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Why didn't either of the WTC towers collapse sideways? | The momentum of the planes hitting the towers didn't knock them over. It didn't damage the structural members significantly. All the momentum from the crashes was dissipated into the building. What caused the failure is that the structural members on one side of the tower were heated asymmetrically — which caused them to expand much more than the members on the opposite side. If you've ever tried to carry a couch up or down stairs, you'll know that the person on the lower side is carrying a disproportionate amount of the weight of the couch. If both people are level, then each is carrying fifty percent of the weight. If one person is a few degrees lower than the other, they carry a much higher percentage of the weight. Something similar happened. The structural members on the side away from the fire ended up carrying not just the weight they were designed to carry, twentyfive percent of the upper stories, but the weight of over forty percent of the upper stories, because of the tilt. They gave out. Then, like dominos, the weight fell on the remaining members. They too gave out. That happened very quickly, not giving time for the floors to slip sideways. The momentum at that point was entirely downward. As the top several floors came down, they snapped each floor's structural members or tore them off. Pop pop pop pop pop pop … If you want something that models it, build a model of it with toothpicks. Load the upper part with weight. Then dab water on the toothpicks on one side. |
If I adopt a child and don't like it, can i return it in exchange for a better one or ask for a refund? | > can i return it in exchange for a better one? No, but they'll swap an OK one for two real little fuckers. You could race 'em! |
How is the 21 year old drinking age in the United States legal? Isn't that some sort of age discrimination, assuming that one stops being a minor at age 18? | We tend to think that discrimination is illegal by default, but that is not the case. In the US, the assumption is that discrimination is legal, unless some speciffic law or the Constitution forbids it. The constitution prohibits repetitively few types of discrimination . Age discrimination is perfectly constitutional. All other anti-discrimination rules are by statute - that is Congress must specifically act to outlaw that specific type of discrimination . In this case, because Congress has specifically acted to encourage setting the drinking age at 21 and because it doesn't violate any other laws to do so, it is legal to do so. |
What are the differences between USA's healthcare system and the ones used by other countries? Is ours really so horrible? | Short answer: It's not horrible if you have lots of money. USA has plenty of highly skilled doctors, but with the way the healthcare system is set up -- more privatized care instead of public health care like many other countries, it's expensive for the individual.Ours is for profit, and theirs is to make sure that the greatest good goes out to the greatest number of people. |
; if the human body requires calories (from food) for energy, how do energy pills like ProPlus and other caffeine and energy pills work if they're not providing us with calories? | To put it simply as I possibly can. Caffeine doesn't create energy, it prevents the *breakdown* of energy. |
On a donation site (ie:kickstarter) what keeps people from taking the donation money and running? | Nothing, since it's a donation & not purchasing a product. It's up to the backers to be smart about what projects they support. If you support a project with an unrealistic goal & they haven't shown that they're partway there & have the capacity to finish the job, you might get fucked. You really shouldn't throw money at a project unless the people involved have a good track record or they've clearly established that they product is mostly complete and has a realistic understanding of what it takes to bring the concept to fruition.Kickstarter, as much potential as it has, is used by too many abusers. Too many times I see dev logs of the programmer with new computers just about every time they post an update. Or of the product not finishing. Or of the project being so poorly managed that it was destined to fail. Or the project plan being so outrageous with overpromising and underdelivering. |
Why are lights standard in refrigerators but not in freezers? | Reddits making me feel old again. It's only in the past 20 years or so that I've seen freezers with lights.UK here, have a combine fridge/freezer that is brand new, no light in freezer. |
How has Stephen Hawking lived so long with ALS when other people often only live a few years after their initial diagnoses? | 1. He may not have typical ALS. His rate of progression has been remarkably slow. 2. He lives in Cambridge. Addenbrookes hospital in Cambridge is not only home to world class intensive care but is at the forefront of ALS treatment and respiratory disease treatment*. 3. He receives round the clock care from a team of carers. Think about what normally kills people with ALS - failure of the muscles in the larynx to stop food material passing down into the lungs instead of the stomach and consequent pneumonia. 2 and 3 allow preventative measures and prompt, effective treatment of the above. *A certain professor will readily boast about saving Prof's life ;-) |
Why does every single company make you sign up with a credit card for a free trial? | It's basically because, once the free trial has expired more people tend to keep the service instead of going out of their way to cancel it, and that way they already have the billing information to charge. |
Why is Atlas from Greek mythology shown to be holding a round Earth, even though it was proven to be spherical only later on? | The greeks actually proved the earth was a sphere, using geometry and the shadows in a pair of wells. By knowing the distance between the wells, you can measure the shadows and determine the curvature of the Earth. If memory serves, they actually we're only about 4% when they calculated the size of the planet. |
What are the sets of black tubes I keep seeing across the roads and driving over and what is their purpose? | It's a tally meter. It counts how many vehicle's drive over it. Helping plan future maintenance or road extensions to existing highways. |
How did the believe that Earth is Flat manage to gain their root in this current modern society? | Your last question is actually a portion of the answer. There's 2 movements, there's the Flat Earth Society which came around as simply a group to improve your debate skills. If you can 'prove' the Earth is flat you can probably debate just about anything. Unfortunately some people thought they were serious. Then there's the ignorant crowd that it doesn't matter what you show them. By showing them evidence that they are wrong people in general will actually galvanize their own beliefs.It never had root in common society. That is a myth produced by modernity to make past generations seem more stupid. Galileo was not trying to teach the world was flat. Humans have known thousands if not tens of thousands of years that the earth was round. Most cultures that have studied stars knew this, and all that were ocean fairing knew this. |
Those that don't speak English but can sing English songs perfectly, what is it about singing that allows them to form the correct structure of the words? | I listen to a lot of Japanese songs, and I sometimes sing the words even though I don't know what they mean > Senbonzakura yoru ni magire kimi no koe mo todokenaiyo", 'My explanation would be that people who sing have a "musical ear" therefore they perceive the words as musical notes I sing and because of my musical ear thingy i can repeat almost any words/language/dialect i hear, even though I have no idea what I'm saying.Hope I helped you |
Why are certain foods considered breakfast foods? | Last year after watching a documentary on how and why breakfast cereals are marketed as such, I thought I'd experiment for a week and eat dinner-ish food for breakfast and cereals and eggs and toasts for dinner. Wasn't that bad to be really honest. Just should've avoided the sugary cereals before bed. PS: Was single at the time with a 9-5 job, so why not. |
How does sandboxing (computer security) work? | Imagine that you have a huge playground with sand where all the kids play together. If a bully comes to that playground, he can come to you and kick your sandcastle or take a shit and ruin the entire sand playground for everyone. Sandboxing means that every kid has its own playground and cannot go to some other kid because there is a fence/wall between those playgrounds. So it can only kick down its own castle and shit in its own playground. There can be holes in the walls/fences and a smart bully can take advantage of it. But that's another story. |
If I sell stock, who buys it? | You don't just sell when you click the sell button. What happens is that the broker will look for a matching buy bid, if there is none, your order will wait until there is one. A stock is valued by how much someone is prepared to pay for it though, so if you place a sell order at it's current value there will probably be a buy order waiting for you to sell - otherwise it wouldn't be valued at that price!But if you sell a lot, it may happen that the buy order was for fewer stocks, then you can't sell them all at once. |
How can human eggs be frozen? Wouldn't they die like every other human cell? | Human cells can survive freezing if you do it right. The most important consideration is that you don't form large ice crystals within the cells when you freeze them, which would rupture the cells and kill them. It turns out that you can minimize the breaking up of cells by doing the following: 1) Freeze the cells slowly, , which minimizes the size of ice crystals. A good rate is about -1C per minute, which can be achieved by placing the tubes containing the cells in methanol or isopropanol while they get down to -80C, after which they are transferred to liquid nitrogen. At about -150C, all cellular processes are effectively stopped. 2) Before freezing, suspend the cells in a solution containing 10% animal serum of some sort and 10% glycerol or some organic solvent like DMSO. This also minimizes the size of ice crystals. Once cells are ready to be used again, they have to be thawed rapidly. The tubes containing the cells taken out of liquid nitrogen are placed in a warm water bath for 1-2 minutes, after which they can be mixed into growth medium . Even with all these precautions, not all cells survive the freeze/thaw process. Typically you will lose 5-10% of the cells, which is still better than the 80-90% you might lose if you didn't use the steps above. |
Physics Question. Plane falling, jump at the last second, land fine? | I'd like to add a point that I didn't see here already. Assuming you mightily jump to save yourself, you will still be in the middle of an exploding/burning plane crash. Which may kill you anyway. |
What's the difference between blackmail and extortion? | Blackmail is generally inducing someone to give you money by threatening to reveal something about that person that they'd prefer to remain secret. Extortion is inducing someone to give you money by threatening to cause them harm in the future. |
The Donnie Darko movie. | There's also the theory that aside from tangent universes, Donnie Darko is Jesus Christ, and Frank is God. For example: Donnie does what Frank asks. How does Donnie have the strength to put an axe into a bronze statue? The sprinklers in front of Mr. Cunninghams house The tunnels at the party/telling Gretchen everything will be ok Directors cut: When the engine crashes into Donnies room, [the camera pans right and shows Donnie on his bed with a wooden beam in his chest] |
Why are scientists attempting to clone mammoths, opposed to cloning something more practical such as tuna and other endangered animals? | It's really simple: mammoths are cool, tuna are boring. Just creating a couple in the lab won't revive the species. If the conditions driving the tuna to extinction aren't stopped, reintroduced tuna will just die all over again. Trying to reintroduce the mammoth and create a sustained wild population would just be stupid. The world has moved on, and they'd either die off or rampage through the food chain. So, clone something useless but cool, or useless but tuna. Pretty clear choice. |
Why do you stop experiencing nightmares when you grow up? | As a full grown adult, I can tell you I have nightmares more frequently than regular dreams. It's largely to due with psychology. |
Why are Macs considered superior when it comes to editing for their CPUs when PCs have access to powerful GPUs? | Now it's just preference. Old school Apple systems used a different CPU architecture that was faster than their Intel equivalent processors of the day. Look up the difference between RISC and CISC. They performed very well for simple parallel operations like photo and video editing. Add that too a great interface design and well done, artistic, contemporary styling of the case and you create an image artists wanted. Photoshop evolved on the Apple platform and the pc equivalents couldn't even approach it in performance and functionality. |
Why did unlimited data for cellphones/etc.. stop being a thing and data caps are now enforced? | Look at speed of the network. 2G EDGE data is typically [500 kbit/s], so assuming you had something to saturate that network, you would be pulling no more than [1.3Tb of data] which is a lot, but that is litterally downloading as fast as possible 24/7, which would never happen. Your phone would run out of batteries in an hour or two, your storage would fill up, and there was nothing that large to download. Plus, in 2G days, phones couldn't really process data that fast, so the practical limit was much lower. Plus, in 2G days, there wasn't as much streaming content. Netflix didn't come online until sometime around 2010, and most music at that time was downloaded rather than streamed. Plus, in 2G days, not many people were using the internet on their phones. Smart phones sucked a lot more, and were fairly rare. And mobile internet pages were total shit. So realistically, the average person used very little phone data. So carriers were safe offering unlimited data, because not many people would use more than a gig or two a month, and the worst case was so rare that it was essentially a non-issue. |
Why do babies always try to eat their own fists when they're happy? | A couple of things. Babies stick everything in their mouths. That's how they see the world. Also, that is how they show happiness. If you are close enough to a baby after making it happy it will want to stick you in it's mouth. It's a compliment. |
How did they determine the weight of the Earth, and other bodies in the Cosmos without a scale? | Once you know the value of G, the gravitational constant, it is fairly trivial to calculate the mass of an object if that object has a satellite that revolves around it, and the orbital radius and period of the satellite have been measured. The [formula] is: M = x where M is the mass of the primary, G is the gravitational constant, r is the radius of the satellite's orbit, and T is the satellite's orbital period. The symbol π is the mathematical constant pi, 3.1415926536 , reddit's font doesn't display π very clearly. You don't need to know the satellite's mass. This formula is only completely accurate for a circular orbit, but for a near circular orbit it yields a good approximation, and if the satellite has a non-circular orbit whose parameters are well known corrections exist to adjust the calculation appropriately. Accurately determining the radius of the satellite's orbit can be a little more difficult to measure than it may seem, the distance must be measured from the satellite's center of mass to the center of mass of the satellite/primary pair. The experiments described by other posters involving known masses and measuring the tiny attraction between them in the laboratory were all about finding the value of G. Once G is known it is quite straightforward to calculate the mass of the Earth by using the moon's known distance and orbital period. |
Did i do something wrong here? | r/relationships This is not a question for r/explainlikeimfive but there is no excuse for going through someone else's phone imo. Put a lock on your phone an move on with your life. |
How much does gasoline contract when it's cold? | Good answers here so far, but to actually answer the question, the contraction factor is about [0.1% per degree C.] As /u/bongsound points out, the gas pump applies a temperature correction to the volume it sells, so what actually appears on the meter is the volume the gasoline would have if warmed up to some standard temperature. However, for 51ish liters of gasoline to expand to 61.5 liters, the gasoline would have to expand by 20%, which is only possible for a temperature change of 200 C. Since I assume it was still liquid when you pumped it, that's not possible Either you got ripped off or your gas tank holds slightly more than you think it does. In many countries there's a phone number on gas pumps, supermarket scales, etc. that you can call to report suspicious measurements and in theory they'll send an inspector. |
Why is there so much more land mass in the northern hemisphere? | As a side question to this topic . Could it be related to the tilt of the axis and the moon have something to do with the position of some of the mass? For instance, if certain areas have more pull than others due to either the moon's orbit and/or the axis tilt toward the Sun. Just something to ponder. |
how can jets produce directional thrust | For a jet to work, it either needs a starter or it needs to have a fan. So ones like turbofan and turboprop all have fans. When you start the engine, it spins one way so that the air is pulled in from the front and pushed out through the back. At the back side of the engine, there are more fans, smaller though, that is connected to the fan in front through a shaft. The air moving through these smaller fans help spin the fan in front, almost like a cyclical reaction . If you're wondering why friction wouldn't stop this cycle, it's because burning fuel gives the air flowing through more energy. Ramjets and scramjets are a little bit different, because the whole system is just a giant tube. They need an engine starter, something to blow in air from the front. Once it gets started though, it's better to imagine it like a river - once water starts flowing one way, it takes a lot of energy to push it the other. Of course, rivers flow in a direction because of slopes and such, but with regards to changing directions it's a similar idea. Ramjet and scramjet ignition are actually pretty hard problems to solve, so some aircrafts have both a turbojet and a ramjet on board, so when it goes fast enough it can use the ramjet. Another thing that keeps the ramjet fromt flowing backwards is that the aircraft is already moving forward, so the airflow is going in the correct direction. Finally, the exit velocity of air is faster then its entring velocity, and actually creates a negative pressure due to the air flowing out. This pulls in more air. |
Shouldn't our stomach acid flow back up if we turn ourselves upside down? | I believe we have a sphincter muscle at the entrance to our stomach to prevent that from happening. Open to correction on that though because I'm not an anatomy expert. |
How much pain would a victim of beheading feel? | You'd feel serious pain right up until the point where the spinal cord was severed. Most extremist beheading videos, seem to wait til very last to severe it, making their victims suffer for as long as possible fucking good blokes. |
What exactly is graphene, what does it do and why is it so talked about. | It's a new form if carbon. The particular arrangement of carbon atoms is extremely strong but also incredibly light it will hopefully become a new building material like carbon fibre did. |
How do members of Anonymous remain anonymous? How do they get caught? | Anonymous doesn't really have a membership. It is just a brand.Anonymous is more of a movement than an organization. There isn't a fixed number of "members" behind Anonymous. In a sense, anyone can put on a mask and make videos on Youtube and claim being part of Anonymous. And that's what makes Anonymous so intriguingJust curious what about using a "throwaway device" such as a laptop purchased with cash and only used over public/open wifi spots until no longer needed then discarded. Would other technologies such as VPN, TOR, etc even be needed?', "I have a pretty well working method so far - I never do anything as 'anonymous' except from one specific WiFi point that is: well away from my home, and tracks itself as being in another state. |
Why do so many Americans seem opposed to unversal healthcare? | In this country, you have the right to remain willfully ignorant. People can't be bothered to learn the science behind the idea, or the empirical evidence the supports it. We have a strong voting population that is old and afriad of change, savage and selfish. They'll accept budgeting for a war so our children can go die in a forein land, for depleated resources we can't be bothered to develop a replacement for, but won't help themselves or their countryman. |
Why is Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback so eager to not expand Medicaid? | No. The federal government agreed to pay the vast bulk of the Medicaid expansion. The money that gets spent at the hospitals provides money to Kansas doctors, nurses, and hospital staff, and recycled back into the local economies. Poor people who can now get medical coverage will be more productive. More preventative care will help prevent costly and ineffecient emergency room care. From a strictly economic standpoint, people in Kansas are already being taxed by the feds to pay for the nationwide Medicaid expansion. And with the federal government picking up most of the tab, it's a very good deal, economically. But if your ideology says rich people shouldn't be taxes to pay for health care for poorer people, you refuse to accept it. That's the only real reason; everything else is a fig leaf rationalization. |
What defines why cord plugs are made the way they are? Say for instance, why can't monitors be attached to the motherboard with an USB-plug? | The physical characteristics of a cable or connector result in a limit to the data rate that can be transmitted over that. The communications 'protocol' and the cable design are done together so the cable used is up to the job but isn't expensive overkill. Monitor cables have always required a very high data rate over a short distance, external hard drives require less speed and keyboards and mice way less. That said nowadays there seems to be convergence in performance. USB 3.1 is capable of 10 gigabits per second, compared to 15 for HDMI 2.0 and 26 for Displayport 1.4. That makes USB 3.1 theoretically fast enough for most non-gaming monitors. On the other hand 4K 60fps is still beyond what USB can do. |
What triggers the explosions of atomic and hydrogen bombs? | The proper term for the thing that starts detonation in any bomb is the fuse. A fuse can measure something or sense something and start detonation when a preset value is reached. Altitude fusing does what you'd expect, as does impact fusing. An altitude fuse might use barometric pressure or a small radar altimeter as a data source. Position data is another option - Bomb, when you get *here* exactly, please explode. There's a good fellow. Fusing might also be relevant to the delivery system. An aircraft dropped weapon, which has the funny name 'gravity bomb', would likely use altitude and/or impact fusing. A weapon that rides an ICBM might use speed, altitude, and position data to fully confirm that it has reached its target and fire, and these sensors would be considered parts of the fusing system. Torpedoes, cruise missiles, and portable demolition charges probably all have their own unique set of fusing options to suit their uses and operating environments. |
How do developers protect their software's source code? | Reverse engineering is always possible because nothing is 100% safe. It takes time and dedication to filter through everything, sort and rearrange codes, and try hit and miss tactics. That's why a lot of games are very similar in the App store. |
What makes an iceberg invisible? | This isn't specific to the Titanic, but fog can reduce naval visibility to just few dozen yards. |
You're suddenly in a vacuum chamber with only 1 plant. How many extra seconds / minutes oxygen do you get? | You don't. Both of you are killed by the lack of pressure long before the lack of anything else even starts to cause a problem. Even if that was not a problem, nothing you breath out would reach the plant and nothing it outputs would reach you. They'd disperse into the air as evenly as possible. |
why does a wooden spoon prevent a pan from boiling over? | Two main reasons: 1. The rough surface of the wooden spoon will break the water bubbles, causing the foam to break around the spoon. 2. The contents of the bubbles is mostly steam, and when it comes into contact with the room-temperature spoon the steam condenses into liquid water. This hack isn't a complete fix though, and will stop working when the spoon gets saturated with water or reaches a similar temperature to its surroundings. |
Why are drug cartels not treated the same way as terrorist organizations when they pose a larger threat to north and south America? | They are. Perhaps you need to do some reading on the War on Drugs which was declared by Nixon in 1971. The federal government spends about $15B a year on the war on drugs and state and local governments spend about $25B/year. It's estimated that a trillion dollars has been spent since the war began. |
Why do we have curved feet? | The inward curve is called the arch of your foot. When you step down the arch flattens somewhat. It flattens more if you are say jumping off a chair or running than simply walking. The action of the foot flattening absorbs some of the force from whatever action you may be doing. This limits the stress put on your long bones .In this video you can see how horses' legs do the same _URL_1_. This horse actually overextends their ankle .When people have, say, plantar fasciitis their arches often have collapsed. The tendons/ligaments in the arch no longer act as shock absorbers, which is why it can cause them more pain walking long distances or doing high impact activities. |
Why are fights between players allowed in the NHL when it is very strongly prohibited in just about every other sport? | It's also a way of self-policing the game. I can't speak to it specifically but I heard a radio host describe it better than I could. Maybe someone who knows more about hockey could elaborate on it |
How are we still prone to sunlight radiation, given the sun was there our entire existence? | > the sun was there our entire existence? According to our current knowledge, when humans first evolved, everyone had dark skin. Dark skin is like natural sunscreen. It helps prevent you from getting sunburns and skin damage. However, a small amount of sunlight hitting our skin is necessary for the body to synthesize vitamin D from a molecule related to cholesterol. Dark skin pigmentation means less sunlight reaches that chemical. This can lead to vitamin D deficiencies, which can in turn lead to serious conditions like rickets. As human populations gradually increased and as a result spread out of intensely sunlit equatorial regions of Africa, darker skin wasn't as important. Now vitamin D was, so lighter skin became more advantageous. |
Why Shanghai and other parts of China are so polluted compared to the rest of the world. | China's air is polluted largely because of their reliance on coal as a heat source. When coal is burned for electricity it is burned at a very high temperature, over 1000 F. This causes a lot of the contaminants to burn off as well, and is very efficient. Residential and businesses use coal for heating and cooking, not electricity. The coal isn't burned as hot or efficiently, creating more pollution. The solution would be to reduce or eliminate personal use and increase electric heating and cooking. |
Why are there different blood types, and how do they work? | Thanks for this. The one question I always had was/is,Why can't you donate blood if you have high BP or high colestorol?I mean, if it came down to life and death during an operation or after a car wreck wouldn't any blood be better for a transfusion then none?I am O- and used to give blood all the time as I knew from the Military it was the most useful type. I even had to find my blood buddy so if injured in the field we knew who we could get blood from After I started meds for the BP and Colestorol I couldn't give blood anymore. Would you know why? Thank you, |
what is embezzlement and why is it so bad? | The main difference between embezzling and stealing is that when you embezzle, you normally have a legitimate access to the money. And usually it's a larger amount. If you pull $5 out of the till at work, you are stealing. If you add 15 fake people to the payroll and pocket the money from the excess wages, you're embezzling.This is embezzelment. I work for a company that has fuel on site. Each month i snag 10 to 15 gallons of gas for my personal vehicle an charge it to company vehicles. Thats embezzelment.There are lots of different ways to 'embezzle' but in all of them, you are taking money from the company you work for. This is stealing. |
Is there really any difference between the seemingly infinite amounts of brands of shampoo, conditioner, soap, toothpaste, etc., or do they basically all do the same thing? | For some people with no specific needs they all do the same thing, for others the brand really do make a difference. For example people with dandruff can't use shampoo that dries out their scalp even more, or people with sensitive teeth would prefer Sensidyne. |
How come sometimes when one is extremely hungry, a sensation of almost needing to vomit occurs? | To staple onto this question, in case anyone has any insight I have been suffering from depression as of late, and one of the major effects is the near disappearance of my appetite. Simply put, I never actually feel hungry. However, if I don't eat at all, often my body will start to feel nauseated. Is this the same thing? Is my body not telling me I'm hungry until its far past the time I should have ate?", 'What about the weird "static" sensation I get in the back of my throat when I'm really hungry. I can feel it in my throats and hear it as well. Edit: I'm super happy other people experience this. Also I have many many throats. Edit 2: Anyone checking back for answers I made a post over on /r/askscience so we'll see. Here's the post: _URL_2_', "You'll still likely vomit if you're sick and haven't eaten anything. Your liver will manufacture about a quart to a quart and a half of bile daily, and if you haven't eaten, well, it's gonna be that bile coming back up |
Why didn't the major European powers just annex Germany after WWII? | Prior to the German surrender, the Allies had already agreed about how Germany should be divided up between them at the Potsdam conference. Russia got the occupation zone in the East and the British, Americans and French shared the West. Berlin was also split between the Allies though Stalin wasn't particularly happy about it. You ask about stopping the Germans from being a threat but in fact, the Americans fought hard to help Germany get back on its feet. They lent a lot of money to Germany and other countries so they could rebuild after the war. Another rise from Germany wasn't the problem anymore, it was the massive Communist country a few hundred miles east. EDIT: I was talking about the USA sending money to Germany, I would like to point out this only went to West Germany and the US originally aimed to destroy what was left of Germany's industry, not to redevelop it. |
at what point does a group of molecules become an organism that's alive or other (viruses, bacteria, etc.)? Where does that border start and end? | I'm sure someone here will answer this better - but at school I was always taught its when it exhibits the seven signs of life 1 -It should maintain some balanced conditions in its inner structure. This is called Homeostasis2 - Its structure is highly organized.3- It should be able to break down or build up nutrients to release or store energy based on need. This is called Metabolism4- It should grow, which means its structure changes as time goes by in an advantageous manner.5- It should show adaptation to the environment.6- It should be able to respond to environmental stimuli on demand .7- It should be able to reproduce itself. Viruses are arguably not alive as they only reproduce using the genetic material of another organism - bacteria certainly is though |
How do people hire actors to do things that are basically making fun of themselves? For example hire a fat person then have them constantly getting jokes made about their weight in the movie | Because there's nothing inherently wrong with making fun of yourself, and the actors are being paid to do it. |
Why do snakes sometimes bite themselves? | Their vision sucks, and they get very excited near food or danger. I was introduced to a baby Macklot's, or Savu island python. The owner was trying to feed it a baby mouse, and it bit the mouse, the man, itself, the man, itself, the mouse etc. Just a hyper reaction. I took this animal home, because I knew it would help me get over the fear of being bitten by a snake, and it did. _URL_1_", 'Boredom. They'll typically bite themselves and if nobody's around, they say "Damn is that really what that feels like?" |
Why does it take so long for employers to reach hiring decisions? | They're interviewing a bunch of other candidates to see who's best.1) We have to go through whatever resumes we collect during that time period, and select from those which candidates we think are worth interviewing. 2) We have to schedule and conduct interviews of all of those candidates. 3) We have to do decide which candidates we might want to hire. 4) We have to do background checks on those candidates. Some places also do a credit check . 5) We then extend offers. 6) Depending on how 4 & 5 go, we might have to do another round of interviews.There are a lot of good points here. But I'm guessing it's because time moves slower for a prospective employee waiting to hear from an employer.I understand the criminal background checks. But why would an employer need to do a credit check? |
How do they cast obese and/or ugly children? | The children's parents would have paid a casting agency to profile their little money creature. A casting profile includes photos, a brief description of the little monster and working conditions such as the area they are available and what type of work they are willing to perform. A casting agent can then select a short list of appropriate candidates and hold a casting call, where the director of an ad, TV show or film can send their people to choose which ugly or fat kid they want. They'll never list they want a far or ugly kid in the brief, but they'll use less harsh descriptions so the agents know what they are looking for. The agents in turn won't ever call the kids ugly or fat, but may make mention they are looking for certain features or body type. TL;Dr.. A lot of tip toeing around the fact the kids a class A candidate for beetus and walmart commercials. |
How hackers are getting away with hacking banks? | As someone who worked briefly in cross boarder banking, transfers are done by swift. When these transactions are lost we started a wire investigation. One time I saw one where the money was suppose to go to Canada but ended up going to Bank of America, but not in Canada. It took 30 days to investigate and find the money . If someone had actually stolen it, I'm sure 30 days is long enough to walk away with 90K . The bank got fucked though because he had a contract on the trading floor with an exchange, so they had to do it 30 days later at the same rate |
What happens when a non-fully grown tattooe'd body grows? | I know someone who got a small tattoo on his arm when a young teen. He grew a lot in the years since then. His tattoo got a bit bigger, but it also rotated about 45 degrees so it's facing a different direction.They move as well. The only tat I have that I got 25 years ago on my upper left arm is about 2.5" back from where is was originally. |
Donated human blood only has a shelf life of about 21 days, what happens to the gallons of un-used human blood if it never finds a recipient? | _URL_2_ A pint of blood is worth several hundred dollars and usually doesn't make it to the shelf life. It gets sold to other blood banks across the region it was donated. |
If I drink soda through a straw without it touching my teeth, would it still cause damage to them? | I ask my dentist the same thing, and asked about drinks with no sugar and she told me that, yes it still could because it's not the only sugar that is decaying the teeth. She told me that anything that causes a higher PH level in your mouth will start a decaying process. So, if you drink coke through a straw and it never hits your mouth that's good, but if you can taste it, then it's effecting a PH level and on some level it's hurting your teeth. This was a few years ago she told me this and I have honestly never heard anyone else mention a PH level in your mouth balancing out decay, so I'm not sure. |
Why does the United States spend OODLES UPON OODLES more on defense compared to all other countries? | The US took upon itself to maintain the global order and contain communism since it was the last remaining power after WWII. Obviously, throughout the decades since WWII how the US applies its military and economic power has been the subject of great debate. As others have stated, the US has basically been the defender of the West for the past 70 years which would include western Europe, all of North and South America, Japan, and the South Pacific, among others. It was the US that kept the Soviet Union from aggressively expanding around the globe and, in my opinion, saving hundreds of millions from the brutality and misery under communism. The US defense spending is largely credited with ultimately bringing down the Soviet Union and freeing hundreds of millions more from communism's evil grasp. It's been the US Navy that has kept the sea lanes open for free global trade. It's been the US military and it's ability to project it's might around the world that has kept China from taking Taiwan. The list could go on and on. With that backdrop, the United States still sees itself as the one nation that can generally keep world peace . This is why many US politicians stress for a strong military and do not like defense spending cuts. Knowing that the United States carries a big stick and will use it occasionally has, in my opinion, kept the peace. Other countries, knowing that the US has such a large defense budget, don't worry too much about defense spending. That has certainly been the case with Canada for the last 30-40 years. |
Why did Eastern armies prefer curved swords over the straight swords of their western counterparts? | There are probably lots of different reasons, and people have already posted a bunch of them. One I haven't seen as of yet is that the Romans adopted the straight, stabbing gladius as their primary sword, and I'd maintain that it is a safe assumption that later Western armies were at least in part indebted to this, since for a long time everyone and their cousin wanted to emulate the Romans. Also, for what its worth, Arab swordsmiths had far superior steel production techniques than their Western counterparts during the time period we're probably talking about here. Having a really sharp blade encourages slashing weapons, whereas a lot of the traditional Western swords are designed more for blunt force injuries with perhaps the occasional thrust, in each case where sharpness isn't quite as critical.in addition to everything here, a curved blade is good for horseback because you could ride right past an enemy and slash at their chest and it is much less likely to catch than a straight sword. |
My 12 year old brother wants to know why the debt between all the countries in the world cannot simply "cancel each other out." | A lot of this money is owed not to other countries, but *people* in other countries. I might have decided that Greek bonds were a great place to put my life's savings. Cancelling that debt might be good for the Greek government, but it would ruin everything I worked for my entire life.To understand this, he must understand what created this debt in the first place; and there was a [very relevant ELI5] done about this before.The debts aren't to other countries. It's not as simple as China owes the US $200 billion, and the US owes China $250 billion, lets just cancel it out and just make the US owe China $50 billion. The US government is in debt mostly to individuals and corporations, who invest in their debt- in the form of bonds. If you have a US savings bond, or treasury note, you own some of the debt of the US gov't, and they owe you money. |
How do native speakers of languages with many characters e.g. any of the Chinese Languages, enter data into a computer, or even search the internet? | Native Hindi Speaker here. Similar to the Chinese and Japanese language keyboards, Google also has Hindi keyboards which work through transliteration. If I want to type hello or namaste in Hindi, I'll use the Google Hindi Input keyboard and type in hello or namaste which it transliterates into Hindi. One gets a few options to choose the correct spelling though, for e.g., when we write N in English it may mean न or ण in Hindi . This is one of the easiest methods and is also available for desktop PCs/laptops. However, many mobile companies in India are nowadays giving their own Hindi keyboards which have their own layout with Hindi alphabets and vowel sounds instead of the English alphabets. It is upto the individual to choose which one they prefer. The specific Hindi keyboard has been available for quite a few years as my mother used to type out Hindi/Sanskrit question papers for exams since at least the last 10 years. However, it was on a desktop and you had to use the English keyboard with a software that would allow Hindi typing on an English keyboard. That was quite laborious and did not work on all computers. So it would show Hindi on our computer but just garbled English characters on other PCs. |
Why Greece defaulting on its debt would mean it would have to leave the Eurozone | Once you have royally pissed off the people who print your money, you had better be able to print some of your own. Whether it is legalistically required probably doesn't matter much. They might not force you to leave at gun point, but you can count on them to not do you any favors in the future. |
Why, as an American, have I been taught next to nothing about the extent of our involvement in places like the Philippines & Guam? | Well because those two events are blatant examples of America's hypocrisy. Becoming exactly like those people we declared independence from, sustaining oppressive overseas imperial colonies? Impossible! |
What is high functioning depression ? Is it real ? | It's a real thing, and it's also known as dysthymia. Kati Morton, a therapist on YouTube, made a great video on this earlier this year if you're interested. |
If a take-out delivery includes "arrives in x minutes or it's free". If it comes later than x minutes, who gets penalized? | The delivery guy certainly wouldn't have to pay for the pizza. The shop would just eat the cost. However if it happened many times he could be reprimanded or fired for his lateness. |
Why do you lose your appetite after a breakup? What actually happens in your body to suppress hunger? | Post break-up, if one's appetite and sleep patterns show a significant change, it's because of an episode of depression. Depression is essentially the 'sickness syndrome' one faces due to emotional inducers. Sickness syndrome is what happens when you get sick, like the name suggests. It could be because of cold, fever or even cancer. A sickness is an active attack on your immune system, and your body starts shutting down certain functions slowly. One of the primary symptoms are the dulled down sensory organs- Sight, taste, touch, sound and smell. You will find depressive patients preferring darkness instead of light, because their eyes have literally become that sensitive to so much brightness, it can't register that amount of information as easily as a healthy person would. Similarly, your sense of taste becomes less efficient and food begins to taste bland. This is the cause for over-eating as well as loss of appetite. The over-eaters seek solace in the food that they are eating, and there are some food items, such as, chocolates which help with the increase in Serotonin which helps maintain a balance in hormones.Hmm strange. I went completely in the opposite direction after my last breakup and put as much food and whiskey in myself as physically possible to the point where I would be really uncomfortably full. This lasted several months. |
How is it that the same 5-10 companies seem to sponsor every podcast I listen to? | I always hear ads from:-Backblaze-Harry's-Fracture-Casper-Automatic I think because they will sponsor an entire network of podcasts, such as _URL_1_, and so all the shows get the add. Yet, I know of 3 other podcasts not part of relay that also get them. |
With so many animals we could be eating, why can't we chew past beef/poultry/sheep/pig for meat-stuffs? | > I just wouldn't know where to order said delicacies. Google for specialty butchers. Although some things nobody is going to carry either because there is no demand at all or because it is extremely difficult to import certain game . As to why you don't see all kinds of weird game meat at the supermarket, there's just no demand. |
Why don't americans vote absentee? | Another reason - the race goes on until election day, and the candidates continue to campaign for themselves and against each other until the last day. The race can change up until the last minute, and to vote absentee, one would have to make one's final decision at least a few days before the polls. |
Why is marriage under control of the state, in America? | In short, 9th amendment. Powers not given to the national government are given to the states. It just isn't a national law yet.not how I would tell a five year old but it expresses my view best _URL_1_In what part of the world is it not?', "The central purpose of marraige is to provide the state with a way to do two things. 1. Allow citizens to create new family's 2.Promoting people to have children. |
What is Dark Matter, Can a big chunk of it hit me? | According to the most popular theories, dark matter is a type of matter that has mass and that interacts through the gravitational force and the weak nuclear force, but does not interact through the electromagnetic force or the strong nuclear force. As such, a 'chunk' of dark matter could pass through you and you would not notice it apart from its gravitational effect. The chunk would have to be very big before you felt the gravitational effect. It is quite likely that dark matter is passing through you all the time, and you never know. |
Why eating Sushi is healthy and safe and why other raw meats can't achieve this. | eating raw beef is 100% acceptable as long as it has not been punctured exposing it's inner contents to Oxygen, and bad germs. E: i know someone who eats raw bacon. |
Why don't people just Google their ELI5 questions? | Sometimes it's nice to feel like someone is actually responding to your curiosity.Maybe a different way of saying the same thing. You can answer a question 5 different ways, but some people may not comprehend 4 of those. So why not ask a forum of laymen and skilled people instead of reading a blog written by someone that likes to use big words?', "I don't know, have you tried Google first?", 'its a nice sub and its nice to have other people know new things as wellsometimes the question is hard to word in a google search, it might need more explanation |
Why aren't there thunderstorms in the winter? | Here in Utah occasionally we'll get blizzards with super dry air and will get lightning strikes. Lightning strikes and thunder during a snow storm are crazy cool. |
why do we feel so tired after getting too much sleep? | Most likely dehydration but I've seen another ELI5 and it's suggested that your entire sleep should be divisible by roughly 1.5hours. This is so you complete an entire sleep cycle.I think if you pass a certain state It wrecks havoc on your body making you feel worse than if you woke up before or just after completing that stage of sleep. Edit: Actually here's the [response] from that thread:) |
The purpose of developing self driving cars. | Here's 3 reasons, there are plenty more too. Safety - human drivers are prone to errors. When you make an error while driving a car, it often doesn't end well. Efficiency - human drivers have to be cautious so they don't crash, this causes traffic build ups. Self driving cars could drive faster and closer to one another, and at constant speeds, reducing travel time and fuel costs. Comfort - you can have a nap, read a book etc while traveling, instead of having to focus on the road. And you don't have to use public transport, which is often not ideal, for various reasons. |
How do people sell a house when the mortgage isn't fully paid off? | I'm not much help but I mean while someone's at it .what exactly is a mortgage and how does it work? I know it has something to do with loans and houses but beyond that I'm in the dark |
Why are we unable to defeat viruses like the Cold, Herpes, and HIV? | Viruses are not alive, and unlike bacteria their structures are very simple so there's not much you can break without damaging the rest of the human body. |
Monsanto and why everyone hates them. | Monsanto is only seen as evil because of smear campaigns from their competitors. Monsanto [supports LGBT equality] and [discourages child labour in India], and is also very charitable. Monsanto recently won an award from the Corporate Responsibility Magazine for [being a good corporate citizen]. Monsanto allows independent researchers [to test their products with no contract.] GMOs don't pose [any elevated risks to humans or the environment]. GMOs [reduce pesticide use and increase yield], thereby decreasing emissions while [increasing profits for farmers]. Monsanto has [never sued any farmer for wayward pollination]. Monsanto [doesn't monopolize the seed market], and [plenty of independent groups are developing GMOs]. Patents exist on both [non-GMO] and organic seeds, and have [for decades]. Seed saving is [very uncommon in modern industrial farming]. Indian farmers are [not committing suicide] because of [Bt cotton]. [Organic pesticides] are often [quite toxic] and [organic methods are more harmful to the environment]. Glyphosate is [practically nontoxic], is applied at very low dose, and does not pose a significant risk to [consumers] or [applicators] or [soil] and it is [not found in breast milk]. Glyphosate use is increasing, but replacing other more harmful herbicides and [herbicide use per lb of yield is dramatically decreasing]. |
What is an 'automatic cryptocoin miner', and what are the implications of having one included in the new uTorrent update? | It's an opt-in checkbox when you install it fresh. You're not going to get it via an auto-update. It's dumb, but easy to avoid, so don't panic. This is a pretty common piece of opt-in malware. Digsby included it years ago. If you can't uncheck a checkbox when installing something you aren't computing right.I thought it is just a hoax, why would developers do this? Did somebody else buy their app, or what?', "The miner is called Epic Scale, and it doesn't always install with uTorrent. I believe you need to accept the bundled software that is included with the uTorrent installer before it will install the extra software. I have been a uTorrent user for years and I will continue to use it.. haven't found any Epic Scale remnants on my computer. I am also pretty sure that most anti-malware scans will detect it. Or just check your installed programs list. It's not hard to remove/uninstall. |
Why do animals like to be pet by humans? | I'd attribute it to the calming effect. Even most humans get it when being patted, or when being snuggled by an animal. Cuddles and touches that are welcome release oxytocin , which leads to the *fuzzy feels*.Cats like their smell on you. There are other reasons mentioned, but cats are pretty selfishProbably the same reason some Humans like to be Hugged, I agree with the Poster 3 replies above, its the Calming Effect. |
Can someone explain the differences between name brand and generic foods and drugs? | I don't have much to add to this discussion, but Freakonomics Radio did a podcast about this! I think it's worth a listen. _URL_0_ |
Why does my dog act friendly towards strangers but is nervous/aggressive towards other strangers without provocation? | I've yet to encounter a dog I couldn't win over. Just takes patience and repetition. From what I've seen with some friends though, 99% of the time, it's either the ones who don't like dogs or are terrified of them that get on the dog's bad side. |
Why is the deadline for all tobacco products to be removed from CVS stores on October 1, 9 months away? | Because it's actually time-consuming and expensive to make a sweeping stock change like that. They're not just going to pull the products off the shelf, they're going to decide what should go there instead, figure out what kind of displays or shelving should go there, and have workers make the swap. They also have to sell down existing inventories and get products out of their supply chains. |
Why do computers struggle so much to "cancel" a task? | Two factors contribute: 1) It would be very slow to check between every operation to see if the user wanted to cancel. 2) Anywhere you can cancel you have to be able to unwind everything that you already did back to a sane state. For example, if you cancel an install you don't want to end up half installed, you want it to be like you never started installing. That point limits where you can cancel: There's complex, and infrequently used code to unwind things, so you don't want to put in too many places like that. It also means that when you cancel, the unwind steps may take a long time, and it tries not to let you cancel *that* because then you're in trouble.When you cancel an active process that is in the middle of operating, it must fully complete its current task before it terminates. For example. you are moving a number of files, if you cancel in the middle of this process and it immediately stopped you could end up with no source file and an incompletely moved destination file, thus data loss. A good analogy is a printer; if you cancel an active print job, it will finish printing anything that is currently in the spool, but if there is a paper jam, you have to reach in and and yank the paper out. |
Why in 2014 does it still take 10 business days to clear a check? | , Are you sure it's 10 business days? That goes against the maximum hold times outlined in [Reg. CC] . Under normal circumstances, it should be fully released no later than the 7th business day. . As for the *reason* for the hold -- it's all about protecting the bank against fraud. In the past, it could take several days before the issuing bank would fully clear the funds. But within the past decade with the implementation of the [Check 21 Act] , must checks clear much faster, usually within 1 or 2 days instead of closer to a week. Most banks are able to verify the check is good fairly quickly. For example, our bank participates in EARNS , where banks are informed that a check *may* return with a 24-hour timeframe. But not all banks are that efficient -- especially the smaller, local banks that do not have a sophisticated electronic infrastructure or staff. Hence the extended hold period, as a blanket for all deposits. The bank is just playing it safe as they should. If you have large deposits in the future, I would see if the issuer could send the money to your account electronically -- there's no hold on electronically-transmitted funds . Or, barring that, as an official/cashiers/counter check , which clears usually within 1 day. Or, reach out to your bank to see if they can release the hold sooner; sometimes we say yes. |
Watching someone play a video game | sometimes it's to watch to get tips on the game, sometimes it's just entertainment. when i watch people do this, it's usually a group of people playing together and they are a group that knows each other and has their own quirks and all of that. almost like watching a performance or comedy routine with a game involved. |
our pupils change size but the amount we can see doesn't? | Our field of view is based on the distance from our eye lens to our retina, which does not change. Our pupils are more like the aperture of a camera lens, it lets more or less light in but doesn't change where that light is coming from. |
Why are people against retail stores being open on Thanksgiving, but it's okay for everyone involved in the football game to be working? | I have a friend who worked at one of the games. He's union and got overtime. The number of NFL and NFL-related jobs that work on Thanksgiving is a small fraction of the number of people who have to work retail. Also, the NFL-related jobs usually make more than retail. |
How does one make a random number generator? | I don't know how to ELI5, but a great explanation can be [found here]. Basically, random isn't random. It just appears that way. The idea is that each possible number is equally likely to occur on every iteration AND there is no dependency between successive numbers. I created a random name generator recently in Java. I imported the random utility, declared the random variables, defined the strings , did a little math, returned the value of each iteration, and then set the text. Unfortunately, I feel it's quite complex.I remember way back in the day of the Web, like 1996 there were some guys that took pictures of a lava-lamp, pulled the color value of each pixel and used that for generating random numbers. Neat. |
How does a person born on a ship in international waters gain citizenship? | Depends on the country but you usually gain citizenship in your mother's country, fathers country and the place you were born. |
How does The Pirate Bay get away with all the copyright? | Technically, since the piratebay isn't hosting any files, it's a search engine like google and protected by the same laws as them. However, companies like the MPAA and RIAA disagree with these laws and they sue them into oblivion. Because money. Piles and piles of money.The Pirate Bay doesn't actually host anything illegal. They're a repository for "Magnet" links which is basically just an algorithm for connecting with a Tracker . Piratebay is basically just pointing you in the direction of somebody selling *stolen* goods. They're not actually selling them to you. In the country they mainly operate in this is mostly legal. Really though, the only true answer to why they haven't already been shut down is largely because it's not feasible.The entire site could easily fit on a small usb drive or email attachment and has no doubt been made available to different groups. Even if they managed to shut it down in Sweden there are other servers and other groups that are prepared to host it. This is basically what happened when the original owners/founders went to jail back in 08\'. It was only a week or so before the site was back and running and currently nobody "knows" who's even running it. |
why are doctor's offices the only place where you need to fill out the same paperwork at every office? Why isn't there a universal system? | Simply put, if they interconnect their systems then everybody is fucked if a breach occurs; if they don't, then only a select few are fucked when that breach happens. Minimizes risk on multiple fronts in terms of protecting electronic medical records in relation to HIPAA requirements. |
How does this beekeeper relocate this hive without getting stung, even though he isn't wearing protective gear? (see link in the description) | They largely calm them down with smoke, so they just sort of fall off harmlessly when shook. Beekeepers get stung by bees ALOT though. They just get stung so much they don't really pay it a lot of attention anymore. Source: have friends with honey farms. |
What is the difference between the U.S. Navy and the Marines? | For a *really* oversimplified answer, try this one that I was given many years ago: Sailors aren't soldiers, and soldiers aren't sailors. An awful lot of the men on a boat are there to *run the boat* -- i.e., they're not the fighters.Also what are the Merchant Marines? Is that still a thing? |
If water conducts electricity, how come when lightning strikes the ocean all the fish don't die? | From the PBS Nova website _URL_0_ > Q: What happens when lightning strikes a body of water? If you are swimming in the water, how far from a strike would be dangerous? Why are fish not electrocuted in large numbers? Norm Althausen, Hudson, Ohio > Dwyer: Dear Norm, > Electrical currents like to flow over surfaces, so most of the current from the lightning flows over the surface of the water. Since fish usually swim below the surface they should be fairly safe from the effects of lightning. I am not actually sure how close to a strike you need to be for it to be dangerous when swimming. Since I don't want to be the guinea pig that finds out, I don't go anywhere near the water when there is lightning in the area.Water is a conductor of electricity yes, But it is no copper wire. Electricity loses energy or Volts the farther it moves out. Think of it as holding a lighter under a sheet of metal. The spot directly above the lighter is the hottest, and the heat spreads out from that point. But it gets cooler, or in this case, Less energized. The fish directly near the strike do die. But not all the way down to the Twilight Zone. It loses volts the farther it movesThe ocean is a very great body of liquid to spread even the considerable amount of energy in a lightning bolt thorughout. |
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