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

[User]
cmv:/ Underage voting should not be allowed

***I am from Switzerland so the voting system is different as at the most countries. so if you know to less about the voting-system go look it up real quick. thanks <3***

For context, there is a huge discussion about if voting under 18 (at 18 you're an "adult") should be allowed.

I personally think that this is a bad idea. I just think if you can vote at 16 you are most certainly to young to have your honest and true opinion on things. When I think back what my political opinion on things were when I was 16 I would not have let myself vote for anything. I was in the middle of puppetry and that's were you really make your mind up and start to think more adultlike.

Also I am kind of afraid that they don't take the voting's serious enough and just vote something random or something meme-ish.

I would like to hear some good arguments why this should be allowed because it sounds pretty progressive to our society.

Edit: What I forgot to mention is that you get fined for not voting. It's not much money but still about 5 Dollars. That's because they want to make the participation rates higher. So the option for them to just not vote is not really available and I don't think you're that interested in politics  at 16 to make yourself the time to read all the things to vote for.

[Assistant] Changing the voting age to 16 would allow for more integration of political and civic engagement by youth into their education, which could in turn create more seriously politically engaged and participatory culture. It seems like a really good idea tbh.


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

[User]
[Dune] How do those huge 500 meter long sandworms travel through the deep sand? And how can they detect footsteps if they themselves are thrashing about?

You cant really detect motion vibrations if you yourself are creating a massive amount of tremors and vibrations at your own location.

and how the hell would huge worms travel through sand?

[Assistant]
When they want to listen, they lie still.

When they want to move... basically the entire outside *and* inside of the worm is designed for locomotion. They take a large amount of the sand blocking their way, ingest it, filter out the micro-organisms they live on like a baleen whale, and poop out the sand. Their outside has ring segments that expand and contract like an earthworm, forcing them into the hole they made.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why is a lion seen repeatedly in British, specifically English Imagery?

A lion can be seen in their league and national football team badges, as statues in Trafalgar Square and a lion is even found in one of the names of a former king of England (Richard the Lion Heart).

[Assistant]
The lion is a common thing in heraldry. It traditionally symbolises courage, nobility, royalty, strength, stateliness and valour, because historically it has been regarded as the "king of beasts".

Its not only the English, its also in the coat of arms of nearly every European country.


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

[User]
[HALO] My younger brother wanted to know why UNSC Marines don't just take the armor off of Spartan bodies when they die?

I was wondering this myself, and a few years ago I think I saw a video that showed what would happen if a Marine wore Mjolnir armor, and it ended up killing him. If anyone has that clip, I'd greatly appreciate that too! (Unless it was just a fever dream)

[Assistant]
There are lots of reasons:

- Spartans are much taller than average, over 7 ft, so it'd be unlikely to fit.

- Mjolnir connects directly to Spartans brains through neural implants, which low ranking soldiers wouldn't normally have.

- Spartans' bodies are stronger and faster then a normal human's, which allows them to use the suit without being crushed. (Like that video your thinking of.)

- And finally, Mjolnir actually take a whole team of people to put on and take off (or a specialized robot like in Halo 4), with several parts being literally bolted down. So it's not very conducive to field transfers.

Hope that helps


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

[User]
[40k] My planet has just been lost to the forces of Chaos. Now what?

The local militia has been routed and our allies in the stars have abandoned the fight. So, what happens to us?

[Assistant]
Depends on which Chaos forces.

Khorne: You will die.

Slaanesh: You will die, after being tortured for so long that you start to blur the lines between pain and pleasure.

Nurgle: You will *probably* not die, but instead live on forever as a giant, pus-ridden walking corpse full of hundreds of diseases all fighting forever for dominance. You might also die, though. Grandfather Nurgle loves his little children.

Tzeentch: Who knows. They might just leave. They might turn you into a mutated warp-horror. They might feed you to daemons. They might open a hell-rift that swallows your world whole. They might give you all fresh-baked pies and walk away, chuckling madly. With the twisted mind of Tzeentch, who can say what is possible?

Chaos Undivided: Take your pick from the above, but weight the scales towards death.


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

[User] ELI5: When did American Healthcare become so terrible, ie when did jobs with benefits become the epitome of a career?

[Assistant] Health care being tied to employment started in World War 2. The government realized that with a lot of young men joining the military, and the increase in military production, that there would be a serious labor shortage. To try to control things somewhat they prevented employers from increasing wages. Once employers couldn't compete for labor using pay, they started looking for other perks that they could offer, one of which was 'free' health care. It stuck around after the war as something that people sort of expected.


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

[User]
Is it impossible to gain weight without consuming carbohydrates (without your body producing insulin)?

I recently finished an interesting book, "Good Calories, Bad Calories" by Gary Taubes. While the book has several big flaws, overall it is very valuable as it shows how many current nutritional/medical "facts" are not based on good science. In the book one of Taubes's main assertions is that it's impossible to gain weight if we eat no carbohydrates. Since insulin is the only hormone that facilitates fat deposition into adipose tissue, if we remove insulin, then we cannot have any more fat stored in the body. I guess it would just all be excreted as waste. The book goes into the fat storage/mobilization cycle in great detail. Several researchers are quoted, basically saying that insulin is what causes fat to be stored. So, my question to any biologists, nutritionists, or doctors, is insulin really the only hormone that causes fat to be stored? If so, does it follow that it's impossible to gain weight eating only protein and fat (if I got it right, then if the body doesn't take in carbs, it won't release insulin)?

[Assistant]
Insulin secretion is not only carbohydrate dependent. Fat in the intestinal lumen induces secretion of hormones (GLP1, GLP2, GIP, Neurotensin, PYY), and at least some of these stimulate insuline secretion.

If you block all insulin secretion, it is true that you would lose weight (like type 1 diabetics). If you only impair insulin secretion and/or sensitivity, you could still gain weight (type 2 diabetics).


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

[User]
Why don't drug doses (e.g., ibuprofen, allergy medicine) depend on body weight?

It seems that all over-the-counter and prescription drugs have a single prescribed dosage for an adult, regardless of body weight. Intuitively, however, it would seem that the concentration of the active ingredient in the bloodstream of a 95lb woman vs. a 200lb man would be substantially different.

I get that body fat doesn't factor as much into the efficacy of a drug in the bloodstream, but wouldn't blood volume / tissue mass have a major bearing on this?

[Assistant]
The concentration that the drug reaches *does* depend on body size and composition. In research, it's normal to see doses quoted as milligrams of substance per kilogram of body mass.

But for over-the-counter drugs, manufacturers and regulators don't want to risk a customer calculating the dosage wrong. So they calculate a single compromise number that's large enough to be reasonably effective for the largest customers, but small enough to still be safe for smaller customers.

For some prescription drugs, the same is true. One size of capsule or tablet works for a large enough range of body sizes that it's usually okay to prescribe that size instead of trying to be more specific. Others are available in a range of dosages, and your prescriber will have done the math and chosen the option that's the best match for your body weight.


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

[User] [Star Wars] How did the Hutts become so powerful in their particular system?

[Assistant] Millennia of conquest and slavery. The hutts used to be vicious warriors and early in their history conquered neighboring races before enslaving them to be workers and warriors. Now they use vast mercenary forces and near total control of the spice trade to influence enemies. They can flood a rival with narcotics before savaging them with pirates and mercs.


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

[User]
[Kingsman The Secret Service] What was the point of the final test?

If the earlier test with the train already proves loyalty then what does an agent prove by willingly shooting their own dog? Also, if both eggsy and Roxy took the shot would they both have been given the position of Lancelot?

Another thing to mention is shouldnt eggsy have been given a bonus point since he was the last one to deploy during the skydiving test? Proof of  strength of character should have at least merited a free card.

[Assistant]
The test was for if the candidates were able to put their feelings aside to finish the mission. In the field, theyre gonna be forced to do things they may not personally want to do but have to do. Shooting the dog proves theyre willing to do what needs to be done.

Its also a test of trust. A kingsman is gonna have to put his life in the hands of people who will help him in his missions. He has to trust the people providing support otherwise he might get himself and a lot of other people killed. This is why the dogs arent actually killed. Its to strengthen the idea that a the people supporting the agents really do have their best interests at heart.


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

[User]
Are there any forces that get stronger the further away something is?

Gravity for example gets stronger the closer two objects are. Do any forces have the opposite effect?

[Assistant]
On a fundamental level: Nothing we have found so far.

If you look at effective forces then the answer is yes. A spring is an example, where the force is approximately proportional to the extension within some range.


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

[User]
[X-men] Does Colossus age in his metal form?

Bonus questions:
Is he susceptible to rusting?
If he does age, but doesn't rust, does a damp environment speed up his aging? Conversely, would an arid one slow it down?

[Assistant] Nope. In one story he was sealed away and trapped like that in an environment with no air, food, or water for seven (?) years. When he came out it and reverted to human it was as if he hadn't aged a day.


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

[User]
Is all life conscious to a degree?

Is there a point in complexity where a living creature would have no consciousness, or would something like a bacteria just have some infinitesimally small amount of consciousness? Is being "unconscious" simply a lower/different level of consciousness?

In philosophy, is consciousness thought of as the ability to understand one's own existence/ make decisions, or is it thought of as a spectrum and all living things are conscious to a degree, or a combination of both? I guess I'm wondering what the arguments for each side are.

[Assistant]
Sorry to be *that* person, but *it depends on what you mean by "consciousness".*

There are physicists, like John Wheeler and David Bohm (both of whom were well-respected), who framed consciousness in terms of information-theory, essentially as the force that determines a particle's "decision" to collapse into a particular wave-state. By this definition, elementary particles are conscious. Wheeler was content with information being the fundamental constituent of reality (It from Bit, now revised as It from Qubit), but Bohm pushed further and explicitly brought free will and panpsychism into the picture.

Honestly, no one knows what consciousness is apart from a tangled zoo of vague, vaguely related definitions and research suggestions. Ask ten philosophers what consciousness is, and you'll get twenty answers centered around properties like awareness, self-determination/freedom, adaptation, emergence, self-referentiality, and those are just the *normal* ones, the mainstream conceptions no one bats an eye at. Until we're clear about what consciousness is, with a fair bit of precision, we're in no shape to be arguing about it; most arguments boil down to differing assumptions and definitions that are often actually compatible, showing how our language and knowledge alike are both inadequate for a discussion of this caliber. Never stops people from trying, but there's a reason why there's next to nothing that all credible philosophers agree on in the realm of philosophy. There are even philosophers (Dan Dennett) who outright say that consciousness doesn't exist, that, in the words of Walter White, "There's nothing but chemistry here." In other words, that there's no useful way to distinguish consciousness from the organism's nervous system.


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

[User]
[40k] The God-Emperor, as he is dying because of his wounds, is suddenly sent back to the Stellar Exodus with knowledge of what happens to Mankind,

What does he do to prevent the Age of Strife, the Horus Heresy, ect. ?
EDIT: Forgot to mention, he gets healed to perfect health when he arrives.

[Assistant]
The answer to both questions is simple. Hoard STC's. If humanity never lost the Dark Age Tech, they wouldn't need to worry about troubles during the Age of Strife (since it wasn't really preventable) and there would be no need for Primarchs with the insane levels of tech the Imperium would have.

The reason the Emperor never revealed himself was because humanity was doing just fine up until the AoS, thanks to their tech levels.


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

[User] ELI5: How come there were some ancient civilizations that were advanced in one field of science (like Medicine), yet there were others that were better at another field (like astronomy)? What determines which civilization excels at what?

[Assistant] Survivability. Each condition, such as weather or food or agracolture, will determine what that "tribe" would need to survive. They basically evolved to survive. Astronomy e.g. is for navigation, and agracolture is for areas with little prey.


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

[User] humans can over eat and beconme obese, is it possible for flight capable birds to over eat and become unable to fly?

[Assistant]
If their ability to acquire food depends on flying, they probably won't stay over the line for very long.

If you're talking about birds that are being fed unnaturally (like a pet/caged bird) then there's certainly going to be a point where they'll weigh too much to fly.


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

[User]
[LotR] Could Frodo have "gamed" the One Ring's corruptive power by taping the Ring to a mouse and keeping the mouse in his pocket?

Y'see, the mouse is technically the Ring-bearer, and Frodo is carrying him.  Sure, eventually the mouse will become corrupted and desire Lordship for himself, but with a sufficient supply of mice, this problem could be averted (except of course Gollum would be joined by a string of ex Ring-bearing rodentia all following the Fellowship).

Another benefit is that Boromir would probably be too embarrassed to fight a mouse to take the Ring for himself...

[Assistant]
No, the ring would still affect Frodo. The mere proximity of the ring is enough to affect people, it's not like its affects are limited to some official "bearer."

So not only would the ring still affect Frodo, but the mouse would present a constant threat of escaping which would only trigger Frodo's desire to prevent said escape and cause him to focus and worry about it more, perhaps speeding up the corrupting effect on Frodo.


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

[User]
How fast is electricity?

How fast is electricity in the case of a lightning strike? A standard wall outlet?

[Assistant] The actual velocity of the electrons in the wire is quite slow. They drift at about the speed you walk. The wave propagates down the wire at near the speed of light (I think it is somewhere around .67c for copper).


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

[User]
CMV: I don't believe there is a benefit to getting married.

I really don't believe there is a large benefit to getting married these days. This post is influenced by a disagreement with my significant other who believes that marriage is a very important part of a relationship and would not have children out of marriage.

Some background information on us:

She is a P.Eng student and I am an accountant. We are Canadian and would qualify for a common law marriage status in Canada. We currently have all of our finances split and would continue to do so if married. For reasons I completely agree with, she would not take my name if we married. If we had children we would split the time 50/50 taking time off work until the children would be old enough for daycare or babysitting to the point we could continue work. In our arguments we assume that I (the male) would have a higher income in the future, simply because of our current job arrangements that are estimated to around the same rate in the future. If we split I presume we would share custody of children evenly.

I believe that there is no longer any real benefit to marriage. I believe there is more cost than benefit to a marriage ceremony. Most of the legal benefits from marriage in Canada can be mitigated through legal frameworks if we choose to do so. My significant other is firm that a relationship without a marriage is not a dedicated relationship but I simply cannot understand this point of view. I think if two people love each other and have financial and legal freedom it would be better not to marry, however I would really like you to change my view.

[EDIT]: I should state that I think the emotional aspects of a marriage can still be there without a legal contract.

[Assistant] Marriage can be a way around the prisoner's dilemma. It's a promise from each party that they are primarily committed to the interests of the partnership, rather than to their own self-interests. Given that assurance, each party can work to increase the partnership's well-being, which will generally be beneficial to each party individually. Absent that assurance, the cost of contributing to the partnership is higher, because neither party can be confident that their investments of time and money will be returned.


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

[User]
[Marvel] Spider-man leaves criminals wrapped in web for the police to pick up. Can they be arrested?

Really this question is for any vigilantes who fight minor criminals.  They are often left subdued, sometimes with a note, for the police to pick up.  But with no evidence can they be arrested?  If so, how does the trial go when the hero doesn't show up to testify?

[Assistant]
There's a **Spider-Man: Tangled Web** story called *The System* which revolved around that that premise.

The story is about the discovery of two webbed up thugs found near the scene of a robbery that led to a shop owner being put in a coma, but no witnesses or cameras in the area, save for Spider-Man.

The investigating NYPD officers are shown to be fed up with Spider-Man because him intercepting, beating up, and webbing up criminals, then leaving them to dry before the cops can respond has given way to "the Spider-Man Defense": criminals take advantage of Spidey's controversial public reputation and argue their way out of charges by saying that Spider-Man simply assaulted them for no good reason, and that they only happened to be in the vicinity of various crimes, even suggesting that the Spider-Man was the real culprit and was trying to frame them.

And since Spidey doesn't stick around to fill out any police reports, submit evidence, give testimony at trials, many criminals end up walking free because of the lack of clean and irrefutable evidence.

The story ends with Spider-Man leaving the detectives a photo he took with his Spider-Camera of one of the thugs trying to rush him with the baseball bat used to put the shopkeeper in the coma, which is apparently enough for the cops to put him away.


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

[User]
Eli5: How come the new Iphone can have magnets built into it and be fine while older electronics would be damaged if I put a magnet near them?

Growing up I was told not to put a magnets anywhere near things like our TV, monitor, desktop computer, laptop, and VCR. Now the newest Iphone uses a magnet to hold accessories onto it. Why isn't it damaged from this?

[Assistant]
A lot of the things youre talking about from back in the day were using magnetic fields to function...CRT TVs and monitors for example using the field to control the light and color emission. Putting a strong enough magnet nearby would screw with the performance and maybe even damage the equipment.

There were also a lot of magnetic storage media at the time...like, almost all of them. Audio and video tape, floppy discs, etc. a strong enough magnet would erase information and really screw things up.

Things now are not only shielded better, but also not as reliant on magnetic fields.


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

[User]
[Batman] Do the villains (Joker, Scarecrow, penguin, etc) in Gotham exist because of Batman or would they still be around if he wasn't?

I remember there was an episode in the Animated Series that brought this question up.

[Assistant]
It's been brought up numerous times, the answer is both are true.

Many minor crooks have tried to gain an easy rep by getting a gimmick.

It's been established that Bats 'created' the Joker by dropping the Red Hood into that vat of chemicals [comics, not Nolan Universe.]

Poison Ivy, Scarecrow, Mad Hatter, Croc and Penguin had agendas/psychosis prior to meeting the Caped Crusader.


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

[User] Why do rockets fly upwards instead of sideways like a plane lifting off ?

[Assistant]
Almost all of the work an orbital launch rocket does is flying sideways. That's the hardest part of getting to orbit, getting up to orbital speed.

But consider the problems of doing this at low altitude. Atmospheric drag. The problem of crashing into the Earth from losing altitude. Low rocket stage performance due to needing to have the exhaust at 1 atm of pressure (which limits the exhaust expansion and diminishes rocket Isp, which has an exponential impact on stage performance).

So the typical M.O. of a launch vehicle is to boost up above most of the atmosphere as quickly as possible and then begin thrusting sideways to do most of the work. This is more efficient because it reduces gravity losses (you don't have to "hover" against gravity pulling down and wanting to crash you into the ground), reduces aerodynamic drag, and improves engine Isp and stage efficiency.


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

[User]
ELI5: In recent years, new formats like webp and jfif have started popping up. However, if I rename them to gif or jpeg, they still work. How can it be that renaming the extension doesn't ruin the image format? Why do they even exist then?

Obviously I'm just tired of constantly renaming downloaded files because I can't open them in discord or photoshop. It seems entirely unnecessary.

[Assistant]
The file extension just tells the OS what program to use to open the file. The program that tries to open it is going to actually look at the file to see what it is.

In virtually all cases, any program that can open webp or jfif also knows how to open gif or jpeg, so when they open the file they just go "Oh, this is a jfif" and keep doing their thing.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do stars twinkle while planets don't?

Also, why do some faint stars seem to disappear when we look directly at them, but can be noticed when we look at a nearby patch of sky?

[Assistant]
Starlight is from so far away, it's essentially a single point of light with near zero diameter. When the atmosphere refracts that light, you can notice it more, because the amount of refraction is greater than the diameter of the source.

Light from planets is refracted too, but since they're a lot closer the source isn't zero diameter, it's just slightly bigger. The refraction is more obscured by the diameter of the light source.

So, planet light is dimmer light, but coming from a larger diameter source.


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

[User]
Can dogs percieve the 60 Hz flickering of a light bulb?

I learned today that human stop perceiving flickering of a light source above 55Hz. I also learned that dogs can percieve that flickering up to 80Hz.

Does that mean that every night when I turn my lights on, which flicker at 60Hz, my dog thinks he is living in an insane strobe-light madhouse?

[Assistant] Depends on what kind of lights you have. Tungsten filament bulbs dont really flicker very much, since the filament stays hot between the peaks. Fluorescent bulbs flicker a lot more, but they dont go completely black. Some LED bulbs have DC converters inside, so they stay solid, but ones that just run on the AC from the mains usually go black half the time, so your dog would probably see that.


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

[User]
I think that all prices displayed (e.g. on the shelf at the store, menus, etc.) should display the real, final price. CMV

In some countries, such as France, the prices shown on menus, price tags in the store, etc. is the actual price the consumer pays.  Not the price before tax, not the price before fees, but the actual price.

In other countries, like Canada, the price shown is before taxes etc.  I feel this is inefficient and mildly harmful to consumers.  In most places, there is no indication as to what is taxed and what isn't - you just have to know.

And it is not always simple either - in my region, the exact same item (milk) could be taxed or not taxed, depending on the quantity you buy.  500ml of milk = tax, 2 litres = no tax.  One muffin = tax, 6 muffins = no tax.

The counter-argument I see is that displaying pre-tax prices prevents governments from hiding taxes, and forces the government to display taxes to the consumer.

But this argument makes no sense - since the receipt will always show the amount of tax you pay, regardless of whether you are in France or Canada.

I see no downsides to mandating displays of real prices.  Please CMV.

Edit:  I am specifically referring to places where the price is fixed (stores in real life, restaurants, etc.).

[Assistant]
This practice is common in countries with many different regions (provinces or states) that all have a different sales tax. This makes for a tricky problem for companies which ship their products across these different regions, as the price of their products wouldn't be consistent.

Keeping sales tax off of items also allows prices in stores to be the same as prices online.

To sum it up, its easier for the companies.


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

[User]
How do shifts work on really long medical operations?

First time asking here, hope I'm within the rules.

.

I saw some picture of a doctor and nurses sitting on the floor in exhaustion after a 36 hour life-saving surgery (or so the post claimed).

.

I then found myself wondering - how do the shifts work in such a procedure? Surely it wasn't the same staff for 36 hours, right? Is there an overlap where a second team takes over and is fully briefed over an hour or more, or what?
If the scope of the operation is uncertain, how are the shifts designed?

.

In my mind this is a scientific question about procedures in the field of medical science. I hope you agree and that someone can offer some valuable insight.

[Assistant]
Everyone except for the surgeon gets rotated out.

Usually big long surgeries have 2 surgeons. One is the primary surgeon and the other is assisting. The assisting one may be another attending surgeon or a resident surgeon. Even big surgeries have a point where the patient is stable enough to temporarily pause so one of the surgeons can be relieved for a minute to get some food, use the restroom. So the patient is never without a surgeon, but surgeons dont operate through a 36 hour case without a break.


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

[User]
CMV: Abortion will never be solved without major technological advances in birth control.

Some large portion of the US population will always believe that abortion is morally equivalent to murdering a baby (population A). Some other large portion of the population believe in some form of my body my choice mostly due to wanting complete control over if and when they will become a mother or father to a child (population B).

Any real resolution would either involve changing the minds of A or changing the minds of B. My base assumption is neither of these options will ever be possible.

My insight is that A is a moral issue whereas B is a technological issue. There is no changing the view of A, but there is a technological solution to make Bs view comparable with As view.

If we were able to develop a form of birth control that had the following conditions:

a) Free, and easily accessible to anyone who wants to be sexually active.

b) Almost no effort to to use. Something analogously as simple as pressing a button for it to be on and another button for it to be off. (Think orders of magnitude easier than putting on a condom)

c) Virtually risk free and side effect free

d) Easy to determine if a partner was using the birth control.

e) Having sex on this birth control felt identical to having sex not on this birth control.

f) virtually perfectly effective while on, and perfectly ineffective while off.

If all these conditions are met, we could ban abortion completely.

Group A would be okay with it since abortion is banned and they could always choose not to use the birth control. Group B would be okay with it since with the birth control they would have complete control over if any when they wanted to have a child while being as sexually active as they want.

Abortion solved! (/s)

This is mostly me thinking out loud to find a solution to an unsolvable problem and I welcome any holes being poked in this argument.

Possible problems that I recognize

1. What if you want to have a baby, purposely become pregnant and it turns out the baby has severe abnormalities? Honestly no idea. This seems to fall somewhere on the eugenics continuum and I think this could be turned into a separate CMV. But I think this is the rare case in abortions although an important consideration.
2. The birth control I described will never be possible! This seems like a lack of imagination. No fundamental reason we wont be able to hack the human body in such a way in the future even if it needs to be specialized per individual.

Ways to change my view:

Reasons why a majority of A or B would still not be happy with the birth control I described.

Real evidence that A or B actually could actually collectively change their mind without my magic birth control.

Other much simpler solutions with todays or future technology that would make group A and B jointly happy.

Other conditions about the birth control that are required in order for B to use it.

Convincing arguments that even with perfect technological progress in birth control, A would still be against it.

Ways to not change my view:

A is stupid, naive, or evil! It doesnt matter what they think!

B is stupid, naive, or evil! It doesnt matter what they think!

[Assistant]
>Group A would be okay with it since abortion is banned and they could always choose not to use the birth control.

Except there is a huge number of people who are both anti-abortion and against birth control.


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

[User]
When you light a propane torch, why does the fire not also ignite the gas inside the canister?

Probably sounds like a stupid question to many but I'm struggling to imagine the science behind it.

If you had a watering can full of petrol and lit the sprinkles of petrol coming out of the nozzle, you'd rightfully expect to have the can explode in flames.

If you sealed the can, would that be any different? What about if you sealed the can and pressurised it?

Does the pressure have to be high enough that the speed of fuel coming out of the nozzle is higher than the speed that the fire can move towards the fuel source?

[Assistant] Propane requires oxygen to burn.  It only gets enough when it exits the nozzle into the atmosphere.  The velocity and pressure of the gas coming out blocks any significant amount of oxygen from getting into the canister.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is is that a venomous animal can bite you anywhere on your body and it be a danger, but in medicine they have to find a vein to inject drugs into you?

[Assistant]
Most forms of venom destroy tissue and cells by attacking and digesting their walls. You actually lose the flesh where the animal bites you. If it's injected into the bloodstream, depending on its quantity and strength, it may destroy enough blood and parts of the circulatory system to kill you quickly; if it's injected into a more localized part of the body such as a hand, that part might be seriously damaged but if enough of it doesn't enter the bloodstream and get carried around it won't move to and damage other parts. You could still easily die of gangrene or other secondary complications however.

Needle-delivered medicine is typically intended for either the whole body or a large part of it. In many cases, such as a drip-delivered nutrient and saline solution, the easiest and fastest way to distribute it through the entire body is the bloodstream. Miss the vein and it just sits in the local tissue and doesn't reach where it's supposed to go.


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

[User] ELI5:Whats the difference between Christianity and Orthodox Christianity?

[Assistant]
The meaning of "Orthodox" in the Christian teaching is to denote a kind of Christianity that, according to the speaker, is close to the early Christian beliefs. This means that many different branches of Christianity are likely to regard themselves as orthodox, even if they are at odds with each other regarding theological matters.

"Orthodox Christianity" is often used to refer to the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is one of the branches of Christianity, one that is mainly practiced in Eastern Europe, Greece and Russia. In this sense of "Orthodox", the question about the difference between Christianity and Orthodox Christianity is similar to asking "what's the difference between a sandwich and a ham sandwich?". Eastern Orthodox Christianity is one of the branches of Christianity.

Basically, like the Roman Catholic church, it believes it is the kind of Christianity that carries on the original intent and authority of Christ and His apostles. Unlike the Roman Catholic church, it is not united under the authority of a single pope, but rather it is a group of related churches with their own religious leaders. The Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church (which also calls itself the Catholic Church) were joined together in most matters until 1054, when they split due to disagreements. One of those was the issue of the authority of the Pope.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is it that so many random sites have their own app and care so much about getting me to use it over just viewing the mobile version of their site?

[Assistant] Their app allows a level of surveillance and interaction that can't be achieved via a mobile website.  It also 'ties' you more closely to the site so you're less likely to move on to other, similar sites.


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

[User]
Why can't we utilize the crushing forces of ocean depths to generate green energy?

- Are the technical requirements for achieving such a system currently not cost effective?
- Have we not figured out an effective means of harnessing said energy?
- Am I just stupid and this isn't actually something that can work?

[Assistant]
>this isn't actually something that can work

This one, there's no mechanism to harness energy from that. You can't run a turbine off water that isn't moving, you can't harness the pressure deep under the ocean any more than we could harness the weight of a brick to generate electricity. Now if you have a stream of water that is *moving*, then it's easy to put a turbine in it's path and spin a generator.


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

[User] [ Game of Thrones] so the dothraki view women as property and spoils of war. How would khal drogo have reacted to daenerys being pregnant with a girl? How would he raised or viewed his his daughter?

[Assistant] Uh, Drogo probably would have been enormously disappointing considering his child is supposed to be the Stallion Who Mounts the World. The prophesied uniter of the Dothraki and conqueror of the world. If it is a woman, then well the prophecy was wrong and Drogo will be humiliated.


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

[User]
[MCU] Prior to joining the Avengers, Bruce Banner went into hiding in some of the most densely populated places in the world. Does this not constitute criminal negligence on his part?

When the events of The Incredible Hulk begin, Bruce Banner already knows what he is. He knows he can turn into *the big guy* if his heartrate gets too high. He knows his blood is, at minimum, harmful to other people and, at worst, capable of creating more monsters. He's already been through incidents where he has lost control and hurt people he loves, including putting Betty Ross into the hospital.

So, on the run from Thaddeus Ross and the United States Army, he decides that his best course of action- as a man who is capable of accidentally leveling cities- is to hide in one of the most densely populated cities in the world. Of all the places to go and become a recluse, Bruce Banner picks *Rio De Janeiro*. For the record, this is the 43rd most populated city in the world with a population of 6.32 million people. The fact that his transformation into The Hulk while inside the city didn't kill several dozen people qualifies as a legitimate miracle.

Following this, he continues hiding in cities until he reaches his goal of traveling to New York City- the 26th most populated city in the world at 8.62 million people. He visits here knowing already that the US Army is hot on his trail and another Hulk incident is extremely likely- even going as far as to *intentionally transform into the Hulk within the city* in a mad experiment he hopes will cure him. Neither he nor the scientist aiding him have any clue if the experiment will work, or just create another "incident".

After doing the sensible thing and fleeing to an isolated cabin in British Columbia, we find Bruce Banner a few years later hiding in- you guessed it- another densely populated city. Bruce is in Calcutta, the 59th most populated city in the world at 4.49 million, and smack in the middle of the second most populated country in the world. Just like he did in Rio De Janeiro, he settles in the poor area of the city, which is massively overpopulated and full of potential victims.

So, is Bruce Banner really this big of a dick? Maybe his desire to help the common man has overthrown his common sense. Maybe he believes that curing The Hulk will save more lives in the longrun than hiding in a secluded cabin. Maybe he believes getting caught by the US Army is somehow worse than the potential of accidentally murdering thousands of people, due to the fact that they want to weaponize his gamma accident. To me, it's irrelevant. No matter how you slice it, he's a walking/talking atomic bomb that can go off at any moment. His management techniques are obviously not foolproof, as a fistfight in Brazil forced him to transform. He knew this and went to India anyway.

I think, because he knows the consequences if things go wrong (which they do, all the time), living in these populated cities represents an atrocious level of negligence and Bruce Banner really is a criminal for remaining in these places when it isn't necessary. His *always angry* thing isn't justifying this from my perspective. All it takes is one slip-up and an entire neighborhood full of people gets flattened. Bruce does seem like a smart guy with good intentions, so am I missing something? I feel like SHIELD should have thrown him in a cell to keep him from going on the run again and putting more people at risk.

[Assistant] During Bruce's time in Rio he's working to try to cure the Hulk with Mr Blue.  He needs to be somewhere with internet access and scientific supplies can't get that in a remote cabin, he also needs money to buy supplies so he has to be somewhere with jobs he can do incognito.   He later goes to New York at the behest of Mr Blue.   by this point he's go decent control of the Hulk so he's not too worried about an incident unless Ross comes for him and if that happens at least he'll have a focus for Hulks Rage.


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

[User] ELI5: My phone always tells me to unplug charger when reaches 100%; am I hurting my battery by leaving it plugged in?

[Assistant]
*possibly*

Lithium Ion batteries, which are the most common type in modern phones don't necessarily like being at 100% all the time. This is a stress on the battery.  The general advice is to charge to 100 (or even a little under more like 80) and let it run down to about 30 or 40 - charge it back up again and let it run down a bit - for ideal operating conditions.

Li-Ion hates extremes so avoiding overcharging (charging beyond 100% - uncommon in modern phones) and deep-cycling (letting the battery drain entirely) is important.

Lithium Ion batteries also don't like heat, for example which is caused by leaving it on the charger and is generated by having the battery fully charged.

This said - your phone manufacturer also knows this, and if they're worth anything they don't keep trying to charge your battery once its full. They stop - let it discharge a bit - then send it back to 100.  In fact some manufacturers don't use the full capacity of the battery except when calibrating.

Realistically, environmental factors like heat are much more damaging than having it at full charge (which is why some devices turn off and lock themselves out if they start overheating) so don't worry about it too much. But yes, you are stressing the battery a little bit.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do I wake up with a stuffy nose when I stay the night at somebody else's place?

It seems like every time I stay over at a friend or family members house, I wake up with a really dry, stuffy nose. This often happens without staying the night as well if im there for a few hours. Not sure if anybody else gets this, but can anyone explain it?

[Assistant] It is the bodys natural reaction to a new/unfamiliar enviroment. Their different detergents, soaps, air pollutants, pet dander, and even human dander all cause your body to have a mild allergic reaction and up the defenses. In this case, primarily the nasal entrance. Some people are more susceptible to allergies than others, you are in that list. You will also find that when you travel to new locales, the new pollens and other irritants cause you to feel stuffy or ill for the first week or so.


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

[User]
I am currently reading Kants Critique of Pure Reason, and I am having trouble understanding the passage below. What does Kant mean when he says that appearances fail to agree with the conditions of its unity? Why is the deduction of the categories necessary and what is it meant to establish?

For appearances could after all be so constituted that the understanding
would not find them in accord with the conditions of its unity, and everything would then lie in such confusion that, eg, in the succession of appearances nothing would offer itself that would furnish a rule of synthesis and thus correspond to the concept of cause and effect, so that this concept would therefore be entirely empty, nugatory, and without
significance. Appearances would nonetheless offer objects to our intuition, for intuition by no means requires the functions of thinking.
 (A90-91/B123)  from the Transcendental Analytic.

[Assistant] He is just pointing out that there must be a faculty of the brain that unifies appearances so that we can attach them to objects or to causes and effects (which we do). Hes basically pointing out that the way we experience the world isnt necessary, it could be another way and so we should figure out why it is the way it is. How do we unify appearances (he says it is due to the understanding).


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

[User]
CMV: National Treasure is an amazing movie and a national treasure of it's own.

Nicholas Cage (Ben) puts on a phenomenal role playing a man trying to do good for his country and himself. His tale is inspired by him trying to do good, redeem his family's name, and make some big cash.

The acting by Nicholas Cage and the rest of the cast members are on point, and probably one of the best fitting roles of Cage's career.

The story involves history, an FBI investigation, a bad guy with the same goals as the main character just a bit twisted, an amazing supportive character (Justin Bartha as Riley), and a great love story that compels people to route for the protagonist even more as well as the end goal of finding the treasure.

The film 14 years ago and even now has so much nostalgia of American history and pride that it legitimately is an all-American film.

The plot to the eyes of anybody that isnt a full time treasure hunter or FBI agent is absolutely flawless.

Argue with me on these things and I promise to be kind. But fair warning I am drunk on my couch watching this movie at 4a.m. and I will heckin do my best to defend this movie. And I'll do my best to make my defense as coherent as possible, God and spellcheck be with me.
Thanks (:

[Assistant]
You are right. The acting is good and the story is decent.

But that isnt all it takes for a movie to be a national treasure. The cinematography and directing? Meh, it gets the story by but never adds anything to the story. The action scenes? Passable for an action movie. Never anything new or daring or visually interesting. The story? Complelling and decent but again, nothing new nothing truely original.

There are plenty of movies that have good acting and decent storys. But to be a national treasure you need so so much originality or at the very least have the other dozen components of a film to be good.


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

[User]
CMV: Men should stop trying to attract women and start trying to connect with them

I was once in Miami and saw a beautiful woman walking on the beach. I approached by saying, Hi, I just saw you and had to share my awesome mood. Her eyes lit up. She liked me instantly. Then, for the next minute or two, I proceeded to spit good game at her, saying witty, cool lines that would supposedly get her even more attracted to me. (I had been taking an online course about how to talk to women.) But with every passing second, I could feel her interest diminish. The cooler and wittier I was, the less relatable I was, and the less she liked me. After a couple minutes, she said, It was nice meeting you, which is code for, Not interested. Ouch.

I was trying so hard to attract her that I repelled her. Instead, I should have simply connected with her.

Do a Google or YouTube search for terms like attraction secrets or how to talk to girls and youll see thousands of tips purporting to teach guys how to attract women. Be alpha. Be mysterious. Be cocky. Be funny. And on and on.

Men should stop trying to attract women. Women are already attracted to us, just as were attracted to them. Attraction is handled by Mother Nature, the ultimate wing-woman. As Homo sapiens, weve been attracting each other for 200,000 years. Early Man didnt need clever lines from Youtube.

You dont need to attract women. Theyre already attracted, just as youre already attracted to them. (If Scarlett Johansson approached you, how good would her game have to be?)

When a guy focuses too much on trying to attract, he hurts himself in two key ways 1: He comes across as a try-hard guy straining to impress her, which makes him less attractive. 2: Hes not focused on what women really want: connection.

Were all wired to seek romantic connection. Its a fact of evolution. But unlike attraction, romantic connection is not instant or automatic. It takes time and effort. You have to both like some of the same things, or share emotional experiences. So, a guy on a date who focuses on be attractive is failing to focus on the most important thing to do on a date.

Hes like the Hulk with a handgun. Its overkill. Women already find him attractive. They want connection, not attraction. (Watch any episode of The Bachelor, and almost every woman will say, We had the most amazing connection!)

If you try to attract women, youll repel them. But if you try to connect, youll attract them.

Change my view!

[Assistant]
Ive always looked at it like this:
Attractive is something you ARE
Connecting is something you DO.

Dont attract someone. Just work on yourself through self-improvement so that you ARE attractive... then focus on making genuine connections with the other person.  If they find you attractive and you make a connection, youre golden.  But directly trying to make them find you attractive is almost never successful.


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

[User] [Marvel] If Ego was successful in his quest to take over thousands of planets and essentially have control over a good chunk of the universe, would someone like the Living Tribunal have stepped in?

[Assistant] No, because gaining control over (parts of) the universe doesn't mean he's a threat to the universe, it just means that power has shifted between the universe's entities. In other words, to him it's just local politics.


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

[User]
If we kept up the research and development on steam engines would they be more efficient than our combustion engines today?

I feel like the steam engine was a growing technology and then the combustion engine stole its thunder. It was a quick fix jump in technology leaving the steam engine tech in the past. A century(?) of research of steam engines lost and focused on the combustion engine. Could you imagine a hightech and highly efficient steam engine car today? (The new car that runs on water is not a steam engine if somebody was going to mention it)

Edit: Our modern "internal" combustion engine vs. a modernized **compact** "external" combustion engine that doesn't really exist.

Edit: Thanks for the answers guys. I think I figured out that what I wanted out of a steam engine such as in a car kind of defies physics and/or logic.

Edit: Still have hope :)

[Assistant]
Modern, efficient steam engines are everywhere. Steam turbines are a huge improvement in terms of mechanical simplicity and efficiency over the piston design that springs to mind when you think of a "steam engine". Every power plant uses them to convert heat into rotary motion for electricity generation. They bump up against the theoretical limits for efficiency and cannot really be improved any further.

Steam turbines are not used for locomotion because they cope poorly with varying load. They were used in ships and trains for a time, but diesel engines proved to be better suited.


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

[User]
Why wouldn't banks prefer to get compensated with loan defaults (i.e., collecting collateral) rather than through interest?

A lender can take as profit an interest rate, say 3% of the money it lends. *Or*, it can take as payment the collateral (eg. a car or house) if the borrower defaults on a loan. Wouldn't a car/house/equity/whatever given collateral be much more valuable to be compensated with a small percentage of the money lent (plus, banks can collect some of the money it lent back before the borrower defaults).

[Assistant]
They wouldnt mostly because of the risk associated with collection and the motivations involved. Of course, the person with the collateral doesnt want to lose it, and the prospect of banks collecting on a default is almost always a nightmare for banks because of regulations regarding collections and the people who hold the collateral.

Take a house. Say a person defaults on their mortgage and the bank is taking their home. Well, by law theyre going to have to default for several months before the bank can collect, and even at that point they often have optional repayment plans they can enter into at any time. Now. Say were at the point that the bank is absolutely kicking them out, well a lot of people are going to gut the house (I.e, theyre going to fuck the house up in a number of ways to screw the bank).

Now the bank has a house, almost certainly in a worse condition than when it was bought, and now theyre responsible for selling this house in the open market which may or may not be favorable at the time theyre trying to sell.

In the end, the bank much prefers you to pay your mortgage and collect their interest. This is more complicated though because a lot of banks package debt and sell it in the form of securities, so its really investors who prefer you not to default and banks who just service the mortgage. They still really prefer you not default though because the investors dont take too kindly to their loan products falling apart.


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

[User]
[40K] Could the Great Crusade have succeeded without Astartes?

Yes, the Legiones Astartes played a vital role in the Great Crusade, but they didn't do everything. Mortal men and women fought in the crusade. If the Emperor of Mankind decided that making an armies of post-human killing machines with demigods heading them was too risky, would mortal forces have been able to conquer the galaxy?

[Assistant]
>Yes, the Legiones Astartes played a vital role in the Great Crusade, but they didn't do everything. Mortal men and women fought in the crusade. If the Emperor of Mankind decided that making an armies of post-human killing machines with demigods heading them was too risky, would mortal forces have been able to conquer the galaxy?

Possibly?  But at greater cost. They would have been facing equivalent or stronger enemies, and the gains would be less.

Contrary to popular belief, Space Marines (High Gothic "Adeptus Astartes") are not meant for battle line formations.  Even in the great crusade that was rare.  Space Marines are the "tip of the spear" assault units.  Their primary function was to shock and awe human worlds into surrender by orbital drop assault against their leadership.

Imagine if today, right now, 1000 drop pods landed outside Washington DC.  Out of these drop pods came 8 foot tall giants in shining metal armor.  They would stride through our defenses, eliminate our leadership in a single blow.   And then would come the message from orbiting space ships, "Surrender and join us, or face this in battle."

Most human worlds just surrendered.  At which point the Emperor essentially added them and their resources, largely intact, to his Imperium.  This is what permitted the exponential growth of the crusade.

The other benefit of the Astartes, is that when focused they present far greater firepower in a narrow front than regular troops can provide.  They're also more capable of facing the alien terrors of the galaxy than regular humans.

Without Astartes, the much slower pace of successful conquest would have greatly increased the cost of expanding the Imperium.  Eventually it would have just ground down his resources.


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

[User]
[El Dorado] Would the natives have been able to fight the Spaniards with Tzekel-Kan's help?

Tzekel Kan was clearly magic, he bound a panthar idol to his will, and his book had images of demonic conquistadorers on it. Would his aid be enough to repell the Spaniards?

[Assistant]
Not a chance.

If two white losers can trick the city into them being gods Cortez and his more impressive soldiers would be even more divine in power. Remember, the Tzekel Khan was convinced Cortez was the real god when he met him.

Once he got there all he would need to do is play sides off each other like Tulio and Miguel  (Miguel and Tulio!) did, only with far more violence. If that didn't work he would just bring the rest of the Spanish Army to whoop ass.


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

[User]
[Naruto] Was Might Guy the strongest person in the world for a short while?

I was rewatching Naruto the other day, and got to the part where Guy was explaining Lees back story during the Garaa fight, and suddenly thought "Hey, isn't Might Guy the strongest right now?

At that point in time, assuming Might Guy could already open the 8 gates, who could stop him? He was stronger, faster, and tougher than any if the current kage, Pain couldn't stop him at that time as even 6 tailed Kuruma could break past his Almighty Push, much less the guy who nearly killed Sage of 6 paths Madara with the rinnegan.

Itachi was also near Madaras level at that point, even in ocular powers.

Orochimari would probably be destroyed by 7 gates Guy much less 8.

So basically was there anyone stronger than guy in the whole world during the chunin exams arc?

[Assistant]
The thing about the 8 gates is you get one shot.  If you use them and fail, you're done.

While Guy could temporarily become the strongest warrior in a direct fight, the Ninja world is all about misdirection.  It would be tough, but not impossible, for a weaker fighter to fake their own death against 8 gates Guy, and then come out victorious after Guy has essentially just killed himself.


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

[User] What is actually happening when I feel my stomach "drop" on quick bump on a roller coaster?

[Assistant]
Imagine this: you are in a car and the driver makes a hard turn. Doing this will push you against your seatbelt, or, if you aren't wearing one may even throw you out of your seat. This is because for a couple seconds, you are traveling in a different direction than the car.  This idea is called conservation of momentum.

Now think about the inside of your body, when you go over a small bump in a roller coaster, for a split second your body is in the same situation as you were in that car. Your insides are moving in a different direction than your skeleton, which makes you feel weird on the inside.


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

[User]
ELI5: Do bees know they're going to die if they sting someone/something?

If so, how could they follow through when the motivation of life is to survive and reproduce....?

[Assistant]
The short answer is no.

Bees aren't complex enough organisms to have a concept of "self" in the way that we do. Let alone a concept of life and death. Insects brains aren't really much more than hard-coded behavioral rules.


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

[User]
Why does licking your lips make them more chapped?

ELI5: Every time I get chapped lips I end up licking them and this always results in worse chapped lips! Why does this happen?

[Assistant]
Evaporation. You wet your lips, humidity is probably low, so the heat and the lack of moisture in the air carry off your saliva and more moisture, which comes right out of your lips. Which you lick, because they're dry, which repeats the process, making them drier.

Chapstick and other lip balms work by putting a layer of wax down. This prevents moisture from evaporating from your lips, as well as moisture from your tongue getting to your lips to screw up the protective process.


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

[User] ELI5: Why can I balance on a bicycle while it is moving, but not while it is stationary?

[Assistant]
All the detailed physics theories aren't necessary here.

While moving, a rider is simply able to steer the bike back under him/her as they inevitably begin to fall one way or the other.

And to ride with no hands - notice that due to the design of the front fork, whichever way the bike leans, the front wheel will turn toward having the same effect as steering the bike back under you with hands on the handle bars.


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

[User]
CMV: I don't get why coronavirus from Wuhan is such a big deal

As far as I know:

\- Its symptoms mostly resemble that of an influenza. Most people who get it, are fine

\- People who die to it are old and sick, who can frankly die to many things that are not that dangerous to younger, healthier population (like heatwaves or common cold)

\- It doesn't seem to be particularly infectious, especially considering its origins. So far, 8,000 known cases out of a city of 11,000,000 people. That's less than 0.09% of the population of Wuhan. And most of the infected are in China

\- The fatality rate seems rather low too (around 200 so far). Which is about 2% of the people infected

\- It's pretty easy to prevent, just wash your hands well and often

Yet, everywhere, in every newspaper the top five news pieces are all about it. I understand that people hope it won't get any worse, but so far it seems like so much ado about nothing.

I do appreciate and understand that international health organisations are taking it seriously, like they should, and try to contain and study it. It's better to be safe than sorry. But to me, this panic seems to be blown out of proportions.

[Assistant]
> The fatality rate seems rather low too (around 200 so far). Which is about 2% of the people infected

That's actually very high for a disease that has spread so rapidly. There are diseases with higher mortality rates (like ebola or rabis), but they tend to be more difficult to spread. The current reported mortality rate for this coronavirus puts it way over something more contagious like measles or the flu (with the exception of the 1918 flu). Think of it this way: if 10% of China were to be infected, the current mortality rate would mean around 3 million deaths.

> It doesn't seem to be particularly infectious, especially considering its origins. So far, 8,000 known cases out of a city of 11,000,000 people. That's less than 0.09% of the population of Wuhan. And most of the infected are in China

The outbreak is only 2 months old. The virus presumably recently made the jump from animal to human. We can expect the virus to evolve to become better able to transmit between humans, since the viruses that evolve in such a way will themselves spread faster. This is a stochastic process, since it relies on random mutations, so a sudden increase in virulence is probable if the outbreak goes on for long enough.

> People who die to it are old and sick

Average age has been 55 so far. That's not that old.


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

[User]
Why do nursing schools and med school mostly teach treatment based information rather than preventive?

As I was in nursing school so much of our program was treatment based, and very little was talked about prevention, for example so many people have never had a full lab test that shows all functions in the body. With the human body being so complex it feels like we arnt taking advantage of all of our resources to keep our patients healthy.

[Assistant] Preventative healthcare is taught as part of public health and health promotion. You probably had a short module on that as part of your course but its a separate profession. Things like education and environment are more important to preventative health than lab tests. Have a look at Michael Marmots work for more info.


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

[User] ELI5: How can humans see fire? What is the light were actually seeing?

[Assistant] When things are very hot they glow red. The soot and ash in the fire - mostly particles too small to see - are super hot and glowing red. You see this glow. If even hotter they can glow blue. Some materials may add color.


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

[User] ELI5: Spider silk was, until recently, the strongest known natural material known to man. How is it that spider silk is stronger than something like a turtle's shell or a ram's horns?

[Assistant]
Strong is relative.  Cement is strong, unless you pull on it; steel is strong, when being pulled on, but isn't so great when force is applied in certain axis.  Cement has incredible *compressive* strength, steel has great *tensile* strength.

When they discuss spider silk as being "strong", what they are really saying is that it's the strongest naturally occurring tensile material (at the time), meaning that it can support many times more weight than something like a steel cable of the same mass and length.  A turtle shell or ram's horns have better sheer and compressive strength - they resist being compressed and are rigid, and don't break under specific levels of force.

But don't confuse hardness with strength - a turtle's shell may be hard, in that it has little give, but not be very strong, while steel is relatively soft (in that it deforms easily, but has great tensile strength when under load.


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

[User]
ELI5 why do some people blackout and lose control when they are drunk while others are perfectly fine?

Whenever I get drunk I always know what's going on around me and what im doing, and I always remember everything the next day, even if I'm totally completely absolutely wrecked.
But I have friends who get just slightly drunk and completely lose control of themselves. They do things they would never normally do, like take off all their clothes and run around, and then not remember anything the next day.
If that happened to me i would never ever drink again. I tend to be loud and cheerful but i never find myself doing something i would regret.

[Assistant]
Blackouts are a function of the level of intoxication. Some people have higher or lower tolerances, but mostly, it's a matter of self control.

Quite simply, they're taking in more alcohol than you more quickly (relative to their body mass), resulting in a high enough blood-alcohol level to induce blackouts. You, however, never reach that point due to the way you consume. It might just be a preference, it might just be personality.

Most people don't find that level of intoxication, loss of control/memory, and impending hangover to be enjoyable. They usually regret it, but a lack of control or awareness means that they will repeat the performance.


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

[User]
Do "millennials" really have it that bad

Is there any basis for the common claim on reddit that the youth of today has it much worse than previous generations? And if that's the case how true is the common sentiment that milennials have gotten screwed over by previous generations?

[Assistant]
This is a non-scientific answer.

The standard of living that we enjoy as millenials is probably higher than any generation before us. Food quality and diversity, electronics, and education is probably at all time highs.

However, certain "life goals" and "milestones" are now unattainable to us in exchange. Due to debt and stagnant real wages versus soaring home prices, it's unfeasible for millenials to achieve certain milestones, such as buying a home. Most of us will spend our 20s paying down college debt, and with current home prices it would take a decade to even save for a down payment.


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

[User]
[40k] What's with the land war focus?

Ok, so seriously, reading Titanicus (good novel, read it), and it's got titans.

15-30m meter tall walking engines of death with 20cm armour. Or, less armour than WWII tanks (lets put that down to some poor writing).

But seriously, why has nobody sortied some air to mud and deal with these?

In general, naval combat is ignore, air combat is skimped and mostly ignored, and it's land war all the time.

What's so wrong with getting some air superiority, then bombing the opponents back to the stone age? There are bomber in setting, there are fighters, but they don't seem to have the impact and effectiveness that we know IRL bombers, especially with precision munitions, can have.

[Assistant]
>15-30m meter tall walking engines of death with 20cm armour. Or, less armour than WWII tanks (lets put that down to some poor writing).

Lets not put that down to poor writing.  Lets put it down the fact that technology has advanced significantly and they can get huge amounts of protection out of less armor.

>But seriously, why has nobody sortied some air to mud and deal with these?

>In general, naval combat is ignore, air combat is skimped and mostly ignored, and it's land war all the time.

>What's so wrong with getting some air superiority, then bombing the opponents back to the stone age? There are bomber in setting, there are fighters, but they don't seem to have the impact and effectiveness that we know IRL bombers, especially with precision munitions, can have.

Effective countermeasures for air craft coupled with chaos influencing society *massively* toward more gruesome forms of combat which breed more chaos.


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

[User]
I have come into possession of a device that can speed up my brain (but not my body). Could I be reasonably sure of winning any given fight?

I have a device that can speed up my brain by any amount I wish.  It doesn't make me any smarter, it just makes the world around me seem to go slower.  It also has no effect on the rest of my body; it can still only move as fast as my muscles allow normally, so it feels quite slow when I have the device turned up to a high setting.  (It's rather disconcerting to take subjective minutes or hours to draw a breath, but one gets used to it.)

Now before I set out to find interesting and profitable uses for this device, I think it would be a good idea to consider if it could aid in my self-defense.  I am a healthy (if slightly overweight) 30-year-old man of average strength, I have never been in a fight, and I have no particular training in fighting.  With the device, my reflexes are effectively instantaneous, and I'll have as long as I wish to observe, evaluate, and consider any given situation.  But again, I can't move much faster than normal, or punch any harder than I could before.

Could I be reasonably sure of winning any given fight?  What about against someone considerably larger and stronger than me?  What about with an expert martial artist?  What about multiple opponents?  (I still can't see behind me or turn my head any faster!)  What if my opponent is armed- could I perhaps dodge bullets with my perfect reflexes and unlimited time to consider how to move my body?

[Assistant]
This really depends on who you are fighting.  With some training on how to fight dirty, there are some dirty techniques you could use.  For example, you'd be able to aim and correct for the eyes with your fingers to a greater degree of accuracy than most others.

The best kind of martial art for you to learn would be an akido or judo type, which uses the momentum of the opponent against them.  Once they throw a punch, you could easily observe and turn the force against them, provided you know what to do.

Against someone much larger and stronger, you'd be in trouble unless you had training.  The moment they got you on the ground in a grapple, your reaction time would be useless.

Against multiple opponents most people are screwed.  Against an armed opponent, particularly one who is trained to aim, you would not be able to move your body faster than he can draw, point, and fire.  You would be like a man captaining a boat, fully able to observe the enemy ship point its guns at you and fire, and utterly powerless to change your course to stop the fire.


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

[User]
ELI5: How, in just 2,000 years are we finding Ancient Greek and Roman ruins buried under a foot or more of dirt and rocks?

From my understanding dirt settles and accumulates rather slowly. 2,000 years seems like such a relatively low figure for things to get buried that much. It just doesnt make sense!

[Assistant] Dirt is produced and accumulated at a very slow rate but the earth and the ground is in a constant state of very slow motion and weathering which can cover stationary objects. Ash from volcanoes, landslides, organic layering such as leaves, mudslides and other phenomenon can contribute significantly.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40k] What would be the best way to fix this hellhole of a galaxy?

So Warhammer 40k is a universe where everything went wrong. It's the literal "worst timeline", and life sucks for everyone. If you were living in the 40kverse, and you could go back in time at any point in history and change one thing, one thing that would have the biggest positive impact on this universe, what would it be?

[Assistant]
Kill Kor Phaeron before he kidnapped young Lorgar. This prevents Lorgar growing up to be a religious zealot and stops his legions love of worshipping anything that could be a god. This means no Erebus, no Erebus means no Horus being stabbed and almost dying and being corrupted by the forces of chaos. Already the Horus heresy is stopped meaning no empire destroying war. This also means Magnus doesnt have to do anything like warn the emperor thus ripping a hole in the webway project. With no civil war and no daemons trying to get into the palace. The emperor can finish his plan for humanity dramatically reducing it reliance on the warp, whilst further advancing humanity to being a psychic race.

Another way would simply be make the old ones save the necrons so they dont become bitter and kick off the war in heaven which prevents the warp becoming so violent and stops races like the orks and Eldar being made. No orks always a good thing and no Eldar means they cant murder fuck a god into creation.


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

[User] [Spongebob Squarepants] Would Mr Krabs give the Krabby Patty's secret formula to Plankton if he was offered money in exchange for it?

[Assistant] As greedy and short sighted as Mr. Krabs is, he knows the secret formula is the goose that lays the golden egg.  That's why Plankton has to steal it.  He knows there is no circumstance that Mr. Krabs would ever give up the secret formula.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do antihistamines make people sleepy?

Its the time of year when the trees are shedding pollen to reproduce with other trees, my eyes and sinuses clearly do not consent to this airborne plant-bukkake. Ive taken a little pink pill, and it does alleviate the allergy reaction, but it also puts me to sleep. I have stuff to do, this is annoying.

[Assistant]
Histomines do a lot of different things for different parts of the body. In most of your body, it helps control inflammatory response (which causes allergy symptoms).

In parts of your brain, it regulates wakefullness.

Some antihistimes like benadryl are non-discriminatory antihistamines. This means they block the effect of histomines everywhere, including in your brain. The histomines that usually keep you awake are now blocked and that makes you drowsy.

"Less/Non-drowsy" allergy meds have less effect on those histomines while still being effective against the rest that cause allergy symptoms, making them effective but less drowsy.


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

[User]
[Star Wars Rebels] Why are Corellian Corvettes, ships more or less specifically designed to engage fighters, never actually used TO engage fighters and just let themselves be shot?

Three TIE interceptors are the exact opposite of what should be considered a threat to a corvette IF THEY EVER ACTUALLY SHOT BACK.

[Assistant]
It's because the CR90 series isn't specifically designed to engage fighters.
It was designed as a diplomatic vessel, and later used mostly as a blockade runner or very light carrier.  It's armaments are turbolasers, which are generally better suited to attacking capital ships.  Fighters can typically evade such weapons, as famously demonstrated at the battle of Yavin.
For ships meant to engage fighters, you're thinking Lancer-class frigates or similar.


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

[User]
Why do all of the planets almost orbit in the same plane around the sun?

There's no up/down in space, so why are all the planets orbiting on what is close to the same plane around the sun? Why aren't there planets orbiting the sun on 90 degree angles to Earth's orbit?

[Assistant]
Short answer, the planets are coplanar (on the same plane) because during the solar system's formation, the planets formed out of a disk of dust and gas. Because it was a disk all of the planets formed on the same plane.

Longer answer, disks and by extension rings are extremely common in astronomy, we see rings around planets in our own solar system as an example and galaxies could be considered giant disks. The reason is, when a cloud of dust and or gas collapses, the conservation of angular momentum amplifies any initial tiny spin of the cloud. As the cloud spins faster and faster, it collapses into a disk, which is a balance between gravitational collapse and centrifugal force *(see reply comments for discussion)* created by the rapid spin. The end result is any objects forming from the material in the disk will be on the same plane as the disk.


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

[User] ELI5: Is milk good or bad for you?

[Assistant] People are not all the same with regard to milk, so when you ask if milk is good or bad for you, it depends who you are talking to.  Furthermore, there is more than one kind of milk.  The most usual kind is cow milk, and that is high in a type of sugar called lactose (which unlike other sugars does not have a sweet taste, but does help to make milk taste milky) and which many adults (and some children) cannot digest.  Inability to digest lactose is called lactose intolerance.  So for a person who is lactose intolerant, it is bad to drink cow milk.  For those who are able to digest lactose, which includes almost all children, milk is a highly nutritious drink, which is a particularly good source of vitamin D and calcium in the diet.  Children in particular are in need of good nutrition in order to grow in a healthy manner.  Children who suffer from a lack of vitamin D will develop a disease called rickets, whose main symptom is weak and unhealthy bones, which break easily.  Of course, there are other possible sources of vitamin D (fish is very good) particularly for adults.  Babies cannot chew food the way adults do, so they have fewer options.  It is also known that the most beneficial form of milk for babies is not cows milk, but their own mother's milk.  That has many benefits, not just vitamin D but also useful antibodies to strengthen immune response, and other useful nutrients.  Breast feeding generally works very well to nourish babies.


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

[User]
Is Voyager still orbiting the sol system or is it on a total escape trajectory from our system?

If on a total escape trajectory, where is it heading? Will it have an encounter with another system in say the next 100 million years?

[Assistant]
They are on escape trajectories.

It's impossible to predict where they will be in 100 million years, the dynamics of the galaxy are too complex to forecast out that far. Neither spacecraft will get within a light year of any known star, other than the Sun, within the next million years at least.


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

[User] Can you make a Venus fly trap fat by over feeding it?

[Assistant]
No, plant does not posses a layer of adipose tissue that, in mammals, constitutes one of the body's main stores of fat.
 Overfeeding the plant may possibly kill it. A high quantity diet could increase its overall size to an extent. But you definitely wouldn't get a fat fly trap.


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

[User]
What would be the economical effects of raising everyone's salary to match inflation every year?

I can't understand very well why workers simply don't get a raise according to inflation for every year of work. I'm not so cynical that I think that companies are simply exploiting more more from the workers, but it does seem very suspicious that it's hard to get a raise in the same position after a year, even if it's just to stay even with inflation.

So what could be a possible consequence if, say, everyone got a raise very year according to a given inflation index? And what would this imply in periods of hyperinflation, where you would need to raise everyone's wages every week or so? (Assuming that paperwork is easy, just interested in economic effects, not practical ones).

[Assistant]
This might sound great and fair, but it's very much doubtful this is a good idea.

First of all, this sets you right on track to a wage-price spiral. Inflation happens, which forces companies to raise wages, which leads to further inflation, until you end up in a situation where wages keeping up with inflation is the least of your problems. The currency goes down the drain, imports get super expensive, lending unreasonable, etc.

Second of all, wages are rigid downward. People don't like wage cuts, surprise. Inflation helps companies during downturns by lowering real wages, and helps them to avoid firing people or going under instead.

Third of all, what about dying industries? Eventually the revenue you generate falls below your wage, right now you'd still have the choice to accept a lower wage, if you couldn't cut wages, people would against just get fired.

Median real wage growth is usually positive, wages *do* keep up with inflation, just not always and not immediately.


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

[User]
[Mermaids] Wouldn't they smell really bad?

I mean, they're covered in shellfish and stuff like that.

They look alright from afar but surely the closer you get the stronger the smell of fish would become.

Edit: I formally apologise to all the merfolk out there, I did not mean any offence. I was merely misinformed.

[Assistant]
Fish only smell that way if they're sick or decomposing. A live or freshly dead fish smells fairly clean.

As for their accessories, merfolk tend to use still-living creatures bred for use as garments or thoroughly clean the shells of dead ones.


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

[User]
Is it true that a thing either has consciousness (subjective experience) or it doesn't? If yes, does it follow that consciousness appeared at a single moment in the evolutionary sequence?

This is a "test my theory" post. Is it considered true that for any particular thing (e.g. a human or a stone) either it is *like* something to be that thing or not? I.e. anything either is a subjective experiencer/observer/conscious or no? If yes, then there had to be a single moment in our evolutionary past, probably a major mutation (explainable by the anthropic principle), when two "soulless machines" gave birth to a subjective observer. Is this a common thought? If no, where did I make a mistake?

So, the argument goes like this.

1) An organism is either a subjective observer or no, tertium non datur.

2) Humans are subjective observers, and at least our very ancient ancestors like say proto-cells aren't.

3) Therefore, in the evolutionary sequence from non-observers (say proto-cells) to observers (us) there had to be a specific moment when non-observer parents gave birth to a child that is an observer - i.e. a major brain wiring mutation, similar but more profound to how there was milk-digestion mutation when the first ever lactose-tolerant person was born, or anything like that.

4) Pointing out when exactly this happened requires extra considerations. But assuming this is done, it follows that

a) there can be two very similar organisms, yet one of them is an observer and another isn't;

b) namely every organism down from this division line is a thing, and every one up is an observer.

Did I mess something up?

[Assistant]
I deny the first premise in that we can't confidently exclude the middle.

Consciousness could be like a heap of sand, with each new capability or opportunity for capacity building upon the rest (ala grains of sand) with no clear division between what does or doesn't count as being subjective and/or being an observer.  This is *not* the panpsychist claim that every grain of sand is conscious, but rather a claim that consciousness analogous to the pile itself; maybe the fundamental parts of the universe are definitely unconscious and certain patterns are definitely conscious, and there is no clear demarcation between them.

For a crude example, is a video camera conscious?  Most people would say no.  But it surely does something *like* observing.  And there must be *something* like what it is to be a video camera, because there *are* video cameras; therefore, a video camera has something *like* subjectivity.  On the one hand, it seems a quite stretch to say it is a subjective observer; but on the other hand, it isn't something we can rule out either.  Maybe that's not because we haven't defined "subjective" and "observer" well enough, but merely because there is no clear, ontological division in the first place.

Consciousness could be an inherently fuzzy quality of being.


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

[User]
[Frankenstein] Couldn't the monster have just worn a mask?

I'm talking the original novel version here, the superhuman, highly intelligent one. Was there something disturbing about its entire body, or just its face?

Even if its entire body looked *off* and uncanney valley-ish, a full body suit/cloak and a mask should surely still work, and avoid the whole "everybody gets instantly revolted just by looking at him issue."

He could claim he was born with a facial deformity, or was badly injured, explaining the desire to cover most of himself up. As long as nobody saw that he was *definitely* not human, he should have had at least a chance at interacting with people.

[Assistant] IIRC his skin was translucent yellow and he was unnaturally large. He was very obviously not normal even if he were to wear a mask and people would treat him differently just for his general abnormality alone. This was the 19th Century, too: people with physical deformities weren't treated the same as normal people then. Just look at the story of the Elephant Man. If he claimed something like that then people would just try to send him off to a freakshow.


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

[User]
CMV: The US minimum wage should not be raised to $15/hour.

So maybe an economists or someone can help me see the logic behind $15 minimum wage. I understand that the current min. wage is not enough to live on. I get that, but if you raise the min. wage then you greatly increase inflation and in a few years we'll be paying $8 for a gallon of milk etc.
Most of the time min. wage is for unskilled labor that by definition almost anyone can do. I am not hating against the min. wage workers, but McDonald's could replace cashier jobs with machines if wages became that much.
I know we have a low min. wage, but at least we don't pay 22% sales tax (like Italy). They pay over $6 a gallon for gas there as well. Someone please help me understand this argument in a way that takes massive inflation into account. Thank you!

[Assistant]
Places that have raised the min wage saw a small increase in inflation, but it was far less than the amount that min wage was raised.

The cost to produce milk didn't go up. If milk got too high people would simply stop buying it. And then those prices would have to fall to find people willing to buy.

Min. wage really hasn't kept up with the state of inflation.


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

[User] [Idiocracy] Is "Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho" what his parents named him, or did the porn superstar, professional wrestling champion, and President of the United States add anything in some kind of marketing scheme?

[Assistant] I just want to understand the drink scene in that universe. Obviously Brawndo has won the hearts and minds of the people with its electrolyte advantage, so how can Mountain Dew, an electrolyte-poor soda, afford to endorse the President?


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

[User] When the federal government is in running a budget deficit and needs to borrow from the federal reserve, can the federal reserve refuse to give them a loan?

[Assistant]
Federal government budget deficits are not financed by the Federal Reserve. They are financed by issuing Treasury bills. Whether they can issue these bills is determined by the interest rate the market is willing to pay them (as determined by an auction).

The Fed is a buyer/seller in the short term T bill market in order to set the Federal Funds Rate, since these rates move in tandem.

During QE, the Fed is a participant in the market for long term T-bills.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are some people more intelligent than others? Why don't our brains all have the same capability to absorb and use information?

[Assistant]
The capacity to absorb and use information would be determined genetically, and different people have different genes. Furthermore, regardless of theoretical capacity, the actual growth of your brain is greatly affected by diet and nutrition (especially early on). Lastly, your capacity for absorbing and using information is useless if you aren't exposed to information in the first place.

In short, your actual intelligence is a combination of internal and external factors, both of which can vary greatly from person to person.


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

[User]
How does any photon reach exactly the energy needed to excite a particular atom?

I know that quantum mechanics states  that some things, like bumping an electron to a higher energy level,  requires something like a photon to have juuuuust the right energy for  the electron to 'accept' that photon and then rise to the higher energy  level.

But it is always explained  that it has to be exact. Like, EXACT exact. It must be, let's say,  10,854.7952 electron volts, which corresponds to a frequency of  12.795832 GHz (ignore the actual values, I just pulled some numbers out  of my head). It is always explained that if it were even slightly higher  or lower than that amount of energy, the electron wouldn't be excited  by it.

Well, what are the odds  that a photon with that very very VERY exact energy level would come  passing by in any reasonable amount of time? I know photons are a tiny  amount of energy and there are a huge number of them all the time, but  still, it seems like such a precise requirement would be very  restrictive, and would result in almost no interactions between  particles and the EM force.

It seems like all my assumptions can't be right here. What am I missing?

[Assistant]
There's a relationship between the uncertainty in the energy of an excited state and the lifetime of that state. This creates the "natural linewidth" of a spectral line. The fundamental broadening of a spectroscopic line that cannot be narrowed by any sort of improved spectrometer design because it's just due to the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.

In essence the shorter the lifetime of a state, the less precise the energy of that state. But no matter what there is always some fundamental breadth to the energy spectrum.


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

[User] ELI5: Why are all the windows on planes a specific oval shape, is there a reason?

[Assistant] Imagine you make a little tear on the edge of a piece of paper. If you then try to pull apart the opposite ends, the tear will easily get bigger, rather than any new tears forming. This is called 'crack propagation', and is similar to what happens when very high stresses -- such as those found within the fuselage of a plane -- are put on the corners of metal windows. In short, all the stress is focused on the single point of the corner of the window, and rounding them out distributes the stress a little more evenly throughout the frame of the window. It actually took a few crashes for people to figure out how important this was, iirc.


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

[User]
[Muppets] Do The Muppet Show and the various Muppet movies take place in the same universe as Sesame Street, or are the concepts of Sesame Street and The Muppet Show sister-AUs to each other?

Ordinarily I would never bother to ask this question and assume "same world, no further questions" because of the obvious similarities (humans living and working alongside Muppets as a normal state of things), but for one anomaly: Kermit the Frog is present in both, with different jobs. In The Muppet Show, he's in showbiz - theater, movies, comedy. It's established in The Muppet Movie that this is where he began his career, after leaving the swamp: putting together the troupe we know as The Muppets. Big Bird also appears briefly in The Muppet Movie, but there's no disconnect with him; he states outright that he's looking to get into television specifically, which fits with his later stardom on Sesame Street before he passed the torch to Elmo. However, Kermit *also* appears on Sesame Street, as a TV news field reporter: still involved in the broadcasting industry, but not in the field of entertainment as such.

So what's the deal here? Is Kermit, the de-facto troupe leader on The Muppet Show, moonlighting as a news reporter? He's overworked as it is managing his colleagues; this seems unlikely. Is Sesame Street set in a world where Kermit went into reporting instead of entertainment? Or is Sesame Street set later than The Muppet Show, and the making of all the Muppet movies, and the Kermit we see there has retired from that role to pursue something else?

[Assistant]
I feel that as unlikely as it may seem, the idea that Kermit spent some time doing additional work for Sesame Street as an occasional guest star, while away from the Muppet Theatre makes the most sense. There are plenty of actors who will find the time to do occasional guest appearances outside of their full-time gigs, and Kermit is a nice enough guy to do this for children's educational programming.

Likewise, many of the performers who do Sesame Street have visited the Muppet Theatre on occasion. Big Bird was a guest star on episode 318 of the Muppet Show, and mentioned how he knew Kermit from Sesame Street, while Miss Piggy displayed disdain for that "cute little children's show with puppets."