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wxrd9 | anarchy and how anyone could possibly support it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/wxrd9/eli5_anarchy_and_how_anyone_could_possibly/ | {
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"Think about your group of friends. There's no *ruler*; you may have a leader, who people tend to look up to, but nobody forces you to always do what he says. But you guys are still perfectly capable of making decisions.\n\nAnarchists think that *all* of society should be organized this way. Rather than having governments and corporations, we would just have a bunch of groups of friends figuring out how to get things done.",
"A big misunderstanding is confusing Anarchy (no ruling) with Anomy (no rules).\n\nIn my opinion, pure anarchy is unstable and needs some form of regulation.",
"Anarchy is just what is once you realize that the only real power of the nation/state is the monopoly on the legal use of force. \n\n\"To the degree that we are responsible, we will have anarchy.\" Terence McKenna"
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3y1qt6 | if gravity attracts, how come planets don't gradually get closer to a star while orbiting? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3y1qt6/eli5_if_gravity_attracts_how_come_planets_dont/ | {
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"They do. That's what an orbit is: The planet constantly flying away at an angle, and being pulled back closer, which results in an elliptical orbit.",
"They're moving incredibly fast. The gravitational attraction changes what direction they are moving, but never fast enough to actually move the planet directly *towards* the star.\n\nImagine you were standing on a tower on the summit of a mountain. If you drop a ball off the west side of the tower, it travels 0 ft to the west in the time it takes to fall to the ground. If you *threw* the ball instead, maybe it would go fifty feet west in the same amount of time. But if you were able to get it to fly faster - say you used an air gun - maybe you should get it to travel 150 feet west by the time the ball has fallen *to the level of the bottom of the tower*; but once it has gotten that far away from the summit, the mountain-face is begin to fall away, so the ball doesn't actually *hit the ground* until it has fallen for another few seconds, which might allow it to travel 200 feet west in total. Now imagine you fired the ball off the tower out of a cannon; it might only have travelled 1,000 feet by the time it falls to the level of the bottom of the tower, but by that time it is so far away from the summit that it is still nearly as high above the ground as it was when it was fired out of the cannon; so it can travel another 1,000 feet, but the mountain is continuing to slope down so the ball still isn't anywhere near the ground; and maybe in the end it travels nearly a mile and hits the ground near the base of the mountain.\n\nDo you see that even though in the four examples the ball is always equally attracted to the earth by the force of gravity, and in fact (if we assume it always starts moving directly west, without aiming up or down) the ball is *moving downwards with the exact same velocity at each second* in the four examples, the mere fact that the ball is traveling much faster when it is fired from the cannon means that it takes much longer for it to finally collide with the mountain, compared to when it is dropped?\n\nNow imagine you had an *enormous* tower, and an *incredibly* powerful cannon. You could fire the ball fast enough that, even if the tower wasn't on a mountain, the mere fact that the *earth is roughly spherical* would mean that the ball would never be falling fast enough to reach the earth. If you fired it from the South Pole, then by the time the ball was moving directly \"down\", from the perspective of the cannon, it would have already reached the Equator, so \"down\" would mean it was still flying parallel to the surface of the earth. By the time it was flying \"down\" relative tot he equator, it would have reached the North Pole... and so on and so forth.\n\nIf you start even further away from the earth, of course, then it doesn't even matter that the earth is spherical. "
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1yrepy | can natural predators in the wild, grow up to be 'friends' when raised together in captivity? | So let's say there's a lion that's raised as a baby lion since birth with a baby antelope. (Lions eat antelopes right?) They learned to interact with each other while in a zoo. Would they be able to become friendly with each other or would their insticts take over?
How far would their insticts go? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1yrepy/eli5_can_natural_predators_in_the_wild_grow_up_to/ | {
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"predators in wild are taught what's food by their parents. zoo predators know meat comes in a bucket. they don't associate meat with a gazelle."
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5qvsz7 | how do pain killers detect which part of the body to heal? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5qvsz7/eli5_how_do_pain_killers_detect_which_part_of_the/ | {
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"When you take them , it sends signals to your brain, and as your brain is communicating with all of your body it know where to help.",
"I think pain killers act on the brain, not the injury. They don't \"fix\" anything, they just alter your brain so you don't \"feel\" the pain, even though its still there.",
"As others have said. They don't. They work on one place, the brain. So drugs that are sold 'targeting' areas such as sore backs or whatever are false advertising. By cutting off the pain receptors in the brain you cut off pain from everywhere. \n\nExample: i have osteoarthritis in my foot and am prescribed various painkillers (tramadol, dihydracodeine, naproxen and cocodamol) if i say fall over and hurt my arm the same drugs sort that pain out. They're not going round my bloodstream looking for pain, they're just stopping any pain signals crossing the neuron paths so my brain doesn't know that somewhere hurts. Obviously there are also megatives to that. We experience pain as its our body telling us something is wrong."
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3l8vo2 | watching the gop debate, why do they have the candidates using both a lapel mic and a podium mic? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3l8vo2/eli5_watching_the_gop_debate_why_do_they_have_the/ | {
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"To make sure we can hear them. It's a live event, so having multiple microphones is a good idea. It's cheap insurance against technical failure.",
"My cousin works as a sound producer for plays/comic shows. He has told me he always keeps 2 mics on all members with significant speaking roles in case of technical failures or battery failures. In addition he replaces batteries (if disposable) every act and similarly with packs for rechargeable ones.",
"Redundancy and just in case the candidate isn't speaking directly in to their lectern mic. \n\nI do on-location recording as a side gig, and I'll double up on mics for important shows.",
"Redundancy. One of the breaks, the other one is still on. Also, sometimes politicians like to get a little...walk-y and like to take a stroll in front of their podiums to get their point across and thus would exit the range of their podium mics. "
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28js76 | why do movie/games producers use voice actors with awful fake accents instead of actors with that accent? | It just confuses me that the producers of almost any kind of media will chose a voice actor with insultingly bad fake accent over an actor from that country with that accent with a good grip of English. It's extra baffling when they get an American actor to fake and English accent (because English actors are so hard to find right?) and it just sounds like an Australian with a severe head injury.
Why do they do it? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/28js76/eli5_why_do_moviegames_producers_use_voice_actors/ | {
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"Because they use the same actor for multiple roles to minimize costs. I think Oblivion had something like 4 actors doing the whole game.",
"It might have something to do with not wanting to go through getting a work visa for the actors, as well as paying for them to fly to the studio and pay for them to stay in a hotel.\n\n\n It's cheaper and more time efficient to hire someone who doesn't need any paperwork to legally work in a different country.",
"Unless they want a particular voice actor, the most cost effective way to record voices is to put out a casting call to a talent agency and use whomever shows up. Actors do multiple voices, and some are going to be better than others. \n\nThe person in charge of recording asks \"who can do an English accent?\", and if it sounds good enough to him, they use it.",
"Are you playing Assassin's Creed 3 too?"
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601qg6 | what are some reasons for and reasons against washing apples before you eat them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/601qg6/eli5what_are_some_reasons_for_and_reasons_against/ | {
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"for: wash off pesticides and bug shit, avoid cancer. against: strengthen your immune system, live fast/die young",
"For: wash off pesticides, dirt.\nAgainst: why the hell would there be anything against washing your fruit.",
"Something to be careful of when washing fruit and veg is that you may wash off a protective layer (wax, etc) that keeps moisture in and germs out. In some cases it may be best to wash them just before you use them and not as soon as you buy them."
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5hjym8 | how did disney recycle animations? | A recent post with a collection of shots that Disney used in severeal movies showed that Disney "recycled" shots. How do animators do this? The symmetry and motions of the shots were identical, but the characters' features and surroundings differed. How much is actually recycled, and HOW do they recycle these shots? Do the animators pick an old drawings in their early draft state, copy it, then adjust some features for the movie its in? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5hjym8/eli5_how_did_disney_recycle_animations/ | {
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"Disney animators worked in layers with a camera that would shoot down thru the assembled layers to make the scene. These layers were often shot separately in order that the backgrounds and drawn props would be the same from one shot to the next. \n\nTo recycle an action shot they simply used one part of the animation leaving out the backgrounds and props"
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1zgo9r | why can't life exist on non-earth-like planets? | I was reading [this article](_URL_0_) about planetary requirements for life, and I wondered what makes scientists so sure about their assumptions. Haven't we seen life on Earth surviving in the most unlikely places? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1zgo9r/eli5_why_cant_life_exist_on_nonearthlike_planets/ | {
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"The important phrase in the article is, \"Life as we know it\". This doesn't mean that life cannot exist.",
"It's not so much life *can't* exist, so much as Earthlike life needs Earthlike conditions. If we have no idea what other life would be like or if it's is even possible, as we have not encountered it, then we also have no idea what to look for.",
"Well, I think most scientists use the phrase \"life as we know it,\" rather than just \"life.\" Life as we know it is often not capable of living in any sort of environment like those on Super-Earths, for the very reasons outlined in the article you linked. The intense pressures make life as we know it impossible. The article even says that phrase a couple of times. It's not that we know that life is strictly impossible under these extreme conditions, it's that we cannot imagine a life form that could exist in such an environment.",
"So far the only life we know of is ours. There are trillions of planets in the universe. It is more likely for a planet that has similar features to ours to have life on it. Others may also have life in it but we don't have the resources to check out every single other planet. If 1 in a million planets has life then we should narrow that down however we can. If we can narrow down that likeliehood to 1 in 10,000 that makes the search much easier.\n\nPS I made up those numbers",
"All the other answers here have made the point that scientists have not ruled out life in extreme environments, and in fact spend considerable time studying various extremophile organisms to understand what the possible ranges of life could exist in. However, a primary goal of NASA is to seek out and locate positive identification of life elsewhere. If you were given the task to locate extraterrestrial life, you would be wise to narrow your search to places based on high likelihood of success. It would be smart to start out by skipping Mercury-like and Jupiter-like planets in favor of Earth, Mars, Europa, Titan etc. like places. Furthermore, you can also expect to increase your chances if you narrow the search criteria even more to focus on planets with liquid water. Once we discover extraterrestrial life somewhere it will then become easier to locate it elsewhere, including extreme environments. It's not even clear yet what would constitute a positive detection or what all could be considered \"biomarkers\" detectable to remote sensing. "
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aue265 | why are rail bridges in service for so much longer than road bridges? | In Vancouver there's a 115 year old rail bridge that AFAIK has no replacement plans. Right next to it is the 80 year old Patullo bridge which will soon be replaced with a modern one carrying the same amount of lanes. The explanation given is that its "dangerously old"... yet the rail bridge beside it built before WW1 is fine?
Edit: Thanks for all the responses everyone! I vaguely assumed these were the reasons why but I wanted to know specifics. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aue265/eli5_why_are_rail_bridges_in_service_for_so_much/ | {
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"It might seem like one bridge is just the same as another bridge, but actually rail bridges tend to be built to be much stronger than regular road bridges. This is because a normal vehicle is going to be driving on a load which can be carried by rubber tires and under the reasonable pulling power of a truck, while a rail car is sitting on steel wheels riding directly on steel rails and can be carrying enormous loads. A semi-truck has a maximum total weight of around 80,000 pounds while a loaded rail car can weigh up to 315,000 pounds, and it is expected that such fully loaded rail cars might be following directly one after another. So rail bridges tend to be built *way* stronger than regular roadway bridges, and all structures are overbuilt on top of their expected load by some percentage.\n\nIf we then assume that age weakens the bridge materials by some amount then the rail bridges have a bigger absolute buffer in strength. Also I suspect the wear patterns of a rail bridge differs considerably from a road bridge in that all the load of the rail bridge is coming from the rails themselves and those can be replaced as they wear down (which isn't much considering the extremely low friction). Water can freely drain away and different from roads the structure is never salted and exposed to such corrosive effects. A road though would tend to hold water more in that it must have a reasonably unbroken road surface where water can seep into cracks, carrying salt in the winter down to corrode rebar and other supports of the structure."
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3vjeiv | why isn't carbonated coffee a thing when carbonated water is? | Chemistry? Taste of market? Anything? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3vjeiv/eli5_why_isnt_carbonated_coffee_a_thing_when/ | {
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"You make coffee with hot water you would need to carbonate the water to make carbonated coffee and then heat the water at which point you lose the carbonation.",
"it *is*. Manhattan Special out of brooklyn is truly marvelous...but it doesn't have a very good marketing or distribution system.",
"Carbonation gives a slight bitterness and sourness. These are both qualities that when in excessive amount, make coffee too strong and bad-tasting to many people, which is they often add cream and sugar to negate those tastes. Carbonating coffee would exaggerate those tastes."
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3r7xmn | why do they air the same tv show repeats when the show ran for years and has tons of episodes? | Watched old school Roseanne the other day and it was the same episode they'd had on recently. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3r7xmn/eli5_why_do_they_air_the_same_tv_show_repeats/ | {
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"Because some reruns are more popular than others. People are more likely to watch the more popular ones. More people watching = more advertising revenue.",
"it may have been a more popular episode. whatever rated high back then, may have been the decision to syndicate it now. I'm probably wrong, so, which episode was it? was it the one where Becky's lied about seeing Mark and left home to stay with Jackie?",
"Most stations don't necessarily have rights to the entire library of shows. Some shows which are in syndication broker deals for the entire library available which is why TBS (I think?) created \"The one where...\" Series for Friends, or how FXX aired every Simpsons episode in order. However with premium channels and NetFlix battling it out for content there's an increasing land grab for rights to air things. A perfect example is Anthony Bourdain's 'No Reservations' series. Travel Channel only allowed NetFlix rights to one season of the show, so they could retain the rights to the others, and still draw a crowd for when they need to fill airtime, with other old episodes - resulting in constant repeats on Travel Channel, and a lack of choice on NetFlix, kind of a lose-lose. ",
"This gets pretty bad with Seinfeld. Whenever I come across it on TV I feel like it's one of the same 10 episodes that are always being aired.",
"It'd have to do with higher and more consistent ratings for that TV station, more than likely.\n\nSpeaking of The Simpsons(though I'm aware a lot of local TV channels have given up on rerunning syndicated Simpsons episodes in recent years), it's weird that the few times I've caught it on the local TV station(now switched to another channel and down to 1 airing per weeknight in Chicago, vs. the 3 weeknight airings Fox 32 did years ago) instead of FXX, that they overdo focusing on airing the newer episodes, then when they go back to the better old seasons, they only air a handful of episodes from those seasons before mainly going back to the most recent seasons of Simpsons episodes. And it's widely known too that many Simpsons fans favor the older episodes and seasons(particularly 2-10, though I'd argue 1, and to a lesser extent 11-14 had some good episodes, with the last really great episode IMO in 12, Trilogy of Error), over the new episodes.",
"Another thing that may come about is how many hours a show will air on syndication per day/week, and how much the network is willing to overlap these episodes (e.g. play the last two episodes from one night as the first two episodes the next night). This has especially been prevalent with my parents' choice in crime dramas..."
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2fzn1j | why do very elderly people in "perfect health" still pass away? | I saw this video of 112 year old man who remained lucid and felt confident that he would still be around in several more years. He functions normally and could engage in conversation, unlike many other centenarians. He invited his interviewer to come back then. But he actually died two years later at 114.
_URL_0_
What causes the death of these people even when they remain in good condition mentally and physically without any detectable health problems? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2fzn1j/eli5_why_do_very_elderly_people_in_perfect_health/ | {
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"They may not currently have any health problems, but age has weakened their body's ability to fix new issues. Something that you or I would shrug off without a thought can easily kill someone of that age. \n\nAnd since this is ELI5, I'm going to try (and probably fail) to make an analogy. Imagine you've got a building with a lot of pipes, and you've got a small army of maintenance men ready to fix any issue that comes up. Suddenly, 50 of your pipes start leaking. But it's okay, because you've easily got 50 plumbers to cover that shit. \n\nNow imagine you've only got 1 maintenance man because all the others have moved on. Your building is still in perfect condition, you're just running it with less staff. Suddenly, you get that 50 pipe leak again. So now that single plumber has to go fix all 50 of them. And you know what? He's not gonna make it. Before he's even close to done, your building is flooded. \n\nSo basically, trying to run the same operation without all the resources it used to have. As long as everything goes perfectly, you'll continue to live. But the moment you so much as catch a cold, you're done. ",
"this sort of touches on why dying with cancer is so popular, when you live in a social health care country it gets hard to die from other things.\n\nalso old people usually die from compilations to something that is completely curable in a younger person, just can't handle the cure.\n\nand gets weirdly marked as \"cause of death\"\n\nalso, lets not forget the all time favorite of old people, hitting your head to something hard, usually in bathroom."
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2ovsco | for a long time the pirate bay has been considered "raid proof", so why has a single raid in sweden brought the entire website down? | Here is an example of the "raid proof" claim which I have read many times over the last few years: _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ovsco/eli5_for_a_long_time_the_pirate_bay_has_been/ | {
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"Raid proof is speaking more in terms of a permanent effect. TPB has been \"taken down\" many times before, but it always pops back up, it's only ever temporary. It can not actually be destroyed.",
"It is called raid proof because the content they serve (magnet links) is freely available and people have taken it upon themselves to create redundant backups. This way the site can go down due to a raid but a new site can be quickly constructed to serve the same backed up content. ",
"Other users have helped explain what \"raid-proof\" means but I'll try and ELI5 the article you linked.\n\n\nBob is looking to make some extra cash so he decides to get into the bootleg DVD business. After a few weekends, he's got plenty of DVDs to sell so he gets his buddy Phil to try and solicit some customers. Business is going pretty good, Bob keeps producing content and Phil keeps distributing it to customers. In the software engineering world, Bob would be described as a back end service and Phil would be described as a front end service. The back end involves handling data management while the front end provides the user experience. In the case of the Pirate Bay, Phil got caught by the police but can't rat out on Bob because Bob has made sure to spread out all of his bootleg DVDs throughout a variety of secret locations. It is only a matter of time before Bob finds a new front man and his customers flock back.\n\n\n\nTL;DR The police removed the means to access the Pirate Bay, not the content that is provided. Given a few days, weeks, or months, the website will be back online.",
"It is raid-proof, anyone saying otherwise right now is just trying to get some page views/karma because it was temporarily offline.\n\nIt's already back up, _URL_0_. Moved from se to cr domain.\n\nEDIT: Use \\^that link with caution, nasty ads on the page have been spotted. You should be ok if you use adblock.",
"Wait hold on....what's the news about Pirate Bay recently? Did something happen? "
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3niaug | why do some people win millions in lawsuits for products or services that cost them a few bucks? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3niaug/eli5_why_do_some_people_win_millions_in_lawsuits/ | {
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"Do you have an example in mind? \n\nMaybe you are thinking of class-action lawsuits, where a great many people win a small case? There are also cases where cheap products have done great injury to people leading to million-dollar lawsuits. But in those cases the cost of the product is irrelevant.",
"Often times (but I don't know that it's most of the time) it's the court's way of punishing the defendant. For example, in the case with the McDonalds coffee that burned someone, the original request by that woman was only for the medical costs, which were far fewer than $1 million. But the court found out that McDonalds had been warned by the law more than once that their coffee exceeded the safety standards in temperature, so in order to punish McDonalds the court awarded the woman over $1 million."
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6d2nt2 | how are horses taught that they to go as fast as they can in races? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6d2nt2/eli5_how_are_horses_taught_that_they_to_go_as/ | {
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"cause there are little men called jockeys who sit on top of them and whip their ass to go faster",
"First, race horses are bred to be fast and have stamina. So they have to have that ability. Racehorse owners don't just, for example, mate two work horses and raise the foal to be a racer.\n\nSecond, the jockeys have crops. They are \"spanking\" the horses to make them go faster during a race. The horse goes faster to try to escape whatever it is that is causing the pain, not realizing it's the tiny person on their back.",
"I really hope this makes sense but it might not. Anyways,\nObviously horses are not born with the knowledge to move away from pressure. If something tightens around them or pushes on them, they instinctually try to fight it. Basically, humans teach them to go against that instinct and yield to pressure. Where as a horse that hadn't been handled would jerk away if you tried to grab their ears, we would teach them to drop their heads closer to us. This applies in lots of ways - including leg pressure and crops. They are taught to yield to the leg/crop pressure by moving forward. If a horse is already moving forward and leg/crop pressure is applied, they will move faster. That's basically whats going down on a track. "
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6ov4bb | what does clearing cache and cookies do? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ov4bb/eli5_what_does_clearing_cache_and_cookies_do/ | {
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"Cookies are little files stored by websites. They contain information that the site has to temporarily leave in your computer, like the fact that you are logged in or that you have closed the cookie prompt or your personal preferences sometimes, if you are not logged in on YouTube for example, it uses cookies to remember what videos you watched and give you suggestions based on it.\n\nCache is temporary memory used to load sites that you have already visited or that you visit often faster.\n\nWhen either of those get corrupted, it may make some sites load not like they are supposed to. In such cases, cleaning your cookies and cache might fix it.\n\n*I’m not an expert though, correct me if I said something wrong.*\n\nLook it up on Wikipedia if you want to learn more about them: [HTTP cookie](_URL_0_), [web cache](_URL_1_)"
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218tw1 | if russians arent declaring that they are in crimea, could ukraines forces not shoot them without it being a declaration of war as putin and the russian gov refuses to recognise them? | So yea if they arent declaring that they are Russian and the kremlin is refusing to recognise them as being russian soldiers rather describing them as self defence forces then surely if Ukraine forces shoot them it officially would not be an act of war against russia... | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/218tw1/eli5if_russians_arent_declaring_that_they_are_in/ | {
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"Russia could simply say that Ukraine soldiers were slaughtering civilians (who happened to be possessing Russian military equipment) and invade openly \"for the safety of ethnic Russians\".",
"Logic has little to do with it when political ambition and nationalistic fervour are running the show.",
"Russia's main goal is to maintain access to its Crimean bases. So far what it has done is deplorable and illegal, but it has done it in a mostly non-violent fashion. If Ukraine presses the issue Russia just might invade the whole country. The rest of the world is not going to start WWIII over this, so the best outcome for Ukraine is to forget Crimea until some point in the future (quite possibly 50-100 years) when Russia no longer considers a foothold in Crimea as necessary to its national interest."
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a5nd1u | how are drugs made? | Serious question. Drugs like Tylenol, Advil, NyQuil...etc
Like did someone just synthesize a bunch of stuff and then try it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a5nd1u/eli5_how_are_drugs_made/ | {
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"Can't speak to the basic originals, but a lot of drugs nowadays are stumbled upon while researching something else.\n\nCase and point: Viagra. Viagra was a blood pressure medicine. When they started human trials, it had a very fortunate and lucrative side effect unrelated to its initial purpose and the rest is history.\n\nThere are lots of drugs like that. Intended to do X, but discovered to actually do Y, so they begin research why it does Y and how it can be useful for people that need their Y treated.",
"Ibuprofen (Advil) was made by synthesizing different molecules based on the known aspirin structure and mode of action, looking for a safer alternative. The different variants were tested for effectiveness and the best one selected for production. Much drug research is done this way rather than testing a completely random chemical"
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69y07x | how do credit card reward systems work and why do some people get more points/cashback than others? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/69y07x/eli5_how_do_credit_card_reward_systems_work_and/ | {
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"When credit card companies are competing for transaction fees (getting their cards in wallets and used) they're looking for extremely low risk customers. When you \"sell\" the card to someone that always pays off their balance, they don't get value from low interest rates. At that point rewards are all that a given bank can to offer differentiate themselves from others. The cost of the rewards ends up being paid by companies accepting cards as part of the \"swipe fee.\"",
"Credit card companies make money in 2 main ways;\n \n1) If you do not pay of the balance at the end of every payment period (usually a month, but there might be cards with other terms), they can charge interest. Usually this is a rather high rate.\n \n2) Companies that want to accept payments from credit cards must pay the credit card companies for this. For this reason credit card companies give you gifts for using their cards. If you want those rewards, you'll use your credit card more often, which means companies must pay your credit card company more.\n \nA little more color on #2.\nRetailers that take credit cards from your mom and pop shop all the way to Walmart pay about 2.9% per transaction. This is what is used to subsidize your rewards program. The retailers pass this fee onto you via higher cost of goods.\nOn average, rewards program values are around 1% of your transaction.\n \nLots of retailers are starting to push back on this since they are the ones subsidizing the rewards program of these credit cards. In addition, for low margin businesses like grocery, their typical profit margin is between 3-5%. If they didn't have to pay the cc transaction fees, they could double their profit.",
"The simplest explanation is that merchants pay higher rates for rewards cards because the processors (merchant acquirers) pass those fees on to the merchants. \n\nMerchants don't have a choice as to which cards they can accept (as in, if they accept Visa, they must accept all Visa cards) or they can get in trouble with the association (Visa/MC/debit network, etc). \n\nBecause the fees are higher, it helps to subsidize rewards. The other explanations already here help to explain credit cards on the consumer side as a whole so I won't reiterate those things. \n\nSource: I am a trainer for the largest processor (merchant acquirer) in the world. ",
"The rewards come from the processing fees paid by the merchants, ie. you buy something and the store pays Visa 2.5% of the price to process transaction, keeps 1.5% and gives you 1%. \n\nThe cards that pay more points/cash back usually have higher annual fees, so you pay Citibank $100/yr for the titanium travel card and get 2 miles/dollar instead of 1 with the platinum travel card, but paid the annual fee. Often, you also have to have better credit so you are a lower risk to cost them money chasing down payments or defaulting on them all together.\n\nOften the rewards have a mutual benefit -- the card gets your repeated business to rack up points and marketing exposure to airline customers, while the airline gets loyalty because you have miles on that airline. Ones with non-exclusive partners benefit from cross marketing, ie. one I have offers gift cards from a few dozen retailers that can be received instead of travel... in this case, Amazon, Home Depot, Chili's, etc. get the marketing exposure to credit card (read: wealthier than average) customers and the breakage from unused gift cards.\n",
"I just want to point out that whomever invented the credit card rewards system was an absolute genius. That made credit more valuable than cash/check to huge numbers of consumers. It seemed like free money to the consumers, and it kind of was since those rewards were being indirectly subsidized by cash users and people who carry credit balances. As a result, [credit card usage has really grown quickly](_URL_0_).",
"to answer the second part of your question it's based upon people being very diligent about what cards they use for every purchase. There are various apps that will help you select the card which will give you the maximum rewards based on your cards. Additionally, people will continuous change their credit cards to get the bonuses that come from signing up for a new card.\n\nPeople will also look for cards that provide the best rewards based upon their particular spending habits. I personally do a lot of grocery shopping so I found a card (Amex Blue Preferred) which gives me 6% back on grocery purchases. I have a friend who travels a lot for business so he picked a card that gives him a ton of rewards.\n",
"**How Reward Systems Work.** Reward cards offer a variety of rewards in different ways. Some give cash back on all purchases, some give bonuses if you meet a spending threshold (such as 50,000 airline miles for $3,000 spent in the first 3 months), and some give other perks.\n\n**Why Some People Get More/Better Rewards.** Some people get more points or rewards because they qualify for rewards that other people don't. Just like qualifying for a loan, card companies offer different cards (with different rewards) to people based on their credit worthiness. A reliable consumer qualifies for better reward cards with better perks just like a reliable borrower qualifies for better loan terms. \n\nAlso, the amount of rewards you get is based on the amount you spend on the card. So if you have a card that offers 1 mile per dollar spent, but you only spend $500, you only get 500 miles. If I spend $15,0000, I get 15,000 miles.\n\n(Source. I've used credit card rewards to pay for about 80-90% of my vacation expenses for years, and regularly cycle through cards to farm rewards. The only reason card companies offer these cards is because: **1.** People qualify for the card but don't end up meeting the minimum spend, **2.** People let the points expire, and most importantly **3.** People incur enough fees that the amount they pay in interest or fees exceeds the value of the offered rewards. (And because card companies make a little money on each transaction.)",
"We \"make\" anywhere from $40-$65 a month on a cash back card. We could do better if we were motivated enough to get another card and use both across multiple categories but it's just too much work and our payout is pretty good already on Chase Freedom. We use it for EVERYTHING including high dollar daycare costs. Cash back is the best IF you're responsible enough to pay it off every month. ",
"Others have answered better, but I'll offer that it's like when an online casino offers you up to $500* for joining... All of that money has to come out of [the rake](_URL_0_(poker ), the profit the house makes off of you anyway... So if you give the house $1 + $10 buy-in, it will give you, say, 10 cents back, so you're only paying 90 cents of rake for a while until you hit that limit.\n\nBasically, to get $500 back, you have to put up $50000 worth of bets, and pay $5000 to the house.\n\nThe credit card is different because you don't HAVE to pay the house to get these rewards if you're dilligent and don't carry debt. But like with anything free, they're making money somewhere, or they wouldn't do it.",
"Piggybacking on this, what's a good Bank (in TX) that offers good cash back rewards? I'm tired of using State Farm Bank (they offer nothing)",
"Hey! Something I am actually qualified to answer! I actually started a [beginner's guide/series to reward programs](_URL_9_) on my blog and [my startup built an app](_URL_11_) that helps you optimize your credit card rewards and find the best cards for your spending.\n\nThere are two main parts that make up credit card reward programs: \n\n* Earning rewards \n* Redeeming rewards \n\nThere are three types of reward currencies you can earn \n\n* Cash back \n* Points \n* Miles \n\n(points and miles are virtually the same and vary depending on what that specific reward program wants to call them. A lot of Airlines will use miles because you're \"flying a certain number of miles when you travel\" and others use points because they tend to be more generic - hotels, specific bank branded credit cards etc.) \nLet's break down each type of program: \n & nbsp;\n\n**Cash Back** \n\nCash back is pretty simple - you earn a fixed cash percentage back on your credit card purchases based on an [mcc code](_URL_6_) multiplier or a specific merchant (like Target or Banana Republic). For example, the [Amex Blue Cash Preferred](_URL_2_) earns 6% cash back on groceries, 3% cash back on U.S. gas stations and department stores, and 1% cash back on everything else. You can read the Blue Cash Preferred [Terms and Conditions](_URL_8_) and [Reward Terms](_URL_3_) to see which MCC codes are included/excluded and also learn about every other limitation/quirk this card has. \n & nbsp;\n\n*The complicated part* \nThe biggest complication with cash back cards are the limits/caps the issuers put on how much you can earn each year. With the Amex BCP, you only earn 6% on groceries on the first $6000 in grocery spend each year, then 1%. Some cards offer [rotating categories](_URL_10_), like the Chase Freedom and Discover It cards. \n & nbsp;\n \n**Points & Miles** \n\nI'm bucketing points and miles together because although they have different names, they are effectively the same thing - a virtual rewards currency. Any non cash back reward program will be either points or miles. These include airline, hotel, car rental, supermarket, gas station co branded cards and more, as well as bank specific non cash back cards like the Chase Sapphire Cards where you earn Ultimate Rewards and Citi ThankYou cards where you earn ThankYou Points. \n\nInstead of earning a cash back % for each $ spent, you instead earn a points/miles multiplier on specific categories and merchants - The [Chase Sapphire Card](_URL_1_) (CSP for short) earns 2x points on travel and dining and 1x for everything else. Of course, there are exclusions in the terms and conditions. \n & nbsp;\n\n*The complicated part* \nRedeeming points & miles is extremely variable, and the $ value for what the rewards are worth changes depending on a whole lotta factors. For example, if I redeem Ultimate Rewards from my CSP card for Travel I \"get 25% more value when you redeem for airfare, hotels, car rentals and cruises through Chase Ultimate Rewards. For example, 50,000 points are worth $625 toward travel.\" < - Directly from Chase's site. That means if I redeem my points for non travel, they're worth less. The Points Guy does [monthly reward valuations](_URL_4_), but IMO they're a bit too simplistic and I'm not sure he uses a big enough data set to make super accurate calculations. \n & nbsp;\n\nBut, in this case above, if I can redeem 50,000 points for $625, that means each point is worth $.0125 each. Meaning that if I earn 2x on travel and dining and redeem for travel, I effectively am getting **2.5% back** per $ spent. \n & nbsp;\n\nTo take it one step further, I'll use United's MileagePlus program. (In light of current events I still enjoy flying United, personally have their CC, and fly 3-4 flights for free each year). The miles on United's program vary depending on the airports you fly to/from, the time of day you fly, how far in advance you book, seat class, etc. This holds true on many other airlines as well. And even though United is a [tier structure](_URL_7_) - if you select North America as your departure and arrival location it will show you the 10k, 12.5k, 25k chart - the flight values vary, so the more expensive flight I can get for 12.5k miles on way, the more my rewards are worth. Most recently I flew Orlando - > San Francisco and redeemed my miles for around 2.9cents each, so on each purchases where I earned 1x mile I got 2.9% back effectively, and any purchases with multipliers I got 5.8% back, effectively. \n & nbsp;\n\nTo get even more complex, I can [transfer my Chase Ultimate Reward Points](_URL_0_) as a 1:1 ratio to United. So purchases made on my CSP card at travel and dining and redeemed for the reward example above would net me 5.8% back. \n & nbsp;\n\nTake this system of changing reward rates above and apply it to hotels and other redemption types and it gets tricky. This is why a lot of people choose cash back cards with a flat 2% cash back, like the [Citi Double Cash](_URL_5_), but many of us enjoy racking up points and miles and getting higher value when redeeming for travel (usually the highest). \n & nbsp;\n\nThis is not a complete list, and there are so many more things to consider like annual fees, foreign transaction fees if you travel abroad, cards that offer airport lounge access, anniversary bonuses, spending bonuses, other caps and exclusions, sign up bonuses and more. And if you travel, you earn rewards just by flying the airlines and staying in hotels, so you can rack up points beyond just what the credit cards offer. \n & nbsp;\n & nbsp;\n\n**So who pays for rewards?** \n\n* Interchange Fees: The credit card issuer takes a cut of your purchase when you pay at a retailer. The rate on this varies but is usually higher then the redeemed value % on that purchase (plus a lot of rewards just sit around and are never redeemed) \n* Credit card debt: The interest that revolving card holders pay will fund reward programs much of the time. That's about half the US population. \n* Annual fees: The annual fee you pay on the cards will sometimes offset the reward value earned \n\n & nbsp;\n\nTl;dr: You earn rewards a variety of different ways and redeem for different reward types where values change. Cash back is just a % back on your spending. All have exclusions and limitations to look out for. \n\nedit: formatting \ndouble edit: My first gold! Thanks stranger! Who would have thought it would be a comment about literally the one thing I know this much about because I work in it all day long.",
"What are a few of the best credit card reward programs? I'm looking to get a new credit card. I'd like rewards for international travel. ",
"I'd suggest you watch the YouTube channel \"the financial diet\" theyprobably have a video on it ",
"You've gotten several excellent answers to \"how\" rewards work, but there are also interesting reasons \"why\" they've grown in popularity.\n\nAbout 10-15 years ago, when airline \"miles\" were still the dominant credit card reward, the IRS decided that these rewards from credit cards would not be treated as income and, thus, would not be taxable. This is different from traditional interest on a savings account, for example, which is still taxed as income.\n\nThe rationale is that credit card rewards are earned only when you purchase something, and so they operate like rebates or even simple price reductions. In other words, if you used a coupon at the grocery store for 2% off your entire purchase, you wouldn't have to pay income tax on the 2% that you saved; and if you went to the grocery store, and a week later they sent you a rebate check for 2% of your purchase, same thing; and if you went to the grocery store, and paid with your credit card, and later you got 2% back on your credit card statement ... well, same thing, says the IRS.\n\nNow, add this to the fact that interest rates on savings have been at rock bottom for nearly 10 years now. Banks couldn't attract new customers with higher savings rates because, frankly, the economy just wouldn't support paying out interest. So instead, the IRS revenue ruling has created something of an arms race as banks use bigger/better credit card reward programs to attract customers.\n\nFinally, it's not just the banks. Many popular cards are co-branded with specific companies (the Southwest cards offered by Chase are a popular example), and those companies not only get a cut, but they use enhanced points and perks to drive up their own business. Southwest recently reported in an earnings call that their credit card revenue is the fastest growing source of revenue in their company!",
"There are a lot of detailed answers here, but I don't see any good ELI5 near the top so here's my take:\n\nCredit card companies charge stores a fee in order to accept credit card payments. Depending on the type of card, they charge more or less. Cards with reward systems usually end up charging the most. The credit card company gives some of that fee back to the customer as a reward - either points, or cash back. This gives customers an incentive to use that card more, which means more of the money that stores pay goes to that credit card company. Of course, merchants raise prices to compensate, so it's not really \"free\" money - it's just funded by all the people who buy things and *don't* get rewards.\n\nPeople get more cashback/rewards by choosing to use cards that offer the best rates. Some cards give you better rates on certain categories, like gas or groceries. If you always make sure to use the right card on the right type of thing, you can maximize the reward. \n\nAnother trick people sometimes use is to buy things like gift cards at grocery stores. Say you want to get something from amazon that costs $100, and your credit card gives you 6% for groceries and 3% for everything else. You could just use the card directly on amazon and get $3 back, or you could buy the card at a grocery store and get $6 back, then use it on amazon to make your purchase. Credit card companies are aware of this tactic, so they often have limits on the amount of purchases you can get rewards for in categories like that.",
"Credit cards charge a fee to merchants, the cash back is a share of their profit that they use to allure customers.\n\nHigher the reward cards 1.5%-2.% are usually for people with better credit.",
"To take full advantage of credit card reward programs, make full use of the card. Use the card to pay for everything you can, including your utility bills and maybe even rent (if you're lucky) and then pay that balance off in full each month. You'll earn more points than you would just buying dinner and gas on your card. The secret is to pay it off in full and do it again each month. You'll earn a lot of points and boost your standing with the credit card company. If you call in to ask for them to remove a late fee or to change something, they'll be more willing to do so if you spend a couple grand a month vs a couple hundred a month. ",
"The real ELI5: The store you buy from has to pay the credit card company to process your payment, and the credit card company gives some of that money to you.\nEdit: I think I was misunderstood.",
"As a VERY small business owner, I hate CC points. Why? Because I pay for them in addition to all the other regular fees. Same with airline miles.... enjoy your trip, it's on me. \nGuess whose price is going up next quarter....",
"I have a question: \nWhen I turn 18 will I have good credit or bad credit? I've never had anything credit wise before and want to get a car with no down payment. Does no credit = good credit?",
"So, the next obvious question, what is the most efficient card available for cashback/points?"
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129pkf | if everything has to exist in time and space, what did the little cluster of matter prior to the big bang exist in? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/129pkf/if_everything_has_to_exist_in_time_and_space_what/ | {
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"The rules didn't apply for that little cluster. It's better to call it the 'singularity'. Everything we know about physics breaks down in that little point. In fact, the word 'before' can't even be used here, because time didn't exist before the Big Bang. Time, as far as we are concerned, began *at* the Big Bang. \n\nSo to answer your question - that singularity became matter and space itself. The Big Bang caused a very fast expansion of space. And today, space is still expanding. Quite fast. \n\nOften, that leads to another common question. [What is the universe expanding into?](_URL_1_) \n\n____________\n\nI want to link to a few videos that explain this quite well from Khan Academy. They're absolutely free and very well explained. A good place to start is here: [Big Bang Introduction](_URL_0_) and work your way across the videos (left column) to a bit of mind-bendiness: [A universe smaller than the observable universe](_URL_0_/v/a-universe-smaller-than-the-observable). ",
"Let us say you throw a pebble into the pond and the pond ripples. That pebble is the singularity, the big bang itself, and the rippling that occurs is the infinite expansion of space up until this present moment of time. To ask what existed prior to the pebble is a redundant question, for there was no pebble, no ripple. We can only measure the ripple based on the reverberating effect the pebble produced.\n\nCertainly, in contrast to the analogy, time and space as we know it is expanding ad infintium with no concrete idea when, or if it will cease – so let’s assume that unlike in a real life situation, that ripple is continuous and the waters yet to be affected by the ripple are merely the nothingness which the ripple - space - expands into.\n\nI’ve never really tried to answer these questions before with an ELI5 analogy, so sorry if it doesn’t suit – or even answer your question!",
"This is a question that can't be answered. ",
"\"Everything\" doesn't have to exist in time and space, at least not as we know them. There may well be other universes out there that have nothing to do with our space-time.",
"The simple answer is that everything does not have to exist in time and space. \n\nThere is no real good answer to the question of what happened just before the big bang because our model of the physical universe doesn't extend to singularities. \n\nThe best way to think about this is to think of it like the Einstein's equation of E = mc^2. We know that matter can be converted to energy if we can accelerate it to the speed of light squared because it fits the theory. Unfortunately there is no way to accelerate matter to the speed of light to test the theory. But because the theory works in every other situation we assume it will work in the most extreme situations. \n\nThe same can be said for the big bang. It's a theory that can't be tested but the data fits best so we accept it until we can replace it with a theory that accounts for all the data.",
"I love to think about this stuff. But my tiny brain melts when I do",
"As some people have said, the short answer is we don't really know, and because of the way physics works and the universe seems to be, we can never really know.\n\nHowever, here's a bit that might help a bit (ELI10 or so): \n\nYou said \"a little cluster of matter\", which is how a lot of people think about it because with an explosion in our own frame of reference, it's a small thing expanding into something big. \n\nBut the thing is that, as far as we know now, space and matter interact. You might have seen the examples of a bolwing ball on a bedsheet and a golfball rolling around the indent made by it to be an example of how gravity works. Space is actually warped by matter. \n\nWe're not totally sure exactly how yet, but it's at least somewhat possible that space only exists where matter is. SO when all of the matter in the entire universe was packed into a smaller area, all of the SPACE in the universe was also packed into a smaller area. So while most people imagine this little ball of stuff blowing up into this big empty universe, the whole universe was packed into a small area...and so when it all blew up, it blew up everywhere in the whole universe at once. ",
"It wasn't matter, it was energy. In E = mc^2 , 'E' stands for energy and 'm' stands for mass (matter), this means energy can be converted to matter, and visa verse. In a nuclear explosion, a small amount of matter is converted into a lot of energy. In the big bang a LOT of energy was converted into a lot of matter.",
"It might be worth looking into Lawrence Krauss' [A Universe From Nothing](_URL_0_).\nIt describes a plausible beginning from the universe, and how it could have come from just energy in otherwise empty space.",
"One interesting thing about that little cluster (it's called singularity, as others have already pointed out) is that time is affected by gravity. The stronger the gravitational forces are, the slower the time moves. Now imagine what would happen if all the matter in the universe got squeezed together in one tiny spot? Yes, time would simply stop. Consequently, as far as we know, time wasn't moving in/around singularity.",
"In other words; what banged?",
"It does not, and it did not. There were no laws of the universe because the universe didn't exist yet.",
"Time and space itself was that little cluster of matter, so the question is equivalent to asking what the current universe exists in. When physicist talk about the universe expanding, both now and at the moment of the big bang, they don't just mean all the matter in the universe is spreading out into existing space, they mean space itself is expanding, as if we were on the surface of a balloon being inflated.",
"Thor installed and booted The Sims 999,999,999.",
"I've always been a fan of the cyclical model of the universe which _URL_0_",
"As Stephen Hawking put it so eloquently \"There was nothing before the Big Bang, just as there is nothing South of the South Pole.\"",
"OP's brain hurts now.",
"I once heard it explained as \"Asking what was there before the big bang is like asking what's south of the south pole\"",
"[This should sum up the whole thread.](_URL_0_)",
"may i recommend Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene? its written for the layman, and is really incredibly interesting although perhaps a bit runaway speculative at times. but taken with a pinch of salt it gives some very interesting proposals to answer the sort of question you asked ",
"Well, according to string theory, we live in a multiverse (multiple universes) and the big bang happened from two universes colliding into one\n\nFeel free to correct me",
"THERE IS AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER",
"from what i know with the big bang both time and space began, before it there was not even empty space or time, as for the matter being in one point, a point by definition has no dimensions so it was all in one place but this \"Place\" cannot be measured.",
"Agnostic here: Atheists keep proving to be bigger dicks than 99% of the Christian Redditors. I respect your beliefs."
]
} | [] | [] | [
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"http://www.khanacademy.org/science/cosmology-and-astronomy",
"http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=274",
"http://www.khanacademy.org/science/cosmology-and-astronomy/v/a-universe-smaller-than-the-observable"
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3eps71 | how can uber get away with saying they are not a transportation service? | What do they claim to provide to customers? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3eps71/eli5_how_can_uber_get_away_with_saying_they_are/ | {
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"They claim to prove a connection between the customers and the people who want to drive them. \n\nSo, pretty much the same way that Pirate Bay said they weren't a piracy site, they just connected people who wanted to swap files. We know how well that worked out in the courts. "
]
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[]
] | |
yw4ad | what is the difference between fox "hollywood" and "fox news"? they seem to have contradictory interests politically and appeal to entirely different audiences. how do they get away with keeping the same brand without abandoning viewers? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yw4ad/what_is_the_difference_between_fox_hollywood_and/ | {
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"Fox Hollywood, doesn't have contradictory interests politically than Fox News. What 20th Century Fox produces is a lot of movies, and yes some do go against the grain of the political views of much of the Fox News shows. But the simple fact is they produce these movies, for the same reason Fox News itself exists: Money. Fox News came about because Murdock (I'm using him here as a figurehead here, not saying the idea was his or of that sort) believed that the media was biased, and he wanted to create a completely unbiased news network (read: a conservative news network [Note before those few on the right come to attack me: There is nothing wrong with having a conservative news network. It doesn't have be \"Fair and Balanced\" as it tries to say, it isn't, and it won't ever be. Just like MSNBC, it has a sway to it, and it isn't balanced, it is the opposite of MSNBC, and exists as that reason]). Now what this did was shift a huge portion of the CNN crowd who didn't like being told that maybe their side does some wrong (they all do) and created a huge load of wealth for News Corp. \n\nWhat 20th Century Fox does (and Fox Broadcasting Company does with a lot of it's more political liberal [Simpsons, Family Guy, Glee, etc.] shows) is it ties in the other side of the spectrum. You now are being paid a huge buttload of money by pissed off conservatives, who then piss off a bunch of left wingers, who then use your movies and tvs as escapes into a better more liberal minded world, and you're getting money from every single aspect. It's money over philosophy, money over convictions. \n\nSo they exist, not because they are fighting internally against each other, but because they are able to fill in the needs that every side wants. And if you produce good enough movies, and funny enough tv shows, than those who don't know squat about politics will also tag along, so you get the best of all worlds. ",
"\"Hollywood\" and \"News\" are run by different people (though all owned by one) but they're both really about one thing: money. If Fox News saw its viewership plummet by 90% because people got fed up with the conservative bias, they'd turn on a dime. It's that conservative brand that makes it popular. \n\nAs for how they \"get away with it\" it's simple: Most people don't care. If I like The Simpsons (or any other Fox show) I'm going to watch it. ",
"I look forward to a future where news is aggregated from thousands of sources by AIs and presented to me in a purely factual form.",
"It's all about the Benjamins.",
"ELI5? Fox news is entertainment for conservatives. The rest of Fox is entertainment for everyone else.",
"I don't consider myself R or D, but those that criticize Fox News for being right should also accuse MSNBC and CNN for being left.\n\nIf you think otherwise, your head must be comfortable so far up your ass",
"News Corp.'s ideological goal is purely the generate revenue for its shareholders. Fox News is conservative because it found a market for that kind of coverage. Yes, its leaders are largely conservative, but its actual political ideology is second to its goal of revenue generation. ",
"One is comprised of a guild of screenwriters, producers, and directors to create the most extravagantly overblown stories filled with plot holes and unrealistic scenes to the viewer...and the other one makes movies."
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2bwwx8 | can two cuttings of the same plant reproduce? if so, are the resulting seedlings exactly the same as their parents? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2bwwx8/eli5_can_two_cuttings_of_the_same_plant_reproduce/ | {
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"Commonly. Plants don't get to choose a reproduction partner. Whosever pollen lands on your stamen, that's it. It doesn't even have to be cuttings. Cucumber flowers commonly fertilize themselves."
]
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[]
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1o6kv1 | what would happen if an atom, proton, electron, neutrino, or something smaller hit you near the speed of light? | Just curious about how varying particle size would impact a collision with a human body. I'm aware that particles like neutrinos can pass through the entire earth without contacting anything- so I assume this would have no impact. What about as particle size increases- to say quarks, electrons, neutrons/protons and then entire atoms? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1o6kv1/eli5_what_would_happen_if_an_atom_proton_electron/ | {
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"_URL_0_\n\nThat guy stuck his head inside a particle accelerator and was hit by a beam of protons. He was injured, but it was a beam of proton.\n\nAstronauts in space when they close their eyes see flashes of light every now and then, thought to be when cosmic rays interact with their eyes. ",
"In all of these cases a single particle would not likely do any macroscopic damage. However, we can break it down:\n\n* Atom: You may have heard of alpha particles and/or alpha decay. Sometimes when an atom decays it ejects an alpha particle, which is just a helium nucleus--two protons and two neutrons--moving at very high speeds. A single alpha particle wouldn't do anything to you, but enough alpha radiation and you would be hurt. Alpha radiation can be stopped with a piece of paper.\n\n* Proton: This would be similar to the effects of the atom. A Proton is, if you will, just a hydrogen-1 atom sans electron. Shouldn't be any more dangerous than the He-4 nucleus.\n\n* Electron: You've likely been struck with electrons moving at a substantial percentage of the speed of light--a carpet spark. Electrons are incredibly lightweight and can be accelerated to great speeds by relatively minor electric fields (such as the ones that exist between your finger and a doorknob when you've been shuffling your feet on carpet). Probably no damage. Note also that Beta decay is either electrons or positrons (just like electrons but with a positive charge) and can be dangerous. It is stopped by a relatively thin piece of aluminum.\n\n* Neutrino: Neutrinos pass through you at nearly the speed of light all the time, mostly originating from either the sun or cosmic radiation from other stars. They are highly unlikely to interact with you in any way. No damage.\n\n* Something smaller: I don't think there *is* anything smaller than a neutrino in the Standard Model, assuming by size you mean mass. For instance, Up and Down quarks which make up protons and neutrons (3 quarks each) are 1.7-5.7 million eV/c^2 , while the electron neutrino and electron antineutrino have masses of < 2.2 eV/c^2 . Only the two most massive neutrinos--the tau neutrino and tau antineutrino--have a larger mass, at < 15.5 million eV/c^2 . The only thing I can think of with less mass would be photons and Gluons which are both massless. Gluons never leave the volume of a hadron (e.g. proton, neutron, etc) so they couldn't hit you. Photons are typically harmless--light--but can be very high energy. This is the final form of radiation that radioactive decay gives--gamma radiation. It can pass through even lead and harm you."
]
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoli_Bugorski"
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3awgdl | why is it so common that teenagers go through an 'emo phase'? what are they identifying with? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3awgdl/eli5eli5_why_is_it_so_common_that_teenagers_go/ | {
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"It's just called \"puberty\" and the culmination of raging hormones, bodily discovery, while simultaneously being forced into High School and trying to fit in with some sort of clique to protect yourself from eating on the fucking floor at lunchtime. Combine that with obsession with sex, at the same time your skin is going crazy and no one can even look at you directly, at a time of serious self-discovery... yeah, you're gonna go through a phase of some sort. Most people don't fit into a social group straight up. So they have to change themselves a little bit. If you're a jock who likes video games, maybe you can totally chat about video games with some of the geeks, but then all you're jock friends beat the shit out of them and lock them in their locker... you kinda gotta pick a side. You can't just be friends with both and watch that shit happen. So there's \"alternative cliques\" for the leftover folks. They're just people, man. Sometimes you gotta dress a certain way to fit in, even if fitting in means not fitting in. ",
"I actually saw the same thing among university aged students when I was last in Japan. As youths develop a sense of identity and individualism, they start pushing against the boundaries of their world. We all do this, but youth seem to tale it to its absolute extreme. \"Emo\" phases, as well as everything else youths do, are just them trying to experience things that are counter to theor past experiences. In North America, teens do this, but in Japan, I found young adults doing this, having not been able to explore those same issues at a younger age due to social pressures.",
"It's difficult to rebel when you've grown up in a stable, loving environment. As a teenager I went through a period of not knowing how I was meant to feel about things, and being too wrapped up in understanding myself, I became enamoured with the Emo look. It allowed me, an ordinary, unoffensive teen, to suddenly become the center of attention, in a way. I've definitely grown out of it, but being a teenager is an absolute storm of emotions and pressures, everyone finds their own release.",
"This is just my personal point of view, but (in some cases) teenagers are 1) seeking independence from their parents and 2) looking for social acceptance. Especially for those who do not have good social support (family and friends), this can be accomplished by participating is a whatever subculture is accessible to you, either because you have people around you who belong to that subculture or you resonate with it artistically etc. "
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4ljadd | i know the moon's gravity is what affects the tides, but how come it doesn't affect much else (or does it)? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4ljadd/eli5_i_know_the_moons_gravity_is_what_affects_the/ | {
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"It does. So does the sun, actually. There is a phenomenon called \"earth tide\" where the same forces that create ocean tides affect the earth's crust. At the highest point of effect the crust rises about 25 cm but the change in elevation is so gradual that it is unnoticeable. Seismologists who use instruments to measure the motion of the earth's crust have [graphed](_URL_0_) the earth tide and have determined that lunar gravitational forces are sometimes related to volcanic and earthquake activity."
]
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"http://www.okgeosurvey1.gov/tide.200307.05.27.png"
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35z2tq | in the us, why is it "election day" rather than, say, "election week"? | Why do we have to do all of our voting in one day? I would imagine we would have better voter turnout and more fair results. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35z2tq/eli5_in_the_us_why_is_it_election_day_rather_than/ | {
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"text": [
"Most states have early voting, so it doesn't have to be all on the same day, for the reasons you're mentioning."
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27el10 | why do we fall in our dreams and sometime wake up jumping and sweating. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27el10/eli5_why_do_we_fall_in_our_dreams_and_sometime/ | {
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"This is actually something that still is gray area. A lot of psychologists believe it's your body's way to expelling its last bit of energy. At the point it happens in your dream, you are in a state limbo as far as being awake / asleep, so your body has to do something to change that.",
"It's called something like a psychic jerk. Google it I don't want to give you a wrong answer. But I know I used to get them a lot when I would fall asleep at school. On the desk and would wake up with a jerk. I would link you something but I'm on my phone."
]
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[],
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3c0adt | why do people with sleep parlaysis only dream nightmares? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3c0adt/eli5why_do_people_with_sleep_parlaysis_only_dream/ | {
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"I'm pretty sure this has been asked before but,\n\nThis has to deal with how your mind works, in this case anxiety. Since you're in a half-sleep half-wake stage, your mind realizes that you are unable to move, and immediately jumps to negative conclusions. Since you're still mentally primed to dream you see your dreams, now influenced by anxiety, to become nightmares",
"I don't think they do. Some people have out of body experiences instead of nightmares. \n\n[info](_URL_0_)",
"When in sleep paralysis, the body is somehow aware of its environment but still asleep. By being unable to move and having the body completely frozen, the brain starts hallucinating as in a normal dream but accordingly to the situation the subject is in, which in most cases is a dark room.\n\nThere's two things to keep in mind:\n\n1. Sleep paralysis is a form of lucid dreaming (where the brain is more capable of creating images by the thought), it feels more real, in fact most people during it think they are awake.\n\n2. By being \"awake\" in a dark room with a brain ready to process anything it sees, it makes images by anything that looks weird. However, the darkness makes it hard to see. Like a child afraid of the monster in the shadows, the brain actually gives life to it, which is why most people dream of something coming out of the shadows.",
"I occasionally get sleep paralysis and I don't experience nightmares. I am aware of it when it happens I just can't move and get up. Don't get me wrong it's a shit feeling but by no means nightmare.",
"I don't. I had sleep paralysis once and was dreaming Gillian Anderson was biting me on the neck like a vampire and rendering me helpless and unable to move. It was erotic as hell! ",
"I have a type of sleep paralysis where I have the hallucination but I am able to move. Some of my dreams were nightmares with the seeing ghosts, giant spiders on my chest trying to eat me or that my room is on fire and I can't put it out. These last about thirty seconds to one minute. \n\nTypically though my sleep paralysis episodes are really just dumb. Half the time I am at work doing my work things (Cashiering) and I just go through the usual steps. Bag groceries, make small talk or I am just laying there while someone tells me about a product that they can not find. It isn't always nightmares but the most memorable ones worth telling are nightmares. ",
"Every healthy, non-sleepwalker / talker etc. goes through sleep paralysis. It stops us acting out our dreams. If the body were able to move during dreams, we'd do all sorts of stupid stuff in our dreams and could end up in some sort of danger. \nI'm not sure if this is what you mean, but assuming you mean the thing where you are awake and become paralysed, you become scared because you can't move around and it's uncomfortable and unnerving. Since your dreams are a reflections of your thoughts and feelings, your dream becomes scary too.\n\n"
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4eefi9 | is there any science behind why many people find the basements in their home to be creepy? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4eefi9/eli5_is_there_any_science_behind_why_many_people/ | {
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"The darkness is where lurking predators live, always watching never seen. Waiting to take you away to tortures unimaginable. The darkness is unknown and unknowable. You might remember where things *should* be, but can you ever be sure?\n\nUnderground it is cold, cold like the grave. The faint damp smell reminds some part of your brain more ancient than memory that death awaits you someday. When it comes, the ground will be there for you, to consume what little remains and leave nothing by which you may be remembered. It's no accident that the afterlives of every ancient religion - and most modern ones - were deep underground, where the silent stone could drown the screams of lost souls. Fell beasts too come from underground, from enormous bears strong enough to rip your loved ones to shreds before your eyes to tiny vipers, so unassuming, but capable of making your flesh rot from your bones.\n\nThe modern basement, crafted out of practicality and the need for artificially inflated square footage, harkens back to two primordial fears, older than culture, older than humanity itself. Why shouldn't it be a little scary?",
"Probably a number of reasons.\n\n*They're underground*. Underground is for permanent storage, death, graves, and the Underworld. Satan/bolrogs comes from the ground. Hell is down, not up. Generally, us as humans have historically always associated things underground as being malicious. \n\n*They're dark*. Basements are mostly completely dependent on artificial lighting. Humans don't like dark. Humans loose one of their senses in the dark and humans don't like not being aware of their surroundings. \n\n*It's a place in your home where you don't live*. Another feature of basements is that a lot of them are purely used for storage. Thus it probably isn't meant to be cosy or inviting. \n\n*Cold. Bugs. Damp*. These are all associated with basements and most humans don't like those things.",
"There are several reasons, most are to do with our sense of danger. Humans are generally wary of situations where they are likely to be vulnerable to attack, accidental injury or death. In my basement I quickly came up with 3 things considered a hazard:\n\n\n1. **Dark:**\nWhen people say they are afraid of the dark usually they mean they are afraid of what could be in the dark. (eg. Dangerous animals, trip hazards, sharp or hot objects). Humans find low light spaces difficult to navigate, difficult to escape. The heightened danger triggers a fear response.\n\n2. **Confined Space (No windows):**\nOften spaces with no natural light make people uneasy. You often walk into a basement with an awareness that you're surrounded by cement. navigating an unfamiliar territory keeps you on edge. \n\n3. **Single Entry/Exit:**\nWhen your chances of escape are limited, your brain makes you aware of it with a fear response. The deeper you go into your basement (away from the exit) the less likely it is you will escape from a confrontation. \n\nFear is also like a heightened awareness, and it's pretty important. When you hear a rustle in the bushes you'll immediately imagine it's a predator, even though it's most likely just the wind. But this fear response is good because being ready for a predator attack when there's only wind is fine (or embarrassing), being ready for wind when there's a predator after you is catastrophic.*\n\nHope this helped\n\n*(I wish I could attribute where I heard this to the original author, it wasn't me that thought of it)",
"Think about it in evolutionary terms. Our genes have survived by inheriting cautionary measures. Since somewhere way back when, our ancestors had the mutation to be afraid of caves, that kept them from getting eaten/killed by whatever might have lurked in there, when a possible ancestor that didn't have that anxiety mutation walked carelessly into that cave and was killed. Genes get passed along, especially cautionary genes. Small children are afraid of the dark for the same reason, our ancestors passed on the genes by surviving when they were two years old and screaming for mom, when the other toddlers didnt, and we're probably eaten by predators. ",
"Often there are things like furnaces, HVAC systems, electrical systems, etc, that may produce [infrasound](_URL_0_) , which has been shown to provoke feelings of unease, creepiness, and even visual hallucinations. ",
"For starters monsters live down there, furthermore they tend to be a bit cooler than the upstairs ,which can be uncomfortable if you aren't wearing socks."
]
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3v6z1x | weird taste after cancer treatment? | ELI5: Hey guys so recently my dad finished his radiation treatment for lymph node cancer and is now cancer free (Yay for him!). But he has been tasting weird things.
For some reason ever since his radiation treatment everything he tastes is bland and the only flavor he can really get is cinnamon and to the point where it makes him sick. I was wondering if there was any sort of explanation for this and how long it will take for him to get his taste back, or if it's all in his head | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3v6z1x/eli5_weird_taste_after_cancer_treatment/ | {
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"hello, as I don't feel like rambling on about stuff I don't really know about after doing minum abount of research on the subject, as but reddit isn't the very best place for answering questions. my suggestion to you is look at this \n_URL_0_ \n\nand if your father has any concerns about his taste changes please contact your health care team know about it palliative care is important to recovery and treatment."
]
} | [] | [] | [
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"http://www.cancer.net/navigating-cancer-care/side-effects/taste-changes"
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9dj6jj | what is really in the online terms and conditions? | I assume it's mostly legal jargon. Do companies have to disclose everything that their software does to your computer, such as permission that you'd need to allow? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9dj6jj/eli5_what_is_really_in_the_online_terms_and/ | {
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"Ideally, Terms and Conditions should describe the product or service, describe how it is meant to be used, how it is not meant to be used, what steps a provider can take to discriminate against misuse, what sort of accountability the user has in regards to what they do with the product or service, what sort of accountability the provider has for what you do with the service, instructions of cancelling the contract, and a detailed description of fees or payment services.\n\nIt can all be boiled down into simple and readable sentences, but in order for it to be legally binding, it has to be incredibly specific. This is because ambiguity in a contract favors the person who did not draft the contract. "
]
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[]
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3zcyly | why do shady keygen/crack programs play really catchy 8-bit music? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3zcyly/eli5_why_do_shady_keygencrack_programs_play/ | {
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"Chiptunes are an old-school warez scene thing.\n\nCracking groups compete to make the first/best crack for popular games. Pretty much ever since the beginning of the scene different groups have added their own tags to what they cracked. Back in the day it was often a new game intro screen with chiptunes and other fun features as a way to show off.\n\nNow since most cracks run external to the actual game groups add the fun stuff to their installers and keygens."
]
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dgg9wt | what purpose does that little knob of skin on the upper mouth behind the front teeth serve? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dgg9wt/eli5_what_purpose_does_that_little_knob_of_skin/ | {
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"I think you're talking about the incisive papilla. From what I know it's just a bundle of nerves and is rich in blood vessels as it is situated lower to the incisive foramen where these nerves come through. If it's a bigger or hurts then it's likely inflamed, which is quite common. Usually you don't really feel it."
]
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] | |
3vja63 | how does the restaurant get the tip from my card when they have already swiped it? | I'll get the bill, hand them my card, and they'll bring me back the receipt where I write down the tip amount. At this point I take my card and go. How do they get the tip off the card? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3vja63/eli5_how_does_the_restaurant_get_the_tip_from_my/ | {
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"They don't actually charge your card until the end of the night. When they swipe it they're just getting the information off of it and checking that it's valid. Later somebody goes through the signed slips, adds the tips, and runs the charges.",
"In the states (I'm guessing that's where this is), is it not common to punch the tip amount straight into the terminal when you pay by card?",
"When I worked at \"Australian Steakhouse\" (you know what I mean) what happened was you would swipe the card, make sure it works and leave the check open then once they give you the tip amount that's when you go back to the computer and punch in the amount then finally close the check. Then at the end of the night the manager and head wait would finalize everything.",
"This is already changing in the US because of EMV cards (Chip and Pin). Restaurants are going to be required to take tip at time of sale like in Canada and Europe. Canada and Europe reduced credit fraud up to 50% switching over to EMV. \n\nA lot of businesses are not happy about that, but it's going to be good for the consumer. There has been a huge problem with waiters stealing credit card info, so now the card will never have to leave your sight when you pay.\n\nSource: work for a credit card processing company.",
"Short answer. All payments in an EDC system are finalized when the batch is settled at the end of the business day. Until that batch is settled, all payments are adjustable and when a tip is inputted into computer it simply adjusts payments. When aforementioned batch is settled is when the transaction details are sent to companies. \n\nSource: Restaurant General Manager",
"When a card is swiped it's just an authorization. Basically, it's a real time message from the merchant to the bank to see if there are funds available to cover the purchase. That authorization will hold the funds (for several days -varies by bank).\n\nSettlement is the \"batch\" process to complete the transaction and initiate fund transfer from cardholder bank to merchant bank. Typically this is done end of day (night) but some small merchants might wait a day or two. \nSettlement will make the authorization drop and replace it with the actual transaction. The settlement matching allows for variance in the amount BUT if there is a charge-back situation the merchant may lose any amount above the actual authorization amount. To prevent this, some restaurants with authorize for more than actual amount - up to 20% to help secure that tip amount. \n\n"
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t8gxn | delegates, and ron paul's strategy concerning them. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/t8gxn/eli5_delegates_and_ron_pauls_strategy_concerning/ | {
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"The most recent info I've seen said that he is going to individual states' Republican conventions in hopes of \"poaching\" delegates who were pledged to one candidate or another during the primary/caucus process, but whose decision isn't technically final until their state's convention.\n\nIf he can get enough...I think like another 300 or something (there are also is a certain number of \"at large\"/uncommitted delegates up for grabs) then he can keep Mitt Romney from getting the number he needs to clinch the nomination (even though he would still be the delegate leader by far) and which could trigger a brokered convention -- that is, if Mitt doesn't get the majority on the first round of voting...then at that point everything is pretty much \"reset\": delegates are no longer obligated to vote for a particular candidate and anyone at that point can join the slate of nominees. At that point, Ron Paul would hope that he could step in and get a chance to woo enough delegates on the spot to get the required number and the nomination.\n\nIt's a long-shot, at best...but being the last man standing after Mitt does kindof leave him (if only in theory) in the \"line of succession\" if there is some kind of a Mass Mitt Meltdown.\n\nI may be off on one or two details, but I think this is generally the plan.\n\n\n\n",
" You are going to have a school-wide election for student body president. Each class gets to send X votes, based on their class size. Some classes decide to take an overall vote, and give their votes to each candidate based on a percentage of how well the candidate did.\n\nIf a class has five votes, and of the twenty people in the class, twelve vote for Kevin (despite the fact he keeps stealing your pudding), Kevin will get 60% of the votes, or three votes.\n\nHowever, some classes decide to let only a select few really awesome students decide how to vote. The candidates can come in and try to get those students to vote for them (guess whose pudding Kevin is using?). Those students vote on who they like most, not who the class picked.\n\nIn the end, the school tallies up all the votes, and the winner becomes class president. Obviously, here it's a metaphor for GOP nominee. Ron Paul is kind of ignoring the first kind of classroom, and going to the second. He believes that he can get enough votes from the second kind of classroom to make an impact in the primary.",
"A long time ago, before instant communication and mass media, parties used to decide who was going to represent them for president by holding a vote of just the highest ranking members of the party at a convention. The people who came to the convention each cast a vote for who they thought should be the party's pick for President. These people are called delegates.\n\nIn the early 1900s, regular people started to complain that this was an unfair way to pick the party nominee. So at the state level, parties began holding votes for everyone to pick the nominee. This was sometimes a \"caucus\" (which is like a small convention) or a primary (which is like a regular election). This was done state by state and so party conventions never stopped happening, but delegates to the national convention from some states were required to vote for whoever the locals chose. The rules were a little bit different from state to state, and the Republicans never attempted a national overhaul of the system.\n\nSo, because not every delegate is legally required to vote for who wins an election, there are many ways where the winner of a primary could still not win the most delegates. \n\nRon Paul has focused on how to get the most delegates, not how to get the most votes. In Iowa for example, even though he came in 3rd, thanks to a how the delegates themselves get selected to represent the state at the national level, Ron Paul has more delegates from Iowa than Santorum or Romney. In some states, delegates are voted on separately from the primary, and in state like that Ron Paul is doing very well.\n\nHe still isn't able to capture the nomination, but his strategy is unique in that it focuses on the more technical rules and less on getting the most votes from regular voters. He can do this because the system evolved over decades and there are lots of ways around the results of the actual election."
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1q0esb | how come when you've been drinking closing one eye makes you "see better" / " focus better?" | This is all from my own experience, but when I have been drinking and need to focus on text if I close one eye it's a lot easier to focus on said text. Why is this? If I try with both eyes the text is blurry, but with one eye it's clear as day.. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1q0esb/eli5_how_come_when_youve_been_drinking_closing/ | {
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"The cerebellum is a part of your brain that coordinates your muscles, so that they work together. Your eye muscles must work together for you to focus on any given point- if they don't, you end up with competing images that are difficult to interpret.\n\nAlcohol makes it more difficult for the cerebellum to do its job. Just as it becomes more difficult to walk gracefully, it also becomes more difficult for your eyes to work as a team. \n\nBut when there's only one eye to control? That requires less elaborate coordination and so you might not have issues until you're nearly blackout drunk.\n\nI feel like I need to warn you about the perils of underage drinking. Five is wayyy too young to start getting drunk. "
]
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[]
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2rdhlu | why aren't the barrels of guns aligned so that the recoil doesn't exert rotational torque about the grip where the person holds the gun? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2rdhlu/eli5_why_arent_the_barrels_of_guns_aligned_so/ | {
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"I believe OP was questioning why the barrels arn't positioned below the grip, or lower. The best reason is that the closer the sights are to the barrel itself, the easier it is to sight them in. The farther you get the sights away from the barrel itself, the larger the lapse will be. So if you make a more centered or lower barreled firearm, it now will be a lot less accurate depending on shooting distance changes. It would be easy to over compensate for the sights, and aim for center mass and hit the head if you are too far away for where the sights are zeroed. ",
"A [Chiappa Rhino] (_URL_0_) fires from the bottom cylinder to reduce that torque. I have one. They work very nicely. I can fire .357 Magnum all day without my wrist hurting. The .357 rounds feel like .38SP and .38 rounds feel like .22. "
]
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[],
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"http://gunsumerreports.com/Chiappa_Rhino_60DS/Chiappa_Rhino_60DS_007.JPG"
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vxbxf | who are the turks or the country of turkey | My world geography education covered the ancient Greeks and Persians in the area, and then the rise of Islam in the middle east, and then the ottoman empire losing WWI and the creation of the modern Turkish state. My question is that who are the Turks as an ethic group and where did they originated from, they just kinda popped up in my understanding of history. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/vxbxf/eli5_who_are_the_turks_or_the_country_of_turkey/ | {
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"This will explain it all:\n\n_URL_0_",
"Turkish peoples are a collection of closely related ethnicities whose origins are in Central Asia. So if you pull up a map of Asia and look for Kazahkstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, etc, that's approximately where the Turkish peoples came from. At various points in history they were in parts of Mongolia, China and Persia as well.\n\nA people called the Seljuk Turks invaded Anatolia (the land of modern Turkey) in the 11th century. They stuck around, and their descendants became the inhabitants of modern Turkey.",
"My girlfriend told me to post here, but it looks like SantosKlaus and watabit somewhat covered it. I'm working on my PhD in Ottoman/Turkish history. So if you want any in depth answers, feel free to call on me.\n\nThe Turks came from the Central Asian steppe and can trace their ethnicity back to the same roots as the Huns and Mongols. Much like the Magyars (Hungarians,) they were initially invaders to their respective territories, but they eventually came to view their conquered territories as their homeland.\n\nThey were fantastic horseback riders and archers, and also adopted firearms rather readily. The term Ottoman comes from the name of the founder of the Empire, Osman. Note, this wasn't the guy who conquered Constantinople. Osman was the original tribal leader who started it all. In Turkish, the empire was known as Osmanlı İmparatorluğu (Empire of Osman.) In 1453, they conquered Constantinople and took over the remainder of the Byzantine territories in short order. Over the next few centuries, they posed a serious military threat to Europe, and were a massive economic powerhouse.\n\nThe Turkish language is an interesting one, because it was written in an Arabic script until the 1930's, when Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (who was the Turkish equivalent of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln rolled up into one awesome person) mandated that the country change to a Western dialect. He also implemented a program which required that Istanbul be referred to by its Turkish name, rather than Constantinople, in order for mail to be delivered. Until this point, many countries still referred to the city as Constantinople. Nowadays, it's mostly just Slavic historians and my roommate (who knows it irritates me) who call the city that anymore.\n\nEthnic Turks live in many countries across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. Germany has a rather sizable Turkish population (about 3 million people.) The country of Turkey is ethnically diverse itself. Kurds, Armenians, Arabs, Turks, Greeks, and many other groups make up between 10 and 20% of the country, depending on what estimates you are using."
]
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[
"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3Hq27gq8K0"
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42jwt8 | how do noodles in canned soup remain edible, yet if i put noodles in homemade soup they expand until they become mush if left too long? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/42jwt8/eli5_how_do_noodles_in_canned_soup_remain_edible/ | {
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"Most likely the noodles being used in the canned product are egg noodles, so the egg is helping to bind the pasta even when it stays in a liquid. Normal pasta is just a type of wheat, and nothing else. If you boiled normal pasta for too long it would disintegrate. I would expect it would also disintegrate being left in a cool liquid as well if you left it for long enough."
]
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[]
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rj1y9 | compasses | How do they work? What's guiding them to point north/south/east/west? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/rj1y9/eli5_compasses/ | {
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"The earth has a [magnetic field](_URL_1_). You can see that the south pole, S, of this magnetic field is 'towards the top' of our planet. \n\nYou have a compass and the compass has a needle (which is magnetized) which is attracted or affected by magnetic fields. In other words, it is 'pulled' or 'pushed' on by the Earth's magnetic field.\n\nBecause opposites attract, the North part of your compass needle will point towards the S of that magnetic field. As a result, the place it points to is called the North Magnetic Pole (confusing?). It is currently located near [Ellesmere Island](_URL_0_) in Canada and it moves around quite a bit.\n\nBecause you now have a bearing that points towards the North magnetic pole, you can easily deduce E and W and S from the direction the needle is pointing."
]
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[
"http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=81.3,-110.8&spn=0.3,0.3&t=m&q=81.3,-110.8",
"http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/Earths_Magnetic_Field_Confusion.svg"
]
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1r8uex | why do youtube links usually have _url_0_ instead of just youtube? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1r8uex/eli5_why_do_youtube_links_usually_have_youtube/ | {
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"URL shorteners make it so that the URL can be contained in something with a limited length (like a Tweet for instance). So on Twitter, you might want to link to _URL_0_ instead of _URL_1_"
]
} | [
"youtu.be"
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"http://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ",
"http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ"
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drd81h | the pros and cons of creating an llc | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/drd81h/eli5_the_pros_and_cons_of_creating_an_llc/ | {
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"Choosing a limited liability company as your incorporation form means you're insulating yourself as an owner from the debts incurred by your corporation. \n\nPros:\n\n* Your personal assets are insulated, meaning there's a cap on how much you can lose if the company fails.\n\nCons:\n\n* Only the company assets are available to creditors, so people will be less sure about lending it money. Given two otherwise identical companies, the limited liability one is less credit worthy than the one that isn't limited liability. \n\nAny other pros and cons can't really be considered in a general sense - different jurisdictions have different sets of corporation forms and regulations for how they're taxed and operated."
]
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6t428k | how do tokens work? how does a machine (i.e: arcade game, subway turnstile, etc) distinguish one token from another, or from a similar sized coin in general? | I found a roll of tokens in my desk at work from a previous employee and I'm curious if they would work in another arcade's machines. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6t428k/eli5_how_do_tokens_work_how_does_a_machine_ie/ | {
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"Typically, this is done by size and/or weight. There will be elements of the machine that will evaluate the coin by one or both of these metrics to see if it is \"valid\" - it will return it if it is not.\n\nOdds are, the tokens will work just fine as there aren't that many people that make tokens and there isn't much value in having unique tokens for each customer.",
"Tokens are just privately made coins. Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained:\n\n1. [ELI5: How does a coin machine know what coin I put in? ](_URL_2_)\n1. [ELI5: How does a vending machine know which kind of coin I put in? ](_URL_3_)\n1. [ELI5: How can vending machines tell the difference between foreign coins and domestic ones? ](_URL_4_)\n1. [ELI5: How does a coin slot determine which coin is inserted? ](_URL_5_)\n1. [ELI5: How does a vending machine differentiate between different types of bills and coins? ](_URL_6_)\n1. [ELI5:How does a vending machine 'read'/identify coins? ](_URL_0_)\n1. [ELI5 : How a vending machine knows when you insert counterfeit money? ](_URL_1_)\n",
"Size, weight, and magnetism. Quarters are not magnetic, but cheap steel washers generally are, so a magnet make an easy test to separate one possibly type of fake. Otherwise you have various sized chutes for the coins and only the correct size coin will count."
]
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1bk7eb/eli5how_does_a_vending_machine_readidentify_coins/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3uhqsh/eli5_how_a_vending_machine_knows_when_you_insert/",
"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41gys6/eli5_how_do... | |
3hdvxb | how do 911 operators distinguish between a situation where the caller is not able to respond and a pocket/accidental dial? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3hdvxb/eli5_how_do_911_operators_distinguish_between_a/ | {
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"They don't, for the most part. They assume the worst so they will treat it like an emergency and dispatch an officer to check if they can get a location."
]
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24yvw3 | how a fly/bee/wasp can ignore the infinite space in the world around them and instead find and fly through the small gap in my lounge window | It seems impossible! The outside world must be so vast to them and yet they seem to want to get in...only to spend the rest of their time trying to leave. Wanting to get in is one thing but actually finding that tiny gap in a world so big baffles me | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/24yvw3/eli5_how_a_flybeewasp_can_ignore_the_infinite/ | {
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"Insects use temperature and chemical signals a lot in their navigating. Your window is letting out a different temperature and a lot of chemicals, some of which indicate food. Its easy form them to follow this heat/\"scent\" trail into the house. Once in, there is probably much less of a trail going the other way.\n\nAlso, theres a question of numbers. Maybe only 0.01% of the bugs that try to get in your house succeed, but there are billions out there. If only 0.01% escape successfully, it takes a LOT of bugs in the house for you to notice. ",
"Whatever you do, when there are bees around, dont spray or use Lemon Pledge. I used to be an exterminator, and the hormones bees use to communicate \"this is home, or this is a safe place\" smells exactly like lemon pledge (i've smelled a vial of it). Before you know it you'll have a swarm of bees looking for a new home, making your antique table their home LOL",
"Actually, a million of them did fly into the vast unknown. But you're only noticing this one pesky million-plus-one bug.",
"There actually are so much bugs just floating a bit higher up in the sky that many species of birds and bats can live off them."
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4v9ykr | how do biologists know how long an animal has existed on earth for? how accurate is this estimation? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4v9ykr/eli5_how_do_biologists_know_how_long_an_animal/ | {
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"Remains of animals can be carbon dated, which can accurately give the age of said remains. Carbon dating is the measure of the amount of residual radiocarbon on a specimen. Historical records can also come into play. For example, a cave painting could depict a bear, showing that bears were around at the time. These could also be inaccurate, as an entirely different species of bear could have been around at the time. "
]
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2etz5k | car dealership says they'll beat any of dealer's price by $1000. how do they know for sure what another dealer offered me? | This car dealership in my area has been advertising this for ever. How do you prove to them that you got an offer for a specific price from another dealer? Do they really honor this or is it just a scheme? I don't think another dealer would be too compliant if I asked them for their best deal in writing so that I can take it somewhere else.
edit: typo in title, should be "other dealer's". | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2etz5k/eli5_car_dealership_says_theyll_beat_any_of/ | {
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"You ask for the offer in writing so they keep it open for a short period of time for you to consider, get your finances together, w/e",
"They don't need to worry too much about it, because almost nobody buys cars in cash. So they can \"beat\" basically any price, and then increase the interest rate on the loan to make up the difference.",
"Usually they'll call up the other dealer and say something along the lines of \"Hey, my wife/husband was there the other day, and apparently you said you could do this car for $X. Is that still possible?\""
]
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26y2nf | why does the us have so many intelligence agencies whose functions seem to be overlapping (to the average person)? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/26y2nf/eli5_why_does_the_us_have_so_many_intelligence/ | {
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"Each intelligence agency in the US is looking at different things (most of the time) and under no conditions are they allowed to share intel with other agencies.\n\nI have no idea why, as this seems totally asinine ",
"Interestingly, I just read that the US actually has 17 intelligence agencies operating today. \n \nAs far as the Big Three, I've always thought the NSA covered all the electronic stuff, code-breaking, encryption, bugging, etc. \n \nThe CIA dealt with foreign spying and governments, and dealt with covert ops. \n \nAnd the FBI handled all the domestic stuff for US soil.",
"There are in fact 17 intelligence agencies working openly within the US government. And yes, there is some overlap.\n\nIt's just a Wikipedia page, but there are plenty of links to start your research, here...\n\n_URL_0_\n\n\nA few points of interest:\n\n1) the CIA is the only independent intelligence agency in the USA (it does not fall under any department of the US government)\n\n2) the FBI and DEA, despite being enforcement agencies, actually report to the Department of Justice\n\n3) the Treasury Department controls the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, and has authority over certain functions of the Department of Homeland Security\n\n4) The CIA must have a Director and a Deputy Director, and one must be civilian and one must be a serving military officer",
"I see a lot of people explaining the various agencies, but I don't see anyone answering the \"why\" part of your question. \n\nPart of the thought process of having multiple agencies is that it prevents a single agency from getting too big for its britches. You see this in some other countries (e.g., Pakistan) where the intelligence service ends up undermining the government. By having multiple agencies, each with their own specialty and each reporting to different channels, you can prevent any one of them from causing too much trouble.\n\nThe same can be said of the military, somewhat, where the U.S. has multiple forces, often with overlapping technologies and responsibilities. "
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33nv7u | deer hunting. why do hunters aim at the heart rather then the head? | I have been wandering that since I played the first hunting mission in GTA 5. Cletus gives you more money for a heart shot and congratulates you.
It's also pretty prevalent in songs and other folklore.
Is it a skill thing because it is so difficult to achieve or especially efficient in killing the deer painlessly or is it merely a honour thing and aims to add keep the deer's dignity by not damaging its head? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/33nv7u/eli5_deer_hunting_why_do_hunters_aim_at_the_heart/ | {
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"Center mass is an easier target than a head shot. With a well placed heart and/or lung shot, one can put down a deer pretty quickly.",
"Headshots are great for video games and movies. Very bad in real life. A deer's head is a small target, even smaller is the spinal cord and brain. A deer's head will be moving as it feeds, or hears sounds. \n\nSo there's a high chance of a miss, or a slow kill. A deer shot in the mouth for example will run away and suffer as it slowly bleed out. Finding the deer after it's run away is difficult, so the net result is an inhumanely killed animal whose meat was wasted. \n\nA shot through the heart has a good chance of hitting the lungs, major arteries or the heart itself. The result of that is a deer that dies within a short distance of where it was shot, and quickly. Good hunters understand that they're taking a life for food, and take pride in doing so in a manner that's as humane as possible.",
"You can miss the middle of the heart by 10 inches( or like 30 inches if you miss in the direction of the tail) and still kill the deer. Miss the middle of the brain by 3-5 inches and the deer will probably get away.\n\nAlso trophies, if it is a buck.",
"The head is harder to hit than center torso is, you have a greater chance of a glancing blow due to the skull being solid bone and deflecting the bullet, and the head is the primary trophy that you would be destroying by hitting the head. "
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1yzbud | why when you breed a lion and a tiger to create a liger why does it come out so huge? | What makes it grow abnormally large and why doesnt it just grow up a cross breed but normal size?
Are there any other animals which have cross bred where this occurs?
- Additional why in title, apologies | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1yzbud/eli5_why_when_you_breed_a_lion_and_a_tiger_to/ | {
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"It's thought it's because it didn't receive a growth controlling gene(s) from either parent. A Liger is from a male lion and female Tiger. The control genes may be inherited from female lions and male tigers. ",
"Even without considering things like environment and diet, size is something that is actively controlled by the body. If it goes out of control, you might get things like gigantism, which has a variety of health implications.\n\nA lot of the controls for our body size are genetic in nature and in order to function, \"size control genes\" from the mother and father have to work together. However, if the mother and father are from two separate species, these \"size control genes\" may not recognize each other or they may interact in a strange manner, causing the offspring to be of a different size than either of its parents."
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k92c0 | why potato chip bags are only 1/2 full after opening. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/k92c0/eli5_why_potato_chip_bags_are_only_12_full_after/ | {
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"Two reasons:\n\n1) Potato chip bags need to be packed with air so the chips don't get squished/crumbled.\n\n2) Having a larger potato chip bag makes consumers think there are more potato chips in the bag. It's cheaper to fill a larger bag with more air than more chips.\n\nEdit: Citation: _URL_0_",
"Two reasons:\n\n1) Potato chip bags need to be packed with air so the chips don't get squished/crumbled.\n\n2) Having a larger potato chip bag makes consumers think there are more potato chips in the bag. It's cheaper to fill a larger bag with more air than more chips.\n\nEdit: Citation: _URL_0_"
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avfjzh | how can salt make ice colder when making ice cream, but also be able to melt ice on the ground when it snows? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avfjzh/eli5_how_can_salt_make_ice_colder_when_making_ice/ | {
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"Salt lowers the freezing point of water. \n\nThe ice in your freezer is closer to 0 F than to 32 F. The salt water /ice mixture around ice cream can be colder than 32 F. The water helps transfer the ‘heat’ from the ice cream mix to the ice\n\nThe ice on the road does a similar thing, except the ice on the road is closer to 32 F (depending on outside temp) so the salt makes it a liquid that can flow off the road. If it’s too cold, salting the road doesn’t help. ",
"The salt lowers the freezing point. Imagine a bunch of people jumping on a trampoline, and if they ever jump higher than 5 feet then they float away. Most of the people will stay on the trampoline, but a few who try hard enough will escape.\n\nNow imagine there are also a bunch of people floating around, and if they come within 5 feet of the tramp they fall onto it.\n\nThe trampoline represents the solid ice and the space above is liquid water. If you add salt, that is like adding a bunch of people to the tramp that can not escape no matter how high they jump. They effectively block all the people in space from landing on the tramp, I.e. They prevent water from solidifyiing on the surface.\n\nSo for ice cream, the salt allows the water to get colder, it does the same thing on the roads, it \"allows\" water to be colder than 32 F without freezing. So if its 30 degrees and the roads covered in ice, you can add salt and the freezing point may become say 20 degrees, and the ice will melt because its warmer than that. But if its cold enough, the ice will never melt no matter how much salt you add.",
"To be more explicit about what people are saying:\n\nIce melts at 32F without salt, so an ice cream maker with unsalted ice will have 32F water in it when the ice melts. When you add salt the ice melts sooner (before it warms up as much) so the water in the maker is a lower temperature than 32F. Water is important to have in an ice cream maker because it gives much better thermal contact with the ice cream tub so it freezes faster.\n\nIt works in the road because it lets the ice melt even if it's below freezing (unless it's too cold - salt can only lower the freezing/melting point a certain amount). It also adds some grit which helps add traction, which when it gets too cold for salt some places will lay down salt instead",
"Okay, so plenty of people have explained how salt lowers the freezing point of water and how that affects the roads, but they havent been explaining why salt makes ice colder.\n\nThe most complicated part of this is the fact that it takes energy to melt ice. At 32 degrees Fahrenheit ice can be either a solid or a liquid. Imagine that you have an ice cube on the counter. The ice cube will slowly heat up until it hits 32 degrees. At 32 degrees, it stops heating up and starts melting. The water that is melting off of the ice cube is still 32 degrees, and that water wont get warmer past 32 degrees until all of the ice is melted. It is only after all of the ice is melted that the water can continue heating up to room temperature.\n\nNow you flip the scenario around (sort of). You have ice that is at 32 degrees. When you add salt to the ice, the freezing point is lowered. Because the freezing point of the salty ice is below the current temperature of the ice, it starts to melt. But melting the salty ice *still requires energy*. Where does that energy come from? It comes from the heat energy of the salty ice. The temperature of the salty ice falls as it melts, as that heat is being used as energy to turn the salty ice from a solid into a liquid. The temperature of the salty ice will continue to fall and the salty ice will continue to melt until either all of the salty ice is melted, or until the salty ice is at the temperature of its melting point.\n\nI know it isnt very ELI5, but thats the best I can do at answering your question OP.",
"To pile onto what others have said about salt lowering the freezing point, keep in mind that making ice colder for ice cream and melting ice on the road is literally the exact same thing in both cases.\n\nWhen you make ice cream, the cream is in a sealed container floating in a watery ice bath. The salt melts the ice before it normally would, making the water colder than freezing. This in turn helps to freeze the cream in its tub, since it's now floating in icy water that is below freezing.\n\nIn the case of salting the road, it's doing the same thing. It melts the ice before it normally would, but that's it. The colder than normal water just runs off the road.",
"Salt lowers the freezing point.\n\nIf ice melts at 32, and salted ice melts at about 28.4 the ice on roads can melt if the temperature is under 32...\n\nFor Ice cream, water that comes off the ice is colder (28.4 instead of 32) this colder water has good contact with the metal container, and is colder than non salted ice (water) the ice cream can freeze."
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ad6pls | why do doctors in the united states ask for a patient's race on their registration forms? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ad6pls/eli5_why_do_doctors_in_the_united_states_ask_for/ | {
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"There are some conditions that are more common for specific ethnicities, and some medications that work better/worse for some ethnicities thus making knowing ethnicity an important medical fact. ",
"There are plenty of health conditions which are more common in certain races. It’s also not as easy as looking at someone to determine their race; the last thing a doctor wants to do is make an assumption when it comes to the health and well-being of a patient. Then there are the cultural aspects to consider; some cultures view health issues and recovery or treatment very differently. It’s all part of a whole-person approach to healthcare. \n\nEdit: Typo",
"Public health information can be very valuable and is regularly reported including information like age, sex and race. In addition, disease prevalence varies with different races. For example, people of Asian descent have an increased likelihood of having nasopharyngeal carcinoma and people of African descent have an increased risk for sickle cell disease. This data is incredibly important in identifying risk factors of certain diseases and initiating public health measures to ensure prevention of said diseases.\n\nI think the second reason is a bit less important in terms of the decisions the physician makes.The race options given on these forms are usually fairly vague and is aimed more towards getting a general idea of race, so I would say the primary reason is for collection of public health data. The reason they do this more in the United States as opposed to some European countries is because there is a much more diverse population. As the European population diversifies I expect these questions will be asked more frequently. For now, when this data is collected in a German, Dutch, French, Estonian, etc hospital, it is safely assumed (and is mostly accurate) that the patients are mostly of the same descent, so including them in one data set is an accurate measure of the occurrence of a disease in a population.",
"They report it to Government agencies for statistical purposes and for delivery of care. \n“\nFREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT COLLECTING PATIENT RACE, ETHNICITY, & LANGUAGE (FOR HOSPITAL STAFF)\nQ: WHAT DO MY RACE AND ETHNICITY HAVE TO DO WITH MY HEALTH?\nA: Although we are all individual people, our racial and ethnic backgrounds may place us at differing risks for some diseases. We can work to reduce these risks by making sure that everyone gets high quality health care.\nQ: WHY AM I BEING ASKED THESE QUESTIONS?\nA: We are collecting race, ethnicity, and language information from all of our patients to help us get to know them better. By knowing more about your racial and ethnic background, we can get a better idea of health risks you may have and better meet your health needs.\nQ: WHAT WILL MY INFORMATION BE USED FOR?\nA: Information you give us on your race, ethnicity, and language will help us provide better services and programs to everyone. For example, with this information, we can provide health information in languages spoken by our patients and offer effective programs that can improve health.\nQ: WHO WILL SEE MY INFORMATION?\nA: Your information is kept private and confidential and is protected by law. The only people who will see your information are members of your care team and others who are authorized to see your medical record.\nQ: WHO ARE YOU COLLECTING THIS INFORMATION FROM?\nA: We are collecting this information from all our patients.\nQ: WHAT IF I DON’T WANT TO ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS?\nA: It is perfectly alright if you do not want to answer some or all of the questions. However, this information does help our hospital provide better care. Regardless of whether you answer these questions, we will provide you care.\nQ: WHAT DO YOU CARE? WE’RE ALL HUMANS.\nA: Information about your race and ethnicity helps us make sure we provide the highest quality of care for all patients. Studies show that our racial and ethnic backgrounds may place us at different risks for certain diseases. By knowing more about your racial and ethnic background, we can get a better idea of health risks you may have and better meet your health needs.\nQ: CAN’T YOU TELL BY LOOKING AT ME?\nA: Every person is different, so we do not make any assumptions based on how a person looks. Q: I WAS BORN IN ______ COUNTRY, BUT I’VE LIVED HERE ALL MY LIFE. WHAT SHOULD I CHOOSE?\nA: It is really up to you. You can choose any term that you are most comfortable with.\nQ: ARE YOU TRYING TO FIND OUT IF I AM A U.S. CITIZEN?\nA: No, definitely not. This information is confidential and used only to improve health care. No questions regarding citizenship or documentation are asked.\nQ: ISN’T THAT AN ILLEGAL QUESTION TO ASK?\nA: No, it is not illegal to ask. Collecting and reporting race, ethnicity, and language are legal under the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 and several California State laws. However, you may choose not to answer any question.”",
"The dosing of some things is also based on race. \n\nI give people MRI contrast. They need a GFR (kidney function score) of at least 30 to get contrast. If I run a GFR and put a patients race down as white and I get 29 GFR they don’t get contrast. If I change their race to black and everything else is the same they can end up with ~31 GFR and get contrast. \n\nNo one has told me what to do with people like Obama in those situations. "
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2dx3tp | what's it like to be stuck in a coma? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2dx3tp/eli5_whats_it_like_to_be_stuck_in_a_coma/ | {
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"* [_URL_0_ - Coma](_URL_0_/Conditions/coma/Pages/Introduction.aspx)\n\n > A person in a coma will often be unresponsive to their environment. They may not be able to hear voices or feel pain. However, they may have some awareness of their surroundings. **Every coma experience is unique.**\n\n > Occasionally, a person in a coma may open their eyes, grimace or make a noise. They may not be aware of these movements or have any control over them.\n\n > Being in a coma means the person has a low level of consciousness. Their level of consciousness will depend on how much of their brain is functioning, which may change over time. \n\n\n > People don't usually suddenly \"wake up\" from a coma, but tend to come round gradually and regain brain function over time. When a person comes out of a coma, they may be agitated and confused. They may need to be sedated for their own safety.\n\n\n(bolding by me)\n\n|\n\nHere is a personal account noted at the same link on the left hand side of the page...\n\n|\n\n > **One man's account of being in a coma**\n\n > \"For much of the time I knew what was going on. I couldn't see, but I could feel and hear. I knew what was in the news and, when I awoke, could repeat anecdotes that had been recounted to my apparently deaf ears.\n\n > \"I remember being told what the doctors thought was wrong and consciously setting out to fight it. I once overheard a discussion about how seriously ill I was.\n\n > \"The nurses would say that they were going to give me an injection or take my blood pressure before I felt the needle going in or the tourniquet tightening.\n\n > \"I could also feel my dear wife's hand in mine, our fingers entwined. I could hear her telling me that the children were all right and that their schools and my office were being supportive. I couldn't work out what she was doing in the strange world I now inhabited, but her presence was enormously reassuring.\" \n\n--------\n\n\n* [A google search that will yield some personal stories/experiences](_URL_1_)",
"I was in a coma for a week after a car accident. I don't actually remember any of it. When I came out of it I remember having some pretty vivid hallucinations/delusions but I think that had more to do with the morphine. It isn't really like being asleep In that when you wake up it doesn't feel as if any time has passed at all. ",
"I was out for a week, I recall nothing from that time.\nWhen I woke up I was groggy, eyes were not focusing and everything was blurry. Speech was somewhat difficult, and I had lost a lot of strength and had trouble walking. \nI'm not sure what the cause was but I have absolutely 0 memory of that time.",
"Wake me up and I tell you."
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7s6kyx | what determines the consistency of our snot? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7s6kyx/eli5what_determines_the_consistency_of_our_snot/ | {
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"Snot is made from mostly water and a few proteins, along with whatever it catches while lining your sinuses. Your body can adjust both the amount produced and the levels of water pretty considerably depending on your current state. \n\nIf you're dehydrated or in a dusty environment, it will thicken as your body uses less water to make it or it fills with the particles that it's catching. When you're sick it thickens for the same reason it does when you're in a dusty environment (it's collecting lots of germs). \n\nIf you've eaten spicy food, it will thin as your body makes lots watery mucus to flush the irritant from your mucus membranes. "
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6zo1gj | do twins in the twins paradox keep the same age if the acceleration to and from each other are added? | From what I understand, the reason the travelling twin ages less is because time appears to speed up for the resting twin on the acceleration back towards him.
However, does the acceleration *away* from the twin at the beginning of the journey and deceleration at the end cancel out the ageing by slowing down the resting twin's apparent time in those periods?
---
My failed imagination: [Imgur](_URL_0_) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6zo1gj/eli5_do_twins_in_the_twins_paradox_keep_the_same/ | {
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"The direction of the acceleration is irrelevant. Accelerating away or accelerating towards both slow down the clocks for the accelerating twin. They don't cancel out."
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e829qx | why does putting pressure on a wound facilitate clotting? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/e829qx/eli5_why_does_putting_pressure_on_a_wound/ | {
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"It's not that it *facilitates* clotting so much per se. It doesn't make the platelets work any better or faster, but it does slow blood loss while platelets migrate to the area by compressing the vasculature.",
"Short answer: It doesn’t.\n\nLonger answer: putting pressure on a wound decreases blood loss the decreased blood flow may make the clotting take less time to seal the damaged blood vessels.",
"It doesn't, at least not directly. Pressurizing a wound allows for more blood to be held in place, and with a greater quantity of blood comes a greater presence of platelets and increased clotting ability. The more blood that stays in the body, the better.\n\nWhen we are physically injured, our body undergoes a process called vascular spasm, in which the arterial connections to the injured tissue vasoconstrict (tighten) significantly, reducing blood flow to the area - this is intended to reduce blood loss. As an unfortunate result, we also don't have a lot of blood going there to the injured site to actually assist in the healing process. Luckily, the actual injured arteries themselves vasodilate (widen), allowing any blood already in the injured area to pool into the injury. If this blood is lost, clotting is much more difficult because of the now closed pathways. This is why it's recommended to pressure any wound (special exceptions for eye and some lung injuries), as whatever blood is in the area is going to become our first line of defense against pathogens, further blood loss, and that whole death thing.\n\nTL;DR: pressure it, it's good for you",
"3 things facilitate clotting: hypercoagulaity, stasis and endothelial damage...know as virchows triad\n\n1) stasis: slow moving blood clots better\n\n2)endothelial damage: damage to the blood vessel wall exposed compounds which make clotting easier\n\n3 hypercoagulabilty: catch all for things that make blood easier to clot ie smoking, estrogen, etc.\n\npressure helps with number 1",
"First you stop the bleeding if the pressure you apply is higher than the blood pressure inside the blood vessel. By doing so you give blood the time to form a clot and prevent the wound from bleeding again when not applying pressure anymore."
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4xq8f2 | why can't we just replace our heart when we are getting old? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4xq8f2/eli5_why_cant_we_just_replace_our_heart_when_we/ | {
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"You can, and some do if they have heart problems. However old age is something that not only affects your heart but your entire body. For instance the blood vain harden and become more fragile causing higher rates of stroke and embolisms. It would be very tricky to replace all your blood vains.",
"Recipients of transplanted organs have to take anti-rejection medications for the rest of their lives. These drugs can lower patients' resistance to infection. \n\nPerhaps in the future it may be possible to grow a new heart with stem cells or clone one from your existing cells, but that's pretty far off in the future. ",
"We do that fairly routinely. If no donors are available, we can use even mechanical hearts which work pretty well.\n\nThe problem is that old age affects everything in your body. The more organs you swap the more complications you'll face, and some (like the brain or veins) can't be realistically just \"swapped.\" Your body doesn't accept foreign organs easily, so you'll be on medication for the rest of your life to keep your own body from trying to expel the transplant."
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fcndr2 | why is there more compression and tension on your joints when u walk up the stairs compared to standing on one leg? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fcndr2/eli5_why_is_there_more_compression_and_tension_on/ | {
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"Gravity is a bigger factory when going up stairs vs standing still. So the legs will tense up with strength to keep you connected to the floor and moving",
"Standing exerts one unit of gravity worth of acceleration. When you walk up the stairs, you are moving upwards in a gravitational field, therefore experiencing an even greater amount of acceleration. \n\nPer F=ma, a higher (a)cceleration will result in a higher (F)orce"
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41107g | why are storage bin capacities measured in gallons? | My trash bin and my Rubbermaid storage bins are marked in gallons or quarts. Why is this, versus say cubic feet? It's not like I'm going to put 10.5 gallons of water in my trash can... | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/41107g/eli5_why_are_storage_bin_capacities_measured_in/ | {
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"probably because cubic feet is too large of a measurement for the type of plastic, portable storage its used for. There's 7.5 gallons to one cubic foot. you can see how this would get clunky with too small a measurement. Also, gallons takes into account crevices, and non uniform formations. like containers that are tapered at the bottom, or have rounded edges. "
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9iej3p | why does the sun seem to bleach everything but our skin? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9iej3p/eli5_why_does_the_sun_seem_to_bleach_everything/ | {
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"The sun breaks down chemicals that make color on inorganic objects but when it hits living skin their are cells called melanocytes which produce pigment.",
"Also to add, your skin regenerates, whilst the stop sign down the road made from metal, does not.",
"If you were dead, the sun WOULD bleach your skin. \n\nBecause you're alive, the cells in your body react to the sunlight by making themselves darker, to reduce the harm done to them by the sunlight."
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6yc96i | what is the half moon on your fingernails, am i in bad health if i don't have it? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6yc96i/eli5_what_is_the_half_moon_on_your_fingernails_am/ | {
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"..You mean what's sometime referred to as the \"Lunula\"?\n\nIt's part of the root structure of the nail, as in the flesh that your nail grows out of, and it's appearance varies from person to person.\n\nIt's perfectly normal to not have a visible lunula.\n\n\n\n"
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7g8t0s | why don’t things like stickers and tape work when they are submerged in water? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7g8t0s/eli5_why_dont_things_like_stickers_and_tape_work/ | {
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"The adhesives work by contacting and physically or chemically attaching to the surface.\n\nWater molecules obstruct that contact on a microscopic level, and may also chemically interact with the adhesive."
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a2ffva | would two large dinosaurs running at top speed into each other have the same catastrophic results as two cars doing the same thing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a2ffva/eli5_would_two_large_dinosaurs_running_at_top/ | {
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"Think about this: have you ever heard of elephants or rhinos or hippos running into each other? \n\nNot really, right?\n\nBecause an elephant is as big as a truck, and can do 20 km/h (roughly). Two running into each other would do as much damage as getting hit by a big truck doing 40km/h. That's enough to break bones, sending you to a hospital... or being a fatal accident in the wild."
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3mks15 | why do some people willingly (and apparently enjoy) confessing to crimes they didn't commit? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mks15/eli5why_do_some_people_willingly_and_apparently/ | {
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"Many are mentally disturbed people that need help. .others seek the attention and spotlight.. like that scumbag that confessed to killing JonBenet Ramsey many years later. . He was in Thailand I think... brought to the US for investigation..and was found to be nowhere around when the crime was committed.. he seems like he had both issues working for him",
"- They either are mentally ill and are not really capable of distinguishing between what they have done or what they've thought about doing.\n- Some commit crimes to gain notoriety. The more you can confess to, the more notorious you are.\n- Some make false confessions because they have been proposed a deal by the police. These deals are meant to 'reward' cooperation, but sometimes end up rewarding false confessions instead. Because if someone goes 'listen, if you just confess, we'll not pursue the death penalty, but life in prison instead', for many people, they'll do anything to get that, even lie.\n- Sometimes it is a genuine mistake. Not all murderers know their victims. So they might confess to killing a 16 year old brunette hitchhiker, not knowing what her name etc was, which the police then links to the wrong 16 year old brunette hitchhiker.\n- Some false confessions are the result of poor police work, where they all but torture the suspect into confessing. Some people end up so worn down from that, that they confess just to get it over with."
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t1vb8 | how lawn treatments kill weeds while simultaneously nourishing grass | What is happening in the process that distinguishes between the two? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/t1vb8/eli5_how_lawn_treatments_kill_weeds_while/ | {
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"Weedkiller that preserves grass tries to avoid using chemicals that harm grass. For example, imagine there are lots of pups and kittens, and you want to (gasp!) kill all the pups. Try chocolate. That kills dogs but not cats (AFAIK, correct me if I'm wrong, you get the point though). Why should different types of plants have 100% same mechanisms? Some chemicals hurt some plants, and not other plants.\n\nA weedkiller formulated against poison ivy might not be useful against a weed in your grass; it may even kill your grass as well. ETC.",
"After spending three years professionally killing weeds and insects in lawns, I can give you what I was told. Weeds are aggressive grasses. If they weren't they wouldn't grow in your lawn. The weeds grow long roots and suck the nutrients out of the soil faster than the grass you want to keep. \n\nWhat the lawn treatments do is play up on the greed of the weed. The chemicals used, in small dosages, are actually fertilizers. The fertilizers speed up the growth of the weeds to the point that they burn out. Think of it like a steroid overdose. \n\nSo if the chemicals are used properly, you end up with dead weeds and a stronger lawn that is more resistant to weeds. "
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18pxsq | the psychology behind game grinding | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/18pxsq/eli5_the_psychology_behind_game_grinding/ | {
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"There's two - there's MMO Grinding, and there's classic JRPG Grinding. \n\nWith MMO Grinding, it's a [Skinner Box](_URL_0_). Push button, receive reward. Early in the game you're rewarded for doing damn near anything. Talk to someone - get a level. Cast a spell, get a level. As you go up in levels, it stretches out more and more, leading you to do the same repetitive tasks for the reward. It's why people do high level dungeons over and over and over again - they're grinding for the \"reward\" of a slightly different colored items with slightly higher numbers on them than the item they already have.\n\nWith classic JRPG grinding, it's a mechanic to stretch out the gameplay. Selling a game with 20 hours of gameplay when your competitors claim to have 60 is going to get your game ignored. So rather than assume the player will gain two levels traveling to the next area's boss, you tweak it so that you need to add at least ten levels, maybe more. Item prices are much higher as are spell or item prices. This forces the player to fight random encounters for hours on end to gain the experience and money needed to beat the next boss and move on to the rest of the game.\n\nThe first is.... when it's done well, you don't notice it. When it's done poorly, it's all the game is. The second is an outdated mechanic and should be delegated to the dustbin of gaming history as something that, in retrospect, is a terrible design decision."
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8zxriq | what is the difference between a bore and a valve in a car engine? | I can't seem to tell the difference. I'm trying to learn about car engines and some places say valve others say bore. So what's the difference?
Thanks! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8zxriq/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_a_bore_and_a/ | {
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"They are two completely separate measurements. The bore is a measurement of the size of the hole that the Piston goes up and down in, and valves are very small piston like rods that open and close to allow the air-fuel mixture in and the exhaust out.",
"They're completely different things.\n\nThe \"bore\" of an engine cylinder is the measure of the cylinder's diameter. \"Stroke\" is how far the piston moves up & down inside the cylinder.\n\nThe valves are the openings at the top that open & close to allow fuel in, compression to happen & exhaust to escape.",
"A bore is a cylindrical hole or passage, machined smooth so a component can slide, move, or rotate within it.\nA valve is actuated by a camshaft in order to open which allows air to flow in or out of the cylinder (which is a bore that houses the piston).\nYou can Google 4 cycle engine operation to learn how the piston and valves work together. "
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5z4kw5 | what is independence referendum proposed by scottish firth minister about? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5z4kw5/eli5what_is_independence_referendum_proposed_by/ | {
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"Scotland had a popular vote in order to decide whether or not they should leave the uk in 2014, they voted to stay by a narrow margin on the basis that the UK would remain in the European union. \n\nhowever now the UK have chosen to leave the European union. \n\nUnlike the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland voted to stay in the EU with a 70% majority. So now, Sturgeon, the head of the Scottish government is seeking permission to have another vote, to see if Scotland want to leave the UK to presumably join the European Union again. "
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6ccbua | why does almost everybody pronounce years from the 1900s like "nineteen eighty" but years from the 2000s like "two thousand eleven? | Most people pronounce say the year they were born as for example 1990 as "nineteen ninety" but when they say a date in the 2000s it's usually pronounced for example 2011 as "two thousand eleven" but usually nobody pronounces 1990 "nineteen thousand ninety." Why is that? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ccbua/eli5_why_does_almost_everybody_pronounce_years/ | {
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"Because of that first decade. \n\nTwenty one (2001)? That's not right. Twenty oh one? That still sounds awkward. \n\nI bet it'll change back when we hit twenty twenty.",
"Nope it's twenty eleven here. \n\nAfter the millennium the first 9 years were two thousand and one / two etc etc to nine and then it became twenty ten / eleven etc etc...",
"First just wanted to say that \"nineteen thousand ninety\" would be the year 19,090. Thus the reason it isn't said.\nIf you wanted to read 1990 like a number it would be \"one thousand nine hundred ninety.\" 8 syllables\nInstead people said nineteen ninety. 4 syllables.\nThen when the new millennium hit we had no choice but to call it the year 2 thousand, because twenty zero zero, just sounds weird.\nSince then most people kept up reading out the 2 thousand part out of habit.\nSome people would read this year as twenty seventeen (4 syllables)\nor two thousand seventeen. (5 syllables)\nThe reason being that the amount of syllables aren't that different.",
"Referring to the year as Two thousand X is a bit of a holdover from the last decade. I don't hear it much anymore. its increasingly being referred to as Twenty X and will be going forward."
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2tf568 | why isn't russia's invasion of ukraine treated as an act of war by the rest of the western world? why don't the us, uk, germany etc. intervene? | Lads, it's ~~Tottenham~~ been explained. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2tf568/eli5_why_isnt_russias_invasion_of_ukraine_treated/ | {
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"Nobody wants to start a war with Russia because wars with Russia don't tend to end very well. Unless you are Finland, but that is another thing. Basically, Russia is huge and has a huge population of able bodied men they could potentially use for an army. You won't start a war you know you can't win. Besides, Europe is a bit tired of wars happening on their lands. ",
"Short answer: the expected losses do not justify the probable gains.\n\nYou cannot intervene with one of the [\"Big Five\"](_URL_0_) because they will veto. If you attempt to defect from the UN to get around the sanctions, you risk being alienated from the rest of the developed world. ",
"Because this is not Bush and the New Crusades.\nthat era is dead.\nand more civil and intelligent heads realize that punishing Russia economically, and through isolationism, is more of a winning strategy than \"bring it on\".\nAnd they're right. it's working far more than \"Shock and Awe\" did.",
"There are a lot of reasons, but it has been treated as illegal aggression, the question is what to do about it. \n\nBasically we've imposed some sanctions on them.. And that's the usual response in this situation. Ukraine declined to pursue NATO membership so there is no real legal obligation to race in our armies to help them. \n\nFor Europe, Germany particularly, but everyone generally they all rely on Russian oil and natural gas. And antagonizing the Russians too much jeopardizes that relationship. \n\nThe other problem is a troubling philosophical one. Where should the borders of Russia be? Ukraine was a part of Russia for hundreds of years and the Crimean peninsula being part of Ukraine was a sort of internal reorganization, that it kinda stayed Ukrainian is a quick of recent history and isn't necessarily something worth picking a fight over. \n\nThe other issue is that the Russians are not really directly moving large numbers of their own troops in. If they want to fight a limited scale proxy war we can give weapons to the Ukrainians and see if they can and will fight back. \n\nWe went through the same questions with Nazi Germany of course. And had Hitler not invaded Poland ww2 would have played out very differently if it played out at all. \n\n",
"I don't think they aren't treating it like an \"act of war,\" it's just that there isn't some pre-defined response to a war not involving your own particular country. Countries have a range of different responses based on how the conflict is perceived to affect their self-interests and how they are equipped to deal with it, and you're seeing some of those being taken by western countries now.\n\nAlthough various signatories of the Budapest Memorandum provided Ukraine with security assurances, those were never specified and do not necessarily have to include picking up a gun and heading for the front lines.\n\nThe \"Why don't the US, UK, Germany etc. intervene\" answer is obvious: let's not ramp up a shooting war between multiple nuclear-armed combatants, shall we?\n\nStill, in the long term, the failure of the various signatories of the Memorandum to successfully protect Ukraine from Russian aggression (though this was complicated in an apparently unforeseen way by Russia being one of those signatories--blatantly breaking the treaty) is probably going to have the effect of increasing the danger of nuclear war.\n\nUkraine gave up nukes on their territory for assurances that exactly this sort of thing would not happen. Now, one of the countries that gave those assurances is attacking it, and the rest are failing to or unable to stop it.\n\nWhat sort of luck are non-proliferation negotiators going to have getting Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, or any other unstable nuclear-armed regimes to give up their arsenals after this stellar example of what happens when you don't have the Bomb?\n\nNo way would this be happening to Ukraine right now if they had kept a couple warheads instead of dutifully handing them over after independence.",
"Because Russia never invaded Ukraine? ",
"If Russia had *really* invaded Ukraine, conducting airstrikes, helicopter strikes, missile strikes, paratroop drops, rolled in armored columns, totally annihilating the Ukrainian military and rolling their troops right into Kiev to oppress a local population completely against their will (imagine the U.S. in Iraq in 2003 if you need a mental image), the story would be quite different. \n\nBut did that happen? No. What is happening? Russia is covertly helping to arm and fund Russian speaking Ukrainian rebels in East Ukraine. \n\nThe west doesn't want a hot war with Russia, because we have very little to gain in that situation. We just want to weaken Russia. Ukrainian lives are currency we are using to accomplish this.",
"Because Russia has nuclear weapons.\n\nThat pretty much the main reason why you can just intervene."
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73nz2r | why does it feel more uncomfortable when cold water touches our stomach area but it feels fine when cold water touches our hands? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/73nz2r/eli5_why_does_it_feel_more_uncomfortable_when/ | {
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"Our core is the most important part of our body (Besides the brain of course). It's where all your organs are that keep you alive. It needs to maintain homeostasis. In other words a consistant set temperature to ensure your vital organs work properly. Your limbs don't need warmth as much as your core simply becuase they're not as important and don't have anything im them that requires a specific temperature. Also, I am just a guy in college so please don't crucifiy me if I'm a little off but this is the general idea. ",
"Your hands are more tolerant. You grab cold drinks all the time, hot drinks, ice for your drink, washing your hands throughout the day, carrying stuff, and work. You do none of this with your stomach area. Hands are less sensitive to the change, as in not bothered by it."
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6osc10 | when there has been no rain & all the plants you want to keep around are dying, why do weeds thrive? could we not "breed" that hardiness into our flowers & such? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6osc10/eli5_when_there_has_been_no_rain_all_the_plants/ | {
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"For the plants that matter, like ones we eat, that kind of hardiness usually works against large yields. We need plants to perform very well and grow quickly to feed all of us. Weeds survive because they don't grow juicy fruit, or large edible roots. They just devote their all to... weedlike growth. ",
"You cannot breed hardiness into plants without compromising its yield.\n\nPlants have stomata which are tiny little holes in the leaves that allow air exchange to occur. This is necessary for them to breathe and collect carbon dioxide, photosynthesize, then trade it back into oxygen. Exposure to the air causes evaporation and if this process is too fast then the plant will wilt and die.\n\nThere are three commonly known respiratory systems.\n\nC3 is the most common system used by plants that has a good balance of air exchange and protection from evaporation.\n\nC4 is evolved for plants that are near water sources. These plants are typically species like grains that don't have to worry about dehydration so the respiratory system goes into overdrive and photosynthesizes as much as possible.\n\nCAM is found in plants that have to survive drought like conditions. Cactus have this system where the stomata remains shut during the day as to prevent as much water loss as possible and is only active at night. This is troublesome because it also needs sunlight to photosynthesize. This is the reason why cacti have the slowest growth rate among all plants.\n\nTL;DR - Weeds grow in harsh conditions because they grow and photosynthesize very slowly to survive. Non-native plants need watering because they produce more rapidly than the local environment can support which leaves them vulnerable to dehydration. ",
"There are. A list from [California University.](_URL_0_) \n\nThe thing is that these are generally more costly seeds. Many have lower yields than normal varieties of the seed. You have to know ahead of time you will have a drought. If you are in adrought prone area it is worth the extra time and money to buy drought tolerant seeds. \n\nI guess the first question is: What type of plants? Crops like those listed have drought resistant varieties, but are you talking about say flowers or other decorative plants? The same thing applies. They may have drought resistant varieties.\n\n\nThe reality is it is possible to breed drought resistance into plants. The reason it doesn't happen is: The market is not ready to pay for them. If you really live in a drought prone area, you buy native or other dry land plants that are naturally drought hardy. Or you make peace with having to water them. The cost of breeding other plants into being drought tolerant is not worth the returns. \n\nAlso you are applying survivors bias to the situation. Like in WWII when they wanted to armor the parts of the planes that made it back form bombing runs all shot up. Nope Armor the parts that aren't shot up on the planes that returned. Those are the parts that got the other planes shot down. In this case you are seeing many weeds thriving. On my property for the last three years we had issues with water due to record flooding. So we had a group of weeds that went crazy. Uncontrollable. But it was really only a small number that went crazy. This year is really dry. None of those are even growing. What you get is that for any condition dry, wet, cool, hot, there is some variety of weed that has that as it's perfect conditions. That weed will then go apeshit growing. If it is not ideal for your intended crop/plantings you tend to think \"weeds\" but in reality it is a group of only a few weeds. There may be weeds that you can't even find growing right now due to the drought that will be back like gangbusters once it is not a drought.\n\nHere is a good explanation of this idea and some of the drought tolerant weeds from [North Dakota extension](_URL_1_) "
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2bgaw5 | why does beer taste bad when you drink it through a straw but most other beverages are fine? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2bgaw5/eli5_why_does_beer_taste_bad_when_you_drink_it/ | {
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"Between low pressure\n\nand agitation, the beer\n\nfoams up and tastes bad.",
"Foam I would imagine, but really I don't mind the taste of beer through a straw I just don't usually drink it that way unless I am wearing one of those cool drink hats.",
"Personal taste. I find water tastes gross through a straw."
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2d5s0l | cable networks in the us. especially amc. | I'm in the UK, so we don't have breaking bad on TV, only on DVD and Netflix.
Anyway, on the official page, there's a marathon of season 1 - 5 starting at 4/5c ...
How do they allow something as graphic / violent as breaking bad on air hours before the watershed?
Or does it work as you pay for certain cable networks and they have passcodes so kids don't view them? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2d5s0l/eli5_cable_networks_in_the_us_especially_amc/ | {
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"Television in the US (free television) is regulated heavily on what types of content they can show, and when.\n\nAMC is a paid-for cable network and can typically show whatever they want. They are paid via advertisments and typically don't show anything viewed as obscene (advertisers won't pay em!) \n\nThey aren't as extreme as HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, Playboy Channel etc where they are paid via subscriptions and typically don't get advertising revenue.\n\nPay-For TV is not regulated in the US. It's just based on what will or will not drive advertising dollars in\n",
"[From the FCC's website](_URL_0_):\n\n > 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.\" The Commission has historically interpreted this restriction to apply to radio and television broadcasters, and has never extended it to cover cable operators. In addition, because cable and satellite services are subscription-based, viewers of these services have greater control over the programming content that comes into their homes, whereas broadcast content traditionally has been available to any member of the public with a radio or television. "
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zsehx | its vs. it's | I know where to use them, but I don't understand why one has an apostrophe and the other not. "It's" makes sense for possessive and "it is". Why is it this way around? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/zsehx/eli5_its_vs_its/ | {
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"Here is how you can remember!\n\nPossessive:\n\n*hers*\n\n*theirs*\n\n*its*\n\nThere are no apostrophes in those possessives. So, you would say:\n\n*The dog plays with its ball.*\n\n\n\nThe apostrophe with a pronoun means \"is.\" Like this:\n\n*He's going to the store.* (He is going to the store)\n\n*It's an interesting book.* (It is an interesting book)\n\n*She's such a good writer!* (She is such a good writer)",
"The English language always proves to be tricky. Basically, pronouns (he, her, it) differ from nouns in this regard. Nouns need the apostrophe to show possession whereas pronouns don't (his, hers, its). This is because you don't need to worry about plurality with pronouns like you would a noun. If you are talking about multiple boys using the pronoun *he*, you say *they* and not *hes*. *Its* is no different, because the plural of it would be *these* or *those*. *It's* still needs its apostrophe just like *he's* and *she's*.\n\nIt's a little unfair when it comes to nouns but if there was a different word for the plural of every single noun, no one would learn English. Luckily, the context is obvious. \"The dog's bowl\" certainly means the bowl belongs to the dog. \"The dog is bowl\" would make no sense. "
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fhpgeo | what does it mean when the government “injects” money into the financial system? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fhpgeo/elif_what_does_it_mean_when_the_government/ | {
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"They are trying to influence interest rates. \n\nThe Federal Reserve will buy large amounts of treasuries which injects money into the economy. This makes money less scarce and drives interest rates down. Same is for the opposite direction. If they want to push rates up, they sell a bunch of treasuries, which pulls money out, less money to go around, so it drives rates up.",
"It means that the Fed has started buying securities, usually bonds, off the open market or engaging in short term agreements where they buy a bond with the seller agreeing to buy it back soon after, essentially an over night loan.\n\nThese actions means that companies and banks have access to actual cash available when they need it.\n\nTo understand why they need cash, when you deposit money in a bank, only s fraction is keep as cash. The bank only wants to keep enough cash to meet their typical withdrawal needs. Everything else they store in bonds and loans to earn interest and protect against inflation. Then they don't have enough cash on hand, they burrow in from other banks/investors or sale their bonds. But what happens if their aren't any banks or investors willing or able to lend, or nobody who wants or is able to buy the bond? Suddenly the bank or company can't pay it's bill (when you withdrawn from a bank they owe you money, like you owe your power company money). When this happens on a large scale, the Fed can step in a provide the cash needed to the system. So they create money out of thin air and start buying bonds or lending money. It's not that the bank didn't have the assets to meet it's obligations, it just didn't have the cash. Like a family with a large and valuable house and valuables, but no cash. They are wealthy, but cash poor. By doing so, the Fed helps prevent a bad situation in the economy from getting much much worst \n\nExamples of when the Fed did a bad job of providing cash to the economy? The Great Depression. Had the Fed provided cash, and properly, to the economy, it likely would have been just another recession.",
"ELI5: Think of money like water flowing over a water wheel. When the economy is healthy, lots of water is moving, and the wheel spins. This water comes from lots of places, but consumer spending is the important one. When the economy turns bad, and people start worrying, they stop spending and hold on to their money. The water stops moving, and the wheels stops.\n\nThe government can make water out of thin air (printing money). When other sources of water dry up because the economy goes bad, the government is the only entity that can keep the water flowing by itself. So they make more water out of thin air, and dump it on the wheel to keep it moving.",
"In Australia it means they give us all $750 each and tell us not to pay bills with it, but go out and buy stuff from the shops which then brings life back into the retail sector which means people get more hours and it all flows on.",
"Lets say your friends are all complaining that people keep stealing their allowance. You have a nice safe so you decide to become the neighborhood bank. You tell all your friends that you will hold their money in a very safe place and if they want it, all they have to do is ask. \n\nYour friends love this idea and all give you their allowance each week and you stash it in the safe. Sometimes they take some out, but for the most part it just sits there. Then Sally comes up to you and says she is starting a lemonade stand, but needs money to buy the lemons and sugar. You know Sally is honest and reliable and will repay the money. So you take some out of the safe, and give it to Sally. In exchange, she gives you a piece of paper that says she will pay it back with interest. \n\nOnce the word gets out that you lend money, more of your friends come and borrow to start their businesses, buy a new bike, all sorts of things. So you lend out more and more money, get more and more pieces of paper, and start getting more and more interest. Good times indeed! \n\nBut then something bad happens. Everyone's allowance gets cut. So people stop giving you as much money and more people than normal want their money from the bank. At the same time some of your friends start having trouble making their loan payments. This is a big problem because you promised those people they could have their money and you don't have enough to give everyone what they want. \n\nSo you have an idea! Those pieces of paper your friends gave you promising to pay you back can be sold to someone else. They will give you money now, and in exchange they will get the payments from your friends. This will then get you the money you need to pay out to your friends who want their deposits back. \n\nThere's a problem though. Every neighborhood has a bank like yours and they are all having the same problem and all had the same idea. So the market is flooded with people trying to sell their friends' debt. Since there is so much of it, buyers don't have to pay as much. This means you have to sell more to get the money you need for deposits. But that just means there is more for sale! This causes prices to collapse. \n\nIn comes your parents and they say look, we know you are just having a hard time but things will get better. Allowances will rise again! How about we give you a good price for your friends' debts. When things get better you can pay us back, with a little interest, and we will even give you the debt back. Now you can pay your friends for their deposits and, when allowances go back up, you can still get the payments from their debt. Your parents will get a little interest, but mostly they just don't want to see you go out of business. \n\nThe Fed is your parents and you are the financial system. The reality is a lot more complicated and involves lots of actors, but that's the gist of it.",
"I just started learning about the Fed. \n\nThere’s a book by G. Edward Griffin. \n\nBut also watch this video for a good breakdown \nIt puts into perspective how all this money circulating the United States is essentially made up and worthless. It’s fucking bonkers. \n\n[The Creature from Jekyll Island](_URL_0_)",
"Most of the responses are not very ELIAF, despite the fact that most of them are deliberate oversimplifications.\n\nI decided to post in order to change that below, but before i pressed \"comment\" I came back up here to acknowledge that actually maybe this shit is not something you could realistically explain to 5 year old so that they understood it. Nevertheless the below is my best effort to simplify the issue without actually lying. I did my best.\n\nFundamentally money is like everything else, the price of money depends on demand vs supply. Sometimes it is beneficial for the economy to reduce the value of money, this effectively transfers wealth from savers/(the rich) to debtors/(the poor). If money is less valuable the debt you owe is reduced and the savings you own are reduced. This encourages savers to invest their money into productive businesses (invest instead of watching it depreciate) which stimulates the economy in general and at the same time reduces pressure on people who have taken risks and accrued debt. This is called inflation. Inflation is good at manageable levels, not good if it runs out of control. There is a reason why most central banks target inflation levels at 2-3% rather than 0%. Deflation, where the value of money is reducing, is catastrophic because it induces panic in society and erodes the stability of the social contract.\n\nSince most governments have huge debts they would normally secretly prefer if inflation ran at 4% or so, as long as interest rates stay low, since this would mean they could easily continue to borrow to fund expenditure and let inflation erode the burden of the debt. They would never admit this because as soon as they admitted they would like inflation to run at a \"healthy\" level the \"interest\" rates they could borrow at would increase.\n\nUnfortunately lenders are not so dumb, and realise they need to keep the interest rate > than the inflation rate or they end up being repaid less than they lent in real terms. \"interest\" rates are in quotes because governments (or large corporations) don't go to banks for a loan and negotiate an interest rates, they issue bonds and have the rates determined by an auction. This is why most western govts have independent central banks who can ignore the government and who are tasked with managing inflation, this means lenders can be reasonably confident that their lending will be below inflation so that they will end up in profit in real terms. Lenders who lend to countries where the central bank is controlled by government have noticed what happened in zimbabwe and price that risk into the interest rate they charge those countries.\n\nWhen we talk about injecting money what is happening is that governments are increasing the supply side of the supply/demand ratio and therefore reducing the value/price of money. Most countries (except in the Eurozone where this is collective rather than left to individual countries) can print as much of their currency as they want. They could run the printing presses all day and increase the supply of money. If demand remains the same and supply increase, price (value) drops. This means inflation increases. Printing presses is a simplification here, because in the modern world 90% of money is digital rather than actual paper money, so to increase supply central banks only have to lend money to banks at cheap interest rates and those banks can lend it on, so the supply of money is immediately increased. Not even going to go into the multiplier effect for ELIA5.\n\nWhen it suits governments to do this they will inject money. They are cautious because they are aware that this effectively causes a transfer of wealth from the saver to the debtor (which is often the investor).\n\nThis is normally a good thing for social cohesion and wins them votes, but if they go too far the wealthy will retaliate, not by voting, but by moving the wealth out of their reach. So they have to take little bits and often rather than a smash and grab.",
"money need to go around in a circle from earning it to spending it, from earning it to spending it. \nfrom a business/company making the money by selling their product. To ultimately spend it on maintenance, new equipment, marketing, employee training, salary, etc.\n\nthe money given to the employee gets spent on food, rent, gas, going back to the food company (Costco,wallmart) , gas company, rent company (real state)...\n\nand those companies spend that money on themselves and on employees... completing the circle, and so on and so forth.\n\nRight now people are not spending as much(or any) so that money is not going back to the companies or businesses.\n\none store going out of business, the bank would not give a fook.\nbut now make that EVERY store, EVERY movie theater, EVERY restaurant... the bank is in deep shit too because the bank needs the money to keep rolling, so...\n\nthe government is going to make money and \"inject\" (forgive debts, cuz banks also have debts) into the banks (which is all digital and fake, for lack of a better term) just so the economy stays somewhat afloat.\n\n#its like when the bank ran out of money in Monopoly (the board game) and your dad just made more money by cutting money sized paper pieces from your school notebook. just so the game continues\n\nthis is going to affect the economy in more complicated ways, for sure, but that is another question to be asked.",
"The role of the Federal Reserve is to act as a referee for the economy with the goal of maintaining stable prices and employment. They can speed up or cool down the economy through buying/selling government bonds using cash.\n\nThe Federal Reserve buys up government bonds, this will add money into circulation. Since everyone will have a little bit more money, everyone will likely spent more or pay off their debts more quickly.\n\nThis comes at a cost. Now that there is more money circulating, business can raise prices since you have more money now (Inflation).",
"I'm going to assume we're talking about the US in this. It could mean a couple of things. Typically these measures are taken when a recession is going to or has happened in order to lessen the downturn. There are 3 big options. The first is that the Federal Reserve (the Fed) can lower the interest rate. Banks around the country take out short term loans from the Fed all the time and the interest rate the Fed charges for these loans impacts the interest rates in all other loans in the economy. Having lower interest rates encourages people to borrow money and spend it instead of hoarding it. More people spending more money is good for the economy. The next option is for the Fed to buy treasury bonds from banks. Banks buy and sell treasury bonds as an investment. When the Fed wants less money in the system, they sell these bonds to banks so the Fed has money and banks don't. When they want more money in the system, they buy the bonds back so the banks have money to spend and lend out. These measures are often taken together. They have important but not huge effects on the economy. They are best used to smooth out little bumps, not going scale recessions. In the case of big recessions, even when those measures are taken, they often aren't enough to get the spending up to where it needs to be. In this case, the federal government just starts spending like crazy. If the average person can't be persuaded to send like crazy (which would be required in order to get out of a recession in a timely matter, or at least make it not as bad as it would be) then the government steps in and just starts spending. This is typically accomplished by borrowing even more than usual because, even in regular times, taxes don't fully cover the spending the federal government wants to make. It's worth noting that it's important that this spending needs to be in the country affected by the recession for it to work."
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3qj8cp | why is it not concidered unsanitary to wash a cast iron pan without soap? | Certainly this is a food safety risk.... or is soap not as effective as I am led to believe? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3qj8cp/eli5_why_is_it_not_concidered_unsanitary_to_wash/ | {
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"Nothing wrong with using a bit of soap on a cast iron pan but, if you don't, it's not the end of the world.\n\nPans get really hot - hot enough to kill any potentially harmful bacteria. As long as you don't let food sit in it for a long time after you finish cooking, you've rinsed away all the bad shit & potential food for the bacteria. Anything that does try to settle between uses should get killed when you preheat the pan.",
"The only reason you use soap to wash your dishes is to cut through grease. Any kind of bacteria is going to be taken care of by the heat of cooking.\n\nProperly seasoned cast iron has a thin layer of polymerized oil, almost like a plastic film, on the surface so food and grease don't stick to it. ",
"There is nothing wrong with washing a cast iron pan with soap. It just means you have to re-season it more often. Restaurants that use cast iron cookware wash them with soap. ",
"Bacteria need 3 things to grow and live, food, moisture, and ideal temperature. A cast iron skillet when cleaned with a bit of hot water and scrubbing dislodges any stuck food, drying removes moisture. \n\nIt becomes a balance between maintaining the seasoning on the pan and food safety. Since cast iron pans are preheated before cooking, any remaining harmful pathogens are killed anyways. ",
" The pan will be re-heated to a temperature that kills bacteria. Soap degrades the surface that the seasoned pan has developed."
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5kibe3 | 'why do strongman competitors have such bulging stomachs?' | Recently watched the Eddie Hall documentary on Netflix. Couldn't helped but be amazed at the diet, training and dedication the man puts into his daily life to realise the dream.
One thing I couldn't wrap my head around was his stomach size. Is the bulge due to a number of factors? His diet, heavy weights, his spinal alignment? Or is there a another reason to it? Is it solid or soft? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5kibe3/eli5_why_do_strongman_competitors_have_such/ | {
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"Your body really wants to store food as fat, and only builds muscle reluctantly if it is sure it has plenty of calories left over.\n\nIf you want to be as strong as possible, you make you sure you eat as much as possible, and don't worry if you have fat in additional muscle.\n\nIf you want to have large appear, well defined muscles like body builders do, you have to strike a balance between low fat and big muscles. This is usually accomplished by having a bulking phase, where eat a lot to gain muscle, and a cutting phase, where you eat little to gain lose fat. In the end, you do not wind up as strong as if you had only concentrated on gaining muscle.",
"Strongmen require a metric fuckton of energy (read: calories) to be able to do what they do. That's why strongmen competitions are filled with chubby-but-freakishly-strong contestants. At bodybuilding competitions, contestants actually damage their bodies (low body fat, dehydration) to add definition to their bodies. It makes their muscles look cool, but those muscles aren't as practical."
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3jndhi | how did we decide the value of a single unit, such as 1 watt or 1cm? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jndhi/eli5_how_did_we_decide_the_value_of_a_single_unit/ | {
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"A watt is not a fundamental unit. Its joules per second so its clearly defined. Defining joules and seconds however is a different matter. Most fundamental units like distance and mass we are trying to link to universal constants so we can be hyper precise all the time but originaly a metre and a kilogram were physical things. It was a stick you could go out and measure and a block of stuff you could go weigh.",
"'We' didn't, someone did once and it got popular. Often the popular unit was at least a bit reworked later, like the second, but still much the same.\n\nMost units are defined in terms of other units. A Newton, for example, is 1 kilogram times 1 metres per second squared.\n\nThe 'base' units tend to be fairly arbitrary. Someone just decided something. The kilogram, for example, is based on the 'prototype' kilogram object. That prototype is, by definition, 1kg in mass.\n\nAs long as people reasonably agree on it being the base unit it's all good.",
"In metric: by looking at physical properties in nature. \n\nFor example a second is formally defined as: \"9192631770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the caesium 133 atom\"\n\nDistances like meters can be defined by the speed of light. 1 meter is equivalent to the amount of distance light travels in a fixed period of time (in this case 1/c). \n\nVolumes and some other metric units come from properties of water. 1 L is 1 kg of water under standard temperature and pressure. \n",
"It depends on the unit. Originally most units were defined in terms of an artifact—a physical object that you can measure. You define that that object is the perfect representation of the unit in question, then you measure everything else relative to that (or relative to some other measurement apparatus that you've calibrated against the perfect artifact).\n\nA notable exception to this is the second. You can measure the length of one day, then divide it into 24 equal pieces (hours), then each of those into 60 equal pieces (minutes), then each of those into 60 equal pieces (seconds). This allows people far apart to standardize their definition of how long a second is.\n\nThe big problem with this approach is that as science marches forward you get better and better at measuring things. At some point you get good enough at measuring time that you can tell that the length of a day varies by just a little from day to day. This has pushed most units to be defined in terms of more universal things. For example, the second is now defined as \"the length of time it takes for < very large number > of periods of oscillation of the radiation emitted from < specific isotope of cesium > .\" Anyone anywhere in the world can set this up and get exactly the same length for a second. Similarly, the length of a meter used to be defined as the distance between two marks on a platinum-iridium bar, but now it's the distance that light travels in one second, divided by the speed of light. This means that the speed of light is *exactly* 299,792,458 meters per second by definition.\n\nThese days the one fundamental unit that is not defined in a way like this is the kilogram. The international standard kilogram is a lump of platinum and iridium, and we can tell that its mass is changing over time (which means that the definition of a kilogram changes, since the item is always 1 kg exactly, by definition). There are various calls to change this definition to something more universal, but thus far none has gained enough traction to overturn the long-standing definition.\n\nThat covers the base units, but there's still derived units like the Watt. For this you just combine base units. For example, a Watt is one Joule per second. A Joule is one Newton \\* meter. A Newton is one kilogram \\* meter / second^(2). If you know kilograms, meters, and seconds then you can come up with the magnitude of a Watt.\n\nThen there are units that are just multiples of the base unit, like cm. Here you just take the base unit and scale it, so 1 cm = 1 meter / 100.\n\nFinally, there are completely separate unit sets, most notably Imperial. In this system these days you actually have units defined in terms of their SI counterpart. One inch is defined as *exactly* 2.54 cm. This means that as long as you can follow the procedure to generate a standard meter you can also find the value of an inch.\n\nEach time one definition is replaced by another there is a lot of effort put into making sure that the new definition is essentially the same as the old one, just with more precision. This is why you get things like the meter being defined as the distance light travels in one second, divided by 299,792,458, not just 300,000,000. ",
"The centimeter is based on the meter, which was originally defined in 1793 as one ten-millionth the distance between the equator and the north pole. The definition has been polished over time as our measurement tools have improved, and the meter is now defined as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second.\n\nThe second was originally defined in the year 1000 as 1/86,400 of a solar day, and is now defined as the duration of 9,192,631,770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the caesium 133 atom. You'll have to ask somebody else what that means.\n\nThe International Bureau of Weights and Measures in France is responsible for keeping these definitions up to date. They also possess the international prototype kilogram, a cylinder of platinum and iridium that sets the definition of the kilogram. There is a push to redefine the units based on fundamental universal properties, like the speed of light, Planck's constant, and the gravitational constant, but we can't yet measure them as accurately as we'd like."
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1ii7u4 | what is the appeal of heroin? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ii7u4/eli5what_is_the_appeal_of_heroin/ | {
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"Pleasure is something we evolved to help us prefer good things (like food and sex) over bad things (like rolling around in fire or running up to predators). When you experience good things (like food and sex) your brain releases chemicals called \"endorphins\" which cause our pleasure neurons to activate, making us feel pleasure. \n\nHeroin is chemically very simmilar to our natural endorphins and because of this heroin can also cause our pleasure neurons to activate. When you take enough heroin you can feel as much pleasure as is physically possible for your brain to feel, like a 3 hour long orgasm. The down side is we're naturally evolved to seek out pleasure so much that this amount of pleasure is extremely addictive to the point that people will turn their back on everything they used to care about to feel this pleasure again.",
"For a short period of time, it makes you feel really, really good. You usually get addicted to it, and then end up feeling really bad later, but people generally prefer to ignore pain in the future and get more pleasure now.",
"I remember reading studies in my psych courses in university about how powerful the high is from heroin; it kills not only physical pain and creates almost unbearable physical pleasure but also uniquely kills any/all emotional pain that the user consciously or subconsciously has within them (temporarily of course). Other drugs don't even come close to the euphoria/release, from what I understand.",
"Being a former addict, I just want to emphasize how incredibly horrible the withdrawal can be. Feeling sick or ill is an incredible under-statement. It may sound Nancy Reagan-ish but using this drug even once will make you feel like crap when its over and is more than enough to begin you down a spiral of serious addiction. Follow this path long enough and you'll do just about anything (and I do mean anything) to get your hands more. Fortunately, I managed to get into a rehab before I sold my own mother, but I did sell some of my dads handguns. A decision that I regret and have to live with. I met a guy at rehab who was going to sell his son just to get more of it. \n\nBasically its a drug of incredible euphoria and pleasure for a couple hours and possibly a lifetime of hell, if you allow it.",
"not exactly in the spirit of the subreddit but [this](_URL_0_) video does a great job explaining the whole thing",
"*As I type this I am high on opiates, take it for what it is*\n\nThe thing about heroin (And opiates in general) that no one tells you is just how innocently the addiction starts out. Unlike what most people believe due to \"Just say no\" and 1980s drug propaganda that still carries over to today is that you don't get physically addicted to it after one use. Further, very few people go from being sober to full blown heroin usage. They generally start with a perc or vicodin or two that one of their friends gives them. \"Here take this\" they say, \"It's kinda like weed except better.\"\n\nAnd they are right, it IS kinda like weed...except better. So the first time user takes a few days off and quickly realizes that they don't feel any different. No withdrawl, no vomiting...nothing. So the next time the opportunity comes up they think \"Hey, nothing bad happened last time...what harm is going to come this time\" and do a few more pills...maybe even snort one if they are feeling extra rebellious. Lather, rinse, repeat for a month and all of a sudden you are sitting around one day and your nose starts to run for no apparent reason. Also, your lower back is achy and you just feel all over miserable. \n\nAt first you think maybe you just have the flu. Initially the feeling is very similar...the lethargy, nausea and aches but soon your skin starts crawling and your legs won't stop shaking and your addled brain starts to put 2 and 2 together and you have the thought that will trouble you for the rest of your life \"Man, I bet if I had a few Percs/vics/oxys I would feel better\" \n\nI've found that people who become addicted to opiates are all fundamentally lacking something within themselves that allows them to be truely happy. Theres a hole...somewhere deep inside that not family, friends or any other stimulus can fill so they start doing heroin because for a couple of short blissful hours it makes you completely forget that you can never be truly content. Therein lies the problem, however, because heroin doesn't actually fill the hole. It just throws a board over it for you to stand on until it breaks and drops you straight back down. ",
"If you can make sense of this trainspotting passage, it might help: \n > Whin yir oan junk, aw ye worry aboot is scorin. Oaf the gear, ye worry aboot loads ay things. Nae money, cannae git pished. Goat money, drinkin too much. Cannae git a burd, nae chance ay a ride. Git a burd, too much hassle, cannae breathe withoot her gittin oan yir case. Either that, or ye blow it, and feel aw guilty. Ye worry aboot bills, food, bailiffs, these Jambo Nazi scum beatin us, aw the things that ye couldnae gie a fuck aboot whin yuv goat a real junk habit. Yuv just goat one thing tae worry aboot. The simplicity ay it aw. Ken whit ah mean?” \n\nOops, I thought this was Explain Like I'm Scottish. My bad!",
"[This](_URL_0_) is one of the best accounts of what heroin (and most other opiates) feel like and how addiction starts without you realizing it.\n\n\nOn another note, I can't describe heroin, I can tell you the appeal of just about every other opiate I was prescribed (hydrocodone, oxycodone, morphine, hydromophone). Just like the video describes, they feel nice. There's no extreme high or crazy hallucinations or mind altering experiences. You just feel this warm wave wash over yourself and your stress and anxiety seems to wash away with it. You can get home from class, pop a pill and lie in your warm bed and not give a shit that you got chewed out by your professor for doing something stupid. I take them because I had my leg nearly destroyed in a car accident a few years ago, and while I can lead a relatively normal day to day life, walking from class to class or working all day just simply hurts. That pain, although tolerable, wears at me over time, and sometimes I just want it to stop. On those days I get home, take a pill or two and just enjoy not being reminded of the accident.\n\nLong story short, the appeal (to me) is an escape from something that I cannot get rid of on my own. I suspect the appeal is very similar for anyone who pursues opiates as a medication or drug. They are missing something or something is wearing away at them that they believe will go away (if only temporarily) if they take this drug. If I'm extremely careful (and luckily I have been so far) I can prevent addiction while treating my condition, but I have seen myself get taken past the line of physical dependance once right after the accident (4 months of heavy morphine and oxycontin use to control the fact that my leg had nearly been torn off) and I never want to get anywhere near that line again. I was lucky to have a doctor who understood that getting off painkillers is extremely difficult and supported me along the way, but for people who don't have that kind of suport system, there's really only one way to feel better once you're in withdrawal, and that's to take more.\n\n\nSorry for the ramble, hope this helps!",
"I hope I'm not repeating someone else, but I've heard it said opiates don't mask pain, they just make you stop caring about pain. In addition, you can stop caring about everything except the incredible bliss. When I was addicted, I would have gladly never left my bedroom if I had an unlimited supply. I mean that literally, I would willingly grow old and die there. I'll never use a needle again, but 8 milligrams of dilaudid (my preferred drug) made the best sex I ever had not even worth a thought. Nothing even comes remotely close to that ecstatic comfort of not giving a damn about anything, because everything is absolutely fucking perfect."
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yailm | how do university endowments work? | Why do some colleges get bigger endowments than others, and what are the criteria that are used to decide how much of an endowment a school gets? Who gives endowments? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/yailm/eli5_how_do_university_endowments_work/ | {
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"In simplest terms and endowment is how much money a college or university has. This includes things like property the university owns, investment funds, money, and other assets.\n\nEndowment funds come from a lot of different places, but primarily this money is given by donors who are either alumni of that university or in some way associated with the university for whatever reason.\n\nEndowment funds can have different stipulations depending on who the donor was. In many cases someone will donate money to a university with the stipulation that the university may not spend the initial donation but may only spend the interest made on the donation or money from investing it. In other cases endowment funds are set aside for specific programs like sports or research in a specified area.\n\nNo one really \"decides\" which universities get bigger endowments that one another. It just sort of evolved that way. If a university has successful students who like the university they are more likely to donate to it. \n\nBigger endowments are often considered a good thing for a college/university because it means that they have more funds available to invest in capital improvements, resources, materials, research, etc. But, a big endowment does not necessarily mean that a specific university/college is better academically than another."
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2rt5ej | how does universal health care work? | If citizens' health care is covered, then who picks up the cost? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2rt5ej/eli5_how_does_universal_health_care_work/ | {
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"The government does, which in turn means you do.\n\nThe citizens do. Universal healthcare is basically a system in which everyone who pays taxes is pre-emptively paying for services they will or will not receive. What share you pay is going to be based on how much you make. The more you make, the more you pay.\n\nThis scaling costs problem is largely why higher income individuals are more often against universal healthcare and lower income ones are for it.",
"It is included in the government budget therefore the taxpayers pay it. You just don't realise it because you don't get an actual bill from the hospital/clinic. I'm Canadian and fairly young and I'm just starting to realise how lucky we are to have \"free\" health care. Sure if you have money in the states you can pay to get your care faster but if you don't have money you are either going to go bankrupt, dead, or both. ",
"It works just like the military but with doctors instead of soldiers. ",
"Step 1: you fail to use the search box, and read the HUNDREDS OF TIMES this was asked here. \n\nStep 2: I hit you with a shovel. \n\nStep 3: You get free health care. \n\nStep 4: Thanks Obama.",
"If you mean universal health insurance, which is what most countries use and Obamacare attempts to approximate- the government is everyone's insurance company. \n\nIn England, by contrast, they have the NHS- where doctors are public employees like fire and police. "
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3cft8x | how and why do posts with 10 up votes an 4 comments show up on the front page of reddit? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3cft8x/eli5_how_and_why_do_posts_with_10_up_votes_an_4/ | {
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"Your front page is a composite of the front pages of all the subreddits you are subscribed to. It doesn't ask \"what are the top 10 posts overall from all your subs,\" it asks \"what are the top posts from each of your subreddits.\" In this way a post with 10 upvotes on a small subreddit you are subscribed to has a better chance of hitting your front page than a post with 500 upvotes on a huge subreddit you're subscribed to. ",
"Posts are weighted by the size of the sub; a sub with 100 upvotes from a very small sub will be given a higher ranking than an AskReddit post with 1000 upvotes. If this wasn't done, your front page would be dominated by posts from the most popular subreddits."
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2uvgn8 | all the hate youtube gets | I understand the hate on the business side with copyright, DMCA, ads, screwing content creators, etc.
But it seems a lot of people complain about the site/product itself.
Always mentioning how it was better in 20XX. Is it the UI? The comment sorting?
I'm 23, I've known YouTube since it's inception, and I've never had any issues... | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2uvgn8/eli5_all_the_hate_youtube_gets/ | {
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"YouTube would be so much better if it just had no comment system whatsoever. \n\nI don't care to run into those trolls in public and I certainly loathe running into them on the internet as well. ",
"Because they've been constantly changing their site for the worse and people are sick of it. Some examples off the top of my head:\n\n* They said they were going to make the comments section less susceptible to trolls but they made it worse by bringing the comments with the biggest chains to the top rather than the most upvotes so the top comments are the ones being yelled at the most.\n\n* They made this worse by removing the ability to downvote comments.\n\n* When you're looking at someone's videos or a playlist with multiple pages they use this \"load more\" system where if you click on something then go back none of the other pages will be loaded. It used to just be multiple pages and you could select the middle of a channel/playlist instead of having to scroll down > load more > scroll down > load more etc. Also middle clicking on something on a playlist is the same as left clicking it, so if you're trying to open them in a new tab so you don't lose your space and miss then it'll screw you over anyway.\n\n* They tolerate and promote content aggregators over unique content. Seriously just look at any video with a dog or something in it and see how many related videos are some bullshit like \"Best guilty dogs compilation\" or something like that.\n\n* Dunno if this is still the same but recommended videos is composed of videos you've seen rather than videos you've liked. It'll even recommend videos you've seen and downvoted before.\n\n* Playlists autoplay no matter what. You used to be able to turn off autoplay and it would remember that, then they made it so it wouldn't remember it and you'd have to disable autoplay for every single playlist and every time the page refreshed, then they just removed disabling autoplay all together. I would assume this is for the sake of generating ad revenue since there's no good reason to remove it otherwise.\n\nAnyway those are just a few things I can remember off the top of my head. There's plenty more that I can't think of. [Here's](_URL_0_) a video of a content creator ranting about the most recent youtube layout. Dunno how much of it's still relevant today.",
"Two (and one related) things I don't notice people mentioning:\n\n1. Ads are much more pervasive. I sometimes get an ad every play for like 5 videos in a row. Not too big of a deal though.\n2. They don't let you buffer much. What I used to do is load the video, pause it, then come back to it and have a nice uninterrupted video to watch. \n3. Related to #2 is the fact that before you can skip to any part of the video that has already loaded instantly. You can't do that anymore since they only buffer parts of the video."
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9l6f7p | what's wrong with midichlorians? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9l6f7p/eli5whats_wrong_with_midichlorians/ | {
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"I thin the big push back was that the force was like a religious supernatural thing within the world of star wars, midochlorians made it a measurable natural phenomenon, which felt counter to previous representations. ",
"Because people enjoy the mystery. The Force is supposed to be something mystical and unexplainable, midichlorians take away the mystery. It explains something that doesn't need to be explained.",
"Star Wars is a classic fantasy which appealed to a younger audience who could imagine that they were participants in the story universe. The Force is originally portrayed as a power which resides within all living things and can be manipulated by those who are trained to do wondrous things. Key to this entire idea is that it is mysterious: Anyone can be a hero and one's internal worth is not visible to the eye. This is a great moral for young people who may have issues with self-esteem, a common theme in youth (Yoda might look like a tiny wrinkled goblin but he was wise and powerful despite his appearance. The acne-ridden chubby kid may really appreciate the moral that their outer appearance doesn't mean anything.). There is also a strong moral theme introduced where there is a \"light side\" and \"dark side\" of the force, an ethical conflict across the entire universe. If you are good the Light Side will protect you, if you are bad the Dark Side will destroy you with its insidious offer of quick power.\n\nThe introduction of midichlorians changes all that. It is a direct contradiction of the original portrayal as a fundamental aspect of life within the universe, instead making it the act of a particular organism. Now someone can take a blood sample and tell if that person can be a powerful force user or not; oops, you don't have the right genes so you will never amount to anything. You can't be a Jedi because you don't have the right stuff, and we can tell just by looking at you. This destroys the childhood fantasy aspect. Because it is a mindless microorganism it breaks the moral aspect; the midichlorians don't know or care about ethics, they can just be wielded like tools. The Light Side isn't some powerful benevolent force, it is just a fiction of some people who wielded them. And finally it simply breaks the mystery of the Force. Explaining where it comes from, what the limits of its power is, what its end goal might be, all destroys an important thematic element of the entire idea of the Force. It is like a horror movie bringing the monster out into the light instead of leaving it to lurk in the shadows, the imagination of the viewer is far more powerful than anything the movie can show.\n\nMidichlorians are the epitome of terrible storytelling and the idea to add them displays a profound lack of understanding of their own product. Many people grew up with this fantasy setting and the producers completely bungled the very basics because they didn't apply even a basic level of care."
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3fbehp | for ordinary mail dropped off at usps mailboxes, why don't people put the actual desired delivery address in the top left corner, a fake address in the center of the letter and no stamp? wouldn’t it go to the desired address for free? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3fbehp/eli5_for_ordinary_mail_dropped_off_at_usps/ | {
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"Doubt it. In the UK, unstamped mail is held in the local post office and a card is delivered instead, informing the recipient that they must pay the postage for the letter of they want to receive it.",
"This is called mail fraud, I would imagine.\n\nUnited States Postal Inspectors are pretty serious people. You'd probably get some free mail, but they'd catch it before too long, and there could be some serious trouble.\n\n[This US statute seems to apply.](_URL_0_) It sets the fine at up to $300, but that's assuming that you weren't charged with fraud or something crazy.",
"Well, if you put a letter in a mailbox with a home/return address that is nowhere near (or from another state even) where you dropped the letter off, it would raise suspicions quite quickly I would imagine."
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18dhbj | american law enforcement and military. | PDs, FBI, CIA, National Guard, Homeland Security, Army, Marines, Navy, Airforce and anything else that I missed (Must have been left by your movies and series :P).
What are there objectives, jurisdiction? Who falls under who? Accountability: Federal government or state government? And anything else you can tell me.
P.S.: I am not American. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/18dhbj/american_law_enforcement_and_military/ | {
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"Ok this might get a bit complicated so I hope I can make it simple.\n\nArmy, Navy, Marines, Air Force, CIA, NSA, DIA are part of the Department of Defense.\n\nHomeland Security is it's own Department it also contains the TSA, Border Patrol and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). \n\nFBI, ATF, Marshals, DEA are part of the Department of Justice.\n\nSecret Service is part of the Treasury Department\n\nJustice, Treasury, Defense and Homeland Security are under the control of the president, they are federal.\n\nAt the state level it flows like this: State Police > County Sheriff > Local Police. None are necessarily more powerful then the others its just a matter of jurisdiction (their area they are patrol).\n\nState Police are controlled by the Governor of the state, the elected sheriff controls his department and the Mayor of the city appoints the Chief of Police.\n\nI hope this helps.\n"
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244vfh | why do so many animals wear "socks" of colored fur? | A ton of cats and dogs especially have a patch of white fur on their paws and lower legs that is a different color from the rest of their body. How did this develop and what purpose did it serve? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/244vfh/eli5why_do_so_many_animals_wear_socks_of_colored/ | {
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"Animals like to keep their feet warm in style.",
"With dogs, it is a feature we bred for. [Wolves do not have socks/booties](_URL_0_). I am drawing a blank on wild cats that have sock patterns as well. \n\nIn fact, the only socked animal I can picture atm is a fox.\n\n",
"In cats most fur patterns are related to habitat, either as defence camouflage or to hide from pray to enable them to ambush. This is also why young often have different patterns from parents because they have different survival needs. \n\nIf you look at horses though they are born with socks that remain the same throughout life, and its been suggested they are linked to how they identify other herd members. "
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1yxrsu | when we read, do we actually read out the word or do we just recognize most words? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1yxrsu/eli5_when_we_read_do_we_actually_read_out_the/ | {
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"There's lots of research about how the the human brain just recognizes words. Lkie tsohe sorteis aoubt bineg albe to urdensantd tihs, as long as the the first and last letters are in the correct place. Plus, most people don't notice the two \"the\"s in each sentence. So no, you don't read very carefully unless you put in extra effort to."
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5kysmp | is green juice healthy because it's vegetables or unhealthy because it's all sugar no fiber? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5kysmp/eli5_is_green_juice_healthy_because_its/ | {
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"I don't know anyone who makes green juice with a press. Make it with a blender and you don't lose the fiber.",
"Although they are correct about pressed juice. Fiber slows down the intake of the sugars. If you don't slow down the intake, on a regular basis, you greatly increase the possibility that you are heading down to road to diabetes.\n\nBut as I stated in another comment, I know lots of people who make their own green drink and none of them press it, they use a blender."
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2fnvzc | why is that i can easily pick up my niece who is 50 lbs but carrying a cardboard box of 30 lbs of printer paper hurts my arms? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2fnvzc/eli5_why_is_that_i_can_easily_pick_up_my_niece/ | {
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"Boxes are smooth and hard to grip, but your niece has convenient arms and sides you can grip. Plus once she's up she can hold on to you so it's not all on your biceps ",
"The closer to your body the weight is, the easier it is to manage. It's also easier to lift something that's higher off the ground. I assume the box is bulky and inconvenient to grab as well. ",
"You love your niece (hopefully), you do not love that box of paper. No one wants to carry that much paper.",
"If you are holding a child who is also hugging you, she becomes more like your own body weight. All of your muscles are sharing the extra weight. If you pick up a box and only use arm muscles, they are carrying all of the weight. I find if I lean the box against my body, other muscles help and it's not as difficult.",
"Her weight is distributed"
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bvozap | when the doctor/nurse takes blood from you, why do they try to find a vein, not an artery? and also why is this mainly done on the arm as opposed to other parts of the body? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bvozap/eli5_when_the_doctornurse_takes_blood_from_you/ | {
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"They use your arm because it is easy and convenient to get at.\n\nThey use veins because they don't want to kill you.",
"Arterial blood is harder to get and carries more risks than venous blood and therefore is used only for specific tests. \n\nThat being said, if numerous arterial tests are required (such as being placed on a life support machine), then they insert arterial catheter so they can just open a stopcock and draw out blood required for arterial blood but can also be used for tests venous blood is used for. Arterial lines also have sensors so they can read continuous blood pressure.",
"Pressure\n\nVein pressure is low and arterial pressure is high.\nDrawing blood from a low pressure vein and leaving an IV catheter is safe for several days. Leaving a catheter in an artery requires a hook up to keep back pressure on the system so you don’t bleed out.",
"Arteries are deeper in the tissue and as many have said, difficult to get to. They also have layers of smooth muscle surrounding them. If you poke them, they squeeze up and get just that much more difficult to draw from. \n\nVeins are much easier to get at.",
"Try putting a sprinkler on the end of a hose with the water turned on full without kinking it off. Next, turn down the water pressure by 50% and kink it off then try and put the sprinkler on. High pressure vs. Low pressure. Artery vs. Vein.",
"There is a type of blood draw where an artery is punctured. But that is more specialized. An arterial puncture requires more training and carries more risks. Plus, they tend to be more painful.",
"Your arteries are still under pressure from your heart pumping blood behind it. By the time blood gets to your veins, it's not under nearly as much pressure.",
"We try to find a vein instead of an artery because the pressure of the blood in a vein is much lower than the pressure of the blood in an artery. This is important because the higher pressure in your arteries makes it much harder for your body to plug up the hole from the needle- you would bleed a lot more than if we poked a hole in a vein. The pressure is higher in arteries because the heart is a very strong muscle pushing the blood through the arteries to be taken all over the body. The pressure is lower in veins because little muscles all over your body are (more) gently pushing the blood through the veins back to your heart to get pumped out all over again. \n\nSometimes we do take blood from arteries! There are certain tests that we can only run on blood from arteries. The blood inside your veins and arteries is pretty similar, but arterial blood can tell us extra information about things like your lungs and kidneys, and how acidic your blood is. Thankfully, most tests can be run on blood from veins. When we do have to take blood from an artery, we use as small a needle as possible and hold pressure on the spot we stuck with our hand or a bandage for a much longer time. This helps the body make a plug for the hole.\n\nWe mostly take blood from the arms because they are easy to get to and usually the veins are pretty big and easy to find. However, we can take it from anywhere! I’ve taken blood from feet, stomachs, breasts, and necks when we couldn’t find a vein in an arm. We are extra careful to not take blood from people with diabetes in their legs or feet because diabetics don’t have very good blood flow in their legs, so the hole may not heal."
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6wx4c4 | why do people have "types" when it comes to dating? what causes people to have certain fetishes? | Why do we have types? Why does someone find someone attractive and another person find them very unattractive?
Why do people have fetishes? What causes someone to have a feet fetish?
What makes up all this stuff in our brains? What decides it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6wx4c4/eli5_why_do_people_have_types_when_it_comes_to/ | {
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"The only part i have insight for is what makes them attractive and possibly why. We find symmetry attractive and we tend to be attracted towards people of a similar attraction level (10s like 10s, 2s like 2s). Hope this helps. ",
" > Why do we have types? Why does someone find someone attractive and another person find them very unattractive?\n\nOn the superficial traits it is often linked to associations with something positive in ones childhood. A teacher who was kind, an actor/actress, that girl/guy in 5th grade who was kind, etc.\n\n\"Types\" on personality is another issue.",
"Your question is so broad that its wider than the grand canyon.\n You are the base of your ancestors. If your family tends to be a storytelling family its because it was wired into them. The way you laugh and the way you smile is encoded into your DNA. This is nature\nThere is also How are you brought up? Which is nurture. \nWhere you Live also plays a huge roll in your upbringing as well. A child raised in Alabama has a different set of experience than a child raised in Portland Oregon. \nFetishes are derived from the psyche and we don't really know what causes them. There are broad fetishes: feet, breast, hair, lingerie, skin color ie Then their are smaller fetishes with sub groups: robot girls, pie fetish, tickling and so on.... Most people have something called A Preference Scale. This is not a determine of sexuality. What it is a composite of what you find pleasing basically it is Lust, your Id at a basic component. Also a fetish if think about it is a totem its a part of controlling your DNA of who gets to share with you and pass it on to your offspring. It's a primitive and most mysterious part of our brains. "
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1oljbv | if low testosterone makes men tired, lethargic, etc., why are pre-pubescent boys full of energy with no ill effects? additionally, how do women function differently by not needing a much testosterone? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1oljbv/eli5_if_low_testosterone_makes_men_tired/ | {
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"Anything anyone says here may be great. But if you simply google \" this american life testosterone\" you will find a radio show that covers the effects more succinctly than you could imagine.",
"I asked one of my friends this question who is currently getting his PhD at a top 20 university for biology.\n\nHe told me that first off, testosterone is a hormone that allows individuals to operate better in stressful situations. Young males do not deal with the type of stress adult males do and therefore testosterone is less relevant to their overall moods (though, high testosterone does push males into puberty sooner and can make them more aggressive). Ultimately, adult and prepubescent male brains are very different - both physiologically and environmentally - and thus hormones and different medications effect them differently.\n\nAs to women, he told me male and female brains deal with hormones fairly differently and therefore females need less testosterone (although they still produce it).\n\nHope this helps. My friend literally explained this to me like I was 5 so I'm sure there will be more thoughtful comments.",
"As succinctly as possible: Women are more sensitive to testosterone in receptors and such, so they require less for it to do the functions it does in them. Children have a plethora of other things like amped up metabolic processes and such, less body mass to regulate, fresh news cells, etc that keep them spry.",
"You see inside all of us in every boy and girl we have these tiny little particles that float around in our bodies all day. Us grown ups named these particles Testosterone and Estrogen. Both exist in all of us. To make things easier to explain we will call these things boy hormones and girl hormones from now on. Ok, you understand that? Goood! You're doing fantastic. These hormones tell all the other little guys inside your body what to do. You see you have little boogers inside you that are living creatures. They are very, very tiny. They do nothing but sit around and eat and poop all day! HAHA I know right! poop makes us grown ups laugh to!\n\nAnyways, Sometimes these guys forget what they are doing or get out of control then comes along Mr or Ms. Hormone and reminds them that they need to pick up their toys or take out the garbage. If you want a fun way to remember it you can imagine the hormone is A pokemon trainer! and they run around all day having battles with wild pokemon inside your body! Ordering them around and everything!\n\n But you see Boys bodies prefer boy hormones and make more of it because its an aggressive little bugger. It makes you rough, tough and makes you grow hair just like your daddy. Girls on the other hand prefer girl hormones they are particles that love to be happy and soft, listening, loving, caring particles so a girl will make more of them instead. But both still exist inside of us because sometimes boys need to be soft and girls need to be tough! \n\nYour body is very good at mainting exactly what it needs, especially when you are younger, it loves to be balanced. Bad things like poor diets and unhealthy ways of living can throw your body out of balance and bad things can start happening to it. During your young years you dont have much life troubles other than what does glue taste like and will the girl I have a crush on be impressed if I eat a little so your body is having a great time, its living in a good balanced place.\n\nBut as you get older life tends to take a toll on you if you are not on your game. You will face what we adults call lots of stress and some even have a bad thing called depression! :( Its sad I know. When you face things like these sometimes your body will shut down certain things it needs! and sometimes these things are our Hormones! OH NO!\n\nWithout our hormones how will the little boogers inside of us know what to do! They will not make the things that give us energy to run around and jump and play! And they will forget to get rid of their poopie and this will make us feel bad :( We will lay in bed all day not wanting to go outside and play in the dirt or chase little susie with a frog! \n\nBut its ok as long as your body is happy and you dont live in a stressful place your body will be fine! :D so stay happy and have fun!\n\n-----------------------------------\ndisclaimer: I am not a scientist I have a degree in arts. This was just fun to write and may have no basis to back it up for bean squat. :) all these other comments where just funny and stupid.\n\nLow T is real but because of extrinsic factors I.E: stress, depression. We produce so much estrogen in our world today with plastics and everything its insane.\n\nYour body can work off the other hormone, see Transgendered people. Eventually your body will adjust but for the most part your body just simply prefers one over the other and when you dont have enough of it because your body isnt producing it you will become lethargic and brokendown.",
"First, let's go over some basic physiology that will help things make more sense.\n\nTestosterone is one of several sex steroids. It's categorized as an \"androgen\", and there are many different kinds of androgens out there. Estrogens are another class of sex steroids. Androgens generally have more masculinizing effects and estrogens have more feminizing effects, although males still need some estrogens and females need some androgens. Testosterone can be converted to other androgen steroids or it can even be converted to estrogen. In short, steroids are a complicated mess.\n\nFor fetuses with a \"Y\" chromosome, the production of androgens by the little baby testes is critical for development of male structures. After birth the level of sex steroids drops way down, only to mysteriously spike at puberty when it tells the male to assume his final form as a manly man. In adulthood androgens (primarily testosterone) remain elevated and play a maintenance role that primarily supports baby making (sperm production and seeking-out sex), maintenance of bone strength, and maintenance of body mass. As men age their testosterone levels may gradually decline, due to a state called hypogonadism (small gonads). In some cases the effects of this can be significant enough to warrant ART, androgen replacement therapy. \n\nLow testosterone in a previously healthy middle-aged male has NOT been linked specifically to generalized fatigue, although it can cause impaired cognition and mood alterations (in addition to bone loss, decreased sperm production, loss of libido, and loss of muscle strength, etc.).\n\nThat's the science background. In the early 2000s it became a \"thing\" for pharmaceutical companies to aggresively advertise testosterone gel patches and other forms of testosterone supplementation. As a result the use of these gels increased 5-fold between 2001 and 2011. This issue has been discussed already, so I won't add much more. \n\nOne of the comments here links to an excellent This American Life segment that tells the stories of men who tried supplemental ART and eventually came to regret doing so. Additionally, [this medscape article](_URL_0_) is very informative, interesting, and readable for those without a science/medicine background. \n\ntl;dr: it's debatable if \"low T\" (in a previously healthy adult male) actually causes fatigue/lethargy. Low T can be a real thing, and some men need replacement therapy, but the whole thing has turned into a marketing and media circus, so there's a lot of confusion.",
"Testosterone is not the fuel that our bodies use to make energy. That is glucose.\n\nChildren have new and healthy cells that are able to efficiently use glucose to make lots of energy.\n\nThey also have testosterone in their bodies, just in smaller amounts compared to adults.\n\nWhat testosterone does is deliver messages to the cells and give them \ninstructions on what to do and how to operate.\n\nFor example, when testosterone goes to muscle cells that are working hard, it tells them to make more protein to make the muscle stronger.\n\nThere are a number of reasons why men become tired and lethargic (especially in the afternoon), low testosterone being one of them.\n\nIf you start off your day with a low testosterone level, as you work through the day, you are using up the free testosterone.\n\nWhen there is no more free testosterone available, the cells start to go idle with out instructions. \n\nTestosterone is a very powerful hormone, and in healthy men, they produce far more than they need. Only about 2% of testosterone produced is made available for use by the body. The other 98% is made inert by different proteins.\n\nWomen also produce testosterone, but it is in smaller much amounts than men.\n\nSource: Registered Nurse who has treated men with low testosterone. Author: Low Testosterone: What every man needs to know",
"I have a question that relates. Is it possible to have low testosterone, yet still have a high, powerful sex drive? I'm a 23 year old male and was an avid gym-goer who has been out of the gym for about 3 months now and I just can not seem to find the energy/motivation to get back into it. Maybe low testosterone is the cause?"
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[],
[]
] | ||
2r5ngz | how do plasma speakers work? | Like [this]( _URL_0_). Bonus: How/Why does nitrogen gas get released? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2r5ngz/eli5_how_do_plasma_speakers_work/ | {
"a_id": [
"cncooii"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
" > Plasma speakers are a form of loudspeaker which varies air pressure via a high-energy electrical plasma instead of a solid diaphragm. Connected to the output of an audio amplifier, plasma speakers vary the size of a plasma glow discharge, corona discharge or electric arc which then acts as a massless radiating element, creating the compression waves in air that listeners perceive as sound.\n\nBasically, plasma speakers use the plasma to change up the air pressure in order to create sound waves.\n\nSource: _URL_0_\n\nEdit: As for the nitrogen gas:\n\n > Plasma arcs are very efficient at producing Nitrogen Oxides (the plasma combines the nitrogen and oxygen in the air), known as NOx and includes Nitrogen Oxide (NO) and Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2), NOT Nitrous Oxide (N2O). These are far worse than ozone. Amongst its effects are that it converts in to nitric acid in the moisture of your lungs and eats them away, as well as entering the bloodstream and causing cancer. NOx is one of the emissions that is now restricted on cars by using catalytic converters - you don't want it in your house. The larger and more powerful the plasma arc, the more NOx is produced and in a small room the levels can build up quite quickly. You can't smell it or see it but it will stream upwards from a hot plasma.\n\nThe electric arcs used by the plasma speaker produce ozone and nitrogen, which are both dangerous to your health.\n\nSource: _URL_1_"
]
} | [] | [
"http://youtu.be/hgCLxB9vHm0"
] | [
[
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_speaker",
"http://airspeaker.co.uk/Starter-Info-ionic-loudspeakers,-plasma-tweeters,-corona-wind/safety.htm"
]
] | |
c5iiny | i don't know if this is allowed here but can someone explain how "post nut clarity" works? (i am a 19 male so i just mean chemically) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c5iiny/eli5_i_dont_know_if_this_is_allowed_here_but_can/ | {
"a_id": [
"es20v5s",
"es29kbj",
"es2fewj"
],
"score": [
19,
2,
2
],
"text": [
"We're biologically programed to procreate, so if they possibility is close at hand, our basic instincts might cloud our judgement. So afterwards, the need to procreate diminishes, and your thoughts clear.",
"I can't explain it chemically, but psychologically your sexual desire is kind of overwhelming. Like, wanting to have sex gets you the furthest from rationality. Once you're done, it's like all you ever wanted in life, all your desire have been fulfilled, so the desire gauge is back to zero and you're left with rationality. Also, that desire built tension and that, too, is gone, so you're in a sort of meditative state where you don't desire anything and your body is relaxed, which realigns your priorities, I guess.",
"Search the archive"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[]
] | ||
6ghhfc | why do we go weak at the knees when someone makes us excited? | Like it's usually a sexual thing. Why does being excited have anything to do with your knees and pretty much making it hard to stand up? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ghhfc/eli5_why_do_we_go_weak_at_the_knees_when_someone/ | {
"a_id": [
"diqduea"
],
"score": [
2
],
"text": [
"This usually has to do with the emotional response to the stimulus. For example, picture a man and a woman. They've already got a hot situation going on, but if he were somehow to add more to this, it would cause a temporary overload in her mind. If the stimuli were powerful enough, it would also cause her to forget how to do basic tasks, like her legs holding up her body.\n\nThis also applies to everyday things, think of it like your computer. If it's only got 4gb of ram, you already have a program taking up around 2 or so gigabytes of that, and you opened a program that took around 1gb, your computer would get overwhelmed for a minute, before making more memory available for both to run well.\n \nAnother explanation might be that the situation causes her mind to wander to even more ideas which would excite her. Thus, the body tries make a visible call to the man, in an attempt for her imagination to become reality. In this case, that would be the knees going weak, a sign of submission.\n"
]
} | [] | [] | [
[]
] |
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