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

[User]
What is that largest percent majority that could still loose an election due to gerrymandering?

I saw a meme that visually depicted how gerrymandering can cause a 60% majority to loose an election to a 40% minority, which made me wonder to what extent gerrymandering could theoretically change the outcome of an election.

[Assistant]
First, we have to specify a few assumptions:

- A population is separated into districts and each district elects 1 representative.

- Each district has the same number of inhabitants.

- There are only 2 candidates per district, one from each party.

- The candidate that obtains more than 50% of the votes wins.

Some of these assumptions align with the US electoral system, others are idealized situations that we use for the purpose of this thought experiment. Lets say that we're looking at parties A and B and that we are trying to optimize the outcome of party A.

The question is: What is the lowest percentage of support among the population as a whole that could still win a majority of the districts, given the right districting scheme?

In order to achieve the maximum effect of gerrymandering, the goal is to create districts in such a way that supporters of party B are packed into as few districts as possible, with B-majority districts ideally having 100% party B support. Party A supporters are spread across districts in such a way that districts have a 50% + 1 voter A-majority.

Using this system, you can fairly easily see the smallest overall rate of support for A that still results in a 50/50 outcome: B-majority districts have 0 A-supporters, whereas A-majority districts have 50% + 1 A-supporters and 50% - 1 B-supporters. If the number of people per district is large enough, the +1 and -1  becomes negligible and given an equal amount of A-majority and B-majority districts that means that 75% (minus a negligible amount) of the total population supports B and 25% (plus a negligible amount) supports A while still resulting in a 50/50 outcome.

In order to achieve an actual victory in number of districts for party A, they'll need to win 1 more district than the 50/50 outcome and so the number of voters they need will slightly exceed the bottom value of 25%, with the amount depending on how many districts there are (the more districts, the smaller the deviation).

So in the limit case with many districts that have a large population, a 75% majority in popular vote could still be insufficient to win a majority of the districts given the right districting scheme.


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

[User]
[X-Men Comics] Why are Professor X and Magneto both so young looking?

Both Charles and Eric came of age during WWII, they're both knocking on 90 and yet they still look as if they both can pass for men in the 30s, meanwhile you have Aunt May who looks every bit like the  senior citizen she is. Is there a reason behind their youthful appearances?

[Assistant]
In Magneto's case he's been de aged on two occasions. He was once turned into a baby and when he was returned to adulthood he was placed at age younger agen than he was before the incident.

Much later he lost his powers due Wanda and in his attempt to return to his powered state he underwent a risky procedure that had the side effect of reducing his  age.


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

[User] ELI5: Phone speakers are so incredibly tiny, but have an incredibly loud sound, and is usually pretty clear too. How?

[Assistant] One reason is that the phone cuts off most of the low frequencies, below a certain limit. With every lowering of an octave (1/2 the Hz), a speaker diaphragm has to move 4x the distance for equal volume. So by cutting off the bass they can get more perceived volume out of a smaller unit.


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

[User]
[The Ring] What if someone isn't scared and frozen in place? What if they attempt to fight back?

She seems to be physical, at least when coming to attack her victims. What if a braver person or one with experience int he paranormal wasn't scared frozen and decided to just punch her in the head or something?

[Assistant]
I think the cause of death is due to psychic trauma not physical.  She is a ghost and operates mostly in the spiritual and mental realm.

Confusion and fear seem to be her allies.  Someone who had little of either might be able to resist her.


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

[User] [Star Wars] I wear different clothes on different days. Sometimes due to the weather or where I'm going and other times just because I want to look different. Why do Darth Vader, Boba Fett, Kylo Ren and the like never seem to experiment with different looking outfits?

[Assistant]
Well Vader is kind of trapped in the suit, it's more of a fancy Life Support System. Kylo Ren is a fan boy and is copying Vader's look, trying to be like him. Boba is wearing Mandalorian Armor, you won't find better armor anywhere else.

They see their equipment as tools and honestly could give 2 shits about their look, if you know what they look like you're probably going to die.


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

[User]
ELI5:The difference between "civil" and "criminal" court.

Is civil court only for monetary recompense, and criminal for legal?

[Assistant]
Basically things you would get the cops to come investigate tend to fall under criminal. When you sue someone its civil.

Criminal courts are meant to *punish* wrongdoing. There are no winners. Civil courts are meant to *compensate* you for some wrong that has been done to you.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why were revolvers created to generally have 6 shots?

It would make sense to have 5 or 10 considering we have a base 10 system, but it's not. Was there any historic reasoning behind this number specifically or was it only a random choice that stuck for the rest of production?

[Assistant] Ease of design, mostly. If you stack 7 circles in as close a shape possible, you get an hexagon with 2 on top, 3 in the middle, and 2 at the bottom. Use the centre as a rotating part, and you get 6 holes in a symmetrical way, without having to do weird complicated math.


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

[User]
[Doctor Who] Why do The Daleks even have a parliament in the first place?

Do they vote on things? I would have thought that Daleks don't have much to debate on.

"THOSE IN FA-VOUR OF EX-TER-MI-NA-TION?!"

"AYE!"

"EX-TER-MI-NATE!"

So what's the point of even having a parliament when every Dalek is pretty much identical and has the same world view?

[Assistant]
Because the Daleks aren't just talking personifications of murder (close, though), they're a well oiled military machine.

Their plans upon setting down on a planet are not just "shoot everyone and when the dust clears hope it isn't us who lost". They take over areas the same as any species in the universe does - ease into one area, capture and enslave people, use them as cogs in the war machine, have them build you a base and spread out from there, etc.

There are entire planets out there under Dalek rule, where every man woman and child mines resources for them all day. No extermination required, unless they get rowdy, but even then they don't have to enforce it in person. They have Dalek Puppets and Robomen for that.

You also have to keep in mind that while they have no emotions, and they are passively linked through the Pathweb, they still have their own unique brains, every single one. There are always dissenting opinions on how to wage war, who gets enslaved and who gets killed, whether a small planet is even worth it, etc. They can argue without fatigue for ages on these topics, though indeed much dissent is instantly quieted by being overridden by a higher ranking Dalek.

So TL;DR the parliament is there to help all the Daleks work together, settle differences, and exterminate the universe more efficiently.


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

[User]
[MARVEL and DC] how do more religious superheroes deal with the existence of gods? Does it effect their faith?

Im talking about characters like Clark Kent or Matt Murdock or Kamala Kahn who have been shown to be fairly religous what with Islam, Catholicism, and Christianity. Does it effect their beliefs when they live in a world where various gods such as Thor, Loki, Zeus, Odin and Hercules exist?

[Assistant]
They the acknowledge the existence of extremely powerful beings, they deny their divinity. Thanos is at least as powerful as these Gods, but he's not a divine being, he's just a weird alien. Same principle here.

Basically, they accept "gods" but only one Actual God.


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

[User] ELI5: How can cities all over the US like Ferguson operate debtor prisons if they were outlawed over 200 years ago and reaffirmed by the Supreme Court in 1983?

[Assistant]
Debtors prisons do not exist in the U.S.  No city, including Ferguson, has one.

Some articles refer to that, but they use quotes: "debtors prison". The quotes mean "this is not debtors prison but we can criticize what is by making comparisons to an actual debtors prison". Again, not debtors prison; they don't exist in the U.S.


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

[User]
Could an ancient Coelacanth breed with a modern Coelacanth ?

[I just picked coelacanth because I heard it is the oldest still surviving species (according to a source I have little faith in), and I understand they aren't 'unchanged', but just have a relatively stable body-plan.]

Basically, do we have any idea if an ancient individual from an enduring, relatively "unchanging" species, time-travelled to today, could breed with a modern version of that species?

Would all the millenia of genetic drift, etc prevent reproduction. And if it *would* prevent breeding, how does this affect our definition of 'species'? (Thats what got me thinking; the question of how well Linnaean Taxonomy reflects nature- but I guess I went off on a tangent.)

[Assistant]
No, it could (probably) not.

The reason is that there is a bit of semantic confusion when we use terms such as "the coelacanth". Coelacanth refers to all lobe-finned fishes to ever have existed when used in the generic sense, and to the few surviving species within that group. Should you go back in time, the species of coelacanths you would encounter would not be the same which exist today, in the same way that you shouldn't expect to successfully breed a modern species of roach (Say *Blatta germanica* for arguments sake) with an extinct Cretaceous one (say, *Gondwablatta abrahami*). The cumulated genetic variation should normally exceed the ability to interbreed. Yes there are rare exceptions (ligers, mules, and like that), but as a rule interbreeding gets more and more unlikely the further removed 2 species are from one another, particularly animals (plants are a different matter).

There are currently 2 living species of coelacanth, *Latimeria chalumnae* & *Latimeria menadoensis*. They are the last remaining taxa of their subclass; both are highly endangered. To the best of our knowledge, these two species are not interfertile, although their geographic ranges do not overlap. Genetic caracterisation indicated they last shared a common ancestor about 30 to 40 million years ago.


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

[User]
ELI5: How come people around the world all use the same math, but we all speak different languages?

If you think about it, math is the language that helps humans understand the universe. Different aspects of math originated from different places around the globe. How come math has been able to stay globally consistent, but spoken languages are all different depending on where you live?

I hope my question makes sense. Thanks in advance!

[Assistant]
Math is way more universal than language. You can change words and their definitions, but you can't change logic.

Although the old Babylonians split numbers in steps of 12 rather than 10.

Most peoples split them into steps of 10 because that's how many fingers we have.


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

[User]
Is an atom of a particular element completely identical to every other atom of that element?

Also the same isotope of that element and bound to the same other molecules. For example are all the 12C carbons of all methane in the universe identical?
EDIT: Isotope not isomer.

[Assistant]
Yes, isotopes are essentially identical to other isotopes of the same type.

There will be some minor differences in the electron distribution, enhanced slightly by their different chemical environments, but other than that they are identical.

Edit. As mentioned below, electrons can be excited and ions can be formed after enough excitation.


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

[User] ELI5: Why were land and sea animals much larger and bigger tens of millions of years ago compared to that of modern day species?

[Assistant]
There are three theories, and no real concensus. Perhaps the answer is a mixture.

1. Dinosaurs were big because the plants were big.
    * CO2 levels were significantly higher back then, meaning plants grew bigger, faster. Herbivores could afford to get bigger and more numerous, as could the carnivores that ate them.
2. Size was a form of self-defense.
    * The bigger you are, the harder it is to eat you.
3. They are big because they are cold-blooded.
    * This has to do with the square-cube law. The amount of heat your body produces increases with X^3, your volume, while the rate at which you can cool down increases with X^2, your surface area. At some point, a large, warm-blooded animal would cook themselves alive because they couldn't cool fast enough.


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

[User]
ELI5 MOSFETs, How do they work.

Hi so I get that a MOSFET is a gate, source and drain. I've dealt with a number of n channel MOSFETs on laptops. 19v on drain, 24v on gate allows 19v to flow from drain to source. But it's always confused me a little. Now I have a p channel MOSFET with 18.5v on source, 16v on gate and 0v on drain. If this MOSFET faulty or is the gate not active? Can someone ELI5 exactly how these are supposed to work please.

[Assistant]
With an Nch, you need to pull the gate voltage above the source voltage to turn it on and allow conduction from drain to source.

With a Pch, you need to pull the gate voltage below the source voltage to turn it on and allow conduction from source to drain.

In both cases, the amount you need to pull the gate to start conduction is Vgs(th).  The FET will be fully on when you get the gate-source voltage to about 2x Vgs(th).  It sounds like in your second example you probably just need to pull the gate lower.  Right now you have a Vgs of -2.5V which probably isnt enough to turn it on.


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

[User]
[Christmas] Is there some Omniversal force constantly working against Christmas?

Ok, so I don't think we need to argue that Christmas is more or less an Omniversal constant. We see that throughout various multiverses that Christmas exists and generally stays the same throughout them.

But almost every year in at least one of those universes Christmas needs to be saved due to some problem.

So is there an outside force that is constantly trying to ruin our happy holiday?

Perhaps some 16th dimensional hyper-grinch?

[Assistant]
In the original "Civilization" computer game, there is a well-known glitch regarding the likelihood of another leader (specifically Gandhi) using nuclear weapons against you. You see, the likelihood was on a scale, with 1 as the lowest value and 255 as the highest. Gandhi's was initially set at 1, but if he became more friendly with you, it would roll back over to 255, leading to him almost always immediately attacking you with nuclear weapons!

Something similar is happening here. Either they are so filled with Christmas joy that they roll over to hating it, or in cases such as the Grinch, they have such a lack of it that they roll over to the top of the scale!


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

[User] As a snake grows in length, does it grow additional ribs and vertebrae, or do they have a set number?

[Assistant]
They as a general matter, barring injury and such, have a set number. Different species vary in number, and this is commonly used as a test to tell one species from another, and some species show sexual dimorphism in vertebrae number.

The number is fixed from birth. The gene that does it acts very early on in development, and so they have no ability to generate new vertebrae during development.


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

[User]
[The Simpsons movie] what were they other three solutions?

EDIT: apparently there's a typo in the title. Fuck.

[Assistant]
1) Drown the entire town in Duff Beer.

2) First, we send in flocks of pigeons. Then, we send in hordes of Bolivian tree lizards, who will eat all the pigeons. Next, wave after wave of Chinese needle snakes to eat the lizards. Finally, we deploy snake-eating gorillas, who will freeze to death when winter rolls around.

3) Let Hank Scorpio take a crack at Springfield.


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

[User] [The Witcher] Who is the intended audience for the notice boards we find in those backwater villages? It's likely that very few of those people are even literate.

[Assistant]
People travel. People talk. And a lot of people are looking for work no matter where you are. Even if they can't read the posting themselves, they might have a friend who can read it for them, or they might overhear other people talking about it. Which would get them to inquire about the job posting without even having to look at the board.

It should be noted that Geralt tends to focus on specific postings, usually those looking for swordsmen or those that pay a generous amount of gold for a seemingly impossible task. The rest of the board would normally be filled with people looking for a few laborers to help carry lumber to a building site. Or stand watch over a charcoal operation overnight. Boring stuff that would only pay a pittance.


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

[User] Since the human body is widely influenced by ion channels in the cell, does magnetism affect this at all? Would prolonged exposure to magnetism have any effect on one's health?

[Assistant]
Well, the strength of MRI ( Magnetic Resonance Imaging ) is limited by their ability ( when strong enough ) to stimulate nerves via this principle. They operate just at the stimulation limit. It is not uncommon for patients having a MRI to experience facial tics or muscle twitches due to this.

It is theoretically possible that if the magnetic flux were increased, that a MRI machine could cause serious problems, such as heart arrythmia, breathing problems, etc.

Mind, this is "Acute" exposure to incredibly strong fields.


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

[User]
ELI5: What is a ketone and how does it vary from glucose to create the positive effects health benefits claimed to be had of a low-carb or Ketogenic diet?

I've looked around online a little and can't find an answer to this question exactly. I keep finding the same generic answer that when fat metabolites it creates ketones and then depending if Im on a site about a low-carb diet or one about diabetes then it varies on how good or bad ketones are. I understand carbs breaking down to sugar or glucose and the body burning that as energy and when carbs and sugar aren't present the body burns fat and it creates ketones that can help with mental clarity, lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol and seemingly lots of other positive benefits but why does that happen and what is it about ketones that create this better effect on the body? Essentially, ELI5 what is a ketone?

[Assistant]
We're talking about specific ketones called ketone bodies. Ketones are a class of small organic molecules that even include some types of sugar.  Ketone bodies are a sub-category of three of them, which are related to how the body processes fat.    What happens is when there isn't enough blood sugar, the body breaks down stored fat.  The result of fat breakdown can go through what's called the kreb's (or citric acid) cycle, which is a pathway that the body would normally use in burning sugars as well.  However because of the chemistry involved there might not be the right chemical balance to run that cycle.  For example inside the liver when its trying to make more blood sugar, a process called gluconeogensis.  Instead the products from breaking down fatty acids can be converted to ketone bodies.    Some people believe that because some of the same enzymes are used to form ketone bodies as to create cholesterol that ketogenesis would limit the ability to make cholesterol, however they occur in different places in the body and are regulated interdependently there's no direct reason for cross-over.

All this goes on in the liver as it produces sugar from fat, this stuff is essentially a byproduct.  The brain needs sugars or ketone bodies that can get past the blood-brain barrier in the way large fatty acids can't.  Most of the body's tissues can just handle burning fatty acids directly and aren't responsible for producing extra sugar, they go through the citric acid cycle and the electron transport chain to produce energy like normal.  Almost any cell, except the liver itself and those without mitochondria like the red blood cells, can gain energy from ketone bodies, but for the most part they prefer just using fatty acids themselves, and ketogensis is limited by other factors like the production of acetone which is toxic and the fact that they acidify the blood.  The body can manage those things reasonably well unless there's another problem, like diabetes leading to diabetic ketoacidosis.

As for all the other supposed benefits, well maybe it helps with mental clarity,  high blood sugar can cause sleepiness.   But its unlikely to be anything overly drastic.   However the main benefit is probably that it burns fat, which many people want.


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

[User]
What are the basic questions one must ask themselves to form their own philosophy on the world, people, good and evil etc.?

I feel as though I am a forward thinking individual. As such, I find myself lying in bed at night thinking of questions that seemingly have no effect on my life or current situation. I lie awake prisoner to these questions until i have found my answer on the subject. To which, I say, there is a reason why and I believe it is to find a deep understanding of my own self and what i believe. I am no philosopher, just a man, who would like to form a basis to expand upon and excercise my right as a human to question. As this is my first post I will appreciate any and all feedback with the appropriate "upvote".

-Kilgore-

[Assistant]
1. What is there, really? (Metaphysics)

2. What can we know? (Epistemology)

3. How should we act? (Ethics)

All of these areas have a massive amount of literature over the past three thousand years and virtually every important philosopher can be lumped under at least one of these categories.


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

[User]
What happens to rain around lightning?

Is the rain pushed away, attracted, unaffected?

[Assistant]
Well first any rain drops caught in the immediate path of a bolt would vaporize, considering lightning is a plasma. Any drops in the vicinity would become very hot, boil, and turn to water vapor.

Short answer: pushed away.


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

[User]
What does Derrida mean by possibility and impossibility?

I was reading Stanford's page on him, specifically the section on justice. I understood that justice is never to be found in the present, and even then, justice must involve injustice since one cannot hesitate and wait for all info if one wishes to make a just decision.

The section ends by saying that justice is impossible, it is perhaps the impossible, and so it is necessary to make justice possible in countless ways.

That seems noble, but I think I missed how the writer got that conclusion. I think it's because I don't understand Derrida's conception of possibility enough, since it said earlier that his version of possibility is complicated.

[Assistant]
One way to answer this would be to say that Derrida doesn't mean anything else than the plain senses of the words: impossibility means necessary non-existence, possibility means not necessary non-existence.

Another way would be to explain *why* Derrida thinks justice is impossible. It's impossible because it is unconditional, immeasurable, incalculable, infinite, whereas we and the world we live in is by definition conditioned, measured, calculated, finite. (Thus Derrida will also describe unconditional hospitality, unconditional forgiveness, unconditional gift-giving, etc. as impossible or the impossible, and as more or less synonymous with justice).

Does that clear it up at all?


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

[User]
ELI5:What is so special about Tesla cars?

I understand large companies see them as a huge threat. What makes them so special and why aren't they more mainstream if they are so great?

[Assistant] Tesla make all-electric cars. But what really sets them apart is that they're not the "hippy" electric cars that most companies have been making, but rather something sporty that has enough luxury to compete with BMW or Lexus (and a price tag to match). One of the big shakeups is that they sell directly to consumers rather than going through dealers.


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

[User] ELI5: How is it that oranges are grown "pre-sliced" by nature? Why does this happen and also does any other fruit do this?

[Assistant]
Trees make other trees by dropping seed.  Not many seed live to grow up to be big new trees, so the tree wants to give the seed it drops the best chance possible of living.

So firstly the tree needs to get the seed away from other seeds as much as practical as you've never seen trees grow right next to each other, have you?  They take each others water and things, big mistake.   Hence it grows the seeds all over the tree so they drop all over the place.  Some of them, if they can manage it, even make the seeds so light the wind will carry them away, or nice and tasty but difficult to digest so birds will eat them and then poop them miles away which is a good thing - but not in the case of oranges.

Anyway, when a seed drops away from its mum tree, it is useful to have something to feed on when its a really little baby tree - just like a chick in the egg gets to eat the white stuff in an egg before it's ready to come out and say hello to the world.  A seed gets to eat the rotting orange material that is round it for a while to give it a good easy start in life.

So, as the orange rots, the segments tend to break away from each other, and each little seed or two is away from other seeds and gets it's own individual source of early yummy food so quite a lot of them actually survive.

The same reason there is only 1 chick in each egg .. think of it that way.

Extra fact:  Oranges, like most fruit with seeds in, are round.  Why?  By fluke?  Coincidence?  Nope - because round things roll a bit especially if mum tree was on a hill.  So when they drop, they may roll away a little especially if the wind is high (which is when these things tend to drop off the trees) which is exactly what the mum tree wants and needs.  You don't see square fruit because they're no good at rolling!


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

[User] If the moon also rotates on its axis,why is it said that we can never view its other side?

[Assistant]
The time it takes for the moon to rotate around its own axis is exactly the same as the time it takes for the moon to orbit our planet. As a consequence, we always see the same side of the moon.

Now, you might say "well, that's a bit too neat to be a coincidence" and you would be right. Because the reason that the rotation and orbit of the moon are synced up is a phenomenon called "tidal locking".

The gravity of the Earth causes the moon to be stretched out ever so slightly, along the line that runs from the Earth to the moon. This stretching is due to the tidal effect and the gravity of the moon does the same to the Earth and because the Earth isn't just solid rock, but also has liquid water, we're able to see the consequences of this in the form of the tides.

If the moon would rotate faster than it would orbit, the elongation would rotate ahead of the imaginary line between Earth and moon. And if this happens, the gravity of the Earth would exert a torque on the moon that would pull it back, both slowing down the rotation and speeding up the orbit.

When the rotation and orbit are the same, this torque vanishes and a stable equilibrium is reached. At this point, we say that the body (moon) is tidally locked to the other body (Earth).

Tidal locking happens in other systems as well. Pluto and its satellite Charon are tidally locked to each other, meaning that Charon is only visible from one side of Pluto and from there you always see the same side of Charon. Mercury is tidally locked to the Sun, but because the orbit of Mercury deviates far enough from a circle, this lock is not 1:1. Instead, a Mercury year (the orbital period) is exactly 1.5 times the length of a Mercury day (its rotational period).

The moon is also affecting the rotational period of the Earth. The length of a day is ever so slightly increasing and the Earth would becomes tidally locked to the moon in about 50 billion years, at which point a day on Earth, a lunar month (a full orbit of the moon) and a lunar day (the rotation of the moon around its axis) would all be the same length. However, the expansion of the Sun into a red giant in 4-5 billion years will prevent this from ever actually happening.


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

[User] ELI5: How exactly do CAPCHAs work? If a bot wouldn't be able to fill out a capcha correctly, how are computer programs able to tell if I answer correctly?

[Assistant] The program generating the CAPTCHA knows what it is because it generates it. It isn't a static image just stored on a hard-drive, they are generated dynamically by taking a sequence of letters/numbers and then distorting them. The computer knows what those letters/numbers are *before* it distorts them, so it knows what the correct answer is already.


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

[User]
[Dune] How do the Fremen deal with kidney stones.

Kidney stones can be caused by not drinking enough water, this obviously going to be common on Arrakis  How would the stillsuits deal with passing a kidney stone? Would a solid in the moisture recycling system cause a problem?

[Assistant] The fremen drink a good deal of water. They constantly recycle it losing only a small percentage throughout the day. So they're not dehydrated or drinking on rations just drinking the same fluid over and over and over with periodic refills.


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

[User]
What are some arguments for and against aborting confirmed down syndrome fetuses?

I understand this is a very sensitive ethical question but I want to hear your opinion as philosophers on this subject. Is it a morally reprehensible act to deny a fetus with down syndrome life? Or is it more reprehensible to force them to live a sub par life?

[Assistant]
Sally Phillips did an excellent documentary for BBC on this.

I guess its a case of how do you judge quality of life? And when is a poor quality of life worse than no life at all?

And what does the termination of down syndrome fetuses say about the extent to which we value people with down syndrome.


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

[User]
ELI5: if captcha codes/puzzles are being trained by us humans to recognize stairs, bikes, taxis, etc, how do they know when we're mistaken?

For example i have a set of 9 images from which i am supposed to select the ones containing bridges or traffic lights. If i dont select them all, it wont let me pass. How does it know if we're training them by completing?

[Assistant] By receiving results from thousands of users, statistical models are used to separate real from fake users by looking at the grouping of data. Fun fact: data collected from certain captcha were actually used to train algorithms to read blurry text. By giving two tasks to the user, the first verified the user to be human and the second was used to train computer to be better at reading.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why those students were killed in Mexico? Purposes?

I can't figure out why all this is happening in Mexico around those students missing. Can you explain that to me, excuse my lack of knowledge.

[Assistant] At this point it is presumed the students, who were activists, were traveling to protest at a meeting where the mayor's wife was to give a speech. So, he had his cops stop their bus and arrest them. They were then turned over to the local Drug Lord for disposition. The rest, as they say, is history.


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

[User] What accounts for the sex difference in life expectancy?

[Assistant]
There are a few schools of thought.

First and most obviously are socio-environmental factors-men are much more likely to participate in risky behaviors such as smoking, drinking, or other drugs, and are thus more prone to dying from the associated diseases (i.e. liver failure, lung cancer, etc). Furthermore, men are much more likely to die from injuries sustained in car accidents or from occupational hazards, and also tend to commit suicide at higher rates. Finally, the overwhelming majority of soldiers/combatants are male.

There is also evidence that suggests that telomerase reduction is accelerated in taller individuals, and since men are on average significantly taller this could play a role.

Finally, there is another school of thought suggesting that males are evolutionarily disadvantaged, because mitochondria are passed exclusively from the mother to her child.  This would allow for selection against traits that are deleterious for female offspring, but not for male offspring.


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

[User]
ELI5: Can mobile phones get viruses like other computers? If not, why ?

Why don't we have to worry about our iPhones or Droids getting viruses or malware like we do with laptops or other computers?

[Assistant]
Generally speaking: yes, they can.

However, they are far less targeted than PCs, and their operating systems are generally far more restrictive than PCs. Windows for example allows you to execute and install pretty much anything you want, while an iPhone (not jailbroken) will only allow you to install apps from the App Store, which have to go through a verification process by Apple first.


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

[User] ELI5: How can worms still move and be alive when cut in pieces?

[Assistant] They aren't alive for long. They have compartments, as you can see by the patterns on their bodies that look like rings, these compartments are separate from each other, but their organs are spread throughout the body, while the two halfs will writhe in pain, it is probable that both will die eventually, the same way as if you had been cut in half, your brain would remain lucid up until you died of blood loss, it just takes a bit longer for worms. They also don't use blood, they use hemolymph, which is the insect equivalent of blood.


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

[User]
How much does the atmosphere compress in the direction the Earth is traveling?

I was sitting outside enjoying a bit of rare sunshine on this winter day when I thought about how the earth is traveling around the sun counter-clockwise, and the earth itself is rotating counter clockwise.

So if I sit on my porch on a cold winter day looking up at the noon day sun with my head pointed north and my feet to the south, then the porch, my house and the planet I'm sitting on are all traveling through space to my right or to the west at about 107,300 km/h from what wikipedia and google tell me.

So as the earths atmosphere travels through space, does the it compress in the direction it's traveling and extend in the opposite direction, something like a tear drop?

I imagine on the one hand it would compress a lot given the speed and size of the planet and how compressible air is, but I guess it also depends on how empty the vacuum of space really is.

I assume it gets at least a little compressed.  Would it be just a few miles or almost unmeasurable?

How has this been determined?  Would a simple air pressure gauge measure it, or do you need something fancier to be sure of your measurements?

Thanks for you answers everyone.

[Assistant] Compress against what? The biggest thing of Earth's that is distorted is the magnetic field, and that is done by the sun's spray of radiation. The Earth (and its atmosphere) are already settled into a stable orbit, undergoing a constant acceleration from going around in a circular path. If we were somehow able to induce an acceleration of only the earth, then the atmosphere would respond. But, the only thing that could influence earth like that is gravity, and that would affect the atmosphere just as much, so we wouldnt see any effects.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why is Cyprus on the verge of bankruptcy?

How can an entire country go bankrupt? I guess this also relates to Greece. Is there a connection with these countries and their adoption of the Euro?

[Assistant]
Cyprus has a large banking industry that functions largely as a tax haven for foreigners (read: "legitimate businessmen" in Russia). Cypriot banks had enormous deposits, and invested those deposits. The financial crash caused many of those investments to fail, and the banks lost so much money that they are no longer able to pay back depositors. The nation of Cyprus doesn't want to lose all of the foreign banking business, but it simply doesn't have the money to fully guarantee everyone's deposits. And, since it doesn't control its own currency or monetary policy, it can't simply inflate away the brunt of the losses.

Their plan is to take out large bailout loans from the rest of the Eurozone, guarantee most of those deposits, and "tax" the remainder. This proved massively unpopular with ordinary Cypriots, who would lose part of their savings so that the government could bail out foreign ~~mobsters~~ investors. It seems that the new plan is to fully guarantee "smaller" deposits and tax larger deposits more heavily, which will probably spell an end to the Cypriot tax evasion industry.

If Cyprus had its own currency, and owed its debts in that currency, then it could simply "print money" using conventional monetary policy and avoid the worst of these problems, at the cost of inflation. But more powerful Eurozone nations don't want inflation, so Cyprus is out of luck on that front.


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

[User] [MCU] If Bucky couldn't remember when he was the winter soldier, how does he remember every murder?

[Assistant]
I imagine its more like a trauma "flashbulb" memory that a normal memory, if that makes sense.

So he might get sudden flashes of shooting an elderly man who is alone in his bedroom but he wont be able to remember where they are, who that man was, why he was killing him or anything else about his life as a winter soldier.


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

[User] ELI5: How do video game coders optimize their games to boost fps and stability?

[Assistant] The basic method is they look at how long their code takes to perform each function and look to see if there are more efficient ways to perform that function. If you can do the same action with 5 calculations instead of 10 then you have double the speed of your code. If you can avoid having to read data from a slow hard drive and instead have it available in very fast graphics memory then you can similarly increase the performance of your game.


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

[User]
[General] What's the SciFi equivalent to the M2 machine gun?

It's as close to mechanically perfect as you can get. In over a century of constant use, the only improvements that have been made is a quick change barrel and improved ergonomics on the grip.

What other weapons in science fiction have been used for centuries with no significant changes because they are ideal for their purpose?

[Assistant] The Lasgun from warhammer 40k, the most basic weapon used by the most basic soldiers of the imperium. Quintillions of guardsmen have used lasguns over 10k years, and since he imperium hate inventing things the weapon never really changed.


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

[User] When I "start" two balls in a Newton's Cradle, why does it reflect with two balls on the other side instead of just the last ball with twice as much kinetic energy?

[Assistant] Because both energy and momentum are conserved.  Energy is quadratic in velocity and momentum is linear.  If the energy of two balls went into one ball, the resulting velocity would only be 1.4x the original, meaning momentum would be lost.  Momentum can't be lost, so that can't happen (at least not without something else getting involved).


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

[User]
[40k] could the universe ever get unfucked?

So Im no expert in 40k, but the other day I was reading a bit about the Horus Heresy, and it seemed to me that the emperors plans to fight the chaos gods was actually working well enough to scare them. Which makes me curious, is there any chance of them ever being defeated? Is there any chance that the galaxy might know more than war? Maybe peace with the Tau, or the return of the Nekrons souls? Will things still be messed up in the 51st millennium?

[Assistant]
No, in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war.

The problem is that the Emperor's plan to deal with the Chaos gods wasn't really working. The warp is a realm of emotion so as long as there are sentient beings with emotions then *something* is going to live in the warp and that entity will want to stir conflict because that generates emotions and feeds it. So even if he somehow succeeded in killing the Chaos gods new entities would soon replace them.

Plus even if all of the sentient races somehow became friends and stopped fighting that doesn't solve the issue of the Tyranids. In many ways the Nids are entropy personified, in the long run they are simply to numerous to be stopped and any victory against them is at best a temporary respite. They come from outside the galaxy so even if the current hive fleets are stopped there are many more coming behind them.


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

[User]
[Superman II] Why did Superman kill Zod?

Couldn't he have literally just sent Zod to prison, since Zod no longer has any powers?

[Assistant] Did you notice how Superman took the Kryptonians' powers? They were bathed in red light. Presumably, this is because Superman was simulating the red sun of Krypton, which would have purged the yellow sun radiation from their cells, but only temporarily. Soon, maybe in hours but perhaps within minutes, they would have been fully restored to power. Not being able to put them back in the Phantom Zone, Superman's only choice was to kill them.


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

[User]
Do antibodies get used up when preventing an infection?

Suppose I have COVID-19 neutralizing antibodies from a vaccine. I get exposed to SARS-CoV-2, but neutralizing antibodies prevent the virus from reaching my cells. Does that lower my antibody levels, leaving me more vulnerable on next exposure? Would antibody levels drop for other reasons than this? Can the distinction (if this depletion does occur) be measured?

[Assistant]
Yes, antibodies get used up while preventing an infection.

Antibodies also get used up when *not* preventing an infection, and the difference in rates is pretty small.

Antibodies normally only have a half-life of 2-3 weeks. The reason antibodies seem to remain roughly constant is that theyre being continuously made, at roughly the same rate they turn over. Theyre constantly being made by plasma cells, which are renewed by memory B cells (I am simplifying wildly here).

If theres an infection, antibodies do get used up as they bind to pathogens, which might get destroyed by white blood cells or simply blown out your nose, covered with antibodies. So the rate of destruction of antibodies during an infection increases.

But B cells also respond to the presence of the pathogen by making more plasma cells and more antibodies. A single plasma cell can make thousands of antibody molecules every second, and there may be millions of plasma cells during an infection; overall, infection leads to a dramatic increase in antibody concentration even though some are being used up while attacking the pathogen.


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

[User]
ELI5: What is the difference between a lawyer and an attorney?

I always thought they were the same thing, but my teacher said they were different today.

[Assistant] As a lawyer, had to get in here after seeing the answers. Yes, there is a difference.  Attorney means "a person appointed to act for another in business or legal matters." *Fuckin Google*. Anyone can be an attorney., i.e attorney-in-fact.  If you appoint your cat to fill out your ss disability forms, your car is your attorney in that respect. In contrast, a lawyer is a legal professional (passed the bar) who also acts as your attorney.   That said, colloquially, these terms are used interchangeably.


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

[User]
Help Regarding Rorty

I've been reading a lot of Rorty recently, and throughout his work he expresses himself as being anti-epistemology (*Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature*) and anti-metaphysics ("On Analytic and Conversational Philosophy"). He seems to be pretty explicit in his attack against these two fields, but what I am having trouble understanding are the exact details for his attacks. Why does he seem to deem M&E as being outdated? What should we replace them with? What would he have thought of fields such as Social Epistemology and Social Ontology, or new developments in philosophy like OOO or assemblage theory?

For the record, I have not yet completed *Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature*, and perhaps he answers some of my questions in a clear manner later on in the book. If so I apologize, but I want to make sure that I am understanding Rorty clearly as he lays out his argument in the first two chapters of his book.

Thank you, all.

[Assistant]
Rorty thinks epistemology is a dead end because, as he sees it, distinctly epistemological questions only arise when we adopt a certain view of this thing called the mind and its relation to the world. As far as Rorty is concerned, the picture is quite simple: causal stimuli produce in us certain propositional attitudes. Those beliefs can be used as reasons when justifying other beliefs to members in our community. There is a radical distinction between the *causation* of propositional attitudes and the *justification* of beliefs with other beliefs. This is basically the most fundamental distinction in Rorty and it does *a lot* of work for him. "Epistemological" questions only arise when we start to think that knowledge has something to do with our minds producing beliefs in the "right" way, a prejudice that, according to Rorty, underlies Locke's philosophy and Kant's notion of the transcendental. Rorty thinks that when we see the distinction between causation and justification clearly, the ground for these investigations will be taken away.

There's a section in PMN on Fodor where he shows how we can (and should) avoid reading cognitive science as a new iteration of transcendental philosophy.

You might also want to read one of his early papers, *the world well lost*, for a very succinct presentation of his view. Also, all his essays on Davidson are relevant. Definitely read *Robert Brandom on Social practices and Representations*, *The Very Idea of Human Answerability* and *Antiskeptical Weapons* in his collection *Truth and Progress*.


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

[User]
[Godzilla] how are monsters like Rodan , mothra and king ghidorah able to fly?

I mean these monster weigh over 10000 TONS!!!

[Assistant] I suspect that kaijus are able to generate some sort of anti-gravitational field that partially nullifies their immense weight. That would also explain how they can walk over some terrains without sinking into the ground, or how they don't collapse under their own weight, or how IIRC in some incarnations Guidorah (and Mothra?) can also fly in space.


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

[User]
Does eating lactose while lactose intolerant have cumulative negative effects?

Does the intolerance have long term effects, if the immediate symptoms are ignored?

[Assistant]
The lactose itself does nothing in people with lactose intolerance, they just can't digest it. The bacteria that feast on the undigested lactose that enters the intestine cause the problem.
If you don't eat lactose for a longer period you'll have less lactose-consuming bacteria in your intestinal flora.
If instead you eat lactose regularly your intestinal flora will contain more lactose-consuming bacteria. Which will result in a stronger reaction.

So no real permanent damage but eating lactose will worsen it.


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

[User]
In space with no gravity, which way do plant roots grow?

Okay I remember from high school that if you plant a seed in dirt, the seed automatically knows which way to direct its roots due to gravity. But imagine a scenario similar to the movie Walle where we are traveling through space in the middle of the galaxy without any local planets or stars influencing our ship. If we stuck a seed into a dirt container in our ship, would the roots branch out randomly, or point towards the nearest system?

Another question if we were in one of those spinning cylindrical colonies (similar to the ones in gundam) in space that simulates gravity. Gravity is the attraction of mass, but could the seed tell that this centripetal force isnt really gravity? Or would it be tricked to thinking it is gravity and still plant its roots outward of this spinning colony.

Follow up extremely hypothetical question assuming the seed roots do grow normally in a spinning colony: if we planted a seed here on earth, but made a small device that spun the dirt and seed in a circle (similar to the colony in space), but the force acting on the seed was greater than earths gravity, would the roots point outward in our little device or still down towards gravity?

[Assistant] Long answer short: there is more than just gravity directing the roots. Soil density, water, and nutrient locations all play a factor. Likely, with the right soil and light source, plants will grow with relative normalcy in no, low, or simulated gravity.


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

[User]
[Star Wars:The Clone Wars]Why did the Republic plan to give Ahsoka, a child, the death penalty?

In a clone wars arc were a part of the Jedi temple is blown up, Ahsoka is accused on doing this crime and is eligible for the death sentence. Doesn't that sound a bit  excessive considering she was 16 or 17 at the time? In our own world most nations have abolished the death penalty and the Star Wars universe apparently is alot more civilised and advanced than ours.Its kinda hypocritical Obi Wan saying it was a more civilised time when they planned to execute a child.

[Assistant]
The fact is this wasn't a civilian matter where she may have been shielded from harsh punishment due to her age.

She was accused of attacking a military target, and as she was a part of that same military, she was subject to a court martial not civilian criminal law, and the punishments were more severe, including the death penalty.

She also couldn't really plea that she wasn't part of that, because she held a command position in that military.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] I'm a Hutt crime lord with vast spice dealings, a pirate fleet, and a corrupt Senator from Naboo on my payroll. How do I go about acquiring a lightsaber gun, a gun that shoots lightsabers?

I want the gun to shoot whole lightsabers, hilt and all. Preferably really fast. Money is no object. As you may know, us Hutts love acquiring curios and my sarlacc just isn't thrilling anymore.

[Assistant]
Buy all the lightsabers you can from shady antiquities dealers. Then contract a mechanic to build a tube that can fire saber handles, with a mechanism to press the activation button as it leaves the barrell.

But you realise any time you miss you're delivering your enemy a light saber, right?


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

[User] ELI5: why are nails or screws better in different applications and how do you know/work out which is best for what?

[Assistant]
Nails have a little bit of give, while screws generally do not.  For this reason, nails are used when building with wood, as they can handle it when the wood flexes over time (due to weight, age, humidity, etc).

Screws provide a stronger, less flexible connection, which is preferred when things aren't supposed to flex.  Screws are used on decks specifically so that the boards don't loosen.  Screws are also easier to remove, so they are better for situations where the item will definitely have to be replaced.


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

[User] Can you actually Punch so hard you put a hole in reality?

[Assistant]
I can't speak for whether superboy would have the strength to do so.

But lets look at this for a second.

A black hole is created when the amount of mass, and therefore a form of energy' is concentrated in a very small space.

A punch, a physical motion, is unlikely to be able to give the right kind of energy, regardless of whether it can reach the amount of energy required.

Say a cube of matter is punched, with extreme, possibly reality breaching energies.

It is much more likely, that the matter being hit will simply be vaporized, or possibly even straight up fused, by the level of energy being placed into it.

Which would of course cause the matter and all your hard delivered energy to fly off at some sizable portion of the speed of light.

What might work, is using the energy of your superpowered individual to compress existing large quantities of matter.

For instance the individual takes a handful of some already dense matter and squeezes as hard as they could.

The energy levels they would need to reach, would be much much larger than would usually be required in a late stage star to collapse into a black hole, as the amount of mass would be much smaller, thus it would need to be a lot more concentrated in order to reach the same "lets-punch-a-hole-in-reality" levels.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do pro boxers not wear head protection in fights, but amateur boxers do?

[Assistant] Rules and amateur is fighter centric so they care more about safety while pros are viewer centric and more about bringing in money. And when people watch fights, they like them bloody so you see amateur boxing associations require you to wear specified gear  while pro boxing fights don't have them. If you check it out, you'll also see that amateur fights have rules geared towards safety that are not there in the pros.


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

[User] [Avatar] Humans have the tech for faster than light travel but can't cure Jake Sully's paralysis with a simple pill or surgery?

[Assistant]
They can.

They're not *going* to, because this is a hypercaptialist nightmare future and Jake Sully is on a disabled war vet's income. But they absolutely *could*, yes. If a rich dude had the same accident, he'd be out of the wheelchair in minutes.


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

[User]
CMV: No large business (Google, Amazon, etc.) actually does anything out of the goodness of their heart and it's all for publicity, so no one should be applauding them.

Google has been thanking essential workers all week on the google homepage. Today is delivery people. Yesterday was public transit workers.

But it's all a sham.

I don't get why people are commending them for acknowledging these people when they are solely doing it for publicity and to look good. I feel like there's nothing altruistic going on and there's no "Leslie Knope" that works at fortune 500 companies that cares about the world and it's people, and that it's all just something they can point at later and say, "Look, we did a good thing, so you can't criticize us for 'XYZ'."

I feel like this applies to charities as well. I don't round up at the grocery store for X charity every once in a while so I can bring it up at my family dinner as a talking point about myself. So why are people impressed with any large company for their donations to charity when it's all for publicity?

**TLDR: No one in big business actually cares about those people they pretend to care about, so why does anyone care when they do anything?**

[Assistant]
Companies do what makes money.

If being good, charitable, and kind is what is profitable, then that is what companies will do.

If being greedy, evil, and selfish is what is profitable, then that is what companies will do.

Therefore, as a consumer, it is imperative to financially reward companies when they do social good, as well as financially punish companies (such as boycott) when they perform social ills.

As you say, all they do, is make money. But if they look out at the world, and see that being generous and kind is what makes them money, then they will do that. Therefore, we ought to reward companies for being good social citizens. (And continue punishing those that continue to act poorly).


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

[User] Why does metal turn red when it is heated?

[Assistant] Everything glows red when heated to a certain temperature because of blackbody radiation. It's just metal is one of the few things we deal with that doesn't combust or melt before it can get that hot.


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

[User] Could it ever be possible to invent a bionic eye that allows people to see light outside of the visible spectrum, such as ultraviolet or infrared?

[Assistant] Your brain could probably handle the input anyway, experiments have shown that mice and new world monkeys are capable of comprehending the difference between red and green after having their natural red-green colorblindness fixed by gene therapy.


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

[User] ELI5:How we have hundreds of HD channels on cable, but streaming HD on Internet seems to require more bandwidth?

[Assistant]
Cable TV works much like a radio station: Your cable receiver tune into a certain frequency to find a channel and shows the video stream of that channel. It does not matter if just you or any number of people watch that channel, they all get the same content at the same time.

Internet streaming works differently. Your computer )or whatever device you use for watching) talks to a server and requests a video stream. That server then sends that stream to your computer alone. It does not matter if your neighbour is watching the same video or something completely different, he will need his own stream from some server.

Now, let's say that the cable in your neighbourhood has the bandwidth to transfer 100 streams side by side, at any time. For cable TV, that means there could be 100 diffferent channels that everyone can tune into. For internet streaming, that means that just 100 people can each watch a stream.


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

[User] ELI5: How do hormone responses occur so rapidly? When people are frightened/surprised, they can almost immediately feel a rush of adrenaline and heart rates rise, faces flush, etc. How do hormones reach appropriate organs so quickly? Why isnt there more of a delay for the hormones to travel?

[Assistant] So there are already a ton of responses in this thread which explain it better than i can, i just want to add a reason why your heart can change its tune so quickly. You have a node in your heart which is called the sinus node. It has a "natural" tact of approximately 120 Beats per minute. As you know your resting heartrate is quite a bit lower  (around 60-80). This is because your sinus node gets constantly throttled by your parasympathetic nervous system. Imagine someone who is pushing against a door -your sinus node- and someone holding against it from the other side -your nervous system-. If you experience a stimulus which needs a higher heartrate your parasympathetic system just stops blocking  the door. Your sinus node suddenly has no resistance and burst through the door with full speed. This change can occur between two heartbeats so that this is the fastest way for your body to raise its heartrate.


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

[User] [Rugrats] What is the minimum age you have to be to understand what babies are saying?

[Assistant]
There are no absolutes, it's all relative. The babies can't understand Dil because they are too old compared to him, the same way the adults can't understand the babies. Another newborn can understand Dil just fine.

Basically, the rules seem to be:

* You can understand everyone older than yourself.
* You can't understand people that are younger than you past a threshold, but the threshold depends on your age.
* As time goes on you never lose the ability to understand someone you could before. Mathematically, for m > n, if age m understands age n, then age m + k understands age n + k for all positive k  (For example, Angelica is 3 and can understand Tommy who's 1. When she's 4 and he's 2, she will still be able to understand him. The same is true when she's 5 and he's 3, 6 and 4, and so on.)


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

[User] (Star Wars) Would a Jedi feel a great disturbance in the force when the Death Star was destroyed, like Ben Kenobi did when Alderaan was destroyed?

[Assistant] Yes, disturbances in the force are caused by a significant change in any factor that affects the force, including (but not limited to) massive loss of life. The loss of life on the Death Star, while not on the scale of Alderaan, would have been felt by those attuned to such things.


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

[User] ELI5: Why do flys/bees fly in very erratic patterns rather than move in a straight line?

[Assistant] Although flying in a straight line may be a more energy efficient path, the erratic flight patterns mean that their movement is less predictable by predators such as birds. Overtime this evolutionary advantage has stuck.


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

[User] [Harry Potter] Remember the spell Voldemort cast on his ring? The one that would kill anyone who touched it in seconds, with no known cure? Why didnt he use that for every horcrux?

[Assistant]
It was for people who wear it. The locket was enchanted to do the same thing, but with a different method. The journal was enchanted to mind-control someone and eventually steal their life-force, which seems better. And all of them were protected with a number of things that would likely kill you.

Using the same spells to protect each horcrux seems counterproductive, since that would mean anyone that can get past one can get past them all. And if one of them does kill someone, it's likely people will figure out how to get around that for the next one. It's more useful to find new ways to protect each one.

Also, it was probably too difficult as it was. Dying sucks, but it's still one of the better ways of being permanently incapacitated. bu creating too many horcruxes, he risked someone would just not bother with them and encase him in cement or torture him into insanity instead.


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

[User]
[Squid Game] Why did the married couple come back together? *spoilers*

After the first game, people could choose to come back or just go home. Going home is a real option, about 14 chose to do just that. And after the first game, they know what the stakes are.

Why would the married couple come back together? There could only be one winner. I understand they're all in economic desperation, but that only makes sense for one.

Then the guy kills himself when his wife dies. Like, that was probably going to happen the second you both agreed to come.

[Assistant]
That there could only be one winner wasn't actually clear from the initial explanation. The specific phrasing used made it appear that anyone who made it past the sixth game would win, and the prize money would be divided amongst them. So they thought, if they worked together and both of them won the last game, they would get all the money.

That the game was rigged to ensure a one versus one finale was something that no one, even the people who were preparing for the final game, had figured out.

We figured it out pretty quickly, since we kind of expected that sort of behavior from the awful people we saw running the game. But the actual players didn't have all the information we did.


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

[User]
Can someone explain in relatively simple terminology why it is the case that the Sun is not on fire?

I know that the Sun works by nuclear fusion, but the sun does look like it is on fire.

[Assistant]
They are both hot.

It is as simple as that, the reason why fires glow is because they are hot. They emit radiation (black body in the case of the orange glow, spectral in the case of the blue you get with gas).

As something gets hotter the radiation it emits moves from infra-red to red to red to orange to white. Both the Sun and a fire are hot enough to emit visible radiation.

The reason that the Sun is NOT a fire is because of the source of the heat. A fire is heated by combustion which is a reaction with oxygen. The Sun is heated by a nuclear reaction.


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

[User]
ELI5: Why is that spot between the bottom of your ribs and your hip bone so ticklish for so many people?

A light pinch there could take down a grown man in some circumstances. I feel like it's a super power of some sort but I am immune to the tickle.

[Assistant] Well some people believe that the sensation of tickling evolved as a method for young children to learn how to defend themselves from predators (especially in prehistoric times). Consider this, someone tickles you and your first response is to cover it up or in some other way try to defend the area. Your brain then rewards you for your learning with laughter or more chemically a dopamine release. Areas like your side that are "excessively" ticklish are just areas of the body that are particularly vulnerable. That gap in your ribcage has to be there for movement purposes, but is no where near as safe as your ribcage. Your body is emphasizing the need to protect that area because if a tiger got his teeth around it, or any other nasty creature, it would be a very easy kill for the tiger.


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

[User] If my headphones have bigger speakers will the battery life on my iPod drain faster?

[Assistant]
Ramast's answer is incorrect. Changing the volume doesn't change the output power, it changes the output voltage range. At a constant volume level, if you switch to a set of headphones with twice as much impedance, you'll halve the sound output, but you'll also halve the power consumption.

The parameter you care about is how well sound from the headphones couples into your ears. This is reasonably well approximated by putting the headphones on and asking someone to judge how much sound they can hear near you.


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

[User] ELI5, why do images load by first showing the entire picture distorted, then clarifying. Back in the day, they loaded slowly from the top down.

[Assistant]
This is a product of what is called **interlacing**.  Basically, an image will store every 8th pixel first - so if you just get the first chunk of data, it'll be the 1st pixel, the 9th pixel, the 17th pixel etc.  This amounts to being a low-resolution version of the image, so it's very fast to load an image that just shows every 8th pixel.  Then you load the next line and it's every 4th pixel, then every other pixel, then finally every single pixel.  (This is the simplified ELI5 version).

Old BMP or GIF images didn't use interlacing (though interlaced GIFs are commonplace today), so when you loaded them, it just loaded the first line of the image, then the second line, then the third... which came out to the top-down loading you saw.

Interlacing only "works" if your browser supports it, and while interlacing is old, older browsers often did not support it and an area would just be blank.

Sometimes a website will cache a lower-res version of an image and serve that to you first if it detects that your connection is slow.


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

[User]
Do protons and neutrons touch each other within the nucleus an atom?

Weve all seen the models of atoms which show a pile of protons and neutrons, making of the nucleus. Is this model accurate? More specifically, is there a measurable distance between the individual protons and neutrons, or are they touching in the way people normally use the word?

[Assistant]
They don't have well-defined positions in space, but we can talk about the spatial extent of their wavefunctions.

Heavy nuclei (A ~ 100) have radii on the order of ~ 10 femtometers, while a bare nucleon has a radius of around ~ 1 femtometer. So in heavy nuclei, protons and neutrons are packed very tightly together. The density of nuclear matter is enormous, about 10^(14) times the density of water.


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

[User] Purveyors of science! Is it bad to re-use plastic water bottles, and if so - why?

[Assistant]
In general there is no problem re-using plastic water bottles.

It can be hard to properly sterilise plastic. Sufficient heat to be certain of killing/destroying organic contaminants is likely to damage the plastic. Likewise chemicals used for sterilisation may damage the plastic.

Plastic bottles are frequently not made of a single plastic - they are comprised of layers of plastic that provide a variety of properties. The inner-most layer is designed to be safe in conjunction with human consumables (it won't leach harmful chemicals into the fluid). It may be that 'possibly' harmful chemicals are used within the bottle as a whole but they do not come into contact with the food (water).

Damage to this inner layer (see sterilisation above) can reduce the safety of the bottle (and scratches can provide additional places for germs to lodge).

Without sterilisation (i.e. if not cleaned) there is the usual danger from anything else that is used for food that isn't cleaned (bacterial or fungal growth).


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

[User]
[Doctor Who] could a time lord regenerate due to emotional trauma?

if a timelord suffers enough psychological damage could it trigger a regeneration despite being physically healthy?

[Assistant] A time lord regenerates when his body is dying, so as long as the time lord's name isn't padme they should be fine. They could, however, choose to regenerate as a kind of suicide, as the person he is dies.


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

[User]
How do you afford to become an Academic?

Hello!

This is probably going to sound like a very dumb question, but it's something that's been on my mind.

I am currently in my undergrad. I recently decided to pursue my dream of going to grad school and I think I eventually want to teach. I know this will involve a Masters degree at least, eventually a PhD.

I see plenty of professors at my school specializing in humanities topics, being published authors or regular writers, and being very successful in their fields. My question is: how do you afford it?
I made a lot of mistakes in my early 20s and my family couldn't afford to send me to a four-year university. As an adult I'm supporting myself and slogging through a full time job and school. My living expenses (rent, car loan, insurance, food, etc......) easily exceed $1000. I can't imagine not working, or only working part time, but I don't want to work full time in my graduate studies--I've even heard of schools that won't let you. I kick myself for not being more responsible and putting myself in this financial hole.

I hope this doesn't sound rude, it really isn't my intention. How did you support yourself through grad school? Should I just give up?

Thank you!

[Assistant] Any PhD program worth going to will fund you - they'll cover your tuition and give you a stipend for TA work or scholarships not tied to a work contract. There's no guarantee that it would get you to a living wage, and many grad students have to supplement their stipend with a side gig, but it's not nearly the same as undergrad, where it's more common to pay out of pocket. A PhD position is a job in and of itself, and you shouldn't go to any program that doesn't recognize that by paying you for your work.


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

[User] Are drops of water consistent in size? How big is that, and why? And what about other substances like oil, or molten metal?

[Assistant] They are not consistent in size. Think about using a micro pipet or any dropper and then think about mist or large droplets of water on a waxed car. Drops of water from the same object are likely to be of similar size due to surface tension (adhesion) and the force on the drop being similar.


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

[User] Why does a Pfizer booster protect against omicron when the first two doses dont?

[Assistant]
A few points:

1) We are not sure how much a booster will help, but it should help some, just because it will bring our antibody levels back up (they wane somewhat after that second shot, which is normal). These antibodies don't bind as well to omicron due to all the mutations, but they still bind a bit, so having more is helpful.

2) Antibody levels may stay higher for longer with the booster (per Shane Crotty on TWiV 802).

3) There is a cool thing B cells do call "affinity maturation", where they develop better affinity for antigens with repeated exposure (look up how it works -- it's really neat!). This process can also result in  "guesses" of new variants, so the body has a chance of better defending itself against things it has never seen before. This may mean the new antibodies after the booster are better at neutralizing.

4) It's not entirely right to say two doses doesn't protect. We don't know about T-cell response yet, but it is probable that it won't be substantially reduced, as T-cell epitopes are largely the same. It is still possible (I would guess likely) that two doses will provide some protection against severe disease.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Why didn't Vader just get a bunch of troops, lock down the hangar, and start disassembling the Falcon?

He knew the droids had the Death Star plans. He knew they landed on Tatooine. He knew the Falcon matched the description of the ship that blasted its way out of Tatooine. He knew that it was more than a coincidence that he found the Falcon at the remains of Alderaan. And he sensed Obi Wan just as he was standing next to the Falcon.

I can understand his reluctance to just eject the Falcon from the hangar and target a few turbolasers on it; he wouldn't be able to verify the recovery of the Death Star plans. But knowing what he knew at the time I don't understand why he didn't just call in a battalion of troops to the hangar, put the hangar on lockdown, and then start disassembling the Falcon  starting with the engines  bolt by bolt until there was nothing left but a pile of parts and the people (and plans) he was looking for.

It's not like there would be any resistance. Sure, Ben's a Jedi and Luke, Han, and Chewie have blasters, but with a ton of troops backing up Darth Vader in a shielded and locked-down hangar on board the Death Star, really how much of a chance would they have? At best Ben would stalemate Vader which would leave the three humans against a shit-ton of armed troops.

Why was Vader so cavalier about it?

[Assistant]
That's basically what he did do. It just didn't work.

The Falcon was kept there because of the tractor beam, Vader sent troops aboard. When the ship turned out to be empty he ordered a scanniing crew to check every part of the ship to look for the plans.

Why would he have hundreds of stormtroopers standing there watching an empty spaceship?


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

[User]
I ruined my computer with poorly managed libraries. How can I start over and avoid the same mistakes?

**TLDR;** How can I install all of the libraries and languages I need in a way where I can make sure they won't interfere with each-other and will be easy to maintain and/or clean up later.

I've been using this computer all the way through high school and the first half of my undergrad and slowly, the years of installing different version of different libraries and programming languages without truly understanding what I was doing has ruined my path variables, my folder permissions, and filled my computer with trash libraries I will never use again.

I want to start from scratch, factory resetting my computer and reinstalling only the things I care about. I'm on a Mac and I mainly use Python (Annaconda) , Java, and R.

[Assistant]
Isolate dev suites with Docker containers, nixOS paths, BSD jails, Linux chroots, Vagrant boxes, VM's.

For particular languages such as Ruby, Node.js, Python, Java, or Go, there are tools akin to rvm for isolating by language version.


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

[User]
[ATLA] Did Aang and Katara kiss in the Cave of Two Lovers?

It goes dark for a second and then lights up, but I don't know if the lights turning on was a result of their kiss or if it interrupted it before it could happen.

[Assistant]
The lights appearing was the result of all other lights going out. It was glow-in-the-dark.

As for whether they kissed... only they would know for sure. But it *seems* like it may have been interrupted.


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

[User]
How come glow in the dark objects are easier to see using peripheral vision?

I have a few glow in the dark things in my room, but I usually cannot see them glow when I stare directly at them. When I look away, their intensity increases and I can see them using only my peripheral vision. What is going on?

[Assistant] Color sensing cone cells in the eyes are clustered toward the center of the retina, giving us better resolving power in the focus of our sight. However cone cells have a weakness; they are not as sensitive to low light levels as rod cells which can only sense monochrome. At the edges of our retina the proportion of rod cells goes up and thus our sensitivity in low light conditions.


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

[User] ELI5: How is it we suffer no physical consequences, like cramping or atrophy, as a result of being stuck in the same position (fetal position) for 9 months in the womb?

[Assistant] The fetus is moving and growing. It is called quickening. Lots of fidgeting, punching, and kicking. When first born, human babies cannot hold up the weight of their head or sit up. They flop down. Every single action is basically exercise or sleep for them. They start losing weight from all the "activity" and are basically as all systems geared toward bulking.


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

[User]
[MCU/GOTG] (Spoilers) At the end when Starlord has the infinity gem and they all clasp hands to fight it off, why was tiny little Rocket enough?

Drax, who is huge and the penultimate clasper, started cracking all the way to his fingertips. But when Rocket joined, everything became fine. Why?

And no, Groot was not part of this. Although Rocket was seen earlier holding a twig of Groot, if you watch closely he's not holding anything in his free hand in this scene. So it's just Rocket that manages to finally help establish control over the infinity gem. Why, when Drax & co was close to completely cracking?

[Assistant]
To put it simply, Rocket joining in was the tipping point between them all being overwhelmed and the energy being sufficiently distributed for them to survive it. Think the straw that broke the camel's back.

Hope someone more awake comes and explains this, because that was terrible, sorry.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] What did Vader, and more importantly Sidious, think Obi-Wan had actually done when he vanished?

It just seems to me that doing something like that, vanishing into nothing, would have seriously alarmed Sidious; a Force power that he knows nothing about. At the very least I'd be suspicious that somehow Kenobi had escaped and/or mastered some obscure Force power that allowed him to teleport a short distance. On the other hand some Force users were known to mysteriously vanish upon death.

So would Sidious be particularly alarmed? Would he be suspicious that somehow Obi-Wan's death was an illusion and he'd be coming back?

Your thoughts, appreciated as always.

[Assistant]
If we're talking Old Canon, then it's likely that Sidious was aware that Obi-Wan became one with the Force, since it's not a unique ability in old continuity - many jedi over the time who die at peace with themselves and enlightened have vanished upon death.

Vader was shown poking Obi-Wan's robes, just to be sure that he didn't suddenly turn into the Ant-Man or something, but ultimately he should be able to sense how his life was extinguished, and this is not a trick.

In new canon it's a power unique to Yoda, Obi-Wan and Luke (and a little bit of Qui-Gon), so probably yeah, it would be somewhat  disturbing for the sith lords that their enemies achieved ability to cheat death in any way.


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

[User]
[Game of Thrones] How does the Night's Watch make its recruits say the words and actually take the Black?

Based on the show, there's a few weeks of training and testing before recruits are assigned jobs and say their oaths.

However, many of them have been sent to the Wall as a punishment or chose it because it seemed the lesser of two evils, rather than going of their own free will like Jon.

So what's to stop them from refusing to swear their oaths and leaving the Wall before becoming men of the Night's Watch?

[Assistant] People who go there involuntarily are facing a criminal penalty otherwise, and drinking bad ale and sneaking off to go whoring in Mole's Town beats a dungeon, or a noose. Refuse to say the words and honor your promise to take the black, and the dungeon or noose are waiting on you.


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

[User] ELI5: How a trial is made fair when a criminal case gets broad media attention. How is it possible to pick an impartial jury in cases like the Boston Marathon Bombing?

[Assistant] It's very very hard, and its one of the reasons that high profile trials take so long. During jury selection, the defense is looking for people that don't really pay any attention to current events, or at least remember very little about it.


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

[User]
Can the body naturally clean fat from arteries?

Assuming one is fairly active and has a fairly healthy diet.

Or once the fat sets in, it's there for life?

Can the blood vessels ever reach peak condition again?

[Assistant] Atherosclerotic plaques are made of a lot more than just fat. Immune cells, platlets, the endothelium (inner cellular  lining of blood vessel) all contribute to the plaque build up (physical blockage and chemical signaling). That environment creates a local pocket of inflammation and  screwed up cell signaling which results in those cells taking up excess fat and calcifying it. The calcified fat is the real problem that the body cannot readily deal with, nor do we have good therapeutics for it. While healthy dieting and regular exercise can improve the plaque, it is not 100% reversible. Surgically, we can use angioplasty to widen the plaque to improve blood flow to a tissue - very common treatment for coronary artery disease.


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

[User]
If a twin donated an organ to his/her sibling, would the sibling have to take immunosuppressant drugs?

I know that twin's DNA differs but I am wondering if it would differ enough for the body to recognize a transplanted organ as foreign. Would this also be a problem if an organ were to be grown in a lab using cells from the recipient?

[Assistant]
The more closely related the donor and recipient are, the less rejection.  The first successful transplant was done with twins, and there was no observed rejection.  The organ will express the same antigens because they have the same genes.  They need to be identical twins, because fraternal twins do have some differences.

Identical twins have the same genotype, with small differences.  They usually differ in the number of copies of individual gene segments.  But they are much more similar than fraternal twins.


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

[User] ELI5: Why does a vehicle need to go very fast to escape earth? Why cant it go very slowly but with a lot of power?

[Assistant]
It can go slowly with a lot of power, but it will need to move a huge amount of fuel with it as it will have to keep burning for a very long time

Escape velocity is the speed you need to get out of an object's(Earth's in this case) gravity well and continue off endlessly.  The 11.2 km/s escape velocity of Earth is for an object near the surface that isn't impacted by air resistance, but if you move further away the speed requirement drops.  By the time you get to 9000 km you only need to be moving about 7.1 km/s to escape Earth

Your slow but powerful ship would just have to keep burning away from Earth until it gets far enough away that its speed exceeds the escape velocity at that distance.  Unfortunately if you're going slowly you're going to need an obscene amount of fuel due to all the energy you lose to gravity, we go quickly so you spend as little time burning fuel to fight gravity as possible.


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

[User]
[Star Wars] Did Vader have any Maul-esque vendetta against Obi-Wan after they parted ways on Mustafar?

We see Vader taking a keen interest in hunting down Jedi during the Rise of the Empire, but eventually becoming rather "matter of fact" about it all. Did Vader harbor intense resentment towards Obi-Wan like Darth Maul did? Did he allow his personal vendetta to overrule any of his new duties (e.g. following a lead on Obi-Wan instead of aiding an Imperial incursion)? Or does he just forget about Obi-Wan entirely until he shows up on the Death Star? I mean come on, his former master and BFF "betrays" him, "manipulates" his wife against him, and chops off his limbs before leaving him to burn in lava. You would have thought that if Vader had *any* intense hatred for someone in particular it would be Kenobi. Did he ever make any sort of plan like Maul did to locate Obi-Wan through the Force or with Holocrons? I would have thought with the Empire's resources and Vader's influence that doing so would have been far easier than if an old Sith hermit or couple of unofficial Jedi rebels had to accomplish the same task, so I'm left to assume Vader simply didn't bother. Why?

[Assistant]
The best revenge is a life well lived.

Vader certainly wanted to see Kenobi again. If he had gotten any leads he'd have likely followed them (though perhaps not to the detriment of other missions). But Kenobi decided to live in a cave, cut off from the galaxy, and Vader simply had shit to do.


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

[User] What is worse on our skin, a strong acid or a strong base?

[Assistant] "Acids eat you from the inside out, bases eat you from the outside in". I'd be more concerned about bases, high molarity sodium hydroxide will turn you (quite literally) into soap via saponification if you get it on you.


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

[User]
ELI5: Dreams. Why sometimes the dream is so vivid that we get that "Damn it was just a dream" feeling?

Trying to make it more clear: I had this really nice dream last night. And was kinda sad for me waking up to realize that I was in fact just dreaming.

[Assistant] You're going to get lots of 'experts' giving self-assured reasons why. But any question about dreams is like a dream itself - we just don't have confident answers yet because we don't really understand dreams well, or even the brain itself for that matter.


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

[User] ELI5: Where does Box Office money go? How is it distributed? Does the budget of a film include the salaries for the actors?

[Assistant]
It's super, super complicated. That's why people refer to "Hollywood accounting" or "Hollywood bookkeeping" in general to what happens when unusually complicated accounting and bookkeeping schemes are created.

Usually, the owning studio will create a subsidiary corporation for the movie. The film will have a budget, funded by the executive producer, and virtually everyone involved will simply be paid a salary or hourly wages to work on the film.

After the theater gets their share of the ticket sale price, the rest of the box office revenue goes to that subsidiary corporation. If the movie makes more money than its budget, the corporation turns a profit, most of which goes to the studio and executive producer - the ones who financed the film in the first place.

Two things complicate this:

First, big-name actors, writers, and directors may request a percentage of the profits rather than a salary. They want to share in the riches if it ends up being a huge success.

However, evil Hollywood accountants try to minimize the amount they pay those people who get a percentage by using clever accounting tricks.

For example, as the movie gets popular they'll do additional promotion. They'll "outsource" the promotion to their own subsidiary corporation but have them charge ridiculously inflated fees. The movie ends up not making a profit, on the books - but the producer ends up making a killing.

Example - here's what should happen

    Budget: $100 million (pays for almost all costs to produce film)
    Director promised salary: 10% of profit
    Box office gross: $500 million
    Profit: $400 million
    Director final salary: $40 million

What happens instead:

    Budget: $100 million (pays for almost all costs to produce film)
    Director promised salary: 10% of profit
    Box office gross: $500 million
    Marketing expenses: $400 million
    Profit: $0
    Director final salary: $0

The marketing expenses all go to a different subsidiary corporation owned by the same executive producer, so he gets rich while the director gets screwed.


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

[User] ELI5: Since Chinese is a tonal language how can song lyrics be written? Wouldn't it be affected by the pitch of melody and tone?

[Assistant]
In most Chinese music the tones are just omitted. The lyrics of the song can be understood without tones through context. The singer just follows the melody and does not change it based on tones.
Although tones are an important part of Chinese language, it can still be understood most of the time without the use of tones.


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

[User]
ELI5:Why can you buy very cheap reading glasses in shops but there is no cheap equivalent for those with short-sight?

I have noticed you can buy reading glasses for 1 in certain places, but nowhere are short-sighted glasses sold for this price or indeed anywhere except opticians. Why is this? Is there a dramatic difference in how they are manufactured?

[Assistant]
Reading glasses have a really specific purpose, so they don't have to be custom made.  You can put your reading material at a whatever distance they will be in focus, to make up for the lack of accuracy in the lens.

Short-sighted people have very specific focus problems, possibly different in each eye. They also need to be able to see objects are extremely variable distances.  It's impossible to make generic glasses for this purpose; unless both lenses are just right it will be blurry and possibly give headaches.


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

[User] How do internet service providers harness the internet and distribute access to it via cables? What do the cables in our homes connect to on the other side?

[Assistant]
Routers.  The internet is routing all the way down.

Everything sent over the internet is broken down into little collections of data (called a packet) and then sent like a letter -- with a destination "address".  The process of getting a packet to a particular address is called routing.

Routing is super complicated in detail, but in concept it's pretty simple.  Imagine you're trying to pass notes in math class: you look to see if it's for you, and if not you hand it off to a friend that who's closer to the desired recipient.  Your note bounces around for a while but eventually ends up at its desired destination.  Your ISP does the same thing but at a larger scale -- messages arrive over the wire from your house to a router in their data center and that router figures out where to pass the messages (via a routing table) so they get closer to the destination.


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

[User]
Doesn't a mathematical statement/theorem, etc. depend on the axioms you use, the logic you use in your proof, and proof methods you accept?

Mathematical equations are often treated as hard and fast truths.  However, a mathematical 'truth' can be different depending on what axioms you are working with (just think of set theory).  Secondly, the logic you use (classical logic, intuitionistic logic, or one of the other logics) can affect whether a mathematical statement is 'true' or not.  Thirdly, a mathematical statement may be proven with a certain proof method but unable to be proven with a different one.

So, my question is: how can anyone claim mathematics consists of hard and fast, eternal, undeniable and undebatable truths?  Or, do I misunderstand something?

[Assistant]
As said in other comments, mathematical theorems called "true" are true in relation to certain axioms and inside certain systems that are widely used (Zermelo-Frankel Set Theory etc). If you assume difderent axioms and/or use a different system, those sentences can become false or meaningless.

The reason that most mathematical works take these axioms to be true and use the same systems is that they seem to work *in real life*. That is, if you try to build a bridge using mathematics where the sentence "2+2=5" is true, that bridge will probably fall down. Some mathematical tools became a convention because they can used to make predictions about reality that usually turn out to be true.

No math can justify it's own validity, but the Universe seems to work according to some kinds of math and not according to others.