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

[User]
CMV: White chocolate is not chocolate.

This may sound like gatekeeping or pedantry but whatever.

Chocolate is the word for products made from the cacao bean. This for the most part is split into cocoa solids and cocoa butter. Milk and dark chocolate products are made with cocoa solids (along with milk, sugar and other things) but the primary component of flavour that makes it distinct is the cocoa solids. Cocoa butter is the primary component of white "chocolate." While it does hail from the same plant, the same bean even, it has a distinctly different flavour, almost opposite colour and different consistency. The similarity is just one of origin and says nothing of qualities. Calling derivations of cocoa butter "chocolate" is as helpful as calling weed hemp and an acorn lumber. Only one of the components should have the title "chocolate."

When someone says something tastes chocolatey, they're invariably talking about the rich flavour of the solids. When someone says something is chocolatey in colour, it is invariably a rich brown. That and chocolate containing solids is far more commonly consumed. White chocolate should be the party that shoves over and renames. It could still be something similar, begining with the "choco-" prefix but it's both confusing and somewhat disingenuous to keep calling these two very different things by one name.

Hell, on a solely marketing note, it may be beneficial to rename the white stuff. Calling it chocolate is only gonna first first buys from people who like chocolate, many of whom will note the stark difference to their preferred confectionery and never touch it again. Meanwhile, there are still plenty of people who don't like chocolate and turn their noses up at the white stuff because of the association. Think of that untapped market. Probably not a huge one but still, why turn them away?

Addendum: It could be argued that chocolate liquor (a product with the same ratio of cocoa solids and butter as the bean) should be the true holder of the title with both of its scions shoving over and being renamed. While I am in principle in favour of this, it would be awfully inconvenient as  the food is so popular. White chocolate being so much less popular should be what is renamed.

[Assistant]
Like how almond milk isn't milk?

White chocolate has a similar origin, and a similar function as chocolate. You can make a KitKat bar with white chocolate instead of milk chocolate, and it will still function the same, but with a slightly different taste. You can mold white chocolate into shapes just like you would any other chocolate. You can melt it and drizzle it on a desert, or coat a strawberry with it.
Things that taste good with chocolate usually also taste good with white chocolate instead.

There already is a distinction. Putting the "white" in front. Just like how you would put the "milk" or the "dark" in front to differentiate between *those* two.


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

[User]
CMV: Participation Trophies are necessary in youth sports to promote prosocial sportsmanship and allow for the game to be more than about who wins. Many kids will need the encouragement too.

When I was a kid I had several trophies on my mantle. From my seven years in Baseball there were only seven participation trophies. From my two years in chess I had three for achievement. Chess didn't have participation trophies because it was less of a team sport. I was obviously better at chess than baseball but I was pushed to do the less nerdy game for longer. Plus both chess and baseball are objectively awesome.  I just wish I was better at baseball.

----------

For chess all I needed was my brain for baseball I needed an ultra tight leotard and a protector for my ballsack. Any sport that requires testicular protection is one you should be awarded for just participating in.

-----------

I didn't wanna go up to bat where a third of the pitchers will hit you and it's basically dodgeball. The best I could manage was a slapshot single and fielding wasn't great either. We were in a semi-final match up 7-1 Midway through and I casually fielded a routine ground ball from 3rd and overthrew the first baseman allowing two runs to score. I was benched for the remainder of the game and really wanted to scratch my balls but the sack protector was in the way. I also had to pee. I paid little attention to the game until I started being yelled at because we lost and I couldn't field a damn grounder.

---------

That was in about seventh grade when I also once missed a flyball because I was literally asleep in the outfield. Way back in my first year of youth baseball someone had decided I would wear the torture suit and have balls thrown at me. I don't think I made it past the first out before I intentionally pissed my pants to get out of the catcher's torture suit.

-------

If five year olds are pissing themselves and twelve year olds passing out during a game then they deserve trophies end of story.

-----------

There were ways my nerdiness benfitted me though. I could get on base with a bunt. I could swing at a wild pitch at 0-2 because I knew the catcher would drop it and I could get on base. I also knew to exploit this when stealing bases. I should've been given trophies for imaginative zeal dang it.
If I can't have a trophy for making the game work better for me because I had no RBIs then dammit give me that participation trophy!

Go team!

[Assistant]
I prefer the competitive aspect of sports compared to the prosocial stuff that isn't about winning. To me, trying to win IS the fun part of sports, enjoying playing the sport itself is almost secondary.

If kids are pissing themselves so they don't have to play or are falling asleep mid-game, maybe they would rather not be playing in the first place. Most sports aren't structured to be kid-friendly anyway.


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

[User]
ELI5 How are 3D shapes described in 3D files

I am working on a program to render 3D shapes with perspective using python and I would like to know how standard 3D formats "describe" shapes like how all the points and faces are notated. Thank you!

[Assistant]
.obj files tend to be the easiest to understand since they can be opened in a notepad to mess with. First they state a list of points and their order matters. Then it gives a list of triangles (sometimes larger n-gon) by writing a list of numbers refrencing points to form sides so each side is a list of points. An octahedron looks like:

V 1 0 0

V 0 1 0

V 0 0 1

V -1 0 0

V 0 -1 0

V 0 0 -1

F 1 2 3

F 1 2 6

F 1 5 3

F 1 5 6

F 4 2 3

F 4 2 6

F 4 5 3

F 4 5 6

V stands for vertex and f stands for face. Notice that the verteces count from 1 because  the 0 vertex is reserved for the center or point of revolution. This is a close aproximation to a .obj file and would not be opened by your favorite 3d viewer.


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

[User]
[Powerpuff Girls] Why is Mojo-jojo tried and jailed as a human?

What kind of legal decisions were made that landed a dangerous animal, albeit a hyper-intelligent animal, in a city prison? Let alone in general population.

Are there animal rights activists that want him let free in the wild? Are there groups that want the dangerous animal put down?

[Assistant]
The law does not specify that only members of *H. sapines* are people. Mojo-jojo is treated as a person because he's a person. From a strict taxonomical perspective, he's an ape. But so are you. If one intelligent ape can be a person, why not another?

Also, the Power Puff Girls were created artificially, and again, are not strictly human. Do you want to be the one to tell them they have no rights?


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

[User] ElI5 why do glass cups and other glassware cost so much while the glass in beer bottles isn't worth more than maybe a few cents for recycling?

[Assistant]
You're comparing the cost of producing glassware with the monetary incentive you're offered to recycle.

The price you pay for glassware and glass cups is a combination of their production cost -and profit. Plus these items are produced in smaller quantities than beer bottles are.

When you buy beer, you are paying for the beer and a small fee to cover the cost of the bottles. Beer bottles are cheaper to produce mainly because of the volume of bottles created. If beer bottles were produced in quantities similar to glassware, the cost per bottle would be higher.

A recycling fee paid to you doesn't cover the value of the glass, but is an incentive to get you to recycle and reduce landfill waste. That payment price is set by law, not the beer producer. The beer producer does not receive their old bottles back. The bottle is ground up and sold as raw material to glass- and bottle-makers, who might or might not make bottles for the beer producer.

In the far past, soda and liquor producers would charge you a deposit for the bottle, which was repaid you when you returned the bottle to the manufacturer. This is different than recycling today. The bottles were not destroyed, melted down and remade into new bottles. They were cleaned, sterilized and reused by that company. You could only return bottles to the company that you purchased the product from. You could not return Coke bottle to Pepsi and vice versa.

So, you pay for the production cost when you purchase glass items as part of their selling price. You pay the production cost of the bottles your beer comes in as a part of its selling price.

You receive a payment for those bottles when you return them for recycling, but that payment may or may not correspond to what you paid for the bottle in the first place.


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

[User]
How is there a gender wage gap in government jobs?

Speaking to CA:

Public ed is overwhelmingly female and they make 20% less than cohorts with similar level of education. Comparing a government job to the private sector is tricky.

But prison guards are overwhelmingly male and can make upwards to $100k at the top end. And you just need a high school education.

How does a pay gap exist in an entity that can create its own wage price?

[Assistant]
Gender wage gaps are - nowadays - rarely on a direct like-for-like comparison, ie a woman being paid less than a man for exactly the same job. Rather, it tends to be what roles are offered to women - at top levels most clearly seen in the lack of female CEOs - and also how far women have progressed in similar job categories to their male colleagues. For instance women are more likely than men to take parental leave, are often more likely to deal with child-care, can have often (to men) poorly-understood menstrual or menopausal challenges, and so forth. Each individual item may in itself have an incremental effect, but the cumulative effect can lead to women missing out on promotions, pay-rises and bonuses.

This, alongside residual bias towards appointing men over women (the exact point about CEOs), can suppress womens career advantages compared to men, and therefore depress wages. In any particular case the justification could appear sound but on a generic level it is obvious that there is a disparity through minor cumulative biases.

For example, Cathy could be on maternity leave whilst Bob deals well with a project. Bob deserves to be rewarded for his work. He gets a decent pay rise while Cathy gets an average one, and his efforts draw the attention of senior management. When it comes to being promoted, Bob gets the job. Is it wrong to reward Bob? No. But Cathy was excluded from the opportunity and could well be the better manager: she just is less well known to senior management. Has Cathy been discriminated against? Again, not as such. But pay disparity grows and it could be that the wrong person has been promoted for entirely logical-seeming reasons.

The public sector is no better at addressing this than the private sector. For prison guards its more specific: there are more male prisoners and so more male prison guards. Hence any individual male prison guard has more options for promotion than his female counterpart. But that is an unusual case. For most jobs, it is more down to the generic issues above.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is the rising cost of housing considered good for homeowners?

I recently saw an article which stated that for homeowners their houses are like piggy banks. But if you own your house, an increase in its value doesnt seem to help you in any real way, since to realize that gain youd have to sell it. But then youd have to buy or rent another place to live, which would also cost more. It seems like the only concrete effect of a rising housing market for most homeowners is an increase in their insurance costs. Am I missing something?

[Assistant] You don't have to sell.  You can refinance or take out a Home Equity Line of Credit as well.  You can also take other types of loans using it as collateral.  When people say this though, they're mostly just referring to the idea that they WILL eventually get to cash out all that value one day.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] What would happen if you failed a class at Hogwarts? Would you have an opportunity to retry the class the next year?

Lets say you didnt get an owl in your potions class during in your fifth year finals, would you be able to take the course over the summer? Or maybe the following year?

In the HP universe, is your only shot at becoming an Auror, l determined solely on how you perform on your first exam?

I understand that Aurors want only the best, but there has to be a little wiggle room and ability to retest, right?

[Assistant]
Marcus Flint had to repeat his 7th year after he failed his exams. He's initially described as a sixth-year student in The Philosopher's Stone (Book 1), but he's still in school by The Prisoner of Azkaban (Book 3), while Hogwarts only has 7 years of schooling.

I believe that the N.E.W.T. exams can be retaken if the person desires, although that's never explicitly stated, it'd make sense.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why do muscles look like they're permanently in a flexed position after working them out?

I've noticed this especially with my biceps, where after giving the a good work out, they look like they're perpetually flexed, and when I actually try to flex then, here isn't much difference.

[Assistant] When muscles are being used or anticipate being used, they fill up and engorge with blood. Same principle as a penis filling up with blood for an erection, after you work out your muscles fill up with blood to stay full.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Why did the Seperatists bother blocking off Iego from the rest of the Galaxy?

In the Clone Wars episode "Mystery of a Thousand Moons" it is revealed that the CIS drove the angels from their moon put a complex death star like security system on it to keep the people of Iego from leaving. It doesnt seem like Iego was a very important planet, being described as a backwater and really only notable for spice smuggling. And when they left the CIS left hundreds of droids behind. The whole thing seems like a massive waste of time and resources so why bother keeping like 15 people trapped?

[Assistant] They probably had some idea where the blue shadow virus cure was, and in anticipation of restarting the project they took steps to lock down the planet so that they would be the only ones with access.


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

[User]
cmv: Calling a non-binary person they or them is absurd.

I have no problem with being whatever. But to me it starts getting annoying when they want to be called they or them, thats what i call the queen or any royalty for that matter. I wouldnt have a problem calling them it, but they obviously wouldnt tolerate it because it sounds demeaning. Yes you might not feel one or the other but that can be your own problems, i shouldnt have to change how i adress people in order to fit your world.

It occured to me when i was at a get together and a non-binary person was there(I didnt know what it was then), so i said oh good for her, and my friend said no, call her them/they. I was taken aback but still tried and every time it felt so wrong, like she was put on some pedasto, so i just started saying her instead. She pulled me aside a said i should call her they/them, so i said call me your majesty, and she said no, because youre just a guy. So i said same goes for you, she gave me mean looks the rest of the night.

I would be cool if you could change my mind.

EDIT: I think I have come to the conclusion that I would never do it in Denmark, but it probably isn't as formal as i thought in US or UK for that matter, so i will start calling non-binary people them/they if they speak english.

EDIT 2: I am probably not clear enough, so will say it again. I will call english speaking people them/they, but i would never call a danish person they/them in danish.

Last notes, i don't think my mind will be changed more than it has, thank you for keeping the discussion pretty civil and friendly.

[Assistant]
I asked to see the manager, but they werent available.

He asked his friend for a donation, but they werent interested.

Have you seen the local farmer? They said they were coming around soon.

We already use they/them as pronouns for singular people when the gender is unknown. Its hardly a stretch to extend that to non-binary people.


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

[User] [Superman]How come Supermans biological parents never go with him to Earth if Krypton is advanced enough to build spaceships?

[Assistant] Krypton doesn't have starships. Jor-El made Kal's pod in secret when it became apparent he wouldn't win over the Science Council; his original plan was to make one big enough for Lara to join Kal, but when she pressed him he admitted it would reduce the likelihood of Kal's survival. So she refused.


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

[User]
[Economics] If a country adopts Basic Income what, if anything, prevents inflation or the markets adjusting the prices so that the spending power of the BI reduces to pre-BI level?

If everyone starting tomorrow in a given country would start getting $2k every month without providing any additional service or products wouldn't that lead to massive inflation?

And if there is no inflation, what's to prevent the spending power of those $2k dollars to remain stable? What's to prevent a landlord from raising rent now that people have more money? Or shops selling things at a higher price now that their clients all have more cash? Wouldn't it simply mean that after a couple of years the $2k is basically worthless in terms of spending power bcs all prices re-adjusted to everyone having more money?

[Assistant]
Most versions of basic income are paid for by taxes (and even printing money would work this way as long as basic income follows inflation because each dollar devalues as hard as every other and rich people generally have most of those). This means very rich people would pay increased taxes. They would lose purchasing power. Via basic income this purchasing power would be spread evenly to everybody who qualifies. Thus poor people would get extra purchasing power. middle class people would either get extra or would stay the same, that depends on the height of basic income and the taxation system.

What changes long term is that now the income of poor people is basic income + income from their labor. This means that even a working person isn't as dependant on their labor for there complete income. This means that a 30-40 year old can chose to get more education and during this time they might lose only 25-50% of their income long term increasing the social mobility of people in poverty. It will likely also increase entrepreneurship as basic income gives some income where the new entrepreneur is certain of while he/she gets a profitable business going. This is harder when working for a boss who pays 100% of their income.

Prices will rise but purchasing power is still likely to go up. It depends on how much it intervenes in markets that try to create artificial scarcity. Food, housing and other life necessary goods rise in price when demand is greater than supply and their prices drop when supply is greater than demand. If governments make policies that keep the supply slightly larger than demand their prices will stay low and purchasing power of the lower class will increase with increased social mobility to join the middle class later in life.


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

[User]
ELI5: What exactly are stains? Why do they stay on something seemingly forever? Are they remnants of the liquid that was spilled still on the clothing?

So I was at work today and noticed a coffee stain on the carpet. The boss said it was from 10 years ago. It had me thinking. Are there still particles and remnants of that coffee from 10 years ago? If so, why? What makes it stain?

[Assistant]
All liquids (except pure things like distilled water) have chemicals dissolved in them.  If the liquid evaporates, the non-volatile substances in it will remain. Yes, the coffee stain still has particles from the coffee in it.

Generally speaking, a stain is something that prefers to stick to the object (clothes, carpet, whatever) rather than be dissolved in water.  Coffee in particular has chemicals that are only barely soluble in hot water and almost insoluble in cold water, so spilling it on the carpet (which cooled it in the process) gave it a choice between sticking to the non-polar carpet fabrics or staying in the water as it was dabbed up.  If you brew some strong coffee and let it sit in a cup until it cools, you will see brown deposits on the side of the cup.  Same thing.

Some stains are from dyes in the product (i work with seeds that have a red dye in them, takes powerful cleaners to get it out of clothes or countertops), these are typically very hard to remove and take powerful cleaners which chemically alter the dye to a substance that dissolves easier, or a solvent that the dye prefers to be in more than whatever its stuck to.  This is the same as any other stain, it is just much more difficult to remove.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do airlines seem to overbook flights so often, especially when they end up having to pay extra in rewards to passengers who give up their seats?

It just seems like it happens so often, and airlines will sometimes offer you three times the price of the ticket just to stay a few extra hours. Seems like itd be easy to just...stop selling tickets once the plane is full??

[Assistant] There are always some people who don't show up so airlines use algorithms to predict how much to overbook so the plane will be exactly full. Of course algorithms like that cannot be perfect so overbooks at the gate still happen here and there. Apparently the bottom line works out better  for the airlines even if they have to pay a few people not to fly.


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

[User]
Is Voyager's velocity great enough to eventually leave the solar system?

I'm not sure I'm asking this properly. I'm asking, essentially, if Voyager will legitimately leave the solar system entirely, eventually passing through the outer limits of the Oort Cloud and moving on. Or is it more likely that eventually the drag of the Sun's gravity will cause it to slow down and be captured in a very long orbit like a long-period comet?

I ask because there's a common conception that Voyager's just going to go on in the direction it's moving forever. Maybe my question has to do with the escape velocity for the Solar System?

[Assistant] Voyager 1 and 2 both have velocities greater than that of our solar system's escape velocity.  They are currently leaving (or at least exploring the definition of the edge of) the solar system and - if not interfered with by the unlikely collision of another body with extremely unlikely perfect momentum to cause them to come back  - will never return.


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

[User] Eli5 How does the start/stop feature in newer cars save fuel and not just wear out the starter?

[Assistant]
The simple answer is that the starter motors are specifically designed for that purpose. Engineers design them with different bearings, brushes and gear ratios so that they are better suited to the task.

Starting a warm engine is also less strain on a starter than a cold engine.


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

[User]
I think Apple isn't that good/special. CMV.

I don't get what's so special about iPhones, when it makes more sense to get a Samsung Galaxy (you know, if they want a smart phone). And I don't think Macs are nothing compared to PCs.

[Assistant]
Apple is typically the simplest possible user experience out there - it abstracts away the software and hardware to "do you have OS version Y or more recent", and "do you have hardware X or more recent" (instead of keeping track of graphics cards and whatnot), and has a UI and system designed for that exact resolution and system.

For technophobes, it is the best system, IMO.

As for the Samsung Galaxy, try developing for Android, and you may find it's rather annoying to deal with all the different hardware bits and pieces and whatnot (it's Android). It can be a pain to set up.

That said, Linux master race. Freedom!

^^^No, ^^^I ^^^don't ^^^care ^^^that ^^^technically ^^^it's ^^^GNU/Linux, ^^^STFU ^^^already.


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

[User]
ELI5: How does code work? (C++, C#, Java)

I somewhat understand code, only to the point that I know you can design apps with it though. I know that there are different "languages" for different things you're doing, but I don't understand what and why there are different ones.

Main questions:
What is code exactly?
Why is there code?
What are the different "languages" used for?
What could one make knowing code?

[Assistant]
> What is code exactly?

Code is the instructions that tell a computer what to do

> Why is there code?

Without code, we wouldn't be able to get a computer to do anything. Or perhaps we would, but it would have to be built for a single task. It's the code that enables us to take advantage of the flexibility of a computer, to get it to do whatever we want.

> What are the different "languages" used for?

Some are fast and powerful, but difficult to use. Others aren't quite as powerful, but are much easier, making them better for beginners, but also better for writing simple software that doesn't need to do anything complicated (because it's quicker and easier to write in these simpler languages).

Some are specifically designed for a particular purpose - for using in web pages, for doing mathematical tasks, for handling lots of data. Others are more general-purpose.

And very often there's more than one language for doing exactly the same thing.

> What could one make knowing code?

Every single thing your computer does, is made using code. Every single thing it ever could do, could be done by writing code to do it.


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

[User] ELI5: Difference between Expressionism and Impressionism?

[Assistant]
It's more about thought behind the work than imagery. Impressionism sought so show light. Instead of painting imagery like a boat they wanted to paint how light interacted with the boat. It's based on lighting in the moment.

Expressionism is attempting to show moods or emotional experiences. It's often said that an expressionist wants to make you feel.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do computers have to download and install software? What's the difference between the two and why can't it install as it's downloading?

[Assistant] One gathers the files, one applies it. Depending on what it is, if you started installing before you had all the pieces of the file, and something happened to the download, bad things could potentially happen.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is charging an electric car cheaper than filling a gasoline engine when electricity is mostly generated by burning fossil fuels?

[Assistant]
First, electricity is generated in many different ways. In some areas, large amounts of electricity come from non-greenhouse-gas sources, such as nuclear, hydroelectric, solar and wind, and more.

Second, the way in which we harness the energy of burning fuel in an engine is very different to how we harness burning fuel in a power plant. Any power source will have an efficieny percentage of how much theoretical energy something produces, versus how much useful energy is created.

Specifically, when you burn fuel in a car, you are using the explosive (kinetic) force of the fuel to push pistons out. However, a large amount of the energy in the reaction is lost as heat energy that doesn't have any practical use. Compared to an electric plant, we can capture extra heat and use that heat in sufficient quantities to spin a turbine to produce more electricity, increasing the overal efficiency.


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

[User] Why did the smallpox vaccine cause a scar and why dont other vaccines leaves scars?

[Assistant]
Most other vaccines are given by injecting a needle deep into your skin and into the muscle with one shot.

The smallpox vaccine was given by injecting you just below the first layer of skin into the dermis. They would use a two prong needle and make multiple shallow injections. This causes a bump as the vaccinia virus multiplies. This bump would scab over and that is what causes the scar.


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

[User] [Star Trek: Generations] Why couldn't Soran just fly a ship into or in front of the ribbon to get into the Nexus?

[Assistant]
If you fly a  ship into the nexus it will be destroyed.

>   DATA: Our records show that every ship which has approached the ribbon has either been destroyed or severely damaged.

So you can't because you will die...  Except that you will have been pulled into the Nexus by then. See for example Captain Kirk and the El-Aurians that were in the nexus but pulled out.  So the whole incident is based on a faulty assumption by the antagonist and also the protagonists.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Was the Kamino star system removed from all offical star maps or just from the Jedi archive?

[Assistant]
Just the Jedi Archives. To remove it from all official maps would require far more time and effort than would feasibly be possible for a single man, especially with constantly-updating navigational markers.

Whereas Dooku could have easliy erased the system from the Jedi Archives before he finally left the Order.


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

[User]
How is Planck time, length, temperature, etc. determined?

Because as far as I know the measurements are way way beyond what people can do or measure. How do people know the specific measurement when it is way too small to be measured?

[Assistant]
They're trivially defined as quantities you can build with powers of G c hbar k_B. They're not predictions for the outcome of any experiment. They just give the general order of magnitude where we expect quantum gravity (unless large extra dimensions).

You simply compute them by multiplying the necessary powers of hbar G c and k_B to obtain something with the units you need - and there's always only one way to do that.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is "0! = 1"?

If n factorial is n(n-1)(n-2)...(3)(2)(1),

Why is 0 factorial=1? If 0=n, should the answer be 0 due anything multiplied by 0=0?

EDIT: Wow thanks for all the good responses! Never actually expected this to make it to my top post, but Reddit never fails to amaze me!

[Assistant]
A factorial represents the number of ways you can organize *n* objects.

There is only one way to organize 1 object. (1! = 1)

There are two ways to organize 2 objects (e.g., AB or BA; 2! = 2)

There are 6 ways to organize 3 objects (e.g., ABC, ACB, BAC, BCA, CAB, CBA; 3! = 6).

Etc.

How many ways are there to organize 0 objects? 1. Ergo 0! = 1.

This is consistent with the application of the gamma function, which extends the factorial concept to ~~non-positive integers.~~ all reals EDIT: except negative integers!


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

[User] ELI5: Why does the human smile convey happiness? Shouldn't stretching the muscles in your face upwards to display your teeth be threatening like it is with animals?

[Assistant] No, because we don't bite things to hurt them. Animals like dogs have their teeth as their main weapons, so they show them when they're angry to remind other animals that they can fight back. The human equivalent would be flexing your biceps or showing a weapon, because we use blunt force and tools instead of biting.


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

[User]
[Game Of Thrones] Did the nobles of Meereen understand the context of why they were being crucified?

Were they like, "Oh, just like the kids we crucified! We're even pointing in the direction that they were! How poetic! This may be painful, but I admire her vision!"

or were they like, "WTF? What have we ever done to deserve this? This is a complete and utter shock to me! What a baffling decision!"

[Assistant] From their perspective, they were just property owners exercising their rights. They would understand the retaliatory crucifixion in a cause -> effect sense, but would not perceive it as 'justice'; this isn't a punishment for a crime, but a tyrant enforcing their alien will over their land.


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

[User] [Magic: The Gathering] Is it possible to travel to other planes without being a planeswaker?

[Assistant]
Yes. Current planeswalkers have lost this power, but old walkers were able to take people along for the ride. Urza travelled extensively with Xantcha, for instance.

The Weatherlight has already been mentioned. It fought Yawgmoth's Phyrexians who possessed Planar Portal technology and used it to invade numerous planes. Jin Gitaxias , Praetor of New Phyrexia, has focused his research on recreating this technology.

Nicol Bolas's current invasion of Ravnica also hinges on one portal like that. Tezzeret, his agent, stole it from a young inventor in Kaladesh and it's being used to transport an army from Amonket.


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

[User] ELI5: What happens in your brain when you don't understand something at first and then suddenly get it?

[Assistant]
This is related to hiw we learn in general, and is a fascinating subject!

The short answer is that we're making neurological links between different pieces of information in our brain.

The LONG answer is basically the subject of an entire free online course through Coursera, called Learning How To Learn. Neat stuff, you should check it out.


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

[User] [Star Wars] If The Praetorian Guard had successfully defeated Kylo and Rey following Snoke's death... what was their plan then?

[Assistant]
They report to General Hux, who formally takes over leadership of the First Order as Supreme Leader. The Guards themselves failed to protect Snoke, and so would be dismissed by Hux or, if not dismissed, resign their positions in disgrace. Hux might want them to train the next set of Guards, before disappearing from the First Order (perhaps even being executed by Phasma after a brief mock trial).

Some of them might become bounty hunters, or soldiers of fortune, or some other type of mercenary ostensibly in league with the First Order but only indirectly.


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

[User] Why is solving the 2038 problem more complicated than simply storing time as 64 bits instead of 32?

[Assistant] Simply because many embedded systems, which already store time in integer types that are 32 bits or smaller, can't really be modified to change how time is stored. Likewise a lot of software that may still be in use at that time would no longer be in current development it would be similarly impossible to modify it to use 64-bit integers for time.


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

[User] [The Ring] What if the ring video goes viral.

[Assistant] XK-class scenario. All Foundation operatives are to initiate deployment of national nuclear arsenals, followed by mass deployment of amnestics and Thaumiel-class SCPs to reset humanity to pre-outbreak state.


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

[User] ELI5:How come animals that are smaller and lighter than humans,like wolves,be stronger than us ?

[Assistant]
Because you are afraid to be hurt.

If you are not afraid to be hurt, in a life and death situation you can kill the wolf. You just have to face it that you will be hurt severely.

Next thing is experience. The wolf has killed many things before you have met it. You probably haven't. If you have spent your whole life hunting and killing animals, you will kill that wolf in a second.

You will jam your hand straight into its mouth to the elbow. So it can't bite. And then you break its tiny legs with your massive legs with stomping.

Or just suffocate it.

Or strangle it.

And this is without using your most powerful weapons, your mind, and your opposable thumbs. Grab a stick and jam it into its mouth. Grab a larger stick and wreck its spine. Grab its legs and swing it by them into something. Or if you are powerful enough just grab it by its neck lift it and stomp their legs. And then comes the brain... Traps, guns, anything will kill the wolf without even doing any damage to you.


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

[User]
How to get better at statistics?

Im a psychology student and I plan to shift to BS Statistics next year. Any tips/advices will be appreciated. Thank you!

[Assistant]
Psychology PhD turned data scientist here.

Psych only teaches a very narrow part of statistics. A key thing you probably won't have been taught that you should get your head around soon is distributions. understanding different distributions and what they mean.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40k]What are the long-term implications of the Emperor's death?

It has been rumored that the Golden Throne is failing and more and more psychers are required to keep him alive.  I understand that traveling the Warp will be impossible without the Astronomicon, but it seems to me that this would be the Blackest Night and the End of Days.  But assuming we survive the horrors of the Warp, what are the long-term implications?  The Empire would be sundered with no way to travel between worlds... but I wonder if the Emperor might be reborn...

[Assistant]
There are currently 3 things that could possibly happen if the Emperor dies.

1) The Astronomicon falls apart, warp travel becomes extremely difficult, and because the Imperium is far too large, it will fall apart almost immediately. Regional warlords will assume power, Xenos factions like the Tau, the Orks, and the Necrons will be quick in exploiting Humanity's weakness, and many world will fall. The Hive worlds like Cadia, and Armageddon would hold out initially, but with the combined threat of Xenos invasions and starvation, they will eventually fall. Essentially, the Age of Strife happens all over again.

2) Star Child theory is correct, and the Emperor will be reincarnated. No one will believe that he's the Emperor at first, and many will try to oppose him, but after while he will unite the factions and remnants of humanity (just like after the Age of Strife), and lead the Imperium on another Great Crusade.

3) The Emperor gets reincarnated in the immaterium. He becomes shining golden god in the warp and completely destroys the Chaos Gods once and for all. Making warp travel safe and free of daemons while at the same time guiding humanity through the stars as a even more literal god.


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

[User]
Why doesn't Bruce Wayne go into politics?

He's one of the most famous and popular men in Gotham with enough charm to get elected mayor. Why doesn't he? He can't be bribed because he's already loaded. He would do a lot more good that way.

[Assistant]
Because he foolishly thinks that he does more good for the common man as Batman than he would by working in a legitimate fashion.

He could hook the cops up with Bat-gear, give Arkham a total makeover, improve the infrastructure of Gotham, and have more to spare. He doesn't because he believes that he's one of the few people in the city that make a difference. He doesn't see that Batman causes as many problems as he solves.

Remember, he went back in time, traveled through centuries, came back to life, and felt that the best thing he could do was create a Bat-franchise. Train and gear up a very few vigilantes to fight crime in a few cities, not help police, fire fighters, or the military. Metropolis has the Science Police. In Marvel, New York had Code BLUE. They had funding, gear, and training to take down supervillains.

Gotham has no such force because they can't afford it. And the guy who could would rather strap on a cape and scare a few crooks than pump his money into rehabilitation programs and supplying *official* law enforcement personnel with the gear to make Batman unnecessary.

Really, he feels that *he* personally has to make the difference.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are we still flushing toilets with clean, drinking water?

Why are we treating and cleaning water which will essentially be used to flush down the toilet? If costs to implement weren't a factor, why can't we use grey or even salt water?

[Assistant]
We certainly _can_ use grey or salt water and many places do.

The reason that many places don't is cost of implementation.  You have to install and maintain two sets of pipes - potable and non-potable water - to every bathroom.  In areas where fresh water isn't scarce, there is little reason to do this.


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

[User] [DC] Can Superman's heat vision cut through anything? If not, what can't it cut through?

[Assistant]
Depends on how much power he puts into it.

Some materials are totally immune to heat, either as a result of advanced science or magical properties. Some materials - including other Kryptonians - aren't *totally* immune, but are so incredibly durable that he's not able to cut through in a reasonable timeframe, even at full power. Some objects are simply so massive that his heat vision has little effect (for example, he probably can't cut a planet into two pieces with heat vision alone.)


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

[User]
Do the same tactics to reduce exposure to COVID (mask indoors, frequent handwashing) work for the flu and common cold in the same capacity?

See also: suggestions for only gathering outdoors, 6-feet apart, etc. I \*assume\* they do, but perhaps the common cold/flu has their own weird methods of infection.

[Assistant] Yes. They are all viral disease with droplet transmission. Mask wearing during flu has been common overseas, particularly in Asian countries for a long time. Washing your hands and staying away from people is always a good idea. Thats why cold and flu numbers were drastically lower the last flu season.


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

[User] ELI5: How come in the 1700s a single musket ball to the torso could kill a man, but now it may take 2 or 3 shots from a modern firearm to do the same?

[Assistant]
This isn't quite true: a modern high-calibre sniper rifle or a .45 magnum will kill you quick with a body shot. But if you're talking smoothbore larger muskets compared to smaller sidearms, the answer is calibre and shock.

A single musket or minie ball is very large and very heavy compared to a standard sidearm bullet, and although it typically moves slower it has a lot more force behind it. When it hits, it slams into a person's body rather than punching through rapidly like a faster revolver bullet, transferring all of its shock into the surrounding tissues and crushing them like a hit with a sledgehammer. That's enough to almost instantly kill someone when it hits them in the abdomen, at minimum knocking them out of commission until their bodies dies from the trauma.

There's other factors such as infection and modern medical treatment, but they're more about surviving for days after the person is shot, not about whether the shot immediately stops them in their tracks.


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

[User]
ELI5:What exactly is an itch? What triggers us to feel like we need to scratch that spot?

and I don't just mean insect bites, but also when we get those random itches??

[Assistant] An itch is caused by a molecule (Neuropeptide Natriuretic Polypeptide B) that is released by a nerve cell which triggers a system in our bodies telling the brain that you have an irritation on some area of your skin. Sometimes the nerves are stimulated by an actual itch and sometimes they are stimulated by reactions to chemicals in our bodies (like Histamine). It's really hard to say exactly what causes itches but scientists are working on pinpointing the exact reasons.


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

[User] [Harry Potter] If you keeping soul-splitting by making Horcruxes (say 10, 20, etc.), do you stay physically and magically strong but inhuman and robotic (Dr. Manhattan), or reach a point where you start getting magically diminished and weak? (Gollum)

[Assistant]
It is suggested in both the books and the movies that Voldemort's sanity and compassion were damaged by the constant soul-slicing.  In other words, mutilating his soul did not make him less emotional but instead more self-absorbed and reckless in his emotions.

This fits with Medieval Anglo-European beliefs that passion (hunger, lust, rage) arise from the corporeal body but that empathy, compassion, affection, the ability to comprehend the emotions of others, and the like all arise from the soul.   This was one of the arguments made about what we would now refer to as vampires and ghouls or zombies:  the reason they would kill indiscrimately, even their kin, is that despite their remaining sense of reason and emotions, their soul-less state meant they were no longer capable of feeling any sort of pity or loyalty or connection to any other living creature.  (It also meant that killing off a risen dead body caused no harm to the individual since his or her soul had already gone to its just rewards.)


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

[User]
[MCU] Are Asgardians a joke when it comes to military power?

In the first *Avengers* both Thor and Loki consider the Chitauri a very powerful force. But then Rocket claims the Chitauri were the suckiest army in the galaxy in a deleted scene, and Nebulla doest say anything against it. And in *Dark World* Asgard (save for the big guns like Heimdall, Odin, Thor, Loki, supposedly the Warriors Three, etc...) pretty much defenseless against the Dark Elves (who are using the same technology they did thousands of years ago) and Asgard has not been show to be much more powerful than perhaps Earth. So was Asgard in some sort of decline even before *Ragnarok*?

[Assistant]
The Chitauri are impressive because of their sheer numbers... Numbers are important in war. One million standard soldiers are more useful than 1000 captain america.
The dark Elves planned a sneak attack against Asgard and had ridiculous stealth technology that can bypass Heimdall eyesight and had black hole grenades with a supersoldier that can beat up Thor.

The Dark Elves lost against Asgard in an all out battle.


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

[User]
Can someone explain the Diablo Story leading up to D3 (LI5)?

I was one of those people who played D1 and D2 for years but never really knew anything about the story whatsoever. I've been trying recently to read a lot about it but I just dont understand how in Diablo II we killed Diablo and his soul stone, yet hes coming back? And I dont understand the Worldstone at all :(

The goal of this is to be able to go into D3 without being clueless and knowing who is dead and who isn't :)

[Assistant]
Originally, the 3 Lords of Hell (Mephistopheles, Diablo, and Baal) were trapped in what are called soulstones. Diablo's was buried and a monastary built over it in a town called Tristram. A king decided to turn the monastary into a cathedral. A man named Lazarus was tricked/lured into breaking Diablo's soulstone. Diablo possessed the king's son to do bad stuff.

Now you come in as the hero. The hero is awesome and kills stuff and kills Diablo's mortal form, leaving him in a soulstone again. The hero drives the stone into his own skull to hopefully contain him. But this is what Diablo wanted, as the hero is stronger. Diablo also corrupted the other two heroes (you were the warrior for the story). The rogue became Blood Raven and the Sorcerer became the Summoner.

In Diablo 2, you follow the wake of the unnamed hero who has started to become corrupted by the soulstone. You find out the truth about the soulstones. You fight lesser evils of Andariel and Duriel. You fight Mephisto, who was released by Diablo. You find out that a fallen angel, Izual, taught the evils how to corrupt the stones. You fight Diablo.


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

[User]
CMV: I should support Nuclear energy over Solar power at every opportunity.

Nuclear energy is cheap, abundant, clean, and safe. It can be used industrially for manufacturing while solar cannot. And when people say we should be focusing on all, I see that as just people not investing all we can in Nuclear energy.

There is a roadmap to achieve vast majority of your nation's energy needs. France has been getting 70% or their electricity from generations old Nuclear power plants.

Solar are very variable. I've read the estimates that they can only produce energy in adequate conditions 10%-30% of the time.

There is a serious question of storing the energy. The energy grid is threatened by too much peak energy. And while I think it's generally a good think to do to install on your personal residence. I have much more reservations for Solar farms.

The land they need are massive. You would need more than 3 million solar panels to produce the same amount of power as a typical commercial reactor.

The land needs be cleared, indigenous animals cleared off. To make way for this diluted source of energy? If only Nuclear could have these massive tradeoffs and have the approval rating of 85%.

It can be good fit on some very particular locations. In my country of Australia, the outback is massive, largely inhabitable, and very arid.

Singapore has already signed a deal to see they get 20% of their energy from a massive solar farm in development.

I support this for my country. In these conditions, though the local indigenous people on the land they use might not.

I think it's criminal any Solar farms would be considered for arable, scenic land. Experts say there is no plan to deal with solar panels when they reach their life expectancy. And they will be likely shipped off to be broken down, and have their toxins exposed to some poor African nation.

I will not go on about the potential of Nuclear Fusion, or just using Thorium. Because I believe entirely in current generation Nuclear power plants. In their efficiency, safety and cost-effectiveness.

Germany has shifted from Nuclear to renewables. Their energy prices have risen by 50% since then. Their power costs twice as much as it does for the French.

The entirety of people who have died in accidents related to Nuclear energy is 200. Chernobyl resulted from extremely negligent Soviet Union safety standards that would have never happened in the western world. 31 people died.

Green mile island caused no injuries or deaths. And the radioactivity exposed was no less than what you would get by having a chest x-ray.

Fukushima was the result of a tsunami and earthquake of a generations old reactor. The Japanese nation shut down usage of all nuclear plants and retrofitted them to prevent even old nuclear plants suffering the same fate.

I wish the problems with solar panels improve dramatically. Because obviously we aren't moving towards the pragmatic Nuclear option.

I don't see the arguments against it. That some select plants are over-budget? The expertise and supply chain were left abandoned and went to other industries for a very long time.

The entirety of the waste of Switzerland fits in a single medium sized room. It's easily disposed of in metal barrels covered in concrete.

[Assistant] Clean and cheap, no. Nuclear power stations are crazy expensive and have a relatively short lifespan; and the fuel will take eons to decay into something probably safe. The environmental damage from a broken nuclear power station could conceivably contaminate a huge area for an extremely long time whereas a broken solar panel is little more than a pain in the arse to replace.


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

[User]
ELI5: What are these blackouts going to do to prevent SOPA/PIPA/OPEN/etc?

I get they're a means of protest, but what would it do to change Congress' mind on the matter? I bet you not 5 members of Congress are regulars here on Reddit. I can see Google perhaps having some affect, but not much. What needs to be blacked out are sites that Congress members frequent daily or need for work.

[Assistant] They will make people know something is happening and that people are upset about the legislation. People who may not be aware of SOPA and PIPA will notice that wikipedia and other large sites are down and will see why.  That should raise the profile of the issue and hopefully make more people aware its a bad idea, that in turn might put pressure on congress and the US government as a whole.


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

[User] ELI5: When and how did gold teeth become used in dental work? Arent there more practical things that could be used?

[Assistant]
Gold is unreactive.

The last thing you want is your tooth to rust or dissolve. Gold is so unreactive it doesn't even have a flavour.

It's also valuable so can be seen as a display of wealth.

There are more practical things, and they're generally what your dentist will use today. Silver amalgams, plastic, ceramic or special types of glass are used today for fillings and dentures.


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

[User]
I believe Yoko Ono is a crazy, talentless person with absolutely no artistic value present in her work. CMV.

That's about that. I've seen some of her presentations, and they mostly involve screaming or.... well, screaming is about all I've seen her do. I've seen some of her music videos and I don't believe her music is good at all. Namely, she would've not made it anywhere without Lennon.

I've seen some of her "performance pieces", one of which involved she sitting still while someone cut off pieces of clothing. It was not very interesting. I've seen her in MoMa simulating an orgasm, it was not very interesting.

I'm really really open to seeing something she did that would blow me away, I've done some searching but I was not able to find anything.

CMV!

[Assistant] Yoko Ono is the privileged daughter of a Japanese American diplomat and survived world war II firebombings during her teens, so her art results in a simple but cynical form. She was also inspired and mentored by John Cage, a notable member of the artistic community. Before she had met John Lennon, she made some of her best art including her 1964 published conceptual instructions "Grapefruit" and 1966 "Say Yes" installation. She may not have been a household name without seducing John Lennon, but she would probably be remembered in the avante garde art community, and might even have her own entry in an encyclopedia of 1960's art.


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

[User]
[DC] When Batman is on all-night patrol, where does go the bathroom? Is there Bat-poop on the roofs of Gotham?

He's just a regular human, so must take regular toilet breaks.

It must be awkward to pull down your tights and hold your cape out of the way while trying to take a shit behind a dumpster and finish up before someone walks past.

Does he carry toilet paper with him?

[Assistant] His suit retains urine for prevention of forensic contamination and general civic responsibility. His metabolism takes care of his fecal schedule to keep it outside of his night activities. Bruce Wayne is regular so Batman doesn't have to be.


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

[User]
[Fallout] How did the NCR beat the Enclave and BoS?

I mean, they wear power armor that basically makes you into a walking tank, but were defeated by an army wielding conventional weaponry.

[Assistant] Numbers, mostly. Power armor is great and all but a walking tank still gets taken out by enough guys with anti-tank missiles. The Brotherhood also made a number of strategic errors, such as the Battle of Helios One, that caused them losses disproportionate to their strength. Other times they made the opposite mistake and willingly ceded defensible territory to the NCR; holding territory was never the main objective, so they undervalued it.


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

[User]
[Sunshine] Why did the sun stop working?

They never explained what caused the sun to start dying, or how a bomb would fix it.

[Assistant] The reaction of energy (hydrogen, helium, ect) within the Sun was slowing to a point where the Earth was in a state constant winter. Much of the planet had become frozen with Australia being depicted covered in snow. The idea was to send a nuclear bomb designed to "jump-start" the reaction once more. It was purely theoretical and not much more than humanity's last hope.


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

[User]
[DC/Marvel] Are Superheros better off with secret identity or a pubic identity?

Which is better for a superhero to have a public identity like Ironman or a secret identity like Batman or Superman?

[Assistant] It depends on who you are.  Reed Richards has a public identity and he's also a billionaire super-genius who outfits his home with insane futuristic security protocols and everyone he loves is also super-powered.  Daredevil works as a blind lawyer and has a lot of friends who can't protect themselves.  Mr. Fantastic having a public identity is better because his security and their superpowers means that he's not putting those he cares about in danger, Daredevil is better private because it reduces the risk.


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

[User]
Can a 'moon' be bigger than the 'planet' it's orbiting? Can this last or will the smaller object soon switch to being the moon?

I know that Pluto and Charon are close in size and 'orbit' each other. Have any other planet / moon systems been found where the larger object orbits the smaller one? Is it even possible?

[Assistant] What's actually happening is that both objects are oribiting the common center of mass, which is somewhere between the centers of the two bodies. When one body is much more massive than the other (which tends to be the case), the center of mass is very close to the center of that body, and it will appear as if the smaller body is just orbiting the larger. When the two bodies are equally massive, they will orbit around the midpoint between them. You see this sometimes in binary stars.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does the East coast of the US have high humidity but the West coast doesnt?

Ive lived on both coasts for extensive periods of time and never understood why the humidity was high to the point of being unbearable on the east coast while the west coast doesnt have the same problem.

[Assistant]
Both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans circulate clockwise above the equator.

The water at the equator is heated more by the sun. Then that warm water flows northward. On the East Coast, it's the Gulf Stream Current. It carries heat northward, warming the air above it. Warm air can carry more moisture, so that's why the East Coast is humid.

On the West Coast, the clockwise circulation is bringing cold water down the coast from the Arctic region. This cold current cools the air above it. Cold air can carry less moisture, so the West Coast has lower humidity.


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

[User] Do any philosophers cover sobriety?

[Assistant]
Gilles Deleuze was an alcoholic for a substantial part of his life and had to quit so as not to die. He wrote a lot about drugs and alcohol, but not in the naive way it is often presented. Here is a quote from What is Philosophy? - his last book, with something of a conclusion on the subject:
 "The question of whether drugs help the artist to create... receives a general answer insofar as that which is composed under the influence of drugs is most often extraordinarily brittle, incapable of conserving itself, undoing itself as it's made, or as we look at it. One can indeed admire the drawings of children, or rather be touched by them; it's rare that they manage to stand on their own, not ressembling a Klee or a Miro unless we don't look for too long."


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

[User] Is the difference in strength in the dominant hand  primarily due to greater muscle fiber size or motor control differences in the brain?

[Assistant]
On a side note, most people's difference in grip strength is an average of 10lbs, though sometimes it is greater.
Source: occupational therapist who tests grip strength using a dynamometer on every new patient.


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

[User]
What's the point of "donate yor hair to cancer"?

Maybe I'm missing something, but why wouldn't they take the patients own hair before treatment?
Hard to get any better fitting hair than your own, I'd say.

So, does this charity actually do something useful, or is it another pink ribbon style organisation that largely benefits itself rather than cancer patients?

[Assistant]
Locks of Love doesn't donate wigs to patients with cancer, they donate wigs to people with permanent hair loss such as alopecia or burn. Although in reality very few wigs are donated since the majority of hair they received cannot be made into wigs. They sell those hair to use as hair extensions to offset their operating cost.

Which brings to your first point. No, not everyone's hair can be made into wigs. The minimum length for donation is 10 inches, and that can be made into a very short wig. To make one full looking wig you will need 3-4 heads of hair. Not to mention the said hair need to be the same texture, has never been processed, doesn't get washed often, has never used a hair dryer, etc. They actually prefer men's hair for this reason. The human hair wigs you can buy are usually from hair harvested from countries like rural India, rural China, rural Eastern Europe etc where people don't wash their hair often.


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

[User]
When you lose weight by exercising, where does the weight go?

I know that mass and energy both have to be conserved in any system (if you take into account all the inputs and outputs).

So I am assuming that a (simplistic) way of looking at it is:

**If you are losing weight:**

    (Calories from food ingested) + (Calories removed from body fat stores) = (Calories burned)

    (Mass from food ingested) + (Mass removed from body fat stores) = (Mass lost)

**If you are gaining weight:**

    (Calories from food ingested)  = (Calories burned) + (Calories deposited in body fat stores)

    (Mass from food ingested)  = (Mass lost) + (Mass deposited in body fat stores)

When you are losing weight, the "Mass lost" will include what you pee, poop, breathe and sweat out.  But if you exercise more, what is that *extra* part of the mass lost?

What are by-products of the chemical reactions in the cells when you use energy?  Is it H20 (you pee it out)?  Or is it CO2 (you exhale it)? Or something else?  I remember years ago learning about ATP, but I can't remember any details on that stuff any more.

My hunch is that you breathe heavier when you exercise and that mass is lost as carbon in your CO2.  But I'm sure there are some bio-chemists out there that can give me an explanation about that is going on.

[Assistant]
The carbon in your body which is stored in fat you lose by breathing out (CO2). Its kind of a cool concept, the air you breath out is heavier than the air you breath in. As you debulk in size you will also lose a certain amount of water, although your body tries to keep a pretty consistent amount of water per cell volume to maintain homeostasis. Try looking up an oxidative metabolism wiki if you would like more chemical details.

Cool thing to note though is that you don't exactly have CO2 cruising around in your blood stream. This is a gas, and would cause many problems. Your body transfers the CO2 around as carbonic acid, which is degenerated into CO2 in the blood -> air transition in your lungs.


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

[User] ELI5: How does the silencer on a gun work?

[Assistant]
A gun is loud for two reasons.

1: any gun which fires a bullet which breaks the sound barrier is impossible to suppress without slowing the bullet. Part of the sound is the sonic boom created by the bullet breaking the sound barrier.

2: The way that a gun fires is to create enough pressure behind the bullet the push it out the barrel of the gun. There are very hot gasses which expand very quickly. A suppressor (also known as a silencer) slows the expansion of the gas outside of the barrel. If you were to disassemble a suppressor, you would see it is basically a tube with small holes that feed into another chamber. By giving the gasses a slightly larger area to expand in, it allows the gas to expand and cool at a slower rate.


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

[User]
[Star Trek: TNG, DS9, VOY] What is the difference between the "beam" and the "bolt" phasers?

Some ships like the Enterprise-D fire phasers in a beam that last a few seconds whereas others like the Defiant fire phasers bolts that travel like projectiles. Is there any difference between the two types in terms of performance?

[Assistant]
Phaser cannons--what the Defiant uses as its primary armament--can output significantly more power in a short amount of time than a phaser beam array of the same size.  However, this isn't without its disadvantages.  For one thing, they have a shorter effective range, both because the bolts lose cohesion over long ranges and because the projectile travels slower than the speed of light.  In addition, they are much less versatile than a traditional phaser array and cannot be reconfigured to project exotic particles or jury-rigged into force field projectors or scanners.  Due to the bulky pre-fire chambers and other internals required to produce such a high-powered blast, cannon emitters can't be placed closely together in banks like we see with beam phasers, giving them a narrower firing arc.  Finally, it is important to note that while the energy output is potentially much higher than a beam, cannons are not more efficient and require much more power per array, possibly even needing dedicated power conduits to support such a load.

Mounting a phaser cannon array in lieu of more traditional weaponry sacrifices some of a ship's versatility for raw power.  Vessels with phaser cannons need to be maneuverable enough to keep their guns on target, but can punch high above their weight class if deployed properly.  The Defiant is a perfect example of an ideal ship for phaser cannons because of its massive warp core and oversized impulse engines.  Not only does it have the energy output needed for sustained cannon fire, but it can turn to face its target in instants.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why is a paralyzing agent used in lethal injection?

So I can understand a drug to knock a person out and then a drug to kill them, but then why a drug in-between to also paralyze them?

[Assistant]
Some people get traumatized when they see a person flailing about as their body struggles to stay alive.

So we paralyze them so that the people watching don't get traumatized by watching someone die.

Yes, that's supposed to make sense.


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

[User]
How can light have momentum if the formula for momentum is p=mv? If light has no mass doesn't that mean it has no momentum?

p=mv where p is momentum, m is mass, and v is velocity.

[Assistant]
The equation p = m v is part of classical mechanics and will hold for particles with non-zero mass at low speeds (compared to the speed of light).

However, in special relativity, things are slightly different. Einstein showed that the following relation between energy, mass and momentum holds:

E^2 = (m c^2 )^2 + p^2 c^2

If the mass of a particle is zero, the first term on the righthand side falls out and you can take the square root to obtain:

E = p c

Which is a relation between the energy and momentum of massless particles, such as photons.

Unrelated to photons, but still interesting is if you consider a particle at rest, so p = 0. The Einstein relation then reduces to:

E = m c^2

which is the equation he is most famous for, the rest energy of particle expressed in terms of its mass and the speed of light.

Obviously there's much more to special relativity than the above relation and its two extreme cases. And an interesting (and necessary!) property is that if you look at the limit case of velocities going to zero (that is, velocities being very small compared to the speed of light), special relativity is reduced to classical Newtonian mechanics.


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

[User]
Why is the Arctic warming significantly faster than the global average?

Multiple studies and reports have shown that the Arctic is warming much faster than the rest of the planet. Why is this occurring?

[Assistant] The Arctic is warming faster because of the ice-albedo feedback.  A large area of the Arctic is covered by snow and ice, surfaces with a high albedo.  That high albedo reflects a high percentage of incoming sunlight, and thus the ground doesn't absorb as much energy.  As the snow and ice melts due to warming, darker ground and ocean is exposed, surfaces with a much lower albedo.  That lower albedo allows the ground and surface ocean to absorb insolation, causing the surface in the Arctic to get warmer.  As that surface warms, it melts even more snow and ice, exposing more dark ground/ocean, heating up even more, etc.  It's a positive feedback loop.  Lower-latitude locations don't have the ice-albedo feedback effect, and thus aren't warming as fast.


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

[User]
Could Magneto feasibly control or kill someone using the iron in their blood? (READ INFO TEXT)

I am almost certain that normally he wouldn't be able to, but if his control over metal was somehow amplified or directed at the iron in the blood, could he? And is there any existing tech or magic to do this?

[Assistant]
Actually, he used to be able to do it with absolutely zero enhancement. He once took over an entire military facility this way and has pulled all of the iron out of someone's blood to fashion it into a nail to kill them with.

Of course, nowadays he's not quite as in control as he used to be, but he'll undoubtedly reach his previous heights some day soon.

Magic and tech might be able to do it, especially magic, but why bother when you can hypnotize them or hijack their brains to fulfill the same purpose?


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

[User] ELI5: Why does running cold water sound different from running hot water?

[Assistant]
The differences in density and viscosity are the causes.

Cold water will have a higher pitch due to the stronger surface tension and hot water will have a lower pitch due to the weaker surface tension breaking up the water before it hits the glass or whatever you may be pouring it into.

That's why coffee or something warm will have a low sound and a cold glass of water will sound higher.


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

[User] Has the introduction of emojis into Western language structures made our minds more capable of learning Eastern pictorial languages?

[Assistant]
The idea that Chinese or other similar characters are pictorial is off. There are some historical connections to actual pictures, some of which feel very dubious and retrofitted, some of which are plausible. But for the majority of characters you soon realize they are built of subcomponents next to each other. As such you have a word being a bunch of basically arbitrary symbols arranged spacially next to each other, which is the same thing we have in (our Western) phonetic alphabets.

So no. Emojis have zero impact on anyone's ability to learn non-phonetic writing systems.


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

[User]
What would happen to a paperplane in space that has the same orbit as the ISS?

Especially short term, like heat affecting the structure etc.

And just for fun, would a paperplane thrown from the ISS be able to reach escape velocity under any circumstances?

[Assistant]
If it's as high and fast as the ISS, then it will simply orbit like the ISS.

At that height the atmosphere is almost negligible (after all, the ISS didn't need to be streamlined for exactly this reason), so it won't glide like you might expect. It will simply orbit, and maybe tumble while doing so.

However, the ISS does experience a tiny amount of drag from the very thin atmosphere up there, requiring approximately monthly orbital adjustments in order to keep it from falling into the atmosphere. The paper plane, after many thousands of orbits, will start to spiral into the earth's atmosphere and probably burn up or disintegrate.


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

[User] Why won't New Horizons orbit Pluto? A nine years journey just for a flyby?!

[Assistant]
Because Pluto is (a) very far away and (b) very small.

New Horizons took nine years to arrive at Pluto even though it had the fastest launch velocity of any spacecraft in history--16 km/s. In order to achieve orbit around Pluto, New Horizons would need to be going (considerably) slower than Pluto's escape velocity, which is a mere 1.2 km/s because Pluto is so small.

If New Horizons had been launched at a low enough velocity to make its capture by Pluto practical, it would have taken decades for it to arrive, and no one wanted to wait that long. Bringing along enough fuel to slow New Horizons down once it arrived would have made the mission prohibitively expensive. And unlike the gas giants we've put satellites around, Pluto is too small to have a thick atmosphere that can be used to slow New Horizons enough for Pluto to capture it. So we have to settle for a flyby.


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

[User]
ELI5:Neither Cheddar Cheese or Butter is naturally Yellow. (In fact they're both white.) Why and when did they start adding food dye?

I've always wondered this. Things like candy or pastries it makes sense, but there's plenty of white cheeses. And Butter starts out as cream which is white to begin with. How did they even get the idea to add dye in the first place?

[Assistant]
Grass fed butter is yellow, actually. Grass fed milk has a yellowish tint, too. Cheese made with high quality grass fed milk has an orange tint.

Annatto was added to cheddar as both a flavoring and a colorant so that inferior cheese could replicate the color of grass fed milk when using cheaper milk. This started in the 16th century or there about. It stuck around as tradition.


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

[User] Why do radioactive elements still exist? Shouldn't all matter have decayed to a stable isotope by now, 14 billion years after the big bang?

[Assistant]
No radioactive isotopes were produced in the Big Bang at all. The BB produced only hydrogen, helium, and very small amounts of Lithium and Beryllium.

Radioactive isotopes are created primarily in supernovae. The ones in our solar system were almost certainly generated by a nearby supernova that exploded prior to its formation.


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

[User] What if all the planets in our solar system, except for Earth, vanished? Would Earth get closer to the sun or further away?

[Assistant] It would depend on where they are in their orbit.  If all of the planets were on the opposite side as the sun and magically disappeared, then Earth's pull that direction would slightly lessen, moving it further away.


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

[User] If we don't hear our own voice like it actually sounds, how can we sing correctly? (according to notes, keep a tone etc.)

[Assistant] It's the *tone* (or timbre) that sounds different, not the pitch. You can tell if the pitch of your voice is flat or sharp without needing to properly hear the timbre. A trained vocalist will know how his/her tone changes when they sing from the lungs, diaphragm, or through the nose (head voice). It's not like we can't hear our own voice at all, it's just that certain harmonics sound a little different from inside our head, so maybe it's more accurate to say that you only hear about 75% of our own voice the way other people hear it, not that we can't hear it at all.


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

[User] [The Simpsons] At it's height how many people in America/Internationally were doing the 'Bartman?' What's Bart's lasting cultural impact in-universe?

[Assistant]
People don't seem to remember Bart for it, just like they don't seem to recognise Homer as an astronaut.

The Simpsonsverse apparently has an incredibly short fame cycle, and its inhabitants terrible memories.


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

[User] ELI5 Why do your symptoms feel more severe when you think about them?

[Assistant]
Psychologist's perspective:  Distraction is a powerful tool.  There is a technique called body scan, in which you hone in on bodily sensations to feel them more powerfully.  Mindful meditation is also similar but has more of a focus on un-focusing element to it.  Lastly, there is a technique called "The Wave" that has you hyperfocus on one specific craving/pain/ache to better understand it.

Our brains are not actually all that good at multitasking.  So by changing the level your brain is focused on a thing and you will change how much perception you have of that.  Despite the fact that the symptom itself may be the same.  This gets MUCH harder to do cognitively the bigger the symptom.  A splinter is easy to distract from, but an amputation would be impossible.


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

[User] [Pacific Rim] How is it socially acceptable for children to be playing with toy versions of monsters who are still killing thousands of people?

[Assistant] Because at that point in the war, fighting Kaiju had become something of a sport. Jaeger pilots were celebrities, not soldiers. The Jaeger program was in its prime, fielding a few dozen Mechs, any one of which could beat the run-of-the-mill Kaiju that were showing up from the Rift. Bear in mind that the Kaiju attacks featured in the excellent documentary Pacific Rim were not your average Kaiju, being specially adapted to fighting Jaegers. There was a ten year period where Kaiju weren't taken very seriously, when humanity got complacent.


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

[User]
[MCU] How could the Dr. Strange's "forget spell" affect other universes?

In Spiderman NWH, because Peter tamper with the spell by adding many parameter to the spell, everyone that know Peter is Spiderman are brought to their universe. My question is why? How? That spell was unnecessarily powerful for whatever reason. The worst effect should be in-universe at best but somehow it affect all the universes. Is it because Dr. Strange is the one who cast it? Is it because the place where the spell was cast? Or it's really just because the spell is very powerful?

[Assistant]
The spell wasn't excessively powerful, Dr. Strange simply underestimated how fundamental Spider-man is to the multi-verse. The magic piggy-backed off of the connection between Spider-men in ways he couldn't have predicted.

It's possible the events of Loki and/or what-if left the multiverse more vulnerable to this specific kind of damage, but we won't know for sure until *Multiverse of Madness.*


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

[User]
ELI5: how do file formats work?

Also, how do formats like for example jpeg/png, or pdf/xps differentiale?

[Assistant]
A file is a bunch of bytes, and that's **all** a file is.

A file format says what the bytes mean. ASCII text files are pretty simple - each byte means a letter or symbol (except for a few of them that mean other things). 72 then 105 then 33 means `Hi!`.

Bitmap files are a bit more complicated. There's a certain number of bytes at the start of the file, called the *header*, which tells you things like how big the picture is, and the number of bytes per pixel. After that, each group of 1 to 4 bytes (depending on what the header said) represents the colour of one pixel. Put the colours together in the right order, and you get a picture.

Most other formats are a lot more complicated. A ZIP file contains a header for the first file in it (unlike the BMP header, this one tells you things like the filename and the compression level), and then the compressed data for that file, and then a header for the second file, and the compressed data for the second file, and so on. Then at the end it has an extra copy of all the headers but without any compressed file data in-between.

JPEG and PNG both store images, but they do it in completely different ways, *and* they use completely different compression algorithms. The result of that is that JPEG is sometimes better and PNG is sometimes better.


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

[User] ELI5: On Netflix, why do old tv shows like Rockford Files and Magnum PI start out with a 30 sec preview of the entire episode? A lot of older shows do this, but why?

[Assistant] This was just what was done in the 70s and 80s. The preview was basically click-bait, to hopefully get you to sit down and watch the show. You have to remember that recording shows was fairly uncommon at this time. People actually sat down and watched these shows as they went to air. So the networks would put a few exciting scenes of the upcoming show on, hoping this was enough to lure you into watching the entire show.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do nuclear power stations need cooling towers instead of using the excess heat to create more electricity?

[Assistant]
Cooling towers are actually more common in coal fired plants, though they can be used in nuke plants also. Both types of plants use the energy to heat water and turn it into steam and the steam then powers a turbine to create electricity.

Once the steam has done its job of powering the turbine, you then need to turn the steam back into water by cooling it. That's what the cooling towers are for. Otherwise you would need a constant supply of fresh water to turn to steam rather than being able to use a closed system with a finite amount of water.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does the same website sometimes load lighting fast with just 1-2MB of download speed and other times struggle to load up all the way with 10MB+?

To clarify...where I live I have 1-4MB depending on the day but often it works just fine, with every website popping up immediately. So it surprises me when I am overseas at a hotel or cafe with 10-20MB of speed that the internet can often lag a bit. I can tell a big difference when streaming but not browsing. Perhaps it's related to the number of people logged into to the same WiFi network...actually, I am sure that's it now that I think about it but I'll ask anyhow.

[Assistant] Your browser caches pages and will save it to your device to speed loading. That cache will periodically get cleared and require the entire site to be loaded again. Ads add a lot of overhead as well with images, animations, video etc. If those change it will impact loading time. Plus there are a lot of libraries that may need to get loaded behind the scenes. Again, ads may call different libraries that also need to be loaded. Then there's the time of day you visit. There may be higher traffic at certain times of day. There might be issues with a server somewhere along the line. There are tons of issues that can come up that will slow things down but ads are mostly to blame.


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

[User]
[Marvel] What happens if you put the Infinity Gauntlet on the other hand for which it was designed?

In my universe, the Infinity Gauntlet was designed to be worn on someone's right hand. I lost my right arm in an earlier battle. By chance, the Gauntlet now sits by my feet and I have a chance to do something with it. Can I wear the Gauntlet on the other hand? Will it be just as effective and allow me the same "snap" powers? Will the Gauntlet change to fit my other hand?

[Assistant]
In most universes, the Gauntlet is just a convenient way to collect and hold the Infinity Gems; there's nothing magical about the glove itself, and you can use the Gems without it.

If your universe works like that, you wouldn't even need to put the Gauntlet on; just holding the Gems would be enough. And, of course, you could also use the Gems to give yourself a new hand.

In the MCU (and probably similar universes), the Infinity Stones are too powerful to be controlled by a mortal mind, and the Gauntlet is specifically designed to harness their power without killing the user. In these kinds of universes, you're more likely out of luck. Of course, Thor said that most people would be turned into gibbering lunatics for even trying to use a weapon that powerful, so maybe you're better off, anyway.


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

[User] Why is glass translucent/transparent? Is it a molecular arrangement thing? Is all clear matter clear for the same reason, such as water and diamond?

[Assistant]
In general: Because there is no transition between an occupied and an empty energy level that corresponds to the energy of the light you consider (here: visible light). If there is such a transition, an electron can absorb the photon and reach the higher energy level, but if that process is not possible then the material will be transparent. This is not a binary thing - in general all materials will absorb *some* light, this includes glass and water. A few meters of glass or a few hundred meters of water are barely letting any light through.

The energy levels mainly depend on the molecules in the material and a bit on their arrangement.


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

[User]
[Spiderman] Would Peter Parker have known about superheroes/powers before he became Spiderman?

 In heroes origin stories, you never see them say stuff like "Oh I'm a superhero, just like \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_!" Was Peter the first superhero in NY?

[Assistant]
No. The Fantastic Four were around a few months earlier in the 616 universe, and Captain America along with many other heroes had been active in the 1940s and early 1950s.

But Peter Parker was arguably the first publicly known hero in the present day of the 1610 "Ultimate" universe.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does toilet water move when it's windy outside?

I live on a condo and noticed that the water in the toilet bowl was slightly moving (kinda like waves) and was fascinated. So i started paying attention to it more and noticed that it would do that only on windy days, the windier it was, the more it moved and would sometimes start to resonate which blew my already blown mind!

[Assistant] There is a vent that goes through your roof and is connected to your plumbing drains. It facilitates the water draining to the sewer or septic. Wind blows over it and creates oscillations in the connecting plumbing.


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

[User]
A core tenet of the Christian belief is that the Christian God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent and most especially, omnibenevolent. Then how can this apply to God's actions in the Old Testament which were often motivated by anger or God sending the sinned to hell?

The main concept of Christianity is that the Christian God prophesized the arrival of his son, Jesus, to save humanity from their sins to guide them to the truth, which is God himself.

The Old Testament is a collection of stories that build up the arrival of Jesus via the use of other prophets who also wanted to guide people towards God and teach them about the name of God.

As Jesus is also technically a part of the Christian God, as stated in the mystery of the Holy Trinity, both Jesus and God (and the Holy Spirit) are powerful and capable of all things and present in all ways and most importantly, benevolent in all ways and more "benevolent" or "closer to the truth" as a Christian theologian would say, than the other deities such as the "false" polytheistic gods, and enemies of God such as the Devil and his followers.

The problem is that if God is meant to be omnibenevolent since the very beginning, then what are the explanations for some of his actions towards humanity that were sometimes motivated by jealousy or anger but later wanted to "repent" for his actions by doing something more benevolent?

For example, the story of Adam and Eve and how he banished them from the Garden of Eden and when Cain killed Abel, God punished him with a mark and condemning him to a life of wandering.,

Or the story of the Tower of Babel where the humans wanted to build the tower to be closer to God but the latter deceived them linguistically and destroyed the tower and made the human confused about one another which later led to the creation of different languages.

Or the story of Noah and how God flooded the Earth and drowned all the sinners and later created the rainbow as a reminder to not killed humans at a mass scale again.

Or the story of Moses and how God wanted to show the Pharoah his might by causing many plagues and later drowning the Egyptians in the Red Sea.

Or the story of Sodom and Gomorrah where God wanted to punish them for their sins.

This is a stark contrast to the benevolent God that is implied in the Christian religion and it contrasts with the notion that if God is omnipresent and omniscient, then he would have been capable of knowing the consequences of his actions all along instead of attempting to make amends for his actions or succumbing to his emotions of anger or jealousy.

This is also in contrast with God wanting to save humanity and give them an eternity of paradise after death but if they do not follow his rule or way of life, then they are punished in hell for an eternity which is ruled by the devil and his followers which are technically the enemies of God so allowing the enemies of hell to work well with God and willingly take his creations and give them an eternity of suffering or torment them and warp them into his followers in counter-intuitive to what defines what God is.

So how can a God do all of the things mentioned above but also be capable of doing certain acts?

[Assistant]
The short answer is that G-d as portrayed in the Tanakh is simply incommensurable with the theology of the New Testament.

The earlier books of the Tanakh were written such a long time before the New Testament, in different cultural climates where G-d was understood in a different way. Even monotheism is not always a given in the Tanakh, and many of the authors believed there were multiple gods but only one who they ought to worship (i.e. monolatry). Meanwhile Asherah and the Nehushtan (the bronze serpent Moses erects in the book of Numbers) were still worshipped as secondary deities in the Temple until the time of King Hezekiah (you can see him cast them out in 2 Kings 18:4).

Further, the G-d of the Tanakh is treated as a personal deity who has a specific relationship and covenant with the Israelites and guides those people to prosperity. This G-d is not everyone's God. There is also no Hell, and 'Heaven' is understood in a very different way. G-d rewards and punishes people in this life.

The New Testament, on the other hand, has universalist goals. God is portrayed as a universal God for all people who offers a different covenant (a 'new covenant' - the same new testament in the title). As part of these universalist goals, it was really important for the authors to emphasize his omnipotence, omniscience and omnibenevolence. He rewards and punishes everyone, but not necessarily in this life (he has Heaven and Hell to do this *after* life).

In other words, they are two different conceptions of God. It is worth considering that they simply may not be reconcilable (and they may not even have to be). The bible is not a single philosophical argument put forward by a single author that we can critique and find contradictions within. In many ways, it is not surprising at all to find that 7th century BCE Israelites of the Babylonian Exile understood God differently to 1st century CE Hellenistic proto-Christians.


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

[User]
[LOTR] Would it have been possible to discard the One ring someplace nobody could find it?

I mean if Frodo hucked that thing deep into the Dead Marshes, who could ever retrieve it? Or if they took it as far away from Mordor as humanly possible and threw it into a normal volcano, so it was encased in rock. Maybe leave it in the caverns under the Dwimorberg, throw it down a chasm and let the Dead Men of Dunharrow handle it.

I know the ring has a habit of getting itself found, but you can make it so difficult to get it that it would eventually just be forgotten entirely, right?

[Assistant]
No.  The ring WANTS to be found, and has the power to do so.  If thrown into a volcano?  The volcano would eventually harden, and dwarves or goblins would tunnel and mine, and find it.  Or perhaps a dragon would choose that volcano of all others to make its lair, and the One Ring would find itself in that dragon's hoard...

The Dead Marshes?  Many are those that are drawn there and yet still wander free, more still would do so if the One Ring called.  The Dead Men are not immune to the Ring's charms... even one of they might keep it for a few centuries, as Gollum did, but always will it call for others to take it home...

It can never be lost, only found.  It can never be wielded, save by its own choice - except by the Dark Lord on His Dark Throne.  The Nine Kings each thought they were clever as you and could outwit the magic of the Ring... and each was wrong.  It WANTS you to think that.  It WANTS you to think you could hide it, keep it from harm through your cleverness.  But you'd always be wrong.

No, no.  Best to give it to me, to be safe.


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

[User] ELI5: How does your brain automatically know how to make your entire body function?

[Assistant]
Basic bodily functions like breathing and heart beat are plain hardwired in to your body. Just like simple electrical circuits. Yes, there are things (hormones) that can regulate them up or down, and your concious brain can override the signals. But evolution has conserved this feature because it is so efficient at keeping animals alive.

Your heart beat for example is controlled by the "sino-artial node". It is basically an electrical timer that self regulates it's electrical pulses, and doesn't even need input from your brain to keep your heart going (hence why you can be brain dead, but still "alive").