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

[User]
[Star Wars] If Jedi broke with the Order's doctrine were they expelled? If so, what happened to them?

This is regarding the Old Jedi Order prior to it's destruction.

I am somewhat familiar with Gray Jedi, both those that butt heads with the Jedi Council but still remain in the order and those that were either expelled or left the order.  I am also aware that some would fall to the Dark Side and become Dark Jedi or even Sith.  What I want to know is, say you broke with a lesser yet banishment worthy doctrine like having a wife and children on the side, like in the case of Anakin Skywalker.

If he had been found out, what would happen to him?  Would the Jedi Order just kick him out, or make him dissolve the marriage and do penance, or what?  And if he left, then what?  Do they just let a fully trained Jedi go off and be at risk of falling to the Dark Side?

[Assistant]
Let's step away from Anakin.

We have a Jedi. We'll call him Dick. Dick has fallen in love with, and secretly married, Jane. His best friend Bob discovers this and turns him in to the Council. They would, at that point, give Dick an ultimatum. Dissolve either his marriage or his relationship with the Jedi Order. They'd likely give him time to think about it, urging him to meditate and search his feelings.

If Dick decided to leave, they'd be very, very disappointed and possibly ask him to turn in his lightsaber before he left. They'd also make it clear that he's welcome to return if he ever changes his mind. Sure, they could try to force him to let go of her, but that would only make him resent the Order more. Plus, he'd be distracted by thinking of ways he could see Jane again.

Anakin, however, is... His is a tricky situation. Not only is he close with the Supreme Chancellor (who possesses enough political clout to force the Jedi to accept him onto the Council), not only is he married to one of the most powerful and popular women in the Galaxy, he's also the Chosen One. Destined to do great things, namely bringing balance to the Force by destroying the Sith. So he's got political power and a prophecy behind him. Funnily enough, though the Jedi would frown on it and probably try to pull him off of active duty, they don't dare let him leave and they don't dare try to force the two apart.


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

[User] If PI was ever found to actually repeat, what would it mean for mathematics? Or is it impossible for it to repeat?

[Assistant]
It's impossible.  Because you can show quite easily if Pi were to repeat it would be a rational number. You could write it out in the form

    Pi = Pi*10^k - C

Where C is all the digits prior to the first repeat and 10^k shifts the decimal place over to the first repeat.   For instance with a simple repeating number like 0.1212...

    0.1212... =  (0.1212...)*10^2 - 12 = 12.1212.. - 12 = 0.1212..

Thus you can show this would imply Pi is rational by isolating Pi which gives you the expression

    Pi - Pi*10^k = -C
    Pi(1-10^k) = -C
    Pi = C/(10^k - 1)

Since the way everything was defined implies C and (10^k - 1) are integers this implies Pi is a rational number (can be written as the fraction of two integers).

BUT it's been proven by a multitude of theorems that Pi is irrational and therefore as shown above having Pi repeat would be impossible since the property of a repeating decimal implies rationality.


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

[User] [Star Trek TNG] In "Elementary, Dear Data", if the holodeck has a finite amount of space, how does Moriarty get Pulaski at so far a distance (several hundred feet, perhaps even several hundred yards) from Data and Geordi that they just couldn't find her?

[Assistant]
Distance is a flexible concept in the holodeck. If you divide the holodeck in two with a wall and paint that wall to resemble as much space as you need, you could hide anything behind that wall as "far away" as you need it to be.

Likewise, if two people were to walk in opposite directions, you only need to keep the participants walking in place and project an image to one person of the other moving further away (and vice versa) to complete the illusion.


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

[User]
Why is Tritium radioactive?

Since radioactivity is caused by electromagnetic force outweighing the strong force, how is Tritium radioactive, since it only has one proton and therefore no repulsion?

[Assistant]
>Since radioactivity is caused by electromagnetic force outweighing the strong force

That's greatly oversimplified, and tritium is a perfect example of why.

In general, any nucleus which is unstable is unstable because it *can* decay. That means that there's a lower-energy state available which it can reach without violating any conservation law.

So what determines which nuclei are unstable to each decay mode is the energies (*masses*) of the parent and daughter. And the mass of a nucleus is determined by both the number of protons and neutrons it has, and also how they're bound to each other.

In the case of tritium, its decay mode is beta decay. Things beta decay along the same isobar (constant A). So according to the logic above, beta decays occur when there exists an isobar with a lower mass. Because of the nature of the interactions between nucleons, it turns out that helium-3 has a lower mass than tritium, despite them both having A = 3. So then it's energetically possible for tritium to undergo a beta decay to become helium-3. And therefore, tritium is unstable.


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

[User]
How long would the communication delay be from Mars to Earth?

How long would the delay in communications be through audio and video from a person on Mars to a person on Earth?

[Assistant] The distance between Earth and Mars depends on where they are in their orbit, but it can vary between approximately 55 million and 400 million km. Light (or any other electromagnetic signal) travels 18 million km per minute, so sending a signal from Mars to Earth (or the other way around) would take anywhere between 3 and 22 minutes.


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

[User]
What would you consider the single most important/best invention in all of human history?

What are the criteria that should be used?

Should we include the simple machines, since that was nothing more than leveraging physics?  (There was no real invention there, just application of existing forms in nature.)

Would something like agriculture count, since that isn't a single thing that was developed, but instead a whole systematic process?  (Science falls into that category also.)

What are your thoughts, askscience?

[Assistant]
Not a real invention, more a harnessing of natural processes, but the consistent, controlled use of fire.

Though it is still up for debate, there is an idea that the increased cranial capacity of H. sapiens occurred as a result of cooking food.  Cooking kills food-borne pathogens as well as breaking down foods to allow for more complete absorption in the GI tract.  Controlled fire would also provide warmth, allowing an increase in geographic range, and protection from other animals.


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

[User]
[Friday the 13th] - Is Jason the one that makes the KI-KI-KI MA-MA-MA sounds or is it just a sound effect to make the movies more suspensful?

I was always wondering in Friday the 13th. Is Jason making those sounds. When watching Friday the 13th Part 7 it pretty much looked that way when his mask broke and he had that angered look on his face with his mouth wide open.

[Assistant]
It's actually the "Kill her, mommy" that Pamela Voorhees imagined Jason was telling her in the first one. She basically talked to herself as Jason, so you could argue that the score is what she hears in her head.

That it still follows Jason around could be taken as a sign that he's still haunted by his mother's death. FvJ revealed that he doesn't think it strange to dream that she's giving him instructions, and Friday 2 makes it seem that he doesn't fully understand or accept that she's dead. So her madness lives on through him.


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

[User] [Doctor Who] Im told that I have to press this big red button, apparently its something called a fixed point in time. What if I dont?

[Assistant]
Turning to walk away from the button, you trip and fall, your reaching hand landing on the button.

Carefully sitting on your hands to avoid pressing the button, you suffer a sudden attack of dizziness caused by low blood sugar, topple sideways, and hit your head on the button on the way down.

Shooting yourself in the head in a desperate attempt to defy the fates, in your last conscious moment you realise that your dying body is falling directly towards the button.


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

[User]
[The Dark Knight Returns] - Does Ronald Reagan know Batman's identity?

Did he ever ask Superman to tell him, or does Superman simply refuse out of respect for Bruce?

[Assistant]
Just as a public service announcement - The Dark Knight Returns is a comic book storyline, not a movie.

It's set in a non-specific future, that's still the 80's, where all superheroes except Superman, who is nothing but a government puppet, have been forced to retire and Batman has been inactive for years.


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

[User] GMOs- engineered genes in crops don't spread into the wild, into other species, do they?

[Assistant]
If the engineered plant or animal can interbreed with a native (or natively-cultivated) plant or animal, the engineered variants can be passed to offspring, just like any other gene. A genetically modified organism is just like the non-engineered organism plus a tiny bit of DNA added or changed in order to add, augment or change some function - they aren't fantastical beasts with lions and eagles spliced together. GMO corn is still corn, GMO soybeans are still soybeans and GMO salmon is still salmon.

If no native species exists that the engineered plant/animal can breed with to produce viable offspring, or the engineered plant/animal is rendered infertile or otherwise isolated, no transfer into the environment will occur.

As far as whether they'll take over wreak havoc on the local flora and fauna - that depends strongly on exactly what was engineered (genetic engineering is only a technique) and if there were any impacts on organismal fitness - not all modifications are made with evolutionary fitness in mind, and some variants may be less "competitive" against their wild relatives.


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

[User]
ELI5: What happens to all that bleach/toilet cleaning product after I flush it away? How is it removed from waste water (if it even is)?

I've always had a mildly guilty twang every time I flush after loading the toilet with chemicals to clean it as I honestly don't know for sure what happens to it. In Australia, in case we have different processes etc.

EDIT: Wow thanks for all the replies ppl, certainly some food for thought here.

EDIT2: Front Page?! Seems we're all fascinated with fluids we flush.

[Assistant]
Soaps used in cleaning products are generally biodegradable, at least in countries that have reasonable environmental standards. This means that by the time it leaves the water treatment plant, most of it will no longer pose a threat to the environment.

In general, the danger posed by soaps varies drastically. Conventional hand washing soap is usually not very dangerous, and will either break down very quickly or easily react with calcium ions, producing a harmless solid. You can wash your hands at a river or lake without poisoning fish.

Dumping laundry detergents however is a different affair, since they are often far more stable and won't break down as rapidly outside a water treatment plant!

Bleach is also a fairly harmless substance, since it does not harm organisms if diluted. It's also an unstable substance that will break down on its own.

Most other chemicals in cleaning products are either present in very small quantities (e.g. dyes and odorants) or are harmless (e.g. water softening agents)

In the past however, certain soaps were used that were not well biodegradable, causing huge damage to rivers and lakes. These are now outright banned in most countries or used in very small scale.


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

[User] ELI5: How do game shows make money?

[Assistant]
They make a lot more in advertising revenue than they pay out in prizes. Consider "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" In a 30 minute show there are probably about 3 competitors and time for about 14 30-second commercial spots. Each 30 second spot costs about $100,000, so that's $1.4 million right there without considering reruns or anything like that.

In terms of costs, the show does have to pay contestants the prizes, but it's not that much money compared to the advertising revenue. For instance, only 9 people won the million dollars in the original US version, which was one for three seasons. That's only $3 million per season in top prize money. Additionally, any money the show pays out it gets to count as a loss on its taxes. That's not huge, but it definitely saves them some money. In cases where the show gives out items instead of money, the items are often donated by the manufacturers to get some free exposure for their product.

Finally, game shows often don't have a huge special effects budget or anything like that because they're relatively low-tech. Wheel of Fortune, for instance, isn't going to have a $500,000 CGI scene in the middle of an episode.


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

[User] What are the limits of Longshot's powers and what other marvel characters can affect luck?

[Assistant] In terms of other characters, Domino has something similar, Black Cat had a power that would cause enemies to suffer bad luck (for a while), and there is an obscure character called Shamrock, who had the luck-of-the-irish (seriously)


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

[User]
ELI5: How does drinking more water help people lose weight faster and increase metabolism?

I've seen the whole "drink 8 glasses of water, you'll lose a ton of weight" article in a ton of places. But how does it exactly help the body burn fat?

[Assistant] Drinking more water can help reduce your food intake.  A main reason why people gain weight/maintain a high body weight is because they snack a lot without thinking about it.  Drinking water will help curb your appetite and reduce your urge to snack.  If you can condition yourself to drink a glass of water instead eating a cookie, you save yourself 100-200 calories.  If this happens three times a day, that's a total of around 500 calories.  500 calories is equal to doing a 5km run in 30mins.  Eating 500 fewer calories per day will lead to one pound of weight loss per week.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are horses put down if they break a leg during a race instead of rehabilitating the injured animal?

[Assistant] To heal a broken leg relatively painlessly, the animal needs to stay off of it. Horses don't/can't do this. They suffer tremendously, and the leg never fully heals. It is more merciful to put them down.


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

[User] ELI5: Why flu shots can go into a muscle but other stuff needs to go into a vein?

[Assistant] It depends on how fast you need it to act. Injecting into the muscle tissue is easiest and entails the least amount of risk. The drug is then absorbed through the fluids around the cells and eventually into the bloodstream. When you need something to act faster, though, you inject directly into the bloodstream where it can then be carried throughout the body within a matter of minutes.


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

[User]
[MARVEL: What If] Is Ultron the most powerful being in the known Universe(s) now? If so, how can Dr. Strange contain him within the collapsed Universe?

Absolutely loved this series but these two questions loomed large for me at the end.

I don't quite understand how Ultron can be more powerful than a cosmic being, like the Watcher...and Dr. Strange still have the ability to hold him hostage in his collapsed Universe. I understand Strange consumed all those beings to gain immense power but does that mean he's "technically" the most powerful?

Are both more powerful then any known cosmic being, ie: The Living Tribunal, Beyonder or The One Above All?

If not, where would you rank them?

If not, why haven't any of the more powerful beings stepped in to stop Ultron? Is that answer as simple as, Marvel isn't ready to introduce them to the MCU?

I apologize for the thousand questions but these need answered,  lol.

[Assistant]
Your first question is that Strange wasn't holding Infinity Ultron hostage in the collapsed universe. He was holding Ultron in the collapsed universe. Ultron and Kilmonger had equal pull for the Infinity Stones, and while the stones were being pulled between them, neither had their power. So Ultron and Kilmonger was stuck in a never-ending battle for the stones. (Presumably they were trapped in some manner of stasis by Strange's magic because otherwise Kilmonger would eventually tire and Ultron would recover the stones.)

Your second question is more difficult to answer though because we haven't seen the Living Tribunal, Beyonder, One Above All, etc. in the MCU, and the MCU regularly changes the power levels of characters from their comic counterparts. So right now it's impossible to know how Infinity Ultron stacks up against those characters. We just know that he was at least as powerful as the Watcher.

As for your last question, that's also unclear. We know Eternity didn't step in because he was locked away in another dimension. It's possible the others were locked away as well or have other oaths of non-interference for some reason or another. The MCU will probably explain that eventually, but we likely won't get that answer before The Kang Dynasty or Secret Wars at the earliest.


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

[User]
ELI5: why are car batteries already "good enough" that they haven't changed much while all other battery technology has improved?

Car batteries look basically the same in cars from decades ago, but mobile devide batteries are much smaller, stronger etc. So what is it about the standard car battery technology that has stood the test of time?

[Assistant]
Car batteries require a very powerful, but short burst of energy to get the engine started. This is very different of what we expect of other battery use cases: small size and long endurance. In that sense a car battery acts more like a capacitor than a battery.

Therefore car batteries are still lead-acid based instead of Lithium. The battery in electric vehicles is of course a Lithium one. There has been some improvements to avoid battery failure, but in essense there is little to no need to innovate lead-acid batteries.


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

[User]
How do driverless cars detect and deal with ice and snow, especially when it comes to braking?

As a seasoned winter driver, I often have to anticipate stopping distance and turn speed based on the road conditions ahead. You could be on a plowed patch of a main road, and then turn onto a snowy/icy side street.

How do driverless cars deal with these conditions? Do they also see or is it based on the tire traction?

[Assistant]
I don't know how driverless cars do it, just want to add, that drivers also are not just seeing it. A modern car is also designed that way, so you can feel the street conditions, for example via the steering wheel. This is for example a problem when you design "steer by wire" technology, where the steering wheel is only conected by wire to the wheels and not by a hard connection through linkage. If you would not add some artificially produced effects on the steering wheel, so you can feel the condition, the driving experience would be worse.

So even cars with drivers with 'steer by wire' need to have some sensor system, to collect data to simulate the driving conditions you feel on the steering wheel.


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

[User] What do storm clouds do that make them darker compared to regular, lighter clouds?

[Assistant] Simple answer... They're thicker. The dark grey you see in storm clouds is a result of the shadow of more cloud between it and the sun. Storm clouds usually have a large amount of cloud above them that you can't see from underneath, or close to the cloud. You do see it's shadow though, at the base of the cloud, obscuring most of the suns light from making the cloud appear white.


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

[User] ELI5: If I've had chicken pox before and donate blood to someone who hasn't, will them become immune too?

[Assistant]
No.

Short answer: Blood is split into three products; red cells, platelets, plasma. Most people who get 'blood' only get 'packed red cells.' Antibodies will reside in your plasma thus a transfusion typically does not confer passive immunity.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do people nod their head when they hear music they like?

When people like music you see them nod along with it, are they any particular reason why this occurs?

[Assistant] Charles Darwin researched nodding for his book The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals and found that head nods were fairly (not completely though) universal for agreement. So if something is agreeable it seems we are built to nod. Nice music, nod.


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

[User] ELI5: What lead to Japan and Germany becoming allies in WW2?

[Assistant]
It was an alliance of convenience. The more natural friendship was actually between Germany and China; both countries rejected the Treaty of Versailles, and there was much German investment in China.

Hitler correctly perceived Japan as a valuable ally against Britain, and given the recent conflict between Japan and the USSR on the borders of Manchuria, hoped that he could use Japan to threaten the Soviet Union in the east, drawing away forces that might be used against his invasion in the west. As a major naval power, Japan could project power in the Pacific in a way that Germany or Italy had no hope of doing. Since Japan was interested in conquering China, this caused a foreign policy pivot from China to Japan.

With Japan having their eyes set on British colonies, the Dutch East Indies and French Indochina, Germany was also a natural fit--the Germans would take on these countries in Europe, paving the way for Japan in the Pacific. Moreover, since the Japanese were outnumbered by the USSR in Manchuria, a German invasion of Russia would reduce the threat to Japan. The Japanese ended up signing a non-aggression pact with the Soviets, and the Soviets funded the Chinese war against Japan, spoiling Japan's value as an ally against Russia.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do so many people believe in ridiculously complicated 9/11 conspiracy theories (controlled demolitions, holographic planes, mini-nukes, etc) instead of simple ones (hijackers were government agents, other people had advanced knowledge, etc)?

I don't believe 9/11 was an "inside job" but I'm willing to entertain the possibility that there are major parts of the story that we don't know.  I wouldn't be surprised if some governments had advance foreknowledge to some degree or another, and if somebody came out tomorrow with evidence that, say, Saudi Arabia's intelligence service was complicit, I probably wouldn't be terribly shocked.

However, I get immediately turned off by most "Truthers" because most of them seem to believe not just that the official story is incomplete, but that the attack itself unfolded completely differently than what everybody saw.  What I don't understand is, why does believing that 9/11 was an inside job require one to believe that the buildings were brought down with pre-placed explosive charges or atomic bombs, or that there were no planes at all even though thousands of people witnessed the impacts right in front of them?  What happened to flights 11, 175, 77, and 93 if there were no hijackings?  I mean, if you're going to believe in conspiracies, couldn't you just believe that somebody up the chain of command in the terrorist organization was a government operative?  That's fantastical, but plausible and doesn't take a carving knife to Occam's Razor like the "fake planes & thermite" theories do.  Why do people go through such intellectual contortions to arrive at conclusions that seem completely absurd?

[Assistant]
Basically the 9/11 truther community is undergoing citation inflation. Here is roughly how it goes:

1. 9/11 truther creates relatively moderate conspiracy theory and posts it somewhere
2. 9/11 truthers see that theory and cite it in their own expanded theory
3. Repeat steps 1-3.

So originally, it was an inside job, and then people accepting that as the 'normal' truth, because they're always looking for conspiracies they look for conspiracies *in the conspiracies*. Over time you get gradually more absurd theories.


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

[User]
ELI5: if they all come from milk, why do cheese, butter, cream and yoghurt all have different nutritional benefits/impacts?

For instance, a bowl of yoghurt is good for me but a bowl of cream isn't? Please explain!

[Assistant] Besides the fact that different parts of the milk - which have different ratios of fat to protein to water - are used for different products, many dairy products rely on bacterial or fungal action. These microbes digest some parts of the milk into new compounds, and change the overall nutritional profile.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] What is it about the dark side makes it so damn hard to leave it?

I'm currently, as I type this, watching the 6th Star Wars, 3rd one released in the original series.

I just got to the part where Luke turns himself in on Endor and asks Vader to come back to the light side and he says he can't.
Why? What's so appealing about the dark side that he completely shut out family and love for his son and is willing to murder his own son to obey a master such as the Emperor?

Is the dark side like a drug or state of depression that clouds everything you know and love?

I love Star Wars, that's just one of the few things I never understood. Why does Vader feel like he HAS to stay with the dark side.

EDIT: Vader just said "It is pointless to resist [the dark side from the emperor] my son."
Does this mean Vader knows the dark side is bad but can't resist? If so, why?

[Assistant]
To understand why the Dark side is so irresistible you have to know what the Jedi go through in training and what they're taught. They're told from a young age to suppress certain emotions and that ruling people is not the Jedi way.

Let's say you're a 14 year old impressionable Padawan. A strange man approaches you and tells you that all of those feelings of anger and lust you've held at bay are things that can actually make you a better, stronger Force user, wield a lightsaber better and create peace instead of sitting back and not interfering.

Of course there is more to the Dark side of the Force than just letting in certain feelings, but that is the start of it, and once you begin to delve into it, do you really want to go back to suppressing yourself again?

Vader is given the choice by Sidious to become more powerful as his Sith apprentice, to save his wife and children, or to be a good Jedi and potentially let his family die. Unfortunately for Vader there are some things that you just can't go back from. By the time Return of the Jedi rolls around, he has murdered countless people across the galaxy to better the Empire, including the slaughter of the children at the Jedi temple.

For Vader it's not a case of being able to resist anymore, it's trying to live with what he has become. Of course he knows that the Sith and Dark side are bad, but he's destroyed the only family he's really had, where else can he go?


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

[User]
ELI5: What happens when you see a tiny flash of one commercial, only to have it cut off by another commercial?

I always imagine the company didn't pay its advertising bill, so it gets yanked at the last minute. I'm *pretty sure* this isn't true.

So ELI5?

[Assistant]
It happens when you're watching a local affiliate of a national network, like ABC or NBC.

The network has satellite feeds (and their own nation-wide commercials) that the local affiliate is to switch over to at various times (like to Letterman or another late prime-time show at 11:30 after the local news).

The local feed has its own commercials (for local advertisers), but the network feed always takes priority. So if the local broadcast runs over by a few seconds and there was supposed to be a local commercial immediately after, sometimes the cutover will cut off the end of the local programming.


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

[User] ELI5: How does sneaking up and knocking someone unconscious from behind really work? Is it at all like in the movies?

[Assistant] No.  A blow to the back of the head/neck can knock someone unconscious(like in the movies) but it is highly likely to lead to some damage or even death(oddly they never show that).  It used to be not uncommon for police to carry blackjacks or the like to deal with unruly suspects in this manner but it was fatal far too often and the practice was phased out.


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

[User]
If black is the most effective color for light absorption, why are plants green?

thanks!

[Assistant] The reason plants use the frequency of irradiation that they do has to do with the machinery plants use to harvest energy from light.  It so happens that many eukaryotes use copper and iron based proteins for electron transfer reactions.  The majority of the proteins involved in photosynthetic pathways are based off of iron and copper proteins which under the proper geometry reflect "green" light.


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

[User]
Can electrical circuits make noise?

My laptop (UX305C) doesn't use a fan nor a mechanical hard drive, but I hear a very soft kind of zzz - zz -zzz noise in especially quiet environments. What might be the cause of this?

Edit: sorry, the title should say "sound."

[Assistant]
Yes.

Ultimately, for any normal electrical circuit to make a sound, it must cause a physical vibration. However, even circuits with no "moving parts" often have inductors, which are usually just coils of wire. The inductor is there because there are rapidly changing voltages, and inductors will often vibrate in response the the rapidly changing voltages. This is the likely source of your problem.

If you were really curious, what you should do is open up the case, and expose the motherboard. If you put a tube/straw in your ear and move it around the motherboard, you will clearly hear it when you're near the component making the noise. There are various coatings that you can apply which will then stop the movement.


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

[User] ELI5: severed limb reattachment (e.g., which tissues in what order, success/fail factors, trauma-to-care time limits, etc.)

[Assistant]
Med student here.

1) connect small vessels and nerves first, then the larger stuff like muscle. Better and easier to do it that way since otherwise you're working around big flesh pounds that are reconnected. So start with nerves and arteries/veins.

2) depends on what limb is severed but in general, the amount of time you have to get to a surgeon is about 4-5 hours. At the 5-6 hour mark tissue starts to die. The reason why reattachment is possible is because of this fact that limbs can survive detached for hours.

3) if you're going to transport a limb to a hospital, put it in a cooler. Don't put it in ice water, don't get it wet, keep it cool but not frozen. If it's a finger or toe, don't put it in your mouth, the bacteria fucks the digit up.


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

[User] ELI5:Why does Quebec want to secede from Canada, and what are the implications of it does?

[Assistant]
Quebec wants to leave Canada because of a long running divide between the English speaking majority and the French speaking minority. The roots of this go back to colonization, during which the English defeated the French and kicked them off the continent, more or less.

Quebec considers themselves to be culturally unique, to the point where they pushed for recognition as a 'country within a country'. They believe by seperating, they will be able to better protect their cultural identity and achieve greater independence from the Anglo ruling class who holds them back.

In reality, there is no such conspiracy. Should Quebec leave, they'll also leave with a substantial debt and faltering revenue -- currently, the province relies on transfer payments from the other provinces to maintain the balance sheet.

They have a pipedream that they'll be able to access the rest of Canada without a passport, that tourism dollars will actually flow into Quebec and that they'll be able to continue using the Canadian dollar with a seat at the Bank of Canada. So far, none of these seem to be realistic expectations.

50/50 odds that within 20 years, the country of Quebec would be bankrupt and rejoin Canada out of desperation; 60/40 we invade them within the century and annex the territory.

On a practical note, they are unlikely to be able to pass the referendum: current levels of support for separatism are around the same levels they were in the 1980s -- substantially lower than their last vote [1994?]. There is also the complexity of dealing with the Natives and their treaty rights, who would likely side with the Federal government, and the Anglo-Quebecois who will never vote for separatism.


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

[User] ELI5: The theory that the universe is a hologram.

[Assistant] All the holographic principle means is that the information contained in a volume, can fit on it's boundary. To try to ELI5: If you had a sphere filled with particles, the state of all those particles will fit on the surface of the sphere. Thus you don't "need" the 3-dimensional sphere, all you need is the 2-dimensional surface to describe the state of the system.


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

[User] eli5 If there is no oxygen in space, how do our rockets produce fire and how do things burn in space?

[Assistant]
They take the oxygen with them in tanks, it's called *oxidizer*. This mixes with the fuel inside the rocket booster itself and then it gets jetted out to push itself. All this stuff weighs a lot, so engineers try to use gravity and shorter routes to get things where they are going with as little fuel as possible.

There has also been exploration into the topic of nuclear engines for rockets.


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

[User]
[Sonic] Where do the chaos emeralds go after each game?

Sonic has to collect them each time, so why doesn't he just keep them around him? And where do they go after he uses them? Do they disappear?

[Assistant]
According to Sonic Adventure 2, when they are fully used, their power is drained. They are no longer conduits of the primal Chaos energy, and just large grey gems. As such, other chaos emeralds must be found.

Other than that, say if/when they don't use all of the power, it is likely that either Robotnik or another badnik later steals them, Knuckles takes them back to the Floating Island, they are lost through some sort of misadventure, or Tails, Rotor and/or Nate experiments on them and has them secured away in an inaccessible location.


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

[User]
[Suicide Squad Movie] What exactly makes Harley a meta human?

Harley kills those creatures with nothing but a baseball bat while trained soldiers die from them. Did falling in the chemical vat give her some sort of power?

[Assistant] Yeah, pretty much.  There's really no other explanation for her even *surviving* the events of the movie besides super-strength and super-durability, and the only reason for her to have those powers is the vat of chemicals incident.


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

[User] [Marvel] Is Domino's "luck" just present in combat or does it extend to everyday life, for example could she use it to win the lottery?

[Assistant]
I just skimmed the wiki. It says her powers constantly emanate from her, but in order to effect something, it has to be something she is actively engaged in.  So the lottery wouldnt work since that's just picking numbers and waiting for the draw. Sports based gambling, like horse racing also wouldn't work since she isn't actively engaged in the race.

Using it for card games might work though. Especially poker.


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

[User]
I found a suspicious wifi network at a cafe with a similar name and a login portal that tries to look legit but isnt. How bad is it for someone who connected to it?

I let the owner know and didnt connect.

What I wanted to know was how bad could it be for someone who did connect? What information could be exposed?

I know passwords are encrypted for things like FB prior to being sent over the internet. Does that help stop hackers?

[Assistant]
One issue is that yes passwords are encrypted on real sites, but this fake network could have local fake versions of things like amazon,facebook etc.

When you log onto this network and log into those sites everything may seem fine but theyve just got your username and password because you have been redirected to their identical looking version of those sites which can capture your inputs.


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

[User]
Is there an industrial or structural reason that any recyclable plastic bottle most always has a non-recyclable plastic cap?

I have looked pretty far and wide for an answer. The only reason I could think of would be that bottle makers want a harder plastic cap, either for the threading or to prevent it breaking, but if high density polyethylene is strong enough for the container, why isn't it strong enough for the cap?

Can you not dye HDPE?

Is polypropaline just more durable?

[Assistant]
Both polyethylene and polypropylene are thermoplastic polymers. That is, they can be heated up and reformed, thus 100% recyclable. This is in comparison to thermosetting polymers like Bakelite, which cannot be heated up and reformed, as they will break down when heated.

The main reasons that you are told not to recycle the polypropylene cap:

Polyethylene and polypropylene have different melting temperatures. They need to be processed separately.

Also, the bottles are crushed by the recycling facility before shipment (if they're sent out to melt at another facility) to save space. Leaving the cap on would cause problems with injuries and the crushing process. Polypropylene is harder, and would likely shatter instead of compressing nicely like the bottles.

Finally, the human element is the last line of defense against making sure extraneous materials aren't traveling with the polyethylene bottles down the line towards the melt. Workers would be a lot more likely to miss the small caps, which would then remain solid as the bottles are melted.

Edit: Forgot to answer why the cap is polypropylene instead of polyethylene. One, polypropylene is cheaper. Two, polypropylene is one of the next best things to Teflon for "slipperyness," so the cap comes off a lot easier than it would compared to PE on PE.


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

[User]
ELI5: What exactly is happening when Chromecast is mirroring a phone/tablet screen?

Is the phone/tablet literally just sending all its display data through the WiFi to the router which is then read by the Chromecast?  Or say I'm streaming video to my tablet, then casting the screen... Does this mean my tablet is streaming from the router, then back TO the router, and then back out of the router to the Chromecast?   And typical routers can handle all that easily? And if so, why couldn't we do this a long time ago?

[Assistant]
So there are two different ways that Chromecast works:

The best way is when you are streaming a supported video or supported app. Then it's very efficient - the app just tells the Chromecast what url to load, and if the content is protected gives it a one-time "key" allowing it to access that content. Then the Chromecast accesses that url and plays that media directly, and your phone or computer is no longer involved.

However, the other way a Chromecast works is that your device can stream video directly to it. So yeah, when you mirror your screen, that's exactly what's happening - your device is downloading the video over your router, decoding it, displaying it, then re-encoding it, streaming it back over the same router to your Chromecast. It's very inefficient, but it works.

Your router can handle it, easily. A video stream is around 5 Mbit/sec and your router can probably handle 50 Mbit/sec easily.

The hard part is actually compressing the video. Phones and laptops from a few years ago weren't powerful enough to compress live video of the whole screen in real time.


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

[User] Why are water bottles always #1 plastic, milk jugs always #2, and yogurt/margarine containers always #5?

[Assistant] I am a packaging engineer. The numbers refer to different types of plastics which all have different properties - strength, barrier to oxygen or moisture vapor, how it reacts to temp extremes etc. There are a variety of reasons the packaging is chosen including how the product will be filled, how it will be stored, consumer needs and product compatibility with the package. Example PP holds up well to heat which is why it is used for hot fill applications, microwave trays and sealant films for steam able veggie bags. Also you might see "other" which can mean either it is a coex (think a sandwich of different plastics to take advantage of all the features of the different layers) or that the plastic doesn't have a number assigned. Example of a coex "other" is ketchup bottles use a coex containing EVOH which is an oxygen barrier and keeps your ketchup from oxidizing and turning brown, since EVOH dissolves in water it gets sandwiched between PET. (Sorry for typos on phone)


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

[User] A fever breaking is a term used commonly to describe a cold or illness going into a less severe phase, and is even used in medical papers, what if any is the scientific measurement to quantify it breaking?

[Assistant]
In medicine having a fever or being febrile is generally considered to be a temperature greater than 100.4F. Sepsis criteria includes fever of more than 100.4F (38C) or less than 96.8F (36C) as hypothermia can be a sign of infection as well.
A fever breaking is a laymans term and is also outdated as it really has no meaning in modern medicine. Its based on the notion that some illnesses often accompany a fever and after it (a self limiting virus) runs its course the fever resolves as the body recovers.
But you should know that the fever is NOT the illness. Fever is just a response by the body. Just because a fever ends does not mean the illness is ended. Different illnesses have different patterns. Some may have a constant fever, some intermittent, some have recurring patterns of days or months. And treating a fever is not usually necessary aside for comfort reasons unless it gets severely high around 105-106 where febrile seizures are a concern, especially in babies/children.


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

[User]
ELI5: why cats hang open their mouths a bit when they smell something odd

edit: thank you for the answers!

[Assistant] Not an expert, but cats have something called a jacobsons organ or vomeronasal organ located on the roof of their mouth. It is particularly good at detecting pheromones. Breathing through the open mouth would expose the organs to more of the the chemical in the air. The flehmen response is the funny face they make to direct more of the chemicals to the organ.


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

[User]
ELI5 - Why diamond has little to no resale value?

Popularly said that diamonds value drop by over 25-50% the sec you buy it. I know that diamonds value is low key de beers bullshit.
But what I wanna know is how do they calculate the diamond resale value and rational behind 50% resale value of something that never breaks or damages. How do they come up with this shit?

[Assistant]
>How do they come up with this shit?

Same as anything else - the price is what people are willing to pay for.

People typically buy diamonds for engagement/wedding rings or other special occasions. Especially for people locked into the idea of a diamond in particular, try telling someone you're giving them a used diamond. It may not make LOGICAL sense, but people don't act logically.


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

[User] Why is copying 1000 1MB files so much slower than copying 1 1GB file, given that the same amount of data is being copied?

[Assistant]
Any process has overhead - process time needed to set up and tear down that process.  Overhead is generally fixed, or close to it.

As an example, let's say that copying a file take 3 operations to set up and 2 to tear down, plus 1 operation per MB transferred.  For a 1000MB file, you'd have:

    3+1000+2 = 1005 operations.

For 1000 1MB files:

   (3+1+2)*1000 = 6000 operations

That's not precisely how it would go down but you see the point.


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

[User]
[Dragon Ball Z] What exactly did Dr. Gero do to 17 and 18?

Androids 17 and 18 obviously had some work done to them to make them considerably stronger than the average humans, but they still retain a lot of their human biology (They are both shown to be completely fertile). What exactly did Dr. Gero do to them?

[Assistant] Despite being called Androids, they have very little mechanical parts. The only machine parts they have in them are the emergency deactivation controller and the self-destruction device. It would be more accurate to call them bio-engineered super-humans.


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

[User]
ELI5: How has no country been aware of the US hacking their systems?

I really just don't get this. How can these massive technological companies and international powers not have had any inclination that their telephones and computers were being hacked?

[Assistant]
Tapping is very different from hacking. Hacking is much more detectable, because it generally involves compromising a device you are using.

The kind of tapping under discussion here is just making a copy of the data as it travels over the line, not at the destination. The equivalent metaphor would be the post office taking pictures of postcards as they go through the system. Would you know when the postcard arrives if the post office made a copy of it?


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

[User]
Does every piece of matter in the universe really affect every other piece (even negligibly)? (Physics of Douglas Adams's Total Perspective Vortex)

Chapter 11 of *The Restaurant at the End of the Universe* by Douglas Adams starts with a blurb on the inspiration behind the Total Perspective Vortex--a fictional machine that gives the user a "sense of proportion" re their place in the universe.
> "...since every piece of matter in the Universe is in some way affected by every other piece of matter in the Universe, it is in theory possible to extrapolate the whole of creation-every sun, every planet, their orbits, their composition and their economic and social history from, say, one small piece of fairy cake."

I'm sure--pretty sure--that the latter sort of extrapolation is ludicrous. But I wondered about the first part.

I've always assumed that the sum of forces on one body due to the presence of another body drop to ***effectively*** zero at a large enough distance. But is there some distance at which it is zero **in exact arithmetic**?

(Sorry if this is too broad or poorly phrased).

[Assistant]
An important consideration here is the finite speed of the propagation of information (the speed of light), which means that an event can only influence other events in its future light-cone; therefore it has no effect on anything which is occurring simultaneously with it.

A piece of cake on earth would eventually influence events on the other side of the galaxy in a negligible way, but it would take 100,000 years for the signal to propagate.


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

[User] [Teen Titans] How does Raven control the effect of her spells if every single one is "Azarath Metrion Zinthos"?

[Assistant] It not like harry potter. Raven decides what the spell does, she needs only to concencrate and clear her emotions for the duration of casting. The words she speaks are like her personal mantra to help herself focus.


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

[User] What is the feeling of hunger? Is it a simple matter of needing something edible to fill up volume in your stomach? Is it a biologically driven signal that your body wants certain nutrients? Or something else?

[Assistant]
If you think about it, hunger is an incredibly complicated system that takes into account stomach fullness (the physical stretchin you were talking about), nutrient in the intestines, nutrients in the blood, fat stores, and higher order functions like smell and taste. Not only that, but it integrates this into the pleasure of eating, the desire to seek out food, and satiety.

The field of "hunger research," or more approrpately Energy Homeostasis, began in the 70s when Jeff Friedman at Rockafeller University discovered a mouse in the world-famous Jackson Labs. A strain of mice got a spontaneous mutation that made them morbidly obese. It wasn't due to fat deposition, but due to the fact that the mice over-ate, essentially always feeling hungry. These mice were discovered to have mutations in the gene encoding the hormone leptin, the "thinness hormone."

I was then discovered that leptin was a hormone secreted by fat tissues, and it's receptor was discovered to e in the brain. This was one of the first instances where a body signal affected the CNS, and led to a huge field that exists today.
If we think about it today, it makes a lot of sense: hunger and food-finding in higher organisms such as humans and mice requires higher order tasks such as memory of how to find food, etc. also, every physiologic system requires an "integrator" to control it and maintain homeostasis. The kidney for calcium, the brainstem for blood pressure, and other system. Because these homeostac systems required multiple organs, the brain was usually the integrator.

As it turned out, it was previously known that the hypothalamus was important for body temperature regulation. It is the site of regulation of fever-inducing compounds, sweating centers, everything related to maintaining heat. You can imagine how it makes sense that body metabolism is related to energy intake though hunger pathways.

More recently, finer biomedical techniques allowed us to zoom in on other players in the hunger system. Leptin generally comes from the fat tissue, but it acts on a network of neurons that respond to a host of other hormones and chemicals as well. Common ones you might know are insulin for pancreatic function, in incretins like glucagon for liver energy states, blood glucose for...well...blood sugar, and even some fats and cholesterols.
From the leptin-sensitive ineuron system, other hormones have been discovered:CCK for stomach distension, orexin for the actual sensation of hunger, NPY and AGRP for the signal of starvation, melanocortins (another very interesting class or hormones) for satiety.

Well, These hormones acting in these neurons don't only stay in the hypothalamus. They act on seroton and dopamine systems in the brain to elicit the effects owe associate with eating.

As said before, this is a very exciting field that is being pursued by many institutions internationally. However, how exactly do all these parts work together, what other hormones and neuron networks are there, and how do these signals affect other regions of the brain as still unknown.


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

[User]
How does 14nm lithography work?

I am wondering what technology the semiconductor industry utilizes to achieve 14nm feature sizes. I searched the web for a while but could only find stuff about Moore's law and why 14nm is great, but nothing tangible about the actual manufacturing process. Would be great if someone could help out!

Edit: I should have made more clear that I'm not interested in a general explanation of lithography but rather in the specifics of the 14nm lithography process, especially how the feature size can be so small.

[Assistant]
The two main technologies used are photolithography and electron beam lithography. Generally, you take a silicon wafer, cover it in a material that is resistant to acid but sensitive to light (called a resist), and then expose it to UV light that is shone through a "mask" that lets light shine only on specific spots (this is similar to how cameras focus an image onto film). This induces a chemical change in the resist, such that the exposed parts can be washed away. Then, you expose the whole thing to acid so that the silicon that is not covered in resist gets etched, while the rest of it gets protected. When you remove the resist afterwards, you have a patterned surface. Electron beam lithography is similar, except instead of exposing light you use a beam of electrons, whose path is controlled with electric and magnetic fields, like in an old TV screen. This is higher resolution, but slower.

Another technology is focused ion beam milling, which is sort of like using a pressure washer on a wood deck, except instead of water it's a beam of ionized atoms and instead of grime being blasted away it's the surface atoms.


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

[User] ELI5 Why when you pull a material suddenly it snaps where as if you applied the same force gradually it stretches.

[Assistant] Most basically put, it all depends on what is called strain rate. All materials have defects within the structure, as you move a material the defect moves as well. When the defect can no longer move, the material breaks. Slow movement of the material allows the defect to move within the structure, quick movement restricts the movement of the defect and causes failure.


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

[User]
[Dr.Who]what exactly is a Time War?

What were they fighting for?how does one even fight in a time?

Wow really interesting stuff! Thanks for answers guys.

[Assistant] The problem with time travel is that you are never really sure of what happened, even if you experienced it yourself. As battles were fought, each side would travel back in time to account for the most recent strategy of success. This lead to millions of sentients dying over and over again. Each side kept traveling backward and forward trying to manipulate already fought battles for their own benefit. That's what made it the great time war.


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

[User]
[Game Of Thrones] If Westeros ever reaches modern-day tech/society levels, how will the characters and events of the series be portrayed in films and television?

Centuries later, Westeros looks like modern-day Earth, with skyscrapers and cars and computers.

If the events of *Game Of Thrones* were made into a movie, how will the characters be remembered and portrayed so long after theyve faded from living memory?

[Assistant]
Depends on who writes the histories and what verifiable texts survive. Caligula is portrayed as an absolute maniac but there's a school of thought that its propaganda, that after his assassination he was pretty thoroughly vilified and made into a monster. A lot of the info regarding him was written well after his death (at least a hundred years later).

The fact at the end of GoT Sam tells Tyrion he isn't in the book ASOIAF is a pretty huge omission. His kidnapping by Kat Stark essentially started the ball rolling, he was hand to Joffery,  was the mastermind behind the victory at the Blackwater, killed his father/ kingshand, was then Dany's hand and was instrumental in her assassination but no mention of him in a book that's likely going to be a go to source regarding these events.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Say a Jedi knight mind-tricks a speeder salesman to give him a vehicle for free, all so he can run down a bank robber in an exciting chase. The speeder is totally destroyed in the process. Since the salesman got screwed over, will the Jedi make sure the Republic reimburses him the money?

[Assistant]
The speeder salesman claims that the speeder was stolen and files an insurance claim.  What happens after that depends on the local laws.

Jedi wouldn't go after bank robbers anyway.  The local authorities would.


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

[User]
How do orcs work in Lord of The Rings?

Uruk-hai are dead elves, but are all orcs just dead things from various species? Shouldn't we see dwarf orcs ect.?

[Assistant]
Uruk-hai aren't dead anything - their origins are hidden but it's probable that they are hybrids of orcs and men bred by Saruman - their man-blood is what allows them to stand daylight.

Orcs are elves that were corrupted by Morgoth thousands of years ago - how they *go on* reproducing isn't known, though it almost certainly doesn't involve corrupting *more* elves, there just aren't enough left to account for the vast number of orcs/goblins in existence. It's possible that there are no 'other species' orcs because none of them inspired the same jealousy in Morgoth that the creation of the elves did, and he didn't feel the need to work with 'lesser' stock.

(These are the most commonly 'accepted' explanations, though neither is absolutely word-of-god endorsed because it's often not specified, for example, it's never made exactly plain that the man-orcs referred to in the book *are* Uruks, but it's a fair assumption).


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

[User]
ELI5: why is it that in all movies and TV shows, characters never end a conversation on the phone by saying "goodbye"? Instead they simply hangup, regardless of genre or tone.

I've observed this every time I've watched a movie or TV show.

[Assistant] Movies and TV shows are supposed to show only the bits that matter. Screen time is limited and you want to keep your viewers focused. You don't see characters having their breakfast, having a shower, shaving, taking a poop, etc because they are mundane and don't contribute to the plot.


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

[User]
[Fullmetal Alchemist/Brotherhood] Could immortality actually be achieved through the philosopher stone and not just extreme longevity ? Like could u have an alchemist turn you and a few other people into a small philosopher stone when you're near death and then just create bodies for u later.

Then just separate each soul into a new younger body and  repeat ?

[Assistant]
You and a *few* other people?  No, absolutely not.

The philosopher's stone doesn't really create *limitless* power, it's more like a super battery that relies on harvesting so many human lives that you wouldn't feasibly use up all the fuel.  You'd deplete the battery on trying to transfer distinct souls alone, never mind constructing new living bodies for them to inhabit.

There are also issues of whether soul/identity is truly transferred or whether the alchemist is simply constructing their interpretation of that person.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is a 4g connection almost useless now when a few years ago it was perfectly fine for streaming audio and video?

Whenever my phone shows an LTE connection, I have really fast speeds and can stream anything. If I drop to a 4g connection, and can barely load text.

[Assistant] When 4G was "cool" there were very few users.  Now there are lots, far too many, and LTE seeks to move traffic out of 4G except for edge areas with poor access.  Alas, when you're there, everybody in the area is 4G and data users are much, much more common.  So, yes, it is un-excellent.


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

[User] Is there a protocol or concept on how we would define date and time on other planets?

[Assistant]
Two main options, one is much more practical than the other.

1. Use the characteristics of the other planet to define the units of time, just as we do on Earth.  This includes the orbit around its star, any sort of satellite (lunar) orbit, rotation around its axis, etc.  Just like on Earth how there are solar and lunar calendars still in use to this day.

2. Normalize everything to Earth days and Earth Years.  This is highly impractical for living on *another planet* but can be useful during transit in between planets.  Our astronomical values are already highly Earth-centric, such as the distance unit of AU's (avg. distance between Earth and the Sun), Earth days and Earth years.  However, these are intended for easier relative understanding, not so much practical use of potential future space travelers.

I would like to point out two additional things:

* Ever notice why there are 12 months, 24 hours in a day, 60 minutes and seconds in an hour and minute respectively, 360 degrees total in a circle?  It is because these numbers are *anti-primes* meaning that they have multiple divisible factors and are *versatile* for the sake of the ordering and division of units.  It is completely arbitrary how many numbers we assign to these values, as you can divide up a specific amount of time into any units that you want, although it is more intuitive to use ones that have multiple divisors.

* Ever wonder how Earth time zones were first made and why?  Prior to the invention of the locomotive, horse-travel was simply too slow and inconsistent to warrant there being different time zones.  You would base your arrival time as, well, the time it is at your destination.  This was still the case in the early days of locomotive travel (3:10 to Yuma, anyone?!) where the name of the specific train ride had the destination time printed on it as its unique identifier.  It wasn't until a little later when people realized that it was a huge pain in the butt to have to keep two separate times for long-distance travel (both the departure and arrival times *at their specific physical locations) and their actual time of travel.


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

[User] ELI5: If all chemical reactions are the result of creation/termination of bonds between the electrons how is it that the number of protons identifies the chemical properties of an atom?

[Assistant]
Number of protons decides the electron configuration of atoms. And so has the most significant impact on it's chemical properties.

But different isotopes (same proton number different mass) can have an impact but usually it just effects speed of reaction etc not major chemical properties since isotops share the same electron configuration.


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

[User]
[Incredibles 2] How were they just finding out about Jack-Jacks powers?

Did they not notice what happened when Syndrome was kidnapping him? Especially when he was on fire. Plus they had a mask on him when The Underminer showed up so they had to be aware of it.

[Assistant]
They couldnt see exactly what happened with Syndrome and Bob discovered Jack-Jacks powers very soon after. The events of the second movie immediately follow the first.

Jack-Jack was with them so needed a disguise. Cant have a recognisable baby blow their covers.


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

[User]
Does science necessarily assume anything about epistemology?

When doing science and talking about things such as truth, knowledge and the scientific method, what are the necessary assumptions we need to make/positions we we need take about epistemology? Does science itself need to "hold" any particular views on epistemology? What schools of thought/theories of epistemology are most/least "validating" regarding science?

[Assistant] That rather depends on what you think "science" is. The answers you'd get for this question if you're a scientific realist (a la many a STEMlord) are wildly different from those you'd get if you're a social constructivist (a la Latour & Woolgar). So unfortunately you'll have to choose a certain view of science before being able to figure out what sort of epistemic commitments (if any) "science" has.


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

[User] ELI5: How is burning crosses by KKK not considered blasphemy by them if they consider themselves Christian? What is their reasoning?

[Assistant]
It's not that they're burning a cross, rather they're creating a fiery cross. This idea has a long history but it dates back to Scotland and Scandinavia, where a fiery cross was a declaration of war and a request for clan members to rally to defend the land.

The KKK continue this, in that they burn crosses to make it clear to individuals that the community is not okay with them or their actions.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] Why don't they use the/a Pensive to get witness testimony to resolve issues?

After the final defeat of You Know Who, the wizarding world at large was shocked to learn any number of truths that had been concealed by both the ministry and Albus Dumbledore for many reasons. Here are a few examples:

1. The innocence of Sirius Black and truth behind the betrayal and murder of James and Lily Potter.

2. The veracity of Harry Potter's claims during his 4th year of You Know Who's second rise to power and the events during the Triwizard Tournament.

3. Claims by former/renounced Death Eaters after the first and second fall of You Know Who.

Why did the suspected or disbelieved parties not volunteer or be requested to produce their memories to be examined through the Pensieve? Even if it is a unique magical artifact produced by Albus Dumbledore, there seems to be very little way to tamper with it or use it to convey false or altered memories without the alteration being obvious, and it is possible for the memories of people other than Albus Dumbledore to be shown, as demonstrated by Harry Potter's testimony of his examination of Horace Slughorn's altered memories during his 6th year. The first example above seems like it would have produced a swift acquittal for Sirius Black had he presented his memories of the Secret Keeper Binding ceremony involving Pettigrew or his confrontation with Pettigrew, and Harry Potter could easily have shown precisely what happened in the cemetery at Little Hangleton and proved the true loyalties of many supposedly "renounced" Death Eaters. Even if it is considered taboo or an invasion of privacy, surely the benefits to the suspected/disbelieved outweighs the cons?

Edit: I apologize for the misspelling in the title. I spelled it correctly in the rest of the post at least...

[Assistant] Slughorn altered his memory. As Dumbledore said, it was clumsily done, and it shows that it had been altered. If wizards were considering committing a crime, they would just research methods of concealing their true memories and they'd do it properly.


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

[User]
[marvel] Why is Iceman considered so powerful?

 I see he has been called an Omega level mutant but compared to others with similar designation he seems downright pedestrian.

I get he can influence world wide weather, but not easily, and he has never actually done it (as far as i can tell) Other omega level mutants, like Franklin Richards and  Jean gray clearly outstrip him signficaintly.

What is the deal with iceman?

[Assistant] He has been shown to prevent a nuclear explosion. He has created ice walls so thick and strong it contained the hulk. With a thought he can freeze the molecules in a person and dissipate their body. He has the ability to block other mutants from accessing their powers. In organic ice form you can destroy his body and he can still reform it essentially making him close to unkillable. He can use surrounding moisture to grow in size gaining superhuman strength in the process. Even though he has done all these things he still hasn't tapped all of his potential.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] In terms of pure ability and skill, which Republic-era Force wielder are the closest to Luke around the time of the end of The Empire Strikes Back?

Or, basically, if you were gonna have Luke face off with someone that could use the Force and wanted to have a fair fight, who would it be?

[Assistant]
You need to keep in mind that Luke was basically given only crash-course on how to access the Force, which barely lasted a couple of weeks by time of ESB. A padawan of his age in Old Republic times would be more or less superior to him in almost every way.

To find his equal, you'll need to find someone equally wide-eyed and untrained in using the Force, or some shamanic Force-Tradition. Although in old canon even shamanic Witches of Dathomir swiftly proven themselves just as badass as post ROTJ-Luke.


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

[User] When will the James Webb Telescope start taking images?

[Assistant] From the FAQs at Webb.nasa.gov: In the third month: From 60 to 90 days after launch we will align the primary mirror segments so that they can work together as a single optical surface. We will also turn on and operate the MIRI. By the end of the third month we will be able to take the first science-quality images. Also by this time, Webb will complete its journey to its L2 orbit position.


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

[User]
How does an ovary decide which egg to drop?

When the body drops an egg from the ovary in anticipation of being fertilized,  how is the specific egg chosen? Is there a queue of eggs waiting in a funnel-like system that switches every other month? Is it completely random?

[Assistant] They don't necessary drop in order, as if they were on a production line.  Multiple eggs begin to start towards the path of "dropping" at a time.  The egg that gets to drop is the first one to grow large enough to rupture (corpus hemorrhagicum). That rupture release hormones that revert the other candidates.


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

[User]
How many dinosaurs populated the earth during their most populous period?

I'm not talking about how many species, but how many individual dinosaurs walked (and swam and flew) the earth at once?

[Assistant]
There's a lot of people gettting downvoted for saying the simple truth; there really is no way to put an accurate number on it.

Fossil preservation is exceedingly rare, and only happens in certain environments.  Those are not good datapoints to extrapolate continent-wide populations from. As well as this we don't know what proportion of the dinosaur fossil record we have discovered.  Have we identified 0.5% of dinosaurs or 50%? The error bars are big.

The only way to get anything like a sensible number out is to look at modern equivalents and compare what their frequency is like in modern environments.  Unfortunately, there are very few modern equivalent environments as the biota has changed so phenomenally (the development of grasses in the last 65 million years being the prime example).  We also don't have any pristine environments with large predators that we can accurately draw numbers from.


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

[User] ELI5: why didnt humanity advance technologically for thousands of years when it comes to things like electricity and other electrical power devices like WIFI, but now humanity is advancing rather rapidly?

[Assistant]
The ability to produce excess stuff allowed more human resources to be focused on new technology and methods. This further increases productivity (since we started at a low level) and this frees up even more human resources to do new stuff.

Prior to the industrialization, most (say around 80-90%) of the world's population had to work in agriculture (or very nearby occupations - transportation, etc) simply to feed societies. This kind of economic system is very sensitive to weather etc and things like hunger, disease and famine were not uncommon. Basically the vast majority of human effort went to provide the basics like food and shelter - education, science etc were restricted to a small elite.

The industrial revolution meant that transportation became much easier, things like cloth became easier to produce, labor moved from farms to cities. Cities are a great form of organization for human interaction and innovation.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Why don't astromech droids speak common?

Throughout all the movies and shows we can see that astromech droids serve a major role on spaceships of all purposes and sizes so why do they only talk in beeps and boops? Sure, many people that work with them can understand them but wouldn't it make it a lot more useful if they could communicate with everyone?

[Assistant]
Leaving a language barrier helps to keep slaves in line.

Because that's what most Star Wars droids are. We are given all the indications they are sentient, yet they are treated like property, and continually mind-wiped to keep them submissive.


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

[User]
ELI5: How was it so easy for America to fly into Hiroshima and Nagasaki and drop those bombs without any opposition?

I'm watching a few documentaries on these events and tried looking up this answer. The pilots stated that they just flew over these cities, dropped the bombs and left without any resistance. How could Japan not see an unidentified airplane on a radar and pursue it?

[Assistant]
At that point in the war, the Japanese navy and air force was pretty much destroyed, they had very little left in the form of air defense.  By August 1944, the Japanese navy was down to using kamikaze pilots that pretty much only knew how to take off, and sort of fly their plane.

The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a full year later, in August 1945. Japan had almost no naval or air defense, so even if they saw the bombers on the radar, all they could do is point at the screen and watch.


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

[User] How do the crew of the Federation starship Voyager keep running into the same groups of people when theyre traveling in a straight line at rapid speed away from that area of space?

[Assistant]
In addition to wordserious's explination, Voyager also wasn't always able to travel in a straight line.  They often had to take extensive detours around claimed space when the locals wouldn't give them permission to travel.  Voyager also generally traveled a more "interesting" course rather than just blank space.  They hoped by doing so they might find quicker methods of travel to get home or additional resources to supply the ship.

Had they desired, they could have just left the galactic plane and headed across the great open space.  But that would have taken the full length of time and they may not have had the neccessary supplies to make it.  In addition to not getting there until they were all extremely old.


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

[User]
Why are we the only animal with the need to wipe after we go to the bathroom?

If I don't wipe once I feel the burning sensation throughout the day, but pretty much every other animal has a "no wipe" policy. do all animals feel this and ignore it or is there an actual scientific explanation for why we need (or desire) to do something that other animals do not?

[Assistant] Many animals prolapse their rectum when defecating while humans do not. Other animals do manually clean themselves with various methods (like licking). When defecation is complete, the animal then reduces the prolapse to normal position and and remaining fecal material is stored in the distal rectum for the next round. For humans, after defecating there may be fecal material left around the anus, which can cause irritation.


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

[User] CMV:There isn't one place where blacks have become the majority that has improved the area.

[Assistant]
Harlem Renaissance (1920s)?  As blacks moved in, property values rose and the neighborhood became a cultural powerhouse.

Many people associate Harlem with high crime rates and poor property values, but it's important to note that this decline occurred in the 1960s-1970s (long *after* the Harlem Renaissance), and that the decline occurred after a decrease in the black population (1950s-1960s).


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

[User]
ELI5: How is the universe a hologram and what does that mean for me as a person?

I'm trying to wrap my head around this but Im too stupid.

[Assistant]
We get this question at least once a day.

It's not a hologram in the sense of being projected by something. It's just a mathematical interpretation that allows you to *think of* information about an area as being determined by information about its boundary.


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

[User]
What do living organisms do to prevent bacteria from decomposing them that dead organisms are unable to do?

Basically why does decomposition begin after death?

[Assistant] Our bodies form many barriers that stop bacteria from entering our tissues. Even though we have bacteria on our skin, in our gut and many other places, we have very specialized cells lining these areas. They defend our bodies by numerous mechanisms: secretions that capture bacteria, cilia that push bacteria away from sensitive areas, VERY tight connections between cells that does not allow the passage of bacteria, and defence cells that ingest bacteria and bind antigens are some of these defences. When we die, our cells will also die as our heart stops and oxygen is no longer being delivered to the tissues. as the cells die, they can no longer perform these defensive functions. they may also lyse, releasing proteins and other molecules which the bacteria can thrive on. Consequently the bacteria and other microbes can cross our barriers and invade our bodies.


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

[User]
ELI5: Where do nicknames for enemy soldiers come from?

In the US the bad guys are "Charlie" in the UK they are "Jerry" I assume that other countries have similar names for enemy troops. Where do the names come from?

[Assistant]
>In the US the bad guys are "Charlie"

No they aren't. That specifically refers to Vietnamese forces in the Vietnam war. The Vietcong (VC) is "Victor Charlie" in radio speak. That's where the charlie comes from.

>in the UK they are "Jerry"

Again, it refers to just Germans. Not just any aggressor. Jerry is just an abbreviation of German.


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

[User]
[Skyrim] How much does the average city guard make?

Does it depend on the hold/area that they're guarding? Or is it a constant rate across the whole land? A guard in Whiterun said he'd wanted to buy Breezehome which implies they were earning a decent amount.

[Assistant]
The Skyrim economy is a mess. Whole cities are often inundated with high-priced, niche goods that the local merchants are incapable of reselling, and for some reason, they never refuse the purchase. A single Daedric Warhammer (while rare) has a rough value of 4,000 Septims, and can cause even an accomplished smith and shop owner to tie up *all* of their capital in that one item. This becomes a major problem when there is literally no one outside of the Jarl or a wandering adventurer who can afford to buy it. To deal with this, merchants must either break down the expensive item into less valuable components or arrange complicated multi-level trades with other merchants, often in other regions. This takes time, and should result in periods of recession and depression in the holds. Yet the flow of money and goods remains constant throughout Skyrim.

How does all this effect guards? Well, keeping those avenues of trade open and safe is *incredibly* important. If the hold's best smith were to lose their investment in one of those Daedric Warhammers to thieves or brigands, that smith would likely go out of business, and the realm would suffer. Same thing for the local potion master, general store owner, and enchanter. So guards are employed to ensure that those trade routes are maintained. Given the value of their task, it stands to reason that being a hold guard, while not prestigious or terribly exciting (minus the occasional dragon attack), is a very lucrative position. Speaking of dragon attacks, the recent upswing in on-the-job casualties among guards does nothing to scare potential applicants away from the job, as vacancies are filled almost immediately, indicating a high degree of interest in becoming a guard.

Based on the relative need for the position and the near instant replacement rate, we can assume that being a hold guard is an  incredibly profitable job.


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

[User]
I've decided that I am not a fan of existence in general. Which books explore this idea?

I know next to nothing about philosophy, so forgive me if this question is too silly sounding.

RecentIy I got exposed to the ideas of anti-natalism. I myself don't have a particularly good life, so these ideas made sense to me.

Today I watched Dominion, a documentary about factory farming. I knew of course that it was a horror show, but it's the details that get you.

I could rightfully blame humanity for these atrocities, but I want to go a step further and say that existence itself is garbage because these atrocities are at all possible and there are no "built-in" safeguards against them.

I am sure that people far smarter than myself have considered these things.

I'd prefer contemporary authors that repackage old ideas in a more accessible form.

[Assistant] Thomas Ligotti's *The Conspiracy Against the Human Race* is probably what you're looking for. Though Ligotti isn't regarded as a philosopher *per se*, as he's known better for his horror fiction, this is his non-fiction presentation of his pessimistic philosophy.


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

[User]
ELI5: What exactly is "hacking" and is it like how it is in the movies?

I'm talking about those scenes in movies where people are "hacking" into websites and accounts within a matter of seconds. Is it really like that in real life?

Can you even get to a point where you're so good at "hacking" that you're able to easily access accounts or is it just Hollywood nonsense.

[Assistant]
Imagine you see a building. Its one of those company buildings that has automatic doors, but these automatic doors only open from the inside so people can walk out. You think this is interesting, and you want to know how it works. It could work a couple of ways, it could have a weight sensor, or it could have a motion sensor. You dont see a floor pad, so it couldnt be a weight sensor. You notice that theres a gap in between the doors and you happen to have a can of compressed air that has a straw that will fit inside the gap. You figure if its a motion sensor, it should sense the dust the compressed air moves so you stick the straw through the gap and spray air. The door opens.

This is hacking. Typically you think of hacking as computer hacking, but hacking really is just getting things to do something they werent intended to do. Computer hacking is typically seeing a system, investigating how it works, and seeing if you can get it to do something it wasnt intended to do

Edit: Thank you kind stranger for the gold!


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

[User]
[Lovecraft Mythos] It' been about a century of scientific (and cultural) advancement since ol' H.P. first informed us of the great and terrible Elder Things that lurk in the shadows. Are they still as incomprehensible and madness-inducing as they were in his time?

Or are these ancient and (formerly) unknowable things now accepted fields of study?

Are there stressed out grad-students pirating copies of the Necronomicon rather than paying 800$ for a textbook version?

[Assistant]
It kind of depends on which canon you follow.

If it's one of the RPGs, humanity is just as fucked now as it ever was. When C'Thulhu awakens, his attacks don't have hit points, they have character deaths per turn. He is a living/dead embodiment of madness, and there's no escape.

Lovecraft's original work had a bit more wiggle room, however. Sailors were driven mad at the sight of him, but at least one was able to claw his way back from the depths of insanity and make his way home. There's also the fact that people from developing nations seemed to be more susceptible to his influence, which makes it seem that ~~Lovecraft was pretty racist~~ scientific thought can act as something of a shield from the Old God's powers.

Still, if the Elder Gods showed up, or C'Thulhu awakened when the stars were right, it would destroy the world in an orgy of madness, lust, and violence, even if you had your PHD.

In the Derleth stories, and later writers, humanity had more of a fighting chance. Most people were still totally fucked when confronting a thing from the outer darknesses, but there were occasional characters who could actually confront eldritch horrors and come out on top. Also, some of the Elder Gods were actually "good guys," working for humanity, not in spite of it.


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

[User] [John Wick] Why didn't Viggo just put Iosef in a Continental? Surely he would've been safer there then in the open?

[Assistant]
I would imagine its because The Continental is intended to be a neutral ground for assassins and the like to recover, resupply, and transact business in relative safety, not a convenient safehouse for any mob lord to secure their idiot family members from the consequences of their own actions.

Someone as rich and well-connected as Santino might be work things out to be able to stay for an extended time, but Im certain abusing hotel policy like that has to be a punishable violation  otherwise every two-bit mob boss would just live indefinitely in the hotel.

And the people who run the Continental are *not* people you want to try to take advantage of.


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

[User]
Need help please ;_;

Hello everyone, I'm going to make this short and sweet. I defended my M.S. last October (Hurray!) and am now working on my Ph.D., my advisor wanted to publish my M.S. work, so I was re-reading all of my gels/charts etc. when I notice that I made a HUGE mistake, the numbers from my results don't add up to my samples. Essentially, my entire thesis is WRONG, but I obviously want to publish what's right, so how do I tell my PI that my M.S. was basically wrong and that I've fucked up royally? (I wasn't exactly the best M.S. student either, so I feel really bad telling him this too) I feel so stupid for overlooking these large mistakes for so long! I think I just need to take a break from research in general, I'm starting to feel too overwhelmed.

I've already given speeches at conferences etc. so I'll essentially be contradicting myself when I speak again. I feel so stupid and depressed, I guess with the hustle and bustle attitude of grad school, I became too busy and sloppy with my work. The good news is I haven't published anything in journals, so I have that going for me.

Will I have to "re-defend" my thesis? How bad is this going to affect me? I would never intentionally include wrong data in my work. Has anyone out there been through similar experiences, I could really use any help/words ;_;

[Assistant]
First of all, you need to tell you'll advisor. Not telling them is probably the worst move. Second of all, mistakes happen. You shouldn't feel too bad. People publish corrections to journal articles when they realize they made mistakes or have more information about the results.

So start this conversation with your advisor sooner rather than later.


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

[User] My water bottle is a stainless steel, double walled, vacuum insulated vessel. It claims to keep liquids cold for up to 24 hours but only hot for 12 hours. Why are these not the same or at least close to one another?

[Assistant]
If your cold stuff has any ice, it will have a hard time melting in there. The hot drinks will lose more energy due to the higher difference in temperature, and the biggest effect I've noticed:

If you pour any of the liquid into a cup to drink it, the air entering the vessel does much more to cool off a hot liquid than it does to heat up a cold liquid, due to evaporative effects.


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

[User] ELI5: When rice is boiling over, why do the bubbles immediately go down when you lift the lid?

[Assistant] The starch from the rice allows the water to form bubbles, but not very strongly, so typically the high pressure in the bubble will cause them to burst immediately, but when the lid is on the pot, the hot vapor and air increase the pressure in the air in the pot and lowers the imbalance in pressure, meaning the ambient air pressure is similar to the pressure inside that bubbles, so they don't burst. Opening the lid lowers the pressure, creates an imbalance and causes the bubbles to burst.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are some food with lower calories make our stomatch feels fuller than others with higher calories?

For example, i feel so full after eating just a bit of sweet potatoes, but can't get enough with the original potatoes!

[Assistant]
Generally, we feel full when our stomach is full of food. Fibre fills up the stomach but doesn't really have much calories so makes us feel fuller. (vegetables have alot of fibre)

There are however foods that 'hack' our fullness mechanism. For example, food that are rich in both fat and sugar (at roughly 50/50 ratio) stop us from feeling full so we eat alot more calories before we feel full.

So most 'bingeable' foods are those that have a 50/50 fat and carbs content (ice cream, cakes, donuts, pizza, crisps etc

Fat or carbs on their own don't do this and we feel full quickly after eating them separately.

The combination of fat and carbs in modern foods is supposed to be one of the biggest contributing factors to the obesity epidemic.


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

[User]
[Supernatural] Why are all of the monsters humanoid? Are there any who aren't?

The vamps, werewolves, and basically all of the human born ones I can understand, they have to blend in and what not?

However even the Phoenix, the dragon, and even the fairy folk look like your average every day guy. Despite our Lore depicting them as other shaped creatures.

I just couldn't help but wonder why it seems like no creature turns out to be the shape of maybe a lizard, or horse shaped, or something.

[Assistant]
Some of them can shapeshift, which they need to do for survival in this world, like the dragon. In their true forms, they are massive beast-like creatures, but they take the form of humans. In private, it's probably mostly for reasons of space.

The fairy folk have looked like that when they show themselves.

Any creature who cannot hide their true form, cannot survive in a settlement, and so will only be found in the wilderness, or purgatory.

Even the worms in a way hide what they are by taking human hosts.


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

[User]
This one sucks. My research supervisor has taken medical leave and we aren't sure if he will make it back.

I adore him and I'm gutted that he's going through this. It's all been sudden, I know he would have done everything he could to make arrangements if he'd had any time to prepare. What I know for now is that he's taking time off to pursue treatment, and no one can really predict what will happen. So, I'm grieving and in shock, and I guess I have a few questions that you guys might be able to help with:

1) If there is anything we can do to support our supervisor. He is closer to some of us more than others (our lab is postdocs down to interns). He has always been open about things going on his life, but never really been vulnerable (or perhaps only on a rare occasion). We'd like to visit (in time) but don't know if that's appropriate. Sending an email back saying, "hope you get better, fingers crossed we see you next year!" seems so... lacking.

2) On a more personal level: I am in the writing up part of my dissertation, and should have been completing within 6 months. I am meeting my school advisor next week, and I know policy is to usually hand off to secondary supervisor when needed. My secondary supervisor is be capable of seeing my degree through to completion, but I feel like all the intellectual work was with my primary, and feel awkward about transferring. Partly due to authorship concerns when we go to publish: my secondary has had no input into any of my work so far, and there are researchers from other universities who have been more involved (lending me their data, giving critique on experimental set up etc), and with whom I'd feel more comfortable eventually publishing with if required. At present, I am happy to continue writing without supervision and hope that my supervisor makes it through. I have collaborations that I can pursue in the meantime, and I could delay my degree for a bit if that would help. I'd like to propose this to my school when I meet next week, but I am wondering if there is anything else I need to consider, or reasons this is a terrible idea.

Edit: I ramble, and have tried to edit down to be a bit more concise.

[Assistant]
Can you also ask your department chair or committee members for advice?

You could send your advisor a card, flowers, or food. If he has family members involved in his caretaking, food may be especially useful for them as well. Something like a fruit basket, or something from Harry and David could be good.

Please make sure to take care of yourself too. Your school likely offers free confidential counseling service that can help a lot.

Best wishes. *hugs* if you want them.


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

[User] ELI5: The skin's cells are regenerated every 27 days, and the entire body's cells regenerated every 7 to 10 years. If this is the case, how do skin imperfections like freckles, scars, and birthmarks persist?

[Assistant]
The cells in the superficial or upper layers of skin, known as the epidermis, are constantly replacing themselves. This process of renewal is basically exfoliation (shedding) of the epidermis. But the deeper layers of skin, called the dermis, do not go through this cellular turnover and so do not replace themselves. Thus, foreign bodies, such as tattoos, implanted in the dermis will remain.

Our skin is primarily made of the protein collagen, which is produced by cells known as fibroblasts. When the skin (or any other tissue, for that matter) is wounded, the wound-healing process initiates the generation of new fibroblasts to produce scar collagen, which is different from the collagen in normal skin. Even though individual cells within the skin periodically die and are replaced with new cells, the scar collagen remains. The only time when wounds will heal without producing scars is during the fetal stage of life, when the skin produces fetal collagen, a protein that is different from adult collagen. If we could find a way to turn on the production of fetal collagen after birth, then we could, presumably, perform scarless surgery.