query stringlengths 19 300 | pos list | neg list | task stringclasses 1
value | instruction dict |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Why do recipes for sweet foods (cookies, brownies, etc.) often call for the use of salt when the taste is near absent? | [
"Salt ionizes and binds to taste receptors, reducing bitterness and amplifying sweetness, sourness, and umami. Food tastes more like itself when it has been salted."
] | [
"You need very little vanilla to achieve enough taste. Also more often than not its artificially colored. For instance when making chocolate chip cookies or edible cookie dough you'll find the same thing. Usually the recipe, which is crafted to serve at least several people only calls for 2-3 tsp of vanilla extract... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
Would a person who never heard of a religion still go to hell? | [
"In Islam, no. Anyone that has not been exposed sufficiently to Islam (or religion at all) isn't judged as if they had."
] | [
"All you know about Will Smith or John Travolta is that they star in films you life. That has nothing to do with whether they are decent human beings. That being said, spend decades in a religion, and you aren't going to decide that your faith is a lie and actively making the world a worse place just because you re... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit argument:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit argument:"
} |
Why "can't" you lie when you're under oath? What would happen if you do, and how would anyone ever find out? | [
"Generally, states and the federal government have laws criminalizing perjury, which is defined as knowingly making a false statement under oath as to a material issue. (There are also laws against \"false swearing\" which cover non-material sworn lies.) These laws can be felonies or misdemeanors, so you're potenti... | [
"How do you think he is going to pardon himself for a crime without telling anyone what it is? In any case, you can't pardon yourself."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
Ron Paul's Philosophy and why so many liberals are avid followers | [
"Liberals really aren't rabid Ron Paul people. They agree with him sometimes, but on things really important to them like how to handle poor people, they so starkly disagree that in general liberals dislike him more than like him."
] | [
"He's not as conservative as most republicans, he's a bit moderate."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
If the sum of two even numbers is an even number, and the sum of two odd numbers is also an even number, then how are there the same number of even numbers as odd numbers? | [
"Because there are another two possibilities. Say you have two numbers, X and Y. There are 4 possible odd/even combinations: * X is even, Y is even. Result is even. * X is odd, Y is odd. Result is even. * X is odd, Y is even. Result is odd. * X is even, Y is odd. Result is odd. 2/4 have an even result, 2/4 have an... | [
"A prime number is any number that can only be divided by itself and one (3,5,11,etc). The Twin Primes conjecture states that there are an infinite number of prime numbers that are 2 away from each other. This does not mean that ever single prime number is a part of the twin prime logic (e.g. 67) however there are ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document about Mathematics:"
} |
How to measure mass in Zero Gravity | [
"There's a couple of ways. The first one that comes to mind is a simple application of Newton's second law, F = MA. You apply a known force, say 10 Newtons, on an object and measure the acceleration. Say that 10 N force accelerates the object 5 m/s/s. Well, you have an equation to solve now. 10 = 5*M. The mass is 2... | [
"By studying the effect their gravitational pull has on other bodies such as moons, asteroids, comments and fellow planets. Modifying Force = Mass * Acceleration Gives us a pretty accurate result. Refer to: _URL_0_ For a more detailed answer"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
what is the us chamber of commerce and what do they do? | [
"It's a national association that has about 300,000 members. Most are very large national or international corporations, but there are some small and mid-size businesses. The Chamber advocates for pro-business policies through lobbying and sometimes in court. Positions they advocate include low corporate taxes, lo... | [
"funeral companies want to cause accidents to create more clientele. genius!"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why don't movie actors pour water on bombs to defuse it instead of cutting wires? | [
"They're probably water proof, and most characters don't have bottles of water on them, and it would destroy the action"
] | [
"Let me answer your question with another question: if you tape a grenade to the back of someone's head and pull the pin, what happens to the front of their head? Same thing, more or less."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
the "Keep Sydney Open" movement and campaign. | [
"Because of the \"One Punch\" deaths over the past couple of years strict law were passed in Sydney to restrict clubs and bars to prevent anyone entering after 1:30 am. Last drinks are also called at 3am, I think, and bottle shops can't sell alcohol after 10pm instead of 12am. It is being argued that these laws, af... | [
"Their top execs worst secrets from being exposed."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the paragraph:"
} |
Why people think illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay in the USA when it is difficult for Americans to move to other countries? | [
"It's really really easy for Americans to immigrate illegally, US citizens don't need a visa for most places, you could cross into Canada saying you're there to visit and stay working illegally. Same if you take a flight to Europe and just stayed there. Being allowed even to visit the US (unless you're from a visa ... | [
"Bringing the subject of race into a conversation when it is irrelevant. Person 1: I think that illegal immigration in America is a problem. There's no way to see if any dangerous individuals are entering the country. Besides, they can't pay taxes, yet many receive government benefits. Person 2: Why are you racist ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the answer:",
"neg": "Represent the answer:"
} |
How can my phone stream continuously switching between LTE and wifi | [
"Computers send files in small packages. Each of these packages gets a number of sorts so the downloading computer knows how to put all of these small packages back together in the right order. When the server sends a packet, it expects to get an acknowledgement from the downloading computer, confirming that the pa... | [
"This is a limitation from the Sprint network and the technology they use. An iPhone on AT & T or Verizon has simultaneous voice, data, and GPS."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
Why is it that you can only smell food when it's hot/warm? | [
"My best guess is that what causes something to release an odour is diffusion, the same process as when something dissolves in a liquid. When something is a higher temperature, its molecules are vibrating faster and therefore break off and become airborne much more frequently, thus creating what we detect to be a s... | [
"Good coffee tastes good hot, warm or cold. Shit coffee tastes ok when your taste buds don't work...ie extreme temperatures."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
Why did we use lead in pipes? | [
"At the time, it was the best means of transporting water. Meaning, it was cheap, malleable & most, of not all plumbers were able to literally, make pipes & fittings while on the site."
] | [
"Why do some parts of the world call gasoline petrol?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
Is my cold aching goosebumped body wanting to get cooler to fight the bug or make me seek warmth to raise my temperature? | [
"Generally you get a fever when you are ill. this results in your body temperature being much warmer than the air temperature. you would then feel like the air around you is much colder than it actually is, thus you feel cold all the time, except when you are in an area that is as warm as your body. this is also t... | [
"For the same reason you're more likely to begin feeling cold, too. You're body is basically trying to force you to find a warm, comfortable spot and close your eyes so it can fall asleep."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit comment:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit comment about Biology:"
} |
Why do I need such a sharp knife to cut through tomato skin? | [
"the skin of a tomato is very tough, yet thin and smooth meaning a knife has no catching point to start the cut, along with the soft flesh of the tomato the skin will bend in and not start the cut."
] | [
"The water softens the keratin. Thats about it. What's easier to cut a hard cookie or the same cookie after you soak it in milk."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why shouldn't I drink water in Mexico? | [
"Mexico doesn't have the same quality control on water that most other countries have. Because of this, their water often has little \"bugs\" living in it that will upset your stomach. When you drink water or eat foods containing these \"bugs\" your body cannot process them right because your body isn't used to the... | [
"They don't eat that way all the time."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
Why are some coupons worth $0.001? | [
"This is actually a very interesting question that was answered by \"Now I know\" [a month ago](_URL_0_). Basically, back in the day there were \"trading stamps\" which were like punch cards at retailers; purchase a certain amount and you could place orders from a catalogue to get random stuff (toasters and the lik... | [
"I believe it's Psychology. People are more willing to buy something if it is listed as $19.99 as opposed to $20.00."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
What is the most responsible way to decide who to vote for? | [
"The first thing you should do is to make a list of the issues that are most important to you. Then, you should research the candidates and see where they stand on those issues. It's entirely possible that you won't find any candidate that feels the way you do; in that case, you'll have to figure out how strongly y... | [
"The difference is based entirely on how many people are willing to raise Hell if you call their faith a mythology."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
How can water around us evaporate when the boiling point is 100°C? | [
"The boiling point of water is actually dependent on the pressure it's under, and the small amounts of water in droplets or the surface of water are under less pressure than what we normally think of as water."
] | [
"I'm not positive, but there are two things I can think of that are in play. The first is that the thermostat may just be wrong. The other is relative humidity - when there's a lot of moisture in the air, your body's natural cooling mechanisms aren't as efficient and may cause you to lose heat faster or slower. > ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query about Science:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text about Science:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
Why is calling someone/something "Jew" more racist than saying "Jewish" | [
"It's the difference between a noun and an adjective. Calling someone a Jew, as a noun, makes it seem as though their religion is the only important thing about them, and can be dehumanizing. \"A Jewish person,\" as a phrase, recognizes the inherent humanity or person-hood of the subject, and also mentions that thi... | [
"I don't think it does at all. People call me 'white' and not an American. So why would it be racist to call someone 'black' instead of African American?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the post:",
"neg": "Represent the post:"
} |
Why aren't all words spelt phonetically? Wouldn't it be easier? | [
"English is a Germanic tongue with a French vocabulary thanks to the Norman Conquest period we then borrowed a number of words and Order roots from Greek and Latin, as well as adopting words wholesale from languages as diverse as German and Japanese. The silent k in knife was not always silent. Back in the days wh... | [
"Noah Webster (of Webster's Dictionary fame), decided that he did not like the spellings and rules of English. He \"Americanized\" it by making things more phonetic (spelling the words the way they sounded) in his first dictionary. He also liked to get rid of unnecessary letters in words. That's why, for example, i... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
shooting a gun backwards | [
"From your perspective, the bullet would travel 800mph \"backwards\" (because you're traveling forwards at that speed), but from the point of view of a stationary observer, the bullet would indeed appear to hang in midair and then fall straight down."
] | [
"Watch the l.a. beast crystal pepsi challenge on yt. About the same will happen to yourself."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
Why is it significantly cheaper to buy a round trip flight from europe to america and back than the other way around? | [
"At the moment, the exchange rates are playing havoc with prices. Try booking with a non-American airline e.g. Aer Lingus if you're happy to go through Dublin. (Which I recommend because, on the leg to the USA, you can go through US Customs & Immigration *before* you get on the plane.)"
] | [
"There is no real reason other than the airline is able to make a lot of money from people who buy the one-way tickets not realizing there is another less expensive option. Sometimes it's just a case of there being a special promotion on round-trip tickets that, for whatever reason, wasn't uniformly applied to one-... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
Why are black holes not infinitely bright? | [
"If the photon is permanently caught, it cannot make it to your eye."
] | [
"1. Our solar system is infinitesimal compared to the size of the universe, hence having supermassive black holes a few times the size of our solar system is not impressive with regards to the rest of the universe. 2. Unless we were very near the event horizon, I believe that all light paths would be heading (spira... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
If you have a miscarriage pretty far into pregnancy, what happens to the baby thats inside the body? | [
"You give birth to it. In very very rare cases the body forms a cyst around it and the fetus becomes calcified and stays in the body"
] | [
"The umbilical cord is not connected to the woman, it is connected to the placenta. After a woman gives birth to a baby, she will also give birth to the placenta."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
Why do we generally enjoy hot food, but cold drinks? | [
"Hot food = Cooked food = **Less Bacteria, parasites, etc.** Cold water = Running water = Non-stagnant water at temperature that pathogenic bacteria/viruses/parasites don't like to live at = **Less bacteria, parasites, etc.** That's how things are evolutionarily, but biochemically, some receptors do/don't work at c... | [
"Upbringing bias? If you always drink cold water you will prefer it. My daughter doesn't like cold water, she likes room temp."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post about Language and culture:",
"pos": "Represent the document about Language and culture:",
"neg": "Represent the document about Science:"
} |
how do am/fm waves translate to such a wide variety of sounds? | [
"Humans can, at best, hear sounds from 15 hertz to 18,000 hertz. The overwhelming majority of what you hear in your daily life, and what they play on the radio, is a lot narrower than that. Radios work by mixing the sound they want you to hear with a carrier frequency - that of the radio station, or what you tune i... | [
"Its not actually sound. They take readings of radiation that comes off of the object or they take readings of its magnetic field. They then use these electromagnetic radiation readings to create a sound wave. The intensity of the reading corresponds to the volume of the sound and they normalize the frequency of th... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post about Technology:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence about Technology:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
Why are chemical attacks frowned upon, but regular missiles (potentially burning people alive) are okay? | [
"Most militaries take care to not kill civilians if it can be helped (or at least do their best to mitigate the potentiality). Modern missiles are designed to hit specific targets. Chemical weapons by nature are indiscriminate and are almost always used for purposes of terrorizing civilians."
] | [
"It's the destruction of civilian property, especially food production (that's what is banned......... burning factories that produce bullets is totally allowed even though it's part of scorched Earth), and it's not only done in defence of a country but when an invader is being pushed out and they burn everything i... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit post:"
} |
Why do glowsticks crack when you bend them? | [
"There are two chemicals in a glow stick. One of the two is isolated within another, smaller container inside the main glow stick. The cracking is that container breaking, allowing the two chemicals to mix. When they do mix, they release a glowing light."
] | [
"When you crack your knuckles, youre popping air bubbles in the synovial fluid between your joints. After you pop them, it takes a few minutes for air to join back up together and form bubbles again, at which point you can crack them again. And by the way, contrary to popular belief, cracking your knuckles doesn't ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
What on earth possesses the sites to incorporate ads that make it virtually impossible to read the contents of the pages using mobile devices? | [
"Often it is the click to the app itself or whatever other crap being offered. Sites make money on clicks sometimes, and sometimes also on how much of the screen the ad takes up. It's a shady tactic and I personally tend to avoid those sites that do it often, with a possible exception to those that are self-adverti... | [
"For each new page, they have more ad view, thus more money. Technically inclined sites may also use it to measure the popularity of each articles since bored reader won't click past the first page."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the comment:",
"neg": "Represent the comment:"
} |
This quote - "Do it to do it, not to have done it." | [
"I believe it would mean that you should do something for the thrill and happiness of actually doing it at that moment, not for the prestige that you might have over other people when you tell them about it."
] | [
"Because at that moment, you also realize that your words and actions will matter and you dont have the confidence in yourself to believe you won't screw it up."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why do we feel as though our brains are "goo" after learning a lot or focusing on something for a longer period of time? | [
"Information overload; it's like going to an auction block for the first time and listening to the auctioneer. Heey-fiddy-fiddy-fiddy-ONE-hubba-hubba-hubba-fiddy-two-findin-lookin-fer-fiddy-two-two-two-now-fiddy-three-fiddy-three-three-three-three-... You're probably thinking, \"How do *ANY* of these people unders... | [
"Basically, the human brain is very alert and active when it is bombarded by a lot of stimuli such as noise, smells, sights, etc. When you're doing something boring or repetitive, the brain isn't usually receiving a lot of input, and it isn't really being stimulated at all, and it tries to be efficient and conserve... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document about Sleep and boredom:"
} |
emotional eating. Why do some people "eat" their feelings? | [
"From personal experience it appears as a form of control, usually when you aren't able to control other aspects of your life, in a similar way people go out and get drunk or self harm. We eat with our eyes and usually to get fast food or ice cream or cake is quick and easy. In the same respective get a rush of dop... | [
"Depression causes you to feel sad or numb. Eating can give you a feeling of being \"happy\", but it's very short lived. We have a term for it - \"comfort food\". So people eat more, and generally unhealthy food. Or, depression can make you uninterested in normal activities, like eating. It just takes too much effo... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit answer:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit answer about Health and Wellness:"
} |
Why on a computer screen does the cursor disappear when moved to the right/bottom edges, but not at the left/top edges? | [
"The cursors 'point' is the very tip of the arrow and this cant leave the boundary of the working area (so your screen). When moved to the bottom right of the screen, the cursor is still on screen just the rest of the white arrow is not."
] | [
"Number lock allows you to toggle between using the number pad (on the right of a standard keyboard) to enter numbers or to navigate (notice on [this keyboard](_URL_0_) there are arrows on some of the numbers and other movement functions on others) Scroll lock switches the function of the arrow keys in many program... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why are different sized clothes all priced the same? e.g. A size 5 shoe costs the same as a size 13 shoe but they require vastly different amounts of material to make. | [
"Yer not alone in askin', and kind strangers have explained: 1. [ELI5: Why aren't plus size clothes more expensive than normal size clothes? ](_URL_5_) 1. [ELI5: Why are different sizes of clothes the same price? Even though larger sizes would use more material than the smaller sizes. ](_URL_3_) 1. [ELI5: Why are c... | [
"One factor that may be at play here (not knowing enough about cigarettes in particular to say for sure), is that the breakdown of costs is different than you've envisioned in your head. One of the most prominent places this comes into play is clothing. The reason a small shirt generally costs the same as an XL is ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit sentence:"
} |
Why do monitor's have polarizing filters? | [
"LCDs work by changing the polarisation of light. Since your eye can't detect polarisation, you can't see the image without a polarising filter."
] | [
"ELI5 why you are putting your fingers on the computer's screen."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit passage:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit passage:"
} |
Why are S type corporations limited to one class of stock? | [
"In essence, to keep things simple. S-Corporations were designed for small businesses. Congress wanted to keep it this way by, among other things, only allowing one class of stock. There would also be complications as to how to avoid double taxation on preferred dividends. Rather than trying to envision all these,... | [
"A corporation is a type of company. Specifically it's own where ownership is shared by the allocation of stock in the company that gives shareholders rights to profits and voting authority in the business decisions of the company. It's generally a favorable business entity for large companies."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
When you look out over a city scape at night, why do the lights appear to flicker? | [
"Basically, the eye is sensitive to the amount of light received. Due to the large distance between the observer and the source of the light, there may exist refractions in the medium the light passes through. For example, the temperature of the air changes the density and hence refractive index of the medium. The... | [
"If you're on a train, scooting along at 75 miles per hour, the fenceposts and the bunnies sitting by the tracks, and the nearby rocks and stuff will appear to fly by so fast you can barely tell what color they are, but the huge mountains 300 miles away barely seem to move. Stars are a lot bigger than the mountain... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit answer:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit answer about Physics:"
} |
Why does the captain needs to be the last one to leave the boat when it sinks? | [
"A captain doesn't always *need*, but often should be last off. The captain is in command, and supposedly the most capable person on the ship. The crew and passengers trust the captain to make good decisions and keep them safe. In an emergency, it's the captain who should know best how to save the people who trust ... | [
"They leave the cockpit to go to the bathroom, and make sure the door is locked when they leave."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
how martial artists are able to break wood and bricks with their bodies. | [
"A martial artist can produce quite a bit of force with a blow. Bricks and wood can only resist so much force before they break. And most breaking demonstrations you see don't use treated lumber and plywood like you would use in construction. Breaking a couple of inches of untreated lumber along the grain isn't all... | [
"Your friends are wimps. But, their hairline fractures are a start a making them tougher. As bones and tissue repair they become tougher. There are a lot of training techniques for \"iron hands\" starting with moving your hands through a wok of rice and graduating eventually too pebbles and rocks. Beginners in the ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit post:"
} |
How exactly did the word "dank" come into it's current meaning? | [
"Similar to your grandparent's cellar, stoners describe smelly, potent marijuana as \"dank.\" They and many others then started to use \"dank\" as an ironic or self-aware description of so called \"memes.\""
] | [
"ELI5: Why have so many people recently started spelling masturbate as masterbate on reddit? Am I missing out on an in-joke somewhere? Is it some semantic shift underway?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
Why is College in America so expensive? | [
"Government subsidies. As the government has increased aid for tuition (10x as much is spent helping students as in 1960), the colleges have factored this aid in and [raised their prices accordingly](_URL_0_). Also, many colleges use high tuition as a signal of quality. The top tuition is usually only paid by the w... | [
"Small Population, High Tax Rate, Reasonably Successful Companies and Economy, and a Socialist System. Socialism isn't bad, its expensive but it also takes care of you."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
what "existentialism" means. | [
"To understand existentialism you have to know the history of what came before it. Modern philosophers believed that things had an basic nature (An \"essence\"), and from that we derived their existence (ex: Descartes said \"I think therefore I am\"....first he deals with the thinking, from that he gets existence).... | [
"in few words - the idea that there is no \"right\" answer."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the paragraph:"
} |
How does White Supremacy/Neo-nazism "Classify" when it comes to races? Is it just everyone who looks "White"? How are Slavs, Persians, Hungarians, Indo European groups etc. considered? | [
"My understanding of this is that it depends on where you live and it's not so much that some people are considered not white as they're considered Not Our Kind, if that makes any sense. Race can be more complicated than just skin color, even though in the United States, that's generally how it's boiled down."
] | [
"I think a very important question to ask before answer your question OP, is when Hume says \"white\" who exactly is he referring to? Even today the term \"white\" has very different meanings depending on who or where in the world you ask. Is he referring to people of European descent only? Perhaps just Northern Eu... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit comment:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit comment:"
} |
How come the Finnish passport allows the most visa-free travel? | [
"A country chooses for themselves what restrictions they place on foreign visitors. Apparently the most countries feel the least threatened by Finnish nationals. Excluding the Schengen area of Europe, in which nationals can move about and work freely, probably the most permissive single relationship is between the... | [
"Governments decide based on mutual agreements. IE, 2 countries have good relations, trade is good, people are happy. They decide to have a visa free travel for both sides to encourage growth and lessen burdens on your everyday travellers. Hope this helps."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Explain to me Cold Fusion | [
"Fusion has the potential to provide a lot of energy, but it occurs at temperatures so high (millions of degrees) that we have been unable to harness it. Some people think there might be a shortcut, where fusion might be possible at relatively colder temperatures of hundreds or thousands of degrees. In the late 198... | [
"The things that are touching get tangled. ELI25 Version: Pursue a Ph.D. in Material Science...we still don't have all of the answers."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
Why do some people get nauseous when they drink alchohol? | [
"Alcohol is a toxic, hence intoxicated. It's your body's initial reaction to get I out of system."
] | [
"Try eating some food before hand. Some people experience pretty bad stomach aches when drinking water on an empty stomach."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the passage:",
"neg": "Represent the passage:"
} |
The Jailbait subreddit and controversy | [
"Basically \"r/jailbait\" was for pictures of underage girls. There were accusations of it being used as a connection for people looking to trade child pornography and was also giving Reddit some negative press as jailbait is a somewhat dicey moral area. The admins decided it wasn't worth it to keep the subreddit a... | [
"It's a subreddit for making fun of reddit in general."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the argument:",
"neg": "Represent the argument:"
} |
What's the difference, if any, between Cyborgs, Androids and Robots? | [
"A cyborg is a person with robotic components. An android is a robot specifically designed to look human. A robot is a non-human-like machination."
] | [
"Can someone explain the difference between Dementia and Alzheimer's, please?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit post:"
} |
If climate change is causing droughts, rising temperatures, shrinking polar ice caps, etc., where is all the water going? Earth is a closed ecosystem. | [
"It's not that there is less water, it's that it's distributed differently. It also causes more floods. There will be - in net - more water in oceans than there are currently, but...it can't be said that the earth will be \"more dry\" (or more wet, for that matter) the result of global warming."
] | [
"Among other things, warmer air holds more moisture, making storms effectively worse. With each degree Celsius increase in sea surface temperature, the atmosphere holds 4% more moisture, which can make for worse hurricanes and typhoons. Warm temperatures mean glaciers melt faster, and so do the polar ice caps. Glac... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question about Environment:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document about Environment:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
Whats the difference between 44kHz and 48kHz when the human ear can only hear up to 20kHz ? | [
"You're getting confused by two totally separate things. First of all you have the frequency of a specific sound, which as you rightly say is limited to about 20kHz for young, healthy people, and generally the upper range decreases as you get older. However this is nothing to do with the frequency you see for encod... | [
"I personally can't tell a difference between 128 and 192, 192 and 256, or 256 and 320. However, there is a noticeable difference between 128 and 320. Less of a difference between 128 and 256 or 192 and 320. However, there are people who are much more sensitive and can tell a big difference. It also depends on your... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the passage:",
"neg": "Represent the passage:"
} |
Why do many roman numeral clocks depict 4 as IIII and not IV? | [
"To form the letters on a clock, you cast the letters I, V, and X, and put them in combinations to show all 12 numbers. Depicting 4 as IIII results in a total 20 I's, 4 V's, and 4 X's for a complete clock face. You would notice that you can just build one mould with 5 I's, 1 V, and 1 X, and stamp or cast it 4 times... | [
"BC and AD are indeed inverted. I agree that it's confusing as all get out, and even though I work with it every day, I still have to sit and think about it. Not a stupid question at all. \"Early\" and \"Late\" are used in relation to *today*. So \"early\" would be further in the past than \"Late\" from this moment... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit post:"
} |
If mirrors only reflect light/images, why do we think of them as silver? | [
"Back in the day mirrors were *made* by putting a layer of silver on the back of a piece of glass. So they actually *were* silver. Old worn out mirrors could be refreshed by having them resilvered- that service is still available today by specialty craftsmen."
] | [
"Because it is a mirror, not a television. It is only reflecting the light it receives, so it is almost the same as just looking at the tree, except mirrored of course."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text about Physics:"
} |
If I use one earphone at 50% volume, audio seems much louder than with both earphones at the same volume. Do our ears actually distribute that audio and if so how? | [
"Imagine your house is deathly quiet, and you can hear some things: a faucet dripping in the bathroom, the cat scratching her post, something walking around in the attic (uh, ignore that one). Then, you turn on the TV, and you can't hear them any more. It's not that the sound of those things aren't reaching your ea... | [
"Headphone amplifiers are not merely just for increasing the volume. There are different specification for each headphones namely impedance (ohms) this value means it is harder to drive (or just harder to power). If you put a 600 ohm headphone on a soundcard/headphone amplifier that could only power a 300 ohm head... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
'Earworms' are where a song gets stuck in our head on a loop - I end up knowing all the words to pop songs even if I try to avoid them. Is there a way to harness this phenomena for good - like learning a language? | [
"it worked for me. I know 99 luftballons and völlig losgelöst by heart"
] | [
"You see or heard something that reminded you of the song. However, your brain is not satisfied just remembering the song. Your brain can't find closure and throws it on a loop. That's why listening to it usually helps; the brain has heard it all again and can end the song in a natural manner. Think about it, you n... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the passage:",
"neg": "Represent the passage:"
} |
Vehicle insurance rates are vastly lower for young females than young males. How is this not sexual discrimination? | [
"I think a lot of people are missing the point by saying \"the statistics support it.\" Yes, the statistics support it, but that doesn't make it non-discriminatory. Statistics support a lot of discrimination we usually wouldn't accept. The real answer is that gender discrimination in automobile insurance in the Un... | [
"New drivers are statistically far more likely to be in an accident than more experienced drivers. Insurance is completely a statistics game."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Does stunted growth mean that growing will take longer, or that the maximum amount of growth has been permanently reduced? | [
"'Stunted growth' is a reduction in the **rate** at which a person will grow. This means they grow a lot slower than normal people. However, since (typically) you stop growing at around 18, stunted growth will result in a reduced size, assuming you have stunted growth throughout adolescence."
] | [
"So, you only grow during certain times of your life. Stunting your growth during that time period is permanent, because your body won't start growing more later if you change those habits."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the comment:",
"neg": "Represent the comment:"
} |
Why don't car manufacturers make all cars as visually appealing as Ferrari's or Lamborghini's? | [
"I think the OP is asking why a manufacturer doesn't just create a great fucking looking car without the expensive engine and components. Not - why doesn't Toyota Camry look like a Ferrari. c'mon, get with the program guys."
] | [
"I believe body types are copyrighted or trademarked, so you can't just throw a lamborghini body on. Also, the frame of the car would have to change, which means you'd be changing the seating, the engine mount, etc - and since the size of the space under the hood isn't the same, you'd be redesigning the engine also... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
What does it mean to "Optimize" a game? | [
"Generally optimizing in video games is trying to get the same result by doing less work. This is usually accomplished by smarter use of the platform on which the game runs or removing redundant/useless operations that were not obviously wasteful before"
] | [
"How are you going to change the filter?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
why can NASA get super high resolution images of galaxies hundreds and thousands of light years away, but struggle and cannot get even a decent image of Pluto? | [
"The same reason you can get a brilliant image of the mountain 100 miles away in the day with your camera phone but a professional photographer wouldn't be able to make out the detail of a flea across the room in the dark It's easy to take pictures of huge bright things, even if they're far away. TINY things are ha... | [
"Those pictures are: * an artist's conception * a computer generated simulation base on what we can see from earth * another galaxy we think looks like ours As you point out, it is not possible for us to take a picture of our galaxy from the outside."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question about astronomy:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document about astronomy:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
Why did serial connections (like USB) win out over parallel connections? | [
"In the olden days, transistors / chips / electronics was expensive and wires & cables / connectors were cheap. These days, that equation is skewed the other way (and there's big pressure to make things smaller too). So, if you needed to send (say) 8-bit wide data down a cable you might use 8 wires (one per bit) pl... | [
"It's an old way for devices to talk to one another through wired connections, created by IBM and pretty much only used by IBM. At one point, there were a lot of competing standards (SCSI, Ethernet, Econet, Token Ring, LocalTalk, RS-232, IEEE 488), but most of these standards have died out, and most devices today t... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the answer:",
"neg": "Represent the answer:"
} |
Why do we view north as 'up' and south as 'down' etc.? | [
"Would love to hear from cartagraphical historians. How long has north been at the top of the page? Did this emerge simultaneously in unconnected places, or is it the dominance of one ideal over others?"
] | [
"The Coriolis Effect. The way the Earth spins causes winds around high pressure systems to flow clockwise, and winds around low pressure systems to flow counter-clock wise in the Northern Hemisphere. The opposite is true in the Southern Hemisphere."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit sentence:"
} |
How does the printer know what to print? | [
"If you have a dot matrix printer, it's pretty simple. First you click \"print\" on your computer. The computer then creates an image representation of your file. It picks a resolution, then goes over every inch of the page and records how much red, green, and blue (or yellow, cyan, and magenta, will verify later)... | [
"You may need to change the display settings on your console."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why do our ears feel weird when someone in the back of a car opens their window? | [
"The air moving into your car doesn't have an exit, so it pressurizes the existing air in the car, which then pushes it back out, over and over again. This creates alternating high and low pressure zones, aka, the \"WUBWUBWUBWUB\". Sounds are basically just alternating high and low pressure zones, so your ears are ... | [
"It's called tinnitus. You probably have a very minor case of it. It happens all the time but you don't hear it for the same reason that you can hear yourself type on a keyboard in a quiet room but not if you turn on loud music."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the comment:",
"neg": "Represent the comment about Health:"
} |
How does world news affect the stock market? | [
"Much of what determines stock prices is market confidence-- that is, how people are feeling about the company. So if a huge war were about to happen, a defense contractor (like Lockheed) would likely shoot up. This is also evident when retail prices go up before holidays, stock prices fall when a key figure at the... | [
"Like everything else, currency responds to supply and demand."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why do new "odors" have greater strength when first smelled but the longer you smell the more you become oblivious to it. | [
"New Smell: \"Hello\" Brain: \"Holy shit...do you have the potential to cause me harm?\" New Smell: \".....\" Brain: \"Hey...I asked you question!\" New Smell: \"....\" Brain: \"Meh\""
] | [
"This is probably more likely your taste receptors becoming less sensitized to the flavors in the food, similar to how your nose becomes used to a particular odor after a while and you can no longer smell it."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post about Science:",
"pos": "Represent the answer about Science:",
"neg": "Represent the answer:"
} |
How does squinting help improve vision temporarily? | [
"It's much like looking through a pinhole camera. Less light can get through, but since it's much more focused near the middle of the eye it won't distort as much. If you ever want to make something far away look bigger make a tiny circle with your thumb and index finger :)"
] | [
"Do you have corrected vision? And if not can you focus on other small things near your face without getting a headache?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title about Science:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit comment about Science:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit comment:"
} |
Does cancelling my credit card hurt my credit? Or is it better to keep it and not use it? | [
"Banks look at the total of all your credit lines, and the total of all of your debt. What they want to see is your debt to be a relatively low percentage of your total credit line. As the percentage of total debt goes up in relation to the total credit line, your credit rating goes down. When you cancel a credit c... | [
"Unless you have bad credit and are trying to turn it around as quickly as possible or if you are trying to eek out those last 5 points to put you over 800, the only thing you really need to worry about is make sure you aren't late paying your card. It won't really hurt (or help) to carry a balance or to not carry ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why were some countries allowed to break off from the USSR when it fell, and others were not? For example, why is Chechnya fighting for independence, but Ukraine simply got its independence? | [
"The USSR was composed of different \"republics\", the largest of which was the Russian one. Ukraine was another. The region called Chechnya was a part of the Russian republic, just like, say, Siberia. When the USSR dissolved, the recognised republics were made countries, so the Ukrainian republic became Ukraine. A... | [
"Kosovo's self-proclaimed independence has been recognised by 108 UN countries, and one non-UN country, the Republic of China (Taiwan). The remaining Serbs from North Kosovo want to remain in the Republic of Serbia, but Serbian majority towns are now rare in the Albanian-dominated, partially recognised Republic of ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
Why do drugs make our eyes look different? | [
"i wanna know this. also u got some of that hum... \"karma\"? *cough cough*"
] | [
"They dry out your eyes and can lead to infection."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
When downloading something why will 1GB take longer to download then another GB when they're both the same amount of information. | [
"Because they may not be coming from the same place, or taking the same path. Imagine the streets in your town or city. There are freeways, where everyone drives really fast, and there are major roadways, where people drive at decent speeds but there are stoplights, and then there are surface streets, which have st... | [
"The main one is that an OS trys to do it in the back ground. So it trys to limit the maximum speed of the download. Think of it like only turning a tap on half way. This way other internet things are not slowed down. The other reason is that Apple or Microsoft may not have the bandwidth to send millions and milli... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the answer:",
"neg": "Represent the answer:"
} |
How do we know the coloring and personalities of dinosaurs? | [
"We don't know what color dinosaurs were, but we can guess. As for personalities, we can assume that predators were predatory and herbivores were less so."
] | [
"Lack of DNA The 'shelf life' of a DNA strand is very short compared to how long ago the dinosaurs lived."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
Why does British seem to be the go-to accent for movies/TV shows with fantasy/medieval themes? | [
"High fantasy was largely codified by J.R.R. Tolkien's books set in Middle Earth. Much of the feel of it was set in a kind of medieval England or medieval Europe, and it borrows liberally from English and European folklore in that regard. So: why are medieval themed pieces using British accents? Well, simply put, t... | [
"Technically, nothing. Colloquially, anime refers to animated tv shows made in Japan, typically with a set of cliches (fighting sequences, expressions, plot lines, hairstyles etc.) and an animation style 'unique' to japan. Cartoon refers to animated tv shows most commonly made for/by American/European audiences, wi... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
What makes people heal faster than others? | [
"Some factors affect the healing process and they may vary among people. How the wound has been treated and cleaned, nutritional status/intake, the state of the person's immune system are factors to healing. Also, people who have high sugar level/diabetics have slower healing."
] | [
"So what is it about human physiology that makes this work differently for us?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
Why does even just water burn when it goes up your nose? | [
"The PH and salinity of pure water burn the nose. Sometimes I use a Neti pot. To make the solution for it you add baking soda and salt to distilled water and then it doesn't burn. I forgot to do it once and it did burn like hell."
] | [
"If you mean after drinking from it for a bit, it's the stuff that leaves your mouth and goes into the bottle when you drink from it."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
Why does food that should be warm seem to taste worse when cold? Also why does it seem cold when left out for too long, when it should only be room temperature? | [
"When it's warm, it has more flavor. Some liquids evaporate and give off that aroma, some liquids better coat your tongue. Food left out *is* cold, compared to the temperature it's served at and the temperature of your body. Food is usually heated above 100 degrees F. You body is in the 90s. Room temperature is usu... | [
"Because most coffee you drink is hotter than room temperature, so in comparison to what you expect the coffee to feel like, a coffee at room temperature would feel cold. But we usually drink milk from the refrigerator so when it's a room temperature it's hotter than what you expect. And the reason why coffee is us... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question about Food Science:",
"pos": "Represent the comment about Food Science:",
"neg": "Represent the comment about Language and culture:"
} |
Why aren't humans still evolving? | [
"We are. It just takes many thousands, if not millions of years to visibly see evolution. Evolution doesn't occur in the 5,000 some years that written history has existed."
] | [
"Also, why are some people not ticklish at all?"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
How do aged spirit brands(whisky etc.) that grow rapidly manage to have enough stock if everything is aged minimum 10 years? | [
"It's a secret sheepishly admitted to by some of the newer whisky brands: for the first few years, they would just buy commodity whisky from other distilleries, bottle & label it, and sell it under their own name, until the whisky they made themselves is ready. Once established, a small distillery might routinely d... | [
"Wine is usually sold right away after being made, and then \"aged\" to the preference of the owner. Hard alcohol is aged as part of the production process, and so it's important to know how long it aged before it was bottled. Think about it like this: You care about the year of the wine because you want to know i... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
Clerks Offices have recently been in the news for having refused to issue any marriage certificates in protest of same-sex applicants. Is this legal? Being funded through taxes, shouldn't their pay be docked for refusing obligatory services? | [
"It is probably illegal, but it is not completely clear. The legal argument a clerk could make is that it violates their religious freedom. This would seem to be a weak argument...a Jewish clerk couldn't refuse a business application for a restaurant that served pork...but recent decisions that allow companies to r... | [
"To be clear, the U.S. didn't exactly decide that same-sex marriage is legal at the federal level, what the Supreme Court recently decided was that a federal law that prohibited validly married same-sex couples from receiving federal benefits granted to heterosexual married couples was unconstitutional because it d... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
The Subjunctive Mood [English Grammar] | [
"The subjunctive is used to talk about possibilities and hypotheticals, and it uses the past participle of the verb. For example: * If I **were** younger, I'd still get summers off. * If I **had seen** him, I would have waved hello. * If I **had jumped** higher, I would have won an Olympic gold medal. * If I **had ... | [
"A Visual, Intuitive Guide to Imaginary Numbers: _URL_0_"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
How many wars are the US currently in, with whom and why? | [
"It really depends on how you define \"war\". If you want to go by locations where troops are stationed and receive imminent danger pay and combat-zone tax relief, here is a list as of 2013: _URL_0_ There were several changes made in 2014 but this is a pretty good list to give an idea of where the US military is st... | [
"Terrorist groups and rebel groups are trying to overthrow the government. The terrorists (including Al Qaeda in Syria) and rebels are funded by the US Government to buy weapons. Syrian government is killing them with guns paid for by Russia. This is what is called a proxy war, and neither nation ever learns their ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the sentence:"
} |
Why birds always fly forming a V. | [
"The V formation greatly boosts the efficiency and range of flying birds, particularly over long migratory routes.All the birds except the first fly in the upwash (Upward motion of air) from the wingtip vortices ( whirlwind ) of the bird ahead. The upwash assists each bird in supporting its own weight in flight, in... | [
"They are synchronized. Each bird follows simple rules, maintain a certain distance, do not get out of line, stay a certain distance and maintain the speed the others do. This keeps the flock together."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
What are idealism and realism? What are the differences between the two? | [
"They're actually complete opposites! They're both specific outlooks on life. If you're an idealist, you live your life based on the ideals you have - how you think a perfect world should be. For example: you support the idea that it should rain candy. You spend your days dreaming about it and wishing for it to hap... | [
"Can anyone suggest respected works that deal, on a theoretical level, with the concept of elites? Specifically from the standpoint of history."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
What did whaling ships in the 1800's do with the whales after killing them? | [
"If you get a complete copy of Moby Dick by Melville, there are 40 chapters in the middle that describe whales and what they did with them when they killed them. I enjoyed those chapters more than the rest of the book."
] | [
"In Marcus Rediker's article about sharks and the slave trade, while some sharks may have followed the slave ships across the Atlantic, he does not indicate that it caused the grounds of where particular types of sharks lived to permanently change. The sharks would be attracted to the ships for sure, but there are ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
What exactly is going on when a doctor places their hand "down there" and asks me to cough? | [
"Hate to break it to you but that guy at the bus stop was not a doctor."
] | [
"There are different types of hernias. This test is for what is called an inguinal hernia. They're actually not grabbing your balls. They are actually feeling right above the testes for any protrusion from the lower abdomen. They usually ask you to turn your head and cough, but turning your head is simply to have y... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit sentence:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit sentence:"
} |
Why sometimes things are now expensive from manufacturer's website than a third-party reseller? | [
"A major reason for this has to do with how the manufacturer's company is set up. They'd honestly rather not deal with small-time customers because packing boxes and shipping to locations is a lot of work. A place like Amazon has really efficient distribution methods, so it's cheaper and easier for them to ship pac... | [
"Most of the time they are not. Price shown is lower but when you are on the \"checkout\" page most of times there will be extra-fees. With these fees, your end price is higher than when booking the same flight directly from the airline. It's a trap."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
How are theaters allowed to oversell tickets | [
"Unlike what other people are saying they didn't oversell. Their point of sale software has auditorium max capacity counts and won't let them sell more seats than they have. What usually happens is sometimes there are more one off empty seats than anticipated and they elected to not ask people to move down or make ... | [
"The reason that websites like Ticketmaster are not functional is because scalpers use ticket-bots which hammer the website the second the tickets become available. This basically causes a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack for everyone else while the bots purchase all the tickets to resell at usurious pri... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit title:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit argument:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit argument:"
} |
If the Sun is closer to the Earth during Winter, why is it not hot as hell? | [
"If you do the math, it turns out that the few percent distance difference between summer and winter, is massively outweighed by the different amounts of daylight the earth sees, as well as the angle of the sunlight. You can think of it sort of like this...imagine having your hand about 3 feet away from a campfire,... | [
"If the earth had always been spinning the other way? Pretty much nothing interesting, other than the sun rising in the west."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post about Science:",
"pos": "Represent the comment about Science:",
"neg": "Represent the comment:"
} |
What are "shadows, midtones, and highlights" that you see in Photoshop/GIMP? | [
"Shadows is the darkest part of the area selected, highlight is the lightest part, and midtone is the average part. That's all there is to it."
] | [
"Cracks and folds are removed by carefully hiding them, either hand-painting over them, or simply copying nearby textures over them. Missing parts are painted. Faded parts of the foto are simply restored by taking the color that are present, and amplifying them (like turning up the volume). There are tools in the p... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
Why does the surface of the moon seem much darker compared to the surface of the Earth? | [
"The moon actually has a very low [albedo](_URL_0_), it only reflects about 12% of light that shines on it. Snow and clouds reflect up to 80% while even soil reflects 20-30% When we look at the moon it seems bright because the sun is blasting it with a crap ton of light and reflecting even 12% of a crap ton of ligh... | [
"The picture was taken when the Sun was down. The Earth is brightest because it's the planet nearest to Mars, and it's lit up because of reflected light. The brightest object in our night sky (other than the Moon) is usually Venus for basically the same reasons."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit question:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit paragraph:"
} |
What are some of the side effects of the Federal Reserve Act of 1913? | [
"This is an extremely broad topic. Could you be more specific about what you actually need explained? It's hard to determine what are the \"effects\" and \"side effects\" of legislation that impacted our economy and monetary in such significant ways. Almost anything could be shown to be related to it in some way."... | [
"An act the U.S. Congress passed in 1933 as the Banking Act, which prohibited commercial banks from participating in the investment banking business. The Glass-Steagall Act was sponsored by Senator Carter Glass, a former Treasury secretary, and Senator Henry Steagall, a member of the House of Representatives and ch... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
How do we know the chemical composition of stars that are so far away? | [
"Stars are big, fiery balls of *constantly burning* fuel. Now, you've probably seen something like this in high-school science, where you add a powdered chemical to a flame, and it suddenly changes colour; green, blue, red, etc. These changes occur because of the chemical compounds being added, and they absorb/refl... | [
"First, it is important to level set on the distance. The closest galaxy to the Milky Way is the Andromeda galaxy. It is around 2.5 million light years away. A light year is the distance that light travels in a year. Since light travels at roughly 300,000,000 meters per second, a light year is a very far distance. ... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the post about Astronomy:",
"pos": "Represent the document about Astronomy:",
"neg": "Represent the document about astronomy:"
} |
Dakota Access Pipeline | [
"There's a lot of shitty answers in this thread so I'll try to shed some light on the issue. An oil company wants to build a pipeline through native lands, and underneath the Missouri River. Since oil pipelines tend to break, and the Missouri River supplies water to a good portion of the country (I believe somewher... | [
"Star Wars Episode VII: The Jar Jar Binks Adventures"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit text:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit text:"
} |
Why are atomic bombs detonated in the air rather than when it hits the ground? | [
"It's because it makes the shock wave of the bomb more powerful, and therefore more destructive. In an air-blast, the primary shock wave reflects off of the ground. This reflection off of the ground \"reconnects\" with the primary shock wave, creating an over-pressure area known as a mach stem which is more powerfu... | [
"Those nuclear weapons weren't all detonated at the same time, which would put massive amount of dirt and debris into the atmosphere and block the sun, which causes the nuclear winter. Also, the nuclear weapons were of varying sizes, detonated in different areas of the world (including underground and under the oce... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the question:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document:"
} |
How do these "hot singles in your area that want to fuck" websites work? | [
"> Who is gullible enough Never underestimate the gullibility of a lonely socially challenged person that's unfamiliar with the Internet. And if the service that the link is providing is actually partially rewarding at all, such as if a mother of seven from Thailand with a nice younger voice is actually *talking fo... | [
"They don't want a \"date\" they want the companionship with none of the strings attached with a relationship. As Chef from Southpark once said \"you don't pay a prostitute for sex, you pay them to leave after\"."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
why we need to have multiple types of screwdrivers/screws and not just one all-encompassing type? | [
"Actually each type has different applications. Wood screws have wider threads and are tapered . Machine screws have no taper and consistent threads. Sheet metal screws have extreme tapered thread with slight tightening thread pattern at top. Deck screws have two different threads of the same shaft. Drywall screws ... | [
"Allen heads are more resistant to stripping than Phillips heads(good for more than 1 assembly), you can get more torque on them(good for less wobble), you can use them in tighter spaces, and they come in a wide variety of sizes and head styles For your desk, i'm betting that all the bolts that took the allen key w... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit query:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit answer:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit answer:"
} |
why don’t protons all repel each other in the nucleus? | [
"They do. But the strong force is stronger than the electromagnetic force at those very short ranges. Don't forget that there are four fundamental forces, the other two being the weak force and gravity."
] | [
"Scientists don't predict antimatter to be present in any significant quantity in the Universe. This is actually a very important problem in physics. We expect that at the Big Bang, matter and antimatter should be created in equal parts, and therefore annihilate with each other leaving nothing. The problem is, ther... | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document about Physics:"
} |
What exactly is asbestos and why is it so dangerous? | [
"Asbestos is a fibrous mineral that can be woven like cloth. A sheet made of asbestos has amazing properties because, being essentially rock, it cannot burn and is terrific insulation. This lead to widespread adoption in the building industry as it gave cheap pre-fab structures the same insulation properties as sto... | [
"When it is mined, there can also be asbestos in it. Many people currently believe that the talcum that has been sold for decades had an unacceptable level of asbestos in it. The companies that sold the talcum dispute this. & #x200B; Asbestos has been known to cause cancer."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the title:",
"pos": "Represent the text:",
"neg": "Represent the text:"
} |
Why computers sometimes take so long to cancel a print job and begin the next? It even sometimes requires a restart. | [
"[Here is an explanation and a way to resolve it from reddit user /r/Shikyo from four years ago that will help.](_URL_0_)"
] | [
"Actual ELI5: Because the programs are busy doing things, and if you click shut down they get a chance to finish what they are doing. If you hold the power button down they get cut off in the middle, which can mess things up if they are doing something important."
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the query:",
"pos": "Represent the document:",
"neg": "Represent the document about Technology:"
} |
Is there any evidence to suggest that current animals have evolved to overcome specific environmental challenges due to human intervention? I.E. Roads, Buildings, Pollution? | [
"Yes, definitely. A very early and popular example are/were moths in Manchester in England. Basically, the moths tended to be the color of tree bark for camouflage, but in the 19th century soot from factories in Manchester caused the trees to be darker in color. Moths with darker bodies and wings skyrocketed in pop... | [
"Just off the top of my head: * Natural disasters destroying their habitat * Natural shifts in climate destroying their habitat * Food shortages * Diseases killing either them, or a necessary link in their food chain * Being out-competed by a rival species"
] | eli5_question_answer | {
"query": "Represent the Reddit post about biology:",
"pos": "Represent the Reddit document about biology:",
"neg": "Represent the Reddit document:"
} |
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