Split (2)

train · 226k rows

question stringlengths 3 301	answer stringlengths 9 26.1k	context list
Is there any scientific truth to the idea that you shouldn't sit too close to the TV?	No. However focusing on one spot for a long period of time can cause eyestrain, however that is only temporary. You may find this interesting. _URL_0_	[ "The work of several researchers support the concept of television reality as a consequence of heavy viewing. According to Wyer and Budesheim's research, television messages or information, even when they are not necessarily considered truthful, can still be used in the process of constructing social judgments. Fur...
how is it that a vehicle can be good at towing but shit at carrying heavy loads?	A vehicle can have a strong engine, trans and drive train to pull a heavy tow. It needs a strong suspension system to carry a heavy load.	[ "The military also deploys tow trucks for recovery of stranded vehicles. In the US Army, a variant of the HEMTT truck is used for this purpose, the M984 wrecker. For recovery in combat situations while under fire, many armies with large vehicle fleets also deploy armoured recovery vehicles. These vehicles fulfill a...
What is the chemical reaction that occurs when you put ice cream into soft drink?	No chemical reaction... the fat and sugars from the ice cream increases the surface tension on the bubbles, which means they don't burst. You see a bunch of bubbles because you've just introduced something with a bunch of nucleation sites.	[ "Ice cream (derived from earlier iced cream or cream ice) is a sweetened frozen food typically eaten as a snack or dessert. It may be made from dairy milk or cream, or soy, cashew, coconut or almond milk, and is flavored with a sweetener, either sugar or an alternative, and any spice, such as cocoa or vanilla. Colo...
Besieging castles (pre cannons)	I'm not an expert on sieges, but here's what I can offer: 1. It would depend entirely on the technology available to both besiegers and besieged, as well as what was besieged. The First Siege of Rome during the Gothic war lasted a little over a year. When the Mongols under Batu Khan besieged Kiev in 1240 it took abou...	[ "Siege castles are only evident from the period of the Late Middle Ages onwards. They were usually built as a temporary fortifications using wood and earth above the castle to be captured and within sight and the range of their guns. From this location the target would be bombarded.\n", "In 1632 Swedish soldiers ...
Why do we discuss Ancient Greece in terms of city-states?	Many Greek city-states had slightly different setups, but their basic structure was the same: a single astu (city-center) with administrative control over a chora (territory). Athens controlled a large chora (Attica) as the result of synoekismos, or synoecism as the Brits would say. This is the process by which...	[ "Athens was chosen as the Greek capital for historical and sentimental reasons, not because it was a large city. At the time, it was a town consisting of only 400 houses at the foot of the Acropolis. A modern city plan was laid out, and public buildings erected. The finest legacy of this period are the buildings of...
How did Multi-track sound recording come to be and subsequently widely used?	During World War II, some technically-minded people listening to German radio were puzzled: was Hitler really demanding that the Berlin Symphony Orchestra play Beethoven symphonies at 3am in the morning? It was a puzzle, because the sound was pristine, without the clicks and pops you get from a vinyl disc - at that tim...	[ "Multitrack recording (MTR)—also known as multitracking, double tracking, or tracking—is a method of sound recording developed in 1955 that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources or of sound sources recorded at different times to create a cohesive whole. Multitracking became possible in the mid...
what would happen if there was a second big bang somewhere else outside of our own expanding universe?	If it was outside of our universe it would also be beyond everything that we are capable of observing or understanding, so we would have no way of knowing that it even happened.	[ "The Big Bang itself had been proposed in 1931, long before this period, by Georges Lemaître, a Belgian physicist, who suggested that the evident expansion of the Universe in time required that the Universe, if contracted backwards in time, would continue to do so until it could contract no further. This would brin...
the four tigers of asia	You could post this question in /r/AskSocialScience if it hasn't been asked there already.	[ "\"Widely known as one of the largest predators, tigers are ranged both in Russia and China, where this species is even considered sacred. Moreover, the form of Chinese character 王, which means “a king”, reminds us of stripe pattern on the tiger’s forehead. White tigers, in particular, adapt easily to any environme...
why is there so much nudity in classical paintings?	So with the spread of humanism ushered in by the beginning of the renaissance, people started to take a keen interest in humanity. They started thinking that people were incredible and the individual was exceptionally important. As a result, we start seeing changes in a number of artistic modes of expression. To answer...	[ "In comparison in the material aspect nudity is considered an art. This view is supported by Sri Aurobindo in his book \"The Renaissance in India\". He says about Hinduism in the book – \"Its spiritual extremism could not prevent it from fathoming through a long era the life of the senses and its enjoyments, and th...
why do people pass out/feel like they're about to, if the suddenly go from very warm water to very cold water or vice versa?	It's because of the mammalian diving reflex. We experience bradycardia (slow heart rate) and vasoconstriction. Essentially all of our oxygenated blood is shunted to vital areas (Brain, heart, and lungs)only. This conserves oxygen allowing us to endure the cold water for a longer period of time for the best possible c...	[ "Cold shock response is the physiological response of organisms to sudden cold, especially cold water, and is a common cause of death from immersion in very cold water, such as by falling through thin ice. The immediate shock of the cold causes involuntary inhalation, which if underwater can result in drowning. The...
Were people in the old west (1865-1890) able to listen to classical music? would the average joe be familiar with composers such as Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin etc...?	Depends on who that "average joe" was. People played much more music for their own pleasure than we do today; small towns did have "opera houses" -- which while they didn't often play Verdi, did have aspirations to European culture. So, for example, we have records that in 1877, an opera by Balfe, The Bohemian Girl,...	[ "Old-time music has been adopted by a few Native American musicians; Walker Calhoun (1918-2012) of Big Cove, in the Qualla Boundary (home to the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, just outside the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in western North Carolina) played three-finger-style banjo, to which he sang in the ...
with woman's equality in military combat roles being normalized, why is it still absurd that woman play with men in the nfl and other major league sports?	Because physically a woman in the NFL would not be able to stop most of the males. Now, if you have some sort of 6'4 275 she-hulk that would work.	[ "Finally, there is the argument that by not incorporating women into combat, the American government is failing to tap into another source of soldiers for military combat operations. This argument claims that the government is creating a military that treats women as second-class citizens and not equals of men.\n",...
what is the body trying to accomplish when we dry heave?	Your body is attempting to vomit but not succeeding. That's pretty much it.	[ "Other than treating, curing or remedying the underlying cause of emaciation, it as a symptom is treated by regaining the weight and restoring the tissues. This is done through renourishment, or reintroducing nourishing liquids and foods to the body while increasing the intake of food energy. The process, usually b...
Why were there only two American Aces in the Vietnam War?	Remember that becoming an ace requires downing five enemy aircraft, and to down enemy aircraft the enemy needs to have some in the first place. & #x200B; The VPAF had only started to receive jet fighters in 1964, and their aircraft were generally less numerous and less capable than what the Americans were fielding. ...	[ "The Vietnam War saw a move away from cannon fire to air-to-air missiles. Although US forces maintained air supremacy throughout the war, there were still occasional dogfights and US and North Vietnamese aces. The North Vietnamese side claimed the Vietnam People's Air Force had 17 aces throughout the war, including...
Why did the brain of most animals evolve in the head and not in the torso?	It would be more protected, yes, but we keep our seeing, hearing, smelling, and tasting organs in our heads. If our brains were in our torsos, our senses of sight, smell, and hearing would be much less efficient (because the nerve signals would have to travel farther along pathways), and this would make us less able to...	[ "Human brain – central organ of the nervous system located in the head of a human being, protected by the skull. It has the same general structure as the brains of other mammals, but with a more developed cerebral cortex than any other, leading to the evolutionary success of widespread dominance of the human specie...
why can some animals give birth without help when humans can't?	The only true assets of humanity are its intelligence and its social/communication skills. Those two assets require one big ass brain, proportionally. That giant brain is what makes our birth so difficult and also why we have such high mortality rates surrounding it. The other factor that makes birth so dangerous is t...	[ "Human infants are also almost always born with assistance from other humans because of the way that the pelvis is shaped. Since the pelvis and opening of birth canal face backwards, humans have difficulty giving birth themselves because they cannot guide the baby out of the canal. Non-human primates seek seclusion...
The brain is remarkable energy efficient. Is there any limit to the efficiency in which information is computed?	Information is a very important concept in physics (particularly in thermodynamics). At the most basic level information in physics is quantified as [entropy](_URL_2_), and the relationship between energy, temperature, and entropy can be understood in part through viewing [Boltzmann's constant](_URL_3_) as a (temperat...	[ "Some research suggests that aside from the integrity of white matter, also its organizational efficiency is related to intelligence. The hypothesis that brain efficiency has a role in intelligence is supported by functional MRI research showing that more intelligent people generally process information more effici...
why do some acne medications cause an "initial breakout," making your skin worse, before making it better?	Hi, it’s because your cells are turning over rapidly and pushing acne that is below the surafce to the top. This is quite normal. Now if at any point your acne become severe and it seems that the breakout is not normal for YOU, go to a derm just to make sure you are not allergic to the product. It is a good idea to sta...	[ "Acne usually flares up 2–3 weeks into the treatment and is usually mild and tolerable. Occasionally this flare-up is severe, necessitating oral antiobiotics such as erythromycin. A short course of oral prednisolone may be required. Some dermatologists favour a few weeks of pre-treatment with oral antibiotics befor...
why do professional swimmers wear 2 caps when competing?	So I was actually wondering this out loud the other day while I was watching the Olympics with my wife, and not 10 seconds later the commentator on the TV actually explained it. He said occasionally you will see some swimmers wear their goggles with the strap on the outside of their swimming cap, but most wear them wi...	[ "Unlike triathlons, which allow swimmers to wear wetsuits when the water is below a certain temperature (the standard is at the surface or up to for unofficial events.), most open water swim races either do not permit the use of wetsuits (usually defined as anything covering the body above the waist or below the kn...
What should one look out for when selecting historical works to read, especially ones on controversial matters?	Brilliant question. So it can often be very hard to know quite what to look out for with works of history, particularly when you are new to the field and can’t spot the problems. Academic qualification is perhaps a good starting place, yet, as you note, many books are written by journalists without formal training ...	[ "This series provides vital references for students, architects, town planners, historians and philosophers as well as for readers interested in gardens, garden-makers and collectors. By publishing fundamental works of the past – forgotten, unknown or un-translated – along with French and foreign, historic and cont...
Were number systems written down before words and language?	Sumerian cuneiform has its origin in accounting systems, particularly those used by temples to keep track of goods like cattle and grain. A sign could represent a type of good, and the number with a system of tick marks next to it. Cuneiform symbols originated as mnemonics/pictograms, which were subsequently abstracted...	[ "Traditionally, certain letters were rendered differently according to a set of rules. In particular, those letters that began sentences or nouns were made larger and often written in a distinct script. There was no fixed capitalisation system until the early 18th century. The English language eventually dropped th...
what defines a religion from mythology?	A mythology is a set of traditional stories. The Jewish mythology is the Old Testament, the Christian mythology is the Old and New Testaments, the Greek mythology is... well, Greek mythology. Mythology doesn't have anything to do with whether the stories are true or not, it's an agnostic term. It simply says "these are...	[ "Mythology is the main component of Religion. It refers to systems of concepts that are of high importance to a certain community, making statements concerning the supernatural or sacred. Religion is the broader term, besides mythological system, it includes ritual. A given mythology is almost always associated wit...
how did they predict existence of subatomic particles, black holes, multiple universes using maths and equations?	> subatomic particles They didn't predict those with math. They were largely experimentally discovered. Thomson's cathode ray experiment found that there were negatively charged subatomic particles we now call electrons, for example. > black holes These were first thought of from Newtonian mechanics by Laplace...	[ "Improved understanding of the world of particles prompted physicists to make bold predictions, such as Dirac's positron in 1928 (founded on the Dirac Sea model) and Pauli's neutrino in 1930 (founded on conservation of energy and angular momentum in beta decay). Both were later confirmed.\n", "The Standard Model ...
if your car gets stolen and your insurance covers it, what happens if the stolen car gets found after you have already gotten a new one?	Usually, it belongs to your insurance company now. They'll take full ownership of the stolen vehicle. This should be stated in your insurance policy.	[ "Some drivers believe that a new car is in greater danger than a used car of getting into an accident or having a collision. Some drivers will leave change under their seats. Others use one coin to scratch the car, based on the (false) belief that since the car is new and nothing has happened to it yet, the chances...
what is the difference between normal steel and galvanized steel?	Galvanizing is a process of adding a zinc coat to the steel. It should make the nuts last longer and prevents rust. The actual process is slightly more complicated but this is essentially it.	[ "Electrical steel is one material that uses decarburization in its production. To prevent the atmospheric gases from reacting with the metal itself, electrical steel is annealed in an atmosphere of nitrogen, hydrogen, and water vapor, where oxidation of the iron is specifically prevented by the proportions of hydro...
how are the "dark triad" traits in psychology different from each other?	Psychopathy is a lack of empathy & understanding of how people feel. Narcissism is placing your own needs & wants over others. Machiavellianism is lying & manipulating people to achieve your goals. They're called the "dark triad" because they do so often overlap & feed into each other. It's easy to be narci...	[ "There is a good deal of conceptual and empirical overlap between the dark triad traits. For example, researchers have noted that all three traits share characteristics such as a lack of empathy, interpersonal hostility, and interpersonal offensiveness. Likely due in part to this overlap, a number of measures have ...
Why don't we launch spacecraft using magnets?	To get into low earth orbit with a rail gun would require an exit velocity so high that whatever you are launching would burn up immediately. It has been suggested as an efficient way to launch things from bodies without an atmosphere.	[ "The main disadvantage of magnetorquers is that very high magnetic flux densities are needed if large craft have to be turned very fast. This either necessitates a very high current in the coils, or much higher ambient flux densities than are available in Earth orbit. Consequently, the torques provided are very lim...
how does winrar/7-zip just make my files smaller?	Just about any set of information contains some repeating information. My paragraph contains the word contains several times. One means to reduce the size would be to put a short unique identifier in place of each word "contains" and a reference that the identifier means contains. So a very simple compression sche...	[ "7-Zip comes with a file manager along with the standard archiver tools. The file manager has a toolbar with options to create an archive, extract an archive, test an archive to detect errors, copy, move, and delete files, and open a file properties menu exclusive to 7-Zip. The file manager, by default, displays hi...
model-view-controller pattern	MVC isn't that hard. You have the view (or views). This is everything you see. It's a lot of rules about how to show the info. Then you have the model, which is the data. Then you have the controller. The controller takes the data and moves it into the view. If something changes, you tell the controller and he upda...	[ "Model–View–Controller (usually known as MVC) is an architectural pattern commonly used for developing user interfaces that divides an application into three interconnected parts. This is done to separate internal representations of information from the ways information is presented to and accepted from the user. T...
why do people like to believe in god	I imagine you'll get a lot of responses along the lines of "they need easy comfort" or "they were brainwashed as children". I don't think these are untrue. But they're too simplified, even for ELI5. As far as comfort goes, it's not just comfort people are looking for. It's order. Humans love patterns and we really l...	[ "My faith is based on a constant search but I don't search frantically. It's no use to rush out into space to search for some gods there, if they want to have anything to do with me, they will come. I have often become aware of them, but I don't rush after them or shout at them. I have gotten to know them a bit in ...
Why was Iran/Persia never colonized?	While the area that is modern day Iran was indeed never colonized the way that India was, the country was picked apart bit by bit in the 1800s and what was left was more or less defacto colonized by Russia and Great Britain. Although there were resources to be had, nothing was quite so valuable as to engage a Great Pow...	[ "More importantly, the Dutch East India Company and later the English/British used their superior means of maritime power to control trade routes in the western Indian Ocean. As a result, Iran was cut off from overseas links to East Africa, the Arabian peninsula, and South Asia. Overland trade grew notably however,...
why do people go to the bathroom on a pretty regular schedule?	Because generally your food/drink intake is fairly regular as well. You have coffee every day at 8am. Lunch at noon, dinner at 7 etc.	[ "BULLET::::- Too many people using a toilet: This is especially true in case of shared or public toilets. If too many people want to use a toilet at the same time, then some people may go outside to defecate instead of waiting. In some cases, people might not be able to wait due to diarrhea (or result of an Irritab...
why do prepaid visa cards ask for social security numbers?	Its a bank account. Just like a bank. You can't open an account at a brick and mortar bank without using a SSN. Same applies to a non-traditional account.	[ "Social Security numbers and cards are issued by the US Social Security Administration for tracking of Social Security taxes and benefits. They have become the \"de facto\" national identification number for federal and state taxation, private financial services, and identification with various companies. SSNs do n...
How often are planets found?	Planets in our Solar System, or planets in general? In our Solar System, only two planets still considered planets have been found in recorded history, Uranus in 1781, and Neptune in 1864. If Planet Nine is real, odds are we'll find that within the next 10 years or so. Outside of our solar system, planets are found o...	[ "BULLET::::- 30 planets: On October 19, it was announced that 30 new planets were discovered, all were detected by radial velocity method. It is the most planets ever announced in a single day during the exoplanet era. October 2009 now holds the most planets discovered in a month, breaking the record set in June 20...
whats happening when a sneeze ‘gets stuck’ then just burns your nose and makes your eyes water.	Sneezes are a protective response to alert you to less than ideal breathing conditions and remove irritants/allergens from your nose. They’re triggered by the presence of irritants, but only a certain concentration, which is mediated by multiple nerve endings that generate “spikes” when they’re irritated. Once the numb...	[ "Sneezing typically occurs when foreign particles or sufficient external stimulants pass through the nasal hairs to reach the nasal mucosa. This triggers the release of histamines, which irritate the nerve cells in the nose, resulting in signals being sent to the brain to initiate the sneeze through the trigeminal ...
What was Moscow's relationship with Ceausescu before the Romanian revolution? What role, if any, did they play in the revolution?	Ceausescu was something of a maverick in the Eastern Bloc, which is why your friend probably thinks that. Relations between Brezhnev/Andropov and Ceausescu were cool at best and outright frigid at worst, although they never reached the point of de facto breaking off relations, unlike in Beijing. He denounced the 1968 S...	[ "Satisfied with this appointment, the Soviet authorities were more conciliatory with Romania. On 13 March 1945 Moscow transferred the administration of Transylvania to Bucharest. A few months later, on 19 July 1945, Michael I was decorated with the Order of Victory, one of the most prestigious Soviet military order...
why do roosters "cock-a-doodle-doo" in the morning?	They actually crow all day. Not just mornings.	[ "A rooster's crowing is a loud and sometimes shrill call and sends a territorial signal to other roosters. However, roosters may also crow in response to sudden disturbances within their surroundings. Hens cluck loudly after laying an egg, and also to call their chicks. Chickens also give different warning calls wh...
How Accurate/Bias was "Century of the Self"?	Not commenting directly on "Century of the Self", but Adam Curtis: Most all of his documentaries start with "This is a story about..." Keep that in mind. It's a story. It's a particular account of events too complex to explain otherwise. It may be compelling, even undeniable. It may be well researched, he may have un...	[ "The term of present bias was coined in the second half of the 20th century. In the 1930’s economic research started investigating time preferences. The findings led to the model of exponential discounting, thus time consistent discounting. However, later research led to the conclusion that time preferences were in...
how does my (i)phone know which sounds to let through in a phone call / face time?	There are several microphones. 1 intended to pick up your voice, the other(s) to pick up all the rest of the noise around you (lets call them noise microphones). The cell phone subtracts the sounds from the noise microphones from the sounds picked up by the voice microphone. The sounds that are left are just the voice.	[ "A typical phone call using a traditional phone is placed by picking the phone handset up off the base and holding the handset so that the hearing end is next to the user's ear and the speaking end is within range of the mouth. The caller then rotary dials or presses buttons for the phone number needed to complete ...
In the post red giant stage of a star, why do the outer layers drift into space and not collapse onto the white dwarf?	Two reasons. One is that as the star expands the surface gravity decreases and so it's easier for those outer layers to escape. Two is that it's not actually a "drifting" away in many cases but is in fact forceful; [stellar winds](_URL_0_) are generated which are blowing surface material away. We see this observational...	[ "A third option is that a giant star passes close enough to the central massive black hole for the outer layers to be stripped away by tidal forces, after which the remaining core may become an EMRI. However, it is uncertain if the coupling between the core and outer layers of giant stars is strong enough for strip...
why can't facebook, twitter and instagram just shut down bot accounts?	The problem is how do you actually figure out that a twitter user is a bot. You can use Machine Learning with certain features (like tweet sentiment) to analyze the data, but there's the possibility of false positives. Also, it's an arms race. Once they figure out what you're looking for all the bot creator needs to do...	[ "Using social bots is against the terms of service of many platforms, especially Twitter and Instagram. However, a certain degree of automation is of course intended by making social media APIs available. Many users, especially businesses still automate their Instagram activity in order to gain real followers rathe...
why do higher impedance speakers yield better sound quality?	The amplifier has an output impedance and the speakers have an input impedance. The signal itself is a time-varying voltage which is divided between the two impedances according to their ratio. To maximize the amount of power in the speakers, you want as low an output impedance on the amplifier and as high an input i...	[ "Speaker sensitivity is measured and rated on the assumption of a fixed amplifier output voltage because audio amplifiers tend to behave like voltage sources. Sensitivity can be a misleading metric due to differences in speaker impedance between differently designed speakers. A speaker with a higher impedance may h...
why did teachers always tell us to remove hats/caps when we enter inside a building? what does this signify?	It goes back to olden times when a knight would remove his face gear. It's simply a sign of respect to remove head pieces when in someone else's "home", and as well as during the Pledge of Allegiance.	[ "Wearing coats, boots or other outer garments inside someone’s home is often frowned upon as well. Sitting down to eat at table wearing a hat or coat etc. is even worse. Also one should remove one's hat when showing deference. Removing one's hat is also a form of respectful greeting: the origin of this is that knig...
Would having a more efficient/ faster brain affect our perception of time?	I am by no means an expert, but I know (both firsthand and from [documented sources](_URL_0_) ) that your perception of time can be affected by life-threatening situations. These situations probably (and I'm guessing here) do something like speeding up your neuronal activity and cause your neural "clock speed" to in...	[ "The neural efficiency hypothesis postulates that more intelligent individuals display less activation in the brain during cognitive tasks, as measured by Glucose metabolism. A small sample of participants (N=8) displayed negative correlations between intelligence and absolute regional metabolic rates ranging from ...
Are you born allergic to things or do you get it later on?	No. You are not born allergic to anything. You need to be sensitized to the allergen first, and you aren't really fully capable of that until several months after birth. You can, however, be born with a predisposition to becoming allergic to things (not specific things, just "things" in general).	[ "An allergic reaction can be caused by any form of direct contact with the allergen—consuming food or drink one is sensitive to (ingestion), breathing in pollen, perfume or pet dander (inhalation), or brushing a body part against an allergy-causing plant (direct contact). Other common causes of serious allergy are ...
Will the other side of the moon ever be facing earth?	The Moon is [tidally locked](_URL_0_), meaning it's orbital period equals its rotational period. Thus, the answer to your question is that the same side of the Moon will always face the Earth. Viewing the Moon from Earth, we will never see the other side. Something very dramatic would have to happen to change that.	[ "As a result of the Moon's synchronous rotation, one side of the Moon (the \"near side\") is permanently turned towards Earth, and the other side, the \"far side\", mostly cannot be seen from Earth. This means, conversely, that Earth can be seen only from the near side of the Moon and would always be invisible from...
Question about image scaling	It's a bit more complicated than that. [Here's a very good explanation of how it's done.](_URL_0_)	[ "Image scaling can be interpreted as a form of image resampling or image reconstruction from the view of the Nyquist sampling theorem. According to the theorem, downsampling to a smaller image from a higher-resolution original can only be carried out after applying a suitable 2D anti-aliasing filter to prevent alia...
how exactly do organisms evolve and adapt to their environment?	They don't. There's a bit of variation between individuals of a generation, and traits that prove beneficial have a better chance of passing on than traits that don't. If 95% of frogs of a species are green and 5% are red, so long as green is the preferred camouflage color, the green frogs will reproduce more on acc...	[ "Habitats and biota do frequently change. Therefore, it follows that the process of adaptation is never finally complete. Over time, it may happen that the environment changes little, and the species comes to fit its surroundings better and better. On the other hand, it may happen that changes in the environment oc...
Why are galaxies the colour they are?	The colors gives insight in the composition of the star population of the galaxy. Blue regions are composed mostly of young hot stars, while red regions are older, cooler stars. You will often also see smaller, pink spots. These are huge clouds of hydrogen, the color stems from the characteristic emission of hydrogen...	[ "In astronomy, a blue compact dwarf galaxy (BCD galaxy) is a small galaxy which contains large clusters of young, hot, massive stars. These stars, the brightest of which are blue, cause the galaxy itself to appear blue in colour. Most BCD galaxies are also classified as dwarf irregular galaxies or as dwarf lenticul...
- why wouldn't it be possible to set up a solar heated steam pipeline that also removes salt, to get water to rural parts of africa?	I guess because they can't afford it.	[ "Solar evaporation is the oldest and most energy-efficient method of mineral production. At the Great Salt Lake near Ogden, Utah, Compass Minerals draws naturally occurring brine out of the lake into shallow ponds and allows solar evaporation to produce salt, sulfate of potash (SOP) and magnesium chloride. Its SOP ...
how fresh water fish populations spread from one river network to another without going through (presumably deadly) seawater?	I wondered that about fresh water mussels. So I asked. They have a free living form which basically hitches a ride in the gills of fish. This means the same species can be in one river system even though they are mussels. Similar events can occur for other species. Egrets and other fish eating birds will fly from one ...	[ "A second potential mechanism for accidental movement of infected fish is the international trade in ornamental or aquarium fishes, which includes the global trade of approximately 5000 freshwater and 1450 saltwater fishes. Each year over 1 billion individual fish are shipped among more than 100 nations, creating a...
Do we experience atmosphere tides? Do the molecules in the air get dragged according to the moons gravity causing “deeper” periods of time?	The moon does indeed effect the atmosphere, but orders of magnitude less than it does the ocean. Tidal effects form pressure waves of about 100 microbars, or about 0.01% the atmospheric pressure at sea level. That's only perceptible to scientific instruments, and practically background noise compared to the regular var...	[ "Atmospheric tides are global-scale waves excited by regular solar differential heating (thermal tides) or by the gravitational tidal force of the moon (gravitational tides). The atmosphere behaves like a huge waveguide closed at the bottom (the Earth's surface) and open to space at the top. In such a waveguide an ...
what is the difference between losing weight because i am not eating any food vs losing weight while maintaining a healthy diet and working out to lose more calories?	Losing weight is easy by not eating. But you will feel weak from lack of nutrition and you may still not have a good body composition. Working out and eating well you will feel energised and strong and will end up with a healthy body composition. Body composition is how much fat and muscle you have in your body. You ...	[ "Some popular beliefs attached to weight loss have been shown to either have less effect on weight loss than commonly believed or are actively unhealthy. According to Harvard Health, the idea of metabolism being the \"key to weight\" is \"part truth and part myth\" as while metabolism does affect weight loss, exter...
why are blood stains on fabric so difficult to remove compared to other types of stains?	Mostly because it's a complex substance, containing liquid, suspended solids, cells, fats, oils, and a plethora of other compounds. Most other stains are caused by small portions of these types of compounds. Wine is mostly aqueous (water based), grease is lipid (fat) based, etc. Most solvents are good at cleaning ...	[ "For tissues that are not directly acidic or basic, it can be difficult to use only one stain to reveal the necessary structures of interest. A combination of the three different stains in precise amounts applied in the correct order reveals the details selectively. This is the result of more than just electrostati...
How long does it take to boot up a supercomputer?	The only 'supercomputer' I have access to is a network of 128 computers, each with some xeon processors and lots of ram. These can be booted simultaneously, and boot into a minimally configured Linux environment, which is very quick. The master node then needs to start the cluster management software and register all t...	[ "This process took a total of 0.337 seconds of CPU time, out of which 0.327 seconds was spent in user space, and the final 0.010 seconds in kernel mode on behalf of the process. Elapsed real time was 1.15 seconds.\n", "To give some perspective to this, using Virginia Tech's System X with a maximum performance of ...
Does potential energy "count" as energy?	I somehow miss your sub-question, and I gave an answer. I will keep some of what I wrote there, maybe you will like it. Maybe you didn't realize it, but gravitational energy is also consider/named potential energy. Why? because it has the potential to generate a force (gravitational force in this case) if you put an o...	[ "Common types of potential energy include the gravitational potential energy of an object that depends on its mass and its distance from the center of mass of another object, the elastic potential energy of an extended spring, and the electric potential energy of an electric charge in an electric field. The unit fo...
prism and the nsa scandal	A low level contractor working for the NSA named Snowden leaked a document describing a classified program that collects data from the largest internet communities in the world, including microsoft, facebook, yahoo, google, etc. The internet companies themselves claim to be unaware of this. It's a big deal because th...	[ "Documents indicate that PRISM is \"the number one source of raw intelligence used for NSA analytic reports\", and it accounts for 91% of the NSA's Internet traffic acquired under FISA section 702 authority.\" The leaked information came to light one day after the revelation that the FISA Court had been ordering a ...
why does rubbing alcohol, vinegar, etc have expiry dates? how can they go bad?	The FDA requires expiry dates on nearly everything aside from alcohol and cosmetics. The manufacturers have to put something, so they generally choose a date a few years out, that they are willing to guarantee the product will meet or exceed that date. _URL_0_	[ "Currently there is no practical way of halting or reversing the course of degradation. Many film collectors use camphor tablets but it is not known what the long term effects on the film would be. While there has been significant research regarding various methods of slowing degradation, such as storage in molecul...
In the 60s, was japan's economy expected to overtake the usa's by now?	One minor note: Realistically, China will probably become the world's largest economy much sooner than 2050. The OECD thinks it could be [within the next 4-5 years](_URL_0_), although that's almost certainly jumping the gun. The U.S. National Intelligence Council [thinks it'll be around 2030](_URL_1_) if present trends...	[ "The high economic growth and political tranquillity of the mid-to-late 1960s were tempered by the quadrupling of oil prices by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in 1973. Almost completely dependent on imports for petroleum, Japan experienced its first recession since World War II.\n", ...
if one were to strike a billiards ball with the cue ball, and we disregard the deceleration as the target ball hits each bumper as well as other balls on the table, would the ball eventually, but always sink into a pocket regardless of where on the table it went?	No, it won't always sink. It's easy to think of a situation in which it won't happen. If you hit the ball parallel to any side of the table, it would bounce back and forth forever, never entering any of the pockets (unless it was right in front of the pocket already.	[ "BULLET::::- Knocking any ball off the table; opponent receives ball-in-hand plus 2 points (the ball is spotted in its starting position, or as close to this position as possible, unless it was the now-incoming opponent's cue ball, which as noted is in-hand).\n", "Making the ball: You score a point by making the ...
germany just made all universities free, how do other countries do this?	Economist here. There is no such thing as free. They are just making college payments compulsory for everyone regardless of whether they use it or not. The system used by the US was fine until universities realized the government would subsidize them raising tuition to ridiculous rates by lending to students.	[ "In Germany, most institutions of higher education are subsidised by German states and are therefore also referred to as \"staatliche Hochschulen.\" (public universities) In most German states, admission to public universities is still cheap, about two hundred Euro per semester. In 2005, many states introduced addi...
why apple released ios 6 maps when it obviously wasn't ready for release.	Because google refused to license turn by turn, which was a HUGE feature. Apple had been trying to get turn by turn built in for years but they could never come to an agreement. Also, google changed it's pricing from wholesale licensing to pay-per-use, which would make the maps more expensive. On top of that, google st...	[ "In iOS 6, Apple replaced Google Maps with its own Apple Maps as the default mapping service for the operating system, and immediately faced criticism for inaccurate or incomplete data, including a museum in a river, missing towns, satellite images obscured by clouds, missing local places, and more.\n", "In June ...
How is light that is as old as the universe travelling to us from 13 billion light years away?	The universe was opaque until ~300,000 years after its formation. So the light from the CMB is around that age. Now, imagine an infinitely long ruler. Pick any marking on that ruler and place yourself there. When the universe became transparent, a photon from 10cm from you gets sent in your direction, but due to the ...	[ "The light took much longer than 4 billion years to reach us though it was emitted from only 4 billion light years away, and, in fact, the light emitted towards the Earth was actually moving \"away\" from the Earth when it was first emitted, in the sense that the metric distance to the Earth increased with cosmolog...
why is the minimum age for ‘adult’ medicines usually 12? not 18 or 21?	Because a lot of pharmaceuticals are dosed by patient weight. At 12 years old you are nearly full size.	[ "The most frequently reported drugs that have been associated with the development of AGEP include penicillin, aminopenicillins, macrolides, quinolones, sulfonamides, hydroxychloroquine, terbinafine, and diltiazem. A more complete list of drugs sorted by their intended actions are:\n", "The initiation of drug and...
How long after sperm enters the egg does it take to create the DNA for the baby?	The term you're looking for is the "zygote"; this is the first cell that properly has all 46 chromosomes. In general, this takes about 12 hours to form after the sperm cell has entered the ovum. As to whether it's the "start of a life", I guess you'd have to define what life is. Both the sperm and oocyte prior to fert...	[ "In contrast to oogenesis, the production of sperm cells is a lifelong process. Each year after puberty, spermatogonia (precursors of the spermatozoa) divide meiotically about 23 times. By the age of 40, the spermatogonia will have undergone about 660 such divisions, compared to 200 at age 20. Copying errors might ...
What connection is there between the esophageal sphincter and your ears?	Are you referring to the upper esophageal sphincter or the lower?	[ "The external ear openings are covered with fur and do not have a pinnae. The nostrils are small vertical slits right below the shield-like rostrum. Although the brain has been regarded as very primitive and represents the \"lowliest marsupial brain\", the olfactory bulbs and the rubercula olfactoria are very well ...
farting and its relation to poop.	> what purpose does farting serve? Farting serves the purpose of releasing excess gas in your digestive system. These gases are generally produced by (beneficial to you) bacteria that live within your digestive system > Why do they smell identical to the shit that I would imminently blast out? A human perceives ...	[ "Originally, the various Mandarin Chinese words for \"excrement\" were less commonly used as expletives, but that is changing. Perhaps because farting results in something that is useless even for fertilizer: \"fàng pì\" (; lit. \"to fart\") is an expletive in Mandarin. The word \"pì\" (; lit. \"fart\") or the phra...
Why did none of the southern states have ballots for Lincoln in the 1860 election?	Something to keep in mind is that printed, government-supplied ballots happened relatively late in our political process. In 1860, one would vote by writing out a ballot for a candidate or slate of candidates, or alternatively by using a ballot that was printed in a newspaper or similar publication or handed out by a c...	[ "Among the slave states, the three states with the highest voter turnouts voted the most one-sided. Texas, with five percent of the total wartime South's population, voted 75 percent Breckinridge. Kentucky and Missouri, with one-fourth the total population, voted 73 percent pro-union Bell, Douglas and Lincoln. In c...
Can somebody explain possible reasons why "Super Luminous Supernova" differ from the garden variety supernova?	I mean... the best source is probably [the paper](_URL_0_) itself. But, TL;DR we don't really know yet. It seems too energetic for most models, so the theorists will need some time to adjust. > Only within the past two decades has the most luminous class of supernovae (super-luminous supernovae, SLSNe) been ide...	[ "Theoretical studies indicate that most supernovae are triggered by one of two basic mechanisms: the sudden re-ignition of nuclear fusion in a degenerate star or the sudden gravitational collapse of a massive star's core. In the first class of events, the object's temperature is raised enough to trigger runaway nuc...
if earth's orbit is elliptical, how is it that summer occurs when earth is furthest from the sun, and spring and fall, when earth is closest to the sun, is cooler than summer?	The change in orbit is more or less negligible. You're talking 3 million miles out of about 91 million miles, about a 3% change. The tilt of the Earth 23.4 degrees. Now think about shining a flash light directly at the wall. It makes a spot right? If you tilt the angle around 30 degrees what happens? The spot stretch...	[ "The Earth's orbit is elliptical, with the Sun at one focus; lines drawn through the summer and winter solstice; and the spring and autumn equinox; intersect with the sun at right angles. The Earth is closest to the Sun (perihelion) near the northern hemisphere winter solstice. The earth moves faster through its or...
-why is that if you get distracted, your muscles become weaker?	Grip strength is a voluntary muscle movement, therefore by distracting them you are taking their mind off that action and so the signal to it will be decreased.	[ "When concentrating on a visually intense task, such as continuously focusing on a book or computer monitor, the ciliary muscle tightens. This can cause the eyes to get irritated and uncomfortable. Giving the eyes a chance to focus on a distant object at least once an hour usually alleviates the problem.\n", "Ear...
What unified the Austrian-Hungary Empire - Religion, Culture, etc.?	It was conquest! Always conquest. The Austrian Empire, or the Austro-Hungarian Empire, had its roots with the Habsburgs, and the Duchy of Austria. Austria and Vienna lay on trade roots coming east out of Italy, North out of the Balkans, and South and East out of the Baltics/Ukrainian steppe. Throughout the Renaissanc...	[ "The \"Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867\" created the personal union of the independent states of Hungary and Austria, linked under a common monarch also having joint institutions. The Hungarian majority asserted more of their identity within the Kingdom of Hungary, and it came to conflict with some of her own m...
why is it so much easier to spend money than to earn it?	Because most employment will only pay you a set amount for an hour's work, limiting you in how much money you can make in a span of time, but you can never exhaust the human race's output of purchasable goods.	[ "It has been argued that money cannot effectively \"buy\" much happiness unless it is used in certain ways, and that \"Beyond the point at which people have enough to comfortably feed, clothe, and house themselves, having more money – even a lot more money – makes them only a little bit happier.\" In his book \"Stu...
What is the process for a new atom or element to form, specifically from the beginning when there was only hydrogen and helium?	> If all matter began from hydrogen and helium, how did we end up with 120+ elements? There are 118 known elements, and some of them don't occur in significant amounts in nature. > Is it possible to create a specific element by mashing x amount of protons, neutrons, and electrons together? Yes, although there are ...	[ "Since there had been no previous star formation to create other elements, protogalaxies would have been made up almost entirely of hydrogen and helium. The hydrogen would bond to form H molecules, with some exceptions. This would change as star formation began and produced more elements through the process of nucl...
why do we try to keep people in vegetative states alive, who are not going to recover?	There's several reasons. It's the medical team's ethical and professional duty to maintain the person's life; they have a duty of care to the patient. It could be considered medical negligent or even murder/manslaughter if they ended the person's life. Also, they can't say for sure whether the person will recover or no...	[ "3. Most people want to be kept \"alive\" by machines. Most people don't want to drain their family's funds to keep them alive especially when they are in a persistent vegetative state with no possible chance for recovery. In these cases, it is often weighing the risks and benefits of keeping the patient breathing,...
why is it in the ingredients section, producers use ingredient a and/or b? do they know what they are putting in the food?	They either have multiple facilities with different suppliers or they alternate as the market price fluctuates. They do know internally what went into what batch for traceability purposes, but they don't want to print different labels.	[ "An ingredient is a substance that forms part of a mixture (in a general sense). For example, in cooking, recipes specify which ingredients are used to prepare a specific dish. Many commercial products contain secret ingredients that are purported to make them better than competing products. In the pharmaceutical i...
how having a good lawyer can get you out of serious charges.	The system has a lot of red tape that requires a lot of hands to do things. Someone forgot to sign off on a custody chain document, a tried police offer mistypes a report or something is left out when it should have been locked. The more money you have the more resources you have. High price lawyers have investigator...	[ "However, most jurisdictions have exceptions for situations where the lawyer has reason to believe that the client may kill or seriously injure someone, may cause substantial injury to the financial interest or property of another, or is using (or seeking to use) the lawyer's services to perpetrate a crime or fraud...
the interstellar medium is hot? 54,000 degrees f? how is this possible?	Key phrase: near-vacuum. The interstellar medium is so thin that it can be treated as a vacuum for all practical purposes, but it’s not a perfect vacuum. It contains the occasional particle, and such particles can be measured to derive a temperature.	[ "In all phases, the interstellar medium is extremely tenuous by terrestrial standards. In cool, dense regions of the ISM, matter is primarily in molecular form, and reaches number densities of 10 molecules per cm (1 million molecules per cm). In hot, diffuse regions of the ISM, matter is primarily ionized, and the ...
what would it take to change an atom?	Yes, bombarding with neutrons is one of the ways, but it's really slow. The same process happens when iron is created in the star's core. It starts collapsing so quick that the elementary particles are being crammed inside the atoms, changing iron to heavier metals like gold and uranium.	[ "Electrons can also be completely removed from a chemical species such as an atom, molecule, or ion. Complete removal of an electron from an atom can be a form of ionization, which is effectively moving the electron out to an orbital with an infinite principal quantum number, in effect so far away so as to have pra...
what's so great about kevin bacon?	I'm not so familiar with him myself, but just by the sheer volume and variety of films he has done, it's easy to pick something you like. Try typing "bacon number [name of another actor]" into Google, it will quickly became apparent just how well connected and involved he is.	[ "Bacon is a commentator on e-health and patient feedback. In June 2012, he formed part of a UK delegation invited to Washington for the Health Datapalooza, a US health data forum attended by UK health secretary Andrew Lansley, US President Barack Obama and Jon Bon Jovi. The discussion centred on how the two countri...
why does a standing bike fall down but a moving bike does not?	It's not just gyroscopes that others have mentioned. In fact, this actually plays a very small role, and it is still easy to ride a bike where there is a counter rotating wheel designed to eliminate all gyroscopic effects. It does play a role in a normal bike, but only when you're going very fast. The main advantage ...	[ "Even when staying relatively motionless, a rider can balance a bike by the same principle. While performing a track stand, the rider can keep the line between the two contact patches under the combined center of mass by steering the front wheel to one side or the other and then moving forward and backward slightly...
Do we know why there is nothing left of the Circus Maximus in Rome when compared to many other structures from the area?	Contrary to popular belief, more of the Circus Maximus survives than one might think. The "floor" level of the race track is now about 10 meters below ground level, and has never been systematically excavated. The spina (the central median of the track) was partially dug in 1587 on the orders of Pope Sixtus V. They...	[ "Given the size of the Circus, as it happened in almost all Hispanic-Roman cities, it was located on the outskirts of the walled enclosure. It is certain that from the city there was a causeway to the circus, which has not been found.\n", "Mérida's circus remains very well preserved. As is true with the Circus Ma...
Did Vikings prefer sword and shield or two handed in the battlefield	The favorite weapon set would be spear and shield, usually with some sort of knife or - if you could afford it - sword in case you needed to get more up-and-personal. Fighting in the Viking Age relied heavily on shield walls - tight lines of men standing close together and protecting each other with their shields, muc...	[ "The Viking Age sword was for single-handed use to be combined with a shield, with a double edged blade length of up to 90 cm. Its shape was still very much based on the Roman spatha with a tight grip, long deep fuller and no pronounced cross-guard. It was not exclusive to the Vikings, but rather was used throughou...
in the 1960s did most normal Russians still claim to believe in communism's superiority?	When talking about Russian perceptions of Communism you have to be careful who you're talking about. I think at no point besides perhaps late 1917 would peasants have positive opinions of Communists, and that was simply because they weren't the Provisional Government. The Peasants, like most of the Russian Empire, did ...	[ "Finally, there is a human capital dimension to the failure of post-Soviet reforms in Russia. The former Soviet population was not necessarily uneducated. Literacy was nearly universal, and the educational level of the Soviet population was among the highest in the world with respect to science, engineering, and so...
why does hot chocolate mix/powder stay dry even when milk or water is poured on top of it?	Water likes to stick to itself. That's why the surface of water and water droplets is smooth. Powder are full of little tiny holes. For water to go into the holes it would have to make a little spike of water. The water would rather stick to itself then make the spike.	[ "Alternatively, the milk can be dried by drum drying. Milk is applied as a thin film to the surface of a heated drum, and the dried milk solids are then scraped off. However, powdered milk made this way tends to have a cooked flavour, due to caramelization caused by greater heat exposure.\n", "A second type of ca...
at what point does the flow of air on an object go from cooling it down to heating it up due to friction?	Never, it isn't friction but [air compression](_URL_0_) that heats the object. As for at what point it out-factors the effect of the air whisking heat away, it depends on the shape. Basically a 'bad' aerodynamic shape will squish a lot more air than a 'good' aerodynamic shape, which will allow the air to flow around ...	[ "A surface loses heat through conduction, evaporation, convection, and radiation. The rate of convection depends on both the difference in temperature between the surface and the fluid surrounding it and the velocity of that fluid with respect to the surface. As convection from a warm surface heats the air around i...
the cause of the geometric patterns formed in sand with a tone generator	[Standing waves](_URL_2_) If you shake a string at right frequency "knot" points will form that stay stationary. This is due to the wave created by the shaking and the wave reflected from the other end interfering with each other. Video: Standing waves on a string _URL_1_ Objects that are more complex than a strin...	[ "From the physical-mathematical standpoint, the form of the nodal patterns is predetermined by the shape of the body set in vibration or, in the case of acoustic waves in a gas, the shape of the cavity in which the gas is contained. The sound wave, therefore, does not influence at all the shape of the vibrating bod...
Commercial kitty litter was invented in 1947. Where did house cats pee and poop before then?	If your cat was an indoor cat, you would likely provide them some sort of absorbent material. In the 1922 Feeding and Care of the Domestic and Long-Haired Cat, the following advice is offered: > Each room should also contain a fair sized granite pan, partly filled with sand or sawdust. I prefer saw dust as it does ...	[ "BULLET::::- Cat litter is one of any of a number of materials used in litter boxes to absorb moisture from cat feces and urine, which reduces foul odors such as ammonia and renders them more tolerable within the home. The first commercially available cat litter was Kitty Litter, available in 1948 and invented by E...
why were there tons of super giant creatures like dinosaurs a few million years ago, but there aren't now? why did everything shrink in scale? even a lot of bugs were much bigger then. did earth's gravity change?	The prevailing theory is that our atmosphere had a lot more oxygen in it at the time (right now it's just over 20%). This let animals grow larger, especially with the scale of insects. Since most of them don't have a true respiratory system, they take in oxygen through their skin/exoskeletons. By having more O2 in t...	[ "Recent theories propose that theropod body size shrank continuously over a period of 50 million years, from an average of down to , eventually evolving into modern birds. This was based on evidence that theropods were the only dinosaurs to get continuously smaller, and that their skeletons changed four times as fa...
Are the any dinosaur hybrids ie (like the mule is a hybrid of a male donkey and a female horse)?	animals in the wild hybridizing naturally is pretty rare, and a terrestrial animal becoming a fossil is also (in the scheme of things) pretty rare it's certainly possible but i've not heard of such a thing - which makes sense, as finding any evidence would be incredibly unlikely	[ "Equine species can crossbreed with each other. The most common hybrid is the mule, a cross between a male donkey and a female horse. With rare exceptions, these hybrids are sterile and cannot reproduce. A related hybrid, a hinny, is a cross between a male horse and a female donkey. Other hybrids include the zorse,...
the united states' corporate taxes, and why ours are the highest in the world.	The American tax code is like swiss cheese. There are so many loop holes that in order to actually make money off of it, you need to raise the overall tax rate so high that it outweighs the loop holes.	[ "Some argue that the U.S. corporate tax rate at 35% is the \"highest in the industrialized world\", while others argue it isn't. The rate varies from sector to sector, and can be as low as 21% in the manufacturing industry. A high tax rate would place the U.S. at a \"competitive disadvantage in the global marketpla...
Thoughts on "The Forge of Christendom" by Tom Holland?	I'm working through Tom Hollands 'Persian Fire' and he is very honest in the forward about the amount of embellishment and speculation in the work. I'm reading this with a few other people, and while they find it significantly more enjoyable to read, we all feel that we're reading exactly what he said, speculation and...	[ "His life work was the establishment of the catechism course in his church of \"Unsere liebe Frau\" (Our Lady), whereby he has merited a place in the history of catechism. The origin and growth of this foundation is described in his large work \"Die gesamte christliche Lehre in ihrem Zusammenhang\" 'the whole Chris...
what exactly is the bridge of the song?	There are two ways to define the "bridge." A little music theory 101: Think of how your favorite songs are built. There are choruses (which sound the same each time) and verses (which sound a little different each time). They might be put together like this: ABABA, with A being the chorus and B being a verse. Howe...	[ "\"Anyone Seen the Bridge?\" (abbreviated as \"ASTB\") is an instrumental by the Dave Matthews Band, usually played as segue between two songs during a concert. It is an instrumental jam played by the entire band, with scat singing by Dave Matthews. Performances of the tune today typically are heard between \"So Mu...
how does a temp agency make money?	Company pays temp agency $15/hour-head. Agency pays worker $8/hr	[ "The role of a temp agency is as a third party between client employer and client employee. This third party handles remuneration, work scheduling, complaints, taxes, etc. created by the relationship between a client employer and a client employee. Client firms request the type of job that is to be done, and the sk...
how does using a debit/credit card work when used internationally?	It displays in the currency of the ATM. So in the US its Dollars, in England its the Pound, in the Eurozone its the Euro and so on.	[ "In Canada, the debit card is sometimes referred to as a \"bank card\". It is a client card issued by a bank that provides access to funds and other bank account transactions, such as transferring funds, checking balances, paying bills, etc., as well as point of purchase transactions connected on the Interac networ...
how does the volkswagen emission software work?	VW and Audi included software that could sense when the engine was being emission tested. Once a testing situation was detected, the engine was electronically governed to operate in a manner that would pass emissions testing - this would come at the expense of performance. When the software detected normal operatin...	[ "The business strategy of Volkswagen is to standardize platforms, components, and technologies, thus improving the firm's profitability and growth. For example, Audi uses components from their more pedestrian counterparts, sold as Volkswagen Group's mass-market brands. As an effort to place Audi as a \"premium\" ma...
what is bio chemistry, and what do bio chemists do?	Biochemistry is, simply put, the study of the chemical reactions that underlie biological systems. Think of the way proteins are formed, or how glucose is broken down into ATP. Besides academic study and aid of related fields like pharmacology, biochemistry has a lot of industrial applications nowadays, such as the dev...	[ "Bioresource Chemistry and Bioenvironmental Science focuses on essential knowledge and application of various chemical substances with biological functions, and on developing a solid foundation in the chemistry and biology of various ecosystems (from the terrestrial land to the seas).\n", "Biochemical engineering...
why are astronomers now using radio telescopes more than optical ones?	Light and radio waves are the same thing, photons. Optical telescopes were used in the past because they were easy to make, and you don't have to process the image, you just take the photo and then look at it. Radio telescopes pick up light in the 'radio' range of the light spectrum, the data needs to be processed ...	[ "Because radio telescopes have low resolution, they were the first instruments to use interferometry allowing two or more widely separated instruments to simultaneously observe the same source. Very long baseline interferometry extended the technique over thousands of kilometers and allowed resolutions down to a fe...
how do recoilless rifles work?	When the round is launched, it blows expanding gas out of the back of the tube. This balances the expanding gas that blows out of the front, along with the round. It can't be used in tanks and the like because the back of the tube is literally where the crew sits. It would kill everyone inside. It's also just not n...	[ "A recoilless rifle (RR) or recoilless gun is a type of lightweight artillery system or man-portable launcher that is designed to eject some form of countermass, such as propellant gas, from the rear of the weapon at the moment of firing, creating forward thrust that counteracts most of the weapon's recoil. Technic...
why do night vision cameras cast a shadow?	Many night vision cameras use an infrared lamp to illuminate the scene being recorded. You can't see that light, but the camera can. Hth.	[ "Sometimes a shadow can be used to create a visual effect. Areas of the bluescreen or greenscreen with a shadow on them can be replaced with a darker version of the desired background video image, making it look like the person is casting a shadow on them. Any spill of the chroma key color will make the result look...

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

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