Split (2)

train · 219k rows

question stringlengths 3 301	answer stringlengths 9 7.04k	context listlengths 7 7
Is there a way to determine the radius of a black hole, or would anything of the sort be a guess?	The radius of the event horizon can be calculated from analyzing the orbits of nearby stars or planets. From the way it interacts gravitationally with its surroundings you can find mass, and thus the radius of its event horizon.	[ "Any object whose radius is smaller than its Schwarzschild radius is called a black hole. The surface at the Schwarzschild radius acts as an event horizon in a non-rotating body (a rotating black hole operates slightly differently). Neither light nor particles can escape through this surface from the region inside,...
if everyone on earth infected with a common cold got better at this exact second, would anyone else get sick? if so how would it be transmitted considering there aren't any carriers of the virus?	Viruses can survive for limited times on various surfaces which would allow reinfection.	[ "The common cold is the most common human disease and affects people all over the globe. Adults typically have two to three infections annually, and children may have six to ten colds a year (and up to twelve colds a year for school children). Rates of symptomatic infections increase in the elderly due to declining...
Why does a log burn longer than the same amount of wood chopped up?	If you cut a cylindrical log in two, you increase the surface area significantly. This means more of the log can burn at once, and so it is consumed faster. This is not the only effect. If you put logs in close proximity, part of the radiant heat given off by one can be caught by the other, and structuring the wood ma...	[ "Decomposition speed of organic material depends on the carbon to nitrogen ratio of the material, among other factors. Wood breaks down relatively slowly because it has one of the highest carbon to nitrogen ratios of all organic matter that is used in composting. If the wood is not processed into smaller pieces wit...
where does white zit pus eventually go if you don't pop the zit?	It is consumed and carried away by amoeba-like leukocytes in your body called macrophages. Here's a video of macrophages doing their thing: _URL_0_	[ "Purulent sputum contains pus, composed of white blood cells, cellular debris, dead tissue, serous fluid, and viscous liquid (mucus). Purulent sputum is typically yellow or green. It is seen in cases of bronchiectasis, lung abscess, an advanced stage of bronchitis, or acute upper respiratory tract infection (common...
In general, how accurate do you find the CaspianReport's 'History of Islam' series?	> The thing is, Islam emerged in literate times. Historians were writing journals. Scholars were writing diaries and letters. Jurists were writing bureaucratic articles. So from the 7th century onward there was a rich record of documents, and that's why we know so many historical details. Noooooooooooooooooo... No...	[ "The series tells the full biography of the four imams of the Muslims from the Sunnis and the community Ahmad ibn Hanbal and the events that took place from the beginning of his family and social life and even began his scientific life in the request of forensic science from Muhammad and the Quran until his death, ...
How did the American Forces learn to defeat the Japanese during the Guadalcanal Campaign in WWII?	In the air, the Cactus Air Force was tying out new tactics to combat the agile Japanese Zero. "Cactus Air Force" is a nickname for the pilots of Henderson Field on Guadalcanal--codenamed Cactus. These pilots used a mix of aircraft, most notably the Grumman F4F Wildcats (there were some P-39's as well, and some dive b...	[ "In hindsight, historians have faulted the Americans, especially Patch and Halsey, for not taking advantage of their ground, aerial, and naval superiority to prevent the successful Japanese evacuation of most of their surviving forces from Guadalcanal. Said Chester Nimitz, commander of Allied forces in the Pacific,...
why do most current-gen games on consoles require you to wait until it's fully installed, while last-gen games could be played immediately?	At a guess I would say that new games are bigger then a disc can hold, my battlefield 1 digital game was 43 GB (rip my data cap :( ). Im willing to bet that if everything has to be read off the discs the load screens would be all over the place and, with all the massive open worlds lately, that would be a game killer...	[ "Some consoles lack the ability to play games from previous generations which allow a developer to release older games again but on the new consoles. The re-released game may be unchanged and simply be the same game but run on the new technology or it can be changed by the developer to have improved graphics, sound...
Why is it easier to remember a phrase or image than a single word?	The use of mnemonics such at those you describe are likely to work at a number of different levels. Firstly, when thinking about memory and learning, it is important to emphasise the role of attention. That is, when you personally create a mnemonic, you are assigning more attention to it which makes it more likely th...	[ "An experiment from 1966 showed that people remember a group of words better if they are within the same theme category. Such words that generate recall by association are known as \"semantic cues\". If the sound of the word is emphasized during the encoding process, a cue that could be used could also put emphasis...
the three scripts of the japanese language and their usage.	Hiragana ひらがな　is like the standard Japanese alphabet. Katakana カタカナ is used for words of foreign origin. Kanji 漢字 is that impossible to read shit that was imported from China. Now, why don't they just get rid of Kanji, since they are such a pain in the ass? They had this debate after WW2, and felt that kanji was pa...	[ "Japanese is written with a combination of three scripts: hiragana, derived from the Chinese cursive script, katakana, derived as a shorthand from Chinese characters, and kanji, imported from China. The Latin alphabet, rōmaji, is also often used in modern Japanese, especially for company names and logos, advertisin...
what are computer glitches and why do they occur?	In really simple terms, it's when you do something the program has no idea how to respond to. In a perfect program this would never happen, but no program is perfect. So for example if you glitch through the wall in a game, the game doesn't really know that you shouldn't be able to do that because maybe you did it in a...	[ "It frequently refers to an error which is not detected at the time it occurs but shows up later in data errors or incorrect human decisions. Situations which are frequently called computer glitches are incorrectly written software (software bugs), incorrect instructions given by the operator (operator errors, and ...
how do companies calculate and quantify the value of a new sponsorship?	Essentially, they guess. It's an educated guess based on past experiences, but a guess none the less. They know the size of their current market, and what portion of that they own. They make an educated guess on how much incremental revenue they will gain from being sponsored by whomever and then offer a deal that...	[ "Various investor classes look to the financial sponsor to generate value in a company as much as the management or operations of the company. In particular, debt providers are willing to extend credit in the form of bank loans, high-yield debt and mezzanine capital based in part on the reputation of and relationsh...
how does googles new ai work?	It is called machine learning and is quite complex. What it boils down to is that you break a problem into discreet parts, or steps. You show the machine all the different steps it can do. Then you tell the machine what the desired "win" condition is. It goes and compares all the different steps and series of steps ...	[ "Google bought the company in September 2016 and was initially known as API.AI; it provides tools to developers building apps (\"Actions\") for the Google Assistant virtual assistant. It was renamed on 10 October 2017 as Dialogflow.\n", "Founded in 2014, the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2)'s mai...
how would people, before television or radio decide who to vote for?	Newspapers were the major way information was spread before radio. Political candidates also did a lot more public speaking. They did "whistle-stop tours" where they basically road trains and stopped in every town and gave a speech. Local politicians would also speak in favor of their party in more remote areas.	[ "Historically, a country's votes were decided by an internal jury, but in 1997 five countries (Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Sweden and the United Kingdom) experimented with televoting, giving members of the public in those countries the opportunity to vote \"en masse\" for their favourite songs. The experiment wa...
Why exactly does spinning rapidly throw off our equilibrium.	This is not my area of expertise. But just in case you don't get a more detailed answer. I'm faily certain what you are looking for is the [Vestibular System](_URL_0_) of the inner ear. It contains a fluid which moves with your head/body and helps your brain understand/maintain your balance. When you spin very rapidl...	[ "where \"θ\" is the angle between the vectors Ω and L. Thus, if the top's spin slows down (for example, due to friction), its angular momentum decreases and so the rate of precession increases. This continues until the device is unable to rotate fast enough to support its own weight, when it stops precessing and fa...
what makes an everyday expense/activity tax deductable?	My dad's an accountant. Short answer is, you have to have a business or at least individual income to deduct business expenses. If you're an employee somewhere that doesn't count. If you don't file schedule C there are not many deductions you can take like what you're taking about. If you do, but the deductions are a...	[ "Similarly, the U.S. federal income tax law does not tax the imputed income consisting of the benefit one obtains from leisure. Professor Andrews wrote: \"It would undoubtedly be impractical to try to reflect either the value of leisure or the cost of its sacrifice directly in taxable income.\"\n", "William Nordh...
Natural sleeping position without a pillow	This is kind of an impossible question to answer from an archaeological perspective. Anything early humans/hominids would have used as a pillow would have been made from perishable materials that do not survive in archaeological contexts. Anything from furs to piles of leaves could have been used by early hominids as p...	[ "The choice of bed pillow depends to some extent upon sleeping positions: one manufacturer recommends a thinner and softer pillow for sleeping face down, medium support for sleeping on one's back, and a thicker and firmer pillow for sleeping on the side.\n", "A pillow is a support of the body at rest for comfort,...
Why was the Revolutionary War over after the battle of Yorktown? I never understood why the rest of the British forces didn't keep fighting, especially if they still had significant forces based in New York City, and if Cornwallis wasn't even the commander of British forces in the states.	Cornwallis had one of the armies in the South with Alexander Stewart commanding another in South Carolina around Charleston. The lack of a foothold in the states and resilience of the American army helped push the British surrender and evacuation. British forces held New York City, Charleston, Georgia, and other places...	[ "New York City remained in British hands until the end of the war, behind the protection of its large garrison and the Royal Navy. However, the inability of British commanders to defeat the Revolution led the war to drag on for eight years, resulting in the Continental Army's capture of two major British armies (\"...
If we could cause nuclear fusion on Earth (in a reactor, of course), could we use the products for fission?	It would be an unlimited source of energy the same way having a water turbine run on water that we can then pump back up. Law no.1: If it gave out energy, you need to provide energy in order to reverse it and vice versa. Iron is the bottom of nucleus potential energy. Fusion of lighter than iron nuclei with a lighter ...	[ "All current thermonuclear weapons use a fission bomb as a first stage to create the high temperatures and pressures necessary to start a fusion reaction between deuterium and tritium in a second stage. For many years, nuclear weapon designers have researched whether it is possible to create high enough temperature...
Why do we have organisms on Earth that can survive in the vacuum of space?	Why not? It is a side effect of having a form to survive harsh conditions on Earth, such as drought.	[ "Curiously, for as little life as there \"exists\" in the Negative Zone, it is very \"capable\" of supporting life. There, outer space itself is permeated with an oxygen-rich atmosphere, closely approximating Earth's. Consequently, humans can exist peacefully in space without the need for cumbersome pressure suits ...
Did the Greeks and Romans read the "classics"	> Did the Greeks and Romans read the "classics"? Absolutely. I'm much more familiar with the Romans than the Greeks, so I can only speak as to them - though I can't think of any reason that the Greeks would be different - but today's great Latin literature was definitely important back then as well. For example, *T...	[ "Through the Roman Empire, Greek literature also continued to make an impact in Europe long after the Empire's fall, especially after the recovery of Greek texts from the East during the high Middle Ages and the resurgence of Greek literacy during the Renaissance. Plutarch's \"Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans\"...
Are there any ancient civilizations that did not build stairs?	The wheel is something that would need to be invented in order to be used, wheras stairs and steps can form naturally, so this question would be incredibly hard to answer whilst sticking to the AskHistorians top answer guidelines. The wheel was an invention. Somebody wanted to find a way to reduce the amount of force n...	[ "It is believed the stairs were built some time before the rule of Tiberius (14–37), as they were not mentioned by name in any ancient texts that predate this period. Their first use as a place of execution is primarily associated with the paranoid excesses of Tiberius' later reign.\n", "Only a minority of the ho...
Why didn't the destroyed cities of Europe change their city layouts after World War II?	Some of it has to do with the internal geography (or metageography) that the residents carried. After a war where the familiar has been smashed, people very often wanted to hold on to some of that familiarity, and spatial arrangements were an important part of social interaction. Besides, what was below the ground ...	[ "Many eastern European countries had suffered physical damage during World War II and their economies were in a very poor state. There was a need to reconstruct cities which had been severely damaged due to the war. For example, Warsaw, Poland had been practically razed to the ground under the planned destruction o...
f-stop and aperture	Aperture is one of the things that determines how much light reaches the sensor on your camera. Think of it as a hole in a box. Inside the box is a kid drawing with crayons. (Don't worry, he's being fed.) The bigger the hole (the larger the aperture), the more light that gets in, the more the kid can see his paper t...	[ "In some contexts, especially in photography and astronomy, \"aperture\" refers to the \"diameter\" of the aperture stop rather than the physical stop or the opening itself. For example, in a telescope, the aperture stop is typically the edges of the objective lens or mirror (or of the mount that holds it). One the...
how does soap help remove body odor im comparison to plain water?	A lot of the stuff that makes us dirty and smelly is accumulated on our body because of oil. Oil traps in dirt and odors. And if you know anything about oil, you should know that it doesn't mix or dissolve in water. So while rubbing with just water might get rid of some surface oils, we use soap, which breaks down t...	[ "In chemistry, a soap is a salt of a fatty acid. Household uses for soaps include washing, bathing, and other types of housekeeping, where soaps act as surfactants, emulsifying oils to enable them to be carried away by water.\n", "The salting-out process used in the manufacture of soaps benefits from the common-i...
How do we know this is really 2014?	The most definite way is by old astronomical records. We know down to the minute when all the eclipses, periodic comets, etc of history took place, so if there was an eclipse on a certain day of the reign of the emperor Claudius, we know what year that was. Thus we know that there are some years we don't know much abou...	[ "The setting of XXVC is a possible future of the real universe that we live in. In the year 1999, the Soviet Union and the United States are involved in the \"Last Gasp War.\" This is the world's first nuclear war.\n", "The story takes place in the year 2031, after a series of worldwide crises called the Year of ...
How and when was it discovered the Mayans hadn't used wheels? Are their other questionable decisions that Mayans were 'blind' to?	The wheeled vehicle is not as intuitive an invention as most people seem to think. In fact, as /u/Daeres explains in [this submission](_URL_0_), it was only ever invented twice and possibly even only once, in the entire history of mankind. The reason the wheeled vehicle did not reach the Americas before Columbus is tha...	[ "The interpretation of Maya hieroglyphs was lost as a result of the Spanish Conquest of Central America. However, recent work by Maya epigraphers and linguists has yielded a considerable amount of information on this complex writing system.\n", "Critics argue that there is no archaeological evidence to support th...
how (in north america) social conservative values became aligned with economic conservatism	So there is this thing called [Duverger's Law](_URL_0_) which basically states that our electoral system will cause USA to have two dominant political parties which will effectively shut out all but the remote possibility of a third party candidate being elected. Because politicians want to be successful, they will be...	[ "The extent to which conservative ideology was embedded in 19th and 20th century Canadian society is evidenced by the power and influence of Tory factions in pre-Confederation Canada, such as the Family Compact and the Chateau Clique, the prominence of the Conservative Party of Canada after Confederation and the pr...
how do they make sure that low level employees at the white house (custodians, chefs, etc) aren't going to try to kill the president?	The same way that determine that the high level employees won't do it -- very, very thorough background checks.	[ "While the President may block certain appointments to the Council, he cannot remove a permanent member from his seat. In fact, it does not appear that any person has the power to do so. The door may be open for potential abuse with appointments based on some political agenda rather than merit. The counterpoint is ...
Does a colony of penguins stand s chance in the north pole? What about a polar bear in antacrtica?	Unfortunately not open access, but [this article](_URL_0_) is about those exact questions. Two answers to your questions, from that article: > If polar bears were transferred to Antarctica could they survive? And would penguins survive in the Arctic? > Polar bears would probably survive in the Antarctic, and the S...	[ "Although almost all penguin species are native to the Southern Hemisphere, they are not found only in cold climates, such as Antarctica. In fact, only a few species of penguin actually live so far south. Several species live in the temperate zone; one, the Galápagos penguin, lives as far north as the Galápagos Isl...
How are primers made for PCR chosen?	If the genome of the species you are trying to make primers for is well-characterised then the job of designing primers is not hard. In humans, while there is a lot of variation between people, the vast majority of a person's DNA is identical to the known human consensus sequence. So if you design a primer to be comp...	[ "Tetra-primer amplification refractory mutation system PCR, or ARMS-PCR, employs two pairs of primers to amplify two alleles in one PCR reaction. The primers are designed such that the two primer pairs overlap at a SNP location but each match perfectly to only one of the possible SNPs. The basis of the invention is...
what will happen to mickey mouse when he becomes public domain in 2023?	He won't become public domain. In 2022 they'll extend how long copyright lasts after the creator's death, just like the last two times.	[ "There have been multiple attempts to argue that certain versions of Mickey Mouse are in fact in the public domain. In the 1980s, archivist George S. Brown attempted to recreate and sell cels from the 1933 short \"The Mad Doctor\", on the theory that they were in the public domain because Disney had failed to renew...
why do we accept that all the world's diverse species have a common ancestor while human beings are considered to be too complex for having only one paternal and maternal ancestors?	> while human beings are considered to be too complex That has been debunked and is only believed by people who either don't understand evolution or refuse to accept that evolution is a fact.	[ "Biologists reason that all living organisms on Earth must share a single last universal ancestor, because it would be virtually impossible that two or more separate lineages could have independently developed the many complex biochemical mechanisms common to all living organisms.\n", "Assuming that all of an ind...
what is sdk?what is api?	When you walk into McDonalds, you can order a happy meal & get a nice pre-packaged meal (Burger, fries, toy, etc). But say you wanted to walk into the kitchen and make your own meal - you'd still have to use the ingredients the store has. You can't walk into McD & make a Taco Supreme as part of your meal - it does...	[ "An SDK can take the form of a simple implementation of one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) in the form of on-device libraries to interface to a particular programming language, or it may be as complex as hardware-specific tools that can communicate with a particular embedded system. Common tools ...
why can humans not digest fiber?	There are actually almost no animals that can digest fibers! Almost all animals who live off stuff like leaves and grass break them down with the help of symbiotic bacteria that live in their intestines. Humans only have a tiny number of bacteria than can break down cellulose, and they only break down enough of it to f...	[ "Whole grains, beans and other legumes, fruits (especially plums, prunes, and figs), and vegetables are good sources of dietary fiber. Fiber is important to digestive health and is thought to reduce the risk of colon cancer. For mechanical reasons, fiber can help in alleviating both constipation and diarrhea. Fiber...
why couldn't t-rex have been both predatory and scavenging?	Language like this is usually used for disambiguation. It can lead to confusion in the process, but mostly it's to try and avoid it. There's often some overlap between behaviour. In fact, most carnivores will scavenge when given the chance. There just wasn't much hard evidence of this specifically existing for...	[ "Obligate scavenging is rare among vertebrates, due to the difficulty of finding enough carrion without expending too much energy. In vertebrates, only vultures and possibly some pterosaurs are obligate scavengers, as terrestrial soaring flyers are the only animals able to find enough carrion.\n", "Most scavengin...
Inspired by Interstellar: What happens to the rotation of a large planet orbiting a black hole?	The reason for the time dilation that happens isn't directly due to the black hole itself, it is more to do with how fast the planet needs to orbit the black hole to maintain a stable orbit. If the planet is moving too slow it would just get sucked into the black hole. So for a stable orbit near a black hole that woul...	[ "In the case of stars orbiting close to a spinning, supermassive black hole, frame dragging should cause the star's orbital plane to precess about the black hole spin axis. This effect should be detectable within the next few years via astrometric monitoring of stars at the center of the Milky Way galaxy.\n", "BU...
When splitting water molecules by electrolysis, how would sperate the hydrogen and oxygen?	What? If I’m interpreting your question right, the two gasses will collect at the positive and negative poles in the circuit. Putting a test tube or some other container in the water over each pole will collect the gases as they bubble up.	[ "Liquid water can be split into the elements hydrogen and oxygen by passing an electric current through it—a process called electrolysis. The decomposition requires more energy input than the heat released by the inverse process (285.8 kJ/mol, or 15.9 MJ/kg).\n", "Water can be converted to its component elemental...
Why is it that every copy of the Bible that I've ever seen has two columns on each page?	According to the Bible publisher Crossway (publishers of the English Standard Version), the reasons are threefold: Printing in a single column increases the page count by 10 to 25%, which increases how expensive it it to produce. For the typical font size, the two columns increases readability (9-12 words per line is...	[ "Since the list of line totals [of the books in the Bible available] in the city of Rome is not reliable, and elsewhere because of greed is not complete, I have gone through each individual book, counting 16 syllables to the line (as used in Virgil), and recorded the number for each book in all of them. \n", "The...
Were the mentally ill revered and allowed to roam freely throughout the middle ages?	Well you probably don't consider Syria to be western Europe, but I happen to have a source that suggests this was the case in medieval Muslim Syria. The book is a discussion of Medieval Syrian Saints: "Certain men outwardly defied the ideals of Muslim piety by living in a state of ritual impurity, wearing filthy garme...	[ "In 1349 a church honouring Dymphna was built in Geel. By 1480, so many pilgrims were coming from all over Europe, seeking treatment for the mentally ill, that the church housing for them was expanded. Soon the sanctuary for the mad was again full to overflowing, and the townspeople began taking them into their own...
Gluon are reponsible for the mass of a proton but the higg boson are the responsible for the mass of a gluon?	Gluons are massless. Protons and neutrons get a percent or so of their mass from the Higgs effect (which gives a small mass to the up and down quarks), and the rest of their mass from the strong force fields (primarily) that bind those quarks together (and the strong force field is made of gluons). Finally: the Higgs...	[ "In quantum chromodynamics, the modern theory of the nuclear force, most of the mass of protons and neutrons is explained by special relativity. The mass of a proton is about 80–100 times greater than the sum of the rest masses of the quarks that make it up, while the gluons have zero rest mass. The extra energy of...
Does a star always have to be at the center of a solar system?	It's a misconception that stars are in the center of a stellar system. In such systems, all objects are orbiting around a common center of mass, the so called barycenter. Is the system a planetary system like ours, the barycenter is inside or close to the mother star, not because "it has to be like that", but because...	[ "Each star in the system has about eighty times the mass of the Sun. It is not clear why this system is located away from the center of the cluster. It is possible that the system was formed in the core, but that it was ejected by dynamical interactions.\n", "If the Sun were to be observed from the Alpha Centauri...
Before there was Rock 'n' Roll, what music did the rebellious teens of a decade such as the 1930's (and the surrounding years) listen to?	There was a time when Jazz was not fancy, there was a time when it was considered a corrupting influence. It was linked to crime, drugs, insanity, promiscuity... Check [this article](_URL_0_) published in Ladies Home Journal, August 1921. Racism was obviously a component in the prejudice against that music (and som...	[ "By the end of the 1960s, the American and British counterculture and hippie movement had moved rock towards psychedelic rock, heavy metal, progressive rock and other styles (from which Scorpions rose to prominence), incorporating, for the first time in popular music, socially and politically incisive lyrics. The 1...
When were governments first expected to create jobs?	I'll take your more specific question. The sources I've read about the creation of parks in cities (specifically Central Park, which I'll look through my house to find) shows that during the 19th Century there was some municipally centered demands to create jobs, but this was not to create jobs in and of itself, but ...	[ "In around 1890, both the United States and European governments created government-funded employment offices to provide work for unemployed unskilled laborers. These services proved to be unsuccessful. In 1933 during the Great Depression, with the Wagner-Peyser Act, the USES was reinstated “to set minimum standard...
When and how did child marriage start to be seen as inappropriate in the Western culture?	Child marriage was never really "appropriate" in Western culture; it barely happened. According to parish records, the average age for marriage was between 17 and 25 across much of Europe in the middle ages. The average age for women was 20 to 26 in Elizabethan England, and many writers of the time condemned child marr...	[ "The marriage decisions in pre-modern China traditionally were made by parents with the help of matchmakers, and the fate of the children were determined at an early age. Since the reforms in the twentieth century, and the implementation of the marriage law, such practices have been outlawed. Legally the decision t...
why do artists upload their full album to their youtube channel for free?	From an economic standpoint, there is a theory that this will actually increase album sales. It is based on the idea that psychologically, you want to do something for someone who gives you something. So, naturally, the thing to do in this situation is to buy the album, even if you can listen to it for free. Addition...	[ "They are yet to release a full-length album, because they prefer giving out their music for free. They have had millions of downloads from their site and other related pages. They did release a free multimedia CD of their singles and videos in 2001. The band does not have any policies against their music being cop...
What happened to the armies immediately after a battle in Medieval Europe?	This is a vague question and has many different points that can and should be considered. But in all, I will do my best to provide an answer to a general battle during the early Medieval period. First and foremost, open battles happened quite infrequently. I mean, very rarely did to opposing forces march to an open ...	[ "After 4 years (907-910) of heavy defeats (Pressburg, Eisenach, Augsburg, Rednitz) from the hands of the Hungarian mounted archers, every of which resulting with the annihilation of the armies (this causing a \"shortage\" in soldiers to the Germans), and the deaths of the German commanders (among them princes, duke...
Why does the sun change the color of my hair? Picture in comment	Did you dye it brown? When you lighten hair with a bleach, it does damage it and makes it more vulnerable to harsh chemicals (shampoos) radiation (the sun), wind and any other stress. Also if you dyed it brown, the dye would likely fade off revealing the bleached hair underneath. Most dark hair has some red/gold/coppe...	[ "Light encountering a painted surface can either alter or break the chemical bonds of the pigment, causing the colors to bleach or change in a process known as photodegradation. Materials that resist this effect are said to be lightfast. The electromagnetic spectrum of the sun contains wavelengths from gamma waves ...
How long did slaves in America retain their specific tribal identities/religions/languages?	Many of the customs survived. If you go by John Thornton's Africans and the Making of the Atlantic World, many of the Slaves, though coming from different kingdoms had many language and religious similarities. So when new Africans arrived in the United States there was little trouble in recreating a society they knew...	[ "While numerous tribes used captive enemies as servants and slaves, they also often adopted younger captives into their tribes to replace members who had died. In the Southeast, a few Native American tribes began to adopt a slavery system similar to that of the American colonists, buying African American slaves, es...
how is there a slow lane and a fast lane on the highway if the speed limit never changes?	Some people drive faster than others. Passing on the driver's side is usually safer, which usually means passing on the left. All the people merging in and out tend to slow down the outside lanes a bit, too.	[ "A 65 mph left lane minimum speed limit is sometimes indicated on 75 mph roads with steep grades, \"slower traffic keep right\" is also in effect. On one-way roadways state law reserves the left and center lanes of two or more lanes for passing. There are reduced advisory speed limits for some roads during poor wea...
how can a solution to a problem suddenly pop up?	Subconscious mind solves it for you with all of the acquired knowledge and experience. This won't happen if you've no knowledge.	[ "BULLET::::- Pop : When, during a solve, one or more cubies come out of contact with the puzzle, usually causing the puzzle to be unstable, in which, upon turning, more pieces may become loose and possibly pop out too.\n", "In a \"fixes that fail\" scenario the encounter of a problem is faced by a corrective acti...
If a king was presumed dead and an heir took the throne, what happens when the old king returns?	A slightly different scene. The Ottoman emperor Murad II abdicated his throne in favour of his son Mehmed II (aged 12). Murad wanted to pursue the beauty of the life, poetry and was fed up with government work. But when his son Mehmed II took over, there was an imminent danger of a crusade (christian coalition) to take...	[ "When a monarch dies without a clear successor, a succession crisis often results. For example, when King Charles IV of France died, the Hundred Years War erupted between Charles' cousin, Philip VI of France, and Charles' nephew, Edward III of England, to determine who would succeed Charles as the King of France. W...
Does muscle repair faster when asleep, rather than lying completely motionless?	Sleep involves increased secretion of growth hormone, which does stimulate increased protein synthesis in skeletal muscle. _URL_0_	[ "In addition, as a result of continuous muscular activity without proper rest time, effects such as cramping are much more frequent in sleep-deprived individuals. Extreme cases of sleep deprivation have been reported to be associated with hernias, muscle fascia tears, and other such problems commonly associated wit...
Were Gun Control Laws in the USA originally motivated by racism/Jim Crow?	The bottom line is, yes, there was definitely a racist root to much of it. One of the concerns of the Supreme Court in the infamous Dredd Scott case was that if blacks were citizens, then it would give, horror of horrors, "to persons of the negro race ... the full liberty of speech ...; to hold public meetings upon pol...	[ "Jim Crow laws arose directly from a Supreme Court ruling which validated a \"states' rights\" notion that blacks and whites could be equally well served using separate but equal public facilities. With \"Plessy v. Ferguson\" (USSC 1896) the United States Supreme Court confirmed the right of state legislatures to e...
What is the correllation between the name of chinese currency yuan and the dynasty?	They use the same character, 元. That's it. It's a common character, meaning "round" or "round coin". To elaborate, the Yuan dynasty was a period of Mongol rule over China, from c. 1260 (de facto, 1271 officially) to 1368 (1380 if you count the Northern Yuan dynasty when the Mongols retreated to Mongolia after Kublai K...	[ "The first Chinese yuan coins had the same specification as a Spanish dollar, leading to a continuing equivalence in some respects between the names \"yuan\" and \"dollar\" in the Chinese language. Other currencies also derived from the dollar include the Japanese yen, Korean won, Philippine peso and the Malaysian ...
Why are trees in the Sahara flat and wide?	More sunlight is a good thing for the tree, as long as it can get enough water. Other trees don't spread out so much because the competition makes it a wasted effort, but in the Savannah the chance of two trees thriving right next to each other is lower. It's easier for a single tree to reach deep enough with its roots...	[ "A possibility causing the variation is the Sahel, a strip of semi-arid land on the southern border of the Sahara. When rain amounts in the Sahel are higher, the volume of dust is lower. The higher rainfall could make more vegetation grow in the Sahel, leaving less sand exposed to winds to blow away.\n", "The Med...
what is existentialism? it seems like a lot of redditors believe in this philosophy.	([This](_URL_0_) is a good answer, but I figured I'd try for a more 5-year-old explanation.) You know that game you play, where you keep asking "Why?" until your parents get annoyed? That's basically what a lot of philosophy is. We say that it's important to get good grades. A philosopher asks, "Why?". Then we say tha...	[ "Existentialism () is the philosophical study that begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual. It is associated mainly with certain 19th and 20th-century European philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief in that ...
how are short daytime naps supposed to be beneficial when it takes you 1.5 hours to go through one full sleep cycle?	You don't need to go through a full sleep cycle to experience benefits from napping because your brain does different things at different stages of sleep. REM sleep (which takes about 1.5 hours) is important for making new connections in the brain and solving creative problems, but you don't need to do that in order to...	[ "The 20-minute nap increases alertness and motor skills. Various durations may be recommended for power naps, which are very short compared to regular sleep. The short duration prevents nappers from sleeping so long that they enter the slow wave portion of the normal sleep cycle without being able to complete the c...
why do people go diving with a snorkel that is not hooked up to any oxygen tank?	With a snorkel you can swim with your face in the water, checking out all the fishies and coral and still being able to breathe just fine. This is when you're at the surface of course. Snorkelers sometimes dive deeper, and the snorkel fills with water and they hold their breath. Then they return to the surface and b...	[ "A snorkel can be useful when scuba diving as it is a safe way of swimming face down at the surface for extended periods to conserve the bottled air supply, or in an emergency situation when there is a problem with either air supply or regulator. Many dives do not require the use of a snorkel at all, and some scuba...
Could anybody help me with good but easy written sources for the history of the United States from the end of WWI to present?	_URL_1_ PDF here: _URL_0_	[ "The library has continued its special interest in Rutherford B. Hayes and concentrates on the history of the U.S. from 1850 to 1917, especially the Civil War, Reconstruction, the Spanish–American War, railroad, education, black history and Indian/government relations. Second, the history of Ohio and the Sandusky R...
can solar storms permanently alter earth's magnetic field in some way?	Technically yes due to [Alfvens frozen flux theorem](_URL_0_). We know that the solar wind (and hence solar flares) interact and move the magnetic field lines. Due to Alfvens theorem field lines are "frozen" to the fluid flow. So if you move the field lines you move the flow and vice versa. So technically a solar flare...	[ "Data from THEMIS show that the magnetic field, which interacts with the solar wind, is reduced when the magnetic orientation is aligned between Sun and Earth – opposite to the previous hypothesis. During forthcoming solar storms, this could result in blackouts and disruptions in artificial satellites.\n", "Henri...
As modern medicine increases our longevity further and further, will different types of diseases emerge?	One has to assume yes on diseases never encountered before, but there isn't much of a detailed list at this time. A couple of things to think about. 1) Nuclear DNA damage There is some debate over whether accumulated nuclear DNA damage is relevant to human aging beyond cancer risk over the present human life span. Bu...	[ "In critical situations, biological and social fields of adaptation converge, forming an integrated, bio-social adaptation system: confronted with new and spreading disease and risk factors, modern medicine made people live longer, healthier, more productive lives, and that, in turn, set the ground for further prog...
What do historians specializing in Medieval history think of Peter Wilson's Heart of Europe: A History of the Holy Roman Empire?	I haven't read it, but I am inclined to do so. I'm nearly finished his The Thirty Years War: Europe's Tragedy and I've been really impressed by it. While one good book doesn't guarantee the quality of the others, especially as Heart of Europe ventures a bit beyond his usual comfort zone, I'm willing to trust the qu...	[ "The book talks about the history of Italy in the period of the High Middle Ages. Montanelli used as sources the work of the historic Ferdinand Gregorovius, who deeply admired, while the history of the Popes was inspired by Ludwig von Pastor. At the beginning of work is narrated the decline and fall of the Western ...
where do illegal drug chemists get the skills to make hard drugs such as meth or krokodil?	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.	[ "Clandestine chemistry is not limited to drugs; it is also associated with explosives, and other illegal chemicals. Of the explosives manufactured illegally, nitroglycerin and acetone peroxide are easiest to produce due to the ease with which the precursors can be acquired.\n", "AAS are frequently produced in pha...
what would a free-trade agreement between the us and the eu mean to these countries and to the rest of the world?	The trade agreement would give tariff free access to the $1 billion wealthiest people on the planet. It would significantly lower the cost for businesses that are based in the USA and export to the EU and vice versa. It is basically an attempt to compete with China both now and in the future, if EU and USA based firm...	[ "Free trade agreements were signed by many countries. The European nations broke down trade barriers with one another in the EU, and the United States, Canada, and Mexico signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Although free trade has helped businesses and consumers, it has had the unintended conseq...
How is a full DNA transcribed and what is the end result?	There are actually many instances of errors when transcribing a genome. When you're looking at sequencing something larger than say, 1kb of DNA, a common method is shotgun sequencing. While this can sequence entire chromosomes, it has to break them up into smaller parts and reassemble them after. There can be many gaps...	[ "Transcription is carried out by a DNA-dependent RNA polymerase that copies the sequence of a DNA strand into RNA. To begin transcribing a gene, the RNA polymerase binds to a sequence of DNA called a promoter and separates the DNA strands. It then copies the gene sequence into a messenger RNA transcript until it re...
why doesn't alcohol have the nutrition block?	Because alcohol is regulated by the ATF not the FDA. It looks like they're planning on requiring it soon though.	[ "The researchers noted that moderate alcohol consumption also reduces the risk of other inflammatory processes such as cardiovascualar disease. Some of the biological mechanisms by which ethanol reduces the risk of destructive arthritis and prevents the loss of bone mineral density (BMD), which is part of the disea...
what is a thermoradiative cell and how/why does it work?	I don't know, on a physical level, how this system works. Frankly, I'm too tipsy to research it. However, I can answer some of this from a thermodynamics perspective: Energy alone is not normally useful. It tends to become chaotically distributed everywhere. This is best demonstrated by heat, where the kinetic energy ...	[ "Thermogalvanic cells are a kind of heat engine. Ultimately the driving force behind them is the transport of entropy from the high temperature source to the low temperature sink. Therefore, these cells work thanks to a thermal gradient established between different parts of the cell. Because the rate and enthalpy ...
how do computers know where to send a web request if they only know a web address?	There are databases of where to look called DNS servers. They translate the web address to an IP address; which the computer understands and uses to send messages to.	[ "The identifying information provided by the user's computer typically includes its IP address, the time the request was made, the type of web browser or email reader that made the request, and the existence of cookies previously sent by the host server. The host server can store all of this information, and associ...
why do we praise the Templar Knights?	I haven't ever heard of someone praising them. I have heard people enthused by the mystery of the order, and the various myths that have sprung up around it. To compare them to terrorists is fallacious in the extreme, as well as anachronistic. They were an international organization, authorized by the pope to guard p...	[ "The Knights Templar, full name The United Religious, Military and Masonic Orders of the Temple and of St John of Jerusalem, Palestine, Rhodes and Malta, is a fraternal order affiliated with Freemasonry. Unlike the initial degrees conferred in a regular Masonic Lodge, which (in most Regular Masonic jurisdictions) o...
I want to learn more about Syria during and just after the French mandate	Check out the recent book A Line in the Sand by James Barr. He's one of the first English-language writers to look at the British/French power games in the levant, and he also take advantage of recently de-classified French sources which have been ignored to date. It's also very readable.	[ "France established its Mandate in Syria in 1920 following the Allied victory over the Ottoman Empire during World War I; from which France gained the territory of modern-day Syria. French authority over the area was finalized after their decisive victory over Emir Faisal's forces in the Battle of Maysalun on 24 Ju...
wth is going on with r/all?	this isn't really the right forum, 1: _URL_1_ 2: _URL_2_ 3: _URL_0_ 4: /r/outoftheloop	[ "Triple H is a group of members working together to move the station forward. The station broadcasts a wide range of local programming, interspersed with programming from the Community Radio Network (CRN). The station provides the Aussie Music Weekly Program to the CRN. \n", "WCPV (101.3 FM) is an English-languag...
Did WWI fighter pilots carry extra magazines for their machine guns? If so, how much did they carry?	The [Lewis Gun](_URL_0_) had a 97 round pan magazine attached to the upper wing on a 'Foster Mounting' that allowed the pilot to pull the gun backwards and change the magazine. Bear in mind the rate of fire on the Lewis gun was around 500rpm and that gives the pilot around 12 seconds of firing time. The SE.5a carried ...	[ "A mainstay fixed machine gun in German built aircraft (many of which were sold to other countries) well before World War II, by 1940 it was starting to be replaced with heavier caliber machine gun and cannons. By 1945 very few if any aircraft mounted the MG 17.\n", "The aircraft variant equipped French aircraft ...
Why is mercury a silver color at room temperature when other metals glow fire red at liquid temperature?	The color of glow is dependent on temperature, not state. The glow you see is the [blackbody radiation](_URL_0_) from the metal. Since liquid mercury or gallium are only 300^o K or so, they don't glow very much in the visual spectrum. Additionally, since the radiation emitted is a function of T^4 , things around room t...	[ "Silver does not react with air, even at red heat, and thus was considered by alchemists as a noble metal along with gold. Its reactivity is intermediate between that of copper (which forms copper(I) oxide when heated in air to red heat) and gold. Like copper, silver reacts with sulfur and its compounds; in their p...
why did kim jong il make so many trips to china and seemed to get along with its leaders when they have different ideologies?	They may have different idealogies, but from the perspective of global politics, they are on the same side. North Korea and China, and to an extent, Russia, all are not supporters of a world where the USA is a military leader/policing nation. Put simply, North Korea provides a buffer between China's border and US mili...	[ "These events are said to have marked the beginning of Kim Jong-un's distrust of China, since they had failed to inform him of a plot against his rule, while China took a dislike to Kim for executing their trusted intermediary.\n", "In March 2018, the Kim family's train was reportedly sighted in Beijing, which, a...
why do dogs go berserk over squeaky toys.	Basically, to the dog it sounds like a wounded animal and so the dog gets a sort of "thrill of the hunt."	[ "Affenpinschers are somewhat territorial when it comes to their toys and food, so they are not recommended for homes with very small children. This dog is mostly quiet, but can become very excited if attacked or threatened, and shows no fear toward any aggressor.\n", "Dog toys serve different purposes. Puppies, f...
Before NMR and similar instrumentation, how would chemists characterize a molecule?	Chemistry goes way back. Jons Jacob Berzelius was the man I consider the true father of chemistry. He had a thing for blowing air on hot rocks, and measured the weight changes very carefully. He figured out that things always happened in proportions... 2:1, 1:1; 1:4. With Dalton's concept of atoms, and Lavoisier's...	[ "Before chemistry became a science, alchemists had designed arcane symbols for both metals and common compounds. These were however used as abbreviations in diagrams or procedures; there was no concept of atoms combining to form molecules. With his advances in the atomic theory of matter, John Dalton devised his ow...
what art deco and art nouveau is?	Art Nouveau is a pretty, delicate, girly, mostly interior style of decorating and art. Late 1800s. Think of Rivendell from Lord of the Rings, basically. If an elf would use it, it's probably Art Nouveau. Lots of whiplash curves. Alphonse Mucha posters. Art Deco, on the other hand, is the kind of stuff you see on Ayn ...	[ "Art Nouveau is an international style of art, architecture and applied art, especially the decorative arts, that was most popular between 1893 and 1910. In Russian language it is called Modern (in cyrillic: Ар-нувó, Моде́рн). \n", "In the 21st century, modern variants of Art Deco, called Neo Art Deco (or Neo-Art...
Definition of War vs Conflict	I would argue that you're both wrong. > it was actually only a military conflict since it was never declared a war by Congress. That's a terribly American-centric view of the war and of war in general. Had North Vietnam declared war on the United States would it not have constituted a war if Congress had failed to ...	[ "War – organised and often prolonged armed conflict that is carried out by states and/or non-state actors – is characterised by extreme violence, social disruption, and economic destruction. War should be understood as an actual, intentional and widespread armed conflict between political communities, and therefore...
if falsely imprisoned for a long period of time, do you receive any compensation?	In South Africa , you receive your freedom back.	[ "In the United Kingdom a jailed person, whose conviction is quashed, might be paid compensation for the time they were incarcerated. This is currently limited by statute to a maximum sum of £1,000,000 for those who have been incarcerated for more than ten years and £500,000 for any other cases, with deductions for ...
how can people hold two opposing ideas at the same time? e.g. "doublethink"	I don't think it would be especially difficult, although I might be misunderstanding the nature of your question. The ability to hold two different opinions within your mind or consciousness is a ripe example of mental maturity, in my opinion. Ultimately all opinions are not true, simply on the basis of the fact that a...	[ "Doublethink is the act of simultaneously accepting two mutually contradictory beliefs as correct, often in distinct social contexts. Doublethink is related to, but differs from, hypocrisy and neutrality. Also related is cognitive dissonance, in which contradictory beliefs cause conflict in one's mind. Doublethink ...
if stars explode because they run out of fuel, what fuels the explosion?	A star is basically a massive continuous H-bomb in space. The thermonuclear reaction at the center is constantly trying to blow it apart. Gravity pushes back in the other direction. Forcing the star's mass towards the center. As a star burns up its hydrogen fuel it starts to fuse heavier atoms. That seriously amps up ...	[ "A star with ≲ M ≲ explodes because of the energy consumption arising from an electron-positron pair-production instability during the static O-burning stage, and is referred to as a pair-instability supernova (PISN). Theoretical estimates of early chemical enrichment predict that the metallicity produced by the PI...
What is the historical significance of Kiev to Russia?	Several nations claim to inheritance to the Kievan Rus. The Vikings did indeed sail down through Russia's many rivers and settle in several areas, Kievan Rus being the most well known. Although it is debated whether the founders were Slavs or Varangians (I imagine it was both). It was perhaps the first powerful stat...	[ "Kiev was the historic cultural centre of the East Slavic civilization and a major cradle for the Christianization of Kievan Rus'. Kiev retained through centuries its cultural importance and even at times of relative decay, it remained the centre of primary importance of Eastern Orthodox Christianity . Its sacred s...
By the time the last Roman Emperor in the West came to power in 475, the "Empire" was really just Italy and some other small parts. But just 100 years previously, the Empire had dominated Europe and North Africa. How did the citizens feel about this decline?	There's parts of your question that I'll leave up to people far more educated than myself on the subject to answer, but I'll try to clear up some misconceptions. Firstly, you state that "in 100 years it was all gone." That's not quite true: the entire eastern portion of the empire survived on the as the Byzantine Empi...	[ "After the death of Emperor Theodosius I (395), the Empire was divided into an Eastern and a Western Roman Empire. The Western part faced increasing economic and political crisis and frequent barbarian invasions, so the capital was moved from Mediolanum to Ravenna. In 476, the last Western Emperor Romulus Augustulu...
How many times have 'the Jews' been expelled/exiled/ejected/etc?	Important note, the Babylonians did not expel the Jews from their [the Babylonians'] land as the Spanish, French, Portuguese, and English did. The Babylonians conquered Judea (the land of the Jews) and expelled them from there TO Babylonia, although it should be noted that mostly the Judean elite was expelled while the...	[ "Three times during the 6th century BC, the Jews (Hebrews) of the ancient Kingdom of Judah were exiled to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar. These three separate occasions are mentioned in Jeremiah (52:28-30). The first exile was in the time of Jehoiachin in 597 BC, when the Temple of Jerusalem was partially despoiled and ...
why is fascism conscidered right wing and communism conscidered left wing?	The wings are an incomplete portrait of political spectrum, since an accurate description also needs to include the vertical authoritarian/libertarian axis. Communism falls under authoritarian left while anarchism is libertarian left. Conversely, fascism would fall under authoritarian right while something like Objecti...	[ "Left-wing fascism and left fascism are sociological and philosophical terms used to categorize tendencies in left-wing politics otherwise commonly attributed to the ideology of fascism. Fascism has historically been considered a far-right ideology.\n", "In \"Hate Crimes\", Vol. 5 (2009), Heidi Beirich said that ...
What happened to the Carthaginian people after the fall of Carthage?	Many of them were killed, many of them were sold into slavery, and many of them undoubtedly lived out there lives scarred by the horror that they witnessed. The city of Carthage itself remained devoid of urban settlement, despite the fact that it is a really good spot for a city, until it was designated as a location f...	[ "Many Carthaginians died from starvation during the later part of the siege, while many others died in the final six days of fighting. When the war ended, the remaining 50,000 Carthaginians, a small part of the original pre-war population, were sold into slavery by the victors. Carthage was systematically burned fo...
why are all the celeb naked pictures allowed on reddit but there was such a drama surrounding zoe quinn?	Well I think you could blame the Quinn thing on corrupt subreddits. Also the pictures are never related, we aren't on r/gonewild :-P	[ "While participating on the show, Barba came under media scrutiny when an anonymous source leaked semi-nude photos of her online. Images included her posing in a wet t-shirt at the National World War II Memorial and topless on a beach. She believed the photos had been stolen from her personal computer. Barba explai...
Why did tank destroyers using the Sherman tank chassis have thinner hull armor.	The M10 was a unique vehicle, and wasn't converted from anything that was already produced. The original prototype of what would become the M10, the [T35](_URL_0_), was just an M4A2 Sherman with a different, open-topped cast turret mounting a 3-inch gun. The armor on the upper hull was later changed to sloped plates, ...	[ "All the US tank destroyers were built without turret roofs. This was done to save weight but also allowed a wider field of view to spot enemy armor and quicker ammunition stowage. The drawbacks included vulnerability to small arms fire (especially from elevated positions), grenades, and splinters from air bursting...
Will a leaf continue to carry out transpiration once removed from its plant?	As far as I know, there are no significant differences in the measurement. We did transpiration measurements on olive leafs with the LiCor 6400-XT and we always took the leafs and brought them to the device. Although I was just the 'picker' during these measurements, I was wondering too. My advisor claimed to have made...	[ "The last stage in the transpiration stream is the water moving into the leaves, and then the actual transpiration. First, the water moves into the mesophyll cells from the top of the xylem vessels. Then the water evaporates out of the cells into the spaces between the cells in the leaf. After this, the water leave...
how can al qaeda both launch attacks against shia's yet also work with shia militants?	One reason is the strategic use of lesser enemies against greater enemies. Another is that al-Qaeda is a gigantic organization with lots of franchises. Some groups start independently and then declare allegiance to al-Qaeda in an effort to secure prestige, expertise, funding, weapons, etc and while ideologically simi...	[ "The Sunni extremist groups allied to or inspired by al-Qaeda and the Taliban routinely attack government and civilian targets in north-west Pakistan. They also attack the religious minorities and other Muslim sects that they consider to be infidels. The Shias in Pakistan frequently complain that \" \"the Pakistani...
We have Vampires and Werewolves, what did ancient people get scared by?	Your examples are things that ancient people did get scared by that we do not. Getting killed by wild beasts is a fluke nowadays, and while we are still afraid of twisted aristocrats, they take a different form in our imaginations than vampires and mummies. The monsters we're really afraid of are aliens, robots, serial...	[ "Calves were vulnerable to wolves and, to an extent, bears, while healthy adult aurochs probably did not have to fear these predators. In prehistoric Europe, North Africa, and Asia, big cats, such as lions and tigers, and hyenas were additional predators that probably preyed on aurochs.\n", "These known incidents...
SF₆ exists, so why are sulfur compounds with two triple bonds not a thing?	Because bonding isn't as simple as there being "free" bondable electrons. Each electron populates an "orbital", or energy state, that has a particular "shape" and definition. I don't know the exact orbital shell of Sulfur off the top of my head, but it's likely that the particular arrangement and geometry of its bon...	[ "Compounds that contain sulfur exhibit unique chemistry due to their ability to form more bonds than oxygen, their lighter analogue on the periodic table. Substitutive nomenclature (marked as prefix in table) is preferred over functional class nomenclature (marked as suffix in table) for sulfides, disulfides, sulfo...
Why does lake ice sometimes crack in a spiral?	Your pics look like straight lines. What spirals?	[ "Scree formation is commonly attributed to the formation of ice within mountain rock slopes. During the day, water can flow into joints and discontinuities in the rock wall. If the temperature drops enough, for example in the evening, this water may freeze. Since water expands by 9% when it freezes, it can generate...
when my computer freezes, why does the music hardly ever freeze or lag with it ?	It depends on how your computer freezes. I've had plenty of freezes where the sound gets frozen too and puts out a rather nasty stream of sound. Typically though, unless it's the program MAKING the sound that's crashing, your computer is hung up on some other program, and all of its resources are frozen trying to reso...	[ "A computer may seem to hang when in fact it is simply processing very slowly. This can be caused by too many programs running at once, not enough memory (RAM), or memory fragmentation, slow hardware access (especially to remote devices), slow system APIs, etc. It can also be caused by hidden programs which were in...
I'm looking for reading recommendations on labor history of Nazi Germany (in English)	Although it is long out of print, Robert Smelser's biography Robert Ley: Hitler's Labor Leader is a good introduction to the Deutsche Arbeitsfront, the state body that governed labor affairs and replaced trade unions. The ability of the NSDAP to recruit among certain segments of labor in the Weimar Republic is cove...	[ "The book examines to what extent German industry has part of the moral responsibility for the acts of the German state during the World War II. Krupp profited directly from requisitions of industrial capacities in occupied Europe. The Nazi war effort created a huge demand for workers in the armament industry; a mo...
why are furry creatures who lick themselves clean not constantly gagging on hair?	They developed specific physiologies from their repeated lickings that prevent things like immediate gagging, but that doesn't exclude them. For example, a cat will occasionally throw up a hairball. This is the exact hair that they licked off themselves. It's just stored in the digestive tract until a good time to hac...	[ "Grooming: Animals commonly clean themselves through licking. In mammals, licking helps keep the fur clean and untangled. The tongues of many mammals have a rough upper surface that acts like a brush when the animal licks its fur. Certain reptiles, such as geckos, clean their eyes by licking them.\n", "The animal...
how can insurance companies legally create terms for damages that are impossible to claim?	By the sound of it, if you had purchased the same flood insurance as the home owners, with the same terms, you would not have actually been covered. If the insurance company is saying, "You would have been covered if you had flood insurance", they are probably just taking your word for it that a flood occurred. They ha...	[ "If an insurance company violates that covenant, the insured person (or \"policyholder\") may sue the company on a tort claim in addition to a standard breach of contract claim. The contract-tort distinction is significant because as a matter of public policy, punitive or exemplary damages are unavailable for contr...
How long does it take to test someone for ebola?	Hypothetically between about 2 and 6 hours for either an ELISA or for a genetic test via PCR under ideal conditions. There may be some freaky kits to let you do it a bit faster but that is unlikely for ebola.	[ "The length of time between exposure to the virus and the development of symptoms (incubation period) is between 2 and 21 days, and usually between 4 and 10 days. However, recent estimates based on mathematical models predict that around 5% of cases may take greater than 21 days to develop.\n", "The window period...
why is white a brighter color?	White is a combination of all the colors of the visible spectrum. In screens, all colors are mixed using red, green and blue subpixels. So to get white, you have to turn on all three at the same intensity. Thus you get three times as much light as you would for a solid blue color.	[ "Black and white have long been known to combine \"well\" with almost any other colors; black decreases the apparent \"saturation\" or \"brightness\" of colors paired with it, and white shows off all hues to equal effect.\n", "Black and white have long been known to combine well with almost any other colors; blac...
Where does science draw the line on what is living and what is not?	From, the perspective of an origin of life researcher, life must be considered as a continuum. Some things are clearly living or not, rocks versus cats, but may things fall in between. Viruses are most certainly alive, they can't reproduce by themselves, but then again neither can a human (you need 2). My preferred dis...	[ "Life is a characteristic that distinguishes physical entities that have biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased (they have died), or because they never had such functions and are classified as inanimate. Various forms ...

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.