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

[User]
ELI5: Why do programmers hate using "GOTO" so much?

I just used it in a calculator program and it saved a lot of time and energy.

[Assistant] GOTO makes a program hard to read. The main reasons functions are used instead of GOTOs is that they are easier to modify, debug, and understand without going into details of how they are implemented. In a nutshell, functions may take a tiny bit more time to code than a GOTO, but GOTOs are really just hacky and break easily (but may be necessary if you don't have functions in the language you're using)


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

[User] ELI5:why is it harder for weed smoke to set off my fire alarm compared to a little smoke from my burnt grilled cheese sandwich.

[Assistant]
There are two types of smoke detectors: optical and ionizing ones.
I don't know if ionizing smoke detectors have a harder time detecting weed smoke than sandwich smoke, so I'll focus on optical smoke detectors, which are more common in households anyway.

Optical smoke detectors have a light barrier inside of them. If smoke particles enter the detector, they reduce the amount of light that reaches the end of the light barrier.

The smoke from your burnt sandwich contains alot of soot, which has lots of big molecules. It's pretty easy for a smoke detector to detect these. Your weed burns relatively cleanly and doesn't contain as much big particles as the sandwich smoke.


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

[User] Do we know anything about Neanderthal language capabilities?

[Assistant]
There is high evidence they were able to speak because we share a specific gene (FOXP2) that is responsible for language.
And because of Neanderthal anatomy we can deduce they had a higher pitched voice than us Homo Sapiens!


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

[User]
ELI5: Can Queen insects be born to normal versions of that species?

For example can a Queen Bee or Termite be born to a bee or termite? Or do the parents have to be Queen and King? Or can only Queens lay eggs??

[Assistant] I don't know about termites,  but with bees, only the Queen lays eggs. If the swarm outgrows the nest,  they will separate a female egg, and feed it a very specific type of honey called Royal Jelly, and not fed pollen or regular honey. That will eventually become a queen and lead half of the swarm to find a new nesting site.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does tapping wood and tapping metal produce different sounds?

[Assistant]
you know when you put a ruler on the edge of a table and push it down and let it go and it makes that woioioioinggggg sound? And if you vary the length of it off the table, the sound changes and the speed at which the end of the ruler goes up and back down changes? This is the natural frequency of the ruler when it is that length of the table and thus produces a certain sound.

Now certain materials also will have a natural frequency such as wooden or metal tables and that's why they make different sounds. They make different frequencies because they also will only take in set amounts of energies.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Jedi are essentially monks, as well as warriors and experts in hand-to-hand combat. How does this qualify Anakin or Obi Wan to be military generals?

[Assistant]
It doesn't. But you clearly didn't pay attention in your Galactic History 101.

You completely ignored the fact that Jedi are part of the Republic's judicial branch of government, specifically tasked with bringing gangsters, pirates, warlords, and even rebelling worlds to justice.

That means Jedi spend a lot of time training in space combat and basic warfare so that they can aid Republic worlds with many types of threats.

That's why Jedi were able to decimate the Mandalorians, Kaleesh, and many other highly militaristic species on the battlefield.

And that's why they were put in charge of the Grand Army. They actually do know how to run an army. They would just rather not bc of how that's led to autocratic empires in the past.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is it that the more annoying the tune, the harder it is to get it out of your head?

[Assistant] Annoying tunes are often so annoying because they're too catchy for their own good.  Songs are catchy because they have a nice, and recognizable pattern.  Our brains love patterns, so when we hear a really good one, they repeat it over, and over and over and over until something else distracts that part of our brains.


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

[User] [star wars: legends] Who's the most powerful sith and jedi we know about?

[Assistant]
(In Legends)

Palpatine and Luke. They both have insane power in the force, Luke after killing the emperor of course, but they do some insane things. Like Palpatine can create Force storms in space that can consume entire ships or something, that level of power.


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

[User] ELI5: Why can't they just instal a giant heat scanner (?) for all trucks to go through at Calais to easily detect migrants?

[Assistant] A infra red scanner can only look at the outside of the truck. Some trucks will have been out in the sun, others in the shade. Some cargoes will hold the heat more than others.  So readings will be all over the place and it won't give any useful information.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is fusion considered the holy grail of energy?

I have a degree in engineering and read a lot of science material, and my own reading has shown:
"The power output of the core of the Sun is about 276.5 watts per cubic metre  that's almost three of the old 100W light bulbs. On a power/volume basis, it's a lot less than your body emits (about 100 W) and around the same as a compost pile."

Basically the only reason the Sun yields so much energy is that it is so staggeringly large.

So, that being said, what is the use in creating a reactor that - albeit will generate a net positive power - will only output such a piddling small amount?

I feel we are wasting millions (likely billions by now) on this. Is there some basic conceptual scale up that I am not aware of?

[Assistant]
> So, that being said, what is the use in creating a reactor that - albeit will generate a net positive power - will only output such a piddling small amount?

The fusion output of the sun per given volume doesn't really apply to how it would be performed in a reactor as our designs aren't reliant on what will naturally occur. Consider the difference between a fission bomb and a fusion bomb, the fusion bomb has a far greater output. A practical reactor will be generating far more energy per cubic meter than the Sun does.

While fission of uranium releases about 17 times the energy of deuterium and tritium fusion, the key difference is the availability of the fuel. There is enough deuterium in a gallon of sea water to produce an equivalent energy output of about 300 gallons of gasoline. Instead of refining trace isotopes of an already rare mineral into fuel we can just essentially dump water into such a reactor and create huge amounts of energy; that we need 17 times more water than uranium isn't really a problem.

Edit: Consider that U-235 has a natural abundance of 0.72% and there is about 40 trillion tons of uranium on Earth. That means there is conceptually about 288 billion tons of U-235 on Earth.

On the other hand deuterium has a natural abundance of about 0.015% and there is about 1.36 million trillion tons of water on Earth. That means there is conceptually 204 trillion tons of deuterium on Earth.

This means fusion fuel is approximately 708.3 times more commonly available than fission fuel. Oh, and the waste products are far less hazardous.


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

[User]
[Star Wars/MCU/General Sci-Fi] Why don't more characters have weapons and equipment unusable by their foes?

In most universes, characters exist that happen to possess superior devices and weapons giving them an edge as a hero (or villain). Their opponent disarms them somehow, or stealthily acquires use of the weapon or tech while the hero is distracted. Of course, sometimes like with James Bond (his Casino Royale biometric signature lockable pistol) or Thor (anyone who is worthy) you'll have the powerful object rendered inert when out of the owner's possession.

But far too often like with Syndrome and his Omnidroid remote (The Incredibles) or Tony Stark and his Iron Man suits (MCU) you'll have the opposing side taking control of that key *thing* that gives the other person power, and using it against them. Even in clich villain headquarters we see a self destruct button or command (why would you even have one so easily accessible?) used by a hero who has a casual 10 seconds to spare in their escape.

Surely you'd employ some kind of safeguard like a fingerprint scanner or password at least. Like with lightsabers, combatants routinely get theirs knocked out of their hands. Sometimes they are used to the lightsaberless person's advantage (Han cutting open the Tauntaun or Finn *something something spoilers*), but a lot of the time it's either lost (see Empire Strikes Back, or any of the Prequels) or collected to be used against their allies (see General Grievous).

Why aren't more heroes and villains protecting their equipment and weaponry with safeguards? Are there any cases (besides those mentioned) of safeguards being implemented to ensure such a scenario doesn't occur? Even with the Lightsabers, you could employ a fingerprint scanner connected to an internal database that recognises who can and cannot use the weapon, remaining in the default dead man switch "off" mode when released from control by an authorised user (with the authorised users being updated at a Jedi or Sith facility terminal depending on the allegiance of the owner). I get that it's more R&D, resources and time required to get the Prometheans from Halo kitted out with Promethean only gear, but surely it's worth it to prevent any random evolved ape from the other side of the Galaxy from salvaging your weaponry when theirs is depleted far from an allied ammo cache. The Dark Lord Sauron couldn't have crafted the One Ring of Power to make the wearer emit a traceable signal to the forces of darkness whilst also paralysing the individual?

There's always going to be ways around safeguards, but it seems seasoned combatants and "intelligent" super-geniuses lack some common sense in the "let's make sure only I can use this" department.

[Assistant]
Adding those kind of security on a weapon is one more thing that can stop you from using it. What happens when you're ambushed, really need to shoot back, and darn it, fingerprint didn't register, hang on, I'll jus-

Dead.

For weapons you want them to work every single time. Reliability is the name of the game. Any sort of safeguards puts that at risk.

(Also, Tony Start *had* restrictions on his suits, he added Rhodes to the approval list of Mk2 and Pepper for at least Mk42)


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

[User]
[Star Wars] When blowing up Alderraan, how did Tarkin ensure there were enough witnesses to tell the story and spread terror?

It seems all the witnesses died so how would people know that the death star destroyed Alderraan. Would destroying a planet with a large population on its moon  be a better show of force? Maybe like Mandalore?

[Assistant]
Alderaan was a core world with a population of billions - there would have been a stream of traffic to and from the system continuously that would have witnessed the destruction.

The station then stayed in the system and used its tractor beam to bring in any new arrivals to 'question' the crews and ensure that they knew the Imperial version of the event.


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

[User] If Santa existed, what would be the most efficient route he could have taken to visit every home in the world?

[Assistant]
This is known as the Travelling Salesman problem and it is in a very difficult class of problems called NP-hard.

To answer this question would take an amount of time, in any units you like, some constant multiple of 2^(number of homes in the world).


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

[User]
What happens to information after the heat death of the universe?

Presume the heat death is the ultimate fate of our universe. If so, my understanding is that there are no "nodes of lower entropy" to do work. Does this also mean that there is no way to tell one location from another? Wouldn't all points in space have the same particles at the same energy level? If so, wouldn't locality cease to be relevant? What about temporality? Ultimately, I am curious if this means that all of the information in the universe gets spread out uniformly. If so, wouldn't this annihilate the information (or make it irrelevant)?

TL;DR If you looked at some point and moment in/after the heat death, could you reverse the clock and reconstruct the universe as it was before? Or, is the heat death a kind of point of no return for information?

[Assistant]
>TL;DR If you looked at some point and moment in/after the heat death, could you reverse the clock and reconstruct the universe as it was before? Or, is the heat death a kind of point of no return for information?

You could theoretically do this, but you would have to know literally every piece of information in the universe. In practice you never could because you can't measure all of that data without changing it, which is another way of saying that you're part of the universe. Clearly you couldn't store all of the data of the universe in a hard drive, because the hard drive doesn't have enough space to describe itself as well.

The information is all still there, it just isn't usable because it's so scrambled. Every bit of energy interacts with everything near it and you'd have to keep track of the entire process in order to reverse the universe to a more usable state.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does our eyelids form crystal like substances while we sleep?

[Assistant] Tear ducts lubricate the surface of the eyes occasional dust and other minute particles reach the surface of the eye, these are then blink washed away a bit like a windscreen wiper. This material then accumulates at the edges where some of the liquid evaporates leaving behind the solid material.


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

[User]
[Invincible] What is the day to day governance of the Viltrum Empire like? Is there actually any benefit to being part of it as a subject species?

Omni Man at one point talks about how Earth would benefit from being part of the empire, is there any truth to that? They seem pretty totalitarian but assuming we complied fully and were ideal subjects would there be anything Earth or a planet like Earth would actually get out of the deal? Like would they build us advanced infrastructure or give us medicine or would they just show up looking for tribute every now and then and otherwise not care what we were doing?

[Assistant]
In the comics, Anissa (a high ranking legbreaker for the Viltrumites) justifies the idea of Viltrumite occupation by saying that the people of Earth would be kept fat and happy for as long as it took the Viltrumites to strip mine everything of value from the planet. While she admits that humanity would inevitably go extinct after that, she believes that humanity would last longer as a species under Viltrumite supervision than they would if left to manage their own ecosystem.

In the comics we see a few worlds under Viltrumite rule, and the main tangible benefit is that there's a Viltrumite living on your planet defending it from spaceborne threats. The big downside is that the Viltrumites tend to press-gang tributes of slave-soldiers from any planet that's at all good at military stuff, to the point that most Viltrumite invasion forces consist of one or two Viltrumites and a zerg rush of  expendable slaves in power-armor.

Complicating matters is the specific resource they were hoping to extract from Earth: >!People. Mark was proof of concept for breeding an army of nearly-genetically pure viltrumites to rebuild their numbers after a number of devastating setbacks.!< This might mean that they have a higher-than-average incentive to keep the planet livable than they otherwise might have.


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

[User] If humans were to die out could natural geologic processes completely erase all traces of our civilization or will there be something left behind that could last billions of years?

[Assistant]
Plenty of things would last billions of years.

We have preserved bacteria mounds that are almost 4 billion years old. Tons of them.

We have preserved raindrops and dinosaur poop that are hundreds of millions of years old.

We have preserved leafs, footprints, insects, worm tunnels, jelleyfish, and so on.

Now look at what humans have done:

We have carved through mountains all over the globe to build roads and mines. We have strip mines which can actually decapitate entire mountains, or create gigantic pits in the ground. We have collected many common and rare minerals (and elements) into solid refined chunks unlike anything found naturally. We have spread our trash throughout the oceans and through much of planet's landmasses too. We have diverted rivers, built dams, spread radioactive isotopes around the soil layers of the planet - we create a new-endless stream of junk that we collect and bury into massive dumps which will leave unmistakable evidence behind.

Until the planet is obliterated, strong evidence humans were here will be present to anyone that looks hard.


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

[User] ELI5: if everything is registered in computers and databases, why do fake passports still work? Should they fail on arrival when read thru the machine? Like a 404?

[Assistant]
Because as example the US customs does not have access to the "British citizen passport database". The data on the passport is the same as the written one, including error correction keys and nowadays some biological data as well (such as fingerprint). It also depend on the issuing country and how old your passport is.

All they can do is check that it's correct and matches you as a person. And cross reference with their own data of persons denied entry etc.

TL;DR; there is no secret world wide database with everyone's information for them to connect to.


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

[User]
Why is Marx irrelevant in economics but important in other fields?

Marx is omnipresent in sociology, very important in philosophy, important in anthropology, and influential in history. I am well aware of *why Marx is considered archaic* in economics (LTV, TRPF, etc); what I want to know is why is there such a disconnect between those other fields and economics?

I realize this question may be read as passive-aggressive (I have noticed such tones with similar questions in the past), but I'm asking because I've always found it a strange disconnect and don't often get charitable answers, so I figured I'd ask economists themselves.

[Assistant]
Other fields dont necessarily want Marx for the same things that economists might use him for. (Although obviously there are some in non-economics fields who read Marxs economics uncritically and without knowledge of modern work, but such is the nature of disciplinary boundaries)

In sociology, for example, so much work is on stratification, and Marx introduces class as a unit of analysis. In contrast, economics doesnt often consider class except insofar as that income is a constraint on behavior, rather than having any notion of class consciousness. (For better or for worse)

Marx also for them introduced a lot of ideas about how economic constraints interact with social life, e.g. his concept of alienation. This is obviously exactly the domain of a sociologist!

Obviously these things are very different from using Marxs ideas on price theory or economic growth! Those are more relevant to economics, and theyve largely not been deemed useful, which is why you dont see Marx much in economics.


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

[User] How does anesthesia work?

[Assistant]
General anaesthesia has five components, required in various combinations.

1. The patient should be unconscious - hypnosis. This is usually achieved by inducing anaesthesia using an intravenous induction agent such as propofol and maintaining anaesthesia during the procedure using an infusion of propofol or an inhalational agent such as isoflurane or sevoflurane.

2. The patient should not recall what happened during the surgery - amnesia. This is usually achieved by using benzodiazepines such as midazolam.

3. The patient should not suffer pain - analgesia. Intraoperatively this is achieved by giving opioids such as morphine, meperidine, fentanyl, or remifentanil, or by administering a neural block using a local anaesthetic such as lidocaine, bupivacaine, or ropivacaine.

4. Unnecessary or exaggerated autonomic reflexes should be suppressed to prevent harm to the patient. There are multiple ways of doing this based own at reflexes you are targeting.

5. Sometimes the patients need to be paralysed with neuromuscular blocking drugs. This usually the case when a body cavity needs to be opened or when absolute immobility is required. When we do this, we need to take over the patient's respiration too.

Multiple effects needed, multiple pathways. If on the other hand you are looking to find how any anaesthetic acts on the central nervous system, go to Pubmed and search for "molecular mechanisms of general anaesthesia".


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

[User] ELI5... How can a infection like chicken pox trigger alopecia?

[Assistant]
Imagine your body is a city that you have to protect from invaders.
You have the city walls (the innate immune system) and the city guards (the adaptive immune system). Each of these city guards has been trained to look for a particular characteristic that no normal person in your city has, say brown hair with a ponytail (this could be something like the spike protein in COVID-19). Now suppose this guard arrests an intruder with brown hair and a ponytail. They are now on much higher alert than before, so much higher that they start arresting anyone with brown hair, or anyone with a ponytail, even if they are innocent citizens. This is how an infection in your body can cause autoimmune disorders.

The T-cells in your body are sensitive to particular antigens but are also mildly sensitive to many other antigens, sometimes even self-antigens i.e. your body's own cells. What can happen is that during an infection like chickenpox, the T cell that is specific to a chickenpox antigen will be activated making it much more sensitive overall. It can then react to self-antigens that it was only mildly sensitive to before and begin attacking the body's own cells.


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

[User]
Do people still consider weekend emails unprofessional?

Im a grad student trying to schedule a virtual meeting with a professor who asked me if Im available early next week. I replied in a timely fashion (less than an hour) that I am and let them know that Im basically flexible for any time. This is for an initial invitation I sent to have them come speak at our school next year (or virtually, depending) for an event. They havent gotten  back to me and normally Id wait a week to follow up but since this is regarding a possible meeting earlier in the week, is it rude to follow up with them on a weekend? Im used to getting emails from professors at my school on weekends, but I dont know if it comes off as unprofessional when its someone outside of your campus? Just need to know if Im overthinking this.

[Assistant] An initial email over the weekend is fine because they can just do it Monday, but a reminder over the weekend can be both 1) annoying because it implies they should be working on the weekend and 2) counter-productive because if they are offline for the weekend, your email could be buried by Monday morning and they may actually get to it later than if you had just emailed on Monday.


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

[User]
What makes your mouth more sensitive to the cold after chewing on mint gum?

Whenever I chew on mint gum, then get a drink of cold water, my mouth will be very sensitive to the cold water.  Why is this?

[Assistant] The oils in mint and other minty plants bind to the nerve receptors that detect cold (similar to the way that the capsaicin in peppers binds to the heat receptors), so your mouth already thinks it's cold. When you add actual cold things, the nerves fire even more, making your brain think that your mouth is colder than it actually is.


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

[User]
Why don't plants get sunburned or genetic damage/cancer being out in the sun all day?

When UV-B radiation and other solar radiation hits plants like trees or grass, why does it not cause genetic damage to the plants DNA?

[Assistant]
It does and they do. Though as others here noted, many things help them defend against it.

Leaves are disposable though, and the outer layers of bark are usually dead plant material that protects the rest.

Most crucially, most plants don't have cells circulating like animals do, so they can't really get anything like metastatic cancer. They also lack vital organs that can become diseased and kill the whole plant.

Plants get tumours of sorts for all kinds of reasons but they can't generally spread and kill the whole organism.


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

[User] [Fallout] (Pre-War) My son just got his drivers license and a Corvega. Im worried that he might get into an accident, Ive heard it could result in a huge mushroom cloud if he gets totaled. Is there anything I can do to keep him safe? Is Power Armor training worth looking into?

[Assistant] There's only a danger if the nuclear containment is broken. Corvegas are designed to withstand head-on collisions at high speed and coolant completely surrounds the nuclear pile in the engine. They'd have to sit out in the elements without maintenance for a century before they become unstable.


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

[User] ELI5: What is honey? I know honey comes from bees, and I know honey is delicious on toast, but what is honey, and does it harm the bees we harvest it from? Can you trace back a batch of honey to the hive it came from, or is all honey the same?

[Assistant]
Many flowers secrete nectar as part of their biology. They lack the ability to move pollen from the male flowers to the female flowers so they entice bees and insects with nectar with the hope the while the bees collect the nectar they also move the pollen around allowing for the fertilization of the plant species.

Honey bees have a special compartment in their body to hold nectar. This compartment (called the crop or honey stomach) is designed to allow the bee nectar storage while it is foraging. When the forager bee returns to the hive she passes the nectar to a receiver bee who puts it in a wax comb cell for ripening. Nectar has a high moisture content, perhaps 40+%, but the bees want to store the honey for future consumption. They regulate the humidity in the hive via wing flapping over fresh stored nectar and move air in and out from the entrances. Once the honey is at 17/18% moisture content it is ready for capping. The bees cap the cell with wax and that honey will stay in storage until they need it.

If the season goes well, the colony may collect for example, twice the amount of honey they will need for winter. The beekeeper can take that extra and this harvesting does not harm the bees at all.


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

[User]
[Avengers] why did Thor hesitate in picking up his hammer?

After he's thrown out of the helicarrier and escapes the glass cell, he goes to find his hammer, finds it, goes to pick it up, then hesitates as if he's uncertain. Why?

[Assistant]
Because he knows that if he picks up that hammer, the next thing he'll be doing is using it to fight and possibly kill his brother Loki. Thor still cares for and is somewhat protective of his adoptive brother, all throughout the movie he tries to prevent harm to Loki and wants only to take him back to Asgard where he'll stand trial (and possibly be rehabilitated?).

It's the same reason he didn't simply call the hammer to his hand, Thor is considering his options and emotionally preparing himself for the fight to come.


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

[User] [MCU] Did Tony use any of Stane's Iron Monger designs when working on the Hulkbuster suit?

[Assistant]
No.

Unlike in the comics, where Stane's hardware is distinct and seperate from Tony's gear (to the point of Tony once building himself a "Staneware" suit as a countermeasure in case someone finds a way to undermine his standard "Starktech" gear), in the MCU Stane isn't really contributing much to development. He's a businessman first and foremost, followed immediately by being a ham-fisted goon; his functional yet unelegant solution to the power problems with the Iron Monger was to burgle Stark's house for an arc reactor. Everything about the Iron Monger is plagiarized off Tony's "box of scraps" Afghanistan suit, with the only improvements being in the quality of resources available to build it.

There's literally nothing for Tony to learn by studying Iron Monger, except perhaps the dangers of hubris.


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

[User]
[The Good Place] Spoilers

Why can't you curse in the real Good Place? It makes sense that you can't curse in the Bad Place... but the *Good* Place?

[Assistant] The rules that the Good Place operates on aren't fair by our human standards. Such as punishing the French just for being from France. So apparently, by the cosmic standards of Architects and Janets and the Judge and other cosmic beings, cursing is legitimately bad enough to be banned from the Good Place.


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

[User] ELI5: How is it decided which gene is dominant and which is recessive? Does each gene have some sort of "score" and the highest one between a pair is expressed?

[Assistant]
Let's say a gene is responsible for making a certain protein. The gene has two alleles - one that makes the protein and one that doesnt. Producing the protein causes a certain trait to be expressed. This makes the trait dominant - if you have one copy of the allele that can produce the protein, then you will have the trait.

On the other hand, let's say there's a trait that is expressed only if you don't have that specific protein. This means that the trait is recessive, because you need both alleles that can't produce the protein in order to have it.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does Scientology still have such a devout following, when it has been exposed to be such a farce?

[Assistant]
One of the key reasons as to why they have such a devout following is because of blackmail.

During the initiation process, applicants are advised to speak their deepest, darkest secrets in order to "free" themselves of the burden of carrying them. These secrets are logged, and if a person ever wants to leave the church, they are threatened to be exposed.


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

[User]
Does it hurt to have publications outside of your field of study?

I am a recent graduate working as a research assistant under two PIs. One (PI A) works in my field of study, the other (PI B) does not. By the end of my tenure here I should have two or more papers out under PI A, but I also may have one or two from under PI B.

Does it make a difference if some papers I am published on are not in the field I intend to go to grad school in? Or is it a more papers is better regardless of the field situation?

[Assistant]
It absolutely does not hurt.  Will it help in the short term in applying to grad schools?  It probably depends how far apart the fields are.  If they're, say, biology and physics, I'd say it's still a net plus to have the extra article.  If, on the other hand, they're history and chemistry, then the practical benefits are not so clear.  It's not something that'll get you into graduate school, but it might break a tie.

In the long term, this is surely a good thing.  The more different ways you have of looking at the world, the better off you are in any field of study.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do governments assess private companies for estate tax considering they are not bought and sold and thus the shares to not have a price?

Based on an discussion i had with friends, if its a large private company, but one which is not valued by the market how does the government assess it for inheritance tax purposes? cant i just sell/assess the shares for 100 dollars total even if its worth 100 million?

[Assistant] In the US private companies are assessed for the total value of their assets. The land, the building, every single peice of equpiment and furniture has a value assigned to it and they are taxes for it all. The longer that they have had the equipment the less taxes they pay on it, but for companies which have to stay up-to-date with their equipment that can be an issue.


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

[User]
Is there a psychological reason that people will look up when they're searching for the answer to something?

When people are looking for an answer to something, or trying to seek a centering moment, they will often look up.  Is there a psychological reason for this?

[Assistant]
Yes.

It is a technique used to dedicate cognitive resources to the "thinking" by reducing the cognitive load of processing visual information.

Our visual system uses a very large amount of our cognitive resource (brain processing power).

You can reduce the resource demand of other functions by reducing the level of that stimuli.

By looking up or at the ground. Or even off to the side at a non-moving /simple scene, you can essentially reduce your visual processing need.

You can do this with other sensory systems as well.  This  limitation of cognitive resource is why people drive worse when talking.  On the phone or with passengers.

Because a lot of resource goes to listening and responding in language.  Less to processing the constant changes in the environment.

Same as whenever you need the environment to be quite so that you can concentrate better.

It's all about reducing demand of other systems and devoting more resources to a specific task.
We learn to do this at a very early age.


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

[User] CMV: It is irrational to expect mandatory child support and be pro choice.

[Assistant] The issue of abortion from the pro-choice perspective is that of a woman's right to sovereignty over her body.  The issue of child support is that of the welfare of a child.  They are entirely different discussions, and one has very little to do with the other.


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

[User]
ElI5 Why do city governments care when people have garage sales?

Had  garage sale over the weekend and public security showed up and gave us a written warning saying we needed to have a permit to conduct a garage sale and we had 24 hours to get one. My question, why do they give a fuck if i'm selling my old junk on my property?

[Assistant]
I expect that requiring you to have a permit helps them track how often you're having a garage sale

Many cities have limits on how often you may have a garage sale because they do not want you having garage sales on a regular basis.

You're living in a residential area, not a commercial area.  They don't want you having a garage sale on a regular basis because that would be very much like you were running a business.

Your garage sale brings more traffic to your neighborhood.  The extra traffic can be disruptive to the neighborhood.  If you had frequent garage sales then you'd be responsible for bringing a lot of traffic to your neighborhood and causing a lot of disruption.  Your neighbors would not appreciate this.

This is why cities regulate garage sales.


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

[User] [Star Wars] If Ewoks were a primitive species on a remote world with no contact with the Empire, how did C-3PO know their language?

[Assistant]
Assuming no contact with the Empire is a bit of a stretch given that the Empire selected that world for final construction of the second Death Star.
More realistically, the Empire picked that world from the Republic archives, which means Republic scientists, and most likely anthropologists, had been to Endor and studies the local life forms in some depth.
With over six million forms of communication under his belt, it's not hard to imagine that C-3P0 incorporated the data from the Republic archives concerning Ewokese.


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

[User] [JURASSIC PARK] Aside from outside interference, would the park security systems have been enough to keep visitors safe?

[Assistant]
Probably not.

Many of the park's security systems were designed for contemporary animals, not genetically engineered creatures who resembled the public's shared image of dinosaurs. And those meant to contain the most dangerous specimens were experimental at best, which meant there was always a chance for things to go horribly wrong before anyone realized a system had failed. We know the raptor enclosure was woefully inadequate even before the power failed. Something would have happened eventually when the park opened.

In the novel, Hammond spared every expense he could (in contrast to his film counterpart who proudly declared he spared no expense) So his cheapskate nature undoubtedly paid for woefully inadequate systems somewhere in the park.


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

[User]
[dune] Why not use shields as sandworm bait?

I just got transfered to Arrakis, and this engineering disaster is driving me insane. If the shields draw worms and turn them to a killing frenzy, why not strap one on a solar drone that flies out of reach? Is it really preferable to risk dozens of lives and whole harvesters?

Heck, I'll even rig a lasgun to fire into itself if it gets swallowed, blowing the worm apart with violent force. Is there any good reason not to?

[Assistant]
It's the shield vibrations transmitting into the ground which attracts them. Having one on an airborne probe does nothing.

As for a reason for not destroying the worms.... what do you think makes spice?


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

[User] Is it possible that we get cancer and then beat it without even realizing it?

[Assistant]
Yes, it is far more common than you think.

Your cells have dna checking system to make sure the replication goes well and destroys the vast majority of the errors.

Then you have abnormal metabolism leading to cell lysis and your T cells coming in to check on surrounding tissue for known markers.

Then you have benign and malignant cancers that may never be found or be destroyed on their own after forming.

And then you have cancers that need intervention.


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

[User]
[THOR] If the dark elves are from a time before light, why do they have eyes?

If the dark elves are from a time before light, why do they have eyes?

[Assistant]
The light was a metaphor for Asgard culture. Consider that we now call the European Middle Ages the "Dark Ages", a time before the Renaissance and the Age of Discovery. The Asgard consider the authoritarian, ruthless time before they came to power and ultimately dominion to be a dark time.

"Long before the birth of Light, there was Darkness," means that the Dark Elves were the power before the light of Asgard brought about revolutionary change in the realms.


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

[User]
[WH40K] How powerful is the Ork collective gestalt field?

I've seen it described from just nudging red cars to go faster to basically creating a blaster out of piece of wood and some nails with the power if imagination. So how much of an effect does it actually have?

[Assistant]
It varies wildly. In some cases, Ork equipment is usable by others (albeit with a lot jamming and malfunctioning) - it only runs smoothly because of the WAAAGH's effect. In others, an Ork 'gun' can consist of a metal pipe with a belt of bullets fed in and a trigger assembly - no firing mechanism required, and the pipe may not remotely fit the bullets.

Where it gets confusing is that there's no apparent correlation between size of the WAAAGH involved and how powerful its effect is. Certainly warbosses will pull off crazier stuff the more renown and followers they get, but some quite small (by 40k standards) Ork groups still had quite an effect, while the largest weren't noted as pulling any more overtly spectacular displays of psychic manipulation. A larger WAAAGH may manifest itself in other ways - for instance, more 'advanced' Ork technology being 'invented', rather than 'basic' equipment working in increasingly absurd ways.


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

[User]
[DC comics] Would Batman take on Billy Batson on as a Robin? Has he considered it before?

If he didn't know Billy was also Captain Marvel that is, seems like the kids moral compass is on point, even if he does lack a certain 'edge' or apparent detective skills.

[Assistant]
Batson (heh) would make a good Robin for a few reasons. If he's really in danger he can turn into Captain Marvel. And he's basically good-hearted, so less reason to worry about him going bad. Captain Marvel is already one contingency against a rogue Superman, but a Batman-trained Marvel would be a contingency against *anything*, even Batman himself.

In-universe, Batman doesn't trust magic or technology he doesn't understand, but that's not really a problem. He'd simply insist that Batson remain a kid while operating as Robin. Out-universe, [REDACTED]


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

[User]
Is mountain air really the healthiest/least polluted air?

Is there less polution in the mountains (for example the Alps in France) than in some desolate village at sea-level?

[Assistant]
It's not so much the altitude as it is proximity to large cities and prevailing wind patterns.  There aren't a lot of large cities with manufacturing and chemical processing plants near the French Alps, for example, and the higher you go, the smaller the population is - therefore, the air is much cleaner.

In Hawaii, some of "most pure" air in the world is blown in from the Pacific, because although these winds originate in China, they travel over the pacific for approximately 3 weeks before making landfall in Hawaii which allows all the pollution to settle out.


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

[User]
Why can both X-rays and radio waves penetrate things that visible light can't?

Something about the energy being on the scale of eV so high adsorption there? Did we evolve to be able to see the energy range that is absorbed by everyday objects?

[Assistant] Light tends to interact with molecules whose size are either near its wavelength, or densely packed enough that an integer group is near the size of its wavelength. The visible spectrum covers a large range of molecule sizes, so its convenient for us to see in. Longer and shorter wavelengths only interact with high density or very large molecules. E.g. you'd want lead or thick HDPE between you and a gamma ray.


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

[User]
[Power Rangers] How do they control the megazords?

Like for instance, in Power Rangers Turbo, they use steering wheels to control the megazord. There are 5 of them controlling it, how does it work?

[Assistant]
> Woolowoloololowooololowlwollwoolowoolowlowlooolwolooolowoloowlwolowlowololoool

- Putty Patrol PP10485927

TRANSLATION: *They do not. The poor human children are but puppets of the evil wizard Zordon and his war machines. We fight to free them from his control. Wollowoolowooolowo.*


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

[User] Do traits that humans regard as feminine appear in other animals?

[Assistant]
Depends what you think of as feminine.  There are numerous species in which the female cares for the young and takes care of the nest/den/home.  There are also many species in which the female is smaller and less dominant in appearance than the male.

When it comes to looks however the males are generally "prettier" than the females in nature.  Most noticeably in fish and birds, males tend to have the vibrant colors and otherwise unnecessary adornments that human females use to gain attention from the opposite sex.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why did USSR allow for Austrian reunification but not German?

Both Germany and Austria were divided into four occupation zones following World War II, and Vienna was divided like Berlin. So why was there an East Germany and a Berlin Wall for so long but there was never an East Austria and a Vienna Wall?

[Assistant]
Austria was willing to sign an agreement that said it could never enter a military alliance with either side. This satisfied both the USSR and America and to this day Austria is just as neutral as Sweden.

Germany was not given this option.


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

[User] ELI5: Why the Spanish civil war drew so much influence from outside powers? What was its signifigance at the time?

[Assistant]
It was a cause celebre for left-leaning Westerners because there was a democratically elected leftist government overthrown by a military coup.  It was a matter of great public attention, kinda like how Kony or Darfur took off in the recent past.  So, individuals and governments with sympathetic political leanings had a situation that pitted a like-minded elected government against a coalition of the traditional institutional enemies of the left: royalists, the military and the church.

On the opposite side, the elected government was a European traditionalist's worst nightmare.  They were opposed to the church and king, socially progressive and were viewed by many as a threat to the fabric of European identity.

In essence, an internal Spanish struggle became an ideological proxy war in a very liminal period in history.  The old order had just led to WWI and the Great Depression, and people were trying to decide in what direction to chart their future.  Communists and Socialists flocked to the Republican cause, Fascists and Nazis to the Nationalists.

It became a test by which three new powers, Stalin's USSR, Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy, could test both their newly developed military hardware but also their global influence.


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

[User]
CMV: suspension of disbelief plot armor kills movies and TV shows.

Suspension of disbelief plot armor is having impossible situations occur or characters surviving certain death actions.

Examples: characters surviving plane crashes without a scratch. Outrunning dinosaurs. Or other impossible actions. Please note: this occurs even in sci fi genre. Just because theres a monster doesnt mean Physics doesnt work.

Im my view movies and TV that Break physics Break common laws or break any form of reality distracts the audience from the plot and makes it work. It is the result of bad writing and should be shunned.

To CMV: you will have to explain to me the Rationale of plot armor, suspension of disbelief. Also convince me that for instance a character out running a dinosaur that can run 80 miles an hour is acceptable.

TLDR: plot armor ruins movies and TV

Edit: while I am talking about plot armor the main issue I have are characters who are able to break the already established rules in the series. For example while E coyote is able to walk on air Im fine with that. If he randomly got the power to clone himself like agent Smith in the matrix that is breaking the rules of the series and that is the problem I have too many characters in popular movies and TV shows consistently do this.

[Assistant]
Some plot armor is invented within the universe. If the universe says Thor can survive a plane crash because of superpowers, then he can. If it says dinosaurs are slow, then they are. If it says we have artificial gravity, then we do.

The problem comes when the show breaks out of the rules of its own universe even if those rules have nothing to do with physics. In The Walking Dead, Daryl was established as the ultimate hunter, the one to fear out in the woods, silent and deadly, unstoppable. And then a couple random dudes manage to catch him by surprise out in the woods and capture him. No, that broke the rules of the show's universe. He should have heard them coming from far away and taken them out.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is the skin on our palms lighter than the rest of our skin?

[Assistant]
Stratum lucidum

There is a fifth histological layer for palms and soles of the feet. Literally thicker skin and greater distance to the melanocytes. Less light stimulation gets through less pigmentation. Yada yada.


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

[User]
ELI5: When your body keeps "throwing up" when there's no more to get out, why does it fell like getting your chest kicked in by a horse?

Edit: This..
It's just a normal case of throwing up - ate something bad, drank to much, etc. Not a 3 week flu (or worse).

2nd edit: I might have made it sound like I'm vomiting for a week, but that's not the case. But when throwing up for half an hour, there's usually nothing left to throw up. Your body makes the reflex to throw up and when nothing comes up it feels like getting your chest kicked in.

[Assistant]
Well, ELI5 version, your body doesnt know how to fix itself so it keeps trying to get everything out. That chest kicked in by a horse feeling (or fell-ing, no judge Im bad at spell check too) is your lack of anything to push out. So all youre doing is pushing with no substance. Think lifting up a box you thought was going to be heavy, but then is empty. It throws you off and can really hurt, except instead of throwing the box to kingdom come with all your force going out the force goes to you. Which hurts!

Sounds like you may be experiencing this now, if you keep getting sick with nothing coming out (or bile coming out) for over 12 hours please go see a doctor.


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

[User]
[X-Men] What would have happened if Erik Lehnsherr and Professor Xavier had been born with each others powers.

Basically, the question is what would have happened if the Telepath had grown up in concentration camp, while the Master Of Magnets had grown up in the upper class.

[Assistant] Funnily enough Lensherr might not have become the villain we know him as. One of the reasons Xavier has such faith in humanity is because he is constantly hearing the thoughts of those around him, the good and the bad. Erik is naturally distrusting and while he may not change his view on Mutant supremacy, he would probably be more empathetic to the plight of homo sapiens.


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

[User] If stars have more planets than previously thought, would this "add " enough mass to galaxies so we don't need dark matter for explaining their dynamics?

[Assistant]
This can't explain astronomical observations. There is about 4-5 times as much mass as we can see in star form, and planets typically weigh at most a few tens of a percent of their stars, but often much less. If planets weighed more than stars, we wouldn't see the orbits that we do.

There was an idea that the missing mass might be in the form of starless brown dwarf planets or other massive objects (the MACHO hypothesis), but their existence has largely been ruled out by the non-observation of microlensing.


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

[User] ELI5- What is the static that plays when a radio is tuned to a number without a radio station?

[Assistant] The entire radio spectrum is "noisy"--there's interference in it from both man-made sources and natural ones (e.g. lightning strikes). If you tune the radio to a dead channel then all it will be picking up is that noise, which it amplifies and turns into the static that you hear. You still get the noise on actual radio channels, but it gets drowned out by the radio station you're tuned in to so you tend not to notice unless it's very bad.


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

[User] [Digimon,02] Davies puts himself in danger so Vemon has to Digivolve or he might die (he cuts a rope on a bridge well hes on). This is a onetime thing for Davies, but what is a digimon supposed to do if they get saddled with an emotionally abusive partner who does this kind of thing regularly?

[Assistant] I think this is addressed in the first series with SkullGreymon. If the trainer starts doing stupid and reckless things to fake the necessary emotional response, the digimon will digivolve in extremely aberrant ways. This is a natural warning to the trainer, in case the digimon's protests weren't enough. There's a high chance each time it happens that the trainer will be severely injured or killed, either by the trainer doing something dangerous or the digimon going on a mindless rampage.


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

[User] Eli5: Why is grip strength significantly worse when you first wake up? And why do hands feel so stiff in the morning?

[Assistant] When you sleep, your body turns turns off a lot of movement circuits so you don't act out everything you're dreaming. These may take a while to turn back on when you wake up, varying between people and which stage of sleep you woke up from (as others have pointed out, called 'sleep inertia').


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

[User]
Since friction originates from electromagentic force, does that mean that neutrons, Which are neutral to each other, can overlap?

Overlap = exist in the same spot in case it isn't clear.

This question can be taken a step further, since the force that keeps protons together should be stronger than the force that repels them (otherwise there are no atoms). Would that mean that protons in an atom should be compressing into a single point so that the nucleus has the volume of a single proton?

[Assistant]
Two neutrons can have the same spatial wavefunction as long as they have opposite spin projections.

The nucleus is not a single point. Rather, its more like a liquid drop of approximately constant matter and charge densities. The spatial size of a nucleus is on the order of a few femtometers.


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

[User]
[X-men] specifically wolverine. How was it that his claws were perfectly sharp.

After he was infused with adamantium how was it that wolverines claws were perfectly razor shap? I mean he didn't sharpen them or anything they just were already there.

[Assistant] The blades, like the rest of the adamantium he carries, were bonded to his existing bone structure. The exact means that they came out razor sharp instead of jagged is unknown. As they are adamantium, once they were set they could not be sharpened further, so perhaps they had been molded with a very finely crafted mold, but frankly we don't have a solid answer beyond speculation.


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

[User] Is there a way to do floor and ceiling functions using only 4 operators ( + , - , * , / )?

[Assistant]
No.

Each of the binary operators (+, -, \*, /) is a function from R^(2) to R (in the case of division, some subset of R^(2)). Furthermore, each of the operators is *continuous* on its domain. So any *finite* combination of them would also be continuous on its domain. However, the ceiling and floor functions are not continuous on their domain. (If we allowed *infinite* combinations of the basic operators, then there are ways to write the floor and ceiling functions, e.g. by Fourier series.)


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

[User] [Star Wars] What technological progression has there been from the ancient Old Republic to the Post-Empire republic?

[Assistant]
If you mean "technological progression" as in the development of new designs for technological devices, there have of course been a great many. Most of the ships, tools, etc. that are built in the modern era are quite different in many ways from those built in ancient times.

If you mean "technological progression" as in the discovery of new *atoms* of design, there haven't been many. The exploration of the galaxy has been slow and almost every new civilization that's been discovered has had the same basic elements of technology already known. So there's really no way for such radically new game-changers to come along. It's a well-known theory that we've discovered pretty much all of the basic building blocks of technology that are possible, it's a waste of time to tinker with such fundamental things in the hopes of stumbling across something new. Just have the droids build you the parts and plug them together.

The real creativity comes from the artisans who assemble those building blocks in new ways. Take the Death Star, for example. It was an unprecedented machine, but the basic building blocks are all very familiar. A hypermatter reactor, standard hyperdrive system, and a turbolaser with external focusing dish. They were just scaled up to unprecedented size.


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

[User] ELI5: How come the human genetic code can fit roughly in ~1.5GB of data yet we turn out such complex organisms? Furthermore, the code that separates us from other mammals can fit on o floppy disk.

[Assistant]
A few key differences between the genetic sequence and a computer sequence:
1. Computers run in binary. Genes run in quaternary (4 types of nucleic acids). That immediately increases the amount of data you can store exponentially. One step further, gene sequences build amino acids. There are 21 total amino acids that can form thousands of different proteins.
2. People are made of matter. Matter is comprised of 120-something (the number keeps changing) different elements, each with unique interaction with each other and interactions with groups of other elements, which is even more information than a simple quaternary system. Electricity, on the other hand, is not matter.

There are various theories about coding data in different voltages or currents or whatever to allow electricity to provide more than a binary system, but we don't have the technology yet (and it may not even be possible).


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

[User] ELI5: How does Humblebundle work?

[Assistant]
Each customer pays whatever he feels like, lets say 10 <insert currency here>. That amount is distributed among all of the game creators + some charities and and some money go to huble bundle itself.

For the most part it's a win-win-win-win situation.

First win : you. You win by getting a butload of games for fraction of the cost.

Second win : the developers. This is sometimes not such a big win, but some bundles could generate 10's of thousands of (~65% of total sales divided by the number of developers in the current bundle) <currency goes here> for each developer for games which otherwise may not sell so well or to serve as a sort of a kickstarter to an upcoming game.

Third win : the charities. Charities like "Charity Water", get ~15% out of every purchase .

Fourth win : Humble Bundle by default they seem to get ~20% of each purchase you make.

N.B. Please take into consideration that all the estimates above might differ as you are able to change which party gets what amount of <currrency>


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

[User]
I don't think I should try to reduce my carbon footprint. CMV.

I DO think that we, as a species, should reduce our carbon footprint.  But I think this change will happen over the next few years due to economic incentives (solar getting cheaper, gas getting more expensive, etc).

Classic tragedy of the commons, but I don't see why I should reduce my carbon footprint when my personal contribution to atmospheric carbon is negligible.  I could multiply it by 100 or reduce it to nothing and it wouldn't hurt or help anyone.

[Assistant] You individually will probably not have a significant impact, but if you convince a large number of other people to do it, that will make a difference, and taking part yourself would certainly help with that.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] What wouldve been the downsides of Qui Gon surviving to become Anakins master?

Obviously Obi-Wan did his best, and was a great master, but I usually hear that Qui-Gon was the master Anakin really needed. But considering that the two have completely different teaching styles, what wouldve been Qui-Gons Obi-Wan shouldve been Anakins master moments?

[Assistant]
We don't really know his teaching style.

People assume that he would allow Anakin to be less pressured to follow the rigid Jedi rules, but his two know pupils are the opposite of what people aspect.

So he might have made the same mistakes.


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

[User] [Ant-Man] If Ant-Man shrinks himself and gorges on cake crumbs until he can't eat anymore, when he reverts back will his blood sugar levels stay spiked or be normal?

[Assistant]
Presumably, any food inside Ant-Man changes size along with him. Otherwise, he would explode if he were to shrink after eating a full meal

So we can assume that when he reverts to normal size in your scenario, the cake crumbs, digested or otherwise, would grow proportionately. His blood sugar levels should be the same as they were when he was small.


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

[User] 39% of all american dollars were created in the last 12 months. Is that a problem?

[Assistant]
Money printing is bad assuming there's no productive place for the money to go. The money you're referencing was created in response to a very unique situation in which a large portion of the economy was, by law, prevented from continuing production, but this had a cascading effect where they couldn't pay their bills and their workers couldn't maintain their consumption or pay their bills because they were laid off.

However, a lot of the downside effects of this shutdown were mitigated because of the quantitative easing by the fed which encouraged credit to continue to be extended and the fiscal bailouts of companies and people so they can continue their consumption. This means there's not a lot of reason to expect an incredible amount of inflation or devaluation of currency because, for the most part, that money had a place to go in so far as it brought the economy closer to its productive capacity during a downturn.


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

[User] ELI5: How is oxygen regulated in a submarine?

[Assistant] We store it in tanks and bleed it off as we need it. We also have special candles that, when burned, generate oxygen, so that if the tanks are empty or the oxygen generator is down we can still make O2.


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

[User]
Why is the kilogram the 'base unit' of mass instead of the gram?

The SI sytem of units would have been more elegant if the gram instead of the kilogram had been chosen as base unit of mass. Why and when did they choose the kilogram as base unit?

[Assistant]
Are others actually reading his question?

Yes when using metres of things they are more likely to weigh kilograms but why define a gram as 1000 times less than what would be used with other base units?

The original kilogram was 1 dm^3 of water. So why not define *that* as a gram?


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

[User]
If the human body stores 2 hours worth of glycogen and considerably more than 2 hours worth of fat, why do people get tired before 2 hours of jogging?

What is the biological nature of physical exhaustion? Especially after low intensity aerobic exercize - jogging, or even walking for a long period of time?

[Assistant]
Glycogen is mobilized quickly. Fat needs some extra processing to become available as muscle fuel.

Additionally, it's true that most people have ample reserves of "fuel", but their bodies are not prepared to mobilize and burn vast amounts of it quickly. A large part of endurance training involves changes in the body that just increase its ability to process and burn energy reserves.

An easy measure of that is the amount of oxygen burned in a given time (or the amount of CO2 released - same thing). An athlete can burn a lot of O2 per minute; a couch potato, not so much.


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

[User]
[Predator] What happened to Anna after they got back to base?

She was a communist guerrilla extracted from a hostile foreign country by the US military.  She saw her entire camp, including Soviet advisors, murdered by Dutch's covert team and she was an eyewitness to an alien visitor.

Based on her background and everything she knows, she seems like somebody they wouldn't want to just let go.  Was she imprisoned in the US, returned to her country's authorities, or something else?

[Assistant] Saying she witnessed an Alien Hunter fight a convert American Spec Ops would make her look like a lunatic. The Soviet would either think she went crazy after surviving an Enemy Attack or would think she snaped and killed them herself. Her best Bet would be to ask the US for Protection  as a Witness to avoid her Supervisors.


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

[User]
(Star Trek) Why do the species and individuals in the alternate universe have such opposite personalities to those in the prime universe?

I understand that humans are different because of some past event went differently for them but why are all the species in the alternate universe the opposite of their prime universe counterparts. Was there some sort of universe wide event that changed all this?

[Assistant]
I assume you're speaking of the "mirror universe" experienced by the crews of two Enterprises as well as station DS9.

If that's the case, the timeline had its primary divergence at First Contact between the humans and the vulcans (the event you referred to as the past event). Instead of having a meeting of peace, the first interaction between Vulcans and humans was tainted by Zefram Cochrane shooting the Vulcan with a shotgun, inciting the humans to raid the Vulcan ship.

It was the character of that interaction that would forever taint interactions between humans and every other interstellar race. Humans were propelled forward technologically through the raiding of the technology on the Vulcan scout, but other species would be less willing to share technology, driving the "Terrans" to a hostile campaign of enslavement.

The result is that in the 100 years or so between the different first contact and the species you've seen, at least an entire generation of many species you are familiar with was born and died under the yolk of slavery. Their cultures destroyed and their outlooks tainted by being completely dominated by the Terran Empire, many species may look "opposite" to you. But the incident that changed them was the interaction with the humans over an extended period. Peaceful species who survived the first attacks became warlike over a generation, as it was the only way to survive. Species known for their aggression were either destroyed in the first attacks and forced into captivity (and thus the next generation would be one born away from the warlike influence of their previous culture), or learned to fight differently as a way of surviving.

So, in conclusion, it isn't that some event changed every species, turning some "evil" and some "nice", it's that the massive spread of the very violent Terrans forced a number of changes over the years. In 100 years of conquest, a lot can happen, and the cultures that one would associate with species in our "prime" timeline became warped or outright destroyed.


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

[User] ELI5:What is drophacking?

[Assistant]
Ever have a 3rd person try to talk over you when you're talking to someone else?

Now imagine if they didn't stop, but kept getting louder and louder until neither you nor your conversation partner can hear anything except Guy #3's exceedingly loud voice. You eventually quit trying to hold a conversation because his shouting is so loud nothing is getting through.

You and your friend in the example are you and whatever you're trying to connect to. Guy #3 is the drophacker, flooding the connection with a bunch of random shit.


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

[User]
[Hamlet] Is there indication what Denmark will be like following Fortinbras' rule?

With Denmark's royal family now dead, how will things turn out for the royal palace?

[Assistant] He's generally more capable than anyone else. Definitely a better option than the mentally unstable Hamlet would have been, and less conniving than Claudius was. His reign is probably a good thing, which is why Hamlet named him heir. His accession was also a lot less bloody than things would have been had Claudius remained on the throne (because of the war that would have been pursued).


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

[User]
Should I go to a PhD program I'm not excited about, or apply again next year/in later years (computer science)?

I am applying for Fall 2018 entrance into grad schools for theoretical computer science. I have been accepted into one "safety school", and rejected by a number of other schools. There is a fair chance I won't get any other acceptances, and I want to be ready if that happens.

Basically, I'm not very excited about the school I've been accepted to. It's a fairly good school for CS and I've been recommended for a fellowship. However, there are a number of I'm not that interested in going there (location, people I've met from there, aesthetic). I'm somewhat interested in the work I'd be doing, but there are plenty of things I'm more interested in.

I also feel like I should be technically qualified to get into better schools, and maybe I've just been unlucky with which professors are looking for PhD students. Additionally, I didn't have time to apply to as many schools as I would have liked. This makes me think I should try again next year. But will there be a big difference next year in which professors are looking for more PhD students?

I'm just not sure what I'd do in the gap year. A lot of CS hiring has already been done. I could probably find some kind of job, but I'm not that into industry, and I'm worried I'll hate it.

Any thoughts on whether or not I should reapply next year if this happens? Just looking for new things I should consider or personal experiences from people in similar situations. I'd like to determine this soon so I can start applying for jobs ASAP.

[Assistant] Everyone is different, but if it's a good school, you're interested in the work, and you're getting a fellowship for it, "location, people I've met from there, and aesthetic" seem like really terrible reasons to turn it down.  Very few academics get to pick where they live and being best friends with everyone you work with isn't going to happen.  If those things are super important to you, it might be a better idea to go a different route than academia.


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

[User] ELI5: How do embers stay burning for hours, even while buried beneath soot/ash?

[Assistant] The oxygen in the air is burning the fuel in the wood. Imagine the oxygen as a thirsty person, and the wood/charcoal/whatever as a glass of water. If the embers are completely open to the air, the oxygen can just drink it all up quickly. When the fuel is covered up with ashes and soot, it is more like trying to drink through a cocktail straw, as there is a much smaller path for the oxygen to get to the wood. So, the fuel takes longer to burn (and doesn't burn as hot)


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

[User]
I find myself in my spacesuit floating in space next to a space station. Is it possible for me to somehow "swim" to the space station from a standstill situation?

*Zero gravity.
*Zero speed (relavite to the space station).
*100% vacuum.
*No strings attached.
*All I have is my body and it's normal ways to move.

Or am I doomed forever?

[Assistant] You're doomed forever. If you have something to throw, you can change your momentum but it's very, very difficult to do by hand and it would probably lead to nothing or worse. If you're in EVA and you're not attached, you're dead.


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

[User] Would animals with non-round pupils (such as cats and goats) see a different shaped image to us, additional to that which is granted by the different eye position?

[Assistant]
When light passes through an aperture, each point of out-of-focus light (what photographers call bokeh) takes on the shape and size of that aperture. If you took a near-sighted member of each species and put them far away from a point-source light, each of them would see it as a different shape. A cat would see a vertical slit shape, a goat would see a rectangle, and so on.

Why is this useful?

Let's take the cat for example. The vertical bokeh created by their pupils means they see things with a vertical blur to them and the horizontal remains sharp. If their prey tends to flee sideways, this means they can let more light in their eyes while still seeing exactly where their prey is going.

There are similar evolutionary reasons for the shapes other irises take.


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

[User] ELI5 Why do we bury the dead 6' under and not 2', 3', etc.

[Assistant]
Tradition and wild animals. The last thing anyone wants is for a passing dog to dig up Grandma and bring her half decomposed leg home.

Also, putting them six feet under makes it very unlikely that a flood or other natural disaster will dig out and deposit the corpses all over the place, as that is both a sever health risk and a hassle to re identify and bury *each* and *every* corpse back into it's place.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are people more attractive when they smile?

[Assistant] Actually a study found that's only true for women (in regards to male being attracted to them), the study found the inverse for men, it found that men who smiled in a picture were perceived less attractive (on average obviously)


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

[User] How is single sign on (SSO) more secure than having several logins when its basically using the same password for everything?

[Assistant] The theory is that heavily securing the SSO system is far more effective and efficient than trying to heavily secure each other system independently. Would you rather trust a specialized SSO company to secure their stuff or trust all tens or hundreds of sites you may login to, ran by admins of varying capabilities? Not to mention having a single really good and long password you can remember is far superior to having many different weak, or even strong, passwords you'll have to put down somewhere. Of course in a personal environment SSO is in a bit of competition with password managers, which don't require the same level of trust of a third party entity (especially if it's an open source password manager).


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

[User]
how do I explain butler's gender performativity to a biologist?

i've entered a discussion with a biologist about butler's theory, and he keeps saying that butler "denies biology". he *does* seem to understand the difference between sex and gender, but is having a hard time understanding the idea that "sex is already gender from the start". any ideas?

[Assistant] Butler doesnt say there is no such thing as biological sex, just that gender ends up producing significant constructed notions about biological sex and what a biological sex entails. Just reaffirm that the existence of sex is not without its own major presuppositions, projected onto it by the performativty of gender.


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

[User]
CMV: I don't think everybody deserves the right to vote.

Im talking about the U.S. here because I'm not sure how it works everywhere else. I don't think those who are uneducated about politics and the candidates that they're choosing between should be allowed to vote. It doesn't seem to have any benefits if a person votes based on factors like what their friends/family think about the candidates or something they heard on Reddit.

I started to think about this when my friend told me I should register to vote. I should note that I know almost nothing about the current presidential candidates (or any election for that matter) and never had any interest in politics. I know I should be more educated about whos running the country Im living in but as of right now Im not too interested. My friend convinced me to register and I decided I was going to vote for Bernie because I heard he supports weed legalization and I heard some people say he was a good choice. Then I realized, why should I be allowed to vote if I have no idea about anything in this election? It feels like my vote, based off of a couple minutes of research and what I've heard online, would not be beneficial towards the selection of an appropriate leader for our country.

I understand most people who don't know much about politics would choose not to vote anyways, but what about those who are doing something similar to what I was doing, making judgements off of what other people say, which could be biased and lacking important information.

I don't know how a system could be implemented in order to "test" individuals for political competency but I do feel that some people just shouldn't be allowed to vote, myself included.

Thank you for reading, please change my view Reddit.

Edit:
Wow that was fast, read through 5 replies so far and I have changed my view. Thanks for the great replies everyone.

[Assistant] Pragmatically, restricting the right to vote is nearly impossible to enforce fairly. The people in power have a vested interest in keeping their power and, if the government can restrict the right to vote, then they can selectively enforce those laws in order to change election outcomes. Because of this possibility, the only way to make sure all elections remain fair is to allow everyone an equal vote.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are eSports so much more popular in South Korea than other places?

I've been watching a lot of Overwatch League and one pretty apparent thing is that a ton of players come from South Korea. I've heard the explanation to this is that eSports in general is extremely popular in South Korea. Is this true? If so, why aren't they more popular other places?

[Assistant]
Rewind back to the mid-90's.  The country had decided to heavily prioritize its broadband infrastructure. (Google the Korean Information Initiative for more info) Between 1995 and 1998, the government heavily funded the laying of fiber-optic lines throughout the country, making for readily-available, cheap, and fast internet access.

Of course, you need a computer to use this infrastructure... and computers are expensive... So there was great demand for internet-cafes where you could access this high-speed resource without necessarily needing to pay high prices for your own computer.

In a heartbeat, internet-cafe culture was EVERYWHERE. Per-capita, the US doesn't hold a candle to South Korean connectivity. If you had a cafe near you, you could get online, and given that such a high proportion of the country lives in high-density urban areas, this basically permeated the entire country.

Note that at this time, in the US, you'd be lucky to even have a 56.6k dial-up modem, let alone broadband.

1998 rolls around, and Starcraft gets released. Korean school children eat it up. It becomes the most popular activity at internet cafes (which are ubiquitous). An entire generation grows up on Starcraft. And overnight, it becomes the national pastime.

Entire channels pop up to broadcast Starcraft. Sponsorships, teams etc. arise. Korea becomes the birthplace of eSports, and the rest is history.


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

[User]
ELI5 why increased atmospheric CO2 levels don't just mean healthier more lush plant life which in turn offset that CO2.

.

[Assistant]
Photosynthesis = H20 + CO2 + Light (particularly UV/V/B light) made into O2 (oxygen gas) + C6H12O6 (Sugar).... Let's keep that simplification in mind for now.

When we think about plants making O2 to offset the CO2 production, you run into two key limitations: water and rate of photosynthesis. When there is no water (particularly clean, harmless water), it prevents the process of photosynthesis from occurring. That is why a drought can be devastating in that regard. This usually isn't an issue as rain forests contribute much of the plant-based global-O2 generation and these environments are not insanely water deprived (but global warming and deforesting have still affected this cycle in some regards).

The biggest issue is rate of photosynthesis. Just because more CO2 is present, that does not mean the plant will engage in photosynthesis much quicker. Think of it like this: let's say your car tops out at 100mph. Does adding more gas in your tank make your car faster? The answer - no. Your car (plant) is still limited by its internals (plant chlorophylls) regardless of how much gas (CO2) is in the tank (atmosphere).

Also, the Ocean makes about 70% of oxygen. Phytoplankton and the sorts, and they are also in danger due to the dropping quality of ocean water in some regions.

EDIT: Phone auto corrected "in danger" to "endangered."


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

[User]
How much water does it take to offset the dehydrating effects of an alcoholic drink (0.6 fluid oz)?

Alcohol dehydrates you. But how much water would you need to drink to offset the dehydrating effects of a standard alcoholic drink (0.6 fluid oz)?

[Assistant]
There is no simple answer to this, because the dehydrating(diuretic) effects of alcohol are a function of your BAC, not the ABV of the drink. There is a relationship between ABV and BAC but it includes other factors such as body weight, amout of drinks consumed, when the drinks were consumed, personal tolerance to diuretics effects, how full your stomach was when you started drinking, whether you are male or female, age, and other things. Without accounting for these factors it is very hard to simply correlate ABV and dehydration.

P.S. This is why you should treat
your pharmacist with respect. It's not an easy job they do.


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

[User]
Are there any modern Philosophers who defend Polytheism?

Hey, I have recently been reading about early Christian Church history and something that seems to be brought up a lot are these "pagan philosophers" in places like Egypt which critiqued Christianity. I also heard some people mention that polytheism may have stronger responses to things like the problem of evil, due to the existence of evil Gods, as well as the good Gods. This made me wonder, are there any modern philosophers who still defend polytheism? I tried searching "polytheism" on the SEP and IEP but the closest I got was the article on Hindu Philosophy on IEP. If there aren't any, which book or person should I read if I want the most sophisticated articulation of polytheism, or is that not a thing in western philosophy? Thank you.

[Assistant]
In *Neoplatonism of the Italian Renaissance*, Nesca Robb argued that the fashion for (often veiled) polytheism among the scholars of Renaissance Italy, such as Ficino and Poliziano, was not passed onto the next generation of philosophers for complex religious and social reasons; the witch-craze had emerged and the Reformation had become the locus of theological thought.

However, while academic philosophy moved away from polytheism (and eventually any religion), it was championed by artists and poets. That affection for polytheism became very prominent within the Romantic Movement and, through it, passed into later Western culture where it's remained a strong theme.

There are writers around associated with Neo-Paganism who advocate polytheism (Timothy Jay Alexander is the latest to do so with some philosophical understanding) but few work in academia and none are part of the "canon" which is heavily orientated towards Aristotelian modes of thought and exclude nous and other kinds of apprehension. *Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture* by Wouter Hanegraaff might be worth reading in relation to some of these ideas.


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

[User]
ELI5: What exactly is happening when you squirt one drop of Dawn in a pot of greasy water, and all the grease radiates away to the sides of the pot?

Bonus points if you can explain to me why it's so damn satisfying.

[Assistant]
There is a layer of oil floating on the surface of the water. The water holds together and the oil rests on top.

The soap molecule attracts oil on one end and water on the other. When the soap connects with the water it breaks the surface tension and the oil moves to the outside. It's like if you were hanging on a rope bridge and the middle broke and you swung to the side.

Anyway, this happens with all soaps. Dawn is not special. If soap didn't do this it wouldn't clean.


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

[User] Is there a way to use radioactivity to produce energy, other than using the heat it generates?

[Assistant] Yes, there is something called a beta-voltaic cell, which operates similarly to a photo-voltaic cell, except the high-energy electron from the decay excites electrons in the semiconductor, rather than a photon doing that.


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

[User] [Back to the Future] What would happen if I put the DeLorian on a roller bench, ran it up to 88 MPH on the speedometer and then turned the time circuits on?

[Assistant]
Nothing.

It's not the speedometer or the wheels that triggers the time travel, otherwise when Marty was stuck in 1885 they could have rigged up a gear system to spin the wheels to 88MPH.

The time machine itself needs to be traveling at 88MPH relative to its location in spacetime to break free of the time steam and travel through time.


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

[User]
Can a star have more than one fusion core?

Other than supernova, could for example a blue supergiant/hypergiant have hotspots not in the center that cause fusion?

[Assistant]
The Evolution of some very massive stars (> 8M) leads them to a state in which fusion is occuring at numerous locations within the star.  For example:

Initiallly H fuses into He in the core

After 10 Myr,

* core H is exhausted,
* He core contracts, heats.
* H fuses to He in shell around the contracting core

When core temp reaches 170M K,

* core He begins fusing into C and O
* H fusion continues in a shell surrounding the He burning core.

After ~1 Myr,

* core He is exhausted.
* C/O core contracts and heats
* He fusion continues in a shell surrounding the contracting core
* H fusion continues in a shell surrounding He shell.

At core temperature of 600M K,

* core C begins fusing into O, Ne, and Mg.
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C burning core
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell.

After < 1000 years, core C is exhausted,

* the O/Ne/Mg core contracts and heats
* C fusion continues in a shell around the contracting core,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

At core temperature of 1.5B K,

* core Ne begins fusing into O, Mg, ...
* C fusion continues in a shell around the Ne burning core,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

After a few years,

* core Ne is exhausted,
* O / Mg core contracts, heats
* Ne fusion continues in a shell around the contracting core,
* C fusion continues in a shell around the Ne shell,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

At core temperature of 2.1B K,

* core O begins fusing into Si and others
* Ne fusion continues in a shell around O burning core,
* C fusion continues in a shell around the Ne shell,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

After a few months,

* core O is exhausted,
* Si core contracts, heats
* O fusion continues in a shell around the contracting core,
* Ne fusion continues in a shell around the O shell
* C fusion continues in a shell around the Ne shell,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

At core temperature of 3.5B K,

* core Si begins fusing into Ni and Fe
* O fusion continues in a shell around the Si burning core,
* Ne fusion continues in a shell around the O shell,
* C fusion continues in a shell around the Ne shell,
* He fusion continues in a shell around the C shell,
* H fusion continues in a shell around the He shell

This lasts perhaps a day.  Tomorrow the star explodes.


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

[User] [Death Note] Why do Shinigamis need to constantly kill multiple humans in a short timeframe if the years of each victim gets added to their own? Surely one human every 10-30 years would be sufficient or is there some kind of exchange rate between human and Shinigami lifespans?

[Assistant]
Shinigami are *incredibly* lazy. Like, lazy enough to almost die because they let the clock run down.

So when they realize that they haven't killed anyone in ages, they go and "fill up" by whacking a whole bunch of people. Then they go back to being lazy.


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

[User] [Shrek] How did Farquaad become start leading Duloc? If we look at the musical hes not royalty so how did he take land from the fairytale creatures?

[Assistant] Perhaps he was a pettier landholder that seized power after a previous monarch died. Or maybe he DIDN'T seize power. Maybe Duloc is actually quite small and simply enjoys autonomy due to larger powers being occupied with more important military matters at the moment than securing such a pitiable holding. If that's the case, he's in a pretty precarious spot, once it becomes worth it to take Duloc, the actual kings of surrounding kingdoms will probably make quick work of him. Marrying into a royal family is a pretty savvy move here, even if he's doing it for his own petty reasons. Instead of being conquered by a larger power he can join the royalty and be in a far stronger position to defend his lands. That is, unless he marries himself into a Kingdom so far, far away that their armies are incapable of defending his seat of power, but who'd be dumb enough to do that?


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Did Vader ever reminisce about his life as Anakin?

I know he's basically miserable and bitter 24/7, but, did he ever have moments where he's just sitting in his meditation chamber and thinks to himself "Remember that time I cut off Dooku's hands, that shit was awesome". Basically, was Vader ever even the tiniest bit nostalgic?

[Assistant]
Probably not. Like you said, he lives a very miserable life. Hell, his palace is set on the planet he lost his limbs, humanity, wife, and supposedly his unborn child.

If he does look to his past, it's just to make himself more angry or upset, which helps reinforce his connection to the Dark Side. Being on Mustafar is a source of psychological pain as it serves as a constant reminder of the horrific moment he became what he is now. During his meditations in this dark place, he might think about past moments like watching his mother die, Ahsoka abandoning him (that's totally how he would interpret it over the years), or other dark moments during the war. Never to think about how awesome they were, but to self-flagellate over not being powerful enough to change the outcome. That anger and desolation only makes him more powerful in the long run, no matter how much it hurts.


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

[User]
[Alien] Are all facehuggers identical, regardless of Xenomorph variant that laid the egg?

Can all facehuggers turn into any variant of Xenomorph from human to Predalien?

[Assistant] The face hugger is the xenomorph at its absolute base form. They're designed to take on the most needed traits of the host to maximize the resulting morphology of whatever spawns' survivability and lethality.


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

[User] ELI5: If all ingested carbohydrates are just reduced to glucose anyway, what makes "simple" carbs (soda, pastry, Wonder bread) different compared to "complex" carbs (whole wheat, rice)?

[Assistant]
Simple carbs are broken down very quickly, while complex ones are broken down much more slowly. Complex ones offer a more stable source of energy. You'd have to eat a lot more of simple ones to get the same result.

Complex ones also have other compounds in them that are helpful to metabolism in general.


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

[User]
Is crying an inflammatory process?

After I cry, especially for a while, my eyes feel sore and my eyelids get puffy and red, and they can take almost a day to feel back to normal. I also feel tired for the next +/-12 hours.

Is there an inflammatory feedback mechanism from crying?

Also, this brings up another question: does anyone know the scientific or evolutionary origin and purpose of crying? Is it an adaptation?

Thanks

[Assistant] It's a release of certain hormones, whether it's a sad or happy cry, that can cause swelling/inflammation of certain glands and ducts around the sinuses. This is a automatic reaction to keep producing moisture so neither your eyes or sinus drys out to a detrimental point.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does liquid sometimes pour straight down the sides of a cup when held diagonally, instead of straight down where were actually aiming?

[Assistant] Water likes to stick to things (that's why it runs down your arm in the shower). Pour spouts are shaped so that the water can't grab on. If it doesn't have a spout, you have to turn the cup almost upside down to prevent it from holding on to the glass (like it does in the shower).