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classes | upvote_ratio float64 0 1 | post_content stringlengths 0 29.7k | C1 dict | C2 dict | C3 dict | C4 dict | C5 dict |
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ELI5: how and why does a toaster in a bathtub kill a person? | explainlikeimfive | ucnpu8 | 0 | R2 (Straightforward) | true | false | 0.23 | {
"comment_id": "t1_i6bmc6m",
"comment_text": [
"A toaster has exposed wiring on the inside where it heats/toasts the bread. That exposed wiring can transfer current to the water and to you. Since the toaster is built to toast bread, it’s meant to draw a decent amount of current, so there are fewer/no safeguard... | {
"comment_id": "t1_i6bmjm3",
"comment_text": [
"The way a toaster works is by running a current through a piece of metal which is bad at conducting electricity (called a resistor). The excess electrical energy is convered to heat and the wires glow. This is why a toaster gets hot. You can see the glowing wires... | {
"comment_id": "t1_i6bmtdc",
"comment_text": [
"Note that depending on where you live and how old the building is, outlets in bathrooms should have GFCI protection, meaning if they detect a current leak, they'll stop functioning until reset. It should protect against this kind of electrocution."
],
"score"... | {
"comment_id": "t1_i6bmqj4",
"comment_text": [
"The toaster doesn't, and if you threw an unplugged in toaster you would just make people cranky. ",
"It is the electricity that kills people. To simplify, remove the \"toaster\" from the situation an think of just the power cord with bare wires. If you threw ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_i6bmehk",
"comment_text": [
"Generally the heating elements are un-insulated wires. The electricity flows out of the heating element into the water, then often through the plumbing to ground. It also flows through the person in the bath tub, electrocuting them."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: Resistors, Transistors, Capacitors (And Ohms) | explainlikeimfive | yfxqs | 2 | Answered | true | false | 0.75 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5v6m9r",
"comment_text": [
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_analogy"
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5v92hh",
"comment_text": [
"We're shooting for elementary-school age answers. But -- please, no arguments about what an \"actual five year old\" would know or ask! We're all about simple answers to complicated questions. Use your best judgment and stay within the spirit of the subreddit. "
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5v92hh",
"comment_text": [
"We're shooting for elementary-school age answers. But -- please, no arguments about what an \"actual five year old\" would know or ask! We're all about simple answers to complicated questions. Use your best judgment and stay within the spirit of the subreddit. "
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5vf0ov",
"comment_text": [
"you..you just solved the whole subreddits problem...",
"WIKI ALL THE POST!"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5v6ny7",
"comment_text": [
"Electric current (I amps) flows through a part of a circuit (with resistance R ohms) driven by the potential difference (V volts) according to V = I R . ",
"Capacitors allow current through them only until they \"fill up\". This makes them mostly allow alte... | |
ELI5: Moles and their function in biology. | explainlikeimfive | 10ubgz | 7 | Answered | true | false | 0.77 | Hey guys. I'm a senior in high school, Bio 2. Not a difficult class when compared to college courses, but only chemistry and physics are harder than it during high school, aside from advanced math classes. I can't grasp the concept of moles. I just don't fucking get them. I read and read about them out of the book, but... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6gpom1",
"comment_text": [
"First, as a bit of advice, you shouldn't insult what you don't understand. The concept of a mole is one of the most important in all of chemistry. It wasn't randomly thought up solely to annoy high school students. It connects the macroscopic world (what scientis... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6gptvd",
"comment_text": [
"This is significant for many reasons. One of which is this...",
"You run a business making a certain chemical. To make this chemical, you have to properly mix chemical A and chemical B in a 1:1 ratio. This means that for every molecule of A, and you need a si... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6gq0bv",
"comment_text": [
"No worries! I just <3 chemistry too much =)",
"You're missing another important definition, that of \"molarity.\" Molarity is a measure of concentration of one thing, the solute, in another thing, the solvent. When you put a teaspoon of salt in water, the sal... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6gqe07",
"comment_text": [
"Not a problem!",
"Not everything has the same molecular weight. As I've said, 180 grams f glucose is one mole, but 180 grams of helium is about 45 moles! Pure carbon has a molecular weight of 12.011 grams / mol. Gold, on the other hand, has a molecular weight... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6gq3u1",
"comment_text": [
"Oh.. and to add. The molecular weight of glucose is always 180 grams/mol. This has nothing to do with molarity or anything. It follows from the definition of sugar itself. ",
"Whether or not you're dealing with a thick syrup of glucose or a glass of water tha... |
ELI5: What is up with this whole freshman, senior, etc stuff? | explainlikeimfive | jn9ty | 3 | true | false | 0.72 | The whole thing just seems unnecessarily complicated. For context, I am Canadian.
I'd like to know when it started, why it started, what the names mean, etc. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2di9g5",
"comment_text": [
"The four years of a four year school are: Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior. This is used in High Schools for 9th-12th grade, and four year programs at colleges and universities. For clarity, we usually append College or High School (e.g., a College Fresh... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2dignh",
"comment_text": [
"As I understand it, Universities use it for the first four years. They also call those students \"undergrads\", as opposed to \"grad students\" who have already earned a four-year degree and are going for more."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2dkcw8",
"comment_text": [
"In America, universities and colleges are ",
" the same thing. Universities are like \"collections\" of colleges.",
"So within Arizona State University you have the College of Arts and Sciences, you also have the School of Business, etc etc.",
"http:/... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2dkdmk",
"comment_text": [
"A college is just an undergraduate school. It can be part of a university or it can be independent. This naming system of years is only for 4-year, undergraduate degree programs (Bachelor's), which are by definition offered by colleges."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2dia9e",
"comment_text": [
"Ohhhh!",
"I was always confused because I wasn't sure if it was high school or college. Turns out it's for both!",
"Is it used in university, too, or just colleges?"
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: The plot of the Starcraft Series | explainlikeimfive | kxtym | 25 | true | false | 0.81 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2o4qu5",
"comment_text": [
"Backstory",
"A long, long time ago, an ancient race called the Xel'Naga decide to create the perfect species, with both \"Purity of Form\" and \"Purity of Essence.\" ",
"First they find and uplift the tribal Protoss, who have psychic abilities and Purity ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2o4t8q",
"comment_text": [
"Starcraft 1 Terran Campaign",
"The Zerg start showing up on Terran colonies, and Protoss fleets follow, burning up any planet with a Zerg presence. The player is the governor of a Confederate Colony that the Zerg begin to appear on; working with Marshall Jim ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2o4u8f",
"comment_text": [
"Starcraft 1 Zerg Campaign",
"The Overmind finds Kerrigan, but instead of killing her, transforms her into a Zerg/Human hybrid. As a Zerg Cerebrate (basically a giant brain) the player helps Kerrigan and the Overmind invade the Protoss Homeworld, and the Overm... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2o4v4o",
"comment_text": [
"Starcraft 1 Protoss Campaign",
"As a Protoss known as Artanis, the player commands the remnants of the Protoss on Aiur. After the exiled Dark Templar return to Aiur with knowledge of how to defeat the Zerg, disagreements between the Dark Templar and Protoss ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2o58v2",
"comment_text": [
"Brood War: ",
"With the Overmind dead, the Zerg splinter into factions. Kerrigan convinces the Protoss to help her faction stop a new Overmind from being created and taking control of her again. Some Protoss disagree with this plan of action and another civil... | |
ELI5: What is gaslighting? (Please cite examples related to your dumbed-down definition as well) | explainlikeimfive | hd9zik | 3 | true | false | 1 | {
"comment_id": "t1_fvjuu1l",
"comment_text": [
"Haven’t you posted this question several times already?"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_fvnzed2",
"comment_text": [
"did i? my bad, my app glitches out often"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_fvjv989",
"comment_text": [
"Gaslighting is when someone accuse you of something and you respond by trying to make them question their own feelings, instincts or sanity.",
"For example, your girlfriend is suspicious of you and think that you are cheating. She confront you and tell you th... | {
"comment_id": "t1_fvjvg1x",
"comment_text": [
"You've already asked this here. Why are you asking again? ",
"OP Response:",
"Huh? No I haven't... ",
"Response to that:",
"You know what, I'm getting real sick of this little game you play where you act all confused and upset when I ask you a sim... | {
"comment_id": "t1_fvjvppw",
"comment_text": [
"Gaslighting is making someone doubt themselves by intentionally lying about something for personal gains. Example would be, \"Don't you remember you said you would give me $500 last night? You did have a bottle of wine but you said....\" . The phrase is from an o... | ||
ELI5: Why do headphones get so impossibly tangled when left in your pocket? | explainlikeimfive | c3q3qu | 2 | true | false | 0.6 | {
"comment_id": "t1_ersgb3c",
"comment_text": [
"Here's what others have said",
"."
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ersgxhg",
"comment_text": [
"Search ",
"headphones tangled ",
"in the search box."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ersfn4i",
"comment_text": [
"Because there are many ways for them to be tangled, but only one way for them to be untangled. Its all just statistics."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ersgq5l",
"comment_text": [
"Lol - wow! Quite an over-asked question! Thanks for providing that - I’ll have a look through. How did you collate all of that so quickly?"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ersrsti",
"comment_text": [
"Your submission has been removed for the following reason(s):",
"There are absolutely no exceptions to this rule. ",
"Users will either find a thread that meets their needs or find that their question might qualify for an exception to rule 7.",
"Pleas... | ||
ELI5: What is this whole pickle and banana war about? | explainlikeimfive | osdzj | 8 | true | false | 0.65 | My friend is questioning me on what side I'm on, and I'm so confused. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3jnxmv",
"comment_text": [
"God damn it. BANANANAS!"
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3jp86r",
"comment_text": [
"Welcome to the fold."
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3jnvcs",
"comment_text": [
"Just choose a side. Questions come later."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3jq6ac",
"comment_text": [
"http://slacktory.com/2012/01/reddit-war-pickles-and-bananas/"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3jssy3",
"comment_text": [
"MIXEDGREENS?",
"There's a spy over here!"
],
"score": 3
} | |
ELI5 the Schrödinger's cat paradox | explainlikeimfive | oa4pl | 0 | true | false | 0.43 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3g3hgq",
"comment_text": [
"I want you all to know that I read every one of your responses in Sheldon Cooper's voice, as though he were explaining it to Penny lol"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3fm4wg",
"comment_text": [
"http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/search?q=Schr%C3%B6dinger&restrict_sr=on"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3fll9d",
"comment_text": [
"Say I'm baking a cake; at some point the cake is going to be 'ready' but until then its still just cake mixture. If i'm not looking in the oven, and there is no timer on the cooker, there is no way of telling if the cake is ready or not. Therefore, the cake could... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3fyv6l",
"comment_text": [
"The Schroedinger's cat thought experiment is intended as a critique of the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics. If you check wikipedia, that is the second sentence in the article. Most people do not realize that, which results in one of the common mi... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3fm3ea",
"comment_text": [
"I have no clue what I'm talking about, so this may be a stupid question.",
"the cake could be both ready and not ready",
"I would think it would be ",
" ready ",
" not ready. It can't be both."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: Tachyons | explainlikeimfive | m32vb | 1 | true | false | 0.57 | Backwards in time wat? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2xpev9",
"comment_text": [
"That's not entirely true. A tachyon is any particle that travels faster than the speed of light; it's a category of particle, not a specific particle like a photon, electron or muon, and a category for which no actual examples have been except for possibly the n... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2xpl5k",
"comment_text": [
"Tachyons are any particle travelling faster than light; \"tachyon\" is a category of particle, not a specific particle. Tachyons are hypothetical; no particle that is a tachyon has ever been found.",
"As far as going back in time, there is a relationship to ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2xphhl",
"comment_text": [
"Whoa whoa whoa! ",
" Simpler, please."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2xrpcd",
"comment_text": [
"Well, it has been suggested that certain particles could be categorized as tachyons. These are particles that are spontaneously created in pairs comprising of positive and negative energy. The traditional and commonly accepted view is that these pairs are created... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c2xqotg",
"comment_text": [
"Tachyons: a theoretical group of particles which travel faster than light (which is usually considered an unbreakable rule). Travelling faster than light is popularly said to allow a particle to go backward in time - but this hasn't been seen by scientists, and t... | |
ELI5: The riddle about one person always telling the truth, and other person always lying. Ask one question to find out who is which. | explainlikeimfive | mrec7 | 5 | true | false | 0.78 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c33b9y8",
"comment_text": [
"you can only ask one question. now that you know which one is the liar, you still dont know which of the doors to go through. You don't know if the liar is standing infront of the \"death\" door etc"
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3390oh",
"comment_text": [
"Riddle: Two doors (A&B) protected by 2 guys, one lying, one telling the truth (both know abouts each others traits). One door leads to certain death. One question total, must choose a door.",
"Answer: you ask what door will the other person point to if i ask ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c33d257",
"comment_text": [
"The trap is that most people will intuitively want to identify the liar, but that is not required. You actually need a question that will generate the same answer from both guys, and you do that by involving the other guy in a hypothetical scenario, as shown by ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c33chag",
"comment_text": [
"that won't work, both people would leg it after they see the other guy brutally murdered."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c33d2lp",
"comment_text": [
"He means when you kill one guy, the other will flee -through one of the doors-, and you can then assume that door is the safe one."
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5: Will air travel technology in the next 10-20 years improve to the point where even the lower class people would be able to travel with out a problem ? | explainlikeimfive | eas8an | 1 | true | false | 0.67 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_fawj1n0",
"comment_text": [
"Define the problem with their travel now please?"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_fawj8hl",
"comment_text": [
"Well I didn’t mean problem per say. My bad , I meant that they’d be able to travel for example from America to Spain and back like the rich do. Basically asking if there are any technological advances on the way that would make air travel extremely extremely acce... | {
"comment_id": "t1_fawkbvr",
"comment_text": [
"A flight from New York to Spain cost about 250-300 USD, you don't need to be rich to afford that. Flying have been slowly decreasing in price as aircraft became more efficient and better organization were created, and this will probably keep happening for the nex... | {
"comment_id": "t1_fawjxko",
"comment_text": [
"Planes will not get cheaper. If anything, as fossil fuels become less viable, airplanes will become even more expensive."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_fawkxmq",
"comment_text": [
"You can fly to Barcelona for 700 if you book now for March.",
"But the cost of air travel is not determined by technology. Not just, anyway. Labor is huge. Pilots, attendants, check staff, ticket staff, baggage handlers, ground crews, security, ATC costs, air... | |
When I play a movie or a game on my 24'' monitor as opposed to my 17'' laptop monitor, the resolution is much better.... why? | explainlikeimfive | q5nz3 | 2 | true | false | 0.67 | I've recently learned about the 480/720/1080 framesizes (I know Im slow) but I still dont get why the resolution is better when I play something on actual monitor. It is the size of the monitor? Is it the mechanics of my monitor (my monitor is 4 years old, my laptop is brand new, I figured the laptop would be clearer).... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3uxpbw",
"comment_text": [
"There are a lot of things that go into a monitor that people don't think about.\nEverything that you see on your monitor is made up of pixels, which are basically little color blocks, and there are millions of these on your monitor. Pretty much everything else ab... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3uzedi",
"comment_text": [
"it is grid of pixels 1920 is width and 1080 is hight "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3uxs1q",
"comment_text": [
"Awesome thanks."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3uz08y",
"comment_text": [
"Awesome! One thing though, why are there two numbers? Why not just say: 2,073,600 pixels?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3uzg68",
"comment_text": [
"The two numbers are horizontal pixels by vertical pixels. We do say 2,073,600 pixels, in a way: megapixels. But that's generally used to describe digital cameras."
],
"score": 1
} | |
Would a Faraday Cage protect electronic devices from an EMP? | explainlikeimfive | s4gpl | 5 | true | false | 0.78 | Just a random thought. Let's say that there was an imminent danger of an EMP-attack. Would placing my car inside a Faraday Cage keep it safe and in working order, after the attack? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4b0ejj",
"comment_text": [
"Yes"
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4b1gt9",
"comment_text": [
"With the slight caveat that it can't be wired up to anything outside the Faraday cage. The entire circuit has to be contained inside."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4b0xud",
"comment_text": [
"Though it depends on the strength of the pulse, the conductivity of the cage, and its ability to withstand a large current."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4b10x4",
"comment_text": [
"Well, it is \"like i'm five\". You could have asked \"If so, how does a faraday cage protect against EMP's\".",
"That question I don't have an answer to, sadly."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4b0lhn",
"comment_text": [
"Short and concise. Thank you. "
],
"score": 1
} | |
Why are countries really far from the equator so much more advanced than countries on/near it? | explainlikeimfive | rrzjz | 54 | true | false | 0.77 | It seems like the most technologically advanced countries are really far from the equator and most countries on/near it are "third world." Is it because the climate is way colder/less consistent far from the equator and inhabitants had to make advancements to adapt/survive in it? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c486ld1",
"comment_text": [
"Jared Diamond guns germs and steel is a book which goes in to this. Boils down to availability of animals you can domesticate that are any bloody use. The Llama for example isn't very strong, the zebra is feisty and also not strong, elephants are a bugger to bree... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c489ajr",
"comment_text": [
"some essential points from jared diamond's ",
"...",
" come on, did you really think it would be?",
" nomadic societies don't do it unless they have to in order to survive. why bother cultivating land when you can just travel around and food is abunda... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c487w9c",
"comment_text": [
"Doesn't Diamond also mention that a harsher climate exerted much harsher selective pressure towards innovation and technological development for the people in the north?"
],
"score": 20
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c487sje",
"comment_text": [
"Lets be honest. If you lived in a place that was always warm and had awesome beachs and tons of plants to live off would you do hard work? I mean why not lay on the beach and enjoy a coconut."
],
"score": 18
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c489kbw",
"comment_text": [
"...and yet you offer nothing as far as informative content?"
],
"score": 17
} | |
ELI5: Why is The Sun called The Sun? | explainlikeimfive | qfnqz | 15 | true | false | 0.89 | My actual five-year-old wants to know. We've checked a couple of science books (nothing) and wikipedia's etymology section (confusing) and was hoping for a clear-cut and easy to understand explanation, if possible. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3x8l5w",
"comment_text": [
"I'm assuming you mean the star and not the newspaper. Let's examine the ",
"Online Etymology Dictionary",
" : ",
"In English, we call it \"sun\". In Old English, it was \"sunne\". Old English came from a language we call 'Proto-Germanic', and in it, t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3x9eqt",
"comment_text": [
"It definitely was not a German astronomer, as we know the word is older than that. Proto-Indo-European was spoken around/before 3700 BC, by the Indo-European people who eventually split up into two, one half going to Europe and the other to Iran and India. This i... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3x8kjy",
"comment_text": [
"Essentially the etymology stems from old Germanic terms that personify the sun as a deity. The words eventually evolved into what we know as \"sun\"."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3xa3dm",
"comment_text": [
"I strongly suggest you use this to explain to your 5yo the concept of naming. \"Sun\", or the same word in other languages (which includes \"Sol\"), is an extremely old word. Ultimately, even if the very original naming moment was known, it would likely be unsati... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c3xf2zt",
"comment_text": [
"Because for most of history, the Sun and Moon were believe to be singular objects. We didn't know that stars were in fact suns or that there were bunches of other moons in our solar system.",
"As we saw them in the sky, Mars and Saturn were pretty much the s... | |
How do nuclear power plants work, and why don't we use Thorium instead? | explainlikeimfive | zdlm5 | 7 | true | false | 1 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63njol",
"comment_text": [
"Elements larger than Lead tend to be easy to break apart. Radioactivity is essentially the property that an atom will break easily into 2 smaller atoms, which are different elements than the original. This breaking apart is called fission. A chain reaction is whe... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63omsu",
"comment_text": [
"The reason we don't use thorium is because we never put much effort into researching it before. At the dawn of the atomic age it was discovered that thorium could not be weaponized, at least not as well as uranium. Thus, to gain dominance in WWII and the Cold War... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c649uyl",
"comment_text": [
"I'm nowhere near an expert on this but ",
"npr did a piece",
" where they interviewed a few scientists on what a thorium reactor is and what the pros and cons are."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c64gmzq",
"comment_text": [
"wow, that was great!"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63nb5u",
"comment_text": [
"and why don't we use Thorium instead? ",
"We're working on it still as it's a fairly new technology and needs to be perfected, the first Thorium reactors are set to go into operation over the next 10-20 years, and some countries such as India are on track to... | |
ELI5: If an bomb was dropped right in the eye of a catergory 5 cyclone/hurricane, would it immediately disperse the storm? | explainlikeimfive | zdva0 | 7 | true | false | 0.6 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63q0u2",
"comment_text": [
"God damn I hope Mythbusters tries this one."
],
"score": 21
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63sbet",
"comment_text": [
"The New York Times wrote about that. I can't find the exact article, but basically a hurricane has far more energy than even the most powerful nuclear bombs. All you would do by detonating a bomb in the middle of the hurricane is to spread radiation around with... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63sqye",
"comment_text": [
"Couldn't many, non-nuclear bombs be dropped?"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63ssgs",
"comment_text": [
"No - you could drop hundreds of massive non-nuclear bombs and it wouldn't even make a real dent in the storm."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c63wdm5",
"comment_text": [
"One of us just needs to become the absolutist ruler of the planet and they can make it happen! Peace out New Orleans!"
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: why do certain channels (HBO, Showtime, etc) have permission to swear, show nudity and violence? | explainlikeimfive | 10kbjb | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e6urt",
"comment_text": [
"Basic cable can swear as well, they just don't by convention and to keep advertisers happy.",
"See South Park episode \"It hits the fan\".",
"I don't know about adult content."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e7qje",
"comment_text": [
"The restrictions are self-imposed. ",
"The FCC says",
": \"With respect to cable and satellite services, Congress has charged the Commission with enforcing the statutory prohibition against airing indecent programming \"by means of radio communications.\"... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e7qje",
"comment_text": [
"The restrictions are self-imposed. ",
"The FCC says",
": \"With respect to cable and satellite services, Congress has charged the Commission with enforcing the statutory prohibition against airing indecent programming \"by means of radio communications.\"... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e992c",
"comment_text": [
"Neither are restricted by the FCC, as neither are broadcast. But basic cable channels generally don't have cursing/nudity/violence because ",
"1.) Parents buying a cable package don't want their children to be exposed to that ",
"2.) Shows are often mirro... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6ea448",
"comment_text": [
"Which, if you think about it, is an uncharacteristically narrow interpretation of the powers of the executive branch. Both cable and satellite television very much deliver programming \"by means of radio communications.\" The FCC just interprets that clause as me... | |
ELI5- Why does the air smell different during different seasons? | explainlikeimfive | 10k87t | 352 | true | false | 0.82 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e6ufh",
"comment_text": [
"You know how on Wednesdays me and mommy cook spaghetti? Then the whole house smells like spaghetti? Then on Fridays we make tacos and the whole house smells like tacos? It's kind of like that. It's smells different because there's different stuff in the air."... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e786q",
"comment_text": [
"Great now I want taco spaghetti."
],
"score": 262
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e8o30",
"comment_text": [
"And now I don't want it."
],
"score": 128
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e7t7b",
"comment_text": [
"You're welcome."
],
"score": 56
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6e6ttt",
"comment_text": [
"Because there are different things in the air. In spring there's tons of pollen and most likely cut grass while in the fall there is dead and decomposing leaves. In the summer it's usually hot and dry which means the ground and plant dry out. In the winter it eit... | ||
ELI5: Why does breathing suddenly seem to become "voluntary" the moment we think about how involuntary it is? | explainlikeimfive | 15dgqz | 11 | true | false | 0.69 | Sorry for making you have to think about breathing now. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7lh5na",
"comment_text": [
"The link between voluntary and automatic breathing isn't fully understood at the moment."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7llmjs",
"comment_text": [
"Your mind focuses on one thing at a time*. Breathing is something your body does by itself, without you having to think about it - like a heartbeat, or turning food you eat into something your body can use so you're not hungry any more. But unlike those things, w... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7lzrgd",
"comment_text": [
"I was taught in biology that there are three types of action: voluntary (such as rolling your eyes), involuntary (your iris adjusting for light), and actions which can be automatic or manually controlled. Unconscious breathing is controled by clusters in your bra... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7ljpvd",
"comment_text": [
"Source? This isn't my field, so I don't know if what you say is true, but very often when people post \"Science doesn't know yet\" on a subject I am knowledgeable in, they are wrong."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7lmlgz",
"comment_text": [
"Source: ",
"http://www.unm.edu/~lkravitz/Article%20folder/Breathing.html",
"Gallego and colleagues note that it is not fully understood how the behavioral and metabolic controls of respirations are linked."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: How did we/animals evolve to experience sadness? | explainlikeimfive | 148g9j | 1 | true | false | 1 | What evolutionary benefits are there for such a cognitively complex emotion? One that is retroactive, and must have developed later in the game. Outside of pain, and then complexly, anger, sadness takes a lot more understanding of our environment and possessions. How did it come to be? Inb4dopamine | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7asil5",
"comment_text": [
"Stop bringing up evolve, evolve, everywhere, everywhere i see theres evolve.",
"People need to understand what the word \"Evolution\" means first of all."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7ax2al",
"comment_text": [
"Enlighten us, oh wise one. What word would you sub for evolve in my title? "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7azxn6",
"comment_text": [
"There is no \"evolutionary\" genefit of emotions, we have emotions to show people around us how we are, humans have had lions site the neanderthals. its nothing we have evolved."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7aw50h",
"comment_text": [
"Hmm. This one is harder to sort out than anger. ",
"It seems to me that sadness could have been developed once we had started forming social circles and communities. Let's imagine we're a member of one of these primitive \"tribes\".",
"Socializing promote... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7aw98o",
"comment_text": [
"I read somewhere in an old nat geo that other animals also experience sadness. Elephants and many other animals mourn their dead. I don't really think it benefits us as humans at all, other than to prove bonds between individuals. "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: The reason for Diablo's overwhelming popularity and gameplay | explainlikeimfive | to9ef | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4ob0m9",
"comment_text": [
"it's got a huge user base, it's been 12 years since Diablo II came out, 16 years since Diablo I",
"the gameplay was pretty simple, with fun spells",
"the story was pretty awesome",
"getting better gear is always fun",
"playing with other people wa... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4obhzb",
"comment_text": [
"A lot of it has to do with \"soulstones\". There are the three Prime Evils: Diablo, Baal, and Mephisto. They each have soulstones that they're contained in.",
"In the end of Diablo I, you kill Diablo and shove the soulstone in your head, thinking you can cont... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4oc6fl",
"comment_text": [
"It is! Here's the ",
"Diablo I ending",
"."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4obnl4",
"comment_text": [
"I first bought Diablo when it came out and upgraded to II then got the expansion pack with the Baal missions. We still play it regularly. We meaning myself and my kids. It just never lost its fun. It is big fun to get one of each character and build them up, ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c4obqav",
"comment_text": [
"I'm going to explain it like I'm five, instead of as though you're five and just say \"it's rad. i get to loot and set shit on fire. easily.\""
],
"score": 2
} | |
What do people mean when they refer to women as having "Daddy Issues"? | explainlikeimfive | 115ars | 1 | true | false | 0.54 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6jgea8",
"comment_text": [
"A girl who was neglected by her father so she seeks the attention of other males through unhealthy means. I will not however explain those means to a five year old, sorry."
],
"score": 13
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6jhlib",
"comment_text": [
"It's not necessarily this. This can be one scenario, but it's broader than that. Daddy issues can be any unhealthy way of coping with life (not just relationships) that was developed as a coping mechanism to deal with Dad as a child. For example, a girl who is di... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6jhu5x",
"comment_text": [
"This is absoutely, true but not the first thing i think of when i hear the phrase used"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6jguls",
"comment_text": [
"Five years old, not five years of psychology. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c6jgwqk",
"comment_text": [
"Yes. I plan on being a terrible parent to help future generations."
],
"score": 0
} | |
ELI5: Fractals | explainlikeimfive | 1bd8qc | 32 | true | false | 0.79 | So I was browsing the Wikipedia article on fractals and couldn't really follow it at all, how do fractals work? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c95tynz",
"comment_text": [
"Fractals are a strange thing. The easiest way to understand this would be to first take a look at this .gif.",
"http://24.media.tumblr.com/c36187d48440bc87295c31798105e3b0/tumblr_mkhga6niN61r3k73wo1_500.gif",
"Fractals are kind of a never-ending picture, ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c95tm6o",
"comment_text": [
"Imagine a spiders web which has water droplets on it because it rained. \n",
"Like so.",
" Each water droplet has a reflection of the web and the other water droplets in it. So if you are looking into one of the droplets you are looking at the whole web a... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c95zgau",
"comment_text": [
"/r/pictureswithpatrick",
" would enjoy this."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c95tpby",
"comment_text": [
"A fractal is like a pattern that repeats itself ",
" of itself. So if you zoom in, you'll eventually see the original pattern, which you can then zoom in on, and see the original pattern again. Technically, you could do this forever and still see the original... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c95twjg",
"comment_text": [
"Take a stick. Put a stick half it's length at the middle of the first, pointing out. Take a third stick half of the second stick's length, and do the same for the second stick.",
"Repeat forever.",
"When you zoom in and out, it will look the same the enti... | |
ELI5: Female Psychology | explainlikeimfive | wqnth | 0 | true | false | 0.33 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fsocg",
"comment_text": [
"You didn't ask a question.",
"There is no such thing as Psychology specific to Women. There is Psychology as it pertains to people. There is culture that shapes the thoughts and behaviors of people. This culture, if it says Women are like X and Men are lik... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5gtdak",
"comment_text": [
"It was the only class that fit in my schedule. I'm thinking it's either going to be a bunch of neo-feminist bs or an actually intellectually stimulating discussion on gender roles in society."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5gtqwb",
"comment_text": [
"Very.",
"I'll suggest that if the course does seem to be neofeminist bullshit, to.. basically go ahead and approach it with the understanding that how you understand society may, in fact, be completely and utterly fucked up and wrong.",
"Because it might ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5grsyv",
"comment_text": [
"I'm taking a class next semester called \"Psychology of Women\". ",
"Apparently it's a thing. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5gtbh6",
"comment_text": [
"See, there's ways that could go well, tying in with Feminist Studies and the like.",
"It will probably be terrible, and use terrible Evolutionary Psychology bullshit to justify why women are good at ",
"finding the butter.*",
"*xkcd forum Thread there... | ||
ELI5: Triple DES encryption and how the Meet in The Middle attack affects it | explainlikeimfive | xfppn | 1 | true | false | 1 | So Triple DES encryption uses 3 keys 56 bits long each. From what I understand the first key encrypts the plaintext. The second key decrypts that and then the 3rd key encrypts that result. From what I've read key 1 and key 3 are the same because if you use unique keys for Key 1, 2 and 3, the Meet in The Middle attack (... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5lyba1",
"comment_text": [
"OP was asking about a meet-in-the-middle attack, not man-in-the-middle attack."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5lyebt",
"comment_text": [
"My bad. Meet attacks are more about math theory, but they aren't my specialty. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5lyoh7",
"comment_text": [
"Not really, but I'm not the best authority on DES. So my understanding is that the key config is independent of the encryption methodology. Rather, 3DES is basically DES but \"reshuffled\" some additional times so as to increase the amount of computational power ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5lys56",
"comment_text": [
"Hmm, I've read over the wiki as well but my professor tells me that the part about Keying option 1 being the strongest is incorrect because due to the meet in the middle attack it offers the same security as Keying option 2 but adds extra overhead. ",
"Truthf... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5lzcvc",
"comment_text": [
"Okay here's the explanation. ",
"So DES has a 56bit key, so at a worst case that requires 2",
" operations to guess the key. ",
"So that's pretty bad and we want to improve it, why don't we just encrypt twice with two different keys? ",
"So our pr... | |
ELI5:Human Cloning | explainlikeimfive | wkoxs | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | So I have read a lot about the ethical reasons that cloning is wrong, and it makes me wonder, can this even be possible? Also, if so, how? I don't know if there is an answer a 5 year old could understand, but a simplified explanation of how cloning is done would be very much appreciated. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5e9art",
"comment_text": [
"Ok, it'd play out something like this (the ethical debate, that is):",
"But they're a ",
" human being! They have rights! You can't just cut them up for their body parts.",
"Ok, so we induce a kind of brain death upon them. Then they're just living ti... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5e5foz",
"comment_text": [
"Inside every cell in your body, there are molecules called DNA. Those molecules contain all the information about what you are made of - from your hair to the tip of your toes. Scientists can easily get your DNA from one of your cells.",
"To create a new huma... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5e72h0",
"comment_text": [
"Wow that is amazing. I knew I should have paid more attention in science class. I'm going to guess that the reason we don't do this is because it basically disproves some religions, right?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5e75qp",
"comment_text": [
"Well... I don't think it \"disproves\" any religion. It's just considered morally questionable by many people, religious or otherwise."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5e8lw1",
"comment_text": [
"Agreed. One of the main issues is why you'd clone yourself, where one of the first answers to crop up, is organ transplants. Sure, the organs (or any other body part) may be genetically identical, but then, what rights does the clone have? Even if it's been medic... | |
ELI5: What's the difference between an *actor* and a *character actor*? | explainlikeimfive | 163t6k | 7 | true | false | 0.78 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7siqos",
"comment_text": [
"A character actor is an actor who plays peculiar and unusual supporting roles, often because they lack the traditional attractiveness and charisma of a leading man. They often have an unusual appearance that lends itself to those kinds of roles.",
"Being a c... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7sl7v6",
"comment_text": [
"A character actor is an actor who is skilled at portraying a specific kind of character. For example, an actor who is always cast as a generic mafia muscle. He will put on his resume that that is his speciality, and that if you need a guy to play a mafia tough ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7sh8s4",
"comment_text": [
"There's no formal distinction, but character actors are those who play mostly supporting roles instead of leads, and are given the distinction because they are quite adept at embodying a wide range of characters to the point of building a career on it. The kind o... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7t2mia",
"comment_text": [
"See: Gary Oldman"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7sm4jk",
"comment_text": [
"In the old studio-system Hollywood days, the character actors were the ones you chose to fit a character. The initial producers' meeting would go \"Okay, I'm thinking we need a good crime story based on a true story. We've got Cary Grant on contract, we could cas... | ||
METAPOST: ELI5 should be renamed, or at least repurposed to Explain To A Layperson | explainlikeimfive | wqic4 | 25 | true | false | 0.57 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fl60u",
"comment_text": [
"I'm always shocked by how seriously some people take like I'm five part"
],
"score": 74
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fkyve",
"comment_text": [
"Interestingly enough, you're also in agreement with the original purpose of this subreddit. 'like I'm five' was never meant to be literal. No one is answering questions expecting a five year old to be on the other end. And this is why the sidebar says",
"\... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fmm6m",
"comment_text": [
"I think they're just angry that they didn't understand the dumbed-down version. "
],
"score": 18
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fkwsu",
"comment_text": [
"That's already what it is. No one really thinks explanations should be told like a Dr. Seuss story. "
],
"score": 17
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c5fmkc3",
"comment_text": [
"I hate these analogies using lemonade stands to explain the stock market or cookies or any other stupid literal ELI5 answer."
],
"score": 15
} | |
After seeing the other ELI5 post today, what is the safest way to torrent files? | explainlikeimfive | 16npa8 | 2 | true | false | 0.67 | How do i ensure i am not downloading a virus? How do i know if a torrent is good? What is the best software to use? Pretty much can someone give a beginners guide to torrenting? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7xoari",
"comment_text": [
"Torrenting is in no way illegal. "
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7ynvyh",
"comment_text": [
"That is a good question. I do not know. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7ynvyh",
"comment_text": [
"That is a good question. I do not know. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7xo7bu",
"comment_text": [
"Yes but you can torrent files legally correct? "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7xoqkz",
"comment_text": [
"Do legal torrents not contain virus's? I just assumed if anyone can upload a legal torrent then there could be legal torrents with virus's? "
],
"score": 1
} | |
How do companies get away with advertising that '90% of their customers preferred their product' when they only take a small sample of their total customer base? | explainlikeimfive | 17fbl3 | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | Just curious as I saw an advert claiming that exact thing when they only had a sample of just over 1000 people. Also, are the 1000 people they asked 'hand picked' as it were, to increase the percentage? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c84yn1v",
"comment_text": [
"You can use a kind of mathematical tool known as statistics to determine what the customers ",
" have said if you asked all of them. It turns out asking 1000 people lets you be pretty sure the true number is pretty close.",
"For this to work, the 1000 peo... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8544ar",
"comment_text": [
"It's not really deceiving. It's accurate to within a few percentage points as long as the population is random and unbiased.",
"Statistics are in use all the time. Political polls only get responses from a around a thousand people. TV ratings that estimate... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c84ysd8",
"comment_text": [
"But how can it be accurate if they haven't asked ALL their customers? Surely it would just be an approximation.",
"Because they have fine print saying \"out of a sample of X\" which is them saying it's a statistical sample. EVen if they didn't have it someon... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c84yf7i",
"comment_text": [
"Because it's accurate, even if it is misleading."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c84ygib",
"comment_text": [
"But how can it be accurate if they haven't asked ALL their customers? Surely it would just be an approximation. Please explain if I'm missing something here... "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: Why is there a ban on screenshots in most of the popular subreddits? | explainlikeimfive | 1dswek | 18 | true | false | 0.71 | Is the ban on memes in many subreddits related? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9tij18",
"comment_text": [
"The communities in those subreddits felt that the memes and other quick-to-read content was overcrowding the interesting articles and other text-based content.",
"If you click on a meme, you can look at it and vote on it in about five seconds. An in-depth art... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9tiw61",
"comment_text": [
"Let's suppose that 70% of Reddit likes memes, and 30% don't.",
"Without these rules, the 70% would \"win\" every time.",
"Sub-reddits like these are presumably run by the 30%, for the 30%."
],
"score": 17
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9tjoqz",
"comment_text": [
"This aint a democracy, if it was every goddamm subreddit would be r/funnyadviceanimalpolitics"
],
"score": 15
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9tiu4h",
"comment_text": [
"It is countered by everyone's ability to make a new subreddit and go there instead. "
],
"score": 12
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9tnd5d",
"comment_text": [
"Even if you suppose the opposite, this is problematic. If 30% like memes and 70% don't, if a meme-lover can upvote 2.3 memes in the time a non-lover upvotes more in-depth content (which they can, memes are very quickly processed), a lot more memes get upvoted. Ev... | |
ELI5: Economics question: if industrialised western nations demographics show aging populations with a decreasing working age proportion, shouldn't that mean greater employment prospects for the young? | explainlikeimfive | 1eb0l6 | 6 | true | false | 0.75 | Mostly i hear problems of aging demographics being greater burden on the working population supporting the elderly and non productive. But again shouldn't this be offset by the fewer people chasing jobs threfore pushing up wages? | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9ygzzf",
"comment_text": [
"Assuming the number of jobs hasn't dropped and that the old folk are retiring at the right age."
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9yhlio",
"comment_text": [
"For clarity - this hasn't happened. The population is aging, but they're also working longer and the number of jobs is not increasing at the same rate people are looking for them."
],
"score": 6
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9yhtv0",
"comment_text": [
"Yes! But not in popular fields, jobs such as mechanics, welders, pipefitters etc. basically a lot of blue collar work is a great field for the youth to get into, unfortunately, most youth usually want to be more than that, so they go to business school, art schoo... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9yio7u",
"comment_text": [
"The number of jobs actually decreases per amount of work that needs done (over time) because of increases in efficiency.",
"We actually need to come up with new jobs, over time, to support this excess labor (imagine all of the farm hands that used to be used ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9yl1vt",
"comment_text": [
"Well, there's a lot more forces at work than simple numbers. Here are some stats:",
"The life expectancy is constantly increasing, in fact on average, your life span has been increased by 5 hours each day due to medical advances.",
"The inflation rate for... | |
Why does everyone take the lower cash option on Powerball? | explainlikeimfive | 13xoaj | 14 | true | false | 0.76 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c78394n",
"comment_text": [
"Why not collect $17,000,000+ each year for the next 30 years?",
"Because you could die tomorrow."
],
"score": 18
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c787hb1",
"comment_text": [
"Well with the amount of blow I would do with that cash; quite likely."
],
"score": 11
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c787hb1",
"comment_text": [
"Well with the amount of blow I would do with that cash; quite likely."
],
"score": 11
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c782b7c",
"comment_text": [
"Inflation makes that money worth less over time, you take it now and try to make it worth more overtime. Also, people always do this, they want as much now as possible and don't want to wait. "
],
"score": 8
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c7828lq",
"comment_text": [
"The current logic is that you can earn more money over that 30 years by taking the cash and investing in the market"
],
"score": 8
} | |
ELI5: Is it possible to detect fasting or dehydration with blood tests? | explainlikeimfive | 1mny6p | 1 | true | false | 1 | I was wondering if using mandatory blood tests anorexia among athletes could be eliminated. Is there a bulletproof way to catch someone that isn't eating normally? | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccazidt",
"comment_text": [
"I appreciate the concern but I'm not asking as part of some twisted motive to game a heath test. Anorexia is the last disease I'll ever catch :). I'm just curious because eating disorders still happen to athletes and I'm surprised the medical community doesn't ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccaz4kz",
"comment_text": [
"A set of chemistries (Comprehensive Metabolic Panel/SMA-18) will show the body's electrolyte balance and see what is in and out of range: Magnesium, salts, Potassium, Phosphorus, as well as how hard the liver is working (ALT/AST) and how hard the kidneys are work... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccaz85j",
"comment_text": [
"Could these results be gamed by say eating a dozen bananas the night before the blood draw? What about just eating a vitamin. I guess what I'm asking after is an \"gotcha\" chemical your body makes only when its not getting what it needs that lingers in the sys... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccazaue",
"comment_text": [
"Are bananas just a random example of food, or do you think you'd skew the potassium level by eating 12 bananas? You won't change the K (Potassium) that much by eating 12 bananas. Contrary to popular belief, you have to a lot of bananas to get the K to be abnorm... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccazm5j",
"comment_text": [
"I wish it were that easy. We can test for a lot of things, but a good set of blood results are only a smart part of what makes someone \"healthy\". Nutritional information can be gathered from blood tests, but there is no magic blood test there. A lot goes int... | |
ELI5: why does it sometimes make more sense to say "you are" instead of "you're"? | explainlikeimfive | 1mri3q | 1 | true | false | 1 | This might turn out to be blatantly obvious, but right now I can't think why | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccbxsg6",
"comment_text": [
"\"You're\", as you know, is a short form of \"you are\".....",
"But what are you?",
"If the word is followed by what you are, then you can use the contraction: \"You're nice.\" \"You're here.\" \"I'm sorry to hear that you're not well.\"",
"Otherwise,... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccbxuw1",
"comment_text": [
"OK this makes a lot of sense, thank you."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccbxos6",
"comment_text": [
"Example? "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccbxr08",
"comment_text": [
"Like \"no, you're\" and \"no, you are\", saying the former just doesn't sound right"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccbycal",
"comment_text": [
"\"No, you're\" is ambiguous, especially when spoken. It leaves everyone hearing it thinking \" No, you're ... what?\" It also does not clear up whether the speaker meant You're or Your (No, your car is, No, your dog has). ",
"In this case, it isn't clear that... | |
ELI5: Functional Programming (today's XKCD) | explainlikeimfive | 1n8p43 | 1 | true | false | 0.67 | I tried reading the wikipedia article and got lost almost immediately. Could someone please ELI5 what functional programming and tail recursions are? Also link to the xkcd: | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccgctaz",
"comment_text": [
"Tail recursion is where a function calls itself when it ends. And example is the phrase \"Tail recursion is its own reward\"- it calls itself - \"own reward\" - at the end.",
"Solving problems using recursion - breaking them down into a function that can be u... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccge3wj",
"comment_text": [
"There's a lovely wiki called ",
"explainxkcd",
" which offers explanation for most of the xkcd comics so far.",
"Here's the explanation for the comic you asked about:",
"http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1270"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccgejq8",
"comment_text": [
"Here's the standard example: the factorial function. I'll use C#, which is a flexible language. Here it is in a \"procedural\" style:",
"int Factorial(int n)\n{\n int result = 1;\n for (int i = 2; i < n; i++)\n {\n result = result * i;\n }\... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccge34e",
"comment_text": [
"Functional languages invariably implement tail recursion so that it doesn't suck up extra memory like it can in other languages."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccgeuq2",
"comment_text": [
"If you follow xkcd, you will find ",
"this link",
" very useful. I think it must be run by, or affiliated with, Randall Munroe, the guy who draws the comics, because it almost always has a tremendously helpful breakdown within a very short time after the ... | |
ELI5: Why does a statement have more credibility when it rhymes? | explainlikeimfive | 1gqbfw | 0 | true | false | 0.43 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_campe51",
"comment_text": [
"Perhaps you should first explain your premise."
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_camsutk",
"comment_text": [
"If anything, rhyming probably ",
" the perception of credibility of a statement. We associate rhyming with silliness and with poetry. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_camqdd3",
"comment_text": [
"Why do you think it does?"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_camqs03",
"comment_text": [
"It does if catchiness has any relation to how often it is repeated or how readily it is remembered, which can impact persuasion. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_campwob",
"comment_text": [
"I don't think this is the case. A statement which rhymes might be more catchy, but I can't really see any evidence that it is perceived as more persuasive or credible."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: How can Sony "own" the rights to characters made by Marvel? How can Marvel "sell" their usage rights? | explainlikeimfive | 18gv6a | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | I get that there are copyright laws that exist. What I don't get is how they actually work in practice from an OBJECTIVE stance. Marvel, a corporation, creates characters. They are the lifeblood of the company. They control their names, plots, everything. They publish hundreds of issues of stories using them every sing... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8eoof1",
"comment_text": [
"So, how in a legal sense, can there possibly be a way to say Marvel cannot place its own characters on a sequence of images printed onto celluloid and displayed through a projector?",
"By making a law that says \"Marvel [if they have sold the rights to their ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8epyaw",
"comment_text": [
"There is (to my knowledge) no legal definition of a comic or movie. Of course Sony and Marvel both know this, so I'm sure that in whatever agreement they came up with, they also laid out constitutes a comic or a movie within the confines of their agreement. The... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8ep9rr",
"comment_text": [
"She short answer is that Marvel promised that they would not, so that they would revive more money in the initial deal with Sony.",
"Marvel invented the character, and they can do basically whatever they want with it. They choose to make comic books. The bo... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8epjw6",
"comment_text": [
"Ok, but you appreciate that digital mediums make things more unclear, right?",
"Comics can live on an iPad. Now there are motion comics. Motion comics even have dialogue in them.",
"You can watch movies on an iPad.",
"At what point is a digital comic ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8epubt",
"comment_text": [
"It's possible that someone will invent/create some third kind of thing, which is kinda like a comic book and kinda like a movie. If and when that happens, we will have to update the laws to say whether it counts as a comic book, a movie, both, or neither."
],
... | |
ELI5: Thunder (Lightning) | explainlikeimfive | 19f9qc | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | Someone just told me that thunder is not actually caused by two clouds bumping into each other. I must know the truth. | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8nhu2o",
"comment_text": [
"Lightning is a sudden and massive discharge of electricity in the air. It's also very hot, so it heats up the air around it. Heated air expands rapidly -- so rapidly, in fact, that the sudden expansion/motion creates a shockwave. This is the loud boom that you he... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8oep51",
"comment_text": [
"So where did the \"when clouds bump\" theory come from?"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8ooepu",
"comment_text": [
"People who don't know how lightning works. And that's not really a facetious answer. Things bang together down here -- drop a brick on the floor, clap your hands, whatever -- and they make noise. So it was a naive but logical assumption to think, \"Clouds are big... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8nhu2e",
"comment_text": [
"Lightning is caused by a difference in electric charge in the sky. This builds up until it becomes so big that it creates lightning. ",
"The lightning is really hot, which heats up the air around it really fast. The hot air expands, and creates a shockwave, d... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8ni1rj",
"comment_text": [
"I'm not sure what they taught you, but it's possible. I didn't pay attention in kindergarden when they taught us the order of the months and I still have trouble remembering it today."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: Why companies having access to your browsing habits and why targeted ads are bad things. | explainlikeimfive | 19ffx6 | 2 | true | false | 1 | First of all, I assume these companies don't have a live person specifically look through your browsing habits/history, and instead it all works through algorithms and code. When you look up "hemorrhoid cream", I assume there isn't some guy going, "Ha! Look at this guy!" And isn't the only incentive to do this in the f... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8njbu7",
"comment_text": [
"They don't have a live person specifically look through your browsing habits. But your browsing habits are stored in a database, so someone ",
" do this if they wanted to. Some people just aren't comfortable with that."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8njcbb",
"comment_text": [
"Imagine your friends are over, and you're browsing Reddit. Then suddenly a targeted ad pops up North Korean incestuous midget porn. That would be pretty embarrassing for most people. This could have been prevented if companies did not have access to your browsing... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8njdjg",
"comment_text": [
"You're correct in that it's generally automated, and things like targeted ads are in fact the normal use of browsing history.",
"The problem is that if I'm looking up \"how to cure genital herpes\", and then I leave, and my wife sits down and starts getting a... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8nmsob",
"comment_text": [
"There are three primary issues",
"Employers, Insurance Companies, etc., love to gather as much info as they can before dealing with someone. And what they are usually looking for is a reason to not deal with you. Let's take an example:",
"When you looku... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c8nl2ec",
"comment_text": [
"In addition to what the other users have mentioned. Data on my computer belongs to ME. If a company wants to use that data to make money (off me) I expect to be compensated for the use of my property. The companies who do this do not compensate the source of th... | |
ELI5: Why would anyone want to buy Berkshire Hathaway's stock if they never pay dividends? | explainlikeimfive | 1ji5dh | 22 | true | false | 0.77 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbevwjs",
"comment_text": [
"Instead of paying dividends, the company reinvests in itself, so therefore you would expect stock prices to rise faster than a company that does pay dividends. So the value you get from the stock is the increase in the value of the shares you own over time, inste... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbezyt2",
"comment_text": [
"By reinvest I guess I mean like expand the business"
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbevok4",
"comment_text": [
"Lots of stocks don't pay dividends. Dividends are more often considered a nice perk unless you can heavily invest in the stock to get a good amount coming back. ",
"The reason you'd buy a stock that doesn't pay out is that you expect their value will go up so... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbf0cw9",
"comment_text": [
"The value in owning just a single share is that you are getting stock tips from the most reliable, non-fraudulent, and profit-oriented Business minds to walk the earth. "
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbevrr1",
"comment_text": [
"From wiki:"
],
"score": 3
} | ||
Is it possible that we may not be the only universe created by a big bang? | explainlikeimfive | 1kd9gd | 3 | true | false | 0.61 | If there was nothing to begin with, but obviously something in which to cause the big bang, does that mean it's possible that another big bang (or more) may have or could happen? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbnrw3o",
"comment_text": [
"not in OUR universe. but u cannot prove that there hasn't been a closed universe before OUR big bang happened. you can't disprovable the statement. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbnr0dg",
"comment_text": [
"Actually, what ",
"/u/CaptainArbitrary",
" isn't necessarily true, if I'm understanding what he's saying/the question is asking correctly.",
"In an article I'm reading",
", it says studies show that the big bang is just the ",
" event that we ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbnrjzr",
"comment_text": [
"i don't think \"before the Big Bang\" is meaningless. there may very well have been a time before our universe existed that some other universe bigbanged and since then has collapsed. then our big bang happened and we're still here. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbnrqdd",
"comment_text": [
"Could you explain the energy you're referring to? I get the jist of it, but the mechanics of why another universe cannot exist due to lack of energy is hard to grasp. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbnqrlo",
"comment_text": [
"No, it's not. It was once believed that that was a possibility, but observations of the universe have ruled it out. There's not enough energy in the universe to reverse the positive expansion of the metric. What that means is that all distances in the universe wi... | |
ELI5: Why do some people not get hang overs? | explainlikeimfive | 1kewh1 | 13 | true | false | 0.59 | I never get hang overs. No matter how much I drink I never get any things close to what People describe as a hang over. If I drank a lot and forgot to drink water before passing out then I might wake up completley dry and need water, but after drinking I'm as good as new. How can my biology be so different from the maj... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo7zn8",
"comment_text": [
"Ahh... how sweet life was before the age of 30."
],
"score": 32
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo9kap",
"comment_text": [
"This video",
" explains what else is going on in the bodies (more specifically, livers) of people suffering from hangovers BESIDES dehydration. Doesn't necessarily answer the question, but I thought it was relevant."
],
"score": 9
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo853d",
"comment_text": [
"im not old at all, but i did not get hangovers till i was like 22 im only 23 now.. but i now get them anytime i drink to much"
],
"score": 9
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo8an8",
"comment_text": [
"Oh the dreaded two day day hangover. Just when I thought Mondays couldn't get any worse. Bam! Still hungover from Saturday. "
],
"score": 8
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo83pt",
"comment_text": [
"That's a WHOLE different kind of hangover."
],
"score": 8
} | |
ELI5: If some plants have defenses from things trying to eat it (like poison), why would marijuana be addictive, and cause animals to go looking for the plant? | explainlikeimfive | 1kewz2 | 1 | true | false | 0.54 | I would think that, because marijuana is an addictive drug, animals would eat more of the plant than less | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo85dv",
"comment_text": [
"How did you come to the conclusion that marijuana is addictive? I don't think you would get the same effect eating it as you would smoking it. "
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo8c4e",
"comment_text": [
"I can't answer why marijuana is addictive (psychologically), but it's not that uncommon for some animals to, for example, eat fermented fruit to get drunk. Also some plants do want to get eaten (or at least the fruit) to spread it's seeds."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo8dot",
"comment_text": [
"It is psychologically addictive.. also you DO get basically the same effect from eating it but you need to prepare it a bit for the body to be able to use it. By making cannabutter and baking with that for example.",
"Not that i think animals are making canna... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbo8g2x",
"comment_text": [
"Yeah you need to heat it up to get the effects from the THC. either by vaporizing it, burning it, or cooking it into something fatty. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cboh20g",
"comment_text": [
"Close, you only really need to remove the carboxyl group from the carbon chain through ",
"decarboxylation",
" "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5:Why people chew and swallow their chocolate? | explainlikeimfive | 1hw90t | 0 | true | false | 0.35 | When you eat chocolate, why do people stuff their mouths and then proceed to chew several times before swallowing? Chocolate is not something you should get full off of. You should enjoy it, a small bite of chocolate you leave in your mouth to melt will provide more flavor than stuffing a ton of it and swallowing it. I... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cayl1t3",
"comment_text": [
"Priority in life, you valued the chocolate experience more than those people who are \"doing it wrong\".",
"There is no \"correct\" way to eat it. Just let people do whatever that suits them. They're doing it \"wrong\" is not going to affect your enjoyment ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cayl5g5",
"comment_text": [
"There are different types of chocolate though; people who enjoy dark chocolate often savor it and let it melt, because the percentage of cocoa is higher and the flavor is more intense. Meanwhile, milk chocolate and other types are more \"watered down,\" with les... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cayoxrf",
"comment_text": [
"Well as an economist, I would say that each piece of chocolate you eat gives you some amount of \"utility\" or enjoyment, based on the flavor and perceived value. So since milk chocolate and other less intense varieties have less flavor, lower perceive value, an... | {
"comment_id": "t1_caylr2r",
"comment_text": [
"MY QUESTION ISNT ABOUT RIGHT OR WRONG though..."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_caynjox",
"comment_text": [
"And my answer is it's all about personal preference. Some people just don't see the chocolate tasting experience as high as you. Which is fair.",
"Somebody taste whiskey and some people drink it like it's water. All down to personal preference."
],
"sc... | |
ELI5:Why can't we just "invade" North Korea? (question in more detail inside) | explainlikeimfive | 1i92sb | 12 | true | false | 0.67 | So I see so much news on North Korea about them treating their citizens bad, threatening to kill their families, poverty/famine, stupid laws and rules, not technologically advanced compared to other countries, keeping POWS. Why can't we just "invade" them, overthrow Kim Jong Un and reunite the two Koreas? By doing this... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cb25rj5",
"comment_text": [
"A) They have a ",
"giant military",
". They have nearly as many troops as the US does, even though they're poorly equipped. There would be massive loss of life on both sides.",
"B) They have vast numbers of artillery installations within range of Se... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cb25qpm",
"comment_text": [
"By doing this, we stop poverty, famine and all those terrible things they're doing AND we can reunite families from S Korea and N Korea.",
"As strange as it sounds, spreading peace and harmony is not the duty of the USA. While it is something we like to do in... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cb25u2i",
"comment_text": [
"Which asshat would that be? The US has been invading sovereign nations all my life, pretty much. When I was a kid, it was Nixon doing this. I suspect you aren't talking about him."
],
"score": 10
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cb2976i",
"comment_text": [
"World Police",
"God damn right, Team America."
],
"score": 6
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cb25nrp",
"comment_text": [
"Geopolitics. Consider how China would react to a unified democratic Korea off it's coast. ",
"According to the wikileaks cables, they consider this an acceptable outcome, and have privately said so to S Korea."
],
"score": 6
} | |
ELI5: If Earth was the size of VY Canis Majoris, and everything on it was proportionally as big, how big would actual Earth be on the surface? | explainlikeimfive | 1pxn0v | 0 | true | false | 0.25 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd74q0e",
"comment_text": [
"Well, put it this way, if you stuck VY where the Sun is it'd stretch out to Jupiter or Saturn. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd73xg7",
"comment_text": [
"So... how big is Earth compared to VY Canis Major?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd740h6",
"comment_text": [
"How big it would be compared to us, if it were laying on the surface. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd745lv",
"comment_text": [
"If you're talking about buildings, people, etc. Crushed flat. The gravity would be too immense. ",
"VY Canis Majoris is BILLIONS of kms across. The Earth is about 12000km across. The Earth is also more dense than a star, a lot more dense. "
],
"score... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd749oy",
"comment_text": [
"Thanks for trying to help. Disregarding everything that would make such a scenario possible, I just want to know how big Earth would be compared to the buildings, people, etc. I want to know so I can have a better understanding of the scale rather than the number... | ||
Why do people enjoy spicy foods, when it seems like that kind of eating experience SHOULD be a turn-off? | explainlikeimfive | 1pwd05 | 3 | true | false | 0.8 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd6pyxi",
"comment_text": [
"Some people get a mild mood boost from it. Since the spicy ingredient is technically pain-producing, it alerts the pain response system and releases endorphins and feel-good chemicals. ",
"Since the degree of \"pain\" is actually tolerable, the pay-off is t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd6rzle",
"comment_text": [
"http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0950329301000672"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd6q11e",
"comment_text": [
"I'm guessing it's the same reason people see horror movies or ride roller coasters. It's a thrill"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd6qchy",
"comment_text": [
"It's also incredibly useful for clearing out your sinuses and sometimes can help sweat out a cold.",
"A bowl of soup with hot spices is just what the doctor ordered. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd6rryb",
"comment_text": [
"While I don't doubt that there might be some endorphin type effect as a response from the pain or whatever, I don't think that's the main reason. I personally legitimately like the flavor. Whether it's blazing hot or just a mild thing, the bite tastes good, same ... | ||
ELI5: Why does Mexico use good ingredients and glass for their Coke as opposed to the cheaper, crappier ingredients? | explainlikeimfive | 1jbwwc | 2 | true | false | 0.75 | Isn't high fructose corn syrup supposed to be cheaper? And isn't Mexico poor? Please explain. | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbd4il0",
"comment_text": [
"Also, Mexico doesn't have an embargo on Cuba and their plentiful supply of cane sugar."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbd4f6x",
"comment_text": [
"High fructose corn syrup is cheaper in America because we heavily subsides the corn crop. In Mexico high fructose corn syrup is not cheaper than sugar. If it consistently was cheaper, Mexican Coke there would almost certainly be made with it."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbd4izh",
"comment_text": [
"Ohh, that makes sense! Thank you for explaining to me."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbd8u1b",
"comment_text": [
"Higher fructose corn is cheaper than sugar in Mexico as well, using sugar is a marketing choice made by Coca Cola."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cbd4p1h",
"comment_text": [
"Coke is made with different ingredients all across the globe. There are many many soda recipes that are all bottled and sold under the name \"coke classic.\" Coca Cola tailors their recipes based on what's cheap in a specific area: the US has lots of corn, so US ... | |
ELI5:Why cant we use energy as a currency? | explainlikeimfive | 1pxqpj | 0 | true | false | 0.3 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd75c7r",
"comment_text": [
" Many people forget that.",
"We are essentially just using a more complicated form of barter trade. You could sell a pencil for $2000 and nobody would have a problem with that, as you price it that way due to your naiveness or just because you value that penc... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd761rm",
"comment_text": [
"What about the factor of personal value? A jacket owned by Michael Jackson sells waaaaaaaay more than any other jacket of the same style. Same goes with antiques and the Monalisa.",
"Society, past and present, obviously hasn't given much importance to conserv... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd75xv1",
"comment_text": [
"We are; Petro-Dollars..."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdfe97o",
"comment_text": [
"Wow you can swear and almost form complete sentences! Good job!"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd75wh1",
"comment_text": [
"Currency already is kinda the place holder for energy and materials. I mean some of the price is related to however much we want to charge. Thats why I dont buy apple they charge twice as much as they should for a computer just as good anywhere else. We determine... | |
What is the human body doing when yawning? | explainlikeimfive | 1pxp6g | 10 | true | false | 0.81 | And why is it when I see someone else yawn I have to as well? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd74nor",
"comment_text": [
"Moves carbon dioxide out of our blood stream which makes more room for oxygen. "
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd779dy",
"comment_text": [
"Source? This is interesting"
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd77we9",
"comment_text": [
"This is actually a myth. There was a study done where even when people are given masks supplying 100% oxygen they would still yawn. In reality, we don't know why we yawn."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd74t6f",
"comment_text": [
"How come they almost seem to be contagious? "
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd764ap",
"comment_text": [
"Studies have shown carbon dioxide levels increase after yawning."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: Why does PC have better graphics than consoles? | explainlikeimfive | 1pxxg4 | 0 | true | false | 0.43 | I mean, PCs have several uses and stuff, and have smaller hardware to the consoles. And isn't it console's jobs to be good | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd76lwz",
"comment_text": [
"Better hardware."
],
"score": 8
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd76mon",
"comment_text": [
"Have you seen the size of some people's desktop towers? They can get significantly larger than that of a console. Mine is at least twice of the weight of an Xbox360 and I don't even have a high-end custom-built PC. They have more room to store larger, more powerf... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd76mvx",
"comment_text": [
"Because consoles don't want to cost more than $600, but PCs due to their open nature can be built for more. Also consoles are supposed to last for a few years until the next is released, but if you buy a PC in the middle of this release cycle the cost of hardware... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd7736c",
"comment_text": [
"Because not including the upcoming consoles your current consoles are pushing a decade in age. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cd779j1",
"comment_text": [
"A PC and a Console are basically the same thing hardware wise. ",
"The main difference is that consoles are standardized to a certain specification and have software to make them work as a living room machine without requiring setup.",
"PCs can always be ... | |
ELI5: Why does the (number of upvotes/total votes) for any given reddit post rarely surpass 80%, even for seemingly non controversial posts? | explainlikeimfive | 1qvqgb | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdh0019",
"comment_text": [
"The reddit voting algorithm deliberately \"fuzzes\" voting.",
"http://www.reddit.com/wiki/faq#wiki_how_is_a_submission.27s_score_determined.3F"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdgztez",
"comment_text": [
"I feel like it's cause there's some people and bots that just down vote everything like you said. Why? I have no clue. Seems incredibly pointless to me, but the ratio of upvotes to downvotes is absurd on reddit compared to other sites so I don't think it's just a... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdh0ic2",
"comment_text": [
"Also content quality. Sometimes it's not controversial, but it's just not good. I'll down vote that. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdgzvwv",
"comment_text": [
"Something that isn't controversial generally isn't interesting either. 'Just states the obvious' is a good reason to downvote something, to allow other more interesting/controversial posts to rise.",
"\"I disagree with that' isn't a proper reason to downvote ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdh6kkh",
"comment_text": [
"This question concerns one of the most frequently asked topics on ELI5, so it has been removed. Try the searchbar next time please."
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5: How does mass warp space-time? | explainlikeimfive | 1qvirt | 1 | true | false | 0.56 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdhga2l",
"comment_text": [
"Part of understanding scientific theory is having a good visual imagination. ",
"When you think of the way a planet's gravity pulls objects around it, remember that it pulls ALL matter around it. ",
"So, imagine that you are a planet and your couch is spa... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdhi2nb",
"comment_text": [
"Right, I understand the basic mechanics of general relativity, but my question is ",
" does mass affect space-time the way it does? Why does space time warp in the face of mass? ",
"Are the mechanics behind it known? From what previous posters have ale... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdgxqj9",
"comment_text": [
"If I could tell you, I'd be booking a flight to Stockholm (It is Stockholm, right?) to pick up my Nobel prize.",
"The best answers you'll get are \"I dunno\", \"it just does\", and \"shut up I'm working on it\""
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdgxxyw",
"comment_text": [
"I always thought it was Oslo."
],
"score": 0
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdgxmik",
"comment_text": [
"Considering that even the most brilliant minds in the world haven't managed to figure this out, I doubt anyone here can explain it in a five year old context.",
"I can kind of explain the theory or basic idea, but not the how or why."
],
"score": 0
} | ||
ELI5: Why are pizza places (almost) the only food vendors who do delivery? | explainlikeimfive | 1qslii | 4 | true | false | 0.7 | I realize that there are other restaurants deliver, but as far as I know pizza is the only type of food with nearly 100% delivery rate. Why is this? How long have pizzas been delivered? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdg0s97",
"comment_text": [
"Any Chinese* place worth its MSG will deliver, as do most Mexican places (at least in my area). In big cities I think its more common for more places to deliver. I can get sushi delivered, for example. I've never seen that in the 'burbs before.",
" ",
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdg19cf",
"comment_text": [
"The argument still holds; why not just put the boxes of fast food in insulated sleeves? They made a sleeve to fit pizza boxes, they could make it in other shapes as well.",
"I'm mostly being a devil's advocate here, which is ironic considering your username."... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdg0ovi",
"comment_text": [
"It's easy to keep a few pizzas warm while you're driving to make the delivery. It's a bit harder to keep someone's burger and fries nice and toasty when you have 5 bags to deliver and nothing to insulate them with."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdg0y2u",
"comment_text": [
"So pizzas stay warm because of the cardboard boxes they're in, right? Then why not deliver fast food in boxes too?"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdg1asm",
"comment_text": [
"It's pretty inefficient, given that they could be delivering anywhere from one meal to five meals - at least pizza boxes are flat enough that they can stack easily, without leaving too much empty space."
],
"score": 3
} | |
ELI5: What caused the american civil war? | explainlikeimfive | 1sml6m | 3 | true | false | 0.67 | Can someone explain me a few reasons why the american civil war started? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdz2960",
"comment_text": [
"The N and S had basically developed into separate cultural and economic entities, which fostered that \"us against them\" mentality. ",
"For the three decades before the war, the real area of contention was representation in Congress. As new states were adm... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdz2ey2",
"comment_text": [
"Too complicated for ELI5.",
"Search: q=the+us+civil+war+was+not+about+slavery",
"Find: ",
"Tariffs, not slavery, precipitated the American Civil War",
"Search: q=did+the+north+have+slaves+during+the+civil+war",
"Find: ",
"http://www.slaven... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdz2c0p",
"comment_text": [
"Thanks! This made things more clearly!"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdz4scj",
"comment_text": [
"The U.S Senate declared from the beginning that the purpose of the war was to restore the Union and that there was no other objective. They passed the following resolution on July 26, 1861:",
"http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/congress-passes-critten... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cdz4scj",
"comment_text": [
"The U.S Senate declared from the beginning that the purpose of the war was to restore the Union and that there was no other objective. They passed the following resolution on July 26, 1861:",
"http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/congress-passes-critten... | |
ELI5: What does a modern 'spy' actually do? | explainlikeimfive | 1t0az3 | 8 | true | false | 0.85 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce317yi",
"comment_text": [
"It depends on what it is they are trying to find.",
"Mostly the only thing that has changed is the methodology. Where in the past you might have a spy infiltrate a government facility and try to steal paper records, now you'd have someone infiltrate a governm... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce39oxm",
"comment_text": [
"Spies have been employed for centuries for one purpose: to provide their sponsoring state additional intelligence that it cannot gain through normal channels.",
"It's very much a build-a-better-mousetrap situation. As we've caught spies, we've made better de... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3bdcg",
"comment_text": [
"Something like >95% of the time they just collect information from public databases/other public sources and analyze it. "
],
"score": 0
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce369rs",
"comment_text": [
"Whow whoa whoa, who's asking?"
],
"score": -1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3c4sv",
"comment_text": [
"\"Heavy is spy!\""
],
"score": -1
} | |
Can anyone ELI5 what is a server? | explainlikeimfive | 1tjzka | 1 | true | false | 0.55 | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce8thxh",
"comment_text": [
"A ",
" is a computer on a ",
" that responds to requests for information from other computers on that network. (A network is just a group of computers that are connected together somehow).",
"Just as a (human) server brings food to a restaurant's clie... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce8ppv8",
"comment_text": [
"A server is a computer that lets lots of other computers connect to it and talk to it all at the same time.",
"There are lots of different types of server, eg. web server, file server, database server, application server. If you've got a specie one in mind, t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce8wqtu",
"comment_text": [
"Does the money earned through gold go to buying and maintaining the servers (hardware) or is it just used solely to pay the IT people who work on it? ",
"It's definitely a combination of both, but what's typical ratio like?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce8whqi",
"comment_text": [
"For example, a file server. I understand that files are uploaded to a cloud and made accessible to many people.",
"Similar to Google drive in concept of storage in the cloud, but what's the difference between that and servers which have been around for years?... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce8xtl3",
"comment_text": [
"Nothing. The \"cloud\" is just a buzz-word for \"stored on a server somewhere\"."
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5: Starvation in North Korea | explainlikeimfive | 1twius | 1 | true | false | 0.57 | If labour is cheap or free effectively... Why are the starving people in North Korea? Could they not just clear more land - even by hand and grow crops that would work in their environment? Aren't famines usually political rather than a supply chain issue? Is it the same in North Korea? If so, why? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cec5ctk",
"comment_text": [
"Farmers don't make more for growing more, so there is little incentive for growing more than you need. And much of any surplus they do produce is diverted to cities and the army.",
"In good years, they barely produce enough, and in bad years, you have famine... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cec71zq",
"comment_text": [
"With a large portion of the population pressed into military service, the North Korean government could press vagrants into food production service without much trouble.",
"The existing farmers wouldn't be terribly pleased, of course. But I think they are unl... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cec4vj6",
"comment_text": [
"Sanctions and trade embargos. Thats why they are so pissed off at America because it bullys the DPRK."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cec58ke",
"comment_text": [
"But couldn't they put more arable land into production with all of that 'free' labour? "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cec5k0i",
"comment_text": [
"These embargos are sanctioned by the UN though and even China has agreed to the latest batch. ",
"This isn't Cuba, where the US continued to violate international trading rights with their useless embargo."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5:Why are so many black men in prison? | explainlikeimfive | 1t2j5v | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3o7n6",
"comment_text": [
"This is something of a hot-button topic. There are many possible explanations, of which I have heard at least the following (this list is far from exhaustive and I am very emphatically ",
" promoting one of these theories):",
"Blacks, in general, tend to ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3pdsc",
"comment_text": [
"I would like to suggest that it has more to do with being poor than being black.(Although people often say they are poor because they are black) If you are wealthier you have a greater ability to compete with the legal system.(in terms of resource Resource manage... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3swjm",
"comment_text": [
"There's also the fact that poor neighborhoods have worse schools, worse (and harsher) police coverage, and less infrastructure - as those types of programs tend to be run at the city level. It makes it ",
" harder to break the cycle."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3o5hi",
"comment_text": [
"A combination of socioeconomic conditions, and a justice system that is statistically proven to be harder on black males."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce3o658",
"comment_text": [
"First I read this I though it was ",
"/r/circlejerk"
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: [Unbiased please] Now how is "teaching pedophiles from their sexual desires" any different from the "straight camps" that try to change the sexual desires of homosexuals? | explainlikeimfive | 1t6mur | 3 | true | false | 0.64 | , but if in both cases this is what their sexual desires are, and assuming they are "born with these traits", what is the difference between trying to change their sexuality (besides the fact that pedophilia is "wrong" to society's standards)? I believe there is also therapy for Necrophiliacs and other similar "strange... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce4uqot",
"comment_text": [
"With homosexuals their sexual desires/actions don't harm anyone.",
"With a pedophile, their sexual desires/actions can/do harm children.",
"In a society in which sexual relations with someone under 18 is normal, the idea of a 'pedophile' is essentially no... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce4vc5l",
"comment_text": [
"What is important is not making the pedophiles change their desires, but learn to never pursue them. If a person wants to desire children in the privacy of their own head, ",
"(creepy, but legal). It is when they DO anything about those desires that there i... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce55dcs",
"comment_text": [
"I agree with this,I don't think you can change the sexual attraction towards children with a true pedophile. You just gotta make sure their desires stay in their head or on paper and not harming real children. Unless they also show signs of going after real child... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce4w4qt",
"comment_text": [
"In both cases, the desires harm no one. The ",
" harmful part is the pedophiles acting on their desires. Let's be clear on that so that we can at least stop demonizing people for feelings alone."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ce4uqrj",
"comment_text": [
"You say",
"(besides the fact that pedophilia is \"wrong\" to society's standards) ",
"That is pretty much the point. It is wrong by society's standards to have sex with a child because a child cannot provide \"informed consent\". They lack the maturity ... | |
ELI5: When was the Year 0? | explainlikeimfive | 1u23c1 | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | Was it 2014 years ago? When did people start keeping track of what year it was, and how did they figure that out? When was the year 1 BCE? In the year 500 BCE, what year was it to those living (since they don't know they're "counting down")? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cedr2ks",
"comment_text": [
"if you use the bc/ad calendar there is no year zero. 1bc represents 1 year before the \"BIRTH\" of Christ. 1AD (Anno Domini or \"in the year of our lord) would be the first year of life for Jesus. There is no year zero, we switch from 1BC to 1AD Jesus 1st birthda... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cedrgiz",
"comment_text": [
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0_(year)"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cedsldl",
"comment_text": [
"Great explanation for me at least!\nWould you happen to know when it became nationalized? I know before different countries used different calendars and dates. But what happened to cause it all to because pretty much nationalized? Or worldwide is a good word. "
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cedswox",
"comment_text": [
"I don't know which country you are asking about, it didn't happen over night everywhere. ",
"Great Britain officially adopted it at 1752, while China as late as 1911. ",
"My own country did it at 1945. ",
"You can read more about it here: ",
"http... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cedrlv2",
"comment_text": [
"Rule #2",
"ELI5 is for requests for easy-to-follow explanations of complex concepts and subjects. That means ",
", that are subjective, a request for a guide/walkthrough, or that are objective but not asking for an explanation of an answer. ELI5 is absolu... | |
Why doesn't How It's Made show the most popular brands of a product? | explainlikeimfive | 1wvd2f | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | i.e the "Pringles" video someone keeps posting to reddit is actually some nock-off. I would think brands would appreciate the publicity? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf5q8q4",
"comment_text": [
"Getting permission to film the factory of a brand name where they probably have methods or ingredients they want to keep secret would be difficult."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf5rqje",
"comment_text": [
"For one im sure it would cost more. Bigger company names have more to lose. More difficult to get access to these type of people. ",
"But honestly if you are watching one about q-tips do you really care? "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf5scnk",
"comment_text": [
"Trade secrets and liability."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf5t1rk",
"comment_text": [
"Modern marvels always shows the brand names, which is why I prefer it to how it's made"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf5ubzb",
"comment_text": [
"There was once a big name condom brand on there. "
],
"score": 1
} | |
Why is it that when it's a really cold night outside, the sky is so much clearer & crisper to see the stars more clearly? [Serious] | explainlikeimfive | 1x79uf | 5 | true | false | 0.73 | I've noticed this my whole life living in southwest N. America, & I've always wanted an explanation. Can anyone help explain this to me in detail please? Is it an air pollution/pressure/moisture thing, or something else entirely? Why does this happen? Would really appreciate it :)
Edit: Thank you for your helpful answe... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf8pu72",
"comment_text": [
"The sky isn't clear because it's cold, it's cold because the sky is clear. Clouds act like a blanket that keep the warmth radiating from the earth's surface escaping into the upper atmosphere so easily. Without the clouds, the heat escapes. This is why deserts ar... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf8puri",
"comment_text": [
"Because clouds help trap warmth in the atmosphere. They're like a blanket over the sky."
],
"score": 6
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf8q7n3",
"comment_text": [
"Cold air is less dense than warm air.",
"Uh, no. Cold air is denser. That's why warm air rises."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf8q7n3",
"comment_text": [
"Cold air is less dense than warm air.",
"Uh, no. Cold air is denser. That's why warm air rises."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cf8tv5i",
"comment_text": [
"The same conditions that lead to extreme cold also lead to still air with little cloud cover. Without wind or clouds, the object in the sky are much more clear."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: Why do best before dates often includes hour and minute? | explainlikeimfive | 258d67 | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | I mean it's not like my orange juice is going to be okay at 14:03 but bad at 14:04 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cheojvq",
"comment_text": [
"The hour and minute are included to identify exactly when that item was packed on the assembly line, sometimes it is called a 'lot code'. In the event of a recall it helps identify which products were affected."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chepd88",
"comment_text": [
"OP: this one here is the right answer. They're basically including the time code for when the product was packed as a way of tracking specific batches, and the easiest way to do that is just include the entire time/date code, with the present time and the date in... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cheofrm",
"comment_text": [
"best before dates are an estimate; often things like milk are actually still \"fresh\" a month to two weeks after the best before date.",
"it's more like a SUPER precaution to make sure things are fresh so people don't get sick.",
"hope this helps!"
],
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cheojcs",
"comment_text": [
"Yeah, I get that they're estimates but having a hh:mm seems like a bit of a overkill.",
"I mean you can easily estimate that milk or whatever goes bad after say x many days, but then it really ought to be enough to put in the date. Why bother with hh:mm which... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cheokog",
"comment_text": [
"Best by dates are an incredibly safe estimate for how long the product will last. In reality, it will last a bit longer than the date, but since they're being safe and giving an early date, might as well give one that is less vague than just the day."
],
"sco... | |
ELI5: How can the international market have such cheap fruits and vegetables and why isn't this an option for poor people to eat healthier? | explainlikeimfive | 24txx7 | 1 | true | false | 0.67 | Everyone's always talking about how expensive fresh fruits and vegetables are, and I agree that in many places they are. However I recently visited the international market and was amazed. Not only did they have about 50 fruits or vegetables I had never seen or heard of before (along with the usual stuff) but it was al... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chan34n",
"comment_text": [
"I recently watched a documentary on hunger in California's Central Valley. Farm owners said only the biggest and best looking produce will get shipped to large grocery store chains like Krogers and Safeway, they won't take anything with blemish. Some people might... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chao7g5",
"comment_text": [
"Or bigger. Stores have really strict size limits on things. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chan65e",
"comment_text": [
"Yeah but most of their produce didn't have blemishes either. It just didn't cost anything compared to what other stores have. That's why I'm confused. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chanah6",
"comment_text": [
"It doesn't have to be obvious blemish, they could be smaller, overripe, or not consistently colored. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chap1tu",
"comment_text": [
"A lot of what people do economically is just due to habit. Why are poor people poor? Often it is because of habits of living that are passed from one generation to the next. If you change what you are doing, you change the result. If you start eating fresh vegeta... | |
ELI5: how bad is the "Youth Unemployment Crisis" really? | explainlikeimfive | 24s3c0 | 0 | true | false | 0.25 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_cha3aa6",
"comment_text": [
"Where?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cha3c47",
"comment_text": [
"Fixed"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cha59j3",
"comment_text": [
"Low ranked schools aren't really existent here. There are some universities that are more prestigious than others but going to a state school for a bachelor's degree is usually a good bet. The idea of \"correct major\" is tricky, because when I graduated high sch... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cha6488",
"comment_text": [
"Older workers aren't retiring. If you are a hiring manager, would you rather have someone with 25 years experience or someone with no experience?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cha3o38",
"comment_text": [
"I went to Texas State, and got a degree in Recreational Therapy, which is the the same as Physical Therapy, minus the gym setting. And, yes, there is a demand for people in Rec. Therapy, unlike history majors. I looked for months, couldn't find anything, and ende... | |
ELI5:Why is the word "colonel" pronounced "kernel"? | explainlikeimfive | 24wb05 | 21 | true | false | 0.82 | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbh6m4",
"comment_text": [
"Article is wrong.",
"Colonel came into English from French, not Italian. And it existed before Italian, in Latin as colonellus. The r pronunciation was adopted from the French (and in Old French it's couronnel), and then people decided to get rid of the ext... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbnllg",
"comment_text": [
"In a related question, where the hell do Brits get the \"F\" in Lieutenant?!"
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbngla",
"comment_text": [
"I believe the correct pronunciation is \"ground cows anus'."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbp9sb",
"comment_text": [
"Apparently it's derived from ",
"lieftenant",
", an older French pronunciation. '[B]y 1954 the Royal Canadian Navy, at least, regarded it as \"obsolescent\" even while regarding \"the army's 'LEF-tenant'\" to be \"a corruption of the worst sort\".' lol"
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbqwic",
"comment_text": [
"Interesting! Thanks!"
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5: Why are "Study drugs" such as Adderall and Vyvanse considered harmful to those without ADHD, but beneficial to those with ADHD? | explainlikeimfive | 24wazr | 21 | true | false | 0.79 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_chb9ty8",
"comment_text": [
"I don't think they're considered harmful, but rather, candidates for abuse."
],
"score": 11
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbj7jj",
"comment_text": [
"They can be somewhat harmful, but they are every bit as harmful to ADHD patients also.",
"It's just a question of risk versus reward.",
"Don't get me started on the FDA's decision to not approve Modafinil for ADHD..."
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbaych",
"comment_text": [
"They're just as harmful for people with ADHD, it's just that it's considered a \"necessary evil\" in those cases.",
"Also, there's a range of ADD drugs, all with their own specific effects and side-effects. A doctor will prescribe you one based on your needs ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbaxxo",
"comment_text": [
"People with ADHD are thought to have insufficiently developed connectivity to brain areas that modulate arousal and attention. The drugs enhance this connectivity by increasing chemicals in the brain that facilitate these connections. For them, taking the drugs f... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chbcc4y",
"comment_text": [
"You dont develop a tolerance towards vyvanse. Your metabolism slowing or fastening changes how effective it is."
],
"score": 4
} | |
ELI5: The Inverse Cube Law | explainlikeimfive | 25ttz2 | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | {
"comment_id": "t1_chkppp4",
"comment_text": [
"An inverse-cube force is proportional to 1 / distance cubed.",
"There's an inverse-cube law for magnetic dipoles (small magnets, small compared to the distance between them). ",
" ",
"Edit: ",
"If you get a pair of strong small magnets, you can e... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chkqg1y",
"comment_text": [
"Shouldn't tidal effects be an inverse square law since it's gravity?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chkqsr0",
"comment_text": [
"Ah, okay."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chkqsr0",
"comment_text": [
"Ah, okay."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chkqubb",
"comment_text": [
"It's the slope of gravity. According to calculus, the slope of inverse squared is negative half of inverse cubed.",
"A similar argument applies to magnetic dipoles. Monopoles (if they exist) are inverse-square. The ends of very long bar magnets act like mo... | ||
ELI5: What is the difference between the old testament and the new testament, and why isn't there a clear split? How does the Jewish religion and Christians treat both? | explainlikeimfive | 265ycb | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | I never understood the differences between the old testament and new testament. It seems that the Jewish people seemed to be associated wit h old testament and not the new testament. The Christians will acknowledge the old testament be seemed to be more aligned with the new testament? Where are the lines splits, esp... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chnyxsq",
"comment_text": [
"In the simplest sense:",
"The Old Testament is the story about the creation of the world and the early history of the Jewish people, it the later books it includes many prophecies about the coming \"savior\".",
"The New Testamnet is the story about Jesus ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chnz9x7",
"comment_text": [
"They are two separate religions. Quite separate, Christians just split off from judaism. So did Islam essentially.",
"It's just Christians still consider the old testament important. The New testament doesn't talk about the entire history of the creation ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chnzfkv",
"comment_text": [
"As a point of clarification, Islam didn't split from Judaism. It's abrahamic, but since its founder wasn't Jewish, it's not technically a division of Judaism as much as inspired by (divinely, if the religion itself is to be believed). "
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cho3z17",
"comment_text": [
"Jesus and his followers were Jewish. He read the \"Old Testament\", otherwise known then (and still is to the Jews) as the Torah. The New Testament was the stories of his life written by his followers who believed he was the Messiah as predicted by the Torah. ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chnzdt7",
"comment_text": [
"Since Jesus was Jewish he recognized the Old Testament, not that that would have been what he would have called it. Christianity began as a particular \"branch\" of Judaism. When it became culturally distinct (very quickly) it was viewed first by its own adherent... | |
ELI5: Three Paychecks for Bi-weekly employees | explainlikeimfive | 275ios | 1 | true | false | 0.57 | My wife seems to think that when I get 3 paychecks in a month that means one of them in found money? It doesnt make sense to me, i still get paid each 14 days and we still get the same bills each month. So how is this extra money? | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxkwu7",
"comment_text": [
"It's not really \"extra\" money but it's fairly common to budget on two paychecks a month and getting an \"extra\" one gets you some bonus cash that isn't in your normal budget."
],
"score": 6
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxl0g6",
"comment_text": [
"Many large, predictable expenses are monthly. My rent, car loan, and student loans, and internet are all due every month in the same amount. If you are paid biweekly, then in most months you will receive only two paychecks. Therefore, I have to plan my expenses s... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxl0bw",
"comment_text": [
"A simpler way to approach the problem is: there's 52 weeks a year, or 26 pay periods. That's 2 and 1/6 pay periods per month, on average. If you budget things out that way, you should be fine. Though really, those 2 extra (above 2 per month) pay checks per year s... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxmc1g",
"comment_text": [
"My employer thinks this too. Trouble is, I get paid based on monthly commission. So to figure what my commission check is, the employer takes the amount of commission I've earned between the first day and last day of the month, and subtracts the amount I've bee... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxmf0r",
"comment_text": [
"Sounds illegal "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: Why do Judaism, Islam, and Christianity differ so much theologically even though they all originated from the same "Abrahamic" religion? | explainlikeimfive | 2737pl | 0 | true | false | 0.4 | Is it just a matter of politics, culture, and religious "revolutionaires" like Jesus Christ and Mohammed who shook things up? | {
"comment_id": "t1_chx8mao",
"comment_text": [
"OK, I'm going to try to clear things up. Just remember that this will be grossly simplified. With the term Jew here I mean somebody who professes the Mosaic faith.",
"First off, these three religions did not originate from the same \"abrahamic religion\", but... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chx1yz8",
"comment_text": [
"There is a clear development. Christianity is an abrupt explosion out of Judaism because of Jesus, whom they claim to be from God and equal to him. Because of this, most laws now no longer apply, since Christians interpreted that all Judaic Law to be only pointer... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chx1p9v",
"comment_text": [
"I will point out that Judaism and Islam are closer to each other than either is to Christianity. Both those religions emphasise obedience without a need for us to rationalise God's actions and commands. Christianity abandons many of the traditions that persists i... | {
"comment_id": "t1_chxbb1r",
"comment_text": [
"You so are awesome! Thank you for taking the time to write out such a thoughtful and detailed response!"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_chwywne",
"comment_text": [
"How are they different?",
"They all worship the same God/Allah/Yahweh, ",
"follow the same central tenets (Don't kill, don't steal, don't be a dick, and follow God/Allah/Yahweh) ",
"and they all have the same stories/famous people; Adam/Eve, Satan, Ab... | |
ELI5: Why is it dangerous to sleep after receiving a concussion? | explainlikeimfive | 28ua9x | 1 | true | false | 0.56 | {
"comment_id": "t1_ciejkub",
"comment_text": [
"It has long been thought that a person with a concussion should not sleep because they might slip into a coma or lose consciousness. Through research and the expertise of UAMS doctors. we now know that there is no need to make a patient with a concussion stay awa... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ciejrll",
"comment_text": [
"I've read somewhere that there is an exception with this involving symptoms such as dilated pupils, nasea, and other symtompts. Is there any truth to that?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cieur9p",
"comment_text": [
"Yes. If they are having issues walking or they have dilated pupils its a good idea to get them to a doctor as it could be a complete different issue! If you are to hit your head you can also damage your neck,spine ect. but if the person is dazed or vomiting then ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cieuxev",
"comment_text": [
"Id also like the point out that even tho this was researched by UAMS i still wouldn't allow a person to sleep unless you are 100% certain there is no other issues with them. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cieuyg2",
"comment_text": [
"You learn something new everyday!"
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5: Why is Jimmy Hendrix considered the best guitarist ever? | explainlikeimfive | 22uz4q | 0 | true | false | 0.43 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgqmmgv",
"comment_text": [
"Well, he isn't. He's considered to be extremely influential due to his song writing abilities, i.e because Hendrix did it first. ",
"EDIT: To expand, nobody was doing what Hendrix was doing at the time. Emmanuel is nothing like Hendrix as a player, and appeal... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgqmmpo",
"comment_text": [
"He isn't. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgqmmvw",
"comment_text": [
"arguments about artistic talent are almost never done on objective grounds. and fame has no real correlation with talent. fame is about appeal, relative positioning, and some degree of luck."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgqmqyw",
"comment_text": [
"People like Tommy Emmanuel are technically great guitar players. However, they are not highly influential players and that's something thats needed to become \"the best\" in many peoples opinion.",
"Hendrix may not have been the best technical player but he w... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgqnnpr",
"comment_text": [
"I think Jimi Hendrix is considered a top performer introducing a unique style. His music has stood the test of time.",
"\nI think when you talk about great guitarists, you either have to specify a style, time period, or group size. You couldn't objectively p... | ||
ELI5: Why can hospitals charge $50 a pill for Tylenol, but I can buy a whole bottle at the store for $5? | explainlikeimfive | 28sb8s | 58 | true | false | 0.78 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cie153d",
"comment_text": [
"All those things you listed are charged for and listed on the bill.",
"They charge so much for tylenol because they can, actual healthcare is a distant 2nd to making an obscene profit."
],
"score": 37
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cidzr77",
"comment_text": [
"You're not just paying for the tylenol. You're paying for the nurse to give it to you, to make sure it's the right thing, for the diagnosis from the doctor to give you the tylenol, for anything any of the techs have to do for you, for the bed you're sitting in, f... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cie0xcp",
"comment_text": [
"What about like anybody who ever died from a fever before the 1900s?"
],
"score": 13
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cie9kc5",
"comment_text": [
"comment removed by user or moderators",
"What did it say?"
],
"score": 12
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cie2c2e",
"comment_text": [
"I came here to say the same thing.",
"I can't understand why anyone would down vote you."
],
"score": 10
} | ||
ELI5: Why do some noises make us shiver? | explainlikeimfive | 22jws5 | 13 | true | false | 0.85 | So I was stirring soup earlier and the sound of the spoon scraping the bottom of the pan made me shiver. Why is this? And why are some people okay with sounds that others shiver at? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgnr3bx",
"comment_text": [
"For me I always shiver at the end of the National Anthem at Baseball or Football games. Every time! "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgns4p5",
"comment_text": [
"I have an idea Op is talking about nails on a chalkboard"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgnsdqs",
"comment_text": [
"That too! "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgnt62p",
"comment_text": [
"From a touch if brief research it seems that the more accepted theory is that the sound has similar qualities to the call or a predator or a warning call of our species, causing a subconscious reaction. I find it more interesting though that this reaction (for me... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cgnylft",
"comment_text": [
"I have misophonia so I searched a lot about why sounds affect us in a way we can't understand. Apparently, no one is born that way. Something in your life, maybe your subconscious, associated certain sounds with something depleasing. That \"desease\" was found in... | |
ELI5: What happens when I crack my knuckles/back/neck? | explainlikeimfive | 1bkg37 | 10 | true | false | 0.82 | {
"comment_id": "t1_c97k5xl",
"comment_text": [
"I've seen this discussed a few times here and I encourage ANYONE who posts an answer to back it up with a reliable source. There's just too many different answers from people who have heard from other people that the cracking is caused by X. "
],
"score": 6
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c97kati",
"comment_text": [
"I think that's basically it",
"Nothing too hard and a government source. Same think you'll see on wikipedia. The thing is, wikipedia only lists 3 published papers as a source, maybe because this question is of little to no interest to physicians. "
],
"sc... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c97kck9",
"comment_text": [
"I don't think there's any scientific data to support that claim. If cavitation is the reason behind crepitus (the sound your joints make when you crack them), the released nitrogen, carbon dioxyde, etc.. would dissolve again in the synovial fluid. Maybe in other ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_c97htvy",
"comment_text": [
"Where does the nitrogen go?"
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c97htvy",
"comment_text": [
"Where does the nitrogen go?"
],
"score": 3
} | ||
ELI5: Politics. | explainlikeimfive | 1cxsi3 | 0 | true | false | 0.4 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9l4548",
"comment_text": [
"Don't sent the uninitiated to ",
"/r/politics",
". That's cruel and unusual punishment."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9kyour",
"comment_text": [
"You are going to need to be more specific about what you want to know because this is ",
" broad. It's like saying \"ELI5: math.\""
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9l46dp",
"comment_text": [
"They will maul you... into agreeing with them."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9l49vj",
"comment_text": [
"What if we cross post this into ",
"/r/politics",
"?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_c9l4bu9",
"comment_text": [
"Oh man. My brain would hurt."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: How is it that certain animals above a given size can't exist because they'd collapse under their own weight? | explainlikeimfive | 1nxmm6 | 0 | true | false | 0.33 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccmzscn",
"comment_text": [
"Life as we know it (this includes animals) is made up of cells. For a cell to survive it must be able to transport nutrients in and transport waste products out. Obviously this transport in and out can only occur at the edge of the cell.",
"Consider a spher... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccn0j89",
"comment_text": [
"Square cube law. It states, roughly, that mass increases faster than volume. So an animal 100 times the size would be much more than 100 times as massive, and therefore be much heavier than it could support."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccn0j64",
"comment_text": [
"Thanks for your reply. \nI always thought there would just be more cells rather than larger ones. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccn0ypz",
"comment_text": [
"More cells isn't an explicit answer to your question though. I just re-reread my response and I think I might have thought I was in ",
"/r/askscience",
" when I made it.",
"As a creature grows greater mass directly upwards it generates a greater forc... | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccmzlha",
"comment_text": [
"It's theoretically possible, yes. The muscular requirements for enormous animals would be absurd, meaning they'd require a ton of food. Doesn't really work out that well in practice (except for in the ocean, where the water helps support the creature's weight)"... | |
ELI5: why monopolies are illegal but oligopolies aren't | explainlikeimfive | 1njoih | 2 | true | false | 0.62 | just doesnt make sense to me | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccj6kyz",
"comment_text": [
"Monopolies aren't illegal, they are restricted to prevent their abuse. Price fixing and collusion between a few companies us also restricted."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccj6njb",
"comment_text": [
"oh well damn. it just seems like something that oughtta be illegal. i guess i just assumed"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccj6pqm",
"comment_text": [
"Nothing fundamentally wrong with being the only company selling something. The problem chimes when they use their power to so competition and abuse consumers."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccj6rrc",
"comment_text": [
"seems to me like the entire idea is centered around the idea of abusing the consumers"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_ccj8tzy",
"comment_text": [
"The problem is that, if you assume that monopolies ",
" Abuse the customer and thus must be broken up, then there's less incentive to innovate.",
"If I invent a device called the Moskau5000 that automatically makes tie-dye shirts (just put in some dye and... | |
ELI5: What is election day, who votes on what and what do I need to know as a foreigner? | explainlikeimfive | 2l75qg | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cls2vj5",
"comment_text": [
"If a person is not a US citizen they're not allowed to vote in the US, because they aren't allowed to register to vote. If a person is not a legal resident of a state they can't register there. If a person is not 18 at the time of the election they can't regist... | {
"comment_id": "t1_clswaib",
"comment_text": [
"What is election day",
"The day that people vote for their political representatives, leaders, changing laws, and other people involved in government.",
"There are also going to be a lot of state and local elections on the ballot.",
"These are for off... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cls3wy7",
"comment_text": [
"In the United States elections are broken into 3 groups, local, state, and federal. In Local elections the voter votes on things that concern the city they live in such as city laws, who the mayor is, police commissioner. In State elections the voter can vote on ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_clsvlv1",
"comment_text": [
"That is a bit rude and assumptive. Maybe they don't need to know it for voting purposes, but maybe they need to know it so they are more informed."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_clsy0uf",
"comment_text": [
"Yea I know it came out rude....apologies. But still it's true. As a foreigner there's nothing I needed to know about it from practical point of view. From educational point of view , yes theres knowledge to be gained."
],
"score": 1
} | ||
ELI5 New audio technology | explainlikeimfive | 2mofnc | 32 | true | false | 0.81 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm63dtv",
"comment_text": [
"Some of those \"blue-tooth speaker things\" are stereo; they simply have a pair (or more) of speakers inside of them. Some aren't. Just because the speakers share a housing doesn't mean you can't have stereo. ",
"Why are Beats By Dre so expensive? Because t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm6809g",
"comment_text": [
"To me, the glory days of audio were the '70s with great equipment from Marantz, Kenwood, Pioneer, etc. STEREO with plenty of power and kickass speakers.",
"I love the old HiFi stuff. You can still get all of that stuff, and even more. The primary difference w... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm64vjj",
"comment_text": [
"My dad had a Pioneer modular hi-fi, the dual cassette unit was fucking awesome, as was the RF tuner / power-amp.",
"I know where OP is coming from with \"Great\" equipment."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm64xad",
"comment_text": [
"People don't talk about stereo as much because it's basically the default now. In the 70's, it was a big deal whether something was stereo or not, and music was mixed in a way that made heavy use of the stereo separation. These days everything is ",
" stereo ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm695rt",
"comment_text": [
"I'm an audio junkie, and 2.1 speakers (two stereo speakers and a subwoofer) are great for 95% of home applications, in my opinion. The subwoofer is nice for a couple reasons. First, you don't have to have huge main front speakers to get good bass response. Sec... | |
ELI5: How does compression clothing exactly work and does it really help? | explainlikeimfive | 2mltf9 | 9 | true | false | 0.72 | I see people at my gym dressed like they about to do go surfing and I wonder if it really makes a difference. | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm5fpyp",
"comment_text": [
"I don't know about the people you have seen,but I wear a compression sleeve because I had my lymph nodes taken out along with a mastectomy some time ago. I became one of the 5% that developed lymphedema, or swelling, and the sleeve, helps with that. It is tighte... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm5hxq6",
"comment_text": [
"It's tight but stretchy enough that, if sized properly, it won't cut off your circulation or bind your movement. This kind of squeezes the part of your body that it's over.",
"For athletes, it's used for a few reasons. It can help keep you warmer than loose c... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm5kz3z",
"comment_text": [
"My wife is a surgical tech and she wears compression socks everyday because she stands in the same spot for 8 hours. When she wasn't wearing them her legs would be in pain by hour 2 of work. A lot of surgery people wear them."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm5mzbf",
"comment_text": [
"things like knee bands help to control swelling. ",
"if there's some weird fad that has people going to the gym in wet suits, it's insanity. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm5r7xq",
"comment_text": [
"I wear compression shorts on dates and that's about it..."
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5:Why is free and open immigration bad for country? | explainlikeimfive | 2md4zz | 1 | true | false | 0.57 | I read a book on libertarianism and the author said that many libertarians advocate free and open immigration. He stated that it has the potential to increase world GDP by 60-70 trillion, have little effect on wages, and little or no effect on crime. Also, they wouldn't be able to take advantage of the welfare state. I... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm34407",
"comment_text": [
"As a Canadian born citizen, I can absolutely not find any job opportunities. I have been flat out told that employers are only looking for foreign workers by the employers themselves. I am open to immigration but I personally think it should be controlled. I see ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm34q4h",
"comment_text": [
"1) You have ethnic and cultural issues when the native population gets too diluted. ",
"2) You have citizens unable to find jobs in their own country. "
],
"score": 7
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm34704",
"comment_text": [
"One aspect of the problem can arise from cultural/ethnic differences, which inevitably would result in higher crime rates/violence whenever different cultures/ethnicities interact. This can be seen all over the world, from Europe, to the Middle East, to the Medit... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm34qla",
"comment_text": [
"Also Canadian and have to agree with this.",
"I like immigrants when they integrate and can respect that this is a land of opportunity but we already have too many who don't make any effort to integrate. Also about jobs, it is hard to compete when there are p... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cm35uir",
"comment_text": [
"A lot of immigrants I have spoken to are also just here and living on welfare. That's not fine either. They're overflowing in the workforce and in social welfare. It's not fair to native citizens one bit."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: What happens in time sensitive jobs during the Daylight Saving Time hour? | explainlikeimfive | 2l5mug | 799 | true | false | 0.89 | {
"comment_id": "t1_clrohv5",
"comment_text": [
"We use the current time regardless in hospital settings. Obviously this can result in 2 events happening at 1 am but occurring an hour apart. It isn't a problem cause we can just communicate until we have an understanding and besides, everyone working already kno... | {
"comment_id": "t1_clrpvqr",
"comment_text": [
"I just now realized the difference between EST and EDT. Wowwww I'm slow"
],
"score": 149
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_clroq72",
"comment_text": [
"This isn't exactly about a time sensitive job, but I used to work night shifts at a Pizza Place where my shifts went from five at night to four in the morning. Mind you I work in a college town and this is the only pizza place\nOf that franchise in the town so it... | {
"comment_id": "t1_clrol9j",
"comment_text": [
"Have you watched television at 2am? They're not losing much."
],
"score": 121
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_clrpi5y",
"comment_text": [
"Because.... You know.... Daylight savings isn't a secret. "
],
"score": 117
} | ||
ELI5: Why do we say "People with autism" because we don't want autism to define a person but we stills say pedophiles? | explainlikeimfive | 2ut889 | 0 | true | false | 0.25 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_cobg2is",
"comment_text": [
"Because no one gives a shit about offending pedophiles. It's sad because if we did perhaps some of them could be helped before they hurt a child, but we don't. "
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cobgaau",
"comment_text": [
"Terms like epileptic, diabetic, even cripple are still used sometimes in the US. Lunatic, spastic, etc., have mostly phased out though, and more terms similar to these probably will down the road. As far as social stigmatization goes, pedophiles have a lot more t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cocnlxk",
"comment_text": [
"The term currently being popularized is: Minor Attracted Person. Or MAP I suppose."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cobg4t5",
"comment_text": [
"Whether they are consciously aware of it or not, most people view pedophilia as a choice, whereas autism is something a person is afflicted with. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cobgwxe",
"comment_text": [
"Autism refers to a spectrum of disabilities not just one. Think of it as cancer --then you have the actual diagnosis. ",
"Pedophilia, while it can technically can be a disability, it isn't necessarily. "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: Why people want to get drunk? (for the sake of getting drunk?) | explainlikeimfive | 2nb5h8 | 2 | true | false | 0.6 | Okay, so I can understand, actually no scratch that, why the hell do people get drunk for the sake of being drunk? For instance my brother gets drunk just because he can, he claims he hates the taste of beer etc, yet forces himself to drink it to he can 'enjoy himself', why can people not find enjoyment without drinkin... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmc0esz",
"comment_text": [
"Well I enjoy the taste of beer, so that's an aspect of it as well, many people I know enjoy alcohol in some form or another and that makes getting drunk quite a bit easier. ",
"That said, you probably got ",
" drunk. There's a fine line, especially if you... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmc0um0",
"comment_text": [
"That's also possible. My best friend loves getting completely hammered and he is almost always in pretty decent control of himself relatively speaking, but he always tries to get me to go beyond my limit. Not that it works, because I hate being too drunk."
],
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmc0lkx",
"comment_text": [
"That's definitely true, and a whole other aspect of it as well. Like I said, me personally I love a good buzz and after a long while of not really knowing my limits I finally learned how to manage my alcohol intake so I get the most fun out of the evening."
],
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmc1il9",
"comment_text": [
"I'll give you the example of my life and my drinking habits, just to give a general idea of ",
" people like to drink.",
"In an average week, I'll consume somewhere between 2 and 6 standard drinks. 90% of this happens in my home with my girlfriend and ro... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmc1vzf",
"comment_text": [
"In my case, I like drinking only with friends or in a group of people. Firstly because I like beer under that circumstance, but more importantly, because it makes me less shy and more talkative. "
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5: Ladies' nights at clubs | explainlikeimfive | 2v0f65 | 0 | true | false | 0.38 | {
"comment_id": "t1_codbz74",
"comment_text": [
"They are illegal in a few states, but by and large it has to do with a principle called \"State Action\". ",
"I assume you are alleging that a \"ladies night\" is discriminatory towards men. How can any discrimination be considered legal? ",
"The big anti... | {
"comment_id": "t1_codby8b",
"comment_text": [
"A lot of states are actually outlawing ladies' nights at bars and clubs. I think it's illegal in CA now. Most likely it will be outlawed in that state soon enough, and even then it will still happen. It just won't be specifically advertised."
],
"score": 1... | {
"comment_id": "t1_codcr4r",
"comment_text": [
"The interesting way I've seen bars/clubs get around this is have \"ladies' night\" be about specific drinks being cheap, rather than all drinks being cheap for specific people. So they'll do cheap cosmos, appletinis, and other \"girly\" drinks. Men can buy them... | {
"comment_id": "t1_codcv1k",
"comment_text": [
"That's cool, because it also makes it cheaper for men to buy women drinks. Do those clubs still advertise it as ladies' night, or do they just advertise the mixed drinks being cheaper?"
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_codisk2",
"comment_text": [
"The one I'm thinking of calls it \"Ladies' Night Out\", but on the billboard underneath that it lists the 4 or so cheap mixed drinks. So kind of both? We're a student town with a relatively high male population, so that might impact their choice of advertising.... | ||
ELI5 what causes 'Teflon sh*ts'? | explainlikeimfive | 2vgv6m | 5 | true | false | 0.59 | I heard the term 'Teflon sh*ts' first coined about 2 years ago as: 'When you shit and you only have to wipe once, or not at all due to low or no residue left behind.' What causes this beautiful phenomenon? Is there something I can add to my diet to make it happen more? Sorry for asterisk, I am not sure how to set as NS... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cohidlp",
"comment_text": [
"I mastered this at a young age. Provided you don't have the runs, this is easy. When you sit down, put one thigh down first at an angle. Like you are going to sit with half of your leg hanging off the toilet. Dig in, scoot your butt over like you are trying t... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cohipi9",
"comment_text": [
"He definitely has 'concentration marks' on both his thighs as he typed that up, 'cause you know he's shatting and Redditing. ",
"But agreed!"
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cohjgo7",
"comment_text": [
"I've always called the 'no wipe' a flawless victory. "
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cohlr5k",
"comment_text": [
"No wipe? Not even a check?",
"You live a dangerous life, friend."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cohiido",
"comment_text": [
"I have to say, the procedure is rather glorious in how well you've thought it out."
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: Why don't buses have seatbelts? | explainlikeimfive | 2csou9 | 0 | true | false | 0.5 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjilv24",
"comment_text": [
"For school buses, a few reasons:",
"Ultimately: benefit does not outweigh expense (financial, logistical, or safety). I also think a lot people look at all the other safety measures (color, flashing lights, low speed, signs, etc.) that prevent buses from be... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjil75k",
"comment_text": [
"All newly built buses in the UK now have to have seat belts by law as far as I am aware. "
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjimb87",
"comment_text": [
"This is one of the more commonly asked questions here, so I'm going to remove it. Please use the search bar and you'll find several answers to it. There's no rule against reposting questions, but please be sure to indicate that you've searched and haven't found ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjil2j8",
"comment_text": [
"Not 100% sure, but I believe it was deemed too expensive to install it on all the older buses."
],
"score": 0
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjil4xr",
"comment_text": [
"I'm speculating....",
"Expense.",
"Decreased need, due to not being launched forward. And possibly decreased chance of neck and back injuries from being jerked, due to the mass of the bus.",
"Competing requirements. A bus is more likely to flip. You'l... | ||
ELI5: The Puritan culture | explainlikeimfive | 2d35or | 1 | true | false | 0.55 | [deleted] | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjllojq",
"comment_text": [
"The \"Puritans\" considered themselves \"pure\" and they considered the Church of England to be decadent. ",
"That is why many left England in the 17th centuries to develop a new colony, where their religion and ",
" would reign supreme. ",
"In the en... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjlm6mg",
"comment_text": [
"In the 17th century there were many sects who were not happy with the Church of England, which was and still is the dominant religion in England.",
"The Puritans were one of these sects and they left England to create their vision of a \"perfect\" (or intoler... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjlli6w",
"comment_text": [
"Do your research independently, Johnny. "
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjllked",
"comment_text": [
"Sorry to disappoint but it isn't."
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjlls4u",
"comment_text": [
"But the thing is, I know the puritans are involved with Protestantism in one way or another. How and why?"
],
"score": 1
} | |
ELI5 Why is electricity the most commonly used power to make machines work? | explainlikeimfive | 2d52fq | 3 | true | false | 0.67 | I guess steam can be used as well. But what other forms of powering machines are there? And how efficient? How different would it all be if electricity wasn't used, but one of the alternative ones instead? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjm5f81",
"comment_text": [
"imagine the amount of pipe it would take to furnish a city block with steam to run appliances today, not to mention the heat the pipes would give off. water wheels were used a lot before electricity, ",
"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBqNxXlJxHA",
" ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjm5pi4",
"comment_text": [
"Steam itself isn't an energy source. Steam engines would use some type of fuel (usually coal, I believe) to heat water creating steam, which mechanically drives the engine. Steam is merely a mechanical part of the process. Believe it or not, nuclear power plants ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjm5pyh",
"comment_text": [
"Electricity is used because you can send a lot of \"it\" using easy to obtain, easy to maintain, easy to install, easy to troubleshoot, and easy to repair conductors. You can then manipulate it easily for many functions.",
"You can replace the word easy with ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjm540x",
"comment_text": [
"As far as I know electricity isn't a form of power in itself, but simply a method of transmitting it, and so I assume it's simply because it's the most efficient. Steam, for example, would take up huge amounts of space, waste massive amounts of energy due to heat... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjm55ik",
"comment_text": [
"You have combustible fuel (oil, gas and coal) and nuclear power as well (which gives steam and in turn electricity). We use what is cost effective, and in contemporary times what is renewable. The efficiency depends on the machine in question, trains and submarin... | |
ELI5: why do I look better in the mirror than on photos? | explainlikeimfive | 2czzp4 | 20 | true | false | 0.81 | why do I look better in the mirror than on photos and am I actually more attractive in one instance or is it just that I'm used to seeing the mirrored reflection and not the photo one? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjkpiob",
"comment_text": [
"You don't really look better, you just look \"normal\", and normal is what you're used to. Normal is the baseline you are trying to achieve every day when you wake up and look in the mirror. If you can hit that baseline, you think you look good, when in reality y... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjl789x",
"comment_text": [
"Oh god :("
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjl7o3g",
"comment_text": [
"Well, the point is that you DON'T look bad in real life, or in photos. You just feel like you do. Ask 100 people if they think they look good in photos, and 95 of them will say no. But do YOU think those people look bad in photos? No. They look just like they nor... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjkpplg",
"comment_text": [
"You are more used to see your reflexion than yourself in photo where you are flipped on the other side. You also can take the pose in front of the mirror, you control what you see. "
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjl6zf9",
"comment_text": [
"So to follow up on this do other people typically see me as I see myself in the mirror or as I look in photos?"
],
"score": 2
} | |
ELI5: How can rappers sing about illegal things but not get in trouble? | explainlikeimfive | 2dp0hr | 0 | true | false | 0.25 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjrn0tq",
"comment_text": [
"Because you can talk about illegal things as well, and not get in trouble.",
"Talking about them is fine, doing them is what's wrong."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjrn1nh",
"comment_text": [
"I murdered Hitler.",
"See, I said it, and it's not true."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjrn2x7",
"comment_text": [
"Well folks, me managed 5 minutes without a Hitler reference.",
"That's not bad i guess!"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjrn4q5",
"comment_text": [
"I wanted something anyone could guess I was lying about. :)"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjrn0ui",
"comment_text": [
"Just a small, unimportant part of American government called the Constitution. Which has a small thing called the first amendment. "
],
"score": 2
} | ||
ELI5: Why Can't A Pipeline Be Built For Water To Drought Stricken Regions From Huge Lakes in Other Regions? | explainlikeimfive | 2ebswz | 4 | true | false | 0.7 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjxyx1e",
"comment_text": [
"They can, and to a point do this. San Francisco gets it's water from the ",
"Htech Hetchy valley",
".",
"Generally it's not economical to do so. putting in major lengths of piping to move fresh water would be quite expensive. We do that with oil, but ... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjxzd11",
"comment_text": [
"Because Midwesterners will vehemently and possibly violently object to water from the Great Lakes going to a desert.",
"Source: I grew up in Wisconsin."
],
"score": 5
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjxzo1a",
"comment_text": [
"They're all connected and draining Michigan would mess the whole system up."
],
"score": 4
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjxzlgd",
"comment_text": [
"Even if they didn't, the Great Lakes are international with Canada and they'd be opposed to siphoning them off to a desert in America."
],
"score": 3
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjy00il",
"comment_text": [
"Lake Michigan is actually covered under the various Great Lakes agreements since they all cover the entire watershed. In fact, several of them were signed in Milwaukee which is ",
" Lake Michigan."
],
"score": 2
} | ||
ELI5: Why do Americans glorify their soldiers? | explainlikeimfive | 2ebwuy | 0 | true | false | 0.44 | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjy06d3",
"comment_text": [
"Glorifying troops and soldiers has been happening since the Romans were alive, probably even earlier..."
],
"score": 11
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjy03fn",
"comment_text": [
"Almost every country glorifies its soldiers. Nothing special about how Americans do it. Society needs, and appreciates, people willing to do hard and dangerous things to protect others."
],
"score": 11
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjy06z6",
"comment_text": [
"Because they are all volunteer. Which means we don't have to have a draft anymore. The only people who went to Afghanistan or Iraq are the ones who signed up for it. Our government was sending people there either way, and I didn't have to go because those guys vo... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjxzx0x",
"comment_text": [
"The media has an interest in making us support the wars because their owners are war profiteers. A soldier-friendly media makes a lot of Americans glorify and support the military, which in turn helps combat any anti-war and anti-militaristic attitudes. "
],
... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cjy008z",
"comment_text": [
"Really? Someone that says, \"Your life is more important than mine, I got this...\", needs justification of praise?"
],
"score": 6
} | ||
ELI5:Does RGB really equal white light? | explainlikeimfive | 2o8oel | 1 | true | false | 0.6 | If a create white light using a red, green, and blue LED, then refract the light through a prism, will I get all the colors in the spectrum or just the original red, green, and blue? | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmkrzkk",
"comment_text": [
"You'd get just the original three colors. If you can understand graphs of intensity versus wavelength, ",
"this site has some neat graphs that show the spectrums of different types of LEDs",
".",
"Colors get complicated (they even confused Isaac Newto... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmks80q",
"comment_text": [
"That page you linked is super useful! Thank you!"
],
"score": 2
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmksgcz",
"comment_text": [
"Consider the color purple, which is a wavelength half way between red and blue.",
"It is?",
"Violet: 400 - 450 nm\nBlue: 450 - 495 nm\nGreen: 495 - 570 nm\nRed: 620 - 750 nm\n",
"Purple (violet) is not \"in-between\" red and blue - it's a lower wav... | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmkrxkq",
"comment_text": [
"Your eyes only have cells that can detect those three colors, so if they are all present, your eyes/brain assume it is the full spectrum."
],
"score": 1
} | {
"comment_id": "t1_cmks1na",
"comment_text": [
"Human eyes can only detect Red and Blue and Green. (We have three types of sensors in our eyes, optimized for those three colors. The sensors are also triggered less strongly by nearby colors.)",
"As a result, our eyes are easily fooled. Consider the color ye... |
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