question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
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where does water go when we drink it, how does our body seperate water from other food\drinks, and how does it reach our bladder? | It leaves your intestines through their permeable lining, which permits water but not large solids through.
It leaves your blood through another membrane in your kidneys, which turn this water (and various waste products that also get through) into urine.
Ahoy, fellow redditor. Yer not alone in askin', and kind stran... | [
"The urinary bladder is a hollow muscular organ in humans and some other animals that collects and stores urine from the kidneys before disposal by urination. In the human the bladder is a hollow muscular, and distensible (or elastic) organ, that sits on the pelvic floor. Urine enters the bladder via the ureters an... |
What were the Plains Indians like as a cavalry force? | Good questions. I can't answer all these, but at least I can try to get the conversation started. Plains tribes obtained Spanish horses from southern tribes through trade, so many northern plains encountered horses before actually contacting European or European-American people.
Early historian [Clark Wissler](_URL_1_... | [
"Indian cavalry is the name collectively given to the Midwest and Eastern American Indians who fought during the American Civil War, most of them on horseback and for the Confederate States of America.\n",
"The U.S. Cavalry played a prominent role in the American Indian Wars, particularly in the American Old West... |
why did the boats used by american’s on d-day have a front hatch? why didn’t they use side/ back hatches and use the front as cover, instead of running head first into machine gun fire? | Doors on the front let you unload into shallower water, ideally straight onto the beach. Remember these guys were carrying a lot of weight, if they got into water over their head they were going to drown, there was no way to swim and many soldiers did drown after going over the sides or leaving boats that couldn't get ... | [
"The hatch was opened and with no enemy ships in sight, the machine guns were not manned or prepared. The commander decided to empty a fuel tank in order to escape even faster, which rose the sub even higher in the water exposing the diesel exhaust pipes. Due to more pre-existing damage coupled with damage from the... |
What were the effects of the purchasable commissions in the British armed forces? | I’ll address your side questions first:
|how long was buying commissions practiced?| In various forms, the purchase of military commissions in Britain was practiced from 1200 to 1871, so about 670 years.
| Was it practiced in other militaries?| Yes, most European armies practiced it although the French stopped using ... | [
"Military commissions were created October 9, 1792. There were five judges which consisted of everyday people or soldiers. People who were tried were sentenced to death. These military commissions were initially created to put emigres on trial, but by March 19, 1793 the law changed. Rebels who had weapons or other ... |
What did Native Americans think about periodical cicadas? | /u/ahalenia already mentioned that they (and their annual cousins) were eaten. This was particularly common in the southeast. In Massachusetts, they were regarded as an ill omen.
> Speaking of a sickness which, in 1633, carried off many of the whites and Indians, in and near to Plimouth [Plymouth], in Massachusetts... | [
"Cicadas have been featured in literature since the time of Homer's \"Iliad\", and as motifs in decorative art from the Chinese Shang dynasty (1766–1122 BC.). They are described by Aristotle in his \"History of Animals\" and by Pliny the Elder in his \"Natural History\"; their mechanism of sound production is menti... |
what would happen if the president-elect died or became incapacitated or stepped down before inauguration day? | The incumbent president's term ends at noon on Inaguration Day (typically Jan. 20th, although Congress can move it a little bit for convenience). At that time, if the president-elect is not available to serve, the normal succession rules apply, and the job would devolve into the Vice President. Note that the VP is inau... | [
"If the president dies, resigns or is removed from office, the vice president automatically becomes president. Likewise, were a president-elect to die during the transition period, or decline to serve, the vice president-elect would become president on Inauguration Day. A vice president can also become the acting p... |
how can some medicine (for example tilidin) give me nightmares as side effects? | Let's use the analogy of food. Pizza (drug) for instance would solve your desire to satisfy your hunger (condition). You eat the pizza and feel full (desired effect). You eat pizza for a few days and notice that you have upset stomach from too much acid building up (side effect) but you still feel full (desired effect)... | [
"There is some evidence that this medication is effective in treating nightmares, based on mixed results in randomized controlled trials. Prazosin was, however, shown to be more effective when treating nightmares related to PTSD.\n",
"Nightmares can be caused by extreme pressure or irritation if no other mental d... |
what happens to blood glucose levels when a diabetic on metformin consumes sugar? | It would go up just like it would when you consume any food item, all be it slightly higher as it has more easily accessed glucose. This part is no different than how a non-diabetic responds.
If their medication is properly balanced they should have no major issue processing the sugar from the meal. | [
"When levels of blood sugar rise, whether as a result of glycogen conversion, or from digestion of a meal, a different hormone is released from beta cells found in the islets of Langerhans in the pancreas. This hormone, insulin, causes the liver to convert more glucose into glycogen (this process is called glycogen... |
when to use past vs. passed. | Past when you are talking about time. Passed when you are talking about objective or distance.
e.g. "It is *past* my bedtime!"
e.g. "I *passed* the test!"
e.g. "You just *passed* the exit." | [
"The past is the set of all events that occurred before a given point in time. The past is contrasted with and defined by the present and the future. The concept of the past is derived from the linear fashion in which human observers experience time, and is accessed through memory and recollection. In addition, hum... |
what does the president's chief of staff do? how does he/she influence the presidential agenda | The Chief of Staff runs the President's White House staff. He also usually controls access to the oval office, and may negotiate with congress on behalf of the President. So he is definitely a powerful person. | [
"The President's responsibilities include decreeing the summons to the Senate for its sessions, presiding over sessions and directing the debates on the Senate floor, acting as a representative of the Senate by defending its parliamentary jurisdiction and dignity, and presiding over the sessions of the \"Congreso P... |
what is the difference between the "gang-stalking" phenomenon and having paranoid schizophrenia? | There isn't one.
"Gang stalking" is an invention of people with severe psychiatric disorders. | [
"Psychologist Lorraine Sheridan co-authored a study of gang-stalking in the \"Journal of Forensic Psychiatry & Psychology\". According to Sheridan, \"One has to think of the T.I. phenomenon in terms of people with paranoid symptoms who have hit upon the gang-stalking idea as an explanation of what is happening to t... |
If soap breaks the surface tension of water, could it be possible to fall into soapy water from an extreme height and still survive? | It's a myth that the danger of falling into water is due to surface tension. Surface tension is really only enough force to hold up small insects.
What's really happening is that since water is almost incompressible, when you enter the water you very quickly have to push a lot of water out of the way, and the water p... | [
"BULLET::::- Drainage within the soap film: water falls down due to gravity. This can be slowed down by increasing the water viscosity, for instance by adding glycerol. Still, there is an ultimate height limit, which is the capillary length, very high for soap bubbles: around 13 feet (4 meters). In principle, there... |
I have been selected as a human sacrifice by the Aztecs. Who am I and what is known about my life prior to this? Is this something I regard as a great honour or with fear? | [What was life like for Tezcatlipoca's ixiptla during the year leading up to his sacrifice?](_URL_0_)
That's for a specific type of sacrifice, but you might find it interesting. | [
"A wide variety of interpretations of the Aztec practice of human sacrifice have been proposed by modern scholars. Many scholars now believe that Aztec human sacrifice was performed in honor of the gods. Most scholars of Pre-Columbian civilization see human sacrifice among the Aztecs as a part of the long cultural ... |
how do tv series create the opening montage for the pilot episode? haven't they only shot a few episodes by that point? | There usually is no opening montage in a pilot when it is shown to a network. That comes later, when it actually airs. By that time the show is in full production and there's a lot more material to work with. The pilot is altered significantly in many cases before they air it.
| [
"The programme follows the same format throughout its run. A title intro is shown consisting of a couple of short clips for each character from the series. It is then followed by a series of short two- or three-minute-long segments, followed by the credits. Each segment is introduced by the camera zooming in on a c... |
Looking for someone to concisely refute (or support) the claim that "negative ions" are generated near water active sources and are responsible for health benefits. | I've been reading a peer-reviewed [paper (pdf)](_URL_0_) cited by the article you linked to, and it appears the mechanism is actually kind of interesting. The water droplets have a certain number of positive (H3O^+ ) and negative (OH^- ) ions, and they're usually balanced (as you would expect). But when the droplet hit... | [
"Water ionizers are often marketed on the basis of health claims which are normally focused on their putative ability to make water more alkaline. A wide variety of benefits have been claimed, including the ability to slow aging, prevent disease, offer protection from nuclear fallout, give the body more energy, and... |
why is it that non parasitic bugs swarm around my head? | Without knowing the bugs it's hard to tell, some are attracted to heat, some to sweat, others sound, but if they are mostly around your head they might be attracted to your breath as we exhale we breath out carbon dioxide and some bugs use it to find food or navigate | [
"Different mite parasites are also common at mushroom sites. Mites are external parasites that latch onto the fly abdomen and feed on the hemolymph. Mite bites or parasitic wasp stings are a natural mechanism to introduce infections. They may also serve as a mechanism to introduce and distribute bacterial endosymbi... |
What happens if an astronaut gets a nosebleed while in space? | You can find the International Space Station
Integrated Medical Group (IMG) Medical Checklist here:
_URL_0_
Nosebleeds are specifically mentioned on page 396
For a "Simple nosebleed" the instructions are pretty much the same as they would be on Earth:
> Pinch nose just below nasal bone applying direct, uninterr... | [
"Despite their experiences in some of the most rigorous and demanding physical maneuvers on earth, even the most seasoned astronauts may be affected by SMS, resulting in symptoms of severe nausea, projectile vomiting, fatigue, malaise (feeling sick), and headache. These symptoms may occur so abruptly and without an... |
why do oled screens burn in? | _URL_0_
_URL_1_
As my two primary sources of information.
So OLEDs basically rely on a layer of compound under the screen that reacts to certain charges to light up a specific color, though some OLEDs have an always-on backlight. Each pixel is supplied a separate current than the next, obviously. Over time, the co... | [
"An OLED display works without a backlight. Thus, it can display deep black levels and can be thinner and lighter than a liquid crystal display (LCD). In low ambient light conditions such as a dark room an OLED screen can achieve a higher contrast ratio than an LCD, whether the LCD uses cold cathode fluorescent lam... |
why are there hostage negotiators? has any criminal ever actually walked away scott free with their demands met? | A Negotiator turns a life-and-death situation into a court trial.
They might not get away scot free, but they also don't get a sniper bullet to the brainstem. | [
"Silvestre Bello, another negotiator, said that the hostage-takers said they want to escape due to abuse from prison officials. He said that they claimed that three of their companions had their ears chopped off by prison officials and also added that they demanded to be transferred to the National Penitentiary in ... |
why is rape in prison such a common thing, and why isn't it simply controlled? | Rape is not nearly as prevalent in prisons as popular entertainment makes it out to be. I'm not citing a study or quoting anecdotal evidence. I'm speaking from personal experience- having served 8 and a 1/2 years in prison, from when I was 19 until just before turning 28.
Rape happens, but rarely. How rarely depends ... | [
"Prison is a community sexologically characterized by overt masturbation and by homosexual couplings that may be consensual, coercive or assaultive (rape). Prison rape is defined differently from state to state but is understood to be non-consensual or unwanted sexual contact between individuals. Prison rape can be... |
The sugars that makes fruits taste sweet: are they mainly intra- or extra-cellular sugars? | Intracellular, mainly within vacuoles.
> In plant cells the vacuole occupies up to 90 % of the cell volume5. This large volume makes this organelle uniquely suited to serve as a dynamic storage compartment for various solutes and sugars represent the most abundant molecule type in the vacuole.
_URL_0_ | [
"a. Fructose is not the only sugar found in fruits. Glucose and sucrose are also found in varying quantities in various fruits, and sometimes exceed the fructose present. For example, 32% of the edible portion of a date is glucose, compared with 24% fructose and 8% sucrose. However, peaches contain more sucrose (6.... |
great britain. is england part of it? is someone english and british? | **Great Britain** is the island, the big one on which England, Scotland and Wales are situated.
**The Kingdom of Great Britain** was the union of Scotland and the Kingdom of England. It is historical, from the 18th century. It does not exist any more.
**The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland** is ... | [
"England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Its 55,268,100 inhabitants account for more than 84% of the total UK population, while its mainland territory occupies most of the southern two-thirds of the island of Great Britain. England is bordered by Scotland to the north, Wales to the west and the Nor... |
how do different animals and insects get caught in amber in such lively positions? also, did they die and eventually got caught in amber or was amber the cause of death? | I'd guess they get caught in boring positions too but they dont get shown off as much
Watch out for fakes too. Theres a big market in fake fossils in the middle east where they will make the coolest looking critters.... that never existed:( | [
"Amber sometimes contains animals or plant matter that became caught in the resin as it was secreted. Insects, spiders and even their webs, annelids, frogs, crustaceans, bacteria and amoebae, marine microfossils, wood, flowers and fruit, hair, feathers and other small organisms have been recovered in Cretaceous amb... |
why dogs like the shiba inu do the tapping thing with their feet? | Shiba Inus are pretty high energy dogs. The taps you see in vines, like the one with the dog tapping his feet and spinning while waiting for his food bowl to be given to him is just something many high energy dogs will do when not having enough outlets for it.
| [
"Basenjis often stand on their hind legs, somewhat like a meerkat, by themselves or leaning on something; this behavior is often observed when the dog is curious about something. Basenjis have a strong prey drive. According to the book \"The Intelligence of Dogs\", they are the second least trainable dog, when requ... |
How much of modern 'westernized' yoga actually has its roots in the yogic traditions of ancient India? | I am also curious! Debated this with some equally uninformed friends of mine recently, and we were unable to agree on anything. The most recent thing I've seen on the topic is [this article in the NYT](_URL_0_) about sex scandals in Yoga. | [
"There is no consensus on its chronology or specific origin other than that yoga developed in ancient India. Suggested origins are the Indus Valley Civilization (3300–1900 BCE) and pre-Vedic Eastern states of India, the Vedic period (1500–500 BCE), and the śramaṇa movement. According to Gavin Flood, continuities ma... |
how do materials 'absorb' energy? | It depends on the type of energy. If you're talking electro-magnetic (light), electrons are pushed into higher "shells" around the nucleus. Heat energy is absorbed by the individual atoms or molecules moving more energetically. Kinetic energy by a change in momentum. There can be lots of crossover as well. | [
"The process of absorption means that a substance captures and transforms energy. The absorbent distributes the material it captures throughout whole and adsorbent only distributes it through the surface.\n",
"The term absorption refers to the physical process of absorbing light, while absorbance does not always ... |
What Factors Caused Racism in America to Decline? | One could say and claim that racism has certainly not vanished from America. The KKK still exists as do many supremacists groups. There is also a great book Clean and White: A History of Environmental Racism in America. It documents events to the present, unfortunately it does not cover the event in Flint Michigan. The... | [
"Racism in the United States has been a major issue ever since colonialism and slavery. Legally sanctioned racism imposed a heavy burden on Native Americans, African Americans, Latino Americans, Americans from lesser developed parts of Europe, an Asian Americans. European Americans were privileged by law in matters... |
why does the russian goverment still dislike the united states? | This is just me but the U.S. has a very arrogant position on WW2 and how we saved the day once we joined in the war. In reality Russia suffered millions of more casualties with America being around 500 thousand I think, the Nazis ravished half of Russia and the only reason they didn't completely annihilate them was bec... | [
"On 29 December 2016, there were rumors that the White House sanctioned the FSB and several other Russian companies for helping the Russian military intelligence service, the Main Intelligence Directorate (GRU), to allegedly disrupt and spread disinformation during the 2016 US presidential election. In addition, th... |
What does the vy stand for in the name of the largest known star: vy Canis Majoris? | Variable stars inside a constellation boundary, like Canis Major, are given a prefix to distinguish them from regular, constant stars, like Alpha Canis Major (Sirius). The Roman alphabet is used, and if not enough letters available, two letters are used. | [
"ξ Canis Majoris is a blue-white B-type star. It has generally been assigned a luminosity class of III (giant) or IV (subgiant), for example B1III or B0.5IV. Comparison of its properties with model evolutionary tracks suggest that it is a main sequence star about three quarters of the way through its main sequence ... |
Are there any examples of a pretender to the throne successfully overthrowing a legitimate monarch? | There's a bit of an issue with your question. A pretender, by definition, has a claim to the throne while someone taking a throne with no traceable claim would simply be an invader, a revolutionary ect.
There are plenty of cases of pretenders taking crowns from the rightful owner to secure their junior claim. The one... | [
"Alternatively, the monarch may be deposed, as in a revolution. While sometimes a monarch may be forced to abdicate in favour of his or her heir, on other occasions the royal family as a whole has been rejected, the throne going to an elected candidate. Examples of extraordinary election include:\n",
"In 1912, a ... |
If Genghis Khan is often hailed for being progressive around Women's rights, education, and religion, why is he also known for brutally slaughtering thousands and torturing the rest? | I'm sorry but this question hardly makes any sense. He is known for these things because he (allegedly) did these things. Do you want to ask whether it's true that he did these things? Or is it just hard to believe to you, that he did some things you consider positive, and also some things you consider negative? | [
"During his reign, Genghis Khan raised the status of women in positions of prominence, particularly his daughters and consorts. These women included his daughter Altani, who was awarded the title of \"Hero \"Ba'atur\", given to major figures in the Mongol Empire with successful military and political careers, when ... |
What "size" planet would be impossible to escape with our current rocket technology? | You don't need to reach escape velocity as long as you have an enduring source of propulsion (like a rocket). Rather, you want to look at the force of the rocket vs its weight. The Saturn V rocket could produce 7.6 million pounds of force and weighed 6.7 million pounds, which means it couldn't take off if gravity was ... | [
"Generally, a planet-based civilization might have varying levels of difficulty in reaching space. Both the planet's gravity and atmosphere influence the ease of space exploration. Gravity on a more massive planet would generally make it more difficult to launch a spacecraft into orbit. The effects of atmospheric f... |
why do i cringe at the sound of styrofoam rubbing together? | Well the effect is kind of like fingernails on the chalkboard... one explanation is that it is an evolutionary aversion since the sound is actuually similar to primate warning calls. Another explanation is that the sound resonates in the ear canal, making it "sound loud"
Source: _URL_0_ | [
"A pericardial friction rub is a very specific sign of acute pericarditis, meaning the presence of this sign invariably indicates presence of disease. However, absence of this sign does not rule out disease. This rub can be best heard by the diaphragm of the stethoscope at the left sternal border arising as a squea... |
After World War II, why did Poland get the land east of the Oder? And why were those Germans evacuated? | Simple answer is that it was effectively a quid pro quo for the Soviet annexation of the parts of Eastern Poland they took after the Nazi-Soviet Non-Agggression Pact of 1939 - gaining territory in the west to make up for losing territory in the east.
It was also intended to be a way of weakening Germany in the future ... | [
"After the war, according to the preliminary agreements of the conferences of Yalta and Potsdam, the German territories east of the Oder-Neisse line — most of Pomerania, Silesia and East Prussia — were transferred to Poland and from the middle of 1945 through to 1946 the surviving Germans were expelled. The city wa... |
how does an air compressor work and what makes it so loud? | A piston forces air into a low pressure air tank and the motor driving the piston has to cycle in a way that compresses the air past the valve further increasing pressure. A pressure regulator has to talk to the motor to tell it when it has reached pressure and stop pumping the air into the tank.
Air compression is do... | [
"An air compressor is a device that converts power (using an electric motor, diesel or gasoline engine, etc.) into potential energy stored in pressurized air (i.e., compressed air). By one of several methods, an air compressor forces more and more air into a storage tank, increasing the pressure. When tank pressure... |
Does anyone have any examples of Greek texts extremely biased against the Persian Empire? | I'd say the cardinal example here would be [The Persians](_URL_0_) by Aiskhylos. This is the work notoriously (and maybe unfairly) cited by Edward Said as an "ur-example" of the phenomenon of "Orientalism". I don't think we should project our contemporary or early modern attitudes on the Ancient Greeks, but it should g... | [
"Western art, no less than history and theology, bear testimony to the ubiquity of the Persian presence in antiquity. Of all the extant works of Greek tragedy, for example, the only one that is about a non-Greek subject is Aeschylus' play \"The Persians\".\n",
"In the historiography of the classical tradition and... |
how are visa and mastercard not the most valuable/largest companies in the world since so many credit card transactions are subject to their fees? | the fees they collect are licensing fees.
they don't process credit cards, they don't issue credit cards, they don't loan people money. all those fees are collected and managed by others.
Visa and MC are in the business of marketing their brand. (to some degree they support their brands by developing security systems... | [
"Credit card merchant associations, like Visa and MasterCard, receive profits from transaction fees, charging between 0% and 3.25% of the purchase price plus a per transaction fee of between 0.00 USD and 40.00 USD. Cash costs more to bank up, so it is worthwhile for merchants to take cards. Issuers are thus motivat... |
why has it been decades since the last "classic" christmas song or movie? | Relative appearance of tradition is a function of population age.
What I mean is that new traditions appear when most people are young and when the economy is doing well. Most of our traditions surrounding Christmas come from either the 1920s, 1950s, or 1990s.
When Rudolph the Rednose Reindeer first aired, it was at ... | [
"Christmas songs introduced in theater, television, and film include \"White Christmas\" from \"Holiday Inn\" (1942), \"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas\" from \"Meet Me in St. Louis\" (1944), and \"Silver Bells\" in \"The Lemon Drop Kid\" (1950). Some musical films have been set around Christmas time, and be... |
why is the department of homeland security separate from the department of defense? | (Loosely) The DoD manages the military (Army, Navy, etc.; foreign and domestic military bases; etc.), the DHS runs security inside the country to protect citizens from terrorism and other threats.
Traditionally, the military of a country fights other countries' militaries. They can also fight terrorists, but after the... | [
"Whereas the Department of Defense is charged with military actions abroad, the Department of Homeland Security works in the civilian sphere to protect the United States within, at, and outside its borders. Its stated goal is to prepare for, prevent, and respond to domestic emergencies, particularly terrorism. On M... |
why things visually appear brighter when you're hung over | When you are drunk, your pupils dilate and they also respond slower to changes in light level, this lets more light into tour eye, and things appear brighter. | [
"A stimulus which elicits a positive image will usually trigger a negative afterimage quickly via the adaptation process. To experience this phenomenon, one can look at a bright source of light and then look away to a dark area, such as by closing the eyes. At first one should see a fading positive afterimage, like... |
What would a Roman Catholic priest have worn during the medieval era? Would it be similar to the black outfit with a collar we see today? | First, there is a distinction between monastic or regular clergy, who lived according to a communal rule (*regula*), and secular clergy, who formed the majority of the clergy who ministered in parishes. Regular clergy had distinctive dress (formalized over time) so that, for instance, Franciscans friars wore brown or g... | [
"BULLET::::- The cassock, a long black, multi-buttoned garment that had served as the standard uniform for Roman Catholic clergy in Italy, Spain and Poland for centuries, was no longer required to be worn at all times, as the dress code was eased by church. Under new rules, priests were allowed to wear \"modern\" s... |
What are the properties of a wifi signal? | Wi-Fi works like radio waves, data is encoded into a "carrier" frequency by a transmitter and decoded by the receiving device, much like a cell phone or a radio.
The thickness of a wall that a signal can go through greatly depends on the frequency off the carrier signal. The higher the frequency, the faster the connec... | [
"Due to the complex nature of radio propagation at typical Wi-Fi frequencies, particularly the effects of signal reflection off trees and buildings, algorithms can only approximately predict Wi-Fi signal strength for any given area in relation to a transmitter. This effect does not apply equally to long-range Wi-Fi... |
Was Marco Polo a real person? | The will that Marco Polo left about six month before he died is one of the manuscripts in the Marciana National Library in Venice, Cod. Lat. V, 58. In the will he mentions several members of his family by name, including his three daughters, appoints two other family members to give some of his inheritance to specific ... | [
"Marco Polo was a Venetian trader and explorer who gained fame for his worldwide travels. These were recorded in the book \"Il Milione\" (\"The Million\" or \"The Travels of Marco Polo\"). He reached a port in the northern part of present-day Sri Lanka between 1292–1294. According to him the local king was an indep... |
how can your voice be transferred over the phone and sound exactly like you in real life ? | "Exactly" isn't really true, obviously. They are close enough that you can regocnize them, but they cut many corners to get the size of your transmission down.
And you shouldn't think of it as "your voice being transfered", your voice and your speech in general are just pressure waves, which patterns you've learned t... | [
"The Voice Carry Over Telephone (VCO) is used by those people who are unable to hear over the telephone but prefer to use their voice to communicate. VCO telephone calls must be made through a relay service. This connection allows the person with the hearing loss to speak to the other party and read their incoming ... |
what does this math symbol mean, and how do you solve an equation inside the symbol? example: |4+-3| | It hasn't been mentioned, but absolute value is the distance that a number is from zero. Therefore, the answer is positive because that's the number of spaces you would have to move in order for you to get from a number within the symbols to zero. | [
"This symbol is also sometimes used in place of an equal sign for equations that define the symbol on the left-hand side of the equation, to contrast them with equations in which the terms on both sides of the equation were already defined. An alternative notation for this usage is to typeset the letters \"def\" ab... |
What do japanese high school students learn about world war II and especially the japanese surrender? | While it doesn't address some of the more specific aspects of your question, [this answer](_URL_0_) from u/AsiaExpert discusses Japanese education on WWII more generally and is an interesting read! | [
"During World War II, many Japanese students were enlisted to actively help in the war effort, effectively turning schools into factories. Bombings destroyed many schools. After the Japan's defeat of the war, this left a lot for the occupation forces (SCAP) to help rebuild.\n",
"ALTs may be required to read aloud... |
What causes the variability in malleability between metals? | Malleability is mainly influenced by the energy required for planes of metal atoms to slip past each other. As you said, copper and gold assume a face-centered cubic structure. In this structure, the atoms are packed in such a way that there are four sets of close packed layers that can easily slip past each other. In ... | [
"There are a number of differences between structural metal and fiber-reinforced composites. For example, metals in general exhibit yielding and plastic deformation, whereas most fiber-reinforced composites are elastic in their tensile stress-strain characteristics. However, the dissimilar nature of these materials... |
Were any werewolf or other creature myths based on real events? | According to "Vampires, Burial, and Death" by Paul Barber, the typical vampire before the 19th century literary craze was a peasant who had died an untimely death and/or had been difficult in life. The thesis of the book is that the folkloric tales of vampires were essentially accurate descriptions of the effects of a... | [
"BULLET::::- The werewolf is another evil stereotype in association with wolves. In past centuries people have often been accused of being werewolves. A disease named hypertrichosis may explain the origin of this myth.\n",
"In folklore the werewolves represent the cycle of legends of essentially shamanistic conte... |
Main-sequence star and solar system formation - how does it work and collect at the center of a solar system since Helium and Hydrogen are much lighter and less massive? [Astronomy] | The vast majority of the mass in a molecular cloud (where stars form) is hydrogen and helium, it clumps up and forms a protostellar core. Much of the mass has already fallen into this core before the planetary disk even forms. And much of the heavy elements do fall into the Sun. It's just that once the central star has... | [
"Main sequence stars are distinguished by the primary energy generating mechanism in their central region, which joins four hydrogen nuclei to form a single helium atom through thermonuclear fusion. The Sun is an example of this class of star. Once stars with the mass of the Sun form, the core region reaches therma... |
Tuesday Trivia | What is the most interesting historical document you've ever heard of? | Just to get us rolling...
In my own period, I would have to say the English magazine *Land & Water*. You can go browse [the first volume here](_URL_3_) (it's somewhat muddled in the order of the issues, I'm afraid), and find the rest of them elsewhere on the same site.
Publication first began in 1914, under the im... | [
"What survives are an inaugural address, several disputations which were presided by him, and a correspondence of more than sixty letters with leading scholars, philosophers, theologians, diplomats and poets from the Republic and abroad, such as André Rivet, Constantijn Huygens, Pierre Gassendi and Pieter Cornelisz... |
what exactly is gentrification, how is it done, and why is it seen as a negative thing? | Gentrification is when lower cost, lower income neighborhoods are taken over by those with higher income, which raises real estate prices and rents and forces many of the previous residents out. It often also forces existing businesses out and sees them replaced by higher end and/or chains.
The typical pattern is that... | [
"Gentrification is a process of changing the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and businesses. This is a common and controversial topic in politics and in urban planning. Gentrification often increases the economic value of a neighborhood, but can force out low-income residen... |
if humankind has been selecting and breeding and cropping and, in general, manipulating, seeds for centuries—if not millenniums—manually, why do companies that just make the process faster and more automated and efficient, i.e. monsanto, get so much hate? | The most valid argument against Monsanto is that they engage in some pretty severe business practices. Perfectly legal, but somewhat bullyish. Or at least it seems that way to detractors. They own the seeds, and the farmers who grow them in effect "rent" them. If any seeds from those plants are sold, or grown without M... | [
"Farmers have manipulated plants and animals through selective breeding for tens of thousands of years in order to create desired traits. In the 20th century, a surge in technology resulted in an increase in agricultural biotechnology through the selection of traits like increased yield, pest resistance, drought re... |
Are ancient religions extinct? | Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism are all religions which were active (in one form or another) long before the "ancient religions" you mention had received their final form. They all have adherents today.
(Now admittedly, the modern practice of these religions might well be unrecognizable to th... | [
"As with most dead religions, many aspects of the common practices and intricacies of the doctrine have been lost and forgotten over time. However, much of the information and knowledge has survived, and great work has been done by historians and scientists, with the help of religious scholars and translators, to r... |
How did feudalism in Christian Spain differ from it's Western European neighbors? | Slavery in Northern Europe ended in the 11th century, replaced by the system of serfs- they found it a more practical system.
To understand those times in Spain, you have to look very hard, for much of what you will find will be politically incorrect. The Muslims AND Jews were expulsed, but the second option was to co... | [
"Late medieval Spain was divided into the three Christian kingdoms of Navarre, Castile and Aragon, alongside the small, last remaining Islamic state of Granada. The civil wars and conflicts of the late 14th and early 15th century would result in the unification of the Christian kingdoms; combined with advances in n... |
What is meant by "maximum burning temperature" of a substance? | I think "maximum burning temperature" is supposed to refer to the [adiabatic flame temperature](_URL_0_). The estimate comes from starting with a fixed amount of fuel and air in a stoichiometric ratio at a fixed temperature (usually 20 C). Then you let it react and measure the final temperature. In practice, this is cl... | [
"The autoignition temperature or kindling point of a substance is the lowest temperature at which it spontaneously ignites in normal atmosphere without an external source of ignition, such as a flame or spark. This temperature is required to supply the activation energy needed for combustion. The temperature at whi... |
Why can't fetuses be transplanted like organs? | This sort of thing is technically possible, but it is likely that you would have to transplant the entire uterus.
When the embryo attaches to the uterine wall, it grows a placenta. The placenta is the place where all oxygen transport takes place between mother and fetus; it is effectively the lungs of the fetus. It ... | [
"Ovary transplantation, giving rise to successful pregnancies, will result in children who will have the genetic inheritance of the organ donor and not the recipient; it has so far only been carried out on identical twins. Use of an ovarian transplant from a genetically identical donor prevents rejection of the don... |
Beach Vacations: Have people always done them? | hi! there's lots of room for more input but you may be interested in a few earlier posts
* [Did ancient peoples "go to the beach" as we do today?](_URL_0_) - Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, Polynesia (surfing), 19th c Britain & France
* [When did we start going to the beach?](_URL_6_) - various
* [Question about bea... | [
"The “Day at the Beach” program is a free monthly service provided by trained volunteers to introduce adaptive aquatic recreation using specialized surfboards, wave skis, and flotation devices for anyone with a physical disability or cognitive disability. Due to the struggle that persons with disabilities and their... |
Before being used in divination, what did the 22 trump cards in the tarot deck signify? | There is no documented use of their significance prior to when they started being used in the 18th century as a divination tool. There have been writings that supposedly traced their symbolism to ancient Egypt but this has never been verified.
Edit- A lot of people assume they represent something as the European suit... | [
"Every trump card has a Hebrew letter written on it in the lower right corner, which is the letter that is associated with the card in the writings of Case. In contrast to some earlier occult tarot decks, which place the fool card last in order, and associate it with the second-to-last Hebrew letter, shin (such dec... |
What portion of a person's calories are absorbed in the stomach as opposed to the intestines? | It depends on the food, only glucose can be absorbed directly into the stomach, because it does not require any digestion. Disaccharides and polysaccharides need digestion prior to absorption. | [
"In the human digestive system, the stomach is responsible for mechanical and chemical digestions. The small intestine is involved in both the absorption and digestion of nutrients, whereas the large intestine is responsible for the elimination of wastes (defecation). The small intestine consists of 3 parts: duoden... |
why do lights that are far away have a "twinkling" quality to them? | Yes, heat & particulate (ice, dust) distortion in the air. That's why cold air provides clearer views, especially for astronomy. | [
"Also related, the Pixy-light from Devon and Cornwall is most often associated with the Pixie who often has \"pixie-led\" travellers away from the safe and reliable route and into the bogs with glowing lights. \"Like Poltergeist they can generate uncanny sounds. They were less serious than their German Weisse Fraue... |
why does it seem so challenging now to send a manned crew to the moon, when we were able to accomplish this over 50 years ago? | The best analogy I can think of is that it's also challenging to reproduce the Great Pyramid now, even though it was something that was accomplished 4000 years ago.
It's not that we don't know how to do it, it's that our priorities have changed. We're not willing to spend the money it would require, and we're not will... | [
"BULLET::::- Marcus Allen – British publisher of \"Nexus\", who said photographs of the lander would not prove that the United States put men on the Moon, and \"Getting to the Moon really isn't much of a problem – the Russians did that in 1959. The big problem is getting people there.\" He suggests that NASA sent r... |
why is so much research behind a paywall? | As an academic (PhD student), I completely agree with you that far too much knowledge is paywalled. Most academics hate it. Authors of journal papers don't get paid for publishing articles; you write them for free because, well, you have to. In order to keep a job at a university you have to demonstrate that you produc... | [
"A paywall is a method of restricting access to content via a paid subscription. Beginning in the mid-2010s, newspapers started implementing paywalls on their websites as a way to increase revenue after years of decline in paid print readership and advertising revenue, partly due to the use of ad blockers. In acade... |
A few astronomy questions | 1) Only [Venus](_URL_0_) spins completely backwards, and leading hypotheses for why it doesn't spin in the same direction as others are strong tidal forces on it's atmosphere, slowing it's natural rotation, and large-scale impacts during formation. Uranus rotates on it's side (think of it "rolling" around it's orbit),... | [
"Astronomy provides a spectacular demonstration of the effect of the Pauli principle, in the form of white dwarf and neutron stars. In both bodies, atomic structure is disrupted by extreme pressure, but the stars are held in hydrostatic equilibrium by \"degeneracy pressure\", also known as Fermi pressure. This exot... |
What size of molecules will microwaves heat up? | Microwaves heat stuff by "shaking" dipoles in it through electromagnetic interaction.
Water has a strong dipole moment, so microwaving food that contains lots of water works especially well.
Conclusion: you can heat everything in a microwave that is made of molecules with sufficiently strong dipole moment. | [
"Microwave ovens produce heat directly within the food, but despite the common misconception that microwaved food cooks from the inside out, 2.45 GHz microwaves can only penetrate approximately into most foods. The inside portions of thicker foods are mainly heated by heat conducted from the outer .\n",
"Microwav... |
is the speed of light the fastest any object can move through space, or is it the fastest speed any object can move, period? | Fastest anything can move period. Fastest "information" can travel.
Light can, however, move slower in a medium, which is what allows for Cherenkov radiation. | [
"The fastest possible speed at which energy or information can travel, according to special relativity, is the speed of light in a vacuum \"c\" = metres per second (approximately or ). Matter cannot quite reach the speed of light, as this would require an infinite amount of energy. In relativity physics, the concep... |
when and why did names like evelyn, vivian and ashley, which used to be suitable to either sex, become restricted to women? | In Britain at least, Ashley is certainly a boy's name still:
_URL_1_
_URL_0_
_URL_2_ | [
"The first known Ashleys originally came from Wiltshire, England, where they were lords of the manor of Ashley, at a very early period. Benedict of Ashley was born around the year 1260 in Ashley Place of Wiltshire in England. He lived during the reigns of King Henry II and King Edward I. In ancient and medieval tim... |
Was there gambling on games of chance in the pre-Columbian Americas? | There were many. In these two posts I discuss several games from the Eastern Woodlands, many of which incorporated gambling, especially the bowl game, chunky, and lacrosse mentioned in the first post.
* [What is a typical game of any pre columbian civilization?](_URL_0_)
* [Aside from Lacrosse, what other games did N... | [
"The precise origin of gambling is unknown. It is generally believed that gambling in some form or another has been seen in almost every society in history. From the Ancient Greeks and Romans to Napoleon's France and Elizabethan England, much of history is filled with stories of entertainment based on games of chan... |
what happens to the poison when you kill a poisonous spider? | With most spider venom it will only harm you if it is introduced into your bloodstream. | [
"Trapdoor spiders, they feed parts of their kill to the spiderlings in the form of saliva. The spider uses the trip lines of its trapdoor to sense for any small-to-medium-sized creatures that disturb them, and pounces on its victim.\n",
"Despite public concern about spider bites, severe envenomation is rare. Few ... |
why does visible light seamlessly "loop" (color wheel) when each color is a higher frequency than the last? | Okay, so you know that the electromagnetic spectrum doesn't actually loop. But our eyes see color in visible light using three different pigments in our retinas (in the parts called the cones). These pigments correspond to red, green, and blue. These pigments all respond a little bit to different colors, but respond mo... | [
"Colored dither is sometimes mentioned as dither that has been filtered to be different from white noise. Some dither algorithms use noise that has more energy in the higher frequencies so as to lower the energy in the critical audio band.\n",
"At the interface of such a material with air or vacuum (index of ~1),... |
why do you get paralyzed only by damaging the spinal cord, it's not like it's cut in half | Picture it not as one cable, but as a bundle of cables. If even one little cable within the spinal cord is damaged, some nervous system functionality can be lost. | [
"Spinal cord injuries can be caused by trauma to the spinal column (stretching, bruising, applying pressure, severing, laceration, etc.). The vertebral bones or intervertebral disks can shatter, causing the spinal cord to be punctured by a sharp fragment of bone. Usually, victims of spinal cord injuries will suffer... |
why is moving water harder to freeze/boil? | ...It isn't. In fact, in both cases it makes it easier to bring the total volume of the fluid to the desired temperature. The reason you might think otherwise is just that some regions of the fluid (in contact with the pan, or the cold air depending) are the first to reach boiling/freezing.
In fact however, agitating... | [
"Traditionally, hot water has been used because it slightly melts the layer of ice below it, leading some operators to believe it forms a stronger bond during the freezing process because heating the water releases dissolved gases thus allowing the ice to freeze in a clearer state as well as reduces the freezing ti... |
What happens when you combine acids? | You get a mixture of acids, that's all, unless they actually react with each other. Aqua regia isn't really stronger as an acid, the two acids do different things when dissolving gold. Nitric acid oxidizes gold (but in very small amounts), while the chloride ions from the hydrochloric acid form a more soluble complex w... | [
"Strong acids catalyse the reaction by donating a proton to the carbonyl group, thus making it a more potent electrophile, whereas bases catalyse the reaction by removing a proton from the alcohol, thus making it more nucleophilic. Esters with larger alkoxy groups can be made from methyl or ethyl esters in high pur... |
how did superheroes (marvel/dc) enter the mainstream and pop culture when they were primarily aimed at a young male demographic in the early days? | The kids that grew up reading those comics are the generation in charge now. They're old enough to have jobs, disposable income, and free time, so it stands to reason that some of the things they liked as kids would translate into modern pop culture | [
"The insecurity and anxieties in Marvel's early 1960s comic books such as \"The Fantastic Four\", \"The Amazing Spider-Man\", \"The Incredible Hulk\", and \"X-Men\" ushered in a new type of superhero, very different from the certain and all-powerful superheroes before them, and changed the public's perception of su... |
Is anyone here familiar with Gilles de Rais? Was he guilty, why or why not? | _URL_0_
for context not as an answer | [
"Gilles' origins are obscure. There was a \"zanni\" Giglio in the Italian troupe of the academic \"Intronati\" as early as 1531, and some historians link him to Gilles. But no line of succession has been traced. The French expression \"\"faire gilles\"\", meaning \"to go bankrupt\" or \"to run away\", dates from th... |
How we define bacteria's species? | In the olden days we defined bacterial species by their phenotypes, or how they looked and how they behaved.
In the less olden days we sequenced the DNA of bacteria and clustered them based on similarity and called close enough clusters the same and different enough clusters, different species.
In modern times we s... | [
"Classification seeks to describe the diversity of bacterial species by naming and grouping organisms based on similarities. Bacteria can be classified on the basis of cell structure, cellular metabolism or on differences in cell components, such as DNA, fatty acids, pigments, antigens and quinones. While these sch... |
Why are hitboxes so hard to get exact? | Its compromise between precission and performance. Testing collision with axis-aligned box is trivial. Testing collision with non-axis-aligned box is not easy, but still doable. Testing collision with arbitrary mesh is complicated and slow. | [
"Hitboxes are used to detect \"one-way\" collisions such as a character being hit by a punch or a bullet. They are unsuitable for the detection of collisions with feedback (e.g. bumping into a wall) due the difficulty experienced by both humans and AI in managing a hitbox's ever-changing locations; these sorts of c... |
those 1 second commercials you see, are those some sort of editing mistake, or do companies actually pay for a 1 second ad slot? | Your cable/satellite company you get your TV from is allowed to preempt a certain amount of ads the network sends each hour on each network, and insert their own ads instead that go ONLY to their customers. Each and every cable/sat distributor does this for their own customers, and on almost every network.
This proces... | [
"Telemundo will air several seven packages of product placements instead of regular commercials. Only one 30-second spot will appear during each episodes, either near the very beginning or end of the show. It will use three types of product insertion, each more expensive than the other:\n",
"The original version ... |
Why are the majority of Jewish people named with German names considering that the diaspora was far more widespread than Germanic nations? | As the other comments are asking, I'm not sure where you get that the majority of Jews are named with German names. At least in the modern US, most Jews feel the sorts of names they'd give their kids are Hebrew in origin, with a greater percentage favoring unusual Hebrew names like Matan or Lev than would use non-Hebr... | [
"The surnames of the German Jews are a special case, as they were introduced later, in the late 18th to early 19th century, per \"fiat\". The Prussian authorities imposed made-up and sometimes derogatory names. For instance, the name \"Waldlieferant\" (lit.: forest supplier) was \"created\" to ridicule a Jewish tim... |
why does my cat ignore me when i say its name but it always looks up when i make a kissy noise? | I've worked with cats for years. Your cat knows his/her name. He/She simply does not associate anything that he enjoys with you calling him by name. Since there is no benefit in it for your cat, he doesn't respond to his name when you say it.
The kissy noise might be associated, in his mind, with a bird or other cr... | [
"Cats meow for various reasons, and some are naturally more vocal than others. This becomes a problem behavior when there is excessive meowing or yowling, especially at night. Positive reinforcement training, sometimes accompanied by a clicker, is commonly used in this case. This involves ignoring the cat when it i... |
how did vietnamese monk thích quảng đức achieve such an extreme pain tolerance? | If I remember correctly, during immolation the extreme heat can burn the nervous system, basically killing the cells that would carry the signal of pain to your receptors. The flames would be so hot that they destroy the nerves responsible for fast and slow pain, meaning the body doesn't react like it normally does by ... | [
"Despite the shock of the Western public, the practice of Vietnamese monks self-immolating was not unprecedented. Instances of self-immolations in Vietnam had been recorded for centuries, usually carried out to honor Gautama Buddha. The most recently recorded case had been in North Vietnam in 1950. The French colon... |
Has Islam ever undergone a major period of upheaval and reform, similar to 16th century Christianity in Europe? | There have been other eras that people will argue about--whether it was the seeds of the Shi'a vs. Sunni conflict, or when it really become permanent in the wake of 1501 when Shah Ismail took over Safavid Empire and really created the Sunni/Shi'a split we see today. See [here for more on those two](_URL_0_), especiall... | [
"Islam entered southern Europe through the invading \"Moors\" of North Africa in the 8th–10th centuries; Muslim political entities existed firmly in what is today Spain, Portugal, South Italy and Malta for several centuries. The Muslim community in these territories was converted or expelled by the end of the 15th ... |
why isn't deforestation and the decline of plant life largely responsible for the increase in carbon dioxide we hear everyone talking about. | > Why isn't deforestation and the decline of plant life largely responsible for the increase in carbon dioxide we hear everyone talking about.
To keep it simple, CO2 is given off when wood is burned. Sometimes lots of wood is burned on purpose, like slash-and-burn agriculture that results in large sections of the Am... | [
"Because deforestation is so extensive, it has made several significant impacts on the environment, including carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, changing the water cycle, an increase in soil erosion, and a decrease in biodiversity. Deforestation is often cited as a contributor to global warming. Because trees and pl... |
can you please help me understand native americans in current us society ? | I am not a Native myself, but I live in Montana, which has the most Indian Reservations anywhere in the US. From what I understand, the way it works is as follows:
1) The reservation has autonomous control over its *local* jurisdiction. It fields its own local executive, judicial, and legislative bodies as it sees fit... | [
"In addition, Native American activism has led major universities across the country to establish Native American studies programs and departments, increasing awareness of the strengths of Indian cultures, providing opportunities for academics, and deepening research on history and cultures in the United States. Na... |
Can we still accurately term the era from roughly 1945-1991 as "the Cold War era"? | More of a meta question, but recently scholars have been defining "Cold War" as more of 1917-1991, as the western allies attempted to suppress the communist revolution in Russia, both as a vanguard against communism and to try to keep Russia in the war. There is serious precedence for this too, given that many countrie... | [
"The term Post-Cold War era refers to the period of time following the Cold War. Because the Cold War was not an active war but rather a period of geopolitical tensions punctuated by proxy wars, there is disagreement on the official ending of this conflict and subsequent existence of the post-Cold War era. Some sch... |
Can you balance anything on a flat surface?? | It depends on how what assumptions you want to make. In a purely classical model where everything is perfectly rigid, at zero temperature, no air movement, etc then it is in theory possible to balance anything. This comes with the usual qualifier that this is an unstable equilibrium and any small movement will cause it... | [
"An optical flat is an optical-grade piece of glass lapped and polished to be extremely flat on one or both sides, usually within a few tens of nanometres (billionths of a meter). They are used with a monochromatic light to determine the flatness (surface accuracy) of other surfaces, whether optical, metallic, cera... |
What term did the British use to refer to the American Revolution as it was happening? | I've only really read about the terminology at the very start, so I hope someone who has read further on the subject can build from this.
When King George III addressed Parliament on October 27, 1775, he referred to "The present situation of America" as "their [American's] revolt, hostility and rebellion." He spoke of... | [
"The American Revolution spanned from 1775 to 1783, after which the United States received recognition of independence by and from Great Britain. Rhetorical or hyperbolic references to a Second American Revolution have been made on a number of occasions throughout the history of the United States.\n",
"BULLET::::... |
why do soap makers spritz isopropyl alcohol between layers of soap? | It basically dissolves oils and fats, which soap is made of. So when you put it between two layers, both layers melt a bit. once the alcohol is no longer chemically active, the two halves melt together and solidify, functioning like a single solid object. | [
"Glycerin soap is made by melting and continuously heating soap that has been partially dissolved in a high percentage alcohol solution until the mixture reaches a clear, jelly-like consistency. The alcohol is added to a slow cooked hot-processed soap and then simmered with a sugar solution until the soap is clear ... |
why do some have bigger or more visible veins on their arms than others? | Usually it's due to a higher amount of blood running through the body, or, in general, a lower body fat percentage. | [
"Vascularity, in bodybuilding, is the condition of having many highly-visible, prominent, and often extensively-ramified superficial veins. The skin appears \"thin\" — sometimes virtually diaphanous — due to an extreme reduction of subcutaneous fat, allowing for maximum muscle definition. \n",
"The United States ... |
What do we know of the authorship and history of the Christian Apocryphal and psuedographica involving Pontius Pilate? | Is it alright if I just post a short comment as a placeholder/reminder, to maybe expand on later? (Oh and, FYI, it's usually referred to as the *apocrypha* and *pseudepigrapha*. :P
There's actually a quite significant body of apocryphal/pseudepigraphical literature involving Pilate. Well...I guess there's really a la... | [
"The section about Pilate is an older text found in the Greek \"Acts of Peter and Paul\" and is a purported official document from Pontius Pilate (or composed from reports at the praetorium at Jerusalem) reporting events in Judea to Emperor Tiberius, and referring to the crucifixion of Jesus, as well as his miracle... |
What are the Errors in Will Durant's famous "The Story of Civilization"? | You might prefer to x-post this on /r/badhistory, because it's not really the kind of thing we do here. Having only listened to part of *The Age of Faith*, the errors of fact and interpretation would be too many to list. The story of civilization is an 80 year-old series of books written by a non-specialist for a lay a... | [
"\"The Times\" called the book 'an extraordinary achievement', noting that Dartnell expertly explains things such as the rudiment of a civilization. They state 'it is a great read even if civilization does not collapse'. \n",
"Kasparov believes that the conventional history of civilization is radically incorrect.... |
Why was Hannibal left on his own? | The invasion of Italy by Hannibal can be considered a Barca family enterprise. It was mounted, financed and reinforced from Spain, which was almost a personal feud of the Barcas.
It is not even certain that political elite in Carthage was consulted by Hannibal before he attacked and razed Saguntum, the casus belli for... | [
"Hannibal suffered from two weaknesses. First, he was commander of an invading foreign army on Italian soil, effectively cut off from the home country by the difficulty of seaborne resupply. His only hope of destroying Rome was by enlisting the support of her allies. As long as the Italians remained loyal to Rome, ... |
What is the thinnest atmosphere humans can breath long term? | With generations of adaptation? We don't know beyond the examples that himalayan sherpas offer.
For the average person? Some experience altitude sickness as low as 2500m, or 75kPa.
Presumably there's a predictable molar volume below which we can't obtain enough oxygen for known metabolic processes to keep up, but it'... | [
"Cetaceans have lungs, meaning they breathe air. An individual can last without a breath from a few minutes to over two hours depending on the species. Cetacea are deliberate breathers who must be awake to inhale and exhale. When stale air, warmed from the lungs, is exhaled, it condenses as it meets colder external... |
If the gravitational pull of a planet is the same in all directions, why does Saturn, for example, have rings in only one plane? Shouldn't it be inside of a "shell" of debris instead of just having rings? | A shell or ball is what you'd expect if the particles don't collide with each other. This is why you can get elliptical galaxies - stars almost never collide and don't even have close encounters very often, so once you get a ball of stars, the stars will just keep on buzzing around in a ball for a very long time. This ... | [
"The gravitational tidal forces acting on the rings of Saturn provide an easy-to-visualize physical example. The tidal forces flatten the ring into the equatorial plane, even as they stretch it out in the radial direction. Imagining the rings to be sand or gravel particles (\"dust\") in orbit around Saturn, the tid... |
how are they able to get any combination of colored lights so quickly on monuments? is support for this pre planned? | The light systems in place already have a number of different color bulbs, so they can do any combination they want whenever they want. The [Whitehouse](_URL_0_) is the same way.
So when they want to display a certain pattern or set of colors, they just enter it into a computer and that adjusts the system to display ... | [
"There are covered walkways also connecting several academic buildings. These walkways feature artwork that is coloured circles, which are illuminated by lights at night. Initially this was an art project in 1996, both for the dots on the walkways and for artistic impressions to be made of the result, and they were... |
what does an “instinct” actually mean? is it just some sort of feeling? | Human's have an instinct to hold their breath underwater. If you dip a new baby underwater, it holds its breath until you have pulled it back out. It's not a "I have a feeling I should hold my breath" sort of thing. It's just "I'm holding my breath now". No "reason" to do it, no thinking, just action. | [
"“Instincts,” in this regard, are actions which an organism performs without learning and which are executed without the mediating influence of thought. As such, the action has an “all-or-none” aspect to it: it either does not occur at all or it occurs with all of its force. To this end, Rivers included the protopa... |
Difference in living conditions between the indigenous people of America and Europeans in the 16th century? | Hi - we as mods have approved this thread, because while this is a homework question, it is asking for clarification or resources, rather than the answer itself, which is fine according to [our rules](_URL_1_). This policy is further explained in this [Rules Roundtable thread](_URL_0_) and this [META Thread](_URL_3_).
... | [
"Aboriginal peoples were living in North America at this time and still do today. There were many conflicts between Europeans and Natives. The Europeans had many advantages over the natives. They gave them diseases that they had not been exposed to before and this wiped out 50–90% of their population. (See Populati... |
What did the intersection of the Swiss Border and the western front look like in WWI and WWII? | As a follow-up question - what did the trenches look like where they hit the ocean? | [
"Before the end of World War I, it formed the border between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Italian Kingdom. The Swiss had an outpost and a hotel (which was destroyed) on the \"Dreisprachenspitze\" (literally, Three-Language-Peak). During World War I, fierce battles were fought in the ice and snow of the area,... |
why is the political structure of the european union so complicated? | Fist of all the EU is not a country. It is not a single government. It is an economic trade union comprised of numerous nations with varying political structures, economic structure, and social needs. Comparing it to the US is a false comparison. If you want to compare it to the US you would need to compare it to the N... | [
"Modern European politics is dominated by the European Union, since the fall of the Iron Curtain and the collapse of the Eastern Bloc of Communist states. After the end of the Cold War, the EU expanded eastward to include the former Communist countries. As of 2017, the EU has 28 member states.\n",
"The combinatio... |
Is it possible to react to a gunshot? | One other thing to consider is the hostage taker reacting not to the flash or the sound of the gun, but the actions of the person using the gun.
Reacting to the gun is, as u/NeuroBill explained, not going to happen, but a fast movie villian (or real villain) may be able to react to the movements of the arm or hand of... | [
"The explosive reaction, once initiated, occurs at a very high velocity, producing a large vapor cloud and a loud report. It is marketed as a target designation that is useful for long-range target practice: the shooter does not need to walk down-range to see if the target has been hit, as the target will react and... |
During the American Civil War did other countries try to influence the outcome? Which countries and which side did they take? | There's a lot to unpack here but I'll take a stab at it in a brief summary; there's enough going on to fill several books (which have been written). To put it briefly, Britain and France considered attempting to influence the outcome but ultimately decided not to try. I would argue that the modern countries that most i... | [
"The diplomacy of the American Civil War involved the relations of the United States and the Confederate States of America with the major world powers during the American Civil War of 1861–1865. The United States prevented other powers from recognizing the Confederacy, which counted heavily on Britain and France to... |
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