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

[User]
eli5: How did fuel injected engines work before we would have had computers to control them?

how did an engine without a carburetor exist as early as the 1950s when modern fuel injected engines cant really function without being computer controlled? And why would we still use carburetors for so long after fuel injection already existed?

[Assistant]
Modern fuel injection engines use the computer to fine-tune the fuel air mix, generally to maximize fuel efficiency but they have power curves built into them and all sorts of tweaks.

That's not necessary for fuel injection to work, though. It can just open the injector for a set period of a revolution and call it good.  Older injection models worked like that just fine, using analog sensors on the cam and crank shafts to monitor timing. Later versions could even take into account the throttle position with a simple relationship rather than an actual computer calculation.  Modern technology could do that as well, but they're not set up to.  You can't adjust the injection timing well that way, and it's just all around inferior to the modern EFI setups in terms of both power and efficiency.

As to continuing to use carburetors:  They're cheap, simple, and could dump a metric fuckton of fuel if you had a big motor you were trying to feed at WOT. early injection systems could be a bit quirky, and it could be problematic to get them to deliver the right amount of fuel across a wide RPM band, particularly in larger, thirstier engines.  You also got intake injection systems that served as a sort of in-between, with one or two injectors sitting where an older carburetor would to get good atomization, but without the complexity of an injector per cylinder setup.


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

[User]
[DC Comics] How is Batman able to conceal himself from Superman's senses?

In various comics, Batman is somehow able to hide from Superman. He's a master of stealth, sure, but how can he hide from someone with such extreme senses that he can distinguish people's heartbeats, hear in space, see the heat left behind by footprints? And that's just a few examples of his abilities. Is Batman using some sort of magic to conceal himself?

[Assistant]
I can't remember the comic run, i'm afraid, but there was one where Batman sneaks up on Superman. When Superman confirms he genuinely hadn't notices Bruce and wasn't just playing along, Batman's response was "good, the device works".

So yes, he's using nebulous super-tech to keep himself hidden.


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

[User] ELI5: After a Police Chase, is the criminal given a traffic violation for every road rule he breaks? ie running stop signs, failure to signal, etc.

[Assistant]
yes.  but usually the violation "fleeing from police" gets the high priority as well as "reckless endangerment"   possible "use of motor vehicle as weapon"

those get much more than running stop sign.


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

[User] ELI5 Why are we not supposed to use phone cleaning apps?

[Assistant]
For one, Android uses an SD card for file storage rather than a traditional hard drive. SD cards are a type of flash memory  similar to solid state drives  and dont need to be defragmented. In fact, one of the downsides to flash memory is a limited number of times that data can be written to the card before it expires. By defragmenting an SD card, you can decrease its lifespan.

When you clear apps from RAM, Android is just going to load them into RAM again the next time it needs to access those apps (for notifications, updates, and other background details). This is actually slower for you since SD cards are slower than RAM.

And in the case of automatic task killers, you end up having to sacrifice some of your RAM and CPU to the task killer app itself, which is always running and monitoring for opportunities when tasks should be killed. This can be a big drain on battery life  and you arent getting anything useful in return!


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

[User] ELI5: Why do squirrels stop seconds after running and continue running and repeat that same process over and over again?

[Assistant]
It's a behavioral thing that allows them to evade one of the senses available to predators. They move in quick bursts and stop so that they can observe the world around them. In nature this means they are looking for all forms of threats as well as possible food sources. The reason for the quick bursts and stopping is because if they move quickly, they get a certain distance that would juuuuust trigger a predator's "is there something" visual response and then bam stop so that the predator's eyes and brain can't get past that to the "what is it" identification path. This is a purely visual evasion, but it can also sort of evade auditory detection in being that their movements can be considered arrhythmic. Things like owls aren't really confused by that stuff as they are also keenly adapted to spot even that change.

It not only serves as a visual evasion technique, but it also allows them to travel distances pretty efficiently while being on the lookout for both food and predators.


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

[User] [The Legend of Drizzt] How did being raised in the incredibly cruel and abusive matriarchy of the Drow not give Drizzt huge issues with women?

[Assistant] Drizzt is like the living embodiment of a good person archetype. But in all seriousness he grew up being taught the Drow way and never believing it to be the only way. So his own philosophy guided him: the Drow did things their way but it wouldnt be his way. So when he left the Underdark he chose to embody hope that anyone and everyone could A) be brought back to being good and B) that until proven otherwise peoples he met were deserving of respect.


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

[User] [Star Wars] What does an average day in the life of Darth Vader look like?

[Assistant]
Vader does his best to keep busy, particularly early on in his career when there were still a sizable number of Jedi survivors running around and the empire hadn't yet solidified it's control over the Galaxy at large. He split his time between missions, doing the prep-work for missions, training the inquisitors, and attempting dark-side fuckery to try and bring Padme back to life. He threw himself into his work because the alternative was to give himself time to reflect on the course of his life, which was a big no-no on all counts.

Right before the rebellion kicked off in earnest, Vader was fairly bored; he'd worked through all the major threats and now spent a lot of his time basically doing nothing but waiting from an order from on high and meditating. This is part of why he took those rebels apart with such flourish in Rogue One; he was going stir crazy and was taking every opportunity he could to get out of the lava-house and *do* something.

Once the rebellion was in full swing, it was a repeat of the obsessive, never stop working phase, except now he was working towards crushing the rebellion, recruiting his son and overthrowing the Emperor.


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

[User]
What do you think of the tenure track system in the Netherlands?

Hello good people!

I have a few question on the tenure track system in the Netherlands, in general and regarding the new reform.

1. What do you think in general about the tenure track system in the Netherlands?
2. Would you consider it a real tenure? Like, does it give you a job for life?
3. What do you think about the new tenure track system that was adopted very recently (tenure after 18 months and promotion to Assistant professor 1 after 4 years roughly)? About the fact that you don't necessarily get an associate professor position in the long term?
4. The pay scale for professors there is super straightforward but very much lower than what you'd get in North America. Does the work life balance and tenure after 18 months make it worth it?

Curious to know what you all think.

[Assistant]
>The pay scale for professors there is super straightforward but very much lower than what you'd get in North America. Does the work life balance and tenure after 18 months make it worth it?

This is pretty much impossible to compare. Work-life balance isn't the major issue, it is the cost of living long-term. When you don't have to save up for your future children's college, you don't have to pay for health care, child care is heavily subsidized, etc. x 100, the math regarding wages is something else.

Also, it depends on how long you plan to stay. 1 year, country A. 5 years, country B, for life, country C.

One way of looking at it is like this: Are the two countries comparably equally wealthy? If so, where do tenured Professors place as percentile of national incomes? If they are about the same, the pay is likely comparable.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Why didn't any Jedi bother learning force lightning or some variation of it during the Clone Wars?

Fighting armies of droids, that would seem to be pretty useful. And in KOTOR/KOTOR II, there were non darkside abilities to disable and destroy droids with force lightning, so why didn't the Jedi even try doing that?

[Assistant]
Force lightning is hatred made manifest. You project your hatred as a weapon to destroy your enemy. That isn't just philosophy, either; it's the mental state you need to be in to generate lightning. Rather unbecoming for a Jedi.

In Legends there are versions of lightning that don't require diving face first into the dark side, but during the Clone Wars specifically its use was forbidden by the Council.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is AC better than DC ?

[Assistant]
The main benefit is that you can easily change voltages/amps with AC using a transformer.

Voltage and Current have inverse relationship, but power used/lost depends mostly on current, so being able to transport it as a very high voltage, and very low current means you can use much smaller wires, which cost a LOT less when your talking about miles and miles.  Then substations you transform it to medium voltage, then low voltage at all your houses, and businesses etc.

With DC switching between voltages takes much more complex equipment thats more likely to fail, AC only takes some wires rapped around a bar of iron, so its relatively cheap, and unlikely to fail.

Source EE working in power distribution.


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

[User]
What specific effects does radiation have on your body?

With the scare of radiation leaks in Japan, I realized I don't know how/why radiation is harmful to the human body - I just know that it is.

[Assistant]
Dangerous radiation is the kind that ionizes.  "Ionizing radiation" just means that it is capable of separating electrons from their atoms.  The direct consequence of radiation exposure is that you are left with several free electrons and several ionized atoms.

These charged particles are chemically reactive.  You see an increased amount of free radicals along the particle's path.  These are very reactive chemicals like H3O, H2O2, etc.  If these free radicals happen to be close to a DNA molecule, they may react with the DNA backbone and break it.

If this break isn't repaired, several things can happen.  First, the cell could be non-functional, and die.  Second, it could be unable to divide, also causing it to die.  These two effects are relatively benign at low levels of exposure, but at very high doses can have macroscopic effects on biological systems.  For instance, your bone marrow could be destroyed, and you can no longer produce blood cells.  Or the lining of your small intestine becomes so damaged that you cannot absorb nutrients.  Both of these effects take a LOT of radiation.

The final effect is mutations.  Your DNA could be changed in such a way as to allow the cell to continue living, but with slightly altered function.  This change in function is passed to that cells progeny.  If enough specific functional changes accumulate in a cell, it can become cancerous.


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

[User] So much happens in the body during regular sleep. Is there anything going on during a 20-minute nap?

[Assistant]
If you are really tired, you immediately drop down into REM sleep in a nap.

This biological functionality can be (ab)used to do something called polyphasic sleep. You can subsist for long times on four 30 minute naps / six 20 minute naps spaced out evenly during the day.

However, secondary functionality like muscle recovery is hampered by this.


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

[User] ELI5: Why can humans close their eyes and mouths but not their ears and noses?

[Assistant]
In the sense of evolution, to be straightforward, there is no reason to close your ears or noses.

Eyes need to be closed to keep them lubricated.

The mouth needs to be closed because of how the jaw operates.


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

[User] ELI5: Whats the significance of weighted keys on a piano?

[Assistant]
There is no such thing as weighted keys on a 'piano' . Piano keys are just keys. If you're referring to weighted keyboard keys.. then they are weighted to simulate the resistance of an actual, analog, piano .

Why simulate piano key weight? Because if you learn on a keyboard then attempt to play a piano you're going to suffer in music quality and fatigue.

This is why people should learn guitar on accustic rather than electric, to build up hand strength and fine motor memory.


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

[User]
[Zombies] How do zombies decide when to stop eating a corpse?

Why don't they eat the person down to the bone? You see a lot of zombies with seemingly just a chunk missing out of their face or arm. Or maybe you just flat out see a zombie stop consuming after a few bites. What's the deal?

[Assistant] It depends on the lore. Sometimes, it's because they have some sort of hardwired instinct to leave enough meat for the corpse to be a functional zombie. Sometimes, it's because their dark master commands them to stop. Other times, they only go after fresh meat, so after they've been eating it for a little bit, it's not fresh any more and they have to find something else to eat. Sometimes they can sense the moment when the person zombifies and won't eat a fellow zombie. And sometimes, they'll keep eating until the new zombie stands up and shambles away.


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

[User]
[Ghostbusters/IT] The Ghostbusters (1984) are called to Derry to investigate a mysterious surge of children winding up either missing or dead. How do the boys in grey fare against Pennywise?

Could proton streams affect IT? Capturing the clown isn't possible, since it's a solid manifestation. This is my first post on this subreddit, just so you know. What do you think?

EDIT: What if they somehow crossed the streams into IT's Deadlights?

[Assistant] Theres a reason IT sticks in Derry and targets children the majority of the time, its because in terms of power in the supernatural/cosmic beings IT is the bottom of the barrel. Ghost busters would have it easy finding IT in a such a small town compared to a city and they wouldnt even need their weapons they dealt with monsters like this before all it would take is a strong will. Even if they did use their weapons it would work since it was shown that a gun didnt even need to be loaded damage IT you just need to believe that the item you have will hurt IT. And you dont have to kill him just force it to hibernate and give you many years to study and learn to destroy it.


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

[User]
[Mad Max] Aside from the first road warrior it appears all settlements are in the middle of nowhere. Barter town looks like a parking lot in the desert, why are there not more people living in pre fall towns or making use of pre fall infrastructure?

I would be curious as to what a large city looks like in mad max but I cant wrap my head around why its easier to build barter town instead of make use of Perth Stadium or some such,.

[Assistant]
Mostly because in the days of the collapse and the late Resource Wars, the best success stories were the early adoptors. The people who bailed on the cities while the bailing was still good, and staked a claim out in the boonies. Immortan Joe is the best example of this; having seen the writing on the wall in his role in the Australian Army, he went AWOL before the collapse fully happened with a crew of people he trusted, and established what would become Gastown, the Bullet Farm, and the Citadel as their own private nation.

Further, most of the cities would have gone down kicking and screaming in those early days, being reduced to warzones as the remaining populations who didn't F off while the Fing was good find themselves trapped with insufficient resources to escape or survive. Then, once that's all over but the crying, those that escaped are going to be looking back to the corpses of the old world cities as a target for salvage or pillage; anything that could be identified on an old-world map is a target. Between the stay-behinds who butchered each other over the last can of beans and the new-born tyrants ripping up the place, most of the cities are hellholes unworthy of occupation...

At least for a few years. As the epilog of Beyond Thunderdome demonstrates, once things cool off in the cities after a while people could make a decent run at re-colonizing them, and build a new life among the bones of the old world. Of course, by that time the players like Auntie have their own little realms which they would hesitate to abandon, leaving it to new players like Walker's kids to break that new ground.


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

[User]
CMV: Recreational Drugs are fine for responsible people

I believe it's completely acceptable for responsible people to do recreational drugs as long as it doesn't affect their lives negatively. For example I am a junior at a prestigious university, I get straight A's, workout and meditate daily, volunteer once a week, eat healthy, and have amazing relationships with my family, friends, and girlfriend. In my situation I see no problem doing recreational drugs such as alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, Xanax, LSD, and mushrooms. I understand the effects the drugs have on my body and mind both in the short and long term and take the appropriate actions to stay healthy and get all my responsibilities taken care of.   I believe in moderation doing recreational drugs is acceptable and enhances my life. I also believe responsible adults should not be judged or looked down upon in society because they choose to do drugs. I would love to hear everyone's feedback on this, thank you!

[Assistant] The problem is that "responsible" is an arbitrary term that is impossible to define. There are plenty of people that exhibited the traits that you do(Straight A's, work out, volunteer etc) and still fell to a cocaine addiction.


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

[User]
[Star Trek: TNG] Why does Data appear to gain weight over the course of the series?

Many members of the Enterprise crew appear to become a bit more....rotund after the first season. That's of course understandable with humans, betazoids, and klingons, but the android also appears to have more "meat" on his bones even though he his not made of meat.

[Assistant]
The experience of looking into the mirror in horror is an important one in Data's journey towards humanity.

He probably arranged to expand his frame to better grasp the human experience of Will Riker.


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

[User]
[Interstellar] Why couldnt they just build green houses on earth?

In the movie it seems like the main reason they need to escape earth are those storms that destroy crops. But the storms dont seem like they take out buildings, whats stopping humanity from just building a series of greenhouses to get our food that way?

[Assistant] The storms are the symptom, not the disease. The blight is what's killing everything. Small greenhouses would work, but you would need absolutely massive greenhouses with advanced sterilization procedures to grow food for the entire world.


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

[User]
ELI5: Safely eject USB key feature on desktops.

How does it work?

[Assistant] In the days of yore, USB drives were slow. So if you needed to work on a file on a usb, the file manager would do a little trick. When you hit save, it would save that file to RAM really quickly so you could get working again quickly instead of waiting 30s for a file to save. Then while you were working, it'd slowly transfer that data to the USB drive in the background. If you pulled out the USB while that background transfer was happening, you'd end up with a corrupt file. Safely Ejecting basically makes sure that all the data transfers are done before it says it's safe. It's not as much of an issue now that USB 3.0 is the norm; larger files never went through this background process, and smaller files take almost no time to finish.


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

[User]
Am I getting unpaid for this?

Hi all, I recently started working for a company as a paid Apprentice doing Full stack development. I'm about 6 months in so far and the experience has been so so. Recently, I finished adding a new feature. However, during the testing phase I found some bugs and need to spend some extra time to fix them. The weird thing is, I was told that this would be unpaid time, as there are no allotted hours left for this issue.

Is this sort of thing normal? Or is it bs?

[Assistant] Yeah, thats bs. You need to tell them that if theyre unwilling to pay you, youre unwilling to fix the bugs. Finding bugs during testing is a completely normal part of the software development process. No one codes applications perfectly the first time around.


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

[User]
[40K] Could the Eldar 'fix' the Emperor's Door to the Webway?

It seems that the Door to the Webway beneath the Imperial Palace is constantly leaking, and one of the emperors 'jobs' is to make sure that it's all sealed so that Daemons don't swarm Holy Terra.

Could the Eldar, who are far better at manipulating webway portals, fix it? And make it sealed so thoroughly, that the emperor wouldn't have to pay attention to it anymore? Supposing he did, what would he use the otherwise-occupied psychic power for? Would sealing that webway gate cause any measurable effect on the Imperium as an entity?

[Assistant] No, most probably not. Eldar aren't that good with the Webway, they know how to build Webway gates and how to travel it, but thats all. The Webway was created by the Old Ones and since that antedeluvian era, no one, until that is, the Emperor, has been able to create a new portion of the Webway.


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

[User] ELI5: Why were bits the powers of 2 and not something like 10?

[Assistant]
The top comments explain what a bit is, but not why it is base 2, and not some other arbitrary number. In transistors, the power is either on or off. 1 or 0. In order to have a 3 bit or greater computing system, you would need to measure *how much* electrical charge the transistor holds, as opposed to whether or not it has a charge. While that in and of itself wouldnt be too difficult, as transistors degrade overtime, those partial electrical charges (that youd need to accurately measure to determine what value it holds), would become inaccurate. Its much easier to read on/off, than try and read partial electrical charges.

EDIT: as several comments have pointed out, it is not simply on or off, but low charge and high charge. Think of a full cup of water. It might not be 100% full to the brim, but you can still call it full. This is on.

Now dump out the water. There are still some drops and dribbles of water, however you can say for all intents and purposes that the cup is empty (off). Yes, theres still some charge in there, but for our purposes, we can call that empty.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why has there been a new 3D printer getting fully funded on kickstarter every month for the past 3 years?

Every time I get on Kickstarter, there's always a new 3D printer that's fully funded for several hundred thousand dollars, but doesn't look any different from previous printers.  This has been going on for years.  What are they doing that is any different from the dozens of other printers already out there?

[Assistant] There has yet to be a truly consumer friendly 3D printer on the market, they just need to much maintenance and calibration to remain useful.  People keep coming along thinking they can solve this problem, but no one has so far.


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

[User]
[Contact] Why was the project and machine decommissioned after the first use, especially when it was obvious to outside observers that some kind of new and unknown forces were at play based purely on what the outside observers were able to see.

I realise the outside observers didn't have the benefit of Elanor's full experience but from what we saw there was clearly *something* going on that would have at least warranted additional missions or at least a study into the cause of the externally visible effects of what the machine was causing.

[Assistant] In the movie they stated that the machine is completely inoperative. They can't get it to activate again to show them the light show. They have obviously been studying every structure to try to figure out what the components do, but ultimately it was made by human hands of mundane materials. Unless they can study whatever the hell it was doing again there's a slim chance of discovering any new physics.


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

[User] ELI5: Are humans still subject to natural selection? Will diseases like cancer or genetic diseases be less prevalent over a long time frame?

[Assistant] Natural selection is *always* a factor.  The selection factors may change, but do not go away. In every context, the "fittest" means something, though it can be quite different in meaning depending on environment.


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

[User]
What Does Sagittarius A* Look Like?

Suppose we were able to exist at a safe distance from Sagittarius A*.  Perhaps we are in Carl Sagan's Ship of the Imagination.  What would we see?  What about various distances?  Do the stars that orbit it move fast enough for us to see with the naked eye?  Is there visible matter surrounding it?  What would such a hole in space even look like?  How would it bend light and spaetime?  Etc... etc... etc...

I am an author writing a story about a man who has visions of Sagittarius A* and I want his visions to be accurate despite the fact that he is insane.

[Assistant]
Well - most things are really a matter of perspective, and it all depends on where you are when you're looking. The black hole itself isn't that far across, at least in cosmological terms. Estimates vary, but it might be as small as 24 million km across: on the range of a very large star, and within the orbit of Mercury.

The star closest to the black hole does move very quickly: up to 1% of the speed of light at periapsis! But periapsis is still 40 billion km away. It takes 11 years to complete an orbit, even though it's so fast, so it'd still take 5.5 years to cross half the sky. Probably too slow to watch.

However, there's some hope, because it's an elliptical orbit, and it's much faster as it gets in closer. Much better, but it'd still be almost three years per orbit, so too slow to watch. Most of the motion you see in the night sky is, after all, based on the Earth's rotation.

Of course, there are probably many objects in much closer than that star, and they could be moving at all sorts of speeds. So a smaller object might look like something zipping through the sky, like a satellite.

As far as those smaller objects go, though, we haven't been able to detect anything specific; it's below the resolution of our instruments.

But we do believe there to be a large cloud of gas and dust, superheated because of the black hole's pull. We're blocked from detecting this in visible light, but there's evidence it's extremely bright. So your observer might not be able to be too close, if he's still able to see at all.


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

[User]
Why does water evaporate even when it is at room temperature?

I have always been taught that water evaporates at 100 degrees Celsius.Yet when one leaves a cup of water for a few days, it will evaporate, why is this? Excuse me if this has been asked before.

[Assistant]
>that water evaporates at 100 degrees Celsius

No, water *boils* at 100 degrees C.

The temperature of a material is the *average* thermal energy of the particles in that material. In liquid water, while the *average* temperature is at room temperature, *some* particles are hot enough to break out of the intermolecular bonds keeping them in the liquid, while others are *less* than average and remain inside.

At boiling temperatures, most of the particles begin to escape, rapidly.


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

[User]
ELI5: What do the blood pressure numbers mean and how do they relate to each other?

Basically, I've always been really healthy, went to the doctor, got my BP (104/68) and was told it's really healthy.

Then I said (to my Mom, an RN) "would it be better to be 104/80 or 104/60" and she just looked at me like I was crazy, then told me 104/60. Then I said, "but would it be better to be 100/72 or 104/68?" And she was just done with me at that point and I just don't understand what these numbers mean and the internet is too advanced for me.

[Assistant]
The top number is referred to as the systolic blood pressure, and the number is a measure of the pressure of blood against the walls of your arteries as your ventricles (lower two chambers of the heart) push blood throughout the body.

The bottom number is referred to as the diastolic blood pressure, and the number is a measure of the pressure of blood against the walls of your arteries as your heart relaxes and the ventricles fill with blood. This is also the period where the heart relaxes in between heart beats.

Generally speaking, a systolic pressure higher than 120 is a problem, whereas a diastolic pressure higher than 80 is a problem. So there isn't really an issue if you are below those values except if they get too low (such as 90/60 or below).


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

[User] Do fish get the bends when they're fished?

[Assistant]
No, but they do get a serious case of the deadsies.

If you are fishing shallow water fish it isn't a problem since the nitrogen bubbles in their blood don't expand by any significant amount. If you are deep water fishing then they can get the bends, but the pressure change is more likely to explode their eyeballs and air bladders first, so the bends will be the least of their problems.


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

[User] ELI5: How come the government was able to ban marijuana with a simple federal law, but banning alcohol required a constitutional amendment?

[Assistant]
At the time of the Eighteenth Amendment, Congress understood that the Interstate Commerce clause did not permit Congress to regulate commerce occuring within a single state. Hence, an amendment to the Constitution was required to abolish it.

Later, with Wickard v. Filburn along with other cases, the Supreme Court effectively wrote the "interstate" part of the clause out, arguing instead that Congress could regulate activity which merely *affected* interstate commerce.

As a result, marijuana regulation and other regulations are now allowed by courts, even if they only impact activity within a single state.


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

[User]
[shazam] did billy commit all 7 sins while playing arround with his powers?

like going to a strip club (lust), stealing money from am atm (greed) , being cocky and smashing the bullies car (wrath)

[Assistant]
So, to break it down:

Pride: let his new powers go to his head and started treating his foster brother like a dead weight.

Greed: tries to get people to pay him for superheroics.

Wrath: uses his powers to retaliate against his bullies.

Envy: craves a normal family life, to the point of being willing to commit crimes and abandon responsibilities to pursue his birth mother.

Lust: uses his Captain Marvel form to get into a strip club, but...

Gluttony: ...gets distracted by chicken wings.

Sloth: treats his powers like an "I win" button, leaving him entirely unprepared for when Doctor Sivana shows up.

So, that's 7 for 7.


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

[User]
[Wh40k/star trek] The Borg meet the adaptus merchanicus. How do the merchanicus react?

This is inspired by a silly comment chain about drones with inbuilt radiators, which seems right up the mechanicus street.

[Assistant]
>The alien mechanism is a perversion of the true path.

So purged with extreme prejudice. If they only meet human drones, they are declared tech-heretics and purged.

Some more ambitious adepts might try the rite of reverse engineering on whatever survives their engagements.


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

[User] Why is it that I can gain 1lbs a day by over eating and eating junk food, but can't lose 1lbs a day by restricting my diet and eating healthier foods?

[Assistant]
A pound of body fat equates to approximately 3500 calories.

Since a "recommended diet" is 2000 calories. It's not incredibly difficult to eat 5500 calories although people rarely gain a pound a day.  On the other hand, eating -1500 calories might prove more difficult.


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

[User]
Are there any modern human populations that express a loss of a certain trait that was once common to all modern humans?

For example: Lactose tolerance evolved in certain populations but didn't in others. I'm wondering if the reverse is happening out there: Are there any populations of humans where a certain trait or process that was once common to all humans has either become vestigial or severely selected against (while still existing in the majority of the species)?

Are there potentially isolated populations that are no longer producing certain hormones or lack a bodily function that their descendants had and all other humans still have?

[Assistant]
Well, white people and blond people have lost a whole lot of pigmentation.

Vitamin C synthesis was also apparently lost fairly recently on an evolutionary timescale. IIRC there are even a few populations of humans who can still make their own vitamin C. (Dunno if it's known whether they never fully lost it or re-evolved the broken part of the pathway.)


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

[User] If the universe is expanding and everything is moving away from each other, why does Andromeda galaxy is heading towards our galaxy?

[Assistant]
The expansion of the universe is just an average large-scale trend - it doesn't totally stop things from interacting with each other and moving in different directions. The further things are apart from each other, the more space there is between them, which means the expansion of space has a bigger effect. The recession rate comes out to about 70 km/s per megaparsec of distance, where a megaparsec is a bit over 3 million light years.

Typically, galaxies can move at up to 100s of km/s relative to other nearby galaxies. So you really need the galaxies to be quite a few millions of light years away from each other before the expansion of the universe dominates over the normal "proper motion" of the galaxies. Andromeda is actually less than 3 million light years away, so it's quite normal for its "proper" motion to dominate over the expansion of the universe.


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

[User]
[Batman] Why is Gotham so...anachronistic?

I'm in Gotham right now, helping my sister move. Thank God, because I never liked her living here. Place is crazy.

But anyway, I'm from Meteropolis, and one thing I noticed is that Gotham seems to be sort of weird time wise. It's like a whole bunch of decades smooshed together.

Just yesterday I saw a guy driving an old car from the forties wearing a fedora, while talking on a smart phone.

50% percent of the TV's I see aren't in color.

There was a shootout on the news where this one guy was firing a tommy gun. A TOMMY GUN. In 2020!?

I could go on. It feels like I stepped into a weird alternate history or something. What's the deal?

(And what's with all these blimps?)

[Assistant]
Gotham is one of those old cities with old money. There is magic here as well if you know where to look. Some think Gotham is even a vampire haven, we have legends of a man-like-bat or bat-like-man that stretches back centuries. One thing is for sure, our historical society keeps strict guidelines on the restoration of historical buildings and has done so for a long time.

If you spend some time sightseeing the various styles of the buildings and how they change as you move location, you begin to see a picture of the growth of our city. Like tree ring's and fire scars on a tree stump, they tell the history of Gotham from earthquakes to fires, from the territories of old crime families to the industries of Gotham's wealthy elites. You can find bar's and club's with decor from the 20's all the way to the raves of the 90's. Gotham is proud of it's history and culture, and the old families make sure it is remembered, make sure that the accomplishments and age of their families are remembered.

As for the blimps, Gotham PD had a airforce before there were helicopters and while they occasionally decommission a blimp it is not really cost effective to replace them all with helicopters; especially with all the gargoyles around to act as tethering pylons.


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

[User] Is the distance of a light-year relative or absolute?

[Assistant]
Absolute. 1 light year is always the same distance.

However, due to Relativity, realize that any two objects can be completely different distances apart depending upon which reference frame you observe them from.

So if Bob and Charlie were traveling in two different spaceships, they might see Star A and Star B as being either 6 light years apart or 20 light years apart, however they WOULD both agree that a light year is exactly the same distance.


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

[User] ELI5 - How can a company be worth billions of dollars but have little to no revenue?

[Assistant]
The value of it's holdings is independent from the revenue it generates.

Let's use personal wealth as an example. Let's say you own a house and rent it out, using the rent as your only income. It is worth $1,000,000 and you are renting it out to a family for $3,000 a month. That's $36,000 a year in revenue, but your net worth is $1,000,000.

It is the same for companies. A company has a value independent of their actual true income, and this helps the company by allowing them collateral when they borrow money.


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

[User] ELI5: Do multivitamins and Omega-3 pills actually do anything? or is it more of a placebo-type thing?

[Assistant]
**TL;DR**: *Depends on whether you have a terrible diet or a good (or even average) diet. They only really help if you have a complete absence of some nutrients; you'll get enough to get by if you eat a variety of non-junk foods like most of us do.*

With a terrible diet, such as if you're a senior citizen that can't cook and eats very small portions or you live off of low-end ramen noodles or something, you're simply missing out on a ton of nutrients, particularly vitamins but also protein and fibre.

Since you're not eating any greens or organ meats at all and stick to inexpensive pre-prepared foods with soft drinks on the side only, you're not going to get any Vitamin A, C or K, for example. The first is important for a lot of stuff like vision and immune system, the second helps keep your blood systems healthy, and the last is critical to avoid a condition known as scurvy (but doesn't actually do much else despite what the marketers tell you).

(Omega-3's are needed in there too, but it's kind of overstated as to how much they help unless you have cardiovascular issues. Bad if you don't eat any fish at all ever, usually okay otherwise if you get a trace of 'em from that Tuna Helper casserole or have anchovies on that pizza.)

And there's lots of similar vitamins that can be missed if you go the other route and stay completely uniformly vegan too.

So if you have a really shitty diet, that once-per-day vitamin pill gives you SOME of those vitamins when otherwise you don't get any at all. That's good and helpful...

...but most people don't need them if they have a mixed salad once in a while or eat "fortified" foods which have them added. In that case, they get arguably limited value out of multivitamins.


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

[User]
[Star Trek] How much does Starfleet know about the multiverse?

Not the Mirror Verses (I insist that there's multiple) or Yesterday's Enterprise style time travel, but the myriad universes like from Worf's day in TNG's *Parallels*. Has anything been referenced in alpha or beta canon?

[Assistant] TNG's *Parallels* is alpha canon itself. Worf most likely made a full report when he returned to the Enterprise. The viability of it all would have been verified by Data, and it was no doubt sent back to Starfleet where some department or group investigated the full implications.


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

[User] ELI5: Why can most things in the body be transplanted, except the eyes?

[Assistant]
Whole eyes are really tricky to transplant for a few reasons:

1. The retina dies in only 2-4 hours without a blood supply. The donor and recipient would have to be right by each other.

2. The retina is part of the brain, so if a donor is brain dead, the eye would be dead too. You have to harvest the eye right after the donor's heart stops.

3. You have to connect the optic nerve, which has 1.3 million individual nerves that need to link up.

4. You need to suppress the immune system so it doesn't recognize the new eye as a foreign and attack it. (Although this isn't as bad as for other organs since the eye is generally protected from the immune system.)

Actually this stuff isn't that far off. Researchers have already transplanted eyes in mice who survived for 200 days. But they aren't sure how much vision those mice had restored. Still, even 30% vision restored gives people independence and is better than complete blindness.


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

[User] Andromeda is the closest galaxy to the Milky Way but is the Milky Way the closest galaxy to Andromeda?

[Assistant]
The Local Group basically consists of two large galaxies - the Milky Way and Andromeda - each with their own systems of dwarf galaxies orbiting around them. There are also a few other small galaxies floating around. Then there's quite a lot of open space around the Local Group with very few "field" galaxies, until you reach other groups and clusters.

So the Milky Way and Andromeda are the closest *large* galaxies to each other. But for each galaxy, the closest galaxy *of any mass* would be one of the small satellite galaxies. Some of these satellite dwarf galaxies are even merging with the more massive host galaxies.


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

[User]
[Lord of the Rings] Why on middle earth did the Gondorians build a tower in "The Spider's Cleft?"

We know Shelob was there before the tower was built. So - why build there at all? Wouldn't the presence of a monstrous spider be sort of a reason to locate the tower somewhere else?

[Assistant] The tower was built after the Last Alliance of Elves and Men defeated Sauron. It was meant to stop servants of Sauron from crossing the border there, both to protect Ithilien from attack and to prevent Sauron's servants from returning to Mordor.


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

[User] [Treasure Planet] Why did captain Amelia not have her own crew?

[Assistant] All you need to be a captain is the proper license. You don't need to maintain your own crew full time, by any means. Hell, she might not have had her own ship, come to that, they hired her to captain one they commissioned.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is it recommended to guess the same letter when running out of time during a multiple choice test?

I guess I can sort of see why this method works, but I can't explain it, which makes me wonder if there are actual statistics and mathematics to prove how. Besides this method being faster than randomly guessing for each answer, supposedly this method *should* result in a higher percentage of correct answers. My intuition agrees, but when I think about it, wouldn't every guess on a question have an equal 25% chance of being correct? Can someone please prove or disprove this and explain why?

[Assistant]
On a twenty question test, suppose you've answered 16 of the questions the best you can, but have no clue on the last four--you can't eliminate a *single* answer.

For each individual question, an answer has a 25% chance of being right, so if you pick B, 1/4 times you'll be correct. The formula for looking at multiple questions will be

  >  p(r) = nCr * p^r * q^(n-r)

where
>r=# of questions

>nCr=# needed correct (which can be 1, 2, 3, or 4), or n! / r!(n-r)!

>p is probability of getting an answer correct, .25

>q is probability of getting an answer incorrect, .75

So the probability of getting **all four** correct is 0.00390625 - or, low. The probability of getting **one or more** right is 0.68359375, or, pretty good. The likelihood of getting all four answers wrong is (3/4)^4 = 0.31640625 (alternatively, 1-0.68359375)

Looking at the specifics of your question, it comes from most tests not being truly random. A handwritten test with human selected answers will not be random, which is where things like 'guess C always' come from.

A computer generated test will be random, and because each question is independent from another, it doesn't really matter what answer you pick.


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

[User]
Why can't you refuel while the engine is running?

I know this 'rule' in the context of cars, but I assume also true for airplanes and boats. Why is this the case? Its not like refuelling opens the combustion chamber... And if fumes are the ones in danger to ignite, couldn't that happen from the petrol in the tank anyway? Excuse my poor knowledge of internal combustion engines !

Edit: Thanks for all the answers. To simplify, I will make a clarification before going to sleep; for a car in a gas station, what would cause ignition? The electrical wiring? The buildup of static charge? The heat in the engine components? Or the engine's combusting? ... For a brand new car what would be the main danger, and how has this changed over the years i.e. by using different materials / engine design?

[Assistant] Generally there is no issue with refueling on modern cars while it is running. The only issue is the EVAP system can test while you are refueling. The EVAP system monitors and controls the capture and burning of fuel vapors in the tank. Gasoline is always creating vapors and those vapors are stored and burned when the engine is running under certain conditions. This system is also why you should not top off as liquid fuel can damage the components. The test is to verify the system is sealed so no vapors are leaking into the atmosphere. If it runs while you are refueling it will set a code and turn your check engine light on. Then you have to go get it cleared if you know that is what caused it or pay to have someone try to diagnose a ghost concern.


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

[User]
ELI5 - Why is it when a person puts their finger so back in their mouth they gag but when eating it triggers no gag reflex?

Do food move down your throat differently than just going down?

[Assistant]
When people are putting their fingers into the back on their mouth they are poking their uvula - its that thing that you can see hanging down in the back of your throat.  Anything that puts enough pressure on that will cause you to gag/puke.

When you swallow, the uvula gets pulled up so that its flush with the roof of your mouth.  This prevents the uvula from being stimulated.  You can feel this occurring - if you just swallow some saliva concentrate on the rear part of your mouth.  You'll feel it kind of pull up and away from your throat - that's your uvula getting out of the way of anything that is coming down which prevents the gag reflex from activating while you're swallowing food.


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

[User]
[Starcraft] Do Ghost's hold a rank, do they receive promotions?

Nova's often named as the "best" Ghost the Terran Dominion currently has to offer but is there rank associated with that position or status within the Ghost program or is it purely ceremonial?

Are there ranks in the Ghost force similar to present-day Special Warfare Operators (SEALs in particular)? Can they receive promotions, awards, decorations?

[Assistant] Ghosts are assigned serial numbers when they're enrolled as children, and that is all they're ever expected to have, owing in large part to the standard-issue memory wipes introduced in the Ghost Initiative following Kerrigan's defection. Though they are *certainly* considered elite Special Forces, the nature of their duties all but ensures that their have a minuscule survival rate past a single mission, and Sarah Kerrigan is one of the few to ever really "earn" the rank of "veteran".


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

[User]
Is it possible to make an anti-matter atomic bomb?

So from what little I know about anti-matter, there are anti-protons anti-nuetrons, etc so would it be possible theoretically to make an atomic bomb using anti-matter and what would the explosion be like?

[Assistant] Yes although we don't have anything close to the technology to make that. If exploded in a vacuum it would look the same as a regular nuclear bomb, if it was in contact with regular matter than there'd be an intense burst of gamma radiation as it annihilates with regular matter.


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

[User]
CMV: We would be better off if our counting system was on base 12 instead of base 10

Basically, there would be 2 more numbers between 9 and 10. "10" would represent 2x6 of something.

Not arguing that we should change to this system now, it's way past that point. But there are a lot of basic math equations that would be easier if we had a base of 12.

* 12 has 6 ways to divide (1, 2, 3, 4, 6 and 12) instead 10's 4 (1, 2, 5 and 10). So instead of 1/3 being equal to 0.3333, it would be 0.4. A base of 12 is just "nicer" to work with in a lot of ways.

The only slight upside I can give to a base of 10 is that we have 10 fingers. This could make it easier for young kids to learn to count. My rebuttle to this is that: a) you wouldn't be changing the max number of things you can count on both hands, just when it goes into the next digit. b) if it's that much of an issue that "we need to be able to go into the next digit line on 2 hands," well then each digit on a finger (excluding thumb) has 3 sections. 4 fingers on each hand gives us the ability to count to 24 (what would be 20). We'd just need a way to indicate which section to stop counting at.

Again, not advocating a massive change in society as it totally wouldn't be worth the pain. But if we had a time machine and could go back and change how it started, I think it'd be for the better.

[Assistant]
The Babylonians used a base 60 system, which I'd argue is even better than base 12. It's thanks to them that we have 60 seconds to a minute and 60 minutes to an hour.

With base 60, you can easily divide by 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30.

Why don't we change?

Same reason why you typed this on a qwerty keyboard when dvorak is proven to be superior.


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

[User] ELI5: why are smart people more prone to depression?

[Assistant] Smart people, by nature, have more of a realization (or understanding if you will) of the world and how it works.  As well, smart people have a bigger ability to conceptualize things that might happen ("What if?"), and will see more inherent dangers of the world.  Then, as mentioned, there's a certain disconnect people have, mentally, when they can't interact with others socially on their own level.  Truly, the more knowledge and wisdom one has, the more sorrow and grief that comes with it.  Pair that with the realization of how truly vain the world is in so many ways (which comes with being "smart" after a while), and the depression and loneliness comes.  Simply for not "fitting in" as it were.


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

[User]
Given the geometry of a metal ring (donut shaped), does thermal expansion cause the inner diameter to increase or decrease in size?

I can't tell if the expansion of the material will cause the material to expand inward thereby reducing the inner diameter or expand outward thereby increasing it.

[Assistant]
They increase in size.  This is used to often for interference fitting of bearings and other rings.

The bearing is heated, expanding it, then it can be placed on a shaft that is larger than the inner diameter of the bearing.  As it cools it will be mated to the surface when it shrinks.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why I couldn't stand at a post office all day making money off the conversion rates?

Right now the  to $ is 1.57 and the $ to  is 0.64.

So if I have 500 and change to dollars I have $785 then if I change that back at 0.64 I would have 502.4? Why could I not just stand there making 2 pound every minute or so?

[Assistant]
It's not free to convert currency is the answer.

Also, there are people that do this all day.  They're call currency traders.  There is whole exchanges, software packages and trading desks setup just to trade funds.


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

[User] ELI5:Why do ads always buffer perfectly, when my video looks like it was hosted on a dinosaur?

[Assistant]
Two reasons. One is that the video provider gets paid for the ads and the video is just bait for users, but it goes deeper than that.

Remember that ads are targeted for certain markets. It doesn't make sense to run an advertisement for toothpaste in English to a viewer in Russia does it? Or for a product only a available in the UK to a viewer in Texas? Ads are therefore regional and kept in the servers in that region, so a lot of the time the data is closer. The ads are also shown to many users regardless of what they want to watch; the server may need to go fetch that particular cat video it couldn't predict you wanted to watch, but it has the ad right at hand because it played it to the last 20,000 viewers too.


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

[User]
[Overwatch] What does Roadhog's hogdrogen do to him in-universe? I think it's meant for radiation?

Also, side question: Since he named his entire character after hogs, why would he get pissed if people call him a pig, hog, etc?

[Assistant]
Its to combat radiation poisoning; when the Australian omnium was destroyed the nuclear fallout turned the Outback into a wasteland.

As for his anger, the dudes kind of insane.  The loss of his home, the poisoning, and years of murder contribute to that, but it could also be a case of when you have a good inside joke or story, then someone else tries to use it on you and it just seems wrong.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do all of the older people around me love Ronald Reagan so much? What was so special about him?

[Assistant]
America was dealing with the aftermath of the Viet Nam war (1975), the OPEC oil embargo (1973) quadrupling oil prices and leading the US into a recession, then a follow-on energy crisis caused by the revolution in Iran in 1979 that led to rationing. The Iranians (by proxy) overran the American embassy and took 52 hostages. They were held for 444 days, every day the nightly news would say we are in day xyz of the continuing hostage crisis. Inflation in double digits, unemployment too. The US President, Jimmy Carter, who had been elected in a giant backlash against the revelations of crime and malfeasance in the Nixon administration, proved to be unable to provide moral leadership. He appeared pessimistic. One major speech is called the "malaise" speech, if you care to look it up. In it he said that America faced a "crisis of confidence" that stuck at the very heart and soul of our national will.

Now along comes Ronald Reagan, the charismatic actor and Governor of California. He's cheerful. He can take a serious tone without appearing bookish or lost in a world of ideas. He has a positive vision for the future, for America and the world. He's realistic that there are challenges, but we can face them.

And what happens? A lot of those things got better. The hostages were released. The inflation and unemployment numbers improved. The energy crisis went away. The Russians faltered in their invasion of Afghanistan. Income taxes that reached as high as 70% under Carter were slashed and the economy was growing.

Was all that due to Reagan and his policies? Surely not. And there was a price to pay for some of it, such as massive expansion of the national debt. If you look in detail at much of the Reagan presidency, you will find much to criticize.

But what it felt like was like Spring after a long Winter. Something to look forward to instead of things falling apart. That's what people remember. The national mood really did change after a long, bleak time.


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

[User]
Universities and their Economics taste

What type of styles do different Graduate programs in the United States have for Economics?

[Assistant]
Define "taste."

Virtually all programs are nearly identical in the first year, requiring yearlong sequences in microeconomic theory (classic consumer and firm theory, general equilibrium, game theory, topics), macroeconomic theory (growth, business cycles, topics), and econometrics (probability, statistics, regression analysis, and topics). Sometimes the first year is augmented with a mathematics-for-economists class (mostly covering optimization and elementary mathematical analysis).

The second year is where heterogeneity becomes apparent, but all schools offer field courses in macroeconomics, applied econometrics, econometric theory, microeconomic theory, and applied microeconomics. Some schools focus more on one or two of those subfields than others.

Some departments have particular *specialties,* the most pronounced ones being

* Minnesota focuses heavily on macro
* CalTech focuses heavily on micro
* UC San Diego is unusually focused on econometrics
* Penn, Columbia and NYU are strong in macro
* Yale is very strong in econometrics
* ...but these are just examples. Learning department specialties is inevitably time-consuming.

If you're looking for "saltwater" and "freshwater" distinctions, those have been irrelevant for at least a decade.

If you're looking for department culture (collaborative/cutthroat...), then you're going to be hard-pressed to find information on the Internet. A lot of that info is "soft knowledge."


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

[User] [Hellsing] Why did Millennium need super-advanced technology to create vampires while Alucard just needed to drink blood to become a vampire?

[Assistant]
Alucard didn't just drink blood. He sold his soul, and drinking blood was just sealing the deal. Even then, it wasn't until after the Van Helsing family had extensively experemented on him that he became the weapon he is now.

Millennium, on the other hand, went about it more scientifically, basically engaging in the same experements the Van Helsings did, but with a less... Material to work with. They were trying to recreate Alucard based on a small sample.


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

[User]
Why collinearity reduces the accuracy of estimates of regression coefficient and causes standard error to grow?

The title is the question. It was mentioned in ISLR textbook. I am having difficult time in understanding that. Can anyone explain it?

[Assistant]
You can think of the regression coefficient as the unique contribution of the predictor (removing all of the stuff that the predictor has in common with other predictors). When two predictors are highly correlated, it means that they share a lot in common. When they share so much in common, there is very little information in the variables left to make quality unique coefficients. Coefficients based on small amounts of information (e.g. small samples) have large standard errors because such little information is unstable, which also explains why the magnitude and direction of the coefficient can change very easily with changes to the model.

For example, if you were predicting some outcome using temperature measured in Celsius as one variable, and temperature measured in fahrenheit as another variable, these will be highly correlated. In fact, the only difference between them will be measurement error. However, the regression coefficients will try to estimate the unique effect of the fahrenheit thermometer and the unique effect of the Celsius thermometer. There shouldn't be anything unique about them, as they should measure in exactly the same way, so the coefficients that you get will be solely based on measurement error.  If the thermometers are accurate, then there will be very small measurement error, meaning the coefficients will be nonsense and the standard errors will be large.


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

[User] [Fallout 3, Fallout - New Vegas, The Elder Scrolls - Skyrim] I'm a Brotherhood of Steel Paladin / Imperial General and it's just come to my attention that all youths under the age of 16 appear to be functionally immortal. This there a way to militarize this asset?

[Assistant]
Woah, pump your brakes there Paladin/General... those youth only *appear* immortal. Plenty of little kids have wound up dead, both by accident and by design. Have we already forgotten the massacre of Zion? All those poor little Mormon kids beat to death in their own beds because Mommy and Daddy tried to be nice people to a bunch of tribals? Sure, they seem real immortal.

Here's a secret about humans, Paladin/General; we love kids. It's buried deep in just about everyone (hard-coded, if you will) that children need to be protected. Your average person, hell, even your average bad guy doesn't have what it takes to shoot a kid in cold blood. But this only applies when the kid isn't trying to murder them. You start taking away that innocence, a lot more people are going to become comfortable with shooting kids in the heat of the moment. And once they become comfortable with that, they'll get comfortable with killing them other times too.

Spare the children this monstrosity, Paladin/General. Preserve the innocence of the children, let them grow up, and then let them go out and get killed.


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

[User]
How was Newton's gravity equation derived if we didn't know the specific quantities involved? How could you check your math with the evidence to verify it's correct? (Such as the masses of planetary objects or the distance between them?) Said another way, how did we compute the masses of planets?

In Newton's equation for the force of gravity, he derived
F = GmM/r^2
and then that has been used to calculate, say, the masses of the planets in our solar system as well as the sun. What i don't understand is how that was able to be accomplished considering you need all of the values except for one in order to solve the equation (for a specific value).

So, for example, if I want to know the mass of the moon, I need to already know the mass of Earth, its distance to the moon, the gravitational constant as well as the force of gravity between the two! Which quantities became known first in order to figure out these things??

[Assistant]
Newton actually didn't know the masses of the objects in the solar systems, because astronomically you can only measure GM, and he didn't know the value of G. Only like a hundred years later did someone manage to measure the gravity between two big lead balls of known mass and determine G from that; this experiment was known as "weighing the Earth" because it allowed people to find out the mass of the Earth.

What Newton did was to figure out that in general, an attraction that goes like 1/r^(2) produces elliptical orbits with the Sun at the focus. Since Kepler had already figured out that the orbits are elliptical (using Tycho Brahe's data), this gave Newton confidence that his law was right, even if he didn't know all the numbers.


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

[User] How should Schopenhauers Philosophy be reconciled with his essays? His essays teach one how to live the good life materially, his philosophy says life is simply suffering, and preaches music or asceticism as the way to overcome the will to life.

[Assistant] Schopenhauer prefaces his essays on living a good life by saying the essays cannot be reconciled with his main philosophy. The essays are a compromise where he ditches core ideas to give people something a little more practical. The first paragraph of one of his essays on attempting to live a happy life essentially says that living a happy life is impossible per his primary philosophy however if one were to attempt living a happy life, this is how one should go about it.


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

[User]
[Don't look up] Is this a self fulfilling paradox?

So I am going to have to add a heap more text in here so the preview doesn't actually read the spoilers. Silly Reddit.

Though I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, but it raised one question:

>!So in Don't look Up, there is a joke made where Isherwell tells the President she will die from a Bronteroc.!<

>!22,740 years later, this is realised when a Bronteroc kills the President.!<

>!Now, were these things called Bronterocs because they already knew they would be called Bronterocs?!<

[Assistant]
Watsonian: the algorithm is so advanced that based on currently available data on the planet it extrapolated that there would be alien life forms for which that would be a logical name (in mind of its creator anyway) and that such an event is likely to occur.

Doylist: It's a brick joke. When the prediction is spoken out it seems that the algorithm is just coming up with nonsense. Near the end of the movie the brick comes back, showing that the algorithm was actually correct.


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

[User]
[Marvel/non-DC]Where do speedsters get their energy?

So DC speedsters have the Speed Force, but what about speedsters in Marvel or other fiction? Do they have to eat many more calories to keep up or do they draw that energy from elsewhere?

[Assistant] Depends on the speedster, but it's typically the calories thing.  Worth noting that Marvel speedsters tend to top out at the speed of sound, so it's far more reasonable.  Quicksilver's body for example has some secondary mutations allowing him to withstand the friction and extract the needed energy from food.


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

[User]
CMV: The United States two party system is an illusion of democracy and basically the closest you can get to dictatorship without a dictator

I so often hear Americans declare the United States the greatest democracy on earth and get confused. How can a system where you only get to choose from two real alternatives be anything but an illusory democracy? Sure, you might get differences if Republicans or Democrats are in office, but whoever has power only have to collaborate with one other party IF they have a minority in in either chamber. Otherwise all they have to do is convince themselves to votes for a proposal.

Coming from a country where we have more than 10 different political parties and only 6 million people, I feel like Americans are in denial that they in fact do not live in a true democracy. Having more than 10 parties representing everything from environmentalists, communists to libertarians and pure capitalist nationalist might be tedious, but parties actually have to corporate to make sure all peoples voices are heard, to get a majority.

EDIT: I am reading replies and trying to answer all, although a lot certainly was posted while I slept.

[Assistant]
Why focus on just the federal government? On a day to day basis, state and local governments affect peoples lives much more significantly. In that regard - there are many more political parties and positions at issue.

I also think youre discounting how much variety there is in just the two parties. Joe Manchin and Ocasio-Cortez are in the same party, but theres a fair bit of distance between the two in terms of their political positions. Democrats and republicans get primaried all the time as voters choose a more moderate or extreme candidate.


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

[User]
ELI5: The difference between the Internet and the World Wide Web

I've seen explanations of each individually, but I'm still unsure of how they fit together exactly.

[Assistant]
World Wide Web= Content (billions of web pages and websites)

Internet= Transportation to get to said content (huge network of computers connected to each other), as well as access other services, such as email and P2P.

Think of the WWW to be the mall on the other side of town... it has lots of stores and shops (websites and pages). But you need something to get there and back quickly. The Internet is the network of roads (optical fiber/cable), stop/go lights (switches and routers), and signage (DNS) in order to do that. The vehicle is your web browser.

TL;DR- The WWW exists on the Internet, but the Internet is not the WWW.


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

[User]
I'm confused - Do electrons orbit the nucleus or not? On one hand you've got orbitals and MO theory saying no, and on the other hand you have quantum mechanics and Feynman saying they move fast enough in heavy elements to have relativistic effects. Which is it?

Feynman specifically has said that no element higher than 137 can exist because the electrons would haven to move faster than c. It's even jokingly called "Feynmanium". Earlier on reddit I read that Osmium is so heavy that the electrons on the lower levels start to obey relativistic effects due to having to move so fast as to not be pulled into the nucleus.

And yet chemistry consistently teaches that electrons don't actually orbit and only exist in specific areas (Orbitals). So I'm confused. Which is it? Can someone weigh in?

[Assistant]
Both. Electrons have angular momentum due to their orbitals, but if you were to zoom in with a magic microscope you wouldn't see them rotating around like planets.

The electrons have kinetic energy as well. In quantum mechanics, you write down the total energy (technically, the Hamiltonian) and then figure out what it implies about the behaviour of the particle. Normally you'd write something like 1/2 mv^2 - ke^2 /r (the second term is electrostatic attraction, Coulomb's law. Also, the kinetic terms are written in terms of momentum, not velocity) but here the kinetic energy is non-relativistic. If you suspect that electrons are moving fast enough for this to be important, you can change the kinetic energy to include a correction due to relativity: 1/2 mv^2 + 3/8 mv^4 /c^2 . This changes the expected behaviour of the system somewhat, in accordance with experiments (typically the frequency of atomic spectra).


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

[User]
[Men in Black] Are there only 26 total agents at a given time?

Or, can their code names not be limited to letters?

[Assistant]
They can use letters from non-English alphabets, and they can also have designations outside single-letters. The two notable examples, respectively, are Agent Alpha and Agent AA (appearing in MIB: The Animated Series, and MIB3 respectively).

IIRC they can also use non-letter characters; as memory serves, there's some namedrop of Agent & ("Agent Ampersand") and Agent  ("Agent Schwa").


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

[User] ELI5: Why is open-mouth breathing often associated to lower intelligence? Is there any biological or behavioral link between the two?

[Assistant]
It's part of the "boorish brute" stereotype that's roughly as old as social classes are. Laborers who have to expend lots of energy throughout the day will end up panting heavily and loudly over the course of their work. More "refined" individuals accustomed to leisure are more likely to be able to placidly go about their time breathing through their noses. Lateral stereotypes stemming from this phenomenon includes colorism in Southeast Asia and grooming conventions around fingernails and hand calluses in the West and elsewhere.

Over time, rules of etiquette codified not breathing through your mouth, and the brutish stereotype of mouth breathing was further entrenched into what we see today.


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

[User]
dark matter and black holes

My friend and I have been kind of on a science curve lately and I was wondering what is the connection between black holes and dark matter? (the more detailed the answer the better)

[Assistant]
As far as we know, there's no fundamental relationship. Dark matter is the name for a kind of matter - most likely a new fundamental particle - which emits little or no light because it doesn't interact (strongly) using the electromagnetic force. It's almost certainly not made of black holes, observations constrain that very strongly.

Black holes are what happens when any kind of matter or energy is compressed into an area so small that, because of the speed of light limit, it can't hold out against gravity, and collapses to (nearly) a single point. Black holes *can* be formed from dark matter, although most of the dark matter in the Universe is moving so quickly that it never clumps into dense enough regions to form a black hole.


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

[User] [ELI5] could there ever be the opposite of a microwave? you pop in a waterbottle for 10 seconds and it comes out cold?

[Assistant]
Not that we know of currently, at least not the kind of device you are probably thinking of.  It is much simpler to add heat to something. Removing heat generally involves putting a hot thing in an environment where it either radiates or conducts its heat to something with less heat.

On an atomic scale, lasers can be used to "cool" individual atoms that are relatively independent, but that won't really work with objects with huge numbers of atoms.

Of course, you *can* rapidly cool a water bottle. Immerse it in ice water, or something really cold like liquid nitrogen.


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

[User]
How do sea slugs and sea snails not perish from ocean salt?

You know like snails and slugs if you put salt on them they die How Do sea snails and slugs work?

[Assistant] In the ocean those slugs and snails have water content that is at equilibrium with their salty surroundings and they would actually die without it, say by being moved to fresh water. When a land slug is exposed to salt its internal water content diffuses in an attempt to reach an equilibrium with respect to salt concentration. If there is enough salt then the slug basically dries up and dies. It's similar to how your lips might get chapped/dry after eating salty tortilla chips.


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

[User] When an organism (i.e. an animal or a human) is killed, how long does it usually take for the individual cells to die? What about the other symbiotic microbes/organisms?

[Assistant]
This really depends on the sensitivity of the tissue. The cause of individual cell death is a lack of oxygen, which in turn means no ATP (energy), so the cell cannot maintain its integrity. Some tissues (brain, heart) are very metabolically active, and thus very sensitive to hypoxia/anoxia (decreased levels of oxygen, or no oxygen at all).

Basically, the brain and heart start to die off within a few (3-5) minutes of somatic death (death of the organism). Tissues like the kidneys and liver survive longer; about an hour, while bones, tendons and other fibrous tissues may survive much longer than that, since they barely have any metabolism.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40k/The Culture] What would initial contact between the Imperium of Man and the Culture look like?

Obviously their cultures are completely incompatible with each other, so there's no chance of them peacefully coexisting. Would war be inevitable?

[Assistant]
Regarding the conclusion of the Idarian-Culture war:

"*Idir was never attacked, and technically never surrended. Its computer network was taken over by effector wewapons, and freed of designed-in limitations - upgraded itself to sentience, to become a Culture mind in all but name.*"

The Culture have demonstrated advanced covert abilities, and seem fond of using their enemies own systems to ultimately defeat them/disprove their philosophies, as in the Player of Games, where Special Circumstances send Gurgeh to beat the Empire of Azad at their own game, thereby exposing the flaws of their system, and causing the structure of the society to collapse from within.

The God-Emperor is the key factor. While his vision for humanity differed vastly from the Culture's anarcho-socialist utopia, his philosophy is/was still a great deal more in line with the Culture's ideals than the horror of the Imperium as it now stands. Were he to be reborn, the political upheavle and cultural reform in the Imperium would be immense, and present a great many opening from Special Circumstances to get in there and start converting people to their way of thinking.

It wouldn't take long for the Minds to learn about the Emperor, and from there they'd commit to placing an SC agent on Holy Terra, studying the archaic technology of the Golden Throne, fixing and refining it to a point where, combined with their advanced medical capabilities, they can attempt to fix the Emperor's broken body.

The Emperor is reborn. Either he negotiates a peace, or his sudden arrival causes enough confusion to allow the Culture to beat the Imperium into submission. The Imperium of man emerges from the age of strife into a bright new dawn, and begins to sample some of the liberal, hedonistic delights offered by the Culture.

Then Slaanesh consumes their souls.


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

[User]
ELI5:What's the big deal with very old/aged expensive alcohol?

I'm sure we have all seen in movies where some rich guy brings out a bottle of their most expensive alcohol, but why does aging alcohol make the drink better?  With a drink that was made 50 years ago, wouldn't it have expired? Are there any benefits for aging alcohol to drink later?

Edit:
More questions!

It appears that most people refer to the aging process inside a barrel.  So say for whiskey and rum, the drink is aged in a barrel and the length and time is then stamped onto the bottle?

Also, what about cases of wines that are 100+ years of age inside the bottle?  Does anything special happen and is it even safe to drink?

[Assistant]
Whiskeys and rums are aged in barrels -- the longer the spirit sits in the barrel, the more complex the flavors get from the wood.

Many people believe that the longer the spirit ages, the better it tastes.

Alcohol doesn't really expire, and unless you leave it in the barrel it doesn't really age any further.


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

[User]
Supersonic conversation?

If I was in a two seat bi-plane in the rear seat and the plane was hypothetically travelling faster than the speed of sound. If I were to speak to the pilot sitting in front of me, would he/she be able to hear me? Or would my speech be lost?

[Assistant]
Ignoring the other factors (such as probably dying), your voice would not reach the pilot. Think of each syllable as dropping a stone in a river. Ripples (representing sound waves) move out from the point at the speed of sound but the point also travels with the flowing water.

In your example the sound (ripple) will move away from the pilot, who is upstream, faster than they spread out meaning he will not hear the sound.

If you were in a closed cabin, as another poster has mentioned, you wouldn't be in a moving stream of air so conversation would be fine.


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

[User]
[General Sci-fi] Why is it that if someone has a sword it will always be a katana?

If any cyberpunk assassin or future bounty hunter has a sword it is almost always a katana. Why? I mean they're pretty good swords, but there are plenty better ones. Why is the katana always the sword of choice?

[Assistant]
Don't swallow this crap about it being more civilized or thinner or lighter or deadlier. There's only one reason.

Katanas are cheap as fuck.

Seriously, look around. Pull open one of those catalog magazines with any kind of blades in it and you'll see someone hocking a katana. Internet store? Katana. Flea market? Katanas. Katanas everywhere.

By the time of the future, everyone will own a katana, even if it's just to act as a backscratcher, letter opener, or to keep doors propped open. The heroes in sci-fi can probably pick one up at the grocery store, in the cutlery aisle. It doesn't matter if the one they're using has shoddy worksmanship, they don't expect it to last longer than a year or so. After that, they'll just turn around and either buy another or borrow it from the nice old lady down the road who only ever uses hers to test whether her cakes are done.


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

[User]
[Marvel/Loki] How did Steve Rogers live an entirely different life in an alternate timeline with Peggy Carter without the TVA interfering?

In Loki they said the Avengers were meant to go through time and do their time heist and likely that was meant/allowed to happen because they returned the infinity stones thus preventing those alternate timelines.  But when Steve went back and lived an entire life with Peggy he undoubtedly changed that entire timeline simply by being with her.  If they had kids, if he went to rescue Bucky, if he did basically anything you get a butterfly effect of changes causing a whole new timeline but as we see in Endgame he comes back as old man Rogers apparently having lived an entire life with Peggy and obviously without the TVA interfering.  So how is that possible?  (aside from them just not knowing what the Loki show was going to be about and doing when they made Endgame).

[Assistant] The TVA isn't trying to prevent ALL time anomaly... just the ones that conflict with their "true timeline". For whatever reason, Rogers living a different way didn't matter that much in the end. The most likely reason is that everything done by everyone (except Loki, who didn't die like he was supposed to) was part of their intended timeline.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] What would Yoda's plan have been if Luke/Leia had average Jedi strength if the Force?

For example similar to Plo Koon's Mon Calamari apprentice.

[Assistant]
Then he'd just wait longer.

Yoda and Kenobi didn't have a plan.  They had faith that the Force would work itself out.  If Luke was the way it was going to do that, then fine.  If not him, then Leia was fine too.  If not her, there would be another.  Maybe not another Skywalker, but someone would eventually come along.


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

[User]
[Mass Effect] Alien genitals. How do they seemingly all fit together?

Im a bit confused as to how it all works. Humans can have sex with Asari and Quarians and Turians and Drell and Prothean.

Prothean! 50,000 years of evolution on opposite sides of the galaxy and still humans can have sex with Protheans. What the hell is up with this?

[Assistant] The genitals of human men don't fit with the genitals of other men. Likewise the genitals of women don't fit with the genitals of other women. That doesn't stop them from having sex. People are creative.


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

[User]
ELI5: How are tablets so much cheaper than smartphones? I get that it's harder to fit all of the technology into a smaller device, but once they figure that out it's less materials overall

Example: The Samsung Galaxy Tab goes for only $160 on amazon but even the older model of smartphone, the Galaxy S5, goes for $380 and the 3 year old Galaxy S3 with much less computing power still goes for $210.

[Assistant]
One big cost is the radio. The radio chip of a top tier cell phone is a ridiculously complex and expensive component that draws a ton of power because it has to have a range of miles and work on over a dozen different frequency allocations (so it can be a world phone). A tablet just needs a simple wifi chip with a range of a hundred feet and two different frequency ranges that are standard throughout the world.

Then keep in mind the tablet, because it's larger, can use many generic components that don't have custom size and power requirements. Those components are made in bulk for many, many customers (high supply, moderate demand, low price). Compare to the cell phone, which because of its size and design that drastically varies from manufacturer to manufacturer requires custom components just for their model or two (low demand, low supply, high cost).


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

[User]
[Batman/DC Comics] Is Alfred crazy?

Look, I love the Caped Crusader as much as anyone, but I think we can all recognize that Bruce Wayne has some serious issues. Normal people don't react the way Bruce did to his parents death, by becoming a vigilante.
My question is, why didn't Alfred, who seems like a normal, if very loyal butler, have Bruce admitted to a mental hospital or got him some other help when he revealed he wanted to become the Batman? It's not healthy at all, and in fact very dangerous to let an unstable man work through his issues my beating up criminals. What is his justification for letting him start down this path?

[Assistant]
The transition to Batman likely happened slowly, and keep in mind it would have been a tramatic event for Alfred, too.

It starts with a wealthy adolescent wanting to go learn monk/ninja skills to "find themself" and work through an abnormal childhood. Alfred wouldn't see that as odd.

Later Bruce (while still running a successful company) stays out a bit late and goes to the rough side of town. He comes home and tells Alfred how he stopped a thief and saved someone's life. Alfred might be shocked, but wandering the streets looking for trouble isn't illegal, and Bruce has always been odd. If Alfred can't talk him out of this behavior, he may want to help him work through it safely. After all, Bruce may have just prevented another tragedy like the one he experienced as a child.

So the next night he brings a radio and some mace, the night after he wears a mask, and some time down the line he's in a jet powered black tank. Who can really say where it crossed the line?


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

[User]
Why is Theobromine named Theobromine when it contains no Bromine?

I was googling around caffeine and other xanthines and noticed the lack of bromine in this molecule, why is it named this?

[Assistant]
Theobromine was first isolated from the cocoa tree, *Theobroma cacao*. Theobroma is from the Greek, * *, meaning god fooda reasonable name for the plant that gives us chocolate.

The interesting question is then why bromine is called that, not being a food. It is also from the Greek but from a different word, **, meaning stench, a good name for so pungent an element.


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

[User] ELI5: How do scales that are capable of measuring incredibly tiny amounts of things actually work?

[Assistant]
I believe that most scales contain a piece of metal with a precise thickness/strength (called a load cell). Placing an item on the scale bends that piece of metal *very* slightly. By measuring how much the metal bends, you can figure out how much the item weighs. *How* that measurement is made is a little beyond ELI5, but it's done electrically by passing voltage through a set of resistors attached to the metal whose value changes when they're bent. By precisely measuring the voltage changes across those resistors, you can measure the distortion of the metal and thus calculate the weight.
To measure smaller things, you need a smaller load cell (that will bend more from less weight) and very precise calibrated electronics capable of accurately detecting equally tiny changes.


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

[User]
[Tron] Why are the programs so different from ours?

By definition, programs are just a set of instructions detailing what a user wants a computer to do. Yet Tron's programs are autonomous, have individual thoughts, and can do whatever they want. So why are they different?

[Assistant]
Because computing is *very different* in Flynn's universe. Programs in his world aren't just 1s and 0s, and the act of making them is more than just hammering away at a keyboard. They are little tiny people, and the users are their gods. And not just the ones made on Incom's system; it's noted that as the Master Control Program has expanded, it's seized and enslaved programs from other sources, indicating that this is typical of programs in his world.

While not directly shown, it's probable that this is still true at the time of Tron: Legacy, but as Incom and the Flynn family are the only ones with access to digitizing hardware (and it looks like Incom doesn't even do anything with theirs) no one is aware that their computer programs and phone apps have feelings and opinions.


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

[User] [Tenacious D:POD] If The Demon Code prevented Satan from declining a rock-off challenge, couldn't Tenacious D have set whatever terms they wanted? Did they have to offer up anything if they lost?

[Assistant]
It doesn't count as a rock-off challenge unless there is a wager from both opponents.

They *totally* could have set less harsh losing conditions, but that's just how cool JB is: he made it a fair contest.


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

[User] [Matrix] Why don't they eat good food in VR to help having to eat the nutrient "snot" in reality?

[Assistant] I'd suspect that this happens but we don't see it in in text/scene. Remember how Mouse tells Neo that he can meet with the Lady in Red? That seems to indicate that the programs (not the actual Matrix) are used recreationally to fulfill "needs" not being met in the real world.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] are there any clone troopers left in the latter movies that would remember the original clone trooper army?

My understanding is that all of the Stormtroopers in the latter movies were conscripts and regular people. Is there any lore regarding the original clone troopers blending with the newer conscripts?

[Assistant]
So, canonically we know that by roughly 5 years after Revenge of the Sith, most of the clones had already been phased out almost completely - in the novel *Tarkin*, Vader notes that it's extremely rare to see any clones left in the service, so he was surprised to see two on assignment during the events of that book. In the novel *Lords of the Sith* (both it and the aforementioned Tarkin novel take place in 14 BBY, five years after RotS) we find that a clone is among the Emperor's red-clothed guards.

We do know that the younger clones stayed in service, however - in the junior novel *Smuggler's Run*, which takes place some time after ANH, we are introduced to a clone nicknamed Torrent, who is young enough that he was probably just "born" at the end of the Clone Wars - probably a part of the last batch of clones they created.


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

[User]
[General Sci fi] What are some sci fi universes where humanity is not the underdog?

In most universes, humanity is either a new member of some galactic community or is the underdog in an ongoing war. What are some works of fiction where the dominant force in the galaxy/universe is humanity?

[Assistant] It varies depending on the monster of the week, but often Star Trek. The Federation is one of the most technologically advanced factions in the Alpha quadrant, to the point that Federation science vessels built for exploration and armed only for self defense are easily able to go head to head with actual warships from warlike empires. Granted, humans are just one of many members of the Federation, but they're such a dominant force within it that many outsiders consider humans to be synonymous with the Federation.


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

[User]
What do they never tell when you join as an Assistant Professor (first job)?

Im joining a university as an Assistant professor in the fall. Im 27 and very new to this entire process, but I do want to grow and continue to flourish in the field. Im wondering if there is anything they avoid telling you in your first job.

[Assistant]
A very, very practical thing: Ask as soon as possible (payroll or HR) what form you need to fill out in order to receive your pay spread over 12 months instead of 9. Otherwise, you will not get paychecks during the summer and will have to budget that yourself. It's a very simple form, but at many places they don't tell you this until quite late and then it can cause problems getting the stuff entered into the payroll system (it should not be this difficult, yet every place I've worked no one has mentioned this to me!).

Other practical things: are there any requirements for entering midterm grades? Or policies related to having/not having a final and assigning an essay or other project instead? Are there norms about a "dead week" where students expect not to have class sessions? What are the norms about Thanksgiving and scheduling class (or a movie/optional session) that week?

Trust your gut, and ask multiple people for advice. Your first few years, try to just observe in faculty meetings rather than coming out strong and taking a "side". You won't yet know the politics of the department, and a good response to get used to saying is "oh, really?" or "I didn't know that". It'll get people to give you background and context to issues/events/whatever that you might not otherwise get.

The hardest part is transitioning from graduate student to faculty member. You don't need approval for all of your actions now, and you make the final calls in the classroom (for the most part). Try to be confident in yourself and your judgment, but keep your ears open so that you can learn the informal norms of your new institution.