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[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What's to stop from getting the license, buying a gun, selling it to a criminal, and then just reporting it stolen?"
] | That's a specific federal crime already, a straw purchase. It happens, but it's almost never prosecuted. Its what most gun owners mean when they say "Why not actually prosecute the laws already on the books instead of drafting new ones." |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does ice taste bad with milk, even though it is great with every other cold beverage?"
] | Personally I enjoy ice in my milk, I like it to be ice cold and don't mind if it'd a tad watered down at the end |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If you can create a smoke ring, could you make a regular air ring?"
] | Yeah of course. Like you said though, it'd be invisible to us. There are underwater bubble rings with air though! It's all about fluid dynamics |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are old videos that were filmed in black & white converted to color?"
] | There literally was a person/team of people who colored it in. As you can guess, it is very tedious work. It is also very difficult of beginners, I'm a semi-pro at most everything Photoshop, but I can't for the life of me realistically colorize a B & W photo, let alone an entire film. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"'Scandal' in UK Newspapers over funding Hate Speech, and why many companies are stopping adverts being shown in these papers"
] | Companies like LEGO don't want to have their name associated with a brand that happily promotes hate speech. It makes them look worse even though they aren't doing anything wrong. It's like in Peep Show when Mark makes friends with Daryl but then finds out that Daryl is a massive racist. Mark doesn't want to be friends with a racist so he dumps him. LEGO is Mark from Peep Show. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What exactly happens chemically that causes your body temperature to rise when you're sick?"
] | Your body releases signalling chemicals that cause your blood vessels to shrink and move deeper into your body, making your body less effective at getting rid of metabolic heat. It's kinda like a car turning off its radiator. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If the Senate doesn't have a germaneness rule and can combine two completely unrelated topics on a bill, but the House does have a germaneness rule, how can the House vote on those bills if they make it to the House?"
] | Generally, House members can't invoke the germaneness requirement on nongermane Senate amendments until the House has reached a stage of disagreement with the Senate over the amendments. So basically, the House has to consider nongermane Senate amendments, but when debating those amendments that they disagree with, they can invoke the germaneness rule to make sure they stick to debating the subject matter in the amendment. Source: _URL_1_ (towards the bottom of page 10) and _URL_0_ (specifically, clauses 9 and 10). |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What's the difference between Body Wash & Shampoo? Why can't we use one for the other and visa versa..?"
] | Not an expert, but I've read (a loooong time ago) that the scalp prefers a different pH than the body. But this may not be significant enough to matter. OTOH, women tend to have longer hair than men and a shampoo may be better for longer hair. Lady Brienne of Tarth may ignore this. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Can someone explain to me money markets to me like im 5?"
] | It's no different than a regular savings account, just higher minimum balances which usually yield higher interest than a simply savings account. It is not linked to any external risks, most Money Market account's are FDIC insured. Rates are generally 25-50% better than the average savings. It differs from a Cetificate of Deposit (CD's) because you can take the money out when ever you like with no penalty on the interest, up to 2 times a month. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it advisable to block your license plate when sharing a photo of your vehicle?"
] | License plates can be used to find where the owner of the car lives. Unless you're completely comfortable with random strangers knowing that, it might be a good idea to block the plates. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do lower frequencies in speakers require more power? Shouldn't it use less power since the speaker vibrates less?"
] | Another way to think about this is the question: Why do treble sounds travel farther than bass frequencies? To answer this, take a look at the waveform of the frequency in question. The treble wavelength will be much shorter, meaning that for the same power, an audio source can achieve a higher total sound output due to the shorter wavelength. Let's say the treble frequency is around 13kHz, while the bass frequency is around 40Hz. This would mean that the treble frequency is 325 times shorter than the bass frequency, thus leading to the conclusion of both your question and the question I presented. Since a lower frequency has a longer wavelength, the speaker moves more to achieve the same output. This is why you can see speaker cones moving more during bassy music more than treble-y music. It travels farther because, again, less power is needed since it's a significantly shorter wavelength. Hope this helps! |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does one get ROMs from video game cartridges?"
] | There's hardware you plug the cartridge into and then into your computer that can read the contents of the cartridge and send it to a ROM file. [Here's an example.](_URL_0_) Emulation development is a very broad topic and I don't think I could do it justice here, but video game emulator developers will typically obtain or reverse engineer the instruction set for the hardware that a particular video game console uses. Once one developer has done this, the information is out there and others don't need to repeat this work. They then use that info to write software which will read the instructions and process them in the correct way. This isn't a perfect process and there can be a difference in the way an emulator performs compared to an actual console. Here's some resources: _URL_1_ _URL_2_ |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"In terms of genetics, what is a 'library'"
] | Basically it's a collection of genes that have been identified, that we know their purpose and we know the DNA sequence that codes them. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are some car radios capable of spelling out song titles and artist names when tuning into some FM stations?"
] | Radio stations do a lot of clever work to fit more information in the audio stream then just the audio. Originally an FM station were just a simple mono audio signal. However they found out that the signal quality were good enough to deliver audio signals at much higher frequency then the humans can hear. So they composed the difference between the left and right audio channels and turned the pitch up higher then humans can hear and sent it out on the FM band. A stereo FM receiver were then able to split the audio signal based on pitch and turn the pitch down to its original pitch to then make stereo sound. Later on someone figured out that there were still a lot of unused signals above human hearing so they added a digital signal to a high pitch frequency so it can display the name of the radio station, what song is played and even codes for traffic information where it is supported. So the name of the song title is just part of a high pitch audio signals on the FM signal. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How is the ozone hole \"healing\"?"
] | Ozone is constantly being created in our upper atmosphere because of UV radiation from the sun. It's a good thing too, because otherwise that same UV radiation would cause all kinds of trouble for humans here on the ground. But in the previous century we had a number of machines, chemical processes (and even fridges) releasing nasty chemicals into the atmosphere that would hurt this ozone layer. This was visible in a measurable lack of ozone in the most fragile spots, around the Earth's poles. These "holes" in the ozone layer grew to an alarming size. Thankfully the use and release of these chemicals were banned, and now, slowly, we can see the ozone holes shrinking again. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"In Music why is B- > C a \"half-step\" and C- > D a \"full-step?\""
] | It's not logical, but it sounds better. If you want to try to play the scale of C but using only full stops, you'd have to play the following: C-D-E-F#-G#-B♭-C. [Try it](_URL_0_): I can guarantee it will sound very peculiar. The jump from B♭ to C is especially jarring. It's not that somebody arbitrarily decided: "Hey, I know -- let's invent musical scales, but just to mess with everybody's heads, we'll put half-stops between some of the notes." It's that down through the centuries, a system gradually evolved that produced the best-sounding music to our ears. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does my tv, which has no internet connection tell me what the next program will be?"
] | Assuming you have cable, your cable provider subscribes to a service called an 'epg' which stands for electronic program guide. This is the electronic equivalent of the TV guide magazine. This is sent to the tv on a special channel along with all the regular shows. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What caused humans to outsmart other primates?"
] | The true answer is that we don't know. There are many theories but in my opinion the best one is that it's our migratory nature. We were able to move around which changed our circumstances. So like moving into the north we moved far more into fishing and agriculture. The more northern living conditions resulting in adaptations as well as mutations is what changed circumstances and resulted in greater communication and this is what results in humans being 'smarter' but that's not necessarily doing physics smart. It brought the communities together to do things bigger and more organized. Division of labour being what makes humans so dominant. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why aren't there any dinosaur-sized creatures around today?"
] | It's not a stupid question, and the answer is: we killed them all. There used to be humongous animals all over the place. But, humongous animals make for *real* good hunting for those early humans. Wherever we went, we killed all the big animals, until there weren't any left. The most recent Magafauna species to go extinct was in the place that humans most recently arrived: New Zealand. The Maori found the island around 1300 AD, and by 1400 AD all of the [gigantic terror-birds](_URL_0_) that lived there were dead. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"With #Calexit gaining traction the best argument for succession is that it has the worlds 6th largest economy. I find this oversimplified. How much of the CA economy actually benefits from being a state (e.g. importing/exporting American made goods)?"
] | Right, unless the US immediately signed unrestricted free trade deals with California, it would *absolutely obliterate* the California economy. California is a net contributor of federal tax dollars, so it wouldn't suffer from that perspective though. Btw, the only people really pushing for California secession are angry liberals. They'll calm down. Nobody who knows anything about economics thinks secession would be a good idea. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Are nuclear missiles \"easy\" to launch? If Russia were to go into civil war how easy would it be for terrorists to find, target, and launch a weapon?"
] | No, they are not easy to launch at all. They require secret codes which are not available at the launch site; you don't want a commando team to take a nuclear silo and be able to launch and detonate a missile. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do names work in sign language?"
] | Just as all other communication occurs in this language, names are expressed visually. Sure they can be spelled out using signed alphabet letters, but that's so phonetic and not really how sign language works. If my hearing name is Roxanne and my right eye is a lazy eye, I can almost guarantee you my signed name will have something to do with an "R" pressing against my right eye. Or, if my hearing name is Ashley and I have huge breasts, my signed name might honestly be something like an "A" in each hand motioned around the chest area. Dat shit be visual. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is marijuana officially classified as a hallucinogen if you dont actually “hallucinate?”"
] | There are tons of psychoactive chemicals in cannabis. They vary greatly from strain to strain. Some strains are bread specifically for their high or low levels of this chemicals. Some of these chemicals are in fact hallucinogens. Most of them subside after regular smoking due to building a tolerance. It's much more mild than DMT psilocybin or LSD. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Heterosexuality - Why, exactly, are men attracted to women, and vice versa?"
] | Men and women can breed with each other. That's why. It's a primal instinct every living thing has. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Do the signs on the backs of trucks that say, \"warning stay back 200ft, not responsible for broken windshields\" carry legal weight?"
] | They carry zero legal weight in cases where something falls from the truck. You can't unilaterally disclaim liability for negligence. Loads are required to be secured in every state. The driver would be negligent by either not securing the load or improperly doing so, and a single stone falling from a truck is an unsecured load. They generally would not be liable if they truck were to kick up and object from the road that did not originate from the truck. Now getting them to pay is a another matter. First off, you have to prove that the item came from their truck, then you have to deal with their internal claims departments in many cases which will often stonewall, even for provable cases. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do traffic lights 'know' when to change, etc.?"
] | Some traffic lights are on a timer. Those are the lights that seem to take forever to change. Other signals are triggered by a pressure plate under the asphalt, you can usually spot these by a square "patch" looking piece of asphalt at the stop line. The mechanism used usually depends on the amount of traffic at that intersection. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"In the USA, what is life (in practical terms) actually like for illegal immigrants? Can they get jobs, legally drive, get healthcare, etc?"
] | They cannot legally get jobs, they cannot legally drive as they cannot legally get a driver's license, they can get treatment at an ER but they cannot get health insurance, they cannot legally get an apartment because they lack the proper documents, etc. What this means is that everything they do is under the table. They get paid in cash, and pay for everything in cash. The people that are providing these things are criminal (technically) and are shady. They do not have any legal protections from these people taking advantage of them (underpaying, overcharging, etc). |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What are E-cigs, and what is the controversy about them?"
] | As others have said, E-cigs are devices that vaporize a liquid containing nicotine and other substances for you to inhale. There has been some testing done on these, but most of that is just understanding what chemicals are present in the vapor, as compared to the smoke of traditional cigarettes. There have been no long-term studies completed as of yet. But, the conclusions so far are that E-cig vapor is likely to be much safer than a traditional cigarette. E-cigs are certainly not safe - a variety of chemicals including formaldehyde, can be detected in the vapor. But these are at much lower concentrations than in traditional cigarette smoke. Keep it in perspective though - using an E-cig is probably less harmful than living in Beijing with all of the pollution there. But you can't say they are "safe", just "safer" (and probably much, much safer) than traditional cigarettes. Source: Ph.D. respiratory infectious disease researcher |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are they making technology so damn small?"
] | Its kinda like shrinking a plastic chip packet in the oven. The laser the circuits onto wafers of silicon at a larger size to design then once it works they can user tiny manufacturing methods (smaller lasers etc) to make smaller versions in such a way that individual transistors only take up 32 nano-meters or so. I AM NOT AN EXPERT ON THIS |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If no country is on the gold standard, why does paper money have any value at all?"
] | Because we say it does. Gold does not hold any value either, if no one wanted gold it would be worthless. So long as people want paper money they will ascribe value to it. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What an 'Epipen' is and how it works?"
] | An epipen is an easy to use syringe filled with epinephrine, an artificial form of adrenaline, and a few other drugs. It is one of the most efficient ways to delay an acute allergic reaction until you can seek medical treatment. If someone gets an allergic reaction and have problems breathing so you are not able to communicate with them. Then call the emergency number and look if they have an epipen with them. The instructions on the epipen should be simple to follow. When you inject them with the epipen the symptoms change as they go from an acute allergic reaction into adrenaline shock. Just keep them breathing until medical services arrive and can help out. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"In evolution how did sexual differentiation come about, like males and females?"
] | [Ah, wikipedia :)](_URL_0_). The reason is genetic diversity. If you have two genders, that's twice the genes to one specimen (baby), which allows helpful gene selection to occur. The species then evolves quicker. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does wind or moving air feel cool to animals and humans?"
] | When it is hot you sweat. Moving air makes sweat evaporate faster and evaporation absorbs heat making it cooler. Also, when the air is still your body creates a sort of "heat bubble" around you (the air closest to your body absorbs the heat of your body). When it is windy, a steady supply of cooler air is able to absorb more of your body heat. Heat transfers more quickly to colder things. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do I feel like smoking about 13 cigarettes a minute when I'm drinking alcohol?"
] | Alcohol gives you very poor impulse control. Nicotine is highly addictive, which means it gives you a strong impulse to smoke. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If there is no matter in space, what do the rockets push on to accelerate a ship?"
] | That's not how rockets work. Rockets don't "push on" anything. They're not sneakers. By igniting a chemical reaction, they cause an action, i.e., projecting a stream of expanding gas in a particular direction. The reaction is moving the rocket in the opposite direction. Whether the surrounding environment is a vacuum or not is entirely irrelevant to that analysis. Indeed, rockets work *better* in a vacuum, as there is no atmosphere to resist the motion of the engine. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do we start to salivate when thinking or about to eat spicy or sour foods?"
] | It's a Pavlov's dog effect. We're conditioned to associate the smell of spicy and sour and even the thought of it with eating food, and so our body physically reacts. It's not specific to spicy foods at all. If you walked into a bakery every day and ordered a loaf of bread and then ate it, the smell of bread would probably cause the same effect for you after a while. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens when you get that little knot in your throat when you're about to cry?"
] | It's an inflammation in the throat because you're about to cry. It's called globus. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do postage stamps have curvy edges?"
] | In the old days, stamps were printed on a big sheet of paper, and they'd use a machine to poke rows of tiny holes in the paper so that it would be easy to tear off individual stamps. Those "perforations" would make the edges of the torn off stamp look wavy. Modern stamps are printed on strips of sticky paper with a waxy backing so you can peal them off. Instead of poking holes through, they use a thing that looks like a cookie cutter to make cuts in the sticky paper and, usually, leave the backing paper uncut. Since people are so used to the wavy edges, the cutter has wavy edges to imitate the stamps from long ago. It no longer serves a function though. When you have something with a shape that mimics the shape of something older, but no longer serves the original, or any, purpose, that's called skeumorphism. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How can healthy individuals with no symptoms initially develop allergies later in life?"
] | Also want to know this. Used to be allergic to cats and fine around dogs. Now it's the opposite. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why don't you see rain in sports tv broadcasts?"
] | My guess is that it's the focal length. When they show the field they have to use a rather large focal length since the players are rather far away. When they show the bench they would use a smaller focal length which would include the rain. Depth of field is probably also in play (no pun intended) here. Wider aperture for they players, since they move so much, but it can be narrower for the bench. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Can the POTUS issue Executive Order on withdrawing from NATO?"
] | No. NATO is part of a treaty (the North Atlantic Treaty), and only the Senate can make or break treaties. Withdrawing from any organization that we are members of by treaty, like NATO or the UN, isn't something that the president can do unilaterally. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do electronics which have gotten wet, stop working even when they completely dry?"
] | In addition to the damage being done on contact (i.e. creating short circuits leading to immediate or near-immediate failure); tap water, rain/flood water, etc contain a lot of impurities. The evaporated water leaves these behind which may create a delayed onset of corrosion, which can cause poor contact between components and connectors. Distilled water is actually safe for most printed circuit boards (at least those with sealed components) as long as it is applied and completely dried before power is given to the device. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do humans still have to do their own taxes? Why isn't this process automated?"
] | It is automated. ...In other countries. Lots of countries don't force their citizen to do their own taxes, although they're still allowed to if they really want to (for example if they don't trust the government instances to get it right). It's fully possible to do, if your nation just wants to develop the tools to automate it. I'm 32 and I've never even once done my taxes, just glanced over the work that's been automatically done to see if there were some obvious errors. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens when you have a 'pinched nerve'?"
] | When pressure is applied on a nerve it gets activated, that's how nerves work, you will feel the pressure, pain, etc. However, when too much pressure is applied to a nerve by surrounding tissues, such as bones, cartilage, tumors, muscles, overgrowth of bone or tendons. This pressure disrupts the nerve's function, causing pain, tingling, numbness or weakness. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it that when a couple gets divorced the guy is usualy the one who gets screwed over the most?"
] | Everyone gets screwed over in a divorce. The same number of people are paying two mortgages [or a mortgage and rent], spending twice as much time on housework, etc. Let's say you have a couple making $120,000 a year, and one moves out and is paying $12,000 a year in rent. There's not enough to go around. Do you hear more about the men who get screwed in divorces? Then you're not listening to the women. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are crimes solved years after the fact using DNA evidence?"
] | DNA, kept in reasonable decent conditions (which boils down to not exposing it to lots of ionizing radiation ) lasts of several years. While it does degrade over time, it's half life (the point at which half of the DNA in a sample will no longer be useable) is somewhere north of 500 years. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does it take so long for major reform to happen if most of the general public agrees that change needs to be made? e.g. Marijuana and Gay Marriage"
] | The government is designed to be slow to save us from ourselves. Having to go through the process theoretically vets new ideas and changes so they're not implemented hastily with no thought to the consequences. It may be inconvenient when the changes are positive, but it's there to prevent bad ideas from being enacted without having the time to think over them. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens when people die?"
] | She is in you, and in your siblings (if you have any). You carry her genes, she told you her memories, she taught you how to live your life. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do we get songs stuck in our heads?"
] | Short term memory has an audio component. When you rehearse something in your head it gets recycled into short term memory and reinforced. So you hear the song, your STM registers it, you rehearse it in your head a few times, it gets stuck! If you want a more in depth answer I would suggest googling “short term memory components” |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why can drinking too much alcohol cause you to go blind and what is the biology/chemistry behind it? Is it specifically because you absorb too much too quickly (like with moonshine/liquor/spirits), or is there something else that causes it?"
] | Drinkable alcohol is ethanol; it's what in the beer and spirits you buy at your liquor store. Moonshine that isn't distilled correctly builds methanol which the body metabolizes into formaldehyte (which is toxic) and then further into formic acid which will harm your nervous system, beginning with the eyes (causing blindness). |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"A Calabi–Yau manifold and other higher dimensional shapes."
] | You're not alone. Our brains evolved in a world with only three extended spatial dimensions and that means we simply don't have the mental wiring to be able to "visualise" more dimensions than that. Some scientists and mathematicians who've spent years working on concepts of multidimensional objects claim to be able to mentally "see" 4-dimensional (or even higher) shapes but I suspect even then they're using some kind of simplification. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is the age of consent in some countries such as Japan and Mexico so low compared to countries like the US?"
] | In Japan, the national government leaves it up to municipalities, who enforce higher ages such as 17. To some degree this also happens at a state level in Mexico. However, to answer your question more broadly: historically many societies have felt that sexual activity is permissible after puberty. It's only in the last century or so that many countries (such as the USA) have decided otherwise, based on ideas of *emotional maturity* or the need to get an education before parenting; these were not considered important factors historically. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"how does the money I spend for a CD get to an artist?"
] | Depends on the term of their record contract. If they're on a label that puts their music up on iTunes for example, the label gets a cut and so does Apple. My band was on a small independent label that was a subsidiary of a larger label and each of them got a percentage, so I think after all was said and done the band got 25% or so of total sales. For every dollar we made on iTunes we'd get about 25 cents, which ideally would've been split between the 5 of us but normally just went towards future expenses. If you're buying a CD at walmart or target the artist will receive pretty much nothing as the retailers cut is so high. If you want to support an artist and put money directly into their pockets, go to a show and buy something from their merch table or preorder their album from the labels website. Labels like preorders. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it better to start with cold water and boil it when making pasta or coffee, rather than starting with hot water?"
] | It is a myth that cold water boils faster than hot water, but hot water can freeze more quickly than cool water due the [Mpemba effect.](_URL_0_) |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does the space shuttle or the soyuz need special tiles to reenter the atmosphere but spacex falcon does not?"
] | Are you talking about the Falcon 9 first stage, or the actual Dragon capsule? If you're talking about the Falcon 9 first stage, that's because it separates from the rest of the rocket at a relatively low altitude and speed, and thus there's less heat during reentry. It also burns it's engines to slow down to further reduce heating. If you're talking about the Dragon capsule, it does have tiles. The shuttle and Dragon have reusable tiles since the shuttle was reusable and so is the Dragon. The Soyuz does not have tiles. It has a simple ablative heat shield because the capsule is not reusable. Once it lands back on earth, its job is done, so the heat shield does not need to reused either. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does a hospital medically induce someone into a coma?"
] | giving someone barbiturates will put them into a controlled coma where the body can heal itself until it is ready. For more information on coma - _URL_0_ |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why did the universe \"start\"?"
] | We do not know. We cannot even say with complete confidence that it *has* a start, although the leading theories of the day suggest it. Current science is not capable of getting all the way back to "time zero," nor whatever occurred before that, if such a concept is even meaningful. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How and why do men ejaculate with more velocity when they are more excited?"
] | Welp, I just spent a good ten minutes reading about ejaculation on wikipedia, so now I'm an expert. Here's what I think, based on this sentence: > A prolonged stimulation either through foreplay (kissing, petting and direct stimulation of erogenous zones before penetration during intercourse) or stroking (during masturbation) leads to a good amount of arousal and production of pre-ejaculatory fluid. Increased arousal or longer arousal time produces more fluid production, which builds up more pressure, which, upon release, splooges with more force. [this](_URL_0_) article seems to express a similar opinion. [As does this post](_URL_2_) from some website I just found while googling. So, like you're five, the more pumps you give your super soaker, the more pressure builds up, and the harder it [shoots](_URL_1_) all links sfw |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How binary 1's and 0's translate into complex output?"
] | 01000010 01100101 01100011 01100001 01110101 01110011 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100011 01100001 01101110 00100000 01101011 01100101 01100101 01110000 00100000 01100001 01100100 01100100 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01101111 01101110 01100101 01110011 00100000 01100001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01111010 01100101 01110010 01101111 01100101 01110011 00100000 01110100 01101111 00100000 01101101 01100001 01101011 01100101 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100100 01100001 01110100 01100001 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01110111 01100001 01101110 01110100 00101110 00100000 The above translates to "Because you can keep adding ones and zeroes to make the data that you want". Essentially a long enough string of ones and zeros can be made to represent any data. So with a long enough string of them, you can represent each pixel on your screen and the color it's supposed to be. This creates the image on your monitor. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are doors much easier to close when my window is open?"
] | Because by slamming your door you push a lot of air into the car. This causes additional air pressure to build up in the car, which pushes the door open. Usually it takes at most a few seconds for the additional air to escape via various holes in the car, but that second is enough to hinder the door from closing. If a window is open, the air in the car escapes immediatly through the open window and no pressure is build up. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How muscle relaxers only affect skeletal muscles. (Not organs/muscles like the heart)."
] | They don't? What causes death on many of them (if you overdose) is that it shuts down your heart or lungs. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are black people in USA called \"Afro-American\" if most of them are actually not from Africa ?"
] | Well, pretty obviously the answer is because they were descended from people from Africa. And on the contrary, you do (or did) hear people describe themselves as Irish-American or Italian-American. Most black people in the US have no issue with being called black though. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Where does the skin on the body stop being skin and become something else? Openings in particular. In the case of the face does it end at: lips? tongue? throat?"
] | Skin is a specific type of tissue- epithelial tissue. The other tissue types are connective tissue, nervous tissue, and muscle tissue. Epithelial tissue covers body surfaces and lines most of our internal cavities. Connective tissues function for support and protection, such as bone, fat, cartilage, blood, and lymph. Nervous tissue receive stimuli and conduct impulses (neurons). Lastly, muscle tissue makes up, well, our muscles- skeletal muscle, smooth muscle, and cardiac muscle. When considering the rectum to the anus, the rectum is lined with epithelium and the anal sphincter is made up of both a smooth muscle component and a skeletal muscle component. There are tissue transitions at these junctions, so the tissue will slowly become less epithelial in nature while also taking on more qualities of the smooth muscle until it is eventually all smooth muscle and no longer epithelium. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What does a cat hear if I meow perfectly?"
] | Your body language is probably wrong but if the meow itself is fine, your cat could find it amusing that you would meow and wonder what other secret talents you might have. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens when lightning strikes a plane?"
] | It flows through the most conductive parts (the aluminum outsides) and then down to the ground. Lightning protection is a mandatory part of the design of aircraft, so nothing bad should happen. It might leave a scorch mark, but maintenance can clean that off. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What is Pedophilia exactly and why does it exist?"
] | Paedophile here. Paedophilia is the long-term romantic or sexual attraction towards prepubescent individuals by a post-pubescent individual. It's unclear at present what contributes to its occurrence but recent neurological study suggests it may be a simple genetic anomaly such as those likely responsible for other sexual preferences on the edge of the bell curve. It seems apparent that environmental/developmental conditions may contribute to the expression of a given potential sexual preference even though it is unlikely for them to be solely, or even largely, responsible for the existence of said potential. Basically genetics loads a gun, circumstance hands it to you but it is upon the individual to decide when or upon who to pull the trigger. Some choose poorly. Many don't. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does changing your name work in the US?"
] | You can change your name whenever you want. ~~In the article it seems the woman did not have 2 forms of ID with the same name~~. There is no restriction or requirement to change your name when you get married. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What's the difference between osmolarity and osmolality?"
] | The difference is that volume of the solvent is the denominator for [molarity](_URL_1_) and mass of the solvent is the denominator for [molality](_URL_0_). This shouldn't be deleted as a simple answer, I hope. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why lightning doesn't knock planes out of the sky."
] | Okay, here goes: electricity will always take the shortest path to the ground right? Well, since a airborne plane isn't grounded, lightening strikes generally don't hit planes for this reason. However, they do sometimes hit home and when they do... nothing happens. As ACrusaderA said, the light might flicker but it's very uncommon for something serious to go wrong. [NASA](_URL_0_) actually did a bunch of tests on this back in the 80's by flying a F-106 through violent electrical storms and determined that the most likely outcome of an airborne lightening strike is that the lightening will simply pass harmlessly through the plane and head to the ground (where it was trying to go anyway). Source: NASA |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do cemeteries maintain upkeep after all the plots are sold"
] | CPA Here... Mortuaries and Funeral homes essentially are left with a perpetual liability in maintaining the burial grounds after all of the lots are full. Because of this states have enacted laws that require a certain dollar amount for every plot sold to go into an endowment trust. The earnings from that endowment trust are to be used to maintain the burial grounds in future periods. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What does the term blockbuster mean and why is it related to movies?"
] | In WWII, militaries started using very large bombs that were capable of destroying an entire city block. They were called blockbusters. Later, the term was applied to extremely popular movies that could convince everyone who lives in an entire city block to go watch it. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do companies like Nikon sell cameras that around 16 megpixels but phone companies like sony and Nokia sell phones that have 20 to 40 megapixel cameras?"
] | Resolution is only one aspect of what makes a picture good. And once you can't see the pixels any more, increasing the resolution doesn't help (for reference, the 4K "ultra-HD" TVs they're selling now are only 8 megapixel). The problem with having tons of pixels is that it means very little light hits any portion of the camera, so you end up with a lot of noise- the camera can't quite tell what color the pixel is supposed to be. The reason Sony and Nokia are making 40MP cameras is that they want to be able to average the light that hit 8 pixels and give you a great looking 5MP image instead of a crappy looking 40MP image. Nikon just gives their cameras bigger sensors which allows more light to hit each pixel, so they can just straight up give you a 16MP camera that works better than the 40MP cameras on those phones. EDIT: whoops, sensors not lenses. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"; how does sound work?"
] | Sound is waves, like you said. These waves overlap on each other and add up or subtract. This is called superposition. If you have several instruments, at every point in space, their sounds add up to one waveform. This is an example of two waveforms adding up: _URL_0_. There are two waves that are similar but slightly off. If you look at each part, you will see how the add up or subtract to make the bottom waveform. Because of this, the speaker only needs to make the waveform of the sounds added together, not each one separately. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why some nouns for \"a person who performs a certain task\" end with -er while some end with 'or? e.g. Baker - one who bakes. Traveler - one who travels. Actor - one who acts. Counselor - one who counsels."
] | The -er ending has one of its origins in the Germanic languages. English is a Germanic language, as is (obviously) German, as well as Dutch, Danish, Swedish and Norwegian. These languages all evolved from the same language. This explains the -er in "baker" (compare with modern German "Bäcker"). But a lot of words from words that English borrowed from the French in the period during the Middle Ages. It's just coincidence that it looks like the Germanic -er and has nearly the same function. This is the case with "butcher" (the modern German is "Metzger", so "butcher" actually comes from the same origin as modern French "boucher". Languages evolve over time, and this ending actually comes from the Latin ending -arius. The -or ending, though, also comes from Latin, but not from -arius; instead, it comes from -ator. An example is "imperator" which gives us English "emperor". |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is police brutality against African Americans becoming so prevalent now?"
] | It was always prevalent, it's just that with the advent of social media and similar things that the stories spread like wildfire instead of being local stories that aren't able to gain any traction. The advent of everyone having a phone with a camera on it as well is leading to the rise of mass awareness, as before there usually wasn't explicit proof. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are statistics like \"children die every 16.3 seconds from hunger\" determined?"
] | Count the number of children who died over the last year and divide by the number of seconds in a year. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens to sea creatures (primarily larger animals like whales and sharks) when a tsunami hits?"
] | Out in the open ocean, where whales and sharks mostly hang out, a tsunami is no big deal - it's just a momentary pressure wave moving through the water; the water isn't really "flowing" anywhere. But close to shore it's different; first the sea level drops which could strand them, and then the sea roars back in which could injure them in collisions with debris, etc. Edit: they could also end up stranded on land when it's over. But I don't remember hearing anything about this kind of thing happening with the Japan or Indian ocean tsunamis. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it you can sue drug companies for bad drugs but not the FDA who approved them to be sold on the market? Why are they not able to be punished if they were the ones that allowed it to be released to begin with?"
] | As far as [I am aware of the process](_URL_0_), FDA just reviews the test results and other data supplied by the manufacturer. Test data can be colored to look better than it actually is, or due to limited sample size simply not exhibit the problem that leads to suing. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why it is easier to see something in the dark with my peripherals than it is while staring directly at it."
] | The peripheral vision is more sensitive to movement and contrast. This trait was formed as a way to catch predators trying to sneak up on you. This might have something to do with it. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does massaging a sore muscle bring pain relief, but touching an acute injury hurts?"
] | A muscle's natural state is to be relaxed. Contraction causes movement. A "sore" muscle is in a contracted state even when it shouldn't be. Massaging it causes the muscle fibers to relax (heat will do the same thing) which can relieve the soreness. An acute injury usually involves injury to nerves. Any pressure on these injured nerves will stimulate the nerve which causes pain. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do the have peanuts or some sort of nuts at bars? Do they taste good with beer, or maybe sobers people up? Or even the opposite?"
] | It is to make you buy more drinks. They are salty, which makes you thirsty, which makes you more likely to order more drinks. That is why bars will have nuts, pretzels, and other salty things. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do red light cameras know not to snap a picture when you can make a right turn on a red light?"
] | They give you "clearance" to make that turn without a ticket once they detect your speed has dropped to zero within an assigned zone. If you just rolled through without stopping you'd get a ticket. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If the common cold is so common, why haven't we developed something to make us immune?"
] | My science teacher explained it so well when I was in 6th grade. Pathologists can feel free to correct me. Basically, every cold you get is unique. Every single time you have a cold, it is caused by different germs and every time you get that cold, you are immune to it. However, there are so many types of cold causing bacteria that becoming immune to all of them is more a question of statistics. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why can one slightly dripping tap keep me up all night but a thunderstorm allows me to sleep better?"
] | Thunderstorms produce rain, producing white noise, that and other sounds that we find soothing lull some people to sleep. Noises are just annoying. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What is the logic behind thinking that getting rid of Assad, something good will happen?"
] | It turns out the guy who's been bombing his own people for 6 years may actually be the reason there's a civil war. There will not be an end to the civil war with Assad and his government in charge. That doesn't mean the only two options are "Give him a high five and say 'keep it up, buddy.'" and "Invade Syria, depose him, and leave." IMO we should have tried to get Russia to put pressure on the Assad regime to back down in 2011 (Russia has had a lot more clout in Syria than the US for decades) on the condition that a replacement government remain amenable to hosting Russia's naval bases. Hard to do something like that these days. 6 years of brutal civil war have a way of hardening opinions. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do tortilla chips not come in individual-sized bags?"
] | Because regular tortilla chips are a bit too bland and dry to eat by themselves and are mostly consumed at parties or a home environment, where they can be dipped in salsa. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What makes antibacterial soap different from regular soap?"
] | Antibacterial soaps have chemical additives, like triclosan, that kill bacteria. Regular soap simply washes them away, which is typically just as effective. A quick google search says that the antibacterial agents in soap need to be left on for 2 minutes to be effective, so they are likely not doing anything beneficial in normal handwashing scenarios. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How can we be confident that the leaked emails from the DNC are authentic? Couldn't anyone type up a bunch of incriminating emails, sign them \"Debbie Schultz\" and send them to Wikileaks?"
] | This is the function of Wikileaks and journalists. It is possible to confirm a selection of the leakage by asking the organization direct questions concerning that content. Or they can find other sources that are not willing to be full whistle blowers but might take the lesser risk of confirming documents. Since this is emails it is possible to contact outside recipients and ask them to confirm the content. Of course such activity might tip off to the organization that someone have inside information that they are about to go public with. Their reaction can even further confirm or deny the content of the leak. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"When do we observe red shift?"
] | RobusEtCaleritas is right. You can imagine it this way: Imagine you're standing in the ocean at the beach, a short distance from the shore. Waves move toward you at a constant pace. Let's say you are hit by one swell every 10 seconds. If you start running towards the shore, you will be hit by less and less waves, maybe once every 20 seconds. The frequency of waves has decreased (redshift). If you run back out to the ocean, the frequency that you are hit by a wave will increase. Maybe once every 5 seconds. This is blueshift. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How come my contact lenses are thin as paper, yet my glasses with same prescription have thick lenses"
] | The contacts are closer to your eyes, so less refraction is necessary. There's a point when you can no longer where contacts because they'd be too big. There's also glass contacts. They're very painful though and you have to put them in with a special tool. They are a lot thicker. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do guys send dick pics?"
] | I work for a porn site. We don't do any production, I'm rarely ever where a camera will shoot me (mostly an odd party). However, guys send me as many dick pics as they do the models themselves. I guess it's just the thought of a girl opening it gets some of them off. Some probably think they might get some action? I don't know...someday I should start a dick pick site. LOL |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why can aquatic animals grow to be so much larger than land animals"
] | Because they don't have to life all that mass of the ground and trutch around with it. Buoyancy carries most of the weight. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does everybody get mad at movies shot at 48 fps, but also a video games shot at below 60 fps?"
] | Motion Blur. As movies are filmed, the movement of the actors is recorded as still images. If they're moving fast enough, they blur slightly on the film. Our eyes interpret the blurring as motion more readily. At 48fps for a movie, the frames do not last long enough (1/48 of a second) to have recorded any significant motion blur due to the higher shutter speed. This makes them almost look video-game like and unnatural Video games do not have motion blur. They are rendered directly as a series of still frames at full resolution with hard, crisp edges. Our eyes are good at seeing edges, and its easier to see the jumps from one frame to the next. At about 60fps, the still, fully rendered sharp images are coming fast enough that they appear as a smooth transition. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If one of the arguments for the moon landing being faked is solar radiation sickness, how are the ISS astronauts alright?"
] | Because the moon landing was real and its all bullshit? |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What are fabergé eggs and why are they so expensive?"
] | They are decorative eggs made by Peter Fabergé for the Russian Tsars. They were made out of precious metals and jewels, and were created solely in the Fabergé workshop and he only made 50 before the Russian Revolution. Only 42 are known to have survived (the newly found one should make it 43). The eggs were basically these egg shaped objects that would sit on a table, some opened some had miniature portraits of the Tsars, all were extremely tedious to manufacture. They were all pieces of amazing jewelry, and were intended to inspire wonder and beauty to the Tsars, who were difficult to impress. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens to a person's debt when they are the last person of a family line and die?"
] | It doesn't matter if you have family or not, debt cannot be inherited. If you do have debt when you die, your creditors can take from your estate to pay it off. If your estate is not large enough to pay the whole debt, the debt just goes away. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does heating up food make it taste better?"
] | Part of your sense of taste comes from the smell sensors in your nose. This is why you can't taste much when you have a cold. Heating food causes it to give off more steam and various vapors which can then get to your nose quicker and easier. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If God sent His only son to earth and then people killed him, how did that mend the relationship between humanity and God? Surely it would only make God more pissed at us?"
] | Reminder: jokes as top-level posts will be removed, and people posting hateful or offensive comments will be banned without warning. Do not turn this into a debate about religion. For the sake of this question, **interpret the story as just that, a story.** There is no need to argue about whether it's real or not. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How have denim blue jeans maintained their popularity while pretty much every other type of clothing has gone in and out of fashion?"
] | Cuts and styles of jeans have come and gone over the years. Sure, denim's been a staple of fashion since the 60s (when they became acceptable to wear off the farm) but we've seen... Different cuts: bell bottoms, boot cut, straight leg, skinny jeans, pipe legs (eg - JNCO), low-rider waist, normal waist, high-cut waist, etc Different finishes: Indigo, stone washed, acid washed, galaxy washed, distressed, etc Denim's a comfortable, durable, (originally) inexpensive fabric to work with. It's no surprise that it's had a long life as typical American casual/semi-casual wear. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are NFL quarterbacks overwhelmingly white while most other positions are held by black men?"
] | The percentage of white quarterbacks in the NFL is 78. The percentage white americans is 72. |
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