[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [TMNT/XMEN] Could the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles be accepted into Xaviers School For Gifted Youngsters?

[Assistant]
For being turtles, yes. There are super-evolved animals in the Marvel-universe and they were generally considered mutants and allowed to join some mutant groups. Xavier's school was one of the more inclusive mutant groups.

However in the Marvel universe the Ninja Turtles wouldn't be considered mutants. Like Spider-man, Captain America, or the Fantastic Four the turtles gained their super powers (for turtles) after birth when they were exposed to an outside substance that did something other than activate their mutant genes.

Xavier's school and the X-men are generally open to working with mutant allies who aren't technically mutants and never were mutants on occasion, so their is a good chance they would be accepted even though they weren't actually mutants. It's unlikely Xavier, or whoever happened to be in charge, would seek them out for recruitment though unless they met by chance.

Though Xavier's school and the X-men may take issue with the turtles preference for killing their enemies (at least in the Mirage continuity), even when they're defeated and no longer pose a threat. Although the X-men are sometimes okay with killing people, even having their own secret black ops team at certain times, and no one bats an eye when Wolverine blacks out with rage and goes on another killing spree, their official stance, and the one they present to the public, is that they're against killing people.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why is the color red used for the Red Light District?

Do the red lights have any effect on the brain with regards to sex drive?

[Assistant]
No. It has to do with old world Asian influences actually iirc.

The streets with brothels used to use lanterns with red paper to mark the brothels, they were usually all in one part of town so criminal activity would largely be limited to the bars and whore houses and the "police" of their respective time periods could more easily contain unruly activity.

Thanks to the lanterns these places became called Red Light districts. It stuck.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
What is happening when hydrogen peroxide bubbles when it come in contact with an infected area?

I recently got my ears pierced and due to me not keeping up with cleaning them as much as I'm supposed to they have gotten infected. To help clear up the infection I dipped them in some hydrogen peroxide. After that they began to bubble. I assume that that just means its killing the bacteria but just to be safe I thought I'd ask that smart people of AskScience.

[Assistant]
Great question!

Blood and cells contain an enzyme called catalase. Since a cut or scrape contains both blood and damaged cells, there is lots of catalase floating around.

When the catalase comes in contact with hydrogen peroxide, it turns the hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) into water (H2O) and oxygen gas (O2).
Catalase does this extremely efficiently -- up to 200,000 reactions per second. The bubbles you see in the foam are pure oxygen bubbles being created by the catalase. Try putting a little hydrogen peroxide on a cut potato and it will do the same thing for the same reason -- catalase in the damaged potato cells reacts with the hydrogen peroxide.

Hydrogen peroxide does not foam in the bottle or on your skin because there is no catalase to help the reaction to occur. Hydrogen peroxide is stable at room temperature.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] The clock on my microwave runs fast. How is that possible, being that it's digital?

[Assistant] Since 1930, electric clocks have kept time based on the rate of the electrical current that powers them. If the current slips off its usual rate, clocks run a little fast or slow. Power companies now take steps to correct it and keep the frequency of the current  and the time  as precise as possible.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How do engineers prevent the thrust chamber on a large rocket from melting?

Rocket exhaust is hot enough to melt steel and many other materials. How is the thrust chamber of a rocket able to sustain this temperature for such long durations?

[Assistant] There  are a few different designs to cool the bell. Some have small tube-like paths throughout for fuel to travel through it, removing some of the heat and pre-heating the fuel. Some use ablative material that slowly flakes off removing some of the heat with it.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5:Why does College tuition continue to increase at a rate well above the rate of inflation?

[Assistant]
In part, because they can.  The availability of government-guaranteed student loans means that their customers have access to more money than they otherwise would, which allows colleges to increase prices.

Colleges spend the increased cost on (a) administration, (b) reduced teaching loads, (c) nicer student facilities.  (b) helps to attract faculty, which attracts students, and (c) helps attract students.  Whenever you go to a college and see a new student center with ultra-nice athletic facilities, for example, think about where the money comes from -- directly from students, but indirectly from federal student loans.

So, why does it keep going up?  Because the Feds keep increasing the amount you can borrow!   You combine that with the changes to the bankruptcy laws in '05 which prevent borrowers from being able to discharge private loans in bankruptcy, and you see a lot of money made readily available to students.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Can we make a new, seperate Internet? If so, how can we switch between current internet and new one?

[Assistant]
Yea, it's easy.

Take two computers, and connect them together with some communication protocol. Bamb, a mini internet.

If you want to connect to it, take a wire and connect your computer to the other two and then use that communication protocol to talk to the other computers.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
If you spin in a circle in zero gravity do you still get dizzy?

E: Thanks for the answers!

[Assistant] Yes you can. Dizziness has nothing to do with gravity; it is caused when the systems your brain uses for orientation disagree with each other. The two main systems your brain uses for this are your eyes, and the fluid in your inner ears. When you spin in circles, you cause the fluid in your ears to start spinning, and your eyes can see that you indeed are spinning, so everything checks out. The problem comes when you suddenly stop spinning, because it takes the fluid in your ears a little while to stop spinning, but your eyes stop spinning immediately. So, for a brief moment after you've stopped, your eyes report that you are sitting still, but you ears are still reporting that you are spinning. This confuses your brain and results it what we call "dizziness." Whether or not you are in zero g has no effect on this process.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why does salsa get more spicy/hot when heated?

I usually add salsa when making cheese toasties (Bread, salsa + ham/cabanossi and cheese) why does it get more spicy when in the toaster, or oven.

[Assistant] So Capsaicin activates certain receptors that are sensitive to heat and therefore creates a 'burning' sensation in your mouth. Since these receptors are already activated when you're eating spicy foods, you become extra sensitive to temperature increases, which is the receptor's primary purpose. Your brain has been tricked, in a way, into a false positive inflammatory sensation, so an actual potential inflammatory source (the heat of the salsa) triggers overdrive for receptors that were already activated.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Eli5. Cold welding. Im a highschool student and ive got welding experience but i just dont understand how cold welding works like in space and even on earth. What exactly constitutes a cold weld and how is it achieved? (Unintentionally)

[Assistant]
Metal atoms really like to stick to each other. That's why metals are both flexible and strong.

However, when metal atoms touch oxygen or water, they react easily to form an oxide. The surface of metal exposed to air is coated with the oxide which slows down metal atoms inside from reacting. Rust is one example of iron oxide.

Cold welding occurs in an environment without anything in the air for the metal to react and form an oxide. Space is one such environment. When bare metal atoms touch other atoms in a cold weld, they stick together much like two water droplets fusing into one. For metal the cold weld causes two solids to combine into one larger one.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Why do pain relievers (NSAID/acetaminophen) relieve chronic pain while seemingly not affecting acute pain?

On the rare occasion I have a headache, I'll often reach for a Tylenol to help relieve the pain.

Usually this is relatively effective. Either it'll eliminate the pain completely or reduce it to a much more manageable level.

Yet, even under the effects of something like Tylenol or Ibuprofen, if I were to say, pinch my arm, I'd still feel essentially the same amount of pain as normal.

Is there a biochemical reason for this? Is there a difference between acute and chronic pain? Or is there perhaps some psychological component to it?

[Assistant]
Pain is a pretty complicated topic- we can think about it in terms of what type of pain is going on- pain due to painful stimulus where nerves directly conduct an impulse/message  (pinch/cut), inflammatory pain (inflammation process) or due to damage to nerves (neuropathic).
Ultimately pain is the bodys ability to sense that something is wrong.

NSAIDs and Tylenol work on reducing the production of prostaglandins and other inflammatory mediators. Prostaglandins are released during inflammation and help bring different types of cells to an area of the body to help fix the site if there is trauma or fight an infection. They do this through various ways including making blood vessels in the area more leaky so those cells in the blood can get to the site. Inflammation is basically the way the body can make sure an infected or hurt part of the body is getting the attention it needs.

When you pinch your skin you are directly affecting causing pain receptors in your skin to fire (there are several types, this would likely be Ad fibers pin prick, sharp pain). This signal is conveyed immediately through nerve conduction. If there is sufficient trauma it can cause an inflammatory response, but if not the pain will subside with removing the stimulus.

Headaches are a tough subject- there are many types. The most common type is a tension headache, where muscles in the neck and head are chronically stressed and can causes inflammation and pain. This is why NSAIDs can work for this type of headache.
Migraine and cluster headaches are caused by other processes and thus require different treatments.

Opioids reduce pain by slowing down signals of nerve conduction in the brain, but would not directly help with inflammation.
Its important for us to detect pain so we can address an issue - trauma/cut or a more chronic inflammatory issue.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5:Why do a lot of old paintings with women in them have one breast exposed?

[Assistant] This is going to sound really odd, but showing your breast was a symbol of how classy you were in olden times.  The truly rich hired wet nurses to breast feed for them, so showing off a youthful breast on a mother of five was the equivalent of flashing a big diamond ring or rolling up in a mercedes benz today.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Why don't glow-in-the-dark objects release their stored light energy all at once?

I understand that glow-in-the-dark objects/coatings store light energy by excitation of electrons to a higher orbital, and that when the electron drops to it's base orbital it releases the energy in the form of photons. My question is, why don't the electrons all drop simultaneously when the energizing light source goes away, resulting in a single instantaneous pulse of light, and then darkness?

[Assistant]
The light coming out of this kind of objects come from a phenomenon called phosphorescence, in which the radiative relaxation is usually much slower than fluorescence.

The main difference is that phosphorescence involves the electrons becoming trapped in certain states with such a property (spin multiplicity) that the decay to the ground state is highly improbable.

You have to keep in mind that even fluorescence is not instantaneous. The fluorescence lifetimes of most molecules lie on the nanoseconds scale. As our eyes cannot resolve such fast decays, we get the impression that it is instantaneous, but it is not.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[X-MEN] In X-Men Origins: Wolverine, do the adamantium bullets leave holes in his adamantium?

If so, wouldn't he have a vulnerability if someone knew of and aimed for the holes?

[Assistant]
That whole movie is BS. Wolverine technically loses his memory every time he nearly dies and recovers. Some fans say its a way to block out the mental scarring that comes with living/dying repeatedly for over 200 years.

That movie is as relevant as Deadpool is to the DC universe.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: When electricity is generated, where do the electrons come from?

[Assistant] The electrons don't come from anywhere, they are already there. What is happening is that you can put a pressure (voltage) that causes the electrons to flow in a direction, like down a wire. In the case of DC, they hop from atom to atom all the way down your wire from one end to the other. In the case of AC, they flow back and forth over and over.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: How does Eye color play into attraction?

I've heard it mentioned many times that the eyes were often the first thing someone was enamored with and its often the thing someone remembers their SO over, men/women with Bright/striking Blue, Green, Hazel Etc. are notable examples.

[Assistant]
Looking into someone's eyes can reveal a lot of information about how that person thinks of you. For example, if you look into your date's eyes and they dialate, you are *much* more likely to think they have pretty eyes. This is because eye dilation is a sign of arrousal in this context.
Similarly, pupil dilation shows interest in other contexts as well.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
CMV: Massive companies and local businesses should not be treated the same under the law

Im coming from an uneducated position which is why Id like to hear the best arguments against this.

If you say the federal minimum wage should be raised, a lot of people will argue that crushes small businesses, which is true. A lot of small businesses can barely afford to pay whats minimum wage right now, much less $15 an hour.

My question is why are Joes Burgers down the street with one location and the McDonalds Corporation treated the same under the law? Or are they not?

Like if Joes makes .001 percent of the profit that McDonalds makes in a year, which is a pretty generous metric, laws probably shouldnt be applied to them in the same way, right? How is small business supposed to thrive in the slightest while being treated the same as McDonalds? Or alternatively, how can you stop McDonalds from exploiting their workers with low wages if you dont give them stronger policies to protect their workers?

I guess this is in the same category of taxing based on income.

Tl;Dr The policies applied to companies shouldnt be the same for enormous companies and small local businesses.

Edit: so I think the real view Im trying to convey is that larger businesses should be required to pay a higher wage based on their ability to do so, because if current minimum wage is simply the best small businesses can afford, then massive businesses with an insanely higher profit is going to 1. Expand more but 2. Line the pockets of the higher ups more. Id say that some enormous companies can afford to pay higher wages and *still* manage huge profits and expansions.

Edit: Ive arrived closer to a viewpoint of raising minimum wage pretty aggressively, Im taking a liking to the idea that if Joes doesnt make enough money to afford paying their employees a wage that would let them survive, then thats like not being able to afford meat for the burgers, and so Joes and McDonalds should pay a higher minimum wage that comes closer to that living wage.

Comments that Ive given deltas and also comments I havent given deltas to have put this argument much better than I feel able to, so for a more fleshed out understanding of what Im saying, read this thread! Lots of good stuff.

[Assistant]
So let's say that you separate the laws so that McDonalds has to pay $15 minimum wage, while Joe's Burgers can still pay $8.

Now, the thing is... wouldn't that kill Joe's even faster? Why the fuck would anyone flip burgers for $8, if they can flip burgers for $15 at McDonalds, with better benefits and job security?


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Where do birds die?

I am genuinely curious. I have seen the occasional dead bird, but I feel like there should be way more of them around.

[Assistant] Probably a lot more in the woods than in the city, where there are a lot of decomposers so they wouldn't lay lon anyways. Occsionally you'll see a dead bird in the city, but a lot less than wilderness because there's a smaller amount of birds flying around the city than in the woods. Think of it this way, when birds are alive they already have stuff chasing them (cats, birds of prey, etc), so when they die they are going to get eaten quickly.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Star Wars] Why were Death Troopers not with Tarkin or Vader?

In Rogue One why did Director Krennic have Death Troopers with him, though Tarkin and Vader did not?

[Assistant] Death troopers are kind of the elite shock troops/commandos of the empire. Tarkin rarely went into battle directly and Vader preferred his own 501st legion if he brought troops at all. Krenik besides being extremely paranoid of assasins and espionage from rivals was considered a valuable if unpredictable asset. The death troopers were both bodyguard and jailer to Krenik. They gave him a sense of safety from assassination while he worked on the deathstar but would also kill him in an instant should he prove disloyal or dangerous with the great work. Vader and tarkin were more trusted by palpatine to not try and use a super weapon to settle petty grievances and more devoted to the imperial cause.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why can there never be true randomness?

I remember reading a post yesterday asking what would happen if something was truly random, and the top reply said that there would have to be new laws of physics written, or something like that.

So why can't there be true randomness, and what do RNG (random number generators) do then?

[Assistant]
>So why can't there be true randomness

We don't know that there cannot be, and indeed certain physical phenomena that we observe appears to be truly random, at least on an extremely small scale. So the assumption is not supported by current evidence.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [STAR WARS] Were the Jedi government funded? How did they pay for things like travel or temple upkeep?

[Assistant]
Yeah basically. The Jedi had been a part of the Galactic Republic for thousands of years.

The Jedi Order that we saw at the outset of the Clone War was created and organised by the Galactic Senate after the New Sith Wars. The Senate ruled that:

The Jedi must not wear armour or be militarised.

Jedi training must take place on Coruscant.

The Jedi Order would become answerable to the Judicial Department instead of the Supreme Chancellor.

The Jedi Order would give up all already existing military roles.

The Jedi must train recruits from birth.

These changes were all made to prevent another resurgence of the Sith from within the Jedi Order.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Why do men and women's shirts have buttons on different sides of the shirt?

[Assistant]
The reason I've heard is that men have tended to dress themselves, while wealthy women tended to have servants to dress them. In both cases, the buttons are set to help a right-handed person.

Not exactly relevant, today, but traditions are sometimes kept regardless.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Power Rangers] Do Power Rangers play any official role in Earth Government?

Bonus Question:

How comes there are a disproportionate amount of hostile Xenos, to benevolent ones?

[Assistant]
Depends on which iteration. Most teams are vigilantes and thus work outside the law but some are sponsored or even created by the goverment such as Space Patrol Delta or Lightspeed Rescue.

The only reason why hostiles seem to be prevalent is because they're the ones the rangers deal with. There's planty of friendly xenos but they're perfectly law abiding and are of no concern to the rangers.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: What happens to a text message when the receiving phone is turned off?

And also, once the receiving phone is turned on, how does the text message service detect that?

[Assistant]
> And also, once the receiving phone is turned on, how does the text message service detect that?

When your phone connects to the network, it performs what's evocatively known as a "handshake." This process of establishing the connection informs the network where to direct a call that will terminate on your handset, so the network has to keep a log of which handsets are connected and which aren't, otherwise you couldn't get calls.

As part of this handshake, the network also checks if you have pending messages, and if you do, it delivers them.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [Borderlands] Is a tediore reload equivalent to buying a whole new gun every time or does every gun you buy come with a set amount of digistructs before you need to "refill" it.

[Assistant]
You don't buy a gun, you buy a personal, non-transferable license to digistruct a gun\*. To digistruct a new gun, you must first discard the current iteration, which will presently self-destruct. Please note that handing the gun to another person will be interpreted as discarding it. Tediore assumes no responsibility for injuries sustained from unsafe discarding.

^^\* ^^Ammo ^^not ^^included.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[MCU] on the Hulkbuster

The design of most iron suits is pretty simple with regards to controls, you move and so does the armor. But this has a scaling problem--the armor has to have little enough bulk that the anatomy of suit and human roughly lines up, or movement is restricted. In the Hulkbuster armor, placing the human operator's limbs inside their armor counterparts would require separating them from the torso, which I'm told would be somewhat counter to the point of having armor.

**TL;DR: How are operator movements translated into armor movements in the Hulkbuster?**

[Assistant] The point of the Hulkbuster isn't so much to protect Iron Man from the Hulk - his ordinary suit would probably do just as well - but rather to unleash a heckton of heavy ordnance on the sucker in order to get him to sleep for a little while. Thus, the Hulkbuster isn't so much meant to be armour as it is a heavy weapons and punching-things platform, kind of like a Jaeger but really scaled down. Thus, Iron Man operates the Hulkbuster from inside its chest with sensor modules that line up with the actuators in the joints and also punching-things. The Hulkbuster can be used as armour - Banner himself uses it in Infinity War - but it's really meant to be just more firepower and strength.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why do trains only have a single gear?

Trains accelerate incredibly slowly and often have a single gear that is optimised for high speed. Similar to trying to pull away in your car in too high of a gear this makes trains really slow and takes along time for them to hit their high speed.

Most cars will often have 4 (for very old cars) - 6 gears to keep acceleration smooth and fast whilst still being efficient at high speed but trains don't.

I get that electric motors have all of the torque available at low RPMs whilst ICE only have full power at a high rpm but wouldn't gears still allow trains to get to higher speeds quicker?

[Assistant] The problem is not the available torque in the engine. But there is a few issues with trains that make their initial departure very slow compared to cars. The first issue is that the train is very long. When the locomotive starts moving the back of the train does not immediatly start moving. As the locomotive moves forward it will start taking up the slack between the cars and also stretch out the frames of the cars a bit. Even a very tight passenger train will have a few seconds from the locomotive starts moving to the back cars starts moving. And first then will the momentum of the back cars make it lighter for the locomotive. This causes a jerking motion going back and forth through the train as it gets up to speed. In order to make this jerking motion much less which increases comfort and reduces wear on the equipment the engineers will start with the minimum of throttle and slowly increase it as they get up to speed. The second issue is that the train tracks and wheels have very low friction. This is very good for high loads and high speeds but terrible for acceleration and braking. If the engineer applies full throttle from a standstill the wheels will just slip on the smooth tracks and he will spin in place damaging both the tracks and wheels. So he have to get up to speed where he have some momentum before he can apply the full power.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Why are we looking for exoplanets?

We can't live on them considering the distance alone, so what are the current goals in the exoplanet search? Just to learn about the universe?

[Assistant] Being able to get a better handle on number, location, size, and make-up of expolanets is fundamental for a number of reasons.  It gives us a much better idea of how common other life might be in the universe.  It gives us perspective on how 'special' the Earth is.  It allows us to better understand solar system formation processes.  And, perhaps most importantly of all, we find out something we didn't know before.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Avengers] Why didn't the portal suck out the Earth's atmsophere?

The thing connected to open space and they obviously had no control over what went through it (could have stopped the nuke otherwise) so what happened? A 50m hole in the sky is a pretty big leak.

[Assistant] Earth's atmosphere is very large, and its pressure is not very high. Assuming the other side of the portal was a vacuum, we'd be losing air at about a rate of 793,000 m^3 / s. By comparison, Earth's atmosphere measures roughly 51,000,000,000,000,000,000 m^3 . If the fight lasted for about a half hour, we would have lost 0.0000000028% of our atmosphere.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] What happens when you sleep that makes you feel rested upon waking up?

[Assistant]
It's poorly understood, but we think it involves the concentration of certain chemicals, including adenosine, in the cerebrospinal fluid.
When you are awake, it builds up and makes you feel tired.
While you sleep, it gets removed, leading to you feeling well rested when you wake up.

Note that this is separate from the circadian cycle (body clock), which also affects how awake or asleep you feel based on a 24-ish hour cycle.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: When trying to sleep, how can one position be so comfortable when you first get into it, but then uncomfortable after 5 minutes?

[Assistant]
What's nice for your muscles and what's nice for your bones and ligaments isn't always the same thing, especially if you have posture problems.

You might have a tight shoulder for example, and being in a particular position might relieve that. But the same position could put stress on your spine. So you lie down and feel shoulder relief, but a few minutes later your spine starts hurting.

If you have persistent problems with sleeping comfortably, you may want to get checked out by a physiotherapist. Especially if it's back or joint pain.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[X-Men] So why isn't everyone terrified of wolverine?

I heard about that wolverine guy. He rolls with the X-Men, they're heroes. Mutants - but nobody can deny they've saved the world a few times. So, the good guys.

But then there's wolverine.

I heard his power is terrifying. They say bullets can't kill him, they say he can't die, they say he has knives that come out his wrists, they say he fights in a way that shows he is well aware of all of these things.

 I know wolverine's terror rages are usually pointed in the right direction, but one can't help to think that all those faceless henchmen with 11 inch knives in their skulls had families.

Why is it that when wolverine slaughters a warehouse full of bad guys with guns he can still walk out at the end of the day a hero? Now I'm a normal guy. I know damn well if I got bulletproof body armor, huge knives on my fists, and karate training, and slaughtered a wave of ninjas, it world be portrayed as a terrifying act of mass murder. What gives?

[Assistant]
War produces casualties. Assuming these henchmen who died were protecting some villainous character holding hostages or threatening the existence of a species, they are enemy combatants. It sucks that Johnny over there with his throat turned inside out has been in and out of prison his whole life and was trying to turn things around by taking the only job he could find, but at the end of the day he still probably tried to kill the guy trying to save innocent people.

Just look at the school invasion from X-Men 2. Wolverine didn't know their motives, nor did he probably care, all he saw was a lot of people threatening his art students. Lt. Dan Jr. may have a wife and kids, but when he accepted a mission from Stryker to kidnap a bunch of American citizens in a black ops raid in the middle of the night, maybe it's a little bit his fault he ended up with 3 stab wounds to the chest.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Star Wars] Why did it seem like Vader was so badly injured and in pain after Luke knocked him off his feet and cut off his hand? All he lost was a prosthetic limb.

If Luke was using some unseen force power that blew his ass apart, then I can sorta understand why he got so wrecked in that scene.

[Assistant] Vader is, essentially, a full body burn victim who does not take pain meds in order to strengthen his connection to the Force. Basically, Luke defeating him made his focus drift and he finally allowed himself to feel the pain.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Can exposure to an incredibly high dose of radiation lead to instant death?

If a person, standing in plain clothes is exposed to an intense radiation source (200+ roentgens / hour) , is it possible for them to die instantaneously?

[Assistant] Yes, high enough acute doses can prevent neurons from firing correctly and lead to instant death.  If you were to pull out a fuel assembly from a nuclear power plant and place it on the wall and run at it from 50 feet away.  You will die before touching it.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: I saw a video of a volcano erupting & lightning strikes happened in the lava as it was in the air. What is making the lightning happen?

[Assistant]
Lightning is many ways the same as the static electricity you can get from walking on come carpets and then touching something and get a small electric arch. They are just on a larger scale and vertical.

In a volcanic eruption, you get a plume with ash that rises and collide with each other and at a higher altitude, it can get cool down and you get ice crystals.  It is that collision that you get static electricity at very high levels and it will discharge with lightning. The breaking up of rock can have a significant effect in generating changes too.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How can an animal eat its own kind with no side effects but human cannibalism causes brain damage?

Deep down we're all 'animals'.

[Assistant]
It isn't the human flesh that causes brain damage, it is the risk of parasites/prions in the human flesh.  Thoroughly cooked human flesh won't hurt you, but if it is under cooked or you eat infected brain matter (as with the cows who got mad-cow disease) then you are at risk.

Generally you only find cannibalism in less developed areas and so the risk is greater.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Why does diplomatic immunity exist? What's the benefit?

[Assistant]
It exists because every country wants their own diplomats to feel safe when working in other countries with very different laws, and the only way to guarantee that is to give the same courtesy to others.

Imagine a world without such immunity.   Canada appoints a woman as deputy ambassador to Saudi Arabia.  She gets arrested and sentenced to jail time for driving a car.  Massive international incident ensues.  This can all be avoided with immunity.

Incidentally, it's not total immunity.  A country can choose to waive it for a serious offence, or can bring their diplomat home for trial under their own laws.  This happened some years ago here in Canada when a Russian official killed someone while driving drunk.  Canada could not prosecute.  We asked Russia for permission to do so, they said no, and then recalled him and jailed him in Russia.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
If it were raining on a planet in a binary system, i.e. with two stars, could there be two, non-concentric rainbows in the sky?

I don't know if concentric is the right word. I'm not talking about typical double rainbows that occur on Earth. I know rainbows are caused by diffractio  of sunlight through spherical raindrops and occur at a certain angle. But if there are two sources of light, can there be two rainbows or is the result just one, extra vivid rainbow?

[Assistant] Yes,  the requirement being that of a normal rainbow,  with the sun behind you, and the angles of internal reflection in the water droplets.  The two suns would have 2 positions (though both behind you as you looked at the rain),  and each could set up that geometry such that the rainbows would have two independent positions, and the rainbows could even overlap.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Can presence of molecular oxygen in an exo planet reliably indicate existence of life there?

Can a planet have a lot of oxygen in its atmosphere without living organisms producing it? If not would looking for planets with lots of oxygen in the atmosphere be a way of guessing if a distant exo planet has life?

[Assistant]
Molecular oxygen is usually an indication that a planet's atmospheric chemistry is in serious disequilibrium. O2 is extremely reactive with a lot of stuff around it - after all, it's what makes stuff burn. The fact that it exists at all on a planet suggests that something must be actively making it, and at a rate more quickly than everything else on the planet would oxidize.

This makes an especially compelling case for life when substances that are easily oxidized are found in the atmosphere, such as methane. Even without that, though, there's still usually plenty of other stuff on a planet's surface that can oxidize. For example, in the presence of free oxygen, iron will quickly turn into iron oxide (a.k.a. rust, as is the case on the surface of Mars).

Of course, this does assume that chlorophyll-containing organisms are responsible for the oxygen disequilibrium. It's entirely possible there could be an entire ecosystem of life on some planet that doesn't rely on oxygen as a waste product, so life cannot be ruled out on a planet without free oxygen. It's just that is we do detect it, it's very likely to indicate that's it's biological in origin.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] At a molecular level, how do softened butter and melted butter interact with dough differently?

[Assistant]
Softened butter is an emulsification.  Under a microscope you would see bunches of tangled fats chains and some milk proteins crowding around trapped water molecules.  When that is mixed with dough, the water from butter remains largely trapped in spherical butterfat cages within the larger "net" of the gluten matrix of the dough.

More water molecules trapped in bubbles of fat means the dough can expand more when the water turns to steam without bursting through the gluten as quickly. Thus your bread should rise more in the oven and youll have larger holes in a softened crumb.

(Things without gluten or less gluten or with baking powder instead of yeast, may have effects thay can vary widely from a loaf of bread.)

When you break the emulsification butter acts like... well, oil and water.  The water molecules will still eventually turn to steam in the oven but because there is less of a "structured" buffer of butterfat surrounding gaseous water molecule and the gluten, it can more easily escape and the gluten is less likely to stretch as far without butterfat as an "organized" buffer to form an expanding pocket.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] eli5: How would "marked money" help law enforcement find a culprit in the early 1900s? I was watching Boardwalk Empire and they talked about marked money. Once it changes hands to a store how did they know who gave them marked money and to turn in to law enforcement?

[Assistant]
It allowed the robbers to be tracked by tracking where the money was spent .

Say the robbers stopped for gas and payed with some of the marked money.  When the gas station deposited that cash at the bank, the bank would go through the cash, notice a marked bill, and notify the police.

Given enough time, you'll get the general idea of where the crooks are going.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Dogma/View Askewniverse] What happens with the last scion that Bethany is revealed to be pregnant with?

The metatron tells her this at the end of the movie and that he/she 'has a world of work ahead'.

So does this child grow up to perform miracles and perhaps prompt the scribing of a third testament in Christian biblical canon? If so, are the prophets Jay & Bob mentioned or quoted in this new text at all?

Bonus question: Did Rufus get any of the changes he wanted made to the bible after aiding Bethany and returning to heaven?

[Assistant]
The events in question occurred around 1999. Assuming the scion was born and made it through childhood in good health, he/she is now reaching age 18. Jesus didn't make anything of himself until he was around 30, and the updates to religion after he came (new testament) took a couple hundred years to get hammered out.

It's too soon to tell. The scion is just barely reaching legal adulthood, and might take more than a decade to really get going. Biblical changes will probably take another century or two after that. It's all well and good for heavenly beings. They live on an eternal time frame, and think in the span of centuries. For us mortals, though, it may be a long time before we get an update.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5 : why do certain containers cause the liquid to disastrously pour down the side but others dont?

[Assistant]
Everyone here is talking about properties of water cohesion and viscosity, but OP specifically asked about why certain **containers** pour well while others don't.

That has to do with the type of spout, or the way the glass/plastic is shaped at the top of the container. You generally need a very sharp edge, or a very crisp curve at the end of the spout. The material of the spout also matters, and you tend to want surfaces that your liquid doesn't stick to as easily. If it's just a smooth rounded top, especially of glass, water will happily stick to the gentle flow over the curve and drip right down the sides of the glass rather than slide off the edge for a smooth pour. Sharper edges don't allow this, water can't stick to it and it just pours right off the end.

The thing with your typical glass drinking glasses, is they generally have very smooth edges because that feels gentler on our mouths, rather than the more geometrically sharp edges you'd see on something like a plastic milk jug. This is why trying to pour water slowly out of a drinking glass causes the water to disastrously pour down the sides, while pouring the same liquid out of a plastic bottle is successful. The drinking glass has soft rounded edges on the top for a more comfortable feel on your lips, while the bottle has sharper curved edges for pouring.

The only other variable is speed at which you pour, a faster pour gives the fluid more energy and forces it to fly off the edge and not drip. That's why if you really have to pour water of a drinking glass, you have to pour it quickly if you want to avoid a mess.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[The Room] So what are the characters up to now, fourteen years later?

What are Lisa, Denny, Mark, Claudette, Chris-R and the rest up to after the events of The Room in 2003? Does anyone miss Johnny's presence?

[Assistant]
Oh hi Jacob.

Lisa and Mark were deeply in love, for many years. Mark provided for her and gave her everything, you know, but Lisa didn't care. After losing his best friend Johnny, Mark didn't understand life anymore, and Lisa didn't support him with his struggles, even though he did all her could to show her his love.

Denny went back to Chris R, and was trained as a drug dealer. He was flying here, there, everywhere, all over the whole world! Trading drugs, visiting exciting places. He always held a flame for Lisa though, who saw him in a new light as he got older. Lisa began making love to Denny the week after his 18th birthday, Mark doesn't suspect anything to this day. Chris R knows about the affair, but his mind is too busy on druuugs to do much with the information.

Claudette died of her cancer moments after Johnny's suicide, but nobody noticed.

Anyway, how's your sex life?


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] "Googol", "Googolplex", "Graham's Number"... outside pure mathematics, is there any real significance in referring to numbers so huge that it doesn't even make sense to try to express them conventionally?

[Assistant]
Googol, Googolplex, and tinou's order of the Monster group are completely different than Graham's number. You can't even count the digits of Graham's number.

To give you an idea, imagine the following sequence...

1. 3

2. 3^3^3 ~= 7.6 trillion

3. 3^3^3^3.... {7.6 trillion times} = !!!

4. 3^3^3^3... { as many times as the previous number } = oh god why

That's a pretty goddamn huge number. Remember that exponentiation is *left-associative*, so 3^3^3^3 is not (3^3^3)^3, but rather 3^(3^3^3).

In other words, every additional exponent has about the same *number of digits* as the *entire previous value*.

Not getting it? Remember how the value of 3^3^3 was about 7.6 trillion? Let's add one more exponent, making 3^3^3^3. The value of this number is about 3 trillion *digits long*.

 3^3^3^3^3 is so long that Wolfram|Alpha doesn't even bother telling me how long it is. There are literally not enough atoms in the universe to write out *how many digits* there are in that number. The "number of digits" itself has about 10^1600000000000 digits, and there are only ~10^80 atoms in the universe.

That was with 5 exponents. We have 7.6 trillion exponents for the third entry on the list.

How long does the list go, you ask?

The list goes on for a total of 7.6 trillion entries

After that process, you now have g1, succinctly written as 33. One up-arrow denotes the repeated exponentiation. Two of those tiny up-arrows are responsible for the two levels of recursion. One remaining up-arrow is because 33 = 3^3.

So that whole process was because of four up-arrows. Remember that.

... because g2 is 3... {g1 times} ...3.

... and g3 is 3... {g2 times} ...3.

Now repeat *that* series until you reach

... g64 is 3... {g63 times} ...3.

***THAT***, ladies and gentleman, is Graham's number.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [Mission: Impossible] Can an IMF agent ever chose not to accept a mission? Of they thought it was too dangerous/risky/stupid or whatever? And what would be the consequences if they did?

[Assistant] Yes, but it probably won't look too good on your performance review. "Well, Mr. Hunt, your work this year has been rather exemplary, but you *did* turn down the mission last March that resulted in half of Yugoslavia turning into a radioactive wasteland..."


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why do some flowers start blooming at certain time in the morning?

I live in the East Coast of Malaysia Peninsula. There's this one type of flower I always pluck in the morning to use it in food colouring. I only choose blooming flower.

The sun rises around 7AM here. I usually pluck that flowers on that time. One day, when I came out again, I noticed the flowers on the same plant that didn't bloom before were now fully blooming at 8AM. But one or two hour later, the same flowers that didn't bloom at 8AM still didn't bloom.

[Assistant] Competition. If the flowers all bloom at the same time then all the bugs and flowers would be in competition and many would die. But if only certain ones open at certain times, then only certain bugs will be out at certain times and only animals that eat those bugs etc., or too much sun will dry it or not enough moisture...If its advantageous for the flower to bloom differently then likely that flower will be better off but what if blooming at that different time brings it in more competition with other flowers or it has less pollinators out and the flowers will either die or do better and kill another plant...and youll be back to just a couple flowers blooming at the same time again.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How / Is domesticated behaviour carried into genes ?

Most dogs are friendly to humans. I assume this comes from a long term mutually beneficial relationship since prehistoric era. How that familiarity is passed through generations (if it is) ?

Is every dog a "subwolf" that need to be updated through training that Human is the alpha etc...
Or they already "know" us and are genuinely symbiotic (For the lack of other words) to us ?

same could be applied to horses and cats. But dog feels like a prime case.

[Assistant]
The short answer is that nobody will give you a list of friendliness or domestication genes (sections of DNA). What we see is a pattern of domestication over many generations; humans would selectively breed the friendlier or less vicious wolves and gradually the dogs we know today were born.

This was done in a small number (<50 or something) generations of Foxes in Russia, using a more aggressive selective breeding program.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Is there a way to know if someone is taken seriously by the philosophical community?

To explain better what i mean, I was speaking with someone and they sent a quote from an economist named Walter Block (I'll add it if you want context but not necessary to read for my question)-

>!" Suppose that there is a starvation situation, and the parent of the four year old child (who is not an adult) does not have enough money to keep him alive. A wealthy NAMBLA man offers this parent enough money to keep him and his family alive  if he will consent to his having sex with the child. We assume, further, that this is the only way to preserve the life of this four year old boy. Would it be criminal child abuse for the parent to accept this offer? Not on libertarian grounds. For surely it is better for the child to be a live victim of sexual abuse rather than unsullied and dead. Rather, it is the parent who consents to the death of his child, when he could have kept him alive by such extreme measures, who is the real abuser. " !<

This obviously sounded very problematic philosophically to me, but the person claimed that this professor had good qualifications  and his book Defending the Undefendable (which delves into a bit of moral philosophy) is up there as  must reads for libertarians . Now obviously this was not a good argument for it's reliability, but I realized I didn't know how to see if this person was considered philosophically competent to talk about these subjects.

So this is my question- can I quickly get a rough idea of whether someone is taken seriously by the philosophical community without having to spend a huge amount of time researching?

People like Jordan Peterson and Sam Harris are influential to many but consequently have many easily accessible criticisms made on them. But how can I find out about less popular figures like these?

[Assistant]
The quickest and roughest rubric is to see if and where their work is published and if and how that work is cited on Google scholar or Philpapers.

ETA - some papers even by very respected folks are liable to be ignored and (maybe) there might be single works which are important in a particular way by people who are otherwise ignored, so its probably useful to distinguish between a person who is taken seriously and a paper which is understood to have been important.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Firing a gun in space; does rifling matter? Or could a smooth bore be just as effective?

[Assistant]
There would be no difference. Riffling causes the bullet to spin, it acts like a gyroscope, giving it extra stability that keeps it from tumbling randomly and deviating from its intended target due to variable wind drag.

But there's no air in space, no wind drag, so whether a bullet tumbles or not, it will still follow the same path.

And indeed when calculating the orbits of asteroids there's no need to take into account their rotation period.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why were monocles used when most cases of vision loss affect both eyes?

I can only assume it's because it was the fashion of the time, but I can't understand why you'd sacrifice clarity in one eye for the sake of looking on top of attitudes and trends.

[Assistant]
They're more like modern reading glasses, you keep the monocle in your front pocket and bring it out to read fine text.

Nobody actually wore them around all day, it just became a symbol of rich old people because that's who would typically have the need for one.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Matrix] Why did the agents need to ask directions to Neo's cubicle?

Remember when morpheus calls Neo and tells him to look up just when the agents are asking the receptionist for Neo's location, and she points?

Don't the Machines have an omniscient understanding of everything within the Matrix? Morpheus himself was able to give minute and specific instructions to Neo on how to escape that suggest that they too have an omniscient view of an area.

[Assistant]
The Agents aren't supposed to disrupt the bluepills anymore than necessary. People noticing things are wrong with the Martrix is what accelerates the process of mass awakening, and if nothing else the Architect seems utterly fed up with that by the time of the films.

So the Agents can bend the rules when necessary, but only when necessary. Otherwise they occupy this weird "more-authority-than-god" unnamed secret police role.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Doctor Who & Mass Effect] Would The Doctor agree to uses of the genophage?

Assuming The Doctor lands during the end of the Korgan rebellion

at this point the Krogan have being winning the war

Destroyed three planets to point of being uninhabitable

The Doctor can see the war effort the death toll, The Doctor then has a chance to talk to Mordin about the genophage. How it only alters the birth rate. How the alternative is a war ending in genocide.

Would The Doctor accept that solution?

[Assistant]
He would probably look for a solution that doesn't require to use the genophage. Most doctors would probably be disgusted learning about the genophage.

And krogans are not daleks, they are not evil.

The whole point of the doctor is to find the other solution no one found :)

The genophage is more like a Torchwood thing.

Now, the doctor in Mass Effect universe would make an interesting two parter where he finds a solution to the reaper problem. With a lot of running in between, obviously :)


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Superman] Does Superman have any weaknesses that exist in the real world?

If Superman were to show up in our reality, we wouldn't have access to his famous vulnerabilities.  Kryptonite and magic do not exist, at least in the way they do in DC comics.  Does the Man of Steel possess any weaknesses that we could could actually control?

[Assistant] It'd be tough. His third weakness, red solar radiation doesn't seem to be a thing in our reality, since photons coming from a red sun and a yellow sun aren't that different from each other. You wouldn't be able to just get red glass and shine a flashlight on him to drain his powers.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Star Trek] Where does the Borg drive for assimilation come from? And other quetions.

Their singular focus is the assimilation of all life and technology for the purpose of achieving "perfection". Where does that come from? They're supposedly a hive mind but they have a Queen (or Queens?) so are their actions the result of their collective decisions or desires, or is there some ancient device or being like the queen(s) making decisions for them?

I guess what I'm asking is if they're a collective consciousness, where does the collective decision to assimilate come from if the vast majority of the collective was taken against their will, violently? Wouldn't the Borgs mission shift very quickly to something that most of the collective "agreed" on?

[Assistant] The early history of the Borg remains unknown. At some point in their biological evolution, they started implementing technological advances. By the late 15th century (Earth reckoning)  the Borg were capable of interstellar travel and had assimilated a few star systems. It is unknown if they had first contact prior to their assimilation drive or hive mind. Likewise, it is unknown if the hive mind is a byproduct of their biological evolution or their technological evolution.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Marvel] About Otto Octaviuss current body...

Hopefully this is the right place to ask this? Anyways, I just finished reading the new Superior Spider-Man series and am up to date on the four issues, but while I was reading something kept bothering me: how is Ocks clone body still healthy and kicking? I thought Jackals clones deteriorated into carrion if they didnt take his pill.

Did I miss something? I havent read any of Ben Reilly: Scarlet Spider, so hopefully I didnt skip out on a crucial detail there.

[Assistant] It was a spare clone body that Ben Riley/Jackal kept for himself when he went on the whole evil cloning binge recently. Otto hijacked it before Ben could - it was specifically made immune to cellular degeneration other clones suffered from.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Parks & Rec] How did Chris' fancy turkey burger lose to Ron's generic hamburger?

As a foodie, I've never understood this. I agree that beef burgers are better than turkey *on a level playing field*, which this wasn't.

Chris describes his Traeger Turkey Burger: "An Asian-fusion burger made with Willow Farms organic turkey, a toasted taleggio cheese crisp, papaya chutney, black truffle aioli, and microgreens on a gluten free brioche bun." Sounds amazing! So many flavors that enhance each other! He has thought about texture contrasts as well!

Ron's burgers looked soggy on buns that  were untoasted. Did he secretly use Prime-grade waygu beef that he ground himself or something?

[Assistant]
Chris went overboard trying to dress up the turkey burger with flavors. The different additions to the burger ended up becoming more distracting and rather than being good at one thing (tasting good) it became passable at several things. Ron's basic burger was everything it needed to be, in a simple, non-distracting package.

Moral of the story: Keep It Simple Stupid.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Spider-Man] What was Green Goblins plan for the city that he wanted to recruit Spider-Man for?

Im referring to the Tobey Maguire/Sam Raimi movies.

He made a big speech about what they could create, how they would make the city greater than ever, etc. What exactly did that entail?

[Assistant] Rule by force and intelligence. Then spread that ideology out to the rest of the country. They had the means to physically overpower anyone and were probably the greatest scientific minds of their world.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: How does shooting in video games work?

Was just playing CS:GO and was really wondering how I can shoot another player. Does the game just detect my click when it's on his face or what?

[Assistant] In early shooters yes it was just a click. But technology has evolved and now the bullet does have a path with many variables. Arma 3 has one of the most advance systems where the bullet not only drops, but depending on the caliber and type of round, loses velocity as it goes through an object.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] If the Philae probe weighs 100kg on the Earth how much does it weigh on 67P?

[Assistant] 67P isn't spherical, so it's hard to say exactly, but if it was spherical it would be about 44,000 times weaker than earth. Technically, kg is a measure of mass and not weight, but it would weight the same as something with a mass of about 2.3 grams on Earth.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: How does the new google phone magically erases people out of pictures?

How does the background look perfect. I have only seen commercials so it probably does not work as great. Just curious as to how the phone guesses what the background looks like and fills it in.

[Assistant]
It uses machine learning to predict what the background "ought" to look like.  Basically they have an algorithm they showed a million before/after photos, and based on that, the algorithm now understands how to create an "after" from a "before".  It's all just math, nothing particularly insightful about it.

You can easily notice insufficiencies in it.  For example it will never create something new, which an unobstructed photo might have (for example, it would never create, like, a black cat in the frame).  The new background will always be something relatively basic.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[TOMB RAIDER] Does Lara Croft take any vaccines before she goes on an expedition?

I have been playing the latest TR game and its incredible the amount of shit she comes across, from cadavers to killing insects.

[Assistant]
Of course.  She's probably got a private doctor just for handling the various vaccines, medicines, and injuries she had to encounter for the things she does

He must be an ENT doctor too for the ear damage of shooting guns in caves all day.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Do doctors from developing countries (trained in developing countries) who come to American/European countries to practice medicine have to undertake additional tests?

American/European medical schools are some of the best in the world and some of the most rigorous, on the other hand standards of education in Africa/some Asian countries I imagine are lower. So would African/Asian doctors have to undertake additional tests to prove their skills?

[Assistant] Yes. Some are never allowed to practice medicine in their new country at all. Depending on where they're from, their options range from simply demonstrating training in an equivalent system to taking the basic licensing tests that all physicians have to pass to redoing a (multi-year) residency. If their degree isn't recognized at all, they're SOL.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [Portal series] In Portal 1, the player defeats Glados by removing and destroying the personality cores. In Portal 2, Glados operates just fine without them. Why is this?

[Assistant]
The personality cores aren't there to keep her running, quite the opposite. They were placed there to hinder her and alter her behavior.

She also had backup personality cores, lots of them. She mentions her "quicksave" feature forced her to relive the last 2 minutes before her death over and over, which she of course is not bitter about in the slightest.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Since our mitochondrial DNA is separate/different from the DNA in the nuclei of our cells, how are cells able to produce more mitochondria with the different DNA when they divide during mitosis?

[Assistant] Mitochondria divide on their own. In single-celled eukaryotes such as protists, the mitochondrial division is synced with the cell division so that the two new cells both have mitochondria. In multicellular organisms such as humans, mitochondria are completely independent and divide when the cell needs more energy. Thus, for multicellular organisms the new cells just get whatever mitochondria happen to be present at the time they're split.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [Star Wars] (KOTOR specifically) If protocol droids exist, what good is a human that can speak a bunch of languages, like the protagonist in KOTOR 1?

[Assistant]
Trask wasn't remarking on the MC's ability to speak a lot of languages as an asset, only that it was surprising. Because while languages are easier to learn in the Galaxy Far Far Away than our own world, knowing hundreds is a feat of genius.

Besides, it *is* useful. How often does Joe Schmoe walk around with a protocol droid 24/7?


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why do people dance and how/why do I not enjoy it, but instead just find it silly and pointless?

Not trying to sound smug or arrogant - I'm just trying to make my point as obvious as possible. Is there a scientific reason behind my disliking of dancing/other people liking it?

[Assistant] The reason people dance is to share the enjoyment of the music they like with the people around them. Reasons you might not enjoy dancing could be that the music genres you enjoy don't lend themselves to dancing or that you aren't a good dancer.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How do I explain the origin and nature of time to an 8 year old?

Honestly, Reddit, I'm stunned that an eight year old is able to simply understand the concept.  Last week, he asked me where the universe came from.  BAM! Big Bang.  Where did people come from?  KAPOW!  Monkeys, little man.  What's more, I know my explanations stuck.  In stumbling for a response, his mom, my girlfriend asked him, "well, um, how do you think the earth got here? Was it god or the Big Bang?"
"You mean, like, little rocks that turned into bigger rocks that turned into bigger rocks?  That way, the Big Bang."

I have no idea how to explain time, as my understanding is vague and esoteric as it is.  The extent of my understanding is that time is a product of gravity, and that it is relative to speed.  As a man with a background in history, I'm pretty proud of this limited knowledge, but know it's missing almost everything, and have no way of relaying it to a kid.

Besides, this will be a good exercise for anybody interested in educating people on science.  If you can explain it accurately in terms that a second grader can understand, you understand it well enough to explain it to just about anybody.  Just channel your inner Neil deGrasse Tyson.

[Assistant]
Your best bet is probably time is just a way of measuring change.  Explain to a kid how watching a movie is just a lot of pictures moving really fast (you can make a flip book or something as well).  Time is just the difference from one frame to the next, but it is continuous.

For the rest of science get him the complete Magic School Bus series.  Seriously.  You would probably enjoy it yourself as it still came in helpful well into university.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[ELI5] Why do fossil fuels not replenish themselves?

So, according to wiki, the theory is that fossil fuels formed from the fossilized remains of dead plants by exposure to heat and pressure in the Earth's crust over millions of years. So are fossil fuels constantly being recreated by new plants dying? Was there just way more plants to create fuels long ago? Are we simply using them faster than they are being replenished?

[Assistant]
In the Carboniferous geological age, a plant underwent a mutation allowing it to make a new type of structural support called lignin. (You might know it better as the main reason wood is solid - before it, plants were ferns made of cellulose.)  For sixty million years nothing on this planet was able to digest lignin, meaning that dead trees just piled up... everywhere.  Tens of meters thick around the entire globe.

This ungodly amount of tree locked up a huge amount of the atmosphere's CO2 and oxygen levels rose accordingly.  Wherever this carbon sink was buried by geological processes, it was subjected to heat and pressure, changing it into coal.

The Carboniferous ended when some fungi evolved a metabolic pathway to digest lignin. No longer would trees fall and remain, unrotting.  Coal is not replenished and will never be replenished because trees break down.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Can a mutated virus become a new disease?

[Assistant] Yes. Accrue enough mutations and all kinds of fun things can happen. Thats why we have a diversity of living things (although viruses are not living, they are comprised of molecular componentsDNA or RNAthat also determine the genomes of living things). The same process can occur with disease in general (of course, this is an oversimplification).


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Could some sort of reverse adblocker become commonplace in the near future?

I like many others am weary of having my personal data collected.

Obviously you can do things to block that collection of data.

But is it possible a movement could start where we do the opposite? Instead of blocking data collection, we could propagate fake data, with the aimed goal of devaluing the relevance of collected information?

[Assistant] There have been some attempts at that. The best example was data spoofing on Android. So far, companies like Google have exercised their platform control to prevent any wide adoption of data poisoning tech.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Why do weathermen/women need to be meteorologists if they just read off of a teleprompter that someone else wrote?

[Assistant]
They don't need to be. They can just be, as you say, people who read the report.

Or they can be the people who also prepare the report and are able to comment on it with a degree of knowledge, and be able to discuss it with the other newscasters and therefore make their weather cast more interesting and authoritative.

It's really up to individual stations/news reports.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: How does everyone have such a distinctive voice when all our parts in that part of the throat are so similar?

[Assistant]
The difference is due to timbre. Its the same reason you can tell the difference between the sound of a piano, a guitar and a trumpet even if they are playing the same note. The different shapes of the instruments affect the resonance of each one (the different overtones and frequencies that come through in their sound)

Natural variations in the size and shape of humans resonating spaces (throat, sinus cavities, mouth etc) produce the same differences in timbre from person to person. Thats why you can recognize voices by their sound quality.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Why can't I remember the moment right before I fall asleep?

[Assistant]
Have you ever been listening to music or watching TV before you fall asleep? I'll assume you have...Do you remember as you were falling asleep, how at one point it seemed like your hearing shut down? The sound of the music or show just stopped registering. Must have been your ears closing up shop for the night....right?

Well, no actually.

The reason you can't remember the moment before you fall asleep is because one of the first parts of the brain to shut down during the "falling asleep process" is the part which is responsible for short-term memory.

So, when you were falling asleep and you suddenly stopped hearing music, you were actually still hearing everything perfectly, your brain just didn't record any of it in your "memory banks".

This is the same reason you can't remember the moment right before you fell asleep: your brain simply shuts down your ability to create memories at all.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How do you feel about unnaturally colored hair in academia?

I'm a STEM PhD student and I'm looking for opinions on unnaturally colored hair. Is it unprofessional? If you meet someone at a conference with colored hair, are you less likely to trust or collaborate with that person? Are you MORE likely to collaborate? Or does hair color not affect your attitude toward that person in any way?

Some of my friends have colored hair, and I don't think it's a problem, but I'm looking for a wider sample size.

[Assistant] I think that youll get a much warmer reception from younger academics. It could negatively affect your networking with the older generations though, so its a bold move. Personally, Id love to normalize funky academic fashion.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
CMV: using mismatching units for physical properties is bad practice and should not be passed down in higher education.

i'm not quite certain how to word this CMV so i'll give the example i'm thinking about and hope i've made my case. i'm certain other examples can be made in other fields.

this CMV is regarding a pet peeve i've recently acquired while taking a course on lasers.i'm consistently taken aback by phrases - used by my professor or in exercises - such as:
"energy gap of 632.8 nm" (energy in units of length),
or
"the energy of the upper state is 166658.484 cm\^-1" (energy in units of spacial frequency)

the worst offender i've seen is: "ambient temperature of kT = 208 cm\^{1}"

that's temperature described not as T but as kT - which is energy, not temperature. that's already bad - which is then obfuscated even further by giving the number in units of spacial frequency, which is neither a unit of temperature nor energy.

far as i can tell this is pretty common both in established, highly regarded textbooks, as well in general parlance of experts in the field, and professors teaching newcomers. it's just generally accepted as an acceptable and appropriate way to convey said information.

is this not insane?

i know get that some units are more useful than others in different fields, and that different fields tend to use dissimilar definitions for the same "thing", but this feels egregious.

want to use wavelength because that's what you're expecting the calculation to require? fine, then it should be "energy gap WITH A WAVELENGTH OF of 632.8 nm". i get that no one that understands what they're reading will actually think it's a unit of energy, but this is still bad practice in my view and i see no reason not to refer to units with this basic level of definitional accuracy.

a nanometer is not a unit of energy, neither is nm\^-1, or a Kelvin, or a Hertz, or any other convoluted indirect reference that one can cook up. if you say "energy" i expect to see a unit of energy at the end of that value. if you're using any other unit for convenience, fine!
just don't call it energy, ya clown?

calling things by their name should be a basic guideline for scientific expression and i don't understand why it's tolerated to muddy the technical lingo in this way.

CMV? why is this a good thing?

[Assistant] Sounds to me like you dont fully understand. If its common and the textbooks and professor do it, seems maybe you should ask more question. Instead of just assuming you know better in an intro class than the book and professor.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: why can Dennis Rodman just hang out in North Korea all the time?

I'm pretty sure that if I did it it would involve me getting killed!

[Assistant]
Kim Jong-un is a huge fan of basketball. Dennis Rodman is there by invitation (and whatever crazy reasons he has personally).

You wouldn't be killed there, though. They deny a lot of people entrance to their country arbitrarily, but if they did let you in, you'd just be watched at all times, most likely.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] [avatar] did avatar roku know about the eclipse? if he knew why didn't he tell aang about it?

[Assistant]
Very unlikely.

It seems like past avatars only have access to knowledge they had in their own lifes. Roku only knew about Sozins Comet because it was a naturally recurring phenomenon that Sozin told him about. Eclipses are something you can predict with Astronomy, but Roku was neither an astronomer nor did he search for information like this during his life.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[MCU] Why would Thanos give Loki 1 Infinity stone to secure another?

**AoU spoliers**, so we know that Loki's staff contained the mind stone, we know from the Avengers that essentially the staff and mind stone were given to Loki by Thanos. Why would Thanos give Loki the mind stone? Does Thanos not need all of them so he can do whatever it is he needs to do? What if Loki did not want to give it nor the Tesseract to Thanos after her retrieved it?

[Assistant]
Thanos knew that Loki was a little shit. He knew that the Tesseract was on Earth. He knew Loki wanted to make a statement by conquering Earth.

He still needed to collect the other gems anyway, so rather than show his hand (remember, some people out there are keeping an eye on these things) he sent Loki to snatch the stone for him. Worst case, two of them are on Earth, and he just has to make a stop at wherever Earthlings keep things like that.

Also, Thanos is apparently slightly incompetent.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5:How can the Earth's gravity be a strong enough force to hold the moon in orbit, and the oceans down, yet be a weak enough to allow me to raise my arms?

[Assistant]
Two reasons here:

First off, look at it the other way around.  Earth's gravity isn't weak, you are just incredibly strong!  We all are, because we casually overcome gravity all the time.

Also, the equation governing gravitational attraction between two bodies is proportional to the mass of those bodies.  Your mass is itty-bitty and so the force of attraction between you and the Earth isn't as strong as it is between the Moon and Earth.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Harry Potter] Can Muggles make Potions?

Obviously many of the ingredients derived from magical plants and creatures would be difficult if no impossible to obtain for a Muggle. But if they were given a well-stocked potion-making kit and tuition by an accomplished wizard, is there anything stopping them? As far as I am aware no potion brewing depicted has ever required actual wandwork, so would you really need magic to pull it off?

If magic is for some reason required, what about goblins, elves etc? Can they/do they brew potions?

[Assistant]
Nope! This is explained in Pottermore. The last step in preparing a potion is waving your wand to channel magic into the brew. This activates the latent magical properties of the ingredients, which is necessary for the potion to work. Without it, you just have a sludge that might have some magical effects, but won't combine in unison to produce the potion you wanted.

A Muggle could, in theory, prepare the potion then give it to a wizard to activate it.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Noam Chomsky once said that "If we don't believe in free expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all." Which other philosophers delve into radical free speech as a virtue?

[Assistant]
John Stuart Mill has a quite similar view, and so have many classic liberals. (Note that this does not say anything about whether freedom of speech is absolute or mitigated by other freedoms and rights). I'd go so far as saying that freedom of speech, in the same way Chomsky says (and perhaps the limitation mentioned above) is the pretty standard view.

Also note that - if this question is about the "culture wars" or whatever -, free expression does not mean that we need to listen to those people we despise, give them a platform, etc. Freedom of Speech is typically meant as a freedom against the state, freedom from state persecution. Classic liberals hoped that free debate would naturally solve the problem of "bad" speech, for example by others speaking against it.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[general horror] Why do ghosts spend so much time moving random objects, walking across halls in the background, grabbing shoulders from behind, and playing piano?

Ghosts used to be living people. Yet, they behave very unlike living people. They're always walking loudly on wooden steps, hiding in closets and drawers like weirdos, jumping out from the dark at people, pointlessly turning on or off lights, moving things around for no reason, walking behind people ominously, playing sad off-key tunes on the piano, grabbing shoulders, leaving ectoplasm everywhere, and generally making a nuisance of themselves. They always seem to whisper and leave needlessly cryptic messages instead of just saying what they want outright.

Why is it that after they die they start acting so-- oddly? Why not fly aroundand explore galaxies and other dimensions and stuff? Do they really have to be such crummy roommates?

[Assistant]
Alejandro Amenbar's movie The Others offered a pretty interesting explanation for this, which was that ghosts might not realize they are even dead, and are just going through their daily lives in a plane of existence parallel to the living.

All the weird stuff people in the realm of the living experience are generally mundane actions the ghosts are doing, but bleeding into our world (voices from nowhere, doors randomly opening, a piano playing itself, or objects being moved around).

And the bleeding can go the other way too, with actions happening in the living plane bleeding into the dead's plane.

But if the ghosts still think themselves to be alive, they mistake the living for the ghosts, and end up behaving like they're the ones being haunted, panic and flip out, which creates even crazier actions bleeding back into the plane of the living, and a reciprocating cycle where both planes are unintentionally freaking each other out.

Once the ghosts realize and accept that they're dead though, they can finally calm down and be more like benevolent or passive spirits if they wanted to.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Dragon Ball Z] Who has more control during Fusion?

Maybe it's explained subtlety. But during a fusion (Gogeta/Gotenks)who has more control. Or do they split evenly? Also, what would happen if, like in the Frieza saga, Captain Ginyu switches bodies with someone (Goku) and then he fuses with someone else (Vegeta)? Could Ginyu switch back out of Goku's body? Would the two split after that?

[Assistant] The entities which are the product of a Fusion are entirely distinct from their components. Gogeta isn't mentally a combination of Goku and Vegeta, he is an individual in his own right. There is no split control, only Gogeta.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: What allows heat to cast a shadow?

I stepped out into my garage and next to our heater, and I had the light on, and was looking at the wall and noticed the shadow being cast was barely visible, but it was there, and it was from the heat coming out. So, I'm just curious what of that is allowing it to cast a shadow.

[Assistant] Light is bent or refracted by whatever it passes through. In a room of uniform temperature, the light is bent the same way everywhere so you see a uniform image. Heat causes turbulence in the air so the light is bent in a more chaotic manner. You're seeing this as a wavy image in the shadow. This is also what causes mirages and the wavy pattern that one can see on top of a car hood when the engine is hot. This happens not only to light, but any part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Radio signals are disrupted in the morning and the evening, thermal inversion. As the air quickly heats up or cools down, the radio waves are distorted by the same effect. Thus causing a distorted signal and static in the radio program you're listening to at those times.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Does "Active Noise Cancellation" in audio products decrease ear damage by loud sounds?

I've always wondered whether or not those "Active Noise Cancelling" earbuds actually helped in reducing the stress exerted on ears by earbuds/over-the-ear headphones. I know that using these headphones allows a user to enjoy audio at a lower volume (because the desired audio is not competing with the ambient), but does the anti-noise also contribute to hearing damage wrought by audio hardware?

Also, on a separate note, can these "Anti Noise" frequencies be effective in a speaker format for a room or larger area?

Thanks so much!

[Assistant]
Only if you dont play music through them.

The music isnt being cancelled just the static of outside noise.

However, they may help you to keep the volume of the music lower than you usually would have, which could help.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Matrix] So how did Neo's power cross into the real world from the Matrix?

I dont understand it.

[Assistant]
There are two possibilities:

One, Zion and the "real world" are just another layer in the simulation; the resistance fighters didn't actually break out of the Matrix, they were just uploaded to another level.

Two, Neo has WiFi. This is, according to the apparently canonical game *The Matrix Online*, the actual answer. Neo has an experimental plug in the back of his head that creates a permanent connection to the machines, and allows him to invoke his One abilities from anywhere.

Both of these are very reasonable answers, and both also allow for Neo's consciousness to be trapped in the train station without his body dying.

I prefer the first answer, but at least until *M4*, the second answer is the "truth."


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[Warhammer40K] Does the Chaos gods do anything personally?

Do they ever give commands to champions or demons? Do they kill demons that have displeased them? Do they bestow gifts and mutations to their minions, or is it regular demons who does that, or does it just happen by itself after a long time in the warp? Is it any of their voices i hear when i walk around in that chaos infested keep? Or is it a demon that lives there that whispers? Or is it my own thoughts and fears that are reflected back to me?

Do the Gods do anything, or do they just sit in their domains and let the demons figure things out, or do they just act like a general background thing giving direction? (Like, Khorne never tells you to go slaughter everyone, you just feel a presence that fills you with rage, like a aoe feild)

[Assistant] You have to remember that the Chaos gods aren't like normal mortal beings. They have no true corporeal body. The demons of a Chaos god are physical manifestations of themselves. They don't have to "kill" daemons, they just return the daemon back to the greater corporeal body that is the Chaos god.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Why aren't pigeons scared of humans like other non-domesticated animals?

I know that many other animals (foxes, squirrels, mice etc) have lost the 'fear' in big cities, but pigeons seem ubiquitously fearless even in towns and villages.

[Assistant] Actually, the pigeon species you probably mean is called the Feral Pigeon (Columba livia) because they are all derived from domesticated pigeons that have returned to the wild. Having no fear of humans seems to be a remnant of that.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How is this paradox involving basic relativity principles explained?

Relativity is a confusing and counter-intuitive concept to the layman, and many people only ever know that there is something called "time dilatation" and "length contration" happening, without fully comprehending (myself included). With this limited knowledge it's possible to construct paradoxes, one of which is the following:

> You sit on top of a tunnel with a length of 100m. A train of 200m (when at rest) approaches this tunnel at near light speed, experiencing a length contraction of 50%, i.e. 100m. From your perspective, the train fits into the tunnel, and as soon as it enters it completely, you close the tunnel with impenetrable doors on either side with a press of a button. However, from the perspective of the train it's the tunnel that was shortened by 50% and it should have been impossible for the train (200m) to enter the now 50m long tunnel. Explain this paradox.

Hope someone can explain it in a layman-friendly way (if in any way possible) :D

And please, for the love of god, *do not* comment on how it's impossible for a train to be this fast, to close doors immediately, for a door to be completely impenetrable, etc. It's a gedankenexperiment and not the point of this post.

[Assistant]
While the closing and reopening of the doors was simultaneous in the ground frame, in the train's frame it's not. In relativity, different observers will disagree on the simultaneity of events happening at different places.

In the train's frame, the train enters the tunnel, then the *second* door closes, then it open backs again, then the trains' head exits the tunnel, then only after the tail has entered too, the first door closes, and then opens up again. In this frame, the train is never all inside the tunnel at any given time. But then, neither are the doors ever simultaneously closed.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
Why is getting soap in your eyes harmful and what causes the burning sensation?

Rough shower this morning.

[Assistant]
It's not just soap, though soap does have a more pronounced effect.

Your eyes are exceptionally sensitive to irritation, which can occur any time the layer of tears that constantly lubricates your cornea is disrupted or altered chemically.

Soap works by breaking the surface tension on water, allowing it to mix with other compounds so they're more easily removed from a surface. Unfortunately, when you get it in your eyes, it disrupts the tear layer on your eyes and also contaminates them. Most of the compounds in soap are irritants, and even if the soap isn't actually *damaging* your eyes, your body will automatically react with pain because of how delicate and important your eyes are. In essence, so many things hurt your eyes because your body is extremely protective of them.

Most soaps aren't actually harmful to your eyes, by the way, and won't cause long-term damage unless you're using them like eyedrops every morning.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: Why is Scientology considered a bad thing/a cult?

[Assistant]
the religion was created by L Ron Hubbard, a science fiction writer who was known to be a scam artist

scientologists believe an ancient race of aliens slaughtered another race of aliens and the slaughtered race of aliens' souls have inhabited some humans, and scientologists take a test to find out how strongly those aliens souls have inhabited your body. yes i am serious.

the 'church' has different levels of membership that are increasingly secretive and require paying shitloads of money to the organization itself, which is a distinctly cult-like thing to do

the organization has done very very questionable things in the way of murder, blackmail, and infiltration of the US government to take suspicion off of the organization itself. people who have left scientology have been harassed by the organization and some have even had attempts on their life, or even been killed. a very cult-like thing to do.

it is not a fusion of religion and science. it is pretty much a cult.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] ELI5: if I connect two electronic devices via USB-C how is the source and the sink determined for charging?

[Assistant]
Every usb-c device has a usb controller chip inside.  The controllers determine among themselves which is the "charger" and which is the "device needing to be charged".

Usually the laptop or pc identifu as the "charger" and your phone or iPad are "devices".


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
[ATLA] How different/messed up would the world have been if the Fire Nation had succeeded in destroying all the other Bending Cultures (e.g Aang doesn't run away and dies with the other Air Nomads, Yue isn't born so the Moon Spirit stays dead, Ozai's Final Solution succeeds)?

It would be a world where the Earth Kingdom is a burnt husk, the Moon (and water-bending) no longer exists, and the Air Nomads are long gone. The Avatar Cycle looks irreparably broken and Fire Bending is the only kind of Bending left.

How bad is the situation, on a spiritual level? Would spirits start rampaging? Would anything happen at all? Or would the Fire Nation actually have gotten everything it wanted?

[Assistant]
There would have been a huge spiritual upheaval, and perhaps literally, the physical world would start to rot and turn itself inside out until the Phoenix Empire had crumbled and humanity had been laid bare.

Society would go post-post apocalyptic everywhere, and the notions of 'nations' would disappear and be forgotten.

The cycle starts anew and benders of all four elements would come to exist again, and the world would rebuild.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Why do fabrics and hair look darker when wet?

[Assistant]
Short answer: because moisture (water) scatters light particles, so that more of it ends up getting absorbed/going through the material and less of it gets reflected back to your eyes.

EDIT: Fun fact - if you have a wet spot on a piece of fabric and there is a light source behind it, the spot will actually look *brighter* for the same reasons.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How to store API secret keys, Oauth id and secret keys etc securely?

Just as the title says.

I created a Python script and used some APIs which give you some token or secret key.

I am currently using them directly i.e storing in variables but I now want to deploy my script on a server.

Read somewhere that you should encrypt the file store your keys in it but it was not clear enough.

Anyways, how should I use them securely?

[Assistant]
Instead of hard coding the keys in your python files, you could:

1. create a file that stores the credentials
2. Add the credentials file to .gitignore
3. Then alter your python to dynamically pull credentials by reading from the file.

Now your code doesn't have to know the credentials, but only where to find them.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] The moon orbits us, we orbit the sun, the sun orbits the galaxy... does the galaxy orbit anything?

[Assistant]
1. The Moon orbits Earth.
2. Planets of our solar system orbit the Sun.
3. Our solar system orbits the center of the Milky Way galaxy.
4. The Milky Way galaxy is orbited by over 25 smaller galaxies.
5. The Milky Way galaxy along with over 54 other galaxies called the "Local Group" orbit a gravitational center located somewhere between the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxy.
6. The Local Group is a part of Virgo Supercluster and orbiting its center.
7. Virgo Supercluster isn't orbiting anything and is moving away from other superclusters.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
ELI5: Why does methamphetamine use ruin your teeth?

I've been watching Orange is the New Black with my mom, and resident redneck Pensatucky's teeth made us both wonder why meth destroys your teeth so much.

[Assistant]
It causes your mouth to be very dry due to reducing the production of saliva. Saliva helps keep your mouth cleaner and flush away sugars, acids and food particles. Without it, decay can happen much more easily.

Amphetamines can cause or worsen teeth grinding also, which may play a part. People on days long meth benders also tend to forget about insignificant matters like brushing their teeth and often favor lots of sugary and acidic drinks rather than actual food.

It's all a perfect storm for tooth decay.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User] Why don't zombies eat each other?

[Assistant]
A virus' main purpose is to spread itself, and with zombies this is done through bites.

There'd be no point in biting an already infected host, so the virus controlling the zombie's behavior simply wouldn't consider it as a potential victim.


[System] Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:

[User]
How the fuck did Obi Wan defeat Darth Maul?

Darth maul is a master combatant with a lot of experience.  He is incredibly well trained and very driven.  There is no doubt in my mind that Darth Maul was superior to Obi Wan in almost every way.  Darth Maul kills Jedi masters for fun and Obi Wan was just a Padawan when they fought.  How did Obi Wan triumph over Darth Maul?

[Assistant] Hubris.  Keep in mind that Maul had just slain a Jedi Master (and not just any Jedi Master, but one of the best swordsmen in the order) and now had his apprentice dangling by an outcropping over what may as well have been a bottomless pit.  He could pick off the younger Jedi at leisure if he so chose.  Rather than do the practical thing, Maul chose to gloat, basking in his victory.  Simply put, he let his guard down and let his arrogance get the better of him.