat into rotary motion for electricity generation. They bump up a... | [
"Steam engines required large quantities of coal and water, which were expensive variable operating costs. Further, the thermal efficiency of steam was considerably less than that of diesel engines. Diesel's theoretical studies demonstrated potential thermal efficiencies for a compression ignition engine of 36% (co... |
why doesn't the ocean's water leak out the bottom and into the earth's crust/mantle? the ocean bottom can't be completely free of fissures, can it? | * the water doesn't have anywhere to go. There aren't gaping holes for stuff to fall into. Any holes there are has stuff coming out (lava), not stuff going in.
* any water that does actually make it to a hole gets turned to steam pretty quickly (by the lava), and starts going right back up.
* rock is more dense than ... | [
"Ocean floor sediment is saturated with water, but since there is no water table per se and the water does not flow through it the migration of dissolved waste is limited to the rate at which it can diffuse through dense clay. This is slow enough that it could potentially take millions of years for waste to diffuse... |
Why did no Tsars before Alexander II think of abolishing serfdom? | The Emancipation decrees of Alexander II in 1861 did not come out of nowhere. They were a part of a whole reform package known as the Great Reforms which restructured and modernized the Russian state in the aftermath of the defeat in the Crimean War. Alexander II himself was an unlikely figure to initiate Emancipation;... | [
"When Tsar Alexander II ascended the throne in 1855, desire for reform was widespread. A growing humanitarian movement attacked serfdom as inefficient. In 1859, there were more than 23 million serfs in usually poor living conditions. Alexander II decided to abolish serfdom from above, with ample provision for the l... |
when a person is outside of a locked car trying to open the door, and a person inside is hitting the unlock button, why is it that when they both do it at the same time the door doesn't unlock? | It is different in different cars. One way to think about is that when you pull the car handle it pulls a rod inside the door and activates a release unless the lock is blocking the release. When you pull with the lock on it puts some tension on the lock mechanism so if you push unlock while the door handle puts tensio... | [
"The remote keyless entry can unlock just the drivers door by pushing the unlock button once, while holding down the button unlocks all doors. Using the key to unlock the door after using the remote keyless entry to lock the doors will cause the alarm to sound, if equipped with a security system. The doors must be ... |
how are movie streaming sites able to operate so openly without getting shutdown immediately? | Some of them are entirely legitimate, of course - the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime Video and so on - but the ones that aren't have a tendency to keep their servers in countries where it's very hard to enforce shutdown orders on them. Nevertheless, there is still a relatively rapid turnover in such things. | [
"Despite the aforementioned legal rulings, companies continue to sell re-edited movies via the Internet. Some have been shut down as well. Yet, search engine results on the web reveal companies continue to provide fixed media products, such as Clean Play DVDs. Sometimes they use \"going out of business\" tactics to... |
Did the Vikings really arrive in Morocco? | Let's break this question into two parts: 1) Did Scandinavian raiders reach the coastline of modern Morocco and Umayyad Andalucia, and 2) did they settle there and mingle with the Amazigh.
**Raiding along the Atlantic**
This question is actually easy to answer: Yes they did! It's well documented in the 9th century th... | [
"Most of the Vikings sailed back to Francia (modern-day France), and their defeat by the Andalusian army might have discouraged them from attacking the Iberian Peninsula again. The following year, the Vikings sent an embassy to the court of Abd ar-Rahman, who then sent the poet Yahya ibn al-Hakam (nicknamed \"Al-Gh... |
"Monarch" of Australia/"Monarch" of (United Kingdom) Commonwealth countries | Elizabeth II's title in Australia begins "*Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God Queen of Australia*...". So to answer your question, her regnal number in Australia is exactly the same as it is in the United Kingdom. The same applies in other Commonwealth realms including Canada, New Zealand, etc.
As to *why* this... | [
"The monarchs of Australia are the same as those of the United Kingdom. The sovereigns reigned over Australia as monarchs of the United Kingdom until 1942 (by a legal fiction, from 1939). From that year they reigned as sovereigns in right of Australia, though the first to be accorded an Australian title, Queen of A... |
how come the un or nato isn't quick to act/doesn't care over russia invading the ukraine slowly? | The UN has difficulty acting because in order for anything to get done, **all** of the Security Council member nations have to agree... and Russia is part of that security council.
As for NATO, well... the Ukrane is not a member of NATO, and NATO is a military alliance. So unless all of the member nations want to sta... | [
"Russia is strongly opposed to any eastward expansion of NATO. On February 12, 2008 (then) Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia may target its missiles at Ukraine if its neighbour joins NATO and accepts the deployment of a US missile defence shield. Former Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has stated mo... |
How precisely did the Soviet TU-4 copy the B-52? | Just to clarify, the copy was not of the B-52 Stratofortress, but of the B-29 Superfortress. It was indeed reverse-engineered from three airframes:
* B-29-5-BW s/n 42-6256 Ramp Tramp of the 771st BS
* B-29-15-BW s/n 42-6365 Gen. H.H. Arnold Special from the 794th BS
* B-29-15-BW s/n 42-6358 Ding Hao from the 794th BS
... | [
"The (Hagelin) C-52 and CX-52 were cipher machines manufactured by Crypto AG starting 1951/1952. These pin-and-lug type cipher machines were advanced successors of the C-38/M-209. The machine measures . The device is mechanical, but when combined with an electric keyboard attachment, the B-52, the resultant system ... |
why are human eye colours restricted to brown, blue, green, and in extremely rare cases, red, as opposed to other colours? | Great question. Eye doctor here.
Eye color is in the Iris, and the Iris has two layers, a back layer that's always fully pigmented, and a thicker front layer.
The pigment is melanin, same that makes our skin different colors.
Now when the front layer is densely pigmented, it appears dark, like brown or even black (t... | [
"Blue eyes do not actually contain any blue pigment. Eye colour is determined by two factors: the pigmentation of the eye's iris and the scattering of light by the turbid medium in the stroma of the iris. In humans, the pigmentation of the iris varies from light brown to black. The appearance of blue, green, and ha... |
how does programming work to make modern stuff? how does "if x else y" turn into say... youtube or skyrim? | You wanna know what really should blow your mind? NAND and NOR gates, 2 transistors, build up all logic circuits in all computers.
But, should it really be surprising? Our bodies are made up of 29 (useful) elements. Everything is built up of small stuff that makes more complex stuff. There are 26 letters in the human ... | [
"Powerful interaction and animation could be created by making different modifiers send messages to each other, allowing a user to create something impressive fairly quickly, without any typing. There was a simple programming language, accessed via a Miniscript modifier, but most of the programming was achieved by ... |
what makes glass so special that it doesn't get harmed by any of the very harmful liquids it holds? | Very strong structure - bit like the difference between say a country stone wall and a sheer concrete wall - one you can get your hands inbetween the rocks and pull them out (i.e. the chemical can react and disrupt the structure) the other is very strongly bound to each other which makes it too hard for you to damage. | [
"Glass is characterized by a high degree of corrosion-resistance. Because of its high water-resistance it is often used as primary packaging material in the pharma industry since most medicines are preserved in a watery solution. Besides its water-resistance, glass is also robust when exposed to certain chemically ... |
why would i need an i7 processor over an i5? | i7 will make CPU-intensive tasks, like video rendering in your case, run faster. For gaming an i7 will barely provide any advantage over an i5 as it's the graphic card that is usually the bottleneck. So if all you plan to do is play games and edit videos, the decision depends on how much you value rendering times. | [
"Core i7 is currently Intel's highest end series of processors designed for gameplay and mid-range to high-end business computers. Core i7 processors are the first to use the Nehalem microarchitecture, and therefore reintroduce Hyper-threading and, in the 9xx series, introduce Intel QuickPath Interconnect, a point-... |
why is it easier to remember numbers in groups of three digits? | It seems counterintuitive. How can I remember more information easier? | [
"For ease of reading, numbers with many digits may be divided into groups using a delimiter, such as comma \",\" or dot \".\" or space or underbar \"_\" (as in maritime \"21_450\"). In some countries, these \"digit group separators\" are only employed to the left of the decimal separator; in others, they are also u... |
What causes the apparent difference in taste when adding milk before hot water to coffee, rather than the other way round? | I wouldn't even bother speculating until I'm convinced that there really *is* a difference in taste. Do a (double?) blind taste test to see if it's legit.
And when you're done with that experiment, stop drinking instant coffee. | [
"Another aspect of the debate are claims that adding milk at the different times alters the flavour of the tea (for instance, see ISO 3103 and the Royal Society of Chemistry's \"How to make a Perfect Cup of Tea\"). Some studies suggest that the heating of milk above 75 degrees Celsius (adding milk after the tea is ... |
how do babies find things funny and how do they know what is funny and what is not? | I *think* it has something to do with the fact that almost everything is unexpected for a baby. As long it isn't unpleasant, it might evoke the feeling that it is funny | [
"BULLET::::2. 1–4 months: Primary Circular Reactions – Babies notice objects and start following their movements. They continue to look where an object was, but for only a few moments. They 'discover' their eyes, arms, hands and feet in the course of acting on objects. This stage is marked by responses to familiar ... |
How did both sides of ancient letter correspondences survive? | It is unknown who originally published the collection of letters and how it was done, but of course much qualified speculation about it has been done by historians.
In the introduction to the Loeb edition (1955) C.R. Haines tells us that there are two likely possibilities, based on evidence that Fronto kept copies of ... | [
"In some cases large numbers of letters have survived from the more prolific practitioners. Nine hundred from Quintus Aurelius Symmachus (345–402) survive, and Libanius (c. 314–392 or 393) left over 1500 letters in Greek. Scholars have sometimes been disappointed with the content of the letters, which have tended t... |
Why did the Australian Aboriginals never progress past hunter/gatherer tribes? | It's always problematic trying to explain why something *didn't* happen. The most correct answer is always going to be "it just didn't" – we have no reason to expect other parts of the world to follow the same path that (some) Eurasian societies did in the first place, or even a remotely similar one. Australian societi... | [
"Prior to colonisation of Australia, there is evidence of ancient migration of Indians to Australia around 4,000 to 5,000 years ago based on DNA and language development in native Indians and Indigenous Australians according to some studies.\n",
"Aboriginal Australians lived on the Australian continent for thousa... |
Is a concept of 'colours' feasible for the invisible EM spectrum? | Color is created by your visual processing system. Red light, for example, isn't *really* red, it is just one component of an EM field. But when some photons at that wavelength hit your retina, your brain interprets them as red. | [
"A \"physical color\" is a combination of pure spectral colors (in the visible range). In principle there exist infinitely many distinct spectral colors, and so the set of all physical colors may be thought of as an infinite-dimensional vector space (a Hilbert space). This space is typically notated \"H\". More tec... |
what is going on when women experience "pregnancy brain"? is this just a mind over matter situation, or is there a real process in the body causing memory loss? | I am not a doctor, but pregnancy = hormones and hormones can alter your behavior. Same principals behind PMS. | [
"One hypothesis suggests that enhanced expression of proinflammatory cytokines and other mediators of inflammation in the maternal, fetal, and neonatal compartments may interfere with brain development, thereby increasing the risk for long-term brain dysfunction later in life.\n",
"Pregnancy renders substantial c... |
How do pediatricians know if an infant needs glasses or hearing aides if the child has no way to effectively communicate? | Kids react to sounds and sights in various ways. For example, if you make a noise (shake a rattle, maybe) in their vicinity, they'll turn towards the noise. If they can't hear, they won't turn towards the noise.
For details, you san read the "optic nerve" and "auditory nerve" sections of [this guide](_URL_0_) | [
"Children as young as 4 weeks of age can benefit from a hearing aid. These devices amplify sound, making it possible for many children to hear spoken words and develop spoken language. However, some children with severe to profound hearing loss may not be able to hear enough sound, even with a hearing aid, to make ... |
In Viking tradition/Religion, what would happen to a warrior who died from his wounds, but after the battle, by way of infection? | It is not possible to answer your question. Even religions tethered by a written text, an organized clergy, and rigid dogma can be fluid, changing from time to time and practiced differently in diverse places. Pre-conversion Scandinavia did not have a written text, an organized body of spiritual leaders, or rigid dogma... | [
"The Vikings believed that if a warrior died in battle, he would be taken to the Norse afterlife: the hall of Valhöll, in which the warriors would prepare for Ragnarökk, the battle at the end of the world. Rune stones were erected to commemorate particularly brave warriors. Death in one's sleep (a \"straw death\") ... |
Is there a temperature at which water will ignite? | No. Water won't ignite because it already is a product of combustion. You get water by burning hydrogen. | [
"The power of such explosions was seen in the Chernobyl disaster, although the water involved did not come from fire-fighting at that time but the reactor's own water cooling system. A steam explosion occurred when the extreme overheating of the core caused water to flash into steam. A hydrogen explosion may have o... |
what purpose does an error code have? | It tells you what, specifically, caused the program to fail or what the program was doing at the time it failed. At least, that's what a well-written error code will do.
If the code is too technical for you to understand that's ok - it's because those codes were designed to help technicians and developers solve your ... | [
"Error codes can also be used to specify an error, and simplify research into the cause and how to fix it. This is commonly used by consumer products when something goes wrong, such as the cause of a Blue Screen of Death, to make it easier to pinpoint the exact problem the product is having. \n",
"In computer pro... |
Can someone explain what is in this medieval painting? | Link didn't work on mobile. | [
"Inside the church are traces of some early medieval paintings on the west wall, which were discovered under plaster in 1930. The painting, which probably represents the Last Judgement (a common subject of medieval church paintings), is divided into sections by the timbering. A haloed male figure with long yellow h... |
who took historical pictures of soldiers on d-day and during other battles? were they photographers or soldiers who happened to own cameras? | They're done by 'war photographers'. The most famous of which was Robert Capa, which actually took photos on d-day. It's not uncommon that these photographers die on the Frontline though. | [
"Soldier Tony Vaccaro is also recognized as one of the pre-eminent photographers of World War II. His images taken with the modest Argus C3 captured horrific moments in war, similar to Capa's Spanish soldier being shot. Capa himself was on Omaha Beach on D-Day and captured pivotal images of the conflict on that occ... |
why hard drive prices seem to have stopped going down. | [The 2011 floods in Thailand](_URL_1_) knocked out a significant part of the worlds hard disk production.
Prices are actually on the way down since it rose a lot just after the disaster.
Edit: [here](_URL_0_) is a chart from Computerworld illustrating the pricespike in late 2011. | [
"In the case of disk-based media, the primary cost is the moving parts inside the drive. This sets a fixed lower limit, which is why the average selling price for both of the major HDD manufacturers has been USD$45–75 since 2007. That said, the price of high-capacity drives has fallen rapidly, and this is indeed an... |
- the london (or any) underground - how do they get trains in or out and why doesn't it collapse? | The top of the tunnel is usually arched which is the strongest shape for bearing weight above, and they reinforce the arched ceiling with metal supports at close intervals all along the length of the tunnels ... they get the trains in and out on tracks which lead to sidings at specially widened stations
Here are [some... | [
"In the years since the first parts of the London Underground opened, many stations and routes have been closed. Some stations were closed because of low passenger numbers rendering them uneconomical; some became redundant after lines were re-routed or replacements were constructed; and others are no longer served ... |
[Engineering] Why don't all air planes have the vertical winglets on the wing tips | The winglets don't technically add lift, but rather prevent lift capacity from being lost due to vertical airflow from the high pressure to the low pressure side. This vertical flow around the outside of the wing end is responsible for creating tip vortices, which waste energy and reduce the total available lift at the... | [
"The bottom wing was rigged with 5° dihedral while the top wing lacked any dihedral; this meant that the gap between the wings was less at the tips than at the roots; this change had been made at the suggestion of Fred Sigrist, the Sopwith works manager, as a measure to simplify the aircraft's construction. The upp... |
How did europeans described earthquakes when they got to America? | The phrasing of the question seems to assume that earthquakes are unknown in Europe, but the citizens of Lisbon—or Catalonia, or many parts of Italy—assure you that isn't the case. | [
"The Lisbon earthquake of 1755, coinciding with the general flowering of science in Europe, set in motion intensified scientific attempts to understand the behaviour and causation of earthquakes. The earliest responses include work by John Bevis (1757) and John Michell (1761). Michell determined that earthquakes or... |
why is body centered cubic iron (ferrite) magnetic and face centered cubic (austenite) not? | on a body centered cubic structure like ferrite, there is one atom in the middle and the rest on the sides. You can think of this as all the spin of the side of the structure is cancelled out by the other side but the center atom not cancelled out.
Austenite has each side and each atom with electrons that cancel each ... | [
"All the iron-rich face-centered cubic Fe–Ni alloys show Invar anomalies in their measured thermal and magnetic properties that evolve continuously in intensity with varying alloy composition. Scientists had once proposed that Invar's behavior was a direct consequence of a high-magnetic-moment to low-magnetic-momen... |
How did Brandenburg recover from the Thirty Years War to become a Kingdom in 1701? | What do you mean by recover? Brandenberg-Prussia didn't really take a leading role during the Thirty Years' War, though fighting did often take place in/near it. The war is usually broken into four phases defined by the leading opponents of the Habsburgs at the time: Bohemian, Danish, Swedish, French. Brandenberg-Pruss... | [
"At the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War, the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 granted Sweden territories as war reparations. Sweden demanded Silesia, Pomerania (which had been in its possession since the Treaty of Stettin (1630), and a war indemnity of 20,000,000 Riksdaler.\n",
"The war ended in 1648 with the Peac... |
How would the world change if our atmosphere were lower? | As a point of correction, the typical value used for where space begins is called the [Karman Line](_URL_1_), and it is 50 miles (80km) or 100 km (60 miles) above sea level, depending on who you ask.
But the atmosphere does not have a real "edge". Air is held on Earth by gravity and the weight of the air above it. Bec... | [
"The profligate demands of humankind are causing far reaching changes to the atmosphere of planet Earth, of this there is no doubt. Earth's temperature is showing an upward swing, the so-called greenhouse effect, now a subject of international concern. The greenhouse effect may melt the glaciers and ice caps of the... |
What was travel like between Canadian cities before cars and without trains? | Before railroads, the Great Lakes, the St Lawrence river and its tributaries were the primary transportation routes in Canada. The most important land route was the portage around Niagra Falls. That allowed the farmers in south western Ontario and the sparsly populated settleme... | [
"Canada has a large and well-developed railway system that today transports primarily freight. There are two major publicly traded transcontinental freight railway systems, Canadian National and Canadian Pacific. Nationwide passenger services are provided by the federal crown corporation Via Rail. Three Canadian ci... |
. why does watching tv/using computers cause headaches?? | Focusing on a nearby object for too long can cause eye-strain related headaches. Try to make yourself focus 20+feet away for a couple of minutes every half hour or so to relax your eyes and see if that helps. | [
"A study with 4100 young adults revealed that intensive use of cell phones and computers can be linked to an increase in stress, sleep disorders and depressive symptoms in young adults. It’s been shown that the light from TV and computer screens affects melatonin production and melanopsin stimulation, and throws of... |
are all purebred dogs alive today ancestors of the first dogs of their breed? | If they are true purebred dogs they can be traced back to a foundation of ancestors. Obviously, one dog can't mate with itself. Generally purebred dogs are linebred and not inbred now. Meaning you can't trace a common ancestor within five or six generations. | [
"Breeds as we know them today did not exist before Victorian times, but local variations of the ancestors of current breeds came into America along with their owners and livestock. Included are some that are now extinct or that have merged into other breeds. These may have included some British herding dogs, native... |
What's our worst "design flaw" as a species? | - Esophagus and trachea in same space.
- Reproductive and waste disposal mechanisms in same space.
- Insufficient protection to prevent severe or fatal injury due to falling from own height.
| [
"Natural design has attribution to the process of natural selection. All species have been designed based on their life situation in order to have more offspring. This resulted as only better designed organisms can be found today because natural selection is only limited by the rapidity of environment change and th... |
In the Middle Ages, when an ordinary lower-class person looked up to the night sky, what did they think the stars and moon were? | I will elaborate on what the Byzantine Suda (an encyclopedia/lexicon from the 10th Century AD) says about stars and other celestial bodies, which is presumably what was floating about as common knowledge to the inhabitants of the Imperial City of Constantinople, however, I suppose it's probably a stretch to say that a ... | [
"In a series of lectures in the United States, the philosopher George Santayana used the appearance of the night sky as an example of what is attractive to the human mind: an intricacy delicately poised between unfathomable complexity and uninteresting simplicity. Because of the absence of light pollution in antiqu... |
why are service providers exempt from giving credit for outages of their service? | Because enough people sign that sort of contract that they don't NEED to... and if they did it could possibly end up being very very expensive for them.
No company in their right mind is going to cut off what might turn into a pretty large percentage of their revenue stream due to Acts of God (another word for a natur... | [
"This results in an \"on/off\" or \"all or nothing\" proposition for the prepaid service providers and their clients (i.e. the account either has enough credit to use the phone, or it does not). Some operators (e.g., Orange) allow their pre-paid customers to have a small negative balance to allow short calls or tex... |
what is a non-newtonian liquid and how is it different from normal liquids | First, a definition: Viscosity, essentially, is the measurement of a fluid's resistance to movement or deformation. Water is much less viscous than molasses, for example.
Without getting overly technical, one good way to look at it is that a newtonian liquid's viscosity won't change when it is stressed (pushed, vibrat... | [
"A non-Newtonian fluid is a fluid that does not follow Newton's law of viscosity, i.e. constant viscosity independent of stress. In non-Newtonian fluids, viscosity can change when under force to either more liquid or more solid. Ketchup, for example, becomes runnier when shaken and is thus a non-Newtonian fluid. Ma... |
Is it possible to have information less than a single bit? | Yes. For example, entropy can be measured in bits. A fair coin that lands 50% of the time each on heads and tails produces exactly one bit of entropy per toss. However, if you had a coin that wasn't fair, it produces a fraction of a bit of entropy.
See 2nd paragraph in summary: _URL_0_
[edit] another example: supp... | [
"If one transmits 1000 bits (0s and 1s), and the value of each of these bits is known to the receiver (has a specific value with certainty) ahead of transmission, it is clear that no information is transmitted. If, however, each bit is independently equally likely to be 0 or 1, 1000 shannons of information (more of... |
how come taser electricity looks blue but an open power line's electricity looks red and orange? | Taser 'dry stun' discharge appears blue because it is ionizing the air. Lightning bolts actually do have a blue-ish hue because they also ionize the air, but it's hard to see because there is so much energy being discharged that the white discharge drowns out the color.
Open power lines have red and orange sparks bec... | [
"A small electric current (for a 5 mm bulb diameter NE-2 lamp, the quiescent current is about 400 µA), which may be AC or DC, is allowed through the tube, causing it to glow orange-red. The gas is typically a Penning mixture, 99.5% neon and 0.5% argon, which has lower striking voltage than pure neon, at a pressure ... |
why do people with cancer seem to get one last burst of energy in the week or so before they die? | Probably because the treatments can physically take you down harder than the disease itself. Yes the cancer is fatal, but without chemo and a host of other drugs, your body kinda recovers and feels significantly better than the treatments leading up to that point. | [
"If the treatment is lengthy and disruptive, many patients experience some difficulty in returning to normal daily life. The energy needed to cope with a rigorous treatment program may have caused them to disconnect from previous daily patterns, such as working, normal self-care, and housekeeping. A small number of... |
can someone please explain how soy milk (and other plant based milks) is more expensive than cow's milk? | Where I live, cow/goat milk is more expensive than plant-based milk (with exception of the organic variety).
I think that for my area, it's easier to import plant-based milk because they don't spoil as easily as cow/goat milk. (None are large-scale produced locally)
It may also be a perception thing. Some countries ... | [
"Plant milks—such as soy milk, almond milk, cashew milk, grain milks (oat milk, flax milk and rice milk), hemp milk, and coconut milk—are used in place of cows' or goats' milk. Soy milk provides around 7 g (¼oz) of protein per cup (240 mL or 8 fl oz), compared with 8 g (2/7oz) of protein per cup of cow's milk. Almo... |
Does holding a glass to the wall/floor really help you hear what is going on in the next room? | Yes it does.
When sound from the inside of the room hits the wall it causes the atoms in the wall to begin to vibrate in accordance with the frequency of the sound wave. When you press the glass against the wall on the other side, the glass begins to vibrate in this manner as well. Although sound travels faster throu... | [
"Sounds, including speech, inside rooms can be sensed by bouncing a laser beam off a window of the room where a conversation is held, and detecting and decoding the vibrations in the glass caused by the sound waves.\n",
"\" It was not a wall of sound. A wall is something in front of you. You were INSIDE the sound... |
Has the quantum entanglement phenomenon "Spooky Action at a Distance" been proven, or is it just theoretical? Also, how do particles become entangled in the first place? | Entanglement isn't some super esoteric aspect of quantum mechanics that is only relevant in physics labs, it's a basic feature of quantum mechanics. And quantum mechanics is the basis of most technology of the digital age. Thus it shows up when we look at, for example:
-how atoms come together to form bonds to make c... | [
"Also quantum entanglement (denoted by Einstein as \"spooky action at a distance\"), according to which the quantum state of one entangled particle cannot be fully described without describing the other particle, does not imply superluminal transmission of information (see quantum teleportation), and it is therefor... |
Will endangered animals, if saved from extinction through Human Intervention, face the threat of inbreeding and recessive genes? | They already do. Tiger populations in Asia, for instance, are extremely fractured because their territories are separated by human development. As a consequence, problems resulting from inbreeding are very common.
There's a lot of species that are still doing fine in terms of numbers but are threatened because their p... | [
"Inbreeding and genetic diversity loss often occur with endangered species populations because they have small and/or declining populations. Loss of genetic diversity lowers the ability of a population to deal with change in their environment and can make individuals within the community homogeneous. If this occurs... |
do human beings always think today is bad versus history? why? | Because everyone is the hero of their own story, and think that their problems are unique to them. People look around and see bad things happening. Since they are worst things THEY have PERSONALLY experienced, they must also be the worst ever as well. | [
"The fourth reason resides in the growing risks of war and terrorism, and in the absence of ways to curb rising violence and barbarity, which indicate that humanity today is principally threatened by its own inhumanity. However, the possibility of humanity's self-destruction makes it its own victim, while being in ... |
Copernicus and heliocentrism met with a lot of opposition in the Christian west. How did other civilizations respond to the idea that the Earth wasn't the center of the universe? | A note beforehand: my speciality is not on Chinese science/philosophy. If there are any such experts around, I would be much obliged if you would correct me and give a more complete answer. I apologise beforehand for my brevity when it comes to the actual encounters between Jesuits and Chinese astronomers. Only after w... | [
"Copernicus' 1543 work on the heliocentric model of the solar system tried to demonstrate that the sun was the center of the universe. Few were bothered by this suggestion, and the pope and several archbishops were interested enough by it to want more detail. His model was later used to create the calendar of Pope ... |
What are some good books on mandate-era Syria, as well as the United Arab Republic? | One of the cornerstones of historiography on the mandate is Philip Khoury's *Syria and the French Mandate: The Politics of Arab Nationalism, 1920-1945*. James Gelvin's *Divided Loyalties: Nationalism and Mass Politics in Syria at the Close of Empire* details the messy transition between the brief Arab government and th... | [
"Syria, subtitled \"Archéologie, art et histoire\" (until 2005 \"Revue d’art oriental et d’archéologie\"), is a multidisciplinary and multilingual academic journal covering the Semitic Middle East from prehistory to the Islamic conquest. It is published by the Institut français du Proche-Orient and was established ... |
how is it possible for some childeren at a young age to enter college? | You don't necessarily have to finish all the grades to enter college. You can also take an entrance exam which determines if you have enough background knowledge, and then sometimes exams to skip prerequisites for courses. Lots of kids are accepted to community college before they graduate high school - my son took cal... | [
"Children enroll in primary schools at the age of seven (usually, all students in a class were born in the same year). However, it is possible for students to enroll at the primary school one year earlier if they were born before March.\n",
"According to the Law on Education, children who have reached 7 years of ... |
A few days ago I read that scientists were worried about lightning the whole atmosphere while conducting the first nuclear bomb test. Is it really possible that the whole atmosphere can burn? | For reference, the paper in question is "Ignition of the Atmosphere with Nuclear Bombs" (Konopinski, E. and Marvin, C. and Teller, E., 1946)
_URL_0_ | [
"After the event was made public, the United States Department of Defense clarified that it was either a bomb blast or a combination of natural phenomena, such as lightning, a meteor, or a glint from the Sun. The initial assessment by the United States National Security Council (NSC), with technical support by the ... |
what exactly are these articles 11 and 13? | The way I understand it, article 11 would impose a "link tax" that would charge user of a certain reach for the use of news links, meaning aggregators like Google news would need to pay a company like Huff-Po and Fox for linking their articles. Which would be fine but it can be a burden on small companies and presents ... | [
"Twelve articles, adopted in 1969, are presented by the fellowship as their statement of faith on the following issues - the Bible, God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, Man, Salvation, the Church, the Christian life, Ordinances, Satan, Second Coming, and Future Life. They are generally dispensational, and pretribula... |
Why does backscratching feel so good? | [This thread](_URL_0_) blew my mind | [
"Backbiting may occur as a form of release after a confrontation. By insulting the opposing person, the backbiter diminishes them and, by doing so, restores their own self-esteem. A bond may also be established with the confidant if they are receptive to the hostile comment. Such gossip is common in human society a... |
why time is different for moving things. | Space and time are interwoven in a fabric called spacetime. Everything in the universe moves through spacetime at the exact same speed. The fasteryou move through space, the slower you move through time.
It's like if you had an RPG-ish set up, and everything in the universe gets ten points to allocate between two ... | [
"Time has historically been closely related with space, the two together merging into spacetime in Einstein's special relativity and general relativity. According to these theories, the concept of time depends on the spatial reference frame of the observer, and the human perception as well as the measurement by ins... |
in the military, what's the difference between a confirmed kill and an uncomfirmed kill? | Battle Damage Assessment is a tricky thing. Modern war, you see, involves a great deal of firepower. To spare the unnecessarily icky details suffice it to say that a heavy machine gun will, for example, quickly render a human unrecognizable in the space of a few rounds. Ordinance can reduce a human to mere bits and ... | [
"A death ruled as homicide or unlawful killing is typically referred to police or prosecutor or equivalent official for investigation and criminal charges if warranted. Deaths caused by capital punishment, though homicides, are generally assumed to be lawful and are not prosecuted. Most deaths due to war are not pr... |
How does putting a phone into a ceramic bowl amplify sound? | Sound waves spread out in all directions and bounce off of solid surfaces. So if you put your phone in a bowl, the sound bounces off all of the interior surfaces of the bowl and exits out the open side. The bowl basically works kind of like a lens for sound waves. | [
"A piezoelectric speaker (also known as a piezo bender due to its mode of operation, and sometimes colloquially called a \"piezo\", buzzer, crystal loudspeaker or beep speaker) is a loudspeaker that uses the piezoelectric effect for generating sound. The initial mechanical motion is created by applying a voltage to... |
After a medieval battle, would weapons be picked up from the dead and recycled again? | Almost all metal objects would be recycled one way or another. They were simply too valuable to let go to waste. If the army that won the battle wouldn't loot the field, someone else would. Because of this, lots of weapons and armor are found from excavations of old battlefields only in special cases, such as the Battl... | [
"During World War II, the entire contents were moved to safety in three castles in remote parts of Styria, and no losses were recorded. After the end of the war, the objects were brought back into the undamaged original building.\n",
"Weapons and armor, designed to be sturdy, tended to last longer than other arti... |
what was so revolutionary about james cameron's avatar? | It was one of the first movies made with the facial mocap technologies and updated mocap suits. It allowed for far better and more realistic CGI movements and faces.
To many it was also one of the few 3D movies with good 3D effects. | [
"With James Cameron as potential director, the film was to be produced with the same mix of live-action and computer-generated imagery that Cameron used in \"Avatar\". Specifically, Cameron intended to render the main character, Alita, completely in CGI. Cameron has stated that he would make use of technologies dev... |
If you place a tree that normally experiences seasons in an artificial environment without seasonal temperature changes, will it keep its leave year round? Will this be detrimental to it? | When I lived in the tropics I noted that deciduous trees would still shed but would grow back their leaves pretty well immediately. Thar said, I am sure a botanist would be able to give you a better answer. Plants have been grown in glass houses for centuries. | [
"Tree species that have well-developed dormancy needs may be tricked to some degree, but not completely. For instance, if a Japanese Maple (\"Acer palmatum\") is given an \"eternal summer\" through exposure to additional daylight, it grows continuously for as long as two years. Eventually, however, a temperate-clim... |
Why is the Armenian Genocide a genocide while the Trail of Tears isn't? | I've answered numerous times in this sub and I will try to keep my conduct in line with the rules like usual, but this subject has a lot deeper connection on many levels than many think. I'll try not to come across as biased. This question isn't necessarily a historic one, but more of a social question.
The United Sta... | [
"The Armenian genocide began in 1915 when the Turkish government planned to wipe out Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire. About 2 million Armenians were killed and many more were removed from the country by force. The Turkish government does not acknowledge the events of the Armenian genocide as genocide.\n",
... |
how did the playstation 1 play games after you removed the disc? | Reading the disc takes a lot of time so programmers generally try to design software in such a way that you minimize the amount of time you are forced to read information from a disc. There is always going to be some amount of information that has been read and stored in temporary memory of the system, and so as long ... | [
"The disc works by inserting it into the system just like any other game. However, rather than directly launching any of the titles, it brings you to the game menu in the Xbox home where you see extra games that are playable.\n",
"Prior to the PlayStation, reproducing copyrighted material for game consoles was re... |
What was the opinion of German soldiers in WWII regarding the fighting capabilities of the allies? | It’s difficult to generalize German perceptions about Allied combat performance. Siberian riflemen in Stalingrad fought very different from Ghurka soldiers in Italy or inexperienced Americans in North Africa and German attitudes therefore could vary a great deal.
I’m most familiar with German opinions on Allied troops... | [
"Generally, the Germans have more powerful (at least in 1941) and more mobile units and are able to usually get more favorable odds in combat, but the Soviets are able to recreate their destroyed armies at a much faster rate and can thus afford the higher casualty rate that comes with the lower combat odds.\n",
"... |
the microsoft antitrust lawsuit | Microsoft started bundling Internet Explorer for free with Windows specifically in order to undercut Netscape Navigator (or "cut off their air supply" to quote one MS exec). This was explicitly illegal according to US antitrust laws. [more](_URL_0_)
I'm not familiar enough with the European suit to comment on that one... | [
"In another lawsuit, Novell claims that Microsoft had \"deliberately targeted and destroyed\" its WordPerfect and QuattroPro programs to protect its Windows operating system monopoly. The US Supreme Court refused to halt the antitrust lawsuit in March 2008.\n",
"BULLET::::- The antitrust division brought suit aga... |
What is the name of these types of military dress from Edwardian era? | Wait, am I missing something? The guys up front are just mostly wearing military uniforms, but you don't seem to care particularly about the exact type (you say Russian, so I say, "sure"). At quick glance, there are several men who appear to be priests and at least one other easily identifiable man (younger man, up fro... | [
"Battle Dress (BD), later called \"No.5 Dress\", was the official name for the standard working and fighting uniform worn by the British Army and the armies of other Imperial and Commonwealth countries in temperate climes from 1937 to the late 1960s. It was a pair of trousers and a close fitting short jacket \"Blou... |
Statics question | A static force applied eccentric to the center of mass (c.m.) of an initially stationary cube in space would result in rotation and translation. In terms of statics, think about the "penalty" of "moving" the force *from* the corner over *to* the c.m., where this "penalty" is the moment.
As a terrestrial analogy, try pu... | [
"Statics is the branch of mechanics that is concerned with the analysis of loads (force and torque, or \"moment\") acting on physical systems that do not experience an acceleration (\"a\"=0), but rather, are in static equilibrium with their environment. When in static equilibrium, the acceleration of the system is ... |
why do local news stations tell you where police are doing speed and seatbelt checks? | The goal generally isn't to bust you, it's to get you to wear a seatbelt. I've never heard of these strange seatbelt checks before, I'm going to assume they are not like DUI checkpoints.
- the goal is to stop you from committing the crime to begin with
- even after you are caught, the goal is still to stop the beha... | [
"Police parking permits, issued in some jurisdictions, exempt news vehicles from certain parking restrictions while on the job. They may be offered to any news-gathering organization that covers breaking news for use in company vehicles employed by full-time reporters, photographers, and camera operators. Often, th... |
In what ways does Earth Hour actually help the environment? | I think it is more about spreading awareness. | [
"BULLET::::- George Marshall of the Climate Outreach Information Network criticized Earth Hour for \"playing into the hands of (the critics of environmentalists),\" as darkness is symbolic of fear and decay. \"The overwhelming need at the moment is to inspire ordinary people with a vision of a better world, to make... |
what is actually happening when a thread says it have a few comments but when i opened the link there are none? | It means that people deleted their comments or someone with a shadowban commented. | [
"A thread is contained in a forum and may have an associated date that is taken as the date of the last post (options to order threads by other criteria are generally available). When a member posts in a thread it will jump to the top since it is the latest updated thread. Similarly, other threads will jump in fron... |
why are wednesday/thursday film showings included in opening weekend box office numbers? | Because for the movie industry, the "opening weekend" is the first weekend the movie is available. Usually that's from Friday through Sunday, but it can be expanded to include Thursday if that's when the movie came out. | [
"Every cinema is open everyday except Christmas Day. The company operates a policy of all cinemas opening 15 minutes before the first film of the day, meaning that local cinemas usually open at about 10:30 am, whereas more major cities like Birmingham, the West End, and Manchester open at 10 am. Seasonally, all cin... |
Could we use light to measure the speed of Earth relative to space? | The luminiferous ether was disproven over a century ago (the concept that light requires some medium or absolute spacetime to travel through). If you measure the speed of light coming out of a laser pointer in all six directions, you will find the exact same speed (up to the experimental accuracy of your set-up). Furth... | [
"The first experimental determination of the speed of light was made by Ole Christensen Rømer. It may seem that this experiment measures the time for light to traverse part of the Earth's orbit and thus determines its one-way speed, however, this experiment was carefully re-analysed by Zhang, who showed that the me... |
why are scientists always looking for planets that are around the size of earth? what's wrong with a larger or small planet other than the physical effects of gravity and pressure on humans? | It isn't that life isn't possible on smaller or larger planets, but the list of requirements to be habitable becomes much more difficult to satisfy as you get further away from the size of Earth. A planet too small would not have enough mass to retain an atmosphere and a planet too large would suffer from greenhouse ga... | [
"The probability of finding an Earth analog depends mostly on the attributes that are expected to be similar, and these vary greatly. Generally it is considered that it would be a terrestrial planet and there have been several scientific studies aimed at finding such planets. Often implied but not limited to are su... |
how do stock prices change with purchase and selling? | In order for someone to buy stock, that means that someone else is selling it. A LOT of someones. That's what the 'Ask' is when you're looking at stock prices: what the lowest asking price is for a seller of a given stock. If all of the stock being offered at a lower price is bought up, then it'll leave only sellers wh... | [
"The price of assets such as stocks is set by supply and demand. By definition, the market balances buyers and sellers, so it is impossible to have \"more buyers than sellers\" or vice versa, although that is a common expression. In a surge in demand, the buyers will increase the price they are willing to pay, whil... |
why there is a "non contest" plea option in united states judicial system? | If you got a five dollar ticket for jaywalking, even though you weren't, would you take a day off work, to fight it in court?
No, you'd just pay it, even though it was unjust to be charged with that, and you didn't commit the crime, sometimes it's easier to just pay the fine and move on with life.
That is what nolo ... | [
"Some legal scholars argue that plea bargaining is unconstitutional because it takes away a person's right to a trial by jury. Justice Hugo Black once noted that, in America, the defendant \"has an absolute, unqualified right to compel the State to investigate its own case, find its own witnesses, prove its own fac... |
what is the extent to which an officer can use force if a person doesn't comply with what they're asking of them? | The usual rule for police is that if the person does not comply and the offense is an arrest-worthy offense they can use enough force to place the person within police custody. Naturally this wording seems vague but it means that the officer cannot do more than necessary to get the person in handcuffs and in the car, a... | [
"The Court then outlined a non-exhaustive list of factors for determining when an officer's use of force is objectively reasonable: \"the severity of the crime at issue,\" \"whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others,\" and \"whether he is actively resisting arrest or atte... |
why did the usa not use atomic bombs in europe during wwii? | We didn't really get them completed until after the European war was finished. The war in Europe ended on May 8th, 1945, but we didn't get an actual test of an atomic detonation until July 16th, 1945. While work on the atomic bomb had begun during the war, conventional weaponry and tactics ended it before the atomic bo... | [
"Germany and Japan were burned out and lost the war in large part because of strategic bombing. Targeting became more accurate in 1944, but the solution to inaccurate bombs was using more of them. The AAF dropped 3.5 million bombs (500,000 tons) against Japan, and 8 million (1.6 million tons) against Germany. The R... |
would tesla self driving car keep people from getting dui's? | What Tesla has right now is essentially an advanced cruise control. The driver is still in charge of the vehicle, and therefore needs to be sober while operating it. | [
"In September 2016, the media reported the driver's family had filed a lawsuit in July against the Tesla dealer who sold the car. The family's lawyer stated the suit was intended \"to let the public know that self-driving technology has some defects. We are hoping Tesla, when marketing its products, will be more ca... |
During childbirth today, doctors almost always cut the umbilical cord. Has it always been a practice to actively cut the cord or is this specific to time and place? | It's beyond my ken to comment on the universality of cord cutting. Going back to the Hippocrates, however, we can see advice on cutting the umbilical cord in the Western medical canon. On the other side of the Atlantic, in Mesoamerica, we also see the practice of cutting the umbilical cord. Seeing as how Hippocrates an... | [
"The most commonly used instruments for cord cutting include a sickle, knife, bamboo stick, and razor. These instruments are rarely washed thoroughly before and after being implemented. If placental delivery is not occurring, some methods used to remove the placenta include procedures that require internal manipula... |
why is concrete always gray? | There is plenty of 'decorative' concrete that has pigments added, or more commonly, is stained or etched with acids after the concrete has been poured. But to properly color concrete, you really need to control all the variables extremely well; add too much water to one load and it will be a different color than the ne... | [
"White Portland cement differs physically from gray cement only in terms of its color. Its setting behavior and strength development are essentially the same as that expected in gray cement, and it meets standard specifications such as ASTM C 150 and EN 197. In practice, because much white cement is used in pre-cas... |
how does an aromatic diffuser create steam so quickly? | It is likely that it isn't actually steam. Does it feel hot? If not then the diffuser probably is actually an ultrasonic atomizer.
[Look at this video of paint on a speaker.](_URL_0_) The atomizer is basically the same idea except the speaker is made of a little metal flap and it vibrates incredibly quickly. The dropl... | [
"The steam passes over a series of alternate fixed and moving blades. The fixed blades act as nozzles i.e. they change the direction of the steam and also expand it. Then steam is passed on the moving blades, which further expand the steam and also absorb its velocity.\n",
"In the oldest modern hydronic heating t... |
tax and healthcare | A) It wouldn't be "free" if it was paid for by taxes.
B) The Republicans are staunchly opposed to socialized universal healthcare - just look at how much of a fight they're putting up against Obamacare.
The problem isn't that it couldn't be done - in the worst case, it might require a constitutional amendment to make... | [
"Taxation is not necessarily an unpopular form of funding for health care. In England, a survey for the British Medical Association of the general public showed overwhelming support for the tax funding of health care. Nine out of ten people agreed or strongly agreed with a statement that the NHS should be funded fr... |
what exactly does the flu virus itself do? | As far as I can gather it attacks the respiratory system and can often lead to infection and inflammation that can spread to other important organs throughout the body. | [
"The American Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) agrees that the \"spread of novel H1N1 virus is thought to occur in the same way that seasonal flu spreads. Flu viruses are spread mainly from person to person through coughing or sneezing by people with influenza.\" The CDC also says that a person may b... |
hyperthyroidism = massive fast metabolism that causes weight loss and high heart rate hypothyroidism = massive slow metabolism that causes weight gain and low heart rates. so, why can't drug companies make drugs to cause weight gain or weight loss through the thyroid? | They probably could but at what cost. The thyroid isn't like your appendix, it has a job to do. If you started messing with a healthy system it would likely cause other symptoms in your body. | [
"The metabolic rate can be affected by some drugs, such as antithyroid agents, drugs used to treat hyperthyroidism, such as propylthiouracil and methimazole, bring the metabolic rate down to normal and restore euthyroidism. Some research has focused on developing antiobesity drugs to raise the metabolic rate, such ... |
What specific wars/conflicts happened during the Hellenistic Period? | Hello and welcome to both reddit and r/AskHistorians! You're doing great!
The easy thing to do is refer you to the [book list](_URL_0_). In doing so, let me put in a plug for Erskine's *Companion to the Hellenistic World*. I read it in college and found it both readable and deep. It'll give you a good overview but mig... | [
"The Hellenistic period began with the wars of the Diadochi, armed contests among the former generals of Alexander the Great to carve up his empire in Europe, Asia, and North Africa. The wars lasted until 275 BC, witnessing the fall of both the Argead and Antipatrid dynasties of Macedonia in favor of the Antigonid ... |
everyone knows that feeling when you feel like something bad's going to happen or something's just not right but there's no reason behind it at all - and then, sure as shit, something bad happens; is there any explanation for this phenomenon? is it just confirmation bias? | Confimation bias. People get that same feeling when nothing bad happens, but tend not to remember those occasions. | [
"Feelings can lead to harm. When an individual is dealing with an overwhelming amount of stress and problems in their lives, it can lead to self-harm. When one is in a good state of feeling, they never want it to end; conversely, when someone is in a bad state, they want that feeling to disappear. Inflicting harm o... |
Why doesn't the phase velocity of light carry useful information? | Imagine you have a light source (currently off) at one end of a medium and a detector at the other end. The medium is one light-second long. The group velocity of the frequency you're sending in this medium is 0.5 c, while the phase velocity is 2 c. After you turn on the source, the detector will start receiving light ... | [
"There have been various reports in the popular press of experiments on faster-than-light transmission in optics — most often in the context of a kind of quantum tunnelling phenomenon. Usually, such reports deal with a phase velocity or group velocity faster than the vacuum velocity of light. However, as stated abo... |
What are the odds that any viruses or bacteria survived any missions to the moon and would they be able to do anything with the moon "dirt" to continue living or more? | [Easy reading on this from XKCD] (_URL_1_). Life can survive in space, there have been several experiments on this. This is a beautiful issue to speak about. Bacteria can survive in the vacuum of space, so can some [small insects.] (_URL_0_)
NASA, ESA, most space programs that send things to other places other than or... | [
"BULLET::::- NASA officials announced at the Ames Research Center in Houston that testing of the lunar soil, brought back by the Apollo 11 mission, showed no organisms and no \"positive traces of life\". Scientists conceded that some of the moon rocks had \"a trace of organic material\" (10 parts per million) but t... |
After slavery was outlawed following the end of the Civil War, Where did slaves living in the south move to or get money to move? How did the new law effect the lives of slaves? | So there are two questions here, and I'll only focus on the second, and narrowly at that, but it is a fairly important thing to focus on with regards to the post-Emancipation landscape in the American South, and how whites did their absolute best to try and perpetuate White Supremacy and maintain a racial hierarchy tha... | [
"Following the Civil War of the United States, the South lay in ruins. Plantations and other lands throughout the South were seized by the federal government, and thousands of former slaves, known as freedmen, found themselves free, yet without means to support their families. The situation was made more complex du... |
What powers the space probe Voyager I? | A radioisotope thermoelectric generator, RTG. It has plutonium-238 oxide spheres which give off heat, which is converted to power by the Seebeck effect.
The probes will continue moving pretty much forever: there is nothing in space there to stop them, unless they run into something, which is astronomically-unlikely. T... | [
"The \"Huygens\" probe system consists of the 318 kg probe itself, which descended to Titan, and the probe support equipment (PSE), which remained attached to the orbiting spacecraft. \"Huygens\"' heat shield was 2.7 m in diameter. After ejecting the shield, the probe was 1.3 m in diameter. The PSE included the ele... |
What was the international reaction to Polpot's genocide like at the time? | The only country capable of international intervention (the US) had already done about as much as it could to prolong the life of the Khmer Republic. It was already apparent that the Khmer Republic was doomed by 1972, and public opinion in the US was against prolonging the war or continuing the carpet-bombing and aid w... | [
"The Seguro Obrero Massacre took place on September 5, 1938, in the midst of a heated three-way election campaign between the ultraconservative Gustavo Ross Santa María, the radical Popular Front's Pedro Aguirre Cerda, and the newly formed Popular Alliance candidate, Carlos Ibáñez del Campo. The National Socialist ... |
what happens to someone's stocks after they die? | The same thing that happens to all of their other assets. They make up the deceased's estate, which is used to pay off all of their outstanding debts, with any remainder going to their heirs. | [
"Under a “death spiral” scenario, the holder of the convertible debt might short the issuer’s common stock, causing the stock price to decline, at which time the debt holder converts some of the convertible debt to common shares with which he then covers the debt holder's short position. The debt holder continues t... |
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