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w9ry8 | construction workers, please eli5 why miles and miles of highway are shut down when construction isn't taking place | I was on the Ohio turnpike yesterday and noticed there were miles and miles of left lane closures, but I never even saw any equipment aside from the barriers, let alone any active work.
I notice this a lot, where there will be a couple miles of a blocked lane, but then only see work being done in a small area. Is it some sort of policy/law that says x amount of road must be blocked off for y amount of work? Is it a safety issue? Are you planning on working that part of the road later so you just block off everything at once? Why not just block off what you're currently working on?
I appreciate the work that goes into keeping roads nice, but I also hate having 3 lanes of traffic sharing 2 lanes of road for miles because of a 200 ft. stretch of concrete being worked on. So what's the reasoning behind it?
| explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/w9ry8/construction_workers_please_eli5_why_miles_and/ | {
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"\"2 lanes of road for miles because of a 200 ft\"\n\n* they probably moving as they work\n* do you want to stand immediately behind some pylons when cars (potentially) are coming at you at 60mph+. I know I wouldn't, cause we all know there is a high possibility someone going to smash through the pylons and run over everyone.",
"It's due to safety of the road workers, they may not be working the shift at the time but it's safer to leave cones out than return and replace each day. \n\n Plus I believe they tend to leave them out a few days either side of work so that regular users of the road that might be on autopilot have time to get used to the idea there is a new scheme in place, before the crew are allowed on to get work done.\n\nIf it's anything like over here (uk), they also need to get the safety stuff in place, then have it inspected and signed off by the highways agency or police before work can begin, since they may need to make diversions or plans to deal with busy periods, then work has to be inspected afterwards before the road sections can be reopened.\n\nA lot of road workers get hit by numpties not being careful through roadworks, the inconvenience of a few extra minutes on a journey are kind of minor compared to the potential mess it can make of people's lives, they err on the side of caution.",
"Depends on the time of day you're going through there, as a landscaper we start early and quit early because of heat/sun so they might be working, but you'll never see them",
"They might be working on 200 ft. the moment you drove by, but they are probably working along the whole blocked off section over the course of the day.\n\nAlso, it is the merging that slows you down more than the blocked off lane. Once you have to make people go through the trouble of merging, it matters less how long they are stuck with one fewer lane. ",
"It has to do with project phasing and safety codes. It's way more cost effective to place a few thousand barrels at once than to have a crew moving then every day. Also, the roads out there are huge and long, and once the initial merge happens, traffic runs fine. What sucks is merging into 1 lane from 2 in the metro Boston area. Fuck Boston and all the road work that takes place around it."
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2wfxo9 | do ceiling fans actually do something? | i have never seen one in real life, i guess they're not as popular here, but the ones i see in tv shows, movies, animation seem to spin very slow and just waste energy. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2wfxo9/eli5_do_ceiling_fans_actually_do_something/ | {
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"Yes, they actually do circulate the air, and they usually have 3 speed settings. I sleep with my ceiling fan on every night.",
"They are actually quite helpful. If you run them at a good speed, they keep the air in the room moving, which improves heat exchange between the air and the people in the room. On a hot day, they can make people comfortable at a warmer temperature, saving energy. On a cold day, they keep the warm air from rising to the ceilings, saving energy. \n\nMy house has fans in just about every room, and I like them quite a lot.",
"Just out of curiosity, where is \"here\" that you guys don't have ceiling fans?\n\nInstalling ceiling fans has lowered my cooling bills considerably. Don't have to rely on a/c so much."
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2jpio2 | why are people scared to invest in penny stocks? | Even more specifically, the Pump n Dump scheme. People are scared they'd lose a lot of money. Say I bought 100 shares of a stock worth $.02, I only put in $2. Even if the value of the stock raises to $3 due to somebody artificially raising the price and then sells their shares, I still only stand to lose $2 of my own money...???
Also why not just buy 100 shares of as many penny stocks as you can? One of them is bound to go up, right?
Edit: Cool thanks guys, love learning new things! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2jpio2/eli5_why_are_people_scared_to_invest_in_penny/ | {
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"The Return on Investment for penny stocks is generally far lower than the return on \"regular\" stocks or market index stocks. As such they are much riskier or poorer investments. Why invest in a potential loser when you can invest in a near sure winner.\n\nIn addition, stocks that are penny stocks usually are for a reason. Because they suck and the chance of success is very low.",
"There are a few reasons.\n\n1) Volatility. A $0.50/share stock can gain or lose 50% in a day.\n\n2) Long term viability. There's a reason the market thinks the shares are worthless. The company is either new and untested, or tested and failed horribly.\n\n3) Volume. These stocks are usually lightly traded. You may not be able to actually find someone willing to buy your stocks should you choose to sell.",
" > Even more specifically, the Pump n Dump scheme. People are scared they'd lose a lot of money. Say I bought 100 shares of a stock worth $.02, I only put in $2. Even if the value of the stock raises to $3 due to somebody artificially raising the price and then sells their shares, I still only stand to lose $2 of my own money...???\n\nWho in their right mind would do this, though? In this example we're talking about a risk-adjusted return of pennies on the dollar if you're *really* good at performing valuations of these micro-cap companies. One would be better off picking cans out of a dumpster.\n\n\n > Also why not just buy 100 shares of as many penny stocks as you can? One of them is bound to go up, right?\n\nOne reason is your ROI will be eroded by commissions. Brokerages won't give a discount for 100 share lots so you'll be paying $7+ to buy the security and again when you sell, which means many times the cost of the commissions you pay will be more than the value of the equity you hold. The EV (expected value) of your trades has to be greater than the sum of the rake (commissions), *plus* your real, risk-adjusted return must be greater than what you'd get investing in some other risky asset such as a mutual fund, an ETF, or a more mature individual stock in order for trading penny stocks to be a sound strategy. \n",
"1) As far as I know pump and dump schemes are illegal and a lot of regulations have been enacted to stop fraud with penny stocks.\n\n2) If you bought 100 shares at $0.02/share you would be spending $2.00 plus broker fees (around $10-$15). Then you have to spend the same amount in broker fees to sell it. Using a $10 broker fee you would have to expect those shares to reach $0.22/share (1,000% increase) to come out even.\n\n3) Penny stocks don't trade at high volume so the price doesn't change frequently.\n\n4) No, if you bought into a bunch of penny stocks then one of them is not bound to go up. They are penny stocks for a reason. Penny stocks are purely a blind gamble.",
"Because if they weren't crap companies they wouldn't be penny stocks. ",
" > Also why not just buy 100 shares of as many penny stocks as you can? One of them is bound to go up, right?\n\nThat's like betting on all the horses because one is bound to win. Like playing the lottery, it's a poor investment. Logically, the amount you invest does not change that.",
"The reality is that most, if not all, companies that are selling penny stocks will not go very far. It is rare for a company that started with penny stock to do well enough to get listed on any exchange.",
"Because of commissions and overhead, it is rarely worth buying less than about $1000 of stock. When you buy penny stocks, you're usually buying 10,000 or 100,000 shares instead of 5 or 10. There are decent OTC investments to be had but there is much less regulation and much less information available so it is a safe bet that the \"tip\" you got is part of a scam. Even if you want to speculate (gamble), you are better off limiting yourself to listed companies as they are intrinsically less risky (the rules for listing and remaining listed preclude some of the shenanigans you see with OTC).\n\nFinally you seem to have the pump-and-dump scam backwards. You would buy the shares for $2-$3 (from the pumper) and then they would quickly drop back to their previous price ($0.02) so in your example, you would lose $198 + commissions."
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66rzxb | how does the body separate fluids from solids when processing food/sustenance? | The body obviously separates the sustenance you intake and turns it into feces or urine, how does it do that? And how does it separate a semi-solid, semi liquid food like soup?
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/66rzxb/eli5_how_does_the_body_separate_fluids_from/ | {
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"Digestion (churning), enzymes, and bacteria break your food down, then as the food travels through your intestines the liquids are removed, sending them to be filtered then excreted, and the remaining solids are expelled.",
"Everything that you eat goes through the intestines. The small intestine removes nutrients, broadly, and the large intestine squeezes liquid out. What's left over goes out the end as faeces. \nUrine isn't separated out from food: it isn't in what you eat. Rather, it is produced in the kidneys out of the various byproducts that your body produces in the process of existing, then sent to the bladder. ",
"All food and drink not absorbed ends up as feces, not urine. So there's not any separation, really, it's just that most of the liquid gets absorbed during digestion (although normal feces are still 50% water by weight).\n\nUrine comes from a totally different system than digestion - your kidneys filter it out of your blood. It contains many waste products that end up in your blood and balances your hydration."
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1b3dhy | how does medicine know which part of my body to go to? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1b3dhy/how_does_medicine_know_which_part_of_my_body_to/ | {
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"You might want to ask this in r/askscience if you don't get a good reply here. ",
"it doesnt. everything you take goes to your bloodstream and is distributed to your whole body. Its just a matter of what that particular chemical does. For example, if you take painkiller for a headache, but you back kinda hurt too, both those pains would be alleviated by painkiller. This is why side effects are a thing. because even though this chemical circulating through your body may make your headache better it may also relax your colon and make you poop yourself",
"Great Question!\n\nDrugs go to different parts of the body based on chemical and physical parameters: how much blood flow there is, if the drug is fat-soluble or water-soluble, the concentration gradient of the drug between body compartments, the dose of drug given, etc... Often times they go everywhere, bathing all cells, but only bind cells that have receptors to bind that drug. \n\nWe study the drug and how it works in the body, and then try to decide the best way to administer the drug (orally, IV, intramuscularly, subcutaneous, topically).\nUnderstanding how the drug will be used may determine how it is ideally administered. Many drugs taken chronically are formulated for oral intake because it is easy for a non-medical person to give themselves, compared to injections. But oral pills take longer to have an effect and may not be as potent compared to injections. So in hospital settings, it may be beneficial to give an IV injection for a fast effect and large effective dose.\n\nHere is an example: Valium is a fat-soluble injectable anesthetic drug that needs to reach the brain. It passes through cell membranes easily, and crosses the blood-brain barrier relatively easily because the brain is fatty. But we cannot give Valium intramuscularly (IM), because it tends to stay in the surrounding fat and muscle near the injection site. This makes giving Valium IM problematic as it doesn't reach high blood concentrations quickly, and therefore doesn't reach the therapeutic dose in the brain to induce anesthesia. For this reason, Valium is given IV for anesthesia induction.\n\nAnother anesthetic drug in the same family as Valium is Midazolam. Midazolam can be given IM because it is water-soluble in acidic conditions. The manufacturer sells you the drug in an acidic solution, so when you inject it IM, it can easily enter the blood stream quickly and at high concentrations. Remarkably, the chemical structure of Midazolam changes because your blood pH is more neutral at ~7.4, and then Midazolam becomes fat-soluble (and less water-soluble). Since it is fat-soluble, it can more easily enter the brain (which is fatty) and cause the desired anesthetic effects. \n\nOther times the drug targets specific cells because those cells have unique receptors on their surface to bind that drug. But often the drug binds a few other cell types in other areas of the body, and this can cause side-effects. \n\nEx: Insulin has receptors to bind muscle, liver, and fat cells. When your sugar is high, insulin is released by your pancreas to tell muscle, liver, and fat to collect that sugar from the blood and store it inside them for later as a reserve. So diabetics who don't make enough normal insulin, or need more insulin to get the job done, can give themselves insulin to improve the situation. The insulin is injected, enters the blood, and bathes cells all around the body. But it really only has an effect on the muscle, liver, and fat cells because they have the right receptor to bind insulin.\n\nAntibiotics and chemotherapy drugs have the same basic goal: to kill the bad guys. The bacteria or the cancer cells, respectively. Antibiotics are designed to target parts of the bacteria that mammalian cells do not have, such as a cell wall. Cancer drugs are much harder to develop because they appear just like our normal cells. This is why there are many severe side-effects to chemotherapy, such as hair loss, weight loss, vomiting - you're killing some of your own normal cells in the process.\n\n\nYour question revolves around pharmacology. These wiki sites may help you further. \n_URL_1_\n_URL_2_\n_URL_0_\n\n"
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3x8ju4 | how have diseases caused by recessive genes (eg. cystic fibrosis) not been evolved out of existence? | Surely before proper treatment became available the chances people with serious genetic diseases would be able to survive and reproduce would have been really low, resulting in those genes not being passed on and the disease eventually ceasing to exist? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3x8ju4/eli5_how_have_diseases_caused_by_recessive_genes/ | {
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"Because only having 1 of the recessive gene provided a resistance to Cholera, a very lethal disease. If your parents are carriers of the CF gene but don't have CF, that means they each have a dominant gene and a recessive gene. This would mean if they had 4 children, odds are 2 children are healthy and resistant to cholera. 1 kid has Cystic Fibrosis, and 1 will be susceptible to Cholera. \n\nThis is the same with sickle-cell anemia and malaria.",
"In this specific case: heterozygous advantage. People with just one copy of the recessive gene (Cc) that leads to Cystic Fibrosis not only don't exhibit the symptoms/phenotype of the disease, but actually do *better* than someone with no copies (CC). Among other things, it makes you more likely to survive cholera, which is part of why CF is most common in people of European descent.\n\nEven without that, heterozygous carriers will generally pass on their genes at the same rate as \"normal\" people, so the trait survives. And they have a 50% chance of passing on the disease allele (c). Unless you have kids with a close relative, it's highly unlikely you will ever have children with someone else who carries that same rare, recessive mutation (at the start).\n\nIf you've got a relatively isolated population, that might mean more and more of the people there start to become carriers after a few generations, and then the actual disease starts to appear in even the children of very distantly related people within the village/tribe.",
"In evolution everything in existence has a reason to exist and the CF gene is no exception. It actually offers partial resistance to things like malaria and typhoid, which used to kill by the thousands."
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511388 | why windows me, vista and 8 are considered "bad"? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/511388/eli5_why_windows_me_vista_and_8_are_considered_bad/ | {
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"Windows ME had two big problems: it was wildly unstable (applications would crash much more frequently than on Windows 98, and the system as a whole would die surprisingly frequently), and it removed compatibility for a lot of DOS software (which was still common at the time). \n\nWindows Vista had two huge problems. The first was that shops and manufacturers were installing Vista on machines that just barely met its *minimum* requirements, far below its recommended ones. This meant that for at least a year or two after launch, the only time most people saw Vista was on a machine that ran it like garbage. The second problem was that it overhauled the Windows internals in a way that required many hardware manufacturers to create new drivers -- so if you were an early adopter, chances are half your gear wouldn't work properly on Vista, and you'd either be waiting for a driver to come out or just throwing old equipment away.\n\nIf you were to go and install Vista on a machine *today*, now that the hardware is much better and drivers for the Vista/7/8/10 series have been out forever, you'd find it was perfectly decent.\n\nWith 8, the big thing was the new UI. They abolished the start menu people were used to and replaced it with a new start screen resembling a phone or tablet home screen, with enormous tiles. People tended to either find this confusing and alienating, as something new to get used to, or just outright ugly and inefficient. Before long, Microsoft added the start menu back, and now it will default to the traditional start menu on desktop and the tablet-style view on touchscreen devices, with an option to swap between.\n\nPersonally, I didn't care much either way about 8. Vista had a bungled introduction, partly MS's fault and partly not, but worked out fine in the end. And ME was just a total write-off."
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1vnlt2 | why is iceland considered part if europe when it is closer to north america | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1vnlt2/eli5_why_is_iceland_considered_part_if_europe/ | {
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"I'm no expert, but I think its based on tectonic plates (Large stone slabs that float on top of the magma inside earth.) I found this map of tectonic plates from a google image search, and a majority of Iceland is on the same plate as Europe: _URL_0_",
"Why is Alaska considered part of the United States, when it is in fact attached to Canada?",
"Very simply, because it was settled by Europeans (from the areas we now call Denmark, Sweden and Norway) about 1500 years ago, and has retained cultural, trading, and linguistic links with the Nordic countries ever since.",
"Continents often have some type of geographic boundary (tectonic plate/sea/mountain range), but in the end they're a human construct. Iceland is part of Europe because we consider it part of Europe. And that's mainly due to the cultural links /u/buried_treasure already mentioned."
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1ptcvp | college football, conferences, bowls, etc. | Why don't all teams play one another and how is decided who wins the national championship. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ptcvp/eli5_college_football_conferences_bowls_etc/ | {
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"There are [a lot](_URL_0_) of teams in college football. Given the number of teams and the amount of rest required between games, in addition to issues relating to travel and accommodating class time, it would be impossible to play every single opponent in a single year. \n\nTeams are divided into conferences (SEC, Big 10, ACC, Mountain West, etc.) that often include teams in similar geographic regions. Teams in the same conference often play a large portion of their games against one another. Each conference may have its own system of choosing a conference champion, such as having a championship game between teams with the best in-conference records. \n\nThe national champion is determined through the BCS National Championship game. The participants are determined based upon rankings from polls and a computer calculation (that seemingly nobody understands) that accounts for wins, points scored, opponent quality, etc. The 2 teams that do the best according to these rankings play for the national championship.\n\nAs a rule of thumb for other bowl games, teams are chosen based on their conference and record. For example, the Rose Bowl features the best Big 10 and best Pac-12 teams that didn't qualify for the national championship game. There are lots of bowls of varying prestige and some of them aren't considered all that important. For example, the Pinstripe Bowl features the 4th place team from the American Athletic Conference against the 7th place team from the Big 12. \n\nStarting in the 2014 season, there will be a new system for determining the champion. A committee of 13 people will select the top 4 teams in the country. These teams will enter a 2-round single-elimination playoff tournament, with the winner of this tournament being declared national champion. The semi-final matches will replace some of the more prestigious bowl games on a rotating basis. "
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ayvfxx | the concept behind government bonds | someone, anyone? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ayvfxx/eli5_the_concept_behind_government_bonds/ | {
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"Basically, it's an agreement between you and the government. You pay the government some amount of money now, and the government promises to pay you back more after a certain amount of time. The payment might be all at once, or it can be over time.",
"It’s an IOU from the government.\n\nA government (city, state or national) wants to spend money on something but doesn’t have enough. They issue bonds for the public to purchase and use the money from the sales of the bonds.\n\nThe way it works is the bonds will have a purchase price and will mature after a specified time. When matured, you turn the bond back in to the government and receive the purchase price plus some additional amount as interest.\n\nE.G. the government issues 5-year bonds at $1000 piece with a redeem value of $1100. Basically you loan the gov $1000 for 5 years and when they pay you back they pay an additional $100 dollars interest.\n\n",
"The government borrows money to pay for things today and then pays off the borrowed money over time, with interest.\n\nBonds can be used at all levels of government. A suburb might issue bonds to build a new school building because they need $20 million to do so now, and then pay back that $20 million over the next 30 years through collection of property taxes.\n\nOr a state might borrow money to fund the constuction of a stadium, paid off through entertainment taxes collected on ticket sales.\n\nOr the federal government might issue bonds to fund a war or programs to offset a recession (bank rescues, jobs programs, assisting states with unemployment funds, etc)."
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27oz8s | why do all of the electronics in my car briefly turn off when i start the engine? | If I put my key in the ignition and turn the battery on, all of the electronics come to life, but then when I start the engine, they all shut off for a moment while the engine starts then come back on. Why does this happen? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/27oz8s/eli5_why_do_all_of_the_electronics_in_my_car/ | {
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"The starter motor in the engine is a big drain on the battery, reducing the current for the electronics.",
"A typical car battery is 12 volts, with around 650 amps. With the engine off and key in, your radio/lights/vent fans are on drawing some amps from the battery.\n\nWhen starting, the electric motor needed to turn over the engine quick enough to rotate the engine requires a substantial amp draw, basically 'hogging' all available amps from the battery. This can be dangerous as unstable amp and voltages can disrupt electronics.\n\nTo avoid this, car manufacturers have disabled the accessories during start up. "
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6yub5d | why can't your phone use wifi and 4g/3g together? | For example when you start to move away from the wifi source, the signal and speed are getting weaker and slower. So why can't your phone gradually move to using the mobile network available instead of you have to turn off your wifi and move to using your 4G exclusively. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6yub5d/eli5_why_cant_your_phone_use_wifi_and_4g3g/ | {
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"[You can do it on Android](_URL_0_)\n\nIn general it's undesirable because mobile bandwidth is far more limited. Something like watching youtube in high quality could easily use up all your limit in very little time if you fail to notice.\n\nIt could also result in you being charged a lot of money, and people tend to hate this kind of thing.\n"
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6os8x7 | what are the financial gains of isps choosing to throttle bandwidth on streaming sites like netflix? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6os8x7/eli5_what_are_the_financial_gains_of_isps/ | {
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"Pretty much the worry is they can then start to put in their own versions of these sites with the advertisement that they won't be throttled and/Or force current companies to pay premiums to prevent throttling.\n\nFor example if you stream tv/movies to your phone through Netflix or whatever it uses up your data, however if you are a Verizon customer and stream to your phone through go90 it's free.",
"Today's ISPs aren't solely ISPs. They're also video content providers. Netflix is a competitor service to Comcast cable TV, At & t / Dish tv, verizon FiOS tv",
"* Netflix is making a lot of money off of \"their\" bandwidth, they want a piece\n* those ISPs are often owned by companies that have their own online services, throttling would allow them to provide their stuff at higher quality"
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3z1n7u | why do we bundle up our top halves with coats and sweaters but only ever wear pants below? | Like, I know there's thermal underwear but that's only when it's really cold. When it's like around freezing why don't we put on "coat pants"? Is there some historical reason why people don't think they're fashionable? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3z1n7u/eli5_why_do_we_bundle_up_our_top_halves_with/ | {
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"Our legs are only muscle and fat, they contain no organs. All of our organs are in our torso and head, so the are the most important parts to keep warm. We are much less bothered by our extremities like legs hands and feet bring cold than out torso or head.",
" In cold places it is fairly common to have a long coat that reaches down to the knees or even close to the ankles. Also, when doing sports that have you outdoors in the cold for a long time, it is common to have thermal pants. There are snowmobile pants, for example, that fit over your regular pants. ",
"You can get casual dress pants that are fleece lined. They are wonderful if you are going to be out in the cold for long.",
"I always wear thermal leggings under my pants when its cold, love them but id never wear \"coat pants\" i need my legs to be able to move as freely as possible",
"Do you mean ski/snow pants?\n\nThey aren't worn all the time because they can be a bit of a bitch to always put on and take off."
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2nyw4v | why using shampoo every day can be a bad thing? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2nyw4v/eli5_why_using_shampoo_every_day_can_be_a_bad/ | {
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"Each head hair is anchored in a specialised pore of skin. The root of your hair is inside that pore. The pore secretes natural oils that clean and protect your hair. Washing your hair removes these oils so 1-2 times a week is ok, but if you wash your hair every day you're removing that natural layer of protection",
"Your hair has a sort of natural balance of oils that keeps it nice and healthy. Shampoo gets rid of these, in addition to the other things you appreciate it cleaning away. \n\nSo, if you can, it's best to shampoo less often. ",
"Ive shampooed my hair everyday for as long as i can remember, no problems for me.",
"Washed my hair with shampoo every day for 24 years. In the last year I slowly weeded that down to once a week due to advice from my barber. Best decision I could have ever made. \n\nI wash with shampoo every Sunday and just rinse with water every other day, maybe using conditioner once or twice a week. My hair feels softer, healthier, and just generally \"stays put\" better. "
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248dug | why does it sometimes cost more to fly from a - > b than it does to fly from a - > b - > c? | There's no way it costs less in terms of man-hours or fuel, so why is it often cheaper to go past a layover city than end up there?
For example: A flight from Baltimore to Milwaukee with a stopover in Chicago is cheaper than just the flight from Baltimore to Chicago. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/248dug/eli5_why_does_it_sometimes_cost_more_to_fly_from/ | {
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"Supply and demand. People are willing to pay more to shave a few hours off of their trip and there's only so many seats on the plane. Airlines aren't priced by how much it costs them to fly; they charge you (or try to charge you) the maximum you're willing to pay.",
"The reason has to do with the efficiency of the **spoke-hub distribution paradigm**. Imagine a wheel in which smaller cities (usually) are **spokes** and all of these spokes connect to a central **hub** (usually in larger cities). This model connects all of the cities with the fewest number of routes. Simply by going to the hub you can go to any destination. Having fewer routes means that there is a higher probability that the planes will be filled. Think, in your case fellow passengers going from Baltimore to Chicago may not be going to Milwaukee. They may be going to any other spoke from the hub.\n\nThe other option is connecting all destinations directly. This is essentially making every spoke into a hub. This would require a higher number of routes and therefore flights would be less frequent to fill up and there will inefficiency. This inefficiency leads to higher prices.\n\nHere is the math if you are so inclined:\nSpoke-hub requires (n-1) routes where n is the number of destinations. So for an airline to have 10 destinations would only require 9 routes.\n\nPoint to point requires n(n-1)/2 routes where n is the number of destinations. So for an airline to have 10 destinations would require 45 routes.\n\nSource:\n[_URL_0_](_URL_0_)\n",
"I think competitive pressure is a likely answer. When you want to get from A - > C where neither A nor C are a hub for any major airline, all the local airlines may be in reasonable competition for that ticket, flying through their own hubs (B being one of those). If you want to get from A - > B then the airline that uses B as a hub might be running nearly all the business on that route with other airlines more reluctant to compete for flights to an opponents hub. Less competition, higher prices.\n\nUltimately, the cost of the flight for the airline is not the most significant factor in the cost of the ticket. It sets a lower (they don't want to keep running a route where they're losing money all the time) and upper (they don't want to price it so high that there is a big drop off in demand) bound, but between those limits they're mostly just trying to charge as much as they can while still getting you to buy the ticket from them and not the competition.\n\n\nDid this question get edited or something? There are four other responses so far and not one of them even tries to address the question asked. At least one person put some real effort into it too."
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3y7yda | what ocd is really like | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3y7yda/eli5_what_ocd_is_really_like/ | {
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"You have disturbing thoughts that you cannot control, e.g. people you care about dying. These are the obessions part of OCD. Certain actions, like tapping a door four time, reduces/stops your obsessions for a short period of time so you tend to repeat these actions to stave off your disturbing thoughts. \n\nWith OCD, most people realize what they are doing is irrational, but that doesn't help stop it. There's also purely obsessional OCD where the compulsions are certain thought patterns. Someone's obsession in that case might be whether they really love their boyfriend/girlfriend. Which then leads to thoughts like \"of course I love them. They brighten my day whenever I see them\", but then you'll think something like \"But what if I'm just lying to myself to avoid hurting them with a break up\". Then your thoughts go back and forth like that and you can't control it.",
"Worrying constantly that your life will be negatively effected if you don't follow routines/rituals. Examples from my life follow:\n\nI frequently drive around the block to make sure I closed the garage door...even though I know I closed it. I will even text my neighbor and ask. She knows my issue, so it's cool. I have driven song the block 3-4 times before because my brain tells me to check again.\n\nI count my swallows when I drink. It has to be an odd number to stop. If I end on an even number, I get anxiety. No, putting more liquid doesn't help. \n\nWhen I'm doing something without definite measures, I have to do a bit more or it's not enough. Cooking for example, dumping in pasta (etc.), I always add a bit more. There may not be enough for the whole family if I don't add those last 3 noodles.\n\nIt sucks. Thankfully my husband rocks and keeps me in check...most of the time.\n\n*edit - horrific spelling"
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3td36d | what is the logic behind the most common hiccup recipes such as jumpscares, sucking on lemons, sipping water, and holding your breath? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3td36d/eli5_what_is_the_logic_behind_the_most_common/ | {
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"The idea is that it will strongly stimulate the vagus nerve (responsible for hiccups). There are actual, more medically accepted treatments (i.e. lidocaine) that actually stimulate the nerve, but even those are not totally understood. Either way, it's the same idea. "
]
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1xbnax | how does red lobster sell lobster dishes for so cheap? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1xbnax/eli5_how_does_red_lobster_sell_lobster_dishes_for/ | {
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"Low quality ingredients, produced in large quantities in factories and prepared by low quality kitchen staff.",
"In some places in New England you can buy lobsters at the dock during lobster season (notice Red Lobster advertise different seafood when they are in season) for $2 a pound. If you order in large quantities you can get them for even cheaper. "
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1wb4v3 | the north american college class numbering system? 101, 209, etc... | Classes in college in America tend to have numbers after the description (eg. Chemistry 101). What do they mean? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1wb4v3/eli5_the_north_american_college_class_numbering/ | {
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"- The first number has to do with the year level. \"100\" classes tend to be for freshmen, \"200\" for sophomores, etc. \n\n- The later numbers are just for organizational purposes, but usually lower digits means classes required for the major while higher numbers are used for elective (which often change by the year). \n\n- Some classes are paired together for a full year of the subject. For example, if you took Calculus I in your freshman fall semester and Calc II in the spring, they would probably be listed as MATH 101 and MATH 102\n\n- You don't have to be in the right grade for the class, but many classes come wit prerequisites (classes you need to have finished beforehand). You can't take Calc II without passing Calc I. Also at my college some classes were reserved for different year groups; for example, Psychology 101 and 201 were both \"Introduction to Psychology,\" but the 101 class was reserved for Freshmen and the 201 class for upperclassmen. \n\n- \"____ 101\" is normally an introductory class and would be the first class a freshman would take on the field. It can also be used as slang for learning the basics of a field. "
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9vuvwu | why is it when i’m driving planes look like they are still in the sky | Whenever I’m driving and see a plane, it always looks like it’s not moving, and it just looks really weird. Anyone know why that is? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9vuvwu/eli5_why_is_it_when_im_driving_planes_look_like/ | {
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"It's because of the distance involved. Its real speed is quite fast by earthly standards, but it's so far away from you that the proportion of your field of view it crosses in a given time is really small. When you're driving, things a lot closer to you like trees, power lines, etc. will cross a lot more quickly, disguising the plane's movement. \n\nIf there were some frame of reference, like a grid made of 100 meter squares up in the air that you could see, you could tell the plane was actually hauling ass.",
"You judge speed based off how quickly something crosses your field of view and then try to adjust for the distance\n\nSince the plane is very far away it will take a long time to cross your field of view despite covering hundreds of miles\n\nA close telephone pole will appear to be moving very quickly as it whizzes by the window because it's so close\n\nOur sense of speed is all about how the angle to the object changes over time. At great distances, there won't be much change of the angle"
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4opx61 | are 'good germs' dying in your mouth due to mouthwash, what are the consequences ? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4opx61/eli5_are_good_germs_dying_in_your_mouth_due_to/ | {
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"Bacteria in the mouth are wholly responsible for the reduction of dietary nitrate to nitrite, which in turn is reduced to nitric oxide - this is very important for blood vessel tone and blood pressure. As humans do not possess a nitrate reductase enzyme, we rely on this relationship with oral bacteria. Use of antibacterial mouthwash has been shown to negatively affect blood pressure. \n\nThere is currently a lot of research in to dietary nitrate as an exercise performance enhancer (beetroot juice has been a big focus for these studies) and the role of oral bacteria is of great importance here :) \n\n_URL_0_",
"Very simply, the mouth is not like the gut where we require stable flora for proper function. There are benign bacteria but they are the founding species that start the biofilm formation which allow the propagation of the \"virulent\" species which cause cavities and periodontal disease. There is not a stable protective barrier of \"good\" bacteria that prevent colonization of the bad ones. Therefore, there really are no good bacteria and there is no negative consequence of using mouthwash. The reality is that mouthwash is not good at killing established bacteria in biofilm and there are really no benefits to using it. The clinical benefits are real but are so weak that they don't really justify use other than to freshen breath. The effective defense is mechanical removal of biofilm: brushing and flossing.",
"Oh finally. My blood pressure has been through the roof recently. My doc said to quit smoking and drop the 1L of daily vodka from my life.\n\nFuck that. I'm just gonna do what these comments say."
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dhd9jb | when we zone out and stare at something random for a long time and then snap out of it, why does that happen? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dhd9jb/eli5_when_we_zone_out_and_stare_at_something/ | {
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"Usually we are thinking about something and depending on the topic, it may use more energy to come up with thoughts.\n\nThere are times where we require less thought and in those moments, we enter a \"hibernation\" state where we just blank out. \n\nWe think more often than not so that's why.",
"I do this mid conversation and sometimes even mid sentence. My friends just say they wait for me to come back and then carry on again",
"For Neurodiverse people who don't have efficient Executive Function, it's a marshalling of energy to deal with the tasks at the time, or it's a fatigued state where we're needing a break but there's no possibility of a real break.",
"I’m not a scientist, so anyone who is, please correct my errors.\n\nThis may be related to what neuroscience calls the task-negative and task-positive networks. \n\nThe brain has a task-positive neural network that’s focused on processing information that demands concentration/attention, like speaking or watching a movie. \n\nBut it also has a “default mode network” (task-negative), which activates when we do things like daydream or think about the past or plan for the future. Creative ideas seem to happen more frequently in this state as well. \n\nPerhaps that sudden snap of awareness is a shift from one network to the other. You didn’t notice the slip into it, just the snap out of it back to the external world.\n\nIt’s an interesting idea. It’s thought that this is how people cope with solitary confinement: Rather than go mad in complete silence and isolation, they retreat into a rich inner world that no one can take from them.",
"It could be called a spontaneous meditative state. Your mind just flows, sometimes with thoughts, sometimes empty. You just exist in the moment.",
"The real question is why my eyes suddenly go chest level.\n\nI get that eyes are stimulating and disrupt train of thought but wouldnt it be easier, mentally, to go above boob level, what with the judgements?!?",
"This could be a very minor form of seizures, you might want to talk to a neurologist. If I am correct, then it is (probably) treatable.",
"I know it's supposed to be dissociation. Everyone dissociates, but some people do it as a response to stress and they just sort of shut down and can't move or speak or respond for a few minutes. Sometimes it's more minor. I don't think that's the only reason for it, but that's why it happens to me. I'm curious to learn more about this too.",
"have you ever tried to be aware of this state while you are in it? You can then choose to continue staring into nothingness or snap back to reality, it feels amazing really.",
"there's a few similar phenomenon that you might be talking about:\n\n**dissociation**, which is an emotion thing. these are usually short, but can be hours long, episodes of feeling detached from your surroundings. you might feel like the world around you is not real, that you are not real, or that you are outside of your body watching yourself. these happen in response to stress, ranging from boredom to a traumatic event. they also can be induced by some drugs. even though it does not happen to everyone, it isn't usually a problem; when it is, we call it a dissociative disorder.\n\n**micro-sleep**, which is a sleep thing. these are 10-30 second episodes of non-responsiveness. you might feel sleepy, your eyelids may close, or you might not remember it happening at all. these usually occur when you're sleep-deprived, and can be dangerous during things like driving.\n\n**automaticity**, which is a habit and memory thing. this is when you do a task that you often do, and still feel normal and can respond to events appropriately, but you aren't occupied with the details involved. you might not remember the task at all afterwards, and you might do another task at the same time. for example, you arrive home and realize you don't remember walking there at all, only that you were planning dinner. this happens to everyone and isn't dangerous."
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3oaoi8 | why are battery sizes named the way they are? (aaa smaller than aa etc.) | I've always wondered why batteries are named the way they are. Why is D larger than AA and AAA larger than AA? I don't get it | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3oaoi8/eli5_why_are_battery_sizes_named_the_way_they_are/ | {
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"The letter system appears to originate in the two types of early radio batteries: A (low-voltage) and B (high-voltage). The first attempt to standardize various manufacturers’ battery names came during World War I, and standards were published in 1919 by the Department of Commerce. What exactly those standards were, I haven’t been able to determine. \n\nIn any case, the letter system was universal by the 1940s, and maintained by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). The letters indicate the size, in height and width, of the battery. For example, “AA” means “50.5mm x 14.5mm.” \n\nThe letters originally began with A and progressed upward in size. But in the 1950s, electronic equipment miniaturized, and suddenly AA, AAA and AAAA battery sizes were required. Current ANSI specs list sizes from AAAA through G, plus J, N, O and R. \n\nSome sizes, like A, have fallen out of use. (B is still used for bicycle lights in the UK.) Others, like F and G, are always linked together in multi-cell packages for electric fences, lanterns, etc. and are never seen individually by consumers. \n\nThe N is actually smaller than AAAA—it’s called N because it was the first mercury battery, and N is the International Electrotechnical Committee symbol for that metal. The J was designed and named by Kodak specifically for its cameras. \n\nAnother problem is that new batteries often must be designed to fit inside new products. As a result, there are now about 300 sizes of battery on the market—12 times the available letters. So there are batteries known as “sub-Cs” and “two-thirds As.” \n\n(Nobody knows why the 9-volt, which appeared in the ’40s to fit transistor radios—isn’t lettered. But its different shape, configuration and voltage probably made it recognizable enough on its own.) \n\nThe letter system is obviously insane and is in fact used only in the US and only for common household batteries. Manufacturers, other countries and ANSI itself use true (though very complicated) nomenclatures that usually indicate a battery’s chemistry, shape and dimensions. \n\nBut they don’t all use the same nomenclature. So, depending on where you are and who you’re talking to, the good old AA battery could be an E91, MN1500, 815, KAA, AM3, 15A, LR6 or SUM1. \n\nEven if a universal system was adopted, battery manufacturers worry that American consumers would be confused without the memorable letters A, C and D. (Duracell is even promoting the use of the letters in Europe.)",
"Batteries got their letter designations back when standardized parts started to become more popular. They were given letters in the 1920's ranging from the smallest battery, \"A,\" to the largest battery at the time, \"E.\" Eventually, however, the need for smaller and smaller batteries arose, so they started to take on different names. \"AA,\" \"AAA,\" and \"AAAA\" (6 of which are arrayed in 9v Duracell batteries) batteries were all manufactured, for instance.\n\nOther batteries, like the \"B\" and \"E,\" stopped being made because no devices used them anymore. That pretty much brings us to the standard battery letters we have today."
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9luhed | what happens to a defendant who no attorney wants to defend? | like a Ted Bundy kind of guy, who's own attorney reluctantly defended him and lost friends over it. But those kinds of people still have the right to a lawyer. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9luhed/eli5_what_happens_to_a_defendant_who_no_attorney/ | {
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"Public defenders are appointed to people who can't afford their own lawyers, they don't usually get a say in whether or not they'll take a client.",
"You are given a public defender. That lawyer is shit out of luck as far as the public is concerned.\n\nEthically it's a lawyers job to best represent their client. \n\nSerial rapist/murder/baby killer a public defender has to do everything within their power to defend the accused.\n\n\"Innocent until proven guilty\"\n\nMost people forget that part.",
"Once you take a case (private lawyer) or been assigned (public defender) it’s very hard to quit your client ethically and even legally. \n\nThere are some cases where the lawyer can petition the judge to get relieved of their duty but it’s very rare to be given permission since it can in some cases be seen as prejudicial to a jury “if his own lawyer can’t stand defending him he must be guilty”. ",
"As a last resort, the judge picks a lawyer and says \"represent this guy to the best of your ability, or lose your license and possibly go to jail.\" Usually it doesn't come to that, though.",
"Public defenders are required to defend whomever they're assigned to. Before the public defenders system, if the state mandated that you had a right to a lawyer (usually in cases where execution was a possible sentence), *any* lawyer could be required to defend that person. That's what happens to Atticus Finch in *To Kill A Mockingbird* \\- he's technically a real estate lawyer, but he has to take the Robinson case because a judge ordered him to.\n\nHowever, defendants can fire their lawyer if they want to. They essentially have to show that either they can pay for their own lawyer (in which case the lawyer they pay has to accept), or that their current public defender so egregiously sucks at their job that it's unethical to let them keep working, or that they not only want to represent themselves, but also understand just how terrible of an idea that is and accept the responsibility for losing if that happens. That last one happens a lot with high-profile criminals, [including Ted Bundy](_URL_0_).\n\n*Way* more rarely, public defenders can \"fire\" clients. The lawyer has to show that their client's case won't be negatively impacted by them passing the case on to someone else. So, leaving before anything important has happened is probably fine; quitting in the middle of trial is almost certainly detrimental to the case and won't be allowed."
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m2kir | what is credit score, and can you save money by using a credit card? | I was reading a post on askReddit earlier when I read [this comment](_URL_0_). The part that interested me was the second half, where the redditor talks about saving money by using a credit card for purchases.
**I don't really understand the benefit of credit cards. You're spending money that you don't have and paying pretty high interest rates. **
**Also, can someone explain credit score to me?** | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/m2kir/eli5_what_is_credit_score_and_can_you_save_money/ | {
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"OK, his comment is kinda accurate. \n\nCredit cards make all their money by charging interest (a penalty based on how much you spent) on items purchased that isn't paid off by a certain date (usually every month). To attract you into using their credit card, they use things like frequent flier miles or gift vouchers to encourage you to spend more money on your card. \n\nInterest on credit cards is HUGE, over 14% usually, thats double what a loan from the bank would be. (at least!). So basically, they want you to fuck up, and spend more money than you have, so you have a debt, and they can penalise you. (They don't want you to spend too much that you'll bankrupt/default, thats why they have spending limits)\n\nSo, if you don't spend more than you have, and you pay your card off on time, you don't get any penalties. However you get to enjoy all the positives (enticements) of having a card.\n\n\n > Also, can someone explain credit score to me?\n\n\nWhen you get a loan, use a credit card, phone bill and sometimes even when renting. The computer collaborates how efficient you are at paying back debts. So if you are efficient, the bank is more likely to help you when you want to morgage a house! However, if you have a shit score, banks will know that you probably won't be able to pay them back.",
"OK, his comment is kinda accurate. \n\nCredit cards make all their money by charging interest (a penalty based on how much you spent) on items purchased that isn't paid off by a certain date (usually every month). To attract you into using their credit card, they use things like frequent flier miles or gift vouchers to encourage you to spend more money on your card. \n\nInterest on credit cards is HUGE, over 14% usually, thats double what a loan from the bank would be. (at least!). So basically, they want you to fuck up, and spend more money than you have, so you have a debt, and they can penalise you. (They don't want you to spend too much that you'll bankrupt/default, thats why they have spending limits)\n\nSo, if you don't spend more than you have, and you pay your card off on time, you don't get any penalties. However you get to enjoy all the positives (enticements) of having a card.\n\n\n > Also, can someone explain credit score to me?\n\n\nWhen you get a loan, use a credit card, phone bill and sometimes even when renting. The computer collaborates how efficient you are at paying back debts. So if you are efficient, the bank is more likely to help you when you want to morgage a house! However, if you have a shit score, banks will know that you probably won't be able to pay them back."
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268v7q | what's needed to make a knife that doesn't dull? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/268v7q/eli5_whats_needed_to_make_a_knife_that_doesnt_dull/ | {
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"Nothing will make a knife un-dullable.\n\nMechanical action against the edge of the blade will always cause particles to shear/fracture off and as time goes on, this will become more and more evident as the blade becomes less and less sharp.\n\nFor a blade to never dull, this would require the material it's made of to never allow particles to come off and there's no material in the world that does that."
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4a70lh | why do lovebugs and june bugs flock to the color white? | I went outside tonight and noticed that June bugs were beginning to show up, with at least four of them loitering on a wet towel I had left outside. This had got me thinking about why certain insects crowd on things like walls, light fixtures, and fence posts that are painted white. Is it something involving light receptors? Is it just a coincidence? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4a70lh/eli5why_do_lovebugs_and_june_bugs_flock_to_the/ | {
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"It's almost certainly tied to some other behavior that is hardwired into their brain (maybe they evolved to do this because the circuit that developed this behavior gave its host a better chance to survive which meant it would have a better chance of spreading this trait). If that were true, we are observing an instance where nature is being illuded into pattern of behaving by an imposter object whose other qualities are hidden by the hosts inability to connect other characteristics and reject its value that would have otherwise been assigned by the targets color alone. ",
"[laundry detergent is filled with ultraviolet reactive 'optical brighteners'](_URL_1_), so your white towels are glowing with UV light, which many bugs can see. \n\nthere are many reasons bugs are believed to move towards light sources and UV light- many types of flowers are UV reactive, and bugs may (probably do) use natural light sources like the sun and moon for navigating. \n\n[many other things contain optical brighteners](_URL_0_), presumably including white paint."
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"https://www.dispersions-pigments.basf.com/portal/basf/ien/dt.jsp?setCursor=1_564558",
"http://www.chemistry-blog.com/2012/08/23/whiter-than-white-how-does-it-work/"
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2oc6zc | why does space scientists always search for 'habitable planets/plays that may have life on them' when in reality they are basing that off humans, whats to say the aliens couldn't survive in environments we'd die in? due to adapting. | Title says it all, but I was wondering why this is. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oc6zc/eli5_why_does_space_scientists_always_search_for/ | {
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"We know a lot of earthlike life, and have good ideas about how we might be able to detect it from very far away.\n\nWe have no idea what non-earthlike life would be like, or how to begin looking for it.\n\nSo we assume alien life is like our, and look for what we can find. If we are right, we might find some, if we are wrong, we probably couldn't have found it anyway.",
"Because we know life can survive on conditions on Earth. Why search for things that MIGHT when we can look for things that CAN",
"Because, as you rightly point out, there may be forms of life so different from us we might not even recognize them.\n\nWhat scientists are looking for is not any form of life, but Earthlike life. They know, because it's happened at least once that they know of, that life can exist in conditions where liquid water can exist. Yes, it's possible that other forms of life exist, but they *definitely* know that life exists on at least one planet that has liquid water.\n\nSo looking for liquid water is an easy shortcut to finding life that they might actually recognize as such.",
"Look at it this way. Imagine you're abandoned on a huge Island. You have a scout around, passing through rivers, beaches, grassland, woodland, desert, mountains, etc. The only definitely edible thing you find is a type of mushroom. You only found one of them and it was on a river bank. \n\nWhere do you hunt for more of them? "
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8louth | what would the universe look like after the heat death of the universe? would rocks remain, or would they have somehow "decayed"? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8louth/eli5_what_would_the_universe_look_like_after_the/ | {
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"A rock is a high energy state. Lots of bonds with lots of energy. Definitely not an end state.",
"No. Eventually everything would be in a perfect state of entropy, meaning not even atom cores would stay whole",
"Heat death is when literally everything that exists, has ever existed, or will ever exist, has already decayed.\n\nRight now, we're pretty darn sure that all matter in the universe is composed of [17 elementary particles](_URL_0_), where these 17 particles cannot possibly break down to smaller things. The heat death of the universe would be an endless sea of these particles, all perfectly motionless after aeons of bouncing around and eventually slowing down.\n\nWith exactly zero possible interactions in the universe, entropy stops in place since it can't ever change. Nothing can change. Since exactly zero things can change after heat death, time also loses meaning and ceases to exist, since time is only used to measure change.",
"Heat is energy, and energy gives matter ( plasma, gas, liquids, solids and exotic variants) their form and properties. \n\nNo energy means that electrons can't move. \nThis means that atoms can't share electrons, so nothing would exist - atoms and molecules would collapse on themselves. \n\nThere would be nothing to see, as there would be no light. Nothing to touch, because nothing would exist - it would be essentially a black hole the size of the universe, but with no gravity as there is no where for the subatomic particles to move to - they're already all there. \n\nNo sound. No light. No temperature. No pressure or weight. No shape or form. No time. \n",
"Everything will have decayed. There will be no rocks.\n\nI know it seems like a rock floating in space is an end state, but not at the scales of time we're talking about in a heat death of the universe scenario. We don't have a definitive answer on proton decay, for one thing (though we know the half life of a proton must be at least 10^34 years). If proton decay is a thing (note that this also means neutron decay is a thing), then over a long enough time frame, matter will simply turn into gamma rays and electrons.\n\nIf proton decay isn't a thing, matter is still doomed: if the expansion of the universe is accelerating enough, then at some point expansion will overwhelm gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Matter will be pulled apart into fundamental particles.\n\nIf there's no proton decay and the expansion of the universe isn't accelerating enough (or stops accelerating), then the nuclei of light elements will slowly (*very* slowly; we're talking 10^1500 years) fuse to iron via quantum tunneling - and similarly, heavy elements will slowly fission down to iron.\n\nBy mechanisms I don't pretend to really grasp, so-called \"iron stars\" should also quantum-tunnel themselves into black holes in a time frame between 10^10^26 and 10^10^76 years. Don't ask me any more about this, though; I literally only know about this from two sentences on Wikipedia.\n\nAssuming it's correct, those black holes will then evaporate themselves into background radiation.\n\nEither way, there's no matter left. Literally everything is done; there is no energy imbalance anywhere, meaning no work can be performed. Time has stopped, and the universe is dead, forever.\n\n---\n\nOf course, that all assumes that the heat death model is the correct one, which isn't to be taken for granted. I am distinctly not a scientist, but I am troubled by universal lifetimes as proposed, because if they're accurate, we exist in a privileged position. Which, while not impossible, has been a false belief when we've held it before.\n\nRight now, the universe is on the order of 10^10 years old. We know the current universe can yield intelligent life, because we exist. We expect - broadly speaking - this era to last until about 10^14 years. But after 10^12 or so, the rest of the universe will be receding from us too fast to be visible (I don't mean because of any technological limitation, I mean that the light from them will be so red shifted its wavelength exceeds the size of the visible universe; they will be causally isolated from the local group). Meaning after 10^12 years, there will be *no way* for a civilization to detect that the local group isn't the entire universe, meaning they will not be able to derive the Big Bang, the expanding universe, etc.\n\nRemember that, in this model, civilizations like ours demonstrably can arise all the way out through 10^14 years. Meaning we had to have arisen in the *first 0.1% of the window for intelligent life* to understand the universe as we understand it.\n\n1000:1 bets can certainly be won, but it really bothers me."
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ds5e7s | why do paper back and hard back cover books exist? why not just one type of book? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ds5e7s/eli5why_do_paper_back_and_hard_back_cover_books/ | {
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"Hardcovers are much more durable than paperbacks. This is why you see school textbooks with hard covers, and, say, practice workbooks with paper ones. Hardcovers are supposed to last for years and years, at the cost of a slightly elevated price. Paperbacks are cheaper, but they're more prone to damage.",
"Paperback books are cheaper to make, so they can be sold for less. They dont hold up as well as hard cover books (covers tear more easily and then pages get damaged) so the more expensive hardback books are also still made for people that want something more durable.",
"Cost and weight. Hard copies are better quality but they're heavier and more costly to make and buy. So you get 2 options depending on what matters more to you",
"Hard cover books are stronger and not so easily damaged. However they are heavier, cost more and are not so flexible. This is why paperback is also sometimes called pocket books as they can more easily fit in a pocket and be carried around. You can make the same comment as to why you need both a laptop, tablet and smart phone.",
"Hardcovers are more durable, built to last, but more expensive to produce. So they might be used for a limited run, or preferred as a collectors item (eg. I have hardbacks of some of my favorites).\n\nHardbacks are also often used for the first run. Im not 100% certain, but i think they may require less setup than paperbacks, so you make a run of hardbacks as an original run to gauge popularity before committing the outlay to set up paperback printing.",
"Books used to be expensive to produce so they were made hardcover to protect them.\n\nIn the 1920s books started to be printed on cheap paper with paper covers. These were pulps because the cheap paper was called pulp. This was only done with lower class books such as westerns and fantasy. \n\nIn the 1950s, paperbacks started being printed for what were considered good books. These were sold to schools in huge numbers because they were cheap. \n\nThere was clearly an audience for cheaper paperbacks but book sellers made less money off of them. So publishers publish first in hardback and charge a lot. Then months later they release in cheaper paperback. \n\nThere are people who prefer hardback books, but for the most part now it is just to charge more.",
"It's a way for publishing companies increase profits. Hardback books will come out months before the paperback edition, so people will have to choose whether to get an expensive copy or wait for a cheaper one.\n\nIt's like if game publishers released only the special edition of a game, six months before the standard edition came out."
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4jvq47 | . how does your body make you sleep so much when you are ill? | I got a stomach bug and ended up sleeping through most of the day and night. Normally I couldn't sleep that much if I wanted to. How does your body overcome your normal circadian rhythm and make you sleep so much? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4jvq47/eli5_how_does_your_body_make_you_sleep_so_much/ | {
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"Your wanting to sleep is regulated by a chemical in your brain. When your brain feels it's better off sleeping to deal with an illness, it makes more of the chemical. So you sleep more. ",
"there are several molecular pathways from inflammatory response to change in behavior in animals (including humans)\nthe initial response is driven by principal pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL-1, IL-6 and TNF-alpha) which can result in increased melatonin production.\nthe induction of so called sickness behavior has several evolutionary advantages:\n\n• it is difficult for wild animals to get food from environment and they might be unsuccessful in search for them - this costs energy which is precious for fighting the disease - > animal is forced to sleep/move less and conserve energy for immune system - raising body temp, ...\n\n• you decrease the chance of ingesting essential growth factors for pathogens - e.g iron, zinc, vitamins - your body also tries to hide these nutrients from the them. in fact force-feeding of animals during disease results in lower survival rate\n\n• immobility prevents spreading of diseases among relatives"
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2b8c5e | i've often seen j.s.bach described as mathematically perfect. how is music maths; and how is it perfect? | Do any other composers have similar mathematical patterns? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2b8c5e/eli5_ive_often_seen_jsbach_described_as/ | {
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"All music is based on mathematics, actually! Let's look at a musical scale, which contains 12 repeating tones - you may have seen this before:\n\nA, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G# - and repeat. Each note corresponds to a tone of a specific frequency. What we refer to as \"Middle A\" or \"A440\" is a 440Hz (440 oscillations per second) tone.\n\nNow look at: _URL_0_\n\nCheck out the frequencies around A440. A# is around 466.16Hz. The ratio of 466.16 to 440 is around 1.0595 to 1. B is around 493.88Hz. The ratio of 493.88 to 466.16 is around 1.0595 to 1. C is around 523.25Hz. The ratio of 523.25 to 493.88? You guessed it, about 1.0595 to 1. \n\nIn our western 12-note scale, every interval of 1 step follows this pattern. Going 12 of these intervals from A440 gets you back to A, but at twice the frequency - 880Hz! That's what we call an \"Octave\" - it's the same note, but twice the frequency. You can verify easily by calculating 440 * (1.0595^12), which is very very close to 880. You can keep going - 1760Hz is another octave higher, but still an A. \n\nHow Bach is \"mathematically perfect\" is foreign to me, but music is all about the math!"
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74bwdb | why does coke/beer/etc spray everywhere after you shake a can but la croix doesn't? | I need science. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/74bwdb/eli5_why_does_cokebeeretc_spray_everywhere_after/ | {
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"text": [
"The sparkling water is not carbonated to the same pressure as the soft drinks or beer. While shaking can make it fizz more it simply doesn't have enough dissolved gas to foam as much as the other beverages."
]
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3bhj1j | who does wearing gloves at food stalls prevent food infection, the workers would still touch the same surfaces as they would with bare hands? | How* does wearing gloves | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3bhj1j/eli5_who_does_wearing_gloves_at_food_stalls/ | {
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"bare hands are not sterile - try it yourself. take a piece of cheese, cut it with a disposible knife and put it in the fridge. it won't mold. break it and rub your hands on it. it will mold like crazy.\n",
"To add to the other answer, when you change tasks (e.g. switching from meat to vegetables), you can just dispose of your glove and put on a new one, which greatly reduces any chance of cross-contamination.",
"Aside from what you touch, your body excretes oils, dead skin cells, sweat, and waste through it's pores constantly. That includes your hands. "
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3o2dbv | the volkswagen scandal | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3o2dbv/eli5_the_volkswagen_scandal/ | {
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"Their cars (or some of them) are programmed to perform and meet the emissions standards when the car \"senses\" that its being tested.\n\nThese tests are preformed under the same conditions every time. So the program can detect when the car is being tested vs. normal driving. After the car \"knows\" its being tested, it will perform so that it falls under the acceptable emissions level. When the car \"knows it is not being tested, it performs outside of the acceptable emissions range.",
"Diesel engines burn very hot. So hot, in fact, that they convert some nitrogen in the atmosphere into nitrogen oxides. Nitrogen oxides are pretty nasty and harmful to humans. As such, their emissions are regulated. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to have an engine that is fuel efficient (and thus meets mileage standards) that also doesn't emit lots of nitrogen oxides.\n\nVW put software on their cars that would, under testing conditions, artificially constrain the amount of nitrogen oxides produced in order to pass the test. But in \"on the road\" conditions, NOx emissions were 40 times higher than the allowed amounts.",
"We bought a volkswagen in 2009 or so. Could we be affected? "
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339te5 | when a law is passed, why is there a date that it goes into effect and why does it not go into effect immediately? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/339te5/eli5_when_a_law_is_passed_why_is_there_a_date/ | {
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"Generally it's so that people affected by the law have time to adjust to the new laws. (For example, with the Affordable Care Act, it left time for states to build their healthcare exchanges and for people to acquire insurance before the individual mandate kicked in.",
"So that law enforcement and the general public knows that it's illegal.\n\nIf you say \"OK, as of this moment all alcoholic beverages over 60% alcohol by volume are illegal to sell or possess\" then you suddenly have millions of people who are in possession of illegal substances that don't know it's illegal because not everyone knows when every law is being passed.\n\nWhereas if you say \"All alcoholic beverages over 60% alcohol by volume are illegal as of June 1 2015\" that gives liquor stores time to liquidate their stock and people who are already in possession of it time to dispose of it."
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1n61ko | why china is such a hot bed for paleontological discoveries, in particular dinosaurs. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1n61ko/eli5_why_china_is_such_a_hot_bed_for/ | {
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"It's a massive country, being about the same land area as Canada or the US. And a lot of people are looking very carefully for fossils there now. It would be much stranger if China *were not* a major source of new discoveries, honestly. "
]
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6snkmv | what happens to elders whose family refuses to take care of them? | Like say they have no money themselves, limited social security, and their kids/extended family want nothing to do with them and refuse to provide care or finances. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6snkmv/eli5_what_happens_to_elders_whose_family_refuses/ | {
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"That depends on what country they're in. But, generally, they will live a life of poverty if they don't have their own resources and no one chooses to help them.",
"Stay tuned: Millions of Americans are about to find out. This is not a joke. And it doesn't happen only to those whose families turn away. See [here](_URL_0_) and [here](_URL_1_)."
]
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"https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/poverty/reports/2008/07/30/4690/elderly-poverty-the-challenge-before-us/",
"https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2013/05/20/senior-poverty-is-much-worse-than-you-think/?utm_term=.8c3a167aff6a"
]
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23d50c | why is it that some people hate the sound of certain materials (e.g styrofoam or crackling of joints) | For me, I hate the sound of styrofoam, it makes my jaw 'fall', but my brothers are fine with it, my dad hates the found of crushing empty water bottles but I'm fine with it | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/23d50c/eli5_why_is_it_that_some_people_hate_the_sound_of/ | {
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"As far as cracking knuckles go... can anyone ever resist the urge to crack your own after?",
"Could be a few things. Many sounds that are hated fall in the same range of frequencies that correspond to human screams, which is hypothesized to be an alert mechanism built into our brains (think nails on chalkboard, knife on plate). Also, and I'm not sure how much research has been done, but there are ideas that certain frequencies of sound resonate more loudly for certain people through their ear canals. Pretty sure nothing conclusive, though."
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8gdui9 | how does a car (when driving) charge it's battery? does it even charges it's own battery or is it a myth? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8gdui9/eli5_how_does_a_car_when_driving_charge_its/ | {
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"It does indeed! The engine drives a little generator (or a similar device called an alternator), which makes electricity that recharges the battery. This is why typical cars never have to be plugged in.",
"Cars have a small generator, known by the name of alternator, that is powered by the engine to recharge the battery. \n\nWithout that part, a car would not be able to start without external assistance once the battery is depleted (which would happen fairly quickly if the car is running as equipment like fans and the car's radio and lights consume electricity).",
"Importantly - the alternator is a load on the engine, meaning that the engine has to burn fuel to turn the alternator and generate the electricity. It's not a big load - maybe 50W peak when a car needs 2000W to cruise at highway speeds - but it is a load.\n\nThere are many people who seem to forget this, and think that they get the electricity from the alternator for free, and try various schemes to power the engine from the electricity generated."
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223inr | why can't (or doesn't) comcast, twc, or i, for that matter, create a tv service where i pick and choose what channels i want? | It baffles me as to why I get the Food Network and 400 other channels when all I watch is ESPN and my local channels. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/223inr/eli5_why_cant_or_doesnt_comcast_twc_or_i_for_that/ | {
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"Because if you only paid for ESPN, they wouldn't be making as much money. They'd rather package channels in bundles, so if you want a specific channel you have to buy the upgrade that includes the 40 channels you don't particularly care for.",
"ESPN is the main thing keeping bundles expensive. If all you want is ESPN, you really wouldn't pay that much less a la carte.",
"The channels are sold to the cable companies in bundles by whoever owns them. For example, ESPN is owned by ABC/Disney. Even if you only want ESPN, the cable company has to pay for all of them in order to provide that one channel. That cost gets passed on to customers, whether they want one channel from said bundle or all of them. \n \nI'm not saying they don't upcharge the fuck out of it, but based on contracts and what not most cable companies are not able to offer a la carte channels. If they did, the companies who own the channels would refuse to let the provider carry those channels."
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21zllp | why are cans of generic or unknown brands of soda more thicker(stronger) than cans of coke or pepsi? | I would think that a thicker can would only increase the cost to manufacture, so why would they do it?
Edit: [This] (_URL_0_) was the result of me trying to squash this particular can, I know if I applied the same force on a Coke can it would be completely squashed not just a dent as in the picture. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/21zllp/eli5_why_are_cans_of_generic_or_unknown_brands_of/ | {
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"text": [
"i have never seen this to be the case. The generic sodas they sell round where i live have aluminum just as thin as the name brands."
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"http://i.imgur.com/SifotzC.jpg"
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[]
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a2xqmw | how is it that ads play well on mobile apps even when the internet is spotty? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a2xqmw/eli5_how_is_it_that_ads_play_well_on_mobile_apps/ | {
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"They are preloaded I think? They do the same on Instagram or FB even when I have no data or Wi-Fi enabled. But I'm sure someone has the actual answer for you.",
"There are different types of advertisements depending on the developer and the advertising network. When there is no internet connection, the app shows the preloaded advertisements(downloaded along with the app itself), which are of the main sponsors ( if you are offline you can notice the same advertisements playing back to back ). Note : Different developers have different methods of handling this, some won't show you advertisements when you are offline, while some will, as a push for the clients to upgrade to the paid versions.\n\nEdit : Beyond a certain threshold, spotty internet is treated as offline."
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1w79cn | why did wwii bombers always fly in formation? | I was watching an old WWII movie and there were portions about large groups of bombers flying over Europe to their targets. Despite enemy fighter attacks and antiaircraft fire, pilots always stressed the need to stay in close formation, with no deviation in altitude or direction. In these scenes, they must have been beyond fighter range because they were not accompanied by friendly fighters to defend them.
I would think this strategy would make them easier to hit by enemy fighters and ground-based guns. Also, I would think that one burst of flak would be more likely to take out more than one bomber. I would think at minimum that they would want to be spaced farther apart. So, what advantage overrides that? Does it keep them from getting lost? More stability for their on-board gunners to shoot back? Less likely to crash into each other? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1w79cn/eli5_why_did_wwii_bombers_always_fly_in_formation/ | {
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"Formation allows for each bomber's guns to support the others. If a fighter takes on a bomber one-on-one, it's probably likely that the bomber will go down, if the fighter knows what he's doing. If ten fighters approach ten bombers in formation, it's going to be a lot harder to destroy the bombers, because there's going to be so much defensive fire coming at the fighters at all times.\n\nAlso, since saturation bombing was \"in style\" in WWII, having bombers in formation made it a lot simpler to manage bombing runs. Instead of \"Bomber 1 aims for Target A, Bomber 2 aims for Target B, etc.,\" they can just order \"When you to Waypoint A over the city, everyone start dropping bombs.\" The formation will help concentrate bombs on the target, and reduce the demands on the bomber crew to find specific targets.\n\nEDIT: Reduced bomb dispersal, not increasing it.",
"Many reasons:\n\n1) to concentrate the bombing zone of the target. Bombing can be inaccurate sometimes and hard when anti air is shooting at you. So unless it's dive bombing they need to concentrate as much bombing power in one spot as possible\n\n2) friendly support: obviously when you're by others you can all defend eachother. And also this allowed for the bomber escorts to be able to watch and protect the bombers from above. \n\n3) navigation: you're going to be traveling for a long time and you can easily get lost at night. \n\nI'm sure there are many more reasons as well "
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2ky7if | i have heterochromia and am short sighted. are the two related? | One of my eyes is green and the other is a noticeable browner colour; and I am short sighted. Is there possibly a correlation between the two? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ky7if/eli5i_have_heterochromia_and_am_short_sighted_are/ | {
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"Since, as far as I know, there is no connection between eye color and near-sightedness, no, they are probably not related. I'm curious though, are both eyes equally short sighted? If one were worse then the other I'd be more inclined to think they could be related."
]
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3e9mrv | why haven't they made cars that are unable to unlock by clicking the button on your keys once? | In order to unlock all of the doors, you have to hit it twice. Why do this? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3e9mrv/eli5_why_havent_they_made_cars_that_are_unable_to/ | {
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"In case you're being attacked. You unlock the driver's side without unlocking the others, so the murderers rapists can't get in before you. ",
"its a safety feature, if you are approaching a car, you may only want to unlock the driver door so a stranger couldnt hop into the other side at the same time.\n\nI believe atleast some cars have settings to select everything to unlock if you want."
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5oh7uc | what exactly about microwave ovens makes them very dangerous to repair? | I asked an appliance repairman yesterday. He was kind enough to talk to me on Martin Luther King Day (everyone else took the holiday off). He said something about the solenoid retaining electrical power whose amount you can never be sure of; and that if you touch this area of the microwave--which does not look the same in every unit--you may get a lethal shock. [Sparking microwave transformer] (_URL_1_)
[Bad bad microwaves] (_URL_0_)
I also Googled this and found supporting statements all over the world wide webs :) So if anyone here is a scientist, can you explain what exactly about a microwave will not discharge electricity, even if you leave it unplugged for, say, a month? Thanks. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5oh7uc/eli5_what_exactly_about_microwave_ovens_makes/ | {
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"Microwave ovens contain a high-voltage capacitor which stores charge; if you touch the capacitor or the HV part of the circuit you may receive an electric shock. \n\nTypically they're also reasonably high quality capacitors with very low \"leakage\" (read: self-discharge), hence they can store charge for a long time even after the unit has been powered off.\n\nSome capacitors have a bleed resistor installed which slowly discharges them, but this resistor may be faulty (open circuit). You can carefully drain the capacitor manually, but you need to know what you're doing.",
"It's literally down to the capacitor in there. \n\nThey designed to hold a very high voltage, and capacitors have the capability to dump all their power into you in one hit, making their ability to deliver instantaneous power quite scary. \n\nIf you get a well made one, the way they're designed means the charge they've accumulated will take a while to dissapate. If you get in the way before it has, then bang. \n\nAs to why the technician was afraid, honestly it sounds like he doesn't know what he's doing. They're safe enough to work on if you know how to safely discharge the capacitors. Considering he called them solenoids, it does make you question his competence a little. \n\nAn experienced electrical engineer would be able to safely discharge a capacitor after which you can work on a microwave with impunity."
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"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL9h8T0KJik"
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556our | when purchasing a new car why does the dealership ask for a down payment? does that downpayment go towards the payment of the car? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/556our/eli5_when_purchasing_a_new_car_why_does_the/ | {
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"A. If you have cash on hand the banks think you have your shit together and are more likely to give you a loan. If they have to repossess the vehicle it will be more likely worth more than the original amount you borrowed and they lose less money. \n\nB. Banks will typically set a limit to the amount of money they are willing to give for a certain make and model if you have shitty credit. Usually a max of around 120% NADA retail value. If you are looking at a car that the dealership is wanting $15,000 but the NADA value is only $10,000. If they get you to put down $3000 they can get you to borrow the full remaining $12,000 the bank is willing instead of having to back down on their price.\n\nC. Dealerships like to focus your attention on monthly affordability rather than total end cost. Typically every $1000 you put down will drop your monthly payment by about $20. You may be able to afford $350 a month but 7 years is a long time. \n\nD. The more money you put down the less you pay in interest over the life of the loan. Good for you. \n\n\nUsed to be a car salesman. \n\nEdit: Sorry misread the second part. \n\nAny money you put down will lower the total amount you have to borrow. The down payment doesn't go towards your payments it goes towards the original total price of the car plus taxes and fees. It was never part of the bank loan. The bank likes to see that you put money down but it doesn't have anything to do with them other than they might lose less money if they have take it back "
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8gg85g | how long does it take animals to fall asleep once they lay down? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8gg85g/eli5_how_long_does_it_take_animals_to_fall_asleep/ | {
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"It depends entirely on what type and species of animal, as well as on the individual in question. Sorry but your question, while interesting, seems way too vague for a satisfactory answer\n\nEdit: but since we're here, did you know that dolphins go to sleep with only one brain hemisphere at a time? \nThis cycling mechanism helps them stay alert and keep swimming, which is useful in that it helps them find more pufferfish in order to get high. \n\nNo idea how long it takes the average dolphin to fall asleep. But if it helps, it takes me 5 min - 1 hour to fall asleep. I'm not a dolphin though. And I've never nibbled on a pufferfish for that sweet, sweet high.",
"All animals are different, just like all humans are different.\n\nIn my case, I can fall sleep in 45 seconds flat (unless I had a bucket of icecream for dinner, then, 3 hours)",
"Depends on the animal. For example, my cat can take your spot on the couch and fall asleep in the time it takes to get a drink from the kitchen. She also has no respect for the rules of \"seat check.\" ",
"I think a big factor would be that we are usually trying to force ourselves to go to sleep, most animals just sleep when they’re tired. ",
"My dog falls asleep sitting up, standing, on the way to lay down, while she’s eating. Pretty sure she can just shut it down instantly whenever she chooses to (or doesn’t).",
"Instead of “it depends”, can people give examples. Yes, we’re aware there’s diversity in the animal kingdom. "
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dd1oq0 | how would we perceive an object with a colour off of our perceivable spectrum? | I might just be super dumb but if for example there were aliens out there with a colour not in our spectrum how would we see them? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dd1oq0/eli5_how_would_we_perceive_an_object_with_a/ | {
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"We simply see the *other* colors that the object reflects, with no effect from this additional color content.\n\nIf the object doesn't reflect any of the colors we can see, it looks black to us.",
"So color is reflected light. Light is electromagnetic waves. The waves that we can see make up the colors that we can see.\n\nHowever, there are a lot of different waves that we cannot see that are all around us.\n\nIf an alien has a \"new color\" it would likely be that they can see waves that we cannot. So imagine that these aliens can see radio waves. To their eyes, everything would look different.\n\nIf you look at a cellphone, you just see normal colors, but these aliens would actually see the radio waves that the cellphone goves off and it would look like it was shining a new color. However, just because it would be shining a different color for them, it would still look exactly the same to you."
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jxzt9 | why is it every time i look into my flashlight and close my eyes(or look at a blank wall), i see the figure of the light but in a different colour? | My new charizard flashlight that is! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/jxzt9/eli5_why_is_it_every_time_i_look_into_my/ | {
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"Well, the way I like to think of it is this: when your body senses anything, it counteracts it with the opposite effect of whatever you were feeling. If you put your hand in warm water, after a while it won't feel as warm, and when you take your hand out of the water, it will feel cold for a moment or two until your body can adjust. It does no good for your hand to keep telling your brain that it's warm. It doesn't need a constant feed of the same information, so it essentially negates a little bit of the warmth so your hand will stop bothering it and your brain can focus on other things. The same happens with your eyes. If you look at something long enough, your brain will add a little bit of the opposite color so your eyes aren't constantly telling your brain everything that it sees. But if you suddenly take away (or change) that feed from your eyes, you have an afterimage. The afterimage is that negating effect from your brain before your brain realizes that something different is happening.",
"Imagine that light is blue paint, and your eyes (or, the back of your eyes, really) are a big, red canvas.\n\nWhen you look at something, you get some blue paint onto your red canvas. If it's just a few drops of paint, then you see the blue on the red for a few moments before it all runs down to show red behind it, again.\n\nNow, when you look into a flashlight (or any other really strong light), it's like throwing *a lot* of blue onto your red canvas. When that same blue paint runs down the canvas, just like the other blue paint, having so much more of it causes the colors to run together. Instead of blue on red, you actually see purple (which is blue and red together!).\n\nThe paint *always* ends up running down the canvas, what makes the purple so bright is just how much blue you use.",
"There are cells in your eye that detect brightness and color (red, green, and blue). They can get \"tired\"; when they do, they stop working to rest.\n\nIf you stare at a perfectly-red light, then close your eyes, the red-detecting cells in part of your eye will be tired, so the little bit of light that comes through your eyelids and hits that part won't look like it has any red in it, so you'll see green and blue.\n\nThe same sort of thing happens with white light, which has all those colors in it. But, some of the color-detecting cells get tired faster than others. If you close your eyes and see blue, it's because the red and green cells are more tired than the blue ones.\n\n(yeah, some of that's a little misleading, but it's fine for a 5-year-old). ",
"Well, the way I like to think of it is this: when your body senses anything, it counteracts it with the opposite effect of whatever you were feeling. If you put your hand in warm water, after a while it won't feel as warm, and when you take your hand out of the water, it will feel cold for a moment or two until your body can adjust. It does no good for your hand to keep telling your brain that it's warm. It doesn't need a constant feed of the same information, so it essentially negates a little bit of the warmth so your hand will stop bothering it and your brain can focus on other things. The same happens with your eyes. If you look at something long enough, your brain will add a little bit of the opposite color so your eyes aren't constantly telling your brain everything that it sees. But if you suddenly take away (or change) that feed from your eyes, you have an afterimage. The afterimage is that negating effect from your brain before your brain realizes that something different is happening.",
"Imagine that light is blue paint, and your eyes (or, the back of your eyes, really) are a big, red canvas.\n\nWhen you look at something, you get some blue paint onto your red canvas. If it's just a few drops of paint, then you see the blue on the red for a few moments before it all runs down to show red behind it, again.\n\nNow, when you look into a flashlight (or any other really strong light), it's like throwing *a lot* of blue onto your red canvas. When that same blue paint runs down the canvas, just like the other blue paint, having so much more of it causes the colors to run together. Instead of blue on red, you actually see purple (which is blue and red together!).\n\nThe paint *always* ends up running down the canvas, what makes the purple so bright is just how much blue you use.",
"There are cells in your eye that detect brightness and color (red, green, and blue). They can get \"tired\"; when they do, they stop working to rest.\n\nIf you stare at a perfectly-red light, then close your eyes, the red-detecting cells in part of your eye will be tired, so the little bit of light that comes through your eyelids and hits that part won't look like it has any red in it, so you'll see green and blue.\n\nThe same sort of thing happens with white light, which has all those colors in it. But, some of the color-detecting cells get tired faster than others. If you close your eyes and see blue, it's because the red and green cells are more tired than the blue ones.\n\n(yeah, some of that's a little misleading, but it's fine for a 5-year-old). "
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fkjb7u | can someone explain what a polity is to me? | For example, what constitutes as a polity? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/fkjb7u/eli5_can_someone_explain_what_a_polity_is_to_me/ | {
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"I go back to the Greek, which I think is related to the notion of a civil society and the rights and responsibilities of its citizens. In that sense, a polity is the civil community the citizens establish and operate. It is more than just the citizens, although it includes them all, since it also includes laws, institutions, and the social and economic structures they deem necessary. I hope that helps ... I’m sure others can add a lot better."
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4fyb55 | what is a nebula, and why is it not absorbed into some stronger source of gravity? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4fyb55/eli5_what_is_a_nebula_and_why_is_it_not_absorbed/ | {
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"A nebula is a cloud of dust that is often the early stages of a solar system forming. If conditions are right it will eventually collapse on itself and form a star and planets. If there is a strong source of gravity nearby, then yes it would get drawn into that, but space is huge and mostly empty. There's usually not anything close enough to draw it away. ",
"The nebula do contain a lot of hydrogen. So when they collapse there is enough hydrogen for fusion to occur in a new star. This generates enough light to push the hydrogen away limiting the growth of the star. Originally there was no dust in the gas clouds. Our sun is a second generation star so there was enough dust, higher atomic number elements, to form rocky cores for the planets.",
"A Nebula is a cloud of gas and dust, usually Hydrogen and Helium, but others are possible. When stellar radiation hits the clouds, they can ionize the gasses and create a wide variety of color.\n\nAs to why they're not absorbed by some other source of gravity, they are-- but remember space is huge and there might not be something strong enough to draw them in in a visible timeframe (e.g, centuries or decades.) \n\nLet's take the [crab nebula](_URL_0_) for example. A supernova remnant. Currently about 13 *Lightyears* across, plus or minus a few lightyears. \n\n\nLet's say it was exactly 13 Ly across-- 13Ly equates to 822134 Astronomical units-- for reference, 1AU = the distance between Earth and the Sun and the size of the solar system is (very roughly) 80AU. Divide 822134/80 = the crab nebula is about 10,000 times the size of our entire solar system.\n\nAlso, it's still expanding at about 1500km/s. ",
"Go watch crashcourse astronomy series on YouTube. Phil is awesome at explaning these things. You might gain some knowledge. \n\nI strongly recommend it to everyone. Your mind will be blown by the things you have no idea.\n\nEdit--\nI want to thank Phill, twitter: @badastronomer, one more time. If you see this, let me say one more time: you are awesome! "
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any3k0 | i graduated from college, got a job and was never once asked for proof of my degree. what systems are in place that stop people from just forging/faking a degree and going straight to good pay without the debt? i learned nothing useful. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/any3k0/eli5_i_graduated_from_college_got_a_job_and_was/ | {
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"How would you go about faking the degree? If you just printed it on a piece of paper, the company can call the university/college and ask if Timmy Turner 3432 ever graduated from their school. The university would say \"no\" and Timmy would get in trouble\n\nIn the tv show \"Suits\" they got a \"hacker\" to modify the Harvard database to claim that Mike Ross had graduated from their law school on such and such a date, but if you asked his alleged professors, none of them would remember him. And neither would admissions dept.\n\nSo there are ways to verify whether a person really did go to a particular school",
"You got a job with a company that doesn't do education verification so there's nothing but values/fear of being caught that keeps someone from doing it in that case. But many companies do education verification so the liars are found out. I have seen many offers rescinded for falsified degrees.",
"Questions like this are better in r/answers."
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911zea | how do screens know where to put individual pixels or how its all connected? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/911zea/eli5_how_do_screens_know_where_to_put_individual/ | {
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"Well talking about a simple picture, the computer doesn’t really know they’re all connected. Each pixel just is a small amount of information that knows where it is supposed to be and what color.\n\nJust like when multiple people are holding a sign with a single letter to spell out a word. You’re the bit of information telling you where you should be, the sign is the pixel. "
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x8s5t | what is the hiv "cure" | I think that all of you have read about the two dudes that have been cleared of HIV for 2 years (?). | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/x8s5t/eli5_what_is_the_hiv_cure/ | {
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"This will have to be like you're five, because that's the only level at which I understand it.\n\nThere is a very rare mutation that makes some people (like 1 percent) highly resistant to HIV infection. They simply lack the major chemical gateway through which the virus enters your cells. (Apparently not having this particular chemical gateway doesn't harm you.)\n\nThe attempted \"cure\" involves introducing this mutation to the patient. In the first case this happened through a bone marrow transplant. The guy got astonishingly lucky as the marrow donor had inherited this mutation from *both* parents. If it had been just one parent, he would have produced less of the chemical gateway in question (a CCR5 receptor, whatever that is) but I gather still enough that the virus would be able to function.\n\n",
"Interactions between cells or viruses often start off with an initial 'Handshake.'\n\nThink of the CCR5 receptor as one end of a handshake, and a receptor on a virus as the other hand (for reference, when viruses are named things like H1N1, or H5N1, they are being referred to by the type of 'receptors' they have. \n\nThe mutual handshake checks several things - whether the two bodies would be a good physical fit to interact, whether a transaction will occur, and what kind of transaction will occur. \n\nLike Naberius said, some people have a mutation in their genes that prevents the CCR5 'hand' from being formed, therefore preventing the HIV virus from 'latching on' in the first place. \n\nIn the past there was a similar theoretical cure being tossed around, regarding another disease among apes that clung to the same exact CCR5 receptor. In other words, by toying around with this other 'monkey disease' and infecting humans with it, their cells' CCR5 hands would act as if the had oven mitts on, and wouldn't be able to shake HIVs hand",
"bone marrow produces white blood cells. They received bone marrow transplants from someone immune to the disease. what makes them immune to the disease is their ability for their white blood cells to quickly identify and destroy HIV infected cells before they themselves get infected. This is what I have come to understand.",
"HIV hides in your immune system making it very hard to completely kill. The cells that would normally do the killing are themselves infected and can remain so for a very long time allowing the virus to reappear even after it seems like it has been beaten down.\n\n\nCertain major medical procedures, such as bone-marrow transplants, can in effect replace the immune system. If you can get the donated tissue from somebody who has a rare immunity to HIV or otherwise use drugs to stop the replacement cells getting infected you can thoretically fully get rid of it which is what has happened with these few patents.\n\nThe trouble is that the bone-marrow transplants and the like are very dangerous AND require donated tissue from somebody who is a suitable genetic match with you. This means that it is not something that could be offered to lots of people right now as likely we could not find good doners for many and the risk of killing the patent is far higher than the risk of staying on the drugs that let you live with HIV.",
"There are a lot of good answers here, but I think we should pay more attention to the actual feasibility of this \"treatment\". \n\nFirst, to give some context : the HIV virus needs 2 chemical to enter a cell and reproduce : CCR5 and CD4, both of which are found on T-Lymphocyte (a type of cell). Some people are born with a mutation in the gene that codes for CCR5, and because of that, HIV can't use it to enter the cell anymore.\n\nBone marrow is the tissue that is responsible for creating new T-Lymphocyte.\n\nBecause of these 2 facts, if you graft on an HIV+ patient bone marrow from someone that has the CCR5 mutation, the HIV+ patient will start producing resistant cells, which will rapidly become the majority, since the other cells are going to die because of HIV. Poof, cured.\n\n2 major problems with that : \n\n* Bone marrow transplant is a risky prodecure, involving complete irradiation of the patient to get rid of his own bone marrow, which implies completely sterile environement for a while. This is dangerous, and very costly.\n\n* The CCR5 molecule is not the only one that can be used by HIV : CXCR4 is another one. HIV entry using CXCR4 is less efficient, but exists. Because of this, there is no way to know beforehand if the treatment is going to work for sure.\n\nSo in the end, the curing of HIV with this method is incidental and cannot be regarded as a treatment since it's incredibly risky and costly compaired to the actual tritherapy. Current treatments have a lot a room for improvement, but essentially give a normal life expectency, without too much side-effects.\n\n",
"Some people have stuff in their bones that make blood that fights HIV.\n\nSome people who had bone cancer got transplants from these people. \n\nThe bone stuff from the first people got into the bones of the new people with HIV and it made their bones start to make the stuff in the blood that fights HIV."
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5s54e1 | what do epa opponents mean when they say they take issue with epa overreach? what do they mean by epa overreach? | I've tried to google it, but can only seem to find ultra-conservative explanations. Looking for a less radical, neutral clarification. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5s54e1/eli5_what_do_epa_opponents_mean_when_they_say/ | {
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"Occasionally poorly written environmental regs get enforced in weird edge cases that end up with ridiculous or outrageous decisions like mud puddles being deemed \"wetlands.\" Similar situations happen with most regulatory agencies.",
"A less radical explanation doesn't really exist.\n\n\"Conservatives\" believe that the Federal Government should be as small as possible. They argue that The Invisible Hand of the Market will provide Economic Incentives to companies to be safe, because unsafe companies will be abandoned by customers in favour of safer companies.\n\nTo this, they argue that complying with EPA regulations is an un-necessary financial burden that punishes those who comply and rewards those who cheat the system.\n\nYes, that's right — they're arguing that because criminals break laws and regulations, it punishes the law abiding.\n\nThey argue that the EPA should be trusting companies to voluntarily follow regulations, and bring enforcement against ones shown to violate them.\n\nThe problem with this argument is that it depends on the public having perfect knowledge of the behaviours of all companies, *and* the spare time to gather and interpret that knowledge, *and* the expertise to interpret that knowledge, *and* the existence of apples-to-apples competitors for the product or service, *and* ignores the fact that middlemen in a supply chain often only care about their immediate cost of doing business and will cover up violations, *and* ignores the fact that most of the time, once the environmental damage is done, it cannot be reversed — for example, with lead poisoning.\n\nI chose lead poisoning for a reason — because their argument is exemplified in the Kehoe Paradigm : \"Show us the data\". Robert Kehoe was a scientist employed by the manufacturer of tetraethyl lead gasoline additive, who worked constantly to deny that there was sufficient evidence that tetraethyl lead was a chronic and acute toxin, and that it was causing an epidemic of lead poisoning, as was demonstrated by Clair Patterson, a researcher who identified lead residues *pretty much everywhere* as a result of gasoline exhaust settling out into the environment, containing aerosolised lead. \n\nKehoe's paradigm, \"Show us the data\", where the burden of proof was placed on those who claimed harm was happening, was also used by tobacco and asbestos manufacturers, and also by *every other* manufacturer that has knowingly put out a product that causes harm. They deny that there is sufficient data to show harm, and then deny that there is sufficient data to show that they knew of the harm, and then deny that there is sufficient data to show that they could have reasonably foreseen the harm.\n\nThe opposing paradigm is to *default to caution*. Prevent illnesses and death before they occur.\n\nBut that would involve companies ceasing selling a product when they have merely *statistically significant* evidence that *reasonably predicts* harm, rather than *having legally proven to a legal finder of fact* that harm *had actually occurred* and that it was more than merely correlative, but actually *caused* by their actions.\n\nThat is what they mean by \"EPA Overreach\": when the EPA demands that they not undertake actions that a reasonable person would reasonably believe would be likely to lead to harm, rather than let them do whatever — and then negotiate financial settlements for fines and lawsuits.\n\nI have to make this disclaimer: I'm not personally neutral on this. I'm a retired scientist, and this is one of my pet causes. I believe that this explanation *is* neutral, however, because it is backed up by history."
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2dtsw0 | when asked to pick a 'random' number from the top of my head, what am i really doing? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2dtsw0/eli5_when_asked_to_pick_a_random_number_from_the/ | {
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"You're thinking up random numbers until you find one that feels right (i.e. that you think is unlikely to be guessed or is otherwise appropriate to the situation) and then you choose it."
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8qqwyx | is there friction in space and does it affect big objects like moon? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8qqwyx/eli5_is_there_friction_in_space_and_does_it/ | {
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"Space is not actually a perfect vacuum so there is the SLIGHTEST bit if friction, the affect on the moon is so incredibly miniscule its practically non exsistant. ",
"The NASA answered this:\n\n_URL_0_\n\n > Does friction exist in deep space?\n > Yes, when two surfaces rub together in outer space, there will be friction. Friction is a surface effect and doesn't depend upon there being air. There is also a force like air resistance from the very sparse gas in space, but it will be very, very small, since space is a very good vacuum.\n > Dr. Eric Christian"
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6gpsuo | how do shows and movies eliminate unwanted noise? | I was watching an episode of Better Call Saul (S1 Ep 3, about 18 minutes in) and you can clearly hear the wind in the background and see the trees shake violently. I feel, that if it were shot with a normal camera, you would hear a lot of the wind distortion. How do they minimize the noise of the wind so that you can hear them talking? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6gpsuo/eli5_how_do_shows_and_movies_eliminate_unwanted/ | {
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"You've seen the long boom mics that Saul's crew uses? Those are real - they're intended to just capture the actors lines during filming. Any background noise is added later by foley artists or other sound crew using sounds that were captured separately, or come from a library of sound effects. Actors may also wear body mics for long shots, and may also come in during post-production to re-record any lines that weren't clear during filming.",
"Additionally there is someone on the sound editing crew called a Dialogue Editor. Their job is to turn the production recordings into a single smooth dialogue track. They use sound editing software like Pro Tools to crossfade between disparate background sounds, to remove unwanted clunks and clicks, sometimes they take a word where there's a noise over a syllable and then they go into the extra takes to find an alt for that line and massage it into sync. It's basically a kind of sound Photoshop. There's other things they do as well but it's not 100% germane to this discussion. I'm a former dialogue editor.\n\nAnyhoo, from there the tracks are given to a re-recording mixer who then adds some EQ to minimize unwanted frequencies like power hums, adds artificial backgrounds and sounds like foley, and mixes in ADR lines (these are lines that are redone in the studio where the actor basically lipsyncs themselves to get a new read of the line). \n\nIn some extreme situations these editors and mixers might use some type of noise reduction technology. This is where a computer will analyze a sound and attempt to intelligently remove just the noise and leave the dialogue intact. These tools are imperfect and you can't get rid of everything, so they are (hopefully) used sparingly as they leave voices sounding digital and hollow.\n\nThe thing to remember is that if a location is noisy typically you don't notice too much unless that noise changes somehow. So let's say you shot a scene with two people talking and the close-up of one is clean and the other one has a loud highway background. When you cut from shot to shit the background sound will cut in and out with the edit. What I would do as a Dialogue Editor is to try to extend the louder fill over the quieter fill (it's a long story on how I do this). If the whole scene has the loud background but it's consistent then that's better than the loud background coming in and out over and over again as we cut back and forth. My goal is not necessarily cleanliness although that is desirable. It's 1) intelligibility and 2) smoothness.\n\nDialogue Editors are some of the unsung heroes of the film business. Their work often saves a ton of money, makes stuff feel super professional, and fixes many mistakes made in shooting, and the sad part is if they've done their job correctly their work is completely invisible."
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1soq4o | why do the chinese copy so much? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1soq4o/eli5why_do_the_chinese_copy_so_much/ | {
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"Because they don't have the infrastructure for design/invention but they have the manufacturing know how. They can replicate items easily and their government doesn't do anything to stop it."
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3h41qh | why is the 1tb hard drive i bought only 930gb? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3h41qh/eli5why_is_the_1tb_hard_drive_i_bought_only_930gb/ | {
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"[lifehacker](_URL_0_) explains this really well.",
"There are a number of different reasons, but the main ones are that the way the drive is measured, I'm tired right now so this may not be 100% accurate but it has something to do with bits and bytes, with one being 1000 and the other being 1024, Windows sees the 1000 and the manufacturer advertises it as 1024, neither is incorrect it's just a different way of measuring something.\n\nThere are also invisible partitions Windows (and other OS's) which is used for indexing, partition data and in some cases boot data.\n\nSometimes if you bought a laptop or pre-built PC the manufacturers will have made a partition with recovery files on it so if you mess your PC up, you can restore it without needing additional media.\n\nMy 4TB enterprise grade drives read out as having 3.63TB of available space on them. My PCI-E Solid state drives which are marketed as 400GB, read 372GB available space. It's just a way of measuring drive sizes that has stuck around longer than it should have, but to change it now would be far to costly with very little benefit/gain.",
"Some systems report file sizes where they use 1024 as 'kilo', where others stick to the SI prefix 'kilo' for 1000. \n\nHaving a 1 TB HD has the manufacturer use the '1000', because it ends up being the bigger number with less actual space. Some Operating Systems (like OSX) do use the '1000' one as well, which means that when plugging your HD into a Mac will make it show up as an actual 1000 GB.",
"The drive you bought is 1TB, which is 1,000 GB, but it's only about 930 GiB. (Notice the \"i\" in GiB!)\n\nGB and GiB are actually two different sizes.\n\nHard drive manufacturers label drives with the **decimal size**:\n\n 1 B = 1 B = 1 byte\n 1 KB = 1,000 B = 1,000 bytes\n 1 MB = 1,000 KB = 1,000,000 bytes\n 1 GB = 1,000 MB = 1,000,000,000 bytes\n 1 TB = 1,000 GB = 1,000,000,000,000 bytes\n\nWindows Explorer and Mac Finder show the **binary size**:\n\n 1 B = 1 B = 1 byte\n 1 KiB = 1,024 B = 1,024 bytes\n 1 MiB = 1,024 KiB = 1,048,576 bytes\n 1 GiB = 1,024 MiB = 1,073,741,824 bytes\n 1 TiB = 1,024 GiB = 1,099,511,627,776 bytes\n\nThe reason for using these multiples of 1024 is that drives are actually split up by the computer into parts that are always a multiple of 1024, not 1000.\n\nHard drive manufacturers report GB and TB instead of GiB and TiB because that gives bigger numbers, and people always like bigger numbers. =P\n\n**Note:** Windows Explorer and Mac Finder *say* KB/MB/GB/TB, but they are, indeed, reporting KiB/MiB/GiB/TiB. The convention that KB/MB/GB/TB would refer to multiples of 1000 instead of 1024 was invented by hard drive manufacturers to inflate advertised sizes, and never actually adopted by most software, which still consider KB to mean the same thing as KiB, and to both mean 1024 bytes.",
"There's two different ways of measuring computer memory. One, the \"right\" way, measures them in powers of 1024. The other, simpler way measures them in powers of 1000. \n\nSo 1 TB can mean 1000 GB or it can mean 1024 GB. And so on (1 GB can equal 1024 MB or 1000 MB).\n\nIf you are trying to make your drive look extra attractive to buyers, you want to get to that next threshold, in this case 1TB. But it's a little easier to cram 1000 GB onto the platters than 1024 GB, so you go with the smaller measurement.\n\nSo you create a drive with 1 trillion bytes on it, which by the smaller measurement, means 1TB. But your computer knows the right way to measure bytes, where 1TB is more like 1.1 trillion bytes. \n\nIf you divide 1 trillion by 1024^3 (the \"right\" measurement of GB), you get 931. Thus that \"1TB\" is roughly 930GB measured the right way."
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alt3t9 | how do goats and sheep not walk around in a constant state of concusion with all the headbutting they do? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/alt3t9/eli5_how_do_goats_and_sheep_not_walk_around_in_a/ | {
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"They're brains are pretty small and their bodies pump their heads with lots more blood which cushions against impacts. It's called the bubble wrap effect. They also have very dense, strong bones in their heads. ",
"Cause they're made to. Same way they walk around on their toes all the time and don't get Dancer's Lung (or whatever Dancers get)."
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au785u | the principle behind laplace transform | I know how to perform it, but I still don't understand why doing so would let me solve differential equation | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/au785u/eli5_the_principle_behind_laplace_transform/ | {
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"Imagine you're solving a crossword and you don't know an answer for a certain question about some wild herb that grows in South America. You call your friend who is great at biology, but he only speaks Chinese. So you *translate the question* to Chinese, he thinks a little and gives you the answer in Chinese. Then you *translate the answer back* to English and put it into your crossword.\n\nEdit: spelling.",
"Let's think of Fourier's transformation for a bit. What it does is basically let you look at a function from a different angle. Initially, you look it from the angle of time. You see what value the function \"gives\" at certain points in time. When you use the Fourier transformation, you switch your view and now you see the function from a different perspective, that of frequency. So instead of saying \"at these points in time the function has these values\" you say \"at these specific frequencies the function has that specific amount of energy\". Now, thing is, the Fourier transformation is a more specific case of the Laplace one. In Fourier's case, the frequencies have value only on the imaginary axis, meaning their real part is always zero. In Laplace's transformation, the real value can be different than zero, so you can use Laplace's transformation for function's you can't use Fourier's one.\n\nSo in the end, what you want to do is take yourself from the perspective of time, to the perspective of frequency, where things are easier to calculate. For that you use Fourier's transformation. But since this \"tool\" has its limits as to the cases it can be applied, you use its \"buffed up\" version that can apply to these cases, that tool being Laplace's transformation. \n\n\n*edit: looking at your follow up questions in the comments section, I get the sense that I misunderstood your initial question. In that case disregard my answer.*",
"You can intuitively think of the Laplace Transform as a \"continuous Taylor Series\" of \"continuous generating function\". This is more ELI-in-differential-equations, rather than ELI5. ELI5 explanations are not very tenable to a useful understanding of these things.\n\nIf you have the sequence of numbers 1, 1, 1/2!, 1/3!, 1/4!,... then you can combine them by multiplying them with the sequence of polynomials 1, x, x^(2), x^(3), x^(4),... to get the function \n\n* e^(x) = 1\\*1 + 1\\*x + x^(2)/2! + x^(3)/3! +...\n\nGiven any sequence of number A(0), A(1), A(2), A(3), ... then, as long as things converge, you can make the function\n\n* A^(~)(x) = A(0)\\*1 +A(1)\\*x + A(2)\\*x^(2) + A(3)\\*x^(3) + ...\n\nThis function A^(~)(x) encodes information about the sequence A(n) in its properties. Most obviously, the nth derivative of A^(~)(x) at x=0 is n!A(n). But we can do more. Sequences often satisfy [recurrence relations](_URL_0_), which can manifest as properties of these functions. For instance, the Fibonacci Sequence F(n) is totally defined by\n\n* F(0) = 1\n* F(1) = 1\n* F(n+2) = F(n+1) + F(n) for all n > 1\n\nWe can then consider the function F^(~)(x) = 1 + x + 2x^(2) + 3x^(3) + 5x^(4) + 8x^(5) + ... Using this, we can write the term F(n+2)x^(n+2) as F(n+1)x^(n+2)+F(n)x^(n+2). Playing with these terms a little bit, we can move stuff around and obtain the corresponding relationship with functions:\n\n* (1-x-x^(2))F^(~)(x) = 1\n\nWhich means that we can write the corresponding function for the Fibonacci Sequence as\n\n* F^(~)(x) = 1/(1-x-x^(2))\n\nFrom this, you can take derivatives to extract the actual sequence itself or use the geometric series and some slightly more advanced techniques to extract the [closed form formula for the Fibonacci sequence](_URL_1_) using the Golden ratio. ([See here for more details.](_URL_2_))\n\nIt should be noted that the \"shifting\" operation, going from F(n) to F(n+1) or F(n+2) or whatever, manifests in the function F^(~)(x) as multiplication by x. That is, if G(n)=F(n+1), then F^(~)(x)=xG^(~)(x)+F^(~)(0). This is key to the manipulations above. The operation ^(~) turns this shifting into a concrete algebraic thing.\n\nWhat does x represent for the sequence F(n) and function F^(~)(x)? Who knows. But it kinda acts like a cipher to transcribe information from on thing, F(n), to another thing, F^(~)(x), where different information is more accessible.\n\n\nLaplace transforms are the continuous version of this. Instead of a discrete sequence A(0), A(1), A(2), we have a nice continuous function A(t), where you can plug in any t. Instead of summing over terms like A(n)x^(n) over the variable n, we integrate over terms like A(t)x^(t) over the variable t. This results in a different function in the variable x. \n\nSince we're integrating over A(t)x^(t) with respect to t, Integration-by-Parts says that there should be some kind of really nice relationship between A(t)x^(t) and A'(t)x^(t). The only issue is that doing integration by parts kinda messes up the form of this, as the integrand changes from A'(t)x^(t) to A(t)ln(x)x^(t), which is a little awkward. In order to make this more streamlined, we can replace x with x=e^(s). If we integrate with respect to A(t)e^(st) over the variable t, then integration by parts turns A'(t)e^(st) to sA(t)e^(st), which is really nice. \n\nSo if we denote L[A]\\(s\\) as the integral of A(t)e^(st)dt, then this manifests as L[A']\\(s\\)=sL[A]\\(s\\) (up to a constant). \n\nBut the same way that F^(~)(x) encodes information about the sequence F(n) into a function in the variable x, so does L[A]\\(s\\) re-encodes information about A(t) into the variable s. Particularly, in the same way that F^(~)(x) turns recurrence relations about F(n) into *algebraic* equations in F^(~)(x), so does L[A]\\(s\\) turn *differential equations* about A(t) into *algebraic* equations in L[A]\\(s\\). \n\nWhat does \"s\" mean? It doesn't really matter. And, really, any way to put some visual/physical meaning to it is overly contrived and you lose anything important about Laplace transforms. The important, fundamental things about s and Laplace transforms are that they are a really simple operation, analogous to Taylor series or generating functions, that work with derivatives very nicely through the use of Integration-by-Parts.",
"Transforms a real function/variable to a complex one. f(x) - > F(s), where s is a complex variable. Has lots of applications in science and engineering. \n\nFor example if you do a Laplace Transform on a differential equation it becomes an algebraic equation that's easily solved, then you use a reverse Laplace Transform to get the solution in real (usually time) domain.\n\nIn Electrical Engineering you use Laplace Transforms to transform a system from time domain, where finding a solution is often incredibly hard and requires a lot of messy math (something called convolution), to frequency domain where again the equations become algebraic and simple to solve, then use a reverse transform to get the system solution in time domain.\n\nsource: I'm an EE and they crammed this stuff into my head for 5 years in school.",
"I think an understanding of linear algebra is really useful for understanding the Laplace transform. If you're learning about Laplace transforms, presumably you already know linear algebra, so I'll just proceed with that assumed knowledge.\n\nThe operator d/dx is a linear operator and the linear combination of a bunch of linear operators is also a linear operator. Therefore, linear differential equations can be thought of as applying one giant linear operator to the function y(x) we're trying to solve for and hoping it equals some output. In fact if we note that linear ODEs have a 0th derivative term (a\\_0 \\* y), then we can rearrange the equation to: (giant linear operator) \\* y = -a\\_0 \\* y, or more simply, (giant linear operator) \\* y = y. The solutions for y then are simply the eigenvectors of (giant linear operator), which look like exponential functions.\n\nNow, we could just find the eigenvectors directly, but a more natural way to represent solutions to this problem is to convert to the \"eigendomain\". This is what the Laplace transform does. The way it does this is no different from how you were taught to find the eigen-decomposition of a vector - basically just take the dot product of the vector with each eigenvector. In the case where our eigenvectors are functions instead of discrete vectors, we simply take an inner product (which is a point-wise multiplication integral). In our case, where solutions look like exponentials, we take an integral of f(x) \\* exp(-s \\* x) dx.\n\nThis explanation sweeps a lot under the rug, but I think it gets to the essence of why Laplace transforms work.\n\n & #x200B;\n\nThe ELI5 explanation then looks something like this:\n\nThe Laplace transform allows you to shift your perspective on a problem so that the solutions to the problem are \"axis-aligned\" rather than a complicated combination of things you were initially considering. For example, instead of telling someone how to get to the point (4,4) by first going 4 units in the x direction and 4 units in the y direction, you can rotate the plane 45 degrees CW and just move 4\\*sqrt(2) units in the x direction. ELI18 add-on: the Laplace transform does this rotation, but to a coordinate system where the axes are exponential functions.",
"Not exactly for a five year old, but the transform turns a differential equation into a related algebraic equation.\n\nYour complicated, difficult (or impossible) to solve differential becomes much simpler when you can algebraically solve for the desired variable in \"Laplace space\" then bring the solved version back to \"real space\" using the inverse.",
"The mechanics of it are just hard to understand, and I don't, really, but maybe I can help with the intuition. \n\nComplex numbers are a convenient way to describe things that go in circles or behave periodically, because they \"swing around\" through the real and imaginary components. That turns out to be handy for differential equations, because they are about vibratey things where the repeating stuff is more important than the constant stuff. The \"frequency domain\" describes things in terms of their repeating parts, rather than their constant parts.\n\nFor an analogy, there are simple geometry problems that are kind of tricky in rectangular coordinates but easy in polar coordinates. For example, what happens if you take a point, rotate it around the origin by ten degrees, then mirror it across the origin. In rectangular coordinates, there are a lot of terms to keep track of. In polar coordinates it's dead simple. The problem has some basic polar-ness. And because polar and rectangular coordinates describe the same thing, we can take the problem in rectangular coordinates, convert it to polar, solve it, and convert back to rectangular knowing that the solution is still valid."
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d25c4r | why do some cancers present symptoms early while others don't often present until stage iii or iv? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d25c4r/eli5_why_do_some_cancers_present_symptoms_early/ | {
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"There are no cancers that I can think of that naturally present themselves in early stages. Some cancers are just more naturally accessible and therefore easier to screen. Take basal cell carcinoma (skin) versus ovarian cancer. Some cancers seem to be naturally more aggressive which is largely still a mystery. Even within certain types of cancer, prostate for instance; some can co-exist without causing much harm or can metastasize relatively early.\n\nIn sum if cancers are not being properly screened, then they are probably not going to be found early.",
"It's important to understand every type of cancer is a different disease, even within similar types of cancers there are subtypes that present different mutations or levels of gene expression which effect their behaviour. Therefore the tumour itself can behave differently.\n\nYou also have to consider where the tumour is in the body. The physical location of a tumour could mean it's putting enough pressure on the organ or nearby organs, to disrupt their normal function. If you're lucky a very small tumour growing in the right place could cause symptoms that warrant a screen before it has spread. \n\nBut unfortunately if you pair a fast growing tumour subtype with a location in the body that isn't disrupting normal bodily functions, it can result in tumours that cause no symptoms until they have spread to other areas of the body like your lungs. Where you may present with a bad cough when the original tumor was on your kidney for example.\n\nThis is why diseases like pancreatic cancer are so deadly and result in one of the highest mortality rates for cancers.",
"5-year old level: Because cancer can happen in easily-seen parts of the body (exposed skin) or deep organs that take longer to give symptoms (pancreas). Also, the mass created by the cancer can be slow to grow, or very fast and aggressive.",
"This is common in blood cancers where the symptoms only really start when it is stage 4. My mother in law has mantle cell lymphoma and they didn't find it until her spleen was huge. So now that we have a history we will screen my wife more closely for symptoms that might be indicative of cancer but it isn't smart to sldo that to the population writ large because most symptoms of blood cancers are closer to other terrible diseases that are more common and more immediately deadly.",
"Some body parts are more important than others and so any problems in how they function cause lots of problems. Others don’t cause problems until that body part is almost destroyed. And sometimes in an individual case, a cancer spreads to somewhere easily detected. Also, in some cancers, the early stages are very short so it can go from undetectable to everywhere in a matter of months.",
"Early presenting cancer: vocal cords. You get harsh voice early on. Voice is extremely important for communication, so you notice it early.\n\nLate presenting cancer: lungs. Lungs have a large reserve, meaning you only use about 5% of its total capacity during resting. Also biology of particular lung tumors makes it so that they spread early in the course of disease. When you notice something is wrong, it can be very advanced.",
"a bunch of extra cells in most parts of the body hardly affects how anything in your body works. it's only when the tumor(s) get large that they start causing pain or other symptoms. at that point it's very likely there has been spread to another part of the body"
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2s9x8g | why does the rims on the front wheels of a bus stick out, but the rims on the back wheels cave in? | Here is a good picture to show what I mean.
_URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2s9x8g/eli5why_does_the_rims_on_the_front_wheels_of_a/ | {
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"Have a look at this picture of a front hub\n\n_URL_1_\n\nThe wheel attaches to the stub axle that sticks out to the left. The hub swivels about the two vertical pins which is what allows it to turn and steer the vehicle. \n\nIf the wheel is a long way out along that stub then any forwards/backwards force on it (e.g. from hitting a pothole) will translate into a large turning force on the hub which you'll feel through the steering wheel. Likewise, if the wheel is a long way out on that stub you will find it more difficult to turn the wheels. Think of the stub axle as the handle of a spanner - the longer it is, the more torque is applied for the same force.\n\nHaving the wheel dished like the front wheels of that bus enables the tyre to sit almost directly underneath the vertical pins around which the hub swivels. This means that the wheels are easy to turn with the steering wheel and any forwards/backwards force on the wheels will not translate into a large force on the steering wheel.\n\n\nThe rear wheels are on the other way round because there are double wheels on the rear, the inner one dished inwards and the outer one dished outwards. That way they both clamp together nicely. Like in this picture:\n\n_URL_0_"
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17q2um | why is wall street performing above average, while the economy is performing below average? | Please and thanks! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/17q2um/eli5_why_is_wall_street_performing_above_average/ | {
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"Because the two aren't related to each other except very indirectly.\n\nDo you know what I mean when I say the \"housing market?\" Houses are a *thing,* obviously. That means they're bought and sold. When we talk about all the people who are involved in the process of selling houses (including building them in the first place) and buying houses, we refer to the \"housing market\" collectively.\n\nAny time you're talking about a bunch of people who are all buying and selling the same type of thing, you're talking about a market. We could talk about the \"car market\" if we wanted to — though we don't, because customarily that's called the \"auto industry\" instead. Different words, exact same idea.\n\nWell, the \"stock market\" is just that: It's the set of all the people who are engaged in buying and selling shares of stock.\n\nThe stock market, then, is *just a market,* not meaningfully different from the housing market or the \"car market\" or the avocado market or any other market. It fluctuates based on numerous influences, some external, some purely internal.\n\nIt's entirely possible for the stock market to boom — that is, demand for stocks is very high and sale prices are correspondingly also very high — while the \"economy as a whole\" is in a downcycle. That's essentially what's happening now, though of course it's actually more complex than that. (The economy, while it's not doing as well as we want it to, is doing far better than it has in recent years, so we're actually in what's called a \"recovery boom,\" but that's neither here nor there.)",
"Very simply put, there's two larger trends that have a lot to do with this, all of which are related. \n\nThe first is low interest rates. The central banks of most developing economies have set their interest rates very low, in an effort to increase demand and stimulate their economies. This leads to banks (who get their money, basically, from those central banks) setting a low interest rate for those who deposit money in these banks. \n\nLets say you're somebody with a lot of money sitting around. Keeping it as cash under your mattress is silly; you will inevitably lose money because of inflation, so you're in effect throwing your money away. Because of the low interest rates mentioned above, putting your money into financial institutions isn't going to earn you any appreciable interest, and besides, the financial institutions are still shaken from their collapse just a few years ago (which started the current recession). So putting your money in a bank isn't even that safe, to go along with those low interest rates. \n\nSo where is the safest place to put your money? The market has decided that US government debt is the safest place; the chances of america defaulting on its debt is miniscule, compared with any other country or financial institution on earth. Since US treasury bonds (which are basically an IOU from the government to people who buy its debt) are in such high demand, the US government has been able to issue them for very low interest as well. So government bonds are safe, but they give no return. \n\nSo it isn't profitable to put it in american government bonds. European government bonds are a crapshot (the euro still might collapse, in which case you're going to lose your money, like those who owned greek debt did), and other countries have a combination of low amounts of debt to issue or inflation concerns. Government bonds are, by and large, off the table for anybody trying to make money without taking on unreasonable risk. \n\nSo what do you do with your money? The only real option you have is to invest in private equity, or stocks, even if the overall economic climate means that the companies you own stock in might not be doing so great. So even though the economy isn't doing great, there's a demand for a place for investors to put their money, and a rise in demand turns into a rise in price. \n\nThe other main factor is related. Since the financial crisis, american companies have, by and large, drastically reduced their debt and increased their cash on hand so that they are not in such bad shape if the economy has trouble again. So, they have a lot of cash saved up, and few options of what to do with it. They might spend some on investments to increase productivity, but since the current economic climate isn't looking great, who knows if they are going to need this productivity in the future. For the same reason, they aren't hiring; why hire if the economy goes back down again and you'll just have to fire the new employees. \n\nSo companies are stuck with these cash piles which, as mentioned above, they don't have a lot they can do with. They can pay some back to shareholders (dividends), which increases the incentive to own their stock...which raises the price of the stock. Or they could hold onto it, which makes the company have better financial leverage, which makes it a better option for investment, increasing the share price. \n\nOver the economy as a whole, this makes the stock market perform quite well. "
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3bo9ma | if adrenaline numbs soldiers from feeling pain during war, why don't doctors inject it in patients before surgery? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3bo9ma/eli5_if_adrenaline_numbs_soldiers_from_feeling/ | {
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"Because it increases your heart rate and depending on the surgery, could be life threatening. We have much safer anaesthetics now.",
"It can often cause vomiting; so this would be increasing the possibility of pulmonary aspiration. Not something one would want their patients to deal with in recovery.\n",
"They do. Not only does adrenaline numb pain, it also constricts blood vessels which minimizes bleeding. So, for local things, like removing a cyst, it works well.\n\nHowever, it's a bad idea to circulate significant amounts because it raises heart rate and many other things that would not be good for a general surgery.\n\nAdrenaline, by the way, is epinephrine...same thing. This is the substance used in EpiPens to prevent anaphylactic shock due to an allergic response."
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653trr | what is plant-based meat? | Was reading an article about synthetic meat and it kept mentioning "culture created meat" and "plant-based meat".
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/653trr/eli5_what_is_plantbased_meat/ | {
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"Animal cells take amino acids from plants and turn them into proteins. Then they arrange the proteins into muscle cells and other tissues. When we kill these animals and eat them, we call it meat.\n\nNow instead of using animal cells to make our meat, what if we train bacteria to take amino acids from plants and turn them into proteins too? They already do that, but they turn them into different proteins than the ones animals do. But if we can create bacteria that make the same proteins as an animal, it would be indistinguishable from animal meat. \n\nThis means a few things. Instead of having to raise animals and then kill them to make our meat, we can use bacteria to make our meat for us. This would be way cheaper, better for the environment, and more ethical than killing animals for meat.\n\nIt's theoretically possible, and companies are getting closer and closer to creating it. The great thing is that not only can these bacteria made tissues be used to make food, they can also make replacement organs and tissues for humans."
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5xxjp6 | how is it that we can breathe through t-shirts/face masks, but aren't able to smell or contract anything? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5xxjp6/eli5_how_is_it_that_we_can_breathe_through/ | {
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"What are you talking about? You can certainly smell through a t-shirt, and you can contract diseases too. Actual sterile surgical masks and air filters are not a loose cotton weave like a shirt. They are very tightly woven specialty fabrics.\n\nBut yes, the general theory behind filters is that they are rated to a certain particulate size. Some are only intended to filter large particles (like dust and dirt), and others are much finer and can filter very small particles like bacteria or even viruses. \n\nMany are also treated with chemicals that neutralize biological or chemical agents."
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7q41j5 | how is metal made and formed? how do we create things like steel and iron? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7q41j5/eli5_how_is_metal_made_and_formed_how_do_we/ | {
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"We don't really \"create\" iron; it, and most other metals, exist in nature. You (typically) dig it up out of the ground and run it through a smelter, which melts the metal (allowing you to concentrate and purify it), and (by adding carbon) removes oxygen that has already reacted with the metal.\n\nSteel is different, though, as it's an alloy that mankind sort of accidentally stumbled on; putting in the right amount of carbon results in a metal that is much harder and stronger than just plain old iron. Eventually, people figured out how to reliably make steel in large quantities immediately prior to and during the Industrial Revolution.",
"Metals are found in our earth by mining it. I'll list some of the common metals you see around you and how we obtain them.\n\nAluminum: Aluminum is very abundant on earth, it is mined though pure aluminum is rarely used. There are several grades of aluminum each with an alloying element such as silicon to give it certain mechanical and physical properties. Alloying can be said the same for any other metals. \n\nSteel: Mined as Iron Ore and essentially mixed with carbon. Again with alloying you can create stainless-steel and various grades of steel.\n\nCopper: Mined as a copper ore, they are usually alloyed with zinc to create Brass and tin to create Bronze. ",
"make charcoal _URL_0_\n\nbuild furnace, smelt iron _URL_1_\n\n"
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aqcog9 | how do animals who aren't parented know when they meet their own species? | For example, a Parrotfish knows to school with other Parrotfish, despite never having seen itself or knowing what it is?
edit: Thanks for all the fantastic replies ELI5 =) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aqcog9/eli5_how_do_animals_who_arent_parented_know_when/ | {
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"The ELI5 answer is that they just \"know.\" We lose a lot of intrinsic knowledge when we define things as humans. Parrotfish can distinguish itself in the same way an infant might distinguish a human parent from another primate for example. While the infant might react similarly, there is deep-rooted intrinsic knowledge about what it means for that particular infant to be a human.\n\nInstincts are very powerful devices which, depending on your belief in whether or not living beings are born with prior knowledge, can bridge the gap between the known and unknown. I'm sure a parrotfish would absolutely know to flee from a predator the same way we can recognize that a wolf wants to attack us in the wild.\n\nImagine as a human you come across an animal you've never seen before. I guarantee there is a 9/10 chance you can decide within the first few moments if that animal is going to be a threat to you. In that same vein, parrotfish can recognize familiar fish based on instinct alone.",
"Think of your brain as little switches. Depending on how they are flipped when you connect a battery to one end a motor turns on in the other end.\n\nThe battery is your senses and the motor is muscle actions.\n\nHumans are a bit more complex where imagination is the ability to pretend that the in happened and the out will happen.\n\nNow learning is flipping the switches sometimes randomly until you get the result you want.\n\nInstinct is basically being born with those switches flipped at birth. Humans have a bit of that. Many animals don't even learn, they just come pre programmed.\n\nThe basic human instincts as far as research can tell:\n\n- like those who are similar to you\n- dislike those who are different from you\n\nTypically you'd find babies happy to see someone cause pain to a character who they identify as different than them, but they are upset when a character is hurt who they identify as similar. This was a pretty complex experiment which I would link you to if I wasn't Ina train tunnel typing lol.\n\nWhile we have small set of knowledge and are required to learn the rest like walking. Many animals are born with some, most, or all knowledge they will ever have.",
"Best explain I've heard for instinctive behaviors like you are describing is that the nervous system is optimized on a hardware level to favor certain processes.\n\nAn example you can experience might be simply counting. Some methods are easier not because of training, but because if how our number system works. Counting by 10's is really easy, but not by 7s. You can... But it's a easier because of the process itself is designed around it.\n\nWhat this means is that some tasks are simply easier, more energy efficient. Like the example given if face recognition. The brain is wired for human faces specifically... It's easy. Other faces or patterns don't work quite right (like counting by 7s)\n\nThe brain does trigger face recognition on other items ( faces in clouds) but it's harder, doesn't fit right, it just rare. \n\nBut exceptions happen, it's one possible reason people and animals fixate on objects.",
"To add to the other comments, sometimes they dont. Often birds and ducks will imprint on any species and more domestic animals can easily assume theyre similar to whatever animal raises them. Sometimes cats behave like dogs and treat their maternal dog as a mother figure etc",
"Attraction // prefrence\n\nWhat animals are sexually attracted to is innate.\n\nIf an animal is sexually attracted to something (say a [shoe](_URL_0_)) it will (try to) have sex with it.\n\nIf it sees a member of the opposite sex the attraction part of the brain tells the animal to go screw it.\n\nThe Parrotfish doesn't need to know \"I am a Parrotfish\" or \"Those things over there are Parrotfish\" it only needs to know \"I am comfortable surrounded by those things so I will hang out over there.\" Similar prosses to mating: the only \"thought\" that needs to go through the solitary animal's mind is \"I want to have sex with that thing.\"\n\nPreference is the strongest tool evolution has for influencing behavior.",
"It's probably true that millions of individual animals actually haven't identified themselves with their own species, but they wouldn't have offspring and died out a long time ago.",
"The mechanisms are surely not the same for all species, but one system for which we have some solid data are brood-parasitic brown headed cowbirds. These birds lay their eggs in the nests of other species, and the foster parents provide all the care the young cowbird receives. How, then, does the cowbird know it's a cowbird? \n\n\nWell, it seems cowbirds are born with a strong predisposition to like a particular cowbird call, and when they hear that call the young cowbird seems to learn everything it can about the bird that made it, which leads to them learning cowbird song and learning that they should be flirting with other cowbirds. This is called the \"password hypothesis\" because the young cowbirds' learning systems are activated by hearing the species-specific \"password\" call.",
"Their brains are hardwired to use various sensory input to react a certain way. For parrotfish, vision is likely a key facor. For other animals, smell is important. [Sometimes](_URL_0_) parasites/predators can take advantage of this hardwiring, but in the evolutionary arms race, the species we see still living have managed to deal with it enough to survive.",
"My wife hand-reared a pigeon. This boy was rather confused as to who or what he was for a time. He would try to woo or fight the wild doves, somehow knowing which were male and which were potential mates. He would even confuse some inanimate objects (my wife's furry slippers, for example) as either male competition or he'd even try mate with them. But then one day, he brought home a lady pigeon. His own species (judging by her ring and RFID, she was obviously a racing pigeon). And now we're having to replace the constant production of eggs with dummy eggs. So yeah, after all his confusion, he eventually managed to find a mate and convince her to come live on our patio with him. They generally mate for life. Hard-wired instinct.\n\nThen on the flip side, we have an aviary of budgies, cockatiels and love birds. The Birds were rescues, so homed one by one and the like. Early on, there was just one budgie, 2 cockatiels and a love bird. The budgie decided one of the cockatiels was his soul mate. The cockatiel wasn't very keen, but the budgie persisted. As the flock grew from more rescues, more budgies were introduced to where there are now 5. That first budgie still only has eyes for that cockatiel and the cockatiel seems to have accepted this (even though there are more cockatiels now too) and the two behave like mates, with the budgie feeding the cockatiel as it would a mate.",
"It’s genetic. \n\nAnd we really haven’t even scratched the surface in understanding genetic memory. \n\nThere are lots of “pre-programmed” behaviours in all species and the only sensible explanation is that these are genetic traits. \n\n",
"I've not seen this addressed yet and I'm not a scientist, but I think scent probably plays a big role in this. I'm sure there are many other factors that come into play but I'm hypothesizing based on the fact that many animals have evolved far more keen olfactory senses than we humans possess.\n\nFor example, if by chance the instinctive part of some animal's brain somewhere along the line happens to be attracted to, and mate with individuals that happen to smell like they do, this would theoretically result in some of the most successful individuals in a particular species, evolutionarily/reproductively speaking. This would lead to a trend within the species over time leading to what we have observed. \n\nLike I said I'm not a scientist or expert and just stoned and hypothesizing. Can anyone more qualified confirm or deny this?",
"One possibility would be this: there's a genetical mutation that \"forces\" a fish to keep close to fish with a particular look. Now fish that don't have it stay solitary and more vulnerable to predators. Give it hundred of thousand of years, and this \"knowledge\" is hardcoded in the specie. \n\nSame way humans have sexual urges, those in history that didn't have it didn't reproduce very efficiently. Your parents don't need to teach you to be horny."
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1ijjwu | if all the pixels in my computer are red, green, and blue, how is my screen white? | how does red, blue, and green add up to white? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ijjwu/eli5_if_all_the_pixels_in_my_computer_are_red/ | {
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"Because white light is comprised of the entire visible light spectrum together.\n\nRemember those old experiment in school where you shone a light through a triangular prism and got to see how it defracted into a rainbow of colours? Well, take that process in reverse and you get a spectrum of colours being focused into a single beam of white light.",
"Well, you need to understand how the eye works. In your eye you have these cone-like cells that are sensitive to light of different colors. These cells are either sensitive to red, blue or green. There is no cone for white, just like there's no cone for yellow.\n\nSo, let's understand yellow first. When you want to display yellow on a monitor, you trigger some amount of green and some amount of red. This green and red light arrives at your eyes and is collected by the cone cells that are sensitive to green and red. The cone cells then tell your brain that you're seeing \"some green and some red\" and your brain, ever the marvelous thing, says \"oh yes, that must be yellow, then\" (because on the color spectrum, yellow is between green and red) and tells you you're seeing yellow.\n\nGood?\n\nNow, when you want to show white, you display all three colors. Red, green and blue. All at the same values. When all these colors arrive at your cone cells, all cells are stimulated, and they tell your brain \"we're seeing all the colors\". And your brain thinks \"Well, what is 'all colors at once?' \n\nWhite, of course.\n\nThat's the ELI5 version.\n\nPS: If you want to blow your mind, go look up \"The Mystery of Magenta\" on youtube, because Magenta is created by mixing Red and Blue, but Magenta doesn't exist between Red and Blue on the color spectrum and your brain just *invents* Magenta."
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6ej6c8 | does the human body have the ability to dampen incoming sound on command? | It seems that an unexpected loud noise hurts your ears more than an expected loud noise. Is this because you have the ability to dampen the incoming noise? Or is it the mental awareness of expecting the incoming sound that seems to dampen it? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ej6c8/eli5_does_the_human_body_have_the_ability_to/ | {
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"This is anecdotal but maybe it is useful. I have sensitive ears and when I hear sharp/loud noises, I attenuate my ears in a way that shifts the sounds a tiny bit. I am also able to wiggle my ears and these are the same muscles doing it. I speculate if it changes the ear canal shape, the ear shape, or if it is deeper. \nI think it's the same reason people cringe – to engage the neck muscles to help engage the deeper ear muscles. That said it is mechanical and not neuronal.",
"Yes, we do! Our middle ears have a mechanism to transmit air waves carrying sound into mechanical energy. [Here's a pic](_URL_2_). See that muscle called the [Tensor tympani](_URL_1_)? It tenses up and prevents the bones from vibrating as strongly as they could, thereby dampening the sound. It's a reflex, so it's mostly out of our control. Also, some conditions (eg, damage to the nerve that controls that muscle) have super sensitive hearing because they can't control the tensor tympani. It's called \"[hyperacusis](_URL_0_)\" "
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3oafnu | what do cell phone service providers, like sprint, do with phones from other companies like verizon or at & t | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3oafnu/eli5_what_do_cell_phone_service_providers_like/ | {
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"From what I understand, they would sell them to Asurion, the company that provides insurance for att/tmobile/sprint/verizon...\n\nWhen you turn in the phone, typically it needs to turn on and off, be free of cracks, and have the reactivation lock turned off. \n\nAsurion will refurb the phone and sell it through an insurance claim. "
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d01xw3 | how are credit cards manufactured? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d01xw3/eli5_how_are_credit_cards_manufactured/ | {
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"The card numbers are assigned to banks by the credit card company, in blocks. You’ll notice all Visa cards start with 4, and MC starts with 5, other card companies start with other numbers. Then the next set of numbers is different for every bank. The banks then assign the next set of numbers to each individual account. There are a few numbers used in there as check sums also. \n\nWhen you ask your bank for a card, they pick the next number in their block, and assign it to your account. That info is usually sent off to a third party card printing company to make the actual card, with your name on it, and the card info on the magnetic strip and chip. They mail it to you after it’s printed. \n\nWhy does it take ten days? Banks move slow and want to check and double check everything. In an emergency, they can print out a new card in a couple hours."
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32bs9k | is skipping more efficient than running? if not why does it feel like it is? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/32bs9k/eli5_is_skipping_more_efficient_than_running_if/ | {
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"just a thought, but maybe it is because when skipping the strain on our muscles is much less than when we run, possibly more energy efficient on our bodies? ",
"Trying to google up an answer, end up at a reddit thread asking the same question with little progress _URL_0_",
"Found an [article](_URL_0_). Not much there, but the best I could do in a half-assed attempt to help. ",
"Guessing... but maybe it feels faster/more efficient because you are jumping a little bit and that sensation of gravity pulling you down along with you pushing forward feels efficient in that moment? \n\nUltimately, you are putting more energy upwards than you are while running, making me think it has to be less efficient for moving horizontally.",
"maybe x-post to /r/askscience?",
"Do you skip as fast as you run? If not this isn't a fair comparison. ",
"My guess would be genetic/evolution. When threatened in the wild, or trying to catch a prey, our ancestors ran. Im sure our muscles aren't made for skipping long distances compared to running, and the impact would be significantly higher. But then again, I'm no scientist. Nor have I skipped for an extended amount of time/distance. ",
"Beyond the fact that it requires more coordination than running, i assume skipping everywhere would wear down one specific part of your shoes very quickly.\n\nRegardless, i love the feeling of skipping ",
"Has anyone actually tried skipping for longer than 30 seconds to kind out if it actually takes less energy? ",
"It's not as efficient as running, because we can only store a small amount of energy (created when you \"go down\" while skipping) in our muscles. Since \"lunching\" yourself up in the air cost alot more energy than running, skipping is less efficent. Also, it stresses your ankles alot more. \n\nHowever, there are some \"special\" runningshoes or some attachments in the paralympics that greatly benefit from that \"system\" of movement. \nFor example [this](_URL_0_). \nWhen \"coming down\", the feather bends an stores tons of energy, wich is used for lunching you up again. \n\nRegarding the question, why it feels more efficent, I guess, that it's just because of the really unfamiliar way of movement. While skipping, you spent some additional time in the air, without connection to the ground. This, and the wind blowing in your face, might give you the feeling of moving extreamly fast. Combined with the fact, that you only skipp for fun and never reach the point where you're getting exausted, you might draw some false cost/result relation. ",
"Might be something like you are using your calves and achilles tendons more (in a springing fashion) and thus requiring less work from other muscles, plus the time you spend in the air doing basically no work is greater when skipping. However, that additional use is going to stress/tire the calves and tendons much faster so they could become injured, so probably don't go on long distance skips.",
"Seeing as how people are pretty stumped on this here are my two cents -- Skipping definitely seems to work better when you're rapidly going downhill on a less sure surface (loose gravel, forest floor).\n\nThat comes with a cool story -- I climbed mount fuji a few years back; and on our way back down we realized we didn't have much sunlight left (and should probably try to get to the treeline before that happened) so the three of us skipped! Take two steps, get massive air, two more steps, repeat!\n\nIt was very fast and very fun :)",
"Skipping is sort of like a canter in a horse (a slow gallop). \"In man, running is a much more energy efficient form of locomotion than skipping for the same speeds, while galloping is most energy efficient in quadruped [four legged animal like a horse].\"\n\n\"Skipping seems to be a way to progress from walking fast without breaking into a run. Skipping seems to be an evolution of walking at unnaturally high speeds.\"\n\nBut, in low gravity, skipping may be more efficient. \"astronauts from the Apollo missions favoured a form of skipping over all the other means of getting about on the moon.\"\n\nsource: _URL_0_",
"Running is much more efficient. My best guess to why it doesn't feel as efficient is with skipping you have two feet on the ground instead of one with running; so your energy is spread over two legs instead of one with each movement. You may also have poor running form. It takes a lot of practice to get good form.\n\nProper running form is basically controlled falling. Gravity is used to manage your momentum. You're just moving your feet to keep yourself from falling over. There aren't any unneeded movements. \n\nWith skipping a lot of your energy is used to push up and forward. You skip with two feet on the ground (compared to one foot at a time with running) so you can't use gravity as efficiently as running."
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3h3w17 | why does going 30mph on a speedboat feel so much faster than 30mph in a car? | They're roughly the same size and going the same speed so why does one feel faster than the other? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3h3w17/eli5_why_does_going_30mph_on_a_speedboat_feel_so/ | {
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"It's largely because you're exposed to the outside, and especially the wind. You're not experiencing the speed with more than one sense, rather than just your sight."
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3if7gd | what do people actually do at work when they have no work to do? | Do they honestly continually ask their boss for new projects? Doesn't the boss get annoyed after a while? Do people just surf the web? Wander around Reddit? I've had three different jobs in office settings and I always have significant amounts of spare time. And yes, I assure you, I'm doing my job thoroughly and well. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3if7gd/eli5_what_do_people_actually_do_at_work_when_they/ | {
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"If you have lots of spare time in your job, count yourself lucky that your boss haven't figured out how to squeeze employee for every ounce of \"productivity\". Some corporate office workers have to work OT without pay because they're THAT busy. \n\nTo answer your question: Most people who have spare time on their job will tend to private matters, like reading their favorite webpage (News/Reddit/Blogs/Etc), check their personal emails, go online shopping (This is a big thing with women apparently), secretly texting their spouse/bf/gf/etc. And when the boss isn't around, socialize with fellow colleagues. \n",
"I'm in management. \n\n I make fake work...just so i don't accidentally find real work. \nI will rewrite and update memos that hang in cubicles...waste an hour writing a new memo that isn't incredibly necessary, but could be helpful... Walk around talking to people, but physically look like I'm helping them with an issue so my boss doesn't question what I'm doing up... \nRun a lot...look like you're rushing everywhere, looks like you're on a mission. ",
"Catch my breath. I used to feel guilty about not doing anything given that for many years I've operated at high intensity. Not anymore. I'm very productive and consistently exceed expectations. When you're so mentally exhausted you can't think straight, you're not very effective and the chest pain from the continual deathmarch projects doesn't help much either. So, I take time and take it easy. Work will drop onto my plate in no time. I don't have to look for it. Besides reddit (which I do learn some cool stuff in the technical subreddits), I like to read technical blogs and get a grip on what's coming down the pike. The rest and research prepares me for when once again a big turd drops onto my plate to deal with."
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2mbdhl | what's happening neurologically when you get addicted to a song? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2mbdhl/eli5_whats_happening_neurologically_when_you_get/ | {
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"I am fairly positive you can't get addicted to a song as it has no chemical component that makes it addictive. I know that isn't the answer you want but that's the answer. I do know people can enjoy certain rythemes and sounds and that will make them want to listen to certain songs repeatedly "
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ommfy | what is the purpose of bass? | I've been getting into metal lately, and am wondering about the role of the bass guitar. Even with booster, I can barely distinguish it from the rest of the sound, so I imagine it has to have a purpose beyond contributing another set of sounds to the song. I notice the music seems to have less "punch" when I reduce it, but I still can't really comprehend what the bass guitar is adding. Could someone please enlighten me? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ommfy/what_is_the_purpose_of_bass/ | {
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"I can't speak for metal, but in other genres, bass is used as a bridge between the guitars and the rhythm section that it itself is a part of. Melodically, it is used to highlight the chord of the song in a way that strumming the chord in whatever manner the guitarist chooses cannot.",
"The bass allows you to have a more complex sound with more elements. As you noticed there is a reduction in sound when you drop out the bass in a song. Though it has less of a role to play in the metal that you listen to, there are many genres where it plays a much bigger role.",
"It can fill some odd gaps in the music. Listen to \"Baba O'Riely\" by the Who. Its a great song, but you probably won't notice exactly what the bass is contributing until you take it out.\n\n[Here](_URL_0_) is the bass isolated. You can see that John Entwistle is doing a lot for the song.",
"The two big contributors to the beat of a song are the kick/bass drum in the drum set and the bass guitar. Think of the beat as the heartbeat/skeleton of the song which gives the rest of the instruments the platform to build a melody upon. People usually dance to the tune of the beat and *not* the melody.\n\nYou can only change the intensity of a drum beat, but with the four strings of the bass you can change the intensity, pitch, and effects on the guitar. Its *significantly* more versatile. \n\nCheck out some of the bass covers on [YouTube](_URL_0_) and recognize how the instrument [drives the music along](_URL_1_). (Yes I know it's not metal, but work with me here)",
"There's a lot of great bassists out there, however in most bands that play in any rock-derivative genre (especially in metal), the bass guitar just plays the root of the chord being played. This makes it easier to follow and rounds out the sound a bit to make it sound fuller. In this way it's almost like a melodic extension of the percussion.",
"Listen to \"The Trooper\" by Iron Maiden. That is a prime example of how a bass guitar is normally played and placed in metal music. Most metal recordings are so guitar heavy that it is hard to hear the bass or the floor toms or kick drum(s). I have been playing guitar and bass, mostly metal or really hard rock for the last 30 years. That's just the way it is. \nAnother band to listen to is Tool. They place the bass in the music like the guitar and it is often really hard to tell if it is the bass or the guitar playing some of the parts. Live metal shows will let you hear and feel the bass in the music that you don't get in the recordings. Go see a couple live shows, you will get it.",
"And now to actually explain it like you're five...\n\nDo you know how in art class you color a background and then add art to the background? Well, bass guitars are what add the background in music! Imagine that house you drew the other day with no background- it wouldn't make sense! Therefore bass guitars help music make sense. They also go good with drums and make you feel happy, or sad depending on the song. ",
"It's one of those things that you only really notice when it goes away. \n\nListen to this from 1:05 to 1:20 \n_URL_1_\n\nPAUSE it but leave it open\n\nThen listen to this from 1:05 to 1:30 \n_URL_0_\n\nPause that, then go back to the bass enhanced version. See the differences?\n\nWith bands like Iron Maiden, and definitely the song The Trooper, you can hear the bass very loudly and obviously and it adds a lot. Same goes to some bands like Death and Atheist (off the top of my head).\nBut with most bands, it just adds a layer of thickness and heaviness that you take for granted until the bass is gone. It's there, its necessary, it just isn't always in the spotlight. \nAlso, once you've played in a band with and without a bass player, the difference is really obvious.",
"Like all God's creatures, bass fill an important niches in the global ecosystem. What many people do not realize, though, is that the various types -- striped, white, largemouth, spotted, smallmouth, sea -- are spread across different families, according to Linnean taxonomy. \n\nIn the US, especially in the south, \"bass\" typically means the largemouth bass, or *Micropterus salmoides*. It is the official state fish of Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Florida, and Tennessee (in various subtypes). Obviously, it is a wildly popular gamefish with anglers!\n\nEcologically, largemouth bass are carnivorous and fairly opportunistic. While humans enjoy catching them, mature specimens are usually the apex predator in their environments, so we might say that is their primary purpose.\n\nI hope this was helpful."
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3ldiaq | how is it that the periodic table works out so "perfectly"? | I'm not too bad at chemistry, but one thing I can't wrap my head around is how perfect the periodic table is. How is it that each element that we know is only one more proton than the last? How come it goes in PERFECT order instead of having a few elements with protons not perfectly linear to the periodic table? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ldiaq/eli5_how_is_it_that_the_periodic_table_works_out/ | {
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"You classify by elements by their protons. It goes in \"perfect order\" because you're just counting the number of protons to identify the atom. The number of neutrons and electrons vary though. \nIt's like saying all animals with \"fur/hair\" are mammals. You just use a trait to identify the thing.",
"It all boils down to particle physics, which follows mathematical laws (mostly). Having a jump in the periodic table would mean there is an undiscovered element in the gap that could be created by adding a proton to the next lower element, and thus the gap would be filled in again. ",
"It's a very interesting topic actually. Originally the periodic table was developed based purely on the behaviours of the particles. Grouping particles that have similar behaviours together.\n\nIt turned out that this way of grouping also made sense in terms of the atoms structure. This was discovered later because when the periodic table was first composed the was no way of figuring out the structure. It's also worth noting that based on the groupings the periodic table predicted atoms that hadn't been discovered yet and what properties they must have to fill in the gaps.\n\nThe why is pretty simple. The structure of the atom, the number of electrons, protons and neurons is the only thing that determines how the atom behaves. So atoms with very similar structures behave in very similar ways. "
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d9dz8a | i keep seeing studies that say vegetables have less nutrients compared to those 100 years ago. does this apply to organic vegetables? is there a way to ensure you’re getting nutritious food? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/d9dz8a/eli5_i_keep_seeing_studies_that_say_vegetables/ | {
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"Yes, it also applies to organic... organic just means whether chemicals were used as pesticides or not. Many of today’s produce was selectively bred for longer shelf life, heartiness when being shipped long distances, often at expense of taste and nutrients.",
"A giant red tomato, has been force cultivated to be that way, and often the genes that handle size and color are in opposition to taste and nutrition.\n\nHeirloom tomatoes are a better choice.",
"Can you link to one of the mentioned studies?\nThis sounds interesting!",
"Organic label is largely marketing and refers to pesticides used not any difference in the produce. As others have mentioned, modern produce has been bred for appearance not nutritional. \n\nIf you eat animal products and veggies your fine as eating both is the closest you can get to nutritional complete and balanced. However if you are vegan or largely vegetarian that requires more work and you must do research to ensure you are eating a sufficient variety and quantity to get all your nutritional needs. This is especially important in youth and children as vegetarian diets are often too restrictive for them.\n\nTLDR if your worried about nutrition just add chicken, or fish.",
"There is some evidence pointing towards higher carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere causing plants to grow faster, thereby increasing the amount of sugars relative to other nutrients. There are some arguing that this is also linked to the global obesity epidemic. \n\nThis would mean that vegetables and fruits overall are somewhat less nutritious today, irrespective of how they are grown. But it's not different enough to cause deficiencies as long as you still eat fruits and veggies.\n\nI saw a good video about this by Veritasium:\n_URL_0_",
"It probably isn't something you need to worry about. The food we eat generally has far more nutrition than we actually need. If you are not nutrient deficient, taking in more does nothing for you. Take vitamin C for example, once you consume enough to not have scurvy, there is no benefit to having more, you will not be healthier or stronger, you just still will not have scurvy (it also does not prevent colds or any illness, except scurvy). The amount you actually need is tiny. One lemon probably has enough vitamin C to keep someone from getting scurvy for weeks or even months. Selective breeding might make the lemon have slightly less vitamin C, but it costs many, many times less. You are probably better off if you can afford 10x as many lemons than if lemons had 10% more vitamin C.\n\nIts good to eat lots of vegetables of course, but mostly for the fiber, not so much the vitamins. It's very easy to get enough vitamins. Even people that mostly eat junk food aren't usually vitamin deficient unless they eat nothing but white bread and chicken. They get fat from the calories, but they also get enough vitamins.",
"Some many people in this thread are sold on marketing term of organic. Go to OMRI's site and see how many pesticides, insecticide, fungicide, etc you can use. Organic bans human synthesized things in the production. That is why if you use non organic hay in your cow production, your cow is non organic. It is built on trust.\n\nAlso I assume you are referring to this study:\n_URL_0_\n\nYes it is true. No it doesn't matter. You have more access to vegetables than 100 years ago. Our food has less nutrition because we encourage fast growing food in nutrition deprived soil that needs to look pretty and large in size. Because that is how you can pay for tractors and other farming equipment."
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2ar536 | why do some people like to take books or magazines to read in the bathroom? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ar536/eli5_why_do_some_people_like_to_take_books_or/ | {
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"If you're gonna be sitting there for a while, you may as well be entertained.",
"Because they don't have reddit on their phones."
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80p301 | why does the adhesive inside my nasal strip packaging light up purple in the dark? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/80p301/eli5_why_does_the_adhesive_inside_my_nasal_strip/ | {
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"This is called triboluminescence. Light is generated through the breaking of chemical bonds in a material when it is pulled apart, crushed, or rubbed. As i'm understanding it, when you're pulling the packaging apart you are exciting the electrons in the adhesive. These excited electrons want to get back to their normal state so they release the extra energy as light."
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aeen8g | different paper sizes | I just recently starting working for a printing company that sells all kinds of printers and toners, and occasionally different paper sizes. I’m used to the 8.5” x 11” which is standard, and the 8.5” x 14” which my lawyers use a lot. I’m learning that there are series of paper sizes from A to C, with a drastic change in size as you go up. Could someone please explain the practical applications for paper going up to these large sizes? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aeen8g/eli5_different_paper_sizes/ | {
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"A0 is 841 x 1189 mm. Every other number up is just half of previous one, so A1 is 594 × 841 mm, A2 is 420 × 594 mm etc, so when you fold A0 in half, you get 2 A1's, when you fold that one in half, you have 2 A2's... A4, standard widely used size is for example 210 × 297 mm."
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1wubok | why "can't" you lie when you're under oath? what would happen if you do, and how would anyone ever find out? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1wubok/eli5_why_cant_you_lie_when_youre_under_oath_what/ | {
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"it's illegal to lie under oath, thus committing another crime and potentially extending your time in prison",
"You can lie under oath and you may not be caught. If you do it is a crime and you can be jailed for it.",
"If you mean in court, you can't lie because it's a felony. Well, you *can* lie, but you shouldn't. If it's found you willfully told something untrue, you can be charged with a whole slew of things, including perjury, obstruction of Justice, contempt, falsifying information, and slander. ",
"If you lie under oath, you are committing an additional crime of perjury (a felony). If you are caught in that lie, you face indictment for that crime. The punishment for perjury varies depending on the context. Lie on your tax returns, that's up to 3 years in prison; lie in federal court, up to 5 years. If you give false testimony in California, and it leads to a death sentence for someone, that perjury is a capital crime and carries the death penalty.",
"Generally, states and the federal government have laws criminalizing perjury, which is defined as knowingly making a false statement under oath as to a material issue. (There are also laws against \"false swearing\" which cover non-material sworn lies.) These laws can be felonies or misdemeanors, so you're potentially facing jail/prison or other penalties if you're convicted.\n\nHow do investigators find anything out? They investigate; witnesses talk; evidence is uncovered. Same way they find out you broke any laws.",
"Because your post isn't asking a simplified conceptual explanation, but rather for an answer, its been removed. \n\nYou should try /r/answers, /r/askreddit or even one of the more specialized answers subreddits like /r/askhistorians, /r/askscience or others too numerous and varied to mention. \n\nRest assured this doesn't make your question *bad*, it just makes it more appropriate for another subreddit. Good luck! ",
"Lying under oath is perjury. It could be discovered in a lot of ways. Previous statements you made that contradict you testimony, for example, or the testimony of someone else. If you're caught then you could be charged with perjury and you'd be put on trial. In which case you should probably not take the witness.",
"Technically anyone can lie if they so choose, but if any evidence can prove they are lying and that lie directly influences the outcome of the trial they can be charged with perjury. In order to convict a person of perjury the courts would have to prove that the person willfully and intentionally misled the court and that lie was so vital to the proceedings that it effected (or would effect) the jury's verdict, it is a tricky thing to prove.\n\nTaking an oath in reality does not compel people to give truthful statements but the whole justice system depends on credibility of testimony. The very essence of a fair trial is reliant on the jury having the most accurate unbiased facts with which to decide guilt or innocence on. So the jury can hopefully not be putting bitches away when they ain't done it. From what I understand perjury is rarely prosecuted, however it is a felony charge and could result in prison time. "
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97kngo | the method to the madness of country codes (+1, +44, +358 etc). what's the actual pattern, if any? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/97kngo/eli5_the_method_to_the_madness_of_country_codes_1/ | {
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"There was a bit of politics to the pattern. 1 for the USA down to 7 for the USSR at the time with other areas being given intermediate numbers. Africa is 2, Europe is 3 and 4, South America is 5, Australia is 6 and China is 8.\n\nIndividual countries within those are split further. They're normally given a smaller number based on the size of the country. USA's country code is 1 for example, UK is 44, and Iceland is 354. \n\nThis is because there was an agreement to try and keep international telephone numbers to eleven digits or less, so the smaller a country is, the fewer digits it needs left in order to be able to dial every possible number in that country, including all the local regional and area codes. So the bigger countries need more spare digits, hence the USA having just 1. \n\nEverything sort of fit over the years around that one concept. ",
"First, the codes are prefix codes, which means that when you're receiving the digits one at a time, you always know whether the code is finished or if there are more to come. This was important for older telephone switches where they made circuits as they went along. It introduces a constraint, though, that any code eliminates any longer codes that have that code as a prefix.\n\nSecond, country codes can only be three digits long.\n\nNow, why do countries have the ones they have?\n\nWhen the system was being set up, the US and its neighbors (which have a regional telephone numbering system: the North American Numbering Plan) had an integrated system that was by far the most extensive telephone network in the world. Plus, the US was a world superpower and had basically invented telephone networks. So North America got +1. That eliminates all other country codes that start with 1.\n\nNext, they allocated the first digit by continent. Africa got 2, Europe got 3 and 4, South America got 5, and Asia got 6 through 9. Australia and Oceania had to tag along with Southeast Asia under 6.\n\nFinally, they had to allocate codes. Countries with lots of internal phone numbers (which basically means countries that were rich in the 1960s) got two-digit codes, other countries got three-digit codes. Thus, the UK got +44 and East Germany got +37, whereas Iceland got +354 and Ireland got +353. Also, the Soviet Union got +7 all to itself, because it was also a superpower and it was the 1960s.\n\nThen over time, things shifted as the world changed. The Soviet Union broke up, and now Russia and Kazakhstan share +7, with all the other former Soviet republics getting new codes. Yugoslavia (formerly +38) broke up into a bunch of countries, so +38 went away and codes like +381 (Serbia), +385 (Croatia), and +387 (Bosnia and Herzegovina) were allocated instead. West and East Germany reunited, so East Germany's +37 was retired and unified Germany inherited West Germany's +49. And so forth.\n\nNowadays they have a rule that nobody can be assigned a new two-digit code, so every new code is a three-digit one.",
"The Method is:\n\nA) North America gets to keep its highly organized system\n\nB) Europe gets to keep its disorganized system\n\nC) The Soviet Union demanded equal footing to North America\n\nD) The rest of the world gets the leftovers.\n\nOriginally, you needed to contact on operator to connect you to another telephone bank. The AT & T devised a numbering system for those central banks that was based on direct-dialing by rotary phone. It used the number \"1\" to start (because it is 1 tick on the rotary phone and is therefore quicker to dial) then a 3 digit area code (ZYZ, where Z can only be 2-9 and Y can only be 0-1). Codes with lower numbers were shorter to dial and were given to larger metropolitan areas (212 to NY,213 to LA, 312 to Chicago, etc). Areas reachable through AT & T's network included Canada, most of the Caribbean, and parts of Mexico. They were all assigned numbers by the same system.\n\nEuropeans saw this system and wanted to emulate it. Because each country had its own numbering plan, they came up with the need for 2-digit country codes. Codes were assigned roughly in the order they were requested. To avoid confusion with the US system (which they anticipated connecting to).\n\n+20 - Egypt\n+21-28 - Reserved for African nations/colonies\n+29X - European possessions in the Atlantic \n+30 - Greece\n+31 - Netherlands\n+32 - Belgium\n+33 - France\n+34 - Spain\n+35X - Countries with small populations\n+36 - Hungary\n+37 - East Germany (now +37X for Eastern European countries)\n+38 - Yugoslavia (now +38X for Southeastern European countries)\n+39 - Italy\n+40 - Romania\n+41 - Switzerland\n+42 - Czechoslovakia (now +42X for Central European countries)\n+43 - Austria\n+44 - UK\n+45 - Denmark\n+46 - Sweden\n+47 - Norway\n+48 - Poland\n+49 - West Germany (Now Germany)\n\nRecognizing the need for International Direct Dialing, the governments of the world got together and zoned the planet.\n\nZone 1 - North America\nZone 2 - Atlantic/Africa\nZone 3-4 - Europe\nZone 5 - South America\nZone 6 - Oceania\nZone 7 - USSR\nZone 8 - East Asia\nZone 9 - Rest of Asia\n\nThey also decided that with the exception of the USSR which wanted a single digit like North America, country codes would be 2 or 3 digits. They later decided to make all new ones 3 digits.\n\nIn most of the world you must \"dial out\" to get to the IDD by dialing \"00\" but in North America you must dial \"011\" to access IDD. This has been replaced, increasingly with the use of the + symbol for mobile phones.\n"
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oqcnj | why can us celebrities openly admit drug abuse and suffer virtually no consequences? | I'm talking about the likes of Lindsey Lohan, Amy Winehouse, Hunter S. Thompson, etc. They are known drug abusers, and what's more, they don't even try to keep it a secret. In a country where you can be locked away in a slammer for years for possession, it seems very unfair and incongruous to see that the same standard is not applied to famous persons. Usually, the worst that they get is getting forced into rehab. Is it the privilege of their fame? Money? Influence? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/oqcnj/eli5_why_can_us_celebrities_openly_admit_drug/ | {
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"Like you're not five: Privilege of their fame, money, and influence, but I think you knew that before posting.\n\nLike you're five: Those people make other people money so sending them to jail would make lots of people lose money. And that makes them upset.",
"Mainly because of how difficult and time consuming it would be to arrest someone just for saying they do something illegal. Rich people are more likely to hire lawyers to drag the police station through court and stuff, and you get a lot of bad publicity, so its not worth it at all.",
"Admission is not possession. You can walk up to any police officer in the country RIGHT NOW and tell them that you just smoked an entire bowl. Yes you may get detained and searched, maybe a tiny chance that they could get a search warrant from a judge just based on your statement and your house may get tossed, but you won't spend a minute in jail. \n\nAlso, money. Money buys good attornies that know how to stall out the legal system(lindsey lohan). Although, chances are ms. firecrotch will be doing some jail time for probation violation before long",
"Like you're 5: The cops have to know you did something wrong before they can accuse you of doing something wrong. When your mom tells you quit feeding your beans to the dog, she won't punish you for it until she sees the dog sitting under your chair at the dinner table and green beans on the floor. But if you tell your mom you are feeding your beans to the dog, she is going to look under the table. \n\nLike you are an adult: The cops got to have probable cause in order to make an arrest. Hunter S. Thompson can write books about how fucked up he got in Vegas, but that does not give the cops probable cause to search his hotel room the next time he is in Sin City. He was a fairly smart guy and knew not to make his dope easy to find. \n\nOTOH: Willie Nelson has gotten his tour bus searched. Not because he said there was pot on the bus, but because Toby Kieth sad there was, and that gave the cops probable cause to stop and search the bus that night. \n\nRon White got arrested for possession of marijuana. The reason being is that he used to state in his act that he carried marijuana on him when he flew, and that is why he uses private jets. The cops had probable cause to believe that marijuana was on the jet, and searched it. ",
"Because it is [not a crime](_URL_0_) to be an addict and celebrities are usually rich and can afford really good lawyers if they get caught with drugs.",
"Because money.\n\nA little more seriously, you seem to have two questions. Why can celebrities *talk* about doing drugs and why can celebrities *get caught with/doing* drugs and in both cases still get lighter penalties than a non-celebrity.\n\nThe first one is because saying you've done a crime isn't evidence that you actually did do the crime. If you're talking about a celebrity that is an artist of some sort, they're able to talk about doing drugs because they can claim what they're doing \"is just art\". So when a guy like Jay-Z talks about selling crack when he was younger, he doesn't get in trouble because he has artistic freedom to talk about doing those things without getting in trouble for it.\n\nIf you're asking why celebrities can get caught with/under the influence of drugs and get off with light sentences then the answer is more \"because money\". A celebrity can hire an extremely competent lawyer who can devote enough time to the case as necessary to get them off with community service or a reduced sentence.",
"Because admitting to using drugs is not the same as having them. I could admit to murder and probably get arrested, but unless they link me to a murder then they have nothing to charge me with.",
"Amy Winehouse is British, isn't she?",
"Hunter suffers no consequences and doesn't need to keep it a secret, because he's dead.",
"Considering two of the three celebrities you listed as examples are dead, you tell *me* what the consequences were.",
"From a legal perspective rather than a sociological perspective (IAAAL(I am almost a lawyer)). \n\nYou have to be caught with something on you. The law does not punish a person's status--only their actions or their failures to act. A person can be a drug addict, but simply being a drug addict is not enough to be imprisoned. Likewise, a person who is not a drug addict may be imprisoned for knowingly possessing an illicit substance even though they never intend to use it. \n\nSo, it is okay to talk openly about being a drug addict. You have to get caught with the substance on you. The law will not punish your \"addict\" status. Of course, it seems like if these people speak so openly about it, it will become more likely that they will be searched for drugs and then caught. This leads to a \"probable cause\" analysis which I will omit. \n\nAlso, as a person who has worked in the legal system for a couple of years, MOST small time drug abusers who are not dealing get off the hook entirely (regardless of whether they are poor or rich or have hired the most expensive lawyer or are using the services of the public defender). You really only will actually get jail time if you are (1) dealing, (2) have a record, (3) committed a violent act in conjunction with taking or selling the drugs. If someone has gotten \"years for possession\" its usually because they also did something else like deal drugs. Or, they could have just had a bad turn in federal court (see below). State court judges, for the most part, are willing to work with you and let you off with supervision or a short term of probation. Most of the judges I have worked with think of handling petty drug offenses as a waste of their time. They would rather spend their time handling actual criminals and working on their enormous civil backlog. Also, what most people miss is the fact that the State does NOT really want to lock up non-violent criminals or even expend too much time on their cases because they have to pay the public defender and the prosecutor. It is a waste of time and resources and the state would really rather put those resources elsewhere. To the person below who said something like \"The government wins\" when it can look up petty offenders. It does not. The only people who \"win\" are the legislators who like looking tough on crime. The judiciary normally wants to give the minimum possible sentence. \n\nIn my jurisdiction most small time drug offenders will get 12 months \"qualified probation.\" Qualified probation is available to first time offenders, typically comes with some community service requirement, and then is expungeable after a few years. Also, I am talking about state court here, which tends to be much more lenient than federal court. The feds punish drug crime much more severely, but very little drug crime actually gets prosecuted in federal court and federal court judges are normally pissed when they have to take small time possession cases. Why is this? Well, the federal courts are beholden to the laws of the U.S. Congress which went through a long spurt of \"being tough on crime\" in the 1980s and 1990s. These laws ramped up the penalties for crimes ranging from possession to arson to help get the senators and representatives who drafted and voted on them reelected. And, as to why federal court judges hate it? It takes away from what they actually need to do (diversity cases and constitutional cases) and fills up their dockets with what the states are best equipped to handle. \n\nHmmmm . . . looks like I might have given a little to much information, but I think the answer is often a lot more broad than expected. \n\nTL;DR: Law does not punish status. Most petty drug offenders actually receive little to no time. The judiciary actually tries to let people off who are not dealers and are not violent. None of the celebrities listed were violent and none, to my knowledge, were ever charged in U.S. Fed Court which is beholden to the stricter laws of the U.S. Code rather than state drug laws. ",
"Stuff that people say doesnt count for shit unless its a police statement or under oath in court. Thats why.",
"The worst offender of this is Pete Doherty. My god, that man has been before magistrates more times than I've had hot dinners. He has had jail time, but really, it took its time coming and he was forever being caught in possession of some drug or other. ",
"[The black ones do](_URL_0_)",
"I liked Hunter Thompson's writing... just putting it out there for no reason at all. ",
"What about some people like snoopdog, cat williams or wiz khalifa how smoke weed on live TV? how can they get away with it when there is video evidence of the possessing and using illegal substances?",
"The police need probable cause, in any sort of case, to make an arrest. Someone admitting to drug use doesn't constitute probable cause. ",
"Ok Wiz Khalifa blatantly [possesses weed in music videos](_URL_0_). You can also see him smoking at 3:12 in that same video. I've always wondered how he of all people doesn't get into trouble. Can someone please explain this to me?",
"I was wondering this too because you have some rappers (Wiz Khalifa for instance) who has videos upon videos of him smoking trees all over the internet. The drugs mentioned by OP are obviously more dangerous, but still it's the same concept",
"Because in a free country you are not criminally liable for statements you make or that other people make about you. Celebrities are subject to the same criminal sanctions as others when they are caught actually committing the illegal act. Just look how many celebrity mugshots there are from arrests.",
"They tried to take Amy Winehouse to rehab, but she said, \"No, I would prefer to live with my auntie and uncle in Bel Air.\"",
"Pretty sure this'll just be overlooked or downvoted, but is anybody else annoyed with the questions becoming popular on this sub? I thought the purpose was to explain complex ideas in a simple way, but lately all I've been seeing as top posts are questions like these that, if anything, belong in AskReddit.",
"no consequences for Amy Winehouse?\n\nShe's dead, bro.",
"I'm shooting heroin into my eyeballs right now (just because someone says something, doesn't mean it's true).",
"Bill Maher talks about how he smokes pot just about every episode of Real Time. It's risky in a way, but it just depends on how much LAPD wants to get a warrant to bust him for it. Remember, a lot of cops--perhaps most cops, especially in urban areas--are fucking over the War on Drugs. They're given the shit end of the stick and, many of them, are *tired* of busting people for weed, because at the very least that's paperwork they don't want to do, and more importantly because the cops don't see the harm in smoking up. Because surprise surprise! A lot of cops unwind at the end of the day with a joint themselves. \n\nThe really draconian cops and judges are the rednecks in rural areas, mostly.",
" > the worst that they get is getting forced into rehab\n\nMany celebrities live in Southern California. In California, there's laws that say first offenders must be offered rehab as an alternative to jail."
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2oga65 | what are "daddy issues"? and how do they relate to your openness to sex? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oga65/eli5_what_are_daddy_issues_and_how_do_they_relate/ | {
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"It's not always openness to sex first off. When you are born your mind is blank and takes in information and copies it. This comes in forms of imitation. So when you are told you act like your parent it is just something that you have copied into your brain that made it's way to the surface of your personality(also can be genetic but that's a completely different discussion). This is also where we take a imprint for what mates to look for. Your first love is usually the first opposite sex you meet and spend time with, your mother or father. whether or not you end up dirty dancing with the opposite sex doesn't have to do with your love for them. So usually boys marry people similar to their mothers, and girls to their fathers. Again usually. So when \"daddy issues\" come into play is when one of those areas is broken examples: never met the father, father abuse, and so on. There is nothing to imprint from in that area, or bad imprints from that area. Now let me clarify: THIS IS NOT THE SAME WITH EVERY CASE, THE BRAIN IS CRAZY COOL AT ADAPTING AND SOMETIMES PEOPLE TURN OUT TOTALLY FINE IF YOU ARE ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE THEN CONGRATS! The openness to sex is just a stereotype, sometimes it's the exact opposite. It comes from wanting to please the other sex to get them to take care of you such as a father is suppose to. Some stereotypes for \"daddy issue\" people are the ones that sometimes date much much older rich \"father figures\" they are open to the vertical tango but they are well taken care of. \n\nAgain not all cases are the same so please don't burn me at the stake I am just putting in my knowledge.",
"Never had affection from their fathers so they seek it out, mostly in excess.",
"I'm not certain that this (perfectly) relates to \"daddy issues\" but, there is some evidence to suggest that when a woman has lived through some form of sexual abuse or rape, she has a tendency to become more promiscuous.\n\nAs far as I can remember, this has to do with a sort of exaggerated response to having one's control over one's sexuality being taken away and in response, the person might have a lot of sex, so as to assert his or her own control over sex rather than having it forcibly taken, as before. \n\n",
"My understanding is \"daddy issues\" mean a form of projection where a girl (or guy, supposedly) projects insecurities from whatever they lacked during their childhood on to you. Meaning that for example, if a person's father was rarely home, often out drinking and womanizing, a person could project that image of a person on to their SO, and become jealous and insecure, and make irrational accusations because that's what they've come to expect from male figures in their life.\n\nOpenness to sex? I think it can relate to any aspect of a relationship, so you'd have to look at specific circumstances to address it. A lot of girls with \"daddy issues\" love sex, but are crazy about some aspects of relationships.\n\nTLDR: Feeling abandoned by their father makes them afraid of, and expect being abandoned by their SO",
"\"Daddy issue\" are an everyman's term for an idea that psychoanalysts Freud and Jung discussed.\n\nFreud talked about an Oedipus complex (something lots of people have heard something about). It was his idea that children start off loving their mom (AKA the milk and hugs machine) when they're young, but as they grow up they start to notice mom spending less and less time with them. Why? Because Dad's always in the @#$%ing way! That's why! Freud's Oedipus complex is about how boys and girls start to realize this in different ways. Boys notice they still have a penis and are afraid daddy will cut it off, while girls think they've already been castrated and they mostly sit in the corner and cry. (Also, failure to go through this process gracefully is the source of psychological problems like homosexuality)\n\nJung added on Freud by talking about an [Electra Complex](_URL_0_) for girls. The idea here is that when girls realize they've been castrated, they experience *Penis Envy* which makes them want to get Daddy's penis, or to have a child which becomes the *penis substitute*. They compete with their moms for Daddy's sexual attention, and then later transfer this emotion onto men they meet later in life.\n\nObviously these ideas are pretty problematic, HIGHLY lacking scientific and empirical basis, and just kinda fucked up.\n\nStill, the idea lives on in the popular imagination in ideas like a girl with \"daddy issues\". If a girl is promiscuous, it's not about her being confident or committed to exploring her sexuality (or maybe compensating for things she doesn't feel very confident about), IT'S THE ELECTRA COMPLEX!\nIf a girl in a relationship acts in a paranoid or manipulative way to her SO, it's not because she has a fear of abandonment from some sort of past behavior (or that she's maybe a shitty person), IT'S THE ELECTRA COMPLEX!\n\nI think it's a problem, and so my 5 year old son, I think you should avoid using terms like \"daddy issues\". At very least you should find a better term that distinguishes girls who like to sleep with you and are confident in bed from those who read your text messages when you're not looking. You'll be much happier.\n\n(Also son, if you like boys it's not because I threatened to cut your dick off, it's because that's a totally natural way to feel and your mother and I will support you always.)",
"\"Daddy issues\" is a pejorative for a lot of social, psychological or behavioral issues that may OR MAY NOT stem from an unhealthy relationship with one's father. It's usually used to marginalize issues women are having, though to be honest men are perfectly capable of having \"daddy issues\" too. \"Mommy issues\" are also a thing.\n\nWhat causes \"daddy issues\" covers a wide swath...ranging from psychological issues that were present from the get-go that meant they would have daddy issues no matter what, emotional and social abandonment (not really being very present in the kid's life), all forms of abuse, physical separation (due to divorce, incarceration or whatever), or even manipulation (like in a divorce where a mother tries to convince the kid that daddy is evil because she's pissed). \n\nThe outcomes cover a wide swath as well. Major problems with home life as a child can result in all sorts of personality, depressive, and other disorders, and honestly dealing with these issues in adulthood can be very difficult. Having an argument is tough...having an argument with somebody with a personality disorder can be a minefield.\n\nIt should be noted that not everybody who experiences childhood trauma will have major problems with interpersonal functioning (they may have some issues...but the kind of stuff where calling it \"daddy issues\" makes you look like the one who has the problem). Also, somebody who had a perfectly healthy relationship with both parents can still turn out a little underdone, and have issues that may be mislabeled \"daddy issues\" by the ignorant.\n\ntl;dr: \"Daddy issues\" is a pejorative term for a myriad of psychological issues. People use this term because it's easier to distance oneself from these kinds of issues than it is to actually try to do something about it.",
"A woman who's never had a positive male role model in her life might exhibit dysfunction in her relations to male partners. This includes seeking out sex and relationships in excess in order to prove to themselves that they are lovable, desiring a man who can \"put her in her place\" aka a figure of authority instead of a partner in a relationship, and having an overall negative view of men as a projection of her experiences with her father.",
"How do daddy issues affect males? I mean, if it is a big thing for females, it would be natural that they are a big thing for mes as well.",
"It means nothing. 'daddy issues' and 'mommy issues' are just made up babble. What they 'mean' depends entirely on the context of when it's said. Sometimes it means someone who the speaker believes didn't get enough attention, sometimes too much. Sometimes it means neither and the speaker is just being a jerk. Like in the case of my overhearing a guy tell a friend that some girl must have 'daddy issues' cause she didn't fall for his lame pickup lines."
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9nqbmd | why everybody cares so much about kanye west and his political views. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9nqbmd/eli5_why_everybody_cares_so_much_about_kanye_west/ | {
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"He is a very high profile star with a wide fan base. That and his political views are exactly opposite of what you think such a man would have. \n\n"
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202849 | how steve irwin was stabbed by the stingray which killed him | Having seen and swam with rays, I am having a hard time visualizing how he was killed. His cameraman describes the event as "all of a sudden the stingray propped on its front and started stabbing Steve with his tail".
Even a crappy paint drawing would help! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/202849/eli5_how_steve_irwin_was_stabbed_by_the_stingray/ | {
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"Stingrays whip their tails either over their backs or to the sides to put their barbs to use. \"Propped on its front\" probably refers to putting its nose down for better reach/angle with it's tail. \n\nHere's a good video to show what happens.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nThe stingray puts its nose down into the sand and then whips its tail up and jabs at the diver with its barb.\n\nEdit: Fixed. Bah.\nEdit: DOUBLE FIXED."
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4zxtt4 | i pay a monthly fee for cable tv. why are there commercial advertisements, and, more importantly, why are movies censored for language? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4zxtt4/eli5_i_pay_a_monthly_fee_for_cable_tv_why_are/ | {
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"The advertisement is to pay to make the expensive original content, or to cover the costs of buying the rights to air syndicated old shows.\n\nThe censorship is for different reasons, usually a hold over from a long ago passed law/regulation back when people cared more about that kind of stuff. ",
"You may a monthly fee for the cable company to hook you up to their data-distribution network. Ads exist to pay for individual programs. And movies are censored because the channel that broadcasts them want to censor them. If it's not being broadcast over the air, they aren't *required* to censor them, but may choose to do to to maximize the size of their audience.\n\nIf you want an analogy to the \"paying for cable\" vs \"ads\" thing, it's like the fact that you have to pay for an Internet connection, but you still also have to pay for things like some music streaming services or online game subscriptions."
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6yw4bg | why do we have to pay to freeze our credit? | Why do we have to pay each of the three credit reporting companies to stop sharing our personal information? Considering that we never consented to them collecting our information in the first place, and the only way we can get them to stop sharing it is to pay them, how is that not extortion?
On a similar note, does that mean other types of data aggregation companies like Intelius could start making us pay to opt out of them sharing our information? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6yw4bg/eli5_why_do_we_have_to_pay_to_freeze_our_credit/ | {
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" > Considering that we never consented to them collecting our information in the first place, and the only way we can get them to stop sharing it is to pay them, how is that not extortion?\n\nYou did consent to them collecting it. Inside of that dense packet of information that you agreed to when you signed up for your credit card, apartment, utility, etc. there was a paragraph saying that your information would be shared with the credit monitoring agencies (Equifax, Experian and/or TransUnion). \n\n**Edit**: It is for that same reason that it isn't extortion. Extortion requires threats or intimidation by the extorting party. In this case, you agreed for them to collect and house your information and distribute it to people who request it. They offer a service where they can temporarily stop doing that, but charging you to stop doing something that you agreed they could do isn't a threat.\n\nAs for why you pay, well, that is a service that they offer that they feel they can charge you for.",
"You consented when you gave your information to the credit card companies. The credit reporting agencies has a relationship with the credit issuing companies, not with you.\n"
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3ahesi | what would happen if my tires were filled entirely with water, rather than air? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ahesi/eli5_what_would_happen_if_my_tires_were_filled/ | {
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"You would have less traction, as the water would not compress, so less of the tyre would touch the road because it wouldn't squash much. You would lose control easier, as the much stiffer and heavier wheel would bounce much more. The ride would be terribly rough, as the tyre would not absorb small bumps on the road.\n\nAll in all, a terrible idea. But some water is put into tyres of heavy equipment like tractors and some earthmovers, as it adds weight, which increases traction, especially on soft soils.\n\nEdit: The first point depends on the wheel being pressurized unloaded, that pressure would increase a lot when the car was put on the ground. If the loaded tyre pressure was normal when the tyre was on the ground, then the contact area would be the same. The other two points still apply, though."
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2oi3m1 | given enough time, would every river turn its channel into something like the grand canyon? | Is water erosion severe enough that every river would erode its channel hundreds (maybe thousands) of feet into the earth to form something like the grand canyon? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oi3m1/eli5_given_enough_time_would_every_river_turn_its/ | {
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"It needs to have enough volume and the surrounding rocks have to be sturdy enough to stand by themselves. If the river is in a sand like environment, it eventually just erodes the soil without making a canyon. \n\nBut with the right conditions, yes, it can happen. Also the course of the river needs to stay constant enough.",
"I don't think so. A lot of what a river leaves behind is determined by the type of terrain it runs over. The Colorado River ran over hard rock, and eroded that into the grand canyon. The Nile ran over sand and silt, creating the Nile Delta. Many rivers will erode land for a while, but then as the land is eroded, water takes different paths. Eventually the entire riverbed is shifted over, and erosion no longer occurs on the original path.\n\nThe water flowing in the Colorado is contained by rock. Imagine the river itself is 100 feet wide and 50 feet at a given space. The water is being held in that dimension by the rock. Now imagine an opening that large between sand dunes. If you filled that gap with water, the water would push the sand out. Because the water would not be contained, it would spread, and therefore place less pressure on the ground, reducing erosion. \n\nErosion would still occur, but at some point the water will find a quicker route to where it is going. Once the water diverts its flow it will spread from that point, over and over and over again. \n\nSo no, I don't think so. I'm not a geologist, though."
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2tc2t8 | what happens to a multi-million dollar company if every important person or owner dies/disappears? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2tc2t8/eli5what_happens_to_a_multimillion_dollar_company/ | {
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"Well. In terms of ownership it's easy. The owner owns shares, the shares would go to whomever inherits from him. So, assuming he has no will, and is declared legally dead, it would go to his wife then children then other family depending on who exists.\n\nIn terms of managing the company. The likely scenario is that the employees would make an attempt but the end result is likely that the company goes under. "
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3orm9f | the hate on florida. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3orm9f/eli5_the_hate_on_florida/ | {
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"I mean it depends on where you want to look at the hate. The hate could be\n\n > Joking [About the insane amount of old people out there] \n\n > Weather, I'm checking in from Massachusetts so this time of year is when I start to adopt the \"Fuck Florida, with there 70-90 (Freedom unit) weather!\" \n\n > One thing I personally am Jealous of is their taxes are so freakishly low [like income tax, they have none of it] They have a higher sales tax but honestly to be taking home all your money [minus federal tax] is pretty great to me. ",
"Much of the recent hate stemmed from the 2000 presidential election. First it was called for Gore, then Bush, then it was too close to call. We were nationally embarrassed because we held up the decision. Hanging chads became the go-to late-night punchline. Basically, the rest of the nation was standing around saying \"Get your shit together, Florida.\" \n\nFlorida also has very open public records laws, meaning that even the most ridiculous stories are almost instantly available to the media or the public. This results in headlines that begin \"Florida man...\" and even it's own subreddit, /r/floridaman That's not to say whacky shit doesn't happen in other states, it just doesn't always get reported upon.\n\nThere are a lot of extremely right-wing and left-wing groups living in very close proximity, which can lead to very stupid escalations of ideas. Doubling down on stupid seems to be a state hobby. Imagine what would happen if you picked up a whole group of people from the Bay area and stuck them in the middle of downtown Dallas. That's basically what Florida is. Except we have liberals from New England and conservatives from the mid-west coming down in droves to either retire or visit Disney World. \n\nOur politics are a joke. Locally it's not too bad. We actually have some really good city and county governments, but state wide we have the problem of not having a decisive majority either way. Because there is such a narrow margin to most political victories, sometimes we get the crazy ones who talk the loudest.\n\nMostly Florida gets hate because we have very little in the way of a state identity. We have so many people here from so many different regions who bring their regional biases with them, that there's always *something* that people elsewhere can relate to hating.\n\nSource: Am Floridian",
"A combination of factors- \n\nVery strong sunshine laws and access to police records makes it very simple to make weird news\n\nLots and lots of parties- it's a lot easier for people to do weird news things when they're trashed. \n\nLots of drifters- it's warm, you can often sleep on beaches, you won't freeze to death, lots of jobs in low-access industries like serving and orange picking. Brings a lot of not super awesome people there. \n\nFlorida has looooong stretches of decaying urban sprawl. Which, again, attracts the sort of people who do five pounds of meth and are found in the park eating grass and mooing. ",
"A lot of party people go to Florida \n\nA lot of tourists go to Florida \n\nThey then do drugs and do stupid shit. The end",
"It's seems like everyone I knew (from Boston) who fucked up their life and wanted a fresh start and a more affordable living headed to Florida. Where I would bet my life savings they continued to be fuck ups. In that respect they inherited are undesirables."
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8gtq1f | how do storms continually drop rain? why does it not all drop at once, and how can storms keep a steady stream up? | Just was thinking about this while getting rained on :) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8gtq1f/eli5_how_do_storms_continually_drop_rain_why_does/ | {
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"I'm not entirely sure why it doesn't all fall at once, but the reason a storm can continuously drop rain as it rolls across a state is because the inflow of the storm is constantly picking up moist air.\n\nStorms aren't just a cloud of water, they are a complex system of air currents that allows the storm to continually recharge. The storm only dies out when it outpaces this system of air currents (or the air currents dwindle due to day/night cycles).",
"For similar reasons that explain why a pot of water doesn't all turn to steam (well, vapor, then steam) at once. The change is a gradual progression.\n\nSo, air holds water. To an extent. Higher pressure air holds more water. Warmer air holds more water. The amount of water in the air is called the absolute humidity, but since different pressures and temperatures of air can hold different amounts of water, we refer to something called the relative humidity. Relative humidity is the amount of water that the air *is* holding compared to how much the air *can* hold at that temperature and pressure. This is referred to as a percentage of saturation.\n\nSo, let's say you have hot, wet air down by the ground (more pressure), and it's moving up into an area of cold air with less pressure, due both to the rise in elevation and the lower temperature (which decreases pressure). At the beginning, you had a certain amount of water in the air, that was the absolute humidity, but the air was able to hold it. That means that the absolute humidity was at or below 100% of what the air can hold (meaning relative humidity is at or below 100%). As you move the air up to the cold, low-pressure area, the air can hold less and less water. At some point the absolute humidity is going to surpass the air's ability to hold it. At this point water condenses, and drops fall.\n\nNow, as the drops fall, they do gather more water and get bigger, but as they get bigger and faster they start breaking up again. This is why there is a limit to the size of drops that we see.\n\nNow, the main reason that all of the water does not drop at once is because all of that change that I mentioned happens over time, not instantaneously. In order for all of the water to drop at once, you would need to instantly cool or depressurize a local region of atmosphere. Not only that, but all of the water molecules would have to be instantly teleported together into drops, since they were all spread out at first.\n\nI hope that helps. I didn't go back and read what I wrote, so that may be kind of confusing.\n\nEdit: I keep logging on to questions. I'm sorry if I confused you. It was an ELI5, but I had to draw the line and dumb it down somewhere. Some want more explanation, some want less. I tried, that's all I can say. But for those of you that keep telling me that I'm wrong about air pressure, or temperature, and amount of water in the air, please refer to [The ideal gas law](_URL_0_), and if you still disagree, then please go take some meteorology courses that may or may not help you understand the relation between a closed system and multiple open systems.\n\nEdit 2: For all others, if you have a real question that you think I can answer, feel free to PM me. Reddit is a difficult place to explain anything more complicated without writing a book that no one will read.",
"The way I understand it is the low pressure system creates the storm from vertical motion. Think of it like this. If you have low pressure then air from around the system is going to get pulled in to the middle and there’s no where for the air to go but up which is how vertical motion happens and how thunderstorms get created. \n\nThe strength of the vertical motion is what prevents rain from falling so any water droplets in the cloud get pushed back up until they collide with other droplets and become heavy enough to fall. \n\nThat’s why the more severe the storm the bigger the rain droplets are. They spent more time colliding with other droplets which makes them bigger. Same thing with hail. ",
"Clouds are like a sponge. Changes in pressures and temperatures start squeezing the cloud. Sponges don't drop all of their water out at once. Even if you squeeze it very quickly, it still takes a certain amount of time for you to gradually squeeze the sponge. \n\nThe atmospheric pressures and temperatures are like a slow-squeezing fist. Fast and heavy storms, when rain falls with heavier drops and seems to be faster, the change in atmospheric conditions happened more quickly, like you squeezing the sponge faster. \n\nIt's possible I'm missing some technical detail but I think this is an ELI5. ",
"Updrafts cause rain.\n\nHumid air gets raised up and up until it cools off enough to condense. Small rain droplets may not be big enough to overcome the updrafts, so they keep accumulating until they are big enough droplets to fall through the updrafts. The process is gradual so it takes some time to deplete your cloud, and there is never a case of a cloud just dropping all of its water in an instant.",
"Imagine a can fresh out of the fridge on a warm day. Condensation. But times a million. It doesn't sweat all at once, but it does start to drip.",
"If you are wondering why, at 100% humidity, we are not drowning, air can only hold 4% before it starts raining. The 100%=4%, 50%=2%, etc\n\nHumidity is based on 0% to 100% because 1.342678% humidity is not easy to understand or track. ",
"When a cold front meets warm air it forces the warm air to rise. As the warm air rises it condenses. Depending on the height and temperature the warm air will either form droplets or snow flakes. \nThe cold air moves through like a wave. Not all the moisture will drop at one moment. ",
"There exists no natural condition in atmosphere where water in the air condenses, agglomerates by itself and precipitates. But all the rain drops you see are formed when water in the air condenses on particulate matter/airborne particles (water needs a surface to cool down) and continuously condenses and evaporates from the particle's surface until a particular size/diameter drop is achieved called as cloud condensation nuclei (ccn) at particular temperature, pressure and relative humidity conditions for the rain/precipitation to finally happen as individual spheres of water steadily until those conditions (T, P & RH) keeps existing in the atmosphere. And thus why they do not drop all at once.",
"Everything in the atmosphere during a rainstorm is in constant motion. The clouds, humidity, temperature, wind, and air pressure are all constantly changing. So while it may seem like a cloudy sky rains on you for hours, it really isn't the same sky. Rain is just the most obvious sign of change and in this complex system."
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