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[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens when I put a magnet up to a computer monitor, or television screen."
] | A CRT display is based on firing a beam of electrons at a coated surface that lights up when hit by electrons. The display is controlled using an electromagnet to deflect the beam, so that the right bits light up to make the desired image. Moving another magnet close to the display messes up this control system. Newer display technologies like LCDs shouldn't be affected this way though, as they don't rely on controlling the magnetic field. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How forums detect whether you're still online or not?"
] | They tag you as "online" when you visit a page of theirs. After that, you're "online" for a certain period of time (say, 10 minutes). If you haven't done anything on the site for that time, you're tagged "offline". Otherwise, your "online" timer restarts. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do your emotions come in 'waves' after something very emotional occurs?"
] | most emotions come from chemicals in the brain such as dopamine, oxytocin, adrenalin, serotonin, etc. When your brain starts to release these chemicals, it doesn't happen all at once. It begins to secrete them as if opening a valve. The flow starts slow until you get enough of the chemicals and your brain is filled with what it needs. So it feels like a wave because it starts slow and builds up until you're full. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does 100 degree F water feel hotter then 100 degree F weather"
] | When you put your hand in 100 degree F air the air around your hand starts cooling down. However only the immediate air around your hand. Air is a good thermal insulator which means that it will not transfer heat from the surrounding air to the air in contact with your skin very fast. The molecules are too far apart and do not crash into each other that often. However water is a good thermal conductor so the water in proximity of your hand will try to equalize the temperature much faster. You might have experienced similar things with metals that feels cold or hot to touch and you can not heat or cool them down at any pace, however a ceramic mug will not feel that extreme and will quickly be fine to touch on the outside. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do we have historical evidence that Julius Caesar existed but none about Jesus Christ?"
] | Because Caesar was actually important back then, unlike Jesus. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"; Why is Jesus on a cross the symbol for the religion and used against demons?"
] | Jesus on the cross is dying for our sins, to absolve and protect all the rest of us. He protects us from our own "demons," that is, our sinful nature. Remember, being crucified didn't destroy Jesus. He was resurrected shortly thereafter. It was merely an ordeal he went through on our behalf. I think I've got this right. Perhaps a better theologian can correct me on the nuances. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do sunsets/sunrises turn pink and orange, but those colors aren't present with the sun is actually up?"
] | White light is every color of light combined. When you see a rainbow, what you're seeing is the different waves of light separated. At sunset/sunrises, sun light isn't aimed directly at you. It hits the atmosphere and bends to where you are. So instead of seeing an intense white light, you'll see shades of colors. And before you ask why you never see green sunsets, it's because it's in the middle of the spectrum of visible light. (You'll see blue/yellow/purple/red more often than not.) |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does every elevator have a \"door close\" button if almost none of these buttons actually work?"
] | They work fine when the fire key is turned. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Movies used to show people dialing numbers like 555-1212. Why couldn't film producers secure ordinary phone numbers from the phone companies by buying them outright?"
] | They can, and have. But why pay money when you don't have to? Also, they might not have that number forever, so whoever gets it after them will still get harassed. No point. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why can Netflix stream at 2.0 MB/s, but Steam can't get above 500 KB/s?"
] | I think you are confusing megabytes (MB) and megabits (Mb). Does your ISP offer you 4 MB/s or 4 Mb/s? Megabits are far more commonly used when ISPs tell you your speed. A 4 Mb/s speed is roughly 500 KB/s (kilobytes) per second) so that sounds about right and your Netflix is probably able to utilize near the full connection as they pick the best quality you can handle so long as you have use HD checked. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Can a commercial aircraft, like a Boeing 747, do a looping?"
] | They can't loop in the nice circular sense. They don't have enough thrust to make it over the loop even if they start at max speed. However, if you're careful, you can get far enough over than, when you stall out, you're past vertical and can "flop" over to complete the loop in a rather ungrateful manner. You are extremely likely to over speed when pulling back to level. A barrel roll is no problem. 707s have done it at least twice for publicity. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do people snort coke? Does coke get in the bloodstream through your lungs?"
] | Nope, it enters through your sinuses. Your sinus cavity has all kinds of membranes that the drugs can enter your bloodstream through, and the effect is pretty quick. The only really quicker ways are smoking or injecting, which both require some equipment and preparation - snorting is quick and easy. Eating or drinking is much slower, as the substance has to process through your digestive tract a bit before it starts getting absorbed. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it that certain weapons, like poisonous gasses, are banned from use in warfare by the Geneva convention, yet countries and governments can still use them against their own population, such as tear gas to control riots?"
] | Geneva convention is largely a gentlemen agreement. No one wants their soldiers getting gassed or having to patch up wounds from hollow points. Its easier to just say no one gets chemical weapons and fight with conventional weapons, then it is to say "there are no rules" and everyone have them. Its already illegal for citizens to use tear gas on cops, so there is no objective reason to outlaw it for law enforcement. The question of its something is humane or not doesnt really tend to stand in the way of most governments. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why can't I buy health insurance whenever I want (in the US)? What is a \"qualifying life event?\""
] | Health insurance companies aren't allowed to turn you down because you have existing medical conditions. So if you were allowed to sign up whenever you wanted, that wouldn't work; you could just wait to buy health insurance until you had large medical expenses to cover. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do we create saliva in our mouths and where does it come from?"
] | I don't have any reference materials, so I can't to much detail, but nobody else answered yet, so I'll do a summary. Saliva is a combo of mostly water and proteins with a little bit of dissolved salts. It comes from salivary glands that are placed in several places around your mouth. Mostly under the tongue. A gland is basically a pocket. The cells that make up the pocket are specialized to make the proteins and release them through their cell walls into the pocket. They also have gates that let them bleed a little bit of water that comes from the cells who absorbed it from your blood. The salts mostly just followed the water. Hopefully a more detailed answer will come along for you later if you're still interested. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If Flash and Java plugins are going to be removed from Firefox and Chrome, why can't they make \"good\" versions of the plugins that will still work?"
] | The problem isn't with the plug-ins but rather security issues with the core languages of Flash and Java. Mozilla (which makes Firefox) and Google (which makes Chrome) feel that there aren't ways to make safe use of those languages for web-based services through your browser. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it that humans have a lot more distinct feature where you can tell one apart from another, but animals almost always look the same?"
] | Three things: There’s a phenomenon where people have a hard time telling people of a race different than their own apart, because their brain hasn’t practiced seeing those types of faces. I would assume this is also the case with animals. Basically, we’re good at identifying human features because we see them a lot, but we don’t have practice with other animals. Second, the human brain is wired from birth to recognize human faces. Newborns will stare at vaguely face-shaped things. This implies that we have an instinctive recognition of human faces. Third, not all animals have the same diversity as we do across a small population. Most squirrels, fish, raccoons, etc. in an area look the same because they’re not as genetically diverse as people. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do we move our whole body around while playing a video game as if we are in the game?"
] | Your brain consists of neurons that are connected to one another, and these connections strengthen over time through repetition. In your whole lifetime you've learned that the way to evade an object flying at your head is to move certain muscles. So when some neurons send a signal "there's something flying at my head" the nerves that move these muscles get an automatic signal. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How Car Lighters Work"
] | At the basic level, wires that don't conduct electricity well generate heat as they resist the flow of it. When you plug a cigarette lighter into your car's port, the electricity does just this: generates heat on a wire. Once it glows red, it is hot enough to light a cigarette if touched to it. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"The body can self heal wounds and broken bones etc. Why not regrow limbs after amputation?"
] | It is theoretically possible, as some species of lizards con do it. However, evolution drove us towards scar tissue, which serves to seal the wound from infection long before the limb could regrow. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Please ELI5: why too much salt is bad for you."
] | I want to take a different approach. Drinking salt water kills people. That is the fact. Why? Because NaCl (that is what salt is) when its in water it forms two ions (Na+ and Cl-). These two molecules attract water around them as they have a charge. So when you drink the salt water, these ions in your body attract water, they are more stable (happier) with lots of water surrounding them. Because Na+ and Cl- can't get into your cells as easily as water can, they end up actually SUCKING water out of your cells. That is why salt water can dehydrate you. the actual term for this area of science is Osmolarity if you want to look into it more, but it doesn't really get any more exciting than this...! |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do they determine the caloric value of different foods?"
] | Originally they used a [bomb calorimeter](_URL_1_) but now it is just calculated using the [Atwater system](_URL_0_) from the percentages of individual components. i.e. if we know the energy in a single gram of protein, fat, carbohydrate, fibre, or sugar then we just need to know how many grams of each is in a piece of food and add them up. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is Oman such a 'quiet' nation despite being right in the middle of chaos?"
] | They are not in the middle of anything. They are a coastal country bordering two stable countries, and one semi stable country. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If diamond is the hardest substance, and you can only cut it with other diamonds, how were diamonds originally acquired?"
] | Diamond is very hard, which means it is very resistant to scratching. It has a very low toughness though, which is the resistance to impact. ["Somewhat related to hardness is another mechanical property toughness, which is a material's ability to resist breakage from forceful impact. The toughness of natural diamond has been measured as 7.5–10 MPa·m1/2."](_URL_0_) This means that you can 'cut' diamonds by fracturing them, instead of grinding and sawing through them. --- To answer your question, diamonds are embedded in different types of rock and soil. Diamond may be very hard, but the material surrounding it is not as hard. Diamonds are not found as large slabs, but as tiny stones. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why did TV and computer screens used to flicker in videos, and now they don't?"
] | CRTs work by scanning a electron beam left to right 15 to 100 thousand times a second while scanning top to bottom at 50 to 120 (numbers are approximate) times per second. That fills the screen, but the beam only hits one spot at a time. The phosphors glow brightly at first but start to fade quickly. By the time a spot is scanned again its intensity had faded significantly. If the video camera and the monitor are running at the same frame rate, the result is pretty good, but if they are running at different rates you see flicker. LCDs can also have flicker, but not as bad as CRTs. Plasmas have very little flicker on camera. Source: am a broadcast TV engineer who has to deal with flicker. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What, exactly, is poo made of?"
] | I'll tackle the Fiber question and I can punch it out with how tired I am. Basically we cannot digest fiber; so what happens is it is a long polysaccharides chain that scrapes the side of your intestines as it passes and this stimulates your bowels to release a mucus. This mucus helps lubricate the feces as well as keep it from drying out. The fiber also helps hold the feces in a solid chunk. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"the current terrorist threat that is causing the US to shut down embassies in the Middle East"
] | A conversation was allegedly intercepted between two top level members of AQAP (Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula) speaking in very general terms about a terrorist attack in the very near future. Given what happened at Bengazi last September, the Obama administation is using an abundance of caution because the last thing they need is more dead American ambassadors on their hands. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Examples of tax deduction and exemption"
] | tax deduction is something you paid taxes on when you got it, but can remove it from your taxes at the end of the year. Most business expenses count, so if your office bought a table then you spent earned money (usually taxable) on that table, but since it was a business expense you can deduct the cost of that table from your taxes, so that earned money isn't taxed. Tax exemption is when you don't pay taxes on it in the first place. Not for profit charities, and churches are tax exempt, and none of their earnings get taxed in the first place. So a deduction is something that should get taxed but gets removed because of how it is used, and an exemption is not supposed to be taxed in the first place |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why don't any larger animals have compound/multiple eyes like bugs do?"
] | Depth perception, visual acuity, and distance. Compound eyes don't fair very well on any of those factors, all of which are far more favorable than having a large cone of view, especially in light of possessing other senses (namely hearing and scent) and ocular muscles. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it that you cannot fix a flat tire if the hole is on the side?"
] | The tread surface of a tire is much more rigid because that's the part of the tire designed to make contact with the road. The sidewall is much more flexible because it is designed to adapt to changes in tire pressure without bursting. Sealing the tread is easy because the patch will remain relatively still, but a patch in the sidewall will be the weak point for a flexible and high-pressure surface. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does pouring water on grease fire increase the amount of flames?"
] | Grease is an oil, it's a liquid at burning temperatures. Oil and water don't mix, so when you squirt water on grease you get balls of water in oil and vice versa. The balls of water in oil are a big problem. The oil is over 212˚F (100˚C) so the water boils into steam. The steam expands, spreading the oil into a big, thin sheet, before it pops. Now you have a big, thin sheet of burning oil and the pop sends it flying through the air. Super-bad. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does electricity conduct better through different materials?"
] | In a metal the electrons 'float' in a sea around the nuclei, they are not bound to a specific atom. In wood each electron is mostly bound to a specific nuclei. The flow of electricity depends on how free the electrons are to move around. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it advised to cut down on salt when one is bodybuilding?"
] | Someone can feel free to correct me, but I believe this is due to the osmosis of the water in our body. With too much salt, the water in your body will retain more making you look bloated. Potassium helps this, because then you will have more potassium for the sodium potassium pump. So the salt or sodium will be removed from the body |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How are acids named? (Chemistry)"
] | It's a combination of systematic naming and what's always been done. If it's an organic acid, that is, it has a carboxylic acid group in it attached to some number of other carbon groups, it is named based on the IUPAC naming scheme, for which wikipedia is probably your best explanation. Examples of organic acids you might know are ethanoic acid aka acetic acid aka vinegar, or butanoic acid which is present and lends its distinctive smell to both vomit and parmesan cheese. As for mineral acids, they're generally called something which makes some sense based on what they're made of, but there isn't a general rule. HNO3 is Nitric Acid, and it's formed from a Nitrate group and a hydrogen, and HClO2 is chlorous acid as it's formed from a chlorate group. Then you go and get hydrochloric acid, HCl, with just breaks the pattern altogether. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"When upside down, how are you still able to swallow."
] | Peristalsis. That is the name for the contraction of myscles that forces food along its path. It is what allows you to eat upside down and what allows astronauts to eat in 0 g. Incidently, not all animals have it. Birds dont, which is why they tip their head up when swallowimg and why we can't take birds into space. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does \"Whataboutism\" differ from giving context to information?"
] | Whataboutism is distraction. When you give context, it means you discuss what, say, Kevin Spacey did in light of other, similar incidents. Whataboutism is when you just make the conversation completely about Woodey Alan. And it didn't suddenly pop up, it was made to describe Soviet propaganda techniques, it just got poular suddenly. Why that is, I'd assume it's because of its mention in [Last Week Tonight's recent spot about Trump.](_URL_0_) Edit: dulistraction - > distraction. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What determines if you are burning fat, muscles or calories?"
] | a calorie is a measure of energy. the food you eat provides a certain amount of energy, measured in calories. your body uses a certain amount of energy (calories) every day just to support regular functions. at the end of the day, any unused energy gets stored in your body as fat. when you work out, your body needs energy, so it starts to "burn" fat so it releases its energy. why arent fat people bursting with energy? well, fat doesnt do anything, muscles do. fat stored as fat is just dead weight and makes it that much harder for your muscles to do their job. you need to get active and have your body use that energy stored in the fat. the energy released from fat is measurable in calories, so thats why when you work out you can gauge how many calories you have burned. only in cases of extreme starvation will your body start to burn muscle, after it has gone through all of your fat |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are you ordered to register as sex offender if you are peeing in public? There is no sexual matter involved in peeing."
] | There is no sexual component in peeing, no. But there is a sexual component in purposely showing your genitals to other members of the public. The thing is, it can be very hard to gauge the motive someone had when they were peeing in public. Were they genuinely desperate and couldn't wait, or are they peeing there because they are pretty much getting off on having any sort of excuse for getting their dicks out in public? Some jurisdictions take a very cautious approach and make all people caught peeing in public register. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How did we develop all this advanced technology in less than 300 years when it took us hundreds of thousands just to learn how to farm?"
] | The major catalyst was the industrial revolution in the late 18th and early 19th century. Political stability and the ability to efficiently produce food were contributing causes to the industrial revolution happening. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do planes need to be pressurized?"
] | At high altitudes the atmospheric pressure is very low - there's less air than there is down at the surface. If the plane wasn't pressurized there wouldn't be enough air to breathe. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why Do Movies Shot 30 Years Ago Look “Old” When Played Now?"
] | Technology in camera equipment has come a long way. Lenses have gotten better. Lighting has gotten better. The art of film has been perfected over the years. But I think the main factor of this "old" look has to do with post production. Back in the 70s and 80s they didn't have the computer power to color correct films like they can today. Every frame of today's films are finely tuned to be color balanced. So in other words, back then, what you filmed was pretty close to what you wound up with. While today the difference between the raw footage and the final result is very different. All that post production processing makes a huge difference. (I work for a post production VFX house so I get to see this in action) |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If permanent colonies were built on the Moon, how would someone born there be effected on Earth due to the differences in gravity?"
] | The moon *does* have gravity. It's a lot lower than Earth's, but it's still there - a lot more than the microgravity experienced on the ISS. All we can really do is theorise, but the likelihood is that if someone grew up/lived a long time in lower gravity, coming down to Earth would be pretty traumatic. Your bones and muscles would absolutely not be used to this kind of strain. Everything would seem very, very heavy (including yourself). You'd likely have trouble walking under your own power, and if you fell down you'd be a lot more likely to break a bone. There are definitely *advantages* to growing up/living in lower gravity, but we're not really built to experience much higher gravity than what our body ends up accustomed to. It's basically the same as if us Earthlings go to a planet with 6 times the gravity. It'd be hellish. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why does water taste so sweet after vomiting?"
] | I'd say there are a couple of reasons. Firstly, the water washes away the acid residue left over in your mouth by your stomach fluids, causing relief of the burning sensation and that might be perceived as sweet. Also your body is most likely craving water due to the sudden onset of dehydration that was probably caused by you expelling all that liquid, and we all know how sweet water can taste when you're dehydrated. As for sweating, i believe it's caused by the stress on your upper body's muscles due to heaving, when your body needs to get rid of something asap, most of the muscles on your chest and back are used to heave and push it out, that stress produces heat, and in order to cool down your body produces sweat. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What is the actual purpose of having a United States Space Force?"
] | I think the idea is to split the responsibility for space off of the Air Force, much like how NASA was split off for civilian aerospace work. The Air Force actually spends more on space operations than NASA (moreso if you include agencies like the NRO). Putting that as it's own organization would, in theory, let them focus on the core mission better. Not really sure I agree with it, since most of the best ideas come from the cross-pollination of different fields, and trying to silo space completely will, I think, be more harmful than helpful. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why baseball stadiums are different sizes"
] | Tradition. And more than any sport, baseball is a slave to tradition. When professional baseball was in its infancy, there were no dedicated stadiums. Teams would play wherever they could find the space, usually somewhere used primarily for something else. The Yankees, for example, used to play on polo grounds. This lead to every park being a little different, depending on space. When teams started building dedicated stadiums, there were no standards, and every facility was build how each team wanted. By the time the league was organized enough for standards, there were a bunch of parks with a bunch of different sizes, and no one wanted rebuild theirs. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does your skin heal faster at night than during the day? May it be for cuts, wounds, spots, acne etc..."
] | Because your body's resources aren't dedicated to moving you around, talking, seeing, etc. Also because you're not moving around, touching your injuries and generally making things worse. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What causes blood to seep out of cuts and scrapes?"
] | For blood to come out of a wound, some kind of blood vessel must be damaged. If the cut or scrape is very small, then these blood vessels were likely capillaries. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"- What are undersea cables, and how do they work?"
] | Undersea cables (aka submarine cables) are made up of bundles of fiber optic cables running along the ocean floor that connect different parts of the world (e.g. North America and Europe) to exchange data/internet communications and telephone conversations. The first submarine cable was laid all the way back in the 1850s and was used for sending telegrams. Obviously, the cable was not made out of Fiber Optics then, but we use optics now because it allows us to carry massive amounts of information on a single strand of glass (or plastic) fiber over long distances using laser light. These cables exist pretty much everywhere. Here are a couple of maps showing where some of the cables are located: [ONE](_URL_1_) [TWO](_URL_0_) |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"I was always told not to put a fridge or AC on an extension cord. Why?"
] | Refrigerators and AC units have a much higher peak power draw than most household appliances. An extension cord that isn't rated to handle that kind of draw could overheat and short, or cause a fire. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"in the USA, when does a dad (or mum) in full time employment see their children?"
] | You work 9-5 in a lot of jobs, meaning that you see your kids in the morning and evening. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does it hurt significantly more standing on a 10 min bus ride, over walking for 20 minutes when commuting?"
] | Standing tends to strain the same muscles over a long period of time. Walking spreads the load over several sets of muscles, so that while you're technically expending more energy no one set of muscles have to bear the load for the entire period. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do TOR/.onion sites make you completely anonymous, even to the government/FBI?"
] | Normally, you're traced by just reading access logs to determine what you downloaded. But with TOR, your Internet traffic is routed through a bunch of other computers known as *proxies*. To trace you in that way, someone would have to go to every proxy and ask them when you were online and what information you got. This is problematic, because many of them will not want to cooperate, and TOR is designed so that having only pieces of the information doesn't reveal anything. Now, I'm sure the US government could still trace you if they really wanted to. But they probably couldn't do so with methods that would hold up in a criminal court, so that makes it pretty useless for things like prosecuting individuals. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"- Can things like light waves or radio waves become radioactive?"
] | Light and radio waves are both kinds of radiation. Specifically, they are both non-ionizing EM radiation. What "non-ionizing" means is basically that they won't come barging in and jack up your DNA. X-rays and gamma rays on the other hand are ionizing EM radiation, and definitely will smack your DNA upside its head. So no, sending a radio signal from an irradiated area won't change it into dangerous ionizing radiation, because that's just not how the EM spectrum works. Sending radio waves from a spaceship travelling very, *very* fast could make your radio a weapon, but at that point your ship is already a doomsday device so it isn't a big deal. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What changed that allowed SpaceX to go from crashing rockets on barges to a 3 for 3 success rate?"
] | Every crash is a learning opportunity. They weren't crashing because they didn't know WTF. There's a ton of very complicated stuff to work out to land a rocket, and getting it even a tiny bit wrong usually results in an explosion. Rockets don't really do rough landings. It's either perfect, or kaboom. So every time they crashed one, they tweaked the next one a little, until eventually they found the winning setup. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is there ice in the mens urinals"
] | Ice cools the urine which reduces odor. Ice also melts, which produces water and flushed the urinal. Much more popular back in the days before auto-flush systems. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do other animals cut their nails in nature? Do they even have to? Also, how did humans cut their nails in the past?"
] | Usually just using them makes them eroded and they are as long as you need them. In nature, animals and humans use their nails for lots of things, and there is where they are "cut": every time they are used, they are a little bit shorter, making up for their growth. If they grow too much, they can be scratched against something to make them shorter, that's all it needs. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"EL5 Why we have a two party system."
] | I have a beautiful youtube video just for you! _URL_0_ |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why do people with accents lose their accents when singing?"
] | Because when they sing, they are consciously controlling their voice and producing a particular phonetic effect. Like you would if you're imitating birdsong. They are in very good control of their voice, and can produce specific desired sounds rather than speaking/singing in their natural accent. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"In movies that take place during 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries in America, characters are often depicted as speaking with an English accent. When did American born citizens actually shed the English accent and adopt geographically identifying accents like in the north east and south?"
] | Each area of america was settled by different ethnic groups. These ethnic groups shaped the way English sounded in a given region. The southern accent is actually closest to what the old English settlers would have spoken. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why we still label circuits based upon \"conventional\" current when we know that current actually flows in the opposite direction?"
] | Pretty much, everything was defined before the discovery of, say the electron. Scientists, being positively minded and optimistic, decided it would probably be the positive charge moving around. Note also how stuff like Capacitance is measured in Farads, which is a huge unit and you usually use micro or nano farads because the SI standards are way off. Same with Coulombs. It was defined before that notion of electron charge. So, like Farads, it is also really small. (x10^-16) So yeah, it was just guess work that got well known to the point where it can't be changed, so everybody gets to deal with it. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How can I simply explain to my friend that two outcomes doesn't mean a 50% chance of one happening?"
] | I would simply say that your odds of winning the lottery are not 50/50, even though there are 2 outcomes: you either win, or you lose. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are there different sized stars? Once enough mass is gathered to commence fusion shouldn't additional gasses be blown away from the star?"
] | The gas clouds that stars form from collapse into a disc shape pretty early on in the formation process. The big-ish protostars blast most of their early heat of formation out in polar jets that never cross that disc, so the incoming matter doesn't meet the outflowing energy until the star is well formed. It takes some time for heat from fusion in the core to make it to the surface so there's an additional brief lag period between when the star "ignites" and when the stellar wind finally stops the star from gathering any more gas. Supermassive stars are rare and their formation is not well understood. We're not sure if the real monsters formed through accretion like the others, are products of multi-star collisions, or some other exotic process. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do online job application systems force me to attach my resume and then also fill out their own resume system?"
] | The parts you have to fill in will be run through their HR system, which can make a preselection. With how many people apply to some jobs, there simply is no time for them to check out all resumes, so they have to select them some way. Once you are through the preselection, your actual resume makes it onto the desk of whoever is tasked to further select which candidates to call / invite for an interview. The reason why they make you attach the resume already is because that works the most efficient for them. They immediately have the resumes of the people who are interesting enough rather than having to chase them down for one. Remember, unless you have really specific in demand skills, you are simply not worth enough to the company that they want to go through the circus of emailing you, requesting your resume etc etc. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"If cold humid air is more cold than dry air, but hot humid air is hotter than a dry heat, what is the tipping point?"
] | H2O is a better heat conductor than air. That increases the heat exchange rate between a person and the environment(both positive and negative). At a low temperature heat from the body is lost more quickly in a humid environment, vice versa in a warm one. The tipping point happens around 98 degrees F, where thermodynamic equilibrium will happen regardless of humidity. Imagine swimming in 0C water vs 0C air, 100C water vs 100C air. Its easy to see that in both cases, heat transfer happens quicker in water. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do so many people hate Piers Morgan?"
] | I don't watch his show, so I don't have any strong feelings about him. From what I have heard from other people, there are two major complaints: 1) Back when he was in the UK, he had a reputation for publishing inaccurate, sensationalist content as news. 2) On his show in the US, he is viewed as arrogant and condescending to guests. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Since there is no \"air\" in space, what do spacecraft thrusters push against?"
] | Thrusters, rockets, engines, etc push against the spacecraft, not the air. The force of the material being expelled creates an equal and opposite reaction on the spacecraft. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does Apple own the Beatles?"
] | [The Beatles sold the rights to their catalog of music back in the 1960s.](_URL_1_) It's been owned by many people, most famously by Michael Jackson, who made almost as much money on Beatles royalties as on his own music. I don't know if Apple Computer has any ownership in Beatles music, but you might be confused by [Apple Records](_URL_2_). Long before Steve Jobs was in business, The Beatles named their record company Apple. There was actually [a lawsuit between the computer company and the record label, because of conflicting trademarks.](_URL_0_) |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How does the software \"Tor\" work?"
] | Here is a little diagram to start off with: _URL_0_ The (very!) basic gist of it: You connect to the network which proceeds your request along a randomized route through network-relays using data encryption, before it transmits your request to the final destination. Backtracking is extremely hard, since the randomizing algorithms obscure the path taken and all data in the network is only proceeded encrypted. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it often recommended to fully charge electronics before using them for the first time?"
] | Imagine that your battery is an opaque water bottle. When you first get it, it has some amount of water in it. You have no idea how much water is actually in it because you can't see the water. It has a weight to it but that doesn't tell you anything because you have no reference. For all you know, it could be empty or it could be full. The person who sold you the water bottle tells you to fill it up until you can't fill it up anymore. You do so. You know now it is completely full of water. You can now weigh it and get a reference point. When the water bottle weighs this much, it is full. When the water battle weighs half as much, it is half-full. Basically, without that initial reference charge your battery could report 100% charge when it is actually only 25% full. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are symptoms more potent in the morning and evening when you are sick?"
] | In the morning it's usually because you've been dehydrated due to sleep or if symptoms just arose, you aren't used to it. In the evening, because of being tired and talking all day, you get worn out. Just think of going to a sporting event all night yelling then getting home and having a sore throat. Wear and tear of everyday things just exaggerates your ailment. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How to people find amber with preserved life inside?"
] | It’s just random. They mine the amber and then upon examining it and cutting it up to sell, find what’s inside |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does 80 degree water feel so much colder than 80 degree air?"
] | Water absorbs much more heat per volume. So water touching your skin aborbs more of your body's heat compared to air of the same temperature. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Ugly power lines, poles, transformer cylinders and other mess of stuff cloud my neighborhood. But my well-off parents' neighborhood has not a single wire in site. How?"
] | All those things can be run underground, but it can cost up to 10 times more than overhead systems. This cost means that they tend to only be put underground in regions where people are willing to pay that price, ie wealthy neighborhoods. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Congratulations ELI5 on 300,000 subscribers! And thank you!"
] | I enjoy seeing the questions people post. Sometimes, i feel like just replying "google it," but then i realize that a lot of times, even if you do google it, the answers you find require you to either know a lot about the topic to begin with, or are so buried that you may never find the answer you are looking for, so it helps to have someone just break it down simply. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is it so hard to spot this \"Planet Nine\" when we can easily observe and photograph light years far off celestial bodies?"
] | Well first of all, we can't easily observe and photograph most celestial bodies that are lightyears away. The ones we can photograph tend to be either giant flaming balls of light, clouds full of giant flaming balls of light, or a collections of billions of giant flaming balls of light. You might notice the recurring theme here: Light. You don't get much of that on the edge of the solar system. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What exactly happens if Russia is proven to have tampered with the voting process (ex: Brexit, US elections)?"
] | The UK has mechanisms to force a new vote. So they could "revert" things fairly easily if the public decides to do that. The US does not have such a mechanism. They could impeach Trump for it which would leave Pense being President. They could also theoretically impeach Pense as well since he was on the same ticket and if they choose to do that the Presidency would go to the Speaker of the House. That could also be considered an act of war and either nation, and by extension NATO could go to war over it. But it would most likely be lots of political "yelling" and then some sanctions that do basically nothing. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What is it that specifically makes the new car smell and why is it the same in every car?"
] | Offgassing plastics. There is some concern that plasticizers and solvents released from many industrial products, especially plastics, may be harmful to human health. All the car companies use the same types of plastics so thats why the smell is the same. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why did Chairman Mao kill so many people including teachers? What could he have been trying to accomplish?"
] | He was trying to purge China of The Four Olds as these were seen to only further the exploitation of the classes. The Four Olds are old customs, old habits, old culture, and old ideas. A lot of teachers were executed publicly, monks were humiliated in the streets, a great number of Kung Fu masters took to the hills or left China altogether. These were all seen as part of the Old China that the Cultural Revolution was meant to be burning off. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"how can PPI (pixels per inch) be different across certain devices? Aren't inches and pixels a set size?"
] | an Inch is a measuring unit. a Pixel is an object. It can be any size. A display's resolution describes how many pixels it has. 1080p means it has 1080 pixels on the short side. So, obviously, to fill a 42" 1080p TV and a 5" 1080p phone with the same number of pixels is going to require differently sized pixels. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What is 'Trickle Down Economics' and why or why not is it bullshit?"
] | Trickel-Down economics is the idea cutting taxes on the wealthy will lead to higher overall economic growth---more than enough not only to help the economy, but also to make up for any lost revenue to the government for the tax cut. When the idea originally came to prominence, top tax rates where extremely high, and the idea that reductions might be especially beneficial for the economy was highly plausible. Most economists today, however, believe that even if there was a slight boost from these sorts of tax cuts when they were dropping tax rates from 80% to 30%, there is no special boost anymore. This doesn't mean that there can't be any positive effects, just that it's no more (and maybe it's less) effective than cutting taxes elsewhere, or even raising taxes and spending the money you raise differently. Of course, it's not a fully settled issue, and your mileage may vary, as demonstrated by [this scandal](_URL_0_). |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why they call dark matter \"matter\""
] | Because as far as we can tell it is matter. It's just a special type of matter which doesn't interact at all with the electromagnetic force, so we can't directly see it. **Edit:** Something I want to add, matter that doesn't interact much with EM isn't actually all the strange. For example, neutrinos interact very weakly with EM yet they have mass(There are billions of neutrinos from the Sun passing through your thumb every second). What's strange about dark matter is that cosmologists have been systematically going through all the possible candidates(like neutrinos) that we know of and showing that they can't explain the dark matter effects we see. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"With the attacks going on right now, why has France been the target for so many terrorist attacks?"
] | They, like all the old European powers, had colonies in the lands that are now terrorism hot spots. They treated millions of people very badly. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Does my way of doing this math problem make any sense?"
] | All you did is multiply both sides by the denominator in the x fraction, and then rearrange terms a bit. a/b = x/c c * a/b = x c * a * 1/b = x c/b * a = x |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is destructive interference unnoticeable, say if you have two sources of light and you move them around?"
] | The wavelength of light is smaller than the smallest thing a human eye can see, by far. So these effects are too fine in scale for us to see. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why carbon monoxide is so poisonous to breathe when carbon dioxide is not."
] | Carbon monoxide binds very strongly to hemoglobin, the molecule that carries oxygen in your blood. When it does so, it stops hemoglobin from binding to oxygen, and limits your body's capacity to get oxygen in the process. Carbon dioxide, which is almost completely non-reactive, doesn't do that. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do they turn old black and white photos into color photos?"
] | Unless the negative is preserved, they literally just color it. Think of it as a coloring book. I've tried photo colorization, and while choosing correct colors isn't that hard, getting the blending to work out realistically is much harder. For video, when it's a single shot, you can use tracking software so you don't need to fully color every frame. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How do gemologists tell lab-grown gems from natural gems when the crystal structure is the same?"
] | Naturally formed gems are not perfect. They have atoms of other elements dispersed within their crystal structure. When a gem is grown in the lab, it is usually 100% pure. There are no imperfections, (or nearly none). So when a gemologist observes the crystal structure, and they see no impurities, it is almost certainly lab grown. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Fire... does it push things or exert force?"
] | Fire itself does not, no. However, fire heats up the air (and other fluids) around it which can increase the pressure that they exert. For example, have you ever seen ash from a newspaper (or something similar) floating out of a fire up into the air? It's not doing that because the fire is pushing it, but the air beneath it is heating up and starting to rise which pushes it up. Similar idea to when an aerosol can gets thrown in a fire: the fire heats up the air inside, which puts more force on the inside of the can until the can bursts. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why are religious texts open to interpretation if they are the word of god?"
] | because they're arguably the word of an infallible being, but they've been written down by a man. I think the bible even recognizes this fact at one point, or it was just my religious education teacher that pointed it out. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"How did we discover Pluto? It's so little and our solar system is so huge."
] | It was by mistake, mostly. In 1906, Percival Lowell made come mistaken calculations that there was a 9th planet beyond the orbit of Neptune. The calculations turned out to be wrong, but he spent decades searching for it, and never did found it. In 1929, Clyde Tombaugh was charged with resuming the search for the 9th planet, using pictures that were taken by Lowell. He would take two pictures of the same place, put them side by side, and look for differences. After what I imagine was the most boring and tedious year of his life, he found [this pair](_URL_1_). That little speck that moves, is a planet. The planet was named Pluto. It was originally expected to be very large, a gas giant like Uranus and Neptune, but every decade since 1931, the calculations of the planet's mass were redone and it's mass revised to a lower number, until the tiny little rock we know it as today. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Is it actually possible for Korea to 'reunite'?"
] | Yes, it is possible. Just as it was possible for East and West Germany to go back to being Germany. That doesn't mean it would be easy, however. There are a lot of practical problems with merging the two states. Even if you assume that the North collapses and the South just takes control (rather than trying to create a new government from scratch) what happens to, say the political prisoners in the north? the regular prisoners? people who get money from the NK government to live on? Do the poorer people in the North automatically qualify for assistance programs from the south? can they join the military? and so on, and so on. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does hearing a song lots make us dislike it?"
] | I think you can relate this in a similar way to drugs. When you take a dose of drugs or listen to pleasant music, your brain is simulated and releases signals that it is happy with whatever you consumed. However, over time the same stimulus will result in lower and lower stimulation in the brain, as it becomes used to that stimulus. This is why many drug users have to take increasingly high amounts of drugs to attain the same high. The more you listen to the same song, the less pleasure you will get from it. But unlike drugs, you can’t increase your “dosage” of music. You can’t listen to a song twice at the same time. So, over many listens, you eventually lose all pleasure you gain from listening to that song, and it becomes boring. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"if someone comes on your property without your permission and they slip or get attacked by a dog, can you be held liable if they sue?"
] | That fully depends on the country/state that you live in. In some places you can be held accountable for any injury, in some you can be held accountable if there was injury due to your negligence (lack of maintenance, lack of warning sign, etc), and in some their trespassing negates all rights to sue you for any injury they get. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why is the US West Coast a desert"
] | The west coast is nice and green, but then there are several mountain ranges. Air that is pushed over the mountains is cooled and forced to drop most of its water vapor, so it is much less moist. This means less rainfall beyond the mountains and more desert conditions. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"What happens to the body when you donate one of your kidneys? Does it become less able to filter stuff out of your body?"
] | When you donate one kidney, or one kidney fails, the other will pick up the slack. When functional, both kidneys are not operating at the fullest capacity. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do Dutch people eat spaghetti with knife and fork, instead of spoon and fork?"
] | American of partial Italian ancestry here, what would you even use the spoon for? why not just a fork? |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"why does cleaning your ears cause gag reflex?"
] | It does? If it actually does, I would say it’s because the ear, nose and throat are all connected. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do browsers replace spaces in the URL with %20?"
] | Some operating systems and software treat a space (white space) differently. It is called URL encoding and the %20 represents a space in the URL (web page name) so the entire URL is resolved correctly. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why do humans/mammals bleed from the mouth after head/chest trauma? Why is this always the imminent death factor in movies?"
] | Think of what the mouth connects to - your lungs, stomach, and the passageways to your nose and ears. Head/chest trauma can lead to bleeding into one of those areas, which is usually a sign things are going pretty wrong. |
[
"Provided a user question, retrieve the highest voted answers on Reddit ELI5 forum",
"Why does it take so long for a country to develop nuclear warheads/ weapons? E.g. Iran and N. Korea."
] | It depends on how many resources they want to put into it. North Korea is a very poor country so they can't spare the same amount of resources that the US put into the manhattan project. Additionally usually people who are developing nuclear weapons programs are doing it against the will of the wider international community so they are blocked from importing many materials that might speed up the process. For instance highly efficent centrafuges require something called maraging steel. However because of this it'd be almost impossible for someone like NK to import maraging steel from any other country. So they have to re-invent the wheel and do it all with local assets. Just an aside but there's little evidence Iran is actually making nuclear weapons. |
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