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75wwjx | why can animals eat dirty food that has fallen on the ground or otherwise contaminated and be okay but humans cannot? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/75wwjx/eli5_why_can_animals_eat_dirty_food_that_has/ | {
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"Humans can \n\nYou can lick the floor and you won't get sick\n\nPeople just .. don't want to lick the floor \n\nSo naturally you wouldn't want to eat off the floor also ",
"Humans absolutely can eat dirty food that has fallen on the ground/otherwise contaminated and be perfectly fine, so long as they are used to doing so. Our gastrointestinal tract is delicate, but it can be strengthed with frequent exposure to new bacteria. \n\nTake the tap water in Mexico for example. The people of Mexico can drink it or use it in recipes just fine, but the average American/European could get dysentery off the first drink because they aren't used to the particular bacteria in the water. You can get it from a single ice cube, or even just by brushing your teeth with the tap water. \n\nAnimals (dogs especially) explore the world with their faces, noses, and tongues. They adapt to the bacteria, flora, and fauna in their region when they're very young. \n"
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236yej | "free will", (in)compatibilism, and determinism. | I realize that the term "free will" is tricky to define sometimes, but I've heard some really good guesses. I've watched a couple videos by Sam Harris which were pretty good. Anything solid on it? I think it says that we are able to make conscious and purposeful decisions. At a glance, this seems obvious, so why have an incompatible view with determinism in some cases?
**I'm especially interested in the vein of compatibilism Daniel Dennett writes about.** I'm also interested in incompatibilism, but to a lesser extent and thought I'd include it just to be thorough. The only thing I know is that compatibilism says free will and determinism can overlap, but to what extent and by what conditions?
I don't know much about determinism, other than it comes down to the thought that there is a 100% chance that I would ask this question because of a large amount of conditions (like me having free time to ask, being interested, etc). There's also a 100% chance a specific user (it might be you!) will answer because of the conditions that qualifies them to answer.
I'm not sure if fatalism is to be included in this trinity, but if anyone thinks it's relevant, feel free to speak on it.
There are a couple of archived answers, but they are either abandoned or focus only on one aspect. I want to understand the bigger picture. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/236yej/eli5_free_will_incompatibilism_and_determinism/ | {
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"Without writing an entire book on the topic, it is hard to do this question justice. Full disclosure: I support the idea that free will and determinism are incompatible so my definitions are probably biased. \n\nEssentially, compatibilism sort of tweaks the definition of free will a bit. When given the definition: \"you could not have done otherwise, but no one forced you to do it\" as a description. Most people would say that definition doesn't really describe what they have called free will their whole life. \n\nFurther, compatibilism has heavy implications into moral responsibility and control. If an agent acted OF THEIR OWN FREE WILL , meaning (in compatibilism speak) that no one coerced or physically forced them to do it, they can be blamed and held responsible. \n\nAs I said, it's hard to really do this question justice without writing a book. Feel free to ask any questions you have, I love this topic. \n\nA good reference to read would be Four views on free will, it's a book that has 4 view on free will.... It also has the authors respond to each others' view and give their rebuttal to the opposing views. ",
"I guess I'd start by saying that philosophers disagree about exactly what free will is. If you check out [this survey of professional philosophers](_URL_0_), roughly 60% are broadly in favour of compatibilism, 14% for libertarianism, 12% for free will scepticism, and 15% for some other view. I'll explain these positions in a moment.\n\nFirst, though, what is free will? Like I said, there's no agreed-upon definition, but we have a bunch of intuitions about it, including things like being able to have done otherwise, having self-control, and being morally responsible for one's actions.\n\nHowever, when philosophers analyse the concept of free will, they might find that some of our intuitions about are inconsistent, or that some of our intuitions aren't really central to the concept of free will, or that these intuitions need to be specified more precisely in order to get a proper understanding of the concept.\n\nSo philosophers try to give an account of free will that is precise and consistent while still respecting as many of our intuitions about it as possible. But they disagree about how to do this. One of the biggest disagreements is between *incompatibilists* and *compatibilists*. Incompatibilists claim that our best account of free will is one that requires the truth of indeterminism.\n\n(And to ELI5 indeterminism, it's just the denial of determinism. Determinism is the is the claim that all events are determined by prior causes. The implications of determinism are often illustrated using two examples. In the first, we rewind the universe to an earlier point in time. If determinism is true then events will unfold in the same way every single time. In the second example we have a computer that makes predictions based on perfect knowledge of the state of the universe and the laws of physics. If determinism is true then these predictions will always be accurate.)\n\nCompatibilists, by contrast, claim that our best account of free will is one doesn't require the truth of indeterminism. On their view free will is *compatible* with determinism, hence the name.\n\nWithin incompatibilism, there are two main positions. *Libertarians* (not to be confused with political libertarians) claim that indeterminsm is true, and that this allows for the possibility of free will.\n\n*Hard determinists*, by contrast, claim that determinism is true, and that this rules out out the possibility of free will.\n\nI can go into more detail if you'd like but then I'd have to ELY8 or so. I'll end with some reading recommendations. *Don't* read Harris. He's been widely [derided](_URL_3_) by [philosophers](_URL_1_) working in the field.\n\nIf you want to read Dennett on this, I'd recommend his *Elbow Room* as a good overview of his version of compatibilism. I wouldn't recommend his *Freedom Evolves*, as I think it doesn't give a compelling argument for compatibilism, as I mention [here](_URL_4_).\n\nI agree with /u/sshjeff that *Four Views on Free Will* is an excellent book. In this book you get presentations of compatibilism (sort of), libertarianism, hard determinism (sort of), and \"other\", each by philosophers who actually hold those views, and replies to each others' arguments. The authors are John Martin Fischer, Robert Kane, Derk Pereboom, and Manuel Vargas.\n\nHarry Frankfurt's paper *Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility* offers a solid argument in favour of compatibilism. I discuss it [here](_URL_2_) if you're interested.\n\nAnd as for introductory books, I think Robert Kane's *Free Will: a Contemporary Introduction* is reasonably accessible while still doing justice to the main positions in the debate."
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"http://www.reddit.com/r/philosophy/comments/1y32vx/weekly_discussion_moral_responsibility_and/",
"http://www.naturalism.org/Dennett_refl... | |
2ltafa | why do cell phone manufacturers make phones with built-in battery? what is the advantage here? | There has to be a reason, I mean even some phones has a removable back, but not removable battery (HTC One Max - One plus One). What benefit does the device or the manufacturer gain from built batteries? Is there a financial reasons? Does it make the battery respond fast to heavy demand? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2ltafa/eli5_why_do_cell_phone_manufacturers_make_phones/ | {
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"One of the reasons is the safety — when battery dies, we often buy some knockoff replacement battery, which has a higher risk of exploding and harming you. So to prevent explosions and fires some companies decided to make batteries not user-replaceable.",
"People often take out the batteries whilst the phone is still on, this messes up your software and hardware. It also increases the general sturdyness of your phone, since more elements are firmly in place.",
"The cynic in me says so that when it breaks you have to pay to have it replaced or buy a new model, thus more money for them.",
"pre-determined service life. The average iPhone battery should last around 3-5 years of solid use. It doesn't need to be replaced, because the phone roadmap usually releases a new iphone every couple of years, with new features for roughly the same price as the old phone, so most people just upgrade to the latest phone when their old one dies. Even though many phones *do* have replaceable batteries, this doesn't neccesartily make them better phones, because those batteries may not be as reliable as phones without a replaceable battery. \n \nIt's an easy business model to keep people coming back for more, and it's not just found in cellphones, but also PC Hardware, Televisions, cars, surround sound systems, the list goes on, where something new *should* come out before your old hardware dies, and it's easier just to replace the hardware than it is to repair it. \n \nIt's not like you can't replace your iPhone battery. Hell, I think if get Applecare, they'll fix it FOR you themselves. But it's just a bunch of screws that need to be removed to access the battery and replace it with a working battery. And there's usually a myriad of stores in any given town that salvage phones for a living, and gather up all sorts of replacement parts, in addition to overseas orders. ",
"Usually in order for the battery to be safely replaceable by your average schmuck, it has to have some sort of reasonably sturdy outer casing around the actual battery. You also need to have some kind of connector between the battery and the phone. Both of those use up more space inside the phone which could be used to increase the size of the actual battery. So they are trading off ease of battery replacement for higher battery capacity."
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8pbyoe | how small can pc chips really get, the recent introduction of 7nm chips from amd made me think is there some kind of limit? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8pbyoe/eli5_how_small_can_pc_chips_really_get_the_recent/ | {
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"Yes there is a limit. if 7nm isn't the limit, you can see it from there. Given AMD's yield numbers, it might be 10nm.\n\nQuantum mechanics says that an electron isn't a little billiard ball of charge, it's a cloudy region where the charge is statistically located. When features get too small, the individual electrons can \"tunnel\" through the insulator walls and get out of one part of the circuit and into another part unpredictably. It's like using a pipe with holes in it, you can make the place at the end of the pipe wet, but you can't easily make it enough wetter than the places under the pip that it encodes a \"1\" or \"0\" of information. When everyplace is wet, you can't compute with \"wet\" vs \"dry\".",
"Yes there is a limit, however it's important to note that AMD's \"7nm\" process isn't 7nm in the strictest sense. A number of years back (around 45nm) chip manufacturers began moving their naming away from being an engineering measurement and more toward being a marketing name.\n\nRemember that they're not just doing a straight up shrink of the previous transistor designs where only a single number would be needed to describe them. Often improvements come in the form of more subtle alterations that don't actually involve making smaller transistors, just tighter clearances and the like (in fact some of these actually increase the size of other elements as a trade off).\n\nTo my knowledge nobody uses pure size to define their process anymore though Intel has been somewhat conservative in how quickly they push their marketing terms ahead. This is apparent in how the various pitch measurements of Intel's \"10nm\" process are actually in line with the measurements that most other manufacturers like AMD are already calling \"7nm\"."
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75qubx | why do rats get cancer very often? | Domesticated rats, to be specific. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/75qubx/eli5_why_do_rats_get_cancer_very_often/ | {
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"If you are referring to lab rats used in cancer studies, then they are specifically genetically created to get cancer. If they don't we give them cancer. Its not a pretty process, but we need to test cures on living creatures, and its a lot of paperwork killing people with failed cures.\n\nAs far as I know normal rats aren't more prone to cancer than any other rodent/mammal.",
"Rats are genetically predisposed to the development of tumors. In the wild rats don't tend to live long before predators get them, and they produce lots and lots of babies, so the fact that they're super likely to get cancer barely played a factor. Domesticated rats, however, are protected from predators and disease and are given plenty of food, so barring anything else killing them they're almost guaranteed to live long enough to develop tumors.\n\nIt's sort of like how cancer rates in humans are rising as other diseases are wiped out and our life expectancy goes up so more of us live long enough to get cancer."
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1rw9nk | why doesn't microsoft word's autocorrect work as well as that of my phone? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rw9nk/eli5_why_doesnt_microsoft_words_autocorrect_work/ | {
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"Modern versions of Word will auto-correct common mistakes, but in general Word is designed so what you type is what goes into the document. You can then go back and spell check everything.",
"Auto-correct on phones is awful. They constantly swap out the right word you typed for a wrong one, just because the word you typed isn't in the phone's limited dictionary.\n\nMost word processors auto-correct systems work well, because they only correct a limited number of obvious errors. Other than that, they keep out of your hair."
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2mrgc8 | what is a physician assistant (pa) compared to a doctor or nurse? | Mom is a PA and no matter how many times I try to ask for a simple explanation of what one is compared to a doctor or nurse she always just leaves me still blank minded with poor layman explanations. Hopefully someone medical can clear it up. It sounds like a PA is both but neither. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2mrgc8/eli5what_is_a_physician_assistant_pa_compared_to/ | {
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"A PA, or a Nurse-Practitioner (similar concept) is somewhere between a nurse and a doctor in terms of training and education. For a lot of the things you typically go see a doctor for - strep throat, cold/flu, ear/sinus infection, pink eye, bronchitis, etc - you really don't need someone with 10 years of medical training to diagnose and treat. It's more efficient and cost-effective to use someone with less training do deal with these \"entry-level\" type problems, while the doctor can focus on more specialized or complex cases.\n\nIn many states PA/NP can only practice under the supervision of a physician. Laws may also limit what types of treatment they can perform and what medications they can prescribe."
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1udurq | when two voices have the same volume and frequency, how can we still tell them apart? | There's got to be some other factors that decide what makes a voice differentiable from others right? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1udurq/eli5_when_two_voices_have_the_same_volume_and/ | {
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"In music there's a special element known as \"timbre\". Pronounced tam-burr, it's what gives two different instruments different voices when played at the same pitch and volume.\n\n99.99% of sounds don't play at a single frequency (pitch). They sort of have a matrix of different frequencies and vibrations at different speeds that are all played at once to achieve their different \"colours\" of sound."
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c25xk8 | why do red and white wine need to be stored in different temperatures? what is the allure of aged wine? what are the different types of wine? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/c25xk8/eli5_why_do_red_and_white_wine_need_to_be_stored/ | {
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"r/wine is that way. They might know better."
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4k5d29 | how can we measure the velocities of the redshift of stars? | Are they measured assuming the earth itself isn't moving or is this somehow taken into account?
| explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4k5d29/eli5_how_can_we_measure_the_velocities_of_the/ | {
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"The red shift measures how quickly two bodies are moving apart. The movement of the earth around the sun (at 1656 km/h (460 m/s))\ndoesn't really matter much, but it is possible to correct for it. The sun also moves around the center of the galaxy (at 828,000 km/h (230 km/s)).\n\nAny linear movement can't be measured, so everything else assumes that the earth is stationary.",
"You are basing this on a false assumption, movement requires two things, an object and a point of reference, however the most important part is that **these are interchangeable**. It is not a matter of \"is the star moving or is Earth moving,\" because according to physics, both principles are exactly the same.",
"So, a large number of stars tend to fall into distinct groups. These groups fuse specific types of atoms, which release specific types of colors.\n\nSo you can usually tell what type of star something is by what colors it is. Run that light though a prism to get individual colors, and what you get a sort of \"Fingerprint\" that describes the atoms inside the star. Match the \"Fingerprint\" to the list of known star types, and you can tell what atoms are in the star, and what type of star it is.\n\nHowever, even though you get the same fingerprint shape every time, the actual colors are usually tinted red. This is the actual red-shift of the star: how far towards blue you need to move that fingerprint to match the one in the list. Some math can turn that red-shift into a speed, signaling how fast the star needs to be moving away from us in order to have that amount of red-shift.\n\nIt's possible that the stars are simply made up of something else, some exotic matter that has a fingerprint like the atoms we know on earth, but just happens to be red shifted down. But most stars can be categorized like this, and similar stars in the same places seem to have the same red-shift values, and most stars that we can see seem to match these fingerprints exactly, assuming this red-shift.\n\nOnce that total speed is measured, we can then see which direction earth is going at the time, and check the red-shift again 6 months later, when we are going the other way. Usually we get the expected amount of red-shift, including that total change in overall speed. So everything seems to be working.",
"Okay, so with my limited physics knowledge (high school ap level), I know that any frame of reference is as valid as another because motion is relative. In that case, how are all these discrepancies in observation vs calculation that most scientists attribute to dark matter/energy found? Aren't the observed effects of dark matter on a point in space different for every reference frame?"
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kyjx9 | saliva, and how the body makes so damn much of it. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/kyjx9/eli5_saliva_and_how_the_body_makes_so_damn_much/ | {
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"Saliva has enzymes (proteins that 'do stuff') that are really useful. salivary amylase is an enzyme that starts the digestion of sugars. Lysozyme is an antibacterial enzyme that helps keep bacteria in our mouths from making us sick or making our teeth rot. Lastly, saliva helps keeps mucus membranes in our mouths and digestive tracts lubricated to help food go down smoothly.",
"Saliva has enzymes (proteins that 'do stuff') that are really useful. salivary amylase is an enzyme that starts the digestion of sugars. Lysozyme is an antibacterial enzyme that helps keep bacteria in our mouths from making us sick or making our teeth rot. Lastly, saliva helps keeps mucus membranes in our mouths and digestive tracts lubricated to help food go down smoothly."
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987i6j | aside from the fact it's a different console, how are developers able to remaster 3 huge games and put them in one disc? | Talking about Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/987i6j/eli5_aside_from_the_fact_its_a_different_console/ | {
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"CD’s have advanced so much that they are able to store so much more information on them, look at the Blu-Ray for instance, so much more info than a regular CD"
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elhocb | how is a company like redbox able to exist in a time where other dvd/video rental services have died out or become minimized, and where steaming is more than commonplace? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/elhocb/eli5_how_is_a_company_like_redbox_able_to_exist/ | {
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"1. They don't have a store, it's just a vending machine, so all the associated supporting costs can be reduced\n\n2. They have a few dozen selections so don't need to carry thousands of movies and games as a draw to bring in customers\n\n3. Local, easy access, and placed in places you are probably going anyway, so they get the \"Well, I'm here, maybe I'll grab this\" effect, as opposed to having a place you specifically visit just for that",
"1. You're assuming they will continue to exist, which is not a given. \n\n2. They have very low overhead, i.e. no real estate/rental costs, they only carry the top/most popular movies, they have very little in the way of staff compared to say Blockbuster (if you're old enough to remember those). In short, it's a vending model, not a retail model. \n\n3. Redbox machines vend more than just DVDs. For a long while, a good portion of their business was renting Playstation/XBox games ... which are more expensive than DVDs and harder to stream. But it appears they [just stopped that a week ago](_URL_1_). \n\n4. They target rural and urban areas where broadband internet access is either less available or consumers can't afford it, thus physical media is still in higher demand. \n\n4. They're trying (not very successfully) to [expand into streaming](_URL_0_) to innoculate themselves against the eventual demise of renting physical media."
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17yxms | how transposition works in music | I am mainly interested in how it works when transposing between instruments different keys of different keys. I just realized how much this confuses me, can you help me out? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/17yxms/eli5_how_transposition_works_in_music/ | {
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"LI5: \nOkay imagine you and your friend are passing notes in class, we'll say it says \"Hello, world.\" Now for some reason, you friend, whenever he reads a letter, he'll read it (i.e. interpret) it as one letter down in the alphabet (so if he sees an A, it becomes a B; if he reads a B, it becomes a C, etc). If you were to send \"Hello, world,\" he would read it as \"ifmmp, xpsme\" which obviously makes no sense whatsoever. However, if you wrote \"Gdkkn, vnqkc\" then he would read it correctly as you intended \"Hello, world.\"\n\nTransposition is kind of the same system in which certain instruments are tuned in different keys. Like when a Bb clarinet plays a C, the absolute pitch it plays is a Bb, so to compensate, it must play two semitones (half-steps, 2 keys if you play both the white and black keys) higher than a \"concert pitch.\" So if you wanted to play a \"Concert F,\" on clarinet you'd finger a G. \n\nAs a whole, transposition barely changes anything as the space between the notes are still the same. The only change is that the entire musical section has been made higher or lower by a certain amount. \n\n(This section assumes you understand musical intervals)\nFor example, in Beethoven's Ode to Joy, which is frequently transposed into different keys, the melody can be in G major and be played B-B-C-D-D-C-B-A-G-G-A-B-B-A-A, but that exact melody in C is E-E-F-G-G-F-E-D-C-C-D-E-E-D-D, if you notice, the interval between the notes is a 0, 1/2, 1, 0, 1, 1/2... in both cases regardless of the key/beginning note, so they effectively sound the same."
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405ngi | why is blindness more common than anosmia? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/405ngi/eli5_why_is_blindness_more_common_than_anosmia/ | {
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"Likely because the mechanics of sight and hearing are far more complex than those of smell and can therefore breakdown more easily."
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a8pt88 | how do steroid creams work? | I’ve been given steroid creams a few times by my doctor for eczema, but I don’t really get how they work, or like how they relate to muscle enhancing steroids! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a8pt88/eli5_how_do_steroid_creams_work/ | {
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"A steroid is a type of chemical. There are literally hundreds of steroids. The steroid in your cream is called a corticosteroid. It has the effect of reducing inflammation, thus treating your eczema.\n\nThere are other steroids called anabolic steroids that your body naturally produces as part of the muscle building process. You can take artificial anabolic steroids to enhance that process."
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38wsui | why is atheism in the us associated with science? | First of all a little background. I was born a Moroccan Muslim and grew up to be an atheist, now living in Canada.
Whenever I see American atheist subreddits/forums etc., the content seems to be 95% science instead of religion (or lack of).
In Islam, there's that thing where you're always supposed to be researching science ("*Seek learning from the cradle to the grave*" and such...). Given, you end up with weird interpretations of the religion, but there isn't much opposition to the science (except of course when scientists say stuff like there's no God).
Now, I do understand that in Christian history, church has always been a roadblock to science. However, I do not understand how being an atheist seems to be 95% about science. To me, these are totally different things!
So... ELI5? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/38wsui/eli5_why_is_atheism_in_the_us_associated_with/ | {
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"First off, the church isn't a roadblock to science, the Bug Bang Theiry was first theorized by a Catholic priest (or a monk I thin, either way, a Catholic). \n \nThe main counter to Christianity is evolution and the Big Bang. As these are science based, it makes sense that a lot of science is used to \"debunk\" religion. \n \nHowever, the Roman Catholic Church fully accepts the Big Bang Theory and evolution, and have for some time, as long as continually believing that God is still responsible.",
"Atheism claims a disbelief in a god because of a lack of ability to see, touch, or hear god. Proper, formal science will only make claims based solely on evidence - those things that can be seen, touched, heard, etc. (in practice science and scientists seem to rarely do this...). Therefore, the same \"type\" of thinking applies to both.\n\nIn reality agnosticism is more appropriately lined up with science. There is no tangible evidence for a god but as the saying goes \"the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence\". Therefore, the best \"scientific\" conclusion to the god thing is \"I don't know\". \n\nThe good news is you can be both atheist and agnostic at the same time. Hell, you can be Muslim and agnostic too. Agnosticism, Muslim, Christian, etc are talking about what you \"believe\". Agnosticism or it's opposite, gnosticism, is talking about what you \"know\". You can \"believe\" in god without \"knowing\" anything is there.\n\nI have no intention of mentioning my own beliefs here since I want the above to stand on it's own merit and not bias anybody. \n",
"I'll try to answer this one. Atheism hasn't always been linked with science. For example, Atheism in China, the USSR, and the DPRK, focus on unity and nationalism. These forms of Atheism don't concern themselves with science. In fact, religion is actually growing in China and Russia.\n\nHowever, in the west, during the enlightenment, many thinkers began to distance themselves from religion the more science seemed to contradict it, laying the groundwork for the association today. Also, I believe that another good reason is that people are always searching for answers. I remember in that Bill Nye creationism debate he said that science allows you to observe and see things that normally you can't see. Most atheists today believe that they can find all the answers to life by studying science and that religion is irrelevant.",
"One thing that you see a lot in the US, maybe also in other countries: Some religious people try to change science to fit their views. The big one is that the book of Genesis has a narrative of the creation of the Earth and the life on it over the course of 7 days. Now, there is overwhelming scientific evidence to show that over the span of billions of years, the earth was formed from space matter, and life evolved from there. However, since that doesn't fit into the box that religious people have subscribed themselves to, they'll try to manipulate the evidence to show that their preexisting notions are correct. In that sense, science being anti-religion is kind of a reaction to religion being (in this case) anti-science.\n\nHowever, strictly speaking, science and religion don't have to conflict, as long as you accept that science deals strictly with facts and physical things, whereas religion primarily deals with philosophy and the metaphysical.",
"Very simplified, a good bit of that comes from the debate of Creationism (God created Adam and Eve and that's where humans came from) versus evolution. If you believe in creationism you therefore do not believe in evolution and the scientific evidence that backs it up.",
"There are a lot of reasons:\n\n* Scientists are educated, and education negatively correlates to being religious. At college, you often for the first time experience different religious viewpoints, and find you can no longer reject them without questioning your own.\n* Methodological naturalism. Western science starts with the assumption nothing supernatural is occurring, and asks how things work. You do that enough, and start to see how a universe can work without gods.\n* Science contradicts Christianity. At least a form Christianity commonly practiced in the US. Sciences tells us the earth is very old, and that humans evolved from simpler lifeforms. This contradicts a literal interpretation of the Bible (and the Qu'ran as well).\n* General hostility. Many religious people are suspicious of science, and don't attract or retain those who follow it.\n\n > In Islam, there's that thing where you're always supposed to be researching science (\"Seek learning from the cradle to the grave\" and such...\n\nLearning and science are different things. My experiences in Morocco showed me it was a pretty moderate country when it came to Islam. I could buy beer, and saw local women without head coverings. But there are more extreme Islamic practices that are every bit as hostile to science as Christianity can be. If all things are the will of Allah, that includes a fruit falling from a tree. Ascribing science and gravity to it is to question Allah's will. ",
"It should be anywhere. Science is the use of reason, while faith is believing even against reason. So, it seems they can't be friends and you have to choose.\n\nThis about them coexisting seems pretty naive, you just can't always treat opposed views as equidistant.",
"My two quarters: American atheists are divided into basically two camps. One group has always been atheist, and had no religious upbringing, and the other group had a religious upbringing, but gave it up for one reason or another.\n\nI think the kind of thing you're talking about comes predominantly from those who left their religion, because these people grew up within a faith-based belief system. Therefore, they tend to cling to the sciences as a surrogate belief system, when it is really a method of thinking intended to discover ways to explain and harness the laws of nature.\n\nOn the other hand, those who grew up atheist may feel disenfranchised by their lack of an organized system of beliefs, and so cling to the sciences with similar zeal, as if they are in an ideological struggle, or a psychological crusade against, faith-based belief systems.\n\nIn my opinion, the whole duality of theistic faith vs. knowledge gathering systems is a crock of shit to begin with. As OP suggests, religion and \"science\" (really just a method of learning) can coexist. That is, as long as science is not used to disprove the existence of the supernatural, which has always been more a philosophical question anyway. It has never been science's mission, I don't believe, to disprove religions, but rather it is to understand the universe we find ourselves in.",
"Seems simple to me. A place like r/ Atheism is full of people from Christian n backgrounds. A lot of them from the bible belt. One they break away from religion, they often denounce all religion and feel no choice but to attack the religion they they feel oppressed them so long. \n\nThe best attack: science. They learn science facts to use against religious stories that themselves are often taken as truth by believers no matter how odd.\n\nThey feel they need to be on the opposite side against religion, and religious fanatics will do the same by attacking science. They strengthen each others sides. \n\n"
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6pky74 | why is it that our facial expressions seem to show that we are in pain while having sex, even though we feel pleasure? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6pky74/eli5_why_is_it_that_our_facial_expressions_seem/ | {
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"I think it has to do with the *intensity* of the pleasure we're experiencing. It can be overwhelming, even though it feels so good, and the body even prepares itself sometimes by involuntarily tensing up our muscles, especially when we're close to experiencing an orgasm. "
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5iegg3 | how do scam centers work? how do they employ people to work there? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5iegg3/eli5_how_do_scam_centers_work_how_do_they_employ/ | {
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"They get people to work exactly like they get people to work there, by promising huge return. For a unemployed men getting such a huge salary is a big positive. ",
"This is my personal experience. I briefly worked for a call center that scammed people. The company sold itself to employees as a legitimate business and most of the worker bees seemed to believe it was a legitimate business. After a few weeks (I was working nights while job-hunting) a customer called me back and said, 'you seem like an honest guy so I want to tell you what happened to me after we spoke.' Essentially everything I had been told and everything I told him was a lie. I spoke with my boss after the call and it became clear the whole thing was a sham. I quit a few minutes later. Looking back, I think some long-term employees knew everything was not above-board but turnover was high and most people did not get a return call like I did (calls were screened). \n\nAs far as how it worked, we called people and offered different vacation packages that were cheap, but, as it turns out, nearly impossible to use and not in locations advertised (usually same state but hours from specified location). The call center was set-up as a LLC, technically separate from the vacation company, and I gathered each part of the enterprise was a separate entity. "
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5pm0g5 | why do postal tracking numbers have to be incredibly long? are there that many products in existence? | A recent tracking # of mine was 9241996901177450612702
I sincerely doubt there are 9,241,996,901,177,450,612,702 products on this Earth.
I doubt there are even 9,241,996,901,177,450,612,702 rocks on this earth!
How is it necessary to need that many digits in order for it to be a tracking number?
Why can't they use less digits, when clearly, we have not shipped anywhere near that # of products in the whole history of shipping, much less in the history of tracking numbers being a thing? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5pm0g5/eli5_why_do_postal_tracking_numbers_have_to_be/ | {
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"There is plenty of redundancy to (1) prevent you guessing another package's number, (2) encode information useful to the carrier, and (3) detect and even possibly correct if a digit is entered incorrectly.",
"It's not sequential numbering of packages, there's information encoded in the number:\n\n > A UPS tracking number, for domestic packages within the United States, will usually start with \"1Z\" followed by a 6 character shipper number (numbers and letters), a 2 digit service level indicator (e.g., 03 for GROUND), and finally 8 digits identifying the package, for a total of 18 characters."
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5g77d2 | why do salt lands have such reflective properties? example: salt land in bolivia looks like the world's greatest mirror | _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5g77d2/eli5why_do_salt_lands_have_such_reflective/ | {
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"They're formed by dried up seabeds, so they are perfectly flat. When it does rain, the rain has nowhere to drain to, so it forms a perfectly flat reflective puddle. "
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3trox7 | what are electric field lines and magnetic field lines and how do they produce each other? | Electric field lines and Electric charges produce Magnetic fields and vice versa. How? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3trox7/eli5_what_are_electric_field_lines_and_magnetic/ | {
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"Electric charges produce electric fields, or electric field lines if you prefer.\n\nMoving electric charges produce magnetic fields.\n\nWhen a conductor moves through a magnetic field, an electric current is induced in it.",
"Electricity and magnetism are two ways of viewing of the same force of nature, called electromagnetism. Light is energy that moves using this force. Have you heard the speed of light is always seems constant for everyone, no matter how fast they're moving? (Well, it is.) So that this works out, an electric charge that's moving seems to do a little something extra: it gains a magnetic field as well as keeping its electric field."
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cxvzhl | what is the difference between “pasteurized” and ”ultra-pasteurized” milk, and why do some countries only have the shelf stable “ultra-pasteurized” kind? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/cxvzhl/eli5_what_is_the_difference_between_pasteurized/ | {
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"Pasteurized: Heated to 145°F for 30 minutes (normal pasteurization) or 161.6°F for 15 seconds (flash pasteurization). Fridge stable for a couple weeks.\n\nUHT, or ultra-pasteurized: Heated to 280°F for 2 seconds. Shelf stable (unrefrigerated) for ~9 months.\n\nNot sure why some countries would only have UHT, probably because it stores easier and is easier to transport because it doesn't require refrigeration."
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4nbe0q | what are the physics behind bulletproof glass? | What allows bulletproof glass to stop up to a 50 caliber round being fired directly at it? [Here is a video example of the glass in action.](_URL_0_) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4nbe0q/eli5_what_are_the_physics_behind_bulletproof_glass/ | {
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"What you think of as \"a piece of bulletproof glass\" is actually a sandwich made of many layers of glass and fancy plastics, with various characteristics. Standing alone, each piece of this sandwich would not stop the bullet. But together, they break in expected ways, while slowing the bullet for the next layer and distributing the force of the impact over a larger area.",
"When a projectile like a bullet is fired through a regular piece of glass it slows down because the glass absorbs some of its energy. You can actually see how the energy spreads outward - cracks. If you record this with a slow motion camera, you can also see that the glass flexes and bends and vibrates.\n\nBulletproof glass is usually made from alternating layers of glass and plastic. The plastic is much more compressible than the glass and it acts like a cushion to prevent the first layer of glass from breaking the second and so on. \n\nWhen a bullet hits, each successive layer of glass spreads the energy of impact out over a wider and wider area. It's the difference between trying to poke a hole in something with a knife versus a bowling ball.",
"FINALLY MY TIME TO SHINE. \nBasically what is going on is the force of the bullet is distributed along the surface of the material. Usually there are several layers, compounding the affect. Really there are two ingredients in bulletproof glass, glass and plastic. I think I can explain the physics using an example. Imagine that the glass is a ceramic tile, and the plastic is a trampoline surface. Imagine you're standing above the trampoline with a brick in your hand. \n \nFirst throw the brick at the trampoline with no tile in the way, the trampoline will go down from the force. Let's say 10 units. \n Now put a tile on the surface of the trampoline. When the brick contacts the tile, the tile breaks along its surface. It takes a lot of energy to break the tiles surface, so the brick is slowed down and the trampoline moves less than before. Lets say 5 units. \nIf you throw a brick at a tile on the ground, some energy is absorbed by the tile, but much of it goes into the ground beneath the tile. \nNow, stack layers of tile and trampoline and what you get is a strong, shock absorbing surface. The glass in bulletproof glass is what is breaking to absorb energy along its face, and the plastic is stretched to absorb the impact \nThis shock absorbing can be seen in this video. \n_URL_0_ \nEdit. Thanks for the gold bruv\n ",
"Some of the posts below have good information in regards to spreading out the energy from the bullet along a wider area. \n\nBut one of the keys is that as a material, glass is rather strong in compression, meaning it can bear a lot of weight on top of it without collapsing. But it's rather weak in tension, which means if it a force causes it to stretch, it breaks pretty easily. \n\nSo when a bullet strikes a pane of glass, it causes the pane to flex a bit, and when you push on something like that and it bends, the side that you're pushing on goes into compression, and the other side goes into tension. Since glass is very weak in tension, the back side of the pane cracks almost immediately and cracks spread very quickly in glass and the whole pane fails. \n\nSo what they do with bulletproof glass is they add in layers of plastic, and some kinds of plastic are pretty darn strong against tension forces. The addition of the plastic helps the glass assembly resist the tension forces and not flex as much. It's also adhered to the glass surface in a way that helps prevent cracks in the glass from spreading as readily as it would otherwise. \n\nThe distinction between compression and tension forces is a huge part of designing objects that have to withstand significant forces. It's the reason why concrete structures need to have steel reinforcing in them. Concrete is great at resisting compression, but sucks at resisting tension. Without reinforcing, concrete beams would mostly be useless. \n\n",
"You see bullet proof glass is like an ogre... or an onion.... or a parfait. It has layers. When the bullet hits the top layer is has a lot of energy and uses that energy to break the top layer. When it hits the 2nd layer it has less energy because it already used it to break the first layer. And so on until the bullet stops.",
"I used to work with ballistic-grade ceramics, so not all of this necessarily applies to glass, but mostly its the same.\n\nBulletproof glass is usually made with alternating layers of hard glass and tough plastic.\n\nFirst the bullet hits the hard glass layer. It's hard, so the soft lead of the bullet is deformed by the impact. That's energy loss number 1. Then the glass starts to break; as the bullet is being slowed down by the glass, it transfers energy into the glass and the glass reacts by breaking up into pieces. Energy loss number 2. Now the bullet is passing through hot broken glass shards that chew it up along the way and now we're taking away energy a third time. Finally, the bullet impacts the plastic layer behind the glass, which stretches like rubber as it deforms, slowing down the bullet again.\n\nEven if the glass is already broken (i.e. the bullet is no longer losing energy from having to break up the glass) you still have all those glass shards to chew it up along the way, and the springy plastic layers to absorb the impact.\n\nRepeat for each layer of glass and plastic and you have a composite that is extremely resistant to gunfire.\n\nEDIT: BTW, hardened armor-piercing bullets are usually not made of soft lead and copper, which is why they pass through \"bulletproof\" materials more easily. If the bullet is hardened carbide, it doesn't deform as much on impact and loses a little less energy there. It doesn't get torn up by the glass shards and loses a little less energy there too. And to top it all off, a hardened AP bullet is usually much heavier than lead, which means the bullet is already coming in with much more energy to begin with.",
"If you filmed the bullet hitting the glass with one of those 4000 images / sec slow-motion cameras, would we see the rear sheet bulge elastically after impact or would it stay flat?",
"I'm not sure if anyone pointed this out yet but here is a little trivia fact; the \"bullet proof glass\" is not so much as bullet proof but more of bullet resistant. \n\nThis is because, it can survive a few 50. Cal shot, but cannot withstand repeated gunshots. It dosent answer the question but it's a little trivia fact that I found interesting.",
"Bullet proof glass is a composite made up of glass and polycarbonate layers. The glass is strong but it brittle and the polycarbonate is soft and flexible and helps keep the glass together preventing it from shattering and essentially allowing the glass to catch the bullet. \nThe first layer takes the impact of the bullet, the second layer takes the impact of the glass that was impacted by the bullet. The third layer takes the pressure of the glass from the second and so on. Each taking the force over a larger area over the entire window.\n",
"The glass is built to protect you rather than itself. It is built to shatter and absorb shock from bullets. It takes energy to rack glass and essentially bullet proof glass will break and distribute the energy of the gunshot throughout itself.",
"On Mythbusters the bullet resistant material we used was called Lexguard. Lexguard is an inch-and-a-quarter thick and is comprised of two layers of 1/2\" thick acrylic, laminated together and laminated between two 1/8\" thick layers of polycarbonate, or Lexan. \n\nI have a beautiful 6\" square of the stuff on my desk, with a .45 caliber slug in it. From what I see the properties of both plastics are used in concert to stop the bullet by spreading it's energy as widely as possible. The acrylic layers shatter, they spread a lot of energy. I can see the widest shockwave from my slug is in the centermost layer. But the polycarb layers don't shatter, they streeetch, (and I think) harnessing the energy spreading outwards from the acrylic layers. The shockrings produced by the stretching laminate layers is super cool. I've got a photo somewhere...\n\n",
"Pretty cool.\n\nThis guy is nuts, where does he get all these guns from?! Very entertaining though.\n\n\n\n",
"I vaguely recall a material science class where it was discussed how polycarbonate sheet (the bullet stopping component of this composite material) actually work hardens as the rest ulcer tries to penetrate. The more it tries to drive through, the more resistance it exhibits. "
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40kvyv | those familiar with immigration law: undocumented vs. illegal | Why do Democrats want to say "undocumented" immigrants as opposed to "illegal" immigrants? Is this just an "illegal is offensive" thng or is there a legitimately grey area here on whether or not they could be considered illegal immigrants? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/40kvyv/eli5_those_familiar_with_immigration_law/ | {
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"You've pretty much got the idea. Liberals consider the term \"undocumented immigrant\" or \"undocumented worker\" preferable to \"illegal immigrant\". Conservatives feel like \"illegal immigrant\" is an adequate description of people who are living in the United States illegally. For the most part, it's just rhetoric. I'd compare it to \"black\" and \"American American\".\n\nPersonally, I prefer the term alien. It's accurate, and you don't often get to use it outside the context of conspiracy talk."
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b14wcs | why are animals smaller near the equator? shouldn’t it be the other way around, since resources are more abundant in warmer climates? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/b14wcs/eli5_why_are_animals_smaller_near_the_equator/ | {
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"On the other side of that reasoning, small animals are far less effective at retaining heat. Larger bodies are better able to function in colder climes.",
"Why would you say that is the case?\n\nElephants, Rhinoceros, Hippopotamus, Lion, Giraffe are large and include the larges land animal and they live on or close to the equator.",
"Consider a sphere, which is a simplified model of an animal. Surface area increases with the square of radius (A=4πr^2 ), while volume increases with the cube of radius (V=4/3πr^3 ). Larger volume to surface area ratios are more effective at retaining body heat, because the metabolic heat (per unit volume) has less surface to conduct, convect or radiate away from."
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avt569 | why does the pitch of a sound become harder to distinguish when it is at a lower volume? | I noticed driving home the other day, when listening to music at lower volumes the pitch of the notes the artists were singing became more ambiguous, but what they were saying was still clear. Like I could hear the words so started to sing along, but got my reference wrong and ended up in completely the wrong key. Not sure if I’ve explained that very well but I’m keen to see if anyone has any sort of explanation! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/avt569/eli5_why_does_the_pitch_of_a_sound_become_harder/ | {
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"The pitch you hear has to do with how fast the note makes your eardrum vibrate. Volume has to do with how much force is behind the vibration. At high volumes there is a lot of vibration so it's easier for your brain to pick up on the pattern your eardrum is registering. At much quieter volumes there is much less vibration so it's harder for your brain to pick out this pattern; also note, at VERY high volumes the vibrations are so forceful that they can start to distort and your brain again has difficulty picking up the pattern."
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ccwrhg | how do supplements like cinnamon and berberine lower blood sugar? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ccwrhg/eli5_how_do_supplements_like_cinnamon_and/ | {
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"Cinnamon has not been proven to lower blood sugar. Some tests say it does but others say it has no effect. Tests seem to show that berberine has a slight effect, but no one knows why or how and it seems to have some negative side effects. \n\n\nSupplements are typically supplements because they aren't proven to actually do anything. Furthermore, there is no regulations on them and if you go to a store and buy supplements you often aren't getting the thing you are actually buying because the company has no legal obligation to actually put in the bottle what they say they do. And many don't."
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1qvvz2 | why does game such as skyrim with a huge open world only require 1 disc but a game like call of duty: ghosts require 2 discs? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1qvvz2/eli5why_does_game_such_as_skyrim_with_a_huge_open/ | {
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"[Skyrim is only 6 GB](_URL_0_), while COD: Ghosts is 31.1 GB. That site is terrible on mobile, or else I would give you a tl;dr. Sorry. ",
"The size of a game mostly depends on the number and quality of assets: Textures, animations, 3D models, sounds. I think you'll quickly notice that most assets in Skyrim are reused extremely often. This results in a consistent, but sometimes repetitive world. Even though e. g. dungeon design has improved massively compared to Oblivion, there are still many repeating \"building blocks\".\n\nCall of Duty is a different beast. Because the gameplay of especially the single player largely stays the same over the course of the campaign, variation has to be simulated by changing set pieces. This requires new models, textures and sounds each time, which is both expensive to produce and - if a high level of quality is desired - to store, resulting in more discs required for the console version.\n\nYou might not be aware of this, but despite Skyrim being a large open world game with potentially hundreds of hours of gameplay, the team behind it was actually smaller than those teams behind recent Call of Duty titles. There is a connection between the small team size and the nature and number of the assets used in Skyrim. For reference, I'd recommend [this blog entry](_URL_0_) by one of Bethesda's lead developers.",
"Given how they've done a bad job of porting ghosts to pc ... or developed it on pc and being lazy about tidying up assets/ram management, everything isn't compressed. Why bother when you have 50gb of space on ps3 and can get people to install it on xbox?\n\nTL;DR Uncompressed game data.",
"It's not all about quality, it also depends on the methods you use for a lot of things.\n\nLet's take an example with the \"dynamic\" map in COD:Ghosts.\nYou might think it uses physics to destroy the map but it doesn't, there's a second version of the destructed map which is just under the normal one .\n\nThat's a pretty clever solution, but it makes the map 2 times larger (in terms of filesize at least)\n\nAnd finally you have to take into account the big differences between the engines used.\nFor example, the engine used in COD: Ghosts has a big lack of physics and lighting. Therefore, to mke the game looks good they have to rely on big textures and models with more polys, which makes the game even more heavy.\n\nEDIT: Oh and maybe when you install the 30GB you also install all the upcoming DLC's which you can only unlock when you'll buy them.\n\nSource : Currently studying game designing.",
"When you take away all the graphics assets and sounds, the entire game of Skyrim is only 237 MB large (the Skyrim.esm file). That's the data for the world, quests, scripting, items, etc. \n\nThe full combination of graphical assets is only 3 gigs worth of compressed BSA files. That contains all the building blocks to build anything in Skyrim.",
"You've heard of Arma 3 right? The game that can simulate an entire country + civilian a.i. persitently online while people simulate warfare?\n\nWell why is that game smaller than both Skyrim and COD?\n\nFirst it has to do with how the games load information.\n\nArma loads all of the information at once so it can be accessed all at once. For example, I've run scripts that makes the a.i. fight each other dynamically for 6 hours at a time.\n\nCome back to see them still fighting and plotting missions. Yet, there was no load times.\n\nGo to skyrim, it has to load occasionally.\n\nGo to Cod. It loads the map when you play online, then it loads the lobby, then it loads the next map.\n\nThis however is all based on the system's limits. So if Skyrim/COD were made for the PC, they wouldn't require the double disc for any reason unless there is so much content that one disc at 7~ gigs cannot handle it.",
"There are many reasons really. Assets indeed are a large part of it. Some games are using higher quality assets than others. Like higher resolution textures, higher bit rate audio, HD video ect. Also some games use heavy forms of compression where possible and other use less if any. Its a lot more complicated than that though because it a game can be made in so many ways.\n\n For example a game like skyrim probably has a bunch of procedural aspects to it like automatically generated foliage when ends up saving a ton space while still looking great when used correctly. There are many tricks like this in game programming. You could use a height map to generate terrain instead of hand molding it for example A game like COD probably has little of that going on and most of what you see is \"hard coded\" which means every thing was explicitly placed by designers which eats more space. \n\nThis really only scratches the surface but long story short there are a ton of optimizations and design choices that can have an effect on the final game size. Game content usually is a small factor in that.",
"Ghosts requires the extra disc to carry it's giant ego "
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axsthd | 'meaning' vs 'semantics' | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/axsthd/eli5_meaning_vs_semantics/ | {
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"\"Meaning\" is like the general idea of something where as \"semantics\" is the very specific meaning of an idea.\n\nThis is why people will say \"well if you *really* want to argue about semantics\" when an argument about what someone intended to say arises. \n\nUsually those arguments devolve into nonsense speculation about extremely specific language that doesn't really say anything about what the person intended to say or what the person's \"meaning\" is.\n\nThis is my understanding as a native English speaker, not as someone with a degree in English."
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6ghzad | why do some vehicles (certain busses, semi trucks, etc) have completely flat front ends? isn't this the last aerodynamic shape possible without getting concave? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6ghzad/eli5_why_do_some_vehicles_certain_busses_semi/ | {
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"A lot of vehicles prioritize length and internal volume over aerodynamics. A bus operator for example wants to be able to fit the maximum number of people in his buses, while still staying under the total allowable length for a bus.",
"There are some weird answers in here...\n\nHaving a semi-flat front isn't the worst actually, you can look at a box fish for example.\n\nSecond these vehicles aren't meant to move very fast, so drag doesn't play a big role...but what about transport trucks on the freeway going 70 mph?\n\nWell they're usually pulling something that's going to kill any aerodynamics, sure they could be made more aerodynamic, but the priority goes towards the engine compartment and design, and the flat front helps feed air into the engine for combustion and the radiator for cooling.",
"Very large vehicles have a lot of inertia, so air drag does not have as much of a practical effect at street speeds as it would on normal automobiles.\n\nCity buses in particular spend so much time slowing down, stopping, and speeding up again that their average speed is low and thus air drag is not much of a factor.\n\nOnly at much higher speeds - such as those achieved by a maglev train - would a very massive vehicle with a lot of inertia need to be designed aerodynamically. This is why the relatively slow trains in the US look like this:\n\n_URL_1_\n\nWhile the Shinkansen bullet trains in Japan look like this:\n\n_URL_0_\n\nAerodynamic needs change with both mass and speed. Lower mass or higher speed = you have to take air drag more into account.\n\n",
"There's a lot of different answers here. I can't exactly link this, but way back in grad school, I was part of a group working on the math part of a larger problem in fluid dynamics (air is a type of fluid), that was very roughly similar to a flat box moving through a compressible fluid. \n\nTL;DR: the air in front of the truck smooshes up and creates a relatively high(er) pressure zone that very loosely approximates an [albacore hull](_URL_0_), which is pretty efficient in moving through air/water/fluid.\n\nTo start - this wasn't my model/project or anything, but a few people in class with me helped out figuring out the math involved. Moving on - using the idea of a box moving through a compressible fluid as a frame our model spit out something like this (hugely simplified): imagine the flat cab of the truck moving at 50mph down the highway. The air immediately in front of the cab slows dramatically and compresses as it encounters the windshield/grill, before it turns ~90 degrees and scoots across the front of the windshield and off to the side of the truck. This creates a relatively higher pressure 'bubble' immediately in front of the truck. This little 'bubble' of air in front of the cab forces the air that comes next (as its driving down the road) to move off to the side and deflect at an angle, much more efficiently. If you were to picture it, imagine that flat-front cab having an invisible bubble/dome (made of higher pressure/compressed air) over the flat front which helps it move through the air easier. \n\nTo be clear, its not the **most** efficient shape possible (that would be more conical), I'm saying that its far more efficient/aerodynamic than you might guess. Plus it has the visibility/volume benefits that other people are mentioning.",
"It's mostly about maximizing usable space. \n\nFor buses, an engine in the back takes up less space than in the front (because it can take up the entire vertical space) and you don't have to run the drive shaft as far to power the rear wheels. So for city buses this allows you to have low floors, which improves handicap accessibility (no stairs) and for long-distance buses it allows more cargo space underneath. \n\nSemi-trucks like this are more common in Europe because Europe has regulations governing the total length of trucks, so a shorter cab allows a longer trailer. Limits in the US are generally only based on the trailer length. ",
"Truck driver here. Flat front because the radiator is just inside that grill. It needs the direct air to cool it. The flat front maximizes the surface area letting air pass directly onto it. ",
"Flat cabs or cab over engine busses also increase visibility in the front. When you have a long nose of the vehicle sticking out in front on nearly the same plane as the windshield there are lots of blind spots. People get on and off the bus and cross the street in front of the bus, thus creating a high likelihood of getting run over if they are in a blind spot. That's why slot of school busses have the arm that extends out the front so people walk out in front far enough to be visible. \n"
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g2lbgs | why do builders and carpenters use those extra big square pencils instead of the regular pencils the rest of the population uses? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/g2lbgs/eli5_why_do_builders_and_carpenters_use_those/ | {
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"They don't roll off your work space, the thicker lead is stronger and easier to see on dimensional lumber and you look cooler sharpening it with a knife than you would spinning a round pencil in a sharpener",
"The larger squareish ones:\n\n1. don't roll!\n2. can be easily sharpened with an exacto or other hand-held knife common on the jobsite. You tend to chop a ticonderoga in half when you do that.\n3. little easier in gloves.\n\nAlso...i suspect they are better marketing materials given how big you can print on the side....and pretty much everyone gets these for free at the lumber yard.",
"Squares don't roll and their size makes them less likely to fit into small cracks. Their worksite might have numerous places that a normal pencil would roll away and fall into some crack somewhere. Especially if working on the upper framework of whatever you're building, you don't want your pencil to get away from you when you're up high.",
"The wood they are writing on isn't as smooth as the paper you write on with a normal pencil. The thicker and stronger lead wears better.",
"My partner would like to know how clumsy do you think us carpenters are!",
"A regular pencil runs out of graphite sooner. It makes a finer line, but that detail is not so important to rough work. A dependable long lasting carpenter's pencil is the way to go. I sometimes use a metal scribe or even a nail as a Neanderthal."
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7uk7vj | how do chess games between some of the best in the world very often end up in a draw? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7uk7vj/eli5_how_do_chess_games_between_some_of_the_best/ | {
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"Chess is slightly biased toward white, given even skill levels. All other factors are identical, it's just that white gets to move first and thereby set the tone for the match. \n\nDue to this inequality, white players tend to play for a win (+1), and black players tend to play for a draw (+0.5). Black often plays defensively, while white tries to break that defense (at the very highest levels of play). Right now, that's the Ruy Lopez variation. This means that the first 11 or so moves are pre-planned and already locked in. If a game isn't won within 30 moves or so, it'll likely be a draw (at the highest levels), which means white has ~20 moves to win. \n\nBlack's job is easier; all he has to do is trade pieces until the board is relatively cleared, making white's job much harder. White has to reposition and restrategize and constantly look for very slim edges. \n\nWhat this ends up meaning is that black is typically successful, because he has a much easier task. It's very difficult to beat a person who is around your own skill level, is playing defensively, and actively aiming to sabotage the game in order to achieve a draw. He isn't trying to win, he's just trying to not lose. ",
"As for the how: While Chess is not necessarily a 'solved game'--meaning every possible permutation of moves is recorded for an \"optimal\" response to every action--the predictive and premeditative caliber of high-end players is very similar. Their practise in determining the available decision tree, x-amount of moves in advance, often leads players of equal skill to stalemate a match. This doesn't just apply to top-tier players, any players of near equal skill will see the same effect.\n\nAs for the why: It's strategically advantageous to tie, rather than lose, and it's technically easier (based on how chess works) to tie, rather than win. This makes a tie game in peak-performance of non-binary games statistically more common. Kotama brilliantly explains why ties are also strategic choices.",
"It is widely believed that with perfect play, a chess game will result in a draw. The closer the players are to perfect, the more chance of a draw.\n\nAnother way to look at is bad players are more likely to make mistakes that instantly lead to a loss. The better you are, the less of these kinds of mistakes you make.",
"I'll try this from a different angle than several of the answers here.\n\nImagine a chess game where both players have traded pieces, and only have their kings left. As the kings cannot move into check, neither side can possibly checkmate the other, and while one could potentially be stuck to one side of the board, neither can advance, so the game, and several others like it, is a draw. Neither side can force a checkmate.\n\nNow imagine the same game, except white has two of his knights left. White could theoretically checkmate black with these resources, but it would require black to actively move into a position where white could complete the checkmate, and it is trivially easy for him to avoid such situations. As checkmate cannot be forced, the game is a draw. There are many variants of situations where the side with the disadvantage in pieces can, with good play, maintain a situation where they cannot be forced into a checkmate position.\n\nFinally, there are a few minor rules related to draws, namely the 50-move rule, threefold repetition, and stalemate. In any of these cases, the game is a draw. These situations (and the threat of causing them) can also be used by a player with inferior position to force a player in better position to lose his advantage.\n\nA player who is losing (black by default, due to white's positional advantage granted by the first move) needs only to force the game into one of thousands of drawn endgame positions to avoid checkmate and thus avoid a loss. At high level, a player with an advantage frequently is not able to prevent an opponent from doing so without giving up his advantages or risking losing himself.\n\nOf course, you rarely see the actual endgames the top players are angling for, because they generally agree to a draw many moves before an \"obvious\" drawn endgame position is reached (or resign if a checkmate or massive disadvantage in material/position is inevitable).",
"To explain it as simply as possible; chess has a finite amount of moves, especially during the early game. Chess masters (aka, the very best) memorize the moves and overall strategies used.\n\nThis means if you are white and you move one of your pawns, your opponent is immediately thinking of every possible opening gambit that move could lead into and moving in such a way as to counter that strategy.\n\nOf course (assuming you are both masters) you will read his moves as well and move to counter.\n\nSo between grand masters it is more a game of reading what your opponent is trying to do, and then countering it, while they do the same to you.\n\nAssuming no one makes a mistake, you'll both counter each other's strategies throughout the game until no more moves can be made, resulting in a draw.\n\nChess between high level players is almost more about who makes the first fuck up than anything else.",
"So what's the use of playing chess after you mastered it? Until there is something to learn ok, but after that (diminished returns doesn't mean nothing, I know, but still) what's truly the appeal? It's not like there are patches or smth like in strategy games of today ",
"Same reason tic tac toe does. The balanced but limited rule set means that as long as you know all the potential moves and don't make any mistakes, no one gains an advantage and so no one wins. ",
"This is actually a very interesting question.\n\nWhile the top grandmasters are very, very much better than the average chessplayer, put any of them up against one of the top computer programs (or even a 2nd or 3rd rate computer program) and the grandmaster would lose frequently, possibly manage a few draws, but almost never win.\n\nThis shows that they are all playing lots of moves which are theoretically exploitable, but which their opponents don't manage to exploit as often as they should.\n\nSo the reason that so many games end in draws, is not so much that they are playing very good chess, but more that they are all playing chess at about the best level humans can manage. They make exploitable moves because the way to exploit it subtle and possibly hidden deep with one of a myriad variations, so they don't notice it in their analysis. But then their opponents often don't notice it either for much the same reason."
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xitn4 | how are certain tires with a different shape tread better than others? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/xitn4/eli5_how_are_certain_tires_with_a_different_shape/ | {
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"An important factor to note is something called hydroplaning. Hydroplaning is what happens when water can't get out from underneath a tire fast enough, and the tire slips on top of this water, instead of touching the pavement. \n\nSmooth tires grip the best on smooth pavement because they have the most contact, but will be prone to hydroplaning, because the water has nowhere to go.\n\nOnes with tread in them offer paths for the water to go so they can clear the water out from underneath faster, touching the pavement and keeping you from slipping. Water is incredibly complex in these conditions and there's no universal \"best\" tread pattern, due to all the factors at play. There's lots of tread designs because making these patterns is essentially making something up and testing how well it works, and repeating it. \n\nAlso, the rounder the tire is, the faster it can go, due to something called rolling resistance. But the trade-off is less contact with the pavement, resulting in less grip.\n\nBig wide knobs are used in uneven terrain, because its essentially pushing dirt / ice and the knobs give it places where the wheel can grip into it.\n\nAlso important is what the tire is made of. It can be soft, and less durable, or hard, and more durable. Soft stuff sticks better, and hard stuff sticks less. Some compounds work better when its cold, vs warm, etc. Some stuff can stick better to ice or dirt or pavement and so on and so forth. \n\n"
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1ii6wo | why is it that manure helps fertilize plants, but i have to go clean up dog crap in my yard or my grass dies? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1ii6wo/eli5_why_is_it_that_manure_helps_fertilize_plants/ | {
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"Whether or not a specific type of poop is beneficial to plants depends mainly on the pooper's diet. So, generally speaking, for feces to make a good plant fertilizer it has to contain digested plant matter. That's why cow manure (herbivore) makes an excellent plant fertilizer, while dog poop (carnivore) doesn't work so well."
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3ycvq7 | what is google search engine? also, who uses bing anyways? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3ycvq7/eli5_what_is_google_search_engine_also_who_uses/ | {
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"About 20% of the internet uses Bing (8% is Yahoo, 12% is Bing).\n\nA search engine like Google and Bing is a combination of software, primarily a crawler and an indexer. The crawler is software that automatically searches every URL it can find and captures the content of that page. The indexer then takes that content and categorizes into a way that is searchable. \n\nBoth Google and Bing, and other major modern search engines, have different secret algorithms that determine how to best index each webpage and what is the best order to return the results to the user. Both will also take into consideration the search history of the user to provide better results. For example, a programmer searching for C-Strings what something considerably different than most other people, their search history will provide clues as to which group the user probably falls in.\n\nThe biggest noticeable difference between each search engine is the perceived quality of the top results. Many people tend find that the top results provided by Google are more relevant than the top results provided by Bing.\n\nThese search engines and all the software that works together to power them are also crucial to other software provided by these and other companies. "
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3dw5pg | what does this giant wall of buttons and cables do for a music producer that a computer can't do? (picture in post) | _URL_0_ | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3dw5pg/eli5_what_does_this_giant_wall_of_buttons_and/ | {
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"The short version: Not much.\n\nThe long version:\n\nIt's the difference between analog and digital.\n\nEverything that can be done on a computer with audio is *simulating* something that can be done in the real world. But it's all manipulation of a string of numbers, so there are things that are lost in transmission and sampling.\n\nFor many types of music, this doesn't make much of a difference. But other genres, or producers, notice the difference and prefer to work with modules and analog synthesizers.\n\nSome musicians and producers like working lime this because it forces limits. You have to plan ahead and think things through when working on a system like this. Where computer systems are susceptible to scatter brain influences. ",
"Those big walls of buttons and knobs are made up up of individual pieces of sound equipment in this case it looks like it is probably equipment for audio synthesis (electronic music stuff). Audio equipment is made to fit into those racks so it can take up as little space as possible and be organized. The cables just connect different pieces of gear in different ways to create and alter the electrical signal which becomes the sound which is pretty much its own art form. This could all be done on computers which is generally easier, cheaper, and more reliable but doing it with analog equipment creates a different and sometimes desirable sound.",
"That looks like a modular analog synthesizer. Possibly one of the famous Moog synthesizers. It has building blocks of oscillators, amplifiers and filters. The user had to patch the various modules to configure it. Once set up it could be played with a keyboard. ",
"Well, it looks like the whole analog vs digital bit has already been covered, so I'll explain why you might still want a wall of buttons even if everything is on your computer. Sometimes having all your controls onscreen just isn't enough. When I'm working in ableton, my midi controllers don't let me achieve any results I couldn't from just manipulating onscreen controls. However, they make experimentation happen a lot quicker than it could if I was just using my mouse and keyboard.\n\nSince that was very vague, I'll give an example. Let's say I want to make a new drum pattern. Sure, I could click to place drum hits on a timeline, and have a rough idea about what it'll sound like even before I press play. And I can play it, and make a few tweaks, play it again, and make a few more tweaks. The problem is, it gets to the point where I'm spending more time thinking \"This doesn't sound right, what does it need?\" than actually making music.\n\nEnter the pad controller. I can finger drum out the beat, every repetition trying something different. If I like one variation, I'll start repeating it, and try adding more. Sometimes I'll even make a mistake, and keep doing it because I like the sound. There's no more wondering why my music doesn't sound right, I'm simply letting myself be drawn towards doing what sounds good to me. Once I've got something I like, I simply hit record, quantize, and do a few final tweaks, and I've got something I like. The best part is that the whole time I've been having fun instead of wondering why I can't get it right. Pad controllers are all the fun of tapping on your desk when you're bored with the added benefit of being able to show your friends without them looking at you weird!\n\nAs a side note, racks and racks of equipment is how the sound gets to the computer, even in fully digitized studios."
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1pgr6w | why is it impossible to scare a bug on the opposite side of a window? | Seriously. You can tap on the glass and everything and they don't even notice but if you were on the other side with them you can't even get close without them flying away. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1pgr6w/why_is_it_impossible_to_scare_a_bug_on_the/ | {
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"They are more sensitive to air movement than sound or visual input. "
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3fwd5s | how is the infamous housing bubble that the u.s. created different from the current student loan bubble that we are creating as we speak? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3fwd5s/eli5_how_is_the_infamous_housing_bubble_that_the/ | {
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" > Eventually banks will realize all these people that drop out or don't pay them back for whatever reason, is just losses. At least with homes there was (although small) some asset for the banks to put a lien on.\n\nThis is the difference. The banks will always get their money back. There is no way out of student debt. They can force you to sell your posessions, they can intercept your paychecks, they can do anything short of throwing you in jail to get you to pay those debts. Even if you go bankrupt, you go to court for it, you have literally $0 and no assets besides the clothes on your back, it is illegal for the debt to go away, you must continue paying it with whatever scraps of cash you find, and it will keep accruing interest. \n\nThe only way you can ever get out of student debt, is if you die, and even then, the banks will attempt to get their lost money from your family, even though it's technically illegal to ask. As long as you are alive, the banks will get their money back. "
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7ts1a3 | do babies still dance if they haven't been exposed to it? | My one year old has been dancing and moving to music for at least the past couple of months. He has undoubtedly been exposed to the act of dancing through me and his mother and through music videos etc. But do babies who haven't been exposed to this behaviour still show a desire/urge to dance? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7ts1a3/eli5_do_babies_still_dance_if_they_havent_been/ | {
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"Yes. There's pretty good research indicating that even infants as young as five months will respond to music by moving rhythmically. The degree to which they're successful at synchronizing their movements with the beat increases with age, but it's something we seem to have an innate instinct for. \n\nBut it's probably more the *beat*, than the music as such, to which the youngest infants respond. Simple drums, or even just repetitive, rhythmic sounds of any sort, seem to provoke the same kind of response as anything most people would be tempted to describe as \"music\" as such. "
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2kywsu | how do anti-bacterial hand gels/soaps kill bacterial cells but not your own cells? | EDIT: Wow, thanks for the great responses! Never knew epidermal cells were dead... kinda creepy really! | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2kywsu/eli5_how_do_antibacterial_hand_gelssoaps_kill/ | {
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"It does not kill you own cells, but overuse can cause undesirable effects like dryness and cracks in the skin. Depending on the gel/soap, it will have components that remove moisture, lipids and also kill bacteria (similar to how antibiotics kill bacteria but your body cells when you take them). The idea is create an undesirable environment for the bacteria to grow or live. This also kills off \"good\" bacteria that helps maintain a balance in the skin flora, preventing \"bad\" bacteria from growing there, or regulating/stimulating the skin's defense mechanisms on a daily basis. So excessive use, can cause cracks/dryness along with the death of these commensals, which will give the bad bacteria a window of opportunity to attack and invade (similar to how you may get diarrhea after taking particular antibiotics but has quite a different mechanism).",
"Skin cells and bacteria cells are built very differently. Because of that chemicals in soap are mostly harmless to us and dangerous to bacteria. Because bacteria cells are much more fragile it doesn't take much to disrupt their inner workings. ",
"Bacteria doesn't have a protective layer of dermis and epidermis covering it. \n\nIf you were to inject pure alcohol hand sanitizer into your body, I have confidence it would kill the cells it came into contact with. ",
"[Also good to note, anti-bacterial soaps are not really any better than regular soaps at cleaning your hands.](_URL_0_)",
"There are multiple kinds. The alcohol-based gels work by ruining the bacteria's cell walls; alcohol in high concentration is very lethal to nearly all bacteria. The outer layer of human skin is already dead, and a lot more resistant to being penetrated by alcohol; the 30 seconds or so that you're rubbing your hands isn't enough to get through that (relatively) thick layer of protein and other dead-cell bits. But if you get hand sanitizer into a small cut it will touch unprotected, living tissues and sting. It also strips your skin of some of its natural oils, which is why the hand gels usually have moisturizers in them.\n\nRelated: Your stomach, and to some extent other parts of the digestive tract, is already protected against *some* chemicals because it's such a strongly acidic environment anyway and it takes rapid cell replacement and a mucus layer to keep the acid from harming you. This also reduces damage from alcohol, though alcohol is still poison. Ethanol, the kind in liquor and beer, is a poison too, but mild to humans in very low concentrations and we've evolved to be able to consume small amounts. It's naturally present in fermenting fruit etc. anyway like we would have encountered in the wild. If you drink a human-potable form of alcohol (say, vodka, which is usually 35-50% ethanol) the most it'll do to your stomach, if you don't overdo it, is irritate the lining; stomachs are tough. Then it's diluted heavily in your bloodstream. But if you wash a countertop with that plain vodka, it'll kill a lot of bacteria; it hits them full-strength and they don't have protective layers. \n\nThe soaps with a small amount of an antibacterial topical drug in them, instead of alcohol, are similar. They're toxic to bacteria, but don't really penetrate the thicker, non-living human skin layer. The amount of exposure you get just from washing your hands, even if you have a few little cuts, isn't enough to do anything bad to you.",
"The main reason why antibacterial agents kill bacteria, but not human cells is that bacterial cells are different from your cells. The most common antibacterial agent in soap is called triclosan. It sticks to a bacterial protein that makes fatty acids ([enoyl-acyl carrier protein reductase](_URL_0_)), which is essential for bacterial metabolism. This protein, carried by many different bacteria, is very different from the human (mammalian) protein that does the same job. The triclosan will stick to the bacterial protein, but will not stick to the mammalian protein. So the active ingredient in the soap gums up the works in bacterial cells and does nothing to mammal (human) cells. \n\nAntibiotics work in a similar way. Penicillin (and similar beta-lactam drugs) stick to the cell wall and break up the molecules which stitch the cell wall together. The thing is is that no animal cells have cell walls, only plants and bacteria do, so the drug only kills those cells. ",
"med school here. \n\nbacteria are a more simplistic type of cell as compared to the type of cells that make up our body (prokaryote vs. eukaryote). Since prokaryotes are genetically more simple compared to our human cells (think basic bitch vs. Jennifer Lawrence), it takes slightly reactive substances to mess with SOME of them. Hand gels are high in some compounds that may inhibit growth, detach the bacteria, cause cell explosion, etc. \n\nToo much of anything is bad. It's true, if you throw too much alcohol on your skin, it can eventually bypass the dead layer on top (which is a protective measure to keep out bacteria/basic bitches) causing irritation and other problems.\n\nA lot of comments involve people discussing antibiotics. there aren't any handgels/soaps that contain antibiotics. Other comments talk about resistance, that's a totally different story. \n\nFACT: there are more bacterial cells on your skin and in your intestines than human cells that make up your body. \n\nFACT: there are species of bacterial cells in our intestines that have yet to be discovered. \n\n",
"While many of the responses here involve alcohol, which are found in hand sanitizers, they do not apply to anti-bacterial soaps. These do not contain alcohol but rather a substance called triclosan. This works by binding onto an enzyme that is responsible for generating the cell wall of the bacteria, and thus preventing it from doing so. This enzyme is not found in animal cells and thus do not affect us. \n",
"I'd really like to see a study on how much bacteria is on the handle of liquid soaps.",
"Because the outer layer of your skin is made of dead skin cells, and so nothing happens when alcohol comes in contact with them.",
"Since no one has really given a direct answer to the question, here's a more specific answer as to how they work based on my little knowledge of microbiology. \n\n\nSo bacteria have 2 types of cell walls, the details of which escape me at the moment. But you have **Gram Positive** and **Gram Negative** cell walls. These differences just describe the make up of the bacteria cell walls through a process in the lab called gram staining. \n\n\nWe use these cell walls to determine the types of antimicrobial and antibacterial agents to use in the hospitals as a generalization to fight bacteria when we aren't 100% sure what it is. Similar to how you go in to the hospital with signs and symptoms of mono, they put you on antibiotics without knowing entirely what it is yet. That's because these drugs work fairly well for the classes (**Gram positive and Gram negative**) as a whole. \n\n\n**Hand soaps** , well most, use an active ingredient called [Triclosan](_URL_1_) which is similar to another very widely used ingrediant that [\"Triclocarban is predominantly active against gram positive bacteria (bacteria with a thick peptidoglycan wall)\"](_URL_0_)\n\n\nThis holds true for other agents such as **Penicillins** which **inhibit the synthesis of bacterial cell walls** by inhibiting beta lactam formation. **Antifungals which damage cytoplasmic membranes ** and drugs like **tetracyclines and clindamycin** which **inhibit bacterial protein sythesis**\n\n\nBut there are reasons that these drugs aren't supposed to be used for long periods, and that is because it can damage the cells in your gut, called your normal flora. Normal flora aren't your cells in the sense that your body manufactures them, but these little buggies help your body out by aiding in digestion and help keep us healthy. Damaging normal flora can lead to what is called a super infection. Sorry I am rambling. \n\n\n**Tl;Dr: antimicrobial soaps attack specific things in bacterial cell walls or specific proteins the bacteria need to grow that our cells don't produce, causing them to die or not grow. **\n\n\nIf anyone more adept in the field would provide input of anything I missed that would be great. ",
"So much misinformation here. It's not like hand sanitizer kills cells indiscriminately. \n\nBascially you are made of eukaryotic cells, and bacteria is made of prokaryotic cells. Since we evolutionarily separated so long ago, prokaryotes have very different ways of taking up chemicals and lack the metabolic systems to dispose of them. If you drink hand sanitizer, most likely the chemical that they're using to kill the bacteria might be sent to the liver and metabolized.\n\nIf a bacteria absorbs the hand sanitizer chemical, then it'll poison the bacteria. It might interact with cell machinary to stop cell division, stop protein transcription, or something like this. In that way the bacteria can't go about its day to day functions and will subsequently die. Similarly some chemicals might be used which can break down cell walls made of things like peptidoglycan, which bacterial cell walls consist of. The idea, anyway, is to use something that'll cause the bacteria to die. Since you don't have the same machinary as bacteria, this allows chemicals to differentiate and not harm eukaryotic cells where they might kill prokaryotic ones. This can be by any means, such as by inhibiting enzymes that are not present in eukaryotes. ",
"\"what is dead may never die.\" \n\nBasically the first layers of skin are a protective dead layer. ",
"An important point that the top comment doesn't make is that most hand soaps aren't \"killing\" the bacteria, rather they reduce the surface tension of water on your hands, which are hydrophobic, and allow bacterial cells to be removed and washed away. ",
"MOST soaps that say antibacterial are actually just normal soaps. Every soap is antibacterial, in the way that it makes your skin slippery enough that most bacterial will slide off with water. Anything strong enough to kill all bacteria will burn your skin. ",
"The outer skin cells on our body are already dead and will soon be sloughed off and replaced. ",
"In simple terms, they don't. They kill both bad & good bacteria and it's argued that they're not safe* to use.",
"if im not mistaken, they do kill good bacteria",
"Most antibiotics exploit differences in cell structure or metabolism between eukaryotic cells (your cells), and prokaryotic cells (bacteria). This is why they generally kill bacteria and do not harm you. Major structural differences include ribosome targets and the cell wall constitutes. Eukaryotic cells do not have cell walls and have different ribosome structure. "
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"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triclocarban",
"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triclosan"
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6woyli | how are old games "remastered" for current generation consoles? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6woyli/eli5_how_are_old_games_remastered_for_current/ | {
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"They do have to redo the code, and to do so, they will most usually use the code from the original game, and make changes where it's due on the new devices they put the game on. \n\nThey will then take the textures from the original, and make them more detailed than they originally were, and replace the old with the now more detailed textures.",
"It can be as simple as redoing graphics and audio at a higher quality - most remasters are this.\n\nSome include additional bugfixes as well, as sort of a \"definitive\" edition.\n\nOthers are the storyline and locations of the old game but put into the game engine and mechanics of a newer title (like the Pokémom remakes), which let you reuse a lot of content but still provides a substantially better experience than the original.\n\nOthers don't have the newer titles to scrape the engine off of, and actually have all new graphics, added content, and a redone engine (such as the HD version of Cave Story and it's several console ports). \n\nTL;DR It can be a fairly trivial job or just as hard as making a new game, depending on how far the dev wants to go."
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9tme0w | why are viruses incurable, while things like infections can be cured with antibiotics? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9tme0w/eli5_why_are_viruses_incurable_while_things_like/ | {
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"Bacteria tend to be complex factories, they bring all their own machinery to run their production chain. Viruses, on the other hand, can be simpler. Some power tool designed to hijack an existing factory and change the product.\n\nSo when you are targeting a bacteria, you just need anything that can throw a wrench into this strange foreign factory, with its unique machinery and \"Made in Some-other-place!\" stickers. Since these things are different from the things that normally make up your body, it can be easier to make stuff that throws wrenches in the right place. You can break down the outer wall. You can break the machinery. Any of these will potentially kill the bacteria.\n\nOn the other hand, since a virus is using *your* factories, you can't simply shut them all down. You don't want to smash open the walls or break the machinery of the factories with 'Made in /u/turnipmeon' stickers, because that means the medicine will be damaging you. So you have a narrower range of things you can damage with a wrench, most of what is going on is just \"your body\" and you don't want to destroy \"Your body.\"",
"You need to define cure.\n\nViruses can be beaten using vaccines. Vaccines are just the virus reduced to a form that will not harm us, but will train our body to resist the regular damaging virus.\n\nSo viruses won't go away unless everyone gets vaccinated, or at least everyone who could let the virus continue to reproduce. Smallpox is the only virus eradicated this way, so far, though there are still samples left.\n\nInfections are fought with antibiotics when bacteria is threatening to overtake the immune system. The antibiotics help the immune system do its job and rid the body of the infection. But the bacteria causing the infection is usually always present in the body or in the surroundings, and it is the immune system failing that causes the infection, not necessarily the bacteria.\n\nSo what is a cure? Curing an individual? Having a known cure for any individual who gets sick? Wiping out all viruses and bacteria from the planet?\n\nThe last will never happen, except for specific strains. And even then, it is very difficult. Smallpox was relatively easy because it only infected humans. It also took 200 years to get rid of it. \n\nViruses and bacteria are everywhere. You'd have to sanitize the world to get rid of them all.\n\n\n\n",
"There are antiviral medications, however they tend to work far less effectively than what we typically see with antibiotics for similar reasons other users have stated. "
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22u7d6 | why can't we access all of our brains full power? what restricts us from doing so? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/22u7d6/eli5_why_cant_we_access_all_of_our_brains_full/ | {
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"We do access all of our brain. ",
"We do use all our brain power, its a myth that we don't.\nThought obviously you can learn to use your brain better by training.\n",
"Its not that we don't use it all. Different parts of the brain do different jobs. If that part isn't needed then it isn't in use because why waste energy?",
"While it is sort of try that we do only use 10% of you brain there is a reason for it if you doing math only the math part of your brain is working if you activated the emotional part while the math part is working it wouldn't increase your math capabilitys"
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70nqjw | why does time seem to take forever to pass when you are really high? especially on edibles? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/70nqjw/eli5_why_does_time_seem_to_take_forever_to_pass/ | {
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"The level of activity in the brain of neurotransmitters such as dopamine and norepinephrine may be the reason for this. Dopamine has a particularly strong connection with one's perception of time. Drugs that activate dopamine receptors speed up one's perception of time, while dopamine antagonists cause one to feel that time is passing slowly. \n_URL_0_"
]
} | [] | [] | [
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"https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_perception"
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4mewqi | why is the wifi on my computer so much faster than my iphone? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4mewqi/eli5_why_is_the_wifi_on_my_computer_so_much/ | {
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"Your phones receiver isn't very good. That's the problem in a nutshell. You can buy a small receiver to plug into your cable jack to boost the signal if you need to.",
"2 reasons.\n\n1. Your computer has better antennae. In computers, they are bigger and have better gain, which translates to more data that can be pushed over wireless.\n\n2. Your computer has more transmit power. Usually it is turned down on mobile devices to save power.\n\nEDIT: storage speeds can go into effect here for things like downloading something.",
"I had the exact opposite happen. \n\nI pay for 100/10 and on the 5Ghz connection on my phone (Galaxy S7), I get about 113 Mbps down, and about 12 up. However, the wireless card I bought for my tower was only 2.4 GHz, and it only got about 50 Mbps down, 10 up on an 4.0 Ghz 8 core, 32GB RAM Win7 PC. Got an Ethernet cable into the back of my PC into the router and I have the same exact speed that I do over 5Ghz WiFi. \n\nWhich iPhone do you have? The older ones don't have 5Ghz chips, and are limited to the slower bandwidth speeds. Also, what is the data rate that you pay your ISP for?",
"Your computer usually has more channels that are used in parallel\n\nAlso, your computer can process incomming data faster than your phone\n\n",
"Holy shit, like you're five?\nYour computer is a race car. Your phone is a soccer mom van.\nThey're driving on the same road."
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37a8ug | what role do the hormones testosterone and estrogen actually play in stereotypical masculinity and femininity? | In other words, what do each of these hormones contribute to common male and female personality characteristics? When we think of stereotypical masculinity for example, we think of certain attributes: strength, assertiveness, dominance, etc. Conversely, when we think of stereotypical femininity, we think of attributes like calmness, passiveness, gentleness, emotion-driven, etc. I'm not asserting that these are or aren't accurate, but I'm curious to what extent testosterone and estrogen play a role in the manifestation of these characteristics. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/37a8ug/eli5what_role_do_the_hormones_testosterone_and/ | {
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"Some of these are known to have a lot of impact. For example, Testosterone directly makes one stronger and larger, increasing muscle mass. Testosterone grows facial hair. It even makes female monkeys screech like males do. (and females normally do not.)\n\n_URL_0_\n\nEstrogen directly causes fat storage, the location fat is stored, and breast tissue, and softening of facial features compared to males. \n\nWe know these chemicals directly cause these characteristics, and people who suffer from Gender Identity Disorder/Syndrome, take estrogen or testosterone to mute not only their biological sex characteristics, but to take on the body shape and appearance of their identified gender. Thus a fully biological man can grow breasts and curves by taking estrogen, or a biological woman can grow facial hair and muscle mass by taking testosterone. Studies have shown that hormonal disruptions during development or present during growing up, may affect the development of Gender Identity Syndrome.\n\nMany sexual behaviors are biological, true. As human DNA is mapped, we are locating gene markers for aggression and nurturing behaviors, but some studies indicate that even our evolutionary behaviors may also be driven or triggered by our levels of hormones.",
"The simple answer is that it's not entirely known. It's such a charged issue that there's a great deal of skewed data out there, and study on sociological issues like stereotypes is difficult at the best of times because it's impossible to control for every variable in a sociological study.\n\nWhat we can say, confidently, is that certain attributes are attributed to particular sexes in some cultures, but not in others. For instance, in modern Western culture, we tend to stereotypically think of men as much more sex-driven than women. But if you rewind a few millennia, this wasn't true - to the ancient Greeks, women were the sexual ones. Other attributes, like men typically doing physical labor and women involved heavily in child-rearing, have some basis in biology: testosterone fuels upper body strength, and obviously child-bearing has been limited to women throughout history.\n\nI can say from my own personal experience (n=1 sample size, baby) that I did notice some shifts in my personality once I started taking estrogen and blocking testosterone as part of my transition from male to female. I am somewhat less impulsively competitive, with less urge to \"one-up\" anyone nearby. My ambition is unchanged. I'm much, much more social to the point that being alone for more than a day or so is fairly distressing to me. Only place I've noticed a change in dominance/passivity is in romantic relationships, where I am somewhat more passive but not to a tremendous degree."
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"http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/10/fashion/10Fitness.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0"
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20n70g | what does cosmic inflation mean to normal people like me? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/20n70g/eli5_what_does_cosmic_inflation_mean_to_normal/ | {
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"Directly? Nothing at all."
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7xu5lw | what is a (second)^2? | I understand how a S^2 is derived (integrated, technically i guess), and how it's necessary so you can multiply an acceleration by time to get velocity, but unlike with m^2 where it's actual area, you can't really get an "area" of time. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7xu5lw/eli5_what_is_a_second2/ | {
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"It means nothing by itself really. It is better to think of it as velocity per second rather than meter per second squared. ",
"I don't think there's any specific physical meaning to \"second-squared,\" so much as it comes up periodically when something is multiplied by an amount of time, twice. You can keep taking further derivatives of position to get s^3 (jerk), s^4 (jounce), s^5 (snap), etc. ",
"Many units in dimensional analysis are difficult to understand intuitively, because they don't make a lot of sense in isolation. In this case, s^2 is rarely used alone, but appears in the unit m/s^2 , which is functionally equivalent to m/s/s, or rather the rate of change of velocity (i.e. acceleration) expressed in terms of meters per second, per second."
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3x4ijy | the importance in the increase of nasa's funding | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3x4ijy/eli5_the_importance_in_the_increase_of_nasas/ | {
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"They're doing some very important work...if you consider the survival of the human race to be important.\n\nIt's pretty clear that we will eventually overcrowd this old ball of mud. We will need somewhere else to go...and who else is working on that?\n\n[Please don't reply 'the guy with the Mars reality show'...pretty hard to take that seriously.]",
"I'm going to slightly disagree with /u/juche on this one. NASA is doing very important work,but its absolutely for the benefit of us living on the Earth right now, and in the future.\n\nSpace exploration has amazing effects on our society, like increased economic activity and new technological breakthroughs. It's said that for every dollar spent on the space program, $8 have been returned due to these breakthroughs.\n\nBy setting a goal, be it get to space, the moon, Mars, etc... NASA pushes the boundaries of Science, inspires the next generation of great thinkers, and provides us new technologies to use right here on earth. Sure, other organizations could do this same research, but NASA is already well established, equipped, and publicly accountable/accessible.",
"There are three options: publicly-funded space research, privately-funded space research, and no space research.\n\nSpace research not only teaches us about what's out there, but often illuminates what's going on on our own planet, teaches us amazing things about how the universe works and how it all began, and gives us important perspective on where we fit in relation to everything else. It may also find and deploy human colonies in the future, serve to make first contact with an alien race, and drive the development of innovative technologies that may prove incredibly beneficial to humankind.\n\nThat is, if it's funded.\n\nIf it's privately funded, then what you'll find is that ultimately the company conducting the research is doing so in the hope of profit. It's not a great comparison, but consider pharmaceutical companies. They develop drugs that do great things, but only the ones they think will make them money. Then douchebag hedge-fund managers take things over and jack up prices, but that's another story.\n\nPublicly-funded research, however, should be free of the need to make money, and able to focus on actually doing things of scientific benefit. It is this freedom that makes funding NASA worthwhile. This is the same reason that university research is generally publicly funded, through various mechanisms. Oddly, when it's Coke paying for a study on how high-fructose corn syrup affects obesity, it's a *little* less credible than when a third-party, scientific review studies the same thing."
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g2sqqf | why do games need to download even more data when you download the game, cant they download all the data at once when you actually download the game? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/g2sqqf/eli5_why_do_games_need_to_download_even_more_data/ | {
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"A game developer makes a game. They combine the thousands of different files the game is made of, put them in a downloadable \"package\" and release it as a version 1.0. When you get the game, you download that package and then the installer unpacks it and puts everything in place on your computer.\n\nThen, they find bugs to fix, or make minor balance changes or add little bits of content here and there. They make a little file that contains the new and altered content, and call this a \"patch\". Once you download the patch, it puts all new files on top of the old ones and sets your game version to version 1.1.\n\nNow, when you download the game, it downloads version 1.0, installs (by unpacking everything and putting all the files in the right spots). Once it's installed and runs for the first time, the game phones home, realizes that patch 1.1 is out, and downloads that and installs it later.\n\nIf you downloaded the patch before you installed the game, the patch wouldn't know what to do, because the files it's supposed to alter haven't been put in place yet (they're all in their nice downloaded packaging). So the game has to download and install first before it can patch.\n\nA way the developer can fix that is by making a whole new download package, where the whole game, including the new fixes, is packed from the beginning as version 1.1. Now new downloads will get the newest, already patched version.\n\nIn games that see rapid patching cycles, this might not be feasible - there might not be a distinct 1.0, and 1.1 and 1.1.1 and 1.1.3 and 1.1.7 \"big pack\" with everything included. There is only 1.0 and then the relevant latest patch. After a few versions, say, when version 1.2 is ready to come out, then the developer makes a 1.2 prepackaged version, and then you no longer need to use all the 1.1.x patches on it."
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1n49i3 | why has the global average temperature remained the same for more than a decade? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1n49i3/eli5_why_has_the_global_average_temperature/ | {
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"[It hasn't, quite. ](_URL_0_) It has remained relatively flat compared to the overall trend, but that happens when you look only at one tiny part of a larger dataset, especially when you pick the starting point carefully to make your predetermined goal look true. This is called cherry picking the data, and is a serious no-no... \n\nThe people saying that are propagandists of the worst sort, and using statistical trickery. They are bad people and should feel bad. "
]
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"http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/"
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ahug02 | why is our food hole the same as our air hole? doesn't it only result in things like choking? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ahug02/eli5_why_is_our_food_hole_the_same_as_our_air/ | {
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"text": [
"Evolution co-opts structures that are already available to it for new purposes. Not everything about our makeup is there because it is the best possible design, but often because it was a functional design that was easier to stumble onto through a series of gradual accidents than a better but more complex design would have been.",
"I am not a biologist but maybe because we have evolved from fishes who have just the one hole through which they take in food and water of which water is pushed out of the gills thereby breathing and food continues down their throats.\n\nWe have that basic structure but as we don't breath under water we have devolved gills and evolved lungs through the same way.\n\nOne more proof that there is no intelligent creator.\n\nThough one can say it is made so as to prevent gluttony /s"
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ubgv2 | why is the queen of england's husband the duke of edinburg and not the king of england? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ubgv2/eli5_why_is_the_queen_of_englands_husband_the/ | {
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"Because Elizabeth is the blood heir to the throne. He is not.\n\nShe is queen regardless of her marital status. He married the queen.\n\nWhen Elizabeth dies, her son Charles will become king.",
"Officially, a King ranks higher than a Queen. So, if Philip was King Philip, he would outrank Queen Elizabeth. However, since the monarchy goes through Elizabeth's bloodline, not Philip's, she is the rightful ruler, and thus Philip cannot be King and outrank her. If the rightful monarch is a man, then his wife is titled Queen because he would still outrank her.",
"There are two kinds of queens:\n\n* Queen Consort - the wife of a king, has no power or claim to the throne\n* Queen Regent - a ruling monarch\n\nSince the male line has precedent in England, having a King on the throne and a Queen Consort is more common...having a Queen Regent like Elizabeth is unusual.\n\nSo giving the title of King to the husband of the ruling Queen Regent would be confusing, and lead people to believe he was in charge. Having the title of Prince Consort reaffirms his status as being inferior to the Queen Regent.\n\nThe Duke of Edinburgh title was conferred to him by King George VI upon his marriage to then Princess Elizabeth. No doubt the marriage had something to do with the King's decision, but he is a Duke because the King made him one, not because he is married to a Queen. "
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40eje3 | why does latin refer to the spanish-speaking people (spaniards and the hispanic people of the americas)? | It's so confusing when Latin is an italian/roman thing then to become a universal language of religion and learned discourse then to now only mean people who speak the spanish language (and portuguese by affinity).
A previous search with ELI5 just copy pastes the reason found in Wikipedia that is started in 19th century to refer to the colonies speaking the Latin-derived languages (mainly french then to include spanish and portuguese).
But in my reading of Sherlocke Holmes in The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge, Holmes referred to the Spaniard in the case as a "Quick-witted Latin", suggesting that the term Latin being synonymous to Spanish exclusively and probably predating its usage to describe the colonies in the Americas. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/40eje3/eli5_why_does_latin_refer_to_the_spanishspeaking/ | {
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"The countries that were conquered by the Roman Empire ended up with much common (vulgate) Latin influence in their languages. Romance languages include Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese and Romanian. In Europe they are distinguished from Germanic languages"
]
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[]
] | |
3zr21t | why arching your back feels more comfortable than having it straight, even though it's damaging? | Edit: Thanks to r/HanaHonu for their helpful answer. | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3zr21t/eli5_why_arching_your_back_feels_more_comfortable/ | {
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"text": [
"Sit with your back arched, and press on your stomach and back. You'll see they're quite relaxed. \nNow, sit with it straight. You'll feel your core is much more engaged (and therefore working hard) to keep you in that form. \nEssentially it's more comfortably (temporarily) because it is much easier on your body. "
]
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303hy7 | if everyone knows california is due for "the big one" earthquake along the san andreas fault. why do people seem to not care? | Since it's a matter of "when" and not "if" shouldn't there be detailed evacuation plans and new routes built to escape? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/303hy7/eli5if_everyone_knows_california_is_due_for_the/ | {
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"Because in California, nobody gives a fuck about shit",
"Also, due to the drought being the worst in 20 years, the tectonic plates Are more likely to cause an earthquake",
"Los Angeles resident here. It's dangerous, perhaps, to live on a fault line, but we won't just leave because of something that MIGHT happen. So many things could go wrong, and probably will (murphy's law) but we're not going to up and evacuate our homes and families. Why do people live in Wyoming when there's a supervolcano underneath Yellowstone? Why Cuba and Florida and Louisiana when there's the overwhelming threat of hurricanes?",
"No one knows *when* earthquakes will happen. \"The Big One\" could happen today, it could be 30 years from now (and it's only a 46% chance that it'll happen at all in that 30 year span). No one's going to evacuate unless the threat is imminent. Additionally, to deal with the problem, they don't need evacuation plans or \"routes built to escape.\" You can't escape an earthquake like you do a hurricane - those are avoided because you know when it's coming, so you can plan to leave before it hits, and return when it's passed. The only way to prepare for an earthquake is to build structures that can withstand them, and educate people on what to do in an earthquake. Evacuation isn't an option.",
"Californian here. Two reasons:\n\n1. There's literally nowhere on Earth that's free from natural disasters. California has earthquakes, other places have tornadoes, hurricanes, or whatever.\n\n2. California is an incredibly desirable place to live: thousands of miles of beautiful beaches, year-round sunny weather throughout the state, two of the top cities in the world, and the best general-purpose farming land in all of North America.\n\nBasically most people consider it worth it to live their entire life in California and have a small, small chance of suffering an earthquake.\n\nYes, a big earthquake is going to happen someday - but most people will only suffer minor damage. A few will die and a few tens of thousands of unlucky people (out of a population of tens of millions) will lose their homes, but the government will cover it.\n"
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2r39j7 | why do sentences only rhyme when the rhyming word is in the back of the sentence instead of the front? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2r39j7/eli5why_do_sentences_only_rhyme_when_the_rhyming/ | {
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"text": [
"A word is divided up into two parts. The first part is called the onset, the second part is called the rime. The onset is everything before the rime. The rime is what is used to make a rhyme."
]
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[]
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14hm0g | in computers, how are processes and services different? | What do they each do? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/14hm0g/eli5_in_computers_how_are_processes_and_services/ | {
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"These are two different concepts, not really related.\n\nYou know how when sometimes when you're doing something a bit complicated, you set up your work area with all the stuff that you need? Like you're doing a report for school, so you set up your desk with the two different books that you need, one to each side of the computer.\n\nWell, a process is like that: it's the \"setup\" for some program that is running. It contains the current contents of all the memory the program is using, what files it is using, what network connections it has open, which step the program is currently at, and anything like that.\n\nMore important than anything, processes are about how a computer can run many programs at the same time. For each program that's running on a computer at the same time, there's a process that keeps track of what the program is doing.\n\nThe word \"service\" has different meanings, but most usually it's just a program that other programs use to get work done. It's not about how the computer keeps track about what programs are running and what they are doing; it's about how programs interact with each other, and how often the best way to write a program is to have it talk to another one to do part of its work.",
"Each word has specific meanings in different operating systems, but the easiest way to think of it is this.\n\nI want to run a web service. This is a \"service\".\n\nI can do this with a process that provides that service. But the process might pass part of the processing of web page requests to other processes, or that process might die and a new one is created.\n\nServices are provided by one or more processes. A service is an abstraction."
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ruxpy | dwarf fortress | I'm trying to play it but I simply don't understand. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/ruxpy/eli5_dwarf_fortress/ | {
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"First of all, understanding the game is impossible without the [wiki](_URL_0_). Half the Fun^tm of the game is figuring out how to do everything. The other half is failing horribly.\n\nThe best way to learn is to look at the wiki's [quickstart guide](_URL_2_), or one of the other tutorials people have made (link at the top of the page, or just search \"dwarf fortress tutorial\" on Google). I highly recommend a [modded tileset](_URL_4_) so it's easier to tell what's what - [Mike Mayday's Graphical Edition](_URL_3_) is good and very easy to install. Most people also use [Dwarf Therapist](_URL_1_) to more easily manage their dwarves, but you probably don't need it on your first fort.\n\nThe \"goal\" of the game is to build a fortress and survive as long as possible. You don't control any of your dwarves directly; rather, you designate tasks for them to do and hope that they don't get maimed or whatever along the way. You begin the game by generating an entire world, which you can use for all the fortress and adventure games you start. The game extensively tracks each and every thing that happens in your world, so even if your fort goes tits-up, you can visit it again later in adventure mode (or even try to reclaim it). After world gen, you pick a region and area to embark in. This area is fixed - you don't get to move outside it once the game starts. The wiki can give you hints for what kind of embark you should start with, or just pick something at random to be extra dorfy.\n\n---\n* Arrow keys: move cursor\n* Enter: confirm selection\n* Esc: cancel selection\n* \"+\" and \"-\": menu sub-selector\n* \" > \" and \" < \": move down/up one Z-level\n\n-------\n* D: **D**esignate task - mining, tree chopping, plant gathering, etc.\n* B: **B**uild a building - including **w**orkshops\n* P: Define a new **p**ile - a place your dorfs will store stuff\n* Q: Examine building/add job/define room from furniture\n* K: Loo**k** at tile\n* V: Examine nearest unit\n* I: Define new act**i**vity zone (pits/ponds, water sources, etc.)\n* Z: Fort status screen\n* J: **J**ob list\n* U: **U**nit list\n* M: **M**ilitary and alert screen\n\n...and so on. All the menus are navigated via keyboard, so just take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with them. Don't forget that you can use the \"+\" and \"-\" keys to scroll through certain lists.\n\nBeyond that there's nothing I can tell you that isn't more easily explained on the wiki. The interface is confusing, I know, but once you're familiar with it it actually stimulates your imagination quite well. The game isn't so much about making a \"good\" fortress as it's about having silly adventures, like smashing all your dwarves into dust with a drawbridge. Hope this helps!",
"sixtheunknown's post is very good but I also recommend you get the [Lazy Newb Pack](_URL_0_). \n\nIt's a cool bundle which has tilesets to choose from, useful utilities llike Dwarf Therapist, and some other options like being able to disable aquifers."
]
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"http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Main_Page",
"http://code.google.com/p/dwarftherapist/",
"http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Quickstart_guide",
"http://mayday.w.staszic.waw.pl/df.php",
"http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Tileset_repository"
],
[
"http://www.bay12f... | |
3c903f | how are scientists able to look at distant planets and determine their gravity? | And how are they able to determine other things, like how do they know that Saturn rains diamonds? Surely a telescope isn't that good. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3c903f/eli5_how_are_scientists_able_to_look_at_distant/ | {
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"By measuring the velocity of the planet's orbit and using the laws of conservation of angular momentum they can calculate the mass of the planet. The gravitational pull of a planet will depend on its mass. \n \nThey can tell things like raining diamonds on Saturn by analyzing spectra and determining the chemical composition. Then using data about its mass, they can determine pressure in the atmosphere. With data about pressure and chemical composition they can determine how chemicals will react and will be able to say that the carbon in Saturn's atmosphere will crystallize and rain toward the center. "
]
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[]
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aurohw | why is the us running out of the poison for the fatal injections of prisoners? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/aurohw/eli5_why_is_the_us_running_out_of_the_poison_for/ | {
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"Many of those companies dont want their drugs used for executions. More than likely from the bad pr ramifications that would result.",
"The idea is to quickly and humanely kill the individual without some of the ugly side effects.\n\nThe US was purchasing the supplies for the injection substance from Europe for cost and supply volume purposes, but they then put those supplies on the list for controlled exports a few years ago, prompting the US to start exploring other options for replacements, but creating a shortage as older supplies expire."
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byqe9y | what is the point of the machine (clapperboard) that starts a film? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/byqe9y/eli5_what_is_the_point_of_the_machine/ | {
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"The clapper is used to synchronize the audio and the video in a movie. Editors can pinpoint the exact frame where the clapper snaps closed and match the audio to it.",
"It’s used by movie editors/producers to synchronize the audio and video. In the old days, it would have the scene/take numbers on it, too. You could synchronize your video to your audio by listening to and looking at the clap.",
"Before the days of digital, it was used to signify the part of a film they were shooting that day. Films are not usually filmed start to finish like how we watch it, they're filmed as the studio is available, sometimes an actors hair or beard change so they film longer hair/beard first...stuff like that. The numbers indicate where on the story board they are so the editors know where to insert that section into the finished product, and the sharp clap made by the board indicates where the audio should begin, as audio is generally always recording and you don't need the background noise before the call to action, so you can clearly see on a VU meter where the clap is to align/sync the audio with the video. Much of that is easier nowadays being the digital age, but the story board part is still true. They film the movie scenes in any order, and the editors still need to put all the scenes into the final sequence.",
"It's an easy way to synchronize sound and video when you're editing the movie - and the writing on it usually lists the scene number and take numbers, so that people could easily say \"Oh, scene 5 take 4 was great, we can throw out takes 1-3. Make sure to use take 4 in the final cut.\"\n\nThe clapperboard is usually black and white striped because it makes it very easy to find the exact frame when the **clap** sound happens, because it would be the moment that all of the black and white angles lined up properly. You take the audio recording and synchronize it with the video starting at that moment, and you could be sure that all of the other dialogue and sound effects for the rest of the scene would match. Much easier than trying to read someone's lips and match the sound that way, for example."
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7jho4x | if weight lost during a diet is just calories expended minus calories consumed, how does that account for feces? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7jho4x/eli5_if_weight_lost_during_a_diet_is_just/ | {
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"Feces is partly food that can't be digested, we don't consume every part of what we eat, as some of it's indigestible. Shit is actually largely bacteria too, bacteria that helps you digest food. 30% bacteria, 30% indigestible substances about 15% fat. The rest is a mix between inorganic substances and a deviation of percentage based of your diet. ",
"Two completely different biological processes.\n\nFeces is what's left after your body does what it can to process out the stuff your body can use as you digest the food you've eaten. Your body pulls out the sugars, fats, starches, nutrients, protein and so on... and leaves behind the stuff it can't pull out like dietary fibre - and away that goes into your toilet eventually in your feces (or urine for some water-soluble elements).\n\nThat's **digestion**, which is one process. It's efficient, but not perfect, so a lot of the calories you eat actually can remain in your feces. \n\nThe other process is **metabolism**, which is the process where your body creates energy from the stuff it pulled out of food. What happens here is your cells actually \"burn\" those fats and starches and sugars that you ate, assuming it doesn't convert them to body fat and store them. \n\nSo our body is essentially a big slow-burning campfire. When you toss a fresh stick into the campfire, over time its combustion process converts most of the stick's solid wood into carbon dioxide and water vapour, both of which go into the air as gases, and it releases heat and light in the process. So, more or less, do the cells in your body (except for the releasing light part, although it could be wicked cool if it did). \n\nAnd your body gets its campfire sticks from your food if you're eating a lot, or stored your body fat if you're dieting.\n\nSo a lot of those calorie-measures of sugar or fat from food, or stored body fat if not enough food is available, essentially get converted into gas that you breathe out."
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1t2ter | the nutritional difference between drinking a home-made smoothie and just eating that fruit. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1t2ter/eli5_the_nutritional_difference_between_drinking/ | {
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"Short answer: not much.\n\nYour teeth do virtually the same work that the blender does. A smoothie is a more convenient form of eating a ton of fruit because you don't have to waste time chewing or fondling around for the proper amount of blueberries for a mouthful.\n\nA lot of smoothies include protein powder because drinking a tall glass of fructose isn't exactly healthy. Likewise, eating the powder by itself would be a bit gross."
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4g9y6h | whats that random pinging noise you hear in your ear occassionaly? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4g9y6h/eli5whats_that_random_pinging_noise_you_hear_in/ | {
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"text": [
"um... gessing you are refering to tinnitus? \n\nIt is a sign that you have damaged your ears. Sometimes it goes away, other times it is permanent"
]
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15zxc4 | double jeopardy. | I understand you can't be tried twice for the same trial...but if you were found innocent and then said "Ha, I did do it!" what happens? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/15zxc4/eli5_double_jeopardy/ | {
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"Basically, it's that you can't be charged for the same crime twice.\n\nExample: Emmett Till was murdered by two very racist white men years ago. The murderers were found innocent, even though every one knew they did it. One man eventually confessed to killing him (because he needed money from the story on it since his business was failing), but no matter what he couldn't be arrested for it since he was already found not guilty.\n\nEasier Example: I kill John Doe, I'm found not guilty. New evidence comes up that proves I did it, or I confess to it, I'm still never going to jail for killing John Doe.",
"Could someone explain why this exists? The downside is obvious while the upside is seemingly non-existent.",
"What about the following scenario:\n\nYou are accused of killing someone. You are tried and acquitted. That person is later found alive and to have faked their own death. Can you now kill that person without legal consequence?"
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bby4uf | can someone give me a rundown of the julian assange case? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/bby4uf/eli5_can_someone_give_me_a_rundown_of_the_julian/ | {
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"Super basic, 'quick and dirty' version:\n\n2010: A member of the US military gives a large amount of information to WikiLeaks, who posts it online, resulting in the military member's arrest and court martial (WikiLeaks propelled into spotlight).\n\n2012: Assange wanted for questioning in relation to an accusation of sexual assault in Sweden, applies for and is granted asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy. British police begin 'stakeout' outside Embassy.\n\n2016: Organization with ties to Russian government steals a trove of documents from the DNC servers, hands them off to WikiLeaks, who publishes them. There is suspicion that Roger Stone knew of publication in advance, and potentially relayed that information to the Trump campaign.\n\nToday: Ecuador ceases asylum protections, Assange arrested. British charge is essentially 'jumping bail'. Assange is subject of a sealed indictment filed by Mueller team, which was mistakenly revealed.\n\nSometime in the near future: US government will likely file an extradition request to the United Kingdom to have Assange brought to the US to stand trial."
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69ss13 | most people i know have a dominant hand they do everything with, but i don't. i write with my right hand, and do everything else with my left. why is that? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/69ss13/eli5_most_people_i_know_have_a_dominant_hand_they/ | {
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"I don't have an answer but I'm the same way. I didn't even realize it was weird until last weekend when I was out to dinner with some friends and they pointed it out. I'm really interested to see what people say. ",
"I write with my left and do everything else with my right. It's because up until 1st grade I could write with either hand but had to make a decision in order to keep up in school with cursive. So I chose left hand just to be different, if I recall correctly.",
"I am the same way. It started out when I was 6 and broke my right wrist but still wanted to attend summer school so I taught myself to write and throw/kick with my left side. I still kick/bat/shoot basketball left handed but everything else I went back to being right-side dominant but am still ambidextrous if need be",
"Same here. I write with my left but everything else with my right hand. Guitar, cutlery, tommy tankin'. No idea where it started from, just always happened. ",
"I write with my right. Throw left . Disc golf right. Hockey right. Shoot bow and arrow left. Bat right. Tennis right. Golf right. Shoot guns left.\n\nAlways wondered why myself. My whole life everyone has said its super weird. I can't do something left and right has to be one or the other.",
"\"Mixed-handedness\" is a perfectly normal thing.\n\n_URL_0_\n\nThere can be different reasons for it, both natural and acquired/learned. For example, I am mostly right-handed, but I am left-side dominant in sports (bat left handed, kick left foot, etc). This is simply because my dad was left-dominant, so when I began learning sports I just naturally copied him, and it stuck. I'd probably be a better/stronger using my right side, but when you've grown up doing something a certain way, it becomes instinctive."
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175esj | what is "cash flow" in a business? | I was reading article today about Tesla: "Tesla's Future Looks Brighter As Cash Flows Turn Positive". | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/175esj/eli5_what_is_cash_flow_in_a_business/ | {
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"Think of money as water running through pipes to and from the business. A positive cash flow means more money is coming in (sales) than is going out (expenses). ",
"Cash flows refers to the transfers of cash in and out of an entity. For example, as an individual your cash flows would look like:\n\n**Incoming cash** \n\n* Salary and wages\n* Government benefits\n* Interest and dividends\n\n**outgoing cash**\n\n* mortgage / rent\n* groceries\n* fuel\n* clothing\n* technology\n* luxuries\n* entertainment\n\nWhen you spend more cash than what you receive over a given time period (say a week or a month) you are *cashflow negative*. When the opposite is true you are *cashflow positive*\n\nIn the context of this article, it means that Tesla have reached the point where they're selling enough cars to cover all their costs without going to the bank or to their owners for additional money. This is an important milestone as the company is now more mature and more risk adverse people like mutual fund managers will want to own the debt and/or equity of the business. These people are willing to accept a lower return on their investment as its lower risk, compared to when the business was not selling enough cars to cover costs.\n\nThis means that the people that took the risk in founding the business (Elon Musk, I think) will be able to sell some of their stock in the business at a big profit.\n\n\n"
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4jqaz9 | how do manufacturers align the pixels in a monitor/tv/screen so perfectly? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4jqaz9/eli5_how_do_manufacturers_align_the_pixels_in_a/ | {
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"Careful placing of the LEDs on a printed circuit board by a robot.\n\nOn the density of the Retina display where you have 157 pixels per centimetre, there is nothing that a human can do anymore."
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[]
] | ||
10r371 | how does fuel make an engine run? | My son has a couple of questions about fuel and engines.
Where does the fuel go?
Why is it required?
Etc. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/10r371/eli5_how_does_fuel_make_an_engine_run/ | {
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"In the most simplified sense, the petrol that you put in your car is mixed with oxygen. That fuel and oxygen enters the cylinder of the car. At this point, the spark plug ignites the fuel and oxygen, causing a small explosion (and a rapid expansion of gas). This causes the piston to rise, then fall. This process is repeated many many times in a minute. The up and down motion of the piston is converted to a circular motion which then turns the wheels.",
"Gasoline + oxygen == > carbon dioxide + water. This is the process of burning a hydrocarbon which is essentially the same as burning wood. The process of combustion is exothermic thus releasing heat. \n\nAn engine harnesses the expansion of the combustion into mechanical movement of the pistons which exhibits torque to the crankshaft which is connected to the wheels.\n\nHere is an animation of the process: _URL_0_",
"The basic function of the engine is to turn the wheels of the car. So let's imagine trying to turn the wheels ourselves. The easiest way to do that would be to use a [crank](_URL_0_). You attach a crank to the axle, so that when you turn the crank, you turn the wheels.\n\nBut this is tiresome, and it would be easier to have a machine do the cranking for you. Now think on how you push when you're turning a crank. In simplified terms, you could say you're pushing it down on one side, and up the other. This is the idea of a [piston](_URL_1_). It pushes up and down to turn the axle, which then turns the wheels.\n\nBut how can we make a piston push up and down? Well, we insert the big head inside a cylinder, and we fill the cylinder with a spray of fuel. If we then make a spark in the cylinder, the fuel spray explodes and pushes the piston down. If you add a second piston like in the drawing, the explosion will not only push the first piston down, but also the second piston up. When the second piston is up, you make an explosion there. Boom! The second piston goes down, and the first goes up again. And that way, you can make the axle turn round and round, which makes the wheels turn.\n\nSo why is fuel necessary? Because you need something to push the pistons, and an explosion is a very efficient (and fun) way of doing so."
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a7b9ug | why does the middle of the earth stay hottest | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/a7b9ug/eli5_why_does_the_middle_of_the_earth_stay_hottest/ | {
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"When the Earth was still entirely molten, the heaviest elements all sank to the center to form a metallic core rich in heavy radioactive elements.\n\nThe decay of those elements keeps the interior of the planet blazing hot all these millenia later.\n\nIf you mean why is the equator the warmest, it receives direct sunlight all year. Higher latitudes pitch away from the sun in the winter and get very little.",
"I love how people are going two ways answering this question. Some interpret middle as the equator, some as the core. "
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9gtgzl | how do breeders change some features of an animal? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9gtgzl/eli5_how_do_breeders_change_some_features_of_an/ | {
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"They wait for one that has traits that they like (for example colour, size, health etc) then they breed it with another one with the same traits and select the offspring that also have that trait and breed them.\n\nThere is a lot of randomness, so just pick the ones that randomly have something you like, and make more of that one.",
"Lets say im breeding people. I want my person to have blond hair and blue eyes\n\nFirst id start 2 breed sets one with light eyes and one with light hair\n\nAfter that id let them go along only letting the ones with blonder hair and bluer eyes breed \n\nOnce i have a person with blonde hair that i like and blue eyes that are very dreamy i let them breed\n\nAfter a few kids or so they should have made the perfect arian\n\nTl;Dr if it has the trait you want it breeds",
"If you were keeping sheep for wool and you wanted to breed the sheep to produce more wool this is how it'd go:\n\nYou have 10 sheep, when shearing you on average 1 Kg of wool (some produce 0.9kg of wool, others up to 1.1kg) . you then pick the male and female with the highest production let's say 1.1 kg each. The amount their producing depends on their genetics much like some men grow thick beards and others thin beards.\n\nYou breed those sheep and on average the wool produced is 1.1kg. You would take a female producing from this group at 1.2kg and a male from another group you're doing the same and breed them so on so forth.\n\nA few generations later you have a much woolier breed producing 3kg of wool but now there's a problem. When wet the wool weighs that much their legs are breaking easily. You now focus on intruding leg strength in the same way. Or another problem is the wool actually covers their head so they can't eat so you breed ones with longer necks using the same method of slow increments.\n\nHope that made sense \n\n"
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6qcw1p | i was recently diagnosed with type two diabetes and have no idea what it is, or means, or anything about it. eli5 what it is and entails pls! | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6qcw1p/eli5_i_was_recently_diagnosed_with_type_two/ | {
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"There are some things ELI5 is fantastic for...this is not one of those times. \n\nGo and talk to your doctor. ",
"You really should ask your doctor about this.\n\nYour pancreas produces a hormone called insulin, and this helps the body convert sugar into energy.\n\nIn type 1 diabetes, the pancreas for some reason stops producing insulin. People with type 1 diabetes usually need regular injections of insulin, and they need the right dosage to cope with the amount of sugar in their bloodstream.\n\nYou have type 2 diabetes, which is when the body becomes less efficient at using insulin. The insulin is still being produced, but it's having less effect. The result is that unprocessed sugar stays in your bloodstream, and this can cause damage to certain organs.\n\nFortunately, type 2 diabetes is less drastic than type 1, but it does need to be managed. Your doctor will be able to recommend a course of action for you, which will probably involve changing your diet, exercising and possibly taking some medication.",
"I can't get to a doctor right now it'll be another month or so until I can. Thank you! It has to be from genetics because I work out and eat stupidly healthy",
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained:\n\n1. [ELI5: Why are we told that Diabetes type 2 is caused by being fat when most obese people don't have it? ](_URL_4_)\n1. [ELI5: Biology of Type II Diabetes? ](_URL_1_)\n1. [ELI5: What's the difference between Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes? Please and thank you](_URL_5_)\n1. [ELI5: Diabetes. The types and what's really going on when you have it. ](_URL_2_)\n1. [ELI5: The difference between type 1 and type 2 diabetes. ](_URL_0_)\n1. [ELI5: what is the difference between type 1 and type 2 diabetes? ](_URL_3_)\n\n\n\n\nSee also /r/diabetes and /r/diabetes_t2 ."
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"https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1iez6w/eli5_diabetes_the_t... | ||
3jjmlv | why are so many films/tv shows set in either new york city or los angeles, but seldom in other large cities like chicago, detroit, houston, etc.? | [deleted] | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3jjmlv/eli5_why_are_so_many_filmstv_shows_set_in_either/ | {
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"Los Angeles and NYC have a long working relationship with production companies and its relatively easy to set up filming in those cities. Both cities also have tax credit programs to incentivize filming. Detroit used to have a similar program but the governor just signed a law ending it. "
]
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[]
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7n7csp | why my monitor refresh rates are alwys 24, 30, 59, 60, 144 and 165? what's special about these numbers? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/7n7csp/eli5why_my_monitor_refresh_rates_are_alwys_24_30/ | {
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"To answer that, we have to go way back to the early days of electronic television. CRTs don't use pixels like modern displays do, they have lines. To make an image, you rapidly scan an electron gun back and forth, line by line. Phosphors on the screen light up when electrons hit them.\n\nTo save on transmission bandwidth (which analogue systems need a lot of), old TVs used a technique called \"interlacing\" So rather than send an entire frame of video at once, you'd send half a frame, every other line. These half frames are called fields. \n\nOne early challenge was synchronizing the field rate so it would produce a stable image free from electrical interference. In the US, this is 60hz and in Europe 50hz. Since a field is half a frame, this translates to 30fps and 25fps respectively. Which is fast enough to offer relatively smooth motion.\n\n120hz TVs first came about when Bluray got popularized. \n\nFilms are shot in 24fps. This is a largely arbitrary number that offered fast enough motion and worked well enough with early low sensitivity films, while conserving expensive film stock. \n\nOn 25fps PAL systems, you can just speed up the film a bit. But you can't do that with 30fps NTSC systems. So there's some trickery a foot called 3:2 pulldown. It's a bit complicated but it involved repeating frames. But it can cause the image to judder, especially in pans. \n\nBluray though can show a film in its native 24fps form factor. 120hz displays came about because 120 is evenly dividable by 60 and 24. So for TV content, you just show every frame 4 times, and films you repeat every frame 5 times. \n\n144hz is evenly divisible by 24. A lot of modern TVs though can handle content at different common refresh rates. "
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8d02i5 | how did suffixes for differing nationalities come to be named as such (-ese, -ean, -ish) | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/8d02i5/eli5how_did_suffixes_for_differing_nationalities/ | {
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"This is only a partial answer, but you're actually correct about “French.” Around the time of the Holy Roman Empire, there was a group of people in France called the Franks, or *Frankish*, and in the year 800 AD the Pope crowned their king Charlemagne the first Holy Roman Emperor. Even in modern German the word for the country France is *Frankreich*, literally “Land of Franks”. Over decades and centuries “Frankish” was corrupted into “French,” like in the telephone game where people in a line repeat a message and it usually is different at the end from how it started.\n\nAlso, it's possible that *-ese* as in “Chinese” and “Japanese” derives from the Latin **-ensis**, which is used to indicate place of origin.\n\nThe word for this is “demonym.”",
"The difference between -ese and -ish in English comes from whether we get the word from French (compare to Modern French: chinoise, japonaise, hollandaise, mayonnaise, etc.) or from its Germanic roots (compare to Modern German: Englisch, Chinesisch, Japanisch, Französisch, etc.). Old French -eis became -ese, while the Old English -isc became -ish.\n\nAs to why we decided to borrow the French word for Chinese instead of use a more native Germanic word, that I don’t have the answer to. Languages are complicated and change occurs often and without much reason.\n\nFor why some things are -ese and others are -ian, you’ll have to ask the Ancient Romans. My guess would be that something similar happened a long time ago where one people used one ending, and another people used another ending, and after one people conquered the other and the languages blended, they ended up with two different ways to form demonyms.",
"Most languages have their own suffix to denote a demonym. In English other Germanic languages, that suffix is \"-ish.\" (e.g. English, Spanish, Turkish, etc)\n\nHowever sometime in the last hundred years English speakers stopped applying that suffix to other places, and started borrowing demonyms from other languages, usually French. Usually the suffix ultimately derives from the Latin -ensis, which gives us -ese and -ian via French. -An also ultimately derives from Latin.\n\nIn modern English usually whichever suffix sounds best is chosen and that becomes convention.",
"While this topic is being discussed, I have been curious for a while about the -ic ending. I have only seen it used in Icelandic and Greenlandic ( also Hellenic ). Does anyone know the etymology behind this? I tried to find the answer before but never did find anything. ",
"If people from Poland are called Poles, why aren't people from Holland called Holes?",
"Interestingly if you are from New Zealand (as I am) there is no proper demonym like English, Italian, etc. New Zealanders are not New Zealandish or New Zealandian. The closest adjectives are the somewhat informal “Kiwi” or the clunky sounding “New Zealander” (which is fine as a noun but weird as an adjective). ",
"A fun fact that I don't know if it's true and I'm sorry for not being an answer. But Brazil, using a Roman language, should use a Portuguese version of the latin -ensis for demonyms. And we do for a lot of nationalities. Yet we ourselves are \"brasileiros\" using and ending (-eiros) that is usually used for professions. And I think it actually fits, because we are not the \"people of Brazil\", but the \"workers of Brazil\" and that's the life of a Brazilian: be born, grow up and work until you die.",
"In our case, we ended up having a new word for the nationality (Spaniard) as the original word (Spanish) became more associated to the language. I can't recall another country with the suffix -ard",
"As a United Statsian I have frequently wondered this. Now I (more or less) know. \n\nEven when I was young I wondered about \"American\" for citizens of the U.S. There are other countries in North, Central, and South America. Monroe doctrine?",
"Something I noticed is that countries ending in “land” tend to go to “ish” (English, Polish, lrish, Scottish, Finnish). And then I thought of Icelandic and decided to go to bed. \n\nAlso one more ending I haven’t seen mentioned here is -i as in Pakistani ",
"What are you talking about? It’s Englandese",
"I really like some british demonyms that come right out of left field. \n\ne.g. Liverpudlian, Mancunian",
"Switzerland here... what is that „suffix“ you speak of?",
"If it ends with \"ish\", it very possibly comes from Old English. Places relevant to Germans will feature this commonly, such as \"English\", \"Danish\", \"Swedish\", \"Polish\", \"Frankish\", with \"Scottish\", \"Spanish\" also, and by extension \"French\", \"Dutch\". These are usually from before 1740 or so when \"ish\" was basically just the default. \n\nIf it ends with \"ian/an\" it's from Latin probably via Normans. These are usually Roman concepts, like a unified \"Germania\" filled with \"Germani\", or a land of \"Italia\" filled with \"Italiani\". Medieval/modern Latin still applies and this becomes the default demonym ending in English after 1470 or so when Modern English, influenced by French-speaking Normans, takes root in recognizable form.\n\nIf it ends with \"ese\" you can blame Marco Polo, but also something about the Italians dominating things for a bit. \"Cinese\" to \"Chinese\", \"Giapponese\" to \"Japanese\", \"Milanese\", \"Bolognese\", \"Parmese\", and I'd blame \"Viennese\" on Italy too, but really it's a weird rule about the way words end. The French are to blame for this too, with \"Congolese\".\n\n\"i\" as an ending is from Persian and that's because Persia basically dominated the Middle Eastern cultural sphere for the past 2000 years.\n\nAfter a while, English stopped taking from German, or French, or Italian, or Persian, and just started taking whatever they called themselves. That's why subsaharan African names are so weird- it reached that stage of \"yeah whatever\".",
"And then you have countries like Lesotho where the native basotho speak sesotho while drinking mosotho beer",
"What about Danemark/Danish? Does that come from French/Latin as well?"
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2hd12n | if water evaporates then rains back down, why are we in a drought? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2hd12n/eli5_if_water_evaporates_then_rains_back_down_why/ | {
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"If I scoop water out of a bathtub, then pour it in the toilet, the bathtub will have less water even though the bathroom as a whole has not lost any. The water cycle works the same way - water that goes up in one place often comes down somewhere else. That can cause a net loss of water in the first region, resulting in a drought as no new water is coming to replace it. Droughts are typically regional, not global, occurrences.\n\nEdit: I spelled \"pour\" poorly..."
]
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5t2dla | how does your computer determine when to use the cpu and when to use the gpu to calculate things? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5t2dla/eli5_how_does_your_computer_determine_when_to_use/ | {
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"It's whatever the programmers tell it to use. The computer isn't smart enough to make that decision on its own. It would be possible to write code that would dynamically make that decision off of whatever the programmer wanted, but it's not a standard function of modern computers or anything like that.\n\nAs for what makes the programmers decide which to use, the CPU is good at doing a long series of computations (where the output of one computation is the input of the next computation) quickly. the GPU is better at doing the exact same computation millions of times on different data and they don't depend on each other."
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4b8geb | if the dark web has so many users, why is it so hard for governments to trace and track down illicit activity that occurs through the dark web? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/4b8geb/eli5_if_the_dark_web_has_so_many_users_why_is_it/ | {
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"not only is the data encrypted, it's transferred all over the globe thru multiple countries. how much money and resources do you have to track down a bit of data that traveled thru russia, then china, then north korea, then vietnam, then australia, then columbia, then brazil, then sweden, etc etc etc 100 different countries around the world.",
"Short answer: It's not. Governments pretend that it's hard to track folks on the Dark Web because they want people to continue to use it so they can track activity and go after larger criminals. ",
"Think about trying to find one particular tree. If this tree is in the middle of the plains or a desert it's really really easy to find. \n\nIf on the other hand, you have a huge forest and many of these trees look identical suddenly it is far more difficult to find the one tree you're looking for. \n\nIn that aspect, the more users the Dark Web has, the harder it is to find the particular user or users they want to find. They're mixed in with hundreds or thousands of others making it extremely difficult to identify those individuals and not waste time and resources investigating others. ",
"If it's being accessed by something like Tor, it makes it very time consuming and expensive to track a single user down. So the answer is \"why would they bother?\" If there is something like terrorist activity, child pornography, hitmen, they can and do track them down sometimes. But for trading the latest Kanye album, they don't give a shit. They would need to be pretty sure someone is doing something seriously illegal to justify the cost and commitment to tracking them down.",
"_URL_0_\n\nI would do yourself a favor and go here. So many of the comments, including the top one, appear to be wrong.",
"Why catch the person looking and buying drugs when you can catch the person making and selling child porn and drugs"
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2pd2ym | why do marketing personnel like to purposeful misspell words (ie. "wyngs", "kwik", etc.)? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2pd2ym/eli5_why_do_marketing_personnel_like_to/ | {
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"A lot of times, it's for trademark purposes. For example, recently the SciFi channel changed its name to Syfy. This is because SciFi is a generic term for science fiction, and because of that it would be difficult to fight any trademark infringement claims in court. Legally, you can't trademark a generic term, and if the courts determine your brand name has become generic, you can lose the trademark. For instance, Refrigerator was originally a brand name for ice boxes, but it became so widely used that they lost the trademark. Coke and Xerox have legal and marketing teams to prevent their brand names from becoming generic.",
"You can't trademark a common word, but you **can** trademark a novel spelling of an otherwise-common word. So companies use purposeful misspellings to help create brand recognition, and to prevent other companies from using the same spelling.",
"In addition to /u/AnteChronos and /u/Mephysteaux 's explanations, sometimes there can be a legal requirement not to use a certain word.\n\nAs an example, in many countries there are legal requirements on what the ingredients of something must be in order to be called chocolate. Same in the US, though we're a little looser than some countries on it. Some of these ingredients, like cocoa butter, are expensive, though, and so companies want to replace it with cheaper stuff, like hydrogenated vegetable oil, so they have to use a word like \"choco-\" or \"chocolatey\" instead, which have fewer (if any) regulations.\n\n\"Cream\" has similar requirements on its use. \"Creamy\" and \"kreme\" do not.\n\nI'm not positive about it, but I'm going to guess \"wings\" vs. \"wingz\" or \"wyngs\" may be a similar deal."
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1rdcgg | why do headphone manufacturers use electricity for noise cancelling? why not use the same method as construction earmuffs? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1rdcgg/eli5_why_do_headphone_manufacturers_use/ | {
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"Construction ear muffs do exactly as their name suggests, they muffle the sounds, not eliminate them. Noise cancelling usually involves some form of analyzing the ambient sounds and filtering them out. "
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9vy5mm | what happens to our bodies while we sleep? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9vy5mm/eli5_what_happens_to_our_bodies_while_we_sleep/ | {
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"The body goes through several phases while sleeping\n\nP 1 is short and is Essentially what happens when you first doze off. You are easily awaken and your body may twitch called myoclonic jerks. Which is an impulse sent by the brain to ensure the body is still alive.\n\nP2 eye movements have stopped and your body temp starts dropping\n\nP3 & P4 is characterized by delta waves. This is where people may sleep walk or exp. Night terrors but it is also the deepest part of sleep.\n\nDuring all 4 stages our body can move and our muscles heal themselves.\n\nREM is the final stage and mean rapid eye movement and is when we dream. Our body becomes paralyzed and our body is physiologically aroused."
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2exmt8 | what is the caliphate that isis is trying to create, and why are western countries calling this a threat? | Just saw David Cameron say in his press conference that the creation of a Caliphate is a threat to the country. What is this Caliphate that ISIS is trying to create, and why is it a threat, ELI5? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2exmt8/eli5_what_is_the_caliphate_that_isis_is_trying_to/ | {
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"Imagine if the Westboro Baptist Church formed an army, created it's own little state for itself in the middle of the US, and aggressively killed anyone with differing views. Now just change religions, and move it to the Middle East and you're not too far off target."
]
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73or0s | how do car dealerships make money when they claim the markup on new cars is only a few hundred dollars? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/73or0s/eli5_how_do_car_dealerships_make_money_when_they/ | {
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"First off, that claim may not always be true. They might barely break even on an entry-level compact, but they'll make thousands on a fully-loaded pickup or SUV.\n\nAlso, warranties and general maintenance sales are a huge moneymaker for the dealership.",
"I actually sell cars so here's the breakdown: \n\nIf you're buying a brand new car, there is a good chance they really ARENT making any money, or maybe only a couple hundred bucks. Dealerships have an invoice cost of their vehicle, which you can typically get a new car at or below that invoice cost. Most place also have about 4% of the cars cost as marketing incentives and otherbullshit from the manufacturer, but it has nothing to do with dealership markup. So if you're buying a new car at or below invoice, there is a very good chance no one is making any sizable income off of that (for instance, I will typically make only $50-75 flat fee for selling the car). But then you might ask, how does a dealership make money?\n\nWell, if you're buying the car at that dealership, then you're likely going to service it there, too. It costs pennies to the dollar to actually perform service on the car, so they'll make more than the money they lost on that one new car in the multiple service visits they'll have to the dealership. But that's not all:\n\n3-6 years down the road, now you'll trade that car in. So the preowned manager will typically give you a trade in value way under what the car will sell for after being fixed up on retail. So now one preowned car could have $5000 profit on the cost of the car alone, making up for a few of those new cars. You might think this is unfair, but sorry, any preowned manager worth his weight isn't going to put any sizable discount on his car, because it's actually keeping the lights on at the dealership. Just the rules of the game unfortunately. \n\nThe unfortunate part is that unlike any other business, people don't feel a dealership is entitled to make a profit. But like, people still have to get paid and lights still have to be kept on. So it is what it is. ",
"All of the add-ons to the new car. Insurance, finance, window tint, protective products, tow bars, bull bars, alarms, gps trackers etc. \n",
"They can make money three ways when they are selling you a new car, the dealer markup, and any hidden incentives from the factory. \nThe second way is what they offer you for your trade in. \nThe third way is through financing of the vehicle. They secretly get kickbacks from certain finance companies depending on what rate they offer you. Say, hypothetically, you qualify for a 3% rate, but the finance manager will offer you a loan for 4%, so then the dealership gets a kickback of $500, and if he gets you on the hook for 5%, the dealership gets a kickback of $1000. \n\nSo the salesperson will usually chat you up and try to pull details about what you want out of the deal, they find out what your \"hot buttons\" are, and lets say you demand to get $5000 for your trade, when it's only worth $4000, well then they can jack up your interest rate by two percent and make that back up. \nOr, lets say you demand a certain interest rate, so they agree to that, but the amount of money they will give you on your trade-in just went down. \nSince usually people only have one hot button, it's easy for them to find out what that is and then structure that accordingly.\nSo it's all a big shell game. You ask for something, they concede, but make it up elsewhere.",
"There is an episode of This American Life that explains it really well: _URL_0_\n\nThey say that the real money is made of incentives from the manufacturer to sell the cars - they just need to move a set number of cars, it really doesn't matter how much they sell them for. And then they get big payouts from the manufacturer. And that's the money they want - not some tiny profit from marking up the car. ",
"Kickbacks for selling a certain volume, the service department, higher end vehicles with more markup, the pre-owned department, kickbacks from finance companies, warranties and dealer packages",
"On people who don’t do their homework on the car they want to buy vs. the car they can afford \nDo your homework on the car you are wanting to buy so you know fair market value. Get pre qualified through your local Credit Union or bank you bank at so you know what you can afford. ",
"I work for a heavy truck manufacturer (we are talking semi trucks) and the process is similar in the truck world. Our truck dealerships actually make very little money on the sale of the truck. We, as the manufacturer, usually have promotions running that gives the dealership and sales people incentives to really push whatever model(s) we are interested in pushing. We give it back in the form of rebates, gift cards, funds for the dealership to use on marketing, and a variety of other incentives. \n\nThe real money maker for a dealership is parts and service. We sell genuine parts that came on at the factory for upwards of 60-100% margin. The dealership then turns around and marks it up to the end users (you and I) for the same amount. Yes, those wiper blades that cost you over $20 we as the OEM sold to the dealership for $4-8 bucks. \n\nParts and service from a dealership border on price gouging but they can get away from it. However, I truly believe if you have the money it’s worth it in so many ways to have your vehicle serviced at the actual dealership that represents your car brand. We give them TONS of training how to properly service your vehicles, plus, we ship them actual tools to fix your specific car that most repair companies can’t get. \n\nDon’t worry - dealerships take in the money hand over fist and it’s truly due to the parts and service departments. ",
"Several ways to make money:\n\n* Lie. Have a higher markup than they claim.\n\n* Extras. Hopefully, you'll buy the extras package, which is a bunch of cheap stuff at a high price.\n\n* Trade in. Usually, you trade in your old car, and they give you peanut money for it. If you can, sell it yourself instead.\n\n* Future service. There's a lot of money in servicing a new car, because there is seldom anything wrong with it.",
"My buddy owns a dealership, there's one more way, they get quarterly bonuses from the auto manufacturer based on total number of cars sold and leased. I think they get more for leases. And they get more for certain vehicles.",
"OK. So it all comes down to how you define \"profit\" for a car dealership.\n\nFirst, and most obvious there's the amount that they paid the manufacturer for the car vs what they sold it to you. That's the \"only a few hundred markups\" that you see. \n\nUncounted in that is that manufacturers often give rebates. So if you sell car X the manufacturer might kick an extra few hundred your way. This is partly how the manufacturer influences what cars are pushed when. So for example, if the new Accord is coming out next month, Honda might incentivize selling the old Accords off by giving a rebate on them for a few months. This gives the manufacturer more control over what salespeople push than simply adjusting the original cost of a car. \n\nNext are targets. Often a dealership will get a bonus if they hit certain targets for sales. So if they have a 100 vehicle target, but only sell 99 they get nothing but if they sell 101 they get $1,000 for every vehicle. These numbers are made up but show the point. The dealership stands to make significantly more profit if they hit these targets than if they miss them. \n\nNext is financing. Dealers get kickbacks from financing companies. If a dealer sets up a loan with company X, they might get a few hundred bucks for doing so. Many manufacturers also have financing companies, for example, \"Ford Motor Credit Company LLC\" is the bank owned by Ford Motor Company. This bank contributes a significant amount to Ford's overall bottom line. So the incentives from the credit company are also present.\n\nNext, and perhaps most important is service. The assumption is that a new vehicle comes with a warranty. Most people get their warranty service at the same dealership they bought from. The dealer's service department charges the manufacturer for those services. \n\nSo if you go in and get something done under warranty, your local Ford dealer invoices Ford Motor Company for that service. Even though you are not paying the dealer, the dealer's service department is still making money on that service. Now, the rates negotiated by the manufacturer are much lower than you or I would pay, but there's a significant amount of service work done through those dealers that this back-end revenue is part of the assumed profit when they sell a new car. \n\nThen there's the remainder of the dealer's service work. Because they sell new cars, people assume that they are the best equipped and trained to service all cars of that brand. So collision repairs, or out of warranty repairs are all gravy for the dealership and those exist because of the new car sales side of the business. \n\nLastly, there are used cars. People often trade in a car when they buy a new one. The dealership flips that car to another buyer, at a profit, or they sell it at auction (often at a profit). \n\nSo the dealer makes its profit in many ways. There's the straight margin, the manufacturer incentives, and bonuses, there's the trade in, the financing and the future service. All of those are sources of profit that flow from selling that 1 new car. "
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36oiwy | how does investigative journalism work? like, if i have proof that some important people are doing illegal stuff, wouldn't i take that to the police instead of writing an article about it? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/36oiwy/eli5_how_does_investigative_journalism_work_like/ | {
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"The difference is what can you get out of taking it to the police vs taking to your local journalists. Let's say you paid a $2000 deposit to a company to work on your roof and months go by and nothing happens. Take it to the police and they'll investigate it. If the find something, there may be a punishment and no guarantee that you'll get your money back or your roof worked on since the police can't force a business to work on your roof. However, you take it to your local news and that exposure means that everyone knows about your situation now and there's been times you hear a follow up that the company made good and sent someone out to work on the roof or refunded the money. The difference is what kind of results you want to get. Call the police for justice and maybe results. Call the local news for results and justice if the police pick up on it."
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70uv3r | identifying elements vs compounds vs heterogenous mixtures vs homogenous mixtures | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/70uv3r/eli5_identifying_elements_vs_compounds_vs/ | {
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"Elements - these are like individual legos, let's say the 2x2 kind is one element and the 4x2 kind is another.\n\nCompounds - these are like a collection of legos all stuck together. Stick the 2x2 and the 4x2 together and you have a compound.\n\nHetergenous mixtures - this is like mixing legos with duplos and wood blocks. They're all stirred up but you can see the differences pretty clearly\n\nHomogenous mixtures - this is like mixing salt into water. It all looks basically the same no matter where you look even though there are two different things in there\n\n"
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9h7s56 | do the bacteria in our mouths that cause plaque and tooth decay/gum disease have a useful purpose? | Like how other bacteria in our bodies can be useful, unless something upsets the balance of amounts of bacteria. Is there any good reason to have mouth bacteria? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/9h7s56/eli5_do_the_bacteria_in_our_mouths_that_cause/ | {
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"There's a bunch of different types of bacteria that can be in our mouth at one time, most of them (like 90%) are useful and help us digest food or protect our gums and teeth. But the kind that you're talking about that cause tooth decay and gum disease survive off the starch/sugars we consume. \nI learned about the way they survive by forming a biofilm over the surface, which makes them really hard to get rid of. They even form networks across the plaque and communicate via quorum sensing. Freaking disgusting amirite??",
"The biofilm they create gives a small amount of protection against acidic foods. Bacteria in our mouths didn't really pose a large threat until we started eating large amounts of carbs like sugar and bread "
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87z4ow | why is it that when i’m sick a small dry spot at the back of my throat can make me cough? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/87z4ow/eli5why_is_it_that_when_im_sick_a_small_dry_spot/ | {
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"It’s not that it’s dry, it’s that it’s inflamed/irritated. To you, you may just feel dryness or however your brain chooses to interpret it. But it’s because it’s infected most likely, if not irritated by something else."
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3k0ocu | how can fifa be registered as a non-profit when it has over a billion dollars in reserves and the people who occupy its top positions are being paid millions? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3k0ocu/eli5how_can_fifa_be_registered_as_a_nonprofit/ | {
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"Non-profit doesnt mean \"does not make any profit.\" It means that all the surplus revenue it does make goes back into furthering its goal. And the people in top positions don't make millions of US dollars. They make millions in other currency, but its equivalent to about $100-200 thousand US dollars. ",
"Non-profit doesn't mean they can't bring in money. It just means that any money they bring in that exceeds their expenses isn't getting paid out to owners or stockholders.\n\nIt doesn't mean they're a charity. It doesn't mean that their workers have to be impoverished volunteers. It doesn't mean they have to lower the rates they charge to stop from having a net income.\n\nIt just means that the organization has to spend the money on itself."
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dr6b14 | how does acute promyelocytic leukemia (apl) effect the body and why is it so rare? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/dr6b14/eli5_how_does_acute_promyelocytic_leukemia_apl/ | {
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"Acute promyelocytic leukemia is a type of acute myeloblastic leukemia (related to red blood cells wich transport oxygen, white blood cells wich fight bacteria and viruses, and platelets wich stop blood loss by forming clots around cuts) wich is essentially quickly installing blood cancer made of very early cell maturation states\n\nIts characteristic is that it stops the differentation, or maturation process of these cells at the pro-myelocytic stage wich is the very first of a long division and growth process in wich these cells are very immature.\n\nIt does affect the body like any acute leukemia (quickly appearing blood cancer), by producing a lot of useless cells and thus affecting the production capacity of healthy cells.\nThis brings us to the first consequence group wich is called medullar deficiency syndrome: in wich there are signs that the the blood cells are not correctly functioning, there are three types of consequences:\n\na) Anemia or low red blood cell count, wich would normally transport oxygen, it does result in pale skin, short breath, and tiredness\n\nb) Leucopenia, or low white blood cell count, wich would normally prevent infections by viruses/bacteria, lower blood cells means more infections (this state is called immunodeficiency)\n\nc) Thrombopenia, or low platelets count, wich would normally form clots around open wounds to stop the bleeding, lower platelets mean an increased risk of blood loss, and not only with wounds but even without them, as bleeding can happen from intestine, mouth, nose, or under the skin (purpuric spots), inside the brain... this consequence is most notable in promyelocytic leukemia than other types of myeloblastic leukemia.\n\nAnother consequence is the infiltration (or invasion) of other body locations, it can manifest as bigger tonsils, bigger gingiva, or bigger internal organs.\n\nOther manifestations include fever, the apparition of adenopathy wich are inflated lymphatic nodes showing under the skin, and diffuse bone pain\n\nAs to why it is so rare is a purely statistical measure, it does represent around 10% of the total acute myeloblastic leukemia. It is due to a translocation (exchange of parts) between chromosomes 15 and 17, wich will affect the production of two genes responsible for killing non-normally developping cells and for the correct maturation of certain blood cells. \n\nThe main practical difference with other acute myeloblastic anemia types is in the used chemicals for the treatment (trans retinoic acid)"
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38m0o2 | could a president today just suspend the writ of habeas corpus like abraham lincoln did? or did he just kinda do it and shouldn't have been allowed to | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/38m0o2/eli5_could_a_president_today_just_suspend_the/ | {
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"Not much help here, but:\nIIRC a portion of the P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act actually allowed for the suspension of Habeas Corpus in the interest of \"Nat'l Security\". However, I also wouldn't be surprised if it was the latter. My home state, West Virginia, was created out of an executive order from Lincoln and its constitutionality (of which there is little to none) is still debated today.",
"All forms of government come down to the will of the people. Even if something isn't technically \"allowed\", as long as no one objects, the government can do whatever it likes. ",
"This is a surprisingly interesting question. It's controversial, and the answer depends on hard issues like who has the authority to interpret the Constitution. That said, I think the ELI5 answer is: he just did it, and he shouldn't have been allowed to. \n\nIn fact, Lincoln *wasn't* allowed to suspend the writ (for some values of \"allowed to\"). A federal court specifically held that only Congress has the power to suspend the writ, not the President. *See Ex parte Merryman*, 17 F. Cas. 144 (C.C.D. Md. 1861) (No. 9487). Lincoln famously disobeyed the order.\n\nToday, federal courts have a lot more power to tell the other branches what to do. That's because the other branches have started *caring* what the Supreme Court says they should do. The notion that the Executive should defer to SCOTUS's constitutional interpretation no matter what is a relatively new idea. It largely started with *Brown v. Board of Education*, and today it obviously has a lot of street cred. \n\nIn many cases since the civil war the Supreme Court has avoided having to decide Suspension Clause questions (usually by relying on various \"justiciability\" doctrines--look it up if you care). One prominent exception is *Boumediene v. Bush*, where the Supreme Court used the Suspension Clause to hold that prisoners in Guantanamo Bay have the right to federal habeas. So there you go: the Supreme Court today is willing to enforce the Suspension Clause, and it's a good bet that the President would listen.\n\nTl;dr--Lincoln's suspension of the writ contradicted Supreme Court precedent, so if you assume that he was bound by that precedent (as most people do), he shouldn't have suspended the writ. The same would probably be true today.",
"For a period of time, the President *could* suspend Habeas Corpus under the Patriot Act and the Military Commission Act of 2006 and *did* in the case of many Guantanamo Bay detainees under the justification that the prison was not U.S. territory, but this ended in 2008 with the case of [Boumediene v Bush](_URL_0_), which declared that the detainees do have rights since Guantanamo is \"de facto\" U.S. land. Since this case, the government has to provide basic constitutional rights to Guantanamo detainees, but there is still many unethical if not unconstitutional (yet) abuses in Guantanamo.\n\nAs for Lincoln, what you said was essentially correct. On the opposite side of unconstitutional actions of various presidents like Guantanamo, many historically beneficial actions, especially from Presidents like Lincoln and FDR, were technically unconstitutional but allowed."
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239uez | what's preventing us from rescuing the (potential) survivors in air pockets on the sunken south korean ferry? | Expat living in Seoul, here, and there's just as much confusion here as there is elsewhere in the world. Why can't the divers get inside? Why can't we just drill a hole in the part of the ship that's still visible above water and get rescuers in there? Is it really that dangerous inside the ship if a rescuer has an oxygen tank? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/239uez/eli5_whats_preventing_us_from_rescuing_the/ | {
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"Its an upside down sinking ship, it is that dangerous ",
"Apparently very strong tides are preventing rescuers from entering the vessel at all."
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3mmuiy | does rest actually help when you're sick? if so, how? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/3mmuiy/eli5_does_rest_actually_help_when_youre_sick_if/ | {
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"Resting in the sense of not exerting yourself lets your body devote its resources to your immune system instead of the rest of you. It's the same reason you often lose your appetite when you're sick, because digesting food actually costs quite a bit of energy upfront.",
"Your immune system is made up of cells. Throughout the day, and in fighting an infection, these cells can die. When you sleep, less energy is used by the body, like in your muscles and brain, and more energy goes in to the production of new immune cells. So, by getting a good rest you will have more immune cells which can then do a better job at fighting pathogens that cause you to be \"sick\"."
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1t6ldh | why salaries don't increase with the inflation rate? | Why a job that's lets say was paid paid 12$/h in 2000 is still at 12$/h today but minimum wages increased and the inflation rate increased too. Everything costs more but the salaries don't go up much and in the end we only get poorer? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1t6ldh/eli5_why_salaries_dont_increase_with_the/ | {
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"I think this question has two parts.\n\nThe first is why doesn't my salary go up *automatically* with inflation. The answer is because the employer often doesn't want the uncertainty of what they will have to pay you in future years. Some contracts are adjusted for inflation and your trade union, if you have one, will usually negotiate higher wages with inflation as the starting point.\n\nThe second is whether salaries do go up with inflation anyway. Normally, they do - people negotiate higher salaries when they move jobs, or from year to year. The minimum wage, at least where I am, is considered from time to time with inflation - and other factors - in mind. Here in the UK we've had a period where wages haven't risen as fast as inflation, largely because we have relatively high unemployment which means there are plenty of people available for most jobs and so an employer doesn't need to raise what they are prepared to pay to encourage applicants.",
"The company I work for gives 2-4% raises \"occasionally\" (barely, if even, enough to cover inflation), and has the nerve to call them \"Merit raises\" as though they're actually giving us real raises and not just paying us the same amount relative to the current rates."
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2lhnkh | why is "pro-choice" so often referred to as "pro-abortion"? | The pro-lifers are at it again at my school today, pictures of aborted fetuses, calling anyone who disagrees with their totalitarian view as "pro-abortion". How does advocating personal freedoms become interpreted as promoting/encouraging/forcing abortions to all? Why is it so black and white, that if you're not pro-life, you can only be pro-death?
Edit to add: I ask because I'm told I can't be pro choice as a mother of a child with a genetic disease because to do so would mean I believe I should have had an abortion.
Can a person be both? | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2lhnkh/eli5_why_is_prochoice_so_often_referred_to_as/ | {
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" > Don't post just to express an opinion or argue a point of view.",
"Its a form of propaganda to make pro-choice choices sound terrible. ",
"One tactic in any argument is to characterize the other side in an unfavorable light.\n\nSo pro-choice people like to say their opponents are anti-choice because that sounds worse than pro-life.\n\nThe pro-life side likes to say their opponents are pro-abortion for the same reason.\n\nBoth sides want to frame the other side as unreasonable or evil or stupid or whatever...just portray them as unfavorably as possible.\n",
"The term is Pro-Choice. It's about choice. So you choose whatever makes most sense for you. If that means you chose to have your child, that's wonderful. It's the desire to take away someone else's ability to make that decision that makes the difference. "
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35zcep | how is crime dealt with on indian reservations | Do the police get involved, or do they have their own group of trusted individuals. | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/35zcep/eli5_how_is_crime_dealt_with_on_indian/ | {
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"Most crime is handled by reservation law enforcement.\n\nMore serious crime, or crime that is not confined to the reservation is handled by federal authorities, who have jurisdiction on reservation land.\n\nReservation authorities can also grant state and local law enforcement temporary authority.",
"Each tribe will have its own police department, which handles most things. This is important, because on tribal reservation/trust land, city/county/state law enforcement officers will not have jurisdiction.\n\nFor felonies, federal law enforcement officials are involved, typically the FBI. The reason for this is that most tribes have misdemeanors proscribed in their tribal legislation, but felonies are just handed at the federal court level.",
"A bit of an add on question. I live in Southern California and there are a bunch of small reservations that I occasionally drive through. If one of the tribal cops tries to pull me over, can I just run?",
"Sometimes it just seems it isn't. Theres a reserve by me and the majority of cars stolen in this region end up being found on the reserve, dragged, without wheels onto the side of a road or into a field, stripped clean. I haven't heard of a single arrest taking place on the reserve due to the auto thefts. I assume they just protect their own, even if some of their own are nasty little shits stealing every goddamn car in the city.",
"In Canada some reservations have tribal police departments, but most are serviced by the RCMP or a provincial police agency such as the Ontario Provincial Police."
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6s1fg4 | why are galaxies and stars named with numbers and alphabets? | explainlikeimfive | https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/6s1fg4/eli5_why_are_galaxies_and_stars_named_with/ | {
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"There is such a huge amount of them that giving them actual phonetic names is totally unfeasible. Only the closest, most well known stars and galaxies have names like Andromeda and Alpha Centauri (which is actually a system of three stars, but the point still stands.)\n\nAccording to Wikipedia, there are thought to be between 200 billion and 2 trillion galaxies. The even larger number of stars thus goes hand in hand.",
"Mostly because there are a lot of them. We've come across tens of thousands of them, and so it's easier to use a numbering system rather than give each one a unique name.\n\nThe lettering/numbering is usually catalog numbering, so you can easily find information about a particular galaxy relatively quickly."
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38d4zu | why do people who are lactose intolerant become gassy or sick instead of getting rid of lactose like the body does with fiber? | I know the body lacks a certain enzyme to digest lactose in these cases, but the body can't digest fiber either. I guess another way to word this question is "Why don't people get sick when they eat fiber but lactose intolerant people get sick when they consume lactose?" | explainlikeimfive | http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/38d4zu/eli5_why_do_people_who_are_lactose_intolerant/ | {
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"text": [
"with lactose, if *you* don't digest it, the bacteria in your colon will happily digest it. When they do that, they make gasses and ferment sugars. The gasses and sugars have a variety of effects ranging from the sensation of bloating, to causing water to enter the colon and give you diarrhea. Fiber does not have the same chemical composition, so you don't necessarily get the same by-products when it ferments inside you. Lactose also results in pretty significant production of those by products, which can overwhelm your system. Symptoms typically worsen with more consumption. ",
"You want to digest things in your small intestine, then send the wastes to your large intestine to have the water drained from them. Lactose that is not digested in the small intestine get's passed to the large. Bacteria in the large intestine are able to break down that sugar (lactose is a sugar) and get energy from it. As a byproduct of this, they leave their own wastes in the large intestine. The gasses are one of their wastes. Their other wastes might cause looser stools and the other effects you feel. \n\nFiber is a type of sugar, but it's much more difficult to digest. Humans can't digest it. Our gut bacteria can't really either.",
"Okay, so is there a way so I can peacefully drink milk and eat dairy products if I'm lactose intolerant??\n\nPlease!! I miss milk so much...."
]
} | [] | [] | [
[],
[],
[]
] |
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