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So, say a man and woman have a daughter, and then the woman and the man's biological brother have a daughter in secret. What would be the term for the relationship between the two girls? | They'd likely just be called half sisters. Never mind that they are technically cousins, too. | genetically it would be the same as if they were siblings. |
The difference between White, Brown, Pink, and Grey Noise. | Are you familiar with the tone control on an audio amplifier? If the knob is set to the middle, then each frequency is amplified equally. That is like white noise. If the knob is turned halfway to bass, that's like pink noise. The low frequencies are stronger than the high. If the knob is turned all the way to bass, that's like brown noise. The low frequencies even stronger than the high. | If I understand it right, white noise stabilizes the decibel level in the room where any noise quieter than that level is drowned out. When it's completely quiet you will hear all noises at all levels. |
How do people make Reddit bots? | In the same way that every program is made, by programming them. Reddit has an API you can use, too: _URL_0_ This means that a program can make requests towards the reddit server, and get replies back that the program can understand. For example: [this link](_URL_1_) returns a big chunk of information about the eli5 subreddit, which a bot can understand. There are similar links for most functionality on reddit, eg. posting/reading comments, upvoting etc. | People just want to keep making them, reddit is popular after all. Their triggers vary by the purpose of the bot. They aren't updated, they find updates themselves. Using the reddit API you can automatically search for whatever you want to trigger your bot and when a trigger is found you use your program to generate the response and the reddit API to post it. |
We are made from stardust? | When stars go supernova the heavier elements needed to form the molecules for the essential proteins needed for life, are made. These atoms are then propelled by the supernova out into space until they reach damnit land (earth). This of course is the dumbed down version. | Elements up to lithium were created in the big bang, up to iron are created in stars, and up to uranium are created in supernovae. Elements bigger than uranium are generally created at atom smashers on Earth. |
Would Jesus have had a dog at any time in his life? | It's very unlikely. Traditional Jewish attitudes towards dogs see them as unclean, and they were not generally kept as pets. The term was applied metaphorically to Gentiles, reinforcing their association with uncleanness. Dogs are only mentioned negatively in the canonical New Testament corpus. On this basis it seems improbably that Jesus would have had a dog. | hi! you'll find several posts on this topic in the FAQ (link on sidebar) * [Did Jesus exist?](_URL_0_) |
How fast can a white blood cell travel? | The speed at which the cells will move will significantly depend on a range of factors, such as the local environment. But to give you a sense of the speed, there was [one study](_URL_0_) where researchers used 3D microscopy to track neutrophils moving through a forest of collagen fibers. They found a speed of ~10um/minute. This is about the same size as the diameter of the cell, meaning that they travel their own size about once per minute. | In general, when you're at rest, any random blood cell does a full lap about once per minute. Blood moves fastest in the aorta, when first being squirted out of the heart, at about 40 cm/sec. It moves slowest in the tiny capillaries, much less than 0.001 cm/sec. But the capillaries are so short that the blood still only spends a short time there. |
Why are programs allowed to use 100% CPU ? | We bought the CPU to be used, not to sit idle. If one program wants all of the CPU and no other programs want any, why would the program that wants it not be given it? The CPU doesn't have inertia. If someone else comes along and asks for CPU, it can be taken away from the first process in a tiny fraction of a second. | I was going to write up an explanation, but it turns out it was going to be very similar to this: _URL_0_ Feel free to ask any follow-up questions that arise from that, but that article explains CPUs quite well. |
How can a flood rise as high as a house? What prevents the water from just draining? | Water starts to flow "instantly", but it still takes time for it to finish and drain away. The massive amount of water in rivers means only a certain amount can flow away every day. If more water flows in from upstream in that day, then flood waters rise. It's quite possible in some areas to hear of flooding rains, then multiple days of news stories about towns flooding as floods waters reach them in turn. | In a flood, the extra water has nowhere to go -- it can't go into the ground like on a day of average rain because the ground is already saturated (filled) with water, so it just stays on the surface. |
When a music composer writes a piece in a certain key, are they only using the 7 notes in the given key? | No. The seven notes are the "central home base," but the composer isn't confined to just those notes. You can use chords from other keys, in modern music, using the 'flat 7' chord is common. (Song is in C Major, but a Bb Major chord is also used.) What Beethoven did and other composers do is modulate keys. Aka, spend some time in a different key, before coming back to home base. (Start in c minor, spend some time playing in g minor, then come back to c minor.) Great composers do this so seamlessly that the common non-musician may not notice. Hope this helps. Source: Took music theory courses in college/ professional a cappella arranger. | I don't have enough knowledge to go into detail, but I do know that the 7 note scale is not universal. Middle eastern music is based on a completely different scale that has more notes, and far eastern music is based on a 5 note scale. So, yes, it's completely possible! The first paragraph here notes all sorts of different styles which are based on a 5-note scale: _URL_2_ |
The difference between scripting and programming languages and any other kind of computer languages. | scripting languages are programming languages. The difference between scripting languages and other programming languages is that other programming languages are normally "compiled" by turning source code into something like a .exe when they're created, while scripting languages are interpreted as they run, this makes them slower to run but generally faster to create, which is useful in many cases. | The difference between compoled and scripting language is much smaller than between those and a markup language. So scripting languages are interpreted and executed on the fly every time you execute your script. A compiled language is prepared for execution once (compiled) and then just run every time you use it. Markup languages (HTML for instance but also docx, pdfs and whatnot. though docx are actually xml iirc) are not a program. they do not say do this, do that to your pc. they are a way to structurally describe data. in html for instance you describe what bit of a website sjould go where. Thats the gist of it. wanna know more? ask away! |
how don't white, middle class Americans know black people are harassed by the state and law enforcement? | Because people assume everyone is like them. And anyone who experiences something different, there must be a reason for it. So, I don't have to worry about the police, unless I'm doing something wrong. So if you DO have to worry about the police, CLEARLY you are doing something wrong. If you look at any group, anywhere, there are things they don't know about other groups because they have never been exposed to them. This is just one example of that. | According to JKNEWS, they have some sort of transparency law(s?) that would have the police release information of crimes more readily than the rest of the US. |
How/why do we lose our voices? | We have folds of skin in our larynx (we call them vocal chords) that vibrate the air. This is what makes the noise part of our voice (our mouth shape also has an effect, which is why when you whisper it still sounds like your voice). When we lose our voice, it's because these folds get inflamed and plump up, so they can't vibrate the way they used to. | Losing your voice is causes by inflammation in your voice box (larynx) this causes your vocal cords, which are basically 2 strands of muscle tissue to vibrate less which results in a change in the sound that comes out ranging from a hoarse or raspy sound to almost no sound at all. Inflammation in your voice box is referred to as Laryngitis. Laryngitis is almost always caused by either a viral or bacterial infection which may or may not cause other symptoms. It can also be caused by overusing your voice, such as cheering loudly at a concert or sporting event. Since vocal cords are made of muscle tissue this is very similar to the way your arms feel like jello after lifting too much when you work out, or your legs after running too much. |
WhatsApp announced end-to-end encryption on all of their services, so that no 3rd parties or WhatsApp themselves can access any information transferred. How does this work? How does WhatsApp prevent themselves from being able to see the data? | The data is encrypted, and it is not decrypted until the other device gets it. To visualize it, say I sent a safe to a friend via FedEx, now FedEx can't see what's in the safe because they don't have the key, only me and my friend do. | Basically it's an encryption scheme where you can perform operations on the encrypted data and get a result that when decrypted using the same method as decrypting the source data will result in the same output as if those operations had been performed on the original unencrypted data. This means that encrypted data can be given to an untrusted party to be processed without them being aware of what the data they're processing is. This is in contrast to conventional schemes where the party doing the processing needs to have an unencrypted copy of the data, inherently reducing the security of the whole process. |
I keep hearing more and more about solar flares/ storms - Are they a legitimate concern? What more can you tell me about this? | Solar storms are only worrisome to electronics and communications. A severe enough storm can disrupt the power grid, burn out sensitive components in satellites, etc. The only thing you should worry about is where to go to get the best view of the amazing and beautiful auroras they can produce. | Well, we do have a bit of an advantage planning for these things: [we've had one before](_URL_0_) to give us a sense of what will go wrong. The answer, unfortunately, is a lot. Solar flares mess up communication by adding extra energy to the wires and messing up wireless transmissions with static and noise. For telegraph operators in 1859, this manifested as a constant signal and actual shocks arcing from the wires and injuring telegraph operators. There was so much latent energy in the air that some telegraph operators managed to keep sending messages *even after unplugging all of their equipment*. Power lines encountered issues; it's expected modern transformers would fail and explode (taking weeks to replace) and telephone/cable lines would be unusable during the storm. Auroras would be widespread over much of the planet (as far south Cuba and Hawaii) which combined with signal failure means no planes in the air. |
How exactly ibuprofen/asprin work | Ibuprofen works by limiting the production of prostaglandins. Prostaglandins are involved in causing inflammation. Ibuprofen’s action as a painkiller and fever-reducer is due to its ability to stop the synthesis of prostaglandins. It does this by interfering with the action of an enzyme (cyclo-oxygenase) which helps make a compound called arachidonic acid which is in prostaglandins. By interfering with prostagladin production. It stops your pain. Aspirin and other NSAIDs work in a similar way. Edit: easier wording | Ibuprofen/Asprin work by reducing swelling (blocking the production of prostaglandins). They are good for pain that involves swelling (ear infection, twisted ankle, etc). They can damage your stomach if taken too much or too regularly. People with stomach and GI issues usually avoid these. Acetaminophen works in the brain by blocking or changing the way that your brain reacts to prostaglandins. The actual method is not fully understood. It is good for all types of pain but better for pain that doesn't involve a lot of swelling (i.e. piercing wound, general headache). It can be damaging to your liver if you take too much. People with liver issues usually avoid Acetaminophen. Normally you can take medications from both categories. Be careful about taking too much of either. Also beware that certain combination medications include these (i.e. Nyquil has Acetaminophen in it), so read labels carefully. |
Why do some many people hate Jar Jar Binks? | Because he is a slap stick character with much less charm or intelligence then the droids from the original trilogy. | Oh, he is, by those who know about him. I'm a big...whatever the opposite of fan is. He's definitely on my short list for historical bastards. |
Why do European capitals tend to be the biggest cities in the country, while North American capitals are only near those cities? | Washington DC and Ottawa were built from scratch for the purpose of being their respective nation's capitals. European capitals are much older cities and were traditional seats of power since medieval times. So the question is, really, why did the new nations built new capitals when they could have used already existing centers (such as Toronto or Philadelphia) as capitals? This is a harder question but my guess is that they felt that the capital had to be located on federal land - not land belonging to any state or province. If, say, the founding fathers made Philadelphia the permanent capital then it might have been seen that Pennsylvania had a privileged status since it hosted the nation's capital. Also, one could conceivably carve out Philadelphia from the state of Pennsylvania and made it a federal district but that wouldn't have been fair since it would have deprived PA of its largest and most important city. Thus they decided to build a brand new capital. | Population density. The population density of France is about 300 people per square mile, and that's one of the lower values for Europe. Germany is 600, Italy is 500, Netherlands are 1000, UK is 700. There are only 8 US states with a population density above 300/sq mi, and except for Florida, all of them are in the Northeast, where the US does have [something resembling high speed rail](_URL_0_). 35/50 states have a population density less than 200/sq mi and 24/50 are less than 100/sq mi. So it's just too few big cities too far apart. You could maybe extend the existing Northeast system south to Charlotte, NC and west to Detroit or Chicago, but after that, the number of big cities starts dropping off pretty fast. |
How are proteins and complex structures encoded into our DNA? | DNA is shaped like a ladder, with 4 types of rung. When a certain protein is needed, the ladder comes apart, and each rung attracts a certain kind of rung from a type of half ladder called RNA. These RNA rungs link together and float off to a factory called a ribosome. This is called [Transcription](_URL_0_) In the ribosome, the RNA rungs are grouped into threes, and each group of three attracts a building block called an amino acid. The amino acids form their own chain along the RNA, then separate. This step is called [Translation](_URL_1_ separation, the unique shapes of each link in the amino acid chain cause the whole chain to fold up into a special shape, that your body uses as either building material, or as a tool to make processes run or stop. | The short answer is that genes code for proteins. A gene is pulled out of the DNA strand, gets unzipped and messed with a little bit to yield RNA, which is then used as a template for creating proteins. The devil is in the details, though. Proteins can do *a lot* of really fantastic things. They can be used as structural units for tissues (bone, muscle, veins, etc), they can be used for signaling to guide the construction of various structures, they can be used in neurotransmitters, they can be used for directly transporting other materials, etc. To summarize, though, if your question is "how do genes tell us where the stuff should go?", the answer is very complex. That said, signaling proteins do a lot of the work. When tissues or structures are being developed, certain cells will transcribe certain genes into proteins and secrete them. This can do thing such as determine the path of micro-filaments that guide various materials to their final destinations and whatnot. |
How did Hitler feel about America as a country? | At first he thought it was naive, but had potential. He had very little direct contact or properly informed experts on America available to him, but he thought as a nation of brother germanic Protestants an alliance with a Slavic people like the Russians would not last very long. He was also ideologically inspired by the cowboys and the genocide of the Indians, and it made him think America would understand if he felt compelled to do the same in Russia (depopulation and deportation for living space and strategic territorial gains) Later, when he came to truly hate the Americans as rivals, he saw them as having a foolhardy belief in freedom of mass media that had allowed Jewish thought to spread ideology in the newspapers and had left the country in a more decadent, obviously race mixed state than he had earlier assumed | First question to help narrow it down for others - East or West Germany? or do you wish to know about how Germans viewed Hitler from both sides of the two German Nations? |
Why constellations in the sky, why not just jumbled messes? | outside my tag, but it's a topic of the Skeptical community of which I consider myself a part: Constelations are a result of [Pareidolia](_URL_0_). Our brains are hardwired to find patterns in noise because it helped us do things like spot predators, identify friends and foes, and find food. Combine that, the universal cultural tendency to tell tales, and our fascination with the unreachable sky and you get constellations as passed down through history. | The stars that make up the constellations are very, very, very far away. The Earth's orbit around the sun is tiny in comparison. So the slightly different view of the stars at different times of year is not noticeable. And yes, they are all moving, and moving quite fast. But they are so far away, and the distances they have to move to make an apparent difference are vast. Over thousands of years you'd be able to see the changes. |
What would be the implications if the existence of a magnetic monopole was found? | Side question: what could you do with a monopole? Assuming you could make them in large quantities. How would interact with matter, or other monopoles? | People have searched for them but so far without success. We don't know if they don't exist or if they are just very rare. Magnetic monopoles would make Maxwell's equations more symmetric and they would also explain why electric charges are all multiples of the same number. Some theories predict their existence but they could be very rare. |
Do most presidents issue executive orders? Have any been impeached for them? | The only president not to issue an executive order is William Henry Harrison, who was only president for a month. FDR issued the most (3,522), then again he was also president for the longest. Following him are Woodrow Wilson (1,803), Calvin Coolidge (1,203), and Theodore Roosevelt (1,081). Obama has issued 193. Only two presidents have ever been impeached, Andrew Johnson, for violating the Tenure of Office Act (acquitted), and Bill Clinton, for perjury and obstruction of justice (acquitted). Nixon resigned before he could be impeached. | An executive order is only capable of ordering something which the Executive Branch has the authority delegated by either the Constitution or act of Congress. This doesn't include just anything the President may want done. Any order must be supported by the relevant existing law. Technically speaking there is no explicit legal standing of executive orders, but rather they are a directive from the President which helps the administrators of the various departments to manage their duties. If they violate the order the consequences could be their removal from their position. |
Is it possible to generate a completely random number? | Yeah, you can use quantum phenomena to generate truly random numbers. For example, set up a Geiger counter and use the arrival time between two blips as your number. | Well if you're talking about purely software, then you don't. You can get acceptably "random" numbers by seeding with some relatively unpredictable input like the user's keyboard/mouse input, but there's a limit. Some motherboards [do feature hardware RNGs](_URL_0_) which are much more effective than software generation, and are probably the best you'll be able to do on consumer hardware. Then there are standalone RNGs which you can get which rely on different principles like diode shot noise or even nuclear decay to generate random numbers via quantum mechanical properties; which in principle can't be predicted or influenced. |
Why migrate north? I get going south for warmth, but why on earth go back? | 1) The South gets too hot in summer. If they stay they burn up. 2) Your main food source is North. If they stay, they starve. | Because of the position of global circulation cells--which are caused by a combination of uneven heating of the tropic and poles and the coriolis effect--the prevailing winds tend to blow north and south from these latitudes, carrying moisture away. These winds also blow somewhat east though, which is why west-facing coasts on these latitudes are still generally fairly lush. |
If black holes create gravity so strong that it's escape velocity =c (the speed of light in a vacuum) then how is it possible for matter or gamma rays to be ejected from the poles of that black hole? | Whatevers being ejected is happening from outside the event horizon (line of no return). It builds up to such pressure as everything is squeezed into the space around the event horizon, and that it's pushed out. | Nope. It just means the escape velocity is greater than the speed of light. Imagine you had a car that could only go up to 60mph and I tie it to a tree with a rope. But its a thin rope so you can get fo fast enough to snap it. Well this time I tie it up with a chain that would require you to go 80mph to break. But your car has a limit of 60. You go as fast as you can but you never escape. The nature of a black hole is only that gravity can be so strong it can prevent things from escaping even if they are moving at the speed of light, it doesn't mean that it attracts them past that speed since as far as we know nothing gets to move faster than that speed. |
Explain Like I'm Five: affirmative action and why that is still relevant today. | > Is it an HR requirment to have X% of your work force minority? That's a "quota" and no, those are illegal. The crux of affirmative action is that if you have two candidates for something and the are both equally qualified for the position, then affirmative action states that you are encouraged to hire the minority person. Keep in mind we are only a few decades removed from discrimination that pervaded the workforce. That being said, the conversation in America has been shifting towards looking to end Affirmative Action. The point was to help-out minorities who were disadvantaged for generations (making it less likely they would rival "whites" in anything). The next generation to go into the workforce will have had parents that benefited from Affirmative Action, so people begin to wonder how far it should go. | I believe she had a higher GPA and SAT/ACT score than minorities who got in because of affirmative action and UT wanting a more diverse student body. Thats how I would try to prove it. |
How did the Vikings affect Britain? | I suggest you ask a more concise question. Vikings affected Britain quite a bit. | You might be interested in this thread, wherein /u/Reedstilt answers the question regarding the Vikings: _URL_0_ |
Where did the modern military salute come from, when, and why? | Here's another question regarding salutes - often on TV and movies, you see salutes rendered when people are inside and uncovered. I didn't realize that salutes were only rendered when both parties were covered until I joined the Navy. Has it always been this way, or was there a change at some point? | I've never looked into the validity of it, but what I was told while I was in the service is that it dates back to the time of medieval jousters raising the faceplates on their helmets as a sign of respect to each other. When they flip it up, it put their hand up into the position that we recognize as a salute today |
How could possibly cell phone usage affect a pizza oven? (see attached image) | I believe that the picture is referring to the fact that you shouldn't be using your cell phone around the brick oven so you aren't distracted from the oven. It takes a little more concentration to use a big fire in a brick oven to cook something than it does using an electric oven. I don't think it has anything to do with the cell phone or it's signal interfering in any way with the way the oven works. | The ignition temperature of gasoline vapour is somewhere around 250C. A cell phone can output around 2W of RF max (the power reduces whenever possible to save battery). Nearly all of that RF energy passes right through a cloud of gasoline vapor without heating it at all. I'd be surprised if you could get it to make any measurable increase in temerature, let alone get it up to 250C. A much more plausible scenario would be a short or a battery failure causing the phone to overheat/catch fire. That could potentially create a flame or heat some localized part of the phone above the ignition temperature. Edit: A static electricity discharge could also be the cause (particularly if the person re-entered their vehicle while fuelling). |
If viruses are not technically alive, how did they come into existence? Did they evolve from something that was once alive? | Could someone explain what definition of life is being used in this question and how a virus does not match that? | Simply put, they came from the same way the flu or any other virus originated. At various points in history, viruses mutated such that they could be transmitted sexually. |
The illegality of collecting rainwater in some areas of the US. | Like most weird laws like this, it can usually be traced back to *some specific asshole*. So water evaporates and then comes raining down. This drains into the groundwater and joins back up with the reservoir where it is purified and treated into safe water. Nobody cares about you putting a glass out in the rain and drinking from it. But what if some dude with 20 acres of land tarps his whole property and collects hundreds of gallons of water? Suddenly there the reservoir is getting lower and lower every year, but consumption isn't going up. This can actually be a problem for smaller towns where people have significant property - hoarding rainwater can mean the town doesn't have enough water to go around. | The basic argument is that, by collecting or damming rainwater, you are preventing it from entering the streams, rivers and underground aquifers where it would naturally go and, therefore, harming a shared resource. |
Why is adenine used in so many important biomolecules but not other nitrogenous bases? | Fact: guanine tri-, di-, and mono-phosphates are also really important for cellular function. Why? I don't think anyone is 100% sure. But cells have evolved to utilize these compounds, and use them for a wide range of cell signals. | um, you need the proper atoms to turn one macro molecule into another. Carbohydrates have NO nitrogen atoms in them. Proteins are linked chains of amino acids which contain an amino group - which has a nitrogen atom in it. The body can't transmute one element into another :) The body can and does use the energy from carbohydrates to synthesize certain amino acids which it then turns into proteins, but it needs to get the nitrogen from somewhere (typically from OTHER amino acids that have been ingested) bottom line, pretty much all the protein in your body comes from re ordering and rearranging amino acids taken from other proteins that you ingested. |
Hi. just wondering what forces cause cells to stick together in order to from larger structures. For example muscles? | Cells actually attach to one another! They do this in a variety of ways, including membrane proteins whose job it is to grab matching proteins, junctions where the cell membranes fuse, and creating an extracellular matrix (think net) for them all to hold on to together! | I'm not sure if this a question about chemical bonding, or what align things in the body. Contrary to simple cell diagrams you would see in a textbooks, cells aren't simple liquid-filled sacs: both the inside and outside of cells and their components (organelles) are packed with structural proteins that keep things together. It is these proteins that "stick" cells together and facilitate movement within and outside the cell |
Why is wearing fur taboo, but no one really cares about wearing leather. | I think it's seen as acceptable to wear leather since they didn't kill the cow just for the leather. Pretty much the whole cow gets used. No one is buying fox steaks though, so the rest of the animal is wasted. A lot of vegans won't (or say they won't) wear leather though. | Leather requires more treatment and preparation, even more so when made into a garment of some sort. And cow skin is more likely to be damaged than meat during the course of the cow's life, due to fences, predators, fighting etc. |
Was the British Empire a real de jure empire? | Could you define what you mean by 'de jure kingdom' and 'de jure empire' in a non-CK2 context? | Well it depends on how you define power?At its height the British Empire ruled over 1/3rd of the world's population and 1/4th of the world's land area. Its navy was larger than the next two combined and while it maintained a small army in peacetime, in wartime it could raise an army over 8 million strong. In world war 2 the British empire was able to stand against the German and Italians practically alone for nearly a year. The British Empire was able to outlast the French, German, Russian, and Austrian empires, before finally collapsing. So clearly the British Empire was definitely worthy of the title "Super Power" . Source: The Rise and Fall of the British Empire by: Lawrence James is a good read if you want to get an idea of the scope of the British empire. |
Why can't protons diffuse directly through a plasma membrane despite their extremely small size? | _URL_1_ > lipid bilayers are highly impermeable to charged molecules (ions), no matter how small: the charge and high degree of hydration of such molecules prevents them from entering the hydrocarbon phase of the bilayer. Thus synthetic bilayers are 109 times more permeable to water than to even such small ions as Na+ or K+ This gives us a clue. _URL_0_ > Molecules that are hydrophobic can easily pass through the plasma membrane, if they are small enough, because they are water-hating like the interior of the membrane. Molecules that are hydrophilic, on the other hand, cannot pass through the plasma membrane—at least not without help—because they are water-loving like the exterior of the membrane, and are therefore excluded from the interior of the membrane. That's better. Ions are hydrophilic, the inside of a phospolipid bilayer is hydrophobic, so if an ion were able to get past the phosphatidyl group, it would be rejected by the lipid. | Less electrons on the outside shielding the protons, thus attracts more electrons more effectively. |
what is the reasoning behind fining someone for not having health insurance? | Ah, the individual mandate. So, health insurance works by having a big pool of healthy and unhealthy individuals. They all pay money into a big pool of money, and then healthcare costs are paid for out of that pool. The ACA (Obamacare) put a whole bunch of restrictions on health insurance companies about who could be refused insurance and what could be charged and so on. So, the net effect of these policies is that if one day you find yourself suddenly afflicted with a major medical issue, like cancer, serious accident, pregnancy, etc, you'll still be able to get insurance. As a boon to the insurance companies, they added the individual mandate. By making everyone carry insurance, it was supposed to make sure that all the healthy people were paying into the system BEFORE they needed major healthcare. If only the sick are paying onto the system, then it breaks down pretty fast because there isn't enough money to go around. | Another misconception about the ACA is that "almost all Americans have it now." That was the theory. In health insurance there is a concept known as "pooled risk." In other words, from the insurance company's perspective, if everyone has insurance, older people are more likely to use healthcare services and younger people (healthy ones) are less likely. That spreads the "risk" of payout over a broad group of people. In theory this should lower the cost of premiums for everyone. So why didn't it work? For a young, healthy millenial it's a lot cheaper just to pay the fine for not having it as opposed to paying monthly premiums. They (foolishly) feel that the chances of them needing the health insurance are minimal. So, they're not buying insurance. No young, healthy bodies paying into the system and they aren't in the risk pool to even out the risk. As a result, premiums go up instead of down. Source: Masters degree in Healthcare Administration |
How come we get no energy from water? Calorie-wise that is. | I can answer longer if this isn't what you're looking for. Take carbohydrates for example, there is a lot of energy stored in the carbon-carbon and carbon-hydrogen bonds. Our cells break these bonds and reform them with oxygen we breath to form CO2 and H2O molecules which are at a lower energy state. H2O in water is already at a very low energy state and our body has no process by which to breakup H2O into even lower energy components and get calories from it. | To gain chemical energy from a molecule, you must convert it from a higher energy state to a lower energy state. Water is already at a very low energy state. Trying to gain energy from it would be like trying to downhill ski on the beach...there is just nowhere else to go. |
Why do Americans that get angry about the Government spending money on social services often not care about the massive amounts spent on the military? | Most do care about the massive amnt of money spent onthe military. Your premise is flawed. | It isn't so much the institutions being free that some people frown upon. Everyone likes free stuff. The issue is how those changes will be made possible. Most tend to fear that it would require that the government raise taxes (which they don't want), and if not that then they would have to cut funding from some where else such as the military. This frightens people because A) they want to support the military (its a cultural thing), and B) less funding for the military makes them feel like they are at a greater risk. So in their eyes that compromise just isnt worth it. Some have a mentality of "if it aint broke dont fix it" but others fail to realize that while the current system might work for them, it doesn't work for everyone (which is a problem when your country contains more than just you). Hopefully that explains it. Let me know if it doesnt though and I will go into further detail :) |
When it's cold, how much of the steam coming off a pool is normal evaporation? | It is all normal evaporation. In warmer weather, the air is able to absorb all of the evaporating moisture. Cold air holds much less moisture so the evaporated pool water condenses into a cloud of tiny droplets until it spreads out enough to no longer be visible. Look up "Dewpoint" and "Relative Humidity" for further information. | It depends how insulated the pool is and if you are an infinite heat source (i.e. you stay the same temperature). |
How or why does moon sometimes appear bigger and in different colour? | When moon is near the horizon, we compare its size with trees, houses, building etc, which makes it look bigger compared to when it is not on horizon. You can test this by closing one eye and covering moon with your thumb and repeat again when moon is not on horizon. Your thumb should be at the same distance from your body. The reason for the color is due to the scattering of light by the atmosphere. Sorry for the grammar. | Two reasons. 1 : It's an optical illusion. The closer the moon is to the horizon, the easier it is to compare its relative size. It seems bigger mostly because you can see it compared to landmarks when it's low on the horizon. 2 : Atmospheric distortion. The lower it is on the horizon, the more "atmosphere" the light has to pass through. I can't remember exactly how it works but basically it acts as a lens. |
Does being able to function well mentally while you're high make you better able to function well when you're not? | No. Many people take cannabis so they can function better mentally, it’s not a boost, it’s a correction. | Just like normal people, some people with Down's Syndrome are smarter than others. A Down's Syndrome "genius" might have a 85 IQ and be highly functional, while at the other end, you might have someone with a 40 IQ who will need constant care. It is more noticeable, because the world designed for people with a 90 IQ and up. A 90 IQ and 140 IQ can both drive a car, use an elevator or prepare a meal, there aren't a lot of day to day tasks that are going to separate the two. But once you drop below a certain level, everyday tasks become huge challenges. |
Why do we put "The Congo" and "The Bahamas" but we don't say "The Canada" or "The Japan"? | Congo and Bahamas are regions (the Bahamas refers to the entire region including other islands) Canada and Japan are countries You might not say the Canada but you would say the North | Well sometimes it's what the name of the country actually means. Take for example the name "Ukraine". The general consensus is that the name derived from the word for "borderland". So therefore, when you say "The Ukraine", you're actually saying "The borderland", which grammatically makes sense. I'm not sure on why Cameroon is referred to as The Cameroon, as the countries name derives from the Portuguese word for shrimp. "The Congo" could be referred to as such since the Congo river was discovered first, and named first (which is a reference to a local word for mountains). So "The Congo" means "The Mountains". Sudan in Arabic means "land of blacks", so when you're saying The Sudan, you're really saying "The Land of Blacks". Hope that helps somewhat. Also, /r/etymology or /r/linguistics :) |
If alien beings have a sense of sight, is it unlikely that they can see the same wavelengths as us? | There are a couple of reasons why the spectrum we see in is convenient. One, is that the atmosphere is [fairly transparent at those frequencies](_URL_0_) meaning that much of the light of the sun makes it to the surface. This is called the [optical window](_URL_2_). Second, visible light frequencies are high enough that you can get great resolution with a reasonably small aperture. Third, they are [non-ionizing](_URL_1_) so we don't have to hide from them too much. Infrared shares many of these properties, but would incur significant loss by a water-filled eye or lens. This all doesn't mean that some other part of the spectrum could be used, only that our part represents a significant local optimum. | Yes, there are plenty of frequency ranges that are entirely absorbed by the atmosphere. Notably, UV and higher frequencies are ionizing radiation so (fortunately for us) they are easily absorbed. Most of the infrared spectrum is also blocked by the atmosphere. _URL_0_ Your question about the human eye may be answered by the transparency of the atmosphere, but it's also worth noting that this is quite coincident with the emission spectrum of the Sun. |
Why do I feel sick if I read during a car journey, but fine if I read during a bus/train journey? | Motion sickness occurs when you feel acceleration, but don't see it, and your brain leaps to the conclusion that there is something wrong with you, or that you are poisoned. So the answer to your question is that busses and trains are much more controlled and have less sudden acceleration than cars. | Passengers tend to look at things inside the car (like a book or a computer), while drivers always look at the road. The road's movements in the eye correspond to the movements detected by the inner ear. The movements in the car don't. If you want to not get sick in a car, either look at the horizon or keep your eyes closed. |
why do working American youth under 18 get taxed? Isn't that taxation without representation? | Just to add, "taxation without representation" was a popular sentiment in Revolutionary times but it's not like it's in the constitution or anything. Lots of people are taxed without representation. Hell, the city of Washington D.C. adopted it as a motto because they have no voting representation in Congress. | Taxes. Young people don't have strong opinions on Capital Gains Tax, for example, because they don't have any yet. No strong opinions on Property Tax, because they don't own any yet. A lot of people have opinions about Estate Taxes....It's not nothing. I'm a lefty guy, but the idea that it sucks when the government takes all of your shit is universal. |
When did the tricorner hat fall out of fashion in America? | Early 1800's when it was replaced by top hats, especially for civilians as fashion icon of the time [Beau Brummel](_URL_2_) popularized the look. James Monroe continued to wear tricorne hats and he was nicknamed ["The Last Cocked Hat"](_URL_1_) because no one else wear those hats anymore. Napoleon actually wore [bicorne hat](_URL_0_), which became more common in the military. | Some additional photos of said hat: [Link 1](_URL_0_) [Link 2](_URL_1_) [Link 3](_URL_2_) |
How are the warnings on asphalt/gravel trucks valid? | > I don't understand how this would make you not liable It doesn't. The *law* makes them not liable, and the sign is just a reminder of that. Though I should definitely clarify that what the signs are referring to, and what the law covers, is **road debris thrown up by the truck's tires**. They are absolutely responsible if the load they're hauling causes damage, but if you pay attention to the signs, they say something similar to, "Not responsible for objects thrown from road". Basically, these trucks have large tires with deep treads, which makes them more prone to snagging rocks and such off the road surface, and they're not responsible for that, because they didn't put the rocks there. | It's to safeguard against malfunctioning warning signs at the railroad crossing. Trucks carrying hazardous material are required to stop in a lot (if not all) cases as well. |
True or false: you burn the same amount of calories running a mile at a 8 minute pace vs running a mile at a 6 minute pace? | This [Runner's World](_URL_0_) article summarizes the answer well and links to a couple of studies. In summary, they says that it is close but not exact. The difference is in the aerobic vs anaerobic percentages of your running, so the faster you go, the more anaerobic percentage you're using, and so the more calories you burn If you're counting calories, however, longer is typically better because they are so close. Running an all out mile will burn you roughly 100 calories, modulo things like body weight. Running easy for two miles will burn you roughly 200 calories and you probably aren't going to be as beat at the end, assuming you're capable of both. | Several factors indicate the out of shape runner will burn more calories: * the out of shape runner will have a higher heart rate while running, which burns more calories * he will take longer to run, which means he will be burning calories at an elevated rate longer * if he is heavier, he will expend more energy per stride * if he is heavier, his basal metabolic rate is increased Two factors contribute to the fit runner burning more calories: * being fit, he has a higher metabolism, increasing basal metabolic rate * if he is heavier, due to increased muscle mass, he will also expend more energy per stride and his basal metabolic rate is increased Overall, the first two unfit factor can result in large amounts of extra calories burned, while the other factors are weight dependent or only impact BSM. So the unfit runner is going to expend more calories. |
Do carrion eaters experience food poisoning? | Yes, scavengers typically have very strong immune systems, as well as really acidic stomachs. Also they actually prefer freshly deceased carcasses and wont eat anything more than a few days old thats really rotten. Also sorta related, what we think of as food poisoning is generally caused by contaminant pathogens as opposed to spoilage causing organisms. | For some reason, people seem to want to fill this thread with things they've heard, movie anecdotes, and statistics on the speed of various poisons. None of these things actually answers the question, which involves whether a food taster ever *actually consumed poison and died*. If you cannot answer the question, please refrain from posting. Thank you. |
Was there any attempt in roman religion to incorporate Jesus or any person in the Trinity into a larger pantheon? Did it ever just happen by diffusion? | Someone was asking whether veneration of the saints have anything to do with Roman gods. So to prevent follow up inquiries concerning this, I would like direct them to this useful answer by /u/thejukeboxhero _URL_0_ | In catholicism jesus is part of the Holy trinity. Father, son and holy spirit...all 1 God, same person, just different forms. Weird, I admit, but that's my explanation. |
Hi ELI5, what is your stance of me taking questions and answers from here and posting it on my own website(details inside/no Ads). | I personally think it's a great idea as long as you provide a link back to where the content was sourced from and the link is fairly obvious. As long as the website looked nice and was well organised I don't see the problem with asking for donations or even including a small amount of ads. What would really suck is if you didn't add anything to what was already in the subreddit. Like, if you added categories, top rated lists and a good searh functionality it would be sweet. But simple stealing the content without making it any better would probably tick off a lot of people :) TL;DR: I think it's a good idea as long as you make the content more awesome. | Mod here of a 70,000 subscribers subreddit. /r/battlefield_4 I do it because I like to. I am a member of a community of like minded people and I want to make it a better place for all of of us to hangout at. I like to do it because I spend a lot of time on reddit doing useless crap so I might as well do something on reddit which helps me and others in enjoy their time on and off the site. To me, its like a little project kinda thing. You learn things that help you out it reddit too. I have learnt how to discuss and manage things that involve several people. How to arrange a meeting. How to compromise and negotiate in situations where its harder than expected. Overall, its a good experience and its about making things better for me and other on and off reddit. Edit: added sub name because proof. |
What stops browsers from going back a page? | There’s a type of website called a “single page application” where you never actually go to a different page when clicking a link but the website reload new data on the fly and shows you new content. YouTube does that, Facebook too, things like Google Docs would be near impossible without this. Sometimes it’s necessary to change how your browser’s history works and if the application doesn’t handle this perfectly (which is often the case) the “back” button might seem broken. It’s a really hard problem to solve and sadly many companies don’t invest the time and effort to really get it right. Source: I’ve been a web developer for over a decade. I got a lot of grey hair because of this. :) | They have a little javascript that 'traps' the 'go back' action. Whenever you try to go back, the little javascript just sends you 'forward' again. When you finally hold down the back button, the list of sites you see is the result of your trying to go back. The way out of this, that I follow, is to open every link in a new tab/window. When I am done, I just have to close the tab/window. Also this way, I can go ahead and open 5-10 tabs/windows and while I am reading one the others will load. I do this because I have a slow internet connection. You can open links in new tabs/windows by holding down shift/ctrl before clicking, or clicking on the middle button/thumbwheel. The exact combination would be dependent on your browser, and any customisation you might have done. |
Female ejaculation. Where does the liquid come from? | A recent study suggests there are [two types](_URL_1_) > Female ejaculation and squirting/gushing are two different phenomena. The organs and the mechanisms that produce them are bona fide different. The real female ejaculation is the release of a very scanty, thick, and whitish fluid from the female prostate, while the squirting is the expulsion of a diluted fluid from the urinary bladder. For review refer to [The history of female ejaculation](_URL_0_) | Long story summed up: nobody's entirely sure, but it may be a product of the [Skene's Gland](_URL_0_), which is something that many/most women don't have. However, if a woman is "endlessly" squirting, it's far more likely she isn't actually squirting but loses bladder control (unintentionally or otherwise) when she orgasms. Squirting doesn't produce much fluid in the grand scheme of things. If we're talking an amount you could measure with a measuring cup... congrats, you like water sports. :/ |
Why do singers (*cough* Mariah Carey *cough*) have such a tough time when an earpiece or monitor isn't working, but the dancers are able to keep pace without anything? | There is often a slight delay between her singing, her voice coming out of the speakers, and the sound echoing and coming back to her. This can result in what's called a [delayed auditory feedback](_URL_0_) which can make talking or singing impossible. > Most delays that produce a noticeable effect are between 50-200ms. DAF usage (with a 175 millisecond delay) has been shown to induce mental stress. There are apps you can download to your phone to try yourself. I recommend trying to say something like the pledge of allegiance, to demonstrate how completely it can disrupt vocalizations. I'm not saying Mariah Carey isn't a "has been with no talent left", just that there's a scientific answer to your question. | Musician here. In ear monitors also give you the luxury of isolating exactly what you want. As a vocalist I want to hear more of my voice, but with an overall mix of what the rest of the band is playing. You can get that with floor monitors sure, but depending on the sound at the venue you're playing you might get feedback issues if your microphone is up too much in the monitor mix. |
Were assassins (original, arabic) stealthy as most of people belive they were? | no. the assassin was more like an ancient suicide bomber than our modern conception of a super stealthy killer. For instance the 1092 assassination of Nizam al-Mulk uses deception to get close to the vizir but the actual deed is done bluntly with the expectation the murderer would be unable to escape. These assassinations were public acts of terror. There could involve subterfuge of admirable length but unlike modern conceptions of these assassins there wouldn't be a doubt who did the deed and the killers were unlikely to escape with their lives. Paradoxically its these "flaws' which made them so deadly. its much harder to protect against individuals who are willing to trade their life for yours. | Speaking to assassination, there is a general over-emphasis of the importance of groups such as the Nizari Ismaili Assassins in Crusader-era pop culture. While the group was indeed prolific, and did use assassination as a major defensive strategy, they were mythologized beyond being recognized by contemporaneous Western sources, which form the basis of a lot of these games. Bernard Lewis cites over 50 self-confirmed by the sect during the tenure of its founder, Hasan-i-Sabah alone, but if you look at contemporary accounts from the Crusader states, they were behind any and all calamities that had anything to do with a move against Islam, which if you look at the strategy of the sect, makes no sense. Drawing on: *The Assassins: A Radical Sect in Islam* - Bernard Lewis *The Assassin Legends: Myths of the Isma'ilis* - Farhad Daftary |
Why are the rules for elections for federal offices allowed to vary between different US states? | The country was formed from 13 States (hence the name of the country), and the Constitution preserves a lot of autonomy on their part. For most purposes, the federal government is very loose. States establish and conduct the elections that send representatives to the federal House and Senate, and also that apportion electors to Presidential races. This was a huge problem in the century after the Civil War because the Southern states rigged their systems so that black people had no possibility of voting, and under the laws at the time, they were allowed to do so. That changed in a big way only with the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that allowed the federal government to stop race-based state discrimination in election procedures. But the same forces are at it again, it seems, finding ways around those federal laws. | Because the constitution and laws don't allow the government to work that way. The US is a representative democracy. You elect people to decide what to vote on and how to vote. |
How do astronomers know how old a star is/how old they can get? | There are different sizes of stars. Big stars have shorter lives than smaller stars. Fast burn vs slow. For different kinds (sizes) of stars, the spectrum changes as they get older. Some of this is really theory, but it seems to hold. More recently, with space telescopes, they've been able to measure the spin of stars. They slow down as they get older. The oldest stars are the age of the universe. Some 14 billion years. Larger ones burn out or explode after about 100 million years. Here's a [picture](_URL_0_) | There are two main ways in which scientists have dated the Sun. The first way uses the fact that the entire solar system formed around the same time. So, if scientists can determine the age of some really old meteorites, moon rocks, or earth rocks, it should correspond to the age of the sun. The age of these rocks is determined by radiometric dating (basically, they measure how much the nuclear isotopes inside them have decayed since they were created). The second way uses computer models of how our sun (and similar stars) evolve over billions of years. Over that time, things like its size, brightness and colour change slightly. Basically, you can run such a model from the birth of our Sun until the moment that all these measurable quantities correspond nicely to what we actually observe. Luckily, both of these methods give exactly the same result of around 4.5 billion years, so they really reinforce each other :). |
when a VPS fails at a webhost, why would it take a week or more for it to be brought back online? | It's because your webhost is shit & they're horribly understaffed. They don't have critical staff available & on call to fix problems over the holidays (at least they don't consider your business important enough to fix it). This is why people pay big money for quality hosting. | Basically, theres a computer somewhere in the world that runs the software someone made to show the website. The internet is just a bunch of computers connected together by wires. A lot of these computers aren't the same as your personal computer. They're basically just boxes that run code and that's all they do. These are called servers. When you type in the name of a website, its converted into a set of numbers called an IP address. This address is how your computer connects to the server so it can start exchanging info with it. When a website is down, theres either something wrong with the code/information on the server, or theres something wrong with the server itself, like it could be turned off or broken. |
Why do we continue to react irrationally to certain situations despite logically accepting we are being irrational in the moment? | Its hard to define irrational and logic. Whats logical to you, might seem irrational to me. But besides that, I think it is a habbit you create unconsciously or was either taught. For instance, when someone gets mad, person A almost always act a certain way to it while person B acts completely deffirent each time in the same scenario. Not really an answer just sharing my thoughts | The way we behave involves thinking (or perhaps not thinking and only acting out emotions) and emotions. The way we feel and the way we think feed off of each other. Feelings can be irrational and can overpower our rational thinking. Changing the way we think about situations (i.e., cognitive behavioral therapy [CBT]) can help us change the way we think and, in turn, feel, so that we can behave in a more rational manner. |
Why Libraries Aren't Illegal | If libraries were a new idea without historical precedent they probably would be illegal. | Libraries are a municipal public good, in the same vein as a city park. They're funded by taxpayer dollars. The fines aren't there as a source of income. It's intended to penalize people that take advantage of their service. In the same way you will be fined for littering in a park. |
Why do words sometimes feel wrong after you say them too many times? | It's called [semantic satiation.](_URL_0_) Think of it as a similar process to how you drain out background noise. If you hear a constant, quiet noise for a long period of time your brain eventually starts to ignore it. This is basically because the circuits in your brain get 'tired' and run out of the chemicals they need to keep activating. The same sort of thing happens when you hear the same word over and over again. The circuits in your brain responsible for recognising and remembering that word become 'tired'. | There are a few different answers because there are a few different psychological approaches. TheCanadianDoctor's answer is the biological approach. Using the behavioral/learning approach, I would say it was because when you learned that word, you learned it by forming a connection between the (echoic) sound and the semantic meaning. This was reinforced positively as you grew. So, if you repeat the sound only without thinking of the meaning each time, you will start to disassociate the sound with the (now unconnected) meaning. |
What would happen if you take a skin graft from an area with a birthmark? | Yes, assuming the graft took, any birthmark that was on the grafted skin would come with it. | Disclaimer: do not attempt to remove a birthmark by annihilating your skin. This is what I like to call a "bad idea." |
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