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

[User]
[Zoboomafoo] Zoboomafoo is a talking, sentient primate in an almost exact copy of our world with few fantastical elements. Does he have human rights?

Furthermore:

1. Zoboomafoo is from Zobooland despite it clearly being established in the show's canon that Madagascar exists. Is Zobooland a Madagascan equivalent of Wakanda?

2. Animal Junction is either in the United States or Canada. Is Zoboomafoo a documented citizen, or is ICE coming to get his ass?

[Assistant]
Animal Junction is pretty much a pocket dimension alongside the "normal" world. Zoboo is just a normal lemur until he partakes of the mind expanding substances unique to Animal Junction.

He doesn't have full access to his memories from the "normal" lemur state. That's why he thinks he's from Zobooland and why the stories he tells from there are filled with unusual drug-trippy animals.

ETA: Regarding customs & immigration - as a parallel pocket dimension, we're lucky that AJ even follows the laws of physics much less the laws of man or beast.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do people want to laugh in a staring competition?

[Assistant]
Our deep down animal side makes us feel a little nervous if someone stares at us wide eyed with a serious face. This is because before we were the humans we are today who can communicate with words, we used to be animals who had to talk using our bodies. Staring without flinching used to be a way of challenging someone's dominance and is sometimes used today when two people fight and/or argue. If two people who are friendly stare at each other nonstop, they will feel awkward and often laugh to break the tension felt from our evolutionary instincts to fight.

Tl;Dr If two people stare at each other they both feel nervous, not because they actually want to fight but because of our evolutionary history and how we used our bodies/face to speak for us. We laugh to break that tension.


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

[User]
ELI5: In baseball how does the "Hidden ball" trick work, as seen on the front page today.

I assume a 5 year old probably doesn't play much baseball or any baseball at all, like me. Also, is it a 'legal' move to make?

[Assistant]
In baseball, the ball is almost always in play.  In other words, the defense is allowed to tag out runners between plays and the offense can steal bases between pitches.  Normally when the fielders are concerned about a runner on base, the pitcher simply makes a pickoff throw, meaning that he throws the ball to a fielder covering a base, rather than throwing a pitch to the batter.

With the hidden ball trick, the fielders find some way to get the ball to a fielder covering a base without the runner knowing.  As soon as the runner steps off the base, the fielder tags the runner with the ball.  Since the runner is tagged off of a base, he's out.

Please note that there is one particular rule that makes the hidden ball trick particularly difficult.  In the MLB, the pitcher can't touch the rubber (white area on the pitcher's mound where pitches are thrown from) after giving the ball to a teammate to hide.  (Other leagues require that the pitcher can't be anywhere on the pitcher's mound.)  This makes the trick difficult because it's harder to convince the runner that the ball's in the pitcher's hands if he's not standing in the place where he would normally pitch the ball.


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

[User]
ELI5: What's to stop someone from broadcasting a radio frequency that is already taken by a local station?

For example: if a local top hits station uses 92.5 FM, what's to stop Joe-Shmo from broadcasting on the same frequency and disrupting the local stations radio?

[Assistant] He will quickly be located and shut down by the FCC. Plus, he would need some powerful broadcasting equipment to disrupt the radio station over its whole area. That equipment is expensive to get and too big to hide.


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

[User]
Does water aeration affect beverage flavor, and if so, how?

I've seen people say over and over that you need to brew coffee and tea with freshly boiled water, rather than water that has been kept warm for a long period of time or boiled multiple times.  The reason given is that the water is no longer aerated anymore.  People say the water tastes "stale", or that it makes tea taste "flat".  When asked, no one can really describe what this "flat" taste is.  Is there any sort of scientific basis to this?

I guess I can buy that extended heating or repeated boiling can drive out dissolved gasses.  If that is the case, how quickly does it happen?  Seconds?  Minutes?  Hours?  How would this affect the flavor of a beverage?  If at all, which gasses are causing the effect?  Oxygen, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, something else entirely, or a combination of several?

[Assistant] I believe the gas that actually affects the taste most is carbon dioxide, though it is typically stated to be oxygen. The carbon dioxide, when dissolved in water, forms carbonic acid, which has a characteristic sharp taste. It is dissolved carbon dioxide/carbonic acid, for example, which is responsible for the taste of unflavored seltzer water. Obviously, there is much less dissolved carbon dioxide in water than carbonated beverages. However, prolonged boiling will drive out the carbon dioxide, reducing the pleasant sharp taste and making the water and resulting brewed beverage taste flat. The pH increase caused by the reduced carbonic acid levels could also affect the extraction of compounds from the coffee/tea, although this effect is much more complicated.


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

[User] In the early stages of the Big Bang (Quark-lepton era) why was there slightly more matter than antimatter?

[Assistant]
We have some hypotheses, but we don't know.

One thing we do know is that matter and antimatter are not perfectly symmetric -- in collider experiments we have been able to start with equal amounts and end up with unequal amounts.

Problem is, all of the known symmetry-violating processes combined are not able to explain the full abundance.  At most they explain why a galaxy or two of matter was produced more than antimatter, not an entire observable universe's worth.

Typical hypotheses tend to be along the lines of "there are other unknown processes like the known ones which existed in the early universe" and we have some models of such hypothetical processes (generally called "baryogenesis" hypotheses) but we don't actually know of any such processes; there may even be multilple unknown processes responsible.  It is an active area of research!

Hope that helps.


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

[User]
Is gender a real thing?

When it comes to gender identity, I find it very difficult to answer What is it to be a woman/man without either appealing either to physical sex, or a set of traits, characteristics or actions which arent shared by all.

I think that if we have to say, to be a woman is to be a caregiver, a mother, or anything like that, or to say that a man is a provider, or a protector or something like that, then were back to the old rigid gender categorisation of behaviours and characteristics which are often very generalised and stereotypical.

The problem then, is if gender is often said to be a kind of feeling, and that feeling appeals to preconceived notions of what a woman or a man should be like, then how can we say that gender is a thing without appealing to some traditional or almost conservative conception of what a man or a woman is, or what theyre supposed to look like?

Are we left then with either; gender exists, and it is constituted by social labels being attributed to traits, characteristics and behaviours/interests. Gender exists, and it is tied to biological sex (hence hormone treatment and surgery). Or gender is not something which can be applied to humans, more like something which is applied to words, and thus doesnt exist in the way it is said to be as an identity.

Id appreciate some insight on this and hopefully to have an actual conversation on the matter!

I would also like to clarify, that I do not aim to devalue ANYBODY, or to dismiss anyones feelings. I just want to have a conversation where we can ask questions about what we do not know, in order to hopefully get closer to the truth together.

[Assistant]
>Are we left then with either; gender exists, and it is constituted by social labels being attributed to traits, characteristics and behaviours/interests.

This is the most common view among Philosophers, with 43% of Philosophers saying this on the most recent Philpaper survey, with the idea that gender is either biological (15%), psychological (4%), or unreal (2%) being significantly less popular.

One concern would seem to be that while yes there is a social system of gender, it's not the case that people who are assigned to x or y gender in fact have all the traits that are assigned to that gender, but this isn't something exclusive to gender, for instance Philosophers also think race is social (53%), and good luck finding some list of traits that all black people have in common.


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

[User]
[MCU] How well known is Dr Strange?

The Avengers are world famous for obvious reasons, with some more popular than the others. How popular is Strange?

[Assistant] Strange was world renowned as a surgeon, but the only people who know about what happened after his accident are people who witnessed it. So, in the medical community, Strange is well known as a surgeon who had an accident that forced him to stop practicing medicine and disappeared from the public eye.


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

[User]
Why does lithium react so violently with water?

I've seen somebody put lithium in water, obviously it started crackling and creating sparks but I wanted to know why.

[Assistant] Atoms and molecules are always trying to find their way to their most stable state.  In the case of Lithium, it has an extra valence electron compared to the noble gases (with their full outer shells), and it'd prefer not to have that one, so it donates it readily, forming an ion with +1 charge.  That ion, however, wants to be neutralized by something with a -1 charge, which it can pull off by pulling an OH- from the water (which is plentifully surrounding it while immersed in water).  The hydrogen is then free to become whatever it wants to be!  But in this case, the reactions gave off a lot of heat, and the hydrogen then finds the most stable thing it can become again is water - by reacting with the oxygen in the air.  So while it's a fiery, messy (and possibly explosive - wear your goggles kiddies) reaction, in the end state, all the atoms and molecules have, essentially, become what they most wanted to be - neutralized and stable.


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

[User]
Any contemporary philosophers continuing Whitehead's work?

I'm slowly working my way through *Process and Reality*, and am both fascinated by Whitehead's ambition and saddened that outside of theological circles, no one seems to be continuing his work seriously in modern times.

Would love to learn about people continuing his project of cosmology-building, but also critiquing him in various ways. Ideally contemporary scholars.

[Assistant] Isabelle Stengers has written much on Whitehead, connecting him to French thinkers like Latour & Deleuze. Try *Thinking With Whitehead*. For something older, but still in continuity with his work, try Mili apek, who did much work in the philosophy of physics with books like *Bergson and Modern Physics*.


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

[User] ELI5: how is it that in times of crisis major businesses will go bankrupt within months? Do they have no savings or what?

[Assistant]
Well it depend on the business. What if they just made a new factory and so they have a lot of debt for some period of time when the crisis hit. What if they are very sensitive to the crisis in specific, for example construction here  is doing not that bad, some project were stopped and we receive less work, but compared that to restaurant that were completely empty for the last week. The impact on different industry is different.

The cost of maintening a business can also be astronomical. The larger they are the bigger the cost. It doesn't matter that nobody buy their product or services anymore, their income drop, but they can't decrease their cost by much and no matter how much money you have aside it will be drained so quicly. Imagine a company with monstly cost of several millions, you can't keep tens of millions aside just in case.

In addition, some companies might decide that it's better to close now than to bleed for months before finally having to close. You don't need to run out of money to close, you can do the math and figure out that you will for sure close in a couple of months and you are better off closing now and saving what you can.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40K]Why did warmaster Horus rebel against the emperor?

I'm reading through the books and though he seems to suffer under the weight of his duties, but his reversal to turn the crusade for unification in to a rebellion seems to come out of nowhere.

[Assistant]
When the Emperor ducks out of the Crusade to (secretly) work on the Imperial Webway project, that doesn't sit well with Horus or some of his fellow Primarchs, who feel they've been abandoned by their father. He was already angry about the fact that the Emperor had delegated a lot of authority to the Council of Terra, whose policies regarding the newly reclaimed human worlds Horus disagreed with.

When Horus is wounded by a Nurgle-infested blade and medics are unable to heal him, Erebus (a chaplain who is secretly in league with Chaos and a Marine who has become one of closest advisers to Horus) advises that they take him to a secret lodge on Davin where rituals are performed which cause Horus to commune directly with the Chaos gods. It should be noted that Erebus and the Word Bearers he served with had been severely reprimanded by the Emperor previously for trying to establish the worship of the Emperor across many of the worlds they conquered, and that this rejection had let them to align themselves with the gods of Chaos, who they viewed as being genuinely divine and worthy of humanity's worship.

They show him a vision of the future where the Imperium has become a brutal theocracy where the Emperor is worshiped as a god. They insist that they have little interest in the affairs of mortals and that they feel threatened by the Emperor's psychic power. They play on Horus's emotions and feelings of abandonment, and this drives him to reject the Emperor and turn traitor.


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

[User]
[The Simpsons] Whatever happened to Lionel Hutz and Troy McClure?

Yes, I am aware that Phil Hartman was murdered and the characters were retired in his memory, but I'm talking about in-universe.

[Assistant]
Troy McClure sued Krusty the Clown and the production studio of the Radioactive Man movie when it was revealed that they used his trademarked character Silly Sailor. If you remember, Troy McClure starred in the recurring role of Silly Sailor in such films as: Mercerss tribute to Oceanic Life, Love at 50,000 Leagues; The Erotic Entanglement of Seaweed, and Tootie! The Friendly Tugboat.

Troy McClure bought the rights to Silly Sailor after hisfish rumor caused the character and his career to spiral into obscurity and cause said films to only be valuable on the black market in Liechtenstein. When he discovered Krusty the Clown was using his character in the new Radioactive Man movie (which he auditioned for and was turned down), he sprung into legal action and sued for trademark violation.

He hired attorney/convicted copper wire wrangler Lionel Hutz to represent him, merely out of lack of financial ability to hire anyone else. Hutz was unable to come up with a legit case, until he found a book on trademark laws he stole from the Judges office one day to wipe hotwing sauce off his hands. He was able to use crude and extremely vulgar drawings of stick figures to win the case for McClure in the lump sum of 80,000,000 dollars and ownership of the Krusty Burger built on an un-manned oil rig out off the Atlantic Coast.

Troy McClure now lives a quiet, yet still questionable, life out on that oil rig. As for Lionel Hutz, he was last seen taking his case earnings and hitch-hiking to Texas to buy lottery tickets. No one has seen him since.


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

[User]
[Warhammer 40K] The Emperor and technology

So basically the Imperium right now is a but backwards compared to the   dark age of technology right? But didn't the Emperor live through the dark age of technology? How come he doesn't remember much, or have an STC backup somewhere?

[Assistant]
Because the Emperor is not a super genius. He doesn't have perfect memory, and he isn't all knowing. He may he the greatest psyker and one of the most brilliant minds humanity has ever produced, but not even he could do everything, be everywhere and remember every detail. He legitimately thought that humanity was in the right track, and that the influence he had put into play would carry them through. By the time things started to unravel, it was too late to salvage anything perfectly.

He may have had an STC on standby, but it failed like all the others. The rug got pulled out from under humanity, and even He-who-would-be-the-Emperor was forced to react. He packed up what he could, and made a beeline for Earth before it was cut off.


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

[User]
[Sonic The Hedgehog 3] How did Knuckles knock Sonic out of his super form in a single blow?

This is the probably the most outrageous thing to ever happen in the franchise and I've rarely heard anyone acknowledge it.

[Assistant]
It was actually a big coincidence. Sonic had just run out of rings at the exact same moment Knuckles attacked. Note that no rings leave Sonic when he got hit by Knuckles, and he started that adventure without any rings at all.

Knuckles is sensitive to Chaos Emerald energies and waited for the right moment just as they were fading. (Having been briefed by Eggman that a bad guy wanting to misuse the Emeralds was coming.)


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

[User]
[Star Wars] episode 4, in the first scene, why did the rebels fight the empire when they were captured and vastly outnumbered?

Also seems it would only make Lela look more guilty in the eyes of the empire. Seems like if they had just surrendered it would have turned out better. I know Lela may have done it so she could have had a distraction to get R2 and C3PO off the ship but that could still have been done without a fight.

[Assistant] The Empire knew they were Rebels since they'd just fled from Scariff and Vader personally watched the Death Star plans be brought aboard the ship.   Everything they did was to buy time to hide or get the plans off the ship.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why can I hear wind?

I mean, I know I can hear it when air blows in my ears, but what about when I'm inside, and the wind is outside?

EDIT: Thanks, everyone.  I know this was a little bit pedantic, but I appreciate everyone's input.

[Assistant]
Wind is composed of matter, just like your computer. Unlike your computer, these molecules are in the form of a gas; it's like smoke from a fire, but see-through.

Sir Isaac Newton proved that anything that has mass can produce force if it's speeding up/slowing down. So when you hear wind, you're actually hearing tons of little tiny gas particles hitting up against your head or on the outside of your house!


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

[User] Why do you blow warm air when your mouth is wide, but cool air when your lips are closer together?

[Assistant] It is due to a process called entrainment. A fast moving jet of air from your mouth draws colder, room-temperature air along it, so the overall temperature of the air is lower - it doesn't just _feel_ cooler; it _is_ cooler.


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

[User]
Why is general knowledge important?

There is a peculiar sentiment in modern day America. No matter your occupation, you are expected to *keep up* with everything. World events, medical knowledge, the economy, social issues, pop culture, everyone from professional bimbos to plumbers to public officials to that smartass at your local bar has to have their own take on every issue under the sun. Why?

I thought the whole point about specialization is that everyone gets their own domain to work in. Woodcutters cut wood, farmers mess around with eggs, prostitutes fondle balls, and doctors do the same but with latex gloves.

What is the philosophical justification for this? I was scorned recently for not knowing what **drinking the kool-aid** refers to. Bitch, I am a swimming instructor, not a historian.

[Assistant]
In one way, it's valuable to be social. It's useful to communicate and connect with others to have a vague set of knowledge that one can participate in with anyone in general. You're sitting at an airport waiting on your flight and the guy next to you also looks bored as hell so you might endeavor to broach a conversation on the event of the time, maybe the baseball playoffs, an election, some scandal in the media. General knowledge is a pool which anyone of a specialization, or even no specialization, can drink from and be a society.

In another way, it's valuable to the human experience. What's a well-lived life if it stays in one corner, in one profession and carries out its duty until it dies? Maybe knowing a range, but maybe not everything, can give us a well-rounded perspective on being a person? We, by our nature, are intellectually curious, sexually curious, ingenuitive, artistic, political, and so on. Why should we relegate our humanity into boxes beyond what's economically convenient?


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

[User] [Judge Dredd movie-1995 version]When Dredd opens his locker we can see volumes 1 and 2 of the famous books, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. What does Dredd think of the arguments of Edward Gibbon and what does Dredd think were the primary factors causing the fall of the Roman Empire?

[Assistant]
> The story of its ruin is simple and obvious; and, instead of inquiring why the Roman empire was destroyed, we should rather be surprised that it had subsisted so long. The victorious legions, who, in distant wars, acquired the vices of strangers and mercenaries, first oppressed the freedom of the republic, and afterwards violated the majesty of the purple. The emperors, anxious for their personal safety and the public peace, were reduced to the base expedient of corrupting the discipline which rendered them alike formidable to their sovereign and to the enemy; the vigour of the military government was relaxed, and finally dissolved, by the partial institutions of Constantine; and the Roman world was overwhelmed by a deluge of Barbarians.

Edward Gibbon.

This appears to justify the Judge Dredd worldview, that it is the responsibility of powerful men to maintain discipline in a world of savage, drug-fueled barbarianism.


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

[User] If Bill Gates and Warren Buffett gave $15B to astronomers and said, "build the most amazing telescope you can", what would the specs be and what could we see?

[Assistant] The price tag of the James Webb Space Telescope project is estimated at about half of that (estimated 8.7B in 2011). This will be a successor to Hubble, and will mostly see in the infrared looking for information about the formation of galaxies and stars/planets.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why do cats love to push things off tables?

What is with that?!

[Assistant]
I did a report for an animal behavior class in undergrad on animal play. It overwhelmingly focused on younger animals and why it is such a common trend across species to mess around with each other and fuck around with objects. As far as playing with each other, it seems to be a natural inclination to enjoy it but the evolutionary purpose seems to be that it reinforces social norms, learning how hard you can bite someone without it being aggressive, seeing how you can figure your social standing in the pack by whether or not you groom the others, as well as running and chasing to build hunting skills and refine motor movement/muscle memory/whatever you want to call it.

Playing with objects seems to be important for that latter part as well. It helps them develop and refine motor functions that can be applied later on in life for actually not ass hole tasks. So, that's why kittens would do that kind of thing, it feels enjoyable for them, and it feels enjoyable because a billion years ago, the saber tooth tigers that liked swatting hamsters off of rocks wound up with better developed neuromuscular systems which allowed more successful not-dying. Traits got passed on.

I can only assume adults do it because that youthful drive to refine motor skills doesn't just disappear.

Edit: Obligatory "holy crap, thank you for the gold" edit...holy crap, thank you for the gold!


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

[User]
ELI5: How do corrupt politicians explain their earnings to the IRS?

If bribery is illegal, how do they get away with this?

[Assistant] Suitcase-full-of-money bribery is practically unheard of in the United States, at least at the highest levels, for exactly the reason you'd suppose: unexplained money is awfully suspicious. So someone who wants to use their money to influence a congressman has to be subtle. Maybe his company will, (just coincidentally, you understand) have a job that the congressman's good-for-nothing brother somehow  got picked for. Or maybe the congressman's law firm will get a lot of high-paying clients all of a sudden.


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

[User]
Why does it take at least 15 minutes to fill a prescription? What's going on back there?

I can understand when bottles need to be filled, but my medication comes pre-packaged in a box. The quickest I can get it filled is in 15 minutes
(If there's no one in the store). What exactly is the pharmacist doing?
*Note: this isn't any kind of complaint against pharmacists. I know they have a serious job to do. I just genuinely want to know what it is they do when they're filling a script.*

[Assistant]
The pharmacist is ensuring that the prescribed medication is appropriate and safe before it is handed to you. Is it the right drug for the condition? Is the strength and regimen appropriate? Are there interactions with the patient's other medications to be aware of?

Physicians also do make prescribing errors from time to time (they are humans too), and a large part of a pharmacist's role is to catch those mistakes before it reaches the patient.

Also note that while your particular prescription may be relatively straight forward to check, it is likely that there are others which aren't, causing a wait time of 15-20 minutes.


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

[User]
[MCU] What is the current status of Gungnir, Odin's spear? Location, wielder, is it even in one piece?

Given the implied power level of Bor and Odin and being made by the same smiths as Stormbreaker, I imagine it's an immensely powerful object, maybe even able to independently channel Odinforce/Bifrost.

[Assistant] The last time we see it is in *Thor:Ragnarok.* It's in Thor's possession when he challenges Hela. She disarms him, and presumably it's left on the floor of Asgard's Throne room. At that point it's up in the air; It may have been destroyed along with Asgard, or it may have been flung across the cosmos by the explosion.


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

[User]
"Existence precedes essence."

What did Sartre mean by this?

[Assistant]
If you look at, say, a hammer, it was created for one purpose - hitting nails. Even before the hammer was assembled in the factory, everyone would agree that the purpose of the hammer to-be-assembled is (will be) to hit nails. Therefore essence comes before existence - the hammer doesn't even exist, but it is already pre-destined, so to speak, to hit nails.

Sartre said this is not the case (or should not be the case) for humans. A human is firstly born, and only then it is up to the human to decide which path to go and what to do with his/her life. So for humans, existence comes before essence/purpose.

I don't quite remember what Sartre says are the reason for this, or if it is just how he feels the world should be.


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

[User]
How would you extract pure metals from ore in outer space?

There has been a lot of talk about mining asteroids in the last year or so and using the materials to build factories in space, but surely the techniques (not the chemistry) used in space would not be the same as on earth since there is no gravity.

[Assistant]
ImminentFate is talking about a fractional distillation system.  A better way would be a gas centrifuge.  You still vaporize it but you run at the highest vaporization temperature of any of your materials.  You spin the vapor and the various atomic weights will settle to the places you have your output hoses set to.  Voila you have pure metals.

Yea it's not quite that easy but it's close.


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

[User]
Why don't forms of electromagnetic radiation other than visible light reflect off mirrors?

Clearly, visible light seems to easily reflect off a mirrored surface, however with both higher and lower wavelengths it would seem to go straight through. Why is this so?

[Assistant]
>however with both higher and lower wavelengths it would seem to go straight through

This isn't true. You can create 'mirrors' that reflect longer or shorter wavelengths of light. In fact, normal mirrors will do so to some extent. For example, a well silvered mirror will likely reflect a large amount of infrared radiation, just like tinfoil. Every material has a wavelength specific albedo, so no material will reflect every wavelength equally, but it is possible to make 'broadband' mirrors.


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

[User] [Narcos] Those five soldiers in the forest had Pablo Escobar at gunpoint. He was unarmed, as were his friends. He didnt bribe or blackmail them. So...why didnt they just arrest or shoot him then and there?

[Assistant] Pablo is so powerful that he doesnt need to bribe or blackmail the soldiers. If they arrest him, his lawyers or army would have him out relatively quickly and now he'll have them killed. If they kill him they put a target on their heads, Pablo was making a lot of people rich who could have them killed easily.


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

[User]
[Supernatural] Does free WiFi and long lasting laptop batteries make the rampant monsters bearable?

You never see any one having to enter WiFi keys or any laptops hooked up to A/C adapters in this world. Does that make the constant monster attacks bearable. Do people say, "Sure there are vampires and demons, but my Chromebook works everywhere."?

[Assistant]
This is truly what sets hunters apart from the rest of humanity. A preconfigured WiFi login for every hotspot in the US.

But really, cellphone tethering?

A satellite connection with WiFi in the back of the Impala?


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

[User] ELI5: Why do tax havens exist/places with very lax taxation laws? What does the government gain from allowing tax havens?

[Assistant]
They collect taxes for being able to live/harbor money there, but those taxes are far lower than what another country might take as part of an income/capital gains tax. Still, if you're skimming (lets arbitrarily say) 5%-10% of a bunch of multi-millionaires/billionaire's hoarded money, you're making a fortune. When you consider it from the standpoint of the person hiding their money, 5%-10% is *way* less than 50%+ in a country like the UK, so it's a good deal for them (assuming they have no conscience).

As for why a government like the UK would allow for their citizens to use tax havens, the answer is that the government is generally controlled or lobbied by people using those tax havens.


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

[User]
ELI5: How does Netflix determine how much value it gets from its original programming if there are no ads?

How do they know how these shows affect their bottom line?

[Assistant]
Well they can tell how many people are watching them, and because it's a paid service, eyeballs are directly equated to money.

But a lot of the income is from product placement.  So advertising is still being paid, you're just not seeing commercials.

Consider the totally organic, not obvious Playstation Vita conversation in the first season of House of Cards, or the headphones that provide such perfect noise cancellation that they save the day in Jessica Jones.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do they do court room sketches? Why can't they just take a photo?

[Assistant]
Most people can't/don't act naturally when they are being filmed.  They become self conscious about how they look, how they sound, if there clothes are clean, if something is in their teeth, etc.  Basically exactly the opposite of how we want people to act when they're testifying under oath about something important or possibly even life and death.  We want them to focus on their testimony.  Having a camera pointed at you makes that very difficult.

Some states do allow cameras, or allow the judge to decide.  The OJ trial was one of the first high-profile cases to allow cameras, and it turned into an enormous debacle.  Clearly cameras weren't the only reason, but having lawyers and witnesses perform for the camera instead of the jury certainly didn't help.


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

[User]
[Better Call Saul/Breaking Bad] How come Jimmy stopped giving a damn about the production value of his TV commercials?

The guy was super into it during the first few seasons of BCS. Granted, he didn't have a lot of money to put into his commercials but he hired a small crew, secured great locations (even if illegaly like with the fake veteran at the airfield) and seemed to really worry about the copy of the commercials. Fast forward to Breaking Bad and now he's just using a green screen and cheesy lines, what gives?

[Assistant]
You see in Breaking Bad his commercials are **intended** to look cheap and low quality.

It's all an act to create this image of a non-threatening, bumbling fraud lawyer.

Both to make his opponents underestimate him and to keep the police of his tail.

Like nobody believes that *this* guy is actually a highly competent lawyer who is massively involved with the criminal underworld.


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

[User] ELI5: Why is gold so soft, and why does it conduct electricity so well?

[Assistant]
The entire group (column) on the periodic table of copper, silver, and gold are all really good conductors. Being in the same group means the outermost electrons of the elements have a similar configurations, there's just more inner electrons as the elements get heavier. As you can imagine, the outermost electrons are quite crucial for conducting electricity. They are also all quite soft metals, again because of outermost electrons which essentially give all the chemical and material properties other than density. Gold is just a lot more dense because the atoms are heavier. And while not silver, you'll note copper and gold share in common being about the only metals that are reddish and not grey. Copper is the second best conductor and by far cheapest, silver is the best conductor, and gold is the most corrosion resistant (so is used for electrical contacts sometimes when surface corrosion has a large impact on the conduction).

So what makes this group special?

Well, the electrons around atoms fall into various different orbitals, though don't take that too literally, they aren't balls circling around like the moon orbiting. These are patterns the electrons take around the atom, they are sort of smeared out in a region of space. They aren't circles, and lot aren't the spherical you might imagine.

Completing filling certain levels of orbitals tend to make atoms more stable. Incomplete orbitals tends to make atoms more likely to simply give up or try and steal electrons to fill orbitals or empty out an incomplete one. This is the premise of pretty much the entirety of chemistry and material science, and it's by no means simple and none of our models are good enough to outright predict all properties from scratch for an atom.

For a simple example, starting with hydrogen as really simple is has a 1s orbital. It's a small sphere around the atom. But this isn't filled, 2 electrons can fit in it. So hydrogen tends to try and share a second electron with another atom to fill it, like in water, H2O. The two hydrogens share a second electron with oxyegn. Helium has two electrons that fill this 1s orbital, so is very stable. Helium participates in virtually no chemical reaction and is always a gas as it won't stick to anything else, including itself. Hydrogen for examples share with itself to make H2 gas molecules. Helium atoms are content all on their own with their filled orbital.

So that 1s filled, and 's' is the only or orbital shape in level 1. And you'll note, hydrogen and helium are the only two elements in the first row of the periodic table. That's why. Table came first based on material properties, but we later figured out that's why. Well, what's next? Well, levels 2. And the s shape shows up again, but so do others. 2s is again another sphere, but a larger one. You keep getting larger version of the same orbitals that we stick number in front of. You also get different orbital shapes, that can hold even more electrons than just 2 and have new letters like d and f. You'll note the periodic table gets more columns as you go down the rows. Some of these orbitals can hold a lot of electrons without going to a significantly higher energy level, that is the numbers.

Anyways, back to group 11. That is, copper, silver, gold. So, the d orbital that metals in rows just before this group had been trying to fill is now filled. These electrons are happy and stable. This means they don't help with bonding (at least within the elements in their pure form) or help with electrical conduction. This leaves just a lone electron in the #s orbital, no where near filling the orbital up but pretty easy to give away. Copper it is 4s. Silver 5s. Gold 6s. For all of them, this lone electron is very weakly attached. It forms very weak bonds the atoms and has little attachment to the atoms.

Firstly, this gives these metals a sea of easy to move electrons floating around them, although a lot of metals have this to some degree. The sea also isn't too full, so lots of space for these electrons to move. Secondly, this means the bonds are really weak. There's where the softness and ductility comes from, weak bonds that are happy to break and reform to a new atom in a very fluid way.

And as for conduction, two things matter. How many charge carriers, that is free electrons, you have. And how far they can move freely before they smash into something.

What do electrons conducting electricity smack into? Well, firstly impurities. Impure gold and copper don't conduct as well. But those aside, the atoms themsleves, but only if they are vibrating. The electrons move easily around the stationary crystal, but when you add vibration, that is heat or temperature, the electrons will start to have collisions and hence have resistance. But gold, copper, and silver have weak bonds. Which means weak vibration, which means low impedance to the movement of electrons. You'll note aluminum, the other common conductor rivaling copper, is also soft.  Though not for the same d-orbital just filled and lone electron in the s-orbital reason, but a different but similar setup. Aluminum isn't as good as conductor as copper, but it's cheaper and more importantly is really light, actually making it a better conductor by weight (but not by size).


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

[User]
ELI5: Kant's transcendental idealism

Thanks for all the great responses.

[Assistant]
There are things as they are in themselves, which are things as noumenon, and things as we experience them, things as phenomenon. We cannot experience things as noumenon. The structure of our experience is necessarily spatio-temporal, so for us, reality and the things in it are spatio-temporal, but we cannot know whether things are ultimately spatio-temporal or whether these properties are just a consequence of how we perceive the world. This approach solves problems that idealists (who think there is nothing *but* what we perceive) have and problems that realists (who think we perceive things as they fundamentally are) have.

There is a divide between people who think Kant believes noumena and phenomena are ontologically distinct (two worlds view) and peopel who think Kant believes noumena and phenomena are two ways of seeing the same thing (two aspects view).


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

[User]
[Ender's Game]Instantaneous Communication and Relativistic Time?

In the Ender's Game series, a technology known as the Ansible exists, which is used for instant communication over any distance. Also, near-light-speed travel is possible, and taken advantage of. My question is this: How would communicating from Earth to a ship traveling at near-light-speed via Ansible work? Would the noises sound sped up to the people on Earth, or slowed down for the people on the ship?

[Assistant] They can communicate to relativistic-speed ships, yes. However, the time difference makes it impossible to, say, use LIVE talking, which is extremely expensive anyway- only the rich such as the nobles of Divine Wind and Ender himself. The time difference severely limits how much data can be sent to the ship, as a ship having it's own time 60x normal, it has approx a sixtieth of the bandwidth it had before. Therefore, text is the only cost-effective way. This is mentioned to an extent in "Ender in Exile".


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are most big businesses made into companies? Theoretically, If I have a lot of money, can't I just be the owner, president, CEO etc. without worrying people trying to kick me out of my company?

I've been following some stories of how some family-owned businesses have been taken away from the family that started them because the board members, stakeholders, shareholders, and whatnot didn't like them for some reason.
Is there any reason why I can't have a multinational company without having those 'pesky' people have a say if I get to keep the company?
If I make enough money, can't I just hire people to do stuff and not have those controlling boardroom people having a say in everything?

I don't know if this is a valid example but I was also reading about how Vivendi is currently in the process of a hostile takeover of Ubisoft, a company owned by brothers. I understand that Ubisoft sold shares of their company but if I have a company, do I have to put my company out there? Can't I just have it to myself?

Understanding business is confusing...

edit: Thanks for the explanations all. It seems like I'm too selfish to own a business lol. I DON' WANNA SHARE!!!

[Assistant] Yes you can keep your company to yourself. There is no requirement to 'go public' - meaning offer investors shares. The downside as others have pointed out, is this restricts your ability to grow the business based on capital. There's a way around this that's used by several companies, notably Newscorp among others. You issue non voting shares. These are shares that entitle the owner to a share of the company profits, but not a say in how the company is run. This lets you keep control, but you do need to share the profits.


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

[User]
Eli5: AM & FM frequencies.

What is the difference?
On FM you can only go from station 88 to 108
On AM you can only go from station 530 to 1710
Why is it that cars can only intercept those frequencies?

Edit) please also help me understand ham radio.

[Assistant]
Ham radio operator here. There is a lot of good information about the differences in Frequency Modulation and Amplitude Modulation. But the question was, why is FM 88 to 108 and AM 530 to 1710.

The FCC in the USA (more globally, the ITU in the United Nations) designates the frequencies to be used for specific purposes. Almost every wireless device is designated a specific frequency or range of frequencies to use.

AM broadcast radio is designated 540 KHz to 1600 KHz (1.6 MHz)
FM broadcast radio is designated 88,000 KHz (88 MHz) to 108,000 KHz (108 MHz)

The numbers on the radio dial are just the frequency in KHz for AM and in MHz for FM. Your radio can only dial to these frequencies because it was only designed to pick up those frequencies.

And yes, there are other frequencies, but they are used for other things.


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

[User]
if your ex commited suicide

If your ex committed suicide because you broke up with him/her. In utilitarianism, wouldn't you be wrong for breaking up since not breaking up would have maximized utility (you being unhappy in a relationship would be less bad then your ex being dead)?

[Assistant] Well one thing to note is that unlike in plays no one ever goes from like 'entirely mentally healthy' to 'have killed themselves' purely because they were broken up with. Rather a great deal of people will have had to make various free choices, including the potential suicide, for such an event to occur, so regarding yourself as if you breaking up with them directly cause their death is almost always going to be just wrong.


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

[User] [Star Wars] Did Maul know Sidious's true identity?

[Assistant] If you mean "did he know that Sidious was Palpatine?" Then yes, he was aware. If you meant "did he know that Sidious was the apprentice of Plageous?" then the answer is no, though he suspected something was up around the time of the battle of Naboo. In fact, his uncertainty about his place in the universe may have been what cost him his fight against Kenobi. Sith were supposed to be master manipulators, hiding in plain sight in positions of power. Though Maul was strong in the force, he knew that he could never escape his birth as a Dathomiri slave. His markings proved his identity. Sidious had also never bothered to build up any sort of political power base around Maul or teach him the subtleties of politics. He was only taught to use his power and brutality to get what he wanted because that's what he was useful for. Maul was never a true sith, but a tool; an assassin. And like all tools you get rid of them when they are no longer useful. These thoughts weighed heavily upon him, and over time he would try to get revenge upon his master and anyone else that claimed the title of sith that wasn't himself or his apprentice.


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

[User] [Dresden Files] In the first book Harry shares his full name. Then later refuses to share the name of a fairy he knows. If names are so powerful why would he tell the reader his full name?

[Assistant]
Harry states a few times that knowing someone's true name isn't just about literally knowing the words that make up their name, otherwise anyone could find a humans true name by looking at their birth certificate. Their true name is how they pronounce it - the intonation, the feeling. Therefore it's (relatively) safe for him to write it down for the reader.

Even if it wasn't though, the crux of the matter is - his own name is his to share, other peoples aren't. You let it be known you're going around sharing other peoples true names all willy-nilly, especially those of the fae, then you're going to get murdered real quick. Even if it's just written down.


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

[User] ELI5: Why when my heart beats fast from playing games like League of Legends is it considered unhealthy, but an accelerated heart rate from exercise is healthy?

[Assistant] The increased heart rate isn't particularly healthy for you, its just an indication that you're working hard. Its like the RPM gauge in a car. If you're in neutral, and your engines racing, its not a good thing, but if you're accelerating to get into the highway, its a good thing for your engine to be spinning quickly.


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

[User]
[Underworld] How come Victor and Marcus get to be stronger than other vampires by virtue of being older, but this doesn't seem to be a rule across the board?

E.g. Kraven and Tanis are not noticeably stronger than other vampires who are much younger. And Amelia, one of the 3 "elders", dies like a bitch in a Lycan attack without even a sign of having put up a fight.

[Assistant]
Marcus is the original vampire, son of Alexander corvinus. As such his power is extremely high naturally.

Victor and Amelia were both turned by Marcus and it's likely that being "1st generation" vampires makes them stronger.

Kraven was likely turned by someone other than Marcus and as such is less powerful.

Amelia and company were ambushed by several of the most powerful Lycans there were at the time and were outnumbered. They likely *did* fight back, but they were just outmatched.

Tl;DR corvinus blood is OP.


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

[User]
is there a reason land masses seem to get thinner towards their southern portions?

I was looking at a world map and noticed that there seems to be a trend with land masses where they get 'thinner' towards their southern portion. e.g., Africa, South America, and North America all have much wider northern portions than southern.

is this purely coincidence, or is there some geological/natural reason for it to happen?

(note: I recognize that 'north' and 'south' is arbitrary, so I guess I'm more interested in how/why there seems to be a trend, not the nature of the trend itself)

[Assistant]
I think this can best be explained by looking at the plate boundaries, in particular the mid-Atlantic ridge. This is more-or-less North-South trending. The eastern side of the Pacific is the same. This is what has defined the shape of continents in part.
The real reason that it appears this way is most likely coincidence, and a slight cognitive bias!


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

[User]
[ELI5] Will two supercomputers playing chess against each other always have the same outcome?

If two supercomputers play chess against each other, will the outcome always be the same?
Consider that they will always play the best possible move and that they do not learn from past matches.

If not, which I believe is the case, why not?

[Assistant] Computers playing chess often include the use of a random number generator to choose between moves of apparently equal value. Such generators often vary by time of day or some other input to ensure unpredictability.


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

[User] If the liquid wax is what burns in a candle, why doesn't a pool of liquid wax go up in flames? Why only the wick?

[Assistant] It's not the liquid wax that burns, it's the vapors. The liquid gets drawn up the wick, and vaporized when it reaches the flame proper, and is burned then (as a general rule, most everyday things that burn do so as a gas: it's the only way to get a sufficient mixture with the oxygen it reacts with while burning).


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

[User] What causes glass to be transparent? If atoms are mostly empty space, then why can't photons pass through that space and make every substance transparent?

[Assistant]
> If atoms are mostly empty space, then why can't photons pass through that space

Solids are mostly empty space. But the maximum dimension of the empty space (the biggest area of empty space you could find without any atomic nucleus in it) is very small compared to a photon.

The spacing between atoms in a "typical" solid, speaking very roughly, is around 0.1 to 1 nm.

The "size" of a photon is roughly the same as its wavelength, so around 400 - 700 nm.

As an analogy, chicken wire (In case you're from somewhere where this isn't a common term, it's the kind of wire net fencing used to enclose chickens) is mostly empty space, but you still can't throw a basketball through a wall of it, because the basketball is much bigger than the largest openings in the chicken wire.


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

[User] Eli5: Why is "beer gut" fat firm and stored in one place when other fat (from over eating, etc) is stored throughout the body and appears more "loose"?

[Assistant]
Visceral fat feels firm because you're not actually feeling the fat; it's deep inside, in between your organs, so when you put your hand on it you're actually feeling the abdominal muscles.

Subcutaneous fat, on the other hand, is right under the skin, so you can feel its softness.


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

[User]
[Fallout 3] Why does the Lone Wanderer already start out as a certified badass?

Its only been an in-game week and my LW has slaughtered hundreds of raiders, feral ghouls, super mutants, and angry krabby patties all throughout DC despite it being his first time out of a vault as a 19-year-old who has presumably not had any other experience with guns besides a BB. Sure there were plenty of vault dwellers  who made excursions into the wastes from time to time, but obviously it was different with Vault 101. There would have been no purpose for James or the Overseer to have trained the LW to face anything deadly outside beforehand either. Like shouldnt he be crying and pissing himself at the first sight of a super mutant?

[Assistant]
It's established that Roaches occasionally made their way into the Vault and the LW killed them as a kid with the BB gun, we can assume they'd do it from time to time, even if for entertainment (Vaults must be boring as shit), even if with a BB gun, they're training and improving their shooting skills, during their way out of the Vault and likely every now and then, they saw Vault Security using their 10mm Pistols, so that adds up.

We saw that during the breakout, roaches began attacking civilians and at least 2 of them, Butch and his mom, weren't prepared at all to handle it.

So we have a young adult with decent shooting skills, somewhat familiar with the Vault weaponry and a Pipboy that helps him aim, so he makes his way through the relatively safe path from the Vault to the nearest Town, where he'd inevitably see more guns, either with other scavengers or for sale, being allowed or taught how to operate them would add up.

With that, they're already better off than the regular raider, when they first see Super Mutants, they have a BoS Squad there to back him up.

From there onwards, it's a matter of the LW gathering better gear, making the right allies and he's a badass.


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

[User]
[Jurassic World] Was the Indoraptor really an upgrade to the Indominus Rex?

Aside from its smaller size possibly making it more convenient in certain situations it didn't really seem like an improvement.

[Assistant] I think they were hyped for it because it was a step up from a normal raptor and they could control its murdering. It wasn't necessarily going to be tougher than an Indominus Rex. It was a more convenient weapon for them though.


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

[User]
[DC] Is telling a joke to The Joker a good idea or a bad idea?

So the Joker's a killer with a funny side, what if I play along? What if I act like him too, or, try to make HIM laugh? Will he get offended if I try to "one-up" him? Or will he respect me and think of me as someone who also loves to have fun?

I guess it would heavily depend on if the joke itself was good or not, but, in general, would he like it?

[Assistant]
*Any* interaction with the Joker is a bad idea. There is no way to improve your chances with him. He's a random-number generator. Chaos. The textbook definition of unpredictable.

He might find the joke hilarious, and shoot you while he's laughing, or not. He might find the joke completely unfunny, and shoot you for telling it, or not. If you don't tell him a joke, he might shoot you for being someone who hates fun, or not.

There's no telling what might set him off or placate him. Being anywhere in his vicinity is a crap-shoot.


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

[User]
Why does poverty exist in the Harry Potter universe?

With magic being able to produce almost anything except for food, why does poverty exist in the Harry Potter universe? The Weasleys are described as being poorer than most families, but they seem well-fed. Magic seems to be equivilent to the replicators of Star Trek(besides the food of course), but Magical Britain is far from a post-scarcity society. Why is that?

[Assistant]
Because there are always some things magic can't produce.

Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration states that food cannot be produced out of thin air, but it *can* be replicated if you already have some of it.  Therefore, poorer families such as the Weasleys can still keep themselves fed, as long as they had a small sample of food to replicate.

However, apart from food, there are many other things that have to be bought.  Clothing for seven children.  Books and school supplies.  Wands.  Upkeep of the Burrow.  Miscellaneous expenses such as a wedding.

The economy of wizard society differs from muggle economies, no doubt.  But the simple rules of supply and demand will still result in the same general phenomenon of haves and have-nots among wizards.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do presidents and CEOs typically resign after a controversy instead of staying or being fired? Like for a example a while back the president of a university resigned after hate symbols appeared around the campus why didnt he stay?

[Assistant]
So the reason for the departure is that it allows the institution to blame them and move on. The university can say "It was the president's fault, we will move forward and improve", even though it's possible they do nothing afterwards it gives the appearance of action.

The reason why they usually aren't fired is because it's seen as a courtesy to allow someone to resign. Getting fired is really bad for their future prospects as a job and allowing them to publicly say they voluntarily resigned allows them to save face.


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

[User]
[Horus Heresy] How are the Primarchs and Astartes so entirely undisciplined?

I'm a Remembrancer attached to the Word Bearers Legion, and recently I've begun to wonder how the Emperor and the Council of Terra tolerate the behavior of the Astartes and the Primarchs as regards His will and the lives of His subjects. I've seen smuggled Picts and heard reports of Aurelian himself striking the Sigilite, the Emperor's right hand, on Monarchia many years ago.  Just recently, I have heard of the savagery of the Lupercals captain's in the wake of Horus' wounding, when they spew dozens of civilians attempting to see him and offer devotion.  And it seems no one punishes them, or takes them to task?  How can an Imperkum function as a peaceful society for its citizens when superhumans with a complete lack of accountability can kill, maim, and murder at whim?

[Assistant] Because the Legiones Astartes do not operate at the heart of the Imperium, they operate at the frontiers of Imperial Space. Where men had forgotten their roots and are more barbaric. Where 20ft tall Orks rape and pillage entire sectors of space.


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

[User] [General Fantasy] If a Nephilim is a cross between an angel and a human, what would you call a child of a demon and a human and a child of an angel and a demon?

[Assistant]
The Nephilim, at least according to the most common interpretations, were the offspring of human women and *fallen* angels, or demons.

The word "nephilim" itself means "the fallen", and it could probably be used for any human/inhuman hybrid.

According to the New Testament, angels are asexual, so one would have to fall - and thus become a demon - in order to produce offspring with a demon. That would just be, well, another demon.


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

[User]
[Back to the Future] Why does the Mr. Fusion need to be so powerful?

What do the people of the futuristic year of 2015 have in their homes that requires a fusion reactor with an output of at least one point twenty-one jiggawatts to operate?

[Assistant]
Thank you for your question concerned citizen.

We refer you to section 6 of the user manual "The Grid and your place in it".
The Mr Fusion device will send all generated electricity into The Grid and use it to power nearby homes, streetlights, hoverways and robots. Our lives depend on the powering of devices all around us, from your beautiful screens and multipoint fax technology right through to holo-ads for new blockbusters coming your way from our sister company Mr Hollywood.

With a peak output of 1.3 Gw, your Mr Fusion will operate anywhere from 500 watts upwards based on the load required at the time.


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

[User]
[Marvel/MCU] In Civil War, Captain America enters a building full of toxic gas. Why isnt he affected?

In the beginning sequence of Captain America: Civil War, Scarlet Witch boosts Captain America into a building full of some sort of toxic gas. When she asks about the gas before boosting him, he simply says, Get it out. While inside, he removes one of the hostiles gas masks, and the enemy seems to immediately feel the effects of the gas and suffocates.

 I understand that Caps powers are mainly (completely?) physical, giving him the highest possible peak human strength and agility. But how does this protect him against the gas? He seems completely unaffected by it. Is he holding his breath the whole time?

[Assistant]
IIRC, he took a deep breath, held it, and only started breathing again once the window was shattered and Wanda removed the gas.

Part of his peak physiology is that, in the comics at least, his body doesn't produce "fatigue toxins," which might mean he doesn't produce as much CO2, either.


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

[User]
ELI5: What are surveyors doing when I see them looking through that tripod?

How do they use that to figure what/how they are going to build?

[Assistant]
First year surveyor here. The tripods which surveyors use are just devices for holding instruments level. There's many instruments which surveyors use, but the most common would be the total station. This has a telescope on it which is used to sight a target or point, from which the angle and distance to that point can be calculated. Other instruments include; levels which are used for calculating heights, gps systems for positioning and prisms which are used as targets for total stations.

Basically surveyors are using various instruments to find the spatial position of different points on the earth.


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

[User]
Why do nuclear power plants produce unique isotopes?

After the Fukushima disaster scientists were able to trace radiation detected in fish off the west coast of the US as originating from the Fukushima plant. I think there was a similar occurrence with Chernobyl

If they are using the same fuel and the same process shouldn't the byproducts be the same?

[Assistant] All nuclear power plants produce the same isotopes. Not in exactly the same ratio, but that's not relevant here. Many of these isotopes have no natural source, and by default reactors keep these isotopes inside the reactor. Fukushima was the only relevant source of these isotopes in the environment in the last 30 years. What Chernobyl released 35 years ago has decayed, is somewhere in the ground, or has been diluted beyond measurement thresholds, depending on the isotope. There are certainly measurements where you get contributions from both accidents, but also measurements where you can be sure the source was Fukushima.


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

[User]
[DC] How much of Harley Quinn's love/affection for the Joker is genuine?

I mean, most of it is a nasty case of Stockholm Syndrome, but could any of it be real love for him? If so, how much of it is the real deal?

[Assistant]
It's real love based on false pretenses. In nearly every continuity, The Joker changes his personality to be her perfect guy, and a very lonely Harley sees him as a miracle.

In most continuities, her love wavers the more she sees of him, and eventually the only reason she's with him is because she's burned every other bridge she had. He treats her like shit, but she thinks he's the only person who doesn't hate her for what she's done.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does cooked food generally taste better than raw food?

Aren't we just supplying heat to the food? What causes the drastic difference in taste?

[Assistant]
Different factors play a role here. What happens to food if you apply heat? I'll name a few things:

Fat melts, becomes liquid or creamy. Makes the texture nice and pleasant.

Sugars caramelize.

Starch granules pop and gelatinize, therefore become smooth and soft, have a better mouthfeel.

Proteins (with some sugars) go through the maillard reaction which is still not understood in its entirety. It's the reaction which causes the browning of meat, for example.

(Unpleasant-ish) textures change. Eggs and doughs solidify - meat and hard vegetables become softer and nicer to eat and chew.

Some toxins are denatured (e. g. beans and some mushrooms need to be cooked to be edible).

And of course one point could also be that we've grown to prefer the taste of cooked food during our evolution, as some of these processes make foods more digestible and therefore provide an evolutionary advantage.


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

[User]
CMV:A Universal Basic Income is an unsustainable proposal which will degrade social services and justify poverty

I understand that job scarcity and income inequality are pressing issues which need to be addressed. However, I fail to see how a Universal Basic Income would solve these. If anything, I see this as a move which would relieve corporations of the duty to provide people with jobs so they can sustain themselves. And while I understand that it aims to eliminate poverty, couldn't it have the potential to worsen it as well? If people *want* to work and be productive but complain that they are unable to find work, wouldn't some (of course, not all) companies just retaliate by saying that UBI is already in place and therefore people don't need to worry?

I've also heard that it would be ridiculously hard to implement a Universal Basic Income due to the cost of such a program. Even if each person in the United States was given $1000 a month to support themselves, that would amount to a cost of roughly 323.5 billion dollars a month. That's over half of the total U.S. military budget in all of 2015, and keep in mind that's only for a single month out of an entire year. How would this be any better than the government urging companies to create more job opportunities, therefore pressuring them to share some of the burden of employing people?

[Assistant]
You seem to think that if Universal Basic Income would be implemented the money would somehow go somewhere.

The money isn't being "spent", it's not disappearing - it's in the hands of prospective consumers. People with more money to spend usually spend more money.

Higher spending power among the population stimulates the economy and creates more demand for goods and services - creating jobs in the process.

The real job killers are companies using cheap foreign labour and hoarding trillions in overseas tax heavens, removing it from the domestic economy.


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

[User]
Why are the equations for gravitational force, electrostatic force, and Gauss's Law all relatively the same?

I am currently an engineering student and I have wondered since I first took physics in high school why those 3 equations are all relatively the same to each other?

They all involve multiplying values of certain characteristics of objects relative to the what you are trying to determine about the object (i.e. mass for gravitational force, charge for electrostatic force) by a derived constant and then the biggest thing for me is that the values of the forces for all 3 of the equations are all inversely related to the square of the distance between the objects being observed.

[Assistant]
because the surface area of a sphere grows with the square of the radius.

basically, the field lines are all spreading from the point throughout space....and at a given distance, you have a shell which is a sphere centered at the point. since the surface area grows with r^2, the intensity falls off with r^2.


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

[User]
[Star Trek] Why are the inertial dampers and artificial gravity so reliable?

Everything else is up for grabs. Shields, transporters, phasers, and everything else has been made to fail sometimes. Artificial gravity and inertial dampers work on a severely damaged starship, but (excluding Undiscovered Country) gravity works. In no episode or movie do inertial dampers fail despite the damage to the ship. Unless you include Sulu's mistake in ST:2009.

[Assistant]
We see some rare failures like on the Klingon ship in Star Trek VI.

I think an educated guess would be that (on reliable Starfleet ships as of the TOS and TNG eras) they developed a passive system for gravity. So the flooring may have an exotic plate of material that exerts a gravity field, and can only be turned off by applying energy (maybe a force field that blocks gravitons or something).

And then maybe it is a directional field so thats why you cant jump and end up walking on the ceiling.

In this scenario then a rare gravity failure could be due to an unlucky or exotic energy weapon or accident that somehow renders this gravity plate inert. Or it could happen on a more primitive or cheaply design vessel. Perhaps the Klingon ship in Star Trek VI was more spartan in design than Starfleet vessels. And failures seen in the days of Enterprise would be attributed to earlier and more temperamental artificial gravity systems.

Whatever technology is used could be extremely robust, because we see in TNG: Booby Trap a ship from an ancient civilization that was adrift for 1000 years has working artificial gravity.

Its possible these robust artificial gravity systems do use nominal amounts of power, similar to life support, and are considered critical systems. So, if life support is on, gravity is probably on too. But weve seen a few instances of near total power failures without any interruption in gravity or even concerns for those systems failing.

It seems likely (at least after the days of ENT) these are passive always on systems for sufficiently advanced vessels.


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

[User]
CMV: The rocket emoji  is much better suited than the eggplant emoji  to represent male genitalia/sexual innuendos.

I must first say Im happily married, and love my wife very much. Like most couples, we enjoy sending flirty messages back and forth via text, Snapchat, etc. But, I find the eggplant emoji  weak and misleading. Heres why I prefer the rocket emoji.

A rockets  lift off is a better representation of an erection.

A rocket ship also conveys the fact that the ride will end. (the average rocket can reach the atmosphere 150 seconds after taking off).

If have children like myself, you may spend **a lot** of time planning the launch, taking every possible variable into consideration. You must remain diligent, as you may deal with last minute cancelations and rescheduling.

After being intensely focused on this amazing moment, you move on to your regular everyday life once its over (much like the *Falcon Heavy* launch).

**EDIT: you have officially changed my mind. Well done, and God bless this sub**

[Assistant]
Rockets can represent male genitalia, or excitement, or celebration, or a great achievement, or the concept of "rocket science", or military applications, or literal rocket launches (which are a big deal.)

Eggplants can represent male genitalia, or
literal eggplants (which it would be unusual to talk about.)

There's a time and place for ambiguous analogies, but it's nice to have an option where the intended meaning is more clearly delineated.

In short, suitability as a metaphor is less important than certainty of intention for sexual innuendo.

We could have an emoji that's just a penis, too, but it would be used differently.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do our eyes burn when we are tired or sleep deprived?

[Assistant] In addition to muscle strain from keeping them open for long periods of time, eyes can also burn when you are tired or sleep deprived from lack of lubrication. Dry tired eyes can be quite burny. It is your eyeballs saying to you "please give me a break!"


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] How does the unicorn blood curse work?

I have been thinking, I know a few spells that um... lets say... reappropriates some blood from it's target. I know dark arts but frankly it doesn't hurt the target unless you take a lot. Anyway my question, right, the unicorn blood curse is apparently for killing or harming the creature to take its blood so what if I don't hurt it? Does the curse not work? Does it still curse you but less? Is it the same as the normal curse implying that the curse is from some magical taint in the blood itself?

[Assistant]
I think you may have been dabbling in the Dark Arts a bit overmuch. You may want to get out and get some sunshine for a bit. There aren't any circumstances where placing a unicorn into a position where you can then obtain its blood does not constitute harm. It doesn't matter, magically speaking, how "humane" you make the process. Taking another creatures blood without consent is harm.

I understand that you're saying that unless you take large quantities of blood, the creature won't experience any lasting damage. That's not the point. *You* will be cursed because *you* will have taken an innocent creature (by definition one of the most innocent creatures in creation) and subjected it to your will and forcibly taken its life essence. There's no mitigating a curse of that nature.


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

[User] Are we just lucky that Magnetic North is very close to True North, or is there something more behind the reason?

[Assistant] In principle there is no real requirement for the magnetic field to be aligned at all with the rotation axis. It would however be expected due to the rotation of the planet producing Taylor columns inside the outer core resulting in a helicity component of the fluid flow roughly aligned with the rotation axis.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does my body produce so much mucus when I'm sick?

I've got a cold right now and my nose has been running nonstop for several days. Why does this only happen when I'm sick? Where does it all come from?

[Assistant]
Your body produces mucus from mucous membranes which are present in the nasal passage, among other places. Mucus is mostly water and glycoproteins, which is why drinking water is important when you are sick to replace the lost water. The mucus also contains antiseptic enzymes and antibodies. It is a defensive technique to fend off whatever is attacking you, combatting it both chemically and physically. Much like pouring boiling oil over a castle's walls, it can directly kill invading nasties as well as simply sweep them away.

When you cough your body is indeed trying to get rid of something: mucus! You can't breath through it, and if it slips down the wrong tube you need to get it out.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] If things went differently above Endor

The Battle of Endor occurs, everything goes as it did in the films. However, the only difference is that Luke and Vader do not make it out of the Death Star II in time. Whether he took too long talking to Vader or the elevator was hella slow, who knows. Point is, Luke did not make it.

So the three primary force users are dead, Yoda died a while ago. Would the Jedi re-emerge on their own?

I understand many other people were "force sensitive", but is it even possible for the Jedi Order and Jedi traditions to be picked back up? What would things look like in this new timeline?

[Assistant] Luke didn't have much formal education either. The New Jedi Order Was fresh start in many ways, but without Luke with the idea and will to try to create a new Jedi order, other force users might just be content with being in the coven that fits them best, and force-sensitives would just do as they always have, namely done well for themselves due to their "luck"


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

[User] Why is magnetic north so close to the Earth's axis of spin? Is it the spin that causes the magnetic field?

[Assistant]
The Earth's interior dynamo is almost certainly driven by spin-related shear in the liquid metal core of the planet.  The main anisotropy in the system is the axis of spin, so it's reasonable to suppose the magnetic poles spend most of their time pointed close to the axis.

That said, the Solar dynamo has broadly similar properties (though much shorter time scales) and the surface magnetic field of the Sun is far from simple -- even though the main dipole moment of the Sun spends most of its time pointed close to due Solar North or due Solar South.

How does shear make a dynamo?  Start with an electrically conductive liquid and induce a shear flow.  A peculiar property of electromagnetic induction will make magnetic field lines that happen to thread through the fluid tend to stick to individual pieces of fluid.  A field line that crosses the shear layer will get stretched like a strand of taffy on a taffy puller.  Stretching the field line increases the sum total field line length inside the volume of interest, which is the same as creating new magnetic field.   If you have a big ol' mass of highly conductive stuff (like solar plasma or like the nickel-iron core of a terrestrial planet) and it has any sort of driven flow (perhaps from convection in a spinning system), it can amplify microscopic magnetic fields (which could be initiated, e.g., by Brownian motion) until they become large.

Human scale dynamos work the same way: you run an electrically conductive system past a fixed permanent magnet, and field lines from the magnet get stretched by the conductive system.  That's another way of saying you've induced a current in the conductor.  You can then run that current through devices like blenders or light bulbs to do some useful work.  But you can make a dynamo with no permanent magnet at all - you build a regular dynamo, then instead of a permanent magnet you use an electromagnet powered by the dynamo itself.  If you turn the crank on the dynamo fast enough, you'll get electricity ... eventually.  Small fluctuations eventually induce enough current in the electromagnet to get the whole system working, and away you go.


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

[User]
[pokemon] Why do so few trainers make use of the league maximum of six pokemon?

It almost seems like cheating for me to roll around with my six and to be accosted by other trainers who only use two or three.

[Assistant]
How many people do you know have the money and time to raise 6 pets? Now switch your Yorkshire Terrier for a gigantic dragon, huge stone serpent, or any of the others. Consider the care that is required for feeding, grooming, and giving them an appropriate environment. Oh you have a magma pokmon AND a water pokmon? Well that's going to be tricky for you, don't you think?

This is why most trainers have few pokmon and mostly related to the place where they are. It takes a very dedicated, talented, well-trained and rich trainer to walk around with many pokmon at once, all trained and cared for.


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

[User]
[lotr] why do all of the orcs seem to be covered in tumors?

all other kinds of orcs (skyrim, wh40k) aren't like this. is this just to make them look less human or is there an actual, cannon explanation?

[Assistant]
The orcs of Mordor are heavily inbred, mutated and deformed. Other orcs and orc offshoots like the Uruk-Hai are bigger, sometimes more intelligent and pose bigger threats in small groups, which is what we usually saw before Sauron began attacking in force.

Other than that, orcs just don't live very healthy lives. Many things that look like growths or deformations are scars both internal and external from their years of living like orcs. They don't have healing skills or arts like other races, so wounds tend to fester and create massive problems. Broken bones heal where they sit if the orc doesn't care or doesnt know how to set it, etc. Some are also probably infested with parasites that make them look even worse than they would otherwise.

Orcs in other worlds can be as violent and brutal, but they usually have some kind of honor code to prevent all of their warriors getting mutilated before even seeing an enemy or actual healing arts to get them back to fighting form. Some other orcs are just tougher and can naturally heal better than those seen in Middle Earth.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does alcohol sting cuts so much compared to water?

[Assistant]
Alcohol kills live cells, and water does not. This is why alcohol based hand sanitizers exist, but washing your hands with water requires soap.

Your body doesn't like when things that kill it get inside, and sends pain to tell you to stop.

The reason why it doesn't burn on regular skin is that regular skin is not live, it's a protective coating of dead cells meant to protect the rest of the live cells from outside things.


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

[User] ELI5: How does the reactor onboard of Curiosity work?

[Assistant]
There's a block of plutonium that naturally stays hot all the time. It's wrapped in a material that creates electricity from heat. It's also used to keep the rover warm during the cold night.

It's expected that the plutonium will stay hot for at least 10-15 years.


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

[User]
[Harry Potter] Had Peter Pettigrew cut a bit more of his hand, or added a bit more ingredient, would there have been enough flesh for Voldemort's nose?

Title.

At the graveyard, had Peter taken some more bone or added a bit more of his flesh, would Voldemort be ressurected with a nose? It seems the whole ritual was to form the different physical parts, the blood of Harry, the bone of Riddle Sr and the flesh of Peter. Does putting more or less of the ingredients affect how Voldemort would look?

[Assistant]
Voldemort's disfigurement is a result of the creation of the Horcruxen; the damage done to his soul began to manifest in his physical form, as well. That's also why he appeared as a shriveled, weak, semi-viable fetus in the Ethereal Train Station, as well.

Voldemort already lacked a nose when he killed Lily and James Potter; nothing done during his resurrection spell would have fixed that.


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

[User] ELI5: Why cant we just continue to make new elements? Why cant we just keep adding atoms and electrons?

[Assistant]
Well to make new elements, you dont add atoms or electrons. You add protons to the atom, each new proton is a new element.

And the reason is because as the elements get larger and larger, the nucleus becomes more and more unstable as all the positively charged protons are trying to repel away from each other, and when theres a lot of them theyre able to overcome the strong nuclear force holding them together.


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

[User] ELI5: Razors - why does the little blue lube bar come after the blades? It goes squeegee, blades, lube strip, instead of the opposite - why?

[Assistant]
~~The squeegee is to clear excess shaving cream before the blades get there.~~ Since you presumably have some sort of shaving soap or cream you don't need to moisturize more before the blades do their job. The moisturizer bar comes afterwards to help re-moisturize once the blades clear away the cream/soap.

Edit: The squeegee thing is actually called a guard bar and prepares the skin for shaving by smoothing it and making it taut.


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

[User] Why is the brain not damaged by impact from running, how is it protected from this sort of impact but not from other impacts?

[Assistant]
Your ankle joints, knee joints, and to some extent your neck joints all act as shock absorbers. Because of this, your head doesn't bob up and down as harshly as your feet do.

If you were to run with a cup of water and try not to spill it, you could probably do it. You'd accommodate for the impacts with your different muscles to stabilize it so it moved less. You're doing that with your head without having to consciously try.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why are burns due to chemicals or intense cold also called burns? What do they have in common with the regular burns due to fire or heat?

Not sure whether to flair this as biology or physics, but any idea why?

[Assistant]
"Chemical burn" is a term that refers to the effect, rather than the process.  It's used to indicate the damage that was done to the skin or the organ, and the source of it.

In terms of damage, cells are damaged or ruptured over a large area of skin, and "first degree, second, or third" indicates how deeply into the various layers of the skin the damage is, basically the extent of the damage.

It's more of a layman's medical term; the doctors are concerned about the damage that was done, rather than the differences between heat, cold, and acids or bases.


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

[User] ELI5: Why when touching something really hot we initially perceive it as cold?

[Assistant]
I don't know if it is still there, but there is an interesting demonstration of this phenomenon at the Exploratorium in San Francisco which has been seen by many, many people.

Two coils of copper tubing, one on the left, one on the right, converge in the middle, so that the coils alternate. One carries very warm water, the other very cold. You can hold either one comfortably.

However, you cannot comfortably hold the center, where hot and cold alternate, because it feels like your hand is WAY TOO HOT.


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

[User]
How to get "invited talks" as a postdoc?

I am a postdoc in biomedical sciences and I am in the final stage of training. In preparation for the job application and to get my name and my research more exposed I have been going to conferences and giving short talks. However, I see in the tenure-track job applicants typically list many invited talks in their CVs. It seems to me that these invited talks increase one's exposure to more experts of the field, and it also looks great on the CV.

How should a postdoc get more invited talks, such as departmental seminars or alike? Would you email the departments/professors in different schools and "self-invite" yourself, or ask about the possibility of giving a talk?

Many thanks!

[Assistant]
1) Have friends at other institutions.

2) Do interesting research.

3) Get a campus invite for a job interview. (semi-joking on this one)

All in all, invited talks don't really do a lot for your CV or career potential. They reflect your larger involvement in the field, though, since invitations usually mean other folks acknowledge your expertise and research as something interesting to present to a larger audience.


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

[User]
[MARVEL][SCP] Place Mjolnir in SCP-914 on Superfine, what is the resultant object?

SCP-914, when set to the "superfine" setting, does not merely improve the input object, but it fundamentally upgrades it (see: Baretta 98 became a laser pistol). It also appears to have cultural knowledge, and understands religion.

You can treat Mjolnir as magical or technological, but it is possible that SCP-914 "understands" them as the same.

How powerful would the resultant object be? Could Thor still wield it? What would it take to stop Thor with SuperMjolnir?

[Assistant]
Mjolnir is very nearly a perfect hammer as it is, pre-damage. Even afterwards, the link with Thor is a good repair and arguably even more powerful. So, the experiment:

Mjolnir is placed within, the settings selected. The machine hums to life and Mjolnir.. evaporates. Enter an idea in the minds of all those who have ever read of or heard of Mjolnir. A swiftly fading one, a certainty that Mjolnir is out there for anyone who seeks it and proves themselves worthy.

From this point onwards, in their hour of need, anyone who satisfies Odin's enchantment and requirements of Thor finds the universe responding to them with a new universal truth. Gravity responds to dropped rocks, Mjolnir responds to need. With no fanfare, they find themselves clasping a hammer, a hammer that seems to embody all hammers, in every incarnation and variety possible. They know instinctively that as long as they work toward the purpose Mjolnir responded to they cannot be stopped or harmed - the clouds will open for them, fire does not deign to burn them. The universe itself will bend to ensure that their goal is achieved. The moment they deviate from their path (or finish their task) Mjolnir disappears into the universe to await its next wielder.

Thor is understandably irritated about this turn of events, and proceeds to stuff himself into the SCP on superfine.


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

[User]
ELI5: What is shader compilation and why is it so prevalent now?

With the recent hubbub about The Calisto Protocol stuttering due to rampant "shader compilation", I was recently reminded that other recent games (like Horizon Zero Dawn) were also known for shader compilation issues.

What is the game doing that makes it different from other games that just open and play without stutter or compilation?

I also don't remember anyone making a fuss about this for titles 5 years ago.

[Assistant]
Your GPU isn't just some fancy thing that makes pictures. It's an wntire computer. A shader is a computer program designed to run on a specialized kind of computer, which has extra hardware that let's it do certain matrix calculations faster than a regular general purpose computer.

Shader can be compiled at two different times. Before or during the time you want to draw an image. If you compile the shader, that is, convert the code into instruction the machine understands, ahead of time, then you don't have to waste time doing that conversion whike you try to draw stuff.

Alternatively,  you can wait until its time to run the program to compile it. This has the upside of being able to dynamically change what you want the program to do in order to be more efficient at the specific task it will be accomplishing.

So, there is an equilibrium point where being better able to plan and adjust for the current situation saves more time than is costs to do that adjustment.

Shader recompilation is an optimization technique used when an application thinks that by changing the program running on the GPU, it can make it run faster.


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

[User]
ELI5: Would radars work in space?

Would radars work better, worse or at all in space? if not, is there anything that would work similar?

[Assistant]
Yes they would work, since they use electromagnetic waves and electromagnetic waves propagate even without air (unlike sound waves, which is why a sonar wouldn't work).

In space a radar would maybe work better but it is mostly due to the fact that it would have a greater line of sight than on Earth, since radio waves would behave almost the same both on Earth and in space.


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

[User] askscience, why is plasma considered a fourth state of matter? Why can't we just call it "gas" and say how hot it is?

[Assistant] It's just definition, not anything intrinsic. But it's a *useful* definition because plasmas behave very differently from gases. Plasmas are ionized, which means they respond to electric currents and magnetic fields in ways that gases  which are electrically neutral don't. Different large-scale macroscopic behaviors make it reasonable to put a different label on things, even though the fundamental truth of the universe is obviously a lot more nuanced.


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

[User] If it was theoretically possible to RAID an infinite number of SSDs, would they eventually be faster than RAM modules?

[Assistant]
Not really. You can increase your throughput by adding additional drives and striping the data across them (e.g. using RAID0), but you can't really decrease the latency, and that's where the problem comes in.

When a CPU is executing code, it frequently needs to read a value from memory. If that address happens to be cached, great. Otherwise, it has to wait for the result before it can decide what to do next. With typical RAM, that might take a few tens of clock cycles; the CPU will make an effort to keep doing other stuff while it waits (by reordering other instructions if possible), but eventually it will have nothing left to do except sit idle until the memory request finishes. This typically accounts for 40-60% of your total CPU time, even when "CPU usage" is at 100%.

If you replace your RAM with an SSD, the same thing happens -- except that the read latency of an SSD is maybe 100 times worse (microseconds, instead of tens of nanoseconds). So now your CPU is spending 99.5% of its time waiting, and your overall performance goes through the floor.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why does it "hurt" when nails are being rubbed against a blackboard?

Is there any instinctive background to that?

[Assistant] V-Sauce theorized that the human ear is especially good at amplifying sounds around 4,000 hertz, which is the mid range talking voice of a human. When you scratch a chalkboard, it makes a sound in the same range...amplified by your ear makes it seem MUCH louder.


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

[User] [General Fantasy] Can you use a genie's wish to wish a god into existence?

[Assistant]
that really depends on your definition of "god". if you mean super powerful being that could probably control the fate of the world through their actions and be pretty much unstoppable, then yeah probably.

if you mean omniscient deity who can bend the fabric of time and space and literally control causality, probably not.


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

[User] [JoJo's Bizarre Adventure] How do stand users name their stands?

[Assistant] In Part 3 they used tarot cards to pick their names out. Others probably just come up with it like Jolyne when she called her stand Stone Free because she wants to escape from a "stone ocean" (prison). Kira also stated that he decided to call his stand Killer Queen.