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[MCU]Why didn't Doctor Strange use the Time Stone to go back in time and hide the Infinity Stones better, or to kill Thanos at a more convenient time in the past or using the Time Stone's time manipulation powers dump Thanos into the end of the universe or freeze him in time forever? | Any issues of "But Thanos has an Infinity Stone so the Time Stone does not work!" are neutered if Strange goes back far enough that Thanos has none and then, he can use his time control powers to fuck Thanos up good.
If the movie ending was the "only way forward" then why not just change the past? And as we saw with... | 104 | People were freaking out about Strange using the stone to go back 10 minutes, you're talking about going back years or at least months. By the time Strange was aware of Thanos's plans billions had already died, it's not entirely clear to me how those people can be brought back without at least the soul stone though pre... | 104 |
[LOTR] Why not just send the Ring to Valinor? | It's not like Sauron can hop over the ocean and fight Manwe and all the other Valar to take back the Ring. Sending the Ring to the Undying Lands seems like a much simpler way to keep the Ring out if Sauron's hands than sending it to Mordor, where its liable to be intercepted and taken back by Sauron. | 31 | Because they knew that the West would never accept it. The Ring is more or less a Middle Earth problem, it's up the the peoples of Middle Earth to solve it on their own instead of relying on the Valar to do it for them.
The Valar did help though by sending the Istari to guide the peoples of Middle Earth. | 52 |
How do modern ship anchors work? If they get stuck on the sea bed how do we free them? | How do modern sea anchors work? Do they hook onto rocks? Sink into the sea bed? Just weight the ship down? What happens if they get stuck? | 16 | Anchors sit on the sea bed and resist being moved initially because of their weight causing friction that resists movement.
If there's enough pull to drag the anchor, the weight of the flukes causes them to dig into the ground, the more they do so the more strongly the anchor resists the pull.
Anchors resist horizont... | 58 |
Why aren't asynchronous processors a viable replacement for synchronous processors? | As a computer scientist, I've always been fascinated by the idea of a clock-less processor, but I have very little knowledge of electrical engineering, so I've never really understood why they're not considered a viable replacement for modern synchronous processors? Is there some inherent flaw in making a circuit witho... | 15 | Two big things:
1) More space is required due to completion signal detection circuits.
2) Synchronous designs are easier to test.
That's really about it. Most of the other reasons we don't make them is no one is trained to make them and none of the design programs are built around asynchronous designs. | 14 |
ELI5: Why do energy companies like Con Edison give you tips on how to use less energy? | I see ads on the NYC subway where Con Edison gives tips on how to reduce your energy use. Why are they trying to get you to use less energy? Doesn't that mean less money for them? | 1,497 | As a regulated utility, they make a profit based on negotiations with the state, not based on exactly how much electricity they sell. In fact they can get paid to reduce demand, as a substitute for getting paid to build more supply. | 1,123 |
Is it possible for a star to be cold? | If it is, is the limit absolute zero? And a follow-up, is there any limits on how HOT things can be? | 3,303 | Stars can be cold if they are brown dwarfs, objects much bigger than Jupiter but not big enough to ignite nuclear fusion at their core, or black dwarfs, collapsed medium-sized stars (white dwarfs) that have radiated away all their thermal energy. The universe isn't old enough to have black dwarfs though.
relephant edi... | 2,322 |
ELI5: What is the "sharp" in sharp cheddar? How are there various levels of "sharp"? | 21,660 | The term "sharp" tells you how long the cheese was aged. Mild is 3 months, sharp is 9 months and extra sharp is more than 18 months. As it ages, its texture also goes from smooth and creamy to crumbly by developing hard, salt-like crystals called calcium lactate. | 17,823 | |
[DC] I hear Darkseid remembers the previous iterations of the Multiverse. What are his memories of that time he died in Final Crisis? | Also, is there still a higher-dimensional Darkseid alive and well even though he was recently killed and reborn as a baby? | 84 | Supposed he would remember Final Crisis, and yes there is a higher concept Darkseid that is continuous through his incarnations, the Darkseid that interacts with the the universe is an avatar of that higher being. | 22 |
Why does tickeling make us laugh? | 19 | The areas of the body that tend to be ticklish are often vulnerable spots, like the neck, sides and stomach. When tickled, we tend to laugh, yet there is something almost unpleasant about it that compels us to protect that area of the body and stop the stimulus. This is believed to come from an impulse of mammalian chi... | 14 | |
Tell me why this is wrong? "You could create virtually free energy by launching a harpoon into a black hole, and hooking up a generator" | I had this thought today as I was looking at a [garden hose reel](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41Qts5Np7VL.jpg).
Now, I know this is a preposterous idea that most likely won't work, but I can't for the life of me figure out why.
So here's the specifics. Sometime in the future, when interstellar travel is... | 334 | > So here's the specifics. Sometime in the future, when interstellar travel is a thing: You launch a very large, very sturdy, very futuristic harpoon at the nearest black hole, and let it travel for a while. Make sure there is a LOT of extra rope or coil. Leave it unhooked to the generator. Because inertia, the harp... | 225 |
[ELI5] What happens to our brain the exact moment we fall asleep? | Like, how in one moment we are awake and in the other unconscious? What precisely happens that triggers it? | 74 | It’s not really such a sharp transition, you generally drift to sleep and the current theory is that the thalamus (basically a relay station between your senses and your brain) gradually stops transmitting information from your senses to your brain. | 60 |
ELI5: Why does practically every website still have trouble handling high traffic volumes even when they're expecting it? | It seems like everytime I go somewhere to buy tickets, watch an event stream, etc. the site hosting the sale/stream/etc. crashes. How is this still the case in 2016? Can they not prepare servers for increased volume ahead of time?
EDIT: Thank you everybody for your explanations, I guess the technology just isn't there... | 127 | Servers have a finite amount of processing power. The only way to increase your capacity is to get MORE servers or upgrade the hardware of existing servers. This is an expensive proposition and takes work to do. It doesn't make much sense unless you're expecting to have to handle this sort of volume a lot. | 69 |
In wholesale electricity markets, the most expensive generator sets the price. | This seems to be a big issue in Europe right now. Per the title of the post, which is a quote from the first link, it seems the consumer does not pay for a KWH something like the average it costs to produce it, but the maximum. The links I post are from the UK but apparently Greece has a similar wholesale market that h... | 74 | Former power trader here. Marginal pricing happens in many deregulated power markets. The concept is that a generator will offer its capacity into the pool on an “X Mw @ Y$/Mwh” basis. These offers are stacked, lowest price to highest price, per period (could be 5mins, 30mins, 1hr - it depends on the market). During th... | 70 |
[Star Trek] Why the Ferengi never had slavery? | > Quark: I think I figured out why Humans don't like Ferengi.
> Sisko: Not now, Quark.
> Quark: The way I see it, Humans used to be a lot like Ferengi: greedy, acquisitive, interested only in profit. We're a constant reminder of a part of your past you'd like to forget.
> Sisko: Quark, we... | 52 | The Ferengi have indentured servitude, and keep almost every feeeemale Ferengi in effective slavery. Quark is just arguing semantics in an effort to appear morally superior. He's like those weirdos who harp on word choice rather than subject matter.
E.g. "it's not pedophilia, it's ephebophilia." | 109 |
[WH 40k] Is there an internet? | 16 | Some planets maintain digital data-networks, primarily used by the Adeptus Arbites and the Machine Cult, but these are temperamental and usually ancient systems governed by capricious Machine Spirits.
Nothing like the Internet exists through the Imperium as a whole, nor is it possible. | 14 | |
ELI5: When can a species be mutated much enough to be considered an entirely new species? | Since evolution happens through mutation after every generation, when can a species mutates so much that it is considered an entirely new species? Would there be a point when the parents considered one species while their children are considered an entirely new species? | 62 | Species are considered different if they can't produce fertile offspring. It doesn't change in one generation. Different species are very vague expression though because there are many animals that are concerned as different species even they can produce fertile offspring just because they live separately and don't bre... | 20 |
Does Occam's Razor eliminate teleological explanations for phenomena? | Here's an example:
Why does a bacterium swim up a glucose gradient to a food source?
The reductionist way to answer this would be to examine the glucose receptors, and what protein messengers they trigger, which result in deformations in the outer membrane.
The teleological answer would say that the bacterium goes t... | 15 | One important thing to remember is that Occam's Razor is a guideline for theories that have equal explanatory power. It is open to a teleologist to insist that his or her account has more explanatory power, and that, for this reason, its greater complexity does not count against it.
Another thing is that the example y... | 17 |
Am I correct in thinking zero is the middle of all the numbers? | Or are there any weird high-end math type things that keep this from being true? | 23 | Well, it depends entirely on what you mean by "in the middle of the numbers".
One possible definition of "in the middle" is this: *A number x is in the middle of all numbers if and only if there is a one-to-one pairing between the numbers smaller than x and the numbers larger than x*.
Before we go on, let's try our d... | 48 |
Would You Step Into The Happiness Box? | This is an exert from - "The Big Questions" - by R. Solomon
Here's the question:
[We have developed a machine, a box with some electrodes and a life-support system, which we call the "happiness box". If you get in the box, you will experience a powerfully pleasant sensation which will continue indefinitely with jus... | 20 | One interesting question is a reverse example. You find out one day that your whole life has been generated by a happiness box. You now have the choice of shutting off the box and stepping out, or continuing to live your life. Which do you choose, and why? | 17 |
[LOTR/The Hobbit (movies)] Couple questions (spoilers) | Watching the new hobbit movies for the first time, and i'm confused on a couple things:
1) If the ring is what gave Gollum an unnaturally long life, shouldn't he have died after he lost it? When Bilbo gave it up in the first LOTR movie he later seemed really weak, and yet Gollum lives 60 years longer after losing th... | 24 | 1. Gollum would only have lost his long lifespan if the One Ring was destroyed; while the Ring existed it still sustained him. Peter Jackson messed up and had Bilbo age a lot after giving up the Ring.
2. Saruman had been a traitor to some degree for many decades before the events of The Hobbit, but he was only revealed... | 29 |
How do philosophers conceive of the difference between intended acts ("I want") and normative acts ("I should")? | I'm a psychology researcher working on a model of normativity - the biological and cognitive basis of the sense of "ought". One of our proposals (based on empirical evidence that I omit here) is that there is little distinction between the mechanisms underlying intended actions and actions that are believed normative. ... | 56 | Look into A.J. Ayer's Emotivism which is a non-cognitivist theory ("Killing is wrong!" = "Boo killing!" with the latter not being truth-apt).
For a refutation, look into the Frege-Geach-problem.
If you talk about statements that are truth-apt but subjective ("Killing is wrong!" = "I don't like killing."), then look i... | 16 |
ELI5: Why do the videos from the early 1900's look like they are being played at 2.5x speed? | 23 | The original hand cranked cameras like the pathé and the bell & Howell 2709 had what was called an 8:1 gear ratio, which meant for every 360 degree crank it would produce 8 frames.
There was a song that cameramen would sing as they handcranked, which would result in about two revolutions per second - 16 frames. I... | 21 | |
[MCU/Daredevil](Spoiler) Why did Kingpin... | organize an escape from justice complete with a shootout against federal agents? He was accused of some serious crimes, but being as wealthy as he is, he could be out on bail in 12 hours. The evidence against him could be spun as the testimony of a single, disgruntled man. His lawyers could have kept him out of the cou... | 24 | The Feds could have frozen his assets.
Most of the people working for him were arrested including his lawyers.
The judge probably wouldn't have to granted him bail.
There's also the documents from that lawyer lady.
Most importantly, his public image was permanently damaged the moment he was arrested. | 21 |
[Marvel] New Costume for a New Speedster! | Hello Reddit,
My hero name is Speeding Betty, and I've been established in Downriver Detroit for the better part of three months, and I think it's time to go legit! I've clocked up to 300 mph and could probably go faster, but what my dad calls my Speed Aura completely wrecks my clothes once I pass 270ish. My dad is ok... | 17 | Talk to Reed Richards.
He specializes in unstable molecules costumes that should be able to keep up with anything you can throw at them. If your super speed turns out to be the one thing that the unstable molecule suit can't handle, then that's actually good news, because now you've just given Richards a novel problem... | 21 |
Eli5: How come we don't use carbon capture at the exhaust towers of power plants to directly capture co2 before it enters the atmosphere and put it back into greenhouses or store as rock? | Climeworks is already doing this passively but why not on power plant exhaust towers? Surely it makes sense, there is enough heat and power available to run the carbon capture devices and its been proven that we can store co2 as rock underground [https://www.volkswagenag.com/en/news/2020/09/audi\_climeworks.html#](htt... | 31 | Because it can't be done just anywhere and requires power, meaning it would probanly decrease the efficiency of a traditional power plant. It also needs water and the right kind of rock (basalt) to filter it through.
This location was specifically chosen for this technology:
"Iceland is one of several places on Earth ... | 23 |
How common is our Moon's orbit which causes it to always show us the same face to Earth? | As stated in the title, is it common for other planetary moons to show the same face to the body they orbit? If not, are there any theories as to how our moon's orbit evolved as such. If so, what causes this to happen? | 2,111 | It's quite common, essentially all the large moons in the solar system are tidally locked to their planet. It's not a random occurrence, it happens because the gravitational gradient from the planet exerts a drag on the rotation of the moon that gradually slows it down until its rotation and its orbit are in synch. | 1,358 |
ELI5: The Double-Slit Photon Experiment | In the wise words of Bender, " Sweet photons. I don't know if you're waves or particles, but you go down smooth."
Please help me understand why the results of this experiment were so counter what was predicted, and why the results impact our view of physics? | 72 | Briefly, in the early 20th century, people like Rutherford, Planck and Einstein had competing theories as to whether light was fundamentally a particle or a wave. Thomas Young had performed the double slit experiment by showing that light that passed through two slits resulted in an interference pattern on the detector... | 36 |
[Predator] Predators/Yautja seem to be all about using their skill, cunning, and intelligence to hunt the most dangerous game in the galaxy, so why is their primary weapon a shoulder mounted plasma cannon equipped with auto-aim? | Sure, it showcases their technological prowess, but it takes away all of the 'sport' of the hunt, which seems to be the only reason they do what they do. | 95 | Shoulder-mounted and self-aiming because it frees up the hands for weapons useful against more worthy prey.. the spear, the claws.. not all meat is worthy of these.
Plasma is useful versus both Soft and Hard meat, and requires little in the way of ammunition and upkeep, unlike the pellet launchers the Soft Meat pref... | 61 |
[FilthyFrank] What's the source of Frank's connection to the Dark Lord ChinChin? | 21 | Dark lord chin chin is one of the main and most powerful beings, who rules that section of the omniverse and can survive the void. Frank, being a leader of his own clan, is the one who must appease to chin chin as it is necessary. Presumably there are other clans that require this as well. | 10 | |
Why does information from entanglement travel instantaneously, yet information from other forces (gravity, etc) travel at the speed of light? | 15 | It is only *causal* influences that are limites to the speed of light. You cannot use entangled particles to transmit useful information (without communicating via other means, first).
Imagine Alice and Bob are light years away and each have a set of entangled particles - say the spins of the particles are correlated.... | 15 | |
[DC Comics] Why is King Shark so weak compared to Wonder Woman when he's also a demigod apparently? | 522 | Well, let's take a look back at Ancient Greek Mythology, shall we?
Both Heracles and Bellerophon are demigods.
Heracles has extraordinary strength and courage beyond the capacity of mortal men.
Bellerophon can ride horses real good.
Sometimes, them's the breaks. | 806 | |
If using AD block is stealing content then so is going to the bathroom during a TV commercial break (CMV) | You transmitted the ad & a program on my computer made it so I didn't have to watch. You have no more right to tell me what programs should or should not be on my PC and what they should or should not do, in same way you have no right to tell me not to click onto a different window or even just close my eyes for th... | 712 | The main problem is that online ads report if they are blocked, which makes the site/video owner not make money off your view. In the case of TV ads the producers of whatever show you're watching make money whether you watch the ad or not. | 321 |
Is it possible to be genetically fat? | What I mean by this question is that one argument given by overweight people is that they've tried all the diets under the sun and they are still fat and thus blame genetics.
Other people give a similar argument that certain medical conditions make it impossible to eat a healthy diet.
But wouldn't the laws of thermod... | 29 | The answer is 'kind of'. Metabolism is determined by the genetic makeup. Still, weight gain and loss is, for every one of us, the sum of calories absorbed and calories spent.
Some ethnicities are on average more prone to gaining weight as a result of being adapted to diets low in fats and sugars. Many tribes from th... | 29 |
[Family Guy]How could Brian have written Harry Potter? | In the episode Back to the Pilot, Stewie and Brian go back in time to 1999, while back in time Brian tells his past self about Harry potter(perhaps he gave the books to him from the future)and the past Brian writes and claims credit for the Novels.The problem with this is that Harry Potter was first released in 1997, h... | 58 | [Meta] Seriously? That seems like a massive oversight for a major show to make, that's like 30 seconds of fact checking [Meta]
OK let's have a go. Well, this isn't exactly the first time that Brian and Stewie have messed with time. Time Travel is a fact in the family guy universe, as is the existence of God and other... | 52 |
CMV: The concept of „Cultural Appropriation“ has some overlap with ethnopluralism because both essentially propose that a culture „belongs“ to the ethnic group associated with it | This has been bothering me for some time! I’m well aware that ethnopluralism is a dogwhistle for modern-day racism, which is why it irritates me so much that one of it’s core aspects seems to also be the foundation of the left/progressive concept of cultural appropriation.
Now, I know that cultural appropriation takes... | 150 | I think it comes down to 1) consent for the culture to be shared and 2) respect for the culture doing the sharing.
Some cultural practices are considered "closed practices," where outsiders are not permitted to witness/participate. There are a number of reasons for this, but this "enclosure" usually serves to protect ... | 24 |
[Marvel] If it were somehow possible to give Bruce Banner an Adamantium skeleton, what would that mean for his Hulk transformation? | 41 | A few scenarios.
1- He can't get the skeleton because it triggers the Hulk.
2- His healing factor forces the skeleton out.
3- His healing factor creates adamantium beta ala wolverine, which transforms with him.
4- You have a very, *VERY* angry Hulk. | 52 | |
Trailing spouse problem -- how to help my husband to get a position | Dear all, I am a postdoc in mathematics, in a German university. My husband has a doctor's degree in engineering and is working in China. I would like to bring him to my university in Germany, but to find a research job directly without any local contact seems to be very difficult. Luckily, he found a professor in my d... | 42 | That's literally all that networking is.
Introduce yourself, tell them that your husband is looking for a position in his area, and ask if he knows of anybody in the department who is looking for a post-doc. | 43 |
Can some infinities be larger than others? | > “There are infinite numbers between 0 and 1. There's .1 and .12 and .112 and an infinite collection of others. Of course, there is a bigger infinite set of numbers between 0 and 2, or between 0 and a million. Some infinities are bigger than other infinities.”
-John Green, *A Fault in Our Stars* | 418 | Yes. For instance, the set of real numbers is larger than the set of integers.
However, that quote is still wrong. The set of numbers between 0 and 1 is the same size as the set of numbers between 0 and 2. We know this because the function y = 2x matches every number in one set to exactly one number in the other; that... | 328 |
[Star Wars] How many Super Star Destroyers did the Empire have? | 136 | Of Executor-class Star Dreadnoughts - the class most commonly known as "super star destroyers" - we know of sixteen specific vessels and potentially of more (it is not clear if others are distinct vessels, or ones listed here but simply not mentioned by name).
Overall, Executors tended to live short, bloody lives; the... | 117 | |
[World of Warcraft] New Demon Hunters are created when they eat demon flesh/blood. Illidan absorbed the skull of Gul'dan. Gul'dan was not a demon. How do these two methods both create demon hunters? | Either the new demon hunters aren't true demon hunters like Illidan or Illidan is something else. He's exponentially more powerful than other demon hunters but when he started out, he just absorbed an old orc's skull.
Granted Gul'dan was a powerful Warlock but he was not a demon himself, so his remains should be li... | 63 | I don't know of any of this for sure but...
The demon or skull is just a vessel, doesn't matter. They're consuming fel energy, fel corruption. Also, Gul'dan is about as much demon as any of the Eredar I'd say. They're all races from other worlds that have been inducted into the legion and corrupted by the fel. | 55 |
ELI5: Why aren't patients, especially children, given something to numb the surface skin before getting a shot? | 6,416 | Because it would slow down the process significantly, as well as adding cost and more time for the kid to think about how he/she is totally about to get a shot, instead of just getting it over with. Since the areas we get shots are typically not especially sensitive to the pain, it is a very minor inconvenience and muc... | 3,649 | |
Is the sun slowly losing mass? | AYpAdEKxxnrmLxZvHnvpv74b5F4g8Pd3DpLNBGgs48GclUo4NIEFpI0KIdkgssAYpAdEKxxnrmLxZvHnvpv74b5F4g8Pd3DpLNBGgs48GclUo4NIEFpI0KIdkgssAYpAdEKxxnrmLxZvHnvpv74b5F4g8Pd3DpLNBGgs48GclUo4NIEFpI0KIdkgssAYpAdEKxxnrmLxZvHnvpv74b5F4g8Pd3DpLNBGgs48GclUo4NIEFpI0KIdkgssAYpAdEKxxnrmLxZvHnvpv74b5F4g8Pd3DpLNBGgs48GclUo4NIEFpI0KIdkgssAYpAdEKxxn... | 227 | The Sun is a big ball of plasma, within it's core hydrogen is fused into helium. This process releases a small amount of energy, approximately 0.7% of the original mass of the hydrogen is converted to energy.
In the Sun 620 million tons of hydrogen is fused every second.
0.7% of 620 million tons is 4.34 million tons.... | 215 |
ELI5: If diabetic people can have dangerously low sugar from not eating, how can non-diabetic people go on fasts, or skip meals? | I understand when blood sugar gets to high, and in theory when it gets too low. However, I don't understand how my fitness crazed cousin can do intermittent fasting (only eats during a 4 hour window each day) and regular 3-5 day water fasts wouldn't have the same issue. | 41 | Diabetic people have trouble metabolizing sugar, and so must inject insulin to properly use glucose. But if they have insulin and not enough sugar, such as from not eating, their blood sugar can drop too low.
However someone without diabetes shouldn't have trouble with intermittent fasting because their body can adjus... | 11 |
[Magic School Bus] Is there a Mr. Frizzle? | 33 | Ms. Frizzle had a fiancé before she was a teacher. They were both scientists and were working together to create a new mode of transportation. Unfortunately, due to a tragic accident, her fiancé was transformed into a sentient bus. After many years spent trying to find a cure, they decided that it was beyond their abil... | 101 | |
What aspect of modern economy would stop working if all people knew about it? | 94 | Although it's empirically unclear how much of monetary policy's 'strength' is due to information frictions, it's certainly a non-zero portion. If everyone were able to precisely see through the 'money illusion', we would probably see monetary policy lose some of it's power.
In general though, it's hard to find an answ... | 85 | |
[Star Wars] The Rebel's successfully capture the first Death Star rather than destroy it. What happens next? | In the lead up to the Battle of Yavin, the Rebel leadership decide that the Death Star is simply too great of an asset to destroy so they decide to attempt to capture it instead of simply destroying it.
So using an attack on a Death Star's trench as a distraction (which leads to the near destruction and disabling of ... | 48 | They certainly don't use it for its intended purpose. The rebels are fighting against the mindset that thinks it's okay to destroy planets and commit genocide in the name of politics.
They might spend time seeing if the targeting system is sophisticated enough to hit starbases or ships as large as star destroyers. Th... | 59 |
ELI5: What makes blood a different "type"? | What's the difference between blood in people that means we have different "types" and why are some incompatible? | 23 | Our blood contains antibodies and antigens. Different people have different antibodies/antigens. Antibodies attack antigens of the same type. Blood type O has no antigens and both A and B types of antibodies. Blood type A has antigen A and antibody B. Blood type B has antigen B and antibody A. Blood type AB has both an... | 32 |
[Death Note] What if I name my child the symbol of a fractal, will it take forever for the name to be written on the death note? | 56 | You would still have to call the child by a verbal name, right? Or at least, there'd be a name that the child would respond to. *That* would be their name, their real name, and not some loophole that trusts the Death Note relies on legal documents. | 81 | |
ELI5: the physics behind non-Newtonian fluids | Hello all,
I know *what* a non-Newtonian fluid is and I know that either the shear rate or shear stress can affect the fluid's viscosity, but I'm not sure *why* they act as they do, on a molecular level.
My best guess would be the shape of the molecules themselves, but that's purely conjectural.
If anyone can tell m... | 41 | ELIF answer:
Think of sand. It's soft and flows when it's wet, but if you squish it down and wait for it to dry, it's hard and crumbly.
Non-newtonian fluids are like sand that absorbs and dries out REALLY fast. So if you apply pressure, it gets harder like you squished out the water. | 14 |
Do creatures with shorter lifespans evolve faster? | Maybe I'm wrong with this but my (very) basic understanding of evolution is that there are genetic mutations in a species that "win" over vast amounts of time and change things as a result. So, if you have certain creatures that only live a few years, then wouldn't any mutations happen faster if they were far more gene... | 61 | This is a little bit tricky depending on your definition of evolution. In the loosest sense, yeah, mutations will happen faster because of how quickly generations go by, but for a mutation to take over a population and 'win' like you put it, there would have to be a selection pressure.
Think of how you hear things li... | 81 |
how are we able to see at really high speeds? why does the "binocular vision" effect happen? | to add context to the question: i used to street race when i was a young and irresponsible lad. when approaching speeds at the 160+ MPH range, things in my peripheral (streetlamps, trees...etc) would get blurry, BUT the center of my vision would become super detailed, to the point where i could see cars miles away ahe... | 52 | Things in your peripheral actually _are_ blurry. Photoreceptor density is very high on the fovea (center of your vision) and very low outside, particularly if you're trying to see color.
Normally, we adapt to this by bouncing our eyes around alot -- a process called saccades. When you were driving, you most likely s... | 26 |
What body system does fat belong to? | If they can be part of different systems, are there other examples of tissues that are not strictly monogamous?
| 2,334 | Endocrine system generally, but it's also important connective tissue. Fat cells derive embryologically from mesoderm (there are three basic embryologic tissues). Also, you may be interested to know that there are two types of fat (let's call it adipose)-- white adipose and brown adipose. White adipose is typically wha... | 836 |
ELI5: Why do muslims consider it a sin to draw/illustrate Muhammed, when it does not clearly say anything about it in the Quran? | 23 | The Bible and the Koran are both very strict about idol worshipping -- it's actually one of the Jewish/Christian Ten Commandments and is repeated multiple times in the Koran.
Muslims therefore consider it a grave sin to worship Mohammed rather than Allah, and some fear that if anyone were to make images of Mohammed it... | 27 | |
[Stargate SG1] By the end of the series, are the Tauri the most powerful non-ascended beings in the galaxy? | Since they have the sum total of all Asgard knowladge, wouldnt that make them the top dogs? | 47 | (Factoring in the post series movies)
What do you mean "most powerful"? Do you mean most technologically advanced? Then you have to consider the Nox, the remnants of the Ori army, and maybe the Furlings.
In terms of destructive force per ship, then yes, we are probably the most powerful.
In terms of total militar... | 34 |
Discrimination against Transgender people in Science Academia? | Hello, I am transgender woman who haven't transitioned yet. I am currently in undergrad majoring in Chemistry who wants to become a researcher in science. I am worried that coming out and transitioning will hamper my future severely and ruin my future as being scientist. Would professors refuse or unwilling to work wit... | 17 | Researchers are just people, so no blanket statements apply. Some professors may be very supportive, others may be uncomfortable, and others may not care at all.
In general the North American academic environment is pretty woke and accommodating of all kinds of people, so you are unlikely to face overt discrimination... | 53 |
ELI5: How is a nuclear submarine lost at sea not a danger? | The USS Thresher was a nuclear submarine that was lost at sea and never recovered. Does the nuclear material aboard it not pose a problem? | 761 | Water absorbs nuclear radiation really well, thats why we use it in our reactors (well that and the whole steam thing.
The radiation wont penetrate more than like 20 meters even if there was a catastrophic containment failure, but normally its in a giant steel box. So no its fine. Not ideal, but not a danger. | 343 |
ELI5:How an Iron lung works? | 17 | An iron lung creates an air-tight seal around your body. It will change the pressure of the air inside from negative to positive, and back again. When a person's muscles will not allow them to breathe on their own, this pressure change will force your muscles to move in the way necessary to make you inhale and exhale. | 10 | |
[Star Wars] Palpatine killing Padme? (Spoilers for Episode 9) | I know this is a discussion that has already been done but I just wondered whether a new piece of potential evidence has been given to us after watching Episode 9. Towards the final scene, we see Palpatine transform back into his complete body after using both the life-forms of Kylo Ren and Rey, so surely this is proof... | 23 | While it's a long-standing theory that Palpatine drained Padme to support Anakin during the surgery, there is no evidence in either continuity or from George's own statements to actually support that he did it or was capable of doing that at that time. In fact, the only examples of him stealing life force from others i... | 23 |
[Marvel] Has Reed Richards ever attempted to create the supersoldier serum? | Given his intellect and multidisciplinary knowledge, it seems strange that SHIELD or some other group hasn't recruited him to re-create the super soldier serum used on Captain America.
Reed seems to do science for the sake of it so he probably would attempt to just to see if he can. Is there any reason they haven't at... | 164 | Problem here is SHIELD. Reed could make it, Reed won't make it.
Reed is peaceful exploration and science, not a weapon smith. Also there are several people who could make it at this point, shouldn't bother asking Reed. Waste of his time. Reed has probably dabbled and examined it, but maybe respects Captain America en... | 88 |
just got rejected again from a PhD program | Sorry I just need to rant.
>Dear (u/rigtm),
>Many thanks again for your application for the PhD we advertised. It was really nice to meet you at interview. We were all really impressed with your application, your research experience and productivity to date, and your thoughtful answers at interview.
>We in... | 488 | Your rant is very nice, but we have received many fine rants here today. While your rant is in the top two rants of the rants we are considering, your rant did not rise to the level of rant magic that we expected. Other rants were more whiny and pathetic than yours, so unfortunately, we must reject your rant. Good luck... | 677 |
Do any of you ever take a step back and marvel at the magic-like capabilities of modern computing? | Like I understand enough about the underlying physical properties of modern computers as well as operating system construction and computer architecture/organization to perceive computers as more than just magical black boxes. At the same time, the speed at which they operate and the complexity of the hardware at a tra... | 46 | Yep. The first time that you make a program that has to process a large amount of data to complete its task, it really opens your eyes to how fast modern computers are.
Prior to taking CS courses (and at the beginning levels) most of what a computer does seems almost magical. You may know it is fast but you don't ... | 19 |
[MCU] Did the efforts of Captain America hasten the demise of Nazi Germany or was it largely a “private war” against Hydra? | And subsequently, if so, why did the German leadership (particularly the SS) not take direct action not only against Cap but also against the openly breakaway Hydra organization, which by killing-off its SS overseers, at which time it declared itself as a usurper faction of the Third Reich, while operating within a tot... | 26 | Cap’s greatest value to the main war effort was as propaganda. The USO shows, the movies, and the genuine battlefield heroics all helped boost morale, especially on the home front.
Taking direct action against him would have been tricky. German attempts to infiltrate America were, for the most part, staggeringly inef... | 32 |
[WH40K] Which civilization is objectively the strongest/weakest? | I know for the purposes of the tabletop, they are all 'balanced', but from a lore perspective which race is the strongest in the galaxy and which is the weakest?
Also, I know civilization may not be the right word, but 'race' also doesn't seem to fit for groups which have more than one race. | 54 | Tyranids are the strongest. The vast forces we have seen so far are only their scouts. They have an entire galaxy's biomass behind them, and they're coming for us.
The Tau are the weakest. While their technology is excellent, they have slow travel with no access to the Warp. They have very small numbers, and only a r... | 85 |
CMV: The U.S. military and the defense industry is the largest and most useless (and dangerous) makework program in history. | More than just the "military industrial complex" that Gen. Eisenhower warned us of, the military post-Vietnam, post-draft era has really become a way for the rich and those in Congress (increasingly the same people) to artificially lower the unemployment rate; redistribute tax dollars to both shareholders of defense co... | 30 | >we spend outrageously and for what? Safety? Global order? Respect?
The ability for the US to globally project power at any place and any time is the single thing keeping order what it is now. When there's a power reduction, something else will come to fill its place.
What do you think would happen if the US mili... | 21 |
So we call it magma while underground and lava after it erupted. But why make the distinction in the first place? Is there anything materially different between magma and lava or is it just tradition to use the two different names for the same thing? | 17 | The rocks that they form are different. Magma cools slowly to form plutonic/intrusive rocks; lava cools rapidly to form volcanic/extrusive rocks. The rate of cooling is an important factor that determines the mineralogy of igneous rocks. Furthermore, magma composition could evolve as fractional crystallization occurs(m... | 13 | |
ELi5 : How were they able to broadcast the moon landing live? | 31 | Radio waves. Same way they communicated with the crew and broadcast the commentary over the air waves. Most if not all of tv at the time was literally broadcast like radio is now and you had an antenna to pick it up for your tv. | 36 | |
Do bugs sleep? Plain and simple. | Do bugs sleep? (insects, spiders, moths,flies, the colloquial application of the word bugs is implied) | 34 | Yes. The only living organisms that *don't* sleep (in some form) are the ones who don't live long enough to incorporate the day/night cycle into their lifespans, ~~i.e. Mayflies~~. Plants sleep. Slime molds sleep. Single-celled organisms sleep. The common misconception that "sharks don't sleep" comes from the observati... | 38 |
ELI5: The taboo of unionization in America | edit: wow this blew up. Trying my best to sift through responses, will mark explained once I get a chance to read everything.
edit 2: Still reading but I think /u/InfamousBrad has a really great historical perspective. /u/Concise_Pirate also has some good points. Everyone really offered a multi-faceted discussion!
E... | 4,512 | * unions benefit the group, at the expense of individual achievement...many Americans believe they can do better on their own
* unions in the US have a history of corruption...both in terms of criminal activity, and in pushing the political agendas of union leaders instead of advocating for workers
* American unions al... | 4,270 |
ELI5: Why must stocks be traded through clearing houses? Why can’t they be traded directly between entities? | 28 | Most people who trade stock do not actually get the stock. Actually moving stock from one entity to another does take quite some paperwork and waiting for the right records to be updated. So most stocks will be in the possession of the stock exchange or the banks. This means that stock trades can happen much quicker, e... | 26 | |
ELI5: Why is it supposedly rude to point? | Is there some sort of cultural "back story" to this? | 63 | Pointing makes people uncomfortable or even feel threatened. If a stranger points at you on the street (assuming you're not a celebrity), it never means something good. They could be signaling an attack, mocking you, etc. Whatever the reason, it's bad.
Thus, it's rude to point. | 55 |
ELI5:How is it that animals trapped in caves for hundreds of years have enough genetic diversity to survive? | 31 | Genetic diversity isn't really as important as you might think. Consider: nearly all golden hamsters in captivity are descended from one litter captured in the early 20th century. Humans care about inbreeding because having one of your kids die from some genetic disease is unacceptable to us. But for many species, h... | 37 | |
ELI5: How come the kickoff is considered very dangerous in gridiron football but less so in rugby? | Having some familiarity with both gridiron football and rugby's rules (but not a regular watcher of either), I've heard that gridiron football kickoffs are one of if not the most dangerous plays in the sport. In fact, they're so dangerous that there have been calls to abolish them. What makes them more dangerous compar... | 15 | Gridiron/American football kickoffs are the most dangerous plays of the game because the most of the kicking team is running straight into full-speed blocks and tackles with the receiving team. Most other blocks in football happen at low speed at or near the line of scrimmage, reducing the chance of injury. Tackles in ... | 28 |
ELI5: Why do bees, bumblebees and wasps all have the same yellow black color pattern? | 42 | Many of them (though not all of them) can sting. The first ones that could sting evolved a distinct pattern to warn predators that they could sting - better to not even be in the situation where you might get hurt, right? But then some of the non-stinging insects evolved the same pattern because predators who avoid bla... | 66 | |
ELI5: Where did the H go in "Herbs" in America? | As cliched as it is to laugh about Americans saying "fanny" instead of "arse" and all that, I genuinely don't understand why Americans drop the "H" in "Herb". It's not a thing in general, to drop H's is it? So why that? | 17 | It was originally a French word, who pronounced it without the H. When it was adopted into English by the English, we pronounced it as though it were an English word, but American culture instead kept the French pronunciation. In a nutshell. | 35 |
[Harry Potter] Wait, was Snape the ONLY spy within the Death Eaters? | Seems odd that Dumbledore would only have Snape as a spy within the Death Eaters.
What if something unfortunate had happened to his only spy? Wouldn't it be smarter to have at least a few double agents, each at differing ranks, to have infiltrated the Death Eaters? | 43 | You don't just walk up to Voldemort and say you wanna be a Death Eater. They are only very few in the Order that could even try. Quite a lot of them aren't pureblood or are blood traitors like the Weasleys so they would probably be killed/tortured on sight.
And for those that would qualify it just is an insane risk. I... | 71 |
ELI5: How are stem cells extracted from blood? What happens to the new stem cell-less blood when reintroduced to the body? [context in description] | My father recently underwent a blood transfusion, and my brother was selected to be the blood donor. So they hooked a tube to a vain in his leg and the machine the tube is attached to drew in his blood. This blood went into the machine and it literally separated and collected the stem cells from the blood. The separate... | 72 | The process is called peripheral stem cell transplantation.
Normally, the hematopoietic (a.k.a. blood-making) stem cells are located in the bone marrow, with very few in the blood. Your brother most likely took drugs before donating that cause the stem cells to rapidly make copies of themselves, more so than normal, a... | 18 |
[General Superheroes] Why are superheroes often reluctant to seek medical attention when they get hurt in battle? | 53 | They've generally received their injuries while fighting villains, and likely while technically committing a crime, and if they go into the hospital those injuries are now recorded and connected to their civilian identity.
But more than that - Superheroes are generally biologically different from a standard human, and... | 100 | |
ELI5: How do beekeepers know when to stop taking honey from bees so they have enough food for the winter? | Also: In naturally occurring hives or in the case where a beekeeper just stopped taking the honey. What would the bees do once they deemed they had enough food? Do they just stop leaving the hive or does that excess of food cause the hive to expand or break off in to another hive? | 2,255 | We generally use deeper boxes for the bottom two levels - one is for bees to raise young and store pollen, the other is for honey … which we leave for them for over wintering. We set shallow boxes on top during honey flow ; from these the surplus honey is collected. | 1,284 |
ELI5: How come other websites prevent you from watching videos when AdBlock is installed, but YouTube/Google does nothing? | 382 | They calculate that it's better to let you watch the video and potentially share it with other people who do watch the ads, rather than stop you watching at all.
Other sites believe that their content is so compelling that you'll still watch if they force you to turn off ad blocking, or they just care less because the... | 352 | |
Eli5: How do anti-seizure meds work? | Am epileptic so curious as to what they do to my brain. | 139 | Depends which one you are referring to! As a very general statement- they can inhibit the markers that cause your nerves to communicate across the nervous system. Therefore less transmission between nerves. Less seizures :)
This is why drowsiness is a common side effect with these meds- as it is slowing down the fir... | 80 |
[Star Wars] Did nobody ever think to move for a vote of no confidence with Palpatine? | He was Supreme Chancellor for a good 20 years, give or take. And if Star Wars politics is anything like real world politics, there must have been someone at some point who thought he was doing a shitty job at running the Republic. | 21 | > there must have been someone at some point who thought he was doing a shitty job at running the Republic.
A motion of no confidence is proposed in times of great need and when there is a large portion of the ruling body strongly against the person in charge, like when Valorum was unable to stop the armed invasio... | 33 |
Why are there different tresholds to reach herd immunity for different diseases? | I thought it was a quantitative concept, applicable for all kind of diseases, as numbers do not differentiate between them.
Why is it for Covid considered to be \~70% but for measles \~90%?
Thank you. | 19 | Roughly speaking the threshold to reach herd immunity is 1 - 1/R0.
Hence 80% for R0=5 or 90% for R0=10.
This is because R0 is the average number of infections from one case. If p is the proportion of people who are not vaccinated, then the number of infections from one case becomes p x R0 which needs to be less than ... | 24 |
CMV: Avengers: Endgame was a worse film than Infinity War (Spoilers Inside) | #WARNING: SPOILERS
I thought Endgame was worse than Infinity War for multiple reasons. Firstly, Thanos, a deep and well-reasoned villain, was reduced to shallow evil by bringing back his 2014 self who was far more bloodthirsty.
Secondly, the pacing of the film was worse and many moments could have been cut to preser... | 76 | > Thanos, a deep and well-reasoned villain, was reduced to shallow evil by bringing back his 2014 self who was far more bloodthirsty
Thanos was never really well reasoned. He put on a good show, but everything was always about his ego. He thought he had the solution to his planet's problem and they didn't use it, ... | 63 |
CMV: Universal basic income wouldn't work without a universal rent control | I support a universal basic income, but I'm curious whether it would benefit as many people as people think. If there was a UBI (Universal basic Income) giving people 1000 dollars a month, what would stop landlords from charging 1000 extra dollars on top of the current rent that they're charging? I get it can work on ... | 23 | Competition would stop it. Just because people have the extra $1000 doesn't mean that they will just throw it away. So if a landlord tries to raise the rent by $1000 their tennants will move to the place that only raised rents by $950. Rinse and repeat until the new equilibrium is found.
That isn't to say some inflat... | 23 |
ELI5: What does it mean if Russia leaves the 1987 nuclear treaty? | 119 | It means they'll start testing new missiles and nuclear systems. The other parties to the treaty (most importantly the US) will probably start too.
If it happens, you'll probably start seeing an increase in military development projects from both sides, along with more sabre rattling. However, it won't go any further... | 56 | |
ELI5: When and how did green generally get associated with positiveness, and red as negativeness? | 23 | It's hardwired. Red is the color of blood and bleeding, green is healthy vegetation. On a biological level, we don't want to deal with injury and we do want a healthy fertile landscape where food and shelter can be found. So we instinctively like green and dislike red. | 35 | |
If someone is walking down the road, is the air around them moving to avoid the person, or are they more like a knife cutting through the air? | 32 | Both. By walking through air youre pushing the air infront of you into other air. This creates a bubble of high pressure air infront of you. As you leave your stationary position, you leave a vacuum where you once were and it is quickly full of air. So some air you push and some air you pull. | 12 | |
ELI5: How does bluetooth actually work? | 176 | Bluetooth works very much like your WiFi, by sending data wirelessly over a 2.4Ghz frequency, but there are 3 key differences:
* Bluetooth is designed to have low power consumption, and that's mainly the reason why its effective range and transfer speeds are both lower than with WiFi
* WiFi will today also operate on... | 152 | |
ELI5: If FM is frequency modulation, then why does each radio station have a specific frequency? | I get that AM carries info by creating a sound wave with the contours of a (given frequency) wave's amplitude. But if you modulate 93.7MHz, then it's no longer 93.7. What am I not getting? | 16 | each fm station has a primary carrier frequency. these carrier frequencies are separated from each other by 200 KHz. out of that only 150KHz is used for modulating the analog signal wave. this leaves a guard band of 50KHz to help prevent crosstalk.
so basically you have the station carrier wave, and then you add or su... | 29 |
ELI5: Why are pork and beef not called pig meat, or cow meat? | In German we're just saying it is "Schweinefleisch" etc, witch basically means pig meat. So why does the English language does have their own names for these kind of meats.
Edit: thanks for all the answers. | 21 | The names for the meats come from French, while the names for the animals come from Anglo Saxon. The usual explanation is that after the Norman invasion, the Saxon peasants raised the animals and so their names for the animals stuck in English. The Norman nobles ate the meat, and so their names for the animals became t... | 44 |
[Marvel] Why does Ant-man retain absolute strength when shrinking but not when growing? | When Ant-man shrinks down, he essentially has super strength because his strength doesn't decrease proportionally to his size. But when growing, his strength increases proportionally to his size. (ie, he can lift 100 pounds when human or ant sized, but much more when giant sized.) | 92 | I think, and this might not be canon anymore, that when Hank Pym shrinks, he isn't just losing mass, but also compressing the space between atoms, making himself much more dense. That extra density is what gives him his super strength in ant form.
When he grows, he's actually adding additional mass from an alternate d... | 95 |
CMV: Reparations should not be payed to African Americans | I'm more or less on the fence with this issue, BUT I see many points raised by anti-reparations proponents to be seemingly valid. First, I am not using the common argument against reparation of "I didn't do anything, why should I pay?". But I am having trouble disagreeing with the view of "Neither I nor my ancestors ... | 59 | I disagree with reparations but for a different reason: it is not ethical or practical for a government entity to decide between the deserving or non-deserving. The idea of people having to prove how black they are to receive reparations is to me extremely dystopic. | 17 |
[DS9/Voyager] How might events have turned out differently if the Defiant had accompanied Voyager into the Badlands and become stuck in the Delta Quadrant with them as well? | 41 | Well, if the Defiant goes then thee are now three vessels to protect the caretaker including the Defiant, which would rip through the Kazon and drive them off.
Janeway may still be leery about leaving the array, in case the Kazon are able to come back and stop the self destruct, but if the Marquis ship is still destr... | 24 | |
[Star Wars] When Vader says that the power to destroy a planet is insignificant to the force, he gets teleported to a planet with the Death Star powering up. Can he stop it? | Let's say after Vader lectures the room about how insignificant the Death Star is, Vader is magically sent to a planet and as he looks above him in confusion, he sees the Death Star slowly taking aim. Within minutes Vader knows him and the planet are going to go boom.
Time to back up his words, what does he do? What ... | 37 | The point was that, to the Force - a galaxy-spanning thing of immense power - the ability to blow up a planet is small potatoes. Whether or not Vader can personally do something isn't really pertinent to the argument. | 103 |
CMV: The word "Problematic" needs to be eliminated from academic and political discourse. | I'm really curious to see how people come to the defense of this way overused word. There are a number of perfectly good synonyms yet people still choose to repeat the word problematic over and over again within any conversation to the point where it diminishes the argument being made.
I know Urban Dictionary isn't re... | 123 | > Ideally, the sentence should go, "I believe ___ issue is a problem because..." instead of "This is problematic".
The problem (heh) here is that you aren't showing that "problematic" is a bad phrase, you're showing that a lack of explanation can be unsatisfying. If you mirrored your example, saying "I believe ___... | 104 |
[Dc Comics] Where does superman's motion stem from? Not how he can fly, but specifically what initiates the movement when he does? | So for instance the muscles in my back start the motion when want lift my arm up over my head. If he stopped suddenly, where would he feel a jerking motion? | 59 | Two prevailing theories.
Firstly, he has a variant of TK- Tactile Telekinesis. Primarily exhibited in his clone, Superboy, it means he has telekentic abilities over himself and anything he touches. Superman's variant would likely have less conscious control over than his clone's, and he likely wouldn't be able to cont... | 30 |
CMV: In the grand scheme of things, nothing humanity ever does matters. | I came across this website that pretty much tried to scale the entire solar system by equaling the size of the moon to a pixel. This was pretty astonishing to just even think about, considering they didn't even include other systems, and it was still huge. I am sure you may have come across something similar, perhaps t... | 23 | When you talk about things "mattering", you have to consider \*who\* it matters to. True, nothing we do makes any significant impact on a universal (or even galactic) scale. But who/what is judging impact at that scale?
What we do "matters" to us, and since we are the most intellectually advanced \*known\* species i... | 19 |
[Avatar TLA] Where did Guru Pathik come from? | He is apparently a non-bender with great spiritual insight. Which of the bending cultures is he from? He doesn't resemble any other characters in the show. | 32 | You don't gotta be a bender to be spiritual. This is going a bit meta, but the chakras thing was developed in a world without bending, so in a world where you actually interact with spirits and spirituality it's entirely possible there's entire groups of people who have developed this view of the world.
If he came fro... | 29 |
Why are we so tired? | Almost everyone consumes some sort of stimulant (caffeine, coca, etc.) to be less tired but, why? Why are humans so tired? Do we sleep less than we should? Are our lives too active? Were the cavemen equally tired? Is it normal for an animal to be tired? | 142 | There is FAR too much layman speculation in this thread.
Please, if you're proposing some ***idea*** about what a better sleep system is, or why we don't get enough sleep, we ***need*** to see some data to support that theory. | 202 |
[General Superpowers] Can speedsters sleep faster as well? | For example, can Flash or Quicksilver get 8 hours worth of rest in a few minutes? | 15 | I think the question should actually be "Can speedsters break their sleep into smaller increments?" If Speedsters can fit the equivalent of 8 hours sleep into 5 minutes that would imply that they need to sleep more often as well since their perception of time is faster and they experience a longer subjective period of ... | 11 |
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