question stringlengths 3 301 | answer stringlengths 9 26.1k | context list |
|---|---|---|
what would happen if the world were to hit the reset button on the global economy? | Nations don't owe each other. If they did the debts would just cancel each other out as logic dictates.
It's the people the governments take loans from. Suddenly saying "lol no, you're not getting your money back" would be a reset button for economics just like a nuke is a reset button for a city, when suddenly millions of investors are left high and dry. | [
"Beyond the Crash: Overcoming the first crisis of globalisation is a 2010 book by former UK prime minister Gordon Brown. The work argues that the only way to fully overcome the financial crisis of 2007–2010 is with further coordinated global action. Brown states that a shared \"global compact\" on jobs and growth s... |
Did other nations have a similar "Manifest Destiny" period where huge numbers of settlers expanded the frontiers of the country? | Japan comes to mind with their expansion into the Northern region of Hokkaido. That period of history in Japan has many parallels to Western expansion in the states. Right down to the subjugation of the native people who lived in the region. In Japan's case the native people were the Ainu instead of Native Americans. | [
"The first westward migrations occurred as representatives of the Thirteen Colonies sought to open up new lands for their respective colonies westward. Those whose original royal charters did not specify a western limit simply extended their lands directly and indefinitely westward. \n",
"There were conflicts bet... |
if your neurones make a new connection when you learn something new, would it be possible to run out of space in your brain for new connections to form. | No, basically a neuron is capable of thousands of potential connection to other neurons, your brain is formed of trillions of these neural pathways (synapses) and they do strengthen and weaken over time. Your brain cleans out old or unused pathways as it develops more. The potential for creating new pathways is always extremely high in our brain and we don't really know the upper limit capacity, but even if you could prolong human life by a significant factor, your brain would never reach full capacity as it would be losing connections as well as creating new ones.
Sometimes when you try to remember something and can't do it right away, then it comes back to you later, it's in essence your brain found a new pathway to old information because the old pathway to it was lost. This is an example of how you lose connections, but because there's trillions of connections there is almost always a backdoor to certain information. | [
"At the beginning of the connectome project, it was thought that the connections between neurons were unchangeable once established and that only individual synapses could be altered. However, recent evidence suggests that connectivity is also subject to change, termed neuroplasticity. There are two ways that the b... |
Is racism due to society or biology? -Social/Psychology- | The three most common classifications of people are age, gender, and race. Evolutionary psychologists have provided some evolutionary reasons for thinking that the first two ways of classifying are more "innate" but that race is not. This is because in what evolutionary psychologists call "The Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness" (EEA), i.e. the Pleistocene, everyone would've been the same race. They predicted that race is actually used as a proxy for coalition membership. [This](_URL_0_) study confirms the prediction. At least according to evo-psych, racism can be overcome, sexism is harder. From the abstract: "More importantly, when cues of coalitional affiliation no longer track or correspond to race, subjects markedly reduce the extent to which they categorize others by race, and indeed may cease doing so entirely." | [
"Despite support for evolutionary theories relating to an innate origin of racism, various studies have suggested racism is associated with lower intelligence and less diverse peer groups during childhood. A neuroimaging study on amygdala activity during racial matching activities found increased activity to be ass... |
What is used as nutrition to cultivated cell meat? And how much antibiotics is used? | You can avoid antibiotics, but most tissue culture uses some. It is really difficult to do industry-sized cell culture without antibiotics.
Also, they use fetal bovine serum as a nutrient, which is essentially baby cow blood, so it isn’t vegan and isn’t very sustainable at this point. Maybe someday they can avoid this. | [
"The basic nutrients required are crude protein, metabolizable energy, minerals, vitamins and water. The formulation procedure has both fixed and variable portions. Swine rations are generally based on a ground cereal grain as a carbohydrate source, soybean meal as a protein source, minerals like calcium and phosph... |
why do some sites require credit card ccv numbers, and others (like amazon) do not? | The CVV2 number isn't *required* to charge the card, but it reduces the risk of fraud. If the transaction is fraudulent, the merchant might end up having to pay fees or fines to their payment processor, so merchants have an incentive to check CVV2s. But if they don't want to and are willing to risk more chargebacks, they can decide not to require it (which is what Amazon's done). | [
"The AVS system was meant to legally protect the companies from laws against disseminating pornography to minors, as the credit card was used to verify that the user attempting to access a particular website was of legal age to view the website's content. Users could sign up with their credit cards to access affili... |
Why are the Planck Length, Time and Temperature so unbelievably minuscule or enormous while the Planck Mass is close to being on our scale, being the mass of a flea's egg or an eyelash? | That's an interesting misconception that seems to be rather common. Not everything with the name "Planck" behind is unbelievably small.
We physicists are lazy, and we don't like keep tracking of dimensions, so we use a system of units in which there is only one to measure things: in length and inverse length. (or inverse energy and energy). So time is a length. And also, mass is energy, temperature is energy, momentum is energy. And these quantities have their corresponding length scale, which is just the inverse of them.
In these units, Newton's constant has dimension of inverse mass squared, and this mass - the Planck mass - is HUGE. When I say huge, I mean huge in particle physicist's sense, as in 10^16 times bigger than the Higgs. The Planck temperature is actually also very very big, even in the scale of a non-particle-physicist, around 10^32 K.
Do you remember the uncertainty principle? It says that dx*dp is bigger than a number. What this tells you is that in order to probe very short length scales, you need very big momenta. So when you build an accelerator that can probe energy scales at the order of the Planck mass, effectively you are probing an enormously short length: the Planck length.
So yes, you have a huge energy scale - and this energy scale corresponds to very short length and time scales. | [
"The Planck time is the unique combination of the gravitational constant , the special-relativistic constant , and the quantum constant , to produce a constant with dimension of time. Because the Planck time comes from dimensional analysis, which ignores constant factors, there is no reason to believe that exactly ... |
AM modulation - What are sidebands? | Sidebands are just your actual signal, before modulation. They are the exact identical signal to what you transmited, represented in frequency domain obviously, just located in a new spot.
Say we have sound, music or voice. It will have frequencies, tones, anywhere from about 20 Hz to 20 kHz. At any given instance in time, each frequency in here is at some amplitude. And as the sound changes over time, the amplitude of each of these changes. There may be frequencies present below or above this, but we can't hear them so they don't matter.
Next we use a microphone to turn the sound an electrical signal, but the excatly same frequencies are preserved.
Next, we modulate that on a carrier frequency. Assuming AM, all that happens is we shift them upward. Say our carrier is 1000 kHz. If we had 20 Hz sound in our signal, we know have amplitude in the sideband at 1000.02 kHz. If we had sound at 1 kHz, we now have amplitude in the sideband at 1001 kHz. If we had 15 kHz sound, we have amplitude in the side band 1015 kHz. All that happened is rather than our sound being based on DC/0 Hz, we now just shifted it to 1000 kHz, our carrier frequency. Sidebands *are* your signal. The carrier itself contains nothing, it's just there as a reference point rather than 0.
So if that's the upper side band, what about the lower? Well, in regular sound in 0 to 20 kHz, we could technically also say there is a mirror of it about 0 Hz to -20 Hz. Has no meaning normally, as it's bandwidth just mirror the real half and doesn't matter. If we now shift it from being about 1000 kHz rather than 0 Hz, that negative mirror is now occupying real positive frequencies. There's still another mirror of both sidebands around -1000 kHz technically, but again it doesn't matter. Any frequency there is, always has its negative mirror doing nothing. AM modulation just reveals the original negative half right below DC now right below the carrier.
Do we need the lower sideband? No, it's just duplicate mirrored information. It's only 50% bandwidth efficient. We can use a filter to chop off the lower, or upper, sideband and still transmit the signal with half the bandwidth usage.
Or we can use quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) and transmit two different signals, both complete with both sidebands, at the same carrier frequency. So long as one signal is transmitted on a carrier delayed by quarter cycle (aka one on a cosine and one on a sine wave), they can be kept seperate from each other. They each have duplicate sidebands still, but the double stacking gets us back to 100% bandwidth efficiency, in a easier way than filtering a sideband out. | [
"In radio communications, a sideband is a band of frequencies higher than or lower than the carrier frequency, that are the result of the modulation process. The sidebands carry the information transmitted by the radio signal. The sidebands consist of all the spectral components of the modulated signal except the c... |
how do viral test kits work? | A technique called qPCR. You use an enzyme called Reverse transcriptase to convert viral RNA into DNA. Then followed by another enzyme called DNA polymerase to clone it multiple times.
Mix that with fluorescent DNA primers (short glowing chunks) that are used by the enzyme to build the target DNA, and you can count how much viral DNA there is based on how much fluorescence is given off under UV light.
There are other techniques but this is the easiest and most common. | [
"Antibody testing has become widely available. It can be done for individual viruses (e.g. using an ELISA assay) but inautomated panels that can screen for many viruses at once are becoming increasingly common.\n",
"Various viral load tests might be used. One way to classify tests is by whether it is a nucleic ac... |
how did ancient people find/define constellations when there was no light pollution? | The pictures you see are long exposure photos, which don't accurately represent what you see when you look at the night sky without any light pollution. [This photo](_URL_0_) much more accurately represents what you see with your own eyes than [this photo](_URL_1_). As you can see, it's very easy to discern specific stars in the first photo.
I suggest going out on an actual stargazing tour, it can be mind blowing. | [
"There are no markings on the night sky, though there exist many sky maps to aid stargazers in identifying constellations and other celestial objects. Constellations are prominent because their stars tend to be brighter than other nearby stars in the sky. Different cultures have created different groupings of const... |
are vegetables alive? | Yes they are alive. The carrot you have in your refrigerator may not sprout given the best care possible. The top was taken off. It was washed repeatedly, and is at the end of its life cycle.
The sweet potato I bought last Thanksgiving and left on the counter sprouted a week ago. I threw it out today. It was probably still good to eat.
Most potatoes can be coaxed to grow if they have not been peeled. Watch The Martian.
Your canned vegetables are not alive anymore.
The more processed your vegetables are the less likely they are to sprout.
Apple seeds will probably sprout. Maybe orange seeds. Everyone is always growing avocado seeds.
| [
"Many cultures have developed innovative ways of preserving vegetables so that they can be stored for several months between harvest seasons. Techniques include pickling, home canning, food dehydration, or storage in a root cellar.\n",
"The ability of some vegetables and fruit to keep for months in favorable cell... |
why do i always wake up from a dream immediately before i suffer some kind of fatal physical harm (ex. someone shoots me, stabs me, hits me etc.) | It's because your brain is reacting to the fear of the situation. It's like "Oh! Bad situation. Done!" so you wake up. Your mind doesn't want to go through that, and you've never experienced it, so you also don't know how to react. :) | [
"BULLET::::- \"I'm starting to think that I'm dead. | Doesn't it make sense that death too would be wrapped in dream? That after death, your conscious life would continue in what might be called a dream body? It would be the same dream body you experience in your everyday dream life. Except that in the post-mortal ... |
Do we have any evidence that the Azores were inhabited by humans at any point prior to their discovery by the Portuguese? | We might!
It's very possible that sharp-eyed observers could have gained clues that the Azores were out there long before their official discovery; many migratory bird species stop there, and anyone watching birds moving northeast from the Azores could have deduced they were coming from islands to the southwest.
There is a tale from the 18th century that a hoard of Carthaginian coins displayed in Portugal was discovered in the Azores, but the supposed site was never charted and the coins themselves lost.
Mice in the Azores are largely descended from ancestors in Iberia; however, [mice on some islands have DNA from ancestors in Scandinavia](_URL_1_). This hints that Norse explorers may have visited the islands centuries before the Portuguese.
Many medieval maps contain [islands in the general vicinity of the Azores](_URL_0_), but there is very little consensus on whether this reflects actual knowledge (passed down from Norse explorations or Iberian fishermen who guarded the location of their most lucrative fishing spots and secluded beaches) or inflated legends which happened to match up with the location.
Most intriguingly, there may be a series of *hypogea*, or underground tombs, on the islands. A team led by Nuno Ribiero excavated there about ten years back and claimed they'd found several sites in natural caves, including Paleolithic rock art. As far as I can tell, though, these claims either haven't stood up to closer examination or are at the very least too preliminary to confirm the findings. | [
"This is a list of the mammal species recorded in the Azores Islands, Portugal. Except for marine mammals and two species of bats, the Azores were completely devoid of mammals prior to their discovery in the early 15th century. All other mammals in the islands are therefore introduced species.\n",
"One (unproven)... |
If a mosquito bites my eye, would it be able to suck up any blood? Would it itch? | This is a great question (because there may not be a complete answer)!
.
First, an aside: When using PubMed to search for another unpleasant insect-eye interaction
> [bee sting, eye](_URL_3_)
There are quite a few results... case studies of bees stinging people's cornea (the transparent part of the globe of the eye, through which you can appreciate someone's iris and pupil) and sclera (the white of the eye)([see this drawing](_URL_11_)). So far, we haven't learned much, except (1) bees are jerks, (2) this is the sort of thing that doctors would publish ... i.e. there should be case-studies for something common like mosquito bites.
.
> mosquito bite, eye
Doesn't give anything useful. Weird.
> mosquito bite, cornea
Nada.
> mosquito bite, sclera
Zilch.
Maybe the search is a bit too narrow. Removing the word "bite" from the above searches just gives a bunch of results for eye symptoms of mosquito-born illnesses. But, maybe people report bee stings because you can identify the stinger, but a mosquito bite leaves no definitive trace... let's try
> insect bite, eye
...well, we're back to a bunch of bee/[hymenoptera](_URL_4_) stuff. Scrolling through, I see examples of [ticks latching onto the inside of the eyelid](_URL_13_)... [huh, didn't even know walkingsticks *had* venom](_URL_1_)... [fire ants](_URL_12_) biting the eye of a child with "neurological compromise".
.
OK.
This gives an interesting thought: Maybe bees are commonly reported because they're *fast*. Mosquitoes are quite slow... if one landed on your eye, you'd blink, rub your eye, etc., etc. It wouldn't get a chance to bite your eye unless something unusual is already happening (e.g. being unconscious with an open eye). Another result from "insect bite, eye" was [this one](_URL_10_) about eye injuries in motorcyclists, caused by colliding with beetles at speed.
.
So far, I've come up with no results. This is very odd, since we have results for ticks, beetles, walkingsticks, and tons of stinging insects. Now I start wondering what the mosquito would actually do if it got a chance to bite your eye. The sclera is *very* tough tissue. Not sure if a mosquito's proboscis could penetrate very deep. [Most of the blood vessels are superficial](_URL_14_), too... which leads me [here](_URL_0_):
> A vascular plexus is found between the conjunctiva and the sclera
**Part 1a of my answer: There's a nice, superficial set of blood vessels below the [conjunctiva](_URL_7_). I'm betting a mosquito could penetrate that small distance, and from there could feed on the blood.**
**Part 1b: A healthy cornea is [avascular](_URL_15_). So, if the mosquito bites you there, it couldn't withdraw blood.**
.
But, anyways, I'm thinking about conjunctiva... back to PubMed!
> [mosquito, conjunctiva](_URL_16_)
...and we get results referring to [filariasis](_URL_8_) and [dirofilariasis](_URL_2_), in particular.
Unfortunately, most of these case reports are written in a foreign language, and/or are behind a paywall. But, there's [this](_URL_9_)([google translate version](_URL_5_)):
> An 81-year-old woman living in the north of France had a history of sudden pain and swelling of the left orbit. On slit lamp examination, a white worm was seen under the superior [bulbar conjuntiva](_URL_17_). Excision of the subconjunctival worm was adequate treatment and was important for parasite identification.
**Important** this *doesn't* mean that the woman was bitten on the eye. Instead, the nematode probably migrated there.
.
I'm really surprised by this. I can plenty of examples of eye symptoms caused by insect bites elsewhere on the body. I can find examples of motorcyclists hitting their eyes into beetles. I can even find examples of eye disease caused by insects that don't bite, but just feed off of eye secretions:
[Thelaziasis](_URL_6_), which wikipedia says can be found in the eyeball itself... and unlike the filariasis example above, is apparently from direct exposure of the eye tissues to the parasite, as described here
From a 'critical comment' by Shen et al., 2006, J. Parasitol., 92(4), "Human Thelaziosis—A Neglected Parasitic Disease of the Eye"
> The transmission of eyeworms occurs when the species of flies (acting as intermediate hosts and vectors) feed on lachrymal secretions from animal and/or human and ingest Thelazia spp. first-stage larvae (L1s) produced by adult female nematodes (living together with males) in the conjunctival sac of the definitive host. After ingestion by flies, the larvae of T. callipaeda encapsulate in different parts of the vector’s body, that is, testes of the male and abdominal fat tissue of the female, and undergo development from the L1 to the infective, third-stage larvae (L3) (~14–21 days after infection). After a migration through the body cavity of the vector, the L3s of Thelazia emerge from the labella of infected flies, **after which they feed on the lachrymal secretions from infected hosts and develop into the adult stage in the conjuctival sac and prebulbar tear film within ~35 days** (Otranto, Lia, Cantacessi et al., 2005).
.
...anyways, **I am stumped by your question, (esp. the "will it itch" part) because I can't find any literature examples of someone being** *bit* **by a** *mosquito* **on the eye**. I know that the cornea's immune responses (e.g. to infection) are different than in other tissues, because (1) it's avascular, and (2) retaining transparency is a priority, so e.g. swelling would be very maladaptive. I suppose this means that a mosquito bite would be different, *somehow*, if it were on some part of the eye than elsewhere, but we don't know until it happens. The stunning lack of anything in the literature makes me think that mosquitoes are either too slow to bite the eye itself, or don't cause a reaction when a bite happens (hence, no reports). So, when you say,
> but I've always been afraid to get bitten there
I wouldn't worry about it. ...bee stings on the other hand... | [
"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... |
How does deionized water stay deionized? | Deionized water still autodisassociates just like all other water. The 'deionized' part refers to the fact that the protons and hydroxides are (nominally) the only ions in solution.
A deionizer works by passing normal water (from the tap, usually) through a series of filters and ion exchangers. All of the cations in the tap water are exchanged with protons. All of the anions are exchanged with hydroxides. The net changes yield a solution of nothing but protons, hydroxides, and water molecules. The autodissociation equilibrium will have the proton and hydroxide concentrations at 10^-7 M at 298 K. | [
"Deionized water (\"DI water\", \"DIW\" or \"de-ionized water\"), often synonymous with \"demineralized water / DM water\", is water that has had almost all of its mineral ions removed, such as cations like sodium, calcium, iron, and copper, and anions such as chloride and sulfate. Deionization is a chemical proces... |
Did any of the ancient civilizations know they were one of the first human civilizations or have any understanding of the significance of that? | In the case of ancient Egypt, the answer is yes. Their mythology and history expressly stated that they were the first civilization. They believed that the universe was created on a "mound of creation" (as it's called by Egyptologists), which rose out of the receding flood waters of the Nile. There are various versions of the creation story, but in the most exciting one [Atum or Re-Atum](_URL_2_) created the first pantheon of deities by masturbating them into existence: "Atum is the one who came into being as one who came [(with penis) extended](_URL_1_) in Heliopolis. He put his penis in his fist so that he might make orgasm with it, and the two twins were born, Shu and Tefnut."^1 This mound of creation is called Benben by Egyptologists (Egyptian 𓃀𓈖𓃀𓈖𓉴), and it was a common feature of temples for millennia of Egyptian history, demonstrating the incredible longevity of this idea.^2
Most cultures have a creation myth that puts them at the center, so that doesn't completely answer your question. In Egypt, however, they kept written records of their history, which referenced their understanding of creation. There are frequent allusions to the "original time" (𓅮𓏏𓏖) in Egyptian texts, including the Pyramid Texts, and a glimpse of what they understood this to mean is found in the [Turin Royal Canon](_URL_4_).^3 That document records the reigns of kings from the New Kingdom back to the reigns of well-known Egyptian deities, including Seth, Horus, and Thoth. The tomb of the First Dynasty king [Djer](_URL_0_) (also in the Turin Canon, II.13 in the facsimile) was later venerated as the tomb of the god Osiris.
So not only did they believe that they were the first civilization, created ex nihilo by the gods, they had places where they could go and see those gods' tombs in person. Their official history recorded the descent of their living kings from ancient deities, and they continually referred to these deities in contemporary texts. When they found old things, they knew that those things belonged to their civilization, and that they were directly descended from the people who made them.
Sources:
1. Translation from: Allen, James P. 2015. *The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts*. See the original texts [here](_URL_3_). This quote is in *PT IV (422-538)*, p. 279.
2. Obviously there is more to be said here. Representations of the mound of creation changed over time, but the central idea was always present. There's a great deal on this in: Kemp, Barry J. 2005. *Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization*.
3. The Wikipedia page is actually a great source for this. It has the original text, a transcription, and translation.
Edit: Thanks for the 𓋞! | [
"The first known civilization were the Subarian-Hurrians who were then succeeded in 3000 BCE by the Hurrians. The Elamites gained control around 2230 BCE and were followed by the Babylonians, Hittites, Assyrians, Romans and Byzantines.\n",
"The earliest prehistoric culture have roots in the mesolithic sites as ev... |
how can we show child sexuality in movies, books, and other media formats, but not in pornography? | > In movies, like The Virgin Suicides and White Oleander, we're allowed to hear about children having sex. We even see a fourteen-year-old girl (in TVS), played by a minor, "grab" a boy.
And none of that is pornography. It's not sexually exploiting children.
> Books can get even more explicit.
Because they're fictional, and don't involve any actual children.
> Yet child pornography is illegal
Because child pornography often involves **actual sexual abuse of actual children.**
It's the same reason that you can have a movie or book about a murderer, but you can't murder people in real life. | [
"Child pornography under federal law is defined as any visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct involving a minor (someone under 18 years of age). Visual depictions include photographs, videos, digital or computer generated images indistinguishable from an actual minor, and images created, adapted, or modified... |
Has a wholly or mainly guerrilla opposition ever driven out a large conventional force, without the aid of another country? | There might be a few anti-colonial conflicts worth looking at here. The FNLA in Algeria didn't (AFAIK) receive any substantive aid from other countries, nor did the major revolutionary movements in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe.
I'm pretty sure FRELIMO in Mozambique drove out the Portuguese without assistance, whilst the MPLA in Angola only received limited support from Cuba.
Finally, a case might be made for the RPF in Rwanda, although I don't think they could easily be categorised as guerillas in the way the other groups could, as they were largely composed of deserting Rwandan units from the Ugandan army.
Of course, guerilla tactics are ideal for combating colonialism precisely because they stall - by making colonialism economically untenable, they could make granting independence a more attractive choice than staying in control. | [
"There are many unsuccessful examples of guerrilla warfare against local or native regimes. These include Portuguese Africa (Angola, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau), Malaysia (then Malaya) during the Malayan Emergency, Bolivia, Argentina, and the Philippines. It was even able to use these tactics effectively against ... |
is sleeping in a fetal position (curled-up back) as bad for your posture as slouching for 8 hrs a day? | I would assume that it is *not as bad* simply because you don't have the same downward pressure on the arch when you are lying down as when you are slouching in a seated position. That said, it probably isn't great for your posture to sleep in a fetal position (I do the same thing, and slouch, and have horrible posture myself). | [
"A study by Professor Chris Idzikowski, director of the Sleep Assessment and Advisory Service found that people who consistently sleep in the fetal position tend to have a shy and sensitive personality.\n",
"BULLET::::- Encouraging prone playtime (tummy time). Although the Back to Sleep campaign promotes infants ... |
Good Holocaust books dealing with holocaust denial? | Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman's *Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It?* is a survey of deniers.
Good luck engaging Deniers though, it's equivalent to yelling at a brick wall. Denialism thrives off of ahistorical arguments and although many deniers style themselves as historians or skeptics, they are not playing by the evidentiary rules of either. | [
"Holocaust denial is also considered an antisemitic conspiracy theory because of its position that the Holocaust is a hoax designed to advance the interests of Jews and justify the creation of the State of Israel. Notable Holocaust deniers include former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, the convicted chemist ... |
why are people hiding ebola victims? | A person you've never met before, dressed in a spacesuit, walks into your home and tells you that your sick child must go with them. You have to walk miles to the hospital where they've taken her. They tell you she died. They won't let you see her. They won't let you have a funeral. They bury her in a plastic bag.
And if you do go to a hospital this is what you find:
> **There was blood on the walls, starving patients and hygienists using water that was “brown like mud.” Health workers moved from high-risk to low-risk areas without changing clothes;** “you never knew who was next to you,” Chenard says. “It could be a patient, suspected or confirmed … it could be hospital personnel.”
The President of Doctors Without Borders, Joanne Liu, said:
> **“Ebola treatment centres are reduced to places where people go to die alone, ..."**
It's a desperate situation and I guess they would rather die at home.
| [
"African conservation refugees, some sources numbering them somewhere around 14 million, have long been displaced due to transnational efforts to preserve select areas of biota that are believed to be critical from a historical and environmental perspective. What purpose do protected areas serve and why are they es... |
what are the main differences between hydraulics and pneumatics? | Air can move far more quickly than hydraulics. If you want something to move fast, air is the answer.
Air is also compressible, if you want shock absorption (like air ride suspension in cars and trucks), again, air is the answer.
Hydraulics use an oil instead of air, but the way they work is almost identical. Hydraulic fluid moves slower, but can be compressed to far higher pressures. When you need to move big and heavy loads, and don't have to do it fast, hydraulic is the answer. This is why you see it on all those big machines (dump trucks, bull dozers, front loaders).
Since fluid doesn't compress, there is no shock absorption, but that also means there is no "bounce". When something needs to be held steady (like an electric company bucket, or a fork lift balancing a load), again, hydraulic is the answer.
Thanks to these two properties, hydraulic is also more precise than pnumatic. When high accuracy is needed, you're probably going to see hydraulic. Believe it or not, even with a huge excavator, a good operator can pick up a coin or fold a napkin thanks to the incredibly accuracy a hydraulic system can provide. | [
"Both pneumatics and hydraulics are applications of fluid power. Pneumatics uses an easily compressible gas such as air or a suitable pure gas—while hydraulics uses relatively incompressible liquid media such as oil. Most industrial pneumatic applications use pressures of about . Hydraulics applications commonly us... |
why are non-real ids still available in the us? | State governments just refusing to implement the new documentation requirements in a timely manner. Plus the process also involves some individuals having to physically visit an office to present documents before their current IDs expire. | [
"On December 17, 2018, H.R. 3398 amended the Real ID Act of 2005 to clarify that a citizen of the Freely Associated States (FAS) when admitted in the US on a non-immigrant basis is eligible for a driver's license or ID card. This was in order to resolve an outdated term in the original REAL ID Act. The Freely Assoc... |
What was the average number of children a Christian family had around 0 - 100 A.D.? | This is an interesting, but extremely difficult question to answer. The reason for this is that the question transcends more than just a religious group. We have evidence that by 50 to 60 AD, Christianity had spread (although it was incredibly small at this time) to cities all over the Levant, ancient Greece and all the way to Rome itself. We also know, by the quality of the writing, especially in the seven letters of Paul that we know are authentic, and by the style of the Gospels, that the writers were all fairly well-educated. This is significant because it shows that By the time Paul started writing his letters (around 50-55 c.e.) until the time the Gospels started being written (70-90 ce) Christianity had gone from being a small Jewish sect of peasants to having a diverse demographical make up. (For more on this I recommend reading, Ramsay MacMullen's (a Roman Social Historian) book [Christianizing the Roman Empire: A.D. 100-400](_URL_0_) which explains this in quite a bit more detail.
That said, numbers mean a lot and Christianity needed to spread an awful lot and quickly to go from between 20-30 people (which I recently discovered is the mainstream belief for Early Christianity Historians) at around the time of Jesus' death (around 30 ce, plus/minus 5 years) to being 5% of the population by the early fourth century, which would have been 3 million people. Rodney Stark's book [The Rise of Christianity](_URL_1_) although incredibly controversial and disputed by many scholars, did make one assertion that many scholars either agreed with or didn't oppose. That is, that he believed that, on average, Christianity needed to gain about 40% more followers per decade until the year 300.
So why do I mention all these numbers? Well, because it shows that A: Christianity started out incredibly small and remained small for quite some time. But B) it did get more progressively popular over the course of the first three centuries CE and that it wasn't limited to just the area around the Levant so again, we aren't just dealing with a specific group of people -- we are talking about different cultures from all over the Mediterranean, most of which had different practices for bearing children.
However, it's safe to say a few things demographics wise. On average, typical Jewish peasant who lived an agrarian type of life-style could typically have up to 4-8 children, of course not all would live to be adults. Those who lived in cities or were more wealthy probably had fewer children, but again, we have no exact numbers on this. I am not qualified to answer how many children people in Ancient Greece or Rome would have had, so I digress from answering that aspect of the question.
TLDR: Ancient Hebrew peasant families typically had 4-8 children, yet Christianity had spread to multiple cities and states over those first few decades, so individual studies would be needed to answer the question in more detail.
Sorry if this wasn't the exact answer you were hoping for. | [
"Various statistics of population were published during the year. Among other significant features, it was stated that the number of children under five years of age, in the whole of the territories of the former Hohenzollern empire, had sunk from 8,000,000 in 1911 to 5,000,000 in 1919.\n",
"By 2050, the Christia... |
Is it possible to create a sonic boom by waving a stick really fast? | Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if this was totally possible. In fact, this is basically the mechanism for making a whip crack - it's just a sonic boom - [these guys have a good high speed video and discuss the exact physics at play in a whip](_URL_0_). | [
"A sonic boom does not occur only at the moment an object crosses the speed of sound; and neither is it heard in all directions emanating from the speeding object. Rather the boom is a continuous effect that occurs while the object is travelling at supersonic speeds. But it affects only observers that are positione... |
Did the early-modern developers of the physical/chemical atomic theory explicitly credit ancient philosophical Atomism? | By the late-18th/early-19th century the idea of Atomism had been hashed over for literally centuries. They weren't going back to the Ancients at that point. Dalton's own discussions of Atomism were rooted more in the work of Newton (who made various corpuscular assumptions in his work) than they were in Democritus or Epicurus.
If you go back to the earlier discussions, e.g. Robert Boyle, you get a much more complicated picture. Boyle's Atomism was certainly done with knowledge of the Ancient philosophers on the subject, but his more immediate inspiration were discussions within alchemical theory about the nature of matter (which are more Aristotelian than Democritus/Epicurus; e.g. "what is matter made of that allows it to be X sometimes and Y another?").
The sort of place where I've seen explicit invocations of Democritus and Epicurus has been in discussions about the vacuum and Plenism (Atomism's antagonist philosophy, which argues for a continuum of matter, and lack of vacuum). The line between the philosophical and the empirical in this discussion, in the 17th century anyway (again, over a century before Dalton), is completely fuzzy. Hence one of the biggest arguments was between Boyle (a "chemist" in a modern framing) and Thomas Hobbes (a "philosopher"), who both saw themselves as doing semi-empirical, semi-philosophical work. Hobbes deployed Democritus and Epicurus to argue _against_ Boyle's conception of the vacuum, and thus against Boyle's interpretation of his late 17th-century air-pump experiments. Which is just to say: everyone in that time would have recognized that these figures were involved in putting out philosophies of Atomism, but even by the 17th century it wasn't required to go back to them to get the ideas, there were plenty of other sources.
Dalton's accomplishment was not in re-inventing or even re-invoking Atomism. It was in trying to give it a strong physical basis and tie that into its possible chemical implications. It is very much the project of someone who has already stopped caring about what the Ancients said about such a matter, which itself is a very late-Enlightenment, post-chemical revolution sort of move. An earlier figure, like Boyle, cared a bit about the Ancients — not so much because he thought everything they said was accurate, but because they formed sort of a bedrock of understanding that he could push back against or build off of. And because he did think that ultimately what he was doing was a form of philosophy, even if he made an argument that new machines (like the air-pump) could serve as a run-around to philosophical quandaries. And the influence of alchemical theorizing on Boyle cannot be overstated — it was core to his understanding of what might have been going on in _all_ of his experimental work.
This is a big topic and I don't claim to know every in and out of it (I am not an early modernist in the slightest, though I dip a toe into these readings sometimes for teaching purposes, and find the Boyle stuff pretty interesting for its strangeness). On Boyle v. Hobbes, Shapin and Schaffer's _Leviathan and the Air-Pump_ (1985) is the classic text. On Dalton's Atomism, I found this article very useful a little while back: Alan J. Rocke, "In Search of El Dorado: John Dalton and the Origins of the Atomic Theory," _Social Research_ 72, no. 1 (Spring 2005), 125-158. Rocke does a great job of situating Dalton's Newtonism and what exactly he was trying to accomplish. On Boyle's (and others') alchemical atomism (and various other Atomisms at the time), see esp. William R. Newman, "The Significance of 'Chymical Atomism,'" _Early Science and Medicine_ 14, no. 1/3 (2009), 248-264. Newman is one of the great scholars of Boyle and alchemy. It is a difficult world to translate into modern physical/chemical terms on the whole — that is just not how they saw it working, and you sort of have to dive in on their own terms. | [
"A basic chemical hypothesis first emerged in Classical Greece with the theory of four elements as propounded definitively by Aristotle stating that fire, air, earth and water were the fundamental elements from which everything is formed as a combination. Greek atomism dates back to 440 BC, arising in works by phil... |
Why didn't slaves in ancient times just run away? and how were they distinguished from free men? | First off, many slaves in the ancient world *did* run away and the possibility was always there. There were also numerous large-scale slave revolts, most famously the one led by Spartacus that had to be put down by a Roman army. To prevent mass escapes, Roman slave owners used either the carrot or the stick. Branding, shackling, abuse, and torture were used to keep many slaves in check, while others in more favored positions were given a stipend (Lat. *peculium*) and much more independence. The most-favored slaves were those belonging to the emperor, who, along with his freedmen, had a hand in administering the empire.
Harper, Slavery in the Late Roman World, AD 275-425 is excellent recent study on the subject. [Here](_URL_2_) he discusses different types of incentives offered to slaves.
To give just one example of a fugitive slave from a documentary source, [P.Cair.Preis. 1](_URL_1_) (148 CE) ([image](_URL_0_)) is a report of judicial proceedings from the province of Egypt concerning an enslaved woman named Eutychia, who was purchased for 1,160 drachmas (a hefty sum, enough to employ some 40 men for a month). According to the report, "after she stayed with him (the new owner) for a short time, she ran away taking with her the sale contracts and much of his belongings." | [
"In Ancient Egypt, slaves were mainly obtained through prisoners of war. Other ways people could become slaves was by inheriting the status from their parents. One could also become a slave on account of his inability to pay his debts. Slavery was the direct result of poverty. People also sold themselves into slave... |
how did obamacre kill jobs, if it really did? | I believe that arguments comes from one of the articles of the bill that requires employers that have a staff of certain size must provide insurance for their employees. If an employer might have trouble affording this cost, they might have to lay off workers or cut back hours in order to compensate.
Of course, the counter-argument to this is that one of the main goals of Obamacare is to push down rising health care costs, so that offering it to your employees won't hit the bottom line so hard. As well there are tax breaks and incentives to help ease the costs. Other arguments for it include the cost savings of having a work force that is healthy. With health insurance, small health problems can be taken care of before they become large health problems. A person who comes down with influenza without health care may have to just tough it out, costing them weeks of missed work shifts or the chance of infecting their coworkers. With health insurance, he'd be more likely to see a doctor and get treatment, turning a long sick leave into a relatively shorter one. | [
"A Zogby International August 2004 poll found that 71% of American voters believed \"outsourcing jobs overseas\" hurt the economy while another 62% believed that the U.S. government should impose some legislative action against these companies, possibly in the form of increased taxes. President Obama promoted the '... |
How will Climate Change affect the the level of the Caspian Sea? | The Caspian Sea is in it's own drainage basin (also known as a [endorheic basin](_URL_1_)) so it is isolated from the rest of the worlds' oceans. As global sea levels rise, they won't directly effect the Caspian since it is not connected. The water levels in the Caspian vary based on the balance of rainfall and evaporation over the basin. So it's fate depends on how climate change alters the precipitation patterns in the region and predictions of how climate change will alter precipitation are still not all that well known - there are so many factors in the freshwater budget. There are other important human impacts, specifically dams on the Volga River (a major tributary) and diversion of water for agriculture. The nearby Aral Sea has mostly disappeared due to water diversion projects.
More information at [This article in Natural History Magazine](_URL_0_). | [
"Climate change is likely to have an effect on the country's biodiversity, with the treeline moving further north and to higher altitudes, and forests replacing tundra. The melting of ice will increase runoff, affecting wetlands. With a rise in sea level, the Baltic Sea will receive greater inflow of saline water.\... |
how does type i diabetes develop so quickly in a seemingly healthy person, and how does this differ to the development of type ii? | Type 1A diabetes is an autoimmune disorder. It occurs when you have a genetic predisposition for the condition and then something triggers the onset (most likely suspect is a virus). So you can have the genetic predisposition but never be exposed to the triggering event, and therefore never develop the condition.
Generally speaking, the average age of onset is 8, but you can be diagnosed with T1 diabetes at any age. If your father has T1, you have a 1 in 17 chance of developing T1 yourself. If a sibling has it, you have a 1 in 10 chance of developing it. Interestingly, it does not always occur concurrently in identical twins, which indicates that it’s partially an environmental issue.
As for the onset, it’s not believed to be as rapid as people think. TrialNet is a longitudinal study looking at people who have an immediate family member with T1 and are therefore at risk of developing the disease themselves. One thing that has been found through this study is that people who eventually go on to develop T1 diabetes have signs of it starting for upwards of several years (increases in their A1C, poor response to glucose tolerance testing, fluctuations in insulin production). Symptoms will only appear when blood sugar reach very high levels.
The term “diabetes mellitus” actually encompasses a number of distinct medical conditions, each with their own etiology. T2 diabetes is a completely different condition, one that has nothing to do with T1 other than increases in blood glucose levels. While T1 diabetes results in a complete inability to produce insulin (and the condition is imminently fatal if the missing insulin is not replaced), T2 diabetes is a metabolic disorder wherein people make insulin but are resistant to it (so their blood sugar rises). While there are lifestyle factors that increase one’s risk of developing T2 diabetes (being overweight, poor diet, lack of exercise), it also has a significant genetic component. This is why there are many T2s who are not overweight and why there are plenty of overweight people who never develop T2. | [
"Type 1 diabetes can occur at any age, and a significant proportion is diagnosed during adulthood. Latent autoimmune diabetes of adults (LADA) is the diagnostic term applied when type 1 diabetes develops in adults; it has a slower onset than the same condition in children. Given this difference, some use the unoffi... |
What did Germany hope to achieve strategically with the invasion of Russia in WWII and how was this war sold to the public? | Initially, one of the main reasons for the German invasion of Russia was food. The Nazi regime wanted to Germany to be able to support itself agriculturally, without having to rely on imports from the Soviet Union. The German administration had perceived the vast plains of Ukraine and southern Russia as the perfect solution to Germany's food issues. The ground was fertile and full of minerals, so crops could be brought back in surplus to the German people (obviously with the sacrifice of the rest of the Russian people, who would be seen as a deficit.) In fact, Hitler envisioned the invading German forces as being able to supply their own food from the lands they captured, meaning less supplies were needed to be sent to the eastern front. Of course Operation Barbarossa was a failure, and the crop yields of the captured lands supplied one third of the food that Germany needed, let alone hoped for.
From what I know, the German government sold the idea of an invasion of the Soviet Union through the notion of a 'self-sufficient Germany.' Hitler stated that there would be no food shortages like in the first world war, and some day in the future, people could travel to the new German frontiers in their 'people's cars' (Volkswagons) and spend holidays in the new lands.
Source: The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan. | [
"The plans were never fulfilled as the German military's plans to capture Moscow and central Russia in the Operation Typhoon failed. The transfer of conquered territories to Nazi civilian rule was therefore never completed.\n",
"exploitation of conquered countries for the material benefit of Germany. Partial real... |
what are neural networks? specifically rnns. | The little league team you coach just won the big game, and you ask them if they want to go out for pizza or for burgers. Each kid starts screaming their preference, and you go with whatever was the loudest.
This is basically how a neural net works but on multiple levels. The top-level nodes get some input, each detects a certain property and screams when it sees it...the more intense the property, the louder they scream.
Now you have a bunch of nodes screaming "it's dark!", "it's has red!", "it's roundish!" as various volumes. The next level listens and based on what they hear they start screaming about more complex features. "It has a face!", "It has fur", until finally get to a level where it is screaming "It's a kitty!".
The magic part is no one tells them when to scream, it is based on feedback. Your little league team went for burgers, and some of them got sick. Next week, they might not scream for burgers, or might not scream as loudly. They have collectively learned that burgers might not have been a great choice, and are more likely to lean away from the option.
A neural net gets training in much the same way. You feed it a bunch of kitty and non-kitty pictures. If the net gets it right, the nodes are reinforced so they are more likely to do the same thing in similar situations. If it is wrong, they get disincentivized. Initially, its results will be near random, but if you have designed it correctly, it will get better and better as the nodes adjust. You often have neural nets that work without any human understanding exactly how.
| [
"A recurrent neural network (RNN) is a class of artificial neural networks where connections between nodes form a directed graph along a temporal sequence. This allows it to exhibit temporal dynamic behavior. Unlike feedforward neural networks, RNNs can use their internal state (memory) to process sequences of inpu... |
Why has Linear B been deciphered but not Linear A? | You must understand both the writing system and the language(s) in order to claim a decipherment. Most successful decipherments are based on bilingual or trilingual inscriptions (e.g. cuneiform, Egyptian hieroglyphs, and the Cypriot Syllabary) or knowledge of the underlying language(s) (e.g. Linear B and Maya hieroglyphs). In cases where one has neither, such as Linear A, Cypro-Minoan, and the Indus script, decipherment may prove impossible.
Linear B has been deciphered successfully because the language was identified (Mycenaean Greek), and scholars were able to understand words based on their knowledge of Greek. For example, a-ku-ro corresponds to Greek ἄργυρος ("silver") and pa-te is instantly recognizable as Greek πατήρ ("father").
The language of Linear A, however, has not yet been identified, and the grammar and lexicon therefore remains elusive. It's as if someone who speaks French picked up a book written in Hungarian. Since Hungarian uses a modified version of the Latin alphabet, the French speaker would understand the letters of each word and perhaps even be able to read them out loud more or less accurately. The meaning of the text, however, would be incomprehensible without learning Hungarian. | [
"In the 1950s, Linear B was largely deciphered by Michael Ventris and found to encode an early form of Greek. Although the two systems share many symbols, this did not lead to a subsequent decipherment of Linear A. Using the values associated with Linear B in Linear A mainly produces unintelligible words. If Linear... |
In medieval Europe, how common would it have been for non-nobility to own weapons or have access to them? | 'Middle Ages' are generally understood as a period of almost 1000 years, so the subject is quite complex. In the following entry I'll limit myself to High and Late Middle Ages, focusing on Germany, Poland and England.
In general, weapon ownership was quite common. There were no rules preventing anyone from possessing any kind of weapon or armour and anyone could have commissioned any type of weapon at the local craftsman, provided the latter was able to make it (your average rural blacksmiths were usually able to make a spear tip, but not a high-quality sword) and the customer could have afforded the commission, what was not always a given, as peasants had relatively little money to spend, especially in earlier part of the Middle Ages when the weapons and armour were relatively more expensive than in 14th or 15th century. In short, every free man had an access to weapons, although some could not have afforded most of them. With the low social mobility and relatively small size of the settlements, people living in a city district or a village were usually forming a well-knit community, where people knew and often helped each other, as the well-being of community was directly tied to their self-interest.
In many cases such possession was actually required by law, though. For example, English Assizes of Arms require each free tenant to have a specified weapons and pieces of armour, depending on their wealth. The Assize of Arms of 1181 issued in the name of Henry II stipulates that '*every burgher and every freeman shall have a gambeson, an iron hat and a spear*' what was a bare minimum for all free people (although 'burgher or freeman' usually meant the head of the family), while 'those who have possessions or rents worth at least 16 marks shall have an armour, a helmet, a shield, and a lance'. Clergymen were generally exempt from all such considerations. Assize of Arms of 1242 issued in the name of Henry III stated that '*the citzens, burghers, free tenants, villeins and others aged 15 to 60 should convene and their be assessed what they should bear in accordance to their land and property, to wit: whoever possesses land worth 15 pounds - one armour, iron hat, sword, knife and horse* \[...\] *(who possesses) less than 10 marks but more than 40 shillings - falxes, knives, guisarmes and other small arms*' (this section contains ten different wealth classes, I included only first and last for brevity's sake). Given that 40 shillings was a relatively small amount of money when applied to personal wealth, it meant that even relatively poor people were expected to have some form of military weapon, with the wording giving assumption that it was supposed to mean 'any weapon one can afford', including common tools, such as axes or hammers. Enea Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II, who had served as a pastor in several German states noted in 1444 that every 'respectable household', no matter whether rich or poor, was armed adequately to the means available and that Germans show high skill in using said weapons.
In medieval cities, the defense forces were primarily composed of the militia, and thus the edicts of the city councils often required the burghers to possess weapons. This was usually limited to people possessing a real estate withing the city walls, but the required equipment could have been quite costly (although not excessively so). For example, according to the edict issued by the city council of Wroclaw in 1290, every owner of a real estate within a city should possess 'bow or crossbow) while a Prussian land regulation of 1410 required all Prussian burghers to possess equipment composed at least of mail shirt, breastplate, kettle hat, plate gauntlets and a crossbow. Those who were found to not possess the required equipment were subject to a fine (although one could not borrow their weapons and armour under penalty of confiscation and additional fine). Control was usually conducted by the city councilmen and high-ranking craft representatives (owners of the real estate in a city were largely craftsmen or merchants united in craft organizations). An interesting thing is that some Polish cities required citizens to actively train in the art of shooting (e.g. prince Bolko of Świdnica issued such law in 1286) with shooting contests being a common occurrence, much like in contemporary England renowned for its archers. In 14th and 15th century, winners of such competitions often were either provided with new weapons and armours or were given a monetary equivalent if the already possessed them.
Now, people were able to possess weapons, but in cities they were generally not allowed to carry. Specific regulations varied from place to place, but in German cities in 14th and 15th century councils usually forbade carrying of all 'swords and long knives'\* either at all or only after dusk, usually under penalty of weapon confiscation on top of a relatively small monetary fine or a jail time of several days. Carrying any form of weapon (even a dagger or a knife) into a church or to any formal meeting (e.g. that of craftsmen in a guildhouse) was often strictly prohibited.
\*A city council edict issued in 1394 in Koenigsberg stated that no burgher is allowed to carry a knife longer than one ell within the city walls (we also need to remember that German word 'messer' could have meant either a common, table knife, or a large weapon, essentially a short sword). | [
"In later centuries, a nobleman of the sword was not recognized as such unless his family had held this status for at least four generations. The Nobles of the Sword also provided non-military services to the king, holding positions in all branches of government. \n",
"Swords were very costly to make, and a sign ... |
how do people spend billions of dollars on water? | That is incredibly cheap, $4 for a whole year of clean water. How could it be cheaper?
The costs are mainly for digging wells and installing pumps -- and then filters if the water isn't clean.
If you don't mind your water dirty and 50 feet underground, can have it for free. | [
"It has been estimated that between 1975 and 2000 a total of more than US$100bn has been invested in water supply and sanitation, and that a further US$130bn will be needed between 2002 and 2022, corresponding to US$6.5 billion per year or more than US$200 per capita and year. This level of investment in water per ... |
why do people who are going to be executed not put up a fight when they know they are going to die either way? | By the same logic, why would you fight? It's not going to change the outcome. Might as well make your own death quick and painless instead of making it a struggle by fighting. | [
"Despite the fact that the weapons are deadly, fights are rarely fatal. Combat ceases when one man is obviously defeated, either because he cannot defend himself or because he has left the circle, voluntarily or otherwise.\n",
"To fight on because there was no other choice, even if winning was not possible, then ... |
Did dinosaurs actually roar or is it just a construct of movies to make them scarier? | You're on the right track in looking at living species to infer what extinct dinosaurs may have sounded like. We can explore traits that wouldn't preserve in the fossil record using [phylogenetic bracketing](_URL_12_). However, you're off on which species to look at.
Basically, we look at related animals on [either side of the tree](_URL_0_) from the organism we're interested in, and if those animals possess a trait then it was probably present in the common ancestor of all those animals, so the organism we're interested in most likely does as well. This works pretty well for extinct dinosaurs, because [birds are living theropod dinosaurs](_URL_7_) and crocs are [archosaurs](_URL_3_) that fall outside of Dinosauria. Traits that both crocs and birds possess are likely ancestral to all archosaurs and therefore would be present in dinosaurs unless they were secondarily lost.
Crocodylians are surprisingly [vocal](_URL_6_) - and social, in fact. Just like we've made assumptions about dinosaurs, we've made assumptions about crocs. They are more like birds than we give them credit for. But I digress! Crocs do roar and [bellow](_URL_11_) using their larynx. They also hiss, and their bellows actually have a subaudible component to them. The wavelength of these subaudible sounds corresponds to the distance between the keels on their scutes, creating the "water dance" they use in their mating ritual (and the dancing water is made up of [Faraday waves](_URL_1_)).
Most of birds' unique vocal abilities are due to a [syrinx](_URL_10_), which is an organ that sits at the base of the trachea. It's not the same thing as a larynx; it's a different organ. Birds do have a larynx, but the degree to which they can vocalize with it is limited (and poorly understood). Not all birds have a syrinx. No New World vultures (like turkey vultures) do, so they're limited to grunts and hisses.
The syrinx of songbirds is extremely complex, allowing for the wide variety of sounds. Birds make [a ton of vocalizations](_URL_2_), from hisses to warbles to squawks. Some [can haz cheeseburger](_URL_4_).
We know that not all dinosaurs had a syrinx; it evolved at some point in theropods. It's present in all bird groups, so it was likely present in their common ancestor. It seems to rely on the [presence of an airsac in the clavicle or collarbone](_URL_5_) (sorry, paywall), which is part of a system of air sacs connected to the lungs of many reptiles. As far as we can tell that clavicular airsac first arises in [enantiornithines](_URL_8_), which are dinosaurs that are so birdlike that they're generally just called birds.
Earlier non-avian dinosaurs probably vocalized more like crocs than birds, but of course their morphology was quite different. Some animals like *Parasaurolophus* had weird hollow chambers that might have [been used for vocalizations](_URL_9_). Given the amount of diversity we see in the sounds modern archosaurs can make, and the variation we have in extinct dinosaurs, there was probably a great variety in vocalizations. However, we have no way to test for that in most fossil species.
| [
"In 2016 she speculated that based on her research she felt it was unlikely that dinosaurs roared. She proposed that it was much more likely that they made noises that were similar to those made by a modern pigeon.\n",
"The dinosaurs' behavior was based on behavior that was featured in the film. Dinosaurs that we... |
why is it socially acceptable to make as much noise as possible while riding a motorcycle? | It's not generally acceptable, if a bike is loud it's because the owner made it that way.
Some m/c groups like to think its a safety device, but in reality it's because they think it sounds cool. | [
"Because the fairing is attached to the vehicle via the front axle, it is prone to clunky vibrations at low speeds and on turbulent surfaces. The nature and position of the motor produce a constant, loud mechanical sound much like a motorcycle. The weight limit for the vehicle, including the driver and all carried ... |
how does renting a property with option to buy work? does your rent go towards the down payment? | Usually these are case by case basis, whatever the renter/buyer and the landlord/seller agree to, there must be some legal contract with the terms spelled out and everybody signs or somebody is going to get screwed and it will probably be the renter. Normally it is the case though. | [
"Renting, also known as hiring or letting, is an agreement where a payment is made for the temporary use of a good, service or property owned by another. A gross lease is when the tenant pays a flat rental amount and the landlord pays for all property charges regularly incurred by the ownership. An example of renti... |
why do some speakers have "mini" speakers around the large ones? | Loudspeakers (the whole box) often have several *drivers* in them...which are those parts that vibrate and make sound. The larger ones are called *woofers* and are used for low-range sounds, while the small ("mini') are called *tweeters* and are used to make the higher frequency sounds. Inside the loudspeaker there is an electrical circuit called a *cross over* that takes the input signal and "splits" it into high and low frequencies. | [
"While a large loudspeaker is naturally more directional because of its large size, a source with equivalent directivity can be made by utilizing an array of traditional small loudspeakers, all driven together in-phase. Acoustically equal to a large speaker, this creates a larger source size compared to wavelength,... |
how do electronics spin in full circles without getting their wires tangled? (example in text) | The rotating portion receives electricity through a device like a "rotary electrical connector" or a "brush slip ring". They allow current to pass through two concentric rings, one inside the other, separated by an insulator, and depending on how fast it's intended to rotate, possibly sealed and lubricated.
| [
"Twist-on wire connectors are available in a variety of sizes and shapes. While their exterior covering is typically made from insulating plastic, their means of connection is a tapered coiled metal insert, which threads onto the wires and holds them securely. When such a connector is twisted onto the stripped and ... |
whats going on with the racial motivated rape gangs going on in europe? | Im guessing you mean Rotherham (UK), not Rotterdam. At least that's what it says in the article you linked. The stories are still floating about, but the main bulk of the interest from the public is more relating to how the police and child protective services made systematic failures, many resulting from not wanting to come off as racist. | [
"The number of assault gang rapes were significantly higher in periods prior to 2015 and the European migrant crisis, with the exception of 2016 where the New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany nearly doubled the number of cases. In 2017 there were 122 cases, the fewest since the German reunification in 1990. Th... |
how to move out of my parents house (aka. downpayments, interest rates, credit) | Unless you are in no hurry and already have a lucrative job you expect to keep for many years, I would not try to buy a place just to leave your parents house.
Save up a few months worth of income and then rent something. If you rent small, close to work/school, avoid car ownership, and always - every month - spend less than you earn, you'll be fine. One day when you have that lucrative job you can look at buying if it makes sense.
Don't get sucked into the myth that renting = poverty and buying = easy street.
Good luck
| [
"How to Live with Your Parents (For the Rest of Your Life) is an American single-camera sitcom created by Claudia Lonow that aired on ABC from April 3 to June 26, 2013. The series was produced by 20th Century Fox Television and stars Sarah Chalke as Polly who—along with her daughter—ends up moving into her parents'... |
Given that many insects are attracted to light sources at night, do spiders take advantage of this? | There are a few species of bat which have learned that a lot of insects can be found near light sources at night. The few species in Europe that have learned this behaviour are quite light-tolerant though, other bat species actively avoid light. So it might be possible that some spiders are more likely to build webs near lights. See _URL_0_
I don't know if there's been research on spiders for this though. | [
"The attraction of insects to artificial light is one of the most well known examples of the effect of light at night on organisms. When insects are attracted to lamps they can be killed by exhaustion or contact with the lamp itself, and they are also vulnerable to predators like bats.\n",
"The reason insects and... |
Why are there so many companies getting hacked? | Major companies operate networks that are absolutely massive. It's simply not possible for them to operate them in a way that is impervious to attack. Anyone who tells you they can operate such a network is lying. With computer systems it isn't a matter of *if* they will be hacked but of *when*.
Moreover operating a server is a very dangerous thing to do if you aren't careful. Case in point, I run my own internet-facing server that I use for various tasks. Since midnight (~11 hours ago) it has seen:
* 70 attempts to log in over SSH (basically log in as administrator)
* 15 attempts to exploit [Shellshock](_URL_0_) against some website hosting software
* ~30 attempts to log in to the administrative panel of said website hosting using what look like gibberish as the name and password
That's just my no-name server hosting nothing of particular importance. All of these things are automated attacks that are fire-and-forget and the scale they occur at is astounding.
Worse yet, you wouldn't actually know if they succeed. The attack would insert some malicious payload that enables the attacker to come back later and steal your data or use your server to launch further attacks. The only defense is pro-actively monitoring for suspicious activity and staying up to date with security patches.
****
Back to big companies. People attack them because that's where the money is. Target and Home Depot got hit with the same malware that infected the POS terminals used to process credit/debit transactions and whoever was responsible walked away with something insane like information on over 40 *million* credit cards. Worse is that the companies were using extremely out of date security software that was effectively useless. The attacks were certainly impressive in scope but the security they were up against wasn't exactly state-of-the-art or robust.
With Sony it's very much a developing situation and we don't know how or why it happened. The reported size of data stolen is enormous (~100TB) and it's been reported that leaked portions show extremely bad security practices like keeping usernames and passwords in a text file in a folder named "Passwords".
tl;dr: Everyone gets hacked. *Everyone*. What makes the difference is how quickly they identify and respond to those events.
e: For more gory details written in a mostly-layman accessible manner about the Target attack, [this article](_URL_1_) is a solid read. It breaks down the attack into a play-by-play look at how it probably happened. | [
"The group has hacked many websites and applications using a series of different attacks. The most notable, however, being SQL injection. There have been a lot of companies affected by the group, but some of the hacks even for big companies did not make the media (probably due to keeping the multi-country legal inv... |
why when you get sunburned you get sleepy/tired? | Sunburns usually come with dehydration as well. Mix dehydration and your body trying to repair a sizable chunk of skin, its quite draining. | [
"Due to symptoms of low mood and energy, individuals with depression may be likely to have behaviors that are counter to good sleep hygiene, such as taking naps during the day, consuming alcohol near bedtime, and consuming large amounts of caffeine during the day. In addition to sleep hygiene education, bright ligh... |
english bill of rights | The Bill of Rights is to do with establishing England (and later Great Britain and then the UK) as a constitutional monarchy, and formally sets out the relationship between monarch and parliament:
It states that Parliament is the ultimate decision-making and law-making body in the land. Parliament makes rules in the name of the monarch, but the monarch can not and must not interfere in Parliament's work or decisions, and specifically mentions that:
* Parliament is the only body that can impose taxes on the population. In particular the monarch cannot set up his or her own private income stream based upon taxation.
* The monarch cannot declare war without Parliament's say-so
* MPs and Lords cannot be sued for libel or slander for things they say in Parliament -- it is the only place in the UK to have absolute freedom of speech
The Bill of Rights also introduced for the first time a written requirement that the monarch must not be a Roman Catholic, nor married to one -- a ruling that has only very recently been rescinded.
There is a lot more in the actual text of the document, but the above points are the most important ones with regard to modern-day Britain. | [
"The Bill of Rights, also known as the English Bill of Rights, is an Act of the Parliament of England that sets out certain basic civil rights and clarifies who would be next to inherit the Crown. It received the Royal Assent on 16 December 1689 and is a restatement in statutory form of the Declaration of Right pre... |
Great ape crossbreeding... possible? | A lot more goes into interbreeding than simply chromosome number; species with different chromosome counts can interbreed, though often the offspring are not viable or, when they are, tend to be sterile.
In the case of orangutan and chimpanzee or gorilla, you must keep in mind that these are species which have been separated by literally hundreds of thousands of years of evolution. While each of these three species does have 48 chromosomes, the location of various alleles differs greatly between them. The enzyme activity also differs enough that any resulting embryo from a forced fertilization would likely not be viable.
And then there's the issue of fertilization itself. Sperm are able to penetrate the membrane surrounding an egg because the enzymatic activity is recognized and an influx of Calcium ions is released, allowing the sperm to more actively penetrate the egg. Because the enzymes are different between species, there would not be such an influx of Calcium ions, making penetration difficult. The chances that a gorilla's sperm could fertilize an orangutan egg are remote.
And, of course, this could only happen in a lab. Gorillas, chimpanzees, and orangutans are not only genetically but also behaviorally isolated. In the wild, they would not recognize each other as potential mates; if anything, they'd either ignore or attack one another on sight.
So the short answer is no, crossbreeding would not be possible. It has not been possible for over a million years, if I recall correctly. I'd have to consult my primatological genetics text if I wanted to be sure. | [
"Polyembryony is a widespread form of asexual reproduction in animals, whereby the fertilized egg or a later stage of embryonic development splits to form genetically identical clones. Within animals, this phenomenon has been best studied in the parasitic Hymenoptera. In the 9-banded armadillos, this process is obl... |
why can't enemy combatants on the ground hear apache helicopters (or whatever) before they strike? | If you look at when they fire that missile, there's about 2.5-3s between launch and impact. Wikipedia lists the speed of the [Hydra 70](_URL_0_) rocket as 2,300 feet per second. That puts the chopper over a mile away from the target - plenty of distance for the sound to die out.
The camera footage you're looking at is zoomed in considerably, making the soldiers appear far closer than they are in reality. | [
"Apache \"Vampire 12\", flown by Warrant Officers David S. Williams and Ronald D. Young Jr., was forced down into a marsh after gunfire severed its hydraulics. Its radio was also hit, preventing communication with the other helicopters. Attempting to flee the crash scene, both men swam down a canal, but were captur... |
the psychology of a troll (serious) | It's really the basest way to get acknowledgement on the internet. Whenever you write a well thought out response, you're putting yourself out there to be ridiculed. You put in your ideas, your insight, maybe take the time to reread and edit, and then post; for all that, someone can easily just say "nope" and downvote. And that downvote - as far as karma goes - essentially negates all your work.
When you troll, especially with troll accounts, you're just changing the goals of your redditting. Instead of saying "I have something thoughtful to contribute", you say "I'm just going to be incendiary". If your only goal is to agitate people, that's pretty manageable. Each downvote represents an occasion when you've gotten a reaction out of someone. | [
"Recent studies have found that people who are identified as trolls tend to have dark personality traits and show signs of sadism, antisocial behavior, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism. The 2013 case study suggested that there are a number of similarities between anti-social and flame trolling activities and the 2... |
why is it that illegal aliens are routinely arrested and deported but legal action is rarely if ever taken agains those that employ illegal aliens? | So since this is already heading into THEY STEALING ER JERBS territory lets break it down.
pretty much every company in the USA pays at least minimum wage and auto deduct taxes. That's a whole lot of liability coverage since good luck proving they knew the person was undocumented. Also they probably actually don't know in the first place since there isn't much incentive for those companies to hire undocumented workers what with the minimum wage thing. Their papers looked good, and it's not your employer's job to conduct the kind of in depth and expensive background check needed to spot the issues. Got a SIN number? You can work.
For everyone else, most undocumented workers are doing cash in hand work. In which case good luck proving they were employed in the first place, or that they knew the persons immigration status especily since A: everyone is getting paid cash in hand, and B: no one is expected to even check a SIN number when you hire for casual day labor since they're only in your employ for a short time.
Failing that sort of work, they also self employ. Quite a few of them actually. One LLC registration later and now they've got their own business doing whatever they care to do. | [
"According to a number of legal experts, INS has taken the view that it can detain aliens for preventive rather than punitive purposes. These experts state INS has no authority to conduct a punitive detention, which is only authorized by criminal statutes. Civil libertarians have noted that over 2,000 aliens have b... |
How does something as large as a city affect the crust/mantle below it? Could a city become so large and heavy that it would collapse or compress the earth underneath? | I'll try to make this as clear as possible.
Firstly, your answer is no (at least with respect to the crust/mantle). As far as compress the earth underneath, speaking in purely scientific terms, any weight will compress the earth underneath, whether it is 100,000 lbs or 1 oz. The degree of compression is what you are wondering.
You can see from [this](_URL_0_) boussinesq chart that the load of a *properly loaded* foundation member the weight is distrbued such that at a depth approximately 6 times the length of the footing, the load "felt" by the soil is only about 10% of that at the surface. Now, I'm sure you're wondering why don't we just make a 3 inch diameter pile and load it with 1,000,000 lbs and say "well, at 18" the load is dropped to 100,000, so we'll double that make it 3 ft and call it a day!" That won't work; notice I said "properly loaded", this means you have to take settlement into account, at an improper load, the foundation will sink (kind of like a hypodermic needle going into skin). So you need to size the footing to avoid this.
Building foundations are designed by geotechnical engineers. The first step in this process is to determine the soil properties below the proposed building; this includes getting information on soil properties deep below the surface (hundreds of feet sometimes) using differing methods (SPT, CPT penetrometers, ground penetrating radar, geophone/shear wave recording, etc) Then based on certain methods of settlement (Schmertmann's method is one, also using Boussinesq force distributions) you can determine the structural capacity of the soil. If you have the approximate weight distribution of the building, you can size your footings so that the force doesn't "over-stress" the soil. This would result in various failure, either the foundation "rolling" over (due to eccentric loading or eccentric support, think two soils next to each other that have different strength), or much more commonly (as noted below with the Mexican example) settlement.
Now, with the soil properties known if it is determined that you can't support all of the load on the surface of the ground, you need to do deep foundations. Commonly these will either be "drilled shafts" or "driven piles". For huge buildings, it will almost always be a drilled shaft because these are basically holes drilled into the ground (commonly over 10 ft in diameter) then a reinforcement cage lowered in, then concrete filling it. A driven pile, is basically a column that is driven into the ground and don't get much bigger than ~30 inches in diameter. Drilled shafts can be several hundred feet deep. This type of foundation relies more on side friction between the concrete and soil (think about a 100 ft deep, 10ft diameter concrete member buried in sand. It has over 3000 square feet for friction to act on. This is a HUGE amount of resistive force.
If you determine that the weight of the building will be too large, then you need to redesign it (either by using light weight concrete, which is about 50-60% of the weight of normal weight concrete or by using more steel as it is stronger when compared pound for pound).
Think about it this way, when you go to the beach and stand in the water, you start to sink , but only a couple inches. So what has happened is that your feet don't provide enough force on the surface to keep you up, so you start to settle *until the side friction between your ankles and the sand, plus the bearing capacity of your feet* is equal to your weight.
On this note, 1.) quicksand is not a thing. You can have sand in what is known as a "quick" condition, which is where water is flowing upward. and 2.) in this situation, you will not drown (unless you can't swim), sand is about twice as dense as water, so if the water gets to a fully quick condition, it will just become buoyant sand, meaning it is about the same density as water, and you can swim through it.
If you want more clarification, let me know.
Source: Masters degree in geotechnical engineering, working on Ph.D.
EDIT: Thank you to whomever gave me gold!
| [
"Lost City is a location dominated by steep cliffs to the south, chimneys, and mounds of carbonate material deposited from chimneys that collapse as they age. Breccia, gabbros, and peridotites are dominating rock types as one maneuvers away from the field, which are prone to mass-wasting as bathymetry steepens. Mas... |
Is time exactly symmetrical? If we were to rewind it would it play back as the reverse of it playing forwards? | Time reversal is not a complete symmetry of our universe. We know this, because we can observe T-violation in experiments. We know that the weak force violates CP, and if CPT is a good symmetry, that implies violations of T as well. We can see T-reversal in the shapes of atomic nuclei. There are nuclei which have electric octupole moments (meaning they’re pear-shaped), which is a violation of T symmetry. People are also looking for electric dipole moments in neutrons and other particles, because that would also indicate T-violation. | [
"The symmetry of time (T-symmetry) can be understood simply as the following: if time were perfectly symmetrical, a video of real events would seem realistic whether played forwards or backwards. Gravity, for example, is a time-reversible force. A ball that is tossed up, slows to a stop, and falls is a case where r... |
What are some modern social concepts that would be completely alien to a person living during the time of you expertise? | It's not just homosexuality - heterosexuality and bisexuality *as modern Western society understands it* would also be a strange idea to a person of that time depending on the nation-state they hailed from. (Greek sexuality is a little early for me but my understanding is that the erastes/eromenos relationship, which I believe is what you are referring to, was by no means a universal social construct within Ancient Greece as a whole, and the norms of the relationship varied from polis to polis.)
Romans, more my speed than Greeks, knew that there were some men who liked other men exclusively, and some women who liked other women exclusively, and some who preferred the opposite sex exclusively, but in general society functioned under strict laws of *pudicitia*, or sexual morality, for the privileged classes, that were more about preserving honor by restricting the types of sex acts that could be performed under a given circumstance. So Roman insults were more about specific acts performed (e.g. *cinaedus* and *pathicus* - which were the equivalent of "buttfucker" except in the reverse - maybe "pillow-biter"?) rather than the gender with whom the sex was happening.
Additionally, the idea of democracy as we currently practice it would have seemed really strange and awful - we include women, and poor people, and in some countries they even allow non-citizen residents to vote! Quelle horreur!
The way we view marriage is a relatively new concept and would have seemed odd to the Romans, for whom marriage was very much about the joining of families rather than the union of two people madly in love. The idea that it was entirely about property is misguided, but it was very much about using procreation to alter the social status of a family, especially among the privileged classes. Even among the lower classes, though, love wasn't really the primary consideration, at least not from the evidence we have, and so when you get beautiful epitaphs extolling a husband's love for his wife (like the Laudatio Turiae, which is totally worth a read), or vice versa, it makes it even more sweet. At least in my opinion. | [
"Social life in the 21st century includes a wide array of personal connections, not just intimates—people associated with a particular part of one’s life and daily activities, such as co-workers, neighbors, gym buddies, fellow volunteers and congregants, and providers of goods and services. Typically, peripheral ti... |
WW2: What do these patches mean? | The circular patches with the "A" are the insignia of the US 3rd Army, which in WW2 was under the command of Gen. George S. Patton. The triangular tricolour patches are the insignia of the US 16th Armoured Division. If you look closely, the embroidery below the 16 shows a tank track. The 16th Armoured was established in 1943, and reached Europe in 1945. It saw combat very briefly at the end of 1945 in Czechoslovakia, before withdrawing in accordance with a treaty with the advancing Soviets.
The patch at the bottom left with the winged star is the symbol of the USAAF, which is a little confusing. Did he transfer to or from the airforce at any point? | [
"The World War I patch consisted of a dark blue disc bordered red having upon it a steel gray triangle (the Greek Delta symbol). The area within the triangle was divided into four equilateral triangles, with the lower left red, the top white, the lower right blue, and the central triangle the same dark blue as the ... |
how withdrawl from drugs causes severe illness? sometimes death? | The worst withdrawal symptoms seem to be from drugs that are sedating: narcotics, alcohol and benzodiazepines.
These types of drugs tend to alter the amount of signaling via various neurotransmitters and their receptors. When one receptor is constantly activated by a drug then it will often be "down regulated" to try to bring things into balance. Other counter regulatory pathways may also get upregulated. But then when the drug or alcohol is suddenly stopped - you generally get activity that is the opposite, more or less, of what the drug was causing.
With alcohol and benzo withdrawal this can be really dangerous - marked increases in sympathetic nervous system activity (fight or flight) occurs, heart rate and blood pressure go up, and seizures may occur. If these reactions are severe, death can occur.
Narcotic withdrawal may cause severe discomfort - but generally not life threatening without other health problems: anxiety, sweating, aches, diarrhea, nausea, cramps and dilated pupils - many of which are from nervous system activity that is essentially the opposite of what you get with the drug itself.
In contrast, after prolonged stimulant use, stopping leads mostly to sleepy folks who are in a bad mood all the time. But not usually very ill from a medical / vital sign perspective.
| [
"Drug abuse, including alcohol and prescription drugs, can induce symptomatology which resembles mental illness. This can occur both in the intoxicated state and also during the withdrawal state. In some cases these substance induced psychiatric disorders can persist long after detoxification, such as prolonged psy... |
About the fancy uniforms we see in war paintings. | Artists who do not travel with armies or have the chance to see one in a situation other than a parade may improperly display soldiers in battle. For example, many artists during the american civil war will draw every soldier with their knapsack (backpack) on and sometimes wearing gaiters, purely because thats what they saw when a regiment marched out of a city or in a parade. However in actual battle knapsacks were dropped before going in and gaiters were thrown away by most soldiers to begin with as they were very disliked.
But for the most part, uniforms in art are pretty accurate. They did indeed wear such fancy uniforms back then, and for a variety of reasons. A large one is these complex uniforms make distinguishing a friendly soldier from an enemy easy in battle. Though complex uniforms may be especially fancy for prestige reasons, such as the Imperial Guard of Napoleon or the Russian Leib Guard. | [
"Portrait of a Commander or A Commander Being Dressed for Battle is a portrait of an unknown man in plate armour, normally attributed to Peter Paul Rubens. In July 2010 it was sold for £9 million by Christie's after Sotheby's turned it down, suspecting its authenticity as a Rubens. In December 2011, the portrait wa... |
why is the triple crown in horse racing so rare? | Because they allow a horse that hasn't raced in the Kentucky Derby and Preakness, to compete in the Belmont and stop a horse that has raced all three from winning. Stupid ass rules. | [
"Unlike the Grand Slam, the Triple Crown winners are not necessarily the tournament winners, since France or Italy – or even another of the home nations – could outperform them within the Championship as a whole. To date, the Triple Crown winners who failed to win the Championship are Wales in 1977, England in 1997... |
Why does Patton seem to be disliked by most of the commanders of his day, yet a prominent figure by the enemy? | I think you have to remember that Patton, for all his considerable skill, could be a thoroughly infuriating figure. Arrogant, rash, abrasive, impatient, and often intolerant of anything less than an almost reckless abandon for action the best that can be said about him is that he won, and that's probably all he or Eisenhower cared about. And, while it's true many American and British generals disliked him personally, most of even his staunchest adversaries admired his skill and ability. His reputation amongst the Axis forces was because, in many ways, he was the most successful emulation of their type of armored campaign. His ability to conduct brash and often reckless maneuver with great success at the expense of multiple German commanders earned him a thorough and almost universal admiration and respect as the best the Americans had to offer. All in all it was mostly his personal baggage that earned him a foul and sometimes unfair reputation and led many to downplay his professional successes due to personal grievances. | [
"Patton's colorful image, hard-driving personality and success as a commander were at times overshadowed by his controversial public statements. His philosophy of leading from the front and ability to inspire troops with attention-getting, vulgarity-ridden speeches, such as a famous address to the Third Army, met w... |
If someone spoke gibberish to babies would the babies mistake it for real language? | It would have to be consistent in order to learn, and if it were then it would just be another language (even if it was made up). | [
"In the language deprivation experiment young infants were raised without human interaction in an attempt to determine if there was a natural language that they might demonstrate once their voices matured. It is claimed he was seeking to discover what language would have been imparted unto Adam and Eve by God. In h... |
How did Genghis Khan's father die, specifically? | Yesugai the Brave, by various accounts, was poisoned at a meal on the steppes, by Tatars who by custom owed even an enemy hospitality.
We do not know if it was actually poison. This could have been a simple bacterial infection. However, actual poisons were available, such as from poisonous mushrooms.
Fecal matter would have been a hit-or-miss matter, depending on the local pathogens and whether Yesugei Baghatur had been exposed to them in the past. | [
"Genghis Khan died on 18 August 1227, by which time the Mongol Empire ruled from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian Sea, an empire twice the size of the Roman Empire or the Muslim Caliphate at their height. Genghis named his third son, the charismatic Ögedei, as his heir. According to Mongol tradition, Genghis Khan w... |
unix vs macosx/windows/linux | Unix is an old OS developed by Bell Labs in the 70s. Since it was copyrighted, there have been many clones that have since grown and branched off. Linux is a notable example, BSD is another one which in turn is what OS X is based off of. These are called Unix-Like operating systems. Windows is something totally different.
edit: One thing worth mentioning is that Linux itself is not an entire desktop OS. This is why we have distributions like Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian, Red Hat, etc. These are all something you can install to your desktop and server and run but also very different in what they include. Linux is just the kernel (which you can think of like an engine in car). | [
"Linux as a gaming platform can also refer to operating systems based on the Linux kernel and specifically designed for the \"sole purpose\" of gaming. Examples are SteamOS, which is an operating system for Steam Machines and computers, video game consoles built from components found in the classical home computer,... |
what are the historical reasons for which english cuisine is usually regarded as "bad" whereas french cuisine is usually regarded as "good"? (at least i think this is how we see it in the us... | They were culturally different. Also under Napoleonic rule, France controlled almost all of continental Europe (but obviously not Britain) which allowed French chefs to experiment with ingredients from all around the continent.
The short answer is simply that French chefs had the ingredients available and the cultural passion to elevate cuisine to higher levels than Britain had. It's not about skill it's about generations of tradition and availability of ingredients and culture.
Brits love their curry though! Can find much better curry and Asian food in general in Britain than in France.
Unrelated side note: Was in London last summer. Went past a noodle bar called "Phat Phuc" | [
"In general, France is regarded with favour by Britain in regard to its high culture and is seen as an ideal holiday destination, whilst France sees Britain as a major trading partner. Both countries are famously contemptuous of each other's cooking, many French claiming all British food is bland and boring, whilst... |
why does my bottom lip get dry and chapped, while my top lip always remains smooth? | I think because when you smile, your upper lip remains straight but wider while your lower lip gets wider and bends down, effectively becoming longer than your upper lip, i.e.: stretching more than your upper lip. | [
"Gloss paint sprayed on a smooth surface (such as the body of a car) should also dry into a smooth surface. However, various factors can cause it to dry into a bumpy surface resembling the texture of an orange peel. The orange peel phenomenon can then be smoothed out with ultra-fine sandpaper, but it can be prevent... |
why can’t pc hardware run mac os but mac can run windows? | They can, it's just that apple doesn't permit OSX to be run on unauthorized hardware, and the lack of included drivers for anything but authorized hardware can be a huge challenge to overcome. | [
"Aside from Apple-branded hardware that is still maintained and operated, Mac OS 9 can be operated in other environments such as Windows and Unix. For example, the aforementioned SheepShaver software was not designed for use on x86 platforms and required an actual PowerPC processor present in the machine it was run... |
why do different numbers of protons/neutrons/electrons cause such drastic differences in the elements of the periodic table? | You can think of them as chemical properties and atomic properties.
~Chemical properties are mostly caused by the outer most ring of electrons (valence) orbiting the nucleus. You see electrons are lonely little guys and they like to be with other electrons, exactly 8 to be specific. If they can find a way to hook up with other electrons so there are 8 of them in an orbital, the resulting chemical becomes stable.
For instance you have Carbon, with 4 valence electrons but it really wants to have 8. But take 2 carbons and put them together and they can share each others electrons, 4+4 = 8 and bang, you have a carbon chain. Or take Oxygen, it has 6 valence electrons but wants 8. However if you took 2 Oxygen and a carbon, each oxygen could share 2 electrons with the carbon making 8 total, and the carbon would be sharing 4 electrons between the two oxygen atoms also getting 8. And bam, you have carbon dioxide. Or take 2 hydrogen each with 1 valence electron, add them to an oxygen which has 6 and 1+1+6=8 and you have water.
Some atoms already have their valence shells full and neither want to give or take electrons. Because they are quite happy to be by themselves, they very rarely interact with other elements and we call these the noble gases. They are stable, and not very reactive because they already have a full valence shell.
~Nuclear properties. The number of protons and neutrons affect the mass of an atom, which in turn affects how heavy that element is. For instance Hydrogen has one proton, and it's the lightest gas there is, and Uranium has 92 protons and 146 neutrons (in some isotopes) , so it is one of the heavier elements (and the heaviest naturally occurring one)
Aside from the mass of the atom, as the nucleus gets larger and larger, the ability for the nuclear forces to hold it together get weaker. Above a certain threshold the mass is so large, and the force holding it together so weakened that the atom can split apart and form 2 new elements. This is how radioactivity and fission works.
~Transmutation is a fact of life, yes. For instance most of the helium in the world today is a byproduct of uranium and thorium decomposition. As the uranium radiates and splits into smaller nuclei it breaks down and helium and lead are the byproducts. Helium is so light it would float off into space if we didn't capture it so Earth lost it's original helium a long time ago. Most of the helium we use today comes from natural gas deposits, where the helium is released by decaying uranium and thorium and trapped with the natural gas for the same reason the natural gas is, it's a pocket of impermeable rock holding it all in. It's expected that gases under the earth should tend to collect together.
| [
"Yet another effect of the instability of an odd number of either type of nucleons is that odd-numbered elements tend to have fewer stable isotopes. Of the 26 monoisotopic elements (those with only a single stable isotope), all but one have an odd atomic number, and all but one has an even number of neutrons — the ... |
how does the definition of "species" work in single cell organisms? | Traditionally, bacteria were classified by characteristics of theirs that were observed in a lab. For example, the most fundamental division of bacteria is between bacteria that are stained by a Gram stain and those that aren't. (This corresponds to important differences in their cell wall and membrane.)
Looking at other features like morphology (what the cells look like under a microscope), colony morphology (what the blobs that grow when you put them on a Petri plate look like), metabolic features (what can it eat and what wastes does it produce; also, what vitamins it needs), and other lab tests, bacteria were further and further classified until the scientists were satisfied that they couldn't discern any differences within the last groups defined. Those groups were species.
So for a hypothetical example, bacteria in genus X might be Gram-positive (stained by a Gram stain) with spherical cells ~1.5 microns in diameter that form very flat greenish colonies and are catalase negative (do not make hydrogen peroxide bubble when mixed with it). Within genus X, species Y can use glucose, maltose, and lactose for food, while species Z can only use glucose.
With the advent of easy DNA sequencing, bacterial species are mostly defined by their genome sequence. But when the genome sequence databases were built, they made them by sequencing the genomes of bacteria classified by the old methods and assigning the sequence to the old species name.
In the end, "species" is not really a well-defined concept for single-celled organisms and it will always be a little fuzzy and inconsistent. | [
"In biology, a species () is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual ... |
Has anything in the bible been proven to be historically wrong? | Where does one begin?
To give a very brief summary of the kind of thing you're asking about:
* The world was not created in 4,000 BC.
* There was no global flood in the 25th century BC.
* The world did not speak one language and all live in the city of Babel (Babylon) in the 23rd century BC.
* The biblical patriarchs (Abraham, Jacob, Moses, etc.) are folklore characters and probably did not exist, at least in the way they are depicted biblically.
* The biblical exodus of two million Hebrews from Egypt did not occur.
* The Israelites did not violently conquer the Canaanites. They *were* Canaanites.
* The kingdom of David and Solomon (if it even existed) was not a mighty empire stretching "from the Nile to the Euphrates".
* Jonah never converted Nineveh to Judaism.
* The book of Daniel gets the kings of Babylon and Persia wrong. In particular, there was no such person as Darius the Mede.
* Some of the historical details in the Gospels are implausible; there was no empire-wide census under Caesar Augustus as Luke claims, and the dead did not rise out of the graves and wander around Jerusalem as Matthew claims.
The real problem is treating the Bible as a history textbook, when it is more of a cultural artifact that includes poetry, mythology, folklore, fiction, allegory, satire, and so on. It is the modern reader who insists that holy books be literally true, not necessarily the ancient one. | [
"Some scholars also believe that antinomianism, the belief that all was allowed because there were no laws, was believed by a faction in the early Christian community. In this verse the Gospel of Matthew directly counters these views by insisting the \"old laws\" such as the Ten Commandments are still valid. France... |
What causes the liquid in a full spray bottle to siphon out entirely? | Based on what information you provided, I would say that the cause would have been a temperature fluctuation paired with a faulty nozzle. As gases heat up, they expand, and when they cool, they contract. Even minor temperature changes (5°-10°C) are enough to make a noticeable difference in volume. So as the air inside the bottle rated up, it would have pushed all of the liquid out of the bottle through a potentially faulty nozzle head. | [
"The difference between the reduced pressure at the top of the tube and the higher atmospheric pressure inside the bottle pushes the liquid from the reservoir up the tube and into the moving stream of air where it is broken up into small droplets (not atoms as the name suggests) and carried away with the stream of ... |
why do our bowels release when we are scared? | Bowel contents are not required in an emergency. | [
"When prey are able to avoid predators, however, prey will sprint away and \"literally shake off the residual effects of the immobility response\" while \"their bodies convulse with paroxysmal spasms\". There is no evidence for Levine's conclusions about the prey's responses or Nancy's response to their session. Ob... |
the difference between libertarian economics and anarcho-capitalism. | Libertarians believe that a government should exist that supports property rights (e.g law enforcement (police), courts, etc) whereas, Anarcho-Capitalists believe that there does not have to be a government to protect property rights as everything associated with them (law enforcement, courts, etc) would exist without government funding, people would pay for their own security.
So just as Libertarians believe that government doesn't have to fund some things as they would exist privately (e.g, healthcare, education, etc) Anarcho-Capitalists go one step further and believe the same of law enforcement, thus there is no need for a government whatsoever. | [
"Left-wing market anarchism identifies with left-libertarianism (or left-wing libertarianism) which names several related but distinct approaches to politics, society, culture and political and social theory, which stress both individual freedom and social justice. Unlike right-libertarians, they believe that neith... |
when a multi-billion dollar transaction occurs between two companies, how are the funds transferred/managed? | Typically by Wire Transfer.
Wire Transfers, unlike checks or regular electronic bank payments (known as ACH transactions in the US), are irrevocable once final -- even in the case of fraud. (That is, if someone authorized to make a wire transfer makes one, even if defrauded or illegally embezzling funds, the accountholder are still liable for the payment. If someone at the bank who isn't authorized to make a wire transfer illegally makes one, the accountholder is not liable.)
The idea is that businesses need finality when they receive payments, they can't just have money disappear from their accounts like if a "chargeback" or "stop payment" is done. If a wire transfer is made and you need your money back, you have to sue the recipient -- you can't just ask the bank to reverse the charge. For transactions between businesses, it's assumed that the need for finality outweighs the fraud protections that checks and nonwire electronic payments provide. (In the US, wire transfers are rarely used by consumers. Also why scamsters try to get you to wire money to them - people wrongly assume that wire transfers have the same protections as consumer payment systems.) Source: The Uniform Commercial Code Article 4A. | [
"The following example shows a classic transfer of funds transaction, where money is removed from one account and added to another. If either the removal or the addition fails, the entire transaction is rolled back.\n",
"Payment by cash. Such transactions are usually termed acquisitions rather than mergers becaus... |
why won't youtube fix the issue of saving the video quality even though it's the number one complaint they get? | You mean when you start a new video? It's becomes HD every time I enter full screen. | [
"Since April 2016, videos continue to be monetized while the dispute is in progress, and the money goes to whoever won the dispute. Should the uploader want to monetize the video again, they may remove the disputed audio in the \"Video Manager\". YouTube has cited the effectiveness of Content ID as one of the reaso... |
i know the 2 major parties don't want 3rd party candidates in presidential debates unless polling is at 15%, but why does the media let the parties control who is invited to these debates? | "The media" is not invovled.
The debates are held by the Commission on Presidential debates. Which is run bipartisanly by republicans and democrats.
Commission sets the rules and the parties agree. The media just covers the debate. | [
"In the United States, if an interest group is at odds with its traditional party, it has the option of running sympathetic candidates in primaries. If the candidate fails in the primary and believes he or she has a chance to win in the general election he or she may form or join a third party. Because of the diffi... |
why the english speaking nations are more successful than any other linguistic nationalities in history? | It's not *English* that does it. It's luck, mostly.
Europe had the industrial revolution first. That gave it an unprecedented ability to conquer other lands, which many countries did. The Brittish Empire just so happened to be in the right place at the right time to spread its influence far and wide.
Then came the United States. It had an ungodly amount of resources and land, which supported a *massive* population. It also was isolated enough that it could grow in strength before and during the world wars. All that combined to make it an economic superpower. The USA is in fact so big that it can swing the entire world economy to its whims. At the time when the US was rising to power, neither China nor India could really compete economically, and after WWII, the USSR dissolved, losing its power.
Given that English existed both in the USA and in practically every former Brittish colony, English quickly became the language of trade. If you spoke English, you could talk with all the big players, which is obviously a good thing if you want to make money.
If some other country, say Portugal, Spain, or France had settled the land that would become the USA, it might have been Portuguese, Spanish, or French that became the language of trade. | [
"English is the current lingua franca of international business, education, science, technology, diplomacy, entertainment, radio, seafaring, and aviation. After World War II, it has gradually replaced French as the lingua franca of international diplomacy. The rise of English in diplomacy began in 1919, when the Tr... |
when a company commits a gross violation that affects people (physically/mentally/financially, etc.), why is the company forced to pay the government, instead of the people they hurt? | Usually they'll have to pay both. Fines levyed by the state is not meant to replace money companies have to pay for the damages they cause a person.
Let's say a company causes you to lose a leg because of negligence, they might be fined by the state if they broke the law, but *in addition to that* they have to pay you money for the damages they caused you specifically. | [
"This federal statute has many consequences. For example, a corporation is allowed to own property and enter contracts. It can also sue and be sued and held liable under both civil and criminal law. As well, because the corporation is legally considered the \"person\", individual shareholders are not legally respon... |
what's the difference between killer bees and honey bees? | The "killer bee," AKA the Africanized honey bee, is a hybrid bee created from Western and European bee strains.
For whatever reason (and I'm not a geneticist nor a beekeeper, so I don't know how this happened), the Africanized bee picked up a few nasty traits. They are excessively defensive of their hive, and will swarm much more aggressively in defense of it. They are also known to pursue more aggressively. Where normal honeybees will swarm a threat and pursue for a limited distance, returning to the hive once they feel the invader is no longer a threat, killer bees are known to swarm greater numbers of bees and will chase for a much greater distance. They're thus much more likely to inflict lethal numbers of stings than basic honeybees.
Several swarms of these bees escaped captivity. The problem then became the fact that they compete more aggressively than European honeybees and tend to push them out when they compete for territory, meaning that the "killer bee" is rapidly spreading as wild swarms supplant the native wild honeybees. | [
"BULLET::::- Killer bees were created in an attempt to breed tamer and more manageable bees. This was done by crossing a European honey bee and an African bee, but instead the offspring became more aggressive and highly defensive bees that had escaped into the wild.\n",
"\"Killer bee\" is a term frequently used i... |
How do scientists know the decay progression of Uranium-238 if it takes place over billions of years? | Because the rate is the same. You can observe it for any period of time and extrapolate that rate of decay across whatever unit of time, whether it's days, months, or billions of years. Even if you observe it for a normal human period of time, there's still a tiny tiny change, and if you measure accurately, the rate is there. | [
"Since radioactive decay is exponential with a constant probability, each process could as easily be described with a different constant time period that (for example) gave its \"(1/3)-life\" (how long until only 1/3 is left) or \"(1/10)-life\" (a time period until only 10% is left), and so on. Thus, the choice of ... |
Why was the Spanish colonisation of the Americas so brutal and destructive compared to their colonisation of the Philippines? | You have a mistaken impression about the Spanish conquest. I don't know much about the Mayans and others, but the Spanish didn't genocide the Aztecs, though in other cases, like with the Pueblo, there's certainly a case to be made for genocide.
The reasons so many Aztecs died were primarily diseases. It's not really clear how many died, but one estimate made by historians at Berkeley University even puts it at 95% of the Aztec population dying because of repeated epidemics. Admittedly, the early Spanish colonial system was filled with abuse as the conquistadors formed their own fiefdoms with the Indians as their servants, a system called the encomienda system, but that system was abolished relatively quickly and replaced by a much more benign system, where Indians generally were left to rule themselves in their own communities, called pueblos de indios, or at least be ruled by Indian mayors called gobernador de indios, who were in turn elected by the local Indian nobility, the caciques, alongside a Spanish administrator called a corregidor.
Mestizos aren't the product of mass rape, they're the product of simply intermixing over the course of several centuries. It's the same reason you have Afro-Indians and Afro-Europeans in Mexico. The early Spanish conquistadors didn't bring their wives along, so they just started marrying native women. Same with slaves and Indians and slaves and Europeans. Though the Spaniards had instituted a racial caste system, race was such a vague system that it was practically useless. Indian nobles were above a poor Spanish farmer de facto, and a village full of black people could be classified as an Indian village simply on basis of location.
In general, the Spanish king had a very paternalistic view towards Indians, so if they were abused he did try to help them generally, although it was from a somewhat misguided point of view. There are still hundreds of letters in Spain between Indians nobles appealing their cases to the Spanish king. This was one of the reasons the Spanish king abolished the encomienda system, alongside the more practical reason that he didn't want the conquistadors to form independant kingdoms in the New World. | [
"The United States claimed the territories of the Philippines after the Spanish–American War. The ethnic Moro (Muslim) population of the southern Philippines resisted both Spanish and United States colonization. The Spaniards were restricted to a handful of coastal garrisons or Forts and they made occasional puniti... |
i love that t-mobile does this, but how is allowing unlimited data for music streaming not a violation of nn? | It is actually a violation of it. However, people aren't really fighting it because people like T-Mobile. Also, allowing unlimited music streaming scissor benefits people, so they like it. | [
"Since June 2014, U.S. mobile provider T-Mobile US has offered zero-rated access to participating music streaming services to its mobile internet customers. T-Mobile launched its plan called “Music Freedom” which would exempt users of T-Mobile from having to pay premium prices for access to music content; additiona... |
how do they make boneless chicken breasts? | They take regular chicken breasts and take the bones out of them. There isn't any magic beyond that. They aren't growing boneless chickens out there. | [
"Some chicken breast cuts and processed chicken breast products include the moniker \"with rib meat\". This is a misnomer, as it refers to the small piece of white meat that overlays the scapula, removed along with the breast meat. The breast is cut from the chicken and sold as a solid cut, while the leftover breas... |
how does amazon ec2 work? | Amazon EC2 is a service that allows you to rent servers and pay for what you use in an easy to use way.
With the amazon ec2 you do not pay for a server by the month though, you pay for it by the hour. So let me create a scenario for you:
Let's say you have a theory for the stock market that you want to test out. You've written some program to analyze historical data to see how accurate your theory has been throughout the stock markets history. The problem is there's a TON of data, and you only need to analyze it once to see if your theory will work. How do you do this?
Well, you could do it on your home computers, but it will probably take forever and what if your program makes requests to webpages each time it analyzes a price? Something like looking up how many news articles were released about that company on that specific day in history. That would kill your internet bandwith and probably get your internet suspended by your ISP if you tried to run all that at home.
So the next logical thinking is, I know, I'll get a dedicated server to process all this. You head over to rackspace and quickly realize that they want a year contract for servers, and it's going to be EXPENSIVE. Before cloud computing services like the ec2, these were your only options. You could either shell out a bunch of money to test your theory, or you could scale it way down, run it on your own computer, and not get a completely accurate picture.
NOW, with the amazon ec2, the way to solve this is to rent a server. Remember you pay by the hour, so if you rent a giant ec2 server with 16 cpu cores and 64 gb of ram, it wont take very long to analyze all that data will it? Maybe it would take 6 hours or so? Well, after those 6 hours, you can simply stop the server, and you will no longer be paying for it. Doing it this way makes it affordable (you pay to rent a giant server for a little while, instead of shelling out the money to buy it all month or all year) even for the little man.
There are numerous other benefits like easily making backups, changing network configurations instantly, and yes scalability (the problem i presented above is a scalability problem).
We use the ec2 and other AWS stuff heavily where I work, so if you have any questions feel free to ask. | [
"Amazon S3 or Amazon Simple Storage Service is a service offered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that provides object storage through a web service interface. Amazon S3 uses the same scalable storage infrastructure that Amazon.com uses to run its global e-commerce network.\n",
"Amazon introduced SimpleDB, a database... |
is human brain at it's limits? and are there other stages of human brain development that will lead to us getting smarter. | A helpful way to think about the brain is not as a something that reaches 'capacity'. Our brains are very efficient, so as we develop and grow we keep reinforcing the neural pathways that help us the most in life - i.e. how should I interpret someone shouting at me, or someone crying.
If you grow up with a lot of exposure to learning, you'll create very efficient pathways that make you very good at lets say math, or writing, or critical analysis. This means that by the time we reach adulthood, we have very established connections which act as a kind of 'cheat sheet' for interpreting external stimulation - we see something and the brain draws on past experience to make sense of it.
BUT what is very interesting is work being done on psychedelics right now. Essentially, under the influence of certain things in psychedelics our mind opens up and we can forge brand new neural connections much more easily - that is bits of the brain that weren't talking before can now talk to each other. This gives us new perspectives and insights and returns our mind to state like when we were young, that is when we were building our neural pathways.
So our brains are never at their limits because what they can build strong neural connections for are endless - they are just set in their ways. | [
"The development of the human brain, perception, cognition, memory and neuroplasticity are unsolved problems in neuroscience. Several megaprojects are being carried out in: American BRAIN Initiative, European Human Brain Project, China Brain Project, Blue Brain Project, Allen Brain Atlas, Human Connectome Project, ... |
Does WiFi have any detrimental effects? | While it's prudent to repeat the experiment, there's nothing that is known so far (as in, reviewed and shown to be repeatable) that would indicate negative effects of Wi-Fi. The most serious detrimental effect of Wi-Fi is the rage it induces when the connection is too weak for whatever you're doing. | [
"The position of the United Kingdom's Health Protection Agency (HPA) is that “...radio frequency (RF) exposures from WiFi are likely to be lower than those from mobile phones.” It also saw “...no reason why schools and others should not use WiFi equipment.” In October 2007, the HPA launched a new “systematic” study... |
why do governments, schools, and big businesses (mostly) always use hp printers? | So they? All I ever see is RICOH | [
"HP produces lines of printers, scanners, digital cameras, calculators, PDAs, servers, workstation computers, and computers for home and small-business use; many of the computers came from the 2002 merger with Compaq. HP promotes itself as supplying not just hardware and software, but also a full range of services ... |
if shadows are the absence of light, why do you get different coloured shadows with different light sources? | A shadow is generally not the total absence of light. It is simply an area where there is less light because a light source has been blocked by something opaque.
| [
"If there is more than one light source, there will be several shadows, with the overlapping parts darker, and various combinations of brightnesses or even colors. The more diffuse the lighting is, the softer and more indistinct the shadow outlines become, until they disappear. The lighting of an overcast sky produ... |
Is the black hole of our galaxy, rotating around something else? | The galaxy rotates around itself. All the stars are being pulled by all the other stars, which tends to mean they are revolving around the center of mass - the barycenter.
Sagittarius A\* happens to be at the center (well, near it), but the Sun doesn't orbit it. It isn't nearly massive enough. | [
"If the black hole is rotating, there is a second radius of influence associated with the rotation. This is the radius inside of which the Lense-Thirring torques from the black hole are larger than the Newtonian torques between stars. Inside the rotational influence sphere, stellar orbits precess at approximately t... |
Could we send a spacecraft to LEO using solar sails? | Solar sails provide a very small but consistent force. For a 100 square meter sail, the force is about 0.0005 Newtons. In space, that will provide a small acceleration, which over long times will give it appreciable speed. On Earth, however, there is the 10000+ Newton force of gravity keeping it down. 0.0005 won't do much. | [
"Unlike conventional chemical rockets which use Newton's third law of motion, solar sails take advantage of radiation pressure from stars. Kaku believes that after sending a gigantic solar sail into orbit, one could install lasers on the moon, which would hit the sail and give it extra momentum.\n",
"Until 2010, ... |
why is there a stigma with google glass? | As with all emerging technology it's paranoia and fear. We've had cameras that you can't even see with the naked eye that can take decent pictures/video for a while now. We've had hidden camera tech going back decades that's gotten even easier to conceal and hide.
The thing is: No one gives a shit about you enough to record you. This is hard for some people to accept but it's the truth of things. There's plenty of already semi-discreet ways to take pictures/record someone with your phone without them suspecting anything.
And sure, some people do. But Google Glass isn't really changing anything that wasn't already quite possible and easy to accomplish anyway. If you don't like being recorded in public, stay home. | [
"Additionally, there is controversy that Google Glass would cause security problems and violate privacy rights. Organizations like the FTC Fair Information Practice work to uphold privacy rights through Fair Information Practice Principles (FIPPS), which are guidelines representing concepts that concern fair inform... |
What different tactics were developed by both the French and Germans to assault enemy trenches? | Towards the beginning of the war, the French and Germans utilized very similar tactics on the offense. This would involve extremely long preparatory bombardments (lasting days, or even weeks, and firing millions of shells) at enemy positions. The idea was, the bombardment would destroy emplacements, ruin trench networks, and break up wire obstacles. Gas shells (which the Germans pioneered) and Livens projectors (which were actually more like holes in the ground with gas canisters which were opened at the right moment time) would be used during the final minutes of the attack to force the defends to stay in their trenches (or, by the defender, to disrupt the impending attack). As the bombardment began to fade, the attackers would come out of their trenches and cross no-mans land. Ideally, the defenders would be so broken from the bombardment that the infantry could quickly cross and size the first trench line. Then follow up bombardments would allow the attackers to continue until the had broken through the trench network, where Cavalry would exploit the the victory and win the war!
Problem was, the defenders were rarely broken by the bombardments and gas attacks. Frequently, the bombardments would only serve to ruin the battlefield and make the crossing *more* difficult. And the Germans became particularly efficient at creating deep dugouts which were difficult to collapse. The defenders could sit for days underground before the bombardment would stop, and the defenses would be remanned. In these conditions, the infantry attack would be brutalized before it gained much ground. Some improvements, like the Creeping Barrage (which was used by all sides) helped, but not much.
But in the French army, these problems were all exacerbated by their concept of *elan*. It roughly means dash or eagerness bordering on zealotry. French troops were expected to attack aggressively, push the enemy hard, and overwhelm them in close combat. Thus, the bayonet was an integral weapon for the French.
Later in the war, the French and Germans began to differ in tactics. The French invested heavily in tanks, which they employed with mixed success. After a shorter bombardment, the tanks would advance against German strong points and absorb their fire. The infantry would advance behind these tanks, support them in bad ground, and secure the success that they achieved. But in practice this almost never happened. Heinz Guderian's *Achtung Panzer* goes into detail with French tank tactics, their success, and their critical failures. He argues that the French attacks failed in two major areas: Concentration and support. They failed to employ enough tanks to penetrate the German lines reliably, which ruined their element of surprise, as well as allowed the Germans to concentrate fire on fewer targets. Further, where tanks were successful, Infantry rarely supported them to secure their success. For one reason or another, tanks were often forced to operate without help. This meant they were vulnerable, and isolated if they ran into mechanical trouble (which many did)
On the other hand, the Germans imported a tactical concept that they first experienced in the East. The German name for it was *Hutier* tactics, and it was a radical departure from the older forms attack. The *Hutier* attack first called on a powerful but short artillery barrage called a Hurricane Bombardment. The issue (as one might expect) with the long bombardments was that they telegraphed the location and timing of an attack. If somebody was willing to burn 1million shells in a sector, it was pretty obvious they were up to something. With the Hurricane Bombardment, the attackers focused more on an extremely heavy, but very short, bombardment. During this bombardment, stormtroopers would already begin crossing no-mans land. They would operate in small teams, and were armed with grenades, flame throwers, and other close combat weapons. When the bombardment ended, the stormtroopers would leap up and immediately attack the defender while they were leaving their dugouts. The hope was, the enemy would be completely overwhelmed by the storm troopers in the transition, and the first line of trenches would be rapidly secured. Obviously this didnt work in *every* place, but where it did, the stormtroopers were quickly reinforced by the regular infantry, who didnt have to contend with heavy resistance. Meanwhile, the artillery was already beginning a bombardment of the secondary trench lines. Not only would that prevent any major reinforcements, but it would serve as a jumping off point for the *next* assault. So the Germans could quickly overwhelm several positions, and the *Hutier* tactic brought the Germans as close to the fabled breakthrough as they would ever get.
As for your last question, I would direct you to the [Mutiny of the French Army](_URL_0_). I dont have time to elaborate more, but if you have questions, ask away. | [
"The popular image of a trench assault is of a wave of soldiers, bayonets fixed, going \"over the top\" and marching in a line across no man's land into a hail of enemy fire. This was the standard method early in the war; it was rarely successful. More common was an attack at night from an advanced post in no man's... |
When did mortgages start to be sold regularly? | In _The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World_ by Niall Ferguson, he discusses (among many other things) the history of debt instruments. The truth is, the buying and selling of debt obligations has been around almost as long as debt obligations themselves.
Specifically, you may be referring to the changing of hands of the *servicing rights* of the mortgage. I have to delve a bit into current events here, but when you get a mortgage today (and this has largely remained unchanged since the sub-prime crisis of a few years ago), the mortgage itself is likely to be sold only once and only once - probably to Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or Ginnie Mae, depending on the type of loan, but sometimes to private companies (although not nearly as much since the real estate bubble popped). Then, the cashflow from hundreds or thousands of loans is sold to investors in the form of bonds. The company that actually accepts your monthly payment (say, Wells Fargo or Bank of America) does not own the loan. They accept a servicing fee each month to pay for their expenses in servicing the loan (I've seen between 0% and 1.25% of outstanding principal as a servicing fee), and pass the rest of the payment onto the trustee which administers the bond. It is not uncommon for the servicing rights to change hands during the life of the loan, and was quite common during the real estate boom in the US in the previous decade.
Away from current events now, and back to history.
Modern securitization as described above is a system that came about with the chartering of Freddie Mac in 1970, and the creation of the first residential mortgage backed security (RMBS) by the US Dept of Housing and Urban Development. But securitization of mortgages had been around since the mid 1800s. It's easier for a small local bank to loan out money when they can sell their mortgages immediately on the secondary market, rather than have their money tied up for many years. However, and getting to your question, even when the mortgage itself was sold, the mortgagor (usually a farmer) still made payments to the same bank that originally made the loan. It was not until the Great Depression and the creation of Fannie Mae that the secondary market included government sponsored enterprises (GSE). Before that, it was large, usually East Coast, banks that bought mortgages on the secondary market.
So I guess the answer to your question would be around 1970, with the creation of the first government sponsored RMBS, and then the late 80s, with the creation of the first private label RMBS. The RMBS structure allows Bank A to make a loan, Bank B to buy and repackage the loan, and Bank C to service the loan, potentially removing the originating bank (Bank A) from the equation before the first payment is even made (in all three cases, I am using the term "bank" loosely, because these are very different kinds of banks). In previous forms of securitization (the ones going back to the 1800s), the originating bank was either the owner of the mortgage, or at least retained the servicing after they sold it (otherwise, they wouldn't have gone to the trouble of originating it).
Besides the above book, my source for the second paragraph, where I discuss modern mortgage servicing, is that I've been in the industry for 10 years, including some very interesting front row seats working as an RMBS securities analyst from 2007-2009. I hope that's ok, and that I answered your question. | [
"The earliest mortgages were not offered by banks, but by insurance companies, and they differed greatly from the mortgage or home loan that is familiar today. Most early mortgages were short with some kind of balloon payment at the end of the term, or they were interest-only loans which did not pay anything toward... |
Was Jesus trying to reform the Jewish faith as opposed to trying to begin a new religion? | From the New Testament gospels, we can find a portrait of a Jesus wherein he certainly considered himself to be operating within "Judaism." I mean, there are any number of phrases we could select to show this (for a particularly 'conservative' one, try "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished," in Mt 5:17-18).
Scholars debate the so-called "parting of the ways" between Judaism and Christianity; but virtually everything about this is mired in ambiguity. It's probably most useful to talk about the parting of the ways in terms of when separate groups (like some of the figureheads in Rabbinic Judaism) would consider other groups to be "illegitimate," and would attempt to exclude them from their sphere of influence and various normative social practices, etc. Certainly, in the New Testament gospels, words are placed in the mouth of Jesus that were deemed heretical--beyond the pale of "minimal"/normative Jewish belief--both by Jewish figures *within* the gospels, and without (and this obviously continues up to the modern day, among Jews). But, in a sense, the ideology behind this was probably thought to be a *corrupt* form of Judaism, rather than a totally separate ideology.
There were certainly anti-Judaic trends that developed among early Christian theologians--one of the great ironies of history. I mean, although there's an obvious sense in which this is ridiculous, you have some sayings by Paul (and others) that on the surface seem to be diametrically opposed to those positive statements made about the Law by Jesus (like the quote from Mt 5:17-18 earlier). And then you have things like [1 Thessalonians 2:14-16](_URL_0_), which was fodder for anti-Judaism.)
____
Addendum: there is a phenomenally difficult crux underlying everything here (and, really, underlying *many* issues of religion, identity, etc.): who is the person who gets to decide who is or is not a Jew (or a Christian, or a “liberal,” or whatever)? Do we look for a "normative" body of belief and practices, find all of those who conform to these, and then exclude all others? Or are the claims of the (supposed) "outsiders," that there are in fact really *insiders* (just as much as any other person), enough to establish their insideness, in-and-of-themselves?
Is Islam the "perfected" Abrahamic religion, over against Judaism and Christianity? Are Mormons/LDS "Christians" just as much as anyone else is?
The ambiguities of insider/outsider identity in regard to Judaism/Christianity are probably no more tangible than at the beginning of the 9th chapter of Paul's epistle to the Romans:
> For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my own people, my kindred according to the flesh. 4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; 5 to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Messiah, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen. 6 It is not as though the word of God had failed. *For not all Israelites truly belong to Israel*, 7 and not all of Abraham's children are his true descendants; but "It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you." 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as descendants. | [
"After Auschwitz the Christian churches no longer wish to convert the Jews. While they may not be sure of the theological grounds that dispense them from this mission, the churches have become aware that asking the Jews to become Christians is a spiritual way of blotting them out of existence and thus only reinforc... |
Is it possible that humans have evolved to have a tolerance to alcohol? | It appears that we have evolved a tolerance to alcohol. Acetaldehyde dehydrogenase is more expressed in humans than other mammals. Some people lack the enzyme (usually asians) which causes them to get red-faced and feel ill after drinking.
> society may have partly formed due to beer
This is nonsense. Apes have societies and they don't make booze. | [
"To engage in alcohol consumption and development of alcoholism appear to be common to primates, and is not a specific human phenomenon. Humans have access to alcohol on far greater quantity than non-human primates, and the availability increased particularly with the development of agriculture. The tolerance to al... |
why did apple's iphone gain so much popularity but windows phones have seen such meager market penetration? | The iphone had no competition, the windows phone did. The iphone has a positive market image, while windows phone does not.
| [
"When Apple's iPhone was first introduced in 2007, it generated substantial media attention, with numerous media outlets calling it a \"BlackBerry killer\". While BlackBerry sales continued to grow, the newer iPhone grew at a faster rate and the 87 percent drop in BlackBerry's stock price between 2010 and 2013 is p... |
when a person is attempting suicide (eg about to jump from a bridge) and gets saved by emergency services, what happens to them next? what's their follow up care? could they just walk away? | Just gonna leave this here:
**National Suicide Prevention Lifeline**
_URL_0_ | [
"Those who argue for a suicide barrier claim that most of those who jump from the West Gate Bridge do so through impulse and that police officers who try to save those who try to jump are putting their own lives in danger. There are multiple incidents of police officers dangling off the side of the bridge while hol... |
What muscle are involved in your tongue sticking out | The primary muscle is the [genioglossus](_URL_0_). Note the figure there - because it attaches to the inside of the chin, contraction of the muscle 'pulls' the tongue forward. | [
"The transverse muscle of tongue (transversus linguae) is an intrinsic muscle of the tongue. It consists of fibers which arise from the median fibrous septum and pass lateralward to be inserted into the submucous fibrous tissue at the sides of the tongue.\n",
"The superior longitudinal muscle runs along the upper... |
how can you love yourself? | If anyone ever is raised by their family *not* to love themselves, to have that voice in their head that speaks loving thoughts, then their family has failed them terribly (likely because they themselves were failed and so on..). No, that is not okay and not right and should be different. Everyone should work hard so that never happens. | [
"This is a story about a university student who believed love has a formula to success and tried to prove it in a month. Her mom left her when she was young and she learn to be independent and strong. She eventually felt in love but to prove her formula works she follows her mind instead of her heart, but only to r... |
why people eat salty food then crave sugary food and repeat the cycle? what's going on in human body that causes this craving? | We've evolved in environments where sugar and salt were no where near as abundant as they are today, and because they're so vital for our survival we've evolved to enjoy the taste of them in order to make us want to eat them to get the nutrition we need(ed). Now, there's a bit of a mismatch because of how readily available sugar and salt are. Not sure if this explains why you'd crave one after the other in a cycle though. | [
"The desires for these new diets and lifestyles are very understandable from a biological and psychosocial perspective. For example, humans have an innate preference for sweets dating back to hunter-gatherer populations. These sweets signaled a good source of energy for hunter-gatherers that were not food secure. T... |
all the different kinds of alcohol, what they are, how they're different, what each one kinda tastes like, etc. etc. | This is something you kind of need to experience yourself but here goes nothing:
* **Wine** is broken into two main categories: red and white. Wine is generally made from fermenting grapes. The color is mainly determined by whether or not the grade skin was strained out. It has a pretty low alcohol content relative to liquor, but a little bit higher than beer. 8-12% alcohol by volume is common. It tastes somewhat like grape juice but less sickly sweet (though some wines are very sweet, so called dessert wines). White wines are generally "crisper" than reds, but they all have such a wide variety of specific flavors that it is hard to generalize. Also in the wine category I am going to through champagne, which is basically really fizzy wine.
* **Beer** is made from grains, and usually has a slightly lower alcohol content than wine. 5% for light beers, to 8 or 10 for regular. Some can get even higher. "Bready" is probably the best taste descriptor for someone who has never had beer, but again you really need to try it, and several different kinds.
* **Liquor** is the last main category. Liquor is distilled, rather than simply fermented, giving it a much higher alcohol content than wine or beer. 40% alcohol by volume is kind of the "standard" content, but it can range from 20 up to 96ish. Different liquors can be made of different things, so I will address them in groups. **Vodka** is made from grain or potatoes. It is notable as a mixing ingredient because it has very little taste on its own. Good vodka is judged largely on how it feels in your mouth. It can easily be flavored with basically anything. **Gin** is basically vodka flavored primarily with juniper, giving it a "christmas tree" like taste. Very piney, with hints of citrus and other flavors. **Rum** is made from molasses, and has a complex flavor that can vary largely depending on the type. **Whisk(e)y** is made from grains, and has no one flavor. Some are described as smoky, peaty, but rarely fruity, if that gives you any general idea. It is broken down into Bourbon (usually from kentucky), Tennessee whiskey, Irish whiskey, Scotch (whisky), and Rye whiskey, broadly speaking, depending on where its from and what its made with. **Tequila** is made from the blue agave plant, and I really can't tell you what it tastes like because I have never had it straight. **Brandy**, **Cognac**, and **Port** are all basically fortified wines. This means wine was taken and distilled to a higher alcohol content. Brandy and cognac can be made from other fruits but they follow the same process.
I probably missed a ton of stuff but hopefully this helps a bit. | [
"Cocktails often also contain one or more types of juice, fruit, sauce, honey, milk or cream, spices, or other flavorings. Cocktails may vary in their ingredients from bartender to bartender, and from region to region. Two creations may have the same name but taste very different because of differences in how the d... |
what's the deal with the uk independence party? | The uk traditonally had two main parties, Labour, left wing, and the Tories/conservatives , Right wing, Over the last few decades both parties have moved more to centre-left and centre-right. This is where the UkIP comes in. The Ukip is right wing party that aims to appeal to the more right wing members of the conservative party who feel disenfranchised by the Tories more recent moderate stance.
One of the Ukip's main positions is the UK should have more autonomy from Europe and European law. Possibly going far enough for the Uk to leave the European union. | [
"The UK Independence Party was founded to press for British withdrawal from the EU, and following the referendum its leader Nigel Farage announced, on 4 July, that having succeeded in this goal, he would stand down as leader. Following the resignation of the elected leader Diane James, Farage became the interim par... |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.