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

[User]
Whats job security like for biology phds in government? (Eg working for CDC or NIH)

And when I refer to jobs Im really talking about staff scientist jobs.

[Assistant]
Job security in federal scientific GS jobs is very good. Typically they cannot fire you without cause and you have to be given opportunities to complete corrective action before then if the "cause" is just that you're not great at your job. Promotion pathways are also clearly laid out, though that doesn't mean they're guaranteed.

It is also easier to get another GS job once you're already a fed, so if you're at NIH and decide you want to move to Atlanta, your chances of getting a CDC job are much higher than they would be if you were applying as a member of the public.

When/if there are budget cuts to your agency, they do everything they can to avoid laying off good people. So they'll do hiring freezes, early retirements, furloughs, cutting consultants, and pursuing for-cause firing of underperforming staff before they lay someone off. And if you are going to be or have been laid off (which is rare!), you're basically given top preference for any other federal job that you're qualified for for some period of time.


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

[User]
Is the formula for perimeter of circle a derivative of the fomula for area of circle?

d/dr [r^(2)] = 2r

Can someone explain this in terms of physics or practice?

Thanks.

[Assistant] If you increase the radius of a circle a small amount, its area increases by adding a thin strip around the outside. If you "unroll" this circular strip to make it straight, you can see that its area is equal to the small change in radius times the circumference of the circle. Hence dA = C*dr, or dA/dr = C.


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

[User]
How can social inequality and privilege be truly tackled if the ones on the top of the hierarchy gains so much (security, economic, social, psychological etc.) by perpetuating it?

I'm not sure which subreddit to ask this question but theres a lot of smart people here so might as well have a go. How can the elite and the ones in power ever be persuaded to share their status or utilize resources to better the whole community if there is so much to lose and very little to gain for them? Seems like a catch 22 that those with the most ability to change the system has the least to gain from changing it....

[Assistant]
Tycho was rather brief but he mentioned the most obvious reply to this. This question is kind of both valid for sociology and philosophy.

Using a Marxist framework, a class based revolution is never simply one where the "cycle starts again." The new mode of production brings about a change in the socio-economic system with a new set political, social, cultural, moral etc. relations. If your question was applied to today and answered using this framework, the solution would be to topple capitalism and replace with democratic worker control of businesses leading to an end to economic plutocracy and consequently political oligarchy. Your comment is kind of right - you can't really persuade your oppressive rulers to set you free, but you can sure revolt against them.


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

[User]
ELI5: low cost from fruits grown on the other side of the planet

ELI5: how can fruits grown, harvested, transported on the other side of the world to my local grocery... can cost less than 2$. How is this possible?

[Assistant]
These days, overseas transportation is not expensive. To send a peach from Argentina to Thailand and then to California may cost only a cent or so for a product that may ultimately cost 75 cents, and a shipping container full may cost only $1000 to transport. It costs much more to transport peaches from a port on the pacific to a warehouse in your city by truck than it does to transport it across an ocean, by a factor of approximately 10.

Comparative advantage describes why different countries produce different goods. Perhaps, it costs 10 cents to grow a peach in Argentina and 15 cents to grow it in the USA, while in the USA it costs 3 dollars to grow a bushel of corn and in Argentina it costs 3.50. this could be due to environmental, cultural, legal or infrastructure differences.

In this example, Argentina has a comparative advantage in producing peaches and both countries make more money if the USA only produces corn and Argentina only produces peaches.

Since trade and transportation cost so little, even minor comparative advantage cause industrial and agricultural trade to globalize.


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

[User]
[Marvel] How does Deadpool show expressions through his masks?

Sorry, I did a quick research and found nothing about it. Is the fabric special?

[Assistant]
Most superhero (and some supervillain) masks are made of fabrics incorporating Unstable Molecules, a substance discovered by Dr. Reed Richards which is both resilient, and extremely flexible. It is incredibly common for masks using unstable molecules to react to the wearer's expressions in ways which might otherwise seem ridiculous and implausible.

Unstable Molecule Fabric now available for cosplayers at Jo-Anns.


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

[User]
ELI5:If I were to sell my pounds 100 to Dollars $120, the Dollar increased in value to $150, then I sold back to pounds, where has that money I've earned come from?

Currently trading is a zero-sum game- where does the cash generated come from?

[Assistant]
It comes from the amount of investment and total wealth that a currency represents.

If you trade pounds for dollars, and then the pound collapses, then more people will want dollars(because they aren't losing value). This increase in demand makes the dollar worth more compared to the pound. At the same time, the pound is losing value, so it is worth less as well.

The total amount of wealth in the world stays the same(in this example), but one currency becomes worth more and another worth less, making it seem like the dollar gained value when it really just took value from somewhere else.

When there are many currencies in play, like there are in the world today, any currency can affect the market as a whole. So if the rupee collapses and lots of indian people rush to get american dollars, then the dollar goes up in value from the increased demand, your pound stayed the same value, but you still see that difference when you exchange pounds for dollars.


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

[User]
ELI5: why does light from artificial light sources not form a rainbow when it's raining?

I know that a rainbow is formed from the separation of white light. But why does it not occur from artificial light sources? This occurred to me when it was drizzling under floodlights.

[Assistant]
Well, first of all, you'd have to be looking away from the floodlights, just like you have to look away from the Sun to see a rainbow. The center of the circle of a rainbow is the point in the sky exactly opposite the sun, or other light source.

When you look away from a floodlight, you are looking into the ground, and there are very few raindrops there to reflect the light. You need a lot of raindrops to reflect enough light to make a rainbow, because the reflection off each individually is very dim.

So, the ingredients of a rainbow are: a bright light, capable of penetrating many miles through drizzle, and the drizzle itself, consisting of many millions of raindrops, each contributing a very small amount to the total reflected light.


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

[User]
[Jumanji] Where is Jumanji?

None of the animals seem to age or die, but are most definitely terrestrial. The hunter Van Pelt has an upperclass London accent. These clues point to Jumanji being somewhere on Earth, likely Western or Southern Africa. But is it?

[Assistant]
Jumanji isn't anywhere but itself. Your misjudgement of the game is expected, though: it was designed (by who knows what) to resemble a jungle on Earth, at least superficially. However, all the creatures, including those that can think and behave like a human, are advanced animatronics existing in an equally artificial pocket universe.

[Source: Jumanji the Animated Series]


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

[User] Eli5: Why do humans develop mental illness? Hoe come animals don't seem to do develop them like we do?

[Assistant]
Short answer: some animals definitely have a mental illness.

Less short answer: we aren't psychic and they can't tell us, so some animals seem to and probably do have something we would consider things like depression, and anxiety disorders. We just don't humanize them the same way, so we just call the animal anxious, excitable, etc.

More detailed: our conception of the inside of an animals mind is constantly changing. It was only in the last few decades that people generally even believed that animals like *cats and dogs* were even capable of feeling pain. People genuinely thought that all feelings of any kind were part and parcel of the human domain.

As we learn more, we of course learned that all higher mammals at the VERY least have physical sensations more or less identical to what humans experience. They just express it differently. Perhaps animals with FAR less developed brains may feel things like pain as well. This is an area of current research.

In terms of emotions, also recognize that only *in the last several decades* has something like mental illness been recognized in the modern sense that you probably mean it. Long ago, people thought they were demons and whatnot. Not as long ago, some mental illnesses were not even recognized as something that even existed. They were attributed to moral or ethical failing, or being weak, or being something other than actually ill.

With all this in mind, it is clear that some animals definitely feel things that we would call depression. Social disorders exist in all higher animals. Emotional ones too.

But, throwing all THAT aside there is definitely a connection between modern living and greater amounts of depression. Modern pressures are more acute and lingering than they ever have been before. While we spend less time physically sustaining our existence with labor, we spend WAY more time being occupied by things like work. We have less free time, we have less socializing time, we have fewer outlets for our problems.

Most animals get plenty of outlets for all those things. But, keep an animal cooped up and bored and you'll quickly find that it behaves just like a depressed person would.


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

[User]
Why is porn legal but prostitution illegal? Isn't the only difference one is being filmed?

Just wondering what the difference is in regards to legal matters.

[Assistant]
It's not the act of being paid to have sex that is the issue, it's the question of who is doing the paying.

A prostitute has a business-customer relationship with the person they are having sex with. In a porn film, both partners have the film producer as the customer.

If the former were true, you could argue that participating in a sex study that comes with a stipend would also be prostitution.


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

[User]
ELI5:If sensations, such as pain, can wake us up from sleep, why can't they wake us up from states such as comas?

I know it's the brains way of telling us to wake up because it thinks our body is under attack, but why doesn't the same happen when we're in a deeper state than sleeping?

[Assistant]
Think of your brain as a computer.

If a computer goes to sleep, you can move the mouse or tap the keyboard to wake it. If a computer crashes (goes into a coma) you can tap the keyboard and shake the mouse all you want, but until the computer reboots it will not work, because although it looks like it's asleep, it's not.


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

[User] [Marvel] Do Asgard or other more evolved populations have mutants?

[Assistant] It could be argued that Thor and Odin are the Asgardian versions of Mutants, beings born with powers that far exceed those of average Asgardians.  Thor and Odin were completely dominating Dark Elves that were slaughtering regular Asgardian soldiers, and probably some of the better soldiers as they were the palace guards.


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

[User]
Does Premium Unleaded fuel really clean my engine as advertised?

Hey all

I was filling up my car today with standard 91 Octane (Australia) when I started reading the spiel on the pump about premium (98 octane). I am aware of how octane numbers work, and that premium shouldn't offer any  mileage benefit to my car as it is designed to run on standard. However, is there any validity in the claim that premium will "clean my engine". What sort of additives would enable this anyway, or is it just advertising BS?

[Assistant]
The cleaning additives are detergents. Collectively called "deposit control additives" or DCA's.

What they do is prevent buildup of deposits (carbon compounds) in two critical areas: The fuel injectors, and the intake valves. Injectors have very fine nozzles that atomize gasoline into very fine droplets. If it should become clogged, the droplets will be larger, and combustion will be less efficient. DCA's remove deposits and prevent them from forming altogether. Intake valves need a tight, clean seal to ensure that compression is where it should be. If they become gunked up, gas mileage will go down.

Now, to the ultimate question: no, premium gas probably won't clean your engine any better than the cheap stuff. They all have detergents in them as mandated by the government.


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

[User]
[DC] How does Bane get stronger without his muscles killing him?

Often times we see Bane take Venom and then he grows larger and his muscles expand in size. How does he survive this? Where does the extra tissue come from?

[Assistant]
Spitballing here but if lets just assume its ultra steroids, its also extremely energy dense, more so than even gasoline. So its probably nuclear in nature which has a few million calories in a few grams.

So ultra steroids and a cocktail of nutrients that allow the body to process nuclear energy into calories giving Bane the caloric intake to bulk muscles instantly.


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

[User]
What significant movements of thought have come after/rejected postmodernism?

I'm trying to wrap my head around the history of intellectual thought (specifically in the last 20th/21st centuries) and so far haven't come across any significant movements or thinkers/writers whose beliefs are not in some way derived from the works of Foucault, Derrida etc. This is entirely due to my ignorance of a vast field of knowledge to which I'm relatively new, but very eager to learn more about. If you can recommend any particular writers or works, I'd be very grateful!

[Assistant]
At most, "postmodernism" in philosophy is a term given to various philosophical critiques, each drawing on the resources of modern philosophy, which occurred in France in the mid 20th century. Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as a postmodern philosophy as some kind of philosophical view after modern philosophy in the way that implies. It is, at most, a group of modern philosophers critiquing some concepts of modern philosophy in different ways, and thereby still modern philosophy and not some view after it.

> If you can recommend any particular writers or works, I'd be very grateful!

Gary Gutting's *French Philosophy in the Twentieth Century* will give you a better topography of the intellectual movements that informed those critiques and therefore a better grasp of how 'postmodern philosophy' fits within the broader trends of modern philosophy prior, concurrent, and after it.


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

[User]
[MCU] What level does a threat have to be before the Avengers step in?

I guess this is specifically pre-Civil War, but presumably Iron Man and War Machine were still somewhat active under the Avengers title since Tony was planning on inducting Spider-Man.

In all, we see the collective Avengers in 4 battles as a team before splitting up:  the Chitauri Invasion, the battle at Strucker's Castle, the Ultron fights, and the fight with Crossbones' terrorist group.  Out of those, only the Chitauri Invasion and the Ultron fights were potentially world-ending.  The battle at Strucker's Castle seemed to be more about cleaning up Shield's loose ends, but the fight against Crossbones could be considered either that or a general battle against terrorists.

What qualifies a threat as being Avengers-worthy?  Would Cap have slipped into a telephone booth to suit up if he saw a bank getting robbed on his day off?  Did they typically only deal with groups like Hydra?  How common would a fight against something like Abomination or the Maximoff twins be?

[Assistant]
It seems that they're a bit of a skunkworks situation. They come together when the situation warrants it and then go their separate ways. The banner always exists, but it's objectives, members and MO depend on the threat.

Fury assembled them to stop Loki, then they went back to whatever once that was over. Steve got them back together to hunt down the hydra remnants, which led directly to Ultron (Tony spends a good deal of AoU talking about making the team obsolete), but once that was handled, they stripped it down again and went back to hunting hydra (which is what they're doing at the beginning of CA:CW).

Tony says it best in IW: after civil war, they're essentially broken up. Rhodes and vision are the only real members still left and they're under the jurisdiction of the sokovia accords. The "real" team is the ones in hiding led by cap and they're likely moving around, staying off radar and helping where they can.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] During the Clone Wars, what was the most underutilized and underestimated vehicle that could have been vital for many victories if used properly?

Or if there is none, what's the opposite situation? A vehicle that was continuously used improperly with no regard for it's actual ineffectiveness?

[Assistant]
CIS Boarding craft were all used incorrectly.

If you are capable of delivering hordes of Super Battle Droids into the interior of a target capital ship (and past the shields at that), you are equally capable of delivering a warhead that could do much more damage than those droids could.

EDIT: Also, if you are dead-set on delivering droids to the target (because you want to disable or capture rather than destroy) then Buzzdroids would be a much better tool for the job, and would be much harder for the crew to deal with as they could get into critical spaces inaccessible to the clones.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do you get a PhD in a field nobody else has a PhD in?

Til about Dr David Clutton who's the only person with PhD in Gin, however stupid that sounds.
How do you get a phd in a discipline where there's no-one to grant you that phd? How was it done in the past?

[Assistant] All PhDs are technically within a field where nobody else knows anything. That is sort of the definition of a PhD thesis paper. In order to earn a PhD degree you need to demonstrate that you are able to do your own base research and contribute to the common shared knowledge of humanity. So when David Clutton got his PhD in Gin he had to do some sort of research or experiments on gin himself and then publish those findings. He would get help from professors within related fields who would guide him and then the paper would be evaluated by other doctors within these similar fields. After getting his paper published and defended he would get his PhD.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are children more likely to fall off the bed while in deep sleep than adults?

I'm in my 30s and the last time I fell off the bed was when I was 7.  What makes kids fall off bed and what prevents adults from falling off?

[Assistant]
When you sleep your brain turns off your motor-cortex (the thing that controls your limbs) so that you are basically paralyzed. This is also the reason you sometimes feel like you are falling when you are about to fall asleep and suddenly jolt yourself awake.

In children this function is still developing and sometimes it doesn't turn off all the way or at all. Thats why kids also sleepwalk much more often than adults.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is Ohio so important in elections?

Ohio doesn't have the Electoral votes other states have (only 18) nor does it have the population of other states (7th overall).  Why does it hold so much sway when it comes to election time?

[Assistant]
Most of the large states lean pretty heavily in one direction or another. fivethirtyeight.com gives Clinton a 99.9% chance of winning California, worth the most electoral votes. They give Trump an 85% chance of winning Texas. Since these states are all winner-take-all, it's just assumed that Clinton gets all of California's votes and Trump gets all of Texas's votes.

If you add up all the "safe" states for each side, they both have about 230 of the 270 votes they need locked up. So it's the handful of states that are about 50/50 on who to vote for that really get a lot of focus. And of the states that are "in play", Florida, Ohio, and Pennsylvania are the ones with the most electoral votes.


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

[User] [John Carter of Mars] Mars is the fourth planet from the sun and has a much colder temperature than Earth. Why are the majority of its inhabitants wear less to nearly no clothing at all?

[Assistant]
Unlike the Mars of our universe, Barsoom must have a thick atmosphere that prevents too much heat from escaping. Like a beneficial version of the greenhouse effect.

It's a phenomenon that exists in reality, too. Venus is much hotter than Mercury, despite being further away from the Sun, because of its atmosphere.


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

[User]
[ALIEN] why did Weyland/Yutani trick the crew of the Nostromo into capturing the alien?

basically my question is would it have not been easier to send people like scientists and/or soldiers who knew what they were doing and knew what the threat was to secure a specimen rather than trick a couple miners (i don't remember what the crew did) to do it?

[Assistant]
Weyland/Yutani didn't know the aliens were there beforehand.  The secret orders to the Captain and presence of the company mole (the Android) were standard precautions the company had in place, not special to that mission.

Space is big, and it might have been decades before Weyland/Yutani could get a special missions team out there to check on what Nostromo detected. Better to risk the crew that was there rather than risk a competitor getting someone there before a follow up mission could check it out.


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

[User] What happens to matter at the center of a nuclear explosion?

[Assistant]
The center of a nuclear explosion would be inside the bomb, which is basically very hot matter and very hot neutrons.  In a fusion (thermonuclear) bomb, the pressure at the center is on the order of billions of atmospheres, and everything is moving away from there at several hundred kilometers per second.  Any matter in the center is being bombarded by neutrons so energetic they will tear apart the atoms.

Essentially, Bad Things.


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

[User] [Linguistics] Why is it English doesn't have gendered nouns and articles while many other languages in the area do?

[Assistant]
The whole story is long and a bit complicated, but here's a short version: English had a gender/case system very much like the other Germanic languages, but a few shifts in pronunciation led to the endings loosing their use, so the system was dropped altogether (except in pronouns).

The most important shift was that various vowel endings which indicated case/number in adjectives and nouns were obscured to a single sound, the "indeterminate vowel", which was often written as an "e". A number of endings like -a, -u, -e, -an, -um were all reduced to -e and whatever grammatical distinctions they carried before were lost. Around the same time -m endings were changed to -n endings and then eventually the -n was dropped altogether. This all started around the year 1000. So, putting these two things together a weak adjective which was *blinda* in the singular and *blindan* in the plural changed to *blinde* in both cases. Similar developments occurred with nouns and even verbs.

One result of the elimination of case/gender is that English is much less flexible with word order than some of the other Germanic languages. Since there's no dative/accusative/nominative anymore, we need to structure our sentences in the standard SVO (subject, verb, object) model most of the time. We can get around this with some prepositions sometimes, but it can still sound awkward. For example, "Bill threw Sara the ball," is ok as is, "Bill threw the ball to Sara," but, "To Sara Bill threw the ball," sounds strange.

If you want a nice and detailed book on all this, check out "A History of the English Language" by Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable.


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

[User] ELI5: How are we able to stand up and balance on two feet easily, but it's hard to balance on only one foot?

[Assistant]
It's a skill, let's say standing wasn't a thing that you do normally so you will have to face the same issues as standing on one leg (different of course).

Quick explanation about how you gain a skill (standing, handatand, riding a bike):

You just need to do it, time after time and each time you are improving your motion and strength your muscles for that position/movement.
And when finally succeeding, unconsciously you work on smoothing it up to use less energy spending for the action - this keep going and going.

There is a lot of info about how the brain really does it if you're interested in that.


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

[User]
[MCU] Which power is greater: Scarlet Witch's chaos magic or the reality stone by itself?

I figure it should be the reality stone but it seems fairly unstable with changes reverting when the user leaves the area and it's mentioned in Multiverse of Madness that Scarlet Witch could conquer or destroy everything.

[Assistant]
As seen in Thor: The Dark World, the reality stone is capable of extinguishing all light in the entire universe if used at the right time and place by the right person, without any need for the other stones.

Its limitation comes from the fact that while it has absolute control over reality it has **zero** control over time, space, mind, power or soul - and thus the absolute power over reality is normally short-lived, localised, unable to affect people's minds or souls, and unable to generate power to act outside its vicinity.

Meanwhile the Scarlet Witch has a balanced set of things she can influence including a lot of reality, a lot of mind, some space, some soul and a large chunk of power (especially once the darkhold gets involved). Her control over reality is not as absolute as the Reality Stone's, but because she can supply the other elements she's far more capable.


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

[User]
[ DC Comics ] Can you use the Flash's speed against him?

Knowing that you aren't going to be faster, how do you compensate? Have someone commit a crime several miles away and clothesline him as he runs by? Another speedster learns martial arts and while they are still slightly slower than him, could they be fast enough to redirect his momentum and throw him really far?

[Assistant]
You can, but it's not easy- as well as superhuman speed, he's also got superhuman reflexes, superhumanly fast thinking and is an intelligent and experience combatant.

He's not flawless and you might pull it off- some have! But you'll need a slightly better plan then "clothesline"


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

[User] ELI5: Why are there so many Islamic extremists causing havoc around the world using terror, compared to all the other religions?

[Assistant] At this point in history, Islamic extremism has gained some popularity -- but bear in mind the majority of Muslims do not engage in or condone extremist activities. Before the fall of the Ottoman Empire (and even before the 1950s) Islamic extremism was relatively rare. Of course, before these periods Islamic countries hadn't been occupied by colonial powers, nor were they being engaged in economic/political/physical combat over oil. And in the past, extremist interpretations of other religions have caused problems (for example, it would have been very dangerous being a non-Christian between 750 and 1300, especially in Europe).


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

[User] ELI5: Why do people and animals get comfortable? What is comfort?

[Assistant] Comfort is a lack of hardship, danger or stress. From an evolutionary point of view, avoiding dangerous situations is obviously beneficial to survival, so an animal that experienced negative emotions  (discomfort) during these situations is going to try & avoid being in them. Feeling happy in a safe area means an animal would be more likely to stay in that safe area.


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

[User] ELI5:are we inventing math or are we discovering it as time passes ?

[Assistant] Some think that at the very deepest level, reality actually is maths, nothing more. Others that it is a language we have created that describes what we obverse well. It's a very fundamental question that we simply do not know the answer to at this time.


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

[User] During the carboniferous period, the oxygen level was 35%. Why did the oxygen level drop?

[Assistant]
Well the better question is that why was it so high. What happened was that trees evolved lignin which made it resistant to basically everything except weather and nature.

So trees started growing massive and massively converted CO2 into O2. Therefore higher levels of O2. It also resulted in lots of coal formation because nothing ate the trees.

Eventually fungus and other things evolved to be able to eat the new evolution of trees; Which then started to reverse the trend and bring O2 back down. However coal deposits stored alot of carbon.

Only really now have we reversed the coal deposits by burning them and so we are bringing earth back to what's to some degree normal.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Did Yoda Die Due To Old Age, Or Was It The Conditions He Lived In?

[Assistant] Considering his comment of his age, I'd imagine that's most of it. His conditions might have reduced his life a little, but he got nutritious food and his connection to the Force probably helped him endure. Remember his race can at least live to 900, and he was only in hiding for Luke's lifetime, so, what, 25 years or so?


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

[User]
ELI5: How are people born with "natural talent" at unnatural things?

Say Eminem who is naturally good at rhyming, besides that then the English language skill is a weird talent to be born with as why would the fetus develope talent for something they are not.... I dunno what I am saying, but you know what I mean, right?

[Assistant]
You are not born with talent at unnatural things, but you brain, or your *physique* might be genetically better to do things that are beneficial for those unnatural things.

Maybe your brain is better suited to work with your ear and then you will be naturally talented for music but not because you are naturally talented to play violin you just have an advantage because your brain can understand notes and tones better than others.

The rest is just practice.


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

[User]
ELI5: What limits creature size here on Earth?

Why is it that we seem to have stopped at the blue whale? Is it possible that larger creatures could exist? How much larger? Would they have to be sea creatures?

Also, If we stretched the rules a little bit, what is the largest a creature could be here on earth? (Land or sea).

[Assistant] Oxygen saturation and transfer efficiency makes it hard to have a large creature that can move quickly.  Thermal transfer and dumping said heat puts a limit on size for creatures. Gravity and the load limit on things like bones sets an upper end on how big a thing can be without crushing. Nutrition requirements mean things eat more as they get bigger but it gets harder to find the food when you are huge.  Blue whales exist at an outer edge of the envelope given present conditions and what biology is able to come up with by chance, relying on water to hold the weight and pull away heat, floating to limit how much energy they put out, and eating craptons of little plankton that can be sucked through in a constant buffet.


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

[User]
Can i teach?

Is it possible to teach with just a master's degree?
I mean i still dont know if I want my phD but I know for sure that I was my master's.

[Assistant]
Im a community college prof with a masters. In most US states a masters is sufficient for being CC faculty, but you need to show experience of TAing, as its quite competitive. Feel free to ask me more questions about landing a CC job.

Also, if youre interested in K-12 teaching thats an option. Most states you can get a preliminary license with a content-area bachelors and some exams, but then youll need graduate education classes to get a longer term teaching license.


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

[User] [Frozen] How was Olaf born with a love of summer, when he as no idea what summer is, nor its effect on frozen items?

[Assistant] Psychologically, it may be that Olafs love of summer was born of Elsas own fear of her ice powers and subconscious desire to be rid of them. Because these feelings were repressed (conceal, dont feel), Elsa may not be aware of them. It would stand to reason that Olaf would then not know why he longs for summer. He just does. He does because Elsa does.


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

[User] [Harry Potter]What was the entrance to the Chamber of Secrets before toilets were a thing?

[Assistant]
Hogwarts was founded in the 10th century AD.

Toilets - including piped sewage and running water - were a thing by Roman times. After the Romans left, the Britons lost the art of good sewage and had to rediscover it much later, but we know wizards have far better and more reliable long-distance communication and travel than mediaeval muggles, so it wouldn't have been hard for them to keep building comfy crappers.

Some of the fittings have probably been updated over the last thousand years, but with magic bolstering good craftsmanship it's entirely possible that the basic pipes have been unchanged since the days of Salazar Slytherin.


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

[User]
What do people mean when they say something is a brain state?

I've heard people say pain is a brain state. The colour red is a brain state. What do they mean by this? Could I say a giraffe is a brain state? Or Jupiter is a brain state? Or my body is a brain state? My brain is a brain state?

[Assistant]
A brain state (or brain process) is just a way that the nervous system of an organism might be at a given moment in time or over a short period of time. Despite the label 'brain', neurons outside the brain are pretty much always included in talk of 'brain states' and talk of 'brain states' also covers organisms with neurons but no brain. The ways that a nervous system might be are usually extended to cover anything that a neurologist might study about an organism's nervous system, anywhere from the structure of the entire neural network down to the membrane potentials or other characteristics of individual neurons and the subcellular parts of those neurons.

When someone says that pain is a brain state, they are usually making something like the claim that being in pain is nothing more than a way for an organism's nervous system to be - what it is to be in pain is for your nervous system to have the relevant neural structure, the relevant neuron activity in the relevant parts of that structure, and so on. This position is often called 'reductionism' about the mind or an 'identity theory' about the relationship between mind and body (sometimes mind/body identity or mind/brain identity as another user mentioned).

So, no, neither giraffes nor Jupiter are brain states. A reductionist would say that *seeing* a giraffe is a brain state or that *thinking about* Jupiter is a brain state but the giraffe or Jupiter aren't brain states. Now, it might make sense to say that your brain is a brain state but it is at minimum weird to say that your brain is the way that your brain is right now. Your brain *has* a state - there is a way that it is right now - but whether or not your brain is what it is right now is going to depend on further philosophical questions about time and the continued existence of a thing over time.


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

[User] [Fallout] Why have robots such advanced AI yet PC's are highly underdeveloped?

[Assistant]
Because 50s logic. The same reason that Asimov wrote that early robots would be totally sentient but unable to speak, and the first talking robot would be a room sized machine. The technology used to create a walking, thinking robot wasn't general purpose, and couldn't be used for speech synthesis.

It's not that the robots have advanced computers and the PCs have basic computers. They're fundamentally different technologies that aren't applicable to each other's problem domain.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] How did the Jedi know about the Sith Order of Two?

They would have known about the sith empires from the days of the old republic, but how did they know about Bane's order of two?

[Assistant] Darth Bane himself was killed by the Jedi in canon. It's possible he mentioned it during the battle that claimed his life. The exact circumstances of how they came to know about it haven't been made known for canon, Legends had a former Sith convert a few hundred years later IIRC.


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

[User] ELI5: Why would restaurants even participate in Kitchen Nightmares? Wont the bad publicity hurt them more?

[Assistant] Most of them are failing without much hope. If it goes well, they get good advice, training and a remodel, as well as publicity. Apparently 40% of them make it, despite their owners' propensity for not doing well in the business. When Ramsey leaves, they're in a much better position than they were before.


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

[User]
ELI5: Electric smoker

I've googled (and even binged), and there are literally no results for "how do electric smokers work" both intext and intitle.

My main questions are:

1. How do they create smoke?  Is it actual combustion, or is it closer to vaporization?

2. How do they circulate air?  Fan powered vs convection?

3. How does it balance the required heating load between the wood chips and the heating element?

4. Why does it need a water basin?

[Assistant]
1. It is combustion. The wood chips are soaked in water so they solder rather than burn outright.
2. The generally are no fans. There are air vents and the bottom and top that regulate how the smoke gets drawn through the smoker.
3. Cheaper models don't have a regulator on th e burner. It's a simple heating element. Some more expensive models do allow you to regulate the temperature but these are more common on gas smokers.
4. The water pan is two fold. One it can help keep food moist so that  like a pork shoulder or ham doesn't just become a desiccated piece of meat. Two when making something like jerky or smoked fish you create alot of steam to basically kill bacteria and allow your food to cure at a lower temperature.


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

[User]
[Stargate SG-1] In the ancient past, did the System Lords get along well enough to all be on Earth at the same time?

About 5,000 years ago, Ra placed a stargate in Egypt and began moving human slaves through the gate for the Goa'uld to use a host. But during this same period, and after, different Goa'uld took slaves from different parts of the world. Did Ra, the Supreme System Lord, control the flow of slaves? Did this keep order amongst the other System Lords?

[Assistant]
Ra probably secure loyalty by controlling access to humans.  The unas were a poor host, not easy to heal, difficult to control and fairly ugly, but humans were ideal for their needs, unfortunately humans only occurred on one planet at the time, so the System Lord who controlled the planet could exact a high price for hosts and human breeding stock.

Ra also had quite a bit of respect as he was the military genius who was instrumental in the overthrow and expulsion of Anubis from the System Lord territories.  Anubis was dangerous, psychotic and was a severe enough threat that all the System Lords banded together in order to combat him, but Ra provided that tactics and leadership required for victory.  This leadership made him an ideal candidate to take over the role of Supreme System Lord, a position that was held by Apep until Anubis murdered him and cannibalized his symbiote.


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

[User] Are electric shocks harmful to plants?

[Assistant]
Depends

Think of it this way, if you can feel it, so can the plant and the damage path is about the same.

Electrical current going thru a human body not only affects nerves and muscles, and that's another matter, but it's carried thru the water in your body.  Electrical current meets resistance, resistance leads to heat, heat causes burns, burns damage flesh.  A plant is no different.

Next time things are all staticy build up a nice charge of static electricity.  Then touch a plant, especially on a bright green leave.  It can leave a small brown dot when your done (may have to look really close).

However, that's high voltage low current.  Both you and the plant will recover.  Voltage, current, and exposure time make a difference.

However, plants are different in low voltage low current situations.

If you run a low voltage, low current thru your body for a long time, you'll likely not have many side effects.  Do the same to a plant and the water inside can chemically change.  Not limited to just the matter that it can separate hydrogen and oxygen from water inside the plant, which can be damaging.


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

[User]
[The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress] How do line marriages work?

Even though they Mannie talks about it a lot I still can't get my head around how it's organized.

[Assistant]
It's really just a consensual group marriage. Start with a husband and wife. But the husband marries another wife and the wife another husband. You're already up to four partners. It doesn't have to be equal ratio. On Luna there's usually more husbands than wifes.

The family shares financial and social burdens. Children are raised and cared for by the entire family group and so on.

Any new partners have to be approved by the entire marital group since everyone will have to live with them. Consensual sexual relations are free within the group of partners.

The main advantage is stability. There's always a number of husbands, wife's and parents. A death won't tear apart a family or orphan children. Since new partners marry into the line marriage, there's always partners in their prime.

It's also genetically quite healthy. Most partners marry into the family, which brings fresh blood and genes. Since there's an increasing number of partners, it's entirely possible for children born in the family to later marry into it as they grow up by marrying siblings or partners they are not genetically related to.

In the end it creates very durable, hard to wipe out family groups that can manage their family assets almost as if they were a business.

Something that is quite useful in a place so harsh and dangerous as Luna colony. On top of that, Manny points out that women are much rarer than men on Luna. Group marriages build large families around women instead of getting them stuck in monogamous relationships where only one man and his children benefit.


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

[User]
Which Economics PhD subdisciplines has the toughest math and which has the least?

I am curious. Which Economics PhD subdisciplines has the toughest math and which has the easiest or least math?

EDIT: If possible can someone please rank all the economic PhD subdisciplines based on how mathy each is?

[Assistant]
Economic and econometric theory are applied math. Academics in these fields are often well-trained mathematicians.

Economic history has a higher density of simple, OLS  analyses than most empirical fields. This is true because the data is sparse and low quality, limiting the use of large, structural models.


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

[User] Why does an ice cube melt faster in cold water than it does in a warmer, dry environment?

[Assistant]
Air has a very low thermal conductivity, meaning that it is a good thermal insulator.

Water on the other hand has a much higher conductivity.

At the same time, since the density of the air is so low, the amount of thermal energy that a specific volume has is actually quite low.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are whisks better at stirring than spoons?

[Assistant]
One of the primary uses of whisks is not to stir but to incorporate air in the mixture. The smaller diameter of the whisk allows more bubbles to form in the mixture.

Another benefit of using whisks is that it is less likely to splash the contents out of the container. This is easily demonstrated - try beating a few eggs with a spoon vs a fork vs a whisk. The spoon would have to be moved rather slowly to avoid splashing and would not incorporate air into the egg.


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

[User]
Does "peak science" exist?

.

[Assistant]
I feel like this hypothesis is limited by working within a strictly capitalist framework. Ultimately, if we can envisage a world where no science can withstand a cost/benefit analysis, it would be equally possible to see a world where money isn't the limiting factor.

tl;dr: Money ain't real, science is. If money stops permitting science, money is more likely to be the obsolete factor!

(Sorry this is so woolly, it's hard not to be on this topic.)


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

[User]
CMV: Black Panther was an extremely mediocre movie that doesn't deserve the praise it's getting, and is, in some ways, a step backwards.

Alright. So admittedly I went into the movie expecting the worse, because of the whole rotten tomatoes controversy, so my opinion of the movie may be extremely nuanced. Here are my main problems with it:
1. Tchalla is Boring
He just doesn't have any character traits besides being compassionate to a fault.  He apparently only learns that racism exists when Killmonger tells him.
2. The CGI is terrible
When I heard from early reviews that the movie  was supposedly beautiful i was initally excited, but most of Wakanda looks like the star wars prequels, it doesnt have a unique artsyle and the movie had moments when the CGI took me entirely out of it, like with the rhinos.
3.  Wakanda doesn't make sense as a country
Has no one wandered into that forest in the 21st century? Is SHIELD, the most advanced intelligence agency in the world ( which knew the exsistance of Black Panther as seen in previous movie's easter eggs) unwilling to disclose the true nature of  one the most powerful country in the world to the rest of the Earth. Why do they determine the leader to be the strongest fighter? shouldn't it be the wisest or fairest?
4. The romance between T'challa and his girlfriend is developed poorly.

[Assistant]
>He apparently only learns that racism exists when Killmonger tells him.

I mean...he and Nakia have a discussion on the issue of what's happening to people outside of Wakanda *before* he ever meets Killmonger, he's just (at that point) willing to maintain the status quo.

Given that this is the status quo that his people have maintained for centuries and attribute their success to you can see why the new King doesn't necessarily want to break it, even if he is himself ambivalent.

Worth noting that he and Killmonger have totally different starting points. Racism (as opposed to general suffering) matters more to a diaspora black man in the minority than someone (the Crown Prince at that) from a totally black, hyper-advanced nation.

>Why do they determine the leader to be the strongest fighter? shouldn't it be the wisest or fairest?

Fantasy/SFF places do things we don't do. Doesn't mean that it makes the works about them bad works.


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

[User] [Captain America: Civil War] Natasha says "You could at least recognize me" to Bucky. Does she mean from "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" movie or from the red room days?

[Assistant]
It's ambiguous, and probably deliberately so, but all the evidence suggests that she simply means "from that time you nearly killed me a couple of years ago".

The backstory Natasha gave in *Winter Soldier* implies that, in the MCU, she didn't know the Winter Soldier the way she did in the comics. But, on the other hand, absolutely nothing Natasha says should ever be assumed to be the truth; her most potent weapon is always deception and secrecy, and knowing the right thing to tell people to get them to do what she wants is a skill so practiced it has become instinct.


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

[User]
Chicken in the egg- how do they get oxygen?

How does the chicken breathe inside of the egg before it hatches without suffocating?

[Assistant]
diffusion through the shell - is is not impermeable to air

to kill the embryos/prevent them from being viable, a process known as egg oiling can be used. this involves coating the egg with an air impermeable film (oil), which prevents the chick from growing normally.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why depression/anxiety often get worse at evening and night?

**Edit:** I think the question can be more precise like

"Why one's mood often get worse and feeling down/anxious at evening and night?"

Not necessarily related with diagnosed mental disorders.

[Assistant] Because you are thinking about everything that happened today or could happen tomorrow right before bed.  You are alone with your thoughts.  With anxiety we all know it gets worse when you sit there and stew on things over and over again.


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

[User] [Avatar the last Airbender] Could a war prisoner who was secretly a waterbender escape the boiling rock ?

[Assistant]
We see that waterbenders can float atop water (Katara as the painted lady.  The weird twins from Legend of Korra), and benders are able to adjust the temperature of the element they're bending (e.g. turning water to ice).  With these skills, a waterbender could pretty easily escape across the boiling lake.

We see that it's possible to get to the lake and cross it without being noticed by the guards using a boat, so a waterbender would have a much easier time of it.  Once they're out, they need to waterbend across the ocean to the nearest land.  But again, we've seen that very skilled waterbenders are capable of doing exactly that.


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

[User] How are we so precise about time, to the point where we skip skipping a leap year every 400 years, when our reference points are millions of miles away in space?

[Assistant]
really precise time is done with really precise clocks

that use atoms and light for their little tick tocks.

---

but for leap year extensions, there are easier comprehensions.

to find the way, just count every day.

---

in four years you're short, so add one more just for sport

but in four hundred years you've gone too far.  the correction, however, is not too bizarre

---

just leave the calendar alone, and you'll find it hasn't grown.

and so this is the case.  every time has its place.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does water feel colder than air if they're the same temperature?

For example, when water is 20C, it feels colder than 20C air.

[Assistant]
Water is able to hold more thermal energy than air. It's *also* more thermally conductive, so it allows heat to transfer faster.

So in both of your examples, your skin is leaking heat into the surrounding environment. But the water touching your body takes far more energy to heat the same volume. And it can take that energy faster than the air can. This is why very cold water can kill you very quickly but a non-windy day at the same temperature is little more than uncomfortable unless you spend considerable time in it.


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

[User] [Star Wars] 90% of communication is non-verbal. Why is C-3PO's face so mechanical? And does he have any way to exude a culturally-appropriate smell?

[Assistant]
The uncanny valley effect means that droids get creepier the more lifelike they become. In Legends continuity it's possible to create droids that're indistinguishable from people, but they're extremely expensive.

It's probably for the best that protocol droids stick to verbal communication, since it's a medium that most everyone can understand and there's less room for misunderstanding. Body language isn't universal, even among members of the same species, and a gesture inoffensive in one culture could be a deadly insult in another. That's likely why C-3PO's arms have such limited range of motion.


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

[User]
ELI5: Can you actually forget/repress completely a traumatic event?

Like, say someone experienced some type of abuse as a child. Is it possible for them to repress this event so strongly they don't remember it in their adult life? Just feel the effects of unexplained mental illness? Or is this just a thing in the movies?

[Assistant] Yes, but often not purposefully. This is why victims of traumatic events often don't remember exactly what happened, when it happened, or how it happened. This is also a part of why police sketches are flawed, as people forget details, and this can lead to false convictions.


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

[User]
[DC] What does Batman have to do in order to win his game with the Joker?

Or at the very least what does he have to do to make the Joker recognize that hes lost? Has he just been on a 20-year winning streak, and the Joker just thinks one day hell get lucky?

[Assistant] Ultimately Jokers endgoal is to break the Batman and show him his perspective of the world. That pretty means that there is no winning state possible for the Batman as part of jokers endgame is getting batman to kill him. Its a lot like a two hamsters on a wheel. Batman can keep chasing and chasing joker, keep stopping his plots and cleaning up his messes, but ultimately the only way to get off the wheel is to let joker win in some way or another, as he would either have to finally lose it and kill joker or die. Joker will not be redeemed, he will not cooperate, and he wont change other than becoming even more deranged. There is no light at the end of the tunnel. Frankly Batman dying would be, as screwed up as it is, the only real way to beat the joker, as he would have nothing to live for. For example, in the Dark knight returns joker went into a catatonic state upon Batmans retirement, he was so devastated by it.


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

[User] ELI5.... why was the result of the Iowa Caucus wrong and why didn't they delay the announcement until they knew for sure?

[Assistant]
**TL,DR:** Iowa has a pretty lax vote counting process, and there is a lot of room for missing and missreported votes. Only in a very close election does this matter.

It may shock you, seeing the importance placed on Iowa in picking presidents, but the whole caucus is run about as shabby as a race for prom queen.

Individual precincts tabulate and call in their own number to the central party office, who places them in a spread sheet, and that's it. No double checks, no second record, the precinct captains are on their honor to duly report. These are the results you see on caucus night. The captains then send in spreadsheets to the central office over the next two weeks, which are counted to make the final tally. This 'gentlemen's agreement' system works, unless its close, then it breaks down totally in several ways:

1) On the caucus night, at least one precinct failed to call in their numbers, the two captains thought the other did it and went to bed. This lead to some hilarious late night phone calls to get them up and call  it in, because neither suspected it would be an 8 vote difference out of 100,000+ votes.

2) This lead to the initial count that had Romney at 8+ votes. But this is the unofficial result. According to Iowa republican standards the process of 'certifying' results takes 2 weeks.

3) One precinct captain relayed to the media in the following days after the caucus that he miss counted and his initial call to the central office was off. He accidentally gave Romney more votes, but reported he would send in correct sheets.

4) Several precincts actually lost their vote counts, only having made the initial call the night of the caucus. So the votes from the precincts could not be counted in the 'certified tally'

5) Adding up the miss reports and subtracting the missing votes gave a final count with Santorum ahead by 30+ votes. Initially the Iowa GOP tried to cop out by refusing to declare a final winner, saying it was a tie. But after some intense drubbing by the media for being cop outs, they gave in a certified Santorum as the winner.

That's how it happens. Iowa will have to make some changes to their process in 4 years, less they want their caucus to become even more of a joke than it already is.

**EDIT:** The 'lax' vote counting thing applies to how the caucus is run by the state republican party. The general is run by the state board of elections and is a much tighter ship, though still prone to failure from time to time: see Florida circa 2000.


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

[User]
ELI5: Could one train in a gravity room like in DBZ to get faster/stronger?

No im not talking about unrealistic 300g like Vegeta did. But maybe 2 or 3?

The only problem would be blood flow, so after a certain point it would be impossible to do because blood wouldnt be able to flow back up from the legs.

But my question is if it would be possible to train in a gravity room, lets say by running, then outside of the room you could exert the same force but run faster.

EDIT: Im speaking more along the lines of running than lifting weights. For example, if Usain Bolt were to enter a gravity room to train everyday instead of outside, then months down the road would he be even faster outside then previous?

[Assistant]
It would just make everything more difficult, really no different to adding more weights to lift, or running with weights attached to yourself.
I don't see why it wouldn't work, but it would be expensive, pointless, and would probably come with health complications.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are "Arkansas" and "Kansas" pronounced differently?

[Assistant]
The names of both states come from a Native American word, "akakaze"; which, if it's Sioux, means "people of the south wind" and if Quapaw, "land of the downriver people" (there doesn't seem to be much consensus on which). It was actually the French that coined the word "Arcansas" in a very bad attempt to pronounce "akakaze".

In the French language, consonants at the end of a word are very often not pronounced, so in the French pronunciation of "Arcansas", or "Arkansas" as we now spell it, the final "s" is not pronounced.

Kansas used the natural English pronunciation, but in Arkansas there was confusion over whether "Arkansas" should be pronounced the English way or the French way. In 1819 it was called the "Territory of Arkansaw", but in 1836 it was admitted to the US as "Arkansas". When the state's two senators actually started arguing over the correct pronunciation, the state legislature had to step in, and passed the following resolution:

> Be it therefore resolved by both houses of the General Assembly, that the only true pronunciation of the name of the state, in the opinion of this body, is that received by the French from the native Indians and committed to writing in the French word representing the sound. It should be pronounced in three (3) syllables, with the final "s" silent, the "a" in each syllable with the Italian sound, and the accent on the first and last syllables. The pronunciation with the accent on the second syllable with the sound of "a" in "man" and the sounding of the terminal "s" is discouraged by Arkansans.


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

[User]
CMV:US Citizens should not have to justify being in any public location with legal accessories including guns

So many people have argued that the Rittenhouse verdict was correct but not just, or that it was incorrect on the basis of "He had no reason to be there" or "he couldn't justify why he was there" or that "no one should go to a protest/riot with a gun no matter what", etc.

I think it was a bad idea, a dangerous idea, etc to do what Rittenhouse did. But I don't think we can or should condemn him or anyone based on simply being on public streets that were dangerous. I can't see how we get the restrictions on movement out of this argument. I don't mean legally, I mean even morally - who decides what constitutes a public place where certain people "can't go"?

Presumably, on different days, these same people wouldn't say Rittenhouse would need to justify being in Kenosha. Most of them explicitly say if he was just outside his house it  would be different. So this would be a shifting curtailment of freedom of movement. What is the universal standard here? I've never liked "I'll know it when I see it" because it seems inherently ex post facto and just likely to be unfair and biased in application.

The final part of my view is that I don't think taking one legal activity and adding an accessory to it that is also legal changes any need to justify yourself. I see that all the time with Cameras - so many people get harassed for having a camera on them in public, even though it's perfectly legal. There is no need to justify having a camera in a public place. This is the same with guns when they're allowed open carry.

You could disagree with the law, but that doesn't mean I need to justify myself to anyone.

Anyway - if you have a coherent argument on why we should require people to "prove they should be somewhere in public" and have that play into their criminal or moral culpability, or clarify why carrying something legal is morally wrong because it bothers others I'll listen to it.

[Assistant]
Choosing to go somewhere, and choosing what to bring to that place reflect on your intent or expectation.  These things absolutely can be morally problematic, and depending on how strongly they imply intent they could also have legal implications.

Going to a fur coat sale is fine.  Carrying a can of red paint is fine.  Carry a can of red paint to a fur coat sale raises legitimate questions.  Do you always carry red paint?  If not, why did you bring it here?  Assuming you don't usually carry paint, and that you aren't on your way to paint something, it's a reasonable assumption that you came to pour paint on fur coats, which is at least morally problematic.

Similar questions can be raised for guns even if they are legal to carry.  Do you usually carry a gun?  If not, and you felt like you needed to carry it to this place, why did you choose to go to a place where you felt unsafe?  You could answer that you felt the counterprotest was important, but that you thought it might escalate so you brought a gun for defense.  You could say you carry your gun all the time.  You could also say that you wanted to bring your gun so that you could keep the protesters in line, and now you've entered problematic territory.

Our laws factor intent heavily into guilt and sentencing.  We can't read minds, but we can look at the situation and deduce at least a bit of what the likely motives and thought processes were.  Where we choose to go and what we choose to bring there are good things to consider in trying to determine this.


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

[User]
[Marvel/MCU] What's it take to kill the hulk? *Possible AoU spoilers

As we saw in both Avenger's movies, the Hulk can take a friggin beating. The hulkbuster suit seemed almost even more powerful than the hulk but even then it barely was able to contain the hulk. He can clearly take advanced weapons as well as conventional gunshots no problem. In the comics what does it take to kill him? Adamantium could probably do it but is there any other ways to do it?

[Assistant] I think the reason the Hulkbuster was able to KO him in AoU was because Scarlet Witch's control was starting to wear off, and Hulk was realizing there wasn't anything to really keep him threatened/angry, since Banner's inside with fear of hurting innocents, which Hulk might even share.


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

[User] [One punch man] What are Saitama's weaknesses ?

[Assistant]
1. A lack of urgency due to not taking his role as a hero seriously.  As he often says, he only acts as a hero for fun.  This means that oftentimes he arrives late to the scene of a disaster or fight, which can have severe consequences.

2. A relative lack of brainpower.  Saitama is **not** dumb, in fact he's shown himself to be surprisingly perceptive more than once.  However, his mental abilities are nowhere close to his physical abilities, and in a world with multiple super-geniuses like Metal Knight and Child Emperor, his relatively average intellect can count as a weakness.

3. A relative lack of technique.  He's never really been trained in martial arts, instead he just uses his vast physical strength and speed to punch opponents into submission.  If there's ever an enemy that could match him in physical abilities *but* has better technique, then Saitama could conceivably be in trouble.  Granted, no such enemy has ever shown up, but still.

4. He's poor.


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

[User]
Does temperature have an effect on radioactivity?

e.g., would nuclear waste stored in, say, Antarctica be less dangerous (give off less radiation) than in a scorching desert? (Not that I'm trying to give anyone ideas ;) )

[Assistant]
No, not really. There are certain decay modes which can be somewhat affected by external factors like temperature (within reason), but they're only the types of decays which directly involve the electron cloud.

So these would be electron capture and internal conversion, primarily. Other decay modes like alpha, beta, and gamma will not be affected.

So putting nuclear waste in Antarctica rather than a hot desert wouldn't have any meaningful effect on the level of radioactivity.


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

[User] What long-term damage will Hurricane Sandy do to the superstructure of New York City by flooding the subways?

[Assistant] The erosion that documentary was likely referring to would be caused by dozens of storms over hundreds of years.  The flooding of the subway would likely only cause damage to the subway, not buildings above it.


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

[User]
Fear of failing my defense

My PhD defense is about 5 weeks from now and I'm really nervous that I'm not going to be prepared for it.

I have been working part-time during my PhD and I just landed a full-time job. I quit my part-time job with my last day being 12 days from today, and then I start my new job the following week. I asked my new employer if it was possible to start after my defense but they said they prefer I start as soon as possible because they are quite busy and need to train me. They said they are happy to give me some days off prior to my defense to make sure I am prepared for it. I've been trying to find the time and energy to study when I'm not working but I'm worried that it will become more difficult once I start my new job. I'll pretty much only have evenings and weekends to study. My PI knows I work part-time and is aware that I've been looking for a full-time job since I was nearing the end of writing my dissertation.

I'm really anxious that I'm going to be unprepared for my defense and fail. How likely is it to fail a PhD defense? Has anyone here worked full-time while preparing for a defense? Any advice or reassurances are welcome. Thanks!

[Assistant]
If your dissertation advisor says youre ready, you are ready. Unless they are an asshole, and advisor has no incentive to set you up to fail.

Everyone gets these jitters, everyone feels under prepared. Remember, you are the expert.


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

[User]
What Happens to Debt After You Die?

What's to stop someone from running up a whole bunch of debt before the kick the bucket? Is it really fair to put that on the spouse and/or kids?

[Assistant]
Depends on what debt it is. Secured loans still are held against the asset. Most other debt is held against the estate. So if you die with 20k in credit card debt, the credit card company goes after what you own.

If the liabilities are greater than the assets, the Credit card company takes a loss. Of course if you and your wife's name is on the card, the wife gets the whole debt.

Student loan debt is discharged when you die.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does a washer-dryer combo use twice as much water when washing and drying compared to just washing?

Drying should be the complete opposite of using water...

I'm looking at specification sheets of washer-dryer combo units and this seems to be always the case.

[Assistant]
In a normal standalone dryer, the hot moist air from the dryer is either vented outside, or is run through a compressor to cool down and release the moisture.

In a washer/dryer combo unit, they instead cool the air using cold water, since a water supply is already present on the unit.


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

[User] ELI5: Why, when you start laughing, every other joke, as silly as it may seems in a normal context, seems absolutely hilarious?

[Assistant]
The part of your brain that makes you laugh has an activation threshold, but once it's active, well, it is easier to keep it active. Think of it like turning on a car with an half-dead battery: hard to do, but once it is running, it keeps going.

It's actually like this with many other things, many other moods. Think of sexual arousal.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are there typical breakfast foods and dinner foods? Is there a biological reason where we want certain nutrients at different points in the day or is it just a social construct?

[Assistant]
Imagine you are are a preindustrial farmer.   You get up before dawn, toil in the field all day, then go back home when it gets dark.

For breakfast, you want something hot that will give you a lot of energy, but can be prepared quickly.

For lunch, you want a cold meal you can take with you and eat when you get hungry.

For dinner, you have time between sunset and bedtime, so you can take a little longer, and have something nice while socializing with friends and family.

The pattern of necessity has become ingrained in our culture, so we consider certain foods to be appropriate for certain meal, long after the original reasons were forgotten.


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

[User]
[John Wick] How public is the continental?

The continental hotel and their coins is obviously a huge worldwide system that has anything an assassin would want at any point. But after finishing John Wick 2
( I haven't seen the 3rd one yet) I'm questioning whether this is a secret organization.

So 1st is the fact that at the end of the 2nd movie.
SPOILERS

Winston puts out a contract on John. But than compared to the earlier scene of a contract going out. Literally EVERYONE gets a text saying they have a chance to kill this man. Is this what the difference between an open and closed account was? Do people just know what the continental is and how to use it?

If the continental is secret. How do they cover there tracks? They were able to fill an entire park with their members. But what if some normal chap tried to check into the continental, then when he tried to have a reservation for the restaurant there a bunch of things with cleaning supplies show up at his doorstep. Does nobody notice how many fuckin people just happen to use gold coins in this world rather than actual money?

[Assistant]
No, the Continental is secret. At the end of 2 you have to remember that they stacked Central Park with people in the know so that they could clear it at a command. All the people that are receiving the text are the people in plain clothes disguised that were used to fill the park.

Without spoiling anything in 3 it's clear that there are crowds of civilians that aren't in the know. Keep in mind when Wick is fighting Common in 2 they're trying to keep the fight a secret. If everyone knew about the Continental economy they wouldn't need to do this.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do we know nothing can go faster than light?

If something were to go ftl wouldn't it be it be invisible? If so, how can we be sure nothing goes ftl?

[Assistant]
No, something being FTL would not be invisible. However, it would only be seen at a location when it arrived, or by a nearby observer after it had passed. At that point, the observer would see two images of the object, the arriving image playing out backwards, and the passing image playing out normally. It would appear quite unusual.

Similarly, something being faster than sound doesn't mean it can't be heard, although you wouldn't hear it till it arrived. You'd then hear the preceding sound 'backwards' as it caught up, and overlapping any following sound if it continued on.


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

[User] What do blind people see when they dream? Assuming they were blind from birth.

[Assistant]
Surveys have been done on this very subject.  A lot of the results found that people with congenital blindness often report experiencing other senses while dreaming while almost none experienced any visual dreams.

For example a lot of studies using participants of three different categories (congenital blindness, later onset blindness, and those not blind) reported that those with congential blindness often had dreams where they had sensations of smell, taste, touch, and mostly sound while almost none of them reported having any visual aspects to their dreams at all.

People with later onset blindness after age 1 found that the longer they were blind, the less visual representations they found in their dreams.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do fish have nostrils?

I understand fish breath through their gills, but why do they still have nostrils? Do they serve any purpose?

[Assistant] Water carries scent pretty effectively. The nostrils on a fish take water in and gives them a sense of smell. Everyone has heard that sharks can smell a drop of blood in an Olympic sized pool of water.


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

[User] [DC/Hellblazer] John Constantine is a right bastard, in every sense of the word. But are there any lines that even he wouldn't cross?

[Assistant] Possibly sacrificing children. His first real foray into the supernatural ended with a child getting dragged to hell by the demon that he summoned. That drove him mad remote to be committed to Ravenscar Mental Asylum for the next two years and was a large driving force behind him for quite a while into he freed her.


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

[User]
How doesn't neutrino oscillation hurt conservation laws?

I heard that electron, muon and tau neutrinos have different resting masses. Let's suppose I generate one electron neutrino in a beta decay (I know it's an anti-electron-neutrino but it's longer to write down.). If I measure all other particles leaving the atom I can be fairly sure about it's energy, momentum and neutrino flavour. I detect it 1000km away and it's a muon neutrino. What happened? How can the momentum and the energy can be conserved at the same time when the resting mass changed? If at the creation I know it's speed was 1000km/s will it arrive to the detector in 1s or more? If it's speed doesn't change where did it get the extra energy from?  What energy and momentum will I measure in the detector?

I have researcher level background in statistical physics, but I'm not too knowledgeable in quantum stuff. Please keep it as simple as possible!

[Assistant]
>I heard that electron, muon and tau neutrinos have different resting masses.

They don't have well-defined masses.

There are three flavor eigenstates and three mass eigenstates, but those two different bases don't coincide. So a neutrino with a given flavor is a superposition of all three mass eigenstates, and a neutrino with a given mass is a superposition of all three flavors.

Since neutrinos are pretty much only produced by weak force processes, they're born in flavor eigenstates. And as they propagate freely through space, the three different mass eigenstates propagate with different phases. And the result is that if you make a measurement in the flavor basis, you might measure a different flavor than the one it started in. And you can derive the probability as a function of time (and therefore distance from the source) for detecting each flavor, as is done in many quantum mechanics textbooks.

As the neutrino is propagating, its energy and momentum are conserved, it's just its flavor that is oscillating with time.


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

[User]
How do you restart a liquid fuel rocket in zero gravity when the fuel is floating and not near the fuel intake?

If the fuel is just floating around in blobs in the fuel tank and not near the fuel intake for the engine, how does it make it in there? Fire a secondary engine first?

[Assistant]
"Secondary engines" (the technical term is ullage engines) are often used for second/third stage ignition in orbital rockets, where the rocket is, after stage separation, briefly in pretty much free fall. These are small solid rocket engines that fire right before the engines of the stage they are attached to ignite, to force all the fuel to the bottom of the tank.

Another method is to pressurise the tank from the top (this is often done using helium gas), to force the fuel down towards the bottom. This is a system usually used for upper-stage engines that will be fired and turned off repeatedly.


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

[User] Is there any part of our body that doesn't contain our own DNA?

[Assistant] Sure, many parts, even some cells. Red blood cells don't contain a nucleus, for example. Tendons and ligaments also don't contain dna, except via any randomly present cells nearby. Which is why they can be donated without the receiver needing to go on immunosuppressive drugs.


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

[User]
ELI5: How can I buy something online for 99 cents and it ship from china and they make money

On ebay there are many items that the buy now price is 99 cents and they ship it from china. How can the seller possible make money on this?

[Assistant] The principle is called the economy of scale. They literally ship tons at a time. They might only sell orders of only a few dollars each, but use cheaper 6 week freight shipping, they can net a small profit per sale. Multiply this by a few thousand, to make shipping a container full worthwhile, and you get a tidy sum. It's not too different from how you can go to a Walmart and buy 4 tees for $5.


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

[User] [Marvel] If Captain America cares so much about civil rights, why doesn't he do more to protect the rights of mutants?

[Assistant]
> "You see, what is or isn't a mutant is a little hard to tell.  It used to be people were picking up superpowers left and right; nobody figured out a select variant was born with it until after the War.  But when you dig right down into what makes us what we are, we're all a little mutated, in our own ways.  A little taller, a little smarter.  Breaking us down into 'mutant' or 'not mutant' is simply a veiled attempt at holding us all in another person's defined role and place, which goes against the grain of what makes this country great.

> "These... Registration acts, these Sentinels, they all have the same things behind them.  And the Captain knows this.  It's an insidious monster, bureaucratic tyranny- the sort of fiend that, if you try cutting off one head, two more grow in its place.  Which is why, all these decades later, he keeps going after the heart of the matter.  You can't let yourself get distracted- it's all the same ploy, just in a little different window dressing.

> "The threats Captain America faces imperil more than just America- but the ideals of freedom and individual effort can save us all, man and mutant alike.  Captain America already does everything he can to protect our empowered sons and daughters, though of course he'd love to do more.  He's trying to save *everyone.*  Showing the *entire world* that, old or young, *we can make humanity what we want it to be.*  With hard work and determination, *anybody* can be a Man of Tomorrow."

>

> "...Also, every time he tries teaming up with the X-Men, they end up going to space, giving the Nazis enough time to rebuild their secret bases, and that's *got* to get annoying after a while."

>

> "...And, Namor and Wolverine are kind of pricks."


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

[User]
[Payday 2] Why is their drill so terrible?

The Payday crew brings in millions of dollars each, couldn't they afford a drill that doesnt break down every 15 seconds?

[Assistant] Drills are hard, regardless of how good a drill you have if you don't use it properly then it breaks quickly. In the professional world using a drill is something engineers with 7 years of college do.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why it isn't unconstitutional to not allow felons to vote.

People bringing up the 14th amendment during the prop 8 discussion got me thinking about this. How are felons not covered under "equal protection?"

[Assistant] Both the 5th and 14th amendments contain something known as the "due process" clause, which allows rights to be taken away from people provided that they're given due process under the law. Conviction of a crime is due process. Voting isn't the only right that felons lose.


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

[User] [Star Wars] During the boarding of the Tantive IV during A New Hope, a random crewman gets a lucky shot and blows Darth Vader's head off. How does the rest of the saga play out?

[Assistant]
With Vader killed, there is no one on board who knows that Leia stole the Death Star plans. So Bail Organa's coup attempt goes smoothly.

Leia is released from Imperial custody, lands on Tatooine to find General Obi-Wan Kenobi. She finds him, recruits him, and takes him to Alderaan, along with a boy that he insists must come with him.

The trio arrive on Alderaan and find Bail Organa. Organa receives the Death Star plans and heads to a meeting of the Imperial Senate.

Obi-Wan Kenobi tells Luke Lars and Leia Organa the truth of their parentage. Their father was the dashing hero of the Clone Wars, Anakin Skywalker. Unfortunately, Obi-Wan's pupil turned on the Jedi and helped establish the Jedi.

Obi-Wan takes Luke and Leia Skywalker to Dagobah to train with him, Qui-Gon Jinn, and Grand Master Yoda. They are told of the Sith, and how their father was destined to bring balance through his destruction of the Sith. Obi-Wan believes that balance is his children.

Bail Organa reveals the plans of the Death Star in the Imperial Senate. He is likely executed. Even Imperial sympathising planets become perturbed by what they see. The Rebellion grows stronger than they could have ever imagined. The Death Star is destroyed.

Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and the Skywalker twins defeat the bio-mechanical apprentices of Darth Sidious created by Dr. Cylo.

The four Jedi eventually kill Darth Sidious and the Empire collapses.

With nothing to take control of, or corrupt, Snoke remains a dark side user until he is destroyed by the Jedi Knights founded by the Skywalker twins under the watchful eye of Obi-Wan Kenobi.


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

[User] Just as glass allows visible light (390 to 700 nm) to pass through it, do any other materials allow only a specific range of the electromagnetic spectrum to pass through it?

[Assistant] This is the case with almost all materials. They absorbe certain wavelengths better than others, while some just passes through. Just think of x-rays (0.01 to 10 nm) that passes through most materials that aren't too dense (even if it is somewhat attenuated along the way).


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

[User]
[Assassin's Creed] If ancestors' memories are imprinted on genes, why do we have access to ALL memories? (Further explanation inside)

The premise of the AC universe is that you are reliving a previous ancestor's life since their memories are encoded in their genes, and then passed on to their offspring.  However, each offspring should really only get half of each parent's DNA, so shouldn't they only receive about half of each parent's memories as well?  By the time all of these memories come to Desmond Miles, the memories should almost be unwatchable.

Now, there's an explanation that only half-works for me.  A huge percentage of what you do didn't actually necessarily happen in the ancestor's life... it's just a simulation put together by the Animus.  However, there are still sections that are confirmed to have happened exactly as depicted... which comes down to pretty much any cutscene, particularly the "on-the-death-bed" victim scenes.  But even then, I feel like DNA would give you bits and pieces of those scenes at best, not the entire thing start to finish.  Again, the number of times DNA splits from the late 1100's to 198x (Desmond's conception) should make these pretty much unwatchable.  So what's going on here?

[Assistant]
So far, we've only seen memories from a male ancestor, passed onto a male descendant.  It's possible genetic memories are similar to Mitochondrial DNA.

Mitochondrial DNA is only passed from the mother, and as such, maternal lineage can be traced directly with it.  If genetic memories are similar, it could be the same phenomenon, but via DNA from the father.

The sheer amount of genetic material involved would be obscene after a few generations though.  In this case, it could be that only particularly important memories are preserved, the rest lost over time.  It could also be linked to the use of Eagle Sense/Sight/Vision, with memories formed (temporally) near the use of that ability being more strongly encoded.

This could explain why we never saw Altair's, Ezio's, Edward's, or Haytham's childhoods, but we did see Connor's.  Connor was closer to Desmond than the others (genealogically), and as he grew up in a less urban setting, he may have had more instinctual need for Eagle Sense, thus better encoding his younger memories.  His more tumultuous youth could also be a factor.


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

[User]
[40K] What about the other galaxies? Do they have separate Chaos entities?

So the 40K universe seems pretty packed, with the empire, elders, etc. One of the most interesting are the Chaos entities, who emerged from the emotions of conscious beings. In particular acts of Eldars and Humans seem to create (?) and awake the Chaos gods.

All that sounds pretty encompassing, but the 40K universe only covers a galaxy as far as I know. A galaxy is infinitesimally small part of the universe, why would the acts of being in only one galaxy create universal gods? Does that means that these Chaos gods are local entities? Do different galaxies have different Chaos gods that are independent from the actions of Milkyway universe Chaos gods?

Also, what's up with all the other galaxies? Are there any hints about what's going on there?

[Assistant]
The short answer is "we have no fucking clue".

The longer answer is that it cannot be known, because nobody has seen another one (or at least come back). Sure, a galaxy, in the grand scheme of things, is an infinitesimal blip, but to a bunch of infinitesimal blips, like ourselves, a galaxy is MINDBLOWINGLY HUGE. Even to a vast empire like Humanity's the galaxy is huge. And all that space between galaxies? Basically incomprehensible. So immensely, mind-shatteringly gigantic that few have even meaningfully conceived of what a trip like that would take.

Of course, among the privileged elite with knowledge of imperial secrets, there are theories abound. Many believe that there is nothing but Tyranids. This theory sort of makes sense, because, at least statistically speaking, the chances of us just being stumbled across by anything from another galaxy is miniscule. We aren't 100% sure how far the Astronomican's light reaches, but near the galactic edge it is already pretty faint. Even if the Tyranids saw its light from outside of the Milky Way, they would have still needed to be close enough to see it in the first place. This leads to the assumption that there are a SHITLOAD of Tyranids floating around out there in the vast emptiness of the void between galaxies, and whichever Hive we are dealing with now just happened to be lucky enough to pass within the Astronomican's range. This is a truly terrifying thought because that would mean we might be the last bastion in at least our galactic group. This theory gains a bit of traction from a Necron King's venture into the void, from which he came back saying that there was nothing to be found besides Tyranids.

Some believe that there is an empire of Old Ones out there. Some believe that the Old Ones were never from our galaxy in the first place, and that their defeat at the hands of the Necrons was not a total defeat. Some believe that, even if they WERE from here, they didn't stay.

The Old Ones theory seems to lend some credence to the idea that the Immaterium extends far outside of our own galaxy. Considering that they were basically masters of Warp travel, their journey to another galaxy could have been aided by utilizing some sort of Webway through the vastness of the void.

More evidence that the Warp extends beyond our galaxy is, again, the Tyranids. There is no reason for them to have evolved a trait like their Shadow without a Warp medium for it to have manifested in.

Another story tells of a renegade Chaos God known as Malal, or Malice, that was "exiled", and considering that the four we know of now have a presence throughout the entire galaxy, where else would he be exiled to?

Tl;Dr = We have no idea. There are a number of theories, many of which seem to point to there being an "Immaterium" outside of our own galaxy, but at the end of the day they are only theories. We cannot know because, at least so far, there is no possible way for us to know.


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

[User]
Why are submarines and torpedoes blunt instead of being pointy?

Most aircraft have pointy nose to be reduce drag and some aren't because they need to see the ground easily. But since a submarine or torpedo doesn't need to see then why aren't they pointy? Also ww2 era subs had sharo fronts.

[Assistant]
Many answers, but one thing most people don't realize about fluid dynamics:  Notice the subs are more tapered on the back that the front.

It is MUCH easier to 'push aside' air/water than it is to 'return' the air/water.

Pushing it aside is very easy.

Getting the air/water to 'flow' properly behind you without causing vortexes or cavitation is much more difficult, and where the majority of your drag will originate from.


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

[User]
CMV: Where your born doesn't matter and country pride is pointless

I don't think I belong to a country and I think the concept is odd. I was born in the UK and have lived here all my life, but I fail to understand why people are so hard-core about being a 'proud brit' or anything. Where I was born isn't something I was able to decide for myself, and I want my life to be what I make out of it, not what it decides for me. I believe the only way to belong to a country is to find one whose culture is similar to your own tastes and opinions, and to move there. What's the point in being proud of a country I was born in if I feel no attachment to how it's run or anything else?

*you're

*View partially changed. Country pride is not pointless.

**Main view unchanged, it seems no-one can quite convince me. I've had some fantastic conversations and I'm really happy with how many of you engaged without being toxic. Stay safe y'all. Thanks so much!**

[Assistant] Being born in and living in the UK means that you would have had a different life growing up than in any other country. your speech, taste in food and  general world view will be affected by the country that you grew up in (legally the country you where born in dose matter). So your country directly reflects on you.


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

[User]
is a black hole necessarily a singularity (and vice versa)

My superficial knowledge of what black holes are and how they work tell me the answer to the question is yes (yes), but I'm not sure.

I guess I understand that if you have a black hole, the mass must be in a singularity since, if you have gravity strong enough to bend space entirely inwards so that light can't escape, then surely there are no other forces that can resist this by pushing apart (like how atoms or neutrons push each other away) to constitute a body of some sort.

So it seems that a black hole necessarily contains a singularity?

Ok, then, if you have a situation where gravity is strong enough to create a singularity, is it necessarily also a black hole? Can you have a singularity so small that light can't fall into it, or something like that?

I'm sort of thinking of this case where you have a neutron star, and you add one neutron at a time... is there going to be a point where I add a neutron and "pop" it's a singularity / black hole, or is there some in-between (however narrow) where you're not quite one or the other?

[Assistant]
Short answer, we don't know.

The math predicts singularity, but usually that's just a big red flag that you've reached the limitations of the math, not necessarily the limitations of the real physical universe. There may be some as yet unknown physics that prevents a singularity. Some believe that a further level of collapse is possible beyond a neutron star to an unknown star type that we haven't seen yet - quark stars are the common term. Just because the curvature of spacetime around an object is extreme enough to create an event horizon, it doesn't necessarilly follow that there has to be a singularity at the center.