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What was the earliest known relationship between early humans and wolves/dogs, and what did they both stand to gain from the relationship? | 36 | I’m not gonna do the fact-finding for you, but it was at least 10,000 years ago.
The branching of wolves and dogs started with some wolves that weren’t as scared of humans as the other ones were.
The brave ones lived closer to humans. They ate human garbage (bones and food scraps). They began to associate humans wit... | 13 | |
ELI5: I read about a "Zip Bomb" today that is a zipped file that is only 42kb when compressed, but unzipped is 45.5 Petabytes. My question is how can so much information be compressed into such a small file size? | 173 | Imagine a file that's literally just 45.5 PB worth of 1s. Like in binary just 1111111111... etc
It's really easy to compress that, yeah? You just say "45.5 PB worth of 1s" and you've got the exact same data in a compressed form.
You want your zip bomb to look legitimate, though, so you alternate more than that so tha... | 139 | |
[Harry Potter] Why Grindelwald told Voldemort where the Elder Wand is? | It happened in the movie | 29 | He knows Voldemort will figure it out eventually. Everyone knows that Dumbledore defeated Grindelwald, so obviously he would be the one who ended up with his wand.
The only reason Voldemort didn't figure it out already is because he's dismissed the possibility. Dumbledore having the wand all along doesn't make sense ... | 19 |
[Star Wars] What is one thing that should exist in the Star Wars universe, but doesn't? | 70 | Maybe kinetic bombardment?
Taking from the scene in The Force Awakens where Chewie, Finn and Hann use Hyperspace until the last possible moment to get on Starkiller Base...
I don't see why it isn't possible for one faction to loosely outfit an Asteroid with basic ship consoles and a hyperdrive, give it coordinates a... | 63 | |
[Sonic the Hedgehog 1-3] What happens to the Rings between stages? | Do they only exist for a finite amount of time? Do the animals he rescues take them? Do they get absorbed by Sonic? Where do they all go? | 24 | Specifically speaking to the games and not the movies - we know rings are used as a form of currency. The best guess is that after freeing a bucket of animals, who have been trapped for who knows how long, Sonic being the good guy as he is gives the animals his left over rings so they can get back on their feet. | 31 |
ELI5: Why is the budget for a cartoonish CGI movie (toy story 3) higher than a realistic CGI movie (Pacific Rim)? | I just gave those as example but overall the costs are pretty equal and Pacific Rim looks very realistic and it was 190 million and toy story 3 was 200 million. I also looked up other realistic ones like Transformers Age of extiction (210million) and avatar (234 million). The last two are more expensive but still in th... | 22 | Think about it like this - in a movie like Pacific Rim if you need a car in a landscape shot you pick a place to shoot, gather your actors and crew, rent a car, and shoot it.
In an animated movie you have to build the land, the road, the sky, the clouds, your characters, literally everything - then hire your actors t... | 11 |
[Star Wars] Where did the name "Millenium Falcon" come from? Are there Earth like animals on this galaxy far far away? | 281 | In works that are still canon, we've seen;
* Ducks on Naboo.
* * Statues of Horses on Naboo (ty, yurkland)
* Rats in Jabbas Dungeon on Tatooine.
* Multiple species of snakes all over the swamps of Dagobah.
We've heard reference to other animals in canon works, like when 3P0 yells out, 'Die, Jedi Dogs' during the b... | 357 | |
CMV: Residential Real Estate Holding groups need to be banned. | I understand that housing supply and city planning can be quite a complicated mess and at the end of the day is a necessary evil. However the amount of properties being purchased and rented at exorbitant rates is ridiculous. This is only works because of the artificial scarcity in most areas.
For example about 5 out ... | 1,186 | I don't think you're wrong, but I'd say the core issue is the shortage of housing being exploited by these REITs, rather than the REITs themselves.
We should make it easy to build dense housing: no more single family detached only zoning. All residential housing can be dense residential. Also get rid of things like ar... | 220 |
ELI5: The Khmer Rouge. | I don't really understand what happened, can anyone break it down for me? | 42 | I fielded an answer to a "Why was the Khmer Rouge so bad/What was the Cambodian genocide?" question a few weeks ago. It follows:
> Wow, where to begin. The Khmer Rouge was a communist revolutionary government in Cambodia in the mid/late 70's. It was founded by a group of largely western-educated Cambodians who enti... | 24 |
[Black Adam] Why doesn't Superman or Justice Society save Khandaq before Black Adam awakens? | 18 | Because to the rest of the world, Intergang was the legitimate authority of Khandaq. You know how people say history is written by the victors? Well, Intergang was winning, by a lot. They have the Eternium to fight off outsiders, and the money to bribe the ones they can't fight. The JSA doesn't maintain their legitimac... | 36 | |
Iridium and similarly hard metals are difficult to machine due to extreme work hardening. Is "grinding" based machining also affected? | I understand how drilling and traditional milling would be made essentially impossible due to rapid work hardening, but couldn't a "grinding" approach be used to get around this?
Is there something I am not understanding about work hardening? Does work hardening affect materials at such a "small-scale" as sanding aw... | 3,779 | Iridium can be machined, it's just a lot harder to do than other materials and there are much eaisier ways to form it. If you want to cut it with an endmill you are going to want a properly coated tool that has a hard coating capable of handling high temperatures - depending on your setup you might be able to do it wit... | 869 |
[Marvel] If Daredevil never went blind, how much of an impact would it have on the rest of the Marvel universe(s)? | 52 | If he had super senses, and was never blind? He may become something like Wolverine or Batman, but without being trained by Stick, so he'd just be learning on the go how to use his powers, and he wouldn't be the profecient martial artist he is. He'd probably die his first night out, or just go a different route to crim... | 28 | |
ELI5: how did scientists discover different hormones in our body given that hormones are just tiny particles and how did they study it to know their purpose? | 218 | Hormones are secreted from different parts of the body, if those parts are damaged or removed the hormones they produce are no longer made. One of the earliest observations of this was in the 1840’s when scientists noticed animals lacking testes had different sex characteristics than other males, and ultimately discove... | 277 | |
CMV: the search for objectivity has been marginalized, and that's a dangerous fact. | First, let me argue that the search for objectivity has indeed been squandered.
After World War 2, the advertising industry began to discover and explore the fruits of psychological research. Its goal: presenting reality in a skewed way, designed to entice people to buy products. It was the first serious dent in the a... | 27 | We didn't "lose" objectivity - it was never there. For proof that idea, look at 19th century snake oil salesmen. Put whatever nonsense you want into a bottle, tell a crowd of people that it will cure all their ailments and collect their cash.
P.T. Barnum's often cited quote is particularly relevant: "There's a sucker... | 12 |
What would be the economic viability of an independent Quebec? | Hello,
I was genuinely curious how economically viable an independent Quebec would be.
There are some who say that independence would be an economic disaster (naturally those who are against it) and those that say it would be business as usual (those are who for it).
Has the evidence shown anything for either side? | 64 | I think brexit is a decent analogy for business as usual case on a smaller scale. Quebec (assuming it didn’t shrink substantially) would be similar in size (gdp wise) to Israel, Denmark, Ireland and South Africa so comparing it to Canada as a whole would probably be unwise. Those 4 are developed (not using OACD measure... | 23 |
cmv: Pro-life is a violation of human rights and the decision by courts/government on the baby's life is a overstepping of authority unless the baby can be considered as public property. | Hello, I know this post is going to be bombarded with religious people but the decision of abortion/ no Abortion solely lies with the mother as she is the one carrying it and is in her natural right to the decision regarding her baby. This can be compared to as the right to oxygen, food and water as these are the natur... | 20 | Humans cannot be owned as property by anyone, including their mothers...in the US there’s ample precedence for that. That being said, there’s also precedence for a government body stripping parental rights in instances where say, a parent is abusive. There are plenty of good pro-choice arguments out there, but the “mom... | 34 |
What reason do I put to recommend a reviewer for a journal paper? | I'm going to submit my first journal paper this week, and have got to recommend some reviewers. However, what reason do I put for recommending them? I can't leave it blank, so what are they looking for? I want to put something like "expert in the field" or "knowledgable on topic area", but this seems so vague it's almo... | 28 | >I want to put something like "expert in the field" or "knowledgable on topic area", but this seems so vague it's almost pointless.
That's more-or-less what they're looking for, so it's not really pointless. | 42 |
What limitations are currently stopping us from collecting and using lightning bolts? | Is it the inability to quickly route and store the varied amount of voltage and or amperage? | 36 | Engineering difficulties aside, from a practical standpoint, a lightning bolt has energy in the range of a few megajoules to possibly a gigajoule. Even if this could be collected and used, it's about the same amount of energy that a large power plant delivers in one second, so even if it were possible, harvesting light... | 33 |
[Warhammer 40k] What do the Custodes think of the Imperial Cult and Emperor worship in general? | With the Emperors explicit order to not be worshipped why did the Custodes even allow the fomation of the Imperial Cult and the Ecclesiarchy? And with some many things in the Imperium revolving around the worship of the Emperor from the billions of pilgrims to Terra and to the Age of Apostasy, wouldn't the Custodes sta... | 29 | The Custodes don't involve themselves with anything outside of the Imperial palace. After the Emperor was struck down the Custodes went into a period of mourning that still lasts to this day; never leaving the palace at all. They personally may not worship the Emperor but their only concern is the protection of the Emp... | 33 |
What is the current accepted risk of Covid-19 infection through fomite transmission? | I apologize in advance because I know this has been asked before, but I would just like some clarification if someone is willing to give it. I have read the \[CDC update that came out earlier this year which detailed how the virus is spread primarily through respiratory droplets and not surface transmission, which said... | 155 | Fomite transmission does not appear to be a significant factor in the transmission of SARS-CoV-2. Some of the early data showed prolonged detectability on some surfaces , but this does not necessarily translate to infectability. This is a very labile virus, with a lipid coat that doesn’t do well outside of its host. ... | 185 |
ELI5: What makes days feel like they're moving faster than others? | Like, I've noticed some days just feel faster than others whether or not i'm actually doing anything. Why is that? | 90 | This can depend on how many things we're focusing on or dealing with but is also highly subjective
Fundamentally the more new things (or different kinds of things) we're focusing on means our brains pay less attention to the passage of time
If we're focused on a single thing then our brain pays more attention to the ... | 18 |
[Discworld]About the Luggage. | I know it's made from sentient/sapient pearwood, but why does it have teeth and a tongue? Also, where do it's legs come from? And why does it have a gender? One would imagine it was just a lump of wood magically brought to some odd kind of a life... It has made children with a female Luggage, so it clearly has a gender... | 23 | *Cracks her knuckles*
Right, I've been reading these books obsessively for the last 10 years. Here's where it pays off.
*Ahem*.
The Luggage is the magical result of a large wooden chest made out of sapient pearwood. This is the most intelligent, malevolent tree on the Disc, and will only grow in areas of dangerousl... | 39 |
Eli5: why new recruits going into the US military are required to have their wisdom teeth removed? | I can't find a good answer online.. You guys have any insight? | 19 | The won't force you to get them out prior to basic, unless they're in such terrible shape they need to out due to medical necessity. I'd recommend doing it prior to going in if they're likely to need to come out anyway. Far better than to recover at home in familiar surroundings than to be recovering on an unfamiliar b... | 20 |
ELI5: Why do they add the letter T, then plus of minus, before saying how many seconds until a rocket launches | 37 | As others have said, T is the time of launch. What nobody mentioned yet is why times are given as T minus X.
The launch takes months to plan. They don't know what day it will be, let alone what time. But they do know that they must (for example) test the engines at T minus 10 and run certain checks after launch at T p... | 73 | |
[Arrival] How did humanity used the alien language to advance the human civilization after the events of arrival? | Costello said they would need humanity's help after 3000 years, so if humanity is going to help them, humanity must have been technologically very advanced civilization after 3000 years (even better than that of aliens).Now the technology the aliens already had was incomprehensible to humans. So why none of the visions... | 26 | Why should the aliens need humanity's technology to help them? Maybe it's our philosophical viewpoints. Maybe we breed faster than them, and they need soldiers. Maybe in 3,000 years we develop an inoculation against the baby shark meme that has infested their society from their first contact. | 30 |
ELI5: What is the difference between BMP, JPG, PNG, and TGA photo formats. | I was looking through my FRAPS settings and I was curious as to the difference between the formats and which one would be the best to use. | 99 | Note: this is a simplified explanation. This is because this thread is in ELI5.
BMP stores your image as data in a grid. It essentially stores information as X1, Y1: blue. X2, Y1: blue. X3, Y1, red. It (normally) has no compression at all and takes up a huge amount of space on disk.
TGA works similarly to BMP, but al... | 68 |
CMV: The movie Primer was unnecessarily confusing and should be remade | I really enjoyed the movie "Primer", although like most people I didn't understand what just happened the first time I watched it. The things that were great
* The plot.
* The acting\- so natural and not overdramatic
* The time machine, and its effects, which were really cool and well thought out
So, now that I've go... | 26 | I would say it is editted in a confusing matter deliberately to illustrate how confusing daily time travel will eventually get. It's an obvious choice by the creator because you can mention the difference in pacing yourself in your initial statement. The whole point of the movie is time travel in practice is never goin... | 16 |
ELI5: How does mopping work? | Okay, you have a bucket of water and by immersing the mop in the water then rubbing it on the ground, then putting it in the bucket and repeating somehow the dirt is transferred from the floor into the bucket, even as the water gets dirtier and dirtier.
How does this actually work? Is it some form of arcane magic? o\... | 257 | Water is actually really "sticky". The dirt sticks to the water more than it sticks to the floor. Even if the water keeps getting dirtier, the dirt can't "unstick" from the water to go back to the floor.
Adding soap makes the water even "stickier" to help pick up even more. | 389 |
ELI5: We can’t drink spoiled milk but we can consume butter milk, yogurt, sour cream, cream cheese etc? | Why can we not drink raw milk or expired milk but we can consume various forms of milk mixed with bacteria/cultures? | 320 | The primary difference is the bacteria present when the milk is spoiling. Some are toxic and cause the milk to go bad. Some are not toxic and produce the yogurts and cheeses you know and love. When they make cheese for example everything is carefully sterilized first so the only bacteria present are the cheese cultures... | 309 |
CMV: Eileen Gu is a competitive sports traitor in terms of nationalism. | Important edit up front:
There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding about the point I am making. To make thise completely simple.
Within a "nationalistic perspective and framework", if she is competing for China to benefit China and "grow the sport there" while growing up in, training, and planning to live in the US... | 16 | In order to be a "traitor," you have to assume she owes some measure of loyalty to the US. In particular, she needs to have some special duty to "grow the sport" in the US that she is breaching by doing it in China instead.
Can you explain what that duty is and where it comes from? | 34 |
[40K/DC] Superman lands on Holy Terra | So, instead of landing in smallville, Kansas. SSuperman's craft lands on Holy Terra in the Dark age of technology, how does this affect events leading up to the 41st millennium? | 23 | In all likelihood, he'd have been taken in by the Emperor and used as part of the geneseed for the Primarchs assuming he found out about him. Otherwise, you just have normal Superman in Grimdarksville. | 29 |
ELI5: What is the true difference between Crackers/hackers and Script Kiddies? | 28 | Hackers, in the classical sense, are a lot like a good baker. They can work from scratch without directions, know what they're doing and why, and can adapt to different things if they don't get the result they expected.
Script kiddies are like someone following a cookie recipe off a bag of chocolate chips. They have ... | 50 | |
ELI5: Why do we produce tears when we are sad? | 209 | Emotional tears are different from reflexive tears (tears that come from smokey rooms, cutting onions, etc.). When you cry because emotions, it releases a hormone that causes you to feel less stressed after you have cried. This is also why we cry when we are in pain or extremely frustrated.
There are also some evoluti... | 101 | |
[Truman Show]Since the show ended we, the Studio have been using the dome, the largest structure in the world for tour groups. We are going to lock a big tour group inside while tricking them into thinking a nuclear war happened and the air outside is deadly. What should we name this new show? | 41 | I don't think the name is what you should be worried about. Unlike Truman, these people will have families. They'll fight back a lot more than people who are worried about a guy they saw on TV being treated badly. | 45 | |
CMV: If being vegan were so great and natural, vegan food wouldn’t include mock meat, milk, cheeses and the like. | I understand that being vegan for religious or health reasons is absolutely a thing. However, a common track for vegans is about environmentalism and how humans were made to be vegan/vegetarian. If that were true, why are we so preoccupied with creating vegan versions of products that non-vegans eat? It’s not to be inc... | 55 | The thing that mock animals products are designed to address is the cultural and mental element of meat eating. It's kind of like quitting smoking - you can just go cold turkey (in the vast majority of cases this never works) or you can incrementally achieve your goal by switching from cigarettes to vapes to nicotine p... | 37 |
[General]When it comes down to the core 'Science' in Science Fiction, which universe has the greatest integrity in its fictional physics and application? | I don't want to exclude iterations of 'magic' from this, but it seems when it comes to most instances that have it magic is simply an unexplained, or vaguely explained, thing that isn't questioned. This could also be applied in same aspect to far off science fiction wherein everything works because its just 'technology... | 21 | A lot of Michael Crichton's books have at least some foundation in real world theories and possibilities. Some of the books are simply conversations about the implications of a new technology that just happen to be set in a thrilling narrative. | 15 |
[DC] Has Child Services ever investigated Bruce Wayne? | I imagine Bruce's sons fighting criminals every night would leave them with bruises, black eyes, bloody noses, and so on. These would probably be seen by their classmates and/or teachers at whatever schools they attend, and people would naturally assume that Bruce might be abusive to them. So with all that, wouldn't th... | 29 | He's really, really rich and connected (specifically providing a large chunk of the polices funding and equipment) in a city that is really, really corrupt.
No, the authorities have no interest in giving Bruce and his home a closer look. | 41 |
[judge dredd] what is the mortality rate of judges | With how much violent crime there is I would think high but I am curious if there training and equipment makes up for it. Thanks for your time | 55 | If you count the time they are performing the "Long Walk" bringing law to those outside mega-cities when they are technically retired, the mortality rate is virtually 100%.
Judge Dredd mentions that most Judges don't live long enough to take the Long Walk, so even discounting that phase of the career it is very high. | 43 |
Why do biofilms form? What is the mechanism bacterium use to communicate with each other in such a situation? | I thought prokaryotes were just a nucleoid and some ribosomes contained in a cell wall. When they form a biofilm, what the heck is going on?
After taking courses in biology, I came across this strange phenomenon. I've got a rudimentary understanding of cell biology, but I'm still confused as to how such simple structu... | 16 | Quorum sensing would be the correct term here. A bacterium can detect the presence of other nearby bacteria because they secrete a ligand. This chemical signal is receive by the sorounding bacteria, and depending on the concentration of this signal, different actions are taking.
This type of activity is also exhibit... | 10 |
[Men in Black] So since the agents are named after letters (Agent J, etc.), does that mean that there are only 26 active agents at one time? And what about other countries - does the Mexico MIB have an Agent Ñ? | 1,303 | There are 26 *high level* agents, each with a single letter code name. These are the agents with a large amount of autonomy and respect, the best of the best. They are the ones that get the "world is about to end" missions. A single letter agent can grab any other agent and order him to fetch a glass of chocolate mi... | 1,354 | |
[Star Wars] Would Palpatine have punished Krennic or Tarkin in any way for the Death Star if they survived, since they were both somewhat responsible for it's destruction ? | 24 | Krennic absolutely. He willfully aided and abetted the spies who ran off with the plans of the Death Star and designed the thing to be vulnerable in the first place. His death would have likely not been quick and would probably have been shown to the next engineering team as ‘encouragement.’
Tarkin probably would have... | 39 | |
ELI5: Why do search engines tell you how long the search took? | 18 | Honestly, they're kind of bragging to show you how good/fast/awesome they are. There is no other reason; it might be interesting to a very small segment of the population, but it's more about people going "Wow, 20 billion results in 0.02 seconds!" | 13 | |
ELI5: Where do illegal drug chemists get the skills to make hard drugs such as meth or krokodil? | 180 | It doesn't really take skill; all you need is a "recipe" and the necessary equipment.
Discovering new compounds to get people high is where it takes skill. That's more the purview of designer drug manufacturers than meth cookers. | 102 | |
ELI5: What is the difference between Visa, Mastercard and a credit card and how do the way of payments differ? | 20 | Visa and Mastercard are both companies that facilitate electronic payments between consumers using a card, merchants, and banks. Mastercard issues credit cards (a card that works like a small loan, that you normally pay off by the end of the month or accrue interest) and also debit cards (a card that works more like c... | 23 | |
eli5:Why does buying in bulk make an item cheaper? | Why do buying 1000 apple cost cheaper than buying one apple?
Edit: ok i should add on a little, lets say one apple cost u $1 from buying it from your farmer supplier and u are selling $1.2 each, do u think its worth it to sell it at $1 per apple for some guy to clear 100 apple at a go? | 16 | Well, that example is not quite accurate. I'd say buying a thousand apples would be cheaper *per apple* than buying a single one's price. This is due to less packaging, more efficient for the seller than selling individually and hoping they don't go bad and to waste, etc.
Economy of scale | 27 |
[Avatar: The Last Airbender] How does combustion-bending work? | 24 | All bending works by the focusing of chi, which is aided by physical motion. The very best benders don't rely on these movements to the same extent as younger benders. For example, Bumi managed to break himself free from a cage in the air with motions of his face.
Combustion bending is merely the intense focusing of c... | 28 | |
Why are bugs attracted to the light? | Never really thought about it honestly, and this summer i've been sitting outside and the spot lights are on and all the bugs keep dive bombing it. | 20 | Moths navigate and orient themselves by using the sun as a guide. For example, Mr. Sample Moth likes it on his left, means he's going the direction he wants to. Porch lights, street lights, etc, confuse them. They will fly in circles around it because they think they're flying straight. In their heads, the light is on ... | 32 |
CMV: Public Colleges That Prevent Free Speech Shouldn't be Eligible for Government Funding. | The 1st amendment protects free speech and expression. However, people will argue that the 1st amendment only protects you from the government censoring your opinion, not private organizations such as websites or private companies.
However, public colleges receive billions of dollars in funding from the state and fede... | 169 | > You can't kick students out for unpopular political opinions, "micro-aggressions", or any sort of structured speech that the moral majority disagrees with. As long as speech is provided in a civilized manner(arguments based on logic and statistics rather than personal/character attacks), a student shouldn't be abl... | 36 |
Evolution: If modern humans have been around for ~200,000 years, why have no other post-human species branched off of us yet? Is there a projected timeline for that to happen? Will we even recognize if it's happening? | 33 | Speciation generally happens much slower than that. Further, you probably wouldn't even recognize the branch until well after the fact. It's possible that if technology hadn't advanced then some of the distant clusters of humans would become isolated enough to eventually branch off, but at this point there is constan... | 41 | |
[Mass Effect] If the Genophage is cured, how will that change the Krogan Rite of Passage? | To those unfamiliar, the [krogan](https://masseffect.fandom.com/wiki/Krogan) are a warlike species native to the extremely hostile planet [Tuchanka](https://masseffect.fandom.com/wiki/Tuchanka). They were granted space travel by the [salarians](https://masseffect.fandom.com/wiki/Salarian) to help them in their war agai... | 16 | Going with the "golden" setup here (>!Wrex lives, genophage is genuinely cured!<), it's important to remember that a young krogran's krant are allowed to assist them in the ritual, but it's by no means necessary. As the genophage would only have been cured by teamwork and cooperation, that may be mandatory; work... | 21 |
[Ghostbusters] Do Egon Spengler and Ray Stantz deserve (a lot) more recognition for the invention of proton packs? Wouldn’t the military have interest in them? The Nobel committee? They seem pretty impressive. | 44 | Among folks "in the know" Stantz and Spengler get their due credit, though a lot of lay folks give Venkman too much of a share due to how he's positioned himself as the leader/face-man of the crew, and the "legit" science community does it's best to ignore them, since they don't want to legitimize "fringe" science.
If... | 51 | |
[Star Trek] Are no ballistic weapons used by federation ships? The Borg can hardly “adapt” thicker or tougher armour on the spot I presume, why not just bring a damn railgun to kill a cube? | 71 | Ballistic weapons just flat out won't work. The Borg wouldn't even need to adapt. Any ship's navigational deflector is already doing the job of keeping small, fast, physical objects from impacting the ship.
We're not even talking actual defensive measures, just normal navigation systems on even the most lightly de... | 78 | |
ELI5:What are Hedge Funds and what do they do? | 53 | It's an investment scheme. Basically a group of people all put their money into one big pot, and the hedge fund manager(s) invests that money in various things with the intent of making more money. Each person who put money into the hedge fund gets a share of the profits that is in proportion to how much they put in. T... | 17 | |
[DCU] Does being half-Atlantean affect Aquaman's powers? What would be different if he were completely Atlantean? | Is his hydrokinesis weaker? How about his ability to communicate with marine life?
I know for a fact that Arthur can stay on land for far longer than 'full-blooded' Atlanteans, but how else does his hybrid physiology separate him for his fellow Atlanteans? Overall, is Arthur weaker than if he were completely Atlantea... | 105 | Usually he doesn't have hydrokinesis - most atlanteans don't. In the movie it seemed to be the function of his trident, which is a magical artifact of bygone age, and in comics he had it when he had a water arm, which also was magical. | 59 |
CMV: languages that use a Latin-script alphabet should move towards eliminating accent marks. | My reasoning: I have some level of proficiency in five languages, using three alphabets between them. I have recently gotten more into language learning and am studying four more, all of which use Latin script (the alphabet used by Romance, Germanic, and Celtic languages among others). In doing so and using my phone fo... | 22 | I would counter that accent marks actually provide for less ambiguity, more possible phonemes, stress marking and ease in differentiation of homophones, while at the same time aiding the reader in inferring the correct pronunciation or meaning.
Accent marks have a wide variety of uses that are ultimately beneficial. I... | 12 |
ELI5: Do men’s and women’s hygiene products (shave gel, lotion, face wash) actually do different things for men or women, or is it a marketing thing? | 70 | Most of the ingredients are the same, though some manufacturers claim that their gendered products are tailored more towards the different areas that each gender tends to shave more.
The main difference in ingredients is the scent. Fragrances and oils can be incredibly expensive, which could go towards explaining som... | 59 | |
[Back to the Future] Why does Earth Angel get a positive reaction? | During the Enchantment Under the Sea Dance, Marty subs on guitar since Marvin sliced his hand open earlier getting Marty out of the trunk. Marty starts off decently, but as soon he starts to be erased from existence he starts messing up and then stops playing altogether for the majority of the song. The band notices, M... | 21 | The band was just keeping up appearances for the sake of the show.
As for the crowd, years of experience as a performer tell me that crowds don't notice shit. This is especially true if they're a lot more worried about dancing or smooching than listening to the band. They might have a vague notion that something soun... | 29 |
need help with work bully | there is a staff member at my work (responsible for organizing orientation, budgets sheets, etc) who is making my life miserable. im a new tenure track hire and this staff member constantly makes demands of me which are not my responsibility. he orders me around and talks to me like im his secretary. i have pushed back... | 16 | Complain to HR if your chair won't act. Yelling is almost always the sort of thing where they will intervene, at least at a reasonable institution. Especially when it is a staff member yelling at a TT line hire.
Refer them to the chair every time they make requests/demands of you. Say no firmly and more often. | 17 |
This might sound like a stupid question, but was the sky pitch black eons ago? | I’m new to this sub and I was curious, since I had nothing to answer this question with other than my own headcanon. So this might actually have a short answer than expected. So light takes a super long time to travel right? Since what we’re seeing up there (outside of the solar system) are dead or dying stars and the ... | 17 | Within the galaxy, the light travel times are actually quite short. The whole Milky Way is only about 100,000 light years across, and we're about 30,000 light years to the centre. But most of the stars you can see in the night sky are less than 1,000 light years away, and many are less than 100 light years away. It tak... | 40 |
ELI5: How well-supported is the big bang theory? Are we fairly certain it's true? | 105 | Yes, and overwhelmingly so. However, you have to be careful about what you mean when you say "Big Bang Theory", for it is *not* a theory about how the universe was *created*, but rather how it has *evolved*. Despite what anyone will tell you, we physicists currently have no idea how the universe was created. | 81 | |
[DCA/Marvel] How do supervillains get food? | I’m sure villains who wear masks like Scarecrow and Mysterio are fine out in public. But what about all those villains that walk around committing crimes in broad daylight with nothing covering their face? Every time Doctor Octopus or Magneto go to the grocery store or out to eat at a restaurant, I’m sure there’s a doz... | 410 | - They have enormous stashes of resources
- They live in self-sufficient strongholds
- They order online
- They go and simply buy trusting no one will recognize them
- They steal
Also: human memory and recognition are flawed. Very flawed. | 428 |
ELI5:Why isn't there a good defense for companies against DDOS attacks? | As someone who plays Blizzard games, I found myself locked out tonight as a result of DDoS attacks. This was most likely because Blizzard issued a ban wave against cheaters and hackers.
But this seems like a recurrent problem for various companies.
If it's so common, what is it about a DDoS attack that makes it so hard... | 572 | DDoS means Distributed Denial of Service attack. Now you obviously experienced the part where service was denied. The key here is that it was distributed.
What that means was rather than one guys with his one machine trying to keep their service too busy, the attackers used a great number of compromised system that a... | 393 |
ELI5: How come the ocean isn’t making the ocean floor compact? Like, the pressure at the ocean floor is absurd, the weight of the ~4km of water is a lot and yet we see the sand loose. | 47 | The pressure exerted on the sand at the bottom is experienced in all direction. They are separated because they have different densities.
Imagine you have a plate on the floor of a pool. Apart from just it's inertia and the viscosity of the water you could easily pick it up.
Large pressure differences on either side ... | 49 | |
Endless prerequisites & accessible books that get around them? | I'd love to read some Hegel, but I've heard that you *really* should know your Kant before you get to Hegel. I'd love to read some Kant, but I've heard I *really* should only do Kant after Hume and Leibnitz. Lebnitz requires Descartes; Hume (maybe) requires Newton. I'd love to feel like I'm deeply understanding what I'... | 20 | Well the good news in the consensus here is that you don’t actually need to read all the prerequisites, and if you needed to, probably no contemporary philosophy would get done at all.
For getting into Hegel, Terry Pinkard’s *German Philosophy 1760-1860: The Legacy of Idealism* gives a good overview of the major think... | 12 |
eli5 how Google claims not to 'sell' your data, so what does Google do to give data to others, and what data is being shown to them? | 48 | Google does not directly give your data to anyone. They don't want to- access to your data is the secret sauce that makes Google ads more valuable than ads from other places.
Instead, companies can come to them with an advertisement targeted towards men in their 30s in the American Southeast that like baking, and they... | 124 | |
CMV: I don't care that facebook and there social media sites sell my browsing info to ad companies | *other social media sites
What does it even matter? The service is free to me because I'm the product - that was obvious from the beginning. I can't believe it was a shock to anyone.
And how does it negatively affect me? So instead of getting ads for bunion pads, I get ads for period pads. Worst case, the ad doesn't ... | 20 | The problem is that these little pieces of your browsing info can be pieced together to incriminate you. There's no regulatory agency making sure this info isn't leaked from the ad company. For example let's say you search, "drug store" on Google maps, then a couple hours later, the term "when is the right time to have... | 11 |
ELI5: Why is a population decline in a country considered a bad thing? | 16 | The problem, especially with extreme population decline, is that eventually you have too many retired/elderly folks and too few workers to support them. Either directly supporting elderly parents, or paying into social security.
A slight decline may be fine, but many social systems are set up on the premise of consta... | 20 | |
[Question] Why did the Fed get rid of conventional monetary policy in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis? | 29 | The zero lower bound was a major factor. They couldn't set interest rates below zero, this constraint meant other avenues of monetary policy had to be consider. This being QE, paying interest on excess reserves, etc. It was because they got to a point where conventional policy could no longer be done. | 12 | |
[WH40K] Could the Emperor "fix" things in the present? | So, if the Emperor were to heal totally and wake up today (as in the WH40K present, not 2015 :P), would he be able to fix things in the galaxy? Fixing, of course, being relative to the Imperium/mankind in general (sorry Tau), finishing his webway, destroying/crippling humanity's enemies, etc.
Also, after millennia of... | 63 | The Emperor is not subject to the same effects as Chaos Gods, as he's entirely bound to a mortal frame, basically manifesting as an immensely powerful Psyker. The devotion and worship of mankind will not have had any impact on either his power, or his outlook.
As for can he 'fix' things... probably not. The Webway pro... | 44 |
[Star Trek] What are some legitimate reasons to turn off the safety protocols on the Holodeck? | I mean, it seems like every couple of months something goes wrong on a Federation starship and somebody has to struggle to survive in an environment that is both lethally hostile and wholly illusory. A whole lot of trouble could be avoided, and lives saved, if you just made it completely impossible to disable the safet... | 18 | The Federation is a very Liberal society; they prioritise personal freedom in many instances. If someone (Miles O'Brien for example) wants to go kayaking on a dangerous river then he's not really going to get the full effect when he knows that there's no danger. He doesn't really get to experience the satisfaction of o... | 19 |
Is academia so competitive now that it's pointless to try if you aren't exceptional/remarkable? | People will suggest to major in engineering instead of physics or mathematics due to academia being so extremely competitive. Has it reached a point to where if you're not, say, winning math olympiads during secondary school, you should probably not bother with a mathematics degree & academia, and instead default t... | 350 | I don't think being exceptional/remarkable is as noteworthy as people make it out to be. Plenty of geniuses can't get a job. Plenty of them quit before they evem graduate
Being average and knowing how to play the game (publishing, schmoozing with faculty, getting into tje right subfield, etc) is more important. Work e... | 410 |
ELI5: How does super glue work and how is it different from a regular glue stick? | 526 | Most regular types of glue just harden as water or solvent in them evaporates. If you want to glue something really well, you have to stick it really tight together with a clamp and let it cure for a bit.
Superglue however doesn't need to dry out. Instead, it "polymerizes" - that means the individual liquid molecules ... | 408 | |
CMV: It's not racist to try to preserve cultural heritage in certain spots with native ethnic people or who speak the language natively. | Classic examples like Venetian gondola rower or City centre markets where you hear the old traditional women speaking in a particular accent and story. No one should be discriminated against on the basis of their ethnicity for a job or command of a language (as long as it is professional), so if someone from a differen... | 22 | Well first we need to unpack the idea of cultural heritage as a tourist commodity. Why do you feel entitled to seeing something 'traditional' when you visit when the commodification is already very artificial, and why should national origins have any bearing on that anyway? The 'traditional' market you're seeing isn't ... | 11 |
ELI5: How has The Pirate Bay not been shut down with the owners so public? | The owners of the Pirate Bay go around talking about the site and don't hide from society Silk Road style, but how has the Pirate Bay not been shut down itself? It's definitely not an obscure site, and Megaupload already went down before because of pirating and copyright infringement on tons of their downloads.
EDIT: ... | 1,900 | It's like playing whack-a-mole, the entire site is like 30mb of data. It gets uploaded to a server and a domain name gets pointed to that server.
If the domain name gets taken you point a different one at the server.
If the *server* gets taken down you upload the site to a different one, and point the domain to tha... | 1,892 |
ELI5: Is there a maximum hot? | I know the maximum cold is literally no heat energy, absolute zero, but is there a highest possible temperature in the way that speed has the upper limit--as far as we know--of light? | 21 | Theoretically no.
However, technically you could only attain a temperature as high as the energy of the universe would allow. Something like the exact moment of the Big Bang would be the hottest temperature that could ever be achieved in the universe. This is called the Planck temperature which is the highest theore... | 26 |
ELI5: Has there always been the same amount of water on earth? | 18 | No. It is theorized some/most water was brought to Earth by cometary bombardment. Also, some (miniscule) amount of hydrogen is constantly lost from the atmosphere to space. However, it is relatively insignificant to the total amount.
Water is also sequestered in rocks and ice in varying amounts throughout geologic hi... | 10 | |
ELI5: Why do we have wisdom teeth? | It seems like all wisdom teeth are good for is being removed. Why does everyone have them? | 40 | Our jaws have actually gotten smaller as we have evolved, along with the fact that we no longer have use for them as we can keep our teeth healthier and learned how to cook. As the wisdom teeth come in, they get impacted now because most people do not have the room in their mouth for them to properly grow in, which is ... | 16 |
ELI5: Why does basically everyone in a hospital get an IV regardless of their situation? | Is there anything to it other than keeping patients hydrated and getting medicine into their system when necessary? | 17 | A lot of the time it's just to have an established line, so that if things go south, you don't have to waste the time to start one. With some people it's not easy to get a line in, especially once their BP starts to crash, and they need medicine right now. | 26 |
Eli5 Why do steep rear windshields need a wiper and normal sloped windshields dont? | For example on a minivan there's a rear wiper and a front wiper, but not on say a Toyota corolla. Why is that? | 28 | It's not because of the angle of the rear window, it's because of how much dirt sprays up from the back of the vehicle.
On most cars, the trunk is between the rear window and the back of the car, and the window stays relatively clean and dry from road spray from the back of the car.
On minivans, hatchbacks, station wag... | 103 |
ELI5: What happens in the stomach of a lactose intolerant person after eating dairy ? | 182 | Nothing special happens in the stomach. It's the intestines where it gets real.
When someone is lactose-intolerant, their guts lack the enzyme *lactase* (either partly or totally) that usually breaks it down into simpler sugars.
Do you know what doesn't lack the ability to break down lactose into simpler sugars? The ... | 199 | |
If marijuana causes an increase in heart rate why does it not cause cardiomyopathy like cocaine? | 27 | So marijuana causes your blood pressure to drop, and as a reflex your heart rate increases, but it's not working against higher blood pressure- there are still risks as the elevated heart rate for someone with cardiovascular disease can lead to a heart attack. Cocaine is a stimulant forcing your heart to beat harder ag... | 28 | |
[Marvel] Do superheroes also get discounts and free meals at restaurants on Veterans day? | Someone like Captain America and Punisher would be obvious because they've served in the military. But could someone like Spider-Man swing by an IHOP for some free pancakes? | 28 | Im sure Captain America does, but if the Frank Castle flashes his I.D. assuming he would and has one someone might call the cops or the mob. As far as the rest of heroes goes its probably more like a police/firefighter discount assuming the hero isn't wanted by the law and popular enough to be recognized. | 24 |
ELI5: How do the big YouTube channels (pewdiepie, Yogscast, etc) avoid getting three strikes from frivolous/bogus copyright claims? | 851 | They aggressively pursue their rights. Every-time they get a strike they reach out to YouTube and let them know what happened.
Given their size and value to YouTube they likely get handled very quickly. | 654 | |
[Star Wars] Why don't the Inquisitors use tracking fobs to find the Jedi, like the Mandalorian uses to find bounty targets? | 399 | I don't think we have enough info on how the Tracking Fobs work right now or the limitations of them.
We know the Tracking Fobs are tuned in to a target's chain code somehow. Maybe Jedi just didn't let themselves get signed up for the chain code? Maybe the Jedi used forged chain codes. (That has been done) We can jus... | 423 | |
ELI5: Why can't spiders climb up the side of the bath tub? | To confirm, I didn't kill the spider, I put it outside. They're great for getting rid of pesky bugs, plus... Live and let live right? | 103 | They climb using the hairs and little microscopic hooks. Think of it like rock climbing. If there weren't any type of way to hold on to something with your hands and feet you wouldn't be able to climb a nearly vertical wall. Same is true for the spider. The tub is a smooth and relatively vertical surface for them to... | 59 |
[The Dark Knight] How did Batman and Rachel survive the drop off the skyscraper? | During the penthouse/party/whatever you want to call it scene, Joker drops Rachel off the building, and Bruce jumps off after her. I've watched this scene multiple times, and there is no use of the cape to slow down the fall like in TDKR. How did they survive? | 20 | Watch the surveillance footage right before the crash onto the car, and listen carefully to the sound. The cape is clearly fluttering with the same strong resistance that it displayed when Batman flies to Lau's tower to arrest him. Batman's cape doesn't have to be at full wingspan in order to slow a fall. | 16 |
ELI5: Why do women look different than men? | I understand the need for wider hips / breasts, but what's the point of creating two distinct creatures (one with a normally larger and muscular frame) and another with a smaller and more 'aesthetic' face and body?
Wouldn't the human race be simplified by just having a single organism that can reproduce with itself? | 18 | Men and women look different (sexual dimorphism) because of the presence or lack of the Y chromosome and different gonads which in turn leads to different hormones. Natural selection has selected certain features in males and females which made them reproductive successful. Males for example are larger and stronger bec... | 22 |
How did broken bones evolve to heal if a broken bone is usually a death sentence for a wild animal? | I was just thinking that many broken bones need to be "set" in order to be able to heal (which is not possible for a wild animal to do to itself), and even with that, healing a broken bone can take weeks or months. A wild animal that is incapacitated by a broken bone would probably die before the bone could heal. Given... | 41 | I think your premise is misleading. A _complete_ fracture (as opposed to one that does not go all the way across the bone) of a long bone like a femur would be difficult to recover from in the wild but
* most fractures are incomplete
* most bones are not "alone": ribs and the lower bones of the limbs of many animals ... | 45 |
ELI5: Why are the helmet-straps that the British military use in formal dress placed under the lip instead of under the chin? | 16 | The dress bearskin hats have a chain strap so when not firmly affixed will hang naturally around the lip area, however the chain will allow the chain to go under the chin when needed to keep the hat firmly on. | 15 | |
[Harry Potter] what makes one person better at a spell than the other? | Does pronunciation account for anything? Like Hermione said. | 25 | Pronunciation only matters because inexperienced wizards need it to focus properly on the spell. Truly powerful wizards can cast nonverbally, as they don’t need the words to help guide their focus.
There seems to be a certain level of raw power/will that wizards can pump into their spells (If we believe Fake Mad Eye ... | 30 |
[MCU] During the events of Spiderman Far From Home, what do the general public know/ not know about the snap? | To what extent their knowledge of the blip are? Do they know about the infinity stones? Thanos and how he looked like? Different alien races? | 97 | Maybe not the full exact details, but they seem to know pretty much everything. In particular, the help group from Endgame references Thanos by name in their posters and the in-flight TV in Far From Home has a documentary called "The Snap" with a picture of the complete Infinity Gauntlet as its poster.
For the record,... | 89 |
CMV: the entire “humans weren’t meant to be monogamous” argument falls apart when you take children into account. | I often come across discussions that center around the fact that now humans live such a long lifetime, monogamy is unrealistic and out-dated. But every study I have ever read on the topic of childhood seems to prove children have the best outcomes in a two parent home with parents who have a good relationship.
I don’... | 436 | The idea of children needing a home with two parents is more of a cultural aspect of western society than something inherent. There are other arrangements. Some cultures take a more community rearing approach where the individual parents aren't so important and children will be raised as children of the whole village... | 365 |
ELI5:What makes your stomach hurt when you are hungry and what causes your stomach to growl? | 543 | The growling is called borborygmi and it's caused by fluids and gasses moving through the intestine, not the stomach. The stomach sits left orientated, partially in the ribcage, wedged just below the diaphragm and part of the liver.
The stomach itself is pretty thick and relatively deep in comparison to the coils of i... | 171 | |
How are spacesuits sealed from the vacuum of space when assembled? | I understand that the space suit provides air pressure to keep the fluids in your body in a liquid state, and that the suits are assembled in different pieces for the limbs and such. But how are these separate pieces sealed from the vacuum of space when assembled? (i.e. where the separate pieces connect) | 21 | The same way as docking. Joints lock tightly so air can't escape. It's like putting your finger over the neck of a bottle and flip it upside down. The liquid inside won't come out because your finger is in the way.
Basically, a space suit is an upside-down water bottle with a finger on the neck. | 12 |
[FMA:B] If alchemy is so insanely powerful and can be learned from books, why are there so few alchemists? | 26 | Investing can be learnt from books, why isn't everyone Warren Buffet?
It takes a special kind of person to pursue Alchemy, same as any other profession. Its hard, requires endless hours of study/practice and not everyone has the drive to become an alchemist. | 32 | |
ELI5:Why can't flies get out of open windows as soon as you open them? | 18 | Imagine being in a very large room, and you can only see a small part of the room at any time. Someone makes a small opening (door, window) in one part of the room.
You can't leave immediately since you don't know it's open until you explore it.
On top of that, flies are very bad at figuring out transparent obstacles... | 17 | |
ELI5: How are people able to think themselves sick? (somatoform disorder) | 97 | We don't feel sick because we are sick: we feel sick because certain patterns of neurons in the brain fire. Most of the time, they are firing because we are sick, but not always; and doctors aren't sure why they fire when we aren't sick.
And the real answer is "we don't know". In many ways, somatoform disorders are th... | 31 | |
[X-Men] On Krakoa, the mutant nation is now performing mass resurrections on dead mutants, thru the efforts of the Five. Are there any moral implication of them bringing back the dead and on such a massive level? | 24 | The just-started Way of X series is going to be dealing with this. Nightcrawler has had a long history of being a devout Catholic, and the ritualistic deaths and rebirths for depowered mutants, and other mutants being nonchalant about death, is really freaking him out. | 22 | |
[Mad Max] Why are there a disproportionately high number of people with American or English accents in post-apocalyptic Australia? | From the comments of Furiosa who only vaguely seems to remember what power lines look like, we can pretty safely assume we are at least 25 years post-apocalypse. If this is the case why does she (and a few other characters) possess non-Aussie accents? I mean surely their accents should have assimilated by now. | 18 | Those ain't English accents, it's the Cultivated Australian dialect, similar pronunciation but more inclined to call you a cunt in general discourse.
Can't explain the seppo though - might be she grew up around another seppo and kept her accent to retain a sense of indiviuality and separation from those around her. | 18 |
ELI5: How is a new video game sometimes "ready to play" when less than half the game is downloaded? | 31 | Some games are packaged in a way that gives you what you need to start the game first.
The game is a bunch of separate files. There’s sound, music, levels, character models etc. if the game is set up for it, you can download the title screen and the first level, and start playing before the final boss is downloaded. | 50 |
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