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

[User]
[General] Which sci-fi or fantasy universes would be the best to be an average person in?

Many sci-fi and fantasy universes are filled with civilizations at war, dystopian economic and political systems, or sometimes the cool stuff is just too rare to have an impact on an Average Joe's life. Which ones would be the best to just be a normal person in?

[Assistant] Obvious answer is the Culture universe from Iain M Banks novels. Post scarcity galactic society where humans are basically kept and led by benevolent AI called Minds. People can go where they like and adventure and explore, change gender or even species at will, gland drugs on a whim or even ascend to the next plane of existence if they wanted.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do I always feel dehydrated when I wake up no matter how much water I have the night before?

When I wake up my throat is always dry and my pee is always a yellow colour yet I drink plenty of water the night before.
EDIT: I'm pretty sure I don't have diabetes because I have a couple of diabetic friends but I'm going to my GP soon to get checked out about something else so I'll mention this to them to see if anything is actually wrong with me, thanks for all the answers guys, I'm not 100% sure what it is but I've got a rough idea from you guys and I will see what my doctor says.

[Assistant]
You don't. Dehydration is a particular condition that is a result of an *excessive* deficiency of water in the body resulting in metabolic changes. It wouldn't take place over 8 hours of sleeping, especially if you drank water before bedtime.

More likely, you simply feel thirsty because you haven't had anything to drink for ~8 hours (or however long you slept). But you're not dehydrated.

If you're experiencing a dry throat, a likely source of that could be nasal congestion. If your nasal passages are congested, this will cause you to breath through your mouth while you sleep, drying out your throat.

And urine is naturally yellow.


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

[User] ELI5: In a stockmarket crash, where does all the value go to?

[Assistant]
Imagine you find a car in your grandpas old storage unit.

You take it to a mechanic and he tells you its a one-of-one Plymouth Barracuda prototype worth a million dollars.

Great!  Youre a millionaire!  You take it to auction.

Upon further inspection its a fake.

Did you just lose a million dollars, or was it all theoretical value that never existed in any concrete form?

A market crash is similar to this.  The theoretical value of stocks drops considerably, but there arent actually huge gobs of cash changing hands.


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

[User]
[Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia] What is Franks Net worth?

I mean I know he founded and ran a company for years but the things he and gang get into from paying rent in Philadelphia, pay people or expensive things like the Lamborghini and even pay bail for he and the gang whenever they get caught doing something.

[Assistant] Probably in the $20-50 million range. He made more than 15 million selling Atwater to the Japanese. (Lefevre was selling his stake for $31 million and Frank had about half his shares). Add that to the furtune he already had, plus income from Frank's Fluids LLC (parent company of Fight Milk, and Wolf Cola *the official beverage of Boko Haram*) and Frank is sitting on quite the nest egg.


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

[User]
What determines which X chromosome becomes active during the X inactivation process?

Shortly after the conception of a female mammal, one of the X chromosomes is inactivated. I'm curious as to what determines which of the two X chromosomes becomes the active one in a given cell?

edit: clarifying question.

[Assistant] Its typically random, hence genetic mosaicism in most female mammals. You can see this more easily in calico or torture cats, because those genes are X linked, while genes that arent so phenotypically obvious arent the best examples, in a visual sense. They also tend to inactivate in patches.


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

[User]
How do surgeons connect nerves to donated organs?

It's one thing to connect blood vessels, but how do surgeons get nerve impulses to organs like the heart in a transplant patient? Can transplant patients feel those organs?

[Assistant] They do not connect nerves to transplanted organs. Most organs don't actually require nerve input to function normally, and instead rely on hormones transmitted though the blood, like adrenalin, to alter how they function. People who have transplanted hearts actually cannot feel them, which leaves them unable to feel chest pain if they are having a heart attack. It also makes the heart immune to drugs like atropine that take advantage of nerves normally present to increase your heart rate. However the good news is hearts don't need external stimuli to function, they have what is called automaticity, Which means it will generate beats all by itself.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is it so hard to forget movie spoilers, but so easy to forget more important stuff?

[Assistant]
You don't generally really forget important stuff, you just don't remember it at the correct time. Its rare that if you forgot a meeting, that you have absolutely no clue you should have been in it, after someone reminds you. Once you get triggered, you remember.

Now in case of movie spoilers, you always get triggered to remember it at the worst time. The moment you go see the movie. Giving the impression you never forget a spoiler, but always forget a important meeting.


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

[User] Which philosophers most "bit the bullet" in following their arguments to a non-intuitive or undesirable conclusion that was being led to by their rationale?

[Assistant] Dennett says that none of us experiences anything. Lewis says that all possible worlds exist and are as real as the actual world. Singer says there is nothing particularly wrong with infanticide and that you ought to give almost all of your possessions away to those who are in dire need of resources. Pereboom says we have no free will. Parfit says that there are some circumstances under which you could die and this would not bad for you even though your life is going quite well.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do saying or writing our thoughts out can help relieve stress?

[Assistant] Once you express a thought, the brain checks it off the list, considering it a done deal even if you don't actually act on the thought you express. This is also why you might feel less motivated toward a goal after telling someone about it.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do we have so many different races that are so unique (black,white,indian,asian,hispanic). I know it was evolution but how/why ?

This question is for my 8 year old I tried to explain the best I could and why do asians have squinted eyes, why are black people black. Most of the googling I did just explained human evolution and not the race part of it. I know you guys can explain this way better than any article I could find and summarize.
I apologize in advance for my grammar I am not very book smart.

[Assistant]
Human populations in various parts of the world have been largely isolated from one another; it wasn't all that common than a Chinese man wed an African woman or whatever. Gene pool mixing was minimal between what we now consider the racial boundaries.

Over time evolution change the local population in relatively minor ways as compared to the difference between humans and chimapanzees, say, but nonetheless visible ways. Some were actually adaptations like the melanin content thing; the darker skinned humans can handle sunlight far better than can the pale. Pale skinned humans, though, absorb vitamin D from sunlight much more easily.

This worked well considering the climates you got your more pale and more dark skinned folks in.

Plenty of the difference aren't adaptations so much as just non-destructive mutations. There's plenty of cosmetic affairs that don't really make a difference to survival.


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

[User]
[General] Earth has been invaded by aliens numerous times in books and movies over the years. However, what are some actual reasons an alien race would have to invade earth?

Other than just being in the mood to conquer a planet and be an evil antagonistic force in general, what would Earth have that would cause an alien force to invade Earth?

[Assistant] I can only see that they would do it because they see a worth in our biosphere, or some kind of interest in us as intelligent beings, for some reason. Resources themselfes are plenty in space, and you could probably get them from shallow gravity wells compared to ours. Also, even if they wanted some natural resource from Earth that wasnt biological, why not just bomb us from orbit without actually invading and then pick up whatever they want.


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

[User]
[Cast Away] Could our hero have actually survived 4 years on that island?

Is it literally possible for someone with no survival training and no equipment to have survived 4 years on their own?  Especially in terms of nutritional deficiencies.  Never mind simple caloric intake along with shelter and other survival problems.

[Assistant]
I don't see why it wouldn't be. He has fruit, fish, shelter, and fresh water. He's a very resourceful and smart person which is how he is able to learn to survive.

meta: the movie was heavily researched before being scripted.


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

[User]
Anyone here in the embedded devices field, or programming with C or C++? How do you like it? What are the pros and cons of your workload?

Im pretty sure i can get a job offer to do embedded device engineering working with C and C++. Ive never worked in either of those languages, and Ive never worked with embedded devices. Im debating if I should even go down that route but I admittedly dont know enough about the languages and workload to even know if ill like it. Im curious what your thoughts are around the field. Pros and cons?

For some context, Ive been a software engineer for 3 years and have mostly done full stack with C# and JavaScript etc.

[Assistant]
Embedded device work is typically a completely different animal to client, back-end or full stack development.  The severity of the departure from what you're used to will depend a lot on the nature of the embedded devices you're considering.

There's a world of difference between what is essentially a full-blown PC, hidden within, say an ATM vs. a PIC or microcontroller in a garden hose timer (which might have just 128 **bytes** of RAM, a very rudimentary and slow processor, and a couple of KB of program space).  Yet both are examples of embedded development work.

For what generally is considered "embedded device" work (i.e. smaller, lower-powered devices, that don't rise to the level of using a SoC or SBC) as opposed to just "embedded" development:

* You're working much closer to the metal.  Libraries, beyond the standard C library and maybe a hardware interfacing library, that come with the microprocessor or board you're targeting, may be off limits (typically due to resource constraints).
* Direct memory management and manipulation (pointers, manual malloc/free), without a safety net, is the norm.
* Bit-twiddling is common.
* Resource constraints often meaning optimization concerns in both time and space complexity - for situations which in full stack development you wouldn't even bother optimizing.
* Special/clever "tricks" become things necessary to get the job done, rather than being frowned upon because they're hard to read/understand.
* Comprehensive testing becomes a major factor, as for low cost devices it may simply not be possible to update them if you find issues post manufacture (never mind after sale).

If your embedded device is a "controller"of some kind, you'll usually need some basic level of electronics knowledge as well.  Understanding the reason for, and usage of, pull-up and pull-down resistors, why you need to and *how* to debounce inputs, applying PWM and PDM, DAC and ADC capabilities and so on, how to read a basic schematic etc.

Optimization can be a bear, and there's frequently a strong drive to do it; developer time is cheap if you're making 1,000,000 widgets and you can optimize your way from needing a $4 microcontroller and get the job done with a $0.50 PIC instead.

That can mean the "comparatively beefy" microcontroller you started with, that had 2 KB of RAM, 16 KB of program space, 10 I/O lines, a 32-bit CPU at 16 MHz, suddenly becomes a device with 128 bytes of RAM, 2 KB or program space, an 8-bit CPU at 4 MHz and only has 4 I/O lines.

Well, now you don't have the space for a full 8-bit pop-count (count the number of set bits in a byte) lookup table, and your CPU is slower so the fact it was a lookup table in the first place (trading time for space complexity) meant you were already performance constrained!  So it's clever tricks time!

In this case, that might mean embedding the lookup table in the program space block (if you're able, it's not always possible).  Or it might mean using a 4-bit set-bits look-up table (requiring 1/16th the space of an 8-bit one), and processing the upper and lower nybbles of each byte separately, and then add them.

And those six I/O lines you lost?  Well, now you've got to come up with a multiplexing scheme for the four you do have, so they can act as eight.  And that'll require working with the hardware guys.

Oh, and to deal with any value larger than 255, you're now manually dealing with carries and multi-byte representations, rather than simply being able to treat 4 bytes as word with a 4-billion value range.

\---

That seems a like a lot of "doom and gloom".  Again, it depends on what you mean by "embedded device".  There are lots of "embedded" systems that run on essentially normal PC hardware, with maybe custom input or display devices, and those are not nearly as far from what you're doing as "controllers" and simpler "embedded devices" will be.

And in the middle, there are more powerful microcontrollers, and SoCs that, while still requiring a different way of looking at things, aren't nearly as constrained  in terms of power, development model, tooling and so on.


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

[User] Does listening to audio with one ear or watching something with one eye have an effect on how the information is processed/remembered?

[Assistant]
Both visual and audio information is immediately crossed on secondary neurons in the brain. In the brain stem for hearing, and in the optic chiasm for vision. So immediately the information is spread to both cerebral hemispheres, and shouldnt be processed any different with one-sided input than both.

There are portions of the brain, however, that relate to specific visual fields. These neurons would be repurposed in an individual with vision loss.

For someone with one-sided hearing loss, they would lose the ability to determine location of sounds, since the brain uses the minuscule time difference between the sound arriving in each ear to determine location.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] When Grand Moff Tarkin orders the Death Star to "target the base at Scarif", why do the gunners target a point several hundred miles from Scarif Base?

I mean, they manage to blow off the top of the transmission tower in the process, which is pretty cool, but why not target the base at ground level and vaporize the whole thing like they were clearly ordered to? They targeted the city of Jedha directly. It makes it seem like the Death Star's crew lack discipline and are just showing off to see if they could hit the smallest target available.

[Assistant]
They fired on the tower. That was their priority to stop any signals from being transmitted.

The death star couldn't wait to be at a higher angle so that's why the shot went through the tower and past it.


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

[User] ELI5: what is chaos theory?

[Assistant]
Chaos theory describes chaotic systems, which are systems where very small differences in the starting conditions lead to wildly different end states.

To put that a little more simply, imagine youre dropping a ball off a building. If you know exactly where the ball is being dropped from, how big it is, how much it weighs, and how strong the wind is blowing in what direction, you can  accurately predict exactly where the ball is going to land.

If your estimate for any of these things is off by a little bit, the predicted place that you expect the ball to land will be off by a little bit. If your estimated value for any or a bunch of them is off by a lot, your prediction with be off by a lot. As long as you have roughly accurate starting values, you can make a roughly accurate prediction.

Now imagine that you are dropping the ball down one of those boards with lots of pegs that causes the ball to bounce around a bunch before reaching the bottom.

Very small differences in the starting position of the ball, or the size of the ball, or the weight of the ball, etc, may cause it to bounce in different directions and take *very different* paths down the board. This means that if the values that you are using are off by even a little bit, instead of your prediction about where the ball lands being off by a little bit, it may be off by *a lot*.

Because of their sensitivity to initial conditions and propensity to yield wildly different results, chaotic systems are difficult to predict very far ahead unless you have absolutely perfect and complete information. This is why things like, for example, weather tend to be given as percentages and is only really accurate for a few days or even hours ahead of time, rather than being able to predict the weather months or years in advance.


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

[User]
[Witcher] Is it better to be a commoner, a Witcher or a mage towards the end of the books/start of the games?

If you were stuck in the Witcherverse permanently and you had the choice of being a peasant, a Witcher or a mage in around 1260...what will the best choice be?

Before everything went down, it would have been to be a mage as they had the king's ear and were treated as part of the aristocracy. That being said, despite being the most powerful of the three choices, they are now actively hunted. Do you still think being gifted with the knowledge of magic and biological immortality is worth the risk?

Alternatively, Witcher also sounds cool - except you'll have to constantly risk your life when doing contracts. Also, a lot of people will despise you just because of their prejudice. For the purposes of discussion, let's assume you will pass the Trial of Grass/graduate from the magical academies.

If that is the case, wouldn't being a commoner be the best choice? Except there is also the Catriona plague, you may get conscripted and/or die of some weird disease.

What do you think? Which of the 3 would you say is the best choice?

[Assistant]
Mage, hands down.

Peasants in the Medieval Age tend not to survive very long. Witchers are viewed as marginally useful mutants at best, and beings worthy of being lynched at worst. Mages have long lives, are treated like royalty in places other than Novigrad, and you get cool powers.


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

[User]
[Dune] What happens to Caladan after the Atreidies leave for Arrakis?

Did Leto nominate a regent to rule in his stead?  Or does it become an independent planet?  Does another house take it over?  Seems like it would have been a nice place to live.

[Assistant]
After House Atreides was ordered to relinquish Caladan in favor of Arrakis, the Emperor Shaddam Corino IV gave the fief to one of his advisers, Count Hasimir Fenring. This lasted until the Jihad, when Caladan (and the rest of the galaxy) fell under the rule of the Atreides.

Edit: Fenring was named Siridar-Absentia of Caladan, which is apparently a "title given to an individual who was given temporary governorship of a planet while it was undergoing a change of fief"


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

[User]
What do we actually sense when we feel that something is wet?

As far as i know there aren't any specific receptors for 'wetness' and sometimes it feels like something is wet but as soon as you enter a warmer environment the sensation is gone. I also heard that mercury doesn't feel wet although it's liquid. How does that work?

[Assistant]
The typical sensation of wetness is related to the coolness of the evaporative effect. When we are wet, either from sweat or an external source, the water is immediately drawing heat from our skin as it evaporates. Hot or warm water splashed on us feels different at first because it's actually adding heat. It feels wet and uncomfortable as soon as its temperature drops below our body temperature.

Mercury does not evaporate. It and other non evaporating liquids may give a sensation of its presence, but won't feel cold like water or alcohol.


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

[User]
ELI5: How did they use Graham's Number in a mathematical solution?

I have an idea of what Graham's Number is and how unbelievably massive it is, but how did they actually incorporate it in a mathematical solution? In what way was it used?

[Assistant]
It is an upper bound.  Often the first step to finding the answer to find some crazy high number that you can prove the answer must be smaller than.

Let's say you haven't seen your pet turtle in the last hour, and are afraid he might be lost.  If you knew your turtle's top speed, you could prove he must be within a specific radius.  And if you don't know your turtle's top speed, you can pick a number you know is higher to serve as a upper bound.

Graham's number is kind of like saying the turtle must still be in the solar system, because it couldn't exceed the speed of light.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does an excess of genetic material (like an extra chromosome) lead to abnormalities?

I understand why the body might be adversely affected by, say, Cri du Chat, where a part of chromosome 5 is missing, but why are there such drastic changes in development when someone has extra genetic material, such as in Down syndrome? Couldn't the body just ignore the third chromosome? Pardon my lack of experience with genetics, we're learning about it in school right now and this question has been bouncing around in my head for a while. Thanks!

[Assistant]
>Why such drastic changes? Couldn't the body just ignore the third chromosome?

Chromosomes are essentially blueprints that contain instructions on how to make something from scratch. It'd be sort of like a cookbook which tells you how to mill grain into flour, how much flour to add, how to mix all the ingredients together, *and* how to cook it.

If you add an extra two cups of flour into a cake batter, you can't just tell the final cake to ignore the extra flour. The end result will change.

An extra chromosome (or lack of one) would be like a printing error in a cookbook. If your copy of the book says:

>Combine four large eggs, One cup water, Two cups flour, **Two cups flour**, Mix. Bake at 450 degrees or until golden."

Then your cake is going to come out quite different compared to the one your friend made from a *different* copy of the very same book. You accidentally added twice as much flour.

Worse yet, if the printing error resulted in no mention of flour *at all*, you're not even going to have a cake! ...Just a sugary sort of baked omelette.

The end result will vary dramatically depending on which ingredient or cooking step is printed incorrectly in the book. Sometimes you'll end up with something unique and edible, sometimes you won't even notice the difference unless you compare it closely, and sometimes you'll end up with something completely unrecognizable as a "cake" at all.


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

[User]
[Star Trek] Why the Federation doesn't help Bajor more?

In the second season, there's an episode that Bajor refuses to accept refugees because they "barely have recourses for themselves".

Why there's no more shipments of resources from the Federation?

[Assistant]
Remember that Bajor is somewhat wary of the Federation. Having just gotten rid of the Cardassians, they don't want to immediately invite a new oppressor.

Bajor fought for its independence and wants that: independence. Relying too much on Federation aid would just be another form of dependence, even if the Federation is completely benevolent.

They accept *some* assistance and protection as is necessary for survival, but mainly they want to solve their own problems and get on their own feet.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are there so many spam links, specifically to sex sites? Do they actually work? Who is the ultimate benefactor?

I run a website and get hundreds of spam comments that get caught in our filter. Most of it sound like completely random websites and I have a feeling they don't get many clicks.

If this is a profitable way to advertise, what exactly are they selling? What's the end game? Where does the profit come from?

[Assistant]
It costs virtually nothing to send an email. A small fraction of a cent. If one in a million people clicks the link they make money. Especially because...

Most of these 'sex sites' are just pirate porn sites with malware. They don't want to sell you porn (though they may take your credit card number), they want to infect your computer and take it over. Often to make it part of a botnet or steal your money or extort you.

So they need one in a million people to click on "HOT NAKED CHICKENS!" so they can steal their credit card number and charge 200$ on it.

Some other scams do other things, like the 'Nigerian prince' scams. These people don't *WANT* you to contact them if you aren't a complete idiot because then you are wasting their time (because if you aren't a moron or in elderly decline you won't go through with wiring them the money...)


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

[User] Why is 20/20 vision considered 'perfect'? What does it mean if a person has better vision than this (ie 20/10)? Is there a physical limitation for human eyesight?

[Assistant] 20/20 isn't perfect vision, it's normal/average vision.  20/40 is half normal, or you need to be 20ft away to read something an average person can read at 40ft.  20/10 is twice as good as average, meaning you can read at 20ft what most people can read at 10ft.  20/8 is pretty much the best vision recorded.


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

[User]
Eli5: Doxxing

I understand what happens, personal information is gathered and released in an effort to effectively blackmail that person, but, how does that information gathering work? How do you get the information? (I swear I'm not planning on doxxing someone, sketch as hell I know)

[Assistant]
You just go look at what the person has posted before. Maybe they mentioned their school in one post, where they lived in another, their mom's name in another. You find their other social media profiles, get more information about them.

The whole point of doxxing (vs. "hacking") is that you just do it by looking at public stuff. It requires no computer skill or knowledge. Anyone can do it with enough time and motivation.

And that's why you shouldn't post real life details on the internet.


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

[User] ELI5: why is scratching on a chalk board so universally horrid sounding?

[Assistant] The frequency of the sound is in a range that irritates the human ear. Sort of like a dog whistle to a dog. Read an article about this. Scientists tested the frequency of the noise and have a better explanation maybe. "The most painful frequencies were not the highest or lowest, but instead were those that were between 2,000 and 4,000 Hz. The human ear is most sensitive to sounds that fall in this frequency range, said Michael Oehler, professor of media and music management at the University of Cologne in Germany, who was one of the researchers in the study.Oehler points out that many acoustic features ofhuman speech, as well as the sound of a crying baby, fall in this frequency band, suggesting that the shape of our ear canal may have evolved to amplify frequencies that are important for communication. Having these frequencies amplified could have been advantageous for survival, allowing people to come to the rescue of their screaming infants quicker, and thus improve their  offspring's chance of survival, or coordinate more effectively during a hunt. In this scenario, a painfully amplified chalkboard screech is just an unfortunate side effect of this (mostly) beneficial development."


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

[User]
[Doctor Who] Since The Doctor and his enemies have travelled back in time, shouldn't the actions in the past have a butterfly effect on the "present"?

Things like Family of Blood, Daleks in Manhattan, Fake Doctor in Victorian England, etc. I haven't seen any of those actually have any effect on the "present", unless you can tell me that somehow, all these things were covered up. People who die in the past should erase people in the present, right? Or even perhaps actions in the past overwriting the current present with a new one?

[Assistant]
Given that the Doctor sometimes encounters the results of things he hasn't done yet, Doctor Who seems to take the 'predestination' approach to time travel, where all this stuff has actually happened already, whether our main characters have experienced it from their perspective yet or not.

With regards to your point about fantastical things happening on earth, it seems that humans in the Doctor Who universe are pretty good at living in denial when it comes to things they don't understand.


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

[User] ELI5: If medical research papers aren't available for free, how does med schools teach their students?Does it mean that different med schools are using different study materials based on the medical papers they have access to?

[Assistant]
The libraries at large universities will have vast collections of academic journals that they subscribe to.  Important studies will get published in the big name journals that should be available in every school.

Even in med school, you're not really going to be focused on learning about cutting edge research but building up a strong background of commonly accepted practice.  There's a big gap between the time a paper on a subject gets published to the time it gets reproduced & becomes common knowledge.


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

[User] If there are solid and gas planets, are there also liquid planets somewhere in the universe?

[Assistant]
Well practically speaking gas planets really are mostly liquid.  Well liquid and metallic hydrogen which is still a fluid. The standard solid liquid gas phases kindof go out the window when dealing with the high pressures interior to these planets. Only the surface is gas, so you kindof really need to think about what you mean by a liquid planet.

You might consider the ice giants kindof a "liquid planet" Currently we class Jupiter and Saturn as gas Giants because they are mostly made out of light elements hydrogen and helium. The ice giants Neptune and Uranus have a large amount of heavier elements/molecules like water, ammonia, and methane.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is it so hard throwing an object straight upwards when lying down?

[Assistant] When you were a child you took a long time to learn how to throw properly, moving your body in just the right way. Throwing (well) is actually quite a complex action, using lots of muscle groups, and if you try to throw in a particular way without having practiced a lot, for example with your non dominant hand, or lying down, you will tend to just use your arm which gives you far less power and just feels wrong.


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

[User] If grass turns brown when it dies, why do grass stains stay green?

[Assistant]
Plant leaves are basically made up two types of photosynthetic pigments: chlorophylls and carotenoids. Chlorophylls gives green color while corotenoids gives brown. In young leaves, the no. of chlorophylls is dominant, so it is green. As the plant gets old, chlorophylls degenarate and carotenoids become dominant. So it gets brown.
However a grass stain is literally dead, so the chlorophylls dont degenate, and remain as it is.


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

[User]
ELI5: Is the stuff that makes animals feathers and fur a multitude of colors the same as the stuff we use to dye materials?

I know that chlorophyll makes plants produce their green color, but what makes a peacocks feathers into a rainbow? Is it the same thing we use to color crayons?

[Assistant] The "rainbow" effect like peacock feathers and beetle shells isn't a dye, it's an optical effect called "diffraction" caused by very small physical features of the surface. It's roughly similar to the physics of rainbows or the colours you see with gasoline on water. You can't extract that and put it in something else, like a crayon, because it's physical, not chemical.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do drugs like meth and crack change someone's appearance?

Thank you all for your contribution! I will get to upvoting all of you... tomorrow.

[Assistant] Constriction of blood vessels decreases the amount of blood that reaches parts of the body, and parts that rely on the smallest vessels may not receive enough blood to remain healthy. Skin and the face are two examples, and the mouth is a special case because other regulating systems are also compromised, like saliva. Smoking complicates mouth problems, and injection further compromises the already-suffering skin with wounds, which the body struggles to heal. Not sure about hair, eyes, and nails and stuff.


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

[User]
ELI5 - Android rooting and IOS Jailbreaking, How does it work?

I get the general overall concept of it (youre manipulating the current OS to replace it with a customized one) but what are the minor steps inbetween and how does it work. Please use simple crude language and not the lingo.

I assume a rudimentary amount of Linux knowledge would help in the process of JB or Root to make it go smoother, but I still get lost in all the different software and firmware versions and methods. Can somebody explain in laymens terms of what what exactly goes on when doing either from start to finish?

You have to understand from an outside observer there are just too many "Rom's" and black snow, white snow, red snow, etc. etc. and broken documentation that makes it get really easy to get lost in the shuffle. It's not like they offer classes in college about this kinda thing yet...

[Assistant]
OK so let's start with the *why*. You just bought a phone and you want it to do something the manufacturer didn't enable. If this was a normal machine you could modify the files on the disk to achieve what you want, but things are different on your phone.

On your computer you might have Administrator (root on Linux) privileges which allow you to change *anything* on your machine, including destroying it (deleting system32, for example) either intentionally or not.

Phones run pretty much the same software (some kind of *nix) but this time you don't have total control, so by extension neither do any of the apps you might be able to run on it.

If the phone manufacturers were competent, this is where we'd stop. You want to change the font on your phone but you don't have the privileges, so you can't.

(un)Fortunately, manufacturers aren't perfect. The software they ship phones with might be vulnerable to some attack that allows software to modify things the manufacturer doesn't trust you to modify. This is how rooting works.

All jailbreaks/roots are based on this principle, get code running on the device, then attack the software to allow it to execute with supervisor privileges (i.e. root). The specifics of these attacks vary, but they're basically doing the same thing a virus would want to do, modify system files.

The best example is the jailbreakme PDF attack. This was a PDF file that was carefully crafted to cause code embedded in the PDF to run as the administrator on iPhones, allowing it to install Cydia. This same attack could be used to place a trojan on an iPhone, just by having the target view this PDF, just how malware spreads vid exploits in Flash. This is why manufacturers fix rise bugs as they're found (as well as protecting their own interests in reducing piracy).

As far as all the *sn0ws and \*ra1ns, these are just names for particular exploits that allow control over the phone's system files to install custom software like Cydia.

Android custom ROMs work similarly, they're essentially custom versions of the operating system that are installed on devices. They're a step above roots because they are normally installed by wiping the old system entirely, whereas rooted firmware is normally slightly modified factory default software.


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

[User]
When a star collapses into a black hole, does the density of the singularity continue to increase forever?

From what I understand, once the star exceeds the electron degeneracy pressure, there's no known force in the Universe that will prevent the star from not only collapsing but to *continue* collapsing. That being said, is the density of the singularity of Sagittarius A* higher than it was, say, yesterday morning if we had some way of measuring it?

[Assistant] It doesn't really make sense to consider the density of the singularity. You can consider the mean density of the entire black hole within the event horizon, which actually decreases as the black hole gets bigger. If you treat the center as a singularity, it has infinite density, like an electron has infinite charge density.


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

[User]
ELI5 why is it so much harder to pick someone up when they clench?

If I try to pick up my son, its easy as pie. However if he sees it coming he clenches and trying to pick him up feels like twice the weight. What gives?

[Assistant]
It is actually easier to pick up someone who is simply "clenching". Except that they are not simply clenching, they are putting their body weight further from you, and that's what makes it harder.

What is also hard, is picking up someone who is completely relaxed, like unconscious (or dead). Because, unless you do it properly, their flailing limbs will keep on moving their center of gravity.


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

[User] [Men in Back] Are there any backup options available to field agents in the unlikely event an individual proved naturally resistant to neuralyzation?

[Assistant] Yes, there are alternative chemical amnesics for that. However, the neuralyzer can be amped up to such power than no normal biological human can resist it successfully. At the highest settings, the neuralyzer will simply wipe your mind clean, and leave you at an infant stage of memory.


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

[User]
[LOVE & THUNDER/INFINITY WAR/ENDGAME] SPOILER QUESTION

Gorr seeks out Eternity in order to have his wish for all gods to be destroyed granted.

Thor explains that the first to reach Eternity at the center of the universe can have whatever wish they convey granted, including and perhaps not limited to reviving the dead.

Why wasn't this something Thor mentioned during the events of Endgame? Given the one shot nature of their quest, surely he could have thought to mention it as a backup? Why wasn't this a factor in the 14mil+ timeliness Dr Strange looked into?

[Assistant]
Thor had no idea how to reach Eternity.  It was such an impossibility that Thor didnt consider it an option. Omnipotent City was filled with a massive amount of gods, the most powerful beings in existence and none of them knew how to reach it.

It wasnt until Gorr figured out that the key was the Bifrost that it ever became possible.


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

[User] Where does the flu virus go when it's not flu season? What is the reservoir it uses to come back from each year?

[Assistant] Sick people. Flu season is just the time of year when the rate of infection by flu increases ~1,000%. But all year long its still steadily transmitting itself from person to person, there is no flu off-season unfortunately.


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

[User]
(WH 40K/ Event Horizon) Is the Event Horizon incident an example of the Warp?

Dear Inquisitor,

I am but a lowly servant of Your Grace and the Emperor of Mankind. I have been assigned to clean a data disk that is allegedly from before the Dark Age of Technology. I have completed the filtering process, using the best tech available to our small library to clean such a crude form of data storage.

What I found was incredible and terrifying.

It appears to be a fictional film, like a book or play that is being acted out. It is the story of a vessel called the *Event Horizon*. In it, the vessel is an experimental craft that is designed to travel faster than light. It's amazing how our ancestors could have such an imagination! But what was terrifying was the story around the ship. The crew of the ship in this story have done nothing less than puncture a hole into the Warp and were consumed by the daemons within!

I nearly destroyed the disk because of this blasphemy! I know it is fiction, but could the people of ancient Terra have made this story as a dramatic re-enactment of a real event? Could the *Event Horizon* have been an example of the Warp, as seen by our naked, innocent eyes? Is this what happens when a Gellar Field collapses?

I have made no copies of this disk, and am ready to destroy it on your orders. I await your response.

[Assistant]
While lost to time, the records of the *Event Horizon*, once released to the public centuries later, were the inspiration for the line of research during the Dark Age of Technology that led to Warp Travel.

Without the guiding light of the Emperor shining through the Warp as the Astronomicon, however, early Warp Engines were.. Iffy.. To say the least.


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

[User] After all the decay is done, why don't teeth just fall out of a human skull?

[Assistant]
Well, they do fall out. Maybe not all of the teeth, but it's very common for teeth to fall out of their sockets, in humans and in animals, because they're actually mostly held in place by soft tissues like ligaments. It also depends on the little tooth sockets in the maxilla (upper jaw) and mandible (lower jaw), because some tooth sockets are tight and the tooth is kinda wedged in there, but sometimes the socket is larger, so it's really just tissues keeping the tooth in place.

Now if someone gets buried, for example, and their bones are just sitting in the dirt for hundreds of years, without anything disturbing or moving them, then the teeth will stay where they are, because there's no gravity or scavenger activity to kind of jostle them out of place. In fact that's one of the things you have to be careful of when you're an archaeologist working with human remains, when you take a skull or jaw out of the dirt, you have to do it very carefully to be sure the teeth don't drop out and get lost.

But if someone dies in the woods, or somewhere on the surface of the ground where scavengers and little critters can move the bones, then the teeth are more likely to fall out, and bones get scattered around as animals eat the tissues. Sometimes they'll drag bones off to their dens, or just far away from the body, so they can eat in peace. That's why human remains that are found outside often have some bones missing, or spread over a large area.

But back to your question: Yes they can and do fall out. That's why they have to get glued in place when it's a medical skeleton, like the kind they use in science classes.


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

[User] ELI5: Is it dangerous to fall asleep with your head under the covers, or will you instinctively wake and gasp for air if needed?

[Assistant]
Unless your covers are made of plastic, you're not going to suffocate under them. But even if they did, you would wake up because your body reacts when there is a buildup of CO2 in your system.

When you here of people suffocating in their sleep due to a gas leak or whatnot, it is because the gas replaces the CO2 and O2 in your system, and our bodies aren't set up to react to that.


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

[User]
How do the scientists estimate mass of galaxies based on their brightness and colour?

I've recently watched YouTube video called Dark Matter's Not Enough by The Royal Institution and I heard there the explanation of dark matter. Presenter said that dark matter idea came from discrepancy between two estimates: there seems to be 5x more mass in galaxies based on their rotation speed than when estimating mass based on their brightness.  I know a little bit of science and I could image measuring mass based on rotation speed but you would need to know how large that galaxy really is, so that I imagine is a bit of a challenge.
The bit that blew my mind was estimating galaxies mass based on star brightness. How such thing can even be possible and how can estimate measurement error for that?
The 5x times discrepancy suggest to me that there might be huge error in there that is not accounted for, meaning that measurement may be incredible inaccurate.

[Assistant]
So the vast majority of normal (baryonic) matter is contained within stars, and obviously stars give off light. We can work out the ratio of how much mass a star has compared to how much light it gives off - this is called the mass-to-light ratio. For example, our Sun is a fairly typical star and has a mass-to-light ratio of  5133 kg/W.

This ratio differs depending on the exact size and composition (stellar class) of the star, but the figure above gives a reasonable "average" value for a population of stars. Therefore if you measure the brightness of a galaxy, you can then work out the mass by simply multiplying by the mass-to-light ratio. As to the errors in this calculation, I'll have to defer to someone more knowledgeable.


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

[User]
Would it be more efficient to send rockets into space from Earth's axis?

So, since we spin on an Axis, would it not be more efficient to fire up a rocket from the north/south axis rather than where we do it in Florida/Texas?  It would seem logical that given the centripetal force, that the atmosphere would even be thinner?? allowing for less force/distance to reach space?

[Assistant]
No.

The atmosphere is slightly thinner at the poles, but the bigger factor is that launching near the equator gives the vehicle additional velocity. Launch vehicles turn east shortly after takeoff. At the equator, this would give roughly 1,040 mph (465 m/s), which is about 4% of escape velocity. Atmospheric drag accounts for a smaller fraction, so it's better to plow through slightly more air and take the extra speed from Earth's rotation.


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

[User] ELI5: When a game's "code is lost" what stops a company from dumping/decompiling code from a disk or cartridge copy of the game for things like remakes and remasters?

[Assistant]
Decompiling isnt all that easy, and if it works at all youre left with bare code that contains no notes about how anything is supposed to work.  Millions of lines of code that someone wrote years ago with no explanation about what they do or why.

While its theoretically possible to reverse engineer a program that way, it is much too time consuming to be practical for a product youre trying to make money on.


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

[User]
Christmas Trees

This might sound dumb. Is there a philosophical argument that a real Christmas tree is better than an artificial one? Like something about reality and beauty?

[Assistant]
To put it simply, yes.

If we go by Platos world of Forms, we can then assume that there is an ideal Christmas tree in the world of Forms by which all physical Christmas trees that we perceive abide by. Since an artificial christmas tree is simply a man-made imitation of what we perceive to be Christmas trees, it then follows that the imitation is a step further away from the ideal Christmas tree in the world of Forms.


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

[User] [Batman] Has Gotham actually improved since Batman started his war on crime?

[Assistant]
Yes.

Oh, sure, *supervillainy* in Gotham is up by an enormous margin, but that's simply the world we live in-- any major city has costumed criminals these days, and Gotham's tend to be a lot lower-powered than those in cities like Central City or Metropolis. And while super-crimes are flashy and cause a lot of property damage, they're statistically *less* destructive than the mob warfare that characterized Gotham for the years before the Batman became active.


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

[User]
Have ethics been solved yet?

If not what are the major problems of it?

[Assistant] What does "ethics being solved" mean to you? If you mean, do we have some ethical theory that everyone agrees on, then the answer is no. If you mean, do we have some rigorously argued for positions in ethics then the answer is yes. If you mean something else, well, what do you mean?


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

[User] How do animals recognize each other without distinguished facial characteristics?

[Assistant]
They do have distinguished facial characteristics. Humans just suck at noticing them because we are not of the same species, nor do we spend enough time around most animals to be able to recognize them.

There's a human disorder called prosopagnosia which is the inability to recognize human faces. For instance, the way someone with this disorder recognizes people they know is by clothing, hair color, eye color, etc. They can see the face, they can see its structure, but there's a mental disconnect where it is hard to recognize it on the fly.

Could you recognize your cat from among several similar cats? Probably. Because you live with it. But when you go to the zoo and look at a monkey habitat you notice no differences because you took only two minutes to observe them. Researchers CAN recognize their animals.


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

[User] ELI5: Why squinting appears to improve your vision.

[Assistant]
Because you may have some form of **astigmatism/Farsightedness** (common eye problem) Whats happening is way to much light is entering your eye and your eyes all like *Whooo dude slow down with all this information im not perfect you know!* as a result you tend to get distorted vision.
When you squint your actually allowing less light or **information** into your eye so your eyes all like *Whoooo brooo i can see this as im only processing a little bit of info, i can totally handle that! But your going to lose things like quality of depth but lets go with it!!*
I hope this answers your question :)


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

[User]
[The Matrix] During the opening office sequence with Neo, how is Morpheus able to give such extremely detailed information?

So, Morpheus gives him step by step instruction. Is he getting all of that from the green falling letters?

[Assistant] Yes. The agents aren't manipulating the matrix so everything is following rather strict guidelines. Morpheus can see the buildings layout and all it's occupants and so on and none of it is changing beyond positions. He can't always do this as active agents will bend the matrix to move around and jump bodies and so on which is more disruptive and harder to follow in real-time.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does being alone in a usually crowded place feels so good ?

I don't know if that's just me, but when I'm alone in a place that is usually full of people / car / noises, I feel really relaxed (e.g walking in the street at night, or in my school during classes)

[Assistant] I think it has to do with the fact that you're in a place that's familiar to you but without the added pressure of socializing with others. Plus, when you're alone, you have a sense of freedom and ownership over the place. When it's crowded with other people, it's clearly a public shared spaced.


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

[User]
[Superman] What crime would the police charge me with for shooting at Superman?

Its common knowledge that Superman is invulnerable to regular bullets, so it would be pretty tough to make the case that I was trying to murder or even harm him in any way.  Hes not a sworn police officer so you cant charge me with assaulting an officer or resisting arrest.  Essentially all Ive done is hit him with the equivalent of a spitball, if that.  So, aside from unlawfully discharging a firearm (and whatever other crimes I am allegedly committing at the time), what do the police charge me with?

[Assistant] Assault with a deadly weapon. Shooting someone with a bulletproof vest is still shooting someone. Unless Superman is cool with taking a bullet from you, or if he was the one who threatened you first, regardless of whether he can take it or not, it's still illegal to fire a weapon at someone.


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

[User]
I represent a galactic trade group. What does Earth have to offer for export?

We have no interest in your raw materials, as all of those are more readily available from asteroid and comet mining. Most of your food is poisonous to us. We find your culture strange and our senses are tuned to different wavelengths, so your dramas tend to be incomprehensible, and your music and artwork tend to be either uninteresting or even painful to us. Still, we are friendly, curious, and similar enough to you to be interested in trade. What do you have to offer?

[Assistant]
We are distance runners par excellence, apex predators, efficient as ambush predators, have fantastic eyesight, dramatically reduced tendency to go into shock compared to the rest of our biosphere, huge livers, and have been infighting for millennia. We have ready deposits of subcutaneous fat for lean times and can swim, climb, and run. Our eyesight and built-in motion-tracking is amazing. We're even macrofauna, among the larger known species of our world.

Arm us and give us even the most basic of training in how to use the equipment and we'll make fantastic mercenaries and soldiers. We can export ourselves. We're pretty fantastic, just in ways that our science fiction multimedia rarely mentions.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do squatters in the UK have rights to where they are squatting? Why can't they be kicked out as soon as they are discovered?

[Assistant]
Although the specific laws and development differ in different places, the ultimate reason is always that the people who have to enforce an eviction don't know in advance who is actually right.

Even if it may seem obvious in a news report, if someone is living at a place and some third party comes in and says "that's not there house!" presumptively believing that second person can create a lot of problems. Generally, society thinks it's better to let the tenant/squatter stay in place while the court system sorts out the truth, rather than acting hastily.

It also incentivizes landowners to monitor their property (and prevent squatters) rather than pushing all the costs to the police.

Of course, this can lead to weird outcomes, but the same thing could happen the other way.


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

[User]
Why are CPU frequencies so much higher than GPU frequencies?

Most CPUs can reach 4.8+GHz easily, whereas most GPUs struggle to get 2+GHz, why is that?

[Assistant]
They're optimized for different tasks.

CPUs need to compute stuff in order, and to get that fast, clock speed is needed to some extend. CPUs will then try to get common operations really fast, and just take some more cycles for complicated stuff.

GPUs on the other hand are built to compute lots of independent things in parallel, and also must do quite a lot of these expensive operations that would take longer than a 4GHz cycle anyway. So they have their own sweet spot for clock speed, but more than make up for it by having more parallel units.


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

[User]
ELI5 : How does oversampling work?

I just don't got it. I'm talking about oversampling on a screen. Let's suppose I have a full HD screen. That means 1080*1920 pixels. When a game purposes to display the image with oversampling, how does it work? My screen still has the same amount of pixels doesn't it? How can it displays a more detailed picture?

[Assistant]
What is the benefit of oversampling? You get a cleaner image for edges, color gradients and transparency.

If you calculate the imagine in a higher resolution first, that imagine contains more *information* about what is going on on the screen in comparison to the lower resolution.

So if you get a FullHD image you get just 1920*1080 pixels, let us assume you calculate a scene in a dark hut in shadows and a fire that throws sparks. Now take some pixel that there is SHADOWY_BACKGROUND and the next pixel to it is RED_FLAME. So you get a sharp transition, a jump from BLACK to RED between the shadow pixels to the left - they are all very dark grey - and the next one, that is a bright red spark. It clearly is discernable as a black surface next to a red block, especially considering the again next pixel is also the same (or very similar) red.

Now you do a oversampling in 4K (this is a good example, as you get exactly twice as many pixels in each dimension): The same transition from the dark shadow to the flame might not be as clear cut. You have a dark shadow, the next pixel is a shade of red, the  next one brighter, the comes the red pixel.

You have the same scene, but with more information, more details about all color gradients, all transparencies, and all edges. If the oversampled image is downsampled, it is not just done by discarding, for example, every second pixel, but the image is processed in way that pixels next to each other are averaged. So instead of BLACK BLACK RED you'd now get BLACK DEEP_SHADE_RED RED in the FullHD image, which means your oversampled FullHD image is cleaner regarding *all* color gradients that are next to each other than a native FullHD would have been.

In this way, oversampling works like a full-screen all-details anti-aliasing. Just with the difference that it works with internally more details that the native resolution would provide. Normal anti-aliasing basically works by blurring the image in smart ways, oversampling works with more details and then uses that to average near pixels instead of just "blurring around".


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

[User]
I believe the US Presidency should be limited to one 6-year term. CMV

Our political system is broken. Representatives spend so little time legislating and SO MUCH time campaigning for re-election. Senators are only slightly better.

The President needs to be the one to make tough decisions in this country. Unpopular decisions. Decisions that might kill his approval ratings in the short term, but will end up helping the country in the long.

If the President isn't constantly obsessing over his approval rating, he's more free to do what he feels is right. He's also less disposed to special interests.

Do you think the advantages to the current system (4-year term, 1 re-election) outweigh the benefits of a change?

[Assistant]
Well, it's not like there's a sudden upsurge of productivity during a President's Last/Final term.  He's got no worries about reelection then, but, in case you didn't notice during the Shutdown, things can still grind to a halt.

The thing is, the President doesn't really have much to due with policy-making.  He can spearhead new ideas and campaign for certain legislation, sure, but at the end of the day, it's still all on Congress.  They're the ones who vote for or against something.  And they're ALWAYS up for reelection (hell, if you're a representative, you only get 2 year chunks), so they're always gonna to be watching the polls.


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

[User]
[Godzilla] How did Godzillasaurus survive the K-Pg mass extinction?

Godzillasaurus was the ancestor of Godzilla, but unlike him, he just appears to be a regular theropod dinosaur.

[Assistant]
Unfortunately, we don't know a lot. The world's governments are more interested in researching the current, mutated Godzillasaur that we know as Godzilla, than in allowing expeditions to find more about the pre-mutation Godzillasaur.

The only documented encounters we have with a specimen of Godzillasaurus, prior to the appearance of Godzilla is from WWII, on the Pacific island known as Lagos (not to be confused with the one off Africa), located somewhere near the Gilbert and Marshall Islands. Eyewitness accounts are spotty, and the veterans are mostly gone these days. Plus, G-Force has denied most civilian research on the island for fear of Godzilla returning there on one of his rampages.

There is not a lot of publically-available geographical and ecological data on the island, or how old it is geologically. The islands in that part of the world are volcanic in nature and may likely be younger than the K-T Extinction.

Likewise, there has been no fossil evidence of Godzillasaur found (not surprising, as there are likely millions of extinct species we've never found fossil evidence of). We don't know what their native range was or what they evolved from. Despite some resemblance to therapods, Godzillasaurus apparently had four toes. Some speculate that the species did not evolve until well *after* KT. This hypothesis states that a small, warm-blooded carnivorous dinosaur species, perhaps with some amphibious traits, survived KT along with small mammals, and somehow found a niche to occupy in the post-KT world. Eventually this species's evolutionary descendants migrated toward the Pacific and found its way to Lagos before dying out elsewhere. On Lagos, the Godzillasaurus evolved through convergent evolution to become the island's apex predator, with strong resemblance to the therapods of old.

From there, nuclear tests had a strange effect on the last surviving (as far as we know) Godzillasaurus's DNA, causing the mutation into Godzilla.

(Note: This is based off the canon of the Heisei-era Godzilla series, beginning with Godzilla 1984 and ending with Godzilla vs. Destroyah)


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

[User] When it comes to cables that transfer data, do the angles at which it is bent have effect upon its transfer rate?

[Assistant] It's not quite like a garden hose, where bending it flat will reduce the flow.  A sharp bend in a transmission line creates an impedance mismatch, which can cause signal reflections.  These reflections create interference that could lead to read errors on the receiving end.  When this happens the data packet fails the checksum test and the packet needs to be resent.  This is what affects the transfer rate.


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

[User]
[Fallout Universe] If someone with advanced knowledge of modern day computers(how they work, how to build them, understanding programming) were transfered into the Fallout universe, what kind of advancements could they make?

Would they be able to bring order to the world? Make it better? Become rich?

[Assistant]
They'd be pretty badly hamstrung to start, to be honest. Fallout's tech development followed a very different path than ours, so a lot of a computer expert's knowledge wouldn't transfer to working with their systems. The hardware is different, meaning the underlying logic is different, meaning the program languages are different. In some ways, they're worse off than an individual coming in with no computer knowledge at all; not only do they need to learn something new, but they need to keep their knowledge of "our computers" separate from their knowledge of "these other computers".

That said, someone with the patience and skill to become a computer expert could probably do pretty well for themselves, in the right circumstances. Once the initial learning curve is overcome, they would be able to bring new insights to the post-War tech field, since they bring a very different perspective to the field; in addition to asking a lot of "stupid" questions that people have never really bothered to answer and inadvertently challenging dogma just because they don't know it's there, they also have a completely alien perspective from the local techies. If they could get in with a relatively civilized community long enough to get their bearings (NCR, Followers of the Apocalypse, Lyon-era East Coast Brotherhood, some parts of the Commonwealth, etc.), they could make a very strong go of it.


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

[User]
CMV: Ukraine is winning the war now and theyd be stupid to try and make a deal with russia at this point

Someone proposed the idea that Ukraine should try and make a deal with Russia at this point. The reasoning being it will save more lives but I cant see how that would be beneficial or smart.

Firstly the Ukrainian people to my knowledge want to fight this war. To make a deal to save lives that dont want to be saved doesnt make sense.

Ukraine has been holding their ground longer than anyone would have expected, and they are winning. Russias economy is heading to the gutter and its people dont even want to fight the way anymore. Ukraine has successfully been able to push them back and are still receiving aid from the US and other allies.

If anything Ukraine should keep pushing to take back land from Russia.

Even if Ukraine were to make a deal with Russia, Putin would never take it because it would most likely be a deal that had Russia getting the worse end of the stick.

Even if Putin did accept the deal all it would mean is Ukraine got too tired of fighting a war they were winning, and it would also mean that if a big country like Russia could bully a country long enough they would give in.

[Assistant] The only way this war ends is Ukraine putting up enough of a fight that Russia signs a peace treaty and ends it. Thats what the end game of this war looks like. The question is if Russia has felt like they have taken enough of a hit that its worth capitulating to the Ukrainians. Even if we imagine some heroic push that ends with all of the Russian forces being pushed out of Ukraine, It doesn't mean the war is over. It just means they have to now defend their outermost border until a treaty is signed. The point im trying to make is that a deal is the only way this war ends. Ukraine is winning, which means they can start negotiations from a position of strength. If they don't like the deal that is on the table they can go right back to fighting. You might as well start talks now, because they have power to make demands and literally nothing to lose.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Did Anakin plan on sparing Obi Wan?

In Revenge of the Sith while Anakin and Obi Wan are talking before they fight Anakin says Dont make me kill you. Does that mean he planned on sparing him?  Does he think hell turn to the dark side as well and help him? What did he mean by that?

[Assistant] I think "plan" would be a very generous way to describe what Anakin was up to those days. Anakin was a man who had pretty much completely lost his grip on his own will, and was so fucked up at that point that after spending an entire movie freaking out about Padme's safety, proceeded to choke the shit out of her on the boarding ramp to the ship. Between his own confusion and losing himself to the Dark Side, Skywalker is pretty much grasping at straws, trying to rationalize his internal image as a kind friend and lover with his new state as a treasonous, child-killing monster.


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

[User]
What brain function takes over when I'm able to zone out while driving and still navigate turns and make stops without incident?

While driving to work today, I began thinking about something completely random but it took over my conscious mind and I wasn't actively concentrating on driving.  When I "came to" I had driven miles down the road.  Why didn't I wreck and how can I exploit this in other areas of my life?

[Assistant]
The brain forms neural connections based on common activities. The more often you do the activity, the more connections are formed, thus improving the throughput across the 'ol synapses. The reverse actually occurs as well: if you don't do something for a long time, the brain scavenges some of that material, and downgrades the path in favor of something you do MORE often.

The practical upshot of this is that, if you do something constantly, and it's reasonably repetitive, you don't have to put much attention into it...The channels are so optimized, that it's not conscious anymore.

The problem is when you break the habit. When you get up in the morning, get in the car, and *don't* go to work. When you're driving down the road, and something unexpected happens. This is basically the same across all learned behaviour.


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

[User] [War of the Worlds] If the aliens that invaded us are weak to our bacteria why are we not affected by their bacteria?

[Assistant]
They don't have any.

"Micro-organisms, which cause so much disease and pain on Earth, have either never appeared upon Mars or Martian sanitary science eliminated them ages ago. A hundred diseases, all the fevers and contagions of human life, consumption, cancers, tumours and such morbidities, never enter the scheme of their life."


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

[User] [Metroid] Samus Aran's a bounty hunter right? What notable bounties has she brought in?

[Assistant]
An infant metroid after being hired to exterminate the entire species on its homeworld.  Though the infant wasn't a bounty, the Federation researchers were happy to have it.

The rest of the extermination went pretty well, considering, though.

Further back she was hired to deal with the known pirate base on Zebes, but that occurred before the planet's destruction (rumor has it Aran played a not-to-small part in that, though it was no bounty when she went back a second time).

The Federation basically seems to treat her as a one-woman HTR Unit, which is fair, as she's got enough Chozo in her to be faster and stronger than most others, and that's before you even bring her power suit into the equation.  She's not going to be hired to bring in some small-time hacker, or a small-time gang harassing trade on lesser-used routes.  She's earned enough respect that they bring her in for things that tend to have a major impact.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why Is Ten Where We Put the Zero?

I dont even know how to explain this one really. But in numbers why do we choose to make ten double digits? And subsequently why then is 100 and all other squares of ten where we add the extra zeros/digits? Is there something special about ten itself and its powers or was it just chosen randomly?

[Assistant]
Ten was chosen likely because we have ten fingers.

We could choose a different number to be "10", so for example binary uses two (counting up goes 0, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101 and so on). There is also hexadecimal, which uses 16 (so counting goes 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F, 10, 11 and so on). There are various different ways of counting numbers, using different *bases*, but base-ten seems to be the one we've stuck on.


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

[User]
How much plagiarism will you tolerate?

I teach at a small college and I'm presently involved in a case of plagiarism where the student has gotten her parents and my boss involved. This lead me to wonder what the general consensus is on plagiarism. Do you allow any of it? Would you let it slide if the student was just missing quotation marks or forgot to add something to their bibliography? Does anyone have a zero tolerance policy for all cheating? Are there some people who let flagrant plagiarism (buying/copying essays from the web) slide just because reporting students is so much trouble?

Just curious what people's standards are.

[Assistant]
I think the line between plagiarism and misattribution is pretty clear. If you would have accepted the paper with the quotation marks in, it's misattribution, and the student should get a warning talk and maybe a small grade penalty. If the quotation marks wouldn't have made it okay, it's plagiarism.

Fortunately for me, though, the university where I've been teaching had an office that took care of all this stuff. They made all the decisions about guilt and sanctions.


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

[User] Why is it that even when a donated organ is a match, the recipient still has to go on anti rejection drugs? Furthermore, why is it way harder to find a match for a donor organ than it is for donor blood?

[Assistant]
With blood

 * There is a small number of compatibility factors (blood type and Rhesus +/- factor are the main ones), which means that for any given person, there are many people with the same type of blood
 * Therefore, we can give you blood that is a near-perfect match for your own, so you don't need immunosuppression
 * Blood cells are recycled and have ~120 day life-span, so even if you needed immunosuppression, you'd only need it for a few months.

With all other cells, and therefore all tissue that contains cells (this excludes, for example, ligaments that have been irradiated to destroy donor cells while retaining the connective tissue):

* There are many compatibility factors (called histocompatibility factors), so there is usually nobody who is a perfect match (except for identical twins)
* Therefore, we have to reduce your changes of rejection both by giving you as close a match as we can *and* by suppressing your immune system
* That's why when we say someone's an organ "match", we mean "close enough that immunosuppression therapy can work", not "perfect match".
* And since your transplanted organs are with you forever, you have to be on immunosuppressants forever.


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

[User] [Marvel/DC] Most super powers seem to have a problem with conservation of matter or energy. Is there any explanation that address where characters get the extra matter required to regenerate or transform, or calories required to fly or shoot beems of energy?

[Assistant] Yes. Specifically in Marvel, things come from a different dimension. Cyclops's eyes are actually more akin to portals to the "Punch" dimension. It varies from power to power, but some are straight reality warpers that create matter within their own universe.


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

[User]
CMV Suicide should be legal

I know I'm probably gonna get a lot of hate for this but realistically I don't fully understand why it isn't. None of us ever really chose to be alive yet by law we're required to maintain an existence we never asked for. I'm not suicidal, I'm just genuinely confused why there isn't more discussion about this. Suicide is such a touchy subject, and we've all been lead to believe that it's never the answer even though we don't even know how or why we are alive to start with. Does it make sense to make someone keep something they never wanted in the first place? I know it's more complicated than that, but I feel like there needs to be a real discussion about this.

Edit: I know there's loads of arguments to either side of this debate and honestly I hate arguing I just really felt like there needed to be a discussion about this. The media and all of us are so brain washed in a sense to fear death and things surrounding it rather than understand that its not all bad. Pretty much everyone I have met on this post has been pretty adamant against my points, but I'm honestly just glad we can talk about it. I hope this post helps some people understand that this doesn't neccecary have to be a one sided issue. Thank you guys :)

[Assistant] In many cases, depression can be effectively treated and people can be brought back to the state of mind they were in prior to their depressive episode. In many cases of mental illness, suicide should stay illegal, however, in cases where the afflicted individual doesnt respond to medication or therapy, the individual should be allowed to end their own life. Same applies for physical illness. If one is terminally ill and wants to put their life to an end before they succumb to their disease, they should be entitled to do so.


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

[User]
Any advice for a someone who aspires to be a philosopher?

It is the one thing I always loved. It is called philosophy. And for the first time in my life ( 17 years old ) I have started reading it and watching lectures about it. Yet I feel like I am missing something or doing something wrong, perhaps I am missing intelligence ( Average educated right now - Now doing above average education ) or perhaps it is due to my ADD ( Which prevents me from fully concentrating on the text which I'm reading ). Anyway, I love it, just as much I love science and just as much I love music. But I still feel like I'm not making any real progress, meaning that I am not really developing the philosophical mindset or skill. I still have sometimes a lot of trouble mainly with logic and things like philosophy of mind. For example: I read something and they use arguments which literally kill my brain ( metaphorically ). I am always open-minded, I always use a dictionairy, I always try my best. I assume you know where I am going. It is a lot of trouble I know that. Most philosopher in history had different views, different backgrounds, different arguments. So any advice about how one can get a more philosophical mindset? How one can become a better philosopher? How can one develop himself correctly as a philosopher? How one can improve this great skill? How one can read philosophy ( Works like: Beyond good and evil or the gay science, Being and time, Aristotle's metaphysics, Major works of Ludwig Wittgenstein ( I am planning to read all those ), philosophy of mind and logic ( Those two in particulair hurt my brain )) and making sure his brain survives?!

I here apoligize If I have been wasting to much of your time for such a simple question and I ofcourse I apoligize for If I have been obscure or unclear. Anyway for those who did understood and answered, thank you for answering! I will try my best to take the advice to my own heart!

[Assistant]
>How one can become a better philosopher? How can one develop himself correctly as a philosopher?

Reading. A lot. There are reading lists out there, but the important thing is to just *do* it.

Writing too. Loads of it.

On a more personal level, get your condition under control. Meds, therapy, daily rituals/procedures, meditation, whatever works. That'll help you with *life*, not just philosophy.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do accidental notes in music have word accident in them?

[Assistant]
In old-school philosophy things were described as having an *essential nature*.  Objects behaved according to their essential nature - rocks fell downwards, smoke rose upward, dogs barked, water flowed, old men were grumpy, and so on.

Anything that happened that was contradictory to something's essential nature was *accidental*.  So if you threw a rock upwards, that was accidental motion of the rock.  If you dammed a river to stop it from flowing, that was accidental motion of the water.  Make an old man happy, that was an accidental mood, and so on.

Expanding that into music, the key signature at the start of the piece sets the "essential nature" of the notes.  If there are notes that go against this essential nature, that have to be marked with their own sharps or flats, those are accidental notes.


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

[User]
CMV: popular vote is not superior to the Electoral College.

If my understanding is wrong, please tell me, because this would probably change my mind.

So the way it makes sense to me is that if we have the popular vote, the more people who vote will win. Just like almost everything else we vote on outside of politics.

And the Electoral College prevents this from happening by attempting to give states like Maine or Rhode Island the same voting power as California or Colorado.

People want a popular vote because it makes sense as the one with the more popular opinion wins.

So this is my question/ opinion...

Lets say 51% of the country is progressive and 49% is conservative. Does that mean that almost half the country just has to deal with it? They just dont get a say in the matter?

If I flipped those numbers, and the conservatives won, would you for the popular vote as much?

This largely assumes that the two sides would never change and therefore it would always be a progressive or conservative President, as a result. I do realize people change their minds.

[Assistant]
>Lets say 51% of the country is progressive and 49% is conservative. Does that mean that almost half the country just has to deal with it? They just dont get a say in the matter?

Yes, because either way, almost half the people in the country have to deal with it. The more popular vote should be the one that sticks.

It's like when you were a kid. Say you've got 3 siblings so there's 4 children and 2 parents. You're discussing what to do for dinner.   The parents want to go to Chili's but you and your 3 brothers want to get outback. Well, you're going to Chili's because the electoral votes are the parents. They have more say. The popular vote doesn't matter and 2/3 of the people just have to deal with it.

That's exactly what's going on now except everyone voting is an adult so they shouldn't be able to pull the "parent" card.


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

[User] How is Netflix streaming so reliable and high quality compared to other streaming services?

[Assistant]
Netflix has has servers all over the world so you are likely not receiving your content from far away.
But i believe one of the biggest things is the bandwidth you have, Netflix is very good at streaming across low bandwidth connections due to excellent data compression algorithms that make the stream more stable.

But in saying that i have seen many many websites that transmit steams that are jut as good as Netflix if not better in some cases.


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

[User] What economic theories are wrong/incorrect?

[Assistant]
There have been numerous economic theories that turned out to be wrong/incorrect. On a very high level, back in the 19th century, people tended to assume that prices reflected value in some way, in the 1870s there was the marginal revolution in economics which overturned this assumption and fundamentally transformed economic thought.

In the 1960s and 70s, the failure of import substitution industrialisation policies, the failure of many resource-rich countries to grow and the economic success of the Asian Tiger economies despite being resource-poor (and in Hong Kong's case, ideologically committed to free-markets) overturned a lot of theories about economic development.

In the 1970s, the Lucas Critique overturned a lot of work in macroeconomics, that relied on statistical relationships to make policy predictions.

More recently a number of studies by behavioural economists have failed to replicate.

There are also a number of economic theories that are in the strictest sense wrong but are still useful. E.g. the Efficient Markets Hypothesis has some anomalies and has failed some very demanding tests but it's still the case that economists reckon you shouldn't try to "beat the market." Or, demand curves don't strictly speaking have to slope downwards but for almost all purposes it's reasonable to assume they do.


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

[User]
[Hitchhikers guide] how were the people of earth able to understand jeltz when he was announcing the destruction of the planet?

Now i can just pass of the zaphod trillian thing, but as soon as ford and arthur are on the vogon ship , garbled gibberish plays over the ships sound system thus bringing us into the explanation of the babel fish. But how is tje earth able to understand jeltz, because the vogons really dont seem like a race that would go through the paper work required to get some kind of universal translator to announce their intentions to a planet just to blast it out of the sky anyways.

[Assistant]
> the vogons really dont seem like a race that would go through the paper work required to get some kind of universal translator

I think you've fundamentally misunderstood the Vogons here. They are, as a species, the most bloody-minded and obnoxious bureaucrats in the universe. They would absolutely delight in filling out the paperwork in triplicate, querying it, resubmitting it, re-re-submitting it, burying it in soft peat for three months, and recycling it as firelighters.

And, once all that was done, they would also delight in telling the population of insignificant backwater blue planets how comprehensively fucked they are in their own languages, and also blaming them for not having the foresight and technology to do something about it.


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

[User] ELI5: How do benzodiazepines work to quiet anxiety/panic?

[Assistant] There is a molecule in your brain called GABA. Think of GABA as the brakes of your brain. With anxiety, your brain is basically pushing the accelerator down all the time. Benzodiazepines work by increasing the effects of GABA, sort of like adding a brick to the brake pedal. This helps slow down the over-stimulation of anxiety.


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

[User]
4th Year Phd...My Advisor Was Denied Tenure...

Hello everyone!

I found out this morning that my advisor was denied tenure. His contract runs through May 2020, which is conceivably when I should graduate, but I have so many questions. I very firmly do NOT want to switch advisors, he's the most supportive professor I've ever met and has been helping me develop my research all 4 years of the program so he is very familiar with my work and is supportive despite my fairly controversial dissertation topic (I'm doing applied stats in a political science program). I'm his only student. I don't know what happens next...has anyone been through this? What happens now? I'm devastated.

[Assistant]
You're about to have a very frank discussion with your advisor, specifically concerning your graduation timeline and any issues that may arise with your funding.

I'd expect him to try and find a "co-chair" for your committee in case anything comes up that causes him to leave before his contract is up (i.e. a new job) or you simply not being finished.


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

[User]
[Dexter] What would the social ramifications be of a world that has as many serial killers as Miami does in Dexter?

Every season, especially towards the end of the series, Dexter battles with multiple serial killers, all with different M.O.s. (Ice Truck Killer, Harry's nurse, Miguel Prado, Trinity, Jordan Price and the other Barrel Girls Killers, Doomsday Killer, Hannah McKay, Zach Hamilton, Oliver Saxon/The Brain Surgeon... not to mention Dexter) What would a world look like in which we had to be worried about a new Serial Killer showing up in Miami alone every few months?

[Assistant]
John Douglas, the guy who ran the FBI's original profiling unit, and the inspiration for Jack Crawford in the Hannibal Lecter books, calls it a "very conservative estimate" that there are between 35 and 50 active serial killers at any given time in the USA.

It is probably safe to assume that they're more likely to be active in major cities than evenly distributed, one serial killer per state. So the idea that there could be a handful of serial killers operating in Miami at any given time is actually pretty plausible for the real world.


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

[User] Since light can't escape from a black hole, can gravitational waves escape? If not, how do black holes have gravity?

[Assistant]
>Since light can't escape from a black hole, can gravitational waves escape?

No, they can't, assuming they originate inside of the event horizon.  Waves originating outside the event horizon and directed outwards will of course escape, the same way light would.

>If not, how do black holes have gravity?

Don't think of gravity (or electromagnetism) as a continuous exchange of gravitons or gravitational waves; it's not.  Gravitational waves are produced when masses accellerate.  If you have two masses which are stationary with respect to eachother, they won't suddenly emit gravitational waves, but they *will* be attracted to eachother.  It is the gravitational *field* that causes them to be attracted; even without any gravitational waves at all, the attraction will still occur.

(Above, replace "gravitational wave" with "electromagnetic wave", "graviton" with "photon," and "mass" with "charge" and the same statements apply for electromagnetism.)

Objects which fall into a black hole are being accelerated and will emit gravitational waves on their way towards the event horizon.  For an outside observer, these waves escape just fine, and the object never crosses the event horizon anyway from their perspective.

You can think of a gravitational wave as a moving *change* in the curvature of spacetime.  Even if the curvature is not changing, there may still be curvature present (and massive bodies will tend to "roll together").  Same with electromagnetism -- photons are propagating *changes* in the electromagnetic field potential; even if you have a static field, the potential difference between two points may not be zero (and opposite charges will attract).

Hope that helps.


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

[User]
ELI5: How do websites that fake items (particularly watches) get away with using the companies logo?

I found a bunch of seemingly legit sites that sell almost exact fakes of Rolex, Tag, Movado etc.

Why don't these get shut down by the actual companies for copyright infringement?

[Assistant]
If you're a Swiss watch company, you don't have any authority to shut down a company in Uzbekistan.  About the best you can do is get your government to call their government and complain, hoping that they'll deal with the copyright infringer for you.

If the infringer is based somewhere like the US or Canada with at least barely functional copyright laws, the risk is high and the odds of getting shut down are good, but for example the Chinese government have made it pretty clear that they could care less whether Chinese companies are knocking off Western goods.

Meanwhile, customs doesn't have the time, budget or manpower to inspect every watch that gets Fedexed into the country to prove whether or not it's authentic, so in the unlikely event that one counterfeiter does get caught,  his neighbour re-opens the website the next day at a different address and goes right back to work.


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

[User] [DC] Batman dies and is seen dying by many in some big televised on-earth alien war thing. How does the Justice League recover the body, handle the funeral, and deal with the whole "Bruce Wayne is now also dead" thing?

[Assistant]
Probably the same way his "death" was handled in the Dark Knight Rises. Funeral for Bruce, bury him at Wayne Manner, Gotham City constructs a giant statue of Batman as a memorial.

I highly doubt anyone is going to question the League if they walk in and say "we need the body."

As for the "Bruce Wayne" thing, they could make up many excuses. Died in the Alien War, disappeared on his yacht or private jet somewhere at sea, etc.


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

[User] [Game of Thrones] Was Aegon the Conqueror a follower of R'hllor, if so why didn't he enforce his religion in Westeros?

[Assistant]
No, he was a follower of the Valyrian Religion, of which little is known.

As for why he didn't enforce his religion, almost his entire kingdom followed the Seven. It was a sound political move to adopt their gods.


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

[User]
Are there any Philosophers of Art which have examined the idea of the starving or suffering artist?

After reading Antic Hay by Aldous Huxley, this quote stick out to me : "Perhaps it is good for one to suffer. Can an artist do anything if he's happy? Would he ever want to do anything? What is art, after all, but a protest against the horrible inclemency of life?"

Are there any philosophers of art that explore this sort of idea?

[Assistant] This is a central concept in Nietzsche's thought. He considered Goethe to be the pinnacle example of the Ubermensch because he defied societal conventions to transform his suffering into great works of art.


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

[User]
ELI5: What is a "startup" company and how do they work? What is the employee/department structure like?

I live in NYC and many of my acquaintances have told me that they work for a startup. I feel foolish asking for a detailed explanation.

Please and thanks :)

[Assistant]
- A startup could have been formed last week or 4 years ago.
- They could be working in a garage out of a $1000 investment from a founder, or a 5 million venture capital they painstakingly raised over several rounds of financing after showing steady improvements and meeting the targets they promised they would.
- They could have 2 people working 100 hours a week each and creating a web app, or 50 people working 100 hours a week each and creating the world's first commercial space shuttle.
- Ideally the startup is "flat" and devoid of heirarchy. The CEO can regularly cleans out the sink and loads the dishwasher. The engineer also signs for Fedex deliveries and keeps the bathroom tissue stocked. The intern spends his day helping with market research and making databases of prior patents, competition etc. Come lunch, every one lunches together and discusses their weekend, the game next month, or the concert last week.
- Dressing is usually casual - jeans, t-shirt, sneakers...sometimes even shorts.
- Focus is on getting your product launched successfully or pleasing a customer, and little importance is given to exactly how many hours you logged in a week. In the same token, startups are more flexible when it comes to employees taking time off. With more freedom comes greater accountability.
- There is a no set path, no formal document that guides you to a certain new process. You explore a lot and frequently have to create a document out of scratch so that future employees down the line may benefit from it.
- Pay usually does not match a comparable job in a Fortune 500 company. However they do make it up by offering stocks. The earlier you join a startup, the more risk you take, therefore the larger chunk of the equity you could hope to bargain for.

Hope this helps. Ask any specific questions. Will be happy to help.