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This may sound daft but, when Comets go though space they appear to have a tail, but space is a vacuum so what would be causing the tail is there is no resistance?	The sun. The tail of a comet doesn't indicate where it is going but rather where it is relative to the sun Edit: _URL_0_	[ "In the outer Solar System, comets remain frozen and are extremely difficult or impossible to detect from Earth due to their small size. Statistical detections of inactive comet nuclei in the Kuiper belt have been reported from the Hubble Space Telescope observations, but these detections have been questioned, and ...
[Mores, Customs & Folkways] Do historians use literature to study areas that are well documented or is literature only used if there are no other sources?	Hi, history is more interdisciplinary than the question seems to imply - but it's also a big question. Cultural history may involve study of fictional literature; for example, a student could examine how Shakespeare's portrayal of the Plantagenets in his history plays related to propaganda reinforcing Tudor / Elizabe...	[ "A study of cultural history could include fictional sources such as novels or plays. In a broader sense primary sources also include artifacts like photographs, newsreels, coins, paintings or buildings created at the time. Historians may also take archaeological artifacts and oral reports and interviews into consi...
if bathroom hygiene is so important why don't we get sick after performing oral sex?	It's more a matter of frequency. If you consider all the times in a day you touch a person (shake hands, etc.) or touch something they touch (doorknobs, etc.), it ads up to a lot of exposure. If you sucked that many dicks, every day, from that many random people, you would probably get sick a lot.	[ "Women may consider personal hygiene before practicing oral sex important, as poor hygiene can lead to bad odors, accumulation of sweat and micro-residue (such as lint, urine or menstrual blood), which the giving partner may find unpleasant. Some women remove or trim pubic hair, which may enhance their oral sex exp...
how did people get enough heat to smelt metals before the industrial age?	Coal fire forges are able to reach temperatures of about 1900 degrees C which is more than enough to melt most ‘primitive’ metals such as iron, bronze, copper and steel.	[ "In the Old World, humans learned to smelt metals in prehistoric times, more than 8000 years ago. The discovery and use of the \"useful\" metals — copper and bronze at first, then iron a few millennia later — had an enormous impact on human society. The impact was so pervasive that scholars traditionally divide anc...
How did scientists measure the radius of atoms and other stuffs?	The most accurate measurements are spectroscopic measurements, in which the energy between states of e.g. atoms is measured. These measurement happen typically with lasers, the frequencies of which can be very well controlled. This is the domain of atomic physics, which is mainly quantum mechanics dealing with discrete...	[ "The Van der Waals radius, \"r\", of an atom is the radius of an imaginary hard sphere which can be used to model the atom for many purposes. It is named after Johannes Diderik van der Waals, winner of the 1910 Nobel Prize in Physics, as he was the first to recognise that atoms were not simply points and to demonst...
How is the infrastructure of the internet built?	The "internet" is simply a huge network. There are many subnetworks, and subnetworks of those networks, but it all is just a big web of connections. Some huge telecommunication companies own huge fiber optic cable trunks, and they have an agreement to connect them. The top level ISPs are called Tier 1 ISPs. Tier 1 IS...	[ "The infrastructure by which individuals, households, businesses, and communities connect to the Internet refers to the physical mediums that people use to connect to the Internet such as desktop computers, laptops, cell phones, iPods or other MP3 players, Xboxes or PlayStations, electronic book readers, and tablet...
why does english pop up everywhere? like in anime, and foreign music they just say a line in english and then just back to their respective languages.	Because it's currently seen as the lingua franca of the western world I'd reckon	[ "The foreign language songs are often \"misheard\" into English by the creators and added as subtitles. The words are not translations but soramimis, English words that sound roughly the same as the original lyrics. For example, the animutation title \"French erotic film\" is a soramimi of the original Dutch lyrics...
Border Between Portugal and Spain	Why specifically these borders and not somewhere else is a question that's beyond me, but Portugal, immediately after its Reconquista, was a County and vassal to the Kingdom of Galicia and later Leon. Afonso I of Portugal became independent mostly with papal support due to his role in driving out the Moors in present d...	[ "Despite these definitions, the Portugal-Spain border remains an unresolved territorial dispute between the two countries. Portugal does not recognise the border between Caia and Ribeira de Cuncos River deltas, since the beginning of the 1801 occupation of Olivenza by Spain. This territory, though under \"de facto\...
- why do people want ivory so bad and why is it illegal?	Before the advent of plastics, ivory was a very durable alternative to wood. It was considered a luxury good because of its relative scarcity. Most countries have made ivory trade illegal because harvesting it requires killing of endangered elephants.	[ "Ivory has been traded for hundreds of years by people in regions such as Greenland, Alaska, and Siberia. The trade, in more recent times, has led to endangerment of species, resulting in restrictions and bans. Ivory was formerly used to make piano keys and other decorative items because of the white color it prese...
what is the difference between a credit card reader and a chip-and-pin machine?	Chip and pin cards look [like this](_URL_0_), where you insert the chip into [the reader](_URL_1_), and are prompted to enter a PIN number (like an ATM) before you can make a purchase. Traditional credit card readers just [swipe the magnetic strip](_URL_2_), and you sign the receipt. Edit: Added images.	[ "POST cards are inserted into an expansion slot, and are available with connectors for the ISA (also supporting EISA), PCI, PCI Express, Mini PCIe (for laptops), Universal Serial Bus, or Low Pin Count bus, or for a parallel port. A typical card for desktop computers has a different bus interface on each edge; a car...
Is there any hard data to suggest that an animal that has killed a human (like the bear on the front page) is actually likely to repeat this behavior?	Yes there is. Especially if they develop a taste for human meat. Carnivores frequently will attack humans if they are sick, weak, or old. We are quite easy to eat. about lions in the 1800's that preyed on Keyan construction Workers _URL_0_	[ "BULLET::::- Initially, there were a number of animal deaths from disease, toxic exposure, maternal killings, and park vehicles. The United States Department of Agriculture investigation found no violations of the Animal Welfare Act for the 29 deaths that happened September 1997 – April 1998.\n", "BULLET::::- Ini...
why is it that the majority of the police officers/military in corrupt states defend the corrupted governments?	Cops aren't as oppressed as those they help oppressed. Cops break the law a lot more than your average citizen and their position lets them get away with it. As long as they keep those in power they get to keep their jobs and the perks that come along with it.	[ "Police corruption is a major problem, owing partly to low wage and poor training. The police are generally viewed as the nation's third most corrupt institution, and corruption is widely seen as the main impediment to legitimate crime-fighting. In six years, three police chiefs have been fired for corruption or ab...
What is the Western Han and Eastern Han in the context of the Han Dynasty?	They are the same dynasty ruled by the same family. The reason why there is the Western Han and the Eastern Han is because in between the two, a man named Wang Mang usurped power from the Western Han emperor and established the Xin Dynasty. After he was defeated and overthrown, the Han dynasty was reestablished in Luoy...	[ "Han (, Old Chinese: \"*\") was an ancient Chinese state during the Warring States period of ancient China. It is conventionally romanized by scholars as Hann to distinguish it from the later Han dynasty (漢).\n", "The Han dynasty (simplified Chinese: 汉朝; traditional Chinese: 漢朝; pinyin: Hàn Cháo; 206 BCE – 220 CE...
When you rinse out a glass of red wine, why does the water turn gray?	Probably the pH change, which turns the anthocyanidins from their "native" reddish/purple color (at the low pH of the wine) to a blue color which, when diluted, looks a bit gray. This is also a decent technique for removing red wine stains: use a cleaner with a higher pH. _URL_0_	[ "As red wine ages, the harsh tannins of its youth gradually give way to a softer mouthfeel. An inky dark color will eventually lose its depth of color and begin to appear orange at the edges, and eventually turn brown. These changes occur due to the complex chemical reactions of the phenolic compounds of the wine. ...
Why aren't we crushed by the weight of the air over our heads? And why don't we feel the weight of the air lifted off of us when we go into a car or building?	[Atmospheric pressure](_URL_0_) is the measure of the amount of force the air exerts on you per area. So it _is_ already measuring the weight of air that exerts on some area. If your room is at one atm, it is pressurized. The weight of air is on you.	[ "The sensation of weight is caused by the force exerted by fluids in the vestibular system, a three-dimensional set of tubes in the inner ear. It is actually the sensation of g-force, regardless of whether this is due to being stationary in the presence of gravity, or, if the person is in motion, the result of any ...
why do some people who's parents are immigrants have an accent while others don't ?	Accents tend to come more from peers than parents. So someone who grew up in an area where all the friends and neighbors share the same accent, or perhaps went to a private or parochial school where that was the case, will more likely have a similar accent. But when children go to assimilated schools, especially at t...	[ "Children are able to take on accents relatively quickly. Children of immigrant families, for example, generally have a more native-like pronunciation than their parents, but both children and parents may have a noticeable non-native accent. Accents seem to remain relatively malleable until a person's early twentie...
When did winking become a thing?	I can tell you the OED's first use of this definition of the word "wink" if that's useful at all. 1541 Thomas Elyot's Image of Gouernance (Governance) "Of a mayster sturdy and fierce, a lyttell wynke to his seruant is a fearefull commaundement."	[ "Winking is one of the more subtle gestures, usually involving eye contact between those involved. In most cases it is only meant to be known by the sender and their intended receivers, but in some cases can be more widely intended.\n", "However, winking in the Indian subcontinent often has similar connotations a...
why do we use olive oil instead of frying oil when stirfrying vegetables?	Properly stir-frying anything requires using really high temperatures. Most olive oil has a relatively low smoke point (the temperature at which it starts to break down & smoke). Stir-fry oils are generally things that handle temperatures better like corn, peanut, canola & soy. There's also the bit that olives a...	[ "Olive oil is produced by grinding olives and extracting the oil by mechanical or chemical means. Green olives usually produce more bitter oil, and overripe olives can produce oil that is rancid, so for good extra virgin olive oil care is taken to make sure the olives are perfectly ripened. The process is generally...
why european civilizations were so much more advanced in terms of everything compared to african and native american civilizations. and so when white ppl came to america they basically just took over with guns.	_URL_1_ _URL_0_ _URL_5_ _URL_2_ _URL_3_ _URL_4_	[ "Between 1878 and 1898, European states partitioned and conquered most of Africa. For 400 years, European nations had mainly limited their involvement to trading stations on the African coast. Few dared venture inland from the coast; those that did, like the Portuguese, often met defeats and had to retreat to the c...
the united states is over $22 trillion in debt. what does that mean?	Not a whole lot, actually. Somewhere between 70-80% of that debt is held by American citizens in the form of bonds, including savings bonds. Bonds are heavily used as a stable investment to protect your money from inflation (the rates on the bonds basically keep up with the rate of inflation). And none of the debt is c...	[ "The total national debt of the United States in the United States was $18.527 trillion (106% of the GDP) in 2014. The United States has the largest external debt in the world and the 14th largest government debt as a % of GDP in the world.\n", "The U.S. public debt was $909 billion in 1980, an amount equal to 33...
what is the bubonic plague, and would it be as fatal today as it was in the middle ages?	Bubonic plague is a specific kind of disease caused by the bacteria Yersinia pestis. (Pneumonic and septicemic plague are the other kinds, less famous because they didn't destroy Europe.) Yersinia lives in fleas, which live on rodents. As a result, plague was able to spread very quickly in a time when sailors could bri...	[ "The reference above to bubonic plague seems improbable. Typhoid is far more likely; it was both endemic and epidemic at the period, killing Prince Albert in 1861, but bubonic plague had a heyday from 1348 to about 1700. Cholera is just possible; there were outbreaks in 1832 in Liverpool and reputedly as late as 18...
[Medicine] Improper alcohol detoxification can kill a person. How then can people rehabilitate alcoholics?	have them (the addict) continue to consume alcohol as needed to avoid serious withdrawal symptoms. However, the amount consumed per day is decreased continually over a span of several days, so that their dependance on ethanol is gradually reduced to zero.	[ "Alcohol detoxification is a process by which a heavy drinker's system is brought back to normal after being habituated to having alcohol in the body continuously for an extended period of substance abuse. Serious alcohol addiction results in a downregulation of GABA neurotransmitter receptors. Precipitous withdraw...
What is a plausible scientific explanation for "glory clouds" in church services?	That's dust. Definitely dust, you can tell by the straight line it makes coming from the light.	[ "The Morning Glory cloud is a rare meteorological phenomenon consisting of a low-level atmospheric solitary wave and associated cloud, occasionally observed in different locations around the world. The wave often occurs as an amplitude-ordered series of waves forming bands of roll clouds.\n", "A glory is an optic...
how do cough suppressants, decongestants and expectorants work together to help with a cold?	None of the above help colds. They help the symptoms of a cold. Decongestants, fine. Cough suppressants and expectorants seem illogical if mixed but separately they might help the symptoms. Many of this type of symptomatic "cure" has ingredients that defy strict logic. Despite this, people buy them.	[ "When laryngospasm is coincident with a cold or flu, it may be helpful for some sufferers to take acid reflux medication to limit the irritants in the area. If a cough is present, then treat a wet cough; but limit coughing whenever possible, as it is only likely to trigger a spasm. Drink water or tea to keep the ar...
What causes the varied distribution of resources across the Earth?	It's not a random process. Certain minerals only form under a set of very precise geological conditions. Much like how you need just the right ingredients to make a cake, you need just the right conditions to produce certain types of rock. These conditions include depth below the surface, temperature, pressure, local r...	[ "Resource distribution refers to the distribution of resources, including land, water, minerals, fuel and wealth in general among corresponding geographic entities (states, countries, etc.).Resource distribution refers to the geographic occurrence or spatial arrangement of resources on earth. In other words, where ...
How did Italian-Americans react to the extremely racist Allied anti Axis propaganda films?	Can we broaden this to include Asian Americans?	[ "From the onset of the war, and particularly following Pearl Harbor many viewed Italian Americans with suspicion. Groups such as The Los Angeles Council of California Women's Clubs petitioned General DeWitt to place all enemy aliens in concentration camps immediately, and the Young Democratic Club of Los Angeles we...
The ratio of the distance between a planet and its star vs the ratio of the distance between an electron and its nucleus, are the two ratios similar?	Compared to the radius of the sun, the Earth is 215 times farther away. Compared to the radius of a proton, the average position of the ground state hydrogen electron is 62,350 times farther away. Now, there are other planets and stars and other elements, but that gives you a rough picture.	[ "In practice, this ratio is almost always extremely small. For example, the Schwarzschild radius \"r\" of the Earth is roughly 9 mm ( inch); at the surface of the Earth, the corrections to Newtonian gravity are only one part in a billion. The Schwarzschild radius of the Sun is much larger, roughly 2953 meters, but ...
Considering all dogs have 38 chromosomes, can a very small dog mate with(in some manner) and give birth to a very large dog's pups?	A family member of mine breeds dogs so I've seen newborn puppies firsthand. There were two simultaneous litters of puppies; one from a toy poodle, and one litter from a standard poodle. What was amazing is that these newborns were practically the same size, just the toy poodle had considerably less (2) than the standar...	[ "All animals have a set of DNA coding for genes present on chromosomes. In humans, most mammals, and some other species, two of the chromosomes, called the X chromosome and Y chromosome, code for sex. In these species, one or more genes are present on their Y chromosome that determine maleness. In this process, an ...
why are vishnu and his avatars blue?	Blue is considered a divine/pure colour. I.e. connected to the sky / the sea	[ "BULLET::::- Blue in Hinduism: Many of the gods are depicted as having blue-coloured skin, particularly those associated with Vishnu, who is said to be the preserver of the world and thus intimately connected to water. Krishna and Ram, Vishnu's avatars, are usually blue. Shiva, the destroyer, is also depicted in li...
How long can a plant survive in space?	Depends on the environment. Plants can grow in microgravity with an artificial atmosphere, but if you're just talking about throwing a naked plant into space, the extreme temperatures would start rupturing cells immediately (areas in the sun would be very hot, and areas in shade would be well below freezing). Between...	[ "In 1982, the crew of the Soviet Salyut 7 space station grew some Arabidopsis, thus becoming the first plants to flower and produce seeds in space. They had a life span of 40 days. \"Arabidopsis thaliana\" seeds were taken to the Moon on the Chang'e 4 lander in 2019, as part of a student experiment. \n", "The pla...
Why were brass knuckles made of brass?	I can't speak to the historical aspect but from an industrial aspect brass is pretty inexpensive and is usually cast in a mold. Forged steel would be much more labor intensive. Cast iron would be subject to rusting. Brass is a good tradeoff of strength, cost, and corrosion resistance.	[ "Brass knuckles, also sometimes called knuckles, knucks, brass knucks, knucklebusters, knuckledusters, an English punch or a classic, are weapons used in hand-to-hand combat. Brass knuckles are pieces of metal shaped to fit around the knuckles. Despite their name, they are often made from other metals, plastics or ...
why did ants ( and other insects maybe idk) get an exoskeleton rather than a normal skeleton?	Because a hard outer shell doubles as protection from predators, as well as anchor points for muscles. Endoskeletons evolved to provide otherwise soft-bodied animals leverage to generate more power in their appendages without sacrificing as much flexibility as an exoskeleton.	[ "Like other insects, ants have an exoskeleton, an external covering that provides a protective casing around the body and a point of attachment for muscles, in contrast to the internal skeletons of humans and other vertebrates. Insects do not have lungs; oxygen and other gases, such as carbon dioxide, pass through ...
do people who talk languages other than english think in those languages?	Do you think in English? Seriously, when you think of a dog running across a field, do you imagine those words "a dog running across a field"? Or do you imagine an actual dog running across an actual field? The only times that we actually think in words, is when we are thinking of a language. I could think "My name i...	[ "English is on the school program latest in 7th class, and it sounds somehow familiar so that everyone believes he knows English at once. Anyhow, most people can communicate a bit in English. It is being said: If you don't know how to speak English, just take a hot potato in your mouth and speak a funny Luxembourgi...
How is corruption measured?	Transparency International publishes what they call a "Corruption Perception Index" made up from polls. They ask people how often in the past year (or whatever timeframe) they paid a bribe, and how much, and in what situation. It is true that the data is not entirely reliable because of the very nature of the thing b...	[ "BULLET::::- Lack of measurement of corruption. For example, using regular surveys of households and businesses in order to quantify the degree of perception of corruption in different parts of a nation or in different government institutions may increase awareness of corruption and create pressure to combat it. Th...
what happens to the food company when someone who is allergic to a secret ingredient consumes their food? will it be revealed? why has it not ever happened?	I think due to FDA regulations all ingredients must be listed, so the secrets are usually formulas and combinations. But the individual ingredients that people may be allergic to are listed.	[ "Allergic reactions are hyperactive responses of the immune system to generally innocuous substances, such as proteins in the foods we eat. Why some proteins trigger allergic reactions while others do is not entirely clear, although in part thought to be due to resistance to digestion. Because of this, intact or la...
if it is illegal to melt down pennies, how is it legal to press them?	Are you talking about how it's legal for the US Mint to press them? Because they're authorized by law to do so. If you're asking about those novelty machines that strech out a penny, it's because defacing the currency for non-fraudulent purposes isn't illegal.	[ "In anticipation of the business of melting down U.S. pennies and U.S. nickels for profit, the U.S. Mint, which is a part of the US Department of the Treasury, implemented new regulations on December 14, 2006, which criminalize the melting of pennies and nickels and place limits on export of the coins. Violators ca...
why the american corn taste different from middle eastern corn or asian one?	They differ in species, soil composition, environment, exposure to the sun. These all could effect the taste.	[ "BULLET::::- Maize: Maize (\"Indian\" corn), is native to Mesoamerica and Peru, The varieties used in Europe and most of the world are from Central America. The corn grown in Peru is so sweet and unique in the world cause the characteristics it has and has very large grains and is not popular outside of Latin Ameri...
what's the difference between tense, mood, and case?	Tense is the time of the action, past, future, happening right now. The tenses give a sense of when an action was completed, or if we expect the action to continue into the foreseeable future. It puts the verbs into a context of when. Mood adds or removes a certain certainty or uncertainty or more commonly, obligat...	[ "The term \"tense\", then, particularly in less formal contexts, is sometimes used to denote any combination of tense proper, aspect, and mood. As regards English, there are many verb forms and constructions which combine time reference with continuous and/or perfect aspect, and with indicative, subjunctive or cond...
if peanuts aren't actually nuts why do people with a nut allergy die from them?	Because peanut allergies are different from nut allergies. I'm allergic to peanuts but not nuts.	[ "Peanuts are legumes, not true nuts, but they share with true nuts the risk of causing allergic reactions, even in minute amounts. Pure peanut and nut-derived oils are not usually allergenic (as they do not typically contain the proteinaceous part of the plant), but avoiding them may be safer, as serious peanut and...
why does my cat retain the ability to bound at 30 mph and jump vertically 5ft if he sleeps all day?	I assume your cat, like almost every cat, likes to jump up on things and tends to go bat-shit crazy in the middle of the night and run around like a maniac sometimes. This is its exercise. Compare that to a reasonably fit human that works out regularly - not a gym nut or anything but just a guy who works out like twi...	[ "During a fall from a high place, a cat can reflexively twist its body and right itself using its acute sense of balance and its flexibility. This is known as the cat's \"righting reflex\". The minimum height required for this to occur in most cats (safely) would be around .\n", "In addition to the righting refle...
why don't we just use two or more different antibiotics, with different ingredients to kill off 100% of bacteria	We do. Antibiotic cocktails are quite common when resistance is suspected. But as /u/sablemint notes, any survivors - and there are likely to be some - then develop resistance more quickly.	[ "Antibiotics such as tetracyclines, rifampin, and the aminoglycosides streptomycin and gentamicin are effective against \"Brucella\" bacteria. However, the use of more than one antibiotic is needed for several weeks, because the bacteria incubate within cells.\n", "Bacterial infections may be treated with antibio...
how do different sound waves of the same wavelengths carry a different timbre?	There is a big difference between 'wavelength' and 'pitch'. All sounds are made up of many pure sine waves overlaped on top of eachother. A pure sine wave is what you here when you strike a tuning fork. Pitch means a note, like C# or D. Each note corresponds to a specific wavelength. But again, the sounds you hear i...	[ "Aside from pitch and loudness, another quality that distinguishes sound stimuli is timbre. Timbre allows us to hear the difference between two instruments that are playing at the same frequency and loudness, for example. When two simple tones are put together they create a complex tone. The simple tones of an inst...
Were torches used in medieval times as much as movies make us believe and what were they made out off?	Were torches used as often as we see in movies? No. Movies generally seem to show torches as the most common light source for medieval people, when in fact rushlights (reeds soaked in animal fat), tallow candles and simple oil lamps seem to have been much more common. What were torches made of? Usually a wooden hand...	[ "Lit torches (burning sticks) were likely the earliest form of incendiary device. They were followed by incendiary arrows, which were used throughout the ancient and medieval periods. The simplest flaming arrows had oil- or resin-soaked tows tied just below the arrowhead and were effective against wooden structures...
why do monotonous noises (like the sound of an alarm clock) begin to sound like it has two different pitches after hearing it for a while?	i think that it may be because of our natural tendency to turn repetitive sounds into melodies. So a repetitive sound gets given different pitches by our brains. Its called the speech to song illusion.	[ "In electronic devices, it shows up as a low-frequency phenomenon, as the higher frequencies are overshadowed by white noise from other sources. In oscillators, however, the low-frequency noise can be mixed up to frequencies close to the carrier, which results in oscillator phase noise.\n", "Many types of noise e...
how come many fish were able to survive the great k–pg extinction, but pretty much no sea reptiles (mosasaurs, plesiosaurs, etc) were able to?	It takes a LOT of food and a very balanced ecosystem to keep a giant alpha predator alive. If the food diminishes or the ecosystem shifts, alpha predators die out pretty easily.	[ "A wide range of species perished in the K–Pg extinction, the best-known being the non-avian dinosaurs. It also destroyed a plethora of other terrestrial organisms, including some mammals, pterosaurs, birds, lizards, insects, and plants. In the oceans, the K–Pg extinction killed off plesiosaurs and the giant marine...
how do bank errors leaving customers with extra money happen?	I have this saying: "As long as humans are involved, there will be human error." Simple as that - someone at the bank done goofed. You are right - banks do have incredibly strict controls to prevent errors, but as long as human beings are punching keys and inputting information, there's going to be human error...	[ "However, the problem is exacerbated by some of the banks themselves for failing to implement any controls which prevent companies or fraudsters taking monies from business and consumer accounts. The problem of cancelled and obsolete direct debits being wrongfully revived or re-implemented is estimated to cost UK c...
Did European explorers/settlers encounter any Native American urban centers in the in modern-day USA and Canada?	> the Pueblo Indians had urban centers, but I'm not sure what happened to them Many are alive and well. Consider Acoma Pueblo and Taos Pueblo, both of which were founded around 1000 years ago and both currently home to between 4500 and 5000 people. Others didn't survive, such as Hawikuh - an old Zuni pueblo that wa...	[ "This district, a nationally significant distinction, provides material evidence of one of the earliest instances of interaction between native people and European explorers on the west coast of what is now the United States of America. This distinction is based on the two historical encounters, Sir Francis Drake's...
why does light/sound propogate as a wave? why not a straight line?	They both do propagate in a straight line just as a wave in the water does. A sound wave or water wave is a varying pressure, not space. And luckily google gave me the answer [from Reddit](_URL_0_) on what varies in a photon: > The wave is not the path that the photon takes. The wave is a representation of the ele...	[ "This two-dimensionality, compared with the apparent four-dimensionality of light, is because light travels in rays (0D at a point in time, 1D over time), while by Huygens–Fresnel principle, a sound wave front can be modeled as spherical waves (2D at a point in time, 3D over time): light moves in a single direction...
are there gradual forms of depression or is it purely binary?	As someone who is very depressed, it's gradual. Never binary. You have good days, you have bad days.	[ "A half century ago, diagnosed depression was either endogenous (melancholic), considered a biological condition, or reactive (neurotic), a reaction to stressful events. Debate has persisted for most of the 20th century over whether a unitary or binary model of depression is a truer reflection of the syndrome; in t...
why is it that it's possible to shake a cup with a bunch of dice in it to the point that they can all stack on top of each other?	It's not just being shaken randomly. If you'll note, the predominant motion is a circular swinging. What they're doing is forcing the dice to the edge of the cup and getting them to swirl around. If done right, that forces the dice to assume a vertical stack inside the cup. It takes practice of course, but it's no more...	[ "Each round, each player rolls a \"hand\" of dice under their cup and looks at their hand while keeping it concealed from the other players. The first player begins bidding, announcing any face value and the minimum number of dice that the player believes are showing that value, under all of the cups in the game. O...
how come putin has the same power in russia now as a prime minister as he had as a president?	Vladimir Putin is the President of Russia. Has been since 2012. Before that he was Prime Minister. Before that, he was President. It is fairly accepted that he was still running things when he was Prime Minister, though and that the president at the time (Dmitry Medvedev) was merely his puppet.	[ "In his first speech after being endorsed, Medvedev announced that, as president, he would appoint Vladimir Putin to the post of prime minister to head the Russian government. Although constitutionally barred from a third consecutive presidential term, such a role would allow Putin to continue as an influential fig...
What was the military organization, equipment, and tactics of Carthage like during the Punic Wars?	In large part, the Carthaginian armies during the first Punic War were largely composed of mercenary troops from a variety of different areas under the control of Carthage (think North Africa, Spain and southern Gaul). During this period, the command was generally along the lines of the Romans - upper class members w...	[ "Carthage's military battled the Greeks over control of the island of Sicily. These encounters influenced the development of the Carthaginians' weapons and tactics, causing Carthage to adopt the Greek-style hoplite soldier fighting in the phalanx formation. However, the Carthaginian war machine faced its biggest ch...
what are you supposed to do when an emergency vehicle passes you on the opposite side of the road?	If there is a physical obstruction in the median (for example trees, bushes, dirt etc.) then you do not need to do anything but if it is just yellow lines or there is a big enough opening for them to cross onto your side of the road then you should pull over until they pass. This is so that if for example traffic is ...	[ "Depending on local laws, vehicles on the road may be required to yield the right of way to emergency responders who are using their warning devices. For example, in Utah, when an emergency vehicle is on the road while using its warning devices, all cars are required to pull over to the side of the road, stop, and ...
what is a generator in electricity?	It's like an electron pump that pushes electrons away from one end and toward the other end. This creates a voltage (electric pressure) which is then used to power the flow of electricity through wires and other things.	[ "In electricity generation, a generator is a device that converts motive power (mechanical energy) into electrical power for use in an external circuit. Sources of mechanical energy include steam turbines, gas turbines, water turbines, internal combustion engines, wind turbines and even hand cranks. The first elect...
why are media companies so obsessive about pirating movies or music online, when just a few years ago people would record movies off of tv or music from the radio and it wasn't a big deal?	They were making a big deal about it then, that's why they would put in warnings and videos about piracy, but they had to crackdown harder on internet privacy because the ease of it caused piracy numbers to skyrocket creating a bigger problem	[ "Rather than destroying film studios, videotape sales became increasingly important to their revenue. The press discussed the VCR \"and the viewing habits it has engendered — the Saturday night trip down to the tape rental store to pick out for a couple of bucks the movie you want to see when you want to see it\". ...
Were there any devout Christians among the Nazis who participated in the Holocaust? How did they come to terms with the things they had done? How did they justify their actions in front of the altar of God?	Not sure if this would be considered devout. Josef Tizo was a Catholic priest and also one of the leaders of the Slovaks Peoples Party a Clerical-Fascist party that was installed in power during WW2. It was also founded by another Catholic priest Andrej Hlinka, for which their paramilitary, the Hlinka Guard was named...	[ "During the Holocaust, the Roman Catholic Church played a role in the rescue of hundreds of thousands of Jews from being murdered by the Nazis. Members of the Church, through lobbying of Axis officials, provision of false documents, and the hiding of people in monasteries, convents, schools, among families and the ...
many american football players have brain diseases in their old age because they have so many concussions during their career. why don't rugby players, who don't wear helmets, have this problem?	Because American Football players wear helmets and protective armor, they regularly crash into each other way more violently than rugby players would, leading to the apparently paradoxical effect that football players' "protection" actually make the sport more dangerous. In a similar case, the introduction of soft, c...	[ "Other organizations continued to publish study results that linked repeated concussions and long-term health problems contrary to reports by the MTBI Committee. A 2003 report by the Center for the Study of Retired Athletes at the University of North Carolina, for example, found a connection between numerous concus...
When history says "Alexander founded a new city," what is being described here?	Hi, not discouraging responses here, but fyi there was a fairly lengthy thread on this topic last week that would be worth catching up on - see here * [In ancient times I've heard that historical figures "built cities" like Alexander did at Bucephala in honor of his horse. How did a ruler in Greco times go about estab...	[ "The exact quote found in \"Guardians of the Lost Library\", \"The city was founded by Alexander the Great in the fourth century B. C. to be the capital of his empire!\" is a bit ambiguous, meaning either that it was Alexander's direct personal intention or that it was about to happen independently of whatever Alex...
Do we have any idea what the relationship between Sumer/Mesopotamia and Egypt was?	According to [this website](_URL_0_) "There is no mention of the Egyptians in the Sumerian archives, or vice-versa, and there is no direct evidence that they had a noticeable influence on one another, except for their propensity to build giant pyramids and ziggurats. Although on a modern map they appear to be quite clo...	[ "The majority of Sumerian deities belonged to a classification called the \"Anunna\" (“[offspring] of An”), whereas seven deities, including Enlil and Inanna, belonged to a group of “underworld judges\" known as the \"Anunnaki\" (“[offspring] of An” + Ki). During the Third Dynasty of Ur, the Sumerian pantheon was s...
if i have an electrical circuit, run a current through it, and then suddenly interrupt the circuit, what happens to the electricity still within the circuit?	Imagine a channel of water. On one end you pump in water, on the other end you suck water away. Imagine that you suddenly stop doing both. The water briefly builds up due to leftover inertia and then it stops moving. Same thing in a circuit. The electrons are slowly moving through your circuit. If you interrupt it the...	[ "All lines and all electrical equipment must be protected against prolonged overcurrent. If the cause of the overcurrent is nearby then automatically that current is interrupted immediately. But if the cause of the overcurrent is outside the local area then a backup provision automatically disconnects all affected ...
When did nations begin to regularly levy taxes?	Can you winnow this question down more, whether geographically, temporally or both? It's quite broad, considering that taxation was introduced, disappeared, and reintroduced at varying times as well as varying regions throughout history. Are you talking about taxation in antiquity? Late medieval European feudal taxa...	[ "The history of taxation in the United States begins with the colonial protest against British taxation policy in the 1760s, leading to the American Revolution. The independent nation collected taxes on imports (\"tariffs\"), whiskey, and (for a while) on glass windows. States and localities collected poll taxes on...
What are those curvy distortions in the air above a hot stove?	The index of refraction (how much the speed of light changes through a medium) of a gas depends on its temperature. What you are seeing is light going through regions whose temperature is changing (and possibly also a changing composition, e.g. leaky propane above a bbq). You can see it more clearly with [Schlieren ima...	[ "BULLET::::- Forced air stoves have a fan powered either by a battery, an external source of electricity, or a thermoelectric generator. This fan blows high velocity, low volume jets of air into the combustion chamber, which when optimized results in more complete combustion of the fuel.\n", "Certain stove design...
what happens during an internet outage?	There can be a million reasons ... The chain from you to the data center is: PC -- > LAN -- > Router/Modem -- > Landline/cable/fibre to some more central place (plus converters) -- > Another Router/Modem -- > fatter line to data center -- > [more hardware] -- > interconnection with other ISPs -- > repeat until ...	[ "BULLET::::- On October 22, 2012, a major outage occurred, affecting many sites such as Reddit, Foursquare, Pinterest, and others. The cause was a memory leak bug in an operational data collection agent.\n", "One way natural disasters impact internet connection is by damaging end sub-networks (subnets), making th...
Why do scientists currently refer to Dark Matter as matter? Isn't it possible that the evidence for Dark Matter may actually be an incomplete understanding of gravity or other forces?	> Isn't it possible that the evidence for Dark Matter may actually be an incomplete understanding of gravity or other forces? Yes, it's possible. Actually several scientists have thought of this and proposed alternate theories aimed to refine gravitation. They are [MOND](_URL_0_) and it's relativistic version, [TeVe...	[ "Although the existence of dark matter is generally accepted by the scientific community, some astrophysicists, intrigued by certain observations which do not fit the dark matter theory, argue for various modifications of the standard laws of general relativity, such as modified Newtonian dynamics, tensor–vector–sc...
What is an inertial frame of reference?	It's a reference frame that's not accelerating. If you're just floating in space, you're in an inertial frame of reference. If you're on an accelerating spaceship, you're not, so you feel like there's something pulling you towards the engines when it's really just the engines accelerating towards you.	[ "An inertial reference frame (or inertial frame in short) is a frame in which all the physical laws hold. For instance, in a rotating reference frame, Newton's laws have to be modified because there is an extra Coriolis force (such frame is an example of non-inertial frame). Here, \"rotating\" means \"rotating with...
Looking at maps of Yugoslavia, its clear that large parts of Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia had ethnic majorities from one of the other nations. Did this cause problems before the 90's? Were there any attempts to change the internal borders?	The only real evidence I can find of any internal attempts to change borders prior to the late 80s/ early 90s was the Nazi and Fascist Italy attempting to "persuade" Croatia to become independent, to push for more autonomy so to speak. When Yugoslavia as a whole was invaded by Axis powers in 1941, Croatia was given in...	[ "Within Yugoslavia, separating Croatia and Slovenia from the rest of Yugoslavia is an invisible line of previous conquests of the region. Croatia and Slovenia to the northwest were conquered by Catholics or Protestants, and benefited from European history; the Renaissance, French Revolution, Industrial Revolution a...
Tesseract 4th dimension	The square doesn't have to be within the other cube. When you see a tesseract drawn... What you're looking at is a 2 dimensional representation of a 3 dimensional representation of a 4 dimensional shape. If you were to build one out of matchsticks and view it front on at the correct angle, you'd start to get the illu...	[ "A tesseract is an example of a four-dimensional object. Whereas outside mathematics the use of the term \"dimension\" is as in: \"A tesseract \"has four dimensions\"\", mathematicians usually express this as: \"The tesseract \"has dimension 4\"\", or: \"The dimension of the tesseract \"is\" 4\".\n", "The term 't...
why do instruments sound different if sound is just vibrating air?	It all has to do with what they call timbre. Different instruments may be capable of playing the same note or pitch, but they all do it differently. Not only is the pitch (or frequency of the note) being sounded, but also other frequencies get sounded, too. These might be overtones, or multiples of the intended freq...	[ "Pitched musical instruments are often based on an acoustic resonator such as a string or a column of air, which oscillates at numerous modes simultaneously. At the frequencies of each vibrating mode, waves travel in both directions along the string or air column, reinforcing and canceling each other to form standi...
there are people who claim that drinking beer gives them a "happy-go-lucky" drunk, but drinking whiskey or liquor makes them a "mean" drunk. what could cause this?	It's mostly due to accelerated drunkenness. 1 shot of 80 proof liquor is roughly equivalent to 1 beer. So taking a shot is like drinking a whole beer in a matter of seconds. Even if you sip liquor, most people will end up drinking it faster if you are out with the boyz. So people that claim that a certain liquor makes ...	[ "There is a lack of medical consensus about whether moderate consumption of beer, wine, or distilled spirits has a stronger association with heart disease. Studies suggest that each is effective, with none having a clear advantage. Most researchers now believe that the most important ingredient is the alcohol itsel...
If the population of rome was so large in its early history, why is there so little written down?	Why are you equating size of settlement with presence of surviving written literature? The two are in no way correlated. We have a plethora of sources from democratic Athens, including tragedy, comedy, history, and philosophy, and that city was absolutely tiny compared to Rome as far as population. We have only scra...	[ "The size of the population of Rome at the time also needs to be considered. In its early days, Rome was still a city-state of only regional significance, and its territory did not stretch beyond 50 km (30 mi) from the city. Cornell notes that the estimates of the population of Rome in the late 6th century BC, base...
why isn't the data on a black box saved 'in the cloud'?	Some of the newer devices can upload data, but it's a recent development that hasn't yet spread to every airline in every territory. It's a lot of data to push, if you don't have a good connection. Many planes just don't have that sort of bandwidth.	[ "For Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage, data is stored in Backblaze Storage Pods and Vaults using Reed-Solomon erasure coding. Encryption is handled entirely by the user and client software used to manage the stored data, making it immune to government subpoena or data breach and protecting the data during transfer and ul...
if there are over 7 billion people in the world & only a limited number of features on the face (eyes, nose, chin, etc.)that can determine how a person looks, why is it that almost everyone looks different?	There may be a limited number of features on human face, but there is a near infinite number of tiny changes you can make to them. Subtle changes in size, shape, and position of each of the individual features all add up to give everyone their own unique look. Recognizing faces is immensely important for non-verbal ...	[ "Judgments made by others are greatly influenced by facial appearance from multiple cues. There is a wealth of information that people gather simply from a person's face in the blink of an eye, such as gender, emotion, physical attractiveness, competence, threat level and trustworthiness. One of the most highly dev...
when big movie producers send out movies to be reviewed by critics, shouldn't it be easy to catch who uploaded the dvdscr?	It's a decent idea. Amazon tried to do something simillar for their e-book sale, they thought of placing 1-2 random spelling mistakes in each one, to see who uploaded something at a torrent tracker. But eventually they abandoned the plan. I'm not answering your question though :(	[ "By clicking on the name of critics closest to your film tastes, you get a list of the movies they've seen that you haven't; in order from their highest rated films, down to the lowest rated. This method allows critics to not only use recommendations for what movies to go see, also what movies to avoid seeing.\n", ...
why are fruits that can be grown on the east coast so much more expensive to purchase than produce in california?	/u/friend1949 explained why the shipping costs don't add significantly to the price, but that doesn't explain why the east coast produce is more expensive. Part of the answer is that the farms on the east coast are smaller, and don't have the economies of scale. But also locally grown produce is perceived as bein...	[ "Compared to other states, California has a large agriculture industry (including fruit, vegetables, dairy, and wine production), but at less than 2% of the GDP, it makes a relatively minor direct contribution to the state's overall economy. The total economic contribution is likely more than double this value (see...
why can't you compress a rar file with rar or zip?	Compression is a technique for finding patterns in a file and writing it in a way that takes more space. For example instead of writing "aaaaaaaa" you may write 8*"a" which is much shorter. Or instead of writing "abcdefgh" you may write "a"-"h". However if you have already compressed a file and written it in the shorte...	[ " files are archives that store multiple files. ZIP allows contained files to be compressed using many different methods, as well as simply storing a file without compressing it. Each file is stored separately, allowing different files in the same archive to be compressed using different methods. Because the files ...
Considering the universe is constantly expanding, what would happen if you suddenly stopped in place?	Weird as it might sound, the expansion of the Universe doesn't actually mean that you're moving at all. It means that the distance we measure between two fixed points will grow with time. It's a statement about how we measure distances - or in other words, the geometry of the Universe - rather than what the stuff in th...	[ "The expansion of the universe reaches an infinite degree in finite time, causing expansion to accelerate without bounds. This acceleration necessarily passes the speed of light (since it involves expansion of the universe itself, not particles moving within it), causing more and more objects to leave our observabl...
Why were so many Nazi war criminals released very early into their prison sentences?	Not only were Nazi war criminals released relatively early into their sentences, but also Japanese war criminals. This largely took place in the mid-1950's, not only by the United States, but the majority of the Western Allies, who realised that there was limited political value in holding war criminals, who were seen ...	[ "Most of the perpetrators of Nazi war crimes were never charged, and returned unremarked to civilian life. The West German Central Prosecution Office of Nazi War Criminals only charged about a hundred former \"Einsatzgruppe\" members with war crimes. And as time went on, it became more difficult to obtain prosecuti...
Sports in History	Related: [What were the most popular sports in your fields (pun totally intended)? Is the game still around? How has it changed? Why did it die?] (_URL_3_) [What were and where were the earliest known sports and tests of skill?] (_URL_2_) [Over the last few centuries, how did organized sports grow from a pastime, to...	[ "The roots of modern sports can be found in the mid-nineteenth century in Great Britain and the United States where first professional sports were organised in mining and industrial towns and cities. Back then, sport competition was conducted mostly on local and national level. First signs of globalization in that ...
Please steer me in the right direction about Civil wars in Republican Rome	Could you elaborate a bit? * What's the paper for? * Where have you searched for sources? * What have you found so far? * What do you know already? (You do know something.) Anything else you may think is relevant.	[ "In 49 BC, the last Republican civil war was initiated after Julius Caesar defied senatorial orders to disband his army following the conclusion of hostilities in Gaul. He crossed over the Rubicon river with the 13th Legion, a clear violation of Roman Law, and marched to Rome. The Optimates fled to Greece under the...
how does diet coke cause cancer? was that just media hype for a while, or is there legitimacy behind it?	Diet Coke contains Aspartame, which is an artificial sweetener that many people believed for a long time helped contribute to cancer, specifically brain cancer. While there are people that will argue this is true and swear by it, the overwhelming majority of the medical industry believes that it is not carcinogenic in...	[ "Studies on laboratory rats during the early 1970s linked high volumes of cyclamate and saccharin with the development of bladder cancer. As a result, the United States Congress mandated that further studies of saccharin be performed and required that all food containing saccharin bear a label warning that the swee...
clueless about economics. how will the dow dropping 1,400+ points today and a potential recesssion/etc affect everday working people like me? those who aren't wealthy.	Immediately, it won't, outside of any 401k you may have. If the market rebounds within a month or so, you probably won't see much impact overall. If the drop lingers, then you can see potential layoffs and reduced hours from employers.	[ "BULLET::::- On December 10, 2016, Dent predicted that the Dow Jones Industrial average could fall 17,000 points as a result of Donald Trump's election win. Less than two weeks later, Dent reversed his opinion and thinks there is short term growth for the US stock market, but demographic forces will keep the econom...
The rule of India by East India Company is famously cited as a case of Corporation ruling an entire country. How did this work in practise? Did they separate their Commercial activities and Governance?	Follow up question: what was the British people's opinion of this rule by the East Indian company? Did they have any anxieties about a company having so much power or was it mostly just accepted?	[ "The Company Rule in India refers to areas in the Indian subcontinent which were under the rule of British East Indian Company. The East Indian Company began its rule over the Indian subcontinent starting with the Battle of Plessey, which ultimately led to the vanquishing of the Bengal Subah and the founding of the...
Do worms have a home?	They just kind of roam around eating tasty soil. No set place of residence other than the entire patch of soil they came off of	[ "Acorn worms are solitary worm-shaped organisms. They generally live in burrows (the earliest secreted tubes) and are deposit feeders, but some species are pharyngeal filter feeders, while the family Torquaratoridae are free living detritivores. Many are well known for their production and accumulation of various h...
How much difference was there in the way different ancient Mediterranean people dressed and clothed themselves, before the dominance of the Roman Empire?	Unfortunately I can't give you a very full answer at the moment as I am away from my computer for today, but I can write something more detailed tomorrow. Until then, I would recommend this website: _URL_0_ Along the side you can see there is a section dedicated to costume. It does not deal with North Africa but many ...	[ "The clothing of ancient Italy, like that of ancient Greece, is well known from art, literature & archaeology. Although aspects of Roman clothing have had an enormous appeal to the Western imagination, the dress and customs of the Etruscan civilization that inhabited Italy before the Romans are less well imitated (...
What is the fastest you can move, taking into account relativity?	Massive objects can get asymptotically close to the speed of light given enough force.	[ "The description of motion in relativity requires more than one concept of speed. Coordinate speed is the coordinate distance measured by the observer divided by the coordinate time of the observer. Proper speed is the local proper distance divided by the local proper time. For example, at the event horizon of a bl...
POW mail in WWII: were mail ships neutral or was mail routed through neutral countries/states, or...	I believe this was answered in another thread, so to make a long story short, the [Red Cross did most of the leg work of delivering mail to prisoners of war](_URL_1_), at least in the European theater. Mail would be routed through a neutral country such as [Portugal, Switzerland or Sweden] (_URL_0_), then sent on to t...	[ "Military mail was subjected to censorship when it was the primary means for deployed servicemen to communicate with their families. The following text was printed on the message (non-address) side of standardized postcard \"Subron 4 Standard Form No. F14 471-A-S/M Base. PH-7-15-41-20M.\" distributed to naval perso...
what is this 'google dream code' thing i keep seeing every where and what is it used for?	Think of your own brain, and imagine you are five (slaps knee), lying down on a field of grass looking up at all of the funny shaped clouds in the sky. You notice one cloud looks like something, but you can't quite put your finger on it. You think of every single thing you've ever seen in your life that kind of looks ...	[ "McPhee launched www.dreamdoctor.com in 1997. It was among the first sites on the Internet devoted entirely to providing credible information about dreams and sleep. Through it, he had amassed the largest database of dreams in the world. With it, he broke their code. Taking a scientific approach to dream interpreta...
Why did elevated beds arise in some cultures while others use beds low to the ground?	EDIT: /u/extesser is right, it's mostly dominated by heat conduction and not a temperature gradient. I'll leave the post untouched for the history books, since it sparked some interesting replies! _________________________________________________________ I can only speak for the Vikings in Norway. Temperature is ...	[ "Platform bed development was closely intertwined with the evolution of the modern bed. The earliest humans most probably slept on the ground. It would have been cold, hard and offered no protection from crawling insects or small animals. Readily available piles of leaves and branches could be covered with animal p...
If a mosquito bites a person who is HIV positive, then bites me, will I become HIV positive?	[This](_URL_0_) is a pretty good answer.	[ "When mosquitoes bite a person, they do not inject the blood of a previous victim into the person they bite next. Mosquitoes do, however, inject their saliva into their victims, which may carry diseases such as dengue fever, malaria, yellow fever, or West Nile virus and can infect a bitten person with these disease...
if california's housing market is already incredibly overpriced, why does it keep rising?	Supply and demand. More people want to live there than there are places to live. The two obvious next questions are "Why is the supply so low?" and "Why is the demand so high?". Why is the Supply so low? Short answer: Few people actually want it to rise. The current homeowners don't, because their home price...	[ "The state’s high rent prices have translated into increased homelessness, more households spending half their income on housing, and an exodus of low and middle income households leaving to states with lower cost of living. The housing shortage negatively impacts the Economy of California. A 2016 McKinsey & Compan...
When a person loses their vision in one eye, is their loss of depth-perception permanent or does the brain find a way to adapt?	There are many monocular cues to depth such as parallax, relative size, atmospheric perspective, etc. you can find a list [here](_URL_3_). Some of these are both relative cues (something is farther away than something else) and some are absolute (something is this far away). If you close one of your eyes, the world doe...	[ "It is known that the act of visual perception is a cognitive exercise and not merely a stimulus response. In other words, perception is a learned ability which we develop in infancy. Kenneth Ogle of the Mayo Clinic, reported 1967 that left and right-eye information can be presented alternatively to the left and ri...
When / why did it become a custom to put your hand on your heart for patriotic moments (specifically US pledge of allegiance and national anthem)	The hand over one's heart is a civilian salute. It is for use by civilians (people who are not in a nation's armed forces) at moments that would be appropriate for a military salute. Some countries (the US, Italy, etc.) use the hand over the heart as a civilian salute, some (Latin American countries for example) have ...	[ "The recital was accompanied with a salute to the flag known as the Bellamy salute, described in detail by Bellamy. During World War II, the salute was replaced with a hand-over-heart gesture because the original form involved stretching the arm out towards the flag in a manner that resembled the later Nazi salute....
I know why the inter-war Germany was called 'Weimar Republic', but who started using that term? And when? And did it have a positive/negative connotation?	The name "Weimar Republic" was not really used much during the existence of the Republic. The Republic used "Deutsches Reich" as the official name, and "Republik" in various compounds, but Weimar was an informal title at best. Some Anglophone publications used Weimar Republic yet this was typically a minor naming conve...	[ "The 1918–1933 republic, which was also called German Reich, was ignored and denounced by the Nazis as a historical aberration. The name \"Weimar Republic\" was first used in 1929 after Hitler referred to the period as the \"\"Republik von Weimar\"\" (Republic of Weimar) at a rally in Munich with the term later bec...
Who were the most influential figures in the Bolshevik Party who weren't executed during the purges? Why did Stalin spare them?	I think most influential is pretty subjective and the range of purges meant pretty much everyone who -was- overly influential and famous got purged. And the remainder of the Communist party in the aftermath of Stalin's purges was absolutely subordinated to him (with the possible exception of Beria) The closest I can t...	[ "Eventually almost all of the Bolsheviks who had played prominent roles during the Russian Revolution of 1917, or in Lenin's Soviet government, were executed. Out of six members of the original Politburo during the 1917 October Revolution who lived until the Great Purge, Stalin himself was the only one who remained...
French Colonies Gone Wrong	It is hardly just France, The Belgian Congo and Portuguese Angola are hardly examples of successful states. For every successful colonial state you can point towards another that has been unsuccessful.	[ "The French were unhappy about the loss of this valuable colony, and planned to regain them in any future conflict with Britain. In 1764, the French launched incursions against the coast of Senegal from Gorée angering the British cabinet. In 1779 during the American War of Independence a French force landed and sei...
when two tvs in tvs same house are run through the same cable service, why does one seem to always lag behind the other?	A modern TV contains electronics which decode the digital HDMI signal and then turn it back into a picture and sound. Unfortunately these usually introduce a delay, and on some models it can be a notable fraction of a second, and it's not a standardized amount.	[ "In the 1980s, it was more common to split one cable television feed into two separate channels – one that aired during the daytime and the other at night; this method was used in particular by cable systems to account for headend infrastructures that limited the number of channels that could be carried on a single...
What actually is going on as electrons move through a circuit?	The best way to think of it is that the electrons in a wire are moving because of the electric field in the wire. The electric field is established in the wire when you connect it to the battery terminals, and the speed at which it propagates through the wire is the speed of light in that wire (or circuit). You're ba...	[ "Therefore, in this wire the electrons are flowing at the rate of . At 60 Hz alternating current, this means that within half a cycle the electrons drift less than 0.2 μm. In other words, electrons flowing across the contact point in a switch will never actually leave the switch.\n", "Electrons can move (slowly) ...
why can't leaded engines use unleaded petrol?	Neither of those is correct. The leaded gasoline vapor can be compressed more than unleaded without spontaneously exploding due to the temperature increase. The compression ratio is determined by engine geometry, so an engine designed for leaded gas will compress unleaded gas to the point where it spontaneously ignites...	[ "Lead replacement petrol (LRP) was developed for vehicles designed to run on leaded fuels and incompatible with unleaded fuels. Rather than tetraethyllead it contains other metals such as potassium compounds or methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl (MMT); these are purported to buffer soft exhaust valves and...
From where do we measure distances between celestial bodies? (center-to-center? surface-to-surface?)	I think the answers provided so far can be fairly misleading. The real answer is, the order of magnitude between celestial bodies is SIGNIFICANTLY greater than the size of the bodies. Analogy: Lets say you're measuring the distance between two marbles that are 100 feet away from each other. Then you ask - is my dis...	[ "When a horizontal angle measurement is made between two known points on land, the observer will be located at the apex of a triangle, with the other two corners of this triangle consisting of the landmark pair. The observer will also be sitting on a set of points that fall along a large circle. The diameter of the...
why does our heartbeat and blood pressure lower in our sleep and why is it important for our body to do so?	* You are lying down. It takes more effort for your heart to pump blood straight up to your brain than it takes to pump when your whole body is horizontal * Your muscles aren't moving during sleep so they requires less blood * Your brain uses just as much blood/oxygen when sleeping as when awake	[ "Zaregarizi and his team have concluded that the acute time of falling asleep was where beneficial cardiovascular changes take place. This study has indicated that a large decline in blood pressure occurs during the daytime sleep-onset period only when sleep is expected; however, when subjects rest in a supine posi...

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