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

[User] [Harry Potter] Why are unicorns such sexist bastards?

[Assistant]
I assume your referring to Unicorns unwillingness to be handled by male students in the Care of Magical Creatures Class.

Over several thousand years Unicorns went from being plentiful across Europe to incredibly rare, now confined to a few reserved areas like the Forbidden Forest. This was partly due to the reduction in wild areas but mainly as a result of hunting by both muggles and wizards, who valued their horns, blood, etc. for their powerful magical properties.

As a response to being hunted they grew to be cautious of humans, and especially male humans because those were the ones most likely to be hunting them in medieval times. Although Wizarding were more egalitarian than muggles they were still fairly medieval in their attitudes. So hunters would almost exclusively men.

Its not clear whether this is a learned reaction* or a product of the selective pressure of Unicorns that avoided human males being more likely to reproduce), but whatever the mechanism it developed into an increasingly strong instinct over generations. Young females by contrast were not historically a danger to them, and could in some cases be a positive force.

Obviously in the modern era muggles are prevented from interacting with unicorns, and wizards regardless of gender treat them with respect and reverence, but an instinct developed over thousands of years doesn't fade quickly.

-----------

*^^Unicorns ^^are ^^a ^^powerfully ^^magical ^^species, ^^which ^^means ^^they ^^are ^^intelligent ^^but ^^not ^^in ^^a ^^way ^^that ^^is ^^very ^^comprehensible ^^to ^^humans. ^^Some ^^wizarding ^^researchers(cf ^^Boggins ^^et ^^al.) ^^have ^^theorised ^^they ^^can ^^communicate ^^with ^^one ^^another ^^via ^^transference ^^of ^^memories, ^^which ^^would ^^allow ^^the ^^message ^^that ^^male ^^humans ^^were ^^especially ^^dangerous ^^to ^^be ^^transmitted ^^between ^^them ^^swiftly ^^and ^^passed ^^on ^^through ^^generations.


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

[User] [Scooby-Doo] Why is faking hauntings and cryptid appearances such a popular criminal scam?

[Assistant]
"Drive the price of a place down artificially so you can buy it for a fraction of the actual value" and variants thereof is a fairly common scheme.

"Dressing up a monster to scare teenagers" is, admittedly, a very odd way of doing that. But the basic principle is a solid criminal strategy.


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

[User]
Weather: Does snowfall cause flooding?

Thanks for the info guys! I live in the SW United States and I was kinda wondering about how the snow north could effect flooding. Glad I asked!

[Assistant] Well, nobody else has answered so I'll give you a probably less scientific answer than you're looking for. Snowfall does not directly cause flooding, however when snow melts it can definitely cause flooding. When snow melts faster than the normal water ways can allow it to flow away, it results in flooding. This can occur near the source of the runoff (melting snow) or it can occur many miles away.


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

[User] ELI5: How do cemeteries continue to pay the bills after there are no more plots left to sell?

[Assistant] The cemetery has to put some money for each burial into a perpetual care fund. This money is invested and used to pay for the ongoing maintenance of the cemetery. Some cemeteries are publicly funded by taxes.


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

[User] ELI5: Duty Free. Why are they found in airports/borders, and why do they usually have mostly alcohol?

[Assistant]
Duty free shops (generally found in international airport terminals) allow travelers --who are traveling out of the country-- to purchase certain items free from most taxes.

Depending on the country the traveler is from, at, or going to, these items can be sold at a large discount because some countries have high taxes. In other words, if your home country has high taxes on alcohol, it may be much cheaper to buy it from a duty free shop since there will be less taxes.

Why Alcohol and tobacco? Because many countries impose very high taxes (called sin taxes) on these items, so to get these without taxes could be much much cheaper.

For Americans, duty free alcohol isn't actually all that cheap (for the most part) because US taxes on alcohol isn't nearly as high as other places, you may only save a few dollars.

Quick EDIT: To be clear on leaving the country. Duty free is only available for travelers who are leaving the country as in they cannot consume the products before they get to their destination.


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

[User]
Could we be AI?

How would we know our selfhood, identity, and personality are not simply a collection of algorithms?

[Assistant]
We could be just as we could be a dream of a butterfly.

It's less about how we would know we're not simply X but, rather, whether we have any positive reasons to believe that we are X. Hypothetical speculation is not a positive reason.


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

[User] Does the speed of a planet going around its orbit or the speed its spin affect its ability to support life?

[Assistant]
I would say yes. In the extreme case:

If it's tidally locked to the sun, like the moon is to earth, then the two sides would be temperature extremes. The terminator, the edge between the sides, would probably suffer extreme atmospheric events. The dark side may be cold enough to freeze the atmosphere. These things should make life more difficult.


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

[User]
[Pokmon]can a Pokmon be charged for a crime and if so, what would its punishment be?

Take the squirrel squad for example. They knowingly caused trouble and mischief through their activities (vandalism, theft, Etc.). I do believe other, more intelligent Pokmon would knowingly commit more violent crimes (robbery, assault, murder, etc) regardless of the presence of a trainer. How would a Justice system approach this problem?

[Assistant]
Most likely people would just rely on their own pokemon to drive it off. If it became enough of a problem, the local police might get involved in driving it off or capturing it. If it continued to be a problem even then, they'd probably ask a trainer to come deal with it and either capture it or find a way of changing it's behavior. Just like what actually happened with the Squirtle Squad.

Idk why people keep saying "wild animals aren't arrested so they'd do nothing" as if wolf populations haven't been utterly devastated in both the US and UK due to wolves hunting livestock, which is only one example of humans dealing with wild nuisance animals. And the whole "monkeys in India" claims are ignorant of *why* monkeys in India are allowed to do that, which is because they are sacred to Hindus and thus cannot be harmed like bears, wolves, alligators, wild cats, feral dogs, foxes, and so on are every where else in the world are when they become an even slight nuisance to humans.


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

[User]
How did we conclude that iris and fingerprints are unique for each and every individual?

It is commonly known fact that no two persons can have the same fingerprints (and iris). But how can we conclude that? What is the research behind this? What are the chances that someone else on this planet in the present, past or future does not have the same biometrics as I do?

[Assistant]
>It is commonly known fact that no two persons can have the same fingerprints (and iris). But how can we conclude that?

It's not that they *can't*, it's just that they're highly unlikely to. And that can be statistically verified. We have huge databases of biometrics so it's easy to check how rare it is for people to have the same fingerprint etc.


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

[User]
Would Kant say that you can't tell your kids about the tooth fairy because it's a lie?

Or would he say that it's okay because we could rationally will that every parents tell their kids that there is a tooth fairy without contradiction? And also in this case the child is not being used as a means, but rather the child's enjoyment is the end in itself?

[Assistant] He would say it's still immoral because your still disrespecting the autonomy of the child by willingly stating a falsehood. This question is very similar to the "can a parent lie to their terminally ill child that theyll be okay" and deontologists have already stated that they cant on that one either (but you can choose not to answer them or dodge the question just fyi)


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

[User] ELI5: If an astronaut was to open his suit in space and all the oxygen was sucked out where would it go? Would it somehow make it to Earth? If you were closer to another planet would it affect the outcome?

[Assistant]
Each molecule would move according to the velocity it gained while being expelled from the suit, determined by the pressure behind it and its initial speed. If there was a planet nearby, the planet's gravity would pull on it; whether it could pull it all the way in would depend on that initial velocity and the mass of the planet.

If it had sufficient speed, it would go into an independent orbit around the sun, or even possibly escape the solar system entirely, becoming an indistinguishable part of the interstellar medium.


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

[User]
[NSFW] [MCU] If antman became a proctologist...

Could he use a shrink disk to shrink a poo inside someone so it could come out super easily, or would that just shrink the entire person since the poo is still part of them?

[Assistant] Pym particles make the Speedforce look consistent.  Yes, he could shrink the poo so it comes out super easily.  Also, poo isn't really a part of you.  Nothing in your digestive tract is.  Think of your body as a donut with your mouth and anus being the donut holes.  Everything in there is, depending on your perspective, "outside" of your body.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does the influence of certain sports spread across the world while others online exist in one country

For example gridiron/NFL is only in America, it isn't even in any of the two bordering nations. While on the other hand football/soccer is known all around the world. Then there are some in between such as cricket or rugby where it is only in a few countries.

[Assistant] Football/soccer is a sport that has very simple rules and minimal equipment to play. All you really need to play at a recreational level is a ball and something to mark off the goal area (some cones or sticks).  This makes it popular with children because if its accessibility, and allows it to spread worldwide.


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

[User] ELI5: Why old monkeys don't have white fur?

[Assistant]
Old apes do get gray, starting with their heads, just not to the extent that humans do.

Why? Your hair follicles makes two chemicals to feed the hair: catalase and hydrogen peroxide. The catalase breaks down the hydrogen peroxide into water and oxygen*. When you stop producing catalase, you just have hydrogen peroxide, which bleaches the hair. The hair's not a gray color, it simply doesn't have any color anymore.

For whatever reason, other great apes don't have the same wide-scale catalase loss that humans have. They do have other signs of aging, such as body hair loss, that we don't have.

**correction of mistake*


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

[User] If the eye is opened during sleep will the brain still process the visual information?

[Assistant]
No, and maybe!

OK. During sleep, particularly REM sleep, the ascending sensory pathways are shut down by strong inhibition. On the other hand, visual input provides a very strong drive to inhibit sleep. Enough light in the eyes, and you stand a good chance of waking up. However, lower amplitude visual inputs should be shut off.


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

[User]
How do black holes work?

Mainly - Where does what ever it sucks up go?

[Assistant]
You need to know two things to understand this. You know how if you put heavy things on top of something, it crushes it? Black holes kind of work like that. Imagine if you started stacking loaves of bread up and up and up, hundreds and hundreds of loaves. The ones on the bottom would get really really crushed, right? However, the same amount of bread is there, it's just fitting into a smaller space.

There's also this thing called gravity. It's basically a force that makes stuff pull other stuff toward it. The bigger something is, the stronger it pulls. Earth has gravity, and it's what keeps us from floating off into space. It's always pulling you in. Really big stuff pulls everything else into the centre of it. It even pulls on itself! The outside is always being pulled into the inside.

So imagine millions of loaves of bread in a big ball in space, bigger than Earth. They'd all be crushing the ones in the middle, and then the gravity of the ball would pull more loaves of bread in. As they pulled more in, the ball would get bigger and gravity would pull harder, and the ones in the middle would get crushed more and more. Eventually, the ball would get so big and gravity would pull on all the loaves of bread so hard that it would crush them all at once into the very centre. They'd all be crushed into a really really tiny space, smaller than a single loaf of bread. The gravity would be so strong when this happens that it even pulls in light! This is how a black hole works.


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

[User]
How do certain senses inside our bodies measure certain parameters? For instance, how do cells measure our blood pressure, or body warmth?

Recently, in biology class, we came across the subject of nerves, and all things related. There was stated that our body can measure certain parameters for instance our osmotic values or our blood pressure. I was wondering how our cells could measure this.

[Assistant]
Our bodies have sensor cells located in very strategic places.  Lets take, for example, blood pressure.  The baroreceptor cells, located in the aortic arch and carotid arteries of the neck, provide a signal to the brain telling it to slow the heart down (a negative-feedback loop).  As blood pressure increases, the baroreceptor cells get physically stretch, or distended, and are thus more and more stimulated - sending more signal to the brain, which in turn, tells the heart to beat less frequently and drops the blood pressure.

It gets a little more complicated when we look into the sympathetic outflow inhibition of norepinephrine, which through another mechanism, can relax blood vessels dropping systemic pressure.

These baroreceptor cells are based off of relative distention, so it's not really absolute values that determine the signal outflow.

An interesting note; Patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) or emphysemia have an interesting situation when it comes to their oxygen sensing cells.  As a patient develops COPD, the oxygen that gets into their blood stream diminishes over time due to decreasing efficiency of their lungs.  Their body becomes accustomed to this drop of oxygen saturation and sets a new 'normal' lower than before.  So in this new 'normal state', oxygen levels have to be pretty low for their body to say "Take a breath" again.  Now, if a poorly trained EMT decides to put this patient on pure 100% oxygen, their blood is now much more saturated with O2.  Their body senses this abundance of oxygen way above their 'normal level' and thinks, "Hey, we have so much oxygen, we don't even need to take a breath now", so this patient, if not actively taking breaths, will stop breathing!

Hope this helps/is interesting.


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

[User]
ELI5 How do we know which colors different animals see?

Also, would we know if a specific animal had color blindness?

[Assistant]
Dissect their eyes to see the actual color detecting cells and test what light they respond to.

The cone cells have specific proteins tasked with reacting to specific wavelength bands of light, you can expose those proteins to light in the lab and monitor their activity.

Since all animals are at least loosely related, there are only a few variants of these color detection structures and it's pretty easy to see which ones are present and which are missing.


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

[User]
What would be the most effective layout for a tug of war team?

Say you have 2 strong large guys, two medium strength medium size, and two small, low strength guys.  What layout would produce the most effective tug of war team?

[Assistant]
It shouldn't matter - the tension on the line will just be a sum of all the players' pulls.

It would matter more to order everybody from shortest to tallest or vice versa so everybody can get into an efficient and comfortable pulling stance (so a short guy isn't stuck between two tall guys pulling the rope at his head height instead of shoulder-height or wherever the ideal pulling position is).


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

[User]
Is it possible to synthesize ozone and get it into the atmosphere?

And if so why haven't we done it yet?

[Assistant]
It is possible to synthesize ozone, unfortunately, this is a question of scale.  The mass creation of ozone and then facilitation to the correct altitude would be an astronomical cost.

Ozone can be created through arcing electricity through oxygen; however, ozone in the troposphere is actually a pollutant and acts as an irritant to humans.


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

[User]
Can someone please tell me why we curve-fit?

I'm doing a physics project that includes Gaussian and Lorentzian 'fits', and I want to get a basic of understanding of why we curve-fit, and why those two fits are considered good.

[Assistant]
"Curve-fitting" means different things to different people but in general when you are fitting a curve you are doing some form of  hypothesis testing.  **Hypothesis Testing** is the basis of science:

* Step 1) Make a hypothesis;
* Step 2) Test hypothesis with data.

In many branches of science a good hypothesis requires expressing a proposed idea in a mathematical formula. For example, the mathematical expression of Newton's 2nd law is F=ma.  Suppose you wanted to test this hypothesis,  than you would take some mass, **m**, and push on it with a variety of forces, **F**, and measure the resulting acceleration, **a**.  A 'curve fit' in this case would be to see if your data (the measured accelerations as a function of forcing) provides a good fit to the hypothesized linear relation F=ma as opposed to some alternative hypothesis such as F= ma^2. By testing your model against the data you determine if it is consistent.  A key subdetail is that in many cases you have to be careful with understanding the measurement uncertainties of the data. In the real world with real data, you might not find a perfect relationship F=ma in your data but it's crucial to be able either reject the hypothesis or conclude it's statistically "close enough" given the uncertainty of your measurements. If your measurement quality is really poor, you'll find that you can't discriminate between competing hypotheses because all the different 'curve-fits' look as good as the next one.

In your specific case it sounds like you are testing whether the data is consistent with a hypothesis that the measurements will follow a specific type of distribution, either Gaussian or Lorentzian. By curve fitting you should (in optimal situations) be able to determine that one of these hypothesis provides a better fit to the data. Another key in any sort of experimental design is to insure that the data you get is going to be sufficient to conclusively test the hypothesis you start with.  If you get shitty data and you may be unable to draw any sort of conclusion from the 'curve fitting.'

The practice of "curve fitting' is often abused in many different ways (badly formed hypothesis, poor experimental design, neglecting data uncertainties, statistical trickery, etc...) Detailing all those cases would be a book-length rant.


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

[User] ELI5: When we eat too much, why do we get tired? Shouldn't we instead get a lot of energy from the food?

[Assistant] Digestion takes a lot of energy. Your body likes to digest things as soon as possible to make more fuel for further shenanigans. You digest things much more efficiently when your body doesn't have to do anything else. Therefore...Sleep is a viable option after eating a large meal that needs time to digest.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why can't humans hold themselves perfectly still without twitching, hence the difficulty of the game "operation"?

I don't understand why we twitch slightly holding tweezers, standing still, etc.

[Assistant] Muscles are composed of many strands. When your arm is held up, not all fibers are being used simultaneously, as that would need you to carry an extra weight. Over time fibers get tenuous, needing to relax, so your they switch  to other strands, and this switch is usually abrupt, so our arm twitches a bit.


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

[User]
CMV: Socialism's checkered history makes it to risky to support

I really love Bernie as a canidate and I think he has a great head on his shoulders. I think he has some fantastic ideas but I am really lost with his stance on socialism. I hear a lot about "democratic socialism" but im not really sure what that is? Again I am open ears to some good logical arguments because I am sure they are out there but please no "capitalism bad" silly arguments like that.

Here are my current arguments against socialism:

\- It killed millions in Mao's China before they switched towards a more capitalistic nation and emphasized the free market which has allowed them to become a global superpower as well SIGNIFICANTLY increase the income of average chinese citizens.

\- India, China, etc. have seen massive economic boosts and dropping poverty rates

\- Venezuela is currently in a state of economic ruin and people fleeing to escape the nations economic crisis

\- People would risk there life to escape west germany to go to the more economically prosperous east germany

\- Every single major first world country is based around the free market

\- A green society is impossible without first progressing through an industrial stage (kuznets curve)

\- It destroyed the USSR which went through terrible economic conditions before its collapse and now embraces capitalism and is prosperous.

\- It causes confusion in the markets since government can control the price which leads to bubbles and pricing issues

Thanks so much :)

[Assistant] Every economic system has a checkered history. Sudan, Libya, Zimbabwe are some capitalist examples. I've read articles suggesting that larger economic situations (natural resources, political lines, geography, ect) have more to do with the economic success of a nation than it's economic policy.


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

[User] If polar caps are melting, how do we measure altitude of a place in a precise, consistent and time-invariant manner?

[Assistant] Altitudes are measured with respect not to the instantaneous sea level at any point in time, but to a datum surface which is periodically refined or replaced. At present, the most widely used datum is the WGS 84 reference ellipsoid.


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

[User]
[Groundhog Day] How did Phil get stuck in a time loop? And what was the cause of the loop?

What made me think of this was an episode of Startalk, where Neil DeGrasse Tyson said the director of Groundhog Day was interviewed and said that Phil was caught in the time loop for the equivalent of decades or even hundreds of years. That is so scary....

[Assistant] Ned Ryerson is actually a powerful warlock.  He does this kind of shit all the time...approaches strangers in the street posing as a long time acquaintance and rewards those who receive him kindly, while banishing the aloof to endure this kind of living purgatory.  Those souls damned to repeat the day can return to normal life if they find a way to gain perspective, care for others, & selflessly care for the wants of those around them.


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

[User] Is there a chance we haven't yet discovered a fundamental branch of science, such as electricity?

[Assistant]
Stephen Wolfram claimed that Cellular Automata and iterated systems were a new branch of science in his book "A New Kind of Science". It has been suggested that Stephen Wolfram can be a bit full of himself at times. There is no doubt that the relatively recent Chaos Theory (Complexity Theory) is significant.

More fundamentally - we know that General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics are incomplete (and incompatible). Physicists are looking quite hard for a replacement (or extension) for these two theories.

Electricity is part of four currently known forces (Gravity, Electro-magnetic, Weak Nuclear and Strong Nuclear forces). Additional forces that we aren't yet aware of are possible - but tightly constrained - most observations can be understood in terms of the four known forces. There isn't much left over for extra forces.

Having said that, both Dark Matter and Dark Energy are concepts looking for an explanation. Neither Dark Energy or Dark Matter are very tractable at our scale. For a quasi-human species to miss electricity and build a civilisation on whatever is behind Dark Energy seems highly unlikely (for large values of 'highly').


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

[User]
ELI5: When institutions like the Cancer Society spend money on cancer 'research', what are they actually doing?

From someone who has virtually no background in the medical sciences - what does one do when 'researching' cancer? I see calls for donations from organisations such as the Cancer Society all the time, and I know it isn't easy, but objectively speaking (from a public bystander POV), I feel Cancer is still very much out there. Sometimes there are little flare-ups in the media of some potential 'miracle' cancer cure, which are only then shot down again by some other high-up medical authorities. What is actually happening, and where does our money go towards?

[Assistant] Generally it's for researchers working in universities. They put forward proposals for research they'd like to undertake.  If the proposal is sound, aligns with said society/organisation's goals and has good prospects, they provide funding, usually in the firm of a grant, to the researcher.


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

[User]
Eli5 how does radiation work?

I've been reading a lot about Chernobyl recently. And Google gives quite complex answers, so I thought I'd try here. So I have a few questions:-

What is radiation?

How do very high doses, like the ones workers and emergency workers experienced during the disaster, effect the human body?

[Assistant]
It may help if we start with 'what radioactive decay is'. Radeoactive decay is when a large unstable element (like uranium) splits into two smaller elements. For seemingly most elements, this decay sends off subatomic particles and photons, often referred to as radiation.

Those particles and photons from radioactive decay are very good at fucking up cells. They break down molecules, key among them DNA and RNA. So in addition to damaging the normal molecules of a cell, it damages the instructions used to fix the cells. So someone exposed to radiation might come out with a burn (sunburn is a mild, shallow version of a radiation burn from UV radiation), but the real danger is the cells' DNA/RNA basically making it so that the cell can't continue to function. Our body can handle some radiation, though it does increase your risk of cancer. The deadly non-cancerous issue is when you get too much at once. In the case of nuclear radiation victims, they get hit with such high doses that on a cellular level, too many cells stop functioning because of DNA damage.


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

[User] [LotR] Sauron is sometimes called the Necromancer. How is he a Necromancer? Can he raise the dead?

[Assistant]
He controls fell spirits. The Barrow Wights, the Nazgul (who are basically dead but their spirits remain), and other fell creatures brought from the spiritual realm to terrorize the Free People of Middle Earth.

He doesn't really do zombies, but arguably the spirits are far worse.


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

[User]
ELI5: The difference between irony and sarcasm.

I never really understood the difference between those two. I know irony is saying something that you dont actually mean but sarcasm is the same, right?

[Assistant]
First, to be clear we're talking about verbal irony.  There are other forms of irony, but verbal irony is saying something while you mean something very different.

Sarcasm is a bitter remark designed to hurt.  It is very often done in the form of irony, but it doesn't have to be.

Let's clarify with a few examples:

* **What a fine musician you turned out to be!**  This is sarcasm and irony.  It means the opposite of what it says (irony) and is done so with the intent to insult (sarcasm).  This is the most common form of sarcasm, and it is why it's often assimilated to irony.

* **You couldn't punch your way out of a wet paper bag.**  This is meant as a caustic, insulting remark, but it means exactly what it says. It is sarcasm, but not irony.

* **The weather is so great!** (when it's raining)  This is irony, as it means the opposite of what it says, but it isn't sarcasm, as it isn't a jab at someone.


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

[User] ELI5: What is the process for creating cgi effects on the scale of something like the battle for Winterfell where there are so many individual moving objects?

[Assistant]
I can think of two techniques that are typically used high character count scenes.

1. Duplicating actors through a process called **rotoscoping (think copy and paste)** multiple times in the scene. This works best for characters with similar appearances like the Dothraki Horde or the Unsullied.
2. CGI Studios can make use of specific plugins in Maya that can **simulate large groups of people using the same technology to simulate fluids or particles.** This cuts down render time and means that animators don't have to animate each individual person/object. This is particularly useful for something the wights. An example of where this type of technique is used is in war games like Total War.


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

[User]
[Nolan Batman] How is the League of Shadows not seen as a terrorist group?

Maybe I shouldn't be assuming that NYC and 9/11 happened in the Nolanverse, but since New York exists in the DC Universe as well as Gotham, I figure they both might coexist in Nolan's world too. So anyway, assuming that this world is as paranoid about terrorism as the real world is, how could something like the League of Shadows infiltrate the city so thoroughly in Begins and in Rises? After the Scarecrow fear gas incident, wouldn't the city be put under martial law for a while? And just how well known was Bane supposed to be anyway? CIA knew his name and that he wore a mask, and Alfred dug up all that stuff about him coming from the Pit. Was he well known to the public ala ISIS or Bin Laden?

[Assistant] Because people don't know they exist. Other terrorist groups announce themselves, ISIS actually has a quarterly magazine. But the league is 100% secret, members willing to kill themselves rather than expose the identity of their group to the authorities.


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

[User]
Ethics of Pugs

Someone posted an interesting proposition

>   Pugs arent fucking cute. Theyre suffering and continuing to breed them should be considered animal abuse.

Which brings us the ethical dilemma:

What is better for a species, a life of suffering or extinction?

[Assistant]
Often, the choice is between a pet pug and a pet non-pug (eg mut), as opposed to between a pet pug and no pet at all.

So in the former case the relevant question might be: is it better to be a pet pug or a pet mut? And other thing being equal, it's plausible that the mut will be better off given their health advantages.

If we suppose for some reason it is 'Pug or Nothing' (possible world/thought experiment  where there are no other dogs, etc), then we have to ask whether their lives are worth living. Measuring well-being in the absence of verbal report is still a tall order for present science, so it is hard to say. But, by way of analogy, we can consider whether humans with health issues believe that such issues nullify their life's worth. If not, we can extend this (with low but not negligible credence) to fellow canines.

Lately, it seems anytime one talks about well-being and doesnt mention antinatalism, someone feels the need to bring it up. So, feel free to search that term or 'benatar' for some of his objections. (On mobile, can't hyperlink)

Lastly, extinction is an odd term to use. Imagine a small population where folks were controlled so as to only reproduce with their brothers and sisters, then their brothers and sisters, and so on. The relevant question there might be: is it best to continue to control their reproduction in that manner so that we might preserve the purity of their breed? Here, it's hard to see why answering 'yes' makes any sense, unless we are essentialists of some sort about the value of the purity of that particular breed--a view that might be crudely analogous to viewing pure races as having superior value. Such a view  might make sense in a world with Targaryens, what with their dragon blood(?) and all, but it doesn't make much sense for canines and hominids.


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

[User] [TheCulture] there's a bit in Excession where a character almost vomits after seeing footage of torture. Why hasn't the Culture genofixed nausea out of existence?

[Assistant]
The amount of modification a Culture citizen undergoes is a deeply personal thing.  Some citizens prefer to have almost nothing beyond baseline human, most will want genetic defects and human weaknesses alleviated as much as possible, and some choose to undergo full body modification to the extent that they don't even resemble a human anymore.

The character in question has chosen to retain their reflex to vomit when exposed to extremely disturbing stimuli.  This is one of the more popular choices actually, there's a persistent fear that getting rid of responses like this takes away a little of what makes culture citizens human.


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

[User]
CMV: The WNBA would be a better product if the players accepted their limitations and lowered their rims to allow for more exciting plays.

The WNBA players complain that they arent paid like the men and claim misogyny but the truth of the matter is their game lacks the excitement and flair of their male counterparts. If the women agreed to lower their rims to 9ft and decrease the size of the game ball it would open up their league to more exciting plays. Players taking it to the hole to dunk on someone, alley-oops, and 1 dunks, put backs etcthese are integral parts of the mens league that make the highlights every night on the sports shows and could easily make the womens league more watchable for casual fans and increase ticket sales. The game of basketball has evolved so much that the womens game seems bland compared to the menso ChangemyView, why shouldnt the women use a smaller ball and lower their rims?

[Assistant] Because if you work on your free throw your entire life, going to a 9 ft hoop is completely different. The infrastructure to play on 10 ft hoops already exists, thats what they grow up on. Its what they honed their skills on. Same with the ball.


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

[User]
[Revenge of the Sith] In the second half, Anakin quickly transitioned to the Dark Side and still served the Emperor despite knowing about Padme's death which was the reason why he wanted to turn to the Dark Side in the first place. How come he was so corrupted by the Dark Side so suddenly?

In the first half of the film, we see Anakin expressing confusion and doubt and noticing how Palpatine is slowly creeping into Anakin's mind and convincing him that the Jedi are corrupt and only he can save Padme.

Then the scene with Windu occurs where Anakin makes a decision between stopping Windu and actually save Padme and give Palpatine a fair trial, or not. We see him expressing shock when he killed Windu and all of a sudden, he is instantly loyal to Palpatine as a whole.

He openly kills the younglings and the other Separatists and even actually was close to killing Padme out of jealousy.

We know that Anakin always had strong emotions and came across as arrogant or sometimes power-hungry and angry in extreme instances. And despite that the Jedi shuns emotions and attachments, we see Obi-Wan trying to teach Anakin on how to get in touch with his feelings and use them wisely and we slowly see Anakin maturing through Obi-Wan's teachings.

So there is a huge and sudden constrast here and it happened suddenly and Anakin was convinced of his deeds. So does this mean that being corrupted by the Dark Side literally means that he was brainwashed like with some sort of space magic; or was he corrupted symbolically and metaphorically through his change of ideals and attitudes?

He later learns that Padme is dead so how come Anakin stayed loyal to the Emperor? What made him so convinced that building a tyrannical empire is the only way forward for the supposed "peace" that he was promised?

[Assistant]
Anakin didn't transition quickly at all, he'd been falling to the Dark Side since he killed the Sand People in episode 2.

He was befriended by Palpatine who inflated his ego and arrogance and made it harder for him to work with the rest of the Order, on top of the Order's failure to address his concerns about his mother, resulting in his rage and massacre of the Sand People. He'd then go on to fight in the Clone Wars and carry out increasingly dubious commands for the Order while seeing firsthand how most of the Galaxy is ravaged by both the Republic and the Seperatists, before his own padawan walks away. Between the dismissal of his dreams about his mother and their bureaucracy during the war, by episode 3 Anakin's faith in the Order is dramatically eroded.

When he starts having dreams about Padme and Palpatine suggests that a Sith had the power to save lives, Anakin starts to feel there's no real difference between the Sith and Jedi, which only deepens his resentment and pushes him further.

He was already on the edge when he went to Palpatine's office, betraying Windu just pushed him over that edge then kids and surrendered foes only pushed him further.

By the end of the film Anakin's not only betrayed the only home he had, but he believed he killed the one person he was doing it for. Palpatine had been a father figure to him since he was a boy and was the only thing Anakin had left aside from his own self-loathing.


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

[User]
Is it possible to calculate the speed of the engine components themselves ie pistons in kph/mph?

It's just something that has fascinated me. Sure I know that at 5000rpm the crankshaft is spinning 5000 times per minute and the piston goes up and down for every rotation but what is the actual SPEED of the piston?

Say, my Harley which has a stroke of 101mm. What would the piston speed be at 5000rpm?

[Assistant]
The piston moves in oscillatory motion with a maximum travel length of L (~stroke length) with frequency f (=RPM) then it's position at time t is given by:

x(t) = L/2 sin(2 pi f t)

Then it's velocity is

v(t) = dx/dt = pi L f cos(2 pi f t)

Thus the maximum speed is: |v|*_max_* = pi L f. If the stroke length is 10 cm and the engine runs at f = 5000 RPM = 83 s^(-1), then the max speed is ~26 m/s = 94 km/h = 58 mph.


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

[User] ELI5: Why I get goosebumps when I hear a song I like that I haven't heard in a while or when someone is an excellent singer?

[Assistant]
Goose bumps are created when little muscles in the skin pull your hair so it stands up.  The mechanism evolved in hairy animals so that their fur could trap more air and keep them warmer when it is cold.  They don't do  anything useful that we know of in humans.

They are controlled by the sympathetic nervous system, which controls the way we prepare for fight-or-flight reactions.  When furry animals are scared or otherwise emotionally aroused, their hair stands on end which makes the animal appear larger and stronger to potential enemies.  Because humans have evolved from apes with this reaction, we still show it-- and the same muscles contract when we feel strong emotions-- of fear, or awe-- we get goosebumps.


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

[User]
Why did the Apollo CSM not have solar panels?

The Soyuz Craft have always had solar panels, even today, yet the Apollo, Gemini, Mercury and Space Shuttle Orbiter, which did things similar to Soyuz (rendezvous and long duration docking) used only fuel cells.

[Assistant] It basically wasnt in space long enough to make them worthwhile. For the relatively short lunar missions it was easy enough to transport sufficient hydrogen and oxygen to power the fuel cells and the fuel cell exhaustwaterwas useful too.


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

[User]
ELI5: Many people have stated that "money is cheap right now" when referring to mortgage loans. Can someone explain why or how this is true?

Context: I live in Oklahoma, so I'm not sure if this is just referring to the housing market.

[Assistant] "Money is cheap/expensive" is a statement made about interest rates. If you need a hundred thousand dollars to buy a house, you borrow it from a bank. But another way of looking at it is that you're actually "buying" that money, and the price of the money is the interest rate. Rates are near all-time lows right now, so that's what they mean when they say money is cheap.


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

[User] ELI5 Why is market competition not driving down the prices of insulin in the US?

[Assistant]
Many of the common modern insulin analogues are sometimes still under patent or only recently have had interchangable biosimilar products approved (also, getting an approval for a biosimilar also takes a very long time).

When a company has the legal right to be the only supplier of a particular specific good, even if mildly similar alternatives exist, that company can set their own prices without much restriction.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] I don't understand why it seems like the Resistance is small compared to the First Order. Weren't they the official government of the galaxy?

Here's my understanding of events. After the original adventures of Luke Skywalker, there was a new government formed by the good guys. They ruled for a while. But, in secret, remnants of the former empire were forming a new military organization called First Order. Then, once they felt the time was right, the First Order revealed themselves and waged war against the good guys. The good guys then began calling themselves the Resistance.

What's strange to me is that the Resistance seems small compared to the First Order. Haven't they spent decades establishing a government that spans the galaxy? Shouldn't they have established a large military? Shouldn't the First Order be treated like the resistance movement rebelling against the larger government?

What's going on? Why are the fighting forces of the Resistance so small?

[Assistant]
The resistance and republic are two different groups. After the destruction of the second Death Star the New Republic spent a little while trying to clean out what was left of the empire. Most of them were taken care of, but a chunk went off into the unknown regions to form the first order and rebuild.

While the First Order rebuilt, the New Republic was sorta getting its footing. They decided to demilitarize since they wanted to encourage peace as much as possible after the civil war, and didnt think they had any real threats they needed a military for. Leia and the people who went on to form the resistance didnt agree. They knew the First Order was out there and a threat, but once word got out Leia was Vaders daughter, a lot of the New Republic stopped trusting her. So she went off to start up the resistance to do what the Republic would not while the New Republic continued to demilitarize.

Then the FO came out and obliterated the central government of the New Republic and all that was left really was scattered local militaries and the resistance.

I think its also worth mentioning the original Republic didnt have a standing army before the clones either, so its not like theres no precedent. Palpatine had to pull the strings to arrange for the creation of an actual Republic military force because it didnt exist beforehand, at least not at any real scale.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] How would I go about buying myself a lightsaber?

I'm a business person in Naboo and I have done quite well for myself. My tastes are a bit... eccentric, but I have no problem paying top credit to whoever sells what I'm looking for.

Who should I talk to to buy a lightsaber and how much should I expect to pay for it?

[Assistant]
Pre-empire, you might be able to find one on the black market, but since it was taken off the body of a dead Jedi, any Jedi that knows you have it is going to have ... questions.

Post-empire, all Jedi paraphernalia is illegal, and possession of a lightsaber would be considered treason. You could still find one on the black market, but expect the price to drastically increase. And there is, of course, the possibility that the individual selling it to you is really an undercover agent looking for Jedi sympathisers.


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

[User]
When rubbing a wine glass with a finger to produce a tone, why does the finger have to be wet?

You probably all know the story: I get bored, there's a wine glass on the table, I start to play with it, exploiting one of its resonance frequencies by rubbing it in a certain way with the finger. I know why that tone comes about and what influences its frequency.

But what I don't know is: why does it require a wet finger? Can one of you guys help me out?

[Assistant]
Seems to me it's just because you want to lower the coefficient of static friction.

When your finger is dry and you're just about to break static friction and start sliding across, you're forcing with some very large shear. You break static and then you're finger jumps pretty far and you get stuck again. So the forcing looks like delta functions spaced by too long a period.

And as we all know, we want to force close to the resonant frequency. So wet your finger lower the coefficient and it will be much easier to break in to sliding at it will happen more often.

More importantly I've heard that the glass has to be crystal.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do doctors ask the exact same questions that I just told the nurse before he came in?

ELI5: Why do doctors ask the exact same questions that I just told the nurse before he came in?

Pretty annoying. Why do they do this?

[Assistant]
A couple of reasons:

* Easy to get charts mixed up. By asking you directly, they know for sure what your symptoms are.

* It prevents the loss of communication.  What the nurse interprets and what the doctor interprets may be two different things. Getting a first-hand explanation is better than a second-hand one.

* The reason the nurse initially asks you questions is to help assess the severity of your symptoms.


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

[User] ELI5 How come eating/drinking minty things makes water and air so much colder?

[Assistant]
The reason is that menthol (the minty ingredient) sensitises the nerve fibres that signal 'cold' sensation in the mouth (TRPM8 ion channels). So when you breathe in, the air 'feels' colder than normal because the nerve fibres respond more strongly at that temperature than they would normally. This hypersensitivity fools the brain into thinking your mouth is colder than it really is. In terms of cold water, it already has a cooling effect on your mouth, and the menthol amplifies this feeling (notice that hot water doesn't have this effect).

edit: typo menthol*


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

[User]
[Justice League Unlimited] What would have happened if Lex Luthor had escaped in Flash's body?

In the episode where they swap minds, suppose that he had managed to successfully construct a teleporter and get himself off the space station. What would have happened next? How bad would it be for the League and the world in general? What would Luthor accomplish with his new body?

[Assistant]
what he usually does, but much much much faster.

approximately one week after escaping the justice league are all wiped out as portals are opened at each of their individual locations and robot fighters, dozens of them and each hand tailored to counter their quarries powers, burst out.  Supes himself is tied up in a kryptonite infused rope by a powersuit wearing superspeed lex and is shot in the back of the head with a kryptonite bullet.

after that is where it gets interesting.  most of his previous allies in the injustice league get the same treatment as the justice league, having eliminated his rivals he has no more use for his allies.  But after that, he proceeds to distribute, at his own pace, the technological marvels he has created to humanity at large.  it starts slowly at first but soon the world starts seeming more and more like star trek or some other technotopia, and lex gains more and more control over humanity.

lex is more than anything a narcissist.  He hates superman because he hates the idea of someone superior to himself.  In this new techtopia things are...ok.  People who badmouth lex, even in private, find their lives ruined.  For everyone else life continues more or less as normal, within parameters specified in their lexcorp employee/citizenship contracts, but at the very highest levels humanity is managed and directed by one voice, one intelligence: an AI approximation of his own mind left behind by Lex hundreds of years previous.

Flash can live fast, not simply move fast.  Lex exploits this almost continuously, to multitask, to plot, to perform experiments, and as a result of living in his time bubble becomes disconnected with humanity.  Being a narcissist he assumes humanity needs *him* so he creates an AI backup to manage humanity while he uses the speed force and devices of his own design to explore the multiverse.


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

[User]
How do scientists decipher a language with no known speakers?

How do scientists decipher ancient languages (like a carving, insription, scripture or whatever) with no known speakers? Can they figure out the sounds would relate to each visual symbol? What if there aren't any languages that were verbally or visually similar (as if none evolved into or from it and it was "unique")? What are the main problems scientists face while trying to decipher an unknown language?

[Assistant]
Sometimes you can find a document in both an unknown and known language. But often you have to resort to cribs (phrases that you know will appear in the text). For example you know a text was issued by a king, you can guess that the word king and the king's name appear. It's basically a known plaintext attack.

Sounds? Not sure how they'd figure that out.


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

[User]
[Guardians of the Galaxy] How does Quill know about Pulp Fiction?

He says that the Orb has a(n) "Ark of the Covenant, glowing briefcase, Maltese Falcon-esque vibe." The Ark of the Covenant and Maltese Falcon make sense, as those films came out in 1981 and 1941, respectively. The question is how he knew about the briefcase, seeing as Pulp Fiction came out in 1994, six years after Quill left Earth.

[Assistant] Tarantino films are often an amalgamation of many pop cultural references, the glowing briefcase idea likely coming from the movie Kiss Me Deadly (1955). It is probable Peter Quill was referring to that.  Not sure why he was watching old movies like that, perhaps his mom recommended it.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does an outdoor extension cord not short out when it rains?

[Assistant] The cord is covered in layers of rubber and the plugs on the ends are water tight plastic with rubber seals. There is no way for water to get inside the cord itself. There are of course some weak points in this system in the plugs themselves as they need to expose some bare metal so you can plug them inn. To reduce the amount of water here they tend to have covers on them when not in use and be a very tight fit using rubber or soft plastic for when they are in use. That makes it hard for water to get into the contacts themselves. However they do not rely on this by itself. The design of the plug is so that the contacts are far enough apart that even when fully submerged in water they are too far apart for the electricity to short circuit over that distance. And if they short circuit they short circuit to ground as this is a shorter distance. So any ground fault interrupter will trigger.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does it take 55 minutes to cook a burrito in the oven, but only 3 minutes to cook a burrito in the microwave?

[Assistant]
Here's an analogy:
You have a towel you are trying to dampen. You can mist it with a spray bottle, or you can dunk it in water. Obviously dunking it will have a much quicker effect, as you are introducing the towel into a saturating wet environment, instead of achieving a wet towel with gradual water, which will take longer.
Microwaves are completely saturated environments, where as ovens heat food up by warming from the outside, in. There is no way for oven heat to reach the inside of the burrito in 5 minutes, but in the microwave, the microwaves penetrate all the food, immediately.


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

[User]
Criticism of "I think, therefore I am"

I have recently started learning about philosophy, and started with reading through Jaworski's 'Philosophy of Mind'. I found this to be a really good introduction if anyone is interested in an introductory book on the topic..!

Following this, I became interested in Descartes' meditations and have been considering his 'cogito'. There is an interesting criticism of it, which says that the presupposition of an 'I' is problematic. And that a better statement would be 'there is thinking'. Which I am inclined to agree with.

My question is, is this also going too far? And would a less presumptuous statement be 'there is experience' or 'there is awareness'? Perhaps this is just semantics, but 'thinking' to me implies a specific subset of experience that brains do.

I am very keen to read more on this topic and if anyone has any recommendations on either side of this issue I would be very interested to read them.

[Assistant]
'There is experience' sounds really Deleuzian to me. He's a french philosopher who worked on what he called transcendental empiricism which would be something quite close to this, that is, that experience is a kind of impersonal transcendental background on which the subject may then emerge. He also worked upon William James as well, who has similiar stuff in his Essays in Radical Empiricism. Just so you know, Deleuze is a *difficult philosopher* and quite singular in what he proposes. His philosophy also converses with Spinoza, Nietzsche, Bergson, Marx, Lacan, amongst many others.

Edit. Deleuze's first published work is about Hume's empiricism, commenting this cause of a previous comment.


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

[User]
Why does clothing go darker when it gets wet?

I saw a thread in askreddit a few months ago where it derailed and ended up with this question being asked, and the answers they gave were fairly interesting. I was wondering what askscience had to say on the matter.

[Assistant]
A wet cloth looks darker because less light is reflected from a wet cloth. Any cloth is woven from a yarn or fibre. That fibre is in turn made of smaller micro-fibres. Light comes from the room lights, or from the Sun, and lands on the cloth. Some of the photons of light are absorbed, but some are reflected and land on your retina - and that gives you the sensation of seeing the cloth as having a certain level of brightness. But when the cloth gets wet, the water fills in the gaps between each individual strand of fibre, and also between each individual micro-fibre. When light falls on the wet cloth, some of it is now more likely to enter the water, and be bent away from your eyes. So some of the light that would have previously been reflected off the cloth back to your eyes, is now bent away.

Fewer photons of light get back to your eyeball, and so the wet cloth "appears" darker than the dry cloth. But as the water gradually evaporates, more and more light is reflected back to your eyeball, and you see the brighter color of the fabric again.


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

[User]
If stars conserve angular momentum when they collapse into a black hole, shouldn't the rate at which the black hole spins that tell us that whatever is in the center of a black hole has a measurable diameter rather than being an infinitely dense point?

After all, if there were an infinitely dense point with no diameter at the center of a black hole, wouldn't the black hole have to spin infinitely fast?

[Assistant] A rotating or "Kerr" black hole, as descibed by general relativity, has a ring singularity, with a non-zero major radius (across the ring) but zero minor radius (thickness of the ring 'material'). The singularity being a ring resolves the angular momentum issue.


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

[User]
[Spider-Man:Homecoming] (spoilers) What was Tony's plan for....

...Peter at the end? Peter was kinda blindsided with an offer to join the Avengers at a press conference, this seems like something that should have been discussed beforehand. Was Peter expected to drop out of school? Wouldn't May's permission be needed as he's a minor? Was he going to be introduced as spider-man or Peter Parker?

Bonus: Whats Visions room like?

[Assistant]
> this seems like something that should have been discussed beforehand.

Tony Stark is known for being impulsive. He isn't big on the "let's talk things over" phase.

> Was Peter expected to drop out of school?

The Avengers could easily afford to hire Peter a private tutor.

> Wouldn't May's permission be needed as he's a minor?

Do you really think Tony Stark cares about getting Aunt May's consent?  He already encouraged and helped Peter lie to his Aunt about going to Germany to arrest Captain America.

> Was he going to be introduced as spider-man or Peter Parker?

Considering Tony was going to have him put on the suit, he was probably planning on introducing him as Spider-man.


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

[User]
[Dragon Ball] Why did Mr. Satan become such a big hero?

After defeating Cell he became a big hero and the whole planet admired him, thought of him as a super human being, and the savior of mankind. But assuming that everyone believed that Cell was a phony who did lights and tricks like Mr. Satan convinced them to believe then they shouldn't have really thought that he was a threat to the whole planet or think of Mr. Satan as that big of a hero for stopping someone who they thought was a normal dude with light shows and tricks.

Yeah they knew that Cell took out the whole royal army and killed thousands but irl you wont be considered the savior of mankind or become the richest man in the world for stopping a terrorist will you?

[Assistant]
Beating up a terrorist who blew up countless military bases still is pretty heroic even if they staged it using bombs

It's a bit like asking "Why are Mystery Incorporated famous for stopping crimes? It never turns out to be a real monster."


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does peppermint oil repel ticks?

I saw a video recently of someone pouring peppermint oil on a tick that was biting them and it stopped within seconds and started squirming around. I tried googling this but all I get are a bunch of websites promoting "natural repellents" instead of answering why it works.

[Assistant]
Menthol is potent stuff.  If you get peppermint oil on your skin, it can definitely burn sensitive tissues.

Now imagine being immersed in the stuff- like a bath of the hottest hot sauce ever.
Yeah, that's what that tick is going thru.

Beekeepers use menthol to control mites in bee hives.  The fumes kill microscopic tracheal mites and tend to confuse or stun larger varroa mites so they fall off the .

Essential oils are potent compounds produced by plants to have effects on insects and animals.   Concentrate it into an oil many times stronger than that found in nature and you've got some potentially wicked stuff.


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

[User] What did our evolutionary ancestors do for hygiene, such as showers, brushing teeth, and cutting hair and nails?

[Assistant]
Look to our evolutionary closest relatives, like chimps and orangutans.
A huge difference between humans and our evolutionary ancestors is the food we eat, particularly cooked food and sugars. Our ancestors didn't eat that stuff, and therefore didn't have the same issues with oral hygiene.
Bathing? Live near water, or don't bathe.
Ever hear of people who can't kick a habit of chewing their fingernails? There could be a reason for that!


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

[User] ELI5: If all wine is just fermented grape juice, how does one winery make a bottle that's worth $1,000 while another winery makes a bottle that's only worth $2?

[Assistant]
The quality of the grapes, the quality of the water, age, the barrels it is aged in, what yeast is used, how much sugar was added, the temperature, fermentation time, how it was racked, etc etc etc..

Source: Brew beer at home.


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

[User]
[Ironman] Why does Ironman's suits go out of charge?

Arc reactor is a self-sustaining source of energy which means it can continuously supply energy to the suit... So how do the suits get discharged?

[Assistant] Self-sustaining doesnt mean infinite, it means that the energy required to perform the reaction is less than or equal to the energy produced by the reaction, such that once the reaction is started it can be maintained solely using its own energy. Fuel still has to be spent on this reaction.


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

[User] [The Hobbit] Elrond: "Hey, wait a minute. This is Glamdring, the 'Foe-Hammer' wielded by Turgon, King of Gondolin...who happened to be my grandfather. This is my Grampa's sword, you slimy dwarf! I'm taking it back and you sure ain't gonna stop me." So, why not?

[Assistant]
Um. That would be Gandalf, not the dwarves, that Elrond would be picking a fight with.

Also, Thorins company came into possession of the trolls hoard fair and square. Elrond had no legal claim to those weapons, and he was a super-nice dude.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do phones know you got a text, snapchat, etc... without soaking up a lot of data?

It seems like if they were constantly checking if you had a notification from any app it would use up a lot of data quickly.

[Assistant]
Since this is really about power consumption, the answer is the phone turns off the radio. Basically it tells the cell phone it's going to turn off for a second, and if any data for the phone comes, it must be announced at exactly that second and the phone will power up it's radio and download the data. If no data comes it will immediately turn the radio back off.

As for apps, internet connections over TCP support connecting and then waiting for transmissions so apps can use this to allow the phone to power off while connected. On Android many apps use this directly, but both Apple and Google offer push services that optimize this and put all the app notifications on one connection to reduce unnecessary wake ups. Apple actually forces this on their developers.


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

[User]
ELI5: what is it that determines whether a third prong is needed on power plugs for tools and appliances?

First of all, Im in the US, if that matters.

On power plugs that stick into wall outlets, there are always two prongs that allow for electricity flow. There is sometimes a third prong, but not always.

What are the criteria that determine whether a third prong is necessary? My theory as a layperson is that its for electrical grounding and it must have to do with the amount of power being used, the nature of the tool/appliance, or maybe both. But I cant figure out what exactly that factor is. Similar things, like two vacuum cleaners of approximately the same size, would presumably require about the same amount of power, but sometimes one will have a third prong and another wont. I guess one of them might be just a bit stronger than the other and require enough additional power that it crosses some threshold beyond which the third prong is suddenly necessary. But it seems kind of arbitrary for someone like me who doesnt know the intricacies of electrical engineering.

[Assistant] Designers of electrical gadgets have a choice, they must provide internal shock protection.  One choice is to ground all the conductive parts the operator can touch, and doing that requires a ground wire, and thus a third prong on the plug.  The other choice is double insulation, where every part the operator can touch is non-conductive.  Some things just can't do their job and be made of plastic, so some gadgets always have a third prong.  There are other odd cases, like the blow-dryer with the GFCI in the plug, but those are for specialized situations.


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

[User] ELI5: How can a magnetic field go through wood and other materials? What does a magnetic field consist of?

[Assistant]
We dont know. But you first need to understand the field isnt a physical thing where a block of wood or material would stop it. it is an area of potential charge. It exists due to a subatomic arrangement of particles within matter, we think.

 The question is like, what is gravity? How can it exist through wood?

We know it does, we just dont know exactly why. We see it and can model it. We know what materials can create it. We can make artificial magnets with current, but we actually still do not understand the specific mechanic.

Like gravity it is an undeniable fundamental force.

We can only describe what creates a magnetic field and/or is naturally magnetic. For some reason, passing a current thru a wire creates a field, we dont know why.

Also, just like a collection of mass creates a larger gravitic field, a permanent magnet appears to be compromised of specific building blocks. Specifically, according to gage theory, elements comprised of specific bosons in alignment can create a larger magnetic field we can see. The belief then is that these bosons are aligined when current passes thru an object.

So, just like the higgs boson conveys mass in our reality, so to do other bosons convey electromagnetism, which again, is an area of charge. The only way to stop it, is to distort it with a stronger field.

Specifically, the boson responsible for electromagnetism is one most are familiar with. Photons. Photons move right? Yes, but can remain static via virtual particles. This explanation would require a dive into quantum mechanics i dont have a good grasp on. A high level but probably incorrect way of understanding it and moving on, is simply believing that photon is interacting in another dimension we cant yet measure, leaving what appears to be a virtual particle. This static virtual particle still interacts with our environment in the form of an electromagnetic field.

(EDIT) So, to conclude, building blocks of atoms create the field, field is area of potential charge, but not a physical thing, why this occurs we don't know (magic)

Someone please correct if wrong, im trying to recall from nearly a decade ago.


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

[User]
Could a black hole with a schwarzchild-radius of, say, 5 centimeters, be close to our solar system without us knowing?

Lets say the black hole is just outside the Oorts-cloud or something.

Also, what would happen as it travels towards the sun and when/if it hits the sun?

[Assistant] A black hole that size has about five times the mass of Earth. It might have passing gravitational effects on small objects as it passes them, which we might see if we happened to have a telescope trained on one.


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

[User]
[D&D] What's life like in a Duergar society?

I know this varies from edition to edition and world to world but I'm looking for the broad strokes in varying situations.

What's a Duergar family like? Do they even believe in a nuclear family or some kind of cohesive social unit?

What's a Duergar business like?

What's a career (life?) like in their military?

Religious institutes?

From what I've read, Duergar appear like a very austere and pessimistic race that mostly values material labor. They also have a deep mistrust of others within and outside their society. While not necessarily purely greedy, Duergar focus on what furthers their own gains with no regard to concepts like altruism or intrinsic value. Despite all of this, I wonder what really motivates a Duegar society? They keep their own faiths, run business, and have a surprisingly functional society with sophisticated cities and institutes. There's history and bad blood between races, but that doesn't really explain what Duergar do with money, free time, or how they see their goals as individuals?

I know the experimentation done by the Illithid plays a large part in all this but it can't all be biology.

[Assistant]
> What's a Duergar family like? / What's a Duergar business like?

I would guess that duergar view mating and child rearing as a loveless business affair.  A prospective suitor wants a man or woman for the synergy they provide in some industry or another.  They are judged on their ability to fulfill their end of a contract and bring wealth and prosperity to the deal.

Children may actually be part of the initial dickering as well.  For example, a young duergar wishes to secure a coveted exclusive contract as a wheelwright with an Underdark caravan.  He proposes a partnership with a woman whereby she shapes the felloes while he forges the strakes.  To grow the business they plan to add children to work the bellows, fetch the water, grow/harvest the fungus-wood, lathe the spokes, etc.

When the kids are old enough they each evaluate their own prospective profits and either strike out on their own or continue a working partnership with their family.  Clan loyalty doesn't factor into it.

> What's a career (life?) like in their military?

Military life is somewhat like becoming a slave.  You indenture yourself to an outfit with the hopes that it will lead to profits in the form of wealth and power later in life.  It's also a necessity to learn how to fight in the heartless world of the duergar.  No one will come to your aid if you need it, so becoming strong yourself is the only way to survive in the long run.

> Religious institutes?

According to *Underdark*, duergar worship Laduguer, the dwarven deity of toil.  Doing their work is their worship.  They don't assemble for ceremonies and pageantry.  They may produce works of art to dedicate to their god if they believe it will somehow profit them later on.

> explain what Duergar do with money, free time, or how they see their goals

Their endgame is the actual industry itself.  They don't save money for luxuries - everything rolls back into the business.  Better equipment, more slaves, bribes for contracts, etc.  They work so they can work.


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

[User]
[Rick & Morty] What would happen if I asked a Mr. Meeseeks to not do anything at all?

He wouldn't do anything, I know, but then again he wouldn't be doing ANYTHING. So he wouldn't actively try to accomplish a goal. Oh god, did I make a paradox?

[Assistant]
Wouldn't he just stop existing? Existing is doing something, not existing isn't doing anything, and it's what he wants. Bam. Done.

It also wouldn't surprise me if Meeseeks automatically cease to exist if you give them a paradoxical task.


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

[User]
CMV: The Hammer and Sickle should be considered just as offensive as the Swastika

Both of these symbols have lately become more prominent in popular culture. While the swastika rightfully elicits a bad reaction, the hammer and sickle does not.

Both of these symbols represent failed countries from the 20th century that had commented horrible atrocities to achieve their goals. Both nations were extremely authoritarian, and extremely repressive to their citizens. The leadership of both counties was responsible for countless deaths, with the holocaust for Nazi Germany, and the purges and holodomor for the Soviet Union.

I believe that the only reason that the Hammer and Sickle does not illicit such a reaction is because the ideas that it represents have become more fashionable lately. If it was far right ideas that were gaining prominence, the current situation with these symbols would be reversed.

Edit: Aight Im done with this post. I feel like Ive said everything I can say, and if you have any more questions you can look through other replies and see similar questions to yours.

[Assistant] You just said it yourself, it's the idea that the symbol illicits, the hammer and sickle is synonymous with communism, which as an ideology isn't bad, though it can be argued that it's unachievable, so that's an obvious reason for why the hammer and sickle should not be at the same level of disgust as a swastika, the swastika represents fascism and that ideology is inherently flawed because it doesn't uphold equality like and ideology like communism or socialism.


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

[User]
[Star Trek] If a weapon were to instantly and entirely vaporize a Borg drone upon contact, would other drones be able to adapt to it?

I've always assumed that the Borg were able to adapt to weapons because the technology in their corpses communicate information on how to adapt.  If there were no corpse left and no time to communicate information, would the Borg be able to adapt?

[Assistant] The Borg ability to adapt comes from their ability to analyse obscene amounts of data at immense speeds. When a drone is hit by a weapon, the corpse does indeed send data to the Collective to be examined so that counter measures can be devised, but so does every other bit of Borg technology in range. So if you shoot one drone and destroy it utterly and instantly, all the other drones nearby are all still scanning as well. It might take them a little longer to adapt since they lack the 'first hand' data but sooner or later they'd create some sort of defense.


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

[User] ELI5: Why didn't any of the APOLLO astronauts go to the moon twice? Would a crew not benefit by having a member who had already accomplished a very similar mission, in a real environment with all of the associated problems?

[Assistant]
Jim Lovell, David Scott, and Eugene Cernan (e: and John Young, oops) all went to the moon twice though none of them landed on it more than once. If Apollo 20 had happened, Pete Conrad would have potentially been the first person to land on the moon twice.

I think a big part of why NASA ended up doing things this way rather than just sending the same people more than once was that they wanted a good sized pool of the very best people available, and promising them a decent shot at going to the moon was the way to get that.


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

[User]
[Diablo franchise] Why do Malthaels angels look so different from other angels?

In Diablo III we learned that Malthael disappeared for a while, a host of angels went to look for him and also disappeared, then centuries later reappeared to cleanse Sanctuary of demonic taint, but the angels all looked like demons themselves  what gives?

Was there some form of corruption?  Malthael doesnt have the normal wings of an angel until the moment you kill him, then the skeleton wings briefly disappear and are replaced with angel tentacle-wings as if youd just released him from something corrupting

[Assistant]
After Malthael abandoned his post among the Angiris council, he wandered through Pandemonium fortress seeking answers to his burning questions about good, evil, mortality, and the end of the eternal conflict. He knew humanity would be the key to the end, all the angels and demons know this, that's why they fight over Sanctuary so much. But Malthael felt that there was something else to it all.

After the Nephalem destroyed Diablo and stood among the High Heavens, which no mortal had ever done, he realized humanity was an abomination of both sides. The end of the eternal conflict meant the end of angel-kind. (and also demons, but he's fine with that) So he plunged into the deepest depths of Pandemonium and found the site where the worldstone used to rest before it was stolen and placed inside Mount Arreat. In that place, a vortex of souls swirled around, and Malthael used their power to increase his abilities. He crowned himself aspect of Death, and took on his new appearance. His followers were granted portions of the same power, and so they took on a similar glow.

Most of his minions look much the same as they did when they were angelic, but the soul-energy they use defines their bodies, so they don't look like empty suits of armor anymore. Other lesser minions, like the raised up, yet empty, husks of human bodies, are very similar to some of the dark magics that the demons use. (it's probably the exact same spell, just used hypocritically)


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

[User] ELI5: What is Lent?

[Assistant]
Lent is a season of forty days, not counting Sundays, which begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on Holy Saturday. Lent comes from the Anglo Saxon word lencten, which means "spring." The forty days represents the time Jesus spent in the wilderness, enduring the temptation of Satan and preparing to begin his ministry.

Lent is a time of repentance, fasting and preparation for the coming of Easter. It is a time of self-examination and reflection. In the early church, Lent was a time to prepare new converts for baptism. Today, Christians focus on their relationship with God, often choosing to give up something or to volunteer and give of themselves for others.

Sundays in Lent are not counted in the forty days because each Sunday represents a "mini-Easter" and the reverent spirit of Lent is tempered with joyful anticipation of the Resurrection.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do humans bare their teeth (smile) to show positive emotions when baring teeth is an almost universal signal of aggression or fear among other mammals?

[Assistant]
In primates, showing teeth within a /closed/ mouth is a submissive gesture.  It shows that there is no aggression going on.  If a monkey bares fangs with their mouth open, then that is a dominant gesture.

I did behavioural research with monkeys for several years.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do you want to keep swelling down?

If swelling is a natural response from your body, why stop it?

I just broke my hand and my hands pretty swollen and everyone's saying keep the swelling down. Why?

[Assistant]
This is a classic example of short term vs long term gain.

The body's natural swelling occurs when macrophages (a type of white blood cell) concentrate at an injury site and absorb parts of broken cells. This process pokes small holes in the surrounding muscle tissue which allows fluid to enter and creates swelling.

However the macrophages also introduce a growth hormone that speeds the healing process, so by reducing swelling you are preventing the muscle tissue from being fully broken down (thus allowing it to be used temporarily), but also lengthening the healing process.

The current accepted best practice is to reduce swelling as much as possible if the injured muscle needs to be used in the near future, but to allow a limited amount of swelling (still controlled with RICE) if the injury can be completely rested for a few days.


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

[User] ELI5 Whats modernism and post-modernism?

[Assistant]
Modernism was a movement in art and culture in the late 19th and early 20th century that was obsessed with new ways of doing things, owing in part to the technological and scientific advances of the era. Modern art, for example, eschewed realism in favor of abstraction and surrealism. Modernists would reject traditional ways of doing things simply because they were traditional. In the words of Vladimir Mayakovsky, a modernist Russian poet, they wanted to throw all the old ways overboard from the Steamship of Modernity.

Post-Modernism came about in the mid to late twentieth century and was a reaction to Modernism. Whereas Modernists would reject traditional art and culture, Post-Modernism draws on both traditional as well as Modernist design. Post-Modern architecture for example might be modern in design but with Greek-style columns as a playful reference to Classical architecture. Post-Modern art and design is known for these references and commentaries on other work. These references are why Post-Modern art is sometimes considered meta, referring to itself or the medium in a provocative way.


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

[User]
[Fallout] Why is music stuck in the 1930s-1950s?

It's been nearly 200 years since the bombs fell, society has rebuilt itself to a degree, why hasnt anyone made new music?

[Assistant]
The music isn't from the 1950's per se. It is contemporary music from 2070s.

The world of before the bombs fell had long diverged from our. The ideals and aesthetics of what we think is our world's 50s was the hight and paragon of what the United States saw as cultural perfection.

There could have been other genres of music at the time but they were all very minor or underground movements and next to none survived the destruction.

As for why there isn't much new music after the bombs, well the fact is there is. We have recording from the Lonesome Drifter, and Magnolia. The fact that both have adopted "older" styles, western folk songs and jazz respectively, points to the backwards looking culture that has permeated society at that point. People are looking back to the past, to a time when things had reach a peak culturally in their history. They are taking their cues from a point before the world went to hell for their musical inspiration.


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

[User] Could adamantium cut Superman?

[Assistant]
Sorta.

Adamantium is practically indestructible and can hold a molecule-thin edge, capable of cutting Superman, but for a deep cut enough force needs to be applied to shove his tissue out of the way.

The initial shallow cut relies on shear stress along that molecule-thin line but cutting deep also requires enough lateral compression across the entire surface area of cut tissue to displace enough volume for the blade to occupy.

If Wolverine somehow got the jump on Superman he'd end up looking like he was in a fight with an especially vicious cat.


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

[User]
[Batman] Where/How did Alfred receive butler training?

We know that before Alfred became the Wayne's butler, he used to be an actor, a military medic, and/or a member of either the SAS or the MI6, depending on the continuity. However, non of these jobs provides the skills necessary to run a large household or attend someone as a personal servant. Granted, his father used to buttle for the Waynes as well, but he didn't seem to pass on any knowledge to Alfred before his death, as Alfred at that time steadfastly refused to follow his father's steps. Hence, one has to wonder about how did he not only become a butler, but also an outstandingly capable one.

[Assistant] Butler training only really takes a few weeks. Military types tend to be quite good at it since they have experience making sure everything is smart and clean, don't have a problem with authority (even in cases where the person in charge is a fool) and are able to deal with the long hours without difficulty.


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

[User]
[His Dark Materials] When babies are born, where do their daemons come from?

I can't imagine that the mother would give birth to the daemon along with the baby. Does it just appear out of thin air once the baby comes out?

[Assistant] Essentially, yes; the daemon is a manifestation of the person's true personality, and just as it disappears into nothing when the person dies, it will manifest from nothing when they begin to develop a true self.


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

[User]
Why are things measured in half lifes in science? Why not just use the whole amount of timethat something is expected to exist for?

I don't see the point of a half life. Why not measure in a full life?

If 100 atoms of X have a half life of 4 years, why not just say they have a life cycle of 8 years instead?

I feel like I must be missing some sort of reasoning for this. Can anyone explain it?

[Assistant]
The most intuitive way to think of the half-life is to consider an initial sample of N atoms.  After one half-life, the amount of atoms left is half of what it was: N/2.  After two half-lives, the amount of atoms left is half of what it was at the beginning of the second half-life: N/4.  After three half-lives, we have N/8 left, and so on.

Radioactive decays are exponential, meaning that the amount left follows an exponential function of time: N(t) = N(0) exp(-t/T).  As time goes on, the amount that is left exponentially decays towards zero, but (in the mathematical model) never reaches zero.

Your previous understanding of the half-life assumed that the decays were linear.


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

[User] When water does down the drain, why does it always go down the drain in a form of whirlpool.?

[Assistant] Conservation of angular momentum explains why liquid spins faster the closer it gets to the drain, but it doesn't explain why the liquid starts spinning in the first place. In principle, you could have a reservoir drain liquid without spinning whatsoever. So why then does it always spin in the real world? Well that's because the real world isn't so perfectly symmetric, like in the ideal case. This means that there's a good chance some liquid will fall down the drain at an angle, as opposed to straight down. The liquid that falls at an angle will push on the liquid next to it, which in turn pushes on the next bit of liquid and so on, all around in a circle. This effect reinforces itself, and so even a tiny amount of asymmetry will determine the net spin. Whats important is to realize is that liquids are sticky, especially water, and so theres not just pushing going on, but pulling too. Not only that, but a spin that starts further down the drain can propagate upward and affect the water that has yet to fall in. This happens for the same reason, because water is sticky, and so its best to visualize it not as a huge number of individual particles, but more as a stretchy interconnected substance. This is exaggeratory, but it explains how spins begin.


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

[User] ELI5:How is it that we can watch tv channel via tv signal in real time without any buffering yet they can't apply the same technology on the internet?

[Assistant]
You can turn on your tap and get water instantly but if you're at a bar and want a beer, you need to wait for the bartender.

TV is broadcast like radio. That means that the signal is always running and you just need to tell a TV to start paying attention to it. Modern digital cable TV system complicate some of the details but the basic idea doesn't change - everyone still has a full stream coming at them all the time.

When you watch a video online you are asking to have a copy of the video to be sent just to you. That means it takes time to set up the connection, time to start getting the video and there's a chance that part of it gets delayed on the way to you. Buffering the video just makes sure that if part of the video is slow coming to you, you won't run out (like ordering another drink before your glass is empty).


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

[User]
Eli5: What was Japan's end goal in WWII?

Hitler wanted to take over the world and implement the master race.

What was Japan's end game? And why would they align with Hitler knowing they would be targeted for extermination?

[Assistant]
> Hitler wanted to take over the world and implement the master race.

No. The closest thing he had to an end-goal was to depopulate what is today Eastern Europe and settle German farmers in their place. He also wanted a negotiated peace with Britain that left Germany the dominant European power. The "master race" stuff was just to motivate his people.

> What was Japan's end game?

Similar to Hitler. They wanted to group the Asian countries into the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere, which would effectively make the rest of Asia Japanese colonies. Japan wanted this because they have few natural resources in their home islands. They needed rubber, oil, coal, and other resources to industrialize.

>  why would they align with Hitler knowing they would be targeted for extermination?

They were not. Hitler considered them "honorary Aryans".


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

[User]
[Marvel] How do supervillain/terrorist organizations (HYDRA, AIM, etc) recruit their members?

Why would anyone join an organization that regularly gets its butt kicked by the Avengers?

[Assistant]
Because HYDRA is about an idea.

Humans, no matter how powerful, are selfish, short-sighted, and stupid.  And some humans are cognizant of that fact.  Some of *those* humans realize that something needs to be done before they destroy the world; that "it be like that sometimes" is not a valid answer so much as an excuse to let the earth burn around them.  And a select group of *them* choose to do something about it.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Why didnt Darth Sidious clone Vader?

From what I understand Anakin Skywalker held the potential to become the greatest Sith of all time. Before his accident. After Mustafar couldnt Sidious have scrapped off a few burnt bits and started over? Perhaps the clone could have been trained somewhere in secret (like Korriban) while Vader spearheaded the Inquisitions hunt for the last Jedi.

[Assistant]
He tried that with Luuke who was a clone of Luke Skywalker. Not a good idea since he was very unstable.

Up until then it wasnt really needed since even an injured Vader was leagues above everyone he would face.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] How big of a fleet would be needed to destroy the death star assuming no thermal exhaust port knowledge?

Assume no reinforcements. Could the Imperial fleet do it?

[Assistant]
The Imperial fleet could do it.  It would take a lot of ships, but they could beat their own death star.  They would need to play smart though.  The Imperials would first have to stop this station from leaving whatever system its in (probably requiring a few Interdictors).  Next, they would have to disable the superlaser.  They could disable the superlaser by constantly bombarding the area with turbolaser and ion cannon fire.  Eventually the local shielding will fail and the main threat will be eliminated.  Finally comes actually destroying the station.  This will probably take the most time as it is such a large station with so many defences.  The Imperial fleet could use the intense local bombardment strategy to knock out local defences.

The Imperial navy would also need jamming ships (lots of them) in order to render the Death Star's turbolasers inaccurate at range.

We also know that from the Rouge One novel that ranges in SW aren't as bad as they seem to be (Raddus has a few ships engage the destroyers from +50,000 km).  This means that Imperial forces could use their ECM to great effect.


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

[User]
[ASOIAF / A Game of Thrones] What is the worst decision any character made and if not the worst, what are some of the really, really bad ones?

In either the show or the books. But let's not discuss chapters from the Nextbook which is not yet been released. What are some especially bad and destructive decisions that characters made which ultimately turned out poorly?

[Assistant]
# The Entire Series Should Be Called "And Then a Stark Fucked Something Up Again"

Lyanna Stark not leaving a note saying she's eloping.

Brandon Stark not listening to his mother about climbing.

Sansa Stark telling Queen Cersei her father was planning on spiriting her and Arya away from King's Landing.

Eddard Stark notifying Queen Cersei he was going to tell Robert everything.

Robb Stark thinking with the head between his legs.

Catelyn Stark releasing Jaime Lannister for free.

Arya Stark naming random people to Jaqen instead of Tywin.

Rickon Stark just running in a straight line instead of crisscrossing.


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

[User] To what degree can the safety of previous vaccines be generalized to the Covid-19 Vaccines? How generalizable is previous safety data to a given new vaccine?

[Assistant]
If its the same type of vaccine and uses the same dosage of adjuvants, the safety data from an older vaccine could give you a very good idea of what to expect safety-wise. More often than not, adjuvants are the cause of negative side-effects. That being said, there is still a chance that the antigen used can cause toxicity as well, especially if the antigens native function is to subvert your immune system or have some other physiological affect on your body. Usually vaccine researchers go out of their way to pick an antigen with very little likelihood of having such functions, like the covid spike protein.

Definitions, if needed:

Adjuvant - the compound in a vaccine that stimulates your immune system.

Antigen - a compound, usually a protein, derived from the pathogen you want to building lasting immunity to. This is the target your immune system will recognize when you get infected with the real pathogen.