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How do NFC Credit cards work? Do they store the credit card number? How are card numbers not stolen by people with NFC readers?
Firstly, there are no NFC cards, they are RFID. The distinction comes from power. When using NFC payment on phones, the phone transmits the signal, costing some battery life. On RFID cards, you obviously don't charge them, the card reader actually sends a tiny amount of power to them so they are able to transmit the signal back to the reader with your payment info. On to security, these cards use something called tokenization. What this means is that instead of just transmitting your actual card number like a swipe card, they transmit a single use security code, which the card reader sends to either the processing company and/or the bank , and verifies that it is a correct security code. Now, I am unsure if your actual card number is also sent. With Apple Pay, the iPhone sends the token and a DAN , which is a verified number specific to your Apple Device that has been verified by your bank when you set it up. I would assume when using RFID, the card also sends a DAN equivalent instead of the actual card number. This method is the same for chip cards, except it's not wireless. Now, where chip/RFID is less secure than Apple Pay and other NFC payments , the card number is still on your card. Since swipe readers can still accept chip cards, a thief can steal your card and can copy the card number to a new card and swipe it at any reader not set up for chip . However, the US had RFID cards about 10 years ago, but I guess they actually transmitted the actual number instead of a DAN equivalent, because you can find news stories on YouTube that show the news people going around a mall and copying people's cards wirelessly , loading it onto a hotel room keycard, and using it at McDonalds . I am 99% sure that they now use the current method I described with Apple Pay.
Why are none of the major news websites reporting on the Ukraine riots?
I feel the Ukraine riots is well coverd in the media, but I have not visited many international news-sites. But the main reason for this is simply money. News-sites base their content on what "news" gets the most clicks on their website. The more clicks equal more advertisement money since each click on a article opens a new page with new advertisement. So the articles you see on many news-sites is simply a representation of what the people on the website wants to read about. The fact that Justin Bieber has more coverage that the Ukraine riots is because people find it more interesting .Justin Bieber articles may have 5000 clicks, while the Ukraine riots have 500 clicks, so then its natural for the news-site to make more stuff about Bieber and highlight his stuff insted of the Ukraine riots.[Try this] They're new to the USA but they've been around a while and have a decent reputation for being proper journalists. They have biases like anybody, but they do actually report on actual news, and they do it from a global perspective. Worth a look.
Why are carbon and oxygen so ubiquitous in living organisms
To be useful for life atoms need two somewhat opposite characteristics; they need to be reactive enough to be readily changed when needed, but not so reactive they degrade by themselves e.g with moisture. Carbon fills that role perfectly. Carbon based molecules will on average hang about a long time, but when called upon can be manipulated by say enzymes to change. Lead based compounds could stand in for carbon in some instances, but the bonds with other atoms are too weak and wouldnt last for the time needed. Carbon forms strong bonds with hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, which is why they are also widely found in life.My education is more related to populations and ecosystems than microbiology and biochemistry so we should all hope ~~that~~ for someone with more specialization than me. Carbon can make long chains, which is good for structure. It can also take on more molecules than other things because it has four attachment points Oxygen is reactive as shit. Just look up what can happen when something oxidizes rapidly. It's also ubiquitous if you can break it away from the hydrogen in water.
If most money is just numbers in a database, how come we don't hear of hackers who break in and just increase their account balance?
Accounting and balance sheets. Every debit has to have a credit, and every credit a debit or it will show up as out of balance. If there were to be a balancing entry in the respective offset account, then maybe it would go undetected but nonetheless it would still show up as an entry that someone is eventually responsible for reconciling.
How does a lightning strike crumble buildings even when they are made of meters and meters of non-conductive materials?
The amperage and voltage difference between the ground and clouds are so large that it doesn't really matter what the thing is made of. If the path is connected, the electricity flows. Resistance causes a big chunk of that energy to turn into heat, which spells out a thin cord-like volume that briefly reaches temperatures over 4000°. This is what makes things blow up or catch fire.> Assuming it is several floors high, it has layers / meters of such non-conductive materials. The lightning just arced through kilometers of air which is even less conductive, why would a few meters of concrete pose a big issue?
Why does faraway smoke look like it's staying still?
The same reason airplanes look very slow. A plane flying 400 mph looks like its crawling along because its so far away. Smoke rising a mile away is only going, I dunno, ten miles per hour, so it looks completely still because of the same principle.It's a phenomena named parallax, u might google it to find visual examples along with explanations
What shape is the Big Red Spot?
It's storm-shaped :) It's more of a fat oval, but vertically, it's quite thin. It's a storm about 15,000 by 35,000 kilometers in size, and about 100 kilometers or so in thickness. [This wiki entry] has some great info on it. So yeah, it's more or less a circle .
How does a headbutt work? Wouldn't it hurt you just as much? Is there any practical reason to utilize it?
You use your relatively strong forehead to strike in a less strong part of the head, ideally the bridge of the nose. Also, even if it does hurt you, you are expecting it, and can use that surprise to your advantage.Generally you want to hit the nose or chest to back them up and give yourself some space. If lucky you'll break the nose. A good example of a head butt is the one that French player whose name escapes me delivered in the World Cup final a decade ago.
Is intermittent fasting healthy?
There is some evidence that intermittent fasting is beneficial in humans , but the bulk of the work has been done in animals. The idea is that the longer your body is in a "starvation" state, the better. Valter Longo at USC has done a lot of work in this area, using what he calls the fasting-mimicking diet, which is a bit more intense than just intermittent fasting . You can Google some of his research pretty easily.
How do federal housing programs like FHA/USDA loans work and why do they exist?
A typical non-FHA/USDA loan usually requires 20% downpayment because the lender doesn't want to be too exposed in the event of a foreclosure. The government loans tend to be more forgiving in regards to credit. The two houses we've bought over the years have been FHA because we didn't have 800+ credit scores and 20% down. FHA loans generally require only 3-5% down and you can sometimes get a downpayment assistance program that will help you with that 3%. We bought our two houses with about $500 out of pocket per house.
Why is it the vast majority of rainbow flags do not have violet in them?
Newton was the one to popularize the division of colors in the rainbow thanks to his work with prisms. And Newton was very religious and superstitious, and saw a great significance in the number 7. So he decided that there should be 7 colors in the rainbow, which led to him breaking the blue end of the rainbow into extra, unnecessary colorsHere's a bit on it: _URL_0_ tl;dr: rainbow flags started with 8 colors. Hot Pink had to be removed because flag makers didn't have the fabric. Turquoise was either too tough to make, or, the flag worked better with an even number of stripes. Other colors get "adjusted" over time as fabrics are more availableThey have violet, what there are missing is indigo. Indigo is kind of a fake color. When the spectrum were first being studied, people hung up on there having to be exactly 7 colors.
How do people who are shown using drugs in documentaries / TV shows not get arrested?
Two answers: One of legality, and one of practicality. **Legal answer:** To convict a defendant in a criminal trial, the standard of evidence used is "beyond a reasonable doubt." This means that if the jury is **98%** sure that the defendant committed the offense, the defendant gets to go home. 98% isn't good enough. In a simple drug possession case, reasonable doubt is usually overcome via law enforcement testimony and, perhaps more importantly in our [CSI Effect] era, forensic testing of the drugs. Without those critical pieces of evidence, there's nobody to say that the defendant wasn't faking. Yeah, he or she probably was not. But are you sure beyond a reasonable doubt? Probably not worth the prosecutor's time to find out. Which brings me to the **Practical answer:** Prisons are overcrowded. Prosecutors and cops are overworked. Many jurisdictions don't even bother prosecuting people on simple possession charges, pursuing only cases where an intent to distribute is implicated . MTV also wants to keep having volunteers for its shows, so the network would be incentivized to volunteer its vast resources and contribute top-notch legal defense in the event that anybody actually is charged. There's simply very little motive for any prosecutor to open that can of worms. There's enough crime to go around.Because there's no proof that what they're using is an actual drug, rather than a reenactment with a prop. It's not like the cops are invited to the filming.
How are street address numbers decided upon, if they apparently don't refer to an agreed upon distance unit?
In US cities, some central intersection is designated as 0. The first east-west cross street north of that is 100N. The first block south is 100S. So if your address is 6407 N State Street, you're on State street 64 major cross streets North from the 0-0 intersection, and the seventh house north from the 6400 cross street. In heavily gridded cities like Chicago these are pretty straightforward, but some curvier roads in curvier cities get sloppy.
What does "HTTP 2.0 to be HTTPS only" mean and what are the implications of this?
HTTPS means that the web page and the requests for the web page are encrypted in transit, meaning that people listening in on your computer traffic can't analyze them and steal personal information. Standard traffic is done over HTTP which isn't encrypted and people can intercept these communications, HTTP 2.0 won't have HTTP and HTTPS, there will only be HTTP which will use the encryption protocol of HTTPS by default.HTTPS = HTTP , but using SSL , which is a form of encryption. Which means that HTTP2.0 by default will use SSL, meaning that ideally all HTTP2.0 web traffic will be encrypted from endpoint to endpoint. This is a really big deal in the world of Government Surveillance, nevermind how it might effect how ISPs deal with traffic shaping. HTTPS does *not* hide things like the URL you are trying to hit - but the conversation between you and that server will be better protected. Of course this depends on people getting comfortable creating and using SSL certificates that are well secured , but its a good start towards making the internet something that is secure by default, instead of secure by choice
How does taste and flavour work?
There are five basic tastes: * Sweet, usually caused by the presence of sugars, though there are other types of compounds that will active the receptors for sweetness. * Saltiness, caused by sodium ions. Potassium and lithium ions have very similar tastes, rubidium and cesium ions do have a salty taste, but also have a metallic or burning taste. Calcium, magnesium and ammonium ions also have a salty taste, but are also bitter. * Sourness is the taste of acidity. Hydrogen ions cause a source taste. * Bitterness, alkaloids like caffeine tend to have a bitter taste, though there is a broad range of substances that taste bitter. * Umami, a savory or meaty taste. caused by the presence of gultamate. Smell is responsible for all other flavors. There are hundreds of different receptors in the nose and a thorough description of them could fill an entire book. I can give a brief overview on a few classes of compounds. * Sulfur containing compounds will usually either taste/smell horrible or like garlic. * Esters tend to have fruity tastes/smells. * Ketones, aldehydes and terpenes are also responsible for a number of tastes/smells. > what is different among foods that give them varying tastes? Different amounts of various chemical compounds. > why do some things taste better than others? Sweet, salty, umami and fatty foods tend to be the ones that taste the best. Salt will cover up bitter tastes and works very well with umami. Genetics play a role in the taste of certain things. Cilantro is an example, some people find that it tastes fresh with citrus overtone, while others find that it tastes like soap or has a disgusting smell. Phenylthiocarbamine is a compound that either tastes bitter or is tasteless, depending on your genes. Acquired tastes are another element in whether something tastes good or not.
Why do deep burps sometimes sting the nostrils?
Because you've been drinking something carbonated. The CO2 gas from the carbonation continues to be released in your stomach, and actually speeds up its release since there are a lot of nucleation sites, which the glass/plastic didn't have. When the pressure from the CO2 gas gets up there, your stomach releases the pressure, usually as a belch. But CO2 is fairly dissolvable in water, so as it passes over your wet tissues, some of it will convert back into carbonic acid. If that happens on extremely sensitive tissue like the inside of your nose, you can feel the acidic sting. If you get the same concentration of CO2 gas around your eyes you can feel the same kind of effect.
Why is Atomic Bomb testing in the ocean allowed?
At the time it was done, it was not prohibited by any treaty. Today it is prohibited by the Limited Test Ban Treaty. As a result the USA, USSR/Russia, and UK have not tested underwater weapons since the 1960s. India, Pakistan, and North Korea have only tested their weapons underground. As for the radiation, much of it gets absorbed into the water, which does get highly radioactive. However the ocean is very large and so that diffuses to non-harmful levels in a relatively short amount of time. As for killing lots of animals, sure — that happens all the time. In many ways it is better than detonating them on land, because that produces long-range, harmful radioactive fallout when the dirt mixes with the radioactive fireball. Underwater testing actually produces very little fallout outside of the immediate area of the test. It is worth distinguishing between true underwater tests and those which are on coral atolls. Atolls are a terrible place to set off nuclear weapons from a fallout concern; actual underwater tests are not so bad.
Why do we have the electoral college?
When the Constitution was written, nobody *wanted* an easy and clear reflection of voter's opinions. The common attitude was that the average voter was just too poor and uninformed; they would never be able to make a good decision about who should run the country. So the average voter would send an Electoral College representative to decide who gets to be President, in the same way that the average voter sends a Congressional representative to decide what gets to be the law.
How do air bubbles in a needle kill you if you don't get them all out before injecting?
I think that's mostly a Hollywood invention. A large amount of air injected into a vein can kill you, but a little bit won't. Imagine my surprise when I was in the hospital and saw a few air bubbles go into my vein. I freaked out and thought I was going to die, but absolutely nothing happened.
From 1954 to Blu ray
It's kinda a strange concept, but since old movies were taken on real film, the film itself is basically HD As long as you have the old film, it'll be convertible into HD into at least the near future . However, it's worth noting that, even if this wasn't the case, you can still convert a very low-res movie into HD, that's what happens when you watch a non-HD movie or non-HD TV channel on an HD TV . You probably wouldn't call it HD though just because it doesn't look very good compared to things which were made in HD. When converting in this way, as long as the producers are willing to put a little money into it, you can touch-up the quality a bit so it looks much more like it was made in HD rather then converted.
Why do I see a sudden flash of light when I sneeze with my eyes closed?
Everyone sneezes with their eyes closed. Some people have a nerve that causes your pupils to widen or shrink connected to the same nerve that causes the sneezing reflex so it may be possible it acts as a stimulus when you sneeze. I may be wrong though but if you have ACHOO syndrome this may be the answer
People who understand NSA stuff: why don't they have a better lead on Jim Dimaggio? (California Amber Alert)
IF he was trying to flee, he would have taken a different car, or disabled his GPS Nav system, and from that point he would stay off the grid.|They do use it for the domestic good, remember the Boston Marathon manhunt?The NSA is not concerned with domestic crimes. There is a massive legal hurdle for a domestic law enforcement agency to get the NSA to give them anything.
How do you prove the title of this post is the same as always?
ELI5: We can't prove anything we know is true, we can only decide for ourselves based on what we see and experience. For many facts, we simply must either trust that whoever told it to us is telling the truth, or seek the truth ourselves by checking other sources or through experimentation. Slightly less ELI5: If you want an interesting read that deals largely with this exact issue, try reading George Orwell's 1984. In the book, many "facts" are simply made up by the government. Nobody knows any better because all their information is from that one source. The worlds history has been largely rewritten, and very few people are any the wiser. Anyone with knowledge of the real history, or it's rewriting are being killed off. The fact is, we don't know if anything we 've been told is true. This is why conspiracy theories are so prevalent and intriguing. Obviously fantastical stories can be ignored, but conspiracy theories with a basis in truth that can explain events that don't otherwise make sense is simply a healthy dose of skepticism from the public. As the saying goes, "history is written by the victor". The loser of a war usually becomes the demon or evil entity in the history books, and the winner is often allowed to justify it's own horrible actions by using the loser as a scapegoat.
After time in the sun, why does my hair get lighter but my skin gets darker?
Your skin can react to a stimulus. It adds more pigments to protect you. Your hair is mostly dead cells and thus cannot react, so it gets bleached in the sun just like paint or plastic.TL:DR Your skin is alive, but your hair is not. Long answer: Your hair gets lighter in color because it is being damaged by the UV rays in the sunlight, which bleach the hair. Since your skin is being nourished by your bloodstream, it is able to respond to this damage. The damaging part of sunlight is the UV rays for a detailed explanation of how UV does damage), so your body has learned to counter this damage with a chemical called Melanin. Melanin is what makes your skin appear dark, and it absorbs the damaging UV radiation so as to prevent DNA damage from it. This is why dark skinned people don't get sunburns, but very light skinned people burn very easily.
If i deposit 1 dollar into a bank, what are all the options of where that 1 dollar could end up?
Do you mean the idea of the dollar or the physical currency? The dollar becomes two entities on the banks balance sheet: one dollar on deposit that they owe you and one dollar in cash. They can then use their cash to buy securities , as funding for a loan, to pay a depositors withdrawl, pay an expense , or it can be deposited with the Federal Reserve . The physical currency will likely be returned to depositors or sent back to the Fed .Few people withdraw $1 bills so it will likely be shipped back to the government along with thousands of others 1s and they will get 20s and 100s back.
How come it feels infinitely more perilous walking down an icy incline than it does walking up one?
My guess, going downhill if you slip you will fall backwards and won't be able to catch yourself and possibly hit your head, going up hill you will fall foreward and be able to use your hands to catch yourself
Why can't we artificially inseminate endangered species like pandas and rhinos in order to raise their numbers?
Increasing their numbers doesn't solve any problems. They're being wiped out in the wild, through habitat destruction, poaching, etc. Having 'more to die' doesn't fix the 'to die' part. Additionally, artificial insemination isn't a surefire mechanism, and once your population is low enough you run into problems with a lack of genetic diversity that you can't overcome with more of the same genes.
Can anyone explain why when you sit for an extended period of time your knee will start to bounce up and down?
This actually doesn't happen to everyone. If it happens all the time and feels like it's out of your conscious control, and really severe, it might be Restless Legs Syndrome , a neurological disorder which causes a strong urge to move your legs. It might also simply be a symptom of impatience or boredom or, in the extremes of those cases, a symptom of Attention Deficit Disorder. Here's a Wikipedia article about RLS: _URL_0_
what is going on with Adrian Peterson
He hit his kid with a "switch" as a way of discipline, but apparently it left some pretty bad marks which makes it look like he went too far with corporal punishment and possibly crossed into abuse. Hard to say exactly what could happen with his career, but this coming the same week as the Ray Rice domestic abuse issue is probably going to make any suspensions he receives much stiffer.
What's the deal with the O.J. Simpson trial?
OJ Simpson was put on trial for the murder of two individuals, Nicole Simpson and Ronald Goldman. He was acquitted of those murders. The response to the verdict was very polarized along racial lines, with blacks generally favorable and whites generally unfavorable.
How can services like Google Drive offer so much storage for no charge?
Google offer 'free' services to lock people into using Google, this in turns makes people use other services such as search and gmail, where they do make money for people clicking on advertisements. It's also another way of gathering as much information about people to enable them to target specific types of advertisement to that individual.
why do lightbulbs seem to go bad only when being turned on?
The filaments in the bulb get thinner and thinner with more use. At some point they are thin enough that the surge of electricity when turning on the bulb is more than the filament can take.The majority of the wear on filaments is due to contraction and expansion when they heat up or cool. This heating and cooling occurs when the bulbs are turned on or off. Whether the final wear that causes it to burn out occurs on turning it off or on, you are only going to notice it when you turn it on. Hence most bulbs you've ever see burn out happen when you turn it on. Though it's possible for it to happen while on, it's much less likely as no contraction or expansion is going on.Only when electric current passes through the wire in the middle of the bulb does it decay. Turning off the lights cuts the current so they last longer.
Why are most SQL error messages useless?
They're not useless. They give you the exact line the problem has occured on and the nature of the error. It is assumed that you know what you're doing and are competent enough to be aware of which keywords exist. Why did you cut off the rest of the error message you quoted: ERROR 1064 : You have an error in your SQL syntax; check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use near 'NOT NULL,PRIMARY KEY ,FOREIGN KEY REFERENCES User(' at line 4 References being capitalised is a pretty big clue. I don't mean to be rude but you're stupid.
Why do large semis shake your car when you drive past them?
[Vortex shedding] Because semi's are not very streamlined the air rushing past them ends up in a series of vortices. As these vortices pass you, your car is alternately sucked toward and blown away from--hence the shaking motion.
How much repulsive force can two or more magnets produce?
It comes down to their strength, size, shape, and distance between them. Here is a calculator from a site that sells neodymium magnets, some of the strongest you can find _URL_0_ The strongest I found was around 3000N between two magnets
How are cranes on the side if buildings built during construction? How is the last crane disassembled?
A crane can build and disassemble itself. They build what they can on the ground and then let the crane take over. There is no way I'd be able to explain it better than this video._URL_0_", 'Smaller cranes at first, they lift the base sections into place. Then some cranes can start to lift their own sections in to place and splice them in. Nifty video:_URL_1_
Why does everything you mix together turn brown?
Pigments absorb some colors and reflect others. Mix a bunch of different ones together and it ends up absorbing most of the color and then reflecting some of the light so you get a dark mass of brown
Why do we still have court reporters?
Transcripts. Every legal action is based on a transcript, the written word of what happened in court, and also at depositions . So anytime a hearing is at issue or deposition testimony is needed, the court or court of appeals needs a transcript to review what was said. And the easiest way to do that is by reading it. The written transcript is also very easy to reproduce, where an audio recording is not as easy to reference or excerpt in papers. The reporter actually will record the hearing in audio and use that recording to help correct the transcript, in case there are any errors in the first draft.
What is the difference between a voxel and a pixel?
A pixel is part of a 2-D image - like all the dots that make up your screen. A voxel is a 3-D element, like the cubes that make up MinecraftPixel: Picture Element. A 2D square with a very small size and a single color, to represent a portion of a 2D picture on a screen. Voxel: ~~Volumetric Element~~ Volumetric Pixel. A 3D cube used to represent a portion of a 3D environment. Not all 3D environments use voxels, though. It usually looks much more realistic to use polygons instead of voxelsAn important thing to keep in mind though, is that voxels and pixels are not cubes or squares inherently, but they are just rendered as such since squares are easiest to lay out in a grid, and they are space fillingAdding to the conversation, a common place where you can find voxels is in Magnetic Resonance Images , where the 3D rendering of the models is based off volumetric information obtained from the sample .The same as the difference between a sphere and a circle, or a cube and a square. The former is 3D with volume . The latter is 2D like a *pi*cture.
How can a person break cement blocks with a fist? Surely there is no training that makes bones as tough a concrete?
The dirty secret of concrete is that it's weak in *some* ways. Like natural rock, it's great at withstanding compression. However, it is very poor at withstanding tension . Which means that it's also poor at handing bending, which imposes compression and tension in different regions at the same time. To make concrete handle bending - e.g. to span a space between columns - you have to reinforce it. Depending on the composition of the concrete, e.g. the size and quantity of the gravel - it can also be poor at handling shear . This is the weakness most relevant to martial arts displays: the hand or fist imposes a sharp shear force peak, and the result can be a fracture along a plane. If the blocks are made specifically for the demonstration, I would expect the concrete composition to be suitably weak.fun fact. there is actually training to toughen your bones. if you repeatedly hit something hard, you can do minor damage to your bones. They then repair themselves, then you repeat the process. This training has been noted in muay thai fighters.
. If I watched 15 minutes from a 90 minute YouTube video, do I get charged data for the entire 90 minute file ? What about the ads .
you don't stream the entire file at once. Youtube doesn't stream the entire thing to you anymore, just sightly ahead of what you watch. They want to save data too, after all.yes, ads do use data too. they are not magical.
Why do people have different skins tones, face shapes, body shapes etc from different continents?
Indications are that a lot of those features, the key reason Europeans and Asians are different is because of interbreeding with neanderthals and denisovans. The neanderthals and denisovans had lived in those regions for a long time and had gradually adapted to the environment of the climates, and the interbreeding enabled the people recently emigrated from Africa to draw on this. The dominance of fair skin, hair and to a lesser extent eyes in Europe is actually a fairly recent event. [As recently as 7-8000 years ago] - a time when the first cities were rising in the Middle East - there remained groupings of people with more African traits, but blue eyes. There are indications this was still the norm in great parts of southern Europe. _URL_1_
Why do muslims grow long beards?
This is still a debated topic in Islam. Many scholars say it is Fard while many also say it is only Sunnah. There is no one clear answer to this question. Fard= mandatorySunnah= highly recommendedIt was commanded by the prophet. I believe it was originally meant to make Muslims more distinguishable from other people, to promote a sense of pride.
Why does my nose run when it's excessively cold outside?
My guess : Cold air is warmed by your nose and upper respiratory tract in order to maintain core temperature. When air is excessively cold it requires more blood flow to your sinuses and nasal passageway to warm the air. In order to increase blood flow a local vasodilator is released in the form of histamine and this also increases mucous production. Now I'll go look it up and see what I can find. EDIT: Found a good article on NPR website about it. Apparently I was partly correct. It's about warmth AND moisture. Cold air is usually dry. The fluid production in the nose is to warm and moisturizer the air so that it is conditioned to be gentle in the airways. Link: _URL_0_ Edit 2: if you're wondering how the nose knows that the air is cold it's a matter of thermal receptors in the skin of the nasal pathway that can detect temperature.
If America has the best colleges in the world and some of the hardest working people in the world, how are foreigners able to take our jobs?
They will work for less money. It's primarily jobs for low skill workers that are leaving the US. A factory worker in China will cost about the equivalent of $1.36 hour. Even if they are slightly less productive, it's still more cost effective, even after shipping the goods to the US. It's about $2000 per shipping container from China to USA.
Every picture we take is a rectangle, so is the sensor inside our digital cameras. So why are the lenses of our cameras round?
It is not the case that every pixel have a single point on the lens collecting its light. Every pixel gets light from all parts of the lens. You can try this yourself by covering up parts of a lens and observe that the light in the other end of the optics only gets darker but not obscured. You can even try this on your eyes by squinting which will cover up parts of your eyelenses. So the shape of the lens does not correspond with the shape of the sensor. There is no part of the lens being wasted by being round. It is just the case that it is easier to make a round lens then a square lens with the same area. This also means it is easier to make the lens rotate to move the lenses when you are changing the focus or the zoom. However pictures, sensors and film is easier to make rectangular as this is the easiest shape you can tile togetherRound lenses are much easier to make than rectangular lenses. Likewise rectangular film was much easier to make than circular film, also human vision is more rectangular than round.
How does my penis know I’m looking at something sexual?
Your brain finds whatever you’re looking at arousing and as a result releases endorphins and sends blood to the penis to make it erect
Why did the communist structure of the USSR fail while China still continues to grow under the banner of the CCP?
The USSR tried to liberalize their politics without liberalizing their economy. China is allowing the economy to liberalize into a more capitalist system, but maintaining strict control of the politics. Freedom of politics tends towards freedom of economy, but freedom of economy doesn't always lead to freedom of politics because everyone is happy making money. Edit: Correcting my own stupid.
Do dogs have bonds within their families?
Yes. Most social organisms do. There is something called the Hamilton rule which was the first quantitative description of a phenomenon called kin selection; meaning that an organisms will risk its life to save the life of those who are closely related. The more closely related the organism that needs saving is, the less likely the organism in question will risk its own safety and ability to propagate its own genes to save another organism. The rule is represented by the following equation: rB > C "r" being the relatedness of the actor to the receiver of the altruistic action "B" being the reproductive benefit to the receiving party"C" being the cost to the altruistic actor So if the risk is less than the benefit to the recipient times the proportion of shared genes the organism will put forth more risk in order to preserve those who are more closely related to them, than others who are notI am not at all an expert on this but I can say that I have seen two dog siblings go straight murder-mode on each other over a toy or food on several occasions. Maybe there is some explanation for this?
Was Bill Clinton impeached?
Yes he was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice. Impeachment refers to any official being accused of illegal activity. So while impeached he was not removed from office. Richard Nixon was also impeached though he resigned before the trialYes. He was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice but was acquitted by the senate.
How do we sense that something is cold? Can we sense particle speed of objects?
Temperature difference between two objects causes a bit of a flux between the two. So if object A is cold and object B is warm, the particles in object B are at a relatively higher energy state than A, and this energy gets transferred to A. And two things happen once this occurs: object A gains energy, that is gets hotter, whereas object B loses energy, that is gets colder or in other words gets less hot. We sense cold by quantifying this change in energy, which would be decrease in energy for something that is cold. This quantification is done with elements/objects that show a uniform and standardized expansion or shrinkage. Like mercury. As for how we detect temperature by hand, well there are nerve endings all over skin called free nerve endings. Some of these function as thermoceptors and detect temperature changes in a particular temperature group. A shift in temperature changes the firing rate of the nerve cells. The change in rate is detected by your brain and perceived as cold or hot .We don't actually feel the temperature of the object. We feel the temperature of our skin as it increases or decreases.
How is NASA able to download data from from satellite like Hubble telescope and Juno?
There are antennas on Juno that send out the information and giant dishes in different parts of the world that can pick it up no matter what side of Earth is facing Juno. It takes about 48 minutes for the signal to make if from Juno to Earth at the speed of light.
Why does digital data have to be stored on a physical medium?
There is no such thing as "the digital space". Everything persistent is physical. Everything. The only non-physical things are signals such as radio or microwaves, but they too require amplification and boosting which again would require more hardware.If it's measurable, it's physical. The digital 'space' isn't some alternate universe, it's just yet another bunch of computers storing information. Consider someone memorizing a poem, they may not use any papers, but it's still physically stored as neuron arrangement in their brain. While there's a limit on [how much information can be saved], in practice we would [run out of accessible energy] far before we hit the limit. Unless we have the answer to the [last question]", 'Everything has to be stored on a physical medium and cloud based storage is also a physical medium in the server room. There is no such thing as "digital space" for "floating". We certainly have run out of space for storage many times and in the process wiped away many years of information and also bought more storage to add on; not everyone had losses but many have; not everyone bought the right amount of storage so some go over, some go under. A physical hard drive IN the computer instead of hoping for a cloud-data server has a great advantage: networks go down and when they do you can't get them back up without files here NOW. So if you had no files except the cloud you would never get back on the cloud again.just because data is digital it doesn't mean they don't phisically exist. in the case of computer science it just means they are binary data. we store binary data on harddisk by giving the disks a magnetic load that is able to represent 0 and 1. for each bit of data there is a tiny area on the disks' surface, therefor there is a limit to its' total capacity
Why aren't escalators activated by touch/motion to save on energy costs?
Because keeping the steps moving at a given speed for most of the day is cheaper and has less wear on the inner workings than constantly starting and stopping.
Why is the first episode of a series always called "Pilot"? Why not giving it a real title even though it serves as a pilot?
Most pilots do have a title, or at least a working title. But the word pilot is used as an adjective meaning "done as an experiment or test before introducing something more widely." It's importance to the series is in getting its foot in the door so to speak.
why big tech companies aren't using their lobbyists to stop SOPA.
I remember hearing on a podcast the idea that since many of these companies are quite new, they haven't had the time to lobby and make the connections the more established companies those in the RIAA/MPAA have formed.Fairly simple: a) They think that the public effort should be sufficient to stop it b) The entertainment industry is a powerful industry and can cause major problems even for giants like Google. Perhaps especially like Google, as you can see a potential Google TV v. Apple TV v. Microsoft Entertainment Center fight coming up. The entertainment industry dare not try and pick a winner , but they certainly have a chance to pick a loser So Google dare not act overtly in case Apple and Microsoft don't. Hell, Facebook might get in to the same game, and at this point the entertainment industry can basically make life very difficult for Google. Oh for sure Google could retaliate with similar "oh-our-indexing-for-your-sites-was-bugger" pettiness, but there's just no way that could end well for anyone involved. Unless ALL the key players in this struggle join to lobby in a major way, there's no too overt lobbying from any of them. The statements are about as far as it'll get. Consider it a typical case of the freerider problemThe Entertainment biz and copyright holders are older companies and are lobbying harder FOR SOPA
why laptop charging cords have two parts.
The specifics of mains power differ greatly depending on where you are, so power bricks are usually made to handle a wide range of input voltages and frequencies . This is because economies of scale make it less costly to make a whole lot of one slightly more expensive part that's much more flexible vs. a bunch of slightly different ones for a single region. Since different countries have different connectors to go with the different voltages and frequencies, the AC end of the cord is removable so that only the cheapest part needs to be changed for different regions. As a bonus, this means you can take your laptop to most countries and need only a cheap AC cord to do it instead of a whole adapter or voltage converter.
How can we be certain that there isn't another 'Earth' on the opposite side of the sun, always out of view of our telescopes?
Its gravity would have an effect on our planet, the other planets in the system, and even the sun, as well as all the comets and asteroids constantly cutting through our solar system. As we have not observed any such gravitic effects, we conclude there is no such body.
What is the log likelihood function and how is it different from probability?
Probability is chance some random or hard to predict event will occur. Usually, we can't compute probabilities exactly, so we create a model. We say getting heads on a coin flip is a 50-50 probability, even though when we analyze the actual physics, the chances aren't exactly 50%. Probabilities can be distributed linearly, like on a die, where each result is equally probable. Or they can have more complex distributions, like how when rolling two dice, 7 is more likely than 12 or 2. Often the relationship between the model and the data is less clear than with coins or dice. With a die roll, you just count up the sides, divide, and call it good. With something more complicated, like the chances for rain, you have to look at the data and try to guess which model works best. The likelihood is a tool that helps you come up with the best model. More precisely, for a given model, it allows you to find the parameters that best fit your data. All models have one or more parameters. A linear model has a min and a max, you could try to simulate a die roll with a random number from 2 to 4, but that would be less accurate. Similarly, the parameters for a normal distribution is mean and standard deviation, if you don't have a good value for those, your model won't be of much use. Likelihood takes those parameters along with the model to create a likelihood function, and the maximum of that function is where the parameters best fit the model. In practice, likelihood functions have a lot of exponential terms that can be hard to work with. The natural log function is monotonic, which means that the max of will be the same as the max of ln). That allows us to use log likelihood, where we take the log of all the terms, and simplify the calculation.
How do natural fields exist? (More specifically, ones found in the middle of forests.)
It's part of ecological succession. Environments are constantly changing. It's a system that is complicated by an almost infinite amount of factors and conditions. Usually a glade represents an area that recently changed so that it could no longer support the other surrounding plants. This could be because of poor soil, a forest fire, aggressive feeders, disease, strong wind or snow. When an area is cleared, pioneer plants take over. This will include some trees, but it will take awhile for them to grow tall enough to be more permanent fixtures. Eventually, enough trees will grow so that canopy cover is achieved. At that point, the trees might have grown so dense that they block too much sun and the soil becomes poor. This will cause some trees to die. Shade tolerant plants will start to make a significant appearance once the trees' population dynamics even out around their carrying capacity. After the shade plants, more plants will arise, each changing the former glade in some way that allows more species to grow and some to die back. Eventually, climax community is reached or another dramatic change happens that causes a significant portions of plants to die.
why do drills spin?
There are really two things that are going on with a drill bit. Firstly, if you look at the tip of the bit, you'll feel that at the end are two sharp cutting faces. It's the constant movement of these cutting faces that removes the material in the first place - each revolution results in those cutting faces taking a little bit more material off. This material then lies at the bottom of the hole, and would quickly clog the bit if it wasn't removed, and that's the second thing - the spiral up the shaft of the bit serves to remove the sawdust/swarf and take it out of the hole. If you hammer a nail in, the material has nowhere to go - what happens is that the material around the nail gets squashed a bit. This means that a nail hole will often close up once you've removed a nail, because the compressed material can relax a bit. With a drilled hole, because you've actually taken the material out, the hole won't close up.
Explain "syntax and implementation" in regards to learning programming languages.
Syntax is the rules of the language. If I understood the vocabulary of English, but not the syntax, I might say something like "explaining syntax, I am trying: to". Even though I 've put the words in the wrong order, and used the wrong punctuation, you can work out what I mean - but if you put the words in the wrong order and use the wrong punctuation in a programming language, the computer won't know what you mean, and your program won't compile. Just because a sentence is syntactically correct, it doesn't mean that it's right. Consider the sentence "I rode to work on my fridge today; the temperature was very happy and I was red, pink and useful." That sentence is syntactically correct. I 've put verbs where there should be verbs, nouns where there should be nouns, and adjectives where there should be adjectives. My punctuation is all correct. But the sentence makes no sense. If this was a programming language, the compiler would compile it, and you 'd be able to run it, but it's pretty sure that it wouldn't do what you wanted when you run it. Your implementation is wrong. Once you get the syntax and the implementation correct, then your program will compile, and, once compiled, do what you want when you run it.Here's an analogy: Because all major languages share the same basic concepts , once you've learned how to speak English, learning other languages is just a matter of switching to a different set of words and grammar.
The Trayvon Martin shooting. Was out of the loop for a day or two.
Trayvon Martin was a 17 year-old black male who lived with his mother in Miami, but was visiting his father in Sanford, Florida. On the way back to his father's girlfriend's house in a gated community on 2/26/12, a white, neighborhood watch captain named George Zimmerman saw Martin and was suspicious of him. He called 911 to report seeing this "suspicious" man, and when Martin went to run away from Zimmerman, George chased him down and shot him. On the recently released 911 calls, you can distinctly hear Martin screaming for help before being shot. The Sanford police department has yet to arrest Zimmerman. They claimed his record was "squeaky clean," despite having been charged with resisting arrest in a previous incident. Martin was found to have been unarmed and had no record. The incident has caused an outcry in the community and the nation, with accusations of incompetence and/or corruption at the Sanford police department, and accusations of both Zimmerman and the police department having a racial bias in the incident.Trayvon Martin was a young African-American male. His father lives in a gated community in Florida. Martin left the home to walk to a nearby convenience store. On the way back a community watch person called 911 to report him as suspicious. When officers arrived they found Martin dead of gunshot wounds and Zimmerman claiming self-defense. Martin's family claims that he was shot, basically, for Walking While Black. Zimmerman claims that Martin made an unspecified aggressive action and the shooting was self-defense.
Why does someone stricken with Alzheimer's forget names and memories, but retain math skills and advanced vocabulary?
They don't actually necessarily keep all of those. Vocabulary is *very* frequently affected by Alzheimer's, to the point that it can be part of the testing or a warning sign.
If you have to have yogurt to make yogurt from "scratch", how does it form originally?
leave milk out and let it naturally grow bacteria. Hope you have the right kind of non toxic bacteria.
What is this gray liquid coming out of my blender and how does it get there?
The seal around the drive shaft which powers the blades inside the blender is not completely water proof. Liquid from inside the blender gets into the bearings and seals area where there is also lubricant and this liquid then slowly leaks out through the bottom onto the base.
Since a compass is a magnet, why do compasses always point towards magnetic north, but not a typical household ceramic magnet?
The needle is long and floats on a bearing. Put your ceramic magnet so the North and South poles are parallel to the ground. Float it on water somehow and wait. It will orient itself with the magnetic field in your vicinity. Compasses orient with the magnetic field. One end points to the North magnetic pole, the other towards the South magnetic pole. Unless you are near Magnet Cove Arkansas.The pull is too weak to overcome friction to rotate a household magnet. But if you float a magnet on some styrofoam in water, it'll slowly orient the right direction.
Why do publishers have to pay royalties to voice actors when re releasing a game those VAs performed in?
Because it's in their contract. A voice actor does voice acting in return for money. The terms of this are specified in the specific contract they sign. Contracts may be set up so that the voice actor forfeits all rights to their performance, or retains some rights, and they may be paid all at once, or per sale, or a combination of the two Even more specialized and complicated scenarios may be specified by the contract This is somewhat similar to how some screen actors are paid flat fees, and other royalties, and others a mix. Sometimes different actors in the same movie are paid different ways!
why do we sometimes wake up accidentally when our bodies are still obviously tired?
It's more important to be able to respond to threats than to get a good night's sleep, and while modern life may be safe, this was not always the case.
Is dust able to stack up, let's say, 1 cm (0.39 inches) and how long would it take?
Yes it can, and it depends entirely on the speed of dust production. Cotton flocking factory? Probably minutes. Intel clean room? Most likely never.
What happens behind the scenes when a person is clubbed and blacks out?
Movies and TV show this pretty unrealistically. It's a lot easier to kill a person with a head blow than to just knock them out. This is especially true of hitting the back of their head, where the section of brain matter that controls a lot of autonomic systems happens to sit. Unconsciousness is usually caused when your brain stops receiving enough blood to operate Obviously, that's not a good thing. Blood is food and your brain needs it. Even when people are classically 'knocked out' they usually have a pretty severe concussion and have to be kept under observation for days or weeks following such a blow as it is considered head trauma, and severe head trauma if the person was knocked out for more than 10-20 minutes. Starving your brain for blood can cause long-term damage after a very short time. Boxers usually develop a lot of these problems due to this, including memory loss, confusion, fatigue, ect. Now, that being said there is an odd nerve near the jaw that can be hit which causes a stun knockout. You see this in boxing occasionally, but the knockout from those hits usually only lasts a few seconds, not hours like they have in movies, and the hit has to hit the jaw, not the head.
What do modern spies do?
OK, first, take whatever picture is in your mind, and make it about 50x more boring.If they told you, they'd have to kill you.
Why do dogs suck at hide-and-seek when they have a super sensitive olfactory sense?
Remember that their noses are so sensitive that to them, the whole house is saturated with the smell of everything. Imagine trying to find one hidden bottle of perfume in the perfume department at macy's - it's just too much sensory input to be accurate in all those "smells" -
If I renounce my U.S citizenship where would i be deported to?
You cannot revoke your citizenship while inside the country. The first step would be to leave. Assuming you were just visiting somewhere and then renounced your citizenship, that country may still be able to deport you back to the USA, just as a noncitizen. This would make some things like travel and work very difficult.Unless it's part of gaining a new citiZenship, nobody would consider your renunciation of American citizenship to be valid. It helps avoid problems like this one.
U.S internet costs a lot due to lack of competition. Why aren't many competitors in the U.S opposed to places like Korea?
You have the cause and effect backwards here. It is expensive to be an internet provider because you have to physically run the lines and run the servers. In countries like South Korea the distance that you have to run things is short because the country is small. They also have a large percentage of the infrastructure built by their government. In the US the infrastructure is built by the company, and the country is huge so they have to run long distances. That means very few companies are able to spend the money to compete.A few decades ago, the local governments granted local monopolies to the cable TV companies. They called them franchises or concessions, but they are just a form of legal monopoly. The federal government prohibited that in 1992 , but once competition was strangled in the crib it isn't going to come back quickly, due to the massive infrastructure cost involved and the fact that a patchwork quilt of monopolies suits the incumbent players just fine.
Why do some Internet Service packages come with data caps?
Because they can get away with it. The cost for the Internet infrastructure that the company needs to provide are for peak loads, not total load. It is much cheaper for them to provide several TB of data a month for a customer that only uses it between 3 and 5 AM local time than it cost to get a few GB to someone who uses it at the absolute peak demand time . This is because they already are paying the fixed costs on the cables and servers needed to provide internet anyway and the data is really cheap, however maintaining decent speeds at peak demand times require more servers and better/more cables increasing fixed costs. The actual variable cost of providing Internet service is ~$.02/GB. If there was a technological rather than a business reason for it they would charge more for using data when demand is peaking. Also while speeds slow when there is high demand the protocols built into the Internet can handle it and just slow down everyone so the servers can handle the load.
why are almost all the animals afraid of rain ?
SOME animals can stand extreme heat, SOME animals can stand extreme cold, MOST are in the middle. Being out in the rain means their fur will get soaked, and if it gets soaked it doesn't work to keep them warm any more. This is why we humans do not wear fur coats in the rain, we wore oilskins and now we wear smooth synthetic raincoats. Fur just gets wet and then it transmits the cold outside temperature straight to the skin.
Why does crickets chirp at night?
They try to hide from their most common predators by staying quiet during daytime. And then come out during the night to attract a mate when it's too dark for birds to hunt.
If we re-built voyager today, but with the advancement of technology we posses. How much more could we learn, if anything?
You'll need to be more specific. Best guess is you're refering to Voyager the space probe, or the Rutan Voyager aircraft, [but it could be a few things].
Why would a British Candy bar have different nutrition facts when sold in the USA on the exact same bar?
1: they aren't the same bar, just because they're called the same thing. 2: different regulatory requirements for what needs to be listed and how accurate it needs to be. Maybe the US doesn't require decimal places but the UK does and so they round for the US?", 'Almost everything sold in America with sugar in it actually uses high fructose corn syrup instead of real sugar, since we grow metric fucktons of corn. Sugared products elsewhere are more likely to contain actual sugar.
Why can Red Bull still advertise that it "gives you wings" and not get sued for false advertising?
The legal doctrine is called "Puffery". If a claim is so absurd or un-verifiable that a reasonable person would not consider it to be an objective statement of fact, then it's not false advertising. _URL_0_The legal doctrine around false advertising is that a statement is illegal if a "reasonable person" would believe it were true, but it is false. So if I'm marketing fruit or something and I say "science says it reduces risk of cancer", that's not a crazy notion. It could be true. You wouldn't be exceptionally naive to believe that. But if it's not true, that's false advertising, and I'll be sued and the government will take me to court. If you say "Red Bull gives you wings", no one actually hears that and thinks this energy drink causes human beings to sprout wings out of their bodyBecause taking every single thing absolutely literally would be moronic on every level. It's idiotic to think that British Telecom would be somehow responsible if calls made via their networks weren't always "good." In Red Bull's case, it's obvious that it's not meant to be taken literally.
Why do people experience déjà vu?
If I remember correctly, it's a cognitive short circuit - so to speak. The brain working diligently, transferring visual and auditory stimulus to the subconscious for processing, when a few bits of data slated for 'real time' end up getting tagged as 'past memories'. When the data comes full circle and is processed by the conscious mind, the tags come up as expected, real time - real time - real time then all the sudden, past memories - real time - real time. The brain, being the powerful processing machine that it is, instantly recognizes the abnormality and in turn, tells the face to quickly form a dumb expression and instructs the neck to slowly turn the head around so the mouth can effectively project the words 'Well that was weird' to anyone near by.no body knows for sure, but the best guess is that somehow the processing of what you are experiencing at that time in your working memory gets mistaken for a long term memory so it "feels" like you have done it all before. Because everything has already happened before and we are just experiencing the same timeline of the universe over and over again for eternity.
What is Net Neutrality and why does it matter to me?
As it stands, now, you 've paid for internet access and you're able to connect to anyone you want. Would you like that to continue? The companies trying to end net neutrality want a setup where they're able to limit connections to those that they 've approved . Suppose Comcast wants you to buy their movie streaming service? Easy, just throttle all traffic to Netflix, Hulu, or any other competitor, and you'll notice that those other services *just don't work*. Suppose Apple wants you to stop using Google Maps? Easy, just strike a deal with Verizon so that any mobile connection to GMaps is "iffy" at best. These deals can work at both ends. Maybe you'll need to pay an extra $5 a month to use Reddit, since that's not part of the basic subscription plan. Some proposals would allow companies to throttle any connection they don't like; others would allow them to block the connections outright. At the end of the day, though, those amount to the same thing: companies want the ability to control your internet connection, because that control is worth a lot of money to them.
What is that loud vibration noise I hear when I open my car window on the freeway?
Have you ever blown across the top of an empty beer bottle? Enclosed space, air blowing across the opening. Notice how the bigger it is, the lower the note? Now, imagine a beer bottle shaped like the inside of a car. That open window is like the spout of the bottle, and the wind like a giant mouth blowing across. The vibrations are lower in frequency, feeling more like a throbbing pulse than a sound. If you crack a window on the other side, it'll go away. or open the sunroof. or open a second window on the same side. But, one window open, it'll make an awful sound!
You're not suppose to use Band-aids/coverings for a scarless and well healed tattoo. So why are they used for every other cut, scrape, or puncture for extended periods of time?
For tattoos, the needle only goes a certain distance into your skin so it's not a full puncture. On top of this, the idea of a tattoo is to have the ink stay in your skin; if you cover it or use medicated ointment, you'll pull up the ink and ruin the tattoo in general. Since cuts, scrapes and punctures are wounds that you'd otherwise like to go away, using a bandaid to cover it is to prevent outside debris from entering the wound, seal the wound and to help speed up the healing process. You also use medicated ointments to help keep the wound closed and speed along the healing process and reduce scarring. It's actually one of the things discovered about vaseline and how neosporin got started.
Why when it is sunny out do you close one eye instead of closing both eyes equal amounts?
This might be poor etiquette, but I'm going to direct you to [this *extremely informative* response to this exact question] from AskScience. The tl;dr version : > Your brain is processing just fine. It's more that a certain level of stimulation for the trigeminal nerve triggers the sensation of pain. Opening your other eye puts you over the threshold. This sensation of pain would have some evolutionary advantages . > This is an odd phenomenon, because your pain pathways aren't themselves light sensitive , and the light-sensitive pathways aren't themselves pain-causing . So, the pathways must be linked somehow. Based on available data, it appears that intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells detect light, and convey this information to pain pathways neurons. This communication happens somewhere in your eye, not back in your brain. But seriously, go read the actual response, because it's super informative.
Why do Jewish people make up just 2% of the US population, yet they are very dominant in many industries (i.e. banking, Hollywood, corporate, etc.)?
Connections, hard work and a cultural importance of a good education.A big part of it is that all of these things were at one point considered fairly disreputable and not something that good WASP type people would be involved in. As people who faced quite a lot of discrimination historically but who are also generally smart and hard working, Jews ended up being very successful in the handful of industries that were open to them. Edit: Also, fields where you see a lot of Jews tend to be ones where you succeed by being well educated rather than by having a bunch of capital built up. A big part of what happened to Jews historically was that a wave of anti-semitism would sweep through an area and the local powers would seize all their assets and force them to move. If you're a farmer having your land taken away is a huge fucking problem, but if you're a doctor or a banker most of what makes you valuable economically is between your ears and can't really be stolen from you.
Why does nearly every frozen food require the oven to be preheated at 400 Fahrenheit? What is it about 400 degrees that's such a sweet spot?
The hotter the oven, the faster it transfers heat into the food. Water requires a large amount of energy to melt, and a huge amount of energy to change its temperature regardless of what state it's in. A cool oven won't melt the food fast enough to avoid drying out or overcooking the outside. A hotter oven will dump more heat into the outer layer of food, melting it faster, but the inside will probably still be frozen because the heat is still going into melting the interior, which stays its melting point until it's completely melted. This results in an overcooked exterior with an icy interior, whereupon the diner will likely curse the manufacturer for providing poor food and/or poor cooking directions. The suggested cooking temperature will likely result in adequate cooking in a wide variety of ovens, some of which might be improperly set up , out of calibration, or otherwise less than ideal.What is "confirmation bias". I have plenty of things in my fridge that is heated to 375 and 350.
When my house phone calls or answers a call, I get huge lag spikes on my computer?
Do you have a cordless phone? Is your computer using a wifi connection? Some cordless phones operate on the 2.4 gHz band, which is also what wifi b/g and some wifi n networks operate on. Therefore, any communication through the phone will interfere with the wifi signal. If you are using a cordless home phone, check the markings on the base station and handsets. It should have the wireless band printed on one of them. EDIT: It's worth noting that wifi a, n , and ac should be unaffected by phones operating in the 2.4 gHz band. Also, to solve the problem, replace it with a phone system that advertises "DECT 6.0," which operates on the 1.9 gHz band and does not interfere with wifi networks.
suggestion for the mods: Please add a current events section to the sidebar.
Interesting idea. But also remember: the first answer to a question isn't always the right answer. But reddit voting tends to push one answer to the top, and then it tends to stay, even if it's wrong. It's good to have a little turnover.I love this idea. Every 10 minutes there is a post about "EXPLAIN OWS"
Why do flies always land on my monitor?
Confirmation bias. They may well land on your light bulb. But you're not staring at your light bulb for hours and hours on end, so you wouldn't notice it as much.
Is it possible to have a solar panels system on a roof of a house and be fully energy self-sufficient?
Absolutely. In some states you can even sell power back to the electric company for tax credits.Very dependent on where you live, and whether your house has been optimised for it. In the right place, in the right house, yes. In Northern Europe in the winter, no. You might manage enough electricity but you'd never heat the place for a long cold winter.Yes. Although you would have to store the energy in a battery for it to be reliable. Tesla made one called Powerwall for this purpose, and the announcement video outlined exactly how you can make your home independent of the electric company using the sun
If sounds passing through an object cause it to vibrate is it possible to create sounds such as the chirping of birds just by vibrating an object at the right speed or frequency?
Yes. That is how speakers work. You induce them to vibrate in JUST the right way to produce the exact sound you want. You can turn any object into a speaker, but speakers are specially designed to not distort sound. If you try to turn a glass cup into a speaker, you will have distortions due to the natural frequencies of that glass. Every sound can be broken up into a bunch of individual sine waves at different frequencies and amplitudes , including a bird chirping.
How do Fast Food Restaurants like KFC keep their recipes a secret, if they're distributed worldwide?
They don't make everything from scratch in each restaurant. Things are made in a factory and shipped to the stores, similar to how you 'd buy a box of Mac and Cheese. Inside they have a packet of "cheese" powder. You make Mac and Cheese at home when you open the box and follow the instructions, but that doesn't mean that you know what's in the powder.Although PurpleMonkeyFeet is correct in what he says, the real answer is that no one cares. Let's say you found out their secret recipe. What could you do with it? If you cooked with exactly the same recipe, no one would visit your restaurant instead of KFC, because the reality is that people don't eat there because of the secret recipe. They eat there because of the marketing and the well-known brand status of KFC.
Why do shoelaces lose their ability to stay tied up over time?
The same parts of the lace always are in the knot so they get worn smooth by the action of tying and movement while beinng worn. The smooth parts don't grip each other as well.
Why is buying things in bulk cheaper?
From a purely economic stand point, there are two types of costs: Fixed and Variable. Fixed is say your rent, or start up costs, so for example to buy a teddy bear factory costs 100 dollars, while variable costs for example are a teddy bears costing 4 dollars per bear to produce. So in order to make one bear your total cost is 104, for two bears its 108 because the factory always costs 100, for three bears it costs 112, and so on . Now while for each additional bear you produce your total cost increases, but if you look at the total cost per bear , it drops. So while one bear costs you 104, two bears costs 54, and so on. This is called economies of scale, and this is the main reason buying in bulk results in a lower cost, although other factors do contribute: shipping, packaging etc.
Why do our bodies not feel sexually aroused anymore once we have an orgasm?
Because your body needs to worry about other things too, like eating and sleeping. If an organism was always feeling randy, he'd waste all his energy getting his groove on, and he'd be putting his health at risk. So instead, we've evolved so that once the prime directive of breeding is handled, that impulse is mitigated a bit, and we go back to worrying about food, shelter, and all those other good things. And once those are handled, we can start feeling frisky again.
Why do small dogs start to "swim" if you hold them above water?
He's warming up for the eventual possibility that you are going to drop him in water. Why else are you holding him over the water anyways.
Why does the government permit lethal habits like alcoholism and sometimes drug addiction?
The government has no power to prevent alcoholism or drug addiction. They can make these things illegal, but anti-alcohol/drug laws have been shown to be ineffective. Prohibition didn't work and created a great deal of violent well-funded gangs and corruption. Today lots of drugs are illegal, but people still use illegal drugs if they choose to.
If the human mouth has so much bacteria that a bite is almost guaranteed to get infected, why do we want to put a fresh cut in our mouths?
From what i'm aware of, the bacteria in our own bodies is safe for our body, so it wouldn't matter whether it got inside our own body. The reason we put the cut in our mouths is because it's an instinctual action because saliva has healing properties. Same reason why animals like dogs lick wounds.