- We have been measuring the age of earth by looking at the layers of ground, how do we know there aren't any older evidence underneath the thick snow of North pole? Or the deepest ocean floor that human has yet to discover?
- How do we know that mass compressed into a space below its Schwarzschild radius collapses into a singularity, rather than some non-singularity density?
- Since the flow of electric current through a wire is same as that of water through a pipe, will the flow of electric current be restricted when we "squeeze" the wire?
- What is the "shelf life" of a nuclear weapon? How long could one be stored before the fissile material decays to a point where it can't be detonated?
- Since CO_2_ in our blood regulates our autonomic breathing reflex, what effect has increased atmospheric CO_2_ had on humans and our breathing (and other animals, if possible)?
- Why do we use different ways of detecting light as its frequency changes?
- If i had magnet and i would put piece of iron under it just right so it wouldnt fall nor rise but it would float would it eventualy fall anyway? If so why?
- Is any research being done by serious mathematicians on finding an easier and more direct solution to Fermat, or is that sort of thing left to the amateurs and hobbyists?
- Do scientists need to know the amount of an isotope present initially when doing radiometric dating? If so, how do they know?
- What makes our saliva able to form bubbles? Does it share similarities with soap bubbles?
- Why is energy and momentum conserved?
- What happens to molecules after binding to cell receptors?
- Does HCl melt ice more efficiently than plain water? Why or why not?
- What causes dark circles to form around your eyes?
- Is the movement of tectonic plates in any way influenced by their average latitude?
- Why is there such a thing as "critical mass" for a radioactive material? Why couldn't the chain reaction sustain itself with less mass than the critical amount? How is this mass calculated?
- If a drunk driver is severely hurt in a crash, how does the hospital treat the pain?
- Why do quantum dots behave they way they do?
- Which two points can be connected by a wormhole and will it always be a shortcut?
- Is it possible to store muons, like we can store electrons?
| Posted: 20 Mar 2017 04:29 AM PDT We have been measuring the age of earth by looking at the layers of ground, how do we know there aren't any older evidence underneath the thick snow of North pole? Or the deepest ocean floor that human has yet to discover? Or even unknown creatures that lived before the dinosaurs.. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 20 Mar 2017 06:18 AM PDT I understand that if you have a given mass compressed into a sphere with radius below its Schwarzschild radius, the escape velocity of that mass is such that light cannot escape it (it is a black hole). I understand that current understanding of elemental particles and the forces they exert would not provide enough force to resist gravitational collapse. The thing I'm kind of missing is how this necessarily leads to the idea of a point of near - infinite density and infinitesimal volume. From my limited understanding, part of the idea of a singularity is that we don't understand how the physics of such an object would work at all, in common parlance we hear that physics "breaks down." If we're going to admit that physics as we understand them can't tell us anything useful about a singularity, what leads us to believe the collapse wouldn't stop at say - the size of a tennis ball, or the Planck length, or something like that? Also, can someone speak to any explanation of the coincidence that the density we calculate as being unable to observe due to it's escape velocity is exactly the density that we calculate collapses into a singularity? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 20 Mar 2017 01:27 AM PDT |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 08:14 PM PDT |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 12:28 PM PDT This came up as a side comment in an ELI5 post. Human and all other oxygen-breathers evolved on a planet with atmospheric CO2 ranging from 200-280 ppm. Right now atmospheric CO2 is around 400 ppm, and estimates are that over the next few centuries it will climb to 1500 ppm. What effect is this having on people's respiration (or perhaps on animals more sensitive to it than humans), and what will happen in the future if this trend continues as predicted? /r/explainlikeimfive/comments/60a843/comment/df4ycaa?st=J0H28NQE&sh=e8ceb4fc (Thank you /u/--geode) [link] [comments]  |
| Why do we use different ways of detecting light as its frequency changes? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 02:39 PM PDT If everything on the electromagnetic spectrum is a form of light, then why do we have to use such vastly different detection methods as we move up and down the spectrum? Why can't I use an antenna to observe visible light (or can I)? Why do properties vary so much, if its all waves on a continuum of frequency change? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 03:29 PM PDT Would the magnetic field "demagnetize" the iron after time or the magnet itself would get weaker?... [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 01:34 PM PDT |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 10:02 PM PDT Hi everyone, this may be a dumb question, but I'm curious as to how we know what the amount of Carbon-14 was thousands of years ago? I've never considered this before, but I was speaking to a friend who is a YEC, and he gave me this analogy - "Radiocarbon dating is like coming in a room, finding a burning candle, and measuring how fast the candle burns. The problem is that even if we know how fast the candle burns, we don't know how tall it was in the first place." Personally, I'm an atheist, and I don't doubt the veracity of carbon dating (I find it hard to believe this many scientists would not have considered this "problem"). That said, I really didn't know what to say to him. I feel like he is (and to some extent me, because I couldn't answer his question) either missing the point, or misunderstanding how carbon dating actually works. I know what a half life is, and know that they are constant. I also understand that we use other dating methods to verify and create calibration curves for radiometric dating. My question is, are scientists assuming that the levels of these isotopes have been constant? And if so, how do know? From what I understand, we measure the amount of these isotopes present, and since they decay at certain rates, that allows us to come up with an age. My (very limited) understanding also assumes that we would have to know how much was present in the first place. Is this true? BTW: I just want to make this clear, I am not a YEC!! This comes from a question posed to me by one; it was a question I did not have a good answer for. [link] [comments]  |
| What makes our saliva able to form bubbles? Does it share similarities with soap bubbles? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 12:39 PM PDT |
| Why is energy and momentum conserved? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 11:35 AM PDT Are these equivalent? Like can I prove that if I assume that energy is conserved in interactions, momentum is also conserved? Another question: these two conservation laws, are they based upon how our part of the universe seem to work, or is there some fundamental contradiction in saying energy or momentum might not be conserved throughout the universe? [link] [comments]  |
| What happens to molecules after binding to cell receptors? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 02:05 PM PDT To my understanding, once the ligand binds to the cell's receptors, this sets off a biochemical cascade in the cell, leading to a change in genetic or cell expression as a response to environment (i.e. it's complicated). But what actually happens to the ligand/molecule itself after binding to the receptor? I don't think this was ever mentioned in my intro bio class. Intuitively, I guess the molecule would just... unbind, but that doesn't make much sense to me either. I have a feeling this is a silly and simple question but oh well. [link] [comments]  |
| Does HCl melt ice more efficiently than plain water? Why or why not? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 02:37 PM PDT Although HCl and H2O are both polar molecules, O has a elecronegativity value of 3.4, while Cl is just 3.0. Does this mean that H20 is better at dissolving ice than HCl, or are there other factors? [link] [comments]  |
| What causes dark circles to form around your eyes? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 08:09 AM PDT |
| Is the movement of tectonic plates in any way influenced by their average latitude? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 12:31 PM PDT |
| Posted: 19 Mar 2017 09:27 AM PDT |
| If a drunk driver is severely hurt in a crash, how does the hospital treat the pain? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 06:18 AM PDT Alcohol and opiates are dangerous to mix and the interaction (both being CNS depressants) looks like it would increase head injury and blood pressure problems. So what would a hospital do here with someone in severe pain (i.e. crush injury) who they also believe had recently been drinking heavily? [link] [comments]  |
| Why do quantum dots behave they way they do? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 05:43 PM PDT I am trying to get a conceptual understanding of why the size of a quantum dot nanocrystal causes a change in the absorbance and fluorescence of the crystal. I understand that the reason is vaguely because of the "particle in a box" explanation but every description of this I find involves a bunch of math. I would like a less mathy explanation if possible. Thank you! [link] [comments]  |
| Which two points can be connected by a wormhole and will it always be a shortcut? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 08:23 AM PDT First of all, I know a wormhole is entirely theoretical right now (but taken serious by the likes of Einstein and Hawking). Nevertheless, I wonder how they should work. During the past hours, a number of questions came up and I'm happy about answers to any or all of them. Here's what I think I already understand: I got the idea of shortcutting through additional spatial dimensions, as it's shown in this picture. If the 2D plane on this picture was straight and not shaped like a "U" in the 3rd dimension, it would not be possible to save distance by shortcuting through the 3rd dimension. So a wormhole here can only help shortcutting if the 2D space is not completely flat in other dimensions and if the wormhole takes a (relatively) direct path. 1) But how curved is our 3D space in other dimensions? Do we know this? 2) Is my understanding correct that we have to work simply with how our 3D space is curved in the higher dimensional space in reality? So assuming we can always decide to connect point x and y with a wormhole that takes the shortest possible path through the higher dimensional space, we still can't decide how much of a shortcut that wormhole would be, because that depends on how curved our 3D space actually is? 3) Can even any two points be connected with a wormhole, or are there also natural restrictions to which points are connectable (still purely theoretical, no matter how much exotic matter or energy or whatever might be needed)? 3) I've read about spacetime that it's locally curved by massy things but on the bigger scale it's about flat in our observable universe. Are these the curvatures I'm asking about? 4) Will it always take the shortest possible way through the available additional dimensions? So will it always be straight or can it be winded like on this picture? As with the first picture, I understand this picture to depict the connection of two points in the 2D space by going through a 3rd dimension. However, in this case the path through the 3rd dimension is longer than the shortest possible distance when just using 2 dimension. 5) How many spatial dimension are available for a wormhole / how many spatial dimensions are really there? [link] [comments]  |
| Is it possible to store muons, like we can store electrons? Posted: 19 Mar 2017 01:26 PM PDT |
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