10 Answers To Questions You Always Wondered About
MrHumptyDumpty
Published
10/28/2015
Answers to questions you always thought about.
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1.
How/why are college sports so big in America? American football was made popular by colleges and universities, then the pro leagues formed, not the other way around. The colleges and universities spent many years and lots of money creating the market for American football. The pro leagues were formed to try to capitalize on that market. In fact, a popular anecdote is when the pro leagues were still in a fledgeling state, a college star named Jim Thorpe mentioned he was thinking of going pro, most thought he was kidding as the pro leagues were considered a joke. By the time the NFL became the powerhouse it is today, the college scene was a well entrenched participant. -
2.
What is the CISA Bill? The CISA bill basically tells cyber companies to “anonymously” share its data with the government for the sake of cybersecurity. In other words, your name (or whoever is paying for your internet’s name) won’t be connected to the data that cyber companies are forced “asked” to share with the government. However, given the wording of the bill, this anonymity isn’t guaranteed, and there’s a loophole where your name still could be attached to your data as it is passed to the government. Further, the NSA and FBI will still be able to over-rule the part of the bill that grants anonymity, so they will know who certain data is coming from. Taken from a recent news article, a former government security officer said that this bill basically increases the NSA’s spying abilities, and that is supposedly the real point of the bill. -
3.
Why does a graphing calculator with a 4 inch gray scale screen cost more than a quad core tablet with 1080p screen? Schools often mandate specific calculators for specific classes. This is for two reasons. One is that instructions can be very exact: hit this button then that button then enter these numbers and get a result. Also it’s to prevent cheating that you could do on a general purpose computer. So since students have to buy these calculators, just like text books they have a smaller market than general computers (costs are spread over a smaller market), and since buyers are forced to buy them, they can set a higher price and margin. -
4.
Why are Middle East countries apparently going broke today over the current price of oil when it was selling in this same range as recently as 2004 (when adjusted for inflation)? They adjusted their budget to match their income. The Saudis are determined to maintain market share. They are selling the same volume of oil accepting a lower price. So their spending budget is now greater than their income. They have plenty of reserves and they are adjusting their budget slowly. Imagine if you got a promotion, kept the position for 11 years, and during that time period took out a mortgage, bought an expensive car with big payments, and incurred other large expenses that you didn’t have 11 years prior. Now imagine you lost that job and your salary went back down to what you were earning over a decade ago. You would probably have a hard time paying your big mortgage and expensive car off right? -
5.
Why do we rely on cops to turn on their own body cams? We have the technology to remote control them and to alert when they are tampered with. Privacy. Thinking about the goal of monitoring police interaction with citizens, it’s easy to jump to the conclusion that the cameras should be on all the time. But aside from the fact that that would generate massive amounts of video data, there are very real privacy concerns to be taken into account if police are constantly recording everybody around them. This is even more of a concern when you think about any time where police are entering a private residence (you may be calling them for assistance with something, it doesn’t just have to be entering on a warrant or pursuit or something), as they now have images of the inside of your home. It’s in everyone’s interest to strike a balance between privacy and recording. I can’t speak for policies everywhere, but the ones I’m familiar with require officers to ask someone they’re interacting with in public if they can turn on their camera. Obviously, if they suddenly find themselves in some kind of incident, they might not have the opportunity to do this, and will turn it on anyway. The downside to this? Having to strike a balance is not as clear-cut as being able to go all the way one way or the other. This will surely inevitably lead to cases where something goes unrecorded that maybe should be recorded, not necessarily for nefarious reasons, although it’ll look that way. On the other hand, it provides a possible excuse for officers who are doing something wrong to not record when they should be. But that’s just the nature of the issue—there isn’t as easy of a solution as we’d like there to be. -
6.
Why does feeling or hearing certain things, such as rubbing your nail on sandpaper, literally send a shiver down your spine? Human hearing has evolved to be much more sensitive at certain frequencies (in particular the 1-4khz region). This is so that we can more clearly distinguish things like human speech, crying babies etc. As a trade off of this, certain sounds that have their root frequency (lowest and generally loudest frequency in their spectra) or a lot of harmonics (higher frequencies above the root frequency) within this range are extremely jarring to us, as they reach the “peak” of our hearing at much lower sound pressure levels than other frequencies will. This is why sounds like scratching cutlery, smashing glass, babies crying and nails on a chalk board can catch our attention so easily and have the potential to be downright painful. -
7.
Why is Violence more tolerable than Sex in America? America was born by puritans, who had a buttoned-down view of sex, but not of violence. Our relatively new country was created through violent revolution. We held on to involuntary servitude as long as just about any other “western democracy,” and it took a war to stop it. Our constitution includes a reference to the ownership of firearms. We are a violent, imperialist (both against native peoples and internationally) country with roots in puritanism, and even Christianity in general (which has lots more problems with sex than it does with violence). -
8.
How are laws prohibiting the sale of alcohol on Sunday legal and not a violation of the separation between church and state? Separation of church and state does not mean you can’t have religiously motivated laws. It means you can’t establish an official religion or have the government advocate or counter certain religions. Prohibiting the sale of alcohol on Sunday doesn’t change your freedom to practice your own religion -
9.
Why can’t we eat raw meat in fear of getting sick but can order a steak rare? Beef is a very dense meat. Bacteria and other microbes that would make you sick cannot penetrate into a steak; they can only live on the surface. So if “not getting sick” was all that you wanted, you could theoretically just sear the outside and leave the inside totally raw, and you’d be totally fine. In fact, this is an actual way of cooking a steak, known as Pittsburg rare. Note that this only applies to cuts of beef. It does not apply to ground beef, as during the grinding process the meat is totally mixed up, and there is no longer an “inside” that is safe from microbes. It also does not apply to less-dense meats like chicken or pork. This is why you can never get a rare pork chop. -
10.
How does a twin turbo engine actually work There are a few systems, but typically one is smaller and spools up faster, forcing the air into the second which is larger. The first turbocharger doesn’t usually directly affect performance, instead it is used to increase the responsiveness of the second. This doesn’t typically improve the final amount of boost much above that of a single larger turbo, but improves responsiveness. End result: responsiveness, but not much extra power There are two other main approaches, though, where both do work together Both are the same size, and are used synchronously or independently to either act as a single larger turbo, or to allow “staging” of the turbocharger power (ie half or full boost). This is slightly more responsive than one turbo, but not by much, but provides more boost than one turbo. End result: lots more power, but not much more responsiveness One is larger and the other smaller, allowing the smaller to kick in earlier for responsiveness, while the larger gives a larger boost but with normal turbo responsiveness. End result: More responsiveness and a moderate amount more power, although typically a more complex system
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