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ELI5: Why are there countless numbers of animal subspecies, but no human subspecies? | 127 | Well subspecies is a rather nebulous term. See when a two population of the same species become separated geographically, they won't exchange genetic material through breeding. If they are separated for long enough of put under enough pressure, they will genetically change enough that they will eventually become differ... | 100 | |
ELI5: What is the biological function of a coma? | 27 | A coma is the body's equivalent of the Blue Screen of Death on a computer, or the engine stalling in your car. It doesn't have a purpose. It's an error state that means something has gone very wrong. | 23 | |
ELI5:why does tv signal manage to have no buffer when you watch tv, while internet videos buffer a lot ? | As the title, how come when you watch tv there is no buffer on the shows while on the internet it can buffer a lot, i mean both are radio signals right ? | 172 | TV, whether over the air or over cable TV, is "broadcasting" one thing to everyone who can possibly receive it. If you've got an antenna and are tuned in, you will see whatever is going on right at that moment. There's no buffering, because there's no before, no after: you can only receive what's being sent at that e... | 118 |
CMV: Bernie Sanders Free college plan is a huge tax on retirement savings | Text of the bill [Source]( https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/s1373/text)
Bernie Sanders website clearly states that his free college plan will be paid for by:
“Fully Paid for by Imposing a Robin Hood Tax on Wall Street. This legislation is offset by imposing a Wall Street speculation fee on investment houses,... | 18 | You made a mistake in your analysis. You determined the time value of money for the retirement savings but you didn't determine the time value of money for spent paying for college.
The simple fact is that if people have outstanding college loans, they're generally not going to save as much for retirement.
Let's... | 12 |
CMV: The 2nd Amendment is now pointless | I interpret the 2nd amendment as follows: to prevent a government from exercising tyranny over the citizenry by force of arms. The idea was that ordinary citizens would have their own weapons and be trained and drilled in their use, so that if the day came they would be able to stand up to a government which oversteppe... | 19 | Big powerful armies have had a hard time winning against individuals defending their homes. The British were an insanely powerful army, but lost to the US. The US later became the most powerful army in the world, but still lost the wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. The weaker side's goal isn't to vanquish the pow... | 26 |
ELI5: Objectively speaking, why does depression make food taste worse? | 18 | *Anhedonia*, the absence of joy, is a symptom of depression. It's not that the food tastes worse, but the *sensation of joy from the taste of the food* is reduced. The mechanism is not well understood, but it is generally believed lack of serotonin, a neurotransmitter, plays a role. | 45 | |
ELI5: If water freezes at 0 degrees Celcius and ice melts at the same tempreature, what would happen if you took water and placed it in a place with exactly 0 degrees, no variations in temperature? | Would it turn into ice, then melt, then turn into ice again and so on? | 60 | If you add water to a zero degree environ, it will stay water. To freeze it you have to remove the latent heat of fusion. You have to continue to remove heat energy to get it to freeze into ice at zero degrees. Similar thing happens at the saturation point when water becomes steam, to it takes 1BTU/Lb of heat energy to... | 38 |
[Star Trek] How can it be that every Holo-room can create more emotionally convincing personalities than Data ever was? | 190 | Those personalities were driven by conversational algorithms, tailored to present convincing facades within scripted scenarios. They were not inherently sentient, but non-self-aware bots puking out pre-drafted dialogue and pulling, when needed, from banks of text (and body language, and scenery) which looked statistica... | 165 | |
ELI5: (not USA) How is it still democratic when different political parties "team up" after the election to get the votes necessary to rule? | If I vote for party x, and after the election party x and y team up to get more majority of the votes. However personally I do not agree with party y and party x has to change their promises etc to team with party y. To me this does not seem like democracy as the party I voted for doesn't stand for what it did when I v... | 26 | If the voters wanted x, they would have given x a majority. They voted for a balance between x and y. So x and y compromise and arrive at something that resembles the balance between x and y that voters asked for. | 14 |
Why are most bulletproof vests vulnerable to knives? | I know that a lot of soft, Kevlar-based vests are vulnerable to stabbing, but I forget the exact reasons why. I know that they stop bullets by distributing the force across a relatively large area, and that a lot of it is dependent on the high tensile strength of aramids, but I don't know why this makes them vulnerable... | 46 | Kevlar is a fabric, which spreads the impact of a bullet across a larger area. The blade of a knife can slip between the threads of the fabric.
A fragmenting bullet is still lead, which is soft, and warps before passing through the weave. A lead knife probably would be stopped by kevlar, but a steel knife wouldn't be. | 31 |
ELI5: does gargling mouth wash actually do anything? What's the best way to keep your teeth clean (beyond brushing)? | 30 | It does, it has antibacterial properties as well as forming a sort of protective coating on the tooth surface that prevets plaque buildup. It also reaches places where the toothbrush struggles. Other than that you should also floss as that removes debris between the teeth that are otherwise hard to reach. | 26 | |
ELI5: At the risk of seeming insensitive, if bombs are so powerful, how does one person hugging a suicide bomber save so many others? | 932 | The bombs that suicide bombers use can have shrapnel (like nails), to maximize the casualties - it's not just the shockwaves, it's the high speed bits of metal that gets you.
If one person gets in close, they absorb that shrapnel that would otherwise have gone out in an ever-increasing radius of destruction. They get ... | 727 | |
[MCU/Marvel] If Antman throws a blue Pym Particle Disc at a trarget and misses, what happens when it impacts the ground? | 74 | I would guess that the discs have a mass threshold, and if they impact a sufficiently massive target, such as a building or the the ground the particles will simply disperse and be ineffective.
A more powerful source than a handheld disc would be needed to effect an entire structure, as we have seen. | 71 | |
ELI5 How is it that people can be featured in documentaries on t.v. about illegal drug use? | I just watched this doc: [Heroin Crisis](http://youtu.be/gOMvXngEHmw). I have seen others like it and they sometimes feature people visually doing the drugs, as well as people basically admitting that they use these drugs regularly. Is there a loophole in the law that says this is o.k.? I don't understand. ELI5. | 17 | For one the camera crew aren't cops and don't have to, and shouldn't, enforce the law.
Also the person could later just say they where faking it, and unless the cops can find the actual drugs used at that exact time and demonstrate forensically it was drugs, then they really have nothing to prosecute on.
Maybe if you... | 18 |
ELI5 how can we only see objects a few kilometers in the horizon, but at the same time, see space objects hundreds of kilometers in the sky? | I got this thinking while on a car trip. I know the medium distance into the horizon are only a few kilometers (say between 10-20 kms), so how can when I look up, I can clearly see stars, the sun, the moon, airplanes and possibly even spaceships which are way more distant than the horizon limit? | 16 | The horizon is because of the curvature of the Earth, not a limit of vision. You can't see past the horizon because the Earth is between you and whatever you want to look at.
Distant stars have nothing in the way so as long as they're bright enough you can see them with the naked eye. | 68 |
[Eyepatches] How do Nick Fury, Deathstroke, Big Boss, and other elite soldier types with eyepatches still retain their marksmanship skills without their depth-perception? | 36 | You don't need depth perception to look down a scope or iron sights. It's often distracting, which is why many two eyed marksmen close one eye when aiming.
Depth perception would help for close ranges when you're shooting from the hip. But most people aren't Bullseye or Revolver Ocelot, so they just bring the gun beh... | 72 | |
[The Princess Bride] Why does Westley choose to use his left hand when dueling Inigo? | He is pursuing his true love in an attempt to rescue her from kidnappers who plan to kill her. It seems time would be of the essence, so why does he choose to dual with his non-dominant hand? | 39 | He was giving his right arm a break. He'd just climbed up a cliff. Inigo gave him a rest but Westley probably felt he could use more time. Westley was also confident in his left-handed swordfighting.
As a master swordsman himself, it's also possible that Westley could tell that Inigo was right-handed. He guessed at I... | 50 |
Eli5: why does the mint sell "$20" silver coins for such large sums? | Why bother putting a price on the coin at all? It's not like a $20 coin is even a thing out of this context and they always cost over $50. | 1,060 | Non-circulating legal tender (NCLT) coins are never intended to circulate as cash money but they include a denomination as a fail-safe of sorts so that should the world economy collapse and silver becomes worth less than $5.00 per ounce (for example) then at least this item's value is backed by a treasury for $20.00.
... | 618 |
[Star Wars] Is it true that Obi-Wan's "high ground" speech was more of a psychological mind-game rather than a tactical strategy? | In my opinion, Anakin did realize that he had other options other than foolishly jumping over Kenobi's head, and that he would have won the Mustafar duel if he had used them. However, by saying "I have the high ground" and "Don't try it", Obi-Wan was basically implying that Anakin wasn't powerful enough to make the jum... | 89 | Obi Wan didn't *want* Anakin to attempt the jump, he genuinely was trying to dissuade Anakin from continuing the duel. If anything, it was probably more of a bluff than anything - hoping despite all evidence to the contrary that Anakin would consider backing down.
But when Anakin jumped, obi didn't ignore the opening... | 111 |
An average tennis ball floats in the centre of a hollow sphere made of extremely dense material, floating in space. Is the tennis ball "squeezed" by the sphere's "gravity well" toward the centre, or pulled outward by the gravity of the walls all around? | In other words, if you have a hollow sphere made of, say, neutron star material, does the entire sphere make a *single* impression in spacetime - ie, gravity is highest at the centre of the sphere?
Or, does spacetime mirror where the mass is, meaning gravity is highest the closer you are to the walls, and lowest in th... | 155 | The tennis ball floats as if it was in space without any other mass around. The gravitational attraction from each side of the shell exactly cancels the attraction from the other side - this is called Newton's shell theorem. | 166 |
CMV: Claiming Blizzard is deleting dislikes on their youtube video is an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory. | So, Blizzcon happened. I, among many others, are entirely unhappy with the Diablo Mobile announcement.
It's a well-known fact that YouTubers have the ability to remove comments they don't like from their videos, or disable the like/dislike feature entirely
**But I am seeing people claiming that Blizzard is somehow de... | 30 | If YouTube had an anti-bot algorithm, wouldn't it make more sense for it to keep some dislikes from being counted in the first place rather than deleting them later? Also, is it known that YouTube uses or has been planning to use such an algorithm? If not, how would it be easier to keep secret than a few people's abili... | 14 |
[My Hero Academia] I'm a minor villain who wants to turn my life around and become a hero, what are my options? | Recently, I was in a fight with this UA student who mentioned that Hero work would pay better and more more reliably than just snatching purses. I've never killed anyone, just minor theft because that's how I was raised- my parents were also minor villains and they taught me how to survive in the back alleys. I'm tire... | 29 | Honestly, if you have a criminal record, getting certified to professionally use your powers in emergency situations might not be feasible. You might want to consider going to school for some other type of heroism, like being a doctor or tax accountant. | 17 |
[Marvel] If Galactus possessed the Infinity Gauntlet with all the stones, could he create a source of sustenance that would allow him to stop eating worlds? | 70 | In theory, yes. But on the galactic timeline, that would likely doom the entire universe and he's not a malicious actor, he's a force of nature clearing through for the rebirth of the universe.
Now as to how necessary that rebirth is, or if the universe could be augmented to last without a cycle using the infinity gau... | 62 | |
ELI5:What's the difference between beating separately and folding in, and just beating it together? Doesn't it both accomplish the purpose of mixing it? | This is regarding egg white and yolk mixing. | 125 | When you fold in eggs you are preserving the air bubbles made when you beat the eggs to begin with ending up with a fluffy consistency. If you beat it altogether you just get scrambled eggs with no bubbles and no fluff | 106 |
ELI5: How does grocery shopping work in New York City? | Here is what I mean:
1) Are there really large grocery stores in such a dense city? Square footage costs in NYC would seem to make a large grocery store not possible.
2) If there are large grocery stores, where are they usually located? Is there one whole floor of a large building, for example? (e.g. the Safeway ta... | 49 | There are "large" grocery stores in the city, but not as large. None the size of malls. Maybe the size of a "large store". Or a basement, in the case of a Whole Foods.
You either buy groceries more frequently so that you carry less each time... Or get one of those infamous granny carts so you can haul your load onto t... | 24 |
ELI5 the appeal to Atheism | 34 | Imagine that you have substitute teacher in school. A little before lunch time, you get a math worksheet. 19 of the questions are very easy, simple adding and subtraction questions that you can easily do. The last question, however, doesn't look like anything you've done before:
Let f be the function given by f(x)=... | 205 | |
I believe that prisons should be work camps where you must work if you want to eat. CMV. | I believe that convicted criminals should be locked in a place where they are not allowed to leave, but also if they expect to be given food, they should be expected to work.
They would be paid minimum wage, and the cost of food, heat, housing, prison guards would be subtracted from their earnings. Whatever money was ... | 32 | The problem is that this system has been used in the past as a workaround for the emancipation of slavery.
Slavery abolished? No problem! Make a bunch of pointless laws, and either target them at black people or enforce them in a racialized manner, and suddenly you still basically have slavery.
The Prison-Industrial ... | 31 |
ELI5: Why are embarrassing moments SO hard to forget compared to other negative emotions? | I can remember times when I felt afraid, angry, upset, any other negative emotion. And when I remember those, I usually just don’t care and move on.
But when I think of embarrassing moments, it sticks to my head like crazy. I cringe and blush about it for a VERY long time, even if it’s been YEARS since it happened. Am... | 20 | Positive pathways and negative pathways are different in your head. Your brain prioritises negative pathways when it comes to laying down memories. That is why your single moment of embarrassment at your fifth birthday party overwhelms the memory of your four hours of fun.
The reason your brain prioritises negative... | 14 |
ELI5:Why does music sound random when you listen to it at a very low volume? | When you listen to music at a very low volume, you can clearly hear the lyrics, but the melody sounds really weird, as if the notes were random, even though you know the right melody in your head.
PS: I flaired as biology because it may have to do with the brain, but maybe it has to do with physics and the airwaves, s... | 23 | At low volumes, many of the frequencies don't reach your ear at an audible level. The speaker may not reproduce everything perfectly, or some frequencies do not carry enough energy to make it all the way to your ear. So, the music sounds weird because it's incomplete. | 18 |
[Avatar - Legend of Aang, Legend of Korra] Is the Avatar able to master all sub-bending? | We know that Avatar is capable of mastering magma, metal and redirecting lightning, but can he use any sub-bending he wants? My biggest question is about Combustion, Blood and that strange astral thing that Jinora has. | 65 | Yes, the Avatar can learn all forms of sub-bending as those are just different expressions of the same power.
I think that Jinora's astral projection has more to do with her connection to the spirit world than her bending; like how Iroh was able to see spirits in the astral plane. | 74 |
[Titanic] When Jack and Rose are doing the "I'm flying" thing, how come there is no one else on deck in a fully occupied cruise ship? | https://youtu.be/8MDPeL8lpzo | 27 | One, the Titanic is a passenger liner, not a cruise ship. It's transport, not vacation.
Two, the bow is a crew area, not a passenger area. Passengers aren't exactly barred from going there while at sea, but there's not really anything up there for them. It's a place of work. This is true on many cruise ships, but... | 37 |
ELI5- Why is milk measured in gallons, but soda measured in liters? | 2,602 | The two and three liter bottles of soda just happened to be introduced at a time when the US was taking some steps into metricating. While metrication never really took hold, the bottles stayed because people were used to them. | 2,320 | |
Why do streams seem to originate from mountain tops? | At least here in Japan, most streams emerge from the ground quite near the tops of mountains. Even relatively small mountain tops (area-wise) will have a continuous stream emerging some 30 meters down from the peak. This, of course, joins with other streams emerging farther down or from other mountain tops and that i... | 46 | Higher elevations are generally colder than lower elevations. On the windward side of the mountain, wind (caused by air pressure differentials) pushes air up the side of the mountain until it reaches the point at which the air can no longer hold the moisture. Cold air can hold less moisture than warm air. So, when t... | 40 |
[MacGyver] What was MacGyver's actual job? | Do "think tanks" like the Phoenix Foundation exist? Where they send out private agents to handle various dangerous situations? | 78 | MacGyver had lots of jobs. He served in the Vietnam War on a bomb defusing team, then was a fire fighter, fighting oil fires in Sumatra, and basically bounced around from job to job until he was hired as a field agent for the Department of External Services, an intelligence agency.
Later he would be world for the Phoe... | 87 |
[Pokemon] Why do Ice-type Pokemon exist? Ice is just frozen water. Shouldn't they be considered water-type? | 38 | It's less ice and more cold powers. The moves that are ice type don't always involve water, such as aurora beam, frost breath, and subzero slammer. But they do contain some ice-based powers too.
Also ice/water type Pokemon do exist, so they aren't necessarily the same typing. | 75 | |
[DragonBall Z] if all the Saiyans are dead, wouldn’t Vegeta be the king of all saiyans instead of the prince, as he keeps introducing himself? | 32 | We can assume there is some sort of ceremony for crowning a prince King. This is impossible since Goku can't perform the ceremony. Vegeta is the highest ranking Saiyan, but there is no rightful method to promote him to King. | 48 | |
Why do our bodies separate waste into liquids/solids? Isn't it more efficient to have one type of waste? | Weird question, but I've been wondering this. | 241 | To expound on rlee's first comment, the primary reason is because of the different types of waste.
Solid waste is largely the remnants of the food you eat -- the undigested bits, the leftover fiber, as well as some of the dead bacteria that lives in your digestive tract. You can think of this primarily as the stuff yo... | 221 |
[General RPG] So I just came upon this unreasonably small town | It has a Mayors house, Item shop, Inn, and Weapon/Armor shop. Each only has one person in it. There is also one empty house. That is it, no other people are in this town. As far as I can determine I am also the first visitor they have had in ages. How can this town even function like this? | 91 | It's probably less of an organized town and more of a glorified rest stop for travelling adventurers. The businesses there (items, weapons, and an inn) certainly seem catered to that crowd.
The inn was probably the first thing that was built, and the rest of the buildings sprang up to fulfill the needs of the sort of ... | 103 |
25% of all dollars were printed in the last year, why has their been no meaningful rise inflation? | I have no economic knowledge, but it was always hammered into me from schools and people, that printing lots of money will start and inflation spiral. The US has created trillions in the last year, how is a ps5 still only $500 and the price of food is basically the same? | 23 | Because the federal reserve is actively managing inflation and this is the reason why the money supply was increased in the first place.
You see, "a lot of new money was created so we must get inflation" isn't really the right place to start. It's more "the economic downturn and falling money velocity caused a lot of... | 67 |
CMV: There is nothing wrong with using the word "normal" when describing those who for within societal averages as long as it's not used to judge those outside those parameters | Here's a couple of examples of what I'm taking about. I have a friend who is genderfluid and they posted in their Facebook the other day a post explaining the term cis as in cisgender. The post ended with "sorry not sorry cisgendered people you can't call yourself normal".
I watched a video on YouTube made by a high f... | 77 | > The dictionary definition of normal is "conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected." Considering that we determine what is usual or expected based on what we experience the majority of the time
That's already a crude and self-serving simplification of the dictionary definition. Police officers are abo... | 18 |
What Scientific Discoveries Proved Lord Kelvin Wrong About The Future Of Physics? | In the 1900s Lord Kelvin said "There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement." I'm assuming this quote is backed up with the fact there weren't many discoveries being made and it felt like physics had been fully sussed out (I'm assuming he didn't just say th... | 57 | 2 major things happened
in 1905 Einstein began his work on Relativity, which would end up redefining space, time, and gravity.
The main experiments that got explained were the Michelson and Morley constant speed of light result and The precessing of mercury's orbit
And a few year ~~later~~ (Earlier sorry it was 19... | 41 |
ELI5: What is being changed when phones are made 5G-compatible? | 39 | Phones are small computers that have a chip and antenna in them that can connect to cell towers via very specific radio signals.
5G signals are different than 4G ones, so phones that support 5G have a different chip and antenna that also speak the 5G language. | 83 | |
How can the shape of an interstellar object be inferred from its light curve if it only constitutes one pixel ? | [ʻOumuamua light curve simulation.gif](https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%CA%BBOumuamua_light_curve_simulation.gif#mw-jump-to-license)
*EDIT:*
Also is this modelling deterministic ?
Is there a term for it ?
What are the assumptions scientists make for this kind of modelling ? | 24 | We know the direction of light falling on the object, so we can model "if it were this shape, rotating at this rate, and made of similar materials to known objects, the light curve world look like this". Then we have the computer vary those parameters systematically until the simulated curve is similar to the observed ... | 14 |
[Animaniacs] how do i handle these three monkey? dog? Cartoon things? | So im working at this electronic store when these three kid things, two brothers and a sister i think warner is what they said. They ask where the air in a can for the keyboards are, i told them and now every so often they show up, ask me random questions or tell jokes that are... odd to say the least. How should i han... | 21 | Dogs. The gloves are a dead giveaway.
Just befriend them. It's truly your only hope but make sure to do it in a legitimate and genuine way, as they will certainly sniff out what you're doing and won't be so happy if your just tryna save your skin. | 14 |
Can cold welding, like when two pieces of metal touch in space, be achieved on earth in a vacuum chamber? | Ive been reading about how cold welding can happen in the vacuum of space, but could it be achieved with a vacuum chamber on earth? | 684 | Yes, although it's likely of limited use in an industrial setting, since vacuums are difficult to maintain. Friction welding would probably be preferred. However, a cold weld can be achieved without vacuum if you can apply enough pressure.
The reason for this is that metals in atmosphere have an oxide layer at their s... | 303 |
[Godzilla] How large are Godzilla's Bowel Movements? | Title says it all. Specify in volume please. You can also specify weight if needed.
Scenario A: 50 meter tall Godzilla
Scenario B: 100 meter tall Godzilla
You can choose what he has been eating if you think it will effect the size of his stool. Sushi? Instant Noodles? Chinese take-out? Mexican Food? New York Pizza... | 18 | anywhere between 3 - 40metric ton of feces, sometimes more, it is highly radioactive and lumpy in texture.
As far as i know about Kaiju's they do not heave diarrhea, even after consuming a whole taco bell restaurant. But in the event that Godzilla would get the runs, imagine a napalm flamethrower, the ones you see in ... | 17 |
ELI5: why putting a pillow under your knees when you sleep helps with back pain | 651 | Massage therapist here, and side sleeper.
Under knees when supine (laying on the spine) shortens any muscles pulling on the pelvic girdle and allows tight lower back muscles to lengthen.
For side lying, a pillow raising the upper knee will ease the hip flexors, glutes, and sciatic nerve entrapment sites.
Ease means ... | 781 | |
Is sociological privilege distinguishable from a persecution complex? | Social injustices occur, for sure. One of the main arguments I hear about privilege is that the majority simply cannot experience or understand it, and need to take the notions of their privilege on good faith from the underprivileged minority. This got me thinking though: how can we (either the majority of the minorit... | 18 | First, two issues:
One is that you seem to be trying to analyze this primarily (or totally) from an individual level of analysis. Individuals can "have privilege" in the sense that they as individuals accrue advantages due to privilege but privileges are ultimately social in nature - the individual accrues the advant... | 16 |
If a star explodes because it ran out of fusion fuel how can it be that a new star can form out of the gas that the supernova leaves behind? | 29 | The star doesn't run out of fusion fuel. Eventually the core of the star becomes too heavy to continue fusion, but there are shells of helium and hydrogen around the core that are still burning. However, when the core stops burning in giant stars, there isn't enough pressure to prevent gravitational collapse, which cau... | 34 | |
How did the Nazis use Nietzsche's work to their advantage? | I am aware that Nietzsche was not an anti-semite and did not support those types of ideologies but I belive I heard that they manipulated his works to benifit them. How and why did they do this? | 19 | His sister Elisabeth, who married a fanatical anti-semite, was Nietzsche's caretaker after his mental decline and was instrumental in organizing his notes for publications after his death. Like her husband, she was an anti-semite and imposed her own ideological views onto Nietzsche's notes, often arranging or rewriting... | 15 |
ELI5: What rule, or how is it that in American Football you're able to get away with "fake plays"? | Like [this](http://i.imgur.com/D7QxhUJ.gifv).
I searched this thread but with no answer, and I'm just slightly confused. | 93 | Why not? The team with possession followed all the rules, the ball was hiked, making it in play, and quarterbacks are allowed to run with the ball. What the team with possession probably did is not give a a snap count (like "hut, hut, hike!"); however, while this is done 99% of the time, it isn't required. So, since th... | 74 |
ELI5: Is what we see on an oscilloscope simply an abstract visual representation of sound, or is it possible to "construct" coherent sound (for example, speech) simply by "drawing" the correctly shaped waves...? | ...perhaps into a "backwards oscilloscope".
[image for reference](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/Sound_wave_Correlation.jpg) | 51 | The oscilloscope is showing you the change in voltage/current over time, it's not really an "abstract" visualization, it's a visualization of a literal event that's going on in the circuit.
Yes you can go backwards. In fact there are synthesizers that work that way, you can draw a waveform and it will play it back. T... | 23 |
If we cloned a dinosaur today would it die quickly due to the lower oxygen content in the air today? | 138 | Oxygen content today isn't actually much different than that at the time of the dinosaurs. Over the millions of years they were alive, it was sometimes higher and sometimes lower. It's the giant insects of the Carboniferous which were really dependent on high oxygen levels. | 96 | |
ELI5: Why is being flat-footed a hindrance? | As a child, I was flat-footed - my father insisted I needed orthopedic insoles at a young age, so as to be able to serve in the armed forces if my grades didn't come good. Lo and behold, I shit-talked my way into a decent paying desk job as a young adult that did not require a protractor to get me hired. So, what advan... | 106 | Feet are supposed to have an arch, and the bones/muscle in them require it for proper function.
It's a bit like a bridge. If you look at large bridges that support a lot of weight, you see those giant cables that 'curve' up and to a point in the middle. So when you put a lot of weight on the bridge, it's not just the ... | 129 |
ELI5: Where does electricity go when it goes into the "ground" | So if electricity is just the movement of loose electrons in a material, then where do those electrons go when they run around in a circuit and are dumped into the ground through another wire? or say you got struck by lightning, the electrons go through you into the ground but where? like where do the electrons go, int... | 54 | In electrical circuits, "ground" often means a big, low resistance path back to the power source. In many cars, for example, ground is simply the body of the car providing a return path back to the battery.
In other cases, like household electrical, the ground is literally the ground. Electrons are not completely lo... | 25 |
How did we adopt standard rendering settings such as 1080p resolution, 30-60 fps, 60-144 hz refresh rate, etc.? | I'm curious as to how we came up with these standard values that most screen manufacturers, game creators, video rendering programs have adopted, etc. have adopted. | 25 | The standard TV refresh rates - 50Hz in former "PAL" countries, 60Hz in former "NTSC" countries - came about largely because they matched the frequency of the alternating current used in the countries that developed them, although NTSC later screwed this up and has annoyed a generation of broadcast engineers by droppin... | 18 |
ELI5. How do trees stay alive during the winter when it’s really cold and all their leaves fall off | 35 | When a trees leaves fall off, it is essentially entering a state of hibernation. It’s metabolic processes slow to nearly a standstill, and it uses stores of sugars (sap) as an energy source until warmer weather returns. | 28 | |
CMV: I don't believe that "minors cannot provide consent" is a legitimate argument in support of statutory rape laws. | To preface, I am a teenager. Consider it from the horse's mouth. Also, I am in no way advocating statutory rape or pedophilia, I'm simply saying that this particular argument is illegitimate.
I believe that, for *sexually developed* minors, the argument that minors cannot provide consent is illegitimate. Teenagers hav... | 62 | The problem isn't with teenagers having sex with each other - that's perfectly normal and acceptable. There's also Romeo and Juliet laws that protect kids who are close enough in age, but would otherwise normally be charged with statutory rape without these laws.
That's not the issue people are talking about when di... | 53 |
[X-Men/My Hero Academia] If Magneto was transported into the My Hero Academia universe, what faction would he empathize with or join? | Suppose Magneto found himself irrevocably transported to the My Hero Academia universe. While there's some difference in how powers manifest, he would probably just perceive people with Quirks as the mutants of that world. I gather that he would be initially elated that they make up 80% of the population and that gover... | 19 | A world where mutants are in charge?
He’ll be thrilled. He’ll also be fine with restrictions, total freedom is really not one of his schticks and he’s perfectly aware of how dangerous mutants can be. They’re not being oppressed, they just have to follow public safety laws. He’ll get the issues that would arise with ho... | 27 |
Which philosophers were actually happy at the end of their life or put forth a philosophy that may make people happy to follow? | So many philosophers I’ve been studying seemed to have been depressed, dissatisfied, alone and never married, or even mentally ill at the end of their lives. Some have even concluded life is not worth bringing new humans into existence. Which philosophers were happy and/or seemed to promote a philosophy which might bri... | 96 | Socrates is an obvious one. He was upset when his friends were crying at his execution, and stated he could not be sad because he didnt know whether whether death was good or not.
Epicurus thought similarly stating that since there were no gods to judge you after death, there is no reason to fear death.
| 94 |
How did the recent space-grown lettuce develop identical microbial communities to its terrestrial counterpart? | >When NASA researchers tested both versions of the lettuce, they found the space-grown variety was strikingly similar to the ground-grown controls. Each had equivalent levels of nutrients and antioxidants. Cutting-edge DNA analysis even showed that the space lettuce also developed the **same diverse microbial commun... | 81 | If you're asking where the "initial" microbes came from - they were always there. The amount of microbes around (and in) every living thing is staggering, both by count of individual cells and by number of distinct kinds. The interesting question was which subset of those microbes would end up thriving and growing to a... | 53 |
[Marvel] If you needed a team of ninja-type trained heroes for a black ops mission and they couldn’t have flashy powers, who are the top candidates? | I’m thinking in terms of people on the sort of Black Widow to Daredevil to Wolverine axis.
Who’s your Oceans Eleven here?
1. Able to enter a nation discreetly and legitimately.
2. Pass among the public as regular people.
3. Get into ultra secure places to exfiltrate information, items or people.
4. Slip discretel... | 95 | Kitty Pryde (intangibility, ninja training and genius level computer expert), Invisible Woman (invisibility), Black Cat, Gambit (both are master thiefs, BC have +Luck on her side), Mystique (Camouflage), Ant Man, Wasp (both can hide reducing thier size), Cloak, Nigthcrawler, (teleportation), any telepath. | 83 |
What is the most fundamental definition of energy? | If I think about it, it seems that energy is like time, in that we all experience it, yet nailing down exactly what it is isn't so easy.
Thoughts? | 89 | It can be derived from Noether's theorem. "Noether's (first) theorem states that any differentiable symmetry of the action of a physical system has a corresponding conservation law." - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noether's_theorem
"For illustration, if a physical system behaves the same regardless of how it is oriented in ... | 51 |
ELI5 How mirages work | What are they? When do they occur? Ay other interesting stuff? | 30 | You know how when there's a cookout and you look just above the grill you can see distorted wavy lines in the air?
A mirage is that same thing in the desert, where the distortion is so strong that a bit of the blue sky appears mixed up with what should be the sand, so people believe they are seeing blue water on the g... | 16 |
[DC] How does Batman possibly keep up the image of a horrifying bat-monster that scares criminals when he has several clearly human sidekicks, who are mostly children? | 846 | As far as criminals are concerned, there are basically 3 different Batmans.
You’ve got the guy who hangs out with the Justice League. He clearly has some kind of superpowers. Everybody knows that, he’s a superhero after all. He fights alien invasions and stuff.
The second “guy” works for the cops. He’s some detec... | 855 | |
Other than rationalism and empiricism, are there any other ways of gaining knowledge? | 57 | Rationalism and empiricism aren't really ways of gaining knowledge, they're traditions of philosophical work - or historical hypotheses about what historians suppose constitute such traditions.
If you're interested in the issue of sources of knowledge, the place to begin would be with an introductory survey of epistem... | 52 | |
ELI5: Why do different strains of cannabis have different effects? Isn't it all still just THC? | 37 | You know how with some vegetables or fruits there are a bunch of different varieties, like with apples or tomatoes, that are all technically the same fruit but maybe have slightly different tastes, colors and shapes from each other? Like how one type of apple tastes a lot more bitter than a different type, or how some... | 14 | |
[Harry Potter] Dementors feed on happiness, so their victims become miserable. Boggarts feed on fear; why don't their victims become brave? | 77 | Boggarts don't "feed on fear." They simply become whatever their target fears most. To what end is not known. It's not even know if they are intelligent creatures using their ability for some specific means or are more akin to a force of nature that just does what it does. | 77 | |
[General] We scan something too powerful, our computers spark and blow up. Something hits us which our shields deflect, our computers blow up. Doesn't this seem like incredibly bad engineering? | 37 | Those monitors have to have 3,000,000° plasma running though the decks to power the extremely advanced computers inside. This isn't your home PADD, these computers have to process subatomic phenomenon into something you can understand. Doing so for just the hundred meters in front of the ship uses more computer power t... | 46 | |
ELI5: How do adhesive factories (super glue, caulking, etc...) prevent their machines from seizing up with dried glue during production? | 14,031 | When the glue is running in the pipes it's usually not exposed to air and it spends very little time in the tube so it can't clog up. These factories might be running the filling machines 24/7 or when the machine is turned off, they run a solvent through the pipes to clean the left-over glue. | 7,758 | |
ELI5: Why do many parade uniforms have a chin strap that rests on the mouth not under the chin? | 2,949 | Former Danish Royal Life Guard here. It's placed on the "mouth" due to that if someone comes up from behind or if you're in combat, they can't choke you or drag you to the ground while pulling on your bear-skin. And it also protected against attacks from the cavalry, where it would protect your face from sabers. | 1,220 | |
How come every lake and pond has fish? Where do the fishes come from in newly formed lakes and ponds? | 16 | They can get there a few different ways. The most common methods of populating a new lake or pond by fish are either swimming there (whether due to temporary flooding of the area or an underground spring connecting two seemingly unconnected lakes) or being introduced by another species (usually humans, but sometimes f... | 13 | |
[WH40K] Say I'm a Slaaneshi cultist that prefers the pleasure of good food over sex or drugs. What does Slaanesh offer me and how does my chaos corruption progress? | Instead of wild orgies or space crack (or both) I'm just a real gourmand, always in search of the finest culinary experiences. How does Slaanesh inevitably corrupt me? | 39 | You know how Pablo Picasso became "so" interested in art, that drawing conventional faces began to bore him? The same thing will happen with you, as you constantly vamp up more and more daring recipes, incorporating more ingredients of "exotic", if unseemly qualities. It all culminates one evening where, in a high-leve... | 73 |
When ancient language or code was deciphered, how did they know that it is correct? | 35 | If you are not asking how it is deciphered, but merely how one knows one has it right once it HAS BEEN deciphered, it's really just a matter of massive probability. Let's say you have a two-paragraph sample of text. The fact that your decipherment method gives a readable and meaningful result for both the first and t... | 42 | |
[Marvel] If Spider-Man were to create a Patreon account, how would he collect his patrons' money without getting his true identity exposed? | Enough is enough. Peter Parker is sick of struggling financially, and he figures out that since he has already made a name for himself by serving several years as *Spider-Man*, he ought to create a Patreon account in *Spider-Man*'s name so that the people he protects can support *Spider-Man*'s efforts.
The problem ... | 104 | Talk to a public hero (or a hero like Matt Murdock who has an appropriate public persona) and convince them to operate the Patreon on his behalf. Peter wouldn't ask a regular person or friend to do this, but he might let Daredevil. | 77 |
Why are acoustically guided weapons an option in the ocean but not in the air? | For example, most modern stealth warplanes take great care to minimize their infrared and radar signatures, but are still quite loud. Would it be possible to track these planes acoustically? | 221 | Ships are extremely slow (say 15 m/s / 30 knots) compared to the speed of sound in water (1500 m/s). What that means is that acoustic detection is practically instantaneous -- when the sound waves hit you, the target hasn't moved far.
Warplanes travel a significant fraction of the speed of sound (or well above it) so ... | 118 |
ELI5: How do bugs even survive in nature? | I just watched a cockroach walk along a ledge for about 10 minutes, hit the end, try to walk up it, fall on it's back, do 360's for about 10 minutes, get back up, do the exact same thing, fall off the ledge this time, hasn't moved since.
How do these things not go extinct? | 48 | Insects don't have the "intelligence" approach to survival like us. They have short lifespans. A female cockroach can lay 300-400 eggs in her lifetime. They are quite hardy but numbers is their strong suit. | 26 |
Why Are Fed Interest Rate Increases So Seemingly Low? | Like, just now the Federal Reserve raised the rate by 0.5%. Now, I'm no economic illiterate (minored in Econ in college), but this is supposedly a lot, yet on its face doesn't seem like much. | 18 | Raising rates too quickly has a high chance to cause a recession. On the other hand, raising them too slowly won't have the desired effect. The fed tries to toe the line between the two, slowing down inflation without causing a recession, but that's not exactly easy. | 45 |
[Pokemon] I'm lost and getting hungry. Do people normally eat pokemon? Which ones should I hunt or avoid? | I was only supposed to hang around for two days on this island. Now, I can't find my boat. My supplies are dwindling, and I'm craving protein.
On a side note, I have two friends who are vegan. Would they eat plant pokemon? | 81 | This is... Such a common thing. Like, on the show you see them eating meat, but you NEVER see any non-pokemon animals. It shouldnt be such a big issue, except that every single pokemon has shown some sort of sentience, and ablity to understand exactly what humans say. So there for, if you kill a Miltank for a steak. Yo... | 76 |
ELI5: The work of the 2012 Nobel Prize in Physics winners. | Thanks! | 566 | There's these things called quantum particles, which are really really small and are very difficult to see.
If you try and look at these quantum particles, then you disrupt whatever they're doing. Observing them causes them to change their behavior and their state, because they act differently when they interact with ... | 327 |
ELI5: Why do we yawn? | Why do humans and animals yawn? What does it do for us, does it relieve some kind of pressure? Why is it associated with being tired? Thanks | 19 | There's no sure answer. Humans and animals have different reasons. But three suspected reasons in humans are:
1) To express fatigue, similar to how a smile shows comfort and happiness.
2) The yawn helps cool the brain thought different mechanisms. Your brain temp rises when you're exhausted or fatigued.
3) humans ... | 20 |
ELI5: why is blood pressure not measured in psi? | 17 | Before digital blood pressure measurement tools became widely available, the device used to measure blood pressure would literally consist of a column of mercury, and the pressure would just be the height of that column (millimeters of mercury = mm Hg).
Obviously now it can be anything but healthcare workers are very ... | 20 | |
CMV: The alt-right's push against censorship and towards free speech is diametrically opposed with Donald Trump's stance on Net Neutrality and Whistle-blower protections | I'd like to have a conversation on how to rationalize some of Donald Trump's positions on free speech since many of his views are in direct contrast with the new right wing Republicans (or as some would call it the alt-right). These alt-right Republicans overwhelmingly seem to support Trump, despite some inconsistent p... | 57 | Trump is opposed to political correctness, as are the alt-right. He's also more concerned about potential security risks than the left appear to be. His anti-political correctness and "America first" agenda vibes well with that of the alt-right, and all of his proposed policies reflect that agenda, even though some of ... | 10 |
ELI5: How can police confiscate your phone as evidence for taking photos from a public space of a crime scene when the first amendment protects freedom of the press? | Something happened to me recently that I explained in [THIS](https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtectAndServe/comments/3kmggn/can_a_police_officer_take_away_your_phone_for/) post on /r/protectandserve. ELI5 how this is legal. | 16 | They can't, not legally. You see stories about this, but not one where a bystander has been sentenced by a judge for refusing to turn over their phone.
Some people believe that the press have legal protections in this matter not available to the public. This is a lie often told by police. Don't fall for it. | 10 |
How does electricity from a specific power provider get to me, when other power companies use the same power lines leading up to my house? | So for instance, I used to live in an apartment complex where you had to choose and separately pay for your own electricity provider. So for my apartment, I chose electricity provider G, but other apartments around me chose a number of other energy providers, T, C, and Q. All the electricity came to the apartment com... | 29 | Your power meter is installed by your company and your neighbors meter is installed by theirs. Power is all the same and those companies with the meters then pay the company that supplies the power to the lines after you pay them for your usage.
Just image your power meter is a gas station. You pay the gas station, th... | 30 |
[Marvel] Why doesn't Dr Doom build a stronger suit like Iron Man? | What's so important about his current suit that he won't use Iron Man's suit which can withstand nukes, fly at Mach 9-ish, lift almost 100 tonnes, etc? | 120 | Doom's armor IS that strong, which is why he can easily hold his own against entire teams of heroes. It's full of weapons, traps, and all sorts of other goodies to compliment his technological and magical skills. | 161 |
The US needs to upgrade its passenger rail system. CMV. | While most Americans don't rely on passenger rail for transportation, a large sector of the population in the Northeast does. The Northeast Corridor gets as many passengers as a European line of the same size would.
Meanwhile, the US has seen a large number of entirely preventable rail disasters. For example, most fir... | 42 | Largely because trains are made obsolete for city to city travel by airplanes.
An airplane can put you anywhere in the country much faster than most trains (even if we had euro style 'high speed' trains). They cost less and do not require expensive right-of-ways through developed areas.
Within a given metro area,... | 10 |
CMV: More nations should adopt Autobahn-style speed limits | I live in Southern Ontario and frequently drive on 400-series highways which have a limit of 100kmh and other highways have speed limits around 90kmh and 80kmh.
I believe that this causes problems, mainly people going at or below the speed limit in passing lanes with people tailgating or lane-changing rapidly around t... | 92 | One thing to consider is that this really doesn't work unless you *also* greatly increase the difficulty and requirements of getting a drivers' license. Germany is one of the most grueling and technically challenging countries in the world in which to be allowed to drive.
So they can get away with this. An autobahn a... | 35 |
how do you explain what is "language theory" and automata for someone who has little knowledge about computers? | 22 | I've got a book "Introduction to Languages and the Theory of Computation". It mathematically defines a few models of computation without directly discussing actual computers. That seems like a reasonable way to do it. | 17 | |
ELI5: Why don’t we remember falling asleep? | 19 | Memories are similar to data stored in a computer - it either reads (looks back on a stored memory) or it writes (logs and saves data / memories). When you’re about to fall asleep, your brain is going from conscious to unconscious, where it won’t write new memories. Without storing information, you don’t remember going... | 28 | |
ELI5: Why does radio reception sometimes increase when we stand next to a radio or touch the antenna? | 18 | Your body reacts to electromagnetic radiation (which includes radio). FM just happens to have frequencies near the resonant frequency of the human body. So your body acts like a tuned antenna for some stations. | 13 | |
[MCU] Why was W'Kabi so willing to throw in with Killmonger? | I mean, W'Kabi vocally supported Killmonger's plan to overthrow the governments of the world shortly after having watched him (seemingly) kill his best friend, and still assisted Killmonger after Black Panther revealed that he survived the attempt on his life. What I don't understand was why W'Kabi was so willing to sw... | 17 | Because Killmonger succeeded in killing Klaue (avenging W'Kabi's dad), where T'Challa had failed to apprehend Klaue in Korea after refusing to bring W'Kabi with him on the mission. So in his view, Erik is a strong leader who gets results and doesn't sideline his closest allies, unlike T'Challa. | 32 |
[Watchmen] Why is the discovery at the pyramid building such a shock? | Like why is it surprising that Veidt International owns pyramid? They enter the building and literally say "I'll look for adriens itinerary". I just don't understand why it's played out like such a huge climax. I must be missing something. | 26 | Pyramid is the element that connects the guy who tried to assassinate Veidt, the mission that The Comedian was on before he died, and several people who contracted cancer apparently because of proximity to Dr Manhattan (such as Moloch and Laurie).
The fact that it was owned by Veidt means that it is owned by Adrian, ... | 23 |
ELI5: what’s Trauma Bond? | 33 | It's when people come together due to a common trauma. Surviving a car accident or living through an abusive home makes people stick with fellow survivors. They understand what they went through because they also went through it. | 29 | |
CMV: It's totally okay to use coffee to suppress appetite and routinely skip lunch and breakfast to be productive | I've been doing this a lot recently as I work from home. Will just slam a couple of potent coffees at the start of the day and find that the day flies by without me even noticing that I need to eat. Sometimes I pop a multivitamin just to know that I'm also ingesting some nutrients, but there's obviously no protein / fa... | 67 | Iv been doing this for over 2 years and haven't noticed any negative effects.
I would however advise against the multivitamins, they should be used after a meal otherwise the vitamins don't get absorbed and are thus not only useless but also bad for your kidneys.
| 26 |
Could we make a rocket that uses both matter and antimatter? Could antimatter be used to propels us in the same way matter does? If it annihilates with matter after it propels something, does that mean it can't be used to propel something in a vacuum? | 20 | In principle yes, but not with present-day technology.
Proton-antiproton annihilation produces fast moving massive particles (specifically, charged and neutral pions) as well as gamma rays and neutrinos. Electron-positron annihilation produces just gamma rays and neutrinos. One way to propel a spacecraft is to deflect... | 22 | |
[Batman] How does Bruce Wayne explain Jason Todd’s death to the public? | So after Jason Todd was killed by the Joker, how did Bruce cover it up? Was it even public knowledge that he adopted Jason Todd? | 30 | Jason Todd died while overseas trying to investigate reports that his mother was still alive. Bruce just had to omit the "was killed by the Joker because he was Robin" part of that story, and it was tragic, but "Jason Todd got caught up with terrorists who killed him" was legitimately what happened. Just, the Joker was... | 46 |
What is the specific advantage of a moon base over an orbital space station? | Now that several nations have developed plans for permanent installations on the moon, what is the specific advantage of building such an installation over having an identical facility floating in space? | 3,874 | Mass. Every gram of everything that is needed has to be launched to an orbital space station. Structural members, radiation shielding, water, rocket fuel, ammonia, cooling system, oxygen, etc.
On a planetary body, you can get some for free (bury the station for radiation shielding), or minimal processing. By sendin... | 2,249 |
Pacific rim, what is the overall difference in the kaiju in the different categorys? Are they just all different sizes from one another?? | 46 | The Serizawa scale measures water displacement (size), toxicity of the creature itself and ambient radiation, the level of which generally indicates how much work the precursors did on the creature to create a god awful monster.
These all combine up to give you the class of the Kaiju on the scale. | 63 | |
Why is cancer rare in fat cells? | 15 | Short answer: fat cells don't undergo a great deal of cellular turnover and are probably relatively unlikely to acquire cancer-causing mutations compared to most other cell types. However, while malignant fatty tumors (liposarcomas) are very rare, benign fatty tumors (lipomas) are exceedingly common.
Long answer: canc... | 13 |
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