Question: Why is it that a planet with a lot of technosignatures would mean the Great Filter is in the past, but a planet with life and no technosignatures would mean that the Great Filter is in the future?

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 Why is it that a planet with a lot of technosignatures would mean the Great Filter is in the past, but a planet with life and no technosignatures would mean that the Great Filter is in the future?

The "Great Filter" concept is an explanation of the Fermi Paradox, which says essentially "If there are billions of billions of stars how come there are no alien civilization we can join?" The GF presumes that somewhere in the process from "a star forming" to "an alien civilization spanning the Universe" there are a series of steps and each step filters out some of the stars. For example, maybe the first step is forming rocky planets in the zone where water is a liquid. This might be an optional step, if some life doesn't use water in its chemistry, but we've got no evidence for that. So, your star gets "filtered out" of the race to civilize the Universe if you don't have rocky planets in the right region. This filter doesn't explain the paradox, as we've been able to find planets in the right region with even our crude tools. So, it's a filter, but not The Great Filter. Maybe the Great Filter is life, or multicellular life, or intelligent life, or control of fire, or electric power control, or nuclear energy control, or fusion energy control, or warp drive, or ... . The real question behind the GF theory is "Is Humanity past the Great Filter?" Are we the civilization that will some day in the future rule the Universe?? Finding rocky planets, which we have on Earth, indicates that the GF is forward from that. Funding radio communication (which we have not yet done), indicates that the GF is forward from radio. Since we don't find radio communications, that's sorta evidence that the GF is behind us and we are on our way to being Masters of the Universe. But, our ability to detect radio communication at distance is pretty poor, and we've only had radio for 100-ish years, so this evidence is pretty weak. Finding a techsignature would be excellent evidence that we are not yet through the GF.


Question: Is there any one food that's nutritious enough for a human to survive indefinitely eating only that food?

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 Is there any one food that's nutritious enough for a human to survive indefinitely eating only that food?

Potatoes. The caveat is you'd probably need at least two types of potatoes (white potatoes + sweet potatoes) to work. They have the necessary carbs, fats, and proteins as well as some minor but necessary nutrients like Vitamin K. Unfortunately you'd run into some issues with certain vitamin and mineral deficiencies like iodide and Vitamin A for example. In those cases you'd need something like cheese or iodized salt for the former and some butter or something for the latter. It wouldn't be ideal but you could definitely survive for a long time. I don't know about "indefinitely" though. There really isn't a single food that provides everything you'd need to be healthy.


Question: How does reaction time develop or improve?

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 How does reaction time develop or improve?

The same way any skill or ability does. Imagine a bucket with a hole in the bottom. If you pour a gallon of water into the bucket, it'll take a minute to drain. That's your average, lazy, unattuned, slow-reaction-time brain. As you do things that require quick reactions, you start to poke more holes in the bottom of the bucket. It might have taken a full minute to drain a gallon of water with one hole, but with 10, it only takes a few seconds. That's what your brain and muscles do - they develop more(and more efficient) neural pathways which allow you to process inputs faster, and thus, react faster.


Question: How do metal detectors not detect themselves?

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 How do metal detectors not detect themselves?

the easiest way to think of it is like a flash camera. so the flash is a bulb with a casing that only allows the light to leave in one direction. It then reflects back into the lens and a picture is formed of everything that reflected light in that direction within a set time. In our scenario we are creating a magnetic field and using [magnetic shielding]( URL_0 ) we build a casing which guides the field in one direction. it then interacts with any metal (creating it's own different magnetic field) and we have a sense that looks for any magnetic fields which do not match what we sent out.


Question: I've heard many times that honey is actually a superb home remedy for burns. How true is this, if at all? What's the science and chemistry behind it?

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 I've heard many times that honey is actually a superb home remedy for burns. How true is this, if at all? What's the science and chemistry behind it?

It's at most *maybe* true. There was a metastudy conducted in India on whether honey was useful for healing burns, and its findings were that honey can be effective for improving the healing of minor, surface burns; its effectiveness was not proven on deeper or more serious burns, however. Since there's only one study, and the results have not been repeated, it's difficult to say how accurate the results were. The study did not explain why it may be effective, but honey does have mild antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties which *may* help promote healing.


Question: why does pop/soda "expand" and blow up my sealed water bottle?

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 why does pop/soda "expand" and blow up my sealed water bottle?

Just like you can dissolve solids (salt, sugar) in water, you can dissolve gases like CO2. And the amount you can dissolve depends on pressure (more pressure = more dissolved gas) and temperature (higher = less dissolved gas). So in a chilled, closed container where the pressure is higher than outside, the gas is stable in its dissolved state. But once you remove the pressure, it becomes oversaturated, meaning it's now an unstable state and wants to release some of the gas.


Question: What happens to a photon when it hits your retina?

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 What happens to a photon when it hits your retina?

Your retina has photoreceptors with specialized pigments which get modified by the inciding light. They change in conformation and affect nearby receptors, closing them and stopping a previously active influx of Na+ and Ca2+. Without the entrance of these positive ions, the cell membrane undergoes hyperpolarization (becomes more negative). This change in electrical potential is propagated until it reaches the end of the photoreceptor, upon which neurotransmitter vesicles sit. These neurotransmitters are usually released into the synapse on depolarization (the cell becoming positive), so in this case they will be *less* released. Nevertheless, the postsynaptic cell will detect this *alteration in neurotransmission* and will relay the signal to yet another cell, the ganglion cells. These ganglion cells take the signal to the lateral geniculate nucleus in your pons (part of your brain) which has another neuron that takes the signal to your visual cortex. There is more to it than that. For example, when one photoreceptor receives light, it hyperpolarizes, but it sends signals to the photoreceptors around it so they will do the opposite and depolarize. The neurons in the visual system aren't connected only vertically, but also horizontally, and these patterns are helpful for discrimination of contrast, geometric forms, and movement. Your nervous cells use several ion pumps to keep the electrical resistance greater on the outside of the cell membrane than on the inside. This increases the propagation of the current through the cell with minimal loss. Bigger nerves in your central nervous system also have myelin sheaths, which are layers of fat that make it even more likely that the currents will flow thorugh the inside. Note that not all cells in your retina are sensitive to a single photon, only those in the fovea, the place of highest visual acuity in the eye.


Question: How do you find the line of best fit on a scatterplot?

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 How do you find the line of best fit on a scatterplot?

There are different ways to do it depending on what you care about most. The most common way is doing a least squares regression. Basically you use calculus to figure out the line that makes the square of the distance from that line to each point the smallest. The math of it is a bit above an ELI5 but you can look up least squares.


Question: in the military, what happens when a lower ranking officer has to arrest/detain a commanding officer?

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 in the military, what happens when a lower ranking officer has to arrest/detain a commanding officer?

This is a movie magic trope, not reality. If some weird crazy thing happened where a senior officer was being arrested (probably for being accused of some major crime, like maybe they are accused of rape for example) the military police, would come in and arrest them. These are basically the same situation as any police force so rank doesn't matter, they're cops. It would not be his own unit, they aren't cops, the cops would do it. If you're thinking some crazy scenario where a junior officer thinks their boss is doing something weird and has their troops detain him, thats movie magic.


Question: If the military chooses the lowest bidder when purchasing products why is "Military Grade" considered a superior quality product?

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 If the military chooses the lowest bidder when purchasing products why is "Military Grade" considered a superior quality product?

It's something civilians think is superior based on "if the Military uses it, then it must be top of the line!". Terms like Military Grade or Mil-Spec doesn't exactly mean lowest bidder - more like the cheapest that will still work enough. Make sense? Hopefully someone will have a better explanation.


Question: Physiologically, what's happening differently inside our bodies when we speak vs. whisper vs. yell?

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 Physiologically, what's happening differently inside our bodies when we speak vs. whisper vs. yell?

Speaking vs whispering is the difference between engaging your vocal chords or not. The vocal chords are what give you your "voice". It's your lips and tongue and mouth shape that actually control the air flow to give it the sounds that give your voice meaning. When you whisper, you're simply relaxing your vocal chords so that they don't vibrate and don't create sound. You still make all the same mouth shapes, though, so the air moving through still makes all the same sounds needed to be understood. Yelling is just shoving more air past your vocal cords. More air means more volume. If you push *too much* air and don't have the kind of strength and control over the muscles that control your vocal cords, the yell ends up sounding rough because although the cords are tight enough to produce sound, they're flapping around more than they normally should.


Question: Why is k-12 a state issue when most citizens look to the federal government?

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 Why is k-12 a state issue when most citizens look to the federal government?

In the US if the Constitution does not specifically give the power over something to the Federal Government it belongs to the State. Education is not specifically given to the Federal Government so they are only allowed to put a few regulations on it. And what do you mean by "most citizens look to the federal government"? They look to it for what?


Question: How does the newer generation of captcha determine I'm not a robot? (The one where all you must do is click)

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 How does the newer generation of captcha determine I'm not a robot? (The one where all you must do is click)

It tracks mouse movement. If it was a bot it would immediately click the checkbox after it was loaded. You as a human have to move your mouse cursor to the checkbox and this movement is not in a straight line. So basically they just check mouse movement and time between checkbox being rendered and when it is clicked. There sure is much more going under the hood but thes is the basic idea.


Question: Why is there a statute of limitations?

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 Why is there a statute of limitations?

The difficulty of prosecuting a crime years after the event is absolute pain in the backside. Do you recall what you had for breakfast a week ago Do you recall what you had for breakfast a week and 21 years ago. Human memory is fragile. that's the first point Then we get into the logistic of a trial 20+ years after the event now officer Murphy the officer who discovered the crime and took information is in Alaska and retired officer jimmy has degenerative brain disorder, officer jones was on his first few days and had no idea what was going down. officer tom died three year after the crime Getting them in for this case also cost money and court time that is needed for all of today's crimes (all of today's crimes that the state or crown can win other wise the DA or CPS will drop the case) The witnesses are even harder to track, even if they can recall it. and we do kinda need them to have the look of a trial that any defense lawyer can't just break over his knee. Edit can you tell I did one of these...


Question: How are Open World Games like Red Dead Redemption 2 made in such detail?

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 How are Open World Games like Red Dead Redemption 2 made in such detail?

"Is every square foot of the open world actually created by a programmer" - not a programmer. For any large game, the asset creation is a major task, and people working on that tend to greatly outnumber the programmers. Good tools can help automate a lot, but still there's a reason why there's 3000 people on RDR2 credits list - it does take a *LOT* of manpower to make games in such detail.


Question: Why are we told to lean forward and put your head towards your legs in the event of an airplane crash?

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 Why are we told to lean forward and put your head towards your legs in the event of an airplane crash?

Ducking forward will protect your face from anything that may become airborne during a plane crash, while hands on your head provides an extra layer between debris and your precious brain. It's about protecting the head. One does not have an emergency position for a car crash because cars are built to try to save occupants when they are sitting normally in the chair. Leaning forward could cause you to get slammed against the dashboard even with a seatbelt on. At best, you should tuck your arms into yourself to avoid them flailing and being struck by things outside your body, potentially cover your face.


Question: what happens exactly when you blow out a candle or shake a match in order to extinguish the flame?

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 what happens exactly when you blow out a candle or shake a match in order to extinguish the flame?

The candle is surrounded by a pocket of flame that keeps it warm. Since it doesn't have very much mass, it doesn't take very much cold air to cool it down until it's too cold to burn. Shaking the match pushes this hot air away and replaces it with cold air. It's the same thing that happens when you blow on it.


Question: What’s the difference between infant formula for 0-6 month olds and formula for 6-12 months old?

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</answer>
 What’s the difference between infant formula for 0-6 month olds and formula for 6-12 months old?

It's essentially a marketing ploy and therefore depends on the manufacturer. There is a single set of FDA (or equivalent) requirements for infant formula, but the age-specific formulas may have differing amounts of vitamins, corn syrup, etc. It's perfectly fine to use newborn formula until 12 months (at which point babies should ideally be consuming family foods and have no need of formula, though they may still be breast fed). **Update**: here's some [medical advice]( URL_0 ) confirming this > Research shows that switching to follow-on formula at six months has no benefits for your baby. Your baby can carry on having first infant formula as their main drink until they are one year old.


Question: my Keurig coffee maker has a "strong" setting, what makes the coffee stronger if it's the same amount of coffee with the same amount of water?

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 my Keurig coffee maker has a "strong" setting, what makes the coffee stronger if it's the same amount of coffee with the same amount of water?

It allows the coffee to extract longer by increasing the time that the coffee is in the hot water physically. By increasing the time that the coffee grounds sit in hot water, the stronger the water is flavoured with coffee. A longer soak is a thicker bev. The same principle works for socks and old ladies.


Question: From where does plants and trees get their mass?

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 From where does plants and trees get their mass?

Literally "out of thin air". Plants are, as all life, mostly made from carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. Carbon comes from the CO2 in the air, hydrogen and oxygen from the water in the soil. "Photosynthesis" is just the process of grabbing CO2 out of the air and making useful stuff out of it, using sunlight as the energy source. edit: Soil is important for the other elements life needs. Phosphorous and nitrogen are 2 important ones here, that's why we fertilize crops with ammonia and phosphate compounds. Interestingly, while the air contains vast amounts of nitrogen, plants can't use directly it because it's extremely hard to break the N2 molecule apart, and only very specialized bacteria can do it.


Question: In computer science, how do packets get lost in the first place?

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 In computer science, how do packets get lost in the first place?

Many ways including: 1. Packet filtering due to policy rules 2. Routing errors causing loops resulting in the time to live TTL expiring 3. Link errors causing corrupt frames that can not be self repaired 4. Queue buffers getting full on routers 5. Software errors on routers such as the bloody VSS issue with have on our 6870XL at the moment and Cisco Tac are being slow resolving it ( not an ELI5 but a rant )


Question: Why is money taken instantly from your bank account for online purchases, but it takes several days, or weeks for a full refund?

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 Why is money taken instantly from your bank account for online purchases, but it takes several days, or weeks for a full refund?

Your bank immediately puts the money into a giant holding account to be transferred during the giant end of day batch transaction. The other bank will have to process the incoming money and put it in the appropriate accounts accordingly. As a result, the retailer doesn't actually see the money from your sale for several days. When you do a refund, the same is true in reverse. The retailer will see their money disappear instantly, but it will be in a banking buffer for a little while until it gets deposited into your account. The reason for all of this is that banks want to manage as few inter-bank transactions as possible. Having every $5 transaction between banks have its own link just adds a lot of room for error, and doesn't really add any value on the banks side.


Question: How come when it is extra bright outside, having one eye open makes seeing “doable” while having both open is uncomfortable?

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 How come when it is extra bright outside, having one eye open makes seeing “doable” while having both open is uncomfortable?

You have a blink reflex when exposed to bright light. Ideally, you're exposed to a light that's too bright and you squint or close your eyes to prevent any damage. You might ask, "Surely only closing one eye shouldn't help, since the open eye could still be damaged, right?" And you'd be absolutely correct. This is a glitch of the human nervous system. Essentially, this glitch occurs because your brain registers bright light by adding together the amount of light received in both eyes. If one eye is closed, that eye is receiving the same amount of light, but the brain is only registering half of the original amount. Fun fact, some people (Ze Frank is a notable example) don't have this glitch. You can (but don't, it's not good for your eyes) test this by shining a light in one of your eyes, blocking the light from getting to the other eye, and watching to see if your non-lit pupil constricts. Normal people's pupils will both constrict if one eye is exposed to bright light. In the case of Ze Frank and others, only the pupil receiving the light will constrict.


Question: In the early twentieth century smoking and drinking during pregnancy was fairly common. Now it is heavily emphasized that these practices are terrible for prenatal health, although babies were born normally for years despite these practices. How were so many babies born without birth defects?

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 In the early twentieth century smoking and drinking during pregnancy was fairly common. Now it is heavily emphasized that these practices are terrible for prenatal health, although babies were born normally for years despite these practices. How were so many babies born without birth defects?

Because they weren't born all that normally. And a lot of kids died very young. Looking at the statistics, back in the 1930s, per 1000 births, 80 kids died before being one year old. These days that is 6.5 per 1000 (and the USA is at the high end with that number). And seeing as disabilities were not as accepted and heavily disabled children were often hidden away and not talked about, it is easy to get the impression they just weren't around.


Question: Why do people sometimes get runny noses when they eat?

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 Why do people sometimes get runny noses when they eat?

It's called 'gustatory rhinorrhea' - in some cases a reaction to spicy foods which are an irritant; in other cases, like if your nose runs no matter what you're eating, its a mistaken stimulation of the nerves running to your nose that create mucous - the nerves that control saliva flow upon thinking about eating, or eating, or smelling food smells. The mouth glands are normally stimulated into producing saliva, but in these cases, your nose gets involved by mistake also.


Question: Why do people talk backwards sometimes? Swapping the first letters of a two word phrase or name. Ex: Brain Damage= Dain Bramage. Butterfly= Flutterby

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 Why do people talk backwards sometimes? Swapping the first letters of a two word phrase or name. Ex: Brain Damage= Dain Bramage. Butterfly= Flutterby

When it is not intentional it is a type of Literal Paraphasia. There are several types of paraphasias but this type of letter switching can be one. It can happen to a normal healthy person on rare occasions just like word dropping, meaning we cannot think of the next word of a sentence and it is 'just on the tip of the tongue'. But if it occurs frequently it can be the symptom of a neurological problem like a stroke or turmor, or induced by brain trauma.


Question: How do amateurs keep long exposure astonomy shots from blurring?

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 How do amateurs keep long exposure astonomy shots from blurring?

A ten-hour single exposure is difficult, requiring good equipment and experience. These days you can “stack” a series of shorter exposures in software to reach the same total exposure time. This has the advantage of being able to throw away bad exposures so a single adverse event doesn’t ruin everything. The software can also align all the shots, effectively correcting for any long-term drift in the tracking system.


Question: How do they fit 6.9 billion transistors on a 7 nanometer chip? Additionally, how do they connect them up correctly?

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 How do they fit 6.9 billion transistors on a 7 nanometer chip? Additionally, how do they connect them up correctly?

7 nanometer technology refers to the smallest feature they can make. As for how they can be made they are produced through a process called lithography. Individual layers are made and projected onto the material with light, interacting with chemicals to either stay put or wash away to mask areas so other material can be deposited. Think about making art on a wall by masking things off with tape or paper, then rolling or spraying paint on the wall to stick wherever isn't covered. Then you take it off and repeat again many times to make complex pictures. With chips they can actually be 3D structures as each pass lays down a tiny layer of metal or other material.


Question: Why are there only 10 digits?

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 Why are there only 10 digits?

The decimal system, which uses ten digits, is only one of several number systems that have been invented, so it's not accurate to say "there are only ten digits". Binary (2 digits), octal (8 digits) and hexadecimal (16 digits) are commonly used in computer programming. It's likely that decimal is the system most commonly used throughout the world because we have ten fingers, like you said. I'm not sure what you mean about the number zero being invented to differentiate from Arabic numerals - Arabic numerals are the symbols we *do* use (1234567890).


Question: how is a wildfire's containment percentage determined?

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 how is a wildfire's containment percentage determined?

Let's say the circumference of a fire is 10,000 feet long. At 31% containment, that means they have secured line around 3,100 feet of that fire. Wildland fires are contained by denying fuel for the fire to grow. That means that they literally dig down to the soil, clearing the ground around a fire of anything that could possibly be burned. When the fire reaches that containment line, it has nothing to burn so it doesn't spread. So when a fire is X% contained, that means that X% of the perimeter has containment lines of a quality high enough to prevent the fire from growing in that direction.


Question: My science teacher said, in physics 5x5=30 but in traditional mathematics 5x5=25. However in physics 5.0x5.0=25. why?

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 My science teacher said, in physics 5x5=30 but in traditional mathematics 5x5=25. However in physics 5.0x5.0=25. why?

Your teacher is talking about something called "significant figures". Significant figures talk about precision or accuracy in a measurement. Imagine measuring the length of an object with a ruler. This type of measurement isn't necessarily precise, right? You might measure something out to be 4.9 millimeters but your friend might guess it's closer to 5.0 When you say something is "5" centimeters, you're saying it is 5 whole centimeters but aren't talking about how many 10ths of a centimeter it is past those 5. The notation "5.0" says something like, "we're certain it is 5 centimeters and 0 whole tenths of a centimeter". Carrying it out further, "5.01" would be, "5 whole centimeters, 0 tenths of a centimeter and 1 hundredth of a centimeter". Now this is where 5.0x5.0 and 5x5 give different answers. You want to use the *least precise* number when doing calculations. The number 5 has one significant figure. When you multiply two numbers with one significant figure together, your result should be written with one significant figure. Basically, if you're doing a calculation, your answer can't suddenly be more precise than the measurements going into that calculation if that makes sense. Therefore, that answer is 30. There are a lot of rules for when a digit is considered significant or insignificant. You can read a lot more about it [here]( URL_0 ) 25 as an answer would say it's "two whole 10 units and 5 whole single units". The number "30" just says it's "three whole 10 units and we can't be exact about how many single units it is". Hopefully that starts to explain it.


Question: How do Rubik's Cube speed records work if the starting cube can have so many different variations?

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 How do Rubik's Cube speed records work if the starting cube can have so many different variations?

When you scramble a Rubik's cube, you're never more than 17 or 19 moves away from a solution(I don't remember the exact number, but it's around there). In practice, this isn't how speed cubers work, but the principle is similar. Speed cubers have different processes and memorized patterns of moves to get solve the Rubik's cube. Step one might be get all the edge pieces for one side solved, then solve the corners for that one side, and so on. These moves take about the same amount of time no matter how scrambled the cube is. The only time there is any variance is when solving one step also accidentally solves part of the next step.


Question: How does a Roth IRA work?

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 How does a Roth IRA work?

Basically it's a normal account, but you are exempt from capital gains, interest, and other taxes within the account (provided it stays there until you retire). This is in contrast to a traditional IRA where you are exempt from income tax on any money your put in, but then owe income tax on the money you take out when retired. Both types of IRAs have various contribution limits and requirements that force you to keep the money in the account until you retire. The benefit for both types if you owe less taxes overall by using an IRA (you don't get taxed for saving money). A traditional IRA is better if you pay more in taxes today than you pay when you retire (most people expect to go on SS [untaxed] and take a pay cut, so most people expect a low tax rate). A Roth IRA is better if you pay more taxes in retirement than you do when you're retired (typical if you're currently an intern and expect your pay to quadruple over the next 10 years, in that case a retirement pay cut is still more than you make now).


Question: What exactly have Man City done and haven’t Real/Barca/PSG been doing this for years?

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 What exactly have Man City done and haven’t Real/Barca/PSG been doing this for years?

The biggest thing is their parent company (essentially the royal family of Abu Dhabi) also owns some of their sponsors. The rules state there's a specific ratio of income to expenditures to be eligible to compete. Since the club and the sponsors are owned by the same people, the sponsors were paying heavily inflated sponsors fees as a way to inject cash into the club while looking like its coming from their sponsors. At its core, it's essentially money laundering to circumvent financial rules.


Question: Why are karats only up to 99% purity and not 100%?

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 Why are karats only up to 99% purity and not 100%?

You aren't able to remove every little bit of the various metals which are in a gold bar. By in large, no chemical process produces 100% purity. When they 'filter' out the different metals, some are left over due to random disorder in the system. The metal alloy slowly gives a higher content ratio of gold as others are processed out, but you can not say its 100% gold. Imagine you have a ball-pit with walls full of red, green, and yellow balls. This ball pit has a fan below it, and so the balls fly up and down, and hit the sides, hit each other and are just moving all over the place. You've found that the yellow balls have Velcro on them, so when you drop a large Velcro ball in there, they all bind to it. This large ball is easy to take out, because you've tied a string to it, and when you remove it, there is a lower amount of yellow balls than before. There are still yellow balls, but there is a lower amount. If you do this for every colour, you'll soon find you can't remove all of the balls, and so it is not worth your time. The second thing you notice is that the yellow balls add a preferred property to your metal; say they make it more colourful in the ball-pit. You would want to keep some to preserve this property, because it creates a better ball pit. For some alloys (metal mixtures), they do this as well, as things such as gold are very malleable, and an alloy can make it stronger. *This is not really what they're doing when purifying gold, but its a good relevant thing to note.


Question: Why is politics considered a sensitive topic to talk about?

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 Why is politics considered a sensitive topic to talk about?

Many people have very passionate opinions about political subjects. So bringing it up at a casual affair like a party or work lunch can get people upset and angry. If you believe that the people opposing your political views are literally getting people killed, a common belief these days, then it's hard to have a calm and reasonable discussion about it.


Question: How polygraph test detects a person lying? Is there any way to cheat the test?

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 How polygraph test detects a person lying? Is there any way to cheat the test?

Polygraph doesn’t detect lies. They take find a baseline by asking you normal questions to see how you react when they know you’re telling the truth (what’s your name?). Once they have a baseline, they ask harder and more dubious questions. They compare this to the baseline And determine whether you are nervous or not. Polygraph proves nothing. It’s pseudoscience.


Question: Why can't our inner voice shut up?

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 Why can't our inner voice shut up?

It can. Try mindfulness meditation. It takes a lot of practice but you can turn down the inner dialogue. This may or may not be called for in a given situation, but it's nice to have the choice if only for a few moments. As to why the inner voice always seems to be going by default, I am afraid I have no idea.


Question: Why does wind die down right before a storm hits?

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 Why does wind die down right before a storm hits?

To form and thrive, storms need warm, moist air that they suck in from their surrounding environment. This warm, humid air rises from the surface, cooling and condensing into water droplets which in turn become clouds. The rising warm air actually creates a partial vacuum with sucks colder, drier air from higher in the atmosphere towards the ground. This actually helps to push the rain towards the surface. With the more air being sucked in from all around the storms, the air moving away from the storm actually gets pulled back towards the storm creating calm ahead of it. [source]( URL_0 ) It doesn’t always happen but it is absolutely a real thing.


Question: Why does it seem that big things move slowly?

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 Why does it seem that big things move slowly?

1. Some big things do move slowly. Elephants for example move a lot slower than humans normally do. 2.The main reason we perceive it that way is to do with angular velocity. We look at how much of an angle an object covers in a certain amount of time or better: We perceive how much of our field of view a moving object passes. With big things, you have to stand quite far away to see the whole thing, so at that point it will move by a far smaller angle than it would if you were standing right beside it. Idk if that's a good explanation, hope that helped


Question: how does it work with copyright laws when someone does a cover of a song and makes money off it?

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 how does it work with copyright laws when someone does a cover of a song and makes money off it?

There is a thing called a compulsory license. Once a song has been released publicly, anybody can cover it if they are willing to pay a fixed license fee. The fee is currently 9.1¢ per digital download. However, most record labels don't like the compulsory license system and would rather get paid directly. So you can use a site like URL_0 to clear the song and setup the payments.


Question: Why are court cases named (e.g. “Roe v. Wade”) instead of just given an alphanumeric code? Are all cases that go through courts given a name or just the famous ones? Is it the same practice in all countries?

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 Why are court cases named (e.g. “Roe v. Wade”) instead of just given an alphanumeric code? Are all cases that go through courts given a name or just the famous ones? Is it the same practice in all countries?

"Roe v. Wade" refers to *Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)*. The "full name" is "Jane Roe, et al. v. Henry Wade, District Attorney of Dallas County". US court cases are generally identified as "plaintiff versus defendant" (or, in criminal cases, e.g. "state versus accused"), but are also identified by numbers. In the above, 410 refers to volume 410 of the SCOTUS' collected cases, and Roe v. Wade is case 113 in that volume. Famous cases become known by the "short form" of *plaintiff vs. defendant*.


Question: Did prehistoric humans cut their nails?

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 Did prehistoric humans cut their nails?

Specific nail trimming implements do extend into ancient history, possibly prehistory. Beyond that, ancient peoples tended to have a lot of work with their hands, which would contribute to general wear on the nails themselves, and even relatively primitive tools (or even unmodified objects) would be capable of cutting or wearing down nails without too much difficulty.


Question: What causes alkaline batteries to leak when mixed with other types of batteries?

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 What causes alkaline batteries to leak when mixed with other types of batteries?

All batteries of the same size pretty much always put out the same voltage regardless of what they're made of, so I think it may be a case of the other batteries may leak and they just copy-pasted the same safety warning. Those cheap "Heavy Duty" batteries you see in dollar stores are I believe Carbon-Zinc or Zinc Chloride batteries, an older, cheaper battery technology that has a lower capacity, and, more importantly, leaks when it is fully discharged. If you mix alkaline cells with these cheaper ones, because their capacity is lower, they will deplete first, but because the alkaline batteries will still have power left, your TV remote might still work, but one of the batteries is rotting it's guts out and is a out to spray acid all over your lap because, of course, you lost the battery cover. Its most likely a warning because if you mix battend types, one type may start leaking when it dies, but you won't be warned by all the batteries running down.


Question: Why does Facebook seem to be overrun with still images as videos lately?

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 Why does Facebook seem to be overrun with still images as videos lately?

Facebook Slideshow - it is a feature they released last year. Facebook wants you to share more stuff on Facebook - so it's rolling out a new feature designed to do just that. The social network thinks video is the answer to all its woes. According to The Information, Facebook has experienced a decline in original, personal sharing (it's down 21 per cent year over year as of mid-2015), but Live Video and video seem to be helping. People are no longer keen to post text statuses about what's going on in their lives, but they will post stories full of videos and pics to their Snapchats, for instance. Facebook isn't Snapchat, though. Users aren't limited to 10-second clips they can overlay with doodles, text, filters, etc. But they can post 20-minute videos and boring, static photos to albums. While Facebook Live is slowly adding some Snapchat-like features, the social network still has to make the process of posting videos and pics much more fun not only for users but also for people looking at this stuff in their feeds. That's why Facebook is now pushing an automatic movie-maker feature called Slideshow. It's similar to the new Memories feature coming to iOS 10's Photos app, and it's also a lot like the Movies Assistant feature in Google Photos. Slideshow, which originally launched in August as part of Facebook's photo-sharing app Moments, basically takes your recent videos and pics and spices them up a bit. You don't need to download an entirely new app to use Slideshow. The Facebook app will sync with your phone's libraries and is able to detect when you've taken five or more videos/pics in the last 24 hours. Facebook will then gather the media into a slideshow and create a preview of it at the top of your News Feed. You can ignore it or post it. The choice is yours. You can even customise it. The idea is you can now jazz up your lame videos and pics and turn them into something worth sharing (and watching). __________________________________________________________________________________________________ [Source]( URL_0 )


Question: Why does a harmonic series diverge while the sequence converges?

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 Why does a harmonic series diverge while the sequence converges?

The clearest way to see this is with a comparison test. The harmonic series is 1 + 1/2 + 1/3 + 1/4 + 1/5 + ... Now consider the sum: 1 + 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/16 + ... + 1/32 + ... + 1/64 + ... This sum is clearly smaller than the harmonic series. But you can group the terms of this sum as 1 + (1/2) + (1/4 + 1/4) + (1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8) + (1/16 + ... + 1/16) + (1/32 + ... + 1/32) + ... which equals to 1 + (1/2) + (1/2) + (1/2) + ... This is an arithmetic series which always diverges, but is less than the harmonic series at the same time, so the harmonic series must also be divergent.


Question: Why is the solar system always illustrated co-planar and all. Like since the Sun is spherical isn't it logical that some planets might revolve sun in plane perpendicular to what earth revolves? Why is the northen hemisphere always represented on top? There is no Top and bottom in the space.

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 Why is the solar system always illustrated co-planar and all. Like since the Sun is spherical isn't it logical that some planets might revolve sun in plane perpendicular to what earth revolves? Why is the northen hemisphere always represented on top? There is no Top and bottom in the space.

If you live in the southern hemisphere, you're more likely to see maps with south at the top. As for why it's coplanar, lets say you start with a bunch of dust, each particle moving randomly. as it coalesces into larger bodies, angular momentum is conserved, so if your starting cloud was on average orbiting counterclockwise when looking down on the north pole, the whole system will end up like that as the particles that started north of the plane will collide with and cancel out the particles that started south of it. If you look at other solar systems and galaxies, they don't orbit in the same plane as our solar system.


Question: If valence electrons determine how an atom reacts to the atoms around it, why do different atoms with the same number of valence electrons not act the same?

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 If valence electrons determine how an atom reacts to the atoms around it, why do different atoms with the same number of valence electrons not act the same?

I assume that you’re thinking about elements like Fluorine and Chlorine - if they each have seven valence electrons ordinarily, why aren’t they exactly the same? Well they’re both very reactive and will form compounds with many of the same elements, but the reason that they aren’t exactly the same in terms of reactivity and properties is more subtle and it’s helpful to think of it as their size and shape. Chlorine, for example, has a whole electron “shell” more than fluorine. This means that electrons are hanging out a bit further away from the nucleus than for fluorine. This gives it a slightly different size and shape, and therefore changes the way that it interacts with the world. And the number of protons matters as well - imagine a Cl- ion with 8 valence electrons and an O(2-) ion with the exact same number of electrons. The Chlorine ion has one extra proton pulling on those electrons, changing the size and shape of the ion, meaning that the two will react and behave differently.