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

[User] ELI5- how does the Earth stay balanced? Like a tire will wobble or have major vibration if it isn't balanced. the planet couldn't possibly be balanced could it?

[Assistant]
A tire vibrates because you force it to rotate around a fixed axis that is not in line with the center of mass. It is this difference between the center of mass and the center of rotation that causes the vibration. This is why you can stop it vibrating by adding weight to move the center of mass to the center of the axis of rotation.

If you instead take the tire and lay it down on the floor with low friction you can make it rotate the same way. The tire is now not fixed to an axis so the center of rotation will be at the center of mass.

Earth does not have an axis through it that is fixed in something else so when it rotate is rotate around the center of mass.

If you go up some stairs you will slightly change the center of mass and the earth will rotate around a slightly different axis. But because the earth is so huge and massive any change we can do to it have an effect that needs advanced measuring equipment to measure. We talk about change in mass because you trap a large amount of water in large dames to have measurable effects.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Why there is not more wireless technologies shown to be used?

[Assistant]
Technology in the Star Wars universe is built to work. Not to look pretty, not to be convenient. Just to be reliable and to work. It has to work out in the cold of space and in the wilderness of a uncharted planet. It's highly advanced but also analog.

You don't get that with wireless technology. It's too prone to failure, hacking, signal loss, etc. Droids interfacing directly with computers is old fashioned but reliable. So are discs and holographic projectors.

That said there is wireless technology. Instant communication across the galaxy is wireless.


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

[User] [Star Wars] What happened to the Deathsticks guy after he rethought his life?

[Assistant]
* *Legends*: Elan Sleazebaggano tried to go clean twice. The firs time, he fell back into a life of crime, albeit diversifying his peddling to include other contraband. After the Clone Wars, however, he had successfully cleaned himself up, and became an anti-drug use activist.

* *Disney canon*: Elan Sel'sabagno may or may not have gotten clean, but he did end up having a child by the events of the original trilogy.


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

[User]
[Spider-Man] What did Spider-Man see in Mary-Jane?

My knowledge of Spider-Man lore is pretty limited, but I don't remember MJ ever having any real qualities that would make her worthy of attention Peter gives her. Based purely on what I've seen, it looks like the only reason he's into her is that he thinks she's attractive.

But at the same time, she constantly needs saving, she doesn't seem to express anything that would make him actually love her, and at times she seems to act like a jerk toward him. In the Raimi movies she didn't really do much beyond get mad at him when he didn't give her what she wanted. One of the few Spider-Man comics I've ever read involved Peter experiencing some kind of horrible mutation and practically begging for her help, and she completely blew him off and forced him to go to some stupid party for some damn reason. And then when his condition messed up the party, she got mad at him for embarrassing her or something (if I'm remembering right).

So... why does Peter even bother with her at all? Why not just dump her and go off and enjoy being a superhero with all the other heroes forever?

[Assistant]
Well, Raimi's interpretation of MJ differs greatly from comic-book MJ.

In the comics, Peter's attraction to MJ initially is because she is super-attractive and looks like a movie star. He gets to know her and he is attracted to her boldness, confidence, and sense of adventure, but is turned off a bit by the flaky party-girl part of her personality. He eventually begins dating Gwen Stacy, but when the Green Goblin kills her, it's Mary Jane who decides to be there for Peter, rather flake on him in what is a major development in her character and her relationship with Peter. She is Peter's major lifeline of support in the aftermath of Gwen's death and it blossoms into romance, and Peter later learns that the reason for Mary Jane's party girl persona is that it was a way to for her to escape from her abusive father and to keep herself from becoming like her mother and sister, who both gave up on their dreams only to marry horrible men. She's saved Peter just as much as Peter has saved her.

In the Sam Raimi films, he's attracted to her because she's the girl next door and was a childhood friend of his, and she was always friendly to him when others weren't.


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

[User]
Could you create a controlled-gravity environment and if you could would it be possible to train in higher levels of gravity and be less affected by Earth's gravity?

So pretty much, can you do what they did in Dragon Ball Z to get stronger?

[Assistant]
You have a few options, all of them ridiculously expensive:

A centrifuge.

A really powerful elevator in a really tall building with good brakes at the top.

A quickly accelerating train.

A quickly rising airplane or rocket ship.


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

[User] ELI5 What exactly are home water filters filtering out of your drinking water?

[Assistant]
It depends on where you live and your water source, but some of the more common things:

* Chlorine (more common) or chloramine (less common) are added to municipal water to disinfect it, but it tastes better if you filter it out before drinking it.
* Calcium and magnesium dissolved in your water make it "hard" and leave limescale deposits in your faucets and drains. Softening or conditioning your water can help with this
* Other trace amounts of other contaminants may be at levels that are safe enough for human consumption, but you might like the taste better if they're filtered out

If you're not sure if you need a water filter, you can get a home test kit for less than $20 on Amazon or your local hardware store.


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

[User]
Can sound kill a human?

I know sound can cause damage to our eardrums and break glass, but is there a sound that could cause enough damage to someone to actually kill them? Also, what could create this sound?

[Assistant] Yes, but it's unlikely to be sound in the traditional sense (like from a speaker).  A sudden burst of air (such as from an explosion) can cause a near-instantaneous severe rise in air pressure that would both rupture your eardrums (so you wouldn't hear anything) and damage your internal organs, such as causing your lungs and other hollow organs to collapse.


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

[User]
[Fallout] Why do the domestic Mr. Handy robots come equipped with a flamethrower and buzzsaw?

Surely there's more civilian friendly tools they could be equipped with if they're expected to clean houses and change diapers, right? Maybe, I dunno, two more hands instead?

[Assistant]
Remember- the fallout world was on the brink of war long before the nukes started falling.

"Able to defend itself and you in an emergency" would be a perfectly valid selling point for a domestic robot, even if the polite nature of society stopped them saying it outright.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Han Solo shoots at Darth Vader on cloud city before Vader steals his gun. What would have happened if Han somehow succeeded in killing him?

[Assistant]
Imperial forces probably would have started a coup attempt on the station, and tried to forcibly detain the main characters.  Star Destroyers likely would have ended up in orbit too, since the death of Darth Vader would be a big deal.

As we saw though, the Force was with Vader in that encounter and he was fully capable of dealing with a shot from a small blaster pistol.


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

[User]
[Halo] What would've happened if the Nova bomb left on Reach was reactivated on High Chairty?

The Nova bomb on Reach was designed to either go off on Reach or be brought back to a potential Covenant homeworld. What would've happened if, after the Battle of Reach, a bunch of Engineers accidentally rearmed it?

[Assistant] High Charity is destroyed along with a good chunk of its defense fleet. Without the Prophets riding herd on the Covenant races, the Covenant breaks apart, much like it did during the Great Schism, with the Elites and the Brutes  contending for control. This gives the UNSC some major breathing room to consolidate their defenses and maybe reclaim some lost territory.


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

[User] Is Scientific realism as same as Scientism?

[Assistant]
No. "Scientific realism" is roughly the view that scientific theories are generally true and/or aim at truth.

"Scientism," if it refers to anything at all, is the view that science is the *sole* provider of truth. Oversimplifying slightly: not only are scientific theories generally true, but everything else---art, literature, lived experience, etc.---is false.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is Windows Vista so hated?

I have absolutely no clue why Vista has become so hated over the years, and from personal experience with it, I really didn't find it bad at all. In fact, I actually liked it. So why all the hate?

Edit: I already marked this as explained, but I feel the need to thank you for all your informative answers and opinions. Much appreciated clarification from everyone who answered.

[Assistant]
Vista's system requirements were much higher than XP's, and it dropped compatibility for a lot of software including drivers. For some people this meant that Vista ran slowly and either didn't support their hardware/software or crashed trying.

There were a lot of other changes made from XP to Vista, both in the interface and under the hood; and people don't usually like change.

Vista to 7 on the other hand had relatively little change, hardware and drivers had also gotten better, and old software was generally replaced.


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

[User]
Were Henrietta Lack's cells special?

I was wondering if Henrietta's cells were special to begin with, or if the same result, that is making the immortal cells so important in research, could have been achieved by using canceorus cells from any other person?

[Assistant]
This is a great question! By today's standards, there is nothing inherently special about HeLa cells. Not only do we have countless "immortal" cell lines from other people, we have very well established protocols for immortalizing cell lines ourselves.

However, at the time Henrietta Lacks' cells were isolated, this was definitely not the case. These were the first human cells which were found to be able to divide indefinitely. Prior to this, cells would last only a few divisions before either dying or changing dramatically. The use of HeLa cells allowed for: 1.) More convenient cell culturing; and 2.) More importantly, it allowed the scientific field to "normalize" their *in vitro* research in a profound way.

All that said, HeLa cells were special because they were the *first* of their kind isolated, not because they were inherently special. In theory, cells of equivalent value could have been isolated from any cancer patient.


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

[User] ELI5: Why can I get overnight shipping for $3.99 from Amazon (granted I used my dad's Prime account), but to overnight my mom an equally-sized box for her birthday through UPS was $95?

[Assistant]
Part of it is the volume.

Amazon sends a lot of packages and they naturally have to pay different prices then somebody who just sends a one-off.

Amazon also has extremly streamlined their whole logistics process and integrated it with the ones who do the shipping so that actually taking a package from one of their warehouses is a whole lot of less effort than it is for most packages that are send.

Since Amazon sends so many packages it has a much better bargaining position that normal people to get the lowest prices possible.


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

[User] ELI5: What's the difference between 4 wheel drive and all wheel drive?

[Assistant]
The idea behind them is the same,  but they work differently. 4WD is the older system, and it's optimal for off-road vehicles. Power is directed from the transmission to the transfer case, which splits power evenly between all four wheels, so that each wheel rotates at the same speed, making them great for off-road conditions like powering over a big rock. But this can be problematic for turning, because to turn properly the outside wheel has to turn faster than the inside wheel.

On the other hand AWD vehicles usually have computers involved in the mechanism nowadays (in new models) that help direct the power in an optimal way (so its even when going straight, but redirected when turning, etc). So the control is better. The tradeoff here is the traction isn't as good, neither is the fuel economy.

TL;DR: They are often used interchangeably, BUT THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.

edit: with 4WD you can turn the system on and off (usually there's just a button), that's part of the reason the mileage is better. AWD drives with all of the wheels, all of the time.


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

[User]
[Marvel] Could a united Earth conquer other galactic civilizations?

Let's say somebody, maybe Doctor Doom, is able to unite and Earth. With the combined intellect and power of super heroes and super villains along with the resourcefulness of the  regular people of Earth, could Earth go toe to toe and subjugate a place like Asgard or go farther?

[Assistant] With all of Earth's hero s & villains combined it would be easy. Earth has defeated multiple alien empires in the past & Doom has personally killed some of the most powerful creatures in existence and taken their powers.


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

[User] ELI5: If muscle is lost during severe dieting, is it actually "lost" as in gone, needing to be rebuilt from nothing? Or are there remnants that simply need to be repaired?

[Assistant]
No. Your muscles are never really "gone". As in, you'll still have your muscle strands and muscle groups. When dieting, the muscle strands just get thinner, and you lose muscle mass. When working out, the muscle strands get thicker, and you gain muscle mass.

You never really gain or lose muscle strands. The strands just get bigger or smaller.


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

[User]
How does waste water testing identify specific viruses based on protein fragments, especially after hours or days of degradation?

I'm having a very hard time establishing exactly what technology is used for waste water testing for viral fragments, most fact sheets just say things like

>The samples are analysed for viral fragments

Which while perfectly fine as a public service announcement, leaves me craving a jucier explanation.

What tests are actually performed and how accurate are they?  Is the same technology used elsewhere or for other reasons? (eg: could it detect proteins that could, for example, indicate areas with relatively good or poor nutrition?)

[Assistant]
It's a PCR test.  The actual magic of a PCR test is the PCR part isn't actually the test. The PCR part is a trick we found where you can take basically anything, Mix it with some chemicals and free DNA bits and then heat and cool it a bunch and you'll end up with a billion copies of every single bit of DNA that was in the thing in a big bucket.

Then you do the actual test, which is thinking of a sequence of DNA you are sure is only in the thing you are looking for then you make a chemical that can stick to that sequence and react and you make a jar of that. Then you pour the jar into the bucket and if it turns red then it found the DNA and if it didn't the DNA wasn't there.

It's really extremely accurate, it can fail for sure, but the steps it failed you KNOW it failed, if you don't end up with a bucket of DNA then you did it wrong and have to try again, if the reaction happens then you know it really stuck to that specific sequence of DNA, and you know that there was some of that creature in it, and since it multiply the DNA a bajillion times you know it'll find it even if there was only a teeny tiny amount.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] Why do wizards/witches think that Muggles don't care about magic?

In the Harry Potter novels, it's implied that wizards and witches think that one of the reasons Muggles can't perform magic is because they lack the imagination to. It's implied that they think Muggles are all like the Dursleys: stupid, intolerant, square, old fashioned, and simply can't comprehend magic. Now for the average wizard/witch you can just chalk that up to plain ignorance and bigotry, but what about the ones who DO know about Muggles? Surely the people who regularly come into contact with us must have noticed by now that Muggles have an intense and vibrantly rich culture devoted to science fiction, fantasy, surrealism, mythology, and so forth. They must have noticed the mountains of books, comics, movies, TV shows, and games that are all about magic. They must know that stage magicians exist and are popular, that occultists like Aleister Crowley exist, and how much time and effort we devote to thinking about magic and magical things through philosophy and the arts, so how can they justify this nonsensical belief that we have no desire to understand the supernatural?

[Assistant]
They probably don't fear so much if muggles will accept them into society or accept magic. They fear being forced to be experimented on and used by their countries military or both. That's if everyone doesn't freak out immediately and a war breaks out.

Think of how useful a SEAL trained wizard could be, attaching their wands to a handgun or something.


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

[User]
What is the reason that virus variants only very briefly coexist?

How can it be explained that virus variants such as the alpha variant or delta variants are no longer existent, apparently being replaced by new variants. Why are there variants only briefly in parallel?

[Assistant]
Exponential growth. Modest differences in transmissibility allow one variant to out-spread another.

Let's start with two people. One has Variant A, and one has the newer, slightly-more infectious Variant B. If Variant A infections two people for every original infection, and Variant B infects 3, then after a dozen cycles there will be more than 100 times as many cases of B as there are of A.

As well, previous infection may protect against future reinfection by the same variant. (Whereas previous infection may or may not provide protection - or provide less robust protection - from infection by a variant.) If Variant A has burned through a population already, there will be more people susceptible to infection by B.


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

[User]
How do I make my belief system more clear to me?

I had never paid much attention to my beliefs and values and I want to a chart or rough sketch or something so I could clearly define my value system. Any suggestions on how to do that?

[Assistant]
The best thinkers in the world share one thing in common: they always look to *challenge* and *replace* their ideas with better ones, not just sketch the beliefs they have. If you view truth as a game of argument you will become a decent lawyer and a horrible philosopher.

Try reading some of Plato's diologues and place yourself in the shoes of the people that Socrates talks to. Many common belief systems come up in them, and Socrates tends to break them.


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

[User] Why is it that if two cars run into each other while both going 60mph the collision isn't equivalent to a 120mph crash?

[Assistant]
That 60 mph crash is into a solid, unmovable wall, and all the energy is absorbed by 1 car. In the two cars colliding head on at 60mph each, each car delivers as much energy as the other, but also absorbs as much, so while the total energy in the collision might be double, it's also absorbed by double the number of cars, and each car absorbs the same as just 1 hitting a solid object.

When the cars have different masses, it changes, and something like a big rig at 60mph smoking a smart car at 60mph, head on, becomes much  more like a 120mph accident, for the smart car. On the other hand, the big rig won't see it as nearly a violent accident as it would had it struck a solid wall instead.

This has great implications in crash-test ratings. The Smart has great forward crash test rankings, thanks to it's high-tech and ultra-rigid body. But against something like an F-350...mass wins.


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

[User]
I find the word "faggot" a highly offensive slur, and carries a lot of oppression and discrimination behind it. CMV.

Remember the guy who said a speech with the Bible replacing certain parts about black people with gay people?

To me it's the same. Using the word "faggot" is like calling someone a "nigger", it carries oppression behind it. Sure 4chan uses it like a casual phrase, but it's still not right. "but it's just a common word used online" etc. Well in certain circumstances, gays were called "faggots" and were maimed/bashed/murdered. Why should that word be acceptable? I see it so commonly everywhere.

I look forward to this. Change my view please.

[Assistant] The most important thing is the context in which the word is used. When people are called the f word or the n word in an insulting manner, they feel insulted, regardless of whether they are homosexuals/blacks. This shows that the literal meanings do not matter much. If used in a friendly manner, no offence should be taken.


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

[User]
Why doesn't microwave energy escape through the holes in the screen of a microwave oven?

I've heard the classic explanation as to the wavelength being longer than the spatial frequency of the holes, so the radiation can't "see" the holes. But this is hard for me to visualize since the spatial frequency of the holes would be orthoganol to the wavelength of radiation. Can anyone provide an intuitive explanation?

--- Update 4/20/18 13:12E ---

Thank you for the explanation. I think the issue is we all have the classic TEM wave model in our heads, but it doesn't give any insight into the transverse physical dimensions of the fields. I think this leads to confusion with people that assume the vectors in the model correspond to physical boundaries of the light, rather than relative field strengths. I understand what happens when an EM wave contacts a faraday cage, but no one was explaining why it had to touch the cage at all. I just imagine the wave propagating through like in the double slit experiment.

[Assistant] Correct. But you must remember that the high conductivity of the screen material shorts out the field and makes it go to zero - reflecting it in the process. The microwaves cannot match the zero field condition at both edges of a hole that is much smaller than its wavelength. Fundamental law of wave too: cannot form a spot smaller than the wavelength. Think of water waves, e.g. and try to form a wave let smaller transversal than the wavelength.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are judges given discretion in deciding penalties for crimes?

[Assistant]
In theory, to make sure the punishment fits the circumstances surrounding a crime.

If someone robs a convenience store because their kid needed lifesaving medical treatment and the person genuinely appears to feel terrible about it, yes he still deserves to be punished. But, most would argue he shouldn't serve the same sentence as someone that did it because they're a sociopath, and generally acted like an unremorseful dick.

It's basically impossible to codify all the potential variables in a case into law, and the law's complicated enough as it is.


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

[User] ELi5: How does smoking cause cancer?

[Assistant]
Chemicals in tobacco cause damage to the DNA in cells in the body. These cells then divide into other cells with a higher number of mutations then they would have without the damage. The higher the number of mutations the greater the risk that one of those mutations will cause the cell to become cancerous.

Every time your cells divide your basically playing a cancer lottery with relatively low odds. Certain environmental factors increase those odds, tobacco smoke is one of them.


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

[User] [DC] Superman lands in the mid-1400s Europe, right in time for the Spanish inquisition and discovery of the new world. How does that play out?

[Assistant]
Nothing happens.

In 1460 the vast majority of the population still lives in the country (unsurprising since that didn't happen in the States until the 1920s) and worked in farming or agriculture.  So odds are that Kal-El lands on a farm.

However, traditional Kal-El grows up with the expectation of the American Dream and in an era when country-life is giving way to urbanization.  He goes to the big city to make his way because he wants more out of life than being a farmer.

In 1460, there is no such expectation for a peasant farmer.  There is no upward mobility.  There is no concept of making more for yourself.  Your lot in life is that of a humble farmer and you were completely at peace with that because there was zero expectation of anything else.  Generations before you had lived and died as farmers, generations after you would too.  Even though universities exist, you've never heard of them, you have no interest in them, and the very concept of that life might as well be in another dimension.

If you're raised with no expectations and no ambitions, you're not going anywhere.


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

[User]
What are some criticisms of Kants Categorical Imperative?

text.

[Assistant] The biggest issue for me is you can specify the maxim of your action in different ways, and whether your action satisfies the CI can depend on how you do so. You could resolve this problem by specifying some procedure for formulating maxims, but this is a non-trivial problem.


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

[User]
CMV: The point as a decimal should be universally adopted as a standard

Many European countries and others use the comma as a decimal (e.g. 100.000,00) while most English speaking countries use a period. (e.g. 100,000.00). I believe the latter, the point as a decimal, should be adopted universally as the standard to avoid confusion and ambiguity. This is not to say one standard is inherently superior to another, but the point as a decimal has seen such widespread uses in so many domains, that the comma doesn't make sense to use anymore in the modern world.

**Use in the sciences**

For one, most scientists and mathematicians in comma-using countries use the point, due to ubiquity in scientific literature and the comma being used as a separator. For example, a set of elements is declared by the notation {w,x,y,z}. Hence, the notation {12,73.3,43} would be ambiguous. Most scientific literature you will find will use the decimal point, even if it came from the countries that traditionally use decimal comma. This causes a divide between casual uses and scientific ones, similar to Fahrenheit vs Celsius in the US

**Use in English**

In English, the decimal point is used as the separator for fractional numbers in linguistics. Numbers after the decimal are prefixed with "point". The number 7.22 is spoken as "seven point two two". As such, when using English to discuss numbers, the point decimal should be used.

**The technological era**

Most of the internet is based on languages from countries where the decimal point is used (English, Chinese, etc) and as such, the vast majority of content uses the decimal point system. This has many implications in technology and the use of technology, where many technologies require the use of the decimal point system, which has become a de-facto standard in these domains, such as web forms, programming languages, databases, calculators, just to name a few. One example of a possiblity of confusion is numbers such as "142.215.211.101". What is this number? Is it an IP address?

Due to the widespread usage of the point decimal system in multiple domains, the decimal point system is deeply ingrained in many domains and fields in the world, and as such, has become a de-facto standard. We should aim to standardize it and as such, abolish the use of the decimal comma system.

[Assistant]
* in sciences, you can use semicolon as a delimiter
* yes, in English they use decimal point and they call it "xxx point xxx", in other language they can use decimal commas and say "yyy comma yyy" (in translation). Why should be other languages be forced to call numbers in English? It's like saying that every language should end a sentence with a dot.
* every interface should have some kind of information what format it accepts. There are many ways to represent phone numbers, postal codes, logical operators and everything else, and if it's clearly stated how to input your data, there will be no ambiguity.


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

[User]
Do animals regard machines as other animals and try to bite them, eat them, etc? At what point do they/can they distinguish machines from animals?

I've always wondered if a snake would try to bite a drone that landed near it. If it did, would it try to bite a lawnmower? A CAR? At what point do animals distinguish living things from machines?  Has this ever been studied?

[Assistant] A snake would absolutely try and bite a drone if it flew near it. Well at least some aggressive snakes would. They'd also bite stick, rocks, hands, cars, lawnmowers etc if they got too near to them and they felt threatened. Whether it thinks it's an animal is a bit too philosophical for them though. They know danger, they don't know animal. Some animals do show that they know what other animals are, usually prey, like mosquitos "smell" blood and probably wouldn't try and eat a tree unless they were very confused.


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

[User]
ELI5: How was it decided that most car engines go in the front of the vehicle?

And why do many luxury cars have engines in the back? What are the advantages or disadvantages when it comes to engine placement?

[Assistant]
Packaging, cooling and handling. Only Porsche still uses rear engines in the 911. All other cars you may be thinking of are actually mid-engine. The difference is that in a 911, the engine is behind the rear axle. In a mid-engine car like the Cayman or Ferrari 458 the engine is ahead of the rear axle.

Mid-engine layouts handle quite well because there's little polar mass, so the car can rotate quickly. The downside is that it takes up a lot of space, so these cars are almost always 2-seaters.

Rear-engine layouts like the 911 have better packaging, but when the rear wheels lose grip, all that mass behind the rear axle may be difficult to control. You get something like a pendulum effect. Older 911s are notorious for this.

Front-engine layouts offer better packing, so more room for passengers, and while they have more polar mass than a mid-engine car, oversteer is easier to handle than in a rear-engine car. So it's a good compromise. In addition to that, you have plenty of airflow in the front to cool the engine with. This can be more tricky in rear- and mid-engine cars, which is why they sometimes have air intakes on the sides.


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

[User]
[LotR] How did Saruman become a servant of Sauron?

When last we saw him in *The Hobbit*, Saruman was a good guy, helping Galadriel to fight off the Nazgl. He knows just how dangerous Sauron is.

Years later, in the Lord of the Rings, he seems to have been corrupted and intends to aid Sauron, creating an army for him and hindering the Fellowship.

Surely as Treebeard puts it, "a wizard should know better!" I wouldn't think wizards would be so susceptible to corruption. So how did Saruman go from point A to point B? Is it ever explained?

[Assistant]
> When last we saw him in The Hobbit, Saruman was a good guy, helping Galadriel to fight off the Nazgl. He knows just how dangerous Sauron is.

Saruman was corrupted even then. When Saruman first arrived in Middle Earth he was good, but his lore was ring lore and even merely researching the One Ring as he did was enough to corrupt him and make him desire it. Saruman at first advised against attacking Dol Guldur. This wasn't out of doubt of Gandalf's warning, but the opposite: he believed Gandalf but wanted Sauron to gain strength, hoping the One Ring would emerge so that he could take it. When it seemed that Sauron knew where the One Ring may be, Saruman agreed to attack.

> Years later, in the Lord of the Rings, he seems to have been corrupted and intends to aid Sauron, creating an army for him and hindering the Fellowship.

Saruman and Sauron formed an alliance in which Saruman only feigned to be working for Sauron. This is why Saruman's Urak-Hai and Saurons Orcs come to odds over Merry and Pippin. They are each on orders to bring them directly to their own masters, in opposite directions.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40k] Dark Eldar. Do they clone or do they breed.

In the book Renegade and the latest Codex it is mentioned that only Dark Eldar elite do carry to term.
The normal Dark Eldar are raised in "tubes". But are they cloned/ entirely artifcial. Or are they the product of sex and then just transfered to the "tubes".

[Assistant]
They're entirely natural. Eldar can detect pregnancy at an extremely early stage, and when a female determines she is pregnant (or possibly that there have been sufficient inseminations to carry the foetus to term) she goes to the Homunculus, they remove the offspring and implant it in one of the gestation tubes, and she goes on her murderous way.

Tube Born almost never know their parentage either, and their growth is accelerated past infancy into early childhood, before being turned out onto the streets.


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

[User] Why do GPUs constantly need updated drivers for best performance, but CPUs don't?

[Assistant]
The driver for GPUs acts as a software layer (running on the CPU) for the operating system and whatever software you're running to interact with the GPU without actually knowing how it works.  Any software running on your CPU, though, needs to know *exactly* how it works, in order to make optimal use of it.  The operating system itself acts as a sort of "driver" in this regard.

That said...

There exists such a thing as a microcode update for certain CPUs.  The basic idea is to allow the computer's BIOS to apply limited fixes (usually to the instruction decoder, but not always) on boot, for flaws discovered after the processor design was finalized.


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

[User] ELI5: How come most of the cars in the USA are automatics while most in Europe are manuals?

[Assistant]
Automatics used to rather fuel and energy inefficient and heavy. With fuel always being cheaper in the US, it was no big deal to put bigger and more powerful engines in to the cars as the price to pay for fuel didn't matter much. Fuel in Europe has always been more expensive and the drive for more fuel efficient vehicles meant smaller and weaker cars, and thus manual transmissions.
The difference in fuel efficiency in todays manual and automatic transmissions is negligible, but people are now more or less used to what they grew up with or what their parents drove.
Edit: Automatics used to **be** ...


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

[User]
At the risk of sounding like an oblivious idiot, could somebody explain Che Guevara?

I try to be as aware of world events as I can, but for whatever reason, I was never really taught about Che Guevara. All I (think I) know is that he was a revolutionary in South America. Other than that, I know nothing.

[Assistant]
Che Guevara was born Ernesto Guevara de la Serna in Argentina. His parents were fairly well to do. He was a sickly child (asthma) and lived in the dry climates to help this during his childhood. Once his family moved to Buenos Aires, he began reading the works of Karl Marx and other communist thinkers. He went to school to become a doctor but before finishing his tests, decided to embark upon a motorcycle journey of South America (it was on this journey he adopted the name 'Che', which is Argentinian for 'Hey', as in hello)
. Whilst on this journey, he saw the plight of the common people and vowed to fight for them (according to his journals). He took a motorcycle journey across S. America twice, the second not ending too well.

He served some time in a Mexican jail (not sure what for) and met Fidel Castro, a Cuban who wanted to reclaim the government of his country from Fulgencio Batista and therefore from American capitalist influence. In the late 1950s, Castro, Guevara and something like 60-70 freedom fighters boarded a used yacht and set sail for Cuba from Central America. However, the Cubans knew about the plan and met them at the beach with force. As his comrades fell around him, Guevara said he had to choose between being a doctor and a soldier and chose the latter.

Creating two "columns" he and Castro marched across Cuba to Havana and took it, mainly due to having recruited so many Cubans along the way (they went from numbering a couple dozen to a few hundred) and executing those loyal to Batista. They set up the communist government which has been in place there ever since.

A couple of years later, Guevara went to the Congo to impart his knowledge of revolutionary tactics and principals, but found the people there to be lazy and not willing to fight to the end. So he left, lived in Europe for a bit, then wound up in Bolivia where he tried to repeat the whole thing and was killed by a CIA spook who claims to still have his iconic beret.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is usb a serial port and not a parallel port?

[Assistant]
It is serial because the transfer speed that was required could be managed with just two data lines with differential signaling.   It also has two wires for power so a total of 4 wires.
If you can have fewer wires you can make cheaper connectors and cables.  USB is designed to be a way to connect stuff.
This is the main reason that USB is series because it will be cheaper.

Later USB standard add extra wires for dor signaling so USB 3.0 have2 additional differential pairs and a signal round for a total of 9 wires. The extra wires allowed higher transfer speed.

USB-C has 23 pins connectors but only 16 wires and a shield in the cable. The difference is because some pins are duplicated do the connector can be flipped.
It uses 6 wire pairs for singaling.

Even if USB 3.0 and the USB C  has multiple pairs of wire for signaling they still operate as serial connection side by side.
A parallel connection would require the same timing on all wires and you would need an extra clock wire.  It also requires tighter tolerances for the wire and connectors.
Using them as a separate serial connection that is self-clocking is a simple way to obtain high speed.

Parallel connection is simple to use if the speed you operate at is not limited by the performance of the wire but of the electronic, that drive it but it get harder and harder to do when you start to be harder and harder to do if you include signaling speed so you are closer to what is possible with the wire.


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

[User] ELI5:Why are car chases televised so much on the West Coast and barely ever shown on the East Coast (USA)

[Assistant] This phenomenon is almost unique to Los Angeles. That city has a huge amount of freeways, and several different TV news stations  with their own competing helicopters. A car chase on a freeway is one of few things that makes those helicopters actually useful for producing interesting television.


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

[User] ELI5: What is 5g and how is it different from former 4g lte etc?

[Assistant]
If we think radio waves as sound, the previous generations were like putting one big speaker in the middle of your house to play back music for everyone. The music naturally doesn't reach every corner of the house as some walls might be thin and others might be thicker. When moving about in the house, you might not hear the music at all if you went to the cellar for example.

5G is like being able to have the big speaker and then putting smaller speakers in the rooms where the big speaker can't be heard loud enough.


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

[User] ELI5: What exactly are Jewish settlements and why do the people of Palestine hate them so much?

[Assistant]
They are communities of Jewish residents built on land that is part of Palestine. In many cases they have displaced Palestinians in order to take the land.  The goal is to make the land part of Israel, the reality is that it is fragmenting the land that should be Palestine into tiny islands that will be unmanageable. They are doing this in direct violation of previous peace agreements and UN resolution.

Both sides have elements that are doing everything they can to insure the continued violence and needless deaths, in the US we focus on the violence of the Palestinians while ignoring if not outright supporting tha of the Israelis.


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

[User]
[The Joker] How far does he go with the crazy chaos gimmick?

Like does he still use a toilet like a regular sane person? Or does he just crap wherever he wants and never washes his hands. Does he ever just crap his pants to make a point?

Does he ever just run around naked for the thrill of it.. and then crap himself?

Does he eat food properly cooked? Or does he eat anything he can find. Like live rats?

Does he sleep in a normal style bed? Would he just sleep in a pile of his crap on the floor?

If he has a medical issue will he seek treatment? If a tooth goes bad will he try to get it fixed or just deal with the pain?

[Assistant]
For the most part, most versions of the Joker are capable of basic upkeep and hygiene. He can shower, shave, get his hair cut and keep himself in clean suits, though the means by which he achieved those aims may be grossly antisocial (pray for his tailor, for his is a life of terror). A sick Joker would abduct a medic or break into a hospital.

Even with "grungier" versions of the Joker, there's a question of how much of it is a put-on. The Nolanverse Joker comes off as the sort of guy who can't tell you when he showered last, but he can also clean up and act with great caution and forethought *when it serves his needs*, implying that his "greasebag hobo clown" appearance may be crafted to a certain degree, or a completely artificial facade.


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

[User] [Futurama] If the Planet Express ship moves the entire universe around it instead of moving, what happens if they build another one and both work at the same time?

[Assistant]
When ship A is moving it treats ship B As part of the rest of the universe, and when ship B starts moving too, then ship A ' s stationary position relative to a universe in motion is treated by ship B as a vessel that is for all intents and purposes in motion.

So even if they start moving at the exact same time that same principle should apply: they treat eachother as part of the rest of the universe. And when either ship is moving the universe around itself (or when both ships are) the other treats it like it would treat a ship in motion.

It's a matter of redundant relativity. --or rather i should say a *principle* of redundant relativity; because matter of redundant relativity causes itself and a sizeable portion of the universe to implode...  like those poor poor Osmonds...


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

[User] ELI5: Will a single global currency ever be possible?

[Assistant]
Possible? Yes
Likely? No.

A global currency means every government in the world would have to follow strict fiscal policies, they couldn't manipulate exchange rates to help their industries, couldn't spend more then their tax revenues. The lessons learned from the Euro make it very unlikely we'll see a global currency.


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

[User] [DC] Could Godzilla's Atomic Breath supercharge Superman?

[Assistant] Most likely not. Superman isn't powered by radiation in general but by the specific frequencies of a yellow or blue star. Unless Godzilla's atomic breath matches one of those it probably wouldn't do much for him.


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

[User]
[Samurai Jack] Why don't the gods stop Aku?

They destroyed the darkness one time, why not again?

[Assistant]
They *shattered* the darkness, but did not destroy it. If they had, there would be no Aku. As both the original Darkness and Aku have both shown time and again... it's one thing to be able to harm them, but something entirely different to completely *destroy* them.

When the legendary katana was forged, it was not just divine powers that were placed within the blade; the righteousness in the heart of the Emperor was also an integral component. This remains equally true for Jack; without his heart being strong, he cannot wield the blade.

The fact is, the gods *can't* destroy Aku. They need mortal help, and the combination of all sides results in the magical katana Jack wields. If there was an easier way, somebody would have taken it by now.


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

[User]
[superheroes] I've just realised that I can turn invisible. How can I make money from this without going into the public eye, committing crimes or telling the authorities?

I'm quite shy, so I don't want to become a magician, and I don't want the government to do weird experiments on me. Now what?

[Assistant]
There are plenty of legal activities that would benefit from invisibility.

Becoming a private investigator is the first one that comes to mind. You'll need to get a license, but there isn't a check box on the form that asks if you have superpowers or anything, and it'll be a lot easier to catch your client's soon-to-be-ex slipping it to the secretary if they can't see you.

You could also be some sort of spy. Again, there isn't a spot of the form that asks if you can make yourself disappear. Your boss will just think you're good at your job.

You could become the world's greatest wedding photographer. People always complain about how the photographer is in everybody's face. Tell them you have a secret nanotech camera, and that they won't even see you there. Then provide stunning pictures taken up-close, without bothering the guests.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Did the Battle of Scarif directly lead to the ending of the Imperial Senate?

Grand Moff Tarkins opening line in A New Hope is to proclaim that the Imperial Senate will no longer be off any concern, because he had just received word that the Emperor had dissolved it.

Canonically, this whole scene takes place within hours or days after the Battle of Scarif.

Was that battle the excuse the emperor used to dissolve the senate? Im assuming that eradicating the senate was eventually on Palpatines vision board, but with the successful testing of the Death Star coupled with the irritation of the attack on the Scraif, was this the trigger?

[Assistant] They're separate incidents at the same time. The Senate was being dissolved by the Emperor as the Death star was near completed. Even had it not been finished he would have disbanded the Senate in favor of the Moff council that he had greater loyalty from.


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

[User]
[The Simpsons] Where do the Simpsons Family get all this super-fancy technology?

It's 1990, and yet the Simpsons have a giant tv (and I've never seen anything that thin!) little cell phones that look more advanced than what I've seen on Star Trek. I thought they were supposed to be a middle-class American family, not some super-rich scifi family!

[Assistant]
The Simpsons reside in a twilight zone. A zone in which many people are yellow and have only 4 fingers. This zone also has a different passage of time. As you may have already known, Bart has always been 10 years old. This is due to the fact that the Simpsons universe we are observing (through the twilight zone) floats, in a way, in spans of ten years.

For example, since Bart is ten he was born in 2004 in the currently observed Simpsons universe, opposed from his original 1980 birthdate.

So, it is 2014 in the Simpsons and flat screens are pretty cheap.


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

[User]
[Pokmon] In Pokmon The Movie: 2000, why is there a talking Slowking?

Question is pretty much in the title, but I'm rewatching the movie right now, and I had totally forgotten the talking Slowking right now. I'm super out of touch with the anime, so is there a precedent for Pokmon speech? (Other than their names).

EDIT: I'm done the movie now and realise that Lugia also speaks, and obviously Meowth.

[Assistant] Some Pokemon such as Team Rocket's Meowth have the capacity to speak with human language, but little actually learn to do so. Pokemon with powerful psychic or magical abilities are also shown to communicate with humans. Slowking is a psychic type and is shown to essentially be an oracle in the Shamouti Island prophecy, so it seems pretty important that he can talk to fit his role.


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

[User]
How much of our body weight can be attributed to genetics?

Many people claim they simply can't lose weight or gain weight but then I constantly hear about "calories in, calories out." If it is genetics, how is it that the obesity rated has gone up so much in the last ten years? If it isn't genetics, is there still a portion of the population that cannot lose or gain weight? Finding good, unbiased information on this seems impossible.

Edit: marked as interdisciplinary since it could fall under medicine, chemistry, biology, etc.

[Assistant]
Calories in, calories out absolutely works. It's not possible not to lose weight if you limit your calorie intake below the calories you use daily. People may miscalculate their calorie intake and how much they consume energy however.

Metabolism, gut bacteria etc. may affect the rate of the weight loss a little bit.  Genes controlling appetite and metabolism predispose to obesity when sufficient food energy present. Nobody gets or stays fat when food energy is scare.  When people sign in to hospital for being dangerously obese and they are put into diet in controlled environment, they always lose weight.


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

[User] After element 20, the neutrons begin to outnumber the protons in stable isotopes. Why do they need the extra neutrons?

[Assistant]
There is a little bit of an energy cost for adding a proton due to the repulsive Coulomb interaction that the additional proton feels with the rest of the nucleus. There is no such cost for neutrons, because they have no electric charge.

Except at very high Z, the Coulomb force is generally much weaker than the nuclear force. So bound states can still form even with lots of protons, but the surface of minimum binding energy per nucleon (the "valley of stability") tends towards N/Z > 1 as you go to higher mass numbers.


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

[User]
[MCU] How does Iron Man/Tony Starks technology compare to the rest of the universe?

Obviously we see in the movies space stations, space ships, and some exciting weapons. In the instance of Stark, who is one of the brightest humans, how does his tech compare to the rest of the civil universe? Both in terms of comics and moves.

[Assistant]
Have you ever seen an antique watch and marveled at all the intellect and effort it took to put together.  It's great, but no amount of watchmaking skill is ever going to make an antique watch more accurate than the cheap flip phone you can buy at a mall kiosk.

Tony's tech is like that, very impressively crafted, but ultimately just too far behind technologically to compete with the tech many aliens have.


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

[User]
How many nukes would it take to cause a nuclear winter?

I'm confused about nuclear weapons. A Ted talk I watched, along with several other sources, all say "a hundred or so nukes will be enough to cause a nuclear winter and wipeout humanity". But, according to google, there have been over 1000 nuclear detonations. Why such a discrepancy between these numbers?

[Assistant] A nuclear winter would be caused, primarily, by the fires that followed a comprehensive thermonuclear exchange between the nuclear powers.  China, US, Russia, France, Great Britain, Israel, India, Pakistan and a few others.  Many of these fires would be swept up to actual fire storms and the smoke and ash that would be fed into the upper atmosphere.  Blocking the sunlight and creating the conditions for a nuclear winter.  You can not create the conditions for a nuclear winter by simply detonating even a single huge nuclear weapon.  It has to be a large number of weapons spread over a large geographic area.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is undercooked chicken or turkey more likely to cause food poisoning versus a rare steak?

[Assistant]
Both beef and turkey can potentially contain many harmful pathogens and/or parasites, but what is interesting about beef is that these parasites only exist at the surface level, the part of the meat exposed to the air.  This is because beef flesh is a very dense meat and its difficult for the pathogens to spread throughout.  So a fresh steak only needs to have the surface layer fully cooked to minimize infection risk.
This is also why rare steak is fine but ground hamburger must be further cooked.  If the meat is ground then that surface yuck has been mixed throughout the result.

Chicken, and turkey on the other hand, are softer meats and the bacteria present in them typically penetrate a lot farther than the surface.  For this reason they have to be cooked fully to kill all of the pathogens and be made safe for eating.

Think about how when there is mold on a hard cheese, You can just scrape the moldy part off and be fine, but with soft cheeses like Brie or ricotta they must be trashed immediately if they mold (not talking about the mold used to flavor it).


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

[User]
Why do advances in animal models rarely translate to equally functional & effective therapies?

I understand that there are fundamental differences in biology between animal models and humans. However, I dont think I have a clear answer as to what broad categories of issues might be responsible for the aforementioned failure of successes in animal models to translate to human therapeutics and I was hoping someone could explain. Enormous amounts of funding go to these therapeutic developments each year, surely someone must have discussed this discrepancy.

[Assistant]
A few of the "broad categories" that come to mind:

* Actual anatomy -- presence or absence of anatomical features, differences in relative sizes of anatomical features or organs, etc.
* Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics -- how quickly drugs are taken up by the body, distributed within the body, metabolized, and excreted
* Immune system response -- how the body reacts to foreign species (e.g. implanted devices)
* General considerations about genetic diversity -- animal models may use individuals more closely related to one another than a human trial would, which can confound study effects

There are more factors, to be sure.

I don't think that anyone using animal models of disease in their research expects the models to be perfect analogues of human physiology / biochemistry, but the idea is that the animal models are far closer to the "real thing" than an in-vitro test / cell culture or computer simulation would be.


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

[User]
CMV: you shouldnt have children if you dont have the means to support them.

I understand all people (those impoverished or lacking consistent access to essentials) want kids just like everyone else. But I grew up in poverty (my mom was also a user and abusive so I admit my opinion could be distorted) and I just would never wish that soon anyone else. Going days without eating, talking baths in cold water, no gas it just makes your life feel so bleak and dim and when u see others who arent impoverished u just ask yourself why did you deserve this and not them. I know there are kick ass moms and dad who make something out of nothing after having kids and thats amazing but thats usually not the case. A lot of time ppl born in poverty stay in poverty and lack of education (that be school, basic skills like doing taxes, sex Ed ect )and a safe environment . So many families have kids in poverty and its just selfish in my opinion. I understand you may WANT a child but if you dont have what it NEEDS then you shouldnt have it period. Maybe Im just an asshole tho.

Edit for context plz read: as a foster kid I was placed in this big ass fancy mansion with this foster family while my aunt kept fighting to be my guardian. You know what these people did to get that money? They took in so many kids. (You get payed to he a foster parent)Filled each room with as many kids as they could fit. Had a padlock on the fridge. The adults there were mean and cold and never showed interest in us. I hate to burst your guys bubble but this is a majority of foster families. The only thing that made that place livable was the kids there who shared my experience. Not the nice house or the warm beds . Id wholeheartedly prefer a parent who cares with inconsistent access to certain things  then living with a family who lives comfortably who treats you like shit. If dcs didnt exist I would have been able to escape from my mother much much sooner. And its not the back up plan it needs to be. And until it is dont expect dcs to give your family handouts even if you really need them

Edit 2: I should probably state that I dont wish for the people who do have these kids for them to be taken away. In an ideal world no one should have to worry about feeding their kids let alone themselves. But sense here the responsibility is strictly on the parental unit in the US at least we have to plan for this when having kids. And there are a lot of success stories of people from poverty its just not an ideal environment to grow in. And also, if a woman wishes to have an abortion and cant as a result I feel like this doesnt apply to you at all. I only think its this about ppl who are actively planning pregnancy.

Edit 3: okay I think I figured out the delta thing Im sorry if I did it wrong still a noob here

[Assistant] What if we had a safety net so every kid got meals and an education? We could even setup assistance to help pay for heat during winters too. That way the people who get sick or lose their jobs after already having children get help too.


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

[User] ELI5: Is there an advantage of any particular blood group over the other?

[Assistant] O-type blood provides a bit of resistance to malaria. Also, some blood types are much more valuable for blood donation. O- blood can be donated to 100% of the U.S. population, and O+ blood can be donated to 84%, so people with those blood types are encouraged to donate blood as much as they can. On the other hand, people with AB- or AB+ blood are universal plasma donors, so they're encouraged to donate plasma instead of blood.


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

[User]
[LotR] Are there fat elves?

Does elven biology even allow them to become overweight? Can an elf suffer from cardiac disease?  Would a fat elf sink in the snow?

[Assistant]
Deep inside our human psyche there is an innate fear of death. This motivates our biological drive to consume more than we need, because there is a fundamental anxiety in our nature that there may be a future point where we don't have enough.

To an immortal, if there is not enough food later on it's not a big deal. They can't die, they're just uncomfortable until they get fed again. Their appetites work differently from our's. In this way, all their biological drives are naturally tuned to be more moderate. They don't crave non-procreative sex, because they don't need to adopt a high-productivity reproduction strategy. They don't crave excessive amounts of food because they don't need to fear starvation.

This is why some of the half-elven choose to be mortal. The knowledge that things may have an end makes all the highs and lows of life more intense.


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

[User]
[Digimon] Was Angemon some sort of anomaly in the digiworld or digital code that made him so strong?

Angemon was his in champion form, but he was by farther stronger than any other Champion. He could even rival and defeat many Ultimates in his champion form. I read in the Digimon archives that the only Digimon Angemon is unable to defeat are those who are of the Mega level. And even then he could at least hold his own. And then when he turned into MagnaAngemon. It was game over man.

[Assistant] You may recall that there are 3 designations of digimon, vaccine, data and virus, and they have varying effectiveness of each other (vaccine > virus > data > vaccine) . Angemon (and others of his line) are a little special in that they take this to the extreme, being incredibly effective against virus digimon, especially those themed after demons or devils (who are themselves typically a bit more powerful than normal), explaining the disparity of power in the shown scenarios. The price for this is difficulty fighting other types(morally and power wise), and overall difficulty of digivolution.


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

[User]
Why are price controls not seen as a legitimate way of dealing with current inflation issues?

In most parts of the world, central banks are responding to inflation issues by increasing interest rates. To me, this seems to hit the middle and lower classes the hardest, by increasing their biggest expenses (mortgages). People can just buy less when products become expensive, but you can't really reduce loan payments without severe consequences.

Why don't central banks consider price controls, especially on less elastic goods like food, as a strategy for dealing with inflation? What am I missing? Also, are there any economists that do advocate for alternative solutions to increasing interest rates?

[Assistant]
Changing interest rates ultimately changes supply and demand. To be precise, the goal is a downward shift of the demand curve.

Price controls don't change supply and demand, they only increase the quantity demanded and decrease the quantity supplied (movements along the demand curve, not of the curve itself), causing shortages.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] What if Dumbledore amputated his arm?

In Book 6 Dumbledore gets cursed by Gaunt's Ring. But the curse was contained in his hand. Couldn't he have removed his hand? Would that have saved his life?

[Assistant]
It's a magical curse, it doesn't have to give a F about infection vectors or whatnot, for all we know amputating the hand it was contained in would let the curse loose to kill him, or explode, or the disembodied hand would immediately strangle him, or kill the person doing the amputation before killing him.

Tom may have been many things but he was certainly not someone to halfass a murder.


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

[User]
ELI5--- Higher dimensions. just can't get my head around it. please. someone.

I have read the book Flatland so i get how there can be a higher dimension but I just can't comprehend it. If you have a way it can be visualised or even explained a lil bit, please tell me.
Thankyou for your time!

[Assistant]
So presumably, you know at this point how a 3D sphere looks passing through a 2D universe, right? It starts off not existing, then it becomes a small circle, grows to a larger circle, shrinks to a smaller circle and then ceases to exist again. a 4D hypersphere does the same thing in the 3D universe: It spontaneously appears as a small 3D sphere, grows larger, then shrinks and finally disappears.

That's the best visualisation of four dimensions that we can possibly have, because our brains are only three dimensional. We are literally incapable of visualising higher dimensions, similar to how we can't possibly imagine a colour that doesn't exist. We can talk about and think about how that would occur and how it would interact with the world, but we can't imagine what it would look like.


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

[User]
CMV: basic universal income is useless, due to supply and demand and inflation

The idea of basic universal income (BUI) is floated as a solution for the increased automation and socio-economical differences in many Western countries.  While I support measures to address this issue, I fail to see how BUI will help.

Imagine a simplified scenario in which the only thing people buy is tomatoes.  Supply and demand (and other factors) set the price for a tomato at 1$.  Now say we want to help the poor and give all the people 100$ BUI.  Very quickly the price of tomatoes will adjust to reflect the higher income, to say 101$.

Two possible rebuttals are that different "classes" buy different things (yachts vs food) and that different people need different things (tomatoes vs cucumbers).

However I believe that there exits a most basic service that is prolific and significant enough to overcome these rebuttals - housing.  In particular - rent.

In a sense my view is that potential services, and particularly rent, would be priced higher to reflect the new demand / purchase ability, thus rendering the effects of BUI to a minimum.

Would be very happy to hear a different opinion!

EDIT:  I'm adding a few points to clarify my view, as it seems a lot of the comments are similar.

A.  First let me say that if by BUI we actually mean wealth distribution I'm all for it.  The BUI propositions I've seen are more similar to subsidies for the entire population.  In fact, if we just mean wealth distribution I don't think its BUI at all, its just taxes. It is clear the funding for BUI comes from taxes but it is not the same.

B.  Inflation is a complicated issue and is not solely a result of printing money, but rather the amorphous concept of the VALUE of money.  Certainly printing money would reduce its value but it is not the only thing that leads to inflation (as a side note think of countries that go bankrupt.)

In this issue BUI, especially types of BUI that would only or mostly benefit the most poor,  would lead to an influx of money to a very specific population.  That population have similar needs, and if they can pay more - I believe they will be charged more.

C.  A related issue is the supply and demand.  I should not have brought this up as this muddies the water but for the sake of clarity let me say this: It's true that people will always buy food because the must (it is very rigid demand), but the price of products is based not only on supply and demand but also on ability to pay.  In other words, the fact that the supply and demand will not change as a result of more money DOES NOT mean the prices wont change - again see point B.

D.  I do agree that there will be a net benefit for the very poor, especially if they are the only benefactor of BUI, but I think it would be limited to products that they share with the rest of the population, and I think the benefit would be rather small.

Thanks for your opinions so far!

[Assistant]
Mathematically, poor people will still be better off.

The price-increasing effects of UBI won't all go to the things poor people want/need. Only some of the price-increasing effect will affect those things. That means that while poor people may get an extra $1000, their cost of living would only go up by a smaller amount, for example by $500. They're still $500 ahead than they were before, and so it's a net benefit for those that are poor.

Inflation won't technically occur, because the amount of money in the system would stay the same. You're not printing new money, you're taking money from the rich and giving it to the poor. It's a net change of $0.


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

[User] ELI5: Everything has Sodium Laureth Sulfate in it. What's the real difference between hand soap, shampoo and body wash?

[Assistant]
Sodium laureth sulfate is what is called a wetting agent. Together with various chemical compounds that break surface tension and make emulsions, it becomes very effective at making the soap bubbles and lather. The thing about hair and skin is that it is hydrophobic, so water can't really rinse off dirt and grime as easily by itself. Adding sodium laureth sulfate helps correct that problem.

The differences between those soaps would be whatever main ingredients, additives and moisturizers they want. Sodium laureth sulfate is not the ingredient that determines what area of the body it is for. It just boosts the cleaning power of everything.


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

[User]
eli5, How do ant tunnels not collapse?

How do ant tunnels not collapse? Our mines always have supporting beams, but do ants so the same?

[Assistant]
By being very very small and a bit sticky.

There are two things in effect here. Firstly, small things are much more structurally sound than the same thing but bigger. This is because as you increase the apparent size, mass increases exponentially. Imagine a cube that's 2 meters on each edge. This cube's height, length and depth are all 2m. Its volume is 8m^3 (2x2x2), and its surface area is 24m^2 (2x2x6). Now imagine the same cube but 4 meters on each edge. It's volume is 64m^3 (4x4x4), and its surface area is 96m^2 (4x4x6). Its height (how big it looks) has been multiplied by 2, but its volume has been multiplied by 8 and its surface area by 4. A large tunnel has to support *far* more mass proportional to its size than a small tunnel does, so it's more likely to need supporting.

The second thing is the material in question. Mines are carved into rock, and rock comes in layers. Typically, mines follow one of these layers, because they want to mine whatever's in that layer. The entire layer is made out of the thing they want to mine though, and if they mine the whole thing out, there'll be nothing to support the layer above. Mines must find compromises then - mine out as much of the layer as possible without causing the ceiling to collapse from too much weight being on too little support. Many mines fail to strike the right balance here, because rock layers contain faults and weaknesses that are difficult to predict, and get a partial collapse as the area between two supporting walls caves in. Additional supports can be added to allow more of the layer to be mined without the roof falling.

An ant is not trying to mine coal or iron, nor is it digging through heavy rock layers. Instead, it's burrowing through sand or dirt. This is much lighter, and so its much easier for the sides of the tunnel to support. It's also separated into many grains, so where in a mine an entire rock layer will collapse, in sand and dirt, most collapses are just a few little fragments falling off, instead of the entire thing coming down. Wetness of the particles makes them sticky too, and allows them to hold a shape better. This is particularly effective on the scale of ants because the stickiness force of water works better the smaller you get.


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

[User]
Do particles move in a solid? Do they oscillate or vibrate?

I've heard about movement of particles in a gas or a liquid, but what about a solid?

[Assistant] Yes, they are constantly vibrating, but are a lot more constrained than in fluids. For a real solid solid like a metal or crystalline substance the atoms or molecules have to keep their lattice structure, so there isnt free movement throughout the solid, but they are constantly oscillating about their average position. If this werent the case, solids would be at absolute zero all the time.


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

[User]
[Marvel] What would be a cost effective weapon for my henchmen to use against Wolverine, Sabretooth, X-23/24?

I was re-watching Logan and during Laura's amazing first fight scene, Pierce yells at his men to stop shooting since Laura heals, yet Pierce is well aware of this and still brings only one harpoon gun that is effective against Laura, while the rest of this party are armed with regular AR's.

So the question is pretty straightforward. What would be decent, sustainable, realistic and cheap weapon to arm my guys in a fight against Wolverine and others who share his DNA?

[Assistant]
Flame throwers could work.  You'll probably lose a few guys, but sustained application will quickly overwhelm Logan's senses in that his nose, eyes, and ears will get burned away.  This should make the following steps easier. You should continue burning until the muscle tissue is gone from his limbs.  At this point apply restraints if you goal is capturing him; his soft tissue will be forced to regrow around the restraints.  Make sure that his arms are fully immobile so that his claws are useless.  Consider attaching other restraints between ribs, closely around his spine, etc., so that his skeleton prevents him from escaping.

If your goal is ending him, keep burning him until he is charred down to the bone.  Then throw the bones into a vat of molten steel.  Let them stew in the hope that all organic material gets destroyed by the extreme heat.  Then let the steel cool and dispose of it.  However, if you lack access to molten steel, stewing in acid followed by burial in concrete should yield similar results.


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

[User]
What is the probability that a rolled d10 has a higher role than two d20's?

 I'm in need of a good statistics mathematician.

I was rolling some dice playing DnD and was wondering how to figure out this question about probabilities.

If I roll 2 D20's and 1 D10 what is the likely hood that the D10 roll is a higher number than both the D20's (indivudally, not combined).

For example, one d20 is a 5, the other d20 is a 6 and the d10 is a 7.

[Assistant]
Everyone is doing coding simulations that obfuscate the reasoning when this is really just a pen and paper probability/math problem.

Imagine you roll a 1 on D10, what are the odds that's higher than both D20?  It's 0.  What about a 2?  That's only higher if you roll two 1s D20, so 1/20 x 1/20, or 1/400.  If you roll a 3 D10 then the D20s can be 1 or 2, so the probability is 2/20 x 2/20, or 4/400.  Continue this way and you find that if you roll an n, the odds it beats both D20s is (n-1)^2 /400.  So we just sum this from 1 to 10, and divide the total answer by 10 because each D10 roll has a 1/10 chance.

Re-indexing, this is the same as summing n^2 /4000 from 0 to 9.  The sum of n^2 to k equals k(k+1)(2k+1)/6, so for k=9 we get 285/4000, or 7.125%.  This procedure generalised well, the 4000 is from 20x20x10 and the 285 is the k(k+1)(2k+1)/6 formula for k=10-1 (because you didn't count ties we didn't sum to 10).  If you use a D8 and 2 D12s, the probability is 140/1152 or ~13%


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

[User]
What should I read to learn about Islamic Philosophy?

I own two books on the topic, The Sufi Path of Knowledge and The Teleological Ethics of Fakhr al-Din al-Razi, and really want to dig into them, but Im afraid that Im not prepared for the reading. Ive read the Quran and Platos the Republic, but other than some Camus and Jean Paul-Sartre Ive no real experience in philosophy. Im mainly interested in metaphysics and ethics, and I think the Islamic tradition is the right place to start for me. Any advice on what other readings I should do would be helpful, thanks!

Edit: Sorry for not responding immediately to all your great responses. I wrote this post down right before going to sleep. I truly do appreciate your help, you are so amazing and courteous.

[Assistant]
There is Peter adamsons Philosophy without gaps which goes through Islamic Philisophers and their ideas, there are also books by syed hossein nasr  which are decent.

I would recommend reading the Philosophers by keeping in mind the historical and political narrative, sometimes they were responding to the greeks as well
Maybe start with al kindi, al farabi, ghazali, averroes and avicenna and then there is the sufis as well, most prominent being ibn al arabi
And you might find brethren of purity interesting.


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

[User]
Why is it that that windows cant read mac format hard drives?

I understand that they are different ways of encoding information on a hard drive, but i dont understand why the windows os shouldnt have a built-in way of reading hfs format for example. Is this merely a competition thing, or are there bigger difficulties?

[Assistant]
Business reasons.

For Apple, they want to make it easy to switch to a Mac.  They have a small marketshare so their job is to convince people to try OS X.  An easy way to do that is to ship the OS with the ability to read more file systems.  From their perspective they have a better product than Microsoft so they just need to get people to try it.

For Microsoft, they have captured most of the market, and are just concerned with locking people in.  Anything they do to make it easier to switch is bad.  Increased interoperability will make it less of a burden for things like businesses operating in mixed environments.

Obviously simplified, and Microsoft has gone away from that attitude recently with things like the Linux Subsystem for Windows, but that's one of the major historical reasons.

There are probably some arguments about the fact HFS and APFS are proprietary, but so is NTFS and Apple includes an NTFS driver in Mac OS, so it falls back to business reasons.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do prongs on plugs have holes in them?

[Assistant] It's cheaper to manufacture (less metal), there are little nubs inside the socket that go into the prongholes to keep the plug in the outlet, and some devices will string a warning label through the holes so that you can't use the device without reading (or at least seeing) the safety info.


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

[User]
[Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood] Why couldn't Edward and/or Alphonse transmute their bodies back just utilizing the elements and components?

To my understanding, the basic concept of equivalent exchange is that in alchemy, you reorganize base elements into new combinations/shapes/forms to create or change something. You pull the iron from the earth to make a weapon, you reform the molecules in a wall to make a door, etc.

Also, to my understanding, although the Elrics did have, to the best of their knowledge, every required material needed to create the average human (which would likely be more than enough to recreate what seemed to be a petite, short woman), the reason they are unable to resurrect her is both because her soul has left the mortal realm and is thus unattainable, and because there is no object that equals that value to be sacrificed for its gain, which causes the rebound.

But we know that alchemy on animals is possible, because chimeras are relatively commonplace, and even alchemy on humans in general is possible, because Shou Tucker creates a half/human chimera with his daughter. So, knowing that, why weren't the Elrics able to just transmute his arm and leg back with the elements and materials needed for the average 15 year old male arm and leg? To a limited extent, one might argue the same is possible for Alphonse, as his soul is already present and is naturally drawn to its human body anyways, meaning theoretically it would bond more securely with an alchemically created human body, similar to the ones created by the military.

Basically, why do they need the damn stone in the first place?

[Assistant]
They did investigate other methods, and found they were either unfeasible or not worth the cost.

Biological alchemy was one of the first methods they investigated, and it wasn't nearly advanced enough to be reliable. Shou Tucker, the leading expert in the science, was hitting a dead end over and over, to the point of losing his commission. The "bio-alchemy barrier" seems to have been crafting a living being from scratch; which is why creating a creature with something near human intelligence took a human base.

Tucker's technique would likely require human donors to create authentic-enough limbs and a full body. They weren't willing to do that, and even then, that wouldn't feel like *their* bodies, but bodies stolen from someone else.

Human alchemy (as in, anything not done by Truth) may not have been able to restore their bodies in any case, since their loss was the result of human transmutation. Hohenheim didn't restore Izumi Curtis's organs, even with a Philosopher's Stone. It's a bit ambiguous whether he *wouldn't* because it was her earned punishment, or whether he actually *couldn't* because it was in God's domain - but it raises the possibility that humans can't restore parts taken by Truth without it facilitating an exchange.


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

[User] ELI5: whether or not sleeping early and waking early is healthier than sleeping late and waking late is true and why?

[Assistant]
There was a study not long ago in which they proved that it doesn't matter. Everyone's body has a different sleep pattern and it only becomes problematic when you disturb this natural pattern, for example if you're generally a late sleeper but are forced to wake up early.

The important part is that you get enough sleep, hours wise. Whether that's from early to early or late to late doesn't matter.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do we sometimes get a feeling of falling when really close to falling asleep that wakes us up?

Like you know when youre already about to fall asleep and then you just randomly get this feeling that youre falling and you instantly wake up in fear? Why does this happen?

[Assistant]
These are called "Hypnic Jerks." They occur when:

* You have **anxiety**. As your body falls asleep, your brain remains awake. Your body may send out an alert, because it thinks it's falling.
* You've taken **stimulants**, like coffee. Your brain is falling asleep, and this chemical wakes you back up abruptly.
* You've **exercised** too recently. Your body is still in go-mode!
* Your tree-dwelling **ancestors** may have received these jerks to keep them readjusting as they sleep high up in trees!


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

[User]
On planets like Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and Uranus, is there *some* point where the temperature, gravity, and atmospheric pressure resembles Earth, or at least something humans could tolerate?

Most of the "giant" planets have no solid surface, and if you look at the temperature, gravity and pressure, it varies depending on how deep into the atmosphere you are.

My question is, is there any point where these three factors are within what a human could tolerate, at least with some training?

For instance, submariners can adapt to high pressures near the bottom of the ocean, and even go into the water there in scuba gear, as long as they descend and ascend slowly and follow certain protocols.

Does there exist a similar point on any of these giant planets where these parameters could be similar?

[Assistant]
In the upper atmosphere of Jupiter you will find pressure of 1 bar (same as here) however you wouldn't last very long in a temperature of \~-70-100C with gravity rapidly drawing you into the planet because there's nothing to stand on. The extreme wind speeds of 300-600 kph might also be a problem. Radiation may have killed you even before reaching the surface too.

Then it only gets worse from there as you go deeper.


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

[User] Why is static always black and white even on color TVs?

[Assistant]
Its because of the way color was added to the original U.S. TV standard. (Im assuming you are referring to the now-obsolete analog system; it obviously doesnt work like this in the current digital systems.)

 Color TV had to be made compatible with the original black-and-white system.

 Color TV signals are a little bit different than black-and-white TV signals - a certain frequency band within the signal is used to transmit color information. That band corresponds to high frequency horizontal detail (patterns about 1/200th of the width of the screen). In a Color TV signal, those details are elided and the information used to carry hue and saturation information instead.

 This meant that Color TVs had to be able to correctly display a black and white transmission, one in which no color information was present. The way this was achieved was the addition of a color killer circuit, which detected the signals that indicated a color TV transmission and forced the set to behave as a black-and-white receiver when those signals (specifically, the color burst signal, which is a brief burst of the color sub-carrier frequency transmitted during the horizontal blanking period) werent present.

 Having a signal of the correct frequency at the correct time for that period of time is extremely unlikely to occur by chance (and even if it did, it would disappear again before you had the chance to notice it). So when the TV is showing static, it thinks it's showing an old black-and-white movie and turns off the color interpretation circuitry, leading to black-and-white static.

 Of course, if youre not tuned into ANY signal, those color signals arent present, so evenstatic looks just like it would on a black-and-white set. Later, the dominant European system (PAL) would behave in a very similar manner.


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

[User]
[General superheroes] How liable, either criminally or through a civil suit, could someone be held accountable if their actions were what caused someone to become a supervillain?

For example, let's look at Mr Freeze - Ferris Boyle had tried to kill the cryogenically frozen Nora Fries and was directly responsible for turning Victor into the ice-monster that he is now famously known as, and he did so by ordering thugs to attack the two of them.

Or, hell - any bad guy who dumps nuclear waste that mutates either animals or people into mindless monsters who go on a killing rampage?

Would they primarily be in the kind of trouble that could get them sued for a lot of money? Or does this fall under such state of legal affairs similar to felony murder charges?

[Assistant]
I asked a similar question once about Marvels J. Jonah Jameson and his bankrolling of the experiments that led to the Scorpion and Spider Slayers. This was the top comment:

> They could, and theres more than enough PC (probable cause) to get the matter into court; you dont fund giant robots and a LEGITIMATE SUPERVILLAIN for no reason after all, and JJJ has never made his feelings on Spider-Man a secret.

> Conviction would be another matter entirely; as you pointed out, any civil suit or criminal charge would have to prove intent, and thats going to be an uphill battle as in most cases these ventures went off the rails damn near immediately.  Any defense lawyer worth a damn will have ammunition for days on that proviso alone.  Further, the state would need to identify a victim, and a guy in a Spider-Man costume isnt going to cut it.  Considering the lengths Peter went to in order to keep his identity under wraps and dangerous super-psychos being an occupational hazard of sorts, theres zero chance that Peter Parker outs himself as Spider-Man over this.  And if theres no victim, theres no crime.

> Attempted murder charge is dropped.  All that property damage, however

So basically, while they might not get charged for the direct actions of the supervillain in their role or by what happens to heroes, theres still the matter of property damage. Theoretically, John Doe here who got his car destroyed by Mr. Freeze could absolutely sue Ferris Boyle and make a decent case for it.


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

[User]
ELI5: How could we have had so accurate world-maps before we could fly/see the world from space?

For example in the 1700's we already had very accurate world maps.

[Assistant] Surveying. Surveyors took records of how far they travelled, how far between landmarks, the angles between landmarks from their positions, and so forth and so on, creating a network of measured triangles. This allowed the creation of accurate maps.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does swallowing an air bubble hurt so badly?

I hate it when I take a hasty drink of water and then suddenly I'm swallowing a giant air bubble. Why does it hurt as it goes all the way down?

[Assistant]
ELI5 TLDR:  Food is better at keeping it's shape, air tries to expand, and our mouth is bigger than your throat.

Your esophagus is closed most of the way unless you are swallowing something.  Typically your esophagus is used to pushing things down that are roughly 1/2 the size of a golf ball (solid foods).  When we swallow air we are taking all the air that is inside our mouth and attempting to push it into a shape the same size as that golf ball and shove it down our throat because that's what our throat is used to.  This pushes the same amount of air into a smaller space generating a larger PSI (pounds per square inch) than when you just have a mouth full of air.  That "Pain" you feel is the air trying to readjust itself to it's natural PSI.  If we focus on swallowing smaller bits of air like when you force yourself to burp then it's not painful going down.  You will also experience similar pain if you tried to swallowing larger pieces of food that same size.  Food is better at keeping it's shape and not expanding is the main difference why the same size food will hurt less.


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

[User]
Does the 3 dimensional shape created when one end of a cylinder is pinched have a name? If so, what is it, and what is the formula for it's volume?

As the title suggests, I have a cylinder that I pinch the end to flatten it, much like a toothpaste tube. Does this shape have a name, and can it's volume be determined based on length and diameter?

[Assistant]
I don't know if that shape has a name.  However, shapes whose volume formula is unknown can have it calculated by integrating over the volume of the shape.  All that's required is knowing equations that describe the boundaries of that shape.  It's worth mentioning that this is how the volume equations of shapes you're familiar with are generally derived.  The following may be a bit confusing if you don't know calculus.  In case you don't, the basic principle of integrating a function is that you add the infinitesimally small heights under a curve to get an area, or the areas under a curve to get a volume.

I'll use the xy plane for the cross section, with the flat surface along x, and z for the length dimension of the shape, and assume that the rate of flattening is linear, and that it tapers to a point.  The easiest way to integrate it, it seems to me, is to break it up into triangles in the yz plane, and integrate along z.

I'll use r as the radius at the un-squished end, and L as the length.  I'll also put the center of the un-squished cross-section at the origin.  Now, on the xy plane, a y coordinate along the boundary can be expressed as y=sqrt(r^2 - x^2 ).  If the squishing of the shape is linear, the yz sections will be triangles with height 2 * sqrt(r^2 - x^2 ) and length L.  The area of each will be L * sqrt(r^2 - x^2 ).  A brief sanity check shows that the areas are 0 at x=r, where the height tapers from zero to zero.

By integrating these areas along x the volume can be determined.  The integral in question is the integral of L * sqrt(r^2 - x^2 ) with respect to x as x goes from -r to r, which is equal to V.

This integral isn't terribly easy to solve, but there's a way around actually doing it out.  By inspection, sqrt(r^2 - x^2) is just the y coordinate of a circle.  The integral of this from -r to r should just be the area of a semicircle, pi * r^2 /2.  And plugging the definite integral into wolframalpha, it is!

Plugging that back in and cancelling the 2, V = 1/2 * L * pi * r^2, or half the area of a cylinder.  And intuitively, that makes sense--each cross-section of it is a triangle with the same base and height as full rectangle.  And that shape made of rectangles is a cylinder.  So the volume will be half that.

An important practical note is that squishing a real-life cylinder will result in something significantly different, because just squishing the end won't produce a constant taper throughout the cylinder.

tl;dr it can be determined by summing all the arbitrarily thin cross-sectional volumes of the shape, each of which is an area times an arbitrarily small increment in the direction we're slicing.  By doing out this calculus, the area is A = 1/2 * L * pi * r^2 , or half the volume of a cylinder.  This makes sense when you think about how a cylinder and this shape differ.


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

[User]
What immunologically is going on to make people asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19?

What mechanism immunologically speaking, causes people to be asymptomatic COVID-19 carriers? Is it that the innate immune system is more capable of controlling the infection very early in certain individuals?

I've asked my immunology professor and a few other medical professionals and they have all stated that it is not yet clear. I was curious if anyone has a better answer for me :) Thanks!

[Assistant]
It's not really accurate to say people are "carriers" of COVID, implying some kind of long term equilibrium state.  The human immune system will always fight covid and the battle will be won or lost.

The spectrum of symptoms will be determined by a lot of factors.  Some may have had previous exposure to a similar virus.  Some people will just not recognize the symptoms on top of their normal bronchitis, etc.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Did Clone Troopers feel regret after killing the Jedi?

I have seen it mentioned on this sub that the clone troopers had computer chips in their brains that forced them to obey Order 66. How did the clones react afterward? Did they feel regret or ptsd from killing the Jedi who had commanded them for years? Did any feel betrayed and try to desert, retire, or mutiny?

[Assistant]
This is an interesting question, as Tup seemed to not know what happened and freaked out about it (though his chip was faulty and activated early). The only other examples we have so far of troopers after Order 66 has been activated and they've killed a Jedi are Grey and Styles, who killed Depa Billaba and chased Kanan around for quite a while and were quite happy when they caught him. It's entirely possible that it was more than just a simple override chip, as it lasts for several weeks if not months.

We haven't seen any other clone troopers in the immediate aftermath of it all - other than the two named above, the closest we get is five years later.

Of course, Rex, Wolffe, and Gregor all got their chips removed once they learned what the truth behind them was, and will be seen in the forthcoming Rebels season, 14 years after Order 66 was executed.