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

[User]
[Infinity War] was the order in which Thanos obtained the infinity stones determined more by how difficult it was to get them, or because of their abilities?

ie, did he get the Power Stone first because it was easiest to just steal from the Nova Corps, or because he needed its powers first?

[Assistant]
The Power Stone made Thanos essentially invincible; he was able to go against the Hulk without any trouble once he had it, and was also able to ditch his armor. That seems like it would have been a top priority for a guy like Thanos.

Running into the Space Stone was at least partially a coincidence, but it's very possible that Thanos was on his way to Asgard anyway. The Space Stone allows the now-invulnerable Thanos to instantly travel to the location of any otherStone.

The Time Stone was the next target, because it provides the biggest hax in the game. You could make a good case that the Time Stone is, in isolation, the strongest Stone of them all. Strange used it to defeat a dimension-ruling deity, after all.

They went after the Mind Stone next, probably due to its proximity to the Time Stone. Even though Cap shut that down, Thanos was still able to gather the other Stones, indicating that the Mind Stone's power wasn't essential to that quest.

The Reality Stone was in a well-known location, and Thanos hung out there because he needed Gamora to find the Soul Stone. While Thanos did use the Reality Stone's powers, it was mostly to craft illusions and fuck with his enemies. He didn't make very good use of the Reality Stone's full potential.

The Soul Stone was planned to be the last Stone he acquired, because it was the hardest to find.

The Mind Stone was the one he actually acquired last, because his first attempt to grab it failed.


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

[User] Mitochondria have their own DNA; do all mitochondria in a persons body share the same DNA?

[Assistant] You normally inherit your mitochondria from your mother. However, as they replicate, they tend to collect mutations. Eventually you will have subpopulations of mitochondria with slightly different genomes, what we call heteroplasmy. They typically aren't particularly common, maybe accounting for 10% of all mitochondria. But because they are randomly assorted between dividing cells, it is possible for a cell to inherit a significant proportion of mitochondria with a deleterious variant, impacting the viability of the cell, and potentially causing a localized mitochondrial disease.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40,000] What interactions occurred between the Eldar and Dark Age Era Humanity?

I've heard that at it's height, the Eldar empire was the pre-eminent power in the Galaxy. Similarly, Mankind was at its technological height during the Dark Age of Technology. If I'm reading things correctly, it seems like the Fall of the Eldar and the Age of Strife both occurred nearly simultaneously. Furthermore, it would seem that these two societies co-existed for nearly 10 Millenia.

My question is, what sort of interactions did they have. If Mankind reached it's zenith in terms of technology and spread at the same time as the Eldar were the Galaxy's most powerful society, how could they have co-existed as they did? Given that the current Imperium encompasses nearly the entire galaxy, and Dark Age humanity was apparently even more widespread, I don't see how the Eldar could ALSO have been controlling most of the galaxy.

Basically, both species were at their heights at the same time, and the current Imperium is big enough to control the majority of the galaxy right now. So how the hell could both of them have controlled more than 50% of the galaxy at the same time? Plus, whatever the relationship was, what do know of their interactions?

[Assistant]
They didn't.

Mankind, at that point, had no single, unifying leader. They had technology which was closing on the Eldar, who weren't really advancing - having a webway, a post-scarcity society and an infinite supply of chocolate sauce and lubricant does that for you. Die? Fine! Just run straight into the warp and hang around for a few minutes until you can reincarnate. This caused warp storms, which began to become more and more frequent during the DAoT, a time when Man had no single leader. The Emperor was lurking on earth somewhere, but he hadn't really subjugated the world yet. Working on it, though.

Anyway, while man puttered about, the Eldar had truly staggering amounts of sex and drugs and everything and being so massively psychically active, pumped all that excess into the warp. Travel became extremely difficult if you relied on the warp. And dangerous. Warp storms gathered more and more around the embryonic Slaanesh, until its birthscreams created the Eye of Terror, ended the Eldar (barring a few hardy dissidents who decided they would follow excess in their own way, the Exodites, or excess in denial, the Craftworlds, while claiming not to) and got rid of all the warp storms shrouding the galaxy.

This was the point when Big E said to himself "Now or never" and launched a tiny little galaxy-spanning crusade to find his lost kids and unite the galaxy under his iron-fisted rule.


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

[User]
Is anything in the universe truly random? (For Physics majors)

I was wondering if any event in the universe is truly random. I mean, since we have so many laws and models that can predict the behavior of most particles, then technically isn't everything predictable... Doesn't every action and reaction of a particle happen a certain way, which is dictated by the laws of nature.. random energy doesn't just appear or disappear to make particles act randomly

I mean sure, someone might point out that the Heisenberg uncertainty principle shows that we don't know where an electron is on an atom, we can only guess where it probably is... but I would argue that its just because we dont have the proper tools to see where an electron is on an atom, and/or we dont have the proper models or laws to predict where the electron is

I mean, hypothetically, there shouldn't be any random actions of small particles ... If a small particle seems like its doing something random, its just because of our incomplete understanding of the laws of physics

This leads me to my next conclusion.... that if every reaction is predictable.. then does that mean that the universe is predictable, and that it only had one possible "destiny"

This can be translated to us humans as well... Even our actions are dictated by our biology, which is dictated by our chemistry, which is dictated by physics, which is dictated ultimately by math... so at the most basic level, even our actions are technically are predictable and not our own, but are in fact a culmination of an infinitely large number of reactions at the subatomic level....  Its like we are slaves to the laws of nature

EDIT: What is the mechanism that causes something, like quantum mechanics, to be random.. what is the process of randomness....

[Assistant] There are aspects of quantum mechanics that, as far as we know, are totally random. An example is radioactive decay: an unstable atom will decay randomly without warning or trigger. You can attempt to modify quantum mechanics in a way that there is order to the randomness that we are unable to detect (hidden variable theory), but this has observable consequences that we are starting to be able to probe experimentally.


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

[User] ELI5: why does a broken leg essentially mean a death sentence for a horse?

[Assistant] Horses legs are under high tension with tight tendons from the knee down. This means that when they break they often shatter. That same tendon situation also means there fairly little blood flow down the leg which makes healing slow. That means that the horse would have to spend a long time on only 3 legs, something it is too heavy for without damaging those 3 legs, or spend that time lying down or in a rig to hold their weight both of which have a high likelihood of them developing colic which is a potentially lethal twisting of the intestines.


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

[User]
[Fallout 4] What's the deal with these Mini Nukes creating no rads?

Hi, I'm a Lone Wanderer from the Commonwealth. Through my adventures I've become fond of using the Fat Man and it's upgraded MIRV variant, but I'm wondering, why isn't there any radiation present after impact? I'd assume that a mini nuke would flood the immediate area with rads, but avoiding the primary explosion is the only concern.

It seems to defy physics, like when I loot a long closed off army base, only to come back a week later and find it restocked again. If I take enough Med X, Psycho, Buffout and Whisky while in decent power armor, I can even withstand a mini nuke detonation and receive less rads than simply standing on the corpse of a recently killed Ghoul. So what's going on here? Is the mini nuke emitting some sort of radiation my Pip-Boy isn't detecting? Or is it a misnomer, and in fact just a powerful explosive with no post-detonation radiation?

[Assistant] Mini-nukes rely almost entirely on fusion and therefore can detonate with a minimum of radiation. Given that they were designed to be used tactically rather than strategically against those damned reds it was a requirement that they didn't release much harmful radiation.


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

[User]
ELI5: How exactly the symptom of rabies, the fear of water, the hydrophobia works?

One of the rabies symptoms is a fear of water, also called a hydrophobia.

Wikipedia article on rabies even shows a diseased trying to drink water but still unable to.

My question is: how it works on the biological level? Is it happening in consciousness, subconsciousness, or where? How does the sickness knows the water is approaching the mouth? How? Can one trick the sickness by making person close their eyes? Or by putting water in a closed box and then moving it towards the patient? Etc?

[Assistant]
The hydrophobic comes from the nerves in the throat being damaged. If anything touches the back of the throat; any water or saliva or food, all the muscles in the throat and neck suddenly tense up with maximum strength causing extreme pain and choking.

Because having anything in their mouth (including water) causes extreme pain, they can't drink and have to drool because even having saliva in their mouth will be incredibly painful.


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

[User]
How come almost every other mammal (carnivore or herbivore) can eat their meat completely raw and we have to cook ours or else we could potentially die?

I don't understand, every mammal I can think off of my head can heat meat off of the newly dead animal coated in whatever dirt and bacteria came with it while obviously being completely raw. However we have to cook all of our meat for fear of salmonella and other things that can make us very sick. Where did we go wrong? Surely we didn't evolve to adapt to go through extra work to eat.

[Assistant] Humans can eat raw meat easily enough.  Ever had sushi, sashimi, steak tartare, or (for that matter) a rare piece of beef?  We don't have to cook our meat.  However, there are benefits that come with doing so.  A reduced chance of parasites and bacteria, for one.


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

[User]
Given our society's rules, slut shaming is completely acceptable. CMV

I see this tired argument every single day: "If a guy has sex with a lot of girls he's a god among men, but if a girl has sex with a lot of guys she's a hoe!" Well no shit. Know why? It's because girls *themselves* perpetuate the archaic stereotype of being pure, non-sexual beings in public, never asking guys out, never admitting their feelings for another guy, etc. (And yes I know, just like with every generalization there are exceptions.) So why are there girls that complain about slut shaming when they themselves are the cause of it? You can't stop slut shaming without restructuring society as a whole from the ground up. Unless girls magically become as open about their sexuality as guys are, slut shaming will be a thing forever. Women/girls will always be devalued for having lots of sex while guys who do the same will be praised and looked up to. You can't be mad at a guy for slut shaming a girl if promiscuous girls *are* deviant in our society.

[Assistant]
Generally it's different girls -- some perpetuating the stereotypes and others complaining about being slut-shamed.

You're falling into the classic problem with prejudice: even when most members of a group are statistically one way, not all are.

Besides that, you're making a "two wrongs make a right" kind of argument. Harassment is wrong, period.


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

[User]
ELI5: if I make coffee (acidic) with high pH water (basic) would I have a pH neutral beverage?

Wondering why this wouldn't work to take out the acidity of coffee. Would it just taste terrible? What makes coffee acidic in the first place?

[Assistant]
>Would it just taste terrible?

Yes. The acid is a key flavour component in coffee and without it (or with the addition of base to "balance" the pH) it will taste flat, and exacerbate other negative characteristics of the drink. The by products of the acid/base reaction may also contribute off flavours of saltiness or soapyness.

> What makes coffee acidic in the first place?

The acids present in the raw coffee fruit before they are dried, processed, and roasted are mostly responsible for the acid in the finished drink. Just like apples or lemons contain acid, coffee cherries do too. Some additional acid is produced by fermentation of the beans which happens after they are harvested.


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

[User] ELI5: Is it me or whenever I'm done working out I randomly get full and don't feel like eating ?

[Assistant]
This is a common thing.

There is a hormone believed to be responsible for your body creating that hunger feeling or having an appetite.

And studies have shown that it seems physical exercise suppresses the release of that hormone.

One theory for why this happens is it a beneficial reaction developed through evolution. For most of human history the only time youd really have super intense physical exercise is likely in life and death scenarios, like say, fighting off, or running away from, a predator. The theory is that in these kinds of scenarios, it is beneficial to not be distracted by hunger pains.


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

[User]
I believe the western countries are socially liberal only because of a higher material standard of living and not some sort of higher enlightenment on the part of the citizens, CMV

I see it quite often, living in the western world and consuming western media, this attitude of latent superiority over the "backwards bigoted people with Wrong beliefs", be they the Muslims with their treatment of women or the older generations with their treatment of gays, I'm talking about this idea that people have, to use a hyperbole, ascended to some sort of objectively higher plane of existence by virtue of the civil rights movement.

I disagree with this whole premise, I believe that the trend of social progressivism that occurred during the 20th century was a by-product of improving standards of living during that time, and not wholly a deliberate effort on the part of the masses. While there were definitely people pushing the civil rights movement for women, blacks, gays and the rest it seems to me that the reason these have caught on is less to do with people becoming more educated in the relevant fields and more to do with the standard of living improving for people enough that they simply occupy themselves with something else and don't bother exerting energy to follow these political trends, opting to just roll with it.

The reason I feel this way is because I see a direct link between poverty and discrimination. We can of course account for different cultures like those of Islamic countries, but even in westernized regions there appears to be a clear relationship between the two. The most conservative parts of the United States are those with the highest poverty levels (the bible belt), the most socially liberal parts of the EU are those with the best safety nets for the population. Furthermore, due to the economic crisis it appears that the trend is reversing, with attitudes to immigration worsening and some countries outright acquiring Neo-Nazi movements.

If this is the case, can it really be said that the civil rights movement is an inherent part of western society, or is social progressivism just another aquired luxury of first-world living?

**TL;DR: I believe the social liberal trend in the west isn't so much an ideology in itself but the absence of any conservative counter-ideology, with people becoming accepting of gays and the like because of material comfort-induced indifference rather than an informed conviction. Ergo, I believe that if the average standards of living in the west deteriorate things may very well go backwards on the civil rights front.**

[Assistant] It isn't that the standard of living is higher, it's that education is better. Poverty does not correlate with bigotry because being poor causes you to be bigoted, it correlates with bigotry because the poor are less likely to be well educated. You will find that the actual causal relationship is between education and bigotry, not wealth and a lack of it.


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

[User] [ELI5] Why does the moon look so tiny in pictures when it looks so large from where I took it?

[Assistant]
It looks small in pictures because it's a photograph.

1. The lens you are using. Most cell-phones/digital cameras have a fixed lens, and it is usually a wide angle. The zoom that is available isn't optical zoom. It's digital. This means that the lens doesn't make anything bigger, but the image itself is cropped. This is why you see a loss of resolution when you zoom in. If you have a dSLR with a zoom lens, you're physically moving lens elements to make the image bigger/closer. Another thing that wide angle lenses do is they make far away things look SMALLER than close things. This is why a lot of times when a person takes a selfie, they look like they have a big nose and small eyes: the nose is closer to the lens than the eyes, so it makes it bigger.

2. You're viewing a very small image. This is mostly psychological. You're looking at a small photograph, and in comparison, the moon is huge, so it makes it look even smaller. Think of it this way: you take a picture of your dad, and he looks smaller in the picture than how he really is. The reason it's not so apparent is because you have a better reference of your father since you see him physically in front of you (as opposed to far away like the moon). Now, if you want a larger version of your father, you would have to print a bigger picture.


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

[User] [MCU] [Avengers] If the infinity stones are so crucial to the flow of the universe that the Ancient One won't even let Bruce borrow them at first, why isn't it a problem that they're destroyed now?

[Assistant] Her visualization of the timeline splitting looked nearly identical to the timelines splitting at the end of Loki.  This implies the disaster she was anticipating *has come to pass*, and she was simply wrong about the root cause.


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

[User] [The Dark Knight] What makes Health Ledger Joker impossible to manipulate/threatened compared to other criminals/villains?

[Assistant] He doesn't care about anything except getting a rise out of Batman. He barely cares about survival, he has no loved ones, and he's not interested in wealth. Essentially he's dangerous for many of the same reasons Batman is.


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

[User] ELI5:ELI5: When a person exercises and burn calories, what is actually happening to the fat? when someone loses weight where is the fat going?

[Assistant] Your fat is made of hydrocarbons - molecules of hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon.  When you inhale oxygen (O2) and exhale carbon dioxide (CO2) you are literally exhaling the carbon from those fat molecules as you burn those calories.  What about the hydrogen and oxygen? That becomes water which you urinate/sweat out.


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

[User]
Do plugged-in laptop and phone chargers et. al. continue to use electricity even when the paired device is not connected to them?

If I leave my laptop charger plugged in but do not have my laptop connected to it, does that still use power? I frequently unplug my devices' chargers/power cables from outlets, even when the device is not attached, because I suspect that having a cable plugged in still uses electricity. is this so?

**thanks for the knowledge, guys! very helpful in clearing up this mystery for me!**

[Assistant] Once the load (device to be powered/charged) is removed from the charger, very little power will be used.  Most power bricks have little LEDs that remain on, and there is a small amount of power dissipated in the cord/other components that stay electrified (commonly referred to as phantom power), but only a VERY small amount of power is still consumed.


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

[User] [Monsters inc] so youre telling me that an adult would NOT be scared shitless if Mike wazowski walked outta their closet door? Wouldnt a grown ass mans scream be louder and much more effective than a toddlers?

[Assistant]
Yes, it would, as we saw in Monsters University. But the problem with scaring adults is if a bunch of adults start saying they see creatures coming out of closest, then the human world is going to start investigating.

If little kids do it, then people just dismiss it as nightmares or overactive imaginations. Remember that the Monster world considers humans to be poisonous. The goal is to get scares *without* attracting attention to their world.


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

[User] ELI5:Why are all "As Seen on TV" commercials so similar to each other?

[Assistant]
These companies carefully study what works -- even trying different versions of an ad to see what brings in more orders.

What you see now is the optimal format -- the one that brings in the most orders -- so everyone tries to use it.


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

[User]
Is the purpose of life to contribute to society?

Is the purpose of life to contribute to society?

An average life consists of surviving, learning, reproducing, teaching, working.  Then you're finished.  You're born, you contribute a small bit of your existence to the world then die.  Outside of that, there is using your physical and emotional functions to work through life and its obstacles.  That's life.  There will be suffering, there will be joy.  Then there are experience such as sport, love, sex, drugs, games, and many more other life experiences to try.

You can look back on all lives in the past and you can see that pattern in what we do.  It seems happiness can come from your experiences, but meaning comes from contributing to society on your work, or just passing on your knowledge to many or few.  That seems to be the meaning and purpose of our lives.  That do you think?

[Assistant]
It really depends on your definition of "purpose".
If by your definition of purpose then yes. You will find the answer to that in many western political philosophies especially the philosophy of communitariansm, utilitarianism and socialism. You'll find alot of what you're looking for in Jean Jaque Roussoeus work and the social contract or Thomas Hobbes idea of how a society should be run also helps. Then again purpose draws a fine line between the individual and the community. If you are familiar with any sort of works regarding existentialism it is based almost fully on the self and personal freedom. As for linking that to society that has more links to social science and political philosophy. Then again, your question is very subjective since purpose is a very broad term.


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

[User]
CMV: Those in nursing homes and other settings for long-term and/or end-of-life care should have basically unlimited access to recreational drugs.

The main argument against recreational drugs seems to be that it's detrimental to your health and makes you less likely to be a contributing member of society. These are settings where these arguments no longer apply. If these people want to gamble their health then that's their choice, so long as they feel this gives them a higher quality of life in the interim. There is no argument that I can see that they're somehow going to be less productive citizens, because they're already in their end-state as far as their participation in society goes.

[Assistant] Physiological differences make it hard to predict peoples reactions to various recreational drugs. Sure, you might handle most of them fine, but even the most benign one could trigger severe bouts of extreme paranoia or aggression in someone else that could lead them to harming others - especially in a situation where people are aggregated together like that. Then theres also the issue that many recreational drugs can interfere with the intended physiological effects of the copious amounts of life-sustaining drugs many of these people are already taking.


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

[User]
ELI5: How is Ebola able to spread the way it has during the current outbreak?

I am seeing reports that multiple medical professionals have begun to contract the disease.  How is this happening if it is so hard to transmit and what is preventing this from spreading further, if anything?

[Assistant] Ebola is transmitted through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person; every droplet of a sneeze has the potential to infect, and so do other fluids as well. It also stays virulent after death, so touching the dead body during funeral rites also has the potential to infect. There is a pretty high chance you will be infected if you do come into contact with the fluids of a sick person, but if you don't then there is very little chance of catching the disease. Even with all of this; most of the problems with spreading during this epidemic have been because of extremely poor facility conditions and the medical practitioners often having little or no access to water or proper hygiene equipment. A large portion of the people getting infected are themselves health workers attempting to take care of the sick in appalling conditions, which could be solved with better equipment and education about how the disease spreads.


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

[User]
Do scientists testing medicine on animals have to give the animals the disease first?

Is there a market that sells animals with the disease you want or something?

[Assistant] This really depends on the study. Many studies just test the effects of the drug on healthy animals. Often the disease cannot be vectored in the animal, as it the case with some viruses, so you cannot give it to the animal. However, most of the time you are able to introduce or induce the exact or similar human disease into an animal. Commonly studied diseases like cancers do have markets that sell diseased animals, or will do the entire animal part of the study for a lab or company. In the end though, lab animals are not humans and human tests will need to be done.


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

[User]
CMV: Raising minimum wage isn't the answer to poverty and correcting the wage gap. We need to institute a maximum pay gap within companies, get rid of tax loopholes for the super rich and stop taxing low income brackets

Disclaimer: This was written from a Canadian point of view, having seen minimum wage rise, and the effects it has had on my Provence, cost of living and other challenges we face, but I do think it would also benefit America and other countries in a similar wage to cost of living situation. The research I did was mostly based on American wage and tax history due to the availability as well as the expected readers and response, though Canadian numbers were very similar. The rise of minimum wage and cost of living inflation was more focused on Ontario pricing and wage correlations, because I have personally witnessed it, and believe it to be the best example of what will happen if similar systems ie. the US were to try as well. I broke down my opinion into 4 seperate points so you can pick at any leg of the table you choose.

Minimum wage: Raising minimum wage has historically backfired. While the reason for the institution of a minimum wage remains important, the way the economy reacts to it is different and more volatile. When minimum wage rises, workers getting paid higher than minimum wage don't get a raise, and the perceived value of the work drops. At the same time, the people setting the costs, raise their prices. Now, some people who could comfortably afford things cannot, and those who couldn't afford it before still cannot. This doesn't effect the rich at all, but hurts the middle and lower earning classes. This is why this option is not a solution, and we need to stop using it.

Maximum wage gap: Instead of raising minimum wage, we need to incentivize the billion dollar industries to pay their employees better, and help people making low end wages earn more. The best way I see in doing this is enforcing a 10:1 pay ratio for highest earning in the company vs lowest. I could understand an argument for owners making 25:1 because they have to hold the liabilityand chance of failure. It should all be based on hourly wages, and salaried positions can only be based around a 40 hour work week. Management/ownership pays themselves a bonus, everyone else gets at least 10% of that. While this seems like small numbers, it would actually result in a massive pay jump for pretty much the entire working class, as employee to employer earnings are currently sitting at about 221:1. It would take a huge hit to the super wealthy, but that is kind of the point, redustribute and balancing the wealth, and making it so everyone can put food on the table, correcting a flaw in the capitalist system without completely removing the free market. Making highly profitable businesses pay their epmloyees better without raising minimum wage and making businesses with tighter profit margins go under.

Taxing low incomes: The majority of the taxes paid come from business tax. Income tax provides a much smaller slice of the pie. Of that smaller slice, the top 1% pay about 40%. The amount that comes from the bottom tax brackets is negligible from the government side, but the amount thats taken from the under 50k brackets makes a huge difference in their quality of life. By not taxing the first 50k in income it makes living on lower incomes a lot more sustainable. This is a choice that could drastically effect quality of life, and help give everyone  an equal chance and leading a successful, happy and not have to decide between eating, paying taxes and having a place to live.

Tax Loopholes: So with the top 1% paying 40% of income taxes, you would think they are doing their part. The issue with that is once you start getting into those who control more than 100 million, those individuals end up usually not paying very much as they are able to invest in what they need to hit tax writeoffs to the point of negating paying anything. While the amounts the low income group is paying is negligible, the amount the 100 million plus are writing off and avoid are not. By eliminating write offs and making the payments mandatory for anyone earning more than 1 million, we are more than covering the bit the government are losing by not taxing those who need it, and getting even more to work with to provide nessiscary services. What ends up being done with that money is a different debate, but this would result in a better balanced tax system, putting the burden on those who can provide, and taking it away from those who struggle to.

[Assistant]
The issue with this is you are misunderstanding how these people at the top are making money. No one is making 100 million in a salary or a bonus or anything like that. Comments like: "The issue with that is once you start getting into those who control more than 100 million, those individuals end up usually not paying very much as they are able to invest in what they need to hit tax writeoffs to the point of negating paying anything." Do not even make sense. Because that is not how that works. They aren't writing of 10s of millions in taxes.

Most wealthy people have their **wealth** increase by owning assets that have increased in value. They aren't paid. They aren't avoiding taxes or writing it off because they haven't observed any gain until they actually sell those assets. So even though they have a massively increasing net worth, they haven't actually "made" the money yet. Those kinds of gains are called capital gains. Capital gains are taxed at a lower rate than your standard income tax, in part because we want to incentive this type of activity.

So if we look at someone like Bezos. He had a salary of under 100K his entire time at Amazon. So how did he become the wealthiest man? Because he owned an asset (Amazon shares) that exploded in value. And when he sells those shares he then pays a capital gains tax on the amount he made.


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

[User]
[MCU] Does War Machine's suit have its own snarky AI?

I don't think we ever see Rhodey bantering with his suit or even issuing it verbal commands. But after JARVIS disappears in Age of Ultron, Tony has to install Friday on his suit, implying it does need some kind of AI to operate.

[Assistant]
> Tony has to install Friday on his suit, implying it does need some kind of AI to operate.

Tony installing FRIDAY does not mean that he *needs* to have her on the suit. He repaints his suit when it gets scratched off after a fight, doesn't mean it needs that hot rod red to operate.

IW Spoilers

>![Tony loses his connection to FRIDAY after leaving Earth and he does fine without her. Peter doesn't have Karen either.]


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

[User]
If rogue waves occur in the ocean, and rogue sound waves also occur?

To my knowledge a rogue wave occurs when lots of smaller waves converge in the right way.

My question is, does this happen with sound waves? Could a loud booming sound occur at random from the confluence of many low amplitude waves?

[Assistant] Theoretically yes, small amplitude sound waves can converge to form a large amplitude wave. In practice however this is ridiculously unlikely, and even less likely that it will occur somewhere that it can be heard.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] Could you splinch/telefrag someone by using a Time Turner?

If your point of arrival in the past happened to be where someone was standing, what would happen?

If you've been standing in the same spot for an hour then travel back one hour, would you telefrag your past self?

[Assistant]
#DO NOT MESS WITH TIME

Ahem.

Time-Turners operate within consistent loops. This is *not* a feature of time-travel itself in HP; it is indeed possible to change time and e.g. erase people from time (though time seems to have some kind of Butterfly Effect immunity; if you give someone's father a condom, they vanish from time, but it doesn't retroactively edit the whole world the way you'd expect from chaos theory) but not with a Time-Turner.

Clearly, the closed-time-loop function of Time-Turners, whereby you can't change time because it's already happened, is a built-in safety feature of the device itself, and it probably has other safety features.

Presumably, if you tried to perform a Time-Turn that would kill someone like that, it would fail for timey-wimey reasons, the same way it would if you went back in time and tried to kill your past self, which obviously can't happen because it would cause a paradox: you reach for the Time-Turner and inexplicably keep dropping it, or it breaks in your hands, or you have a heart attack and fall over before you can.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is honey dangerous to toddlers and infants?

[Assistant]
Honey often contains botulism spores, growth of botulism is suppressed when there is low water activity (such as in honey), and it's suppressed when the pH is low. It needs to get 125'C to kill the spores. Botulism produces one of the most toxic poisons  known to man when it grows.

The temperature to kill botulism is too high for honey (it would ruin it). For adults this is a non-issue because it doesn't grow in honey, and when you eat it your stomach acid prevents it from growing. Babies don't have a low enough pH in their stomach (not enough stomach acid basically), so botulism can grow in a babies stomach after it mixes with water in their stomach which could be deadly.


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

[User] ELI5 if every cell in your body gets replaced over time, how does your brain maintain memories?

[Assistant]
Neurons that compose memories do not normally die and are not replaced by newly forming cells. The cell is replaced in the sense that sooner or later every molecule is swapped out as a normal part of cellular maintenance but the entire cell is never replaced all at once.

Think of a car for example. A normal cell dying would be like a car exploding so you buy a new one. For neurons, its like replacing a wheel one day, the windshield the next, and the seats sometime after that. Sooner or later its a new car because the parts are replaced but it still operates the same and carries the same function.


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

[User]
CMV: The best way to reduce immigration is to make the countries of origin better places to live.

The United States spends billions of dollars trying to prevent people from Central and South America from immigrating to the US. If we spent some of that money to invest in those countries, and making them better places with more opportunity and less corruption and crime, then people wouldn't need to emigrate in the first place.

We spend trillions on a military that as far as I know does absolutely nothing at the moment (which is better than just bombing the crap out of the Middle East at least). If that military went down into Mexico to help build infrastructure projects, and combat rampant gangs and corruption, we would not only be making people's lives better, we would also be building a more stable trade partner, and preventing the need for people to have to cross the border.

I would assume many Americans wouldn't be on board with this idea because they'd see it is free handouts, and they'd rather keep putting people in cages at the border instead of actually helping our neighbors.

But down the road spending money on our neighbors now, seems like it would save us money in the future.

[Assistant]
the problem isn't lack of money, the problem is corruption. sending huge amounts of money is just going to result in that money getting stolen. unless you want to annex those countries into the US and subject them to US laws and US institutions, it is going to be very difficult to fundamentally reform those countries.

and even if quality of life was marginally improved, life in the US would still be better. you may no longer be in grinding poverty, but why would you settle for poorly paid job when there are much better jobs in america?


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

[User] ELI5: Why is shampoo usually translucent but conditioner opaque?

[Assistant]
Because conditioner is marketed as a "cream". (In fact it's sometimes the case and used to be the case back in the day that people would call conditioner "cream rinse".)

We associate opacity with creaminess and moisturizing properties, while we associate clarity with cleaning properties.

Kind of like why Crystal Pepsi didn't do well as a product, and why the SNL spoof commercial for "Crystal Gravy" was so hilarious.

TL;DR It's all marketing/what we expect the product to look like.


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

[User] If I shout into a breeze blowing straight at me, does my voice travel less distance then if I was to shout without a breeze?

[Assistant]
Basically, yes. The speed of sound in a medium is always measured with respect to the medium itself! If you speak on a very windy day, then your voice will travel at different speeds *with respect to you* in different directions depending on the direction of the wind.

If you visualize the sound you produce by shouting as an expanding spherical wavefront, if there is no wind then this sphere expands with you at its center. If there is wind, the center of that sphere will move with the wind. So if you shout into the wind, by the time your voice reaches the same distance as on a still day, it will have spread out more and therefore it will be quieter!


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

[User]
[Thor 2] Odin-Loki-Thor conversation and post credits scene.

If Loki disguised himself as Odin to talk to Thor then what happened to Odin? Is he aware that Loki alive, is he aware that Thor turned down  Asgardian throne? He would want to listen to Thor's reason.

Is it possible that Loki disguise himself as Thor to have a conversetion with his father? If Odin alive then what will Loki do?

Second part of my questions concerns scene after credits. Lady Sif and Volstagg brought mini version of Aether in a container (just like Tesseract one) to a blond guy played by Benicio Del Toro and a hellboyish looking female apprentice.

So what did actually happened there? I doubt that was sunctioned by neither Odin nor Thor. And that collector guy looked evil to me, smells like betrayal...

[Assistant]
Benicio Del Toro was playing "The Collector," one of the "Elders of the Universe," the last remaining members of their otherwise extinct species who were the first to gain sentience after the Big Bang.  As their various races died out, Death herself gave immortality to the last remaining members.

These Elders basically need to have an obsession, otherwise living for billions of years will drain their sanity and their will to live.  While otherwise immortal, they will waste away and perish if they lose that will to live.

The Collector's obsession, as you might guess from his name, is in collecting.  At first, he collected things because he had prophetic visions of great creatures who would threaten the universe.  Should any of those creatures succeed, he would be able to repopulate a new universe with the biological specimens he gathered, and then share the knowledge he had gathered as well.  That noble view has deteriorated after a few billion years, however, into an obsession with collecting all things rare and valuable.

This would explain his final statement: "One down, five to go."  What good is collecting one Infinity Gem if you don't go for the complete set?

If you wanted to keep something safe and away from others, the Collector would be a decent choice.  As one of the Elders, he has access to the Power Primordial, the remnants of the energy of the Big Bang.  Akin to the Cosmic Energy used by the Silver Surfer, it makes any Elder, the Collector included, a dreadful opponent.

Bear in mind that the information presented here is based on the Collector from Earth-616.  Earth-199999, the dimension of the cinematic universe, may alter this to some degree.


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

[User] ELI5: why does having a baby with a sibling create deformities and weaker genes in said baby?

[Assistant] It doesn't unless the aforementioned siblings have recessive defects. You need to have two copies of recessive defects to see an effect. Two siblings are more likely to share a recessive defect since they share a parent that could have one. If both siblings have this defect and pass it on, then the offspring will definitely exhibit the mutation.


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

[User]
What would happen if we paid off our debt?

What would happen to the United States economy if a large percentage of individual Americans made an asserted effort pay off their debts (Homes, Credit Cards, Student Loans, Cars, ect) in the next 5 years? How would it effect our economy in a whole over short period of time (5-10 years) and how would it effect over a long period of time (20-50 years) Would it be wise for a politician to ask his/her constituents to pay their debt to help the economy?

[Assistant] Money spent paying down debt is money not spent on consumption. If everybody redirected their income from consumption to debt repayment, it would probably spark another recession in the short run. In the long run, total interest payments would be lower due to the reduced debt burden and so the money that would have been spent on that could be redirected to consumption and in the long run there could be a boost but the positive impact of this would depend on the severity of previous recession (i.e. if it caused a very horrible recession, it's unlikely that the positives would outweigh the negatives).


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

[User]
Eli5 - How do the USA test top secret aircrafts such as the B-21?

I'm pretty sure the U.S. revealed the B -21 bomber because they have other top secret aircrafts that make the B-21 look like childs play. I don't think we would reveal anything that would give competitive information to enemy countries. Based on those logic, how do we test out to secret aircrafts without getting caught on satellite cameras from other countries???

[Assistant] That's why they have test ranges like Area 51, to protect things. What was shown in the reveal probably did not actually contain any competitive information. And it's going to be a nuclear-capable bomber, and one of the big reasons for a nuclear arsenal and platforms to begin with is deterrence. It helps to keep your enemies deterred when they actually have an idea of what you're working with.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do people get a knot in their stomach when something bad has happened or they are anxious?

[Assistant]
I actually know this one! Sympathetic nervous response (SNR) more commonly known as fight or flight. When you induce stress on the body it begins releasing dopamine and adrenaline to give you the best chance at surviving the immediate stressor; shutting off digestion and using that energy for more immediate things like beating your heart more and getting more oxygen rich blood to muscles etc.

Issue is most stressors these days are stuff like debt that being able to run faster doesnt actually solve so the body runs down its reserves and basically fucks itself trying to prepare you to punch a wolf to death or whatever.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] How did Luke explain to the galaxy that Darth Vader redeemed himself?

I cant imagine the people who had loved ones killed by Vader and the 501 would appreciate Luke saying well he was a good man deep down.

[Assistant]
I don't think he did, for precisely the reason you're putting in there; returning to the light and killing the Emperor may be a personal victory for Anakin, Luke, and the Force, but it in no way undoes twenty years of atrocities.

Legends actually addresses this; Anakin appears as a Force Ghost to Leia in order to beg her forgiveness, and Leia *dismisses him out of hand,* completely unable to see past the evil deeds he had done.  She does eventually get around to it, but it takes decades (and this is with the family connection, mind).  In current canon, Leia's blood ties to Vader are exposed, and this revelation is the iceberg that goes on to sink her political career.


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

[User]
How much productivity is enough?

What does enough work in a year look like for you? With the ambiguous pressure to always be publishing more, getting more grants, and taking on more teaching and service, how do you assess whether youre meeting your goals and progressing in your career? Do you have finite numbers (publications, grant dollars, etc) that you strive for, or some other metric that you use to gauge success?

[Assistant] How do you feel? Are you happy with your accomplishments in a given time frame? If not, why not? Is it due to external pressure or do you really think, after laying out all the obstacles in your life and work, that you actually could have done more with that time? If the answer is yes, you can try pushing harder, but dont let the parts of your life that make you happy OUTSIDE work slip. You are a human first and a scientist second. Never forget that.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do dogs seem to be able to nod off whenever they are comfortable?

My dog seems to fall asleep whenever he puts his head down, especially when he's touching me. That sounds awesome. Why can't I do that? When I want to nap or go to bed, I feel like it is a conscious decision with a plan that involves a certain amount of effort.

[Assistant]
We also don't have as sensitive senses as dogs do, so we can't wake ourselves up at the slightest sound, touch, smell, change in light or taste.

You'll notice that while the dog nods off easily, he'll be awoken by certain things that won't wake us up. Not to mention that they sleep when the need/can, whereas humans usually sleep when we should.

ie A dog that just lives around the house and is nothing more than a pet will more likely nap throughout the day and night, occasionally getting up to make sure everything is alright.

Whereas a work dog, such as a search and rescue dog, or a hunting dog will stay awake while they are working and sleep when they aren't. Much more similarly to humans.

The reasons dogs can sleep in much shorter spans is because their sleep cycles are shorter. This means they sleep for a shorter amount of time, get up, do their stuff and then fall asleep multiples times a day, whereas we only sleep for one extended period, with a possible nap.


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

[User] ELI5: why do all things fall at the same speed regardless of weight?

[Assistant] The short answer is because heavier things have a greater attaraction to the earths gravity (hence why they are heavier), but they also take more force to move. So a baseball has less of a force acting on it that a bowling ball, but is less massive (lighter) so it takes less force to move at the same speed.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why do catchers in baseball give the pitchers signals?

What do these hand signals mean? Shouldn't the pitcher know what pitch to choose?

[Assistant]
The pitcher and the catcher usually work out in advance a general strategy, so in most cases the catcher is simply *confirming* what kind of throw to expect. The pitcher will sometimes shake a signal off, which tells the catcher "no, try something else." The pitcher makes the ultimate call, but it's up to the catcher to offer suggestions.

>Catcher: "Are we doing this?"

>Pitcher: Shakes his head "no."

>Catcher: "How about this?"

>Pitcher: "Yes."

>Now the catcher positions himself properly for the expected pitch.

The catcher might also give a signal which basically says "Hey, this isn't coming from me. The pitching coach is telling us to do this pitch against this batter."

The catcher is *behind* the batter, so he is in the best position to do this secret signalling. If it were reversed, then the batter would know what to expect.

When there are runners on base they sometimes use a more subtle signalling method. This is where that general strategy meeting that took place before the game comes in.


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

[User]
[Pokemon] What does a Diglett look like underground? Also, why is the Diglett the only Pokemon to appear partially underground after being summoned from a Pokeball?

Bizarrely, the only records of Diglett that anyone's seen is them above ground. What do they look like underground? Why hasn't anyone (I'm look at you, Professor Oak) tried to document them in more detail? It can't just be a head, because something else has to be digging below it for it to be able to dig underground after emerging.

Also, when I summon a Diglett, it automatically morphs partially underground. Why does this phenomenon only apply to this one Pokemon?

[Assistant]
Notice no matter where you call the diglett the stones and mud around its base are the same?  It never changes based on the ground type and appears even when not on stone or dirt or inside a steel floored gym.

Diglett is a type of slug and the 'molehill' is the edge of its foot, there's nothing underground.


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

[User]
Do cameras that see through walls exist?

Is it possible to have cameras installed behind your walls? And for the resolution high enough to read text messages and emails?

Im asking because I feel like my house has been bugged and Im being watched/under surveillance but I do not see any camera lenses.

I also remember watching a crime show where police used cameras in the walls to read the subjects text messages and emails.

What do you guys think of this kind of technology?

[Assistant]
hahah wow.

1st: you arent important enough to be tracked like that

2nd: things cant see thru solid objects - heat cameras may pick up on heat signatures of people thru the right walls but even then its a blob

3rd: 99.9% of what you see on crime shows cant happen/doesnt exist.

4th: stay off and delete social media, uninstall any 3rd party apps off your phone, and dont link google accounts to your shit.


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

[User]
ELI5: How and when did we realize stock trading was something we needed? What prompted the first companies to issue stock for outsiders to buy shares in their company?

Since the whole sector from the outside looks really silly (it isn't), how did the first few pioneers in the sector realize there was a need for it?

[Assistant]
It was a long time ago (think like the 1700s) and it was necessary to fund growth and to create bigger opportunities.

To start, let's understand what came before.  If you were a merchant in the Middle Ages you were basically trading on your family's money.  You paid for the goods, you paid for the ship to transfer them, and if that ship sunk you were in deep trouble.  You were *personally liable* for the debts of your business.  Even a group of people funding an expedition would be in the same boat (heh) in regards to what happened.

Obviously this means that early companies tended to be a single very wealthy family and relatively limited ventures anyway.  You simply couldn't fund the kind of large scale companies that you see today.  There wasn't enough money in one or a few people's hands, and it was risky.   A single bad deal could break an entire family.

Jumping forward a bit, as business ventures got larger and more complex (because empire) people came up with an interesting idea.  Instead of paying for an expedition to the Americas or to sell wool in Flanders or whatever by yourself... why not crowd fund the thing?  So you would create a company, and sell ownership stakes in it to your wealthy family, friends and fools.  This gave you a source of funds to make it happen without having to fund it all yourself.  Everyone risked a little bit and would get paid based on their stake at the end.    Of course there was still some issues with the debts of the company falling back on the owners... but this was fixed with the notion of "limited liability" which basically means that as a owner of a company you are only responsible for YOUR share of the company and if that hits zero that is the limit of what you can lose.

That developed into our modern system where shares of ownership in massive companies are traded at the rate of millions a day.


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

[User]
[The Stand] What happens to the more supernatural elements like vampires and Pennywise?

So, Stephen King's shared universe has a lot of different things that go bump in the night and eat people.

What happens when their food supply is cut short?

I don't know if the vampires can get the flu, I believe in the Dark Tower, it was said that they could act as carriers for various diseases.

With everyone dead, what's gonna happen when Pennywise wakes up, or the vampires start getting hungry? Will they starve?

[Assistant] Pennywise doesn't need humans specifically he just prefers us for our flavor. As for other things dependant on humans for survival they'll slowly die out or resort to feeding on each other if possible.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do electric tooth brushes vibrate slowly when on low power instead of running normally then suddenly shutting off?

[Assistant] They use a simple electromagnetic motor, which means that when the electricity goes through it then it pushes a magnet attached to the part of your brush thats vibrating. Now the battery provides the electricity, but as the chemical reaction that is happening inside the battery starts slowing down it doesnt stop all at once, rather it slowly peters out, like a fire does. So the motor still gets pushed, but not as fast. This keeps going until the battery just isnt pushing the electricity enough to start the motor at all and your toothbrush is dead.


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

[User]
[Marvel] Can Wolverine get fat?

I might be wrong but isn't Wolverines strength a side effect of his healing factor? Doesn't his regeneration stop him from losing muscle when inactive so if he got fat would it keep regenerating even if he tried losing it?

[Assistant] I find it hard to imagine Wolverine getting fat because 1) Wolverine's healing factor is fueled at least in part by the food he consumes and 2) The dude's bones are coated in heavy metal. He is literally weightlifting every waking second of his life.


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

[User] [Star Wars] The ion cannon that the rebels had on Hoth looked like a giant ball turret. Could it have been aimed horizontally to zap a few of the AT-ATs assaulting the base?

[Assistant] Yes, but it would be like using a sledgehammer to swat a fly. Besides, the ion cannon was already doing a much more important job, targeting the Star Destroyers to allow rebel transports to evacuate.


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

[User] [any Star Trek] The Borg (or worse) have proven unstoppable and the Federation is collapsing. Eventually all of the powers like the Klingons and Romulans will be gone. Does Starfleet have a contingency plan? Do ships run? Where to? Do they hide? Do they make futile kamikaze attacks?

[Assistant]
At that level of breakdown it'd likely come down to individual captains. Some would probably try and escape the galaxy, others would carry out guerilla attacks or go down in a blaze of glory.

We see the mentality of Riker in such a situation in the episode where they ran into every enterprise-D from every alternate universe. There was one captained by Riker from a timeline where the Borg were on the cusp of wiping the federation out. He tried to attack the main enterprise rather than be sent back.


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

[User]
Diatomaceous Earth. How does it actually function as an insecticide?

I keep seeing that it works via a mechanical action, by abrading the joints of insects, or all sorts of other "cool" analogies about working like "broken glass" on insects, but I suspect it is more of a dessicant. If it IS a dessicant, wouldn't corn starch or other dessicants work as well?

[Assistant]
The abrasion model is correct. Put some under a microscope and check it out for yourself. It is made up of the exoskeletton of diatom frustules, which are quite angular, sharp and made of silica (essentially glass). As such, it is chemically inert from an insects point of view.

It is not a dessicant as it remains effective even in rainy conditions, which would definitely not be the case for soaked corn starch.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do horses start side by side while runners are spread at equal distance before the race?

Is the difference just negligible for horses? Don't we want the race to be the same length for all the participants?

[Assistant] They will generally only spread runners out to compensate if they are restricted to a certain lane during the race. In races where there's no "lane" (like horse racing) everyone can move to the innermost lane basically immediately.


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

[User]
Where does the energy to break a frozen bottle of water come from?

If I put a bottle of liquid water in the freezer, the freezer takes out heat energy in the water down to about -18 deg. C. But in the process the water expands and breaks the bottle. If the heat energy was taken out by the freezer, then where did the energy come from to break the bottle?
Is it just that some of the heat energy was converted to kinetic energy, and the freezer only took out the rest of the heat energy?
Bonus question:
How can I calculate the energies/forces involved? i.e. if 1 L of liquid water is encased in a bottle, and taken from +1 deg C down to -18, then how much force can i expect the expanding water to exert on the bottle?
Thanks!

[Assistant]
The way to think about this (and indeed most problems involving energy) is in terms of relative energy and relative stability.

Everything in the universe "wants" to be in as stable a state as possible. That means systems lose energy in favour of stability if they can.

Something that is suspended above the earth is in a high energy but low stability state - it would "rather" exchange its energy for stability by falling to the earth. The same is true of both nuclear fusion and fission: small elements fuse and large elements split to lose energy and gain stability by becoming more iron-like (iron is the most stable element). The same is also true of water when it freezes - it exchanges the high energy liquid state for the lower energy (high stability) ordered structure of ice. The difference in energy between the two states is called a "driving force" and determines the direction of processes in chemistry (a and b react to give c, but c does not spontaneously split into a and b), physics and biology. The driving force has the potential to do "work". An example of this would be the huge explosion that results from a nuclear bomb.

The energy lost by water when it freezes is similarly converted into work. As ice is less dense than water this work takes the form of pressure being exerted on its container as the water expands - if enough work is done, the container will break.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do men's clothes have buttons on the right while women's clothes have buttons on the left?

[Assistant]
The general explanation for this is a few hundred years ago it was common for gentlemen to dress themselves while ladies would be dressed by others.  Since right-handedness is by-far the dominant trait, the buttons would be on the right for a man, but on the left for a woman so that for a second woman facing the first, the buttons would be on _her_ right.

With many things, these fashions trickled down to the gentry then just stuck around ever since.


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

[User]
[Star Trek] If the Borg encountered a more advanced version of themselves from the future, would they allow themselves to be assimilated?

Or would they fight back?

[Assistant] Wouldn't the future borg be able to find their registration numbers in the cube's database? It would only seem logical that the future borg would help their forefathers by giving them additional technology.


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

[User] ELI5:Why, when I've done nothing wrong, do I feel guilty when passing by a cop? What's the psychology behind it?

[Assistant]
You evaluate a threat using two criteria: intent and capability. "Does this person want to harm me? Does this person have the ability to harm me?"
Law enforcement officers score high on both these scales. In terms of intent, the police might not have any desire to harm you physically, but they are motivated to harm you financially by issuing a traffic ticket, for instance.

For capability, they peg the needle. You know for a fact that they have the tools and authority to fine, detain, or even kill you.

It's a rational response to be wary of the police, because in rational terms, they are somewhat more motivated to do you harm than an average person, and far, far better equipped to do it.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are bulletproof vests not stabproof?

[Assistant]
For a start, vests are not really bulletproof. They are bullet resistant. They work one of two ways. The lightest and most flexible ones use multiple layers of material, usually kevlar, that are strong enough to resist the bullet traveling through them. With each layer, the force gets spread over a wider and wider area, until it reaches the user and is (hopefully) spread out enough to not do lethal damage. A knife, though, just cuts the fibers; that being said, the vest will slow a blade down.

The other method uses high-strength armor plates, usually ceramic that absorb the impact but crack (and must be replaced); these plates are quite stab-resistant.


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

[User]
ELI5: What's the benifit of working at your desk while standing instead of sitting?

A number of people at my company have something at their desks that they can raise up to stand while working.

[Assistant]
It's better for your back/body.  Sitting for long periods of time is bad for the human body.  By standing you remove those health problems, including back strain from poorly adjusted chairs/desks.

Edit: Yes... standing all day is equally bad.  The point of standing desks is to stand for a few hours and sit for a few hours.  The key is **balance** people.


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

[User]
What determines if a material melts or burns?

When you apply fire/heat to some materials like ice or plastic they melt, while some metals and coal is set on fire themselves. What determines if a material melts or burns when applied to heat/fire?

[Assistant]
There are two variables: the actual melting point of a material, and the temperature at which the material starts combining with oxygen.

Many materials doesn't combine well with oxygen (like water) so the combustion is small or absent. In that case, they are more likely to melt.

Many others release flammable gases or particles that reacts violently with the oxygen (like wood), or can be directly oxydized (like alcohol). In that case, a combusion is more likely to occur.

In other cases, both can happen: aluminium can melt, but a fine aluminium dust or ribbon is more likely to burn, because of a different ratio between surface exposed to oxygen and volume.


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

[User] ELI5: What is the purpose of those rare traffic lights that have "foggy" lights that end up only showing the color of the light when you're about 30 feet away?

[Assistant]
Generally it's because they are near other lights. They are designed so that you can only see the light from a certain location, which also sometimes limits the distance from which you can see it.

If you have a weird 3 way stop it might there's sorta looks like this _\\|  where all three of those lines are going into an intersection. It could be feasible that someone on that angle street could see regular lights for one of the other streets and assume they are following the correct order. The 'foggy lights' would prevent others from even being able to see the lights of the other lane.


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

[User] [ The Incredibles] Why do children of supers have different powers than there parents?

[Assistant]
Possibly that it is more of  genetic anomaly that accentuates a prominent feature within the person already, i.e. Bob was built more for strength, and when his powers developed that was the emphasis, etc.

So, the genetics might be a predisposition to developing powers, but not specific types of powers.


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

[User]
[general fantasy/science fiction/superheroes] Do mind readers run into a language barrier?

In real life people don't think in these neat, orderly thought bubbles you see in comics, but one's native language and its structure surely has some effect on our general thought process. Do you think a mind-reader peaking into the head of someone whose language they don't understand is going to have problems?

[Assistant]
In the Wizarding World (Harry Potter, Fantastic Beasts), it does but it's a lot worse than merely language. Queenie, when the Goldsteins have Newt and Jacob over for dinner, outright identifies herself as a natural Legilimens (natural mind reader) but says that Newt's mind is extra-hard to read due to his *accent*.

This is actually in-line with earlier sources on the ability; legilimency is extremely hard to perform effectively since a human mind *isn't* some sort of book to read but a whole bunch of abstract sounds, images and shapes loosely connected by ideals.

Legilimens need to sift through a *lot* of material to get even the slightest amount of usable information. This is why those skilled in it are rightly feared; it takes a lot of willpower and skill to use, all hallmarks of master wizards.


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

[User]
ELI5 How do microbial lifeforms with no brain like parameciums, amoeba, bacteria, etc know what to do and where to go?

I've seen videos of them chasing down food and eating it, if they have no brain and no sensory organs, how do they do this?

[Assistant] Generally, they dont. Many can't move intentionally at all (microbes in the ocean are totally at the mercy of water currents/turbulence). The ones who do intentionally move, like amoebas, are only complex enough to sense certain chemicals in one direction, or light vs shadow, and move toward/away from it.


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

[User]
[Ethics] Is it okay to enjoy the rain?

Dumb question but here it goes.

Is it ethically okay to enjoy the rain brought by a typhoon/hurricane, when that weather disturbance is wreaking havoc on the lives of marginalized people?

I am from a country that is frequently visited by typhoons, and being an introvert I find rains comforting. I certainly enjoy the times when it is raining but I cant help but to feel guilty on finding enjoyment to a weather disturbance that makes life harder for other people.

[Assistant]
So long as you're just enjoying the rain itself and not other people's suffering, you're good utilitarianly speaking.

Rain increases your own happiness and you're not personally adding to anyone's suffering by enjoying it.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do malls and businesses not have peaked roofs like you see on houses?

I remember hearing about a store collapsing from too much snow collecting on the roof. Is there a reason not to have a peaked roof to prevent this?

[Assistant]
Flat roofing is cheaper to build, is accessible (you can go up on it and do stuff up there more easily, including maintenance and are unlikely to fall), and you can add another floor more easily if you want to.

Providing you have a decent membrane on there and it doesn't need much maintenance, it will be cheaper in the longer run than a pitched roof, and gives you more options.


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

[User] [Star Wars] In term of combat is the Dark side straight up better than the light side?

[Assistant]
Luke: Is the Dark Side stronger?

Yoda: No, no, no, quicker, easier, more seductive.

The Light Side has plenty of abilities, we just don't see them as much. Things like healing, lightning absorption, and projection.


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

[User] Why does thermite release it's energy as incredible heat rather than exploding?

[Assistant] Thermite doesn't produce any gas. Aluminium reacts with Iron oxide. The result is Iron and Aluminium oxide, both solids (or, liquids because of the heat). So the volume stays (mostly) the same, and no explosion happens.


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

[User]
[Pokemon] Did the Pokemon we know today evolve from prehistoric types? Was Pokemon science at one point more a kind of religious, spiritual thing?

I know several people practice seemingly religious or spiritualist varieties of Poke'science. I wonder though if there were any druidic cults or communities that helped to spur on early Pokemon studies? Were these the people who made early drawings of Mew or Unown, for example?

[Assistant]
Yes, the Pokmon we know today have their origins in fossil Pokmon. There are exceptions, though (Godlike Pokmon, Arceus, Rayquaza and stuff.)

An example is Archen, according to his Pokdex entry, it is assumed to be the origin of all bird-like Pokmon.

Furthermore, lore says that there were cults surrounding certain Pokmon: Regice, Regirock and Registeel have been imprisoned in Hoenn region by those people.
Lately, those cults are rising: Team Plasma and Team Flare are some of those.

And at least their ideas are not completely wrong: Plasma wants to make Pokmon happy by releasing them. What they did not understand is that Pokmon are happier with a trainer than alone in the wilderness.


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

[User]
ELI5 How did knights participate in tournaments like jousting without killing themselves?

If movies have not lied to me (), knights' tournaments are involve hacking, slashing, and jousting each other. How did they not kill each other using such weapons or speed on horses? And if it was actually dangerous, why did they participate?

[Assistant]
Oh, they did die. Henry II of France famously died due to an eye and brain injury sustained during a jousting bout. Wood splinter got in his eye.

\>And if it was actually dangerous, why did they participate?

The recognition they would get was often worth the risk to them. The sport was dangerous, and people did die, but it was a relatively uncommon occurrence and they felt it would show their bravery and honor to everyone else.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why was it better for swords to only have ONE edged blade (like the Katana or Falchion)?

Just wandering if it was better at all, or if there are disadvantages to having both blades edged.

[Assistant]
Swords were designed for various purposes. Double edged blades were used to impale or stab the opponent. Whereas katanas are curved and one sided to provide a better slicing motion.
The shape of the blade provides structural strength. To simplify, the cross section of a katana would resemble a triangle. Impacting a triangle on a point would distribute the force and stop the blade from breaking.


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

[User]
[Kick-Ass] What kind of bodily damage did Dave receive from the live torture?

I know it is justified that he can walk away with his metal plates and damaged nerves, but are there any major injuries to be expected? Also don't know how those injuries can be explained to his dad as well as the recovery time.

[Assistant]
Maybe early Parkinsons, microfractures in his spine paralyzing him by age 60-70 and permanent nerve damage in the future.

I believe in the comics, he accidentally spread a rumour in his school he's a gay prostitute and is frequently raped on the streets.
After he told the girl he liked he's actually KickAss, she kept his secret, but her and her boyfriend bullied him by sending him pics and vids of them fucking, and probably beat him up between 1 and 2.

His father was pretty negligent and thinks he's been mugged a lot.

**Edit:**
Oh, and infertility.
His balls were fucking destroyed.


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

[User]
ELI5: Where do STDs come from if you can only get them from someone who has one?

Where did STI/STDs come from? Ive always been taught that you can only contract most of them from sexual contact.

This begs the question of where did they originate from?

[Assistant]
Most STDs came from close contact with animals. Not necessarily sexual contact, just close contact.

Gonorrhea came from close contact with cattle. A person working on an infected animal could easily be exposed to the bacteria. Milking a cow or helping birth a calf and then going to the bathroom without washing your hands would be enough.

Chlamydia is caused by a very common bacteria that affects all sorts of animals including humans. Most famously almost the entire population of Koalas are infected.

Syphilis may have come from Sheep or Cattle, but it also may have come from Llamas. Working theory is that it was a disease that early explorers brought back to Europe from America.

HIV likely came from a human eating an infected monkey or another primate.

Herpes is by far the most interesting (from a historical standpoint) because humans have always had Herpes. Our species inherited the disease from our evolutionary ancestors. Genetic testing shows junk DNA from Herpes infected our species hundreds of thousands of years before we even left Africa. Likely because one of our ancestors ate another infected primate. So Herpes, Warts, and Cold Sores are older than humans.

So when you hear on the news that we caught a bird flu, or a bat virus, it's because a disease mutated and jumped species to us. But does it work in reverse? Is there a common Human virus that could potentially jump to another species? yup... Herpes.

Dogs can get Herpes Cold sores... and they got it from close contact with us.

**EDIT for clarity:** Dog Cold sores aren't like ours, but they get wart like growths and lesions and it can be very serious so if you suspect your dog is infected see a vet.

Dogs have their own version of the Herpes virus and can't be infected by regular human herpes directly and vice versa. But Dog Herpes likely originated from humans ages ago when it jumped species and mutated.


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

[User]
is eating animals wrong?

If causing pain and death only so someone else can have a pleasant (but not necessary) experience is morally wrong then wouldnt it also be morally wrong to kill/eat animals? Just like it would be wrong for me to imprison, chop and eat a human just so i could experience the pleasure of consuming their flesh, how is it not wrong for us to do the same thing to a dog, cat, pig, cow or chicken?

[Assistant]
>If causing pain and death only so someone else can have a pleasant (but not necessary) experience is morally wrong then wouldnt it also be morally wrong to kill/eat animals?

Most philosophers believe something like this, yes. There are other arguments for why it is wrong to kill animals, but this is one of them.


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

[User] Is there a sound analogue of one-way mirrors? Can we,do we have constructs that can look t sound through one way, but block it completely in the other direction?

[Assistant] One way mirrors, transmit light in both directions, the reason that they work is that the side you want to be a mirror is kept brighter than the other, so that the brighter reflection drowns out the transmitted dimmer light.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is the rate of homelessness in the USA so high?

[Assistant] In the 80s, President Reagan gutted the system of mental hospitals which had existed for decades to care for people not fit to live on their own and remanded their care to the states. Federal funding for state-run mental hospitals was inadequate, and as a result thousands of mentally ill people had nowhere else to go. The problem hasn't gotten better since then.


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

[User]
If I swallow a large piece of food, will I still digest all of it?

I've have some idea how food moves around inside the body and some about the timeframes, but I've no idea of the capabilities and mechanics of the system.

Are large pieces of food broken into smaller pieces chemically somehow and then digested? Or does digestion happen layer-by-layer, no matter the size of the object? If so, will it just continue until it's all gone?

[Assistant]
Digestion has a few phases. Your mouth begins the first part, where saliva breaks down starches. The stomach is next, which has two primary methods of digesting food: acid mostly kills bacteria, but does help to break down the structure of food. Pepsin is a very active digestive enzyme in the stomach that is activated by the acid. Primarily though, your stomach is a muscle, and churns the food to break it into pieces. Big chunks of food simply won't proceed out of the stomach after this: if you swallow a big piece of meat whole, it will slowly break apart in your stomach and won't move as a chunk into the intestines.

Your intestines are where the "real" digestion occurs. Bits of food (at this point called "chyme") are squirted through the pyloric sphincter into the intestine. Here is where we see real protein and fat digestion occur. Most nutrients are actually absorbed within the first foot of the intestine, fats take longer and are broken down and absorbed over the first few feet. The small intestine are where the primary enzymatic breakdown of food occurs; the stomach is mostly a preparatory step but is not a good environment for most protein activity (because it is so acidic).


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

[User]
ELI5:How can we not yet replicate the composition of expensive aged drinks like old Whiskey and Cognac

If it all comes down to chemistry, and there are some burnt oak traces and such... Shouldnt it all be reverse engineerable at this point in time?

[Assistant]
Which would you rather have? An autographed original rookie babe Ruth baseball card? Or a replica? Which would you rather pay more for?

Could some whiskey be made in sped up fashion to replicate an aged 100 year old product? Maybe. Do the type of trees used still exist? Do the types of crops, growing conditions and distillery still exist? Will people pay for a replica? Or is the age, rarity and brand value important?


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

[User]
[Half-Life/Portal] So Black Mesa is stupid enough to practically invite an alien invasion, and Aperture Science is dangerous to my financial and physical security, is there ANYONE I can work for that's high profile and not going to kill me?

Seriously, seems like I'd sneeze and Cave would fire me. Black Mesa has what I can only describe as a "bureaucracy" issue. Oh, and what's even better is that now Aperture is run by some AI they just rolled out. "Take your daughter to Work Day" has always been a terrible idea (R. I. P. Lindsey, loving sister and dear friend).

I just want to pay bills and make a name for myself, is there anyone I can work for that can give me that without the threat of death?

[Assistant] Have you considered joining the Civil Protection under the Combine regime?  You get certain perks, such as better food and living conditions.  Also you get a cool uniform and mask.  And you can knock over cans and then order people to pick them up.


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

[User] [Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated] In the final episode after destroying the Evil Entity, why did this suddenly altered reality to where the Entity never existed?

[Assistant]
I assume it's a matter of temporal mechanics. That creature must not exist entirely in a single time, so it being destroyed caused effects that were, from our perspective, before the cause, destroying it before it ever influenced the species of Earth despite the destruction happening well after.

Mystery Inc are basically refugees from a destroyed timeline, in which talking animals exist, who have found themselves in a world where that never occurred.


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

[User]
ELI5: How come new e-mail is first pushed to my iPhone before I can see it on mail.google.com?

I noticed when an e-mail arrives to me, I get a notification on an iPhone. When I try to read it on desktop, I have to wait few seconds (even after refreshing) before it appears in GMail web interface. How can the e-mail be pushed faster? Or is GMail web interface so slow?

[Assistant] The gmail web interface is a "pull" technology -- the page periodically refreshes itself and checks for new mail. If your mail is being pushed to your phone, then it will get it very quickly, while your gmail session is waiting until it checks mail again.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do newspapers or news put brackets around words or letters in a quote from someone?

[Assistant]
Usually to provide context for a quote that originally used pronouns.  If the quoted person actually said, "He does not know what he's talking about," but the newspaper wants to make clear who the subject of that sentence was, they would write, "[Barack Obama] does not know what he's talking about."

It can also be used to properly capitalize a quote that begins in the middle of a sentence.  If the quoted person said, "This movie is terrible because the acting is so bad," but the newspaper wants to truncate that quote, they could write, "[T]he acting is so bad."


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

[User] Humans apparently share 50% of their DNA with bananas. We can all see the genetic differences but how do the similarities manifest themselves?

[Assistant]
All multicellular organisms need to do some basic things like divide cells, have all the parts of cells, have cells stick to each other, decide how each new cell will function. For example, we all have structures in our cells called ribosomes that help make new proteins. The ribosomes of humans and the ribosomes of bananas do pretty much the same thing (even using the same code instructions for how to make new proteins).

The basic building blocks of cells are the same, with minor changes. So, the basic genetic code for these things is the same, with minor changes.


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

[User] [Star Wars] We've seen the silly rebel propaganda. Now what really happened in the Clone wars and Galactic Civil War?

[Assistant]
Many video records of the events of the Clone Wars exist. The famous Clone Wars trilogy, a dramatization made several years after the fact, consisted in significant part of character assassination of Anakin Skywalker. These more accurate records show that rather than a petulant child, Anakin was a measured man who harbored a few deeply reactionary tendencies-- one can clearly wee the man who would one day become Darth Vader, but in those days he was a good man with a shadow in his heart rather than the evil man with a last spark of good he ultimately became. A recent Holovision series provided a much more accurate portrayal.

If anything, the most well-nown dramatization of the Galactic Civil War was softer on the Empire than they deserved. The real Empire were as competent as they were villainous. Its portrayal of the Alliance and of the life of Luke Skywalker (being its primary concern) are actually shockingly accurate.


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

[User]
I believe that the world would be a better place if nobody was allowed to be payed over US$100,000 a year, CMV.

Basically I think that salaries in excess of US $100,000 a year are not a fair reflection on the work that people put in to high paying jobs and lead to inequality and prejudice in our society. In my opinion, a better alternative would be to force anyone who earns over $100,000 a year net to pay, either as charitable donations or additional tax, to reduce their income to $100,000 a year.

Note: I don't live in the USA but used USD as a standard that everyone can easily compare to.

[Assistant]
You are not American, but there is an interesting side note to the US healthcare system.  We had a president who thought almost exactly what you do.  He tried to get congress to place a "salary cap" on workers.  It didn't make it into law, but he did manage to get a 94% income tax on money made above this proposed salary cap.

What happened?  Companies wanted to keep good workers.  They found ways to make it worth their while.  They paid them below this level, but they offered to pay doctor bills.  They offered very generous pension plans.  They offered education benefits, vacation days, travel money... It was this desire for equality that led to healthcare in the US being connected to having a job!

The bottom line is, companies will find a way to retain and recruit top talent.  Whatever laws are created, there will be ways worked around them.  The workarounds may have worse repercussions than what the laws were trying to prevent!


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

[User]
[Marvel] Multiple Man makes copies of himself. He sends them out to do whatever. When they recombine the new whole has all memories. If one dies, it's irrelevant, he'll survive from even one left. But the body remains. How the hell could anyone discretely do multiple careers? A death unravels all.

I send copies of me out to work five jobs (why not?) and two to different colleges. Several of me are on all day home care and yard work. One's whacking off. One's playing X-Box. Several more are running odd errands, one is volunteering, one's out fishing.

One gets t-boned by a drunk driver and dies instantly. The cops are on site in minutes and I.D. me immediately, and call it in.

Now what...? I'm dead. They got a body.

[Assistant] It works because it's not really a secret. He's a little more low-profile than many heroes, but he uses his real name all the time, doesn't wear a mask and usually wears a variant of the same garment his dad made for him when he was a child. And since at least one of the duplicates is in law enforcement himself (SHIELD agent) he can probably clear things up quickly when things get awkward. So the cops ID the body and the system tells them who and what this is. Probably a nightmare for paperwork, though.


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

[User]
[MCU] In Universe, how do you think the rest of the heroes view Spider-Man?

We really only know Tonys full thoughts on him. And some dialogue of Steve, Sam, and Bucky. What do yall think the rest of the team thinks of him seeing as the Avengers roster went through universal combat of the highest order with him. Just thought it was interesting seeing as he was probably the youngest combatant out there next to shuri.

[Assistant] They probably liked his potential but his age and maturity may have had some scratching their heads, this would probably include War Machine, and black widow. Steve would probably like him and view him similar to how tony did. Sam and Bucky may find him annoying but would respect his fighting ability since he whooped them w/no experience, and Dr. Strange probably thought he was a goofball. The rest would probably be indifferent since they barely knew him.


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

[User]
CMV: Schools Cause Psychological & Developmental Harm

Hi, I'm a preschool teacher, and I've been studying psychology a lot over the past several years. It led me to psychoanalyze myself pretty thoroughly, and realize the causes for a lot of the difficulty that I was having (depression, anxiety, OCD, ADHD).

Having gotten to the root cause of a lot of different problematic thought processes, and realizing that these later developed into disorders, it seems to me that school causes huge problems for us, psychologically.  I'll approach this topic by pretending we're all currently back in school. Put your imagination hats on, and come with me!  ;-)

For example, we sit... for 8 hours. We're still basically animals, and yet we're not allowed to move, stretch, talk, or even use the bathroom without an external authority approving us first.

We aren't allowed to exercise our executive function, which atrophies as it stays dormant for most of the day.  Then, when we need to make choices for ourselves, it hasn't been used much, and isn't very strong.  This can make it difficult to act upon what you want to do, or what you need to do, and are trying to do.  Since this is happening while we're developing into adults, our developing brain and body aren't using as much of the chemicals related to making choices and acting upon them, so it gets used to producing less...Which is a problem that happens with mental disorders.

Lack of stimulation causes developmental delays and stunting. We sit at a desk, stare at a blackboard, and listen to a lecture, for basically 8 hours straight.

I believe that we naturally learn by being inspired or curious -- seeing something interesting, and playing with it. Trying different ways to use it, or combine it with things.  We learn by playing, building, trying, expressing. Playing allows newness to occur.  Expression is part of the process of understanding something, and saving it to memory.

Basically, I think school is ruining us all. Hurting more than helping.  And I wont even start on which classes are taught vs what would be much better to include. Except to say that emotional management and understanding, mediation & conflict resolution, how to empathize, and how to cooperate, are all things that we desperately need to know, now, and we should be teaching.

[Assistant]
It seems more like your point is "bad teaching causes harm" - like this part:

> Lack of stimulation causes developmental delays and stunting. We sit at a desk, stare at a blackboard, and listen to a lecture, for basically 8 hours straight

That's a bad teacher. A *good one* is calling on students and eliciting opinions and discussion and whatnot - stimulating their minds.

Also, what would you replace the current system with if we agree it's bad and abolish it?


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

[User] ELI5 what is my body doing in the "Aaaah, AAAAAAH-" moment of a sneeze? Why does it vary in length?

[Assistant]
When you start to sneeze, it's because of some sort of irritation in your nose to release histamines. When histamines reach the nerve cells in your nose, it tells the brain to start what I'll call the Sneeze Sequence.

The "Ah" sound you make is due to your body reflexively taking a large breath. During this time, the muscles in your throat and nose expand, creating an opening that allows large amounts of air to pass through. Then, your chest muscles rapidly contract, forcing the air out of your lungs and through your nose.

The variation in length is based on personal anatomy and how your brain handles the Sneeze Sequence. It's different from person to person.